#it’s still usable luckily

[stardial]

MY TABLET PEN NIB BROOOOOOOOKE.. GRAAAAH. a new set of official ones is like 20 bucks.

[lildoodlecat]

guysss i rescued my abyss saves from my ps3!!!

i already had them backed up to an sd card before the console died thankfully but i wasn't sure they were usable elsewhere,, and tbh it wasn't an entirely straightforward process but they're now on my physical PS2 memcard and totally playable ✨✨

sooo when i get to abyss in my tales play queue i can actually finish a ng+ for once sjxkd

[bisexualbaker]

Finding friends and things to do on Dreamwidth

I made a different post about this at an earlier time, but honestly, I think I can do better now.

Anyway! One of the things that sucks about moving social media and/or blogging platforms is not knowing if there will be enough activity for you at the new place. Be it from old friends, new friends, or interactive communities, there's a lot of ways you could find activity at a new place, but finding at least two of those categories can be tricky in itself.

Luckily, Dreamwidth has a few shortcuts for you already!

Adding new people to your reading page and finding new friends:

addme: Straight up a place to find new "mutuals" on Dreamwidth, with no particular focus; a good place to start!

addme_fandom: Same as above, but with a specific fandom focus! Interested in a particular fandom right now and want more people to talk about it with? Here's a good place to find fellow fans!

fandomcalendar: This is a community dedicated to announcing fandom events, which can include fandom-specific friending memes. (I'll be linking this one again later, as well.)

Getting started on Dreamwidth:

newcomers: A community dedicated specifically to helping Dreamwdth newcomers find their way around on a new site! I believe it was launched around the time Cohost was being shut down, so a lot of the people there now are Cohost "refugees", but it's still a good place to start.

dw_news: The official Dreamwidth news community. I highly recommend following this one and the next one, which will help you keep up with what's going on around Dreamwidth. DW News typically only posts a few times a year, but maybe that'll change if a bunch of new users come by...

dw_maintenance: Keep up with the mechanical goings-on at Dreamwidth! If there's a planned site outage or if DW is updating code, you can find out more here; if there's something funky going on at Dreamwidth but the site is generally still usable, it's also a good place to check.

Things to do on Dreamwidth:

dw_community_promo: The official Dreamwidth community for promoting Dreamwidth communities! People will promote new communities here, as well as events going on in established communities. A good place to find out about new things in general.

followfriday: A place to share links to check out once a week. Did you find a cool community that you want more people to know about? Link it in the comments here!

justcreate: A place where you can talk about things you're working on. There's a weekly check-in/reporting post, but sometimes people also organize body doubling sessions and other productivity-boosting things.

queerly_beloved: An anti-exclusionist queer space to get together and talk about all things queer, including intersectional matters. Hosts a weekly recommendations thread, but more and other content is very welcome!

Fandom things to do on Dreamwidth:

fandomcalendar: I linked this above, and I'm linking it again: Want to know about fandom events that are going on at Dreamwidth? This is a good place to do it! It'll also fill up your reading page in a hurry; you might be surprised at how many events are going on at Dreamwidth, or are at least connected there!

fictional_fans: A community for all fans and fandoms. If you've got a post you want to make about fandom in general, or a specific fandom that doesn't have its own community, this might be a good place to check out.

fandom_on_dw: Pretty much the same as above, honestly, but it's good that there's more than one place that hosts this kind of thing!

Anything else?

Search Interests: Individuals and communities can have lists of things they're "interested in". If more than one person has that thing listed, it may turn into a hyperlink that you can click to find other accounts with! You can also use the Search Interests function pretty much the same way. Simply type "cats" into the search bar, hit enter, and a bunch of accounts that have "cats" listed as an interest will pop up!

The Latest Things Page: Literally the latest things posted publicly anywhere on Dreamwidth. There's a list of commonly used tags at the top, if you want to narrow things down at all, but in the mean time, it can be pretty neat to see what J. Random Dreamwidth User just posted about!

The Explore Tab: Useful links for Dreamwidth in general. In addition to linking to the Latest Things Page, it can take you to a random account, the FAQ page, and more! Worth checking out if you're feeling lost.

And that's all I can think of at the moment! This should help you get started at least, and help fill out your reading page a bit.

If you still have questions or want to do more, you can check out my Dreamwidth 101 tag; I'm also happy to at least try to answer any questions myself. I'm pretty sure I've got a few "Dreamwidth for Tumblrites" guides linked in my Dreamwidth 101 section, if nothing else...

[gach-doodles]

My younger sister spilled water over my PC last week and it really fucked my PC up really bad. I have it fixed today, although it is still a bit wacky, overall it is still usable.

And luckily I was able to save my files! So have these 🥹👍✨ Aventurine and Topaz.

And this too lol

[linkito]

Hi ribbon anon! 🎀💕

So Scar is a vex hybrid, which is slightly different than the vex mob itself. Sort of a fusion of the magic vexes utilize into a person. Scar doesn’t know a whole lot about vex hybrids and their origins to be honest. He and Cub grew up away from other vexes and around friendlier folk like the Hermits.

So vexes definitely have a negative connotation. But not on Hermitcraft. This is a new experience for Scar— to be feared and hunted.

Noticeable vex features are pointed ears, spectral wings, and a devilish tail. However, the latter two can be hidden and summoned at will. They’re sort of semi-corporeal, only as physical as the user chooses. Scar can use them to glide, much like an elytra, but they’re not strong enough to straight up fly. However, he can use magic alongside them to sort of hover, which helps a lot with his mobility issues.

But his wings are bright and noticeable. He can’t lean on that and he doesn’t have a cane, so flare ups are inevitable here. And won’t be pretty!

Ange is going to get into it, but Scar’s wings are actually in tatters now due to some unfortunate circumstances. They are capable of pain, and it certainly doesn’t make gliding easy, but it’s truthfully the magic that makes any kind of flight possible, so in theory they are still usable. But ouch.

Other vex features are claws and fangs because why not. Claws can be extended and retracted at will.

I write vex magic to be very emotionally volatile because 1. It’s fun and 2. I think vexes normally operate on primarily negative emotions. Cub, a very reserved person, doesn’t need to worry about that getting out of control. And Scar, a very positive person, doesn’t either.

Until now of course. Positive emotion can make him powerful as well, but in order to survive here, Scar’s going to need to learn how to make use of his negative emotions as well.

When overcome with emotions, Scar’s eyes may shine bright blue or even entirely white. He lashes out at everyone and everything except for Grian, because, luckily, his protective instincts are just as strong as his vex instincts. He can also seemingly rapidly heal in this state, but it leaves intense scarring. Interesting. 🤔

Another thing to consider— vexes, the mob, disappear after a certain time when summoned. I interpret it as using up their allotted magic and vanishing. If a vex hybrid overuses their magic… there can be consequences. :)

[nanowrimo]

How to Write a Quality First Draft

Every year, we’re lucky to have great sponsors for our nonprofit events. ProWritingAid, a 2023 NaNo sponsor, helps you turn your rough first draft into a clean, clear, publish-ready manuscript. Today, author Krystal N. Craiker shares some tips on how to make sure your first draft has some good bones to start with:

One question I often hear about National Novel Writing Month is, “Won’t my novel be of terrible quality?”

It’s true that writing 50,000 words in 30 days won’t give you a polished manuscript. And it’s always great to embrace the creative mess of the first draft.

However, there are some tricks to ensure that your first draft has plenty of usable content. These tips are also a great way to move your story along when you get stuck.

1. Have a Plan

Pantsers, this might be hard to hear. But having even a basic outline of your story can ensure you stay on track. You don’t have to sacrifice creativity when you outline. After all, you’re still the author creating a story. 

A detailed outline can even act like your messy first draft. The more work you put into planning, the better your first draft will be. When I spend more time plotting, I spend far less time cutting things from my later drafts.

2. Make Every Scene 3D

Okay, I get it. Not everyone is a plotter. Luckily, there are other things you can do to ensure your first draft is good quality. One is adding enough sensory detail to bring your story to life.

I like to use a 3D method: have at least three of the five senses in every scene. It’s a great trick to improve the flow of your scene. Take a few minutes to immerse yourself in your story and write what your characters are experiencing.

You might change it or move it around in your final draft, but you’ll save yourself time during revisions if you add sensory detail from the beginning. 

3. Reword Your Writing

Sometimes we get stuck after one bad sentence. The imposter syndrome kicks in, and the scene just falls flat. 

Ideally, we completely turn off our inner editor during NaNoWriMo. But when you encounter that one pesky sentence, it’s okay to rewrite it. 

You can use a tool like ProWritingAid’s Rephrase. Just highlight your sentence, click Rephrase, and select a new sentence. Rephrase uses your own words and enhances them. And don’t worry about security and privacy—ProWritingAid never uses your writing to train AI.

4. Embrace the Chaos

Of course, the most important thing about National Novel Writing Month is to embrace the messy creative process. It’s okay not to have a perfect manuscript at the end of the month—no one will. 

Everyone will need to revise, edit, and rewrite after November ends. That’s why NaNoWriMo includes "I Wrote a Novel... Now What?" resources. And when you’re ready to turn your mess into a masterpiece, ProWritingAid will be there to help.

Krystal N. Craiker is the Writing Pirate, an indie romance author and content writer who sails the seven internet seas, breaking tropes and bending genres. She has a background in anthropology and education, which bring fresh perspectives to her romance novels. When she’s not daydreaming about her next book or article, you can find her cooking gourmet gluten-free cuisine, laughing at memes, and playing board games. Krystal lives in Dallas, Texas with her husband, child, and basset hound.

Top photo by No Revisions on Unsplash

[actual-changeling]

me? writing fluff? without any pain???? incredibly rare but it happens.

———

Crowley loves to nap, and although it is technically a choice to be in need of sleep in the first place, his body often takes it upon itself to make that decision for him—usually whenever they share one bottle of alcohol too many.

Tonight has been one of them, filled with an incredibly good wine and hours of time to waste, even though neither of them would ever consider an evening in each other's company anything but an enrichment. After centuries of conversations with topics all over the place, stretching from current political events to what exactly She was thinking when She made platypuses, they still find new things to discuss or rehash the ones that have already escaped both their memories.

About halfway through the third bottle, Crowley began sprawling out in earnest, claiming his usual spot on the sofa instead of continuing to pace, and even his arms, which had previously been moving all over the place and come precariously close to knocking over Aziraphale's glass, eventually stilled.

There is a perfectly usable bed in the flat above the bookshop, yet Aziraphale cannot bring himself to move Crowley from his spot on the couch, let alone wake him. The evening has long but faded into the early morning hours, and he luckily does not care about opening the shop on time, or ever, really, so there was no argument against allowing him to rest.

read the rest on ao3

[carionto]

Humans and Boredom II

The planet cracker.

A devilish name that somehow still does not do this type of Human ship justice. Arrays of massive gravity hooks capable of tearing out kilometers wide and deep chunks of mass from any celestial object one of them decides to settle in orbit of.

The process is slow and tedious and, luckily, unsuitable for any practical military application, but unimaginably rewarding nonetheless. Once a chunk has been lifted, a fleet of harvester drones meticulously tears it further apart and separates into individual minerals and any other categorizable substances. From there the internal refineries of the planet cracker process them further into more usable metals, alloys, resins, and countless other resources. Finally, another fleet of transport ships ferry those back to where they are needed.

The land based production capacity of an entire (small) planet, with a single (albeit metropolis sized) ship, crewed by no more than a hundred Humans and thousands of drones.

One of these immense beasts - The Hardy Gal - was stationed around one of Saturn's moons - Epimetheus - that was recently voted out of the global popularity contest "Who's Even Heard of This One?" and thus sentenced to become part of the Dyson Ring.

The drone fleet that was supposed to be tearing up the unfortunate little moon, however, was recently recalled for refitting after a report showed a key part was manufactured using an outdated guideline by a suspiciously licensed corporation, that was also caught up in an unrelated embezzlement scandal.

Suffice to say that chief Gravity Master Boris Fruischtyen didn't have much to do. Laws and regulations do not permit any unsupervised extraction results to just be left in orbit. Oh no, can't preemptively arrange chunks for processing later, nope, "efficiency? what's that?". *sigh* Lift, hold, harvest, repeat.

Boris would have nothing to do, except the gravity hook arrays were a set of fifty per array, and The Hardy Gal had eight arrays. Four hundred individually aim-able and moveable chunks of matter.

While his day job was not very productive for now, his social media activity shot through the roof. There's a lot you can draw with four hundred "pixels" and the literal cosmos as your canvas and backdrop.

His personal favorites were water features and creatures set against the blue of Saturn, and he arranged quite a few of the extinct whales and penguins too. Additionally, every day he would fulfill one of the audiences top ranking requests.

Through these he discovered he has a fascinatingly good sense for flower compositions, especially from unusual angles. It's odd. He's only ever seen flowers in images and videos, perhaps lacking actual real life flowers to compare to allows his imagination to fill in the gaps in a way referencing factual knowledge would limit him. Who knows.

Despite having access to a three dimensional canvas, he preferred to keep things flat.

"What can I say, 2D is better. *chuckle*"

However, that doesn't mean he keeps things simple. The gravity hooks are quite good at selective manipulation, they have to be to target certain spots beneath a whole lot of other matter (which is then raised alongside the "elevator" matter). He demonstrated how the same image can look wildly different if you just change the "pixels" from squares to spheres, or how certain material compositions change color when squeezed more densely.

His personal favorite part is the finishing touch. After he's had a drone go out and stream his latest piece from plenty of angles for the viewers, he gives the whole image a simultaneous and gentle push back towards the moon. After a few touching hours of people in chat saying farewell, sharing personal stories and just asking questions Boris is always happy to answer, the image impacts the surface where the majority of parts were extracted from in a spectacular show of minor impacts and a shower of debris. Too bad it doesn't have an atmosphere, just imagine how cool it'd look burning up on reentry.

[notsogoodphotographer]

Hi i want to talk about my all time favorite camera 📸

pls ignore all my grammar mistakes, i’m not professional reviewer 😂 i just wanna talk about this camera.

This is the Sony RX1Rii, this is the third and “most recent” version of this camera. i put “most recent” in quotes because this camera is almost 10 years old. don’t like the old age fool you because this camera can keep up with the newest cameras in its niche.

This little point and shoot sports a 42mp full frame sensor. YES, F U L L F R A M E!! This tiny camera is actually smaller than all the x100 series (minus the lens on it). The camera has an incredibly sharp Zeiss Sonnar 35mm f2 glued to. This camera has 399 af points, with eye AF. The camera is incredibly fast and accurate!! the camera is pretty much a tiny packaged Sony A7Rii!

One of my favorite features of this camera is the pop-up EVF! This is a feature that was added to only this version of the camera and it’s a feature that i wish sony continued to incorporate into some of their other smaller cameras like the A7c or a6k series!

The camera does shoot video up to 1080 120fps, but does not have picture profiles such has S-log or HLG. This was a camera made strictly for photos, which is probably for the best because the battery life on this camera is terrible, any kind of prolong video shooting would absolutely burn through these batteries in minutes.

That brings me to my next point, my cons. There’s not many but i figured i’d point them out anyways for those who are interested in this camera. these aren’t make it or break it cons, these are just issues that hinder it from being the greatest camera ever released (IMO)

1) battery life, i believe it’s rated for like 220 shots. Ive definitely gotten it to last twice than that. That tiny body processing all that data on some of the tiniest batteries makes sense why it’s so bad. Luckily batteries are cheap and like i said they’re tiny, so they’re pretty easy to carry around!

2) no picture profiles in video. i know i touched on it briefly up above and this camera is mainly a photo camera AAAAAND hybrid cameras were just beginning to grow in popularity around the time this camera came out but it would’ve been amazing to have s-log in this camera for little snippets here and there. i know at the time IG and other photo sharing apps were mainly photo sharing apps, and a camera that was built strictly for photo has no business having usable picture profiles in video.

3) no crop mode in RAW. this one is weird to me because i know the A7Rii has an APS-C mode where you can shoot RAW photos with an inbody crop and there’s times that i’d love to shoot something at 50mm (35mm + sony’s 1.5x aps-c crop). there is a digital zoom option but that’s for jpg only.

4) PRICE!!!! why the fuck is this camera still being sold for $3200??!! this is a 10 year old camera with outdated tech. i bought mine used for $1900 (which is about the price of the fuji x100V at the time of purchase) and i still think that’s a little too much.

that’s really about it aside from minor complaints of not having tele/ wide converters. i’m also sure all of those cons stem from the small battery. I’d love to see all of these corrected in a Mk3 one day, but as of a couple weeks ago sony just discontinued the Rx1rii’s production. I’m being a little hopeful but maybe that means we’re getting a successor, i doubt it but a boy can dream.

I don’t really do reviews or anything but this camera has had my heart for the past 9 months so i had to show it off/ talk about it. this to me in the perfect everyday camera. it never leaves my side and comes with me to any and every trip! Im always blown away by the photos i create with this little camera and i know whenever a mk3 comes out im going to hop on the chance to buy on immediately!

[val-pine]

Parabolan Kitten Statistics!

Hello hello FL community! In the past Feast of the Rose, I have been distributing Lovingly Be-Ribboned Kittens. In this write-up, I wanted to share a bit about the process that went into it, as well as charts breaking down the rough statistics, and my favourite responses to write back! I will keep all of this below a Read More, as there's quite a bit to go through.

The Process

I decided to run a form like this quite soon after finishing up Seeking, just after Christmas. I decided my goal would be to send out at least 100 kittens, and so I set to work gathering the Surface Silk. Some quick research quickly pointed me to the Maze-Gardens, where I busied myself for a few days.

Meanwhile, I set up the form. There were two bits of information I'd need to make a successful delivery: their in-game name, and whether they already owned a Parabolan Kitten. This last bit of information was largely so I could determine the order in which to send out kittens. If I got a lot of responses at once, I would have to prioritise who to send kittens to first. My ordering was thus: no kitten havers first, and then the oldest requests first. I also decided to add a question for fun, lifted from the official FBG survey: how do you prepare your scones? First cream, or first jam? And I figured that I might share the results at a later point, if they were at all interesting.

Somewhere in the wait for the Feast to arrive, I decided a cute idea would be to add a little custom message to every kitten. At that point, I had around 30 responses, which is already quite a lot, so I decided to take a shortcut: if the response was a plain Cream or Jam, the message would be a boilerplate message affirming that choice. If they wrote in something different, the return message would be a bit more elaborate.

That is not to say that the boilerplate message was truly copy-pasted, I did take care to ensure every plate of scones and Parabolan Kitten would be brought by a different character, someone who Valerie Pine, my FLPC, would be able to get in contact with. The final kitten would be brought by herself. On three occasions, an additional gift was sent out - but we'll get to that later.

The Statistics

Now, the moment you've all been waiting for! The statistics. All in all, I received 155 responses on the form. One of these responses, however, was by someone kindly trying to get my numbers up. Luckily, at a later point, I was able to collect the response of someone who was unable to complete the form, thereby still giving me 155 usable responses at the end. I did send out some additional kittens, but unfortunately did not keep record of them. They, as such, won't be counted here.

I was able to fulfill 154/155 requests. Unfortunately, there was one player I was unable to find, despite my best efforts to try and track them down.

Out of the 155 requests, 129 were from people who did not own a Kitten before the Feast of the Rose. The remaining 26 people did already own a Kitten. See the below chart.

As of writing, which is quite soon after sending out the last kittens, 4 have gone unclaimed. Cross-referencing with the spreadsheet reveals all 4 do not already have a kitten. This means that I have, right now, successfully be-kittened 125 previously unkittened accounts.

I tried to balance the gender distribution within the characters delivering the kittens (London is a diverse city, after all). I did moderately well, by my reckoning, but judge for yourself with the chart below:

Lastly, a most important statistic: how did the respondents take their scones? Well, for starters: a fair few people devised creative ways to ensure cream and jam would be applied simultaneously (I've taken to calling them Scone Centrists). Some folks just didn't know what to answer the question with, often invoking nationality. Some people suggested other toppings for the scone, one of the weirdly common ones being butter. Finally, there was a group I didn't know how to classify at all, whom I have labeled other in the graph below.

Highlights

One of the first responses I wrote was in response to someone's IGN being a reference to the Discworld. So naturally, the response had one of its own: a Neathy Rincewind.

It is brought to you by a Nervous Student. He's wearing a lab coat with 'Sciencetist' clumsily embroidered on the back, and he seems like he's quite the runner. He also hands you a box. Inside, there are scones, with jam sensibly applied first.

A Neathy Twoflower does also make an appearance in a different response, as a Bespectacled Tourist.

When I mentioned people often invoked nationality to make clear they didn't know what to put on the scones first, usually this was their own. One person, however, called the question too British. The response was thus:

It is brought to you by what is obviously a pair of urchins in a trenchcoat. While the top urchin tries her best to make her message sound serious from beneath her fake moustache, the bottom urchin can't stop giggling. "Oi chap, 'ere's some scones for you guv, courtesy of Valerie Pine," she says, as she presses a box into your hands. It is slightly grubby, but inside are indeed scones, as well as a jar of jam and a bit of clotted cream.

Someone with rather obvious cat alliances invoked those alliances to refuse to answer the scone question. Naturally, I had them be visited by a possessed artist, to remind them that the cats are not all-powerful.

It is brought to you by a Sibilant Bohemian. "I wouldn't trussst those catsss too much," she hisses, and she hands you a box. Inside are scones with jam and cream applied in precisely the right order, and precisely the right amounts.

Someone was rather adamant about cream going on first. As such, their scones were prepared in the appropriate manner. (Their response was counted as being in favour of cream, for the record)

It is brought to you by a Radical Academic. She also hands you a box. Inside, there are scones, with cream piled on. There is, upon closer inspection, a small dab of jam as well.

Finally, the three special messages, for three special occasions, with three special gifts.

The 100th kitten requested (Additionally received a Lemurian Mask):

It is brought to you by a Bandaged Centennial. He's wearing a Hallowmas mask, out of season. "It's a season to celebrate love, they say. Well, I'm here to remind them that us decrepit fools can love too!" He laughs hoarsely, and then hands you the mask. "Don't tell the Correspondent I gave this to you," he says, and he winks, "Do tell her I gave you this." He hands you a box. Inside are scones, naturally with cream applied first.

Someone responded with love, which I felt was rather appropriate for the season (Additionally received Racy Fungal Themed Poetry):

It is brought to you by a Bazaarine Painter. He also hands you a box. "Always, especially during this season, look to love. It contains many more answers than you'd expect." Inside the box are plain scones. But- oh, what's this? Oh. That's quite the poetry. The Lady in Lilac may be interested in that, too.

The last kitten requested before the form closed (Additionally received a Pink-Painted Cat):

It is brought to you by the Zeefaring Correspondent herself. She also hands you a box. "This'll be the last kitten I'll be sending out this year. Take good care of her, will you? Oh, and enjoy the scones. I've prepared them how you requested." Inside the box are scones, with jam applied first. "I have also taken the opportunity to provide a guardian for the little kitten. They should arrive in just a bit!"

-- -- --

This whole experience has been positively thrilling! I don't know whether I'll be doing the same next year, but I have word that someone is planning something similar at least. I hope everyone who received their kitten enjoys it, I hope everyone who made it to the bottom of this post got through it alright.

[verefex]

Caged Giant

AU story of Sky and Lark meeting (in a cell. Cause he's captured.)

Mild nudity and violence.

The first mistake the celestial giants made was allowing themselves to exist as a corporeal form of flesh.

The second mistake was to assume that humanity would not take advantage of this.

Though massive, colossal in size and power, the titans were still what they were; giant humans. Often taking the form of muscular, masculine humans, the titans were immediately perceived as threats to the much smaller humans of their new world as soon as they appeared.

It didn’t take long after the first titans appeared before the humans waged a war on them. Countless battles of humanity’s finest weapons versus the towering titanic beings, who retaliated with just as much force, shaped the world to how it is today; a kill or capture on-sight order on all titans.

That is not to say that titans themselves did not respond to such threats. While humans, singularly, are smaller than one of their digits, their strength came in numbers. The titans learned very quickly not to underestimate the humans, lest they found themselves being felled or captured by the human’s various contraptions.

The Black Boxes proved to be the most formidable tool against the titans. Forged from an alloy of tungsten and titan blood, these cube-like devices operated via remote control like a drone. Varying in size and sometimes shape, the Black Box was humanity’s greatest achievement, and the titan’s bane.

Though the Boxes may seem like a trivial thing in regards to beating back a towering giant, their unassuming appearance belied a horrifying ability.

The ability to move in any space without regards of obstructions.

Completely indestructible, even from a titan’s perspective, a Black Box could feasibly burrow itself into flesh, bone, rock and stone without any resistance. The Box itself can hover, translate, and rotate on any axis, through any material, in any space. A single Box, though only the size of a small refrigerator, could subdue a 200ft tall titan simply by hovering and pressuring their body, forcing them to the ground. Similarly, Black Chains, made of the same alloy, would be looped around limbs and secured, an inescapable bond.

A titan bound in these chains had no choice but to submit themselves to the will of the Box. And those who controlled the Black Box, controlled the war against titans, and titans themselves.

In a remote location in the northern mountains, a singular titan was being dragged relentlessly across the landscape. His feet, clothed in thick, winter boots, were restrained by loops of Black Chains. His arms flailed wildly as his colossal frame dug trenches in the half-frozen ground, gripping into trees, rocks, and hills with no avail. The Black Box operators drove in a convoy behind him, just out of reach, while the Box itself hovered along, pulling its chains taut around its colossal captive.

The titan was named Sky, and he was taken captive for one reason; to extract his precious and valuable blood. It didn’t matter if he was alive or dead, but keeping him alive was the human’s prerogative, in order to use him as a giant blood bag. The titan’s blood, inky blue in color, would be later refined and reduced into a usable form to be smelted into the indestructible tungsten alloy.

Sky’s clothing, an outfit equipped for the harsh cold, was ripping to shreds as he was dragged over rock and gravel. Soon there would be nothing left to shield his back and stomach from the relentless capture. He cursed himself for falling for the human’s trap; using Black Chains to trip and snare Sky as he walked, blissfully unaware of the danger.

Luckily for the titan, the convoy was approaching their destination. A remote facility in the mountains, where he would be sealed inside their enormous cell, never to see the light of day again. By this time, another loop of chains would appear, controlled with extreme precision to loop around Sky’s wrists. Though weighing easily more than 2 million pounds, the titan was effortlessly lifted by his arms and legs by two black cubes no bigger than his thumbnail.

It must have been quite a spectacle, a giant man lifted high into the air by nearly imperceptible forces, hoisted above the concrete facility and lowered into a cell through two hatch doors. Humanity’s greatest tool at work.

The cell where Sky was lowered into was not crafted for comfort. Three of the four walls were solid concrete, several dozen feet thick and reinforced with steel rebar. The fourth wall was mostly concrete, with a large observational window at the top, spanned by metal walkways. While the glass was certainly thick, it was still breakable by a giant’s fist; if not for the electrified force field surrounding the inside. Any attack against the force field while active would result in an explosive backwards force, propelling any incoming object in the opposite direction.

This huge window would allow the humans on the other side the ability to observe the captive in the cell. As Sky’s huge body lowered into the cell, the man thrashed and fought with all of his might, to no avail. His body thumped on the cell floor and the Black Boxes immediately got to work, deploying robotic limbs from a hatch on the underside of the cube. The limbs gripped the titan’s clothing and stripped him, pulling and lacerating his coat and shirt by the seams, carefully preserving the shape of the patterns while Sky resisted as much as he could with his wrists bound behind his back and his ankles wrapped up.

The humans wasted nothing from the titan. Not only would he be used to collect priceless blood, but quite literally would his clothes be taken from his back. The massive bolts of fabric had their uses, and before long the giant was left wearing nothing but his briefs. At least the humans maintained some level of decency towards their giant captive, or perhaps they simply did not wish to view his private parts from the safety of their glass windows just yet.

Finally, out of one of the trap doors in the concrete walls, a Black Box emerged, equipped with a very large syringe. The device wasted no time in injecting its tip into Sky’s exposed thigh, drawing the plunger back and extracting over a hundred gallons of blood in seconds.

This would be the extent of Sky’s captivity. Bound by wrist and ankle, almost entirely naked on the cold concrete floor of a giant cell, poked and prodded throughout the day by robotic arms. Every now and then the giant’s blue eyes would look up at the window, glaring at the tiny, unassuming humans that monitored his every move.

After one week, Sky’s strength was diminished. The humans offered him meager food and water, barely enough to sustain his massive form. The titan relished the moments at the end of the day when the humans would sleep and cease their sampling, and he’d rest his head back and listen to nothing but the sounds of his stomach groaning.

As the last of the machines hovered along the concrete wall, as if following an invisible circuit, a hatch opened just above the giant’s head. These hatches lined the walls of the cell, concealing tunnels and passageways for the Black Boxes to travel through. As the hatch door opened to receive a Box, something else came out; a human.

This human looked different from the ones who observed the titan from the cell windows. She dressed like a hiker, complete with a backpack to compliment her cargo pants and hiking boots. The human, named Lark, scurried to the entrance of the tunnel, looking down at none other than the giant’s head below her.

“Crap… this is too high…” Lark whispered under her breath, frantically looking around for a different route. Evidently she chose the wrong tunnel to exit out of, but she couldn’t go back… not when a Black Box was approaching the hatch.

As Lark debated her choices, Sky opened his eyes and glanced up at the open hatch above his head. He peered at it curiously, wondering if he was just imagining the small voice he heard from within.

Sure enough, as the Black Box approached the open hatch, Lark had no choice but to jump out of the way… plummeting towards the giant’s face.

Sky’s eyes widened at the approaching human. His mouth watered… and all he saw in this moment was the opportunity to have a snack. He arched his head back and gaped his mouth, its interior bright blue, awaiting the arrival of the unfortunate human.

Lark flailed, seeing the giant’s open mouth below her. It all happened so quickly; she landed on Sky’s soft tongue neatly instead of splatting on the concrete floor below. But the view did not last; the giant was eager to sustain himself.

As Sky began hungrily closing his mouth, aiming to seal Lark inside, she began shouting from the confines of his lips.

“Wait!! Don’t eat me, I-I can help you!” Lark shouted in terror as the giant’s mouth closed around her. Saliva flooded around her body, seeping into her clothing. Oh god, this was not the end she wanted to ever have.

Luckily, the titan heard her pleas. He halted, deliberating now on how beneficial it would be if he swallowed a potential lock pick. Lark bit her lip, refraining as best she could from panicking. This giant was hungry… starving, even. She had to be careful if she wanted to get out of this alive.

“Mhm?” Sky mumbled, his mouth still closed tight with Lark inside. He had little reason to trust her words, being a human and all. But maybe, just maybe, if he spared her… they could mutually benefit from it.

“Uhh… ah… okay. Yes, if you let me go, I can disable the Boxes!” Lark squeaked as her tiny, pitiful body began slowly slipping down towards the giant’s gullet. Things were looking bleak. She could hear the growling guts bubbling below, deep within the titan’s body.

Suddenly, the giant’s mouth opened. Lark gasped and fumbled along Sky’s enormous tongue until her head peeked out from his parted lips. At last, she was freed from the horrible belly of the beast. She looked out at the titan’s body, which was propped up against the wall. His arms were bound behind his back, and his ankles wrapped tightly together.

Sky tilted his head forwards, and Lark tumbled out of his mouth and onto his vast, bare chest. He looked at the human on his body forlornly, realizing she wasn’t all that much of a meal now that he saw how tiny she was compared to him. She looked quite disheveled, her blonde hair a tangled, slimy mess.

Lark gazed up at the giant, feeling even smaller under his icy gaze. The air was cold in his cell… but his body beneath her was warm. He spared her life… for a lie.

She didn’t know what to tell him now that she was face to face. Whatever she screamed from inside his mouth moments before was nothing but a bluff.

“Well?” Sky rumbled, staring down at the tiny woman on his chest. He gestured with his shoulders and head towards his enormous back, where his wrists were bound. “Can you start with freeing my hands?”

Lark shuddered. She started glancing around the cell, frantically searching for an escape.

“Uhh…” She muttered as she started to scoot herself backwards along the giant’s torso. Sky’s face grew more and more suspicious.

Suddenly, Lark stood up and leapt down the titan’s belly, sliding down his middle. She did not look back when the titan growled and twisted his colossal body towards her as she fled across the floor.

“Hey!” Sky bellowed, rattling his chains as he instinctively tried to reach for the fleeing woman. His hands remained bound as Lark darted away from him. With no hands to grab, the giant rolled onto his side and stretched his neck out, mouth open, and snapped his teeth just inches away from her backpack.

Lark’s heart beat rapidly as she narrowly avoided his teeth. She ran in the other direction, back towards his middle, where his mouth couldn’t reach.

Sky growled angrily, watching the human dart towards his body, hiding out of sight. With his hands bound, he could only lay uncomfortably on his side, his freedom of movement almost completely restricted. He seemed to have used up the last of his strength to snap at her, and he lay still now, breathing heavily.

“I spared you…” Sky groaned, closing his eyes. He could still taste the human in his mouth… if only he just went with his gut.

Lark huddled in the shadow of the giant’s body, facing the irony of sheltering herself with the body of the giant that sought to devour her. If he wasn’t bound, she’d already been snatched up. Seems that her luck had not run out just yet, even if her plan was ruined instantly by her poor choice of exit.

The room was silent, except for the sound of the giant’s labored breathing. Lark placed her hand on her chest to quiet her own breathing as she glanced around, surrounded on all sides by Sky’s towering frame. Straying from her current position would place her back in range of the titan’s teeth… what was she to do?

“I… I’m sorry.” Lark said in a hushed tone, nearly only audible to herself. “I don’t think I can free you, giant. I just… didn’t want to be eaten.”

Sky heard her words and sighed. “Yeah. I guess that’s fair. You’re just trying to survive too, I suppose.” He groaned as his stomach contracted and growled, sending hunger pangs through his middle. All he could think about now was filling his belly.

Lark shuddered at the sound of the titan’s guts. To think she almost ended up in there…

“Hey. I’m Sky. What’s your name, little one?” Sky said as he craned his head downwards, attempting to get Lark into view. He eyed her standing just beside his chest.

“Oh… um, I’m Lark.” Lark said in a bewildered tone as she stared up at the titan’s face. She instinctively backed up a few steps, not yet trusting the titan, even though he could easily roll over and crush her at this moment.

“Lark… so… what are you doing here?” Sky asked softly. His eyes glanced upwards at the trap door she fell out of. “I’ve never seen humans slide out of one of those before.”

Lark bit her lip and pulled apprehensively at her backpack straps. She found it quite awkward to speak so casually with this titan who was moments away from swallowing her whole.

“I, uh, well I was trying to gain access to this place. Not here, no… the laboratory.” Lark spoke warily, realizing that there were likely cameras monitoring everything in the cell. “Those hatches are everywhere in here. But I guess I went through the wrong one and…”

“Mmm. So you’re a burglar.” Sky chuckled.

“Hey, I wasn’t here to steal! It was to spy.” Lark retorted, which only made Sky laugh even more.

“Better keep your voice down. If the other humans find out you’re trespassing, who knows what will happen~” The titan rumbled as he grunted and rolled back, propping himself against the wall again. Lark suddenly felt very exposed as the titan’s body moved away from her, leaving her out in the open in the middle of the cell.

“H-hey, wait…” She called, and Sky merely smiled as he stared down at her. She looked so small, standing there where he was just laying.

“Y’know, I know a great place for you to hide.” The titan smirked as he ran his blue tongue across his lips.

Lark winced as she witnessed this. Grimacing, the human tore her backpack off and started rummaging through it. Sky watched her do so with interest.

“Okay. Listen, Sky… I have some tools here.” Lark said as she produced a few metal tools from her backpack, in various shapes and sizes. “I can try to hack into the boxes and release your chains… but you have to promise not to eat me.”

“Hmm.” Sky muttered as he narrowed his brows at her. “Can you really do it? This isn’t another bluff, is it?”

“I… will try.” Lark sighed. The odds were narrow, but what other choice did she have? “We’re trapped in here together, so we might as well try to work it out, right?”

“I suppose.” Sky rumbled as he glanced up at the ceiling. Once his chains were loose… the next plan was to get out of the cell. He guessed that the only way out was in the way he came, through those huge trap doors.

“You’re not going to try to eat me, right?” Lark asked as she rummaged through her bag once more.

“For now.” Sky retorted.

“That’s not reassuring.” Lark huffed.

“Fine. I won’t eat you.” The giant said lowly as he gazed down at the human. “Just don’t mess up…”

“I will do my best.” Lark nodded as she walked towards the giant’s back. His towering form was certainly imposing, even with his hands bound behind him. The chains that wrapped around his wrists were surprisingly thin compared to the titan’s hands, though their strength came from the alloy, not the thickness of the links. The chains were tight around each wrist, with a black control box holding each loop together.

Lark bit her lip. She was now behind the giant, who was leaning against the concrete wall with his hands resting on the floor. Just one of his fingers was bigger than she was.

Tentatively, she placed one foot on Sky’s upward palm, glancing up at his titanic body, which did not flinch. She steeled herself and climbed onto the giant’s hand, scooting herself along until she could reach the bonds.

Sky rested his head against the wall, lips twitching with curiosity as he felt the tiny creature scramble onto his hand. He craned his head to the side, trying to catch a glimpse of the action, but his shoulders were simply too broad to accommodate. He could only sit still as the human got to work in his hands.

As Lark fidgeted with the lock box, she realized this would be harder than she thought. The box itself was solidly constructed, with no screws, bolts, or rivets. Even the chains themselves seemed to attach themselves to the box with nothing aside from some invisible force. As her fingers trailed along the metal alloy, she took note of the blue sheen of the metal; the shimmering titan’s blood that gave the Black Boxes their devastating ability to bypass physics.

Hours passed, and Lark tinkered and toyed with every possible tool at her disposal. The chains did not loosen. She found herself slumping into Sky’s palm to rest, a small and unexpected comfort in that cold cell.

Sky himself had drifted to sleep, and took no notice of the human curled up in his bound hands. The morning had come, and as he stirred, the facility had once again come to life around him. The familiar sounds of the hatch doors opened, and out came Black Box devices, setting straight to work on the titan’s blood extraction.

“Lark.” Sky whispered, curling his fingers until they discovered the tiny woman’s form. Lark let out a surprised squeak as she was gently squeezed in Sky’s hand.

“Hey-” she exclaimed, but immediately was silenced as Sky squeezed her tighter, muffling her voice.

“Shh. Stay in my hand. They’ll see you.” He spoke in hushed tones as his blue eyes darted around. Judging from the pressure on his wrists, he realized that Lark did not succeed with the plan. He groaned.

Lark squirmed briefly in his hand, then relaxed when she realized he was merely concealing her. Luckily, she was already hidden behind the titan’s massive body, in his hand which was against the wall. It was very unlikely that she would be seen, and as the day went on, Lark quietly worked at the chains.

Sky felt his energy dwindling even lower. No food or water was offered to him today, and his body was beginning to develop bruises and sores from the concrete. Oddly enough, his only comfort was knowing and feeling Lark busy herself with the attempt to break his chains, working throughout the day in the comfort of his giant, warm hand.

Lark’s tools proved ineffective against the alloy. Her last ditch method involved a metal rasp, in which she used on one of the chain links until the surface was rubbed bare.

The night came yet again, and as the facility shut down for the evening, the pair was left where they started. Trapped.

“Nothing worked, huh.” Sky rumbled, his eyes shut as he slumped against the wall.

“I… I tried…” Lark uttered as her hands shook from the exertion. She herself was becoming fatigued, and still they were no closer to breaking through the chains.

“Well. You put forth a good effort.” The titan said quietly as he leaned back and gave Lark a gentle, reassuring squeeze. For all he knew, the human could have spent the entire time messing around and deceiving him. But in this moment, Sky had to admit, he enjoyed having her in his hand.

Lark wiped her brows and put all of her tools back in her bag. She slowly climbed out of Sky’s hand, which she had become almost accustomed to. The human walked along the giant’s body until she was in view of his gaze.

The two met eyes. Neither were filled with much hope.

Sky glanced down at the tiny human beside him and let out a chuckle. “Heh. Thanks for providing me some company, at least.” He rumbled as he leaned his head back and looked up at the hatch that Lark originally came out of. “I’ve been wondering if any more humans would come out of there.” He gazed forlornly at the hatch.

Lark followed his gaze upwards, staring at the black, metal access hatch.

“I have an idea.” She said suddenly, and Sky lowered his gaze to look at her.

“Oh?” He asked curiously.

“You have to trust me, though.” Lark added.

“Alright. What’s the plan?” Sky asked confidently.

Lark braced herself. She gazed up at the towering titan, his imposing frame filling her vision. Despite their initial meeting, she found herself trusting the giant in kind. Their predicament surely helped in forcing an alliance between the two.

“If you help me get into that hatch… I can make my way to the control room.” Lark said as she pointed at the hatch and trailed her finger around the cell. “From there, I can disable all the Black Boxes and open the main trapdoors.”

Sky stared down at the human, then gazed up at the metal, reinforced trapdoors above him. They were quite high… but perhaps if he was able to stand up and be free of his chains, he could reach.

“… you’d do that? Why?” The giant asked quietly as he stared back down at Lark. There was no reason for her to risk her neck and sneak into the control room after escaping the hatch.

“I… guess I owe you one. Y’know, for not eating me.” Lark admitted. She did not forget about her recent experience in Sky’s mouth.

Sky sighed and gave Lark a sly look. That option was still not off the table for him. But, he decided it was best to put his faith into Lark’s tiny self.

“Fair enough.” He nodded. “So… how do you plan to get up here?” The giant added with an amused smile.

Lark bit her lip as she looked up and down the bound titan’s body. With no way to use his hands to lift her, Sky was reduced to nothing more than a huge pillar of flesh.

Huffing to herself, Lark marched up to the giant’s waistband and grabbed hold, hoisting herself up along the edge of his briefs. Sky watched in utter amusement as the tiny woman climbed up his underwear as if scaling a rock face.

“Ooh. Better be real careful. There’s not much to grip on to up here.” Sky chuckled as Lark collected herself, standing on his groin. The woman huffed again and marched up along the giant’s soft tummy.

“Don’t distract me, please.” Lark retorted as she steadily moved up the sloping torso of the titan. His stomach was squishy, not at all toned and muscular like one would expect of a giant. Her feet sunk into his gut as she walked, which threw off her balance.

Sky squirmed under the tiny human’s touch. Her dainty movements across his stomach tickled him more than he expected.

“Mmm… heh.” The giant uttered as he stiffened his shoulders to brace himself for the inevitable ascent of the little human up his body. “If only I had my hands. Cripes.” Sky muttered in disdain as he had no choice but to sit still and allow himself to be climbed.

“I’m not trying to tickle you…” Lark huffed as she clambered up the middle of the titan’s pillowy pectorals. The access hatch was directly above Sky’s head… which meant she’d be within biting distance as she scaled his shoulders. Her gaze focused on the titan’s mouth as she climbed.

Sky followed her gaze, and chuckled. He couldn’t help but playfully bite his lower lip, which caused Lark to pause.

“… don’t.” Lark pointed up at Sky, as if scolding a rambunctious pet.

“I’m teasing.” The giant droned. “It wouldn’t be very productive if I ate you at this point.”

“Productive.” Lark repeated, mockingly, as she scaled his collarbone and reached his shoulder. The giant side-eyed her, then leaned closer as she stood on top of his broad shoulders.

“Almost there. You ready?” Sky asked softly, and Lark nodded visibly to him.

“I’m ready…” The woman said as she looked up at the top of Sky’s head. His short, black hair looked quite soft. She imagined she’d have to scale up the thick sideburns of the titan’s jaws to get to the top.

However, Sky merely angled his head down and presented the back of his neck. From her position on his shoulder, it was a steady climb up along his trapezoid and finally the back of his skull.

Lark was quite thankful that the titan was so thoughtful. He didn’t have to make this easier for her… but perhaps that was just his nature. As she climbed along the back of Sky’s neck, Lark started to wonder what made humans wage war on titans in the first place. There was nothing quite like the view from atop the giant’s head as he leveled it, with Lark nestled into his hair.

The two sat there quietly for a moment, waiting for the hatch to open and receive the last of the Boxes. Lark held on to Sky’s hair, looking around the cell from her mountainous perch. It was like she was a small bird, settling down to nest.

“Well… stay safe in there.” Sky said quietly as the hatch opened. He stretched his neck up so the top of his head was level with the entrance of the hatch.

Lark stared anxiously into the darkness of the tunnel. She took a deep breath and crawled forward, entering it.

“I’ll try.” She responded bravely as she disappeared into the hole. Shortly afterwards, a Box came along its invisible patrol route and entered the hatch, sealing the door behind.

And then, Sky was alone yet again. He sat there silently, listening intently for Lark’s journey. All was silent.

With no other choice but to wait, the giant closed his eyes and hoped, prayed, for release.

And after one hour later… the alarms blared.

Sky’s eyes shot open as the sirens and lights lit up the facility. A loud hissing noise came from his shackles, and the chains slid off.

The giant pulled his arms out from behind him for the first time. He examined his hands in front of his face, then looked past them, at the observation window of his cell.

From within, he could see the security force closing in on the trespasser. With one final motion, the quick figure typed in one last array of code, and a loud creak came from the ceiling. The top hatch slowly opened.

Lark gave the giant one last look through the glass as she was seized by guards. A smile ran across her lips. Her task was complete.

CRASH!

An enormous hand came towards her. With the force field dropped, Sky’s fist burst through the glass effortlessly.

His broad fingers enveloped Lark and three of the guards. The titan drew his fist back towards his face, where he opened his palm. In the midst of three other people, Lark stood out easily with her red jacket and small frame.

Sky plucked Lark out from the midst of the guards, clutching her tenderly in his other hand while the guards were quickly tipped into his open mouth, disappearing down his throat.

Lark was clutched firmly within the confines of Sky’s hand, but she managed to peek through Sky’s fingers and see him reaching through the window, relentlessly grabbing handfuls of people and devouring them. The sight was horrifying, but Lark tried to remind herself that this was inevitable… a starving titan seeking revenge for the atrocities committed on him. She was just happy that it wasn’t her getting eaten this time...

“Good work, little one.” Sky rumbled once the place had been emptied, turning his gaze towards the trembling woman in his palm. Though he had just devoured a dozen humans, his face was soft. Lark gazed up at him, nodding shyly back in approval.

“Let’s get out of here.” The titan uttered as he stood up to his full height and reached up to the open hatch doors above him. He placed one hand on the edge of the gateway, then looked down at Lark in his free hand. Without hesitation, the titan brought Lark up to his mouth and opened up, placing her on his tongue gently before closing.

Lark squeaked nervously from within the giant’s maw, expecting to be swallowed.

But Sky was careful with her, and merely held her safe in his jaws as he used both free hands to pull himself out of the cell. The giant emerged, illuminated by spot lights along his almost fully nude frame. Before backup could arrive, he moved swiftly, his enormous legs carrying him easily along the terrain.

“I won’t swallow you.” Sky mumbled as he ran, deep into the mountains, where he would lay low for a while.

“D-Do you have to keep me in your mouth though??” Lark retorted, wincing as her clothes were again soaked by titan saliva.

“No pockets.” Sky muttered, amused.

After running several miles into the hills, Sky hunkered himself down in the thick pine forest. He knelt down and brought his hands up to his face, gazing at the raw strips along his wrists and ankles before holding his hands out and plopping Lark onto them from his warm mouth.

Lark sprawled on his hand for a moment before laying on her back and staring up at Sky’s enormous face. She winced after a moment, then sat up and started wiping saliva off her face.

“I’m starting to notice a trend here…” she muttered, cleaning herself. With no response from Sky, she glanced back up at him, taken aback by his expression.

He looked as if he was about to cry.

“...Sky?” She said softly, staring up at his sparkling blue eyes.

The titan blinked, then smiled. He brought Lark even closer to his face as he breathed on her.

“You really did it. You came back and risked your life to save me.” He breathed, his throat starting to hitch.

Lark stared up at the enormous face before her, feeling his breath wash over her. She reached up tentatively and touched the tip of Sky’s nose.

“Ah… I couldn’t just leave you in there to die.” Lark said with a soft smile. She gazed into the titan’s beautiful, glistening eyes.

She touched his nose, and Sky brought her entire body against his face and snuggled into it. Lark became breathless as she was embraced wholly by Sky’s face, his nose, lips, and cheeks pressed her into the back of his hand.

“Sky…?” Lark squeaked, unable to move in his embrace.

Sky merely responded with a soft grunt as he nuzzled his face into his small companion. He had never been so intimate with a human before… her smallness tickled him in an unfamiliar, but welcome way.

He pulled away, glancing at her confused little face.

“Best hug I could manage.” He admitted sheepishly. “I’m really grateful to you. We make a great team, don’t you think?”

Lark lay sprawled in Sky’s hand as he gazed at her. His expression towards her was much softer than before.

“We do make a great team!” Lark replied with a couple firm pats against the titan’s palm. An unlikely friendship between a human and a titan in the midst of an ongoing war.

Now that he was freed, Sky suddenly felt his exhaustion come over him all at once. He heaved a sigh and curled up on the cold ground, clutching Lark in his hand as he fell asleep. Lark squeaked in surprise, then relaxed.

“Trapped again.” She laughed, and snuggled into the giant’s palm.

[four-alligators-in-a-trenchcoat]

Transitioning to a Flip Phone: Beginning

As my semester started winding down, and finals started ranking up I found myself going back to the ever-present though of transitioning to a flip phone. I finally did it! Here is how it is going. I had done tons of research about transitioning to a flip phone months before hand, I didn't have many requirements like needing WhatsApp or any particular apps as I had access to my computer for specific things such as banking and schoolwork. I ended up going with the Sunbeam Bluebird for a couple reasons, despite its price. (also I just wrote it off as a reward for completing my semester lol)

Accessibility: I knew I wanted a T9 flip phone, a QRTY keyboard would have never worked for me at a flip phone size, woe to my fine motor skills. Voice-to-text is an option if you pay for the subscription (I do) and so although I try to exclusively type as a way to get proficient, longer more urgent texts can be sent quickly. Its very accurate as well! Restrictions: No social media! No googling! No videos! Nothing! Its all I have ever wanted from a flip phone, restriction wise. Instagram reels is/was such an addiction for me, and even with time-limits, greyscale, and just un-downloading it, I always came back to scroll. I was debating on whether or not I wanted a search engine, because although I love to google all the random questions I have, I also will absolutely read on AO3 for as much time as I can possibly allocate to that. Although I am not a huge fan of reading FF on the laptop, its a small workaround for the benefits im seeing. On the case of music: Spotify, I REALLY wanted to keep this as an app, but knew that with what I was looking for I would need to take that loss. I can download music onto the phone through an SD card, and it still has bluetooth which means I am still able to use my noise-cancelling headphones. Additionally, I mainly listen to music while im studying, which means I can just listen through my laptop; and I dont mind driving in silence. Basic Qualifications: Number one, navigation, Im in an area where the construction is crazy and I cant always rely on road signs. I live out in the country, so I havent needed or had the chance to memorize anything other than my usual routes and highways. Luckily, the Bluebird has Waze (which I had never used before) but it works really well! I will need to find a way to attach it to my dash so I'm not looking down at my lap though... I mentioned bluetooth in restrictions, but it was important to me that I could connect my QuiteComfort Bose headphones, especially being on a loud college campus and needing some peace and quiet to study properly.

The transitionary phase was incredibly easy, I have an AT&T phone plan and I just switched my SIM card from my iPhone to my Bluebird. Boom. Done. I imported my contacts with a MicroSD card which was equally as efficient. I can still access and use Messages on my MacBook, but they don't sync to my flip phone. All messages go through to the device I last messaged on. I did have to manually set up my voicemail, but that didnt take much effort.

The only difficulties I have had to deal with is that both my job and my school require apps for two-factor authentication. I believe I can work around that for my school, and get authentication codes by text message, but for my work I don't have that option. This is a big reason why I am considering keeping my iPhone useable, just without a SIM.

On the note of what I am going to do with my iPhone, for right now it is being kept charged and usable, because I'm still transitioning some of the information (like menstrual trackers) and the mentioned need for TFA. Another PRO about the Bluebird is that it does have hotspot capabilities, so Im assuming I would be able to connect my iPhone if I was ever out in the wild and needed to use it, assuming of course that I had taken my iPhone with me.

Day 3 Final Overview:

I have gotten quicker at typing on the T9 predictive keyboard and feel confident responding to messages without using text-to-speech. I also figured out how to attach media to my messages, which means everybody is receiving grainy low-quality pictures of my cats. Im finding that I have so much extra time to do things during the day. Where keeping up with household chores sometimes gets overwhelming by becoming a huge task to schedule into my day, I can do smaller things during downtime. Reheating some food for lunch? Five minuets in the toaster? Boom, I can clean off the counters, sweep the floor, and pick up a little as I wait. That makes such a huge impact on my day-to-day especially compared to the 40 reels I could have seen and than totally forgotten. I learned how to change the ring-tones for my contacts and notifications. There is a 'wolf howling' option that has been dedicated to my friends, of course. The little jingle of my phone can only mean that someone has texted me, so I'm less paranoid about notifications and the urge to pick up my phone whenever I see the screen light up. That was such a huge distraction in my day, picking up my iPhone to check my notifications quickly turned into a 'quick scroll' through Pinterest (my beloved) or Instagram, which was constantly detrimental to my studies. In overview, I'm having a good time and I'm excited to stick with it, especially as winter break approaches (TWO MORE FINALS LEFT LETS GO) and I have a ton of free time I would have spent on my phone. I'm excited to start reading more!

[yin-shimo]

Hello, love your CC conversion to different body types! I’d like to know, is it too difficult to convert? I love some of SMSims' female clothes, but it's impossible to wear them because they all come with a BBL and a G-cup… not usable for a petite Sim hahaha. Have you ever made a tutorial or know someone who has?

😭😭😭i know exactly what you mean. luckily converting their stuff to the regular EA mesh should be easier than an entire frame conversion!!!

and yes i have a tutorial actually (linked in my last ask) you’d just be skipping certain steps like redoing weights or uv1 since it’d still be for regular fem-frame sims

[kirbybecomesastarwarrior]

KBASW Chapter: 1 The Nightmares of Reality 

“Well I guess that’s the last of it!" jeered Gus.

*Bang

He plopped the last of the piece of lumber. Putting it with the rest of the menagerie of materials they gathered. Everyone in Cappy Town was scrambling around, pulling from the charred remains of their homes… Trying to salvage whatever they could find.

After the Destroya attack, the whole town was left incinerated. What was left of their little village was a burnt, empty hollow husk of what it once was. Buildings and houses were charred, roads were uprooted, and the giant oak tree that once stood proudly in the middle of the square was gone. 

It's been a week since then...

But despite that, all the townsfolk were in good spirits, still pumped up on their success. Those who were there regaled their peers with the details of their journey. Extremely proud of their success… How they “went to the heart of NME’S lair and destroyed the place, they were heroes!” 

~Even though technically a good portion of them didn’t do anything but hey, it was still “a win” ...

But more importantly, hearing this gave the other cappies a can-do attitude. It was that type of infectious attitude that made them believe “we can do anything”, giving them the willingness to work.  Even the kids were helping out, especially Kirby. 

The pink puffball was in the middle of helping Kawasaki yank out his old pan. It was buried under the roof; it jammed in a small pocket of debris. Luckily he was small enough to wiggle his way in through. Kawasaki anxiously waited, praying it wasn’t still usable. 

*Pop*

Kirby emerged triumphantly out of the rubble. He waddled over with his pan; it was still in one piece.

 “Thanks, Kirby,” he said as he happily hugged his beloved frying pan. “I’ll make sure you're the first person to eat at my restaurant once it reopens!”

"Poyo, poyo!" he cheered. Excited at the prospect of eating there again.

"Hey, can someone help me out?", Gengu asked. "My old sign is stuck!"

Before leaving, the chef thanked Kirby once again then,... Zoom, he was off on to help the next person. The whole incident really brought the town together. It was a chaotic but lively scene.

And at the center of all this chaos was Fumu. She was busy directing townsfolk around where to put everything. Looking and checking the quality of their findings. 

“Alright, everyone, let's get organized!” Fumu called out. Quickly she whipped out a pen and clipboard and started to write. She carefully counted: jointing down all the things they had managed to save amongst the wreckage. 

~GAAHH

Soon her brother made his way toward the town square with two fists full of trash bags. Brugglingly dragging them across...Unlike the rest of the town, he was in a foul mood. Before he even had the chance to set them down.

“Bun, trash doesn’t go there-” 

“Aw, come on!” Bun whined, "Everything looks like trash right now!” Gesturing arms to the state of the town. Then he angrily yanked his two trash bags together and propped himself up beside them. Making a scene in the middle of town.

Everyone paused for a moment to watch the spectacle. "We've been working all day." he continued. "Can't we take it easy... my whole body's starting to feel sore!?"

Hearing this, everyone suddenly started to recall their aches and bruises too. They had indeed been working all day. And soon, work on the town halted all at once.

"Now that you mentioned it, my back starting to feel sore," Professor Curio called out. He started stretching and then.

*CRACK

"Ahh, my back" Curio sunk down to the ground. "I'm too sore to go on."

"Oh, me too...," Mabel said as she looked down at them. "At this rate, my calluses will have calluses." She dropped to the ground and leaned up against the remains of the old oak tree. "Perhaps we should all take a break."

"Mabel's got the right idea: we've earned it." Samo agreed. He made his way to sit beside her, with Mabel happily making room for him. The lively bartender was holding a big wooden crate under his arm.

He sat down and opened up the top. "I have some drinks I managed to find if anyone interested." It was filled with a colorful array of cold sodas and drinks. They shined beautifully under the boiling sun, like a trove of treasure. Making them look irresistible to any weary Cappy.

"I have some instants from the grocery store... might as well eat'em!" Tuggle soon joined in. He came carrying two boxes of food. They were filled with convenience store lunches and instant meals.

Soon all the townfolk dropped their things and took up Samo and Tuggle's offer. Lining up to get their free food and drink. Some of the other cappies started to take out snacks and share them with each other. They all began to walk away from the construction site and into the open field to enjoy their lunch.

It soon became a lively town picnic, much to Fumu's dismay.

"Wait a minute... we were making such good progress..." the young girl explained as she pointed at her clipboard. "We're almost done! We can start rebuilding soon-"

Mayor Len walked up beside her. "Fumu, I really appreciate your work ethic, but..." He gestured to the townsfolk. Everyone was comfortably relaxing and talking amongst themselves. Laying on the grass, taking in the sun... They were all dead set on taking a break. "I'd hate to be the one to put a damper on this!"

"He's right, dear!" his wife, Hana, chimed in.

She was all smiles carrying two bags of food and drink for her family. "Maybe, it's a sign we should call it a day: after all, it'd be a shame to waste such lovely weather." She leaned on her husband's shoulder. "Besides, we have all the time in the world."

"You know what, my darling... you make an excellent point!" he happily agreed with her. Taking his wife by the arm, he turned to the Fumu. "My child, lighten up; there's no more of this monster nonsense: problems solved, everything is fine now."

"Yeah, right... everything's fine." Fumu watched as the mayor was led away by his wife. She stared at them, laughing and chatting away: as if nothing was wrong. She soon became lost in thought, his words ringing in her ear.

~Everything's fine he says but why don't I feel fine-

“ Yeah, lighten up, sis!" Bun joined her once again. He came over with two sandwiches and soda pops. He offered her one of the drinks. "Don't be a killjoy for once here, have some-?”

*Smack

Swiftly she slapped the can out of his hand. "Oh, you just had to complain, didn't you?!" she scolded her brother. "Now they've stopped working!" She recoiled instantly after realizing what she had done.

Her brother wasn't having any of it, he snapped back. "Hey, what's your problem-."

"I DON'T KNOW!"

That caught him off guard... a silence settled between them. Her body seemed lifeless after that, but he could see her shaking. It was as if she was trying to shrink herself smaller and a sight: he had never seen before...

His strong-headed, hot-tempered, fearless older sister; was-...actually, he didn't know what she was at that moment.

“Hey sis... are you ok-“

“You guys gotta get back to the castle!” two small squeaky voices cried out.

Lololo and Lalala had suddenly appeared: the twins zooming towards the siblings with great speed. Both looked panicked and out of breath.

"Woah, Lololo Lalala; what's the rush?"

"JUST HURRY; WE'LL EXPLAIN ON THE WAY!" Lalala was in a panic. Immediately pushing them to run. Causing both brother and sister to forget something very important... and they weren't the only ones.

~

"Hey, where's Kirby?" Buttercup (Cheif Bookem's wife) asked.

Everyone was about to finish their meals when they realized the little pink puffball was nowhere to be seen. Which was an oddity of init of itself; Kirby was always where food was. The first one to nap and take a break... But the little orb was nowhere to be seen.

*Thunk *Thunk *Thunk

There was a loud hammering in the distance.

" I know that sound, Gengu said, "that's my hammer..."

Everyone followed the sound of the banging... It was only a hammer, but for some reason, there was something ominous about it. As if it was a prelude to something terrible.

The sight that awaited them was something they didn't expect. All the garbage and debris they left to clean was gone. Charred remnants of the town that still needed to be swept vanished. It was spotless...

The town was ready for reconstruction!?

What had happened was while everyone was away, Kirby continued to work. Cleaning up everyone's mess. Inhaling all the garbage and gathering up all the lumber by himself.

And at the center, Kirby was banging on the wooden log: a pitiful attempt to rebuild a house. Mayor Len was the first one to approach Kirby. "You didn't hear me call for a break: you can stop now-"

*Thunk *Thunk*Thunk

Despite his words, Kirby pressed on; as if he were in a trance. More people arrived at the scene, even more concerned now. Calling out to him: telling him "he could stop now."

*Thunk *Thunk*Thunk

But the little pink puffball would not budge: as if he were on autopilot. Hammering away, creating an unsettling requiem with it... Tuning them out.

*Thunk *Thunk *PING-

It was: Kawasaki; he halted Kirby's hammer with his frying pan own. The vibration of the metal finally made him stop; he turned to him and asked. "Kirby, what's wrong... why are ya still hammering away?"

The child slowly tilted his head to Kawasaki, meeting his eyes.

He finally got a glimpse of Kirby's face; he saw it. A dullness had come over Kirby's eyes. Dimming the brilliant blue of his eyes, the sparkle they once adorned it. The life of them was gone. A sight that made Kawaski quiver.

The small child looked away, lowering his head. And in a soft coo, he answered... "Po-yo...my fault-"

~Huh!? They were flabbergasted at his answer. And then, in response, Kirby gestured his little arms to the wreckage of the town... Tracing it back to what he was doing.

"What ?!" The Chief spoke out, "Who told you that-"

~Uh oh, they were the ones.

They were ready and willing to kick him out before Meta Knight came to the rescue with the Halberg. And here they were, treating him normally... pretending that little incident never happened.

But he remembered... Kirby remembered.

Everyone in the square gave each other that look -"OH MY GOD, how could we have forgotten that..."

"Kirby, you don't have to do that" Gengu swiftly swiped the hammer away from him out of shame. "Besides, we didn't mean it." He patted the little puffball's head, awkwardly reassuring him.

"Oh yes, you did!?" a snarly voice said. " Ya'll were practically ready to get the pitchforks and run'em out of town!" The sound of the voice came from the sky.

It was Tokkori; he had just arrived at the scene. He landed at the top of an old lamp pole (the remains of it). He continued on. "And you would have if Metal Head didn't come to the rescue with that big old ship of his."

"Kirby, don't listen to him: we didn't mean that honest... none of us meant it!" Samo was quick to shame Tokkori's. "Tokkori, apologize to Kirby!"

"Apologize, HA!" Tokkori answered back with even more fire in his! "What about all the times ya treated him like he had half a brain cell... not like guys were wrong but... I have never seen you guys apologize for that."

"Half the time you guys get tricked or side with Dedede!" He shrugged his shoulders. "You guys flop sides faster than a fish... " Tokkori began to chuckle. "You never apologized for that either...But then again it's not surprising, given how little he matters to ya..."

"Hey yeah, no good bird!", Tuggled called out. "STUFF IT!" He hucked a water bottle in an attempt to shut him up. Soon the others joined to silence him and get him away before he said anything else.

Tokkori was mad, but he was determined to prove his point. He went to the center of the square and flew even higher; so they could all see him. At this point, he was beet red, with anger ready to unleash his rage...

“HYPOCRITES! YOU’RE ALL HYPOCRITES!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. "AS SOON A PROBLEM COMES ALONG, YA BLAME HIM! AND WHEN HE FIXES IT, YA FORGIVE AND FORGET! IF HE DIDN'T FIX THIS MESS, SURELY YOU WOULD'VE KICKED HIM OUT... YOU'RE ALL TOO JUST COWARDLY, TO TELL THE TRUTH!"

In a sorry attempt to disprove Tokkori's claim, the townspeople pushed Mayor Len to the center.

"You know what we were... we were, we were-." the mayor fumbled with his words. He was panicked; he looked towards the crowd hoping that someone could retort back.

"Tell..."

"Huh!?"

They all turned around in unison. Not prepared for what they were about to see. What stood before them was no longer the fearless hero they had known, but a sad hurt little boy...

The little child started to tremble with tears in his eye. He looked at the townspeople. In a small wavering voice, he uttered again, "Tell..." Taking a deep breath, he spoke again in a tone he had never used before, which shook the cappies, "TELL KABI!"

He wanted the truth: were they really going to throw him out? After everything they've been through. Would they do it again? He had to know... But none of them had an answer for him.

"What's wrong; cat got ya tongues," soon Tokkori wore a smug grin on his face. " Face the truth... A monster exterminator; that's all Junior is to you!"

"That's not true at all! " Mabel said in response. "We all love-"

"Kirby do this..., Kirby destroy this, Kirby suck up that, Kirby kill that, Kirby save us from that!" he mocked. "As long as he gets the job done, you don't give a hoot!"

He flew around the town square as if he was doing a victory lap. He enjoyed their seeing sad, shameful faces; as they all stood there in silence. But that wasn't good enough for him.

"Once he messes up again, you'll find another reason to kick him out: you'll see." He landed right on top of the mayor's hat; to take one final jab at all of them. " Or maybe not, since there's no more monster to fight... who needs him-"

*sniffle*sniffle

In all his narcissism, he didn't even think about Kirby.

"What I was just saying was the truth-" Then he saw it... The last hint of sparkle that once shone in Kirby's eyes vanished. And replaced with a haunted hallow shadow. And all that was left was an empty VOID...

For once in his life, Tokori he knew... he went too far.

"Kir- Kirby I..." Before he could even justify his actions, Kirby fleed the scene, disheartened. Pushing and shoving everyone out of the way, with tears in his eyes. Unable to face any of them.

Soon a mob formed around Tokkori.

“Tokkori, look what you’ve done now?” Mayor Len turned his gaze to him. Soon everyone turned their attention to the arrogant bird. All eyes were on him. As their stares became more intense… he became more anxious.

Gus grabbed him from the top of the mayor's head, "C'mere ya rotten canary ..." Squeezing the bird into his fist. "You've said enough!"

"HOLD IT, HOLD I-". He turned pale as a ghost. "I can fix this just, let me get him-AH!?"

"EVERYONE JUST STOP IT, WE'RE ALL TO BLAME!"

It was Kawasaki... Sheepishly, he made his way to the center of the mob. "Are we really going to get mad at Tokkori for spitting facts..." His head was hung low, and his chef's hat crumbled in his hands. "The only reason none of us could say anything earlier is because it was the truth... we're just as bad."

He turned to the chief and asked, "Chief Bookem if a kid were to steal something from the store, would you arrest him..."

"Wait, what?" the chief was caught off guard by the question. "Of course not!"

"Why is that?"

"Well because he's a kid, ugh-"

Finally, everyone was able to grasp the reality of the situation. The truth is no one had an excuse. Kirby was their hero, their protector, but... had all forgotten that he was a kid. They failed him.

The chief knew exactly what Kawaski was driving at... they all knew, "Dammint this whole time we've been trying an innocent kid as an adult this whole time..."

"I realized that when I saw his little face, saying it was his fault." Tears started to well up in his eyes. "Only a little kid does that..." Kawasaki started to clench his hat even tighter. "If I see Kirby again: I promise I'll do whatever I can do to make it up to him... and give him all the food he can eat."

"We all knew he was a kid, but.... we were all just- I don't know, what we were thinking!" the mayor added. "We were so hard on Kirby this whole time and-" He clenched his fists. "AND FOR WHAT!?."

Ms. Hana started to tear up as she imagined one of her own kids in that position. And then she started to cry "If Kirby never forgives us, I don't blame him..."

By then Gus had already loosed his grip, enough for Tokkori to fly away, but he didn't. Instead, he just stayed there, still haunted by the image of Kirby. He thought of all the times he recklessly ran his mouth to Kirby.

Kirby had never said anything in his defense... he was so used to seeing him unaffected by his words. Believing he could get away with saying anything to him. But this time...

"I broke Kirby..."

~

Meanwhile, Kirby was running as fast as his little feet could carry him. Off to Castle Dedede to find the only person who could give him a semblance of comfort at this moment...

Fumu.

As he got closer to the castle, the heaviness in his chest increased; it overwhelmed his fragile little body. Desperate to take in the air: he began to hyperventilate. As he remembered the events that lead to his showdown with Nightmare. Reevaluating his relationship with everyone.

Remembering all the times his intelligence was questioned, remembering how quick they were to fall for Dedede's scheme and turn against him, and remembering all the times they made him feel like an outsider even though he was their "hero."

Boundless questions began to fill his head. "When I mess up, will they hate me again...", "If can't fight monsters anymore, will they make me leave...", "What am I going to do if I can't fight anymore...", "What can I do to make them love me again..."

"What am I worth: if I can't do anything!"

His heart hurt so much it was just too painful to bare. His worthlessness seemed all too true when they were ready and willing to kick him out... but one person could prove this wrong.

Fumu.

He needed Fumu; Fumu always made him feel better. She'd love him no matter what... Tokkori was wrong, right? He just needed to hear her say that she loved him, and that would prove it.

He was in such a daze that he didn't realize how fast he ran to the castle... his head was spinning. His vision was blurred, making him out of sync with his steps. It gave him a chance to catch his breath, but the voices in his head were relentless.

"So it was always Meta Knight, he just dumped this job on me!"

Kirby knew that voice... it was Fumu. He bolted toward's the sound of her voice. Just hearing it snapped him back to his sense. It was as if his hope was restored.

He saw her; she was with Bun, Lololo ,& Lalala. As he ran ever closer, his heart became fuller. Even some of the light he had in his eyes returned...

Just one more turn around the corner and then she'll-

"I thought I was the only one who could call on the Warp Star... but he could've- it didn't have to be me", she shouted. " I HAD TO PUT UP THIS ALL NONSENSE... BECAUSE HE MADE IT SEEM LIKE I WAS THE ONLY ONE WHO COULD LOOK AFTER KIRBY !"

~What(Poyo?)

Hearing that, Kirby stopped dead in his tracks. He started to cower back into the corner, hiding himself. He watched in horror as he saw her cry in frustration.

"I ALWAYS HAD TO BE THE RESPONSIBLE ONE HERE..., I ALWAYS HAD TO BE THE SMART ONE, I ALWAYS HAD TO PLAY THE GROWN-UP, AND FOR WHAT?... EVEN META KNIGHT DIDN'T WANT TO DO IT, SO WHY SHOULD I?!

~please stop... (Poyo-yo-)

"I NEVER WANTED TO BE THE ONE TO LOOK AFTER KIRBY!"

~CRACK

At that moment, something inside him broke.

He thought she loved him and that he was special to her.

But the reality of the situation was... she didn't love him the way he thought she did.

This was a moment she'd come to regret. But a moment that would push Kirby even closer to his destiny... She was no longer the guardian of the warp star and never would be again.

[fluffle-writes]

Borrower!Yuu

Hehe imagine what it'd be like for a Borrower!Yuu in all the different dorms,,,

Heartslabyul would be great for a borrower to stay hidden and pick up bits and pieces of forgotten materials and food! With so many students, it may be difficult to hide in the daytime, but Riddle's strict curfew and schedule means that there are set times where it's safe to explore and borrow! (Not to mention the small crumbs and pastries that keep being left out!)

Savanaclaw wouldn't be as great - the heightened senses of the beastmen who reside there makes it a more hazardous environment... However, there are empty rooms that are used as dumping grounds for stuff the students no longer want - which makes it perfect for borrowing materials! And a certain lazy housewarden might leave out enough food to borrow from now and then (just don't wake the sleeping lion!)

Octavinelle is risky. The merfolk could have heightened senses - and any borrower worth their salt knows not to borrow things that will be missed... That means that borrowing food would have to be kept in dorm rooms and student snack supplies with how much attention Azul pays to his business' food supplies. Luckily enough, there's a particularly messy room that tends to have opened packets of crisps and biscuits left paying around... (Just avoid the scary twins who live there...)

Scarabia is a difficult one... Chances are, the newer building and more open floor plan means that there'd be fewer places to hide and travel around the dorm safely without being spotted or ending up underfoot. If a borrower could find a way to traverse the area, they may be able to live well enough after leftover food and discarded, yet still perfectly usable, fabric from clothes that... Just seem to need a quick wash. How wasteful...

Pomefiore could provide plenty of hiding places with all of the decor and large pieces of furniture. There are likely one or two very detailed dollhouses somewhere in the dorm (of course a borrower could never take anything from one, but it's nice to walk through and have a taste of what it might be like to be as big as he humans...) And the kitchens are likely not as closely guarded as some others (although the lack of snack foods that are easy to pilfer could prove difficult... Not to mention the feeling of watching eyes when trying to borrow at night sometimes... Odd...)

Ignihyde is a goldmine if borrowing is timed right! No students running through the halls together or hanging out in the living space that could spot you, just a bunch of shut-ins keeping to themselves and with messy rooms where things are bound to get lost or forgotten. If a borrower is lucky enough, they'll be able to get their hands on some tech to play around with. With the quietness of the place and the easily accessed food storage for borrowing, a borrower could probably live decently enough in Ignihyde. (Just avoid that robot boy - who knows how he might react to a borrower...)

Diasomnia seems like it'd be quite cold - with old walls that may have had previous inhabitants who could've left behind all manner of ladders and pulley systems for future borrowers to use. There's often plenty of ingredients left out that Yuu could borrow scraps from after certain students - like the one with pink and black hair - leave them out after cooking. And despite the coolness of the environment, there are enough hidden and abandoned rooms where, if they brave the clouds of dust, a borrower can gain plenty of materials for bedding and whatnot.

[zhalfirin-binds]

Look at things gone wrong with Moomin Midwinter

There's plenty that went wrong with this bind and stupid me kept thinking 'I can fix this'. Well, turned out I could not, some of the things that went wrong were just the step to finish it completely so, well, this is what came out of it

Most prominently, and first thing to go wrong, was the fact that I managed to pare a hole into my leather. Only later I realised, the display on my leather thickness gauge can be turned so it reads 0 thickness when the pushed down without anything in between. Instead of paring down to 0,6 or 0,7 mm I was usually closer to 0,3 or 0,4mm... which explains the hole. Of course the hole was not closer enough to the edge to be covered up or trimmed off too. So I decided to put a think piece of the same leather beneath it to cover the board and have the same colour. This might even have worked, had the hole ended up on a flat surface and in the area that gets the most motion. At least it's on the backside.

Next thing, I did not not sufficiently colour the white core of my endbands. I usually colour them with crayons, but for some reason the colour did not stick this time. I might still be able to fix this with acrylic colour. Either that or I ruin the leather trying XD

Then the mock up on the backside cover. Often the pictures I use are too small or have a too little surrounding the scene I actually want on the cover to be usable as they are without white frames. So what I do is I make the actual picture larger using GIMP of Affinity Photo to create a wider, patterned border and avoid blank turn ins. On the backside I did not notice I failed to make the edge large enough and blend in nicely so I have a more pale and blurry covered area and (to me) obvious edge shape of the tool I used.

Another thing I noticed too late and which was probably the cause for some follow up issues. I think I hung in the book block slightly askew. Now the inner book looks like it's cut askew too. (I measured back and front and I'm fairly certain the skew comes from a twist in the spine and not from the book block being cut at an angle.)

Following this issue, the squares were fucked up. Too large on one side too narrow on the other. I noticed that when I pasted down and closed the lid only lightly to check and fix any skew if necessary. It was necessary on back and front. So I pushed the paste down gently into a nicer position and pressed. Turned out fixing the position left me with wrinkles on the paste down side of the book. Luckily the pattern hides that rather well. (Have some close ups for better view)

Additionally, the paste downs, I cut 1mm shorter because I already suspected the cheap paper would stretch a lot, stretched beyond the book block still and are now visible even when the covers are closed.