#galactic scenarios

[ban--tam]

yangtober day 26: detective “since we're calling ourselves the Yang Irregulars, how about this for a logo?” “no, no, the fleet's already got my name on it, let's not plaster my face over everything as well..”

[turtleblogatlast]

I know it’s not the case but I have a fun time thinking about the idea that Mikey’s portals are specifically time based.

And, in turn, I like to read the Prison Dimension being essentially locked away in the fabric of time, existing just a half second out of reality’s flow. The only way in or out is to align the times up again so their “timelines” thread together.

Or chain together, considering Mikey’s signature weapon.

[autoacafiles]

[thescreaminghat]

when ur crew member decides to adopt uhhhh a thing

[mann-walter]

He'll yeahhh!

And, I don’t think we have to dig deep into the lore for evidence of this. The Prequels may not be the best example of storytelling but I think it got this message out well enough.

idk why people just want to blame Palpatine for everything I, for one, hate great man history let's hold hands together and discuss the institutional failings that lead to the rise of the empire

[yandere-wishes]

˚｡✮ Yandere! Darth Vader {Anakin Skywalker} x Apprentice Reader

˚｡✮ Bad, bad news, One of us is gonna lose I'm the powder, you're the fuse, Just add some friction, You are my strange addiction

˚｡✮ We've talked about Yandere! Anakin Skywalker falling for Padawan! Reader... But what about Vader falling for his acolyte/apprentice?

⋆˚☆˖°⋆｡° ✮˖ ࣪ ★⋆.˚

Vader isn't nurturing.

It feels almost sacrilegious to entertain the thought.

That's why it's so troubling when the galactic empire's staff take note of a smaller morbid figure trailing after the ebony monstrosity.

I can see there being many interesting scenarios in which Vader would pick an acolyte. The most heartwrenching and particularly curious case would be if his acolyte used to also be Anakin Skywalker's Padawan.

˚｡✮ Imagine Vader searching for you across the galaxy. He feels your force signature reverberating inside him, calls out to it, tries to bind and morph it. A sardonic love letter he pens with rage and perplexion. Still, you always slip away. He keeps your hunt a secret, some ancient wound that's never healed right. The swing of your saber still haunts him, your satisfied grin as you land a blow on him. The force works in mysterious ways and Vader's desperation can't fully be reasoned. He's given up everything that Anakin once had. Forgone to an almost spiritual level. But you are the one pesky thing that still lingers. He likes to think that it's because he knows your true power. That you're a threat as long as you live.

˚｡✮ Imagine Vader finally, finally finding you. Mesmerized by how much you've grown. You're rugged, wild. Some strange creature wearing the skin of the girl he once loved. You don't hesitate to attack, and Vader signs it off as a blessing. He needs a reason to hurt you, to drag you back kicking and screaming. He needs an excuse to push his fury between your bones and drown you in his sorrows. He needs revenge in the worst way.

˚｡✮ Imagine Vader winning because of course he does. He leaves you bruised and broken, bleeding on the soft grassy ground. Your eyes are so beautiful when they're filled with terror. Your voice melodic as you scream in agony as his saber severs your leg and arm. Vengeance, Vengeance, Vengeance. You left him, left him to face Obi-wan alone, left him to be mutilated and disfigured.

˚｡✮ Imagine Vader only coming to terms with who he is, and what he is as he's watching the medical droids repair your body. He can never escape Anakin, cause that's who he still is. Anakin hasn't died just grown. He's no longer the kid with a schoolboy crush on his pupil and supernovas under his tongue. He's swallowed the burning stars, let their fires and explosions paint him in shades darker than the nights on Tatooine. He runs a cybernetic hand across your head, feeling you for the first time in forever.

˚｡✮ Imagine Vader training you once more. It's been months since your capture, months of brutal and tender torture. He's ripped you apart and rearranged you so meticulously. Picking favored parts to hem and sew with a buzzing red needle and dark doctrines. Only when Vader notes the red-rimmed golden shift flicker across your eyes does he know he's truly won. Your connection to the light is nearly completely severed. Your past is left to rot on the green planet. What stares back at him from the corners of the dark, damp cell is a creature forged of hate and malice. A sith in every way.

˚｡✮ Imagine Vader only ever happy when he's with you. He's finally free to train you as he pleases, to touch you as he pleases, to kiss you as he pleases. He's taken you to ice worlds to bleed kyber crystals and to Mustafar to forge your new armor. He kisses you on a battlefield littered with the corpses of dead resistance soldiers. Metal clancks against metal all wretched sinister love. You're beginning to love this new master, he's everything Anakin had repressed, he's everything you have always feared. But the thing you must realize about fickle fears is that once you fall in love with them, you begin to lose yourself.

˚｡✮ Imagine Pulling up Vader's mask and kissing the burns across his face. Your kisses are laced with such passion and hate he feels like he's drowning in lava once more. He's brutal in the way he handles you, each touch leaving a plethora of bruises, singing I love you. You like the way each training session starts with a deep all-consuming kiss and ends with him using the force to smash your head into the ground as you laugh and laugh. His force signature is different now, you like the way it slithers across your body, all fire and pain, all destruction. Love the pain that comes with him, this grisly bloody love affair that makes the stars shutter.

The staff of the galactic empire, Find the little midnight creature all too bizarre.

She trails after their commander with vicious playful skips and plays uno with their lives. She twirls around the galaxy's most feared as if she's playing hopscotch.

The staff of the galactic empire doesn't know whether to feel pity or terror...

I think about how at the beginning of being Vader, Anakin was so quick to reject who he once was. Trying desperately to kill off any semblance of Anakin. But by the time of the Original Trilogy, he's sort of come to terms with who he is and who he once was. Anakin isn't really dead he's just grown stronger now, and in a strange way, he even seems to embrace his past as a Jedi, wearing it as - a not so obvious- badge of pride.

[tinydefector]

Hi, hello Tiny. I've got a little "Human Effect" scenario in my almost always empty head.

Do you think the Galactic Council would try to persuade the human crew from the Lost Light to abandone their cybertronian friends?. Like, the Council listing all war crimes from the cybertronian war yadayada.

But the humans, especially the Ambassador, always defend their cybertronian crew. I think it will boils down in "but we all love them" type of argument. Until one day the Ambassador just tells them "¡STOP BULLING MY BELOVED CREW YOU GALACTIC RACISTS!".

All the crew would be like D: "they just said that to the Galactic Council?". And the entire human crew would probably start throwing swears and overal talking about all the good things their cybertronians have done.

Side-note, the DJD is also listening (because I need to include them) and they can't believe they are taking the humans side in the discussion.

Ok that would be all from me at the moment. THANKS.

Oh I can definitely see something like this happening.

Enjoy the meme

The council: we can not have you working with the cybertronians any longer due to the amount of war crimes they have committed.

Ambassador: Ha that's rich coming from you, one word. America.

Council: That does not change the matter. We are pulling you out, and if you refuse to return to earth within the time pool given, you will be court martialled and jailed.

Ambassador: than all your so called outpost and new alliances will be for nothing as they than automatically fall into the hands of the cybertronian sector of the union as they are the ones who forged them. Which means all further communications are to go through the cybertronian Alliance and Commander Prowl.

Council now trying to back track: no, that's not what we-

Prowl: Thank you, Ambassador, as I have stated multiple times this is the reason I had stated to Optimus Prime multiple over why a union between our planets wouldn't work out, I had already calculated and assessed that there was a 78. 874% probability of you betraying the alliance.

Council: Ambassador for this you will be reprimanded and interrogated over conspiring with Cybertron.

Ambassador under their breath: oh I've been doing more than that.

Ultra Magnus: due to the hostility of the earth council I ask that the human crew of the Lost Light be allowed asylum on Cybertron

Prowl turning to Optimus: are we allowed to offer that?

Optimus: it is up to Chancellor Starscream

Starscream sitting back watching the shit show and having heard the Ambassador little remark: Ambassador please share the details of what else you have been sharing with the crew.

All the cybertronians knowing full well how much of a shithead Starscream can be.

The Ambassador stand proudly: chancellor Starscream. Permission to use foul language.

Starscream rather amused: granted

Ambassador: I've been fucking most of the crew of the Lost Light and it's been the best sex I've had before. And I don't intend on returning to earth becuase Cybertronian pussy and dick hit different. And yes I Did in fact Fuck Megatron until he whimpered!

Everyone going silent before Starscream cackles: permission for the humans to have asylum.

[jadeazora]

Rose, Rose, Rose. It sucks because he was pretty likeable as a character up to that point, but I hate how they did him. He had Leon agree to help him on the grounds he wait just a day, but Rose didn't like that so he unleashed Eternatus without that planned safety net out of spite. Like, if things were more urgent, and lbr, Eternatus's power had been leaking out for half the game already, he should have stressed to Leon they didn't have the extra day to wait before it broke containment, and the main issue shouldn't have been over a thousand years away. It should have been maybe 100yrs, at maximum.

Lysandre is #2, pretty much for just the wasted potential him and his team had. I hope ZA is somewhat of a sequel to XY, and they canonize his survival there. Give him the development with Sycamore and AZ he should have had. (Idk how much we'll get of Flare in a sequel, they're my favorite team in concept but the execution was pretty bad in base XY.)

Dishonorable mention to Yell and Star, they're not actually villains. Yell are just annoying and overzealous Gym Trainers, Star were just truant kids that had dealt with bullying and mildly annoying at worst. I hope next Gen, we stop getting the "not a villain" villain teams + a twist villain, and get a proper villainous organization again. (The only well done twist villain we had was Volo and he was a solo villain. I figure most of us knew something sketchy was up with Lusamine, Rose, and the Professor. The only thing that surprised me about the professor was that they were dead and it was a "causing trouble from beyond the grave" scenario.)

[mickstart]

Do you have any Ratiorine or individual headcanons you haven't been able to fit into fics? Maybe established relationship?

(also hi I hope you don't mind asks like this 🫡)

I LOVE ASKS LIKE THIS. ALWAYS. THANK YOU.

Okay. Ahem. Sorry for shouting.

Ok so one I kiiind of got into in my last fic but didn't really get to go into how it would play out in their established relationship - Aventurine struggles to be verbally honest and vulnerable, so he shows his love a lot of the time by buying Ratio everything and anything. He doesn't have anything else to spend his money on - he buys things just for the sake of buying them, the feeling of owning something. So having someone to SPOIL? He loves it.

Ratio mentions the university's coffee machines are awful? There are new machines AND fancy coffee varieties on campus by the next week. Ratio mentions passing interest in wanting to carbon date a rare fossil up for auction? Aventurine buys it. Ratio's microscope is calibrated wrong? Aventurine buys him a new laboratory. Key feature of their relationship is Ratio being showered in gifts. He is the galactic sugar baby.

Also just.... they are both very touchy and clingy because they can only be like that with each other. Aventurine drapes himself over Ratio like a blanket at any opportunity, hangs off his arm like a purse, and Ratio is at his absolute happiest when he's reading a new academic article with the weight of Aventurine's head on his chest.

They will both deny this but with Ratio's lack of friends / companions, and Aventurine's Trauma, they are both very possessive of each other. (In Aventurine's case he's afraid he's doomed to lose people.) But that's okay because they're both into it. That strip of exposed skin on Ratio's side permanently has bite marks on it after they get together.

Some more individual hcs below the cut because I'm rambling sfhgsfdjhg and also because the aventurine one discusses disordered eating!

So I have a lot of headcanons for aventurine. For one he is Skinny - like, worryingly so, because of a combination of growing up the way he did and the habits that's instilled in him. He dines lavishly just to say he can, but he will NOT eat regularly throughout the day unless he's going Out to eat. He squirrels food away and only eats it when he hits that "so hungry you're getting nausea" threshold. He can't stop coming up with wildly unlikely scenarios where he'll end up without food again and he'll need a stash of it.

(Fortunately, Ratio is literally a trained chef and once they're together he regularly visits with lunch or has Aventurine over for dinner so he starts eating 3 meals a day instead of 1 big meal. Aventurine is the only stoneheart with a packed lunch lovingly made by his husband.)

A lot of my headcanons for ratio tend to be more autism and projection related. (The bust is a sensory thing. The robes are actually heavier than they look because having weight on his shoulders calms him and lets him think clearer.) But I guess one thing for him is that he Really resents how the guild is reliant on IPC funding while The Genius Society gets money thrown at them simply for the status their names have. It's one of the reasons he and Aventurine have tension at first bc Ratio is Sick of the IPC lording money over them and expecting weapons and pointless research in exchange for giving him the resources to cure another disease.

[cad-faoi-maeglin]

I was thinking about that scene where Echo gives Omega a crossbow and how my initial reaction was "sir, why are you handing a child a weapon as if that's even a remotely normal thing to do??" only to then realise that, for the clones, this is a very normal thing to do. This isn't just a needs must kind of scenario for them. This isn't just a response to them being in situations where she realistically needs to be able to defend herself. For the clones it genuinely is the most normal thing in the galaxy to put a weapon in the hands of a child and teach them to use it.

I can't help but wonder if they quite understand the horror of it.

And of course this has me thinking of what other ways their upbringing and training on Kamino would affect them. Their entire education is centered around what would make them good soldiers. Their growth is accelerated so they are a lot younger than they appear. Outside of the war, how much experience do they actually have?

I'm thinking about clones with really weird (to non-clones) gaps in their knowledge. What does this look like? Are they unfamiliar with major galactic cultural touchstones? Do they get lost at some official function when over drinks the conversation drifts from the war and into more domestic spheres? Is there ever an uncomfortable silence as they realise that they lack so much knowledge about the republic they're all fully prepared to lay down their lives for? How far on the outside are they? And how much of that do they feel? How much is remedied by finally getting off Kamino? How much is permanent?

[darthmaclunkey]

I love how the acolyte fandom have all collectively decided that osha and qimir are just awkwardly sharing that island with plagueis now. like the galaxy’s ultimate unlikely neighbours scenario. it’s like a sitcom setup for real. you could write a whole season of just the three of them navigating neighbourhood on that little island. imagine plagueis popping over to borrow a cup of sugar. imagine osha having to tell The Sith Lord Of All Time Darth Plagueis The Wise to turn down his music.

personally, I’m a “darth plagueis is really good at sewing, probably competed on galactic project runway, and made osha’s new outfit” truther

[mysticstronomy]

CAN A BLACK HOLE CREATE A STAR??

Blog#359

Wednesday, December 20th, 2023

Welcome back,

Not all black holes are the destructive monsters they're often made out to be, according to new research done with the Hubble Space Telescope.

Scientists from Montana State University published an article in Nature this week that found a star formation in Henize 2-10, a dwarf starburst galaxy — and they say the black hole at the center of that galaxy actually created them.

"We conclude that this black-hole outflow triggered the star formation," the authors wrote.

The findings provided insight into a decade-old mystery about whether smaller galaxies had black holes proportional in size to larger ones, according to NASA.

"Ten years ago, as a graduate student thinking I would spend my career on star formation, I looked at the data from Henize 2-10 and everything changed," Amy Reines, a researcher at the University of Virginia and one of the study's authors, told NASA. "From the beginning I knew something unusual and special was happening."

Reines told NASA that she expects even more research into dwarf galaxy black holes in the future. Using them as clues to better understand how supermassive black holes came into existence would solve a persistent problem for astronomers, and NASA reports that of the three leading theories about how black holes are created, none of them stand out as more likely than the others.

"It really has become the big question: where did they come from?" Reines said. "Dwarf galaxies may retain some memory of the black hole seeding scenario that has otherwise been lost to time and space."

It's poetic that an unusually creative black hole defying rules about how black holes are "supposed" to act may actually help scientists understand the most ancient of galactic mysteries.

Originally published on futurism.com

COMING UP!!

(Saturday, December 23rd, 2023)

"HOW MANY TIMES HAS THE SUN TRAVELED AROUND THE MILKY WAY??"

[wowwforever]

POKEMON EVIL TEAMS RANKED BY HOW LIKELY I WOULD BE TO JOIN THEM

Team Flare

I'm not wearing that suit and I'm not changing my hair. Lysandre is easily the fucking dumbest antagonist and if their plan is successful either they're immortal and I have to live with these losers forever or the whole world dies and I have to live with these losers until I die.

Team Yell

This entire team is centered around having a parasocial relationship with a teenage girl. Also British.

Team Galactic

Similar horrible haircut, bad outfit, and death cult scenario to Team Flare. At least they're like a semi-actual company. I could maybe just go bald and get a regular job after the Poke-government liquidates Team Galactic LLC. But I legitimately think this would be the least fun evil company to work at. Imagine stealing some kids Pokemon but you get chewed out by fucking Galactic Admin Uranus because you forgot to fill out the Paperwork.

The Lame Part of Team Plasma

Okay so to clarify these are the people that actually believe in the Team Plasma shit, which means I'd probably be spit on in the streets while wearing chainmail in New York. Why the fuck would I wear Chain Mail on the East Coast? Do you know how much rust there is? Also I have to become a ginger and worship some green manchild as a monarch. At least they're not a death cult.

Team Rocket

This one is just being a criminal. Like, yeah, you get to steal Pokemon but there's no real advantages except the free gray boots. Probably does not pay well and Giovanni leaving kind of sent them spiraling. Plus they have a lot of Koffings in an underground base so you know there's like lung damage galore. The R stands for Respiratory Distress.

Team Aqua

I don't like the idea of being surrounded by the ocean and I do not like boats and submarines. I would actively join this to sabotage their plan. Also every other evil team has an actual place to put their Pokeballs but this one it seems like the plan is to just shove it in my underwear? ???

Team Star

I haven't actually played Scarlet and Violet because I recently learned I can legally drink. I think this one is the equivalent of a school club? So I'm not actually getting paid to do evil shit. I'd probably just join, like, DnD club or something.

Team Rainbow Rocket

I'd join this one just because I know it's going to fail. I mean, it's got like four people who explicitly just want to end the world in different ways. I'm just gonna join and steal pens and shit until it eventually crashes in on itself for infighting. I'd wear my gay-ass R shirt every june in line with a P, I, D, and E.

The Cool Part of Team Plasma

Fuck yeah. This is the Team Plasma that knows the shit Ghetsis is up to. I'd love to be in on the scheme, plus I don't have to wear chainmail. Downside is I'd probably get murdered or have to murder to stay in, and they have the biggest shot of accomplishing their goal. But Ghetsis is hot so that's a plus.

Team Magma

This one is because there's 0.0% chance this plan will work but I get to just hang out in these cute-ass hoodies and pet camerupts all day. Look at that outfit, I'd wear that all the time. That being said, would probably have to be a field guy. Their location is in a volcano. I'm gonna get a call that says 'Hey all of Team Magma's leadership died' and I'd have to get a job at like Poke7-11 with a major gap in my resume.

Macro Cosmos

This hardly counts as a villain team because they're just, like, security guards for a company whose CEO goes a lil nuts. This is like if you worked for Virgin Atlantic and Richard Branson decided to summon Satan. No one can really put that on you. You'd probably get paid ridiculous amounts of money for essentially doing nothing. Con is you'd have to live in Galar.

Aether Foundation

Working for the Aether Foundation is like doing an internship at Bell Labs or whatever. The evil shit is probably fixed by the end of the game and I could just go back to researching Rotom electromagnetic applications and have that 'week where we tried to fuck up reality' be a weird company thing we brush under the rug. The con is they have all white outfits so I can't eat spaghetti at work. But even if I left I could probably just use Aether Foundation as a decent enough jumping off point for any career.

Team Skull

Genuinely this is just goofing off with a bunch of scummy weirdos. I can respect that and their outfits are thankfully not skin-tight jumpsuits, but main I'd join because they all kind of suck. With the most moderate competency I could run Team Skull. Also Guzma. He's pretty hot.

[leggerefiore]

Possible soap-opera ish territory here, but with the Villains - say S/O finds out that they're pregnant just before figuring out their partner's plans. So they leave without telling them only to stumble across them again months after their failure. Surprise? lol

only three...  my brain would not scenario build for Archie and Maxie sorry 😔. Also... Guzma just doesn't work here... His evil plans (going after a MILF...)

cw: pregnancy, light angst, Volo is a bastard, comfort, sort of an au for Lysandre's part but it kinda has to be,

characters: Cyrus, Lysandre, Volo

It was supposed to be an exciting change. You had hoped it would be, at least. Pregnancy was not exactly something that you had been purposefully trying for and truly hoping to happen, yet… Yet, the obvious signs were undeniable. The news was supposed to be eagerly shared with your boyfriend. Perhaps a moment of shock and confusion would follow, but them happiness. Joy. Anticipation. You had all the crushed in one fell swoop.

Your lover's plans. They had simply been too much. It was not something that you could solely blame on ignorance. You had avoided some glaringly obvious signs in an attempt to not acknowledge the worst of him. Yet, it had become more than obvious what was going on at this point. Listening in on conversations or just observing him unconsciously. Nervousness crept in your mind. There was absolutely no chance that you would allow your child to grow up in such a precarious situation, nor would the stress be manageable in such a state. You took a step back.

Well, you took more than just a step – And more directions than just backwards.

You needed away. Right then and there.

🌌Cyrus🛰

☄️ The shock of your leaving left Cyrus in a horrible mental state. You had just gone. Nothing to explain as to why was left behind. He could only wonder and wonder while forcing himself to keep going further and further into his goals. His new world – he would find peace there. He did not need you. (Granted, he would pretend that he had not made a dedicated group within Galactic to search for you and delayed everything just a bit in the off chance that you showed up.) But, it had not come. An interfering child and the annoyance that was the Lake Trio had interrupted him as he attempted to force the legendary pokemon of Sinnoh into making his world. He had sworn to try again, yet for now, he felt lost. Saturn had been left in charge of everything temporarily as he stepped back.

☄️ It was only then that he found you. Pure chance. Narrowly broken down into the lowest of percentages. You had not left Sinnoh, much to his shock. You had moved somewhere that he simply would not step foot. Well, until now. His eyes widened at your state. He was not ignorant of the reproductive capabilities of humans, but he had honestly never expected to see you in such a manner. He had been careful… Could that have been someone else's child? The thought alone nearly sent him into another spiral. You seemed just as shocked, clearly not expecting him to ever enter the sunny port city. Cyrus swallowed. You sighed. While he expected to run off, you approached him boldly and grasped his hand. You both moved away from the busy streets to the isolation of the lighthouse. No one stood around it at this time of day.

☄️ It was only then that his shock faded. The midday sun hung over you both. His memories of you and this place silenced him still. Cyrus was no fool. It was plain to see why you had vanished. His estimate on how far along you were put the timing just right. “… Why…?” he was not even sure that he wished to be a father but not even discussing this with him felt impossibly cruel. Your reply was curt – practised and trained, as if this exact scenario had been in your head over and over again. His plans. He would have preferred his Weavile to just punch him directly in the stomach to the pain of your words. Right. His plans. Even he could acknowledge that his thoughts about a pregnancy would have been clouded. He nodded. Before he could try to depart once more, unable to handle all these horrible emotions building up inside him. The sun's heat on his body. He felt faint. You caught him once again and gave one simple demand. Stay.

☄️ He relented to you. What else could he do? His new world was lost. You embraced him, burying your face into his shoulder. Cyrus weakly returned the affection. Everything had been for not. Now all he had in this horrible world was you… You and… He struggled to even think it. Your child – his child. The change terrified him. Yet, he could not run. How had you managed alone for all these months? He felt horrible. His new world… It was not reachable, but you were. You still wanted him. In asking him to stay, it was clear that you were looking past his actions enough to let him back in your life. He closed his eyes. You had been right. This was a change – a needed one.

🔥Lysandre🍷

☕️ The Flare Boss fought back the reaction that had entered his head at the sight of the hastily emptied drawers of the bedroom. It was the only sign to give him a hint of what happened. You had gone – narrowly disappeared. Grunts had been ordered to search, and a few calls had been made to certain associates of the redhead, yet nothing had come up. Why had you chosen to flee at a time as precarious as this? He had finally discovered a way to power the Ultimate Weapon. Finally… and you vanish. Without a doubt, you were one of the people he planned to have in his perfect world. There was no time to wait. He felt annoyed. Then, the time came for everything to happen. Everything was meant to go his way. Yet, it did not. A group of children stopped him. The very children hand-picked by Augustine Sycamore himself to go on a journey. The professor even dared to show up, in tears, and tells him off. It was only then that he had been convinced to stop. A desperate hug from his old friend finally brought him back to reality.

☕️ It was only then that you seemingly reappeared in his life. Where had you been? Well, plainly, with the previously mentioned professor. Sycamore had his suspicions about Lysandre's plans that you only confirmed. He had helped you during the last few months for a reason that was plain to see. The redhead pinched the bridge of his nose. He would not claim that he had been careful, nor would he feign surprise at your state. He would, however, feel shocked when you expressed that you wished for him to still be in the child's life. Did he truly deserve such a thing after what he nearly did? Both you and the professor seemed to think so. Your only request was to take things slow. He felt inclined to agree.

☕️ There was something in him that felt like a fool when he tried to order you a coffee at his café. You had only chuckled at that before, instead ordering some kind of tea. Things were not as they were before, but he felt relief that there was some kind of normalcy settling in again. You had made it clear that if he ever began to walk down a similar path of madness, that you would depart from his side and take your child with you. He could not say that was not an empty threat, as quite a few people were clearly in a state to help you do just that. “… I do wonder that if you had told me that you were pregnant back, would have stopped me,” the words came from him without much thought. You shook your head. The harsh truth was that it probably would have inclined him to act faster, wanting nothing more than for his child to be in his ideal world. Shame crept down his spine. Of course, you were right.

☕️ Whatever nerves he had when initially reintroduced to you had faded. A child… He pondered many things related to them. Being a father had not truly crossed his mind. He had allowed himself to grow older with little concentration on familial matters. Now, however, it was a fact – Unavoidable. He still found this world repulsive at times, but he was genuinely trying to let himself work past that. For both you and your child… And Sycamore. His life now felt strangely full. He felt truly relieved that he had been stopped before he reached a point of no return and sacrificed himself for his foolish cause. This change was a good one, you noted. It gave him something healthier to focus his energy on.

💫Volo📜

⭐️ His eyes had scanned the abandoned campsite. You had been there before he left to go investigate a ruin, but now that he had returned, you were nowhere to be seen. The fire burned brightly still, the cloth of the tent was unharmed, and food even remained mostly undisturbed. Items were left as they were. No sign of an attack. His hands clenched the leather straps of his pack. Where had you gone? He searched for quite a while, but somehow, you alluded even his most dedicated efforts. Within the back of his mind, he grew worried that one of those bandit sisters had gotten to you. That was unlikely, yet… He could not allow himself to stray from his goal. That Survey Corps member… They were so close to collecting all the plates. With Arceus's power claimed as his own, he would find you and return you to his side. Though, that was never to come. His carefully made plans… unravelled by some outsider. Arceus chose them in front of him to mock him even more. He, too, needed to disappear.

⭐️ Then, at his lowest point, he found you. A hidden alcove of Hisui. He thought he knew them all, yet Cogita had pointed him to one even unknown to himself. There, you had made quite a small home for yourself. Nothing permanent yet, but clearly a home. Volo stopped as you visible tensed up at the sight of him. His eyes narrowed. Panic coursed through him. Had that woman sent him here to show him something? Both of you stood unmoving. Neither dared break the silence and accept the reality. He sighed. You clearly had some kind of support system, as you were not struggling to survive, despite how clearly far along you were in a pregnancy. He sat down on a stump of a cut-down tree near you.

⭐️ Reality finally dawned on you both. The two of you were here together and clearly needed to discuss something. “… My, to think… This is where you were,” Volo started the conversation that neither of you wished to happen, “I was beginning to wonder if those inept bandits had done something to you. It appears that someone had helped you outsmart me, however.” Nothing about your state left his mouth. Perhaps if it went unacknowledged, it would simply not exist. He rested his chin on his hand. Being a father was not something that he had ever expected to happen to him. You seemed to accept the inevitable of this discussion, too. Your eyes turned harsh as you explained that you had learnt the extent of his plans. His eye widened. Not exactly from shock, but more so that it was his plans that made you flee.

⭐️ “… I'm not going to apologise,” he said simply, “But… You do know that humans can be quite vengeful, yes? I do wonder how that Galaxy Team might react to learning that I have a child… Especially after I escaped their laws' grip.” The threat was hung in the air. Volo was not sure what he wanted. You clearly were not either. Something inside him did twist at the thought of his child being held accountable for his actions. He watched a few Starly fly by the quiet area. A stream ran through here, as well. You did not attempt to chase him off or run away again. He took off his heavy pack and offered you the items inside. There was no chance that he would ever return to the Ginkgo Guild. You scavenged the bag eagerly. He settled in. Something of a tentative agreement was understood without being spoken. It would be easier to work together, especially with a child soon to be in the picture. Cogita clearly had planned this out herself for whatever reason that was unbeknownst to him.

[brainrockets]

I love when a piece of story just clangs about in my head for days afterwards.

Like the interlude has just been sitting there rotating in every dimension.

The devastating effects of the scenario of this holy haunted forest (primeval) and how it's all just wiped out by the magic of wizards.

Like Earth being blown up to make way for a galactic freeway in Hitchhikers.

Did spirits survive that wouldn't have if they weren't under attack?

It was like when they build a dam on an archeological site and the scientists or in this case treasure hunters? Have to try and grab what they can before it's gone.

[oliviax727]

Physics Friday: WTF is Dark Energy/Dark Matter? (Part 1)

To see what this is all about click here.

Preamble: Dark Numbers

Education level: High School (Y9/10)

Topic: Cosmology (Astronomy)

This equation is surprisingly the best representation of what we are doing with dark energy and dark matter. The equations we are using to figure out the nature of the universe are quite literally 'not adding up'.

When we have a situation where we encounter a missing number we are faced with three scenarioes:

Our model is wrong and we fucked up, physics is over

Our model works, but it's not complete. There are situations where it doesn't apply, and we are seeing an example of it

Our model is simply missing a few terms

Scenario 1 would imply that basic physics such as Newton's laws of motion and gravity are just plain wrong. Which is ... well ... a bit difficult to try and prove.

Scenario 2 implies that there is a more fundamental theory that underlies our current one. While it is not off the table, it can be difficult to find a theory for just one or two specific phenomena.

Scenario 3 is like 2, but it's a bit 'softer', what we're doing is just adding an extra number to balance out the equation and then trying to answer "What does this number mean"?

By Occam's razor, we can go with option 3, as it's simpler, and also appears to be more correct than a complete model change.

Dark Matter and Galaxies

Our galaxy is like the solar system in the sense that there is a large object in the centre surrounded by a bunch of stuff moving around that centre.

The difference between the two is the ratio between the central mass and the mass of the rest of the system.

If you combined all of the planets in the solar system together, it would still be less massive than the Sun.

This means we can easily calculate how the planets move around the Sun. As the motions of the other planets don't really affect that motion all too much. And thus we can use Kepler's 3rd Law:

If you combined all of the stars in the galactic 'orb' surrounding the centre, you find that it would be much heavier than the black hole in the centre.

This means you have to account for a more spread out mass as you change your distance from the centre of the galaxy.

The further you are from the centre of the galaxy, the more stuff there is beneath you i.e. there's more stuff closer to the core than you. We have to calculate gravity taking this mass, and the radius to it, into account.

Thankfully, we have methods that can calculate this much easier. And we can use this to figure out our orbital velocity as a function of distance from the centre.

So let's try and calculate things! Take a galaxy, measure it's mass distribution independent of orbital mechanics, and find the orbital velocity!

Image Credit: Citizendium

What we get is the graph above. In a normal universe, we expect our orbital velocity to increase near the core as more stuff gets added to the mass pulling us in. It then peters out as gravity looses it's strength.

What we actually see is that the orbital velocity takes a lot longer to peter out. If Newton's Laws/General Relativity are working how they should, this means that there must be a lot more mass in the galaxy.

What's worse is that this mass is much more evenly distributed. And not just that, but we cannot see it i.e. it does not interact with electromagnetic waves (light).

Hence we label this weird matter 'dark', because we can't see it and it helps us account for the disparity in the equation.

Next time I'll go into what we think dark matter actually is.

Dark Energy and Einstein's Blunder

General Relativity is one of the most backed-up theories in all of physics. The original conception of the theory comes from the Einstein Field Equations (EFEs):

We can safely ignore all of the fancy jargon symbols. What's important to us is what's missing.

When Einstein was playing around with his equations, he made an error. This error led him to missing a part in his equation. And thus he added an additional term to the EFEs:

This capital lambda term (Λ) helped balance his erronious equation.

Eventually, Einstein figured out that this was a mistake, a mistake so big that he called it his 'Biggest Blunder'. It turns out that the EFEs don't require Λ to actually work.

A few decades later, in the 1990s, researchers were trying to use the principles of general relativity to figure out the expansion of spacetime. Thanks to Edwin Hubble, we knew that space was expanding, but we didn't know how it was expanding.

The difficulty is that both the curvature and the amount of energy in the universe affected the expansion of the universe. This is dictated by the Friedmann equations:

Where the a's are the universe's scale factor, i.e. the current 'size' of the universe. The two p's are the mass and energy densities in the universe.

Using measurements of Type Ia Supernovae (you will see a topic on this in the future as I've done research into this), two teams of researchers were able to determine that the expansion rate of the universe was accelerating! Something completely unexpected.

This would require us adding an additional term to the equation involving our suspicious little friend:

This Λ variable, called the cosmological constant, can be propagated up the mathematical derivation chain to show that Einstein's 'mistake' was actually the correct equation all along!

The cosmological constant acts a energy density term that exists outside of our current understandings of the matter and energy in our universe. And because it's outside of our understanding, we call it 'dark' energy - because, just like dark matter, we can't see it.

It's a type of energy that isn't represented by any of the fundamental forces. What's more is that it is constant, which means as the universe expands, more gets added. And even more is that this energy density is negative, suggesting even that the universe is not a vaccum.

This discovery landed three researchers from both teams the Nobel prize in physics. One of the laureates includes the vice chancellor of my very own university, Brian Schmidt. Doxxing myself aside, this is a fact that neither me, nor my university, will shut up about.

In another part, I'll talk about what this dark energy could be and what an accelerating expansion of the universe could mean.

Conclusion

So despite the names, dark energy and dark matter are actually two different things that have two different sets of properties purposes (at least that's what we think). The names simply derive from the same method of using constants to help make our equations work better with reality.

It's always possible that we are wrong and there is a more fundamental equation that helps us understand these things. But that's a task for the future.

Hope you enjoyed reading and please give me feedback! I'm doing this every week as well, so feel free to follow if you want.

Next week I'll probably do something mathematics-related, before continuing on with this part.