#and just keep doing anything else than using nuclear energy

[darthlenaplant]

No discussion of nuclear power is complete without the fact that the radioactive waste from the process of "making*" energy in a nuclear powerplant has to be STORED SOMEWHERE, WITHOUT POISONING THE LOCALS, INCLUDING THE WILDLIFE, IF POSSIBLE, either.

And I MEAN without poisoning ANY local, no matter their skin colour. [Looks at European countries that export their toxic waste to poorer countries in the "global south" and then say "these countries have so much toxic trash and waste that's poisoning the local flora and fauna!!!111one" with the power of a deadly lazer, like, WHO THE FUCK PUT IT THERE, MÉLANIE??]

*) this is just semantics about Physics mostly, but we don't actually "make" energy, we transform one type of energy (kinetic, solar, thermic) into another (electric), with its usual transforming losses

I wish all environmentalists a very suck cocks in hell

[the-dragon-hearted]

Fairy Tail: Smartest Character Headcannons

No one asked, but I wanted to elaborate on my characterization of the "smart" characters in the Fairy Tail fanfiction. These are just in chronological order.

Zeref Dragneel: One must imagine boy-genius mixed with a teenage moron. By that I mean this man is so smart when it comes to science, math, history, language, health, magic - but he's a dumbass when it comes to literally anything else.

Feats: He's a genius

Discovered ethernanos and then created a whole race to combat both dragons and gods. Literally a pinnacle of magic theory and development: all ethernanos studies stem from his initial discovery

On that note, he's actually the one who coined the phrase "magic container". He discovered different individuals had different-sized internal containers for holding mana. Most progress in magic deficiency syndrome can be attributed to him

Created several forms of enchantment magic

BUILT A FUCKING TIME MACHINE

Perfected the making and using of lacrimas, whose development can also be tied back to him.

Does strategize incredibly well, if he has the time to think everything through. He likes being thorough and so prefers to make an all-inclusive plan. As you'll see his plans are bat-shit wild and complicated because the man doesn't like loose ends, and also his opponent is MAVIS. Bro can't afford to slip up. I'd say more, but I'd spoil the story -

Weaknesses: He's literally so stupid sometimes

Makes a time machine, it requires a celestial mage to activate it: the celestial wizard dies. Man leaves all twelve keys in the grass where they are lost to space and time. Whoops, no more working time machine.

Literally everything that he did after Mavis died. Literally all of that.

Actively picks fights with Acnologia

Actively pick fights with Natsu

Picks the aforementioned fights and then feels BAD when the fight happens. LIKE BRO -

Anna Heartfilia: Math smart (high-level physics and theoretical calculus), and a strategist/leader. She was privately tutored as a child and had celestial spirits to teach her.

Feats: Math and leadership

Wrote most of the calculations for interdimensional travel when Zeref was building the Eclipse Gate

Is pretty good with calculating angles on the spot, and is fairly accurate when estimating distances (this is a big deal when you're directing spirits with mass destructive power and using abilities that are distance-limited)

Unlike Mavis' strategist side, Anna's strength in strategy was in rehearsing and forethought. She would practice with her spirits on what to do in high-stress situations so they would all know how to react and who to work with. In all honesty, her ability to lead her spirits was what made her so useful on the battlefield.

Practiced for years subdividing her magic container and memorizing how much energy she'd need to summon ALL TWELVE GOLDEN KEYS AT ONCE -

Weaknesses: One must imagine a chaotic perfectionist two seconds away from a nuclear breakdown

Gets too focused on things and will stay up all night. Will forget to eat and drink, in fact.

A perfectionist - will not stop until her calculations make sense

H A T E S writing, spelling, language, etc. Keep that shit away from her

When backed into a corner, and none of her strategies work her next plan is quite literally: RANDOM BULLSHIT GO -

Acnologia: Bro may be illiterate but he's also an actual genius when it comes to magic. Street smarts > School smarts, because fucked up mentors don't send their human weapon to school.

Feats: Anything magic related. I'm not exaggerating. And funny enough, grammar, vocabulary, diction, etc...

Picked up several human languages fairly quickly and has taught himself to read.

An actual GOD when it comes to enchantments and rune recognition, NO ONE knows more than this man

His knowledge on magic is CRAZY, this man can smell what type of magic you use, deduce whether it be elemental, reactionary, or application, and then IMMEDIATELY figure out how to counter it.

Even if he can't EAT the magic you're using, he knows. He knows what to do. You're cooked.

Thinking and strategizing on the spot is literally his thing. He's a terrifying opponent because he's insanely strong AND insanely good at reading his opponents

Weaknesses: Cannot do math

In all fairness, man did not go to school so all academic areas are a lil hard to grasp when you're over three hundred years old

Old man dilemmas: man can and will disarm a seventy-layer enchantment in thirty seconds but PLEASE do not ask him how to use the newfangled screen lacrimas. He bought those for the children and never touched them again -

His options in any social environment are (a) constant sarcasm, (b) ignoring everyone he doesn't know or like, (c) leaving, or (d) leaving, but faster.

Mavis Vermillion: The greatest strategist there ever has been. This is canonical but let's just elaborate shall we. The gal basically had a decade of university-level studies under her belt when she was fifteen. Girl learned to read by opening up Sun Tzu and memorizing it.

Feats:

Won the Trade Wars. I'm not kidding. This is canon. In the fanfiction though, she won the trade wars and didn't ask Acnologia to participate at all, because she literally didn't need him. She is the SOLE reason Fiore is still a country

Her level of strategic comprehension and quick thinking is terrifying. She actively runs simulations in her head, and thanks to her illusion magic (which makes her a god at multitasking), she can predict several outcomes to a TERRIFYING level of accuracy within an insanely short amount of time.

Even if you catch her by surprise (big "if" there, buddy) she's not pre-planning dependent or easily stunned. She can and will have another plan before you can register that you did something good.

GOD LEVELS of poker face when necessary (canon)

Now, thanks to the curse, she can emotionally detach from most conflicts and make riskier and riskier plays to attain victory. The ability to remove her emotion from plans only makes her that much more terrifying

Weaknesses: The poorest loser to ever lose

Literally hates losing. Will not stand for it. Will demand a rematch

She hates surprises and also hates any information that she deems useless. She will and has lectured spies over what counts as "good" intel.

Detaching from your emotions is not always the best thing to do when your "pawns" are your family and friends, but in all fairness when you have Ankserham's curse, it's kind of for the best to leave those affections aside. Still sucks though, and will cause problems

Natsu Dragneel: The man, the myth, the legend himself. No one has the brain for fighting like this fucking idiot.

Feats: FIGHT

Literally can fight without thinking. His subconscious is that in-tune with his body. Erik HATES him.

When he fights and thinks, his mind his canonically like a steel trap. He can pick up on patterns and weaknesses in his opponents that he will utilize. There's no mercy.

I don't usually include being underestimated in feats - but it's important here. Natsu's so good at what he does, it's easy to mistake strategy for raw power, or even dumb luck. Enemies go in thinking they're fighting some arrogant asshole and then get absolutely annihilated by the combat strategist himself

Pain is never a limiting factor. Natsu prevails.

Weaknesses: Bro has ONE brain cell and it flip-flops between wanting to eat and wanting to BRAWL

Focus is not his strong suit. ADHD poster child right here, he will be distracted if he is not locked in

Cannot read (like he can, but not really -)

Does not know how to multiply. DO NOT ask him what a quadratic is, he'll ask if he can eat it.

Can be a little arrogant, but he's kind of earned it

Someone he cares about is in danger? BRO IS GONE! Bro is not strategizing! Bro is IN THERE and no one can stop him. Bro will throw off all your plans and risk everyone else to save one person. It's all or nothing for him.

Like someone else we know, if he's backed in to a corner and doesn't know what to do, he falls back on "RANDOM BULLSHIT GO", but that random bullshit is usually just PUNCH THEM HARDER -

Ur Milkovich: A creative queen like no other. Her creativity in Ice-Make magic is indicative of just how out-of-the-box she can be. Such an ability is easily overlooked, but that creative tenacity IS a game-changer when you're mid-fight.

Feats: Other than just being the best fucking ice mage on the planet? She's cool about it.

Recognizes her own strengths and weaknesses. This may sound obvious but in a world of arrogance or false humility, Ur knows EXACTLY how good she is and what match-ups favor her, as well as which ones don't. Knowing that allows her to pick her fights very well.

Minor spoiler for the fanfic: She will be thinking up some CRAZY ass creative plans in the future. I'm talking chaotic-Ur-certified plans that will actually work. Perks of creative strategy.

You know how the ice mages typically specialize in a form of ice make, whether it be animals or weapons or armor? Yeah no. Ur has it all. Ur can do it all. Imagination? Ur has all of it -

Weaknesses:

She will compromise her strategy for her boys. As soon as Lyon and Gray are involved, all bets are off - she's going in whether it's a good idea or not. Normal Fairy Tail things.

She actually has a shit poker face. She cannot hide her thoughts at ALL

The smallest mention of calculus will get you turned into a popsicle. She'll suffer through science and history but as soon as the numbers get mentioned she's OUT.

Lucy Heartfilia: Quite literally the peak of adaptive learning. I will DIE on this hill

Feats: Lucy ACED every exam she ever took. Jack of trades, LITERALLY -

Her ability to pick up new magics or items and use them is nothing short of impressive. She's not afraid to leave her comfort zone and try something new.

A master at improvised weapons. Literally a M A S T E R-

She can be quick on her feet and has a great reaction time which lets her effectively pick the best spirit for the job. Her gut instincts are solid in battle.

She knows she has a smaller magic container and so is more limited in longevity and magic potential, which means she's very careful about her magic usage - as we've said, being aware of your weaknesses AND taking the steps you need to work around them counts as a strength.

Let's not forget canonically she REWROTE a book of Zeref after reading through it ONCE and learned how to cast Fairy Sphere after seeing it cast (kind of) ONCE

Photographic memory? Oh yeah, that's Lucy.

Knows when to make the tough calls (Aquarius' key)... enough said.

Weaknesses: Confidence and maybe some application

She doubts herself, a lot, and that is reflected in her hesitation to take action.

She hates putting her spirits in harm's way (which is hard to put in the weakness category cause that's literally just her being a good person but it does inhibit her ability to act efficiently as a celestial mage).

She recognizes that her magic container is not as large as those around her but can get too far in her head about how limited she is. Doubt is never a good thing.

Special mentions, in no particular order, I just don't have as many headcanons for them and this shit is getting long:

Erza Scarlet: Same vein as Natsu. Her ability to strategize in combat is INSANE. Realistically, she's actually ranked higher than Natsu because she can read, write, do math, pay bills, and also knows when to NOT run into a fight. But in battle, Natsu has her quick thinking and prowess beat, at least by the end of the series.

Levy McGarden: Same as Lucy, except she's taken photographic memory to the next level. Girl can remember the exact book, page, paragraph, and line number when recalling information. Perks of her magic but also just the perk of being that fucking brilliant. This is also apparent in her magic (which was nerfed in canon but will not be anymore because a BOOK LOVER being able to use ANY WORD is CRAAAAAZY).

Laxus Dreyar: He's here for his reaction time and quick thinking. It's insane. And, as seen in the Grimoire Heart act when he canonically gives his power to Natsu, he has a good foundation on magic pairings and can make sacrificial strategic plays. All in all, solid foundation for smarts and strategy.

Serena: Man has mastered 8 elements and can switch between them with no problem. That takes some brain power. He loses points for being an actual menace to society and picking a fight with Acnologia in his last life. Actually no, he loses points for being THAT arrogant in his first life and dying a single manga panel later.

Wendy Marvel: Has mastered not one, not two, but THREE forms of magic. Healing, Enchantment, AND Offensive. She quite literally has application magic (her enchantments and healing) and elemental magic (dragon slaying) and has mastered BOTH. She does, however, also struggle with confidence and her good nature means she hesitates before inflicting permanent harm.

Erik: Bro can handle reading five people's minds at once and has the multitasking ability anyone would be jealous of. Bro just gets a lil too angry and distracted sometimes. Can also get overwhelmed if he's experiencing a loud noise or a lot of noise. Really, he just loses points for those times when he gets too mad to listen to anything. He gains points back for having zero hesitation when necessary - man will decide someone's free warranty on life has expired with no remorse.

Special, Special Mentions:

Yajima: Man put up with Team Makarov's bullshit, Fairy Tail's bullshit, AND the Magic Council's bullshit without going insane. Is a lawyer by trade, and a friend of Makarov's by choice. That's crazy work right there.

Warrod: Has been committing tax fraud for over a century. Has never gotten caught.

Weisslogia: Was a strategist in the draconic wars and was pretty damn good at it. No, Sting did not inherit that lol.

Tyregenium (OC): Acnologia's master do be that evil sadistic strategist. He loses points for arrogance - and for losing to Acno twice and STILL coming back for more. Also crazy work right there.

[talenlee]

Meet The OC: Bec Querel

This is an explanatory writeup of one of my Original Characters (OCs). Nothing here is necessarily related to a meaningful fiction you should recognise and is shared because I think my OCs are cool and it’s cool to talk about OCs you make.

Bec Querel lived the life – such as it was – of every child genius. Attaining truly prodigious achievement before adolesence, she burst onto the scene of national significance as a child prodigy and mutant, and just as quickly faded once it was realised that she wasn’t going to do anything of particular noteworthy significance compared to the latest celebrity starlet inclined to lose her underpants in public.

Furthermore, Bec realised that she was in possession of knowledge and understanding that was well beyond her means to communicate. Without a solid social grounding – she had blurred her way through her schooling in pursuit of more knowledge – she had realised she lacked a mature communication base. While in this state, she was approached by Dr Marion Shepherd of Project Corona, and asked to rejoin the project.

Seeing an opportunity to expand her skill base, and to perhaps use her mathematically-refined powers for some good, Bec agreed, and began her two-year journey through high school once more.

Bec Querel is a genius. She’ll tell you as much, but only if you ask. It’s not something she feels the need to volunteer, because that isn’t a thing that Ordinary And Reasonably Standardised experiences involve. An insufferable child genius she has resolved to redo her adolescent education to pursue not an optimal path through to maximised resources and instead stabilising social experiences that result in her not being a potentially Morally Ambiguous Doctorate Scientist (M.a.D).

Bec Querel is a living star, her biology somehow managing to overcome the herculean task of room-temperature fusion. She absorbs solar energy and emits heat, and her body operates like a nuclear furnace. Many of her internal organs are nonfunctional or vestigial, and her digestive tract is almost ornamental [citation needed]. Her body sustains itself through a superefficient permutation of breathing – as long as she has oxygen and carbon atoms to access, she can continue generating energy. Further, her cells emit most of their waste in the form of low-key emittant radiation, which she can focus into concentrated bursts and blasts.

As a hero, as an ally, she is a point of blatant utility. Since her mutation is effectively a nuclear fusion energy battery inside her own body, she is capable of powering some truly ludicrous devices, and uses that energy to drive devices that would otherwise be untenable to use in combat scenarios. It’s all very good to have a flash-vaporiser that can knock people unconscious by dehydrating them for an instant or overloading their optic nerves, but unless you can power that kind of device repeatedly, it’s not going to be useful in most active conflict environments. Bec is the power supply, and everything else she does is filtered through those tools. This even includes the imps that follow her around, three small fire goblins that she keeps contained with an electrically-powered rune portal to give them freedom to hang around her.

Bec’s powers are ultimately limited in their finesse. She wields radiation the same way one might wield a club, and lacking any good visual metaphor for the practice, she instead has to rely on fine-tuned processes and mathematical formulas that need adjustment on the fly. With this in mind, rather than causing irreperable harm, she has to keep her radiation tools somewhat inexact and imprecise – reducing people’s reaction times and making them feel nauseated is often the limits of her radiant prowess. Further to that, her ability to use heat and light to blind and confuse enemies are fairly two-dimensional in their applications, meaning that most enemies who come prepared can best them, usually with heavy optic shielding.

Finally, Bec may be a genius but that doesn’t make her cunning; her ability to outwit enemies often relies on an understanding of what they would or should do, and her lack of social familiarity with most social strata means that she’s not very good at predicting the sensible behaviour of even normal street gangs. All her theories work just fine, for spherical villains in a vacuum.

Mechanics

Bec was a fire control/radiation emission controller.

I don’t have a current build for her and really, if I did have a copy of her build to open it I’d first need to find an earlier version of Mids, open it in that, then export that build to a current version and daisy chain the build to curent Homecoming standards.

If I was building her today, I would deliberately be trying to give her a build that hit the goal of:

Permanent Accelerate Metabolism. This is doable around 130-140% global recharge, with Hasten, and then feeds into it. This would necessitate two ‘auto’ buttons – which I’d get by binding hasten to my ‘back’ button, a trick I’ve been doing on almost all characters these days.

A single-target attack chain of (probably) Char + An Epic Attack + Ring Of Fire, and a ranged aoe fireball effect. Treating these as attacks before controls is a bit risky, but remember that this is a character with a ludicrous amount of recharge; single target holds lasting a long time isn’t that important because she’d be attacking with it every few minutes.

I’d have to choose between using Hot Feet and standing near people to do more area damage and control, versus flying around at range and relying on ranged defense to protect her from mezzes and damage. The former wants Smashing/Lethal defense, the latter wants Ranged defense and resistance armours. This could hinge on how endurance-hungry her build is. If she’s an end hog, turning off Hot Feet and relying instead on resistance armours could play into Cardiac.

If I was building her today, I probably wouldn’t spare any expense. This is an old, beloved character with a very fun playstyle and a beloved characterisation. If I could get her friends back into the game, or even make comparative friends, there would be in my mind, no problem with literally bankrolling everyone to have fancy builds like hers.

Of course, that won’t happen, but it’s still a thing to think about. I still have this character occupying my headspace after all.

History

That is the description I wrote for Bec Querel, sometime before January 2010, and Bec herself was made in 2007. This is at least 15 year old writing. It is, in my opinion, weak, and part of what makes it weak is that it tells you a backstory at the expense of the character you’re going to interact with.

Bec Querel is an autistic supergenius nuclear astroscientist who noticed she was lonely at the age of 15 and decided to re-do highschool as an Optimal Social Experience. She did this because she did all the super-science she needed to do and now she wants friends, and she’s bad at having them. To do this, and not give up on the super science, she took on the task of a High School Hero (which I would, now, probably position at college rather than high school).

I don’t think I even have Bec Querel’s name camped anywhere now. It seemed to me to be one of those free, perfect versions of its name; a character who cared about temperature and radiation, where the unit for measuring those things was itself, also pretty believable as a name? I think it’s clear in my mind that she was a Rebecca, and therefore Bec, and maybe even had some degree of a semi-public identity (when she was publishing academically), that she turned into a private identity by inventing a fake surname for her hero identity. Papers that were published at first pseudonymously because of her age and then declared connected to a superhero identity strike me as a thing for her.

Ultimately, the history of Bec Querel is a tangle because she was one of my important milestones of a character. She was almost my first hero 50; she was easily one of my highest level heroes as I played her in a dedicated team, even if I wasn’t good at it. Bec was my introduction to the Virtue roleplaying server and becoming part of that roleplaying public space. Also, and this is important: Bec is defined in my memory by disappointing other roleplayers by being a butthole.

Also, Bec is a character whose sexuality I had to work out. I’m still not sure where she lands, but for a while there she was genuinely curious as to if she had a sexuality or not.

Oh! And she’s where I first used keybinds to do something impressive (in her case, singing all of ‘O Canada’ one line at a time). I’ve since become very familiar with the keybind system and now I like doing specific things to squeeze function out of the interface.

Conclusion

I miss what Bec was about. I miss the friends I had with her. I wish I’d been better at being a friend and I wish I’d been better at talking with people about what they needed and how they were feeling. I wish I’d been better at talking about what I felt.

Like I dunno, maybe I was specifically, kinda trash at being a good friend because of a hole blown in my high school life.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

[elemom]

@legofreak33 Thank you for ordering the Autism Deluxe Special!

Here’s why I think Zane Julien is Nuclear Powered

(Contains spoilers for 2011 ninjago seasons 1-3)

(I also have not finished the show so i might be missing some details)

A singular object that has seemingly infinite energy

Infinite energy is impossible, but there’s something that comes pretty close - radioactive materials. Since they are *literally* emitting energy and can do so for thousands of years, radioactive objects are basically the closest thing to an “object that acts as an infinite energy source” you can get.

Blue Light

It’s blue. It glows.

Now I couldn’t find a specific element that glows blue AND could be used in nuclear energy, as the only one I know of is cesium chloride. HOWEVER. I don’t need a specific element in order to prove my point here.

Cherenkov radiation.

Cherenkov radiation occurs when charged particles (say, an electron) moves faster than light. IRL this is only possible in a medium wherein photons themselves are slowed, such as water, but in the realm of make believe anything is possible. Even if we DO have real world physics in play, it’s totally possible that the energy core just has water inside it along with everything else (the core’s Blue DOES have a bit of movement after all!)

Critical Mass and Going Boom

This is where it gets too easy. They literally say it can reach “critical mass” IN THE SHOW. THEIR WORDS. NOT MINE.

If you aren’t familiar, critical mass is basically a point where there is enough material (a certain *mass*) in one area to cause a chain reaction: An atom releases a radioactive particle, which hits another atom, causing it to release another radioactive particle. Now we have two radioactive particles. They keep hitting other atoms. And so on and so forth. (Strangely, the show seems to reference critical mass as running *out* of energy, which is the literal exact opposite of what it actually is, so i’m opting to ignore that.)

So how does this apply to Zane and the references to a critical mass in the show? I personally like to believe that his “critical mass” was caused by *using too much power at once.* Kinda. There’s probably a control mechanism with neutron absorbers inside the core, so maybe the critical mass was caused by him retracting said absorbers, thus causing a chain reaction. (also as a tangent, titanium is apparently a decent neutron absorber! perhaps the real titanium ninja was the friends we made along the way)

Oh, and by the way. Nuclear objects reaching criticality are known to glow blue.

Pic related.

Difference between this and the core glow would be based on the types of particles, with the former being charged particles in a medium and the latter being neutrons. I think. Idk im a biologist not a nuclear physicist i dont go here i just autism about it

discussion section

So yeah! Dr. Julien just created a tiny nuclear reactor to make his son go. Sure. Fuck it. Who Gives A Shit

Anyway i think that’s all i have!!! This obviously isn’t all encompassing (how did Nya survive holding a piece of the core? Why was the explosion all icy and not like, anything else? How does Zane not kill everybody he meets?) but those can all be explained away in the name of “i have had a special interest in nuclear energy since i was a very small child and nobody can take this away from me.” like maybe people are fine because he just has really good shielding. Or maybe Nya is fine because girls are immune to radiation (totally true fact)

Thanks for reading! Take this piece of uranium ore as thanks for reading this entire post. 🪨

[terrence-silver]

Random Concept: Terry Silver with a TikTok-obsessed Beloved

It would be cute if beloved wanted to film cute couple moments with Terry.

Spicier with Terry during the Halloween season because of all the Ghostface masks trending.

I can imagine Gen Z beloved doing something like the Gothic Baby account if they have a kids with Terry.

Like, I do think Terry Silver, in his old age majorly keeps up with trends.

He always has.

He always had his finger on the pulse of the 'brand new thing'.

More so than young people, undoubtedly --- he's a businessman, after all.

He's too clever not to keep up. That's how he can blend in so perfectly and adapt if need be, being chameleonic in nature, changing and transforming with the times. It's how he can manipulate perceptions and cultural norms --- by being in touch with things around him, sure, like the advent of social media. The Online sphere. Being Vegan for a while, because that's a la mode and acceptable in a more Liberal, upper crust crowd in Los Angeles --- it's admirable, even. A societal badge that says one's a conscientious, good person (And Terry Silver's just that? Right?) when that wouldn't have been the case in the past. Thirty years ago it was perhaps the discourse between nuclear and fossil fuels or green new energy that mattered, and today, it's all about Tik Tok. It's Twitter. Or X, rather. And what's trending on there --- the type of stuff that can make or break one's reputation because someone said something stupid or cancel-worthy two decades ago. Heck, even the branding of social media itself changes, having one name and taking on another practically overnight! The world moves fast and Terry Silver moves with it. But, in spite of him been keenly aware what's what and what it means, I envision his Online presence is incredibly scarce and unbelievably curated on purpose and what information can be found on him on the Internet has been fine combed and is continuously fine combed so really, not only can you not find anything too controversial about him on there (maybe just the right amount of controversial, tactically speaking; acceptable controversies, as to not make him seem too inhumanly saintly and by extension, unrealistic, too suspicious and fake) --- you can't even really find anything much of anything in general except what Terry deliberately and specifically wants on there. Man's incredibly private all while putting up a facade that he's an open book --- which, don't be fooled, he's anything but.

What I mean to say with this is that Terry Silver undoubtedly wouldn't be on Twitter, for example, posting his actual, real opinions about...anything. He's smart like that.

So, any beloved of his? Gen Z or otherwise?

Chances are, they wouldn't be chronically Online either.

They wouldn't be on Tik Tok, plastering videos of themselves, their family or Terry Silver himself for the world to see consistently, because the thought of thousands of people (Voyeurs, the way an already voyeuristic Terry would see it) tuning in to see and watch his beloved --- random punks commenting on them, expressing their opinions willy-nilly, judge, complementing them, leering, passing, bookmarking, downloading and sharing said clips around unstoppably, without any monitoring as to how they could use and abuse such material...legitimately forever --- well, it presses the button of someone fiercely territorial, jealous, possessive, protective and control oriented like Terry. He doesn't like it. He doesn't allow it. He thinks it's bullshit. He would take advantage of someone's else's uploads Online for sure, if push ever came to shove, so maybe it is a bit of projection on his behalf, that somehow, someone, somewhere, would do the same to him and someone who belongs to him to weaken him or retaliate against him, so to take precaution against it, beloved's presence Online becomes, possibly, even scarcer than his, because they're the most precious thing he has and when something or someone's precious or valuable, they're tucked away. Hidden, in ways. Plus side to this, though --- I can envision Terry Silver, like a man who was young in the 70's and 80's being big on home videos instead. Private collections for his private viewing pleasure and usage only. Cute couple moments galore are permissible --- everything is permissible, in fact --- but these recordings, lets call them, belong and remain explicitly in Terry Silver's private care, because he's a man who doesn't wear his heart on his sleeve and tends to strategically tuck away everything that ever mattered to him. Everything that makes him vulnerable. Everything that can compromise or damage him. Most of everything he really is from the public. Includes beloved. Whatever children he might or might not have with them.

If someone was somehow skillful enough to discover their names and Google them, chances are, nothing specific comes up in their search results. Not anywhere.

That's deliberate.

[thefandom-casserole]

Dndads Teen Headcanons

(It got kinda outta hand, and these aren’t even the angst ones…)

Hermie curls their hair and Taylor straightens his (but because of the adventures neither of them have been able to do it so they’re slowly reverting back to their original state)

Hermie uses they/them pronouns when not in a roll and Dood uses they/it

Normal and Hero have watched Adult Swim shows from a really young age (Lark, Sparrow, and Rebecca either didn’t care enough to turn off Cartoon Network, or just didn’t realize)

Linc and Hermie were PBS kids

Taylor is always playing games on his Chromebook at school (coolmathgames rules)

Taylor has a ton of pins on his jacket and hat

Scary has a TON of birthmarks, freckles, moles all over her body. It’s gorgeous

Dood‘s Teen body rotates between four outfits that all seem too large and slightly too old for it… (it’s Hildy, Robert, Meryl, and Stud’s outfits) (even if It never technically met Meryl)

FUNFACT: none of the Teens have a nuclear family

Hero’s first language is Spanish (Lark and Sparrow decided that forcing her to go through an almost entirely English-speaking school without knowing English would help “toughen her up”)

All of the Oak’s are fluent in Spanish and English

Scary is afraid of going under tunnels (when she was Terri she’d close her eyes and squeeze someone’s hand)

Linc types like an old man but can game really really well

Hermie does cosplays and posts them on the future equivalent to TikTok

Everytime they go to a mall of something Normal tries reallllly hard to convince them to all squeeze into a Photo Booth (it has not happened yet)

Hermie loves Starkid

Taylor really likes FNAF

Scary’s favorite season is winter

Linc’s favorite is spring (even though soccer season is autumn)

Normal likes all of the seasons (he takes after his grandpa!!)

Dood loves everything (all the seasons), though they absolutely despise the mosquitos and gnats…

Taylor’s favorite season is probably summer

Scary was diagnosed with ADHD at a very young age (not autism though), but when she started being Scary she tried to stop taking her medication (she started taking it again)

Taylor used to LOVE dinosaurs. He had every Jurassic Park movie, the book, everything. He still has the anime and the original downloaded for bad days

Scary is tall without shoes (only shorter than Linc and about the same as Hermie) but she wears platforms to make herself taller (queen <3)

Hermie has a younger brother and a younger sister (like, 6 years old) who were not born by Scam and Jodie, and Hermie has no idea where they’re from

Hermie’s two favorite people are their siblings (they would do anything for them)

All the Teens but Dood and Linc had Amino at some point </3 (but for completely different fandoms/communities)

The only class Normal has consistently had an A/100 in has been GYM

Normal, Scary, and Linc are very very athletic

Hermie is more athletic than people would think they are (you run a LOT in theater, and singing takes a ton of energy)

Normal constantly plays the Zip Game throughout their travels (everytime you see a horse you yell ‘zip’ and keep track of how many horses you’ve called, everytime you see a cemetery you yell ‘cemetery’ and everyone else loses their horses)

Normal and Hermie know a ton of car games (though Hermie wouldn’t admit it) because of looong car rides with their sibling/s

Hermie works at a Haunted Attraction during Autumn

Hermie is freakishly worried about their siblings after coming home and not finding their parents (has not mentioned it to anyone though…)

Scary uses her notes app for everything (song lyrics, poems, reminders, etc.)

Dood is the shortest out of them all, then Taylor

Taylor has a ton of stickers on his cane (anime, survival, etc.)

They’re all autistic and queer <3

Scary has a vent notebook and a lyric notebook

Linc doesn’t really get cold, which is why he always wears shorts and tanktops

Scary only eats the Oreos with the orange filling

Taylor either sleeps with a TON of blankets or with only a sheet. No in between

[xanthezhoupropaganda]

Xanthe assumes, at first, that the Justice League didn't notice the aliens. It's not like they don't all have their own issues, and the aliens are subtle, always on the edge of Xanthe's vision, never in their direct line of sight. It doesn't exactly help the aliens that they've got some sort of - Xanthe doesn't know. Something to shift phases or just make them invisible or whatever; it's all kind of the same as ghost powers, and they've got that down.

But the aliens - and Xanthe can tell this isn't what they mean to do, from all the frustrated energy screaming around them - seem to be friends. Not friends, exactly. That isn't the right word. But doing what a friend would do if they actually were trying to help, and they remind Xanthe of nothing more than Superman. (An accidental Superman. And one in less of a feud with the world's biggest clean energy supporter, whatever the fuck's going on with that.)

Tracing back, because now Xanthe's invested damn it, it starts out small. They've taken peppers, a whole strain of them, and made them spicier. It's an experiment, they can tell, because it's one patch of one field in one farmer's testing area, which covers more than one cross but not all of any of them. Anyway, the farmer won some sort of prize and the peppers are commercially available now. (Of course Xanthe tests them for poisons, and viruses, and microscopic robots. Or, at least, they beg the help of people who can. (Batgirl.))

It's not just food - there's a slightly more sour lemon, an apple that's too bright red, potatoes that have extra iron in them - but that's where they start, maybe just because the distribution mechanism is easier. And then the water, not that that does literally anything in Gotham, but it's some sort of, well, not like anything Batgirl's seen before. Her theory is that it's meant to make them complacent, but from everything Xanthe has seen (again, not in Gotham, where nothing gets by the filters, but from chatting with friends outside the city) it just makes people a little cheerier. A little more upbeat. Not so much it changes their daily routines, really, just a smidge.

So it's not that the Justice League doesn't know, so much as they have other priorities. The aliens are a keeping an eye on them kind of situation, and they keep doing things that probably aren't what they're trying. Xanthe's noticed increased shielding at nuclear plants, heavy metal stolen from fields full of them. Areas blocked off, but it all ends up being canyons and rapids and volcanoes about to erupt. Houses are going missing, huge ones, and it makes the news - but they were all empty anyway. Empty fields are suddenly full of trees. One of Batman's private memos (sorry, Batgirl) calls it terraforming, except that it matches the ecosystems the Terra's already formed too closely to be anything of the sort. Even the cars that are going missing all seem to be covered by insurance, and everyone is upgrading to safer replacements.

But the real thing (and the reason Xanthe found their way to this question, anyway) is the ghosts. They have no idea why, and anyway, it's often best not to question the logic of something like this, but the ghosts are calmer around the aliens. More cogent. They know what they want - you know, when what they want is something other than stealing everyone's qi and trying to bring themselves back to life - and can actually communicate it. Xanthe has been playing psychopomp a little bit? It's weird for them to open gateways to other people's afterlives, but, hey, who are they to judge a ghost? Someone has to help them while the aliens are still in town, because as frustrated as they are, Xanthe can just see them itching to leave.

The aliens may have taught pigeons how to use computers. Or else the birds see something Xanthe doesn't.

Aliens are trying to eradicate humanity in subtle ways but it always ends up beneficial for humanity

[holeposts]

I do think people have a point when they say that adults should be able to afford their own apartment, but I also tend to think there is nothing inherently wrong with having to have roommates as an adult, particularly in very dense urban areas. One bedroom apartments are not an incredibly efficient use of space and with the number of single childless people consistently on the rise, I think it's unrealistic to expect the supply of single-occupancy units to keep up with demand (and yes the rise of single childless people is up partially because of the lack of space but that is far from the only factor and the trend is likely to continue even in a world with an abundance of housing). There's no question that housing prices are out of control and it's unfortunate that people are having to put parts of their lives on hold, such as having a family, or have to live in situations that are severely uncomfortable/don't meet their needs (i.e. sensory needs or anything else that might come up I'm sure there are plenty of such scenarios) due to lack of adequate housing, and I completely acknowledge that. On the other hand, people who live with roommages are still housed. They have safe and stable shelter, and isn't that the fundamentally most important thing? To share housing with people who are not part of your nuclear family is not a travesty, it's actually pretty normal and a perfectly logical thing to do when you live in a city where space is precious. I have a hard time with the idea that making sure every adult can live in their very own entirely private space is a priority - the concept feels very fundamentally capitalist and American in nature if I'm being honest.

In my vision of cities in the Good Future, single-occupany or single-family units are attainable by anyone who really wants/needs one, but it's culturally very normalized and perhaps even expected to live with roommates for as long as it makes sense just to save money and save space for those who need it more. To make up for the relative lack of space in those shared private dwellings, there are lots of accessible public spaces where you can go and do all the stuff that you might not have room for in your apartment, like makerspaces and meeting places and music rehearsal spaces and so on - much more efficient than everyone having excess private space that is only for them to use, and healthier than staying in your private space alone all the time.

This pretty much only applies to dense areas. Living in a rural or outskirts area is a totally different story. I'm just trying to imagine a world where in a city of say a million people, every single adult/couple/whatever has their very own personal adequately sized space, and I'm coming up empty. Yes, abolishing real estate speculation and aggressively building upwards will go a tremendous way towards expanding the housing supply, but I feel skeptical that even that would be enough. And even if it is enough, is it really necessary? Yes roommates can be awful, but most of the time they're just fine, and I think the problem of nightmare roommates would be greatly reduced in a world with both a robust "roommates culture" where living space etiquette is very strong and well-known, as well as where housing is more abundant and it's relatively easy to move if your situation is really giving you hell. And a world where it's common for people to share space will require a lot less construction and development which is still very resource-intensive even when it's as efficient as possible, not to mention the energy needed to heat/cool/maintain each individual unit. Ok the end.

[robertreich]

Mr. Fix-It

Joe Biden is embarking on the biggest government initiative in more than a half century, “unlike anything we have seen or done since we built the interstate highway system and the space race decades go,” he says.

But when it comes to details, it sounds as boring as fixing the plumbing.

“Under the American Jobs Plan, 100% of our nation’s lead pipes and service lines will be replaced—so every child in America can turn on the faucet or fountain and drink clean water,” the president tweeted.

Can you imagine Donald Trump tweeting about repairing lead pipes?  

Biden is excited about rebuilding America’s “infrastructure,” a word he uses constantly although it could be the dullest term in all of public policy. “Infrastructure week” became a punchline under Trump. 

The old unwritten rule was that if a president wants to do something really big, he has to justify it as critical to national defense or else summon the nation’s conscience.

Dwight Eisenhower’s National Interstate and Defense Highway Act was designed to “permit quick evacuation of target areas” in case of nuclear attack and get munitions rapidly from city to city. Of course, in subsequent years it proved indispensable to America’s economic growth.

America’s huge investment in higher education in the late 1950s was spurred by the Soviets’ Sputnik satellite. The official purpose of the National Defense Education Act, as it was named, was to “insure trained manpower of sufficient quality and quantity to meet the national defense needs of the United States.”

John F. Kennedy launched the race to the moon in 1962 so that space wouldn’t be “governed by a hostile flag of conquest.”

Two years later, Lyndon Johnson’s “unconditional war on poverty” drew on the conscience of America reeling from Kennedy’s assassination.  

But Joe Biden is not arousing the nation against a foreign power – not even China figures prominently as a foil – nor is he basing his plans on lofty appeals to national greatness or public morality.

“I got elected to solve problems,” he says, simply. He’s Mr. Fix-it.

The first of these problems was a pandemic that’s killed hundreds of thousands of Americans -- Biden carries a card in his pocket updating the exact number -- and its ensuing economic hardship.

In response, Congress passed Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan -- the most important parts of which aren’t $1,400 checks now being mailed to millions of Americans but $3,600 checks a child paid to low-income families, which will cut child poverty by half.

Now comes his $2 trillion American Jobs Plan, which doesn’t just fund roads and bridges but a vast number of things the nation has neglected for years: schools, affordable housing, in-home care, access to broadband, basic research, renewable energy, and the transition to a non-fossil economy.

Why isn’t Biden trumpeting these initiatives for what they are – huge public investments in the environment, the working-class and poor -- instead of rescue checks and road repairs? Why not stir America with a vision of what the nation can be if it exchanges fraudulent trickle-down economics for genuine bottom-up innovation and growth?

Even the official titles of his initiatives – Rescue Plan, Jobs Plan, and soon-to-be-unveiled Family Plan – are anodyne, like plumbing blueprints.

The reason is Biden wants Americans to feel confident he’s taking care of the biggest problems but doesn’t want to create much of a stir. The country is so bitterly and angrily divided that any stir is likely to stir up vitriol.

Talk too much about combatting climate change and lose everyone whose livelihood depends on fossil fuels or who doesn’t regard climate change as an existential threat. Focus on cutting child poverty and lose everyone who thinks welfare causes dependency. Talk too much about critical technologies and lose those who don’t believe government should be picking winners.  

Rescue checks and road repairs may be boring but they’re hugely popular. 61 percent of Americans support the American Rescue Plan, including 59 percent of Republicans. More than 80 percent support increased funding for highway construction, bridge repair and expanded access to broadband.

Biden has made it all so bland that congressional Republicans and their big business backers have nothing to criticize except his proposal to pay for the repairs by raising taxes on corporations, which most Americans support.

This is smart politics. Biden is embarking on a huge and long-overdue repair job on the physical and human underpinnings of the nation while managing to keep most of a bitterly divided country with him. It may not be seen as glamorous work, but when you’re knee-deep in muck it’s hard to argue with a plumber.  

[lilacprincessofrecovery]

Tony Stark x Plus Size Reader//Rewrite the Stars

Warnings: Insecurity and paparazzi.

Song: Rewrite the Stars by Zac Efron and Zendaya in The Greatest Showman

Word Count: 950

It had been 3 months since you and Tony Stark had gotten together. He wants to show you off to the rest of the world on an interview coming up. He had been wanting to for a while. He wants every one besides just the Avengers to know, but you don't want the paparazzi to ruin what you have. It's funny. You always wanted to have someone want to show you off and when a perfectly good man comes along and wants to do so you are too insecure about yourself to let him tell anyone. You just knew they would hurt you. He didn't want that and he didn't think they would. They've always been so accepting of him and his lovers and you were more important than just a lover; and he wants you to know he's serious about you and the world knowing. He's never been with a bigger girl before. To him the only way to show you he truly cares is to go to the rest of the world, publicize.

"Y/n… We need to talk…" You look up at the door from the couch in Tony's and yours' bedroom. You swallowed. He had his managerial, stern voice on as he opened the door and had his arms crossed at his chest beginning to lean against the door frame at the right of him. You were scared of what he had to say. You were afraid he may be getting rid of you; finally realizing that you two would never work. You gave him your attention without saying anything.

"You know I want you. It's not a secret I've tried to hide…" Tony rests a hand on your shoulder as he sits next to you. You look at your hands in your lap avoiding his gaze. You are as if a child being chastised. "Look…y/n. I know you want me… so don't keep saying our hands are tied…" You shake your head. "You'll be ashamed... You think it's easy. You think I don't want to run to you..." Tears well up in your eyes knowing what he wants now. "You're here in my heart. So, who can stop me if I decide that you're my destiny…" "There are mountains and doors that we can't walk through… They won't get us. I'm… I'm not your type. I'm almost 2 times your size, Tony. It's ridiculous. We can't tell anyone." "I can't believe this. Are you saying we should break up?" "Maybe we should…" You got up and he grabbed your hand. "Y/n…" "No. I won't ruin your reputation. You aren't supposed to be with someone like me." "Someone like you? Someone like you. Someone who I've seen cry over a puppy dying in a movie. Or… you who I've seen giving your last pennies to charity. Or… you who stays up with me every night to love on you after a long day at work in the lab… you who asks me questions like you actually care about nuclear energy? You let me talk when anyone else would tell me to shut up. or you who lets me rest my head on your soft pillowy belly that I love so much?" He puts a hand on your tummy with a soft smile looking up at you. "y/N, what if we rewrite the stars? Nothing can keep us apart. Let's rewrite the stars…" You looked at his hand on your stomach and pulls away, crying now. "How can you say you'll be mine? Everything keeps us apart and I'm not the one you were meant to find. It's not up to you. It's not up to me. When everyone tells us what we can be… Why is this so important to you? We can't change how people will see me. We can't 'rewrite the stars.'" She used air quotes. Tony sighs and kisses the top of your hand. "I just want them to know about the most precious diamond I have ever had in my hands. I don't care about how big or small my diamond is but if you think about it my diamond being bigger is just a plus side… I just want to share something important to me with the world; the world that I try to protect so often. I don't like hiding things from them too often. There will always be people who disapprove of something we do. We can't let them ruin my… our joy. It should be joyous for you too. We deserve to be able to tell people about how much we love each other. There's nothing different between us and every other celebrity power couple." He pulled her into his lap petting the back of her head against his chest. "Y/n…We can rewrite the stars." She looked up at him. "All I want is to fly with you. All I want is to fall with you. So just give me all of you. It feels impossible. Is it impossible?" Tony grins. "No it's possible. If they say ANY thing against my babe. I'll say something. It won't matter to me what they say about me. Hell, I know I am a very weird guy. I have a glowing light for a heart for God's sake. I'm also freakishly smart and heavenly attractive." He boasted.

She nods with a deep breath and a giggle. "Ok, you can tell them." Tony smiles wide nuzzling into her neck and rushes to get dressed for his interview. He happy he was allowed to tell the world about his beautiful woman. "Now I have it all."

"We can rewrite the stars."

[nudityandnerdery]

Okay, d&d joke.... was a bard, sang a song to a demon, bit my head off. I continued singing.... it put my head on again and I played for two more years.... not really a joke but happened....but what the eff is going on in the world. Putin said something about nuclear war.... well.... everything is burning to the ground anyway. Can we get the world right again? Been living in it a while and things have never been this bad. I think that we need to do something. Maybe be human for a change

Okay, well, I'm not gonna try and sugar-coat it for you right now. Looking out the window, reading the news, you know what's going on.

Shit's kinda fucked right now.

And it is absolutely fair to look at all this and feel frustrated as hell. There's SO much going on that is happening in places and ways that we feel like we can't control. Because, I mean, Vladimir Putin and Samuel Alito are both about as likely to listen to my well reasoned arguments about why they need to stop their shit as the coronavirus is, by which I mean nil chance at all. There's a lot of people who are just actively out there causing trouble, mixing up shit on social media, and just actively trying to make life more miserable for everyone else. I don't fucking get it, personally, but misanthropes gonna misanthrope, I guess.

And that's all a thing. It's fucking overwhelming sometimes. So that's the first thing we have to do. See to your air mask. By which I mean, we can't do anything if we're just swamped with all of the Absolute Shit™ that is going on around us. So make sure you aren't overwhelmed. Take time to acknowledge the good things around you. You're alive. There's people around who are trying to make the world better. There's cute pictures of dogs on the internet. We can eat pastries that are delicious. Like, I don't fucking care what it takes, what it is. You take some time for yourself every day. Do some basic self care. Remember that though the world is a mess, you are alive. Make sure you are living.

And part of that? Remind yourself that, yeah, shit is fucked. But the world has been fucked before. And the world has been fucked up worse than this. And we've gotten it to a better place from there, right? So we can do it again.

Okay. So what do we do from there? How do we do that? I'm gonna be honest. There's a lot of people out there who have written a lot about how to address the problems that face us. So if you want to fight them, pick one of those topics, find a guide, find how to help, and do it. Know that you can't fix everything all at once. But you're not trying to do that. You're looking at one problem, and chipping away at it. And there's thousands and thousands and thousands of other people out there doing it, too. So that work will all add up. It will all compound. And, as a group, we'll try to make things better. Believe in that.

But, on top of all of that? Even if you don't have the time or energy or money to devote to a cause right now?

Be Kind.

I really mean that one. It's not going to fix everything, it's not even going to stop Putin or anything. But you can do little things to make the world better for someone else. And that shit compounds, too, I promise. You make someone smile, make their day a little better, and they'll feel a little happier about the world. And maybe they'll be a little kinder to someone. And it continues on. If some asshole on the internet can spread a little misery by being a dick, you can spread some joy by sharing a joke or complimenting someone's work or just telling a friend you were thinking of them.

And, honestly? That shit keeps you alive. Not physically, but inside, as a person. It's how we survive. Be kind. Hold on to hope. One feeds the other, and that strengthens it back in return. And that's the whole thing where we keep ourselves going, so we can help others out. It's not easy, it's not always going to get an immediate reward.

But it's the only way to be human, and the only way we can live to see something better than this.

[whatgaviiformes]

Fic: A Study in Light

Here, fam. Have a character study before I head out to dinner. 💛

*****

The sea steals away the gentle light of unfamiliar stars suspended in the deep-purple of a moonless sky, and, though Gordon can’t see the waves, he can hear them surging, lapping towards the sand. Between two palm trees near the back of the beach, close to where they’ve built the path to the villa, he keeps a hammock tied, and it’s there that he sits in the early hours of morning.

John would take offense to him calling them unfamiliar stars. His brother may easily pivot between hemispheres, but Gordon knows he’ll never quite get past looking for the North Star, and these are not the constellations he learned growing up, when his mind was most absorbent.

Scott, who’d learned it from Rescue Scouts, showed him that. How to find Polaris when lost. These days, he lets the water guide him, not the stars.

Gentle stars.

John would frown at that too. He’d tell him that the stars were anything but gentle. That despite how steady and calm they seem from trillions of miles away, on a planet as small and as miniscule as Earth when compared with the infinity of the Universe, the stars churn with nuclear chaos. Forges of a size incomprehensible, scattering elements, and heat, and light so pervasive it can cross the enormity.

To find him here, on the edge of the sand, watching their light die with the depths of his sea.

 He swings his legs, relieving some of the pressure where the rope has dug into the back of his knees.

Once upon a time, Mom would call him “Sunshine.” Dad too, before he’d gone and gotten himself stuck in an explosion that shook their world more violently than any star. He barely remembers the way the phrase sounds from their lips, and no one calls him that anymore.

But they do expect it. They just say it in different ways.

Scott of all of them is the most direct. It’s his job as commander to know his brothers’ skill sets – their strengths, their areas for growth – and to delegate roles on the field accordingly. Gordon’s light, though Scott calls it his “vibrancy,” is perfect for rescues involving children. But that comfort isn’t for kids alone. His strength as a rescuer is his calming positivity. For example, it’s the tone he used with Ned Tedford at the bottom of the sea when all seemed bleak. But he smiled, worked the problem, and made it all seem carefree and easy.

Scott will be the first to admit he can sometimes get lost in the adrenaline rush while Gordon brings patience and a friendly voice and the fine balance that is humor and competency.

Virgil says it in his art, the gold just a bit brighter, the colors bolder, and if Gordon is included as a subject, his smile blinds. In the painting Virgil created for his 21st birthday, Gordon is swimming, descending into the depths underwater, without gear, where the reef and the fish welcome him to their home. It’s a beautiful piece where not even his apparent longing for the sea takes away from the brightness Gordon brings to their depths, and with his sun cast along the coral the scene strikes at his heart every time.

Sometimes, it hurts to look at.

John is trickier, his heart no less feeling than anyone else’s, just harder to read sometimes. John knows Gordon’s passions as equally as his own, maybe not as thoroughly, but he knows what energizes him. Space-residing, but also just as close, John knows how to meet Gordon’s excitement with his own. They both are at the fringes of the world, both living day-to-day for the wonder of what they will find next. And if an exclamation point didn’t accompany the “Awesome, thanks” after sending him an article about the 10 Coolest Nudibranch Species of the Tropics, then John knew something was up. For the record, that article was biased based solely on their appearance, which John knew when he sent it to him.

The proper response was to send him back a podcast about Babylonian astronomy, obviously.

And if he didn’t? If he didn’t have the energy to respond back in kind, John would be the first to call him up and ask what he needed.

Then there’s Alan. Gordon doesn’t know how to be anything other than bright in his little brother’s space, because Alan is the only person in the world he can be a big brother for, and while Alan has four big brothers, Gordon only has the one little one. It’s not that Alan can’t take it; he’s always been smart and intuitive. But Gordon is so proud of him, and if there’s one thing he’s always promised, it’s that he will always try to be the best goddamn big brother he can be to the one little brother he’ll ever have.

It's crushing sometimes, feeling the weight of needing to be - well it’s not on or off, like a switch, so much as it’s a turn of the dial. How much of himself, and which parts is he bringing to the surface?

 The joy is as genuine and honest as it comes.

It’s just? He tones down other parts of himself.

Keep the lights on for too long, and they’ll blow out eventually.

And that’s okay from time to time, as long as they don’t see the worst of it.  As long as he doesn’t bring them down with him.

In truth, his brothers have just as much light to share as he does. He sees it in Alan online, when he sees him helping out newbies get started with better equipment for a more positive experience, and with John, leading the people they rescue from fear into safety with just his voice. Virgil, the first up for a standing ovation when he experiences a piece of live orchestra and piano. And Scott, barrel rolls of laughter over a plate of Grandma’s cookies.

“Gordo?”  His name comes with an exhausted yawn and heavy footsteps along the sand.

“Bit early for you.” That's an understatement. Rescues aside, Virgil is rarely caught out of bed before the sun rises.

He hums, deep and low. “John caught a heat signature out here. Had to be you. Do you even know what time it is?”

He sits down in front of him once he reaches the hammock, not caring that his jeans are collecting beach particles, and follows his glance out towards the blank horizon.

“No? Two or three,” Gordon answers. “I slept out here for a bit.”

“It’s four.” He doesn’t ask what Gordon’s doing out here, doesn’t push for answers. He waits, his presence calm, and comforting, and there. And when it’s obvious that Gordon doesn’t need talking right now, Virgil settles back against the palm tree next to him, his eyes slip closed, and he pauses.

He probably intends to stay awake with him, but Gordon can hear his breathing even out when the hour catches up with him.

It makes him smile that Virgil tried.

“How do you do it?” he asks the sky. But the words are for the slumbering form of Virgil beside him. “Why do you see me the way you do?”

He doesn’t get the answer until the sky fades into gold, when the brightness of the dawn wakes him. Virgil staggers up with a groan, his bones creaking from the position, but he slides next to Gordon on the hammock, clapping him lightly on the back.  

“That’s what’s so encouraging about the sun,” Virgil muses. “It always comes back.” 

[galacticnova3]

Don't forget "I'm nitpicking this thing because it is a real thing, though in a fantasy environment, being written unrealistically and presented in a way that treats it as if it is accurate, and therefore has led others to make decisions and form opinions on the real thing based on this false information about it"

It’s important to recognize the difference between “I’m nitpicking scientific facts because I’m willfully ignoring how suspension of disbelief, fantasy, and sci-fi work and just trying to be obnoxious about how unrealistic this is”, and “I’m nitpicking scientific facts because there are actually some intriguing worldbuilding possibilities if we use them that can add another dimension to the story”, and “I’m nitpicking scientific facts because considering the real-world implications of how this would happen are FUCKING HILARIOUS”

[stagnantblood]

Vowels for Cordelia and Ivy if you want!!

hell yeah! always happy to talk about my two favorite mage ocs <3

i accidentally wrote a lot about them, so i’m chucking it under a readmore ^^;;

ivy first-

A. what nicknames do they get called?

ivy ! tbh i keep forgetting that her actual name is ivanna

E. what is their love language?

physical touch! ivy stays close to those she cares about. she often follows them around without realizing it. she loves holding hands with cordelia and giving her little kisses on the forehead.

I. what makes them feel safe?

lorne makes her feel safe. he’s like a big brother (despite being younger lmao) that she knows would protect her to his last breath. once she gets closer to cordelia, that’s another person that makes her feel safe. ivy finds refuge in people more than anything else!

O. what motivates them?

she wants to get rid of the fear/superstition that always surrounds dark magic. it's banned throughout the country the story takes place in, and dark magic practitioners are feared and shunned by most.

about a third of the way through the story she’s in, ivy also gains the motivation to rescue her mentor, fiensal, when ydrenth captures him. 

U. what do they like to do in their spare time?

ivy loves exploring old ruins and observing wild creatures! ever since cordelia started teaching her how to fight unarmed, ivy has also started to practice for fun in her spare time.

Y. what physical object do they value most?

she really values fiensal’s grimoire. he gave it to her shortly before ydrenth captured him. it’s a well of knowledge and a deeply personal item. she tries not to read it. it feels like an invasion of his privacy even though he outright told her to study it. 

—-------

now for ydrenth! this one’s a little difficult because i just decided earlier today that she’s not getting a redemption arc.. here's Mean Ydrenth for u

A. what nicknames do they get called?

i’m not sure if it counts, but “the necromancer” is something she gets called pretty often lol

E. what is their love language?

ydrenth’s love language is words of affirmation. she likes to make the object of her affection feel like the most important person in the world. however, she has a mean streak and can quickly become very manipulative. ydrenth is 100% aware of her behavior and doesn’t care to fix it. she is not a good person.

I. what makes them feel safe?

her home/research facility is the only place she feels truly safe. only she knows where it is and how to get in it.

O. what motivates them?

ydrenth wants to rebuild the old world and shape it to her liking. she keeps herself alive by sapping the life from other creatures, but as time goes on, she needs more and more energy.. she's starting to fall apart. ydrenth's current goal is to obtain a dragon heart, which is rumored to grant immortality.

U. what do they like to do in their spare time?

ydrenth likes to read, conduct experiments (usually focused on dark magic), and observe the world to learn about how it's changed over the centuries. she also likes cooking wjdslfk, you get good at it when you live alone for a couple hundred years

Y. what physical object do they value most?

her most treasured possession is an old-world pistol that she found in some ruins. she carries it with her everywhere she goes. the new world has recovered and developed to the point of being able to make basic pistols, but they’re too weak and unreliable for her liking.

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since this ask is about my ocs that use the most magic, i'm gonna throw in a bonus and add some context for how magic works in my story setting :-)

dark magic basically = radiation

in my story, magic came to earth (idk how yet lol). humans combined magic and science to study both. unfortunately, they went too far and caused a nuclear/magic catastrophe that wiped out most of civilization. the earth and everything on it was fundamentally changed. radiation warped to gain "magical" traits and dark magic was born :0 i know it isn’t realistic, but the idea was too fun for me to pass up !! plus nothing that has magic in it is going to be realistic anyways wsdfjlk

there are four races in my story- humans, elves, drakonians, and orcs. i could write actual essays about them.. anyways they were all created/influenced by magic & genetic engineering. humans and drakonians are resistant to dark magic, orcs are immune, and elves are very weak to it. however, even an elf is more resistant to radiation than an actual human on earth irl

dark magic can be used to cast incantations with “unnatural” effects: seeing through walls, healing injuries, creating undead, etc... there are a lot of creative uses for it that cause harm, but there's also a lot of potential to help others.

accepted types of magic include divine magic (very rare) and common elemental magic (fire/water/earth/wind/etc- used for mundane tasks like purifying water or generating electricity)

[pineapplebread]

Can we talk about a Pacific Rim AU where Steve hasn’t piloted a jaeger in years and retired from public life since his last drift partner Bucky died on a mission? And then Fury calls him back to the Shatterdome when a new invasion attacks and he meets Tony? And they’re both sad and too gay to function but there are giant robots and aliens and soulmatism? Okay, buckle up:

Steve Rogers was part of the first groups of pilots for the experimental jaeger program headed by Nick Fury, Howard Stark, and Peggy Carter and sponsored by SHIELD. It was a group created to fight the threat of alien invasions that came out of a rift in the ocean floor, monsters called kaiju. Jaegers (giant robots) were built in response to fight these threats.

It was with Steve that they discovered that it takes more than one pilot to successfully run a jaeger, and with two minds joined with the robot, it is significantly more powerful and better controlled. The catch is that the pilots must be completely in sync with one another, or “drift compatible.” By being in the drift together, they have access to each other’s thoughts, memories, intentions, and it takes a lot of trust to drift.

Steve’s co-pilot is Bucky Barnes, his childhood best friend. Together they pilot Captain America, the most advanced jaeger of the fleet at the time. They’re one of the most successful teams, with the highest kaiju kill count. They become national heroes and are often sent out to take care of the most difficult and dangerous missions. 

On one such mission, everything goes horrifically wrong, and Bucky dies in action. Steve is devastated. They were still in the drift when Bucky was ripped out of the cockpit by the kaiju, and the severance of his mind where it connected with Steve’s nearly drove him crazy. It took everything he could to finish the kaiju and survive. After that mission and Bucky’s death, Steve swears he will never pilot another jaeger again, he can’t. He disappears from the public eye and lives a quiet life in the wilderness, until the day Nick Fury comes knocking on his door.

The invasions are coming in quicker succession, he’s told. SHIELD has lost many good pilots, and there are few who can do what Steve and Bucky did. He’s needed again. There’s a war to fight. It takes a lot to convince Steve, but it’s been over ten years, and while he still misses Bucky, maybe Steve can fight for the greater good again. He agrees to meet with Fury in the New York Shatterdome.

There, Steve meets young Tony Stark. He’s the son of the late Howard Stark who had co-founded the jaeger program (Howard and his wife were assassinated by anti-jaeger extremists who think the existence of jaegers invite kaiju invasions). Tony is the head of the Jaeger Advancement Research Venture Institution Syndicate and he’s rebuilding the old jaegers as well creating new ones with better weapons and defense. He created arc reactor technology to pilot new jaegers with more efficient clean energy. He got his hands on Steve’s old rig, Captain America and not only fixed her but made her a new shield with a magnetic return and better recoil as well as an updated AI system Tony built himself.

Tony is intelligent and sarcastic and ridiculous and Steve is painfully reminded of Bucky. Tony takes no shit and doesn’t pull his punches, and he’s sharp as a whip, but he’s also kind and understanding, and his big brown eyes are so sad. Steve can’t help but be drawn into Tony’s orbit but he can’t pay afford to attention to that because he needs to find a new partner and he was told Tony isn’t an option. He’s not a pilot.

Steve runs through a gamut of potential drift partners and none of them work. He’s not drift compatible with any of them. He misses Bucky, and he doesn’t think it’s possible to drift ever again. His mind is too loud to let anyone else in. Fury finds him more candidates. They aren’t compatible either. 

Meanwhile Tony has been on the sidelines taking notes to collect the data. Steve has a sudden idea, and maybe maybe maybe. Why not?  He wants to try with Tony. Tony recoils. He says no. “Apparently I'm volatile, self-obsessed, and don't play well with others.” 

The newest kaiju horde they named the Chitauri are at their doorsteps. Steve still doesn’t have a partner. He’s at a point where he thinks he’s just going to get into Cap by himself. At the last moment, as he’s suiting up for the final test run, Tony comes in and says he can try to see if a drift with Steve would work, but he warns him he’s not the kind of guy to lay down on the wire for others. Steve smiles and doesn’t believe him. 

They’re drift compatible. Their connection is stronger than anything Steve has ever felt and there are a few bumps in the road when they train, they often clash and they fight a lot, but this is it. This is the bond he’s looking for.

When they’re in the drift together, Steve realizes that Tony’s reservations about being a pilot are because his best friend, James Rhodes had been a jaeger pilot, now retired after his injuries. Tony had been in War Machine with Rhodes when the mission had gone horribly wrong and Rhodes was injured, resulting in the loss of the use of his legs. Afterwards, Tony became obsessed with building more powerful jaegers to keep his friends, and the world safe. Tony just wants to build suit of armor around the world.

They end up piloting Captain America together. The battle begins, and they’re part of the front line with Thor and Bruce Banner who copilot Thundering Hulk, and Natasha Romanov and Clint Barton who copilot Widow Archer. They almost all get destroyed in the first wave of the invasion. They survive, but just barely. 

After Steve is knocked unconscious during the initial battle, and they’re surrounded by Chitauri with no way out, Tony ejects Steve from the cockpit in a lifepod and stares down the horde himself. He still has a nuclear payload strapped to Cap but her autopilot function is shot, and there’s only one way to get the payload close enough to have any effect. Tony knows it’s going to be a one way trip but he needs to manually pilot into the portal the Chitauri had opened in the tectonic plates deep in the ocean and detonate it there. 

Somehow, Tony manages to send Captain America into the portal and just barely survives after ejecting in a lifepod at the last moment. The old jaeger is lost, but the mission is successful, and the nuclear detonation in the portal manages to close the wormhole and kill the remaining kaiju. 

On the surface, Steve regains consciousness thinks he’s just lost yet another driftmate and copilot when Tony’s pod bobs up in the water. Steve rips open the door of the pod to find Tony unconscious, and he fears the worst, but Tony wakes after CPR. After Tony says, “please tell me nobody kissed me,” Steve could weep with relief. 

Tony babbles, apologizing that he destroyed Cap, he’s sorry, he’ll rebuild her again, even better this time, but Steve doesn’t care. He’s just so happy Tony is alive, he hauls him in for a kiss, and for the first time in a long time, his mind quiets.

And Tony does rebuild Captain America. He adds rocket launchers, repulsors, and gold to her red, white and blue. Her new call sign is Iron Patriot.

[lesbiskammerat]

Very curious at what would be the alternative to solar or wind power then, when coal/oil/gas is obviously worse and out of the question. Unless you're proposing we do without any electricity at all.

Thank you for being exactly the type of person I was talking about, I really appreciate the lack of self awareness. If you're doing any kind of teamwork and someone points out a problem with your group's approach, do you also instinctively jump to "well what's your solution then dumbass because if you don't have one I'll just keep going"? Or is that just for very profitable energy industries whose marketing campaigns appeal to your liberal sensibilities?

Anyway, there's no way to live in this world without impacting the environment, because we're part of said environment and every other organism impacts it too, we just need to be careful about what that impact is. Saying "well green energy is better than the alternative!" and slapping solar farms and hydroelectric dams everywhere is not being careful, it's more or less the same shit as before but with some green paint.

As someone else wrote about in the notes of the post, just changing the way we produce energy for our society isn't going to fix anything. We need to change that society completely, so that we use less energy overall, and so that the energy we do use is spent on things that are necessary and sustainable to spend it on, and not simply the pursuit of profit that capitalism demands of us. Things like relying on collective transport instead of individual car ownership, producing more things locally instead of shipping everything across the globe, the classic "reduce, reuse, recycle" and so on are all part of this.

Besides that there's lots of big and small things I don't feel qualified to get into because I'm not an expert, like energy storage or the viability of nuclear fusion. But things like solar, wind, water, and nuclear energy can all be part of how we produce usable energy, we just need to be careful with how and when we utilise them and what we utilise them for. And we don't need to ignore their faults just because right-wingers say mean things about them