#creator writes

[reflectionsofacreator]

“You know, it’s generally not the best idea to sneak up on a vigilante. Let alone someone like me,” Red Hood drawled as he rest his hand on his gun holster. 

The floating teenager chuckled at him, and it sounded tired. “Yeah, I’m not known for ‘em, sorry.” 

He was about the same age as the girl with the undercut, maybe around seventeen to nineteen, and the dark bags on his pale cheeks were highlighted by the glowing toxic green eyes that stared straight at him. A fringe of white hair floated around his head like it was moving through water, just barely hiding how his ears swept up into a point and when he grinned at Jason, all his teeth were pointed. He was wearing a black body suit that Nightwing would be jealous of, with white accents that highlighted his lean, masculine frame. 

“You with them?” Hood asked, and jerked his chin in the direction of the van. 

“My sisters, yeah,” the guy said with a shrug. The motion seemed a bit wrong somehow, but Jason couldn’t figure out why. “Sorry, I know I should have better manners than this, but things’ve been… uh. Bad. I meant to bring you a gift and ask if they -- if we could stay here, but uhm…” 

“A gift.” Red Hood stated, and didn’t move save to cock his head curiously to the side. 

Green Eyes rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly and lifted up his other hand in a half shrug. “Sorry, I don’t really have much to offer, and I’m so sorry about messing up the vibes of your haunt. You probably felt us for hours, huh.” 

He didn’t react to that, save to let his considering noise drag through his vocoder and render it a staticky, low pitched hum. It unnerved a lot of people, but surprisingly the teen only winced and didn’t look scared. 

“Yeahhhh I was kind of afraid of that,” he huffed. “Okay. My name’s Phantom. I promise I’m not trying to mess with your haunt, I’m just… trying to keep an eye on my sisters after everything that happened. Keep em safe, you know? I swear they won’t get into trouble, we just need a place to live.” 

“What about you? You going to get into trouble?” Hood asked and shifted his stance to be about ten percent less threatening. It worked, because Phantom brightened, literally his eyes flared, and he looked a bit more at ease. 

“Me? Naw, I’m just going to haunt my sisters and that’s it. Won’t get into trouble, I promise.” 

“The fuck you mean, haunt your sisters? You some type of ghost or something?” Hood huffed. 

Phantom winced. 

“The fuck.” 

-dry wine rebirth, ch 1

Summary

Learning that the new family of maybe-metas had their dead brother for a ghostly protector was not on Red Hood's bingo sheet, and Jason getting roped into a date with one of the sisters was even less on that damn thing. But something's off with the Nightingales, they're running from something, hiding, and it was the same thing that killed their brother, Jason's sure of it - and Phantom's ominous warning that he might be next is getting under his skin.

Hm. Hm. Yeah no, I don't have a defense for this. I got sucked into this niche little crossover. I dunno how much brainspace this is gonna eat, but have what I've gotten so far.

[thecat-inthehat]

7. Morsel

I swear this prompt made more sense when I was originally thinking of it. Uh. Content warnings for post EW duel injuries, medically induced miscarriage, next of kin being forced to make medical decisions, the whole shebang.

(1208 words)

--

“I can’t-- I can’t do this,” Helisent said, and feebly collapsed into a chair that was next to the two beds. The sheets were stained with blood, bandages strewn about over the bodies that lay there and across the floor, and her hands were sticky with viscera as she pulled her hair out of her sweaty face. Her fingers were shaking from the sheer amount of aether that she’d expended so far, her skin tight over her bones and her stomach cramping from spending twelve hours at the bedside. 

Her sister, Nive, lay in one of the beds. The other held Zenos. Both had shown up on the Ragnarok after the Dawn of Tomorrow bloomed, beaten and battered bloody, with their breath and heartbeats in synch. Trying to save only Nive didn’t work, until Helisent and Alphinaud had realized that the two of them were aetherically linked; one could not be saved without the other. No one knew what happened either -- Shining and Helisent had flown away on the tails of Meteion’s Dawn, and it wasn’t until they were back on the ship that they realized Nive still hadn’t returned. They had been found curled together akin to lovers under the new sun, but everything about their look had said that they had tried to fight to the death. 

“Shining will be here with food and ethers for us both soon,” Alphinaud said, his noutliths flicking around the room as he attempted to repair part of Zenos’ spine. He twitched a finger, and the devices created a screen of aether that cut off his lower body, and he started to delicately repair the spinal cord without having to worry that it would affect something up above. The medical screens of the Ragnarok held a layout of the bodies, and Alphinaud was checking it studiously as he worked. Healingway was currently synthesizing more blood for the two of them, and had left the room. It was just Helisent and Alphinaud. 

“I -- I know. But this--” Helisent said, and her voice choked on tears. “Alphinaud, Nive’s pregnant.”

Alphinaud was too well trained to let his nouliths slip from his grasp, but he went utterly still as he sucked a breath in through his teeth. His offhand clenched tightly, and he shut his eyes. He took a shuddering breath, and overwhelmed tears slipped through his lashes and down his cheeks. 

“Did you know before?” He said, and his professionalism was as fragile as spun glass and liable to break at any moment. They could not be emotional about this. (He was going to break anyways.)

Helisent staggered to her feet and her fingers trembled as she set her hands on Nive’s belly. “I suspected. Hythlodaeus had made a strange comment while we were in Elpis, and it kept ringing around in my head. But I didn’t… Twelve above, if she’s as far along as I think, it must’ve happened while we were in Garlemald.” 

Alphinaud finished with repairing the bent spinal cord on Zenos and caused his nouliths to spin around the former Prince and create a stasis shield around him. He flicked his fingers free of blood and came to stand on the opposite side of Helisent, his fingers already glowing with magic as he tried to access the damage. 

“Twelve forfend, she has four kits?” Alphinaud said, and his voice cracked. 

“Her father was a hrothgar from Bozja,” Helisent sniffled, but it didn’t stop her from joining in the diagnostics. “They’re predisposed to litters, rather than one or two like miqo’te. She already has some health issues from it, apparently two of her little siblings didn’t survive their first winters.” 

Alphinaud’s brow furrowed. “There’s… something wrong with the aether…” 

“One isn’t viable,” Helisent said thickly, and sniffled again so she could talk better. “The others, I’m not sure. I… it feels like garlean aether pa…tter…ns…” 

Helisent and Alphinaud met eyes over Nive’s form, the realization hitting them both like a sack of bricks, then looked at Zenos behind them. 

“Right. Right, okay,” Helisent said, and shook herself. When she spoke again, her voice was firmer, more the Stillglade Fen trained healer that she was. “Three viable kits, all half garlean.” 

“Can she even bear the strain of three?” Alphinaud said. 

“... No. She can’t.” Helisent said, and took a breath. “Her body’s eating itself alive trying to heal, even with everything we’ve done, and she can’t handle three.” 

“Fuck.” Alphinaud’s swear was soft, and he buried his face in his hands. It was the only time Helisent had ever heard him truly swear, and she couldn’t begrudge him for it. 

“I don’t even know if she wanted to keep one, let alone three,” Helisent said and didn’t bother to wipe the tears that were falling down her cheeks. It wasn’t even sadness at this point, just sheer exhaustion and the crash of high emotion that was getting to her. But she couldn’t stop now, or her sister would die. 

“There wasn’t exactly time, was there?” Alphinaud said, and his eyes were just as red as her own as he wiped his exhaustion back and returned to assessing the situation. “Everything happened so quickly, there was hardly any time for us to really check in with one another.” 

“No, there wasn’t,” Helisent agreed, and let out a shuddering breath. “How many can we save without risking her life-- that’s the question.” 

“Not three.” Alphinaud said, and his eyes slipped shut as he concentrated. “Two… It could be done, but I don’t… I don’t want to risk it, with how delicate her vitals are.” 

“Then we save one.” Helisent said grimly. “We save the one with the highest chance of survival, understood?” 

“Understood.” Alphinaud nodded, and did not pay attention to his trembling, nor the way his soul screamed at how unfair this all was. He was a healer, and this was, unfortunately, a decision that he had to make. There was no one else on the Ragnarok who could; not between Y’shtola caring for everyone else’s injuries and the rest of their retinue exhausted from torment that was Ultima Thule and the battle prayer against the Endsinger. 

There would be time for screams and sobs later, for now they both had a job to do. 

Helisent’s eyes slipped shut, and her head cocked to the side as she considered their predicament. She turned her hand up a little, and Alphinaud could sense the one she was pointing out. “This one, they’re tinier than the others, but the aether signature is just as strong.” 

“The one to the left has a higher weight,” Alphinaud said, as if they were not talking a difference of mere onzes. His voice barely trembled. “Wouldn’t it make more sense to save that one?” 

“Nive already lost so much weight, I’m not sure if she can handle a big child,” Helisent admitted, and her lips wobbled around her words. “With how much healing she’ll have to go through… Oscheon’s staff, I can’t-- I can’t--” 

“I’ll make the decision. Just follow my lead,” Alphinaud soothed. She’d been strong for him before, the least he could do was be strong in return. He had no choice, really. 

“Right. Your lead.” Helisent said, and wiped the tears away again. “Go.”

[reflectionsofacreator]

This feels. Targeted.

Man I thought for sure I’d get dead dove…

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"

just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible

[magnusbae]

To illustrate this post by @mayahawkse I would like to visualize to you the difference:

A post in 2023:

A post in 2014:

A zoom out of the same post:

This is what a community looks like.

See how in 2023 almost all of the reblogs come from the OP, from their few hours/days in the tag search. Meanwhile in 2014 the % of reblogs from OP is insignificant, because most of the reblogs come from the reblogs within the fandom, within the micro-communities formed there. You didn't need to rely on tags, or search, or being featured. Because the community took care of you, made sure to pass the work between themselves and onto their blog and exposed their followers to it. It kept works alive for years.

It's not JUST the reblog/like ratio that causing this issue, it's the type of interaction people have. They're content with scrolling and liking the search engine, instead of actually having a reblogging relationship with other blogs in their community.

Anyways, if you want to see more content you like, the only true way to make it happen is to reblog it. Likes do not forward content in no way but making OP feel nice. Reblogs on the other hand make content eternal. They make it relevant, they make it exist outside of a fickle tumblr search that hardly works on the best of days.

If you want more of something, reblog it.

[cy-cyborg]

Disability Tropes: The Perfect Prosthetic

[ID: A screenshot from the movie Nimona, showing Nimona, a small white girl with red hair, grabbing the right prosthetic arm of Ballister, a knight in black armour with black hair and light brown skin. He is holding a broken bottle in his prosthetic hand while Nimona admires his arm. Overlaid on the screenshot is white text that reads "Disability Tropes: The Perfect Prosthetic" /End ID]

In a lot of media, prosthetic limbs are portrayed as these devices that act as a near-perfect replacement for a character who has lost, or was born without a limb. So much so that in a lot of cases, the use of a prosthetic has basically no impact on the character beyond a superficial level or their appearance, or it's portrayed as something that's even better than the old meat-limb it's replacing. This trope shows up most often in Sci-fi, but it shows up in all kinds of stories outside of that, even otherwise very grounded ones!

If a story isn't depicting the loss of a limb as the be-all-end-all worst thing that can happen to a person, they almost always default to a perfect prosthetic, functionally curing the amputation with it. But the reality is that prosthetics are FAR from perfect, and as someone who has used them for their entire life I don't think they ever will be. Limb difference is still and always will be a disability, regardless of the prosthetics available, and this really isn't a bad thing.

Why is this trope so common?

I meant it when I said this is a really, really a common trope, so much so that the majority of the media I've seen with amputees and characters with limb differences that released in the last decade or end up using it. Even stories where becoming an amputee is treated like a fate worse than death, ironically, aren't excluded from this. I have a few theories as to why this has happened: The pessimistic answer is that it's easy. You get to have a disabled character and claim you have disability representation, without really having to do much extra work or research because most of your audience won't notice if you aren't accurate - in fact they kind of expect it. You also, for the most part, dodge the backlash other kinds of disability representation (or really any minority representation) usually get. The more optimistic reason is that, for a long time, amputees and people with limb differences (as well as a lot of other disabled people) were predominantly shown in media as sad, depressed and unable to do anything, very much falling into the "sad disabled person" trope. As a kid, this was really the only way I saw people like me on screen or in books. And so, the limb difference community pushed back against that portrayal and were pretty successful in changing the narrative in the public's eye. A little too successful. A lot of creatives were genuinely trying to do right by our community, listen and do better, but many simply overcorrected and instead ended up creating stories where prosthetics were essentially cures instead of the mobility aids they are. I also think the public's general lack of understanding about disability plays a roll in all this. There are a lot of people who, in my experience, believe that the more visible a disability is, the worse it is. Limb differences and amputations are very visible, but prosthetics, even those that aren't trying to be discreet, make them less so. While using a prosthetic is very, very different to a biological limb, you won't necessarily see how in a casual interaction with, say a co-worker or neighbor, especially because there is a very real stigma applied to people with limb differences to keep those things hidden from the public. There are other reasons too, such as the fact that a lot of creatives don't even consider the connection to real amputees when creating characters with robotic limbs in genres like sci-fi and some fantasy, so they never stop to consider that these tropes could be impacting real people. Amputees are also very frequently used in "inspiration porn" content that uses the angle that disabilities can be "overcome" with a good attitude, downplaying the way those disabilities actually impact us. The prosthetics industry - specifically the component manufacturers, often also push the idea of prosthetics being the only way to return to a "normal" life, both to the wider public and to people with limb differences and amputations (which can add to that sense of shame I mentioned when it doesn't play out that way for them). On top of that, I also think the recent increase in popularity of concepts like trans-humanism contributes to it as well. these movements often talk about robotic or bionic body parts being enhancements and "the way of the future", and I think people get a bit too caught up on what may be potentially possible in the future with the real, current experiences of people with "robotic limbs" aka prosthetics, now. There are also inherently disabling things that come with removing and replacing parts of your body, things that will not just go away with some fancier tech.

So How do you actually avoid the trope?

So, we have some ideas about why it happens, but how do you actually avoid the "perfect prosthetic" trope from appearing in your work? The most important thing is to remember that this is still a disability. The loss of a limb, even with the best prosthetic technology or magical item in the world, will always have some inherently disabling aspects to it - and this is not a bad thing. The key is to not over-do it, lest you risk falling into the old "sad disabled person" trope. So let's go over some of the ways you can show how your character's disability impacts them. You don't have to use all of these recommendations, just choose the ones that would best fit your character, their circumstances and your setting.

The prosthetic itself is just different

Probably the most important thing to address and acknowledge for prosthetic-using characters, is the actual ways in which the prosthetic itself is different from a biological limb, and the drawbacks and changes that come with that. For the sake of simplicity, I'm mainly going to focus on modern prosthetics here, but it's worth considering how to apply this your own, more advanced/fantastical prosthetics too. One major thing that most people writing amputees fail to acknowledge is that prosthetic limbs are not fleshy-limbs with a different coat of paint. They do the same basic thing their meat-counterparts do, but how they do it is often drastically different, which changes how they are used. A really good example of this is in prosthetic feet. There are dozens of joints in a biological foot, but most prosthetic feet have no joints or moving parts at all. Instead of having dozens of artificial joints to mimic the real bone structure of a foot, which are more prone to failure, require power and make the prosthetic much, much heavier for very little gain, prosthetic feet are often constructed from flexible carbon fiber sheets inside a flexible rubber foot-shaped shell. This allows the bend and flex those bones provide, without all the drawbacks that come from trying to directly mimic it. Making the sheets into different shapes makes them more ideal for different activities. E.g. feet made for general use, like walking around the city, are simple and light, shaped to encourage the most energy-efficient steps, while still allowing their users to do things like wear normal shoes. Feet made for rough terrain often have a split down the middle of the foot to allow the carbon fiber sheets to bend better over rocks when there is no ankle, and some newer designs also include a kind of suspension using pressurized air pulled from the prosthetic socket to allow some additional padding. Running feet have large "blades" made of these carbon fiber sheets to absorb more pressure when the foot hits the ground, and redirect the force that creates to propel their user forward as quickly as possible.

[ID: A photo of 4 prosthetic feet. On the left, the foot is covered with a black shoe, the one to it's right consists of a small, carbon fiber blade, split down the middle, in roughly the same shape and size as the previous foot. Next to the right is an even simpler and smaller carbon fiber foot with no split, and finally is a very short foot that is vaguely rectangular in shape. /End ID]

These are some of my own prosthetic feet I've had over the years. The two on the right are designed to be used by someone who is less mobile, and the ones on the left are made for someone who is more active. As my needs changed over the years, I've used different designs and styles, and keep the old ones since my needs do tend to fluctuate.

There are also robotic feet available that are designed as a kind of "all-purpose" foot that use an electronic ankle which more closely mimics a biological foot, but they are not very popular as the mechanism adds a lot of extra weight and it requires a battery and power to work, with many amputees feeling the jointless carbon fiber feet do a better job at meeting their needs. The same goes for arms and hands. "Robotic" hands that mimic a meat hand exist, but they aren't really that popular, even in places like Australia where the prohibitively expensive price tag isn't as much of an issue due to government programs that pay for the device for you. Instead, most arm amputees who use prosthetics that I know prefer simpler devices that do specific tasks, and just swap between them as needed, rather than something that tries to do it all. A big part of this is because the all-purpose hands can be clunky. they often require manual adjustment using the other hand to do simple things like going from holding a deck of cards to putting them down and picking up a glass of water, for example. The few that don't require that, I've been told, are often temperamental and don't actually work for every person with a limb difference.

Altered Proprioception

Loosing a limb is a big deal and this is always going to have an impact on the body in some way that won't be solved with a fancy piece of tech. One such example is how limb loss effects your sense of proprioception. This is your sense of where your body parts are in space. It's how you (mostly) know where your foot is going to land when you're walking, or how you're able to do things like lift up a glass of water without needing to actually watch your hand do it. Your brain does this by creating a mental map of your body, but this map doesn't get adjusted if you loose a limb. If that map doesn't accurately reflect your real body, you're not going to have an accurate sense of proprioception. This might look like a leg amputee being a bit less stable on their feet, or like an arm amputee needing to look at their arm or hand to be able to grab something with it. Those born without their limbs who take to using prosthetics often have a lot of trouble adapting, as their brains aren't used to having that limb in the first place, whereas an amputee's brain can sometimes be tricked into using their outdated body map to help them adjust to the prosthetic (though its impossible to line it up perfectly). Prosthetics that directly integrate with the nervous system, while rare, do exist, and even this direct connection doesn't completely erase this issue for reasons doctors aren't quite sure about. This is something that does become less of a problem with time. Eventually, someone proficient with their prosthetic will learn to compensate, but their sense of proprioception will never be 100% perfect. At the end of the day, no matter how it attaches, a prosthetic is still not a natural part of the body, and that will always cause some issues. It also means if they aren't practicing it all the time, they may have to relearn how to compensate for it.

Extra weight

You also have to remember that a prosthetic is not a natural part of the body, like we already talked about, and so no matter how good it is, your brain will most likely always interpret the weight of the prosthetic as something attached to you, not part of you. This means that, even though prosthetics are actually a lot lighter than biological limbs, they feel so much heavier. This is because, while a meat limb is heavier, a lot of that weight is from muscles which are actively contributing to the limb working, so it doesn't really feel like its that heavy. When you have less of your meat-limb though, you have even less muscle to work with to move this big thing strapped to it, so it feels heavier. The more of the limb you've lost, or just didn't have, the heavier the prosthetic has to be, and the less muscle you have left to move it. It's for this reason that a lot of amputees and people with limb differences get tired faster when using prosthetics. Some of us are fit enough where you almost wouldn't notice the extra effort they need to put in, but once again, just because you can't see it from the outside, doesn't mean it's not an issue.

Avoiding Water

Most prosthetics also aren't waterproof, and so prosthetic users have to be very careful about when and how they come into contact with it. For amputees with electric components, contact with water at all will likely damage the device. This can even include especially heavy rain, something I was told to avoid when I got my electronic knee prosthetic and something I assume would also apply to arm amputees with complex, electronic hands. For those with non-electronic prosthetics, water can be hazardous for different reasons. If the prosthetic has metal components, water may cause them to rust, especially if it's salty water. Other prosthetics have foam covers to give the illusion of a limb with the general shape of muscles and fat, but these covers do not come off, and if they get wet enough that water seeps all the way through, it is very hard to dry it and they may become moldy. Finally, cheaper modern prosthetics may also float. Many are made of very light-weight materials and some have pockets of air trapped inside them. For leg prosthetics in particular, this means a user might, at best, struggle to swim with them on, but at worst, may get flipped upside down and become trapped underwater - something that happened to me as a very young child. On the flip-side, older prosthetics were usually made of heavy materials like wood or steel, and so had the opposite problem, acting like a weight and pulling a person down if they were to wear them in the water. Water-safe prosthetics do exist, I had a pair of prosthetic legs as a teenager that were hollow, and designed especially for me to swim with fins on when swimming in the ocean, and Nadya Vessey, a double leg amputee in New Zealand even got a mermaid-tail prosthetic made especially for use in the water. Most amputees though just swim without any prosthetics at all, and in 99% of cases, this is the easiest and safest way to go.

Prosthetic-Related Pressure Sores and Pain

Many people with limb differences also experience pressure sores from their prosthetics. Modern prosthetics typically attach to the body using a socket made of carbon fiber or fiberglass, held on either by pressure, using a vacuum seal or through a mechanical locking system built into the socket. No matter the specifics though, the socket has to be very tight in order to stay on, and this means that extended periods of use can lead to rub-spots, blisters and pressure sores. Many socket prosthetics also use silicone liners to add extra padding, but this means wounds caused by the pressure can't breathe, and bacteria in sweat has nowhere to go, meaning if the person doesn't rest when one of these wounds occur, it can very easily and quickly turn into a serious infection. In a properly fitting prosthetic, used by someone who has fully adjusted to them, this doesn't happen often, but it is something most amputees and people with limb differences have to at least be mindful of. Some new prosthetics use a different method of attachment, called Osteointegration - where the prosthetic attaches to a clip, surgically implanted into the person's bones. While Osteointegration avoids many of the issues like pressure sores that come from a socket, they have their own issues: mainly that they are incredibly expensive, and as of right now, have a pretty high failure rate due to the implant getting infected. Because the implants are directly connected to the bone, these infections become very serious very quickly. Many people with Osteointegration limbs have to be on very strong medication to keep these infections at bay, and they are generally considered unsuitable for anyone who is going to regularly come into contact with "unclean" environments.

Maintenance

[ID: A screenshot of Winrey, from Full Metal alchemist Brotherhood, a white woman with blond hair handing out the sides of a green hat. She is measuring a piece of metal from a prosthetic she is making while Ed, the prosthetic's owner, gives her a thumbs up in the background. /End ID]

Finally, prosthetics also require maintenance from a specialist called a prosthetist, and they don't last forever. Some parts, like a foot or hand, can be reused over an over, but the sockets of a prosthetic need to be completely remade any time your body changes shape, including if you gain/loose weight, you start experiencing swelling, or you're just a child who is growing. Children in particular need new prosthetics every few months because they grow so fast, and as such, their prosthetics have to be made with this growth in mind. If they go too long without adjustment or an entirely new prosthetic, it can seriously impact the child and their growth but even small adjustments can be costly, depending on where you live. While prosthetics are built to be sturdy and reliable, they need a lot of work to stay that way. The more complex the prosthetic, the more work is needed. Complicated electronic components may need to have regular maintenance done by your prosthetist or even the specific component's manufacturer, and depending on where you live, this might mean having to send your prosthetic limb away for this to be done. While my prosthetist technically has the skills and knowledge to do the maintenance on my electronic knee, for example, the manufacturer forbids anyone not from their company to provide this service, meaning my leg needs to be shipped off to Germany once every few years if I want to keep the warranty. This has the unfortunate side effect of sometimes your limbs getting lost in postage (shout-out to Australia Post, who lost mine twice), meaning it can be months before you get it back or get a replacement. Usually, you'll be given a replacement in the meantime if you need it, but walking on a leg that isn't yours, even when its correctly fitted, always feels a bit weird (maybe that's just me though).

Not every difference is Inherently Negative

We've talked about some of the negatives that come from having a prosthetic, but not every difference is negative or even really that big of a deal. In fact, often times, it's these little moments in the depiction of a disability that go the furthest and make it feel the most genuine. My amputations effect me from the moment I wake up, to the moment I go to bed, but that doesn't mean every single way it impacts me is always inherently bad or negative. For example, back when I was working a normal job and going to university, I would often come home, throw my legs off at the door with the shoes still attached and get into my wheelchair, the same way you might throw your shoes off after work and replace them with comfy socks and other comfy clothing. This is something I've only ever seen on screen once, with Eda from the Owl House (and she wasn't even an amputee yet, her limbs were just detachable)

[ID: an screenshot of Eda from the owl house, a very pale woman, laying on the couch in a bathrobe, her hair in a towel. She has taken her actual legs off, throwing them to the other side of the seat. /End ID]

After that, my day mostly looked the same as most other people working a 9 to 5, I'd make myself dinner, watch some TV or play some games, maybe do some extra work at my desk or chat with friends. The only difference is that it would all be from a wheelchair, mainly because my prosthetics were heavy and it was just easier to use the chair around the house. The fact my afternoon and evening routine was done from a wheelchair wasn't a bad thing, it was just different. Likewise, I also don't sleep or shower with my prosthetics on, for the same reasons most other people wouldn't take a shower or sleep in thigh-high, steel-capped boots. In your own stories, this might look like giving your characters similar alterations to how they go about their day. Let them take their arm or leg off when they're resting or relaxing, show them taking a few minutes longer to get ready because they have to put it back on, show them doing some things without it. Arm amputees in particular tend to get very good at going about their days without their arm prosthetics, and leg amputees often either learn to get around more relaxed spaces like their homes using a different mobility aids like wheelchairs or crutches, or just through hopping if that's something they're physically able to do. Even when everything is going well and working as intended, your limb-different character won't wear their prosthetic 24/7, no matter how much they love it. There doesn't have to be something wrong with it or painful about it to not want it glued to them at all times, just like you can love a pair of big heavy boots but not want them on when you're trying to sleep. For more action-focused stories, being an amputee, also changes things like how you fight. The specifics will vary from person to person, but for example, when I did Hap Ki Do, a Korean Martial art, my instructor heavily modified when I learned what techniques. Beginner-level kicks and most leg attacks were impractical for me, as the force from the kicking motion would usually cause one of my legs to fly off. I also couldn't jump very well, due to some complications with my original amputation that made my stumps too sensitive to withstand the force of landing again. So I ended up learning a lot more upper-body attacks much earlier than it is typically taught. By the time I got my green belt, I was practicing upper-body techniques usually saved for black belts - including weapons training that I could use my secondary mobility aids for, like crutches and my cane in a bad situation. Many holds that rely on creating tension in your target are also less effective on amputees, because either the anatomy that causes those holds to be painful just simply isn't there, or the body part in question can just be removed to escape. Whether we're talking about the negative things, or just neutral differences that come with using prosthetics, you don't want to go too far with any one example. The key is to strike a balance. Of course, the old writing advice of "show don't tell" also applies here. It's one thing to tell us all of this stuff, but unless we actually see it play out, it won't mean much.

How NOT to avoid the trope

Before we move on, let's focus for a moment on some common things I've seen that you SHOULDN'T do as a way to get away from the trope.

The Enhanced Prosthetic

A lot of sci-fi in particular will take prosthetic limbs, make them function exactly the same as a biological limb, but add something extra to it. This does change the way the prosthetic functions and is used, but it usually still ignores the actual disabling parts of having a prosthetic. A really good example of this can be seen in pretty much any futuristic setting, but personally, I think Fizzeroli, from Helluva Boss is the best one to demonstrate what I mean. Fizz is a quadrilateral, above knee/above elbow amputee with highly advanced prosthetics that function, more or less exactly like the limbs he lost, but with the added benefit of being super-stretchy. Fizz is an acrobat and a clown in service, at least initially, to Mammon, one of the Seven Deadly Sins. These prosthetics help him perform and we even do see how they change little things like how he walks and just goes about his day, but the show still treats them like natural arms and legs, but better. 

[ID: A screenshot of Fizzeroli from Helluva Boss, a white-skinned imp with 4 black, prosthetic limbs, dressed in teal a nightgown as he lays in bed, reading from a list /End ID]

We see that he never takes them off, even when sleeping, and when he needs to use them as regular arms and legs, they do everything he needs, perfectly fine - at least when they're working correctly. The only time he ever even takes them off or has any issues with them, is when they break in season 2. The word amputee is never used to describe him, as far as I remember, and the fact he is one never really comes up at all, except for when they break or when the story focuses on how he lost them. Which brings me to my next point.

The Glitchy/Broken Prosthetic

One way I see people try to avoid the perfect prosthetic trope, is to take the prosthetic and break it or otherwise make it unreliable by having it malfunction, but not really changing anything else. This approach is heading in the right direction but still kind of misses the point of the criticism a lot of limb different folks have with the depictions of prosthetics in the media. Yeah, prosthetics do break down and some do require extra maintenance, but if your character's prosthetic is still exactly the same as a biological limb (or even better, in the case of the "enhanced prosthetic") when it's not broken, and the only time their disability is treated like a disability, is when it breaks, you're not really addressing the issue. Real prosthetics, like we discussed, even when functioning at 100%, exactly as the manufacturer intended, don't function the same as a meat-limb. They are fundamentally different, and the glitchy/unreliable prosthetic completely ignores all of that. Once again, Fizz is a really good example of this - the only time his prosthetics are not perfect, is when they break or are malfunctioning (despite the criticism, I do genuinely love Fizz as a character, but he unfortunately does fall into a lot of disability tropes).

[ID: Another screenshot of Fizzeroli, this time in a torn up jester outfit, looking down, panicked, at his prosthetic arms which are fully extended and laying motionless on the ground, with his left arm visibly short-circuiting with electricity around it. /End ID]

Now this isn't to say you can't have your character's prosthetics break down or malfunction at all. just that this shouldn't be the only way you differentiate the prosthetic from a biological limb. You should also be mindful of how or why they're breaking. A typical prosthetic isn't going to break down randomly from normal use unless something is very, very wrong or your character just has a terrible prosthetist (which unfortunately, does happen). You might experience issues if you try to make the prosthetic do something it just wasn't designed to do, or expose it to something it wasn't designed to deal with though (e.g. submerging an electronic prosthetic in water and trying to use it to swim).

Just add Phantom Pain

Another common pitfall I see when people are trying to avoid the perfect prosthetic trope, is to just give the character in question phantom pain - which is a side-effect of amputation where your brain's mental map of the body doesn't acknowledged you lost a limb. Your brain tries to fill in the gaps, since there is no signals coming from that part of the body anymore, and assumes either something must be wrong and so you should be in pain, even when you actually aren't. Alternatively, it can also happen when your brain was so used to feeling pain from that area before, in the case of people who had chronic conditions before they lost their limb, that it just keeps remaking those old signals itself. Like the broken/glitchy prosthetic approach, this also doesn't really address the issue with the perfect prosthetic trope, because it has nothing to do with the prosthetic itself. Phantom pain doesn't come from the prosthetic, nor does it effect how they're used, and so including it doesn't really address the issue of the prosthetic being functionally the same as the original, biological limb. This isn't to say that you shouldn't include phantom limb sensation or pain as something your character experiences, but just keep in mind that, when used on it's own, it doesn't counter the trope. Also, just be sure to do your research, everyone's experience with phantom pain is different and it's not something everyone with a limb difference even experiences.

Why is this trope even a problem?

Alright, so we know what the trope is, we know why it became so prevalent, ways to avoid it and also how not to avoid it. All good information, but why is this trope even bad? Why should you try to avoid it? Outside of just wanting to portray a real disability that effects real people more accurately in your creations, the prevalence of this trope actually contributes to a lot of real-world issues, especially when it's as overused as it currently is. I've talked before about "the jaws effect" - where the depiction of something in the media, especially something that the public is widely uneducated on, influences how people see it in real life. The Jaws effect specifically referred to how the popularity of creature-feature movies featuring sharks, like Jaws, caused the belief that sharks were monstrous killing machines to become much more wide-spread, even going so far as to influence decisions about laws and policy surrounding real-life shark preservation and culling in some parts of the world. But sharks aren't the only thing this has happened to.

Disabled people are so thoroughly misunderstood by wider society, that when tropes like this one become popular, people can and often do start to believe the misinformation they spread - in this case, believing that our prosthetics are a perfect replacement for a biological limb, and that getting a prosthetic means you're not disabled any more. While this can be annoying and cause small scale issues for some of us, like people giving us a hard time for using disability accommodations we very much need, it can also impact us in systemic ways too. If the wrong people believe these tropes, it can and does have a very real impact on the lives of disabled people through things like changes to policies to make it harder for amputees and people with limb differences to access financial assistance for other things outside of our prosthetics we may need assistance with.

Conclusion

Despite the very real harm tropes like this can do when it's overused, I don't think it should go away entirely. Some of my favourite pieces of media even use the perfect prosthetic trope and there are even some kinds of media where I even think it's somewhat unavoidable. Characters with perfect prosthetics in kids media in particular, especially when talking about side characters, can help to correct some of the other stereotypes kids may have seen elsewhere - such as prosthetics being "creepy" or "scary" - in a way that is casual and easy for them to understand. The problem with the trope, in my eyes, is it's excessive overuse. It's the fact that it seems to be the only representation amputees and people with limb differences are getting now. Not every story with a limb-different character can or even should delve into the reality of what using prosthetics is actually like, but we need at least some stories that do, without it being this majorly depressing thing.

[hg-aneh]

youtuber x streamer AU: Coming Out Stream Edition 💥

[blackynsupremacy]

black girls,

write the content you want.

i’m serious.

idc if you think it’s gonna flop.

idc if you think you’re a terrible writer or artist.

idc if you believe that character/celebrity/athlete/whoever likes black girls or not. (who cares what the fandom says anyway!)

idc if you’re the first and only one to start that _____ x black reader tag.

make the content you want to see!

do it for you most importantly! (you will inspire others ofc)

in conclusion, you won’t get it if you won’t make it.

[meiloorun-notthefruit]

The Scooby gang are friends. The Scooby gang are BEST FRIENDS. THEY ARE BEST FRIENDS AND THEY LOVE EACH OTHER SO MUCH. THEY TRAVEL AROUND SOLVING MYSTERIES FOR AS LONG AS THEY CAN BECAUSE THEY HAVE A PASSION FOR IT AND BECAUSE IT MEANS THEY GET TO SPEND TIME TOGETHER WITH EACH OTHER. THEY ARE BEST FRIENDS.

They don’t hate each other. Maybe they get annoyed and cause they’re together all the time it might get a bit much sometimes but at the end of the day, they really deeply care about each other. They live out of a van most of the time and are on the road constantly out of CHOICE. TOGETHER. for crying out loud.

They are four teenagers and a Great Dane. They’re a family.

[reflectionsofacreator]

Unfortunately he wasn’t alone, as evidenced by the frayed red beanie that hid a mop of tangled black hair behind a half brick wall, and that low low whisper against the back of his mind.  “A ha!” Ellie Nightingale shouted, and vaulted over the brick wall to point at him dramatically. “It’s you!” “It’s me,” Jason agreed, and tilted his head curiously. “What do you want?”  “So you’re the guy who’s dating Dani,” she said, punctuated by an obnoxious pop of chewing gum and completely ignoring his question. Jason let his head fall back slightly and prayed for strength. He didn’t believe in god, except when it came to dealing with Little Shits of siblings.  Ellie cackled and clapped her hands maniacally. “Oooh, and you’ve got Dani’s coffee too.”  “Hi,” Jason said, cause he was going to try and be nice. “You must be Ellie.”  “Gimmie.” She said, and reached for Dani’s coffee.  “Ey, no, this isn’t for you!” Jason yelped, and lifted it up too high for her to reach. She glared at him, then jumped up to try and get at it, only to hang from his forearm. She was … light. Too light, for a kid her age and size. She was what, thirteen at most? She could’ve fought Tim for shrimpy sizes at that age.  “C’mon!” She whined, kicking her feet slightly before dropping down with a slight thud. “Jerk.”  “And here I was going to offer to buy you your own,” Jason snarked, and smirked when Ellie’s blue eyes widened and turned calculating.  “Oh yeah? What’s your angle, huh?” She demanded, and it was impressive how light she kept her tone, like she was just joking around, but Jason could hear the thread of hardness in her voice. It wasn’t for nothing that the girl had gotten on with the rest of the street kids, and she fit in with them more than her story said she should.  “A glowing review for your sister?” Jason tried, trying to sound sheepish. He wasn't, but he needed to make a good impression. Aaand maybe if he kept telling himself that it would turn true, just like all those stories about gold under rainbows.   “… Get me a muffin too, and I’ll think about it,” Ellie sniffed. “One of those giant ones, with the chocolate chips.”  “Deal.” 

or

Jason gets to meet Ellie and learns more about the Nightingales, while Red Hood and Phantom learn about some trouble brewing.

--dry wine rebirth, ch 2: taking chances

My fics are currently on lockdown and only available to registered users; if you need one, I have invites.

[thecat-inthehat]

1. Steer

Dunno how much I'll do for this year, considering all my other projects and also job hunting, but! Here we are.

(1100 words)

--

“Emet-Selch. With me.” Shining’s sonorous voice rang out across the clearing, even through the static nature of the Tower’s scrying systems. 

“Oh? And to what do I owe the pleasure, Lady Warrior?” The Ascians’ waspish, breathy voice grating to the Crystal Exarch’s hooded ears. He did nothing as she stepped up to him and took his arm in her own, merely lifted a brow in surprise. 

“Come.” Shining said, and her sculpted lips curved up into a smile. “I wish to speak with you in private.” 

The Crystal Exarch drew his staff in a half circle, and the image zoomed out once more to show the two of them walking sedately through the forest of Rak’tika. The Light dappled through the trees in slow moving waves that always seemed so sinfully lazy; even nigh on a century of the golden waves it never stopped being so tempting to simply curl up underneath a beam that stretched through the canopy. 

Emet-Selch had his hand tucked in her arm as demurely as any gentle noblewoman, his other hand lifting up the hem of his robes, and it was with some surprise that the Exarch realized how careful he was to step around the blue flowers that lay along the path to Fannow. 

“Yes, my dear?” Emet-Selch asked. “You know, if you wished to get me alone for more, hm, intimate purposes, you should’ve asked me sooner.” 

Shining laughed softly, a tinkling sound that buzzed through the Tower’s systems. “Hardly. You are not my type, Emet-Selch. Though I do appreciate your love of theater.” 

“Like recognizes like,” Emet chuckled. “Two peas in a pod we are, are we not?” 

“Debatable, but I shall let you have this,” Shining said, with a devious twist to her lips. “Now, as to why I wished to speak with you…” 

“I take it this is about your sister?” Emet-Selch asked politely. 

“Oh, look at you, you do have a brain somewhere in those coiffed locks of yours,” Shining chuckled, and stopped them in the middle of a clearing, surrounded by wildflowers. “Do you prefer to lead or follow?” 

The Ascian was quiet for just a touch too long, and the Exarch wished once again for a clearer picture, if only to see the expression that must have been flitting across Emet’s face. He really needed to upgrade the Tower’s systems if he was to keep spying on the Warriors Three in such a way. 

“This isn’t a test, Emet,” she said with no small amusement. “I’m not about to analyze you on your dancing habits.” 

“Yet that is precisely what someone who would analyze me would say,” Emet sighed, but assumed a follower’s position among the two of them, with Shining’s hand resting lightly on his waist. 

The Exarch ruthlessly squashed down the feeble feeling that niggled in his chest at the sight. 

The two of them, Warrior and Ascian, stepped into a fluid dance that kicked up petals among the flowers with the hems of their clothing. It was a waltz of some kind that the Exarch didn’t recognize, but he set the Tower to record as Shining twirled Emet around with ease, and did not react to the soft smile flitting across Emet’s lips. There was no music, which surprised the Exarch, given Shining’s predilection for such things, but it meant that he could hear their conversation clearly. 

“So, my sister,” Shining said pleasantly. 

“Which one?” Emet replied, just as genial. 

“Don’t play coy with me, Solus, you’re not cute,” Shining said, and her voice was just shy of being sharp. “You look at Nive as if she were a diamond in some pigsty. Enticing, yet you cannot bring yourself to get close. Who was she to you?” 

“Bold,” Emet said, but did not deny the accusation. “And why should I tell you? Can a man not keep secrets close to his chest?” 

“You can,” Shining agreed pleasantly, and when she twirled Emet around once more she dipped him. 

There was a flash of light that short circuited the Tower’s recording magic, yet the sound of Emet’s pained gasp was all too loud in the void. 

“But I will not let you entice her away from her duty,” Shining’s sibilant cadence slithered through the woods, undercut by birdsong and the omnipresent sound of the Light. “And you know this, you’re a smart man. You would not have lived so long otherwise. So why is it, Emet-Selch, that you are so dead set on leading her astray?” 

The scrying spell slowly repaired itself, pixel by distorted pixel, and another half circle of the Exarch’s staff zoomed in on the conversation. She held him under her power, dipped towards the forest floor and the blooming blue blossoms, his hair a haphazard disarray as he panted for breath. It almost looked scandalous, with how his chest heaved and the way her larger hand cradled the arch of his back. But the glimmering Light from her palm, the way her eyes flashed and distorted the image, twas anything but. 

“... I knew her.” He said, finally. “A color such as that stands out, does it not?” 

“... That it does,” Shining agreed, and spun them to be upright once more, with him collapsing against her chest at the sudden movement. She made no move to dislodge him and simply waited for him to catch his breath, her fingers gently smoothing his hair back from his face. The scrying panel flickered once more, and the Exarch could see how her nail traced a line of Light from Emet’s temple to his jaw. A jaw that flexed dangerously under her touch. 

“You are quite bold,” Emet-Selch repeated, and sounded almost bored. 

“I am what I need to be,” Shining responded. “Consider this your only warning. Nive and Helisent might think that your overtures of friendship and cooperation could be genuine, but will not be swayed. Are we clear?” 

“You wish me to stop,” Emet-Selch chuckled. 

“Hardly,” Shining said, and her Light-burning eyes squinted in mirth. “Merely be prepared for the consequences.” 

“Very well. I do so enjoy a challenge,” Emet-Selch said, and pulled back to place his hand on her shoulder once more. “Shall we continue? It’s been many years since I’ve had the pleasure.” 

“But of course.” The Warrior of Light said, and did not bother to hide her bell like laugh. 

The Exarch tapped his staff against the floor, and the image went dark. He did not afford himself jealousy. It would not aid him. 

But he could not get the image of their dance out of his head for hours. 

[the-golden-comet]

Man, those characters look like they’re having a situation over there…. 👀🍿✨

[thechekhov]

👌Content™

[flufftober]

🍂 🍃 Hello and welcome to our fourth annual Flufftober 🍂 🍃

We’re so excited to be back and have you here once again!

As always, let’s fill the month of October with as much fluff as possible 🥰 for that to happen, you can either use our 31 regular prompts or enjoy a little challenge 😏

Below the cut, you'll find all our rules, posting info, and all the prompts in writing. If you have any more questions, please feel free to send us an ask.

And now, for the challenge...

Prompt Extras

We love to see how many of you get inspired by our prompts every year - be it by the original list or the Prompt Extras. Once again we're offering you that option and you're more than welcome to replace prompts from the original list if they don't work for you for whatever reason - no explanation needed.

As has become tradition, we offer you last year's top five fan favorites (as voted in the end survey). In addition to that, we also offer a little challenge: five angsty prompts for you to turn fluffy!

If you don't want to replace any prompt from the original list but still love the additional ones - or you simply want to challenge yourself even further - you can also mix them all together!

So in whichever way you use these Prompt Extras, have fun with them and go wild 💚

We hope you like these prompts, and now

Happy Creating 🥳

Standard Blog Rules & FAQ

Addendum: We do not allow AI creations of any kind.

(Due to previous asks, we made sure to add more points to this section - while they're not new rules, they're newer to this list, so you'll find them colored green)

No inc*st or p*dophilia - we can’t keep you from writing it or creating art for it but it won’t be reblogged. No inc*st: This rule does not apply to distant cousins and such, as you might find in the LotR fandom (or basically in all of European Monarchy). The line we draw is at direct blood relations (siblings, parents, kids) and/or legal guardianship. No p*dophilia: This rule does not rule out fandoms that feature teenagers such as Harry Potter, Heartstoppers, Hunger Games, etc. It also doesn't mean you can't write about their time together as teenagers! It's aimed at ships in which one is a minor and the other is not - but since even that has grey areas, the rule is this: if you keep it SFW, all is good and allowed, we don't care; if it turns NSFW, be mindful of the legalities of the world/society/times your characters live in.

No hate or ship bashing - we’re all different and we all love different things. As long as it doesn’t go against rule #1, it’s allowed.

Tag correctly! Trigger warnings (including cheating!), ships, ratings, (pure) smut, etc - it’s all fine as long as you tag it.

There’s absolutely no word count restriction, write as little or as much as you like.

In regards to art, anything goes: drawings, paintings, collages, mood boards, gif sets, videos, playlists… the sky’s the limit (though not really…). If you would like to create a podfic, the fic you're using does not have to be new - your creation will be new!

You can mix and mash different mediums however you like, be it within one prompt or on different days.

While we can’t force you to write fluff or create fluffy art, please try to keep in mind that this is a fluff event 😉 that, of course, doesn't mean you can't combine it with angsty/whumpy prompts - hurt/comfort is absolutely welcome!

You can start creating as soon as you see this - but please refrain from posting before the respective day.

If you post early, we will schedule your post for the correct day; if you use multiple prompts in one creation, we will post on the earliest day you used.

You can participate on as many days as you like, even if it’s just one; you can also create multiple entries for the same day.

You can replace as many original prompts as you like with our prompt extras; you can also combine them with the original prompts or create for them in addition, that's completely up to you.

It’s okay to write one story/a series for all the prompts.

You do not have to stick to one character, ship, or even one fandom - switch as often as you like to or even write for multiple ships for one day.

The ship does not have to be a romantic one! Friendship and family feels are more than welcome (but this is not a way to get around rule #1!)

Original works as well as OCs in fandoms are welcome! But please make sure to mark these clearly, either in the tags or the post itself. We're not familiar with all fandoms (though we're definitely learning a lot!), so we're not always sure what might be an OC and what might be such an unknown side character not even Google can find them...

Reader insert fics (for example "character x reader") as well as RPFs are absolutely allowed.

Other languages are also welcome - just make sure to clearly mark the day and fandom so that we can still easily reblog.

This event can be combined with other events as long as the other event allows it.

Late entries are always welcome, even if it is months or years later.

All fandoms and ships are welcome - fanon and canon - as long as they’re of age (in case you want to add smut) and not related.

Posting

Posting to tumblr

Please use the tag #flufftober2024 Please make sure there is NO SPACE between flufftober and 2024! We will NOT be checking the other tag this year!

Since tags are sometimes wonky, make sure to also mention us with @flufftober in your post

We will try to catch them all, but please don't be mad if we miss a post or if it gets reblogged a bit late

If you're absolutely certain a post has slipped past us, feel free to send an ask with the link to your post

To make reblogging easier for us, make sure to add the following tags: #flufftober2024 #day [xy] #[fandom] #[ship and/or main character(s)]

If you're using a prompt extra tag it as #alt [number]

Posting to ao3

You can add your creation to the collection Flufftober 2024 (either as flufftober2024 or as flufftober_2024)

Late entries are always welcome, on tumblr as well as the ao3 collection! Neither will close - but like always, reblogs will become less regular the more months have passed...

Prompts

1. Lost Pet Meet Cute

2. “Left. Other left!”

3. Favorite Scent

4. Market Day

5. Acorn, Chestnut, Pine Cone

6. Mistaken Identity

7. Hoodie Weather

8. Chopping & Piling Wood

9. “Don’t do that!” - “But…”

10. Bet, Game, Contest

11. Ingredients & Spells

12. “This is spooky.” - “Really?”

13. Attic, Cellar, Hidden Room

14. Fantasy AU/Mundane AU

15. “What are you wearing?” - “It’s laundry day!”

16. Yes, No, Maybe

17. Only One Bed

18. Bewitched

19. Yarn

20. Paw

21. Bonfire

22. Heirloom

23. Stormy Night

24. Comfort Food

25. Haunted House

26. “I can’t find it.”

27. Afternoon Stroll

28. Lucky Charm

29. Time Capsule

30. “Forever?”

31. Make a Wish

Prompt Extras

Last Year's Favorites

Alt 1: “I’ve got you”

Alt 2: Rainy Day

Alt 3: “Wait you love me?” - “I always have”

Alt 4: “I hate it” - “No, you don’t”

Alt 5: Porch Swing

Challenge "Make it Fluffy!"

Alt 6: Gravestone

Alt 7: Getting Revenge

Alt 8: Written but never sent

Alt 9: Suddenly Severed Communication

Alt 10: Rejected, Betrayed, Exiled, Left Behind

[linkeduniverse]

Dawn pt. 5

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Archive/ About / Linktree

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

got a worm nibbling my brain. can someone help me find a piece of obscure media?

webcomic/indie comic from the 2010s. basically a sci-fi short story about a young girl (with red hair?) who was being raised by scientists as part of an experiment. she receives a haircut/has her head shaved, in preparation for her annual brain scan/testing. it is revealed that while her body is human, her "brain" is artificial, made of computer implants throughout her skull and spine. at some point her biological mother (also a scientist on the same campus?) encounters her and is repulsed, viewing her as a machine who has murdered her daughter.

it was very poignant and it bruised my heart and i can NOT find it anywhere