#early 2000s internet fits them

[steelh4ze]

i feel like i should actual post here instead of endlessly reblogging, so here's a fic i've been working on about pre-scrambled brains durge and his first meeting with gortash

The northern districts of the city was the beating, pulsing heart of it all, and more than once had he wished to steal a few patriars from its upper echelons. They were only a little part of the upper crust that made Baldur’s Gate what it was, but a vital part nonetheless, enough so that striking one meant striking at the city. Lay waste to the repulsive, irksome officials that paraded themselves around the High hall, and it would mean to bleed the council dry. Offering the foetid remains of the soul he had taken to his Father above was one of the best ways, Archimedes had thought, to show filial piety to him. A gift from his most beloved son.

It was not only worship that made him dream so, however.

Perhaps it was due to his ill-begotten, half-remembered scraps of childhood or from some other banal reason, but life had made a hatred of those higher class out of him. He had grown up in the slums, scrambling for what little food he could have after the gift of his heritage manifested and the family fostering him was killed. Waste-not, and he had eaten the bodies of his victims until he grew from a rabid child into what the blessed son of Bhaal needed to be. Want-not, so he had become his Father’s mortal hand, Archimedes’ own wishes becoming whatever Bhaal desired.

The cult of Bhaal, and by extension, his temple, had been left sleeping in the ruins that lay beneath the city, his kind left as a mere story to scare children out of disobedience because of Saverok’s failure. It had taken him years to reawaken the shadow of the beast Bhaal’s followers were meant to be, and Archimedes knew intimately that many patriars had thought of the increased disappearances and murders as a normal rise and fall of crime that came with the passing of one of the city’s most influential aristocrats. It was tempting to give in, to squirrel away another one of their group, and make a show out of it— display their squirming, eyeless, feeble body in the middle of the city and let the world know Bhaal had resurfaced once more.

It would be an unwise decision, with how little Bhaalists there were right now, but satisfying. So deeply satisfying. He was young, not stupid. He would live long and conquer, and perish when he was the last soul on Toril.

They would know soon enough as it was. More and more were being drawn into the temple by the allure of becoming one of his Father’s unholy assassins. 

By nature, he was not a man of bureaucracy. He had kept his finger on the pulse of the city, listening in to the inner-and-outer-workings of whatever his Invokers could infiltrate, the shuffling of hands from the guild to the high hall to wherever. But his main purpose was to maim for Bhaal, to carry out his great plan. Not to pay attention to snivelling bureaucrats nor to all the little lordlings that aspired to make a name for themselves on the Sword Coast.

Banites were a different matter entirely.

It started with a letter. The Dead Three were coalescing, word of a conglomeration of Bane spreading around the less savoury circles of society. He himself had found a scouting party deep in the undercity, the emblems of Bane strung across their necks or buried deep in their pockets.

[makiquas]

Its Butchtober. Bear with me for a second as I rant about children's cartoon ships, butchphobia, the conditional acceptance of butches in sapphic spaces on the basis of desirability, and feeling erased as a butch kid.

It's so funny that I realised early on as a 2000-2010s teen/kid how a lot of so called "sapphics" of social media are really, really anti butch4butch, only by interacting with certain subsets of Catradora and Appledash haters. It may be flippant to connect butchphobia with children's cartoons, but you cannot deny it is there. We finally had two canon butch4butch and masc4masc lesbian animated ships. And the fandoms decided that the best possible reaction to this is to violently hate on the ships for bullshit reasons and write up masterdocs about how the butch character actually looks better with a femme character instead (in both cases–Rarity and Glimmer, who is arguably feminine but not femme, but that's a conversation for another day, how the SPOP fandom waters down gender identities for aesthetics).

This is not just about two cartoon ships; this mindset of seeing two masc lesbians and immediately going "actually they act like bros; but this BUTCHFEMME couple has real chemistry" comes off sounding really, really bad in 2024 when you have no idea how butch identity operates, outside of depicting us as pants-wearing sexually aggressive muscular women. Butches ARE bros, even the ones who kiss each other. Camaraderie and tomboyish swagger *is* a part of their life. It's not our fault you are too fanfic trope-pilled to read these interactions are sexless friendship bantering.

It's also quite concerning, given how there are only a handful of butch4butch books in the market, and almost all of them talk about the stigmatizing of relationships between two butches/studs/masc lesbians. There are many butch lesbians who themselves face internalized butchphobia because of societal standards and expectations of being turned into the "gallant" provider of femmes. Butch and femme are not always inherently complementary, butches can be attracted to other butches, there is no "natural order" model of lesbian/sapphic attraction and your thinly veiled butchphobia is really off-putting, given you guys don't seem to extend that same rhetoric to mascfemme ships like Korrasami or Caitvi, or femme-femme ships like Harlivy.

Here, I must mention relationships like Rei and Kaoru from Oniisama E, or Jess and Lupe from A League of Their Own, who have bucket loads of chemistry but still have some vehement antis only because both the lesbians are masculine. (What's funny is the new wave of lesbian Oniisama E fans are almost all Rei/Kaoru shippers despite the show putting them into two butchfemme pairings.) Something something to be butch4butch is to be failing the tests of palatability and desirability according to conventional models of societal norms. Forever.

Again, one may have valid reasons for disliking these fictional ships (what, I genuinely don't know). But it *is* weird that you guys can watch fifty white fem4fem sapphic shows in a year and read 100+ GL with the same feminine girlish blonde and brunette/pink haired archetype and not bat an eyelid, but conjure a world of made-up "platonic" dynamics just because you read every butch4butch interaction as fundamentally platonic.

A lot of you love to throw around Stone Butch Blues as a catchphrase to educate strangers on the internet about 1950s-70s blue-collar bar culture and USA butch femme history, but how many of you actually know that within the book itself, the lead character acts prejudiced and hates on another butch for being butch4butch? How many of you know that she apologizes to her friend at the end for her hateful remarks? Fun fact: when you ostracize a butch for not fitting into your butch-femme subculture aesthetic, you're no better than lesbiphobic bigots actually.

Anyway, here are some butch4butch resources if you are a baby butch4butch and feel alienated by these kinds of weird rhetoric in online and fandom queer spaces too:

Butch4Butch romance books

My Butch4Butch books masterdoc (**being updated regularly**)

Leo Wilder's Butch4Butch writing (18+)

Butch4Butch photography archive (insta)

Boyish² Butch4Butch yuri anthology (insta)

@milsae Butch4Butch artist (tumblr/insta)

This post is made by a trans masc butch of color. Terfs, racists, biphobes and radfems kindly do not derail or interact.

[markrosewater]

Hey Mark, I just wanted to say you've always seemed like a really cool guy. I've played magic for over 4/5ths of my life, since the early 2000s when I was only five years old, I even met most of my long time friends through it. But I think I finally feel alienated enough by it to drop it entirely.

I always enjoyed every aspect of this game, from the deckbuilding, to the flavor, to the color pie and the possibilities it presented. I loved the fantasy of it, of planeswalkers and wizards, dragons and castles.

Universes Beyond really was the end of it, all the way back then. When i heard the announcements I was terrified, I knew where it would lead even then. I loved the world of Magic, and it feels silly to say about a card game but I truly felt immersed in the world when I played, even with the different planes, everything cohered to an internal set of rules that seemed unbreakable.

For a while I continued, our local scene created a variant format that banned Universes Beyond cards so I was able to ignore them, but then came Neon Dynasty. It felt strange to me, like it was breaking what I had come to expect out of the game. Most people disagreed, said it was still Magic enough, but I wondered just how far it would be pushed before Magic lost any identity of its own, anything that separated it from Fortnite or any other crossover soup known entirely for the things it borrows rather than the things it is.

When I saw the first spoilers for Duskmourn, I think that was the straw that broke the camel's back. When I play at the table with my friends, I enjoy the fact that all the cards feel like part of one larger universe. And when I see cards with televisions and smartphones in them, with modern clothing and internet references, I just can't fit them together in my mind. It seems like a cool world, much like a lot of the crossovers are cool worlds, but I play Magic for well... Magic. If I wanted to play Fallout or Warhammer 40k, or watch Insidious or Walking Dead, then I would. But when I play Magic, I want to see magic.

And it's canon, just as canon as Innistrad or Alara. We can't excise it like we can Universes Beyond, and if we can't, then what's even the point of trying to "protect the tone" with those bans? What tone are we protecting, that's already been shattered from within?

More and more it feels like the game just isn't for me, doesn't want the kind of player that feels strongly about cohesion and immersion. And that's fine, it doesn't have to cater to me, and the current approach seems to bring in more people than it drives away. But it still just makes me sad, on a deep personal level, to give up on what has been such a major part of my life.

In all likelihood, I'm an outlier, and you could easily say that Magic getting even broader in what it covers is only a positive thing. Take my critiques only as the lamentations of a single person. But when you can put anything in a piece of media, when there's no unifying idea of what is and isn't possible, then it just starts to feel meaningless.

I'm sorry, I know you'll probably never read this, I mostly just needed to get it off my chest- and you're the closest thing to a human face Magic the Gathering has. Thank you for all the work you've put into it over the years, and I'm sorry that I can't enjoy it anymore.

Thanks for writing. From a big picture, Magic excels at creating variety and does poorly at consistency. The core idea of a trading card game is we make lots and lots of pieces you can play with and then you, the player, customize your game as you see fit. History has shown us, the wider we spread the potential of what Magic can be, the more people find something they enjoy and are attracted to the game.

Think of it this way. Each player has a different sense of what Magic is to them. There's no cutoff point where we make the majority of players happy. In fact, for many players, it's the ever-expanding quality to the game that they enjoy most.

This does mean though that we might make choices that don't connect with what you personally enjoy, and I respect that. If Magic isn't providing what you want out of it, that's okay. My only recommendation is don't get rid of your cards. Many Magic players rotate in and out of the game, and the number one complaint I hear from players who rotate back in is them having gotten rid of everything when they rotated out.

Magic might not be what you need right now, but maybe a few years from now you've changed in ways which makes it something you will enjoy. Or maybe Magic will evolve in a way that speaks to you. The only constant I know is you and Magic will both change. Just leave yourself the possibility of reconnecting.

Thanks for playing all these years, and I hope to see you again.

[antlergrave]

i don't think i posted this here yet have i

this is kind of like concept art of the EMH analog horror/cursed game website thing i was thinking about doing a few months ago lol

not all things shown below are final. things will still change

the style of the atmosphere will be kind of inspired by VibingLeaf, The Walten Files, and those creepy 2000s games we all used to play back then. If you've watched any of those videos or played those games, you can kinda see where im going from there.

I wanna make this as unnerving and creepy as I can. I'm not going easy on y'all

I was also thinking of breaking the videos up into separate "gameplays" instead of one full long video where the protagonist (you) investigates what's going on in the website and documenting the stuff happening in the games.

In this AU, you, the protagonist, used to love watching EMH fitness videos back in your early teen years (the trio makes it big and become well-known fitness instructors that they make their very own website where fans can play their games lol)

The EMH trio mysteriously left the internet without a trace in the mid 2010s and nobody knew what happened to them. A few years have past, you are now a young adult and the EMH trio's whereabouts still remain unknown. You decide to revisit their old website to (hopefully) find anything that may be useful evidence to their disappearance, but got distracted by what seems to be a virus infecting the site.

^^ not complete yet. i'll work on it💀

These will NOT be playable to the public (im sorry😭) they will only be programmed to tell the story. they're basically mock games that only lead to one ending, showcasing all the glitches and viruses happening.

If you guys have any advice/recommendations etc. on good programing sites and all that stuff, feel free to tell me. I'd love to hear it :))

[hms-no-fun]

🔥homestuck but you can't talk about the post 2016 fandom

EXCELLENT caveat there anon

probably my hottest anodyne homestuck take is that you shouldn't remove the slurs and acting like they're a "flaw" in the text is disastrously wrongheaded. you're talking about a comic that is existentially steeped in early 2000s internet culture, full of highly specific memes and mannerisms, i mean the trolls themselves are just explicitly just Types Of Guy You'd See On AIM And Forums. oh but the slurs aren't part of that? you want to remove the slurs but you don't want to remove the "it's over 9000" jokes?

i think it's genuinely *pivotal* to homestuck's resonance that the characters start off saying slurs and then slowly stop as they get older. i get if younger readers just don't understand this but like, if you were on the internet in the 2000s chances are you said the r-word on the reg at the very least. is that a good thing? absolutely not. that's why we stopped doing it. part of the homestuck cast's narrative arc is about them evolving beyond their youthful teenaged edgelord roots, which are inextricable from the peak-webcomic postmodern irony they operate on. i LIKE that the cast grew up in a way that mirrored my own maturity, as i and a lot of other (white, probably amab) millennials started to realize that oops uhh actually other people with different experiences exist and when you say slurs (even "ironically") they're probably not gonna share a laugh with you. it's an ugly part of our history but it IS the history, and i don't think you can talk about the social justice movement of the 2010s without an awareness of the culture it was reacting to. and don't even get me started on how the dancestors fit into that equation!

there are plenty of legitimate criticisms to be levied against the representation in homestuck, particularly its infrequent bouts of racism vis-a-vis HIC, and the sadly more frequent bouts of ableism vis-a-vis tavros-- criticisms that were the bread and butter of the Perfectly Generic Podcast back in its day. but to approach these deficiencies as flaws in the text that need to be "fixed"???? i just don't get it. we're perfectly capable of looking at "fixes" of roald dahl and mark twain books as flagrant historical revisionism, but because homestuck came out in living memory it's a different situation?? and this opens the door to the broader tendency of fix-it fanworks that seem to have this attitude that like, "homestuck" as such exists beyond the limitations of andrew hussie's imagination and can be "rescued" from her clutches. in practice i have a very live and let live attitude about fix-it projects, i'm done with discourse and drama, i just personally don't get it and feel like it's a misuse of creative energies. but then i'm sure they'd say much the same about godfeels, so,

wait i kinda ended up talking about post-2016 homestuck fandom anyway didn't i. oops

[centrally-unplanned]

This was a good article on the cultural trope of the "menhera", mentally-ill girls with a focus on self-harm that is its own aesthetic and trope. It has relatively little "academic culture studies bullshit" you have to wade through to get to the actually good information, fresh air for me!

The history of the term it outlines is a datapoint for pattern confirmation of how so much internet culture evolved from the 2000's to the modern era. Early 2000's 2ch pioneered the term self-referentially, a tag for their own identity as depressed, largely-male otaku & neets. Discussions of self-harm came up in those threads, but menhera was never used in them; it was a more general term. Then, starting in the mid-2000's, 2chan had a growing population of highly social-political, vaguely-right-coded posters, in newly founded boards like nyusoku, who started using the word for outsiders; both other online-types but also young girls as part of gender discourse. Here is was primarily pejorative; attention seeking BDP-cursed losers.

But like so many things these communities were never isolated, nor were they monocultures; plenty of women and others with different views hung out on them, discoursed about it, and so on - and the terms captured real things in the culture, so the first mover lock-in was a go. And then in the 2010's, the internet massively changed with the rise of smartphones. In Japan "everyone" was already online a little bit earlier, but still the growing ease of uploading diverse content allowed ideas that were previously inaccessible in text-heavy forums broke out via comics, photos, videos, etc - with the people best positioned to take advantage of that being those who had been around the web for a while, and knew all this weird 2ch stuff. A raft of mainly female artists started drawing autobiographical-ish comics explicitly labelling themselves as menhera; all the same so-called negative behaviors, but made cute, funny, and self-aware.

That early media proceeds to be humorous and mocking, but still "authentic" to the artists, who are depressives themselves. But after that initial earnest era, the symbols get tropified - now you can just cosplay Needy Streamer Overload and it is just a look, a costume you take on and off as you see fit. As the article is obligated to do when it quotes Hiroki Azuma, it is now part of the "database" of internet culture.

You can sub a lot of culture objects in Japan & America both into that same timeline - a mixed of social & technological forces pushing niche internet ideas into the mainstream where they are sanitized. Though here Japan's depolitical culture made this transition easier - I don't think wearing "self-harm bracelets" to give you that ~slit-wrist aesthetic~ plays quite as well in the West because of expectations that sensitive topics be treated with more seriousness. But you can learn as much from the divergence as you can from the consensus, so that just adds to the parallel for me.

[mamuzzy]

— Is “psycho” a slur? —

My easiest answer to this question: ASK IF A REAL PERSON IS OKAY TO BE CALLED A PSYCHO. If not, then you are not calling the person with ASPD, BPD, or any other PD a psycho.

Listen to the people with personality disorders, not the people who claim they are allys so they call everything ableist that can hurt our pretty sensitive disabled heart. There is a chance that someone is made the label their own. And someone is not okay with it. No, you don't make a fucking a poll where everyone can vote, and even the neighbours cat can puke on the reblog button. YOU TALK TO A REAL PERSON, YOU ASK. End of story.

Personality disorders and especially Antisocial Personality Disorder are often associated to “being a psycho”.

And you especially met with this term in RepComm while reading.

“EWWWW REPCOMM AND KAREN TRAVISS AND KAL SKIRATA IS FUCKIGN ABLEIST DON’T READ IT OR YOU’LL BECOME ABLEIST YOURSE-“

When I mention TODAY to someone that I have personality disorder, people are being like: okay and you are eating that with fork or spoon?

You call out ableism because you heard it somewhere that being called a psycho is ableist, and calling out ableism gives you browney points on tumblr.

“Psycho” is not a slur. Sometimes not even the self-diagnosed psyhopaths know about the existence of the term of ASPD (that's how personality disorders are not in every speech!!!), they just now that something is wrong, because they always hit walls around people. Psycho or sociopath was the closest that you could name this condition in the early 2000's.

Nulls being called a psycho is not Kal Skirata’s elaborate trick to enslave the nulls or whatever the fuck anti-kal people comes up with. People with pd-s are mostly self-aware. Being always fucking self-aware is why we know that we don’t fit in.

Someone with personality disorder is extremely important to be self-aware, that's why name-erasing, mental-health erasing cause more harm. You don't say shit like to a pd that "you are completely normal, there is nothing wrong with you, carry on" because the next time we actually do something mentally ill™, you will be the first to call us "fucking psychos".

(yeah. I know. so much we, and them, and us, like I'm one with ASPD too, I'm trying to figure if I have more personality disorder than BPD, and probably have.)

In this age where everything is within reach via internet, people truly forget that media is accessible written by different generations, and when I see younger people engaging with the Republic Commando series TODAY in 2024 with today’s tumblr sensitivity standards, I think: vod. Are you aware that the first book came out in 2004, TWENTY YEARS AGO? The accessibility to everything is great but it totally messes up the ability to see TIME CONTEXT. And this time blindness can truly mess up communication between different generations too, causing rifts and we end up invalidating other’s experiences if we are not careful.

“But there were more progressive books even before 2004” - Probably. Only we didn’t have an entire library of progressive labels of genders, sexuality, phobias and MENTAL ILLNESSES AND CONDITIONS.

Not in everyday speech. If no one talks about it, you won't know the concept. You don't know how to ask questions aside from "what's wrong with me?"

WATCH OUT! SLURS INCOMING!!!!

In the early 2000’s and before if your teachers hated you, your parents weren’t educated (or just didn’t care), or your parents themselves never got proper treatment for their neurodivergency, there is chance that YOU ALSO didn’t have a chance to get a proper diagnosis for different types of neurodivergency as a child.

children with dyscalculia were called lazy.

children with dyslexia were called retards who can't even read.

children who were fine playing alone were the weird ones.

autistic people? You mean rain man? Or those braindead retards shitting themselves and throwing fits and should have been euthanized if their parents had any love for them? Oh no you are not autistic, stop being oversensitive to noises and shit and people bullying you for your special interests is not bullying, they are just trying to involve you sweetheart.

ADHD? Problem children with behavior issues.

Antisocial Personality Disorder? Psychos. Problem children. HOOLIGANS. DEVIANTS.

Sounds familiar? No? Then I am truly happy for you.

People like to use this quote to prove that the Nulls didn’t have mental illnesses, it’s just Kal who spread the rumors about them, and the Nulls weren’t more than your ordinary bad behaving children. Because Vau is an outsider, therefore more reliable and objective narrator about the Nulls and because fuckkalskirataingeneral. Yeah. Sure. But we are talking about Walon Vau.

Walon “my father beat the living shit out of me as a child but I turned out fine” Vau.

These kind of abused people In real life with the exact same mentality tell you that you don’t have a problem, you are just oversensitive. You don’t need therapy, you just have to man up. Don’t take pills because pills are for pussies. YOU DON’T HAVE MENTAL ILLNESS, YOU ARE JUST A BAD CHILD. Generational trauma is fucking shit and affects everybody.

Walon Vau alone deserves a separate post about his non-existent mental health. And Sev, now that he was mentioned here. Sev is especially heartbreaking, seeing how Nulls as psychos are treated, and how Sev as a psycho is treated in the books.

This blurb is born from the thought that the Nulls are having Antisocial Personality Disorder and I’ve come to this conclusion because they are constantly called psychos, the most common label people used for this kind of behavior patterns they show throughout the series.

ASPD or Antisocial Personality Disorder and the usage of this name is encouraged in scientific circles because the symptoms and traits of psychopathy can’t be measured objectively anymore. Psychopathy is a neurological/hormonal condition, but no longer its own sickness, because other non-related disorders, diseases and illnesses can mimic the symptoms of psychopathy for eg.: DEMENTIA.

If you ever wonder how can a 80 years old person who never showed any sign of aggression before just go and brutally kill their neighbor for a sole treebranch hanging over the fence and littering the garden with leaves, there is a chance that something is not alright in the brain anymore.

Emotions developed healthy with healthy self-restraints and and self-control will not let you do socially unacceptable things like killing to solve problems, just because your brain tells you: BASH THEIR FUCKING SKULL WITH A ROCK.

Every emotional response are hormones and neurotransmitters in work. Brain is responsible to give the appropriate response to each situation we are facing. If you have hormonal problems, or neurological conditions, different brain structure than a neurotypical people, there is a chance, that these responses are not working as they are intended, you will have different or more extreme emotional responses to things, or not having at all.

So that is why we don’t use the terms of psychopath today as an individual sickness, because PSYCHOPATHY ITSELF IS A SYMPTOM of various conditions! People with psychopathy, the “psychos” are usually on the spectrum of ASPD.

So again, repeat after me like I'm Dora the explorer who put you on gunpoint:

ASK IF A REAL PERSON WITH ASPD IS OKAY WITH BEING CALLED A PSYCHO. IF NOT, YOU DON'T CALL THE PERSON PSYCHO. END OF STORY.

[pedrostylez]

How The Crow Flies: pt. 1

Javier Peña x fem!reader x Frankie Morales crossover

Word count: 5.7k

Chapter Summary: Introduction into the HTCF world, Peña is a menace

Chapter Warnings and Disclaimers: 18+ only. I am not responsible for what you read on the internet. You have been warned! Locations and descriptions of places may be inaccurate in comparison to each story (Narcos and Triple Frontier). Timelines are obviously different between the two stories, so we are going to meet in the middle and say we are in the early 2000s. These are not necessarily canon characters in regard to how they act, how they treat people, and their current relationships. mean!Javier, violence, dubcon, SMUT!!!!!, anger, fighting, PTSD, mentions of rape, derogatory use of slut, whore, and the like

Please support by commenting, sending me respectful thoughts, and reblogging. I appreciate every single one of you!

Taglist: @thevoiceinyourheadx @suzdin @survivingandenduring @bariskaplans @inept-the-magnificent @casa-boiardi (please let me know if I missed anyone that was interested or if you would like to be added)

You used to be new to Colombia. 

You had never really thought you would be invited to the Embassy as a guest DEA agent, struggling to pull your bag through the airport with your purse in your other hand, but you’d made it-and the heat was different from Miami heat. 

But you had worked hard in Florida, stopping drugs from passing through the border, starting your career in the mail office, and working your way up. 

You stood on the docks of Miami undercover so many times that you were considered the local siren, stopping drug mules in their tracks just to talk to you, only to find out that you were there to bust them. 

Your coworkers, male and female alike were proud of you, happy for you. You had been blessed with people who surrounded you and were supportive. 

When you got to Colombia it was like you were back at square one. 

Your boss, the well-known Javier Peña, had a stick up his ass. 

“Would you give these to Noonan?” Peña had swept by, plopping papers on your desk before trying to run further away. 

You stopped him, holding out your hand and wrapping your fingers around his suit sleeve. “Sorry, sir. But what are they?”

“You don’t need to know that.” He scoffed, pulling his arm from your grasp. “You’re sitting in one of my agent’s chairs, and I need you to bring that to Noonan as soon as you’re done setting up her computer.”

You scoffed back, standing up and placing a hand on your hip. His eyes followed your hand, eyebrows raised in interest until you said your name. “I am the agent that sits at this desk, Peña.”

“My apologies.” He said quietly with no hint of actual remorse. “Still, please bring that to Noonan. Our new employee meeting starts in five minutes.”

You immediately regretted wearing the pencil skirt, thinking it would be a good first impression as if that was the reason that Javier Peña had mistaken you. From then on you wore cargo pants and a fitted t-shirt, like the rest of the team, arguing with your boss at every corner. 

“I told you to stay here. And what did you do? You fucking went out there anyways.” Peña had this thing about slamming the door to make a point, even though everyone could clearly see into his office where you were standing, arms crossed, eyes rolling toward the ceiling. 

“Jason said he needed help. I helped him.” Standing your ground came naturally, and Peña clearly hated it. He wanted you to bend over backward for him, just like Jason, and just like David.

“You don’t need to help him by getting yourself killed.” Peña gritted out, turning to you before sitting at his desk.

A quick mumble came out of your mouth, “Would rather do that than push your pencils around like some secretary.”

“Are you going to hold that against me for the rest of the time you’re here? Because if that’s the case then maybe you should go back to Miami.” He was back standing, pointing at you and what he assumed was the general direction of Florida. Sweat beaded at his hairline, eyes dark with annoyance. 

“I’m not holding anything against you, boss.” You snark, twisting around to the door to look out into the bullpen, where everyone is pretending to not watch. “Are we all done here?” 

Peña was quick to brush you off after staring, motioning at the door resting his hands on his hips, and pacing behind his desk. 

But then after a successful mission, Peña brought you and the others out for drinks. A Friday celebration for “catching the bad guys” as Jason had always said, downing the free beer that his boss provided. 

You were all for taking advantage of Peña’s money if he was going to pay for drinks. Quick to order tequila sodas, letting them slide down your throat like water and sway back and forth as you spoke with office staff and the other agents. 

You avoided Peña like the plague. Any time you turned your head you saw his back towards you, speaking to any girl he could find that wasn’t part of the team he was paying for. 

One too many tequila sodas had you stumbling to the bathroom, struggling with the button of your pants, and taking much longer than you had the last time you went. You were thinking that it is about time to take yourself home, walk down the sidewalk for some fresh air, and then hail a cab, but when you finally manage to get out of the bathroom of this bar, your coworkers are filing out. 

“Where are y’all going?” You slur to Jason who is holding the door open for one of the archive girls. It’s like he doesn’t even hear you, stepping through the door wrapping his arm around her shoulder, and whispering in her ear. 

You mumble out a few curse words, turning toward the bar counter where that same head that you had been staring at all night is now facing you. His eyes are watchful, glass to his pouted lips as he takes a sip of what looks to be whiskey. “You want water?”

“Another tequila would be nice.” You perk up, slouching into the seat next to him with hooded eyes. In the back of your mind, you’re aware that you will be having a hangover tomorrow but don’t care enough to stop it. 

Peña motions at the bartender, nodding at you to indicate that you would like another drink. He takes a beat before saying, “So, you still mad at me?”

“I’m not mad at you.” You hiccup, furrowing your brow as the bartender sets a glass in front of you. You take a sip, noticing that there is no fizz, and know immediately that you’ve been cut off. “Damn, he gave me a water.”

He chuckles, draining his glass and turning fully towards you. His eyes scan behind you and the surrounding area before settling on your face. “I shouldn’t have assumed you were Noonan’s secretary.” 

“No, you shouldn’t have.” You sigh, taking another sip of the water. You’re suddenly extremely thirsty. 

Peña waits for you to say more, but shakes his head when you begin tapping your fingers against the counter. “I’m trying to apologize.” He huffs out, resting his head on one hand, propped against the bar. 

“You are?” You laugh, pushing the glass of water away. “I didn’t hear one.”

“I wasn’t thinking, that day I walked in and asked you to go to Noonan.” He sighs, explaining himself. Still not an apology. “I’ve been under a lot of pressure to get this right this time, and I was told I was having a female agent added to my team that had done great things in Miami but didn’t know anything beyond your name.”

You shrug, sliding off your seat. “Okay, boss. No big deal. It was months ago.” You give in, thinking it’s about time to walk home. 

When you stumble away from Peña, he reaches for your arm to hold you up, hissing out between his teeth. “You need a ride home.”

“No, I’m fine.” His hand is warm at your elbow, seeping through his skin to yours so quickly that you break out in a shiver. You attempt to yank your arm away, but his grip is firm and guiding. 

If he notices you trying to pull away from him or the shiver, he doesn’t say anything. “Wasn’t asking.” 

You think you roll your eyes, but you’re not too sure based on how the room is moving around you. “Haven’t you drunk too?” Your hand twists out to grip his shoulder, too dizzy to be pulling away now. 

“Not as much as you.” He mumbles with a short chuckle, guiding you to the door after slipping the bartender some bills. You aren’t sure how much he’s paid, but you think it’s a lot based on how happy the guy looks. 

The typically humid air is crisp against your skin as you step out, and you can’t help but curl your fingers into the sleeve of his shirt. The noises around you feel muffled, and when you turn to Peña he’s already looking at you expectantly. “What?”

He huffs out his nose, trying to keep his composure. “Where do you live? In the same block as the other agents or somewhere else?”

You shake your head, confused by his question but tell him your address anyways. “I can make it home–”

“No.” He cuts you off, lightly pressing into the small of your back to lead you toward his Jeep. “You’ve had more to drink than others, and I need you to be ready by Monday.”

“Oh, I’m definitely calling in sick Monday.” You hiccup, grabbing onto the handle of his car as you hop into the passenger seat.

Peña walks around to the driver's side, sliding in and watching you as you buckle in clumsily. “Don’t get sick in my car.”

“No promises.” You mumble, laying your head back against the headrest and shutting your eyes as he pulls away from the curb. The drive feels familiar, turning at the right moments, and the hum of his car seems to have you slipping into sleep. 

You didn’t realize you had fallen asleep until Peña’s warm hand was on your elbow again, shaking it gently. “Hey, you awake?”

You startle, sitting up straight and looking out the windshield before flashing your eyes over to him, glancing down at his fingers drifting over your elbow in soothing circles. You clear your throat, reaching for his door handle. “Yeah, sorry.”

“S’alright.” He reaches for his own door, gets out, and walks around the front of the car to where you are stumbling toward your door. “Where’s your key?” You mumble incoherently, reaching into your pocket and dangling the key in front of him for a moment before he snatches it out of your hand and into the lock. “Let me make sure you don’t get sick all over yourself.”

“I’m not even that drunk.” You scoff, brushing past him to the bathroom. You are mostly just dizzy, a nasty side effect of tequila that you’ve never been able to curb. “Since you invited yourself in, there’s soda in the fridge.” You clip from your mirror, reaching for a washing rag and turning on the water. 

“What, no beer?” He calls, chuckling quietly before you hear the sound of the fridge opening, his footsteps going quiet when he gets back to your living room and sits on the couch. 

When you’ve finished scrubbing your face, you step back into the living room and see Peña with his soda half tilted up, glancing at you and down to your coffee table where a glass of water is waiting. “Thanks, boss.” You mumble, sitting on the other side of the couch and taking a sip. 

He nods, eyeing you quietly before setting the half-empty bottle in front of him. “Javi is fine.” 

You quirk your eyebrow at him, humming to yourself before taking another sip. “Are we getting personal now?”

Peña squints at you, pursing his lips to hide a smile that seems to be growing on his lips. “Only if you tell me something personal.” 

You scoff, setting down your glass and leaning back. The air conditioner in your apartment is only in the bedroom, leaking out into the rest of the living space slowly and heavily along the ground. Your toes are cold, realizing suddenly that you have taken off your shoes and it seems like Peña did as well, his toes wiggling under his socks. “Something personal? What do you want to know?”

He shrugs. “Anything. I don’t know much about you at all besides that you worked your way up in a field that isn’t kind to women, and moved here from Miami on recommendation from Noonan to help catch the Cali cartel.” 

You tilt your head over to him to watch him, his arm flexing as he reaches for his soda again. You feel this sudden urge to lean forward and touch his arm– “I hate the heat.” You blurt, stopping yourself from reaching for him as he looks at you inquisitively. “I-I grew up in Utica, New York. Love the snow.”

He smiles, nodding his head. “Why did you go to Miami, if you hate the heat?”

You shrug. “Wanted to be different.” You laugh to yourself, leaning forward again for your glass. “Couldn’t stand staying in the same town, or just moving to the next city over like all my friends did.”

As you’re talking your hand knocks the glass off the coffee table, water spilling over your feet and onto the carpet. You jump, leaning toward Peña to lift your feet off the floor before they get wet, but you aren’t quick enough. “S’alright. Let me get a towel.” He says quietly, grabbing the glass from the floor and his soda before heading to the kitchen. 

When he returns with a kitchen towel that you think was hanging on the oven’s handle, you don’t expect him to sit so close and wrap his hand around your calf and lift it onto his lap. He wipes at your feet gently, hand still holding you steady as he glances up at you. “Texas.” He clears his throat, looking unsure before he continues. “I grew up in Texas. The heat was different than here, but…I’ve never seen snow.”

You smirk, watching as he slows his movements and rubs his thumb along your calf. “You’d probably hate it like everyone does.”

You both stare at each other, not sure if you should pull your leg away, ask him to leave and thank him for the ride, or see where this goes. 

You start to pull away, realizing that this is your boss for fucks sake when he tightens his grip. “I’ve always wanted to see snow on Christmas. With the lights and real snowmen…” He pauses, leaning forward and flicking his gaze to your mouth. “I don’t think I would hate it.”

You gasp when his hand slides up your leg to behind your knee, pulling you closer and over his lap more. “Peña–”

“Javi.” He breathes, taking a deep breath that expands his chest and has the buttons straining under the pressure. “I-it’s Javi.”

Your head is swimming with the feeling of his hand on you, over and over, looking from his parted mouth to his eyes. His pupils dilate, his hand tightening around you in anticipation as you start to lean forward. 

Your eyelashes flutter, closing for a moment before opening them again and finding your nose brushing against his, his eyes cast down to watch you ponder the next best move. “Javi,” You whisper hoarsely, swearing you can taste the mix of whiskey and soda in his mouth from how he lets his bottom lip run against yours. “You’re my boss.”

He nods quickly, the bridge of his nose running against yours as he takes a deep breath. “I know.”

It’s only another split second before you make the decision, tilting your chin towards him and sealing your mouth to his. 

He groans, wrapping his hand around the back of your head and into your hair to hold you to him. He swirls his tongue with yours, eager and ready to have you against him and not moving away to take a breath. 

He pulls you closer, bracketing his own hips with your thighs, digging his fingers into your hips to hold you against him. When you begin rolling your center against his, your jeans in the way of each other, he holds you firm. “Don’t do that.” He swallows, shaking his head and looking up at you. “Unless you want me to fuck you right now.”

On wobbly legs you stand, pushing away from him enough that you can reach for the button of your pants, sliding the material down your thighs. You break out in a shiver, forgetting how heavy the air feels right now. 

Javi reaches out with one hand, running his fingers down the side of your thigh before leaning forward to wrap his hand fully around you. His other hand is expertly undoing his own jeans, eyes on you, and a smirk rising on his face. “Needy, aren’t you?”

Biting your lip has little effect on your ability to keep your noises at bay, a groan coming out of your mouth as his fingers grip into the plush skin on your ass. “You’re just as bad.”

“Oh really?” He laughs, pulling you to your previous position hovering over him. “Work for it then.” 

Your thoughts stutter, furrowing your brow as you shakily bring a hand down to the opening of his pants. Gently wrapping your fingers around him, jeans halfway down his thighs already and not a pair of boxers in sight, you swear your mouth begins to water. You glance back up to his face, his knowing wink giving you pause. “What do you want me to do?”

He tilts his head, a small smile rising before he licks his lower lip. “Don’t just stare at it, ride it.”

You gasp at how quickly he reaches forward and slides your panties to the side. His finger glides at your center, opening you up to feel how slick you’ve gotten for him. He groans, satisfied with what he finds as he holds the fabric with his thumb, his other hand roughly guiding you by the hip to sit lower. 

The head of his cock presses into you in one instant, and in the next, you’re fully seated on top of him. Thighs tight, a sheen of sweat covering your forehead, you whine at the feeling of him inside you. He shushes you, bringing one bruising hand up from your hip to your face, moving your hair out of your eyes. “I know, Hermosa. Too big for you, huh?” You nod, feeling faint as you shut your eyes for a moment. He taps roughly with two fingers on your cheek.  “Easy now, don’t lose focus.”

Your eyes snap open as he shifts his hips up, his hair at the base of his shaft rubbing against your clit. He begins thrusting, holding you steady by where his hand is placed on your cheek, digging into the hair at the nape of your neck. Your mouth opens, slack-jawed at the feeling of him thrusting up into you. 

“That’s it.” He growls, pulling your head back tighter. “Just like that.” He pistons up, leaning further back on your couch and pulling you away from him so he can better get a view of you. You’re taking it, turned on, and pretty sure you’re ruining his jeans in the process. 

He doesn’t last long, and neither do you. His words, forced through his teeth and puffing breaths spur you on to the finish line, his own orgasm leaving a mess on your underwear and stomach. He pulls out quickly, hurriedly rubbing at himself with your slick covering him before closing his eyes and moaning as ropes of his spend stick to you. 

Standing on shaking legs, you walk toward your bathroom, grabbing a towel and wiping yourself off before looking in the mirror briefly. You look like you’ve been fucked-hair a nest on your head, your underwear wet. When you step back out toward the living room, ready to offer him a towel or the shower, you stop dead in your tracks when you don’t see him immediately. 

Confused, you step into the kitchen, looking around briefly before stepping back into your living room. The soda is half gone on your coffee table, and the kitchen towel that he brought is tossed haphazardly on the couch. You look toward your front door and notice his boots are gone just as the lights from a car shine through your window. Peña had just fucked you and ditched. 

It hadn’t really been a surprise to you that Peña wanted to pretend like nothing had happened. Just a quick fuck, and nothing serious-you could handle that. Peña must have thought you would be beating down his door because he avoided you for two full weeks before reappearing in the office at the same time you were there. 

You had continued on; business as usual. 

It surprised Peña so much that when you had gone into his office to give him reports to review and then left soon after, he was at your apartment that night asking what your issue was. 

“It was a one-time thing.” Peña was circling your island, rubbing at his jaw and eyeing you every once in a while. 

“I figured.” You roll your eyes, leaning against the doorway. “Do you have something you need me to do, related to our job? Because if not, can you just leave?”

“Was I more hammered than I thought?” He questioned, looking at you incredulously. “I swear you came.”

“I did.” You confirm. 

“Then, how are you…are you not? I don’t-” he growled frustrated, running his hands through his hair. 

“I’m not obsessed with you. Is that what you’re asking?” You laugh, shaking your head. “We were drunk, we fucked. You’re my boss, I’m your employee. Let’s just move on. Now will you leave?” 

“I don’t want you to be obsessed with me.” He says quietly, face going red with embarrassment. 

“Great, I’m not.” You shrug, tapping your fingers against your pant leg. 

He stares at you, grinding his teeth before he steps toward where you appear relaxed. He’s silent as he reaches out, running the back of his finger against your exposed arm. You shiver, rolling your eyes at how he smiles. 

You tilt your head at him, asking with your eyes what are you doing? As he shrugs, he kneels in front of you, hands coming up to hover over your pants. “Let me feel you, hermosa.”

You and Peña continued like this, back and forth for weeks. He would eye you a certain way after berating you in his office as code to meet in the archives. 

You would say something snarky with Jason and David looking on, and he would show up at your apartment later that night. 

Or sometimes, you both would stay late, working until you couldn’t keep your eyes open anymore to then look up and see Peña still sitting at his desk in a similar state as you were. He would sigh heavily, call you into his office, and tell you to go home like everyone else had. 

You never did. 

This seemed to be the most stable thing in your life, even though you and Peña were not an item, and adamantly told each other so when he was deep inside you or when your throat was constricting around him. 

You thought everything was routine at this point-yeah, you fucked your boss, and you still argued with him, but the job wasn’t bad. You were making headway into things that Peña and your team worked on extensively to get to the bottom of the cartel. And when you were having another meeting with Peña, Jason, and David, you were shocked to find out that Peña had a new job for you. 

“I need you to go into the jungle.” He said, looking directly at you with a pinched mouth. 

You stared at him, trying to assess what that exactly meant as Jason and David stared between the two of you. “And do what, exactly?” You question, flicking your eyes over him. 

“I need intel on Gabriel Loreas. He is an upcoming drug dealer that is supposed to be the local cops' responsibility.” He says quickly, flipping through the file on his desk before leaning back and crossing his feet. 

“So why have her go out there?” Jason questions quietly, concern covering his face. 

Peña’s eyes flash in anger, raking over Jason. “Because I don’t trust the locals to not screw me over in the end. And…we have a mole.” David and Jason begin bickering, Peña cutting them off. “I need someone that can infiltrate his home without causing suspicion.”

“And why can’t that be one of us? No offense,” David turns apologetically to you. “But it’s extremely dangerous to be doing that alone.”

Peña rolls his neck, trying to hold his temper. “His security guards are looking for…working girls.”

It’s silent in the office as Jason and David look toward you, bug-eyed and scared. You take a deep breath, chuckling quietly. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Peña freezes, eyes widening briefly before leaning forward. “Now, listen–”

“You want me to whore myself out? For your little side mission? Like I’m some piece of meat?” Your voice is increasing in volume, Jason wincing at the sound of you wobbling through the last few words. He knew how you felt being used as bait while in Miami, and now it seemed to be happening all over again. 

“Everyone out.” Peña glared at Jason and David, waiting for them to file out of his office, and shut the door tightly behind them. 

When his eyes find you, he stays frozen while you remain stoic. He takes a deep breath, cursing under his breath briefly. “I need you to help me out, here.”

You attempt to not scoff. “Why the fuck should I be doing anything you say?”

“You don’t have to actually do anything.” He’s earnest, stepping closer to you while one hand rests on his hip. 

You can’t help the emotion lacing your voice. “You’re kidding.” Shaking your head, you open your arms wide. “How do you expect me to get anywhere without actually offering up anything?”

He growls in irritation, taking another step toward you. “I just need you to stakeout-talk to the men that come back into town, and get a feel for it. When things get heavier we will send Jason and David out.”

You stare at Peña for another minute, waiting to see if he flinches. If you can see the shift, the change of mind. When you don’t, you sigh. “I’m taking the rest of the day off.”

It’s like a blow to the chest as he steps back. “What?”

“You heard me.” You snarl, opening the door so Jason and David can hear your announcement as well. 

As you step out, not waiting to see if Peña has anything else to say, Jason follows you to the elevator. “I’ll talk to him, don’t–”

“It’s fine, Jason.” You sigh, shaking your head. “I just need to get in the right mindset. Don’t worry about it; I don’t want you telling Peña anything.”

He shuffles, holding the elevator open. “Are you sure? He’s such a hard ass to you, maybe if I tell him what you told me he would change up his plans…”

You give him a forced smile, grabbing his wrist and pulling it out of the way. “It’s fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

As the elevator door slides closed with a small wave from Jason, you see Peña’s eyes watching, assessing the interaction. As the door shuts, you take a deep breath and exhale, trying to recenter yourself before stepping into the parking garage. 

You had an inkling of who it would be when you heard a knock on your door a few hours later. You sit on your couch, silent as you wait, and hope that Peña will just walk away. He will understand that you need space. 

You had already cried the minute you stepped over the threshold, feeling that pit in your stomach that you always got when you stepped out onto the docks in Miami. How hands and lips felt against your heated skin where you didn’t want them–

“Hermosa,” Peña calls through your door, jiggling the handle to test if it is locked. “I know you’re there. Let me in.”

You sigh again, waiting for another knock before slinking over to the door and quietly unlocking the deadbolt. He hears it, pushing open the door quickly after and coming face to face with you. 

He huffs, kicking the door shut and shrugging out of his suit jacket. “Were you not going to let me in?”

“No.” You say quietly, sitting on your couch and back down to the book you have bookmarked with a receipt from the corner store. 

He’s silent, standing above you while you refuse to make eye contact. He’s waiting for you to break, but you’re too tired to. When he finally caves, you try to control your lips from ticking up in the corners. “I really need this, hermosa.”

You pick at your fingernails, patiently waiting. 

He sighs again. “There’s a lot of money on the line. Like, millions, if what I’ve been told is correct. The local guys, they’re getting paid on the side by this guy and I need someone in there.”

He’s pacing now, back and forth in front of your coffee table. 

You break your silence, leaning back and crossing your arms. “What’s in it for me?”

Peña pauses, turning to you. He looks flustered, hands having run through his hair by how it sticks out away from the side of his head. “Cash. Cold, hard cash.” 

You chuckle, shaking your head. “So, I will really be a whore then, won’t I?”

He frowns, shaking his head. “No, I don’t want you doing that.” He stretches his neck, clicking his tongue in disgust. “You just, pretend. Don’t do anything crazy–”

You feel anger bubble up inside, over your tongue, and spitting out at him. “You don’t fucking get it, do you?” 

He freezes, shocked in front of you. 

“I don’t get to just say no. I have to be stronger to say no. I have to be strapped to say no. I have to be cute enough to say no. I can’t just not do something once I’ve pretended to offer those things, Javi. These aren’t college boys trying to not catch a rape charge.”

He waits, biting the inside of his mouth as he grows more frustrated. He must know you’re right, must understand what he’s asking you to do. “I won’t let them.” He says quietly, flicking his gaze up to yours. “You have my word, hermosa.”

“I can’t trust that.” You feel worn and tired of the argument. You’ve resigned to the fact that you will have to do this if you plan on keeping your job, and you do plan on it. “I’ll do what you ask of me. It’s my job.”

“I won’t let them touch you.” He growls, reaching forward and squeezing your arms so tightly you squeak. “You’re not going to get hurt in this. I won’t allow it.”

It’s pitiful, really, how you want to laugh in his face. He doesn’t understand, because he’s a man. No matter his reputation with working girls, he doesn’t know. You attempt to pull away from him, but his fingers dig harder into your skin. “Go home, Peña.”

He clicks his tongue at you, tilting his head as if to threaten you. “What happened to Javi, bonita?”

You go to protest, trying and failing again to pull away as he pushes you toward your couch. You clumsily sit back, frowning at him. “I’ll do the job. It’s fine–”

“Lay back.” He barks, kneeling in front of you, his fingers working quickly at the button of your pants. 

You shake your head, resting your hand over his in a silent question. 

He ignores you, pulling the waistline over your hips and down your thighs, underwear soon following as cool air wicks over your skin. You shiver, the contact of his warm fingers, calloused over and rough, over your skin has your legs relaxing wide. 

He lifts one leg easily over his shoulder, smirking when his eyes land on your center. Without further warning, his tongue swipes up your folds, spreading you wide with a groan. “I can’t stop wanting this.”

You throw your head back, unsure if what he said was meant for himself or for you. Words are stuck in your throat, fingers wrapped tightly in his hair, and pulling as his tongue swirls over your clit and down to your center. You want to tell him to keep going, to make you come, but you’re afraid that if you voice your want he will retreat from you. 

One hand squeezes into the skin of your thigh resting on his shoulder, his other working the buttons of his shirt open before coming to your entrance with a sigh. He lets his tongue rest there for a moment, pressing in with the tip and letting you contract around him.  

Javi pulls away, muttering under his breath as he slides one finger into you, a quick “Fuck, so wet for me.” before wrapping his lips around your clit again. 

You swear he would be laughing at you for how quickly you crumbled to his touch if he wasn’t busy with his mouth around you. “Please, I–”

Another smirk appears as he pulls away, curling his fingers inside you to search for that spot he has found again and again. “I won’t let you come,” He breathes, pressing a kiss to your shaking thigh. “Unless you agree to the job.”

You huff, breaths labored and your stomach tightens. “I already agreed.”

“Nuh-uh, mean it hermosa.” He nips your skin, chuckling as your hips jump in an attempt to get away, only pressing his fingers deeper. “Be my little slut, and I’ll share the cash with you.”

You close your eyes to try to focus, his fingers pressing, pressing, pressing against that spot inside of you that he has an obsession with, holding your breath. It’s overwhelming, the pressure in your core building and overheating. 

Sweat pools in the dip of your collarbone, the shirt you still have on soaking it up as you pull on his hair again. “Yes, yes–fuck. I’ll do it.” 

Javi hums, leaning forward again to press his lips to your center, his tongue and fingers working in tandem as a wave of ecstasy crashes over your skin. 

You’re floating, feeling him slow between your legs and breathe against your skin. He says something you can’t really hear, gently setting your leg down on the floor before adjusting himself. A pointed look is thrown your way, your furrowed brow indicating that you didn’t hear him. 

He shakes his head, wiping at his mustache for a moment. “Stakeout starts next week.”

[alternativeminiatures]

Ok, let's talk about Lost In Space.

In the early 2000's there wasn't as much 40k fanfiction as today, you had Turn Signals on a Land Raider, and... I really can't remember. But I do remember Lost In Space!

This is probably one of my favorite 40k comics, even if it only has around 50 strips and never was completed. Sadly the website was nuked on january 2006, and nowadays, it's a bit hard to find all its published content. But hey, guess what? I'm a data hoarder, and found almost all the comic on my external hard drive, and the four strips I didn't have, I found them on a russian website, in russian, but @varanguard did me the favour of translating them back to english.

So, what now? I think I'm going to put it here with tags, so people can find it; lost media is something we should take more seriously, books, videogames, series, music, etc... all human creation should have a place.

What happened to the website? I asked a friend if he remembers and he told me back then James was throwing a fit about copyright, and closed many fan content websites, so yeah, it could be the answer.

And what about the author? Ok, this is a complex subject. Technically, the last we know about the author is a post on DeviantArt where they talks about getting a copy of all the strips and wanting to publish them there, they started on september 2006, and the last one is from october 2006, there are only 11 strips, I think I have near 80 between LiS, Meanwhile and Grail Quest.

Soooo... I still wanted to know if it was ok to put the comic here, and you see, I am a very good internet sleuth, very good, so good that from a complete stranger putting funny drawings on the internets 20 years ago, now I may know their complete name, where they live, where they work, I got 4 different emails and their work telephone number*. And at this point I realized I had jumped head first without parachute into creepy territory (I blame my autism, when you focus onto something it's hard to know when to stop).

And now, contacting the author with the information I got that they didn't put out there to be contacted, to talk about something they haven't talked about for almost 20 years, feels disturbing, like crossing 30km of red lines and boundaries, and way worse than putting the comic out there without their permission.

I think I'm going to follow the spirit of their last post and share the comic, but if somebody has any idea, comment or observation, please, let me know.

*be vigilant about your internet privacy and what you put out there!! I'm just a basic nerd and was able to get all that information with just google! All the people telling you to be careful are not paranoid, they know how easy is to find information about somebody!

[x-mendacium]

Started to think about MePhone in relation to my own experiences again, specifically the fact the running away from home rewires your brain.

Good timezone. My name is Niall Dashiell, and I am still seen as a runaway by my county. I’m a lot better now though, so don’t worry!

It’s nice to meet you!

Enough with introduction, let’s move on to some MePhone stuff. Keep in mind all is based on my own subjective experiences!

Running away from home, especially one you see as abusive, does a lot of things to your way of thinking.

The biggest thing I noticed was definitely a large shift in my identity. Things I once just found interesting suddenly clawed their way to being the foundation of my identity.

iPhones are interesting? Well, now I find extreme pleasure in learning about them. Especially the two from 2011 and 2012.

PLUR culture? Guess where my style is now.

Early 2000 internet? Yes! Gimmie blinkies, old web, and stamps!

I’m not exactly sure if it was regression or my neurodivergence (though, I also hc MePhone as neurodivergent, so it fits) but still. My whole identity became this. All because I wanted to change myself, and distance myself, from the old me.

If we consider MePhone went through the same mental gymnastics of finding himself again that I did, it isn’t that out of pocket to think this is the reason he landed on reality shows.

He was interested in them. Check. It was a way to build his confidence back. Check. And it was also a way to feel like he had control over something in his life. Check.

It’s the perfect solution.

I would go for it if I could.

Another thing it does is the “I was independent. I need to stay independent”. Basically it makes your think that since you saved yourself once beforey you don’t need to be saved by someone else.

I have even more trouble accepting help than I had before. It’s hard to realize I even need help after I thought of a whole plan to safe myrself and it worked.

Why would I, or in this case MePhone, need help? I saved myself when nobody else did.

This whole thing goes hand in hand with not being able to hold up relationships of any kind.

You don’t wanna get to attached, because your brain has already decided that running away worked and you’ll do it again if anything, even the slightest thing, does wrong. You don’t wanna be sad, and don’t want the person to be sad as well.

It’s hard to keep relationships with this in my head.

So yeah, one reason why Inanimate Insanity exists might be the fact that MePhone ran away and didn’t get kicked out or something.

But this was just a collection of thoughts I’ve been having.

See you soon! (On another MePhone post probably.)

[interdimensionaldrey-blog]

That one is in Danger, So This one has awoken...

So i figured I'd cash in some of my street cred as #TLOUBestie of @justagalwhowrites and post my playlist here. Making playlists is a bit of an artistic hobby of mine, I used to DJ for an internet radio station in the more wild west era of internet forums before social media. I really enjoy putting together music that vibes with itself and that transitions well.

Anyways, this being my art blog it seems like the prime place to lay out my thoughts.

So! This concept had been in my mind for some time, but when Kit told me she was writing the hospital scene of #Lavender, as her muse, I decided to put this together for the occasion.

All the songs in the playlist can really serve to fit anywhere in the violent protector narrative, its designed to make a continuous loop, but here Im going to try and paint but a single, generic way of experiencing the playlist, if one is in need of some inspiration.

The playlist

1: I.Dogma

■The track: OKAY BEAR WITH ME. Pretend youve never heard of the famous video game DOOM or its excellent 2016 remake. This track still has some powerful ambience and chilling voice work. For the sake of our story well take this completely out of context and adopt DOOM SLAYER for our subject.

●The Concept: So there is a being. Its violence and deeds are legendary, enough so that the history of its actions are recorded and passed down amongst others with whispers of fear. The terror people with knowledge of this being have is matched only by their reverence for what it accomplished. The Doomslayer.

2: The End is the Beginning is the End

■The Track: okay so... ugh. I hate this version of the song.

This song was originally written about Batman for the ill fates early 2000s Shumaker version of the film with primetime-medical-drama-star George Clooney... it was pretty bad. Uma Thurman was the key preformance in that film

I digress, ive had the original in my music catalouge for some time and I love it. It has a heavy, frantic, snare heavy rock beat layered with twisting guitar chorsa, and haunting vocals singing about some legendary weirdo trying to change a world it hates.

BUT THAT VERSION ISNT AVAILABLE ON SPOTIFY. 😤😤

The version on spotify sounds like their grandma bought them a distortion pedal for the first time. Im guessing its licensing issues but still, not my fav.

●The Concept: Here we have the being as remembered by legend. The stories people tell, the traumas others remember. The Doom Slayer is larger than life, an inspiration to some and a warning to others. To believe his existence by the tales of those who know of him one might almost think the doom slayer a lively one, capable of anything.

3. The Beginning is the End is the Beginning

■The Track: The yang to the ying of these songs here we have the same or similar lyrics... but drawn out into a sluggish, desperate, cynical tone. There is an air of dread in the sounds and low frequencies of this piece. The vocals are almost sinister in nature as if making fun of the subject of the song.

●The Concept: Here we have the reality of the legend. The stories arent false persay, maybe a bit embellished. But the reality is the Doom Slayer lives a life of silent suffering, having entered a state torpor for whatever reason. There is currently balance and they dont think, simply idle in their sludge of an existence. Perhaps the giant sleeps beneath mountains or the dragon in a volcano, maybe a legendary killer lives a quiet life of smuggling and emotionlessly burning the bodies of euthanized children... days only seperated by drug induced nights of dreamless sleep.

Whatever the circumstance its beloved is not with it and not within reach. The quiet acceptance fills its life with a void, but this void balances the fire asleep within.

4: Counting Bodies Like Sheep to the Rhythm of the War Drums

■The Track: An acid bath of sounds and beats that build on top of each other with a chaotic and violent sound. Dread and fear become present in the ominous marching sound of the melody as a sweet voice begins singing sinister reasaurances of ownership and protection. Its clear the voice is passionate about its care of the subject, but its motives are questionable. This isnt a song about the healthy kind of protection, its the kind of protection that doesnt ask the protectee if they want to be protected.

●The Concept: The balance is broken.

Perhaps it was a flood of memories. Perhaps a rumor of the beloveds location. Perhaps another who is like the beloved, but is not, is thrust into the arms of the doom slayer. Maybe even there is a distant cry for help... real or imagined.

Whatever the reason, there is an awakening. A growing pulse, the fanning flames, the start of an avalanche.

5. Betrayal/Forgiveness

■The Track: Apocalyptica is a electric string quartet that does a lot of covers of death metal songs, with a focus on melody and showing off the actual complexity of the music. This track, is hard to describe. It makes me imagine two Bucks fighting with their antlers, ant colonies going to war, lions hunting... there is fury and power. In the controlled chaos order emerges in a raspy melody laid amongst the sounds of ripping and tearing.

●The Concept: In the time spent in Torpor confines have grown around the being. Perhaps its the mountains of stone and vines, layers of obsidian hardnened atop. Maybe our doom slayer is in a city or a facility, imprisoned or exiled. Wherever they are they are not free to pursue their beloved, and so there is a purging.

Tragically in this stage it may not be the ones who deserve it who feel the wrath of the doom slayer simply being in the way at the wrong time. Nevertheless the way is opened and perhaps there is mourning, but in the end there is nothing that can contain this one when its beloved is in danger.

6: One Way Or Another

■The Track: The original is such a catchy, poppy, almost sarcastic hit that its easy to not concider what the songs about. But slow it down? Drop the key to a minor and give it that thriller movie trailer sound? The songs meaning becomes much creepier.

●The Concept: Awoken and no longer restrained there is a calm in the storm. The being takes a moment to reaffirm its intents and desires. Its one purpose renewed fills its being and it prepares internally, fully dedicating its entire existence to the one thing that still makes it burn.

7: Chokka

■The Track: More Apocalyptica, borrowing on the same kind of tense sounds theyre so good at making with an electric cello.

The song has a sense foreboding about it layered with a high pitched piano riff. It manages to say so much without a single word and its beautiful for what it does.

●The Concept: The hunt begins. The doomslayer sets out after whatever awokened it, following a lead, returning to a location, listening to the cries. Whoever you are, wherever you are... it is coming for you. You have taken the beloved, you have harmed the beloved... you are a threat to the beloved. It will find the information, it will believe you when you scream out what it wants to hear. Closer and closer it nears with the first targets if its ire in sight.

8. Die MF Die

■The Track: Ugh. I wish I had better things to say about this track. It was so fucking popular in the military, every fucking daddy issue, toxic masculinity, overcompensating, gun toting, proud boy, soldier cuck wanted to play this song as they rolles out the gate to live out their murdee fantasies.

That aside, the song does a decent job capturing the almost... joyful... demeanor of a predator who has caught its quarry.

●The Concept: The first real conflict. Whatever our being has been hunting it has found a quarry. This is the time for violence and the being is intimately familiar with the process.

9. Dirt Room

■The Track: Blue October who hurt you? This song feels so personal to me. When I listen to it I almost feel bad, like im witnessing something intimate such as seeing somebody else in a hard therapy session.

This songs overall story is a revenge fantasy about burying somebody alive. Id complement the metaphors in this song but, ahhhh Im fairly certain everything said is quite literal.

●The Concept: Theres more to our being than unkempt violence. Information is valuable and will be the way to the beloved. Here we find the insane mind of the doom slayer open and his hate laid bare like a set of tools working at the next barrier lying between them and their goal. May god have mercy on those in its path who survive the fight to be questioned by the being.

10: The Only Thing They Fear is You

■The Track: Spotify licensing agreements strike again. The only thing available on spotify are shittty covers. And sure while they do a good job of playing the song on guitar the problem is the original is preformed by a computer. It blends sounds not possible with acoustic instruments.

I fucking love the original so much. Some of the heaviest, intense, melodic, acid rock tracks ive ever heard. The only version that truly does this song justice is the original:

●The Concept: The climax of the encounter so to speak. The search is over and the beloved has been found. There are no more questions as to where it needs to go, there is only the question of what is in its way, and the answer the being brings is incredible violence. They will resist and fight with all their might, but ultimately they are all aware of the fulity of their efforts and when the mist of blood settles there is only the open path of the doom slayer as it continues forward, unyieilding.

11: Light the City Up

■The Track: You know theres not a whole lot of tracks i can find that really embody the idea "Id burn down the whole city to keep you safe" but this song comes pretty close.

Fun fact, this song isnt on the soundtrack for Spiderman:Across the Universe because production of that movie was a mess, but this is the song played in the giant chase sequence in the spider HQ between a the different spidermen

●The Concept: The story blurs in the blood lust as the being continues his conquest burning down everything in its path. There is literally nothing it wouldnt destroy to keep the one it loves safe and those still foolish enough to stop it begin to learn why the legends were written in the first place.

Here the brush strokes of my story grow broader as therea less form to the songs and their intent. The story begins to swing more wildly in its respective directions as the being desperation grows with the beloved just outside of his grip.

12. Stompbox

■The Track: You can rely on the Qemists to give you some good frantic chase music. This track has no vocals aside from one desperate scream thats overlaid in a few spaces. Still this song gives me the feel of a hostile confrontation at high intensity.

●The Concept: The home stretch. The recovery of the beloved. Reaching the goal. The accumulates momentum of our being finally reaches its moment of critical mass and barrels through the finish line. Perhaps this the final guard, the boss of the ememies... maybe its a final test or a desperate dash to saftey. Whatever it is, it does not stop the being.

13. Tension 2

■The Track: I love me some blue man group. Following the flow of chase music this track pulls out all the stops in portraying anxiety inducing stress and tension. Beats of different speeds overlaid with fast paced bass rhythms blends with the patter of drums.

●The concept: Take the money and run. The being has what it came for. The beloved is honored, the balance is restored... but now is the time to get out. Get the beloved safe. Now is the time to avoid the crashing waves of consequences that swing in from all sides to try and once again seperate what has been rejoined.

14: Rip and Tear

■The Track: More acid rock from Mick Gordon. Another one of those songs that manages to push such vvid imagery without ever saying a word. Theres a confidence in the sound of this track, but also an underlying doubt and anxiety. High pitched siren like sounds mix with a heartbeat like pattern.

●The Concept: Gutteral tones convey the desperate and intense violence of fighting with every once of being. Tooth, nail, knife, fist and spit, this is the last stand of a cornered animal. The full fury of the legend is brought forth in events which new mythologys will be written about by whats left of those close enough to behold its power.

15: Blahhhh blah blah. "Stone Men Song"

■The Track: So this is the end credits song that plays after Jorah and Tyrion are jumped by the stone men and Tyrion appears to sink into the depths of the river, his hands bound. The screen cuts to black and this song plays.

To me it conveys the horror of a situation you cant control and that has gone horribly wrong.

●The Concept: This is not a comedy but a tragedy. Despite whatever best efforts and good intentions of the being, it finds itself in a situation it cannot control. The consequences of its actions have accumulated to a point tbhat in its horror it finds itself ripped from its goals.

16: Ebla

■The Track: A fusion blend of rock beats with synthetic classical overlays and a choir singing in latin. Its not quite hopeful but not quite defeated. Its a somber song that echoes the beauty of love that can create such violence as well as a reminder of its costs.

●The Concept: The ode to the doomslayer. Whatever end its story met, if an end at all and not simply the start of the next cycle, it now once again rests in silent suffering. Its purpose fuffilled and perhaps its time cut short, for whatever reason this chapter ends. The night grows silent and the only light is the glow of the smoldering ruins the doomslayer has left in its wake.

-------

Awww look at you. You sat through all of that! Thanks!

I hope you enjoyed that and that this playlist helps you fuel your own creative art.

BONUS

If you genuinely enjoyed this playlist and want more ive got good news! I have an extended version of the playlist that kit has assured me is "Extended like Lord of the rings, not Star wars"

So for sitting through all that, youve unlocked it!

[budgie-city]

THE ORIGINS OF BUDGIE CITY

Welcome to this informational article where I will be explaining what exactly this "Budgie City" is, where it came from, and in which direction it will be going. So, sit down comfortably - there are some interesting things waiting ahead of you! If you are interested in the lore, visit this article.

What exactly is "Budgie City"?

It is a fictional world that I am actively developing. At the moment, I’m in the process of writing it in the form of a paper draft. I write long texts by hand, and it seems to me that spelling out each letter, unlike typing, helps to approach the composition of sentences more thoughtfully, and to more successfully avoid strange and crooked constructions that will then have to be rewritten and corrected. It is far from the final, but I want to warm up people's interest in this world before the release of a full-fledged work, which is what I am doing now. I will not publish too many pieces of text until I have finished the story completely (though I probably will show some sneak-peeks). For now the content on "Budgie City" is mostly limited to drawings — concepts, sketches and character designs. Gradually, I've been starting to bring this topic to my YouTube channel in order to introduce the setting and concept to my viewers.

You may have seen my first video of Budgie City since 2014, which I have released quite recently — “I am not insane”, a video that focuses on one of the secondary conflicts of the story.

Where did this concept even come from?

It's quite a long story, and it's funny that this year is the ten year anniversary of me registering on the forum called "Budgie City". Yes, it all started with a regular internet forum — a by now almost extinct site format, which in the early 2000s and until about 2016-17 was the main place for interest groups on the internet. Now this has moved almost completely to social media, but before almost any hobby or interest had its own forum with different sections and topics. It saddens me a little that the golden age of forums has already passed.

In 2012, for the New Year, my parents bought me my first budgie — a classic green one, and I named him Gesha. At that time, I was not a regular "user" of the Internet yet. I only started to comprehend the vastness of the virtual network a few months later, and at first it leaned purely on me viewing memes in Google pictures and all sorts of videos on YouTube.

But in the spring of 2013, I discovered these wonderful things known as forums. And it was that point in time when I, having had a budgie with me for a year, decided to find a forum thematically fitting. Upon the request from my country, Google led me straight to the “Budgie City” forum.

The topics on there were something like rooms in a big house. The users randomly surfed through them and followed each other's daily lives. Therefore, Budgie City did actually feel really like being in a virtual society where everyone knows each other. I was getting used to the frequent people, getting to know each person individually. I went to their topics to write comments and answers, they wrote in mine. That's how we existed as this cozy club of interests.

There is an interesting thing with almost every child that is on the Internet — no matter where, in which community — a person with the admin/moder status is perceived as an absolute authority, any response from which causes awe and delight. And there were certain, more active and sociable admins in Budgie City — Anya under the nickname "Phoenix Bird" and Olga under the nickname "Olivka". The "Phoenix Bird" nickname spoke for itself — the image of a large bird of fire that walks around the city and receives admiring glances from everyone, was drawn in my head almost instantly. Olivka didn't have an image yet; I started turning her into a character much later.

Phoenix and Olivka in their modern designs (2022)

In the early summer of 2014, I read "Warrior Cats", and that’s where the whole story took off. I suddenly felt like I should become a writer too and write my own book. And 12-year-old me, who was spending 80% of my online traffic on the forum, decided to write a story, turning part of the admin staff and the budgies of familiar forum members into their own characters. Phoenix and Olivka turned into birds, the latter in particular acquired an image in the form of a wompoo fruit dove with olive-tinged wings, the budgies of the forum were also turned into their respective characters: Gesha and Yasha (mine); Glasha and Gosha (Hoatzin); Clementine, Jack, Fenya, Nira, Mouse, Castorka, Mithril and Small (Phoenix); Kuzya (Dmitriy68), Milana (Radujniy), Raisin (yyna) and others.

Sections of the forum have turned into parts of the city — the restaurant, the mayor's office, the registry office and nursery, and suburbs with parrots of other species, located on trees surrounding baobabs.

This is how the novel of the same name with the slogan "Feathered Metropolis" was born from the "Budgie City" forum. I posted it in its own topic, had about a dozen readers and, judging by the reviews, they all really liked reading the story. Although, looking back at the writing now... I wouldn't call it something breathtaking. Rather the opposite. But then again, I am now judging from the perspective of a third-year animation director student, and not the fifth grader I was at that time.

A couple of my original illustrations from 2014

The story was successfully brought to an end in about seven months, and after a while I started writing a sequel — however, the central conflict wasn’t thought out the slightest, so the plot quickly crumbled and was abandoned after several chapters.

Now the original text is lost in the vastness of the web — somewhere there is a piece of the prologue, somewhere even a couple of chapters. But the full version no longer exists — it was published only on the forum, and the said forum, unfortunately was — somewhere around 2019 — ruthlessly deleted from the Internet due to the desolation. All that's left of it are snapshots in the Wayback Machine.

Rewriting from the old version into a new one

In 2017, three years later, I made an attempt to rewrite "Budgie City" from scratch — leaving only the main conflict, the structure of the world, and the set of characters the same, to write a new text out of this "skeleton". Progress did not go beyond the prologue and the first chapter however, and rewriting was abandoned.

The same story with 2019 — a couple of pages, that’s all.

Two artworks from 2019

The next approach took till early 2021 to happen, when the original story turned almost six and a half years old. At that time I was already in the middle of my first year of animation directing at SPbGIKiT (Saint Petersburg State Institute of Film and Television). I wrote the prologue and part of the first chapter and went to proudly tell our master Galina Voropai about my "really cool" world. Galina interrupted me in the middle of the impromptu presentation, after which followed a forty-minute roast, thoroughly and in detail explaining that the "Budgie City" in its concept is a piece of junk that does not have the right to exist in its current form. And all this was in the presence of my classmates in the workshop. I gave up trying to defend myself halfway through, and when it was all over, I got up, quietly thanked Galina for a detailed objective analysis of the shortcomings of my project, went down to the first floor, huddled in a bathroom stall, and burst into tears.

It was the first (and yet the only) time in my life where I was literally crying over my work, and the girls from senior courses came to my howls, and we sat together on the windowsill of a public toilet. I was all red, shaking, and dropping snot, as they tried to calm me down.

(my mental state that day)

After that, I did not return to those written several pages for about a year and a half. I began to doubt whether I should continue at all or if it would just be a waste of time.

After the roast from the master, I went through all five stages of grief:

Yes, that was tough. But after so much time, I was finally able to evaluate the message of this scolding with a cool head and understand that most of the comments were actually really helpful - the conflict and the world did require a lot more careful study and rework. With the next approach, I wrote out all the conflicts, all the character motivations, and made a proper plan. And since the end of last autumn, I have returned to writing. Now I know where the story will begin, where it will head, and how it will end. All the actions performed by the heroes are finally based in actual logic. And, although Galina will not see the final result (she sadly passed away at the end of 2021), I hope that the new version will be one that she would have approved of.

A small FAQ:

Q: When will the book be released?

A: I don't want to make any promises as of now, because writing is a rather spontaneous and uneven process. I write more when I am inspired, and inspiration is impossible to predict. So the answer is simple — it will come out when it's finished :D

Q: Will it be released electronically or in a printed book form? Will I have to pay for reading it?

A: I plan to release the final version "Budgie City" in the same way as the old one — in open access, so that everyone can read it at any time. I will not charge money for reading the electronic version, but if there will be a demand for physical copies, I may release a small print run, which will cost money for those who want to get a copy. But it's a little early to think about that anyway.

Q: How does the world in Budgie City work? How do they live? What is the main conflict of the story?

A: All of this you can find out in this article!

Q: Where can I find more content to this world and story?

A: On this very blog or on my YouTube channel

I hope this article was helpful and informative enough for you to know where "Budgie City" comes from and in which direction it is currently heading. Thank you for reading!

Huge thanks to @annchanorsomethin for helping with translation of this article!

[jammofsammichflip]

•°^:Sukuna Headcanon hear me out:^°•

Modern!Nerd! Sukuna who's into creepy pasta and (early) internet horror and is weirdly extremely obsessed with Marble Hornets.

Like he puts together Halloween costumes of Ticci Toby, Eyeless Jack and Alex Kralie and somehow n o o n e gets the references??

He calls them stupid morons with no good interests but his big, nerdy, gremlin ass stays awake at night foaming at the mouth about Ben Drowned theories.

Like obsessed with Marble Hornets to the point that he tries to find the filming locations for some godforsaken reason to see if there are any clues but he can't figure out the locations because the videos were made in the late 2000s before the areas were developed.

Hell, just plain Nerd! Sukuna who gets reeaaaallly good grades but keeps them under the table because he needs to uphold an image of himself that big and bad and brutal but even though it would actually help if people also knew he could beat them with words he needs to think it was his own idea first.

Also he'e a jock I've just decided. He plays (American) football, Rugby and Hockey because they're pretty brutal and he does boxing/mma/martial arts on the side

How does he fit any of this shit in his schedule?

Fuck if I know!

Anyways that's it lmao bye

[thatguywhodoesstuff]

Some thoughts about the in-universe “Amazing Digital Circus”

I’ve been seeing a lot of people posit a lot of interesting theories about the exact nature of the Circus and it’s relevance to the show’s universe, and after a brief conversation with @robotoast03, I’ve come to some conclusions of my own:

The Amazing Digital Circus is an in-universe urban legend

My working theory is that TADC was a VR video game being developed as some sort of gaming revolution in the field of player immersion and interaction through VR headsets, but it was shelved and fell by the wayside after a number of “unfortunate workplace accidents”. Because of the nature of the “accidents”, the C&A company probably sunk a lot of time and resources into covering them up, more than likely leading to it closing down because of bankruptcy and/or controversy. Sometime after all of this occurred, either because someone from the company leaked information or there was an ad campaign prior to the coverups and the company going under, people started looking into TADC. This inevitably caused more people to meet the unfortunate fate of getting trapped in the VR world, which quickly led to a “Lavender Town Syndrome” or “Polybius” style rumor about whoever played the game just disappearing not long after. As more people looked into it and started giving their personal accounts and opinions, it eventually spiraled into a full blown conspiracy theory that is heatedly debated on certain corners of the internet, which could have had a hand in most of the cast getting trapped.

This theory has also led me to another idea (buckle up, it’s gonna get weird):

The show takes place in a copy of the Amazing Digital Circus game, possibly the only one ever made

My reasoning for this takes into account the show’s aesthetics being similar to a 90s/early 2000s computer game and that one promotional image of Jax playing a Nintendo 64 console in a room full of paraphernalia from that era. Not to mention the rundown appearance of the C&A offices seen in the pilot and the fact those same offices use old model computers that were prevalent during the 90s, which fits the typical appearance of a long abandoned business. Given these key visual cues, I think that the in-universe game was developed at some point during that period of time, and I feel it’s reasonable to presume that the game has some of the constraints present in games of that period. Specifically that, as a 90s game (even one advanced enough to utilize VR headsets and run sentient AIs), it is unlikely that the game was connected to an online server, let alone one which multiple people playing their own copies of the game could get stuck in the same digital world through. If this really is the case, I like to think that the copy of the game was somehow indirectly passed down from one member of the cast to the next.

Edit: A thought that just crossed my mind that could back up this theory: if The Amazing Digital Circus game was well known in-universe and ran on an online server, more people would regularly be getting trapped. Given how everyone acted when Pomni showed up, it would stand to reason that a new performer showing up is a rather infrequent occurrence. From as far as I can ascertain, there has been less then twenty performers in the circus including the main cast, and each of them probably appeared one at a time, with perhaps some exceptions here and there.

TLDR: I probably just word vomited a lot of nonsense, but I thought I should share it. If anyone else has any ideas for or against this theory, I’m more than happy to hear them.

[spectralsleuth]

🧩🎨☁️🏜️❄️🍬💌🥑

WHOAH WE GOT A BIG ONE HERE

🧩 ⇢ what will make you click away from a fanfiction immediately?

Disclaimer: every piece of fanfiction is a gift from an angel. I love it all, because no matter how cringe or silly it is, the alternative is that fic NOT existing and that is unacceptable to me. That goes for any art.

Okay salty little hater time: Who the fuck started saying "greenette" or "pinkette" to stand in as an indicator for a person with a certain hair color. It is the new "orbs" in fanfiction. I literally have backed out of a fic, walked around a bit, and then gone back in resigned. It's so funny and I actually think of it really fondly, because it's a symptom of fandom the same was all the old fic tropes back in the early 2000's were. But god it even hurt me to write out. Weird formatting and paragraphs breaks I can adjust to pretty easily.

🎨 ⇢ link your favourite piece of fanart and explain why you like it

THIS TAROT SERIES FROM KAYSON (@tangledinink) They picked all of the series perfectly for the cards, they didn't just half heartedly pick the aesthetics that fit, and every single one is absolutely GORGEOUS. The style fits in with the other art/fics perfectly while still having that special little background/detail flair that Kayson likes to use. Fantastic. ('Strength' for LSoW Yoshi was an inspired pick as well. Love it.)

MATCHING BEST IS THIS COMIC by @cool-chocolatebouquet A whole comic! On one of my fave parts of mine and @alicat54cwriting's crossover??? So funny and good.

☁️ ⇢ what made you choose your username?

My username was 'spectralsleuth' for a while because I had thoughts of making a webcomic series about a detective who is dead, and was brain rotted by Homestuck naming conventions. (Which in itself was a satire of early 2000's internet culture, only dramatized.) That never happened, but the name stuck for all my accounts because I'm too lazy to think of a new one.

'audioEidolon' was what I started with on discord forever ago, and I wasn't ever planning to talk to anyone on voice chat because I was shy. (Thus the 'audio eidolon' name.) But I made some really good friends playing DnD and we talk almost every day, and have done for almost seven years now. So I guess my internet nickname will forever be 'Audio' or 'Audi'.

🏜️ ⇢ what's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work?

I love comments that pull out a line they specifically liked, or struck them. Maybe it's selfish, but I like seeing the specific things they liked because THAT'S the kind of comment that you think about while writing and forever after. (Despite how nice and easy as generalized comments are. I love all comments!) I even prefer comments that pull a specific line to say they didn't understand it, or noticed it was a little weird or out of place over generic ones, because it shows that they're invested and actually internalizing the writing. In this day and age of bots and AI, it's nice.

❄️ ⇢ what's your dream theme/plot for a fic, and who would write it best?

MAN THIS IS A TOUGH ONE. Every time I think, wow I wish that fic existed, I generally write it myself! I really can't think of anything I've wanted that I haven't at least started to write myself.

🍬 ⇢ post an unpopular opinion about a popular fandom character

Oh man I don't know if I even HAVE an unpopular opinion about a popular fandom character? My 2003 Leonardo opinions are surprisingly rare I think, he's one of my favorite TMNT characters of all time, and I think he and ROTTMNT Leonardo actually have the MOST in common between their counterparts. I never understood those crossovers where Leo and Leonardo were so bewildered by each other.

💌 ⇢ how many unread emails do you have right now? 

ZERO BABEY. So I actually have OCD and notification stress me out really bad. Like make my tummy hurt and I dream about them. This is the notifications for all three of my main email accounts:

Ignore the ranchers I'm too lazy to crop, the photo widget has like 100 pieces of fanart I really like for all my fandoms. (Natural evolution from printing pictures at the school library to put in your see through binder cover)

🥑 ⇢ you accidentally killed somebody, which mutual(s) do you text for help?

@heckitall honestly? Not because we are besties (WE ARE) but I think Heck would have genuine logical knowledge and together we could figure things out and how to hide the body. (Heck hmu I got a job for you.)

[sunburnacoustic]

Muse full gigs

Some full shows that are available, for anyone who wants to partially relive the Muse live experience.

I figured no one's made lists in a while.

La Cigale, Paris By-Request gig 2018

rarities + I guarantee I'm gonna fuck up Space Dementia + water spitting + Matt and Dom playing Grammy hosts in the way they announced the winners of the by-request polls

Some cool and noteworthy gigs:

Live Lounge 2012

The Mayan 2015 (performance wise this gig was stunning)

Royal Albert Hall 2008 (Teenage Cancer Trust charity gig - Megalomania on the pipe organ!)

Reading Festival 2011 (10 years of Origin of Symmetry - played the album start to finish)

AOL Sessions 2006

Reading 2006 (Muse's first time headlining if I remember right. Plus, Matt's moves!)

Glastonbury 2004 (first Glasto headline and a must-watch! Of the iconic mad-scientist, white lab coat era. Muse had called it the best gig of their life so far, at the time) (*Ruled By Secrecy was played live but wasn't included in the concert footage DVD and isn't in this video upload either)

Montreaux Jazz 2002 (height of piano maniac-ery days. Would also recommend Pinkpop 2002 but they don't. have. the footage anymore :( Space Dementia at Pinkpop 2002 was phenomenal. 2004 is also good, but I never found 2002 again. Speaking of which,)

Pinkpop 2004 (most songs are in, a few performances missing unfortunately)

MCM Café 1999 (marvel at what a good live act this young band aged 21 already was—with about 4 years of gigging experience under their belts. Insane how good they are.)

Wembley 2007 (H.A.A.R.P. The first band to sell out the newly rebuilt Wembley Stadium. 90,000 people. You need to understand, seeing Chris lift up and point his bass at the crowd at the end of the slightly modified Jimmy Jam riff before Time Is Running Out was a religious experience that changed me and we're lucky enough to live in an age where you and I can witness it over and over and over again and I'd suggest that you do)

Rock Am Ring 2018, uploaded to the Internet Archive by the Muse Historical Society!

Austin City Limits 2013 Philipshalle 1999 Philipshalle 2001 (all suggested in notes, check out the crystal clear gifs from @hotbellamy! :O )

A few additions I remembered after publishing: Eurockeennes 2000 (opened with a then-unreleased New Born. Matt playing a full gig in red sunglasses. Treat to watch. Link's stretched up to fit modern screens but if you want a bit of clarity and don't mind the late 90s ratio stretch, here's a different link) 2002 (quality's a bit shit but that is literally what telly used to look like)

Shepherd's Bush Empire 2006 (Early gigs are always interesting because over time Muse develop different ways of playing songs that are fresh off new albums. The way they work through Take A Bow live is a bit different here, Dom's the one controlling the opening verse synths! During the Abso tour, Matt would play that bit on the piano as an intro to Space Dementia and if I'm remembering right, he does now on the pianos (correct me—this was on the ST tour as well). Also, Starlight in Bm at this gig)

Big Day Out (Australia) 2004 | 2007. Muse's first tour Down Under, 2004. If you're impressed by Muse's riffage here, know that you aren't alone, Metallica's Kirk Hammett was as impressed as you are. Also I've linked 2007, presented by the V channel, featuring Matt asking a male interviewer, 'Do you feel sexy now?' and famously proclaiming that they'll look sexier in their 40s, which has been true.

Rock Werchter 2023 (Muse play Rock Werchter in Belgium almost every year, except for the pandemic and 2012 I think, but this year's was a bit special. Best performance of Madness I've seen in a while, I love what he does in the outro! MOTP returns to the set. Muse had tech troubles at the end that caused them to restart Knights of Cydonia twice, to no avail. They finally cut it back for a guitar-bass-drum-vocals-only performance of Showbiz, and Matt's voice sounds exceptional on it— the best in recent years)

Bizarre Fest 2000 (BLESS SOMEONE HAS RESTORED THIS FROM VHS TAPE IN HD, this is so much better than back in the day!! If the falsetto at 1:13 doesn't do it for you, you're into the wrong band, nothing else will help. What an electric performance this was!)

Buenos Aires 2019 (livestreamed Simulation Theory-era gig in Argentina, because the set was changed at the last minute because of adverse weather, Muse gave the audience a choice of song between Bliss and Showbiz. The crowd chose Showbiz, which the band played for... the first time since 2006 I think??)

Gigs from WOTP 2022/23 festivals tour last summer:

Nova Rock Rock In Rio Ejekt Fest Isle of Wight ALTer EGO Jan 2023 (as Muse had talked about in that iHeart Radio IG Live) Hurricane Festival 2023 (a festival at which Matt once complained that Muse's set was cut short by... hurricanes. But the audio mixing at this gig was really good!)

These are in no particular order, and obviously not complete, I just realised no one had put together a gig archive in a while so I thought I'd give it a stab!

Will edit and add others whenever, there are obviously glaring omissions still!