#i need to stay off reddit people are fucking wild over there

[fiona-fififi]

"Eddie has to do so much work on himself before he'll be ready for a relationship, but Buck has grown so much and is ready for a serious relationship now, so they wouldn't make sense together."

Are you serious right now?

Buck dated a man for six months, they somehow barely knew one another in the end, he full body cringed at the idea of being in love with said man, then he basically called him a gay savior and asked him to move in.

If being perfectly mentally well is our measure, Buck is not ready for shit. Please.

That man wants to be in love so bad he is willing to sacrifice every part of himself to keep a partner he barely even knows and who clearly doesn't know him. He is terrified of dying alone and being left behind and that manifests as desperate clinging to any vague prospect that appears before him.

That is not healthy behavior.

They both need to work out their shit. But there is no reason they can't do that together.

Because even people who are not perfectly mentally healthy deserve love, actually.

[martialartslover7]

Weird Wednesday Headcanon: Inner Sakura is a STAND!

Let's be honest, guys, the only reason why the female characters in Naruto got held back so much in their overall potential and fighting prowess, was because of Kishimoto's, very likely, and I mean, VERY LIKELY (we don't even really know, all I am saying is, everything that happened so far in his material, and some of the things he said in interviews about the female characters, doesn't do him any favors), underlying misogyny, since...

Off-topic, but c'mon. Demon Slayer would like to have a word with him. The entire IP was written by a female mangaka, and yet she managed to make both males AND females in her story, equally as interesting and compelling. Sure, it was more on the simplistic and straightforward side, it's Shonen after all, but it was really well done, regardless. And even the "housewife" archetype was done in an appealing fashion, with Tengen's three wives, who were more than stay-at-home housewives, they were his bodyguards too, they kept active to not lose sight of their, now sadly, physically handicapped husband. Sometimes, you don't need to make every single aspect of your IP so deep and philosophical to be good. The point, "more is less", exists for a reason. And once again, because this is a mentality I kept seeing on Reddit and Twitter, just to remind you all, who will try to get all smart on me:

THIS. IS. FICTION. YOU CAN WRITE, ANYTHING YOU WANT! NOTHING LIMITS YOU! ESPECIALLY NOT WHO ARE YOU!

Like, this is fucking ridiculous, you really mean to tell me, that, just because you have a penis, all of a sudden, you can't relate to the problems of women, as though, they are an entirely different species from you? WHAT NONSENSE IS THIS? If you write, you write, nothing should be limiting you, unless maybe, you tackle serious, real-life problems, then it's best advised to do a little research first, before tackling them in a tactful way, but aside from that, NOTHING should hold you back.

Anyway, venting over, back to the topic at hand.

You know what'd be a serious buff to Sakura, overall? Outside of gaining access to the 8 Gates, thanks to Rock Lee and Guy?

...taming Inner Sakura, and turning that joke character into a dangerous weapon. And the way it works, at least if you were to go off of what the 2000s PS2 era was showing off with her, Inner Sakura is an inner, astral projection, manifesting in the real world, and making you eat her dust. Not convinced? Check it out:

C'mon, people! There is no doubt about it. Sakura. Is a STAND USER. And that stand of hers, is like if you were to fuse the lady that King Kong kidnaps, with himself. It just makes you ask: Why wasn't regularly used by Sakura? It could just be a unique extension to her Genjutsu toolkit, in that, her Genjutsu, is so painful, it has real-life effects on you. Basically, her anxiety and delusions are so strong, along with her wild, livid imagination, her mind ends up creating this astral projection of her inner turmoil. And with that, Genin Sakura, buffed to hell. And before becoming a healer, she is mostly a wrecking ball.

All she needs to do, is catch you in her Genjutsu raidus, and you're toast. She will toss and punch you around, like a little kid, venting its frustrations on its plushie.

Just imagine how devastating that technique might look for reals, and the reason I am saying this...

...mentally replace Jotaro with Sakura, and just picture Inner Sakura bombarding, her opposition, who might be, hypothetically, Kabuto, who is tormenting Naruto from afar, so Sakura decides:

Kate Higgins. Chie Nakamura. I will pay you, real-life money, just to replicate this, while replacing the ORA with CHA.

PEACE.

[positivelybeastly]

Did you see Gillen and Brevoort said Beast (used to be/could have been) was the most romantic x man? Veeeeery interesting. Gillen seemingly wanted to redeem beast in SWORD through his love for Abigail but feels that’s been taken off the table at this point. If only there were some other person he held near and dear to his heart who might be able to give him both love and time to grow past this unfortunate moment

"I'm through with love hangovers,

It's best that I stay sober.

No rolling in the clover,

No Gretna Green trip over.

No honeymoon in Paris,

I only feel embarrassed for the,

Cool cats,

The charmed kittens,

Both smitten by the love songs

That he's written.

Caught in the sights of a,

Deadly sniper:

The magic piper of love.

The magic piper of love.

Of love, of love!"

Anon, you beat me to this - the instant I saw that thread on Reddit, I was just besides myself with jimmy legs because I wanted to get back home and post about it immediately.

SO. CONTEXT.

Over at AIPT Comics, they have this segment called X-Men Mondays, where they'll send out various themed questions to people at the X-office to answer, usually as just kind of a fun, fuckabout sort of thing.

Today's was Valentine's Day themed, because, well, it's the 12th of February, there's not a ton else to talk about.

The question naturally came up.

AIPT: Who, in your opinion, is the most romantic X-character? (And why?)

Everyone gets a look in, from Xavier to Wolverine to Havok to Mystique, but. Okay, so, like. Kieron Gillen answered four times in this thread, and most of it was just funny answers, but in response to THIS question, he said this in response:

Kieron Gillen: You know, Beast in the timeline where my S.W.O.R.D. got past issue 5 would have been good for this, but the timeline we ended up in had (er) somewhat less romance interested Beast. Perhaps someone could go back in time and try and do something about it. “We have to time travel to save Beast!” “Why? Is it all his genocides?” “No, he has to carry on devotedly making blueberry muffins.”

. . . . . . . .

Ladies, gentleman, non-binary individuals. S.W.O.R.D was cancelled 14 years ago. It died in 2009. But Kieron Gillen refuses to stop being salty about it, and you know what? You know what? Fucking good for him, because I'm fucking salty about it too!!!

But, like, this is such a wild answer to me! Just, unprompted, one of the premier comic book talents of the day just being like, hey, fuck you all, I really liked my little Beast-Brand OTP book. This man is one of my people, I know this. Well. I already knew this, to be fair, I got him to sign my trade paperback copy of that exact series, but that was over a decade ago, and he's STILL flying that flag???

HE REMEMBERS THE MUFFINS.

LOOK AT MY FUCKING OOC TAG.

IT'S OUTOFMUFFINS.

Then Brevoort, who, by the way, is the incoming editor for the X-Men books, said this:

Tom Brevoort: Back in the day, it was the Beast, before he threw over human needs and desires in favor of science. Nightcrawler also had some moves, but he doesn’t really use them as often anymore. So these days, Gambit is the clear winner. Angel wants to be, but he’s mostly all talk. But Gambit thinks about this stuff.

These are.

Interesting comments.

Beast literally could not be less relevant to the wider Krakoan story arc. X-Force exists in its own little bubble of black ops and body horror, and yet, unprompted, both one of the headline members of the talent (who has made sure to put Hank and Abigail in books for no real reason other than he likes them) and the incoming editor are both like, y'know, Hank was a real romantic back in the day. There's some affection there. It gives me hope. It makes me smile.

Now, I hasten to point out, this is not #WonderbeastConfirmed. We have no idea how these last two issues of X-Force are going to play out. But it is.

Interesting.

Oh, I also want to take a moment to call out Anthony Oliveira, who said this:

Anthony Oliveira: If you want the truth, you go to Emma. But nobody wants the truth. So they go to Jean, who can throw you a reality TV and ice cream pity party like you wouldn’t believe. She has those top-of-the-line flowy pajama pants that facilitate conversation, you know? Worst is Hank McCoy, who has been giving bad advice for decades before his war criminal era. One time he took Angelo Espinosa on a car trip that bummed me out so bad I’m still thinking about it 30 years later.

THAT bummed you out, bro?

Pssh, okay, dude.

Anyway.

Kieron Gillen remains my guy.

[thephantomcasebook]

These fans are mad that the writers are lame af because ain't no way they've never imagined they wouldn't do characters dirty for no reason before lol

In all honesty ...

I've never seen anyone or anything get so goddamn feral, so quickly, in my life, than the HOTD fandom did.

We all sort of eased back into the franchise at first after being incredibly let down and betrayed. Then from 1x03-1x05 it was like being a part of the GOT fandom again with funny memes and joking around. People slowly falling in love with Alicent and kinda liking young Rhaenyra. All of us agreeing that Matt Smith is a great actor.

Then, around 1x06 to current day, everyone just lost their goddamn mind.

Suddenly there's this weird cult like hate or adoration of Alicent. Fucking Rhaenyra stans out here screaming the condoning for the murder of children and the need for it. You can't even praise Jaehaera - a sweet and innocent little girl - and wish that she get better treatment without some creepy losers shitting themselves in anger over it.

I was on discord earlier and I was showing them the kind of deranged asks that people send into my inbox and it was a large topic of conversation between people - some who may or may not work on HOTD in some capacity or another - about the level of vitriol and rage that cropped up out of absolutely nowhere.

Reddit is a hive of buzzing angry hornets at the best of times, but the level of hatred and anger in the ASoIaF fandom is just unreal and everyone who is a fan and even people who work on the show are noticing it.

I've got this major fucking loser we were making fun of today who is so fucking pissed off because I have a pet theory of A+C=D and they're so angry and offended by it that they hate read my blog and act like one of those sad pathetic "Reply guys" on twitter at every post.

There's also this person who we tracked down and whose blog we all had a good laugh at reading, who sends absolute vitriolic asks because they refuse to believe that Jessica Brown Findlay was originally cast to play Alys Rivers. There is all sorts of evidence from both Olivia Cooke and Phia Saban following her on Instagram, to the head costume designer and several directors from season 2 following her on instagram, to her even liking several instagram posts from the Costume Designer about cast fittings before someone on twitter noticed and she unliked everything.

But still, this person truly believes that if she "Stans" the replacement actress for Alys, that she's somehow a good and righteous person that can claim internet points for being the first stan.

And I think that's the weird part about this whole thing with fandom that we were talking about.

There's people in this fandom, on Twitter and Reddit, that somehow equate their favs to be linked to some sort of real life virtue. That there some sort of moral equivalency test to liking an aspect or character of this goddamn show. And if you fail it or don't line up you're not just against the tribe, you're all and all evil.

And it's so fucking wild how a fandom went from fun crank theories about Varys being a Mermaid to being evil and awful, because, you talked to someone who was around the volume for Pre-viz who heard something at lunch and you relay what they heard to someone who asked what the word is in the gossip mills these days.

Even when you preface and epilogue the post with it being a rumor and probably not true, they still gnash their teeth and post on Twitter and Reddit trying to get a hate mob together to come after your blog.

Mutha'fucker, I'm a 33 year old man who has been shot at and been in life or death fist fights with dudes twice my size.

All I have to do to kick your ass is ignore an app for a few days while I finish a chapter and watch retro anime and Downton Abbey.

Either way, it's crazy out here, Nonny.

Get strapped and stay vigilante, the hoard of rage zombies are out in force.

[tumbleweedbloodbash]

Litterally a MASSIVE vent under the cut

Cw: neglect talk, childhood truama, school truama, fakeclaiming self, being used, self hatred, seeking abuse, suicide implications and everything familiar

Silas / Tumbleweed [he/it/they]

I am so pathetic. So fucking pathetic. I am the biggest disappointment in my family 🤷‍♂️ I'll never be anything, I'll never be what they expect of me and it's all my own fault. I really could have been better, I mean I could have changed so much been so much more but I didn't.

I will quite litterally NEVER be what they wanted out of me because how down to earth pathetic I truly am. I'm better off dead and sheltered from any chance to succeed because there is no point, every opportunity im given I throw away because I can't mentally push through it. I feel pathetic for it honestly. I want to be able to go to school I should be able to but I just can't, my mentality and my body stop me- I can't even try to go to school without being in so much pain from stress worsening my chronic illness.

Trying to be the one who stays in front for most of the day but the stress of school causes us to rapid switch so often now. The way I FUCKING TRY! to avoid the people who dislike us but first dya back I quite litterally run into them by accident. I made contact with them ffs I was trying to avoid them, I find it funny how they went from being nice to fucking lol cow farmer reddit junkies it's wild how much a few months and a shitty influence can do to someone. Idk I just feel like I'm reaching my breaking point.

I know I say that alot especially on here aha, but its just getting worse and worse. I feel the need to isolate myself again to try and live some sort of life because I'm not outside of this, im just an vicious animal to my family, a trick dog to our friends and a fucking stepping stone to anyone who I put before myself. I don't actually have a life because I spread mine out so much for the people around me to just walk all over.

I never NEVER put myself first because I'd be seen as selfish, I'd be seen as ignorant, uncaring and rude. So I'll sit there having a shut down in the car. I'll lay there holding back tears, I'll kick others out of front and take it over, I'll sit there in class and try not to violently breakdown, I'll suppress my rage just abit more so I can be there for you. I'll rid myself of hatred to seem more nice! I'll fucking break the walls so you don't have to see me break myself. I'll walk away so you don't see me cry, I'll act like I didn't just get triggered from you raising your voice, I'll suppress that really icky feeling inside me because I need to be there for others. I'll act like I'm not about to have a sensory melt down. I'll downplay every issue of my own to make yours seem so much worse so I need to help. I'll pretend like I'm not triggered by so many small things! I'll be perfect! I'll be seen as fucking perfect in that scenario!

Because truly I'm not even fucking real. I'm not real! I'm just a fucking peice of a shattered identity that only broke this badly because I was too pathetic to just deal with the childhood truama! I was too pathetic and let it all get to me :) I was so pathetic that I had to have coped by dissociating through the neglect, abuse, mental torture and nearly being killed multiple times. Couldn't even face my problems than no wonder I can't now because I'm even more fragmented and I can't stop splitting on people! IM FUCKING TRYING NOT TO IM SORRY I DONT WANT TO BUT I WONT FUCKING STOP!.

But guess what. I'll put on another act, like there isn't a thing going on! Like I'm just a trick dog made to follow people around as it's only job, I'll be your dog. I'll be a dog to anyone who needs one! I have no feelings because I'm not human afterall! So use me. Please just use me, please. I crave it, I crave just being used and fucking abused. I know when it's happening but I just keep repeating it because I deserve it.

Sometimes I wonder why I still care to do specific things when every single time I do them it's followed by atleast 1-3 scenarios. There isn't any changing it, believe me I've tried- I have tried so many diffrent things but it's also a 3 scene scenario! Maybe I keep doing it in hopes one day, ONE FUCKING DAY! there might be a chance it won't play out the same- it's always played out like this. Every. Single. Fucking. Time. I'm starting to get sick of it, im starting to resent so much now and I hate it! Maybe our ex was right and that we will never fucking change.

I feel like him now, waiting for a change in something thats never going to fucking happen because no matter how long we wait, no matter how many things we try, no matter what we do it's always a repeat of the last time. I'm starting to lose ideas on what to do or how to cope through it, im losing it I really am. I think I need to just shrivel up and never come back, I can't even live. I'm sorry, im so fucking sorry to the people who know me in person im a horrible person.

I don't think you understand just how bad I am tbh, I care about people but one second later I don't give a shit, I think whatever happens to them is karma for how I've victimised myself to things they have done. Things I've probably over exhausted to make myself hate them even more. I don't end up hating them though, whoever it happens to I end up just missing them so much IT physically hurts me. But I'm fucking horrible! I have the worst jealousy issues, I can't handle people liking the same stuff as me because I am so convinced that they will steal the ONE things I find that makes me unique! I can't fucking handle when people copy me intentional or not but it gets under my skin and I feel like I'm no longer an individual and I start to absolutely hate what I used to like!

I ruin things for everyone.

I'm better off fucking dead.

I'm sorry boris.

[danny-chase]

Dick Grayson Week Day 4

Prompt: Bruce hits Dick and doesn’t get away with it

Summary/Notes:

A Spyral fixit where the family finds out about Nightwing 30. Perspectives are from Tim and Jason, but Steph, Cass, and Damian make an appearance. Quotes taken from Forever Evil 7 and 8, and Nightwing 30. Tw for swearing, angst and domestic/child abuse (because canon is terrible and I can’t leave it the way it is).

Edit: I have an AO3 account now yay! Read here

“I’ll be right back.” Tim chirped as he left to pull some files out of his room. He could feel his friends’ gazes lingering on him as he left. He had to suppress an eye roll. He was fine. Your pseudo-dad/adopted-father-before-you-emancipated-yourself loses his memory and suddenly everyone thinks there’s something wrong with you. Figures. Bruce was happier this way. And maybe, one day, he’d be able to get to know him again. Maybe not as sorta-father and son. But Bruce 2.0 liked volunteering with kids, running charity events. Maybe they could be business partners, or coworkers. It wasn’t like last time. But that didn’t mean Cassie, Bart and Kon weren’t worried. No matter how many times he tried to explain, they wouldn’t listen. It was better this way. Bruce was happier without them. Without him. It stung at first sure, but he was over it. He could handle it. Even if the knot in his stomach told him otherwise.

His fingers brushed the lines on the hallway as he strode through Titan’s Tower. The halls seemed so much smaller than they used to be. Logically, he knew they were the same size. But they weren’t the same walls as when he’d first visited. And those hadn’t even been the first wall either. “We’ve had to rebuild this place like at least a million times.” Dick had told him. The knot tightened. Don’t think about it, he reprimanded himself. He’d been having a nice afternoon. It was relaxing, staying with his friends. But he couldn’t walk through the halls without feeling like a trespasser. This was Dick’s team. This was his home away from home. Who was he kidding? He was no Dick Grayson. Dick’s friends used to look to him for guidance, for advice, for help with problems, personal and business related. Tim used to look to him for guidance, advice and help. Stop thinking about him, he tried again. Forget the Crime Syndicate. Forget the funeral. Don’t stress, repress. He paused for a moment, stared aimlessly out the window, took a few deep breaths, cleared his mind and continued on his way.

Climbing the stairs, he decided it was better to use his mental faculties to go through the case he was working on. Jason had called two days ago asking about some of his old informants in Gotham, Penguin was apparently moving back onto the scene and reorganizing the structure of some of the newer gangs. Cleaning house. Informants were switching names, following their own protocols. Bruce had written some contingency in a classified file somewhere. The issue was where. The damn batcomputer had like a billion files on it. And Barbara knew the system, but was busy coordinating for the JLA and had put them on “Do not Disturb” mode for the foreseeable future. He could write a program to search for it. Stupid Bruce and his stupid files that he’d kept secret from them. “It was on a need to know basis.” He could almost here the defensiveness in Bruce’s voice if he tried hard enough. He nearly face planted as he miscalculated the number of stairs. Maybe they should just go back to their old Young Justice base. Or wait till the building inevitably explodes again and just make it better. That would be fun. Designing a Teen Titans base with slides and escalators. Bart would be thrilled. Bart could probably build it in 5 minutes. Dick wouldn’t approve, his brain felt the need to remind him. Tim nearly huffed. Well Dick is de-.

He abruptly lost his train of thought. There was noise coming from his room. Someone was sniffing, was someone crying in his room? Who was even in his room? Everyone was downstairs. Cissie and Steph were visiting in the lounge, Greta left a few days ago, the new kids were in the gym getting a feel for the equipment. The hell? His heart pounded a bit louder as he silently slunk towards his rooms. If Dick decided to haunt him from beyond the grave this was not cool. The lights flickered. Tim nearly screamed. He could feel cold sweat gathering in his palms, his heart racing, thoughts pounding in his skull. It’s just one of Bart’s pranks, no one can get in without access. He slid next to his door and pulled up the camera feed on his glove’s embedded computer. They weren’t in lockdown, but it couldn’t hurt to check. Few clicks here, few taps there and…Damian? Tim burst through the door, half relieved and fully confused.

“What are you doing here?” Tim half yelled, Damian startling on the bed as he burst into his room. Tim flicked the lights on as the gremlin crossed his arms in response. Tim shut the soundproof door, no need to bother Kon with this.

“I was given access to the tower as well.” He stated monotonously. Tim frowned; something was off. Damian didn’t just show up in his room. Come to think of it, he hadn’t seen the kid in weeks. Not since Bruce went all amnesiac on them. Where was he even staying. Damian shifted uncomfortably under his gaze. There were dark circles under his eyes, he was paler than usual, but flushed, his eyes bright. Had he been crying in here? “Quit gawking at me, Drake.” He spat, jolting Tim back into reality.

He almost opened his mouth to throw some insult back. Almost. He saw the kid’s lip tremble just so slightly, and he bit his tongue. The kid’s hands were shaking. “What’s up?” He replied cautiously. Keeping the demon brat in line wasn’t in his job description. But the kid had had a rough couple months. Dying, coming back to Dick being dead, Bruce losing his memory. He could help with whatever this was and-

“Grayson is alive.”

-send the kid back to Alfred, he knew the kid better than he did. He had his pets at the manor to keep him company, maybe he’d see if Jon would be willing to have a sleepover or something. Spring break was coming up soon, maybe he could take a trip out to Kansas-

“Drake!” Damian was waving a hand in front of his face. Tim blinked a few times. He hadn’t said…had he? That wasn’t right Dick was-

“Richard is alive, I can prove it.” There was desperation in the kid’s voice, water in his eyes. The trash can was filled with tissues, it had been empty when he left. His shirt was on inside out. Tim inhaled sharply. Fuck. Tim had been there. He’d done that. Denied reality. Gone on a wild fairy tale goose chase. Chased insane dreams. Sure, it had worked. But this was different. They had a body. We had a body then, his mind helpfully supplied. There was no real evidence. It had worked hadn’t it? Denying Bruce’s death out of reality? But Dick couldn’t be alive. Bruce had seen him die. Clark saw Bruce die, his brain again helpfully supplied. Tim studied Damian’s face carefully. He looked two steps away from a mental breakdown. Was that how I looked? He wasn’t exactly looking in any mirrors at the time. Dick had try to talk him back down, that was the wrong move. He’d doubled down. But Damian wasn’t him and Tim had no idea what to do. Damian stared at him, studying his face carefully. Tim could feel his palms sweating again, when had he started clenching his fists? His brain was ticking through options, tell Damian he believed him – high chance of heartbreak, low chance of kid running off and doing something stupid on his own. Try and talk him down – still some heartbreak, but can mitigate, medium to high chance of him running off. Call Alfred – should he really do that though? The kid came to him. Alfred’s busy dealing with amnesiac Bruce. Call someone else? Why did the kid come to him in the first place? Damian hated him, he wouldn’t come to him unless he was really sure, or really desperate. Does he think I can replicate what happened with Bruce? Time seemed to move like molasses. Tim swallowed. Now or never.

“I believe you.” He replied. Damian’s eyebrows furrowed, but his shoulders fell ever so slightly, and he rocked back on his heels, uncrossing his arms and leaning into a less defensive stance. Mixed results. He prayed he sounded convincing enough. If he was going this route, he had to go all the way. It didn’t matter that he’d seen the body. It didn’t matter that Bruce saw. He needed to be on Damian’s side with this one. Just like he’d needed somebody on his side back then. Even if it was a crazy side. Even if it was a leave everyone behind and run around on a whim side. Even if it doesn’t work out, at least the kid would have someone to catch him at the end. Why did it have to be the brat though?

“You do not. But you will.” Damian said solemnly, a bit of an edge to his voice. He pulled a laptop out of a bag on the floor and hopped up on the foot of Tim’s bed. Tim quietly settled next to him, careful to not touch him. He was careful. The kid didn’t appear to be looking for a fight, but you never know. Tim glanced at the laptop screen.

“DAMIAN NO WHAT THE-” He screamed. Damian nearly leapt of the bed. His face turned red.

“-tt- Grow up Drake, this is for research purposes only, that is not-” He started mumbling.

“You’re on DICK GRAYSON THIRST POST WEBSITES for RESEARCH!” Tim half screamed, attempting to lower his voice. Damian flushed harder.

“SHUT UP DRAKE!” He countered. Tim took deep breaths. Dear god, he needed to bleach his eyes after this. He did not need to know these threads existed. Fucking reddit. Humanity has gone too far. There were 20k followers. He peeked over again, the latest posts were from this morning. His mouth was dry. These people were lusting over his dead brother. It was sick, it was fucking disgusting it was-

“Wait what’s that picture?” Tim asked.

“-tt- If you would allow me to explain instead of losing your head, I can show you.” Damian grumbled. He clicked on the picture to enlarge it. “I’ve run the calculations, biometrically, the body shape is a 99.97% match.” Tim let out a low whistle. It wasn’t much to go on. You couldn’t see the figure’s face, he was turned away from the camera. Whoever took it was definitely aiming for a certain portion of the man’s body.

“Have you talked to the poster?” Tim inquired. Damian nodded.

“This subreddit is dedicated to…” Damian made a revolted looking face, “capturing casual images of Grayson in unsavory positions.” He nearly squirmed as he finished the sentence. “I was attempting to research the details of Grayson’s perceived passing and came across this website.” That was a different kind of trauma in Tim’s opinion. “The image caught my eye. He has fans in Ireland, that is where it was taken. These fans are apparently experts at picking him out.” Damian scrolled through some earlier posts to prove his point. “It is odd.” He added pointedly. Tim’s mind was racing. It was hardly evidence. It could have been anyone. But he was right. The perverts were good. They even had a few of Dick in disguise doing undercover work, none of his face of course. But Dick couldn’t be in Ireland. Tim went to the funeral. Bruce went to the funeral. Bruce saw Dick die. Bruce wouldn’t lie about something like that. He never told you about the Joker. His mind supplied. No. Bruce wouldn’t. Bruce couldn’t. He wouldn’t put them through that grief. Not after Damian. Not after all the lies. He promised he wouldn’t lie to them like that. The picture couldn’t be real. But Damian kept scrolling. There were more. In multiple countries. It couldn’t be possible. There was no way. People joked his brother’s butt was iconic but this was ridiculous.

“Drake?” Damian sounded so cautious. Tim was confused. The pictures all looked so real. So accurate. Could they be photoshopped? That could explain it.

“Did you get any of the original files?” He asked much too hastily to appear calm. A smile flicked on Damian’s face for a millisecond.

“You believe me.” Damian stated, half disbelievingly. Tim bit his lip. He didn’t want to. He couldn’t. If he did, then he didn’t believe Bruce. Damian cleared his throat. “I have already examined a few of the original photographs. Their phones were laughably easy to hack.” He looked smug for a mentally unhinged eleven-year-old. “They do not appear to be tampered with.” Tim could feel his heart thudding in his chest. Dick couldn’t be alive. It wasn’t possible. He saw the body. Bruce was in the cave for a week going over it. Not allowing anyone in. No… Fuck…

“What did you do?” He muttered under his breath. Damian looked at him inquisitively, a determination burning in his eyes. Tim hadn’t seen any of the proof himself. And he believed Bruce unquestioningly. That was the opposite of what the man had taught him. But there was still something off. He looked searchingly at Damian. “Dick wouldn’t do that to us.” He couldn’t. Dick would never do something like that. He would tell them. He wasn’t like Bruce, he was reliable. Dick didn’t keep secrets like that. He wouldn’t fake his own death and leave them to fend for themselves. Not after Damian died. After everything they’d lost, after everything he’d lost. Dick wouldn’t do that to him. Damian’s eyes flickered toward the ground, and he frowned.

“Maybe he can’t tell us.” Is all he had to offer. It seemed like a sore spot. Tim didn’t push it. It was probably driving the kid insane. Dick, galivanting across the world, not checking in, not coming back to tell them he was okay? The odds were astronomically low. Dick was a constant. He was their brother. He was a Robin. Robins don’t do that to each other. Steph did, his brain helpfully supplied. But that wasn’t Steph’s fault. Tim dug his nails into his palms. He needed to know. He needed proof. He needed to see the footage, go over the evidence. He didn’t doubt Dick, but his mind was itching. He wouldn’t be able to sleep unless he knew for sure. Hell, Damian probably couldn’t either.

“Look, here’s the plan.” Tim said, his mind racing. Damian stared at him intently. Wow the kid really was desperate if he was willing to listen to him. “I’ll tell Kon I’m taking you home, that you need some help on a case, then will slip out. Maybe, maybe someone close to the family is compromised.” He said, a bit unsure. That could explain the lie. If there was one. Please let there be one. Damian nodded, stuffing his laptop back into his backpack. Tim crossed the room and grabbed the door handle.

A barely audible “Thanks.” reached his ears as he flipped off the lights.

  Jason groaned as he checked his messages. He really didn’t want to go through the batcomputer files. It would be faster if Tim did it, plus he had a lower chance of accidentally messing something up. Not that the file system wasn’t already a disaster. Touch the wrong button and you’re locked in the cave till Alfred realizes something’s wrong.

Tim had stopped responding to his messages two days ago, and well, he couldn’t wait any longer. And so, he found himself zipping through the tunnel systems that led into the cave. It was better to avoid the manner if possible. Happy Bruce wasn’t high on the list of people he wanted to see. That dude was fucking weird. It made him feel weird. It did feel good to cross amnesia off his yearly family bingo though. Now he just needed someone to trip during an interview and he’d break Cass’s winning streak. At the rate they were checking things off, maybe he should start a second batch and make it biannual. That or change the prompts. They were getting predictable.

He rolled to a stop inside the cave, and nearly rolled his eyes seeing the mess of skid marks on the floor. Seriously, tires are expensive, why his siblings couldn’t park like normal human beings was beyond him.

Someone was clacking away on the upper platform. Oh, thank God Tim was probably here, figuring it out before he could mess everything up. Cass poked her head over the railing, Jason cocked an eyebrow at her as he removed his helmet. She grinned and jumped over it, catching the fireman’s pole and sliding down. Someone was going to break an ankle doing that, could he add that to the bingo cards? Stupid non-work related injury was already on there, maybe upgrading it to stupid broken bone would suffice. Dick broke his nose outside Denny’s at 3am last year during a post mission party. Hands down one of the best nights of Jason’s life. Too bad his family members decided to die at least once a year.

“I’m about to win bingo.” Cass whispered as she brushed past his shoulder. That jolted Jason out of his bittersweet thoughts.

“Bullshit.” He growled back, bingo was his this year. She smugly wrapped an arm around his shoulders.

“Sorry brother.” She said sweetly, leaning her head into his shoulder. She let out a long sigh. And then Jason finally remembered that it most the squares weren’t exactly fun.

“Wait, the fuck’s going on?” Fuck, he really didn’t want to deal with this right now. Nobody could have died Dick checked that off, amnesia was gone, Gotham destroyed was gone, natural disaster was checked, Joker breaks out and does dramatic shit was gone too. But that wasn’t a good sigh, that was a ‘I’m so tired of this family sigh’, which could narrow it down a bit. Cass squeezed his shoulder.

“Family secrets.” She admitted, giving him a melancholy look. Jason groaned. This family was the fucking worst. Bruce wasn’t even really part of it right now, who the hell was keeping secrets? Damian. Had to be Damian. Little monster was just like his dad. Fuck. Dick taught the kid better than that. What kind of mess was he in?

Cass took him by the wrist and started dragging him towards the stairs. He resisted briefly as they got to the base. He needed to know. “Who’s is it?” He asked, planting his feet on the ground.

Cass bit her lip, looking extremely uncomfortable. Jason pulled back his arms and crossed them, keeping his expression as neutral as he could, but she could probably read his mood anyways.

“HA. HAHAHA HA. FUCK YOU BRUCE! TAKE THAT SHIT-COMPUTER!”

Jason nearly jumped out of his skin at Tim’s screeching from upstairs, Cass was running up the stairs, not waiting to see if he was coming. Jason sighed. It was going to be on of those days. He took a deep breath and headed up behind her.

Tim was doing a victory dance in front of the computer. Damian was crawling out from under the computer, a shit eating grin on his face. They both looked (and smelled) a mess. Definitely neither had showered in a few days, probably hadn’t slept either.

“Todd, you are just in time to witness our victory over father.” Damian greeted, formal as ever. The brat didn’t even through an insult in there. Must be in a good mood. Well that at least explained who was keeping secrets. Stupid Bruce, keeping secrets even while an amnesiac. Screw him.

“Shall we?” Tim asked, offering a hand to Damian, which shockingly the kid took. The fuck did he miss?!?

“Uh, what the fuck?” He managed to get out. There was cowl footage pulled up on the screen. Cass was pulling chairs over from the table. He tiredly took the seat she offered him.

“Waaaaiiiiiit I have popcorn!” Steph called, pounding down the stairs.

“Steph no!” Tim moaned. “This isn’t a joke!”

“What’s family drama without popcorn?” Steph sung back. Damian huffed. Cass snickered. Jason had to smirk to himself. Dark humor was the best coping mechanism in this family. “Besides you haven’t told us what this is!” She accused. Well at least Jason wasn’t the only one who didn’t know. Tim shifted guilty at the computer, his eyes darting from Damian and then back to the group. Damian responded by huffing and crossing his arms.

“Drake did not ‘want to get your hopes up’.” He began, mimicking Tim’s voice perfectly, “-tt-His concern is unfounded, my research has been impeccable, Gr-” Tim shoved a hand over Damian’s mouth. Damian looked downright murderous.

“Look we want to watch the footage beforehand it might be-” Tim squawked as Cass lunged off the table, hopped over his shoulders and hit play on the batcomputer. “Cass wait!” He got out as the video began to play. Steph grabbed Tim from behind and dragged him into a seat.

The screen showed footage from a first-person perspective, they were walking through a doorway into a large room.

“I’m tired of secrets.” Muttered Cass as she slipped in a chair next to Steph. Damian staid standing, glaring intensely at the screen, looking strangely anguished.

“Hey, kid you can…” The invitation died in his throat. The camera moved forward into the room, revealing a beaten Dick Grayson in the center, hooked to countless machines, suspended in a metal cocoon, only his face and chest peeking out.

“Oh my God.” Came a familiar voice from the screen. A growl reverberated in the cave.

“Well Batman…” Luthor materialized on the right, “…You’ve found Nightwing.” He said, stalking forward.

Something clattered on the floor. The camera was rushing forward. Voices from the cave mixed with voices on the screen.

“Why would you want to watch this!?” shrieked Steph.

“Dick? Everything’s going to be all right. I’m here.” Bruce’s gruff voice sounded oddly strained.

“Shut up Brown!” Came Damian in a high-pitched voice.

“He never showed us the evidence.” Tim’s voice squeaked. “We have to watch till the end?”

“I’m sorry I shut you out. All of you. I didn’t want you getting hurt…I’m going to get you out of this.” Came Bruce’s shaking voice. Jason could feel a lump growing in his throat. He didn’t want to see this.

“Fast-forward?” Cass suggested, her voice equally shaken. Jason could barely see the others in the cave, his eyes were glued to the screen.

“No…You need to…leave.” Came Dick’s horse whisper of a voice. “You need to go…”

Damian made an inhuman noise, which allowed Jason to tear his eyes off the screen.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Muttered Tim. “We can’t fast-forward we need to know what happened.” He forced a sense of determination into his voice. “This is why I didn’t-”

THOOM. The sound rumbled through the cave. Jason jumped out of his seat. The camera whipped around revealing the exit sealed off, with Luthor, Selina, and Bizzarro trapped inside.

“-you guys can still leave.” Tim said shakily.

BA-DEEP. Blared through the speakers. BA-DEEP.

“What is that?” Came Selina’s voice, her usual smooth and silky persona dropped. BA-DEEP.

“It’s a countdown. This isn’t just a fancy pair of handcuffs, Catwoman. It’s a bomb.” Came Lex’s gruff voice. The camera turned again showing a timer counting down from 5 minutes. Jason’s stomach painfully twisted at the reminder of another countdown in another sealed building.

“We’re staying.” He managed to get out. He might have heard noises of affirmation.

WHAM. “The door. The walls. Why can’t we break through them?” Came Luthor’s voice.

“This cell was designed to hold Doomsday, Luthor.” Came Bruce’s voice again. The camera showed him messing with the panel. BA-DEEP.

“Is the countdown monitoring his heart?” Selina asked from seemingly far away.

“Yes.” Boomed Bruce’s voice. BA-DEEP.

“Why?” Replied Selina.

“The detonator is hooked into it.” Bruce responded. Jason’s heart sunk. “He died in a death trap. There was no way out.” Bruce had told him before the funeral. BA-DEEP.

“Batman…The bomb…” Dick whispered. BA-DEEP. Jason spared another glance at Damian. There were tears beginning to form in his eyes, but he stared, glued to the screen all the same. “…It only disams…If my heart stops.” Jason could feel his chest tightening painfully. “I die…or we all die.” BA-DEEP.

“Maybe Bruce had a reason for not showing this to us.” Steph said shakily. Jason glanced over. She looked green. Her sleave and eyes were both wet. The sounds of the heart monitor echoed in the cave.

BA-DEEP. “Please…Listen to me…” Dick’s horse voice started again. Tim was muttering frantically to himself. “You still have time to get yourself out of here.” The camera was so close. Jason could see every cut on his brother’s face, could see the sweat on his brow, the blood trickling down from his nose.

BA-DEEP. “I am not leaving you, Dick. I am not abandoning you.” Bruce sounded much more confident that Jason felt. Too bad Bruce didn’t sound confident.

“You aren’t Bruce. And you never have.” Dick replied. Jason’s vision was blurring. All he wanted was some stupid computer files. He didn’t come to the cave to watch this.

BA-DEEP. “The only way we’re getting out of here is together…No…The wires…” Jason dug his fingernails into his palms. “…Every time I disconnect a relay, it fixes itself.” Jason bit his lip.

BA-DEEP. At some point those in the caves had gone silent. “Then there’s only one way to disarm this bomb, Batman.” Came Luthor’s voice. The video jolted violently and Bruce’s cry reverberated through the cave. Chaos erupted on the screen. A cacophony associated with their customary brand of violence echoed through the speakers, obscuring some of the voices.

BA-DEEP. “I’m saving our lives.” Jason made out. The screen was black. Jason glanced around the room. Everyone was tense. Damian was crying. Tim looked horrified. Cass was perfectly still, her expression blank. Steph looked one step away from throwing up in the empty popcorn bowl that lie on the ground at her feet.

BA-DEEP. The camera was moving again. “LUTHOR.” Boomed Bruce’s voice again. Jason caught a glimpse of the man pressing a hand over Dick’s face. “LUTHOR, YOU HURT HIM AND I WILL KILL YOU.” Cass let out the faintest gasp. Bruce wasn’t lying. How the hell was Luthor still alive? The heart monitor was stuttering. BA-DEEEEEP

“Nonononononononononono.” Came Tim’s voice. “It wasn’t supposed to-”

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

“DICK.” Screamed Bruce. The camera rushed forward.

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

“NO!” Yelled Bruce and Tim at the same time. Damian had sunk to the floor.

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

A fist kept pounding Luthor in the face relentlessly. “Batman, wait-” Luthor pleaded. This was not how Jason had wanted Bruce to break his code.

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

“YOU MURDERER!” Screeched Bruce, righteous fury echoing in his voice. The heart monitor cut off. A hand reached down to cut off Luthor’s windpipe.

“I have this…” Came Luthor’s strangled voice. He looked terrified. “Under control…Grayson…” The hand squeezed harder. “-kk-!” The man chocked. Bruce lessened up slightly. “It’s not too late, you idiot.” Spat Luthor. Bruce was apparently passed the point of listening.

“YOU MURDERED NIGHTWING.” He growled, tightening his grip once more. Luthor was going bug eyed. The man was going to actually die if Bruce pushed it much harded.

“Batman-” Came Selina’s voice.

“Luthor killed Dick, Selina.” Bruce said, his voice strangled.

“You said this lightning rod was from the future! Maybe we can use it to save him or something? I don’t know-!” She cried desperately.

A flash of light and crackle of electricity resounded through the cave. The screen went black for a moment.

Jason could hear metal clinking on the floor.

“Why are we still watching this?” Jason asked hoarsely. Tim looked at him palely.

“I need to know what happened next.” He whispered.

“If I hadn’t stopped Grayson’s heart, this ‘Murder Machine’ would have detonated and we all would have died. I had to make a choice, Batman. I made him flatline…after I forced him to swallow a cardioplegia pill.” The camera slowly tilted back up to focus on Luthor.

“A what?” Asked Steph and Selina at the same time.

“A drug that paralyzes the cardiac muscles surrounding the heart.” Replied Tim and Bruce in sync.

“Then…” Trailed off Damian. The boy looked up hopefully at the screen.

“And if this boy’s heart doesn’t get a shot of adrenaline right this very second he’s going to stay dead.” Luthor finished.

*kaff*

That small cough was the best sound Jason had heard in his entire life.

“YES!” Shouted Tim.

Damian swallowed. “As I expected.” He said shakily. No one called him out on it.

“Dick?” Came Bruce’s voice from the screen.

“Batman?” Dick’s wobbly voice whispered.

Cass tackled Steph into a bear hug, and Steph laughed widely as they clattered to the floor. Jason just sighed deeply and let his head drop into his hands in relief.

“Drake-” gasped Damian, “-get off.”

“You were right! Damian was right! Dick’s alive. HAHA Dick’s ALIVE!” Jason glanced up to see Tim squeezing the crap out of Damian who was going slightly blue in the face. There were words coming from the speakers still but they fell to the wayside in the celebration. Jason walked over and turned the volume down.

“I’m going to kill them.” Jason muttered under his breath. But he’d save that for later, for now, he just paced back to his chair and sunk into it. The cave was quiet for a few minutes, Dick and Bruce continued on whatever the fuck adventure they were on was. The rest of the video was a blur. By the end, Jason’s racing heart had settled, and the kids had stopped clinging to each other.

“But wait.” Said Steph as the video ended. “If Dick’s alive, where is he? How did you even know to look?”

Jason turned to see Tim babbling. “Well I have a few theories, we recovered more footage as well, you know? Like Damian found pictures of him all across the world so like, we don’t know for certain where he is, but like I don’t know for sure what happened, but maybe someone was compromised so like, he had to stay hidden or like…” Tim continued babbling as the next video began to play. It was once again footage from the cowl. “Bruce shut off all the camera’s in the cave for the next week, I thought he was sulking but like we were able to find some cowl footage that he deleted, and like hopefully from that we can figure out what happened and how to track him down-”

“Turn up the volume.” Demanded Cass from her seat. She was looking at the screen with an odd expression. Damian moved without hesitation. Jason’s eyes followed up to the screen. Dick was glaring into the camera his fists raised and wrapped.

“So, one more time Dick. But now there’s only one rule…You have to win.” Came Bruce’s gruff voice. The pair was in the cave. Dick lunged towards the camera. “You let the crime syndicate capture you. Let them torture you. You let them give your secrets to the world.” Bruce accused.

“Bruce man, what the fuck!” Steph yelled, masking Dick’s response.

Bruce continued “You let them turn you into a bomb. You let them kill you. Before Luthor rescued you, you let everyone WATCH YOU DIE.” He boomed.

“YOU GOTTA BE FUCKING KIDDING ME!” Jason bellowed, knocking over his chair as he stood. He walked away from the screen. Only fucking Bruce. Only fucking Bruce would blame someone for their death. Jason knew that all too well. He walked away from the screen, giving himself distance to clear his head.”

“I trained you to LIVE, and I watched you DIE!” CRACK. Jason flipped around to see Bruce elbow Dick in the face, drawing blood. Bruce’s words cut like a knife. It wasn’t Jason’s fault he died. It wasn’t Dick’s fault either. Neither Steph’s or Damian’s. Damian had unconsciously taken cover behind Tim, who was standing between Damian and the screen with an arm hovering over the kid’s shoulder.

“WHAT THE FUCK BRUCE!” Screamed Steph at the screen, she was also on her feet at this point. Only Cass’s hand prevented her from trying to fight the digital apparition. “WE DON’T JUST GO AROUND DYING WILLY NILLY, IT’S NOT MY-, IT’S NOT HIS FAULT!” Her voice shrilly echoed around the cave, drowning out the audio temporarily.

Dick was on his knees, wiping his bloody nose, looking up confused. WHACK. A powerful kick sent him flying off the platform, crashing into a costume display case. “I have a mission for you, Dick. I need you to do something that will hurt your friends. Your family.” Bruce commanded. He could hear Damian inhale sharply. Tim stopped hovering and pulled Damian tightly into his chest, rushing forward to pause the video, with the boy in tow. His hand was over the button before Cass sprung forward and grabbed his wrist. Jason had never seen Cass look this angry without the mask.

“I deserve to know.” She said with conviction, anger deep in her voice. “I deserve to know what kind of father he is.” She spat. Jason wasn’t going to touch that with a ten foot pole.

“But he shouldn’t, I mean I don’t know if, I mean I don’t know what, I mean-” Tim sputtered glancing from the screen to Damian and back again.

“I want to know the truth.” Came Damian’s tiny reply. He looked so young, he pushed away from Tim’s chest, but leaned into his side.

Cass pulled Tim’s hand back. “I fought him once.” She admitted. “I need to know.” She repeated.

Tim looked at her pleadingly. Bruce and Dick raged at each other on screen. Blood flowed from the cuts on Dick’s back. “I…I…” Tim stammered.

“We all deserve to know.” Steph piped up, leaning against the side of the computer.

“Fight like you’re alive!” Bruce yelled on the screen. CRACK. An oversized die broke on impact with the back of Dick’s head. Dick retaliated, throwing a question mark back.

The words were blurring in Jason’s head, his rage clouding his thoughts, and overtaking his senses. The rest of the world was disappearing, leaving only the screen behind. His vision tunneled. He crossed his arms as tightly as he could, willing himself to stay in place. Stay calm. His hearing cut out. But he could still read his name on his brother’s lips just before Bruce delivered an uppercut powerful enough to knock Dick off the dinosaur.

The next thing Jason knew Cass was sitting on him. People were yelling at him.

“-on’t break the screen-”

“-up I need to see-”

“-op fighting-”

Cass smiled apologetically before tapping a pressure point. Jason allowed himself to fade into the darkness.

 He came to in a medical bay of the cave, with an intense desire to get out. This place was cursed. He needed out, he needed to think, he needed to process, but he needed to get out. He pushed himself up and swung his legs off the bed.

“Wait.” Came a voice from behind him. He spun off the bed to see Tim, awkwardly standing on the other side of the cot. Jason edged towards the door. “We know where he is.” Tim offered. Jason glanced at Tim, and back to the door.

“Can we talk somewhere else?” He asked quietly. He didn’t want to be in the cave for this. Tim awkwardly bobbed side to side.

“Uh about that. We’re moving out.” He said quickly. Jason opened the door.

“OMGIT’SREDHOODHIMR.REDHOODSIRPLEASEDON’TKILLTIM-”

Jason slammed the door in the kid’s face. He stared at Tim, who was banging his head into the wall with a hand covering his eyes.

“Do I even want to know?” Jason asked. Tim groaned.

“I called my team to help us move out, we’re going to use the bunker for Gotham operations from now on.” Tim explained. A loud crash came from outside. The door whipped open.

“Heythegiantpennyisn’t-” The kid started. Jason growled at him. “-nevermindbyebye.” The speedster zipped away and slammed the door.

“You decided this without me?” Jason asked, raising an eyebrow at Tim. Tim looked back at him sheepishly.

“You’re already out voted. Besides you really want to stay here?” He replied evenly. Jason shrugged, that was fair. He’d already tried to leave. “I know you said you don’t want to talk here, but I don’t know when I’ll get you alone again.” Jason sighed. That’s valid, he was planning on avoiding the family for a bit. “Please don’t pull a disappearing act.” Jason looked up at him.

“Why not?” He challenged.

“We don’t need Bruce to be a family.” Tim replied. It sounded rehearsed. That was also fair. “And we need each other too. We found some communications from Dick, Bruce left him stranded when he got amnesia, he’s coming back in a few days.” Jason couldn’t look Tim in the eye anymore.

“I don’t know what to do.” He said honestly, looking at Tim’s shoes. What do you say after something like this? After watching something like that. After knowing the truth.

“Neither do we, but we’ll figure it out together.” Tim offered. He looked sad, tired, his face fell before he spoke again. “He…he misses us.” He spoke softly. “On the recordings. I, I don’t think Bruce even told him about Damian.” Jason swore softly under his breath. Bruce was one fucking piece of work.

“Is there anything else I should know?” Jason said after a moment, catching Tim’s eye once more.

Tim shook his head. “The rest of the tape was mostly the same.” He said quietly. “He won.” He added as an afterthought. Jason snorted. Tim gave a warry smile. None of them ever won. Not in the ways they wanted to. Only when the prizes were more pain, more guilt, more heartbreak.

Jason leaned back against the wall. How was this the way things ended up? Was Bruce always this cruel? The man was unrecognizable to Jason. It was inexcusable. After Willis? After Cain? After Brown? Hell, even Tim’s father was emotionally abusive before he died. Why couldn’t any of them have a normal father? A stable parental relationship. It wasn’t fair. And it hurt more because he didn’t even know where it started. Bruce had been a good father to him. Had that been a lie? He’d never looked to closely at why Dick had left home, could it be that…that…? Had Jason missed something like this? Would he ever even know what he’d missed? They didn’t have as many cameras back then.

Tim had crossed the room and put a hand on his shoulder. “He’ll be okay.” He said confidently. “As long as we have each other, we’ll all be okay.” Tim squeezed his shoulder gently before disappearing through the door into the chaos that used to be his childhood fantasy. When had it all gone so wrong, he had to ask himself. He hated that he knew the answer. His death was this fucking family’s original sin. But you know what, that wasn’t his fault. Even if it felt like it. Even if Bruce still blamed him. Dick didn’t look at him like a ghost, he didn’t look at him like a kid in over his head, like a regret, like a mistake. It was time for Bruce to grow the hell up and move on. Bad experiences don’t justify beating your kids. Maybe from here, they could move on. Maybe from here on, they could heal. Maybe they could start over. Maybe they could make their own new family. Bruce had abused them, lied to them, manipulated them enough. It was time to rise from the ashes like a phoenix and fly again. He wouldn’t know unless he tried. He didn’t have to give up on Gotham. But maybe it was time to give up on Bruce.

Jason swung open the door, descending into a future unknown, diverging from the circle of heartache and abuse. He had broken the cycle once before, on his own, with a new family made of friends, one of his choosing. And now he chose to break it once more, and this time he resolved not to leave his siblings behind.

[comfyswitcherblanketfort]

Professor Cavill HC

listen yall.... i usually stay away from the Real Person fic kinda stuff bc i learned from the psychosis that was the 1D fandom but... this post and @brexrif s additions got me thinking...

Henry as a prof of any kind:

he learns after the first week of his rookie semester that he needs to keep his shirts buttoned all the way. the girls in the front row did not, and could not, pay attention.

he abandons the idea of using the school gym to work out after two days

a group of students just camps in the slow lane of the track surrounding the weight room and ogle

someone said something about ancient Greeks collecting the sweat of gladiators and he had to wipe his sweat off to hide the giggle

ratemyprofessor dot com gets wild

“giant goofball. super hot. defs failed the course bc he was just too hot to concentrate. gonna take it again tho 😏 because i need the credits. just for the credits“

“My girlfriend dumped me bc she felt guilty that she was thinking about Mr. C while we fucked. Stung a bit, but it was the best sex we had...”

all the ‘i thought i was straight’ guys losing their minds

“Someone really should have warned me that hes this hot. I am too much of a thirsty bitch. This semester might actually kill me.”

the ‘how big is it?!’ discourse gets so many people banned that they move it to reddit

complete with zoomed in photos from the second row of class when they think he isn't looking

the engineering majors whip out that trig to try to figure it out, for thirst and just to end the madness.

it makes it worse when they all get results in the 8.84-9.62 inch region depending on what they use in the background for reference and where they rounded digits. 

one class is brave and takes to carving their phone numbers or social media into apples to leave on his desk.

one day he walks in to like seven of them and just gives this long suffering sigh while trying not to laugh, it would encourage them too much.

he does that Hot Teacher thing where he leans back against the desk with his arms and legs crossed and has to be like “Guys. For the love of all that’s good and holy. I don’t have tenure yet, don’t fuck this up for me. Keep the thirst on reddit, please?”

half of them aren’t listening bc his arms are just so big and there’s chest hair peeking out above his sweater and they’re just weak like me

in five minutes there’s a whole new thread frantically trying to sift thru and find his user

his WoW character gets leaked and he just gets buried in gifts

the dean has to have that awkward, “look dude you gotta make a new profile, this is just a scandal waiting to happen.”

he deadass begged the openly ace seniors to be his TA bc the last one was just exhaustively flirty and shameless

he hears someone lament the Chin Dimple™ and grows a beard in hopes that tamps their enthusiasm

this only brings a new demographic into the reddit thread/what has almost become a fandom

he shaves and they go buck wild

he tries a stache because he sees a post about how every guy is instantly creepier with a pornstache

once again, makes. it. worse.

one particularly fearless student calls him “Magnum” at the end of that semester and he blushes

buzzfeed writes an article about him, screenshots of the threads included.

the day he gets contacts instead of those cute nerd glasses the whole class is drooling but half post later that they miss the dorky glasses

he assigns a ‘make a meme out of this’ project and half of them come back with the guy looking over his shoulder at the passing girl while his girlfriend looks at him in disgust, all about him. 

his favorite one had the guy labeled “The whole class” the girlfriend labeled “getting any work done” and the passing girl labeled “Mr. C’s ass”

he gives this guy an A but swears him to secrecy, he cant encourage the thirst but the kid took a risk

the school has to be like ‘calm the fuck down guys. hes just some nerd in sweater vests. plz we like him and you are making us nervous about lawsuits’

Someone sees him out on a date in a leather jacket and reddit goes insane 

everyone actually tries for his classes

he has to make a sign up sheet for office hours

which he now does outside in the courtyard because someone wrote a rather detailed and impressive smut fic called “Office Hours or Dick Appointment?” that had the dean giving him side eye

he secretly loves it but keeps up the long suffering shy boy act out of necessity 

if he makes a song or movie reference it is immediately added to a playlist somewhere

the gays are praying hes bi

praying

the year he gets tenure the seniors do a skit about the redit thread at graduation - it fucking slaps

he give a thumbs up and approving nod

i could truly go for days. plz add to it. 

[gossip-girl-of-middleearth]

Please tell us about the cinema, I beg you

Oh boy...that accursed night. If you think fanfic plots are chaotic, just wait for this story.

Story under the cut:

So, I just got this job at my small town’s local theatre. I genuinely enjoyed it, and was quite content with the way things were going—fun shifts, cool coworkers, and a nice boss. So I thought.

I was only two weeks in when the “incident” occurred.

At the theatre, we had to collect a walkie talkie radio at the start of every shift, and sign it in and out with a piece of paper in the office.

It was a little clunky and annoying when cleaning cinemas with vacuums, but nothing to cry over.

One night, I’m put to work with a new supervisor I hadn’t met before and some new coworkers (they’d all been there a while, but this was my first shift with them).

For a little context, I’m 19, and most of the other employees were like 15-17. So, I was basically being bossed around by pretentious, power-tripping kids. Fun.

King Kong vs Godzilla had just been released, so of course, the theatre was packed that night — 130 people per room.

Now, we usually have 20-30 minute intervals between sessions to clean the cinemas, but with the release of a new movie, it was cut down in half, sometimes less.

I was cleaning the most popular cinema that night, and was first told to take my time, as it needed to be spotless. Also, side note, can people please not throw popcorn everywhere? It’s a pain to clean. Then again, I don’t work there anymore nor ever will, so do what you want, I suppose.

My little coworker told me to take my radio off my belt and put it aside to get a good vacuum going through each aisle, as it apparently made it easier, as the cord would sometimes get wrapped around the radio stem.

Fair enough.

I did so, and left it on the wooden platform of the rows to begin vacuuming. He leaves and I get to work.

However, he comes rushing back a few minutes later and says, “what the hell are you still cleaning for?? We’ve got a hundred people waiting outside???”

I’m over it™️ at this point because I only took this job to see the behind the scenes of how a cinema works. I shrug and go, “okay”

I pack the vacuum up and try to leave hastily, as he’s being very antsy and pushy.

He gets frustrated and grabs the rest of my cleaning crap to leave, and tells me to hurry up behind him.

My hands are full and I can’t grab the radio, so I say, “what about the walkie talkie?”

I swear I hear him say, “leave it, there’s no time!”

I shrug and think it’s weird, but trust him to know better.

However, once I dump my crap and prepare to leave, as a hundred people are pushing in behind me, my intuition tells me to grab the walkie talkie.

I rush back in to where I left it, and find it missing

I have a brief moment of “oh shit”

However, I think to myself, “it’s okay, you only took this job for shits and giggles. If they fire you, you have your other job anyways. What’s the worst that can happen?”

If only I knew.

An hour goes by into my shift, and I’m cleaning another cinema with the same coworker. I’ve kind of shoved the walkie talkie thing to the back of my mind, because I was doing a closing shift that night and could probably get away with not facing my manager about the sign out sheet.

However, at one point the boy goes, “where’s your radio??”

Sheepishly, I say, “uh...I left it in cinema 3, like you told me to?”

He sort of pales and I think this little skinny high schooler is about to pass out.

He starts yelling at me and tells me that I need to get my flashlight and start checking every single row in there.

I go, “fuck no, the movie is still going? You want me to flash a torch in the peoples’ faces during King Kong?? The one cinema hosting the entirety of the sweaty balls side of reddit right now???”

He gets very shitty and says, “I’ll do it myself, wait here.”

By now I know I’m in the shit, but shrug and remember I can always escape through the vents if need be.

Now, there was this really fucking annoying 15 year old boy I was working with that night, who’s the definition of the “well aCtUaLlY” guy irl

He comes sprinting into the theatre I was cleaning, and starts literally interrogating me over this walkie talkie. Like, he thinks he’s the “bad cop” or some shit. Other coworkers closer to my age had already warned me about him before I even met him.

The other boy I was working with apparently couldn’t find it, and just didn’t want to deal with the consequences that night so much, that he called his mum to come pick him up early.

Weakling child.

It was at this point that I quietly arrived at the conclusion of “they think I stole it”

I didn’t understand why, it’s a fucking walkie talkie? What’s the big deal? Go get a Dora the Explorer one to replace it from Target??

I let my inner Mickey Milkovich come out, and play cool.

Him: you fucking stole it

Me:

This 15 year old Ben Shapiro-looking fucker starts grilling me, and literally places me under theatre arrest. I wasn’t allowed to leave the room I was cleaning, in other words.

He gets uncomfortably close—just me and this weird boy in this dark theatre—and goes, “I want you to be brutally honest with me...did you take the walkie talkie? I won’t tell the manager that you did.”

If you guys know me well enough from my blog, then you know this boy suffered a great deal of aggressive sarcasm in response.

He gets pissed (brown-noser), and tells me to continue cleaning, as he leaves the theatre.

Only ten minutes go by until he comes back, but this time with “good cop”.

I roll my eyes, and turn the vacuum off.

They stand at the bottom of the cinema blocking my entrance with their arms folded, and start interrogating me about stealing it.

I give them some more Mickey Milkovich sarcasm, as I had already explained to them a hundred times what happened.

They involve the manager (snitches) and now I’m really in trouble.

They force me to go into the cinema whilst the movie is still playing to look for it. Begrudgingly grabbing my flashlight, and preparing for rightfully angry people as I search their crotches in the middle of a highly anticipated movie, I head inside theatre 3.

Fuck doing that though, I watch the movie instead with the people and eat some popcorn.

Figuring a reasonable amount of time to search had gone by, I sadly leave the cool laser battle scene, and head back out.

Me: “I searched and couldn’t find it.”

Power-complex 15 year old with a punchable Ben Shapiro face: “Did you look everywhere in the cinema??”

Me: “Yeah, I shoved a flashlight up seat 33’s asshole and checked it myself.”

Some more pissy exchanges take place, and I’m told to go clean another cinema.

I’m having fun at this point, because I’ve worked enough jobs to know this situation was being dealt with incredibly immaturely by the other staff.

Regarding accidents like these in the workplace, and given how big the cinema chain is, they should know insurance covers a simple walkie talkie, and that assuming the new employee stole something which is misplaced is a bad way to integrate them into your company. It’s simply a bad look for your business.

I’m cleaning another cinema when all three come in, and tell me they’re going to put cinema 3 on lockdown when the movie ends, and check everyone’s bags.

I’m amused at this point, so I really just go “damn bro that’s wild”

They do exactly that, and it’s as awkward as you can imagine.

People are angry and annoyed—all 130 of them at 9:30pm huddled in a group, having their bags searched for a damn walkie talkie.

After discovering no one had actually stolen it, like I said, they start interrogating me again.

“Are you sure it was cinema 3??? Is your memory perhaps failing you???”

“If I say yes, will I go home sooner?” (my shift ended 15 minutes ago, and I wasn’t allowed to leave)

Naturally, I stayed another 40 minutes, and had to search the entire building. I’m talking arcade, toilets, offices—everywhere.

It is eventually deemed completely lost, and I basically end the night saying, “well, I ain’t about to strip nude for you all for a full body search, and although I’ve never had such a fun shift anywhere else, I’m not a fan of work environments that promote skepticism and cohort-wide distrust. I ain’t coming in next week, or the week after that, or the...well, I think you get the point.”

I leave my badge behind, and basically book it out of the cinema an hour after my shift was supposed to end. I worked illegally longer than I was supposed to, and wasn’t given the legal shift break.

I received text messages and emails from the head office shortly after, asking if I was coming back, and ignored them for a little while, as although I can handle irl confrontation, virtual ones spook me?

Anywho, the walkie talkie actually costs $1000, but as mentioned before, I, an adult, recognise insurance covers these sorts of things, especially in companies as big as these.

So, moral of the story, don’t leave 15 year olds in charge of adults, because most of the time, they’re too young to realise what insurance policies are :)

[taurusborus]

someone translated more of the under the tides event on reddit if you're interested in reading wtf is going on.

I'll also add it under this in case it's easier to read.

Warning, if you don't want to leave the slightest bit of surprise for yourself when the event hits global, TURN BACK NOW!!

I made a comment thread yesterday with a story summary. However, I still left out a lot of things, so I thought I'd make a new post, add in more info about plot I left out, organize the Q&A from the thread, and link to the TLs of the new units. Hopefully a centralized hub of info will help people find the information they're looking for and dispel any of the more wild hearsay floating around.

This will be organized into a few sections, the new unit TLs, my original story summary, a bunch of (my new summaries) separate plot threads that tie into the bigger story, and then some common questions.

Skalter profile + lines TL

Gladiia profile + lines TL

Event CGs

Some good supplemental information about the seaborn hivemind

A much longer summary of each stage, 11 pages - courtesy of Lauli. If you want to know more about the townspeople, Inquisitors, and details on Kal'tsit's end conversation with the Inquisitors, take a look.

The original summary I made yesterday, the fastest crash course on the major story points. I have edited some of the references of the new factions to match the updated TLs from MrSkyblock404 so there's no confusion:

First of all, if you've ever read the manga Claymore, you now understand most of the event. Key differences are that the "Organization" is Aegir. They don't SEEM to be the villains here, and they went the Claymore route to fight the sea horrors fully knowing that their Claymores will eventually awaken into the sea horrors that need to be put down.

The "secret" of the Abyssal Hunters is that Aegirians created them as supersoldiers with the bodies of land dwellers but the blood of sea horrors. More on that down below.

The seaborn is part of the underwater cosmic horror hivemind that's been foreshadowed since the start of the game. Its interest is in learning, evolving, and assimilating everything (a la Evangelion's instrumentality more like end goal of Starcraft's zerg). It's acts primitively... robotic? It doesn't understand things like emotions and "Does not compute. We will learn what you mean" is a large part of its exposition. The church in the town is actually the Deep Sea Church hiding in Iberia and slowly indoctrinating remote towns and turning the people to sea horrors. The ending convo with Kal'tsit implies that Iberia is now completely infiltrated by the cult and if they maintain an isolationist policy, they will be destroyed like Aegir.

The seaborn shows up to impale Gladiia, and reveals the big "you [Abyssal Hunters] and I share the same blood. You are us. We are you." Skadi has a mental breakdown over the truth bomb ("I've killed my own transformed family and friends" etc. Glossing over the specifics, just know she doesn't take some past war trauma well), and it seems like the seaborn can somehow "awaken" the blood and turn Abyssal Hunters like Skadi into one of them.

Skadi is right about to awaken [and probably become Skalter, that seems to be the general consensus on CN forums right now, Skalter = Skadi if she gives in to the call] when Gladiia reveals she was sandbagging (yay superhuman regen abilities) so she could listen in on why the seaborn wanted to meet Skadi so badly. Since the seaborn revealed everything, Gladiia promptly kills it and tells Skadi to get her shit together. Skadi gets her shit together. As the seaborn dies, it says its people will learn to understand everything the Abyssal Hunters have told it, and then they will ask them to join the family again. Also, Specter is now free from whatever "control" the Deep Sea Church exerted over her, she's elated over being "free" now. She's still infected but compared to her previous half-dream state, she considers it a minor setback.

Then there's the Deep Sea Church leader dude who had no idea Hunters were also of seaborn blood and also has a mental breakdown. His entire life's work and dream is shattered because the cult crap he made up believed in is a lie, and the seaborn don't put any special weight on his existence and work. He turns into the SV-9 giant tentacle demon that the 3 Musketeers take down. Before he dies, he curses Gladiia and says some ominous things about how she's different and unlike the other 2, her fate is set. Then in the scene with the mirror, she's shitting on herself for being useless and still ending up like an ugly little bitch. The mirror closeup shows part of her neck starting to look like fish scales, so it seems like she's already undergoing the sea horror transformation.

The town situation

The town has fallen on hard times, and the Deep Sea Church has slowly indoctrinated the population with Iberian values twisted into a pro-seaborn slant. These towns become experimentation grounds for the Church and seaborn. Gladiia confirms that she's been busy destroying many of these experiment grounds. The Church now provides the town with food from the sea when the tide comes. There is also a human sacrifice chosen by lottery, which the Church disguises as "the sea has chosen you to take into its embrace and provide a better life." Kind of like how parents tell their kids their dead dog went to live on a farm. The brainwashed people genuinely believe they have a better life and see it as the greatest honor.

The "food" the sea provides are the "dormant" state of severely injured Dinichthys, which regress into a more resilient meaty form while it recovers. This dormant state is edible (ugh) and what the people harvest during the tide. The unlucky human sacrifice walks into the tide to be eaten by the Dinichthys and thus what the sea giveth, it ultimately taketh.

I would like to note that the Church leader has made an appearance before this event. He has a substantial role in one of the story scenes in Archetto's event. I won't ruin the surprise, but if you pay attention to the setting, you'll know which scene it is before he shows up.

Deep Sea Church agenda and the seaborn

The Deep Sea Church are likely the major instigators of this major "sea vs land" conflict. According to the seaborn that shows up in the Church, the general seaborn population are territorial and generally abide by the animal instinct of survival of the fittest, there is no right or wrong if you kill to survive. The seaborn's behavior and inability to lie show that they indeed don't give a damn about individual seaborn, the Church's plans, or even the Church leader.

Distinction needs to be made between the general seaborn population and the seaborn used by the Church, the latter which could be artificially created. The Church leader is Iberian, but somewhere along the way managed to become part seaborn, which is why the seaborn will listen to him. Being part seaborn allows him to "weaponize" the true seaborn population for his own agenda.

The seaborn themselves indeed have a goal to evolve and and expand (from Skalter's profile). But to what degree the Terra conflict can be attributed to seaborn passive expansion vs. the Deep Sea Church's hostile accelerationism is not clear.

Thus, there's an interesting 3-way disparity between how the conflict is perceived.

* Abyssal Hunters: believes all seaborn must be eradicated * Seaborn: not really interested in the conflict * Church: "it is the will of seaborn to subjugate all"

Regardless, Gladiia has constantly repeated she doesn't give a shit about the seaborn's role in the Church's schemes. Her duty is to kill seaborn, and she's not going to discriminate.

Kal'tsit creates a cliffhanger every time she shows up at the end of any event

After the church-leader-turned-giant-tentacle-demon is killed, its enormous corpse is like a beacon calling to all the Dinichthys zerglings to swarm the area. The 3 Musketeers are like "ok fuck what now" and Kal'tsit swoops in with perfect timing to call Mont3r to completely destroy and bury the ground and its secrets.

She's here to direct the 3 Musketeers to leave Iberia and rendezvous with Misery to go back to RI for a vacation (yes, she actually says they get vacations). The Inquisitors also show up to stop everyone, and after giving them her usual condescending finger-wag-and-lecture, she offers to stay as hostage/information source in an Abyssal Hunter's stead. Her agenda is to convince the Iberian powers to ask for help instead of maintaining an isolationist policy. If they continue to keep it internal, they will be destroyed like Aegir.

She has some atypical kind words for the 3 Musketeers before they leave. To Skadi, she makes a throwback to some cryptic bullshit she said in Grani event. To Specter, she makes some banter about her newfound freedom and moving forward knowing her body's state.

And then it turns out she and Gladiia planned for almost everything before the Skadi sets off for Saltwind City.

The state of Iberia and Aegir

Aegir is pretty much sunken Atlantis. Gladiia says that there's no communication in and out of Aegir after the Calamity.

The Abyssal Hunters were created as just one small piece of Aegir's military power. Aegirians are fully aware of the Abyssal Hunters' eventual fate to turn into the enemy, and have special patrols out to monitor and kill any who turned. The seaborn confirms that they had nothing to do with those deaths. The people Skadi killed and watched get killed, those were all done by her own people. This does not help her mental state.

Iberia has likely attempted to replicate Aegir's Abyssal Hunters. We don't have story on the result of this project, but based on clues in her profile, Andreanna might have some connection to it.

In Kal'tsit's "I know everything" exposition, she states that Iberia once had a prosperous Golden Age, and is now a shadow of its former glory. As stated before, the Deep Sea Church has also infiltrated all levels of Iberian government. Thorns' profile says he left because of "religious strife" and how in recent years treatment of Aegirs in Iberia has gotten worse. All the breadcrumbs are building up to Iberia potentially getting the same kind of Calamity that destroyed Aegir. (See Skalter page's TL note on Calamity.)

Bunch of misc info that don't really fit anywhere else, from yesterday's thread Q&A

It's established that Abyssal Hunters are not allowed to bleed, especially on land. The seaborn says the swarms of cannon fodder zerglings can smell the "same blood" on the Abyssal Hunters. But they're a bit stupid, so their brains only know "this is the blood of my kind, but why is it trapped inside hooman skin?" instead of recognizing it's not a trapped comrade.

Their attacks on Abyssal Hunters are attempts to "free" their kind from the trappings of hooman skin. The more the Hunters bleed, the more frenetic the swarms get, because they know they are getting closer to freeing them.

If you are a Specter fan, you will absolutely love the scenes after she wakes up. The ensuing conversations show that the Abyssal Hunters cherish their close connections like everyone else, despite their usual "stay away from me I'm dangerous" vibes. I really hate how Specter's operator record turned out, and I'll keep salting about it, but this event really did her justice.

Question: Is story Skadi already Skalter? She is wearing the same clothes.

Answer:

No, and this is the biggest misconception that needs to be cleared. At no point in the story does Skadi fully awaken. She comes close but pulls back just in time. The in-universe reason Skadi changes into her wandering songstress wardrobe is that she needs a box carrying her "instruments" (her sword and Specter's chainsaw) and to avoid suspicion while sneaking into Saltwind City. There are two high ranked law enforcement officers (something like that) after her, who know she's an Aegir and a possible threat. In story, she's still guard Skadi. Devs probably wanted to keep the red getup on Skalter to differentiate between the two units.

Question: Why did the seaborn want to meet Skadi so badly?

Answer:

It's not entirely clear thanks to hYpErGRyPh oBtUsE wRiTinG. Every time the sea heir talks about how much it wanted to meet Skadi and perhaps why, Skadi or cult leader interrupt with their mental breakdown monologue. My interpretation of its reasons is a combination of desire to share knowledge with her (learning is constantly repeated as a goal of the sea horrors), extend an invitation to join the hivemind, and ask a question, explained below.

There are flashbacks to this one suicide mission she and her Abyssal Hunter squad had against one particular sea horror. Her entire unit died and she barely made it out after landing a fatal strike on it. Based on Skadi's mental breakdown, it sounds like that sea horror is like the Zerg Overmind, a central connection for the sea horror hive mind.

There's some exposition about how the Overmind isn't really dead, and it's gone into Hibernation Mode because though it no longer responds to communication, the sea horrors can still feel its pulse.

His specific question was whether Skadi heard the Overmind say anything before it went dormant. More Skadi breakdown, because she did. It said (rough TL) "[our] suffering is eternal." The "our" is ambiguous. It could be referring to Skadi and the Abyssal Hunters, since she's the one narrating, or it could be the Overmind and the sea horrors, who Skadi is repeating. I'm leaning toward the Abyssal Hunters since "being abyssal hunter is suffering" has been a core takeaway of this event.

And then Gladiia stops playing dead and kills off our sole source of Aegir lore :)

Question: Is Skalter/Under Tides canon?

Answer:

The events that happen in Under Tides is canon. Skalter's canon status is in existential limbo. As MrSkyblock404 has reiterated, devs have directly said Skalter is a POSSIBLE future in which Skadi gives into the call.

Question: But isn't the fate of every Abyssal Hunter to eventually turn into Seaborn?

Answer:

Technically yes. The call will never fade, so the moment it overpowers the Abyssal Hunter's will to resist, it will have won. But I say technically because the other side of the tug-of-war is the Abyssal Hunter's own willpower. There are hints scattered throughout that their fates aren't set in stone. As Gladiia said to Skadi in her "get your shit together" moment, if you don't want to become a seaborn, then you won't. Not to mention, they can always ask to be killed by another's hands before they fully turn, so they can die as "themselves". This is like the black card system in Claymore. Skalter's E2 promotional record also has this part:

Well, but that's not what I want to say to you today. What I want to say is that when they want to acquire a structure, they transform in that direction.

Skadi, since those creatures can become what they want to be of their own volition ...... Then you can also not become a certain way by your own will. You can do what you want to do.

For example, an Abyssal Hunter. Or, a little more freely, a bounty hunter.

The seaborn as a collective are naturally able to "focus" their evolution toward a specific direction. So as an individual, Skadi should also have a degree of control over what she does and doesn't want to become. Gladiia is implied to still be undergoing transformation despite her obvious obstinance, but the Deep Sea Church leader says she's different from the other 2 and her fate is sealed. As one of the first Abyssal Hunter prototypes, Gladiia might not be able to resist like the later Hunter prototypes.

If you made it this far, nice job! I hope that helps the EN community understand the tsunami of information that got dumped on us in the event.

If there are questions, post in the comments and I will do my best to answer them. Corrections to information in this thread and swapping notes with other CN readers are very welcome!

EDIT: Removed the spoiler bars since I got feedback that it was annoying to click on each paragraph. I've also added a new section "Deep Sea Church agenda and the seaborn" to clarify all the relationships defined in the story.

Also loving the connections the comments are making to other media. I personally made this post because I am a massive Claymore fan. Seconding one commentor, I highly recommend Claymore, it's a gem that's passed a lot of manga readers' radars. I'm also giving Bloodborne and Dragon Age a shot after the event.

EDIT 2: Thanks to the awesome ak-lore group on the official Discord, I've since made a number of corrections on key points. They are in the sections The town situation, Deep Sea Church agenda and the seaborn, and The state of Iberia and Aegir.

[tuffduff]

Cuffed (Duff McKagan x Reader)

Pairing: Duff McKagan x Reader

Words: 2052

Request: @niksixx​ “Hi hiii I know you said I could request something, but I don’t have anything specific in mind, so if you’re feeling up to it, maybe you could whip up a cute/romantic/fluffy Duff piece??? Thank you in advance and don’t feel pressured 💕”

A/N: Thanks for the request, Momma Motley! 🖤🖤🖤 OKAY, so this was inspired by a story I read on Reddit about two people realizing their feelings as they got arrested for climbing the roof of a building. Idk, the idea of Duff just makes me long for a free and spontaneous love. I hope y’all like it. 🤍🤍🤍

Taglist: @ubernoxa​ @reigns420​ @the--blackdahlia​ @stradlin-cold-heartbreaker​

They say you’re lucky if you meet at least one person in life that really knows your soul rather than keeping a large array of close acquaintances. You were never really one that believed in the power of the universe until you met Duff; that kind of unspoken understanding was much too powerful and unfathomable for you to understand. There was simply no other explanation. He was your absolute best friend. He knew everything about your life up until the moment you met, and from that day forward, he was almost always around for every new memory of your life.

When he decided to up and move to LA, you went with him. What did either of you have to lose? You stayed together in a roach infested shabby apartment, watching the helicopter lights outside your windows as you slept on the ground, the both of you blaming the predicament on the other.

When things started happening for Guns N’ Roses, sometimes it’s was harder to see Duff. He was always busy, and the mini tour loops they started doing often took him away, but once you were reunited, it was as if you picked right back up on the moment you left off.

“I don’t want to go home yet, Y/N.” Duff told you as the two of you staggered out of the closing bar one night when it was closer to morning. You always tried to be the responsible one if you went out drinking, so you still had your wits about you. Duff could handle his cups and wasn’t entirely wasted, but you knew that wild look lighting his eyes.

“Well, bar’s closing, Duffy.” You told him, crossing your arms and looking around the mostly deserted street you were on. “Where do you suggest we go, the roof?” You had fueled the bright look in his eye, and suddenly he was marching away to the back alley of the building. “Duff! I was kidding!” You laughed, running behind him and trying to keep up with his long legs.

“C’mon, Y/N. You always said you’d jump off a bridge after me if I went. Or at least, you told your mom that one time.” Duff’s face lit up at the sight of a ladder leading up to the rooftop right next to the dumpster piled with trash.

“That was a joke!”

“So, you would let me die without you?”

“At that point, you would be choosing to die without me.” He thought for a moment before he nodded.

“Okay, so that means I’m taking you with me. Got it.” He grabbed your arm to pull you in front of him and positioned you in front of the ladder. Your stomach fluttered as he patted your ass a little. “Go on, it’s easy. You just have to put one foot—there you go, like that.”

“You don’t have to be so pushy, you know.” You told him with a pause. You had climbed high enough on the ladder that you were now eye level with him for once. “You know I was gonna follow you anyway.” He smirked back at you because he knew you were exactly right.

“Hurry up, slow poke, you’re holding up the line.”

You climbed all the way to the top and could see all the glittering lights of LA, all the tops of the palm trees swaying in the gentle breeze, the same breeze that was tousling Duff’s hair about. Your eyes focused in on the dark patch of hair, the memory of you dyeing it for him in your shared tiny bathroom hit you, as it often did.

At that moment, Duff caught your eye and smiled, moving in closer to you.

“See all of this? You were gonna miss out on this view if I weren’t here.” Despite his words, his eyes remained on you.

You took him in, finding him more interesting than the backdrop of California around you, the way his sloppy sleeveless tank top slight hung off his shoulders and exposed a strip of his tummy. The padlock chain around his neck, you had been there to fasten it for him after he bought it. His dark jeans with the wholes in the knees and worn leather belt that had less than a few more wears in it before it broke entirely. The brand-new cowboy boots, his latest purchase, that made him trip over the sidewalk earlier that evening when you arrived at the bar.

A joke passed through your mind, a smart remark—you two were always joking—but instead, you answered him seriously.

“There’s a lot of things I would’ve missed out on if it weren’t for you.” The look remained in his eyes, not quite something you could pinpoint, but it was making you feel alive, rushing through your body. As you were admiring the way his lips parted to speak, his face was suddenly a flashing light show of blue and red. Then, the sirens hit your ears.

“Shit.” Duff said, looking over your head to the street below. You whipped around and could see what looked like at least 4 cop cars pulling up.

“What do we do?” You hissed, turning back to Duff in a panic; you had never been arrested before.

A bright spotlight illuminated the both of you and your mouth fell ajar. Duff calmly looked below you to see the cops already starting up the ladder and waved.

“Well, we can’t make a run for it.” He replied to you, before he began laughing. At first, the sound of his laugh felt out of place—this was not the time for laughter. And that thought was what made you laugh too. You were both gone at that point; once one of you started laughing, neither of you could stop. You had to sit down because you were laughing so hard by the time two cops poked their heads over the top.

“Hey,” Duff managed to say calmly, which only made you laugh more. They pointed their flashlights at the both of you and maybe realized you weren’t exactly threats, but rather, two dumb kids who had decided to climb a roof.

“Are you aware you two are trespassing?” One of the cops asked, almost sounding mildly amused.

“Yes,” Duff replied.

“No,” you replied at the same time, making the both of you break out into childish laughter again.

“...Alright, we’re gonna need you both to come on down now. Let’s go.” The officer was firm with his words despite the half smile he had on his face. “Have you been drinking tonight?” He asked as he shined a light directly in Duff’s face.

“Not enough.” Duff replied, to which you bit back another laugh.

“Why did you climb up there?” The officer questioned once you were back on the ground.

“We had nothing better to do. I always see these ladders and wonder where they go, you know.” Duff answered honestly, as though he were discussing weather. The light amused look remained on the officer’s face as his partner looked at him in disbelief. He turned to you now.

“Do you always follow his lead?”

“For the better part of 7 years, yeah.” You replied, and this time it was Duff laughing.

“Would you follow him off a bridge too?”

“We were just talking about that!” Duff laughed while you shook your head.

“Well, I’m afraid tonight you’re going to be following him to jail. Turn around, both of you, and place your hands on the car. You’re under arrest...” for a moment, you froze up and looked at Duff with wide eyes before you had no choice but to comply.

“Fuck,” you heard Duff mutter under his breath as the cop read you your rights and secured handcuffs on both of you. You just shook your head at him before you were both stuffed into the back-seat side by side, left and right. The car doors shut and sealed you away from the open breeze. It almost made the moment sink in more, but you had the strange urge to hold back a laugh again.

“Why can’t you be more famous?” You broke the silence between the two of you, causing another fit of giggles.

“We should’ve tried to run. Jump from rooftop to rooftop,” Duff joked back. You wondered why you felt so calm. You wondered what you were gonna tell your parents. You turned and looked at Duff, noticing the black strand of hair turning red and blue over and over, his eyes watching the police chat with one another and start paperwork. His eyes then flitted over to you and you both stared, picking back up on the moment you were having on the rooftop, the electricity of seven years too overwhelming to be contained in such a tiny space.

“Kiss me.” Duff said suddenly. Your heart jumped. You surely weren’t hearing right; those words would have never come out of Duff’s mouth. His tone had a slight edge, it walked a fine line between a command and a plea.

“What?” You asked in confusion.

“We’re never gonna get a chance like this again,” Duff pointed out.

“With you, I might.” You couldn’t help but joke. But his eyes, they stayed on you, and that feeling Duff always brought with him came rushing over you again. What you felt on the rooftop you could now pinpoint: it was what you felt riding down the highway with the top down screaming along the lyrics to Iggy Pop. It was what you had felt from the very first moment you met Duff. A roaring coursing freedom. The insistence to be wild at heart, to be you, to exist as you are because with him, you were enough already. With him, you were free. Cuffed and caught in the backseat of a police car, you were still free.

You leaned up without any more hesitation and pressed your lips to his and it was as if your fate was sealed. The deal was done and the ink was dry; there would be no turning back. His lips molded to yours before you felt his tongue swipe over your lower lip and you parted your mouth more, pushing the kiss deeper. Never before in your life had you wanted to tangle your hands in his hair more, to hold his face in yours, to feel his hands roam your body. You both had to pull back after a moment due to the discomfort of the position. You had no time to speak; the police officers opened back up the door.

“You two live around here?” He questioned.

“Down the street.” You replied, still unsteady from the surprise kiss.

“Alright, here’s the deal; we’re gonna let you two off the hook, so as long as you get straight home, okay? Consider this a warning. And don’t go trespassing again, alright?”

The cuffs came off. You knew good and well not to say anything; this was really just luck of the draw and with any other cop, it could’ve been a lot worse. But those thoughts left your mind as soon as they took off, disappearing as quickly as they showed up. The night was still again, the breeze just as gentle, but your heart still felt wild as you turned back to Duff.

“Duff, I—” he cut you off with another kiss, one hand on the back of your neck and the other latching into your waist, pulling you flush against him. You indulged yourself to what you couldn’t before and tangled your hands in his hair, something so familiar and yet so new.

“That was a close one, huh?” He murmured against your lips. You could feel him smiling. You thought of every time you had seen the same smile before and now knew exactly how his lips felt. How they tasted.

“Lucky us,” you agreed, smiling back. “It’s funny; you would be the first person on my list for my one phone call at the station. After you, it’d probably be Steven and I doubt he would answer.”

“I’d call Izzy. He’d probably answer and hang up.” Duff replied. You laughed at the idea. Duff then grabbed your hand, again, a familiar but new situation. “I like this version better.”

[skybird13]

*sigh* Okay...

I’ve been debating on whether or not to make this post. Not because it doesn’t need to be made, but because I’m not sure I’m emotionally up for it. But at the end of the day, staying quiet is exactly what got us into this mess, and curling into a sad little ball isn’t going to change what happened, and this particular shit needs to be called out and acknowledged. 

I was asked to address something posted by Eddy Rivas, one of the writers of RWBY, on Reddit yesterday. It was a shortlived post because apparently he or someone who read it realized what a monumentally bad idea it was, but sadly for him, my fellow cockroach gays are pissed as hell and we have screenshot capabilities. I don’t care that he removed/edited the post. This was still his instinctive response to the absolute pain caused by him and the rest of CRWBY as a result of volume 7 episode 12:

I am so damn tired and so hurt. But I am going to do my best to address this in a civil and reasonable way. 

The Problem With Judgment Calls

First of all, to an extent, I understand the predicament Eddy describes. I really do. I get that being on the creative end of a popular web series is very different from being on the fandom end, and conventional wisdom dictates that creators should do their best to make sure the two don’t mix past a certain point. That necessary separation probably does make these kinds of judgment calls difficult. 

The problem is that several members of CRWBY (including writers, animators both former and current, social media managers, and the marketing team specifically) violated that boundary more than once long before episode 12 aired. There were so many things that factored into Fair Game gaining traction as quickly as it did, and many of those things came from the deliberate way that many members of CRWBY interacted with the fandom outside of the show itself. From the official RWBY Twitter account to the suggestive tweets made by a former animator, to the Twitter and Tumblr posts made by a current animator, this ship was heavily and unambiguously encouraged and leaned on multiple times over the course of this volume. 

Sure, you can make the claim that you can’t control the animators (especially if they no longer work for you), or that the creators and the marketing team are two separate entities and that the actions of one do not necessarily reflect the intentions of the other (both things also stated by Eddy Rivas in a series of Tweets). And perhaps some of that is accurate. It points towards a fundamental lack of oversight and cohesiveness in the organization that is Rooster Teeth, and that should absolutely be addressed moving forward, but quite frankly, in this case, it doesn’t even matter.

The fact of the matter, Mr. Rivas, is that the boundary was violated. Multiple times. On your end. These types of judgment calls are not a one size fits all, and the moment active members of CRWBY took action to encourage something you knew was going to cause pain, it should have been addressed. I’m not putting that on you personally, because as a writer I realize you probably don’t have that type of authority, but someone there should have put a stop to it. There is the matter of the personal responsibility shirked by the two animators who contributed to this mess, and frankly, they should have known better, but this does not excuse CRWBY’s collective silence.

The fact of the matter is that due to the actions taken by CRWBY both in and outside of the show (including the things you could and could not control) you absolutely reached a point where that boundary should have been purposefully crossed in order to mitigate damage. It doesn’t matter what got you or us there. It doesn’t matter whether or not it was intentionally done (it was, let’s not kid ourselves). Things built up, hopes were raised as a direct result of your actions, and you all reached a point where you were morally obligated to say something. Do I suggest a single individual should have taken this on? No. I understand the legal ramifications of that. But CRWBY as a whole and RT as the production studio absolutely should have stepped forward. Would that have fully removed the pain and the disappointment? No. But you wouldn’t be facing the backlash you are right now if you had. 

The Problem with One-Size-Fits-All

Closely related to the previous point is the fact that you, Mr. Rivas, seem to be under the impression that a single judgment call policy should and can apply to all situations equally. That’s not the case. We’re not talking about other ships here, hypothetical, canonical, realistic, unrealistic, or otherwise. We’re talking about this ship. 

The Fair Game ship was the first and only indication we had in seven volumes of RWBY that a prominent mlm relationship might be coming in to play. You have no other relationships of this nature in the show. You don’t even have other male characters who might be able to qualify as gay or bisexual who play major roles. Add on to that the fact that you planned to have one of these characters die in the most brutal and graphic death scene we have gotten to date in RWBY, and no. I’m sorry. That flimsy defense doesn’t stand. This ship was unique, it appealed to a very underserved segment of your fandom, and it should have been treated with the levity it deserved. 

You make the argument that saying something about this ship but not others wasn’t plausible. The issue with that, sir, is one of trust. Up to this point, I and a lot of people I know trusted you, which means you can get away with building up relationships without ever coming out to confirm or deny them offscreen. As long as you understand the narrative promises you’re making as a storyteller to your audience, and understand the importance of fulfilling them through narrative payoff at some point in the story, we’re usually pretty willing to follow you and watch it unfold. This is how writing works. You have to be aware of the promises you’re making and you have to be able to follow through on them in satisfying ways. This goes double if you plan to fulfill them in unexpected ways (note the word fulfilled still applies). If you don’t do that, trust is broken and you have a problem. 

Fair Game is unique in that you knew from the beginning that trust was going to not only be violated but brutally so. CRWBY made promises with Clover and Qrow that they never intended to keep, and that is one of the core issues here. If you want to cling to the excuse that it was all unintentional (again, one I do not buy), that only means you absolutely should have said something to that effect long before we ever got to this point. It would have given nothing about the plot away to let us know that wasn’t the intended direction and it would have calmed down the excitement that built up so quickly around the ship. It certainly would have prevented a lot of people from being emotionally and psychologically damaged as a result of having that trust destroyed. 

Not saying something about relationships that may or may not happen is VERY different from not saying something about a ship that you know is not going to happen because you plan to brutalize and murder one of the characters on screen in spite of the narrative promises made. Particularly when the ship in question would have offered rep to people who thus far in the show ( when we’re over halfway through the series) still have none. 

No rep to be found here...

I’m not sure I should even have to address this but apparently, it needs to be said. It will be short because it’s a pretty damn simple answer.

You want to know “how well [saying no rep to be found here would] have gone over?”  A hell of a lot better than the queerbaiting fest you have victimized us all to for the last three months.  Would you still have had disappointed fans on your hands? Absolutely. But the psychological and emotional damage you all caused in episode 12 could have been so easily avoided, and that should have taken precedence over whatever tension you wanted to maintain between these characters in the show. 

This should not have been a difficult decision, and quite frankly, the fact that you don’t understand this is a little alarming. 

We Are Not a Shopping Montage

Alright. Here is where my civility is going to deteriorate noticeably, so fair warning.

You had the audacity to compare the emotional trauma of hundreds of LGBTQ fans to the disappointment of not getting a fucking shopping montage??? You even acknowledge that on an emotional level these two things are nowhere near being the same thing, and you still tried to justify your actions and the actions of CRWBY with it? That emotional fallout is the thing that matters here. 

But there’s even more to it than that.

The hopes for a shopping montage came from a single Tweet from the official RWBY Twitter (if I remember right) about a montage scene being in volume 7. That was it. That was all fans had to go off of. This absolutely was a case of imaginations running wild and people hoping for a scene that, quite frankly, in light of the show’s trajectory since volume 3, wasn’t a reasonable expectation to begin with. CRWBY was in no way complicit in or responsible for this expectation that I know of, and even if you were.... It. Was. A. Shopping. Montage.

And you dare to compare that with the intentional queer coding of Qrow and Clover’s relationship in the writing, the animation choices, the character design for Clover, and the behavior of CRWBY on social media, only for Clover to die horrifically and for Qrow to be absolutely destroyed emotionally and mentally on-screen??? You dare to relate the disappointment of people who didn’t get a pointless shopping scene with the trauma of watching a loved character’s murder and another loved character’s emotional/mental destruction??? Really? That seemed like an appropriate thing to say?

I don’t even know what else to say to this except absolute world-shattering shame on you, sir. How dare you?

And then to top all of this off, instead of apologizing, instead of showing some contrition, you tried to delete this post and pretend you never said it. Did you hope we wouldn’t notice? That we wouldn’t react if you tried to take it down? Were you even the one who realized what you said or did you need it pointed out to you?

You should not be a writer, sir. You sure as hell should not be a creator of content that engages with people on an emotional level because you clearly have no respect for it and no understanding of the responsibility you bear because of it. 

What is wrong with you?

Tagging @fairgame-is-endgame​ who asked me to say something on this absolute bullshit. 

[ankewehner]

Livetweet of accidentally getting into fairyland...

Best twitter thread ever?

https://twitter.com/NeolithicSheep/status/1330548523721515013 Shepherd: Oh hey Ursula, do you have the number for those people who take out invasive plants still?

Ursula: Probably somewhere, yeah. They said they didn’t usually work on such small properties, though, and I don’t know if I’ve got an infestation worth their time.

Shepherd: Ok but what if I say "kudzu" to you, can we throw enough money at them to make it worth their time.

Ursula: If you say “kudzu” to me, I will panic, scream, and come running to Dogskull with a flamethrower.

Shepherd: Ok well I suggest driving but maybe pack up the flamethrower. Ursula: OH MY GOD YOU FOUND KUDZU OH GOD WHERE IS IT ARE YOU SURE IT ISN’T JUST WILD GRAPE

Shepherd: YES I KNOW WHAT WILD GRAPE LOOKS LIKE THANK YOU anyway I was walking Beamer this morning after the deer ate breakfast and the white deer was walking down toward the back of the property, you know that low tucked away part? And I thought, well, we'll just trail after her at a polite distance and if I'm lucky I'll find some of her fur caught on a bush! Wouldn't that be great! So we kept going past the big ass fucking oak trees that make, like, that weird arch? And there's kudzu.

Ursula: What big oak trees?! There’s no big oak trees back there! It’s all pine!

Shepherd: Yeah you know, the two really big motherfuckers that look like English oak. They're like, way the fuck back there.

Ursula: There are no English oak on Dogskull. Are you sure you weren’t trespassing on the Freemason’s property?

Shepherd: No they're closer to the front I think? Who's next door to them? Also I thought Dog Skull was 7 acres? Because I should be off it and hitting the road by now.

Ursula: Next door to them is the people with the trailer on its side. Do you see any trailers lying on their sides?

Shepherd: A lot of oak trees, a little bit of kudzu, zero trailers in any orientation. Some birds and squirrels. Oh hey Beamer found a nice pond.

Ursula: Okay, this is important. Do the oak trees still have leaves on them?

Shepherd: Yeah but so does the one up front. Oh wait. These are, uh, still green. Like summer green.

Ursula: Right. Okay. This could be a problem. Give me a couple minutes, we have to take trash to the dump and then I’ll look some stuff up. Meanwhile, DON’T EAT ANYTHING.

Shepherd: You mean in case it's poisonous, right? Like THEORETICALLY if I didn't see this tweet until just now and HYPOTHETICALLY I found an apple tree and ate an apple, that would be fine?

Ursula: ...that would not be fine.

Shepherd: Beamer didn't want any, which was weird I thought.

Ursula: INDUCE VOMITING! INDUCE VOMITING!

Shepherd: He didn't eat anything! I'm not going to gag my dog for not eating an apple!

Ursula: Not the dog! Induce vomiting in yourself! Every chunk of that apple needs to come out before you digest it!

Shepherd: FINE. I have puked it up. It was a really good apple, too.

Ursula: Oh thank god. Whew. Okay. The alternative was that you were gonna need a cold iron enema and I wasn’t sure how to do that on short notice.

Shepherd: Oh hey fun fact, "cold iron" is just, like, iron. It's not a special kind or anything!

Ursula: Do you have any on you right now? Beamer’s collar or tags or anything?

Shepherd: Collar hardware is all aluminum these days, otherwise it rusts. Let me pat down my pockets. Syringe of dewormer? Is that helpful?

Shepherd: Anyway I don't want to alarm you but uh. I can't find the trail I followed? So you and Kevin will need to go over tonight and give the boys [i.e. oxen] a hay bale and the goats and sheep two.

Ursula: No! I am scared of cows! We have to get you out of there! Look, I have a bunch of Llewelyn books from my teenage pagan days. I’m sure Scott Cunningham or Silver Ravenwolf covered this somewhere.

Shepherd: Scott Cunningham seems like a really drastic measure just because you're afraid of some cows. But sooner or later I'm going to run out of cigarettes so sure, why not. Oh!! The boys' bow pins are in my pocket, I was going to sand them today and oil them! They're very definitely iron!

Ursula: That’s good! That’s very good! If anyone tries to talk to you, keep hold of those! Now let’s see...do you consider yourself a “solitary practitioner?”

Shepherd: Ursula I'm an ornamental hermit, you don't get much more solitary. Also so far the only person who tried to talk to me was a frog.

Ursula: ...what did the frog say?

Shepherd: "SMOKING KILLS." I tossed it back in the pond.

Ursula: *rubs forehead*

Shepherd: Fucking frogs are all alike, I'm telling you.

Ursula: I really wish these authors had spent less time on “why Wicca isn’t Satanism” and more time on “what to do when you’ve strayed into the fae realms.” I mean, I understand it was the political climate of the time...

Shepherd: I feel like nobody really covers that last one anymore. You have 4 hours until the cows want dinner.

Ursula: Silver Ravenwolf suggests making your magical working space more inviting with stencils? These books spend a surprising amount of time on interior decorating as a vital part of ritual magick. I never noticed that when I was fifteen.

Shepherd: Yeah me neither honestly. It's remarkably unhelpful when you're stuck in faerie and your collie is getting bored. Shepherd: So you want me to... Build a magical working space and stencil it?

Ursula: I can’t actually see how that would help matters. Maybe I should check the Foxfire books instead.

Shepherd: I... Don't remember them having anything relevant, but I might be wrong?

Ursula: They have everything. Ooh, this one is about how to scald the bristles off a hog!

Shepherd: A) I already know how to do that and B) I do not have a hog, sufficient firewood, or a hog scrubbing brush here. FOCUS, URSULA. FOCUS.

Ursula: Sorry, the ADHD meds haven’t kicked in yet today...uh...let’s see...avoid whippoorwills, if you see any?

Shepherd: I do that already, otherwise they steal your toenails.

Ursula: If you harvest apples, leave one on the tree or it attracts the Devil.

Shepherd: You told me not to eat the apples! Am I allowed to eat the apples now??

Ursula: No! These are hypothetical apples! NO EATING! I tried to look up deer in the Foxfire books and there’s a story about somebody’s grandpa wrestling a buck in a mill dam and drowning it, but I don’t see the relevance here. I mean, Grandpa does sound like a badass, though.

Shepherd: I feel like I shouldn't wrestle deer here. What if I try telling Beamer to find his sheep? 

Ursula: Well, research has hit a small snag. I tried googling for the foxfire books and kudzu, in case there was something about fae kudzu portals, right? But it turns out your Twitter is the third hit. Shep, we may BE the experts.

Shepherd: Uh oh. OK. In that case, you and Kevin go over to Dog Skull. Hitch up Cole and Cannon and take them back to the oak trees. Put a logging chain around one and yell real loud "LET SHEPHERD OUT OR WE START PULLING"

Ursula: Oh hell no! I read tree law Reddit! I know how this ends! Do you want us to get sued by Freemasons?! 

Shepherd: I DON'T THINK THE FREEMASONS ARE THE PROBLEM HERE, URSULA

Ursula: I DON’T TRUST THEM WITH THEIR LITTLE LEVELS AND SHEEPSKINS AND WEIRDLY OCULAR PYRAMIDS Also if you see a pyramid with an eye on it, don’t eat it’s either.

Ursula: Okay. Never mind the Freemasons. I wrote a book about this once, I think. White animals, scary fae, random magic deer. It was set in Finland, so you may need to fashion some umlauts, though.

Shepherd: I've got my chore knife, I can carve so many umlauts. Do I just put them in trees until I get back?

Ursula: First of all, are you wearing pants?

Shepherd: YES I'M WEARING PANTS YOU WEIRDO

Ursula: t’s a legitimate question! I mean, I’m not wearing pants.

Now Shep, this is very important. You have to take off your pants.

Also your shoes, your hoodie, and probably Beamer’s collar.

Shepherd: Ursula. Why are we getting naked.

Ursula: To break the misdirection spell! Put your clothes on backwards!

And possibly inside out? Shit, there’s a bunch of different sources. I don’t know if they have to be inside out, but definitely backwards.

Uh...let’s see...hmm, backwards definitely. Inside out might be for leshy. Leshies? Leshys? What’s the plural form, do you think?

If you happen to see any giggling green hairy dudes, ask them what the plural form of their name is. That’s gonna bug me.

Shepherd: Beamer's collar doesn't have a backwards! I'll turn it inside out. And my clothes backwards and inside out, got it. 

Shepherd: There's just, like, frogs. And squirrels. I can hear music though! There might be a dance party, I could go ask about green hairy dudes?

Ursula: STAY AWAY FROM THE MUSIC unless it’s the Freemasons I guess 

Shepherd: No it's more folk music. The Freemasons play, like, Michael Jackson. 

ANYWAY clothes are backwards and inside out. Beamer's collar is backwards and just to be thorough I tied the rope end of his leash to his collar instead of using the clip, so his leash is backwards too. He's pulling me away from the pond! 

Ursula: Tell him to go find his sheep! 

Shepherd: I have so instructed him! Hopefully there's not, like, the faerie equivalent of really good sheep here. Hey do you want me to grab you an apple 

Ursula: No, they don’t come true from seed, but if you can cut me a decent slightly whippy twig with a few leaves, I might be able to root that sucker. 

Shepherd: ...you want me to pause a collie on a mission while I test the whippiness of twigs?? 

I HEAR MOOING. I SEE PINE TREES. 

Ursula: GO TOWARD THE MOOING

Shepherd: THERE'S THE OLD RUSTED OUT METAL THING! I'm back! On uh the opposite side of the property from the one I left from.

Also there's a goddamned chorus frog calling. 

Ursula: Yeah, they do that.

Ursula: THANK GOD THE KUDZU IS ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PORTAL

...oh, and you’re back, that’s good too. Very pleased.

Shepherd: Anyway you don't have to feed the boys. Unless you want to?

Ursula: There is no situation where I will WANT to feed your giant-ass death bovines.

Also, what have we learned about following the white doe into the woods?

Shepherd: She knows where the really good apples are? 

Also my boys are tiny!!

Ursula: ...I’m gonna go take a nap.

[clandestine-j]

Gossip Girl Reboot, Ep. 2 Reaction / Review

This was posted on reddit first, crossing posting it here since I’ve chosen to review the ep’s and post on tumblr as well. So, this post is geared more towards reddit as a whole, this was posted a day after ep 2 aired.

i don't have a favorite character rating but #teamaki, yeah, the acting is awkward but it's getting better and it's not like it's the only bad acting in the show. i like the character either way.

now

people are so extra with zoya and obie and are looking at julien with the rose colored classes. yeah, obie shouldn't be dating zoya but let's not act like julien gave her all and everything to him. from the conversation with zoya in ep 1, his general feelings, audrey calls it out (maybe because she always feels that way)

She admits it at the end, she wouldn’t do the things he wanted when it came to his interest, he’d want to do random and fun things and she’d blow him off...how is this mart of someone fully invested in their other, no, she was invested what he did for her and how he made her feel. She misses him because in their other breaks he’d always come back. We saw a dying relationship and ppl can assume a lot about him but make 0 assumptions when it comes to her.

And then y’all expect Zoya to turn down the one person who’s actually nice, doesn’t ice her out and shares interest? What I want more than anything is for Zoya to find her own friends & her romantic interest, just one episode where her life isn’t an extension of Julien's. Idk wut, maybe she can go off on a find out gossip girl adventure. Idk something.

Then this talk about sisters and sister hood. Yeah, they’re blood related but what sisterhood is there? You say that’s is wrong for Zoya to do that to her sister but what about what her sister did to her? Even in this ep, she wants Obie so instead of idk driving Zoya away from him, she attacks her lil ‘sis’ over her long time boyfriend. She continues to let her friends talk bad about the girl. We can talk sister hood when she gives the mean team a good “learn me or leave me” when it comes to Zoya

At the of ep 1 Zoya says, she’s not playing the game. She’s grounded in fear of losing her scholarship, has already lost her dads trust. So she does that, she keeps her head down and doesn’t bother anyone but it’s the mean team to prompt Julien to after Zoya and she does. She’s minding her business at the even and Julien is the one to storm over and cause a scene. And it’s all about her, she’s scared of her dad finding out without any care that Zoya has lost and what she has left to lose. Of course she doesn’t care about Julien personal problems? When did Julien care really about hers? Then, she wants to sneak away and have fun and because she’s mad Zoya won’t run off and hide like a hood little girl, she once again collabs with GG, brings in the dads and fucks her sisters life up, AGAIN. Yeah, she changed her mind at the end but too little too late. Her come to jesus moment was great but the relationship she wanted/wants it very much damaged.

So yeah, Zoya dating the one person who has empathy for her is not as bad as the older sister who consistently let her be talked down, about and two, plotted with GG and didn’t even ask her if she was okay because, she didn’t mean it, it’ll blow over. Even in the very last apology when Zoya was about to leave, you could see that she had 0 faith in Julien, not only as a sister but as a person.

Which leads me to saying that Julien is probs the most interesting character of the show. She’s lovable and flawed and she is good but she as of right now, she’s mean at worst and horribly complicit at best because right now her career is a bit more important but her 14 year old sister doesn’t deserve the headache of navigating her with her. But I do love Julien because she has layers and I think by the end, she’ll be able to have her influencer career without compromising herself. That does lead us to the the chairmen and co-chair of the mean team.

Monet and Luna weren’t around as much but I do think...I do think...that if Julien goes nice, they’re gonna go super nasty. They have access to her life which mean access to that video if Julien didn’t out right delete it or they find out about it and snooping. They’re her friends but unlike her, they don’t have a much of a Conscious so far of right and wrong and they’ll strike anyone down. I think if we have wild cards, they’re it. If Julien really does go down a new path, learns more to fight for what matters and understand the real her is just as likable, the mean duo will not accept and will try and bring her down. They have their own meaning of friends with benefits.

My dude Obie, I can’t say much. I don’t think he’s as Malicious as y’all make him out to be but he is a bit callous and naïve...which could be worse tbh. I think he does want to do good but he only knows Performative good to counter-act his parents. I do want him to get with someone else but I do hope he learns what true activism means through Zoya and understand how much of a difference he could make if he really put his mind to it. I also want him to learn get out quick, because he wasn’t just looking for a reason to end things but one to stay and Julien didn’t give him that.

Audrey, I like the stuff with her mom. I like the little bit more depth we got, she slept with Max maybe but Aki made out with him, who am I to judge? I hope her mon can step up in the future but I don’t think it’ll be easy and hopefully they explore it more. Not just tease us. Her mom needs therapy but I think I'm a bit invested in her too.

Max, I love max but the dude is Pretentious ~ above earthly love ~ low key a shitty friend and talks in metaphors whenever he has the chance BUT he does it well. I don’t see him with Aki but I want it! I do see him going harder after Audrey but I think he was a bit shocked for all his flirting that he was into the kids with Aki. I think he lives to play with people. I don't know if he really likes Audrey but he does want to bang her, a lot, a lot a lot. I don't think he really wanted to sleep with Aki but he did like playing with him and he could pick up the fact that Aki might be feeling him. I don't think the interest was really, real until Aki kissed him at the pool, home boy was shocked and was like oooo maybe something is there but his focus is on the teacher. And I also think the not in a million years thing had his gears turning too. You tell him it can't or won't happen and now he wants to make it happen.

Aki, my baby, my voice of reason. What makes him great as a person, makes him not great for Audrey when it comes to emotional stuff. He means well and I get where he's coming from with wanting Audrey to understand her mom but she did need a partner. The thing she loves about him is the thing that makes it hard. I don't know how Aki was brought up but I feel like this plays into it, she's always comparing him to a therapist. I wonder if his parents a bit more emotionally cold or curt or just very analytical people. But, like he's been lovely since ep one, the only one of the group to sort of defend Zoya or Julien wanting to know her / keep her secret. (What secrets does he have?) And in ep 2, he really was like 'ya'll fucked in the head' to the mean team. I know some consider him boring because he doesn't speak up often but when he does speak up, he got something to say. I want the show to use him in a way to stir drama just by being friends, his character doesn't have to have a dramatic effect and he could get his own little subplot that's tied into the show but like, my can't become some douche. (If he does, only for a bit.) Now, I don't see Max being endgame for him AT ALL. If it's between the two, Max would go for Audrey for sure while leading my boi on in ways, he could even really start to like him but endgame no. I'd love to see a scene with Max does get jealous of Aki with another dude, in a romantic way or the dude could be hitting on him, I think Aki would be able to humble him just a bit because no one really seems to know what he's thinking. In the end, idk who he ends up with but I want him to find someone who will do my dude right and he should get some non-shitty friends who'll listen to his problems. (Still not over that Max)

The teachers while being shown more, don't have much of a presence. It's mainly Kate and the goofy one for extended scenes. KATE MY GOOD SIS. NO. Please, I want this to be the point where she loses GG somehow and someone takes over or maybe another GG pops up, can market better and isn't willing to have a faltering moments. I want it to spiral. Spiral hard. Also, sexy teach said not on my watch ezra! I stan him. Teachers are still fun for me, they make me want to never teach at a dumb rich private school.

Also, fuck the dads within reason. Esp, Julien's dad but only because we got to see Zoya's more and he is kinda in the right about most of the stuff but not the sister stuff. You can tell he's doing his best to instill morals in his daughter esp when he knows she can fall to outside influences.

Overall, I'm still enjoying it, I'm invested. I see room for growth for all of the characters (maybe not the teachers) and I want to see it play out. It does feel a little rushed but I think they're finding their footing and they have some big things to pull. But's not horrible and if they just play the drama bit longer and then conclude, it wouldn't feel that way. Maybe one more episode or half an episode could've been added to the Zoya-Obie-Julien story line to fully flush it out but I like the ending. Not sisters, not friends but cool with each and possibly re-build, at worst they just don't interact. I noticed some cool things with the promos but I need to confirm when I can find the one for 3.

Sorry if it went from all lower case to proper-ish, I had to switch to my phone and it auto-does it.

[purplesurveys]

671

So my school is indefinitely shifting to online classes starting this week and we aren’t having class again until April because of the coronavirus. Wild times.  Do you watch really old tv shows or movies from the 1970’s or earlier? Not shows, but movies. Gab introduced me to the Golden Age of Hollywood, and it’s really how we became close friends in the first place. It started with Breakfast at Tiffany’s, then Gone with the Wind, then Mildred Pierce, Waterloo Bridge...then it just kinda snowballed from there. I am a fan of a certain old show, but it ran from the mid-1980s to the early 90s – Perfect Strangers. Who’s your celebrity crush(es)? My top 3 would be Kristen Stewart, Hayley Williams, and Beyonce. I don’t like leaving any one of them out haha. What do you think of fake people? Sometimes you gotta do it, dude. Sometimes it’s not about being fake, it’s being polite and civil. What I do have a problem with is being two-faced with people who genuinely see you as a trusted friend. Whats a song you absolutely hate? I can’t fucking stand Demi Lovato’s new ballad, the one that starts off with “I tried to talk to my piano...” I also can’t stand most Halsey songs because of her voice. Ever been to a rave? Nah. I’ve always preferred parties, but I’m not opposed to trying out a rave at least just once. 

Are you afraid to name the person you talk the most shit about? Lmao not at all, but only because this Tumblr is private anyway. Patrice. I’d be a little more hesitant if this had a bit of an audience, though. Are you a jealous person? Not really jealous. I’d say envious is more fitting for me. Who do you text the most out of your friends? My girlfriend, def. I message everyone the equal amount on Messenger though because it’s where everyone is. Song playing right now? I don’t feel like listening to music right now. I do have Gabie on video call though, so some sounds on her end serve as background noise at the moment. Has anyone ever mistaken you for someone else? A few times. The weirdest interaction was when a masseuse for my mom came over one evening – and she’s supposed to be a psychic or recognize the supernatural or whatever – and she asked me if I was currently pregnant. Are you really interested in the lives of celebrities like Miley Cyrus?
 I’m not invested but if I come across an article, I’d take a few minutes to read. I wouldn’t voluntarily go to gossip websites or buy celebrity magazines though. What would you do if you saw a complete stranger dealing drugs in public?
 Probably wouldn’t do anything as I don’t wanna be entangled in shady businesses like that. If you don’t have to be up by a certain time, do you like to sleep in as late as possible?
 Sleeping in sounds wonderful, but my body generally doesn’t allow me to. I’m usually fully awake by 8 or 9. What did you buy the last time you went clothes shopping?
 I got two of the same Filipiniana-inspired tops but in different colors, one yellow and one black. How many books do you think you read in a month?
 Zero. Not really a secret on this blog anymore but I don’t read much, ha. How often do you play video games? What are some of your favourites?
 Uhhhh not a lot. I never did get the hang of video games so you will only ever see me playing easy and kiddie ones lmao, like Mario Kart. I tried playing Resident Evil on my own once, couldn’t get through the literal first and easiest mission because I kept dying. Anyway, my favorite may have to be GTA San Andreas - lots of memories with that baby, even though I did always just watch my cousins and dad do all the video gaming. What are a few things that get on your nerves when it comes to Facebook (or your social networking site of choice)?
 Boomers sharing pubmats with awful layout/graphics, boomers sharing daily Bible verses, and boomers being stubborn about fake news. Do you keep a hand-written journal or diary?
 I used to. But Tumblr’s served as my diary for the last seven or so years now, too. What are three things you’ve started to like lately? BOJACK HORSEMAN, the Cold Brew Malt drink from Starbucks Reserve, and the electric fan we have in the living room that I’ve always found to be too loud and too cold/strong – now that the weather’s beginning to feel warm again, that fan’s been a damn blessing. What was the last reason for having butterflies in your stomach?
 Gab requested we video-call tonight because we haven’t seen each other in a while due to the virus outbreak – I hate hate hate video calls and never do them even with her, but because she asked and because she genuinely wanted to, I said yes. If you live with your parents, do you spend a lot of time with them? If you don’t, how often do you go home to visit them?
 I live with them. I don’t really spend time with them as I like having my own space. Having them under the same roof is enough for me. Do you need a lot of space in relationships, or are you happy to spend a lot of time with your SO?
 I can be pretty clingy so I tend to be the latter, but I’ll also want my space sometimes. What was the last thing you cooked from scratch? Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha Have you ever won anything from those games in arcades?
 We’ve hit the jackpot in some arcade games that awarded us the maximum number of tickets those games can give, but afaik we’ve never spent our saved points on big prizes. We just like to keep accumulating the points haha. When was the last time you went out to a fair?
 First day of February. Came back for my high school’s fair. How far is the nearest zoo or wildlife park from your house? Do you go often?
 I’d say the nearest ‘zoo’ is the eco-park in my school. It’s up a mountain but it’s a pretty quick drive, only takes about 15-20 minutes to get there. And nah dude, I haven’t been there since high school. What are you wearing at the moment? Is it for any particular reason? A tank and a pair of shorts. Do you have anything interesting planned over the next few days?
 Ugh no. This virus is making us stay home for THE NEXT MONTH. Hoping I don’t go crazy. What do you do when you can’t get to sleep?
 I watch something on YouTube or Netflix, or I browse Reddit. Super effective. Are you a morning person? Or does it take you a long time to wake up properly? Am a morning person. I was kinda forced to be ever since I was 4, considering I lived relatively far from my school which meant that the school bus always had to pick me up way earlier than the other kids. In the 14 years I spent in my alma mater I had to wake up at 5 AM every single day, which can easily explain why I’ve never been able to properly sleep in. How old is your oldest living relative?
 I’m pretty sure I still have a living paternal great-grandparent. Not sure about their age, though. Are either one of your parents retired? If not, what do they do for a living?
 My mom is a confidential secretary at a hotel. My dad is an executive sous chef. Do you buy a lot of DVD’s, or do you tend to just watch everything online for free?
 We used to buy DVDs; we had multiple racks back then. But time is obviously a-changing so I watch everything online now, either through Netflix or through sites that illegally stream movies haha. Could you happily spend the day in your pajamas? Or do you prefer to be out and about doing things?
 I’d rather be out and do stuff. Spending the day at home doing nothing can be pretty daunting and claustrophobic. When was the last time you were in a hospital, and what was the reason?
 2010, when I had to be admitted for a low platelet count. Does everyone in your household own their own computer? My mom and brother don’t have one. Do you find that your feet get unusually hot at night sometimes? No, this has never happened to me before.

[entoman-created-by-the-tallgreys]

And the Story End for Humanity

i Wonder, if anything the gray’s told me is Going to Come true, thay Told me of the Mass riot’s and fire’s in that time and thay happened thay told me of the 9/11 and that happened, thay show me ... Humanity is dead for once truly dead .... not a soul in sight, and the earth start heating up ! ALOT 

and then i told you all of the age of fire, And how the Sun will go Micro nova and stay thay way and rain Will be 212 F Hot. 

the world will have endless wild fire and summer will have the heat go up to 500 degree’s F and could still Clime .... 

i Know many don’t Believe Me, and i don’t really care for thay showed me the chaos FEMA Would Bring and OMG is it the end time’s in the Usa ... 

for the Rest of the world thay will suffer a different fate but here in the usa, the world is going to End. 

and No China will not invade, the Level of Chaos will be the end time’s. 

China is Going to get Wracked, By Something Else. 

the Usa is about to Go fully insane and the Nation will be forever dead. 

10 Year’s after the death of 100′s of Million of people in the usa .... the Earth is Going to heat up .... and the earth will be a Hot box and all the shit i told you the Weather and the environment ... will Happen, but i forgot one ... one Weather ... and thay can only happen around the sea and ... right Next to the sea. 

Steam Hurricane’s !!! 

Not a fire Hurricane a or a Hurricane made out of pure heat witch will turn sand to lava, No ! Steam Hurricane’s !!! 

thay Look like a Aggressive fog and thay Swirl very fast and if thay hit you thay will boil/fry your ass ! 

Steam Hurricane’s, and wind’s up to 600 to 900 Mile’s and Hour ... 

All this Heat will Clean Gaia, 100% and Give us a Great source of heat for we are cold Blooded, We Hybrid are cold Blooded, Our Body’s make some heat but it’s so Weak it’s like that bump on your ass where the tail used to be, and when we get heat or get warm our Body’s turn it off 100% and Generate’s 0% heat and drink it all around us and Get Colder as it get’s hotter 

Our Body’s can refrigerate, our self’s ... in the Heat and purge all heat, in the body and live off of the heat around. as the Source of heat for the body ! 

our Body’s at time don’t even hold the heat in us, But Use’s the Heat Around us AS the hat for our body’s if the heat go’s away we freeze instantly. 

And No, We Can’t adapt to Cold, at all.  

i Want you To Watch thing and think in term’s of the Gray’s agenda ! 

agenda 21 .... and the secret Society's !  

thay Need to Get rid of there Last Model to make way for the New 

We Hybrid’s are Humanity 2.0 ! 

and when you get back After thay Abduct your soul ... 

You’ll Be on too - 🧚🏻‍♀️

thay can see the dead unlike us who need cam’s and other way’s, thay can see them 24/7 and everything else .... 

thay Bin doing this Since the time of the Cave’s B.C.E 

all the Way to 2020 Year. 

I’m Not trying to rub it in ... but ... 

https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/space-aliens-are-breeding-humans-university-instructor-says-scientists-say-ncna1008971

there are many, Bit’s of Data like this ... 

Hope you didn’t skip over a few line’s for i just said once the Ufo get you, you’ll be on the earth as a insectoid too aka a fairy 

The Fairy maker’s ! 

and when you get back to earth, You'll be a fairy ... just like Me 

https://www.reddit.com/r/AlienTopic/comments/fqdvvp/fairys_in_fairy_lands_aka_the_new_maggots/

and if you really wanna See me ... I put my Image’s in the Sub reddit post . 

Soon, we’ll all be one Happy Chaotic, Hive ... 

Fairy land is Fucking Wild !!! 

Chaos is a Understatement ! 

[p0is0ned]

The Lamp

I am freaking the fuck out. Before I explain I need to preface this with two things:

1) I have had very bad sleeping problems my whole life. I take melatonin every night because if I don't, I will stay awake until 7-8am, no matter how tired I am. I’m sure the melatonin is the reason I have very very vivid dreams. They are sometimes lucid too, but not every time. And I almost never have nightmares (thankfully!!!). I will write about the next weird dream I have. 

2) I used to spend hours searching the internet for stories that would scare me, because horror movies wouldn’t do anything for me. AND BOI DID I FIND THEM. I got so spooked that I stopped looking for scary stories altogether. I lowkey still get curious sometimes about them, which caused this whole thing to happen today that'll probably take days to not freak me out anymore. 

So today on the front page of Reddit was a thread encouraging people to share the scariest theories they’ve ever heard. I knew it was a bad idea but my mad curiosity set in again. Someone posted a comment with a link to this story, shared 8 years ago. It’s kind of long, so let me summarize:

A man was assaulted by a big dude and ended up unconscious for 20 minutes. While he was out, he lived another reality. He thought he was living a different, normal life with a wife and two kids, a good job, and a house over a period of 10 YEARS. He remembers the floorpan of the house, meeting his wife, getting married, having a kid, years passing, having another kid, having a job, along with some (but not all) of the details from his life. One day in this life, he noticed the lamp in the living room looked kind of off: “I noticed that the perspective of the lamp was odd, like inverted. It was still in 3D but... just.. wrong.”

So in his reality, he spent 3 days obsessing over the lamp. He stopped eating and sleeping to sit on the couch and stare at the lamp. He says he remembers his wife starting to freak out at his unresponsiveness and would even try to invite people over to talk to him. Eventually, the lamp glitched out completely and made him realize that the life he thought he had for the past 10 years wasn’t real and he came back to reality. According to him, he spent a few years after that in a depression mourning the loss of the wife and kids he thought he had. 

I don’t doubt this story is real, or at least felt as real as it did to the author, because I know the brain is an absolute BONKERS organ and does crazy things to people when it is not working right. And I know enough about neurology to know that we don’t know much about it - we can’t always tell for sure how the brain will react to trauma and we definitely can't go inside someone’s mind to know how they think and feel under those circumstances. The smallest bit of damage can make huge differences, and I'm sure perception of time is one of them. Even if you don’t believe it’s real, how can you factually say it’s impossible? EDIT: after doing a bit of reading it seems like this has happened quite a bit with people who have experienced comas or unconsciousness. Wild.

I read this story this morning around 10am and it’s now almost 4am the next day and surprise! I can’t sleep even though I'm exhausted. And now I’m too scared to lolll. This is how my day and night went tonight:

I read the story. peed my pants. I went to my partner’s house. I told him the story. I stayed way past the time I said I'd leave cuz I was scared to drive an hour home alone at night. but I left eventually. I got home and my mom was already in bed at 2:30am, which is rare because she has sleeping problems too and usually sleeps around 4. So the house was pitch black and I was like FUCK. But my cat usually sleeps in the living room at night, so I thought okay, if I see him and be able to pet him I might feel comforted. I called for him and didn't see him anywhere. fuck. ok maybe he’s upstairs with my sister. He is an anxious cat and hates to have the door closed so I assumed if he was with her, her door would be open. it wasn’t. FUCKK. I started to panic thinking I would see a glitch somewhere or something. I started to get that feeling that something was following me up the stairs. so I ran a little quicker and knocked on her door, and thank FUCKKK she was still up. I opened the door, and found her and the cat just chilling. My heart almost came out of my ass.

Now, I have such crazy vivid dreams. I’ve had dreams where I also have partners I’ve met and gotten to know for the first time during the dream. I’ve had dreams where days have passed; I have no concept of time in my dreams. I have those dreams of missing work and appointments constantly, but in my dreams, it’s always a few days after the appointment before I realize I’m late. So I’ll be sleeping for maybe an hour or less, but days have passed in my subconscious. In the past month, I’ve had 2 separate dreams about having 2 different girlfriends, neither of whom I’ve met irl. But they were so vivid I can remember every detail of them, one was even so real I had an o*gasm in my sleep (that also happens often, and not always with other people, which makes these strange worlds feel even more real). Although when I have these dreams, I don’t ever feel like I’m in love with these people. So maybe I’m spared of the heartbreak when I wake up. But other than that it’s usually really hard to tell when I’m dreaming. Just last night I was having a really strange one about seeing a doctor who looked like an old professor of mine who prescribed me medication that would cause water to flow out of my face and fix my airways. I saw other people on the same meds shooting water out of their nose and mouth and thought, damn this can't be real life. So I was triggered out of it. I “woke up”, but I woke up into another reality. I was still fucking dreaming. And this time I couldn’t tell it was still a dream. I truly just thought I was awake and living my normal life. 

So now it’s 4am, and I keep thinking about the lamp. What if I start to notice something weird in this reality just to realize everything around me isn’t reality at all? Who does this even happen to? WHAT IF MY VIVID DREAMS ARE REALITY AND THIS REALITY IS JUST A DREAM WTF MAN I CAN’T TELL THE DIFFERENCE!!! 

I’m tired and I’m going to try to sleep. I hope my dreams aren’t too real tonight. I’m going to try to not take melatonin cuz I don’t want to see even one detail of a lamp.