#conspiracy by big calendar

[stellanslashgeode]

You only need to ever buy seven calendars.

When you reach the end of the seventh year just put the first one back up. That's a dip Big Calendar doesn't want you to know.

[youngsadlesbian]

REPUTATION — wanda maximoff.

pairing: wanda maximoff x reader

summary: taylor swift is your favorite singer, and wanda finds that adorable, even if sometimes you're a bit too much of a fan.

a/n: as my old friend hannah montana used to say: this is the best of both worlds. even though it's super random, i've wanted to write a swiftie!reader x wanda for a while. i hope you like it.

word count: 1,2k

warnings: swiftie reader, that explains a lot.

The day you and Wanda Maximoff started dating was one of the happiest days of your life. Wanda was everything you could ever want in a partner—strong, kind, intelligent, and incredibly beautiful. But there was one thing she discovered about you early on that she found both endearing and endlessly amusing: you were a die-hard Taylor Swift fan.

Your love for Taylor Swift wasn't just casual admiration. No, it was an all-consuming, heart-thumping, lyric-screaming, poster-hanging, album-collecting kind of fandom. The kind that made you want to burst into song at random moments, quote lyrics in everyday conversations, and plan your life around album releases and concert dates.

Wanda found it adorable. The other Avengers, however, found it hilarious.

"You're dating a Swiftie?" Tony Stark teased Wanda during one of the team's downtime sessions. "Isn't that like dating a walking, talking mixtape of heartbreak and revenge anthems?"

Wanda just laughed, shaking her head. "You have no idea, Tony."

When Taylor Swift's social media went dark, the world of Swifties plunged into chaos. Rumors flew around the internet, and fan theories grew wilder by the day. You were no exception to the frenzy. You analyzed every move, every clue, trying to decipher what Taylor was up to.

"Wanda, look at this!" you exclaimed one evening, shoving your phone in her face. "She posted three black squares on Instagram! What does it mean?"

Wanda chuckled and pulled you into her lap, wrapping her arms around you. "Maybe she's just taking a break?"

"No," you shook your head vehemently. "Taylor never does anything without a reason. This has to be leading up to something big."

As the days turned into weeks, your anticipation grew. Wanda patiently listened to every theory you had, from secret collaborations to hidden messages in old music videos. The Avengers, on the other hand, were amused by your relentless enthusiasm.

"What's the latest conspiracy theory?" Natasha asked one morning over breakfast.

"She's totally dropping a new album," you declared confidently. "It's going to be dark and edgy. I can feel it."

Months went by, and Taylor remained silent. It was torture for you. You spent countless hours on fan forums, discussing and dissecting every little detail. Wanda often found you hunched over your laptop, deep in conversation with other Swifties.

One day, you received the news you had been dreading: Taylor Swift had disappeared from the public eye completely. No more paparazzi sightings, no social media updates, nothing.

You were devastated. Wanda held you as you cried, whispering soothing words into your ear. "She'll be back, love. Just you wait."

"Why does this hurt so much?" you sobbed. "She's just an artist, right?"

Wanda kissed your forehead. "She's more than that to you. She's been a part of your life for so long. It's okay to feel this way."

It felt like an eternity, but one fateful day, Taylor Swift reemerged with a vengeance. She announced her new album, Reputation, and you were over the moon. You couldn't contain your excitement, bouncing around the room and squealing with joy.

"Wanda, she's back! She's back!" you screamed, nearly tripping over yourself in your enthusiasm.

Wanda laughed, catching you before you fell. "I told you she'd come back. What's the album called?"

"Reputation," you said breathlessly. "It sounds so fierce!"

You immediately pre-ordered the album, marking the release date on every calendar you owned. You even set reminders on your phone to ensure you didn't miss a single update.

The night Reputation was released, you transformed your living room into a Taylor Swift shrine. Posters adorned the walls, fairy lights twinkled, and snacks were meticulously arranged. Wanda helped you set up, though she couldn't stop chuckling at your elaborate preparations.

"This is serious business, Wanda," you said, pointing a finger at her. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime event."

"I can see that," she replied, grinning. "Are we ready?"

"Almost!" you said, pulling out your Taylor Swift-themed pajamas. "Now we're ready."

As the clock struck midnight, you pressed play on the first track. The opening notes of "...Ready For It?" filled the room, and you were instantly hooked. You danced around the living room, singing along at the top of your lungs. Wanda watched with a fond smile, joining in on the chorus.

By the time the album reached "Look What You Made Me Do," you were in full fangirl mode. You grabbed a hairbrush, using it as a makeshift microphone, and performed an impromptu dance routine. Wanda couldn't stop laughing, her eyes sparkling with amusement.

"You're incredible," she said, wiping tears of laughter from her eyes.

"And you're amazing for putting up with me," you replied, pulling her into a hug.

The next day, you couldn't wait to share your excitement with the rest of the Avengers. You burst into the common room, blasting Reputation from your phone.

"Guys, you have to listen to this!" you shouted, earning amused looks from your teammates.

Tony rolled his eyes. "Oh great, more Taylor Swift. Just what we needed."

But as the songs played, even the most skeptical Avengers found themselves tapping their feet and nodding along. Natasha smirked. "I have to admit, it's pretty catchy."

Clint grinned. "I think we found our new workout playlist."

Steve, ever the gentleman, smiled at you. "I'm glad you're happy."

Wanda squeezed your hand, beaming with pride. "Told you they'd come around."

A few weeks later, Taylor Swift announced her Reputation stadium tour, and you lost your mind. You immediately began planning how to secure tickets, setting multiple alarms and enlisting Wanda's help.

The morning of the ticket sale, you were a bundle of nerves. "What if we don't get tickets? What if the site crashes?"

Wanda placed a calming hand on your shoulder. "We'll get them. Just breathe."

When the clock struck 10 AM, you and Wanda refreshed the ticketing site furiously. Minutes felt like hours, but finally, you managed to secure two tickets. You screamed in triumph, hugging Wanda tightly.

"We did it! We're going to see Taylor Swift!" you exclaimed.

Wanda laughed, twirling you around. "I wouldn't miss it for the world."

The night of the concert, you and Wanda donned your best Swiftie gear and headed to the stadium. The atmosphere was electric, with thousands of fans buzzing with anticipation.

As Taylor took the stage, you felt a rush of emotions. The opening chords of "…Ready For It?" filled the air, and you screamed along with the crowd. Wanda held your hand, her smile mirroring your own.

Throughout the concert, you danced, sang, and cried. Each song was a journey, and you cherished every moment. Wanda captured it all on her phone, knowing how much these memories meant to you.

When Taylor performed "New Year's Day," a soft, emotional ballad, you turned to Wanda with tears in your eyes. "Thank you for being here with me."

Wanda squeezed your hand. "There's nowhere else I'd rather be."

The days following the concert were a blur of happiness. You couldn't stop talking about the experience, reliving every song and moment. The Avengers, used to your Taylor Swift obsession by now, indulged you with patient smiles.

Wanda loved seeing you so happy. She often played Reputation in the background while you cooked dinner together or snuggled on the couch. It became your soundtrack, a reminder of the incredible night you shared.

One evening, as "Delicate" played softly, Wanda pulled you into a slow dance in the living room. You rested your head on her shoulder, feeling the warmth of her embrace.

"I love you," you whispered.

"I love you too," Wanda replied, kissing your forehead. "More than you'll ever know."

[esamastation]

Shizuroth, part eight.

-

"How is he?"

"What do you think?"

Lazard gives the SOLDIER First Class an unimpressed look and Genesis sniffs. "Never fear, Director - your Hero will be well fit for duty - after a break," Genesis says.

"Sephiroth never takes breaks," Lazard points out.

That earns him another sniff, one much closer to a scoff this time. "And people wonder why he's so unapproachable," Genesis says, rolling his eyes. "Why he keeps destroying training rooms in regular spars."

"I seem to recall you and Angeal having a hand in that too," Lazard says, amused and unimpressed. "You are all still forbidden from using the training rooms."

"Yes, yes, ours is a tragic tale of woe," Genesis says dismissively. "The point I'm trying to make is that whether Sephiroth takes breaks or not, he still needs them. He might be Elite even among us Firsts - but he's still human. No matter what the professor says."

Lazard folds his arms. "So this was to be expected, is that it?"

"Wasn't it? Have you not seen Sephiroth's schedule? And I don't just mean his mission roster. He's in and out of the labs so often they should install a revolving door, just for him," Genesis scoffs and looks away. "It's a wonder he didn't start losing it before."

Lazard narrows his eyes. "Has he lost it, then, Genesis? Has he been pushed to the brink?"

Genesis is quiet for a moment and then sighs. "No," he says. "Not yet. But something happened that shook him. Apparently his heart stopped, he was given too big a dose - but I don't think that's it. Not all of it."

"It sounds plenty shocking to me."

"SOLDIERs flatline all the time. That's what Phoenix Downs are for," Genesis waves a hand at that. "Sephiroth must've gone through it a thousand times. But maybe, in combination with the higher dose he got, and however long he was dead…"

Lazard hums. "Memory issues?"

"Most definitely," Genesis agrees, and gives him a sideways look. "He'll be able to cover it up - given time. But he must've forgotten more than he was letting on. I don't know how much - but it was a lot."

Lazard hums in grim understanding, and they're quiet for a moment in shared acceptance. Memory loss in a SOLDIER is common enough and usually isn't reason alone to pull them from the field - higher ups really didn't care. But it tends to have other detrimental effects…

Like an increased mortality rate.

SOLDIERs were sent out only on toughest of missions, taking on most dangerous assignments the company had to offer. Everything Turks or Infantry couldn't handle, the SOLDIER took care of. And going on a high-risk mission with any level of loss of mental faculties… 

If Sephiroth was operating with something worse than your usual case of a few burned synapses…

"He needs to be evaluated," Lazard says finally. "Sephiroth has numerous missions coming up in Wutai - if his abilities are compromised -"

"You'll send someone else?" Genesis asks and scoffs. "That I would like to see! How will that look in the newspapers, when the poster boy is replaced? The horror, the controversy - the conspiracy!"

Lazard casts him a look. "Or maybe I will have to shuffle the roster to send someone with him," he says pointedly.

"To babysit Sephiroth?"

"Better than to risk everything due to lack of foresight," Lazard muses and leans back in his chair. "Angeal will be back tomorrow - I want you to debrief him on the situation - quietly - and then the two of you can assess Sephiroth's condition."

"Out of the company's view, I assume?" Genesis asks while whipping out his PHS to check the calendar.

"It wouldn't do for rumours to spread," Lazard agrees and looks away. "Thankfully the Third who saw him already promised to be discreet."

Genesis hums dubiously. "We'll see how long that will last," he mutters, scrolling through his schedule. In his experience, SOLDIERs gossip worse than the secretary staff. 

"I'll take even a day's delay. With the true extent of his stay in Injections suppressed and with you handling the rest, hopefully the gossip won't find enough ground to spread," Lazard says.

Genesis hums and then frowns at a new message notification. "Ah," he says, reading the title.

"Hm?" Lazard asks 

"Well. Speaking of gossip," Genesis says, his brows arching. "Someone is getting fired at Laybell's."

Lazard frowns and gives him a confused look. "Laybell's? You mean the clothing store?"

Genesis opens the mail that had just been sent out to Silver Elite and reads it through.

SEPHIROTH JUST ORDERED A WHOLE BUNCH OF SHIRTS FROM LAYBELL'S?!? by Beybelina

Hi, hello, hey, I'm a bit of a lurker, usually I don't have anything to say, but something INCREDIBLE just happened! 

I work at the Laybell's in Sector Seven and I was just processing orders when it popped up! At first I couldn't believe my eyes! The name on the order, it couldn't be! It was SEPHIROTH! I thought it was fake, so I checked - and the mailing address is Shinra HQ!

Aaaah, my heart is pounding like mad! Sephiroth, making orders from our store! This is the happiest day of my life!

There's almost instantly a reply.

Re: SHIRTS FROM LAYBELL'S by Silver Tail

OH MY GODDESS! What did he order? What kind of shirts? What colour? Tell us everything!

And then an answer to that, just as quickly…

Re:re: SHIRTS FROM LAYBELL'S by Beybelina 

I have the full list, though I probably shouldn't mail it because of customer confidentiality! But let's just say it  looks like he's moving in from the Glorious Coat of Greatness and Goodness and we'll all be worse for it! He will look amazing of course, but it's still a tragedy! 

Genesis brows arch slightly in incredulity. What customer confidentiality? "Apparently Sephiroth has been shopping for clothes."

Lazard looks up, and Genesis shows him the message. "Hm. I agree, someone is certainly getting fired," he says dubiously. "But is it really that unusual? Everyone uses mail to shop these days."

Genesis gives him a look. "You have no idea what the state of his wardrobe is, do you?"

"I make it a point not to pry into the personal affairs of SOLDIER members," Lazard admits.

"And we're oh so grateful - but I do, and it's something else," Genesis says flatly. He'd gotten his own leather coat because he'd gotten inspired by Sephiroth's style - only to soon realise where it actually came from.

He's never known anyone too damn haughty to get a new shirt, before Sephiroth. It would be amusing if it wasn't so irritating. Of course, there's also the fact that whenever they do as much as charge their hairstyle it's newsworthy. Sephiroth is especially sensitive to it, having been in the spotlight all his life. But mostly it was just the man being contrary on purpose, because someone said something, and sometimes Sephiroth just decides to dig his heels in about the weirdest things for no good reason. Like with the hair, oh, Goddess, the hair.

So the idea that Sephiroth is suddenly becoming fashion-conscious…? Highly unlikely. 

Genesis scowls, snapping his phone shut.

Lazard is right - Sephiroth really needs to be assessed, thoroughly. Because either the man has utterly lost his mind… or he's up to something.

-

Cut to SY, sobbing screaming throwing up over a pile of torn shirts.

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

Regarding the timing of the tour, I think it’s more simple than any sort of conspiracy. I just don’t think they had the control over when they could come. I think they were invited and likely given 2 options on when the tour took place. Meghan didn’t deny the November time frame because she still really wants the royal connection.

They have to take what they can get at this point. Do I think they have something planned for November? No. Do I think they wish they had something planned for November? Yes. Do I think Meghan will try and launch some half baked idea that completely misses the mark just so she can compete with Earthshot? Absolutely.

Probably.

I said yesterday that the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior, and past behavior tells us we can expect Sussex shenanigans to overlap with the royal calendar - that's September (when the royals come back from summer holidays), October (foreign tours), November (tours and Remembrance Day), and December (Diplomatic Reception and the holidays/Christmas).

Here's what I think we can reasonably expect during this time:

A big content-focused initiative - either something like a magazine feature (eg the Time 100 cover/2021 or The Cut/2022) or an actual content production (eg Archetypes/2022 or Netflix/2022).

Something military involving Invictus Games (eg Dusseldorf IG/2023) or invoking Remembrance Day/Veterans Day (eg the cemetery pap walk/2020, Meghan's poppy conference appearance/2021, the Intrepid event/2021)

Royal Court of Montecito - royal-like Christmas card or some kind of black-tie event with a red carpet

An award - either receiving an award or being announced to receive an award.

I don't think we'll see them do another "official" tour like this for the rest of the year, primarily because I think Meghan will be hustling for merch to wear at Vancouver IG.

I'm 50/50 on whether they'll get involved with the presidential campaign. Meghan leaked, a while ago, that she's available and wants to be involved but I don't know if it'll come to pass. The Democrat establishment doesn't want anything to do with her and after the way their GOTV commercial was universally panned globally for the 2020 election, I don't know that Meghan would want to do another one...but she's certainly delulu enough to try.

[pigeonflavouredcake]

My Grimoire Research Library

this is a list of my major resource I've referenced/am currently referencing in my big grimoire project. For books I'll be linking the Goodreads page, for pdfs, websites and videos i'll link them directly.

There are plenty of generalised practitioner resources that can work for everyone but as I have Irish ancestry and worship Hellenic deities quite a few of my resources are centred around Celtic Ireland, ancient Greece and the Olympic mythos. If you follow other sects of paganism you are more than welcome to reblog with your own list of resources.

Parts of my grimoire discuss topics of new age spiritualism, dangerous conspiracy theories, and bigotry in witchcraft so some resources in this list focus on that.

Books

Apollodorus - The Library of Greek Mythology

Astrea Taylor - Intuitive Witchcraft

Dee Dee Chainey & Willow Winsham - Treasury of Folklore: Woodlands and Forests

John Ferguson - Among The Gods: An Archaeological Exploration of Ancient Greek Religion

Katharine Briggs - The Fairies in Tradition and Literature

Kevin Danaher - The Year in Ireland: Irish Calendar Customs

Laura O'Brien - Fairy Faith in Ireland

Lindsey C. Watson - Magic in Ancient Greece and Rome

Nicholas Culpeper - Culpeper's Complete Herbal

Plutarch - The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives

R.B. Parkinson - A Little Gay History: Desire and Diversity Around the World

Rachel Patterson - Seventy Eight Degrees of Wisdom: A Tarot Journey to Self-Awareness

Raleigh Briggs - Make Your Place: Affordable & Sustainable Nesting Skills

Robin Wall Kimmerer - Braiding Sweetgrass

Ronald Hutton - The Witch: A History of Fear in Ancient Times

Rosemary Ellen Guiley - The Encyclopaedia of Witches and Witchcraft

Thomas N. Mitchell - Athens: A History of the World's First Democracy

Walter Stephens - Demon Lovers: Witchcraft S3x and the Crisis of Belief

Yvonne P. Chireau - Black Magic: Religion and The African American Conjuring Tradition

PDFs

Anti Defamation League - Hate on Display: Hate Symbols Database

Brandy Williams - White Light, Black Magic: Racism in Esoteric Thought

Cambridge SU Women’s Campaign - How to Spot TERF Ideology 2.0.

Blogs and Websites

Anti Defamation League

B. Ricardo Brown - Until Darwin: Science and the Origins of Race

Dr. S. Deacon Ritterbush - Dr Beachcomb

Folklore Thursday

Freedom of Mind Resource Centre - Steven Hassan’s BITE Model of Authoritarian Control

Institute for Strategic Dialogue

Royal Horticultural Society

The Duchas Project -National Folklore Collection

Vivienne Mackie - Vivscelticconnections

YouTube Videos

ContraPoints - Gender Critical

Emma Thorne Videos - Christian Fundie Says Halloween is SATANIC!

Owen Morgan (Telltale) - The Source Of All Conspiracies: A 1902 Document Called "The Protocols"

The Belief it or Not Podcast - Ep. 40 Satanic Panic, Ep 92. Wicca

Wendigoon - The Conspiracy Theory Iceberg

Other videos I haven't referenced but you may still want to check out

Atun-Shei Films - Ancient Aryans: The History of Crackpot N@zi Archaeology

Belief It Or Not - Ep. 90 - Logical Fallacies

Dragon Talisman - Tarot Documentary (A re-upload of the 1997 documentary Strictly Supernatural: Tarot and Astrology)

Lindsay Ellis - Tracing the Roots of Pop Culture Transphobia

Overly Sarcastic Productions - Miscellaneous Myths Playlist

Owen Morgan (Telltale) - SATANIC PANIC! 90s Video Slanders Satanists | Pagan Invasion Saga | Part 1

ReignBot - How Ouija Boards Became "Evil" | Obscura Archive Ep. 2

Ryan Beard - Demi Lovato Promoted a R4cist Lizard Cult

Super Eyepatch Wolf - The Bizarre World of Fake Psychics, Faith Healers and Mediums

Weird Reads with Emily Louise -The Infamous Hoaxes Iceberg Playlist

Wendigoon - The True Stories of the Warren Hauntings: The Conjuring, Annabelle, Amityville, and Other Encounters

[afreakingdork]

You Are My Sunshine, My Only Moonshine - Chapter 3

RotTMNT x Reader

I can't stress how much @phoebepheebsphibs brought my vision alive for this week's chapter art~

Rated: Teen and Up Audiences

Relationships: Michelangelo (TMNT)/Reader, Michelangelo (TMNT)/You, Donatello (TMNT)/Reader, Donatello (TMNT)/You

Warnings: POV Second Person, Gender Neutral Reader, Anxious Reader, Introverted Reader, Stuttering, Aged-Up Mutant Ninja Turtles, Romance, Love, Love Confessions, Falling In Love, Unrequited Love, Rejection, Aromantic Asexual Michelangelo (TMNT), Bisexual Donatello (TMNT), Pansexual Leonardo (TMNT), Lesbian Cassandra Jones | Foot Recruit, Demisexual April O'Neil (TMNT), Implied Cassandra Jones | Foot Recruit/April O'Neil/Sunita, Endgame Donatello (TMNT)/Reader, Romantic Love, Platonic Love, Panic Attacks, Sexuality Crisis, Agoraphobia, Social Anxiety, Happy Ending, Fluff

Synopsis:  You’ve lost most of your life to anxiety and fear. Now, in your late 20s, you are desperate to reclaim it and during one such outing you encounter the sun personified. With his and his similarly celestially inspired family, will you finally reach your goal or will you lose yourself along the way?

Also available on Ao3

First 💛 Previous

The moon moved the tides.

It was a factoid that struck you after your fateful introduction to Mikey’s family. You had to process what had occurred. You spent the better part of that next month grappling with the things they could do. Mike was already more powerful than any other human by will alone, but that should have been limited to his incredible disposition. If that wasn’t enough, he had his turtley good looks. That meant anything more was an unjust balancing of skills and yet Mikey actually did have the god-like power you had considered unavailable to him. 

After surviving the movie night, you hadn’t been able to confront Mikey properly and instead told him you were tired as a means to head home right away. Mikey chirped something about that making sense since you hadn’t flexed your going out muscles in a while and happily saw you off. It was only an hour later, tucked in your bed, that you furiously typed out a mania of messages asking if what you had seen was real. Mikey called you and you had then spent the better part of your night hearing a far too casual explanation of all the things you hadn’t put together.

Casey meant it when she had called Mikey a mystic warrior.

There was an alternate timeline.

There was an entire second city under New York.

There had been many more plots to eradicate the human race than those on the surface knew of. 

Mikey was made for one of these plans. 

It was all too much. 

Relating this and unable to sleep the entire night, you thanked the calendar makers that it was the weekend. You spent most of it in recovery mode, only responding sparsely to Mikey’s texts. He had your address now. Not sure how liberal he’d be with that information, you continued forth, trying to fit the man you knew with the one that your eyes had been open to.

Maybe it shouldn’t have been such a big deal. 

Everything you knew about life itself no longer made sense. 

There were entire world’s worth of species with supreme intelligence that had smartly relegated themselves to mythos.

Hiding in plain sight.

Anywhere and everywhere.

Besides work where you were as flighty as a canary, you secretly stared at your coworkers to see if they were any of the broached.  You felt like one of those conspiracy theorists with no way to know how far this all actually went. Almost believing that lizard people were indeed in charge, it was around that month mark when you’d awoken from a nightmare knowing your stress levels were absurd ones. Mutants were a known fact and had already dealt with their media hubbub. Yokai were ancient and hadn’t toppled society yet.

Nothing was actually different other than your knowledge of it all. 

It also rang eerily close for you. 

You’d spent your own life in the shadows for literal decades. 

How had these beings not gone stir crazy in millenia? 

You then were struck for comparing yourself. 

They were forced to. 

Fear or not, the circumstances weren’t comparable. 

Guilt drove you. 

You needed perspective. 

You wanted to be better. 

You sent Mikey a message. 

You: Would it be possible to see the Hamato powers?

In this way you could remove the mysticism from the acts, even though you were sort of sure that’s what they had called magic anyway.

For the first time in what had to be your whole time knowing Mikey, it took him over an hour to get back with you.

Getting more nervous by the minute that you had somehow insulted him. He returned just as you were leaving for work to apologize for the wait. He said he needed to round up his brothers and only asked if you wanted his dad to be a part of the show. You knew Splinter from Mikey’s explanation, but you had yet to officially meet the rat mutant. His fortitude as the legendary Lou Jitsu had seemingly appeared only in his buffed fighting strength. Now grappling with yet another superpowered person, one you had not accounted for and who could, somehow, apparently use every brothers’ power, felt like biting off a little more than you could chew. You would start with the base and work up, you decided then. One step at a time, you asked just the four for now and Mikey quickly rattled off the where and when.

The first of was a location in the middle of nowhere and appeared inaccessible to your searches. 

The coordinates were quickly followed up by an explanation that Leo would portal you as the initial demonstration. 

The date of which was scheduled later that same week.

Again, you did not have near enough time to prepare.

It seemed like seconds passed until you were in the lair and then out on a field. 

Words were happening. 

Something was happening. 

Raph then grew to the size of a glowing Godzilla. 

You stared with your head tipping so far back it felt like you cut off your circulation. Awe not to be diminished, you saw a zip of orange and located Mikey, flying, to land on his brother’s glowing snout. It might have been a cute display were you given any warning for any of this. Instead, you felt your arm tapped and your head lolled to where Leo told you to watch him. His tongue appeared bitten amongst his excited smile before he disappeared out of existence. A sizzle of sparks left in his wake, you sought him out along the ground when a flash of blue light pulled your eye. The blue brother appeared, pinballing in portals all the way up the tower before he gestured at Mikey.

Zips of orange and blue struck like fireworks all over the sky.

Taking a step back, you fell onto your ass in the soft grass.

Even from his massive height, Raph took notice of your fall and shrank down. It left him over a football field away, but he only held out a hand which then kept going. A red projection stretched all the way to your side in an offer. You took it with quaking fingers and felt how it was a solid, but empty light. No warmth other than the shade, you wanted to lean against it, but the thought made you feel all the more pathetic. This was meant to be a grounding experience. You knew Mikey. He wasn’t scary. He was your hero. He was also exploding over and over again in the sky. 

Hapless, you turned your attention to the only brother not participating.

Donnie was sat near where you had exited the original portal and was tapping away on his phone as if he couldn’t be bothered.

“Donnie!” Raph seemed to shoot along his projection and appeared holding your hand. 

You shrieked in fear and were once again on your behind.

“Sorry ‘bout that. I didn’t mean to scare ya. I can move where they do.” Raph helped you up. “But I get it, you know what helped me?”

You stared at him as nothing could help you.

“Playing Pants Pants Revolution!” Raph did a few hopping steps. “I used to trip a lot when i was a kid, but I wasn’t gonna be the big lug with two left feet forever, that’s for sure!”  

You nodded faintly.

“Wait, what was I-?” Raph scanned the ground until he found what he was looking for. “Donnie get up! Let’s go! We can show off our combo move!”

Donnie said nothing and, to your eye, hadn’t moved in the slightest outside of the swipe of his hand.

“Having trouble… ya know? Performing?” Raph knelt down beside him with a snide grin.

With a slow lifting of his head, you saw twisted fury beneath Donnie’s smiling veneer. “While I appreciate your concern…” He held the pause as if drumming up anticipation. “No. Everything is in working order.”

Raph checked around his head space. “Huh. Goading you usually works.”

“Not this time.” Donnie responded with pure ice and dropped his gaze back down to his phone.

You weren’t sure what that meant, but you had a moment to breathe. 

It broke your shuddering form to only a shaking one. 

The chatter of your body quieted, you heard a blip. 

Something akin to a spark, you were involuntarily moving toward the sound when Raph’s body collided with you. 

He held you hard to his plastron as you went tumbling. 

Air and everything else was sucked from you, leaving you unable to even cry out. 

No one would have heard it as the Earth itself sounded as if it were exploding. 

The thundering tapered off into the cloudless sky and you were left covered in grassy debris. 

Raph unfurled himself and checked you over. 

In front of you was an idyllic field. 

The disaster must have been behind you. 

You’d have to face it.  

“Guys!!!” Raph roared and left you.

“Huh. I was sure that’d work.” Leo remarked, no clearly on the ground.

“Is Y/N okay!?” Mikey squeaked before you heard plodding footsteps head towards you.

Readying for another impact, nothing came other than a delicate hand on your shoulder.

“Y/N? Oh no…” Mikey’s head appeared out of the corner of your vision. “You’re in shock!”

“It’s just so unlike you.” Leo sounded like he was upset with something else. “Oh!” You heard a snap. “I know what it is! You’re having performance anxiety!” His voice rose several teasing octaves. “Having a little stage fright there, bud?”

Donnie. 

There had been a catastrophe and he was talking about Donnie. 

“The fact…” You heard a rustling noise followed by what sounded like pants being dusted off. “… that both of you and Raph tried to provoke me using the same exhausted joke is telling.”

“Ah, Raphie!” Leo cooed affection. “You too!? Mi hermano! We are brothers!”

“Uh, guys?!” Mikey waved a hand in your face.

“Yeah, yeah in a minute, Mike.” Leo prattled off. “What’s the deal then, Donton?”

“Are we finished?” Donnie responded coolly.

“Uh, yeah maybe if you tell me why you aren’t showing off. That’s your thing, isn’t it? Validation? Remember?” Leo’s voice moved and quieted. “Did we hit him by accident?”

There was the distinct sound of a gun cocking and Leo gave the smallest fearful squeak.

“So you are good!” Raph exclaimed without real surprise.

Mikey’s head swiveled where he was examining you. “Huh? Something up with Donnie’s little purple-?” 

You didn’t see or hear what hit Mikey, but you watched him go down beside you. 

A scream started in your throat, but Leo’s hand wrapped around your mouth. “Shhh, shhh. I know. I’m sorry about this. It’s scary, right? You seem scared.”

You could see his worried face and you nodded around a few tears spilling.

“Look here. He’s fine.” Leo kicked Mikey’s limp leg in demonstration.

“We said no head shots…” Mikey groaned.

“I’m gonna let go now. Are you still going to scream?” Leo’s mask rose with judgment. 

You shook your head.

Leo carefully released, but held a hovering hand up just in case.

You sank down, barely catching yourself from outright collapse.

“Okay… Good first step.” Leo ushered softly. “It’s a lot. I get that. I’m just not a fan of bursting my ear drums anymore than they already are from… ya know…” He swiveled his wrist gesturing to what you assumed was his life. “We mighta sorta kinda maybe went a little overboard.”

You wished you had the fortitude for sarcasm.

Leo saw how he’d both understated and not explained a thing. “Okay! Fine! Mike and I were trying to do a cool landing! For you! It was gonna be awesome! We just came in… too hot! Like really hot. Like maybe surface of the Sun hot? It doesn’t feel that fast when you’ve been going hundreds of miles of hours for like fifteen or whatever minutes or hours or like ever? We may have misjudged the distance and blew a crater in this pretty nice field, but hey! It’ll grow back! It has before!” 

You felt like your very neurons were leaking out your ears. 

“And with that piss poor explanation, we’re done here.” Donnie asked, bitter. “Let’s go.”

Leo glowered over his shoulder.

You still hadn’t turned around.

“What is your problem, man!?” Leo snapped, moving out of your sight.

You had to look.

You needed to see what had happened.

Dispel the mysticism.

“Me?!” Donnie growled. “You of all people should see!”

“See what? I apparently need enlightening because why else would I be asking?!” Leo huffed.

Fisting grass, you got one of your shoulders down which popped at the strain.

“You! All of you! How you show your entire hand! Email me so I can print out and bind your whole playbook!” Donnie yelled. 

“What are you even talking about!?” Leo matched his volume. 

Glimpsing Raph’s leg, you were almost there.

Silence chased your ears.

The two weren’t fighting anymore. 

“You cannot be serious.” Leo gaped. 

Not even the wind sounded through the grass.

Passing two more sets of green legs, you found a mound of dirt nearly twice the size of the already tall turtles.  Hobbling to your knees just to see it better, you stumbled sideways until you could see how the Earth churned the Earth like ice cream.

Your legs gave out a third time.

This was nothing compared to the climbing wall. 

Leo and Mikey had fallen from the sky. 

They had done this to the ground. 

Both of them were walking without so much as a scratch.

Raph had saved you. 

“Y/N?”

You looked up to see both Raph and Mikey had followed you.

Mikey looked particularly unmarred without any evidence of whatever had knocked him over.

The younger reached first and you scrambled backwards unconsciously.

The pair mixed their surprise and concern while the other two picked up their bicker as an odd backdrop.

“I-I’m s-sorry…” You got out meekly, getting to your own feet. “L-Leo was… r-right…”

“Someone say my name?” In a twirling gesture, Leo danced away from Donnie and split the sunset.

Before a solar eclipse closed the gap, you saw Donnie send some ire after Leo before he sent pure rage at you.

What had you done?

A star sparkled to distract you and Leo bent forward so he was at your eye level. “How’s it hanging? Weak in the knees? We have that effect on people.”

Your gaze slammed to the ground. 

You were never good with people like him.

One minute he was quieting you and not it was teasing. 

Where Mikey manipulated people earnestly, Leo did it with slick speech.

“Hey.” He popped a squat. “Minus one humpty dumpty who got put back together with a stick shoved up his butt, I can tell you this was pretty fun.”

Covering your mouth with a nervous fist, you found it impossible to look him in the eye. 

He went on. “It’s not very often we get to show off. We wanted to impress you both for us and Mike’s sake. We just got a little too excited is all.”

You managed what you thought might be a nod.

“We’re heroes.” He did a form of jazz hands in your vision. “Nothing to be scared of. We use our powers for good… mostly.”

Giving a little exhale, you looked over his spread digits.

“So like maybe once in a while I skip airport security and the whole passport situation, but look at this face! I’m too beautiful for those terrible license pics, don’t’cha think?” One of Leo’s hands left your vision. 

He appeared to be waiting so you snuck him a glance. 

Leo was indeed patient with his chin dropped into a purlicue for a comical glamor shot.

It helped you hold his gaze. 

“Fess up! What else we got boys?” Leo spoke at you, but not to you. 

“Mayhaps Raph has made dummy duplicates to hold his place in line.” Raph pretended to be sheepish, but his smile said he thought himself clever.

“I’m pretty sure I’m wanted in like two countries.” Mikey grinned far too bright for what he’d just said.

“And he who is being a purple pain in my ass is on the FBI, CIA, MMA, or whatever three letter combination you can come up with watch lists.” Leo waved his hand.

“They all lag light years behind my security.” Donnie’s phone was back at his attention. “Though I somehow doubt the intelligent monitoring systems of mixed martial arts,a sport mind you, consider my status.”

“These are just ninja perks.” Leo offered you a hand.

Your index finger made the trek in a nervous twitch until you just barely skirted Leo’s palm.

“There ya go. Look at you.” Leo ushered as if you were a scared dog.

“Kinda demeaning…” You blurted out quietly.

It caused Leo to blink his eye’s wide. 

Mikey burst out laughing and had to hang onto Raph to stay upright.

Great indignity blossomed on Leo’s face before he rose away from you in one upright shot. “Fine! You know what?! We are going home! Woof, woof Mad Dogz! We’re homeward bound!!”

Walking through the portal, you weren’t sure if you’d accomplished what you’d hoped. It wasn’t until later after you showered that you learned you’d earned a seat in the Hamato’s home. Mikey was ecstatic over it, texting you a mile a minute about how Leo casually suggested he should bring you over. At first you didn’t understand why. Mikey taking you under his wing was one thing, but Leo would need an angle. You doubted the blue brother did charity work. When you tried to relay this to Mikey, he only seemed to think the exact opposite of his brother. 

You had no choice, but to believe Mikey. 

You took those thoughts to bed and decided to try to parse out more information in the morning. 

Wary and quick to hold grudges, Leo was described to you as someone who was a good judge of character. Mikey supported his claim with stories of Leo’s leadership and you clutched your phone tightly where you were riding public transit to work. The bus ride rocked you in a soothing manner and you considered what it meant for Leo to see something in you. You weren’t sure if it was like Mikey’s interest, but there’d also been a shift. 

In a way, you thought yourself scared shitless. 

You weren’t sure if your nerves were currently so shot that you no longer cared or if, in your horror, you’d gotten past the point of fear, but you’d reached an accepting state regarding the Hamato’s powers. If anything, when you thought of them now it came with a state of neutrality. Not sure if it would last, you asked Mikey for time. He said it was no problem at all, he knew his family was a lot, and you wished you could clarify. He was just as tightly packed in with the others and you needed to process. Phone loosening in your hand, you settled into your seat to think. 

You’d survived your encounter. 

That counted for something. 

They were undoubtedly heroes. 

You knew the stories everyone else did, even if there were things the public weren’t privy to. 

There was still your quest to be more outgoing. 

Could you argue you were too far to back out now?

The moon moderated the planet’s wobble.

You spent several days going back and forth on the matter before you found your nerves were still on a steady course. Trusting those more than your mind, you accepted Mikey’s invitation to officially come over to the lair. Done after you’d gotten home from work, your phone rang as soon as the message was confirmed as read. Mikey demanded your immediate attendance as he was baking cookies. Telling him you didn’t actually know the way, he clarified that the oven wasn’t even preheated and he was now going to make cookies because you had said yes.

It helped. 

He helped. 

You laughed and he asked to come pick you up.

It was the first of many. 

Your cookie filled coronation had been a quaint affair. 

Leo, Mikey, and you shared the treats while everyone else was busy. 

A cheers done with milk solidified the deal. 

The lair was now added to your selection of safe havens and Mikey appeared on your stoop as your herald more and more often. Never arriving without your authorization, he seemed to adore his attendant duties and joked about driving you. After Leo’s comment about licenses you weren’t so sure any of them had one and, when prompted, he seemed to confirm they didn’t. Still, there was no need for a car in the city so you both either hung out in the lair or continued your outings. 

The latter of which had started up because you began to visit Mikey’s home. Each Hamato with their own idiosyncrasies and you found them to be an equal test of your mental fortitude. No matter how much they depleted your social battery though, they were a fun bunch and you brought them close to your heart. It would have shifted all your life for the better if there wasn’t one exact turtle sized problem you were also dealing with. 

Donnie hated you.

You had no idea why.

No matter how many times you ran through the very small amount of time you’d interacted with him, you couldn’t find the point in which you’d garnered the anger.

You did research. 

You looked for a custom that might have been broken. 

You ran every mental scenario you could possibly imagine. 

From stepping on his dropped contact lens to accidentally taking his special stapler, you’d gone through thousands of scenarios. 

It got you no closer to solving the problem. 

His wrath was impervious. 

In the handful of times you’d been to the lair, he appeared as soon as you entered. Like the moon hanging around the day’s sky after its night watch, he only loomed. It was as if he knew the moment you entered and came just to glare daggers at you. If you mistakenly caught his eye, he was unperturbed in knowing you saw him. For you he had no shame, but if anyone else tried to follow your haunted eye line, he would suddenly be looking in any other direction that wasn’t yours. Trapped under his omnipresence, you often escaped to the bathroom just for a reprieve.

Your longest record of surviving his gaze currently sat a measly 32 minutes undisturbed.

Multiple trips were embarrassing in their own right, but it at least gave you room to breathe. You found it a safe haven right up until the moment it wasn’t. You guessed you should have figured that eventually you’d be found out. Several visits deep and your excuses running thin, you emerged to find Donnie standing right outside the door. You were trapped between porcelain and him. Your pause yet another misstep, your knees knocked together as he stormed toward you with flowing fury.

“Why were you excused from jury duty last year?!”

It was so out of left field, you had no answer for him.

“Well!?” He used his height to tower over you. 

“I-I… d-don’t…?”

You barely remembered the moment. 

You’d been pardoned more than once. 

You usually never did anything to garner them. 

Somehow narrowing his gaze further, Donnie clicked his tongue and made a comically wide steer to get around you.

Growling to himself the entire way, he disappeared around a corner.

It wouldn’t be the last. 

As if that question was an experiment all its own, he now knew he could approach you as soon as you strayed from the group. 

He appeared the moment you did with some ill gotten question.

It wasn’t funny, but it painted him a detective at his wit’s end.

“Why’d you fail 10th grade geometry!?”

“You claimed Amanda was your best friend in elementary school, but there were two Amandas in your class. Which one was it?!”

“Did you leave your last food service job because you never paid for those tacos you offered to comp?”

Whether you answered his inquiries or not, he didn’t seem to care. You only assumed he was getting something out of the exchanges because he kept going after you. While his questions were expected, you could never prepare. He had all manner of dirt on you which became more invasive with time. He was already pervasive enough, but the fact that he’d gotten you to admit to stealing a marble from a craft store when you were four was borderline harassment. 

Even then, that still wasn’t what he wanted. 

You were ashamed to admit you were leaving the lair earlier and earlier. 

Something had to be done. 

You knew that. 

Mikey was starting to notice. 

He didn’t see Donnie, but he saw you. 

Mikey was clearly bending over backwards to ensure your comfort. 

It made the situation worse. 

All because you refused to rat Donnie out.

You couldn’t. 

Not when Mikey adored Donnie. 

Not when this was clearly your fault. 

Not when you would only suffer more if you did anything to disrupt this family’s balance. 

You were new. 

Donnie was mad. 

Donnie also cared about his brothers. 

He was fiercely protective. 

You were aggravating him because you hadn’t figured out what you had done wrong yet. 

You could last a little bit longer. 

You’d figure it out. 

You’d fix it. 

You couldn’t ask for more help. 

This was happening because of you. 

Still, you made about as much progress in your plight as Donnie did his. Early departures from the lair soon turned to you dreading even arrival. While Mikey’s sunny day had once been a safe bubble, Donnie’s distrust was that of a gas. It grew noxious and suffocating until it filled your lungs to the point of bursting.

You had to hold out. 

The moon stabilized climate.

An invitation came. 

You had heard story of the famous Hamato movie night, but you didn’t dare think you’d be offered a seat. It was a special affair held once a month and unlike any other. It marked the adult family carving time out of their busy schedules to get together. It was for them and not something you felt longing for. Instead, when Mikey mentioned it in passing, you felt a warmth in your heart at how studiously they were there for one another. 

Staring at Mikey’s casual call for you to come by during one almost felt like a mockey. 

What had you done to earn a seat at the proverbial table? 

Were they a democratic bunch?

Donnie must have voted no to your attendance. 

Had the majority agreed?

If you thought about it for too long then you could convince yourself that all of them had vetoed you in some way. 

Still, you didn’t feel like you could pass up the momentous offer. 

This was important to Mikey. 

It was important to you.  

Attending found a packed lair and a chance for you to put faces to the last outliers in the clan. Hit with a whirlwind of names you weren’t sure you could remember and painfully trying to come up with a pneumonic device to keep from screwing everything up, Mikey abandoned you as soon as he was asked to make his famous rice krispie treats.

Knowing it wasn’t malicious and instead a show of how he trusted you to get along with his family, you tucked yourself into a far bean bag in an attempt to become as small as possible. On the outskirts of the herd, the others were too savvy for their own goods and you were soon pelted with questions. With your safety blanket several rooms away, you tried to answer, but the speed of the questions picked up until voices seemingly came from every direction. Mouths freely floating, it triggered a painfully ingrained fight or flight that you were about to give into when one voice cut through the crowd.

“When are you finally going to admit your villainous intent?”

Donnie’s question had the caliber of a gunshot. 

Its reverb silenced the crowd. 

It then permeated a cloud layer where all hell broke loose.

Wild like spring, April smacked Donnie up the back of his head. “Do you hear yourself?!”

A perky pulp, Sunita dropped to her knees beside you and mistakenly screamed in your ear. “Omigosh!! Don’t listen to him!!”

Blunt and wrapped in unbreakable binds like the hockey stick she carried, Casey sneered until her upper lip rolled back. “O’Neil’s strikes have dislodged something in your brain! I’d sniff out the indoctrinated in a second if there were one!”  

“Are you still going on about this?” Raph groaned.  

“It doesn’t make sense!” Donnie sprouted rotors and flew out of Aprils’ reach. “If you would just listen! Use your brains for a moment then you’d see! You were all tested! Each of you earned your spots! Then this one walks in and gets a free pass!? Why!?”

As if inciting war, sides were taken up with arms.

“I call challenge!!!” Casey screeched to an echo. “In the bonds of combat we shall unearth true intention!!”

“That’s not how friendship works!” April climbed onto the couch in an attempt to leap after the purple turtle. “You don’t have to fight to become friends!”

“It helps, does it not O’Neil?!” Casey launched herself at April. 

Sunita intercepted. “You know what I find always works?! A group hug!! One time my aunt Chloe and my other aunt Rachel were in a multi-year fight over who stole whose college boyfriend and after they hugged it out and had to spend the next three days separating their jellies, they came out of it closer than ever!” 

“Classic movie night!” Leo cheered through a mouth full of popcorn.

“Donnie, look what you did!” Raph pointed down at the floor. “Get down from there right now!”

Maniacal laughter followed from multiple sources and you pulled your legs to your chest.

They were fighting.

You were the cause.

You failed. 

You ruined movie night on top of everything else.

Why couldn’t you solve it?

You had only needed to make up with Donnie.

Then all of this would stop.

You just had to make it stop.

Everyone just needed to stop.

Hands going over your head, a single thought popped up.

Donnie would be happy if you only removed yourself from the situation. 

Unfurling until a toe touched the floor, you heard a loud whirr and Donnie slammed down to his feet to block you. 

“No way! Nuh uh!! You think you’re going to leave?! Sneak away during all this commotion!?” He held his hands out, passing off ownership of the orchestrated chaos. “You’ve created this… this… distraction!” Finding the word, he loomed over you with an expression dripping with sadism. “I think it’s about time you took my lie detector test. One that actually works…” His fingers writhed to grab you and tears burned fresh in your eyes.

Something metallic was struck and its tuning fork hum rang in your ears.  

“What are you all doing!?” Mikey stood with flowery oven mitts on and the ruins of his rice krispies spilling out from the tray he’d dropped. “Y/N?!”

Casey roared to life at the same time as Donnie.

“We are preparing to test the grit of your baby soft acquaintance!”

“This has to be done, Mikey! We have to know for sure!”

“Know what?!” Mikey screamed.

A geomagnetic storm, orange electricity flicked off of him like a plasma ball.

Except there wasn’t a casing.  

As he closed in, you felt it cause the hairs on your arms to stand on end.

“What they have over you!” Donnie was pleading insanity. “What they’ve done! How they’ve tricked you into letting them hang around!”

“Donnie, that’s enough!!” Leo appeared with a hand to Mikey’s shoulder.

You stared as the orange energy began to obviously sear Leo’s skin, but he didn’t let go.

This was all your fault.

“You’re jealous! We get it!! But you need to stop making it everyone else’s problem!” Leo continued. 

The indignity hit Donnie with an inhale that seemed to never stop.

“Mike’s allowed to have his own life outside of you! Outside of us! Can’t you be happy for him? Don, seriously?! Take a second, a breath. Then we can finally talk about this instead of you always running away-!“

Donnie launched himself with a swinging arm toward Leo, but an orange chain appeared to wrap around his arm.

Coming from seemingly nowhere, Donnie was yanked. 

“Mikey…” Raph warned, getting up slowly.

“You know how unfair it is!?” Mikey shouted as orange glowing pools of sunshine overflowed and dripped down his face. “How I’m a whole adult and you all still treat me like a baby! How I’m still not trusted to make decision on my own! How I go along with it to make you all happy!” Mikey spun from addressing the room to send his pupil-less gaze at Donnie. “Why can’t you trust my judgment on this!? On anything!?”

“Because!” In a burst of purple energy, the orange chain shredded to bits. “Because you do this! Because you still lose control! Because you never did keep up with the training Draxum started you on! Because all of you! You!!!” Donnie threw a finger into Leo’s face. “Just YESTERDAY I was the reason you didn’t eat shit in the Hidden City because of my obsessive monitors! I caught that Yokai trying to attack you! Me!! And why did that happen!?” Donnie threw his arms out and spun around to April specifically. “HRM!?”

April only frowned. “Cause Leo didn’t trust that axolotl, but Donnie-”

“On a hunch!!” Donnie hissed, turning back to Mikey and Leo. “So, don’t give me that making it someone else’s problem crap. You’re just as paranoid as me! As Raph!” Donnie zeroed in on Mikey. “Not you though. You get free reign from our worries!”

“How could you say that!?” More molten tears exploded from Mikey’s face.

One hit the floor and sizzled.

“I’m the one who watches you!” Mikey cried.

“Then stop! Your duty is self imposed anyway! No one asked you to be the family therapist! You force it on us like everything else!!!” Donnie screamed.

Leo looked away.

Raph rubbed the back of his head.

“You create a Doctor of the hour because it makes you feel useful.” Donnie dropped his volume for pure scathe.

Mikey’s gaze hit the floor where he was burning very real divots into it.  

“You take care of that and I’ll take care of this.” Donnie coolly glanced at Leo who was still avoiding eye contact before he zeroed in on you.

You wished you were an ant so you could drown yourself in an acid pool of Mikey’s tears.

“My lie detector is only mentally invasive. I want to run a single test. I will find out what hold you have on my little brother.” Donnie nodded for you to follow him.

Could you go?

You felt like if you took a single step you would pass out.

Were you breathing?

Was this the end?

It felt like Donnie was the mad scientist and any prick from him would cause you to become a husk. 

Maybe then you’d finally match your worth. 

“Is it…?”

Mikey’s voice was near silent, but the whole room turned toward him.

Bringing his head up, those same orange tears were flowing, but they now lifted free from gravity and drifted away from his face.

There they formed dangerous globules in the air. 

“… so hard to believe…?”

He took a step forward and with it the very energy was drained from the room. 

Everything took on an orange hue.

“…that I COULD JUST HAVE A CRUSH ON SOMEONE!?!”

Like a solar flare, Mikey released a shock wave from the power he’d pulled.

💛NEXT💛

Much love to my betas @tmntxthings and @thepinkpanther83

[yekokataa]

i dunno if this has filtered through to anyone who isn't into ufos, but there's a conspiracy theory floating around the ufo community that something big is going to happen in 2027. government disclosure about what they know about ufos? a massive alien invasion? some other big nebulous foreboding thing? unclear. kind of like that belief that the world would end when the mayan calendar did, if you ask me

[apatheticlexicographer]

(this is kind of a long post that somehow turned into lowkey a conspiracy theory but i don’t want to rewrite the start bc it was written pretty much stream of consciousness and that amuses me)

maybe this is an unpopular opinion but i don’t want byler to be spoiled lol

crumbs, sure, little things that keep us invested, but i want to go into s5 completely unawares of how it’s gonna play out. i don’t want the cast or the official socials or some random leaker to tell me what’s gonna happen beforehand.

honestly the fact that so many people involved with the show have acknowledged byler yet none of them have shot it down as a possibility is a big enough crumb for me. or the way official netflix accounts have posted promotional things with byler since s4 dropped. yeah, they don’t have any involvement with the production of the show, but if the ship is being used for marketing then it’s considered a possible sales point.

actually now that i think of it, does anybody remember the june advent calendar??? when, immediately after v1 dropped, the official netflix accounts started posting pro-byler stuff damn near every day, to the point where we made an event out of it???

at the time we all got super hyped over it and then figured it was queerbait when they didn’t get together in v2, but isn’t it mighty fuckin convenient that the netflix accounts just “coincidentally” happened to start posting pro-byler stuff as soon as v1 dropped??? because yeah, byler started picking up traction immediately after it aired, but it took a while to really get the ball rolling. they started cashing in on the byler hyper train when it was only just beginning to grow from its tiny pre-s4 presence. seeing official accounts mentioning byler probably helped to cement it in a lot of people’s radar in the gap between the volumes. and didn’t noah also start saying he shipped byler around then??? 

POSTED ON JUNE THIRD??? only a week after v1 aired??? and ppl were so surprised by this tweet that when he was on a panel somebody asked him if he got hacked 😭😭

back then it really seemed like “oh the official accounts are queerbaiting during pride month” but A: we know noah wasn’t just saying this for nothing,he’s made it very clear that he believes it and B: why the hell would they be queerbaiting the tiny fledgling post-v1 byler audience when it was only just coming together??!?

hindsight says something was afoot here actually. they started releasing the pro-byler agenda from its tightly locked enclosure AFTER the volume where mike tells will hawkins isn’t the same without him and will brings the painting “for somebody he likes” when they go to pick mike up, IN PREPARATION for the volume where will gives said painting to mike along with an extremely emotional nameswapped love confession and mike turns around and gives a stilted and phony confession to his girlfriend. why the hell was attention being drawn to byler outside of the show itself in that interval if not to make people recontextualize what they just saw in v1??? and then when they see v2 have that recontextualization validated when will is confirmed to be both gay and in love with mike??? and to pick up on the fact that mike and el’s relationship is on more rocks than your average pile of gravel???

we know that they’ve had actors straight up lie to the audience before, too, because even if u just take noah as an example he said in a JUNE interview that will’s sexuality was up to interpretation, and then not that long at all after v2 dropped he did the iconic “will is gay and in love with mike” interview!!! and obviously he knew that will was confirmed gay when he did the first interview bc they had filmed that scene like a year earlier. so the fact that he never rlly mentioned byler, except for vaguely negatively when he was a kid, until v1 comes out and “SUDDENLY” he’s byler’s biggest warrior doesn’t mean he randomly changed his mind, it means he hadn’t been allowed to talk about it until after volume 1. after the first half of the season that made the majority of byler shippers see it as a genuine possibility and even the most likely outcome.

sorry i have no idea how much sense this makes and i’ve completely derailed whatever i was talking about at the top of this post. has anybody pointed this out??? have i pointed this out and i just forgot??? help?!!?!??

[crepes-suzette-373]

This is just a huge long winded post about how Germa reminds me of Japanese history and mythology, and some Wano things. Just so that it's all in one place and not scattered.

Very wild and goes all over the place, it's that conspiracy board with strings. I've been enabled by enablers.

WCI:

Related to the Nobunaga post (you probably need to read that one first).

Deep, deep reach here, and I feel like it's just bonkers connecting WCI to something as historically significant in Japan as The Honnouji Incident, and it doesn't even seem relevant at all. But. It was well known that Nobunaga was killed on the verge of reaching a big success.

He was on his way to oversee reinforcements being led to fight one of his biggest rivals, and anticipating that this will finally bring them down. Then one of his commanders betrayed him and he died with his heir. On the night before his death, he was having a glamorous tea party with the court nobles, not suspecting that anything was wrong.

Germa thought they were going to secure a big profit by allying with Big Mum, but are betrayed and they all almost died in a tea party where many VIPs from all over the world were present.

There's a lot of rain during WCI. I think it's just meant to relate to Sanji's mental state, because rain = sadness is a very common trope.

Still, very famous conspiracy related to the above historical incident was that the commander who did the betrayal was said to have written a poem that has the line translated something along the lines of "Now, the rain falls, on the fifth month" before committing the deed. This poem supposedly contains a hidden message that reveals his intention to betray.

Like I said the connection is very flimsy, that's why I doubt there's relevance.

Also in terms of more number 6 stuff, the above incident happened in history in the sixth lunar month (also in June, according to Western calendar).

Japanese crests:

More randomly throwing nonsense at the wall, but speaking of Japanese tradition, Ichiji's belt somewhat reminds me of some samurai house crest. I had been thinking about this a lot since I've been going through traditional Japanese designs in making the youkai AU:

And on the subject of Japanese designs, "lightning/thunder" is actually traditionally depicted as a "square spiral". In patterning (like clothes or paintings), it can sometimes be embellished into a shape that vaguely resembles a swastika.

I just thought the swirly pattern is interesting. It's square, while Sanji and the others are round spiral shapes, so it might not be relevant. I just thought of this because of the lightning bolt in the Germa skull.

Wano:

Also. Probably just design coincidence, but... somehow their silhouette is similar (same big fluffy hair, the coat's cut flares like a kimono):

I mean, not saying the Vinsmoke family is related to the Kozuki, just the Wano people in general. I mentioned once that I thought young Judge kind of looks like young Kin'emon.

Last thought. There is a conspiracy in Japan, where famous warrior Minamoto no Yoshitsune didn't die like history said. He actually went to the mainland and became Genghis Khan.

This was part of what I was thinking, when I thought the Vinsmokes might have Wano origins. It's a story of "Japanese hero leaves Japan, becomes a ruler elsewhere".

Other random things that are probably even more not relevant, but doesn't help my conspiracy brain:

One of Nobunaga's sons who survived the chaos ended up in service of the conqueror who succeeded in unifying Japan, Toyotomi Hideyoshi (apparently according to Japanese text it's not Tokugawa like people think). This Hideyoshi is famously nicknamed "Monkey" in Japan (regardless of whether this is true or not)

Said son is infamous in Japanese perception for being "stupid" and "useless" because he is just absolutely terrible in warfare (not sure if this is necessarily true either, but well, I'm no historian). He's apparently very good in the arts, though.

In the linked post I mentioned of there being another son whose name is literally number 3 and 7 (Sanshichi) that makes me just giggle because of Sanji being 3 and 2. That third son is not the one who survived, but this one and his older brother was born so closely in timing (from different mothers) that people have argued that the order of the birth was incorrectly recorded.

Those two brothers were sometimes said to have issues with each other because of this. I don't think this is relevant, but this knowledge just makes Niji and Sanji's interaction seem funny to me.

[phanfictioncatalogue]

Hey!

I’m in a bad need of a recommendation of a more recent long slow burn chaptered fic.

I’ve read all the older (2020 and back) fics and I was wondering what good ones came more recently.

Can you help? Thank yoou ❤️❤️

Here’s some that have been posted from 2021 to present :)

Advent Calendar 2021 (ao3) - Phantje

Summary: Phil lives and works in a town in the North called Lylchester. Well, 'works'. He does charitable things in the name of being nice and his (adoptive) parents. Things are fine. Yeah. Fine. Meeting Dan who has strong opinions about peculiar things shakes up Phil's life and he is falling before he can help it.

Dan lives and works somewhere, or anywhere really. By fate, or call it the British Railway train running times, he ends up in Lylchester. Before he can help himself, he has made the first real best friend he has ever had - Beatrix. And suddenly, life does not seem so difficult anymore. Dan appreciates the work he can do, even if it has him interact with the rich idiot Phil more often that he would personally choose.

Broke, Gay and New in Town (ao3) - natigail

Summary: Dan Howell was in dire need for a change - he hated his job and his life and he just felt stuck. His grandfather's letter was a blessing that came with an incredible gift: A farm. Dan had no idea how to run a farm but he was willing to give it a try.

He arrived in Stardew Valley with few expectations but even so, he could never have imagined he would encounter magic, otherworldly creatures, corporate conspiracies, so many queer villagers, a secret destiny and right at the centre of it all the love of his life.

Dandelions (ao3) - throughtheirsnoses (det395)

Summary: Phil returns to his small town after studying how to improve his power that lets him grow plants with his mind. Phil is anxious and struggling with the expectations put on him to grow new plant-based medicine and on top of it all, his childhood best friend, Dan, gets his heart broken and turns to Phil as a rebound. Phil panics.

do you feel it too? (ao3) - heartsopenminds

Summary: A bad break-up has left Phil scared of getting his heart broken again. He’s not ready to date, but he’s missing the easy affection of a long-term relationship.

Cuddle therapy might be the perfect way to get what he needs, with no strings attached. But what happens when that’s no longer enough?

First to Listen (To Anything I Said) (ao3) - SylvesterLester

Summary: It's 2004, and Dan Howell is screwing up in school. He can't help that he's stuck in boring classes with boring people and just doesn't care. So when Phil Lester, one of the geekiest kids in school, is assigned to be his tutor, he's expecting this to just be another crappy part of his already crappy life.

But when it turns out Phil might be Dan's first real friend, his hormones threaten to screw all that up. Because that's all it is, right? Hormones?

Laws Of Attraction (ao3) - strawberrysunflower

Summary: When Phil turned twenty-nine, he wrote out a list of all the things he had in his life. One terraced house in Manchester, rented. Two housemates who still buy the cheapest alcohol on offer in Tesco. Three failed long-term relationships.

After a spur-of-the-moment Friday night out on Canal Street, Phil ends up in the bed of a very handsome stranger. It’s a nice yet meaningless distraction from his directionless life. No big deal. Until he bumps into him again. And again. And again...

scratch bark bite (oh, love me, i lied) (ao3) - Tarredion

Summary: Music & Drama teacher Dan Howell has a well-known rivalry with his coworker, English teacher Phil Lester.

An unforeseen event flips everything Dan thought he knew about Phil and himself on its head. Slowly but surely, the grudge withers, and the two of them cross the line between enemy and friend. But what will happen when their true intents and feelings get revealed? And was what they had ever really a rivalry? Was it even mutual?

strike a deal, kiss my lips (ao3) - natigail

Summary: Witches were the only magical beings capable of binding and controlling demons. It required a complicated ritual and crazy amounts of magic.

It happening on accident was practically unheard of until Phil came along and got tangled up with a snarky and dangerous demon named Dan. Suddenly bound together, Phil must grapple with control over a chaotic demon that wants to strip the skin from his bones.

And maybe strip the clothes off of his body as well.

The River (ao3) - Portia331

Summary: Dan arrived in Melbourne two weeks ago with just one suitcase crammed with running gear, psychology textbooks, and a mere fraction of his wardrobe especially curated to fit both his aesthetic and the Melbourne weather.

He's about to start in the role of a lifetime on a 12 month contract, but he's barely ready for the Australian summer heat, let alone what the world is about to throw at him.

Thunder Only Happens When It's Raining (ao3) - Nefertiti1052 (Succubusphan)

Summary: Dan meets Phil at the lowest moment in his life and is immediately enchanted by him, but nobody is perfect - not even those with good intentions and a kind heart.

This is the story of two imperfect people trying to do their best, to find love and strive in life. They gravitate towards each other at every turn, sometimes dancing in harmony, other times colliding.

Two Man Team (ao3) - Nefertiti1052 (Succubusphan)

Summary: This is the story of two struggling friends who after many trials and tribulations find their way back to each other and build the life they've always dreamed of.

Or how Phil changed his life by talking to random strangers on the internet.

what might come with the dawn (ao3) - cloud-gays (wind_brewed)

Summary: The Island has a Guardian, that's what people say. Phil doesn't know if this guardian is a mythical being or just a piece of gossip; a made-up story to make people feel safe during storm season. A made-up story just to make them feel secure.

Now that he decides to move in with his parents again, Phil needs the protection. Maybe he needs to reach out to this lonely, black-clothed being; reach out to the lonely man of winter.

Also called: Phil is a storm-chaser of sorts and Dan, a storm-magnet. In between running and hiding, they find each other inside the calm of the storm.

-Rae

[theabstruseone]

Recently I've been on a kick learning about classical era history, so I'm going to be That Guy and explain a bunch of stuff I recently learned as if it's some grand revelation nobody has ever heard of before. Anyway, some Fun Facts about the Assassination of Gaius Julius Caesar!

Caesar was assassinated because people feared he'd set himself up as a king. He'd taken to wearing a purple toga picta everywhere (which is something only allowed for a general during a triumph aka a parade in honor of conquering new territory for Rome), he'd had a gilded chair installed in the Forum to sit in and preside over Senate meetings even though he wasn't Consul. And Marc Antony during a religious ceremony (that involved the priests running naked through the streets with a freshly-made whip attempting to spank women to grant them fertility) offered a crown to Caesar which he refused. Why he refused is disputed, with some saying it was because he wanted to be seen publicly refusing the crown, some saying it was because he wanted to test the waters and see if Rome would accept him being crowned. Either way, this event was on February 15 so it kind of accelerated the conspirators' plans.

The reason this was a big deal was the Romans HATED the concept of a King. This comes after the (possibly mythical) story of the overthrow of the first King of Rome by Lucius Junius Brutus. Which was why the conspirators wanted Marcus Junius Brutus involved in their conspiracy to assassinate Caesar. That Brutus was an ancestor of the other Brutus and felt it would lend legitimacy to their claims of assassinating Caesar to save the republic from a king.

Caesar was warned the assassination was coming. Not by a soothsayer telling him "Beware the Ides of March" as written by Shakespeare - he got that from Plutarch who wrote about it almost a century after the fact - but likely by one of the wives of the conspirators. So it wasn't some oracle trying to give him a divine warning, it was someone trying to sell out the conspirators in a subtle way and was ignored.

The Ides of March (as in the date itself) has a bit of confusion around it. We're not sure exactly what the calendar was at the time as there were a lot of changes over the 2nd and 1st centuries BCE. March was originally the first month of the year when the year had ten months, but there's some confusion whether January and February were at the start or end of the year at the time. Ovid (the Andrew Tate of Ancient Rome who lived during the time of the transition of the Republic to the Empire) wrote that January was the first month and February was the last while Livy (who was also alive during this time) said that the start of the year switched to January around 120 BCE to shuffle in new Consuls, so it's a bit confusing. Either way, it was still pretty significant because...

The Ides of March was a soft deadline for assassinating Caesar. Now that he had solidified his power, he planned to go to war with Parthia and planned to leave soon after the Ides of March as that was prime campaigning season (don't want to go tromping off so you get stuck in the mountains in winter on the way back, huh Marcus Antony?) So the significance of the date being the former start of a Consul's new term combined with Caesar about to head out on campaign with his army meant they had to get it done by then.

The assassination did not happen in the Forum, but in the Curia of Pompey. The Forum was undergoing an expansion so the Senate had taken to meeting at various places around the city. Not only was the Curia of Pompey ironic as it was the theater built by the man Caesar defeated in the Civil War (the iconic "the die is cast" and crossing the Rubicon), but it was outside the Pomerium. Which was the location of the original walls of Rome and an area where no weapons were allowed with a death penalty attached to taking a weapon across the Pomerium. The Pomerium was a huge deal in Rome and there were a bunch of laws and traditions around it, so this was a big deal.

There's no evidence Caesar said "Et tu, Brute?" That was a flourish of Shakespeare. And he got it from other playwrights where it was part of a couplet "And you, Brutus?" "Then fall, Caesar" The line reported by Suetonius (again, born a century after the events) were in Greek "Kai sy, teknon" ("And you, my child?"). Plutarch (again, writing after the fact but more recently that Suetonius) did not report this but rather that Caesar shouted after being pinned down by Cimbur "Ista quidem vis est!" ("This is violence!", a reminder that violence in the Senate was a death penalty offense). Then Caesa stabbed at his neck (and may have missed or barely nicked him), when Caesar shouted (again in Latin) "Casca, you villain, what are you doing?". Then he was stabbed by Cassius, Titiedius, Decimus, then Cassius missed and accidentally stabbed Brutus in the hand, then Brutus stabbed Caesar in the dick (seriously, and it was intentional because Caesar was already on the ground bleeding out). Caesar pulled his toga over his face and he died.

Estimates for the number of conspirators was up to 60. In what may have been the first post-mortem in recorded history, a physician noted that Caesar was only stabbed 23 times. Meaning that as many as 37 of the conspirators didn't participate in the assassination. And if you notice the description above, I only mentioned Casca, Cassius, Titiedius, Decimus, and Brutus as stabbing him while he was alive. So the rest walked up after the fact and just stabbed the already-dead body. So yes, the group project meme about the assassination is even worse than you thought.

The conspirators left and Brutus began shouting in the streets "People of Rome, we are once again free!" But because they spent so much time afterward dealing with what they'd just done, the people outside the Curia of Pompey had spread the news. And instead of the cheering crowds greeting them as liberators, they were met with silence as everyone had locked their doors and hidden in their homes. For good reason...

Brutus tried to give a speech, but it failed and things were getting bad because Caesar was popular with the people. His whole "No one has been murdered, a tyrant has been killed!" speech didn't work as they didn't really have a plan. It was literally just Step One: Assassinate Caesar, Step Two: ???, Step Three: Restore the Republic! and they had no idea what to do next...

The "Friends, Romans, Countryman, Lend me your ears!" speech from the play is legendary, but it doesn't hold a candle to how weird and fucked up Mark Antony's actual speech was. He propped up the toga Caesar wore still stained with his blood on a spear next to his body. Antony would then list his achievements one by one, then motion to the body after each of them. Then pointed out how the Senate took an oath to protect Caesar's life and called out the conspirators for violating that oath (this is likely because Cassius threatened Antony after they'd negotiated a tense peace and Antony was not pleased). Then he showed off a wax figure of Caesar's mutilated body showing how he'd been killed in graphic detail. And that set off a full-on riot that started burning the city in a massive funeral pyre.

BTW, there were no "good guys" in this situation. Caesar was the reason we assign the meaning we do to "dictator" (which originally just meant "leader with emergency powers") and "tyrant" (which was just Greek for "king"). He was popular with the people because he basically bribed them constantly with land grants and public projects financed by money he looted from seized treasuries and of the Roman Senate itself. Cassius, Brutus, and Decimus (the primary conspirators) were wealthy land-owners who were defending the interests of other wealthy land-owners in opposing Caesar who felt if they got rid of Caesar, they'd be able to exploit their power once again "democratically" (meaning bribing and threatening everyone to going with what they want) and undo all his reforms. Everybody in this story is an asshole.

And there we go, everything I can think of off the top of my head that I found interesting to learn about the assassination of Julius Caesar. Looking forward to the additions and corrections in the notes!

[ts1989fanatic]

Well duh!

here's nothing Taylor Swift fans love more than an Easter egg. Give them a hint of a secret message, a conspiracy theory, or something to decode and Swifties are all over it.

So, it's no surprise, as they (we) anxiously await the announcement of international tour dates, that they would take matters into their own hands and try to determine where Swift might be playing next once she completes her current U.S. performances.

What is the likelihood of a Vancouver show? Let's break it down:

Seattle vs. Vancouver

Taylor Swift has been on five international tours; her current Eras tour is her sixth. Of her five previous tours, she came to Vancouver for three of them: Speak Now, Red, and 1989.

Swift skipped Vancouver during the Fearless tour, her first ever, and the Reputation Stadium tour, but she did play multiple other Canadian cities and Seattle.

ts1989fanatic:

Actually this is factually incorrect, for reputation she played two nights in Toronto that’s it.

Was Vancouver left off the list because she was already playing Seattle? Perhaps. There were already some artists who will either play Vancouver or Seattle for their west coast shows.

Swift played Vancouver during the Speak Now and Red tours and skipped Seattle but she played both during 1989. So overall it's hard to tell if we can bank on a Vancouver show given that the Eras tour is coming to Seattle.

Swift had another scheduled concert tour, Lover Fest, that was cancelled due to COVID and Canada wasn't included in any of the dates announced back in September 2019. Lover Fest included four U.S. shows, seven European shows, and one show in Brazil.

Does Canada count as "international"?

ts1989fanatic:

Hell yes it does, we are a separate country from the US, we have borders and everything. And a lot of us can’t afford to travel to the US or Toronto.

Additionally, previous Vancouver tour dates weren't necessarily considered part of the international tour. In some cases, Canadian shows were announced at the same time as the U.S. dates as part of a North American leg.

ts1989fanatic:

We damn well should be considered part of the international tour.

For Red and 1989 (the last time Swift performed in Vancouver) the Canadian shows were performed concurrently with the U.S. ones based on proximity.

However, Swift also performed significantly fewer shows in the last two tours. Reputation had 53 shows, only six of which were outside of North America and Canadian fans are adamant that Swift won't neglect her fans north of the border.

ts1989fanatic:

I wish I was as certain of this as some, but I honestly don’t know.

Would BC Place be booked already?

BC Place is the largest venue in Vancouver (capacity 54,500) and the one that Swift performed at on her last two visits. Still, its size doesn't come close to the capacity of some of the arenas she has performed at so far during the Eras tour. For example, Raymond James Stadium in Tampa holds 75,000 and NRG Stadium in Houston holds 72,220 fans.

ts1989fanatic:

So add more dates, instead of one night make it two or three like most US cities.

If Swift was to come to Vancouver BC Place is the only logical venue choice and would be booked by now (which means if she is coming someone is walking around Vancouver with a very big secret).

Swiftie super fans online believe that she is performing in the U.K. and Australia based on arena bookings and if we look at the BC Place calendar there are a few gaps in October where Swift could easily fit in a show or two. Some fans think she's more likely to visit in mid to late 2024 and BC Place has yet to reveal next year's calendar of events.

ts1989fanatic:

I could live with October or even 2024 so long as she’s here.

Why haven't the dates been announced yet?

ts1989fanatic:

That’s the billion $ question.

Many fans are begging to be put out of their misery: Is Taylor Swift coming to Canada or isn't she?

ts1989fanatic:

That’s the second billion $ question

International fans were promised an announcement in early 2023 (the initial dates were announced in November 2022) but the Ticketmaster disaster and subsequent hearing may have altered that plan and it's likely that the Taylor Nation team is strategizing how best to accommodate the demand.

ts1989fanatic:

Well how about @taylorswift or @taylornation put us out of our collective misery.

[dancingtothesurfacenoise]

TODAY IN HISTORY

Today is June 15, it is the 166th day of the year (167th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar.

There are 199 days remaining until the end of the year.

It's the birthday of Edvard Grieg, widely considered one of the best composers of the Romantic Era as well as American singer Harry Nilsson, Ice Cube.

Wes Montgomery, American guitarist and songwriter left the planet on this date in 1968.

Today is Ontological Empiricism Day!

On this date in :

6001 BC - Blueprints for square wheel were rejected in favor of the Decagon wheel.

215 BCE - Archimedes is arrested for indecent exposure.

72 BCE – Moses takes steroids; parts the Red Sea.

36 - Jesus Christ becomes a moose to spread the Word in the Americas however he only manages to get tangled up in clotheslines and trip over lawn furniture.

455 - Rome is plundered by Martha and the Vandellas.

1213 - The Vatican, under Pope Indecent III, creates purgatory.

1770 - Captain James Cook, after reading David Eagleman's book "Incognito"; wondered whether the Great Barrier Reef actually "exists", or is simply a bundle of sense-data, which is "perceived" by most to be a coral reef.

He is driven mad within minutes.

1879 - Mary has a little lamb.......with gravy.

1898 - A chicken "crosses the road" for the first time, but the event goes unnoticed by the media except for the news truck that ran it over.

1922 - The Society of Post-postmodernism declares Ontological Empiricism shallow and pedantic.

1932 - Harlem renaissance poet Langston Hughes pens the first Yo momma joke.

1945 - Wheel reinvented.

1963 - A Buddhist monk, believing himself to have perfected fireproof clothing, performs a public demonstration of the clothes by setting himself on fire in a crowded Vietnamese street. Predictably, the monk himself was not fireproof and burned to death.

1978 - Ben Vereen goes insane, riding a hobby-horse unicorn through Weehawken, New Jersey and destroying six laundromats in the process.

1979 -First refrigerator invented. Originally marketed for killing people slowly.

1993 - Margaret Thatcher grows her first beard.

1999 - Cheese is declared a basic element after complaints from several Pan-dimensional beings calling in to conservative talk radio shows.

2001 - Mary Poppins is brutally murdered outside Aldgate East tube station.

2003 – The European Space Agency begins probing Mars. Europeans promise to colonize Mars, give Martian natives smallpox, and spur intergalactic wars of independence.

2004 - Bare assertion fallacy rediscovered as brash, and somewhat titillating.

2005 - Right wing Facebook users baffled by the words 'Ontological', 'Empiricism', and in some cases, 'Day'.

2006 - Right wing Facebook users, armed with pocket thesauruses, attempt to post something relevant. Success is somewhat limited.

2007 - McDonalds start a one-day special offer, giving away a free emo member of staff with every Big Mac meal.

2008 - The creator of Ontological Empiricism Day is punched in the face by God. "Here you have a proof of both your existence and logos !" declared the non cosmic aggressor.

2008 - The Hermeneutic Society votes against the Ontological Empiricism Day, quoting the Universe Indexed Properties and the Fate of the Ontological Argument papers.

2010 - Steve Irwin confirmed as "still dead."

2012 - First recording of a quartet that actually had 4 members.

2016 - The Colonel's recipe of eleven herbs and spices is accidentally revealed, exposing the two-thousand-year-old Illuminati/space alien/Bush/Clinton conspiracy to control the world's supply of food that comes in buckets.

2017 - General Francisco Franco, no longer still dead...found running amok in Washington D.C.

2018- Kim Jong-un joins cast of "Celebrity Shitty Dictator".

2022 - The Hermeneutic Society votes against Ontological Empiricism Day, quoting the 'Universe Indexed Properties and the Fate of the Ontological Argument' papers.

2023 - Pope Francis revealed to be a chat-bot‎

2024- You read this. Wished you had not bothered.

[chorusfm]

Albums in Stores – May 31st, 2024

If you hit read more you can see all the releases we have in our calendar for the week. Hit the comments to access our forums and talk about what came out today, what albums you picked up, and to make mention of anything we may have missed. Age Of Distraction – A Game Of WhispersArooj Aftab – Night ReignAseitas – Eden TroughBad Omens – Concrete Jungle (The OST)Bat for Lashes – The Dream Of DelphiBeaten To Death – Sunrise Over Rigor MortisBen Platt – HoneymindBlack Sabbath – Anno Domini 1989–1995Carnwennan – LotusCobra The Impaler – Karma CollisionCrahda – Existential TurmoilCrowded House – Gravity StairsDuff McKagan – Tenderness Live In Los AngelesEat Your Own Head – The TrawlerEnquire Within – ElysiumExodus – British Disaster: The Battle Of ’89 (Live At The Astoria)Fight The Fight – Shah Of TimeFire From The Gods – Soul Revolution (Deluxe Edition)Four Stroke Baron – Data DiamondGaffa Tape Sandy – Hold My Hand, God Damn ItGlassfires – GeminiGnod – Spot LandGraywave – Dancing In The DustHRTLSS – Blood MoonHalcyon Way – Night CrawlingHalf Waif – Ephemeral BeingHellbutcher – HellbutcherHigh Desert Queen – Palm ReaderHouse By The Cemetary – The Mortuary HauntingsIdaho – LapseIdol Throne – A Clarion CallInvent Animate – Heavener (Definitive)Keaton Henson – Somnambulant CyclesKing Hannah – Big SwimmerLock Horns – Red RoomLook To Windward – The Last Scattering SurfaceLowlives – Freaking OutMarjana Semkina – SirinMaya Hawke – Chaos AngelMy Diligence – Death. Horses. Black.Nestor – Teenage RebelNeutrals – New Town DreamOld Man Luedecke – She Told Me Where To GoRad Owl – Rage GracefullyRaised On TV – Make Time To Make TimeReliqa – Secrets Of The FutureRichard Hawley – In This City They Call You LoveRichard Thompson – Ship To ShoreSam Jr. – Inner ShadowSaving Vice – Good Days, Dead EyesShrapnel – In GravitySuper American – Gangster Of LovediscussSwampbeast – Offering Of Chaos, Lamenting In The Blood Of ManThe Hope Conspiracy – Tools Of Oppression / Rule By DeceptionThe Menzingers – Some Of It Was True (Deluxe Edition)The Spatulas – Beehive MindThou – UmbilicalUnessential Oils – Unessential OilsWallows – ModelWitherfall – Sounds Of The ForgottenWormwood – The StarZero One – Faults In My Design --- Thanks to helloiamzach for providing additional contributions to this week’s list. You can check out and support his weekly music podcast It’s Not A Phase or follow him on his socials. --- Please consider becoming a member so we can keep bringing you stories like this one. ◎ https://chorus.fm/albums-in-stores-today/albums-in-stores-may-31st-2024/

[miramisaki]

Hi, I don't have any suggestions for art. But I saw your tags about Traum still not get an announcement date. As someone who has spent way too much time guessing when events and stuff will begin, and given how we still have one more event and a pre-release campaign to get through, I can say that Traum will probably release around May 18th-20th.

Unfortunately they won't give an actual date until the stream when they show everything off. Which is usually only a day or two before. But hopefully it should be around then!

Hi Anon, thank you for the message! I too have been doing the red yarn conspiracy board thing while staring at the calendar, so I understand your pain.

Sadly there's a lot of unknowns in between now and then that can affect the release date, the biggest one being how long the Learning with Manga event lasts. If they decide that seeing me chomping on tree roots in a maddened frenzy is funny and make it last for a whole 3 weeks, then I agree with your assessment of the release date, though I would posit that it would be May 17 because they've been releasing new content on Fridays recently.

The pre-release campaign will likey last a week, the big question for that is whether they'll overlap it with the Learning with Manga event. If they do, then the LB6.5 release could come as much as a whole week earlier.

Now all of this, of course, hinges on where the localization team is at and how fast they can reasonably get the new content out. The important thing to remember is that the team is human, and no matter how much we may be chomping at the bit to get new content, their health and wellbeing as workers comes first. So while theoretically we could get Traum release as early as May 3 if the Learning with Manga event only lasted 2 weeks and they overlapped the pre-release campaign with the last week of the event, I don't want that to happen if it's going to overwork the staff responsible for the game.

I've waited 5 years for this. For all of my jokes about going crazy, another 2 weeks isn't a big deal. My countdown was already assuming an early June release date, so the fact that we're likely getting it earlier than that is already a huge win in my book!

tl;dr: As funny as it is to joke about it, I'm not going to be tearing off my clothes and running around naked terrorizing the French countryside just because I have to wait less time than I was already expecting for my beloved to come home.

[theotanaka]

"I don't know Robin, I've heard a few things about you catholic girls." Theo responded promptly, his eyes narrowing as if it was a big conspiracy. He in fact had not heard anything. Theo then nodded, "Right, so when I need a bullshit radar I call on you? Noted," and he would, because lord knew he didn't always have one himself. Thankfully he was smart enough not to read the emails in his spam folder...but only just.

"Sounds like you're willing to let me be objectified," He responded, as if he didn't love the attention. A small chuckle followed. "Been there, done that. I did one of those fireman calendars once." @robinsantos

"You'd never catch me using my talent for nefarious purposes, I'm a good catholic girl." Except for the drinking, pre-marital sex and making a career out of being a gossiping nosy neighbour.

"I can smell bullshit from a mile away." Robin warned playfully, slowly tapping the right side of her nose, though her keen sense hadn't done her much good when it came to Ravi lying to her for years after sleeping with her best-friend.

That's what she gets for dating a Libra man.

"Stubborn and reliable sounds about right." Robin said with a nod of her head. "Just like Old Yeller." Theo's questioning about the green tights draws a snort of amusement out of Robin, lips licked into a knowing smile.

"Oh, I don't think we'd have to worry about your fashion choices scaring people away. I think they'd be queueing up to see you in green tights and budgie smugglers."