#it's late and I'm unmedicated

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

you might have been asked this question before but ive been curious for a while about what would have happened when gertrude was there when jon originally gave his statement? would anything change ?

Honestly she probably would have killed him.

Like, it feels mean to say? It would have been more out of mercy than anything.

If Jon had come to her with only a Leitner, she would have taken care of the Leitner and sent him home. She doesn't normally intervene on behalf of the Statement givers, but they also aren't usually eight, and it isn't unheard of for Gertrude to intervene for the random unlucky souls who cross her path. She intervened on behalf of Jack Barnabas, and she told the monster pig dude how to handle his problem. It's selective when she intervenes, but I think if it's just a little boy scared by a book, she would help.

The thing about Gertrude is that I don’t I think she is or ever has been heartless; I just think she’s brutally practical.

One of the most interesting tidbits about her is that she looked for Eric Delano for months after he went missing, but wasn’t close enough to know that he had quit ages before he actually died. She avenged Sarah’s death by seeking out someone she had never, ever let herself meet before that moment, but she did this right after sacrificing Michael without hesitation. She seemed genuinely fond of Gerry, but she still bound him to a book.

I think that, at the end of the day, it wouldn’t be that she wouldn’t want to save Jon. It would just be that she would realize that she couldn’t.

If he had just arrived with a Guest for Mr. Spider, I think Jon would have walked away remembering her fondly as the brusk but ultimately nice old lady who had her assistant make him a cup of tea and taught him how to burn a Leitner. But he didn’t just come because of A Guest for Mr. Spider. He came because of Tommy Bradstaff.

Gertrude’s shown to be more wary of the Web than pretty much any other entity. She got tricked by them way back when she defeated her first ritual, and I don’t think she forgets. I also don’t think she would have thought it was ever a good idea to voluntarily set herself in a competition with the Mother of Puppets. Jon's eight and scared and she'd want to help him, but she also would have immediately recognized that saving him comes with a very high price tag and a very low chance of success.

I do think Gertrude would have at least tried to think of a way to save him. I just think she would have ultimately come to the conclusion that there wasn’t one.

And it’s just practicality, right? That’s the big difference between her and Jon in nhthcth. It doesn’t matter how badly she wishes she could help; she’ll accept when she can’t. But when she can, she usually racks up a very big win. Jon will wildly intervene without even considering his chances. Like, there's a reason why the Eye led him to Danny Stoker that night--it's not conscious the way humans are or the spiders are, but even pavlov's dogs learned association, and the Eye seems to be capable of that kind of low-level consciousness. When Jon finds Eric Delano's statement in canon, it's because he listened to the tapes the Eye didn't want him to hear. That implies the Eye is at least partially able to make connections based on its own impulses and desires.

Jon's its special little boy who has been resolutely fucking starving himself for almost two decades. He went and joined the eldritch version of AA with Daisy in an attempt not to feed the Eye other than when absolutely strictly necessary, and the Eye's never been happy with his starvation diet. But the one sure-fire way to get Jon to forget his sense and start ripping statements out of avatars is to shove some poor schmuck being eaten in his line of sight.

It’s pretty directly stated in nhthcth that danny isn’t the first victim of another entity he’s tried to snatch, even if he’s never gotten as involved with a pair of victims as the stoker brothers. And honestly—he almost didn’t get super involved with them either. Like, when he was trying to duck out after the initial fight at the theatre, long term involvement would have only made it worse for them. Most of the time, the absolute best chances come from "hope that they've forgotten you existed and won't come back for round two. if that fails maybe just hop continents and it will be too inconvenient for them to track you down again. buy guns." There's a pretty high mortality rate with people who hang around him, and he's not exactly expecting these random male model brothers to manage this world long-term.

If Jon’s hadn’t straight up passed out, he would have called Daisy to come pick him up and bitched to her about fucked up clowns being a problem now. He’d feel vaguely mad at himself when nikola skinned both Danny and Tim, because it’d be just another case of him trying to help and just increasing the body count, which is what happens most of the time.

I think Mike described him like someone who kept putting half dead birds in boxes and feeling disappointed when he opened the lid and saw they’d croaked. It's not unheard of for the people he helps to make it, but it's also not exactly often either. And that’s not even really to say he’s any less powerful or capable than gertrude was—honestly, between him and Daisy? They’re sort of a powerhouse duo. Like, people are afraid of hunters. At one point Dekker says that he was going up against something that would require a hunter to kill, and that while he knew a few, he would never actually risk consulting one. Amateur lobotomy it is. And Daisy is the sort of hunter that can kill other hunters. Jon’s this absolute muppet of a human being rolling up to soul-rending horror like “this is Daisy :) she is my best friend :)” and then they turn around and the Avatar of Fucking Them Up is standing there breathing too heavy and blatantly fucking insane. It’s like if kermit the frog kept bringing the fucking terminator to social events.

And Jon isn’t exactly a slouch either. Like, he’s keeping himself as weak as he can, and he’s still strolling into other entities' domains, feeding on them, and just... walking away again. These are people who are extremely used to being the human equivalent of a great white shark, more powerful and deadly than anyone else in any room they're in, but they've got this extremely distressed looking twink curb stomping them when he has reached the absolute breaking point of his Victorian Fatigue. this man keeps coming into their homes and one-shotting them after weakening himself to the point of being on death's door. jon on his own makes other avatars twitchy, but the Jon and Daisy Buddy Cop is honestly kind of one that the other avatars are somewhat actively afraid of.

Like, they'll dunk on Jon (where daisy can't see), because he's jon and he's ridiculous and pathetic at all times, but people are secretly pretty careful to toe the line of shit jon will put up with. Mike will be smarmy with Jon because he knows Jon will let him get away with it, but he also knows that if he fucks around too hard jon will put him through a psychic paper shredder and daisy will bury his corpse in the woods. It's not a secret that Daisy and Jon are strolling around feeding on and blatantly fucking murdering things like them, but none of these self-serving assholes have managed to handle a pretty active threat to their longevity. that's more because they can't than because they won't.

And still, Gertrude is pretty universally regarded as a force of nature, but Jon's still getting told that a seven percent success rate is a bit generous.

Gertrude is Gertrude Robinson, and she's the baddest bitch around, and that has a huge bit to do with her success rate. But it would be a mistake to say that the number of battles she picked didn't have something to do with why she's more successful. Like--Gertrude's going for quantity over sentiment. She'll save the world, but the individual people in it? Those aren't the fights she has ever prioritized, at the end of the day.

Almost all of the statements Jon in canon recorded were from her tenure, and Jon's follow ups usually concluded with "and then they horribly died." Gertrude was casually eating a fucking sandwich in her office and watching while Jane Prentiss decided that she couldn't be saved and went off to cram her forearm in a spooky wasp nest. She didn't help Jane. She didn't explain what was happening. She didn't try to intervene. She ate her sandwich, and she let Jane leave, and I think that at least in part she would have agreed with Jane's assessment. There wasn't any saving her, and that's a judgment that always precludes Gertrude's help.

Gertrude wins as often as she does because she picks her battles carefully. She delivers maximum damage to maximum effect, and she doesn't spin her wheels on things she knows are a waste of resources. She came right on the heels of an archivist who died because he burned through his resources and his luck, and her tenure has been marked by her being smart enough to be cautious.

I think Jon would have given her his statement. I think she would have been nice to him. I think she would have allowed herself to feel sorry for him, and sorry that he was so young, and sorry that it was too late.

I think that she would have considered what the web could have planned for him, and she would have considered how painful a fate was waiting for him if he met the End the Spider probably had planned for him. And I think she would have decided it would be crueler to let him meet it.

Gertrude in nhthcth specifically has always had a weird, twisted mercy when it came to Jon. She never manipulated him, is the thing. Elias made sure that what he did to Jon had long past the point of no return by the time Gertrude ever caught wind of his existence. As far as she was ever concerned, Jon was beyond saving from the day they met, which meant there was no point in trying. She was never going to offer him the mercy of trying to help him.

But she could have played him and she didn't. And I think that's about the most merciful action that Gertrude Robinson would have been capable of.

She knows about Agnes, okay? better than anyone. she's been bodily hauling the world as they know it through a decade of apocalypse attempts. She took one look at Jon and realized that elias had made him to wear the watcher's crown, but also that she couldn't kill him without completely alienating her resources to stop much sooner apocalypses.

But she sort of knew from the day they met that she may have to one day kill him, if only to stop him from wearing the crown. It wasn't set in stone, but it was a very significant possibility.

In chapter 24, Jon reached out to gertrude for absolutely any comfort possible, and she actually could have given it to him. She could have strung him along with false hope, or just given him a shoulder to cry on. Someone other than elias to love.

And she would have done that knowing that she was actively planning how to kill him when the time came. And she's definitely not above that kind of manipulation. Jon's extremely vulnerable when he comes to her, and he already thinks of her as a source of hope. Stringing him along and being his only source of comfort and support would give her an enormous advantage over him that she normally wouldn't ignore. But if he did die by her hands one day, as she knows he probably will, he'd finally go to his end after a very painful life being murdered by the only person that he thought loved him after he lost Gerry. Gertrude sort of uncharacteristically gave up that advantage to spare him from that final betrayal. She'd never sacrifice the world for him, she could have loved him like her own son and she would still kill him without hesitation, and she won't lie to herself about that fact either. It's a weird, twisted act of mercy to have it be turning the cold shoulder to a little boy begging for help, but in her mind, it was the most merciful option open to her.

And I kind of like the idea of Jonathan Sims in nhthcth always demanding the most painful acts of mercy of Gertrude that she's ever contemplated. Because the thing is, if she had been the one to take his Statement that day, she's almost definitely would have decided that Jon couldn't be saved. Not when the thing after him was the Web. And once she decides that, she has two options: let him meet the End waiting outside of those doors, or handle it herself.

And the thing is, her MO is to go for the former. It's not like she's mercy killing everyone who shows up and tells her of the fate worse than death that's most likely to befall them--hell, to take the risk of mercy killing is borderline out of character to her. If it were anyone else, she wouldn't have done it.

But Jon was eight. He was begging her for help that she couldn't give. And the Web has never been merciful. Either it was lying about wanting him for itself and he was going to be killed in the most slow, horrifying way possible, or it wasn't and he wasn't even going to get the mercy of death. Like, if a horrible, tragic fate is inevitable for him, Gertrude has to at least contemplate if there's an option that's more merciful than the rest.

Even giving him a less painful death is dangerous for Gertrude, but I think that's more of a price she'd be willing to contemplate. Like, killing another entity's victim is another way of snatching a meal from them. She had to at least entertain the risk that the Web would have some kind of retribution for it. But she would also entertain the fact that Jon's only sitting in the Archives because the Web let him get that far, that it wanted him to give its Statement to her, and ultimately decide that the risk is one she's willing to shoulder.

I think she would have made sure it didn't hurt. I think she would have made it quick, and made sure he didn't know it was happening. but I don't think she would have ever saved Jon the way he wanted to be saved.

If I’m being extremely generous (and self indulgent) and trying to come up with a world where she would go on a crusade to save him, and probably assuming some kind of off screen character arc that’s completely made her change her entire approach to life, I think she’d bring him to Agnes Montague.

If Jon could ever have a chance way back when he was eight, I think it would have been Agnes. Agnes is the direct opposite of the Web. She's the demigod messiah of the entity of Fucking Up All Your Life Plans. In canon, she's the one that Gertrude went to when she did need to go after the Web. If she had decided to try for him and needed to come up with an option to save him, she'd go to Agnes.

That being said, getting to that decision is just still really unlikely. For all of the above reasons and because of the difficulties Agnes poses. Even if they're in like, lesbian soul love, they've never met in person, and she doesn't really know if Agnes will help. It may attract the Lightless Flame's attention, and Jon may just end up burnt to death instead of filled with spiders. A lot of ways it could go wrong and give Jon a worse fate. It's the sort of Hail Mary play Gertrude never really did.

That line is in the summary because I thought it said everything about what the reader needed to know for Jon in nhthcth. (Also, I just thought it sounded nice.)

Jon in nhthcth is sort of defined by the fact that he has never gotten past who he was in the moment that James Wright locked him in Gertrude's office. It's one of the two cornerstones of everything he became.

The other cornerstone, of course, is Gerry.

Jon has spent his entire life trying to figure out a way that he could have been anything but what he is. It's been a decade and change, but he's never, ever been able to let go of what happened to him. And that feels at least a little off.

Maybe it's the idea that time heals all wounds, maybe it's the idea that Stockholm Syndrome should have kicked in eventually, maybe it's the evil god eating parts of his personality, maybe it's the idea that it's probably exhausting to eternally be struggling against a fate that you met when you were fucking eight. Even if he never becomes okay with what happened to him, he probably should have at least accepted it and moved on to some measure. Like, this has been his reality for almost his entire life. No matter how terrible it was, people usually adapt and acclimate to what happens to him.

One of the core traits of Jon in nhthcth was always supposed to be that Jon just didn't for some reason.

Like, Jon has not even passed the threshold of accepting what happened to him. It's all these years later, and he's desperately replaying what happened and trying to come up with the version that has him going home at the end. Even if you don't accept your current situation, you probably should have stopped trying to figure out what you could have done differently when you were eight, no matter how terrible what happened is.

At the end of the day, even with all he knows, Jon just has never understood why he couldn't have been saved.

He knows there's no Light Side at the end of the day. This isn't some big battle of Good Against Evil--it's just a series of Bad inconveniencing Other Bad because what Other Bad wants is not in the interest of what Bad wants. There's no ancient secret order battling the dark--there's just a lot of people stopping each other from ending the world because they want to be the ones to do it, and also like, Gertrude Robinson and her good-time buddy That One Random Priest. If you're looking for someone to save you in the TMA world, there just isn't really anyone.

And that's part of why Jon goes in after Danny Stoker. It's part of why he keeps undertaking the world's most half-assed rescue attempts. Trying to save Danny when his entire life has indicated that's impossible and probably going to make things worse is a deeply irrational thing to do. He probably should have learned when to walk away by now.

But a part of him is still eight, and a part of him has spent his entire life going over the worst thing that ever happened to him and trying to figure out the way to make it different.

It takes a specific sort of person to keep undertaking herculean efforts in a desperate, wild attempt to save people that he knows are as good as dead. And I think that sort of person once was someone who was as good as dead. He saves Danny Stoker because a part of him is still desperately trying to find the person who could have done the same for him.

In the end, he became the thing he once needed most in the world, which was a chance. I don't think he's realized that fact. And I don't know if he'd find it comforting if he did.

The other thing about that sentence is that it's completely and utterly pointless.

Like. It's been eighteen fucking years. At a certain point, you have to decide it doesn't matter anymore, and clinging to the question of whether someone could have saved you just doesn't help anything. But one of the other core traits of Jon in nhthcth was that he was someone who just simply did not care if what he was doing was practical or had any chances of succeeding.

He's designed to be so stubborn in it that it's almost ridiculous, and more than a little comical but it's honestly borderline sad to me. Here Jon is, making it his life's fucking mission to hold the title of World's Shittiest Employee. He is going to make his hostage situation inconvenient for everyone. He's not doing fucking paperwork; he's only here because elias kidnapped him. He can't get away, but he's going to be the absolute most unmanageable nightmare alive.

It does absolutely nothing to help him.

He doesn't think anyone in the Institute is ever going to help him. He doesn't think he's going to force Elias's hand into letting him go by racking up the most HR complaints in Institute history. It doesn't actually help him in any way to do the vast majority of what he does--it actively hurts him, actually. There's no one in the Institute who wants to help him, because they see him as a nuisance. When he causes Elias too much trouble, Elias punishes him for it. It'd be better from a consequentialist perspective to have settled into some kind of facade of normalcy, but he hasn't. Because playing along, going along with the facade as an Institute employee--he'd have to at least implicitly admit that what happened to him isn't relevant anymore. Sure, Elias kidnapped him and fed him to an ancient, primordial hunger from the dawn of civilization, but by god, he has his monthly staff meeting to get to, and that's too important to make a fuss about the first thing.

It's kind of sad, because while the Institute didn't know the entire picture, nineteen-year old Martin almost immediately said "wow, that blatantly unstable child sure does act like he's being severely abused." Elias had to feed him a story about an entirely different abuser to dodge the world's most needed CPS visit, and Martin still almost turned around and reported Elias literally the same afternoon. Yeah, Elias had a story for the institute to explain jon's Everything, but they really didn't have to buy it.

Like, willful ignorance absolutely played a role in it. Part of it was Elias was their boss and nobody wanted to be the one to accuse him of child abuse. It was easier to accept his lies at face value and not stick their neck out for him. Part of it was just that Jon's never been a very likable victim for them. He wasn't some tearful damsel they could swoop in and save--he smoked too much and was angry and loud about it. And once they made that initial decision to ignore their misgivings, the chances of anyone breaking that pattern got extremely low. No one wants to admit to themselves that they ignored a little kid in an extremely abusive household just because his abuser was their boss and they didn't like the kid all that much. Martin kind of hit Jon like a grenade when he first joined up and actually gave a shit if he was okay.

Of course, this all means that Jon's spent the past decade or so being told by everyone who could see him hurting that his upset at the soul-crushing pain he was in was inconvenient to them and it's rude of him to be so loud about it, could he do that somewhere else, because it really doesn't matter. and he's still there saying "it does matter. it matters to me."

Just--doing pointless things because if he doesn't then they stop mattering and they have to matter somehow defines so much of what he does.

When he was a little boy, Gerry told him that the clothes you wore were meant to be things that make you feel like you, that were who you were or wanted to be, and Jon decided that the parts of him that he loved were made up of other people. It's been fourteen years since he told him that, and out of all the people he's tried to make himself with, Daisy is the only one he still has in his life. He wears the secondhand clothes of people who he lost without anyone else caring to preserve a self that people are actively trying to kill. The fact that he feels more like him when he wears Gerry's coat only matters to the extent that he lets it. He makes pointless interventions on behalf of people he knows he probably can't save, because if he doesn't, then he fact that they needed help to begin with didn't matter. It only mattered whether they could have been saved; needing to be saved doesn't factor in.

I basically wanted him to be the opposite of Basira. Basira was the world's most polite hostage in Season 3. Martin had to actually ask her if she was aware she was in a hostage situation. Her entire thing was that there was no point in getting upset at something you couldn't change--you either got on as best you could or you found a way to change it anyway. That's the exact opposite to nhthcth Jon's approach to life--the Web even pokes fun at him for it in chapter 9. A spider's prey thrashes itself to death trying to get out of its web. Jon's just--flailing like a fly struggling against a web. Gertrude always conserved her resources and energy for where it would matter most, but he exhausts himself on things he knows wouldn't succeed. It doesn't make any practical sense, but there's something viscerally human about it still.

And the last thing that sentence tells you about Jon is that he is someone who has to believe in the lightning strike.

The thing is? Jon knows about pretty much everything this post discussed. No one really knew Gertrude, but if there was someone who did, it was him. He's been hanging around her since he was a little kid. It's been stated that she personally tried to teach him to some degree, though, and we've seen that she's stated to his face that she would not have tried to save him if she had been the one to take his statement. She never really represented a chance at things having gone differently to begin with.

But he still thinks of her specifically when he tries to find the version of himself that isn't this. Because even if she was never really a chance, she was still the biggest chance he had.

Jon was eight. He knew jack all when this started, and he was going up against the most dangerous entity there was. He was never going to come up with a place to go to that wasn't the Magnus Institute, and he was never going to outsmart the Web on his own. Gertrude Robinson was the only one who he ever had a snowball's chance of crossing paths with who wasn't like, actively evil.

There's basically nil chance of her having had some kind of midlife crisis right before he showed up and deciding that this is the one she must save and damn the consequences. There's an even smaller chance of her actually pulling it off and saving him from the Web. But that was the biggest chance he had, and he can't help but cling to it.

Sometimes, you have to beat the odds. Sometimes, lightning strikes.

If you believe in the idea of the multiverse, and that everything that can happen will happen, there is a Jon out there in some far-off universe who walked into the Magnus Institute and met Gertrude Robinson instead of James Wright. There is a Gertrude Robinson who, against all odds, decided that Jon was worth the costs of saving him, who fought tooth and nail to save him and won. It's a fairytale he tells himself, but the idea of someone kind enough to put him in a car so they could drive all about, go on adventures, and find places with rain was also a fairytale he once heard, and it still happened. Gerry was his lightning strike.

And that's really the crux of it. In order for Jon to have loved Gerry the way he did, he had to be someone who would bank everything on odds that were a lot smaller than being struck by lightning. Jon needs to be the type of person who will believe in chances that barely exist, because if he doesn't, he could have never made he decisions he had to make to stay by Gerry's side.

Gerry Keay was not Gertrude Robinson, and he definitely was not anywhere near her caliber when he was the little boy who tried to take Jon and run. They live in a world that tears into your soul, that Marks you in a way that cannot be removed and that never, ever lets you go. It's monsters eating other monsters, and they were both very small and very damned from the get-out. The chances of Jon Sims and Gerry Keay saving each other were always so much smaller than the chances of Gertrude Robinson saving him, and he knew it. If he couldn't believe that there was at least a chance that Gertrude would have saved him, then he couldn't believe that he and Gerry ever had a chance of finding their way home.

We still don't know where Gerry is in 2013, why he isn't there, but we know that Daisy saw him with Jon in 2011, kicking each other under the table for making ill-timed jokes to a monster who wanted to kill them. They first ran in 1999. That's twelve years of betting everything on odds south of a lightning strike. It takes specific kinds of people to do that. It takes people who will take the worst odds possible because they're the only ones they have.

There's no power of love or friendship or hope in that universe, but I think Jon and Gerry wanted to believe that they could love each other to the point of survival. They were looking at a world where, in the whole span of human history, love had not made a lick of difference to the things they faced, and they were asking to be the exception. Wondering if Gertrude Robinson would have saved him... it's hardly the most improbable thing Jon's ever let himself believe.

[cyrsed]

repainting this lil painting i made after we moved bc you could tell i was 1. using too small of a brush, 2. not using acrylic medium so the colors were chalky and harder to spread and 3. not thinking about composition, so this is take 2 :) very unfinished so far. i do kinda miss the smiles but i think once this one is done it'll look way better

[bimirmir]

I so eepy

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

I think the reader's response to this post is probably going to either be "That's incredibly minor" or "Holy shit YES I'M ALSO PROUD", depending on people's personal experiences with academia, but:

Today I am incredibly proud of one of my students.

In the interests of disguising identities, let's call them Ceri. Ceri is one of my third year undergrads (meaning their final year, for anyone unfamiliar with UK uni systems.) They transferred to us last year, and within two weeks I was giving them the contact info to get to Student Services and get themself screened for ADHD; they have some mental health struggles, but I clocked pretty quickly that they STRUGGLE with procrastination, and punctuality, and attending 9am lectures in particular. Naturally, as is the way of my people, it took them a further four months to remember to go to the screening. Lol. Lmao. Rofl, in fact.

But, they did it eventually! Their screening lit up like a Christmas tree at the ADHD section, and they got a free laptop and optional one week extensions and a study support worker named Claire. This has helped tremendously, and although mental health + until-then-unsupported ADHD meant their academic profile had slid sideways somewhat, with the new tools available and a couple of resits they passed the year and hit this year running.

Until, that is, the last fortnight.

Now, I take them for a Habitat Management module that has two assessments: an academic poster presentation before Christmas, and a site-specific management plan in May. Naturally this means we are at that happy point in the year for the poster presentations. I give out the briefs at the start of the year, so they've had them since October; I've also been periodically checking in with them all for weeks, to make sure they don't have any major burning questions. The poster presentation was to pick a species reintroduction project, pull the habitat feasibility study out of it, and then critique that study; Ceri chose to look at the hen harrier reintroductions proposed for the southern UK. All good.

Which brings us nicely to today! Ceri's presentation is scheduled for 2.30. At 11am-1pm, I am lecturing the first years on Biodiversity, while Ceri is learning about environmental impact assessment with a colleague I shall call Aeron. This means we are separately occupied during those same hours.

Nevertheless, Aeron messages me at about 12.

"I think Ceri needs to see you after your lecture," he writes. "They're panicking, I genuinely think they might cry. I'm worried. Are you free at 1?"

I say I am. At 1, I get lunch and sit in the common area; Ceri comes to see me. To my personal shame, imagine all of the following takes place while I stuff my face with potato.

Now: this part is going to be uncomfortably familiar to anyone who has ever tried higher education with ADHD, especially unmedicated. It certainly was for me. All I can say is, I never had the courage to take the step here that Ceri did.

"I have to confess," they said quietly, and Aeron was right, they were fighting back tears. "My mental health has been so, so bad for the last fortnight. I've left it way, way too late. I don't have anything to present."

"Nothing at all?" I asked.

"I've been researching," they said helplessly. "I found loads on the decline of the hen harrier. But it wasn't until last night that I finally found a habitat feasibility study to critique. Generally... I've been burying my head about it, and it just got later and later. I thought I should come in for Aeron's lecture, and I should at least tell you."

This part is a minor thing, right? But honestly, I remember being in the grip of that particular shame spiral. I never did manage to tell my lecturers to their faces. I just avoided. I honestly can't imagine having the courage it took them to come in and tell me this, rather than just staying home and avoiding me.

"I think..." they said hesitantly, "I know I can submit up to a week late, for a capped mark. I think I need to do that, and apply for extenuating circumstances. But then I'll have both Aeron's assignment and yours due at the same time."

Which meant they would crumble under the pressure and likely struggle to pass both; so me, being as noble and heroic as I unarguably am, stopped eating potato and said, "Let's make that plan B."

(It was good potato. I am a hero.)

So, we made plan A: I moved their timeslot to 4.30, giving them three and a half hours. The shining piece of luck in this whole thing was that this was the crunch time assignment - if it had been Aeron's, they'd have had to try and write a 3000 report in that time. But for me, all they had to write was an academic poster, and those things are light on words by design. We found them a Canva template, and then we quickly sketched out a recommended structure based on the brief: if it's habitat feasibility, look at food availability, nesting site availability, and mortality risks in the target release site. Bullet point each. Bullet point how well the study assessed each. Write a quick intro and conclusion. Take notes as you go, and present the poster itself at 4.30.

"You think I should try?" they asked doubtfully, looking like I'd just asked them to go mano-a-mano with a feral badger.

"If you run out of time, so be it," I said. "But your brain is trying to protect you from a non-existent tiger. That's why you've procrastinated - it's been horrible, and you've been shame spiralling, and your brain is trying to shield you from the negative experience; but it's the wrong type of help for this situation! So while you're sitting there working on it, hating life, every time your brain goes 'This is hopeless, I can't do it', you think right back 'Yes I can, it just sucks.' And you carry on. Good?"

"Good," they said. "I'm going to mainline coffee and hole up in the library. Enjoy your potato."

And then, of course, I had to go and watch the other students' presentations, so that was the end of me being any help at all. I spent all afternoon wondering if they were going to manage it, or if I would be getting a message at 4.25 telling me they'd failed, and would have to submit late and hope for an EC.

And Tumblrs

Tumblrs

Let me FUCKING tell you

They turned up at 4.15, fifteen minutes early, wearing a mask of grim, harrowed determination and fuelled by spite and coffee, and they pulled up that poster and started presenting and yes, okay, I'll admit their actual delivery was dramatically unpolished and yes, they forgot to include the taxanomic name for the hen harrier on the poster and yes, fine, I admit that there were more than a few awkward moments where they lost their place in their hastily scribbled notebook but LET ME FUCKING TELL YOU -

They smashed it. It was well-critiqued, it had a map, it had full citations, it had a section on the hen harrier's specific ecology and role in the ecosystem, it had notes on their specific conservation measures. They described case studies they'd read about elsewhere. They answered the questions we threw at them with competence and depth. There was analysis. All that background research they'd done came right to the fore. They were even within the time limit by 15 seconds.

You would never have known they'd produced it in three hours, from a quivering and terrified mess fighting the bodily urge to dehydrate via tear ducts. After they left, the second marker and I looked at each other and went "So that was a 2:1, right?"

I caught up with Aeron downstairs and he was beaming. Apparently Ceri had seen him on their way out, and had gone over to talk to him. Aeron said the difference between the Ceri of this morning and the Ceri of then was like two different people; in four hours, they'd gone from their voice literally breaking as they admitted the problem, ashamed and broken, to being relaxed and happy and smiling.

"I reckon I've passed," they apparently told Aeron, pleased. "Maybe even a 2:2. There's things I wish I'd had the time to do better, but I'll be happy if I passed."

They won't know until late January what they got, because we're not allowed to release marks until 20 term days after hand-in, and the Christmas holidays are about to hit. But I'm really hoping I can be there when they're released.

But mostly, I'm just... insanely proud of them. I cannot tell you how happy I am. And I know, I know, obviously this is not a practice I would want to see them do regularly, or indeed ever again, and it only worked because they were fucking lucky with the assignment format, but like... when life is just punching you in the face, and you hit a breaking point... isn't it nice? That just this once, you pull off a miracle, and it's fixed? The disaster you thought was about to ruin you is gone? To get that relief?

Anyway. Super super proud today.

[mxnd-infxction]

just some more vent

there's so much things i'm stressing about going around in my head.

i've been really stepping up lately in terms of my job search, school, working to get my license and looking for a good reliable car, and other chores and responsibilities and shit. my dad might me moving out (learned from my mom, and atp i don't know for sure what's happening bc they've been actually fucking communicating like a normal healthy couple talking)

i've been occasionally checking for several months now for affordable apartments in atlanta (and by that i mean like under 950 in an neighborhood that's on the outskirts of the itp area) and with the way i'm now looking at apartments in las vegas (which is pretty much cross country from where i live rn) you can tell how that's going. i don't even know how to start that conversation with my best friend so i haven't mentioned shit about it to them.

with my dad possibly leaving i'll have to get a better paying/full-time job, but with this semester starting in a few days god only knows how that's gonna go. it's only two online classes but still. i fully intend on doing college full-time starting in the fall (or as soon as possible bc by god i wanna get my damn degree already, and i could've already graduated by now if i'd been going full-time from the start) too.

regardless of moving, i still need to downsize the amount of shit i have in my room and paint the walls.

all i do lately is do nothing on my off days, stay up till 4 am most nights because i read that burns more c4ls. i desperately want to get back into working on my songwriting but i have no inspiration anymore.

i don't even give a shit about going to driving school just for learning how to parallel park and k-turn and all that shit. just let me at the driving test and i'll be on my (not-so-)merry way. my mom just shoots down every car i'm even vaguely interested in. i could've had that shitass f-100 as a first car, put in a bigger gas tank, but GOD FUCKING FORBID. 88k miles and 3500$? but nah. can't have shit with you people. fuck off.

i feel stuck in this hell state right now and i'm slowly losing it day by day. hell, i've been romanticizing using h4rd drugs. i've been almost-genuinely considering going back on my adhd m3ds just for the weight loss and appetite suppressant side effects. i'm not doing well mentally; i'm spiralling and i know it. we can't even go on vacation anywhere because of everyone's schedules, our pets at home, jobs, and travel distances and time spent at the wheel. i hate living here so much. i just wanna get out. all i do is think, think and overthink about anything and everything. i hate winter, i hate this state, if i could i'd drop out of school and move out west tomorrow.

[jamiepaige]

Constant Companions Closeup #5: CADMIUM COLORS

(also on bandcamp and spotify!)

Once again, welcome back to the Constant Companions Closeups - a series of in-depth dives into the songs off of my latest album, Constant Companions! Last time, I wrote a whole diatribe about my OCs while talking about I Wish That I Could Fall, and today, we're eating paint! Cadmium Colors featuring Soneji of Project Mikan!

Consider this a content warning: this post will discuss the pandemic, struggles with mental health, and suicidal ideation/attempts. I'm hoping it'll ultimately be uplifting, but the discussions at hand are incredibly heavy, and it wouldn't do this song right to be vague. Please be warned.

---

Let's talk about COVID.

At the beginning of 2020, I was in the midst of a long-term break from making music. It wasn't completely cold turkey, and I might not have even called it a break if you'd asked me at the time, but things were dire. I was still dealing with the burnout I'd sustained from the making of Autumn Every Day; I'd had my ego bruised by a live performance at a house party that went so hilariously bad it'd hurt even the most stoic performers (imagine watching an entire packed room of people clear out in 5 minutes flat from the already hyper-exposed vantage point of being on stage in front of them and knowing you single-handedly caused that lol); I had just moved across the country, and was preoccupied with trying to make ends meet as a 22 year old dealing with pure adulthood for the first time.

I was working a shitty minimum wage job at a discount clothing store I will not be naming, slogging through late-night shifts that wouldn't get me home until 3 am some nights. I had friends and roommates, but they were all just as overworked and exhausted and dealing with their own shit as me. I was mentally ill and unmedicated. Suicidal ideation was rearing its ugly head at my lowest moments.

Then, as I turned 23, a global pandemic shut the world down, my grandpa died with me being unable to attend his funeral, and I had a catastrophic mental breakdown that suddenly turned the voices in my head into a deafening cacophony of self-inflicted malice.

In hindsight, I think being 23 kinda just does that to you

---

Fast forward to 2021. I was back at my retail job with the pandemic raging in full force, my sense of self was held together with duct tape, positive self-talk essentially didn't exist for me, and I was the loneliest and lowest I had ever been. I was working the fewest hours I could get away with, and still, almost all spare time I had was taken up either by work or by my recovery from it.

This was around the time I got an email from Crypton, of all places - the people that make Hatsune Miku, for anyone uninformed. They wanted a remix of the song Happy Synthesizer for a Digital Stars compilation. I could not for the life of me tell you how I lucked into this or why they reached out to me of all people, but they did, and I was deathly determined to prove myself worthy of it.

This was August of 2021. I was staring down the barrel, languishing in what felt like only half of a life, fantasizing about death and trying to twist my thoughts into something that could at least keep me blearily shuffling forward another couple days. It was untenable.

(I'd also recently been diagnosed with OSDD 1b - this is a whole can of worms I can't really open until we talk about Breeze Blows, but it's important to at least mention that coping with this was a significant part of this turnaround.)

It's melodramatic, but I had only two options - make things again, or die.

I finished that remix within 24 hours of getting the stems, and I will gladly toot my own horn about it - it's really fucking good, in my opinion. Bittersweet ended up coming together in a mad dash over the next couple months as well. I was making music again.

Even though I was exponentially busier, things paradoxically got easier. I made the creative process a priority in my life, and not only did it give me an outlet for everything that had otherwise been eating away at my soul, but it struck a chord with other people who had been struggling as well. Things just... started getting brighter.

So I kept making music and living and yadda yadda blah blah here I am. This is all a lot of words and very personal stories of mental health struggles to say this:

One: The line between being an artist and being one of countless people forced to work jobs that go nowhere, that put their life at risk, that force them to strip parts of themselves away - it is a faint and transparent line built on circumstances of class and privilege and luck. Making Art and being an Artist aren't magical elevated states of existence, but something anyone is capable of if given the space to nurture their creativity. I believe the world should be a place where any person can do this.

Two: It's easy to convince yourself that art is meaningless in the face of the world at large. And yes, revolutions aren't fought by poetry and paintings, and people aren't fed through songs. But art is a source and a medium for connection; Art is how we find beauty in a disorganized and entropic world; Art is what we come home to and what words we write and pictures we paint and songs we sing to remind us that people matter to us and love is real and life is worth fucking living. Maybe that's corny and stupid, but it's true.

Three: So help me God, I will never work retail again in my entire life.

---

This is another song that is heavily inspired by artists like Prefab Sprout, Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, and other artists of that ilk - very 80s, very flowery and sentimental lyricism, focused on telling a story. I greatly admire songs that aren't afraid to paint otherwise banal or ordinary scenes in abstract reverence!! I wanted the verses to contrast heavily with each other in that way, with verse one's relentless poeticisms (prosaic practice of depravity) and idioms turned on their head (suspending innocents above their disbelief) against verse two's incredibly straightforward depiction of a factory worker's circumstances.

The flowery language might have worked against me somewhat, though! I've seen a lot of folks that thought the ending was darker or much more defeatist than I intended, and while some of that is just inevitable with a work of art, I want to be clear.

Translator's note: this means "don't kill yourself, you idiot"!!

As you may have picked up from the previous post in this series, this song does heavily feature a leitmotif or two predominantly performed under pudgy pretenses. I'm not going to go on that whole novella-length spiel again, but rest assured knowing that this song, too, is one that makes me think about my OCs. Since it's something many people missed, however, I will take a moment to point out that this song quotes none other than Autumn Every Day off of my album of the same name!

Painting and visual art have been something of a reoccurring obsession of mine in my own art. I grew up around visual artists, have always been friends with many visual artists, and generally have a really intense love of it as a medium and a mode of expression. However, there's also always been a sense of... well, I don't want to call it jealousy, but it's jealousy. I've tried many times to start making visual art of my own, and I have made some things, but it's been a struggle, and I worry sometimes that my eye has permanently outstripped my ability.

However, in my quest to toss out grand expectations and simply have fun making art, I did recently pick up a cheap little drawing tablet! I'm excited to be a beginner at something artistic again...

Finally, I want to thank a couple people: Soneji of Project Mikan for the gorgeous, soaring saxophone solo; friend_xp for the mindboggling MV editing; and especially my good friend Que for the GORGEOUS painterly art that goes along with this song! Que's style was just perfect for this, and really tied the whole thing together immaculately!! There's no joke or deeper lore or anything I just fucking love Que's art go follow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And with that, I think this post is complete!! If you have anything else you wanna know about, ask away in the replies! Tomorrow will be Breeze Blows with Marcy Nabors and Marlow Jacobs!!!

MAKE ART AND BE GAY

[mars-ipan]

HEY FOLKS!

sooooo. remember when i was posting about being up way too late for a powerpoint thing i was doing with friends? yeah i'm posting that final powerpoint now.

allow me to introduce you all to...

THE KOMAHINA BIBLE

(aka a demonstration in unmedicated ADHD)

120 slides. 163 MB. somewhere between 14 and 22 hours of work. sleep deprivation. influence from @anonzentimes , respected komahina scholar. this bad baby has it all this is a powerpoint presentation summarizing and analyzing just about everything you need to know about komahina in sdr2 (and a bit from adjacent media as well). we go in-depth and we prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that komahina real and love wins (loses?)

WARNING: THIS CONTAINS MAJOR END-GAME SPOILERS FOR SDR2 (AS WELL AS DR1). IF YOU WISH TO REMAIN SPOILER-FREE (OR YOU ARE SOMEONE WHO I HAVE BEEN TRYING TO KEEP SPOILER FREE (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE)) THEN DO NOT VIEW THIS POWERPOINT PRESENTATION UNTIL YOU KNOW. I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR YOU HAVING BEEN SPOILED

ok cool! some other things to keep in mind under the cut:

THIS IS LIGHTHEARTED THIS IS LIGHTHEARTED THIS IS LIGHTHEARTED. IF YOU DO NOT SHIP KOMAHINA THAT'S LITERALLY SO FINE I KNOW THERE IS KOMAEDA SEXUALITY DISCOURSE GOING ON RN FOR SOME GODFORSAKEN REASON KNOW THAT I DO NOT THINK EVERYONE HAS TO SHIP KOMAHINA PLEASE I'M LITERALLY A MULTISHIPPER PLEASE. PLEASE DO NOT CRUCIFY ME FOR FUNNY YAOI POWERPOINT

i made this powerpoint in two sittings across 2 days, each sitting about 8-12 hours long

i got about 7 total hours of sleep in that time. not for each day- total. i was mad scientist delirious by the end of this

originally, i wanted to include far more- i wanted to analyze other media in depth (like the stageplays, the drama CD, komaeda's official songs, and even official art and materials) but i did not have the time for it. maybe i will make a new testament powerpoint detailing these as well as fandom analysis but that is not currently in the works

this is a presentation! as such the intended way to consume it is As A Presentation! unfortunately i am not someone who records videos so i cannot present it to you. if you would like to present it to you feel free. if you would like to present it to your friends feel free. if you would like to present it to the internet i'm honored but would like for you to talk to me about it first. cool

the original target audience for this was my friends and not all of them are anime people so. i am using the more english-friendly terms (as well as first names). i don't think this will bug any of you but i'm making it clear anyways

all art included in the presentation is credited with a caption linking back directly to the original artist's account. if you see your art in here and you do not want your art in here: let me know! i will take it down immediately and without question.

i may have missed some details/glossed over some things! if you think i've made a mistake somewhere or have missed something important, talk to me about it! i'd love to discuss it and if i make the new testament sequel powerpoint then i will include your corrections at the beginning :)

a lot of the jokes i make happen in the transitions of this powerpoint. some of them use audio- click on the little speaker icon to play the audio and time the animations yourself i suppose. i'd recommend playing it as a slideshow ^-^

have any questions about a particular point i make? ask me! i will elaborate for you

ok that's all i can think of!! have fun folks :]

[shithowdy]

i'm finally getting my driver's license this year. at 35 years old. as a teen my parents completely dropped the ball in teaching me or encouraging me to sign up for driver's ed, and then i allowed anxiety and unmedicated adhd to rule my life and serve as excuses for why i thought i would be "a danger on the road" for the next 18 years. well, i'm medicated now, and lately i've been taking care of any non-freeway drives like grocery trips. and i'm fine. i'm finally getting my driver's license this year at 35 years old.

[lakunalaika]

@maxicaiman @chaimeanstee

Finally after MONTHS I got enough energy to finish these. They were originally supposed to be artfight attacks but because I joined late I ran out of time. I'm so sorry you've had to wait so incredibly long 😭 unmedicated ADHD is kicking my ass rn

Sadly because these were started back in July my artstyle has changed a bunch and these feel a little out of date, sorry :(

[burntheedges]

get to know your moots

thank you for tagging me @ace-turned-confused @kedsandtubesocks @sawymredfox @iknowisoundcrazy @jeewrites @katareyoudrilling @ghotifishreads 🧡 I freaking love these lol I know it's been a minute but hi, here I am.

what's the origin of your blog title?: username and title are both from a Hozier song, Eat Your Young (because "I'm starving, darling" is how I feel about Joel Miller)

OTP(s) + shipname: alright I've been reading fic since I was 12, here are some of the highlights in vaguely chronological order - Dramione (but like, in the 2000s, lmao), Drarry, Sterek, Johnlock, Arthur/Eames, Stucky, Stony, Sirmione, Wolfstar, Damen/Laurent, 00Q, Spirk, PPCU/reader, Rookanis, DinLuke

favorite color: orange

favorite game: Dragon Age Veilguard, Dragon Age Inquisition, the Mass Effect trilogy, Stardew Valley, BOTW, TOTK

song stuck in your head: Not Like Us, Kendrick Lamar

weirdest habit/trait?: hmmm my husband would say it's no outside clothes allowed on the bed, but I don't think that's weird. probably biting my cuticles. 😬

hobbies: knitting, sewing, writing, gaming

if you work, what's your profession?: let's not talk about work lmao

if you could have any job you wish what would it be?: I don't wish for work lol but maybe owning a book store or yarn shop.

something you're good at: languages, parallel parking, overextending myself

something you're bad at: not overextending myself. feeling my feelings.

something you love: talking to people who love the same things I love 🧡, going to concerts

something you could talk about for hours off the cuff: knitting, linguistics, languages, video games, hockey

something you hate: everything going on right now in the US

something you collect: hmm I used to collect a lot of things and then I moved across the country multiple times and got tired of having stuff. books, probably lol

something you forget: anything that's not in my calendar

what's your love language?: fyi the love languages book is fundamentalist nonsense BUT I do feel very loved when my husband does what they call acts of service (which he knows). that's what I tend to do by default, too, but he likes when I use my words.

favorite movie/show: LOTR, Ever After, Deep Space 9, The Matrix, Clueless, Inception, TLOU, The Mandalorian, Skyfall, Pacific Rim, CA:TWS, Andor, so many others lol

favorite food: pasta, a perfect caeser salad, sopes, sushi

favorite animal: cats. also hippos, those big dorks

are you musical?: I was kicked out of band lol but I was in a singing group in high school and another later. I can read music ok

what were you like as a child?: looking back, obviously unmedicated for ADHD, lmao. but extroverted and hyperaware, really

favorite subject at school?: languages, and then history

least favorite subject?: science, but mostly because some of my teachers sucked and I was socialized to think I was supposed to be bad at it

what's your best character trait?: probably my empathy?

what's your worst character trait?: not taking the time to think (I'm working on it)

if you could change any detail of your day right now what would it be?: I want my cold to be gone lol

if you could travel in time who would you like to meet?: ETA just realized I never answered this one. I spent a lot of time thinking about it and I'm still not sure!

recommend one of your favorite fanfics (spread the love!):

I have yet again begun to reread Be-All and Endor by @djarins-cyare because it brings me comfort (which I've needed lately) 🧡

A new favorite is The Morning Commute by @iknowisoundcrazy -- speed!AU Javi! god I love it

I think a lot of people have already done this, but in case you haven't, np tagging: @maggiemayhemnj @secretelephanttattoo @schnarfer @the-mandawhor1an @sixhours

@@davnittbraes @wannab-urs @justagalwhowrites @beardedjoel @futuraa-free

[weresilver]

Sentinel AU vignette

I ended up writing a thing mostly unrelated to anything that I actually have going in order to battle writer's block. It worked. And I even picked up the secret santa fic again (sorry guys, but it's coming along!) but the now-diagnosed-yet-unmedicated ADHD is now kicking my butt with how much I actually have to do in a hurry.

For now, have this cute lil thing :)

Note: I'm a nerd, who will work with TS canon. This is 1982, however. So, y'know. No one is actually referred to as a Sentinel in this.

When her little brother started crying this evening, Stella Williams knew it would be a rough night. Call it a big sister’s intuition. Her parents told her to never doubt it. That same intuition told her that her little Danny would end up a... What was it Dad called it? A guardian?

Guardian, yes.

Stella never presented any enhanced senses during her childhood, and, at 12 — almost 13 — years old, she decided she was glad for it. Dad didn’t really talk about how his three enhanced senses came online, but she wondered. If it had been as bad as it was going for Danny lately — and he was at the age where only one sense came online — then she could easily accept she had none of it.

She found him sitting on the floor of his room, scratching rather frantically at his arm and sniffling sadly. Stella crouched in front of him, not daring to touch.

“‘Tella,” Danny called. He didn’t open his arms for a hug as he usually did, instead pulling his t-shirt away from his body. It was a sad, pathetic sight that pulled at her heartstrings.

Not that she would ever say that out loud. She actually really loved her little brother.

“Hey, Danny.” She kept her voice soft. “Mom and Dad are not back yet,” she trailed off, watching his face scrunch up again. “What if I run you a bath, huh?”

Danny nodded, still sniffling and teary eyed, but doing his best not to cry again. Stella ran out of his bedroom and into the bathroom, setting what she needed up. Watching the tub fill, she kept an ear out to her brother, though the sound of the water drowned out most of the little kid noises Danny would make.

At six years old, their parents’ only surprise — well, Dad’s only surprise — was that the first sense to come forth had been touch. It had been a few months now, but this week was the first time it really seemed to bother Danny. The fact that touch didn’t seem to be a sense that ran in the family was what surprised Dad; it was also what made Stella believe her little brother would be a guardian.

She wasn’t quite sure what that would entail. All five senses enhanced, sure. But Dad was always saying that there was more to it than just the senses. All the stories in his side of the family said so. She didn’t really understand those stories, to be honest.

She shut the water off, tested the water, and, satisfied that the temperature wouldn’t aggravate his skin, the way Mom had told her. Well, time to get her little brother all set before their parents arrived with Matty and Bri.

————

Itchy, itchy, itchy.

Danny’s clothes hadn’t bothered him before, he didn’t think, but it was really bad this week. Mom and Pops were busy with Matty and Bri, somewhere not in the house, but he knew that it was important. Stella was there with him, though, and that was fine; she was kind of boring, but for once he wasn’t in the mood to play.

His sister had left to run him a bath, since it usually helped a lot with the itchiness and the heat. He was thinking he didn't like summer much.

A clicking sort of sound came from behind him just as Stella turned on the water in the bathroom; she wouldn't hear the noise.

Danny turned around quickly, facing the big animal that was suddenly in the room with him.

————

The first thing she heard when she left the bathroom caught her off guard. Giggling was not the type of sound Stella associated with her brother struggling with his sense of touch.

Maybe it was one of those “laugh so you don't cry” things. Danny seemed to try his hardest not to cry when it came to his sense of touch being weird. Instead, he threw one heck of a temper tantrum that only Dad seemed able to get through, sometimes.

Either way, Danny's bath was ready and—

Well, shit. May her mother never hear her thoughts at the sight that greeted her.

“Hi, ‘Tella!” Danny waved from where he lay on the flank of... a really large wolf. Larger still when next to a six-year-old boy. Stella was hard pressed to admit that she was gaping. “I have a friend!”

The wolf nosed at Danny’s cheek, gently, making her little brother giggle again. It was, somewhat disturbingly, an adorable sight.

“Uh, Danny?” He made a questioning noise in return. Or, heck, that had been the wolf, she wasn't sure. But they were both looking at her with equally curious faces. “Where did it come from?”

The kid frowned, hard, looking between her and the wolf as if her question didn’t make sense at all.

“He’s my friend,” he repeated. “He came here.”

Stella nodded. It was all she could do, really; she was pretty sure that every window was closed and the doors were locked. And, well, someone would have said something if a wolf had escaped a zoo, right?

The wolf was watching her, not as though cautious of her, but just... Analyzing her? She shook her head minutely, choosing to ignore what sounded like a huff from the animal.

“He’s my family,” Danny stated, quite simply, “His name’s Fen’ee.”

It dawned on her quickly after that. Family. Familiar, the wolf was Danny’s familiar. Well, Mom was gonna love this. This Fen’ee was huge. But Danny was lying down, using its flank as a pillow and back rest, and, for the first time today, he looked downright peaceful.

The wolf nosed at Danny again, this time at his ribs, in order to get him to stand up. Her little brother scrambled upright, using his companion to balance himself.

“Ready for that bath?” Stella asked as she stood up. Danny nodded happily, eager even though he wasn’t scratching at his arms anymore. The wolf — Fen nipped gently at Danny’s t-shirt, making the boy giggle one more time, and turned his attention her. There was intelligence in the golden eyes, as well as a good dose of humor. It let its tongue loll out, gently wagging its tail. “Thanks, Fen.”

It tilted its head, looking a little confused at the nickname. Well, Stella would have to figure out what its actual name was at some other point; she had a little half fish sibling to take care of.

[crazylittlejester]

Wait so is your modern au Sky also epileptic? (Sorry if this has been answered before XD) And if so, what kind and how do his symptoms manifest? (Full permission to yap ! I'm invested in this au /gen)

No worries! I honestly can't remember if I've talked about it or not for this au, but yes my modern au Sky has epilepsy too :)

(sorry this is a bigger yap than i intended it to be aljdlsljdld, you awakened my inner yapper. also my bad for typos if there are any)

The meds he takes to help stop him from having seizures so frequently (they don't stop them completely) make him pretty tired, he doesn't have as much energy as his friends and this makes him upset a lot of the time because he's had to sit out on a few activities. He also has to make sure he gets enough sleep and doesn't stay up too late or he'll risk triggering a seizure, so he can't stay up with Twi and Wars and sometimes it's hard for him to not feel like he HAS to exclude himself. Twi and Wars are both incredibly understanding, especially since they've known him for so long and have listened to him rant and tried to help as best as they could, but sometimes it's just exhausting for Sky to argue with HIMSELF. He knows his friends aren't excluding him and go out of their way to make sure he can join them, but he gets a little jealous when he has to go to bed and can still hear the TV on in the living room (and this is also why he can get a little snappy when Twi and Wars want to play video games all afternoon. It's not their fault and Sky feels bad for getting upset about it, but he PHYSICALLY cannot play with them, he can't share that with them, and he can only handle watching them for a little bit before he has to stop watching the screen. Twi and Wars don't have a whole lot of time they can play together because Wars is so busy and has like no free time, but they REALLY try to only play if Sky is out at work or actively asleep because they wanna spend time with him too)

One of the most outwardly noticeable signs he's about to have a seizure is that he'll get a bit of an energy boost and act a little hyper for HIM, which can sometimes be hard for friends to notice because when he's hyper his energy level basically just goes up to 'average young adult with unmedicated adhd', which is like half his friend group so he's just acting like the rest of them. Sometimes they don't notice because Sky suddenly being a little more energetic fuels the group's chaoticnes and they just rile each other up [This is EXACTLY what happened in Secrets (Un)known, which isn't a fic for this au but it was the first fic I wrote specifically about Sky having a seizure and just a good example of the situation I'm trying to describe aldjhkd] Things right before that SKY will notice include things like getting super anxious and suddenly feeling really heavy and like everything is slowing down. He'll also feel nauseous and like he's overheating.

His meds can also make it hard for him to focus and when he first started taking the ones he's currently on they'd give him headaches, though he doesn't really get headaches from them anymore, which he's super thankful for because the migraine auras he'd get would feel similar enough to seizure auras that he'd end up working himself into a panic attack thinking he was about to have a seizure, or, on the flip side, he'd tell himself it was just a migraine and then try to push through what ended up being a seizure

He can't drive, which has really affected his mental health because he gets frustrated that he can't be seizure free long enough to be able to learn how and he's got to rely on his friends to drive him places (granted he does live in a city, which is where both his job and college campus is, but sometimes the weather is bad and it just isn't walkable, or he has to go to an appointment which is a bit further away). The entire reason he's an english lit major who plans to become a teacher is because school was SUCH a struggle for him, between being unable to focus and having seizures and then missing school because he was simply unable to go, and because his grades were sometimes poor his teachers and the education system would make him feel stupid and it frustrated him to NO end. He'd get called sleepy and lazy, and 'no wonder he failed he doesn't pay attention in class' so he became HELL BENT on not letting another generation of kids with disabilities suffer like that. He's not stupid at all, he's so so smart and he has so much to say about the books he loves, and he wants to be able to help at least ONE kid who was taught to think they were just stupid realize no, their brain is just a little different. (Wars also played a part in this. He has unmedicated ADHD and couldn't pay attention well in class back in high school and his grades suffered a bit and he genuinely thought he was just stupid because the teachers would make fun of him and tell him he needed to spend less time thinking about his appearance and more time paying attention, and Sky got so genuinely fucking mad that Wars to this DAY believes he's just a pretty face that he snapped a bit and decided he was going to take his passion for literature and helping people and channel it into becoming an english teacher)

At THIS point, Sky's meds are helping ENOUGH that he won't stop taking them but he can't increase the dose to help more because of the side effects. He has focal impaired awareness seizures most commonly, which looks to the outside person like he's just zoned out. He'll usually blink quickly or sometimes his hand will twitch for about a minute and then he'll be a bit confused for a little afterwards, and it can sometimes be hard for him to talk immediately after. If he's really stressed out he can have a couple of those a week, but usually he'll have like 3-7 per month (though sometimes it can be more than that). It's RARE he makes it through a week without having a seizure at all

The main reason he's worried about changing his medication is because this current one has really decreased the number of big, dropping to the ground convulsing seizures he has per year, and he's scared to start trying other things because he doesn't want to risk those becoming more frequent. When he was younger he'd have several tonic clonic seizures per week, and now he'll get them like once-ish per month (again it depends on stress, sleep, and making sure he avoids flashing lights or fast moving videos. sometimes they'll happen more than once a month, sometimes he'll make it a full month without having one (and then get a little anxious about it))

Wars and Twi have kind of mastered the very fine line between taking care of Sky and pissing him off, because they're well aware Sky doesn't need their help with anything and if he does he'll ask for it, but sometimes when they notice him getting a bit worked up over something (like a school assignment or exams) and they've had to get really creative about helping distract him and calm him down without making Sky paranoid they're treating him like a ticking time bomb. They do not baby him, they do not treat him like he's about to explode, but Sky went through grade school and teachers who've all seen him start to get stressed and gone "Why don't we take some deep breaths?" in a SUPER condescending way, so it's become a bit of an instinct to lash out if he feels like he's being treated differently. The little things Wars and Twi do to help him just take a deep breath and relax a little are the same things they'll do to each other or any of their other friends when they get stressed, like make him some tea or offer to help him study by asking questions so he can see if he remembers the answer. They'll just get his dinner for him so he doesn't have to worry about it or get him a little treat at the store, sometimes Wars will literally just use a laser pointer to send one of his cats into Sky's room

He's been looking into seizure alert dogs, because he thinks one could be really useful and help him feel a little more independent and also help with his stress, but they're expensive and he lives in an apartment, so he's hesitant to get one

(full disclosure, I myself do not have epilepsy but a close friend of mine does and I've talked with her as well as someone who has a family member who experiences seizures and I've done a TON of research, however that does NOT make me an expert and if i do make any mistakes i would greatly appreciate kind corrections. representation is important to me, and i don't want to accidentally spread misinformation)

[rainbow-neko-artblog]

Rlly late buts whats your opinion on the new dandys world toons like shelly, teagan and tisha? You kinda just posted two things about dandys world and never heard from you again so I'm just wondering.

Ohhh you must be new here.

I have severe adhd that's unmedicated 90% of the time, so I switch whatever I'm interested in, faster than a knife through air. Which is why I haven't been posting Dandys World content. The initial stimulus has died off- sometimes I post one off things and then dissappear.

My opinions on the latest toons haven't been said because I don't particularly feel any type of way about them. Other then the fact that they are lesbian coded to me.

Also I had a mild debate on my server about Shelly's design and how it could have been better (but for LORE reasons it wasn't. And I think that's intentional.) But that's about it.

[felldowngirl]

helloooo 👋

a while ago i got kicked out (was staying in the apt my grandma rents out, paying just for utilities ($70-$150/month), ended up being 4 days late for a $130 bill & was told 2 not be surprised if the doors were locked when i got home from work) & had to move in with my mom in her boyfriend's house. i'm living in a small cleared-out section of the basement.

now, all this is fine, i can manage, deal, whatever, but it's been very hard trying to save up money for a new place while including the deposit & first couple months rent. & as this situation continues, it's putting more strain on my mom because my stepdad is an asshole & not really happy with the situation. i'm unmedicated & depressed, trying to keep myself optimistic. if you've ever been stuck somewhere you either don't want to be, or are not wanted, then you can imagine what it's like.

i know everyone is struggling right now, & i'll be working all the time anyway, so if there's more pressing & urgent things to take care of, do that. but if you do find yourself lucky enough to have money to spare, i'd appreciate the consideration.

you can send whatever $mossliker or @/jrdntcktt on pp. thanks for reading if you got this far. if you do end up sending anything, shoot me a message! i doubt this will get much traction, so maybe if time permits, i'll draw you something or give you a tarot reading (i'm really good at those!)

[order-zerum]

How Zerum Ends

Well, everyone, it's finally happened. The end of Discord Whooves has occurred so now I can talk about what Zerum is and where he was going.

I've said in the past that Zerum's timeline runs parallel to Discord Whooves' timeline, meaning both exist at the same time. And by this I mean events in Discord Whooves line up to the various things that happen to Zerum, starting from the start of both blogs. How this is happening?

Well, Zerum is supposed to be the discord curse in the Doctor's head. He's a literal virus infecting the Doctor's mind, planted there to keep him captive to Discord's influence. The ways you can line up events is through 4 various types of events.

1: Sex. Most of the times that sex occurs, is when The Doctor is overcome by his lust and goes on various sexapades. This doesn't ALWAYS line up, but it does for sure whenever Discord shows up for it.

2: The Light. The light occurs any time The Doctor becomes his old self, undiscorded. It's the glimpses of hope that we get that he's still there, deep down, and the light is a threat to Zerum because if the light stays on, the virus gets destroyed along with Discord's influence. The light's appearance remains consistent with the Doctor's blog, so this is the best way to keep track of where Zerum is in The Doctor's story. I was planning for the light to manifest as a cute creature so people would try to defend it which would ultimately cause more harm to Zerum because the light is basically antibodies.

Eventually the light was going to get so bad that it nearly kills Zerum, during the time that Twilight and Minuette helped the Doctor. Discord seems to have abandoned him but really he can't get in his head during that time.

3: The baby nightmares. These nightmares happen any time Hyde becomes active in The Doctor, and eventually the 'baby' who is actually The Valeyard breaks free of Zerum and escapes the mind prison.

4: Perry Doctor. After the point where Perry appears in Discord Whooves, any time The Doctor is sleeping Perry travels into his mind to interact with Zerum. Perry is a dream traveler, which is why he is able to do this.

Also, there is a reason Perry was able to reach him. Perry travels through the dreams of various ponies and beings, he is a dream traveler rather than a space/time traveler. He found Zerum by visiting his old self's dream, because Zerum is in Dissy's mind.

How was the blog supposed to end?

Eventually, Zerum was going to be able to be convinced to fight Discord when the light shows up and weakens him, and he manages to kill Discord. The event that causes him to have his change of mind is when Discord disguises himself as Perry and attempts to destroy their relationship after he discovered it. But Zerum manages to figure out it's not Perry, and Discord reveals himself. That's when the light returns and Zerum is able to kill him.

Of course, he's accepted that he'll die with Discord, and is ready to accept his fate... but Perry found a way to materialize a TARDIS in The Doctor's mind and rescue Zerum before it's too late.

Zerum is then brought into Perry's dreamscape, where he slowly learns to recover and gain a sense of self worth.

Zerum's cutie mark was going to change to represent his newfound freedom and the self love that he found with Perry's help.

So there you have it, you now know what Zerum's whole deal was, and where the story was meant to go.

This blog was extremely personal to me, and was an exploration of the trauma I had obtained from past abuse, both sexual and mental from horrible people in my past. For a long time I had unmedicated PTSD so this was the best way I could find to cope. The blog was meant to be shocking and to manipulate people into saying and requesting horrible things to feed into the abuse and put people in the place of the abuser, or those trying to help the abused. I'm happy to say while it started out pretty awful, after a while people were much more kind and wanting to help. It started from a very basic hypnosis kink idea, but then I got to wondering why it was a kink and if it was okay to be one. The blog itself wasn't meant as me being kinky, but me exploring 'why does this make me feel this way', and I was able to come to the conclusion that many abuse survivors have these kind of kinks because it gives them a sense of control in something they lost control over in the past. It's a safe way to explore a traumatizing experience, and their own way of having consent in exposing themselves to it. A lot of people assume people are getting turned on by the idea of being abusive, when in actuality most of us are putting ourselves in the victim's role. These are complex feelings but it gives us autonomy over our experiences. It doesn't mean we're turned on by being victims, or that we enjoyed what happened to us. It just means we want to have control over when we feel submissive and vulnerable. We're not 'sick fucks' who get turned on by the suffering of others, most of us would never want anyone to experience what we went through. But we want a safe space to come to terms with our feelings, to feel power in exploring a fantasy situation of powerlessness. This is a process that we need to cope with trauma, and it doesn't hurt anyone but the fictional characters we put ourselves into.

That said, I will be deleting all the posts of this blog besides this one, because it is much to sensitive to me and I've closed that chapter in my life. I don't want this series to be easily found or associated with my original works, so it's time to say goodbye to Zerum. I will leave the posts up for a month so people can read and see all the clues and how the story lines up with Discord Whooves, but after a month is up I will delete the rest of the blog and leave this post in its place.

Thank you all for following, and especially thank you to all who approached this story with understanding. I hope I helped people come to terms with their own traumas, or at least informed people more on what trauma is like.

[barrenwomb]

Im going thru It (21 years old n in university n failing), anyway how are u marti?

who doesn't go thru it at 21, honestly. my 21 yo brother just texted me "i attended my first class in MONTHS and i don't want to kms today 👍" and i was like yaaaay because being is your early 20s is the same for everyone. i realized it not a long ago. you think you're struggling way worse than your peers and it's simply not true. ask a bunch of your classmates if they ever think of running into traffic and they'll all give u the same answer. it gets better. my brother watched me being at my LOWEST at his age so when i tell him it gets better he kinda believes me. thank god. university sucks. i wanted to study italian literature and philosophy, then i wanted to learn russian and mandarin, then i went to law school and dropped out after a semester, then i became a nurse. who cares. i wanted to kill myself while in nursing school, too. you think you're sooo grown but you're actually a kid. living with your parents sucks. you don't own them anything btw. ur 21, you should be at the club. it gets better. i'm doing great btw! spent my early 20s taking so many antipsychotics i lost count and now im unmedicated and thriving!!!!!!!! u think being a teenager sucks until u hit 21 and gain 27 different mental illnesses. then one day you wake up in your mid/late 20s and can't believe u used to feel batshit insane and hopeless 24/7 lol the cycle of life. kisses u on the forehead