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lovecanbesostrange · 3 months ago

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I would like to write out all my feelings about the Krakoa era through my obsessed Rogue brain. Overall after some initial hiccups and also seeing lots of untapped potential, I have very positive feelings towards the Krakoa years as a whole and I did think it would last a bit longer until we returned to a more status quo. There’s lots that could be discussed, but I wanna talk about my fav once again.

First up, I’ve been reading (specifically X-)comics for a long, long time. I know the ebb and flow. I am somewhat lucky with my fav, because ever since she joined the X-Men Rogue has been featured somewhere in the Marvelverse. A few months without a sighting here and there, but she had stuff to do. Look, a character I also love is Sage (who had a fantastic run with Krakoa’s X-Force, hooray), who can go years without showing up. I’m not obsessed with an obscure background figure, I have stuff to read (plus of course I don’t read X-Men for just one character, that would be insane). And hey, I was fed with X-Men ‘97 (sorry to especially Storm fans, she was shoved aside in that; but she has an amazing run in the comics and keeps on going currently; thus is the nature of superheroes in a big ensemble). I’m not sitting here moping about how my fav was completely sidelined during Krakoa and boohoo my fav should always be front and center. Rogue’s contribution during big events is mostly minimal and I could write about how unremarkable her whole backstory is in comparison. Honestly, she’s so streetlevel in some ways… But also, hmm, well, for being one of the best known X-Men her Krakoa time was very uneventful and I am bothered by it. Especially when now I get to read that Rogue is very depressed about the fall of the island…

Oh, another thing very important to me and I’m already nitpicking when I keep reading the editorial in the new From the Ashes comics - Krakoa itself, the Mutant Utopia, is not The Dream. Krakoa was a compromise and a step towards getting leverage and saving mutants. The Dream is co-existence in the world, not an ethnostate. The Immortal X-Men books (probably my fav series during the era) had one very good issue about this. That also included how fortunate the world is, that for all his terrible faults, Charles Xavier is an idealist. He could have altered every brain on the planet to just not hate mutants and he does not do that, because it would be morally wrong. His dream is for mutants to live as part of humanity, with a free will. That is very important.

And I love to think back to when Rogue and Gambit were depowered after almost dying back in X-Treme X-Men all those years ago. They chose to live in a human/mutant community. A city that lived the dream. Where mutants were allowed to be themselves. That was nice. Places like that do exist. Jumping ahead, I find it fascinating - and maybe telling - that in the Rogue & Gambit (2023) mini it was revealed they kept the NY apartment. Sure, at first they lived in the Lighthouse with all of Excalibur (makes sense). When Rogue joined the official X-Men after being voted on the team, she had a place in the Treehouse. And then Excalibur was over, Gambit was nowhere. Rogue wasn’t on the team. Neither had an official spot anywhere and… what? How much time did they spend on Krakoa? They were seen in the background in the Green Lagoon, sure. Did they just live in New York though? (Is Krakoa not safe for cats??) The living situation overall wasn’t described very well, which is one of those tiny details that add up. (I would have made sure to feature the Summers residence on the moon more, explore Kurt’s unique home etc; this is where the fun stuff was. Right in the beginning Gambit mentions putting a house up on Krakoa, but that one sentence leads nowhere.)

I’m at a point where I like to imagine that Rogue and Gambit mostly took Krakoa as their big break. They actually enjoyed the island. Not involved with the Quiet Council, not involved with the Black Ops shenanigans, not knowing much about Orchis, not helping Kurt with the Spark, not shown teaching the youth about Mutant Circuits (lol, Rogue… not involved at all with the whole Mutant Circuit thing… the woman who has used multiple powers as a one woman army… yeah…).

Somebody had to get the orgy vibe going I guess. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Also a benefit is that future writers do have the luxury to look back at Krakoa and Rogue (and Gambit) will be free to use. Some minor stuff that happened.

My biggest point of utter frustration will always be how Rogue was cut from Irene’s resurrection. It was stated in an official interview that the idea was there to put her in, but oh, not enough space. AND THAT’S BULLSHIT! Okay, so my fav male X-Men is Kurt and Nightcrawler had a very solid run. I mean, you can love or hate what Si Spurrier wrote, it’s a matter of taste, but it was such a luxury that one writer followed Kurt throughout and shaped him for this era. It was a creepy start imho (with the infamous “make more mutants” panel), but I enjoyed his journey. Which ultimately gave us X-Men Blue: Origins. The definitive retcon to make Mystique and Destiny his parents. Wonderful. And all of that was at the expense of Rogue.

Yeah, sorry, I said it.

Plus, honestly, that the reveal was shoved into the Fall of X time, was also sad. Because the family never got to experience joy. But hey, Mystique and Destiny had memories and feelings repressed and it was never about not loving Kurt. Nice?? I guess?? BUT THEY ALSO HAVE A DAUGHTER! PLEASE!! This was finally the time to have the Nightcrawler and Rogue sibling vibes we deserve. How is X-Men: Evolution to this day the best we ever got? (‘97 catching up though) Well, okay, apart from alternate timeline X-Men Forever maybe… Mystique had a plan to revive Destiny, it involves deceit and doing stuff sneakily. If only she knew somebody who could use other mutants’ powers…………….. And don’t tell me Rogue wouldn’t have been on board.

It’s kinda funny, if you track the relationship between Rogue and Mystique, it only turned real sour when Mystique killed Moira (ahahahahahahahaha, or did she, as we now know) and yes, okay, then wanted to kill all humans. Come on, who here hasn't thought about that? I love making jokes about Mystique stabbing everybody in the back, including her own family, but really that was when it first happened and truly mattered. And it has always bummed me out. And then there was Messiah Complex. Did Mystique do evil shit? Sure. And she had Gambit helping her. She also did kill Sinister in the funniest way possible. And later Cyclops sent Wolverine to finish her off for everything she did. But hold the record, the reason for all the schemes? To fucking save Rogue’s life. Gotta acknowledge that. Once again Destiny had a vision and orchestrated heinous stuff from beyond the grave. Mystique does care… sometimes… her way… depending on the writer… she can be the most fascinating anti-villain actually.

Mystique and Rogue deserve to be a messy mutant family - sometimes mutant families try to kill each other, it’s a thing. And compared to others those two did have good times together. Why couldn’t Krakoa give us a bit more? This was the time to do so! For another tangent, here is a Krakoa hot take: Mystique herself was wasted! She is the perfect spy. Her goal has been to help mutants (in a bit of a mutant supremacist way). She does choose violence, but when all her rage is channeled for a good cause, she can be such a brilliant asset. Krakoa was funded with the most holy rule of Kill No Man, but then Charles and Magneto looked at Mystique “except when we tell you to kill someone, that will be our thing”. It set up the power imbalance nicely. But after Inferno (how much do I hate the re-use of event names, ugh)? Destiny became the driving force and somehow Mystique was like the… love interest. And that’s mostly it. I adore the relationship Mystique and Destiny have. The absolute showcase of “I would burn the whole galaxy for you”, the way every shitty path Destiny follows has the goal of “keep Raven alive”. Truly at ALL cost. It’s so destructive and raw and I’m already crying, because I’m sure I will never ever get much of that again. But the truth is, Mystique played second fiddle and even though she was on the Quiet Council start to finish, she wasn’t allowed to rock the boat. Well, except for bringing Irene back and thus forcing Moira out and setting everything in motion……. consequences, oops.

Mystique deserved to have scenes with Nightcrawler before her mind shattered and the truth was revealed. (Or really to have that happen earlier.) And she also deserved to have a second (third? fourth?) chance to repair things with Rogue.

Thinking back, the Rogue/Gambit wedding was a little bit of a joke. It was a literal bait and switch. The teasing of getting a big mutant wedding, everything is about Kitty and Colossus, and then she blows it off (thank you!!!!) and Gambit is like “hmm, perfect time to propose”. And while the art in X-Men Gold #30 is fantastic, if you want to actually read about the wedding you need to read Mr & Mrs X, which was like a second fiddle book and I… well… the art… Kelly Thompson was a genius (still is) for the way she shoehorned Mystique in. Of course that woman loves mutant gossip and attending the supposed wedding in disguise, to then be there for her daughter. And with one page all the grief between the two was mentioned to handwave it all away. Because one writer actually cared and used the most minimal time wisely. But Krakoa, the mutant island paradise that lasted for years, couldn’t give us one longer moment of Rogue and Mystique together, finding a way to have like regular family dinners…….. Not asking for a long drawn out arc (oh, I wish for a mini just for them, but that’s another thing). Tiny acknowledgments would have gone a very long way.

And when Irene was resurrected? Did I get to see Rogue’s actual reaction? HER MOTHER RETURNED TO LIFE! And she fucking did love that woman, okay? We have proof of that. Destiny died before Mystique did the literal backstabbing plain on page (well, Destiny dying is arguably THE reason why Mystique went over the edge). No, no, no, Rogue and Gambit walk into a bar and Destiny is there. It’s a hilarious moment (I support Irene’s man-hating raging lesbian vibes, not even sorry about that), but I don’t even get a long hug and a few tears. You know, the kind of reaction people would have for loved ones returning from the dead. (I have a receipt from Necrosha how that meeting should have gone!)

The most insulting thing of course is how Destiny says that she wants Rogue by her and Raven’s side for future shit. And nothing comes of that for quite a while. No, Destiny leaves Rogue with cryptic messages. pfffffff…

tbf though, the Gambit hate Destiny gets to utter feels like a stab directly from write Duggan. He wrote Rogue for a while, he clearly loves her flying brick qualities above all else and he so wanted to push for an actual Deadpool/Rogue romance. I enjoy their flirtation and want their friendship, but for Duggan Gambit seems like a bad obstacle he can’t overcome. The funny thing is, in some ways I understand him perfectly. My biggest problem is that while I do like Remy, he couldn’t crack into my top 10 X-characters. I just don’t care that much about him on his own. And sometimes I am absolutely frustrated with how tied Rogue is to Gambit and vice versa. Sometimes it’s like they are even more unbreakable than Scott and Jean (look, it’s hard when your all time absolute fav is in an iconic relationship to a character that you don’t feel hype about). In an unfair way it’s like Duggan gets to channel the dislike. Which weirdly does not make me feel better.

When Gambit died in Otherworld it was a bit nerve wracking since normal resurrection was off the table. Oh boy, did I enjoy to see the subconscious love display he had built of Rogue in his mind! Fuckyeah! And then he comes back and we get a nice lovers moment and they both mostly vanish into the far, far, far background.

Until their own little miniseries, which… sure is a thing that exists. I don’t hate it as a whole. The concept is actually pretty cool. For one it does start with something I do want - Destiny gives Rogue something to do. And it is clearly morally shady. There is a catch attached. But Rogue’s trust in Destiny is too big to say no. I LOVE THAT. For two reasons - one, this is a “she’s still my Mom and I do actually trust her” moment. And two, Rogue has weirdly become (one of) the absolute least questionable X-Men. Hard choices? Moral conundrums? Doing something slightly bad for the greater good? Having an argument about something? Actually, well, going rogue?? Ahahahahaha, nope, not Miss Avenger. (This is why next to Wolverine, she’s the only X-Men Steve Rogers can call a friend without getting punched in the face.) She is one of the most heroic heroes. Maybe it stems from starting with a long redemption arc and setting her back in the slightest could be mean.

Rogue has become the number one Xavier crusader - for his dream, but also holding up a candle for him. In some ways I like that. We went back to that moment in UXM #171 when Rogue comes to the mansion. Charles says she’s allowed to stay and Storm along with the other X-Men threatens to walk away. And Charles is just “so be it”. That moment has been hyped up through flashbacks. So at least it’s an understandable progression.

Plus Uncanny Avengers and the ongoing saga of getting Charles’ brain back from the Red Skull. Sure a sentence to type out. Rogue is a person who can have a romantic/sexual relationship with Magneto and not agree with his methods, moving away from him. (And then be so estranged that his death does not affect her at all. But we should be thankful that Lorna was at least allowed to grief.)

I’m still haunted by the panel where Irene says that Rogue would come around to see things her way and she was sad about that, because it would change Rogue. I don’t think that ever happened. I mean, sure, back to the mini, Rogue does follow Irene’s lead and in the end she does put Eden in stasis - for the greater good. Which turns out to actually be a very important play. Orchis was ready to disable all the teleporters, but with him hidden he was there to then use the SWORD station. Very cool actually. But nothing Rogue did or said was about seeing Krakoa in a different light or something. Rogue is not a character to ever be involved in the more political side of things.

And the other thing that mini-series does? Throw in a wrench in the Rogue/Gambit relationship for no reason. ??????????????? On paper I think that emotional premise is also pretty cool. They’ve been on different teams for a while. And he fucking died. Which in some way shouldn’t be a big deal, since defeating mutant death is THE Krakoa thing. But his was different. And he doesn’t talk about the trauma of that. Being apart and going through things alone can be a good way to explore the relationship. But they are needlessly miscommunicating and never fix anything on panel. (And I won’t even touch that absolute ass-thing where Gambit endangers innocent people on purpose. Character assassination of the highest order.) Instead of all the action that mini should have had more talking scenes and giving us the Rogue/Gambit vibes we enjoy. Banter, flirting in the face of death, a little monologue about loving each other so much it hurts… Rogue came out of that story way better than Remy, I know that, I’m lucky here once again. Also big thanks that we have two different moments that showcase how Rogue and Rocket Racoon are friends (I love to see when two seemingly unrelated characters in the Marvelverse clearly keep a text chat going and might meet for drinks once in a while; Rocket being a gambling buddy of Remy makes sense).

A weird thing to look at is Rogue’s powerset. Yes, in Excalibur she got the control back and the collar could go, but the draining people over a short distance was completely ignored. The official X-Men team had Synch. And it was nice that an almost forgotten character got the spotlight. And his powers got an evolution, he was important, it is not the best to have two people around who copy others, so it’s good that Rogue is the tank of the group. Still, a look into her own stuff would have been nice. Can we acknowledge what a wild ride it has been? Over the past 25+ years Rogue’s powers have shifted a lot, starting with the time a Skrull awoke all previous power sets lying dormant within her. Of course unpredictable for the fun of it. Then a little burst of intentionally using it to then be completely de-powered. Then she strolls back in and with no control over her absorption nobody knows what she could do and she is given Sunfire’s power more permanently (look, the flying tank can now melt things). She gets infected and her touch becomes instantly lethal. Then a complete cleanse of everything and after a little walkabout she gains control for the first time, able to touch people. This is where she shines a bit as a teacher, guiding younger mutants. She can absorb just powers, without personalities, but she also learns to navigate other people’s memories better (even David Legion Haller himself). She stays that way for quite some time, until she needs to absorb every single available decent Avenger and X-Men in reach to save the world. And oops, Wonder Man stays behind, inside her head, trapped. His consciousness gets suppressed, his powers stay - the flying and the punching and the being mostly invulnerable. When he gets out he doesn’t remember, but the powers stay. And after a while Rogue goes through round two of learning actual control, except with the mentioned added effect of absorbing over a bit of a distance.

It’s very telling that the absolute most heartfelt, true to character, emotional devastating and uplifting moments for Rogue during the Krakoa era happen in – Captain Marvel Vol 10. (Yes, you got me, I’m okay with all these writers having a go at Rogue over the years, focusing on different aspects, pushing her this way and that, but if I got to choose, I will always pick Kelly Thompson to write her over anyone else. Yes, including Claremont NOW. I’ll get to that.) Where Thompson gives us a Brood-Rogue who sucks a whole ass X-Men team dry lol. Collecting my fav Rogue moments from the Krakoa era, the talk with Gambit about not wanting kids (at the moment or foreseeable future) stands out, but also that scene with Hazmat about the trauma of finding out you have powers in the most unfortunate way and being afraid to become a villain. And the second happened in the Captain Marvel title (that 8 parter is such a great story - Gambit being the only dude with a handful of kickass women in space is a concept I can get behind).

I’m not ungrateful. Rogue had stuff to do. I read it. Far more characters got sidelined worse. But well, here we are now in the From the Ashes world and Rogue misses Krakoa. But I never got to witness what that island nation meant to her while it was around, because her stories didn’t touch much on Krakoa as a concept.

And then there was the Mutant Massacre, the last Hellfire Gala. CHILLS! Reading that was a thrillride and I like it. Shoutout even to Charles talking to Kamala and since the topic of Inhumans is brought up, suddenly Rogue having M-Pox is remembered. Ahahahahahaha. That was somewhat hilarious. (Since the big IvX event didn’t involve Rogue at all.) Rogue leaves for a distress call and gets to save Steve’s life, that was nice and I didn’t expect anything further. But oh wow, when Rogue returns and rescues Xavier, that was a most unexpected safe.The horror on her face and in his mind is everything. That splash page will haunt me forever, when she leaves him at the beach. Helmet discarded. And two simple words “Avenge Krakoa”. Honestly that felt like all those Uncanny Avengers years came full circle and it meant something. But then… Rogue does… like the least… avenging. Kate grabs her Shadowkat outfit and kills so many people, it’s fantastic (but also heartbreaking, because she is broken). The X-Men book shows everybody fighting with pure unfiltered rage. Meanwhile Rogue runs around with Cap and Deadpool and the one big thing she does is to save people from a nuclear explosion. And honestly, Cap’s big press speech about mutants helping him, makes no sense, because Rogue, Psylocke and Penance running around like that in broad daylight should have cost human lives, since Orchis made those threats about mutants still living on earth… They fight evil Hydra Steve. Right. He posed as a fake Captain Krakoa, but nothing he did really was about Krakoa.

Again, Rogue has stuff to do and got scenes I enjoyed a lot. I liked the Excalibur team and when Rogue took Betsy’s “death” to heart it was a good reminder how close they are as friends (Rogue is far closer to Betsy than to Jean, going strictly from actual on page interaction Rogue and Jean are almost strangers).

Oh, right, I wanted to mention Claremont. X-Men #35 aka legacy numbering #700 happened and it was a nice enough swan song (actually happy for Moira). And while everything flows from scene to scene there is a screeching halt for a whole Darkhölme family scene. HEAVEN! At the same time it’s like I’m thrown back into the past. I’m glad Claremont is still doing things, allowed stuff like the 5 issue X-Treme X-Men mini. But wow did Rogue feel super young and naive. That took me out a bit. I would not pick him to write a big retcon for things to get some of his own early visions back in. Of course I am so happy he got to give us some Mystique/Destiny love.

Speaking of, that Pride Wedding Special? Hilarious romp. It does not fit anywhere on the timeline and thus can’t be taken at face value, not even serious one bit. And that’s exactly why I enjoyed that.

Destiny, Mystique, Nightcrawler and Rogue - give me family feels.

Well, with Blue: Origins Rogue’s own backstory has once again been altered. Now found on a playground after running away from home as a tiny little kid. Huh. That’s something Krakoa did. Well. Will this ever be touched upon??

I have very mixed feelings about the Arakko stuff during this and I guess I’m glad I don’t need to care too much, because Rogue had zero involvement in any of that. (Love Storm and Magneto with their character moments, but the plot, that’s another essay.) Also Rogue would not work in anything that deals with the Quiet Council. Being among THE X-Men was perfect, yet sadly during her year on the team she didn’t do very much. She’s not angry and/or shady enough to be on X-Force (would have been a perfect fit before Messiah Complex). I think it would have been cool to see Captain Pryde and her Marauders keep going like in the first volume. The whole Shi’Ar-secret-timetravel-mutant-Cassandra-story - while not being bad per se - robbed Krakoa of a cool feature. Hands on smuggling, helping mutants, going places mutants aren’t welcome. Rogue could have been a part of that. Or let her teach the younger generation, because her power set helps with that!! Her counselor/mentor role after Second Coming was good actually. (I don’t read all of X-Men Unlimited, but her and Karma in the Green Lagoon, when Karma was heartbroken? Perfect moment. And reading that again now I am horrified that I forgot that in this, Rogue officially mentions she has actually been through Resurrection. I don’t know if I should take that as canon now though. I’m still unsure if a lot the deaths in Judgment Day weren’t reversed by the Celestial instead of resurrecting every mutant. Well, we’ll never know.)

It’s just… one of the more prominent X-Men characters had no purpose during the biggest X-Men run in recent years. Wow. (And Gambit had it worse imho. Again, I do like him, he is just far lower on my list.) Not having Kelly Thompson in that office, someone who has actually read X-Men, loves X-Men and is always finding emotional angles (her 50 issue Captain Marvel run is peak Carol Danvers) while being funny and fair to the whole cast… that was needed. Yeah, her fav is my fav, sorry, I’m biased.

And now with the first issue of Uncanny X-Men out, I am happy with the way Gail Simone lets Rogue and Gambit flirt and also the big friendship vibes with Logan (look, in a divorce Rogue gets Logan and Gambit gets Laura; even though two of my fav tiny moments from Krakoa era Rogue involve Laura actually lol). I am a bit nervous about the sibling thing with Kurt. But it can’t really be a bigger let down than not having Rogue connect with her Moms in the past few years!! And above all I wonder if we’ll get an inside into Rogue’s feelings about Krakoa - we didn’t have much on page (mostly just the initial phase during her stay with Excalbur).

Anybody read all this? Why?? I needed to vent. I’m lucky I like, love and adore so many characters, so I did have fun with most of the stuff anyways and also Rogue had it worse. And we still don’t know what her legal family name was before she married Gambit. HA!

#X-Men #Krakoa #Rogue #Anna Marie LeBeau #ramblings #I'm so sure I forgot something I wanted to mention but this is already a way too long mess

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fivedayshakespeare · 9 months ago

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2/20/24-2/24/2024: All's Well That Ends Well

The typography of that title is just terrible. Why isn't there a space between "that" and "Ends"? How come the first "Well" isn't on the first line? Wouldn't that look better? The First Folio really does feel more slipshod the more I look at it.

I think this play is about "What happens after the end of a comedy." I'm clearly biased by the Oxford chronology, because Measure for Measure was right before this, but that play ends with a bunch of marriages being decreed. That's the sort of thing that happens at the end of Shakespearean comedies. Gilbert and Sullivan operettas also tend to just pair people up in the last scene without regard to whether any of them have regarded each other with any affection.

So in All's Well That Ends Well, the first act is a compressed comedy: Helen (or Helena; I kind of hate how a bunch of characters have different names in different editions) want to marry Bertram, so she does a favor for the King and gets the prize. Hooray!

And then he runs away to war, so she has to do a bunch more shenanigans designed to trap him into marriage for a second time, which may or may not involve getting him to actually love her. At the end of the play, he seems at least resigned to her.

Minor Character Watch

New feature! There are often minor characters, usually comic relief, who I enjoy a lot. Thersites from Troilus and Cressida, for example, just reads everybody for filth and I love him. So I'm going to split out the observations on them from the plot stuff.

Here, I liked the relationship between Lefeu (old snarky guy) and Paroles (young liar and braggart). Lefeu really tears into Paroles, but once Paroles has been brought low, Lefeu takes pity on him. It's fun! There's also a couple of scenes with a (fake) Interpreter that I like a lot. The other characters even comment on how good the Interpreter is.

Next up: King Lear

#shakespeare #all's well that ends well

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ducklooney · 3 years ago

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Gyro Gearloose The Snooze Button

Story code: D 2020-225

Origin: Denmark

Title: The Snooze Buttom

Pages: 11

Writing and art (pencil and ink): Kari Korhonen

Year of publication: 2021

Now I'm going to post something from the comics, only it won't be scanned (it's more photographed), and since the comic I have is in Serbian, I'll translate this into English, and someone who can scan this would really be nicely. And now a comic related to Gyro Gearloose and that this comic is original in Denmark, but that comic has also been translated into Finnish, French, German, Norwegian and Swedish. The rest will be the conversation of their speeches, and you have the rest in these photos of that comic. And let me immediately say that I apologize for some of the translation errors I made while translating into English (my English is not the best), so if there is anything to correct, feel free to tell me.

And yes, I know you might like this comic, since I know you love Gyro. @equustenebris

Now let's get started.

Huey Dewey and Louie: “Gyro!!!”

“Something terrible is happening!” “We need your help!” “Everyone outside fell asleep!” “Duckburg has turned into a real Sleeping City!” “We can't wake Uncle Donald, he's sleeping like a cannon with a lawn mower!”

“It seems that everyone who fell asleep an hour ago found themselves asleep. We stayed awake because we were at Junior Woodchucks.”

Residents of Duckburg (including Donald): “ZZZZZZZzzzzz ...”

Gyro Gearloose: “We are lucky! I just finished this gadget that could be of use to us!”

Gyro to HDL: “Take me to Donald. I'll see what I can do!”

HDL (Huey, Dewey and Louie Duck): “Duckburg wasn't so eerily quiet...

Gyro: “Donald was with me this morning! I just fixed this lawn mower for him!” Donald: ZZZZzzz...”

Gyro: “My dreamer can tell us what he is dreaming about.”

“Our dreams often refer to what happened to us during the day!

If we peek into Donald's sleeping mind, we discover the cause of this pajama party.”

Gyro: “It seems that Donald is a very happy inhabitant of the land of dreams. I would say he is exceptional and rich.”

Gyro to Donald: “Your carriages are ready, Governor!” Donald to Gyro: “Your inventions are wonderful, Gyro! You have no equal!” Gyro to Donald: “Your vassals love you, sir!” Vassals or citiziens to Donald: “Three times for Donald! Hooray!”

Donald to Gyro and Little Helper: “Vassals you say?! Does that mean I'm... king?” Donald to Daisy in his dream: “And every king must have a queen.”

Donald to Gladstone as donkey: “The place jester is still open, if anyone is interested!” Donald to Gyro: “Where have you gone, my faithful inventor?” Evil Gyro robot: “Why do you always bother me with some nonsense?” Donald:”AAAaaa...”

“Noooo...” Gyro: “Poor me, I think we have seen enough!”

Donald: “No, Gyro, no !!”

Gyro: “Poor Donald! I wonder why he dreams of me as a terrible villain?” Donald: ZZZ .... Gyro to HDL: “We are no closer to the cause of this collective winter dream...”

Soon in the park.

Gyro to HDL: “It’s usually so lively at Daisy’s charity events!” “I heard the audience fall asleep, but I haven't seen anything like this!” HDL: “What open guests! Even the mayor is there!”

Pig mayor: “Hrkkk...”

Gyro: “Let's turn on our gadget and see what happens here!” HDL: “Mayor! Maybe Daisy is dreaming today!” Pig mayor to Daisy: “For your services to the animal kingdom, I give you this little thing!” Daisy to pig mayor: “A little thing? This can be a whole dinner!”

Animals in Daisy's dream: "Three cheers for Daisy, our great champion!" Daisy: "Oh you're so kind." Animals: "Long live Daisy!" Rabbits: "Come with us, Aunt Daisy! Someone else wants to thank you!" Daisy in a rabbit costume with three little rabbits that look like HDL: "Tra-la-la-la-la! Who is that animal?" Daisy to the big deer: "Oh!" "Well that's the king of the woods! I thought it was just a legend!" Daisy to the deer: "Wonderful! I am indescribably honored to have met you, Your Majesty!"

Deer with Gyro's head: "I don't have time! Get out of here!" And hit Daisy. Gyro: "Me again?! Why?" Daisy: "Gyro! No!" "Zzzzz..." Gyro: "And Daisy went back to my workshop to fix her speaker." Soon near... Gyro said to the sleeping Scrooge: "Scrooge doesn't seem pleased at all!" HDL: "Looks like he was chasing the Beagle Boys!" Scrooge's dream... Beagle Boy as judge: "Silence! Peace in the courtroom!" Beagle Boy as judge to Scrooge McDuck: "You are accused of premeditated and bad intent ... stealing time from the Gyro Gearloose present here!" Gyro Gearloose in a dream to the judge as a witness: "Everything is as you said, Your Honor!"

Beagle Boys as a disguised jury according to defendant Scrooge: "Go to jail with him! Lock him up and throw away the key!" Scrooge: "No! I..." "I didn't mean to..." "My money! All the way to one!" - Scrooge runs away from losing his money. Gyro in a dream: "That's my money now! Yupiii! Hooray!!!" Gyro to the sleepy Scrooge: "And this time me! What are they trying to tell me?" Gyro to HDL: "Even Scrooge was with me this morning! He wanted me to make him a wave machine so he could surf his entire vault!" "There's a sleep button on this button!"

Gyro as he presses the sleep button: "Will I press him to see what my subconscious has to say about all this?" "It should start working..." "Zzzz..." The narrator in Gyro's dream: "Gyro's scientific mind shows what exactly happened earlier that day!" Gyro: "Just a little more and the invention that will change the world will be over!" The narrator in Gyro's dream continues, "Gyro is usually happy to help his friends!" "Still, this morning he needed to create in peace! But they kept interrupting him... over and over again!" "As usual, Gyro helped everyone!" "But he was not happy about it and his friends noticed."

Gyro woke up and said, "Now I know exactly what happened ..." Gyro to HDL: "After Scrooge left, I was so confused that I hooked the wires upside down." "The device made a short circuit and the sleep system exploded!" "Then the sedative rays escaped through the open window and put to sleep everyone who happened to be on the streets!" And finally Gyro said, "The dreams were absolutely right! I really am some kind of villain in this story!" And so ... when everyone woke up ... Donald and Daisy smiled, while an angry Scrooge said this to Gyro, "You really have to be careful with these gadgets, Gyro!" Gyro finally said that to Donald and HDL as he lay on his couch: "The workshop is closed! After a morning like that, it's time for a nap!"

Epilogue...

A few days later, in the village (Grandma Duck’s farm)...

Grandma Duck (Elvira Coot) to Gyro: "Thank you for coming, Gyro!" "Your dreamer is exactly what I needed!" Grandma Duck to Gyro: "I've always wondered what Gus dreams about! How much time he spends in his sleep, he must be spending unseen in the land of dreams!" Gyro to Grandma: "It's a real challenge! I'm going to have to turn up the machine if I think I'm going to get into the mind of such a sleepy sleeper!" "This should work!" "Now we'll finally find out what Gus is dreaming about!" Eventually when Grandma found out the truth and said angrily to the sleepy Gus, "Ugh!! Why doesn't that surprise me? He even dreams of sleeping!"

The end.

I hope you enjoyed this comic.

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only-martha-knows · 3 years ago

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The Path of Daggers Chapters 3-4 Notes

Warning - SPOILERS both for PoD and for future books will be in these notes! I have some knowledge of major events happening later in the series and I may reference them to have an honest reaction. But I do ask that nobody tells me anything extra in the notes.

The One Where Elayne Wants to Scream

and

The One Where Vandene Maybe Just Maybe Gets a Little Respect for Elayne (and Starts "Questioning")

Chapter Three: A Pleasant Ride

Ha. “The heat did not touch her, of course.” It’s funny to me that this huge conflict is happening over the unending heat and Elayne is just like luckily, I don’t feel heat.

So Aviendha has SO much affection for Elayne, she is willing to start a war because someone didn’t deliver her message that would have helped to protect Elayne from danger. That’s honestly sweet. I love the dynamic where one is like we need to do violence! Justice! and the other is like whoa whoa whoa that’s not necessary.

Hmm okay so Adeleas is taking this opportunity to try to get Elayne to allow them to “put the fear of the Aes Sedai” into the Sea Folk because... they’re sharing their knowledge with them. That’s annoying. More Aes Sedai plotting.

Oh so the Sea Folk did actually get a lot of power over the Aes Sedai in this bargain. Maybe too much power - not allowing the Aes Sedai to leave until they’re replaced seems a bit much. So Elayne decides she needs to do something to temper it, which does make sense. But what will she do? Hopefully nothing terrible.

Okay good she just sent Aviendha to give them a talking-to. Clever. But also - “...if the Atha’an Miere went on believing they could stare down any Aes Sedai, there would be trouble.” Elayne! Aes Sedai are not inherently better than the Atha’an Miere! See, this is the frustrating thing to me about her thought process.

So both the Knitting Circle and the Aes Sedai want the Aes Sedai to keep and guard Ispan. Interesting. Though it makes sense, I mean, the Kin don’t want anything to do with insulting Aes Sedai and the Aes Sedai think the Kin are too lowly to keep an Aes Sedai prisoner. But Elayne wants to keep it this way. Because she wants the Kin to learn to be on the same level as the Aes Sedai, I think.

Ah... I see now. The chapter title is clearly irony. Elayne is NOT having a pleasant ride.

“The problem was that Nynaeve had glued herself tight to Lan’s side before they left the first clearing.” Oh Elayne. You should have expected this, it’s their honeymoon period.

Oh so they are going to Caemlyn after fixing the weather! Hooray! And also phew, Rand needs to be able to let go of Andor and Cairhein and do some other things.

So this was a bit of a comic relief chapter. Poor Elayne, I did have a few laughs at her expense.

Chapter Four: A Quiet Place

“She might have regretted bringing the world into this quiet place, except that she also brought new hope.” That’s a pretty line, and also a bit of interesting commentary on linking of hope and strife.

Oh great. Come on Careane! You can’t follow instructions and you ruin everything! (I get very frustrated with people who can’t follow simple instructions, which might be a root of why the Aes Sedai are so annoying to me, haha)

I love... not that Lan is rolling his eyes at Nynaeve, but he knows what she’s like, and it’s like he’s shaking his head fondly at her while running to obey her orders. That’s cute.

Wait what needs to be settled here? And what did the Windfinders decide for them?? I guess Nynaeve is impatient to use the Bowl and doesn’t care about sitting and taking inventory of all the women on the farm before using it?

“[Alise] showed little of the deference toward Aes Sedai that the Knitting Circle did.” Curious. I think maybe Alise has accepted more of her life now, rather than hoping and wishing to be let back into the Tower by the mighty and wonderful Aes Sedai. That would temper the deference.

Well. The Aes Sedai have taken charge of Ispan. Let’s see how this goes.

Okay at least the White Tower has laws about... what torture is permitted during questioning. That’s... nice.

Hmm, okay so the use of the Power on novices is banned. I know from the show that Elaida beat Moiraine with the One Power to get her to be able to channel better - so Elaida broke the law. Did she get punished, or was she never found out, or was it one of those things where the other sisters were like as long as you never do it again we’ll let you off.

“What you order done, you must be willing to do with your own hand.” The implications of that with how Rand is doing - ouch. Rand has to make a lot of hard decisions here and I don’t think this little maxim would be very comforting to him.

“Then another use hit her, and suddenly the silence from within was more ominous than any shrieks that ward would contain.” Yikes!!!! Good writing. Also I’m a bit annoyed with Vandene for steamrolling over Elayne here, but I also admire her a bit for taking charge and being the one to break the laws of the Tower. And maybe, just maybe, this will give her a bit of respect for Elayne, that Elayne was willing to break the laws.

I wonder if this stash of ter’angreal came from some stray wagons of the Da’shain. Where did they come from, actually?

Ooh are they doing it now??? “It’s time.”

#wheel of time #the path of daggers #reading wot #wot book spoilers

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jacksgreysays · 4 years ago

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Not a prompt, I'm afraid! Just wanted to say firstly, thank you so much for all the hard work and beautiful writing you bring to the DOS community; I've been reading your fics and blog for years, and it's very awe striking to me how large and brilliant all the creators are in, and you are one of my favorites. Secondly, I wanted to ask if you have seen the Umbrella Academy on Netflix? I'm already tossing over the idea of Shikako in that universe to myself lol

Thanks, anon! I haven't been as active lately (both in the fandom and writing in general) so it means a lot that the stuff I have done is still being appreciated. This is probably weird to say but I do miss the DoS fandom even though it hasn't exactly gone anywhere--or, I guess it's more like I miss the state of mind I was in when I was more active in the DoS fandom? There was something about it where my creativity and productivity were both just in synch creating a fun sort of feedback loop within itself. Now it's like... the desire is there, but I'm slogging through a swamp to drag the ideas out of me. Don't get me wrong, I do still enjoy it, but man do I miss that DoS self-renaissance from before.

Nonetheless, I'm honored to be counted as one of your favorites, and thank you again for your kind words :D

Re: Umbrella Academy on Netflix, I have seen it and I love it! (Both seasons, since I don't actually know when your ask came in. I think I like season 2 better than season 1, but obviously season 2 would make absolute no sense without season 1 so hooray for both.) And I also have thought about Shikako in that universe. I think with most new universes I encounter my brain automatically tries to put in either Shikako or Tetsuki Kaiza depending on which one fits better or which scenario feel right.

For example, in Boku no Hero Academia, I can't help but feel like Tetsuki would have been age-mates/classmates/friends with Todoroki Touya. It doesn't feel right to have her be the same age as the canon Class 1-A (well, I have a weird idea that kiiinda does that but involves time travel semi-angst so...) Whereas for Shikako, well, I wrote stuff about that. And while I could imagine her as Todoroki Touya's age and it does work, she just fits better the other way.

For Umbrella Academy, Tetsuki Kaiza doesn't really fit. Or, at least, not in a significant way? She has more of a "consultant/outside contractor for The Commission" vibe via the Dimension Witch than anything else. I mean, maaaybe she is one of the strange 43 babies born mysteriously with powers, but even then I don't think she ended up with the Hargreeves.

In contrast, when I think of Shikako in the Umbrella Academy, my brain is immediately like: oh, she's Number Eight.

And, here's the thing, I know within the world the siblings with the lower numbers were perceived to be the better/stronger/favored of Reginald Hargreeves, but like. Obviously not true. I didn't read the comics/graphic novels, so I don't know how accurate this is, but I'm pretty sure the higher the number the more powerful/less tractable the specific person was. And whether Reginald knew that or not is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

So, like, obviously Shikako who is crazy powerful and knows that's all Reginald wants from her and has withstood far better brainwashing/propaganda (and he's not even good at it) would never even show a peep of power. Out of spite. And solidarity with Vanya. But mostly out of spite. And also, considering Shikako's ride or die for her friends and more so for her brother, you know she would be all about mitigating Reginald's truly terrible parenting/training for her new siblings. And I just think there's a lot of space for her within the Hargreeves family relationships (or the dysfunctional lack thereof) for her to make small but significant changes.

[In contrast, Tetsuki would just be throwing more dysfunctional fuel into the fire. Depending on how much she does or doesn't remember, she would probably fall into the might is right trap and use force to establish herself in the Hargreeves hierarchy. Not because she wants to be Number One, but because she mostly knows the best method for survival is through shows of power. It doesn’t really contribute much to the story to have her as a Hargreeves, tbh, which is why if she were in TUA, she’d be elsewhere]

Shikako as Number Eight not using her powers out of solidarity for Vanya (while also simultaneously training Vanya to get her powers under control), commiserating with Ben about the call from the Horrors/Eldritch being from the Other Side (either because her powers are Void based or the experiences of Gelel/Jashin), snarking/collaborating with Five because he needs someone to push back and not just either ignore him/shut him down.

Is she haunted by ghosts from her former life? Could she help Klaus come to terms with death and the dead way earlier than in canon? Would Allison, seeing the sister solidarity of Vanya and Shikako, try to reach out to join them rather than ignoring them? Do Diego and Luther stop caring so much about ranking when its clear that Shikako doesn't and is all the happier for it?

I dunno, anon, it's a fascinating thought exercise.

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doctorporkchop02 · 4 years ago

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Some Pigster's Underswap Updates.

Okay, so I know I have been leaving you guys in the dark for a while again. So I'm going go ahead update you guys on stuff that's happening behind the scenes and answer some questions that literally nobody is asking. Now time for the big question...

Is this AU Cancelled???

Nope, not yet. Quite the opposite really, behind the scenes I've been rebooting this AU a little bit to flesh out the story a bit, I also have been getting a team together... kinda... it's mostly my friend Xboxlee doing most of the work in asking some very talented people in the community if they want to help me in this project. I don't blame them for not wanting to help since it's some random loser's Underswap take, where Underswap takes are very VERY common in the community. But I've actually decided to turn this Project into A SPRITE COMIC!!! HOORAY!!!

I've met some amazing people from this project and even met some people that I've been fans of for a long time, like the Legandary Sprite Artist @vuristwo or Snowy who might know as the composer of Sensational Studios' Underswap project to name a few. They are amazing people and I'm very thankful that they even CONSIDERED helping me. (Seriously, I almost had a panic attack when I found out that Vuristwo and Snowy joined the Pigster's Underswap Discord thanks the mad man, Xboxlee.)

Anyway progress on the comic has been kinda slow since I realized that I'm... a terrible leader when it comes to a project like this. Plus we are making all the sprites from scratch and coming up with unique ideas to make this AU more interesting. If it weren't for people like Green Papyrus AKA Allen, @reth-vil15 , @lordnindroid of @reallyanotherunderswaptake (Underswap Super Sigma) and many of the other very talented people that have been in the Pigster's Underswap Discord pitching awesome ideas... I probably would've cancelled this a LOOOONG time ago.

But again, Progress has been slow due to me being a terrible leader, and everyone having lives outside of the community. But when everything is done, the wait should be worth it. :)

Now I already see another question you are more than likely asking.

Why are you updating us on this???

Because I'm a lazy jerk. Roll Credits!!!

But seriously though, that's not far from the truth, you guys should be very VERY aware by now that I'm a lazy jerk who forgets to update everyone on this project... usually... but this time I've intentionally been quiet about this since it's kinda been helping with the stress this project has been giving me... even though almost no one knows about this project, but I don't know, It's just helping with it a lot and I don't know why. I know that's a very crap explanation, trust me I know. But that's kinda what's been happening here, but I swear, once chapter 1 or the Ruins is done, then this blog this should be more active, so progress again is going to be super slow, sorry bout that, I hope you can understand... oh yeah and I've been moving recently and my Computer is in... god knows where and I don't know when I'll be getting it back so progress on the sprites is on a hiatus at the moment, which I REALLY should've been working on it before the move because just my luck, recently the Pigster's Underswap wiki page has been removed for no reason other than the AU "Didn't have a proper story" which is dumb but, oh well, I really could just post stuff here instead.

But yeah, that's what has been happening recently, I'm very sorry for wasting everyone's time here but I swear, this AU isn't going to be cancelled anytime soon, just on yet another hiatus and I'll be working on the AU as much as I possibly can be. But I hope you guys have a great rest of your day/night and Happy Holidays!!

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mittensmorgul · 5 years ago

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Today on the TNT loop, a wonderful direct callback to 15.09 and 15.10, via 4.15, 4.16 and 4.17...

I need to start out by reminding everyone that the entire purpose of s4 was to manipulate Sam and Dean into “playing their roles,” even before they knew their roles existed as roles. Cosmically fated to act out a specific story for the entertainment of a bored God. Remember, they’re about to learn of the existence of “Chuck the Prophet�� who’s been writing their lives down, in explicit detail, and publishing them as a series of pulpy horror novels. Hooray, 4.18, up next for me.

But I really need to pause here, because the sort of manipulations that Sam and Dean suffered through in 15.10, while I’ve already pointed out a lot of other “silly” episodes they referenced:

https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/190430063655/mittensmorgul-episodes-i-expect-1510-to-remind

I’m gonna now add 4.17 to that list, too, because holy HECK.

Remember the setup to this episode? 4.15 and 4.16 both? Where Dean had been DIRECTLY MANIPULATED into stopping Alistair from breaking another seal-- to “kill death twice” by ritually murdering two reapers-- a hunt that Cas “tricked” Sam and Dean into taking on by literally making them think that Bobby had sent them on that hunt.

Then 4.16 used Uriel to manipulate both Dean AND Cas into believing they needed to torture information out of Alistair. The goal was to break both Dean AND Cas here, because Uriel knew all along that Alistair was literally just a distraction, a diversion from his own actions, recruiting angels for Team Lucifer and murdering those who refused to join him. But also breaking Dean’s will to just... do what he’s told. Because Dean himself was never destined to be anything more than a tool to Heaven, a vessel for Michael to wear to the apocalypse. Of course, Dean didn’t know any of that yet, and neither did Cas. He knew Dean was “important,” but truly didn’t know why.

At the end of 4.16, lying in a hospital bed, Dean felt hopeless:

Castiel: It's not blame that falls on you, Dean, it's fate. The righteous man who begins it is the only one who can finish it. You have to stop it. Dean: Lucifer? The Apocalypse? What does that mean? Hey! Don't you go disappearing on me, you son of a bitch. What does that mean! Castiel: I don't know. Dean: Bull. Castiel: I don't. Dean, they don't tell me much. I know our fate rests with you. Dean: Well, then you guys are screwed. I can't do it, Cas. It's too big. Alastair was right. I'm not all here. I'm not—I'm not strong enough. Well, I guess I'm not the man either of our dads wanted me to be. Find someone else. It's not me.

Tell me this isn’t super similar to his state earlier in s15. Let’s say... at the beginning of 15.06, holed up in his room in his bathrobe, bingewatching tv shows and eating cereal directly from the box. By the end of the episode, he still wasn’t sure what was real and what was Chuck’s doing in his life, and he’s absolutely right to question that, given his lifetime of experience being manipulated in exactly this way by higher cosmic powers.

In 4.17, that higher cosmic power was Zachariah, literally giving Sam and Dean alternate memories and directly inserting them into entirely different lives to prove a point. In 4.17, the Winchesters had their lifetime of knowledge of the Supernatural excised from them-- and even all the practicalities of hunting like “how to buy guns,” and “how salt can repel ghosts,” and “how to fight.” Throughout the episode they were forced to re-learn all of these skills for themselves, ironically using Ghostfacers videos about ghost hunting that directly referenced information that the Ghostfacers had learned from “The Winchesters.” Very much like how the Winchesters were “depowered” in 15.10, and yet... they were saved because of their prior relationship WITH GARTH, in which they had not only saved Garth’s life a couple of times, but had also learned things and imparted knowledge and information TO GARTH in the past.

I guess what I’m attempting to point out here is the direct parallel to Chuck’s active manipulation of Sam and Dean in 15.10. They may not have had their memories removed like Zachariah did to them, but they’ve been reset to a similar sort of “baseline” status where NOTHING they do actually works this time. It’s... it’s almost a perfect inverse of 4.17.

Literally the episode leading up to the first appearance of Chuck The Author in canon.

Tell me Dabb isn’t explicitly suggesting an inverse parallel here, framing everything as Dean’s CHOICE, when it’s been one grand manipulation to pressing him into making that choice through any means necessary-- up to and including direct deceit and false narrative:

Zachariah: Believe me, I had no interest in popping down here into one of these smelly things. But after the unfortunate situation with Uriel, I felt it necessary to pay a visit, get all my ducks in a row. Dean: I am not one of your ducks. Zachariah: Starting with your attitude. Dean: So, what? This was all some sort of a lesson? Is that what you're telling me? Wow. Very creative.

and

Zachariah: I know, I know. You're not strong enough. You're scared. You've got daddy issues. You can't do it, right? Dean: Angel or not, I will stab you in your face. Zachariah: All I'm saying is it's how you look at it. Most folks live and die without moving anything more than the dirt it takes to bury them. You get to change things. Save people, maybe even the world. All the while you drive a classic car and fornicate with women. This isn't a curse. It's a gift. So for God's sakes, Dean, quit whining about it. Look around. There are plenty of fates worse than yours. So are you with me? You wanna go steam yourself another latte? Or are you ready to stand up and be who you really are?

Zachariah KNEW the bigger plan all along. Here he showed Dean an “alternate life” that was entirely manufactured to be a “false choice.” Dean, because of who he is as a person, would never have chosen that corporate falsehood. Just like he rejected Zachariah’s intended lesson in 5.04. And Gabriel’s lesson in 5.08.

Dean... doesn’t want to play his role. His role sucks. It’s a river of crap that would send most people howling to the nuthouse, after all... oh... wait, that’s a direct quote from 5.09, aka another episode where Chuck is directly involved, and directly manipulates them into a hunt... Dean... is not a fan...

But... we also learn something that I still think is true, and that I still think is IMPORTANT to s15. And important to Chuck as a character on this show we’re watching. I really don’t think he’s omniscient. I don’t think he can actually see every possible outcome. I don’t think he can control everything. But I think, and will always think, that because of Free Will, his ability to truly influence the outcome of his story is hindered. Unless he can use everything he CAN manipulate to crush Sam and Dean’s free will... to force them into making choices directly against their own interest, because of their perceived situation, or in this new post 14.20 universe, Chuck’s perceived intent for them.

Sam and Dean (and Cas! remember this was also about his discovery of the “rot” in Heaven, and how he himself had been used and manipulated into helping start the apocalypse) spent s4 thinking they were doing the right thing, because they’d been lied to from the start. When they questioned their path, questioned each other, their actions were met with often comically implausible verging on outright ridiculous situations that nudged them back into this cosmically “destined” series of events.

And Chuck’s history of this is directed at Sam and Dean in different ways-- Sam through the psychological manipulation and emotional angst, and Dean through physically hindering him. Chuck needed to break Sam’s trust in Dean, and replace it with the false belief that he was actually doing the right thing back in s4:

SAM: Dean’s not... he's not Dean lately. Ever since he got out of hell. He needs help. CHUCK: So you got to carry the weight? SAM: Well, he's looked out for me my whole life. I can't return the favor? CHUCK: Yeah, sure you can. I mean, if that's what this is. SAM: What else would it be? CHUCK: I don't know. Maybe the demon blood makes you feel stronger? More in control? SAM: No. That's not true. CHUCK: I'm sorry, Sam. I know it's a terrible burden – feeling that it all rests on your shoulders. SAM: Does it? All rest on my shoulders? CHUCK: That seems to be where the story's headed. SAM: Am I strong enough to stop Lilith tonight? CHUCK: I don't know. I haven't seen that far yet.

Chuck needs to break Sam’s will in 15.09, but Dean? Dean he needed to break his car, break him physically, and break his belief in his own choices and actions. Break his belief in his own identity. Because Dean’s will is not so easily shattered. He’s still willing to punch God in the face, for all of this.

And that’s how we end up with 15.10...

bonus destiel content: Dean’s very first prayer to Cas, ever, is asking him for help to stop Chuck’s prophecy from coming true. Dean question’s Cas’s “mission,” i.e. the thing Dean is unaware Cas has been questioning himself all this time, in the face of Dean’s refusal to just sit around and wait for Chuck’s prophecies to happen to them. Cas supplies him with the bit of information Dean needs to interfere and break the prophecy. I’ve written about the importance of that act before:

https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/187983341865/i-always-thought-anna-said-only-an-angel-can-kill

(and it bothers the everloving fuck out of me that people still don’t see that Chuck is a flim-flam artist of the highest order, and is the most unreliable narrator in the history of unreliable narrators, because not only is he biased to his own view of the story, he has the power to make the story conform to his own views, even if he can’t fully control each of the characters like glorified puppets)

and then Lizbob has also written about this scene and its import:

https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/169437649690/elizabethrobertajones-dean-cas-are-in-love-a

which is incredible when paired with Dean’s most recent prayer to Cas in 15.09, not about a problem he needs help fixing, but directly about their relationship... to quote Layla from 1.12, speaking on the subject of prayer, there’s a miracle right there.

#spn 4.15 #spn 4.16 #spn 4.17 #spn 4.18 #spn 15.10 #spn 15.09 #chuck's process #sam sympathizes and dean empathizes #spiders georg of the tnt loop #s15 meta rewatch #destiel #it's spirals all the way down #the scheherazade of supernatural #spn 1.12

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darkestwolfx · 5 years ago

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City Under the Sea - Re-Review #30

Some holiday this is! Here is a happy little family, doing your standard underwater holiday in a rented sub, fighting over ipads and whatnot, and not really knowing what they’re doing because they’re tourists! That’s a bit of an assumption on tourists - sorry, many tourists are quite wise - and not my everyday thought on tourists... this family however, definitely fit that mold.

Can I just ask though, 1. does anyone else find the logo on the rental sub hilarious? And 2. does anyone else get reminded of that fish from ‘Shark Tale’ (2005) that looked a little bit like that I think? Anyone, or is that just me?

Oh look, a big red exclamation mark! Now, I’m not an expert, but when that symbol appears on my car dashboard, the manual says to stop driving immediately. And look, it’s even got a little amber circle! Should so stop driving... piloting... whatever method driving a sub is actually called. I can’t think whist I’m trying to watch comic Gordon moments.

But yeah... point being, they drive on for a while first... foolish. Just saying.

Have they not taught this girl that pointing is rude? Eye spy is such a traditional stuck on the motorway care game as well. Playing it in the Amazon when you are not from there - just to say - definitely leaves an unfair advantage. I think that is the only time I have ever lost so bad at eye spy (and I mean, really, how do you even really lose eye spy?).

Don’t worry! International Rescue are on the way! Because, you have made it onto Thunderbirds are go, so there can’t be fear of you dying. That doesn’t happen here, folks. This is an escape from the real world (much needed right now as I’m sure we all know... which reminds me, I need to finish writing some irrelief2020 prompts... sorry, off track). Let’s move on to talk about Gordon.

You know, I really don’t know what Lady P sees in him... he’s such a... slob? I mean, maybe that is why he and Parker don’t get along so well.

“Aren’t you going to pick this up?”

“Of course I was! You don’t think a responsible member of International Rescue would leave trash lying around do you? Who do you think I am?”

“A slob comes to mind.”

Yeah, thanks for agreeing with me, Kayo. That makes me feel better about (not) insulting Gordon myself.

“Wow.”

“Go ahead. Just say it.”

“Gordon Tracy, you are a secret slob.”

“Oh, the wrappers? What can I say? Scott’s always at me about my room. This is my own personal domain.”

It’s also a rescue sub... but hey, who looks at whether there’s rubbish on the floor of the International Rescue sub when they’re being rescued? Really, what does it matter in the long run when he’s going to save their lives?

This city looks so so freaky. Whenever they were driving through it I was just like... shivers. Bay City must have been a greeeaaat place to live. I bet Lady Penelope has great memories of the Creighton-Ward building.

“Just follow my lead, Parker. I spent many a summer playing hide and seek in these walls.”

“Bit different with ha giant crab ship nipping hat your ‘eels.”

“Don’t worry, Parker. I always won.”

Oh...kay. She actually does!

“But the monster!”

“That’s not a monster. It’s the mechanic.”

You know, I think they’re two very similar things at the moment. Considering at this point we knew very, very little about The Mechanic, i think it was perfectly reasonable to think such. After all, he doesn’t really speak, and he attacks people and he has a bit of a temper, and he’s quite obviously... well, the bad guy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-TbQnONe_w

You know, that’s just in case anyone wants to start a post on character theme songs within the 21st century, specifically 2020 - you know, I think that would actually be a great way to take our minds off of everything... please someone do that for me!

This guy really does have some serious tech, and the worst part is probably that he knows so well how to use it. He uses it like an extension to his own body (principles of martial arts here, guys, a skill worth having let me tell you) and acts like he’s completely in sync with it. Really it’s like he lives and breathes with those meccas. And that ship looks unsettlingly like a crab... don’t blame me if I make sure to look at them twice in the future You know. Just to be sure.

“But you don’t even know how to operate Thunderbird Four... Don’t scratch it! And be careful! Ah, Brains is gonna’ kill me. Woah! I didn’t even know it could do that!”

Um... you were saying, Gordon?

And, actually, I think it will be Scott who kills you before Brains when he sees the state of Thunderbird Four’s interior. After all, if he’s that fussy over Gordon’s room, he’s going to be a tyrant over anything IR related.

“Don’t worry, Brains can get mad at you for something else.”

I can imagine there’s quite a list.

“Unbelievable.”

Thunderbird Four is not Thunderbird Shadow... Please remember that for Gordon’s sake, Kayo. Although, maybe in her hands it is a little more like Shadow. Definitely appeared so.

“Don’t ever scare me like that again.”

“FAB. I’ll come up with some other way.”

You can bet she will.

Anyhow, back to the subject, I think Gordon does enough damage to Thunderbird Four without needing anyone to help him, so lets just discount this whole sea chase of Kayo’s.

But let’s so so not because it was awesome! I mean, as much as Gordon would love to claim that no one else can pilot Four, I don’t think Kayo (or Scott for that matter) do a bad job at all. I mean, she managed to give the Mechanic a run for his money and he’s a nasty character, so I think that really does mean something.

“You three get to the crash site.”

“Wait, you three? Underwater rescue is my thing.”

“But sneaking up on bad guys is her thing.”

“You have a point there.”

And that’s Virgil’s point proven I think.

Sherbet looking at the fish! I mean, I suppose that’s to be expected as it’s not natural for a dog to be quite that far underwater.

Hell, Parker really does have good driving skills. If I could drive half as well as he can through an old abandoned building which if half-decaying and underwater then I would be incredibly impressed. My best skill level is being able to park perfectly in one go like once a week every week most. You know what, I think I might just employ Parker for myself. Anyone have his contact number?

That past of Parker’s really does make a difference! The Mechanic’s face was such a sight to see. He got away - of course he did, he’s obviously the new series main villain and connected to some big plot twist with The Hood, so we couldn’t kill him off yet, that would just be a really bad use of an interesting (though slightly chill-provoking) character. Besides, I think he’s pretty hard to kill, but Parker gave it a pretty good go, so he’ll have to have a medal for trying and count that as good enough. Honestly, The Mechanic seems indestructible, much like another family we know... Yeah, that combination is going to go down swimmingly when they meet. It will be like two rhinos butting heads. Although we do have to wait a while for that, so let’s get back on subject.

“This won’t be the last time The Mechanic tries to get The Hood out of prison. The GDF needs to be on their guard.”

“Where The Mechanic and The Hood are concerned, everyone should be on their guard.”

Well said Lady P.

“Have time to make that Dad a hero?”

Oh yeah, and back on the subject, the final note is: what a great holiday that was. Real holiday of a lifetime.... Hooray for the happy family who got to see Thunderbird Four in action to rescue them from the very, very, terrible bad guy. Who are shaken up, but will probably be okay and oh there we go! Magically okay because they get to ride in Thunderbird Two, all the way to Antartica to see the Penguins!

So, I’m not sure it really works like that - ‘curing’ PTSD and shock I mean... but I do agree that Penguins can make everything feel better. They hug, brilliant creatures that they are.

Anyone want to know a fact? I’m sharing it with you because it’s my work-based knowledge - when penguins huddle together, they keep moving (waddling) whilst they huddle so that eventually the penguins on the outside of the group end up on the inside and so on. They’re so smart that they can realise the penguins on the outside of the huddle will get cold unless they rotate and they’re smart enough to realise that if they keep rotating, the penguins from the inside who then go on the outside, will be warm enough by that point (from being on the inside) that they won’t get cold because of how quickly they can keep waddling around each other. It’s absolutely brilliant. If you get the chance, definitely meet penguins.

P.S. You can thank me later for the penguins

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sometipsygnostalgic · 5 years ago

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It’s been a long decade

This time 10 years ago, I was 14, sneaking onto my brother’s computer, waiting for the new year with @alphahas and a bunch of others on the Roblox forums.

That doesn’t begin to express how much my life has changed this decade, but for some reason, it’s one of the most memorable parts.

In 2010 - I gained my first drop of internet fame making DBZ-themed Roblox clothing, dropped out of school for 3 months leading up to the summer holidays, bingeread all the Twilight books, decided that my education was more important than my feelings about getting bullied, went back into school, got my first Xbox and Laptop, and began playing on Xbox Live 6 hours a day.

In 2011 - I ditched Twilight for Discworld, made some new school friends for the first time in my life, played a LOT of Left 4 Dead 2 with my sister, got my heart broken by Modern Warfare 3, and at the end of the year, I moved in with my dad and his fiance for the first time - moving from a shitty, overcrowded, unclean house into a strict environment where yes I do have to shower every day, and yes I do eat proper food with actual utensils rather than used paper plates.

In 2012 - My dad and his fiance split up and kicked me back down to my mother’s house just before my GCSEs began, and I was obviously very unhappy about this, so I decided to bingewatch Adventure Time across the 3 weeks they took place. Fortunately my GCSEs survived the fallout. I became inspired to draw Adventure Time art, massively improved my digital art style within the space of a couple months, and opened my first tumblr blog dedicated to analysing Adventure Time.

In 2013 - My blog kicked off, I was making plenty of friends during my A-levels, and I was deeply enjoying school for the first time ever. On top of this, my dad finally got a place of his own and invited me to live with him. I’m still living with him now and the quality of life is much better, everything is much cleaner, we have actual heating, I’m actually clean, I had a stable food source, I cannot describe how much the change benefitted my life. Even if he is an unstable moody bastard. Oh, also, I read Homestuck.

In 2014 - I got really fit at the start of the year going to gym 3 times a week, then I studied AMERICAN POLITICS in A-level (which 2 years later I’d deeply regret). I did better in my A-levels this year than the previous year, so evened out to B’s all round. It might have been better if my good sociology teacher didn’t get sacked for accidentally sabotaging every health and social care student... Applied for university and got a placement in the best uni in Wales. Started Uni. Had tons of money for first time. Got fat very quickly, RIP my weight. Got depressed and lonely in Halls. Hated politics classmates. At the end of the year I deleted my Adventure Time blog, and.... started getting really into Homestuck.

In 2015 - Opened up this blog (hello it’s been 5 fucking years!!!), slouched off in university, became a massive Terezi stan, drew lots of Homestuck comics. I ate a tons of Quiche as well. It was okay. I’m going to be honest, other than this blog taking off not a lot of interesting things happened to me in 2015. However, Undertale came out this year, so that was cool.

In 2016 - Found Dad increasingly difficult to live with as he was getting frustrated with... everything about me, for some reason. It sucked. Brexit happened, the US election happened, Homestuck Act 7 happened, Hiveswap went off the map. I don’t remember much about this year and I’m glad for it because I was not happy. I think this is when I joined the Homestuck Reddit though/

In 2017 - Graduated University!!!! Volunteered in a charity shop for a few months whilst looking for a job, did 5 weeks of crappy work experience in a job centre. What else happened this year? I’m sure it was a lot of things but really I can’t remember. Got myself a Nintendo Switch. Became a permanent member of the Homestuck Discord.

In 2018 - I secured myself a job! Hooray!!!! This alleviated the tensions with my dad, because he was happy that I was finally working. We’ve been on good terms since. As irritating as working in customer service for 8 hours a day can be, I liked that I was doing something all the time and the year could be a memorable one for that reason, rather than fading away like the previous 3 years had. The year was capped off by Deltarune, and being given a fuckton of wine by work contractors.

In 2019 - A lot of terrible videogames came out earlier this year but it was mitigated by the release of DMC5, which must be cherished by all. I was put on short-time in January after the first Reckoning, then I got my full hours back in March when given a new role. Then our main client went into administration, and the OMEGA-Reckoning happened and everybody else in my tier lost their jobs with me as the sole survivor. We had no wine this year either, which is the saddest thing honestly. Later in the year I started taking up driving lessons, and I’m hoping that I’ll be able to drive by spring, though my instructor thinks that is too optimistic. I’ve found driving tough because of how my brain works; I can only concentrate on one thing at a time, so when I’m doing something right I’m usually doing something else wrong.

What am I doing today - Sitting here playing Persona Q2 and humming the new Pokemon OP to myself because it is catchy. I will probably open the champaigne soon.

From 10 years ago I’ve grown significantly. It’s almost like I experienced my teen years later, because I was so stunted from how I lived. I feel like it’s only now I’m reaching the maturity level, and degree of self respect, to call myself an adult. I’ve always struggled with relating to people offline as well, but... I’m growing okay with that. Who needs other people anyway? They just bring in drama. If I’m comfortable being by myself, there’s nothing wrong with that.

#personal

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thanksjro · 5 years ago

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Before We Begin

Full disclosure: I’m not working off of a physical copy of this story, but rather a PDF download. I live in the United States, and don’t think I’d be able to find a copy of this book if my life depended on it.

When I was looking at the download packets, I chose the one with as many extra materials as I could, so I’d have the best chance at understanding the story without having to rely on the internet too much.

As you can see, there’s a good amount to work with here. I’m especially happy to have the notes- also known as the Story So Far. Thank god for this, because this would be an absolute slog to get through otherwise.

Eugenesis takes place within the Marvel comics continuity, which includes both the American and UK comics published at the time, and The Transformers The Movie. The guide summarizes the millions-year long war between the Autobots and the Decepticons over control of the planet Cybertron. Pretty basic stuff, things anyone who’s ever heard of the Transformers ought to know. The notes assume that the reader knows absolutely nothing about the franchise, which is good, because it means nothing gets left out.

This is already an interesting contrast between Eugenesis and MTMTE/LL, which didn’t need very much extra reading to be understood, if any at all. A rarity in the comic industry. Sure, there were things you could read to get a deeper understanding of certain character motivations- Last Stand of the Wreckers, for example, giving one a better grasp of why Fort Max is so messed up and angry.

But this is about the notes right now, not the comics. So, let’s dive right into:

That’s right, baby, this novel takes place in the far-flung future of 2012, and you better believe the date 12/21/12 comes up at least once.

There’s a lot of stuff that’s covered in the notes, and I’ll bring it up as needed as I progress through the novel. It’s helpful to have, but let’s move on to the juicier stuff.

…Is what I would say, if the notes weren’t completely batshit insane.

It starts out innocently enough, describing the beginnings of the war, establishing that the Transformers didn’t always, well, transform. Transformation technology was developed by Megatron in order to make the Decepticons more combat-effective, and the Autobots followed suit. They fought so hard that Cybertron was knocked out of orbit and got lost for a little while, eventually coming under the rule of a warlord named Trannis while Optimus and Megatron are busy being unconscious for four million years on Earth.

Trannis is a massive technoist, who believes that mechanical beings are the bee’s knees, so he starts cyberforming other planets, until he gets offed by the resistance. He’s quickly replaced with Jhiaxus, who’s basically more of the same, and the Decepticons of Cybertron split up, one team heading into space to do evil robot things, the other guarding Cybertron from the resistance. The Beast Wars are mentioned. The cartoon continuity is mentioned. Shockwave shows up for a bit, gets thrown in a swamp a couple times.

Things go on like this until 1985, when the Earth-based Autobots reestablish contact with their homeworld.

Galvatron shows up- y’know, Galvatron. The revamped Megatron from the movie, which takes place in 2005. He time-hopped from the future to build a weapon to kill Unicron. The Autobots try to stop him. Why they don’t just let him kill Unicron, who is blatantly evil and a threat to anyone around him, isn’t stated, but they eventually trick Galvatron into going back to the future, with a little help from Kup, Blurr, and Hot Rod, who are also from the future.

Galvatron comes back a year later. He causes a bunch of time-travel nonsense to happen, and is basically the worst until the Time Wars happen.

Meanwhile, Megatron heads back to Cybertron to see what’s happened while he was taking a dirt nap. Straxis- who was left in charge by Jhiaxus- isn’t doing so hot, and decides he’s going to steal Megatron’s body for his own. He gets killed for his troubles. Megatron decides he’s just going to head back to Earth, feeling pretty paranoid at this point- which, fair enough. I don’t think I’d feel very safe after someone tried to steal my body either.

Later on, Optimus Prime dies in a video game. Optimus Prime is killed by a human child in a video game. In fact, let me just show you the whole paragraph that covers this, because I don’t know that I’m able to do it justice.

It just blows my mind, and I knew that this happened before I even attempted to read the notes. These notes are eight pages long, and this is on page three.

Now Fortress Maximus is leading a group of Autobots, but he’s really not feeling the fight so much, so he, Kup, and Hot Rod just kinda… leave. They end up on Nebulos and become Target/Headmasters, just in time for the Decepticons to track them down and fight some more. Back on Earth, the Autobots launch Optimus’ corpse into space and elect a dinosaur as their new leader. This goes about as well as one would expect.

Over in London, G.I. Joe finds out that Megatron’s been living in the sewers. Actually, it isn’t Megatron, but a clone, housing the personalities of both Megatron and Straxis. They kill him and throw him in the river. Shockwave catches wind of this and has the body brought to him so he can use it to kill Galvatron. He brings the body back online using a ‘psycho-probe’, and uses the power of suggestion to have Megatron do his dirty work.

Megatron decides to kill Cyclonus and Scourge first, since they work for Galvatron, and through a time-travel mishap, ends up killing one of them before they were created. This displeases the space-time continuum, which promptly rips, and will continue to do so over the next few months.

Are you starting to see why I needed to break this down?

Optimus Prime is brought back from the dead. Hooray.

Starscream finds the Underbase- an ancient storehouse of Cybertronian knowledge so vast it will literally melt your brain- and wrecks shop until the moment it kills him.

Meanwhile, clone-Megatron has decided he’s not going to kill Galvatron, but rather join forces with him. Everyone agrees that this is a terrible idea, and so the Autobots and Decepticons living in the year 2009 join forces to get Galvatron back to the future. The space-time rift swallows him, Scourge, and Cyclonus’ corpse, solving the problem pretty cleanly. Clone-Megatron finds the original-flavor Megatron, and promptly kills himself.

With the original Megatron back in play, he kidnaps Ratchet and forces him to resurrect Starscream as a Pretender- a robot in a protective shell. Ratchet decides that he’s going to fuck the warlord over as thoroughly as possible, instead bringing back a few of his friends and then exploding the Decepticon base. Both Ratchet and Megatron are presumed dead, but when has that ever stopped anyone in this franchise?

The newly resurrected Autobot Pretenders wind up in the center of the planet, Decepticons hot on their trail, and find themselves face-to-face with Primus, their creator god. Someone shoots the poor guy in the face, and he screams loud enough for Unicron, Bringer of Chaos, Vorer of Worlds, to hear him. So, that’s a thing they’re going to have to deal with in a few months.

Unicron finds a Galvatron from a parallel universe and takes him along for the ride, as the Autobots spend the start of the 90’s looking for the original Optimus’ dead body, which they never bothered to get the Matrix out of for some reason. They better hurry, because space is pretty big, and that Matrix is the only thing that can stop the Chaos Bringer.

Ratchet and Megatron are found- alive- in a pocket dimension, though they probably wish that they weren’t, seeing as they’ve been fused together so hard their brains have to take turns piloting their horrific, melty, shared body.

Unicron shows up in ’91 and kills, just, so many people. Optimus Prime sacrifices himself to save the rest of the population, flinging his body and the newly-recovered Matrix into the World-Vorer’s mouth. This kills God.

Optimus names Grimlock as the new leader of the Autobots- because that worked out so well the last time- and then dies. Prowl does all the heavy lifting to actually get the planet back in shape, seeing as the fight with Unicron wrecked Cybertron so hard its trying to tear itself apart via earthquakes.

Cyberquakes?

Anyway, Prowl works out a deal with the new leader of the Decepticons, Bludgeon, only to get sabotaged for his efforts, the Autobots being left to die as the 'Cons fly off to find new worlds to conquer.

Shockwave and Starscream- that’s right baby, he’s back- steal the Ark, unaware that there were multiple other people aboard. It’s like they didn’t even check. Galvatron is stowed away, and both Megatron and Ratchet- freshly separated- are stored in stasis pods. Ratchet wakes up and immediately crashes the ship into Canada, hoping to kill the Decepticons aboard. Galvatron lives, only to be trapped under the ice by a nasty fight with Fortress Maximus, the last Autobot left on Earth.

Back on Cybertron, Gridlock has a show of competence and reveals that he had extra ships hidden away, just in case the Decepticons tried anything funny. They get off the planet and go to fight some ‘Cons.

Optimus Prime is brought back from the dead. Hooray.

The Matrix is recreated. Wahoo.

The Autobots fight the Decepticons, defeating them once and for all. Or do they?

No, they don’t.

See, even the notes know what’s up.

Not even a year later, Optimus catches wind of Decepticon forces gathering along the edge of the galaxy. He decides to make Grimlock leader of the Earthforce- because Optimus never friggin’ learns- and they face off against Megatron and friends a few times before the Decepticons abandon Earth altogether. At some point, Fortress Maximus gets killed off. Grimlock disbands the Earthforce to chase the ‘Cons across the galaxy, and finds a Cybertronian empire, which holds at its center Liege Maximo, who claims to have created Megatron.

Well, that’s not exactly right; he claims to be Megatron’s progenitor.

It’s at this point I broke out the TFWiki, because that could mean a lot of things.

Still vague. Hmm. I’m onto you, Marvel comics. Don’t be jumping on the mechpreg just yet, we still have three more pages of notes to get through.

…What did I just say, Marvel comics?

Did I say three pages? I meant two paragraphs. Holy hell, that hits like a punch to the face, it does.

Okay, so this isn’t exactly what you think, believe it or not. This is describing the form of reproduction that was established in the Marvel comics known as budding- some unlucky robot’s body runs away with itself and basically vomits out another fully-formed ‘bot. It’s like their chest was chewing a huge wad of gum, tried to blow a bubble, but did it just a little too hard.

Getting back on track, Optimus Prime finds out about budding from Vector Sigma, but pulls out of their little pow-wow before he can be told about the byproduct of this birthing process- the Swarm, an ink-black cloud of evil energy that left Cybertron ages ago to find something to feed off of.

The Swarm finds its way home, interrupting yet another standoff between the Autobots/Decepticons and the Cybertronian Empire. A lot of folks die, and Optimus surrenders to the Swarm in an attempt to save his compatriots. The Swarm gets introduced to, and I quote: “concepts of nobility, compassion, and sacrifice”, then goes back into deep space to seek enlightenment.

Can you imagine if human afterbirth did that? You just had a baby, and now you have to beat your placenta off with a broom? Then the god-king of the world introduces it to meditation and kindness, and it goes off to find inner peace instead of killing everyone? Comic books are wild.

Other than that funky little aside, it’s business as usual for the Transformers- war! From 1995 to 2003, they’re fighting nonstop. Then the UN decides that Optimus Prime’s allowed to build a giant robot city on Earth. It sure is a good thing Optimus is such a nice guy, because I don’t think they would have been able to stop him otherwise. Imagine telling the thirty-foot tall robot-Jesus from space he needs a permit to build a city in the middle of the desert.

They build the city- Autobot City, in fact- with Metroplex the Titan sealed inside, just in case the Decepticons decide to try anything funny.

They do- it’s called The Transformers The Movie. There’s a slight difference in plot, in that the notes remind us of the fact that Galvatron is a time-traveling ponce, but other than that the movie’s the movie.

To summarize that- though I’d be surprised if I needed to- movie goes like this: It’s the distant future of 2005, ‘Cons attack Autobot City, Optimus gets shot and dies AGAIN, traumatizing thousands of children in the mid-80s, Megatron gets shunted into deep space, meets Orson Welles who makes him a thigh-tastic new body, Megatron-now-Galvatron turns Starscream into a small pile of ash, a bunch of robots get vored, Hot Rod fulfills his destiny and becomes the new space-Jesus, Unicron explodes, YOU GOT THE TOUCH YOU GOT THE POWER-

So after all that happens, the Autobots take back Cybertron and tell the remaining Decepticons to kindly screw off. Hot Rod- now Rodimus Prime- decides he’s not taking any chances and hires a bounty hunter to find and kill Galvatron, who’s off galavanting somewhere in space. Both Rodimus and the bounty hunter follow Galvatron through time- of course- and land in 1987, but return to the future/present empty-handed. While they were gone, Shockwave and a group of Decepticons showed up on Cybertron, resulting in a stalemate between the two factions.

In 2008, the bounty hunter shoots down Cyclonus and Scourge- Rodimus put a hit out on them, too- over the planet of Junk, home of the Junkions. Who else is there? Oh, just Unicron. He’s got the Junkions brainwashed and building him a new body. He uses the bounty hunter to kill Shockwave, instates Cyclonus and Scourge as the new Decepticon leaders, then gets blown up by Rodimus and Wreck-Gar. Cyclonus, Scourge, and the bounty hunter all go through a time portal as this is happening, and the two Transformers end up in 15th century Cybertron, where they’ll become Targetmasters. Their resumes must be very impressive at this point. Nobody’s sure where the bounty hunter’s gotten to- we’ll get back to him later.

Although his physical form has been destroyed, Unicron’s essence lives on inside the Matrix. This can only end well, surely.

Back on Cybertron, Soundwave takes control of the Decepticon forces.

The Quintessons break free from Unicron’s control, just in time to discover that their planet’s about to be torn apart by the space-time rift Cyclonus’ dead body made.

Are you beginning to see why I felt the need to summarize these notes?

The leader of the Quintessons decides that now is the perfect time to attack Autobot City on Earth, as well as Cybertron. This doesn’t go very well for the Quintessons, or their planet.

The time-rift is still causing issues, so Rodimus Prime grabs some Autobots and heads to the past, to go grab everyone’s favorite time-traveling ‘Cons. What happened there we already covered, so I’ll leave it at that.

Rodimus and friends return to the present, only to wind up in a parallel universe, and the fact that this is only the second time I’ve had to write “parallel universe” for this section of the breakdown honestly astounds me. Rodimus gets possessed by the spirit of Unicron, who was hiding in the Matrix as we covered earlier, but he handles it pretty well and they head back home.

Back in their original universe, they find Galvatron, Cyclonus and Scourge, repaired by the space-time rift. Rodimus destroys any and all time machines he can get his hands on at this point- the notes say it’s to keep a promise he made to Optimus, but between you and me, I think he’s just gotten sick of Galvatron’s shit.

A couple years after that, Unicron’s got himself a hot new bod, and now he’s gonna tear up the town. By "tear up”, I of course mean devour with the sole intent of destruction, and by “town", I mean the entirety of Cybertron. Rodimus Prime manages to stop him, by containing him within his body, perhaps his mind? The notes are vague here, but the Wiki seems to imply that he’s trapped within the Matrix again, which Rodimus holds.

Now it’s December 2012, and things aren’t going so great for the Autobots. The Decepticons have control of Cybertron, the remaining Autobots being forced into hiding underground. On Earth, Autobot city is manned by a hundred ‘bots, Ultra Magnus acting as leader. They’re there to make sure Earth’s safe from the ‘Cons, but there hasn’t been an attack in quite a bit.

That’s where the notes end. That’s everything you need to know before reading Eugenesis. So, what did we learn?

We learned that Galvatron and his goons time traveled so frequently they broke the laws of physics. Optimus is just as incapable of staying dead here as he is everywhere else- multiversal constant, that one. Rodimus is smarter than Optimus about confronting the enemy, in that he intends for them to die, either by his hand or one that’s been hired. Good for him, I say. Get the job done, Rodders.

We also learned that the mechpreg really isn’t Roberts’ fault. I mean, yeah, he probably leans on the concept a bit heavily, but he’s just working with what he was given by the franchise. We’ll see how deep that rabbit hole goes later on.

But I think the most important thing to glean from this is that comic timelines are a nightmare. That’s the real lesson here.

Okay! Notes are done! That means we can start on the novel, right?

No.

No, it doesn’t.

We still have the prequel to get through.

#transformers #jro #maccadam #eugenesis #Hannzreads #text post #long post

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mynameismad · 6 years ago

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Read SAKANA #554 here!

Are you ready for some HARDCORE SAKANA-STYLE INTIMACY??? (Spoiler: they hold hands.)

I’m back from ECCC 2019 and BACK from my nice long post-ECCC break! Updates will resume their normal Monday-Thursday schedule for the foreseeable future. Hooray!

What is this comic??: SAKANA is a slice-of-life, romantic comedy (a sli-li-rom-com, if you will) that takes place in a giant fish market. It follows the lives of a few 20-somethings working at the market, their friends and family, and all the wacky situations they constantly find themselves in despite their best efforts. Basically they all want to date each other, but they’re all terrible at it, and also there’s lots of seafood involved.

Start reading from the beginning HERE

#sakana #sakana comic #my art #hiveworks #webcomics #update

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twdmusicboxmystery · 5 years ago

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TTD and the S10 Preview Show - Analysis

So we had three good hours of TWD time this past Sunday. (Yah!) I watched all three with the intentions of doing posts on all three.

However, the TTD episode and the S10 preview show, while they had a few interesting things in them, neither had tons, so I decided to combine them. (Hooray!)

Okay, down to business.

S10 Preview Show:

The first thing we noticed—something @wdway always looks for—is that the music box is still sitting on the shelf in the background.

A couple of ways in which this is important. You could argue that they have lots of past artifacts from the show sitting on the shelves. And they do…ish.

1. No other artifact appears so often or for so long after it was last scene in the show. So the fact that they keep bringing it back is significant.

2. We also noticed the music box was NOT present in TTD later in the evening. That was a TTD episode for Fear, rather than regular TWD. But it’s obvious that they don’t just throw things onto the shelves and leave them there. They specifically put the music box there for the S10 special, and then specifically took it away for Fear’s TTD.

3. I also had the thought that Rick’s hat occupied a prominent place on the shelf as well.

Of course, no one questions that because we KNOW he’s alive and the hat is still relevant. But think about that. If the hat is there because Rick is still alive and out there somewhere, even though TF family doesn’t think he is, what does that say about the reason for the music box being there? Just saying.

So the guests on the show were Khary Peyton (Ezekiel), Josh McDermitt (Eugene) and Angela Kang (our favorite TWD writer).

Khary did address the Michonne/Ezekiel kiss from the trailer. He certainly didn’t explain what it was or in what context it happened. As they always are, he was evasive. But he did tell a story about how weird it was for him and Danai because they’re good friends and felt like a brother and sister kissing.

Okay, I’m really side-eyeing that, guys. Because Danai and Andrew Lincoln are good friends too, and they make out on the show all the time. Heck, she and Norman are good friends and does everyone remember the behind-the-scenes vid from S6 that Michael Cudlitz hosted where Norman just decided to jump into the frame and make out with Danai to be funny? It’s just kind of an odd thing for Khary to say, given that these are professional actors.

So why did he? I think this was his way of saying without saying that this Michonne/Zeke kiss isn’t at all romantic. No idea what it’s all about, but I think this was code so Khary could answer without technically giving anything away. It’s what I believed anyway, and this was just confirmation for me.

Chris also asked what Zeke thinks of Daryl and Carol’s relationship. Khary basically just said that Ezekiel isn’t terribly threatened by Daryl. He doesn’t necessarily LIKE him, but he doesn’t dislike him or feel threatened by him either. That’s pretty telling, guys. If Ezekiel were afraid that Daryl was making the moves on Carol and they were going to hook up, he’d be freaking out. Just more confirmation that there’s nothing romantic between Daryl and Carol. If the guy would probably be the most jealous in this situation ISN’T? Well, that says a lot.

They talked a lot about how RK suddenly ended the comic book series, which discussion didn’t anything particularly important for TD in it.

Chris showed off a new TWD drop box you can buy online. It has a “Dixon Brothers Moonshine” mason jar.

Much like the music box, why do they so often bring up moonshine going on six season after Still aired? Could it be to remind us of something?

I also noticed that he showed the RV with umbrellas, and Alpha’s belt buckle, which is a snake eating its tail in an infinity symbol. All of those are symbols we can tie to Beth. After that, Chris just said, “and a whole bunch of other stuff.” I thought it was suspicious that he only showed those things.

This doesn’t have much to do with the special itself, but Chris held up a t-shirt with this picture on it:

And I had sort of an epiphany. I’m sure this has occurred to many of you already, but it hit me hard when watching the special. I think it’s because he called it a “Season 10 commemorative T-shirt.” Something about that made me realize that to “commemorate” S10, they put an X in the logo. That’s kind of a confirmation that the Xs we’ve always seen represent the number 10. The Xs are always related to Beth, and now here we are, going into S10. Just saying.

They also showed a sneak peek.

About the only thing I took from this is a parallel to S4. Just as in S4, Michonne was going out to search for the Governor all the time, and Daryl was concerned about that. Now it seems he suspects that Carol is secretly searching for Alpha in a similar way. And he’s concerned about that too. What does it mean? I don’t know yet. We’ll have to wait and see more of a context, but it’s always encouraging to see a parallel between the current season and one that Beth figured prominently in.

What didn’t they talk about? Well, lots of stuff. But @wdway pointed out something important. While they did say we’d see a lot of Daryl/Carol scenes this season, there was absolutely no mention of Donnie or Connie at all. Yes, we saw her in the trailer somewhat, but you’d think they would tease it a little more like they did last season. Nope. We’re pretty sure there’s nothing to worry about there. ;D

TTD:

I think TTD had even less stuff of note.

They did talk at length about Al and Isabelle’s relationship and how lovely it was and how most people hope Al will find Isabelle again. That’s encouraging because it’s a heavy foreshadow that Morgan’s group will run into the helicopter group again at some point. That alone doesn’t prove anything, but since we think perhaps Beth is with them, that would be a good thing for us.

They also put some focus on the song in the episode about the bear. If I can get around to it, I’m going to do an entire post on that song, because the “bear” isn’t the only important symbol in it. I definitely think tptb chose that song for a reason, and that reason is all the TD symbols it happens to contain. ;D

One thing that made me excited was an interview with Lenny where he said something would happen in this back half of the Fear season that will be really shocking and NO ONE will see it coming. No idea if that’s Beth (meh, probably not) but either way I get excited about stuff like that.

Finally (yes, this is really the last thing) the sneak peek for next week’s Fear is SUPER exciting. We see a bird at its nest (Beth = songbird). But the bird is red and yellow. It looks EXACTLY like a Phoenix. And if you listen to the voice over, it’s a man talking about how he wants Morgan’s group to kill him because he’s already been bitten. So it’s a discussion about suicide. Also something tied heavily to Beth.

I have more to say about the upcoming episode, but I’m going to give it its own post in a couple of days. But suffice it to say, I’m EXTREMELY excited for next week’s episode.

Yeah, I think that’s it. Like I said, nothing huge, but a few things worth mentioning. ;D

#beth greene #beth greene lives #beth is alive #beth is coming #td theory #td theories #team delusional #team defiane #beth is almost here #bethyl

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burlybanner · 5 years ago

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Fanfic Stats thingy

Fannic Stats! Fstats!

***

I was tagged! By the estimable @ellewritesfiction no less :D So if anyone else is reading, it’s proof I can actually finish one of these - hooray! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Author name: nina, ninamonkey or tess/tessmarker. I also have a few others, but they’re closer to my real name (or actually are my real name).

Fandoms I write for: Currently MCU, but back in the day I used to write in the Star Trek, X-Men (comics and movies), Firefly, and in other lesser known fandoms (*cough*TalesoftheGoldMonkey*cough*). I also wrote pieces pre-interwebs.

Where I post: AO3 now, but I used to post at fanfiction.net and I posted to my livejournal/dreamwidth accounts.

Most popular one shot: On Ao3? Probably Infundo. I think that’s received the most likes. I could’ve also said The Bigger Man, but I turned the one shot into a series.

Most popular multi-chapter story: Infundo Chronicles, or Twice the Man.

Favorite story I wrote: Funny you should ask that...it depends. Sometimes I write for causes or reasons. Sometimes I write for fun. Most times I tend to merge the two, and maybe I feel better about myself when I write a higher rated kink piece. I’m also reeeally critical about my writing, and what sounds “good” to some might’ve been something I didn’t initially like.

Right now, I guess Infundo, molecular gastronomy, Catch and Release, or something recent (haven’t posted those to Ao3 yet).

Story you were nervous to post: Any of my kink pieces! Lol! Usually I expect a lot of backdraft...it surprises me when people are more than encouraging and even touched by something I wrote.

How do you choose your titles: Sometimes I like the cadence of the title, or I’m doing some stupid pun. Or, it’s a metaphor for the piece. Or, I just want to sound sooper schmart. :P

Do you outline: Yes and no. If I’m plotting a lengthy piece, I do write out what I’d like to see. But if it’s a short piece I prefer a stream of consciousness method (with editing for later).

How many stories: Posted? I have no idea. More than 20 on Ao3, a few on tumblr that haven’t been to Ao3, a few on fanfic.net, some on livejournal, some actually published things (paid things). Hard to say, but let’s just say “a bunch” and not worry about the numbers. :D

Do you take prompts: Yes I do, but sometimes I don’t have time to complete them. Or, sometimes I started on ‘em and haven’t finished. I have one or two in the latter category.

Story you are most excited to write: I don’t know - when inspiration hits, I’m excited then and there. But writing is tough, man! It’s hard getting excited for something, and then realizing the fun thing has to be written by YOU. :P Seriously though, I love the art of writing. But I’m a terrible perfectionist and overthink most of what goes on paper. Stream of consciousness is the only way I can beat my mind to the punch so I don’t overthink. ;)

Tag Five Fanfic Authors to Answer These Questions: jeez, I hate this because I inevitably forget someone or someone else has gotten slammed. And there’s always someone I forget who needs to be recognized. So...if you’re reading this consider yourself tagged! And tag me, so that my lizard brain will remember you next time. And because I keep thinking I have to tag someone, here’s my tag list (and ignore me, if you’ve been taggled multiple times already): @ashnapalm, @featheredschist, @celtic7irish, @daftpunk-delorean, @ivebeenavengered

#ignore me if you've heard this one before

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bazypitchandsimonsnow · 6 years ago

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Watford Cove

Chapter 5: not so typical love song

Rating: T

Genre: Fluff/Angst

Word count: 5365

Chapter: 5/13 [All chapters]

Summary: Baz goes to Simon's house to work on the project.

Read on AO3

AN: So as some of you may know/remember, I work at an amusement park. I was supposed to work today but it's literally raining all day so the park is most certainly closed. Which means I can post early! Hooray! This is personally one of my favourite chapters. I enjoyed writing it quite a bit, though I had trouble writing Baz's emotions. The boy is a weird self destructive mess and it's difficult getting that across lol. Finally, we learn a bit more about Simon. Plus some fluff, of course. Hope you all like it!

Tagging: @wayward-son-61 @lunar-lover394

———————————————-

“Where are you going?”

I lazily turn towards Mordelia. She’s standing next to me with her arms behind her back, rocking on her heels. The picture of an adorable, unassuming child. You can hardly tell she's a brat.

“Out,” I reply.

“Mum says you go out too much.”

I do feel a bit bad about that. Daphne does legitimately care about my well being. “Well, you can tell her I’m not going out drinking. She can stop worrying.”

“Drinking what?”

I sigh. Right, she is still seven years old. “Nevermind. I’m just going to do schoolwork at someone’s house. I might be home for supper or not, I don’t know.”

“Okay. When can I ride on your motorbike?”

I smirk and buckle up my helmet. “Let's wait until you can reach the pedals. Then we’ll talk.”

Mordelia pouts pathetically. I ruffle her hair, which only makes her pout become an impressive scowl. I flip down my visor with flare and rev my engine. I give Mordelia a salute before driving off down the country road.

Simon’s house isn’t that far from mine, actually. Maybe a twenty minute ride, the way I break the speeding laws. I zip down the hill at ludicrous speeds, and keep that pace up across the country roads until they become moderately paved. Soon I’m on the sparse outskirts of Watford Cove, not the bloody fucking wilderness like mine. A much nicer place to live in my opinion.

Only a few minutes in, I arrive at the address Simon texted me. The house is actually quite posh. It’s not the terrible extravagance of the Pitch mansion of course, but it’s nice. Red brick, white shutters, some fancy curtains. There's a silver mailbox at the end of the drive with "Salisbury" painted on it in annoyingly bright green letters. The handwriting looks childish, as in a child probably wrote it. The initials "LS" are under the words like an artist's signature. Hm, interesting.

I park my bike in the driveway then make my way to the oak door. The doorbell chimes deep and loud. There’s some steps and soon it swings open. Oh. This is...not Simon. Because Simon is not an older greying-blonde woman.

This woman reminds me of portraits my own grandmother. She was also tall, straight backed, and respectful looking. But my grandmother never showed an ounce of happiness. This woman has a very kind smile on her face though, her wrinkles more from the expression rather than age.

“Hello,” she says kindly. “May I help you?”

“Um, I’m here to see Simon.”

Both her blue eyes and smile widen. “Oh right, Simon said you were coming. Simon! Your friend is here!”

There’s a crashing sound, like someone falling on the ground. Rapid steps come down the stairs until a beaming Simon jumps to the bottom.

“Hi Baz,” he says breathlessly. “Glad you found it.”

“I have Google Maps, Salisbury,” I deadpan, but with a smirk.

“Oh yeah, right, let’s go.” He motions for me to follow him inside. I nod to the woman. She looks up towards the stairs, hands on her hips.

“Simon,” she says with mock accusation, “are you not going to introduce me to your friend?”

Simon freezes halfway up the steps and whips his head around. “Oh right! Sorry, Gran. Um, Gran, this is Baz. Baz, this is my grandmother, Ruth Salisbury.”

I reach out my hand. “Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Salisbury.”

Her brows rise up in surprise. I suppose she didn’t expect politeness from a guy wearing a black Ramones shirt, leather jacket, and ear piercings. But she still takes my hand. “Pleasure to meet you as well, Baz. You two have fun.”

Simon scoffs. “It’s school, Gran. We’re not supposed to have fun.”

“School can be fun if you try, darling. Maths has made me very good at cards.”

“And you fleece Mrs. Jones every week at your games, I know. We gotta go.”

“Yes yes, go do your schoolwork. Don’t break anything.”

Simon and Ms. Salisbury smile good naturedly at each other as we go upstairs. He runs at a breakneck pace, nearly tripping over the green carpet. I follow more slowly, looking over the walls. Unlike my house, there are many personalised things. Landscape art, funny knick knacks, and some pictures. There’s one of Ms. Salisbury with an older man, who I assume to be her husband. Next to that, there’s the couple again but in their younger years. A boy and girl stand in the foreground, both as blonde as Ms. Salisbury. The last one at the top of the stairs is obviously the two kids as teenagers, grinning with arms around each other. The woman looks weirdly familiar. Her freckles, they remind me of...stars.

“Baz, c’mon!” Simon yells.

“Yes, yes, I’m coming. You’re quite bossy today, darling,” I say teasingly. I hear his gasp, then fall into a coughing fit.

“I-I just want to start working.” His voice is still a bit hoarse.

“Alright.”

I saunter down to the hall Simon went down. I step into his room, and...well, I’m not sure what else I expected. The bed and desk look old, but everything else is new. The floral blanket, the multicoloured rug, the IKEA shelf filled with comics, all quite fresh. The walls are bright blue and covered in posters. Troye Sivan, Lana del Ray, Hayley Kiyoko, and assorted pastel coloured art. Equally pastel clothes are spread out across the floor. The whole room is so...bright. It sort of hurts my eyes. I’d prefer everything a bit darker. I guess I like Simon’s colour palette in small doses, just not all in one room.

I look up. Simon’s at his desk. I finally notice that he’s wearing a new shirt. It’s like the sunflower one, but pink and with bright red rosebuds instead. It works with the copper undertones of his hair. He looks perfect in it.

“Pretty,” I whisper.

“What?” Simon asks sweetly.

Fuck, I hope my face isn’t as red as his shirt right now. “Um, nothing.”

He looks confused for only a moment then shrugs. “Okay. I woke up late and forgot breakfast, so I'm starving. Want some of this? For brain food and stuff.” He holds up a mint aero bar. My smile is instantaneous.

“Sure. Mint aeros are my favourite.”

He grins to his ears. “Mine too!

I sit in the chair next to him. He breaks off a large piece for me. We eat the chocolate at the same time, but Simon gets some around his mouth. (Of course he's a messy eater.) I want to slowly lick it off his cheek then kiss him so hard we run out of breath. I quickly look away to resist temptation. “So, you got the project up?”

“Oh yeah!” He turns back to his laptop. I see that the desk is covered in scribbly note paper, candy wrappers, and nail polish bottles. He’s got almost every colour in his preferred pastel shade. He’s actually wearing the pink one right now. It matches his shirt. I have to keep myself from making an out loud comment again.

“So I’ve started making the powerpoint,” Simon says, bringing up the application. “And I think we should start with Watership Down. The actual place. Cause it’s like, the most important setting right?”

I bite my tongue, because I...disagree. Strongly. Watership Down should be in the middle, because it is the end of their first journey and the beginning of the next. It’s important to illustrate that, I think. But he doesn’t know I would think that.

“Sure, cool,” I mutter.

“O-Okay. Then, uh, for characters, we should start with General Woundwort.”

Wrong, very wrong. He’s important, sure, but others should be discussed first. Maybe Hazel, Bigwig, or Fiver. Fuck, Bluebell should come before Woundwort.

“Yeah, that’s fine.” I hope there isn’t a strain in my voice.

“Awesome! And I thought for analysis, we could talk about the archetypes and shit.”

No! Archetypes are Jungian! We’re supposed to do Freudian! Oh, fuck it.

“Give me that,” I hiss, snatching the laptop away. Simon blinks at me confused. I type furiously, barely thinking really, just spouting out the knowledge I have onto the slides. Some of the stuff is very smart but not well put, so I redo the wording. Not good with words, just like Simon said. I don’t know how long it takes, but when I’m done, I put the laptop back on the desk with my arms crossed.

“There,” I say curtly.

Simon looks through it, jaw falling open wider and wider with every slide. I shift away. Christ, this is embarrassing.

“Holy shit,” Simon whispers. I wait for him to start laughing, or yelling because I change his work. But he just turns to me with big awe filled eyes. “You’re...really smart.”

My cheeks must be as red as tomatoes now. I scoff and look at the Hayley Kiyoko poster. “Yeah, whatever.”

“No, no, I mean it, Baz. This is bloody brilliant! You’re super smart!” His brow furrows. “Why do you never show up to class? You could be getting As in like, everything.”

I press my lips together, digging my nails into my bicep. “I don’t care about school or grades. That’s all.”

“Really? You just, don’t care?”

“No, I don’t.”

Simon sighs, and I hate how close to pity it sounds. I don’t need his pity or anyone else’s. I made my choice a long time ago, and I don’t regret it. Well, I mostly don’t regret it. Certainly don’t regret because of where I’m going when term is done. Not at all...

“So, uh,” Simon says rapidly, obviously trying to break the forming tension, “I'm also mostly done the drawings. I’ll scan them later and put them in the presentation if you like them.”

He pulls out a sketchbook from his desk and flips through the pages. He shoves it in my face once he’s found the right one, making me jolt back in my chair. I snatch it from him.

“Christ, Salisbury, let me actually look,” I chuckle.

“Oh, sorry, sorry.”

I look at the picture, and it’s my turn to be awestruck. It’s...amazing. Rough, raw, a bit messy, but amazing. He’s captured Watership Down in just pencil. Sure, it’s just a hill, but Simon has drawn it from the perspective of the rabbits, so it looks looming and majestic. There are little shapes at the top, and I realise it’s a few of the rabbits looking out into the distance. A cute and perfect addition.

“Wow, this is incredible,” I say with absolute reverence.

Simon blinks at me. He seems genuinely surprised. “R-Really?”

“Yes. You’re very talented, Simon.”

“Oh, uh, well, thanks. I’m...really glad you think so.” He fiddles with his fingers nervously. “There’s a-a couple more if you want to see them. Three pages after.”

I flip through a few more pages. There are a lot of rough, abstract sketches. They look more like feelings than specific things. Waves of smoke, angry scribbles of pencil, over and over. He must do that a lot. Eventually, I land on what I think I'm supposed to see. It's obviously Fiver, based on the photo he showed me. But it's not an exact replica. It's a gorgeous interpretation. He's emphasized Fiver's large, sad, all knowing eyes. You can almost see everything terrifying and wonderful happening in them. To say I’m impressed doesn’t really cover it.

I go to the next page, and I immediately recognise it as a scene from the animated movie. When El Ahrairah, the first rabbit, was given physical gifts to survive predators from their fictitious god Frith. This one is in colour, and somehow even more stylised than the movie. El Ahrairah himself is a deep rich brown with grey loops, the sun is swirl of orange and yellow, and the sky is ripples of vibrant blue. The same colour as his eyes.

“These,” I say, “are perfect, Simon.”

Simon chuckles nervously, fiddling with his fingers. “I’m glad you think so. Think Miss Possibelf will approve?”

“If she doesn’t, she’s completely incompetent. And I don’t think that’s true.” I absentmindedly turn to the next page. It’s the start of another unfinished drawing. It’s of someone’s face. Someone with sharp cheekbones and dark wavy hair. Wait, is that-

Simon snatches the book and quickly flips it closed. He hides half his scarlet face behind the leather cover for a long moment, until he nervously coughs and lowers it. “Okay, good,” he stutters. “Glad you think so. I, uh, guess we’re done now. Man, we really could just do most of this over text.” Mother of God, must he keep doing that hair tuck? It’s torture.

“I suppose that's true," I chuckle.

"Wanna hang out?" He asks very quickly, gripping his sketchbook with ghost white knuckles.

I shouldn't. Fuck, I really shouldn't. I should go home, avoid him, keep my toxic self far away from Simon. But fucking hell, I'm weak for this boy, and just weak in general.

"Sure." My voice stays impressively neutral. "Any ideas?"

Simon twists his lips, looking around the brightly coloured room. His eyes drift down to my hands and he smiles mischievously. “I could redo your nails.”

I look down at my hands. Well, my nails are definitely chipped. I forgot to repaint them a few days ago. I look back at him with a raised brow. “I doubt you have a bottle of my ‘Chanel Le Vernis in Gris Obscur’, Salisbury.”

“Nah, definitely no Chanel. But I got some pretty good stuff from the drugstore.” He lifts up some obviously cheap but pretty nail varnish bottles. They’re all his pastels colours though.

“Not really my style.”

He shrugs. “Maybe you’d like to try something new?”

I bite the corner of my mouth. The colours hurt my eyes a bit. But he looks so adorable with that hopeful grin and glint in his eyes. I sigh, and put my left hand out. “Very well. I want your darkest shade though.”

Simon literally bounces with excitement. “Awesome! So, uh, how about...” He messes around with the bottles, almost dropping a few. Eventually he settles on a pale blue. “This one, and,” he holds up a unused looking dark grey, “this one? We can alternate.”

“Hm, sure. That grey doesn’t really match your style, though.”

He shrugs. “Eh, came with the set. Glad it did. It, uh, matches your eyes.” He looks pointedly at the desk instead of my face. That’s good though. I don’t want him to see the blush that’s spread across my cheeks. “Now gimme your right hand.”

I do as he says, placing it on the desk. He puts down some paper towel then pick up his nail polish remover and cotton balls. I have the exact same supplies at home. He reaches towards my hand, but quickly hesitates. He’s shaking actually. I can’t blame him. Every time we’ve touched, it’s been accidental or very quickly. This is different. This isn't a shoulder pat or playful shove. This is long and sustained and purposeful. And I may not be showing it, but I’m just as nervous.

“I can take it off myself,” I say quickly, reaching for the bottle. But Simon pulls it away.

“No no, I’m good. Just sit there and look...badass, alright?”

My lip twitches up. He’s so sweet. I leave my hand where it is. “Very well.”

Slowly, shakily, he slips his finger under mine. His skin is callused but still much smoother than my rough palms. It feels weird, but very nice. Almost electric. He dabs the cotton ball on the nail, rubbing off all my high end black nail polish. Huh, they look odd. it’s been awhile since my nails have been clean. After wiping them dry, he starts on with the blue. It’s a nice colour. Not something I would pick, but I can see the appeal. Simon drags the brush against my nail slowly but surely, making sure the coat is even.

“Hm,” I say, “you’re good at this.”

“Thanks,” he chuckles. “Self taught. A lot of trial and error, y’know? Took me ages to figure out how to do my right hand.”

“I learned from YouTube videos. Those makeup gurus know their shit.”

“Huh, smart. Oh, y’know what.” He stops painting and spins in his chair. Even with his back to me, I now he’s fiddling with his phone. Suddenly, the honeyed voice of Lana Del Rey is resonating through the room. He spins back with a grin.

“Your weird music is necessary?” I raise an eyebrow for sarcastic emphasis. Simon chuckles.

“Yeah, helps me concentrate. And it’s part of my continuing effort to convert you to good music.”

“Oh, is that your grand mission?”

“Yup! Slowly pull you away from all those screamy boys with bad haircuts and towards the beauty of Troye and Lana.”

I scoff. “You keep trying that, darling.”

He gives me a shy but sort of playful look from under his long eyelashes. “I certainly will...darling.”

Oh shit. I hope my complexion hides my blush enough. I smile back and try to look calm, hiding the storm in my chest.

We switch between chatting and companionable silence. Though Simon is never truly quiet. He hums along with the song, or makes noises of contemplation and frustration while trying to get my nails right. His hands slowly get less shaky, which helps. When we’re not talking, I take the opportunity to just watch his expression. How he sticks his tongue out in concentration, and his brow pulls together, and his face adorable pinches together when he gets something wrong. He always tries his best to fix it though, even with his clumsy fingers. It’s really sweet. Just like him.

I'm so unbelievably fucked.

“And...there!” He pulls back with a flourish. “Topcoat and everything. What do you think?”

I examine my hands. Huh, the blue is actually nice on me. And he’s right, the grey matches my eyes. It’s very well done. Maybe black isn’t the only colour I should use. I look up. Simon is staring at me wide eyed, chewing on his lip, leg jittering.

“It’s wonderful,” I say. “You did a marvelous job, Salisbury. Maybe you have a future as a nail artist.”

His nervous expression breaks, thankfully. I’ve found I prefer his grin to his genuine agitation. Blushing smile? Adorable. Wide eyed leg jittering? Not so much. “T-Thanks. Maybe...you could do mine sometime?”

Our eyes meet, and there’s no deception there. He’s always so genuine. It’s amazing. “Sure," I say before thinking. "If you can learn to like black.”

She shrugs. “Well, if you can learn to like blue, I guess I can try black.”

He grins, and I grin back. There’s a stretch of silence. It builds between us, making the air thicker and thicker. I’m torn between what I want to say and what I should. That I want more from this, more than just winks and smiles and “darlings”. But I know it can’t work. Simon should know that. I should tell him, all of it. But...he'll hate me. For not telling him about Switzerland, for using him like a plaything, for being an utterly stupid reckless prick. Can I handle him truly hating me?

“Simon, love! It’s nearly supper! Are you and Baz done your work?” Ms. Salisbury’s voice carries quite well. It jolts me from my depressive pit. Simon sighs and leans out towards the door.

“Yeah! Be down in a minute, Gran.” He looks at me, and I swear I see genuine sadness. “Looks like it’s time to say goodbye.”

I try to hide my own disappointment. “Yeah, looks like it.”

He bounces out of his chair, then offers his hand. I inhale sharply. Did not expect that. But after only a second of hesitation, I take it. He pulls me to my feet with ease. I’m still disturbed by how much his strength excites me.

“C’mon, let’s get you back on your motorbike, Pitch.”

“Should get you on it one day,” I say under my breath.

“What?”

I straighten up, hands in my jacket pockets. “Nothing, Salisbury.”

We walk down the stairs quickly. Well, Simon more jumps down them. He’s a never ending ball of energy. Ms. Salisbury is at the bottom.

“How was the work, you two?” she asks sweetly.

“Wonderful!” Simon chirps. “Talked about bunnies and stuff, and Baz let me do his nails.”

My brow shoots up to my hairline. I can’t believe he’s so open about this. If I told my father or Daphne the same, they would not say anything at best and lecture me at worst. But Ms. Salisbury looks positively elated by Simon’s words. “Oh, marvellous. Finally you can practice on someone other than me, love.”

Simon rolls his eye. “Yeah, like you don’t like it.”

“Of course. But it’s good you have another guinea pig. May I see your work?”

Simon looks at me in silent question. I shrug in response, then hold out my hand for his grandmother. She flips the glasses down from her head. “Amazing job, Simon. You’ve gotten so much better. And it looks great on you, Baz.”

“Thank you, Ms. Salisbury.”

She pulls away, waving dismissively. “Please, call me Ruth. Now, Baz, will you be staying for dinner?”

“Uh.” I turn to Simon. “Am I staying for dinner, Simon?”

Simon’s face turns red. “Oh, sure, if you want.”

I shrug. “I’m certainly in no rush to get home, and if it’s no trouble.”

“Oh it’s none at all,” Ms. Salis- Ruth says, waving her hand dismissively.

“Then I guess I’ll stay for supper.”

Ruth claps her hand once loudly. “Wonderful! Let me put out another setting.”

She saunters off to the kitchen. I decide to actually take off my jacket and boots and stay awhile. Simon leans in close to my ear, making my pulse spike.

“Hope you like roast beef,” he whispers. “It’s the only thing Gran knows how to cook well. Grandpa was a chef, and she’s been on her own since he died, so she’s never had to cook anything else. But she’s been learning more since I’ve got here.”

I shrug like he does. “I think I’ll live.”

“Good to hear.”

Simon leads me to the small dining room table. When I go to the left side, Simon grabs my hand and drags me to the right. I jolt slightly. Wow, that’s bold for him. Not that I’m complaining. I sit next to him as Ruth brings out a platter of delicious smelling meat and mash potatoes. Simon immediately shovels the food on his plate, licking his lips like a starving animal. I on the other hand take only a few slices delicately just like my mother taught me. But Ruth gives me an odd look.

“Are you not hungry, Baz?” she asks.

“Um, no, I am,” I reply slowly.

“Then please, take as much as you like. I always make a lot because of Simon’s endless appetite.”

Simon rolls his eyes, speaking with a mouth full of roast beef. “I’m a growing boy!”

“Growing monster more like it,” Ruth chuckles.

Huh, okay. I decide to be polite and take some more. Dinner proper starts, and it's...weird. My family is never this talkative at supper. We’re mostly silent and sullen. But the Salisburies are the exact opposite. Ruth and Simon chat, though Simon has trouble responding through all the the food in his mouth. (The boy has zero manners. It’s adorable.)

“So, Baz,” Ruth asks, facing me, “how’s school for you? I’ve only ever heard about it from Simon and Miss Penelope.”

No one’s ever asked my opinion of school either. I shrug. “It’s alright. Not my favourite place to be, of course. I think English is my favourite subject.” I tap Simon’s foot under the table. His breath hitches slightly, and he flashes me only a small smile. But it’s enough.

“Glad to hear so. Simon loves English too. He’s always eager to get to first period for Miss Possibelf’s class every morning.”

I flick my eyes over to Simon. His cheeks are flushed as he bites into his roast beef.

“Hm, glad to hear I’m not the only one who loves literature.” I let my voice drawl a bit, hopefully enough for Simon to notice but not Ruth. He doesn’t look up from his food, but I feel his toe tap my foot. And once again, it’s enough. Everything Simon does seems to be enough for me.

“I’m just glad Simon’s adjusting to Watford,” Ruth sighs. “It’s not easy moving schools most of the way through the year.”

Simon sighs in return. They sound almost exactly alike. Though Simon is more exasperated. “I told you, Gran, I’m fine. My grades are much better than last term.”

“There’s a good reason for that.” Ruth aggressively stabs her beef, and Simon looks sad as he nods slightly. This is the only crack in Ruth's kind demeanour I’ve seen all day. It’s strange, and the curious brainiac in me wants to know more. But the sensible part knows to just keep eating my food.

“Hey,” Simon chirps, “did I tell you about the kid who gave himself a wedgie in gum class yet?”

Ruth’s playful smile immediately returns. “No, I don’t believe you have.”

“Oh man, it was hilarious! Baz you’ll love this too.”

I lean my cheek into my palm. “I’m sure I will.”

Simon launches into the rambling anecdote, using mostly weird noises and illustrative hand gestures instead of words. Ruth and I both laugh along genuinely. This is the first time I’ve enjoyed a family meal in ages. It may be unusual, but it’s certainly not unenjoyable.

Soon enough, dinner is over, and Ruth brings out dessert. They’re sour cherry scones from Pritchard Bakery. Simon takes three immediately and starts slathering butter all over them.

“You like scones?” I ask mockingly.

Simon nods, scone crumbs all around his mouth. “Uh-huh. Gran got me some my first day here. They’re absolutely incredible.”

“My cousin owns the bakery, you know.”

His eyes go impossibly wide. “Really?! Could you get me some free samples?”

I shrug, a playful smile on my face. “Maybe.”

“Simon, you eat enough, you don’t need any more,” Ruth kindly berates. Simon frowns.

“There’s never enough scones, Gran.”

Ruth and I exchange an understanding look. Maybe I will bring him to see Cousin Pritchard before I go though. Something to make him happy before I’m gone.

Soon enough, Simon’s eaten all the scones, the dishes are done, and it’s my time to go. I’m a gentleman, I know when to take my leave. Simon and Ruth walk me out of the house.

“It was lovely having you, Baz,” Ruth says. And I have to admit, I’m a bit taken aback. Most parents and/or guardians aren’t this friendly to me. Dev and Niall’s parents barely acknowledge my existence nowadays, and they’ve known me since I was a baby. It’s a warm feeling I never thought I’d miss.

“Thank you for having me, Ruth,” I reply, smiling graciously.

“Anytime. Simon, feel free to invite him over again.”

Simon smiles sweetly at me, cheeks unabashedly scarlet. “Yeah, okay. Maybe we should meet up before the presentation on Wednesday?”

I nod, hoping my cheeks aren’t as bright. “I think I’d like that.”

Because I would. I regretfully very much would.

“Awesome! See you later!”

My lip twitches up without thinking. “See you.”

I get my helmet on. I don’t rev my engine as loud as usual to be respectful. Simon waves with his entire arm, while Ruth’s looks more like the queen. I salute in return. (That seems to be my thing now. I’ve embraced it.)

As I drive back towards my home, my mind stays with the Salisburies. With nail polish, roast beef, and a sense of peaceful happiness that lingers in me long after the house is in the distance.

I get to the Pitch hill and just sit there, looking up at the looming little bastard. I know what I’m supposed to do. Go back to all the misery there. But fuck that. I turn to the left, not back towards Simon’s, but at least somewhere my father isn’t. Somewhere I can keep this feeling for a little longer. And maybe get really pissed.

———————————————-

“Basilton! Where have you been?!”

If I didn’t already have a migraine, I’d assume my father’s voice had just given me one. Going on a two day bender will do that to you. I stop walking but don’t turn around. Honestly, I look like a wreck right now, and I don’t want him to see it.

“Away,” I say curtly.

“Away where?! We haven’t seen you in days! No calls, no mail. We’ve been worried sick!”

I groan and turn on my heels finally. To my utter surprise, he looks genuinely concerned. His eyes are wide and his hair is disheveled, like he’s been running his hands through it. Huh. Actually worried about where I’ve been. That’s a first.

“Well, I’m home now,” I sigh. “Happy?”

“Certainly not.” He puts his hands on his hips like a pissed off school teacher. “I’ve been getting calls from your school. You’ve missed almost all of your classes, including tests and projects. I thought we had an agreement.”

I whip around, scowling with as much menace as I can muster with a hangover. “No, you gave me an ultimatum. And I refuse to be threatened into doing what you want, Father dearest.”

I start stomping away again, but we Grimms refuse to not have the last word. “Are you sure you haven’t just been...distracted, Basilton?”

I stop halfway up the stairs. The tone of his voice could imply many things, but I have a sinking feeling I know what he means. I chuckle, shaking my head. “Daphne told you about Tuesday, I suppose.”

“That you brought a boy over to our house without our knowledge? Yes. And I find it a bit disrespectful that-”

“That I what?!” I yell, probably louder than I should, considering it’s late at night and I have four younger siblings. “Dare to be gay?! Sorry it’s harder to ignore my sexuality when I’m actually acting on it.”

My father takes a deep breath, something he always does when he’s trying to keep his slipping composure. “Basilton, that is not what I meant.”

“Oh really? So you’re actually okay with me bringing guys around? Maybe I’ll start having big gay nightclub parties in the receiving room.”

I can see my father losing his cool. Bit by bit, his perfect British man composure is slipping. It’s the effect I certainly have these days. “That would not be appropriate, Basil. And I merely meant that maybe this ‘Simon’ is distracting you from your studies and causing your poor grades.”

For a second, I don’t know whether to laugh or be furious. Fire bubbles in my gut, my fingers curling on the bannister. Yup, let’s go with righteous fury. I stomp down the stairs and push my face into his.

“No,” I growl, “Simon is not at fault. You are. You are the catalyst for all the things I’m doing now, Your bullheadedness, your pride, your prejudi-”

“Oh for God’s sake, Basil!” He roars. “For once in your life take some goddamn responsibility for your own actions!”

I step back a bit. I haven’t seen him this outwardly angry in a year, but he’s practically seething. If he was the kind of man to throw a punch, he would have just clocked me. But instead he just stares me down in an attempt to intimidate. That won’t work.

“Fuck you,” I mutter, turning on my heels and stomping towards the door.

“Where are you going?” he calls after me.

“Out!” I turn to glare at him. “And I’ll be back when I feel like it!”

I make sure to slam the door very loudly, hoping my message is clear. I know exactly where I want to go. And who I want to see.

———————————————-

AN: Is Baz being a total brat here? Yes. Is his bratiness sorta justified? Also yes. Things are complicated. And finally we meet Ruth! I loved reading everyone's comments speculating about Simon's home life cause this was planned from the start lol. But why is Simon living with Ruth? Well, that will be explained shortly. Tune in next time for answers :)

Chapter title is from "Alfie's Song" by Bleachers.

#carry on #snowbaz #simon snow #baz pitch #ruth salisbury #fluff #angst #punk/pastel #mysnowbazfanfic

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