#friend-shaped

[yourfaveisfriendshaped]

Reimu

The plush specifically

Plush Reimu is friend-shaped!

[mysterious-trail-of-goop]

^this is what i mean when i say Damian Wayne has kitten energy

[marlynnofmany]

Has Tumblr met Buddo yet?

A little friend-shaped friend made of whale bone, from back in woolly mammoth times.

[beasttrash]

you gotta bow in respect to hiking bear y'know? @opanimalszine

[markscherz]

What is the best toad you have ever seen? (doesnt have to be one you saw irl, just the best toad in your opinion).

Look, there are 647 toad species in 53 genera, and I have seen many of them, some of which are truly glorious. So it is hard for me to say that any one is the best I have ever seen. But to just choose one group for the sake of argument:

I am a huge fan of animals evolving mittens instead of fingers, like what we see in bolitoglossid salamanders and the web-footed sand gecko, Pachydactylus rangei. In toads, the arboreal African genus Nectophryne have done this gloriously. And they're also exceptionally cute for true bufonids.

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[michiriii]

BROOO I JUST STUMBLED UPON YOUR BOLG AND YOUR ART LOOKS LIKE A FRUIT GUMMY I WANNA EAT SO BE /VPOS

i really like the ones you do of marx and magolor :}

THANK U SMMM WAAAHHH 💖���💖

[the-faultofdaedalus]

oh ive realized why elf senshi is so unsettling to me personally. its bc he looks like he's french.

[tiny-waving-snail]

Hey guys, look! The fairy showed up at my door!!

[bouncyballcitadel]

not me finishing the demo and coming to find out more about riley only to learn he isn't a RO?! 😭 it's too late your honor I already love him

Never say never 😉

[sing-you-fools]

a grown man in the wild just informed me that i am "very friend-shaped." sir, i know you're on here. the book is the goblin emperor by katherine addison

[yourfaveisfriendshaped]

Peri from Fairly Oddparents A New Wish

Peri is friend-shaped!

[mishimakitan]

~ Potentially useful JP fact ~

Once upon a time (300+ years ago, before modern science), Japanese people thought the echoes you hear on mountains and canyons were made by this friend-shaped creature that looks like it's shrugging (¯\_(ツ)_/¯) named Yamabiko (山彦 or 幽谷響).

Yamabiko isn't typically known to be malicious or harmful, but people thought the delayed echoes (e.g. when you yell atop a mountain, your voice echoes back) heard on mountains, canyons, and valleys was this little furry creature's fault.

More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamabiko_(folklore) Nowadays in Japanese, when people say "yamabiko" it is usually about the mountain echo phenomenon or Yamabiko (JR East bullet train name) depending on the context. Source 1: https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%B1%B1%E5%BD%A6-144298 Source 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamabiko

[marlynnofmany]

Friend-shaped

“She’ll want to pet it,” said a smug voice from the next room. “Humans will pet anything.”

“Even spiky things?” asked the skeptical voice that I recognized as Zhee. “I’ve never had a human want to pet me, and this thing is much worse.”

As curious as I was to see our newest cargo and judge for myself, I first had to finish setting out food for the animals in the next bay. I lugged in bags of dried pellets and fish jerky as the door slid shut behind me, cutting off the sound of Zhee insisting to the delivery person that there was no way under several suns that I would want to touch this new mystery animal. We’d see about that.

I stashed the pellets in the appropriate closet and pulled out a sheet of jerky for each of the three fangy monstrosities that twined around each other, trying to hypnotize me through the bars. I ignored the moving pattern of stripes that probably worked on prey from their world. Working quickly, I set the sheets down on the floor outside the cage, spaced as far apart as possible, then used a gravity wand to lift them through the bars without losing a finger. Left one, right, one, then the middle, to keep the beasties from all jumping on the same treat.

A chorus of happy growls and chewing noises filled the air. Success. I put away the gravity wand and reflected that I absolutely would have liked to scritch all three terrifying predators on the head, but I valued life and limb too much for that.

On to the next room! The doors opened and closed in quick succession. I passed other people loading and uploading various crates, but I only had eyes for the terrarium that looked like it was made of force fields instead of glass. Or maybe some room-temperature version of hard water, given that the person chatting with Zhee was a Waterwill. They had some pretty bizarre tech.

“Ah, here’s the human!” the Waterwill said happily, her voice burbly and vaguely female. “What do you think of your newest live cargo?” She extended what passed for an arm from her column-of-goo body. Beside her, Zhee spread purple pincher arms in a silent display of “ta-dah.”

Inside the tank I saw rocks, sand, a puddle of algae, and the ugliest little ball of snot and spikes that I had ever encountered. Protruding eyes struggled to focus on me like a wall-eyed Chihuahua that had rolled through the most unfortunate of trash piles.

“Wow,” I said, bending down for a closer look. “That’s an animal, all right.”

The Waterwill bobbed up and down. “And is it not, as you say, cutesy-wootsy?”

Zhee made various clicks and taps that were probably skepticism. I couldn’t blame him.

“Well,” I said, struggling for a tactful answer, “It sure is a little one. Looks a bit scared.”

“They always get twitchy when they’re moved around before egg-laying,” the Waterwill said with a dismissive wobble. “It’ll settle down when everybody stops walking by. It’s non-toxic. Maybe once it’s calm—”

The rest of her sentence was cut off by loud snarls from next door, carrying through the hall while both doors were open at the same time. It sounded like a brief squabble over fish jerky, no cause for alarm.

For me, anyway. The animal in the terrarium made a piercing squeak and tried to burrow under the rock, its spines growing visibly longer and flinging droplets of moisture as it trembled violently.

“Oh, that’s bad,” said the Waterwill, all cheer gone. “It could sour the eggs. Everybody be quiet! Move slowly!” She waved two armlets at the other people carrying boxes, who did as she asked.

Zhee was making a whistle that was probably a curse in his own language, or maybe someone else’s. “We’ll get blamed for egg troubles. Would dim light help? I’ll hit the controls.” He moved off on quiet bug legs.

“What else helps?” I asked. “Wait, there’s a manual for this, right?” Without waiting for a response, I unfolded a screen from my pocket and looked for the newest files. There it was. Easily searchable, too.

While I spent a moment on that, the room dimmed and quieted into a soothing nighttime. The other crewmates grabbed the remaining crates, left, and shut the door. I heard someone say to leave oncoming boxes in the hallway for the moment.

“It’s still stressed,” the Waterwill said. “We should have brought another one to soothe it!”

“Hang on, I found the sound files,” I said. “Here’s the soothing one.” At the press of a button, a brief gurgle played, then cut off. “That’s it?”

The animal turned toward me, then back to the rock. No change.

I asked the Waterwill, “I don’t suppose you can make that sound?” When she hesitated, I tried myself. Hard to do without any water around to gargle, but I managed an awkward warble in the back of my throat.

The animal’s shivering stilled.

“Keep doing that!” the Waterwill said with an urgent wave.

I did, feeling silly. But the animal liked it. The trembling ended, and the spines started to retract. When I paused for breath, the creature held perfectly still, then when I started again, the spines continued shortening. After a few moments, it was a slimy ball of green with eyes that stuck out, and soon enough those finally closed. When they opened again, they weren’t bulging any more.

A head lifted from the goo, with a cute little face that chirped curiously.

“Aw, look at you,” I said to it. “All calm and happy.”

It oozed over towards me, moving much like Waterwills did, without any legs. It nuzzled a hatch that I hadn’t noticed in the side of the tank.

“You said it’s non-toxic, right?” I asked, not waiting for a response. I’d skimmed the manual. The hatch opened easily for me to stick my hand in and stroke the slimy little head. It purred like a babbling brook.

“Told you,” said a voice behind me.

Zhee hissed.

I turned to see him handing over credits with a displeased tilt to his antennae. “Did you just lose a bet?” I laughed.

Zhee threw his pincher arms into the air. “It was covered in spikes! No fair changing shape like that.”

“Well, if we’re going to be fair,” I said. “I would have sacrificed a hairbrush to pet it through the spikes, if it liked that kind of thing.”

“Of course you would,” Zhee muttered.

“Righto,” the Waterwill said as she stuck the credits into a wallet pouch that floated among her other miscellaneous bits. “I can see it’s in good care here. Guess I’ll be off.”

I gave the creature one last stroke, then eased my hand out and closed the hatch, waiting to make sure it stayed calm. When it settled back into goo, I stood and joined the other two in soft-footing our way to the door. “I’ll keep an eye on it,” I promised.

“And a hand,” Zhee grumbled.

“I’ve petted worse,” I told him.

“I’m sure you have,” he said. “And I don’t want to hear about it.”

~~~

The ongoing backstory adventures of the main character of this book. More to come!

[trustmy-rage]

i took pictures of the capybaras i saw today :)

[lalunanymph]

My god you have ignited something in me w that bachira as baby daddy ask

😭😭😭🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏

the smell of angst is delicious when it comes to bachi ngl 🤕

[secretspecialname]

Ya im in shape. In shape of a friend.