#like what do you mean out of all of the thousands of death game cycles he hasn’t won a SINGLE ONE???

[str1wberry7thyme]

The watchers apparently fucking hating Impulse is so hilarious to me because the worst he’s done in his life is maybe leave the toilet seat up once. The killings too but he didn’t mean it I swear

[espace--positif]

This image from the third Elden Ring Book of Knowledge on SOTE has been circulating, and people are citing it as proof that Radahn was a willing participant in Miquella's plans. I don't think these words can serve as definitive proof, and I maintain that Radahn was controlled by Miquella. Here's why.

Image credits: @/Siofra_Mariner on Twitter

To me, the words "their order" and "their cause" don't prove that Radahn is united with Miquella by choice. These deliberate words make me think of Leda's group, Those United in Common Cause, who end up at odds with each other when Miquella's charm inevitably breaks. I think that that very same influence is being alluded to here, with Miquella having used his influence to control Radahn and join him to his cause.

The words "Miquella will intervene once again" imply that Miquella has to fight against some form of natural current, has to change the course of fate, in order to succeed (or try to succeed) at defeating the Lord of the Old Order; to me, the first time he intervened and changed the course of fate is referred to in the first paragraph, where they detail his resurrection of Radahn's body, free of scarlet rot. The text also refers to Radahn's "deserved rest" - again implying that Miquella's resurrection and use of Radahn is somewhat unnatural and morally wrong. If Radahn truly were a willing participant, I don't think that it would have been referred to this way. The story of one intervening with another's fate ironically occurs earlier in the base game, with Radahn stilling Ranni's fate by holding back the stars.

Next, I want to talk about, guess what, more wording.

"Miquella's wish to instill Radahn as his Promised Consort upon his ascent to godhood, a promise he made to Radahn in their childhood."

Note that the wish is Miquella's wish, not Miquella and Radahn's wish, not their collective wish. The word promise is also interesting if we look at the way Miquella uses the word in the DLC dialogue, and towards whom it's directed.

"I promise you, a thousand year voyage, guided by compassion."

Miquella says this to the Tarnished when they are grabbed. Two grabs, and the Tarnished gets their "Heart Stolen", charmed by Miquella forevermore. The Tarnished is resistant, and this is one way through which Miquella deals with resistance.

To Miquella, promises and vows are not shared agreements, but they are the way he enacts his will and influence upon others. They are unidirectional, assured, and a means to an end. His compassion extends to all, but strips all free will, and Radahn's is no exception.

A few notes that didn't fit into any of the above points:

This is my interpretation of the game and the text, and I always enjoy reading other people's interpretations. I think that's the great thing about Elden Ring's ambiguous lore; there can be many readings, and we'll really never know which are right.

I'm very biased when it comes to the topic of Miquella's desecration of both Radahn and Mohg, one in body, and one in soul - I feel like it really cemented how wrong Miquella ended up turning after abandoning all those aspects of himself in the Land of Shadow, and I felt all kinds of icky and sad when I finished the DLC because of this. St. Trina's being discarded and her death was devastating, especially when she was one of the most human and compassionate characters in Elden Ring, granting respite to all the frenzied merchants out of true compassion.

I do believe that Miquella is a victim of the cycle, though, and that he lost himself in more ways than one after witnessing what happened to his mother. To Miquella, the only way to make people stop doing horrible things is to stop them from doing anything of their own volition at all. In theory, it works. But it is so sad. I'm reminded of Melina's dialogue when you choose to inherit the frenzied flame: "However ruined this world has become, however mired in torment and despair, life endures. Births continue. There is beauty in that, is there not?" I sympathize with Miquella, I really do. I understand that he did all this because he not find any alternatives. The world being comprised of cyclical happenings that one person cannot fix is a recurring theme in Souls in general, and Miquella is just another victim of another cycle, which ends up begetting more violence, much like the violence enacted on Marika which prompted Miquella to try and fix things in the first place.

That’s it! I really needed to get this off my chest, and it definitely didn’t fit into a tweet (which is where all the discourse is happening lol). If you made it to the bottom of this yap, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this as well! Thanks for reading my ramblings <3

[camgoloud]

this is the same anon from justttt previously with the end of book asks. hiiiii. i have also been slowly getting into sff short fiction (and made the plunge and added a few magazines websites to my rss feed so i can be Locked In) and i want this NEXT year to be my year of sff short fiction….do u have any fave stories to rec? also some more end of year book ask: 12 and/or 13?

omg… hello again! And sorry this ask ended up taking me so many days to get to, but, you know how it is with the holidays: time isn’t real. Also, my response ended up getting, like. REALLY long. So, sorry about that! I’m putting it under a cut to be considerate, but if interested, please read on for a List of some of my favorite authors for sf/f short fiction, and also a few other specific stories I read this year that I’ve been thinking a lot about! And also my fun little Hater Rant in response to your ask game prompts!

[The referenced end-of-year book ask game is here, by the way]

SF/F Short Fiction Recommendations

Starting with some authors who I consider Masters Of The Craft:

1. Isabel J. Kim.

If you’ve been on this blog longer than a couple months you’ve probably seen me casually gush over her stuff at some point, but if not… well, you really can’t go wrong with any of it! It’s pretty much all free to read on her website. (Incidentally, this is a great time to get into her work, because she had a huge three-book deal go through with Tor earlier this year and she’s going to have novels start coming out probably by 2026 which I predict are going to do VERY well—start with her short stories now and you’ll be able to say you were into her before she really hit the big time!) A few personal favorites of mine include:

Homecoming Is Just Another Word For The Sublimation Of The Self (doing some really interesting things with diaspora! This one is also her debut publication and the basis for her forthcoming debut novel, so maybe a good place to start)

You Will Not Live To See M/M Horrors Beyond Your Comprehension (this one is quite short, only like 1k words, and also quite funny if you’re an Online sort of individual! What if Achilles went to see the Oracle of Delphi and the Oracle had an ao3 account, basically.)

Why Don’t We Just Kill The Kid in the Omelas Hole (basically, it’s about the title. A take on Omelas (have you read the original Omelas story by Ursula K. Le Guin? If not, definitely start there) with the premise: what if the Omelas universe had social media reactionaries in it. VERY darkly funny.)

Zeta-Epsilon (possibly my Favorite Of Favorites. FANTASTIC meditation on What It Means To Love Things You’re Not Supposed To Love, and also a very well-written non-linear narrative, and also, there’s a heist; truly, I love this story so much)

Day Ten Thousand (WEIRD (positive) story, I would not start here with IJK, BUT if you end up liking her stuff this one will give you a lot to chew on. Some real “I will find you in every universe” vibes going on. Lots of thinking about wheels and cycles. Also lots of thinking about suicide, so, know that going in maybe)

2. Rich Larson.

This man is like, probably the most prolific writer of speculative short fiction currently active. He's written SO MUCH. A lot of it is REALLY GOOD. Some favorites of mine:

Ice (cool Arctic-world vibes off the charts (they have a thing called FROSTWHALES) but the real highlight is the deliciously complicated relationship between the protagonist and his younger brother. It's full of jealousy and love gone sour and misunderstandings, and it makes me insane whenever I think about it. They made an episode of Love Death + Robots out of this story which is also pretty good—it ends differently than the original and isn't as impactful in my opinion, but the animation goes hard)

Last Nice Day (A bit of a Winter Soldier vibe with this one. Very moody. IS it possible to make peace with the things your body has done?)

Travelers (this one is... heavy. To say too much ahead of time would be to spoil the impact of realizing what's going on in my opinion but it's a lot. Don't read it unless you're in the right mindset to tackle some serious topics but if you ARE in that mindset it's very good)

Not actually short fiction, but if you end up liking the three short stories I listed above, I highly recommend his novel Ymir. It's got a lot of common elements with them, especially Ice.

3. Kelly Link

The undisputed queen of the SF/F short story. Everything she's written in her 20+ year career is spectacularly creative and absolutely haunting. Again, you probably can't go wrong, but my personal top three are:

Valley of the Girls [not online so I can't link to it unfortunately but it's in her collection "Get in Trouble"—you could see if your library has it?] (this story fucks me up to the MAXIMUM possible degree. It's like. Hm. It's like. What if Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh was about the teenaged children of, like, Elon Musk. And in their desperation to be noticed and remembered by a world in which literally none of their actions have any consequences ever due to the isolation born of their privilege they all became obsessed with a bastardized version of ancient Egyptian funerary culture and started building pyramids to get up to their teenaged antics within. Well okay so that's the setting. As for the plot. I'm going to leave it to Link to unfold the plot, because she does it so, so, SO masterfully. The way crucial information gets slowly revealed as the story creeps along to its ending... and the ending itself... seriously, I get SO fucked up over this story every time I think about it. Read it please!!)

The Summer People (extremely classic Link vibes on this one; might be a good place to start with her work, especially since it's online. Very atmospheric, featuring deals with fairies and prompting some interesting discussion on class within vacation destinations)

Skinder's Veil [I read this in the 2022 Best American Science Fiction & Fantasy anthology volume edited by Rebecca Roanhorse and John Joseph Adams; not sure if it's available elsewhere] (not sure what to say about this one tbh besides OOOOFF. VIBES. It was my first Kelly Link short story and the first time I'd ever read anything quite like it, and it will thus live in my heart forever <3)

Moving on to some other miscellaneous stories that I read this year and liked a lot!

Selkie Stories are for Losers by Sofia Samatar. I got recced this one by the good people of Wyrmhole (are you signed up for the Wyrmhole newsletter yet? If not, you SHOULD be - it’s a project started by Isabel J. Kim and a few other short fiction authors. Their tagline is “a terminally online newsletter for speculative short fiction”. You’re on Tumblr, you’ll probably like a lot of what they promote at least as much as I do!) It's beautiful and tragic—the story of two kids whose parents have failed them and how they find each other.

Binomial Nomenclature and the Mother of Happiness by Alexandra Munck. This one from the first 2024 issue of Clarkesworld does great work with first person POV/unreliable narration, and the tone is so quietly, profoundly sad that reading it broke my heart a little. It's about the tragically doomed attempts of the narrator to rigidly and scientifically categorize emotional responses, and letting that work blind her to the ways her actions are causing emotional harm to herself and others. Very well done!

If Someone You Love Has Become a Vurdalak by Sam J. Miller. Devastating supernatural take on addiction and the way it impacts loved ones. Really just gorgeous.

I'll stop there for the sake of brevity (lmao, as if) but there are plenty of other stories I've read and loved, and would be happy to recommend also! Anon (or anyone else!), if you'd ever like to swing by my dms and discuss—if you read anything I mention above, what your feelings are on it, if there's anything else you particularly enjoyed that strikes you as similar, etc.—I'd be really happy to chat short fiction further! I'm always looking for new recommendations myself, as well.

With that I'll move onto part two: the hater half of this love/hate saga!

Books That Suck 2k24

12. Any books that disappointed you?; 13. What were your least favorite books of the year?

As far as disappointing books go… I read this non-fiction book called “Solid State: The Story of Abbey Road and the End of the Beatles” which was… well to be honest my feelings are a little complicated! Because on the one hand the subject matter is inherently interesting to me (coming-out of the closet as a Beatles enjoyer on Tumblr dot com) so I was personally pretty invested in it the whole way through and I’m on the whole glad I read it because I did learn some more Fun Facts And Minutiae. However. I don’t really feel like the information, as interesting as it was, was very well presented? I mean the thing is. Come ON. It’s literally the break-up of the Beatles. There surely must be a way to spin a bit more of a proper NARRATIVE out of this rather than presenting it as just a collection of trivia and fun facts which is sort of what I felt it was when all was said and done. And also I took issue with the spin the author gave some of said facts in the “unbiased” narrative voice but whatever, I’m a Paul girl so I’m always going to be dissatisfied with any male author’s take on the breakup lmao, so I guess that’s kind of a non-factor.

Really I think the primary reason I felt disappointed coming out of the book was its failure to live up to its title! Like. In addition to falling a little flat on the “Story” side of things… You call your book “Solid State” and I’m gonna want to see some TECHNICAL DETAILS on those consoles, baby. Tell me about the inner workings! But instead it was just very. “The new desks meant you could have more tracks which was cool 👍. George bought a Moog. Anyway here’s why the other three Beatles breaking with all precedent and overruling Paul 3-1 on the Klein issue rather than waiting until they had reached a unanimous agreement to make a major business decision means that it’s PAUL’S FAULT that the group wasn’t speaking with one voice anymore 🙄” (Side note if anyone seeing this DOES have any resources on recording technology of the 60s-70s that are a little more technical in nature PLEASE send them to me! I would really like to learn more about this!)

I don't think Solid State was my least favorite book of the year on the whole, though. That honor probably goes to Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon, which... God, I really wanted to like it, and in principle it sounds like it should be a lot of fun, but I don't know. I just felt the pacing was off, I think. I didn't enjoy reading it very much. That said, I don't think it's bad, and it would probably work for a lot of people—it just didn't for me. And I didn't read that many books I disliked all the way from start to finish this year, but I did finish Shigidi just because it was such a fast read (took me less than a day to get through), so... unfortunately that's a mark against it here, I guess.

[coffee-counts-as-a-meal]

warning for tlou ep 4 spoilers (and TLOU Part 2) but:

not to be horribly meta on main but I'm mainly screaming over how this episode exemplified how well this story was adapted to a television format, ESPECIALLY regarding the themes that ND has repeatedly stated he wanted to explore in the TLOU Part 2 that maybe didn't quite land the way he meant them to

(Benioff and Weiss and their hatred for eighth grade book reports should be taking copious notes rn lol)

I remember when the second game came out and there was this big to-do about how the perspective towards "villains" had changed - not just in the fact that you spend half the game playing as Abby (Joel's killer), but that the developers had actually given names to all the NPCs that end up as cannon fodder for the player. The AI was supposed to be so advanced that for every enemy you killed as either Abby or Ellie, the NPC would beg for their life or curse you as you make the final blow or whatever, and then when their NPC friends found them you would hear their wailing and crying out for "Beck" or "Miranda" or whomever the fuck and the whole idea was that it was supposed to make you the player really think about the implications of taking a human life and the cycle of revenge yadda yadda yadda.

Which is a GREAT CONCEPT, but I just remember how...tedious it became, after a while. TLOU Part 2 got a lot of flak for a lot of reasons (some more valid than others imo) but I personally think its impossibly difficult to instill the lesson of "taking a life is something that carries real emotional weight" through the medium of a video game where you are mowing down LITERALLY HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE. That's just par for the course - you end up killing so many people that after a while their names mean nothing, BECAUSE THERE'S NO WAY TO CONTINUE THE GAME WITHOUT DOING SO. (I remember one reviewer talking about how fatigued they were with it - they didn't want to be killing all these people and stabbing dogs and they as a player were screaming through their fingers at the decisions Ellie was making to continue down this cycle of violence but there was no way to continue the game without going through it, even though the point had already been hammered home over and over again to the point where it was exhausting, we get it, killing should not be this easy but this is a video game for fuck's sake).

And maybe that was also the point was to make the player wonder how some characters (like Joel, maybe) eventually become so numb to the concept of taking life, but I just remember it being a point in Part 2 that ultimately just...kind of missed the mark.

And BOY OH BOY did the show hit it in this episode.

Literally, TLOU Part 2 wanted to make its point by naming hundreds upon hundreds of NPCs and TLOU Episode 4 managed to hit it with a single character named Bryan.

I think it also helps that when Joel is shooting back at the "hunters" (idk what they're calling them in the show canon but that's what they were at the game) we don't really see them die onscreen, so it makes Bryan's eventual demise even starker. But holy fuck hearing him plead with Ellie and Joel for his life hit so much harder than it ever did in the game. Hearing him try to bargain with a little girl, screaming for his mom only to go silent...I freaking love Joel and even then in that moment I felt that horror and slight...idek what to call it, not even disgust but just the moral grayness of it all made my stomach churn.

Ellie's tears felt so deserved in that moment. Even Joel's moment of hesitation (fuck you Pedro Pascal I hate how good you are at EVERYTHING) even as you know this must have been a thing he's done thousands of times before and even as necessary you might consider Bryan's death to be. Even as justified it may have been to kill an enemy in that moment, "It doesn't get any easier" is something that rings true. I believe it.

tldr; another banger episode from a team that knows what the fuck a theme is and how to tie that into your story with subtlety and nuance and FUCK EVERYONE AT NAUGHTY DOG AND HBO I CAN'T KEEP GETTING MY HEART BROKEN FOR ANOTHER MONTH AND A HALF

[ask-moonbig]

And the universe said I love you.

480 words

In game deaths mentioned

( @ask-mother-spore )

Idk if this is any good, tried to do something more poetic

<ꖎ⚍リᔑ burned to death>

Sp… Spore? Is anyone there?

<ꖎ⚍リᔑ burned to death>

Help me- help- I-

<ꖎ⚍リᔑ burned to death>

<ꖎ⚍リᔑ burned to death>

<ꖎ⚍リᔑ burned to death>

I can’t-

<ꖎ⚍リᔑ burned to death>

and the universe said I love you

What?

and the universe said you have played the game well

I'm not a player, what do you mean?

and the universe said everything you need is within you

…

and the universe said you are stronger than you know

and the universe said you are the daylight

That's not right.

and the universe said you are the night

I am just the moon, not the night.

and the universe said the darkness you fight is within you

and the universe said the light you seek is within you

and the universe said you are not alone

But I am alone.

and the universe said you are not separate from every other thing

and the universe said you are the universe tasting itself, talking to itself, reading its own code

and the universe said I love you because you are love.

...

Let me tell you a story. In the beginning, there were three beings. The universe, and their two children. They named these children Solar and Lunar and split a piece of their power to each.

Solar was the perfect child. He was reliable and always kept the cycles running. When the players were created, they loved him and all of the warmth he brought during the day.

Lunar was the troublemaker. She was always going through phases and never seemed to decide what the night should be like. She even changed her name to Luna to distance herself from her brother.

The people hated Luna. They were scared of her human form, a towering pillar of void in a humanoid shape. She mostly stayed away from the players and lived in a cottage with her mother and brother.

Luna was just… so done with everything. People hated her and said she was useless and harmful. So she came up with a plan.

Using her powers, she carved a hole in the sky for herself to sit in. Nothing existed in this void but her. She raked her hands through her hair to pull out the night sky and the planets. She let go of her control on the tides and lastly… she let go of her memories. They exploded out of her and filled the sky, making thousands of glittering dots. Stars.

And all that was left of her was… the moon. Her consciousness faded away and she lost her powers. The night would still go on, but she would not control it. This made her mother and brother heartbroken.

It was only when a certain Hermit began watching her that she woke up, as Moon. She knew nothing but the love of her mooners.

...

and the universe said I love you because you are loved.

[rokkenjimaisland]

Ren's "similar to Umineko" list! (now overhauled)(You're welcome)

Stuff on here reminds me of Umineko for a variety of reasons. If I add to it, I'll just edit this post and add the date I added it to this list. Separated by genre this time.

Under the read-more, with the "why it reminds me of Umineko" blurb after the title rather than a whole plot synopsis like I had done in the previous list

Feel free to rec stuff in tags or in comments etc. if I haven't read/played/watched it it might be hard for me to add it but I'll definitely add it to my own list of things to check out!

VIDEO GAMES The House In Fata Morgana - Visual novel, Unreliable narration, witch haunting an illusory mansion for thousands of years, cycles of abuse and trauma, Gothic setting, romance 9 Hours 9 Persons 9 Doors - Visual novel, "The killer is among us" (lol), murder mystery scoping out paranormal/metaphysical elements and twisting them into its own crazy logic, romance NieR Replicant - It's up to you to find your own happiness whatever that means to you despite the circumstances of the world you're living in or your own birth Alan Wake - Author creates and infers reality around him, horror setting, unreliable narration, creations rallying against their creator Alan Wake 2 - see the above, it's the sequel, except Alan Wake 2 is an actual survival horror. I didn't like Alan Wake 1 much but I'm LOVING 2 so far. The Forgotten City - I haven't played this just saw someone on Twitter say to play it if you like Umineko so I'm trusting their recommendation Pathologic Classic HD - Questions of morality, wishy-washiness on the reality of the fantastical elements of the town's culture, meta universe shenanigans forcing you to contend with "none of this matters, so why do/should I care?" Patho 2 can probably go here too but I am playing that at the moment.

ANIMANGA Naoki Urasawa's Monster - "Why did the culprit do this?" over "Who is the culprit?", murder mystery, cycles of abuse, questions of character identity, the ultimate "victim of circumstances has created the monster" situation Shiki - Sleepy town being annihilated by an unknown threat, humans doing unspeakable things in the name of justice, the question of the antagonist's morality/justice is brought to the forefront and maybe they were right all along...? Princess Tutu - Characters who have been created for a story and are living out a narrative sort of against their will, the narrative as a framing device and also a prison, love love love lots of love, the death of the author and what this means for a tale and the characters within it too--if you can only call them characters I Want To Hold Aono-kun so Badly I Could Die - romantic relationships as a way to combat your personal loneliness, horror and romance and how they intersect...kind of hard to explain this one unless you've finished Umineko but this manga really reads like AU Bato[redacted] to me so far, lots of supernatural elements, learning how to find happiness

TV Succession - Rich people dealing with their abusive and unpredictable father deciding who will be the successor for the family business and dragging everyone else into it, cycles of literally every sort

MOVIES Knives Out (2019) - Rich family called to a house to discuss the ailing patriarch's will only for him to be murdered, murder mystery Haven't seen Glass Onion yet but that too. Decision To Leave (2022) - Confessions of the unspeakable as acts of love, Another time another place maybe it could have worked, I created myself to love you, tragic romance, the sea as a motif representing character worlds Memento (2000) - it's up to the watcher to interpret events as they happen and piece them together, the most unreliable narrator of narrators, just go in blind The Prestige (2006) - Magicians get into a big dick competition and destroy their relationships for the sake of greatness, branches into metaphysical territory for the sake of pursuing magic House (1977) - Group of girls visit an ancient family home, horror setting, love is always enduring for better or for worse, witches, using other bodies to fulfill your own wish

BOOKS The Locked Tomb Quartet - Cites Umineko (and 999!) as an inspiration and Muir is a very very referential reader so it's kind of hard to say stuff without spoiling TLT also so honestly just go read it. Magpie Murders - Murder within a murder And Then There Were None (duh) - Directly inspired Umineko and the murders within Umineko The Last Unicorn - Characters acknowledge they are living in a fairy tale, the unicorn is often called the only 'real' one in the group due to her immortality, dream-like narration and fantastical whimsy, ocean representing character strife House Of Leaves - The metaphysical book of metaphysical books with stories within stories within stories and extremely unconventional formatting, house as a vehicle to tell a horror story IT - Two stories in different times existing side by side to inform the reader how to read it. I never finished reading this either though sorry </3 Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead - metafiction play about characters and the absurdity of their existence, repeating stories, tragedy is only a story and the characters within only exist to tell that story regardless of their own individuality Wuthering Heights - toxic romance the novel, idk why I didn't have this here yet. Honestly I'm not super big on this book but it's a classic for a reason. Dread, isolated spaces, fucked up romance, ghosts, etc.

[stranger-rants]

This is so random, and only loosely connected to issues I have with the ST Fandom when it comes to Billy, but in speaking about video game AUs, I am reminded of how people talked about abuse, abuse survivors, and systemic violence in the Dishonored fandom. This may be a little bit of an incoherent rant if you know nothing about this game or its universe.

A lot of discourse came out of the Dishonored Death of the Outsider game because of the moral dilemma protagonist Billie Lurke is put in. It’s one that the gamers themselves have to resolve on their own, but many people argued back and forth over what the “morally correct”option would be, and what’s interesting to me about it is that I think those arguments exposed how people think about systemic violence and the role of scapegoats in society.

She is tasked with hunting down and killing The Outsider, a chthonic “god” figure who is blamed for the in-universe political and economic turmoil, as well as the various plagues and supernatural fuckery that has ruined people’s lives. People reason that the choice to kill The Outsider is the best option, because The Outsider has lent their power to people before who have used it for harm. However, The Outsider is very much a scapegoat. Any time there is trouble in society, they blame The Outsider.

The Outsider could refuse to gift someone with his powers, and he would be blamed for any harm that came from that refusal. The Outsider could gift his powers to someone, and he would be blamed for how those powers were used. He tends to gift vulnerable people especially with abilities, but he becomes cynical over the thousands of years he’s witnessed people utilize these gifts not to better society but to perpetuate the harmful conditions they were born under.

The most interesting thing about Billie’s role in all of this is that The Outsider’s would-be death by her hand is presented as an ending of the cycle of violence. To take out The Outsider means healing all of society’s ills right? However. As she begins to piece together who The Outsider was, she discovers that The Outsider was a victim - is a victim. He was just a teenager who was taken off the streets, horrifically abused, and then sacrificed and suddenly she finds herself having more in common with him than anyone else.

You can totally kill The Outsider in this game. You can kill him ruthlessly with the same bitterness and rage towards him that so many characters in game feel towards him. But… why? Fucking why? The argument that came out of this game that this was the better option is based in this idea that if you simply sacrifice the scapegoat then everything will be okay. If you simply view ONE PERSON as The True Evil, you can deny any culpability in the harm done in your society or deny any responsibility in making it right.

The Outsider was a victim of that systemic violence, who was put in a damned if he does damned if he doesn’t position to play witness to thousands of years of violence. The amount of trauma done to him was unspeakably bad, and it was made worse by the fact that he was then blamed for everything wrong with society by merely existing. The OTHER option(s) made available to Billie involve dismantling the cult that did this to him, rectifying harm in her society, and stating out loud that NO ONE deserves to be treated like this.

(She can also mercy kill him, or return him to his mortal form so he can live and die naturally)

How is this not better? How is it not better to “end the cycle” by actually doing the hard work of dismantling the systems that abuse people instead of blaming individual survivors and victims of that system? How is it not better than killing the scapegoat who people have spent years foisting hate and blame onto in order to avoid any accountability for their own actions? How is killing someone out of that hate in any way cathartic when that person has already experienced an inordinate amount of suffering?

Make it make sense!

At least in the game, it’s acknowledged through these alternative routes that what happened to The Outsider was wrong. This is a game where the environment literally becomes more hostile the more harm you as the player do in universe. It just baffles me that there are people who still don’t see the connection between their actions and the world around them and in many ways people in the ST fandom treat Billy as a scapegoat and truly believe his death and the celebration of it will cure everything.

The “cycle of abuse” / “cycle of violence” involves everyone! It is a systemic, institutional problem that cannot be undone through the punishment of its survivors and/or death of its victims who you deem to be unworthy of being saved. Having that opinion alone makes you complicit in those cycles, when you could otherwise target systems of abuse and violence and create pathways to recovery.

[cheese-water]

hi im sorry I just need to ramble gen loss crap somewhere this s relating to the pole you did I really don’t wanna ramble literal paragraphs in tags:

The dehumanization of content creator by both corporations and fans alike: Lets me honest this is just kind a the surface metaphorical meaning of it all im pretty its been confirmed if not I dont think I need to explain why.

How when our perception of reality is manipulated, our choices mean nothing: tbh this is kinda correct in a way?? Because it all ends in Ranboo dying right? Like let’s if he refuses to do the activities in ep 2 like he’s just gonna die yknow? Like the more you think about it our own choices didn’t really matter they all lead up to the ending scene of rans death. What if we chose live? Something tells me showfall would just erase his memory and reuse them and then the cycle could repeat until inevitable death.

One of many attempts to escape the facility that always ends in death: Kinda what i js said but like: Also it would be extremely hard for Ranboo in any way to escape. Primarily bc mind control. But let’s say that doesn’t apply. Try to escape the mall? Let’s be real the doors are gonna be jammed and there’s showfall people everywhere they’re probably just gonna inject Ranboo with something. Tries to prove to the cameras he being held hostage by showfall? In a ‘real world’ situation Is anyone gonna believe him? They might just think he’s acting. At some point showfall is js gonna get bored of dealing with them and just off him.

also did you see sneeg trying to escape-

The sanitization of today's media to better cater to and profit off of children: I could see this because it is also a VERY common thing in the world with like family channels, child beauty pageants, and what is more similar to genloss’s implementation of this: Ranboo blew up when he was 17! Tommy and Tubbo 16! They were literal minors! They were kids! It was and still is disgusting how much sexual content was produced of them when they were CHILDREN. There are endless examples of this: hundreds, if not THOUSANDS or articles made about an ‘offensive comment’ that was literally just taken out of context, tiktoks and threads saying THAT THEY SHOULD GROW UP?? they are kids!

honestly unsure what the cannon ages of the genloss characters are but if were going by irl ages Ranboo is still 19! Honestly more rambling about how kinda sad this is like, bro is 19 he is literally getting doxxed, death threats, and still creating genloss! Like their 19 and made a work that was considered for an Emmy! (Also being the only not virtual reality work)

The favorable interpretation of events we're supposed to believe vs. the truth: A LOT of ep 2 how they par-take in these games with seem innocent at first, just playing some mouse trap, introducing yourself, etc. but they are literally being held a gunpoint. The scene where Ranboo rips open Charlie it just seems like a comedic scene but for a few seconds the slime is blood. Ranboo is being forced to rip open Charlie simply to survive himself. The puzzler straight up shoots Niki TWICE and the audience(LITERALLY US LOL) feel bad, but a lot people find it funny(kinda is tho- low key loved that scene) obviously Niki is alive so its funnier but what if she actually died?

here’s more of my ramble on genloss meanings and stuff

I just the horrible effects of social media. hate from just being yourself, hate for being ‘fake’/ a ‘catfish’, hate for having fun, hate for not enjoying yourself and people telling you should be grateful. To the point where instead of being yourself you force yourself to shape into this emotionless mold just to appeal to the internet. You could try to ask for help(ranboo spelling sos in Morse code w hand),but your to far gone “you already bought a ticket and there’s no turning back now” I know this isn’t the most accurate but it’s literally 4am lol

Social Media|Showfall Media ya see it?

Srry for the such unorganized thoughts and crap im a dying autistic. -☁︎🪷(just a name to recognize me by you never know also I’m rambling more here about random shit-)

I’ve been trying to think of a response to this ask for a solid five minutes but I just can’t. I just, I’m so so so happy right now. Like, literally smiling ear to ear. You have no idea how happy this makes me. :DDDDD

I adore analyzing media to pieces but with genloss specifically, I also enjoy understanding all of the different influences and interpretations from the audience. Normally, once I find an interpretation I like (either created by me, the most popular, or simply the first one I see) I stick with it, hard. All future thoughts about that media run through the certain interpretation filter only, which isn’t y’know the most open mindset I’ll admit lmao. I think what was different about genloss was a combination of me being a genlosser from the very beginning, being share my theories publicly for the first time, and probably the biggest reason, I didn’t believe the most popular interpretation.

I’ve always been an OUR CHOICE DOESNT MATTER believer since the beginning and could never get on the content creator exploitation train before it left the station. So I guess it gave me a different perspective in regards to reading and sharing analysis posts. Somehow both more critical and more understanding, like I could tell you how the dehumanizing cc theory only applies to eps 2 and 3, while acknowledging that the end of ep 3 literally had a choice that supposedly did matter so who tf cares we’re all having fun. And then I wondered if the cc interpretation was the most popular one and now we’re here.

And so far, it turns out that yeah it very much is lol. But all the notes going into detail about why they believe what they believe just gave me so much more insight and appreciation for the theory. Not just that one but all other interpretations, timeloops, capitalism allegories, your social media parallels just to name a few, have grown a special place in my heart in a way that hasn’t happened to me before genloss. Idk it’s just very cool and I love hearing ‘em all.

Also so I can be told very obvious things I haven’t noticed before. Like how am I just now understanding Social Media -> Showfall Media pfffff

[solardick]

The wheel card.

This isn’t a card i usually consider. It’s there, minorly used to represent the chariots wheel. And the machine. Wheels, going back a several generations, have limited designations. The press, the mill, the boat, the clock, the car. Production. The vessel, doesn’t have mobility. It’s a state of being.

Which card to use. Is a question. But as for now. From this deck, there’s the four angels. Temperance, Justice, Judgement, and the Wheel. And so these four cards bring out a select piece of script to relevance.

M and W also come out being reflections and one and the same thing. The wheel and the moon.

The fact that this card is so variable. Each card here, perhaps, being placed on one of the four “corners”. 13->4->▫️. And the wheel card takes on flavour. Remove the moon. And three angels form a triangle. That fourth card being a reflection show the querent to three hosts. 1->3.

10. 1->0 zero is absence. And one can only puzzle at it. The blind fool here speaks a loud connection to death looking back on it. And not the child. But here shows the quake. It’s the doorway. Through which the dragon comes. Act.

10 to qwert is the chariot. 13 to tarot is death. Subtracted equals 3. Connected to the empress, meaning life, and to C- the high priestess. And again among other things resembles a horseshoe. Games of luck and skill. Fortifications and protections. Added equals 23, W, the moon card comes back. The new figure sits her throne. Judge, jury and executioner. The fool, being the delinquent, facing the court.

In this light the wheel card carries a significance to the divination-oners. Consulting the oracle. Sketchy stuff.

To the calendar. The wheel card represents the leap year day. Serving as a correction to usable time. And here one may connect the stages of the moon to 4 year intervals. Each year representing a specific lunar phase.

If one expands on this…. Considering the 28-29 day lunar cycle equaling four years. 13 lunar cycles a year…. 13 times 28 equals 364. Times 4 equals 1456 years. give or take on the approximation. Right around the same time tarot has been taught to be originated from. So every 14-15 centuries equals an age. Based on the presented logic. Not to mention the industrial age. Bringing this card to planet Uranus.

On the queerer side of things. 4 may connect to the empress and the emperor. As systems overlap. Or again represents to either party, being subjected to correction. Of to a phase shift of perception.

Hard to go further here for the late abusive manipuations or recent years to be able to trust in experiences.

Ok, journal what questions to you have to ask me? And i’ll go from there. ugh. Lonely. Theres just me. No one else. Always been.

I muse thats why god’s been helping me. I always close with a good thing. Spent enough time watching the wind. Chasing it. Catching it. But, its always hit back with violence. Always. Give violence back. Get more in return. Years. But. Lets stop that here. For a wish on the wheel for a change of fate. Is all one can do. If one keeps it true. Otherwise gets lost in the web like most are now a days.

So now take 1456 or 1461 if, calculating by a perfect leap year interval. Times 2. The toasting “magician card” equals year 2922. Shows the beginning and close of the present age. So for the next thousand years the present age will continue feeding the machine. Production, technology and union-matters. The third reich. The third stage of colonization practices will last a thousand years is what the germans were saying. Odd, how in 1922 exactly 1000 years started with the world wars.

Tarot is certainly significant in regards of what is taught by history class. And i find it curios in regard to the qwerty system of tarot that it has 28-29 cards in it.

Though i must admit it was determination and control, ambition to increase from a new moon to that of a full. That will result in the interruption of attainment by a beautiful 2.

Cute movie. Though, too bad on the tough luck to bring you to a one spot.

Give me the all clear when you stop abusing me with girl. The sum of my entire childhood. Ugh. As much as you’ve made that unbarable. The only consistent dialogue at work is gays, niggers, videogames, drugs and dildos. The other quarter of the time theres her. Being a fucken downer. The other quarter of the time, there’s some reprieve, but i don’t like that shift. So it’s just me alone as ive always been. Going on 39 years. Serrounded by hostile forces and abusive fucken cocksukrs. Whats next you gonna bribe me with a toy to suck my cock, like my childhood too. The world is never going to stop raping my life. Thats all its eve rbeen. Ling before i wver fiucked my own life up. Spend a entire life time being raped by existance for no othe treason than being born. I dont want to be alive anymore. And theres only one person i like on my shift. And its probabbly not who you think it is.

Oh well. Too bad for never gaining any life experience. And it diens tmatter if i move. This shit as been on me since my first memory. Doesnt matter where i am. Still gonna fallow me. So who’s the next girl or fag your going to line me up with abuse me with? I think been through 6-7-8-9 people so far in the last few years alone. I winder what havinf trust and feeling safe are like. Never exoerienced it before.

Sex fear and violence thats my childhood. Thats my life. Nothing has changed. The second my mother let go of god. And all those years of conditioning. She just let her family demon take over and destroy her family.

But it’s during times like this when one searches out and finds good dialogue with older women. There’s no stress or sex or violence or cruel intent. No projections, no games. Just good things. And it makes my day. If you look at them, try and measure. They don’t automatically assume you’re wanting to bend them over and slap dat ass. No resistance.

But if one brings the wheel back to the machine. Running the world. Iron and steel turning cogs. And here brings it up to activate participation in changing gears. Which is relative to speed and movement. The ability to taking charge with one’s chariot. Being a vessel. And one finds a little more credibility with a horsemen. Though waites still doesn’t give it justice. He rarely does. He replaces it with something else.

But to go back to the divination, the wheel serves as a spindle. The yarn or golden silk thread of the three fates. Here under justice, temperance and judgement. The wheel M as Moirai. Shows the nature of the three fates.

Clotho being the wheel, with temperance. Lachesis, judgement and Atropos justice. The high priestess here sits on the bottom of the wheel. Which gives it a distinctly feminine influence. As the power of divination is fused to that under a lunar dominion. The logic is secondary. Its more about sense and impression and passivity to reception of somewhere else.

Im already recoetive to y’all bs. Wheres my TnA.

But in the sense of logic first when it comes to the cards, sense and impression come secondary. Here strengthens one direction of expression over another. And the vessel along with it.

The two horses here work in brilliantly. On this regard. But there’s issue over the card being played in context. And it doesnt seem so. It has so far.

Because the goal here is not to interfere with the way things are. Waite’s death card does work well with the war machine and it ties back to the moon. But doesn’t take with it sex. Peace Or warning.

…. Under the guise of sexuality…. Usurping the throne… To the horror of the harmony with the mother. Wife. Love. Her man is dead! Only this queer querent having its flag. Poor girl. … yup, that’s Waite for you.

😋fun

Though waite did infact connect death to the emperor and the chariot and the fool and brought it back to the pope, the sun card and his strength card.

Though not the same fool(s) are being used here. The only similarity connecting some of these fools is the dog. Thats the only thing. Which i àready went over. Symbolizing the fool and the dog to be of the same nature. One card one image. Chasing its tail, running in circle and never reaching anywhere. Waite’s fog though. Isn’t chasing his tail. Its a very convenient image considering the ouroboros. Which has been taught to be one of the most significant image in this ol’school esoteric world. It has to be included. No? Though that card does seem indifferent. Taken from a side angle. Theres a cross between death, the pope and family. To the moon and the emperor. Looking down the cross the far end is the moon. Where it is planted or fixed. Its a destination. Where the “christ” is tortured to death. Though the strength woman, wife. Is open and expectant. Waiting and willing to go. Sacrificing her child as she goes. Holding hands. The child being innocent is just there. Learning reaction. The pope offering death…. a stone, to be determined. Perhaps a pact. And even though the king is dead. He doesnt look dishelved. Lying peacefully resting with blanket. The bed has been made.

The card of the rosy cross. Biblically speaking. Here, the man without sin of flesh, bear and open, sensibly vulnerable. Pure in act. Black being the shade of absence equaling zero. The loss of senses to those of others. Touch, feel, sound, taste, smell. Black being a shade for sex. And from here may still be taken one of two ways.

Though a card resembling something more like this;

Shows a charge of energy. Startling and intense.

Though certainly not the charge for death when one considers it. It not being an increase of energy, but a closing of memory.

A perfected feminine sexual experience. while not incorporating the loss of transition. The crow works as a warning to loss, or destructive to violent experiences which may be covered over by lies, and manipulations. But the primary nature is on intent. The addition of portents into an image gives power to the querent as directly personal experiences are plugged in.

On other means. The death card here under zero, shows beginnings and not endings. The card serves as a halting, rearing, function. On spot. A stop or a jump to right here. Shows grandeur of purpose. It shows an anxious state of being. Chaos to chaos. Other then the card saying, charisma, and for-thought instead of hindsight, searching for answers.

This brings the card to an inner dialogue of consciousness. When one stops to ask oneself what. How. Where. When. Based upon a light to joy to safe and good living. The card begins to lose much of that sexual tone. But one gets lost to as the A-fool is to facing the devil. And the church goes on preaching this reception to the sacrificial, reception to a holier than thou male figure. Peace and love and the total absence of violence save from the dramatic reconstitutions of state. Where it becomes an act of god to bring curses upon mankind. And to re-adjust the vessels forward motion.

But if one is found consulting the oracles. Then ones set becomes predominantly feminine in nature and becomes receptive to the forward motions or external influences. Which comes with it the sexual function as well if there is no forward motion from the querent.

It’s the single most powerful card in the deck. Where everything is born. Death and the Wheel. And the lesson in it is, think before one acts. Let intent be receptive to the “common sense.” With wisdom of experience and to reparation of damage.

Or the tower crumbles by this turn of fate. Saved by the image of the war machine.

Bleeding resistance from the ideal. And the visionary of set intent and discipline. Close but no cigar.

The high priestess in 3, adopts a relationship to the lunar phases. She has everyage. She the young virgin, she’s the full bellied mother and she’s the wise grandmother. As is she connected to the three fates. As i chose her image. She stands as a symbol of purity that lasts consistently in contrast to how variable the moon is. Though being this a reflection. A lunar being from that of a solar being. Makes her nature to balance and tame the power of the serpents forward motion from that of destruction to the higher ideal of companionship and be welcoming subservient to it. Brings the harmony card back around as bonded to the masculine. But, as here the high priestess. Also serves as a reflection in the literal symbolic sense towards forward moving creation. The image brings with it a sense of pride, and of the querent adopting this disposition. As already talked about above. I mention this here again. For any modifications forwards with the images of the three fates. One being young to two being old. That particular script will then become more visible and easier to read. Though dangerously enough be being castrated by the attainment. For drive has been accomplished. For the priestess here would serve as the all C’-ing eye. A purely feminine mind.

Cheers to being frames up for something im not, to be punished for what i don’t deserve. For the death card of fear and sadness. To what once was. Ugh. Alright time for a shower. And a quitting to smoking.

[randomkposts]

#my theory is that sins regenerating with yu yevon breaking down the final Aeons

#their minds I mean. to turn them into the next sin

#rebuilding that armor and each time he gets better at it while he is slowly turning into a parasite

#until all we see is that tick

#tbf those 5 were the ones that were sucessful

#that became high summoners

#previous summoners had gave up & turned back

# or killed on their journey

Tags by @moonlightlunalaa

Your theory about regenerating Sin makes sense. It would get easier to break down the armor over time, as Yu Yevon gets better at being a parasite.

There being only five summoners, makes less sense to me. I hope you don't mind if I ramble a bit. Or a lot, knowing me.

In part its a numbers reason, that bugs me. As I said before, there are 600 years between Gandolf and Yunalesca. And 170 years between Gandolf and Ohalland. The last two have a much shorter gap between them. This is all over 1000 year time period. While there is no trajactory to mesure the progress of the devouring of defences by the parasite ghost tick, and Sin likley gets stronger over the incarnations, thats still a lot of time for Sin to be rampaging and Spira to still have people left to grow up to be summoners.

Braska's calm was apparantly less then a year, which offers no time at all for the people of Spira to recover. Less then a year, thats time to sucessfully have a pregnancy, but no time to raise a child, or even sucessfully train as a summoner. I feel that has to be an unusually short calm, as for the poupluation to have still been alive, there has to have been a longer recovery time, and even at me trying to make a high estimate (20 years), and inflating Braska's to high of seven, we get 163 years spread out between 1000 years. If we go for something lower, like assuming 2, we get eight years of no sin, which is not enough time for recovery, especially spread out.

Yes, people of Spira live fast and expect to die young. Lulu is 22 in game, and already has a dead fiance. Rikku, at 15 would like to see Yuna settle down and get married, and does say that people tend to marry the first person they fall in love with. How old was Lulu when she got engaged I wonder?

Yuna trained from 15 to 17, and is said to be talanted, possibly implying that other people train longer. In contrast, Braska was a high summoner at 35. He fell in love and eloped at 27. Intrestingly, priests are said to often be summoners or former summoners which may possibly mean this might be his second pilgrimage attempt. Or perhaps, most priests are just good at the sending, which would make a lot of sense.

Speaking in the direction of Yevon, its leaders are covering a lot of things. Seymour is the minister of affairs, which oversees temples, rituals, and teachings of summoners. He has the authority to handle the records of sealed histories. Seymour hasn't held his position long (thankfully), but someone who has held his position a long time is Yo Mika. He has held the title of grand master for fifty years (he is 99). Assuming that the avrage person in Spiria has their first kid at 21, and and their kid continues the trend, he has "lived" past four, almost five generations of Spirians. Ruleing as grand Master for 50 years, he has ruled through Yunas time and her fathers time. How many of those years were spent alive is unkown, but in the live fast die young cycle of Spira, he was the equivalent of the Queen of England or whatever.

Critically, Yo Mika is indiffrent to Seymours partacide, and puts Yuna on trial for murder of a master, despite not doing a thing about Seymour's doing so. He's also a racist, and also cool with execution, as he tries to do to the party.

He's shown more then willing to lie and cover up truths in game and has had a rule of fifty years. What other truths has he been hiding. What other truths has Yevon been hiding?

There are a lot of ruins in Spira. Makes sense, after the thousands of years death spiral. Three known abandoned temples.

One is Remiem. Lost after Gandof's battle with Sin. Ok.

Baaj. An island attacked by Sin and left in ruins. In game it houses Anima, who is a new faith. She is Seymour's mother, who was exiled to Baaj with her son. Between her mysterious unnamed dying of something, and Nilihism, she decided that the best way to gain acceptance for her son of interracial marriage, was self sacrifice. Her husband aplroved. So she was apparantly a badass, and she served as a guardian to her ten year old son, and took him to Zanarkand, and became his fayth, where her kid balked on the plan. At age 25, he came back for her Fayth, and took it to the temple, where he sealed her.

Was there a Fayth there before? Maybe. After all, I assume Seymour learned to summon with someone else before summoning Mom. Aditionally, its not the first time a fayth has been moved.

Yojimbo:- "Centries earlier, the Yojimbo Fayth was stolen from an Unkown temple, and taken to a cave to impede summoners journey's"

So she's probably not Baaj temple's lost summon if we assume Seymour had another summon, but with them we have the existance of at least two lost temples, and with them, missing histories. Maybe more summoner statues, crushed admist the ruin. Perhaps amongst the sealed records the minister of affairs has are controversial summoners the religion of Yevon decided were better left forgotten.

Water is such a big part of the game, but where is an aeon for Siren, or Leviathan?

But to get back on the main track, I know that there are a lot of failed summoners, by death or retirement, but there is also a lot of history that is forgotton, both through the distruction of Sin, and deliberately on the part of Yevon, thst I feel more summoners would make a lot of sense.

While I am thinking about final fantasy X

How long does a calm last?

Every fanfiction has their own take on it. And while the game does indicate Calms are varients, I think numbers like a year or two (or shorter), are unrealistic.

Lady Yunalesca defeated the first Sin 1000 years before Yunas in game journey.

Gandof, the first Summoner after Yunalesca came 600 years after her. Gandof also accomplished other great deeds, like Qactuars entrapment apparantly. So 400 years pre- game. I have to wonder what Sin was up to? Did he have Annual attacks? Are all other parts of the world destroyed besides Spirian Islands? Hard what at that official history. So while probably Sin has probably done a hell of a number on the Spiran poupluation, I don't know that how Spira is still standing if Sin is half as destructive as it was in game. FFX your world is sad and beautiful, but your lore makes me want to kick things sometimes. And this is one of them. Probably not what I should do at 2am, but yolo.

Possible theories include but are not limited to- Sin has gotten faster over the years in travel time to sow more destruction.

-Sin has recovered from the calm faster over time, like a virus learning resistance to antibody.

-Sin conqured other worlds occasionally coming back to cause Havoc on Spira.

-Naps?

-Summoners with the strength to seal Sin have had their leinages die out.

-Jecht personally got into a pissing match with his son, and the destruction seen in game was an unusually high ammount?

In order for Spira to still be standing, the poupluation has to have time to recover. And it takes 15 years for someone to be somewhat of an adult. Sort of. And we have to assume that summoners are not grown on trees, and that it takes more then just changing your job class to be an effective one. At least 2-3 years. In other words, training. Apparantly his Calm was short lived, in whatever the hell that Means in Calm timelines.

High summoner Ohalland came 230 years before Yuna. The blitzball playing priest. It doesn't specify the length of his calm, but apparantly he was only the third.

The numbers make me baffled, ok. Theres 170 years between them, assuming the numbers are accurate. 170 years between High summoners second and third. 600 between the first and second.

This does not make a lot of sense of the Calm is two years. Two years is not a lot of time to recover the poupluation after being struck by the uncaring fists of death and destruction.

Yocun was 100 years before game. She was the Crusader High summoner. She had a sword, and is apparantly the first female summoner since the original. Her Guardian is a warrior Monk!

Then 13 years before the game, Sin killed Braskas wife, and So Braska went back to the temples to get summoner training after all his priest training. So now theres a 90 year gap.

But I'm still in disbelif over the only five High Summoners Over 1000 years period, and the intensity of the gaps. Like Sir, I'm no mathmatician, but your numbers are insane. Absoloute hard what. If any Sin is capable of disintigration like at Mushroom rock, and even without that drownings seem to be frequent given its tropics, what has the rate of death been over those thousand years? Not just direct death from monster attack, but death from messing up the landscape, or killing the people needed to bring in harvest and support the poupluations. The property it destorys, people crused in homes, breathless in the merciless ocean?

Summomers do not have a high sucess rate, with both dead summoners, and ones who give up encountered on the journey. Lulu has been a guardian to both an ex-summoner, and a Dead one.

So I think that, while high summoner is not a roll anyone should be able to fulfill, I think that its sensible for there to be more then five High Summoners before Yuna. Let Takumi and Kaya, Katara and Sakura, Dimitri and Lambert have been summoners in the time before Yuna. Make some OC High summoners. I've just expanded the summoner count to nine, and even with those numbers it still feels pretty unbelivable.

Like, lets give the Years of Calm an unlikly number of 20 years. 9x20 =180. Lets give Gandof 10, beacuse actually his was apparantly short. 170. And give Braska 7, as thats when Yuna joined training (3 years before start). 163. Thats 837 years of Sin rampaging. Or 900 with the original at 20 years.

And thats paced throughout the 1000 years.

Lets go to 10 years for 3, 5 for Gan, 7 for Braska. Thats 42 years of Calm. 17 within a 100 year time period.

If Sin is something that builds up the longer it is active, then that period of 600 years before Gandof became a summoner is boggling. What is Sin doing? Spawning Jenova?

Even if we give Yunalesca and Ohalland 25 years of Calm, for ridiclously long, Braska 7, Yocun 15, and Gandof 10 thats still less then 100 years for recovery, paced out over 1000 years. Just what in the world is missing in the history between what was covered up in the church, and what is lost to time known only to the fadeing ruins? Other summoners, so my bet goes. Swallowed by church propaganda and time.

[waitingforwinterwinds]

Game of Thrones - 40 CATELYN VII (pages 416-428)

Cat picks up some sus vibes from her sister, but puts them right back down again, and Bronn wins Tyrion's freedom.

-

Alyssa Arryn had seen her husband, her brothers, and children slain, and yet in life she had never shed a tear. So in death, the gods had decreed that she would know no rest until her weeping watered the black earth of the Vale, where the men she had loved were buried. Alyssa had been dead six thousand years now, and still no drop of the torrent had ever reached the valley floor far below. Catelyn wondered how large a waterfall her own tears would make when she died.

Are you sure about that? cause, water cycle babe, unless that earth is parched, her 'tears' have watered that ground for sure.

Poor Alyssa Arryn, she didn't dissolve into a weeping, wailing mess and got punished for eternity. It's all "she's too stoic and unfeeling" until a woman actually starts crying then she's an unstable wreck who proves one bad stereotype or another.

Love subtle world building like this, oooohhh, the tragedy of it all~ The sneaky peak at Cat's own mindset. Mmmm, the good stuff.

The builders had intended it as a godswood, but the Eyrie rested on the hard stone of the mountain, and no matter how much soil was hauled up from the Vale, they could not get a weirwood to take root here.

I feel like this says something about the presence of gods in the Eyrie, like it is a godless place, ruled by the hubris of men who climbed too high and now think themselves above the matters of other men. Or a place that shuns its history in favour of new fancies.

But also you would need just, so much soil and also a stable self sustaining biome to grow a tree, because it's not just dirt, soil is the good stuff, with the microorganisms, and you need nutrients for the tree, and where do they come from once the soil is tapped out? Trees need a lot.

"Life needs things to live."

"And I remind you, the dwarf murdered my lord husband!" Her voice rose. "He poisoned the Hand of the King and left my sweet baby fatherless, and now I mean to see him pay!"

Part of me wonders if part of her genuinely believes that. Every vibe I get from Lysa is that her brain is a scattered mess of cats, like she cracked under the strain of everything (not getting what she wanted as a girl (Petyr), being married to a man old enough to be her father, and taken to live in such a terrifying and remote location (the Eyrie) before being relocated to King's Landing which we all know out does Mos Eisley as the most wretched hive of scum and villainy) and now she doesn't even know she's lying because she's made herself believe in her own innocence. or she's 100% lying her ass of and deserves All the Oscars.

"I believe the Lannisters murdered Lord Arryn," Catelyn replied, "but whether it was Tyrion, or Ser Jaime, or the queen, or all of them together, I could not begin to say." Lysa had named Cersei in the letter she had sent to Winterfell, but now she seemed certain that Tyrion was the killer... perhaps because the dwarf was here, while the queen was safe behind the walls of the Red Keep, hundreds of leagues to the south. Catelyn almost wished she had burned her sister's letter before reading it.

So do we all. Come on Cat, even if you can't see this is her lie unraveling, you should at least be able to see this is retribution, not justice.

*sigh* you do though don't you, you know this is wrong, your instincts scream it at you, but you've walked yourself into a corner and you've only realised it now that you've gotten trapped.

"You are mistaken, Maester," Catelyn said. "It was Casterly Rock, not Dragonstone, and those arrangements were made after the Hand's death, without my sister's consent." The maester's head jerked so vigorously at the end of his absurdly long neck that he looked half a puppet himself. "No, begging your forgiveness, my lady, but it was Lord Jon who-"

Hindsight is flagging this conversation with so much red.

But Bronn jerked back. Jon Arryn's beautiful engraved silver sword glanced off the marble elbow of the weeping woman and snapped clean a third of the way up the blade. Bronn put his shoulder into the statue's back. The weathered likeness of Alyssa Arryn tottered and fell with a great crash, and Ser Vardis Egen went down beneath her.

That is so much more dynamic and a fun use of the terrain than fight up the stairs and down and kick him out the hole. It has that nice subtle hint of "the gods think you suck also." Like obviously the trial by combat is always decided by the better fighter, but I don't know, I just like it when 'fights overseen by the gods' have a trace of 'the higher powers were watching and they have no complaints with the outcome.'

You know, after this chapter I'm kind of wondering if the anti-stark sisters crew (the anti-sansa arya-stans and the anti-arya sansa-stans) are applying one sister relationship over another. Because Lysa and Cat are sisters too, who had a decent enough relationship as kids, but then they moved apart and grew apart and ended up on opposing sides at the end, are some people seeing that and thinking "this is how Sansa and Arya's story will go also" even though their relationship is kind of the opposite, they both felt like outsiders in their youth, like they were excluded by one another, but after all the shit they go through they both just want their family back. They went through different stuff, luckily, because neither would have survived the other's journey as much as we'd like to say they would, but at the end, the differences between them are going to look so petty and insignificant.

[in-2004-fandoms-and-counting]

AU where Nico dies (don't hate me pls I'm sorry I love Nico and ship the hell out of Solangelo, this is just to allow for some dark AUs) transporting the Athena Parthenos in BoO.

(Sorry it's such a long post) Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano, revered praetor and peace-loving daughter of Bellona, loses the ability to share strength. Now, when she uses her power, she saps your energy, draws on your bravery, and poisons your mind with horrific images. Nico's death has allowed suppressed traits to resurface and overwhelm all her progress since San Juan all those years ago. She picks fights. She becomes a dictator in all but name, abolishing the Senate and making War Games a lot more "realistic": weekly funerals become commonplace, words are spoken under breaths, and terror resides in the heart of every New Roman. And so, Reyna Ramírez-Arellano turns her brilliant mind and poisonous power to Gaea's aid. Gleeson Hedge doesn't seem more than a broken satyr at first glance, his smiles never sincere, his voice never loud, his bat never raised. But when he slips off into the wilderness, he does not sit quietly among the trees and reflect. He whispers into the trees' leaves, his twisted words echoing the bitterness that now consumes his being. He has been tricked too many times: Pan, forcing thousands of satyrs to lose their lives in their quest to find him when he was alive all along; Clarisse, who never tried to connect with nature or understand his own ties to the natural world, who teaches his child the game of death while Mellie watches, fading away, unable to fight back; the gods, who, in their promise of protection, conveniently ignored the nature spirits. He is bitterest about Nico's death: about all he could have done, about what the kid should have done. The glint in his eyes scares even the worst monster that Tartarus could send. But it is Gaea he turns his allegiance to. It is Gaea who promises that he will always be good enough for her. And so, Gleeson Hedge turns nature back to its true mother: Gaea. Hazel Levesque is not someone you want as an enemy. Her golden eyes, gold like the masks of the judges of the dead, seem to see everything. Her powers grow stronger, but now she is able to control them. One glance, and she can cause an entire legion to scream and writhe in agony as she manipulates the iron in their blood, twists their shining armour, forces weapons to turn on their handlers. She stops wearing normal, mortal clothes, and now she wears flowing dresses of molten gold and bronze that no spear could pierce nor hand touch. She calls on the remnants of metal in the cave in Resurrection Bay to rise, and rise they do, twisting and weaving together at her command to form a cathedral-like vault with a solid Stygian iron throne. At the front of her temple lies a chasm from which her first creation arises, complete and healed, at last. Alcyoneus clambers out of the pit, back with his mother's life and Hazel's burning desire for destruction. And so, after seventy years, Hazel Levesque joins forces with Gaea of her own free will. Frank Zhang's arrows are no longer aimed at Tartarus's monsters, but at the people he once considered friends. The ruins of the Zhang family mansion become a shrine to Gaea, the ancient walls falling in blissful happiness into the Earth Mother's embrace. Frank returns often with fresh skulls, unfailingly whole - his arrow pierces cleanly through the eye every time. His piece of firewood safe in Gaea's belly, protected where no flame could reach, he is unstoppable. His shapeshifting causes unforseen problems with the allies' plans, it's very hard to plan how to fight a lion when he could turn into a swarm of bees at any moment. He is the ultimate spy, a literal fly on the wall, and for once, he feels needed. He feels worth something. He feels as though he is good enough, something the gods could never give. All the gods ever did for Frank, he realises bitterly, is take. His mother. His grandmother. His self-confidence. His chance for a stable, loving family. Nico. And so, Frank Zhang finds a different kind of family, one that will not let him down, in Gaea. Piper McLean never wanted to be a tragic love story; that was purely for her mother's entertainment. She

cuts her hair short. She kills Gaea's enemies on sight. Her charmspeak forces even her old family, Camp Half-Blood, to turn against each other, brother against brother, sister against sister, until bodies litter the strawberry fields and the Big House crumbles to smouldering ashes. The gods have her no love. Their boundaries mean nothing to her any more. Her love extends to her favourite mother, her boyfriend, the rest of the Seven, Grover, Reyna and Hedge. Beyond that, it is poison. Gaea takes her hands, looks into her eyes, and tells Piper that she is more than the spawn of an unfaithful, air-headed immortal, more than the damsel in distress. She tells Piper that she is who she decides to be. And Piper agrees. Gaea gives her the opportunity to be out of others' shadows. Piper McLean takes the chance and joins with Gaea, her charmspeak almost her most dangerous feature, second only to her unbridled wrath when Nico's death is mentioned.

Jason Grace owes fealty to only one eternal goddess now. He scours the Underworld with Hazel and Frank, relentless like the wolves he was brought up with. He knows no bounds, his destruction barely controllable by even Piper and her charmspeak. He has obliterated entire cities, counties, even an entire nation. He feels no regret, no remorse, no nagging guilt. He seeks out and electrocutes homophobes as his powers grow in complexity, along with his ability to control them. No matter how much they scream, the same two words shoot from Jason's scarred lips like the lightning bolts he commands: for Nico. As the darkness inside him grows, the son of Jupiter advances on Olympus, eyes and hands blazing, to destroy his father, as one of Gaea's allies, as one of Gaea's found children. Jason Grace vows by Nico's soul and Gaea's love to destroy the gods who shamelessly abandoned them.

Percy Jackson has been close to the darkness before. As just one examole, he's controlled poison to choke the goddess of misery at the edge of Chaos. But now, Annabeth's words at the time - some things aren't meant to be controlled - strike differently. Percy doesn't follow rules any more. That brooding, troublemaking face now alludes to his new form: gone is the class clown, here is something more akin to a devil. Like Hazel, he has made hundreds of people and monsters shriek in pain as he controls their blood, contorting their bodies into unnatural forms and snapping necks with a mere snap of his fingers. If Nico's death is mentioned around the pair of them - Hazel and Percy - both turn on the individual, eyes smouldering with the deceitfully cool ashes of the fire of grief, and slowly unleash their wrath. Percy cannot be controlled. He wants revenge. Part of him wishes he had never given his mother the head of Medusa to kill Smelly Gabe; it tore him to pieces when he made the fluid in her head seep out of her eyes. But she wouldn't stop begging him to leave Gaea. She had to go. She was no longer loving him as he knew he deserved. Now, Percy Jackson takes his support from the mother he should have accepted long ago: Gaea.

Annabeth Chase did not accept powers from her new mother, her better mother. She chose to use her mind as her weapon and Gaea respected that. Gaea gave her the resources she needed to wreak havoc on mortals and immortals alike. Now, instead of studying for a stupid internship in a misogynistic, capitalist society, Annabeth unleashes her fury, her grief, her mind on the world. The gods deserve to pay for what happened to Nico. The demigods need to feel her grief. The mortals started this stupid cycle of overwork and inadequate pay. Annabeth is ready to work with the mother that respects her, that loves her, that nurtures her as she deserves. And work she does. Plan after plan is developed, improved, redrafted, mocked up, redeveloped, and finally executed with clinical precision. Her mind becomes what her enemies most fear, even above her reputation: first child of Athena in millennia to reach Arachne, retriever of the Athena Parthenos, survivor of Tartarus. And she laughs, laughs in a maniacal way that makes you want to take a step back as she strides towards you, grey eyes alight with an unnatural glint as you realise that she knows everything about you and she knows how this will end. She will not let herself or her friends die. She refuses to let another situation like Nico's death happen again. So, Annabeth Chase takes Gaea's resources and turns them into a mass genocide, executed with her new mother's blessing.

Grover Underwood leads the nature spirits now. He commands dryads to extend their unstoppable tendrils through the paths that Gaea forms for them, deep in the earth, then sending them exploding through the surface and reclaiming all that was torn from them under the pretence of friendship. His empathy link with Percy allows him some degree of control, both over the son of Poseidon and over naiads. Grover is betrayed and bitterly disappointed in Pan, in the gods, in demigods, in mortals, in Nico. And so, he turns nature back home with Gleeson Hedge. The hauntingly beautiful whistling of his pipes lures demigods, mortals, even gods to their doom. Apollo is the first to fall, trapped by the music of the satyr whose horns now make him seem diabolical as he dances in the flames. Grover Underwood finds his roots in Gaea and his revenge in destruction.

Leo Valdez wants to burn the world to ashes. There's not a moment he's not on fire, his hair smouldering, his skin aglow. At his feet lies Hera, trussed up like a rodeo calf, bound by the power of the guardian Leo knows he deserved as a child. There is no Piper with her charmspeak to free the ex-queen; at least, Piper is by Leo's side as he blasts her with his searing flames. There's a smile on Leo's face that rivals even Annabeth's as he torches cities, razes acres and lights up the sky with plumes of smoke and columns of fire. His reasoning feels etched into his heart: the gods let Nico die. The gods let us down one time too many. And so he lets the flames go. Gaea stands behind him, her hand on his shoulder, proud and respectful. She knows that he secretly enjoyed starting the war with New Rome. He has fire powers; it's only natural, and that Octavian is enough to drive anyone mad. So, Leo Valdez finally makes his peace with Gaea.

Will Solace goes out like a light as the news of his beloved's death is announced. He lies, broken and silent, in Gaea's arms, tears streaming down his face. He stirs only for Nico's name, and his eyes turn slowly to whoever dared say it. He reaches out an arm, eyes turning black, leaching all the colour from the surroundings as his whisper echoes: there is no hope. Behind him stands Gaea, a tear of her own on her earthen cheek. She feels his pain, raw and fresh. But she takes some of it onto herself. Will Solace shares his grief with Gaea now.

And so they stand, eyes alight and expressions dark and triumphant, by the side of the goddess who did not want to let Nico die.

Gaea smiles.

[lock-my-feelings-in-a-jar]

Can you post your favorite quotes of Bruce? xoxo

YES, I LOVE THIS ASK! THANK YOU! okay, i don't know if this is the type of answer you had in mind, but here's what i have for you. i apologize for my grammar, any misspellings, misheard words, misREMEMBERED words or small sections missing from the original quotes. these are in the random order that my brain thought of them in. i'll put a 'keep reading' thing here because it's a long post. (i still have no idea if that works for mobile tumblr but it's probably fine)

okay i'll start with this one

-

bruce(about his very good choices in pants): "there were certain...items of my anatomy which gave the game away, really."

interviewer: "have your children said anything about this?"

bruce: "well no, the reason i have children is because of the items of my anatomy that people could see through the spandex."

-

just this whole thing: Bruce Dickinson yells at bottler(link)

-

bruce(after coming back to the band): "that's actually what the world needs now, is an iron maiden record."

-

bruce: "we're deeply fond of each other."

dave: "yes, we are."

-

bruce: "i have never been able to bite my toenails."

-

bruce: "they(the fans) expect to be entertained and they expect us to give them our attention because they, after all, did pay to come and see the show. they didn't pay to see us get off on ourselves. i mean, i think a lot of artists go around as if they've got a huge mirror taped this far away from their faces and that's all they notice throughout the whole show."

-

bruce: "it's more important to us to sell one record to a person who appreciates the band, cares about the band, knows the music and likes to get involved with what the band's about, than it is to sell three records to people who heard it on the radio and think 'wow there's two really nice tunes on there. i'm gonna take it back home, get wasted, sit and play it to death and then get sick of it and throw it in the dust bin.'"

-

interviewer: "so where does the thrill lie then, is it having ten thousand people in front of you or having ten thousand people buying your record?"

bruce: "it's having ten thousand people WITH you that's the thrill. knowing that, not that you CONTROL ten thousand people, but that ten thousand people support you in what you're doing. that's a very nice feeling."

-

janick: "there's bits dropping off him(eddie), a bit like us, really."

bruce: "you speak for yourself, there's no bits dropping off me. not yet. later, maybe. "

-

janick: "you know, we've got a lot of older people that have been there from the beginning. they move to the back of the hall, probably."

bruce: "or DIE. or they just DIE. they just DIE. some of them DIE."

janick: "some of them get their hair cut and move to the back of the halls."

bruce: "and the other ones, they breed. the iron maiden fans. they breed. they procreate. and that's where the new ones come out. so what you're seeing is like the endless cycle of nature repeating itself in life."

janick: "i think eddie's been busy as well, helping out."

bruce: "yeah, the old fans eat the new ones and the new fans eat the old fans and they, you know."

-

bruce: "i don't wear jeans, i wear pajamas."

-

bruce: "it's that english thing of, you know, if there's a murder going on next door to you, they go 'do you mind killing him a little more quietly?'"

janick: "wait a minute, i live over the road from you , i would save you. i would come over and save you."

bruce: "yeah, but that's probably because you're from the north, you see. we're both from the north, so we're different to londoners."

-

bruce: "steve, are you warm enough? i can put some heat on if you want."

-

bruce(to the people seeing their show for the first time): "all i can say is we're a friendly bunch, really. most of the time. and we don't exclude anybody. brothers, sisters, welcome to the maiden family."

-

bruce: "because the one thing that all of us stand for, you know, this is family. it's not one nation, this is not one race, this is not one religion. this is all religions, every race, every person, every gender. there used to be two, now there's a few more. we are all family in this together, everybody is welcome. and the answer to the bullshit going on out there is not to be full of hatred, it's to be full of love and light and music and a lot of beer."

-

bruce: "i was so nervous tonight before we came on, i very nearly shit myself"

-

bruce: "i've never understood all these bands that say "yeah man i got into a band cause i wanted to take lots of drugs and i wanted to do this". if you want to do that, just, you know, go and do it somewhere else, but don't mess up my world because what we do here, to us, is really important and it's really important to loads and loads of kids that come and see us."

-

bruce(about when he first joined the band): "i started off, i sort of went "look! for a start, don't expect me to get dressed up in all that black leather gear and all that and cut all my hair off because i'm not the same as the previous singer. i've got my own ideas about what should happen and if you don't like it, (folds arms) stuff it!""

-

interviewer: "so adrian, how important is that respect to you?"

janick: (starts to answer nicely despite being called by the wrong name)

bruce: (interrupts) "it's REALLY important that you know that this is not adrian. you know, cause you're supposed to be the journalist and you obviously don't know your ass from your elbow. his name is janick."

-

bruce(drunk): "STAR TREK! IT'S CAPTAIN FUCKING KIRK! MY LAST WORDS, BEAM ME UP SCOTTY!"

-

bruce(i am providing no context for this one): would it confuse you if anything happens out of sequence? like you wipe your bum with your razor or something like that?

and that's all for now. there are so many of these, i could stretch this answer out for a whole week but i'll make myself stop. (i would be thrilled if anybody added more to this list though. or if anybody corrected me if i got anything wrong)

[swaps55]

This Hole You Left (Anderson)

Pairing: mShenko | Tags: Canonical Character Death, Grief

Post-Alchera. 

This is a stand-alone scene from a larger work, but I’m very fond of it, so I’m posting it on its own. 

~

Captain David Anderson stares out at the repair crews moving around the Presidium. Here, from the safe retreat of his office, it doesn’t look so bad. Scaffolding covers the damaged bridge. Debris still floats in the lake, turning the serene blue water a murky brown. The air circulators have almost cycled out the smell of soot and burnt alloy, but a trace of it still lingers. If he leans out far enough, the tip of the relay Shepard had barreled through using nothing but an M-35 Mako just four weeks ago is barely visible on his right periphery.

He doesn’t lean. Just as he doesn’t look at the datapad in his hand. Hearing the words come out of Joker’s mouth was enough. Seeing the helmsman’s face was enough. Anderson had remarked once to Shepard that he’d like to be there the day someone wiped the smartass off Joker’s face.

Shepard had snorted. Not me, sir, he’d said. If he gives up the smartass that probably means I’m fucked. I’d prefer my pilot remain an asshole at all times.

Shepard had been right, of course.

Anderson wipes a thumb across the corner of his eye. It’s all right. No one here to see.

They came back around for another pass, Joker had said, in a voice that was dull, dead, about as far a cry as you could get from the insubordinate ass who’d gone off on the stand in Vancouver just two weeks ago. Shepard had to be to blame for that display. Politics had never been his game.

We lost gravity right as he shoved me in the pod. Momentum from the blast…kicked him the wrong way. I didn’t see what happened after the door closed, but I didn’t need to. Drive core implosion doesn’t leave much to the imagination.

Anderson’s fingers grip the datapad harder. No. It doesn’t. That doesn’t stop his mind from filling in the blanks anyway.

All Shepard’s training. All the hell he’d put himself through to earn that N7 designation. There couldn’t have been a person more prepared to live through the Normandy’s destruction. And in the end, the realities of space had still won.

At least it had probably been quick. Probably.

The door to his office hisses open. For a moment, Anderson expects it to be Shepard. It should be Shepard. That son of a bitch has been putting Anderson’s heart in his throat since he was fourteen years old, but he’s never had the audacity to actually die. Hell, the kid had taken a reaper to the face and shrugged it off.

Kid. Shepard hasn’t been a kid in a long time, maybe never really was to begin with. But to Anderson, some part of Shepard would always be that fourteen-year-old with the thousand-watt grin and a glimmer in his eye that usually meant Anderson’s heart was about to leap into his throat. The smile had faded over time, but not that damned glimmer. He’d last seen it right here on the Citadel, when he’d stood up from the table at Flux Casino with plans to steal the Normandy right out from under the Council’s nose. And Anderson had helped him do it.

This can’t be how it ends. It can’t.

A voice speaks up behind him, crisp, formal. “You wanted to see me, sir.”

His expression tightens, but he smooths it out before he turns around. Lieutenant Alenko stands just inside the door to his office, shoulders straight, hands clasped behind his back, chin in the air. Anderson can’t shake the feeling there’s an empty space next to him.

Probably because he’s never seen Alenko without Shepard.

Kaidan Alenko. Damndest thing.

Who do you want on your marine detail? Anderson had asked, after informing Shepard he was being transferred off the Myeongnyang and onto the Normandy.

You’re asking me?

I’m naming you XO. If there’s someone you want, just say the word.

Alenko.

Anderson hadn’t had a chance to blink before the name was out of Shepard’s mouth. Not another N. Not someone from the special ops teams Shepard had run when Anderson could pry him out of Captain Oseguera’s hands. He wanted the biotic from the ‘Yang.

Hackett was the one who’d argued for assigning Alenko to Shepard’s detail five years ago, when the dust from Torfan had finally settled. Anderson had thought it would be a mistake. Alenko’s file showed he could keep up with Shepard, sure. But Alenko embodied the kind of idealism Shepard would chew up and spit out.

If we’re going to put his mind right to get back on the front lines, he needs an anchor, Hackett had replied, with that calm, ice cold demeanor that has won him nearly every argument he’s ever been involved in. Alenko will do the job.

The old man had been right. Shepard didn’t get close to people, and that was before Torfan. But he’d gotten close to Alenko. Hell, Alenko probably deserves most of the credit for bringing Shepard back from the brink. Because after Torfan, Shepard had indeed been on the brink.

Alenko might be the one on the brink, now. There’s a look in his eye that Anderson recognizes, and it isn’t a good one.

“Sit down.”

Alenko shifts his weight. Not the sitting kind, then. Not today. Anderson’s going to take a wild guess that Alenko hasn’t stopped moving since the Marrakesh picked him up.

He sighs and remains standing, giving the lieutenant silent permission to do the same. “I thought you’d like to know we’re working with the elcor to get a salvage team to Alchera. We’re hoping they find the Normandy’s black box data. Be nice to get some clues on what the hell happened out there.”

“Yes, sir.”

Hm. Brick wall is not Alenko’s usual MO, but that’s sure as hell what he’s talking to right now.

“Joker finished his debrief an hour ago,” Anderson goes on. “I assume you’ve heard his version of what happened.”

More shifting. The uncomfortable kind. Shepard’s done it more than a few times in Anderson’s various offices over the years.

“I haven’t, sir.”

Anderson takes a good, long look at him. He’s spent fifteen years worrying about Shepard. It’s never occurred to him to worry about Alenko.

“I see.” He exhales through his nostrils. “The Normandy was attacked by an unknown vessel. Whoever they were, Joker says they came out of nowhere. Shepard got him into the escape pod, but the ship lost gravity. He…well.”

Alenko stares straight ahead, silent. Anderson looks for a tell, but he only knows Shepard’s.

Alenko isn’t Shepard.

If this conversation is going to be one sided, Anderson needs backup. He moves to his desk, fishes a bottle out of a drawer that’s already half empty after being new just yesterday, and pours two glasses. He pushes one of them across the desk. Doesn’t occur to him until after the fact he has no idea if Alenko drinks scotch. It’s just one of the things Anderson and Shepard always agreed on.

“Have it if you want it,” he says, not up for bullying the lieutenant into a drink. “This is off the record.” He swallows half of his in one go, then heads back for the balcony. A few moments later, Alenko joins him, hands empty, still avoiding his gaze. There’s a chip in the brickwork, though. Not much, but something in his eyes wavers.

Yeah. It might be time to worry about Alenko. Losing two ships in the span of four weeks would do a number on anyone.

Except he doesn’t think it’s about either the Myeongnyang or the Normandy.

Anderson leans on the railing, gazing out at the wreckage of the Presidium. He takes another sip from his glass. “I’m sorry. I know he meant a lot to you.”

It takes Alenko so long to answer Anderson thinks he isn’t going to. But then some of the starch fades from his shoulders.

“He did.”

Anderson side eyes him. Had it been Shepard standing next to him, he might press. He could get Shepard to open up if he was careful enough. Sometimes.

But this isn’t Anderson’s business. And his own grief certainly isn’t Alenko’s business. But while most of the galaxy is preparing to mourn Commander Shepard, the soldier standing next to him might be the only person he knows who’s grieving for Sam. He swirls the remaining liquid in his glass.

“He was the most reckless SOB I’ve ever met,” Anderson says, watching a hanar drift along one of the intact pathways below them. “I’m pretty sure half the shit he pulled over the years was just to piss me off.”

Alenko raises an eyebrow ever so slightly in surprise, but doesn’t turn his head. “He’s always at his best when the plan goes to hell.”

“Since he was a kid,” Anderson agrees, not missing the fact that Alenko had referred to him in the present tense. “First time I ever laid eyes on him he was four. He’d wandered away from Daniel on Arcturus and he called in the cavalry to look for him. You know where I found him?”

Alenko shakes his head.

“In a fountain, playing with a model ship. I asked him what the hell his spaceship was doing in the water. He said, ‘I’m about to find out.’”

Alenko’s mouth curves in a brittle smile. “I didn’t know you knew him that young.”

“I doubt he remembered,” Anderson says. “His father and I were good friends. I dropped in on occasion while he was growing up.” 

Before Shepard was a soldier. Before he was the Butcher of Torfan or the Savior of the Citadel. Back when he was still Sam, all knees and elbows, so desperate to please he couldn’t sit still.

Anderson still misses that kid.

“He said you kept an eye on him when they shipped him to Ares Station.”

Anderson huffs. “Told you about that, did he.”

Alenko nods, resting his hands on the balcony railing.

Then Shepard had indeed trusted Alenko. Only a handful of people knew about Ares Station and Guthra Tulak. Shepard had been one of five kids sent to biotically train with the krogan, and the only one to realize any potential.

Leave it to the Alliance to come up with a program even riskier than BAaT. Leave it to Hannah Shepard to volunteer her own kid to be part of it. Anderson always wondered if Sam knew about Hannah’s role in Ares, and how hard Daniel fought to keep it from happening.

To Hannah, Sam was a legacy. To the Alliance, he’d been a tool with astronomical potential. Someone had needed to look out for the actual kid. Daniel had tried, but.

Losing Daniel still stings. What would he have thought about his Spectre son?

Hell, Anderson knows exactly what he’d have thought. He would have feared this day, this ending, with every breath he took. He’d wanted anything else for Sam. Anything but this.

And Anderson had helped him become everything Daniel was afraid of. Hell, what choice did he have? You couldn’t dissuade Sam from anything. Once he was target locked on something there was nothing you could do but get as many obstacles out of his way as possible and hope for the best. So that’s what Anderson had done. Mentored him, advocated for him, taken a few hits behind the scenes on his behalf and cleared the path as best he could. Maybe you couldn’t take the target out of Sam’s sights, but you could guide his aim to make sure he hit it dead to rights.

“He’s come a long way since then,” Anderson says, wincing when he realizes now it’s him who can’t let go of the present tense. “I wish I’d been at the inquest. From the secure feed it looked like he put an entire roomful of admirals on their asses. Would love to have seen it in person.”

Alenko stills, expression frozen in place like a mask. Whatever nerve Anderson just touched is a big one, so he steers the conversation in a new direction.

“Though what I really wish I could have seen is what he found to gripe about being stuck in atmosphere. The entire time he was in Rio for ICT, he never once complained about the work. Wouldn’t shut up about how much he hated humidity.”

The fragile smile returns. “He hated going down a well without a hardsuit.”

“Know what almost kept him from qualifying for N1?”

Alenko shakes his head.

“Bugs,” Anderson tells him. “Not twenty-hour days, not hostile terrain, not crawling around in the mud without food or sleep. It was the bugs that damn near washed him out.”

A laugh escapes the lieutenant. It’s a rusty sound. “That…doesn’t surprise me.”

Anderson smiles at the memory. “He got over it. Made it through, like he always did. Wish I’d told him more how��proud I was.”

“You meant a lot to him,” Alenko says, so quietly Anderson almost doesn’t hear him.

The lump that forms in Anderson’s throat takes him off guard. “He had a way of affecting everyone he ever met. I forget sometimes it could go the other way. He made it so easy to think he was fine on his own.”

“He wasn’t.”

Alenko’s stare remains fixed on the view from the balcony. Not many people saw the side of Shepard that needed anyone. Even Anderson only saw it on occasion. Alenko was so far from the kind of person Shepard would let his guard down in front of, but clearly he had.

If we’re going to put his mind right to get back on the front lines, he needs an anchor, Hackett had said. Alenko had done the job, all right.

Problem was, it looks like that had gone both ways.

Anderson draws in a breath. Might as well get this over with. “I called you here to ask if you would speak at the memorial.”

It’s going to be a spectacle, the likes of which Sam would have hated, but the Alliance sure as hell isn’t going to be denied their PR opportunity.

Alenko shifts his weight. He’s so damn still. Shepard would be pacing the room until Anderson wanted to strangle him.

“Is that an order, sir?”

“A request.”

“Then I respectfully decline.”

Anderson finishes his drink. “Can I ask why?”

Alenko’s grip on the railing tightens. “The Alliance cares about the symbol. I cared about the person. I can’t give them what they want.”

Anderson can’t help but wonder what the lieutenant would have to say. Shepard was so many different things to so many different people. What, exactly, was he to Kaidan Alenko?

Why Alenko? Anderson had asked Shepard back on Arcturus, the Normandy’s hull gleaming and new out the shutters.

Shepard had thought a long time before answering, like there was too much to say and not enough words to say it.

Because he grounds me.

The older Shepard had gotten, the rarer it was to get glimpses of Sam. Sometimes Anderson wondered if Sam still existed, or if he’d been swallowed up by the mantle everyone demanded he carry. But that answer had come from Sam.

“Ok,” Anderson tells Alenko. “I’ll hand it off to Hackett.”

“Why not you?” Alenko asks, looking in his direction for the first time.

Anderson gazes down at his empty glass. Twenty years ago he might have thrown it against the wall just to watch it shatter. Nowadays he thinks too hard about the mess it would make, and being the one who has to clean it up. “Because I cared about the person.”

Heavy silence settles between them.

“You should take some leave,” Anderson says. “You’ve more than earned it.”

“I’m fine,” Alenko replies, but that haunted look is back.

Soon enough you’re going to have to stop moving, son, Anderson thinks. After Torfan, Shepard had hit the same wall Alenko is cruising right towards. But Alenko isn’t Shepard, and he isn’t under his command anymore. All he can do is give him a hand if he asks for it, and from the looks of it he isn’t going to ask.

Not that it would matter. Anderson’s got no anchor to give him that could replace the one he lost.

“Just think about it. And get some sleep.” He gestures towards the door, freeing the lieutenant from further torture. While Alenko makes for the exit, Anderson heads for his desk and the untouched glass. No sense in letting it go to waste.

Alenko pauses at the doorway and looks back over his shoulder. “Rain.”

“I’m sorry?” Anderson asks with a frown.

“You wanted to know what he found to gripe about on Earth. It was the rain.” He looks away without waiting for a response and walks away.

That empty space Anderson thought he’d been imagining when Alenko walked in feels even larger, now. Yeah. Shepard sure knows how to leave a hole in people.

[practicalmagicintuitions]

A little something about tarot for beginners and everyone who is interested.

I planned this post for a long time, mainly for tarot newbies, someone who wants to start or  just interested in how works. It won’t be a Tarot 101, definitely not. More likely, how I work with the cards. 

DISCLAIMER: If you are underage I cannot and I won’t give you any ideas how to hide your practice from your parents or guardians. I know tiktok is very popular, but be careful because there is way more misinformation than any other SM site. 

First, you obviously got familiar with the basic meaning of the cards, the build of the deck. You will learn the suits, the arcanas, the court cards, the numerology groups, and a few keywords. But this comes with practice. This doesn’t mean you can only draw your first card after you learned all of those things. No. When you buy your deck, look at each card carefully. Do not turn into a companion book or the internet immediately. Think about the card, make notes into a journal or a paper about what you feel, notice when you look at the image. Makes you happy, makes you scared? Is it dark, it is light? And after that, you can read what the book says. 

Tarot is about storytelling so your intuition, your memories, your feelings are very important.

When someone is saying tarot has fixed meanings… this is not entirely true. One card can have many many meanings depending on its position or the surrounding cards. Yes, Death card won’t mean your soulmate is coming on a horse, but it’s also 99% won’t mean you are gonna die. 

If you want fixed meanings, you should read Lenormand instead. In Lenormand, there are certain combinations with fixed meanings, there is no place for intuition. The pictures on the Lenormand cards have aesthetic purposes only they don’t have additional meanings. Tarot is intuitive. It means you combine the meanings of the cards and above that, you are using your intuition AND the pictures on the cards. Movements, colours, directions, animals, flowers, symbols etc. 

What do I mean? I’ll show you. 

Those are the Fools from the classic RWS, the Modern Witch Tarot and the This Might Hurt Tarot decks. Look how similar they are at first. They are representing the carfree, daydreaming attitude, the journey. They all have a companion, a dog etc. You can fairly read those the same way. Of course, there are differences, the big city instead of the mountains, backpack etc, but I think those are amazing starter decks. 

I think I wrote in my first tarot post that even many people do not like the classical RWS deck, because the images seem ugly and there is no diversity, for me that is the basis and I think everyone should have own it. But if you absolutely don’t want to because you don’t like it at all, those 2 decks, the Modern Witch Tarot and the This Might Hurt Deck seems a good starter deck. RSW was not my first deck, I haven’t started with it, so you can buy it later on if you want and start with the deck you like more. It is very important to choose a deck that speaks to you. Tarot first and foremost is about your personal journey or helping others if you are reading for others. What I am doing here in tumblr is fun, a good practice, it is testing my abilities but tarot is not only for knowing more about our celeb crushes. It is a guied to ourselves. 

Let’s see more examples with pictures.  The RWS tarot and the New Vision tarot.

New Vision tarot recreates the RWS imagery but as you will see gives a different perspective to the cards, therefore gives a new layer to them. I heard the deck has only a little white book, not a real guide, which is a shame. I think it’s an interesting concept and you could deliver very different readings than with a standard RWS. Personally, I wouldn’t recommend this deck to a newbie but it’s interesting so I show you. You can see how different those images, how different intuitive messages you can get.

Same-ish concept is the Vica Versa Tarot. Based on the ratings it is more usable than the New Vision Tarot. This deck has pictures on both sides and the meaning varies depends on this. This is also a very RWS based deck so it is very interesting to me. Not in the near future, but I want to purchase this deck. 

I will show you a few more examples of cards that are less based on the RWS system (or not at all) therefore you need you and your intuition more.

RWS, Gentle Tarot, Wild Unkown, Shadowscapes

I hope you understand now how important it is to use your own intuitions, feelings, experiences and find the style that suits you. Personally, I prefer the more earth-based, pagan or darker decks (not too dark though, I should say more serious) but you can find all pastel pink, fluffy decks too. There are literally thousands of decks on the market in every style. But those are not cheap things, if you cannot connect you won’t be able to work with them. If you like a deck, go to youtube, search for a flip through. Look at the cards carefully. If you still like it, amazing. However, if you bought a deck and it turns out not for you you can still sell it online or if you are really lucky you have spiritual stores or fairs in your area where you can sell or change it for something else. 

Connecting the cards it’s not easy, but one of my most spot-on reading was when I let my intuition work completely. I remember I pulled the cards and I started to collect the information about what they could mean. And I felt it makes no sense left to right but right to left I understand it crystal clear. I was hesitant because you have this preconception you have to read the cards in order, but guess what, you don’t have to. I will link an excellent video about it, I found it after my reading and it was a light bulb, aha moment for me. This youtube channel is not for beginners, but I recommend watching this video, you will understand what I ment and it will help you.

The other thing, yes, in western culture we read left to right but this is only one way you can do it. You don’t have to stick with it in your readings. In the most popular spread in the Celtic cross you read the last 4 cards from down to up. And on the standard RWS deck (as you can see on the first picture above), The Fool starts his journey and he is heading from right to left. Isn’t this amazing? And the Major Arcana is about The Fool’s journey. Aka your journey.

*( I cannot link here, in the middle of the text, so it will be video 1 at the end)

So don’t be afraid, be free, make your own meaning, rituals. This is your tarot journey, no one else's. Yours. Don’t let some bitter, “I know better, you are wrong” people take your enthusiasm away. 

You can read many books and sources but it doesn’t mean you will understand the cards. You cannot read the cards mechanically. Keywords are helpful at the beginning but after a while you have to leave them behind and use your intuition. 

99% of the tarot readers have difficulty with Court Cards. Those are basically people on the cards, doing very little. Some readers read them only as a person, some of them read them as an influence. Just because there is a man on the cards this doesn't mean it represents a male in your life. So it’s hard. 

One exercise which is fun and you can make it easier  is that you try to pair them with people in your life. Do you have an impulsive brother who is flirty and rushing things? Knight of Wands. Do you have a mean female boss, who is gossiping and bitching? Queen of Swords rx.  Of course, this is very basic, but it could help and it is fun.

If you don’t want to use your family or acquaintances, use tv series instead. I think Game of Thrones is amazing for this. It has so many different characters. Many of them are even changing. Jon Snow went from Knight to King, Arya from page to Knight, Sansa from Page to Knight, from Knight to Queen.

The second type of exercise is similar just with the minors. Choose a movie and try to tell the story with the minors. People met, fell in love, getting married, broke up, fighting over money during the divorce etc. All in the cards. 

Pulling a card daily is amazing in every way. People recommend doing this in the morning, however I like to do this at the evening. Firstly, because I am a night owl, mornings are painful for me and I don’t have time in the mornings. But the most inportant reason is because I can be anxious and easily stressed out. If I pull the Death at the mornig I will stressing out the whole day. However if I pull this at the evening as a summary of my day maybe I will realise immediately, “oh, my favourite tv show was cancelled, bummer.” or “ I have a new teamleader at work or school, so this is a new cycle for us” I think this gives you a bigger and clearer understanding how those cards are fit into your daily life and what are they meaning for you personally. 

When you choose to do any kind of divination it’s crucial to protect your energies. So it’s inevitable to start meditating. The other two practices which I highly highly recommend are called Grounding and Circle Casting. Don’t be scared, those are just higher forms of meditation that help you to keep the balance, but those are also a must if you decide to do another type of Energy Work, for example of Energy Manipulation. I will link an excellent video about it. This YT is also an amazing resource if you are interested in Wicca. You don’t have to! This channel is amazing anyway. Personally, I am not a Wiccan either as I am not celebrating Wiccan sabbats like Beltane or Imbolc, but I love this channel so so much.

*I cannot link the video becuse she’s blocked this option but this is her site. Go and check her  Centering and Grounding ║ Witchcraft 101 video, it was uploaded on July 10th in 2019 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFz0Rtv2bh86aUy_5_YsGLw

There will be a point when someone wants to scare you that tarot, divination and spirituality are evil. It is not. Tarot is a piece of paper with pictures on it. It’s not deviant or anything. The cards have no intentions or consciousness, they are just cardstock. Not bad or good. What can make it harmful is the unethical people. Someone who wants to bribe you to pay a big amount of money because “you are cursed” or is someone trying to manipulate the readings to scare you or make you do something. If your intentions are good, have a moral and you protect your energy, you don’t have to be afraid. 

In my experience usually people who are heavily involved in churches or Christianity try to push that the tarot and spirituality are evil. Of course not all of them, I know many professional tarot readers who are also Christian, love Jesus etc. 

What you should know and maybe this could give you a little comfort or calm that we are all spiritual beings. All of us are made of energy. We are so much more than flesh and blood and bones. Everyone is attracting or have spirits in their life even the most hardcore churchgoers have. You are not bad or evil just because you use divination. Always your intention is important and that you seek the light side of spiritualism. 

I hope you liked this post, it becomes my baby and I am really proud of it and I hope you will find it useful or interesting. In the forseeable future I am not planning anyithing similar but I am open to questions as always. Maybe I will have an answer.  

Be Blessed.

[thebibliomancer]

Archaia’s Jim Henson’s The Dark Crystal Age of Resistance #10

The Journey into the Mondo Levidian Part 2

The true untold tale of All-Maudra Mayrin’s inaugural adventure!

Well, untold in the show. Comic is telling plenty.

In part one, Mayrin becomes All-Maudra and has plenty of unresolved mother issues and insecurity about it. Her first crisis is the growing Sifan separatist movement which threatens to shatter Gelfling solidarity and make her more of a Most-Maudra. She charters a ride with Captain Kam’Lu to go speak to the separatist leader Fenth but the ship goes and sinks.

So far we’ve had a journey so far but not into or Mondo Levidian. We probably should get around to that soon. There’s only three issues left.

So let’s get started!

When the ship sank, Mayrin jumped overboard to save Kam’Lu. Now they’re stranded in the middle of the ocean on a raft.

Mayrin is insistent that they try to find and save the crew of the Scalene Anchor and also Dot. Kam’Lu is equally insistent that No That’s A Terrible Idea. They have no food, no water, and no hope of survival unless they’re lucky enough to find land. They’re in no position to rescue anyone else. Plus...

There are political considerations.

Kam’Lu: “If the other clans believe the Sifans killed the All-Maudra, we’ll never be trusted again.”

He also mentions that Fenth predicted that THIS EXACT SITUATION might happen if the All-Maudra intervened in the Sifan separatist movement.

Huh.

Speaking of Fenth, the plot cuts over to him for a bit.

He learns of the sinking the Scalene Anchor and the presumed death of the New-All-Maudra and thinks hey, its free real estate.

High Councilor Fenth: “That means... There’s no one in line for the All-Maudra’s throne! The seat is vacant!”

skekSa: “How... fortunate! Haha! Ha! Haha! You wanted autonomy for the Sifans! Freedom from the greedy hands of the Vapra clan, yes? That is why honored me with this grand tithing -- to enlist my immortal aid? I am the only one who is sympathetic to your cause. That is why the Skeksis are here. To help Gelfling lead...!”

Call it a shot in the dark but I feel like skekSa was involved in the suspicious sea monster sinking of the Scalene Anchor.

Of course, she’ll probably get away with it. It’d spoil the surprise too early if a Skeksis was caught doing an evil scheme.

Also, look at the ambition on Fenth. Grows up in a matriarchy where clan leaders are always women, where the word for clan leader means ‘clan mother’ and thinks to himself ‘psssh i can do that.’ Good on him. Dream big, guy.

Back over with our mismatched comedy duo, as all Dark Crystal stories must have, Mayrin and Kam’Lu have some mismatched comedy duo banter.

Like her criticizing him for not being able to find land despite being a captain of a ship. And then immediately spotting land while he’s indignantly defending his credentials.

Or her maligning his swimming abilities since he fell off a boat and got knocked unconscious and had to be saved from drowning by her.

So he decides to turn this into a swimming contest, winner gets to be All-Maudra.

Good fun.

Just how I like my Gelfling buddy comedies.

Of course, its all fun and games until the island turns out to be a sea monster that eats them.

And it turns out that the island is a sea monster that eats them.

A mondo levidian, if I had to guess.

Giant turtles passing as landscape. Giant monsters being mistaken for islands. This comic series is too good to me.

So the two slide down the mondo levidian’s throat (gross) MANAGING TO BICKER ON THE WAY DOWN!

Kam’Lu: “Don’t you have wings?!”

Mayrin: “They don’t work well when they’re wet!”

Amazing.

They slide and slorp and flump all the way down to presumably the stomach.

But as they stop to rest, they realize they’re not alone.

Sulub: “Yer some kinda fishie-fish I ain’t ever seen! Betchur tasty! Anyway! No wrigglin’ while I kill ya good!”

OH MY GOD

This comic series is too good to me.

Look at this delightful podling crabtaur.

Once Kam’Lu proves immune to Sulub’s “advanced technology” (ie Sulub stabs Kam’Lu in the foot with a spear), the podcrab agrees to take the two Gelfling to see his village elder.

Sulub actually assumes that Mayrin and Kam’Lu are married and here on honeymoon at the thriving fish digestive system tourism industry I guess. Mayrin claims that Kam’Lu is just a fool and her servant (and Kam’Lu doesn’t speak Podling very well so has no idea about this) and introduces herself as the All-Maudra.

Sulub: “ALL-MAUDRA! The legendary All-Maudra! Well, why didn’t ya say so! Sulub is gilltickled and downright honored to lead ‘the all-powerful and all-knowing’ All-Maudra to our home. You’ll be enjoyin’ to know we’ve kept care of your most regal gifts! Still in pristine condition for havin’ come in a while ago!”

The gut city of Bajula has a statue of the previous All-Maudra, one apparently commissioned when Mayrin was baby.

Huh.

Well. Its helpful to Mayrin that they know about the All-Maudra and are excited to have her here. And that they’re assuming that she sent the statue ahead of herself, like luggage.

Sulub tours Mayrin and Kam’Lu around Bajula. Showing them the goo farms, the visitor center, the fermented... milk wine bar.

The king shows up and is disappointed that the Gelfling want to leave so soon into their visit and asks if Sulub even bothered to show them the goo farms!

But since Mayrin insists that they have important outside stuff to do outside, the king decides to rush through some exposition.

These podling crabs? They’re called Boblings.

Bobling King: “Thousands of trine ago, my tribe set out to explore the Silver Sea as proud, stalwart Podlings! Our regal forefathers were not known to swim, but their bravery was unmatched, and they set out to conquer everything they discovered! All those who would get in their way would be destroyed by the might of the Podlings! Yet there are creatures in this world that are mightier, and the Mondo Leviadin emerged from the Silver Sea and devoured their ships. Thousands of digestive cycles passed as we changed to better suit our new home. Our new world.”

An unstoppable army of Podlings sounds funny until you remember how awesome Hup is. The Mono Levidian may have spared the peoples of Thra a tragic fate.

Also, I’m a big impressed at the lack of linguistic drift. Thousands of trine and Bobling language is indistinguishable from Podling and Gelfling is still recognizable.

Kam’Lu gets fed up with the Bobling King and starts yelling that he’s cold, he’s hungry, he doesn’t want to be in a fish’s guts! Mayrin manages to convince the king by speaking of duty.

Bobling King: “You speak of duty. I know it well. As a leader of my kind, I would do anything for their survival. So yes, I will help you and your servant. Why you married him, I will never know.”

Kam’Lu: “Her what? We’re what?!”

Hah, that misunderstanding is paying dividends.

The king explains that the levidian only surfaces to feed once per trine and that it stays near the surface for a time after feeding.

So if Mayrin and Kam’Lu don’t get to the porticol (blowhole) within eight or so intestinal groans (.... hours??), they’ll be stuck until next trine.

WHICH IS GOING TO BE REAL BAD FOR MAYRIN’S CAREER.

Even though the Boblings are but a simple goo-farming people, the king sends his daughter Gunda, the most skilled hunter in Bajula, to escort them.

Gunda: “But father, the journey as never been done by a single Bobling. You send me into certain danger!”

King: “And do you not crave danger?! My daughter, you are the only one capable and brave enough to undertake such a quest! Please! A duty for your king!”

Gunda: “So be it. I will guide you to the porticol, but know that it is dangerous and uncharted. There are many creatures that call this place home. We must be vigilant. Stalwart. Like my podling ancestors!”

This is a fun little bit because it implies a life and experiences and that these Boblings haven’t just been sitting waiting for protagonists to show up. I mean, they also have been doing that. They have a visitor center set up. But they’ve been living their own dramas.

And off they go! Mayrin, Kam’Lu, and Gunda! On a grand journey to a giant sea monster’s blowhole!

Wait, is this thing a mammal?

So that’s issue 2.

We’re finally in the Mondo Levidian. And now all the protagonists want is to get out. So we’ve got the title, we’ve got an objective, we’ve got some fun side cast, we’ve got a ticking clock before Mayrin and Kam’Lu have to look at the sea monster gut apartment listings, and we’ve got some outside stakes!

Mayrin continues to impress. There’s even a moment right when Kam’Lu rouses after the shipwreck where he seems in awe of her confidence in a crisis.

Kam’Lu has his own personality now that’s not parroting Fenth. Its being a butt monkey, with a slight shade of being a little shit. Between Mayrin giving him shit for supposedly being bad at sailor stuff to getting stabbed in the foot by Boblings twice to being mistaken for Mayrin’s servant-husband, Kam’Lu is having a trying adventure. Plus his ship sank and all of his friends may be dead and if they fail to escape the Mondo Levidian, he’ll go down in history as the idiot that got an All-Maudra killed.

Poor guy.

Gunda has only had two pages to shine and she seems endearing! But it feels weird that Sulub isn’t coming along. He’s the introductory Bobling and all. But I guess speaking only Podling would be an impediment to interacting with Kam’Lu. Still, its weird that he just seems to fade out of the story once the king shows up.

Farewell, Sulub, you funky crab potato.