#i think i would have been cool with it if they did

[moon-of-curses]

You are on the moon. You have a job to do. That job requires the other Guy, so it would really fuck things up if you killed them with a rock.

1-2 players.

The task is simple: go out and fix something. You’ve done it before, and if you make it through today, you’ll never have to do it again. That is to say, you’ve been out here for six months already and if you spend another second with this Guy you think you might snap. 

You have a task. The progress of this task is represented by a d12, starting at 1. When this die reaches 12 the task is completed and you get to go home.

You must maintain your cool. Your Cool is represented by a d6, starting at 6. If this die ever reaches 1, you snap and kill the other Guy with a rock. Please avoid killing the other Guy with a rock.

Every round, both Guys roll a d6. If both Guys roll less than their current remaining Cool, the Task Progress increases by 1. If a Guy rolls more than or equal to their current remaining Cool, their Cool is reduced by 1.

I was going to title this "If There Were Two Guys On The Moon", but I thought that having the intro paragraph be the full title was funny. anyway I don't know if anyone else took you up on the concept back when you suggested it, or if anyone else has done it here, but I did it a while back, never posted it, saw this, and then edited down to 200 words.

the original included an event table to roll on every round, but the main mechanic was always the frustration-induced/feeding death spiral, so I pared it down to just that. there is a small amount of the original humor still there, but mostly I'm glad I could keep the intro paragraph and "Please avoid killing the other Guy with a rock".

I am ok with this entry being archived off-site.

200 Word RPGs 2024

Each November, some people try to write a novel. Others would prefer to do as little writing as possible. For those who wish to challenge their ability to not write, we offer this alternative: producing a complete, playable roleplaying game in two hundred words or fewer.

This is the submission thread for the 2024 event, running from November 1st, 2024 through November 30th, 2024. Submission guidelines can be found in this blog's pinned post, here.

[deoidesign]

Ray of sunshine

(pre-launch page for their comic)

[bluespider008]

Oc: Mayhem (transformers)

1. [are they associated with a certain color? what color do they wear the most?]

Like many other Decepticons she had a mainly purple color palette, though after leaving the 'con army she began to veer into more greys, various purples, 'n some yellow as well in her paint jobs (kinda like a Megatronus color palette)

2. [what sort of music would they like? have you thought about what genres or bands do they lean towards? do they have a favorite song?]

Absolutely LOVES rock 'n rap! 'Keep their heads ringin', 'Rollin', 'X gon give it to ya', 'The choice is yours', 'Till I collapse', 'No sleep till Brooklyn'

3. [weapon of choice? any particular reason they chose their weapon?]

Prefers blasters that she herself makes (being a weapons specialist/engineer) even if they don't always work the best. She's currently workin' on makin' a blaster that can also change into a sword (likely will never work)

4. [how crafty/resourceful are they?]

She is incredibly crafty 'n can make a weapon out of just about anythin', she specifically loves building weapons or items to make missions more fun for her chaotic self.

5. [how do they typically dress? does their wardrobe lean more towards practicality or aesthetics?]

She has spikes naturally formed on her helm but she added ones to her shoulders. She also likes comic stickers, 'n caution tape, as she heard they looked cool in human culture.

6. [how do they wear their hair? do they care a lot how their hair looks?]

No hair, just helm lol

7. [favorite animal? why?]

She likes platypuses.. cause, like- they are mammals but lay eggs? How? HOW???

8. [do they have a nickname? who gave it to them? if it's not derived from their real name, what's the story behind it?]

Bullet (from her brother. Y'can probably guess why she's called Bullet)

9. [favorite food? least favorite? are they a picky eater? do they have any dietary restrictions?]

She'll literally eat anythin'- even if she ain't supposed to 💀

10. [if they wear jewelry, what kind? do they prefer silver or gold? do they have a favorite gem?]

She likes any yellow stones/crystals as they remind her of her brother's optics

11. [what do they have in common with you?]

Fear of attachment/abandonment as well as love for buildin' things (same fam, same..)

12. [how long have they been around? do you know their birthday? is their birthday the day you made them or another day? what do they think of celebrating birthdays?]

Birthdays aren't really somthin' she's accustomed to celebratin'.. (also, cybertronian age is pretty confusin' so just think of her as a 17 year old in human standards)

13. [what languages do they speak? how fluently?]

Cybertronian, basic alien dialect, can learn any language by goin' through databases as well as mimickin' accents.

14. [are they any good with numbers?]

Ehh.. so/so

15. [how big or small is their family? who did they live with growing up? do they live with anyone now?]

The actual size of her family is yet to be known as she was raised by her brother. Neither of them truly never knew their sire or carrier 'n had been on the move constantly throughout their childhood.

16. [do they have any pets? what do they call their pets?]

She isn't allowed to have pets yet until she learns to be more careful with her large frame 💀 (she's already accidentally crushed multiple things)

17. [how did they spend their summers/free time as a child?]

As a sparklin' / young teen she spent most of her time on buildin' random projects, her first successful build bein' a hoverboard like invention (before she learned how to transform properly)

18. [their opinion on lying, stealing, and killing?]

All can be reasonable dependin' on the situation you're in.

19. [are they quick to anger? what sets them off?]

She's a bit of a hothead 'n can easily be set off when someone mocks her or her inventions.

20. [if applicable, can they drive? if they have their own, what color is their vehicle? is the inside neat and tidy, or a mess?]

She definitely drives like a drag racer 'n not so surprisingly becomes very competitive if she's actually challenged to a race. (Her alt mode is a deep purple custom '69 Ford Mustang Mach 1)

21. [their favorite place to be?]

She likes the mountains, finds the snow to be beautiful 'n peaceful durin' winter.

22. [do they sleep well at night?]

Depends on the night/ how hard she'd worked prior. Sometimes she'll fall into recharge rather quickly, other times she won't or she'll be jolted awake from dreams.

23. [how would you describe their voice? can they sing?]

She loves to project the voice of the singer she's listenin' to through her own vocalizer, pretendin' that she's the one actually singin'. She often switches through accents 'n speaks pretty fast, so it can be a bit hard to understand at times.

24. [do they have any creative hobbies? art, writing, music, etc]

Loves art, engineerin', 'n music.

25. [how good/bad is their hearing? what about their eyesight?]

She has very sharp hearin' 'n pretty good sight, though one time she'd almost lost her optics in a fight.

26. [how do they move? are they clumsy? light on their feet? do they use mobility aids?]

She's far too strong 'n flexible for her own good which only boosts her already huge ego, often gettin' to her head 'n causin' her to do very reckless things durin' battle, sometimes old Decepticon habits come into play 'n she goes overboard.

27. [if applicable, do they have a favorite sport they play any sports or prefer to watch?]

Boxin' 'n racin'. Gets WAY too competitive.

(Might do the last few questions some other time..)

i wanted to make an oc ask game 😋 things i like to ask people abt their characters:

are they associated with a certain color? what color do they wear the most?

what sort of music would they like? have you thought about what genres or bands do they lean towards? do they have a favorite song?

weapon of choice? any particular reason they chose their weapon?

how crafty/resourceful are they?

how do they typically dress? does their wardrobe lean more towards practicality or aesthetics?

how do they wear their hair? do they care a lot how their hair looks?

favorite animal? why?

do they have a nickname? who gave it to them? if it's not derived from their real name, what's the story behind it?

favorite food? least favorite? are they a picky eater? do they have any dietary restrictions?

if they wear jewelry, what kind? do they prefer silver or gold? do they have a favorite gem?

what do they have in common with you? how are they different? would you get along with them?

how long have they been around? do you know their birthday? is their birthday the day you made them or another day? what do they think of celebrating birthdays?

what languages do they speak? how fluently?

are they any good with numbers?

how big or small is their family? who did they live with growing up? do they live with anyone now?

do they have any pets? what do they call their pets?

how did they spend their summers/free time as a child?

their opinion on lying, stealing, and killing?

are they quick to anger? what sets them off?

if applicable, can they drive? if they have their own, what color is their vehicle? is the inside neat and tidy, or a mess?

their favorite place to be?

do they sleep well at night?

how would you describe their voice? can they sing?

do they have any creative hobbies? (art, writing, music, etc)

how good/bad is their hearing? what about their eyesight?

how do they move? are they clumsy? light on their feet? do they use mobility aids?

if applicable, do they have a favorite sport? do they play any sports or prefer to watch?

how do they show that they care about someone? how do they express that they don't like someone?

are they associated with any particular element (air, earth, fire, water)?

do they smell like anything notable?

do they like receiving gifts? giving gifts? what is their ideal gift?

do they have any habits that aren't particularly self-destructive, just maybe odd?

if applicable, how would your other characters describe them? i mean specifically the people around them.

how would your character describe themselves? it doesn't have to line up with how they really are.

do they ever return home?

[ronwestbreeze]

NONBELIEVER | viktor

summary: you would think two zaunites would come together and change the world. but perhaps fate had other plans for the two...

word count: 5.7k

warning: no use of y/n, angst and ambiguous endings???

author's note: so act 3 really messed me up lol but enjoy some angsty viktor because why not? the gif is from this set!!

ACT I: MOB

Like Viktor, you lived and breathed the Undercity just not in the same way.

Your face used to be what artists would paint, even for a revolutionary.

But now it was stained with blood of your own. Beaten out of you mercilessly until cool shackles were clamped onto your hands and steel bars shielded you from the world. You have been in prison for some time now. Months, maybe a year? These days you’ve lost count. The only way you could tell how much time had passed was the growth of your hair. That was the price of being a revolutionary. That was the price of taking risks no one else would. Now you tasted blood and smelled old pipes. That was life in Stillwater Hold.

How you got here was the same story as any other inmate. You had planned to destroy a part of Piltover to make a point. To show that the people of the Undercity would not rest or become the ants under their boots. Most of your comrades had escaped from Enforcers, others were killed in the explosion, and then there was you. It was a sacrifice so that your comrades could have time to escape. And you’ve long accepted your fate.

That is until a certain professor decided to mess with fate.

After being forced out of your cell to meet this Professor Heimer—something, you weren’t really sure about. All you knew was that these Enforcers really liked to manhandle you especially roughly and took pleasure in seeing the black eye and blood on your teeth. That you were used to.

“Oh dear, could we please get her a towel at least?” The professor chided with a shake of his head. “Goodness, at least have her be presentable!”

Eventually, you got the rag, albeit it was thrown at you. After spitting on one of the Enforcer’s shoes, you wiped the blood and dirt from your face as the professor began speaking.

“Well, you certainly live up to your name. The Rebel Moon, is it? You may or may not have heard of me, but I am Professor Cecil. B. Heimerdinger and I are here as a Piltover Academy representative!”

A beat of silence went by. You realized then he was waiting for a response. You rolled your shoulder back and rubbed your aching jaw. “What are you meeting with me for?”

Professor Heimerdinger cleared his throat awkwardly, “Well….it seems you’ve left yourself a bit of a…reputation. I specifically admire your work on the bridge a year ago—marvelous work!” Sarcasm. You didn’t quite appreciate the condescension either. Seeing the unimpressed expression on your face, he quickly continued, “What I mean to get at is that we found some of your…erm, blueprints and I was surprised to see that most of them had been handwritten yourself, is that right?”

One of the Enforcers placed down a file filled with your old blueprints. They were mostly a copy of the Piltover Bridge, others were for weapons that your previous comrades built off of your drawings. Then there were the private drawings. The ones filled with naïve dreams of rebuilding the Undercity, changing it to a place where it was safe for everyone.

You snatched the files and hid those drawings in the file earning a quick yank from one of the Enforcers holding your chain. But after a subtle look from the professor, the chain loosened, and you frowned, anger boiling in your blood. “Where did you get this?”

Heimerdinger raised his hands, “I come in good faith, child, that I can promise.”

“I don’t particularly care about your promises—”

“Oh yes, very true,” The professor tapped the table thoughtfully. “But I do think you will like the proposition I have for you.”

Apparently, you had the potential talent of being an architect. One of the best in your generation it seemed—which somehow, he got from just looking at your old blueprints. And now he was convinced that you should join his Academy and that this was the perfect opportunity for you to change your life. To start over. To—

“Become one of you people?” You frowned and pushed the file away from you. “I’ll take my chances in here.”

 Heimerdinger, of course, was quite the persistent man.  “Imagine what you could do with your talents, Miss Moon. You’re still so young, you don’t have to waste your life behind bars. You can start anew!”

“I’m not wasting away in here.” You say simply, your shoulders are heavy and your face still sore. Carefully and slowly, you leaned back in the chair you were sitting in,  trying not to put too much stress on your recently dislocated arm. “That’s the thing with you Upsiders. You all don’t know anything about what it is to fight. And what it is to sacrifice just so your people can see the light of day. I don’t need your handouts. I’m doing just fine here. It’s where I belong.”

At that, he frowned. “I’m afraid I disagree with you, Miss Moon.” He pushed the file back toward you. “You have the chance to create something beautiful for your city, for your people. You have the chance to help them live. You have the chance to be something greater.”

Greater. You weren’t great. It was either great or nothing.

Somehow, Heimerdinger managed to strike a deal and get you out of Stillwater despite your rejection. For some reason, he was so determined to make you into something that you weren’t. And you were determined to fail. You were determined to prove him wrong. Even if he tried to impress you with the new uniform, the scenery, and the architect of Piltover—just to inspire you—you would not break.

If anything, seeing all this luxury only made you angrier. Even if they preached about you now being free with new chances, there were still shackles clamped on your wrists, imprinting themselves like a tattoo. To remind you that even if you’ve gotten this chance, there is always a chance for you to go back. And they wouldn’t hesitate to send you back once you mess up. Which was what you were counting on.

But it seemed that Heimerdinger was a lot more astute than you expected. The professor had you in his study during the day to work and look over some blueprints for new housing at the Academy. It left you with very little time to plan something reckless that would have you sent back to prison. Which, you guessed, was what Heimerdinger wanted. So, you entertained him and worked on the stupid blueprints, redesigning everything as fast as you could so you could get done faster and have more time on your hands.

Of course, that plan went quickly out the window when there came more demands for blueprints. Leaving you swapped and buried deep in work you didn’t even want. And yet, admittingly, it was a nice distraction. There was a small part of you—the child you—that enjoyed some of this. You would never admit that to Heimerdinger and yet you couldn’t put the pencil down. Eventually, you began receiving so many different requests for different projects that Heimerdinger got you a lab over your own, so all your stuff didn’t get overcrowded in his study.

Requests were filled with more designs or redesign for specific buildings they were hoping to update to catch up to the times—and then there were a few that had you designing weapons. The more you worked, the more of a reputation you began to build in the Academy. The new Undercity kid. Rebel Moon. Hephaestus. It was all ridiculous.

That’s when another fellow Undercity student finally found you.

“I fear those papers would catch on fire the more you glare at it.”

It was an accented voice that stirred you out of your spinning thoughts. You definitely had been glaring at the blueprints of a recent request for an apartment just a few walks from campus. You briefly glanced over your shoulder toward the man—he seemed a little bit older than you, walked with a cane, intrigued amber eyes, and a small, amused smile tugging at his lips.

“If you’re here for a request then just leave it over there with the rest.” You murmured before turning your attention back to the blueprints after pointing toward a desk in the corner stacked with many more requests.

There was a short breath before he spoke, “Ah, no, I actually already sent a request just a few weeks ago…I’m impressed by your work, the professor has a knack for spotting talent.”

You didn’t respond as you kept staring at the blueprints, twirling the pen in your hand, feeling the weight of the shackle around your wrist.

You heard him clear his throat, “So, you are from the Undercity?”

“What’s it to you?” You grunt before outlining.

“Well, truthfully, I didn’t expect the Academy to accept another one.”

At that, you swirl around in your seat and sized the man up carefully. He was pale, slightly hunched to hide his true height, neatly combed dark hair, and he had very fine cheekbones. “Another one? What, too many Zaunites in your perfect little school?”

“I would’ve thought they had enough once I joined.” He gave a knowing smile that made you pause and narrow your eyes.

“…You’re…from the Undercity?”

He moved toward you; the click of his cane echoed in the quiet room and offered his hand to you. “I’m Viktor. I’ve heard a lot of great things about you, Miss Moon.”

You stared at his hand for a moment, tilting your head, “Great things? That doesn’t sound right.”

Viktor chuckled, still holding his hand out. “Eh, some people might have a few opinions about you. Unfortunately, it made me all the keener to meet you in person.”

“Am I what you expected then?” You asked as you eventually shook his hand, your shackles clinking a bit.

With a small smile, he squeezed your hand, “No. Not at all.”

Your brow twitched as you studied him. He was delicate-looking. But his hand was a bit larger yet slender. They were calloused, just like yours yet warm compared to your coldness. It was then you realized that your hand was still in his and you pulled it away and turned back to your work.

“My name’s not ‘Miss Moon’ by the way.” You grunt as you refocus.

There was another soft chuckle and a click of his cane before he was gone. You couldn’t help but glance over your shoulder and stare at the doorway, a little bit too intrigued.

After that, you didn’t stop seeing Viktor. At least twice every week you’d get a request for him to polish some designs for his work. Sometimes he’d send his assistant, Sky, and sometimes he’d come in person himself.  At first, you weren’t entirely sure about him. But the fact that he was from the Undercity along with his assistant was slightly comforting. At least you weren’t alone here. Still, it was odd. Foreign.

“Have you ever gone out to see the finished product of your work?” Viktor asked you one day, deciding to linger even after delivering yet another request for something to do with a Hexcore.

“No.”

“Why?”

You frown and glance toward him. He was looking over some of your finished blueprints with a strange look accompanied by a smile. “I’m just not interested.”

Viktor blinked and met your eyes with a small frown. You didn’t say much more—truthfully there wasn’t much more to be said about it.

“Well, it’s one of the most beautiful designs I’ve ever seen. If that’s any consolation.”

You felt something in your chest at his words. Perhaps some of you did want to see the finished products of your design. And yet you were always rooted in this lab. In the dark under one lamp, barely seen by other students. Hephaestus.

Viktor tapped your workbench thoughtfully and hummed, “I’ll leave you to it, Miss Moon.”

You rolled your eyes, “That’s not my name.”

He laughed and left your lab.

On another day he came into your lab in quite a hurry. He left his requests as usual before rushing out. Only he left a ring behind. Chewing the inside of your cheek, you glanced at the ring on the floor and toward your workbench before sighing. After grabbing the ring, you pushed up from your stool and left your lab. This was the first time you’ve walked around campus or went anywhere besides your lab or Heimerdinger’s study.

You asked around for Viktor’s lab until you stopped on a bridge, spotting something quite familiar.

It was the newly remodeled dorms. They glistened like gold in the sun. Build just like how you imagined them in your head. Just like how you outlined it on paper. Only in your dreams could you imagine what they would look like. But seeing it….It was real. And it was beautiful. And it came from your mind.

“Ah, Miss Moon, odd seeing you here!” Viktor approached you quite smugly from across the bridge. He glanced toward the dorms and gave a grin, “They just got done with it last week. What do you think, hmm?”

You narrow your eyes, “You scheming little eel.”

Viktor blinked almost too innocently, “I haven’t a clue what you mean—ah, I was looking for that.”

He gestured toward the ring in your hand. You gave it back to him while your eyes couldn’t help but draw back to the dorms. There was a tightness in your chest and a small ache behind your eyes.

“Glorious, isn’t it?” Viktor asked, his voice gentle as always.

You snapped out of your reserved awe and cleared your throat. “They did okay, I guess.”

With that, you darted back to your lab, the dorms imprinting themselves in your mind.

It became a routine at some point. Viktor began visiting your lab a little more often. At first, you didn’t notice this. But some days he’d come back to your lab a second time that day just to linger and see what else you were working on. At first, you thought you found it annoying. But as the days carried on and turned into weeks, you began to begrudgingly look forward to his visits.

“At least make yourself useful. Look over my work and see if there’s anything I missed.” You tried grunting when he leaned a little closer than usual to look at the blueprint you were working on.

“Hmm, I can try.” Viktor hummed as he flicked his eyes over the finished prints. “But they’re all probably perfect as usual.”

“Don’t you have some work to get to?”

“Not particularly, no.”

For some reason, he started leaving shit in your lab. Which would lead to you having to go and find him and return his stuff. Stuff like a screwdriver or some paperwork. Today it was a journal as you trudged through the campus and finally found his lab.

“Vik, I understand you’re a busy man, but you can’t keep leaving your shit in my area.” You huffed, throwing his journal onto his workbench, breaking him from his focus.

“Oh, Miss Moon,” He looked genuinely surprised to see you. “I wasn’t expecting you…”

“Yeah, right, so you didn’t leave this in my lab on purpose? You just happen to leave it there for me to find and bring to you?” You hummed, tilting your head as you got a good look at what he’s been working on—something a lot longer than what you’ve been doing. The Hexcore was what he called it. You didn’t understand it yourself—or cared much to learn about it. But you did notice some of your designs were used for his work.

“Mmm, you make me sound like a calculating stalker.” Viktor hummed as he got to his feet, joining your side. So, close his arm brushed against yours.

“Are you?” You quipped dryly while studying the Hexcore.

His slender fingers gently brush along your elbow. “I wouldn’t call myself a stalker, no. Are you interested?”

You glanced at him and realized he was talking about the Hexcore. “No. Just give me the why.”

Viktor hummed once more and leaned against the table, his fingers still brushing gently along your elbow. “For our home.” At that, you felt a tightness within your chest, your features falling slightly. Viktor, who had become very astute with your expression, gently grabbed your arm and squeezed it. “What’s with that face?”

You remember your life before the Academy. You remember your determination to prove Heimerdinger wrong. “Sometimes…I feel as if I’ve gotten too comfortable…too used to all of this….”

In the end, it was always your people above everything else. A revolutionary never dies, that was the simple truth.

“I think I’ve gotten too comfortable too.” Viktor frowned softly, tilting his head a bit to get a better look at your eyes when you averted your gaze. “And it’s all your fault, Miss Moon.”

You rolled your eyes only for him to lean forward and capture your lips with his. A lick of fire had been rekindled within you, breathing life into your soul, into your body. When he brought his hand to the back of your neck, when he practically cradled your face and brought you closer so he could deepen the kiss, when he touched you so gently as he always did, it was as if for a moment that heavy weight on your shoulders had been lifted. Leaving you weightless for even just a moment. That bit of relief was a breath of fresh oxygen in your lungs.

The heat from his lips moved from your mouth and down to your jaw and to the crook of your neck. Your back was pressed against the workbench as he practically clung and draped himself over you. And you let him. Even when he desperately wanted to feel you and kiss you all over, he was gentle. He always was.

The days didn’t change much except for whenever he was free, he’d head straight for your lab. Whether on a break or in a hurry, he’d always stop by and pepper your face with quiet kisses and touches before leaving for his lab. It was routine. You were getting comfortable. Comfortable in his warmth. In his gentle hold.

“Just stay,” Viktor murmured against your jaw as you examined some of his work with the Hexcore. “Your presence is better than that tea Jayce always makes.”

“I can’t, Heimerdinger wants to meet with me soon, and I got a bunch more new requests on my desk.” You hummed while looking through Viktor’s partner, Jayce’s, notes. “I think that Jayce guy requested some designs for a hammer of some kind—that’s been taking up most of my time as of lately so I can’t necessarily—”

“I know, I know,” Viktor rested his chin on your shoulder, closing his eyes for a moment as he slumped against you.

His health had gotten worse, which was something you and everyone else noticed. It did worry you how much he was working lately without much sleep, but you quickly learned how much of a stubborn man he was—especially when it came to his work.

“What do you think Heimerdinger wants to meet with you about?” He voiced your constant question out loud.

“Don’t know.” You murmured, trying not to think too much about it—or his health right now. “Won’t know until I get there. Probably wants to send me back to Stillwater.”

At that, he pinched your waist, “Don’t joke like that.”

“It’s a little funny.”

“Losing you is not funny to me.”

You placed Jayce’s scribbles down and wrapped your arms carefully around his neck, burying your face into his shoulder with a soft hum. He instantly relaxed in into your hold, but of course, you could tell his mind was still half Hexcore and half you at the moment. “Be sure to get some rest, okay?”

As usual, he gave a half-assed noise of slight agreement.

ACT II: REBEL MOON

It wasn’t long before Jayce Talis became the Man of Progress and Viktor became buried in his work. And then you were promoted. The lead architect of a very important project for Piltover. No longer the Rebel Moon but Hephaestus, Piltover’s future.

But.

But.

Everyone saw you as the kid saved from the Undercity and made a new. Everyone saw you as the future of their city. You were part of the progress of tomorrow. And you kept chasing Viktor, trying to keep up with his mind but he—he had become so work driven—so ambitious on the Hexcore dream that he had forgotten everything else.

You were angry. Angry at Piltover. Angry at what you’ve become. Angry at Viktor. This wasn’t the life you had chosen. All of this was envisioned for you. This wasn’t for you. You had nearly gotten so swept up in all the glamour and success that you had nearly forgotten—

No. You would never forget your people.

So, when your lab went up in smoke when you destroyed the project that you had been assigned to as lead architect, when the Enforcers tackled you to the ground and arrested you on the spot, when one of them grinned as if they’d been waiting—waiting for you to finally mess up, you knew right then that you would never be what Heimerdinger, what Viktor, or what anyone saw for you. You were a Zaunite after all. And a revolutionary. A rebel. Always.

It wasn’t long before you were placed back in Stillwater Hold. In the same cell. With the same shackles. You didn’t even get to tell Viktor goodbye. Would he have even realized it? Or perhaps, it was better off to leave him to his Hexcore dream. Perhaps, that was best. Yes.

But your mind was no longer settled with just staying in a cell and living out your sentence. One thing Piltover did give back to you was your fighting spirit. Rekindled your fire. And breathed life into your dead soul. And so, you weren’t quiet in the cell. You made noise. Cried out for war until the rest of the prisoners joined you. It wasn’t long before a riot broke out. The prisoners overpowered the guards, and you led them to escape.

The streets of Zaun were screaming for the Rebel Moon once more. Even now more so than ever when rumors began flying around about a rocket hitting Piltover, resulting in a few councilmembers’ deaths. Your thoughts wandered to Viktor, you wondered if he was okay, if he hadn’t killed himself working so hard. But your focus went back to your people. To the escaped prisoners as you all went into hiding underground. They followed you. Their chosen leader. You had no wish to be a leader, but you did want to be free and help your people.

ACT III: NONBELIEVER

Hiding in the Underground for months began to wear everyone down, even you—their supposed fearless leader. The sickness in the Undercity knew no bounds. Many of your people were getting sicker and dying as the days passed. You did your very best trying to supply and care for them—but you could only do so much.

That’s when you started hearing strange rumors about some healer in the Undercity. A herald or whatever that meant. At first, you didn’t think much of these rumors while being so focused on caring for your people.

Soon, sightings of strange people began appearing. Shouting about the Herald and how he could save their people. You were…wary of this. It almost seemed too good to be true. And you hadn’t seen these strange people yourself, so you thought it was all fake, stories made up to give the people false hope.

You came back from the small local market with more food than you could scrape up. Somehow, you’d have to figure out how to make it last throughout the month. But there were so many people. So many people are coming for refuge, and so many people in need of help.

“Are you the Rebel Moon?”

At the voice, you stop and glance over your shoulder, only to find no one there. Had you imagined it? Were you too wary after months of people coming to you and seeking refuge? The name Rebel Moon became a beacon of hope as much as it was for the name Jinx or that Herald.

Deciding it was just exhaustion messing with your head, you turn to continue forward, only to gasp and stop when you nearly ran into someone standing directly in front of you.

And they had appeared out of nowhere. It was a man that you didn’t know. His face void of any emotion except for a simple smile on his face, strange crystal-like fixtures embedded into his skin, while wearing white fabric far too clean to have come from the Undercity.

“You are Miss Moon, yes?” The man asked.

You stiffened. No one had called you that in a while. No one except… “Whose asking?”

The smile remained on the man’s face, “The Herald has been searching for you, Miss Moon. And he would like to speak with you.”

You gripped the basket of fruit and near stale bread in your hand and gritted your teeth, “I’m not interested, thanks.”

Just as you nudged past the man to continue down the crowded street, he spoke again. Only this time it wasn’t his voice coming from his mouth.

“You’re a hard woman to track, Miss Moon.”

It was like the air had been stolen from you as you whirled around to stare wide-eyed at the man with Viktor’s voice. The basket fell from your grasp, but the man was quick to catch it—somehow so fast—as he handed it back to you. “V-Vik?”

He nodded and slowly blinked, “I feared I wouldn’t see you again. You disappeared so suddenly, almost as if you weren’t there to begin with.” The man’s hand came up to gently brush his fingers along your jaw sending a sharp shiver down your spine. “Almost as if you never existed.”

You flinched almost and stepped back. Thoughts swirled within your mind as you tried to reel from the man speaking in Viktor’s voice. “What…what is this? How are you doing this?”

“I don’t want you to be frightened of me.” He instead said, taking another step forward but didn’t reach out to touch you again. “I only want to help you. I can save those people from that sickness.” You opened your mouth, ready to ask how he knew but stopped yourself which allowed him to continue, his voice gentle. “Only if you let me.”

“You’re the Herald.” It was mostly confirmation for yourself as you let the words slip out.

The man smiled softly, “I wish to see you again, Miss Moon. There is so much I wish to show you. But I will come to you first.”

Before you could ask what, he meant by that, the man’s voice returned, and Viktor’s voice was gone. “The Herald will come tomorrow, Miss Moon.”

And with that, watched this vessel of a man walk away. Leaving you feeling as if you were in some type of nightmare. No, alternate reality. It must’ve been some hallucination. Yes. That had to be it.

Only when the next day came, one of the children at your camp came running to you about the Herald being here, did you know right then and there that this was not a hallucination.

You watched as he entered your camp with those lifeless people that followed him.  Viktor had changed. Covered in indigo metallic skin, his hair slightly longer, his posture straighter yet still relying on a cane—or staff in this case.

Viktor’s eyes found yours almost instantly as if they were magnetically drawn to you. It looked like him.

“Miss Moon.” He hummed as he drew closer, staring at you with the same gentleness despite the distance in his expression.

It sounded like him.

You led him to the tent he would be staying in, watching the lifeless people tend to your people with baskets of fresh fruit and food. Viktor called your name in his accented voice, drawing your attention back to him, finding him already staring at you with an intense expression.

Even in this form, Viktor’s body couldn’t help but be pulled toward you. He let the staff rest while his hands slowly came up to trace and feel this human skin. Distantly he was all too aware of it. How he still reacted to you. With the remnants of Sky lingering in his mind, his thoughts had always wandered back to you. The image of your divine being. If he could still dream, it would’ve only been you he would’ve seen.

There was a strong pull that led him to you. Perhaps sensations of desperation. Even as he leaned his forehead against yours, feeling the little warmth coming from your body against his metallic yet pallid skin—he still wished to mold himself to you. To never stop touching you. To never let you slip from his fingers again

And then there was that look on your face. The furrow in your brow running heavy with exhaustion—you hadn’t slept. At that realization, his hand gently squeezed the side of your neck absently.

“You’re so quiet.” Viktor hummed finally, quietly for only you and him to hear in the stillness of the tent. His thumb traced your cheekbone. “You’re always keeping your thoughts from me.”

You tilted your head, trying to stir yourself out from the haze of his touch. “Are those…those people….are they the ones you ‘saved’?”

“Yet, so honest.” There was a hint of a smile on his face as he selfishly pulled your hand against his chest, keeping it there, selfishly. “Yes. They’re healed. No more…senseless pain. I can offer your people this peace. And you can come to stay at our new home. I think…you’d like it. You need peace.” He rubbed his thumb under your eye, making your shoulders grow heavier. “And rest.”

You couldn’t come up with a response. His lips linger on your mouth, and your jaw, and your neck. His fingers thread through your hair which had grown longer since the last time he had seen you. Gentle traces, cool breath fanning along your skin, his arms wrapping around your weathered and scarred form. Even your fingers traced his new skin. Refamiliarizing yourself with him.

But.

But.

It wasn’t him.

Even when his lips pressed gently yet hastily against yours, his body clinging to your human flesh, it still felt like a stranger. Familiar yet unfamiliar.

Confliction warred at your mind as you watched him move through the camp, your people looking at him as if he were a savior. As if the gods had sent him when it was only magic and remnants of the Hexcore embedded into his body. Your eyes couldn’t stop falling onto the lifeless people he ‘saved’. The ones that followed him without much thought. Would your people look like this? Void of themselves? No breath. No heartbeat?

But then you wanted Viktor. You wanted to go to this peaceful land he had created for himself and these people. You wanted to be with him. To be wrapped in his gentle embrace once more. To hear his voice whisper gently into your ear, easing the exhaustion from your muscles.

But.

But.

But.

Viktor reached out toward a boy. Sparks danced along his fingertips. The boy stared in awe. It was instant, your reaction.

Your hand grasped his wrist, stopping him. Viktor’s gaze met yours in an instant. You didn’t know what your face looked like, but it made Viktor falter.

Viktor saw your face and absolute dread filled him. A sense of it at least. It made his body go slack in your grasp—surrendering to you instantly. The glassiness of your gaze and that expression. He had never seen such a thing on your face. Fear. Desperation. Hurt. Sorrow. Grief.

He’d lost you. No. No. He’d…He’d get you back. He couldn’t let you go again…he couldn’t let…

What was this strange feeling in his chest?

You pulled him away from the boy and Viktor allowed himself to follow you. Gazes unwavering. But you forced the words out of your mouth. “This isn’t what I want for these people. This…this isn’t saving them…”

He couldn’t let you slip from his fingers.

You couldn’t let him take your people’s humanity.

He needed to keep you. To keep his humanity.

“Revolutions never rest.” Was your whisper as you released his wrist.

He called your name, but you forced yourself to turn your back on him.

“Show him out.” You murmur to one of the stronger men in your camp. You couldn’t turn back. You couldn’t look him in his eyes. If you did….

Then this conflict would disappear in an instant.

Viktor and his followers left without much problem. Maybe that hurts too.

The yearning for Viktor never left you and yet it wasn’t your job to bring him back. This Hexcore…all of it was beyond you. Maybe all of it wasn’t meant to be for you. Maybe…Maybe he wasn’t meant to be yours….

Days later you had heard the Herald had changed.

Days later the Herald was gone from this world.

Days later your exhaustion and grief wore on your shoulders.

Days later you’re trudging through the Undercity, more baskets filled with fruit in your arms.

Days later, you find a blue shard on the ground, somewhere near where Viktor’s utopia had been.

You picked it up from the ground, a remnant of what remained of Viktor and his work. You saw the manmade tents that were now abandoned, the builds similar to your past designs of what you wanted for the Undercity.

Silent tears fell from your cheeks as you gripped the shard. And you clutched the shard so tight in your hand that you could’ve sworn you felt a soft hum from it. Or maybe you were imagining things. Maybe you were too exhausted. Maybe you really did need rest.

And then.

You heard that accented voice.

“Miss Moon.”

Your breath hitched as the shard suddenly began to glow.

And Viktor’s voice came from it.

“May I show you something?”

And then. There was a bright blue flash.

[jasvtsc]

losing your powers simply meant one thing—you couldn’t disappear whenever or wherever you wanted to. in fact, you pretty much couldn’t do anything.

and with your preservation skills or rather the lack of them? yeah, you were screwed.

as much as dean loved your innocence and good-hearted nature, sometimes he wished you could be a little more reserved and bitchy. not so open to anyone. and by anyone, he meant anyone.

so when he found out that you’ve been hitchhiking with strangers? he was fuming after experiencing first signs of an early stroke. you couldn’t spot a dangerous situation if it was pointed at with neon signs and blasting horns—you thought that since your favourite human was nice to you and his younger brother was also a good man, everyone else would probably be the same.

that’s when dean noted that you needed some exposure to other human beings, like a resocialized puppy.

because when he called you (teaching you how to use the phone was like teaching a baby how to walk, but you got there in the end, your phone only having dean’s number) you were once again hitchhiking.

“what? birdie, no, what the hell are you doing in nebraska?” he sighed, running his hand through his tired face. you were going to be the death of him.

“research,” you said as if it was something obvious. “sam said you needed to check something out here, and since you didn’t have time, i did it,” he knew you were grinning right now, and it just tugged at his heart.

“birdie—” he didn’t have it in himself to scold you. or at least not right now. instead, he sighed and got up, getting his keys to Baby. “tell me where you are exactly. i’ll pick you up,” he said, although he frowned when he heard some weird commotion on the other side of the phone.

“you don’t have to. i’ll be back in the bunker in a few hours,” you said with excitement, and when something revved up, dean’s face went pale.

“birdie, what are you doing? what was that?” he asked, panic already evident in his voice and in his tightly he was gripping the phone.

“oh, i’m on a bike! it’s bigger and louder than normal ones, but it’s so cool! and the kind mister has such a cool beard! it’s so fun!” you practically squirmed in excitement, sitting behind some biker since his gang decided to drop you off.

dean sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. at least you weren’t in a car where they would lock you up. at least on a motorcycle, you could just jump off (he knew you were capable of doing that).

“tell me you’re wearing a helmet,” he let out an exasperated sigh, closing his eyes as he expected your answer.

“i did. but it was squeezing my head too much, and i couldn’t think, so i took it off. also it was ruining my hair.”

lord have mercy.

drabble inspired by this ask <3

[audliminal]

Survivability Bias Pt 5

Masterpost Ao3

“So hypothetically,” Superboy begins, glancing over at Robin. “Say I met another meta, and they, like, needed a civilian identity...” He trails off, listening intently. Trying to get anything from Robin's expression is pointless - between his skill at maintaining his composure, and the expression obscuring mask, there's not a lot to be read on his face. Instead Superboy focuses on his heartbeat, which speeds up the smallest amount as Robin turns away from the tablet he'd been working with, and settles his full attention directly onto Superboy.

“Hypothetically,” Robin repeats.

“Yeah. You know, in theory, if that ever happened.” Robin stares at Superboy for a moment, presumably reading everything that's missing from his own face in Superboy's.

“Well. In theory, the Justice League has the means to grant any meta hero a full identity. Is this about you? Because honestly it's insane that they haven't bothered yet, and I will straight up make you one right now if you-”

“No, it's not about me,” Superboy interrupts. “But like, you could do that? Without the Justice League’s support, I mean?. Like, say if this hypothetical person really didn't want the Justice League knowing about them?”

“You met a meta who doesn't like the Justice League.”

“I don't think it's really about the Justice League specifically. I mean, they definitely don't exist, but if they did, then I would say that the second I showed up they were bracing for a fight. Like before they even saw who I was.” Robin sets his tablet to the side without looking, and leans just a touch towards Superboy as he talks. It's honestly wild, he thinks, how the other boy can manage such intense eye contact through white lenses, but, well, that's the bats for you.

“Theoretically, I could absolutely make this person an identity, if they did exist. But I would want to meet them first.”

“Cool, cool,” Superboy says leaning back into the couch. “I offered to introduce you and they said they'd consider it. I think, maybe they don't trust adults very much, bc they asked if you were our age.”

“Theoretically?”

“Exactly.”

* * *

Though the specific details as to when the founding member first became acquainted, it was only after multiple incidents of near-worldwide devastation that they realized the necessity of an organized front.

The details of the forming of the Justice League should be fascinating, if only for the revelation that world-ending disasters are, apparently, relatively common in this universe. In a way, it’s a comforting thought. Memories of Dan sit as heavily as ever in Danny’s mind, especially now that he’s effectively lost his family, just like in Dan’s timeline. Of course, here there’s presumably no risk of him getting fused with Vlad, so probably that specific threat isn’t likely, but - well, if it comes to the worst and Danny does go mad, there’s at least a reasonably good chance that the heroes here will be able to stop him.

On the other hand, this also means that if the heroes turn out to actually be evil or whatever, he has less chance of getting away. Of course, Superboy hadn’t really seemed evil, but Danny really has no clue if he would even be able to tell. Sure he’d known Vlad was a nightmare from a mile away, but Vlad wasn’t exactly subtle about his obsession with Danny. Evil steeped in calculation would surely be harder to spot, wouldn’t it?

“I don’t mean to interrupt,” someone says from behind Danny. “But are you going to be using that computer for much longer?” Danny blinks, staring back at the teen who’s looking at him nervously. Danny glances over at the clock, but it’s now reading 2:30, which means that he’s been here for like three hours already,and he really hasn’t read much of anything in all that time.

“You can have it,” Danny says, pulling back to shove his notebook into his backpack.

“You sure, man? I don’t wanna chase you off, but I really could use it. Physics project, you know?” 

“Yeah, I get it. Wasn’t really making much progress anyway. Might as well take a break.” Danny says. He never got to take physics in school, but he remembers struggling with lit class enough to understand the sentiment. And he really isn’t making any progress, if he’s been staring at the same Justice League page for multiple hours.

“You working on a history project or something?”

“Yeah.” It’s close enough to the truth.

“What teacher d’you have? It’s pretty cool that they’re letting you do it on the Justice League.”

“Oh, uh,” Danny quails for a moment, focusing on closing the tab so he doesn’t tell the kid he’s not going to school. After all it’s probably reasonable to assume the laws about delinquency are the same here. “It’s more about the meta protection acts than like, the Justice League itself. And I’m not really local, so...”

“Ah, that explains why I don’t recognize you,” the other teen grins.

“Yeah,” Danny says, stepping back so the other teen can take over the computer. “Well, good luck with your physics project.”

“Thanks, man, and good luck with your meta-acts essay.” The other teen turns his attention to the computer as Danny steps away, heading for the library exit. Clearly research isn’t going well today, and Jazz would definitely yell at him for trying to force his brain to focus when it clearly doesn’t want to. He pauses outside for a moment, trying to remember what Jazz said to when your focus was shot. Obviously part one was to take a break, but he’s certain that she’d had more to say than that.

He thinks he remembers her going on a rant about monotony, and boredom, but he doesn’t really feel bored. Actually more than anything he feels wired and anxious. And anxious means he should...

“Turn slow tigers into fast tigers,” Danny mutters, gaining a deeply confused look from the couple other patrons standing outside the library. He ignores them, though, and starts heading for the nearby park, so he can do some stretches. Fast tigers means he has to exercise, which he would usually complain about but- well, his routine has definitely been a lot less active since he got here. Other than the train crash the other week, Danny’s been spending most of his time sitting and reading, and while it’s been insanely nice to have nobody hunting him, honestly the idea of exercise sounds almost horrifyingly nice.

He does his best to run through the kind of stretches he remembers doing in PE, warming himself up as best he can before starting to jog the little looping path. The jeans make it a little more annoying than he remembers in PE, but luckily they’re kind of loose, so they’re not too terrible to run in, and Danny has no intention of going very fast. There’s too many people around even if he wanted to, and he does his best to be polite and not in the way as he jogs. it doesn’t take long for his breathing to go heavy with exertion, and as he finishes his second circuit, Dannyt relaxes into it, and just lets himself run.

Thirty minutes later, Danny is feeling markedly more tired, and he lets himself slow to a walk. His heart is thudding rhythmically in his chest, the occasional stutter only more prominent in the heightened pounding, and his legs feel a little wobbly, but he keeps walking, The sweat he’d worked up feels gross against his clothes, so probably he could’ve gone about it better, but Danny figures a whole thirty minutes without worrying about his existential situation is more than worth feeling gross for a bit. His usual tactic of sneaking into the local gym while it’s closed isn’t gonna cut it during the day, so he’ll have to wait to shower, but in the meantime, he can walk off the remaining adrenaline, and decide what to do for dinner.

* * *

“Hey, did you really mean what you said about me having a civilian identity?” Robin looks up as Superboy sits in the air beside his work desk.

“I have four different identities, ready for you to choose from,” Robin says.

“Wait do you just keep possible identities around in case anybody needs them? Is that, like, a Bat thing?” Superboy leans over to examine the tool Robin had been working on. Like everything else he uses, it’s emblazoned with a bat insignia, not that the marking does anything to help identify what the little machine even does. It’s ridiculously small, definitely not any kind of weapon, unless Robin’s been tinkering with the idea of murderous nanobots, which honestly wouldn’t be that shocking. Of any hero Superboy’s ever met, Robin seems uniquely predisposed towards mad scientist-type stuff.

“I keep exactly two emergency identities on hold, but those are separate. I was talking specifically about identities for you.” Superboy freezes, turning his eyes back to Robin, who looks at him like this is a perfectly normal thing to say. Superboy is at least ninety percent sure it isn’t, but what the hell.

“What the hell,” Superboy echoes his own thoughts. “Why would I ever need four identities?”

“You don’t need four, you need options. There’s no point in giving you an identity you hate.”

“Okay, but people don’t get to choose their names? So why would I care.”

“Most people don’t choose their names because most people receive them when they’re babies, but everyone has the ability to change it later if they decide they don’t like it. You have the unique advantage of being cognitively developed enough to have a say from the beginning, and you should have the opportunity to use it.”

“Huh...” That’s actually kind of sweet. “Do you like your name? I mean, like, that’s not why you don’t want to tell us, right?”

“My name is adequate,” Robin answers slowly. “It’s mine and I am... accustomed to it. The reason I haven’t told you my name is because it... implicates the other bats, and Batman considers that to be a significant security risk.”

“Oh, yeah. I guess that’s fair. Could I see the names you were thinking of?”

“Certainly,” Robin says, pushing back from the desk. “Let me get my tablet.”

* * *

“Uh, Superboy?” Danny shouts, trying to ignore how fucking ridiculous this feels. “Are you, like, free to talk? I think I want to meet your friend.” He’s hovering in the sky about a mile out from his town, in as close to the middle of nowhere as he could manage. He’d done a bit of looking into Robin this morning, before making his decision, and what a wild discovery that Robin was a name that had been held by multiple individuals. It makes him think of Dani, and he almost hopes that wherever she ends up, she might use the name Phantom too. After all, if anyone else rights to it, it would be his genetic clone.

Danny has no clue if time is flowing the same here as back home, but with any luck his friends have managed to orchestrate Dani’s escape too. It was always going to be a little more dodgy than Danny himself- his death being inherently tied to the portal had meant it was a bit more responsive to him than it otherwise would be, and that detail had been pretty quintessential to the rewiring that had needed to be done in order to send him to an entirely different universe, but they’d been hoping that her nature as a post-portal clone would mean that she had a close enough tie to the portal to send her through as well. Not that Danny would likely ever get to know for sure.

The soft rush of air alerted Danny to someone’s arrival, and he just managed to keep himself from falling into a defensive posture as he turned to look at the newly arrived Superboy, and the other teen being carried in his arms. Danny recognized the other boys outfit as that of the current Robin, who was now staring at Danny through a pair of disconcerting white-lenses set into a domino mask.

“We were free so I figured we’d just come meet you?” Superboy says with a nervous grin.

“Yeah, that’s, um, kind of obvious. Should we land?” Danny’s pretty sure that none of the Bats have flight, and like, as much as flying is cool as hell, Robin doesn’t look particularly impressed by it.

“That would be preferable, please,” Robin says, confirming Danny’s thoughts. He nods, and heads for the ground. Superboy follows just as quickly, and a moment later they’re all gathered on a gravel road in farmland.

“So, uh,” Superboy begins, once he’s deposited Robin on his own two feet.

“You told him about me before,” Danny says. Superboy may have had plenty of time to fly over here, but there hadn’t been enough of a delay to have explained the situation to Robin just now.

“It was an entirely theoretical conversation,” Robin offers dryly, before Superboy can respond.

“What does that even mean?”

“It means that he was asking if I could theoretically help a meta acquire an identity if they were uncomfortable with the Justice League. Nothing of it was mentioned to anyone else and he told me no details about who any theoretical metas might be.” Danny blinks, taking a moment to process Robin’s explanation. In a way it makes sense, and he can see why Superboy would want to make sure that what he was offering was even possible.  Besides, it’s pretty obvious already that they both really trust each other.

“Okay, sure. I guess I get it.”

“I would like to know why you’re concerned about the Justice League, though, if you’re willing to share. If there’s anything illicit happening-”

“Oh, no, it’s not like that,” Danny cuts in as soon as he realizes where Robin’s going. He’s suddenly glad he’d already decided to explain his situation in more detail. “It’s like, I’m not from here so my shit is entirely unrelated? It’s just, they’re -you’re?- associated with the government, you know?”

“And your government is a threat to you.”

“Honestly, everything was. But they can’t get to me here. It’s why my friends- that’s why I’m here.”

“Okay, but are you sure you’re safe? Because like, space travel is a thing, and if you need protection...” Superboy trails off, looking concerned.

“I mean, it should be fine? Even if the GIW did manage to figure out inter-dimensional travel, I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t be able to figure out where specifically I went, so yeah.” Danny really doesn’t want to think about a GIW that’s gone inter-dimensional.

“Well if they did manage to make it here, they would be breaching the meta protection acts if they tried anything, so I hope if that does happen you inform myself or Superboy.”

“Yeah,” Danny laughs. “It’s honestly been kind of crazy trying to wrap my head around the idea I have protections here?”

“That’s understandable. Plenty of meta-individuals have complicated feelings about them, even if they grew up here.”

“Oh?”

“Well, just because it’s illegal to exploit or discriminate against someone doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t happen. And metas who have been treated poorly often have trouble trusting in the protection acts.”

“Or sometimes you just didn’t get that info programmed into you and then you have to adjust to your understanding of history being manufactured,” Superboy mutters under his breath. Robin doesn’t react at all and Danny’s pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to hear it either. The implications are a bit concerning, but Danny’s not about to press him on it.

“Yeah, I mean that’s kind of where I am, I guess. I think I’d like it if you’d be willing to make me a legal identity? I’m basically homeless at the moment, so I’d like to be able to get a job or something. But I’d really rather not end up on the Justice League’s radar yet. You guys seem nice, but databases are- a lot.”

“Easy enough. I can actually do it all with my personal resources, so the info never goes anywhere near the Justice League’s databases. We just need to determine what name history you want to have.”

“I mean, I’d like to keep my name, if possible?”

“Sure, What’s your name?” Robin tilts his head.

“Danny Fenton.”

[phyrestartr]

Deal With It | Gojo Satoru x M!Reader (TEASER)

CW: Arranged marriage, SELF-HARM (on and off-screen), hurt/comfort, angst, drama, self-loathing, blood and gore, implied depression, suicidal thoughts, suicidal ideation #NSFW, probably top Gojo, probably bottom reader, maybe switch idk, idek if they'll bang it out tbh lol, angst with a happy ending, reader is a sorcerer, time skips, time progression, relationship development, student era into teacher era Note: I got this request to make a story revolving around Gojo and an arranged marriage to the reader (but bro is in love with Getou sob.gif), and I've been RUMINATING on it for forever. I think I finally have a good idea of who the reader is/what their chemistry is like with Gojo, so I'm happy to post a wee bit of a teaser to motivate myself! Let me know your thoughts---I'm finding that I absolutely love writing for Gojo, so I'm down to write more LOL. He's a very fun, complex character.

Deal With It

“So, you really don’t care what he thinks?” Shoko asked as you lit her cigarette. “Even I think he was kinda harsh.”

You pocketed your lighter and leaned back against the cold stone of the college walls. “He’s got a thing for that black-haired guy.”

“Getou.” 

“Sure.” You shrugged and tried to rub the ache out of your neck as you stared up at the bleak, grey skies. The air reeked of petrichor. Thankfully you’d brought an umbrella that day. 

“And you’re not bothered he’s in love with Getou?” Your friend continued, her cute bobbed haircut swaying with the tilt of her head. She always looked so charming like that, when she was being a mischievous brat while pretending to be anything but. 

“Dunno.” And that was the truth. “He’s not even my type. I’d rather hitch up with someone like you or Nanami. Someone less annoying. Less loud-mouthed.” 

“Ooh, that'll hurt his ego.” Shoko smiled. “Well, guess you'll have to learn to deal with it.”

You took a deep breath and rubbed your face as you nodded. “Yeah.”

–

“Forever is a long time,” You mumbled, leaning your forehead against the cool touch of the window. Rain pittered and pattered, exploding off the glass like trillions of kamikaze planes. It almost birthed some sort of hurt in your chest. Best not to dwell on it, you decided.

“Hah? Are you talking to yourself again like a weirdo?” The one and only Gojo Satoru yowled before kicking you in the rear like a petulant child. “Pft! Figures. Knowing my luck, I would have to get married to a creeper.” 

“Even if you married Getou, you'd still be marrying a creep,” you grumbled, dusting the dirt off your behind. “You need something? Or did you harass me just for the fun of it.” 

You heard Gojo, your fiancé, scoff and shuffle behind you. “I just wanted to remind you to humble yourself! Just because I'm forced to marry you doesn't mean you're accomplished or cool or anything, got it?” 

Being in his presence had you craving a cigarette. “Yeah, got it.” 

“And Suguru's better than you,” he added, aloof voice bowing down beneath hardened, steeled words. “Don't forget that either.” 

You bit down on your cheek to ward away the heat building under your skin, the magma sinking deep into your eyesockets and threatening to pour down your esophagus. The taste of iron washed against your tongue, and you released your flesh from between your molars. Sometimes, you wanted to keep boring down on yourself to see how much you could really take, but a fear of the answer too often made you think twice. 

“This is starting to bore me,” you said, tilting your head as you caught a flicker of red in your rain-muddied reflection. You touched your fingers to your tongue and found translucent red coating the tips. 

“Pah. I was gonna say the same!” You watched his reflection turn away. “Good luck trying to impress me.” 

I'm not interested. You watched him walk away, slouching and with his hands in his pockets like he was emulating some kind of yankii character. He might have fit the bill, if he hadn't had such a ridiculous, brat side to him. Just deal with it. You wiped the red on your uniform with a sigh. Tomorrow's a new day.

--

Feel free to comment on this post if you want to be tagged for the full version!

@kamote-kuneho @tr4nnie @silvern1006

[auroracalisto]

opposites attract, or so they say

simon x gn!reader, 1.9k words summary: simon's got a crush on the sweet little thing down the street. a/n: I love him. I love kyle gallner. send help. tw: lots of cussing but it's mostly because I went with simon's pov and ran with it, simon is buzzed, brief mention of sexual content but like nothing other than the idea

Simon was a lot of things.

Angry. Vile. Crude. A badass punk rocker.

But there was something more to him than just that. There was something deep within him that screamed for release, that just wanted to be a part of his world just as much as the rest of him.

And that, which it's far more simple than you might think, was the need to be loved.

His family was shit. That was a given. Never once looked at him like they were proud of him, which for what it was worth, he couldn't give a shit.

His bandmates were fucking righteous, but what the fuck's that got to do with anything? Love from a bandmate? Right. Weird as fuck. This wasn't one of those half-assed teen romcoms where the drummer fell in love with the lead singer. He'd rather vomit in front of an entire set than have his drummer fall in "love" with him.

And then, there was you. That bitch down the block that made him question anything and everything. Just looking at you made him feel things that he wasn't used to, and it infuriated him.

Sure, maybe he wanted to be loved, but by you? Sweet, little Y/n who'd never had a bad thought in your life? For fucks sake, it was as if the universe was laughing at him!

The universe was always laughing at him.

But who cares? He was in a punk ass band, he always stuck it to the Man, and when it mattered most, his bandmates showed up when others didn't.

But you were always on his mind.

Shit.

He was down bad for you. There was no way around it.

Standing outside your doorstep, half-smoked cigarette hanging from his lips, he knocked rather loudly. If you didn't answer, he'd just leave. God, he hoped you didn't answer. The cherry wine coolers he'd had just moments before weren't doing much to settle his nerves.

Why the fuck was he even nervous?

It wasn't like it was the first time he'd been around you. Hell, he'd smoked a cigarette or three on your doorstep, complaining about anything and everything as you drank a soda, a coffee, or one of those cheap wine coolers he brought you.

It wasn't like he didn't know you.

There's a pause as he sucks in a deep breath of smoke, and the door opens to reveal you. In your pajamas like a good little samaritan, ready for bed at 10 in the evening.

Simon silently scolded himself. Of course you were ready for bed. A goody-two-shoes who most definitely wasn't waiting up for some kind of divine inspiration for a new song. Who wasn't waiting up for some kind of alcohol to finally kick in.

You blinked slowly at him. You knew him—not as well as you would like to, but you knew him. You had a history class together back in high school, and while you weren't that teenager from way back when, you still remember the inkling of a crush you had on him. You knew him way better then than you did, now.

Ethics be damned, am I right?

"Simon?"

Your voice was so soft, so sweet. He just wanted to turn around and walk away, to avoid you so he wouldn't taint you like he wanted to.

Dammit.

"Hey, Y/n," he said, dropping his cigarette and crushing it beneath his boots. "You, uh, got a minute?"

You blinked slowly but gave a small nod, stepping out onto the porch. You closed the door behind you to keep the cool air from going in. Your arms crossed over your chest and you watched Simon closely before he spoke. It wasn't the first time you had done this.

You stood barefoot in front of him, the cold concrete a not-so-welcome addition to the conversation.

"Look," he began. "I, uh, just wanted to—well, fuck, I don't know what I wanted to—"

He was a blabbering mess. What the fuck was this? He was confident, but around you, it was as if every little bit of his brazenness melted away.

"You, me, bar tomorrow night, yeah?" he blurted.

Simple. To the point. Far less embarrassing than what happened just moments prior.

Your eyes widened, and he can see the gears turning in your pretty mind. But you didn't seem adverse.

You smiled a bit. "What bar?"

He blinked slowly. "What bar? The fuck—uh," he looked over his shoulder, clearing his throat. "Sure. Why the fuck not? Bar on Main Street."

"Will I meet you there?"

He scrunched his nose. "Yeah. Meet me there."

"Cool. What time?"

He blinked slowly. "Time? Fucks sake, Y/n, you ask a hell of a lot of questions," he said, snorting softly. "Let's, uh, say nine? Or is that too late for you?" He eyed your warm pajamas.

"I'll be there," you said.

He perked up a bit before he looked you up and down one more time. "Fucking right," he said. "Be there." He took a step back, nearly faltering on the first step of your porch, but then he turned away and without another word, left you behind.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. He wasn't stupid. He was smart in his own ways, sure, but what the actual fuck was that?

Girls threw themselves at his feet, especially when he was John Q. Guys did too, in their own ways—hell, he had one guy one time tell him he'd give him a blowjob if he looked at him for longer than five seconds.

He almost took him up on the offer. But that was nearly a year ago, and the way you looked at him tonight made his heart melt in the confines of his beaten chest.

Dammit all, what the fuck was he doing?

Love. What the hell would love give him that he couldn't get from some random fucker down the street?

What in the ever-loving hell was he doing?

Nine o'clock on the dot, he was there at the bar on Main.

Down bad. He knew it, too. Even canceled his band practice just to come and see you. His drummer had nearly cussed him out, but Simon didn't give a shit.

He went straight to the bar and ordered a beer, downing half of it in the first few seconds of having it.

When he felt a hand on his arm, he nearly jumped out of his skin. He looked down, seeing you standing there. You actually came. You weren't pulling his dick, you actually showed up.

His heart pounded nervously in his chest. Shit. When was the last time he was actually this nervous?

"Y/n," he said.

You smiled up at him. Did anyone ever tell you how pretty your smile was?

What. The. Fuck.

"You said nine, right?" you asked. "I'm avoiding my pajamas just for you."

Just for him. Fuuuck.

You were cute.

He shoots a cheeky grin, leaning against the bar counter. He could be suave. He could be confident and not seem as needy as he felt. The pyro was more than capable.

But for some reason, he didn't feel like lying to you. He didn't feel like joking around, or trying to show you something that simply wasn't true.

He'd loved you since that stupid class back in high school—the one with Mr. Fuck-face and that terrible toupee. You had been so nice to him, while everyone else had treated him like a parasite. Not that he blamed them. He knew what he was.

He cleared his throat and looked around the bar. Maybe it hadn't been the best place to ask you to, but the alcohol definitely would help at some point.

"Yeah. I said nine," he said.

You ordered a drink. He doesn't listen to what you say to the bartender. He's staring you down, eyeing you like a fine choice of meat. Fuck, you were, though. Every inch of you was like heaven to him.

Maybe it wasn't love he wanted. Maybe it was just lust that kept him in a chokehold.

Besides, he hardly knew you. Knew you briefly in high school, but the fuck's that matter? How long has it been since the two of you graduated?

Long enough.

Long enough for everything to change, except for him, apparently.

"How've you been?"

Your voice drew him out of his thoughts. He looked at you, blinking slowly, before he shrugged.

"Busy," he said.

"You still playing?"

He blinked slowly. "Huh?"

"In high school. You had a band. You still playing?"

You remembered that? Shit.

"Yeah," he said. "I'm still playing. We play a couple gigs here and there."

Your eyes widened. "Really? Where do you play?"

"Wherever we can get a spot. You, uh, should totally come out to hear it some time."

You smiled immediately. "I would love to," you said.

He stared you down. Either you were lying or you were one of the fuckers who he knew he'd never get enough of. It's looking like it would be the latter.

He looked away from you, taking a swig of his beer.

"You think that—"

He interrupted you, slamming his beer onto the counter. "Look," he said rather quickly. "I don't know what it is, but I need you to take me seriously for a second."

You blinked slowly. "Yeah. What's up?"

He clenched his jaw as he looked at you. He wasn't angry with you—nah, he was angry with himself. Not talking to you sooner, not kissing your pretty mouth, not—

"I think you're fucking tits," he said, taking hold of you by your shoulders. "I'm not about to sit here and tell you I love you, because I don't, but for fuck's sake, I want you more than I've wanted anything in my entire life."

Okay. Lie number one. Starting off strong. But how could you love someone if you didn't truly know who they were? Guess it wasn't really a lie. It just... was a half truth, if that.

Your eyes are wide as you stared up at him. "What?"

"I want—" he began, letting out a labored breath. "I want you. Okay? There. Fuck. I said it."

"You... you want me? How?"

He snorted softly at your question. "I want you in every fuckin' way imaginable, Y/n."

He said nothing more, leaving it up for your interpretation, but clearly, by the way he was looking at you, it was obvious.

"Simon—"

"Nah, don't," he said. "If you're gonna protest, I don't want to hear it."

"I'm not gonna protest—"

"—I've had enough people tell me they don't want me, and it pisses me off."

"But I—"

"—I'm serious, Y/n."

"Simon. I'm not protesting," you said defensively. "I—I feel the same way."

He blinked slowly at you, like he didn't just hear you correctly.

"What?" he asked.

"I like you," you said. "Have for a while now."

"You..."

"Yeah. I do," you said.

"Well shit," he breathed out, looking down at you. "Well that was easier than I thought it would be."

He pulled on a cheeky grin, and those pretty eyes of his bored into yours.

"You should kiss me," you said, smiling up at him.

"The fuck?" he let out a curt laugh, but he took you up on the offer. A hand moved to the back of your neck, and his lips pressed to yours almost instantaneously.

Fuuck, he'd wanted to do this shit for ages. Why the hell didn't he ask you sooner?

[aheathen-conceivably]

Warm air settled over Strangerville as Antoine spent his weeks at home. For days he did little but enjoy the quiet rhythm of life, helping Zelda with work or waiting for Violette to return home from school. All he wanted was to spend every moment that he could with them, storing away memories for the sleepless nights he knew awaited him in the near future. Only there was still one thing he had to do before he went back on the road, so one day in Spring he made the long trek up the hill to Hines Ranch.

Violette was by his side, mostly because she had hardly ever left it since he returned, but also because she never missed an opportunity to visit Hines Ranch now that her days there were few and far between. The whole walk she vacillated between chattiness and moody sighs, trying to make her displeasure about his imminent departure known while still wanting to talk to him. 

Every time she did, his resolve crumbled. Whatever other difficulties he faced leaving again paled next to this: disappointing her over and over again each time her childish joy turned to loneliness right before his eyes. It was all he could do to give her every bit of attention she wanted while he was here, so that there was never any request too big or misbehavior worth reprimanding.

Because deep down, he felt like she was right to treat him this way. He had seen how much her hair had grown and how desperately she needed new dresses. Even if he knew that leaving meant he could give her that and more, it was at the expense of missing so much.

The farmyard was quiet as they approached, the pens where Antoine had learned to wrangle horses empty and the man he sought nowhere to be seen. He took Violette by the hand and walked toward the barn, betting that Abe and his horses were in the cool shade of the afternoon. As soon as they drew near a small voice sang out from the darkness beyond. “Lottie!”

She hesitated briefly, pulling at Antoine’s hand as Will appeared at the stall doors. “I should have known you were near. Silver didn’t seem nearly as angry this feeding. Wanna come and see her?”

Immediately, Violette let go of Antoine’s hand and ran toward Will; but as she reached him she seemed to remember that if she turned her back, her father might disappear. So she kept her face turned even as Will guided her to the horses. Antoine’s heart ached as he looked at her. “Go on, little Princess. I’m right behind you.”

She ran directly into the enclosure without an ounce of fear. Silver neighed happily before looking up toward Antoine; then she brought her ears forward and turned her attention to Violette. As he looked at them, it seemed almost foolish to think of how many weeks he had spent calmy and hesitantly winning the horse over when his daughter's intense energy and loud laugher had immediately done the same.

He wondered what exactly it was that Silver sensed in her that made her so calm. Maybe it was her fearlessness that he himself had come to admire, or the unabashed way her emotions came to her without thought or filter, like a storm in the desert sending clouds of dust through the sky.

Antoine’s thoughts were interrupted by heavy footfall that he would have recognized anywhere. He turned toward the sound while the two children stayed preoccupied. “Judging by that new tie, I take it you’re not here to get back to work, are ya?” 

Forgetting why he had come for a moment, Antoine allowed himself a smile before he took his friend’s outstretched hand. Then he glanced back at Violette, trying to ensure that she wasn’t listening. He knew that any mention of the next tour was guaranteed to send her sulking, but she had already begun to whisper conspiratorial plans to Will while she pointed at the caged horses.

“I’m afraid not.” Antoine cleared his throat nervously, guilt washing over him that he had come here to quit a job that had been given to him in good faith. Before the first tour he had told Abe that it was only temporary, and maybe he had hoped it was. But there was no denying the opportunity anymore. “Jo’s booked up two more tours. I hope I’m not putting you out too terribly by leaving with so little notice."

A bright smile overtook Abe's face, one that Antoine immediately recognized as genuine pride. "Nonsense! I believe congrats are in order. Will's old enough to help now anyhow, and if need be there’s still no shortage of men after a job. No replacing you with them horses though, so might as well give it a go on my own for a while.”

Guilt settled deeper in Antoine’s stomach as he realized what he had already suspected: Abe had never needed his work. He had done it to help him when he had been at his lowest. The bright smile stayed on his face. “Want to come inside for a cup of coffee? Day’s mostly done anyway. Besides, I would like to hear where that guitar has been. Will?” His gaze went over Antoine’s shoulder, snapping Will’s eyes to immediate attention even while Violette’s continued to wander the stalls, “No leaving the farmyard, you know the rules.”

Settled inside the cool wooden walls of the farmhouse, Abe set down a tray of coffee still steaming from the stove. He poured a steady stream of coffee into each mug as he spoke. “So how was it out there?”

Antoine reached out for his cup, letting the scent wash over him like he would after a long day’s work. “It had its moments.”

Abe looked into his cup the same that way Antoine was, his voice taking on a sort of melancholy tone that sounded just as rooted in the past as it was the present. “I reckon alot of folk will act like it should be easier. Making your living playing music rather than working somewhere like here. But it has its own pains. I know.”

Their conversation seemed to flow easier after that, discussing how the mountains grew taller as the road led further from New Mexico, or how this year’s cattle drive just didn’t seem to be getting any better. Eventually their rusted pot stopped steaming and the seemingly endless stream of coffee ran dry, but their shared laughter felt just as warm.

Only the sun beams angling through the Western windows told them how much time had really passed, and Abe looked down at his empty cup one final time. "Come on, I'll walk you out. Lord knows we'll have to go looking for Lottie and Will." Antoine rose to his feet behind him, a good natured laugh leaving his lips as his chair scaped against the floor.

By the time they emerged from the house, the early afternoon sun was shining on the sand and the heat had begun to abate. In the distance, children’s laughter could be heard, most certainly from beyond the farmyard. A small smile played on Abe’s face as he looked out toward the distant voices. “You know he only breaks that rule when your girl is here?”

“I’ll talk to her first thing when we get home…”

Abe waved his hand dismissively. “Don’t. It’s good for them to feel a bit independent 'round this age. Besides,” his eyes narrowed ever so slightly as his voice grew quiet, “I worry he follows my rules to a fault sometimes. Life will hit him hard one day.”

Quiet fell between them as the laughter came closer and footsteps rang out across the mesa. Antoine shuffled his feet, conscious of the lingering words he wanted to say. “‘Suppose they heard our voices, didn’t they? Bet they’ll claim they were only just over the fence.”

Abe looked in their direction, letting the sun hit his eyes. “Sure will. And we’ll pretend like it’s the truth.” He brought his hand up to his face, ostentatiously to shield it from the sun, but also to ensure that it wasn’t visible as he spoke. “Just don’t be a stranger, will you? No need for work if you want to bring your girl by.”

Antoine cleared his throat, the words he had really come here to say finally bubbling to the surface. "Of course. And, Abe - thank - thank you. For the work I mean - for - for everything since we’ve been here. Zelda and I - we appreciate it.”

The quiet that fell between them was one of understanding, and from the corner of his eye Antoine saw Abe give a quick nod of his head. Then, right on cue, their children rounded the fence, their hands interlocked and their faces full of joy.

[dear-ao3]

riddle me this. what does a 50 million dollar drive, a giant helmet made from recycled materials, the british media, safety infringements, an aborted start, six red flags, rain, team orders, the first black flag in seventeen years, the dutch national anthem and ayrton sennas 1990 mclaren all have in common? 

stumped? well i’ll tell you. 

it’s the 2024 brazilian grand prix.

the last race of our second to last triple header. a sprint weekend. and chaos in its highest form.

today is november 23, 2024 and make sure you get a snack because this is a long one. 

we started the week off pretty strong with lance stroll getting broken up with on his birthday.

well, maybe. 

his girlfriend deleted all of the pictures of him off of her instagram account on his birthday, which really doesnt look good. and this really set the tone for the week of bonkers shit that was now upon us. 

things like lando being asked about the dreaded Last Week With Max incident. in an interview he was asked (told?)

“Are you aware that people watching at home don't want to see the fight between you and Max for the world championship ending in radio messages, tedious steward inquires, time penalties? They want to see you racing nicely and cleanly.” 

lando was in agreement clearly because he said 

“And so do I! And I do.”

max on the other hand still remained max about the situation 

he was asked  during the press conference: “a lot has been said since mexico. are you going to change the way you go racing this weekend?” 

and max said, like a badass:

“yeah, ive heard that before in my career. its my tenth year in formula 1. i think i know what im doing!”

christian horner brought receipts, as in actual data sheets, to his mexico gp media session about how max’s penalties from mexico were unjust. i don't think that anyone really listened to any of this though because the penalties were never unturned. 

one penalty that they did figure out what charles’s swear penalty from the press conference in mexico. the fia finally made a decision. charles will be pleased to know that he does Not have to do community service with max. but honestly (and this is now my own opinion here) why give one guy community service and not give it to the other? max apologized for his language Before he said “the car is fucked.” charles apologized After once he realized what was going to happen. not really sure here why the fia is out to get max but whatever i don't make the rules. also. the fines and the community service seem to Only be confined to the press conferences because as we know. people have cursed in the cool down room (lando in singapore notably) and also many have over the radio (checo, franco, charles, george, etc etc) and they have not been told anything. hm. in any case though, we have more important things to focus on than weird swear bans. 

like charles leclerc nation going insane when this video was posted, which is a new contender for best weird yet still sexy video of charles on the ferrari page

liam lawson told everyone that he is “not here to make friends, im here to win.” following his Incidents with fernando and also checo at the us and mexican gps. which is interesting for a few reasons. 1. hes in a vcarb and statistically they have not won a single thing all season because they are vcarb and 2. he was soon after seeing being besties with yuki.

oh and also. max reacted to (was asked about?) the whole liam flipping checo off while they were driving in mexico thing, and max said “Checo, I think if I did that to you, I would be quite afraid leaving the country.”

and there were also the usual “this is checo’s last race weekend” general threats. weve seen these before. so theyre not worth wasting typing space on because i cant imagine that theyre going to fire him this late into the season. and why would we talk about the goofy red bull rumors that always are swirling everywhere when we could instead talk about lewis hamilton and franco colapinto.

lewis hamilton praised the crap out of franco colapinto. at the press conference on media day. as we all know franco is a lewis fangirl. so. he honestly might still be in a state of shock.  

“It's always great to see young people, young talented individuals get the opportunity to come through and shine, and he did that in the first race. We had a great little battle and it was super safe. It was hard but fair. [...] He's saying it's not for him to decide, but my advice would be - I would be pushing on my side to make sure I'm doing absolutely everything. At the end of the day, he's got to continue to focus on doing his job every weekend, as he is, and hopefully, he's got good people behind him who are doing the right job to make sure that he's here racing next year.”

and low and behold a few hours later franco did make a fangirl post about it.

also. brazil is Not franco’s home race, but they are now officially in south america, so it was like a home race adjacent for him (hes from argentina) and the crowds were definitely in agreement. we will get back to that later. 

there was a fan at the race who saw him in the paddock and yelled at him “FRANCO. CAN YOU SIGN MY SHIRT? IT’S A KNOCKOFF ONE. FRANCOOOOO” and he lost his shit over that. because remember a few weekends ago he told everyone to buy williams knockoff merch cause it was just as good and not as much money?

we also had some helmets. valtteris had coffee on it because its something that brazil is known for.

oscars had funny little androids on it that were all different hims (he also said he only recently learned that it was polite cat and not sleepy cat)

esteban had some brazil themed stuff

lewis had a senna/brazil tribute helmet

lewis was also going to get to drive ayrton senna’s 1990 mclaren after qualifying on saturday.

oh and of course we had stake do a funny little meme thing on their twitter because theyre quite known for their funny little meme things.

is this a terrible glimpse at media day? yeah absolutely but u know what i have 7 pages of notes front and back from the races themselves so deal with it i suppose. unlike what some of you may think, i 1. do not want to be writing this post forever and 2. also have other things i need to do.

one person was not at media day though and it was fernando alonso and it was because he was in the hospital im pretty sure somewhere in spain for what im also pretty sure was intestinal issues. he had also been out last week for media day due to sickness, but he was back for the race. between this and lace’s probable breakup it was shaping up to be a banner weekend for aston martin, and it was only going to get worse!

someone who definitely didn't miss media day though was sebastian vettel. if you don't know who sebastian vettel is, he was a four time world champion, menace, shit stirrer and boy toy twink esque guy who is now mostly unreachable and is the epitome of “hey i cant do nothing to nobody no more” and comes out of hiding maybe twice a year to subject the grid to a new arts and crafts project. but do not be fooled. this is the same guy who was asked, after winning his first race, if it was the best moment of his life and he said, and i quote “you obviously weren’t there when i lost my virginity.” anyway, this time his arts and crafts project was a giant helmet made from recycled materials paying tribute to ayrton senna. and yes, he made the whole grid get in the helmet. his whimsey is still off the charts.

he was also wearing really terrible shorts. as in they were long, over the knee khaki shorts. some things never change. 

he also tried to make a bet with sky germany about max winning the championship. sky germany refused.

ok im not even going to Pretend to know what happened during the practice session. max got a 5 place grid penalty for sundays race because he took a new engine.  i think george’s car briefly broke? idk. he did get it fixed tho and ended the session in p2, behind lando who was p1. and then we had a special guest in p3.

who was it? well i will give you a clue. it was NOT kevin magnussen!!! why? because he wasn’t feeling well.

so, everyones favorite (team dubbed) “super sub” jumped back in the cockpit once again. 

you guessed it, it was ollie bearman!!! originally i think he was supposed to just be in for practice (and yes he did get p3 in practice). but since its a sprint weekend (yeah, i forgot that too) that means theres only one practice session and then sprint qualifying later that day. and so. the way formula racing works. is that whatever driver drives the car for qualifying also needs to drive the car for the race. they cant get replaced if the car has already qualified. 

ollie by the way had never driven in brazil before. he said that he did it once in a video game. and now he was about to do it irl in a real car. he also got a phone call at 6:45am saying heyyyyy buddyyyy you wanna jump in the car this weekend? we happen to have an opening! and well that's not the exact quote but that is what happened.  

and then haas announced that kevin was not going to be racing that weekend due to sickness. ollie responded in a definitely very normal way which was “of course condolences…i mean, give my best to kevin.” and then he was officially In The Car for the weekend. what could do wrong???  

well lets just say that a Lot happened:

starting with lovely and wonderful Sprint Qualifying. yes that’s right. this is a sprint weekend. why does the fia do this to us guys. 

two things were important to note. 

there was a slight threat of rain

2. the track had been resurfaced and it was bumpy, which is not great when you're driving over 200kph. it really can affect your vision and also your back

lewis had trouble with the car a few years ago when it was porpoising and he was also not doing great at this race. but merc said that he was “all good.” he was not the only driver complaining about the bouncing though. it was extreme and it was dangerous and we will hear more about it later. 

i think that franco took a nap at some point. at least its in my notes so it must have happened. and i think that it was also in the car. unfortunately i don't have a photo. like many other things on this post you will just have to trust me.

aston martin had decided that their car sucked to massive degrees and rolled back their upgrades all the way to suzuka. u know, just to see if they could figure out what the fuck was wrong with their car. Unfortunately though they could not because both of their drivers got out during sq1. 

one team was pleased with what was happening and that was mclaren. they had a new rear wing that was brazil specific and also apparently legal unlike the last one and they were Flying. in sq2 lando took the fastest time with a 1.09.0. on medium tires. last years fastest time was 1.10 on soft tires, so in the words of the commentators, “norris is on another planet!” this was good for them because they hadnt actually been sure they were going to be able to race. theor freight for their car (and some other teams cars) had all been delayed cause they were shipped in wooden boxes and you cant ship things in wooden boxes to brazil because they need to protect the rain forest.

the commentators, mostly karun, also lamented about the swear bans, which they rightfully thought were stupid as hell. he brought up a good point though which was “are you going to have translators for every language? how are you going to monitor it?” because very few of them speak english as their first language and most speak more than 1 language so it is possible they could just curse in Not English

but we don't have time for that right now. not when ollie bearman had just knocked checo out of sprint qualifying. that’s right, ollie went just slightly faster, pushing checo from p10 down to p12. 

liam and checo also almost crashed. which wasn't a surprise but it was still funny.

also surprising was that oscar pulled out a pole lap at the very end of sq3, a 1:08.899, only a few thousandths faster than lando. 

“where did that come from?” karun asked. “was he saving something in his pocket away from his teammate? that is a very fernando alonso trick”

regardless of what it was, he was still on pole. for the second time during a sprint. 

“very very happy,” oscar said in his interview. “try and win obviously…starting from the best seat in the house, make sure it stays that way.” which is an important surprise tool that you should all remember for later. later being the sprint race. 

they all lined up

oscar, lando, charles, max, carlos, george, pierre, liam, alex, ollie, lewis, nico, checo, franco, valtteri, fernando, esteban, yuki, lance and guanyu. 

and before we get into the sprint, lets get a little reminder on the championship standings.

1 Max Verstappen 362

2 Lando Norris 315

3 Charles Leclerc 291

4 Oscar Piastri 251

5 Carlos Sainz 240

6 Lewis Hamilton 189

7 George Russell 177

8 Sergio Perez 150

9 Fernando Alonso 62

10 Nico Hulkenberg 31

11 Lance Stroll 24

12 Yuki Tsunoda 22

13 Kevin Magnussen 14

14 Alexander Albon 12

15 Daniel Ricciardo 12

16 Pierre Gasly 9

17 Oliver Bearman 7

18 Franco Colapinto 5

19 Esteban Ocon 5

20 Liam Lawson 2

21 Zhou Guanyu 0

22 Logan Sargeant 0

23 Valtteri Bottas 0

so max, lando and i believe also charles and maybe oscar?? were still in contention for the championship title. and as a reminder. oscar was starting on pole, with lando, charles and max all behind. lando was able to knock some points off of max in mexico with the time penalties that he racked up and was really hoping to continue to do that in brazil. so max needed to get around charles at the start asap so he could start duking it out with the mclarens.

and speaking of mclaren, there was some good speculation that we might get faced once again with the “papaya rules” aka mclaren team orders. as in, oscar might have to let lando past.

and so. lets see what happened on lap 1. 

well. max did not pass charles. lewis dropped several places, ollie dropped several places, and the two mclarens started to pull away from the rest of the pack, especially oscar who managed to get half a second ahead of lando. 

so we had a slightly new running order:

oscar, lando, charles, max, carlos, george, pierre, liam, nico, ollie, alex, checo, franco, lewis, esteban, valtteri, yuki, fernando, lance and guanyu

and then max and charles started battling on lap 3. by lap 4 charles had taken the fastest lap. and by lap 6 he had closed the gap to lando and was in an epic drs train because lando had also closed the gap to oscar.

george had also started struggling, probably because he was in a mercedes, and was trying to get passed by pierre gasly, in a alpine. 

lando meanwhile, was still up in p2 and not entirely pleased. 

“yeah, im not sure what were doing here i thought we talked about this” he said over his radio right before he locked up and fell out of oscars drs and into charles and then also max’s drs. he was probably referring to, why the hell hadn’t mclaren done their team orders business yet?

well, his race engineer, will jacobs, had absolutely no information to offer for him, he instead said. “understood keep doing what you’re doing.” 

“yeah whatever,” lando said, unimpressed. 

there was some announcer speculation that oscar might give it up to him on the last lap, on the last corner, similar to what lando did to oscar way back in hungary. hungary? idk. its been a long season. and its still even longer.

anyway. checo had been stuck down behind nico hulkenberg in 11th for a very solid nine laps, unable to pass him. he finally managed it on lap 9. his reward? another haas to pass! ollie bearman! he managed that a few laps later and was met with quite possibly his biggest foe: liam lawson. who, just to add even more insult to injury, was in the last points position of the race.

mclaren meanwhile had decided to do some team orders, but not the ones that lando wanted. they told oscar to drop back to give lando some drs, to rescue him from the charles and max inferno that was chasing him. and oscar did. the top 4 though were still separated only by 4 seconds. 

and charles, he understood the assignment. he was racing absolute balls to the wall, elbows all the way out. doing anything and everything to keep max behind him. 

max was though, unimpressed. 

“ah come on charles man, so many mistakes,” he said over the radio. 

charles was told about this post sprint, and he had a funny little reaction. unfortunately i could only find that reaction in gif format.

in any case, i believe this was a clip from sky sports, possibly probably alex jaques who said after that radio "that is max verstappen urging a rival that he's had since his childhood to stay with the McLaren because he wants the ferrari to stay there. but that error has created now two battles instead of a four car battle for the lead."

to make it worse for max, lando could have gotten ahead of oscar here, but alas there were no team orders. so he could not. and also he was still slightly too close to charles and max to not be under threat from them. still, oscar was told to floor it to open the gap between lando and charles, for the potential swap. 

and there was nothing that charles could do about it cause he had absolutely no battery power. 

will jacobs finally decided to mention the team orders threats on lap 17. “we are happy to hold these positions until the last lap.” 

to which lando said “yeah i will overtake.” 

and so it seemed that the commentators were correct. there was a prophesied last lap swap coming from mclaren. 

in case you're tired of this mess, checo was still battling for 8th place with liam. he managed to get it very briefly. and then he lost it because he locked up. 

oscar went fastest on lap 18. and then max also passed charles. 

so it was game fucking on at the front of the grid. and everyone, including gp, max’s race engineer, knew it. because he told max on lap 19 “cmon mate, lets chase em down.” 

mclaren responded as anyone would. by telling oscar “verstappen we believe is faster than leclerc” on lap 24. which is like. fork found in kitchen. max is the king of putting that red bull in places that it should never be allowed to go and that is the front of the grid. 

speaking of red bulls, checo finally managed to pass liam lawson for 8th. and he did it cleanly without locking up this time. and liam didn't even flip him off.

and mercedes, to no ones surprise, had no race pace. 

then! interestingly! there was a yellow flag! but the cameras didn't quite cut fast enough so we didn't really see what happened. turned out that nico hulkenberg had pulled off with an exhaust issue. he was technically off the track, but it was not in an overtaking spot (can overtake during yellow flags) and he seemed to still be trying to maneuver the car further away from the track, so the announcers said that this would not hurt the overtaking battle that was looming between the mclarens and max. the cameras then jumped back to that, kind of ignoring nico. 

they had still not swapped, and max was gaining. 

then the cameras cut Back to nico hulkenberg. and he was now out of the car. standing on the grass near some barriers. and this picture doesnt really do it justice but he is about 15 feet from a live race track

(there was still a yellow flag in that specific sector but he was OUT OF THE CAR next to a FORMULA 1 TRACK with NO SAFETY CAR) 

there was now though a Threat of a safety car. gee i wonder why. his car was stopped not too far from the track and he was standing on the track, it was a massive disaster waiting to happen. 

and so, mclaren gave the team order to swap positions. 

lando and oscar did. 

and immediately.

and i MEAN IMMEDIATELY they called a virtual safety car. 

oscar had dropped back into the clutches of max verstappen and max had just revved up to pass him when suddenly! no no! safety car!

which was interesting.

but we will get back to that in a minute.

now, under a virtual safety car, cars need to keep the gap between them, but the track can go green at any moment and without any warning. 

and max was on top of that. “pay attention to this!” he said over radio “because if hes (oscar) on purpose driving slow (to give lando a bigger gap) report it!” 

oscar though seemingly remained on his best behavior. 

and on the last lap the virtual safety car was announced to be ending. 

max was getting antsy behind the two mclarens and pulled up next to oscar in preparation for the track going green, but it went green a second too late and oscar was able to pull away and make a beeline all the way to the checkered flag while still keeping max behind. 

lando came in first, followed by oscar, max, charles, carlos, george, pierre, checo, liam, alex. lewis, franco, esteban, ollie, yuki, guanyu, and lance and nico DNFd. 

oscar was clearly very disappointed about the result (remember he said after sprint qualifying that he wanted to hold onto his p1). and karun wondered aloud if “mark webber will negotiate a bonus for oscar with that, he should.” cause remember, mark webber was the infamous number 2 red bull teammate to sebastian vettel who was forced to pretty much give up anything and everything for him. and, need i remind you, this weekend seb was running willy nilly around the paddock getting drivers to get in his giant recycled helmet. all very distressing things for one mark webber. 

oscar also said that it was “a bit tricky….bit bumpy….learned a lot for the race tomorrow.” 

lando said that “we work well as a team together….i thanked oscar….he deserved it but you do what you have to do.” 

later, in the press conference, an interviewer congratulated oscar on his win. oscar, confused, said “i don't know what i won but thank you” 

max said that he “had to wait for some mistakes and luckily they came” in regards to overtaking charles. “it took a bit too long with charles…but whenever hes on the drs, hes very hard to attack!”

charles said in a later interview about max “i think max was a lot more on the reserve at the beginning then started pushing at the end. he had more pace, he did a better job with tire management”

lets remember that these two are Not Teammates. 

max though was brought to the stewards though for a vsc infringement (when he pulled next to oscar) because that is Not Allowed. and he ended up with a time penalty that demoted him to fourth. so charles ended up finishing third. and he got a penalty point on his super license.

but what about that safety car call? 

well i am so glad that you asked. 

the post race show opened with one will buxton talking to one andrea stella, the mclaren team principal. and here was what he had to say about the mclaren 1-2:

“very good news, a mclaren 1-2… [we had a ] clear conversation with both drivers [before the race]” here he then called them both number 1 drivers again (which everyone thought we were past) “[it was] very risky swapping even with 1.5 seconds [to max], we were waiting for a few more seconds to materialize, but it never did” 

will buxton, ever the shit stirrer and also as we know, probably the number 1 person pissed at mclarens team strategy this year, then asked why lando was so upset over the radio. 

andrea was having none of it. “well i already answered the question didn't i? when you're a number 1 driver you get nervous when you are behind…we needed to do a very good job to stay ahead of him [max].” 

he then departed and james hinchcliffe quite literally Stumbled into frame with his own thoughts on the mclaren swap. “it ended to plan, it didn't go to plan,” he said. “they got very lucky with the vsc.” 

he then talked about the vsc. “the timing of the vsc was weird to me” you know with the driver being a solid 10 feet from the track with zooming cars? “i don't think it was done the best it could have been done.” 

and this seemed to be the general consensus everywhere else online. why on earth wait to call a safety car when quite literally we had a driver who was out of the car and standing next to the track? that is quite literally a Safety Problem. and given the timing of the mcalren swap, it seemed Possible that perhaps race control had been waiting for mclaren to swap before calling the car. which is, as im sure you could all figure out, kind of weird and sketchy.

but aside from that. there was still much praise for max. “max played it so smart today,” james said, referring to max selectively murdering charles’s tires by fighting with him for the first half of the race. “with not the best car on track hes still performing above expectations.” 

there was some proper francomania in brazil. so much so that flights from argentina to brazil had sold out. franco said on the post race show that “the rivalry between brazil and argentina is in football not motor racing.” 

pierre had scored a p7 which he was happy with. mostly because it was a points position and those are kinda hard to come by at alpine. 

lewis though just about wanted to quit. they asked him how his race pace was and he said “horrendous. one of the worst races ive had” which is really saying something when you remember that he has had 353 race starts. he wanted to change the car entirely before quali. 

and lance stroll also winked at esteban ocon while they were interviewing ollie bearman. 

most notable quote from the post sprint was this, by max:  

the interviewer asked him: “lando said ‘i don't have to change my driving style, if anyone has to do it, it's max.’ do you agree? you won't change it?” 

and max said: “[im a] three time world champion. i don't have to change anything.”

max, as some of us may forget, is a very good driver, he’s just in a shit car this year and other people are very very fast. finally. but he is in fact a 7 time world champion. he won every race except 3 last year. he’s insane and he loves this sport. it never pays well to underestimate max verstappen.

and with that absolute banger of a line, let’s get into qualifying. 

what's that? its delayed? why is that? 

oh! cause its raining!

like comical, almost biblical amounts of rain. 

during the delay we had one will buxton and one james hinchcliffe speaking to us about all the current drama.

for example: is checo doing enough? apparently christian horner has dialed back the intensity of his support, so whos to say! but then again, this is red bull, they drop people for anything and everything

and they briefly mentioned the audi seat cause everyone is in contention for the audi seat apparently, including gabriel bortoleto, who is currently leading the f2 championship and a mclaren academy driver.

but they mostly debated their favorite topic: what the ever loving fuck is going on at mclaren. 

specifically, this edition: Why Didn't They Swap Cars Sooner????

(please know this conversation was had in rain jackets in the pouring damn rain and it looked like they were like uh we got no broadcast happening cause downpour we need to fill the time we need to fill the time hmmm what to do oh! we got will and hinch! give then a microphone and let them go for it! and that they did)

james thought that they left themselves exposed to max and charles for too long, and apparently mclaren said that it would swap the cars at the first opportunity originally but then they didn't swap when they said over the radio that the gap to leclerc was significant. 

will buxton had a theory: “they’re trying to do it without upsetting either driver” 

he then, in true will buxton fashion, went completely and totally off the rails about it: 

“andrea stella wrote the guidebook for team orders when he worked at ferrari. where is that? [why aren’t they saying ‘you work for us, you do what we say’?]”

“the team [the drivers] needs to understand who pays the bills here” james added.

“if they don't lay down the law now they put themselves in an awkward position or later” will said about how this would affect the future of mclaren because if they were already starting to win now and be in contention for the championships then whos to say that they couldn't do it again next year?

and then, somewhat inexplicably, they stopped talking to us and we had no screens no nothing no view on anyone for about 40 minutes. all we could assume was that qualifying was delayed. 

and that it definitely was. 

once we finally got a visual on the track again it was in fact still raining, and only getting worse. 

but if theres one thing about formula 1, its that they know how to have fun in the rain.

like how they let ted loose in the pit lane and he stalked through the mercedes garage, and proudly told the whole world that bono, lewis’s race engineer, has a carbon fiber cup of tea. and then the camera zoomed in on it.

 

he then also tried to talk to toto by picking up a headset and shouting into it “we miss you toto!” but instead of getting to toto the message went to jack, toto’s son?  

and then someone, i don't remember who, perhaps it was karun, told ted to “look at fred vasseur, hes a handsome man most of the time.” 

the crowds were shouting “ole ole ole franco!” which was different from their usual chant of “ole ole ole senna!” and will buxton told franco that “flights from buenos aries to sao palo have sold out, that's the affect you are having” franco was impressed.

ollie bearman, who has objectively, by the way, been thrown now into three increasingly more insane race weekends (saudi arabia with like a few hours notice, singapore, and now the hellscape that was the giant rain storm in brazil) decided to do the sensible thing and take a nap.

"at his age it's gonna be his bed time soon, right?" one of the servus tv announcers said about ollie.

lewis decided to brave the rain to take some aesthetic rain pics

which he then posted on his instagram story

kimi antonelli was not so lucky. he got shoved into the rain by some mercedes mechanics. for sport.

george meanwhile was off jumping in puddles

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and looking like a polite bowling pin wearing maybe some toe nail polish

and jack doohan made everyone tea in the alpine garage

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oscar had a lovely little chat with fernando alonso

and then so did mark webber 

perhaps the most insane part of this was that no one and i mean no one knew how they were going to decide the grid order, should qualifying not happen. and as it got progressively more and more delayed, that was looking like it was going to be the case. 

the race director told everyone at one point that it was “not really possible to qualify” which was you know, a problem, since that needs to happen in order for them to race. 

hilariously, there was nothing in the regulations for if someone like this were to happen.

next years regulations said that championship standings could be used for qualifying order if qualifying was not able to occur, but that's not this years regs so they couldn't do that. there were though regulations for what should happen should qualifying for a sprint race not be able to occur and that was use the standings from practice 1. and there was also regulations for what should happen if qualifying could not occur on a normal race weekend and that was use the standings from practice 3. but this was a sprint weekend in the main grand prix. so should they use the standings from practice 1? that would be particularly advantageous to haas who had ollie bearman come in third. should they use the standings from the sprint race? that would benefit mclaren. 

“i’ll add this to the list of reasons why i’m glad im not a steward,” karun said.

they continued to debate. everyone went back and forth. theyre going to use practice 1! theyre going to use the sprint! they’ll use sprint qualifying! 

they got a hold of mike krak (the aston martin tp) who said that it was “a bit too dark and a bit too gloomy and a lot wet” definitely too wet for racing. 

sure enough qualifying was then switched from “delayed” to “postponed” perhaps indefinitely. 

there was a chance that they could move qualifying to sunday morning. but the weather was not good for then either. and so the session ended, with no one knowing what the fuck was happening and sir lewis hamilton interrupting f1 ceo Stefano Domenicali’s interview saying:  

"I wanna go out give us better wet tyres and warming blankets so we can go out!" 

and that was it

now, rain at the interlagos circuit is not exactly unheard of. mostly because it is literally interlagos (between two lakes, in portuguese)and theres been some insane rain races here before. namely 2016. max, who was still nearly a rookie and only in his first full year at red bull at that point had qualified fourth but ended up down in 16 with 15 laps to go due to some oversteer and pit stopping. he managed to make it all the way up to 3rd by sheer willpower and insanity alone and toto wolff called it “the verstappen show” because it was “physics…being redefined.” 

another infamous rain race was the one in 2008, the season finale race and where lewis hamilton won his first world championship title at mclaren. he almost lost the title to felipe massa at ferrari. felipe won the race, and lewis was running in 6th around the last few corners to the checkered flag when the person driving in front of him, timo glock, started going slowly and he managed to pass him for 5th place, which was all he needed to get to win the championship. but there were a few minutes of celebration in the ferrari garage where they thought they had won the drivers championship, until lewis crossed the line. and “is that glock going slowly?” is one of those very famous facing quotes

and last year at qualifying in brazil it ended with an absolutely biblical storm (according to crofty) and we got the infamous max verstappen storm lap for pole position

the running fan theory though as to why there was such massive amounts of rain this year was that nelson piquet was in the paddock. why does this matter? well. nelson piquet (a three time world champion and also father of max verstappen’s current girlfriend kelly) was fined 1 million dollars and banned from entering an f1 paddock again as punishment for racist and homophobic comments he made on video about lewis hamilton. and he was just there. in the red bull garage. like nothing was wrong. (this is made infinitely worse by the way that f1 drivers have since been banned from making “political statements” on the track and etc, mostly because lewis in 2020/21 did a bunch of advocating for black lives matter and got some other drivers in on it (he was stopped by the fia for wearing a shirt that said “Justice for Breonna Taylor” and sebastian vettel did some other advocating for the environment and also lgbt community, so they cant really even complain too much about this) 

lewis did though tweet this tweet after that whole incident.

but anyway. qualifying. what was to come of qualifying??

well. let me tell you. 

qualifying was postponed until 7:30am on race day, local time. and the race was moved up to i think 10:30 ??? am? to try and avoid as much weather as possible. which was good progress for f1 cause usually they don't do this. 

it wasn't great for the drivers though who had to be awake at about 4am, barely ate food and jumped into the cars. esteban ocon set his alarm at precisely 4:31.

and george had coffee on an empty stomach. lando had a nutella sandwich. and off they went.

and by off they went i mean, it was still raining. “wetter than a fisherman’s boot” according to crofty.

but they were qualifying.

ollie had never driven an f1 car in the wet before. which he was about to get a whole lot of experience doing.

some drivers though really love the wet. rain at at f1 race, while scary, is sort of a neutralizer because it really comes down to the skill of the driver and not so much the car. george loves the wet (a la spa 2021 when he managed to qualify a shitbox williams in p2) and so does esteban and lewis and max among others.

lance also likes a good wet race. “well hes canadian, lance stroll,” crofty said. “he’s rather good on the ice.”

and to make it extra fun, theres no tire warming blankets for the wet tires to save money, which seems a little counterintuitive, but they don't really get used very often. 

everyone was whipping around, dodging the puddles as best as they could, trying to clear the track of water a little, and we had some interesting people up in the top 5. as in the top five was esteban ocon, fernando alonso, yuki tsnuoda, checo perez, and lance stroll. 

and then, could it be? in this economy? a red flag??? 

it indeed was! and it would not be the last!

it was franco, he had found the wall. he was okay. but the car was not. 

and there was not a lot of time to fix it.

karun took this time to tell everyone that he thought that franco could not possibly get the red bull seat (which was a thing that was being debated hotly in the paddock despite franco saying that he was not in talks for a seat last weekend) because of incidents like this due to his own inexperience. 

crofty brought up a separate but interesting point which was that in all the previous times that we have had qualifying on a sunday, a german has been on pole. 

he is of course, correct. 

japan 2004: michael schumacher

japan 2010: sebastian vettel

australia 2013: sebastian vettel

texas 2015: nico rosberg

japan 2019: sebastian vettel

and there was of course only one german on the grid right now. nico hulkenberg.

“its written in the stars!” crofty proclaimed loudly and to the general annoyance of karun, who did not want there to be a german polesitter this race because then crofty would be “insufferable” about it. 

while they were debating that, the red flag had cleared and everyone went out again. including george russell, who was so impatient to get out that he overtook in the pit lane and despite being impeded a few times, still managed to put his mercedes in p2. 

max got his lap time deleted and was now stuck down in 12th. lewis still needed to get out of the bottom 5 and lando was stuck in 15th. 

everyone had one more lap. 

lewis managed to only go 14th. then got pushed to 15th.

lando managed an okay first sector but needed “a middle and final sector of his life here” in order to clear the elimination zone. and he got a personal best in the middle sector but still only managed to go 14th. he was safe, but lewis was out. along with ollie, franco, nico and guanyu.

(“your run of german poles on a sunday is gone,” karun happily told crofty)

lewis, as could be predicted, was very unhappy with his car. as he should have been. according to crofty he is “one of the top 3 drivers of all time in the wet” and yet. here he was. in the wet. out in q1. 

at the start of q2 it was not actively raining, which was good news. but it was still slippy and people still had on wet tires for the most part. 

george went for a little spin but he was okay. no damage and no walls for him.

carlos was not so lucky. 

he found the barriers. another red flag. 

later he said that he had clearly misjudged the grip.

his crash was pretty big, bigger than francos, and again, theres less than 5 hours until the race. 

everyone was ushered back into the pit lane as the track was cleared and repaired. 

at the time, oscar was leading, followed by george, lance, max, liam, checo, valtteri, fernando, charles and carlos with lanco, pierre, alex, yuki, and esteban in the drop zone. 5:51 to go. 

when they came back on track fernando alonso somehow managed to go fastest. could it be his first pole in over 4000 days???

and as everyone was on their final flying lap, including lando and max and checo, the yellow flags came out. it was lance stroll, he had gone off. 

again, like in the sprint, the cameras did not immediately cut to him. but the announcers said that “i think race control are waiting for these laps to count before calling the red flag.” because several people were on flying laps and it was the end of the session, so it would not be resumed after the red flag.

lando crossed the line. he went fastest. almost immediately the red flag was called. max and checo were unable to finish their flying laps. 

the red flag has had to be called cause lance was in “a dangerous position” 

later, there was a half baked excuse that they thought that lance was trying to get the car moving which was why they did not call the red flag. this, by the way, was the state of lance’s car:

it was clearly not in any state to be driven. 

and yet. it took them 40 whole seconds to call a red flag for this. the previous two red flags were called in under 5 seconds. 

and, need i remind you, that the delay of this red flag allowed for lando to get himself out of the bottom 5 and also knocked max and checo out of the qualifying session. 

now might also be a good time to mention that max had a five place grid penalty for changing his power unit. so he would be starting all the way down in seventeenth. 

and he was fucking pissed. 

because remember. the 40 second delay of this red flag allowed Everyone to finish their flying lap Except for max and checo. so q2 ended with lando in first, followed by fernando, oscar, liam, alex, charles, esteban, george, lance, and yuki with valtteri, max, checo, carlos and pierre all getting eliminated. 

also this is a very very valid safety complaint. it should not take that long for a red flag to be called when the car is not moving, had three clearly broken wheels and is also 15 feet from the track. all the worst accidents in f1 happen when there is a car that is already not moving from an accident or a problem and then it gets hit by another car. there have already been people who have died this way. it does not need to happen again. 

aside from the bs flag call, checo was also pissed at red bull for entirely separate reasons and those reasons were because red bull had waited really long to go out for the final run which was part of the reason why they were not able to finish. 

“cmon guys,” he said over radio. “we gotta do that better…if everyone is already waiting at the end of the pit lane why don't we go?” 

fans were outraged at this. one commented on instagram under a post about the teams qualifying positions “what is checo's garage doing? seriously???” and a red bull mechanic named greg commented underneath it saying “giving him the same tools as max.” then, a second red bull mechanic named charlie commented responded to greg, saying “why you lying for”

so. shit is certainly hitting the fan in more ways than one at red bull. 

but back to qualifying. 

there were no red bulls. which was odd. but we did have nine cars: both mclarens, both rb’s, and one aston, one mercedes, one williams, one ferrari and one alpine. what an interesting mix. 

and it was about to get even more interesting because fernando alonso found a wall. 

another red flag. 

“red flag was much quicker that time,” crofty said. “19 seconds instead of 40.” 

and another wrecked car.

the standing order, with 6:59 left on the clock was lando, alex, oscar, esteban, george, charles, yuki, liam, fernando and lance. 

and the rain could be coming back. 

but there was good news for some people! like alex albon who was, according to crofty “on course for his highest start” as he was currently sitting in p2 rather comfortably. 

and in anticipation for the rain to re start, everyone had already queued up in the pit lane, despite the fact that the track had not yet been green flagged. 

“it’s like the post office on a tuesday morning. you go down to get a box of stamps and they're already queuing up!” crofty said, making absolutely no sense. 

thankfully there was no need to dwell on it because the track went green and they all spilled out again. 

yuki went off and into the gravel, but was able to get out. so there was no red flag. 

that came a few minutes later, for one very, very unfortunate alex albon. 

yes, the same alex albon that had been on course to have his highest ever start. that alex albon. 

and it was a big crash. he ping ponged right across the whole track like a very expensive and very broken ping pong ball. 

he had no idea what happened either. over the radio he asked if the brakes failed. 

and now williams had two very, incredibly broken cars to fix in just about three hours. remember that this team is held together by an excel spreadsheet. 

three minutes, thirty one seconds to go. 

and esteban ocon was seated at the front of the pit lane, waiting. behind him, the remaining six cars still left in the qualifying session from hell. remember this was all before ten am. at least two of them were running on only coffee and nutella. 

“if i were him [esteban ocon], i’d select first gear and then wait ten seconds,” crofty said, speaking about how to impede lando and waste time, who was behind him, when coming out of the pit lane. 

“oh you’re naughty,” karun said. then he went on a rant about how you physically cannot lie to the stewards because they will find out out. he apparently knew this from experience. 

esteban did not impede lando and oscar upon exiting the pit lane. they all came out as they should. 

“glad to see esteban found his first gear no problem and is out on the track,” crofty said. “[this is] quite the day in the championship battle.” 

and that it really was. five red flags, seven cars still standing, max verstappen starting p17, lando finally starting to really close the gap to him in the championship, qualifying at 7:30am on a sunday, race in three hours, rain, back end of a triple header, no one’s been home in a month, and everyone was awake at 4am. 

still, lando managed to improve his time, staying on provisional pole. oscar locked up and didn't finish his lap, he stayed p3. 

liam lawson was gaining. he went second. 

he was then replaced by yuki. for second. 

then esteban ocon pulled out a third, splitting the two racing bulls.

lando extended his pole lap a second time. 

and then george pulled out a p2. 

charles unfortunately did not get in on the p2 fun. he stayed 6th.

and so. 1 hour and 45 minutes and five red flags later, with only barely 3.5 hours to the race. we finally had the starting order of the 2024 brazil gp.

p1: lando norris

p2: george russell

p3: yuki tsnuoda

p4: esteban ocon

p5: liam lawson

p6: charles leclerc

p7: alex albon

p8: oscar piastri

p9: fernando alonso

p10: lance stroll

p11: valtteri bottas

p12: checo perez

p13: carlos sainz

p14: pierre gasly

p15: lewis hamilton 

p16: ollie bearman 

p17: max verstappen

p18: franco colapinto

p19: nico hulkenberg

p20: zhou guanyu

one person wasn’t satisfied with their position and that was charles leclerc. 

“that's p6” his race engineer told him over the radio. 

“that's fucking shit” charles said.

the top three were definitely pleased though.

“a lot going on today,” lando said, accurately. “a little surprised.”

“really pleased to be lining up p2,” george said.  “i loved it [coming in early] to be honest. maybe this is the format for sunday morning.”

“very tricky,” yuki said. “certainly enjoyed it. feels much better than yesterday, good pace.”

yuki also ran into all of his mechanics in victory.

and we got this hilarious picture. 

and i know what you're thinking. did everyone manage to repair their cars in time for the race? 

yes. everyone except for alex albon, that is, who had to withdraw from the race due to significant damage.

what? that was not what you were thinking? 

oh. you want to know if lewis got to drive sennas 1990 mclaren?? 

yeah! he did! before the race! and he did it no handed, in the rain. not to be biased here, but that's my fucking seven time world champion.

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and. finally. without any further ado. the race. or more accurately, the drivers parade. 

charles was standing with pierre and then Yanked his had away from him so that he could shake hands with max. they seemingly developed somehow even more of a soldiers bond here, having a weird unspoken agreement that they were going to stop mclaren at whatever costs, because honestly what else could these two be yapping about, looking like they were teammates? especially when max was one minor inconvenience away from burning down the entire paddock?

meanwhile george and alex were causing all kinds of problems, completely oblivious to the scheming going on around them

and that about sums up the drivers parade. 

onwards. 

to the race. 

it was still slightly raining when the cars all pulled off for their formation lap. and unfortunately that was where the chaos began. 

with lance stroll going off during the formation lap. he then turned out of it and got himself stranded in the gravel after boinking into the wall and was effectively stuck. 

and so there was an aborted start. some drivers, the several at the front, started to go around the track again, but their was confusion from others (like max) if aborted start meant that they did go around again or if they just sat on the grid and waited for the mechanics to come back out. in any case, everyone ended up going around again. 

in the end, it ended up being that lando, the polesitter, was not supposed to go around again. and he did. and a lot of people followed him around. and no one knew if anyone (like his engineer) told him to go around again or he just did it on his own. he was still noted for going, and the whole mess was going to get brought up to the stewards later. 

because what were they supposed to do in that instance? penalize everyone? 

“yet another reason why im glad im not a steward,” karun said.

one thing was for sure and that was that lance definitely should buy his mechanics dinner that night as an apology because they had worked very hard to fix his car only for him to bin it again. (though the car had been in several pieces not too long again and there was a chance something was not connected correctly, he did say later that the car had felt pretty bad to dive in the formation lap) 

this isnt even the first time that a car hasnt completed the formation lap in brazil. just last year charles leclerc crashed on the formation lap due to steering failure. 

once they all arrived back on the grid after formation lap 2 the mechanics came back out and started rechecking the cars and etc while they waited for lance’s car to get cleared. and the mercedes mechanics made a sneaky little adjustment to the tire pressure, hoping that no one would notice. unfortunately, they noticed. 

onto formation lap 3! and thank god! everyone made it this time!

so with 18 cars and a rainy race ahead, lights went out and away they went into lap 1.

george was able to hold onto the lead! 

and at the end of the first lap (which everyone blessedly survived) we had the following order: george, lando, yuki, esteban, charles, liam, oscar, fernando, pierre, lewis, max, franco, ollie, valtteri, nico, guanyu and checo.

that's right. max made up seven places. seven. and lewis had made up five. they were coming. max especially

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checo meanwhile had briefly gone spin, hence why he was now down in last place. 

max passed lewis for 10th, already back into the points by lap 2.

george took the fastest lap on lap 3, already leading by 1.5 seconds. lando took it from him on lap 4. there was no DRS due to the rain, so lando was going to have to pass george the old fashioned style. 

ollie bearman briefly went off the track after a small incident with franco, but he was able to rejoin.

and max passed pierre for 9th on lap 5

and then was up to 8th on lap 6 after passing fernando

meanwhile, along with lando, george, yuki and liam were all also noted for the starting procedure infringement at the beginning of the race. they would have to go with lando to the stewards after the race to hear their fate. meaning that no matter what the outcome of the race was, there was still a chance that they could get slammed with penalties after, so who knew if the real winners would in fact be the winners. 

max, who had followed the rules for the starting procedure, took fastest lap on lap 7 as he started to close the gap to oscar in p7.

lando had started to eat into george’s lead a little, and george was now only .8 seconds ahead. 

and the stewards noted the incident between ollie and franco. ollie received a 10 second penalty for causing a collision. which didn't really make a lot of sense to people as franco didn't really even have any damage.

max was declared to be the fastest man on track, faster than george, as he still zoomed up to the back of oscar. 

meanwhile, lewis’s car had started bouncing, but george seemed unaffected as he took the fastest lap again on lap 10. 

max passed oscar on lap 10, now in 7th. “he came from so far back,” oscar said, entirely not expecting it. 

“max has tremendous confidence,” karun said.

and might i remind you all that it is RAINING

and then he passed liam for 6th on lap 11. unsurprisingly, liam was more compliant with max passing him than he had been with checo passing him in mexico). he was only 2.5 seconds behind charles, who was in p5. he had already made up 11 places in 11 laps in the pouring freaking rain.

lewis was not having as good luck. he went off the track and then got passed by franco. 

“if i was haas i’d be annoyed with the penalty,” the announcers said, referring to ollies 5 second penalty. “nothing is wrong with that williams.”

by lap 15 there was a four way battle brewing for third. yuki, esteban, charles and max. who again i will remind you was 17th a mere 15 laps ago. this performance was starting to put even his 2016 brazil rampage to shame. 

lewis was still not doing nearly as well, he tried to pass franco and failed. 

lando was still in second behind george on lap 17 and said that he was struggling to overtake and that they were slow on the straights. 

and to top it all off. the rain was set to get heavier in 15 minutes time. 

charles, meanwhile, was managing to keep max behind. maybe he had brushed up on his skills since yesterday when max had called him out during the sprint for making so many mistakes over the radio. 

no one had boxed yet. and the rain was starting to come down a little heavier. “getting slippery with these worn tires in the wet” nico said on lap 18. 

and now as we know, its a crapshoot at best figuring out when to box for tires when its not raining. all that gets compounded into a fuckshoot when its raining. because it its expected to rain more soon, you'd want to put on new tires closer to then so that you have a better chance at clearing the water. plus theres always a chance it could get red flagged and then you could get a free pit stop. so the teams needed to get to the point with the big rain and then box for tires and hope that that was the right choice and that no one went off before then.

lando was back to gaining on george on lap 18

and ollie passed lewis for 14th

hamilton was clearly struggling in the mercedes, but george was leading? so was it a lewis problem? was it a car problem?? no one knew

max, meanwhile, was still under a second behind charles, no drs, on lap 20. charles had managed to hold him up for 9 laps and counting, which was a true feat when you remember how many places he has already made up. 

“car’s not driveable mate,” lewis said on lap 21. “locking up, bouncing everywhere.” apparently the mercedes had some kind of a brake problem, but george was managing it just fine. he was still leading. 

on lap 22 max tried to pass charles

charles, clearly, did not let him

“that was charles leclers knowing exactly where max was going to go and defending it a long way out!” karun said.

“he was squeezing me!” max complained. “he didn’t leave a car’s width!” 

no one else seemed to have this view though because the stewards did not note the incident. 

carlos was seemingly having some kind of car problem as he stopped behind ollie and lewis after going off the track briefly. 

and this was all looking like it might be a good time for some new tires. 

by lap 24, with heavier rain rolling in any minute, here were the standings:

george, lando, yuki, esteban, charles, max, liam, oscar, pierre, fernando, nico, ollie, lewis, franco, carlos, checo, valtteri, and guanyu.

the drivers had to make the call for the tires to go to the wets, according to the announcers. its something that the driver has to feel, not really the team, because the driver is the one in the car. 

charles pitted for inters on lap 25.

not full wets, which was interesting (wets have more groves on them, inters have less, and they were about to have a shit load of rain)

lando asked to box to overtake george on lap 26. mclaren wanted him to stay out, despite his protests that he wanted to box for new tires. so he stayed out. 

liam lawson meanwhile went off the track due to contact with oscar. he came back on in 9th.

nico hulkenberg pitted for inters on lap 26

lando was half a second behind george on lap 27

and apparently those inters didn't work too well for nico hulkenberg because he went off track and managed to get stranded on some banking.

a virtual safety car was called on lap 28, though not before esteban ocon managed to pass yuki for third.

again, who knew why it took them so long to call the safety car. 

many people decided to pit. 

oscar, fernando, lewis, ollie, carlos and checo.

and at this point, mercedes was finally reported for adjusting their tire pressure on the grid, which is not allowed! and also very bad news for george should he win the race because usually that behavior results in a disqualification and i don't think that george could handle another dsq after winning this season.

nico hulkenberg, meanwhile, was able to get back on the track

and the virtual safety car ended.

right as george and lando went to pit. which was incredibly unlucky

prior to this, george came on the radio to say that he thought that it was now red flag conditions. and he was probably correct.  

“i think this is going to go red mate,” he said on lap 28. “this should go red. we cant keep a car on the road like this. theres going to be big crashes. theres a big puddle through 4 and 13. there will be a crash there. i think stay out. it should go red.” and that would be good because then george could get his free pit stop and also maintain the lead of the race. 

“understood, understood,” his engineer said. “so box, box.”

“i think, no, its going to go red,” george repeated. 

“box box. box, box. box, box. we need to box,” his engineer said. and so george had no choice but to box. 

someone who didn't box was esteban ocon. he chose to stay out and with both lando and george pitting he was now leading the race on lap 29.

liam lawson and yuki tsnuoda pitted. 

and after all the pit stops, we had:

esteban, max, pierre, george, lando, yuki, charles, oscar, fernando, valtteri, lewis, carlos, checo, ollie, franco, guanyu and nico.

“after a truly awful season,” crofty said. “alpine is 1 and 3.” that they were. somehow. maybe it would stay that way. 

and after all that. lando finally managed to pass george. but only for fourth, not for first. 

and the safety car was deployed for rain.

so now no one could pass anyone. 

esteban ocon had a 7 second lead on max verstappen. 

and franco colapinto took this opportunity to pit for new inters. 

oscar got a 10 second penalty for causing that collision a way long time ago with liam lawson.

and merc were still under investigation for the tire pressure thing.

and then all the others were still under investigation for the start procedure mishap as well. 

at this point, max had gained 15 places. pierre had gained 10. 

and behind the safety car they all pootled along. esteban, max, pierre, lando, george, yuki, charles, oscar, fernando, liam, lewis, valtteri, carlos, checo, ollie, franco, zhou and nico

that was, until franco had a huge crash.

and once again, there was the return of the red flag. 

so now williams had crashed three whole times during the weekend. remember, they have no money and hardly any parts. and the mechanics were distressed beyond belief.  

lando hopped on radio, annoyed with the mclaren strategy error because now everyone at the front (two alpines and max) would get free tires and he would not have the opportunity to get back to the front after they pitted. 

george on the other hand….

“so, red flag, red flag,” his engineer said. 

“fuck!” george cursed. “i fucking said it! shouldve stayed out!”

yuki got a pep talk immediately after getting out of the car from team principal laurent 

and oscar jumped out of his car and immediately apologized to liam lawson for the incident.

“theres a proper variety bag of pick and mix penalties that need investigating,” crofty said. 

including nico hulkenberg who was being investigated for restarting his race after getting assistance from the marshalls pushing him back onto the track

and the results were in. he got a black flag. meaning he fucked up so bad he was disqualified. he was out. and it was the first black flag in 17 years. team haas was really doing it different this year. cause remember kevin got the first race ban in 12 years this season as well.

and ted just happened to watch nico get told this. he felt very awkward about it.

“i cannot watch this anymore, it’s too depressing,” ted said, turning away.

it was then announced that the race would be restarted as a rolling start. in 10 minutes. 

max sprinted down the pitlane. meanwhile george and lewis peacefully scootered. they might still get disqualified for the tire pressure. they didn't seem to care.

george even stopped to get his boots cleaned as he stepped into the car (which yes i know is a thing cause they were wet with water but it looked so funny to see the mechanic wiping his feet like he was a princess)

and alpine, as we know, would be starting 1 and 3. they had not been in the top 5 all season at all whatsoever. 

george did not like that there would be a rolling start. “that’s more dangerous than a standing start,” he said over the radio. 

and carlos thought that they needed 2 or three laps behind the safety car to decide. cause remember it is still very much raining.

but it was officially a rolling start. in six minutes. a rolling start meaning that they wouldnt line up on the grid, they’d go out and do a slow lap and then just zoom! go!

carlos had a problem with his tires as they pulled out onto the track. “ricky,” he said. “these are not new inters. which ones are these? ….hello?” ghosted by his own team.

and they went racing

zhou and bearman ended up in the grass pretty quickly, but they were able to get back on.

lando also went off and came back on just ahead of george. george took the position back.

and charles briefly went off. 

on lap 34 esteban was still leading and had managed to stay 1.5 seconds ahead of max

hamilton overtook alonso for ninth.

ollie went spin spin spin into the barriers on lap 37. he was able to get going again but he had boinked his front wing. which had already been replaced during the red flag.

and yuki suddenly didn't have pace anymore because he was down in 8th. and getting hunted down by lewis.

ollie went off again. “interlagos is really testing him,” crofty said. yeah no shit. prior to this race he had only driven the track once in a video game (not even the sim!) and he has no experience with f1 cars in the wet, much less this much wet.

on lap 39 esteban ocon was still leading by 2.8 seconds now.

and then carlos ended up in the barriers. no red flag, just a safety car. 

he was okay. but he didn't get out of the car. it then became clear that he was trying to get the car out of the barriers before getting out. and thent here was a tractor on track. with a safety car. in the rain. cause that's safe and totally didn't happen at all during the fatal 2015 japanese gp.

it was at this point that they realized that most people who had gone off track had done so because they had gone over the white lines. and remember, the track had just been resurfaced. and despite the anti slip paint, they were still slipping. hm.

also, the last time that alpine had gotten a double podium was back when they were lotus with kimi raikkonen and romain grosjean in 2009 (?)

and, because this race wasn't already interesting enough, there was potential for more rain at the end of the race. 

the safety car ended and they all went racing again on lap 43. ocon, verstappen, gasly, russell, norris, leclerc, piastri, tsnuoda, hamilton, alonso, lawson, perez, bottas, zhou, and bearman. the remaining 15 cars.

and max finally managed to get in the lead. all the way up for 17th place at the grand prix from absolute weather hell. 

lando went off! dropping all the way down to 7th!

meanwhile liam passed fernando for 9th

and fernando went off the track, triggering a brief yellow flag.

max was already 1.5 seconds ahead of ocon. doing what he does best and making a gap. no one had ever won from 17th before at brazil either

and he took the fastest lap too, on lap 45

so our new order was: 

max, esteban, pierre, charles, george, oscar, lando, yuki, liam, checo, lewis, ollie, valtteri, guanyu and fernando 

mclaren popped on the radio with some infamous papaya rules and told oscar and lando to swap positions, so now oscar was in 7th and lando was in 6th, minimizing the damage to the gap that lando had just managed to close in the drivers championship very very minutely. 

charles was noted for rejoining unsafely

and max took another fastest lap on lap 48

“massively impressed with the alpine’s pace in these conditions,” karun said. 

the last time that two french drivers finished on a podium was in 1997 in spain

on lap 50 checo and liam lawson started to battle for ninth. the commentators brought up the ever present talks that checo might not be in f1 next year. 

oscar briefly went off the track, but managed to stay ahead of yuki, who was chasing him down.

and lando, despite the swap, was still quite stuck behind charles, despite having more pace. and we had already seen charles keep max behind for many many laps, so there was no doubt that he would continue to fight with lando. he and max were low key now teammates, after all

and yet, there still might be more rain

checo was still trying to pass liam lawson. he was still failing. 

fifteen laps to go (finally)

max was still leading esteban, pierre, george, charles, lando, oscar, yuki, liam, checo, lewis, ollie, valtteri, guanyu and fernando on lap 55

and checo still could not pass liam

max had an 8 second lead

and even if the race ended up getting red flagged and not resumed for rain, everyone would get full points because the race was more than 75% complete

checo and liam had a minor incident. it was noted. “he drove into the side of me!” liam complained

on lap 57 ted popped on to give his Insignificant and Unnoticed Award of the Day “to fernando alonso, he was 20 seconds down and now hes cut it down and is going to overtake zhou.” 

 max took yet another fastest lap, he was now 10 seconds ahead of ocon

“hes never changed one iota since he came in,” crofty said about max. “sometimes when you get penalized for the same thing over and over you do need to change.” though honestly, max was proving that he really didn't need to change, because he went balls to the wall with confidence unlike any other, and was leading a race he had started in 17th by 10 seconds. in the rain.

and george had managed to get within a second to pierre gasly

if pierre could hold onto third, alpine could jump from 9th to 6th in the constructors championship. which was estimated to be a difference of 50 million dollars in prize money.

lando was told over the radio to go close to leclerc. “i am!” lando said. “what do you think im doing?” 

by lap 63 max was still leading. this time by 13 seconds.

max was set to get 18 points more than lando at this race, and that was before any start penalties that lando might get awarded. 

and he took another fastest lap

on lap 66 max was leading esteban, pierre, george, charles, lando, oscar, yuki, liam, lewis, checo, ollie, valtteri, fernando and zhou

“looking like he [max] will be a 4x world champion and hold off the threat of mclaren,” crofty said.

and then, fernando alonso’s radio crackled to life. 

“i will finish this race for the mechanics, they did a very good job today,” fernando said. “but my back hurts so much, there is so much bouncing. this is not normal.” and he did sound very in pain saying that. this re brought up concerns about the porpoising on the track. lewis had complained about it earlier and its been at no other track this year, meaning that it must be a track thing. meaning further that the track was probably resurfaced badly. because this is not normal. and yes, fernandos been having a terrible time during the triple header. hes been sick, he was in the hospital, he missed media day. this is still not normal though and cant be attributed to that.

lap 68. nearly to the end now. and max was leading by 18 seconds. 

“he’s got more god given talent in a finger than some drivers every have,” karun said,

and meanwhile his teammate was down in 11th, trying to pass lewis for 10th. and failing.

last lap! finally!

and max won by 19 seconds! and he broke the record for most consecutive days leading a championship, breaking the record previously set by michael schumacher. and made it from 17th to first in the rain, despite all odds, in a car that barely worked, no drs, just spite and rage and pure talent. a true world champion

one by one, everyone else crossed the line

p2: esteban ocon

p3: pierre gaslu

p4: george russell

p5: charles leclerc

p6: lando norris

p7: oscar piastri

p8: yuki tsunoda

p9: liam lawson

p10: lewis hamilton

p11: checo perez

p12: ollie bearman

p13: valtteri bottas

p14: fernano alonos

p15: zhou guanyu

“brilliant for alpine today, disastrous for mclaren,” crofty said

max, predictably, was absolutely thrilled saying that it was "SIMPLY LOVELY"

he sprinted to his mechanics, screaming and celebrating everywhere. he kissed kelly. he did not kiss christian. 

this was only the 5th time, in this history of formula 1. 1125 races. that a race had been won from 17th or lower. 

alpine was also thrilled.

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the funniest part was esteba ocon’s radio, where they asked him “did you think we were going to be here?” and he said “funnily enough, no!”

ruben barichello did the post race interviews. 

max said that he “stayed out of trouble, made the right calls.” he had 17 fastest laps. which you can watch here.

and you can watch all of his overtakes here.

esteban was also thrilled. “what a day that was after a difficult season! very happy to be on the podium!” they didn't know that the car would perform this well in the wet. 

and pierre was equally as excited. “its incredibly for the whole team…in these conditions everything was possible. im absolutely buzzing right now….would have been easy to just give up but we never give up.” 

because lets remember where alpine started at the beginning of the season. heaviest car on the grid. and also the slowest. and now, here they were, with a double podium. and scoring the most points out of any team at the brazilian gp (35)  

alpine even made a little graphic, reminding everyone of this:

also, id like to remind you, that pierre and esteban don't really get along. they used to be friends and now theyre not for complex reasons, and they were so overcome by the emotion of their double podium that they effectively ended the french civil war

the cooldown room was quite excitatory. never had we ever seen a podium where everyone was so insanely happy to be there. max said in the cooldown room to esteban that "You were fast. You were so fast I was happy to settle for second."

and of course. we got our dutch national anthem. she was back ladies and gents! she was back!

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and we had the goofiest looking podium selfie

esteban and pierre dropped their champagne bottles down to their mechanics. they celebrated. they were on top of the world.

prior to today, esteban had 5 points. today he scored 18.

“red bull might feel a bit more back in the game,  but they still need 2 drivers,” crofty said. “mclaren are leading by some 46 points.” 

max though, now had a 62 point lead on lando.

and so lets see what our favorite dynamic duo, james hinchcliffe and will buxton, had to say about all of this in the post race show.

“i don't know what we were missing,” james said. “we had everything.” and he was right.

starting off with the fact that max absolutely showed who was boss and now lando has to score 21 points every weekend in order to beat him in the drivers championship. prior to this weekend max hadnt been within 20 seconds of the winner at all in the last ten races. and today he won by almost 20.

and alpine hadnt finished in the top 8 all season!

“i take my hat off to them” will said. “they were 19th and 20th in bahrain, their car was overweight, there was no hope and they got their heads down and they got it done.” 

then we were joined by yuki and liam lawson.

“it was like floating around!” yuki said about the conditions.

“i nearly crashed probably 10 times,” liam said. “i came into the pitlane and i tried to stop nad i wasn't stopping. crazy race.” 

the two of them said that they just didn't have good luck today and got stuck behind others in dirty air. “shame pierre got p3 and they overtook us in the championship,” yuki said. “but we keep going.”

then they examined the start. lando, george and yuki all went for the second formation lap. esteban ocon asked over the radio if he was supposed to say where he was and the tea, said yes. but then they eventually told him to go. james said that this was not great and someone from the team should have reminded the drivers of the procedure. 

lando, george, yuki and liam were all going to see the stewards about the start.

then they moved on to discussing lando. “lando did not have his day when max showed his absolute best,” will said. 

lando said in his own interview that he was “just unlucky with the vsc pit. just that's life sometimes, not talent, just luck….still made a couple of mistakes in the end, little unfortunate….4th was the best anyone who boxed could do.” which, its unclear what hes really talking about here. if hes saying max just had good luck or if he had bad luck. in any case, insane to call a run from 17th to first just luck and not talent. and will buxton agreed.

“verstappen proved once again that he is the best in this sport. to beat the best you need to be better than the best.” and today lando wasn't.

james was in agreement with will, saying that mclaren did make some bad calls and also that max has a habit of putting his car where it doesnt deserve to be

first lando lost to george, then the safety car pit, then his mistakes on track, then he lost position, then he swapped positions and still couldn't get past charles. it was “enough mistakes that it does come down to his driving,” will said. “max was ruthless today. there was no drs and he [still] found it.” 

“doesnt take many mistakes to lose to max” james added.

mclaren also posted one of the strangest post race videos ive ever seen. usually theyre like somewhere in the paddock or whatever. this week they were in what appeared to be a weird dark closet, with lando and oscar only half in frame. oscar sitting on a desk and lando sitting in a spinny chair next to andrea. and it vaguely looked like they were all being held hostage. oscar aso said that “lando has one sock on inside out and that sums up our weekend.”

then they moved on to mercedes. 

“my take is that iv we stayed out we would have been at the front,” george said. “i was pretty angry at the time cause i wanted to say out” because he was confident despite the conditions and thought it would get red flagged. 

by comparison “lewis hamilton looked like he was having a horror show today in the first half,” will said. 

“hes been unsettled with the race car,” james said. “his highlight was before the race even started,” as in driving sennas car. and it was. 

lewis had this to say on instagram about the whole thing

“Grateful for the team and the engineers, we did our best out there but it was a hard race throughout in really tough conditions. This could’ve easily been a weekend to forget but the energy and passion from the fans have made it memorable for me. I still can’t put into words how it felt to drive Ayrton Senna’s car. To share that with this crowd means everything to me. Thank you Brazil for the support and the love. I feel it, even on days like this, and I send it back to you 🇧🇷🫶🏾”

checo, they said “was having a good comeback drive, but then that incident with lawson threw him off.” 

and ollie “equipped himself pretty well.” he said that it was a “tough race…finished p12, quite close to the points…really tough day, learned a lot that's for sure…racing in these conditions the water is quite rare and valuable.” 

will was disappointed in the stewards decision with his 10 second penalty. and they gave him two penalty points as well. 

will tried to also look on the bright side for sauber by saying they could have gotten their first points. 

james was unimpressed by this take.

“i’m trying to out a spin on it, i just want them to get one point this season!” will said. 

they then moved to feranndo alonso, commenting on the amount of pain that he was in at the end. “very 2022,” james said. “havent heard that in awhile, especially with the wet” so it was definitely the track surface itself. 

there was also a clip of fernando getting out of the car post race where he almost needed help from the mechanics.

and they were unimpressed with lance. “he had the ability to get it onto the black and he drove it into the gravel.”

and nico, to them, very obviously got disqualified because he had help from the marshals, something he should have known would happen.

they agreed that it was a tough day for williams. especially losing a place to alpine in the championship.

ferrari also have a “tough day…at the end of two brilliant gps” and charles was “kind of in no mans land today.” 

james agreed. he said they “just never had that spark….salvage what you can kind of weekend.”

“all good things just come to an end,” james said, realistically. 

also on the not having a great day list was oscar. though he thought his penalty was deserved. “it was tricky,” he said. “just trying to stay on track was difficult at some points” 

they also spoke with oliver oakes, the alpine team principal. “big result today,” he said. “we were confident [staying out] was the right chouse but we werent sure [about other peoples choices to stay out]. today is a bug result, doesnt chage what we are doing….gotta stay humble and keep pushing.” 

and alpine were definitely humble about their win

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but they also hula hooped in the trophy

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“i just want to say so many words but i need to calm down first,” pierre said. “unbelieveable, its historical for the team….its been difficult..at the end of the day we never give up…no one thought one alpine could make it onto the podium this year and we made it two…there is so much to say but from p13 to p3 im so happy.” 

and esteban said “i don't know ig we are in reality right now it this is just a dream…my alarm rang this morning at 4:30 and we had no idea….[ive kind of been] thinking when is my rime going to come, if we all had the same car…the cars they level out in some tracks.”

and finally, we had max. “I was very frustrated in qualifying, but tried to use it as motivation in the race….made all the right calls again…was hoping for two points so this is amazing.” he was also asked how driven he was and he said “we had moments, but after that quali where i knew we'd be fast, i nearly destroyed the entire garage. i was barely able to hold myself in. but i started the race very driven. i think i'm the best when i driven, i don't show it an awful lot, but usually yes.”

he was also asked about lando and he said that “if you look a few hours ago it was the other way around…three hard races to go, we need to make no mistakes.” 

so turns out, after all that, max’s quote from earlier in the weekend was correct. he is a three time world champion and he doesnt need to change how he drives. 

this though was too much for the british media to handle and they didn't bother to show up to the press conference. which max called them out on.

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in the end, no one ended up getting penalties from the start and mercedes did not get disqualified. mercedes got fined 5000 euros for each car. and the stewards agreed that "The gate to access the grid was not immediately opened. The FIA accepted that given this short notice it was extremely difficult if not impossible for the teams to follow the procedure prescribed in the technical directive"

which meant. this was our current championship standings. 

for the drivers

max verstappen: 393

lando norris: 331

charles leclerc: 307

oscar piastri: 262

carlos sainz: 244

george russell: 192

lewis hamilton: 190

checo perez: 151

fernando alonso: 62

nico hulkenberg: 31

yuki tsunoda: 28

pierre gasly: 26

lance stroll: 24

esteban ocon: 23

kevin magnussen: 14

alex albon: 12

daniel ricciardo: 12

ollie bearman: 7

franco colapinto: 5

liam lawson: 4

zhou guanyu: 0

logan sergeant: 0

valtteri bottas: 0

and the constructors

mcalren: 593

ferrari: 557

red bull: 544

mercedes: 382

aston martin: 86

alpine: 49

haas: 46

rb: 44

williams: 17

stake: 0

“fun to watch it all, cool to watch it all, but at the end of the day you have to congratulate max verstappen for another championship win,” james said. “by far most dominating performance of the year and one of the most ever.” 

“we leave you with one message resonating louder than ever,” will said, staring directly into the camera. “mess with the bull, you get the horns. we will see you in las vegas.”

the 2024 formula 1 silly season and drama master post, part 2 (part 1 here)

Hello and welcome to ah fucking fuck auto caps fuck fuck fuck how do i turn off auto caps AHA there we go okay. take 2

hello and welcome to the great and very insane formula 1 2024 season drama post, part 2. if you are new here or are just looking for part one (which contains the previous 16 (?) races, the off season, pre season testing and everything else, that can be found HERE. (a word to the wise: open it in a browser, not the app, and preferably on a computer to avoid crashing. its fucking long). 

what the hell is formula 1? car go fast. fastest cars in the world zoom around tracks at top speeds of over 300kph, piloted by the top 20 drivers in the world. it might not sound dramatic, but oh man. you will Not be disappointed. this post focuses on the drama, the insanity, the sheer what the hell how is this a serious sport. no legitimately. we've just about seen it all this year. grindr, dogs, watersports, ice cream brands, its all here.

the point of this post? to educate, to catalog the insane drama, and to just have a good time. people like to gatekeep this sport, there is also a lot happening. i try to make it easy to understand. again, probably best to start at the beginning of the post because it does a pretty good job of explaining things, which i began way back in january, and can be found HERE (again, shes long, be careful)

and, as usual, if you do not want to see this post EVER AGAIN, block the tag #saph explains silly season 2024

and a second caution, i assume this post will be getting long as well. including this one we have minimum 9 updates left!

anyway, those of you who have been following along the whole time, welcome back! i know we got a little delayed. and i know we’re on a new post, so lets just briefly take a second for me to explain what the fuck happened. first i had an anatomy test, second i work 2 jobs with fuck ass hours, third tumblr decided to stop letting me look at any of my drafts, fourth tumblr support ghosted me about the drafts issue and the post was half saving half not so i just decided fuck it, were going with post 2, electric boogaloo, and fifth, i decided to start typing this instead in a google docs so. many changes. if you're new here i am usually more on top of this.

but here we are. were back on street circuits. we’re in baku, azerbaijan, for the start of the last third of the season. 8 races remain, world championship titles are still within grasp of multiple people. the drama is dramaing. and today is september 22, 2024 and lets fucking go. 

first and foremost, on account of the fact that this post is late (again, see above), were going to have to do a bit of a speed run. if you're new here, i promise that this is not representative of my normal dedication to the update post. and for those asking, yeah, ill probably compile it somewhere better than a tumblr post after its all said and done, but we don't have time for that now. 

what we do have time for is the Off Week (and like some of the media stuff). and it was filled with silliness: 

george russell decided to wear what can only be described as slightly ugly yellow short shorts with his taylor swift shirt that he got at the eras tour. this was baffling for several reasons, the main reason being that i don't think the internet knew that he was capable of wearing a graphic t shirt

fernando alonso got his aston martin valkyrie finally. in case you are unfamiliar, a valkyrie i think is the worlds fastest street legal car. he posted tweets about this that made it seem like he wanted to fuck the car. hilariously, the car broke down an hour later.

we also had the very thrilling conclusion to grill the grid. oscar won and he somehow managed to look more pleased about his grill the grid win than his first race victory. 

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nico rosberg went to the green awards and he wore a fantastically insane teal blue suit. yes i know hes not a current driver. but you all like hearing about him so ask and you shall receive. unfornunately i cant find a picture of it though

and also not a current driver is mick schumacher, but my roommate asked me to include that he was seen on his girlfriends instagram being bad at golf. like. exceptionally bad at golf. like he hit a tree 20 feet in front of him.

also playing golf was lando norris. except he managed to look like try bolton from high school musical 2.

he also talked about the world driver championship with his friend max fewtrell while they were playing golf. unfortunately i lost this link in the sea of technical difficulties, but the gist of it was that he was saying that there is still hope for him to beat max in the championship (hes about 60 points behind right now). lando doesnt usually talk about the championship because he doesnt want news outlets to paint him as “desperate” so this was interesting

charles leclerc had an insane off week. first he rear ended someone in monaco. then he spoke at a yacht conference. he was not scheduled to speak at said yacht conference, he was there doing something else and they were like hey you're cool people know you, heres a microphone. he alsp ended up on a weather channel while promoting a karting event he was doing for the jules bianchi foundation (his god father, the one who died during the f1 race in japan 2014). he also changed his instagram pop and re centered it because some random tiktoker told him it matched his aesthetic better.

oscar piastri posted a photo of himself sitting in the cockpit of a plane and then promptly deleted it. because he posted it on 9/11. for anyone who doesnt know what that is, that was when some terrorists hijacked commercial planes and few them into the world trade centers in nyc and the pentagon in washington dc

max verstappen also posted a plane pic with himself and lando norris, but he did not delete it.

we also had the return of daniel ricciardo’s jpg instagram account, which is kinda like a finsta for photos that hes taken. i think lando started this a few years ago. 

heading into the race week we certainly got a weird ass batch of pr. including but not limited to:

lewis hamilton was back on top and slaying in the fit game. as was yuki. 

lewis hamilton also exposed george russell as listening to katy perry pre race. katy perry and taylor swift (this was after he claimed that he liked listening to old school rap music.) though, lewis then started singing wrecking ball???? confusing vibes all around

george was not off the hook yet tho because some intern definitely make him say skidibidi toilet or whatever the thing is idk, i might be gen z but im not insufferable, okay? actually george in baku was just all kinds of unhinged

george and alex also got up to something, what it is no one knows but it is clearly something

max pulled up to the paddock de aged about 10 years. picture one is of him in baku in 2015 (i believe he was 17) and picture 2 is this year. no i am not kidding. 

and franco walked into the paddock telling everyone about argentinian mate (which is a drink, not a friend)

and max shoved a microphone out of the way so everyone could gossip

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then of course, we had some slightly more relevant drama

haas announced that ollie would be replacing kevin at baku. in case you forgot, kevin magnussen received a total of 12 penalty points over the season so far, which means he gets one race ban. how did he get the points? well he was mostly wreaking havoc on everyone else so that his teammate, nico hulkenberg, could drag his car into the points. lets all remember the time in saudi arabia where he managed to get 20 seconds of penalties by basically driving like a mad man just to make sure that nico could keep his position after he pit stopped. anyway, nico was kind of pissed about the race ban situation and said “maybe the guidelines for F1 penalties need to be reviewed as the stewards ‘want to get involved’ no matter the contact.”

in any case though, k mags was out. and ollie was in. we’ve seen ollie before. notably he subbed in for carlos sainz at the saudi arabia gp when carlos had appendicitis. he managed to get points as well. since then, he has been announced as a haas driver for 2025 and is now subbing in for k mags (haas, later in the week called him a super sub. clearly no gen z person read that over.) he can do this because ferrari has a haas engine so they share reserve drivers.

adrian newey finally got employed. i know! i can hardly believe it either! but he did! and youll never guess where! 

ferrari? no that would be too obvious. 

mercedes? nah

williams? no too much of a shit show

aston martin? ding ding ding! just the right amount of shit show! 

that is right. newey is going to aston for 2025. 

apparently he was offered a “good package” according to himself, which i assume means pay and also the fact that lawrence stroll made him a shareholder? stakeholder? whatever its called. in the team itself. basically he has a lot of power. 

he said that he always wanted to work with fernando and lewis. and he couldn't do both. and aston had a better package than ferrari. 

fernando looked positively evil during all the announcement pictures. and called the team "definitely the team of the future" and for those of you who don't know, fernando is positively evil. hes just been stuck in a shit box and we havent seen very much of him, but man does he know how to evilly slut it up. so that will be fun to see.

by contrast, people said that lance was not excited enough. and well. lance 1. has resting bitch face and 2. never really looks excited about anything. also he lives in a world where take your child to work day somehow became his job. (his dad owns the team).

lewis hamilton was asked what he thought about adrian not going to ferrari, and here's what he had to say:

"i feel like, while I have mentioned before that it would be an honor to work with adrian, i have been privileged to work with two championship winning teams that didnt have adrian."

mclaren announced pato o ward would do FP1 in mexico. who is pato o ward? hes one of mclaren’s indycar drivers and one of the f1 reserve drivers. he is incredibly charming and definitely runs his own social media as seen here:

mclaren Also claim they figured out who their number 2 driver is and they claim its oscar. i say they claim because the statements were a lot more complex than that. essentially, according to andrea stella, the priority is to the team first, then lando and then oscar. so they didn't outright say that oscar is the number 2 driver and i am willing to bet real money that this is because mr mark webber, oscars manager, has something in oscars contract that prevents him from being a number 2 driver. this is of course because mark webber was one of the most infamous number 2 drivers in f1 history to none other than menace war criminal sebastian vettel, who in their time as teammates, managed to win 4 back to back world champions. or, top to bottom if you're mrs darbus from high school musical. 

lando was asked about this and he said that yes, the team does support him. though he would not expect oscar to give up a win for him and that it is more complex behind the scenes. i suppose we will see if there are any papaya rules coming out this weekend….

and oscar said "i think the main point is its not purely just going to be me pulling over for lando every single race, because thats how none of us, including lando, wont want to go racing, if we feel that someone has done a much better job on a weekend, whichever way it is, we want that person to be rewarded."

max verstappen commented on the mclaren situation as well. which was funny mostly because red bull has one of the most defined number 1 and number 2 drivers of any team. he said "you look at it form oscar's perspective, he is closer to lando than lando to me. they have to deal with that."

and allow me to put on a tin foil hat as we are about to talk about the future of the red bull seat. because all i have to offer here is a baseball hat and a red bull can. 

a long time ago we talked about the red bull cans. the ones that red bull makes to promote f1. at the end of last season red bull put max and checo on the red bull can. this season at the start it was just max on the red bull can. well. now checo has reappeared on the cans too. and i will tell you what i think this means. it means that checo is not getting swapped this season, which was a possibility for awhile. 

but! there is more! 

daniel ricciardo made an instagram post this week. and it was very interesting. but most interestingly he was wearing a red bull hat.

which he does occasionally, no big deal really. he did race for the for several years, he technically does currently. BUT then he showed up TO THE PADDOCK wearing the red bull hat.

which is Big Interesting. usually you show up in a statement outfit or wearing the team kit. and daniel is not a red bull racing driver. he is a visa cashapp racing bulls driver. they might be owned by red bull but they are Not the same team. so why the red bull hat. in the paddock. well, the rumor is that hes taking checos seat for 2025. and the rumor is that this will be announced before mexico. so checo can have a proper send off. 

and with that. the baku lore. 

theres a lot that has happened at baku. as i said its a street circuit. and i think its the fastest street circuit. but over the years theres been some notable events. 

such as the great kimi raikkonen radio for gloves and steering wheel:

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they gave mini kimi this week gloves and steering wheel in honor of that

the max and daniel crash in 2018 when they were running p1 and p2 respectfully

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and of course. how could we forget. charles’s infamous “i am stupid” radio.

speaking of charles, he crashed again in fp1. not quite in the same spot, but nearly. he took a picture with the marshalls. 

then in fp2 he rage quit, basically saying that the car sucks. 

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but he was back and better than ever in practice three because he managed to top the time charts. welcome back fuck ass ferrari.

some other teams definitely experienced the lows but not really the highs of baku during practice. like lance stroll who came on the radio to say “this is not a car” (good thing they have adrian newey now, right? 

franco colapinto also cut his ear before practice on the neck strengthener stretcher thing that they all use and the team wanted to give him stitches but he was like no no no i need to be in the car in about 5 minutes im not doing that. so he jammed on his helmet and jumped in the car. he also crashed and when he went to the medical center he took off his helmet and there was blood everywhere and they were like no no no you cannot race! and he was like no! this is not from the crash! and then explained it and they let him do qualifying. 

also im pretty sure? ollie bearman crashed? in practice? but frankly i don't have time to google it so whos to say. 

but alas. qualifying. 

i know i know this is kind of a shitty update. i promise ill go all out in singapore. i PROMISE. 

so as i said. its a street circuit. high speed. 90 degree corners. and also windy as hell. we also had the dynamic duo of karun and harry in the commentary box. 

max led the first practice, george led the second and i think charles led the third. or some order like that. 

slipstream here is almost essential (slipstream: going behind another car to reduce the wind drag so you can go faster) 

charles has the last three pole positions (first in qualifying) here in baku, but he has never won. by comparison, red bull have never had pole here but they have won. 

and franco has never been to baku before. 

i think that's all the exposition that we need here. 

q1 started with max complaining about his car. “the car is jumping around like crazy on the rear axle” he said. despite this he was sitting in p3. 

the mid field battle though….the mid field battle was heating the hell up. mostly because none other than franco colapinto, who if you will remember, has never been to baku before, had split the two ferraris. he was in third for the moment, .109 seconds behind carlos sainz and .159 seconds ahead of charles leclerc. we still had a lot of qualifying left to go, so this was probably not going to stay, but it was still insane. he was pushing insanely hard, nearly kissing the walls. clearly he had learned from his crash in practice. 

the two mclarens waited until the very end of q1 to do their final flying push lap, and oscar made it through, but tragedy struck for lando. 

lando was in the middle of his last flying lap, time was ticking down, and there was a Very Brief yellow flag on the track. now, according to rules, you cannot complete your flying lap if there is a yellow flag. so lando pitted and was stuck down in 17th and out of qualifying. this would be the first time that he was out in q1 since vegas last year (which if i remember correctly was also not his fault) 

now though, of course nothing is ever that cut and dry. people thought that there had been a mis showing of a flag. yellow flag means that a car is stopped on track, white flag means that a car is going slowly on the track. and people thought that there had been a yellow flag shown when it was actually supposed to be a white flag (if there had been a white flag then lando would have been able to keep doing his flying lap) lando himself said that he had no idea what people were talking about because there is a light on the steering wheel that lights up when flags are called and he had a big yellow light. so it was clearly a yellow flag. 

if you're concerned about lando being able to pull it out of the bag, id like to point you in the direction of the mexican gp last year where lando qualified 17th and finished 5th. on a track that was hard to overtake on. he can be absolutely insane when he wants to be. worry not gentle reader. 

in any case. also out in q1 was daniel ricciardo, valtteri bottas, zhou guanyu and esteban ocon.

and notably, williams, who was on fucking fire this weekend as we already saw, finished q1 with alex albon in second (ahead of oscar) and franco colapinto in 8th. pierre gasly had somehow managed to also get into 4th. and nico hulkenberg was in 7th with ollie bearman in 13th. i told you the mid field battle was heating the hell up. 

q2. everyone zoomed straight out of the gate. they didn't want to get lando norris’d. but, speaking of that, if lando managed to get no points in the race and charles managed to win, charles would overtake lando in the drivers championship. mark webber himself told this to charles, who was absolutely baffled. 

in any case, charles was kinda suffering right now and that was because he was not getting slipstream from carlos to make his lap faster. meanwhile, carlos seemed to be actively trying to give charles the slipstream because he came on radio to say “he keeps missing the tow” 

and amazingly, franco colapinto was 4 tenths AHEAD of alex albon. alex albon who had not been unqualified by his teammate once since the start of 2023. ex red bull driver alex albon. that alex albon. 

max topped the times in q2, followed immediately by charles. insanely, fernando alonso managed to drag the aston martin to fifth. and franco was right behind him in 6th. by comparison alex albon was in 10th. 

and from q2 we lost ollie bearman, yuki tsunoda (who has never qualified lower than 8th in baku), pierre gasly, nico hulkenberg and lance stroll. so yes, ollie bearman managed to outqualify nico hulkenberg. this is ollies second ever f1 race. 

steaming on forward to q3. 

we had, for review, in q3 the following: 

both ferraris, both red bulls, both mercedes, both WILLIAMS (has not happened since vegas 2023), plus fernando alonso and oscar piastri. 

right out the gate it was wild. 

“red bull! theyve re found their mojo! or have they!” karun said. red bull were in 5th and 6th and not entirely sucking for the moment. 

everyone did one flyer and then came out at the end for a second flyer. 

here were the standings: 

charles, carlos, oscar, george, checo, max, lewis, alex, franco, fernando

and everyone was making it to the line and all was going smooth until-

wait a second what is that

could it be! alex albon! with the air box fan still on his car! surely not!!!

oh but it was! and harry and karun were like oh wow so unfortunate for williams tisk tisk

meanwhile ted jumped on the radio to Loudly announce to everyone that this was insane and if i have time here i will put the rant he ranted cause it was Fantastic.

and what do you know i have time

so we had 3 minutes left qualifying and everyone was pulling out of the pits for their last flyer when oscar hopped on the radio to say

"the williams still has the air box fan in"

"oh what an error! disaster for williams!" karun and harry said. they speculated if the marshalls could get it or if the session needed to be red flagged. but alex threw the fan off the car.

and then they asked "ted have you ever seen that before?" and ted did not hold back:

"ITS A MASSIVE YELLOW FAN HOW COULD YOU MISS IT???!!! HOW COULD THE MECHANICS MISS IT???? I CANT BELIVE THEY WOULD MAKE SUCH A MISTAKE DOWN AT WILLIAMS! SUCH AN EXPERIENCED BUNCH OF GUYS AND GIRLS! WHAT IS GOING ON AT WILLIAMS OPERATIONALLY? HOW COULD YOU SEND A CAR OUT LIKE THAT?"

alex, obviously, got fined for an unsafe release 5k euros. he also had to throw the fan off to the side and got slightly covered in dry ice. he did not get to the a second flying lap. 

franco did tho!

and here were out qualifying results: 

p1: charles p2: oscar p3: carlos p4: checo p5: george p6: max p7: lewis p8: fernando p9: franco p10: alex  p11: ollie p12: yuki p13: pierre p14: nico p15: lance p16: daniel  p17: lando p18: valtteri p19: zhou p20: esteban 

oh ho ho but we werent done yet. because pierre gasly got disqualified from qualifying. for failing fuel flow regulations. and lewis was going to have to start from the pit lane for changing his power unit. 

everyone, and by everyone i mean oscar max and checo, pretty much said that charles was going to get pole no matter what, they knew this coming in and the best they were trying for was second

onto the race. 

notably, this is considered a checo track. this was one of the three races that max did not win last year. because checo won it. its a track that he does well on, evidenced by the fact that he qualified above max in qualifying. so people were expecting big things from him.

and so, we head into lap 1.

charles managed to hang onto the lead. checo passed carlos straight out of the gate for third and max managed to pass george to take fifth. lando had managed to get ahead of nico and up into 13th. notably, franco held onto 8th and ollie was able to hold onto tenth. 

someone who was not doing well was lance stroll, who came on the radio saying that he had a puncture. this was from contact with yuki. lance had to pit for fresh tires and was pretty immediately thrown to the back of the grid. 

by lap 2 lando had managed to get past daniel and was in 12th, he was trying to get past yuki next, which he managed by lap 3. yuki also lost a  spot to nico. 

also slaying in the mclaren was oscar, who took fastest lap. then charles took fastest lap.

and lewis hamilton, who had started from the pit lane, was up to 16th. already. somehow. though he was displeased with the tires, sayig that “this tire is pretty bad” over the radio. 

yuki meanwhile was clearly having a problem because he had started going very very slowly. thought the pit wall said that he had no problems. this would later turn out to be false but we will indulge them for the time being. 

franco was STILL ahead of alex albon on lap 6. STILL. 

lando on lap 8 managed to push his way into points positions, overtaking ollie bearman for 10th. though this was where things were about to slow down for him because in front of him were alex, franco and fernando, who were all very close together and would be hard to get past. 

george was back in bad luck hell as a plastic bag entered his airbox. will he ever catch a break. 

on lap 11 nico hulkenberg finally caught up with ollie bearman and passed him for 11th. 

and max’s car was not working. to potentially no one’s surprise. “i have zero bite in the car” he said. and this was probably true because checo was a whole 6.5 seconds ahead of him. insane gap. 

several pit stops later that i will not detail out because we simply do not have the time, alex albon ended up in 4th and lando ended up in fifth. and oscar was about to get undercut by checo. 

“mojo seems to be back for checo perez” harry said, correctly. 

mojo was back for him indeed. and now he was right behind lando. 

and if you will recall, according to mclaren themselves, priority at mclaren is the team first, then oscar, then lando. but oscar was ahead of lando. so what did mclaren do? 

they asked lando do hold up perez, but not compromise his own race. 

remever a long time ago when i said mclaren wouldn't have any internal drama this season? man how i was wrong.

lando managed to hold up perez for around a lap or two before he got past. this was crucial because this was during when oscar was in the pits. 

thanks to lando and the power of the papaya rules teamwork, oscar ended up coming out in 4th, only .706s ahead of checo. 

mclaren are working together everyone! mclaren are working together!

meanwhile, turns out that yuki did indeed have problems because he retired on lap 17 with a hole in his sidepod from the contact with lance on lap 1. this was now two races in a row where he had had to retire for reasons out of his control. 

several more people pitted. and eventually charles was back out in front, oscar was in p2. until he wasn't. no, he didn't dnf. he overtook charles! he was in p1! he popped out of nowhere! nowhere being 2 car lengths back and just flooring it to spring around charles like a little silly slinky! karun called it a “good, fair and robust defense,” which sounds like its descibing notes in wine. but this was not wine. this was the baku gp. and we were only half done. 

ollie bearman was defending against lewis hamilton, holding on tightly to 14th place. 

charles was still behind oscar and he could not get past, despite the fact that he was still very much in spitting distance. “they are pushing like crazy or they have more grip than us” he said. 

carlos got past both lando and alex albon and was up into 4th

this brought max up behind lando. max was on 11 lap old tires and lando was on 24 lap old tires. but lando still defended like hell and managed to hold onto sixth. max was 0.632 seconds behind lando on lap 25 when he said that “my brakes are not working.” this was hardly a surprise. max has hated the car since china.

also experiencing technical difficulties was sir lewis hamilton. he was stuck down in 14th and was first told to do “everything you can do to get the surface temp down” of the tires. he said “im trying” then several laps later on lap 29 he came on the radio to say “are you seeing how i have to drive this thing?” “yes,” bono, his engineer said. “quite effective though.” 

max was still half a second behind lando. mclaren faked a pit stop call over the radio to get max to pit. he did not. 

but, george russell did manage to pass him. which was “not good for max’s world champion aspirations.”

this was also when ted very bafflingly said that “if i had a sofa in the pit lane i would be jumping up and down on it” im not sure what that was in response to. 

meanwhile, ollie was still holding off sir lewis hamilton. and charles was trying to get oscar to pit again by lying over the radio. it was not working. 

lando did a pit stop finally and came out a whole 15 second behind max. he was hoping to catch max by the end of the race. but it might be tight. lets go last lap lando. 

“lando, imagine andrea on your shoulder saying ‘zero wheel spin’ in every exit,” lando’s race engineer said. if you're confused, everyone else was too. 

10 laps to go and here were the order of affairs:

oscar

+.449s charles +1.865s checo +2.989s carlos +16.530s george  +1.909s max +11.535s lando +9.715s fernando +2.589s alex +2.451s nico +4.667s franco +1.590s lewis +1.261s ollie +1.791s pierre +9.205s daniel +23.919s esteban  +.789s lance +3.862s valtteri +3.631s guanyu 

lando was determined. he took fastest lap on lap 43 and was 8.8s behind max

at this point, the leaders were starting to lap the cars in the back. “the back markers are starting to come up,” checo’s engineer said to him. “its going to get messy.”

“hold onto your hats and if you don't have one go get one and hold onto it” harry said. harry would turn out to be correct. 

we had the top 3 all running very close to eachother, that was oscar, charles and checo and “welcome to the party carlos sainz!” who was now 1.2 seconds behind checo in the four way battle for the lead.

definitely not leading was lance stroll, who retired on lap 47 with a brake problem. 

oscar managed to pull ahead of charles by 1.5 seconds, finally knocking him out of DRS range. so now it was a three way battle for second. and charles had “no rear tires. no rear tires at all.” 

and, just like i said he would, lando managed to pass max on lap 49. he was closing the gap slowly in the championship. 

“verstappen’s day goes from bad to worse,” harry said. because lando still had fastest lap, so he would score 3 more points than max. which is important if lando wants to beat max in the championship (though i think hes still like 60 points behind)

meanwhile! franco managed to pass nico hulkenberg for 10th! he was in the points!!!! at his second race!!! 

but this was short lived because there was a crash! a big smackeroo! between carlos and checo!! checo was mad, carlos didn't know what happened. 

what happened was that carlos was trying to pass checo but checo did not move over. it was deemed an equal fault accident. both of them were utterly confused at what happened and apparently spent 20 minutes in the medical center being utterly lost and aparently saying that sometimes this sport sucks. and! contrary to what several people said! checo did not bang on carlos’s helmet after the crash. 

the crash actually caused chef's dad to have a heart attack. he is stable now.

and well. this clip of george from the post qualifying interviews definitely didnt age well:

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but! since we were a matter of a few laps from the end, this meant that the rest of the race was finished under a virtual safety car. 

which meant 

OSCAR PIASTRI WINS THE AZERBAIJAN GP

and george inherited p3! 

and on his own merit too! no safety cars, no team orders, no weird shit! 

“yes!” he whispered over the radio. 

he almost fell getting out of the car, then gave us all the “one moment” hand gesture before properly celebrating. 

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he also got driver of the day! 

(this was marginally better than george russell, who said over the radio “i cant get any rubber (to pick up on his tires) all im getting is leaves”)

gunther steiner also hosted the post race interviews. which was interesting. 

george said that the most difficult part of the race was “driving full gas into a wall of carbon fiber on the penultimate lap…the vsc should have come out sooner” 

charles bashed ferrari because they didn't do any high fuel runs in practice. 

oscar was entirely pleased. “i managed to overtake and hold onto it for the next 35 laps..one of the better races of my career.” and honestly, oscar winning a race straight after mclaren basically announcing that he was their number 2 driver is nothing short of hilarious.

and! mclaren was now leading the constructors championship by 20 points! for the first time in ten years!!!!

the top three had a moment outside of the car that was filled with baffled: 

and oscar's engineer tom got to stand on the podium with him. he usually takes a selfie with oscar after each race he podiums at, but he was too excited to so george took this picture for them

(george also aparently demomished oscar in a game of uno on the plane, immediately humbling him)

george also shielded himself from the champagne on the podium

the cooldown room reacted to the crash in a very straight forward manner:

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and very quickly cause its midnight and the singapore gp starts in 8 hours, the post race, speed ran: 

-mark webber told off laura winter for thinking that oscar didn't have good tire management

-alex albon was “super happy, that's a lot of points for us” (williams finished in 7th and 8th). he cut his own interview short when ollie bearman arrived, saying “I can go, im happy to go” and then waving comically. 

-williams was so pleased with this result they blasted everyone with champagne. and they overtook alpine in the constructors championship! this was also their best race finish all season

-(and a quick note, if youre going to really blame logan for being that shit of a driver here, please remember that the car he was driving was several rounds of upgrades behind alex's pretty much the entire time he was driving it)

-ollie became the first driver to ever score points in his first two races for two different constructors because the double dnf pushed him up to 10th place. he said that there was not much difference between the haas and the ferrari, the ferrari was just red

-franco continued to charm everyone and flirt with the reporters. 

-they interviewed george and lewis and the camera had to be adjusted for george's height. it was comical and resulted in my favorite edit so far of the season (sound on)

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-lando looked pleased and happy for once. he said about holding off checo that “i didn't hold him up i just had to cool my tires a little.” he was delighted to be leading the constructors for the first time in ten years and he defended alex albon saying “i struggled to get past alex for a while, which is common, alex doesnt make mistakes.” he also ratted on max for going to fast during the VSC and said “i didn't complain, facts were stated.” and to sum it all up he said that “im executing things well, i’m very quick…i’m not going to be the happiest guy, but i am never the happiest guy….car is performing well everywhere…some red cars behind us seem to be our biggest competitors right now” 

-by comparison george insulted all of pirelli. the tire people. “pretty infuriating that it (the pace) changes this so much….its black magic, people who make the tires don't understand the tires…..for 20 laps we had a car not worthy of points and for 20 laps we had a car fighting for victory and the only difference is the tires.” 

-lewis was notably upset after the race and walked through the paddock with his helmet on, not wanting to talk to anyone. but he did talk to franco and ollie and congratulate them on a job well done defending against him and racing against him. franco even fangirled over this on his instagram. 

-charles was clearly upset with ferrari. he was so upset he posted a thirst trap.

-and oscar. oscar was very happy this afternoon. and his mom was there! she doesnt usually come cause it scares her, but nicole was there today! 

-mclaren celebrated with a hell of a lot of champagne. both oscar’s wina and lando’s insane recovery, and the fact that they were leading the championship. red bull have been dethroned, at least for now. 

-there was so much champagne that lando took off his socks to spray it. all seems well at mclaren. 

-at least one thing is for sure, oscar had a better time here this weekend than last year when he got food poisoning and only ate four pieces of toast

and with that. we head into singapore. quite literally as it is starting in a few hours. again, i apologixe about this post. its a little sad, but the next one will be better. pinkly promise. 

see you all soon!!!

[frmulcahy]

Listening to an episode of the @antiquesfreaks podcast where they cover the costuming in The Terror and here are some amazing moments:

"But Ken, are you the only one of us that put themselves through reading the book?" "I did. Because John Bridgens was trapped inside and I had to get him out and if I read the book good enough, perhaps I could save him"

"If you don't tell these men what to wear, they're gonna look like straight up hoochies."

"As we see in the later episodes of The Terror and discipline does break down and Dundy just starts showing up to command meetings with his suspenders out! Slattern that he is!!!

"Victorian Navy: one to one analog to working at present day Target."

"I heard they flog you at Target."

"I was press ganged into working at Target."

"It's Victorian times. Everyone's wicked fucking repressed and they're about to get wicked un-repressed whether they like it or not, and they're going to show that through their clothing."

"a blur of muttonchops"

"I pre-gamed the show for 5 years with gifsets on tumblr to makes sure I would be able to tell at least the major speaking roles apart, and I still could not tell Little and Jopson apart until I figured out they had different eye colors."

"And now I'm Pilkington SpottingTM as a hobby"

calling JFJ a "fashionable boy" with his "nippies out" because he doesn't button up his coat all the way like Franklin and Crozier

The two regular hosts repeatedly comparing themselves to a delinquent class that their guest is stuck substitute teaching

"I think my character would be hitting a fat doobie right about now"

Discussing Jared Harris being obsessed with his own costuming details like all the mending on Crozier's clothes

Jopson's first appearance - "he's normal and they're normal and everyone's having a normal time here on this completely routine expedition." "It's so normal. Do you ever fall in love with your boss???" "It couldn't have been more erotic if they had just had gay sex."

Stanley and McDonald's button grouping on their uniforms to denote rank

THEY TALK ABOUT THE ICONIC JFJ GANSEEEYYY

Also Irving's Sanquhar scarf :')

"the red sweater of tenderness" sobbing screaming throwing up

"I think The Terror would have been improved if all of the marines had Boston accents for no reason"

Also marines vs normal sailors

comparing sailor's clothes to fast fashion because it's not very tailored lmaooo

The canvas overcoats being period inaccurate but still neat because they're referencing later polar expeditions like what we see on the guys in the Shackleton expedition etc

They talk about irl Goodsir's letter about clothes and the many many shirts!

Nive having to wear a cooling vest under her costume since it was real caribou fur and her coat being patched with sail cloth later.

They go into Yup'ik masks which is super cool! As well as have a conversation about the ethics of visuals/information/knowledge about indigenous artwork being shared with folks outside of those communities.

Repeated! Dan! Simmons! Roasting! As! They! Should!!!!!

Reapted! Nive! Nielsen! Praising! As! They! Should!!!!!!!!

Sophia's "oceanic color theme"

"They let the dresses have colors. The dresses have colors. The dresses have bright beautiful colors, and it's great."

"They had invented aniline dyes and they were about to make it everybody's problem!"

Lady Jane in more solids vs Sophia in more patterns

"'A woman could never possibly understand polar exploration' meanwhil Silna's up there doing it better than all of them."

Clowning on how other period pieces never use bonnets and always fuck up in the hair and makeup department

"I found Harry Goodsir's fursuit btw"

"On a scale of Calypso's Birthday to Fitzjames's Carnivale, how's your impromptu nautical drag ball going?"

"It's actually exactly like The Purge." "It's like a little Victorian maritime Purge."

"As far as metaphor and literary analysis and whatever, scurvy understood the fucking assignment."

"I punched in Scorbutic Nostalgia so that I could remember to read about it later." "I have some literature for you if you want." "Yeah fantastic! I love disease"

"CGI bear expensive"

"This episode comes with a heavy caveat of 'go to Terror Camp'" amazing.

THE DRESSTM

Tozer's Hotspur costume and Dundy's Henry VI costume and their relevance

"This is the last we see of Party!Dundy"

(About Little) "Every day he gets emails :("

Bridgler and Apollo/Hyacinthus stuff fuuuuuccckk

"Hodgepodge, my boy"

"Oompa loompa doompity dacticals, don't indulge your morals over your practicals"

"Rip Hickey you would've loved Joker"

Not a silly quote but just a really fantastic one: "That is what the best historical designers do, is they find these nuggets of information that allow them to tell a story with authenticity, both in a way that is historical but authentic to the characters as well." EXAAAACCCTTTLLLYYYYYY

"Whomst among us has not Joplarped to get through the workday?"

[loycos]

my head's a bit clearer, some thoughts about act 3

-my biggest gripe is episode 7- cool idea, love the concept of peaking into a different universe and seeing what our characters couldve been under different circumstances, but a WHOLE episode. when you only had 9 episode in this season, that already feel like theyre moving at a neck's pace. for a universe that ultimately doesn't matter to the main universe where the story takes place. the fact it had timebomb made it feel extremely fan service-y.

-no emotional resolution to a lot of characters. viktor and jayce are the only ones i can think of that felt like they got the screen time and care for an actual emotional closure.

-isha wasn't even mentioned in this act. in general she was already a martyr for jinx's character development but guys can you make it less obvious.

-it started in act 2, hence why i was so jaded on it, but it continues here: just where the fuck the political drama between 2 cities go? the conflict between zaun and piltover took a back seat since episode 4 and never came back. the resolution to it isn't bad per say, but when u got so little focus on it in the finale it just feels rushed.

-i loved the cait and jinx scene. but like, that was the resolution to it??? after act 1 thinking about it disappoints me. im not against a conversation being the climax to a story, but that is, and im not joking, the ONLY conversation these 2 have in the show one on one. in general the jinx\cait\vi arc ends with 1 conversation per duo (well caitvi got one fight and one very steamy sex scene but u won't catch me complaining). and after act 1, idk i think i wanted just a little bit more. im biased though- the jinx\vi\caitlyn dynamic is my favorite part about arcane. the teasers for s2 always had them front and center so i assumed it'll play a bigger part in the story???

-i felt like what the show was at its core, which is the conflict between the sisters and the cities, was completely sidelined this season. in general i can't really tell what the main theme of the show is anymore. but yeah look at the resolution to the jinx and vi story.did it feel like it had the emotional impact u expected? cause i felt like it was underwhelming.

-sevika?? didnt speak since episode 4???? huhh???

-maddie was pointless. why was she there?? i don't understand the point of that character. i dont understand her motives. she ended up not mattering at all to caitvi's story. the only thing i got from her inclusion is "caitlyn fucks" but is it that THAT important??? of a character trait??? to add to caitlyn of all people?? in THIS season??? this belongs in the realm of fanfiction.

-a lot here felt like fanfiction actually. every silco inclusion (except of him in the cell with jinx), the whole "nobody dies au" they threw in the middle, even the caitvi sex scene (IM NOT COMPLAINING THO). the caitvi scene at the end was dialog out of fanfiction, wtf was that.

-why did caitlyn lose her eye? im not like against the idea on a base level but losing an eye is very symbolic, and im not sure what its supposed to represent here. caitlyn is an observant person, its a big character trait for her. so youre basically saying she sees less now? that she's more laser focused? i sure hope not. wasnt her whole arc with giving up of revenge about seeing the "bigger picture"? her sacrifice didn't feel in character, because caitlyn is not really a "fight to the death" type of character like ambessa is. if she made that sacrifice for something like love, or for the betterment of other people, that would be more in line. idk, you couldve made me on board with it but im just very meh on it. also caitlyn only really emotes through her eyes, it sucks that we get even less of it now?? though i guess it doesnt matter at this point.

-what was the point of the enforcer that looked like vander?

-ambessa was so wasted in these last 2 acts its crazy. where's the "you have to be the fox and the wolf" mindset from her? she felt like she was wolfing only with no wit anymore by the 3rd act.

-mel????????????? it was. uhhh. maybe you shouldve saved it for another series, riot. but in this show, waste of time. the fight she had with caitlyn against ambessa was cool tho.

-i sound like im a hater but u have to understand. s1 of arcane was a political drama and a character study show. seeing all this discarded for magic and time travel shenanigans on like 4 different fronts was so jarring it took me out of the show multiple times.

-cant believe im saying that, but i wish they'd try to stick closer to the characters' current state in the source material (the cursed game). someof it felt out of left field and done for shock value, which isn't why we love the story or these characters to begin with.

good stuff:

-caitvi sex lmao ill take it babyyyyy

-jayce and viktor's scenes at the end were powerful.

-as usual, the visuals were phenomenal. the animation is gorgeous. fortiche u made this show what it is and youre still its saving grace.

-thank god they dropped the warwick\vander plot

-i liked the implication of the conclusion to jinx's story, even if it felt a little inconsistent with the character.

-the ending to jinx\vi\caitlyn was poetic and i did love it, even if it was rushed and didn't really hit the emotional highs i wanted it to.

[elderwisp]

◁ || ▷

Dan: They only onboarded me today and I have orientation tomorrow. Hopefully I get to meet some of the animals.

Ares: Oh so that’s why you have those goofy shoes, I thought you were leading the girl scouts for a second.

Dan: You’re buggin! Frances said they were cute.

Ares: It’s not a bad look, it makes me feel like we’re going on an adventure.

Dan: I bought you a boba and this is how you treat me?!

Ares: [ snickers ] Where are we going, captain?

Dan: I hate everything.

Ares: Ok, ok! You’re right I shouldn’t treat sugar mamas like that.

Dan: Ares! Shut up!

Ares: [ whispers ] I think the whole store is looking at us.

Dan: And?? Let them look. 

Ares: Wait, wait, make sure my hair looks good.

Dan:  You’re so…

Ares: Well?

Dan: It looks fine. 

Ares: I am proud of you by the way.

Dan: Really?

Ares: Yeah! It’s cool, graduation’s around the corner and you have this sick job to look forward to.

Dan: Oh! Neat.

Ares: Did I say something wrong?

Dan: Not at all, I guess I want to feel the same excitement as my friends do. 

Ares: Ah, I see. Well, you know it’s alright to feel that way, right?

Dan: I know. Walk me to the train?

Ares: [ nods ]

-

Dan: My mom would project all of her dreams onto me. So success doesn’t ever seem real to me. Like there’s always some sort of ladder to climb.

Ares: You ever think you haven’t found the right one? 

Dan: I do but then again I worry if anything truly is satisfying enough to try.

Ares: Then maybe that’s the issue.

Dan: What is?

Ares: We’re too busy measuring things by success rather than happiness.

Dan: Ahh, I see the vision. 

Ares: Maybe take this step as the thing that’ll allow you to build a future you want. Like a platform. 

Dan: I guess I’ve been under the impression that a career was the end goal not the foundation.

Ares: Felt that.

Dan: Yeah right.

Ares: Dan, I don’t know what I want to be. There’s music, photography, going back to school. I feel like I’ve spent more time trying to pick something than actually doing it. You have something to work off of.

Dan: So do you. Plenty of things. 

Dan: Look, you should listen to your advice as well. There’s a lot of good stuff in there. 

Ares: Hey, don’t move.

Dan: Noo. I hate having my picture taken.

Ares: Then act like I’m not here.

Dan: That literally changes nothing.

Ares: Oke I’m taking it now.

Dan: Ugh.

Ares: Shit. You might’ve blinked.

Dan: Seriously?!

Ares: [ laughs ] No. Not at all.

Dan: This dude. 

Ares: You should catch your train now.

Dan: That would be smart. 

Dan: Ares?

Ares: Yes?

Dan: You’re a pretty cool guy.

Ares: Ah. Nice, nice.

Dan: Awkward as fuck too.

Ares: PFFT I’m leaving now.

Dan: Bye.

[ink-and-dagger]

Hi Legacy, thank you for your comment and for your compliment about my writing. Unfortunately, Tumblr wouldn’t let me leave this response to your comment under the fic, so I am having to add it onto your reblog. Something I really, genuinely, did not want to have to do.

I hear what you are saying, and am in full agreement with you - tags play a vital role in reader protection, and there’s nothing more frustrating (and in some cases dangerous) than people misusing them.

However, a few words now in my own defence.

I am not new here. I have been writing and posting Silco fics since Arcane first aired back in 2021. It seems more likely in this case that you are new if not to the Arcane fandom then to my blog/writing specifically - so allow me to provide a bit of context which may help, because I don’t believe this case is as cut-and-dry as you believe it to be. I began posting my multi-chapter Silco x Reader fic Drink With Me in January 2022, and updated regularly until its completion in July of that same year. I was extremely lucky in that my story gained a lot of traction and interaction within the fandom throughout that time. People became extremely invested in the Reader character, and would ask me all sorts of questions about her. That’s how Astrid was born. She became a point of reference outside the fic for those who wanted someone to visualise, whilst the fic itself remained strictly a Reader Insert. In the few years since this story wrapped up, my followers have remained invested in the ‘Drink With Me’ universe (again, I’m incredibly lucky and thankful for this), and to this day I receive tons of requests for bonus content set within this universe that I try to fulfil whenever I can. Despite these ficlets being connected to a main multi-chapter fic, most of them can easily be read as a standalone and do not require the context or any prior knowledge of the main fic to make sense. Additionally, as I did with the main fic, they are always written in 2nd person, the character is never referred to by name, and I never use any physical descriptors beyond anatomical ones during smut. If you were to take away any and all tags and look purely at the text alone, it reads as a traditional reader insert, which is why I tag it as such. I include the ‘Astrid’ and ‘OC’ tags for those people who are familiar with the DWM fic and universe and who specifically follow me for this reason, so that they know in their minds that the ficlet relates to the world/timeline of Drink With Me in some way shape or form. I think the point I’m trying to make is that those who are familiar with me and my work will see the ‘Astrid/OC’ tag and go “Ah cool it’s this universe”. Whereas for everyone else I add the ‘can be read as gen!reader insert’ note at the top so that they can go “Ah cool, let me just ignore that character tag then” and happily read it as a general reader insert fic perfectly fine. I hope that makes a bit more sense as to why I tag this way, why I’ve always tagged this way, and why I will continue to tag this way for my Drink With Me adjacent works. If I ever were to write something in 1st or 3rd person or that described the MC in a very specific way, then I would of course not tag that as a reader fic.

Now, so long as we’re here discussing fandom etiquette, I’d like to politely point out that adding your grievance onto the reblog of a specific fic is not a ‘gentle reminder’ - it’s a full-frontal attack on the author who wrote that fic. It would have been far better for you to create your own, separate post addressing the fandom as a whole, or to send me a quiet, private comment/DM on the side.

As I’ve already said, I empathise with your point of view, and I hope you are able to empathise with mine. If the way I choose to tag my work bothers you, then please feel free to block my account so that I don’t show up whilst you are searching for content. At the end of the day we are all individual humans - you cannot expect everyone to interpret/measure/categorise everything in the same way you would, and it’s imperative to take some measure of responsibility for cultivating your own online space, instead of relying on others to do it for you.

What if Astrid find a pic of young Silco by accident hehhehehehhehehehehhe

Snapshot

A Drink With Me ficlet

870 words || Established relationship || Silco x Astrid (but can be read as gen f!reader) || SFW but suggestive || MDNI

“Oh my Gods.”

“What?”

“Oh. My Gods.”

Time has stripped the photograph between your fingers of its glossy sheen and has left the edges blunt and frayed, but you would recognise those features anywhere; no less sharp nor striking through the faded sepia.

“This is you.”

It had slipped from between two ledgers as you’d perused Silco’s bookshelves – an activity more to entertain your idle hands than a genuine search for reading material. The image itself is simple and candid: A young man, seemingly oblivious to the fact his portrait is being taken, sat at a familiar bar, with eyes downcast toward a spread of papers.

That same man looks up at you now from a very similar spread of papers. “What is?”

“This.” You drift over to his desk and perch on its edge, all the while unable to tear your gaze from the photo in your hands. The pitch dark hair swept back into a low bun. The familiar strays – the same ones that even now will always be the first to escape any styling under the combing of agitated fingers – falling forward into his face, only far longer and thicker than you’re used to. His skin, unblemished and smooth, save for the chronic furrow between his brows – etched there long before time and tragedy ravaged the rest.

Silco hums absently; an indication that he acknowledges your discovery but finds little interest in it. You can imagine the man in the photograph making the exact same noise, were someone to distract him from his paperwork for a reason he deemed benign. You flip the photo over. No date.

“How old are you here?”

Silco exhales through his nose, places his pen down with a pointed clack, and extends his hand wordlessly toward you.

“Hah! Do you think I’m wet behind the ears?” you hold the photograph out of his reach, “You can tell just fine from over there thank you very much.”

He cuts you a scathing glance, before leaning forward in his chair with a foreboding creak to peer more closely at the image. His scarred lips purse slightly in thought.

“Mid–late twenties. I can’t say for certain.”

“You were hot.”

“Were?”

“Were and are,” you coo, reclining backwards over the desk into his space, one elbow pitched on his paperwork to hold your weight whilst you flap the photograph in front of his face, “Can I keep this?”

“For what reason?”

“Dirty ones.”

“Hardly necessary,” Silco says, the very corner of his mouth creasing upwards as he catches your wrist to halt your photo-flapping, “You have access to the real thing.”

“True, true, and you can be sure I’ll continue taking advantage of that.” You grin, shoving your captured, photo-wielding arm a little closer to him in emphasis, “But right now I’m talking about some alone time with this guy.”

Silco scoffs under his breath and releases your wrist. You twist onto your front, weight propped on both elbows as you admire the photograph in your grip. You trace a finger down the slender throat of the man in the photo, over the generous wedge of chest exposed by his open crimson collar.

“D’you think he’d notice me? If I came into that bar?”

“Oh I’m certain he would.”

“Yeah?” You lift your gaze from the man in the photo to the one before you – as equally breathtaking. More so. You catch your lower lip between your teeth. “What line would he use?”

Silco hums, low and thoughtful, leaning forward in his chair, closing in on your space. He picks up his abandoned pen, briefly twirling the implement until it’s poised between his elegant fingers like a cigarette. Nib safely facing his own palm.

“After downing the dregs of his drink for courage... he would have approached you.”

With sensual tenderness, he brushes the barrel of his pen along your cheek, warmed metal against warmer skin. Catching at the curve of your jawline, and tracing over your pulse in a way that makes it fumble a beat.

“Cast his gaze over each of your pretty, pretty features. One by one,” he murmurs, slowly drawing the end of the pen down your jugular, down the slope of your collar bone, to leisurely trail through the cut of your cleavage. The corner of your mouth hooks up. The warmth low in your belly coils a little tighter.

“He would have leaned in close,” Silco whispers, demonstrating just so, “Close enough that you’d almost taste the whiskey on his breath.”

Blunt metal drags a purposeful line up your throat, and your lips part softly as he tilts your face toward his with the barrel of his pen flat and firm beneath your chin.

“And asked you – very nicely – to stop leaning on his paperwork.”

You press your tongue against the inside of your cheek while Silco’s dual eyes sizzle with smug mirth. It’d be unthinkable, really – to forfeit either one for the sake of a matching pair.

You straighten and push off his desk, hips swaying as you saunter over to the bedroom with the photograph in hand.

“Well,” you say, pausing in the threshold and turning to him with a smirk, “If you need us, you know where we’ll be.”

[valzhangism]

i know i said i was happy about how mel's story went, but the more i think about it the less i'm sure about that. this is very much connected to how the themes of classism and wealth disappeared in s2, but mel in the beginning was the epitome of piltover. she wanted to advance piltover to prove herself to her mother. to "put piltover—" and by extension herself, "—on the map."

she wanted wealth just to have it. and i'm not blaming her for anything that happened, especially with hextech! she, just like jayce and viktor, could not have known what it would lead to. i mean yeah heimerdinger said so but who the hell listens to heimerdinger? but anyway i think mel changed throughout s1, much in thanks to jayce. by the end she's become more cognisant of the mistreatment of zaunites. she's the first to vote for their peace. she was a good person all along but now she knows how to act on it. it's also seen more in s2 act 1. when she covers her painting with gold, it's symbolic—she won't act according to what her mother might think. she won't let her desire for approval dictate her anymore.

so somehow i wish those themes were. continued, somehow? like again they were dropped not just with mel but the whole show and it makes her story a off to me. there's no meaningful commentary on war or classism or how her ideology stands opposite to her mother's. like some people have said, it feels like she doesn't have much agency, even if she is really cool. and that to me is a shame because agency felt like her thing. "to shape your own destiny" as she says to jayce in s1. i know her collaborating with the black rose (but not fully joining them) and learning magic is supposed to represent becoming independent from her mother, taking her own path, but some other aspects of her character were thrown away... the more i think about it the more i'm thinking they kind of #girlboss-ed her a little bit. maybe to sell another champion. i can't help but feel like even though i enjoyed seeing her on screen, the payoff didn't feel proportionally satisfying compared to her setup in s1.

[lexirosewrites]

A Slick Sunday thought (if not for this week then for the future)

I really enjoy exploring the medical concepts related to the omegaverse but I also really love exploring them in the specific concept of the setting. And I have thoughts about 80s medical knowledge and diet culture.

Basically, I like the idea that Omegas need certain conditions in order to be healthy and fertile. I like the idea of them needing to feel safe (high adrenaline and cortisol levels functioning to basically pause their reproductive cycle) and I like the idea that (heat being a pretty physically demanding bodily function) Omegas also need a higher body fat percentage in order to have heats. (Heats also cease much more easily than normal female menstruation. An Omega can technically lead an otherwise perfectly healthy life without presenting or experiencing heats. Heats historically could prevent an Omega from being able to eat and expend a great deal of energy and thus Omegas adapted so that they could not go into heat without enough fat in reserve to survive fasting completely throughout. This is not a healthy practice but it is survivable.)

But I don’t think that that would be well understood in the 80s. Our understanding of hormones and nutrition have changed pretty dramatically over time and the common public perception has very rarely actually lined up with that understanding. And diet culture in the 80s was very much present.

Thus, a crisis for suburban mothers to clutch pearls over. Fewer and fewer presenting Omegas and heats few and far apart! What could cause this? The threat of nuclear war? A communist plot? (The diets. It’s the diets and the weight related bullying. And a little bit the threat of nuclear war. Give your kid an ice cream and stop letting them watch the news.)

Anyway, peering into this world we observe Steve Harrington. Who presents after he starts working at an ice cream shop. (Mostly because he was too stressed before. A little because he hit some ill-timed growth spurts. Male Omegas often present later because they stop growing later) But at Scoops he’s as relaxed as he’s been in a long time and he’s eating more and exercising less and as tall as he’s ever going to be. So finally conditions are right. And now Steve knows he’s an Omega. And then the Russians happen. And his heats stop. And he’s not entirely sure that it’s not something the Russians did to him. (Doctors said everything was fine. There’s no reason he shouldn’t be having them. (Except for the trauma. And stress. The stress experienced after the trauma. They haven’t really figured that one out in the 80s either.))

So Steve is pretty sure he’s just broken. And will just have to take out all of his thwarted Omegan maternal instincts on the Party. Who hate it. (They love it) And complain about it vociferously. (Because they’re teenagers) Especially to the super cool older teens they hang out with. (Eddie’s merry band of nerdy social outcasts) And Eddie is… intrigued. Eddie may also have gotten a little too into all the courtly love fairytale shit a few years ago. Eddie is determined to woo the babysitter with shows of chivalry and gifts of food. Eddie is not the least put off by the fact that Steve can’t be a “traditional Omega”. Eddie would love to share Steve’s heats and give Steve all the pups he desires, but he doesn’t need it. He mostly dated Beta guys before anyway. He’s the opposite of turned off by finding out that Steve is a monster slaying badass. He is down to make Steve the Eowyn to his Faramir.

Steve doesn’t fully get his heat cycle back until the Party have all flown the nest for college. But by the time they’re home for Christmas he and Eddie have an announcement to make.

YESSSSSSSS🥳🥵🥰🥺😮‍💨🔥🔥🔥