#he's a menace and will destroy the ecosystem otherwise

[casual-praxis]

“Those awful, ravenous rainbows.”

Shadow’s Slime Rancher AU design is finally complete! I may have procrastinated getting it done a little, but ironically he’s the only one whose design I had completely figured out. I can already tell he's going to be a pain to draw more than once lmao.

(Sorry if this one looks wonky, I drew it entirely on my phone instead of sketching on paper like I usually do. It did not make the process any faster sadly.)

I intended for him to have both Tarr inspiration as well as hunter slime, but the bulk of it ended up being Tarr related and the only potential nods are the yellow stripes on his pants and the claws on his gloves. Very impractical, but Shadow doesn't really do the normal ranching stuff anyway.

As always, more details about him below the cut!

+ Shadow was the second person to arrive at the shared ranch, although the gap between his arrival time and Red's was much shorter than the one between him and Vio. As a result, he was still learning the ropes alongside Red for a while. This helped the two bond while also driving Vio slightly (more) insane.

+ While he does find the slimes to be cute, Shadow much prefers the vibe of the Tarr, hence his jacket theming. The others don't really understand his choices, but so long as he doesn't intentionally bring one back to the range, they don't mind it.

+ Everyone had their outfits tailored by Shadow. It's just one of his many miscellaneous unconnected talents. He can also play the piano, speak three different languages, do a perfect split (among other things), and partially keep up with Vio in the lab. Asking about where he learned any of these things gets a wildly different explanation each time.

+ Shadow pays the most attention to the plort market. He goes to the board immediately after breakfast to check what's going on with it for the day, despite the fact he doesn't have any slimes of his own. Depending on what's high value, he'll hunt down whoever has said high-value plorts and let them know it's time to crash the market.

If he doesn't have a stream planned, or has time to spare before one, he'll spend that time helping move plorts where they need to be.

+ Streaming is something Shadow had always been passionate about, but he just wasn't getting any traction back on Earth. It was hard to stand out even with his odd assortment of skills, so that's how he ended up moving to the Far, Far Range. With literally no one else to compete with, he very quickly found success in livestreaming his day-to-day there.

As a nice bonus, he does genuinely enjoy being out on the range. His viewers mostly stick around for him and his wacky roommates at this point, even if a few more streamers have popped up in the area since.

+ One of the first things Shadow ever said to Red was, "Vio is lying. He has more than one," with absolutely zero follow up context. Like, more than one what? Slimes? Plorts?? It took him a bit, but he did figure it out eventually. Green and Blue are still in the dark, but Shadow finds their confusion hilarious, even more so since Vio won't explain either.

+ Pretty much right from the get-go, Shadow was flirting with everyone. The other's always had such funny reactions to it, he wasn't even mad when he caught actual feelings for them. Vio would flirt back harder (which Shadow was not expecting), Red always took a moment to realize he was being flirted with (to which he'd start fumbling through his own attempts before laughing at how silly it sounded), Green would get incredibly embarrassed (Shadow was delighted to find out Green's ears light up too), and Blue similarly got embarrassed (but brushed it off a lot quicker and would usually chase Shadow off).

No surprise, Shadow was the first one to suggest they all date each other. By the time he mentioned it, they were all basically married anyway. All their stuff was merged and it's not like anyone was going to move out. Plus, different pairings kept getting caught doing couply-stuff, might as well make it official.

+ He gets lost most often, to the point where Green constantly has to go out and look for him. It's a running joke on his streams that whenever Shadow tries to show chat something he found in a different direction than he was originally heading, one of the mods needs to start a prediction (point-based betting poll) on whether or not they should call for Green now or later.

Green is attempting to get Vio's help in making a tracker for these specific situations, but negotiations keep falling through.

"You can't make him wear a collar, Vio, that's demeaning."

"It fits his brand. I don't think he'd mind."

"Why's it have to be a collar? Can't it be something less weird?"

"It's symbolic."

"No."

(A collar may or may not actually be added to his design. It can even have a little nameplate on it with instructions on how to deal with the lost little feral cat should anyone find him, because Vio thinks he's funny.)

[lycanlovingvampyre]

MAG 196 Relisten

Activity on my first listen: Slow Tuesday at work.

ANNABELLE: "Perhaps… that’s because you didn’t seem to like what I had to say." MARTIN: "No, it’s because you weren’t really saying anything, were you? It was all just ominous foreshadowing again." Lol, poor Martin, always surrounded by ominous people XD

MARTIN: "Hey, this is your magic bubble. You���re the one making it so that we’re, like, actually walking, walking all the way to Oxford. So sorry I’ve got to sit down occasionally, like a human." Isn't Oxford a bit far from London to simply walk there? You know what, let's find out! Okay, Google maps, starting at the Chelsea College of Art and Design and our destination is 105 Hill Top Road in Oxford... 90 km, 19 hours. That's actually not that bad, they'll reach that in two days. I hope Martin has his camper backpack with him.

ANNABELLE: "And the book breaks?" MARTIN: "It’s not like you’re entertaining company." ANNABELLE: "And it’s nothing to do with the fact that any lost souls in our area also get a break from their torment? Hmmm?" First, I imagine Martin has a camping chair and a little parasol with him and every now and then he unpacks them, gets comfortable and starts reading. Second, OMG aren’t the victims of the domains they come across super confused?? One moment they facing their worst nightmares and suddenly there's sunshine and all their bones ache and they are tired, oh actually, they all probably fell asleep immediately... Otherwise, I'd be asking where are they. Why didn’t they spot the obvious tourists and walk with them in a little parade, all following the camera. (Don't mind me rambling here, I'm just having fun with silly little scenarios.)

MARTIN: "… So what if it does? Is that a problem?" ANNABELLE: "Actually, I find it very reassuring." Cause she wants him to want to save everybody.

ANNABELLE: "No. I did it in his sleep. He’d always been accommodating, so… I wanted to honour his wishes." Was there a superior motive? In the end, if she stole the camera and left him alive and well at Upton House, he'd just be integrated in the fear ecosystem, become either a watcher or watched. And either way, he wouldn't be able to leave his domain to try to stop anything. Hm... can watchers call out to Jon? So if Salesa ended up to be a watcher and could call out to Jon, he could have warned them about Annabelle at best. And only on short notice cause he wouldn't be able to reach Jon when they were in the tunnels, it would have had to be while they were inside the Panopticon. So somehow I think it wouldn’t have mattered if Salesa lived or died, not for our story.

MARTIN: "That’s a shame." ANNABELLE: "Is it?" MARTIN: "I mean… he seemed nice. To us at least." ANNABELLE: "And what of his victims? The people whose lives he destroyed?" Hehe, thinking about Martin wanting Fairchild dead because he threatened him to throw him off a rollercoaster and was a bit of a menace to talk to XD But tbf, Fairchild actively tormented people and wanted to torment them. Salesa was more of an accomplice. Selling all those cursed items (to the rich and arrogant,.. aaaand I’m thinking about MAG 155 again here) instead of sealing them away somehow or even destroying them.

MARTIN: [Sighs] "Is it much further?" Haha, this is the third time now that we hear him asking how much further it is XD

MARTIN: "Hey, is that – ? You told me not to bring a tape recorder." ANNABELLE: "No. I said we wouldn’t need one. We have plenty of tapes." Yeaaaah, already said it in MAG 161, the change of the logo for season 5 gave away the whole "the tapes are web" thing. I mean, it looks really cool and if you listen on a podcatcher it's all the same to you, it's the web tape logo right from the start, so I think it's better and not such a dead giveaway. I listened on YT the first time so I also saw the change in the logo and based my conclusion on the change.

ANNABELLE: "Do take a seat." [MARTIN PUTS DOWN BAG, TAKES A SEAT] Is it finally a comfortable seat?

ANNABELLE: "I’ve written you a statement. I would like for you to read it." Actually I was thinking, why does Martin read it. Why not Annabelle? Is there a canon-reason for that or was it something behind the scenes?

Okay, what about the "Stop no"s, just cross it out and start again, Annabelle, it's not that hard! xD

"immolated by the Chosen of the Ravening Burn." Oh, Ravening Burn, I like that title! Totally forgot about that.

"It was not wide enough to allow true passage, not yet, save for the odd accident." MAG 114.

ANNABELLE: "Oh, it’s so much more than a crack now. It’s an aching hole, a gaping wound in the very fabric of our world." I can't believe this line made it into the podcast... xD

ANNABELLE: [Wistful] "It’s a real shame, you know. I was so looking forward to filling you with spiders." I love that the initial plot of Web!Martin still made it somehow into the podcast. The self-awareness!

Also, Annabelle telling Martin of her plan is the moment Martin realizes this little stunt of him was extremely dangerous. Before that he was always annoyed and snappy, not really grasping the severity of the situation. For him, I mean. Not just for the sake of saving Jon.

ANNABELLE: "Because you always managed to get what you wanted through smiles and shrugs and stammerings that weren’t nearly as awkward as they seemed." [SMALL SOUND OF MARTIN’S CONCESSION TO THE POINT] MARTIN: "Point taken." I’m, sure y'all know what traditional narcissism is, but have you ever heard of nontraditional narcissism? Narcissism is probably more fueled by insecurity than an inflated ego and self-centeredness. While a traditional narcissist will push others down to get validation and keep their insecurity in check, nontraditional narcissists will put others on a pedestal. They’ll put themselves down in front of others, quietly manipulating them into giving them validation ("Oh wow, the XY you made looks so amazing, I will never be as good as you" - "Nooo, your stuff is amazing too!"). Not out-rightly saying Martin is a nontraditinal narcissist, but there definitely are tendencies in these kind of manipulation... I have them as well, after this line of Annabelle I did recognize this in myself and then with the knowledge of nontraditional narcissism I try to stop it when I catch myself doing it.

MARTIN: "Okay, let’s try a different question. What was your plan?" ANNABELLE: "I was going to snatch you away. Lure you both into this web, and then take you. Drive him to despair, so that when you returned to him, bulging, and talking in a thousand tiny voices, it would drive him to a final push." Since JonMartin wasn't planned to be canon at first and Web!Martin in return actually was, this would still have been a cool revelation and a wonderful surprised Pikachu betrayal, but not quite such a knife to the heart (heh, foreshadowing...) if they were together. God, JonMartin being a thing and Web!Martin happening would have been so unbelievably cruel... proper broken heart syndrome material... I like the way it eventually came together. Web!Martin still is valid and great, but from what I know about it I think I do prefer what ended up to be canon.

MARTIN: "And now?" ANNABELLE: [Sighs] "Your bond is too complicated. I couldn’t drive that kind of rift between you now. I’ve considered every angle, examined every cause and effect, and have finally come to the conclusion that I… [sighs] I need to tell you the truth, to explain things." Ha, JonMartin is stronger than the Web! (Well, stronger than that one plan at least.) Also, lol, sounds like Annabelle wrote a meta about their ship...

[WIND CONTINUES AS THUNDEROUS RUMBLES AND BUZZING INSECTS INTRUDE AUDITORILY] Sounds of a thousand gigantic spiders!!! I never understood, why this buzz sound is used for spiders, isn't that from a cricket or cicada or something? (The one here in TMA is not that stereotypical we hear in movies, but still.) (Also, of course spiders are not insects, they're arachnids.)

ARCHIVIST ON TAPE "So just listen –" [CLICK] [CLICK] "Listen, Martin, you should know –" [CLICK] [CLICK] "Now, listen to me, Martin, li-listen –" [CLICK] MAG 160, MAG 129 and MAG 159. Elias, the mass-ritual, which was crucial to the Web’s plan and Jon’s only purpose in all of this. And then talking to Martin twice. MAG 129 being the anchor episode. And MAG 159 of course when Jon went after Martin to get him out of the Lonely.

MARTIN: "What? All this time, through all of this, it, it was just you spying on us?" ANNABELLE: "Oh Martin. You have no idea who’s listening, do you?" Forth wall break?

@a-mag-a-day