#big data being the funniest

[creekfiend]

I have been having a really weird experience this summer, which is that I fell in love for the first time. I'm 36, and if you'd asked me if I had ever been in love previously, I would have said "I don't know, maybe? I used to think so but now I'm not sure? What's it mean to be in love?? how would I know if I had or not???" I thought that because I had not experienced it myself, the people who were always saying "oh no, trust me, You Would Know" were all lying or otherwise mistaken. I DID NOT BELIEVE THEM. I was fully like "this is some sort of mass delusion, there's no way that's a thing"

Now that I know that this is something that Exists even if it doesn't always Look Like They Tell You, there's SO many things that make sense to me!!! Whenever I encountered Romance Stuff before, I had no desire to do any of it AND could not comprehend why anyone else would ever want to either. It was this really large experiential disconnect for me. Whether or not I want to do any of those things, I now understand why other people would, if they Were In Love. LIKE I GET IT NOW. IT MAKES SENSE TO ME. I still can't relate to things like people in movies falling in love instantly, but now it's like "oh right, that's a potential state of being that exists," rather than "pretty fucked up that hollywood made Being In Love up to sell more flowers or whatever."

I feel like I'm constantly 24/7 running a software update on my brain that's been overdue to be installed for years or perhaps decades. It's just like "OK YUP UPDATING ALL THESE PROGRAMS AND FOLDERS. THIS WILL TAKE SOME TIME AND DATA BYTES OR WHATEVER, BUCKLE UP!" Pretty sure there's actually one of those little rainbow spinning icons above my head the whole time I'm conscious, like I am some sort of very confused Sim.

This happened to me REALLY SLOWLY, too, so it was like a big blockage in a river, and more and more stuff was just piling up against it, and then the dam broke, and now I'm sitting in the shallows of a giant basin lake under a massive waterfall wringing my hat out and going "woah. they got never before seen types of fish in here"

Who else knew about this??? Unfortunately the answer is: a majority of human beings over a certain age DID in fact know about this, it's just that every time anyone said "this is a way people feel about each other sometimes," I said "hmm. sounds fake." In-cred-i-ble.

Turns out that being in love is just an experience that people can have!! It's just a thing that happens sometimes! Some people have had it happen to them a bunch and some people not at all. It's just A Thing That Can Happen To You. Wtf. WHAT WILL I DISCOVER NEXT????? IT COULD BE ANYTHING !!! WHAT WOULD BE THE FUNNIEST POSSIBLE NEXT THING FOR ME TO REALIZE EXISTS? ONLY TIME WILL TELL. (Can you fucking imagine having this happen to you when you are in your seventies or eighties rather than your mid thirties ????? THAT WOULD BE THE WORLD'S MOST DISORIENTING EXPERIENCE.) (I also thought that "having chemistry" was fake.) (Do not diagnose me, I PROMISE I already know)

[brineffxiv]

Hermes and I feed lightning sprites as we discuss the nature of life and of the soul.

I'll be the first to admit I don't entirely understand the explanation - I probably need to hear it a few more times - but as I understand it, the difference between an arcane entity and a living creature is the presence of a soul, and a soul cannot be granted, but rather forms in a creation that fulfills the necessary conditions to live independently?

He doesn't give me a straightforward answer when I ask what category Meteion falls into. Rather, he considers the question unimportant; he cares for Meteion as herself. That's very sweet and heartwarming.

Oh, look! An Elpis Flower!!

Hermes exposits that the flowers were a happy accident created by a past researcher of Elpis, and that though they change color to reflect the emotions of those around them, they are rarely seen in any hue save white.

...I think this is the first time I've ever seen them white.

Hermes explains that the flowers do this by means of an unseen energy driven by emotions. I describe akasa to him, and he agrees that it sounds alike, but names it something else...

Dun Dun DUN!

...hah. Hah. That's... That's the name of my Data Center... Dynamis... Oh. Oh dear.

So, Entelechies are entities that have the ability to interact with and convert dynamis into tangible phenomena - like the color change seen in the flowers. Meteion is also an entelechy. The first with free will.

Emet-Selch is perturbed that he's never heard of dynamis before, but Hermes explains that as dynamis can neither be seen or felt normally, nor be interacted with by beings comprised solely by aether - such as us - there are only a few scholars that know of it. Similar, it seems, to the present day.

Dynamis is a vastly weaker energy, but it comprises the majority of energy in creation as a whole? It sounds like this concept is similar to dark matter.

Uhh... Hermes, you're starting to give me some Fandaniel vibes. Me no like. Something involving dynamis is causing the Final Days, and here you are talking about wanting to empower this energy to a point where it can overpower aether. That, uh... That seems to be exactly what is happening.

I... do not believe you. That speech was entirely too impassioned for you to not care keenly about this. You might claim to have only created Meteion to have made a creation capable of traversing the great expanse, but I sense there's more to this story.

Meteion is comprised mostly of dynamis, which is why her aether is so thin. Hermes did this by necessity, as aether is relatively scarce in outer space. Meteion wants to know if I'm an entelechy too, since my aether is thin as well (no, it's because I'm 9/14ths of an ancient, I'm missing aether as opposed to having had it replaced with something else). I'm not, but Hermes claims that having thinner aether might allow me to interact and be interacted upon by dynamis more easily...

Oh. Oh no. That's why people are transforming into monsters in our Final Days; their aether is thin enough that the dynamis can affect them. Where the ancients were appropriately dense enough to be immune to that particular effect. Shiiiiit.

With those unsettling thoughts we move on to our next creation to visit; the charybdis.

There is a problem with this big blue charybdis; a third generation creature, it's aether is slightly too much aspected towards water and it cannot fly. The researcher minding them suggests that these creations be "reverted" (culled, I would guess) and their concept revised.

Hermes seems appalled at the idea, and insists that the creation can fly, but is simply afraid to, and proposes that he himself will transform and teach it to.

...And then the funniest thing in the world happens.

Pffft... Hghjlkdshsdk. HHHGLGKJSD

"Behold, a sorcerer of eld!"

Ahahaha!

You. Y-You never thought I'd find this out, did you!? Makes it all the better that you're the one telling me!

AHahaha! oh god I'm losing it hehehehe!

Transforming is apparently the ancient equivalent of stripping. Of walking around buck ass naked.

H. Hey wait. I read.

Where is it...?

...

...Guys, that is gay. That is really gay.

Never ceases to impress you, eh, Hythlodaeus? So that wasn't the first time Hades had transformed in front of you, then? Not even the second.

I can't believe that's canon.

Alright, okay, I'll stop.

...Talking about it, maybe. Not gonna stop thinking about it though...

(*laughing maniacally*)

Hythlodaeus is totally up to some mischief, and has Emet-Selch take the blue charybdis somewhere out of sight. He then informs us of his plan to have Emet-Selch teach the charybdis to fly, which he should be able to do with his prodigious magical prowess.

My job is going to be to ask him. lol.

Emet-Selch wants none of our shenanigans. Unfortunately for him, he's vulnerable to being asked persistently, just as Hythlodaeus promised he would be. He makes many delightfully exasperated and conflicted facial expressions I wish I had the room to include in this post. I am saving them all.

OMG it's Grani! omg I've been riding Emet-Selch's weird unicorn horse all this time!? (Emet-Selch, you have an... intriguing aesthetic sense)

Hythlodaeus and I get to take it easy and sit in the grass. While we're waiting, he tells me about Emet-Selch joining the Convocation.

The truth of it is that Hythlodaeus was actually the first choice for the office, but he turned it down because - in his own words - "I am pedestrian in all other aspects". I would disagree with this strenuously. Hythlodaeus, you might not be good at magic and manipulating aether, but you are a bright and shining soul. A light in the storm. A solid rock amidst the sea of chaotic life. You feel like home.

That said, I take his point. One must be able to act to resolve problems if one is to take a seat on the Convocation.

Hmm... I am having difficulty objectively analyzing this scene, lol, because by now I'm shipping these two something fierce. And, in the most non-romantic way I can manage, it's clear to me that Hythlodaeus loves Hades a great deal. He is proud of Hades' accomplishments, and that he is recognized for his deeds, even if Hades himself does not consider his own actions anything extraordinary.

And he loves me too. Well, ancient me. Azem.

The way Hythlodaeus tells it, Emet-Selch and Azem are the most important people to him in the world. He expresses his desire to one day return to the star with them, when all their purposes have been fulfilled. I think that's so lovely. And I think that says more than any speculation I can make; how much they mean to each other that they have planned their lives together. How wonderful, to love and be loved in return.

I only wish that I could help him have that.

I try to pretend I don't know what happens to them.

[bitchesgate3]

Last thing I will say, and I think most people won't want to hear this, but:

This is a thinly veiled kink game.

Outside of the tumblr community, and a prevalent topic back in EA, was the question why the game was filled with so many dominant women and "wimpy" men. Almost every woman in the game is a bitch. So much so that the biggest plea for having Alfira as a recruitable companion was because there were no "nice characters" (read: no nice women) in the game in early access.

If you know anything about dominatrices (different from dommes) then many of the scenes and plots follow predictable scripts, and you won't be able to unsee it.

Lae'zel making Zorru bow.

Lae'zel telling you not to grovel to a goblin.

Lae'zel ordering you to free her.

Lae'zel's concept art (and popular depictions of female Githyanki on fan sites) looking like a stereotypical dominatrix.

Lae'zel's superiority you must appease.

Having to entertain Shadowheart's snarky behavior. As if you are not behaving as she likes. Then turning sweet when you do.

Shadowheart knowing how to train people and doing so on Tav in the post-Raphael scene.

Groveling and sucking toes.

Mystra telling Gale to wait and him facing consequences when he doesn't.

The flavor text on Mystra's statues making her out to be sexy but stern as fuck. Do as she tells you - and you will be rewarded.

Obedience as a concept tends to be rewarded, but you become someone else's lapdog and puppet. It is portrayed as being enthralled rather than enslaved.

Take a drink any time a man does something and you could reply with "Good boy."

Wyll given pet names (pussycat in EA, pup in launch).

Mizora's whole condescending, teasing, bratty demeanor.

Even after the rewrites and new narrative direction, they still snuck in Orin making Ravengard a human chair. Why did she do that? Nasty! 🤣Only woman in the scene - she has to playfully telegraph her control? LOL

The big bad: The Absolute takes on the voice of a commanding, domineering woman. "Hear my voice. Obey my command."

Everyone is mean and snarky not to hurt your feefees but because it's hot. You are supposed to banter with it. Say something mean back or obey. It was never more serious than that.

Swen being shocked that fans felt the companions were too mean.

Wyll's writer's tweet seeing Wyll's plot as kinky.

The funniest evidence of this is also the one character not mentioned here: Astarion.

Contrary to popular belief, Larian had made mentions of their surprise of Astarion being popular among fans.

He was a character of hedonism who wanted it all and would be corrupt enough to try to get it all. But he did not get as much attention from Larian originally than the others - probably due to lacking a dominatrix plot.

Astarion's popularity was not something they orchestrated or predicted. They clearly did not know this demographic of fans existed.

Coupled with him being a surprise hit and wanting to ensure their game sold and scored well in reviews, Larian decided to fully capitalize on fan engagement, fan feedback, and the data metrics they were collecting in EA. Then they hired someone (and probably others) from this demographic of fans and this is probably where the narrative changes began.

The mean women got softer. The exes got removed. The kink tho stays in.

Storylines that had elements of kink began to be taken in a new direction, but while retaining those elements. Plots take on more serious turns to appeal to this superfan base who will keep Larian's social media full of free advertising.

And henceforth, a game that started as "don't be ruled by your temptations" became "don't blindly obey those things you make a god".

Power Corrupts Absolutely because once you get a taste of it - you'll never stop wanting more. And that was a wonderful motif. The song "The Power" is alluring and sweet sounding because it's a love song. Of temptation.

But with the changes, understanding the plots of the game becomes a blurred line between willfully giving into temptation and not thinking for one's self vs unwittingly being used and victimized.

And this is why half the tumblr fandom will see the game one way, and the other half as another.

When in reality we are arguing over a thinly veiled kink game.

[garnetaldebaran]

2023 Creation "Wrapped"

A bit of recap of all my creations in 2023. I'm really happy that I did a lot of things, tried new tecniques and styles.

JANUARY

Most notes: Lewis and Valtteri on the podium in China 2019 -> gossiping on the podium like real champs

Fave: Pablo Neruda quote + Australian GP -> this was the result of me getting feelings about his win in Australia 2019

FEBRUARY

Most notes: Valtteri at C43 Launch event -> he was hilarious here (confirmed it's not his fault)

Fave: Valtteri talking about the grey in his beard -> I'm charmed, what can I said?

MARCH

Most notes: Valtteri being complimented by Tiffany -> I think about all the time, it was incredible

Fave: Valtteri + Judas Priest's "You got another thing comin'" -> this was super complex to make but I like the result and the song is still perfect

APRIL

Most notes: Valtteri and Guanyu talking about pineapple on pizza (again) -> again the pineapple and my notes taking fire with opinions which is the funniest thing to me (Do I have an opinion on pineapple on pizza? that will remain a mystery between me and my pizza)

Fave: 5 times Valtteri dodged the shoey -> this gifset is the result of a very throughout scholarly review that is syntesyed in a chaotic form for your viewing pleasure

MAY

Most notes: Finnish Florida man campaign -> this was so funny to make and still like it a lot

Fave: same

JUNE

Most notes: Guanyu and Valtteri guessing each other F1 rating part 2

Fave: Val closing his fireproof collection -> a gifset I made for an audience of one (me) and it worked like a charm

JULY

Most notes: Fernando beach party in Hungary 2017 -> a meme of his meme, classic Fernando

Fave: Valewis talking about each other -> I'm still not normal about the quotes. This sort of cemented that I like to gif them in purple and blue.

AUGUST

Most notes: Women in F1 vintage trading cards -> I loved doing this. The research for the data and for the visuals was so fascinating.

Fave: Val Podiums -> this was a titanic effort but finishing it was so satisfactory

bonus Val collage -> this is probably one of the set that had the nicest comments and I love that it resonated

SEPTEMBER

Most notes: Valtteri post race interview after Monza

Fave: Valtteri in the video for his 100th race -> I absolutely adore the original video, I wanted to gif it for so long

OCTOBER

Most notes: Valtteri half naked ad for radlgrvl -> no further dignified comments

Fave: F1 Big Bang gifs -> this was very challenging technically but I'm really glad I got to work with an amazing person for an incredible fic

bonus Jenson win in Canada 2011 -> the only time after I finished school I made a graphic willingly

NOVEMBER

Most notes: Most Likely Las Vegas Edition - Tattoo -> again Val and Alex being edited together for maximum chaotic effect

DECEMBER

Most notes: Drivers + Soups -> A few years ago there was a trend with characters + beverages, I remembered that and I was cold, so this was born.

Fave: Valewis + Sufjan Stevens -> it was near Christmas so the pining was mandatory.

[thegeminisage]

tng update time!! we're back, baby. sunday we did "the masterpiece society" and "conundrum" and last night* we did "power play" and "ethics."

*by last night i mean earlier tonight, but i'm typing this at 1am and letting it post tomorrow

the masterpiece society: this one was okay. i was very endeared at first to this guy flirting RESPECFULLY with deanna after the ordeal of 3 rape scenes in one episode but then she shot him down and he kept flirting. WILL my misery never cease

that said, i like that picard was nice to her when she fessed up about fucking with him. i am so fond of saying "treat him really niceys" about data but perhaps we should also be treating DEANNA really niceys. instead of raping her repeatedly.

one hilarious detail i noticed about this episode was that they went out of their way to show us a lot of extras in this episode (sometimes we don't even get this many extras in ten forward scenes) and show us that the extras were. diverse. because if the society is "genetically engineered to perfection." and then you only show white people. THAT puts a whole new spin on things. i'm imagining some joker on the production team looking at a shot of mostly-white extras and frantically calling the casting director on the phone

i was EXTREMELY worried when they asked geordi to work with this woman but he was professional the whole time to my huge relief. actually, geordi had a little bit going on in this ep that i really enjoyed - when these "perfect" people kept implying he would have been aborted as a fetus in their society he gave as good as he got EVERY time and his blind ass DID in fact wind up saving all their lives and GOOD FOR HIM!

i dont really get what the big deal is about 23 people leaving = destroying their society. if you can't plann for people being out then it's your managerial skills that need work. also, they were kinda freaks, so maybe they needed to have their little cult broken up. sorry

conundrum: EPISODES FOR MEEEEE. this episode was just like tabula rasa, except this predates tabula rasa, so really tabula rasa is just like IT. anyway, amnesia. i was gleefully rubbing my hands together the entire time

hands down funniest bit was everyone just assuming worf is captain despite the fact that he's bloodthirsty and insane but the second funniest bit was data the bartender. "where's the android?" "serving drinks in ten forward." "[as data speed types] you must have been one hell of a bartender." 10/10 no notes

also his little chess game with deanna!! wah.

actually no the other funny bit was riker lowkey running around on deanna with ro. and i abslutely LOOOVED he and deanna being flirty with each other. it's ABOUT TIME we got some real food. it's been so sexless up til now that all she did was play with his hair a little and we both went bananas

and then the scene at the END? riker more flustered than we've EVER seen him and these two ladies ganging up on him...mwah. 10/10 perfect.

the villain this episode was good. when he first showed up cathy was like who tf is that and i was like idk some rando im sure he doesnt matter but then the computer named him first officer and it was like !!!!!!!!!!!! they tricked me !!! it's a VERY rare day when tng manages to trick me i was so pleased. i do kinda wish they hadn't theo teennwolfed him though (made everyone else a bit dumber to make him seem smart)

power play: deannna was so hot in this episode she should play male characters more often

i really REALLY wish i had been riker deanna and worf that had been possessed. data's not as much fun when he's someone else and not data. obrien could have come too if he wanted though i guess

PLEASE do not tell rosalind chao to shut her baby up. the last time someone told anyone to shut a baby up in a property she happened to be acting in. well. mash fans know. they know.

i genuinely believed those guys were ghosts until the last second. probably because prisoners makes no sense. also, i think prison for 500 years is too much. can we not just let them die

i love when possessed data tried to prove worf and worf was like lol no. he knows data is 10x stronger than him lmao

i wish guinan had been in this episode it's been ages and i miss her

after how tense and fun the beginning was the end and middle of this episode were kind of anticlimactic. still, it was fun and so it gets a pass. more people should get possessed on the enterprise

WHY DO I ONLY GET 4K CHARACTERS PER TEXT BLOCK staff i'll fucking kill you. anyway

ethics: RIKER/WORF/DEANNA IS REAL IT HAPPENED ON MY COMPUTER SCREEN!

ok, first of all, sorry i have to go ahead and get this out of the way before i get to the good stuff, picard advocating for assisted suicide is NNNOT his best look. in fact it's literally such a fucking bad look. actually. uhh tw for talk of suicide here on down

i understand what they were trying to do. they wanted to present both sides of the ethical dilemma here "equally." but there are some problems with this. firstly, in the real world, assisted suicide is for people with like. terminal illness. worf was fine. yes, he was paralyzed, but he was healthy and had the change to regain a great deal of his mobility. so picard already looks like an asshole because he's advocating for a disabled person killing themselves because they "can't" adjust to the loss.

SECONDLY, the use of "can't" was very poorly done here. if picard had said, worf is too stubborn to change his beliefs, he WON'T adjust to this because he will refuse to try, that would be a LOT BETTER than saying "worf CAN'T adjust to this, it's too many lifelong values to change."

and finally, if we really wanted to be "equal" about the debate, it wouldn't be about worf's ability or inability to adjust to being disabled, it would be about his BELIEFS. like his society and heritage, which he cherishes so deeply because he felt disconnected from it for so much of his life. instead picard was just like "worf is way too much of a pussy to do this just let him die lmao"

like he seriously tried to persuade will to KILL WORF. worse, to help worf kill himself!! JUST BECAUSE WORF WAS DISABLED. he even guilted riker about it: "he wouldn't have asked if he didn't know he could count on you." girl what the FUCK

ok anyway, speaking of will: his reaction here was so strong i wonder if he knew someone who'd killed themselves before. NOT that i'm complaining about a strong reaction. FINALLY we are getting some solid worf/riker Content. maybe asking your commanding officer to kill you is romance or whatever. i loved their argument to little bitty pieces. compare to: riker in tears next to deanna's sickbay bed. ooough i am eating. according to the wiki they actually cut a scene of nose-to-nose yelling and i'm mad about it. LET THEM PUT THEIR FACES TOGETHER. give me something to live for

deanna in this episode too. her kneeling by the fallen worf and murmuring "let me help you." her making him talk to his son. him BASICALLY asking her to be his kid's new adoptive parent should he kick it

oh speaking of alexander. he said some really troubling things this episode. such as, "my mom always said klingons had dumb ideas about honor" and "i don't care about being klingon." HIS MOTHER WAS RACIST..............if alexander decides the klingon ways aren't for him that's fine but that should be a choice HE GETS TO MAKE what an insane way to be raised. meanwhile people are out here calling worf a deadbeat and he put aside his suicide plan for alexander specifically

other shocking things about this episode: beverly was sooooo good actually. she was channeling bones energy in her fury and i mean that as the highest possible compliment. that other doctor quite literally KILLED A PATIENT because she's so sketchy and focused on her own glory "oh i need tokeep a professional detachment" YEAH SO YOU DON'T FEEL GUILTY ABOUT KILLING PEOPLE. bones would have torn her limb for limb and i'm very glad beverly did too. i just don't understand why she was allowed to like leave the ship and go back to practicing medicine. she should have her medical liscene revoked. was this too also in the name of "both sides" of the debate girl this isn't fox news she KILLED A PATIENT for her own personal gain just space her ass!

the fake-out with worf dying was expected but them faking us out for so LONG was a surprise. i was like how are they gonna get him out of this one and it's literally the klingon anatomy. double of eeeeeverrrything. wow that sure is something. funny that worf has ridges on sooo many places. love that it took until season 5 to see it

also, that surgery scene was GROSS. im not normally squeamish but that little worm thingy they put into him looked awful

devastated there was no worf/riker reunuion at the end but other than that and picard and that other dr lady not getting fired it was extremely good. one of my favs so far i think actually.

tonight: "the outcast" and "cause and effect." i've started spoiling myself w/ episode summaries in order not to get surprised by 3 rape scenes in a row again and ik what both of these are about and im soooo excited for it

[delta-queerdrant]

she's not your satellite (Twisted, s2 e06)

I peeked at reviews for “Twisted,” and apparently people do not like this episode! I guess I understand why - it is literally 45 minutes of people wandering the corridors, exchanging increasingly tense dialogue as they contemplate their deaths. What can I say, I enjoyed watching it. I am partial to a drawing-room novel where nothing happens, and in Star Trek, the corridors are the drawing rooms.

“Twisted” opens with Kes’s birthday party. She is turning two (underage even in dog years). This poor young woman is having such a bummer of a birthday! The party is at Sandrine’s, undercutting a sweet moment of found family with several rounds of holographic sexual harassment. A bad time becomes worse when Tom gifts Kes a locket, raising Neelix’s hackles. To be fair, it is a genuinely bizarre gift - all of the lockets I’ve received in my life were gifted to me before the age of ten - and only heightens the narrative confusion around Tom’s “just friends” intentions toward Kes. 

As soon as Neelix starts quietly freaking out, Janeway inserts herself into the conversation. What is this lady doing? She compliments the necklace and explains to Kes how lockets work, stoking the drama with the same energy with which she micromanages a science experiment. Is she oblivious? Does she think she is helping? Why is everyone being so weirrrrd?

I will pause to appreciate Neelix’s genuinely beautiful cake. I am so tickled by the conceit that people in space have space themes for their birthday parties, though I suppose it makes sense for Kes, who is excited to celebrate her first birthday on Voyager.

One distortion wave later, the layout of the ship begins to warp. Attempts to leave the holodeck continuously route the crew back to Sandrine’s (truly, hell). So much of Star Trek takes place in these interchangeable corridors, so the ship’s geography becoming the obstacle of the week is very fun! And cost-saving!

Unfortunately this is a Bad Neelix episode, in which we are subjected to the latest eruption of Neelix’s obsessively jealous ruminations. Neelix broaches the subject with Chakotay and gets the absolute worst advice: Chakotay explains that fear and love go hand in hand, but isn’t love worth the risk? Perhaps this is peak Star Trek: the suggestion that you can platitude your way to healthier thought patterns. In Chakotay’s defense, Neelix is asking the wrong questions; right now he needs help with his behaviors, not his feelings. Soon after, the two are separated by the diverging corridors, and we get the funniest moment of the episode, in which Chakotay calls for Neelix in the same plaintive tone that one uses to summon a cat.

The episode finally gets some momentum when Janeway is disabled by some 90s-era CGI, resulting in a power vacuum. “Twisted” was originally filmed for Season One, so we get a charged argument between Chakotay and Tuvok about how to respond to the distortion. Chakotay pulls rank, and Tuvok’s decision to cede to him feels like a big character moment - this is the guy who broke the Prime Directive behind Janeway’s back, after all. He’s accepted Chakotay as his superior, and he’s willing to set aside his own self-regard to play by the rules.

Chakotay’s plan fails, so Chakotay, in turn, puts his trust in Tuvok and decides to ride out the progression of the wave. Certain they are going to their deaths, everyone hugs it out, in a stiff upper lip, Starfleet way. To be specific, they hold hands, clasp shoulders, or in Tuvok’s case, sidles up close to Janeway without actually touching her. These people, honestly.

Of course, they don’t die. The wave was just one of those uncanny alien encounters that Starfleet crews are wont to have, and they depart with extra data about the Delta Quadrant. Maybe that’s why I like this episode: the ending just feels really… nice? It’s certainly a departure from the usual Voyager arc, where hard lessons are learned and sacrifices made. To quote the Ninth Doctor, “Just this once, everyone lives!” Our crew of weirdos with emotional deficits gets to have their cake and eat it too.

3/5 Jibelian fudge layers.

[ronearoundblindly]

The Stark Legacy (14)

Rusted, part of Book Two: Mind (see previous or series)

Summary: Bruce tasks Bucky with taking extra baggage to Wakanda while Sam Wilson recovers.

Warnings for tough (but vague) talk about past accidents and physical trauma. Rated Teen/Mature so 15+ only, please.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN—August 2038

“I don’t think I should leave if something is wrong,” Bucky said, staring in at Sam Wilson reading a book while getting blood drawn in the lab.

“It’s not really…wrong. He just…” Bruce replied. He couldn’t explain it. Wilson adjusted holding his book with the hand not being stuck, showing the title Total Applications of Quantum Field Theory.

Bucky pressed a finger against the two-way glass. “You don’t see anything wrong with that?” He scoffed, partly concerned for his friend, partly annoyed to be the chauffeur to a teen on a trip across the world. “Seriously?”

“Am I supposed to be panicked he’s got different interests since waking up? That’s not uncommon with head injury—”

Bucky fumed. “Everything weird is common with head injuries, apparently, because you people don’t know anything about them. It’s 2038!”

“You people? I think…I should be offended.” Bruce may have been completely jaded to ‘smartist’ mockery, but he also loved the chance to study such an extensive turnaround of Sam Wilson’s recovery. The patient remained irritable, sarcastic, and alert with full motor-function. He had occasional headaches but, most bizarrely, had developed not only an interest in but the ability to understand all sorts of scientific studies quickly. “Look, Bucky, you won’t be able to do anything if it is wrong anyway. No offense. It’s not something you can just—” Bruce slowly swung his fist through the air, making a small ‘pow’ noise.

“Don’t do that,” Bucky said flatly.

Bruce pursed his mouth. He was definitely not the funniest Avenger, but he did try every so often, usually failing and immediately retreating to a cave of algorithms to plot his next joke. The team repeatedly called it ‘cute;’ Hulk didn’t like that distinction either. Hulk had toppled cities for less.

“I’ve got a couple data sets and stuff for Shuri, too. Let’s load up the quinjet and get you on the way. Looks like Little Sam is coming up the drive now,” Bruce continued, pointing out the far window.

Bucky groaned. The ball-capped girl trudged down the lane with two massive hard suitcases. She was barely big or strong enough to maneuver them, yet he watched as she waved off one of the security members who came over to help her. The guard pointed her in the direction of the landing pad. Stubborn, Bucky internally groaned, just like good ol’ Pa. Bruce returned to shove a box of odds and ends against Bucky’s chest. The doctor looked at him seriously for a moment.

“I’m glad it’s you taking her. Also, don’t mention the,” and he waved a hand over his head. “Fair warning.”

Even though it was not necessary, Bucky made Sam strap herself into the chair up front, damned if he would be responsible for any other injury on Stark’s daughter. The two were quiet for all of takeoff, and they’d flown over nothing but water for a while before Bucky glanced over.

Samantha sat tucked up like a rolly-polly, craning her neck to look out the window curiously.

“You look like you’ve never flown before. Natasha’s taken you in one of these, hasn’t she?”

“I’ve never crossed an ocean,” the girl replied in a voice so small he could hardly hear it.

That was a quaint notion. The Avengers bounced from continent to continent almost daily, occasionally planet to planet even, and Sam was afraid of a body of water. She rubbed her hands over her arms, stopping only to rub her legs. However, she still looked on, fascinated.

“Alright,” Bucky finally broke in after another half hour, “I’m gonna ask what I’m not supposed to.”

Samantha looked up at him, shocked but quiet. Her brow furrowed in confusion.

“Are you harming yourself?” He regretted asking the second the words came out, but then he felt the impulse to double down. “I’m asking because the hair, and the scars on your arm, and the limp.”

“Those weren’t from—” Sam cut herself off. “No, Captain Barnes, I do not harm myself on purpose,” she chimed systematically.

His eyes flickered back over to her at the distinctive choice of words.

Sam looked at her feet. “There was an accident. The Bartons like to bike, motorcycles and dirt bikes specifically. I am…terrible at it, so the last time we did, I was behind Nate on his Ducati, and we crashed.”

“Why does Tony not know about this?”

“I was 14, and that was the day Clint told me Tony was sending me to boarding school. I…said some—I screamed several choice things and ran off. Nate came to find me, even though he was a jerk about it, and I got on his bike to go home.”

She stretched out her legs into a seated position. “When we were close enough to see Clint waving us back over, Nate raised his hand to waive and hit a ditch, but see, we were right by a bit of a hill. I went flying when Nate skid trying to correct us. They said I smacked a tree—” Sam grabbed her left arm, “—and then my momentum and weight snapped my leg.”

Bucky tried to imagine the absolute horror for the Bartons. If Bucky was so worried about strapping her in for one flight, how anxious must Clint have been… He knew immediately why someone wouldn’t tell Tony, if it was at all possible to hide it.

“Compound fracture of the left humerus. Compound fracture of the left femur. Damage to the growth plate, so my left leg stopped growing at age 14, resulting in a now one inch difference in length. I tried not to listen when they said how many pins were in there. I stared at the ceiling. They made Nat,” Sam swallowed, “explain why we couldn’t tell him. So I didn’t go to boarding school, and after four months I went to Harvard with Cooper. Well, I lived there.”

Bucky knew that stare, the one where you know the past can’t change so you stopped reliving it, the one where you try over and over to accept the hand you’re dealt, the one where you remember everything and feel nothing. Steve used to pull him out by recalling baseball stats incorrectly. Bucky would always snap out to rub his knowledge in that punk’s face. He could try a version of that on Sam Stark, something else for them to talk about.

“What’s quantum field theory?”

She didn’t change her gaze but scrunched her nose in thought. “Um, like which area do you want? Electromagnetic? Chromodynamic?”

Well, that was nice while it lasted, Bucky thought, already lost. 

“Do you know what normalization is?” she continued.

So she couldn’t pick up on hints either… “How about like I’m from the 1940s,” Bucky requested.

“Well, they knew some bits in the 20s—” 

Bucky frowned on purpose, deeply, comically.

“Right. Basically,” Sam thought out loud, making a roundabout motion with her hands, “how… stuff interacts within a—where it is.”

“What stuff?”

“Subatomic particles.”

“Ok, and we’re done with that.” Bucky had zero intention of going back to the shrunken feeling of not following the teacher in school, but he could still gain some context for Falcon. “How smart do you need to be to understand that stuff?”

Sam sat, confused. “That’s not a quantifiable question. It’s not a specific neural requirement.”

“Nineteen-forties—”he reminded through gritting teeth.

“It’s my personal belief that you can learn anything if you have the right teacher. If you make the subject relatable and applicable to something in your life, you remember it. So instead of starting with quantum field theory, you could begin with the psychological field theory or how people interact with where they are.”

Although a perfectly reasonable association, Bucky snorted. “You don’t get out much, do you?”

“You know that I don’t. Why else would I be so excited to leave the country I’ve been in my whole life?”

“Is that why you’re so…fidgety?”

“No.” She continued to scratch and shift in her seat.

“Do you have a rash?”

“Why did you ask about field theory? Uncle Bruce need a book club buddy or something?”

“Sam, I mean, Big Sam was reading a book.” 

Samantha’s eyes grew wide, and her head snapped over to look at him. To his surprise, she seemed just as concerned as he was. 

“Thank you! That’s weird, right?”

“He…” She tried to get a spot behind her right shoulder blade. “You mean, he can follow—he is learning very quickly?”

“Essentially. It’s like he woke up and was smarter.”

“I feel like Big Sam would be a little offended—”

“That’s not what I mean,” Bucky sighed, but Sam had already quieted.

“So,” she began after a long pause, “how worried are you?”

“It’s not exactly a health risk, to be smarter, but I just—what else could change?”

Lil'Sam remained silent this time, holding one arm against her chest, seemingly lost in thought. When Bucky’s eyes flicked over to see if she was even still sitting there, he saw her staring at him. He looked again. She wasn’t staring at him per se, but her eyes were fixed on his metal arm. Loads of people still stared at the arm, so in public, he covered it with clothes and a glove. He thought back to the wedding. He’d been covered; she couldn’t have seen it then. Didn’t she already know about it? Suddenly, he wished he’d worn more cover than a tank top even if it was summer and they were flying to an African nation close to the equator. Why would Sam still be wearing sweats? He glanced again. She was still clutching her left arm against her.

“Are you in pain?” Bucky asked.

Sam snapped back to reality, suddenly guilty and ashamed of her rudeness. She didn’t convey the same in her response, abruptly announcing, “I’m tired. Can I go lie down?” She didn’t wait for a response, either, and unbuckled to rush back into the jet’s cargo area.

Teenagers, Bucky thought.

[Ch 15: Judgment]

[Main Masterlist]

[scorpius-rising]

It's very funny to me that intentionally or unintentionally each new Star Trek series/crew ends up having a character who is The Autistic One. Sometimes there are multiple, but there's always at least one character whose character arc is about being more human, or reconciling with different internal aspects of themselves, or engaging with certain types of emotion, etc.

The unintentional ones are the funniest though, because you can just see that the writers/showrunners are thinking hard about all these Big Sci Fi Ideas and the Nature of Sentience and Humanity, and then the Neurodiverse fans see it and go "oh sick, love Data, what a funky dude, I know three people in my friend group who act just like him, what a Chad"

[rocketboots564]

More of my thoughts/reactions to the Red Versus Blue Seasons!

Season 6:

WHAT IS HAPPENING?! THAT OPENING?! AGENT WASHINGTON?!

You think Sarge would kill it at a rave? I think so…

Oh naaah they got Mark “gimme the Zuch” Zuckerberg’s Meta here? We’re doomed

Man screw the One Piece time-skip, the Red Versus Blue season 6 time skip is WAAAY better.

Granted, not much happens between that single year gap, but still…

Also, I LOVE that we get to see how the Red and Blue teams interact with other people outside of the main cast…. Specially Caboose… cause that was funny

Ooof Agent Washington you are in for one hell of a ride.

I LOVE CABOOSE SO MUCH I LOVE CABOOSE SO MUCH I LOVE CABOOSE SO MUCH I LOVE CABOOSE SO MUCH

Church don’t act like you weren’t SCREAMING over his death last season.

Granted because of time loop shenanigans that didn’t happen, but I know the truth! Caboose is definitely a friend

Caboose can do no wrong… even when his throwing arm is worse than mine, and I would know.

ZUCKERBERG HAS THE DIO MEME POWERS?! OH WE’RE SO FUCKED

Hah… control f u

“I would’ve told them you shot her, but I wanted it to be believable,” JESUS DAMN WASHINGTON

I LOVE THE WARTHOG THEME

Agent Washington being perceived as the equivalent of a power ranger x James Bond superhero in Caboose’s mind is so on point

Also Church… if a secret message made for a very specific person is cryptic, then it’s probably something that only they’ll know

NOT THE ALPHA 🐺

I know the omegaverse fics go crazy with that don’t they

The beef between the Director and the Chairman is the FUNNIEST THING TO ME

I want the VA of the director to re-voice that clip of that one woman leaving a voicemail. The one that goes “This is for Rachel you big fat white nasty smelling fat bitch. Why you took me off the motherfuckin schedule with your trifling dirty white racist ass you big fat bitch oompa loompa body ass bitch–”

Just replace “Rachel” with “Chairman”

I would pay ACTUAL MONEY TO HEAR THAT

CHURCH IS THE ALPHA? BAHAHAH THAT IS THE FUNNIEST SHIT

Also… is Sarge an ai? I mean, we saw him communicate with Church “beyond the grave” as he literally tried to charge Sarge money to get into heaven. but now that we know Church is actually an ai… doesn’t that mean the same goes for Tex and Sarge?

If so… what human mind are they based off of?

Honestly deleting all of the blue team’s records and data is such a power move.

Is… IS CHURCH DEAD?! DID THE EMP KILL HIM?! IS THE META DEAD?!!!

DIRECTOR LEONARD CHURCH WHAT THE FUCK

Conclusion: WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK THIS SHOW IS SO GOOD

So recently I decided I would start Red Vs Blue and binge the whole series….

And then proceed to find out that Rooster Teeth was shutting down, as I live under a rock

…but despite that, I’m still gonna document what I think about each season in small little increments ! Cause honestly… this show is really damn good.

Anyway, here are my thoughts

Season 1:

Whoever told me that Midsummer Night’s Dream is the best Comedy of Errors has NOT seen this show.

Also… I thought Caboose was the dumb one, but he’s not that dumb? Does something happen to him oorrr?

I take that back, getting horrifyingly traumatized by Sheila’s death and dealing with Tucker might ALSO give me slight brain damage.

At first I joked and said “ha! What if Tex and Church were gay for each other, and that’s why he lost his girl,” and like… I was kinda right! I mean they weren’t gay but they were (are?) in love with each other!

Also she’s a girl! Kinda expected it later but still, pretty neat!

DAMN DONUT HAS GOT ONE HELL OF A THROWING ARM!

Conclusion: I bet Sarge whimpers….

[kusogamesss]

Hypnospace Outlaw

I don't have much to say about Hypnospace Outlaw itself beyond it being one of the funniest, most heart-warming, most endearing, most sincere, most ironic, most fun depictions of the Internet ever presented.

In my review-cum-memoir on World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, I bemoaned the death of online spaces noted for their lack of thorough knowledge. It is perhaps fitting that WotLK's release came a mere five days before the launch of Jim Garvin and Ryan McGeary's 'Let Me Google That For You' website. Perhaps by divine providence too, WotLK's release coincided with the steady downward trend of Bill Dyess' then World of Warcraft database 'Thottbot' and the first massive spike in traffic to 'Wowhead'. The coincidence is staggering, but also points to a trend which has irreversibly altered the gaming landscape, and society at large. Much as WoW players sought user-data-verified hard statistics on their MMO of choice, tech savvy individuals' astonishment and contempt for being asked readily verifiable questions reached a tipping point in late 2008. Confirming and corroborating data on WoW would in time become something accomplished by every player. LMGTFY would in time become a site even your grandparents might send as a slight towards a query. The genuine question 'where is Mankrik's wife?' was less the object of ridicule, more a target for sarcasm and eye-rolling as the naive were directed to Wowhead. With ever increasing databases and wikis, games and media in general have become less about a sense of mystery, more one of minutiae. Players no longer revel in not knowing, they would rather examine the entirety of a game's mechanics and lore and history with a finetooth comb.

My point in bringing this up is two-fold. One: Games have genuinely not been the same since players expected to be able to understand them inside and out at whim. Two: The Internet has genuinely not been the same since users expected others to rely on a corporate search engine, largely constructed (especially now) to deliver advertising rather than substantive content, to remedy their perceived ignorance. As Embracer Group, Microsoft, Tencent, Sony, Epic, Valve, Ubisoft, EA, and other megacorporations oligopolise the gaming space, so too do Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Tencent, Joybuy, Alibaba, Twitter, Spotify, ByteDance, Baidu, Adobe, Block, and others reduce Internet diversity to a minimum. I can't act as if I knew the Internet of eld in its entirety, but a lifelong fascination with Internet obscura and history has me at least somewhat informed.

In my review of GeoGuessr, and corroborated by jobosno's review of Microsoft Flight Simulator, stressed was the importance of appreciating the non-place. So too does this apply to the Internet at large, and Hypnospace Outlaw itself if we wish. Not everything on the Internet is substantive or substantial, nor is every page on Hypnospace. We fall down rabbit holes of Wikipedia deep dives, we examine every page on Hypnospace regardless of its relevance to our duty. Duty and productivity and the confines of time and the constraints of life and gaming guide us towards Internet or Hypnospace use that is conducive to our end goals, but those detours persist as availabilities. In the real world, they dwindle as web diversity shrinks, as webhosts go offline, as swathes of the Internet go unarchives and unremember[ed/able]. In Hypnospace, their finite nature means we cannot search forever.

The Big Crunch theory postulates that at some point, the universe will cease expansion, and will recollapse unto itself as all is returned to zero. To null.

At some point, the Internet might cease expansion, and will recollapse unto itself as all is returned to zero. To null. We will not go to website, we will go to keywords. That which is unadvertisable, incompatible with commercialisation will in effect go dark. In due time fewer and fewer spaces will exist. In due time, all will be one, and one will be none.

The Big Freeze theory postulates that the universe will never cease expansion, and will drift into entropy until all is returned to absolute zero. To null.

At some point, the Internet might expand infinitely to the point of unnavigability. In a web of infinitudes, all will be irrelevant and all will be lost as data becomes unable to be quantified on any scale. In due time, one will be all, and all will be none.

The unknowability of the universe renders any theory pointless. We do not know what will happen. We cannot know what will happen.

The unknowability of the Internet renders any theory pointless. We do not know what will happen. We cannot know what will happen.

Enjoy the Internet as it is now. Enjoy the Internet as it was then. Enjoy the Internet as it will be. Forever is it in flux, forever is it a stable constant. Forever does it all drift apart, forever does it all close in. Forever shall it be known and forever shall it be unknown.

We exist in a cosmic nothing of no import.

We exist in a digital nothing of no import.

Every atom in the universe is critical to its being.

Every byte of the Internet is critical to its being.

In the waning light of what's digital, make you whole.

Mirai will free us.

As a historian, I live on a periphery of data boundless yet intangible. I scour for that which does not exist, may never have existed.

At the end of Hypnospace Outlaw you are tasked with archiving a wasteland.

Archive our wasteland with the Wayback Machine extension. https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/wayback-machine/fpnmgdkabkmnadcjpehmlllkndpkmiak https://addons.mozilla.org/en-CA/firefox/addon/wayback-machine_new/

We exist at a time where unfathomable amounts of human knowledge are being erased from existence every hour of every day. This is not a deliberate book burning. This is an incidental blaze.

Save what you can.

What a beautiful thing we are a part of.

Seek the obtuse, obfuscated, and obscure.

A selection of webzones I have found and I enjoy:

https://geocities.restorativland.org/

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215085602/http://www.u-ga.com:80/jp/games/mobile.html

https://web.archive.org/web/20070902163202/http://www.cbs.com/primetime/kid_nation/

https://web.archive.org/web/20050222012115/http://everquest2.station.sony.com/pizza/

https://prairieecologist.com/2020/01/13/finally-a-practical-guide-for-roadside-wildflower-viewing/

https://web.archive.org/web/20010118210000/http://www.l0pht.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20030207171752/http://www.wired.com/news/games/0,2101,50875,00.html

https://web.archive.org/web/20060314162213/http://www.classicgaming.com/pac-man/Pac-Games/PacManVR/pac.htm

https://www.geo-grafia.jp/product/

http://erogereport.blog.jp/archives/cat_87375.html

https://web.archive.org/web/20060515154050/http://users.stargate.net/~glshir/PLAY.HTM

https://dreamlogos.fandom.com/wiki/Dream_Logos_Wiki

https://web.archive.org/web/20150222012855/http://quitesoulless.com/story.htm https://www.yelp.com/user_details?userid=Oi1qbcz2m2SnwUeztGYcnQ

https://web.archive.org/web/20030407094755/http://www.vernonjohns.org/snuffy1186/movies.html

http://www.poetpatriot.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20000229230522/http://symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/y2kgame.hoax.html

https://forums.furaffinity.net/threads/camping-in-a-u-haul-they-are-cheeper-than-an-rv-and-better-than-a-tent.53919/

https://web.archive.org/web/20140803164736/http://theodor.lauppert.ws/games/

https://tss.asenheim.org/

https://jimedwardsnrx.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/pepsi_gravitational_field.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20130812175052/http://csbruce.com/tv/clone_high/

https://xercesblau.com/

https://www.walgreens2.com/peach-ring/peach17.html?fbclid=IwAR0iWWPkq0qf2kkYIVmUgL2pPuE1023aImBPnYuwmQXAxtyXNiElOnSDlVs

http://www.secondlivestock.com/ https://origamisimulator.org/

https://web.archive.org/web/20180818104057/http://underlinestudio.com/linesbreakingnewspaper/

http://blueteethnovel.tilda.ws/

https://web.archive.org/web/20170207203428/http://pacificitysoundvisions.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20120915100800/http://meryn.ru/portfolia/

https://web.archive.org/web/20130415230745/http://www.reddit.com/

http://www.woodswoods.com/new-gallery-5

https://web.archive.org/web/20120807153003/http://weblog.liberatormagazine.com/2010/11/minstrel-show-visual-art.html

https://glasstire.com/2012/11/23/the-ten-list-walk-as-art/ https://news.ourontario.ca/page.asp?ID=2910113&po=6&n=1

[star-trek-dumb-comics]

i just watched 9 tng episodes in a row

[vergess]

Sorry to burst into your asks like this, but I'm really interested in the exocolonist datamining-can you tell me what/where to find the file you looked through?

So! Number 1 thing!! You never have to apologize for asking me to talk at great length about something I love. I am extremely autistic. This is one of my favourite kinds of social interaction.

Now then!!

I play on linux, so all the files are just out there in the open and most of them are plain text files with custom file endings.

I don't know what the file structure looks like on windows, but since the game seems to have been written in java, probably basically identical. Assuming nothing is encrypted on windows either, I would say this game is the most beginner friendly for data mining I've ever seen.

So for me, the files are in ~/.steam/debian-installation/steamapps/common/Exocolonist/Exocolonist_Data/StreamingAssets/ and then in the Data and StreamingAssets folders.

On windows, that would be in your steam folder, then steamapps/common/Exocolonist/Exocolonist_Data/StreamingAssets/

You can also just right click on the game in steam, and go to Manage > Browse Local Files. That will open you to the main Exocolonist folder, so you'll navigate to exocolonist_data/StreamingAssets/

The data folder is where you will find the bulk of the writing for endings, character profiles, cards, card abilities, etc. If you want to modify how much a particular card is worth, view the full names of characters you only see mentioned briefly, etc, this is the folder you want.

The Stores folder contains the actual "gameplay" parts, in the sense that the buildings, locations, jobs, combat calls, etc are in it. That includes mid-game dialogue!

There's also a specific file in Stories called 'unimplemented memories' that shows the specific coding syntax for modifying the game, to ensure any changes you make look and play correctly!

Between that and save files being basically plaintext with a button on the 'load game' menu that will take you directly to them in your file system you you can edit them even easier, this game is a GREAT choice for learning more about how to datamine or mod a game. Everything is so straightforward.

I mean, the code is fully commented, with all human-readable variables and methods. That's insane! I didn't even code shit that tightly when I was in school, actively being graded on it!!!!!!!!

The endings are all written out in Exocolonist - endings.TSV. I mean that's. That's SO straightforward!! You can open TSV files in any spreadsheet editorfor a more visually pleasant experience, or in a plain text editor if you're hardcore for the sake of being hardcore.

Oh, save games are actually located in your documents folder (I think?) on windows, and in the home folder on linux. The folder is helpfully called "exocolonist/save_games" so it's very simple to find. You can edit your save files (which end in .JSON) in any plain text editor. For windows, I like notepad++ since it will automatically color code the formatting. For Linux, I use Kate but any of the ones that come pre-packaged will do just fine.

Some of my favourites so far from fucking around where I don't belong:

The "releasing endorphins" card you get for distracting Tangent from her Big Government Project by fucking her is called "TangBang" in the data. This is, to me, the single funniest phrase on earth. I can't stop saying it.

Unimplemented Memories contains tons of non-canonical filler text including gems like:

"Git outta me bloody face, ye sodding nullshite!" Vace yelled, as Rex blew him another kiss.

~set bg = pinup_tammy_saved WOW you saved Tamtam! Tammadammadingdong lives!

Anemone Enhancement: Scaly lizard lady. > facts

marz: "Ho ho ho welcome to _my_ bridge which _I_ am totally the boss of." dys: "Ug Marz this place smells funny." marz: "He who smelt it dealt it, Nerd."

But, most importantly of all, the dog-like creature that tries to kill you/Anemone in the opening sequence??

Is named Doggo.

[smhalltheurlsaretaken]

hm since i found your blog i've been thinking a lot about clones picking up much of their culture from the jedi & i was thinking, you know, jedi seem to place some significance on the person who finds you & brings you to the order, assuming that the connection between plo & ahsoka can be taken as standard (big assumption based on one example, i know, but i love the idea so much) & i just - how cute would it be if the clones picked up on that & concluded that obi-wan was their finder!

sorry for making you sad about yoda the other day please have this sweetness to make up for it

!!!!!!!!! *incoherent screeching* You already know me so well 🧡🧡🧡 I just adore Jedi and Clones sharing traditions and customs, no matter what those are - and especially Clones discovering/making up their own traditions as the Order inspires and encourages them!!

I absolutely think Ahsoka and Plo's relationship isn't unusual. Ahsoka explains it to Anakin like it's a normal thing. ("He's one of my oldest friends. It was Master Plo Koon who found me, and brought me to the Temple where I belonged." => the way she says it, the fact that he brought her to the Temple is apparently enough of an explanation for why they're so close. Hence, it's probably somewhat expected. In the EU, it's Quinlan who finds Aayla, and she later becomes his Padawan, and Mace rescues Depa (and presumably her sister Sar, by extention) as infants and takes Depa as his Padawan, and Anakin still has a connection with Qui-Gon even after Qui-Gon's death, especially in the 2003 TCW series that Lucas oversaw.)

SO IN THE AU WHERE SHEEV GETS STEPPED ON BY THE ZILLO BEAST (my favorite spaghetti dino doesn't deserve such a nasty taste in his mouth, let him squash Sheevy instead) AND DOOKU GETS VOODOOED BY TALZIN AND THE SENATE DOES ITS JOB AND BAIL IS CHANCELLOR AND THE CLONES GET FOLDED INTO THE ORDER AND EVERYTHING IS BEAUTIFUL AND NOTHING HURTS???? FINDER OBI-WAN!!!!!!!!!!! Finder Shaak Ti for the babies because she's the one who watched over their growth tubes in Kamino and who brought them home once they were born :3

During the war, before Sheev gets flattened to a pancake for my personal happiness, the Clones just joke about Obi-Wan being their finder because their Generals have explained a bit what it means and they find it cool. After the war, the younger Clones use it to one up the cheeky Padawans. "Oh, you think Master Tiin is cool? Well we were Found by Master Kenobi! Beat that!" Their own Generals are still their favorite, of course, but I'd love to see the Council and the Archivists debating over technicalities before making the most confusing, funniest data entries in the archives to date.

"*Average Jedi Master Finds 499 younglings over their lifetime* actually just statistical error. Average Jedi Master Finds 1.07 younglings over their lifetime. Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi, who stumbled upon an entire planet and Found 3203765 of them is an outlier and should not have been counted."

[actualbird]

I like your analysis(es?) so much hh, and apparently my brainworm of the day is the NXX crew getting a flowering cactus called Karla, for some reason. It’s a therapy cactus XD. No other thoughts. - Book

thank you, Book!!! and also wait no get back here and tell me more

KARLA!!! KARLA!!! oh i love her already but please understand that i have so many questions and all those questions have accompanying THOUGHTS oh gosh okay let me just hm wordbarf both those things very messily, you know how i do things

what kind of flowering cactus?

there are so many, afterall.

given that vyn is into botany and gardening, i assume he would have a lot of opinions on this.

actually, ive met a lot of botany hobbyists in my life, and the snobbier ones among them actually HATE cacti (and succulents). theyd say stuff like "oh cacti are the in thing with the millenials these days, theyre the plant people get when they dont know anything about plants."

WOULD VYN BE LIKE THAT, LMAO????? he seems like the type to at least THINK IT.

but also deep down i assume vyn is like "a plant is a plant is a plant" bc among the sweeter botany hobbyists ive met, theyve got this notion that "as long as you help it grow strong through the challenges, u did a good job" WHICH....MAKES ME THINK....VYN THINGS....vyn is not going to admit it, he will never admit it, but hm. what a strange plant. shaped to protect itself yet in need of care all the same.....

ANYWAY if anybody is getting a premeditated-bought cactus for the HXX HQ, you bet that vyn will, one way or another, have some kind of say in what the cactus will be. if it isnt premeditated-bought, he'll definitely have many things to say about the cactus' future care

or does the cactus just kind of appear there? is it brought into the NXX HQ in the dead of the night like jesus in the manger? if that's the case, who brought it?

i think it would be artem. or, well, i think it would be FUNNIEST/PATHETIC-EST if it was artem.

let's just say that a non-NXX and non-MC person decides eyyy, artem, got u a gift, it's a cactus! haha, get it! bc ur a prickly unapproachable dude! and artem is like ".........." BUT LIKE IT'S RUDE NOT TO ACCEPT A GIFT EVEN WITH THE BACKHANDED CRITICISM OF HIS GENERAL STATE OF BEING

so he takes the cactus and like leaves it at NXX HQ because if he brings it to his apartment hes going to get vaguely annoyed by the cactus and what it supposedly represents and he'd want to set it on fire

(sidenote: cacti do not burn well, by the way, ive set some on fire for cacti funerals and sigh, you have to put gasoline on them for a good burn)

anyway he brings the cactus there, leaves it vaguely hoping that the air conditioning will like, kill it (cacti live in the desert, right? so cold...bad?) and then somebody else will go "where the fuck did this dead cactus come from, can we throw it away" and then artem can throw it away (ALONG WITH THE REST OF HIS EMOTIONS. artem...GET HELP....)

but that doesnt happen because get fucked, artem wing

who names it Karla?

naming a plant most often comes from somebody who has gotten VERY ATTACHED TO THAT PLANT. i first thought hmmm maybe it's luke, but then i remembered that luke has this HILARIOUS tendency of making comments about eating MANY ORGANISMS HE COMES ACROSS (ssr shape of you, he threatens to cook and eat goose, chara story ep 1, hes very happy at eating the cooked crabs for their crab crimes, sr aquarium date forgot the name, hes like let's eat seafood SURROUNDED BY HAPPY ALIVE FISH, luke....what the fuck?) so maybe it's not luke and that leaves...

marius von hagen getting attached to a cactus and naming it is SO FUNNY TO ME but also makes me soft. hes the first one who sees the cactus in HQ and is like "who the fuck left this here?" //big data lab googling what it is. "well good thing it's fine with cold temps wouldve died if not, you cant just leave a thing in a place...with no warning....with no help...thats tough....huh, thats tough, isnt it, cactus?"

am i saying that marius von hagen gets attached to the cactus because it vaguely reminds him of his own life story of being pushed into very stressful circumstances and essentially left to fend for himself? yeah. yeah. because im deranged

"the cactus' name is karla," marius says at the next meeting, spraying the cactus with a mist bottle. "be nice to her or else im biting you."

who declares it a "therapy cactus"? aka who realizes that literally EVERYBODY else on the team is, one way or another, projecting themselves and/or their desires onto the PLANT???

luke. luke does. luke has the habit of dissociating and spiraling at any given moment when he encounters anything even ADJACENTLY related to what hes going through (again, sr aquarium date, luke u were just looking at the jellyfish, WHY R U GETTING DEPRESSED PHILOSOPHICAL OVER LIFESPANS???? SIR, GET HELP.....), so like lol he can clock that shit in from a mile away because hes the worst offender of that too

he doesnt bring it up of course. i mean, im sure he thinks about it because it's just the right kind of shithead move to pull just in case the others try to push him around again but mc gets mad at him when he goes agent scary at the rest of the boys so okaaayyyy he'll retaliate against getting dunked on in a more...civil way. so he doesnt bring it up. he also doesnt bring it up because...

well, if it makes them happy, then it makes him happy. thats all that matters to him

"keep making them all happy, yeah?" luke absentmindedly says to the cactus one day. "i heard you guys can live for a hundred years."

the cactus, of course, does not reply.

mc gets very into taking care of karla. pls expect many conversations where the boys are talking about the "cactus" (theyre talking about themselves) and mc is just like "okay im 90% sure this is a metaphor, you guys aint slick, but i like this cactus very much and thats true whether it's a metaphor or not."

all the boys: //PLEADING EMOJI WITH HEARTS

thanks for making me go insane over a cactus, Book. it's 8am here.

[mistingdreams]

Walmart Buddy

Imagine Wilbur goes shopping super late at night to avoid people and also because his day job has long hours, and he always sees the same kid going shopping at the same time.

One night the kid actually comes over to him to ask if he knows where the workers moved the battery isle because he can’t find it for the life of him and his roommate very needs some new batteries for their project.

Cue the first time Wilbur & Tommy interact.

Tommy insists on getting Wilbur a candy bar (it’s the one with the ugliest cartoon anteater Wilbur has ever seen, and Tommy says its because it’s a mirror)

They fall into a routine

They shop together, talking about their days and their whacky roommates

Wilbur starts to learn that Tommy attends martial arts lessons in his free time (which explains the bruises) and that the little gremlin is the funniest person he’s ever met

Wilbur shares the fact that he does music (no, he’s not going to start singing in the middle of a store) and that he works as a secretary in the hero tower

It’s not all that glamorous of a job, but Tommy seems enamored and asks him all the time about his interactions with the heroes

Their routine doesn’t break until one night, after nearly 5 months of being shopping buddies, Tommy never shows up much to Wilbur’s concern.

He doesn’t show up the next week either.

Or the one after that.

But then he sees the news, the villain of the week has one of the city’s most well known vigilantes, Hollow, hostage.

And then they rip off his mask and it’s Tommy.

When Wilbur goes into work the next day, he’s not just filing papers.

He sneaks into the tech department easily and steals gear, steals information, steals as much as he can.

Because that night the vigilante Den makes their debut.

Heroes storm the villain’s hide out 24 hours later only to find the place soaked in blood.

There’s no one left alive.

Hollow is long gone.

The only thing they have to go off of is a signed note from Den.

(Wilbur’s protective big brother calling card)

It informs the heroes that all records of Thomas Bennit are gone.

Tells them, that as long as they don’t come looking for Hollow, Den will leave them alone and never resurface.

Meanwhile, with BenchTrio and Wilbur, Tubbo is scrubbing their records from existence and Wilbur directs him on how to remove their records from the hero data base.

Wilbur returns to work, easily slipping under the radar for suspicion.

All items have been returned, all records in order.

The vigilante Hollow returns to the crime fighting scene a month later.

And if Den is scanning all the networks to redirect and stop any calls or reports concerning the young vigilante, no one has to know.

[thekidsarentalright]

Fob Survey Results

Hi! So, a few days ago I made a post asking u all to take a survey i made so i could, basically, just see the different opinions in the fandom and nearly 400 people responded, which is crazy! I didn’t know that many ppl still were in fob bandom 😳 Anyways, without further adieu, the results are enclosed below under the cut!

First, I wanna start with some disclaimers or lil housekeeping things. The first thing I wanna mention is that, obviously, this sampling of people is small compared to every single fan of them ever but regardless of that i’m still gonna be referring to it all very generally just bc that’s easier for me lol. Next, I made a pie chart for every single question just so there was a visual of it but a few of them are a bit stuffed, just because the sheer amount of variety in peoples answers, which is great! But I just wanted to warn, and assure that i’ll be breaking down the charts a bit below the pictures so it’s more comprehensible. Also everything is color coded to try and make it a little easier! Lastly, more info and like discussion about any of this is totally welcome! if u have q’s, ask me! 

Question 1: When Did You Become A Fan?

This chart is one of the more comprehensible ones, thankfully. It shows that the era most fans became a fan was srar era, with 104 people answering that. The era with the least being tttyg era with only 5 people (technically pre-tttyg era/folie era since no one answered those). It’s so cool, to me, to see such a variety of answers! Fob rly are timeless 😌

Question 2: What’s Your Favorite Album?

I feel, for me, this one wasn’t a big surprise. Folie is clearly the fan favorite with 37%, while take this your grave is in last with only 9 people saying it was their fav. Again, lots of variety in this which is pretty cool to see! (also sorry that ab/aps name got cut off lol)(Also also justice for abap and mania)

Question 3: What’s Your Favorite EP/Non-Album?

Here, Lake Effect Kid Ep dominated the results with 126 people saying it was their favorite. B-Side was sort of close behind, with Pax Am Days in third. Here, what surprised me, was that anybody answered with eowyg or llamania, tbh. And, though I didn’t include it in the chart, 7 people answered saying they didn’t have a fav or hadn’t ever listened to one of them!

Question 4: Who’s Your Favorite Member?

This was one of the most biased questions with nearly 50% of u saying Patrick is your fav. I expected that, though I thought it’d be more of a battle between him and Pete. The only thing rly worth saying, ig, is that Andy and Joe deserve more love :(

Question 5: Favorite Fob Related Artist?

When I made this question and put mcr as an option I knew they’d be number one, so that’s not a shocker, to me. Here are your guys’ top 3 fob adjacent artists: 1. My chemical romance 2. Paramore 3. Panic! at the disco And, honestly, rest didn’t stand a chance against those 3 which I kinda expected but it is nice to see Some people appreciating cobra and gch! (Misc. answers included bands like idkhow, waterparks, as well as green day and elton john! Lots of variety!)

Question 6: What’s Your Favorite Song?

This question is where it starts to get a bit messier. I did my best to make it as clean as possible, but it still def looks a little wacky (sorry). According to you all, however, your top 3 favorite fob songs are as follows: 1. Disloyal order 2. (Coffee’s for closers) 3. Hum hallelujah Now, I am not at all surprised that disloyal order is that high up there, nor does hum hallelujah surprise me but coffee’s for closers kinda does! I’m also shocked that ginasfs isn’t higher. (where’s tkaa tho)

Question 7: Most Underrated Song?

Luckily, I managed to get this one a bit more organized looking (in my eyes) but, again, sorry if it’s messy! Regardless, according to you all, the top 3 most underrated fob songs are: 1. You’re crashing, but you’re no wave 2. From now on we are enemies = Headfirst slide 3. Twin Skeleton’s (Hotel in NYC) = Coffee’s for closers What is the funniest, and most interesting to me here, is that there are so many ties and also that 2 of these songs (Headfirst slide and coffee’s for closers) were in your top 5 favorite songs... making them clearly not underrated. I was delighted to see you’re crashing at 1, though. It hits hard.

Question 8: Most Overrated Song?

Now, with this one, I fully expected the results I got. It was very predictable: The singles are the most overrated. Something about them playing nonstop on the radio 6+ years ago rly bugged y’all (/j). Here are your top 3 most overrated songs: 1. Centuries  2. Uma Thurman = Immortals 3. My Songs  I’m very very stunned to see what a catch on there. And to all the people that said mania and the kids aren’t alright: ow :(

Question 9: This Or That 1

All the this or that’s are pretty self-explanitory, I believe. By a very thing margin, you all prefer sugar over thnks fr the mmrs!

Question 10: This Or That 2

By another very thing margin, wams beat out just one yesterday.

Question 11: This Or That 3

A pattern you’ll notice is that all of these are super close... once again, by a thing margin, Immortals (famously disliked) beat out champion (even more disliked apparently)

Question 12: This Or That 4

This one was ridiculously close the entire survey, for a majority of it pavlove was winning, actually. But, at the very end, from now on we are enemies won it 183 to 146.

Question 13: This Or That 5

Lastly for the this or that series, we have the most biased one. I thought this would be closer, but clearly you all have a Lot of love for disloyal order, picking it over the kids aren’t alright 240 to 105. That’s fuckin crazy.

Question 14: What’s Your Favorite Lyric?

For this one, so many people answered so many different lyrics all presented in a different way that I physically could not bring myself to organize them like i did the previous song questions. So, I present to you the songs that were quoted/referenced the most and therefore are precieved to have the best lyricism, according to you all. The top 3 most mentioned songs are: 1. Disloyal order (shocker) 2. Hum Hallelujah 3. Wams = Miss Missing You What surprised me the most here was that apparently overrated songs appeared, with a few people mentioning centuries, my songs, what a catch among others. And that disloyal order once again came out on top. 

Conclusion: What I learned from this is follows; the fob fandom (on here) is made up of people with somehow both very varied and yet congruent opinions. We might not all have the same favorite album or ep but we do all lose our minds to disloyal order and think that patrick is the best which i think is just beautiful.  (Feel free to come into my inbox and talk to me about this!! Naturally, I have all the data- the stuff that’s hard to see or wasn’t shown on the charts is interesting too. I’d love to talk about any of it!)