#blarg writing is hard

[sunflowerdigs]

Reblogging again because I read it again and I do have one tiny difference of opinion. I think the first midpoint is the Nexus Event at the start of 1x04. It falls closer to the actual s1 midpoint and, imo, it shows us Loki manipulating time for the first time (inadvertently) through caring, a skill he goes on to hone and that becomes the series game changer. It's also the moment his goal. shifts from "gain power" to "make sure someone else is ok". That someone else is a variation of himself, so he's really (finally) putting his own emotional needs before his quest for power for the first time in his life. It's why the final line that he hears before he learns to control the timeslipping is a callback to the nexus event trigger ("Do you think that what makes a Loki a Loki is the fact that we're destined to lose?").

HWR doesn't understand love or its power, so I don't think it occured to him that Loki (who is 99% of the time a villain) could come to care for Sylvie if they met up. And he didn't anticipate the danger of that. He thought it would be like him and Ravonna (which, as you pointed out, is the midpoint of s2) and Loki would just dispose of her after gaining power. But Loki is different. Again...it's not romantic love, really, because Loki is viewing Sylvie as a variant of himself at the time. He also sees her as a separate person, as Sylvie, and he definitely has a crush on Sylvie and wants to get to know her more and maybe even have a relationship with her (up until the citadel fight, where, like you said, he realizes that she can't trust him). But he doesn't promise Sylvie that even if they lose they'll still survive because he doesn't really know Sylvie - he promises that to the part of Sylvie that is a Loki (in effect, making the promise to her and himself).

Idk. Hope that makes sense. I like...find it really difficult to talk about Loki and Sylvie. Because it sounds like I'm trying really hard to create something non-romantic because I don't like their romance but I'm not. Like you say, Loki's character development gets in the way of romantic Sylki, so it's important to understand that he is both (1) crushing on Sylvie as an individual and (2) kind of projecting onto/empathizing with Sylvie-as-Loki in order to nurture his burgeoning self love. And it's that second piece that wins out. So, even when he stops being romantically interested in her, he's still deeply invested in her future and her happiness.

honestly I'm more at a loss when people say sylki is canon. I am...very confused by what people mean by that. they were never anything romantic together? I honestly feel like I've missed a whole season of the show when that gets said. that's not from a shipping standpoint; that's from nothing happening that'd make them "canon"

like, to ship sylki is still to ship something that isn't and didn't become "canon". it's still wanting something that didn't happen between them

like, even if sylvie was an intended "love interest" (was she? even? on the basis of her being a woman that loki connects with?), I don't call that alone a romantic relationship between them being "canon". Like, if elizabeth bennet and mr darcy never became anything, they're not "canon". that's just something that could have been but wasn't.

they were never actually anything?

LET'S TALK ABOUT "CANON" & BISEXUAL REPRESENTATION, THE SERIES' MIDPOINT & THE THEME OF BETRAYAL, AND THE SUBJECTIVITY OF ROMANCE

I've been sitting on this inbox comment/ask for a long time because I wanted to make sure I respond in a way that feels productive, kind, and doesn't step on other fans' joy. Having said that, as a Lokius shipper, I think it's really important for Lokius shippers and Sylki shippers to unite on at least one subject and that's positive bisexual representation. This isn't meant to be a harsh reply--I understand what the anon is saying from their point of view--but I also want to delineate between canon and personal interpretation/taste.

I also want to note that it's unfair to disavow Mobius and Sylvie's impact on Loki, Loki's impact on each of them as a result of his individual relationships with them, and thus the impact Mobius and Sylvie have on one another separate from Loki. Doing so really halves the overall richness of the story, and taking this into account is why my metas are so annoyingly long. This one, in particular, is a mess but hopefully I've managed to wrangle it into some kind of coherence that addresses the anon ask that is respectful to Sylki. Fear not, Lokius shippers, I discuss Lokius in this post, too. But first, let's talk about canon and bisexual representation ...

CANON AND BISEXUAL REPRESENTATION

Canon is often defined as: 1.) what is actually written in text (as opposed to subtext), AND 2.) what the creator(s) verbally confirm.

I've said before and I'll keep repeating: the most important aspect of art is art's relationship with the reader/viewer. Individual interpretation is what escalates a medium to a deeply personal and, at times, spiritual level. Art is supposed to make us think and feel. We're supposed to interact with it and do with it what we will. This is particularly important when we consider that much of consumable art is hampered by the demands of capitalism. Fan-interpretation democratizes what people without power want to see and hear, whereas canon (especially mass media canon) often self-censures to sell to the widest audience.

From the creators' standpoint, Sylvie has always been intended to be Loki's romantic interest, and Loki was always intended to have romantic feelings for her. This is what the creators tell us. Whether or not one likes Sylvie and Loki together is subjective.

As for the text, the plot between Loki and Sylvie has the markers of a romance, albeit one that doesn't come into full fruition. By full fruition, I mean a happy ending with each character affirming one's love for the other and committing to being together. Now, a relationship doesn't have to be successful or reciprocal to be considered romantic. Heck, it can be absolutely toxic and still be romantic. Whether or not the plot is convincing in its execution of romance, however, is also subjective.

What romance requires is: 1.) at least one of the characters desiring the other, and 2.) at least one of the characters willing to sacrifice for the other. Sacrifices don't have to be big, either. They can be small and cumulative.

Canonically, Loki fulfills both of these romantic requirements for Sylvie. (More on Sylvie below).

Subtextually (that is, not canon as defined above), Loki and Mobius fulfill both of these requirements for one another.

I'm gonna soap box for the next two paragraphs, so you can skip over this if that's not your jam. Both romances, canonical and subtextual, can exist concurrently without erasing the existence of the other. Even if Loki and Mobius had miraculously become canon in S2 (it's Disney, this never would have happened but let's explore the hypothetical), that doesn't erase Loki's former romance with Sylvie in S1. To erase that history is bisexual erasure, which isn't okay. Likewise, quashing the importance of queer subtext in order to "kill the other ship" isn't okay either, as it reinforces optical heteronormative romance in mass media and is also a form of bisexual erasure.

What's more important than either ship "winning" is the positive portrayal of a bisexual character. This means a character who demonstrates genuine love and devotion to people of more than one gender. If we accept the canon AND the subtext (we don't have to like it; Sylki's not my cup of tea personally, but I accept it as real), Loki fulfills positive bisexual representation, however restrained that representation may be. The social goal is to get to the point where a media juggernaut like Disney allows its franchise characters to experience relationships with more than one gender canonically and positively. We're not there yet and I'll probably be dead before Disney ever gets there, but Loki can be seen as a historical stepping stone distinct from Aziraphale and Crowley (Good Omens) and Steve Bonnet and Edward Teach (Our Flag Means Death).

(NOTE: Polyamory is a whole separate subject matter, which I'm won't get into here.)

ON SYLVIE

There's fan dispute over Sylvie's interest in Loki. I've previously written meta on Sylvie's sexuality and how she responds to Loki's romantic advances here. In S1, while she starts off frustrated, I think Sylvie slowly develops interest and was cautiously hopeful that she and Loki could figure out their futures together. Loki has been consistent about wanting to be with Sylvie and supporting her up until the necessary plot conflict of the series midpoint (S1E6; the S1 finale). This midpoint is the root cause for why Loki and Sylvie's relationship becomes strained. Again, this doesn't mean that the romance never existed--the plotpoints are there--but it does mean Loki's character development got in the way.

So let's talk about the series' midpoint and the interplay of Mobius, Loki, and Sylvie's mutual impact. The three are so deeply entangled that it's worth untangling their cause and effect on one another.

THE SERIES' MIDPOINT & THE THEME OF BETRAYAL

I keep stressing in my other metas that the series' midpoint (S1E6) is the most critical. Structurally, midpoints are where the story turns. Midpoints occur on multiple scales: at the episode level (typically in acts 3 or 5, depending on how the screenwriter divides their screenplay), at the season level, and at the series level. Midpoints are what provide the overall narrative and character arcs with movement.

As a whole, there are 3 key midpoints in the entire series:

1.) S1E2/E3 - When Loki betrays Mobius for Sylvie (midpoint of S1)

2.) S1E6 - When Loki betrays Sylvie for the "bigger picture" (midpoint of the whole series)

3.) S2E3/E4 - When it's revealed HWR betrayed Renslayer; Victory Timely is brought into the mix, and Sylvie reluctantly joins the TVA (midpoint of S2)

There is another betrayal that runs near-concurrently with #2, which is Mobius's betrayal of Renslayer (it begins in S1E4 and continues into the S1 finale). Thematically, we can take Loki's betrayal of Sylvie and Mobius's betrayal of Renslayer as mirrors of one another because these are the only betrayals that are motivated by good rather than selfishness. The selfish betrayals of #1 and #3 bookend betrayal #2 to highlight the beginning Loki's readiness to become a hero in S1E6. Where S1 focuses on Loki exploring who he is, S2 focuses on the hero Loki will become. S1E6 therefore serves as Loki's turn, his launching point to get to where he lands in S2E6. The story is really well-structured!

The poetic irony is that Loki's S1E6 betrayal was not an act of villainy, but an act of character growth.

There is plot set-up for Loki's betrayal of Sylvie, and that set-up is 2-pronged: 1.) from Sylvie's end, her misinterpretation of Loki's intentions, and 2.) from Mobius's end, the provision of unconditional friendship. Building up to these prongs are S1E1 - S1E3, in which Loki's self-interest and impulsivity are emphasized. S1E4 pivots Loki from self-interest and impulsivity to consideration for others and caution. Sylvie did not bear witness to Loki and Mobius's interactions in S1E1-S1E2 and S1E4 in the time loop chamber. She has no context for why Loki would hesitate killing HWR. I'll discuss this more under "Prong 2".

PRONG 1: SYLVIE'S MISINTERPRETATION

In the scene below (S1E5), Sylvie makes an assumption about what Loki wants and Loki admits via subtext that ruling a timeline actually won't make him happy.

Sylvie smiles in response, implying she understands what Loki means, however Loki often speaks in double-meanings (he cannot be trusted) and Sylvie has doubts (she cannot trust). From Sylvie's point-of-view, Loki has discussed the desire to rule with her 3 times (writers' magic 3s again). Above is the third. The previous 2 are:

1.) In their first confrontation in S1E2, when Loki offers Sylvie the opportunity to be his lieutenant. (Can't find the gif of this. Grr ...)

2.) On Lamentis (S1E3) in the scene below:

By S1E6, Loki has no interest in rule.

He's honest when he says he's worried about the greater ramifications of killing HWR. Sylvie doesn't believe him. The question is how did Loki arrive at this point in his character arc? Why slow down now? Why worry about the consequences now?

The answer is in S1E4.

PRONG 2: MOBIUS'S UNCONDITIONAL FRIENDSHIP

It's established in S1E1 that Mobius knows Loki better than Loki knows himself and consequently better than Sylvie knows Loki. A lot of Mobius-haters despise Mobius's cold confrontational tactics but it is those same tactics that force Loki to self-reflect. And to be clear, Mobius uses cruelty in S1E1 because 2012 Loki would not believe in, let alone listen to, softness and compassion. Cruelty is a language 2012 Loki understands, therefore Mobius communicates with him on that level to get him to listen and start thinking about the answers to the hard questions.

Not exactly the gif I wanted, but close enough. In this scene, Mobius wonders why Loki, who "has so much range", wants a throne. He then asks Loki, what's next? The implication of these questions is that Mobius knows Loki will never be satisfied. He knows, deep down, a throne is a poor substitute for what Loki really wants: love, acceptance, and companionship.

Mobius's tone is mocking, his note that Loki has a wide range is complimentary, and the question is serious. Further, and this important, Mobius gives Loki respect in conjunction with his cruelty, his compliments, and his seriousness by acknowledging Loki's intelligence ("I am smart"; "I know") and his potential to be more than a villain ("That's not how I see it"). Understandably, this strange, dizzying mix of seemingly contradictory truths puts Loki off-balance.

Their tenuous allyship becomes a friendship in Mobius's eyes near the end of S1E2. Mobius is practically squeeing about Loki's multiple breakthroughs and how well they work together to Renslayer:

And Loki genuinely looks excited to help Mobius. Look at that fist-pump. Mobius doesn't see it, he's ahead of Loki, so his enthusiasm isn't an act. The seeds of mutual trust (rather than doubt) have been planted.

Unfortunately, Loki's poor impulse control and need to hedge his bets out of self-interest lead him to betraying Mobius. Both Sylvie and Mobius take Loki's betrayals poorly.

The key difference is that Mobius cannot resist the desire to trust Loki, to want to be his friend. This desire creates Mobius's doubt in Renslayer, which in turn leads to his betrayal of her.

Forgiveness isn't easy. It requires the ability to accept disagreements and another person's shortcomings. It requires good will, faith, and a willingness to move on. It requires compromise and, at times, letting go entirely.

Mobius torturing Loki with the Sif memory loop was awful. His personal hurt is directly tied to the below admission, which informs Loki what Mobius thought of their relationship:

And that revelation startles him. It forces him to evaluate his actions that led to Mobius saying such a thing (impulsivity; self-interest). Loki, who doesn't want to be alone, desires Mobius's friendship.

So when Mobius returns to Loki with an olive branch ...

Loki offers Mobius an olive branch of his own by affirming the friendship Mobius believed in but felt betrayed by.

Thus, Loki and Mobius accept each other's olive branches. They forgive each other and repair their relationship from there. This is critical thematically because Loki and Mobius each extend olive branches to Sylvie and Renslayer respectively, both of whom reject those olive branches more than once. Sylvie and Renslayer represent opposite ends of the chaos versus order ideology, for which neither is willing to compromise. Loki and Mobius also start out at opposite ends before meeting in the middle.

Sylvie unfortunately does not know anything about Loki's interactions with Mobius and how those interactions have impacted Loki's motivations. She doesn't know that Loki wants to "slow down and think about this" because the last time he acted on impulse, it turned out he almost threw Mobius's friendship out the window without realizing he had his friendship in the first place.

For her, the seeds of doubt have already been planted: Loki betrayed the TVA to pursue her, Loki expressed shock at Sylvie's desire to "walk away" rather than taking advantage of the "ultimate power vacuum" once the TVA is destroyed, he expresses the desire to rule 3 times. Therefore, it's perfectly reasonable for Sylvie to assume Loki would betray her for power even though she had hopes to the contrary. Romantic tragedy? Absolutely. Believable? Depends on who you ask and what your personal taste is.

There must be some kind of sentiment on Sylvie's part, however, because she chooses not to kill Loki. Instead, she kisses him goodbye and throws him through a time door.

Mobius's friendship is therefore the catalyst for everything that unravels between Loki and Sylvie in S1E6 (the series' midpoint). I think it's safe to interpret Sylvie's tearing into Mobius in S2E4 as not only due to being in the TVA and having all her traumas brought to the surface, but also due to experiencing jealousy. This level of anger matches Mobius's outrage about Sylvie in S1E4! Note, however, that this interpretation of Sylvie's interaction with Mobius is subtext. Subtext goes many ways!

THE SUBJECTIVITY OF ROMANCE

Are Loki and Sylvie a believable romance? It depends on your taste.

A fictional couple's overall successful reception by the audience (which is rarely if ever 100%) is contingent on a few things:

1.) Character development

2.) Story execution

3.) Chemistry between the actors

Reception and interpretation of the above are all subjective. In addition to these elements, another important factor is couple trope. Depending on your preference, some tropes might be nope while others are yum. You might even like most tropes but the actor chemistry, character development, and/or plot are just not doing it for you.

Loki and Mobius follow the tropes of:

Opposites attract/Complementary set

Sunshine and cynic

Enemies to allies to friends to lovers

Sherlock and Watson

Slow burn

Ride or Die

Loki and Sylvie, on the other hand, follow the tropes of:

Exceptionally similar but with key differences/Matching Set

BAMF duo

Enemies to allies to lovers

Bonnie and Clyde

Fast and passionate

Ride or Die

Loki and Sylvie's romantic dynamic may be compared to the following couples in other media:

Batman and Catwoman

Jack Sparrow and Angelica Teach

Benedict and Beatrice

If you notice, they all have very similar personality traits. They also fight and fight a LOT. It's part of their charm and can add to their chemistry.

Personally, I didn't feel any chemistry between Loki and Sylvie, I didn't feel like there was enough warmth between them, and I really wanted Loki to be loved by someone who makes an effort to understand him rather understanding his core traits off the bat by being the same entity. Loki and Mobius hit all the right story beats for me. Tom and Owen's chemistry as actors is remarkable. I'm also a sucker for ball of sunshine and cynic dynamics.

But that's just me. That doesn't mean I don't see what the creators tried to do with Loki and Sylvie in terms of plot, character development, and couple tropes. Some people felt chemistry between Tom and Sophia, others (like me) didn't. Whatever the case, the canon exists and the romantic tropes are there. I just feel the subtextual romance between Loki and Mobius is stronger and that, again, is my subjective judgment.

[grif-hawaiian-rolls]

You're my dad! Boogie woogie woogie

Species swap au, anyone?

Sangheili Tucker and human Junior

[cat-of-many-faces]

Is it this tiring to write for others?

I'm currently working on an alchemical charmset update and expansion for Exalted versus the World of Darkness and every time i finish a session of writing i feel physically tired.

Like, what the heck? I sure didn't hit the keys on my keyboard that hard, lol.

[storybounded]

Blarg, Idk what's wrong with me today. For the last few months really. I just feel I've hit a brick wall as far as writing and drawing. I was on a roll and then BAM, I'm flattened like W.ile E. C.oyote.

I apologize if this inconveniences threads and the like but whew. I'm trying to get it together, but it has been really difficult to wade out. It's no ones fault, I'm still excited for everyone's threads. Don't believe me not responding is me trying to ignore. I promise, I'm not.

I just feel as if I'm fresh out of inspiration and I don't want to give anyone bad replies, because I see the heart you put into starters and responses for me. Doesn't help I feel like I'm under continuous stress in my personal life, so that's always taking a toll. I just currently dislike the state I'm in right now and feel as if I'm throwing slop if I force myself.

I know this is probably me just in a low tide of creativity, and high tide will be back soon....So I'm trying not to be so hard on myself. But oof. Today has been me being exceptionally highly aware of the fact since I've been extremely brain brrr today.

I'll get it out of it. I always do. I just wish it was easier to deal with r i p

[starified-lizzy]

I figured I should redo my intro to my blog-

ELLO >:DDDD

(Edit/Update:) First of all, because my friend and I just had to deal with an art tracer;

YOU CANNOT TRACE, REPOST, CLAIM MY ART AS YOUR OWN OR *WHATEVER*. MY ART IS *MY ART*. MAKE YOUR OWN. ITS NOT THAT HARD AND EVERYONE STARTS SOMEWHERE.

Reblogs and comments are appreciated tho :3

Also- if you wish to use my art as a profile picture, you MUST give me credit as the first thing in your Bio/About me.

(Back to the original post)

Name’s Lizzy! Or Star! I really don’t give a fuck which you use!

Here’s my pronouns card! https://en.pronouns.page/@starified_lizzy

I draw shit for FANDOMS

I write shit for FANDOMS

I got OCS whom I LOVE and ADORE.

“Can I draw fanart of your fics?” My sibling in Christ, we are married. /pos

“Can I draw fanart of your fanart(like DTIYS)?” My sibling in Christ. /pos

“Can I draw fanart of your OCs?” CHRIST. /pos

RAHHHHHH (it’s really fucking early I shouldn’t be doing this now ;-;)

Here’s a list of my socials, it is very limited because I hate the “standard” socials like Twitter and Insta and stuff like that. So it’s more like- fanfic sites, and any other blogs I own for you guys to check out >.>

My AO3

My Art Fight

My YouTube

My TikTok (basically dead at this point, I only ever like/favorite things on it, but I might start up again with my FNF au instead)

My Pinterest

My Spotify because sure

My FNF au blog

My demonpocalypse blog ([possibly] forever retired due to a severe issue in the community it was for)

Blog for food/recipes I want to try because MMMMMMMMMMM FOOOOD

Wow that’s actually not limited like I thought- hot damn I need to touch some grass.

HERES A LIST OF FANDOMS IM EITHER CURRENTLY IN, OR HAVE RETIRED FROM (Also CCs):

Retired-

DSMP (and MCYT as a whole for the most part), dude our community is in *shambles*. I’m so glad I left when I did, but at the same time O W.

ATLA. Technically I’m still in this fandom, but I only really get back into it/brainrot about it if I get a reminder, otherwise I kinda forget about it

FNAF. Same with ATLA, still technically in it, but I gotta be reminded it exists sometimes.

BATIM. Ditto

Wings of Fire. Ditto

Undertale. Ditto. Lizzy, my main persona, was actually an OC created from Undertale, who just ended up becoming her own person, and then ended up being associated with mine and my friend’s Minecraft au instead.

Onto CCs I no longer watch:

Any of the DSMP ppl, with very few exceptions

Jacksepticeye. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll still watch a video of his if it pops up and spikes my interest, but I don’t actively seek his content out anymore.

Any of the old Minecrafters. Like DanTDM, Stampy, Tiny Turtle & Little Lizard. Hell, I don’t even think any of the ones I listed even do YT at all anymore. I’ll still watch their old videos tho.

Current-

FNF. I really could give less of a fuck if y’all think it’s “bad” or “for kids (it’s not, I promise you)”. The music slaps, and quite a few mods are really well made, so eat my ass.

Day of Dragons. The dragons are cool. I don’t care about any drama in the community. I’m here for the cool fucking dragons.

The Isle. Once again, I don’t care about any drama in the community. I’m here for the cool ass dinosaurs because you can customize your own skins and they just look and sound cool (Dilo, Herarra, and Ptera are my faves)

Lethal Company. Do it for the Company.

RainWorld. Scugs and Scups. Need I say more?

Hollow Knight. Sorta falling out of this one, but until I beat the entire game (P5) I am not finished.

Minecraft. Technically in “the fandom”, but not really attached to a specific YTer or anything like that anymore. I just like the game.

CCs I still watch:

Astral Spiff. Sprog is a good gamer.

Smii7y and his friends like Grizzy, Droid, Puffer, Blarg, etc.

Jack Manifold. I only watch his You Laugh You Loose and Ghost Sighting Compilation videos. I don’t even know if he still does Minecraft anymore.

8-BitRyan. While he doesn’t swear in his videos, it’s kinda a breath of fresh air. Plus his edits are quite funny.

Markiplier. Yes. Just… yes…

IGP. His content is just interesting. The way he freaks out over shit is funny as hell. Does he do content with IcyCaress anymore? Their banter was funny, but idk if something happened, cuz I just don’t see much stuff with Icy in it anymore.

As of right now, that’s all I can think of. It’s nice to meet you!

[r0ttingsystem]

North here and I'm about to rant about system stuff, enjoy

I'm going through survivors guilt rn, kinda

I just read the experience of a system with an extreme persecutor and just

I don't know, thought about everything

We don't have many internal conflicts, it's peaceful

Right now I can see the people in the front room

Yellow and Tommy are gossiping about each other's crushes

Grumbot is drawing for his best friend

All our small littles are in the corner napping

Grian and Dani are to either sides of me, zoned out thinking about their partners

William and Steven are talking about school, since both of their sources are being students

Will is trying to see what other cool thing he can do with his new body, since him and commet fused into a subsystem

John is on his chair sleeping

Mary is just laying down under a whole bunch of blankets asleep

Blarg is cleaning up the headspace living room thats connected to the frontroom

Everyone else is doing their thing, drawing, talking, writing, sleeping, going in and out of their rooms

I'm just here

Trying to comprehend everything

Thing to make sense of all of this

Why are we peaceful? How can we sit here doing our thing while other systems have to deal with so much in their innerworld

Hell, our 'worst' persecutor is sleeping in a wooden chair cuddling a plushie and a music box

It doesn't help that I'm one of the only ones that can remember/care about our past

When I formed our system was a mess, everyone physically and emotionally torturing each other, we were Trying to hold ourselves together by a thread. Everything was loud everything was so god damn loud

But now it's just, quiet

Sometimes that bothers me

Why can't it be loud again I was used to be running around being one of the only ones willing to help the system

My brain is still in that mode

That I can't relax, if I do something bad will happen

But I know that nothing will happen

I know I can just lay down and take a nap for a while

I can't do my rounds? Rowan will be happy to run around headspace to check everything, he's a dog he'll be more then happy

Something going on in outerworld? Grian and Lio will take care of it

Something going on in innerworld? Again Lio could help, or if anyone needs advice they can ask dani

I know I can relax

But the thought of relaxing makes me more anxious then I can put into words

I feel like I'm the only one of a generation that has survived

The only ones from our "old system" that are still here are me, Mary and commet ,I guess will counts too cuz they share a body now, madness, misery and some more people I don't currently remember

But it doesn't bother them like it bothers me

Mary couldn't care less, commet/will too

Madness and misery don't remember much of anything really

And then there's me, it's my job to remember and to care about it, I have a whole office full of all the system information I can gather, which is most likely 1/3 of everything

And I don't understand why I'm at peace with that

Why do I like doing my job? Why does it calm me?

am I just a secret autism holder who's obsessed with information? Likely XD

Ah, that joke reminded me my job used to be a comedian, and I fucking hated that

I don't understand any of this and I'm trying to be at peace with that

But it's so hard when I'm obsessed with information to the point I beg people to let me rant to them about our system

I don't know where this was going but, thank you for listening to me

[not-alien-girl-v]

hi love ur work!!! could u write an eddie munson x reader where reader tells him she’s pregnant and he kills himself in the upside down instead of being a parent. also could y/n be secretly vecna? thanks 🤩🤩

I'm on my way to tell my boyfriend, eddie munson, that i'm pregnant. i'm so scared he will be upset, but i know he loves me, and deep down i know that he would never hate me for anything. i'm just so scared for such a big change. a baby is a huge responsibility! i hope we can make it through this endeavor!

i knock on his door.

'KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK'

he opens it and i see him, wearing his iconic hellfire t-shirt and jean jacket, hair a frizzy mess, but that was my man! i lunge forward and trap him in a hug, pee stick in hand.

"why are you so happy? especially when vecna is going around killing everyone!" eddie warns me. little does he know... hehehe.

i show him the pregnancy test in my hand. he jumps back. "EW DON'T TOUCH ME WITH IT!" he exclaims as he wipes the peepee off of his clothes.

"sorry! i'm just so happy! we're gonna have a baby!" i smile big at him but he doesn't smile back. what's wrong, i wonder.

"i-is it mine?" he asks me like a dumbass.

"of course it's yours! i'm not a slut, munson!" i poke fun at him. he still doesn't smile back.

suddenly, over a walkie talkie, a frantic voice starts talking. i think it's dustin, his weird little friend. he's already basically a father figure to those young boys in his dnd club. i don't get why he isn't happier to be a real dad!

"listen... y/n... you should probably go... don't call me... don't come by my house... we're done"

"EDDIE NOOOOOO!" i scream but it is too late. he kicks me out of his trailer, and i land hard on my ass on the cold, hard, ground.

i'm so fucked!

___

on the boat at lover's lake, above the entrance to the upside down

"so, how are things between you and y/n, eddie?" steve asks him, looking wearily down at the glowing portal below. no one knows where exactly it could magically transport them.

"she told me she was pregnant, so i dumped her ass!" steve high fives him at this.

"nice one man!" steve is happy at this.

"shut up you two! we have to jump down there to the portal! we have no idea what might happen to us, though! what are we going to do?" nancy worries like the worrying bitch she is.

"i'll go first" eddie volunteers.

"eddie no! it coul dbe dangerous!!!" robin warns like the hot bitch she is.

"girl. danger is literally my middle name!" eddie tells her sexily then jumps off the boat into the unknown. they all follow soon, hoping eddie doesn't lead them to certain death.

___

as sooon as eddie wakes up, he is face to face with y/n, his pregnant ex-girlfriend. "w-what?"

"hi eddie" she says

"this can't be real!" he says but looks around and sees the rest of the gang down there with him.

"you bet your ass it is! if you don't want to be a father, then all your friends will have to die! also blarg!! i'm vecna! i'm actually evil and stuff and you r baby will be half vecna half munson!"

"noooooooo!" eddie curses the heavens above for his terrible fate. "it's a good thing i always carry around a rope!"

eddie takes out his pocket-rope and walks to a vecna tree, which is like a regular tree but it's in vecnas house and thats scary!

he ties a noose with the rope, and gets up on a chair.

"omg eddie nooooooooo!" steve cries but it is too late, eddie has tied the rope around his neck and jumped off.

he is now dead!

"noo! how will i ever raise my baby now!"

"omg girl he's dead..." robin whispers to nancy and nancy agrees bevcause its true.

"now you all have to go! prepare to die, teens!" y/n/vecna says in her vecna voice and she does the clock thing and then robin and nancy and steve all die from the vecna curse of whatever scares them or something.

"haha!" y/n/vecna exclaims in victory!

[commander-gloryforge]

okay since this has gotten a lot more notes than i would've liked it to get, and while i'm happy to see others feel validated and resonate with this, let my try to clarify things a bit since i dont think i worded this post in a way to really say what i wanted to say.

before i say anything though i want to note that this post was created 1. in the middle of the night when my brain is the meanest and 2. because of general personal issues/fears that i currently face that are unrelated to gw2 but just happened to carry over into my fandom activities

this wasn't meant to be a complainy "weh nobody likes me ocs" kind of post. i have a couple of people that like my ocs and even if they didnt, thats not gonna stop me. its more about struggling to keep up with a fandom very centered around creation when when you dont have the energy to create, and a very personal yearning for finding friends and community, especially since i'm currently in a headspace that makes finding "my people" very hard and very scary. i know there are a bunch of people that like my ocs. i know that because they tell me and i love them and kiss them on the lips also. but sometimes theres still a very somber feeling looming over me.

like yes obviously in a fandom you have to interact to be interacted with, you cant stand in a corner hiding behind a houseplant at a party and then expect someone to drag you onto the dance floor. even if its scary, youll have to talk to people and put yourself out there if you want to get something back.

but i think because this community is so heavy on ocs, art and writing, it'll feel difficult to keep up and really "truly" be a part of it if one "can't" draw/write/edit etc or doesnt share it online or doesnt do it consistently. there's going to be a pressure to create "content" (blarg) in order to keep up and stay "relevant" (blarg²) and "interesting" (blarg³).

this does feel a little isolating at times and one may start to believe that they don't belong or that their characters arent as interesting. that they have to create "proper" stuff in order to keep up with all the fantastic work this community produces. and this is kind of an experience one might have in any community that is heavily focused on ocs.

i'm also aware that there are no "cool kids" (and i probably should've put it in quotes in the original post) or as @hawkepockets said in his reply "there is no inner circle of popular creators & posters that anyone is being denied admission to", but in the end there's still people and/or friendgroups one would see as more known inside the community, people with ocs that everyone kind of knows their name of, that everyone gets excited over when they show up at an event, that are known because their creators put tons of art and posts out about them, that seem to have so many friends and connections to other people and their ocs. and i guess its natural to be like. man wish that were me but i dont have the time/energy/whatever to be that present within my fandom. theres a struggle with finding friends because everyone already seems to be grouped up and especially if its difficult for someone to keep up conversations or socialise, it'll easily feel like one may not be interesting or "cool" enough.

then again i had people reblog this post that i consider to be "popular" or "bigger figures in the fandom" so i suppose that also says something about something. i think.

in the end i didnt even want this to come off as a vent. and while i'm fine with people in the tags airing their feelings out, what i would've liked this to be was a post with maybe a couple of likes and people who don't create as much art or don't appear on everyone's dash a thousand times a day to go "yea! i don't really do much either! lets be besties!". and that did partly work, but on the other hand i also feel like maybe i've worded it too bitchy whiny, which wasn't my intention in any way.

my brain is kind of fogging up and i'm forgetting what my point is as i write so i'll wrap this up. i do feel like i did in fact not clear up shit but uh. well yeah. idk.

fellow guild wars 2 enjoyers that arent popular and part of the cool kids and have ocs that everyone knows/loves and create banger fanart and post really good fics and all that

fellow guild wars 2 enjoyers that are just kinda there and kinda average

lets band together. and maybe kiss.

[the-storytellers-seer]

Fickle Muse

What was that, Lassie? Did Lirael fall into a well? No? She fell into a vat of radioactive goo and became a superhero? None of those things? She just somehow pissed off her muse and was unable to write anything even moderately decent?

Yeah so...hiiiii. I'm still here, trying to write.

I'm stuck trying to write Sarea and Teldryn's battle through Miraak's Temple with Frea. And there's a part of me that's wants to gloss over the whole nonsense, but another part of me that doesn't because I can't gloss over all the battles just because I don't enjoy writing them. Blarg.

In other news, I'm also working on a one-shot prompt. Again, set in the same timeline as Sarea's story. This time with everyone's favorite grumpy werewolf. Wherein introvert werewolf escorts extrovert alchemist girl to Windhelm and they solve a murder together.

It's totally a one-shot...even though it feels like it might be a really short three-chapter thing...

Anyway, here's a blurb:

The Imperial girl was back. Ostensibly, he knew she arrived every Morndas a few hours after sunrise, but her presence was something of a shock to his senses every week. So much so, that Vilkas preferred to stay far away from the hall when she arrived to deliver her packages to Tilma. It wasn’t just her voice—loud and excessively bright like a pealing bell, or her wide smile that she foolishly greeted everyone with like annoyingly insistent beam of sunshine after a night of carousing. No, it was her scent. The combination of lemons and lilacs--like the girl herself--was annoying bright and tooth-rottingly sweet. He'd made the mistake of lingering over his morning meal to speak with Skjor about the previous day's dragon attack—and the woman who’d devoured the beast’s soul—when his nose filled with the cloying scent of her…mere moments before her overly loud voice rang through the hall. “Good morning, Companions!” she crowed.

A few hullos echoed back to her. Vilkas gritted his teeth and stood, with barely a nod toward Skjor as he stepped away from the bench. The entirely wrong move as her sun-bright-on-the-snow smile aimed toward him. “Good morning…um…I’m sorry I have a hard time telling you and your twin apart, are you Farkas?”

Vilkas’ felt his teeth grind together and he took a breath through his nose in a vain attempt to calm himself. She was an idiot, he decided. A migraine-inducing idiot with less sense than a rabbit. His eyes slid shut briefly as he fought against the urge to tell her so. He was not some brash youth with more anger than sense anymore. He was a man grown and fully capable of calmly distancing himself—his calming inhalations had the unintended effect of drawing in more of the scent. The sweet, clean scent bringing to mind freshly washed linens drying in the mountain air, tangling up his thoughts for the briefest of moments. It caused him to step closer, his finely tuned senses detecting the increase in her heart rate, but not the scent of fear. When his eyes slid open, he was much closer to her than he’d intended. Her small face tilted upwards at an almost comical angle given the fact that the top of her head barely came up to his sternum. Her eyes were a deep greenish brown like a mossy forest floor. They stared up at him with expectation and a surprising lack of intimidation given the way he was looming over her. “No, sorry, you’re Vilkas, aren’t you? Sheesh, that was rude of me! Have you seen Tilma I’m here to drop off the alchemy order.”

He was saved from having to answer—or even after to find his tongue at all—by the aforementioned woman. “Ah Luci! Sorry I was delayed in the kitchens!”

Just like that, the woman flitted away and Vilkas found himself able to move and think again. The opportunity was used to sneer at the ground before he hurried out into the training yards without giving into the urge to glance back.

[jedimordsith]

Inspire Me?

Writing like it’s homework on Gift over here. (Still. Again. Ugh.)

If you have/are reading it, tell me something you want to see happen? Or really, really don’t want to see happen in upcoming chapters?

[writing-for-me-at-this-point]

v. Streaming Clips | Obey Me | Actor AU

        *I have been watching McNasty videos... lord help me. Here are some stream moments. :)

        *Satan, Solomon, Beel, Belphie, and MC all stream together... all while smoking some good bud. This ensues.*

        *Satan is Grizzy, Solomon is Blarg, Beel is Doo, Belphie is Soup, and MC is McNasty*

        *We can make Levi Yummy*

        THIS CHAPTER WILL CONTAIN HUMOR THAT IS OFFENSIVE

Tags: @weebartistinc​ 

Satan: Ya know, everybody wants to talk about equality, but y'know there's- there's breast enlargement. 

Satan: What about penis enlargement? Not pills, but just like, surgery. 

MC: There is...

MC: Ya know what they do? It's like... every man has like 3 or 4 inches of dick that's like, in their body.

MC: And they just... pull the rest of it out.

Beel: REALLY?!

Satan: So what you're sayin' is... I HAVE HOPE?

Everyone: *laughs*

Belphie: So if I PULL HARD ENOUGH?!

Everyone: *laughs*

MC: I've never heard you guys get more excited about something in your entire lives...

Beel: Can you tell we all have small penises? We're like tryna be average out here!

Satan: 3 to 4 inches... is that true?

Belphie: Damn, I ain't even got three inches right now, shit!

Solomon: Ya mean I got more inside me than outside?

Belphie: Shit girl, you want a dick pic? You gon' need an x-ray!

Solomon: My dick is a fuckin' iceberg!

*****************************

Levi: Pussy tastes awful :(

Satan: Excuse me?

Levi: It tastes like somebody took sweet 'n sour sauce and spit in it and then breathed all over it...

Levi: And then fuckin' farted on it.

Satan: *giggling* Levi had a bad experience, holy shit!

Belphie: You gotta eat pussy like you're taking a shot.

Belphie: You just gotta like- gotta like close off your... breathing, pretty much.

Satan: *cackling* You gotta close off your sense of smell and everything, dude.

Belphie: Yeah, you just kinda like... *makes a licking sound*

Solomon: Have the girls you guys have been with never fucking showered before?

Solomon: Like whats going on?

Satan: That's what i'm wondering!

Belphie: It's like- Not a matter of-

Solomon: Are you sure you're not rimming them?

MC: *dies of laughter*

Everyone: 0.0

MC: Oh my god... did nobody hear what Derek said?

Belphie: Nah- what did- what did Derek say?

MC: *still laughing* He said, "Are you sure you're not rimming them?"

Belphie: I've been eating ass this whole time!

Solomon: You mean THAT ONES THE PUSSY?

MC: This pussy tastes like shit!

Satan: Been eating ass the whole time...

*****************************

Belphie: To the windoooooow to the wall... to when I get thrown in federal prison for drinking blood outside of a gas station.

Everyone: *laughing*

MC: What goes on in your brain sometimes...?

Solomon: Is that how the song went?

Beel: What drugs are you on?

MC: Did you just like... start writing a poem and start reading it off to us?

MC: WTF was that?

Belphie: Idk man... I'm just talkin' and playin' the game.

*****************************

MC: I'm fuckin' hungry right now! I need some chitlins!

Levi: Some chitlins?

MC: I need some chitlins and some greens...

Belphie: I need some ox-tails and some pigs feet!

Belphie: And chitlins!

Levi: *mocking Belphies accent* And cow tounge!

Levi: Get that shit in my stomach right now, boy!

Belphie: I want some ox-tails and some gravy w/ some chitlins!

Levi: Ya! Ya saw him like that back there, boy! 

Levi: *Says some shit in too heavy of an accent to understand*

Levi: Ya boy!

Satan: Oh, jesus, SHUT THE FUCK UP OH MY GOD!!!

Belphie: I WANT SOME OX TAILS 'N SOME CHITLINS 'N SOME GRAVY!!

MC: God, you gotta be from the DEEP south to be cravin' that kinda shit...

MC: I'M HUNGRY I WANT SOME FUCKIN' PIG TOUNGE!

Belphie: I want some crawfish and ox tails sittin' in gravy!

Levi: With the shells on! I like crayfish w/ the shells on...

Beel: What the hell is happening?

Belphie: IMMA GRAB A CRAWFISH OUT THA RIVA 'N EAT THAT BITCH RAW

Belphie: WITH SOME GRAVY.

[charmerquilled-aa]

I think... at the end of the week, I’m going to take a week long hiatus. I’m tired of saying I’ll be here. I’m tired of saying that I’ll try to get to things when in reality, I won’t. I’m admitting to myself right here and now that I have writer’s burn out. I want to write with you. I want to plot with you. Gosh, I want to talk to all of you sweeties. But I keep striking a damp match that won’t light, no matter how hard I try.  

It doesn’t help that there was a point I felt REALLY confident in my writing muse when I first took up Rakan back in July, only for it to be ripped away a week later because of my grandmother having her first two falls. That really...changed everything for the rest of the year. It pounded my writing muse back into the dirt, and it hasn’t recovered, especially after the chaos that happened with my grandmother in March. The last 9 months has honestly been hell on my mental health. I need to make time for me. I need to make time to draw, to watch shows I’ve been missing out on, etc. Because right now, on top of all this anxiousness I’ve felt about writing, I’ve also been so scared to start things I want to do. I’m literally fearful that I’ll have to drop everything and be a caretaker on 24/7 call because I’m the only one around to do it. I know that will not happen anymore, but in my mind, it’s still the reality that could happen and it’s hindering me. I need to take time and tell myself that everything will now be okay. That I can move on. 

I’m just bLARG. A tired sweet potato who needs a break from writing to take time for me. TL:DR: Maybe Saturday-ish I will be put my blog on a week long hiatus and will be deleting the app on my phone. I will still stock the queue with my artwork, headcanons, and such, but no threads will be placed inside because I just. can’t right now. Hopefully, you’ll understand. I know you guys will be around when I come back. You can’t get rid of me that easily ♪(´▽｀)

I. Really need to practice what I preach when I tell you guys to focus on your mental health first and foremost before this site LOL.

[due4amiracle]

Day 258

Over the past couple of days, i’ve been fading in and out, so, not a whole lot got done. But ya know. Here’s what i’ve got.

Listo:

Wash 2 plates/bowls/pieces of silverware, 2 chapters, Dailies, Vamp shiz, 2 anime eps.

Wash 2 plates/bowls/pieces of silverware - Nope🚫

2 chapters - Under the Whispering Door by T.J. Klune 100%, White Smoke by Tiffany D. Jackson 100%, The Mask of Mirrors by M. A. Carrick 3%, Defy the Night by Brigid Kemmerer 0%, True Dead by Faith Hunter 0%. Ok so. Whew. UtWD: 4.5🌟 Oh. Oh. Whew. i blitzed through about 70% of this book in one day - and promptly spent the last 30% of it sobbing. This book teetered on the edge of "DNF" for the first, oh, 30% of it because gottverdammt Wallace was a piece of absolute shit. But damn. Damn did he redeem himself, over and over and over and over and over again, in SO many ways that i did not even see coming. Ok i saw a lot of them but WOW. Wow. WS: 4🌟 That... INCREDIBLY abrupt ending lost it a full ass star because... WHAT HAPPENS THO?! What a FANTASTIC book that just... fell off a cliff into the abyss and stopped dead. Done. Wild. Up next is The Mask of Mirrors by M. A. Carrick! ...and of course i get thrown off by all my holds coming in. So also!  Defy the Night by Brigid Kemmerer AND , True Dead by Faith Hunter! Blarg.✔

Dailies - Waifu Did mah dailies! Also, level 50 BP now~! AND! Tree lvl 14! New week new weeklies! Too many rolls until pity, not enough time. Rip. FFXIV did mah dailies~ MSQ +1 -> 66, BTN +1 -> 75, CUL +0 -> 75, WVR +1 -> 76, GSM +1 -> 73, FSH +0 -> 61, MIN +0 -> 66, ALC +1 -> 48, LTW +2 -> 56, ARM +1 -> 48, CRP +4 -> 46, BSM +4 -> 47. Vath 280/1730 Rank 7/9 Sworn, Vanu 400/990 Rank 5/9 Respected, Moggles 300/360 Rank 2/9 Recognized. No FFXIV was done. Sad. ✔✔

Vamp shiz - Outside of watching LABN, i did a few smaller scenes here and there. No writing got done, but that’s ok. ✔

2 anime eps - Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu: Sukeroku Futatabi-hen! Nope🚫

Other things -  Yesterday i had my first meeting with a psychologist. Of course, it was a prelim "i'm going to ask you a million questions" kinda thing but... oof. It was still exhausting and oh shit did the imposter syndrome smash me in the face so hard. Like. Whew. Yea. It was rough, but good. Good. It's good to finally be seeing someone, and i'm finally going to be getting all the bits and bobs in my brainplace figured out and get on the proper medications and... i know it's going to be a rough road. But it's worth it. Whew. 

Today, proper, was first day of Acthar. Yay? 😬 Hell.

Food: A Liquid: A Pain: C Brain: C

Tomorrow: Wash 2 plates/bowls/pieces of silverware, 2 chapters, Dailies, Vamp shiz, 2 anime eps.

Ever Onwards and Upwards!

[turquoisephoenix]

What’s A Little Galaxy-Wide Destruction Between Friends? - Chapter 2

Chapter 1

Five days after saving the galaxy from the Deplanetizer, Elaris is greeted by an old friend, who wishes to talk to her, vent a little, and give her life advice. Unfortunately for her, her old friend also happens to be a freshly transformed robot version of a dangerous criminal madman that everyone believed was dead. Elaris & Dr. Nefarious friendship Characters: Elaris, Dr. Nefarious, Lawrence, Qwark (mentioned) ————————————————

Author's Notes: I also mainly wrote this to write down a headcanon I had for why Dr. Nefarious wanted to blow up Umbris as his main plan in the movie, when a galaxy-wide explosion leading up to "just" city-wide takeovers and roboticization kinda seems like a downgrade on the evil scale. Plus at the end of the day, Nefarious kinda is a goofy idiot in addition to being an evil mastermind.  

Also because Elaris is a gamer and we stan a gaming legend.

----------------

Three weeks had passed since the incident on Umbris and Elaris couldn't be happier.

The weapons technician was grinning from ear to ear as she entered her workplace, practically bouncing on her heels as the events of today's meeting still making her giddy. She set down a bunch of cardboard boxes she was holding down on an empty table and pumped her fists in the air. A scream of joy filled the air.

At last! She was moving out of the broom closet and getting a proper laboratory! They finally listened to her! No more bottles of cleanser and pails of dirty water! No more having to say "excuse me" and awkwardly shove past the janitor to get to her office! No more terrible smells!

At first the process was as slow as it always was - everyone kept pushing back her appeals because they kept saying they had more pressing matters to attend to, where would we find the space, surely this could wait when we just saved the galaxy, Qwark has another book signing today - but then she did something that they didn't expect from a passive nerd like her. Elaris dug in her heels and let herself get a little angry about this issue. She'd raise her voice a little bit, she demanded a little more respect, until finally the group listened.

In other words, she channeled a bit of her inner Dr. Nefarious.

But just a little bit. The part of him that didn't want to murder anybody.

Elaris looked at the corkboard in her office with Dr. Nefarious's photo still pinned to it, where the perfectly happy and organic Nefarious smiled with the blissful unawareness of what would happen to him after that picture was taken. She couldn't help but smile back, even though the person in the photograph tried to blow up the galaxy - with her in it - last month.

She really did have that weird dream meeting with Dr. Nefarious to thank. As the days went by, she started to see that one incident with the robot version of Dr. Nefarious sneaking on her spaceship and coaching her on her job as less of a thing that happened and more like a vision. A spiritual calling if you will.

Sure, it felt real. And for a while, she earnestly believed that it was real. But as the days went by and as her brain thought about it for a little while longer, Elaris began to rationalize to herself that no, it didn't happen and her patrol shift near Umbris was so boring that she fell asleep and had a strange nightmare of a screaming zombie robot telling her to quit her job.

Which is why she wasn't worried about the notification from a "DrN42" popping up on her account after she started an online session of Resistance: Fall of Blarg after her shift.

Apparently they were already friends and their last online activity was years ago, but it was an older game so she thought nothing of it. She accepted and settled into her chair, also thinking nothing of it when the voice chat booted on. She cracked open a can of Nanotech Gamer Fuel Cola ("the drink of true 133ts!" as it said on the side) and adjusted her headset.

"What's up, DrN42." she said into the microphone, in the tone of voice she used for livestreams.

"Testing...testing..."

Elaris made a tiny yell and jumped, her can of Cola flying out of her hand and crashing onto the floor.

Yes, there was no denying it. The voice on the other end of voice chat was Dr. Nefarious. The Dr. Nefarious that was supposed to be dead. The Dr. Nefarious that was supposed to be a figment of her imagination.

Immediately she remembered why the username was still on her friend's list - before he quit the Galactic Rangers, Elaris would try to get him to blow off a little steam by playing a couple online matches, usually after he got into another shouting match with Captain Qwark. She remembered days where both of them were standing side by side in the crowded broom closet, their shoulders touching as they were both in The Zone...

She shook that memory away before she dwelled too hard on it, her face flushing. She hated how much she missed the company of a criminal mad scientist.

That also meant she didn't just imagine that one meeting back on her spaceship. The weird robot in her dream that was yelling to a Lawrence over a cellphone and breathing like he still had a pair of lungs was real and now he was playing an online game with his old work username. Her mind reeled at the revelation.

"I heard a yelp so speakers seem to be working..." he said calmly, snapping her back into reality.

"How...." she stopped herself. "Okay, seriously, what are you even doing?" Her brain was still trying to play catch-up with what was going on. She fought to calm herself down - it's not like he could physically threaten her over an online game or anything after all - as a harsh metallic voice filtered through her speakers.

"I ran into a bit of inventor's block. Managed to get the wi-fi working from the crash site and worked my way there." he explained evenly. She couldn't see, but back on Umbris, he was currently sitting in a chair made out of stolen spaceship parts and twiddling a small wrench in-between two claws as he gently tweaked the sensitivity of his game controller, which was a Frankensteinian chimera of scrap metal and loose wires sitting in his lap.

Behind him, Lawrence was silently dusting. Lawrence didn't want to play, which was fine for Nefarious, because he didn't want to construct a second controller.

"You..." Elaris was still having a hard time making sentences work.

"If you must know, if you take about five repair droids and rip the wiring and chips out of their miserable carcasses, you can cobble together a working game controller out of them." his voice remained calm and at a normal speaking volume, but running underneath it was a seething undercurrent of hatred. "All you really need is some soldering materials and a small screwdriver."

"This is insane." she said, stating the obvious.

"I get that a lot, yes." he continued. Lawrence made a quiet amused noise under his breath but Nefarious wasn't paying attention. "It takes an additional two repair droids for the headset-"

"What if I tell the Galactic Rangers that you're still alive?" she blurted out suddenly, the words falling out of her mouth. She immediately clapped her hands over her mouth in an act of instant regret, but Nefarious didn't seem phased.

"Then you'd have to explain to them how you'd know this information, Elaris." he answered. Even though she could only hear his voice, she could just feel the smug smile crossing his metallic face. "And wouldn't that be an awkward conversation to your fellow galactic heroes?"

Crud, Elaris thought to herself. No wonder he was so calm.

"I'm also using a frequency jammer so don't try tracing my connection back to me. One of the first things I learned during my untimely stay in a prison cell was how to leech wi-fi and go completely undetected..!" he said with a sinister voice, his words taking on such an evil tone that didn't betray the fact that the main reason he learned how to leech wi-fi was because he didn't want to miss any seasonal events in League of Legendaries and wanted to keep his place in the top PVP DPS lists.

"Are you going to use this as blackmail?" she said in a tinier voice than she meant to.

"N-No?" he said incredulously, taken aback. The way he said it instantly defused most of the tension hanging in the air. He sounded almost hurt, of all things. "Calm down, Elaris. I just want to play Resistance and I just happened to see you online. What kind of person do you take me for?"

'Someone who's backstabbed everyone he's ever worked for?' flashed through her mind and while she didn't say it out loud, Nefarious could practically read her mind from the long silence that followed, which caused him to clear his cybernetic throat in embarrassment. There he goes doing the non-robot things again. At least he was consistent.

"I just want to play one online match. You know...for old time's sake. After that, I'll disappear. What do you say?"

She wasn't sure what made her say yes. Was it something in the tone of his voice? Was it curiosity? Or did she believe this was another weird dream, similar to the previous weird dream back when she was patrolling Umbris?

'Stupidity, probably' she thought to herself as DrN42's character loaded into the waiting room. She did the wave emote. In response, DrN42 shuddered a bit and then started walking into a wall. She heard grumbles of annoyance and the angry hammering of buttons as DrN42's attempt at emoting proved disastrous. He managed to get the dance emote working before he sank into the decorative pool that was in the training area map and drowned.

"Are you having any problems there, buddy?" she asked as he respawned and then proceeded to get his character wedged between two bushes. The hammering of buttons continued echoing into her ears.

"Ever had all of your fingers surgically removed and replaced with sharp, clumsy metal claws meant for rending organic flesh and not much beyond that?"

"No?"

"Well....that makes one of us...." he said glumly as his character lurched forward right into another wall. He controlled like someone who never played a video game in his life. He found the fire button and his character started shooting wildly into the air.

"Did you even practice beforehand?" she said in amusement, watching him figure out the controls.

"N-no...." he admitted sheepishly. His character fell into the pool again. "I'll say I have bad lag!"

"Well, too late for any regrets because our match is starting." She warned him, her eyes locked on the countdown clicking down on the HUD. A smile of amusement crossed her lips. This was going to be a virtual trainwreck and she was ready for it.

"Wh-what-"

Before Dr. Nefarious could finish his weak protest, they were both immediately loaded into bleak post apocalyptic ruins. Shades of brown and toppled skyscrapers surrounded them from all directions. Elaris adjusted her headset like a grizzled war veteran as the heavy metal soundtrack of Fall of Blarg flooded the broom closet.

To say that Nefarious "sucked" at this game was an understatement, and possibly an insult to creatures that sucked things for nutrients. Nefarious was so bad at this game that Elaris wondered if there was a correlation between his sudden drop in gaming skill and his unwanted transformation, and made sure to make a mental note to never turn into a robot. He played worse than someone who intentionally played bad for cheap clicks on YouTube, and that was saying something. Elaris was positive was one of his deaths was because he accidentally shot himself in the face with his own weapon, and she didn't even think that was possible in Fall of Blarg.

"Wow buddy, you're kinda bad at this game!" Elaris said as she killed the soldier that was camping on Dr. Nefarious's body and keeping him from respawning.

"SHUT UP, I'M REALLY RUSTY!" was his response.

Elaris couldn't help herself. She was on the battlefield of Resistance: Fall of Blarg - a game where she livestreamed with the Galaxy's greatest champions, a game where she ruled with an iron fist as Queen. He was in her domain now and not even his new robot form could protect him from her fury.

"Oh no, are you already getting rust?" she mocked playfully.

"NOT HELPING!"

"I could suggest some derusting agents, I know you're new to the whole robot thi-"

"WHAT WAS THAT? I CAN'T HEAR YOU, MY HEADSET'S ACTING UP!"

Elaris broke out into a fit of laughter, which caused Nefarious to nervously chuckle on his end. She couldn't help it - as absurd as this situation was, she was having a lot of fun. Not even with the wild difference in skill level between her and her partner did her foes stand a chance. She was in Gamer Mode and nothing can stop her now.

One online match became three. Then five. Then nine. Every match, Elaris carried them to victory. While she did enjoy playing babysitter to a wildly flailing partner that drew enemy fire, Dr. Nefarious was a fast learner and actually figured out how to not suck and die on the battlefield. By the fifth match, some of his old Galactic Ranger skill began to come back and soon he was able to pick off one or two kills himself. Still not as good as Elaris, the Iron Queen of Resistance, but at least he wasn't so much of a dead weight anymore.

And honestly, she was having the best gaming session in months. She missed having a gaming partner. In this brief happy moment of leeching company wi-fi to keep her own Internet bill down, Elaris forgot she was playing video games with a scary robot monster that once pointed a giant space station sized weapon at Umbris and tried to blow up the entire galaxy.

'Umbris...'

The exhilarating rush of video games soon gave way to curiosity. Elaris checked the clock. She had been gaming with a bloodthirsty madman for a solid hour now. Normally she was out of Galactic Ranger Headquarters much earlier than this, even during days where she hung back to fix a few bugs on overtime. Now, she wanted to use the voice chat to its full advantage rather than blast enemy soldiers.

"Hey Nef." she said, setting their group to private and cancelling their next match.

"Hrm?"

Elaris looked around. She checked behind her to make sure there was no one walking down the hallway of HQ and then, after a brief hesitation, she lowered her voice and asked the question that was burning on the back of her head, even though she was dreading the actual answer.

"Why did you want to blow up Umbris and kill everyone?"

There was a quick cackle of disbelief - a sudden, pointed "HAH!" - over the other end.

"Where did everyone in the Solana Galaxy get this idea? How is blowing up Umbris going to kill everyone? Umbris is an uninhibited wasteland where Qwark has his stupid training base for squishy meatheads! I thought my motive would be crystal clear in me targeting that worthless mudball of a planet! No one would miss it!"

"W-what..." Elaris uttered in disbelief as her team partner suddenly broke into a rant befitting of a true gamer.

"Don't think I don't read the news! I've been seeing the propaganda from both Qwark's autobiography and that holovid that I was planning to "wipe out everything". Why would I wipe out everything? There's no one to gloat to when you wipe out everything! What did everyone think I was going to do - go to the Bogon Galaxy and march up to the doors of Megacorp like "guess who has six fingers and blew up billions of people"?"

He drew in a breath to calm himself; yelling at Elaris didn't feel nearly as good as yelling at Qwark or at some weird Lombax kid. "I swear you try to atomize one city in a fit of rage and everyone thinks you're a genocidal maniac." he added at last.

She thought back about the Deplanetizer and the holovid made in honor of the heroics of Ratchet and Captain Qwark. They added a couple scenes for Dr. Nefarious about how he was going to reduce the Solana Galaxy into space dust. The planets were perfectly aligning and Umbris has an unstable core - it just made sense that he would've planned this all out.

"Whoa whoa whoa, you mean to tell me that you set up the Deplanetizer to blow up a planet with an unstable core - a move that would've set off a chain reaction and wiped out everything in the galaxy including yourself - entirely by accident?"

"Yes!" he said instantly. There was then an awkward pause as his brain caught up to him. "...wait that would've actually destroyed the galaxy...?"

"Yes! Yes that would've destroyed all the other planets!" she barked back, a little louder than her normal speaking tone.

He went silent for a long period of time, a disconcerting period of time that made Elaris wonder if he lost connection.

Finally he spoke, and his voice was suddenly really quiet.

"I didn't know that..." he admitted.

"WHAAAAAT?!" she screamed.

She couldn't help herself. Anger was flooding her senses and clouding her thoughts. Maybe it was the heat of the online battlefield but she did not like the idea that Nefarious almost killed her - not because he wanted to! She accepted the idea that he had devolved into a bloodthirsty killer at this point! - but because he didn't know a goddamn thing about geology.

"Wait but that means you would've died too..." he added as his brain put the pieces together.

"YES! YES I WOULD'VE DIED, YOU IDIOT!"

He didn't answer, but his embarrassed silence really said it all.

"I swear do you actually spend longer than fifteen minutes thinking your plans through!?" Elaris said, her voice raising in volume until it became a harsh, almost Nefarious-like yell.

"Wow Elaris, you're getting really mad at that game! Is your teammate a total noob or something?" Ratchet called from the hallway. He had caught the last thing that Elaris had said as he was walking by, a doughnut still hovering near his mouth. Ratchet was usually one of the last people to leave Galactic Headquarters on account of all the extra-curricular training he liked doing.

"Yes! Yes, he's very much a total noob! He's normally much smarter than this but he nearly went and got everyone killed!" Elaris yelled back, gesturing vaguely at the screen where both her and DrN42's characters were staring at a poorly-textured wall.

There was a mild chuckle from the Lombax. "Okay Elaris, talk to you later!" and with a quick wave of a hand and a Lombax tail, he was gone.

Another awkward silence descended between them as Elaris fought to get her emotions back under control. It felt weird being the angry one. She was so used to being the calm, collected nerd next to the angry, raging nerd back when the two of them worked together as the Nerd Herd. She was used to being the one that would calm Nefarious down, not the other way around, and her gaming partner on the other end knew it from the way he hesitantly tried to help.

"Are you okay there, Ellie?"

Ellie. Like a needle puncturing a balloon, all of her fury drained out of her body when she heard that nickname. It had been years since she last heard anyone call her that pet name, the name she said her grandma used to call her one day while she and Nefarious were trying to fix the ammo capacity of the Bomb Glove, and just the tiniest act of him remembering it calmed her down. Her shoulders sagged.

"I swear you can be so stupid sometimes!" she said, but there was no fire behind her words anymore.

"Okay okay...so I made a rookie mistake!" he said with a chuckle. Was he humoring her? Was the killer robot actually trying to make her feel better? Why? "Next time I'll plan better! The best part about being a supervillain is that you can always try, try again until the heroes lose!"

"How did you make it all the way through med school and then build the blueprints for a giant space station armed with a planet-destroying laser without knowing a single thing about astrogeology?" Elaris said, her face resting in one of her palms.

"How was I to know planets had different cores?"

"That's something you learn in the fifth grade!"

"I never did really pay attention to geology in school..."

Despite that, Elaris felt better. Even though it still kinda stung that she almost died because Mr. Loose Cannon didn't think too hard on the consequences of his own actions, thinking about the previous game sessions brought her happy mood back. She found herself smiling again. He may have allied himself with Chairman Drek and nearly killed them all, but deep down he was the intelligent yet idiotic nerd that she shared a broom closet with, and that brightened her mood in a strange, confusing way.

"Sorry for yelling at you, Nef. I did have a great time!"

"I did too!" he shouted back, his mood immediately bouncing back now that Elaris was happy again. The Galactic Ranger decided not to think too hard on the fact that Nefarious seemed genuinely concerned for her. This situation was already weird enough as is.

"Well, I gotta go now, but thank you for talking to me back on Umbris. I wouldn't be moving out of the broom closet and into an actual laboratory if it wasn't for you!" When he didn't immediately reply back, only giving her a stunned silence in return, she didn't even wait for an answer when she turned off the game. Satisfied, Elaris finally removed the headset and ran a hand across her head. It really was time she got back to her apartment. Leftover ravioli didn't eat itself.

She got up from her chair, took one step, and immediately heard the sad, fizzy squish of her foot colliding with a cola puddle that had been laying there for a solid hour.

Elaris sighed in mild disappointment. She couldn't leave yet.

"I spent two bolts on that soda too..."

------------

"Did you have fun, sir?"

Dr. Nefarious looked up at Lawrence as he fiddled with his eldritch abomination of a gamer rig, his claws entangled in some loose hanging wires and a wide, childish grin on his skeletal face. His handcrafted gamer PC made from Deplanetizer guts and some repair bots was like a new pet to him, and he cherished it as such.

"Did you see us, Lawrence!? We won every match! We annihilated everyone that stood in our way! No one could get past our defenses!" he shouted with all the giddy excitement of a grade schooler. He was gesturing wildly, communicating as much with his arms and hand movements as his face, and from the way he was wrapped up in his PC wires, it was a miracle he didn't strangle himself or trip over.

"Masterful work. I can see why you're so popular with the ladies." Lawrence quipped, sounding about as excited as someone filing paperwork at the DMV.

"And then she told me she actually took my advice and then thanked me for it! She listened to me! You remember, back when I first became a robot! She listened!"

"I think she likes you, sir."

"I think she does! Isn't that wonderful, Lawrence!?" he practically screamed.

This would've been a happy moment, and indeed the mad scientist could feel a warm, fuzzy feeling spread through the circuits in his chest as his mechanical heart fluttered, thinking about his old science partner, if Lawrence didn't immediately chime in with a curt "So why didn't you ask for any of Captain Qwark's patrol schedules or passwords from her again?", ruining the moment instantly.

The warm happy feeling went cold. The excitement bled out of him.

Oh right. The real reason why he logged onto Resistance: Fall of Blarg around the exact same time as Elaris. The reason that Elaris had almost guessed before they ended up just fooling around in an online video game. His diabolical revenge scheme that he had cooked up after he realized that he and Elaris still had each other friended. His fullproof plan that would lead to Qwark's demise.

Dr. Nefarious sucked in a breath and dragged a hand slowly across his face, suddenly feeling very tired.

"Oh..."

[agent-85]

.

[golgoterror]

Your name is Jake English and you’re about to fulfill your destiny.

Ever since you were thirteen, you knew it had to be done. Your grandma had been killed for it, you were on your island became of it, and you had your last name as a result of it. Everything was set in stone. When John’s retcon blue faded and the eight of you now stood on a stage before Caliborn, a box, a strange bunny, and Lil’ Cal, it suddenly set in. This was when it was going to happen. You were going to give Lord English his first defeat.

==> Jake: Prepare

The first thing you notice is the cherub’s sickening laugh, which came about after initial confusion. This is almost like the trigger of a pistol because everyone jumps up and beings rummaging about, including yourself. Truth be told, you have no idea what in the fuck you’re doing. You haven’t even tried using your powers yet, nor do you believe you can. Your eyes leap from the bunny to the box to the puppet to the cherub, then back, looping around. Occasionally, you catch glimpses of your teammates. None of you know what to do. At this moment, you wonder if maybe, perhaps, you all bit off just a bit more than you lot could ever dream to chew.

None of you settle down until the green bastard before you leaps off his makeshift podium. Out comes a very strange, white house-looking thing. You’d ponder what it was, perhaps even noting the similarities between it and that symbol on the game’s papers, but you don’t have time. Suddenly, your grandmother ( but younger ) and her friends get sucked into it, and the box closes. Half your team is down. Is there really any hope of winning this? That’s all you can think as you half-hide behind Dirk, though keep your ground in front of the girls. 

The sound of Caliborn hitting the box eats away at your brain. Are they safe? Are they hurt? Will he do that to the rest of you? A wave of questions crashes down on your mind, causing you to not think straight in the slightest. You barely even register Dirk demanding his puppet be returned. You blink, and suddenly, a fight breaks out.

==> Jake: Fight

Dirk, being in the front, is kicked down first, and Jane is thrown back. You’ll have none of that! No one hurts your friends, especially not with you in earshot! You’re a big, strong adventurer… Right? 

No. No, you’re not. You’re not a fighter. That point has hit you like a speeding bullet multiple times since you awoke from the trickster spell. But you’ll be damned if you aren’t going to help your friends. Which is your first move, as you rush to Jane to help her up. If you can’t fight, at least you can see if she’s alright. Minorly hurt, but nothing to write home about. Still, you’re furious. Anger is boiling over in you at the mere idea that he’d go after your dear friend. An attempt is made at the so-called defeat you’re ready to gift the cherub, a fist coming up as you turn around, when, suddenly -- he pushes you over and kicks you with such force, you’re sent back into the side of the stage. As pathetic as it is to say, this is enough to cause you to wobble as you get back up. One of your resulting stumbles lands in a bad place as no stage is there to catch your foot and you tumble to the floor below. 

The force was a lot stronger than you’d ever care to admit. Now, like the weakling you are, you’re immobile on the ground, forced to listen to the grunts and moans of your three friends getting their asses handed back to them. Was that it? Your one shot at a defeat? Did you just doom your entire timeline because you fell off of a stupid stage?

All four of you are getting kicked and punched in a cycle, and none of you are getting up. The whines from your friends hurt more than any of the hits. You’ve failed at keeping your friends safe. In a matter of minutes, you’ve fucked up so badly, you can’t even reclaim your own last name. 

Pathetic.

Pathetic.

PATHE--

That last hit does you in. The edges of your sight get fuzzy before darkening. It hits you what’s happening, but not before you fall unconscious on the floor below you. 

==> Jake: Black Out

Below you is your bed. On your head, your skulltop. Dirk just finished telling you some sort of story. A real kicker of a story, if you do say so yourself. So many twists and turns. How prodigious it was!

GT: Anyhoo thats a heck of a tragic and thrilling tale dirk.  GT: I am still totally cockeyed and catawampus about it all i dont even know what to think.  TT: But you believe me, right? 

What… were you two talking about?

GT: Oh yeah every word of it!  TT: Wow.  GT: Why shouldnt i? You are my friend and i trust you. 

This feels strange.

TT: I still just think it's impressive, is all. Even after all this time. You are pretty much a one of a kind dude.  GT: Heh not really i just like believing stuff and believing in people.  GT: Wait what do you mean?  TT: About what?  GT: When you said after all this time?  GT: You just told me now!  TT: Yes.  GT: Hang on.  GT: Blarg! The deja vuey shit is happening again!!!  GT: Okay i am SURE weve had this conversation before so many things are familiar.  GT: I remember you saying the one of a kind dude thing and i remember saying the word catawampus and...  GT: All of it!  GT: Whats going on? 

You’re right. You have said this all before. Every word of it.

TT: Took you long enough to figure it out.  TT: Pages really are a slow burning class. Damn.  GT: Figure what out!  TT: You're asleep.  GT: Oh. 

Of course. You’re asleep. And this isn’t Dirk. It’s Brain Ghost Dirk. You don’t remember falling asleep though… Or do you? Wasn’t something important happening? 

GT: What… were we on about? GT: My goodness my mind is foggy… TT: Damn, you’re fucking forgetful. TT: This whole thing started with your grandma and Lord English. We then wrapped around about my timeline and here we are. GT: Wait what was that first thing? TT: Your grandma. GT: No after that. TT: My timeline. GT: Work with me strider for crying out loud!!! TT: Lord English. GT: Yeah! That!

Why is that so important? Those two words. They stick out like sore thumbs, causing you to bite your tongue.

GT: Oh! I was serving the guy up some slap stew! TT: More like he was serving you, bro.  GT: Oh. Right. TT: You can still turn it around, though.  GT: I can? TT: I dunno. You’re the hope guy, remember? GT: Haha. I thought i was. TT: What’s changed? GT: Oh you know nothing much just about EVERYTHING. TT: Well, do you think it’s worth a shot? GT: I mean id like to hope so. TT: There you go. GT: What? GT: Oh. GT: Hardy har har. TT: Dust yourself off and give it another go. Your words, not mine.

Hearing that alone brought a smile to your face. Dirk, whether in Brain Ghost form or not, always believed in you. Maybe even enough to make you believe in yourself on rare occasions. That alone gave you some hope. 

GT: Then ive got some english ass to kick! GT: Wait i mean his ass not mine!!! TT: I gathered that much. 

==> Jake: Wake Up

At some point, you feel your eyes blink a few times. The sounds, which begin muffled and hide behind a ringing in your ears, become louder and louder, until they’re making your head swim. You’re not done. The fight isn’t over. 

Grabbing the side of the stage, you get up, regardless of how dizzy you feel. Roxy and Jane aren’t doing anything, so that only leaves one person to be leading the resistance. Climbing on stage, you see Dirk, incredibly hurt, but fighting nonetheless. He was always a fighter, something you wish you were more like. But he’s in bad shape. 

What you did to him was wrong. Ghosting him was the worst thing you could have done, and you know that now. Do you still love him? Does it matter? He’s always been there for you, either as a lover or a best friend. You can’t stand to see him take a beating like this. Tears well in your eyes. Blinking them away just makes them run down your cheeks. When Dirk falls and Caliborn kicks him, that’s the last straw. You’re angry. So angry, in fact, you want to kick his ass. So much so, you’re going to do it. You’re going to kick his fucking ass.

==> Jake: Defeat This Poor Son Of A Bitch

Flying into the air, you force yourself between the two and yell. You yell so hard, you barely even notice the glow around your body, the ball forming around you, or how the stage is being brightened up. The hope is so big and out of control, it swallows the three of you, though your intent is not to hurt Dirk. Caliborn is not so lucky. He’s yelling, which you can’t hear over your own screams and sobs. Eventually, the shield gets so big, Roxy and Jane are subject to it, along with everything around you guys. But you don’t want to destroy anything but Caliborn. 

==> Jake: Calm Down

You’re so lost in your anger, you barely even know what’s happening. Then, a soft voice in your head tells you to calm down. As quick as it came, the ball is gone, though you’re still glowing. Once the anger clouding your eyes has blown away, you look down at whom you just defeated, who is currently staring up at the ceiling. He’s not hurt. At least, not physically, from what you can see, but he does look very broken. Exhaustion barrels into you and you fall to the floor, lying on your stomach, hands trying to push yourself back up. You can’t, but Dirk and Caliborn both do.

You’re unsure if you’ve fallen unconscious again or not, but three metallic horses land on the stage. The pure, unadulterated absurdity of this makes you wonder if this is some sort of fever dream, but you feel awake, so what the fuck. Though with a bit of added strength from them, you get to your hands and knees, then stand. 

Caliborn is walking towards you four and, for a brief moment, you’re worried. Then, the famed red sprite Arquius comes out from the shadows ( was he always there? ) and grabs Caliborn by the neck from behind. The green asshole is choking, gasping for air, and you don’t know how to react. Luckily, the other three seem to be equally as shitting-their-pants scared as you are. This is only heightened when Dirk seems to attempt destroying them, their souls stretching and deforming, but it’s futile. As a last resort, everyone but you and your posse gets sucked into the puppet. Then, with a nod of Roxy’s head, the puppet is gone. 

You stand there in awe, wondering what just happened. Did you do it? Did you just defeat and, as a result, create Lord English? Does this mean the timeline isn’t doomed? As the other four lost kids return, you want to smile. You honestly, truly want to grin. This day has been built-up since your birth, yet, you feel empty. A fight was still going to go down. All you did was make one of the main targets all the more terrifying. But you had to. This was your purpose. 

With a pat on the back from Dirk, almost to signal you had done something right, whether you believe that or not, you all get prepared for the final battle and the subsequent winning of the game. A part of you feels your job is done, though. 

Your name is Jake English and you just fulfilled your destiny. 

==> Jake: Get Ready To Kick Some Felt Ass