#i think some of these guys are not sapient actually

[spiralneko]

tag yourself incarcecon prisoner edition!! i am the large spider person with the dog

[alllgator-blood]

I posted these on reddit a while ago and I've gotten multiple messages asking if I had any other social media? Which I didn't at the time, but after years of not bothering to post my art I think that was the boost I needed to finally re-emerge from the rock I've been living under.

ANYWAY uhhhhhh I've drawn these guys so much since I posted this that they might look a little different when I eventually post my newer art of them. Mostly because I don't bother drawing the little crosses on their heads anymore besides on leshy because frankly the antennae are really funny. If anyone has any questions about my hcs or what I intend to do with the characters, my ask box is open and I don't have anything better to do than endlessly ramble about gods that 100% would rip my head off immediately if I ever encountered them!

SPEAKING OF WHICH, the reception I got for these on reddit was way more positive than I was expecting which I am immensely grateful for, but there was definitely some miscommunication about the afab shamura headcanon so I'm just gonna dump about that below the cut if you want to hear me ramble about my nonbinary-ness for a while:

OKAY SO it's canon that the bishops were feral little animals before they found their crowns, right? Leshy and Shamura both talk about it during their follower quests. Feral animals do not have a concept of gender, only biological sex, so if they ascended to sapient godhood they would suddenly have a grasp of gender. My hc is that Shamura was a female feral spider, ascended to godhood, lost their bio sex in the process as with all the other bishops, and was just like "you know what? I don't want to be anything. This is kinda swag actually" so they just became War and Grief and Cosmic Horror incarnate. I am fucking desperate for any relatable enby representation in the media I like, so I just want to clarify me saying they were female at some point just is me going "I am living vicariously through this character who shed their mortal flesh prison to be an eldritch spider war god devoid of any sex characteristics" and not "I'm one of those numerous people who for some reason lumps this canonically agender character in with a binary sex". Anyway thank you for reading this far, here's an unfinished voidpunk shamura from a pride flag color palette thing I did of the bishops:

[weirdmarioenemies]

Is King Bob-omb a robot?

Is he? Huh?

Recently I have been thinking about the nature of King Bob-omb, because I think it is more interesting than one may think upon first consideration! Yes, he is a big living bomb. But what does this mean for him? Let's discuss!

Bob-ombs

Bob-ombs! They are bombs. Even a dog could look at a Bob-omb and tell you "Rhat's a ralking romb! Hreeheehee!" What do we know about Bob-ombs? Well, they are very clearly artificially created entities. I mean, they're bombs. They're powered by wind-up keys! And they're mass-produced in factories. These are artificial, mechanical creatures. Automatons! The ones in Sunshine are very overtly robotic, and even if those ones are Bowser Junior creations, it may reflect how he views the real ones.

There is a history of sentient, talking Bob-ombs and Bob-omb society, so these are clearly rather advanced automatons. All the more reason for me to confidently declare them to be robots! It's weird to make a living bomb capable of thought and emotion, but as established by Origami King, the ones working for Bowser are intent on making their single blast really make a difference. So I guess making them sapient is ultimately helpful for Evil purposes, if unethical.

King Bob-omb

Now let's consider the King! That guy loves to be considered. He is NOT mass-produced. He does not have a wind-up key. He does not even have a fuse! And of course, he has arms. No Bob-ombs have arms...

...but Chuckyas do! Big, Bob-omb-like, with arms for throwing Marios. King Bob-omb seems like he could be a stronger, more refined model of Chuckya! Chuckyas are absolutely robotic, so this does make a good case for the King being such, as well!

Could a robot have such a magnificent mustache, though? Yes, a robot could. Even standard Bob-ombs are capable of having mustaches, as are creatures made of ice, and also this is a silly cartoon world. So yes, I think a robot could have a mustache.

Mecha King Bob-omb

Now HERE's the thing that got me thinking of this in the first place! Mecha King Bob-omb, from Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope. This is a robotic version of King Bob-omb... hm. This IS obviously a robotic replica based on him, and there's no reason a robot based on another robot couldn't exist, but that WOULD make the "Mecha" title pretty weird! Is the original king mechanical or what? I guess the "Mecha" could also be referring to this version being a pilotable mecha, unlike the real version, which is a Guy. This brings up questions, and answers none!

The Big Dud

Finally, the last possibility of King Bob-omb's origins. If you are aware of the Super Mario 64 Iceberg, you are aware of the Big Dud theory! After Big Bob-omb (as he is known in 64) is defeated, an additional metal ball will be rolling around at the base of the mountain, and a Bob-omb Buddy will declare that the Big Bob-omb is nothing but a big dud now. This has led some to believe that the additional cannonball might be Big Bob-omb himself, made inanimate upon his defeat!

And then THIS gets me thinking about Power Stars. They do weird things to Mario creatures! I think it is likely King Bob-omb could have been created BECAUSE of the Power Star he holds. Maybe he was an ordinary Bob-omb enhanced into a new, regal form by the Star, or maybe he even was an ordinary inanimate metal ball, chosen to be extra resilient compared to his subjects! You know, in 64, he doesn't even explode like a Bob-omb. Is he a FRAUD? (No, he explodes in other games)

Final thoughts

So, after all this analysis, is King Bob-omb a robot or what? I don't know. Maybe. Maybe not. No one knows. This guy is weird! He can fly with no effort if thrown off the mountain. When killed, he congratulates Mario for killing him and invites him to do it again sometime. If I HAD to come to a conclusion... I would say he is technically robotic, but that's not something the designers/developers actually ever have or had in mind, and is just a result of being a Bob-omb.

I don't mind that there is no concrete answer! I was not expecting there to be! This is Super Mario we're talking about. They're not going to expect us to analyze evidence about characters and come to conclusions. But it is so much fun to do! That's why we do it! Call this guy a robot if you want! Or affirm that he is not if you don't! I don't really care as long as you are nice!

[wuxiaphoenix]

Worldbuilding: Outliving Emperors

There’s a common tendency in a lot of fantastic fiction portraying long-lived races or individuals interacting with shorter-lived types. It often defaults to, “they have a mindset of slow and patient consideration in the face of Problems. After all, they have plenty of time.”

(Until, of course, they don’t, and the Evil Overlord obliterates lots or possibly all of them.)

It’s a valid way to portray a fantasy race, I guess. But I think it misses a critical consideration of sapient life. And that’s pattern recognition.

To boil it down - if you’ve lived a long time, and you pay attention to what’s going on around you, sooner or later you will recognize when things are about to go nastily sideways. The river-folk down there and the mountain-folk up there have had a new generation grow up without bloodshed; sooner or later some young buck out to make a name for himself is going to dig up the old feuds all over again. Or, we’ve had three years of bad harvests in a row, I bet the nomads think we’re weak now, let’s watch for raids. Or (and much worse), this guy is making speeches about a Glorious Past and Restoring the Nation to its Rightful Place in World Affairs... right, time to duck, world war incoming.

If you’ve had time, you’ve seen things happen. If you’ve had enough time, and survived it, and even a little breather afterward, you can sift back through the history leading up to When All The Maps Got Arrowy, and try to see what set the whole mess off. So if you see similar precursors go off again....

Slow and patient consideration might not actually be your preferred plan. Instead, you might opt for, find the bastards and shut them down, fast.

Someone slaps you? Walk out now, no matter what anyone else thinks. Squatters on your land? Find them and toss them out on their ears so hard they bounce. Sabers rattled your direction? Make it absolutely clear there will be heavy weapons firing back - as soon as fired on, not “two years later after we’ve deliberated it to death”.

Because if you’ve lived for a while, and you anticipate living a lot longer - think about it. “I’ll be a slave for a decade, then die,” is bad. “I’ll be a slave for a century, and that’s only if they let me die-”

Yeah. That’s worse.

With a long lifespan, the number of Bad Things that can happen to you automatically increases, just by virtue of your being alive to have them happen. Why would you want to give any avoidable Bad Thing a chance to happen?

 Wouldn’t it be possible that an elf, cultivator, dragon, or other creature who might live centuries, might actually be quicker to act than regular humans?

I have found this in one fantasy setting. In Lejentia, by Flying Buffalo Games, the Aelvan Nations finally beat down and imprisoned the Hyl Sudiar (Hellish Seducer) and the demon who possessed him, and breathed a sigh of relief. Some centuries later, said demon persuaded another person to become the next Hyl Sudiar... and the Aelvan Nations declared war immediately.

Human kingdoms: “Whyfor you do that?”

Human kingdoms a few centuries later, after despite all efforts the Hyl Sudiar’s armies have conquered half the world: “...Oh.”

I have to think about this, given I have a story that has at least one nearly three-hundred-years-old vampire, and a somewhat younger cultivator who has still outlived three emperors and is working on a fourth. (Zhengle, Jiajing, Longqing, and Wanli, if you’re interested.) They’ve seen threats to their people. They know, over and over again, what it is to lose people to the actions of evil men. What it is to live on, while those you love die, and it never stops hurting....

Long life might not mean slow and deliberate action. Just a thought.

[riggedbones]

making a dashboard simulator post from my octopus world that is so inscrutable .

2 notes

🐕 themodernwisdom

stop fucking telling me it’s problematic to have “humans dni” on my carrd none of you understand how traumatizing a symbiosis breakup can be.

👨‍💻 typical-hue-man follow

traumatizing for who 🤨 lmao you weren’t even the one dependent on them for survival

🐕 themodernwisdom

do you not know what dni means.

#blocked. #youd think after all these millennia they’d evolve some reading comprehension

52 notes

⚡️ psychiclesbian

like i don’t esp like how often were asked about our sex life but like yea i mean they’re right. tentacles 👍👍

#minors dni #like if they rly want to know just find an octopus whos dtf not that hard #i mean. okay maybe a bit hard. but idk they’re online sometimes?

3 notes

🎛 oldstructuremusings

just got the most insane piece of fanmail what the fuck. why is this child learning local human language from my radio show. in the middle of the fucking ocean. apparently they can’t pick anything else up that isn’t the occasional raven station but like i feel like i have some sort of responsibility to not teach this kid how to say fuck every five seconds.

#text #its probably too late tbh #if the kid is seeing this. get off of tumblr

12 notes

🦋 lonesomedreamer 🔁 why-no-pigeon-emoji follow

🐦 why-no-pigeon-emoji follow

does anyone know how human symbiosis works i saved this guys life right after his cat friend died and i think he is getting attached. or something.

🚧 mazemaster follow

ur not a dog or cat ur fine.

🦋 lonesomedreamer

it’s a common misconception, but humans can actually form symbiotic bonds with any sapient creature, actually! the relationship mostly helps with their social and mental requirements, and if there are enough humans in an area to form a community, they’re actually not at all reliant on forming interspecies symbiotic relationships! doesn’t really happen where i’m from though, i think last i heard there are maybe 6 humans in the area max 😅

🐦 why-no-pigeon-emoji follow

everyone stfu he made us matching outfits im gonna cry

#omg this is so cute 🥺 #i'm glad things worked out

5,923 notes

🌿 grasstoucher 🔁 toogenericusername follow

🐚 molluskfan12 follow

currently keeping some smaller snails atm after you-know-what >_> their shells are a more fragile but the meat is better imo. hope it'll work out still!!

🪶 aviandinosaurs follow

cottagecore bloggers off the shits lmao what is this

🐚 molluskfan12 follow

what the fuck is a cottagecore

10,239 notes

⚡️ psychiclesbian 🔁 undereclipse follow

🗼 prehistoric-structures follow

i'm curious!!!

🌅 sundownscare follow

op i appreciate the button for humans in theory but are you under the impression that we don't show up in our own creation myths???

🕸️ veryseriousmonkey follow

maybe they just want to know about other species, like humans appearing in their own myths is p much a given lol

🗼 prehistoric-structures follow

oh yeah thats... totally why that's there

#they forgor 💀

42,143 notes

🌿 grasstoucher

do you think they had discourse like this pre climate disaster like it was just humans at that point how bad could it rly be

[quitealotofsodapop]

Between Azure and Wukong... I think he did manipulate Wukong into taking the fall for them when their initial attempt to overthrow the Jade Emperor failed, similar to how he had manipulated MK into freeing the other members of the Camel Ridge trio. The difference, I believe, is that with Wukong, he had done so unknowingly. He truly had admired, possibly even loved, Wukong... but he'd done so in the most toxic way possible, and when Wukong was young and at his most arrogant, making him easy prey to fall for it. And I think the entirety of the odea to overthrow the Emperor was Azure, tbat maybe the Havoc Wukong had caused may have unintentionally opened the door for them to rally behind, but the truth of the matter was that Wukong was jsut lashing out and hadnt actually intended or wanted to start a rebellion. I think Azure put the idea into his head, or rather, put it into everyone's head and then just elected Wukong as leader after hearing the story, leaving him the perfect scapegoat for when the plan went south.

And Wukong KNOWS he was manipulated into it. He knows it and wants to protect MK from this. When he spots Azure, he IMMEDIATELY pushes himself to the front to block his view of MK and Mei. He was at the back of the group but pushed himself in front to block Azure's access to the two youngest members of his new family. I don't think he's entirely aware that it wasn't intentional, but I'm certain Wukong is self aware enough to realize who it was who wanted the Jade Emperor's throne and who was it that got pulled around like a puppet and then had hsi strings cut the moment he couldn't live up to his puppeteer's expectations

Huehuehuehue

My buddy @a-tea-goblin has done some amazing posts on why Wukong despises Azure specifically for what he did to him, even if the lion isn't aware of it.

This shot in particular I think sums up Azure Lion's motives;

Azure pretty much put Wukong on a pedestal. A powerful demon king with loyal subjects. Someone able to go toe to toe with the gods. Thats what Azure, Peng, and Yellow Tusk saw. To make someone an idol is to unknowningly dehumanize them.

Wuong is someone that DBK calls their "youngest worthy brother/xiandi" in JTTW. Someone who became king of his people when he was barely a cub. Someone who is clearly not mature enough to rule the Universe. People like DBK and Macaque were able to see this side of Sun Wukong that the others couldn't.

Azure used Wukong's immaturity to head the charge when even his own brothers saw him as "the Leader", because he was trying to defer punishment that would have befallen him if they had failed.

For Azure, it was easier to say that Wukong "betrayed" his brothers when he was captured by Erlang (and Furnace'd) + forced to surrender to the Buddha, rather than admit that he allowed their youngest brother take the blame.

And it was easier to think that Wukong had "become a warrior for the oppressors" than admit that the monkey was on religious probation. And ofc dodge the tiny detail that Camel Ridge stripped the dao of it's surroundings into a desert + in the novel was actively hunting and eating humans and sapient animal spirits. Macaque gained his reputation as a "coward" not because he ducked out at the sign of danger, but because like Wukong - Macaque cared for his own people and not for some Demon Las Vegas like the other Three.

even Macaque points this out in the S4 special

MK: "I thought he wanted to help people. He said he wanted to be the hero." Macaque: "I'm sure he does. Everyone thinks they're the hero of their own story. Azure's always been good at convincing people he's the good guy. He's even fooled himself."

Ultimately I think Azure's greatest sin is Inaction/Refusal to take blame. Even when he was at peak power in Heaven, he said nothing about the divide between the celestials and mortals. Azure doesn't want to admit that he was no more than a celestial agent who jumped straight to rebellion instead of reform. Someone willing to fight but die for their cause.

Which the lion attempts once again when he manipulates MK into rescuing his old brothers from the Scroll. Azure literally sees Wukong within MK, and by seeing the full of how much alike MK & Wukong are; he panics and almost cuts him down.

Because Azure saw the "old" Wukong in MK, and when he saw the "new" that he had encountered back during th Journey - he knew his attempt to make MK the new rebellion's idol had failed.

Think about it. Why did he only show MK his memories and not his allies? Because someone more emotionally mature like Pigsy or Sandy would have immediately clocked on that Azure was full of it and called him out.

Azure, describing Camel Ridge: "But the celestial realm did not abide competit-" Tang, interupting with his copy of JTTW: "Didn't you guys eat people!? Alolai was a paradise because it was full of peaceful non-people-eating monkeys!" Pigsy, furious: "That is it! Stay the Diyu away from my kid!" *whacks Azure with the Jade-Toothed Rake*

Even if Azure doesn't realise that he's doing this conciously, he still manipulated Wukong and attempts the same on his successor. Whilst LBD sought out a new world order by erasing the past, Azure does so by repeating the steps of his past failure.

And we see that when Azure does become a true leader when he takes the celestial throne, his decaying mind defaults to accusing his remaining comrades of treachery and Wukong of poisoning his mind when it is his own refusal to admit that he's in way over his head.

And of course, it is only when Azure is defeated and being ripped apart by the Emperor's power does he recognise all of this...

[alwaysoutofpaper]

surprise map attack.

flat map of my elves' home planet (currently unnamed bc the name will probably have stupid lore to it, whoops)

in my head it's around the size of Venus and very mountainous with a very slightly higher gravity and less water than earth. in other words, I don't know what i'm talking about !!!

It is marked and referred to as LF-18. As the story goes, it was the 18th life-bearing planet "discovered" by Linceur-Fah, a now defunct space exploration company - the amount of planets they take credit for discovering is subject to skepticism, the true number is widely contested in the wider space-exploration community.

rambling + extra versions of map below the cut.

the extras are just a height and political map, respectively

i really don't know a lot about land formations, so i'm sure to an expert or someone who appreciates the subject a lot that this does not look great. I hope to learn more and revisit this in the future with that knowledge!! this was fun to make and i would like to make more, even if they aren't super scientifically accurate :D

as with a flat map of the earth, this does not truly reflect accurate sizing and is certainly not how the land would appear on a globe. it's also not Mercator-style because I wasn't thinking about that. anyway, I will return to label countries at some point :)

there are actually two sapient species on this planet atm. elves are my little non-literal kitty cat guys who evolved to live arboreally and then went from there i guess. humanoid because i am a coward !!! and this will not change !!!

anyway this map took me a few days to create so i hope it passes for what i need it to :)

[jackdaniel69nice]

@khonaker ALL MIGHT ALL MIGHT ALL MIGHT!

Tokoyami and dark shadow have loved all might from a young age as most children have although their reasoning is a bit different from others. All Might is completely terrifying. He sends fear into hearts of villains and is like a god amongst men, a creature of vengeance and justice. His devastating power holds the potential for great destruction but he wields it with such precision and control that he can use it help others. He also has a good sense of humor XD When tokoyami says all might is “like a god” he means it literally and thinks of him as a god and treats him as such. His opinion changed after seeing him in person and realized he’s just a guy but for a long time he was a really big inspiration for tokoyami and shadow for what kind of hero they want to be. He is like their second favorite hero after dark crystal.

Due to this hero/god worship they were very nervous about talking with him one on one just because they didn’t want to make a fool of themselves. When all might gave them that hug during the sports festival it meant a lot and they were secretly fanboying I’m sure of it. Obviously he also gave tokoyami the advice to train his body as well and I mean if all might was the one telling him to do it he sure as hell isn’t going to let him down.

Tokoyami was obviously shown to be very animated when All Might was fighting AFO. He has a great deal of faith in the symbol of peace that it broke his usual emotional composure, he must have been very worried about him.

While all might is definitely focused on Midoriya and needs to learn more teaching skills he’s definitely good at being uplifting and encouraging to his students. Most people forget all might made midoriya a personalized work out plan so he actually knows a lot about how to help other people train their bodies. He probably made work out routines for all of his classes best suited for their fighting style and matching their quirks abilities. Tokoyami definitely focuses on core and leg workouts because he fights with his legs and needs to hold himself up when shadow is carrying him.

You would have to be completely blind to miss the power dark shadow has. Toshinori certainly catches on and is very interested in Tokoyami’s potential, the more he watches though the more interested he becomes by picking up on dark shadows behavior as well. Dark Shadow acts very different from Tokoyami, they laugh at his puns and jokes, they are playful and energetic while tokoyami is serious and refined. Sentient quirks are quite rare, especially not when he was born since only 50% of the population had quirks at all back then, but dark shadow is on a whole other level of “alive”. While most people his age would laugh off the idea of a truly sapient quirk toshinori isn’t your average man and takes it in stride. He awkwardly goes about trying to bond with these strange birds (including embarrassing himself with misconceptions but he is really trying) and dark shadow is delighted to have THE All Might’s attention.

I don’t think there is anything monumental about their relationship, it’s just all might being a true hero to everyone he meets and inspiring them. He talks to tokoyami about his health at one point and how it’s important to take care of his emotional and physical needs. If he keeps pushing himself too hard, he will just burn himself out. Tokoyami was so determined to become faster (like hawks) he forgot to slow down and prioritize himself over his work. He will do well to remember this from now on.

I really love All Might and I want tokoyami to interact with him more so much! I want to see him and shadow making dad jokes and tokoyami suffering from them.

(All Might offers tokoyami some water while he sits in the shade to let shadow recharge)

[ganymedesclock]

Tell me more about parasites and their hosts. Do you think the dynamic works if neither is aware of the other?

Before all else, any simplified dynamic has nigh infinite potential and how you explore it depends entirely on what you personally are looking for.

In my own case, a lot of my relationship with the idea of parasitism comes from my own mental health being strongly dependent on where I live- being able to return to home like a save point in a horror game. This sense of constantly being dependent on comfort, not merely as a normal person is but to the extent that I've felt like I'll be unable to cope if I can't get home in time or haven't built adequate mini 'safe rooms' (e.g. my car or a hotel room) to recharge, has formed a lot of my relationship with the idea of parasitism and the idea of haunted houses.

Both, to me, centrally focus on the idea of dependency on equilibrium. A house can't really chase you down- while there's certainly haunted house stories that give it the power to trap or pursue, to me, the most compelling angle is often one of necessity. Someone weighing the ghosts, the violence, the blood on the walls, and having to ask themselves if this is really worse than being homeless, or losing some advantage or shelter that you have here that can't be found elsewhere.

In the case of parasitism, the host is the haunted house. It may be simply indifferent to the parasite's survival; it may be actively hostile to and trying to rid itself of the 'guest'. But both parties have to weigh the odds- is it worth tearing into your own walls just to get at the interloper, is it worth staying in a place that unknowingly tolerates your existence at best and hates you at worst if the alternative is being laid barren in the world?

As a child, I remember reading the Animorphs books and one thing that always struck me as an unexpected source of pathos was how bleak and miserable the yeerks' default existence was. While we mostly experienced them from the horror of their would-be victims, people terrified and paranoid that those around them were being controlled, made prisoners in their own minds... the book where Cassie is briefly host to a yeerk and the first thing said yeerk does is, rather than focus on their agreement or advantages, start running around wildly and making use of Cassie's morphing power for the sheer wild euphoria of being able to.

As much as they are the Bad Guys in the story- invaders, body snatchers, sometimes sadists- there's something to be said about the torture of a fully sapient and intelligent being living as a nearly senseless, barely mobile creature by default. A tapeworm is perhaps lucky it cannot evaluate its existence in comparison to other life forms.

And, yeah, sure, parasites trip a particular contrarian reflex in me that I always want to root around and play with things that are seen as too icky or evil to be 'worth exploring', whether or not there's even any actual morality attached to things. Parasites do nothing on a basis of sadism- 'parasitism' is how they survive just as much as herbivory is how a rabbit survives.

It's instead on a basis of need.

And the point where we need others- especially imperfectly, reluctantly, warily, always hesitating on these dynamics of exploitation- and especially when it comes to the body which we often see as the most private bastion of the self- is where some really juicy dynamics can spring from.

[rassicas]

Are pet sea pigs a thing in Splatoon? I have an oc who name their pet sea pig Kevin (from an old mammalian Era tile that read “Kevin Baco”, it’s a pun similar to Kevin from animal crossing). Then again they’re sea cucumbers which are implied to be cat-like, but IDK

This is what a sea pig looks like

when were sea cucumbers implied to be cat like...? are you thinking of nudibranchs which are kind of like splatoon dogs? anyway sea pigs were explored as a concept for C.Q. Cumber and scrapped. when it comes to most species and whether or not it exists as a pet or a fully sapient creature, it's a mystery until we see it actually in the game LOL these sea pig concepts are cute though, reminds me of guinea pigs. maybe they could exist in the deepsea as pets. or theyre just some guy but small

[sexiestpodcastcharacter]

AI Bracket — Round 2

Propaganda

Imogen (Stellar Firma):

#IMOGEN 💥💥💥💥💥 #she invented a guy to just put them in situations that she couldnt do herself bcs she is . an ai . #she gave this guy to the most horrific man known to anyone and the only help she gave him was . giving him almost the same rights as humans #not according to anyone else but to her yeah #shes an ai who didn't want to work for big evil human corp so she made a guy who could let her not do that #i love her sm #i cannot hear the words ' watch it buster ' without thinking of her #shes soooooo <33333 #man i should relisten to stellar firma i miss her

The Audio Tour Guide AKA Mistholme (The Mistholme Museum of Mystery, Morbidity, and Mortality):

The ATG is a sentient museum audio tour guide for a museum full of spooky artifacts. It is both completely lovely and kind of bitchy

Sentient AI who is a real sweetie. Got pulled into too many adventures after the museum went on lockdown. Gives tours most of the time but is also the museum now and oversees daily goings on

A magic/tech hybrid AI exploring its own personhood and sentience as it grows. Could easily take over the museum it has become a part of but is a very kind soul. Most demanding it has ever been was convincing its friend to pat a cat for it.

It's a tour guide in an alternatural museum. After facing some challenges and dealing with huge problems, guide learns new things about itself and the world around it and makes new friends. Its woe is trusting people (or not only people), forgetting that they might have bad intentions. Guide is the bestest friend ever.

Where do I even begin? The Guide literally exists on those audio tour devices, go look it up its so cute. It had to deal with its growing sentience and new emotions basically on its own. Was treated terribly by the human museum staff and it had to basically debate them until they accepted its new-found personhood (but it still uses it/its yayy)(the staff have since apologized for their actions and treat it equally now). At some point it was hooked up to the museum mainframe which was supposed to be temporary, but as it turns out The Guide is actually great at running the museum and would like to stay this way. This eventually leads to a small identity crisis since it now sees itself as the museum itself, and its consciousness and responsibilities are a lot grander than when it was just a tiny little tour device. But it's figuring that out, and it still likes being the museum, thus The Guide also counts as a sapient location! It becomes besties with a creepy bloodthirsty creature because they share the struggle of being constantly dehumanized. It fucked around with the fae and found out. It has to deal with time travel bullshit. It loves cats! It got to hang out with the embodiment of knowledge itself. And did I mentioned that throughout all of this it still gives museum tours to guests?!! what a cool guy!

Guide my beloved <3 (platonic)

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

I'm probably going to do a terrible job of articulating myself here but every time I think about the worldbuilding in Hatoful Boyfriend, I think about the implications of having the birds simply have adopted the structure and policies of human society and go insane.

It's clearly originally just for the ridiculousness of it all for the players, but AGH it explains so much regarding the extremely rampant classism/racism/speciesism and how apparently normalized it is. It also, to me, adds a bit of moral nuance to the Dove - Hawk Party conflict.

(Long post under the cut. I'm so sorry I just kept going.)

First off, I'm obsessed with the concept of the birds becoming sapient and simply... taking over a society that was not structured for them. It leads to difficulties in universe! Bird wings are not made for doing tasks that human hands can do naturally - there's a couple instances where the characters ask for Hiyoko's assistance or express envy since she can just do the task more easily than they can. The birds are outright disadvantaged in certain areas of life, and yet, the society is in such turmoil due to the newness of it all that there still aren't really any workarounds for stuff like this.

Not that there haven't been any suggested solutions, such as the Labor 9 series, put forward initially by the Dove Party. Yeah, you know, that one throwaway line about how the party that up until this point have been the "good guys" wanted to take still semi-conscious human brains and make robotic slaves out of them Cyberman-style? What the hell. And what gets me is that Shuu was able to find the initial proposal, which he really only made tweaks to, which means that the project was at least close to being finished on the conceptual/planning/design phase before somebody went "hey this is a little fucked up actually".

The Dove Party wants peaceful coexistence with the humans, while the Hawk Party wants to eliminate humanity entirely. But we don't really go into how these two lines of thought evolved. I believe I have a suggestion for at least one part of the puzzle though.

Of all the birds in Hatoful, who enjoys the most privileges and the highest status? Fantails, it would seem. A breed of pigeon that is popular as a pet, considered beautiful and sought after, and achieve high accolades in shows and competitions - for clarity's sake, fantails were valuable in human society, and this status appears to have transferred when birds became sapient and took over. Conversely, which birds are ranked lower and often blocked from entering certain higher class places? Rock doves, who, in human society, are given an unfairly bad reputation, and considered anything from unclean and dirty, to nuisances, to pests. Again, this status transferred over when the birds took over.

So, while we don't know too many of the birds who make up the agents of the Dove and Hawk Party, let's take a look at who we do know of.

Fantails (Yuuya, Dove Party) are considered valuable over other doves and pigeons for being specially bred for their striking tail feathers

Cockatiels (Leone, Dove Party) are some of the most popular and beloved companion birds, kept as pets and considered very friendly

Rock doves (Ryuuji, Hawk Party) are considered unclean pests who receive a bad reputation, and are generally not treated with respect or appreciation &lt;;- notable thing to mention here is that Ryuuji actually does like humans - I think he was only Hawk affiliated for the grant money and research facilities, which... fair enough man.

Chukar partridges (Shuu/Isa, Hawk Party) are game birds, specifically bred and released to be killed and eaten, and considered a delicacy

...do you... see what's going on here?

(I haven't mentioned Tohri as he's a special case. Give me a minute and I'll get to him!)

The birds we see in the Dove Party are those birds that were already viewed in a more favourable light by humans, a favourability that transferred over to their new society. Of course they are more likely to advocate for coexistence! They have less to lose, overall. And the Labor 9 series, and how that could've ever been suggested in the first place, suddenly makes a lot of sense. For many of these birds, society the way it exists now benefits them. Some of these high ranking Dove Party folks may be less about actual peace and justice (like Yuuya or Leone) and more about maintaining the current order of things - humans coexisting under their control, while they get to maintain their status... which is itself a product of human invention.

The birds we see in the Hawk Party, by contrast, are looked down on or hunted. Historically, even before bird sapience, they did not have a harmonious relation with humans - and it's likely this status carried over to their new society also, with many of these birds being more likely to have been disenfranchised. Their goal of elimination is therefore reactionary towards perceived threat. After all, the people who suffer when things go wrong aren't the ones at the top - it's all the people who sit at the bottom of the social rung; the vulnerable members of society who do not enjoy the same advantages as others.

Of course, the Hawk Party has built itself up into such a powerful group that they may have lost touch with this starting foundation - the only thing that remains is likely that reactionary fear. After all, people caught up in the actual conflict - Nageki, Hitori, Ryouta, and Hiyoko - see this kind of horrible bloodshed firsthand (firstwing?) and just want it to stop.

Again, it's not usually the people in these political factions who are the ones caught up in their conflict. It's the individuals who lack power or influence.

But that's just the political groups themselves. On an individual level, it's kind of interesting to look at and theorize where along the spectrum our core cast falls based on their species/breed.

Ryouta (rock dove) is actually rather indifferent towards humanity as a whole - he just likes Hiyoko. However, his witnessing of the Heartful House tragedy led him to abhor violence and unnecessary loss of life, and I'd imagine his mother's later illness solidified this. Ryouta doesn't seem overly interested in political struggles or the broader implications of a lot of things - he's actually a rather self-oriented character when it comes down to it (this is not a judgment, nor a bad thing! I love my boy!). Ryouta just doesn't want to lose people, really. A conflict would mean more loss, and rock doves seem to have to struggle enough as is.

Hiyoko (human) is the daughter of two diplomats, but interestingly, we don't get to see much of her political views on things - perhaps because even if she expressed them, it wouldn't really matter - she's not herself a diplomat, and humans are the lowest of the low - her going to a fancy school doesn't really change that. Social-wise, except with her friends, she is tolerated, not accepted. Yet, it's safe to say that Hiyoko strongly disapproves of people who flaunt their status - she's quick to not take crap from Sakuya, to get angry on behalf of Ryouta and herself over the gull clerk's assholery, and also to defend Miru and Kaku as living beings worthy of respect. Interestingly though, she also uses Okosan's status as a fantail to get Ryouta to let go of him and let him do whatever he wants so... it's kind of unclear what her firm beliefs are. Perhaps, as a human, she still values fantails more highly. I don't know honestly. Implicit bias?

Sakuya, Yuuya and Okosan (fantail pigeons) may share the same breed, but their experiences are highly different. Sakuya is largely separate from the human-bird conflict, as he is unlikely to be directly affected by it. As such, a lot of his story and development has to do with actually learning and un-learning about the world outside of the limitations of his "father's" classist views, which he simply mimics without understanding the larger implications. Yuuya and Okosan, on the other hand, may be fantails, but are also looked down on and often treated as inferior - Yuuya for being a "half-breed" and for his reputation, and Okosan for being closer to feral than a lot of other doves. Interestingly, these two show more interest and respect for the individual than Sakuya does, who often makes sweeping generalizations based on status - which makes sense to a degree, as they've been on the receiving end of this kind of treatment, whereas Sakuya hasn't. Okosan believes that each person has their own "wonderful names" (read: identity outside of breed or status), while Yuuya is a genuine fighter for justice who is able to get to the heart of people, especially in Holiday Star. However, even though they have experienced classism, they still have certain privileges with regards to species/race - take Okosan's shock when Hiyoko and Ryouta are barred entry from his favourite store. None of them are quite as out of place in everyday society as some of the other birds here, and it's notable that "diverse" St. Pigeonations still apparently has a significant fantail student population.

Shuu (chukar partridge) is really interesting, as he doesn't particularly care for the politics of the Hawk Party, and yet his role as a killer/hunter of both his fellow birds and humans is an interesting reversal of the chukar being a game bird. Shuu also has a disability (his semi-paralyzed right side) which hinders him in bird society even more than most. His extreme, yet coldly logical solution to kill all humans to stop the fighting between them, could be as much his rationality, as his joy in the sadistic, as a reactionary survivalism (remember he was caught up in a human terrorist attack as a child - while overall he considered this beneficial to him, he also did lose much of his colour vision and the use of his right side, so it did leave him weakened). Shuu attains control by "flipping the script" as it were.

Tohri (golden pheasant) starts out in the Hawk Party, but much like his colleagues, doesn't seem to care much for their politics. Golden pheasants are game birds whose eggs can be eaten, but are more often bred and kept for their plumage - they're not prey, but they're not exactly pets either. All this puts Tohri in this interesting position of being somewhat in the middle of this conflict, and indeed he goes on to be a part of (found?) the Crow Party - an opportunistic group that seeks to benefit from the overall conflict. Golden pheasants are birds intended to be admired for their beauty and intelligence more than anything else, benefitting in some ways from humans without a strong connection or a reliance, and Tohri's opportunism fits nicely with that. (As an aside, our sole crow character, Albert, is also something of an opportunist, being an assassin on the fringes of society.)

Hitori and Kazuaki (button quails) are somewhat interesting. It would be both expected and understandable if Hitori held hatred for humanity after the Heartful House incident, or even before then, considering they were all war orphans. Instead, he doesn't seem to harbour any particular ill-will - he seems totally fine around Hiyoko, and her being a human has nothing to do with his reticence with letting Nageki hang out with her in the shrine universe. Kazuaki, too, doesn't seem to mind Hiyoko being human and isn't afraid of her any more than he is anyone else. While quails are game birds, with both meat and eggs being eaten, button quails are too tiny for that and are mostly kept as pets - they are considered cute, silly, and entertaining, though a bit too jumpy to be outright companion birds. The quails don't seem to experience too much in the way of speciesism (except arguably with the whole mistaken identity of Kazuaki's corpse... there may be a bit of an "all quails look the same" thing going on perhaps). At the very least, they are able to occupy teaching positions at a renowned school as respected intellectuals, and did go to university. Still, it's kind of a known thing that you don't put button quails with bigger, more dominant birds, since larger birds will often pick on them or even outright try to kill them simply because they're small and shy - this may, in hindsight, explain some of Kazuaki's demeanour.

Nageki (mourning dove) and Anghel (luzon bleeding heart dove) are the two who are uncommon bird species in Japan. Nageki is another war orphan, who would be forgiven for harbouring resentment for humanity, but instead is appalled at the violence and made a huge sacrifice to get it to stop. It's kind of unclear how Nageki fits into this society, as mourning doves are not prey or pets - they're wild birds. They live on the outside of the human world, and while Nageki exists within current bird society, he likely doesn't have a designated status within it. Nageki is unfortunately also alienated from much of the action due to his illness and later his untimely death - this is why a lot of Nageki's thoughts are somewhat from an observer's perspective, with his most emotional moments being derived from his rare direct experiences - specifically the Heartful House tragedy and the human killings he was forced into, which solidified a really firm stance of not wanting anyone to suffer like that. Anghel is another outsider, this time genuinely a foreigner, as opposed to Nageki. Again, Luzons are wild birds, not prey or pets, and so it's a bit unclear what his status is. This might explain why Hiyoko repeats Sakuya's remarks towards him without apparently realizing they're actually insults - Anghel is removed enough from the conflict she is familiar with that it seems she doesn't quite... get it. Again, Anghel's role is as this strange kind of omniscient observer, whose perspective is closer to the player's than to the rest of the cast. He definitely frowns on the Hawk Party's overall goal - the Demon Spores are evil to him, and his main objective is to stop them from spreading, as they would cause damage to both birds and humans. I attribute his morals to his mother having raised him right lol. The lack of a clear status for both of them may be why they appear to take the stance of judgment based on individual actions, but are not heavily involved in the conflict itself - while humans tend to like mourning doves and luzons, there isn't much interaction that goes on between them. Nageki and Anghel are simply less embroiled in bird society's human-derived status conflict, which makes them both outsiders and observers.

As a bonus note, Azami, Rabu and Kenzaburou are all species of birds that can be kept as pets (java sparrow, budgie, parakeet), which may account for some of their friendliness towards Hiyoko, and Kenzaburou's willingness to hire her. Kenzaburou is even a bit old-fashioned it seems - he sleeps in a cage, which implies his ancestors were probably pet birds themselves. It's likely he, in particular, has more positive views on humans.

...Please tell me I'm not the only one who spent ages thinking about the implications and workings of a fictional post-apocalyptic bird society. Also I hope this made sense I kind of went off the rails here.

[zenless-zideblog-zero]

ZZZ sexuality headcanons

Because everyone else seems to do it.

~Phaethon Sibs~

Wise: Biromantic (slight preference for women) Pansexual, but like Theater Kid Bi/Pan. He IS LGBT+, but he's so dramatic about it the only people he ends up falling in love with are those with big dramatic reveals and backstories (Lycaon, Caesar, ETC.)

Belle: Demi on both accounts. She finds herself falling for girls more often but to be fair, an inordinate amount of the people she's around are Girls.

She has some Trans Vibes™ to me, but also just as likely to be cis.

~The Cunning Hares~

Nicole: Likes Women, and Certain men. Aromantic, but willing to be in a romantic relationship.

Anby: Sex positive Asexual, Panromantic. She only recently figured this out since she escaped her mysterious past.

Billy: Okay, him being a Robot, even a sapient one, makes the whole Sexuality/Romanticism thing weird to consider, but given the fact he has some kind of attraction to Monica that seems to be deeper than an emotional infatuation, so like. Straight? But also I reserve the right to change this in the Future.

Nekomata: Okay, as a bisexual it's hard not to make everyone like both men and woman as a form of projection, but also. Shooting her with the Bisexual Beam™.

~Belobog Heavy industries~

Koleda: Pansexual Demiromantic.

Grace & Anton: I am putting these two together because I cannot begin to fathom what is going on inside these People's heads. Should either of them have a sexual and/or romantic partner, they won't care what their partner is, in a way that is impossible to distinguish between Bi/Pan/Omni/Etc and Asexuality.

Simultaneously, I can also see them both being DEEPLY Homosexual, OR in the vein of "HRT Hit me like Freight Train" trans, but not both gay and trans.

Ben: Either the straightest man ever or the least flamboyant gay man in history, because on one hand he's a Bear (Heavyset Hairy Man) and a Bear (Furry) but also he's the accountant, which means he likely was in Business classes in college. I have never met a gay person good at math.

~Victoria Housekeeping~

Lycaon: I think he is like, pan/Omni/etc, but he's so deeply uncomfortable with being open to those he doesn't know he seems like he's demi.

Rina: Again, as a bisexual it's hard not to make everyone like both men and woman as a form of projection. But also, *Bisexuality Beam*

Corin: She really hasn't put much thought into it, but to seem 'normal' her kneejerk reaction to such a question is to claim that she's straight, even though she's still very much figuring herself out.

Sapphic, with unclear feelings towards men.

Ellen: (BisexualProjection.TXT) Sapphic, but Demi with guys, sort of like how Nicole is described.

~Criminal Investigation Special Response Team~

Zhu-Yuan: Comfortably Pan, terribly single.

Qingyi: Same thing with Billy where it's different because she doesn't have "Organic" Impulses, but also she's lesbian.

Jane Doe: She's so deep into the "Flirty Femme Fatale" Persona that she's forgotten what her actual preferences are. When is the flirting real, and when is it a ploy? If it was real would it actually be for this Guy/Girl?

She lands somewhere between Lycaon and Corin's deals in this way. I don't Think it's that clear to her, let alone to anyone else. She just needs to be allowed to be honest with others to be true to herself, and figure it out again.

Seth: Sex-Neutral Ace, Panromantic. He WILL Cuddle you after and he WILL Make you breakfast in the morning.

~Sons of Calydon~

Caesar: Bi, heavily leaning towards men because that's mostly what she can find in her romance stories.

Lucy: (BisexualProjection.TXT) As a revolution against her dad, she went HARD into being a lesbian, but the freedom and kindness provided by the Sons have let her really consider her options. She does like women a LOT, but sometimes ... she wouldn't mind a guy treating her like the princess she wants to be.

BUT TO BE CLEAR. She is a Disaster Lesbian for Caesar specifically. Caesar is basically the pinnacle of Sexual Attraction to which she bases all other potential partners against. She does not realize this and it is part of the reason she fights Caesar so much because of the Weird Feelings™ She gets.

Burnice: Literal Flaming Homosexual. The MOST Lesbian. If the bad word for gay (F**) didn't already have the hitorical context for it's existence, Burnice would be the origin of it.

Piper: Also a lesbian. She had a wife ten years ago, but they've divorced. This cannot be surprising to anyone.

Lighter: GAY GAY HOMOSEXUAL GAY-

~Misc.~

Soukaku: A Child. Do not bother.

Soldier 11: A Good Soldier's only love is for their country, and their only marriage is to the code by which they live!

The amount of Psycho-sexual issues this Woman will have if she ever uncovers her own personhood will be Deep and Troubling. and HOT.

[whatudottu]

All this new Earthspark content (i say with a sigh, not liking what i see), just makes me think more about it? Season 1, so good I didn’t need to think about… give or take Shockwave and the rushed end. Season 2? God- and I’m hearing the bloody ‘Decepticon Dome’ is still around for I guess this is season 3 instead of 2b??

I feel like I wanna share my notes for a season 2 rewrite or at least some concepts for one (with some Shockwave edits from season 1) that I had written on… *looks at the date* 28th July just before I started my shift-

Let’s see what happens then :P

First of all, Shockwave.

What do you mean the fucking unethical science guy has issues with what he immediately labels as cybrids? TFP Father-of-Predacons guy? IDW Literally-Becomes-Onyx-Prime guy?

So you’d think my first idea is to turn him not-racist right? Make him curious about the terrans like (using my main Shockwave experience) his Prime’s equivalent interest in predacons, right?

But what if I didn’t, what if he still has that speciesism but… reflavoured it into something more fitting? Say the ‘medical exploitation’ variant of racism that TFES Shockwave can openly claim that ‘I know I’m doing all these unethical experiments to one specific group, but I would do the same for any cybertronus’ to use Mandroid’s scientific name, but really he doesn’t actually desire to experiment on others he might consider the ‘default’. The kind of racism that treats others as scientific wonders in need of full study.

Heh, TFP Shockwave got off lucky, his obsession was predacons and he only knew they were sapient after reviving one from the dead AND discovering it he could transform; something about archeology vs graverobbing :P

Shockwave in the season 1 finale thus has more willingness to work with people who he considers in some way to be lesser, at least different; what’s a good test for a species’ intelligence than watching them problem solve against a corrupt government organisation?

Now onto the actual fucking season 2 notes then shall we?

With GHOST and Mandroid gone we are lacking threats that aren’t the fucking Decepticons again. The Quintessons of course take Mandroid’s role of the active antagonist, the one or ones that act their own agenda divorced from a wider perspective, but who fills GHOST’s role as the passive background threat? Well, as GHOST was the only company/organisation that had extended their hand to establish a proper post-war cybertronian-human alliance, and they seemed to be pretty tied in to either the government or with heavy media scrutiny, in its place could be filled by the actual American government now labelling any and all cybertronian (and terran) presence as criminal behaviour and thus officially rendering them as illegal literal aliens.

I’m not saying this is what the show should’ve done because that is a fucking stretch, but if I’m gonna rewrite Earthspark that’s who I’d want to fill the slot, fanfiction (maybe bayverse) kinda stuff. Maybe for a ‘kid friendly’ ‘not-so-anti-american’ way to make it just a special task force that’s still paramilitary enough to not get conservatives to freak; but let it be known the original idea :P

Back to Mandroid, considering the type (and aesthetic) of his final cybernetics - as well as his sharkticon guards (?) that he from what I remembered freed from somewhere (like a fucking shark pit???) - what if he had in fact made contact with the quintessons and, learning that he was from Earth, they had assumed that humanity and the Malto children were the children of Quintus, they were in fact assumed kin by His abandonment. When Mo ends up waking the executioner, it is still however her cybersleeve that draws it’s attention, yet it is also the terrans that draw its ire as they seem kin to the cybertronians Quintus oh so favoured over them, but also because they are filled with Quintus’ energy and ‘getting in the affairs’ or ‘robbing the power’ of humanity by their disturbance.

It’s not particularly too far off of the actual canon motivations to coming to Earth, as they already view humanity as fellow creations of Quintus even if literally untrue and prefer them to cybertronians and specifically to the maltos, but just imagine them being more anti-cybertronian rather than ‘pick me’ over Quintus’ chosen (one of the better things about 2b/3, the Judge actually acknowledged that the human Maltos were another set of child soldiers chosen for a destiny beyond their years, heh even Prowl agrees).

In a way, with this, both the human government and the quintessons can come to the idea that (for their own reasons and information provided) cybertronian affairs disrupt the human way of life and need to - in one way or another - be punished for their ‘chaos’.

Regardless though, the Emberstone is still shattered, and it’s not coming back (though the characters don’t know that… yet).

What doesn’t happen between it shattering and it’s… let’s say ‘pieces’ for now… is that the Decepticons don’t ‘do what they do best’.

Without GHOST in the way to arrest any Decepticon by virtue of them losing the war, the Autobots can actually begin to offer a genuine chance at armistice. Maybe not full on peace, their existence is a little too criminalised at the moment to immediately settle give or take a millennia worth of war in one sitting, but it is so much easier to prove to the Decepticons that they do in fact have a chance of rest against vorns of war and years of imprisonment and - as much as saying so word for word may begrudge the mecha - can ‘prove’ that they are worth as much freedom as the Autobots so prattle on about if neither of them have power over them in the ways GHOST provided.

What are their current goals? 1) do not get captured by government agents; there’s only so many cybertronians left even with a large concentration in Witwicky, and who knows if GHOST sent their technology back to their military. 2) do not let the government know of the terrans’ existence; with what Mandroid was invested in and what GHOST had intended to learn from him, neither faction nor any of the Maltos want to let the terrans become fugitives or pet projects (the craziest scientist they’ll even begin to consider studying the terrans would be Shockwave but even then they’d prefer even bloody Tarantulas more than him). And 3) gather the Emberstone shards before the government does; if Mandroid literally killed every cybertronian and terran on Earth with one blast of the full thing, what is the strength of one fragment actually measured by?

Given that apparently a shard with just a little bit of water is enough to make an entire spark (or at least, depending on what we learnt from 2a or the designs in 2b/3) act in replacement to a spark, probably decently powerful enough-

But to quote Brennan Lee Mulligan in his quite popular Game Changer, on a planet with 70% water coverage, weather patterns of a few sorts that scatter H2O in its many states to its surface, and all the time in the world between the Emberstone shattering and scattering, it is a “…statistical wonder…” that there were TWO (count them, 2) ‘’’’’’’’’Chaos’’’’’’’’’ terrans throughout - I’ll give it this - the entirety yet exclusively of the Americas.

First of all, FUCK THE TERM ‘CHAOS’ TERRAN! Let’s describe them as shard-spark for now, continuing to use Mandroid’s scientific terms we do not know if there’s a particular biomechanical difference beyond the Emberstone shard to sever the terrans AKA cybertronus terran from their new shattered siblings… or perhaps only cousins.

Second of all, shard-spark terrans are NOT born evil, just troubled in whatever relevant ways their circumstances cause them to be. Most often however without the conflict between the factions, a lot them if they do not happen upon a body of water in a location of dry weather conditions or even unluckily get stuck in a glass display would end up probably already being terrans by the time Autobots, Decepticons and 3rd or 4th party lock onto their signal to track them down from interesting community reports.

You know what was funny? Seeing everyone fall in love with Breakdown projecting a father-son relationship onto Aftermath who conversely didn’t give a shit, because y’all would just see Breakdown imposing that as just the cutest thing ever when he literally didn’t earn the right to think that way about a stranger that happened to be a child.

No, if Breakdown wants his ‘being a parent’ moment, he needs to put his back into it and make an effort to at least fucking try to be a parent? Hell, he can fucking suck at it and maybe even fall into a similar situation where he imposes the parent-child relationship onto a bad relationship, the main caveat being that it isn't supposed to be funny that Aftermath doesn't get it.

Breakdown can be the first contact with a shard-spark terran, maybe a few others or maybe alone, maybe he and Bumblebee took it upon themselves to race towards a shard only to discover a lost child. Instead of the fucking gang recruitment way 2a attempts to explain Aftermath going along with Breakdown, both the racers are mildly freaking out that there's a solitary kid who may or may not be a little fucking pissy right, just in the very spot both their scanners are saying IS the Emberstone shard they've been tracking. It takes a harsher more Decepticon standard demand to get Aftermath to follow either of them over a softer weaker Autobot plea; a force of habit for both of them, even if Breakdown starts actively avoiding Bee's responding glare.

Something about Breakdown associating harsh orders, reprimands and mutual hostility says more about him and his relationship to 'family' than it does on Aftermath sneering at squishy feelings that make him feel weird and preferring the worse treatment since it's the one thing he's got experience in. Something about how in fandom spaces every group of people is immediately turned into found family or just straight up family? Well- considering that Breakdown joined the Decepticons because the Stunticons also had done so (and changing Breakdown's association of Decepticons as family down to Stunticons as family), considering that most iterations of the characters 4 mentally ill soldiers and an abusive leader that actively preys on his team's weaknesses then... heh.

Breakdown finding the bickering and the fighting and the unspoken assumptions of that meaning family... it DOES mean more for Breakdown than it does for Aftermath doesn't it? :P

I don't think I got a good order with this but :P With GHOST gone the Autobots don't have a main base anymore, and by don't I fucking MEAN IT they don't go back to GHOST headquarters after all is said and done; it would be the first place to look for cybertronian activity after the government finds out the closest thing humanity had for bot sympathisers went belly up after all. Between them and the newly freed Decepticons, there is only one neutral ground between them on the Malto farm, but it would be Starscream to bring up stink over it (if even in his mischaracterisation in 2a he labels Autobots as oppressors) siting that the Malto's are functionally civilian and shouldn't - whether or not they could at all in the first place - be responsible for the housing of all these soliders; it's a farm, not a warbase, there is no need to bring more children into their squabble especially with the likelihood of crossfaction shared quarters he'd say.

There is one fortification left to stand against potential government hunting, even if it means to repair defense systems and cloaking devices, even signal scramblers just to hopefully allow rest to those tired of running. None of the Autobots would be happy about it - the Decepticons might disagree seeing it as potentially a little bit funny and as a little bit of petty revenge - but that base may or may not happen to be quite purple in it's paintjob, Decepticon base. To offer the curtsy that none of the 'Cons were given however, the Autobots in addition to the betrayer Megatron would be allowed free reign of the base, give or take a few zones off-limits even to lower ranked Decepticon forces. It's not like the Autobots would have left the base unraided in their time under GHOST's thumb, so there's no doomsday weapons to be wary of anyone activating.

Actual base life doesn't feel horrible for the Decepticons who, thanks in all due part to Megatron's aggressive leadership and hostile work environment, are already particularly used to being near permanently on guard even at rest; if the Autobots still had a base of their own in the local area the Decepticons would've made an easy transition even if still incredibly tense. It takes an extremely disciplined trigger for the Autobots not to snap under the tension, everyone save for Megatron who is used to being on edge, unfortunately for him the Decepticons give him shit constantly and tends to skew towards aggravating him than any of the 'Bots.

However, at the very least the remaining scientists have access to Shockwave's lab, which he might be more willing to share if it helps Wheeljack and Tarantulas to agree to run some tests on the terrans and actually begin to study them to get the full picture, at least as full as they can without dissection which is one of the compromises Shockwave would have to contend with especially if Nightshade wants to be science team buddies with at least the other 2. Either way, probably the least hostile section in the crosshabitation Decepticon base? Mostly because of the fact they're all agreeing to science together rather than punch each other.

But not everyone actually remains in the base, some take off to find better opportunities or because they find the base environment more stiffling than usual real free spirit types, AKA Breakdown. And also why I don't think I ordered this the right way- but I suppose from Emberstone to 'chaos' terran to Aftermath to Breakdown may break if I went no GHOST to no Autobot base to 'don't hide warriors in civilian homes' to Decepticon base to Breakdown to Aftermath... actually no... because then I can go to 'chaos' terran again and bring up Spitfire and others.

So, speaking of...

Shard-spark terrans, while not guaranteed to be trouble-kids so to speak, they are more predisposed to such given the circumstances of their creation in addition to the presence of the shard they are aptly named after. Aftermath is of course a bit of a destruction lover, it feels so good to break things it's often quite the shame that to have a broken thing, you must destroy something that may or may not have a use when it is unbroken. Breaking trees, breaking roads, breaking armour (even if it's a little baby dent to a soldier who's dealt with worse from a kid who didn't even exist up until a week ago), all the same to Aftermath who loves the thrill of it and hates things that make that thrill go away.

Can't even make a dent in that annoying Jawbreaker's armour! Ugh, he'll just have to teach JB to break something for him to make these gross feelings stop AKA JB discovers 'breaking things' stim and (with a bonus quick rewrite of his altmode episode where HE'S the one wreaking havoc on town because 'STOP BABYING HIM' 'WHY WON'T YOU LIKE ME' 'I HAVE AN ALTMODE NOW WHY DON'T YOU PAY ATTENTION TO ME' feelings) feels like really bad about it when he wants to break more things and scream :P good thing his mum's a veteran she can probably get him to do a war cry!

Spitfire kinda immediately did a gifted kid speedrun I think instead, Twitch 2.0 with a better drone model with better and more capabilities and the speed to out fly the out-mode, only up until it is Twitch who is preferred for her softer attitude and willingness to give up all that lets her win for someone else. Look Megatron, if you introduce a 'non-deadly' version of the Polyhex Protocol, maybe make fucking sure there is literally no fucking way for someone to be in immense 'death by falling' danger? Look look look look look- you put a newborn into her first race (btw, created while falling and thus having first hand experience that falling isn't deadly), say it's not to the death, and expect her not to assume that the giant cliff beneath the flying fox was also safe?? And that you had initially planned the Malto CHILDREN to run the course also and yet failed to create a proper safety net, literally or not you have a flight mode you could've played spotter!

Is Spitfire without fault? No, but what do you expect a newborn storm child to know about safety especially with a competitive streak like the one she's fast to develop! You all told her how she has the better altmode and 'better than this' why are you all looking at her like she'd suddenly BROKEN!?

And all these fuckers think they can all hug it out while she stands out in the rain biting and gnawing for attention?! Gross!

:P AKA Spitfire is like 12 (minutes) old and already fallen from grace, no wonder she gets a kick out of mutual 'want to bite people' sibling Aftermath :P

I think these thoughts are spiraling though to be fair my notes are also at this point spiraling-

Spitfire and Aftermath love to brawl with each other, it's too wild to be called sparring but it's not particularly deadly enough to call a battle, though it does get out of hand in ways that Breakdown - if he's still trying for parenthood - isn't even prepared to deal with (bumblebee voice: first time?). During one such brawl, Breakdown alternating between chasing the pair and backing off as they throw in more hits on each other, the kids accidentally run into Skullcruncher and - instead of backing down like someone more in the know - end up dragging him out of his listless reverie when Spitfire dodges Aftermath's double hammerfist after he threw her into the Decepticon.

Now why am I bringing up Skullcruncher is he secretly my favourite character? No, no he really isn't. But considering he's been used as a tool to not only display Mandroid's mind control technology as well as the visible consequences of that technology being used by GHOST, I feel as though he'd been left in the dust to kinda... regress? To disappear into his head? Some fucked up torture coping really, just in a literal brainwashing sense since :P GHOST wanted a pet project test subject. The aforementioned science team, with the help of everyone that was mind controlled and able to tell of it, have been trying to work through the brainfog it seems to have left Skullcruncher with. Regardless of the actual care they have for him specifically, they want to know if there's any actual lingering corruption on a mecha's processor all in due part because of it, to see if it would affect them physically as it had done mentally.

Between Shockwave's calculated response only providing his own experience in cold logic, Hashtag's experience (Shockers listing her under 'confounding variable' because of her status as a terran) having been used to connect her to Starscream when it counted the most whether or not she was good at playing therapist as a child full of fears and no wisdom, and Megatron nearly gunning down a kid he believed to be the hope of all cybertronian kind (all of the science team is reminded of how he has changed, how he now feels guilt over the future he could've failed instead of snuffing it out himself without mind), there may be a few networks rewired via the cybertronian equivalent of neuroplasticity... but the results so far are inconclusive and it's looking more and more likely to just be biopsychological placebo and coping mechanism Skullcruncher invariably got himself stuck in.

But getting dragged into the antics of laughing yet snarling children, going around beating each other around base not out of malice but out of pure enjoyment and glee, being chased around by someone who has the time and freedom - if not, the ability to be panicked about something so relatively small - to try and deal with the situation? Sure, the first strike is always surprising, and maybe he panicked with something violent in response. But the shard-spark siblings were already in the ebb and flow of their fight, if they got caught or grazed by jaws, if they got hit or dodged a sweep of claws, they'll fight like they always enjoyed. Skullcruncher may not be fully present, may not ever be, but hey... maybe those kids can help fight away the monotony and get him out of his head, out of the past the same faces of over a million years couldn't get to sooner.

Something like that?

And to give more love to other side characters that don't even get voices, why not some more Insecticon content- hell, why not a shard-spark terran who becomes an Insecticon, or at least has a bug altmode that caters to their personality. The 'sit alone inside the tube of a playground set all recess' type, the 'uses thoughts to give themselves company' type, the 'weird loner' type who's non-verbal and asocial? A very patient praying mantis, who takes the bugs outside when they're in and wants to show others the cool little creatures? To BE a bug?

Breakdown, who's willingly tied himself down to who he immediately claimed as his kid... his kids now? He... let's Spitfire decide for herself if she wants to be that but... Aftermath calls him 'old man', that's... that's what humans call their 'dad' right? They both make his spark ache and he's growing more and more confused at why he doesn't just run, take to the streets and drive away where his spark can be free again. But the idea sends his systems into a stronger more whole-body version of the feeling, shooting through his chest down through his arms and legs, in ways that feel familiar but... warmer than with any of the Stunticons.

Bumblebee, who was more or less stuck with the Maltobots as Optimus changed his mission, having gotten to actually learn from them as they learnt from him; he knows the feeling, he knows it strongly. And if they get to hang out more now that they aren't actively fighting each other - though I guess it's still a mutual 'hiding from the government' thing isn't it - they might get to talking about it.

"Yeah, that's just classic worry for you." "Bee, I KNOW what worry feels like, we've been at war for Primus knows how long!" He hated the way it sounded like Bumblebee was brushing him off, emphasised with waving of his hand like he was dusting his plating. If his 'cool' slipped well, the 'Bot didn't press him on it. "Always worrying about dying, worrying about energon. Pit! Worried about shrapnel to the wheels, can't keep beating you in races if my tires blow." Maybe not the best thing to bring up considering... "This is different." It has to be, because he knows he worried about the Stunticons, and they were his family. But... "Breakdown," When did he look away? Breakdown turned back to face Bee, "it's worry FOR them. It's... it's a worry because you care? I care about the Maltos, for the humans AND the terrans, and... I feel worried about them?" He can't help it, Breakdown laughs. A quiet chuckle really, turned snickers as Bumblebee's expressions twist. "HEY! What's so funny about that!?" Just in time to feel a fist beat against his shoulder - right on that afformentioned wheel, hah - even though his optics are narrowed and dentae bared, Bee vents out a laugh he tried and failed to hide. "Mr Never-Settle-Down hiding some wisdom I missed?" He squints at the name but doesn't let that stop his smirk. "Hah, come on Bee, you said it like you were such an expert before! But look who's confused now, right? Because 'classic worry' is so hard to explain." Bumblebee shoves against Breakdown's chassis, venting out another huff. "Okay sure, I'm not perfect at explaining it but!" "You care about them, these new... shard-spark terrans?" Aftermath, Spitfire, almost instantly that burst of 'classic worry' runs his systems wild. "I'm not an expert, so don't quote me on anything but..." He offered up his hand, beckoning for Breakdown to take it in one bold move. "I can help with what I do know, yeah? You've got one handful of kids don't you." With another pulse of his spark, the 'classic worry' - that 'worry FOR them' emotion - shivers down his wires and back up to his chest. Wordlessly, Breakdown takes up the offer with a small quick nod of acknowledgement, and feels the residual tingle simmer. It's not the same feeling with the Stunticons, this kind of worry but... maybe that's a good thing. "Good talk, Feelings-Expert, now why don't I the Winning-Expert take you up on that race?"

Can you tell I hate the first episode of season 2b/3?

Get prepared for a mood shift, we'll be talking about GHOST again!

Obviously because GHOST going defunct and maybe so suddenly it's hard for anyone to corral it under control of the next in rank, it IS an entire organisation after all, there would be quite a few lingering resources within the building itself that the government may be interested in let alone the mecha that would be at a disadvantage to those who would access such resources. Mind control technology and research (definitely don't want the government having that), anti-cybertronian weapons and restraining tools, the fucking GHOST harddrives that were placed in the fucking public recycle centre A YEAR AFTER GHOST FUCKED OFF AND DIED!? Yep that's all getting scavenged, at least as best as they can be while the government is extracting as much resources they can without needing to be sneaky about it.

Hah, considering the lows GHOST is willing to go, one such section - another where the cybertronians can't seem to access one way or another - ends up leading to a morgue of cybertronians, Autobot AND Decepticon. Some of course were known casualties, others are now confirmed dead rather than missing, but missing is an apt term. Missing limbs, missing parts, missing heads. Open chests, open sparks, open processors. Cybertronians were only machines to GHOST, only machines to Mandroid, only machines to manipulate and not even mind control... reprogram would be the term more accurate.

With a well of supply for how cybertronian brains may work, of course someone could eventually slap a remote control onto them and pilot them like a puppet on strings, and it's something something pretty horrific yada yada robot corpse desecration is like nothing on human TV screens.

Hmm... as I said I did like that Prowl acknowledge that hey maybe kids shouldn't get involved with war (even if it might've been framed as 'are we sure children are capable of doing adult responsibilities), so I wonder if I should continue with what my July 28th notes say about him or not... hmm...

Okay! MAYBE! I think it could work?

ANYWAY! Villain Prowl who is a stickler for the rules, villainous only in the way a lawmaker is (read: maker) and collaborating with the government to work cybertronians into the system so that they may be apart of the judicial system, which uh fittingly reflects the quintesson motivation and probably would be really cool to parallel the two. Prowl finds out about human war crimes and goes 'hoo boy some if not a whole fucking many of these laws have been violated by the cybertronian war' and resolves to fix it, but under American government cannot do anything official nor fair while the law only considers humanity. Something something 'cybertronians shouldn't be held to human standard law' yada yada 'so you think yourself above it!?'

Maybe not VILLAIN Prowl per say, more antagonist Prowl who wants to atone for the crimes committed on Earth's surface and give back justice to the people but doing so in the only way he knows how, like a cop. Or at least like a second in command/high ranking Autobot commander and advisor, doing his 'due diligence' to make sure that justice is served and that crimes are punished, which I mean ACAB and all he's still a bastard about it by doing it AS FUCKING SOON as GHOST collapses or at least working actively after the fact but :P

Hah and yeah, Prowl would be stiff lipped about children engaging in conflict. For all the bastard cops that oh so value the punishment part of crime fighting, there are laws in other areas (especially around war) that are to the benefit of the innocent. It's just that war crimes seem to really be listed down after the war has official come to an end and the cybertronian war is still in armistice as of now, in due part because Prowl has committed to atoning NOW of all times :P

This was a bit of a mess, I hope you derive some enjoyment out of this

[cipheramnesia]

I think it's funny how you got these general schools of scifi artists depicting their ideas of alien or imaginary sapient life. Like bottom tier are the "write what you know" artists. We know what humans are like and factors contributing to our present day adaptations, all their aliens are humanoid with a lot of effort put into explaining why the eyes are slightly bigger or how come they have only three fingers and scientists get super excited about the "realism" while everyone else knows these are bullshit and absolutely these aliens do not fuck.

Next tier up is the silly zone, aka probably the actual realistic zone. These are the artists who start out wondering what a really fucked up looking guy would be made out of and generally use some amount of familiarity with the natural world to come up with weird skin and skeletons and shit so you get like trilateral symmetry aliens or guys who have eyes on their snake arms and brains in their body cavity or whatever. It's great but also really takes the monster fucker winds out of the sails because a bunch of these ones you know for a fact like you couldn't fuck. Probably a bunch you could have sexy good times so it's still cool, but you can't plunge right into icky sticky fantasy, you gotta spend a lot of preliminary time on logistics.

I this group there's also a division, some artists will still insist everything has to rigidly adhere to something we know from life on earth and others are down to clown for the most abstract ideas. In the former group is the artist whose name I forget but he was really bitchy about Giger's alien having jaws that opened the same direction, because "in natute" secondary jaws always open the opposite direction. Then I learned about pharyngeal jaws in eels and was like in your face buddy. The latter is Wayne Barlowe who is all about the challenge of depicting fucked up under described creatures.

Top tier of course are artists who depict alien life in the coolest way they can first and think of reasons why second. This is what is top tier monsterfucking looks like.

[baenyth]

First Half of Miraculous Season 2 Done. Here's my thoughts:

The Collector: A pretty good start! They made the teens smart while still being dumb teens!

Despair Bear: Chloe needs a therapist, arguably moreso than a redemption arc and especially a downward villainous spiral. Also Dangit Grandpa

Prime Queen: Wow, this was a lot more chill than expected. Even Cat Noir was left aghast at what Nadja was doing, Nadja seemed to be pressuring Ladybug and Cat Noir more for views than anything else, and I'm not entirely sure Akuma personalities can be trusted.

Befana: Fun fact: This was the episode that got me into Miraculous in the first place because of how shocking it was. And then I discovered even more. In hindsight from watching the other episodes, it was relatively darker, but mostly because it's Marinette's friends and family that are getting G-rated killed instead of random civilians like every other episode.

Riposte: Kagami is here! I don't see too much chemistry with her and Adrien yet, but she's cool and I like her and feel like I could be friends in real life. Also this feels like a relatively uncommon trope, but I wish "X is blatantly a woman but no one notices" was spedran through by someone with brains.

Robustus: Pretty good, all things considered. From what I've heard about Miraculous lore, creating sapient or at the very least semi-sapient AI isn't that uncommon for weirdness hotspots, and I'm putting Max in the list of characters I think should have figured out Ladybug and Cat Noir's identity. (There's four now!)

Gigantitan: It turns out my favorite parts of Miraculous are the slice-of-life bits instead of the superhero bits the show is about! We got to see more of Marinette's friends! Alix! Mylene! Julie! The Eeby Deeby herself! Also it was really sweet to see Adrien's bodyguard calm down just by looking at the kid. Adrien's true daddy.

Dark Owl: No wonder these two aren't allowed to know eachothers' identities, considering how much of a loose tongue Marinette has!

Glaciator: Alright, it's finally time to talk about the sins of Marinette and Cat Noir, considering the fan content I osmosed before watching the series was heavy salt stuff, and I wanna see how much it holds up. So far Cat Noir has acted as if he's already dating Ladybug previously, and in this episode he got mad at Ladybug for not showing up at a date when she herself said she might not come due to having other plans. Isn't he supposed to be used to not-showing-up disappointment as Adrien due to his dad? Is it different because he's Cat Noir? Is this a breaking point? No matter, he eventually calms down and is ultimately the less bad member of the relationship. Marinette, meanwhile, doesn't have as many misdemeanors to her name but they're a lot worse. She stole Adrien's phone to get rid of an embarrassing message and got away with it too, what the hell, and also owns the schedule. Although I don't believe she stalked Adrien and made it herself due to how busy she is as both Marinette and Ladybug, that's just weird and wrong. I'm reluctant to call her a stalker, but her actions are still wrong. Ultimately, this relationship is going to need a lot of therapy and counseling to not crash and burn. What were we talking about again? Oh yeah. The ice cream episode. I think the ice cream guy can be wrong and he doesn't understand that.

Sapotis: Silly little fun episode, also it introduces the first new Miraculous holder! I'm honestly fine with it so far if it means more screentime for side characters. I honestly really like seeing Marinette's classmates. They're neat. Also I was this close to putting Alya on the list but she proves time and time again that she doesn't actually know Ladybug's identity.

Gorizilla: In this episode we are introduced to Adrien's deranged parasocial fanbase. I'm starting to understand some of his father's decisions at this point. This is what I was talking about with the schedule, by the way. These obsessive stalker creeps make Marinette look reasonable, and I wouldn't be surprised if the one guy who I'm pretty sure becomes Party Crasher discreetly stalked Adrien to get his schedule. Restraining orders need to be filed.

Captain Hardrock: One of the funniest episodes, up there with Dark Cupid. Also Luka is here! And he already has great chemistry with Marinette! And more Rosie and Julie content even if it's crumbs!