#endless short form video is the enemy

[onleylonely]

turns out that if you don't immediately get on your phone right after work you're able to do things with your life! what a concept!

[f1nalboys]

hiii can i request stu macher x short girl one shot? they’re in the same friend group but they don’t always get along bc stu teases her for being short and she thinks he’s supa annoying (but there’s obvi tension) its kinda enemies to lovers type beat so their besties (tatum and billy) try setting them up. thanks!!!

hi there! thank you so much for the req, I hope you enjoy it! got a bit carried away so it’s a little longer than anticipated o_o

WORD COUNT: 1921

WARNINGS: none

As the third paper ball of the hour bounces off of your head onto the floor, you begin to form a plan to kill Stu Macher, who was currently crunching up another sheet of paper, and your English teacher for sitting you in front of him.

“Stu, if you throw another one of those at me I’m going to cut your hands off,” You say, turning around in your seat. Stu was smiling wide, his eyes crinkled, tossing the paper ball from hand to hand. Billy and Tatum sat next to you two, though they were busy arguing amongst themselves, probably about something stupid. “What the hell do you want?”

“Just wanted to talk, munchkin, that's all,” Munchkin. You glare at him which earns you a laugh in response; he always laughed at you when you were angry. The paper he was holding drops onto his desk and he rests his head in both of his hands, peering at you with his annoyingly blue eyes. “You still coming over with everyone for movie night?”

“Yes, she is. Isn’t that right, Y/N?” Tatum says abruptly, answering for you. She gives you a smile and raises her eyebrows, something you’ve come to know to mean ‘just agree.’ You moved to Woodsboro three years ago and became fast friends with her, which in turn helped you befriend the rest of the group. You sigh, nodding your head.

“Good! I’m picking a scary one so make sure you sit next to me.” He winks and for some reason, you feel your face heating up. You roll your eyes, ignoring the way your heart had skipped a beat at the sight.

“And why the hell am I doing that?”

“So I can protect you!” The bell cuts his sentence off and you were glad; you didn’t want to hear any more of it. You and Stu got along fine, but god did he get on your fucking nerves. With all of the short jokes, stupid nicknames, and the endless flirting, it was a miracle you hadn’t killed him the first month you had shown up. 

You grab the things off your desk, following behind Tatum as you walk out of class. You were finally free from the hell that is high school. The only problem, you realize after Stu rests his arm on top of your head, is that you were still stuck with this asshole. Tatum laughs as you shove him hard, sending him stumbling to his right. 

“Alright lovebirds, let’s not get too handsy; theres still people,” Billy says and Stu lets out a low whistle, wiggling his eyebrows at you. You smile at him mockingly, flipping him the bird. Sidney wraps an arm around your shoulder as she catches up to the group and gives you a quick squeeze. “Now hurry your asses up; I’m not spending three hours at the fucking video store.”

“Relax, we’re gonna make it with so much time to spare it’ll blow your head off,” Stu says, sticking his tongue out, something you notice he does a lot. The weather was finally becoming bearable and the sun was due to set any minute now. To you, winter was the perfect season; the day ended early and gave you plenty of time to do whatever the hell you wanted instead of whatever the hell you needed to get done.

The video store was packed despite getting there less than twenty minutes after school let out. Billy lets out a quiet stream of curse words, smacking the back of Stu’s head before heading straight to the horror section. You watch with a soft smile as your friends go their separate ways, each finding a movie section for them to pursue. Ever since you joined the group, it had become a weekly tradition to have a movie night every Friday after school. 

Everyone got to pick a movie and, after ordering pizza and loading up on snacks and (the occasional) beer, you’d settle in and watch them all. It was fun, for the most part. Stu and Billy’s choices were always horror, though Stu was more likely to stray from the ‘classics,’ unlike Billy. Tatum, Sidney, and you liked to try different genres every once in a while which made the marathon bearable. 

You head over to the Thriller section, your fingers brushing over a few copies. You didn’t really know what you wanted to watch, but this section was always a safe bet. The sound of Billy and Stu’s hushed voices grab your attention and you look up and right across from you was the horror section where they stood, backs turned towards you. You leaned in slightly, straining to hear them as you pretended to search through the movies. 

“Just tell her, moron,” You heard Billy say grabbing and inspecting two videos and Stu sighs heavily. He was hunched over and for once he looked...unhappy.

“She hates me, man, I just get on her nerves. I mean, you saw the way she shoved me today; I don’t have a chance,”

“She likes you, she just doesn't know it. And if you want her to stop shoving you off of her, you might wanna stop using her as an armrest. She isn’t feeling the short jokes either, munchkin.” You watch, eyes wide, as Billy taps Stu on the arm with the movie he picked, walking away, leaving him to stand there alone. You snatch up a movie and rush towards Tatum, your heart racing. They were talking about you; who else does Stu call munchkin? Who else shoved him off of them today? 

Tatum stands in the romantic comedy section and she drops the movies she was holding when you stop right in front of her. “Jesus! What the hell’s got you in such a hurry,” Her face was twisted into annoyance until she sees the panic in your face and her features immediately soften. “What’s wrong?”

“I just heard Billy and Stu talking and I think Stu likes me.”

‘Well duh. Is that it?” You stare at her, dumbfounded. She knows? She turns back to her movies, placing a few back, deciding between two, all while you continue to stare at her. You open your mouth in an attempt to question her but you stumble over your words and she sighs. “Come on, you seriously didn’t know? It’s super obvious. Just like it’s super obvious that you like him.”

“What? I don’t like him! And he can’t like me. I mean, he makes fun of me all the time even after I’ve made it clear it pisses me off. If he liked me, wouldn’t he try and be nice?”

“Boys are stupid and their brains are small; don’t expect so much out of them. Plus, everyone but the two of you realizes you’re, like, in love or whatever.” You scoff, ignoring the way your stomach flipped at the suggestion. You did not like Stu. You couldn’t! Hell, you and he fought all the time and the only reason he interacted with you was to get under your skin! “Here comes lover boy.”

Before you can open your mouth, she’s gone, walking over to the counter where Billy and Sidney were at talking to Randy. You can feel his presence behind you and you suck in a breath, turning around. Stu’s cheeks were flushed red and he was fiddling with his necklace. Was he nervous? 

“Hey, uh, can we talk?”

“Sure.”

“Okay, cool.” He pauses for a second, an awkward laugh slipping through his lips. “So, I like, kind of been into you for a few months. Like, in a crush way, I guess. I know you don’t feel that way about me and that’s alright, I just wanted to tell you for… closure or whatever those shrinks on TV say.” 

He nods quickly and turns on his heel, attempting to flee the scene, but before he gets the chance to, you grab his forearm, holding him in place. He looks down at your hand on his arm and smiles even after you drop your hand back to your side. You bite the inside of your cheek as you sort through your feelings, taking into account the way your hand was tingling from the feel of his skin, the way your heart skipped a beat when you met his eyes. 

“I thought you hated me.” 

“What? No, oh my god,” His eyebrows shoot up in surprise, shaking his head. He rubs the back of his neck and you bite back a smile at the sight of his nervous smile. “You know I can be an ass when I’m messing around, but I really didn’t think it bothered you that much. It’s just… I think it’s cute that you’re shorter than me, you know? And the nicknames are just funny.”

“You think I’m cute?” You grin up at Stu and he rolls his eyes, nodding. He breaks out into a smile as he looks down at you and you realize something. You want to kiss him. Badly. You glance down at his lips, praying he didn’t notice, but he had. 

“Guess you think I’m cute too, eh?” You punch his shoulder gently and he grabs a hold of your hand, intertwining your fingers, leaning down, and placing a gentle kiss on your lips. You instantly sink into the kiss, your free hand coming up to rest on his shoulder. He laughs into the kiss as he takes a small step towards you, wrapping his arms around your waist, pulling you in even closer.

A wolf whistle breaks the two of you apart and you glare over at the culprit. Billy, Tatum, and Sidney all stood together a few feet away, smiles on all three of their faces. Tatum and Sidney laugh as Billy cups his hand around his mouth. “Stop sucking face and pay for your movies,”

“Shut up, dick,” Stu says, shoulder checking Billy as he passes by. The three of them follow you two up to the counter where Randy was waiting at. Thankfully he didn’t say anything, though you could tell that he really wanted to with the way his eyes were darting between the two of you. Turning around, you watch curiously as Billy hands Tatum money which she immediately pockets. 

“What was that for?”

“Oh, he and I had a bet on when the two of you were going to stop being babies and date,” Tatum says smoothly, raising her eyebrows, a teasing smile plastered on her face. You scoff, folding your arms across your chest, leaning into Stu instinctively as he wraps his arm around your waist. “I figured it’d be before Christmas, he thought after New Years'.”

“Can’t believe you two gambled on this! You owe me some of that $20, Tate.” Your comment earns a laugh out of everyone. Stu squeezes your hip slightly, laughing when you jump. You were out of the street now, walking down the road towards his house. “What?”

“Can’t believe me and my munchkin got together.”

“Don’t make me break up with you before we’ve even started dating.” The smile on your face betraying the words that left your mouth, though you were grateful for that. The rest of the night was perfect; sitting down cuddled into Stu underneath a blanket on the couch, your head rising and falling with his every breath. You drift off to sleep to the sound of his heartbeat, barely feeling the kiss he had placed on the top of your head.

[sokkisky]

~brightest bird~

Want to make a request?: https://forms.gle/NyZgUcqkCPzHRvVn6

Want a short quick post?: https://sokkisky.tumblr.com/ask 

Rating: SFW (Angst, Fluff) 

Pairings: Keigo Takami (Hawks) x Winged Y/N 

Contains: Mentions of injury/loss

A/N: I honestly don’t think I’ve written much action scene, so this might be a first lol. The request reads as such. 

Jesus I’m blowing you up ok LAST ONE I PROMISE THIS IS THE LAST ONE so can I request a hawks x reader with the same wing quirk as him but a villian attack broke out they both had to respond and hawks wings were about to get burnt out but instead she sacrifices herself and loses her wings instead angst to fluff with a fluff ending please :>

So thank you so much @waffleareniceandfluffy​ for the request, it’s adorable and thanks for the continued love and support. Guys please always remember to take care of yourselves and be kind to yourselves, treat yourself today! And without further ado, enjoy!

“He’s gonna blow again!” 

“Watch out!” 

“Move!” 

~~~

Keigo loved your wings. Your wings were big, like his but they shone a beautiful yellow. They seemed brighter than the sun at times, the light shining from your feathers. Your quirk was like Keigo’s in that you could control your feathers, but they couldn’t leave the wing like Keigos. 

They’d shine. 

They could shine brightly or dimly, depending on what you made them do, and each individual feather was like this. Your quirk was beautiful, but able to blind anyone if need be. No wonder you were a rescue hero. You were perfect for the job. You easily guarded the ones in trouble flashing away any enemies. 

You were the number 11 hero afterall, the greatest rescue hero of all time. The people loved you, always coming up to you in the streets and talking about you. Next to Hawks you seemed to be the most beloved with the people, and there was endless talk about you two being the best duo in the city.

When you’d come home from a long day he’d sit next to you, watching your wings as you made them glow in beautiful patterns. “You are always gonna be the brightest bird, songbird” he’d say as he straightened your feathers, or flew alongside you to work everyday. He was allured by your wings, his eyes never leaving them sometimes as he just stared at your beauty. Not to mention when they’d glow and they’d illuminate your face. He adored it, your skin blended perfectly in your magical quirk. 

Which is why you knew he’d hate the decision you made. 

~~~

The villains were running mad and you, working alongside Hawks and other pro heroes, worked to get everyone to safety and arrest the Villains. You rushed people to safety as the villains and heroes fought before the heroes started squaring off with each villain. 

Hawks ended up with a darkened mist quirked villain. One who could make shredding dark winds with his quirk and despite being in broad daylight, they were strong. He was one of the worst villains nowadays having planned this whole attack. There was no way Hawks’ wings could stand up to his mist if he used it. 

And that’s what he did. 

“Hawks! Watch out!” 

You turned, someone having called out to your husband. You looked in horror as a dark cloud of heavy winds enveloping him. “It’s a dark barrier, we’d need an intense light to disperse it!” someone shouted.  The winds were strong Hawks’ feathers being forced away from the wing from the speeds. You couldn’t faintly see his form get pushed to the ground as he was caught off guard. He looked around, his crimson wings pulsating from the shredding winds. You watched him struggling on the concrete to find a way out. 

Dispelled by light? 

Without thinking you rushed in standing in front of him your wings spread out wide and shining brightly, a spectacle for anyone to see. The wind burned against your back as the swirling widened but weakened around the two of you. 

You wanted to scream but you held up as best you could. 

“Baby bird?” you heard a confused shout from behind you, but you stood forward, all your energy pressing towards the darkened winds. You worked hard, trying to make your wings glow as bright as they could. Your back began to feel lighter before the light glowed so bright it looked from a distance as if the sun had engulfed you all. Villains, heroes, bystanders, everyone alike. 

After a moment the light went away and the darkened wind villain laid defeated on the ground, but the light was gone. It was complete silence and you felt something was wrong. You tried to fly up, check the area, 

But you couldn’t. 

You flapped your wings but nothing moved. You reached your hand back before you felt, nothing. Nothing there. Panic set in as you turned around yourself but realization hit you.

They were gone. Your wings were gone. 

It took you a minute before you turned back to Hawks who looked up at you, a mix of sadness, worry, and pain in his eyes. “They’re gone..” he murmured quietly. You felt your eyes well up with tears. You watched as the heroes gathered everyone up to safety and arrested the villain but Hawks moved to his feet in front of you. “Baby…” he said softly, and you couldn’t help but move to his chest, sobbing in his arms over it. He held you close, his head buried in the crook of your neck as you sobbed. You almost thought you could feel small tears escape his eyes but you were so wrapped up in despair you couldn’t tell for sure. Your legs felt weak and your body felt not only emotionally exhausted but physically as well. 

But you were a rescue hero, and you did your job. 

~~~

The next few weeks were torture from the extensive media coverage to your departure from your agency. You left, although they said you could stay, because you feared not only the press but you didn’t feel like a hero anymore. 

You’d given up on your title and didn’t go out, curling beside your old hero costume that you refused to wear. You just cried, a darkness forming around you as your life seemed to crumble and fall apart piece by piece. Breaking off into terrible endless tears. 

Every night Keigo would do his best to comfort you, hold you and give you kisses, however you felt a slight tinge of envy whenever you saw his wings. You missed yours, they were big and beautiful and had always been a part of you. 

Not to menton a lot of the times you felt empty. Going through your day as a shell of your once self, losing bits of your once happy and outgoing personality bit by bit. You forgot what it felt like to smile, how to laugh, and it seemed that no joke or happy story could brighten your day. 

Sometimes you’d stare into the mirror, looking at your back and at the discolored skin where your wings had once been. You couldn’t believe they were gone. It all felt like a bad nightmare as you watched your reflection cry back at you. 

~~~

You watched your old hero videos all day, eating a tub of ice cream while past you happily fended off attackers from the citizens, protecting men women and children alike. You missed your job, and you felt alone. All alone and in the dark. 

 You heard the front door opening, Keigo stepping inside. He looked at you and sighed, walking over to you and shrugging the blanket off your shoulders. You turned to look at him, the ice cream spoon halfway tucked between your lips. 

“Come on songbird, I have a surprise for you.” he said softly, lifting you off of the couch. 

You turned to him, confused as the night time darkness outside settled in. You followed him out of the penthouse apartment and onto the roof, overlooking a city. 

But it was dark. 

You looked around, “What’s going on?” you asked him, staring out into the darkness. He smiled and held you close. “I know you’ve been feeling really down, and being the number 11 hero, I pulled some strings and we wanted to show you how amazing you are.” he said softly, his arms wrapping around your waist. “Ive been working on it for a few weeks with a million times more help. You looked at him confused. 

“What time is it songbird?” he asked you, and you pulled out your phone. 

“10:59,” you responded.

You were more than confused, why were all the building lights off, the only lights in the city were the few illuminating the city streets, yet no cars drove by. They were the only lights that were, until the city illuminated itself. 

You gasped. 

A large display of bright wings laid out across the landscape, the darkness fleeting when a brightly filled shape of wings spread across the cityscape. People cheered, clapping and shouting your name, some took to the streets and music began to play as drones from above caught pictures of the whole outlook. You could feel yourself begin to tear up as the people praised you and cheered and celebrated. 

You turned to Keigo who was supporting a large happy grin. 

“You are still our hero songbird, still number 11, still the greatest rescue hero of all time, and you forever be the brightest bird.”

[nullset2]

Undertale: an in-depth critique and review

You were probably expecting this one.

Undertale is a 2015 RPG created by the one-man team of Toby "Radiation" Fox from the starmen dot net forums. After release, the game acquired a ridiculous amount of acclaim and sent shockwaves through the medium, becoming an instant cult classic. It's the little indie game that could.

Undertale won its players over with its quirky and charming characters, its heart-wrenching storyline, a lore that's deeper than deep in what is probably one of the most meta games ever created (the data miners are still discovering secrets in the game to this very day, and its eclectic mix of shoot em up mechanics with RPG mechanics, a mixture that works well against all odds for some reason (some may even say that it works too well!)

Part "Mother 3 with Skeletons", part Tumblr Fanfiction, part Dating Simulator, part Shin Megami Tensei and part Touhou project, Undertale wears its heart on its sleeve and fills you down to the deepest reaches of your SOUL. Want to know why?

Part 1. Mother 3 with Skeletons

Undertale started in the starmen dot net forums after its creator published the infamous Earthbound Halloween Hack. You see, there's a small subsection in the site for people who are very passionate about ROM hacking, the ability to convert a previously released game for an old game console into a new experience. A very big and passionate community has formed over the years, as emulation has improved, that's very interested in this. Take a look sometime at the ROM hacking community to be amazed at the things that people have managed to make out of retro games.

The PK Hack tooling was created back in the day. This allows people to edit Earthbound, the USA version of MOTHER 2, to add whatever content they see fit. Out of this the Halloween Hack was created in 2008, an edgy and profanity laden version of Earthbound where you kill Dr. Andonuts, with a primitive version of Megalovania in tow.

Out of his experiences with RPG design Toby decided to create Undertale in 2013. The game was developed over 32 months and financed through Kickstarter, with an original scene of the game and a short demo released to promote the game.

The main premise of the game was "what if nobody had to die?". Toby recalls that he's always felt that RPGs are a little bit of a blood bath, in the sense that the main heroes go around killing endless prey for profit. Need to level up? Time to extinguish three more species in the game world --it's almost sadistic when you think about it, since in theory the player behind the screen is actually doing it for fun. So he wondered if it was possible to create an RPG which eschewed the need to kill people while still providing a compelling experience. Inspired by Shin Megami Tensei and how it allows you to talk and negotiate with enemy characters, he set off to the task. Its resemblance to other games is also palpable. The game world, pixel art and general non-sequitur take a page off of the Mother series, and the music --composed and performed completely by Toby on his own, by the way-- sounds right off from the Touhou series --not to mention the bullet hell stages of course.

The game massively overshot its modest kickstarter goal of $5000. It displayed tremendous innovation in RPGs, and it had a charming, meta tone which was unlike everything else in the market: the turn based battles in the game progress as a series of shmup stages, where you navigate waves of bullets shot by your enemy towards your soul, represented by a little pixelated heart inside of a black and white box. Moreover, the characters in the game world seem aware of the fact that they were inside of a video game, so the fourth wall breaks were right there from the very beginning. Could anything else be stemming from this?

The game is a beautiful accident in many ways, the crazy work of an absolute polymath, its likeliness to exist infinitesimal. It's also humble to the core. The script reads like a Tumblr post (grammar and all). The battle scenes are in monochrome. Megalovania was composed "in 20 minutes using free samples that I downloaded online" according to Toby. The graphics have clipping issues and look hastily put together. The game world is tiny but dense, the puzzles are simplistic at best, its RPG mechanics are sort of just a coat of paint that's not even fully dry, and all around you can do a single run of the game in around 8 hours. Toby was a hobbyist when he created it, not a professional game designer, and used a simple engine like Game Maker because he was, relatively, a newbie to game creation. The graphics are simple pixel art style because they were easier to draw. The enemies are drawn in a single color because "it's hard to draw graphics with multiple colors" in his own words. The animation is mostly flash-style tweening rather than keyframes.

But all of this is by design. Undertale is more than the sum of its parts --WAY more--. Goes to show that it's possible to convey strong emotions with simple pixel art, and that if you put something out there which comes from the bottom of your heart, people will embrace it.

Part 2. What if nobody had to die?

Undertale has a very simple plot: once upon a time there were two kinds of beings, humans and monsters. After an ancient war between both races, all monsters were sealed underground by the humans behind a barrier created with a magical spell. Then, one day, a child who was playing in a cave in Mt. Ebbott fell down into the underground by accident onto a bed of golden flowers, and thus they begin their return to the surface...

You control this fallen child, as they progress in the Underworld, meeting its inhabitants. Soon enough, you run into a flower friend, Flowey, who teaches you how to play the game. However, the gig is up soon enough: Flowey is shown to be a vicious, bloodthirsty killer, who is hellbent on destroying every single human who comes across his path, and he's just about to kill you.

Toriel, guardian of the ruins and archetypal mother figure (if a bit overbearing), saves you from Flowey's schemes and guides you through the ruins in what effectively is the tutorial (tu-toriel) section of the game (with the game literally hand holding you through it). Toriel teaches you that it is possible to solve conflicts in the world of Undertale by means other than violence, though the power of ACTing. ACTing allows you to satisfy monsters instead of fighting them, at which point you can spare them. You can also spare monsters if bring them close to 0 HP and you decide not to kill them --the indicator in both cases being that their name turns to yellow.

But interestingly, it seems that she's already been through this more than once --many times, even. She seems to already have a complete curriculum designed for the education of a Human child, together with a vacant, completely furnished room for a child... Once you make her face the fact that you wish to leave the ruins and not to live under her tutelage, she begrudgingly fights you in combat, asking you to prove yourself "not to have this happen again". Begrudgingly, she lets you go, warning you of the vicious king of the underground, Asgore, who she was trying to protect you from, as she failed to protect several other children before.

So depending on your actions here, the game starts to branch. It is very well known that Undertale has three routes: the True Pacifist route, the Neutral route, and the Genocide route, and your decisions when playing Undertale will impact which route you take. If you manage to truly get through the game, never killing not even one enemy, not even a grunt or a slime, and you are at least on your second run of the game (since the game keeps memory of how many runs you've made so far for reasons which I will explain more in depth soon...) you will see the Pacifist route. If you miss certain side quests in the game (like taking the game's bosses for a date to woo them) or otherwise kill at least one enemy, you will see the Neutral route. And finally, if you cave in to Flowey's demands and purposefully start killing every monster in the Underground, you will see the worst ending in the game...

From here onward the underground is yours to explore. You get to meet a very wide array of colorful characters, learn about their lives and hang out with them. The game will also reveal some interesting backstory about the Monster War and the mythology that came from it, most interestingly, the legend of the DELTA RUNE. The delta rune is the most important symbol among monsterkin, a figure of a winged creature and three triangles, which is said to represent a prophecy that the monsters have told since times immemorial about their salvation from the Human race: the advent of a powerful liberating angel who will guide the monsters to freedom from the Underground (the Angel's Heaven). This Angel is worshipped as a god among Monsterkind.

What are the three triangles underneath the winged figure, though?

The most important characters in the game are the Boss Monsters, who have a stronger soul than the regular monster grunts. If you play your cards right, they will become your friends and will join you in your adventure.

These characters are:

Toriel, the kind Mother figure who guards the ruins, who you already met. She never leaves her home, perhaps harkening a bit to the archetypal devouring mother... and she wants you locked in and educated at home eating pie (maybe against your will...).

Sans, a weird, slobby, lazy animated skeleton with no work ethic, addicted to jokes, who talks exclusively in Comic Sans for some reason, wears hoodies and likes eating fast food. He seems to not have a care in the world and to just be coasting by... however, strangely enough, he seems to have powers of teleportation and telekinesis, and he may or may not know something about the true nature of the world that every other monster in the World is oblivious to...

Papyrus, Sans' brother, a silly, queer Skeleton who is desperate for love and affection and who will do anything to capture a human to prove himself worthy of the ranks of the Royal army. And yes, he speaks in Papyrus font. Friends with...

Undyne, the legendary armor clad leader of the Monster Army who will stop at nothing to kill all humans who descend into the underworld to harvest their souls for Asgore.

Alphys, an insecure otaku dinosaur/lizard with social anxiety (who may resemble the Undertale audience a bit too much) who has a crush on Undyne. Head of the Royal scientists, in charge of the Underground energy core and with a backstory that haunts her...

Mettaton, a super powerful robot AI created by Alphys and a flamboyant superstar female ghost who now inhabits the body of a male robot (since the ghost characters in the world of Undertale need to inhabit a body --usually that of a training dummy) and who entertains the Underground as no one else can, the embodiment of glamour.

Asgore, the archetypal Wounded King, forever bearing the weight of his sins against humanity after killing six human children, seeking redemption through the liberation of the monsters to get back with his divorced wife Toriel, mother of his defunct child...

You'll also find ghosts, Napstablook, Hapstablook, and Madstablook. The ghosts are special characters because they're naturally incorporeal so they need to find a body to inhabit, otherwise living their melancholic lives in search of purpose, in what is, I believe, again, a special shout out the the game's Tumblrish audience. Napstablook is your archetypal doomer, a melancholic ghost who lurks around message boards listening to pirated music. Hapstablook decides to make the most of things by becoming friends with Alphys, who helps her transition into a male body to become Mettaton (another subtle shoutout to transexuality). Madstablook is angry with the world and decides to live his life in spite in the dump, inhabiting the body of a training dummy. Another unnamed ghost lives in the underground and is presented as the first training dummy, but their personality is not really elaborated upon.

You will also fight Miss Muffet, a spider goth-loli character with ojousama demeanor who loves money, baking and trapping people in her web to eat them. And there's also a lot of dogs! They like to do dog things!

Part 3. The Neutral Route

So now you continue playing through the game. The game is divided by sections, Snowdin, Waterfall, Hotland, the energy Core and the Royal Castle, which leads to the Barrier. Every section of the game will present you with a few puzzles (which are there more as meta-commentary on RPG design and for funsies than actually being puzzles) and boss encounters, in which again you can choose to either kill them or to make friends with.

Every boss battle will have a unique spin on it. Some battles will become a rhythm game, others will become a platformer, a shump, and yet others will become a game of frogger. I loved playing through each of these scenarios because they keep the game fresh and fun, since no idea ever really overstays its welcome.

Each big boss battle turns your heart a certain color. In the world of Undertale, your soul is represented by a pixel heart of a certain color depending on the strongest quality of your personality: cyan for patience, purple for persevereance, blue for integrity, green for kindness, yellow for justice, orange for bravery and red for determination. Now, it is revealed that there's been six previous children who fell to the underground, who have tried to escape through the barrier. All of them met their demise at the hands of Asgore, the menacing king of the Monsters, who needs the power of seven human SOULs to use them in a spell to break the barrier. The existence of the previous six children is never explored in depth, so we don't know who these children are... But we know their souls are one of every color.

Human and monster souls are different (monster souls are colored white), with a balance of power which is lopsided in favor of the humans. One human soul is equivalent to all of the monster souls put together, and thus only humans can cross the barrier, because the soul of a monster would collapse if they ever went through the barrier.

And why are human souls stronger than monster souls? Because humans are shown to have a trait which monsters don't have: Determination.

Determination is what allows you to SAVE in the world of Undertale. In the world of Undertale if you SAVE at a save point you can revive from Death through Determination (or De-termination, get it?). Notice the beginning of a strange correspondence between the aspects of the lore and the things that happen in the real world itself, as if the game was inexplicably connected to the fact that it's a video game itself. It is implied that, perhaps, the only monsters who have a semblance of Determination are Undyne and Flowey. But is their determination greater than the Determinaton of a human?

This is explored at the end of the Neutral route. Once you face Asgore, Flowey will take over by force and kill him. In what seems right out of Giygas' mindfuck end battle in Earthbound, he transforms into a photo-realistic full screen shump end boss sprite that completely clashes with the bitmap style that the rest of the game has, subverting the player's expectations and inciting a certain feeling of disgust and shock. In the climax of this battle, Flowey will actually start manipulating your IRL save files Emulator style, to load them once and over again to render you hopeless and in eternal torture. But lo and behold, the other six human souls decide to impose themselves against Flowey and they rebel, and they free the human by Deus-ex-machina from the clutches of Flowey's degenerate schemes.

Again: it seems that some of the actual characters inside the game are aware of the fact that there's a game system powering it all. But why? At the end of the neutral route, you can choose to kill or spare Flowey. Whichever decision you take will not matter at this point... since you can just, you know... Reset the game and run it again.

Part 4. The True Pacifist Route

This is when you should try to play the game in a fully pacifist manner.

The pacifist run is the longest one in the game and the most satisfying one (also the true, canonical ending to the game), because it involves exploring everything in the game, doing every possible side quest, and not killing a single enemy in the world, not even a grunt. The game doesn't actually make this difficult and if you're good at shmups you should be able to handle it --but it has to be your second run of the game (your first run will always be the neutral ending). In this route you will get to date Papyrus and Alphys, but in the end these experiences are less for your romantic progress and more to see their character development. You will also get to date Undyne in the most fiery cookout you could ever imagine. This is my favorite scene in the game!

Additionally, there's a complete area which is unplayable in other routes, the True Laboratory, which provides more details in regards to the plot. It is revealed that the royal scientists were tasked with studying the mortality of monsterkin in an attempt to make them immortal, and they discovered determination. Alphys found out that when old monsters are on their deathbed, they can have their determination extracted with a demonic looking machine and implanted into objects, but if the experiments go wrong, monsters fuse their bodies and souls together. So when you visit the lab, you meet hideous amalgams of monsters, made by clever recompilation of the behaviors and designs of other monsters, in what feels like a fever dream, or like playing through an unfinished section of the game, something you were not supposed to see. But by doing this, you help Alphys come to her senses and face the consequences of her actions. Personally, I love the presentation in this part of the game, and I consider it to be very bold game direction.

Once you clear the True Lab and meet Asgore, in a very emotive sequence, the monsters will reveal the true backstory of the game: before you, there was another human child (you, the fallen human who you named at the beginning) who had fallen into the underground. This human child was adopted by the royal family: Asgore, Toriel, and their as of yet unknown child, Asriel, and raised as their own. But unfortunately at some point the child fell ill of a mysterious disease which could only be cured using yellow flowers, a species of flowers that grows above ground. So, Asriel and the child crossed the barrier to look for a cure, but when the humans on the surface saw what appeared to be the murder of the fallen child, Asriel was mortally wounded by the humans and died when he returned to the underground. The royal family mourned his death by having Alphys implant his soul into a yellow flower, and Asgore swore revenge on the humans, seeking to collect six human souls to break the barrier and free the monsters from the underground they have been locked in. That flower became Flowey, which now has the wicked, corrupted soul of Asriel, hellbent on revenge and thirsty for blood, devoid of all humanity and compassion.

The climax of this route comes once you try to cross the barrier again. All the monsters you befriended along the way will come together for you to defend you against Asgore's murderous intents, since you have made friends with them. Unknowingly, though, you have played right into Flowey's schemes, who takes all of the souls of all of the monsters in the underground and fuses them into one: the reincarnation of Asriel Dreemurr (an Anagram for 'Serial Murderer', by the way). An epic fight between the human child and Asriel unfolds, where the child becomes stun-locked due to the massive power of Asriel. But since humans possess Determination, the human exercises their ability to "Save" their friends from right within Asriel's soul. At the cusp of this battle, Asriel manages to kill the human... but by sheer force of determination they don't die (your soul "refused" to die... or re-fused, get it?). The human starts remembering Asriel of his good times with the first human, the knowledge of whom they have gained now. This leads Asriel to tears and to eventually desist killing, in what is one of the most emotive moments I've ever seen in games. The human, revealed to be named "Frisk" all along, unrelated to Asriel's sibling, manages to break the barrier with the collection of all of the human souls, and leads the monsters back into the surface, where they reintegrate into the Human world.

Part 5. The Genocide Route

What if you decide to take the Dark path?

If you start killing monsters in Undertale, like Flowey incited you to at the beginning of the game, you will receive the Genocide ending. It makes you feel like shit and it's horrible to play this route, but it sheds additional light on the plot.

The key to doing this is to start killing every single monster in the game. Yes, even in the tutorial, even when you're compelled not to kill them. This literally means you have to keep wandering around in circles and keep killing creatures, mashing A mindlessly (in a way that's very reminiscent of regular RPG EXP grinding). This will increase an stat that the game keeps record of, your LOVE (spoiler: this is revealed in the end to really have meant "Level of Violence" all along). I think that, as with many other things in this game, the game is trying to unleash some meta-commentary about games themselves here. What kind of heartless monster do you need to be to actually go the way to kill every single monster, just to see "what if", just to see numbers go up?

If you do it enough times in the tutorial and kill Toriel, you will see "but nobody came" when random battles trigger. After you've seen this in the first section you will start seeing messages being conveyed to you by a mysterious voice that speaks in red when you use save points, which will tell you how many creatures are left in the current area of the game. This evil internal voice will also start interjecting with its own commentary at certain points in the game, talking about how worthless they find everything.

So, you will start seeing a stark difference in how the game plays if you take this path. Unlike the neutral route and the Pacifist route, the monsters will start fearing you and they will leave town, so you will end up exploring the same maps you previously explored, but without nobody to talk to or interact with. The game music will slow down and it will have added reverb, making it sound depressing and demoralizing. The few NPCs that you can run into will start flat out hating you because of what you've done, and the boss monsters will turn harder (still got PTSD from Genocide Undyne). And since you're a heartless monster, you will have to sit through a gut wrenching death sequence for all of them.

The highlight of this route, if you have the gall to endure it, is that Flowey will actually reveal his deepest and most intimate dark thoughts: Asriel reveals himself to have found that, after his soul was implanted into the flower, he gained Determination, and in a way he became nihilistic because of it. He discovered that he was able to endlessly reset the game like a human after he gained determination (even if the human's determination supersedes his after all), and thus he did everything he could within the game because "he had to see what would happen". Eventually he become bored of it all after taking every possible action in the game, killing, re-killing and saving other people, trying to reconnect with the feeling of satisfaction that being with the human child used to give to him. So he invites you to join him and his twisted cause, just to, of course, have the human kill him ruthlessly just as they killed every other boss monster.

Then, surprisingly, resident slob Sans will decide to spring into action to stop you. This is what I like the most about this route, the revelation that this seemingly unimportant and useless character, which the game itself dubs to be "the easiest enemy, with only 1 HP" all of a sudden reveals his deepest feelings while showing themselves to be a powerhouse. He denounces that the player's actions (arguably actually talking to the person who's behind the screen, rather than talking to the playable character) is causing rifts in time space due to the starting and collapsing of infinite in-game "timelines", something which happens with every game reset. Sans claims that this is leading to the ultimate destruction of the world, and that if he doesn't stop you for good by providing one of the hardest matches in the whole game, you will proceed to total annihilation. He also claims to be incredibly depressed because of the whole affair, since it renders every action he takes in the game world worthless given how everything could be reset at any given point...

The implication of additional timelines and time/space paradoxes existing in the world of Undertale is important, because I think it ties into Deltarune, the game's sequel --but that game is still in development, so as I said before, see you in three years when it fully releases :) so we can finally unravel all of the mysteries.

And if you're that determined to use your will to power to withstand Sans, you will meet "Chara", Asriel's sibling. And Chara is shown to have been... You, all along, a corrupted, evil murderous child fallen into the chthonic world of the Online, of fictions, that Undertale is, in the ultimate consummation of the premise of the game.

You see, "Chara" is just a template and not the actual name of the Child, but rather they're revealed to share your name, or whatever name you input at the beginning. Frisk is a completely independent character, unrelated to you and your soul. When you start the game, Undertale asks to "Name the fallen child". Predictably, most gamers will enter their real life name in this box, as they do in most other RPGs where you can name your player character. You will play throughout the whole game assuming that this is the name of the character you control. But lo and behold, this was the name of one of the previously fallen children after all, a puppet master who has been pulling the strings all along with their murderous intent. And in the Genocide route, this child is shown to be a corrupt figure made manifest, and then it develops into one of the eeriest game endings ever, telling you how much they want to "discard and move on from" this game (an action which may scarily reflect what happens to a game after it is put back on the shelf). So an offer is made (or rather, the illusion of choice is presented). You can destroy your save file in exchange of the final destruction of the world of Undertale... and when that eventually happens (because at this point it will happen whether you want it or not), Chara will jump scare you and shutdown the game by force (the actual game program will literally shut down IRL).

And if you try to boot it up again... silence. Nothingness. The game will be rendered unusable and impossible to play again (well, turns out you can wait for 10 minutes while in nothingness and Chara will offer to bring it all back... but this is one of the weirdest, more nihilistic game endings I've ever seen).

Part 6. Undertale as an ARG

Undertale has an incredibly deep lore, which has not been unfolded in full even to this day, six years after its original release. In what is one of the most clever approaches to game design, Toby actually left clues around in the game's files, because he expected it to be hacked and dissected for unused data or content post release, as it happens with every other game that has ever existed. If you datamine the game, the game, incredibly, will actually reward your dedication with a plethora of unused content, notes from the developer, and nuggets of information pointing towards possible developments in the Undertale world (yes, even pointing to the sequel, Deltarune).

Of these, one of the most important things I can mention is the presence of some incredibly mysterious dialogue from a character apparently named "WD Gaster", who can be made to spawn randomly in your copy of the game depending on random events (the "fun" variable in memory, of which there are plenty of technical analyses around which I suggest you consult ipso facto, since explaining it all here would definitely overrun the scope of what I want this review to contain). A skull-like character that speaks in Windings (presumably what "WD" stands for, WingDings), harkening to both Sans and Papyrus (the former of which I should remind you has special meta-knowledge about what's going on with the World of Undertale) leaving cryptic notes behind which suggest that at some point he was involved with the Determination Laboratory.

This launched a bit of an actual ARG within the Undertale community, who are still making discoveries to this day. With the announcement of Deltarune and the presence of some interesting developments within it which seem to point at this part of the game, we can remain excited about what is to come with the eventual undoing of this plot knot.

Part 7. Determination

My final interpretation is that Undertale, the actual game itself, is the manifestation of Asriel and his relationship with you as a player, masterfully crafted by Toby Fox as a colorful, vivid, amazing sounding tour de force, a testament to what great indie games can be like, full of secrets and wonders to discover. This game wishes to be your best friend. It may be, right now, just lying on a shelf or installed in your machine somewhere; yet if you listen closely, the game is trying to call you back into it.

But what kind of soul, or "will" if you would, are you bringing into it? Your Will is all that you have. This is one of the biggest dilemmas that the game actually presents to you: will you kill such beautiful creatures, if your determination dictates so? Or will you choose the more peaceful alternative? The decision is up to you... Makes me think of the Nietzchean will to power. Nietzsche argues that the main driving force in humanity is the Will to Power, an ability that each one of us can exercise. Will you use your Will to power to cause pain and backstab and kill your friends, or will you use it to cherish your friends and gain freedom? What is the nature of your SOUL?

What kind of decisions will you take? Actions have consequences, and in this game's case, incredibly real consequences too. Your will can effectively override Flowey's at any point... again, making me think about the Will to Power, but this is a gift too precious to waste. Or will you waste it?

What kind of world will your soul create within it? A pure soul that wishes to make friends? Or a dark, dirty, twisted, sick soul that wishes to just end it all, a sadist who only takes pleasure in numbingly playing and re-playing a game to kill its characters?

[lovemademoisellebelle]

Uh oh... did we do that?

Pairing: Draco x y/n

Warnings: underage drinking, mild swearing

A/N: been reading and writing fan fiction for years but I've never uploaded any of my own work, so please be nice! any feedback is highly appreciated. P.S. this sounded and looked a lot better in my head 

inspired by Emma Watson dancing in The Bling Ring, endless amounts of videos on DracoTok and the vibes that 212 by Azealia Banks gives me

Slytherin common room party – think low-key green lighting, firewhiskey, Draco in an all-black suit that kinda thing 

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

In the hundreds of years since Hogwarts’s conception, not once have the Slytherin house hosted an ‘all houses invited’ party. Sure, they were invited (and rarely came) to the Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Gryffindor parties, but they never thought to return the favour. That is until Pansy’s raging crush on a Ravenclaw boy in the year above prompted her to throw an all-inclusive rager, much to the dismay of her Slytherin classmates.  

Naturally, this caused some concern from the other houses, as the new spread around the Great Hall the morning of the so-called ‘unmissable’ event. There was a palpable buzz of deliberation from the separate tables, with the clearly same queries on everyone’s minds.

“I don’t know Ron – I mean, these are the Slytherin’s we’re talking about,” Hermione cast a furtive glance to the sea of emerald robes on the far side of the hall, much to Ron’s dismay.

“Oh come on ‘Mione, what’s the worst that can happen?”

“Oh I don’t know, how about humiliation from Malfoy’s smug face when we realise it’s a prank, or maybe a fight where irreversible hexes are thrown around?” Harry quipped, clearly sharing Hermione’s caution.

Ron and y/n shared a knowing look, both being the more carefree members of the group.

“Here’s an idea,” y/n explained rationally, “how about we just show up anyway – fashionably late, of course – and if the whole thing turns out to be some big joke, we can host our own impromptu party in the common room? That way it won’t be a complete waste of time… or alcohol.”

It was Harry and Hermione’s turn to share a look, knowing no matter how hard they tried they were inevitably going to give in eventually.

“Fine,” Hermione grumbled, “but if it all turns pear shaped, I’m sending you both to the hospital wing with a nasty bat bogey hex.

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

The much-awaited night had finally rolled around, and y/n felt that nervous but excited anticipation that she often felt before occasions such as tonight’s. All day the latest gossip of the party could be heard between the older Hogwarts’s students. At one point, Madame Pince had to usher around 20 students out of the library for whispering ‘too loudly’ about the event. Multiple classmates had come up to y/n throughout the day, all asking the same question: ‘Are you thinking of going tonight?’ As usual with Hogwarts, news never failed to travel fast.

“Are you sure this looks ok?” Hermione twisted her hips side to side in the dorm’s full-length mirror, trying to discern if the length of her skirt showed to much leg or not.

“’Mione, are you kidding? You look incredible, seriously. Ron’s gonna flip when he sees you, won’t be able to take his eyes off your a-” y/n’s sentence was cut short by a well-timed pillow being tossed at her head by Hermione, who had started to form a pink blush across her cheeks.

With both of them re-checking your outfits and makeup in the mirror, y/n and Hermione did a quick, pre-party shot for luck and headed down to the common room to meet the boys.

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

By the time they had arrived at the Slytherin common room, the party was already in full swing; couples were spotted around the corridor outside, claiming to ‘need some air’ whilst making out against the stone walls, and the pungent smell of firewhiskey with a slight cut of something sweeter (butterbeer?) hit them like a brick wall as the group entered. The room was encased in dark green lighting, highlighted by the murky lake shimmering some light into the otherwise darkened room.

It seemed as if almost every student – 5th year and above – were present, either seen dancing and grinding on the makeshift dancefloor at the back, loitering around the drinks table in search of another drink or, if you were Pansy Parkinson, sat on one of the plush sofas on the lap of a Ravenclaw boy, who looked equal parts satisfised and confused about his current situation.

Either way most people were already fucked, or at least on their way.

“What were you saying earlier about a prank Hermione?” Ron smirked smugly, as he grabbed her hand and pushed his way over to the drinks table with a blushing Hermione trailing after.

Y/n couldn’t help but think, maybe tonight will be fun after all.

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

An hour later, and y/n could definitely feel the numb tingling of the firewhiskey spread throughout her body, offering a pleasant release from the previous week’s stress. Though not yet brave enough to venture onto the dancefloor, she swayed her hips lightly to the music as she chatted happily with Luna in the corner – apparently the Ministry were behind the recent surge of wrackspurts in the air, using them to control our minds.

“Well well, if it isn’t Weaslebee and Scar-head polluting my common room,” a little ways across the room however, Ron and Harry were having less of a pleasant time.

Turning around to see the towering, slender figure of Draco Malfoy with his signature smugness, flanked by his usual cronies Crabbe and Goyle. Stood tall in his black turtleneck and blazer combo, with his platinum hair perfectly styled (of course), Draco was unsurprisingly catching the attention of most of the girls (and a fair amount of guys) in the room. Wherever he moved, eager eyes tended to follow, with the hope of him glancing their way. Harry and Ron, however, were unfazed.

“Malfoy,” Harry briefly and glumly acknowledged Draco with the turn of his head, before turning back to people watch.

“You know, I’ve always heard that Gryffindor parties are supposed to be some of the best,” Draco taunted, “but I have to say your lot seem pretty boring to me. I mean, I thought you were supposed to be the ‘fun ones’”. Crabbe and Goyle sniggered behind him, always quick to boost his ego.

“This is nothing,” Ron countered, the alcohol only intensifying his competitive nature, “you should see the way y/n and Hermione get when that bloody muggle song of theirs plays – they go mad.”

“Yeah right,” the blonde scoffed, “they’re both too stuck up to ever actually have fun.”

“Oh yeah? I’ll prove it to you!”

“C’mon Ron, let’s just leave it-”

“No Harry, there’s no way I’m losing this argument. Oi Lee,” Ron hollered to Lee Jordan, the trusted DJ at every Hogwarts party, “put on that song – you know – that one muggle song… can’t remember the bloody name now,” Ron started to trail off.

Luckily, Lee was able to decipher Ron’s drunk slurs, “You got it Ron.”

As soon as the first few beats thumped out of the speakers, y/n let out a squeal of joy. Searching for Hermione, they caught eyes from across the room and both knew what they had to do; meet on the dancefloor between them and let loose. Both being muggle born, the two girls shared a love of muggle music that their magical born friends didn’t. It bonded them when they first became friends and now had influenced even those who weren’t muggle born to enjoy it too.

As the beat dropped, the girls started to dance. Bopping their heads from side to side, they swung their hips in time with the music. With her back to Hermione’s chest, y/n let her head roll back onto her friends’ shoulder as they drunkenly laughed for no apparent reason. Y/n’s black mini dress had begun to ride up her thighs slightly, meanwhile her hips continued to roll and grind suggestively – neither girls remotely aware of anyone around them, nor the shock of particularly their Slytherin classmates, who weren’t used to seeing this side of them.

Especially not Draco Malfoy, his jaw slack as his eyes were entranced in the girl’s direction.

“Uh oh,” Harry teased, “looks like Malfoy’s got his eyes on your girlfriend.”

“Um Harry,” Ron stared at Draco’s face in disbelief, with a slight hint of amusement, “it’s not ‘Mione he’s looking at.”

Unaware of the intense gaze from her long-time enemy Draco Malfoy, y/n continued to dance seductively.

Draco’s initial expression of shock had now turned into his signature grin, his icy blue-grey eyes trailing over y/n’s curves. His eyes expressed admiration (something rare for someone who usually showed distain for almost everything) and apparent attraction for the girl. His head filled with lewd thoughts as he yearned to know more about her – until now he thought he’d had her sussed, but now he started to question his good-girl perception of her. His hand rubbing at his jaw slightly, completely entranced by every swing of her hips.

“Godric, he’s looking at her as if he’s in love with her,” Harry uttered, entirely bewildered by the look on Malfoy’s face – it was a look of attraction and almost tenderness that was starting to scare him.

Ron brought a hand up to his forehead, “Uh oh… did we do that?”

hey, if you managed to get all the way to the end, thank u sm!! any feedback is appreciated. I have an idea for part 2 if anyone wants that :) 

[patriotsnet]

Why Is The Media Against Republicans

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/why-is-the-media-against-republicans/

Why Is The Media Against Republicans

Mcconnell And Co Are Playing As Dirty A Game As Possible In Their Quest To Fill Ginsburgs Seat Before The Election But You Wont Find That Story In Most News Coverage

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US Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell at a press conference at the US Capitol on September 22, 2020. McConnell said in a statement that the Senate would take up President Donald Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court following the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

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The argument against confirming Donald Trump’s nominee to the Supreme Court before the inauguration is a Republican argument. They invented it, they enacted it, and they own it. That’s because it was Republicans, not Democrats, who changed the number of Supreme Court justices from nine to eight for 10 months in 2016, when a Democratic president was in the White House. It was Republicans who argued that no Supreme Court nominee should even be considered by the Senate in an election year. And it was Republicans who promised to block the confirmation of Hillary Clinton’s Supreme Court nominees in the event that she became president while Republicans retained control of the Senate.

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And that argument is simply untenable. We do not have a legitimate third branch of government if only one party gets to choose its members.

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Vaccine Advocacy From Hannity And Mcconnell Gets The Media Off Republicans’ Backs But Won’t Shift Public Sentiment

Sean Hannity, Mitch McConnell and Tucker Carlson

Amid a rising media furor over the steady stream of vaccine disparagement from GOP politicians and Fox News talking heads, a number of prominent Republicans spoke up in favor of vaccines early this week.

On Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told reporters, “shots need to get in everybody’s arm as rapidly as possible” and asked that people “ignore all of these other voices that are giving demonstrably bad advice.” House Minority Whip Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana, got the vaccine after months of delay and then publicly said, “there shouldn’t be any hesitancy over whether or not it’s safe and effective.” And Fox News host Sean Hannity, in a widely shared video, declared, it “absolutely makes sense for many Americans to get vaccinated.” This was treated in the press as an unequivocal endorsement, even though the use of the word “many” was clearly meant to let the Fox News viewers feel like he’s talking about other people getting vaccinated. 

Is this an exciting pivot among the GOP elites?  Are they abandoning the sociopathic strategy of sabotaging President Joe Biden’s anti-pandemic plan by encouraging their own followers to get sick? Are the millions of Republicans who keep telling pollsters they will never get that Democrat shot going to change their minds now? 

Ha ha ha, no.

Want more Amanda Marcotte on politics? Subscribe to her newsletter Standing Room Only.

— Matthew Gertz July 20, 2021

The Technology 202: New Report Calls Conservative Claims Of Social Media Censorship ‘a Form Of Disinformation’

with Aaron Schaffer

A new report concludes that social networks aren’t systematically biased against conservatives, directly contradicting Republican claims that social media companies are censoring them. 

arrow-right

Recent moves by Twitter and Facebook to suspend former president Donald Trump’s accounts in the wake of the violence at the Capitol are inflaming conservatives’ attacks on Silicon Valley. But New York University researchers today released a report stating claims of anti-conservative bias are “a form of disinformation: a falsehood with no reliable evidence to support it.” 

The report found there is no trustworthy large-scale data to support these claims, and even anecdotal examples that tech companies are biased against conservatives “crumble under close examination.” The report’s authors said, for instance, the companies’ suspensions of Trump were “reasonable” given his repeated violation of their terms of service — and if anything, the companies took a hands-off approach for a long time given Trump’s position.

The report also noted several data sets underscore the prominent place conservative influencers enjoy on social media. For instance, CrowdTangle data shows that right-leaning pages dominate the list of sources providing the most engaged-with posts containing links on Facebook. Conservative commentator Dan Bongino, for instance, far out-performed most major news organizations in the run-up to the 2020 election. 

In The Past The Gop Would Be Rallying Their Voters Against This Bill Their Failure To Do So Now Is Ominous

Mitch ?McConnell, Ted Cruz, Tucker Carlson and Ben Shapiro

With surprising haste for the U.S. Senate, in the early hours of Wednesday morning, just after passing a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill. And Democrats could not be more excited, as the blueprint covers a whole host of long-standing priorities, from fighting climate change to creating universal prekindergarten. The blueprint was largely written by Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who released a statement calling it “the most consequential piece of legislation for working people, the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor since FDR and the New Deal of the 1930s.”

Sanders isn’t putting that much spin on the ball.

While the bill fallls short of what is really needed to deal with climate change, it is still tremendously consequential legislation that will do a great deal not just to ameliorate economic inequalities, but, in doing so, likely reduce significant gender and racial inequality. It’s also a big political win for President Joe Biden. In other words, it is everything that Republicans hate. Worse for them, it’s packed full of benefits that boost the middle class, not just the working poor. Traditionally, such programs are much harder to claw back once Republicans gain power — as they’ve discovered in previous failed attempts to dismantle Social Security and Obamacare. 

Want more Amanda Marcotte on politics? Subscribe to her newsletter Standing Room Only.

But that’s not really happening here. 

The Actual Reason Why Republicans And Their Media Are Discouraging People From Getting Vaccinated

Independent Media Institute

Dr. Jonathan Reiner, a CNN Medical Analyst, said last week, “A surprising amount of death will occur soon…” But why, when the deadly Delta variant is sweeping the world, are Republicans and their media warning people not to get vaccinated?

there’s always a reason

Dr. Anthony Fauci told Jake Tapper on CNN last Sunday, “I don’t have a really good reason why this is happening.”

But even if he can’t think of a reason why Republicans would trash talk vaccination and people would believe them, it’s definitely there.

Which is why it’s important to ask a couple of simple questions that all point to the actual reason why Republicans and their media are discouraging people from getting vaccinated:

1. Why did Trump get vaccinated in secret after Joe Biden won the election and his January 6th coup attempt failed?

2. Why are Fox “News” personalities discouraging people from getting vaccinated while refusing to say if they and the people they work with have been protected by vaccination?

3. Why was one of the biggest applause lines at CPAC: “They were hoping — the government was hoping — that they could sort of sucker 90% of the population into getting vaccinated and it isn’t happening!”

4. Why are Republican legislators in states around the country pushing laws that would “ban” private businesses from asking to see proof of vaccination status ?

Death is their electoral strategy.

Is there any other possible explanation?

So, what’s left?

Destroying Trust In The Media Science And Government Has Left America Vulnerable To Disaster

For America to minimize the damage from the current pandemic, the media must inform, science must innovate, and our government must administer like never before. Yet decades of politically-motivated attacks discrediting all three institutions, taken to a new level by President Trump, leave the American public in a vulnerable position.

jonmladd

Trump has consistently vilified the national media. When campaigning, he the media “absolute scum” and “totally dishonest people.” As president, he has news organizations “fake news” and “the enemy of the people” over and over. The examples are endless. Predictably, he has blamed the coronavirus crisis on the media, saying “We were very prepared. The only thing we weren’t prepared for was the media.”

Science has been another Trump target. He has gutted scientific expertise and administrative capacity in the executive branch, most notably failing to fill hundreds of vacancies in the Centers for Disease Control itself and disbanding the National Security Council’s taskforce on pandemics. During the coronavirus crisis, he has routinely disagreed with scientific experts, including, in the AP’s words, his “musing about injecting disinfectants into people .” This follows his earlier public advocacy for hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 treatment, also against leading scientists’ advice. Coupled with his flip-flopping on when to lift stay-at-home orders, the president has created confusion and endangered people.

Media Bias Against Conservatives Is Real And Part Of The Reason No One Trusts The News Now

Members of the media were shocked as he was supposedly revealed as incredibly anti-woman presidential candidate, perhaps even the most ever nominated by a major political party in the modern era. He had admitted that he reduced women to objects and the Democrats pounced, seeking to make him lose him the support of women and, in turn, the presidency.

I’m not talking about the media coverage of GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump and the “Access Hollywood” tape, but his predecessor, Mitt Romney.

His sin? Saying that he had “binders full of women” that he was looking at appointing to key positions were he elected president. Sure, it was an awkward way of stating a fairly innocuous fact about how elected executives begin their transition efforts — with resumes of candidates for every position under the sun —- well before an election is held. Yet, the media and commentators came for Mitt Romney and they did so with guns blazing, as he was portrayed as an anti-woman extremist… for making a concerted effort to hire women to serve in his administration as governor of Massachusetts.

There Is No Liberal Media Bias In Which News Stories Political Journalists Choose To Cover

1Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306, USA.

2University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22903, USA.

3Brigham Young University-Idaho, Rexburg, ID 83460, USA.

?*Corresponding author. Email: hans.hassellfsu.edu ; jh5akvirginia.edu

?† These authors contributed equally to this work.

See allHide authors and affiliations

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‘it’s Time To End This Forever War’ Biden Says Forces To Leave Afghanistan By 9/11

The enormous national anger generated by those attacks was also channeled by the administration toward the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, which was conceived to prevent any recurrence of attacks on such a massive scale. Arguments over that legislation consumed Congress through much of 2002 and became the fodder for campaign ads in that year’s midterms.

The same anger was also directed toward a resolution to use force, if needed, in dealing with security threats from the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. That authorization passed Congress with bipartisan majorities in the fall of 2002, driven by administration claims that Saddam had “weapons of mass destruction.” It became law weeks before the midterm elections.

Once those elections were over, the Republicans in control of both chambers finally agreed to create an independent commission to seek answers about 9/11. Bush signed the legislation on Nov. 27, 2002.

The beginning was hobbled when the first chairman, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, and vice chairman, former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell of Maine, decided not to continue. But a new chairman, former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean, and vice chairman, former Rep. Lee Hamilton of Indiana, filled the breach and performed to generally laudatory reviews.

Long memories

Top House Republican Opposes Bipartisan Commission To Investigate Capitol Riot

But McCarthy replied by opposing Katko’s product, and more than 80% of the other House Republicans did too. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., initially said he was keeping an open mind but then announced that he too was opposed. This makes it highly unlikely that 10 of McConnell’s GOP colleagues will be willing to add their votes to the Democrats’ and defeat a filibuster of the bill.

Republicans have argued that two Senate committees are already looking at the events of Jan. 6, as House panels have done as well. The Justice Department is pursuing cases against hundreds of individuals who were involved. Former President Donald Trump and others have said any commission ought to also be tasked to look at street protests and violence that took place in the aftermath of the police killing of George Floyd.

But with all that on the table, several Republicans have alluded to their concern about a new commission “dragging on” into 2022, the year of the next midterm elections. “A lot of our members … want to be moving forward,” said Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., the No. 2 Senate Republican toMcConnell. “Anything that gets us rehashing to 2020 elections is, I think, a day lost.”

Resistance even after 9/11

The Taliban were toppled but bin Laden escaped, and U.S. forces have been engaged there ever since. The troop numbers have declined in recent years, and President Biden has indicated that all combat troops will be out by this year’s anniversary of the 2001 attacks.

Opiniontrump And His Voters Are Drawn Together By A Shared Sense Of Defiance

Americans in general have begun to catch on: 66 percent of Americans believe that the media has a hard time separating fact from opinion and, according to a recent Gallup poll, 62 percent of the country believes that the press is biased one way or the other in their reporting.

So when CNN, NBC News, Fox News, or another outlet break a hard news story, there is a good chance that a large swathe of the public won’t view it as legitimate news.

And politicians, right and left, are taking advantage of this.

The entire ordeal is part of an ever-growing list of examples in which the media seemed to be biased, whether consciously or not, against Republicans.

Before Donald Trump, there was New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who in 2014 accused the media of “dividing us” because they asked him about some protesters who had chanted “NYPD is the KKK” and . He also accused the media of McCarthyism when they dug into the personal life of an aide of his, who reportedly had a relationship with a convicted murderer. The mayor also publicly and privately accused Bloomberg News of being biased against him, since it is owned by his predecessor. However, de Blasio is not terribly popular within his own party, so Democrats in New York did not buy what he was selling.

The Media Has Entered The Republicans Pounce Stage Of Critical Race Theory

Now that polls show a majority of Americans oppose Critical Race Theory, the Democratic Party and their scribes in the legacy media have launched a rearguard action against parents — by casting them as the aggressors. As is true every time the Left misfires or overreaches, the media ignore the offense and focus on the popular backlash in a tactic popularly known as “Republicans pounce.”

Media coverage proves that CRT has entered the “Republicans pounce” stage. Witness the words of one Politico writer, who said on Thursday, “he right is hoping to capitalize on the grassroots angst over critical race theory and excite its base voters in next year’s midterms.” Chris Hayes, who has the unenviable position of competing directly with Tucker Carlson on MSNBC, agreed Thursday night that all the Republican Party’s “rhetorical fire has moved away from the deficit and on to some random, school superintendent in Maine after his district dared to denounce white supremacy after the murder of George Floyd.”

But why are grassroots Americans so filled with “angst”? Because they are intellectually deficient and, of course, racist, according to Vox.com.

“Conservatives have launched a growing disinformation campaign around the academic concept” of CRT. “It’s an attempt to push back against progress,” wrote Vox.com reporter Fabiola Cineas. The problem is that “Republicans … want to ban anti-racist teachings and trainings in classrooms and workplaces across the country.”

Trump Continues To Push Election Falsehoods Here’s Why That Matters

Republican opposition to the commission

Rice was featured in one of the very few congressional commissions ever to receive this level of attention. Most are created and live out their mission with little notice. Indeed, Congress has created nearly 150 commissions of various kinds in just the last 30 years, roughly five a year.

Some have a highly specific purpose, such as a commemoration. Others are more administrative, such as the five-member commission overseeing the disbursement of business loans during the early months of pandemic lockdown in 2020. Others have been wide-ranging and controversial, such as the one created to investigate synthetic opioid trafficking.

In the initial weeks after the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol, the idea of an independent commission to probe the origins of the attack and the failures that let it happen seemed a no-brainer. It had broad support both in Congress and in public opinion polls. It still enjoys the latter, as about two-thirds of Americans indicate that they think an independent commission is needed. The idea has fared well — particularly when described as being “9/11 Commission style.”

Opiniona Guide For Frustrated Conservatives In The Age Of Trump

Conscious bias or not, such practices do not engender trust in the media amongst conservatives. They only reinforce the belief that the media seeks to defend their ideological allies on the left and persecute those on the right while claiming to be objective.

This idea that the media is made up of unselfconsciously liberal elites who don’t even recognize the biases they have against conservative policies and conservatives in general goes back decades, to when newsrooms were more or less homogenous in nearly every way. At first, conservatives fought back by founding their own magazines; after Watergate and in the midst of the Reagan administration and liberals’ contempt for him, organizations like the Media Research Center began cataloguing the myriad examples of biased coverage, both large and small.

And there was a lot to catalogue, from opinion pages heavily weighted in favor of liberals to reportage and analysis that looks a lot more like the opinion of the writers than unbiased coverage.

Despite Cries Of Censorship Conservatives Dominate Social Media

GOP-friendly voices far outweigh liberals in driving conversations on hot topics leading up to the election, a POLITICO analysis shows.

The Twitter app on a mobile phone | Matt Rourke/AP Photo

10/27/2020 01:38 PM EDT

Link Copied

Republicans have turned alleged liberal bias in Silicon Valley into a major closing theme of the election cycle, hauling tech CEOs in for virtual grillings on Capitol Hill while President Donald Trump threatens legal punishment for companies that censor his supporters.

But a POLITICO analysis of millions of social media posts shows that conservatives still rule online.

Right-wing social media influencers, conservative media outlets and other GOP supporters dominate online discussions around two of the election’s hottest issues, the Black Lives Matter movement and voter fraud, according to the review of Facebook posts, Instagram feeds, Twitter messages and conversations on two popular message boards. And their lead isn’t close.

As racial protests engulfed the nation after George Floyd’s death, users shared the most-viral right-wing social media content more than 10 times as often as the most popular liberal posts, frequently associating the Black Lives Matter movement with violence and accusing Democrats like Joe Biden of supporting riots.

Politifact Va: No Republicans Didn’t Vote To Defund The Police

Rep. Bobby Scott speaks at a 2015 criminal justice forum.

Speaker: Bobby ScottStatement: “Every Republican in Congress voted to defund the police when they voted against the American Rescue Plan.”Date: July 12Setting: Twitter

In last fall’s campaigns, Republicans thundered often inaccurate charges that Democrats wanted to defund police departments.

U.S. Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., is flipping the script and saying that all congressional Republicans voted to defund police this year when they opposed a $1.9 trillion stimulus plan.

“Every Republican in Congress voted to defund police when they voted against the American Rescue Plan,” Scott tweeted on July 12.

Scott represents Virginia’s 3rd congressional district, stretching from Norfolk and parts of Chesapeake north through Newport News and west through Franklin.

His claim, echoing a Democratic talking point, melts under scrutiny. Here’s why.

The Facts

The term “defunding police” arose after the 2020 killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. Many advocates say it does not mean abolishing police, but rather reallocating some of the money and the duties that have traditionally been handled by police departments.

Scott’s explanation

Barbera sent an NBC article noting that communities in at least 10 congressional districts represented by Republicans who opposed the bill are using some of its relief funds to help their police departments.

Our ruling

We rate Scott’s statement False.

Opinion:no The Media Isnt Fair It Gives Republicans A Pass

The right-wing media, willfully ignoring the press investigations into Tara Reade’s accusations, insist that former vice president Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has not been treated similarly to accused conservative men . They have a point, but not the one they were trying to make.

arrow-right

Let’s start with the big picture: Right-wing groups persistently engage in conduct for which Republicans are not held to account. The latter are allowed to remain silent after instances of conduct with a strong stench of white nationalism, but pay no penalty for their quietude. Right-wing demonstrators at Michigan’s statehouse this week — angrily shouting, not social distancing, misogynistic in their message, some carrying Confederate garb — were not engaged in peaceful protest. This was a mob endangering the health of police officers and others seeking to intimidate democratic government. Some protesters compared Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to Adolf Hitler and displayed Nazi symbols. Newsweek reported:

The media has adopted the approach that a pattern of sexual harassment claims over decades is not relevant because Trump has denied them, yet they want investigated the single assault claim against Biden. Biden responded in an interview and in a lengthy ; the media insists these things have to be investigated further. They do not ask Trump’s campaign why the president does not respond to questions. They do not ask Republicans about Carroll, Zervos or others.

Social Media: Is It Really Biased Against Us Republicans

Wednesday promises to be another stressful day for Facebook, Google and Twitter.

Their chief executives will be grilled by senators about whether social media companies abuse their power.

For Republicans, this is the opportunity they’ve been waiting for.

Two weeks ago, Twitter prevented people posting links to a critical New York Post investigation into Joe Biden.

It then apologised for failing to explain its reasoning before ditching a rule it had used to justify the action.

For many Republicans, this was the final straw – incontrovertible evidence that social media is biased against conservatives.

The accusation is that Silicon Valley is at its core liberal and a bad arbiter of what’s acceptable on its platforms.

In this case, Republicans like Senator Ted Cruz believed Twitter would have acted differently if the story had been about President Donald Trump.

Sobering Report Shows Hardening Attitudes Against Media

NEW YORK — The distrust many Americans feel toward the news media, caught up like much of the nation’s problems in the partisan divide, only seems to be getting worse.

That was the conclusion of a “sobering” study of attitudes toward the press conducted by Knight Foundation and Gallup and released Tuesday.

Nearly half of all Americans describe the news media as “very biased,” the survey found.

“That’s a bad thing for democracy,” said John Sands, director of learning and impact at the Knight Foundation. “Our concern is that when half of Americans have some sort of doubt about the veracity of the news they consume, it’s going to be impossible for our democracy to function.”

The study was conducted before the coronavirus lockdown and nationwide protests over the death of George Floyd.

Eight percent of respondents — the preponderance of them politically conservative — think that news media that they distrust are trying to ruin the country.

– Deal gives Atlanta company control of Anchorage TV news

The study found that 71% of Republicans have a “very” or “somewhat” unfavorable opinion of the news media, while 22% of Democrats feel the same way. Switch it around, and 54% of Democrats have a very favorable view of the media, and only 13% of Republicans feel the same way.

That divide has been documented before but only seems to be deepening, particularly among conservatives, Sands said.

In The Age Of Trump Media Bias Comes Into The Spotlight

Almost 20 years ago, after my first book, “,” came out, I made a lot of speeches, some of them to conservative organizations. The book was about liberal bias in the mainstream media. I had been a journalist at CBS News for 28 years and, so, it was a behind-the-scenes exposé about how the sausage was made, about how bias made its way into the news. 

I said that despite what many conservatives think, there was no conspiracy to slant the news in a liberal direction. I said that there were no secret meetings, no secret handshakes and salutes, that anchors such as CBS’s Dan Rather never went into a room with top lieutenants, locked the door, lowered the blinds, dimmed the lights and said, “OK, how are we going to screw those Republicans today?” 

It didn’t work that way, I said. Instead, bias was the result of groupthink. Put too many like-minded liberals in a newsroom and you’re going to get a liberal slant on the news.    

Liberal journalists, I said, live in a comfortable liberal bubble and don’t even necessarily believe their views are liberal. Instead, they believe they are moderate, mainstream and mainly reasonable views — unlike, of course, conservative views which, to them, are none of those things.

But what I wrote and spoke about then — mainly about how there was no conspiracy to inject bias into news stories — seems no longer to be true today. 

Pandering, it seems, is good for business.

Bias shows itself not only in what’s reported, but also in what’s ignored. 

Florida Republicans Move Against Social Media Companies

TALLAHASSEE — Concerned that social media companies were conspiring against conservatives, Florida Republicans sent a measure Thursday to Gov. Ron DeSantis that would punish online platforms that lawmakers assert discriminate against conservative thought.

The governor had urged lawmakers to deliver the legislation to his desk as part of a broader effort to regulate Big Tech companies — in how they collect and use information they harvest from consumers and in how social media platforms treat their users.

Republicans in Florida and elsewhere have accused the companies of censoring conservative thought on social media platforms by removing posts they consider inflammatory or using algorithms to reduce the visibility of posts that go against the grain of mainstream ideas.

With the ubiquity of social media, the sites have become modern-day public squares — where people share in the most trivial of matters but also in ideas and information that often are unvetted.

In recent years, social media companies have acted more aggressively in controlling the information posted on their platforms. In some cases, the companies have moved to delete posts over what they see as questionable veracity or their potential to stoke violence.

DeSantis is a strong ally of the former president, and the Republican governor is supporting hefty financial penalties against social media platforms that suspend the accounts of political candidates.

America Hates The Republicans And They Dont Know Why

@jonathanchait

Americans harbor certain deep-rooted impressions of the two parties, which have held for generations. Democrats are compassionate and generous, but spendthrift, dovish, and indulgent of crime and prone to subsidize poor people who don’t want to work. Republicans are strong on defense and crime, but too friendly to business and the rich. What is striking about the Republican government is how little effort it has made to push against, or even steer around, the unflattering elements of its brand. President Trump and his legislative partners have leaned into every ingrained prejudice the voters hold against them. They have acted as if none of their liabilities even exist.

That is not the approach Democrats have taken in office. Bill Clinton famously fashioned himself as a “New Democrat,” angering his base on crime and welfare and declaring the era of big government over. Barack Obama did not position himself quite so overtly against his party’s brand — which had recovered in part because of Clinton’s success — but he did take care to avoid confirming political stereotypes. Obama frequently invoked the importance of parenting and personal responsibility. He did not slash the defense budget, and took pains to woo Republican support for criminal-justice reform. Obama tried repeatedly to get Republicans to compromise on a deal to reduce the budget deficit. Whatever the merits of these policies, they reflect a grasp of the party’s innate liabilities.

Placing Some News Sources On The Political Spectrum

Here are a few examples of major news sources and their so-called “bias” based on ratings from AllSides  and the reported level of trust from partisan audiences from the Pew Research Center survey.

Note that much of these ratings are based on surveys of personal perceptions. Consider that these may be impacted by the hostile media effect, wherein “partisans perceive media coverage as unfairly biased against their side” . A three-decade retrospective on the hostile media effect. Mass Communication and Society, 18, 701-729. ).

The Capitol Siege: The Arrested And Their Stories

It would only be logical for that memory to inform the imagination of any Republican contemplating a similar independent commission to probe what happened on Jan. 6. The commission would likely look at various right-wing groups that were involved, including the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, some members of which have already been charged. The commission might also delve into the social media presence and influence of various white supremacists.

Moreover, just as the 9/11 Commission was expected to interview the current and preceding presidents, so might a new commission pursue testimony from Trump and some of his advisers, both official and otherwise, regarding their roles in the protest that wound up chasing members of Congress from both chambers into safe holding rooms underground.

House Minority Leader McCarthy was asked last week whether he would testify if a commission were created and called on him to discuss his conversations with Trump on Jan. 6.

“Sure,” McCarthy replied. “Next question.”

All this may soon be moot. If Senate Democrats are unable to secure 60 votes to overcome an expected filibuster of the House-passed bill, the measure will die and the questions to be asked will fall to existing congressional committees, federal prosecutors and the media. To some degree, all can at least claim to have the same goals and intentions as an independent commission might have.

The difference is the level of acceptance their findings are likely to have with the public.

[pctrichvrs]

              * emma mackey, cis woman + she/her  | you know celeste laurent, right? they’re twenty four, and they’ve lived in irving for, like, seven years? well, their spotify wrapped says they listened to cry baby by the neighbourhood like, a million times this year, which makes sense ‘cause they’ve got that whole watching the phone ring to avoid picking up, unintentionally locking eyes from across the room and dark circles further accented by pale skin thing going on. i just checked and their birthday is december 9th, so they’re a sagittarius, which is unsurprising, all things considered. 

mun.

  wow ..,. hello ! i’m jay ( she&her ) and i’ve been eyeing this group for days .. *nicki minaj vc* i’m obsessed . celeste is my only muse but give me 2 business days and i’m sure that’ll be vastly different . i feel like i should give the disclaimer that although i adore plotting, i’m super slow with messages so feel free to just ..,. let my oddball child interact and go with the flow . < 3 

quick stats.

full name: celeste rosalie laurent.

sexuality: bisexual.

occupation: youtuber/podcaster.

neighborhood: lives in port apartments.

mbti personality: intj.

about.

celeste was born and raised in lyon, france . her mother was an art curator and her father was an architect. they passed along their desire to be surrounded by pretty things which resulted in celeste dabbling in nearly every art form imaginable from a young age . 

sure, some of her work turned out better than others but it was clear that she had a real knack for anything that didn’t really require the left side of her brain. if it involved creativity and didn’t have much structure, she was drawn to it and excelled. she was fourteen when she ended up making her first short film. sixteen when she earned a spot at cannes film festival, sparking quite a bit of buzz and earning funding to a school of her choosing . 

celeste knew she wanted to go to america and it helped that she had a few cousins in north carolina . she went to UNC school of the arts for two semesters before throwing her scholarship away . . . her distaste for structure getting in the way . she’s also pretty fickle so when that chapter closed, she decided to give up short films and put her energy into youtube . 

her channel was an absolute clusterf*ck at first but she made a ridiculous conspiracy theory video and it just kind of stuck. i’d consider most of her channel to be similar to buzzfeed unsolved ( conspiracies, ghosts, etc ) with like a sprinkle of ridiculous challenge videos and maybe the occasional cooking/painting video ?? if you’re her friend, you’ve probably made a cameo in a video at some point .

if it wasn’t obvious enough, celeste’s biggest flaws are her need for freedom and her fickle tendencies which affects nearly everything in her life . everything is very sporadic for her with very little consistency . she’ll go weeks without working on anything and then have a deadline and have to finish it in 2 days . romantic relationships are very hard for her because by the time you’ve gotten comfortable with her, she’s probably moved on a bit . friendships are admittedly a bit easier but she’s definitely not a friend you’d expect to be present a lot ?? phone is always on do not disturb and she takes hours to text back . if you want her, you’d probably have better luck just showing up on her doorstep .

kind of spacey too like even if you show up, good luck getting her undivided attention . she’ll be there physically but mentally ?? who knows, really . the type to occasionally cut you off mid-convo with a question that just popped into her head that’s unrelated to the original topic .

overall though, not too hard to get along with if you give her some room to breathe and have some patience . celeste despises confrontation and does her best to stay pretty lowkey . i feel like she’s kind of drawn to people that stand out and are unique in one way or another and LOVES to hear people tell their story or talk about themselves . she hates being the center of attention ( she used to love it when she was making films ) and is nearly a bit reclusive at times but doesn’t even realized she’s been tucked away in her apartment until someone points it out .

basically the human embodiment of Gifted Kid Burn Out(TM) . #relatable

tldr ; a youtuber ( think buzzfeed unsolved ) originally from france who was once incredibly gifted in film . flighty, fickle and spacey but has a genuine curiosity for everyone she meets .

headcanons.

still has a french accent but it’s not nearly as prominent as it was when she first moved to the states . 

has a super odd sleep schedule ? sometimes she’s pulling all nighters and sometimes she’s in bed by 9pm. it usually depends on the amount of work she has to do but sometimes she’s just like fuck it, let me binge this show or start this book at midnight . 

a “look at the sky!” ass bitch ..,. loves to stargazing or take a minute to appreciate a pretty sunset. yes, she will be pulling out her phone to document it . 

her youtube is pretty successful with about 400k subs ..,. although she’s started branching out into making podcasts and neglecting youtube a bit . 

still a bit of an aesthete ? like very drawn to pretty things/people which may make her seem kind of superficial but she literally just has such a deep appreciation for things that are appealing to the senses . 

i’ll add more later but it’s 1am and i’m getting sleepy .

wanted connections.

roommates ; arguably some of my fave plots are roommate plots ! bonus points if they don’t get along for some reason but anything is fine with me .

will they/wont they ; another dynamic that i’m a sucker for ! doesn’t have to lead anywhere like maybe they just have ridiculous chemistry when they’re around each other ? maybe they’ll go on a date and try it out at some point ? 

long-term friend(s) ; someone who she’s been friends with since she was 17 ? i don’t think celeste’s social circle is very big so they probably mean a lot to her .. ride or dies .. best friends .. platonic soulmate vibes . yes pls .

exes ; i don’t think she’d have many but maybe one or two ? could be on good terms, bad terms, one/both of them still aren’t over it ..,. the options are endless .

Parent Friend(TM) ; someone who checks in on her to make sure she’s eaten a proper meal and has slept fairly recently would be super cute, i think ! she’s the type to drink iced coffee at noon and be like : ) thank u . i’m stuffed and then neglect doing self care .

i do not have a cute name for this but basically the exact opposite of the parent friend(TM) and someone who makes celeste go out and have fun bc she’s a tad reclusive ...,. drags her to parties / on roadtrips / other spontaneous shit . 

enemies / frenemies / former friends ; always fun . always a good time !

literally anything like u can send me a musing post and be like ‘do this with me’ and i will probably do it 

[askmerriauthor]

Starbound AU World and Character Lore Notes

Things worth being aware of for characterization and such, either based in canon lore from Starbound itself or extrapolated off reasonable evidence to support the notion.  Likely Part 1 of ??? submissions:

Conservation of Matter, Energy, and You The Starbound setting is futuristic to the point of magic, including also featuring actual magic.  So that gives us a ton of wiggle room on handwaving away just about any nonsense, but there are some constants that continue on regardless.  In this setting matter and energy are flawlessly interchangeable and can be preserved in a permanently stable, non-degrading state with no loss in conversion.  The methods and specifications of how this wondrous technological development works are never deeply explored and frankly it’s better we keep it that way.  So what applications does this have for people who live in the setting?

- Virtually Endless Storage Through the use of various forms of technological tools, matter is either converted into pure energy/data and stored within the tool, or matter can be spontaneously constructed via “nanites”.  That is to say, a legion of microscopic robots with a unified hive mind that can cooperatively build complex structures seemingly out of nothing (in this case, converting some form of stored/ambient energy/mass into the necessary materials desired).

We see this sort of of functionality constantly within the setting, usable both by the player and NPCs alike.  Whether it be a capsule pod, or a ray gun, or a Matter Manipulator, or any other bevy of trinkets that may come into play.  Need a giant mech suit to explore the void of space, or a hover bike to skim a planet’s terrain in style?  Just press a button on a handy little device and poof!  Nanites instantly construct the vehicle for you on the spot.  Want to carry an entire mountain in your pocket?  Transport billions of gallons of molten lava from place to place without it cooling?  The Matter Manipulator has you covered as it converts matter into energy and categorizes it in an easy-to-interpret list.   Have a farm of cute critters which produce natural animal byproducts for you but need to relocate in a pinch?  Just aim a ray gun at each and zap!  Your adorable animal friend is converted into pure energy, stored within the gun’s capacitor system, and held there in perfect status for easy transport.  You can even capture and tame wild animals and monsters from alien worlds by throwing pokeba-- er, “capture pods” at them to the same function.

Mind you, this manner of matter-to-energy-back-to-matter conversion is 100% efficient and suffers no degradation.  Similarly we don’t have any of the Star Trek “teleporting actually kills you and spawns a clone that just thinks it’s the real you” nonsense either.  When you pick up a volume of dirt with the Matter Manipulator, the device doesn’t replicate the molecular composition of ‘dirt’.  It takes that exact piece of dirt, turns it into energy, and when you want to recall it later it gives you back that exact piece of dirt.  This even works on conceptual forms of matter like “storage”.  You can use the Matter Manipulator to pick up a storage cabinet and tote it around in an energy/digital form.  However, you can also fill that storage cabinet with items and then scan it, at which point you energize/digitize the filled cabinet.  When you bring it back out again, it still has all those items stored inside.

Say you have a storage unit that can hold 300 items.  Now let’s say you have 300 of such storage units.  You fill all 300 with whatever you want and then pick up the many units with the Matter Manipulator, store them into that single original 300-capacity unit, and then pick up that to put it in your pocket.  Container-ception!  This only works one-tier deep, however.  You can put a filled container inside another container and then pick that up, but you can’t put both of those filled containers into a third and then pick that up.

What this means within the context of the setting is that moving vast amounts of materials, goods, even living beings is a completely negligible effort.  It would be completely plausible for entire cities to be constructed seemingly out of thin air, or wholly relocated from one planet to another, with no real trouble at all.

-Functional Immortality So remember what I said before about being able to convert animals into energy?  Yeah, that’s not just animals - it’s all creatures, including sentient beings like you.  Teleportation is the primary method of transport throughout the galaxy (followed shortly by ship-based faster-than-light star cruising) where the target individual is converted into energy and hurled across the galaxy in point-to-point teleportation.  This of course can be activated intentionally in order to facilitate mobility (be it long-range teleportation or short-range “blinking” to traverse one’s immediate surroundings) but it also has the potential to activate automatically when one dies.

Being a video game, of course there’s a “respawn” function so you can continue playing after you die.  But this isn’t a benefit only the player gets - NPCs get it too.  When a Being dies from whatever traumatic event, they burst into energy and vanish.  Compare this to when you kill a wild animal on some hostile enemy world - such critters die with a wet squelch sound, a spray of blood, and often leave behind organic matter like raw meat, pelts, chemical compounds, and other facets of their anatomy.  If you have a friendly NPC you’re escorting as part of a mission and they suffer an untimely doom?  The game prompts you with a message saying that they’ve respawned safely nearby so you can continue on.  Whenever you the player die in-game, your character respawns back on their ship’s teleporter platform after a short animation sequence unique to your species.  The animation is clearly just visual flavor and not meant to be taken literally, but the process it represents is what really matters.

Basically what all of this means is that whenever a being travels via Teleportation, there’s some built-in security function that will monitor their biological signal (which is how they can allow for intergalactic teleportation on the fly in the first place) that will prevent a Being from dying.  It doesn’t protect one from being injured (especially since wounds can be immediately healed through similar technological processes), but at the moment one would expire they’re instead recalled to safety by the teleportation system.  This sort of technology operates on faster-than-light processing speeds, so it’s not like it could ever really come up short in the heat of the moment, after all.  But even with that it isn’t infallible.  In the events of the game, Earth was completely destroyed and countless lives were lost in the process, presumably because there was no recall function operating at the time.  I mean, Ruin showed up to wreck the entire planet in short order, so no doubt whatever security systems might’ve been in place on Earth were likewise destroyed in the process, which required survivors to flee via ship.  At the time of its destruction Earth had been a peaceful paradise for ages, so odds are they might’ve been a little lax on having redundancies to cover their butts with since there were literally no genuine threats to be vigilant against.

Back to the point; this serves as functional immortality.  Not actual immortality.  Beings in the setting still age, can suffer diseases/toxins, lose limbs, and so forth.  Similarly, if one were to somehow disable the means of teleportation (putting up a no-fly-zone anti teleportation field, destroying a teleporter array entirely, etc.) that would put someone relying on such a means of security in mortal peril as a result.  There might even be naturally-occurring cases that could prevent teleportation recall as well, which the player may experience during the events at the end of the game which I won’t discuss fully here to avoid spoiling anyone.

[gamepanicplay]

Design Report: Immersion

How enemies help to immerse the player

The importance of in game enemies. this is a detailed explanation on how they important and therefore imperative for immersion in different styles of games.

Enemies can turn the most boring of dungeon crawlers do an exciting impactful adventure and those tense moments and exhilarating action. To make these enemies truly immersive in the gameplay required these three important steps.

·         mechanical Immersion

·         Spatial Immersion

·         narrative Immersion

 Mechanical immersion is usually associated with small Untold Stories that are found in the background. These types of stories are not converted the player by npcs they are visual cues that allow a player to interpret the story differently from what is originally presented these are usually hidden to give the players a semblance of Mystery.

I shall give you a scenario of this "you are in a big dark room all the windows are boarded up from the inside and all the plates and dishes are strewn About shattered on the floor and Scattered around, you see drops of blood leading from the cabinet leading to A Door can you see more blood Pooling under the door frame”.

There are other forms of immersion you can acquire immersion from voice clips or in game files , ones that can be found within a book or notes and most commonly from prodding at npcs and even npcs talking with each other a good example of this is how Skyrim npcs interact with each other and the player and sometimes you can acquire quests by Simply listening to npcs talking and you can outright miss this Quest if not paying attention. And these games these forms of information like they can be found as physical objects you can interact within the games you don't just get a PNG of text you actually get a three-dimensional item that you can look around for more clues.

Spatial Immersion is predominantly described with the featuring of this type experience where players experience seasons and topography of the game like far off mountain treading off into the distance that you are allowed to explore on foot, deep gorgeous that's when you fall in them you gradually increase your speed until you hit the bottom, and endless Fields where the player can experience peace with the calm sounds of nature with the gentle sounds of footsteps on grass. The best way to allow people to experience these forms of immersion or it is better if I say the best say the ways in which this shatters immersion is with the dreaded loading screens the more loading screens and the unexplained invisible game walls where the player is individually told they are not allowed to go there. The player experiences the more it pulls him out of the game.

Some of the player base debate about how far must immersion go?

Some people seem to agree that in some games there is way too much realism, and this type of realism can actually pull some people out of the game a common problem did people like to talk about is carry weights do they help immersion or do they break immersion.

Ideally, if you want a player to go through a specific area and not take any shortcuts you would use the actual enemies themselves to block the players pat through that area to gently lead him to the early wish him to experience first.

 Mentioning the enemies let us talk a little bit about the enemies and what their purpose basic is it is not that simple as enemies stopping the player from proceeding to make it more difficult it needs to be a smart placement so that you do not frustrate the player, everyone knows you cannot just drop an insurmountable wall to your player otherwise they might leave the game.

Now there are games where there extremely difficult enemies but those specific enemies specially were made like that for the purpose of that particular game and the main mechanic of the game like for example:

“shadow the Colossus” (In this game is about gigantic creatures that requires multiple strikes in specifics places while you are climbing them to be able to kill them.)

They are very important criteria to making a good enemy. For the best example, I can present where the grand majority of the ambience of the game is within its enemies Subnautica.

“Subnautica” (A game where you are free-floating through the ocean trying to survive giant sea monsters trying to eat you.)

What Subnautica has is that you first land in the safe Shallows and what this area is a spot where very few hostels to allow to spawn and until the player integrates with this new environment then he can go deeper where he could find bigger and stronger the enemies. In broader terms the enemy should be appropriately levelled of the current level of player it's ok to have weak enemies at the beginning of the game your Player does not know how to play it so you can forgive him that early And this smoothly leads us to narrative Immersion narrative immersion is someone deceiving because it doesn't only refer to immersion from the story but can also be in the way of how your characters are written a good way of doing this is when your enemies have a specific job some people called them enemy classes find the most common ones being The Archer and bruiser there are different varieties of these enemies and because of their specific abilities they look different from each other. To change the player the enemy doesn't just need to be spammed to lose all of its HP there would be intelligent ways of killing enemies with player made traps or with pre-existing traps they make the enemy Trigger.

The most important thing an enemy need memorable is personality good ways to give your anime personality are physical differences in the different jobs said they are assigned this is not just a stylistic choice this can also help players in coming up with different tactics according to the enemy you could have an enemy type does run away from the player when alone but the text to player when in a group. It is very important that is your characterisation of the enemy is very closely related to how they look and that their weaknesses are clearly visible for it to be easy for the player to realise this week point these weak points don't need to be obvious they just need to be clear.

 While making an enemy be very careful of how the enemy looks within the level design  you may you could have designed one of the most beautiful and creative enemies but it doesn't matter if they don't fit the place you've put them in or if the level is not built for them and with this you need be very careful the enemy needs to fit in the overall narrative and game play style you have created, if you have a very slow-moving game where the player needs to be slow and cautious to go through puzzles do not throw in a quick enemy where do player doesn't have time to react to it. It might be frightening yes but it could completely ruin the player’s experience.

While making the games enemies keep in mind when you are making these enemies of how they will react with each other will they be hostile, or will they be friendly or will they team up to kill the player. Enemies do not necessarily need to be hostile to the player they can also be there to serve as a problem for the player to solve.

Now let us talk about how to make a game enemy while using these four aspects difficulty, specific, personality, synergy.

 CHARACTER CREATION

 Let's begin by talking about the environment you're in some kind of cave, now let's say that at the beginning of the game this is going to be a 2 hit kill enemy, where the enemy lets you do a mistake in you getting hit by him immediately kill you the best way to convert these enemies dangerous, is by making him big and angry-looking preferably with big claws that face towards the player now we will start by doing something that will go against realism instead of making our enemy dark give him a bright colour so the player can see him early this will not make the game easier it will make the game fairer for the player.

Now we have a basic description of how the character looks, now we should ask how he will act. The enemy should be aggressive and following player true out the Maze with him giving up after a short while with more of an aggro range this will allow the player to be able to Backtrack if they are in the wrong section of the Maze.

Now we have a description of an enemy. Is only one I know you could create word create synergy with this character I would suggest small but quick anime does very little damage to the player that would not attack the player when alone what would group up and attack the player.

Another section I put focus on is by designing the characters sound like for example the addition off enemies that make insects sounds start the insect phobia of some people and for the bigger enemy large booming steps to show how large this creature is compared to the player this will also help the player not necessarily see the anime first but rather hear him first.

References

Design Report: Immersion

Cheng, K. and A. Cairns, P., 2005. Behaviour, realism and immersion in games | CHI '05 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems. [online] Dl.acm.org. Available at: <https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/1056808.1056894> [Accessed 2 May 2021].

Youtube.com. 2017. Before you continue to YouTube. [online] Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2gIE5gyA6s> [Accessed 3 May 2021].

Frasca, G., 2010. Rethinking agency and immersion: video games as a means of consciousness-raising. [online] Taylor & Francis. Available at: <https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1076/digc.12.3.167.3225> [Accessed 3 May 2021].

Katelyn, P. and Clint, B., 2011. An Examination of Flow and Immersion in Games. [online] SAGE Journals. Available at: <https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1071181311551455> [Accessed 3 May 2021].

Calleja, G., 2011. In-Game. [online] Google Books. Available at: <https://books.google.com.mt/books?hl=en&lr=&id=KIQKV_MXvBAC&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=immersion+in+game+enemy&ots=ykriU7XAE2&sig=VRgi57MxF2RLFdKMYuv_4dusnvc&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false> [Accessed 4 May 2021].

Youtube.com. 2017. Before you continue to YouTube. [online] Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhU4xywyWU4> [Accessed 7 May 2021].

[kindleln]

Itch.io bundle for racial justice and equality part 3!

Time Stone

A very short pixelated point and click puzzle game about a girl named Elle trapped in her professors house locked in by an evil wizard that kidnapped him to find the location of the mythic time stone. When I say short it took me like 15 minutes at most. Good for a quick bit of fun.

Curse of the Crescent Isle DX

A rather straight forward pixel platformer with the gimmick you can pick up and ride the enemies. You play as the King or Queen if the Crescent Isle where all your subjects have been cursed into a inhuman form by an evil wizard. I’m notoriously bad at platformers but had fun, beat it over two days but someone better at platformers would probably finish sooner. Kinda reminds me of the straight to video Return of Jeffar for some reason.

Autumn

A very pretty game but I could not for the life of me figure out the puzzles. Like I lacked the basic ability to fathom them and couldn’t find any help online. Maybe you’ll do a better job than me

Parallax

A black an white first person puzzle game that reminds me a bit of simplified Portal but the portals are preplaced. Everything is black or white and you go between two I guess dimensions, one primarily white and the other black to solve puzzles to get to the goal and to the next level. Pretty fun.

Lingotopia

A polygonal game that’s meant to help you learn languages by going around and talking to the mildly terrifying residents and learning vocabulary words. I can’t say I recommend it as a supplement for like doulingo or a class but maybe if you have some prior knowledge of the language and they have the one you want to learn? There’s quite a few.

Village Monsters

A little farming-social-RPG where you’re the only human in a village of friendly monsters. It’s largely unfinished and apparently will be in fall so I’ll come back to it then. So far it looks very cute with a style that reminds me of a mini game thingy from one of the Professor Layton games called London Life. Anyway.

Hairdash

A game that reminds me of street fighter though I’ve never played that. A bunch of enemies appear and you go left and right to attack them. The point seems to be to last as long as you can.

Wish Upon a Star

A puzzle game raising and lowering platforms in a 3D space and follows a blue haired child’s dreams to go to space. Short and cute finished it in one sit down.

RYB

A puzzle game where you color shapes red yellow or blue, and later other colors, based on clues. I really had fun with this one. Very soothing and pretty short despite the amount of puzzles.

Cats are Liquid: A Light in the Dark

An platformer where you play as a glowing white orb of a cat that can turn into liquid to fit through small spaces. Her owner locked her in a strange never ending room and the story is told by writing on the walls that give voice to the cat’s fears and anxieties. I like the sound track and the minimalist colors and the story hit hard, but that ending!

Cats are Liquid: A Better Place

There was a content warning on the game page so I was worried honestly. The cat is no longer glowing and is searching worlds she made with her friends. Bright flashing light warning on this one. I think I like the first one more honestly and I have a theory this is actually a prequel to the first game. Anyway I played them back to back and my wrist hurts and the ending left me feeling empty.

Where is Cat?

An adorable game made by actual children. Plays as a Where’s Waldo looking for a black cat and other objects in different rooms of a house. Very cute short and simple.

Octodad

Oh my gosh it’s Octodad. I haven’t seen this guy since high school! A guy who sat next to me at lunch would play this some times and I’d look over at it. like a creep. Well anyway you play as an octopus masquerading as a human man and move around with janky physics as you are and octopus pretending to be a human. Octodad has a loving wife and two kids from whom he must keep his cephalopodic secret but doing chores and stuff. It’s fun

Octodad Dadliest Catch

Loved it. It was fun and funny even though I had trouble with some areas like getting stuck in the playground area for like half an hour, but it’s as excellent as I thought it would be staring over that guys shoulder as he played this one as well. Also it’s funny how much of a graphics upgrade from the first game this has.

Starseed Pilgrim

I had a hard time figuring this one out. I think you’re supposed to grow the sky from colored blocks but I’m unsure. I suggest checking it out, perhaps I just couldn’t figure it out.

Four Sided Fantasy

A platformer where you control a woman and a man who can go through the left side of the screen to the right and go down to end up at the top and has a vhs/vcr vibe. It’s a neat mechanic. This game is very pretty and kinda minimalistic with an equally pretty soundtrack. It can get pretty mind bending though and I do not understand the ending I guess it’s an endless loop scenario or something.

Ollie and Bollie: Out Door Estate

A short little game where you play as little dudes Ollie and Bollie as they do little chores like rebuilding a shed or round up sheep with apples. It’s cute but Bollie’s AI kept stealing tires and you walk so slowwww. Took like 20 minutes to finish.

[she-is-tim]

Will you catch me if I fall for you?

Elu Marvel AU 

mostly written for @anxetyt1me and everyone else that are going to enjoy this 

Summary: 

Eliott is an ambitious archer boy who decides to join the Avengers when an opportunity crosses his way. Little does he know that his heart is going to be captured by one of the twins HYDRA experimented on. Lucas and his twin sister Manon just survived the attack of Ultron in Sokovia, but they are already training to become Avengers. The boy is a cheeky bastard who likes playing games. This time his target is Eliott and he can always get what he wants. 

Enjoy *finger guns*

Eliott knew the compound will be huge, he saw it on tv, but he was still in shock as he got out of his taxi. He paid for the ride, it wasn’t cheap, but he was willing to sacrifice all he had just to get here. He grabbed the strap of the quiver attached to his torso, feeling the weight of the steel arrows and his bow pulling him down. It felt like his legs were turned into concrete, heavy and immovable. Every step was like an eternity, his palms started sweating as he made his way inside the gigantic front yard towards the Avengers building. There was a chopper on his right, just waiting on the parking spot, ready to fly away at anytime. He knew the people who lived inside wouldn’t use it, they had flying supersuits, special wings, superpowers and quinjets. They liked to make a fancy entrance, especially Tony Stark. Not like any of this mattered in this exact moment. 

He swallowed the lump in his throat, continuing his road towards the front of the building. Feet still heavy, heart thumping, threatening to burst out of his chest. Now that would be a good introduction. 

As he got closer, he had to squint his eyes, protecting it from the piercing sunlight that was reflecting from the gigantic windows. The weather was nice, not too hot, soft clouds swimming through the endless, blue pool above. He stopped, looking at his outfit. Black leather, tight and well fitting, belts snaking around his waist, his thighs, keeping his throwing knives - silver ones with handles carved out of bones - safe. Boots perfectly melted on his feet, thick sole, strengthened with steel. Hands covered in leather gloves that let his fingers free, except the index and middle finger on his right one. Designed especially for professional archers like him. 

He got kicked out of his thoughts rather literally when a blue flash appeared out of nowhere. During his years of hard practice and training, it was clear that his senses were extraordinary, just like his reflexes, but he still had problems focusing his attention. That’s what made this situation possible where he was laying on the ground, the handle of his bow hardly pressed to his back as a feet on his chest placed pressure on him. Gasping for air he tried to open his eyes, which wasn’t so easy considering the sun was shining right at his face, but then a shadowy silhouette leaned over him. His eyelids fluttered open, trying to take in his surroundings and for a second Eliott was sure it would be less blinding to stare at the sun. 

The boy was gorgeous. Fluffy brown hair surrounding a beautiful, smooth face with perfectly curved nose, pink lips and those damn blue eyes. Eliott wasn’t a poetic boy, but he could write long essays about the beauty of just those irises alone. He knew he was staring, mouth agape, not able to form the words, but it seemed like the boy had a clue who he was. With a slight movement he tilted his head to the side, cocking an eyebrow. The smirk that appeared on his face was probably the most beautiful thing Eliott had ever seen, hands down. 

“You are the boy Clint is waiting for?” He spoke up and fuck, his voice was soft and smooth like warm honey, having a slight french accent, which just made him 1000 times more attractive. His foot was still pressing the archer boy down, not like he had any problems with it. He could put a leash around his neck, there wouldn’t be a complaint coming from his side. 

After long minutes of just staring into each other’s eyes, Eliott realized that there was a question he needed to answer. The boy above him didn’t seemed to be annoyed, on the contrary there was a playful spark in those ocean blue eyes. Trying to take a deep breath wasn’t a good idea considering he was pinned to the ground, but he did anyways, just to help himself find some confidence to speak with this angel. 

“Yes…” he muttered, voice sounding rather raspy. “My name is Eliott.” He managed to say it, but he kept finding himself at a loss of words under the gaze of the person above him.

“Welcome to the Avengers compound, pretty boy.” He said, leaning down even more and with that placing more pressure on Eliott’s already hurting chest. “You are going to have fun.” He added with a cheeky smile on his pretty face. Eliott knew he would already do anything for this boy without a single question just to see him smile again. He was pretty much fucked. 

“Lucas, what are you doing?” The high pitched voice came from where the entrance of the gigantic building was. Eliott could see the outlines of a girl, slim body, wearing black skirt, a grey shirt with a scarlet red jacket. Her curly hair was like a brown waterfall, surrounding a pretty face. Eliott could notice the similarities between her and the boy, Lucas’ features, not mentioning the soft French accent of both. 

“Nothing.” He replied and within a blink of an eye the pressure was gone from Eliott’s chest.

He could only see the blue flash as the angelic boy returned to his sister. Now he knew who they were, the Lallemant Twins, Lucas and Manon. Orphans that were used by the psychopath HYDRA scientists, experimenting and torturing them, making them have special powers to then use them as weapons against their enemies. But they got out, sided with the Avengers and helped them defeat the army of Ultron, the crazy robot that tried to drop the city of Sokovia on the Earth to destroy humanity with it. Of course Eliott didn’t know the details, but he had seen a lot of videos, read articles and interviews with people who were there during the battle. Lots of the citizens died or got hurt, it was a hard price to pay for saving everyone else. That’s what it means being an Avenger, Eliott knew it. 

He slowly got up from the ground, being sure that his back has a bow handle shaped hole now. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t take his eyes off the boy, who was now having a quiet conversation with his twin sister. He just realized what Lucas was wearing and he just didn’t know how to process that sight. The pants were fine, loose ones, black colored with two white stripes on the sides of his thighs, but the top… He was wearing a well fitting, long sleeved shirt, a combination of dark blue and grey mixing on it with lighting bolt shaped white stripes just on the place where his stomach area started. And it was tight, like really tight. 

Without realizing that he started walking forward, he suddenly found himself being close enough to catch some of their talk. It turned out to be difficult to focus on the actual words being said while seeing and hearing Lucas speak. The boy was just so soft and beautiful, Eliott couldn’t believe he actually fought with an army of lethal robots alongside big names like Clint Barton, Thor or Captain America. It just seemed impossible for this soft looking boy to hurt even a fly. 

“-cking care what he said, I’m going to handle this one.” Lucas sounded just a little bit frustrated as he was talking to his sister. Manon looked at Eliott over her brother’s shoulder and then let out a frustrated sigh. 

“Fine, but I am not going to save your ass from Clint again.” She said and with a smooth movement she spun around on her heels, disappearing behind the glass door. 

Eliott just stood there dumbfounded, as the other turned to him, wide smirk plastered to his face. Realization hit like a truck, only noticing now how small the boy in front of him actually was. He could hug him from behind, resting his chin on the top of his head easily. And damn if that didn’t make him want this brunette even more. 

“So, why are you here actually?” Lucas asked, trying to sound nonchalant with little success. He opened the door for the tall one who nodded as thanks, walking inside. 

~°~

Eliott was glad when they arrived to the training room where Clint Barton waited for them. Their walk was really awkward, at least to him, Lucas seemed to enjoy circling around him, asking the most random things. ‘How old are you?’ ‘Where are you from?’  ‘Are those knives on you thighs?’ ‘Wanna try throwing one at me?’ ��Is this your natural hair color?’ ‘Can I touch your hair?’ ‘You wanna touch my hair?’ Of course he could barely stutter out a few words, completely embarrassing himself. This was the first time he felt so nervous around someone that he lost his voice and wasn’t able to speak. Usually he had too much confidence, being aware of his looks and skills, but this very short and also very fast boy seemed to make him turn into a shy, stuttering mess. 

As he stepped into the huge, empty room made out of steel and concrete. Half of the floor was covered in what looked like auburn linoleum, while the other half had epdm rubber flooring. In the middle stood the guy himself. The person Eliott looked up for ever since he heard the rumors about him. Clint Barton aka Hawkeye, the best archer in the whole world. Hair perfectly styled, oil green shirt loosely hanging on his well trained body, tight jeans wrapped around his legs, tucked into black boots. Suddenly his nervousness got doubled, hands getting sweaty. Lucas stepped forward, putting his hands on his waist. The man squinted his eyes at him before his face broke into a wide smile.

“There you are, you little bastard. I was looking for you.” Cint said, walking to the boy and patting him on the shoulder. “I see you found my visitor.” his eyes wandered towards the tall boy, who had to swallow, wiping off the sweat from his palms.

“Yeah, he’s fun, but very quiet.” Lucas responded, now turning around, another pair of eyes landing gazes on Eliott. 

“I… My name is Eliott.” he managed to force out the words. This would be much more easier, if that angelic brunette wouldn’t be there with them in the room. 

“Yeah, I know.” Clint said, looking at the boy next to him now. “Leave us alone, Lucas. I think you have training with Nat and Manon today.” he said cocking an eyebrow, sounding like a father who’s talking to his rather stubborn son. It was endearing to see this kind of relationship that Eliott could never had in his life. 

His father left him and his mother when he was just a baby, not even bothering to pay child support or visiting his son. He grew up in bad circumstances, struggling with money, which lead his mother to borrow cash from the most shady people. That’s why she ended up with a bullet in her head, that’s why Eliott got captured when he was 12, being tortured and trained to be their deadly assassin. To their bad luck, they couldn’t erase all the memories he shared with the mother they killed, so he waited. When the perfect opportunity came, he killed them all and escaped. Since then he was roaming the countries, leaving Paris and all its filth behind. Until he found out that the Avengers are looking for rookies, training them to become fighters. So he called the number, talked to a few people and now he was here. After long years of suffering, loneliness and fear, he found the place where he can get a reason to live.

He got dragged out of his spiraling thoughts when a blue flash, probably Lucas passed by him, leaving with the feeling of soft fingers brushing through his hair. It was so sudden and unexpected that he almost lost his balance, barely saving himself of landing on his back yet again. That boy really liked to play with him, using his speed to get maximum advantage. 

“I’m sorry about the kid.” Spoke Clint now, walking closer to Eliott, who quickly shook his head as weak try to get rid of the clinging feeling of the brunette’s touch. “I guess he’s excited. He is not allowed to leave the compound, so he doesn’t really have the chance to meet new people.” He explained with a soft smile on his face. 

“How old is he?” Eliott decided to ask, because he was genuinely curious about the boy. It felt like something inside him was pulling him towards Lucas, like they were connected. 

“He’s 17, too young if you ask me.” 

“Life doesn’t care how old you are, it just throws shit at your face and expects you to handle it.” Eliott replied, looking at his personal hero, who seemed to be impressed by his words. 

“I can’t wait for you to meet Nat, I think she would like you.” He said smirking. 

~°~

A whole week passed, filled with long hours of training with either Clint or Natasha. They were really good, like real professionals, which made Eliott realize that his skills weren’t much above average compared to them. But this just kept fueling his determination to become stronger, faster, never missing a shot. 

Sometimes as he met Lucas on the hallways or in the kitchen, but they didn’t have much time to talk both of them occupied with their own training. It still couldn’t make the archer boy forget about that soft touch or ignore the way sometimes the other was looking at him. Those ocean blue eyes haunted his dreams, chasing away the usual nightmares he had ever since he slaughtered his torturers. He knew they were bad people, that they deserved to die, if not for their other crimes, then just for killing his innocent mother. And still flashes of spilling blood, echoes of death screams and the sight of lifeless bodies were the only thing he could hear and see once he closed his eyes. Up until he met this gorgeous boy. 

It was Tuesday, his usual training were canceled due to a mission both Natasha and Clint had to participate in. Something happened that involved a guy named Brock Rumlow, so Captain Rogers decided to follow the leads. Eliott only had the chance to see the actual big names from afar considering both Tony Stark and Captain America were busy people. He once had a chance to chat with Sam Wilson, he’s a sympathetic dude with great humor, Eliott liked him a lot. Then there was Manon, the quiet one out of the twins. She’s spending most of her time with either Vision, the android with crazy powers or Natasha, trying to learn how to use her abilities in battle. 

Since there wasn’t much thing for him to do without training, he decided to spend his time outside by the river. He sat on the side of the wooden platform, back resting to one of the pillars that held the roof above his head. He looked at the sketchbook placed on his lap, opened on two blank pages, pen laying on his right ear. It was a long time ago since he had time to actually draw something, but he knew exactly what - or more like who - he wanted to draw. The person that got stuck in his mind ever since they met on the driveway of the compound. Someone with eyes so blue that the sky feels jealous, the ocean wants to hide by the sight of them. 

He let out a deep sigh, dragging his eyes away from the sketchbook to the calm water, trying to enjoy the quiet. There wasn’t any noise coming from inside the building like always, no one was arguing with F.R.I.D.A.Y. or training with explosives. There wasn’t a thing that could ruin this perfect moment. At least he thought so, until a certain fast boy appeared out of nowhere, creating a wind that almost flew Eliott’s sketchbook out of his lap into the river. Thankfully he had enough consciousness to catch it in time, saving it from getting soaked. He shot an angry look at the short boy, who was standing in front of him now, innocent smile plastered to his face. He was wearing sports grey sweatpants and a white shirt with the word ‘Désir’ written on it. Eliott hated the fact how he looked fucking gorgeous in those clothes too. 

“How’s it going?” he asked, running his fingers through the already disheveled hair. Eliott rolled his eyes, clutching his sketchbook to his chest to protect it from the chaos that this brunette was. 

“I was doing fine just a second ago.” Eliott replied. Just because he had a crush on this demonic angel, it didn’t mean he can’t be annoyed with his behavior. During the time he had spent here, it became crystal clear that Lucas lived on annoying the hell out of everyone. Which wasn’t that hard considering his abilities. 

“Wow, someone’s grumpy.” he smirked and crouched down just so their eyes could be on the same level. “I didn’t know you are drawing.” he said, nodding his head towards the sketchbook. 

“Only when I have time.” He said, his sudden anger starting to fade away, giving more space to the fucking nervousness again. This boy was affecting him in ways no one ever did before, which was a tad bit scary. Like the way he smiled made his heart beat crazy fast. “What do you want anyways?” he managed to ask.

“Well, since we both have some free time, I thought we could hang out.” he shrugged and sat down now too, pulling up his knees to his chest, resting his arms on it. Eliott tried not to focus on the veins that were clearly visible on his hands and forearms like this. 

“I would prefer to be alone.” He mumbled and that was the biggest lie in the history, because he wanted Lucas to stay, even if they don’t talk. 

“Yeah, I don’t care. I am going to stay.” He said with a wide smirk, resting his chin on his arms now, long eyelashes fluttering at him. Eliott was afraid that his heart is going to burst out of his chest. “So… you are an archer boy and an artist? What other talents you have?” He asked curiously, wiggling his perfectly curving eyebrows. The tall one sighed and dragged his eyes away from the boy, just to make talking easier. 

“That’s all basically. I am good at shooting and throwing stuff. I rarely miss my target.” His eyes followed a piece of grass floating down the river. This place was so calming and peaceful. It was a long time ago since he got a chance to appreciate nature and its beauty in any kind of way. He forgot how nice the summer breeze can feel on a heated day. How beautiful water looks when it’s mirroring the cloudless, bright blue sky. Everything in this world seemed to be so nice, innocent and sweet in this very moment, almost letting him forget about all the horrors he had seen in his life. All the things he had done. People he killed, tortured and hurt. These just faded away in the bright sunlight, the soft wind taking them far away, leaving nothing but serenity behind. 

“What about the drawing?” Lucas voice dragged him out of his thoughts so suddenly he got startled, letting his sketchbook go that was falling towards the water. Everything happened so fast, but within a blink of an eye, his sketchbook as home from his sight. He turned his head towards the boy in front of him, the black notebook in his hands. “That was close.” 

“Can you give me back?” He blurted out instead of saying thank you, which was not very polite, but he couldn’t care less. That sketchbook was too important for him. 

“What will I get if I give you back?” Lucas asked, playful smile appearing on his face as he got up and took a few steps back, keeping the notebook behind himself. Eliott squinted his eyes at the boy. 

“Nothing, that’s mine!” 

“But I saved it for you, therefore I deserve a reward, right?” He kept grinning as the archer boy got up, trying to get his sketchbook back, but he started just swaying around quickly and flawlessly. 

“No, it’s not how it works. Give it back, Lucas!” 

“Come and get it, Robin Hood!” He smirked, sticking out his tongue, slowly backing towards the building. Eliott walked forward with a determined look on his face, but deep inside he kinda enjoyed this little play. Lucas was adorable as he used his speed to get an advantage over him every time he tried to get back the little book. 

“You are so annoying! Give it back!” 

“I want a reward!” 

“What reward?” Eliott sighed, stopping now, placing his hands on his waist. The other one also staying put, looking at him mischievously. 

“Stay there and close your eyes.” he replied, bouncing on his feet excitedly. It was just so fucking adorable that Eliott couldn’t resist him, so he just let out a defeated sigh, closing his eyes slowly. He could feel the wind brushing through his hair, his nose filling with a scent he couldn’t recognize at first. It was like the smell of air right after the storm. Then before he could react, soft lips touched his own ever so slightly and carefully like being afraid of rejection. He opened his eyes just a little, taking in the sight of Lucas being so damn close, his features seemed even more beautiful, eyelashes casting long shadows on his pink cheeks. Hair falling to his face, making him look like the young, innocent boy he actually was. And fuck if Eliott didn’t fell for him in that exact moment. 

His hands moved on their own, grabbing the brunette’s waist, pulling him so close their bodies were almost pressed at each other and he captured those cherry lips with his own. He could feel the boy gasping into the kiss, the notebook falling out of his hands, landing on the wooden floor with a soft thump. Soft hands were snaking their way up on Eliott’s back, grasping into the black shirt he was wearing. Their kiss started off slow, searching, trying to see how far they can go with the other. In the next moment Eliott found himself pressed to a wooden pillar, the rough material digging into his skin, while a soft body was grinding on his front side. That was probably the best thing he had ever felt. With one hand he kept holding the boy’s waist, while the other was sliding down to grab his thigh, pulling him even closer.

After long minutes of kissing and trying to eat up the other’s face, Eliott pulled back, examining the boy, his flushed cheeks, swollen lips and his ocean eyes that were filled with desire. At least his shirt was accurate, which made the older one smirk. Lucas smirked back at him, fingers gripping into Eliott’s messy locks, pulling him down for an open mouthed kiss this time. Tongues swirling around each other. Not even the soft summer breeze could cool down their bodies now that they were burning in passion. 

Their heated up making out session was disturbed by the sound of the Avengers quinjet landing not too far from them. The boys broke apart, looking into each other’s eyes, smiling like idiots. Before Eliott could say a word, Lucas grabbed his hand, squeezing it slightly and started to walk towards the building with him. 

“Let’s go and welcome the others.” he said on a cheerful tone, trying to fix his mess of a hair with his free hand. Eliott let out a heartfelt laugh and placed a soft kiss on the top of his head. 

“Sure thing, Sonic.” he muttered into his hair to which he got a disapproving look from the boy.

“Fuck off.” 

“Nah, you convinced me to stay. Now you gotta deal with my shit.” his smile didn’t seem to disappear anytime soon and damn if that wasn’t feeling good. Lucas gasped, placing his hand over his heart, faked shock plastered to his face.

“Oh, mon dieu! What have I done to myself?” voice dripping from sarcasm, while he was still holding Eliott’s hand. The tall boy laughed, pulling him closer and disentangling their fingers just so he could throw his arm around Lucas’ shoulder, realizing how well he fits there. 

“Just shut up.”

“Make me!” Lucas retorted, stopping in their tracks, turning his head to the side. That expectant look on his face was so alluring and sweet, Eliott couldn’t resist. Why would he resist? Therefore he closed the short distance between them, locking their lips together in a soft, slow kiss. 

When the weight disappeared from under him alongside with the soft mouth that was pressed to his just a second ago, he almost lost his balance, landing on the floor. He heard laughing from afar, turning his head towards the sound. Lucas was standing in the doorway, leaning to the frame, swinging Eliott’s sketchbook in his hands victoriously.

“Come on, Robin Hood! We have to go.” he said with his cheeky smile that made the tall boy’s heart beating faster. He shook his head with a soft laugh, jogging towards the building where the other was waiting for him. 

Now in this very moment Eliott felt like his life had a reason, that all those things happened to him in the past weren’t just to fuck him over, but to lead him towards this moment. He was meant to be here, meeting Lucas, falling for him. It sounded cheesy, so he would probably never admit it out loud, but in this playful boy he found his reason to keep going. And so he will, because he is not gonna let anyone take this away from him. Not this time.

~°~

Make sure to leave a comment or your opinion on this ficlet! I am super nervous, cause I can’t decide if this is a good one or not, but I really wanted to publish it already. 

Bious

[basicsofislam]

ISLAM 101: Belief in The Hereafter: Part 7

The Proof of Justice

Is it at all possible for a Just and Wise Being, who does everything with absolute wisdom, not to maintain the rights of His creatures, not to obtain the right of the oppressed from the oppressor and to reduce justice to nothing? This justice exists virtually here; so, it means there is a great court somewhere else and there is a land of justice and there must be.

We will examine this proof under two headings:

1st STEP: WHO IS THE OWNER OF THE JUSTICE VISIBLE IN THIS UNIVERSE?

Justice means to give every owner their right and to put everything in its place in accordance with wisdom and benefit. Justice is the opposite of oppression and cruelty.

In this sense of justice, God Almighty is absolutely just. Let us prove it:

Justice means to give every owner their right. When we look at this realm, we see that the sustenance and equipment of all of the creatures are given to them in the best way. Not even one creature is forgotten. A fly is not given the wing of an eagle and an eagle is not given the wing of a fly. Each creature is equipped with the devices that it needs. Even the rights of the creatures that we despise are preserved like that. You will confirm us when you examine the body of a fly or an insect.

The fact that everything is created, given shape and put in their appropriate places in accordance with precise equilibrium and in appropriate measures to equip them with the most appropriate devices and that they are given their rights in accordance with their disposition shows that all matters are done in accordance with infinite justice.

The fact that the fly is given an eye with 5.000 lenses, that the fish is given a fin, that a bird is given a wing, that the elephant is given a trunk and that the camel is given a hump is also an indication of this justice. In short, that each creature is given the organs that are necessary for their survival is an outcome of this justice.

Now we are asking:

Who equips even a fly with organs to enable it to maintain its life by preserving its right to live?

Who equips all creatures with wise organs and preserves their right to live?

Who puts those organs in the most appropriate places?

Who gives them the bodies full of wisdom and the forms full of benefits?

Who maintains the equilibrium in this realm?

In short:Who is the Just Owner of the justice that takes place before our eyes? It is definitely God and it is the manifestation of His justice.

Now, let us have a look at another aspect of justice: One aspect of justice is to take the revenge of the oppressed from the oppressors.

The pages of history are full of the grievous ends of the oppressors in this sense. The Pharaohs, Nimrods, Croesuses, and many more oppressors were hit by the divine blows of the name al-Adil (the Just) and the rights of the oppressed were taken from them.

However, as it will be explained under the second heading, this world cannot be a place for the full manifestation of justice; it is left to another realm. Besides, when a gate is opened in the hereafter with the name al-Adil, the fact that the full manifestation of this aspect of justice is not visible in this world will be presented as proof.

However, we can say this: phrases like “it serves him right”, “you sow what you reap” frequently used for the oppressors prove that the oppressors always suffer divine blows. Even one blow received by an oppressor shows that there exists an Absolute Just Being behind the curtain. The existence of thousands of blows like that shows the existence of that Being like the sun and does not let any opening for denial.

Another aspect of justice is this:It is to protect the rights of other living beings by preserving the equilibrium in the realm. For instance, microorganisms reproduce very fast when they have appropriate conditions. If these microorganisms could reproduce as they wished, they would invade this world.

However, they were not allowed to reproduce as they wished in order to protect the rights of living of the other beings; they were forced to struggle various enemies and thus they were prevented from invading the world.

Let us ask again:

Is it possible for such fine equilibrium to take place coincidentally and such a coincidence to continue for thousands of years?

If it is not possible, who established this amazing equilibrium in the universe?

Who is the Just Being that prevents living beings from the tendency of invading the realm?

It is definitely God. The flawless equilibrium seen in this realm proves the existence of God Almighty, who established this equilibrium, and His justice like the sun.

2nd STEP: THE NAME JUST NECESSITATES THE HEREAFTER

Is it at all possible for justice that preserves the right of a small creature and helps it not to preserve the rights of man, who is a great creature, and to reduce itself to nothing? Is it possible? It is definitely impossible!

Then, a big court must be established and a place of justice must be prepared since the rights of man will be preserved and justice will not be reduced to nothing. Man, who lives a short life in this ephemeral world, cannot realize and experience the truth of that big justice here. This ephemeral and temporary world is away from being a place of justice for man, who has been created for eternity. In this world, the oppressors live in dignity and the oppressed live in contempt.

However, real justice demands that the right of the oppressed be taken from the oppressor and this small man be rewarded or punished not in accordance with his small size but in accordance with the greatness of his murder, the importance of his nature and the greatness of his duty. They can only be possible in the hereafter.

Since the world exists and there exists mercy and justice in the world, there definitely exists the hereafter too just like the world, and we are going toward the hereafter. To deny the hereafter means to deny the world and what is in the world.

That is, the time of death and the grave are waiting for man; similarly, Hell and Paradise are waiting for and watching man, too.

Now, let us summarise what we have learned about this proof in items:

1. There exists endless justice in this realm. The fact that everything is created,   given shape and put in their appropriate place in accordance with precise equilibrium and in appropriate measure to equip them with the most appropriate devices and that they are given their rights in accordance with their disposition and to hit the oppressors with divine blows  shows that all matters are done in accordance with infinite justice.

2. Since deeds cannot be without doers, the justice that is visible must have a doer called “al-Adil”, true to His name. That doer  can only be God Almighty.

3.There must be a big court and a place of justice since God has endless justice and does everything with justice. This ephemeral world is away from being a place of justice. How can the rights of thousands of people that have been killed by one person be taken from the murderer in this world? You can kill him only once and it can be the retaliation for one person only. How about the rights of other oppressed people? If the hereafter does not occur, the rights of man will not have been preserved; God, who has endless justice, will never allow it.

4. When this world is observed, it will be seen that the oppressors live in dignity and the oppressed live in contempt and that they die in the same way. If the hereafter does not occur and if the oppressor gets away with it, it will be an endless oppression for the oppressed. God is far away and free from such oppression.

5. To deny the hereafter can only be possible by denying the existence of God Almighty and His name al-Adil. To deny God can only be possible by denying the justice that takes place before our eyes. A person who denies justice must be blind or insane. Besides, we do not address people who are not sane.

6. We want to add this: The reason why justice is not manifest fully in this world  is the mystery of testing. Due to the mystery of testing, God lets the oppressors although He is not pleased with it. If He did not let them, the mystery of testing would be invalid and the wisdom of the establishment of the world would disappear. It is the same for both human beings and animals. Due to the mystery of testing, many cruelties are allowed and  the rights of the oppressed people are left to the hereafter.

In short:

God, who shows his endless justice by giving a body even to a fly, giving it a form, equipping it with endless wise organs and by training it, will not leave the rights of the oppressed in the oppressor by not bringing the hereafter.  He is far away and free from it.

Yes, one day, the oppressor will be punished for his oppression and the oppressed will be rewarded for the derogation he has suffered. Even the hornless sheep will get its claim from the horned sheep. We believe it and we confirm it.

VIDEO:

https://reverthelp.com/video/belief-in-the-hereafter-the-proof-of-generosity/

[moomingitz]

what is your opinion of the Tom & Jerry movie?

Oh hey. Looks like it’s that time for an unpopular opinion of mine:

I seriously don’t think it’s that bad at all. It’s hardly what I would call god awful. It’s just okay.

A lot of people are getting tired of studios especially pulling the, “Y’all are just whiny entitled fans!”, card. But, the people I’ve seen shriek about how oh-so awful this damn movie is, and how it apparently “ruined” Tom & Jerry, do come off as just whiny fans overreacting because something deviated from a series of shorts they were most likely introduced through from endless re-runs on Cartoon Network or Boomerang. Not just any fans, but usually the average Western animation fan I can’t stand.

I watched re-runs of the Tom & Jerry shorts growing up, but I only really watched them because it was on before shows I was more interested in on Cartoon Network. So I don’t really have any real strong nostalgic connection or loyalty to them, or the characters, like other’s do, so my view of the film is far less biased compared to others. Whatever semi-nostalgic connection I have for the movie has to do with early Youtube memes. Like this classic line.

I even gave the benefit of the doubt and assumed I had some rose tinted nostalgia lenses from when I watched this movie a couple of times when I was little. But when I re-watched it as an adult, after learning that it’s apparently considered some god awful abomination to animation… I didn’t see it. I just saw a mediocre at worst animated film.

I would even go as far to say that I think it’s one of the more competent film adaptations of an old animated IP(whether animated or live-action). Unlike the direct-to-video Tom & Jerry movies, they actually tried to do an original story instead of just having the titular characters fuck around in the background of some other popular piece of fiction. It’s animated competently. The characters don’t go off-model and they don’t end up looking fucking creepy.

The songs in it are a mixed bag, though. They range from awkward, dumb but amusing, or actually kind of catchy.

I don’t even care at all about the decision to have Tom and Jerry actually talk in the movie. If anything I thought the voices they gave them were actually fit them. Like that’s exactly how I always imagined these characters sounding if they talked.(I don’t know why they gave Tom some mobster sounding accent, though.)

The only things that really made me cringe were the sexual innuendos they kept pushing between the fat evil aunt(that’s pretty much her character, along with her morbidly obese skateboard riding dachshund) and Tony Jay the Evil Lawyer, and the fact some grown ass adult just finds some unconscious kid and the thought to try and contact the authorities or any of their possible family members only becomes a crosses their mind once they see they could get a bazillion-million dollar reward for finding them. They really loved shoving in the former into the movie.

If I had what I think is a legitimate and valid criticism about the movie as a whole, it’s that I think it took way too long for it to get to the point and establish it’s actual main plot and conflict.

I didn’t think the film’s premise about two enemies having to form a begrudging truce for someone else’s sake was a bad one at all. If anything I think it would have provided potential to challenge Tom and Jerry in a meaningful way. It’s not the first time the two put aside trying to kill each other for the sake of another, so it’s not like it would even be out of character for them. But here’s the problem with how they decided to go about it:

They wasted the first 20 minutes on what was basically padding, and didn’t get to the real story and conflict until the film was already down to an hour left on it’s run time!

I don’t see why Tom and Jerry needed some random stray dog and a flee with a fake French accent, and an awkward musical number, to teach them that friendship is magic and shit. Then for some reason they have a cat gang, who we never see or hear of again for the rest of the movie, sing to Tom about how edgy and totally intimidating they are. I think helping a kid escape from her abusive legal guardian would give the two more than enough of a reason to form a temporary truce, okay.

What I just described above could have easily been cut out, and in return it would have freed up those 20 precious minutes of the run time to instead spend it on giving Tom and Jerry proper development with that Robin girl they meet. They could even have a healthy mix of humor and slapstick from the two trying really hard not to kill each other throughout the film. Tom and Jerry most likely wouldn’t feel as disconnected with the main conflict, then. Hell, maybe even make it more of a road trip type film with the three. Give the main characters more time to actually bond with each other and in return make Tom and Jerry warming up to each other more believable. Maybe even show that Robin is actually just as clever or resourceful as the two titular characters(her father is Indiana Jones after all), and give the two more reason to help her beyond it just being the right thing to do. This movie would not be that hard to improve or fix.

The movie and it’s premise definitely had potential. It could have been much better, but it is far from what I would call an “awful” movie. It’s just okay at the end of the day.

It really annoys me whenever I hear people hype something up as god awful, or even the worst thing ever, only for it to turn out to be maybe mediocre at worst. I’ve seen some terrible shit, especially when it comes to animation. If I go and watch or look into something because I keep hearing others swear up and down that it’s terrible or something, than it better deliver, okay! You know how people tend to be disappointed, or even mad, whenever they see something hyped as great only for it to not to meet that expectation? Well, that’s me whenever I see something that turns to not really be as bad as people make it out to be.

[periodicreviews]

Uncharted 1-3

With the release of the Uncharted trilogy for free, I decided to finally make my way through them. When I bought my PS4 in 2017, it came with a copy of Uncharted 4 that I’ve left untouched until now. I go into specifics for Uncharted 1-3, then talk a little about the series as a whole.

  Uncharted 1

My biggest complaint with this game was the platforming. It was not only tough to figure out which ledges were “grabbable” but even after my 9 hours in the game, I couldn’t accurately judge distances.

Some ledges appear to be close enough, but there’s actually a different side path the developers want you to take. Drake as a character seems to have a variable jump distance depending on if the game detects you are trying to land on a grabbable ledge.

If you jump too soon or at the wrong angle, you’ll execute a short “hop” and fall to your death. I haven’t done any digging on whether such a system exists, that’s just what it appears like.

I died over and over on one of the later levels where there is a series of platforms in the rafters of a church. I just kept misjudging distances and jumping too early.

My primary cause of death had to have been just been falling as opposed to any enemy NPC.

As I say that, I’m reminded of one particular shootout in a courtyard. At the time I remember being really frustrated that being in cover didn’t mean that you were safe from bullets. There was so much gunfire that I couldn’t get anywhere near the people who were shooting at me especially with the number of grenades they were shooting at me. It was tough to have to unlearn everything I know about cover from Gears of War, where you are safe if you don’t peek out from people shooting towards you.

 Uncharted 2

Uncharted 2 in some ways felt like a step back and a step forward.

The remastering team on U1 maybe did too good of a job because I felt the eyes of the characters in U2 felt a lot more lifeless.

The step forward was obviously in the improved platforming. I had less and less trouble judging distances. I can’t tell if that’s just because I had 9 hours of practice from the previous game, but I feel like the system judging character movement was also greatly improved.

I died 10 or more times in a single sequence when a helicopter is firing missiles at a building. The building begins to tip over and collapse and you are supposed to jump through a window on a neighboring building to escape.

Fail to jump and you die. Jump at the wrong angle, and you fall between the collapsing building and are crushed. Before I realized I was supposed to go through the window, I thought I was supposed to grab onto the ledge of the neighboring building.

Right after you jump at the exact spot, Drake says “Jump”. But for me, this audio cue always came after I was supposed to jump. I’m not sure if they intended that audio cue to be the cue for the user or not.

This particular scene is a symptom of the root problem in my opinion of the game trying to be too cinematic. I say that, even as a fan of Quantic Dream games. I know there’s a very fine line between cinematic and game. Go too far and you can confuse the player on when they are required to interact and/or make it feel like their actions have no impact. Uncharted 2 had a few such sequences for me. I never wanted to see another train by the end of it.

 Uncharted 3

The beginning of the game had me a little worried about the collision detection. It might have just been a side effect of playing with a smaller character model and the collision requirements being slightly different than the regular sized character. There were a few moments when I would get stuck in the chase sequence on corners or edges of geometry.

U3 also put a lot more importance on the melee combat system. I personally prefer to stick with the gunplay but for certain enemies like the shotgun/bulletproof vest guy and the giant brawler types, it felt like a requirement to engage them melee combat. The ability to return grenades and dropdown on enemies in silent takedowns was a welcome addition though.

I really hated the “drug trip” levels. It was very uncomfortable to look at the screen as it distorts and I started to panic during the first level because I was worried I was going in circles and causing this level to last longer than it should. Though to the developers’ credit, that’s really the point of these sequences.

There was one segment I was intent on getting through on all stealth as you infiltrate the airport to stowaway on the cargo plane to the desert. Two enemies at the end guard a door and you can’t shoot either without triggering the “alert”. You had to catch their attention, one at a time, to lure them away from the door and take them out. I really wished I could use the rock mechanic from Horizon Zero Dawn to even get them to spread out on a patrol as they searched for the noise. Ultimately, I was able to remain in the shadows enough to grab their attention but not to fully alert them.

General

I think story-wise, I enjoyed the first game the most, despite it being a little cliché that the Nazis appeared. But gameplay-wise, I probably prefer U2. I enjoyed Elena being presented as someone who didn’t have to rely on Drake to save her. The scene where Elena breaks Drake out of jail in particular was well executed and it was fun to watch these actors perform it.

In U2, although realistic that there would be some animosity between Chloe and Elena, I wished the two could be there as part of a team, not just as two sides of the love triangle. Thankfully they do warm up to each other.

In U2 and U3, characters ask Drake “what’s the point?” and I felt like Drake never successfully answered that. In U1, the driving motivation is rescuing Sully and Elena, then later on it’s in preventing the destructive power from leaving the island. In U2, despite Elena being on death’s doorstep, Drake still decides to face Lazarevic. In U3, especially after getting the warning that Francis Drake himself is alleged to have written. Drake wants to continue on. I guess that just speaks to who he is as a character but the 2nd and 3rd games lost me in that regard as to knowing when to quit. To be fair, he did want to quit in U2 until Schafer convinced him otherwise with the power of the Cintamani stone.

Music

Given Uncharted’s inclusion on stuff like Video Games Live, I expected there to be more to the soundtrack. The main theme is notable but unfortunately that’s the only track that stands out. There are no bad tracks so to speak, but nothing that made me want to listen to it again.

 Hints

The hint system was hit and miss at times. I imagine they did a lot of testing to figure out what’s the average time it takes for someone to figure out a particular puzzle and then use that time for how long it takes for the hint to appear. Frequently, the hint would appear when I was already well on my way to finishing the puzzle or when I had just figured it out.

Sometimes the hints would take the form of pressing up on the D-pad and that’s great because I have the option to not press it. It was frustrating when character dialog would tell me what to do instead of letting me figure it out. I know I could’ve turned off the hints in the menu, but I think that would have only worked for the D-pad. It would’ve been nice if that extra character dialog wouldn’t give it all away or could be triggered optionally by the D-pad.

Take a break

It’s probably my fault for trying to rush through these games. But I couldn’t help but notice how high the body count is as you kill non-descript enemy after non-descript enemy. In the first game, they’re just trying to find El Dorado and yet these people are throwing their lives away. In U2, it’s maybe a little more believable because Lazarevic is a warlord basically. And in U3, I guess it’s also believable that this secret society has vast sums of money and influence. Everyone has a price as they say.

At times, I just felt fatigued at having to mow through a whole other squadron of enemies. I know that sounds strange from someone who has played his fair share of Halo, Call of Duty, and Gears of War, where there are no puzzles or exploration, it’s just killing.

In two of those, you’re fighting aliens or “monsters”. I wonder if I played through the 3 Call of Duty Modern Warfare games back to back, would I feel the same way about them? Or maybe it’s merely because Uncharted is not sold to me as being a soldier on a battlefield, you’re just a treasure hunter against mercenaries hired by some rich guy who are just looking for a paycheck (though to be fair, that’s many soldiers as well). Maybe it’s just my personal tastes changing over the years.

This endless warzone type combat also made me yearn for one or two scene where Drake takes it easy. Even just like stopping to eat or sleep would’ve been good. The puzzle and vehicle sections are there to break up the standard run and gun action but I just feel like as a person, it would feel more realistic to see Drake take a nap some time.

Granted, Uncharted is not necessarily aiming for realism. Chances are very low that any person would be able to climb up a train car as it teeters on the edge of a cliff in Tibet. Or escape from a collapsing building that has been shot with rockets from a helicopter gunship. Or survive days walking through the Rub' al Khali with no water and still have the stamina to survive waves of troops in a gun battle. And keep doing it all over and over again.

He does take 1 nap in Uncharted 3 for like 3 hours and I welcomed every second of it. Uncharted 2 opens at a bar where he takes several sips of a drink and of course he takes several sips of the poisoned water in Uncharted 3. But in excluding all of these normal human activities, Drake feels less and less like a human and more like a god.

 I feel like maybe I’m missing something that all of these 10/10 and 9/10 reviewers saw. Part of that is probably the time that has passed. I started with The Last of Us and moved on to other games, like Death Stranding, that have built upon the motion capture acting format. Part of it is probably due to me trying to beat these games too quickly, especially when it comes to 2 and 3. I feel like as a whole they are more an 8/10.

I’ve since moved on to Uncharted 4 and so far it feels like a very different game, which I’m not sure if that is a good or a bad thing yet.

[lintheotaku]

Watched Anime Genre

Watched List: Isekai 2016-Present 

Anime:  The Rising of the Shield Hero 

Plot:  Naofumi Iwatani is an otaku that is summoned through a book as 1 of 4 heroes to the world of Melromarc, to stop the Waves from destroying the world. Betrayal and ruined reputation causes Naofumi to be shunned by the people of Melromarc as well as the other heroes, forcing him to fight the Waves in his own way, all because he bares the shield. Pros: One of the more unique isekai animes out there. Instead of just one hero, there are four heroes, each from different versions of Japan. Instead of having a quirk or completely overpowered from the beginning, the main is instead knocked down to his lowest, resulting his not so heroic approach to situations. Gradually he begins to trust those closest to him and out of the bunch, he is the most grounded person and grasps reality far better than his fellow heroes. Cons: Pacing can feel a bit slow in the anime since there is a lot of small things building up before you get to the next big thing.(omg I want to knock some sense into the other heroes) And the anime tends to throw in a tad more details to make it feel as those Naofumi has a harem than it really is. (the one filler moment actually contradicts a detail the following canon scene) Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4.5/5] Comments: With the pacing, it’s perhaps better to be reading the manga. And since this is originally a Light Novel, I HIGHLY recommend watching AniNews’s youtube channel on Rising of the Shield Hero: Skipped Content as it helps fill in gaps not placed in the manga and/or anime. 

Andddd I really can’t wait for the Scythe Hero to appear in ep 22<3

Anime: KonoSuba: God's Blessing On This Wonderful World! Plot: “When high schooler Kazuma Satou dies, his given the choice to be reincarnated in a fantasy world much like a video game and be granted one item or ability. But can a dimwitted Goddess, explosion craze crimson demon,  masochist crusader, and a lucky/unlucky adventurer to defeat the Devil King?” Pros: A very clever and humorous adventure with a group of misfits. Cons: There were a few points that felt a bit much or overly done. *cough*Aqua*cough* but luckily goes back into genuinely funny scenes. Too easily can turn into perverted moments for a non harlem type series. Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4/5] Personal Thoughts: Honestly can’t help comparing Megumin’s ability to another light novel character. Agnis, from Adventures of Duan Surk, a fire sorceress that can only use high level fire magic and passes out after each use.  Except in Megumin’s case it’s Explosion magic. Besides that, and the quite troublemaking goddess- this series is unique enough as a comedy of misfits trying to live in a fantasy RPG world.

Anime: Re:Zero - Starting Life in Another World Plot:  “ With the biggest crisis of his life being summoned to another world and no sign of the one who summoned him, things become worse when he is attacked. However, when he is saved by a mysterious silver-haired girl with a fairy cat, Subaru cooperates with the girl to return the favor.” Pros: A series with mix of carefree moments as well as suspenseful.  Cons: Subaru can have some very unlikable moments, other times you can feel your heart being torn to shreds to the point you wonder how would you fair in his shoes. Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4/5] Comments: Seriously Sabaru- Forget Emilia and go for waifu-Rem! TTATT

Anime: Saga Of Tanya The Evil Plot:  “An unnamed atheist Japanese salaryman, in the moment of being murdered by a disgruntled subordinate who he had fired due to poor performance at work, is confronted by a entity that could stop time which he refers to as "Being X" or god, who condemns the man for not having 'faith'. He is sentenced to be reborn in a world that is similar to World War I Europe, mixed with early aspects of World War II and magic, in an empire torn apart by countless wars with all nearby countries.”  Pros: Seeing the main getting bested and even frighten by “Being X” in an endless mind game while in a world in middle of war. Cons: ... uh what else is there to this series? Like how is the plot still moving? Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡  ♡ [3/5] Comments:  I’m not much into war types but this was alright I suppose. Not terrible, not a fave, and not memorable.

Anime: Overlord Plot: “When the shut-down time arrives, Momonga finds that the game hasn't vanished. Instead it appears as if Yggdrasil has been recreated as its own reality along with its various NPCs having been brought to life while Momonga has been trapped in the form of his game avatar, leaving him unable to use the normal player functions, such as General Message, or even to log out. With no other option, Momonga sets out to learn if anyone from the real world is also in this new world with him.” Pros: Curiously await what the future holds in Ainz’s adventure in this fantasy world and his NPCs seeking control of the world in his name. Cons: Albedo needs to dial back just a smidge. Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4.5/5] Comments: Don’t get attached to anyone outside the Great Tomb of Nazarick . 

Anime: Isekai Quartet Plot: 12 minute comedic episodes of characters (Overlord, KonoSoba, Re:Zero, and Saga of Tanya the Evil) are sent to another world to survive ‘school life’. Pros: Ever wonder what it would be like to have different series come together and temporarily work together at school? Wanna see what character would get along and their reactions? Yep, this would be the show for ya.  Cons: Episodes are too short! Once you finally get somewhere interesting, it gets cut to the next episode. Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4.5/5] Comments: Best way to watch this series is to binge tbh. It’s actually a lot of fun seeing the mains becoming friends and understanding their strengths and weaknesses. 

Anime: That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime Plot:  “Satoru Mikami, an average 37 year old office worker from Tokyo with no girlfriend, is stabbed to death by a passing robber. After making some requests during his death, he is reincarnated in another world as a slime with the ability known as predator (which can devour other creatures and obtain their abilities)” Pros: Unique concept of an overpowered little slime Cons: Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4/5] Comments: I really need to watch the rest of this series TTwTT

Anime: The Wise Man’s Grandson/Grandchild Plot: “A young salaryman dead in an accident was reborn in another world filled with magic and demons. As a baby, he was picked up by the patriot hero "Sage" Merlin Wolford and was given the name Shin. He was raised as a grandson and soaked up Merlin's teachings, earning him some irresistible powers. However, when Shin became 15, Merlin realized, "I forgot to teach him common practice!"” Pros: comical moments and fun action scenes. Interesting uses of knowledge from past life. Cons: Um... when/why did this become a gakuen life show? Why should we care about the very generic classmates that add little to nothing to the plot besides the crown prince? .... and you call that romance? Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4/5] Comments: Has a very strong start and I REALLY WANNA LIKE it but I’m starting to lose interest whenever Shin isn’t using his magic in a battle as everything tends to be ‘oh noes we can’t let the world know of Shin’s gifts’ to ‘Look what Shin did for us!’ in the next instant.... everything looks pretty at least.

Anime: How NOT To Summon a Demon Lord Plot:  “Takuma Sakamoto is a hikikomori gamer who is mysteriously transported to the world of his favourite MMORPG, Cross Reverie, with the appearance of his own character in the game, the Demon Lord Diablo. The two young girls who summoned him, the pantherian Rem and the elf Shera, attempt to use a spell to make Takuma their servant, but due to his passive "Magic Reflection" ability, the spell rebounds, and both end up with magic collars stuck on their necks, thus becoming his slaves instead. With a serious case of social anxiety, Takuma decides to act like his character while interacting with others, and makes use of his high stats and vast knowledge of Cross Reverie's lore to survive in his new environment, traveling along with Rem and Shera to look for a way to remove their slave collars while helping them with their own, personal issues that led them to summon him in the first place.” Pros: The comedy and Diablo’s battles are satisfying to watch. Cons: The not so subtle ecchi moments, in particular one ritual scene that was... a bit much personally. Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡ [4.5/5] Comments: If you don’t mind watching ecchi stuff, you’ll have a fun time with the story and overpowering battle moments.

Anime: Death March To The Parallel World Rhapsody Plot: “Ichiro Suzuki is a 29-year old gaming programmer who was tasked with fixing several bugs in two MMORPGs his company is preparing for publication. After taking a nap, he mysteriously wakes up in a parallel world that resembles some of the fantasy RPG worlds he had worked on, as a 15-year old named Satou Pendragon. However, before he could grasp his current situation, an army of lizardmen ambush him and launches an all-out attack on him. In desperation, he uses all three of his special 'Meteor Rain' attack options (a quick fix he added to the game for new players which kills all enemies in the vicinity) at once and wipes them all out.” Pros: A very casual journey of a character with too much exp points and money. Cons: Everything always works out in the end. Is a harlem REALLY needed here? Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡  ♡ [3/5] Comments: It’s a nice laid back Isekai series. I just wish the Elf arch had more of challenge and thrill, and the very cliche harlem girl gimmicks doesn’t make the relaxing scenes all that pleasant. Guess I was really hoping more to the story? I mean it has potential just doesn’t go there quick enough.

Anime: In Another World With My Smartphone Plot:  “ Fifteen-year-old Touya Mochizuki is accidentally killed by God. As an apology, God allows him to be resurrected, but since he cannot send him back to his old world, he instead reincarnates him into a fantasy world along with a single special request. Touya uses his request in order to bring his smartphone into the new world with him, which God modifies so that the phone will function in the new world. God also greatly amplifies Touya's physical, magical, and cognitive abilities to a certain degree as a further apology for the inconvenience of killing him. Taking full advantage of his second chance at life, Touya befriends many different people, mainly females and high-ranking people in the new world. He begins to travel from country to country, solving political disputes, minor quests, and nonchalantly enjoying himself with his newfound allies.” Pros: Visuals are pretty Cons: What was meant to be ‘basics’ in magic turns out to be the over power ability of knowing all affinities, thus you’re the strongest being in the world. There’s little to no consequences for his actions... everything always works out because of his op ability and the number of girls grow.  Personal Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥  ♡  ♡ [3/5] Comments:  This is straight up a LITERAL harem anime.  I’m having to stop watching after episode 12 as it reveals he’ll wind up with 9 wives by the end of the series. Given how everything is hunky-dory and the girls are just being unreasonable- yeah- lost interest.

[vagrantblvrd]

It Goes Something Like This (1/1)

Summary: It’s hard to say how the hell this even happened, but Michael’s not going to complain. (Or, okay, he is, but only because everyone is so fucking stupid.)

Notes: I've been rewatching the Criminal Mastermind videos and fell in love with the idea of these four becoming crew of their own before meeting Geoff and Jack and all the FAHC shenanigans that follow. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

AO3

Technically, Michael meets Jeremy first.

“You fucking shot me!” Michael yells, because he and Jeremy are drunk as fuck and recounting to the others how they met.

Opposite sides, Romeo and Juliet kind of bullshit and Michael running into a short fucker with dyed hair and this shitty little gun.

Michael carrying an equally shitty assault rifle that fucking jammed on him, giving Jeremy enough time to pop off a shot that grazed his shoulder before he bolted. (Insert short joke here.)

“I panicked!” Jeremy yells back, because he remembers that night just as clearly, and he knows Michael now. (Goddamned short jokes.)

Michael starts cackling because he’s got a shit-ton of short jokes all saved up just for Jeremy and Jeremy knows him now.

It’s no surprise when Jeremy yells incoherently and fucking tackles Michael off the couch, mouth crashing into his like he thinks he can stop Michael, the others laughing helplessly at them.

========

Ryan is...he’s this fucking bogeyman haunting Los Santos and whatever hellscape he came from remembers him because pieces of it come looking for him from time to time.

Michael heard about him before he met him, which is something that just happens in Los Santos.

You hear about fuckers like the goddamned Vagabond and either shit your pants at the thought of running up against him, or don’t really think about it because what are the odds, right?

If you’re Michael, though, you end up with a crew that hires Ryan on to help with a job and have the shitty luck to have someone from Ryan’s past catching up to him. (Worst timing really, and Michael caught in the middle of the whole mess.)

They’re waiting for the timer to hit zero before they kick things off and Ryan’s being a little too smug about things again. (Not dangerously so, no. Just this side of irritating, which means someone needs to remind him the Vagabond is really just a huge dumbass.)

There’s a certain kind of silence over the comms, not quite judging, because God knows their own pasts have caused them trouble in the past, but -

“In my defense,” Ryan says, sounding less like the soulless monster he’s supposed to be, and more like  the hapless idiot he is. “I thought Carl was dead.”

The silence this time around is absolutely judgmental because Ryan is an idiot who slips up from time to time.

“Yeah, well,” Michael says, remembering the nightmare chase through the streets of Los Santos while being chased by an asshole bent on revenge. “You’re a surprisingly shitty driver for someone with your reputation.”

Michael grins as Ryan sputters, and outright laughs when Gavin starts squeaking and Jeremy wheezes.

“Oh, you are in for it when we get home,” Ryan says, and it isn’t the Vagabond or hapless idiot Ryan making the threat, just that dumb bastard Michael’s more than a little in love with.

Michael grins at the chorus of ooohs from Gavin and Jeremy and Ryan’s fondly exasperated sigh.

A soft ding sounds over the comms signaling the start of this little heist of theirs, and Michael cheerfully breaks out the explosives to start things out the right way.

========

“Fucking Battle Buddies!” Jeremy yells, because he’s an idiot.

“Battle Buddies, fuck yeah!” Ryan yells, because he, too, is an idiot.

Idiots who refuse to tell Michael and Gavin how they met, just come out with the Battle Buddies shit like that’s a thing normal people do.

They even have matching tattoos on their biceps. Michael likes to run his fingers over them, tracing the lines of stupid hardcore design on the dumbest people he knows, and feeling their muscles flex under his touch.

========

Gavin -

“Ryan was supposed to kill me,” he says, tinkering with some gadget or whatever Ryan got for him on his latest job. “Didn’t do it, though.”

It’s an idle comment, lazy day for them with the rain coming down steadily outside and things going well for them at the moment.

Michael looks up from the deathmatch he is handily losing while Jeremy and Ryan hunt each other in-game, every bit as creepy as the rumors say the Battle Buddies are.

“Fucking surprise there, Gav,” Michael says, as though Ryan’s the only one in the room who’s tried to kill him.

There was a time Michael was ordered to kill Gavin too, and Jeremy has a similar story of his own, because apparently Gavin’s just that annoying.

Makes a habit of making enemies easy as breathing and getting clear of them by the skin of his teeth one way or another. (They weren’t the first to hired to kill Gavin, and knowing him they won’t be the last.)

“Hey,” Ryan protests, not looking away from the screen. “I almost killed you.”

Gavin snorts, like Ryan’s blowing things out of proportion there. (Honestly given the way things went when Michael was sent to kill him, it’s possible.)

Twisty little fuck with a love of traps and clever as hell.

This scar on Michael’s back from one of them, and Gavin patching him up when Michael realized his boss was a lying fuck and maybe keeping Gavin alive was in his best interests after all. (Which, you know, considering how things worked out, it definitely was.)

========

Lester’s the reason they started working together, all that time ago. Called them in for a job he didn’t want to trust to anyone else for whatever reason, and things just sort of...happened from there.

Jeremy eyeing Michael warily, eyes darting to Michael’s shoulder and the graze long since healed. Michael snatching the keys out of Ryan’s hand with a scowl, because he’d be goddamned if he let the asshole drive anything he was in ever again. Gavin with this bemused expression on his face as he looked to Lester as though wondering what the hell the man was thinking.

Lester not giving a shit about any of that as he laid out the particulars of the job and chased them out of his place to get things done.

The four of them staring at each other because really, and finding out through a series of misadventures along the way that they actually worked well together. (Somehow didn’t get each other killed, but that’s one and the same sometimes in Los Santos.)

Lester kept calling them together for jobs, and eventually they figured hey, why the fuck not and formed a crew of their own, and that slid into something else because hey, why the fuck not?

Jeremy’s terrible fashion choices and worse puns and shy, sweet smile when they kissed for the first time. Ryan’s stupid everything and strong hands cradling Michael's face so, so gently after a close call and lips against his, something desperate to it. Gavin’s reckless bravery and blood on his face, crooked little smile and quiet “Hey,” after endless days tearing the city apart to find him like he’d never doubted they’d be looking for him.

The four of them figuring their shit out like complete idiots. (Which meant it took them fucking forever to do it, but when they did it turned out to be the best fucking thing in the world.)

Lester still goes to them when something big is happening, and for better or worse, Agent 14 trusts them too. (As much as an asshole like him can, at any rate.)

========

Gavin is the one who finds out about them. Pair of idiots making like they’re here to take over Los Santos, one step at a time.

Asshole in a tux and his partner in crime known to favor gaudy Hawaiian shirts, and ties to the Roosters.

Looking to carve out a space for themselves here and putting out feelers for anyone willing to take some risks for major rewards.

“No,” Ryan says, because Gavin has that look in his eye again.

The one that says he’s fascinated, and he’s always been a bit of a risk-taker, and they’re a little too invested in the stupid fuck to let him get himself killed.

“I mean,” Jeremy says, icing his shoulder after a sparring match that got a little too spirited, while Michael presses a bag of frozen peas to his jaw. “It could be a good thing?”

Michael leans against Ryan, feels the tension running through him because he’s a pessimistic bastard. (No surprise considering the road that led him here to Los Santos.)

They’re doing pretty well for themselves, when all is said and done.

Have a nice place to live and a few fancy cars, a bike or two. All the tech Gavin could ever want and contacts all over the city.

Lester hates them a little less than he hates most people, and Agent 14 is willing to look away if they get into things they shouldn’t when he isn’t involved. (Hasn’t called the FIB or IAA down on them anyway.)

Absolutely no reason to look into these two idiots, or too closely at the way they’re all feeling a little restless where they are now, too big for the small-time crew they used to run with and the kind of shit they’re involved in, and not big enough on their own for some of the things they’d like to try their hand at. (No reason at all, if they want to stay where they are.)

========

“Huh,” Ramsey says, eyebrows raised as he gets a look at them. “I, uh. Huh.”

Michael glances at Ryan who is menacing as ever while working. At Jeremy who has traded in that brown cowboy hat of his for a blindingly white one apparently as a fuck you to any other cowboys roaming the streets of Los Santos, like that’s a thing that happens.

At Gavin, smug as fuck as he takes a delicate sip of his drink, because he’s got three of Los Santos’ more notorious figures at his back, and loves the reactions it gets from people when they realize. (As though Gavin isn’t as well known as they are, or his work, at any rate.)

The bar is quiet for this time of day, the six of them in a booth at the back and Patillo eyeing them appraisingly while Ramsey -

“You said you were looking for people for this job of yours,” Gavin says, eyebrows raised. “We’re interested.”

Ramsey sits back, gaze flicking between them and this frown between his eyes as he considers. (There are new rumors about the four of them these days, and he’s sure to have heard them by now.)

“We are,” he says slowly, as though he’s realizing the things he could do with them on his side, a light in his eyes alarmingly like the one Gavin gets.

Gavin smiles, just a hint of teeth, because he’s always a step ahead of them in matters like this.

========

Ramsey becomes Geoff, Patillo becomes Jack, and Los Santos never really recovers when the six of them decide to make their mark on the city.

Infinite Possibilities