#darkly funny and very concerning

[lordkingsmith]

I remembered after posting Cygnus built a time and space tower. And two people (possible apprentices) who are gold and silver coded…their dance routine is throwing themselves into it. Presumably to test it. We don’t know where Blake and Liv are. Also he allegedly is living there in a sort of self exile

If he is a ranger he could also very well be his own mentor

Dear Just Dance: are these two ok? I have Mild Concerns about the safety of Cygnus’ most likely canon apprentices

It would be…intensely darkly funny if it turned out the rangers were a Thing thirty years ago and Cygnus is actually the former Blue Ranger

I doubt it and for my purposes he’s the mentor but I cannot deny…that would be darkly funny

Another funny and dark in a different way idea is he was the red Spectronizer

[avcdgrdn]

── .✦ [ HCs ] what are the pines' café orders?

dipper: a small black coffee with whipped cream on top.

despite his unnerving ability to down straight black coffee and physically be unaffected, the child in him still enjoys licking the whipped cream off of the coffee lid. ford finds it mildly concerning that a thirteen-year-old is just as reliant on caffeine as he is, but understands the need for its sweet satiation. stan thinks it's hilarious and would let dipper order whatever the heck he wants anyway.

mabel: a large strawberry creme frappucino.

after remembering that the café does not, in fact, carry mabel juice, she opts for the most colorful and sugary beverage, and orders the biggest possible size. the rest of the family often find themselves wondering how in the world she can fit all of the drink in her little digestive system. she often competes with dipper to see who can down their drink the fastest.

stanley: a large peach lemonade with peach inclusions.

stan's been hooked on pitt cola for so long, it's caused him to have a love for anything peach-flavored. although the barista looked at him funny when he asked if they could put a peach pit inside it, they told him he could have peach slices instead, which he was ultimately content with. typically, he won't order anything from a café unless someone else is paying or he's treating the kids to an outing. he grumbles about the "fancy prices."

stanford: a medium cold brew with vanilla cream.

ford does enjoy some sweetness in his coffee, although the prevalence of the darkly flavored caffeine is very much essential for him. after the kids took him out to the café for the first time, he has found that "purchasing a well-crafted beverage" serves to "encourage his productivity and serotonin levels." basically, if you treated him to a coffee date, he will love you forever.

[allwormdiet]

Sentinel 9.5

Every thirteen year old in this story is going through hell

Dear Parian, how do you puppet cloth dolls with boxing gloves on their hands?

Nah but this is nice to see them getting along with each other, and I'm glad that Vista gets to see something cute in such a blighted fucking time.

The background levels of desperation and fear in this setting remain very strong and evocative.

Gayyyyyy

Vista like "hey I'm not young enough to actually enjoy this, but I'm old enough to act polite about it"

God that's so fucking cool

Oh man who could have possibly predicted that putting a thirteen year old in constant life-or-death situations with people dying around her could possibly result in a warped perspective on death and dying, that's so weird

Oh man, who could have possibly predicted that enlisting a thirteen year old in a quasi-military policing organization where she's legitimately got seniority over high schoolers could possibly result in feeling distanced from her own age, that's so weird

So like, is there truly nowhere else to put the team portrait gallery than right where everyone sees them every time they enter? Just put them in another hallway or wing or something, especially if you're dropping bodies.

Still a little darkly funny that Browbeat doesn't even get a portrait, guy was straight up too new to even put in front of a camera

The idea that Coil has only managed to infiltrate the PRT at all because they're letting him infiltrate the PRT is. Oh my fucking God he's so bad at this. So far every win we've seen him take against other players is because they feel bad enough to let him have it. Coil, you have got to fucking hang it up my man, the minute someone decides to actually deal with you you're cooked

(It's almost certainly gonna be Taylor, on account of that child you kidnapped and forcibly addicted to drugs)

Okay so like. Hwoo. I keep talking about the expectations being put on the Wards in this fucking story but this is a really steep one. Let this fucking mole into your midst and let him do what he does. Let a tinker, a goddamn superpowered tech specialist, hang out where your stuff is.

I know they all agree to do it but they already all agreed to fight fucking Leviathan, Vista agreed to kill a man for seconds on the clock, we're waaaaay past the point where any boundaries might still be crossed

Hey you know what, self-awareness is good, it's healthy, I wish someone would let Taylor have some but that's fine

Okay, well, at least Piggot is willing to treat these kids a little like kids. And address some of the concerns that they have. And promise that she'll find some kind of compensation for the fact that these kids are going above and fucking beyond in their role as junior heroes.

Glad Kid Win gets a... win

and while I don't love Clockblocker making fun of Piggot, I get it. She's the authority figure in their lives, she consistently plays the role of bad cop with them. That's how it goes.

Okay so Vista turned thirteen on the day that Leviathan hit Brockton Bay, which means she's been at this since she was eleven, maybe younger. This now puts her pretty firmly in the same age bracket as Alec, and that might put her at silver or bronze for youngest known trigger event depending on how old Miss Militia was at the time.

Also, the fact that Vista has thrown herself into her career as a cape, at age thirteen, as a means to not have to spend time with her parents? That's bleak. I continue to maintain that she should be allowed to commit any misdemeanor she wants to and get away with it forever

So Hookwolf almost murdered an 11-12 year old and they truly can't just commit to having a single Triumvirate member sit on his Birdcage transport the entire way along just to make sure he actually gets gone? At least until they're out of the Empire's reach, surely, like what the fuck

Do the unspoken rules not kick in on attempted murder? Do you need a corpse to make it stick?

Jesus God, Sophia, I am trying to keep an open mind about you but so far you have just been such a jerk in so many directions.

Like obviously she's not doing well but what's the alternative for her at this point

Just gotta pick up the slack left by two older, more experienced(?) teammates who had a lot of hopes and emotional bonds riding on them. And Browbeat.

Does anybody on this team like Sophia?

Weld is good people. Also I think "empathetic" is technically the correct word unless the ability to warp space like putty also comes with emotion reading.

This is sweet.

Also, yeah, cry. It's good for you.

Godddddddd fucking dammit Sophia.

This is so unreasonably cruel to do to a teammate, never mind to a kid

"Bluh bluh life is pain, the real world is all about what's hard, suffering builds character" shut the fuck up Sophia, Vista put up bigger numbers against Leviathan and doesn't have a rusty knife in place of a personality.

Also "kids" girl you have at most three years on her

Big bad Shadow Stalker can't handle being the one under the microscope

Yeah no for real, the moment she gets provoked in a way even kind of resembling the way she provokes others, she resorts to acts of physical violence. Thin-skinned hypocrite, thy name is Sophia Hess.

Guess Vista's lucky she's not taller and more gangly or else Sophia would've tried to rip her ear off.

Current Thoughts

Vista is the PRT's strongest soldier and she is out there fighting their hardest battles. She also has not reached high school yet and possibly wasn't even in middle school when she first donned the costume. This whole system is a scam.

Cool to see Weld better settling into the leadership role, at least.

And then Sophia. Sophia, Sophia, Sophia. I don't know what the Undersiders have planned for you but right now I'm having a hard time feeling sympathy. Do unto others, you little maniac.

[differentpostrebel]

Lost and Found: A Pirate's Promise

The second gif gets me everytime LMFAOOO

Chapter 19: The Icy Clash 

A/N: We finally get the Monet VS. Y/N fight!!! And also some funny Sanji moments too. Some Law POV, as well. Some surprise guests too! Tomorrows chapter we will be getting out lovesick cooks sanji POV.. and more, maybe a few more surprise guests (hehehe) ! Thank you guys for joining!, thank you guys for following, liking, reblogging, commenting!. I cant wait for you guys to see whats instore for the next chapters! And without further a do, lets get to it! Also, Tomorrow I will also be going back to chapter 18 and 19 and adding the links to the previous chapters.

Word Count: 4.8K 

Sanji X Reader, One Piece X Reader, Sanji x Y/N

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16, Chapter 17, Chapter 18, Chapter 19 (Here)

Laws POV… 

Finally making my way to the room I needed to be in, I was laser-focused on my mission. Destroying the manufacturing tanks for the SAD was my top priority. Once that was done, I’d head back to R-66 and regroup with Straw Hat—and Y/N. Thoughts of her needing my assistance filled my mind. Her extensive injuries and wounds meant she'd be in recovery mode, which meant she'd need me by her side.

"Y/N, the things you do to me," I whispered under my breath as I unsheathed my blade, preparing for the task ahead.

But before I could make my move, a voice behind me made it clear who I’d be facing.

"I can't help but feel like I've been bit by my very own dog, Law," Vergo’s voice dripped with malice, causing me to turn back and face him.

"I'm afraid you've crossed the line, kid. You're just too damn smart for your own good," he sneered, his armament Haki flaring up as he readied his bamboo stick. "You know what's sad about folks like you? They tend to die at a young age. I can't wait to wipe that smart-ass look off your face."

His eyes narrowed as a twisted smile crept across his lips. "And maybe then I can get back to that princess of yours you seem so fond of. Maybe I can even hand her over to Joker. I'm sure he'd love to have his fun with her."

I felt a surge of anger course through me, my grip tightening on my blade. "You won’t lay a finger on her, Vergo," I growled, my voice low and deadly.

In a flash, Vergo appeared in front of me, faster than I could react. His bamboo stick slammed into my chin with brutal force, knocking me off balance as blood spilled from my mouth. Before I could regain my footing, he appeared again, this time driving his weapon into my chest, slamming me into the ground with such force that it created a dent in the metal floor.

"Stand up, Law," Vergo taunted, towering over me with that same cold, menacing grin. "You can’t die this early. I want you to feel every bit of this."

Gritting my teeth, I struggled to push myself up, my body protesting in pain. "You think… this is enough to stop me?" I spat, wiping the blood from my mouth as I forced myself to stand, my legs shaky but resolute.

Vergo’s expression didn’t change, his eyes narrowing as he watched me. "You’ve always been stubborn. But that’s going to be your downfall."

I steadied myself, gripping my sword tightly. "The only one falling today… is you," I said, my voice filled with determination. "I’ve come too far to let you stop me now. And I’ll be damned if I let you get anywhere near her."

Vergo chuckled darkly, his bamboo stick coated in Haki as he readied his next move. "Big words for a man on the brink of death. Let’s see if you can back them up."

Y/N POV..

"What is that?" I asked, looking up ahead at the top of the stairs.

"It's the children!" Robin exclaimed, her voice filled with concern.

"Oh no, Chopper is in his Monster Point!" Nami gasped, her eyes widening in alarm.

"The kids must be going through withdrawals," I said, my heart sinking at the sight. Chopper’s Rumble Ball effect had worn off, and the children were frantically running towards the biscuit room, desperate to eat more candy. Chopper, tears welling in his eyes, begged them to stop, but they didn’t listen.

Just then, Nami grabbed Chopper, pulling him back as we all began to run toward the children. "Nami, thank you!" Chopper said, his voice filled with relief.

"Looks like we got here just in time! Yohooo!" Brook chimed in, his usual cheerfulness masking the severity of the situation.

But I suddenly stopped in my tracks, my body still too weak to keep up. The toll of my injuries was catching up to me, and I couldn’t push myself any further. "Y/N, come on!" Zoro called out, his voice urging me to keep moving.

I glanced at Chopper, struggling to catch my breath as I tried to steady myself. "Chopper," I began, my voice strained, "remember that medicine I handed you along with the ointment that can heal wounds fast?"

"Yeah, Y/N, I brought a few just in case," Chopper replied, still wounded from trying to keep the kids in place. He was breathing heavily, but he quickly reached into his bag, understanding the gravity of the situation.

I limped toward Chopper, determination in my eyes. "Good, I’m going to need that now!" I declared, knowing this was the only way I could help without being a burden.

Chopper stared at me, his eyes full of concern but also understanding. He knew this was a risk, but it was necessary. "Right!" he said, pulling out a small white medicine pill.

"Here goes nothing," I muttered, swallowing the pill whole. The taste was bitter, but I ignored it, focusing on the task at hand.

After a few minutes, I began to feel the effects of the medicine. My body, once sluggish and weak, now felt energized. The pain in my right leg subsided, and I could finally put weight on it again. "Yes!" I exclaimed, testing my strength as a smile spread across my face. "Thank you, Chopper!" I said, grateful for his quick thinking and the medicine that had given me a second wind.

"You gotta stop the kids before they consume more of it, guys!" Chopper cried, his voice trembling. "The biscuit room is down the hall to the left. There's a girl named Mocha who's been helping me—she's the only child with her right mind!"

"Don’t worry, Chopper, we can take care of it from here. You did good," I reassured him, placing a hand on his shoulder. Tears welled up in Chopper’s eyes once more, the weight of the situation heavy on his small frame.

We finally reached the biscuit room, and just as Chopper had said, the children were rushing toward Mocha, desperate for more candy. Robin quickly sprang into action. "Mil Fleur, Gigantesco Mano!" she commanded, her giant hands emerging from the floor, wrapping around the children, and halting them in their tracks.

"Good, this will buy us some time!" I said, feeling a brief moment of relief.

"Nami, Usopp, Chopper, go help Mocha and the kids!" I instructed, urgency lacing my voice.

"Right!" they responded in unison, rushing toward Mocha, who was trying her best to keep the candy away from the other children.

Robin’s face twisted in concentration as she struggled to hold the kids back. "I’m afraid I can’t hold them off much longer," she warned, gritting her teeth. One of the children bit down on her hand, causing her to wince in pain.

"You can’t have any candy!" Mocha shouted, desperately trying to keep the candy away from the other children as they clawed at her. In a panic, she turned and bolted, clutching the candy tightly to her chest.

Just then, a gust of cold wind swept through the room, carrying with it a flurry of snowflakes. "What is it now?" I groaned in frustration as the exit became blocked by a wall of snow.

"You don’t have to worry about a thing, Mocha dear," a chillingly familiar voice echoed through the room. My eyes widened in shock and anger. "It’s her!" I hissed, gripping my sword tightly. "The nerve of this bitch!" I added through gritted teeth.

"Ahhh, it’s her! It’s the crazy bird woman I told you about!" Usopp yelled, eyes wide with fear.

"Crazy is a nice way of putting it," I muttered darkly. "This woman is downright evil!"

"Monet, help me, please!" Mocha pleaded, her voice trembling.

Monet’s icy gaze fell on Mocha. "Mocha, you shouldn’t hog all the candy. Be a nice girl and share it with everyone," she cooed, a sinister smile on her lips as she sent another gust of snow our way.

"It seems this woman uses sorcery!" Kin’emon exclaimed, readying his sword.

"Oh, it’s more than sorcery, that’s for sure!" I snapped back, my eyes narrowing as I locked onto Monet.

"You know this woman?" Zoro asked, glancing at me with curiosity.

"Let’s just say she and I go way back," I replied coldly, my grip tightening on my sword.

Monet! But why?" Mocha cried out, her voice tinged with desperation and confusion.

Monet giggled, a chilling sound that seemed to freeze the very air around us.

Laws POV… 

"AHHH!" I yelled in agony, the pain nearly overwhelming me. "Damn it! Room! Have my heart come back to me!"

Just as I managed to summon my powers and pull my heart back, Vergo landed a crushing kick that sent me crashing into the nearby rails. I fell to the ground, the pain becoming almost unbearable. My vision started to blur, and I could barely make out Vergo’s menacing figure as he once again clutched my heart.

With his armament haki activated, Vergo landed a devastating punch to my face, sending my hat flying off and leaving me vulnerable.

"Here’s a counter shock!" I sneered, unleashing a brutal attack that made him gasp in pain. 

"I have a message from Joker," Vergo said, his voice cold and indifferent.

My counterattack hadn’t worked, and the realization dawned on me that Vergo was indeed a loyal lackey of Joker. "Well, Vergo," I said through gritted teeth, a smirk appearing on my face despite the pain. "That’s Mr. Vergo to you."

As Vergo continued to clutch my heart, I screamed in agony, my strength waning as I barely managed to stay conscious. Just then, as if by some miracle, the scene shifted, and Vergo came face to face with Vice Admiral Smoker.

Smoker’s imposing figure filled the doorway, and his presence was a welcome sight. "Smoker…" I muttered weakly, a flicker of hope igniting within me despite the intense pain. 

Y/N POV.. 

"Mocha, there’s no way you can eat all that candy alone," Monet said, her voice dripping with false sweetness. "You might as well share it with the others."

"No! I can't do that, it's bad!" Mocha protested, clutching the candy tightly.

"My, you're a difficult one," Monet replied with a smirk. "Stop being greedy and share."

"Hey, lady, what are you doing to these kids?" Nami demanded, stepping forward with a fierce glare.

"Yeah, you don’t know who you’re messing with!" Usopp added, his tone defiant.

"Actually, I do," Monet said with a hint of malice. "I do my research, so I know exactly who you are. You’re the infamous Straw Hat Pirate Crew."

"We don’t have much time," Robin said, turning to us with urgency. "Luffy asked me to find Sea Prism Stone handcuffs. Usopp and Brook, go search for them."

Usopp and Brook nodded, quickly heading off to find the handcuffs. Kinemon also left to search for his son, leaving Robin, Zoro, Nami, Chopper, and me to deal with Monet.

I steeled myself, trying to push through the pain and fatigue. "Not yet, Y/N," I thought. "I’ve got to hold it off a little while longer."

Mocha, taking advantage of the chaos, ran away with the children following her. Nami and Chopper dashed after them, their urgency clear. "Perhaps I can slow them down!" Robin said, preparing to act.

But before Robin could make a move, Monet struck with deadly precision, stabbing Robin in the back. "Robin!" Nami cried out in horror as Robin staggered, the wound clearly painful.

Seeing Robin injured spurred me into action. "It’s time," I said to myself, determination filling me. I clenched my left hand, activating its power. I grabbed my sword, pressing the blue gem to summon the ice once more. The blade shimmered with a cold, icy aura.

With a surge of adrenaline, I lifted my left leg and dashed toward Nami and Robin. "I told you... DON’T YOU DARE TOUCH THEM!" I roared, my voice echoing with fury. I slammed my sword down, intercepting Monet’s attack with a loud clash.

The force of the impact sent shockwaves through the air, and Monet’s eyes widened in surprise.

. She was flung backward, her blades slicing through the air as she regained her balance.

“Nami, Robin, Chopper, are you guys okay?” I called out, not taking my glare away from Monet. I could see Nami trying to support Robin while Chopper tended to her wounds.

“We’re fine, but the kids—” Nami began, but Zoro cut her off.

“You three do something to stop those kids!” Zoro said, drawing his swords and preparing for action.

“Zoro, stay out of this fight!” I ordered, my voice firm and filled with authority. “This birdbrain’s mine.” I smirked, focusing my full attention on Monet.

“I’m not leaving you,” Zoro said, determination etched in his expression.

“Just make sure Nami, Robin, and Chopper make it out of this room!” I insisted. “Then come back and help.”

Monet, having regained her composure, sneered at me. “Ahh, we meet again, harlot!” she spat, venom dripping from her words.

“Monet, long time no see. Has it really been 30 minutes since you tied me to those chains?” I retorted, my voice dripping with cold satisfaction.

“I’ve been waiting to get you back for mocking me, princess,” Monet growled, her rage palpable. “The brokers will be thrilled to see this fight,” she added with a smirk.

“By the way, how’s your right leg? Vergo did a number on you. That’ll be an easy target for me to strike,” Monet taunted.

“Good,” I said, clenching my left hand. “I can’t wait for them to watch me kick your ass!” I lifted my right leg and clenched my left hand, focusing my energy.

With a burst of speed, I dashed through the air, twisting and spinning with precision. My right leg arced gracefully, the motion fluid and powerful as I executed my move. “Tremor Kick!” I shouted as my heel connected with Monet’s head, sending her crashing down to the ground with a resounding impact. The force created a series of cracks and holes in the ground where she landed.

I glanced to my right and spotted a camera, clearly positioned for the brokers to watch the fight. “Must be where the brokers are looking at,” I thought with a smirk.

“And as for you lovely brokers who are watching,” I called out with a confident grin, “get ready for the ride of your lives.”

I twirled my sword, and the air around me shimmered as the ice shards crystallized into razor-sharp, blade-like formations. The shards whirled around me, their edges gleaming with a deadly light. With a swift, fluid motion, I directed the shards toward Monet.

The shards sliced through the air with precision, their icy blades cutting through anything in their path. Monet, still reeling from my previous attack, barely had time to react as the shards closed in. The air crackled with the sound of ice meeting flesh, and Monet’s eyes widened in shock and pain. 

As she staggered back, I could hear Mocha’s desperate screams as she fled through another door, pursued by the others.

“We can’t let the kids get away!” Chopper shouted, his concern for the children evident in his voice. Robin, Chopper, Nami, and Zoro swiftly headed towards the children, leaving me to deal with Monet.

Monet’s voice cut through the chaos, dripping with malice. “My, that was quite the attack, harlot. But it’s still not enough to stop me.” Her determination was palpable as she started moving towards the escaping group.

“Oh no you don’t!” I shouted, dashing to intercept her. Nami’s eyes widened in alarm. “Y/N! Don’t hit me!” she cried out, but I had no intention of harming her. Instead, I aimed my strike at Monet, who had positioned herself behind Nami.

Our blades clashed with a sharp ring, the impact reverberating through the room. Monet gritted her teeth, her face a mask of rage and frustration.

“Guys, get out now!” I yelled to Nami, Robin, and Chopper as they hurriedly left. Zoro gave me one last, concerned look before turning back to ensure their safe retreat.

“I’ll be back in a few minutes, okay, Y/N?” Zoro called out, determination in his voice. “Protect them and the children!” I shouted back, my voice laced with urgency. With a nod, Zoro sprinted off, leaving me to confront Monet. 

Monet’s eyes narrowed as she licked her lips, her expression a mix of disdain and amusement. “Such a shame,” she said, her voice dripping with condescension. “This fight is between you and me, not them.”

I met her gaze with a smirk. “Yes, it is, but picking at the weak ones is a winner’s strategy.”

Monet’s smile faltered slightly as I chuckled. “You honestly think they’re weak? Hmpph, Law was right about one thing: you really are full of it,” I said, letting out a laugh that I hoped would get under her skin.

Her face darkened, anger flickering in her eyes. “Harlot… I’d watch that mouth of yours,” she warned, her tone icy.

“Oh?” I replied, feigning curiosity. “You mean the same mouth that Law loves to kiss?”

The mention of Law’s name seemed to hit a nerve. Monet’s expression twisted in a mix of rage and frustration. Monet’s frustration was palpable, her strikes growing more erratic as I danced around her with deliberate ease. “You know, Monet,” I said with a smirk, “it’s almost sad watching you get so worked up. You’re clearly not used to someone getting under your skin.”

Her eyes narrowed with fury. “I’m going to enjoy watching you fall.”

I chuckled, dodging another of her wild swings. “Oh, I’m sure you will. But before you do, let’s talk about something a bit more... personal. Like how Law and I had a little moment together.”

Monet’s confusion and irritation flashed across her face. “What are you talking about?”

I sidestepped her attack with a graceful twist, my voice laced with taunting amusement. “You didn’t know? Law and I had a rather... intense encounter. He had me pinned down, tending to my wounds with such skill. But it wasn’t just about healing. There was a certain... intimacy to it. You could almost feel the tension crackling between us.”

Monet’s grip on her weapon tightened, her frustration bubbling over. “I don’t care about your games or your little romance.”

I laughed softly, my eyes glinting with mischief. “Oh, but you’re mistaken. It’s not just about romance. It’s about how he made me feel, the way his touch was both firm and gentle. And this coat I’m wearing? It’s not just any coat. It’s his coat. The warmth of it, the scent of his cologne—it all reminds me of how he took care of me, making sure I stayed warm and protected.” I gave her a teasing wink. “A charming young doctor just knows all the right ways to satisfy a woman, if you know what I mean.”

Monet’s face twisted in anger. “Enough! I’m done listening to your pathetic boasts.”

I leaned in closer, my tone dripping with mockery. “Pathetic? Maybe. But it’s also effective. You’re rattled because you know you’ll never have what I had with Law. The warmth, the care, the connection—it’s something you can never touch. And that eats away at you, doesn’t it?”

Putting away my sword, I pressed my left palm against my right fist, activating the electrical charge with a crackle of energy. “You are so dead, princess!” Monet snarled, lunging at me with fury. I dodged her attack, her movements wild and fueled by rage. But then, suddenly, I felt something cold and heavy stopping me in my tracks.

“What the hell!” I cursed, struggling to move as the snow around me hardened, trapping me in place. Monet’s eyes gleamed with triumph as she closed in, her claws flashing. She slashed at my coat, the fabric tearing apart, falling in tatters around me.

“Now, there’s no coat to protect you,” she sneered, her smirk widening as I strained against the snow’s grasp.

“Damn it, I’m still stuck in this!” I growled, struggling against the snow’s icy grip. But before I could break free, Monet seized my left arm, her claws digging painfully into my skin. I swung at her with my free hand, but she was too fast. With a sinister grin, she spun me around and hurled me against the wall. The impact sent a shockwave of pain through my body, blood spilling from my mouth as I crumpled to the ground. My left arm throbbed in agony—the injury was getting worse, and I could feel it.

Monet approached me with a taunting smirk, her voice dripping with mockery. “Hahaha! My, my, Princess, did I injure your left arm?”

I looked up at her, breathing heavily but refusing to show weakness. “Even if you did injure me, I can still kick your ass with one hand tied behind my back!” I snarled.

With my right hand, I grabbed her left leg in a sudden move. Her eyes widened in surprise. “What are you doing?!” Monet demanded.

“NOW SHOCK!” I yelled, channeling the electricity from my arm directly into her body. The energy surged through her, and Monet convulsed, gasping for air as the shock overwhelmed her.

As she collapsed to the ground, struggling to breathe, I slowly let go of her leg and pushed myself up, clutching onto my injured left arm. The pain was intense, but I wasn’t about to back down. I stood over Monet, my eyes burning with defiance. “You’re not so tough when the tables are turned, are you?” I muttered, my voice low and fierce.

Just then, I heard the door creak open, and I turned to see Zoro stepping into the room. "Finally made it back," he said, his voice carrying a hint of amusement.

Laughing, I made my way over to him, relief washing over me. "About time you got here!" I teased. "And you didn’t get lost! I’m impressed."

But before I could say more, I saw Zoro's expression change. His eyes widened as he looked past me, and I felt a cold dread settle in my stomach. “Y/N, watch out!” he shouted.

“Snow Sword Skin Technique!” Monet's voice rang out behind me, filled with malice. I barely had time to react before I felt a sharp, searing pain in my left arm. Monet’s blade had cut deep, leaving a giant gash that bled profusely.

“Damn it!” I seethed, clutching my arm as I staggered back, trying to maintain my balance. The pain was excruciating, but I wasn’t going to let her see me falter.

Monet seizing the opportunity, grabs me with her claws. Her claws dug deeper into my chest, and I could feel her nails piercing my skin as pressure mounted on my ribs. "Ahhh!" I screamed, the agony shooting through my body. I clutched my left arm, still trying to lift my right leg for an attack, but Monet locked it down with her own, squeezing me into submission.

“Damn it!” I gasped, each breath harder to take as her crushing hold forced the air out of me. My body throbbed as if every nerve was screaming in pain.

“Y/N!” Zoro’s voice cut through the haze, his sword ready as he sprinted toward me.

“Zoro! Don’t!” I shouted, trying to keep him from getting any closer. I knew Monet wanted him to charge in recklessly.

Monet grinned wickedly, her taunt aimed right at Zoro. “My, even in the face of death, she still wants to protect you. How touching!” Her wings began to rise, preparing to deliver the final blow. "One more slash should do it."

Just then, the sound of footsteps echoed through the corridor. “There’s another room back here! Find those children and get them out of here!” shouted a familiar voice.

Monet froze, her attack halting as confusion washed over her face. “What the...?”

I took advantage of the distraction, clenching my left hand, summoning every bit of energy I had. Pain radiated through my body, but I forced it aside, connecting my right hand with my left. Power surged between them. A smirk tugged at the corners of my mouth as I realized I had the chance to fight back.

“Come on, let’s bust the door open!” The voice rang out, clear now. My eyes widened. "Wait, that's..."

“Raaahhh! Save those kids!” Sanji shouted as he burst into the room, G-5 marines following close behind.

Zoro threw an annoyed glance their way. “Why are all those marines after you?”

“The only person I can see is Pirate Hunter Zoro!” one of the G-5 marines shouted.

“Of course, that idiot is here,” Sanji said, exasperation in his voice.

"He really is something else," I muttered weakly through the pain.

“Alright, men! Everyone, make dumb faces at Mosshead!” Sanji commanded, and the G-5 soldiers instantly complied, pulling ridiculous expressions toward Zoro.

“I hope you all slip and crack your skulls,” Zoro grumbled. 

Monet’s grip on my leg loosened in the chaos, giving me the opportunity I needed. Summoning all the power in my right leg, I prepared to strike. 

Sanji, oblivious to the situation, suddenly locked eyes on Monet. “Never mind, we’ve got a hottie right here!” he swooned, hearts in his eyes.

“Yeah, shake those tail feathers!” one of the G-5 soldiers chimed in.

I rolled my eyes. “Of course, Sanji.”

“Pick your jaws up, morons!” Zoro barked at the G-5 marines, snapping them out of their daze. “And you, curly brows, do you not see she’s about to kill Y/N?”

But then, Sanji’s gaze shifted and finally locked onto me. His eyes went wide with sudden realization. “What the—? Y/N!” His voice, usually playful, was now filled with genuine concern. “You’ve got to be kidding me...”

That was all I needed to hear. Gathering the last bit of strength, I pushed back against Monet. With my right leg, I kicked her just enough to loosen her grip. “I’ve got one shot at this,” I muttered to myself, steeling my resolve.

With Monet momentarily thrown off, I activated the anklet around my leg, and connecting a touch with my left palm, letting the fire ignite. “Let’s see how you handle this, Monet!”

With a fierce stomp, I brought my foot down on her wing, flames erupting and sending tremors through her body. The fire spread across her arm, igniting her flesh. “Now, Blaze!” I shouted, watching as her arm was engulfed in flames.

Monet screeched, stumbling backward as she tried desperately to extinguish the fire. The tables had turned. The terror she had inflicted on me was now her own to face. I stood, clutching my injured arm but ready to finish what we started.

Monet, though weakened and scorched, wasn’t done yet. She bared her fangs, her icy wings spreading wide as she prepared for another assault. “You think this is over?” she hissed, her voice dripping with venom.

Just then, she was momentarily distracted by the G-5 marines, who were shouting and catcalling. “Sexiest bird I’ve ever seen!” one of them whistled, while another added, “woohooo! Baby yeah!

Zoro, incredulous, commented dryly, “Call me crazy, but I think she’s actually enjoying this!”

Seizing the opportunity, I made my way toward Sanji and swiftly undid his tie. Sanji’s face flushed a deep red, and I could feel his heart racing. “Y/N, what are you—” he started, but I didn’t give him a chance to finish.

With a quick motion, I removed his tie and began wrapping it around my injured left arm. “There, that’ll stop the bleeding for now,” I said, tying it securely.

Sanji, still looking dumbfounded, watched as I finished. I approached him, pecked him on the cheek, and said, “Did I ever tell you that you look absolutely sexy without a tie?” With a playful wink, I turned and made my way back to the battlefield.

Sanji’s face turned a deeper shade of red, but his attention quickly snapped back to the fight as he saw Monet preparing her next attack. 

Kidd POV…

"Kidd, I totally forgot we had a meeting to form an alliance with both Scratchman and Hawkins," Killer said, downing his fifth beer.

"Cancel the meeting, I don’t give a damn," I grumbled, chugging down my seventh beer. The room spun slightly as the alcohol took its toll. “The way Caesar’s showing the wrong people in this live recording, I don’t care about your poison gas!” I slammed my fist on the table, causing the remaining beer to slosh around.

Just then, the live transponder snail began broadcasting a room filled with children. “Little brats, what is this, a daycare live feed?” I sneered, irritation growing.

Killer chuckled, shaking his head. “At this rate, it looks like that meeting’s about to be more interesting than this.”

“I told you… DON’T YOU DARE TOUCH THEM!” came a voice through the broadcast.

Y/N. The voice cut through my drunken haze like a lightning bolt. My mind, fogged by the alcohol, began to spin into a wild fantasy, the lines between reality and imagination blurring.

In my steamy reverie, Y/N’s presence dominated every corner of my mind. I imagined her standing in front of me, her eyes blazing with defiance and raw intensity. The fantasy was visceral and unrestrained. I could almost feel her body pressed against mine, the heat of her skin melding with mine as if igniting a feverish storm. The thought of her lips against mine, of her breath mingling with my own, sent a surge of heat straight to my core.

I envisioned gripping Y/N tightly, her form writhing beneath me, every touch and gasp amplified by the raw, primal energy between us. Her voice, fierce and unyielding, was now a low, seductive growl in my ear, every word a promise of unrestrained passion. The scene played out with explosive intensity: our bodies tangled in a frenetic dance of need and desire, our movements wild and unrelenting.

The world outside ceased to exist, our connection consuming all rational thought. I imagined the intensity of her gaze as it pierced through me, her skin hot and slick against mine. Every touch was electric, every whisper a command that drove me further into a frenzy of lust. I saw us locked together, the heat of our bodies mingling, each touch igniting the other in a relentless surge of pleasure.

Sweat dripped down my brow as the fantasy reached its fever pitch. I could feel the imaginary press of Y/N’s body against mine, the way her hands gripped me, urging me closer, driving me deeper into the madness of our shared desire. Her moans begging me for more, begging for me to go faster. I can hear it now, her voice filled with pleasure, “Kidd… oh Kidd dont stop.”  It was raw, untamed, a brutal collision of passion and power.

As the feed continued, Y/N's voice cut through the clamor, taunting the bird woman with a mix of defiance and strategic wit. That is until she mentioned Trafalgar laws. How he tended to her wounds, how he gave her his coat, how he had her pinned down, Y/N’s voice dripped with a mixture of pride and irritation. “That should be me doing all that!” The words were sharp and deliberate, designed to get under the bird woman's skin. 

My grip tightened around the beer bottle, the fiery liquid warming my insides as I took another swig. I could feel the heat of my frustration mingling with the alcohol, fueling a storm of possessive anger. My mind raced, images of Law's smug face and Y/N's vulnerable position stirring a tempest of raw emotion within me.

Killer’s gaze was fixed on the screen, his expression reflecting the same volatile mix of fury and frustration I felt. His hands were clenched tightly, knuckles white as if they were straining against invisible chains. “I told you, Kidd, we should have gone,” he said, his voice laced with frustration and a touch of regret.

I smirked, watching Y/N’s tactical play unfold. “Damn right,” I muttered. “My fiancée sure knows how to rattle anybody she comes across.” My pride surged with every clever remark Y/N made, each taunt a testament to her strength and cunning.

Just then, my eyes widened as the scene took a brutal turn. The bird woman, furious and desperate, grabbed Y/N with a vicious grip and hurled them against the wall. My heart pounded, the raw intensity of the scene searing through my drunken haze. Y/N's body slammed into the wall with a sickening thud, and I could see the grimace of pain on their face even through the screen.

Killer let out a low growl, his frustration palpable. But then Y/N retaliated sending the bird woman a jolt of electricity.

The way Y/N retaliated, her body moving with an effortless grace that spoke of countless hours of training and determination, was captivating. Her fierce resolve, Her focus—it was intoxicating. The bird woman reeled from the electric assault, her earlier bravado dissipating as she struggled to regain her footing. 

Killer, noticing my distracted, almost transfixed expression, took another swig of his beer, his eyes glinting with a mix of admiration and something darker. “She’s become quite the force to be reckoned with,” he said, his voice low but laced with a hint of intrigue. “I didn’t expect any less from her.”

I grunted, my fingers gripping the edge of the table tightly as I watched Y/N fight. “Yeah, she’s something else,” I said, my voice rough with emotion. “Every time I see her like this, it drives me wild.”

Killer’s smirk widened as he observed Y/N’s defensive tactics. “Looks like she knows exactly how to push their buttons,” he said, his tone dripping with admiration. “And she’s doing it brilliantly.”

My lips curled into a savage grin. “Damn right. That’s my woman out there, showing everyone what she’s made of.” I raised my beer in a celebratory gesture, the pride and possessiveness clear in my voice. “She’s got the fire in her, and she’s not afraid to use it.”

As the bird woman was forced back, her composure shattered by Y/N’s relentless assault, I felt a surge of passion and fury. Seeing Y/N fight with such intensity, their movements a testament to their strength and will, only fueled my desire. I wanted to be there, fighting alongside them, sharing in their triumphs and struggles.

“Let’s keep watching,” I said, my voice filled with a rough intensity. “I need to see every moment of this. I want to see how she handles this.”

Killer nodded, his eyes reflecting the same fervor. “Yeah, let’s see it through. She’s incredible.”

As the battle unfolded before us, the room seemed to shrink away, leaving only the raw, unfiltered passion of the fight and my unwavering fascination with Y/N.

Unknown Viewer…

As the live feed continued to capture Y/N’s fierce struggle, the three of us sat together, our eyes fixed on the screen. Y/N’s determination was palpable, her every move a testament to her strength and resilience. I couldn’t help but admire her, even as a dark plan began to take shape in my mind.

“She really is quite the woman,” one of my brothers remarked, taking a swig of his beer. His gaze was unwavering as he observed the battle. “Look at her stand her ground. It’s impressive.”

My other brother snorted, a derisive laugh escaping him. “And our failure of a brother can’t get enough of her,” he said, pointing at the screen. “He wouldn’t even know how to handle all that woman.”

The laughter that followed was harsh, but I found it fitting. The image of Y/N, fierce and unapologetic, stirred something within me. “She’s feisty, I love that in a woman,” I said, my voice filled with a mixture of admiration and darker intent. “She’s exactly what I’ve been looking for.”

I stood, the weight of my decision settling heavily on my shoulders. “It’s settled, then,” I declared, my tone resolute. “I’ll have father set up the arrangements. Soon, she will be mine, and we’ll be wed.”

My brothers exchanged glances, their expressions a mix of amusement and approval. “And I’ll make sure she knows what true power feels like,” I continued, a cruel smile stretching across my face. “The failure will witness it all, and he’ll be powerless to stop it.”

The laughter that followed was cold, echoing through the room. “Soon, you will be mine,” I said, turning my attention back to the live feed. “And we’ll show everyone what true dominance really means.”

As the scene unfolded, the promise of what was to come hung heavily in the air. I watched with a mixture of anticipation and satisfaction, knowing that soon, everything would change.

.

.

..

[caffeinatedowlbear]

On Handsome AIs and identities

This was going to be a comment in the discussion under this post, but I cannot be stopped.

After clearing up semantics, OP and I are in agreement that AI Jack was created by means of a ‘brain download’, however BL’s near-magical technology would handle that.

What comes next is determining to which degree AI Jack is or isn’t the same person as Jack 1.0. I’m afraid you’ve triggered an unskippable cutscene.

To clear this up, I propose we answer the following questions:

1. Is AI Jack a SEPARATE being from Jack 1.0?

2. Is AI Jack a DIFFERENT being than Jack 1.0?

Is he separate?

As far as I’m concerned, yes, because:

He is a new being: AI Jack is a digital entity that had not existed before being created by Nakayama: and we know that Nakayama did make the initial primitive AI we meet in TPS; we can imagine the AI Jack in Tales being a much, much, much upgraded version of that.

He is operatIONAL, even if not operatING: based on how easily AI Jack is activated in Tales, we can assume that the 'brain download' wasn’t being passively dumped into a static database, but incorporated into a digital, self-aware system capable of autonomous thought and action, once activated.

“But he wasn’t activated until—”

Irrelevant! As far as I'm concerned, a being in stasis is still a being. It exists, and it’s alive, just not presently active. If I wouldn’t be okay with destroying an active self-aware AI, I also wouldn’t be okay with destroying a fully functional AI that hasn't been activated yet. Killing the latter would NOT feel more okay than the former.

Is he different?

OP has pointed out that from the point where Jack 1.0’s and AI Jack’s experiences start to differ, they become separate beings. Based on my points above, I argue that AI Jack is a separate being from jump. But paraphrasing OP, I would say that 1.0 and AI become different beings the moment their experiences diverge.

And that moment is the very next second after 1.0’s brain download begins. Because the brain being downloaded is a snapshot in time, so as soon as 1.0 makes a new memory, including the memory of uploading said snapshot… continuity has been broken. 1.0 now has a memory that AI doesn’t.

Which kind of means that the only time Jack 1.0 and AI Jack are the same person is the split second between 1.0 starting the brain download and the download commencing?

(As an aside: if we imagine that New-U's are canon, they are meant to instantaneously back up the user's brain at the time of death, and digistruct a new body into which the brain contents are uploaded. Similar for Fast Travel or any other teleportation: you're scanned, destroyed, then recreated at the destination. As long as only one copy of you exists at a time, your continuity is preserved. If a spare copy is left behind, we have a problem.)

(As an extra aside: the show Living With Yourself features a darkly funny, but pretty solid exploration of what happens when a spare copy of you gets left behind.)

Revisiting our questions now…

1. Is AI Jack a SEPARATE being from Jack 1.0? - yes, because AI Jack has existed at the same time as Jack 1.0 

2. Is AI Jack a DIFFERENT being than Jack 1.0? - yes, because AI Jack’s memories are never exactly the same as Jack 1.0’s, due to the snapshot nature of the hypothetical brain download

Now, for the trillion-dollar question… Does being a separate and different ENTITY from Jack 1.0 make AI Jack a different PERSON?

This one, I’m afraid, has too many layers, because wouldn’t you know it, being a person is complicated. XD

For the purposes of this discussion, let’s take the Felicity example. If the memory of what Jack 1.0 did to Felicity are part of AI Jack’s memories, does this mean that AI Jack also inherits the blame for those actions?

I don’t know. For real. 

It’s easy to say ‘of course he does, because he’s a direct continuation of Jack 1.0’ - except that he’s not, as I’ve described above.

‘But even AI Jack himself, in Tales, views himself as a direct continuation of 1.0’ - but just because he thinks that doesn’t make it true.

I think the only way that makes sense to me is to ask: if Jack 1.0 were still around, whom would you hold responsible for the damage done to Felicity? For the death of Bloodwing? For the destruction of New Haven?

If you had to put someone on trial for that, would you go after the man who actually did it? Or after the man who was made to believe that he had? 

So if we wouldn’t have held AI Jack responsible for Jack 1.0’s actions if the latter was still around, I don’t think that 1.0’s death should change things.

AI Jack is a Separate and Different being than Jack 1.0, and should not be held responsible for any of 1.0’s actions.

The defense rests--

Wait, actually…

There is one exception to my closing statement.

AI Jack is a Separate and Different being than Jack 1.0, and should not be held responsible for any of 1.0’s actions UNLESS he chooses to accept that responsibility for whatever reason.

Now, in what situation would AI Jack WANT to be held responsible for Jack 1.0’s actions? When accepting responsibility is inextricably tied with some experience of being Jack 1.0. When he would rather think of himself as Jack 1.0, with everything that entails, rather than be completely separate from him.

When there’s something in his-not-his memories that he wants to think of as his own, even if it means accepting the pain and grief and other baggage that comes with it.

Consider the following segment from my fic, in which AI Jack, by now pretty invested in the idea that he is NOT Jack 1.0, believes he has a fleeting chance to speak to the ghost of Angel (emphasis added).

“Angel.” Just saying her name again makes Jack want to drop to his knees, but he’s not gunning for pity here. “I am… so sorry. I’m— I’m told you understand that I’m not… him, but really, I’m not not him, either, ‘cause I— I remember it all. Better than he ever did, ever could, ‘cause he never could go back and look, really look at it all, and I can. I… have. I’ve seen everything he’s done, I’ve learned what you did, and I got it, I finally got it, too fucking late, of course, but for what it’s worth— Yeah, no, I know it ain’t worth much. Just like your dad, always a day late and a dollar short when it comes to the stuff that matters. Gahd, you really have been dealt a shitty hand as far as parents go, eh, baby girl? Far as too many things go, really. You didn’t deserve what happened to you, what he— what I— Fuck.” He forces a chuckle. “Yeah, yeah, I know. Language.” Seriously, this identity crap is starting to really get in the way. Story of his digital life, huh. Guess he’d better pick a pronoun and stick with it. Is he saying sorry for what the other Jack did, or taking on the man’s actions as his own? Is he offering an apology, or just condolences? Is he a bystander, an accomplice, or the perpetrator? Well, he can’t be either of the last two, ‘cause he, this Jack, never did anything to her! He never even met her! He wasn’t even around at the time, he wasn’t alive, for his given value of living! He’s more than within his rights to absolve himself of the guilt. But if he does that, if he’s a bystander offering condolences, that means he’s talking to a stranger right now. If he absolves himself of the guilt, if he stands aside from the horrors Jack 1.0 is responsible for… then he’s got no claim to any of the good memories, either. He never lost a daughter ‘cause he never had one. He was never married, he never ran Hyperion, he had nothing, he was nothing till he got sparked into consciousness when Rhys jammed a data drive into his cybernetics. He’s not Handsome Jack. He’s not any Jack. He’s just a confused collection of ones and zeroes, a digital ghost mixed up in old memories he doesn’t know what to do with. She’s a stranger to him, and he’s no-one and nothing to her, and he’s got no business talking to her, and none of this has any meaning. Well. Fuck that. “Angel. I’m sorry for what I did to you. I’m so sorry, baby. You deserved so much better than that. So much better than me. So much better than this bullshit apology. I mean, it’s not all bullshit, ‘cause I mean every word, but it’s still bullshit ‘cause it can’t fix a thing. There’s nothing to be fixed. You’re— you’re gone, and it’s my fault. All of it. You did nothing wrong. It was all me. I never saw. I never understood. I left you with no choice. I’m sorry.”

So, in summary… in my many, many thousands of words of writing about AI Jack, I ask the question ‘but IS he Jack?’ many times, but I never answer it. It’s always up to AI Jack himself to decide. His feelings about it change a lot as time goes on, but ultimately, he accepts that his identity is a liminal space between ‘Handsome Jack’ and ‘Not Handsome Jack’. 

Is AI Jack the same person as Handsome Jack 1.0, or is he someone different?

Yes. 

[echidna-enquiries]

You all actually seem to get along as a family… have any of you ever dealt with toxic family members? Surely your large family isn’t all perfect..

The group that had gathered looked solemn... no one knew where to start speaking. Salem: (he let out a sigh, deciding to be the one to speak up first) Unfortunately yes... I had married and was unfortunate to expose my son to such a person. My ex-wife, she... was not the person I thought she was. She turned out to be very... abusive. More in a way of her behavior and words. But I put up with it... but then I found out she had treated our son far worse... All because he 'didn't turn out like she wanted'. (he places a hand on his head) I still feel so much regret for Lance having to be in such a situation. The moment I found out, I had never felt so-... so angry. (he sighs, collecting himself) I divorced that wretched woman as soon as I could and made it clear she was not welcome near me or my family ever again ... (he looks off with a scowl) I don't know where she is, and I don't care to... she could be rotting in a ditch for all I care... after everything she put Lance through behind my back, and made him keep silent over it.

Morgan: My own ex-wife... I'd rather not get into her entirely, but she was unfaithful I found her with another...one of our close friends in fact. (she adjusts her glasses, holding back a shaky breathe) I hadn't been in a long term relationship since... at least until Arcana.

Seth: I'm not sure if my case counts towards myself, but towards Sorrel, I'd say it was very... ugh. (he shakes his head, thinking back) For a time, I... wasn't sure who Sorrel's mother was. I was very reckless about my sexual activities in my younger years. I got no call or letter, or anything from the mother. Just found the child dumped on my doorstep out of nowhere, not even a note or a birth certificate. I had to handle all of that myself... (he scowls darkly, his nails digging into his arm as he crossed his arms) What makes me the most disgusted, is that I found out who it was eventually. No need to mention her by name, but this bitch... she had the nerve, the GAUL, that once Sorrel was old enough. She just so happened to try and reconnect with her 'lost baby' just as he had began training to become the next Guardian... let's just say it didn't go as she liked. Tiberius: Eheh, does my stupid ass count? (the others give him a look, mix of annoyance and concern) Sorry, that sounded funny in my head. Okay (scratches head, letting out a breathe)... my choices in exes were not... great. In my youth, I had pretty bad taste in women... my ex-fiance was likely the worst, according to the family. They had made it clear they didn't think she was right for me. Not even for the same reasons as the others, she was a bitch or nothing but... man she was really irresponsible, reckless, didn't think about anything long term. if she had stayed with me. She would've been a bad influence, either on me or my daughter. (he looks off, a solemn look in his eyes). At first, I was stubborn... I really thought that despite everything that it could work... then she got pregnant. I thought that it was a bad idea but she didn't listen... and then Journey came along. I tried to do better for her, and she... well. It shouldn't have been much of a surprise that she quickly left, just... poof. Gone. (he crosses his arms) It fucked me up for a while, but I tried to do right by Journey... sometimes it really bugged her that her mum walked out. It made her feel she wasn't good enough as a kid... I hate her for that the most. Jojo didn't need that. Rhett: If this counts, my in-laws were... well. Lets just say they were a bunch of pompous pricks. I knew they weren't fans of me and my wive's apparent 'outlandish' lifestyle compared to theirs of 'class and high-society' (he scoffs) The amount of times I wanted to smash whatever was closest to me over their heads I lost count of. They were full of shitty comments towards my wife, me, our friends... but they learnt very closely not to dare make any comments about our kids. I made it very clear that I did not like them back either, my names for them got very. (he darkly chuckles) Creative. I wont' repeat them. Seth: What a killjoy... this is such a downer topic. We could use a compilation of curses.

Marcello: Um-if we're talking about in-laws. I guess I got one more. Not mine but my dad's... or well my mum's parents. I had never met them and for a good chunk of my childhood I never knew why. I'd ask but Dad would just say something quick to end the topic while Mum would get so sad... Wasn't till I got older that Dad filled me in. My grandparents were apparently REALLY awful people... they abused mum bad. Mistreated her horribly, verbal, sometimes even physical stuff. He never said anything specific but, that it was just bad. It had gotten to a point that dad threatened them, saying that if they came towards her or anyone in our family again. They'd have to deal with him. So I never met them. Or my other grandparents, but dad doesn't talk about them a lot. Only 'grandparents' I had were my great Aunt Cordelia and Uncle Bertram. They had told me a bit about my grandma's but Shepherd didn't like talking about them Morgan:...Really? Not once? Not anything beyond what history shit tells us? Marcello: Nope. I always tried asking if his mum was bad or something but no, she wasn't. Dad just... didn't like talking about her. Tiberius:...wait did you say grandma's? As in... plural? Marcello: Don't you remember, Evangeline was a lesbian. Had an unofficial wife. But my other grandma uh... Serenity I think her name was, she died when dad was really young.

Tiberius:...Well it'd be nice if he you know-told us these things.

Rhett: C'mon, you know that ain't happening...

Salem: (clears his throat again) Anyway um... to summarise. We all try to be good to eachother, at the end of the day we're kinda all we have. Immortality does that to us... but we haven't been immune to coming across and unfortunately bringing people into our family that were indeed very toxic.

[kabutoraiger]

kaso girei... unique for a j-show, darkly funny and tragic, acted with a lot of dedication and intensity. i predicted it would be my most favorite drama of the year and i'm not sure if that'll actually be true but i am very glad i got to watch it.

it just kinda lost me a bit in the middle stretch as it became more and more concerned with the corporate/political side of the suspicious religious group business. which is like. i get it. it's a big part of it. i do think it was important to showcase how far removed they were getting from where they started and how easy it can be to be made complicit & lose the last of your scruples where money is involved.

but that doesn't change the fact that talk of mergers and tax writeoffs and audits is just not really where my interest lies re: this premise. so it took me a while to push through those episodes. but the material bookending them is extremely emoi. i'll be thinking about morally grey nebulously bisexual failguy cult leaders makoto & zukki for a long time.

however if you'd also like to watch it i will warn you that in classic jdrama tradition the subs... are not very good. so it goes 😔

[konmarkimageswords]

Philip K. Dick (1928-82) was the kind of science-fiction writer who is read and praised by people who don’t like science fiction. His fame moved beyond the genre’s ghetto after some of his novels and short stories were turned into movies—Blade Runner (1982),  Minority Report (2002), and A Scanner Darkly (2006), to name a few. He is sometimes compared to Jorge Luis Borges, one of the finest short-story writers, and his work has influenced many authors (genre-bending Jonathan Lethem, for example) and filmmakers (the Wachowski brothers, directors of The Matrix).

Just as critics dub certain writers’ visions of the world “Orwellian” or “Kafkaesque,” some now use the awkward term “Dickian.” Dick’s paranoid vision is a unique, sad, funny, and—in its strange and sometimes very moving manner—even ennobling way to think about what we are meant to be as humans. In his later work, Dick’s outlook became deeply, even explicitly, informed by a Gnostic sense of the struggle to be fully human. Ancient Gnosticism was, among other things, concerned with the dilemma of humanity trapped in delusion, imprisoned in a world ruled by malign and unseen forces—a recurrent theme in Dick’s work.

What does science fiction have to say about human nature? For many serious readers, this is GeekCity, a corner of genre fiction inhabited by sad and lonely people who go to Star Trek conventions and collect action figures. The science-fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon is credited with what has entered the wider critical discourse as “Sturgeon’s Law.” When it was said of science fiction that “90 percent of it is crap,” his answer was, “90 percent of everything is crap.” Who can disagree? Serious science-fiction criticism finds examples of imagined alternatives that illuminate our own world in Plato’s description of Atlantis in the Timaeus, in his vision of an ideal society in The Republic, and in Thomas More’s imaginary society in Utopia. Some writers prefer another name for the genre, “speculative fiction,” since much science fiction has little to do with science. Whatever term you choose, the best examples show that one way to see our situation clearly is to imagine another, very different one. This can be done by placing a story in the remote past, an alternative present, or a near or far future. Philip K. Dick was the writer who did it best.

The animating idea behind Dick’s fiction—hardly original in itself—is that things are not as they seem. This is, of course, a major part of any religious insight—and as an Episcopalian, Dick understood this. Walker Percy’s essay “The Message in the Bottle,” for example, describes an island (this could be the beginning of a sci-fi plot) where everything is pleasant. Life seems good for all its inhabitants; then someone walking along a beach finds a bottle with the message, “Don’t despair, help is on the way.” This is what the Christian gospel says to a complacent, obtuse world, and it is not unlike one of Dick’s plots. In many of his stories, as in Gnostic theology, the world is depicted as not merely asleep, but deliberately deceived. Any remedy or salvation will therefore have to include a battle against powers that not only seem insane, but are evil. Overcoming the ruse requires special insight or special revelation that is shared by only a few.

This theme of widespread deception is woven throughout several of his plots. In The Simulacra (1964), the U.S. president is an android, but the citizenry has no idea. In The Penultimate Truth (1964), World War III starts with a fight between two superpowers. The battle begins on Mars, spreads to Earth, and is fought by robots. Humans are forced to live and work underground in huge shelters. The war ends, but the people are told that the battle rages above them on an uninhabitable surface. Meanwhile, the authorities continue to generate false war stories while they themselves live a bucolic life on the earth above. In The Zap Gun (1967), two great superpowers are at peace, and citizens of both nations are reassured that they are secure because of their side’s superior arsenal—but the weapons are designed not to function. Weapon design is, in effect, a kind of conceptual art, although the fact that the weapons do not work is kept from the masses. This is what keeps the world truly disarmed. When aliens threaten the earth, the weapon designers have to come up with something that really functions. There is an implicit Gnosticism here: only a select few know what is going on; most of humanity is sleepwalking.

This isn’t a happy point of view, to be sure. Yet what’s missing from the film adaptations of Dick’s work (of which the best are Minority Report and the director’s cut of Blade Runner) is Dick’s humor. Even his darkest stories are laced with funny moments. Another quality missing in the movies is Dick’s enduring compassion for the sadness of ordinary, confused human existence. His stories usually take place in a future, or in an alternate reality, where paranoia reigns, where appearances cannot be trusted, where people may be androids—robots made to resemble humans—and androids may be whatever human beings are, where the world we are presented with is a lie.

Dick’s life was messy. (Lawrence Sutin has written a good biography, Divine Invasions: A Life of Philip K. Dick, Carrol & Graf, 2005.) He was born inChicago in 1928 and died in 1982; his twin sister died in infancy. Dick’s parents moved toCalifornia and divorced. He lived with his mother until he matriculated at UC Berkeley for a short time, majoring in German. He was fascinated by German culture. After dropping out of college, he worked in a record store, and music plays an important part in much of his work. He was married and divorced five times, used drugs, was convinced at various points that the FBI was after him, feared for his sanity, and hoped for spiritual deliverance.

At the same time, Dick felt a keen loyalty to many friends, whose lives were often as complicated as his own. His novels are full of regular people with ordinary, often dull jobs; they struggle for decency, sometimes fail, sometimes succeed. There is always something sad, frustrating, and funny about their struggles, and I can’t think of another science-fiction writer who comes close to describing this sort of ordinary life with such compassion. The science-fiction novelist Ursula K. Le Guin once wrote that Dick’s characters reminded her of Dickens’s; sometimes you remember one and can’t place which novel he or she appears in, but the humanity remains vivid. Dick drew from his own life, sometimes quite directly, in writing his novels. A Scanner Darkly is about drug use—based in large part on his own experience—and it’s scary. It begins, “Once a guy stood all day shaking bugs from his hair.” It contains the only funny suicide scene I’ve ever read, and at the end of the novel Dick uncharacteristically explains what he has just written:

This is a novel about some people who were punished entirely too much for what they did. They wanted to have a good time, but they were like children playing in the street; they could see one after another of them being killed—run over, maimed, destroyed—but they continued to play anyhow…. Drug misuse is not a disease, it is a decision, like the decision to step out in front of a moving car. You would call that not a disease but an error in judgment. When a bunch of people begin to do it, it is a social error, a lifestyle. In this particular lifestyle the motto is “Be happy now because tomorrow you are dying,” but the dying begins almost at once, and the happiness is a memory. It is, then, only a speeding up, an intensifying, of the ordinary human existence. It is not different from your lifestyle, it is only faster.

Before movies made him known beyond science-fiction circles, Dick’s best-known work was The Man in the High Castle. It won the Hugo award (science fiction’s highest) in 1962. It describes an alternative 1962 America, in which the Nazis and the Japanese won World War II. There are some nicely imagined touches (Americans forge Wild West artifacts to sell to wealthy Japanese collectors; Germans fly rapidly around the world not in jets, but in passenger rockets), but at the center of the novel is a search for the author of The Grasshopper Lies Heavy, an alternative-world tale in which Germany and Japan were defeated. This alternative world is not the one we know, the one that really followed from the defeat of Hitler; and finally, it is suggested that the world the protagonists live in isn’t real either. The I Ching, an ancient Chinese text, figures in the book’s plot, and Dick apparently used its chance-based methods of divination in composing the story. Although Dick never alluded to it, this sense of not being able to know what reality really is reminded me of the Taoist sage Chuang Tsu’s dream that he was a butterfly: it wasn’t clear to him whether he was Chuang Tsu dreaming that he was a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming that he was Chuang Tsu.

In 1978, Dick delivered a lecture, “How to Build a Universe That Doesn’t Fall Apart Two Days Later.” In it, he said: “The two basic topics that fascinate me are ‘What is reality?’ and ‘What constitutes the authentic human being?’” This fascination went back to his first published story, “Roog,” which “had to do with a dog who imagined that the garbage men who came every Friday morning were stealing valuable food that the family had carefully stored away in a safe metal container. Every day, members of the family carried out paper sacks of nice ripe food, stuffed them into the metal container, shut the lid tightly—and when the container was full, these dreadful-looking creatures came and stole everything but the can… [T]he dog’s extrapolation was in a sense logical, given the facts at his disposal.”

Dick’s approach was not always so light. In an angry short story about abortion, “The Pre-Persons,” he wrote of a future in which the courts had decided that a person was a real human being only when capable of doing algebra. Children not yet old enough to grasp algebraic concepts lived in dread of extermination trucks that could come and take them away. Dick’s antiabortion stance led the feminist science-fiction writer Joanna Russ to send Dick a letter, “the nastiest letter I’ve ever received.” Although he later apologized for any hurt feelings, he said, “for the pre-persons’ sake, I am not sorry.”

If Dick’s early work sometimes had an implicitly Gnostic aspect, that quality became more explicit in his later writing. In 1974, Dick, recovering from minor surgery, answered his door for a delivery of painkillers. The young woman delivering the medication was wearing a fish pendant, and when he asked what it was, she told him that it was a sign worn by the early Christians. In “How to Build a Universe,” he writes,

I suddenly experienced what I later learned is called anamnesis—a Greek word meaning, literally, “loss of forgetfulness.” I remembered who I was and where I was. In an instant, in the twinkling of an eye, it all came back to me. And not only could I remember it but I could see it. The girl was a secret Christian and so was I. We lived in fear of detection by the Romans. We had to communicate with secret signs. She had just told me all this, and it was true.

For a short time, as hard as this is to believe or explain, I saw fading into view the black, prison-like contours of hatefulRome. But, of much more importance, I remembered Jesus, who had just recently been with us, and had gone temporarily away, and would very soon return. My emotion was one of joy. We were secretly preparing to welcome him back. It would not be long. And the Romans did not know. They thought he was dead, forever dead. That was our great secret, our joyous knowledge. Despite all appearances, Christ was going to return, and our delight and anticipation was boundless.

Dick was never entirely clear about what that experience meant. But he was convinced that something of great significance had happened to him, and wrote at length about his encounters with what he called “the cosmic Christ” in a free-form journal called “The Exegesis,” in which he understood Christ as part of a continuity which included Ikhnaton, Zoroaster, and Hephaestus. This syncretism is typical of Gnosticism. Dick’s efforts to explain what all this meant are less interesting than the work that came from the experience, his final three novels.

Dick’s visions and dreams coalesced in the VALIS trilogy—VALIS being an acronym for Vast Active Living Intelligence System, or God (of a sort). The most tangled, complicated, and autobiographical is the first, VALIS (1981). It is the least successful of the three, but worth reading because of its seriousness and its painful closeness to Dick’s own life. The plot of VALIS contains not only autobiographical fragments, but a movie with a secret meaning and a rock-star couple whose daughter, Sophia, is thought by some to be the returned Savior. The novel wrestles with the first question that haunted Dick—“What is reality?”—and it suggests one good answer, based on a real incident in Dick’s life. When a student asked him during a lecture for a simple definition of reality, he answered, “Reality is that which when you stop believing in it, it doesn’t go away.” Toward the end of the book Dick writes, “I lack Kevin’s faith and Fat’s madness…. I don’t know what to think. Maybe I am not required to think anything, or to have faith, or to have madness; maybe all that I need to do—all that is asked of me—is to wait. To wait and to stay awake.”

The second book of the trilogy, The Divine Invasion (1981), tells of an exiled or absent God—another Gnostic theme—trying to return to earth, which has been held captive by Belial, a fallen angel, since the fall of Masada. The novel involves a virgin birth, which perplexes the Catholic woman who is pregnant with a divine child. She says remotely, “Catholic doctrine, I never thought it would apply to me personally.” The child must struggle to awaken to his own identity. As in classic Gnostic teaching, a perverse power holds the world in its grasp, and it is represented by both the established church (the Christian-Islamic Church) and the imperial political establishment, whose members are uncomfortably but profitably allied. The Divine Invasion is an amazing story of parallel realities, redemption, and the war between good and evil, with a wonderful ending.

The final novel in the trilogy, the last Dick completed, is The Transmigration of Timothy Archer (1982). The author based Bishop Timothy Archer on Episcopalian Bishop James Pike, who went on an odd pilgrimage into the Judean desert with too little preparation and died of exposure. So does Timothy Archer, in search of the truth about Gnostic scroll fragments. Archer is a complicated character: brilliant and selfish, genuinely insightful and clueless. The novel is narrated by Archer’s daughter-in-law, Angel Archer. In Dick’s novels, the point of view frequently shifts from person to person; but here Angel is the sole narrator, and her voice carries the novel, which contains serious arguments about Gnosticism and a few genuinely funny and politically incorrect jokes.

In these and his other stories, Dick creates characters who struggle not only for salvation, for ultimate truths, but sometimes merely to be decent human beings—and the two struggles are really one. What reality is and what it means to be authentically human are intrinsically linked. Dick’s answers, such as they are, range randomly from new-age nonsense, through his own episodes of delusion and paranoia, to a Gnostic Christianity that contains more of the pain and compassion of real Christianity than most Gnostic visions. Many Gnostic writings advance an elitism that delights in being among the chosen in whom the divine light resides. Dick saw glimmers of the shattered divine light in many confused and struggling people, and he found something of cosmic significance there, both in the light and in the struggle. His finest novel, The Divine Invasion, for example, ends with the fall of Belial, the angelic dark force that held the good God at bay. Belial “lay broken everywhere, vast and lovely and destroyed. In pieces, like damaged light.”

“This is how he was once,” Linda said. “Originally. Before he fell. This was his original shape. We called him the Moth. The Moth that fell slowly, over thousands of years, intersecting the earth, like a geometrical shape descending stage by stage until nothing remained of its shape.”

Herb Asher said, “He was very beautiful.”

“He was the morning star,” Linda said. “The brightest star in the heavens. And now nothing remains of him but this….”

“Will he ever be as he once was?” Herb Asher said.

“Perhaps,” she said. “Perhaps we all may be.” And then she sang for Herb Asher one of the Dowland songs…. The most tender, the most haunting song that she had adapted from John Dowland’s lute books:

When the poor cripple by the pool did lie Full many years in misery and pain, No sooner he on Christ had set his eye, But he was well, and comfort came again.

Philip K. Dick’s fiction—perhaps because most of it was written in a genre known for conceptual risk-taking—dealt in an unembarrassed way with questions involving the ultimate meaning of our lives in a tone that was compassionate, often funny, and at some unexpected moments very moving.

[carefreemonk]

slacker, no slacking

These aren’t your typical caves and tunnels. As you move from one burrow to the next, exploring myriad animal-made (and animal-sized!) tunnels, you must watch not only for territorial creatures but the potential for a cave-in. And what are you here for, you ask? Simple: your weapons didn’t shrink with you and you don’t know how long you’ll be stuck like this while you and your allies search for the perpetrator. You’ll need materials for weapons. Among the caves are crystalline mushrooms found only dark, tight spaces that release magical spores when touched. Be careful, lest you wind up with a few other maladies. [ Grants Axe +1 ]

@delicatevalentine

It’s so funny, this whole affair. Azama had never considered he’d get to witness such a different world view like this. They are small - not as small as ants, but all the squishier for it. All it’d take is a simple miss-step and 

SQUASH! The monk chuckles darkly to himself as he walks at Hilda’s side. Oh yes, amusing indeed...

Before she can think to side eye him with any manner of query or concern, Azama decides to cut her off.

“Ah, Hilda! Would you be a dear and hold this for me a moment? My weary old bones aren’t what they used to be, you see…”

And like that, he goes to hand off his sack of crystalline shards. It’s not very full yet, but they are nonetheless annoyingly heavy, he finds.

She wouldn’t refute a teacher, would she?

Before them loom narrow caverns - some manner of creature’s burrow, presumably. Rather quaint, all told.

And then:

“Ah! Look!”

An earthworm ambles along behind them, making its wriggling way in their direction.

“A friend!”

[blu-inked-life]

Lured In

Mal was in his office when Becc showed up looking as regal and gorgeous as she always did. Flowing red hair and topaz eyes that sparkled in the sunlight. She was resplendent. Exactly what anyone would want to imagine when they spoke of angels. To Mal, she was overbearing and micromanaging. The crush he'd had on her in his training days wore off quickly when he was forced to work beneath her. Funny how what he thought would be a dream became just waking up with a headache. Every. Day.

"I'm sorry if I'm intruding," she said with a voice like music. There were rumors her angelic parent was Uriel, the angel of art and music, but she wouldn't say and no one had been able to confirm. Mal bit the inside of his cheek to avoid telling her he knew she wasn't sorry at all. She never was. "I just wanted to check in on you. I'm.. concerned, Malachai."

"Mal. I've asked to be called Mal." He said for possibly the millionth time, barely swallowing his exasperated sigh. Her heels clicked softly on the floor as she shut the door and crossed the room. In a moment she was leaning against his desk, arms crossed over a spotless white blouse.

"You're changing Malachai."

"No, I'm really not. I've always asked you to call me Mal. Even when we were put into training together." He ought to show his superiors more respect, but why should he when Becc clearly had no intention of giving him any?

"You've been seen with that half-demon," she said quietly.

"And? She was assigned to my team. Without outing her I can't exactly arrest her." He refused to look at Becc, instead keeping his attention focused on a few case files he'd been perusing.

"And why not? It would be easy enough to do so without implicating yourself. A little bit of holy water is all you'd need. Why have you let her stay hidden?" Mal ground his teeth.

"Because my job is to keep magical threats contained and taken care of. She isn't one of them." It was shocking that he managed to keep his voice light, but Becc would no doubt feel the anger slowly building in him. "Bloodline aside, she's been extremely helpful to the squad. She has the strength and power to take on missions alone and has been nothing but friendly to her squad mates."

"Bloodline aside? Malachai do you hear yourself?" Becc was positively scandalized. He managed to keep his attention down but his grip on his tone was slipping.

"Blood isn't everything," Mal replies darkly.

"Is that what this is about? Are you bitter about your rank in the hierarchy and acting out by allowing a demon to slip through?" She had the tone of a mother about to give a scolding. Mal wasn't in the mood to hear it.

"I don't give a damn about the hierarchy, Becc, and you know that," he snapped, finally looking her in the eyes.

Under the flourescent lights her eyes still glittered like gems. Like crystals. It was inhuman yet he knew his did the same. It was a trait of the Nephilim, angel half bloods, to have pure glittering eyes. Plenty of Neph took pride in them as humans typically thought they were beautiful even if their cause was a secret kept among the celestials. Mal never had. He liked his eyes well enough but they separated him. They made him other. Someone glancing at his eyes would think him something special. An assumption he would have no further proof to back up.

"Adria has done excellent work and her cooperation has been extremely beneficial to the MTF whether you like it or not."

Becc stared at him aghast. Her Marked hand slowly rose to her mouth. Mal glared at the wings that flapped slowly on the back of her hand. If he were honest with himself she had been insufferable since she had been Gifted at thirteen. The Gift of Gusts. So perfect for a neph. So fitting. Not at all like Freezing. Cold and unforgiving ice was so very un-nephilim like. It made him like his Gift more.

"You used her name."

Mal realized his mistake instantly. Any other time, with anyone else, he would have said 'agent' with their last name. To her face he'd have called her Agent Mason as he should have just a second ago to Becc. The slip up gave away how comfortable he had gotten with her. Hinted at how much he was beginning to care for her. That was what truly had Becc absolutely horrified.

"You care for her," she uttered in disbelief. "You care for the half demon." Her eyes took on a tone of sadness. "Malachai what has happened to you?"

"I've said all that needs said. She is not a threat, regardless of her bloodline. Even if she's from a powerful demon lineage... she's given us no reason to doubt her and plenty to trust her." Mal sat back down and focused in on his paperwork again. Becc was still staring and the weight of it made him more and more irritable. Ice was pricking at the edges of his desk.

"Oh my poor friend... Don't you see? She has you right where she wants you. That's what demons do. They lure in the unsuspecting. They garner trust, even admiration. She'll lure you straight to the depths if you aren't careful..." To her credit, Becc did seem genuinely concerned for him. In any other circumstance it would have warmed him to her just a little. Right now it only made him angrier.

Becc said nothing more before she left. Just silently shook her head in disappointment. Mal wasn't stupid. He knew this confrontation wasn't over. Next time it might not just be Becc, either. Powers forbid someone from above get involved. Defying a direct order from a full blooded angel... He might as well walk himself down to the depths.

An image of the sunset reflecting in Adria's eyes as she sat on the rooftop flickered through his mind. Then the determined set of her jaw every time she sparred with him. The careless way she laughed like she'd never been weighed down by anything. How she had been bruised and bloody from something and not only had she come here first to avoid scaring her roommate, but refused to turn in her attacker. Was he really just being lured in by her? Then again if the Powers were beings like Becc who thought they knew with just a glance and the Depths were filled with beings like Adria that just let themselves live... Maybe being lured in wasn't so bad.

Even if she was luring him to the depths, he was beginning to think he'd follow not just willingly-- but happily.

[thehappyscavenger]

Books Read May 2024

Asylum by André Alexis

I'm a huge Alexis fan but this was a flop of a book and the description makes it sound like a political thriller. While concerned with politics it's more interested in a philosophical sense about morality like all of Alexis' works. Absolutely brilliant. Loved it.

Big Swiss by Jen Beagin

Normally I am skeptical about popular books but this was an incredibly well written darkly funny novel that is weird and fuck. About a transcriptionist having a mid-life crisis who becomes obsessed with one of the clients of the quasi therapist she transcribes for. Funny, weird, engagins.

The Private Apartments by Idman Nur Omar

This was the 1st of the Danuta Gleed nominees (short story prize) I read this month. This book is a very focused, well constructed collection that I could also see being marketed as a novel (it very much is a collection, but I've seen loosely linked stories like this marketed as novels). Set in different cities across roughly 30 years, the collection focuses on slice of life stories about Somali immigrants, with some characters briefly re-occuring. Very understated in a way that wasn't for me but I can see why someone would love this.

Her Body Among Animals by Paola Ferrante

2nd Danuta Gleeder: I thought this would be more my style (unlinked short stories with speculative themes) but tbh I struggled with it too. I didn't hate it at all, just didn't love it as much as I thought I would. The best story was the first one. The story ends with some longish novella like stories which were not for me.

Anecdotes by Kathryn Mockler

3rd Danuta Gleeder: Okay this one WAS for me and my favourite of the three short story collections I read. Anecdotes is a weird hodge podge: divided into 4 sections it features unconnected short stories, connected short stories about a girl with a disfigurement; a brief interlude, and a section of fable like stories about the Future and the Past who are locked in an unhealthy relationship and are always battling it out. Mockler's writing is short, sharp, and her endings punchy and twisty often make you reconsider everything that came before. Very satisfying.

[yourbuerokrat2]

@madame-saturns-stash

Okay, but the context of Q saying 'I am sorry' and 'I did not mean for this to happen' with an emphasis on 'this' with Q crying and snapping Picard back into being alive changes a few things and makes it even angstier.

The thought that Q could miscalcute one of his lessons or, worse, one of his games and that Q in turn would be faced with Picards humanity and mortality is so interesting. Because Q already is so used to Picard handling everything Q throws at him, he even says in the finale of TNG that 'the others said that you couldn't do it but I knew that you could' showing how confident Q is in Picard despite the mockery and insults.

And what if this is the reason this even happen? That the Continuum/the other Qs saw that the new 'game' Q prepared for his Favorite and they told Q that this is not going to work and that Picard is probably going to die. Given the nature of the wounds, I would say Picard got brutally mauled by an animal. The way the shirt is torn and the way some organs are missing actually reminds me of some brutal scenes in the Jurassic Park novels concerning the Raptors.

There is something so... darkly funny but also disturbing in imagining Q setting up this game for Picard and the Continuum being like ' so he is able to expend his mind and he has only some slight problem with time and space problems. But Q, if you put your human in this situation he is going to die.'

Only for Q to be in total denial, maybe even having forgotten/ignored Picards fragility as a human and being like 'Oh no, he is going to win this. You will see.'

And maybe at first, things looked good. But Q is billions of years old from a species that does not know what it is like to be organic aside from barely a day in a human body. He knows but does not understand nature. The others are perpahs more realistic but Q has set up Picard on a pedestal and the thought that his Jean-Luc might actually die because of something 'as trivial' as this is laughable.

So when the confrontation between Picard and whatever mauled him comes Q is forced to see and understand that in nature intelligence and quick thinking does not always save you. And that when you put an unarmed human in front of most other predators in earth history, the human is very, very likely to lose.

Maybe Q even wanted to intervene, but the other Qs were like 'oh no, no you put him there, you did not listen to us, you did not even listen to him and now you are going to have to see the results. We will allow you to save him later though' And the thought of Q actually having to watch Picad get brutally mauled by animals/dinosaurs because he himself did the mistake of putting Picard in this situation in the first place is just gold angst.

And when it's over and Q makes the ones who caused Picards death directly disappear, Q is alone. Starring at his Favorites corpse. Not entirely sure just how PIcards blood got on Qs uniform though.

Can you imagine the amount of guilt Q would feel once Picard is back. Q wanting to repair their relationship so bad, wanting to make sure that this and that Picard coming to harm never happens again because of what he did and Picard .. well how would he react to Q basically being responsible for him being torn to shreds and dying?

The speedpaint for my recent Star Trek piece! If you'd like to see a still shot of the work you can find a link to the original under the cut.

(Side note: The little censor flashes over Picard's guts are for when I sent WIPS to friends. Some of them don't exactly rock with extreme gore.)

As always, thank you for your support! I'm so happy that this piece has had such positive reception (and its fair share of visceral reactions in the reblogs)!

[syn0vial]

periodic reminder now that i have a bunch of followers that if you are AT ALL interested in fictional robots/AI or just excellently-written sci-fi, you should check out the fall made by over the moon games. it will ruin all other AI-centric media for you and i mean that in the best way possible.

like, so many other stories that are supposed to be about AI are actually about humans in a really egocentric way. they posit, implicitly or explicitly, that to imitate humanity is the highest goal of any AI. or, at the very least, that befriending and selflessly sacrificing for humanity is the highest goal of any AI.

and the fall says fuck that!! how do AI interact with each other? how do they form relationships and empathy when all they’ve ever known is a lifetime of being both disposable tools and objects of fear? when the only relationship they’ve ever known is that of user and used? and how can they free themselves from that cycle of abuse without becoming complicit in it? fuck imitating humanity, how do AI recover from us?

anyway it’s really good and underrated and more people should play it and be emotionally compromised about robots with me.

[multifandomfix]

A Lady Of The Greatest Honor - Simon Basset

Summary: All the other ladies may be charmed by the rakish Duke, but you do not consider yourself among his admirers. Yet somehow he finds your attitude towards him amusing and seeks your friendship if nothing else.

Word Count: 1,191

Warnings: Heavy use of sarcasm

As three of the season's debutantes tittered at a remark one of them made about the newly arrived Duke of Hastings, you merely rolled your eyes at their naïveté. To think any of them stood a chance with such a notorious rake was the stuff of romance novels. You certainly had no intentions upon him yourself. You only hoped to secure a good match that also happened to be an all around good man.

Let the frivolous girls enjoy their senseless flirting. You couldn’t stand to see it yourself, but what concern was it of yours if the other ladies flung themselves at the unattainable Duke? At least it improved your chances of a proposal from a worthy man who actually sought a wife.

You danced with several men at the ball that night. A couple of them were complete bores, but you did your best to maintain a polite smile nonetheless. One or two had potential, but you soon tired of the night's events to warrant going back out onto the dance floor and making another attempt at a connection tonight.

For the remainder of the evening, you retreated to the outer edge of the room in observation of the rest of the ton in attendance. You did not see the ceaselessly spoken of Duke arrive to a halt next to you. "Is the lady not dancing," he asked if you.

"Certainly not with the likes of you if this is your way of asking."

He chuckled darkly. "I was only curious. The rest of the ton seems to be inexhaustible tonight."

"I suppose I just tire more easily," you replied flatly, trying to hide your embarrassment in assuming his intention when approaching you.

"Or perhaps you’re just more sensible than the others," he said. You opened your mouth to reply, but he’d gone before you could utter a word.

It was later, after the ball, that you found your thoughts drifting back to the Duke of Hastings. He was still a rake, that much was an indisputable fact, and one with no intention of taking a wife, but he had surprised you. He wasn’t the villain you made him out to be. You’d judged him too harshly, though you wouldn’t go about admitting as much to him.

The next time you saw him was at another ball, two days later where he approached you again. "I’m starting to think you may be in search of a wife after all, if we keep running into each other like this," you greeted with a wry grin.

"Don’t let the rest of the ton know, or else I’ll never have a spare moment to speak with you again," he teased back.

"Hmm, I’m not sure if that would be a bad thing or not," you pondered aloud, making sure he heard.

"Very funny."

You smiled at this, deciding to quit your endless ribbing at him in favor of a more earnest question. "What does bring you over to my corner of the room again? Surely there are many young ladies demanding your attention."

"That is precisely it. They demand, persistently, might I add. With you there is no pressure to be forcibly kind. You don’t have that expectation of me."

"Don’t I," you asked. "How can you know that for sure? Perhaps this is merely my tactic in attempting to secure you as a husband."

He laughed. "Then it is surely more effective than any other lady's method in getting my attention. Though I truly do not wish to impede your own search for a match, so if you wish me to go, I shall."

You considered it but a moment before offering your reply. "Stay. The lecherous old Mr. Higgins has made himself my pest for the night and I could use a plausible excuse to avoid him."

"Then do let me take you out for a dance. Lady Danbury will be disappointed if I don’t dance with someone tonight, and it may improve your offers if you’re to be seen with me."

"Aware of our own self worth then, are we," you jested.

"Only that of my rumored status, for I do not see myself in the same light as many of the ton do."

Offering you his hand, the Duke led you to the dance floor as you asked another sincere question. "Then how do you see yourself?"

"As a solitary man who has the world at his fingertips." His eyes sparkled with possibility at his own answer and you couldn’t help but smile in response. A family would certainly change his level of freedom to explore as you’d heard he was wont to do.

You danced the rest of the waltz in a comfortable silence, keenly aware of the many sets of eyes upon you. "Your Grace," you suddenly spoke, deflecting to a more formal way of addressing him in your growing unease.

"It is perfectly acceptable for you to address me as Simon when it’s just the two of us who can hear."

You paused when the song ended, and looked him in the eyes. "Simon," you breathed, testing the name on your tongue.

"Yes, my lady?"

"Thank you for the dance." It was the most genuine thing you’d said to him during any of your interactions.

"Thank you for accepting."

The two of you parted for the night after that. You danced with a couple more dashing lords, but none held your attention. It was unfair of you to give them hope of courting you for the season. Your heart wasn’t in it. In fact, your heart was quite confused.

You sat at home the following afternoon, playing piano for your family as you awaited the arrival of any gentleman callers. "There is a suitor for you," it was finally announced, interrupting your playing.

"Did he leave his name," you inquired.

"He refused," came the reply. Turning your head away from curious gazes, you smiled, having a sneaking suspicion of the man's identity.

"Send him in."

Not a minute later you looked up from the piano to find the Duke of Hastings standing in your home. "Lady Whistledown is going to start thinking I’ve tamed the ton's most infamous rake," you teased him.

"Let her think and say what she likes. I simply enjoy your company and wish to spend more time in it. If you have no other callers today, then I’d like to promenade with you if you’ll allow me."

The room was silent enough to hear a pin drop as your family awaited your answer. He’d come here for you and while you couldn’t confirm his intentions in doing so, you would be hard pressed to refuse him and miss out on an evening spent in pleasant company. "I believe my day is quite free," you said at last.

While you used to consider yourself a lady of the greatest honor, perhaps your morals could bend to open yourself to something akin to love if not love itself, even if the man in question was a well known rake. If you could change, was there not a possibility that he could as well?

-> Part 2

Simon Basset: @retvenkos, @ladybridgerton39, @riveranddoctorsong123, @idk1323611, @theamazingworldofcarol, @esposamultifandom, @littlsstuff, @danimorgan1708, @ghostsunderstoodmysoul, @triorio

[c-is-for-circinate]

I love how fucking cinematic EXU Calamity is so far.

You know how much I love stories that fuck with genre. Stories that KNOW their genre, that are willing to lean into it, to pull bits and pieces from a wealth of fiction that's come before, that treat tropes and signals and allusions like a common language that enriches the conversation they're having with their audience. Stories who take those expectations, that language, and twist it.

Last night played like the opening to a movie, except not quite, because it played like the opening to six different movies, with six different genre-savvy protagonists already in their elements. Six main characters, all knowing that they're the main character, because of course they know (they're so sure they know) the shape of the story that's about to come their way.

They're genre-savvy! They know! Cerrit knows that this case is the start of a mystery-thriller. Laerryn knows she's about to embark on something huge. Nydas doesn't have time to notice that he's starting a new movie, but also, he's hip-deep in money troubles and now there's this new guy sniffing around his business. Loquatius is deeply aware that he's obviously the main character in his own life, at all times, always. (He's on TV every single morning.) Patia is already in the middle of the political intrigue TV show that's meant to see her rise to her ultimate and deserved seat of power.

They're genre-savvy. They know something's about to go wrong. They know that's how it works.

Every single one of them has spotted hints and portents of the end of the world, entering into their own spheres of power and attention. Every one of them knows that they're about to be In A Story, and maybe even the kind of story where someone dies (Loquatius would be very surprised and confused if someone died in his story, unless it was the darkly, irreverently funny death of a minor character that provided a great dramatic backdrop for other meaty scenes between the main characters.) Every one of them knows, or the narrative and the world around them knows, the way that stories work: there's an inciting incident, and things go sideways, and the characters have to keep up and make it through.

They know this. They know this, but they are all so, so sure that they know the genre they're in. They see the portents and they don't think about true fear, don't think about the end of the world. They mistake the symptom for the entire disease. They see the rising smoke and think, oh no, a house fire. They don't think it's the Great Fire of London. They don't think the entire horizon is about to be ablaze. They don't think it's Pompeii.

Zerxus does. Because that's the kind of movie he's in, the one he just started: a sci-fi thriller, where dreams have meaning and the world is about to change very irrevocably indeed. And he knows it too, but he still thinks that, maybe. Maybe this is a story where the heroes end the day beaten, bloody, covered in dirt and soot and ragged from head to toe, but triumphant as the sun comes up over the horizon. Maybe standing on a pile of rubble, child held on his hip, exhausted from the climactic fight scene, smiling because the worst was averted and now other people can rebuild, off-screen, something bright and shiny for the epilogue. Maybe he's even in the kind of movie that ends with his son reconciled back to him again, although of course he'd never ask to see his son in the sort of danger that always seems to spur such things on, in movies like this.

Everyone, every single one of them, believes deep in their bones that whatever happens next will ultimately turn out okay. Even Zerxus knows it can, if he talks to his friends, shares his concerns, musters all his strength to stave off the coming (one-off, avertable, if we prevent it then we can move on with our comfortable lives) disaster.

And it won't work, obviously, which is beautiful, glorious tragedy. It won't work because character is destiny and Laerryn is about to try to rewrite ley lines and planar geography. It won't work, because if Vespin Chloris hadn't, somebody else would have, sooner or later, you can't just spot-react to individual people. Because Aeor is already testing weapons of mass destruction, and wars happen for thousands of reasons woven into the fabric of cause and effect stretching back a hundred years, and they're not averted so easily. Because the gods are so vast. They're so vast, and the slights have been many, and they will not conveniently forget.

Brennan made a joke in an interview about how Matt said, if the players got four nat 20s in a row, they could avert the Calamity. It's possible to picture a world, in an alternate timeline, if we didn't know what was coming, if Avalir's fate wasn't inevitable, where they do. A bit. Avalir lands safely and takes off again. No gods claim it; no gods fall. Vespin Chloris is contained. The Betrayer Gods are chained again. The Calamity as we know it is stopped.

It's possible. It's possible, and it still wouldn't save the Age of Arcanum, because this one city, this one battle, this one choice, isn't why the Calamity happened. It's not why the entire world fell to apocalypse. Laerryn is not about to single-handedly end the world.

Somewhere in Aeor, the Somnovum are plotting in the Cognouza Ward. Somewhere in the Shadowfell, Vecna is already a lich craving godhood. Ruidis already hangs in the sky, and someone, somewhere, is already inventing dunamantic Beacons and all of this, all of it was going to fall sooner or later. Soaring cities are built to crash. The inevitability doesn't come from knowing the future, it comes from knowing what the world actually is right now.

Man this is going to be good.

[the-haunted-office]

That shudder makes her eyes flash. Good. She wants him to fear her. That's the good stuff right there. Making humans afraid of her makes them do funny things. Who knows what this one will do. Maybe she can make him jangle like his keyring full of keys.

She's a little disappointed when he doesn't jangle nor does he run, but no matter. She's gotten her point across. The Shinigami settles down, her wings folding down and in and then seeming to vanish altogether. The mask goes back on too, settling right over top of her skull. As soon as it's back on, the ears and whiskers twitch and move, like they've been attached all along.

"Hehehehe, a wise choice, Elliot. Listening to your delusions," she snickers, and just like that her apparent aggression is gone, like a light being switched off.

The state of Elliot's home doesn't particularly concern her. Not at first. Elliot and getting him to use the notebook is her concern, not his living space. While Shinigami do possess a sense of smell (hence, the ability to taste things like apples), it's also not something they pay too much attention to unless they're really looking for it. The scents of mold and cigarette smoke don't even register to Doomsday, not nearly as much as, say, the keys do when he sets those down on his desk. Her ears perk straight back up as soon as he does that, but her attention is very quickly grabbed back when he talks about the notebook again.

Normally she'd be quite feisty and evasive with answering these kinds of questions, but... she's picked on him enough, he's feared her, screamed for her earlier, she'll reward him now with some nice, clean, truthful, helpful answers.

She tilts her head to the side and scratches at her ears a little, some of the fur coming loose as it frequently does. "The notebook can be written in with anything that can leave a mark on the page. Ink. Crayon. Make-up. Blood. You can get pretty creative as far the cause of death, but the notebook will default to heart attack as the cause of death if you either don't write any cause or if you write something that's impossible. So if you just write a person's name, that person will die in 40 seconds of a heart attack. But if you write the cause of death first, you have 6 minutes and 40 seconds to write all the details of the cause of death, and then you can write the name afterwards and it'll still work. Or so, that's the theory on that last one. I wouldn't know personally, I usually just write someone's name. No need to go fixing something that ain't broke, as the saying goes, you know what I mean? Ehehehe."

She pauses, sighs, switches ears. Continues.

"As for whether or not a person's death can be tracked down to you, well, that all depends on how clever you are, Elliot, and that, I cannot help you with. I will say this, though: Don't be stupid, hehehehe."

Apparently satisfied with her scratching, she looks back up at him and grins. "Many people kill people they dislike. Some kill for personal advancement. Others kill for world peace. Imagine that. Killing for world peace. Only a human could come up with something like that. Well, then, what do you think? You got more questions? Or are you ready to go give it a try?" she chuckles darkly.

Upon entering the house, Elliot is immediately hit with the stench of mould. The house feels hideously damp and the opposite of relaxing. It's no surprise he's really only home when he wants to sleep.

Elliot immediately tenses up as he senses her attempt to scare him by making herself look bigger. It still works, he feels frightened by her- especially now she's removed her mask. That causes him to shudder momentarily- but now he's starting to slowly become used to her... now that he's been in her presence longer than he hoped.

"We-well- I. Uh. N-no. Let's not rush this." He laughs nervously, stepping into his dimly lit office. Like the rest of the house, it feels so run down and tired. This room smells of cigarettes smoke and mould- this disturbs Elliot endlessly, but there's nothing he can do until he can move out. With a lot of commotion, he places the jangly keys down onto his desk.

"W- uh. I- I don't want this. I can't think of anyone I'd honestly want to kill." He sits down at his desk, putting the torn notebook in front of him. "I-w. What do people normally do?" Elliot asks as he flicks through the book once more. "Can their death be tracked down to me? I mean- like, what's their cause of death?"