#half 153

[uu-tella]

Full panel under the cut

[emilytakesphoto]

train stations (with trains in them)

[thekidsarentalright]

‼️ Attention Fob Fan Reading This ‼️

A few weeks ago, I posted the fourth annual fob census asking you all to answer a bunch of evil questions regarding fall out boy, and after getting 1.3k (!!!!!) responses, the results are finally in (below the 'keep reading'). I wanted to quickly say thank you to everybody who participated in this, it's so fun to do every year and it makes me so happy to see so many others enjoy it too!! Without further adieu, here are the results:

Disclaimers: Quickly I just wanted to warn that this is a long post- it's worth reading, the results are very interesting! But it's also a lot to get through, be prepared for that! Secondly, tumblr loves to destroy image quality- click on the image to see it better!

Question 1:

For the first question, you were simply asked what era you became a fan. The top 3 results were, as shown: 1. Save Rock And Roll Era (345 Responses) 2. American Beauty/American Psycho Era (268 Responses) 3. During The Hiatus (132 Responses) Not much to say about this one, every year the results are very similar. Most interesting is that over 100 people have become a fan in the last year!

Question 2:

The second question asked you for your favorite era, and the results were, as shown: 1. So Much (For) Stardust Era (550 Responses) 2. Infinity On High Era (191 Responses) 3. Save Rock And Roll Era (170 Responses) The impact of the newest era is clearly seen in this question! Some could say it's recency bias, only time will tell, but regardless smfs era absolutely dominates as peoples favorite!

Question 3:

Question three asked what your favorite album was, and this was one where I was incredibly interested to see if so much (for) stardust shook things up that much... And as shown in the top responses, it did not! 1. Folie A Deux (550 Responses) 2. Infinity On High (270 Responses) 3. From Under The Cork Tree (153 Responses) Last year, the order of the results was exactly the same. As I believe it has been every year... Folie is unbeatable

Question 4:

The next question asked for you to objectively say which fob album is the best, to see if the responses between favorite and best differed, and as you can see, they did: 1. So Much (For) Stardust (457 Responses) 2. Folie A Deux (389 Responses) 3. Infinity On High (297 Responses) It's so interesting to me to see that so many people believe stardust to be fob's best album, but even then do not consider it to be their favorite.

Question 5:

Now that we've gotten the favorite/best albums out of the way, it's time for least favorite/worst, with these being your least favorite fob albums: 1. Take This To Your Grave (375 Responses) 2. American Beauty/American Psycho (371 Responses) 3. Mania (308 Responses) Most interesting about these results, to me, are how much the top three responses sweep in comparison to the rest. While for the last two questions, the results were more spread, these are much more unanimous.

Question 6:

Question six asked for the objective worst fob album, and you responded as so: 1. Take This To Your Grave (517 Responses) 2. Mania (347 Responses) 3. American Beauty/American Psycho (328 Responses) All I have to add here is that the responses are even More unanimous... Tttyg sweep ig! fdjsnf

Question 7:

Going away from albums, the next question asked for your favorite EP, and you all responded as such: 1. Lake Effect Kid (404 Responses) 2. My Heart Will Always Be The B-Side To My Tongue (374 Responses) 3. Pax AM Days (337 Responses) Last year, lake effect kid was second and my heart was first- always very interesting to see how things shift, even slightly!

Question 8:

The next question had you saying your favorite album cover art, and you all decided these are the best covers: 1. Infinity On High (664 Responses) 2. Folie A Deux (195 Responses) 3. From Under The Cork Tree (176 Responses) I was very interesting to see where smfs would land, with it falling in the bottom half, not disrupting the top three at all. However, folie moved up a spot, swapping with futct. Ioh reigns supreme though!

Question 9:

These results came out identical to last year, but here are the top first fob songs you all heard: 1. Sugar, We're Goin' Down (347 Responses) 2. My Songs Know (171 Responses) 3. Dance, Dance (134 Responses) 4. Thnks Fr Th Mmrs (132 Responses) 5. Centuries (91 Responses)

Question 10:

Question 10 asked for your favorite fob song, a very subjective question that garnered many different responses, these came out on top: 1. Headfirst Slide (105 Responses) 2. Disloyal Order (73 Responses) 3. Hum Hallelujah (69 Responses)(nice) 4. Ginasfs (65 Responses) 5. 27 (55 Responses) I have many thoughts about these results and don't want to ramble too much, but will say, most interesting: This is the first time disloyal order isn't first for this question. A big change, I think!

Question 11:

We know now your subjective fav songs, but what about objective best? You all said: 1. So Much (For) Stardust (244 Responses) 2. Headfirst Slide (136 Responses) 3. Love From The Other Side (83 Responses) 4. What A Catch, Donnie (70 Responses) 5. Hum Hallelujah = Disloyal Order (66 Responses) Once again, lots of thoughts! We have our first tie, both smfs the song and album sweeping, and disloyal order once again Not topping the list! Huge changes!

Question 12:

This question is always the one i get the most excited about each year. It's also the one that gets the most varied responses, but these came out in the top: 1. Sunshine Riptide (56 Responses) 2. "From Now On We Are Enemies" (49 Responses) 3. You're Crashing, But You're No Wave (47 Responses) 4. Rat A Tat (40 Responses) 5. It's Not A Side Effect = Heaven's Gate This question changed a lot from last year, with sunshine riptide moving up three spots, and rat a tat, it's not a side effect, and heaven's gate showing up when they didn't before!

Question 13:

With underrated songs come overrated ones, and you all said these were the most overrated: 1. Centuries (330 Responses) 2. Sugar, We're Goin' Down (96 Responses) 3. My Songs Know (87 Responses) 4. Bang The Doldrums (67 Responses) 5. Immortals (62 Responses) Most of note- Bang the doldrums is here, when it simultaneously was voted pretty highly as a favorite song!

Question 14:

This was the first time I asked the question of what your favorite fob cover is, and you all decided these are the best three: 1. Love Will Tear Us Apart (297 Responses) 2. Beat It (278 Responses) 3. I Wanna Dance With Somebody (224)

Question 15:

Asking which song has the best lyrics is another one of my favorites to see, and this year you all said: 1. Hum Hallelujah (172 Responses) 2. So Much (For) Stardust (75 Responses) 3. You're Crashing, But You're No Wave (72 Responses) 4. Ginasfs (70 Responses) 5. Disloyal Order (67 Responses) It's not surprise these results are very similar to best song, and it's very deserved! These songs are on top every year, save for smfs being newly one of their best written songs!

Question 16:

This question asked how many times you've seen fob live, and the results are as shown: 1. 1-3 Times (780 Responses) 2. Haven't Seem Them Live Yet (353 Responses) 3. 4-6 Times (138 Responses) 4. 7-9 Times (42 Responses) 5. 10+ Times (37 Responses) Last year, a majority of people said they hadn't seen them live, so it makes me really happy to see now, a majority has! And i hope those that haven't get to soon!

Question 17:

Continuing with the tour theme, specific to this year, I asked what your favorite medley song was, and you all said: 1. Spotlight (New Regrets) (272 Responses) 2. I've Got A Dark Alley (165 Responses) 3. What A Catch, Donnie (146 Responses) 4. WAMS (133 Responses) 5. Get Busy Living (117 Responses) Seeing spotlight sweep made me happy, as it genuinely was the craziest moment. All of these were crazy, and so special- seeing each medley song get so much love just shows it <3

Question 18:

Now continuing with tourdust questions, I asked for your fav 8 ball song, here were your top 5: 1. Pavlove (372 Responses) 2. Ginasfs (184 Responses) 3. Bang The Doldrums (144 Responses) 4. "From Now On We Are Enemies" (80 Responses) 5. 27 (69 Responses) Similarly to before, each of these was so crazy and special, it's great to see they all got love. Pavlove swept massively, tho, as deserved i think

Question 19:

I think it goes without saying that each band member is loved and very important, but we all have our #1 babygirl, and here's who you all said was yours: 1. Patrick (676 Responses) 2. Pete (402 Responses) 3. Joe (160 Responses) 4. Andy (112 Responses) All i have to say is... kill that thing patrick <3

Question 20:

Our next miscellaneous question asks for your fav music video, and this year you all said these were your favorites: 1. A Little Less Sixteen Candles (275 Responses) 2. Dance, Dance (109 Responses) 3. Hold Me Like A Grudge (89 Responses) 4. America's Suitehearts = Miss Missing You (74 Responses) 5. I Don't Care (67 Responses) I was curious to see if a stardust mv would make it in, and was glad to see grudge did! Otherwise, very similar results to last year. Old favs die hard i suppose <3

Question 21:

Here, I asked for your favorite band that isn't fob but is related/adjacent to fob, and you all said: 1. My Chemical Romance (576 Responses) 2. Paramore (302 Responses) 3. I Don't Know How But They Found Me (88 Responses) 4. Cobra Starship = Green Day (75 Responses) 5. Gym Class Heroes (58 Responses) Not much changed from last year, other than green day getting more love, which is interesting to see! (Also, wanted to note that i did forget to include panic!... however less than 10 people wrote them in as an 'other', so results were not affected by that oversight!)

Question 22:

These last questions are all this or that style ones, with our first pairing being disloyal order and hum hallelujah: 1. Disloyal Order (762 Responses) 2. Hum Hallelujah (588 Responses) Interestingly, last year this match-up was a solid tie. Clearly, opinions have changed to make disloyal order sweep!

Question 23:

Our second this or that pit snitches and talkers vs you're crashing: 1. You're Crashing (808 Responses) 2. Snitches And Talkers (542 Responses) These were the top two underrated songs last year, so it's interesting to see which one is truly preferred!

Question 24:

Our last this or that, and last question, put centuries and my songs head to head: 1. My Songs Know (977 Responses) 2. Centuries (373 Responses) All the commentary I will provide is saying: is centuries even overrated anymore with it getting destroyed like this.... fkjdsnfks

And with that, the 2024 fob census comes to a close! If you've read this far or, really, participated at all in this in any way, I want to say thank you again! and that I hope you had fun with it, and that these results were interesting to look through! Also, will throw out there, I worked very hard on this and would appreciate a rb if you read all the way through it! <3 If you have any questions about any data or questions, want to see more in depth results or commentary or analysis from me, feel free to shoot me an ask/dm! See you next year for year 5! :-3

[a-shade-of-blue]

Masterlist of Vetted Fundraisers from the Palestinians who directly contacted me (3-12 November)

12 November

Hanan Mahmoud (@hananmahmoud1): Hanan has a 3-year-old daughter Dana and a son called Adam who was born only a few months ago in this genocidal war. She is fundraising to buy basic neessities for the children. (https://gofund.me/032d0dc0) (#270 on @/gazavetters vetted list) (€153 raised of €50K goal)

Rana Sobhi (@ranafamily7, @ranafamilygaza): Rana is 14 years old. She, her mother and her sisters are now living in Northern Gaza. Her mother is suffering from osteoporosis, cartilage fragility and needs treatment. Her father is in Southern Gaza and does not even have a tent to live in. (https://gofund.me/d22a0a2f) (vetted by @/gazavetters and #250 on their vetted list) 

Sama (@samatatari1999): Sama has 4 children: Qusay (15), Sama (14), Firas (10), and Seela (5). They lack basic necessities and they wish to evacuate from Gaza. They need money to buy a tent. (https://gofund.me/1c042325) (vetted by @/gazavetters and #268 on their vetted list) (€195 raised of €80K target)

11 November

Khaled Ismael, Mariam (@khaledismael): Khaled and his wife Rasha have 3 children: Walid (12), Karim (10), and Mariam (5). They have been displaced and the wish to escape to a safe place. (https://gofund.me/357b9170) (shared by 90-ghost, shared by bilal-salah0) ($204 CAD raised of $30K target)

Ammar Hammad (@amaar-hamaad): Ammar was born a few months ago in this genocidal war. His father suffers from a cruciate ligament injury and thus cannot work. His mother Samah suffers from asthma and cannot produce milk for him. They are fundraising to buy necessities like milk for Ammar. (https://gofund.me/b1cd8b73) (shared by 90-ghost)

10 November

Hanan Al-Salout (@hanan-fomily3): Hanan is 24 years old and is a psychological counselor. She and her husband have a 2-year-old child. Her elderly mother-in-law suffers from chronic illnesses, and has almost lost her life due to anemia from lack of food. (https://gofund.me/9af14850) (#152 on @/gazavetters vetted list)

8 November

Sahar (@saharalajrami): Sahar has 4 children: Hala, Rital, Odai, and Talin. Odai has an injury in his leg because he was shot by a drone. They are a family of 9 and they wish to evacuate from Gaza. (https://gofund.me/b3afa42b) (Vetted by bilal-salah0, shared by 90-ghost, shared by @/gaza-evacuation-funds) (€349 raised of €50K goal)

Saeed (@saeid19): Saeed is 19 years old. Their house has been destroyed, and he and his family wish to evacuate from Gaza. (https://gofund.me/a86f5657) (Shared by 90-ghost) (€480 raised of €50K goal)

7 November

Nour & Dana (@danafamilysblog): Nour has lost 3 children, her sister, in-laws, nephews and nieces. Her 9-year-old daughter Dana lost her arm when the Israeli forces bombed their building. She also has a brother named Yayha. Nour’s husband has been seriously injured. Nour is also taking care of her orphaned 7-month-old nephew Mohammed who has lost his entire family. They wish to get a prosthetic arm for Dana. (https://gofund.me/dba55fdd) (shared by 90-ghost, shared by bilal-salah0) (£235 raised of £15K goal)

Islam Al-Najjar (@islamgzacc4): Islam is 27 years old. His 85-year-old grandfather lost his arm in a bombing and suffers from severe injuries. They are fundraising to buy basic necessities and evacuate from Gaza. (https://gofund.me/c6604c3d, https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/mido87ss) (#332 on vetted fundraiser list by el-shab-hussein and nabulsi)

Laila & Sally (@laylaayman24): Laila is 24 years old and have a one-and-a-half-year-old baby called Sally. She is now pregnant with her second child Omar, who is due in a few months. They have been displaced more than 10 times. Her family house was bombed with them inside it. Her cousin and her cousin’s daughter Maria were martyred in the bombing. They are fundraising to buy basic necessities. (https://gofund.me/b0441c7d) (shared by 90-ghost, vetted by bilal-salah0) ($421 USD raised of $20K goal)

6 November

Anas, Baraa (@helpanas): When Anas went to inspect their home after he and his family were displaced, the Israeli forces fired at him from planes, burying him under the rubble and causing severe injuries to his legs. While he received reconstructive surgeries, he could not receive treatment to his damaged nerves and tissues to to a lack of medical resources. He requires extensive treatment and possibly an ankle transplant abroad.  (https://gofund.me/433864df) (vetted by 90-ghost) ($395 USD raised of $20K target)

Shorouq Eldrimly (@shoroa91): Shorouq have 3 children: Qusai (7), Eileen, (5), and Hisham (2). Qusai has a heart condition since birth but they cannot provide him the medication and treatment he needs. Hisham is suffering from malnutrition. They wish to evacaute from Gaza. (https://www.gofundme.com/f/shorouqs-story-a-mothers-cry-from-the-heart-of-war) (#240 on @/gazavetters vetted list)

5 November

Hala Mushtaha (@halamushtaha): Hala has 4 children: Abdul, Jaber, Mohammed, and Lian. They are fundraising to evacuate from Gaza.  (https://gofund.me/ae46eed6) (#1 on @/gaza-evacuation-funds vetted list here)

Hala (@hala-15): Hala’s baby son Abdul Aziz was born during this genocidal war. Abdul Aziz was diagnosed with hirschsprung's disease, which meant that his colon cannot move and he cannot pass waste, resulting in severe swelling in his belly. Hala is raising funds to pay for Abdul Aziz’s surgeries and medication. (https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=XUL966VBH88NC) (shared by 90-ghost, but gfm has closed her campaign without reason so she is using paypal instead now)

Aya Alanqar (@ahmadalanqar99, @ayaayman95): Aya used to be a content creator. She wishes to evacuate her family (consisting of herself, her brother (25), her parents and her elderly grandma (85)) out of Gaza. (https://gofund.me/47c55aba) (#217 on @/gazavetters vetted list)

3 November

Mounir Raed Alanqar (@amani-raed): Mounir is 19 years old. He has 4 siblings: Rasha (22 and married), Rana (21 and married), Mohamed (16), and Sham (4). He is raising funds to buy basic necessitiese and to evacuate from Gaza. (https://gofund.me/f3b1439b) (#8 on @/gazavetters vetted list)

Reem Al ajrami (@reem-alajrami): Reem is a widow with 3 children: Diana, Issam and Abdullah. They are displaced and have run out of money to buy basic necessities. (https://gofund.me/78efc923) (vetted by bilal-salah0) (€292 raised of €5K goal)

Ghada Nabil Al-Anqar (@ghadanabil2): Ghada and her family have been displaced. Her 23-year-old brother is now responsible for providing basic necessities for the family. She is also living her two married brothers Mohamed and Ahed and their children. Each of the brothers have 3 children. (https://gofund.me/b43baaaf) (#6 on @/gazavetters vetted list)

Click here for my Google Doc with my complete masterlist of all the Palestinian gfm asks I've received, updated daily (along with other verified ways to send aid to Gaza).

How are gfm campaigns vetted?  See here, here, here and here.

See post here for other verified ways to send aid to Gaza.

Don't forget your Daily Clicks on Arab.org, it's free!!! and Every click made is registered in their system and generates donation from sponsors/advertisers.

See links below for my Masterlists of Vetted Fundraisers from the Palestinians who sent me asks for if you want to help more people! As well as resources for palestinian students if you are a palestinian student

Masterlists of Vetted Fundraisers

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 13 - 25 July.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 26 -29 July.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 30 July - 1 August.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 2 - 5 August.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 6 - 10 August.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 11 - 14 August.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 15 - 18 August

Click here for my Masterlist for fundrasiers from 19 - 21 August

Click here for my Masterlist for fundrasiers from 22 - 24 August

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 25 - 28 August

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 29 August - 1 September

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 2 - 5 September.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 6-10 September.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 11-14 September.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 15-18 September.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 19-22 September.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 23-26 September.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 27-30 September.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 1-4 October.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 5-9 October.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 10-14 October.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 15-21 October.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 22-26 October.

Click here for my Masterlist for fundraisers from 27 October - 2 November.

Resources for Palestinian Students!

Initiatives and resources to support Palestinian students, academics and universities:

This is a list of initiatives and resources for Gazan students seeking to complete their studies, including initiatives, resources, training and scholarships. See list here.

Scholarships for Displaced Palestinian students:

Putting this here for the palestininans who follow me: If you are a displaced Palestinian student looking to fund your education, this document lists the scholarships available around the world for displaced Palestinian students.

[aihoshiino]

chapter 161 thoughts

Chapters Since The 143 Kiss Happened And Went Entirely Unacknowledged And Unaddressed Count: 18

Aqua Hoshigan Status: For the future

Never has an OnK chapter gone from It's Hoshinover to We Are Oshi no Back quite as hard and fast as this one. I have issues with this chapter in terms of what it implies about the story's overall structure and the fact that it sort of ruins 153-4 by association but this chapter's back half is so fucking good and the chapter itself works so well in isolation that much like 153-4, I kind of uhhh don't care about the structural issues because the story's heart is, for the most part, not just intact but beating harder and more passionately than it has in a long time.

To get what I don't like out of the way, the story seems to have settled on Super Evil Serial Killer Mastermind Kamiki as his final form characterization with some helpful Tsukuyomi exposition to just straightforwardly Tell Us things the manga probably should have spent some of the last 70something chapters Showing Us about Hikaru. The basic idea of Hikaru being some sort of serial killer so dedicated to upholding Ai's legacy that he kills women with the potential to surpass her was more or less always where I expected his character to land and this settling of his character does at least preserve what I think is the most important thing: that he genuinely loved Ai and his bent towards villainy only came after her death.

What I don't love as much is that this chapter seems to continue leaning into Uber God Manipulator Mastermind Kamiki like last chapter. I already talked at length about my issues with this framing in my previous chapter review so all I'll reiterate here is that the story's attempt to frame Hikaru as being equally or even more culpable for the actions of Nino and Ryosuke fall entirely flat to me, especially when the manga itself does such a pisspoor job of actually explaining how or why Kamiki was able to control and/or predict their actions to the extent that he supposedly did. And ESPECIALLY especially given that Nino and Ryosuke seem to have already been dangerously obsessed with Ai by the time they approached him.

In general, Hikaru's character is honestly just so inconsistent at this point that making any sense of his actions feels fruitless. If I really dig into what's going on, I can infer that maybe he fell into the same trap as Aqua by overcompensating for his trauma-induced helplessness by becoming overly controlling and guess that his fucked up trauma response to Ai's death combined with those terrible words Kindaichi gave him at Airi's funeral lead him down he road he's traveling now. I can even extrapolate that Aqua showing him the DVD message in 153-4 pushed Hikaru to this extreme and now that he has nothing to lose, he's lashing out at his children too - though, it should be noted, that the manga still hasn't actually established what Hikaru's culpability is in Nino's attempt on Ruby's life, outside of Aqua saying "well you didn't use your psychic powers to perfectly predict nino's actions so it's on you".

But like - this is all stuff I'm having to infer and extrapolate and guess, reverse engineering logic from our end point in an attempt to create a stable foundation for this characterization. The manga has done such a poor job of properly establishing Hikaru both as an antagonistic force and as a consistent character that I feel like I'm trying to assemble a coherent image from two different puzzle sets with all the fucking corner pieces missing and that's with Crow Girl looking into the camera and Explaining Him to me.

And listen, I am a bitch who LOVES to infer things. One of my absolute favourite pieces of fiction of all time ever is Umineko no Naku Koro Ni, a mystery story that literally does not contain any straightforwardly explicit, textual confirmation of the culprit's identity or motives because it believes so strongly that you, the reader, are smart enough and empathetic enough to put in the time and effort necessary to understand it regardless and it deeply, deeply values being able to give you that experience. But OnK feels less like it's intentionally encouraging me to think hard and enjoy the process of putting my head and my heart to work - it feels like it's leaving its homework unfinished and letting the reader do the actual hard work of sewing up the internal logic.

I probably won't talk much more about Kamiki this chapter cos I'd just be saying all this shit over and over but I really just am struggling to understand from a perspective of authorial intent what the vibe is even supposed to be. Like I mentioned in a previous ask, if this is where Kamiki's arc is reaching its conclusion then it means that the Movie Arc was essentially a whole-ass waste of time in and out of universe. Blech. Hate that.

Also, before I move on, I don't want to leave this just implied - making Kamiki explicitly a CSA victim and then ending his arc on Aqua (and implicitly the narrative) dismissing him as being too broken/corrupted to be saved is a really major misstep that I think represents a huge black mark on OnK's handling of CSA as a topic. The idea of an eternal defilement or an unfixable core wrongness in the self is already something real life CSA victims struggle with in the process of unpacking their trauma and having our likable and supposedly morally superior protagonist espouse this unchallenged in a work as prominent and relevant as Oshi no Ko is irresponsible bordering on dangerous. It's incredibly disappointing that after all the care Aka and Mengo seemingly took in handling this topic that it was whiffed so badly at the last second.

ANYWAY!!! Now all the beef's been dealt with, we can cleanse our palettes and move onto everything else I liked which was… basically everything else in this chapter!

Admittedly, Aqua's overall arc is still suffering from us being kicked out of his head from like 123 onwards for no real apparent reason and while 150 was a welcome refresher on where he's at in this part of the story, it still feels a bit like the story is prioritizing preserving the surprise factor of its twists over making these surprises feel earned. Compare it to volume 1 - you are basically told exactly what is going to happen to Ai, especially in the manga when Saitou and Gotanda outright say as much - but her death is still incredibly impactful and upsetting. I think this chapter is very effective, but could've been a lot moreso if we'd spent more time in Aqua's head leading up to it.

THAT SAID… If the intention of keeping us out of his head was to recontextualize Aqua's behaviour across the past ten or so chapters in this new light, I don't hate it as much as I might have. I initially took issue with what felt like the story off-screening and not addressing the resolution to Aqua's suicidal ideation so whipping back around to prove that it was still very much present puts some particular Aqua moments over this past volume into a very different light. As some people pointed out, Aqua missing Kana's pitch - literally dropping the ball in responding to her feelings - and his wide-eyed look of alarm in 151 seemed very ominous omens for the success of her confession and that beat of him covering his face when Kana approves of his dream… very incheresting knowing Aqua was still struggling with 'love or revenge' at this point.

Most interesting of all to reconsider is Aqua breaking down in tears in Miyako's arms in 155 when she addresses him as her son for the first time. At the time it read like catharsis but now I can't help but wonder if this was Aqua grieving for something he desperately wants but thinks is out of his reach.

i do have to say though. i get the general vibe of this plan and think it works fine as the apex of aqua's self-sacrificial protectiveness for the people he loves but how is being the daughter of a serial killer somehow any less scandalous for her career than being the sister of someone who killed one dude. does aqua think they just won't notice that kamiki happens to be their biodad or something. wasn't that the whole point of the movie. goofy ass plan.

What really saves this whole scenario is the emotions at play, though. This really does feel like Aqua at his most Aqua in a really long while and this chapter has so much love and respect for his life as Aqua and the bonds he has formed as a result. The dreams Aqua lays out are so agonizingly simple, too - he wants to pursue the career he finds rewarding. He wants to date the girl he likes. He wants to accept Miyako as his mom and Himekawa as his brother and to make things right with Akane after hurting and using her. He wants to see Ruby achieve her dream and be there to support her when she does.

But Aqua's always considered his dreams impossible, hasn't he?

I fully admit; I got spoiled with the full page spread of Aqua stabbing himself way in advance of the chapter and initially hated it as a twist. But with the full chapter as context and the sheer weight of Aqua's longing to just fucking live and find joy, it's not just effective but absolutely gutwrenching. It is the synthesis of Aqua's series-long battle to choose love or revenge and it resonates perfectly because it has never been one or the other for him - Aqua's revenge has always been rooted in the fact that he loves others so wholly and completely and hates himself so utterly that he thinks sacrificing himself to preserve their futures is the only path for him to take. It's the culmination and final release of the suicidal ideation Aqua has been dealing with since he was four years old and like Ai's tragedy before him, there's a horrible sense that maybe there really was no other way this could've gone.

Aqua being the character who actually takes the knife also firmly cements him as Ai's narrative echo in the text which has me barkin and howlin because it's what I've been saying all this time. Not just that, but so many of Aqua's expressions in this chapter pointedly and deliberately echo Ai's after she was stabbed. Not just that, but Aqua's achingly simple dreams echo Ai's own heartrendingly simple regrets - all the two of them ever wanted was to be happy with the people they love.

This also reframes the story's prior establishment of Ruby as paralleling Ai and seems to place the twins in the position of echoing not Ai in her entirety but Ruby as 'Ai of B-Komachi' and Aqua as 'Ai Hoshino'. This was actually something I outlined in one of my very first meta posts on the series, but I think making it more specific to 'Ruby as Ai the idol' and 'Aqua as Ai the human', this actually gives Ruby's arc in relation to Ai a bit of breathing room. Don't get me wrong, everything I've said about her post-BH writing being underbaked and inconsistent is still the case, especially when it comes to how confused the story is on whether Ruby is her own idol or New And Improved Ai 2.0 but giving it less ground to cover helps in terms of her writing no longer being spread quite as thin.

Speaking of Ruby, that beat of her seeming to react or sense something is up the moment Aqua takes the stab. 'Something happened to my loved one far away and I just Feel It' is a trope I'm always a sucker for and I really dig it here.

"The public don't care about the truth, so let's tell them a lie" is such a crazy hard sentiment to go out on too. Holy fuck.

There go our boys…!!! Quite a few people predicted they might go over the edge when Aqua showed up in his Mephisto fit (Mefitsto) and I'm interested to see if we get any parallels to the ED's imagery in the next few chapters. Overall, though, I'm really excited for where things are going - I don't think Aqua will die, but I do have some theories about what might happen. I can't think of a more traditional misogi purification experience than the middle of the ocean in late December, after all…

No break next week! Woohoo! While the delay of episode 12 means we won't be getting them on the same day, that is the same week S2 of the anime will be concluding and Aka does like lining up his bombshells with the anime. So who knows what we'll see.

seriously tho aqua. everyone already knows kamiki is you and ruby's biodad. HOW IS THIS ANY BETTER THAN HER BEING THE DAUGHTER OF A SERIAL KILLER AS IT ALREADY STANDS

[running-swimming-living]

These past few days have been wild! We had a bomb cyclone storm with a high wind warning. We saw gusts above 50 mph and conditions typical with a weak hurricane. Trees and power lines were down. The power went out for about half a million people, and we were one of them.

More below

We lost power Tuesday evening. We expected a quick fix and had cheez it’s for dinner thinking it would be over soon. Then we learned a valuable transformer was damaged and the restoration would be much longer.

We still don’t have power. We’ve been eating our dinners from Costco’s food court. The blessing in all of this is that even though our neighborhood sustained heavy outages, the church, McDonald’s and Costco all stayed open.

The nights are the worst. It only got to 56 degrees in our house with no heating when outside it was 44 with a wind chill. I’ve been sleeping with 4 blankets while wearing 5 layers. My bro and mom only needed two blankets. I can’t stand the cold.

We’ve been forgoing showers, laundry and the dishes. We started using paper plates due to the dishwasher not working. I’m running out of clothes.

The real MVP of this event is my thermal underwear. It cuts out the bitter chill from the cold. I was wearing the long sleeve shirt and long pants. The long pants r great because it feels like I’m wearing pajamas in my jeans.

Then on Friday, I did a speech in skagit county to support the upcoming opening of the first clubhouse international clubhouse in that county.

Then I had a stay cation. I booked the hotel two weeks in advance for a killer deal. 153 a night at a four star hotel downtown. I planned it as a fun get away but it suddenly became a necessity. My fam and I used this opportunity to each take a hot shower bc it has been since Tuesday since we had hot water.

It also made me realize we need more emergency preparedness foods than what we have. We have a lot of food that requires hot water like instant noodles and such.

This is a rambling message. I’m grateful for my fam and the community I live in. They had a device charging center at the community center which was lovely.

Now we just wait and see. They originally said power would be back today but it’s looking more like Monday. It went out on Tuesday 😔

[aquaquadrant]

Why do I feel like Etho and Patho would actually really get along well. Like there'd be a minute of "oh shit" then they'd be making some weird machine together.

Also any chance you would be willing to share the story about Patho's clock and maybe info on Hels Bdubs?

(honestly? true. patho isn’t bothered enough w the concept of being a doppelgänger so he’d be chill w etho if etho was chill with him. and etho’s like. always chill. anyway idk if this’ll answer ur questions but here’s uhhhh something)

~*~

patho pauses at the top of the netherrack hill, boots hissing briefly as he shifts off a magma block.

xyz: -12,485.167 / 67.09835 / 253,295.942

the coordinates ever-present within his field of view tell him he should be another hundred or so blocks away in the z axis, but he can already see the jungle’s grown since his last visit. it’s been slowly overtaking the neighboring nether waste biome for a couple decades, now. rate of growth has held constant, unchanging. that's something, at least.

patho slowly scans the horizon. words and numbers flash across the left half of his vision as his cybernetic eye rapidly processes new information based on visual input: netherrack, netherrack, crimson nylium, grass, jungle wood, jungle wood, jungle leaves, weeping vine. light level 3, 3, 3, 2, 1, 2, 3, 4. there's a lava pool eleven blocks over in the x axis; light level 15.

he starts walking again.

153 fps t: inf fancy-clouds b: 15x15 3 tx 3 rx c: 695/41672 (s) d: 16, pc: 000, pu: 00, ab: 42 e: 23/109, b: 0, sd: 9 p: 18 t: 109 error fc:0 xyz: -12,487.331 / 65.21091 / 253,375.987 block: -12,487 65 253,375 chunk: -780 15 7,835 facing: south (towards positive z)(1.5/5) client light: 5 (0 sky, 5 block) biome: error:nether waste local difficulty: 6.75//0.00 (day error404 not found) sounds: 5/247 + 0/8

the data shifts with every step. he's learned to tune most of it out by now, only paying attention to the biome indicator as he crosses the chunk threshold.

biome: error:crimson jungle

particles and sounds immediately jump up a couple degrees. glowing red specks dance slowly in the air, mingling with the ambient noises; hoglins rooting around in the brush, parrots calling unseen from the canopy above, lava bubbling in a pool nearby.

p: 35 sounds: 23/247

the temperature is warmer here. patho shrugs off his jacket, letting it hang at his elbows as he picks his way through the jungle. he doesn't even need to think about where he's going, coordinates left ignored at the edge of his vision. he's taken this path many times before, and he never has to wander very long.

his boots crunch softly on the nylium and grass terrain. jungle leaves and crimson fungus alike brush at his shoulders as he ducks underneath branches, taking care not to get tangled in weeping vines.

this is his favorite jungle. it's not the only crimson jungle he's ever come across- not to mention the warped jungles- but out of all the biomes he's seen, it's the one with the greenest leaves. something about this jungle sustains the normal trees just as well as it does the fungi, allowing the grass and leaves to stay bright and full instead growing in wilted and brown. it makes a lovely contrast with the blood red fungi.

not for the first time, he's thankful that the jungle is far enough away from spawn to be left alone. if other players knew about this place, with its well-sustained passive mob spawning and greenery, they'd destroy it for resources for sure. but he never worries too much about that possibility, because no mob or player sets foot in this jungle without permission from-

a weeping vine suddenly sprouts from the ground and lashes around patho's leg.

it's quickly joined by several more, snaking out from the undergrowth to wrap around his other limbs. before he can blink, he's lifted off the ground and pulled up into the trees. he doesn't struggle, doesn't panic- this is nothing new to him. the vines string him up among the highest branches, where a familiar figure is crouched in front of him, nothing but a pair of glowing red eyes beneath a heap of moss.

<player>dat -7063fdce-39ac-4a12-d836-a990c45b2bb0

"hey, dbubs," patho says casually.

the figure straightens up, hood falling back to reveal his face. his huge red eyes are sparkling with excitement, despite the dark circles lining them, and his mouth falls open in a wide, sharp-toothed grin. vines of varying shapes and sizes curl lazily around his body, small tendrils sprouting from the mossy cloak he wears. a couple veins of red discolor his skin, crawling up his neck and across his face. his messy hair is a bit whiter than the last time patho saw him, tinged red at the roots. a clock hangs around his neck, to match the one hanging from patho's hip.

"patho!" dbubs practically shouts, throwing his arms out.

sounds: 24/247

before dbubs can say anything else, patho asks his usual question. “what’s your name?”

“what’s my-” dbubs blinks, works his jaw for a second. “GODSLAYER666,” he proclaims loudly, puffing his chest out. then he pauses, frowns. “wait, no, i- i don’t know why i just said that. uh…”

it’s somewhere in the middle, then. not as bad as his worst days- at least he’s aware he’s lying, even if he has no control over it. and patho has to admit, that's one of the most entertaining responses dbubs has ever given to his little test.

"uh huh." patho shifts in the web of vines. they're holding a bit tighter than normal. of course, he could still easily break out of them. if he wanted to. "did you miss me, dbubs?" he asks instead, his voice teasing.

dbubs throws his head back to let out a sharp laugh, sending a shower of red particles fluttering through the air. "what?" he demands incredulously, his eyes blown wide. "miss you? i d- eugh, n'you stupid- i- i didn't even notice you were gone!"

patho hums with amusement. "then you don't wanna, like, kiss me or anything?"

"no," dbubs insists stubbornly, even as he comes closer. he steps boldly into patho's space, hands coming up to grab his face. "no, no of course not, i don't..." his long eyelashes flutter as he looks patho up and down. he smells like moss; like old vegetation and decay. there's soil and dried blood caked under his fingernails. "why would i- you ha- you have a lotta nerve..." dbubs tugs at the left strap of patho's mask, tilting his head. "do i- uh, do i get to see ya?" he asks, expression suddenly eager.

"yeah," patho chuckles.

dbubs grins widely, pulling patho's mask down. for a moment, he just looks at him. his calloused hand scuffs along the metal parts of patho's face- the entire ramus of his left mandible and most of his cheekbone, lost in the explosion that took his eye. the remaining skin is rough with scar tissue. dbubs strokes his thumb along that, too.

"i lo- um, i- i hate your stupid face," dbubs mumbles before he finally kisses patho. he seems to process his words a second later, breaking away with a small gasp of "oh! i d-", but patho simply leans in again, reclaiming his lips.

he knows what dbubs meant.

~*~

dbubs spares patho the trouble of walking, simply having the vines carry him to the hideaway. it's a difficult base to categorize: part tree house, part nest, part garden. in some places the floor is made of wood- in others, just a thick layer of leaves. there are potted plants and hanging vines everywhere, interspersed among stacks of barrels and moldy bookcases. little red mushrooms sprout from walls made of thatch and tree trunks. a couple of shroomlights provide gentle lighting as glittery particles drift through the open air; red, from the biome itself, and green from the spore blossom that patho brought him last year.

the vines unceremoniously drop patho onto the makeshift bed- a mat of moss and old, shredded banners. he's barely gotten settled, pulling his mask up and pulling his jacket off, before dbubs flops onto him with a heavy wuff.

"so!" dbubs starts loudly, propping his elbows up on patho's stomach. "what brings ya to see ol' dbubs today, huh?"

patho huffs a laugh. "what, i can't just stop by to say hi?"

"oh sure, okay." dbubs rolls his eyes, one of his vines flicking through the air dismissively. "you j- yeah, okay, be all secretive, then! see if i care." his haughty demeanor doesn't last long, though, as he shimmies up a little further, arms folded on patho's chest. "d'you- uh, do you wanna hear what i've been doin'?"

patho sighs good-naturedly, shifting so he can tuck his arms behind his head and lean back against the wall. "alright, go ahead."

dbubs beams at him and immediately starts telling lies. he tells patho about all the amazing things he's built (the jungle looks the same), all the incredible battles he's fought (no one's entered the jungle in years), all the wonderful places he's gone (he can't leave the jungle).

but patho doesn't mind that it's all lies. he's content to listen anyways.

they carry on like this until dbubs suddenly pauses, scrambling for his clock. "uh oh! gotta schreep."

patho glances at his own clock; dbubs is right on time, as always. that's one thing he never lies about. "okay, okay," he says, pushing dbubs off- he hits the moss with a soft thump. "lemme get my anchor."

"well, hurry up already!" dbubs shouts impatiently, vines swatting at patho's arm as he pops down his ender chest.

after placing the anchor and setting his spawn, patho reaches up and presses his finger directly into the center of his left eye, shutting it off.

he doesn’t regret putting a data processor into his cybernetic eye; the information it’s given him is invaluable. but every now and then, he needs a break from it. even when his eyes are closed, the display is still active, showing blank values on the back of his eyelid. turning the eye off is the only way to make it go away- of course, at the price of half his vision. so he only does it if he’s sleeping somewhere fully secure, and if he’s alone.

the jungle is an exception. dbubs has full domain out here- no mob or player can come close to his home without him allowing it.

"finally," dbubs huffs as patho settles back down. he's quick to cling with both his arms and assorted vines.

patho can't help but chuckle. "what's that you said about not missing me?"

"oh, shut up!"

~*~

patho abruptly reenters consciousness, emerging from a deep, dreamless sleep. with a soft groan, he fumbles to turn on his cybernetic eye, wincing at the sudden influx of data.

149 fps t: inf fancy-clouds b: 15x15 3 tx 3 rx c: 695/41672 (s) d: 16, pc: 000, pu: 00, ab: 42 e: 1/109, b: 0, sd: 9 p: 52 t: 109 error fc:0 xyz: -12,587.412 / 96.77253 / 253,401.623 block: -12,587 96 253,401 chunk: -783 15 7,845 facing: north (towards negative z)(1.5/5) client light: 7 (0 sky, 7 block) biome: error:crimson jungle local difficulty: 6.75//0.00 (day error404 not found) sounds: 27/247 + 0/8

"goooood morning!" dbubs calls, over on the other side of the little nook. he's busy rummaging through barrels, perhaps trying to find some breakfast. it’s unlikely he has any food stored; when he’s hungry, he hunts, and the jungle always provides.

"mornin'," patho says, rubbing his face. he sits up- and then pauses. there are weeping vines wrapped tightly around his legs. he sighs. “dbubs, you’re doing it again.”

“what?" dbubs manages to sound surprised. "no! no, i’m not, i’m- i’m just over here, minding my own business, crafting a loom.”

“a loom,” patho repeats flatly.

“yes! for um, for banners.”

“do you even have any wool?”

“do i ha- uh, of course! yes, of course i do.”

“can i see it?”

“no. no, i- i just ate it, actually. um-”

“you ate it?”

“yeah. sorry.”

patho sighs again. he kicks the weeping vines away. "i uh, i didn't mean to be gone for so long," he says, rising to his feet. "but, you know, i- i got held up with a job."

"a job?" dbubs glances over his shoulder at patho, squinting. "what kinda job?"

patho stretches his arms above his head, hearing both his natural and mechanical shoulder joints pop. "some guys out west are tryin' to make a portal out of hels."

"a portal?" dbubs's mouth falls open. "oh, for goodness sakes- and you call me a liar!"

patho knows better than to take offense. "it's true. they've got a player who came here from another world."

"uh huh." dbubs scoffs, but he can't quite hide the anxious shimmer in his eyes. "yeah, yeah, sure... so- i mean, did you do it, then? make them a portal?"

"basically." patho shrugs. "i uh, i told them everything they needed to know, to make one."

"right. you told th- okay." dbubs nods, bites his lip. "um- you didn't stay? to see the portal? or, uh…”

patho chuckles, crossing the distance to put his arms around dbubs's waist. "nah. i mean, come on, you know me, dbubs. i'm a- i'm a hels player, through and through. what's the rest of the universe got that's better than this place, right?"

dbubs grins at that, slotting his arms through patho's. "oh, you- you're such an idiot! y'know, i uh, i've been outside'a hels before and i- um, let me tell ya, you're missing out!"

"mhmm." patho smiles even though his mask is on. he knows dbubs can tell.

"yeah! "dbubs nods vigorously. "and, uh, there's- i got a whole world that's just mine!"

"is that right?" patho rests his chin on the top of dbubs's head. "tell me about it."

"it's a beautiful world, of course. my perfect builds, i ha-"

"of course."

"- uh, hey! quit interruptin'!"

"sorry, sorry."

"i di- thank you. so i um, i built a big ol' crastle, with a- hyeugh, a sorta um, horse course... y'know, with th- with the fastest horses anyone ever saw, one-stick horses, and- and uh, everyone was really impressed…”

this won’t last forever. it’ll only be a matter of weeks, months if they’re lucky, before patho won’t be able to ignore the itch to wander again. before the comfort and familiarity of the jungle becomes unbearable. before dbubs grows so used to his presence that the jungle itself tries to overtake him, the way it has dbubs- vines and veins of red.

he’ll leave without warning in the middle of the night, while dbubs is sleeping, because trying to leave while dbubs is awake never ends well. he’ll leave without a word and try not to think about the frantic whispers he knows dbubs sends him on lonely nights, despite knowing patho will never receive them (it’s the only time he regrets fusing his communicator with his arm- but how was he supposed to know he’d hear it in his mind? how was he supposed to know that disabling the chat was the only way not to lose himself completely to the endless flood of data?)

he’ll stay away long enough for dbubs to shatter apart, losing himself to the wildness of the jungle, and come back together. he’ll wait until dbubs has recovered from his grief, so that the next time dbubs sees him there will only be joy. because no matter how many times patho hurts him, dbubs always forgets it eventually.

“… so, you see, ol’ dbubs been workin' on a new technique, using the uh. grade- uh, gradient? block palettes... to create depth. ah hah! so- so listen, now, to teacher! it all starts with the color scheme..."

this won’t last forever. so for now, patho closes his eyes and listens.

error fps t: b: tx rx c: (s) d: , pc: , pu: , ab: e: , b: , sd: p: t: error fc: xyz: / / block: chunk: facing: ( )( / ) client light: ( sky, block) biome: error: local difficulty: // (day error404 not found) sounds: 1/247 + 0/8

~*~

[quiltofstars]

The Hyades, C41 // Adam Drake

Located only 153 light years away in the constellation of Taurus, the Bull, the Hyades is the nearest open cluster to Earth. Five of the brightest stars in the cluster form a "V" shape along with the still-brighter Aldebaran (α Tauri, bottom of image), although Aldebaran is unrelated to the cluster.

It's these five bright stars that give the cluster its name. The Hyades were the five daughters of Atlas and half-sisters to the Pleiades. After the death of their brother, Hyas, the weeping sisters were transformed into a cluster of stars that has historically been associated with rain. This cluster has been observed since antiquity, although it was first cataloged by Italian astronomer Giovanni Hodierna (1597-1660).

[kaijuno]

This year is the 71st anniversary of the Flint/Beecher tornado of June 8, 1953.

The tornado resulted in 116 fatalities and 844 injuries (not including those who self-treated). This is the most tornado fatalities ever from a single tornado in Michigan and it was the most fatalities in the U.S. from a single tornado until the Joplin, Missouri, tornado of 2011, which had 161 fatalities.

The tornado left 340 homes completely destroyed, 107 had major damage and another 153 had relatively minor damage.

The tornado was rated F5, the highest category, with winds over 200 mph. It was half a mile wide. It stayed on the ground for 27 miles. The forward speed of the tornado was 35 mph. Damage was estimated at $19 million (in 1953 dollars). That would be close to a third of a billion dollars in today’s dollars. The only other F5 tornado in Michigan history was the Hudsonville-Standale Tornado of April 3, 1956. The last F4 tornado in Michigan was the Kalamazoo County to Eaton County twister of April 2, 1977.

The bark was stripped off trees and a few homes were leveled down to the concrete foundation.

Of the 116 fatalities, 113 occurred over a four-block stretch, generally along Coldwater Road. The vast majority of fatalities and injuries were the result of structural failure. Fifty-five of the fatalities were to children under age 20 and 32 of the fatalities were to children under age 10. Two families lost five members.

The tornado struck around 8:30 p.m. and tracked through an area of single-family homes, with many residents employed by auto factories.

The National Guard was mobilized and the Red Cross was one of many agencies that provided relief.

[merakiui]

Fwb Riddle with the prompts "You don't have to leave, you know" and/or "Stay the night tonight" 🥺

AAAA YES YES. OTL

(fwb dialogues)

“You don’t have to leave, you know,” Riddle murmurs, watching you pick up your discarded clothes scattered on the floor. He’s sitting up in his bed, the covers draped lazily over his lap. Awkwardly, he wrings his hands out of nervous habit.

You glance over your shoulder at him, stunned. “I thought you didn’t have time today. You told me so—said you’d rather be studying when I texted you.”

“Yes. Well…” He huffs, averting his eyes. “I’ve changed my mind. So… If it’s not asking too much, stay the night tonight.”

You tilt your head, resting your hands on your hips. “Isn’t there some rule about this in the Queen of Hearts’s law?”

Riddle chuckles, regaining slivers of confidence with every passing second. “There’s nothing in the rulebook that says I’m not allowed to share my space with you. We’re abiding by the rules.”

“Most of the time.”

Riddle blinks at you, opens his mouth to question you, and then clamps it shut. His face explodes with color. He remembers the night well—the party at the lounge. He only went for courtesy’s sake, accompanied by Trey and Cater, and he’d planned to make his rounds, greet everyone in turn, and leave before he missed evening tea. Rule 153 — One must only drink herbal tea in the evenings.

But then someone passed a fruity drink into his hand—something that was so very obviously alcoholic from the look and sight alone—and Riddle had thought himself strong enough to decline. Even though his wits were about him, they crumbled at the sight of you, merrily giggling alongside Kalim and indulging in the type of mindless fun he’s never had the chance to know. He’s never needed to rely on liquid courage or anything like it; he derives enough confidence from the ever-present fear of failure and that keeps him going.

But this was different, and it wasn’t very secretive to the keen eyes of his friends and dorm mates.

Cater had nudged Riddle, grinning encouragingly. “You literally never get to see (Name) outside of class. Now’s your chance! Go make Cay-Cay proud and talk a bit.”

Riddle flustered outright. “I’ve no idea what we’d even talk about!”

“The upcoming exam,” Trey prompted with a half-shrug. “Nothing gets people talking faster than when it comes to exams they aren’t looking forward to.”

For once Riddle doesn’t find academics an appealing conversation subject. But he hadn’t had time to deliberate because Cater looped arms with him and skipped over in your direction.

Riddle learned two very valuable lessons that night. One: Never drink wine in copious amounts no matter how delicious it is. Two: Never hook up anywhere near or in the Mostro Lounge.

It’s been months since that party, an irresponsible mistake on his part, and he’s arguably closer with you than he’s ever been. Physically, perhaps. Emotions are…difficult. Neither of you signed up for the emotional benefits. Just the sex. Sometimes he wishes there was more. Rule 53 — One must replace anything stolen.

But how can you do that when you’re not aware of the thing you’ve unintentionally stolen?

Riddle surfaces from that rumination, refusing to dignify that with incoherent, embarrassed sputtering. Instead, he simply says, “Certain situations call for…exceptions.”

“Is that what I am?” you ask, stepping into your underwear. Riddle’s gaze traces the length of your legs. “An exception to the rules? Last I checked there’s no rule saying we can’t kiss.”

“And there aren’t any rules prohibiting you from staying either.”

You pause, half-dressed. “No, I guess not… I don’t want to ruin your study time, though. I may be an exception, but I don’t want to be a distraction.”

“We could study together.”

“You’re the only guy I know who’d study after sex.”

Riddle bristles. “W-What else am I meant to do?”

An amused smile curls on your lips. You cover the distance to the bed and lean over to meet him. He stares at you, swept up in your charm. You’re everything his mother would object to. Your relationship doesn’t suit that of normal, standard love (because it’s not), but it’s his choice and no one, not even the rules or his mother, can influence that. It’s messy and imperfect, but it’s all his.

“You could try talking to me,” you offer, your face within kissing distance. “Not about school or dorm stuff. But about you.”

Oh.

Yeah, you’re right. He could try that.

[transhuman-priestess]

The follow-up to The New Flesh. Read that one first!

15 months prior to the raid on the Blair Mountain, Captain Terry Holder butts heads with her Chief Engineer as an unknown threat bears down on their ship.

This story does not contain sexual themes, however it is part of a larger work which does, therefore, this story is only for consumption by legal adults over the age of 18. It includes moderate violence, and coarse language.

January 14, 2253 1041 Earth UTC

15 months prior to the raid on the Blair Mountain

The Hildas, 550 Million Kilometers from Jupiter

“Chester, how long do you think we’re going to be stuck here?” Captain Terry Holder asked.

She and her first mate, Chester Silvera, were sitting in the mess hall of the Huntington. The ore hauler had been coasting .9 AU from 153 Hilda for 56 hours with a damaged ablator in her #2 main engine. Holder was growing restless.

Silvera, on the other hand, was in a fine mood. “Why are you so eager to get back to port?” He was downing his third slice of pizza since taking a seat 10 minutes ago. Holder couldn’t understand where his appetite came from.

“It’s creepy out here,” she said, “The nearest station is 6 days away. It takes 10 minutes for someone to even hear a distress signal. There’s nothing outside the hull. We’re alone.”

“Captain,” Silvera replied, smirking “You are aware that you can, in point of fact, choose a different occupation than deep space captain, correct?”

“Shut up,” Holder said, smiling. “You know what I mean.” She leaned back in her chair. She’d barely touched the chicken Parmesan she’d gotten from the replicator.

“You’ve been out here for 15 years, Terry,” Silvera said, slipping effortlessly into confidant mode, “You’ve been a captain for 8. You’re used to this. What’s different now?”

Holder sighed. Chester, as always, knew how to get to the heart of the matter. She sat for a moment, not wanting to say it out loud, but knowing she couldn’t hide it from her friend and crewmate. Finally, she said, “It’s Powell.”

“The engineer?” Silvera seemed genuinely surprised.

“Yeah,” said Holder, her hand idly falling to the nickel-plated pistol she wore on her hip, “I don’t like her attitude.” She rubbed her thumb on the hammer, feeling the familiar knurling, catching her thumbnail on a well-worn burr.

“You seem to get along with her just fine.” His pizza lay forgotten on the plate, he was all business now.

“Well, that’s what they pay me for, Chester.” She took a bite of chicken to buy some time before continuing, “She’s arrogant, inflexible, obsessed with rules and procedure.” She tossed her fork to the table. Chester scooted back slightly, sensing one of his captain’s moods coming on. Holder stood and began pacing.

“It’s always ‘SOP says this!’ or ‘The tech manual says that!’ always coming up with excuses why something can’t be done, except when it’s something she wants done, then procedure flies out the fucking door!” She ran her hand through her hair in frustration.

“Terry-”

“We’ve been coasting for two and a half days.”

“Terry is-”

“She told me that she has to strip the bell down to the cooling tubes for fuck’s sake.”

“TERRY!” Silvera banged his hand on the table for emphasis. Holder stopped talking.

“Yeah, Chester?”

“This is about the pistol, isn’t it?”

Holder rolled her eyes, “No, it’s not about the fucking pistol.”

“Isn’t it, though?”

The engraved, nickel-plated .45 was a family heirloom. Captains in the Civil Navy were allowed sidearms for ceremonial purposes, but they weren’t supposed to wear them outside of certain occasions. Of course, in deep space, the captain had more or less free reign, barring mutiny, and Terry liked the feeling of the heavy steel on her hip. She didn’t keep it loaded, though she did keep 2 magazines of hollow-points on her belt.

She’d never had to draw it in anger, though there had been a few close calls with pirates where she’d gone as far as to carry it cocked and locked. But that was on her old ship, the Joachimstahl.

This was her first sortie in command of the Huntington. She’d inherited the ship from a retiring captain, Jack Thorton, and the crew along with it, including the old engineer, who immediately took issue with Terry’s habit of wearing the piece. She’d actually pulled Chester aside to complain about it. It pissed Terry off.

Chester smiled gently. “Terry, I’ve known you five years. I’ve been your right hand for two. You need to get over this grudge.”

“She’s a little shit, Chester.”

“She is a fine engineer. Captain Thorton had nothing but praise for her. Has she ever disobeyed an order?”

“No, but-”

“Has she ever put the crew in danger?”

“No, but-”

“Then you need to drop this little grudge, and you know that.”

Terry was about to argue when her the radio on her belt chirped.

“Captain,” the voice of Jill Cambell, her radar navigator, “There’s something weird on the scope here.”

Terry keyed to reply “What do you mean by weird?”

“I mean I’ve never seen anything move this fast. You better get up here.”

“Be there in a minute.”

***

Captain Holder and First Mate Silvera walked onto the bridge of the Huntington. The radar station was the only one currently occupied. Campbell turned to them as they walked through the door.

“Alright, Jill,” said Terry, “What’s cracking?”

“About 20 minutes ago I got an off radar return about an AU out on the long-range band.” Campbell reported, “No exhaust signature, and it was redshifting so much I thought the scope might be broken.”

“And?”

“It’s not.” Campbell said, tossing a hand in the air. “I switched to the secondary dish. Same cross-section. Same redshift. Hit it with the high-rez, same cross section, same redshift. Whatever it is, it’s at least 50 meters long and it’s moving at O.1C.”

“So send a message to SETI’s Europa Division.” Terry was amazed but couldn’t understand why Campbell had called her to the bridge for this, “I mean, that’s incredible, really, it is, but if they’re moving away from us what’s the rush?

“Well,” Campbell seemed nervous, “Now they’re blueshifting.”

“Bullshit,” Holder dropped the word like a bag of bricks, “How is that possible? Even if something could put out that much delta-v, in that short a span, the g forces of changing direction would rip it to pieces.”

“I don’t know how, Captain,” Campbell said, turning back to the scope. “But I’d really like to have a plan when they get here.

***

“Fucking Christ, whose god damn idea was this?” Chief Engineer Genevieve Powell cursed to herself.

“Sorry Chief,” Engineer’s Mate Karl Miller said over the radio, “I uh, didn’t copy that.”

“Whoever designed the Shinkolobwe-class engine is either a sadist, an idiot, or both.” Powell replied, “This engine is pissing me off.”

She was nearing the end of a 4-hour long EVA replacing a cracked ablator panel right in the throat of the massive 10-meter fusion rocket. When the engines were active, the reactors would vent hot plasma out the back at temperatures approaching that of the surface of the sun, sending the ship moving in the opposite direction and accelerating it to a top speed of 20 million kilometers per hour.

But right now, they weren’t doing anything of the sort. The ablator shield, a layer of boronated plastic 4 meters thick meant to both protect the engine bells from melting and absorb excess neutrons, was cracked, right in the throat. With the ablator shield damaged, the plume coming out of the rocket engine wouldn’t be smooth and even, but roiling with turbulence. Turbulence that would, at best, drop the propulsive efficiency enough to put serious differential stresses on the spaceframe. At worst, it would impinge on the hull, or through to the engine bell, either way burning through and destroying the ship.

Which was why Powell had been awake for 40 hours. Why she and the engineering team had been working in shifts to painstakingly repair the panel. Angle grinders, caulk guns full of boron paste, a portable X-ray unit, and lots and lots of elbow grease.

“Miller,” Powell said, wiping her cheek on the inside of her helmet. “You ever wonder whose brilliant fucking idea was it to use ablative shielding instead of magnetic on a 100-giganewton fusion engine?”

“Can’t say I have,” Miller replied, “You’re gonna have to take that up with Tycho Shipbuilding. Captain wants to know your ETA.”

“God dammit,” The Captain was pissing Powell off. No respect for the work involved in keeping nuclear fusion going without blowing the whole ship to hell, or bombarding the crew with fast neutrons, or turning them all into sludge with 100g burns. “Is this about me not using the tether?” The umbilical tether was supposed to be worn whenever the EVA thruster pack was in use, as a backup, in case the thrusters failed. Powell hated the damn thing. It got in the way and the thruster pack was reliable enough she didn’t need it.

“Uh, I don’t think so, Chief.”

“It’ll be done when it’s fucking done. I’ve got another 3 meters of length on this bitch of a crack. It goes 45 centimeters deep. It’s going to take at least another 10 hours to fill that.”

There was a pause as Miller relayed this to the captain, then, “Uh, Chief,” Miller said, nervously, “Captain says you have an hour.”

“WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN? Put her on, now.”

“She says there’s some kind of pirates bearing in on us in 60 minutes.”

Powell rolled her eyes, “That’s not possible. There wasn’t anything within 4 AU of us when I came out here. Tell her I’m not doing anything without talking to her first.”

A brief pause on Miller’s end, then, “Have it your way.”

Powell continued grinding at the crack for a moment. Then Holder’s voice came on. “Powell, I know we don’t get along,” that was an understatement, Powell thought, “But Campbell confirmed this thing is moving at one-tenth c, heading directly towards us. It’s crossed 20 million clicks since she started tracking it. It actually reversed direction to come this way. I know it sounds like bullshit, but I need you to get whatever you can filled and get back into the airlock. I sent out a distress signal but I won’t hear back from Hilda station for at least another 2 minutes”

“Captain, you can’t just rush something like this!” Powell protested, “The differential forces alo-”

Holder cut her off, “I’m aware of the structural ramifications. It’s my ship and that’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

“Captain,” Powell said, “how are we going to outrun something a hundred times faster than us?”

“We’re not. But I’ll need the engines. Trust me.”

Powell gritted her teeth. She couldn’t stand Holder, but Campbell was good. She and Powell had served together under Thorton, and Campbell had helped Powell develop a couple of scanning tools for the engines that worked a hell of a lot better than stock equipment.

“If Campbell’s sure then. I can maybe get you 10 cm of depth along the rest of the crack. It won’t be good for the full trip back to Europa but I should be able to get you enough dV to get us on our way before I have to come back here and fix it again.”

Holder thought for a moment, then replied, “Make it so, Jenna.”

“Aye captain.”

For the next 45 minutes, Powell broke rule after rule for ablator repair. Instead of x-raying the crack she ground it down to 15 centimeters visually. She filled it in with ablator paste and smoothed it by hand before it had cured instead of sanding it once it was dry. By the end of the ordeal, she had used 100 kilos of ablator paste, far less than the 700 the job properly needed. She looked out at a nearby asteroid as they drifted past, and said into her mic, “Miller?”

“Chief?” came Miller’s soft voice through the headset. Powell saw a glint of something off by the big rock in space.

“Tell the captain I’m climbing out. I’ll be at the airlock in 5-” Powell was cut off by a squeel of static and a flash of bright light from the dorsal side of the ship. The shock jolted the Huntington and knocked Powell against the inside of the engine bell. She felt her shoulder crack. The screeching of static faded but was replaced by her own cries of agony. She was floating out towards the center of the nozzle, she couldn’t move her fingers to control the maneuvering pack.

Another flash and another impact jolted the ship vertically. Static filled Powell’s ears as she bounced into the bottom of the engine bell and then up, out into the vast expanse of space.

***

“Owens, damage report,” Holder barked.

Iris Owens responded, “Two detonations in the 2 kiloton range, a kilometer dorsal of us. Numbers 5 and 6 radiators showing a pressure drop. The rest are showing overheat but coming down.”

It had been an ambush. Holder didn’t know how it happened, but it couldn’t have been anything else. Somehow the two ships, 10 light-minutes away from each other, had coordinated. While the Huntington had been busy worrying about the distant ship, another had been hiding behind a nearby asteroid.

There wasn’t time to think about it though, “Miller,” Holder barked, “Pitch us up 115 degrees, roll 45 starboard.”

“Pitch up 115, roll 45 starboard.”

“Powell, what’s your status?”

***

Powell couldn’t move her right arm. The impact had shattered her shoulder blade and humerus. Her RCS system was giving her a warning that one of the quads had malfunctioned. Even if she’d been able to move the translation control, it wouldn’t have done any good.

I’m going to die out here, she realized.

Flashes of warm yellow-white light appeared behind her. The hypergolic RCS system was pitching the ship up, rolling it to the right. She watched as the huge ship seemed to breech like a whale, then pirouette. Over her radio she heard the captain’s voice, “Powell, what’s your status.”

“I’m alive!” she’d never been so happy to hear Terry Holder’s stupid fucking voice, “I’m alive but I can’t get back to the airlock! My thrusters are damaged and my shoulder’s broken.”

“Powell?” came the captain’s voice again, “Powell can you read me?”

“I can read you,” Powell shouted, tearing up from pain, or maybe from fear, “I can read you! Please respond.”

She realized that Holder couldn’t hear her. The wire for the microphone must have been damaged by the impact that broke her shoulder.

She was alone out here.

***

“Miller,” Holder said, “What’s Powell’s biomed say.”

Miller turned red in the face and stammered, “Uhhh,”

“Miller I do not have time for this, what’s her biomed say?”

“She isn’t wearing it.”

“What​?”

“She said she didn’t have time to put it on.”

“Retract her tether.”

“She’s not wearing that either.”

Holder felt ice creep down her spine. The whole scene seemed to go quiet and time stood still. In 8 years as a captain, Holder had never lost a crew member. She hadn’t even considered it a real possibility. But now, with her chief engineer missing and unresponsive, she didn’t know what to do. It felt like she was a lieutenant again, fresh out of training. She looked at Silvera, pleading.

Chester, for his part, looked as disturbed as she was. But he kept his cool, “Its your call, Captain.”

Holder knew what she should do, but that didn’t make it any easier. The fact she couldn’t stand Powell made it even harder, somehow. But if Powell wasn’t responding, and there was no way to retrieve her, then she was dead, one way or the other. Holder didn’t want to think about it.

Time started again, “Owens, get ready to dump ore bay 3. Miller, point the ventral hull at that ship and be ready with a 200m/s dorsal burn.”

***

The ship swung away from Powell, but then continued through its arc and, incredibly, came close enough to her that she was able to grab a handrail, only 20 meters from the airlock.

She scrambled to gain a foothold as she held on tight with her one good arm. This was a long shot, but it was her only hope for survival. She found purchase, and set her aim, then kicked and swung herself around, spinning head over heels. For 3 eternal seconds, she drifted through space, only inky black and stars filling her vision. Then the ship came back into view, and she grabbed at the first thing she could see and held on for dear life.

She’d grabbed one of the many high-gain antennae that dotted the hull. Carefully, she slid her hand down and pulled herself towards the hull. She was only 5 meters from the airlock. As her hand made contact with the hull, she felt a rumble through it. She looked around, and her heart dropped.

***

“Ore bay 3 open, Captain,” said Owens.

“Good. Disengage cargo restraints.”

“Cargo restraints disengaged”

“Miller, 200m/s dorsal,” Holder commanded

“200 m/s dorsal, captain.” Came Miller’s reply.

***

The roof of the ship lit up all around Powell. She could feel the heat from the thrusters. The sudden change in environment made her jump, and she lost her grip on the antenna. Relief turned, once again, to mortal dread as the Huntington sped away from her, leaving her floating, dying, in deep space, billions of kilometers from her home in Dublin.

***

“Dorsal burn complete, captain.” Said Miller.

“Good,” said Holder, “Now put that ore between us and that ship, face us away from it.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She would only have one chance to make this work, but Holder was a star poker player and knew how to use a bum hand to her advantage. Hold 3 had, until a minute ago, contained 20,000 metric tons of dense iridium ore. The Huntington didn’t have any armaments, but that didn’t mean she was defenseless.

“Holder, on my mark, engage engines, full power. Skip the purge burn.”

Miller nodded, “Preparing to fire main engines.”

***

The captain had jettisoned the contents of bay 3. Powell was beyond panic now. Not calm, but something else entirely. Numb to everything around her, she watched with a detached fascination as the ship pitched downward and yawed to starboard, before translating forward slightly, and finally starboard. It settled with the #2 engine that she’d just been working on a mere 10 meters away. She could see the big regenerative cooling tubes and the mounting cavity behind them.

She watched as the bell shuddered slightly, and recognition dawned on her. She hoped she wouldn’t feel what was coming next.

***

“Ignition complete.” came Miller’s clipped voice, “Standing by for full-power burn.”

Captain Holder got on the PA, “All hands, prepare for burn in 10 seconds.”

A preternatural calm came over the Captain. She hoped that Powell’s work had been enough. With 3 seconds left before the burn, she opened a channel, hoping Powell would somehow hear her, and said, “Please forgive me, Jenna.”

The two main engines of the Civil Ship Huntington spooled up. The ship’s dual fusion reactors pumping liquefied lithium deuteride into preburners that heated the silver grey dust hot enough to push it past liquid and gas and into ionized plasma, so hot the electrons and nuclei were ripped apart by sheer kinetic energy.

That was only the beginning, though. Next, the reactor squeezed down with a magnetic field stronger than the sun’s, and as the plasma was squeezed and heated even further, strong forces in the lithium atoms broke down, creating hydrogen and tritium, the latter of which sought out another atom to join itself to and, finding deuterium, they embraced, creating helium. As they did, each of them sacrifice a small portion of its mass to ensure this wedding would endure and, in doing so, a tiny fraction of each of those atoms was transformed, vanished from existence, into pure energy. This happened billions of trillions of times in a single second, and all of that energy had to go somewhere. Knowing this, the ship’s computer opened a hole in the magnetic confinement that coincided with the opening in the engine bell. Kinetic energy and Sir Issac’s third law dictated what happpened next.

Superheated plasma existed the engine bell at a temperature unmeasurable by any mechanical means, directly at the mass of iridium behind the ship. Much of the heavy metal immediately evaporated, but some survived, now white-hot and superheated, and heading directly towards the unknown ship assailing the Huntington at nearly 20 million kilometers per hour. The kinetic energy imparted transferred itself immediately to the ship, shredding it as easily as buckshot would disintegrate a clay pigeon. The Huntington sped away under her own power as the enemy ship dissolved under the barrage.

***

There is no air in space, thus there is no convection. There is, however, thermal radiation. The bulk of the plasma had been directed behind the Huntington, but the brilliant white-hot glow of her engines carried heat as well as light. It was this heat, in a pulse that lasted only 10 milliseconds before the Huntington sped away, that struck Jenna Powell.

For 10 milliseconds, every inch of her space suit that had been facing the engine, as well as her face, were heated to incandescence. Only her flesh and hair burned. The suit’s suppression system temporarily flooded her helmet with CO2, which worked to quell it within 2 seconds, but the damage had been done. The exterior of her suit, unable to ignite due to the lack of oxygen, instead boiled off. The sudden release of energy propelling her backwards, away from the rocket blast, saving her from the quick and painless death she had expected.

She screamed. She screamed and she cried. She was alone. Alone, and dying. She thought about home. About the Wicklow Mountains, about the sound of rain on a March evening, about the warmth of her bed. She thought about all of these, and how she would never see them again.

A shadow appeared over her. She felt herself being pulled backwards. Suddenly, an unfamiliar hallway appeared around her. A door closed in front of her, and she heard the hiss of an airlock pressurizing. After the silence of space and her ordeal, the sound was like a hammer in her brain.

She felt artificial gravity engage, and fell to the floor on her broken shoulder. She couldn’t even muster the energy to scream.

A pair of strangely mechanical armored legs appeared in front of her, and she felt herself lifted off the floor by powerful hands. A twisted face came into view, covered in wires and metal.

“Do not resist,” the figure said, its voice feminine and curiously synthetic, “You will become beautiful.”

Jenna Powell blacked out.

[yuurei20]

Riddle Info Compilation part 28: The Rules and Vil

There are 810 rules at Heartslabyul (In Japanese 8 can be pronounced “hah” while 10 can be pronounced ��toh”, and in katakana hah + toh = ハート, which means “heart”), and Riddle can recite them all.

He expects even people who are not students at NRC to know “at least a hundred of them. At LEAST.”

Rule 6, No fighting on campus Rule 23, One must never bring a cat to a formal affair Rule 53, When something is stolen from you, you must take it back! Rule 89, Never eat a tart without the Queen’s permission Rule 124, When you get soaking wet, you must dry off with a run im the ocean Rule 153, No black tea at night? (a little vague) Rule 186, Never eat a hamburger on Tuesday Rule 228, Flowers in gardens must never be picked on Wednesdays Rule 249, Flamingo caretakers are to don pink attire Rule 256, No drinking honey-sweetened lemonade after 8pm Rule 271, One must leave the table within fifteen minutes of completing their lunch Rule 339, The post-meal beverage is to be lemon tea with two sugar cubes Rule 346, Croquet must not be played after 5:00pm Rule 412, When you see a pair of moving glasses in the forest, never go back the way you came

Rule 469, When throwing a party for new friends, one must decorate with both red and white roses Rule 529, If you eat a steak on the night of a full moon, a cat must play the violin afterwards Rule 562, One must never bring a chestnut tart to an unbirthday tea party Rule 648, One must brush one’s teeth twice over after eating turkey Rule 703, Anyone who comes in second in a croquet tournament must serve the queen tea the next day

Vil tells Riddle that his “glass half-empty approach is basically an advertisement for (his) personal issues”, and we learn Vil may have suspected Riddle’s instability from the start, saying, “That boy is a disaster waiting to happen” in a flashback with a 1st-year Riddle.

In the same flashback we also see Vil giving Riddle advice on wearing high heels and gifting him with a bandaid for a blistered foot.

Riddle says that the very night he received the bandage from Vil he ordered a manual on proper walking technique and he considers it a “win” that he was able to show Vil that he is capable of dancing in heels, as, “one can’t let a poor impression go uncorrected indefinitely.”

Vil responds, “And here I thought you’d mellowed out considerably since those days. I suppose some things never change.”

We learn from Vil that housewardens are permitted to adjust their dorm uniforms as they see fit, and that previous Heartslabyul housewardens would wear sneakers like the rest of the dorm.

Riddle says that it bothers him when people assume he wears heels to make himself look taller, which is not the case: he had his uniform tailored to match that of Heartslabyul’s first housewarden, as he believes that “the head of a dorm honoring the Queen of Hearts should abide by tradition, which includes dressing formally.”

Riddle and Vil also share a conversation about the “unique benefits” offered by heels, such as how it is “pretty gratifying to watch the Heartslabyul students instantly straight up when they hear my footsteps. That kind of clarion clacking only comes with a good pair of heels.”

[niqhtlord01]

The Great Git Hunt Part 1: The Death of a Legend

During the turning of the 42nd millennia the universe was to see many upheavals of a galactic nature.

 The 13th Black Crusade finally shattered Cadia and opened the great rift, sundering the universe in two and unleashing innumerable demonic incursions into real space. Tyranid Hive Fleets began appearing more frequently along the entire eastern fringe devouring innumerable worlds and forcing the Imperium to fight tooth and nail for every world to slow the tide of chitin.The Tau launched the Fifth Sphere Expansion while the Imperium’s attention elsewhere and sought to steal several dozen worlds from Imperial control and integrate their populations in the name of the greater good.

Yet the most perplexing, if not confounding, event was to pit two of the greatest warhosts against each other all over the death of one elderly man.

That man was Commissar Sebastian Yarrick.

Dying at the age of roughly 153, the energetic Commissar Yarrick made a name for himself by leading the Imperial resistance against Ork Warlord Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka on the world of Armageddon. Taking for himself the severed arm of an ork warchief he slew in combat to replace the arm he lost, Yarrick would become a nay mythical figure amongst Ork culture and the primary rival of Ghazghkull himself. It was said that the warboss only ever cursed Yarrick; an honor amongst orks for sure. Their rivalry would span nearly a century as the two would fight again during the third war for Armageddon and then far afterwards as Yarrick chased the warboss half way across the universe seeking to end the green threat once and for all.

Many would be safe to assume that with a rivalry so deep between two titans of their peoples that their stories would end with a climatic clash of arms where one would lay dead at the others feet. Yet fate sought to intervene in the cruelest of manners.

While pursuing his eternal foe with a fleet of Black Templar space marines, Imperial Guard, and several warships of the Imperial Navy; Commissar Yarrick was set upon by the newly reformed World Eaters chaos space marines legion led by their demonic primarch Angron.

With the opening of the great rift Angron emerged from the Eye of Terror at the head of the largest force of Khorne worshipers the universe had seen since the Horus Heresy. Angron was not content to follow Abaddon and his mongrels, so set out on his own to leave a path of devastation and slaughter spanning several sectors. Each world his followers set foot upon they would leave in fire with nothing but the hollow skulls of its former inhabitants piled in mile high mounds to watch over them. It was in fact the most recent slaughter on the planet Mori that reverberated throughout the warp so strongly it incapacitated the navigators of Yarrick’s fleet and pulled them out of the warp.

Angron was surprised at the sudden appearance of an Imperial war fleet, but welcomed the new challengers with great relish. The Khorne warships descended upon the imperial fleet like carrion fiends and began pulling it apart piece by piece. The navy fought back with great ferocity but the troop transports were left to fend for themselves as hordes of boarding craft were launched at them, each packed with world eater space marines churning for the coming bloodbath.

With their escape routes blocked and the transport ships in danger, Yarrick ordered the ground forces to land on Mori. It was only on the surface of the planet could the imperial force bring to bear their full might. The landing was hounded the entire way by the ever pressing chaos war fleet with many ships never making the journey, but by the grace of the emperor several made it to the surface and disembarked their forces.

Never one to back down from a massacre, Angron landed on the planet once more and led his legion against the now dug-in imperial forces. Under the leadership of Yarrick, the guard and space marine forces held the unending horde back for seven days and seven nights. Yet by the dawn of the 8th day only Yarrick and a handful of guardsman remained. Angron himself took to the field for the final slaughter and slew the guardsman with ease until only Yarrick stood against him.

Power claw met demonic axe as the elderly commissar matched blow for blow. So assured of his victory, the inability to shatter the crude ork weapon infuriated Angron and his rage furthered him to unleash a flurry of blows. One snuck past Yarrick’s guard and violently severed the commissar’s right arm at the shoulder.

As the arm and power claw fell to the ground Yarrick staggered backwards. His remaining hand tightened around his bolt pistol as blood began flowing from the wound. He looked up and saw the demon primarch looking down at him; mangled and jagged teeth grinning as Angron looked down at him. No doubt the monster expected him to beg for his life, but Yarrick would not.

Spitting out a glob of blood at the traitor, Yarrick brought up his bolt pistol and roared “FOR THE EMPEROR!” one final time and pulled the trigger. A single bolt left the weapon before Angron swung his axe and decapitated the commissar. The bolt struck home against one of the skulls hanging from the primarch’s neck and shattered it; a prized treasure as it had belonged to one of his close comrades back when the primarch had been mortal and a slave in the fighting pits of his homeworld. The primarch took up the severed head of Yarrick and put it in its place around his neck; a sign of honor for a great warrior while the rest of the skulls of the dead imperials were collected and offered to Khorne.

News of this massacre did not reach the wider galaxy for several months until a passing merchant ship picked up the distress signals of the imperial navy that still echoed in the warp. They soon found the lifeless husks of imperial ships floating above the planet of Mori and when they descended to the surface found the remains of the imperial’s last stand as well as a lone ork power claw still stained with demonic blood.

When the merchant ship reported their findings to nearby Imperial authorities an investigation force was dispatched by inquisitorial agents which further discovered the truth of the situation and the death of Yarrick.

Initially, there was hesitance with releasing the information regarding Yarrick. In a time of such chaos, the death of such a notable figure if reported to the wider imperium could trigger further outbreaks of panic. In a rare show of defiance however, the Astra Militarum insisted that it be made public and a large scale military funeral be held and broadcasted imperium wide to turn Yarrick into a martyr and potentially Imperial Saint stating that he chose to die fighting the forces of chaos then be cowed into submission.

Had the Astra Militarum made such demands a few generations earlier the Inquisition would have purged their ranks for such brazen defiance; but since the great rift’s opening they found their position had weakened and they needed the legions of Imperial Guard standing with them than against them. So, the Inquisition relented and the military funeral was held on Yarrick’s homeworld. Despite the great dangers of warp travel, several high lords of Terra made the journey to pay their respects as well as countless Imperial Guard regiments, space marine contingents, mechanicus forces, and even a rare Imperial Class Titan joined the funeral procession.

It was during this period of mourning as news of Yarrick’s death was spread throughout the imperium that it also trickled into the hands of the Imperium’s enemies as well.

Ork freebooters hijacking Imperial ships learned of the news while having fun with their human prisoners. There wasn’t an ork alive that didn’t know of the legend of “Old Bale Eye” and the impressive ork body count he had amassed over the century of fighting. News of his death spread even faster amongst orks than it had with imperials until finally words reached the green prophet himself, Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka.

At first, Ghazghkull refused to believe that anyone but him could have done in his oldest rival. He had fought Yarrick too long and knew that the wily hummie wouldn’t go down so easily. But when a squad of his handpicked Kommandos came back from Mori and presented him with Yarrick’s severed power claw, the green prophet flew into a rage.

The roar let out was so powerful that it reverberated in the warp, silencing nearby warp storms and sending countless ships of all affiliations from the astral tides of the warp back into real space. Not since the war of the beast was an ork roar heard so strongly in the warp from so far away that even the navigators on holy terra itself could hear the anger of Ghazghkull.

From that moment on the greatest warboss of orks the universe had ever seen had a new mission. He would take every ship in his fleet, every gargant and war machine his boy’z made, and every ork boi in his waaagh and he would not stop until he had the head of the one who done in Old Bale Eye and mounted it to the front of his flagship.

The Great Git Hunt, had begun.  

[stabbyfoxandrew]

vampdrew please i have a mighty need :-:

WIP Wednesday (7/10) | Vampire Andrew AU (Part 153)

Neither of them says anything for a good minute. Andrew’s jaw works a couple times but no sound comes out. Instead of waiting for Andrew to scold him, Kevin opens his mouth.

“It’s not breaking the deal if we add to it, right?” He asks. Andrew says nothing at all, still staring up at him with those magnificent eyes.

“I suppose not,” Andrew says, and he sounds half-choked.

“Alright then. I’ll stop fussing over you, I’ll even tell the others to back off too.” Kevin says before he clears his throat, still holding Andrew’s hand. The vampire nods once and Kevin continues. “In return… I want you to let me care about you. Nothing more, if you don't want more. Just let me care about you, without acting like you don’t deserve it.”

For a split second, Andrew’s eyes go wider than Kevin’s ever seen them and his mouth falls open, making him look like some sort of doll. For a moment, Kevin thinks he’s broken him, then Andrew’s expression shutters and Kevin knows he’s royally fucked up. He opens his mouth to take that back, but Andrew doesn’t let him before ripping his hand away and leaving Kevin’s empty and cold.

“Do whatever you want.” Andrew says, pushing past him to exit the room. “Just don’t blame me when you wind up disappointed.

“Who says I will?” 

“Me.” Andrew says as he yanks the door open. It’s a close thing, but Kevin doesn’t flinch when the door slams behind him. Instead he falls back against the wall and lets himself slide down to the floor like he’s in a coming-of-age drama. Kevin laughs bitterly as he looks at the scars on the back of his hand. 

Maybe he is.

[helenofsparta2]

Huge Spoilers for every future season of House of the Dragon and the entirety of the civil war, and it’s result down below!!!

No one won the Dance of Dragons.

I can’t believe that I have seen so many people, even people who have read the books, say on Tiktok, Twitter, or even here on tumblr, that in the end either Aegon won, because he managed to kill Rhaenyra, or Rhaenyra won, because her son and his descendants sat on the iron throne after the end of war.

No one won the Dance of Dragons. That is the entire point of the Dance of Dragons.

“The only thing that can tear down the house of dragons is itself” is literally one of the first sentences spoken in the show. It is the beginning of the downfall of house Targaryen, the event which made them lose the symbol of their power, and caused thousands of completely unnecessary, avoidable, tragic, and brutal deaths.

It does not matter who won which battle, or who sat when on the Iron Throne, or who killed whom. In the end, the result is the same. Laenor died, Jaehaerys died, Rhaenys died, Helaena died, Lucerys died, Jacaerys died, Joffrey died, Daemon died, Otto died, Daeron died, Aemond died, Criston Cole died, Rhaenyra died, Aegon died, and countless of other lords and especially thousands of smallfolk died.

The king who sat on the iron throne after all of this, after all the battles, and strategies, and politics, and executions, was a 10-year-old, deeply traumatized boy, who would morn the loss of his family for all of his life and was forced to marry his 11 year old, mourning cousin.

“The last remains of the mighty house of dragons were two children who did not know the meaning of the oaths they were swearing.”- Fire & Blood

And even most of the characters who survived suffered under the shadow of the civil war long after it had ended.

Alicent Hightower was confined at the red keep in isolation, often wept, began talking to herself and ended up despising the color green, before dying of sickness. She once terrified her granddaughter Jaehaera by suggesting she slit Aegon III., her husband’s, throat when the girl was only 11 years old.

When Jaehaera was 13 years old, she either threw herself or got thrown off her window in Maegor’s holdfast and was impaled by spikes. She lived for an agonizing half an hour, before finally dying.

Corlys Valaryon died not long after the dance of dragon ended of old age.

Aegon III., Rhaenyra’s son was famously unhappy for the entirety of his life. He exclusively wore black in grief and was known for having almost no joy in his life. His was called a broken reign by a broken king.

He was also called the Dragonbane, because the last Targaryen dragon died during his reign in 153 AC, which marked the extinction of dragons for roughly the next 150 years.

No one won the Dance of Dragons. Especially not any Targaryen.

[aihoshiino]

chapter 155 thoughts

Thanks for your patience! I had some stuff crop up IRL this week that kept getting in the way of my chapter review but we're so oshi no back

Chapters Since The 143 Kiss Happened And Went Entirely Unacknowledged And Unaddressed Count: 12

Aqua Hoshigan Status: White

i can't believe toxic yuri was the real core theme of this manga all along

With the long road to revenge seemingly conquered, Oshi no Ko eases us into a bit of a false high before the real finale comes barrelling in. As with 152, it feels like we're tying off a number of arcs that have lasted through the series, with certain characters getting what is clearly supposed to be their big emotional resolutions… and unfortunately, as with 153-4, while a lot of these beats are satisfying on paper, they suffer a lack of buildup that makes them ring a bit hollow. OnK's clumsy handling of certain characters during the Movie Arc has really come back to bite it during the finale, leaving me feeling like a lot of the emotional payoffs for them are undercut and the character work they're doing doesn't have the groundwork it needs to properly resonate. I defo didn't hate this chapter like some folks seemed to, but it has some pretty substantial issues in terms of micro and macro storytelling I am compelled to talk about. This is one of those chapter reviews I think comes across way more negative than it necessarily is lol but man did this one give me a headache…

To start things off, the thing that initially delayed this review: page fucking one!!! By total coincidence, this was the first chapter in basically forever where I didn't get a chance to look at the JP raws until like two days after it dropped and as such I was ripping my hair out trying to figure out who the narrator was on page one - the use of 'Mama' made me wonder if it was Ruby, but the visual flow of the page is much more biased in favor of Aqua and I probably don't need to tell you how fucking huge it would be for Aqua to have called Ai that for the first time!!! However, based on the speech patterns of the speaker in Japanese and the way subsequent pages flow from this intro, I'm pretty settled on it being Ruby - this chapter is a sort of closing of the book on her involvement in the revenge play or as my friend Mala put it, it's Ruby's homecoming so to speak. And like… honestly, thank god lol.

I get a lot of Ruby fans have wanted her to be more involved in this side of the story for a good while but I think the Black Hoshigan Ruby arc playing out like it did made it pretty clear that Ruby as a character is not super well suited to playing a role in the revenge half of OnK in the way that Akasaka wants it to be written. Not just that, but her actual post-BH characterization in relation to this arc has been such a wet fart that I really think it has taken away a lot more than it has added to her arc.

Not only that but… most of it didn't even happen onscreen lol! Not only did we get that absolutely baffling speech in 147 where she literally looked into the camera and Explained With Her Words the character arc she was supposedly having this whole time (just offscreen and nowhere the reader could see) but we now get Aqua going "well ruby decided to forgive him so it is what it is i guess". It feels so limp as a reason for him to have flipped on a dime like he did, especially when we still haven't fucking seen this supposedly lifechanging performance of Ruby's!!!! SO many characters have the resolutions to their Ai-adjacent arcs connected to how Ruby chose to play Ai in the movie but we're not actually seeing it. We're just sort of talking around it and having it exposited to us. I want to assume this is setup for us eventually seeing it ourselves but like… at this point, IS there any point to us revisiting the movie's content? Everything we might have learned from it has already been addressed by characters Telling Us To Our Faces How It Made Them Feel And Gave Them Therapy so it would ultimately be superfluous.

God. I hate still bitching about the Movie Arc now we're out of it, but it really is the albatross around the neck of this finale. So many of the issues littered through these last ten or so chapters are the result of the Movie Arc's fumbling and misuse of the cast and its failure to establish the emotional throughlines that should have been tied off by these chapters. I keep feeling like I'm repeating myself when I talk about XYZ Narrative Beat not being bad on paper but being less effective than it should do because of lacking underlying foundation but it really is the one central thing plaguing this arc right now.

i get what you guys are going for but. seeing aqua just let kamiki walk away when he has definitely killed people is really funny.

The twins' return to Miyako is another moment that I like in theory but honestly just feels frustrating. It's been over 25 chapters - a week short of an entire year since 125 came out where Miyako lamented her inability to reach the twins like a 'real' mother would and this thread was immediately dropped like a rock. She had zero involvement in the Movie Arc even during parts it was straight up absurd that she was not at least reacting to the events going on, didn't have any reaction to the movie or like… anything going on that could have more organically lead to this development.

I also have to say. The twins returning to Miyako performing this Snapshot of Aesthetic Motherhood (as u/DeliSoupItExplodes on the OnK sub put it) felt kind of. Weird and even a little icky to me in a way I've been struggling to articulate. Just that it felt extremely on the nose and kind of. eeeh.

that said. i won't pretend i'm not 4x critically weak to an 'okaeri' / 'tadaima' exchange at the end of a long quest or journey…

For all my complaints about the surrounding context, this scene in isolation is pretty much the one part of this chapter that just uncritically works. It's hard not to read it as a parallel to Miyako offering to adopt the kids in chapter 10 - except there, Aqua refuses to step into his new family. Here, Miyako pulls him into the embrace and the two of them finally engage not as peers but as a mother and son, as they've needed to do all this time. Her words here are so lovely and so, so sincere that it's really no wonder Aqua breaks down in tears. As much as I've bitched about the lacking work in his arc across the last major chunk of chapters, it's nevertheless been incredibly cathartic to see Aqua finally start letting down his walls, believing in his future and letting people love him. I just wish it had the buildup to really land.

also the twins just… still have not had a real conversation or interaction about literally anything lol.

Ichigo's back…! I already aired my major complaint about this scene vis-a-vis Ruby but I imagine this is the last time we're going to get a real Moment with Ichigo so I might as well get this off my chest now: it was and continues to be utterly bonkers to me that of the characters we saw having Feelings about the 15 Year Lie cast screening, Ichigo was not one of them. And it's even more bonkers that we got this whole bit waxing poetic about fucking Kaburagi and how he feels soooo bad about Ai when like… I'm sorry, but Kaburagi's feelings about Ai are so low on my list of priorities as to be functionally irrelevant. Quite frankly, he does not matter and it's INSANE that the story gave this misty-eyed moment to him and not Ichigo - you know, the agent of the industry that went on to exploit and kill her, her literal, actual dad whose guilt over what happened to her made him ghost his family for nearly twenty years? Can you imagine what an insanely powerful moment of resolution it would've been for that moment of Kaburagi addressing Ai through the 15YL poster to have gone to Ichigo instead?

I also have to note this weird ongoing thread of 'the Dome' being framed as Ai's dream that Ruby is inheriting when it, uh, patently was not! I'm sure she felt some pride in her success but all she herself said on the matter back when it came up was that she didn't get what a big deal it was but that since everyone else was happy, she'd be happy too. I initially took this to be laying the groundwork to disprove this idea and make the characters work out what Ai really wanted in her heart of hearts but now the narrative seems to just be uncritically treating this as a value neutral fact. So… who even knows lol.

Short hair Akane returns…! I don't imagine it was planned, but it's a cute coincidence that she cut her hair in the manga right around the time anime Akane grew hers out for season 2. I've always liked short hair Akane best so this was a nice surprise…

I have to say it was uh, really funny to see so many people get so shocked and mad when Akane talked about 'imitating Hoshino Ai' and screaming that this was a retcon or ruining Akane's character when like… was this really news to you guys??? Even before she grew her hair out, she flipped her bangs to go in the same direction as Ai's as soon as she started acting as her and she was popping hoshigans all over the place when she was getting her career off the ground… like, seriously, was this really a shock to people???

Anyway uh. Vindication for me from this scene!!! I've been pointing out for over a year now that we should be very cautious about taking it at face value that Hikaru killed Gorou and Yura because the story has been very delicately implying that to be the case while avoiding confirming it outright in a way that reeked of a red herring to me. That combined with his failure to even mention these two victims while 'fessing up to Aqua really raised some additional red flags for me and finally, we see Aqua confirming that no, Hikaru was not the one person behind everything, Light Yagami style and the final boss of the series seems set to be B-Komachi's former Queen of Smiles. Fuyuko Niino.

And Iiiiiiiii… feel very uneasy about this twist!

First of all; I have to acknowledge that nope, we have no fuckin clue how either Aqua or Akane figured this out but we'll probably get the exposition in that regard over and done with next chapter. Also something a lot of people caught is that Ryosuke is referred to with a different name here - Sugano vs Kaihara, which was used during the Movie Arc. I've heard this called out as a mistake/retcon and it could be, but tbh I'm inclined to think it's just that Ryosuke's name was changed for the movie, since a point is made about needing everyone's permission to include them in the movie and they, uh… can't exactly ask Ryosuke!

But… back to the real point here.

Nino has been one of my favourite OnK characters since I first read 45510 and every subsequent expansion on her character and her relationship with Ai has only made me more invested in her. But the story setting her up as the final villain here is… it leaves me feeling a little cold and very uncertain about how it'll go.

First off, the framing of Nino on these last two pages is just so overwrought that it's a little ridiculous lol. The image of her squatting in her filthy room, listening to old B-Komachi tracks and staring at a poster of the old group with all the other members but her and Ai aggressively scribbled out… it feels downright parodic to an extent that I think honestly makes Nino that much less nuanced and human by its inclusion alone.

Like… a big part of what I loved about Nino's inclusion in the story and how her relationship with Ai was framed was that it was messy and honest in a way that felt like it wasn't judging Nino herself or making her out to be a villain. Her and Ai's relationship breakdown was a two-sided failure of communication spurred on in large part by Ai's own avoidance and inability to have frank, sincere discussions with the people who cared about her. Nino's tangled up feelings of admiration and desire, envy and resentment, love and hate were not flattering but they felt so real and so human. She was a young girl put into an impossible situation and without the power to change the invisible dynamics of the systems around her, she lashed out at the person in front of her that she could see. The impression I always got was that part of what so deeply fucked up her feelings about Ai was her lack of closure - that she had never gotten to say sorry or patch things up. That she had screamed I wish you'd die at someone she loved and then she fucking died. No wonder she was a mess.

All this though… maybe I'm overreacting when we're just a page and a half into this reveal but again, the framing here really does feel so exaggerated and shallow. It feels like it's falling into the trap OnK previously fell into with the GRSR relationship where it attempts to amp up the drama by massively overexagerrating the emotions at play, blowing them up to their hugest possible extreme and letting all nuance and subtlety get lost in the noise. Ultimately, this will all come down to execution and while it's possible for AkaMengo to get us back on track with the Nino I already liked… idk. Like I said. I'm uneasy.

I also can't let it go unsaid - accidentally or otherwise, the framing of Nino here leans extremely hard into the stereotype of the 'psycho'/predatory lesbian and I don't think I need to explain why that sucks donkey nuts, especially in the midst of a manga that is so insufferably hetero at all other times.

at least she has good taste in b-komachi tracks.