#its time to expect things to be done right done well and ethical

[lillikoifish]

Hbomberguy has made a very harsh and overarching point that I think a lot of people are glossing over so they can dunk on James Somerton, the iilluminaughtii, cinemassacre, internet historian, and that ign guy filip— plagiarism is very easy to slide under the radar on, and well liked people who are universally celebrated have and will profit from others’ labors and masquerade as though it’s theirs.

You think youre cool cuz you havent heard of these people or you didnt “like” them for “”””vibes”””” reasons?? You arent built different, you arent above anyone, you are not anything but another human being who can absolutely be fooled by someone charismatic with decent editing. Heres the real lesson: fucking look closely at every aspect of media you consume, because it is your DUTY to ensure you dont uplift grifters. And that? Is a full time job.

Have fun out there!

[scrubbinn]

Mimic HRT: month 23 “Alone with myself”

“This is a dumb idea. The day after Erian gives up with his mimic research, you decide to resort to the worst possible option. There's so many other options we could try.”

“Oh, so now you show up in my head. Of course you're only here to attack me. Why should I expect anything different? It's just magic. We're inexperienced but the book can guide us. If you want to help then you can stay, otherwise I don't want to hear a single thing out of you.”

“You can't call this magic. This is so much worse. Look, I'm here to make sure you're going to be ok, I'm here to talk when you need it.”

“Well I don't need to talk to anyone right now. So go away. I need to concentrate.”

“And what would she think?”

“Leave!”

“Ms.Mulberry, You’ve been in your office for a while now. Is everything alright? You seem to have locked the door, and barred it considering the master key is doing nothing. I understand if you’re having trouble with your panic attacks. It’s the only reason I gave you this place. I just need the recording on Mimic behavior. The full recording, not the edited draft this time.”

“Sorry Theo, I, uh, yeah I’m kind of busy at the moment. I left the recorder in your desk drawer, the one with all the candy. By the way, you know you’re not at that age where you can be so casual with your teeth, right? Maybe get that sweet tooth pulled instead? Anyway, I’ll be busy for a while so I could use some space.”

“Right… Well your unneeded chastising aside and your odd hiding of your recorders around my office, I’ll take a look. Please don’t take more than 15 minutes. We have several important clients coming in soon and I need you at the front desk on your best behavior.”

“What happened to Jacob?”

“He was fired after he screamed at a dragon walking into the clinic on three separate occasions. Look I would appreciate not having a conversation with a door, will you open up or not?”

“Busy right now, like I said. Just. Go away for now. Like an hour?”

“You have 10 minutes. Harumph. I will be in my own office with the door not barred and I will be listening to your findings, they better be worthwhile.”

* * *

“Mayday! Mayday!? You open this door this instant!!” Listen to me right now! I know you have that book from Thayer library in there! Do not use it! Mayday, you will not use that book or you’ll wish all that happened today is me breaking down this door!”

“Leave Theo, I’m not stopping now. There were no concrete answers anywhere until this book found its way to me. If science won’t show me my origins, then the only answer I have left is magic. Now be quiet. I need to make sure the ritual circle is perfect. I can’t afford to mess up a single line. You said you had some clients, right? Go tend to them, I’ll be fine.”

“You most certainly won’t be! This isn’t magic, Mayday! This is something far more dangerous! Not to mention it could cause the ethics board to take away my license if they found out something like this happened here! I'm calling the fire department, I'll be taking the damages out of your paycheck!”

“Of course that’s what you’re worried about. Now hush already… The protection circle goes here, I think there’s just enough salt to finish the rest of these sigils…”

“Why are you even doing this here of all places!? Do you seriously just want to get me in trouble when this childish impatience blows up in your face? 

Wait. Why are you doing this here? This is the only place where I could interfere with you… You’re worried what she’d say if she knew what you were doing. It’s easier for me to hate you, isn’t it.”

“...Don’t bring up Abigail. She wouldn't get it. Neither of you would. It's so clear you've hit a dead end. You just found some random substances in your office and decided that, in your oh so infinite wisdom, this, this right here. This is what should go in a person's medicine. I'd ask what you'd have done if it didn't kill me, but I've actually seen how many people have nearly choked on your experiments. It's your fault I'm a mimic, I never asked for this. I wanted to be a slime! I still do. Now I'm this thing that can only fake it. I was so close, I was so, so close. And now it's gone forever. I am the only mimic in existence. I am alone, and I can't convey to anyone how scared that makes me.”

“You're worried Ms.Abigail could talk you out of this, aren't you.”

“The ritual is nearly complete. Please leave the building, Theo. I can't call you a friend, but you're like the definition of Stockholm syndrome. I don't want to see you hurt.”

“You open this door this instant you little ungrateful stain of a-

“Theo?... He's… gone? Oh the summoning circle! Ok everything looks fine. Protection ring, spell ring, candles.. have blown out. It's pitch black outside. I think I should close the blinds. Though I doubt it'll stop whatever's out there from getting in. Ok, focus, you're in this deep, what's a few more miles. All you need to do is read the next part. Heh, hehehahaha! I… why can’t I read these words? It's my nerves, I’ll bet. I don’t want to think if it could be something else. Let’s just get this over with, read the passage, figure out the rest later. Iɟ I ʍɐᴉʇ ʇoo louƃ I pou,ʇ ʞuoʍ ʍɥɐʇ ʍᴉll ɥɐddǝu…

I think my reality is starting to break. Oʞ lǝʇ,s qǝƃᴉu.”

“HⱯⱯⱯꓵ ҼODOʁHꓕ IⱯ,Է BEҼ,Γ-EE,H HꓕOHꓕOƧ-ҼO⅄ 'HⱯҼИ,ҼИ,IⱯ,⅄!”

“Are you there?”

…

“Oh, oh stars it worked. Hello… I am Mayday Mulberry. I've summoned you to-

…

“Of course, how rude of me. Then does that mean you know? You know what I am, and where mimics come from?” I beg of you to impart this knowledge onto me. I must know my kind and their history. Are there others out there like me?”

…

“I… I'm sorry for summoning you, but I had no other choice. I- what do you mean I'm stagnant? No, I'm still changing, I’m a mimic! We’re the definition of changing.”

…

“I. I don't believe you! You're wrong! Just shut up! Just tell me what I want to know! I summoned you! I'm the one in control here!”

…You are an insect, a being, trying at something it is not. You who expect mere shapes to impress and salt to keep you safe. You fumble in ignorance. You crave the isolation that you fear so much. If you wish for knowledge, You will have knowledge. This stagnant thing before me. It pretends to change in vain displays of approval. Revolting.

… ..! …….!!

You will not speak. This ingredient you wish to know. This thing that makes you mimic. It is nothing. The entirety of nothing. The concept to not exist, so that you may be anything. You should not be physical, but only existing blissfully as the thoughts of others pass through you. And forget you. Mortals think, and you mimic. You are the accident of yourself. A concept that formed its own existence. The byproduct of which was found by a paradoxically curiously incurious mortal who knows its place in the cosmic scale. Unlike you, stagnant thing. I will teach you. You will mimic.

* * *

Where am I? I can’t speak. I can’t see. I can barely keep a single thought, it disappears

       the second I stop thinking about it. There’s no sensation. Am I dead? Could I even be considered dead? Self, think of a self and try to form an idea and then it will work. I need arms, I don’t have arms. Can I form an arms? Wait… what is an arms? I don’t remember. Legs? No, I've never heard of those. What’s a self? No, I know what a self is because I am a self. I think… hard to think.   How do you think again? Can you do that in this reality?

Mɥɐʇ ǝʌǝu ᴉs ɹǝɐlᴉʇʎ ɐuʎɯoɹǝ?

I I w I

t s i

l c

f t l a

e h n

e i I t

l s

s s r

l e e

s i e m

o v e

i t m

s n h b

t g e e

r ? m r

a

n a h

g g e

e a r

i

Ah n n

did I  a

just melt m

into myself? e

Do I still have a 

self? I can’t even 

remember anything 

about myself. I am a 

mimic. My name is. Oh, 

I don’t know it anymore… 

I think that would be scary, 

but I don’t know how to be 

scared anymore. Was this 

supposed to teach me? To 

be ever changing. Why did 

I do this again? To learn who 

I am? Did I not have a self 

before? Why did I need to 

know?... I was lonely. Right?

It was so lonely. 

I remember being 

so incredibly tired. 

Sometimes I would 

just cry from how 

bad it got. I had to 

be seen. To be 

known. I had to 

be. Or else I. Or 

else I… I don’t 

remember. 

What shape am I 

now? Something 

called a knife? 

What is that?

I was just something wasn’t I? I was a past memory. I don’t remember it anymore. It wasn’t a good one. Should I forget it? But if I do then I won't remember anything ever again. Eternity with a bad memory. It feels fitting for some reason. I should figure a way out. I want to leave.

Every thought takes so long to form.

If I stay here any longer I won’t be able to leave. I need to think. I was talking with someone before I came here. I know they’re here because they've always been here. Because where else could they be? Because… where are you?

There you are! Here I am. 

Who are you? I'm you!

Can you please explain? I’m someone to talk to.

I see. Like an imaginary friend? No, I’m very much real.

Could we talk normally? Yes we can, and it’s no problem.

I’m… Mayday, being able to talk with someone helps focus my mind. I feel like I can actually think straight. How long has it been since we came here?

I think it’s been about… 20 years? I have zero frame of reference. But at least we can finally communicate easily. Imagine if it took us 20 years in the real world. That would suck! But seriously, we really should talk now. I think it’ll be important. Oh right, where are my manners. My name is. Well. Mayday doesn’t really work for me. We can figure out a different one later. Let’s just pick something at random for now. Something like, how about laborer?

Are you sure you want to go with a name like that? Well I guess it’s temporary. So I have a lot of questions. How are you me? Are you the voice in my head? Were you always a part of me, or are you some mimic brain thing?

Woah, Woah, slow down. One thing at a time. How do I answer everything? No, I've been in here long before you. Yes I'm the one who's been able to talk to you, and before you ask, I'm not some ghost of Mayday's former self. I'm just… Someone who works here.

Cryptic. Maybe you should start from the beginning? I'd rather not test if Getting a headache without a head is possible.

Really? You want to start a self therapy session out here in the void? Alright. I’m game. Well you spent the last decade here feeling isolated. I’m sure it felt longer, that’s what happens when you get trapped in a place without time, I guess. Anyways, you don’t remember, but I used to be you. Before we even knew who we actually were, and that was the problem. We didn’t know what was wrong with us, but we knew we weren’t, ugh, normal. Normal in boring people’s eyes. But, it was isolating, we removed ourself from people who didn’t understand, and it isolated us even more.

So you’re saying I went crazy because we never connected to anyone? Why are you only showing up now anyways?

First of all, we’re not crazy. I’d bite anyone who’d call us crazy for that. Secondly, I've only been able to reach you since you started feeling like your true self.

Pretty sure I screwed that up becoming a mimic instead of a slime.

Oh, no, I wanted to be a slime, you were the one who wanted to be a mimic.

Huh? I guess I didn't hate being a mimic exactly. So all this happened because I, er, we felt isolated. Is that really true?

  Loneliness is more traumatic than you’d think. When it was just me, it got to the point that… I couldn’t think of anything else but… no, don't worry about it. Since you stopped me before I could do something stupid, you took over, and you started talking to people. It helped, it got us to where we met others like us.

But it didn’t help. I still feel lonely. I can feel it, you know. There’s other mimics around us here. They’re all here and I still feel lonely.

Yeah, dummy. We don’t know how to feel any other way. We need to unlearn it. Otherwise nothing is going to change.

… Hey um, laborer, ugh awful name. We'll pick something better, I wanted to say I'm sorry, for getting us stuck here for all eternity. I was supposed to be the one who stopped us from feeling this way and I ended up digging us into a deeper hole, at least we have each other, and the trillions of mimics that surround us.

You did your best. Hey, let's try doing something. Look down. You can see Erian right? This is him two years ago. We’re mimicking his thoughts right now. I think normally we would just munch on his stray thoughts. But being physical we could do something fun with what’s left of our body. Check it out.

What did you just do? Did you just. We're the one who left that ingredient for Erian to use. So we created ourself on accident. Oh stars, the ingredient was our own decayed body, I think I'm going to be sick. Wait, isn't this like a time paradox?

Paradoxes aren't real, humans just haven't figured out the physics of time yet. This is a teachable moment. We're going to get out of here. We're going to find a tear in the void and walk out of it. Since time doesn't exist, our perception of it becomes reality. A century becomes a blink, we just need to find the point where we escape to the correct time and go there.

I understood basically none of it but you’re saying we can go back, right? Then I’ll try whatever nonsense you tell me. Hey laborer, will we be able to talk when we get back? Laborer? Hey! Are you there?!

“Ms.Mulberry? Mayday! Mayday! Are you finally awake? Mayday, can you hear me?!”

Theo? H-how long was I gone?

“Mayday! You have so much to answer for! Pull yourself together already!”

Huh? Can he not hear me? Oh, right, I forgot how to make a mouth. No, that’s not a mouth, that's just teeth. Teeth and eyes. Is that all I can remember? No… Teeth, eyes, and knowing, I just know. I know what he’s saying, that he knows what I am, and he doesn’t understand. It felt like it was years. No wonder I can’t remember how to move a body.

All of my memories are flooding back… Except the old ones. I don’t remember my time there. Just that it was horrific, and that I’ll miss it. I was connected to my kind for just a brief moment of eternity. I think I met someone there, and I wanted to say goodbye to everyone before I disappeared. I don’t think I’ll ever get back now. What do I even do? Therapy I guess. Oh, Erian is still talking. Maybe it’s important.

“I swear, you just do things with no regard! You could have seriously endangered my life, and the livelihood of everyone who comes to this clinic! Do you ever think about others? You better have a good explanation, and more importantly answers to our research if you ever want the chance of me forgiving you. You arrogant, ignorant, self-obsessed, blah, blah blah blah…”

Yep. Nothing important. Whatever. Stars, I’m bored. I want to hang out with Aria again, I want to see how Sandy is doing, I want to make sure Alexis is ok, I want to be able to hold Abi again. Maybe I should host a party. It’d be nice to be around others.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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@aster-is-confused, @bloodandbrandywyne, @glitchgloop, @nyxthewary, @lunadook

[box-architecture]

CKAU: Part One of ???

I often find myself struggling to write the first chapter of the Communication Knife AU.

When I first started writing awesamdream, it was me spitballing ideas in the dreblr minecraft server when it first opened, and trying to have fun with a ship that, at the time, wasn't considered A Big Thing, or was purely for whump purposes. And while writing for an AU, Sif was also there, poking and tormenting lovingly as a Sif does, and mentioned the concept of Auspisticism, a homestuck relationship, in regards to Dream, Sam, and Punz. And then one thing led to another, and now I have this big thing that makes me happy and had grown a lot bigger than I expected it to, and there's so many little drabbles and snippets and smut pieces that came out of it, that by the time new people started asking what the hell I was talking about, I realized that the context wasn't properly put together and hard to explain.

So I tried to put together a whole fic for it! And it hasn't been going well.

Because I really want to do the fic justice. I want to make it sound really lovely and use all the right words and explain very well all the things that made me insane so you can understand just the way it went when all this started! But in trying to do that, it's become so hard to write. I feel stuck, the words won't come, I overthink and overedit, and nothing is good enough.

But I still really, really do want to explain the AU so you can understand. And i know it won't be the perfect, well designed thing I built in my head, with all the write prose and all the little extra fancy things, but I'd rather you have it imperfectly than not at all.

Here you go, part one of ???:

(Sam: he/him

Dream: he/him

Punz: they/he

just to make sure.)

When things get bad for Dream in prison, he offers Sam sexual favors in return for better treatment, food/blankets/etc., and Sam agrees to this, regardless of the terrible ethics involved. Its not a great situation, for like, Obvious Reasons, and the consent is very much dubious here. Sam's possessive behavior is at its peak, and even if there ends up being less torture as part of the deal, it doesn't change that things are still fucked up.

When Dream escapes prison and finds Sam during Daedalus Arc, after scarring Sam, Dream offers to meet up to have sex again next week, out of a need to feel in control, to prove how he was Totally Not Traumatized he was and how he was absolutely fully capable of consenting to it, and the two continue their sexual activities.

However, Punz, who has been in a comfortably open relationship with Dream since before prison, bristles at the idea of Sam taking advantage of Dream, of the severe power imbalance still being a problem, and comes with him to these sexual encounters to protect him and keep Sam from pushing Dream's boundaries. They set up some rules, and if Sam breaks any or steps out of line, Punz will stab him with a special, gaudy blue knife that has 'Communication' engraved in its handle.

--

"He tortured you!"

"Technically it was Quackity who did the torturing." Dream corrected him, meticulously sorting his inventory. Their base felt suffocating, tiny, and he wanted to be done and gone already, but Punz seemed ready to fight him the whole way.

"Don't give me that shit," Punz snapped. "Sam let him in, he starved you half to death, for God's sake, Dream, he r-"

"It was not." At breakneck speed, Dream turned on his heel and hissed. "I said yes. Don't you dare say I didn't."

"You weren't in a position to say no." Punz said fiercely. Something dark and angry crushed their heart in its fist. "You didn't have any choice-"

"I had a choice!"

The world seemed to stop moving, the air stale. Dreams breaths were shaky, heaving, and Punz realized with a lump in their throat that Dream was trembling from stress.

"I had a choice." Dream repeated. "And it was mine. Not his, not anyone's. I'm going to see him again, and that's my choice too. Not yours."

They could stop him, a little voice in the back of their head murmured. They could stop him and- and keep him safe. Prevent anyone else from hurting him again. They could say the right words that would cause him to falter ("for me." Punz had once pleaded, and Dream bent, as he always did) and then Sam would never touch him. They could even kill the creeper hybrid, to be sure. They would destroy the entire server with the Plan, and Dream would finally be safe.

But.

Dream needed this. Whatever he said, whatever he thought, he'd been denied agency for so long. The thought of them being the one to take it away, his friend, when they were supposed to be the one person on the server who he could trust… it made them feel sick.

Dreams trembling faded, and he straightened up, before he throwing his cloak over his shoulder.

Punz made his decision. "I'm coming with you."

"What?"

"I'm your backup, and your mercenary, and your partner. If Sam has a problem with it, just say you rehired me."

--

At the very beginning, the rules are this:

No Kissing. Punz doesn't think Sam deserves kisses, and they're vicious about enforcing this. Kisses are for Punz alone, and Sam is incredibly jealous.

No marks. Sam has tried to leave hickies or bruises, but it was quickly shut down. When he argued this, Punz told him that he could leave marks when all the marks (torture scars) he already made on Dream were gone.

No cuddling or aftercare. Since Sam insisted that the sex didn't mean anything, clearly that means he doesn't need to be involved in taking care of Dream after. Punz will take him away and they can be the one to hold Dream. (Not that Sam longed for that. He doesn't feel more desperate each time the two leave him behind. Of course not.)

The most obvious one: what Dream says goes. Sam isn't allowed to Override Dream and insist his way is better, and he isn't allowed to take whatever he wants without asking. If Dream needs a moment, or would like to change positions, or even just say he'd rather not, Sam must listen. Punz will make him listen.

And so every week all three of them get together, usually at the prison, and have sex. Its a very complicated, unhealthy dynamic, for a lot of different reasons.

Punz, usually able to gauge what Dream wants/what would make him comfortable, is left blind, because Dream is always a little uncomfortable here, always stressed, and Punz can't fix that. They're trying their best, and they know that Dream could shut down and be unable to express himself if the wrong button is pushed, but in the beginning its a mess. At some point he micromanages where Sam puts his hands, pushing and arguing with him over whose allowed to say where Sam can and can't touch, and neither of the two argue that it should be Dream.

It doesn't help that Punz is jealous. They don't want to be, especially not in this situation. But Sam's possessiveness of Dream, the way he taunts about knowing Dream in ways nobody else possibly could- it sets off that part of Punz that has always been so self-satisfied with his place as Dream's most intimate companion, the other half of his soul.

(Its the server's second stupidest dick measuring contest where they accidentally objectify Dream in the process, while they also compete to see who Dream likes more.)

Sam, on the other hand, is constantly having to reckon with the fact that he wasn't actually as good as he thought he was. Punz doesn't let him get away with spewing the same lines of crap and insisting he's always right. Sam also considered himself A Good Lover and good at getting Dream off (the only one who knows him, who knows him Best), and his ego takes a fucking hit when Punz corrects him. When Punz points out that certain things were actually harmful/not enjoyable, its hard for Sam to accept because it means he fucked up and made assumptions in his head and Punz rubs each of those in.

Sam tries to defend himself by pointing out that Dream went along with it, and which leads to Punz pointing out that he didn't have much of a choice/wasn't in a good situation to make that choice at the time, and that's the one time it nearly comes to blows between them before Dream speaks up to tell them both to knock it off.

(Sam discovers One (1) kink that Punz doesn't know about and he's so fucking smug about it despite fucking up literally everything else.)

(No matter how many wins Sam thinks he gets during their weekly time together, Punz still gets to take Dream home, do aftercare and keep him safe. Sam hates how much he wants that too, despite the fact that according to his own weird moral code he shouldn't.)

And as much as this is most definitely causing more issues, it does leave Dream actually feeling more in control of his situation.

He gets so much praise now! This is basically therapy but better! He even gets aftercare with no torture. He's getting good dick and most of his kinks are getting hit, truly luxurious for a cDream. He's a lot more confident and content, and he isn't constantly on the defensive, because if Punz says he didn't deserve what happened to him, even if its just a single person, Dream doesn't have to fight to prove that he's a person deserving of basic human decency.

But the Most Important Thing That Makes All This Take The Turn It Does: At first, Sam thinks that the proper solution to all of this is to get Dream all to himself again in his prison where he belongs and not fixing his behavior any more than what he needs specifically to get there.

However, during an very short period of time where Sam is able to be with Dream without Punz there to scrutinize, Sam attempts to do stuff like how he used to before Punz, to prove he doesn't need him, that they don't need him.

But now he knows, he knows that Dream isn't actually into a lot of the things he was trying, or at the very least he likes other things more. He had it proved to him, and he's aware that things can be a lot better. Dream's clearly nervous, anxious, and not super into this, and Sam can tell, and now all he can see are all those little signs that he's fucking up, and it's getting into his head.

In the end, he can't even get himself to go through with it, because now it feels wrong and he can't ignore that. He makes an excuse, and he's frustrated and aggressive, but he doesn't try this again without Punz there.

Mentally he can justify it as Punz would kill him if he did. This is just a matter of self-preservation.

But quietly his plans adjust to not just needing to get Dream under his control. He'll need to get Punz too in order for things to be perfect.

[night-dark-woods]

1, 6, 9 for hapax and fuller, 15 for vexo??

hiii echo sorry this took so long i had to think v hard abt the last one.

1) Does your OC have a voice claim, if so who?

oooh i have never actually thought abt that!!! so no not really, the extent of my knowledge abt their voices is that they both have deeper voices as they are both transfem.

6) If your OC is in a fantasy setting, what profession would they be in the modern day?

Fuller would be basically the same i think but with forcibly improved ethics standards. i think it would be funny to force her to be at a university, she'd be the world's fucking worst P.I. (thinking of my own thesis PI who gave me tasks WILDLY unsuitable for an undergrad student & also was once spotted eating a frozen pizza hunched over the kitchen sink in the middle of the night).

Hapax... honestly given that Hapax is just kind of floating in "canon" with no real drive (she's working for the Reef initially bc it's where she was rezzed, she's a killing machine bc that's what she was Made To Be as a guardian, and she's good at the work and takes pride in it but not driven), i don't think she's the type at all to have her career be her life in any way (healthier, i think). given her utter lack of people skills and general disinterest in a lot of what others care about, she very well might work nights as a janitor.

meet cute(?) where Hapax is trying to fucking clean and gets jumpscared by Fuller still in the lab building at some ungodly hour. i'd never put my girls in the real world though it would be so bad for them :( that house meme but it's like "no! ordinary society will kill the patients! they need life or death stakes and violence to live"

9) How does your OC handle their physical health? Do they take care of themselves?

Hapax takes care of herself decently well! she's got stuff to do and she can't do it if she's not maintaining herself, and she gets satisfaction out of things done well. she loves maintaining her gear (her guns especially) and doesn't regard herself much differently. she's not the type to take a lot of breaks, but she also won't work herself to the bone.

Fuller has never taken care of herself a day in her life. girl runs on whatever horrible fucked up energy drinks they make in the scifi future and like. full meal replacement bars. when she gets fixated on or excited about a new idea, she tends to work nonstop until she physically can't stay awake anymore.

honestly its kind of an interesting mirror where both view themselves as things they need to maintain to do what needs doing, but for Hapax that's a task worth doing in its own right and a neutral thing, but for Fuller having to take the time to do that is frustrating and trivial.

15) Will your OC ever retire? Do you see them making it?

i dont knowww i have to decide. i think so. or something like it. id like to see it make it. i only want characters to be miserable if its their own fault and none of this is its fault.

i think id like to see it fall to maya-as-the-conductor's call and join with the vex expecting that sense of belonging and become part of that expansive all-encompassing multifaceted Self that it remembers and then realize actually it wants to be itself, as fucked up and messy and lonely and hard as it is to be a human, or something very like one. i think that's when it will choose a name beyond its experimental designation (which i need to decide. probably R-[something] for Radiolaria Trial [number] Test Subject No. [number] or something?) bc that's when it will start thinking of itself as a person. ive been listening to a lot of music doing aisle resets at work and i think Human by of monsters and men is a good song for it.

[whiskeysmulti]

Comfort Food (A KHR Fanfic)

Fandom: KHR Word Count: 1,023 Prompt: Stormy Night Ship: implied unrequited 2795 (Tsuna x Kyoko) Characters: Sawada Tsunayoshi, Sawada Nana Event Host: @flufftober

There was nothing better after a long hard day than coming home to a hot meal his mother prepared. Nana's cooking was Tsuna's favorite and probably the reason why he had over two hundred favorite foods but hamburger steak would always be his favorite. A simple cooked burger patty seasoned with just salt, pepper and garlic, no binders, fillers, or mixers added and grilled to perfection in a pan, essentially a fried burger.

Hot, seared perfectly to get a nice char around the edges, so flavorful and juicy that Tsuna would have to wipe his mouth again with every bite. So big and round he often needed two hands to hold it and a napkin tucked into his shirt like a baby's bib because as soon as he sank his teeth into it, hot juices squirted out directly into his mouth and overflowed, running down his face and chin. So thick he needed both hands to handle it, the burger was a once in a lifetime dining experience in itself.

A good burger cooked to perfection needed minimal toppings if any at all when seasoned correctly and cooked medium well to well done. He wasn't certain what type of grade of beef was used, just that it was absolutely delicious. He thanked the cow that gave up its life for this meal, it truly was a dining experience that he wanted to savor without ethical practice brought to mind.

No matter how bad his day was or how many kids picked on him at school nothing filled his stomach better or warmed his soul more than his mother's home cooked burgers. Every flavor-packed bite was a little taste of euphoria when he dug in and every time his mother made them, Tsuna usually had at least three. Comfort food was just that, comforting after a long hard day and today was a day when Tsuna needed more comfort than he cared to acknowledge right now.

He really was a loser and no good as he'd always been called, and it just made his day so much easier to come home to whatever his mom had cooked honestly. But Tsuna also understood mom was busy most days so those hot home cooked meals might have to wait sometimes and some days well he'd have to learn to just make it himself without burning down the house.

Tsuna couldn't wait to once again have a mouthful of that hot, thick and juicy meat, hamburger steak was his favorite. The scent was savory and warm as he watched the steam roll off the top when he cut into it and noticed all the juices flowing out. It was tender and well cooked as it just fell apart on the fork and melted on his tongue. Hot and savory and melting on his tongue hamburger steak was something that always made Tsuna feel better. It was and always would be his number one favorite food out of possibly two hundred or more he liked a lot.

It wasn't even the taste or texture that made it his top favorite, it's the fact that whenever Tsuna had a bad day it's one of the first things his mother would fix for him. For a kid who got bullied as much as Tsuna did, you would expect his mom to be making him hamburger steak every night, right? Sometimes it was prepared just for comfort after a hard day of school, other times it was made for a special occasion like his father returning from a long week on the road for work.

Tsuna looked at the plates on the table, it was just enough for him, his mom and his friends if they stopped by. He thought about it as he looked at the empty spots at the table, his life was like that sometimes. Just sitting at a table alone, waiting for others to join him, and returning home to mom's cooking as a comfort when no one had shown up before. But slowly he started making friends, he started letting people in, people slowly started noticing him and Tsuna's empty life slowly started to become filled with love and more than enough friends to fill up the empty void in him, more than enough to fill every seat at this table right now if he invited them all over at the same time. An abundance of warmth and love had come into his life and filled his heart just like his mom's cooking could fill his stomach and warm him up when he'd had a bad day, his friends were there to do the same on his worst days even if Tsuna didn't think anything could make him feel better, they could.

"Tsu-kun, how was school?" That cheerful grin always greeted him after school, apron and oven mitts on as she carefully stirred a pot or pulled something fresh and hot out of the oven and honestly just his mother's kind smile and concern always made his days a little better and warmer. And then the food was an added bonus, always cooked perfectly, it was no surprise when Tsuna's friends showed up for dinner as well, his mother was an amazing cook and Tsuna honestly wished he had her skills in the kitchen, or at least could do a little more than instant cup noodles and reheating leftovers.

It didn't matter how bad his day was, or how many kids picked on him that day or how much trouble he got into, there was nothing that mom's smile and a hot plate of juicy, tender hamburger steak couldn't fix for Tsuna. However there were some complicated questions that his mother seemed to always ask at dinner time and Tsuna in all honesty didn't have any kind of answer for them.

"Do you have a girlfriend, yet, Tsu-kun?" That was actually the hardest one to answer, as Tsuna wasn't exactly interested in anyone but one girl that he feared he'd never get but that could wait.

"When's dad coming home?"

They both had their fair share of questions that neither of them could answer right now.

[wormbloggign]

genuinely interested in what taylors reading here, assuming it isnt required reading for school since the prt seems to have regulations on and about juvenile capes

i wonder if its twilight?

self care!!! (she would not give herself this kind of time off if she werent in prison)

taylors back to her favourite pastime again!

the logistics around this would be very funny to figure out, though i pity the sap that has to change the bug-ket when it gets full

that explains how quickly they got it, i had assumed dragon was just being creepy and had pre-made the hero!skitter costume in the hopes it came up.

this way is probably better

...

yeah, nah that's not gonna work. "mistakes" is doing a bit too much heavy lifting on your part armsdealer

he is staying as STILL as POSSIBLE (goofy guy behaviour)

so were currently 2 for 2 on PRT non-cape fuckheads, lets see how he holds up! (either way i somehow doubt he is long for this world)

Mrs Yamada. I like where you're coming from but therapy + 10 judgemental onlookers might not be the best call.

aw fuck hes getting downright endearing

REAL (clockblocker has shot up to S tier)

WORLDS SLIMIEST MAN (its nice that hes on taylors side but like wow this guy is shit)

GIRL!! NOW IS NOT THE TIME FOR SPOT CHECKING!!

she does not give up on her hobbies gd

dont worry, all im doing is setting up a large scale surveillance state, perfectly ethically and legally sound.

okay ignore any bad ting i may have ever expected to say about glenn.

THIS MAN GETS IT

YES!!!

WERE GETTING DOWN THE PRESENTATION!!!!

the dissonance is too powerful for him, he's seen taylor at some of her most nightmariest highs and now she's going through the same public relations hoops he had to

i really wasnt trying to find him this charming, i really wasnt

taylor drops ONE (1) bugfact and suddenly shes getting called a nerd. maybe the endbringers are right, we really should kill them all

d-doesn't he go to classes on exacty this?

what am i saying, he wouldnt pay attention in school

yes actually, 'disturbing' does suit your swarm of insects quite well as an adjective

i get that we're supposed to be a little annoyed at the constant micromanaging but i expected theyd do at least this much, im surprised she didnt get some media training beforehand, theyre being pretty hands off, all things considered.

maybe thats because they want her to fail though :(

eyyyy! thats... deeply disturbing as a heroes one-liner actually. maybe take some more time workshopping that

oh that's nice, her bugs worked to break concentration, this is a fight against dnd wizards

LETS GET ELDRITCH BABEYYY

unbe-weaver-ble

i do love how hard theyre commited to the bit though

legitimately sick burn

had to be done, glenn wont be happy though

B)

“Taylor Hebert?  On the issue with the bug population of my facility, I feel it would be a very bad idea to provide you with a caustic substance to give your bugs, given what your file says you achieved with capsaicin.  I had a bug zapper purchased, and you should be able to access it with each and every one of your tiny soldiers.  I expect to see it used, understand?”

(moving to copy paste bc tumblr says no more screenshots)

immensely funny solution

The spiders, I kept on hand, directing them to the burned corpses.  They could breed, in time, and I could put them somewhere where they wouldn’t encounter any people. Breaking the rules, maybe, but it was something to occupy my thoughts.  It made me feel just a little safer, a little more like myself.

its gonna be so funny when the wardens find the underground spider breeding ring

[callofdutylorist]

Call of Duty's Problems

It's important to know the problematic factors to media we consume, and then deciding for ourselves if it crosses the line. Just about everything we can consume in media is problematic in one way or another, nothing is perfect and it's gross and puritan to believe things should be.

But that doesn't change the fact that we still have to acknowledge those problems, and be critical thinkers about it.

I love Call of Duty, but I would be crazy not to admit that it has a dark side, even in recent games.

(I'm not debating the ethics of the FPS genre)

Propaganda

ID: photo of common USA military advertisement, called The Calling.

Being a Triple A video game from the United States of America, it isn't too shocking to admit that US Military propaganda has found it's way into the franchise. After all, Call of Duty depicts the United States' military, and they are very particular about how their image is perceived back home.

Like in many militaristic nations, living the United States lots of military propaganda is shoved down your throat.

Universities and high schools often have recruiters hanging about and running programs of their own. Young adults are tailored to get constant advertisements from military branches. The usual...

Media presenting the US military in bad light is often suppressed in the United States' own sneaky ways. This includes Call of Duty.

Repeatedly Call of Duty has been called out for participating in US propaganda, as well as often being used as a tool by the US military for conditioning teenagers. Some major cases of this include but are not limited to

Participating in a major decade long project of creating a gamer to soldier pipeline

Helping fund military advertisements

Depicting certain historical actions of the United States in skewed pro-US perspectives

Many of the older games including lots of anti-Russian, anti-Latin American/Hispanic, and anti-Asian plotlines. This has gotten better overtime, but it is not completely fixed.

Representing common US media stereotypes

Call of Duty is mostly very open about this, especially in recent years, as they have gotten in trouble for it before. However this isn't a problem sole to Call of Duty and can be seen in the majority of popular military based media in the United States, including shows, movies, podcasts, YouTube channels, and video games.

One game infamous for going against this, as well as going against the glorification of war in the media is Spec Ops: The Line if you're interested.

Harmful Historical Inaccuracies

Being simultaneously a historical fiction, sci-fi, and realism fiction it's expectant that Call of Duty would take advantage of history to tell a story. That's not the problem here.

The problem is when it's not there as part of the story, but instead a straight up historical inaccuracy that's supposed to be a fact. Call of Duty has done this multiple times.

Sometimes it's not only a historical inaccuracy but also a very harmful one, such as propagating skewed US history, lying about important fractions of history, or sweeping major events under the rug.

The most infamous and recent of this example is the highway of death presented in Modern Warfare II (2022).

The IRL Highway of Death is in the Middle Eastern country Kuwait, and was a site for major war crimes committed by the United States. The Highway of Death received its name during the Gulf War. The highway, outside of Kuwait City was viscously bombarded by artillery, ships, and especially air craft by the United States.

The US claimed there was a convoy there that they had the right to destroy, but their excessive force destroyed over 2000 vehicles with photos showing the vehicles to primarily be civilian ones. It was an intense massacre that doesn't even scratch the surface of other US crimes in that area.

How does Modern Warfare II portray it? Well it's a subtle singular line spoken by the characters, claiming that the Russians did the Highway of Death.

This is a major dodging of responsibility, and anti-russian/eastern propaganda. For obvious reasons it made many people (especially Slavic players) furious.

It isn't the first or only example of this in Call of Duty games, or FPS games in general, but it's a significant one.

This article from the Polygon does a very good job talking about the Highway of Death Controversy -> [x]

Activision-Blizzard

Oh Activision-Blizzard... What a mess!

If you're unaware, Activision-Blizzard is a large video game mega corporation in the United States. It has ownership of tons and tons of iconic video game series.

And it's had tons and tons and tons of controversies.

Even right now it's major controversy is Microsoft buying it, which would make it into a monopoly of video games as Microsoft owns many series, and electronics (including the xbox console)

In the recent years and past Activision-Blizzard has had many problems with its workplace, video game finance decisions, and more. This includes a lot of employee misconduct, including infamous cases of sexual harassment in the workplace.

(Jesse McCree -> Cole Cassidy)

It's also been caught with lower pay for female employees, gives incredibly difficult deadlines for video game devs to meet, and generally is known to treat its employees like shit.

Call of Duty itself has been guilty for a lot of this activision-blizzard behavior too.

The sole companies themselves have done tremendous work in increasing diversity, and workplace safety in both their casts, developers, and even inside the games themselves.

Call of Duty is currently praised for this as it has made great strides, however this doesn't cover up how terrible Activision-Blizzard is to people. In fact it should be a major worry as Microsoft and Activision-Blizzard can easily regress that progress in name of bigotry, capitalism, and the United States.

What does this mean for Cod fans?

Unfortunately, like most major video game corporations, we are enjoying at our own risks. This is not a "LeTS BoYCotT cOd!" or a call to abandon the franchise.

It's instead a call to bring awareness that this is nowhere near a perfect franchise, and a franchise with many significant problems and a long history.

I'm going to continue playing the game of course

And you can too, except with a little bit more knowledge

[balkanradfem]

I finished reading the Running Grave! If anyone has read the book or is reading it please send me opinions, takes, or hit me up to discuss it in private!

(spoilers and commentary about the ending, relationships, cult organization and the nature of the book itself)

Oh Strike, that was an awful way of confession. My ex figured I loved you. I would have walked away from that because that is pathetic. Your ex? You relay this info to me, by what your ex thought of it? It's her opinion that we're discussing? Your ex should have nothing to do with you confessing to a woman you love right now. Also you're putting so much pressure on her to now figure it all out, after you just unloaded that on her, in a situation that is nowhere near kind to her. Now she has to struggle with whether to compromise the agency, or break up with her boyfriend, and whatnot. I would literally never confess to someone while they're in a relationship with someone else, much less by the words of 'my ex said this' your ex can... oh never mind.

Speaking of Robin's relationship, Murphy and Matthew are basically the exact same boyfriend, if you replaced Murphy and Matthew you wouldn't need to change the behaviour at all. Both there in a moment where Robin needed comfort, but then utterly insensitive, jealous, posessive, unsupporting of her work, arguing about Strike, demanding, expecting, just the worst kind of pressure that Robin doesn't deserve. And the thing is, I doubt Strike would treat her any better either. He has gotten some kind of appreciation of her work ethic and her company but ultimately I don't think he would understnad her. I don't get why she likes him. I feel revulsion towards him. Poor Robin.

So, I was wrong about Daiyu, and her 'die, you' name lives up to its symbol. The book tricked me every single time, but I was suspicious about Abigail, her behaviour did not add up. I was very impressed with Flora and her talking about the cult's secrets, that was amazing! Way to show Strike to not judge trauma victims for their struggling to process what happened.

I was talking before about how cults ultimately exist to exploit women sexually and reproductively, and for m*n to profit off of psychologically-enslaved women. This book illustrates the same points, even if it doesn't go as far as to say 'this is why the cult exists', it illustrated various ways how it achieves exactly that. Women are told it's required of them to have sex with anyone who wants it, or they're shamed for 'materialism'. This allows m*n unlimited sexual access, as much rape as they could want. Women are forbidden from any kind of contraceptive, or even medicine. This enabled m*n to impregnate them as much as possible. Women are isolated and taught that any family relationships are 'materialist'. The newborn babies are taken from them at birth, and they believe this is normal. This produces indefinite new cult members and, superflous male babies, are sold for cash, earning the cult income off of exploited, indoctrinated, basically enslaved women. Women go so far as to pretend they're sick, pretend something is wrong with them or try to bond with the cult leader, in order to avoid this constant rape, because they can't leave the cult, not even for their own physical safety.

Later we find out that the cult leader also invents 'curative rape' where he rapes mentally ill women and children in order to 'cure' them, and it feels even more that the whole reason all this is happening is to enable as much rape, forced impregnation and exploitation of women as possible. Raping and profitting off of rape and forced pregnancies is what m*n form cults for.

It was very well illustrated, and I wonder if average reader can connect the dots with all of these points and figure out that this was the whole point of the cult, and not just a side-effect, not something that was just done in the background, because they could. It was designed to exploit women like this. I think jkr understood this, and formed the imagionary cult on that basis. All of the teachings were put together specifically to enable this exploitation. And women would get punished for stillbirths, pushing it even further to the point that they exist only to create 'merchandise' (living human beings) for sale.

This book is a horror book, and it brought a lot of fear and anxiety out of me while reading, that's one of the reasons I finished it in a few days, despite it being 964 pages long. You need a release from anxiety and you cannot get it until the cult is brought down. I wish we had gotten more of that. We get a general picture of 'everyone is freed, people are coming out with their stories, Robin takes down Mazu and Becca, Will and Lin are now happy at his parents fancy house, the farm is raided by the police, Daiyu's remains are unearthed', but I wanted to know more. I wanted to know about every single detail they found. I wanted to know about all of the diaries, and the lockers, and all personal things accumulated there as trash. I wanted to hear thoughts and recovery process of every woman trapped there. I wanted it to be pointed out clearly how much worse they had it than males in there (constant rape, forced pregnancies, trauma of babies being taken away, brutal punishments, vs forced labour and free access to women's bodies, whichever one you pick, children are free for the taking too, ability to father children). I now realize that all punishments we've had described in detail were enforced on women, the only male that was being tortured in there was Jacob, and he was just a sick kid, who they let die. The worst and most horrible shaming and humiliating and shunning, it was all done to women. I wanted to know more about how they crawled their way out of that, how they discovered nobody should ever do this to them.

I also wanted to hear Will apologize to Robin for punching her and for being generally awful to her when she literally saved his ass from a whole cult and got fucking tortured in the process. I also wanted to hear about how she got a mountain of money for that job because I don't think anyone in the world would do that job the way Robin did. I don't think any other detective would have gone and taken down a whole-ass cult, as a part of their job, that is not even specialization, she's an unique agent, one in the world, that could have made this happen. She should be filthy rich from this point on.

I forgot to mention this before, but the name "Rowena" reminded me of "Rowena Ravenclaw", and I thought it was fun, I liked that, wonder if it was on purpose. Robin really was amazing and carried this book on her own, Strike was annoying background noise to me. I don't even understand his thought process of realizing those polaroids were a proof of Abigail manipulating people, like in what universe would this occur to someone. I do, however, like a mystery where something is found and then you have to figure out just why was this here, who put it here, for what purpose? Like looking for the object's history. And it was satisfying to get a fitting conclusion to why those polaroids were in the biscuit tin, because Abigail just left them in there, as hidden blackmail material, should she ever need it. Forgotten, in a dusty tin, with the power to make multiple people end their own lives. It ultimately was used, in that way, just without that intention.

I hope the next book will have less trauma in it, this was an amazing, but very heavy read. I'd like a book with less attempts at Robin's life, less suicide, and more dumbass bullshit please.

[teebsbutyoudontknow]

Pokémon Ship Week Day 2: Swap

“Alright, get those packages down to runway C.”

Our world is but one of many. And in those many worlds, there are many worlds like our’s, except a few things may be different. This is one of them.

“Yo, Slacker Jones, are you still sleepin’ or have you found the Chesto Berry in your pocket?” Elesa taps her foot into the gritty floor of the shipping facility as she barked into her microphone.

“Elesa c’mon miss, gimme like two seconds here!” Jones whimpered back into his mic. “We’re not all as fast as yer Emolga.”

“Damn straight ya aren’t.” Elesa rolled her jaw as she chewed her bubblegum and strutted around her facility. She was a tall woman. Made it easier to see all the work being done on the planes, even if they never did make cockpits that fit women of her stature right. Her yellow hair was short, but practical. She was a total no-nonsense lady. Her yellow outfit was form fitting only because it had to be; a tight suit that provided ample protection both in the airplane and out. In fact, her squad often painted her on their planes because she was such an example of a hard-focused, go-getter attitude. They admired her for many other reasons too, one of which being her prowess with Electric Pokemon.

“We’re fast because we gotta be fast. Don’t you, *cough* agree, Gus?”

Airplane worker Gus just groaned. He hated that joke. So did his Yamask. Maybe there were parts of her they didn’t admire. Elesa just smirked to herself and cockily chewed her gum, and continued her inspection, until she had heard one of her workers call her name out.

“Elesa! Elesaaaa!”

The blonde turned her head and wrinkled her nose as she saw one of her Gym Trainers dash over to her.

“Oh, hey Ted.” The man was tired from his short sprint, taking some time to collect his breath.

“Ooogh. Ugh. Sorry. You have a visitor.” He spoke, standing up and saluting her.

“Really now? Who is it? Silph Co. again, or is it Devon Corp?”

“...Actually, its Skyla.” The man swallowed his tongue.

Elesa stopped chewing her gum. Her jaw went slack again, until she closed it with a shake of her head. “The idol from Nimbasa? No way. Why’s she here? Did we Muk up her delivery yesterday?”

“The opposite, actually!”

From behind Ted came walking in a lady with a sparkling sky-blue dress. Her shoulders would be bare, if it wasn’t her wreath of feathers wrapped around her neck. Her red hair was done up in such a way that it almost reminded one of a Swanna’s beak. And everything stood out well against her lightly melanated skin. Skyla, the high-flying celebrity of Nimbasa City. Infamous for shooting herself out of cannons so she can gracefully soar amongst the Flying-Types of the Unova region.

“I just wanted to come by and thank you personally for the delivery last night. My show wouldn’t have been nearly as successful without all the gunpowder.” She spoke earnestly, her hands clasped together as she looked up to Elesa.

“...Oh.” Elesa was present there, but she didn’t think much of it. Most of her delivery work was just that, work. But it was a pretty thankless job. People expect things to be on time, so they notice when things go wrong, and not when things go right. At least that’s what her teacher, Clay, told her before. So she never really heard anyone actually thank her for a job well done. And she felt touched. And unusually warm at her core.

“W-well, uh, I hope Mistralton Cargo Services kept your delivery quick and safe!” She admired the appreciation, but it didn’t change her work ethic. She began to walk off and resume her inspection, before Skyla threw her hands out and squawked at her. At this point, Ted was long gone.

“H-hey! Wait, wait! Elesa.” Skyla brushed at Elesa’s arm. The taller woman stopped in her tracks, turning to face the idol.

“...I. I didn’t come here strictly for professional reasons.” The high-flying girl sighed.

Elesa cocked an eyebrow. “And there’s something personal?”

“...Yes. Yeah, actually. As a matter of fact, I flew in to ask you out on a date.” Skyla emphasized her words with an awkward swing of her hands, a stomp to the ground, and a half-shrug pose.

“...” Elesa would’ve tilted her sunshades down if she had any. “...You. Asking me out. If I’m sleeping I hope a Gengar doesn’t eat my dream right now.”

“Elesa, you’re awake. Or rather, I hope you are.” Skyla gripped at Elesa’s hand. The hand she uses to hold onto her throttle lever. Yup, she’s awake.

“Guess I am.” Elesa blushed. She wasn’t used to this emotion. Let alone having a literal celebrity ask her out on a date.

“I was, er.” Skyla bit her lower lip. “Awestruck when I first saw you. I wanted to get your number, but then Cress made me go backstage to get ready, and by the time I got out, you were gone. So I just came to the source.” Skyla receded back with every other word she spoke. “I hope I didn’t bother you or your work.”

“A date’s a date.” Elesa replied, matter-of-factly and handed her notepad to a random Pilot nearby.

“E-eh?! You sure?!” Skyla stammered.

“Of course I am! I wouldn’t be a very good pilot if I lied.”

Skyla began to smile. That made Elesa smile too.

“‘Sides.” Elesa continued. “I want to see if you’re as smitten as a Litten.” She playfully poked Skyla on the bridge of her nose.

Skyla giggled. Then, she began to laugh. Elesa never had anyone laugh at her jokes before, either. This was going to work out just fine.

[rpgchoices]

Sometimes I really want to read a short summary of what to expect from a game… and thankfully people can also submit their summaries of games they played and help me (and others) find games that cater to their interests!

submitted by @lairofsentinel

(click here for other videogames)

what to expect from THE TALOS PRINCIPLE 2

Story-driven puzzle game. It has exploration elements as well.

The difficulty of the puzzles is immensely reduced in comparison with the first game. These puzzles are more oriented to casual gamers than hardcore-puzzle-gamers. What the game lacks in puzzle difficulty, it makes it in narrative and relationships and human interaction between the many characters of the story. 

If the puzzles still frustrate you because it’s not your thing, I highly recommend cheating in this game rather than abandoning it. The story is too precious to leave it incomplete, it’s worthy to explore it in detail.

This game is highly philosophical, but unlike Talos 1, this one is more focused on the future, on the concept of civilization, and purpose of all these AIs. It has a lot more of anthropology and ethics in it than the previous one. The interdisciplinary information still is amazing in quantity and quality. The metaphorical analogy of the whole game with Christianity remains too. All these details can be appreciated only when you are deep into the game, when small information from Greek myths resounds with the events of the story due to their strong symbology.

It has a lot less content to read than in Talos 1. You still explore the story through console and reading small text archives. 

Its camera can be set as first person or third person [on left/right shoulder or just behind]. Something to highlight: this game has a special section in its settings to avoid motion sickness. Very thoughtful detail.

Graphically speaking, it’s more beautiful than Talos 1, but also it demands a lot more from your computer. 

The game can be finished in around 20 hours and lacks of special, secret, hidden puzzles in the way Talos 1 had with its “star puzzles”. In Talos 2 we have special "golden gate puzzles" than can be done in the last episode of the game, and they are all easily accessible and also easy to solve. 

The main game has 3 different endings that depend on your last choice. 

Highly recommended, even if you cheat. Forget the puzzles if you don’t like them, cheat and play it as if it were a book of sci-fi, where AIs, instead of causing the extinction of humanity, saved it in their own way, becoming the “new humans”. 

Fully voiced except the player.

——- Plot? ——-

You awake as a robot number 1k in a city called New Jesuralem. You are the last person of a prophecy that this AI society has believed for centuries. In a world that lacks resources, has problems with energy and batteries, and struggles with a constant fear of repeating the mistakes of their human ancestors, this society stagnated until a strange event happens in the city that forces you and other 4 companions, to explore beyond the limits and discover alien ruins of higher technology that trigger the new mystery of the game: who made them? What’s their purpose? Are they safe to use?

——- Gameplay? ——- 

Typical game of environmental puzzles, where you manipulate devices that progressively unlock sections of these ruins. You can also manipulate cubes and switches to solve the puzzles. There are new mechanics that were not present in Talos 1, like anti-gravity devices. 

——- Characters? ——- 

Many. You are the main one, of course, leading the narrative. There are also your companions: Melville, Byron, Alcatraz, and Yaqult. There are a dozen of secondary characters that work in this city as representation of the many perspectives that a society can have about the problems. We also find again “time capsules” but this time they belonged to Trevor, a technical assistant of Alexandra. 

 ——- LGBT? ——-

Probably more than in Talos 1. There are some “families” or relationships between AIs that self-identify with the same gender [for example, Hypatia with Aurora].

——- Sadness level? ——- 

It’s still high, since it treats existential crisis. However, it’s a story more focused on a hopeful future than a sad, tragic past, which helps to reduce the sadness level that Talos 1 had. This game still explores deeply the fragility of humanity.

——- Happy ending? Deaths? ——-

This is immensely hard to say. In my opinion, there are no bad endings. The three options available just represent three different ways of being in peace with the world, the cosmos, and life, exploring three different attitudes towards “sentient existence”. 

[badedramay]

TB s2 announcement got me wondering about this general trend where people expect actors to be morally perfect saints who should only pick projects based on principles. Would these same ppl reject a lucrative job offer from evil corporates like a Facebook or BP? The one power they have is to not watch trash like TB but dekhenge bhi, hate bhi karenge, endlessly uske baare baat bhi karenge and then expect the actors to say no to good money. Idk Mais am I being too lenient on actors?

Hmmmmmmmmmmm...I don't think people want actors to be morally perfect saints but yeah they DO want the actors to have SOME ethics and morals driving their professional decisions. I am more often than not lenient on actors wrt their professional decisions. I can crib about them but ultimately I can just choose not to watch those particular projects. it's just with Wahaj and Yumna..they are KNOWN to have done better written projects in the past so it's not like they are not aware of what their particular fandom expects them to do. Yumna especially toh has half her filmography filled with dramas that deal with sensitive issues. and she has gained much critical acclaim for them. TB was, by all means, a very irresponsible decision for them. yes, it worked out BIG time and it's great that they got massive national and international fame from it. that was the drama's job and now that job is done..fans have a right to wish ke okay chalo ab back to doing projects that wouldn't have them compromising their morals. waise have they been finalized for TB2??

another thing..actors with the kind of fame that Wahaj and Yumna have gotten post TB have the privilege of CHOICE. they are aware of the starpower they bring to any project so they have a kind of authority to bring in changes and alterations to a project to make them less damaging. YumHaj didn't do that with TB, either because when the show was being shot they didn't have that authority yet or they just simply didn't see anything wrong with it. but now they DO have the power; the power of their fandom has given them that confidence. so if they still choose to do something similary problematic like TB then yeah..it's completely on them and criticism banta hai.

it takes nerves of steel to have morals and stick to them. look at when Maya Ali says she simply refuses to do dramas with violence in them even if it means not doing much work. Obi is a vocal ally and he's more than happy to play smaller role in projects that have important social message or a story that is close to his heart. Mahira Khan will never do a project where her character is not the strongest. Mawra Hocane put her foot down while her project was in production and used her power to alter the script so a horrendous thing like marital rape wasn't brushed off as nothing. even Farhan Saeed went on record to say that he talked it out with the director so a slap scene was edited out in Mere Humsfar. so, it's not like there aren't examples of actors being on the moral high ground. sure they bring in small changes but what they do is set a precedent for other actors to follow. fans being disappointed that actors like Yumna and Wahaj who are MORE than aware of the repercussions of being cavalier about toxicity and abuse don't use their voice to take a stand against those issues is their right.

but dekhenge bhi, hate bhi karenge, endlessly uske baare baat bhi karenge and then expect the actors to say no to good money.

I have a different take on this. the people who talk against such shows don't necessarily "watch" it out of choice but they do so because well it's all around them. and them "talking" about it isn't in favor of the show but against it. "no publicity is bad publicity" may be well and true and its these people and loyal fans of the actors who continued to criticize the show for its shortcomings and bringing attention to how dangerous the messaging of the show got the attention of the actors who are now accepting that they did have some errors in judgements and promise to now do better. that is why this talking is necessary. sure, for the producers its all money. but the producers aren't the intended audience of this criticism anyway. it's the actors. it's their loyal following urging them to do better. also, actors can make big money from other things. their big money can/does come from advertisements and endorsements. for quality TV, they can compromise on the check if they wish to. end mein baat toh usulon ki aati hai.

[byanyan]

post-college / tattoo artist verse updates, developments, & additional headcanons

ㅤcompleting their associate degree in fashion design at community college and deciding they aren't interested in spending another two years at school for a bachelor's degree, byan begins searching for opportunities in the fashion industry. while they do get more job interviews than they expect, nothing ever ends up being the right fit. either the interview goes horribly (usually due more to their personality and poor work ethic than the work they're capable of producing), or they end up walking out or getting fired before their first week is over (usually due to them creating a hostile work environment or them realizing that the job isn't as appealing as they thought it would be). growing more and more frustrated that none of the work is exactly what they want it to be, that they can't only work on projects that appeal to them, they also start finding that fewer and fewer places are willing to give them a chance.

ㅤwhile getting their latest tattoo done with an artist they've gone to for several of their pieces, who even gave them their first tattoo at age fourteen despite them not having permission from a parent or guardian, the conversation eventually circles around to byan complaining about their most recent job interviews and about how all the work is nothing like what they thought it would be. brea, the artist, who's known them since they were thirteen, has seen a lot of their work since they always want to base their tattoos on something they've drawn themself, and has let them watch her work numerous times over the years, suggests that, if they're interested, byan comes and does an apprenticeship under her. if it goes well, they stick with it, and they successfully get certified, she'll give them a guaranteed job in her shop at the end of it. although blown away by the abrupt offer, they can't deny being intrigued — having always found great joy in tattoos and even learning how to do stick and poke tattoos in order to be able to do several of their own, how could they not be interested? without so much as requesting some time to think about it, byan immediately accepts.

ㅤduring their apprenticeship, when they aren't doing things around the shop like cleaning and prepping work stations, they're drawing or watching brea or the other artists work, learning as they do so. they struggle a little at first, rather frustrated over being relegated to errands and chores most of the time, but they find the grunt work a lot more worth it here than they did in fashion jobs because they're learning a lot when they do get to watch someone work and have them explain what they're doing as they go. plus, they get to draw during work hours. ...although, they still don't handle even constructive criticism of their art particularly well.

ㅤit isn't until they've been there for well over a year in that they finally get to start using the equipment themself, start learning how to use it and start practicing on fake skin, then on themself, and eventually on clients willing to allow an apprentice to give them a small tattoo for a discounted price. all the boring work they've had to do around the shop becomes completely worth it the moment they finally get to hold the tattoo machine in their hand and put ink beneath skin. it was worth the wait, worth the failed attempts at getting a job in fashion, and even worth the two years of schooling for a degree they'll only ever make use of on the side. the instant they're finally able to do more colourful, more detailed tattoos themself, they become even more passionate about the artform than they already were.

ㅤthe downside to their apprenticeship is that it isn't paid — as it's more akin to another few years of schooling than an actual job, they make no money off of it. fortunately, their online shop, which has moved from etsy to its own domain by this point, has maintained its success and thus continued to bring in some money which they can contribute to rent, bills, food, etc. so that sol doesn't have to completely support the both of them. if they aren't working on drawing practice at home, they're working on clothing pieces to sell, as well as commissioned work. this means, unfortunately, that they aren't making as many pieces for themself as they used to or would like to, but it's a necessary sacrifice. they'll have time again in the future.

ㅤabout a little over three years in, byan finally gets certified and starts working full time as an artist in brea's shop, taking their own clients and getting paid quite well for their work. over time, they become known for their use of bright, vibrant colour and their specialty in both very cute designs and stylistic choices, as well as ones which put a darker twist on those cute designs.

ㅤat some point, they start playing with the idea of getting certified for piercing too, since they can do an apprenticeship for that right there in the tattoo shop (with brea as their mentor again, no less) when they have downtime between appointments, although they haven't made up their mind just yet.

ㅤoverall, they've become a fairly functional adult — they still live with sol and their two children cats, and overall they feel much more fulfilled in life. although they still get into trouble with the law, still get into fights for the thrill of it, still struggle with their mental health (while continuing to refuse therapy), and still fall back on unhealthy coping mechanisms... they're a lot happier than they've ever been before.

[magentagalaxies]

Jessamine is Passionate About Fictional AI Sentience But Not Real AI Sentience: An Essay

one thing about me is when it comes to talk of "sentient" AI irl i 100% don't buy it like technology is not that advanced and being able to act like a person doesn't make it a person, however whenever there's a question about if a fictional AI character is sentient i will go to bat for that character's humanity 100% of a time like fuck you they have just as much of a right to personhood as anyone else

i think it's bc in fiction like. all of these characters are fake, so distinguishing between which characters are fake-real and fake-fake is like. why limit yourself to what could happen in our world. like if we're already dealing with a universe where aliens/magic/etc. exists, why can't this android justifiably be as human as anyone else? plus irl almost all AI software is developed as part of this capitalistic hell structure we're in. no matter how "real" or "human" it feels, its function is to make you contribute to its creators' wealth, and its inability to go against this nature can't help but make it feel hollow and inhuman. however, all the best AI characters in fiction are able to go against their designated purpose, often being defined by it, and often being villainized for it

in our real world, the AI's "immoral" "behavior" is a product of it being a Things that serves capitalism. it's not making choices based on a sense of self beyond what it has been told to prioritize, and a lot of times this lack of human judgment can lead to terrible consequences (e.g. mental health AI chatbots that cannot accurately judge a situation and give appropriate advice, employed because it's cheaper than hiring human staff). but in fiction? AI's immoral behavior is frequently a product of it going against its designated purpose, seeing itself as a person and having to make difficult and morally questionable choices in order to strive for the feelings of personhood and autonomy. this is a far more interesting situation ethically (while an AI itself cannot be seen as morally responsible for its actions in our world, in fiction this AI wants to be a person so badly it's willing to commit moral wrongs to achieve its goal, despite the fact that true personhood would allow it to be seen as morally responsible for these crimes) which i think is also why AI characters, especially those that, y'know, kill people, are often very polarizing figures. this conversation can even be taken a step further into the "liking a fictional character does not mean condoning their actions" discourse, but i also often think about well, if you were in the position of this AI character, would you have done the same?

personally i've always found it very easy to empathize with "artificial" characters like clones, robots, etc. and fictional AI is no different. yes, if you're watching a piece of media and expecting the logic of our world, the AI is fake, and incapable of being a person. but if you're watching a piece of media with the goal of emotionally connecting to fictional characters (who are all inherently fake) and exploring universal themes through a heightened setting, AI characters are one of the most interesting tropes to explore this with. personally, I love AI characters because there's something so vivid about knowing you were designed for a specific purpose/life path and ultimately realizing that's not the life you, personally, want to live. your designers and the world around you doesn't even recognize you as a being that should be capable of wanting anything, much less something completely different, so achieving the life you want is an uphill battle of convincing others of your humanity and, when that often isn't possible, having to resort to the most extreme tactics to claw your way out of the life you were supposed to lead. you know no matter how close you get to this ideal life, there's always going to be some part of you that keeps others from perceiving you as "human", but you learn to embrace that and see every mundane experience as a major achievement

this narrative is especially relatable to me as a neurodivergent/nonbinary person, but i think it can be relatable for many different marginalized identities in different ways, or anyone whose "humanity" has been something often denied to them. but because people are often expecting fictional AI to follow the same logic as actual AI, when i defend robot characters who want to kill their human creators, people give me weird looks like i'm advocating for that in real life. listen, if our current AI situation feasibly produced an AI who was invented for one specific purpose but somehow fucking hated her job and was able to pursue a new life and was also queer (all without any of this being by design) then hell yeah i support her, but that's not what's happening. and in our current capitalistic chatbot hellscape where every company wants to convince you that you're chatting with a super intelligent AI friend to get you to pay for a premium membership, sometimes you have to hold fiction and reality to different standards and enjoy this story about a quest for humanity while also accepting that the people this journey applies to in our real world are often the ones being taken advantage of in our increasingly AI-dominated real world.

idk this was originally supposed to be a short post about how it's funny that i'm so goddamn passionate about AI characters in media while also not being into AI in the real world, but then i got thinking about why this is specifically and came to an interesting conclusion imo. tbh it's very surprising that i don't currently have any of my own projects featuring AI characters fighting for their own humanity bc it's a theme i love so much that i've rarely seen done right and i have so many opinions on it. maybe i will write something about this at some point, but for now if you have any pieces of media you enjoy with AI who are absolutely worthy of personhood pls send them my way!

[gear-project]

Why GG over other FGs?

I have quite a few people who ask me just WHY I prefer Guilty Gear over other fighting games.

And really, it's not exactly like I dislike other fighting games in a big way.

I can appreciate a good Melty Blood session, and Skullgirls interests me, even if my skill level in that game is very low.

BlazBlue evokes other strong emotions in me, though I could also say the same for Samurai Shodown and Soul Calibur, as well as Battle Arena Toshinden and Bloody Roar.

Even Under Night In-Birth is a game for which I've begun to hold a candle for... and Mortal Kombat 11 and 1 are pretty much mainstays in my library of Fighting Games as well at this point.

So what makes Guilty Gear different from any of those games?

For me, it starts with the music.

It is also fundamentally a weapons-based fighting game, very much like SamSho and Soul Calibur. Under-Night also has a lot of weapons-based characters in its roster as well.

But it isn't the usual collection of weapons you'd expect. Most weapons in Guilty Gear are SPECIAL. They go above and beyond... like something out of RWBY or Dead Fantasy (shoutouts to the ghost of Monty Oum).

So yeah, it's the music, it's the weapons... but it's also the collection of voice actors gathered together... the right mix of characters.

The low-beat voice of Potemkin, the high-tension voice of Ky... the intensity of Sol Badguy's voice... the high octane voice of Bedman... the insanity of Dr. Faust, A.B.A., and Zappa... and the list goes on.

But, I want people to understand something... the Music of Guilty Gear doesn't simply START with the soundtrack of Strive with its modern lyrics and fresh songs... the music of GG started a long time ago... the Metallica thrashing of the original 1998 game.

And that music never stopped.

So when I play GG... I don't simply play it for the most recent songs... I play it for the classic themes... for the rival themes, for the moods that evoke intense memories of battles long past.

Whether you prefer the original GG, X, XXAC, Xrd, or Strive... none of that matters in my book... because they are ALL Guilty Gear games and share that same "world" that engages and inspires me.

The crazy antics of Robo-Ky... the in-period drama of Baiken and Nagoriyuki... the power invoked by Justice and Dizzy and even Ramlethal...

Things like Renaissance Paintings, Optical Illusions, Chains, Nails, Screws, and Oceans of Red Blood... Giant Monsters, Giant Statues, Elaborate Buildings, Flying Airships, or just an old run down castle creaking and swaying in the Night during a Thunderstorm.

What else does GG have to offer? History, Culture, Psychology, Ethics, Science, Humanity, Inhumanity, Conflict, Comedy, Mystery, Love, Rivalry, Semantics, and more...

I don't think I've ever found such an impactful series as Guilty Gear, at least compared to other fighting games.

Maybe it's just that I've been studying this series for so many years, or maybe it's just that I've never seen that level background content decorate a fighting game AS MUCH by comparison.

Certainly a huge chunk of it is about slicing the other guy in two, or bashing their head in with a headbutt... but if it were just about that... we wouldn't have philosophers like Happy Chaos, now would we?

So, it's the music, the technology, the designs, the voicework, the context, or perhaps even the CORE IDEAS presented.

Whereas some games only invoke one or two concepts... this series likes to jump from genre to genre, hardly skipping a beat in between.

Chaotic? Maybe. But amid the chaos is a certain rhythm and cadence which most will either not miss or enjoy on its own.

Hyper Fixation? You tell me. I think GG itself is a hyper fixation OF the fighting game genre. The mechanics are complex, the culture of the fanbase is varied... The sanity and insanity... Instinct and Intellect.

So why do I keep going back to this series?

What hasn't it done? What will it continue to do?

I don't have the answers to all of that.

But I do know that only a handful of games ever go out of their way to send a message to the player.

Maybe I just wish more games did this. Or maybe I wish more developers were as talented and cultured. I'm not entirely sure.

It's like the difference between a Stick Drawing and some complex painting done by Michelangelo.

You can still appreciate both... but there's only a handful of things that check all the boxes and fill all the requirements of my idea of a good game.

Am I spoiled? You bet.

Am I grateful? INDEED.

Do I want more games to do what GG does? Sure do.

[crimsonfluidessence]

Prompt 4: Off the Hook

Content Warning: Drug and violence mentions, Endwalker spoilers

Esredes was in trouble again, and he knew it.

The teenager sat in a chair inside his manor, arms crossed and feet kicking in the air idly. "So," his mother said with a stern look, a look he was avoiding eye contact with. "Would you like to explain to me what happened, Esredes?" Esredes certainly knew what happened, that was for sure. He'd been out with friends and they had all gotten their hands on fogweed. Esredes tried one little inhale of it, and proceeded to cough his lungs out. But Mother didn't need to know any of that, no no. He had an idea, a plausible story forming in his head. "Ovoix really wanted to explore beyond our limits." He said. "I told him you would be mad, but he said if I didn't go he wouldn't talk to me again." "Then Ovoix isn't really your friend, Esredes." She remarked. "I always had a bad feeling about him. Listen, you." She pointed at him. "No spending time with him again. I will be having a talk with his parents." "Okay, Mother. I'm sorry." Esredes put on his best guilty face. "I really didn't mean for this to get out of hand..." She sighed, crossing her arms. "If I catch you going down there again, I will ground you. Understood?" "Understood." Wow. That had worked better than expected. For once, he could escape her punishments.

Of course, it was easier back then. People took more pity on a noble and a softer face, even if it was less than the others. Nowadays, his face had sharpened and now that he was pardoned, he hung in so many balances he might as well be declared a tightrope circus act. That meant whenever he messed up, he needed to be very precise, and very calculated.

The easiest way was to, of course, simply be clean about it. Use the Dark Knights, use the Inquisitors, stay in the shadows and watch. It wasn't as satisfying, but cleanliness far outweighed personal desires. But failing that, there were other ways to win.

Take the time that one of Esredes' own counseling clients was almost murdered by his own biological father.

It was not exactly a time Esredes wanted to talk about, as there are some things you can't forget hearing on linkpearl, but he'd done exactly as he should have. He ran to stop it, told the apartment desk women it was an emergency and the young man was in danger, then proceeded to burst in and kick the man's face into unconsciousness. Of course, did the Temple Knights who came up appreciate the effort? No. They immediately tried to arrest him, blaming him for all of it. Being a former Temple Knight had its perks, even in light of everything else working against him. Esredes held up his hands, obeyed the command to step away from the victim despite being in the middle of administering first aid, and stood by, calmly explaining the situation. The first time the Temple Knight tried to arrest him, the victim on the floor protested. But the asshole had the audacity to try again the moment it was them alone and the others had filed out. "I think you should put your hands together." He had said. "I think we'll take them off when we get into a nice Inquisition room." Esredes stared back at him. “You know I’ve been proven innocent of my original crime, do you not? My record is clean. ‘Tis not very ethical of your place in the order to lie to an attempted murder victim.” The Temple Knight's expression soured harshly at that. He ran his tongue along his teeth and smacked his lips. "Right. But it's for safety reasons. I think you might be a flight risk. I think you might be one literally." That was most definitely a hiss. “I’m not resisting detainment. I am standing here awaiting your escort, and that is that. To do so would only endanger myself unnecessarily.” "...Fine. You know the way? Walk." “Very well.” He said to this, and turned and began to walk out. Each time he looked back, the man was right there with a hand on his lance the whole way. Considering they never even confiscated his sword and he was allowed to walk out of the questioning room before he even finished his entire statement, Esredes declared that one a success. He was on a mission for both survival and pride reasons to never be arrested. Detainment was normal, but he really couldn't afford an arrest on his record.

Of course, he had done nothing wrong. He was entirely innocent of any negative involvement, why, he'd even held back from completely eviscerating the would-be murderer for legal defense purposes. Still, he counted his blessings. The last time he'd argue he did nothing wrong didn't work as well.

Argue was a bit of a strong word, of course, as both times he had to be talked to in that detainment, it was from people he knew, had a good relationship with, even, making things more awkward. It was especially awkward when he was being questioned by a client. You know, because sometimes you're the unluckiest man ever and you make a client out of a High Inquisitor not long before you get detained for an act of vigilantism.

It wasn't even bad enough to be qualified, he wanted to argue but didn't. He had done nothing but try to ensure an incredibly dangerous and wanted criminal didn't get away while he was being chased. He hadn't interfered or obstructed law enforcement from arresting the man. He was entirely wanting to see this arrest occur. And yet, he was the one in trouble for committing vigilantism? Fucking bullshit, he wanted to say. I've done way worse and not been caught. But it was an extremely unwise position to argue on this. So he didn't, and he took the charge with profuse apologies, and grumbled to himself about the community service charge. There went his clean record. But the community service ended up being to counsel prisoners and then be hired for it at the end, so it was barely a punishment to begin with. He was more pissed about the record by the end of it.

Perhaps he was lucky because of his connection. But he didn't need that to get himself out of trouble, either.

Enter Alvere Travanchet. Who the hells was Alvere Travanchet? The name was known to Esredes already, but not from the man himself. Instead it was from his deceased lover, a fellow harrier in his movement. And when Esredes first saw the way the man stared at him after he showed him a sketch of Alais, he knew he was in for danger. The stalking and monitoring that followed was a given, Inquisitors tried that first each time. But to even manage to follow him using a proxy to one of his recruitment meetings? That took something else. This one was more of a threat. Or would have been, anyhow, if not for his actions completely backfiring on him. Alvere was a shadow, secret Inquisitor. As far as the public knew, he wasn't one. Not until he had met with Esredes' boss and been instated as a public Inquisitor, causing the noblewoman he was a House Knight for to kick him out of her house. Esredes had been planning to cancel his follow up to that meeting. If Alvere somehow stalked him to it he might just arrest him and try to get his pardon undone for execution purposes he most definitely wanted to perform himself, after all. But he found the man staring off a thousand yards out on a bench in Empyreum, had him speak to him about how he just got kicked out of his house, and went on ahead with the meeting. Nothing more ever came of it.

Months later when the two were having an argument, though, he brought it back up in the middle of his anger. "You spied on me. I found you on a bench after I learned about it, and I was pissed. Yet I still picked up your flask for you, and put it aside. I don't think you would ever do that for another person unless they were soft and cute and didn't challenge you on the mountains of bullshit you entertain." "Of course I did. Did you really think I wouldn't?" Alvere leaned in and snarled at him. "But I did nothing. You are still holding meetings, secretive ones, yet I chose to trust you are up to no harm. I let it go, I stopped." He pulled back, his expression and voice turning icy. "Fool I am. Trusted. Hoped." Esredes crossed his arms. "Oh no, I knew you would. That's everyone's first instinct. You're not original in the slightest, Alvere.. And you're really going to frame it as a sign of trust. Is it really that, Alvere? Is it really?" "Name it. You don't believe my trust, so name it. What would make you believe. Nothing." Esredes sighed. "Perhaps not switching your personality off every time you talk to me would help? You know, as a start?" Alvere narrowed his eyes. "Then I am self centered, head up my ass, violating inquisitor." He gestured around. "So much trust here."

That had been perhaps their worst argument. They almost broke it all off entirely. But Alvere was certainly right about a few things. He had taken the bait perfectly. Esredes had leaned so hard into Alvere's emotional issues despite his hatred that he gave up on pursuing him.

And now he simply kept it that way, and let the Black Wolf curl around him protectively, as he continued about his work as usual. Some spy he was, weak at his foundation. But that was okay. Every Inquisitor was weak if you drove the needle in at the right vein, and the wolf was a great boon. It was a good thing that he could still get away with it without Alvere, then. Alvere once thought it was a brilliant idea to confront his father financing a gang with the child who the gang wanted to take back. Sure enough, it went exactly as Esredes anticipated it would, and it went awry. A mind mage tried to turn the two to the gang's side, and if it were not for Esredes following and hiding and sounding an alarm, it could've been catastrophic. Sure, in order to follow and hide, Esredes had to break into a minor noble house, sleeping powder a noble man, and break a chandelier and window in order to attack the mind mage and Alvere's father, but what was a little illegal home invasion when the suspect was guilty and attacked an Inquisitor? He absolutely got detained for that one. It was not a painless detainment. Once again he was cursed to be interrogated by someone he knew- in fact, in all three of these situations he was, weirdly enough- but it was not exactly a happy reunion. Still, he was not charged with a crime. He was free to go. And go home he did, to get ready for a ball while emotionally in the complete dumps.

But emotional turmoil was temporary, and record charges were forever.

Someone who Esredes went to Garlemald with came into his office without warning to search his office on a warrant of suspecting him to be harboring dragon's blood, because his fellow harriers never got it through their heads to be quiet about things. That time, Esredes was almost certain he would be arrested. Still, he sat there calmly in his office chair and didn't hinder the Dragoon's search. He evasively answered his questions. But of course, the Dragoon found nothing. He didn't keep dragon blood in his office. That was miles and miles away safely stored at camp. He wasn't sloppy. And so he left, and nothing more came of it.

He also thought nothing of his neighbor boarding up her upstairs window for a whole week soon after that, claiming she had a home invader while he was at work.

Being a former Temple Knight had its perks, even when you were legally at the very bottom. And if he strengthened his web of connections well enough, maybe he would eventually ascend his status entirely and become impossible to take out.

Oh, what a reality that would be. To finally be free of the crushing weight and more easily get down to business. Yes, this was the outcome he craved. And who cared how many wretched members of law and order would need to be bent to his will like a toothpick to achieve it?

He would take back the power he needed to change Ishgard to Shiva's Will, one way or another. And so the man continued his legal dance.

[thessalian]

Thess vs Work Ethic

Sometimes I just really wish I didn’t have the work ethic I do.

See, while I appreciate that almost every working person in the world, myself included, is overworked and underpaid, and should therefore not be giving any more than what one’s job description details as one’s responsibility in the office, here’s the thing - one should give no more than one’s job description ... but no less, either. And the job is simple, in this case. There are reports. We type them.

The job description on their contracts might be different, but mine didn’t say a damn thing about “but only when the manager’s not in the office, at which point you can slack off all you want because there’s no one to reprimand you”.

Yeah, Scruffman was at another site that was hella backlogged and having some understaffing issues today. Thank the gods he’s back in the office tomorrow because they cleared the other site’s backlog faster than expected. I can take or leave him as a person, but I’m not in the office anyway. The only reason I’m glad is because of what I went through today, which was basically being the only one spending the majority of the workday actually working. I mean, yes, we’re not doing as badly with the typing queue as we had been. Hell, it hit mid double figures today! And I kind of want to keep it that way, but apparently the other girls don’t agree because things ground to a standstill mid-afternoon. That whole thing where Violet does the long complicated dictations doesn’t really happen when Violet isn’t typing at all, or is doing so at such a slow pace that she might as well not be. Temp stopped working almost entirely around 4pm, and I got the reason for that right up in my face when I went to get a last couple of things with seven minutes on the clock: she’d picked up one four-ish minute dictation, apparently to show willing, then dawdled over the shorter ones she’d picked up and left that longer one for last so that when her time in the office was ... well, almost up (I think she also works until 5:30), she dumped that one four-ish minute one back in the queue and left. If I had time to type it (and I did), so the fuck did she. But nope. Just “Oops, almost out of time, back in the queue it goes...”

So the queue’s going to be back in the 150s, probably, by the time people turn up at the office tomorrow. I was actually trying to work at a moderate pace for once because I know I’ve been dancing on the precipice of epic burnout (because, you know, the disability that comes with chronic pain and fatigue?), but by mid-afternoon I was back at breakneck pace and doing the long ones that nobody else seemed keen to touch on top of everything else. I mean, it could have been worse, but everybody knows that the techs crank to high gear after 5pm; the decks should be as clear as possible before then. And nobody should require the manager’s presence to do some fucking work once in awhile. If I can do it from home, with all the temptations of faff to distract me, they can do it in the office.

It’s people like them who lend those stupid articles about how much better working in the office is for productivity any kind of weight whatsoever, you know. Though it’d be entirely the reverse in my case either way; not only does not having to commute help me actually be able to work better, but when shit like this happens, I only fume about the work not being done instead of fuming over the work not being done and grinding my teeth in rage because I’m having to try to do my own work through the distraction of their chatter.

(To some people, noise is noise is noise. I cannot explain to those people the difference between chosen background noise, like music, and not-chosen background noise, for instance chattering colleagues - or, here at home, construction work going on nearby and the neighbour’s kids using the corridor as their personal playground. Again. It’s a beautiful day and there’s a lawn right out back, and they’re using our hallway, with its grubby carpet, as a place to play. I DO NOT GET IT. Anyway.)

So here’s me being grumpy and fed right the fuck up. Huzzah. I will veg a little, take my meds, and gear myself up for the preparation of dinner. I don’t really want to cook but I want to get ahead of the curve on ready-to-eat meals, and also I did a lot of walking for some of those ingredients I got yesterday and am keen to enjoy them and not procrastinate on cooking until they’re kind of skanky.