#i'm expected to just..function???

[wikitpowers]

EXCUSE ME WHAT THE FUCK DID I JUST READ??! KIT POV?!!! AND HE'S HAVING NIGHTMARES AND STILL DREAMS ABOUT TY AND SEEING MINA CALMS HIM DOWN AND SOMEBODY SENT HIM A MF WARNING WHAT IS HAPPENING

[pocketgalaxies]

was talking to my mom today about apartment hunting and stuff for my upcoming move and kinda out of nowhere she went "hey are you going to officially change your name? because i think now might be a good time to do it, since you need a new ID and everything." and i was so surprised? i always thought she thought it was kinda weird, or unnecessary, or childish, or stupid, or something, to suddenly have started using nova (a while back, now). and part of me thought that maybe i was hurting her feelings, discarding this beautiful thing she gave me. my best friend had a baby a few weeks ago and it's been very present in my mind how meaningful it is, naming your child. and the last time (kind of the only time) my mom asked about it, it was over text, and just knowing her i thought she was asking in this despairing kind of way. "oh what now, are you gonna cHaNgE yOuR nAmE?" kind of way. so today i said "does it make you feel weird? that i use a different name?" and she just shrugged and said "no? as long as it makes you happy." and i felt a little bowled over with love in that moment. idk. i think there's a poem in here somewhere

[onesidedradiostatic]

Hear me out

Transfem alastor

Thoughts?

I mean honestly live your dreams anons I'm open to any of these hcs but I wanna be transparent that I am a #cis girl, gender stuff isn't really my Area of Expertise since it doesn't fit under my experiences as a cis person

that being said, transfem alastor, kinda real, hated men so much he said actually fuck being one

and I could see the vees' one, not much to say here (vox does canonically get hard but I respect the energy here. although one could question how hell works in reincarnating you when you die, if you're trans and want your gender's biological parts will it give it to you. although arguably vox IS part tech so maybe he... alright I will stop this line of thought)

[flow2024]

V, JoeNicky & Nile

V. An abandoned or empty place.

When Joe pulls the sheet off the couch it kicks up enough dust that it makes Nile sneeze. The couch underneath is old, wooden frame rotting, fabric stained and full of holes where moths have eaten away at it. 

“Sorry,” Joe says to Nile when she finally manages to get the sneezing under control. “Didn’t realise it was that bad.” He puts his hands on his hips and looks down at the couch. Nile looks it over.

“There’s no saving that,” she says, wiping at her eyes. She can heal from falling over ten stories, but she can’t get away from allergies.

Joe frowns. “I liked that couch.”

The house is older than anywhere else they’ve brought her, and has been abandoned for long enough that it’s falling apart. But through some trick of posing as their own sons, or something, Joe and Nicky still own it, even if there’s a giant hole in the roof and all the windows are broken. Why they’d decided to come back here, Nile doesn’t know, but it’s a nice enough area, and a good distraction from, well. Everything. Growing back a leg, she’s discovered, is not fun. 

From one of the other rooms – she thinks it’s the kitchen, she’s not actually sure where Nicky had wandered to – there’s the sound of something breaking and crashing to the ground, and a muffled curse. 

Joe makes a questioning noise in the vague direction of the kitchen. A few moments later, Nicky appears in the doorway, covered in dust. “I am okay,” he says. “But I think we will need to go out to eat tonight.”

“Nothing?” 

Nicky shakes his head. “Unless you want to start a fire and go hunt some rabbits.”

Joe grins. “Just like old times, right?”

Nile shakes her head firmly, which makes Nicky smile. She loves them, but there’s no way they’re doing that. 

“We can probably clear out enough space in here,” Joe says, gesturing to the floor. “Get the sleeping bags out of the car. Probably have to start a fire anyway, but…”

Nile looks around again while Joe says something to Nicky in Arabic that makes him laugh. The house is falling apart, sure, but it’s structurally stable, and the bones are all there. It could be something. They’ve got time to make it something. 

Nicky is the one who goes for pizza in the end – he doesn’t trust Nile and Joe to order it if left to their own devices – while they try to clear out a space in the living room. Eventually, though, after Nile has another sneezing fit, Joe suggests they just take the sleeping bags outside instead, which works out a lot better. He sets about starting a fire with practiced ease while Nile sets out the sleeping bags around it. They’re far enough away from civilisation that she can’t hear cars passing by, which is kind of surreal, and the stars are brighter than she’s ever seen them. 

When Nicky gets back, two boxes balanced on one arm and a bottle of wine in the other, he looks over their makeshift camp and laughs. “Just like old times, then?” he asks.

Joe grins. “Except we have pizza.”

“And actual sleeping bags,” Nile says.

“Ah, these modern inventions could never quite match the comfort of a pile of furs,” Joe says wistfully. Nile gives him a look. She’s ninety percent sure that one’s bullshit, but she can never quite tell with him. 

Nicky sets down the pizza boxes, and jogs back to the car to grab the pack of plastic wine glasses they’d bought before they got here. 

“We should’ve bought marshmallows,” Nile says. “Could have made s’mores.”

“Well, we’ll have to go to the hardware store tomorrow anyway,” Joe points out. “And I think it’ll be a little while before we can actually sleep in there.”

“Tomorrow, then?”

“Tomorrow,” Nicky agrees.

[ruvviks]

// oc deep dive.

tagged by; @aztarion and @devilbrakers, thank you so much!!

tagging; @mojaves, @deadrlngers, @ordinarymaine, @claudiawolf, @adelaidedrubman and YOU!

What common/uncommon fear do they have?

Nathan has a lot of fears stemming from his paranoia. Tangible ones such as getting captured or killed by MOBIUS, his friends walking away from him, or someone following him home; as well as more unrealistic ones, such as somehow ending up back in STEM, or getting stuck in a time loop, or a giant sinkhole all the way to the core of the earth opening up right at his feet.

It also happens often enough that certain actions don’t necessarily scare him, but make him uncomfortable or highly on edge (often with good reason); think of someone locking the door of the room he’s in– especially when it’s just them two– or getting too close without warning. He often fears people he gets too close to will end up treating him like the Administrator did, which is why it takes a while for him to let Sebastian get any closer physically, despite warming up to him relatively fast.

A more uncommon fear he has is waking up one morning and having lost one of his senses or his ability to speak. Aside from the mental erosion that had become a growing issue among Union citizens, MOBIUS observed a similar kind of process in its agents who regularly jumped in and out of STEM for general maintenance and the like– presumably caused by the constant changes in brain activity, which more than often led to exactly what Nathan’s fear mentioned above describes. While he was among the agents who worked both in and outside of STEM on the Union environment, he was lucky enough to never suffer the consequences.

Lastly, he is deadly afraid of Anima. Despite not having shown any other symptom of succumbing to the STEM domination process, Nathan would have started seeing her around sometime before Lily vanished– presumably got her attention after some of his escapades in the secret labs in the Marrow– and he has not been able to sleep soundly in STEM ever since. While his fear of her mostly acts up when he’s in a STEM environment, it definitely translates over to the real world as well; during bad mental health episodes he has auditory hallucinations of her, and she makes regular appearances in his nightmares too.

Do they have any pet peeves?

When people are too passive. Nathan can’t stand it when he’s expected to initiate everything, from conversations to taking action, both in a work context (scheduling meetings, deploying new code) as well as personal context (scheduling to hang out, doing household chores). He also doesn’t like having to constantly ask people to do what they’re supposed to do– though this irritation more than often extends a little too far, to things he is expecting of people but never told them about.

Loud and unexpected noises, especially when done on purpose. Fireworks would be a great example of this, and they piss Nathan off no end. He gets snippy when people raise their voice at him for no reason, or when they keep banging their fist on a surface to get others’ attention.

Getting cut off in traffic. Nathan’s road rage is easily awakened and he can get a little drastic with it. His reflexes are fast enough to brake on time to avoid ending up in someone’s trunk, but will in that same breath speed right back up to crash into them on purpose as revenge for pissing him off.

What are three items you can find in their bedroom?

A large ring binder full of old code snippets, notes from various projects he worked on back at MOBIUS, and all his research ranging from neuroscience all the way to electrical engineering. Nathan is a little old-school in that regard– he’d much rather have all his research physically with him than save it all to some online storage platform and risk losing it like that.

A jigsaw puzzle, made entirely out of different pieces that he’s collected over the years (stolen from others’ puzzles, found in various locations, stolen directly from the store, etc). The full piece would total up to nearly 2000 pieces, though it is still missing a large chunk in the center; the result is an abstract piece containing mostly darker colors, though with various bursts of color scattered around like flowers in a field. Nathan isn’t the artistic type, but the project keeps him busy and he considers it a type of self-expression.

The knife he killed his parents with when he was sixteen years old. He’s not entirely sure why he kept it all those years– perhaps to remind himself what got him to where he is now, or because it’s the only thing he still has from that time of his life. Either way, it’s kept safe in the top drawer of his nightstand, easy enough to reach in case someone breaks into his apartment.

What do they notice first in a person?

First: State of mind, overall mood. How approachable do they look; can he afford to lower his guard or does he need to tread with caution, can he get close without worrying about a knife to the stomach or should he keep his distance? Nathan rarely shows immediate interest in someone’s overall personality, he would rather want to know which of their emotions he’s gonna have to deal with during their interaction(s).

Second: Body language. Ties in with the first thing mentioned– cautiously watching for threats, waiting to see if they make a move to touch (or harm) him so he can step out of their range. But it also extends a little further; Nathan tends to mimic others’ body language in conversation to make himself appear more approachable. If someone gestures a lot, he will do the same.

Third: Their smile, if relevant. Smiling is an eye-catching action to him, since he’s not one to quickly do so himself. It’s attractive to him; if someone smiles at him, you’ll be able to catch him staring.

Fourth: Scars, and other (skin) details. Nathan isn’t one to ask about them, of course– but they’ll catch his attention anyway, for a brief moment, since some of them already tell a story on their own even without words.

Fifth: Nervous tics, if relevant. By this point he’s been in conversation long enough to pick up on the little details– a slight thrill or shakiness to their voice, a thumb running over the side of their index finger, a nose twitch. In some cases it eases his mind, knowing the other person isn’t confident in their conversation either; in other cases it sets off alarms in his mind, and makes him wonder if there’s more going on than what they’re showing or telling him.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how high is their pain tolerance?

Physically: 7. While he doesn’t quite look like it, Nathan can take a hit or two. Most of his injuries happen in STEM– though with the way the technology works, the pain is very much real, and in some cases the scars are lasting even in the real world despite the damage having been sustained in STEM. To an extent, Nathan even enjoys the pain; it’s grounding for him, and keeps him from dissociating. When it gets too much to handle he simply drinks it away.

Mentally: 10. Nathan’s life has been a constant downward spiral; sent to a youth detention center after being wrongfully accused of killing his younger sister, and he was bullied relentlessly there, which continued until long after his release both at school and at home. At MOBIUS, he was required to work shifts in their HQ as well as in the Marrow, in the Union STEM environment– he was required to be mentally strong, or he would have already started suffering from mental erosion by long-term STEM exposure after his first few trips in. It takes a lot to break him (or so he likes to believe).

Emotionally: 4. Once you get past all the barriers, Nathan is pretty sensitive. He doesn’t deal well with rejection or misunderstanding, and is prone to assuming things are all his fault the second something goes wrong. It’s easy to upset him, though he won’t easily show; but the damage often takes a while to repair.

Do they go into fight or flight mode when under pressure? (Or freeze or fawn?)

Fight, more than often; though it may appear as flight at first, since Nathan’s favored combat approach is stealth and he will always find cover before doing anything rash. In certain cases, however, he would be more likely to freeze; especially anything related to Anima or an enemy type like her, where fighting is out of the question, and he knows that a single wrong move can mean his demise.

It translates to non-combat situations too– often willing to talk to people but his initial response is to get defensive and close himself off, and if not given a moment to regain himself it can lead to either fighting or freezing; biting back with similar ferocity or shutting down altogether, unable to pick up his rational train of thought in the heat of the moment.

It really depends on the type of confrontation, though; taking his own state of mind and who else is involved into consideration. He’s known to fawn when a situation starts feeling a little too familiar– generally surrounding the abuse he suffered from partially his parents, but mostly the Administrator.

What animal represents them best?

Wolf; bordering on dog motif, but cautiously so, requiring infinite patience and understanding to win his trust. Nathan is loyal and guarding to those he cares about, but he values his freedom– his choices and decisions are his and his alone, and anyone who tries to take that away from him will suffer the necessary consequences.

How would a stranger likely describe them?

Curious, above anything else. Distant, reserved; surprisingly well-spoken, almost technical in his interactions with others as if the whole conversation is pre-programmed in his mind. Nathan isn’t necessarily cold towards others, but people would also not be quick to describe him as kind; though there is a certain warmth to the way he speaks and looks at people, despite the fact he very rarely smiles and isn’t one to quickly compliment someone else.

Appearance-wise, people tend to notice the white strands in his black hair first. They’re clustered at the front of his head, and match with the white hairs in his left eyebrow and the white eyelashes in the outer corner of his left eye. Nathan has very pale and rough skin, patchy but dark facial hair covering up most of his acne (/scarring); and part of the skin around his left eyebrow is lacking pigment, though it’s a little hard to see. He has very pale and bright blue eyes, which can be a little unnerving when staring at them for too long. Many people cannot maintain eye contact with him for very long.

Do they have any hobbies?

Nathan’s career is directly intertwined with his hobbies, and he enjoys working on code even long after cutting ties with MOBIUS. Software development, application optimization– his laptop runs on an operating system that he coded entirely himself, and whenever he has some time to spare he can be found tweaking and optimizing it and adding new features.

To no one’s surprise, he’s a gamer. Shooters, roguelikes, survival horror– he does not play all too often as his schedule often doesn’t allow for it, but he generally doesn’t have a hard time playing on higher difficulties and enjoys the challenge. Nathan has tried his hand at game design and development too, but stopped quickly when he found it too similar to developing the Union environment in STEM.

And last, surprisingly, would be writing. Journaling, some sort of attempt at poetry, or articles he would want to send in to some website or appropriate magazine but never does– a lot of Nathan’s writing is for his eyes alone, but it helps as an outlet, it keeps him grounded. For a while after leaving MOBIUS, he worked on writing tech manuals for various employers to earn some extra cash, which also ties directly into his interests.

[gideonisms]

Does a podcast ever release a take you disagree with so strongly it makes you question everything you heard on it up to that point

[eachuisge-cc]

I'll update with screenshots later I'm kinda havin a Time right now

[uncanny-tranny]

You know... it's okay to trust your body. If you are separated from your body to such an extent you feel you cannot trust it, I truly from the bottom of my heart empathize and feel grief for you, but you can trust your body.

It's okay to listen to your body and to heed what it is telling you. I wish you (and your body) well wherever you go. You deserve the peace of mind to feel able to do what you want.

[emobatsy]

genuinely what's the point if you're sick two weeks of every month and in baseline pain anyways the other two and can't have two normal days in a row or you must sleep for sixteen hours the following two days

[nemesis-is-my-middle-name]

gotta admit there is something deeply satisfying abt the ability in ds2 to completely clear out a path to a boss

[adustoflove]

I feel like such a waste of space. What am I doing? I'm ignoring all my worried friends. I'm pushing everyone away. I'm not doing anything worthwhile. I'm not helping anyone. I'm wishing I was dead when I could be doing anything more productive. I feel 14 again, sobbing on my stupid purple rug because I mean nothing to no one and my existence doesn't do much.

[saltpepperbeard]

EDWARD TEACH MY LOVE, STEDE BONNET MY DARLING

IT IS SO SO INCREDIBLE TO FINALLY SEE YOU BOTH AGAIN!!!

[patiann345]

Watching the situation with EA doing a fuckton of updates in a like. 5 days because their latest pack broke TS4 in.. A HUGE VARIETY OF WAYS from player to player. Jesus christ man. and then some of you guys still wanna pay for new packs?? What??? I can't make anyone buy or not buy anything but... C'mon, put your money to better use! Half of that content should've been base-game anyway, but instead gets cut up and sold across multiple packs to milk money out of people,, and it clearly works because I'm seeing people nab packs during the sale even while the game is in an unplayable state for a lot of players.

It's so sad because I was kinda excited for the 10-year anniversary next month. But seeing the state it's in rn, how frustrated people are seeing their game break down and (god forbid) their saves get completely wiped, seeing the very convenient sale for packs go up right as the community sends in complaints that the game won't load properly or they can't use CAS or this and that etc etc,,,

I'm never paying for another pack again. I feel crap that I ever did in the first place. If it ain't 100% off, I'm not getting it.

[oilcolor]

so I just got diagnosed with adhd

It's not a surprise. I've been pretty much certain of this for like, ten years or so (only growing more certain when immediate family members were diagnosed), but it's... pretty vindicating to have a professional be like, 'yeah you've really, actually been struggling for reasons fairly out of your control.' I guess I'm posting about this here as a sort of sorry excuse for my progressively-worsening difficulty with drawing (in terms of frequency + how long it takes me to get through commissions). When I've said I have motivation issues, I don't mean that I've lost my passion for art or my desire to be drawing; it's more like I'm running at full speed into an invisible brick wall I could never find a way around - which, in and of itself is demotivating, but that's not really my point here. My point is that I'm really really hoping this is just some busted dopamine trickery and maybe, somewhere down the line, I'll find a medication that works for me and maybe I'll actually be able to draw more than like, three times a year? If I'm lucky. I have so many ideas I've wanted to draw so badly for so many years (I have a whole list! I write down every idea! It's pages long!), and I've been suffocating and I just desperately, desperately want this to work. Pray for me lmao

so... thank you all for all your patience and support despite it all

[sloughingoff]

Transformers folks

I understand the impulse.

But why are we giving the robots dicks? Don't misunderstand me, I literally could care less, but why are we not getting funky with it? Why's it got to be a spike on the pelvis in the entrance?

We've got a body that can, theoretically, feel any range of anything across its entire surface and below, or even outside of it, including pleasure and well beyond, and we're just. Goin' straight past that to good ol' biological framed interfacing?

I could get explicit in my examples but we have access to FULL BODY INTERFACING WITH A HUNDRED DIFFERENT ENGAGEMENT METHODS AND RANGES! That leaves literally ANYTHING open!

Cybertronians could be their own bloody vibrators, they could get off to getting cut open and put back together, they could get off to entirely merging consciousnesses and interacting in the code, I could go on, those are just the uncreative examples.

Fair sparks, ignore my advice if you please, but I'd recommend getting in touch with the mech & pilot & handler community and groups related. It can go so much farther than just. Slapping penises and vaginas on the metal aliens made of code strings and unobtanium when you've got an entirely blank canvas to play with here.

[everybody-hit-the-pyro-cue]

specialized education and gifted children programs are so fucked up I see the purpose but the execution and expectations are genuinely horrific I've yet to meet a single one of us that's doing okay besides from those who just reached their breaking point and chose to stop caring