#never change a running systems blah blah blah

[darkdragon768]

Ok so my pc is running again but my game isn't working as smoothly as it did before. Nice job dad. Thanks for nothing.

My dad fucked up my pc while trying to optimize it and now it's broken! No more hunting for me today!

[bel1ewrites]

The Alcohol Helped (Tara Carpenter x Reader)

a/n: sorry about the drought.

Description: It's too hard to stay away.

WC: 1.8k

Warnings: sorority setting, mentions of drugs and alcohol (underage drinking), drunk Sam and Tara, idiot reader with top energy, I changed the ages of Sam (22) and Tara (19) to fit the narrative better

COLLEGE parties are never as fun as you think they’ll be. Maybe it’s the lack of alcohol in your system, possibly the absence of mind bending drugs that makes them seem kind of, well, lame. Being the designated driver always reminds you of the pure stupidity that flows through sweaty, half clothed twenty-somethings with a knack for getting themselves into trouble. 

“Oh president!” slurs your new assistant. Sam had secured her position after being one of the least insufferable people you’d ever known. Her first night in the house was spent drinking and watching all of the Pitch Perfect movies with you well into the early morning, and her second night was spent signing all of the new members up for random websites after acquiring their emails. 

“Hello, Samantha.” 

She giggles at the formality, drunkenly mocking the way you said her name and gripping your shoulders, looking into your eyes with serious intensity. “My sister loooves you.”

Tara. A new addition to the sorority. She didn’t even really have to rush due to her sister being your second in command. She was all doe-eyes and sickeningly sweet smiles, raven black hair and the kind of face that had recently begun to creep into your dreams. Truly the picture perfect active. 

“Does she?” you’re smirking a little, arms crossed and back pressed against the cool, probably germ infested wall. Vibrations run through you with each pump of the bass in some mind-numbing song. 

“Mhm,” she hums, a dopey look on her flushed face. She lifts her hand from your shoulder and boops you on the nose. “We were dancing with Chad, and Chad was all,” her voice deepens in an attempt to recreate his, “‘You’re soo beautiful Tara blah, blah, blah, we should blah, blah, blah’ but then Tara was all,” this time her pitch rises, “‘No, Chad. I’m totally… no you’re like my brother blah, blah, I’d never do that with you blah, blah, blah I wish Y/N would blah, blah, until I blah, blah, blah.”

“First of all, stop saying ‘blah, blah, blah’ before I punch you, and second of all, what did Tara-”

Speak of the devil, she’s stumbling towards you, drink sloshing around and spilling over the sides of her cup. Her cheeks are red, her eyes wide and sparkling. 

“Sam, come do another shot with me,” she’s begging, tugging on her sister’s arm. It’s a weak tug, fueled by her foggy mind. She hasn’t noticed you standing there, too preoccupied with her mission to get more alcohol in her system. 

“I don’t think you need another shot,” you cut in. Typically, you didn’t really care what the members of your sorority did in their spare time, so long as it didn’t interfere with their performance. Tara was nineteen. She was old enough to do as she pleased for the most part, and even if she technically wasn’t old enough to drink, she was still an adult who could make her own decisions. That being said, you couldn’t help but feel protective over her, brushing it off with some half-assed excuse about how she’s Sam’s sister. 

Round, brown eyes blink up at you as she processes your presence. 

“I mean,” she stutters, “let’s go uh… form meaningful connections?” 

“Nice one,” you’re running a hand through your hair, slightly damp with the perspiration that comes with a night full of standing and watching. 

“Well,” Sam starts with a little laugh, “I’m gonna go somewhere else.” Her figure retreats, blocked soon by the current of shifting bodies. 

Tara sways lightly on her feet. Midnight black strands of hair fall from her ponytail, framing her face with a flaw free air of carelessness. She’s wearing a cropped tank top and baggy jeans that make her look shorter than normal and sit perfectly on her hips, smudged eyeliner resulting in a strenuous difficulty for you to keep your hands in your pockets. 

“You know what we should do?” she’s grinning, eyes droopy. “We should dance.” Her hands reach for yours as you attempt to maneuver out of her range, aware of what a bad idea this is. 

You tell yourself you tried, but ultimately you fail to keep her off of you when she grabs your forearms and places them on her shoulders, backing up and effectively pulling you away from the comfort of your wall. With your arms resting casually over her shoulders, hands limp and unmoving, she sighs happily and clings to your torso. 

“You’re the perfect hug shape,” she mumbles, words muffled with her face against your ribbed tank. She’s breathing you in and humming.

“What does that mean?” Your voice is low and what the two of you are doing couldn’t possibly be defined as dancing. She’s hugging you tight, hands around your waist, and you’re holding her to you, one arm curved around the back of her neck and the other still hanging off her shoulder. There’s a comforting sway, the both of you rocking side to side soothingly. 

“I mean,” her hands are moving on your back, “You have such a sturdy body,” fingers slip beneath the hem of your shirt, “muscular and soft. Tall-” (“Everyone’s tall to you,” you interject.) “-and you smell so good all the time. It’s like some sort of sorcery. You’re like a hot, good smelling witch or something.” She’s fumbling over her words but you’re barely listening, focused intensely on the way her nails run over your bare back from under your shirt. 

Tara Carpenter has her hands under your shirt and it’s so hot where you stand but you’re shivering and pulling her closer. Tara Carpenter is scratching your back and you're stone cold sober but you can’t think through the fog in your mind.  

“I love this shirt on you,” she groans. She’s groaning and her hands are on your naked back and you’re holding her to you and all you can think about is her.  

“Yeah?” your voice shakes a little.

“Mm,” she nods against you. “It’s sexy.” 

It’s your turn to groan. It’s too much and you’re dangerously close to cracking under the sexual tension. 

“I’m gonna go get Sam.” you gently nudge her off of you. “I think you’re both in need of a glass of water and a bed. “

She’s frowning when you walk off. 

—-----

By the time you manage to drag Sam away from her game of beer pong and into the car, Tara still hasn’t spoken more than two words to you. She sits silently in the backseat and picks at her hands with intent whilst her sister insists on taking aux to listen to the Tangled soundtrack the whole way home. Every once in a while you glance in the rear view mirror and catch her eyes before she looks somewhere else again. 

As soon as the three of you clamber out of the vehicle and through the door, Sam heads for the leather couch in the common area and falls face first into it. You hang up your keys and watch Tara stumble slightly as she makes her way to her room. 

It’s silent, the sound of the heater kicking on fills the space around you along with your racing mind. Had you taken it too far with Tara? Did you make her uncomfortable? Maybe you should bring her some water and leave her an Advil for the morning. 

“Tara?” you call from outside her room, water and medicine in hand. She’s still awake, light on and soft music playing, muffled by the shut door. Beneath the light thrum of the melodies you can hear soft sniffles and little whimpers that make your heart drop in your chest. 

Tucking the pill bottle beneath your arm, you turn the knob and slowly crack open the barrier between you and her, still not peeking inside. “Tara?”

A pause. “What?” her voice is watery and you finally gain the courage to step inside. 

Her room is so impossibly her that it’s shocking. Soft white walls covered in bulletin boards, a few shirts scattered around the floor in a mess that seems intentional. It’s contrasting with the current state of her. Her eyes are puffy, cheeks still flushed from earlier, deeper now with the addition of tears. With the comforter pulled up over her neck all you can see is her face.

“Tara,” her lip quivers, face crumpling. “What’s wrong, baby?” Placing the things on her dresser, you rush to sit on her bed and rest a comforting hand on her forehead, moving the hair stuck there out of her face. She only cries harder.

“I’m sorry,” the bed shifts as she turns to lay on her side and face away from you.

“For what?” Confusion filters through you. If anything, it’s you who should apologize. 

“Making you uncomfortable with everything I said earlier,” she replies, body curled into a ball beneath her blankets. “It was really inappropriate of me.” 

Uncomfortable? The only thing that was uncomfortable was the metaphorical boner you got every time you were in her general vicinity, and that had nothing to do with anything she’d said. 

“Wait,” it clicks in your mind, “when we were dancing?”

She nods. 

“Tara, I wasn’t uncomfortable,” you rub circles on her upper back through the layers, “Hell, I was too comfortable.”

The gears in her mind turn weakly and she turns to look at you with wet eyes; asking, “What’s that mean?” with a sniffle.

“It means we were swaying and you were rubbing my back and calling me hot and I had to step away before I did anything irrational.” She’s on her back now, staring up at the ceiling fan silently. “Not because I don’t want to do… irrational things with you- it’s just that you’re Sam’s sister and I don’t want to complicate anyth-”

“-Sam’s the one who told me to go for it,” Tara informs you. Her tears are gone, their pathways dry on her face. “Said she’d had enough of our eye-fucking back before she’d even had her first shot.”

Agape. Your jaw is agape and you close it before opening it again like a fish out of water, struggling to find a response. Sam was the reason you’d tried to keep your distance; stuck to admiring from afar and aspiring to be close. Was the attraction that obvious?

“I only got the courage tonight because I’d caught you staring at me all week,” she finally smiles, “But the alcohol helped I guess.”

A noise of pure embarrassment emerges from your throat and you fall back against her mattress, crossing your forearms over your blushing face. Clearly you needed to work on your stealth abilities. 

The surface you lay on dips with movement. Tara’s warm hands wrap around your forearms as she struggles to pull them away. It’s truly laughable how little she moves them. She manages to uncover your eyes, her own sparkling with unknown emotions, a warm smile on her lips. You peer up at her with a hidden grin on your face. 

“So,” you start, “a hot, good smelling witch, huh?”

[sadie-bug345]

dallas winston’s last chance for change

this is a little less goofy as my usual shit but i just wanted to talk about dally and so called “last chance for change” characters.

this kinda feeds into my pet peeve of seeing the gang with “stay gold” somewhere nearby cause the saying “stay gold” jus doesn’t apply to everyone. it strictly applies to ponyboy cause he is the only one STILL gold😭😭like do yall understand the quote

anyways i been reading the book How to Read Lit like a Professor for school which sometimes is helpful but other than that its honestly kinda annoying to read ngl. in a recent chapter, the author referenced a short story and mentioned how one character in that, among many in the world of books, is a “last chance for change” typa guy

and like we do with hyperfixations, i was like hmmmm how can i relate this to THE OUTSIDERS👹 and i was like oh duh this is so dally winston lana del rey vinyl coded

anyways the author and said professor of the book says “the character, sufficiently old to have experienced a number of opportunities to grow, to reform, to get it right, but of course he never has, is presented with one more chance, one last opportunity to educate himself in this most important area…”

blah blah blah

if that aint dallas tucker winston, idk what is. another quote from that godforsaken book is as follows: “the reason hes older is just the opposite of why the quester is typically younger: his possibilities for growth are limited and time is running out”

ive always thought about how dallas cant change for the better all thru the book up until the church. and i think dallas did know that helping people does a lot of good. his whole blowup at the end where he dies is cause he cant deal with change in general. he could always trust that the gang would be there for him but the second stuff starts getting messed up, he goes wacko

pony could deal with loss and grief and trauma to the best of his ability (well, better than dally💀) cause he had a built in support system with his brothers. dallas had no one to call family by blood so he chose his friends.

dallas in general couldnt handle the conflicting expectations placed on him by society so he did everything in his power to defy them and have some sort of control in causing chaos.

he was really just put in a pressure cooker his whole life and he just ended up digging himself deeper and deeper into his own grave.

sometimes death is easier than dealing with yourself.

THAT WAS DARK UHM ANYWAYS REQUEST GOOFY OR ROMANTIC OR PLATONIC HCS OR IMAGINES OR ANYTHING IDRK OK BYE🥰🫶

[gilverrwrites]

“People who don’t vote or follow politics.” Oooh I’d loved to hear more about politics and Bruce, and why do you think it’s an important thing for him and his partner ! I’ve always wondered what party he would’ve voted for lol.

Ps: sorry if you got sent this multiple times, my WiFi is crap 😪

[Post in reference]

It’s cool boo! Thanks for asking. So, I won’t go into to much detail on who he would vote for because:

I’m from the UK, so my grasp on American politics is adequate if we’re being generous.

Politics in comics, while often serve as important commentary on real world issues, aren’t 100% reflective of irl politic. Often it’s just wacky.

Case in point:

Bruce himself has always been written as a very socially/politically engaged character. He’s even been mayor of Gotham (I think in an 80s comic plot), and has run at least once (in the 60 TV show).

But there are many other examples of him being involved in political campaigns and what not. I mean, his best friend was The District Attorney until he became Two-Face. And their friendship is often depicted as being built around their shared mission to save Gotham from corrupt officials and crime lords like Falcone.

But to focus more on why it’s important to him; because at his very core what motivates him the most is Gotham and its people.

“No! Your wrong! it’s his parent!” Blah blah blah.

Yes. But also no. He’s Batman because he wants to prevent what happened to his family from happening to anybody else.

And that cannot be achieved purely by putting on the Batsuit and putting the bad guys behind bars. If the system still stinks, it will just keep pumping out more villains, more victims.

There have to preventative measures in place, and rehabilitation available. That’s why he puts so much of his own money into youth centres, medical research, improving prison resources, building homes. Those are good building blocks, but he’s only one man, he can’t change society by himself, there needs to be people in power who are also trying to help the people of the city.

Yes, he knows that unfortunately there is no party that will do everything right, or will even want to. The fatcats at the top get fatter, and the people at the bottom get fucked over. Trickle-down economics don’t work. But some shit stinks less than others.

So with a partner, I guess it’s not so much that they need to care about politics, but that they need to care about making positive changes in the community. They need to care about the people of his city enough to care about who is making the pivotal decisions that could make or break lives.

Caveat: obviously, if you’re not American, ya can’t vote and he would never hold that against you. But that doesn’t mean you can support him, and/or strive to help the city he cares so deeply about.

[retainerstainer]

The difference between wanting and needing...in any perspective

Sunday evening, you're doing a quick reset of everything and everything. Doing your laundry, cleaning your bathroom, finishing up homework, finalizing a study method for tomorrow's test. Your mom asks you to go and get her some chia seeds and avocados because she's making her food system method to lose weight. You get the keys but of course your brother parks in front of your car, so as stubborn as you are, instead of asking him to move the car, you grab a different pair of car keys and take the truck instead. Large, can go over any potholes, and makes you feel like a redneck.

After getting what your mom listed; suddenly you realize that your hair is getting oily and messy and in desperate need of a shower. And then you remember you need your holy trinity of necessities; body scrub, body oil, body butter, and aftershower perfume of choice. So of course you head to your nearby Marshalls and let the conscience do the talking and paying.

While I'm shopping and numbing my nose with every scent that each body product offers, I look around at the women my age and over my age and ponder how we all deal with the most common theory we always experience; getting what we want or getting what we need. But this topic doesn't just cover buying products but pretty much all the other things we overthink about.

"Do I really need this? I mean I already have a half bottle at home that I barely use."

"But if I don't buy it now and run out of the product I have at home, it'll be gone by the time I want it again"

"No one will have this, it'll be my scent that everyone will love and remember me by"

"I really want a boyfriend, but I'm already to the neck with personal things that haven't really been solved yet, maybe having a boyfriend will automatically clear that up, like cleaning my search history that I keep telling myself I'll clean!"

Many of this and more, is the overbearing and underestimating voice we sadly call our conscience that has us women to the neck with things that we think we want and the things we don't think we need at times. My time deciding what lotion to buy at Marshall's for example. But as a college student (and a simple somebody that has college to think about), having to decide by wanting to take a traveling and going overseas course for my spring semester, but needing to study and being on the Dean's List again to get into a great school to continue with my career in life blah blah...suddenly that life part and responsibilities hits you too deep and maybe buying that ice white chocolate mocha makes you second guess your spending choices.

But not everything that falls between wanting and needing certain things fall into buying products and such. Having a headache over deciding if you want to be in a relationship or if you need to be in a relationship can be quite stressful. I, of course, am embarrassed to admit that I have been on dates from the Tinder and Hinge world, and based from the men that I've seen from MY generation, I'm perfectly fine in the single pool and I'm not missing out on a SINGLE thing that is happening in that situationsip/fwb bloodbath. Just writing about it gives me PTSD and goosebumps. But for me, sure there are nights where I wish I was cuddled up with someone I want and that someone who not only wants but NEEDS me which is just as good. However, constantly thinking of wanting or needing a significant other won't get me anywhere or change anything that is most important for MY life, and of course for what I'M passionate about. I'm young, and yes I do WANT a boyfriend, but at the same time, in my position and situation in life, do I really NEED one?

Many girls who are in said relationships will always tell you that you don't need a man you can make yourself happy. Those are the same girls that get railed in the back of a movie theater by the guy she told everyone she'd never get back together with and is always smiling and happy with her situationship that she secretly blinded with as a relationship. Don't take much advice from woman like that, trust me, been there done that, got the memo. Besides the relationship status, what people really need to decide, especially with that they want to do with their life, aka me, is if what they're doing is something they want to do for themselves, or something that they need to do for themselves.

College students, mostly students who have a very strict and "education first, sex and young pregnancy later" kind of family energy, have a hard time deciding what they want and what they need in life, especially when it comes to their career choice. At first, when I was very very young and brain dead, I NEEDED to be a successful album cover artist because they make the most money, they get recognize for their talent, and they make a decent amount of money. And when I noticed that that career was NOT going to get me much, I had to open my eyes and move my body and open my weird circle and interact with people which that alone makes me more scared than an actual horror movie.

I didn't know that the things that I was doing, going out by myself, learning new things, being alone and not feeling weird about it, getting a new job, an adult job, those were the things I WANTED to do. The things that puts the pieces for the future me. Being a kennel assistant to being noticed and getting a different and better position as a clinic receptionist. No one pulling my arms and legs and overthinking if this is what my parents NEED from me in order to feel, I don't know how to express it, but to feel accepted I guess.

Doing or getting the things that YOU WANT for a positive purpose in your life is so important. It makes you who you are. I don't know where I was going with this, but I just NEED to get it out of my chest.

In the end, what to get out of this is, the difference between wants and needs is vital as we navigate life’s choices, especially as we prepare for adulthood. Balancing these two can lead to a more satisfying and fulfilling life, where we pursue our desires while making sure our needs and important subjects for us are met. The understanding alone, helps us to face future challenges with a clearer perspective.

Buy what you deserve, be thankful for the things you earn, give all that you can, and don't expect anything in return.

(I'm so fucking tired that I just came up with that, Maya Angelou don't got shit on me)

[razieltwelve]

Quick Question. It was on my mind, but how would you have developed the Dust system? Would you have them experiment and improve making combinations like put fire and ice make water blah blah; r would have more semblances change effects based on the kind? like Yang with gravity makes her a short lived Gravity Bomb or Suck-you-in for a punch type of move. I know Blake does it, but they never use it for anyone else but her and it barely exists after Vol 3

Hmmm... interesting question.

I like to think of Dust as belonging to a larger group of materials that can be called Aura-reactive materials. That is, materials that react to the introduction of Aura. These materials are different from Aura-conductive materials, which are materials that are far better at conducting Aura than most substances.

Weapons tend to be made out of Aura-conductive materials since they are easier to reinforce and sharpen using Aura. However, Aura-reactive materials, particularly Dust, can have a variety of effects.

In Final Rose, Dust is made out of the solidified Aura of a Living World. In other words, it's the soul of the world given form. This is why it can do so many things. A Living World possesses tremendous power and versatility and can basically do a bit of everything, which is why Dust is so powerful and versatile. The reason Dust doesn't work when it's too far from the surface is because it needs to be close enough to the Living World to operate.

Dust needs Aura to work since Aura functions as a 'trigger'. All living things on a Living World (other than Grimm) can use their Auras to trigger Dust since they are creations of the Living World.

Now, how would Dust work?

I think Dust can be modified in two mains ways: refinement and combination. Combining Dust can give rise to different forms of Dust (e.g., fire and water would make steam). However, refining Dust (i.e., making it purer or exposing it to certain conditions) can also give rise to other forms of Dust. For instance, purifying lightning Dust can give rise to electromagnetic Dust, which can affect electromagnetism directly. Gravity Dust is, in this system, a refinement of Dust that makes things heavier or lighter. Likewise, exposing temporal Dust (an exceptionally rare form of Dust) to extreme cold for long periods of time biases it toward slowing time whereas exposing it to extreme heat biases it toward accelerating time.

Since Semblances are Aura-based phenomena, many of them will be able to react with Dust. However, it depends on the Semblance. Blake's Semblance is versatile because it creates Aura construct copies of her. This means it is easy to incorporate Dust into their structure.

In Final Rose, Yang's Semblance is a forcefield. This means that not all forms of Dust work well with it. Since forcefields are closest to fundamental forces, her Semblance works best with Dust like gravity Dust, electromagnetic Dust, or other similar forms of Dust.

In Pyrrha's case, you need to just grab a big block of electromagnetic Dust and watch the magic happen. Of course, electromagnetic Dust is far harder and more expensive to obtain, which is why you don't see her running around with it all the time.

The complexity of Dust development is why, in Final Rose, there are researchers (e.g., Weiss) who spend their lives investigating it. It is also why there is constant research into non-Dust methods since Dust can be very tricky to work with and certain kinds are extremely limited.

Although many hunters do develop Dust-assisted moves, few people rely on them since you will almost always run out of Dust at some point during a fight, especially if you're in a long battle or away from civilisation. What you will often see in a fight is hunters stripping their ammunition for Dust they can use for a special move.

For instance, you might see Yang ask Weiss to strip some of the Dust out of Myrtenaster so she can do something crazy. Or you might see Blake giving Ruby some lightning Dust, so she can turn Crescent Rose into a rail gun.

Anyway, I'd probably do more with Dust in RWBY, but, hey, it's not my show.

[sugar-omi]

hi! I keep seeing stuff about mechats (online, ads, etc) but I have no idea what it is and im kinda scared but mostly intrigued??

LOL I GET IT!!! if it helps, its literally like a dating app. although no one is creepy (to an extent. there are some INTERESTING characters)

n no one can really reject you? like, you may not match once. but you may match again? or you can force it by hitting the "crown" icon and force a match with whoever you see is getting a game update or is new. or you can change your likes!

because like i said, its like a dating app. so if you say pick everything but "spicy" you may not match with characters whose storyline, like glenn, is reallyyyy sexual. but if you do pick it, you'll most likely/definitely will match with them!

again, you can always keep swiping right on em, n you'll match eventually so you don't have to be all sneaky abt choosing preferences n blah blah blah. but yeah, that's how the matching system works to my understanding. but don't quote me!!🙅🙅 bc i'd hate to be wrong n get flack 💀

eta, i'm looking at the wiki n apparently there are some you can't match with??? i've never seen that before. but it says something about how the game hasn't uploaded storylines for them yet. so. just in case you run into them, there's that info apparently.

OH AND THERE'S A WIKI!! IF YOU WANNA SEE WHATSUP W THE CHARACTERS

they have counterparts n stuff, so if someone isn't your type.. see if they have a counterpart. most of them do. the storyline is the same though! can even switch em half way through...

IF YOU DO PLAY. I HIGHLYYY RECCOMMEND ZAOS VALCAN. (/lewis hill /dejerius lane)

he's so sweet. so cute. amazing... it starts off very cute, n youre friends for a bit. you meet on a video game n a lot of his pictures n dates are fantasy like, n he's so romantic n he's just a amazing... i need him to get an update QUICKLY. I MISS MY POOKIE <///3

or if you're a freak, i highly rec glenn hobbs (/niles robinson) for all your freaky, and non-committal (eventually committal) needs

OR IF YOU'RE A REALLL FREAK. AND A DOM. I REC ARCHIBALD (/ravi /thiago) i refuse to elaborate. just know... that's where the master/servant cake is. and i fucking love it.

oh n i think at the beginning, when signing up, you can filter out the 18+ storylines?? so you won't get NSFW? it's been a long time, but i'm looking at the wiki n it just reminded me.

but there's a whole bunch of characters!!! you can check the "matches > storyline" part of the wiki, to see whats up, see what troupes there are that you might like.

i've browsed the mechat reddit sub briefly for information on different things, so idk how it is over there. but that's a thing too..

i swear its a fun app, had me kicking my feet n squealing n blushing n shit. its so cute n so fun n so good ok trust me

ANYWAY IM RAMBLING. I FEEL A BIT CRAZY W ALL THIS YAPPING ABT A FICTIONAL DATING APP... BUT.... ANYWAY. IF I GOT U EXCITED ABT IT, YOURE WELCOME. HAVE FUN.

OR IF YOU, OR ANYONE, HAS ANY MORE QUESTIONS.. IM HAPPY TO ANSWER.

[mae-books-792]

Here's a fun line of reasoning that I think we could all use: If you're struggling with a problem, try defining a simpler problem first.

I do this all the time in math, in fact I've had teachers recommend it in some cases. 18+24=? Well, I know that 18+4=22, and 22+20=42, so that must mean that 18+24=42!

But this can go beyond math. "Oh, we should make schools start at 7am and have these set schedules and blah blah blah...." Ok? How old are you? 50? Let me ask you. Would you want a 70-80 year old in charge of IT? 9 times out of 10 they probably don't know what a computer is, let alone how to troubleshoot one! How about someone who's never be in politics, never met a judge, probably never heard of the constituton running for president? I'm all for the common person getting elected, but I feel like at a minimum a president should know what the president is.

These are two examples of how some outragious conditions make a situation seem ridiculous. Someone too old to understand something, or someone who's never had an experience shouldn't be the one in charge of that thing. So, coming back to the question, why should someone who hasn't been in school for nearly 30 years be the only ones in charge of it? They don't have the experience that the kids who are actually in the system have, and then (sometimes) refuse to make changes when it backfires. Maybe I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to that stuff, and maybe my schol was just that bad, but there was too many cases where they made a decision, it backfired horribly like we said it would, and then they just...didn't fix it?!

I particularly like "what makes piercing/tatoos ok but gender affirming care not?" This poses the question of "finding the line." As in, "why do you draw the line at a tatoo or peircing. Both are permanent changes to your body as a way to express yourself. How is that different than gender affirming care?" Not to mention, it helps open a more positive discussion. Instead of gunning for the throat "MAKE GENDER AFFIRMING CARE EASIER", it's a gentle prompt that encourages the target audience to rerhink their decision, or the speaker to ponder a valid response.

Of course, that's just an opinion of mine. This is usually my philosophy for making my own opinions, and it helps keep my mind open to new opinions, like in the case where someone makes a good counter to my own opinion. Take from this what you will!! Have a lovely day!!!!

[nikkisticki]

You think there’s an American coup shortly on the way????

Wow that was fast

yeah? I could sit here and spend a lot of time explaining the full length of my actions and thoughts, but the short version is that during the 2016 election I began to notice substantially more racists and bigots being all the more extreme and realized that something bad might be happening, so I spent several years as a side project examining, communicating and trying to deradicalize people who have been drawn into the far-right hole.

Incidentally, in hundreds of conversations I think I succeeded maybe six times

Irregardless, I can tell you that there's a substantial chunk of Americans who have been radicalized to such an extent that there's no turning back; these people will believe whatever they are told and are absolutely frothing at the mouth, ready to kill if given a "morally righteous" reason, and consume media which exclusively feeds them further radical thought (the amount of active popular grifters has gotten so large they are forming their own fucking companies made of several layers of huckster). They will never stop believing this crap as it's become inherent to their Idealogy, effectively a building block of their soul.

As well, Qanon followers didn't just magically go away. While a large number of them have learned to not actively reveal their hand and more have simply decided it was a psy-op, they still entirely believe that a cabal of deep state pedophiles are blah blah blah blah...

This is a substantial base on top of your standard "Republican/Conservative" who doesn't know what fascism is and doesn't care as long as their guy wins, cause they might TAKE OUR GUNS! As the first coup has shown they are willing to do whatever they are told if their blood is running hot, even if they are all incompetent idiots.

Trump's nailed to a wall, he can't escape this many indictments, something will get him...unless he becomes the president again, which he could even from jail! I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the polls are going UP for him as he gets more indictments.

He openly intended to take over America, he's not magically decided against it since then and there's a great deal of rich twats who'd love for this to happen, so do you think it magically stops here? I don't.

If you were to play strategy and try to determine the possible outcomes of 2024, there's only a few I can think of

1) Trump wins > mass riots > civil war

2) Trump wins > coup > civil war

3) Trump wins > further irrevocable damage to the American political system > Civil war but down the line (unlikely)

4) Sleepy Joe wins > Trump throws a coup > Wins (Probably unlikely as the military would be forced to back the bag of bones currently pretending to be not racist (Biden) )

5) Sleepy Joe wins > Trump throws a coup > loses

6) Sleepy Joe Wins > Democrats/legal system actually do something useful and stop Trump from committing a coup > America is still on the brink of collapse (where's it's been for years)

7) Sleepy Joe Wins > Trump goes to jail > 2028 sees a new strong man to replace him as Trump's chosen candidate > See above but replace Trump with their name

There's a functional rot in America that just isn't going to magically go away even if Trump is arrested, there's no stopping the The right with their S.C majority while the Democratic party is functionally no better and only marginally less inclined to upset cis het whitefolk (if your not white, they don't care about you beyond performative gestures). They won't ever change (there's a reason why MLK said Moderates are the biggest hurdle to equality), so here's an obvious spot in history for any old bigot to take the stand and try to "Make America Great Again"

Largely speaking, I'd rather there's no violence, but I'm also not some fool who errantly believes that America is "too great and strong " to split and fall into chaos. The country has been radicalized towards Christo-Fascism and there's no stopping it unless people play legal hot potato and keep offices from being filled by them until they all die of old age and Covid...

Oh and that's not going to happen because part of Qanons movement has been to convince people to infiltrate government (mostly local, but you've got senators and congressmen who are connected to it all the way down to infiltrating the positions of election officials) and attempt to aid their president, when the time comes. This is on top of the countless corporate ghouls who currently have political power that are directly paid and bought for by rich white conservatives.

Ideally, Trumps coup is a thousand bigots getting arrested/shot...but the cops don't like siding against their own, do they?

edit: btw irregardless of what happens there's nothing anyone can do besides prepare as the legal system is useless and the only solution would be mass riots and the near entire removal of all politicians from federal and state positions, which I'm all for!

So don't worry about it too much, it won't help anything.

[footiehoemcfc]

Okay so here is my take, and the only reason i have an opinion this is because it is a possibility of messi coming to city, why? Pep.

Do not get me wrong, i love him. I think he is the best player ever, the goat, an alien you name it. No one will be like him in terms of football.

However, as much as I would love to see messi at this club and reunited with pep…i have my doubts.

Would he be good at city as a winger, i think he would 100%. But i do feel like for example in Barcelona the team kind of accomodated around him. In psg no, and he never really shined there. That and the fact that mbappe and neymar play there as well.

I think city already have so many prominent players like kdb, haaland now, bernardo, foden etc. I just dont see him there if that makes sense?? I feel like Pep would not adapt the whole team to him.

Another thing that makes me have doubt and not want him at city 100% is some of his fanbase. I am guilty 100% of being like “get messi out of psg” and “he is better than all of them” blah blah. Why? Because of the psg fans and ever since the world cup it has gotten really bad. Fans blaming him for the exit at CL? Made no sense. I agree, his first season there he was not as good as he used to, he started off this season very well but then ir changed after the world cup.

If he were to join city, I would not want him to fail here. I think there is no guarantee of him hitting the ground and running the first season, especially at city where pep already has his own system in place. A lot of players needed time to adjust grealish being one example, and lets be real if he were to join he would only join for a year or two so what would be the point if the first year he needs to adapt and doesnt play as much or doesnt pkay as good as were used to seeing him play?

There is also that part of messi fans that are so extreme and will blame the club for his failure. So it just idk, on onhe hand it makes sense for him to come to city to join pep again, play in the prem and maybe he can prove people he can do it because i do think the prem is tougher than la liga or ligue 1. But then the other is like, he is 35/36 and he will have to adapt A LOT not just to the club but the country and the language as well. It will be tough i think and again, he wont join city long enough.

Then the other thing is, i would rather him go back home to barcelona! I think he deserves to go back and retire as a legend there. Obvi is hard bc of financial problems but if its possible that 100% is the best option.

[studiodada]

I’m always half tempted to comment on the rants about how AI art is evil. I mean, sure, it’s evil - I guess - but it’s no more evil than any other tool that’s been made since time began. The fear that illustrators will lose jobs is valid but generally the fear that machines will replace anyone is a constant among all fields. The bigger fear, I feel, is that it exposes artists for what they are vs the image they project.

Artists, generally, rely on the last two centuries of myths that have been built around them: Starving, half mad, romantic, visionary, skilled, etc.

They turn that into marketing for their lives and careers. Painters, poets, etc. thrive on mysticism. Sure, maybe God is dead but these people are clued in on the “human experience” in ways you never can even dream of being.

Meanwhile the institution has been chipping away at them with ideologies and market forces.

First with abstraction (“my child could paint that!”), then with conceptualization (“so…it’s just words on a wall?”) and now with reducing realism to a function of the machine.

And having your “skill” replaced with a repeatable function is simply too much for some people. Never mind the fact that their “skill” was trained on repeating whatever their influences were-teachers, idols, theories, etc. You are an AI model making art but you refuse to acknowledge it because…human.

But maybe it’s because I came into art from a computer/cybernetic background that I think this. Anything can be incorporated into a function and repeated. This is the basis for anyone’s career - find your style then sell it then ride that style til you die=>that way anyone who looks at that art of yours will know “hey! That’s a (insert your name here)”

The key is to make just enough to make a living but not too much so you get undervalued. Duchamp said as much when he talked about limiting the quantity of readymades that he made. Tuymans said this as well. Plus a host of others. Renoir like painting in red and black but that didn’t sell as well as his dreamy weird as blues and greens and peachy lush flesh.

Personally, I’d think this would be freeing. It’s liberating to not have to deal with the system. Let the machine run wild so that you can say “fuck it, today I’m going to paint motherfucking little gentleman Guinea Pigs and then maybe a few triangles and a ufo in space”.

But to not be bound in the prison you made for yourself when you started is terror for the majority. The fear of losing your myth, your clout, your prestige, etc. is simply too much and so everything must be railed against. Everything that isn’t your career choice is an enemy.

AI art is evil.

Abstraction is evil

Conceptual art is evil

Machines are evil

Change is evil

Acrylics are evil because they’re not oil

Machine made furniture is evil

Printers are evil

Digital art is evil

Blah blah blah. ad nauseum

Simply put, the bell can’t be unrung. Rend your clothes, cry and scream, rail against the injustices of the machine. None of it matters. AI isn’t the evil rather it’s the system that pits us all against each other. The one that preys on our egos and pocketbooks and forces people into making grandiose declarations for or against it so that they may curry its favor.

So…if you must attack - attack the system that puts fear into us and makes our lives so precarious that we can’t afford even the slightest imbalance in our pecuniary condition and because of this also makes us fight each other and not it. Leave the tools be.

[ask-codeearasure]

LITERALLY. DREAM COULD KICK HIS ASS. HE WOULDN'T EVEN NEED TO USE HIS WEAPONRY FOR THAT.

Wick, I apologize, I've got more grievances in my system.

While this kind of shit attitude is applied towards characters like Geno too (who I am also convinced could give Reaper a run for his money if he really wanted to), I usually say Dream gets this the worst because I don't ever see his character be given any respect or regard in fanfiction.

He's the bad guy, he's the spouse of the bad guy who follows their every command, he's "innocent" because he never had sex, he only acts innocent but is secretly a sex monster, he's an abuser to his brother, he was a bully like the villagers were, he is the primary caretaker of his "more masculine" lover(s) despite them all being grown ass adults, he is the one most reliable therapist in the entire multiverse even though that is one of his vices the fandom pretends doesn't exist so they can call him a simple character and try to """fix""" what's not broken, he is emotionally manipulative because of his role and aura, he is naive and kind and that makes him stupid— blah blah blah blah BLLLLLAAAAAHHHHH.

Dream is either villainized, babied, or expected to be responsible for the actions of other characters he's associated with throughout most narratives and those have all been openly accepted concepts for the last eight fucking years.

This spells out typical fucking misogyny placed on a queer man who isn't the manliest man in the manverse of all men. This happens all the time and is always ignored. This happens to female characters and characters who aren't female but can either be written off as feminine because of a lack of toxic masculinity (just look at Dream's designs) or identify as feminine in some way.

It's time to do something else. Not just with Dream, but every single character one could be tempted to sexualize just like what conservative men do to women and queer relationships. It all just MUST be villainous in nature or pornography just for them or they'll have to consider they have some biases to question and throw away.

Am I saying the people who do this have done it all on purpose? Fuck no. I'm saying the problems in the world we live in, the prejudices against women and LGBTQIA+ people do in fact have an overwhelming presence in shipping fandom and it's about time that becomes a productive topic to talk about instead of these necessary complaints being written off as "sensitive" or "gatekeeping" by the handful of people that don't want to change.

This better be the last infodump for today or I might just lose my mind.

-- Sarco

lvl20 cross is my no.1 enemy btw. if i see him there will be an unspecified lethal weapon in my paws and it will be pointed in his general location

[livvyofthelake]

yk how like a week ago i found out that thomas gets accused of being the murderer. well i just read the scene. man looks guilty as fuck it must be said :( like he’s not, WE know he’s not. but well. the inquisitor doesn’t.

[roobylavender]

Do you think Barbara Gordon’s relationship with Jim plays a part in the whole cop apologia? I don’t think there has been an instance where she ever calls him out on it or is at odds with him. Their relationship is seen as this father and daughter happy thing which in part sheds Jim as this good guy... hmm...and now looking at how Chuck Dixon wrote Dick Grayson vs Barbara Gordon is really stands out how Dick was written as trying to fight corruption within the police force or whatever (I mean he ends up writing Dick enjoying being a cop? Dixon even wrote a Jim one shot with the same premise about wanting to be a cop to end corruption blah blah) while Barbara was written (by Dixon) as a little girl who admired cops and wanted to be one and then ends up dating a sleazy cop version of Jason Bard (Dixon’s version) and ends up also dating Dick when he is a cop (Don’t get me started on all the sexy uniform and officer Grayson stuff dialogue/scenes 🤢) but the whole actual cop stuff is never really addressed with her? Like half assed lines that have nothing to do with like an actual conversation between her and Jim don’t count because wouldn’t this character have a problem with it? Didn’t this character once run for Congress because they wanted police reform? In so much adjacent media/films/AUcomics she is always a cop or the commissioner which is insane because it is the men around her who really were those things...thinking.....thinking...

YEAH like the sheer degree of disservice done to her by dixon is insane tbh.. so strange how her being inspired by bruce was somehow not good enough and it was more empowering for her to be inspired by the cops instead like oh no i can't be a cop bc i'm young and i'm a girl guess i'll be batgirl instead.. and the thing is you really could create such an interesting tension between her and gordon if you leaned more into the potential for her to be cop critical esp by way of her position as oracle like would she not be near entirely privy to all of the technical ways in which they abuse their power and is she not also privy to their abuses bc her father literally talks about and laments them and the struggle to change them all of the time lmao. it feels counterintuitive to put her in that omnipotent position and not have her realize somehow just how futile trying to change the system from within is and how her father may be enabling the system more than helping it actually accomplish anything worthwhile

[attllhak]

Adoption AU - Lullaby Reacts to Time’s Batman Level Adoption Bullshit

@tortilla-of-courage I offer you mercy. Also no one mentioned wanting to be tagged on the last story on this series so it’s just you for right now I guess.

Also, this fic is called ‘Aunt Lullaby/Uncle Sheik On Time’s Sudden Acquisition Of Kids’ in my docs, but I’ve been using the ‘Batman-Level Adoption Bullshit’ for so long that this is the title now.

Also! Some of the boys have some heavy topics to their backstories (Wars comes to mind as an example), so let me know if I need to tag this with certain warnings or stuff. Nothing is actually shown, but I figured I’d just put that out there.

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

Lullaby, who was still just Zelda then, had been very excited when Time, then just Link, had called her to tell her that Malon was pregnant.

She had gotten the call first, as Link had found it important that she knew before anyone else. After everything else in his life, he said, he wanted the person who he knew would always be there for him to know first, and that he was going to be making a few other calls later that day.

Link had never had an easy life. When his father died when he was 10, he’d ended up devastated. Zelda and her Aunt Impa had found him hiding in an alley a few days after, once he’d run away from the social workers. His sister Navi had been with him, and the two were sorting through the very few bits of snack food they’d had. Link’s father had been a foster parent for a lot of strays, orphans, or abused kids needing another place to stay. Link had fallen into the orphan category, and so the social workers had planned to cycle him back into the system. He’d lost contact with his sister Saria, whom he still hadn’t found out how to make contact with again, and so all he had was Navi. Impa had taken them both in on the spot, much to the annoyance of Zelda’s father initially, but the two grew on him. Navi went missing when Link and Zelda had been 17, after an issue with a man who really had wanted to see them both dead. Link hadn’t given up hope yet, but with every passing year it looked worse and worse for her to be okay.

Zelda had known Malon from day one, and had loved Link’s wife and was so happy to see him find that bit of happiness. The one thing she knew he wanted more than anything else was to have a solid, stable family of his own.

The pregnancy was a wonderful bit of news, and she couldn’t be happier for her brother.

She had spent some time over at their house, her then-girlfriend Ruto coming as well, helping Malon with some of the housework and such since she wasn’t supposed to be doing too much of the ranch work while pregnant.

She had arrived at the hospital less than thirty minutes after she got the call that Malon was in labor, and spent the time pacing in the hall, then supporting Link when he got kicked out after panicking too much. Apparently Malon had enough of him.

She could relate.

After Link had his whole ‘we made a whole baby person’ moment where his brain short-circuited after he was handed his son, the next person who got to hold him was Zelda. A chubby baby, who slept almost the whole time. He had his mother’s nose, thank Hylia.

Zelda saw him open his eyes only once that day, and she could swear she saw in his cobalt-silver eyes that same spark in his father’s eye. Singular, since Link only had the one.

Zelda’s family had a long tradition of naming their kids after family members. Her name was her grandmother’s and her great-grandmother’s, so on so forth. Her father had been pressing to pick a family name the entire pregnancy. Her mother had kept telling him to back off a little. Fortunately, Malon’s family also had a set of passed down names, hers being one of them. So the idea of naming the child after family wasn’t a big deal for her, even if it was a different set of names.

However, there was one thing to take into account here, and that was Link’s family.

No one knew what the naming traditions in his family were, he didn’t even know his birth parent’s names. But that didn’t change the desire to find a way to work them in too.

There was only one name from Link’s family that anyone knew.

The baby was named Link.

Zelda’s father stopped complaining a week later. Her mother was very clear about it.

At Zelda and Ruto’s wedding seven years later, Link Jr. was the ring bearer.

Junior stopped being his nickname when he was thirteen.

(---)

Zelda got a call from Link Sr. about a day after it happened with a simple request.

“Who was in charge of the paperwork when your family adopted me?”

Zelda blinked once, then twice. “Come again?”

“The lawyer who arranged for my adoption, who was that?” Link asked again.

“Why?” Zelda asked, her wife leaning around the doorframe to give her a concerned look. Zelda shot her a thumbs up.

A heavy sigh came from the other end of the phone. “I think I’ve acquired another son,”

Zelda came over.

This new nephew of hers, apparently, was a sweet boy. A series of scars littered his entire left side, burn and explosive damage if she were to guess, and he had no idea how he got them. He had amnesia. The one thing he did know was his name.

His name was Link.

Zelda had to take a minute. She was trying very hard not to laugh. This was exactly the kind of luck her brother had.

“Zelda, stop mocking me, this wasn’t my call,” Link whined, though he’d never say it was a whine.

“Link, you have to see the humour here,” she gasped, waving at the two boys in the living room where Jr. was trying to show Scars how to use a lasso. This was Zelda’s idea, but she wasn’t taking responsibility for it.

Link just sighed heavily. “Link found him on the street. Malon looked into it and his parents died in a car crash a year ago, he has nowhere to go. We’ve agreed to let him stay, you understand that,”

Zelda nodded, sobering up some. “Yeah, I get that, kinda. The lawyer we hired was named Rauru, Mom should have his contact information still, you should call her,”

Link sighed, relieved. “Thank you,”

“Of course, just don’t make it a habit,”

(---)

The first inclination this would be a habit was a year later.

Wild, the younger of his sons, was in the same class as another boy named Link. This boy had lived with his uncle his whole life, and got the call his uncle died when at school. Sheik was about ready to punch someone for doing that to the boy, and just before christmas no less.

Wild brought him home, insisting he could stay at least for the holidays. The agreement wasn’t even a question, there was no way he was going to be forced to spend a holiday at an orphanage.

When Sheik and Ruto showed up on christmas day, not that their family cared much for christmas but they were all off anyways, the newest Link had been named Legend.

He was a little more shy than the others, understandably, and a little snappish.

Not a bad kid, just one grieving and in need of family. That was something their family had never hesitated to provide.

Sheik’s mother teaching him how to spin a butterfly knife was probably not the wisest decision, but considering Rottla heard a therapist say “Your kids are traumatized, they need to feel safe again,” and decided to sign them up for every martial arts she could, well, it should have been a sign that she wasn’t the best in that regard. Time, Link Sr., had made it very clear he felt Sheik took after her. Sheik had no idea what his brother was talking about.

Legend didn’t leave after that. One call to Rauru, and Legend was a permanent member of the family.

Sheik took great pride in being the favorite Uncle of Legend’s, after his late guardian of course. He pointedly ignored that he was the only Uncle, and only part-time.

Time could suck it.

(---)

Lullaby, since so many of her nephews’ friends were named Zelda apparently, received a call at five am.

True, she knew her brother and his wife woke up at sunrise to do yard work and such, but usually they were kind enough to let her sleep in.

Not so this morning.

“Wha?” She mumbled into the phone, trying, and failing, to not wake her wife.

“Zelda,” came Malon’s clipped tone through the receiver, “do you know about a missing person’s case for one Jerimiah Smith?”

Zelda blinked heavily, and had to convince herself not to go back to sleep. Who, why did Malon care? It was five am, the sun wasn’t even up yet.

“Why?” She asked to buy time, still working on a quarter of thought. Ruto rolled over and held her. Not helping, Ruto.

“I have a Link Smith in my barn claiming that his grandfather went missing, and he’s run away from a temporary foster home,” Malon explained, and okay that was worth waking up for.

Lullaby sat up, pushing Ruto’s arm from her waist to her lap, causing her wife to grumble, and turned on the lamp, rubbing sleep out of her eyes. “Okay, okay pause. Pause and back up,” she half-swallowed a yawn, squinting into her bedroom. “What is going on?”

“I got up to do some work, since Link is still asleep, and I came into the barn to find a boy asleep in the hay, here you are,” her voice dropped away from the receiver, likely talking to the boy in question, then came back. “So I found a boy in the hay, and I woke him up. He says his name is Link Smith, and he was living with his grandfather since his father was overseas in the military. His father wasn’t home enough to care for him, so his grandfather had sole custody after his mother died or something, there was a lot of tears at this part. Anyways, his grandfather went missing a week ago, and he’s been through three foster homes and none of them were very accepting of, he apparently has a ‘mental thing’ that he’s dealing with. I was wondering if you could confirm his story?”

Lullaby leaned over the bed, grumbling, and grabbed her laptop, Ruto giving up on getting her back to bed and sliding up the headboard with her to drape over her shoulders while she pulled up Firefox. “Hold on,” she told her sister in law, plugging the name into Google. Jeremiah Smith, went missing a week ago, blah blah blah, oh there we go.

Link Smith, grandson of Jerimiah Smith, left in limbo after his grandfather’s disappearance. Oh, that was interesting. According to this article, which most certainly was breaking some privacy laws and if Link Smith was staying it would be coming down, the boy had multiple personality disorder.

“Yeah, he’s telling the truth,” Lullaby said, switching the phone to her other ear so Ruto could nuzzle up better without bumping it. “Also, I found his weird ‘mental thing’. According to this article, which I’m pretty sure isn’t legal, he’s got dissociative identity disorder,”

“Isn’t that dangerous?” Ruto mumbled, still mostly asleep on her shoulder.

“No, not really. He’s actually more likely to be in danger than a danger,” she twisted to kiss her wife’s head, then went back to Malon. “He probably really needs someone who’ll be supportive enough through all this, both the disappearance and his condition. DID isn’t something easy to live with, I can see him having some issues with foster parents,” Lullaby had never been so glad that she got bored one day and decided to look it up after she heard people talk about it so negatively. You never know when information like that would be useful.

“He’s fine to take in?” Malon whispered after a moment. “I just, the other boys,”

“Will need to be patient, but unless one of his alters is particularly bad for dealing with threats, perceived or otherwise, in an unkind way then he’s fine and safe to be around. I’d ask him about that, but don’t force him to admit anything that can be bad for him, but I don’t see any more risk than taking in Wild or Legend,”

Malon sighed on the other end of the line. “Alright, I’ll bring him in and wake up Link, so he can call Rauru about all this while I sit with him and try and get him to relax,”

“Wonderful, I’ll call the office and see about what I can do about this article then. And for the record, if you ever call me at asscrack of dawn o’clock in the morning again, then next time we meet I’m clocking you,”

Malon had the nerve to laugh.

Four, as he’d been nicknamed by the time Lullaby and Ruto showed up to meet him, was a fascinating person. Green, the host of his system, was a brave, if occasionally airheaded, boy who wanted to try everything, and had been fascinated by his grandfather’s old-timey forge. Time had plans to make one in the yard for him. Red, the emotional and spiritual protector of the system, was empathetic and sweet and compassionate. No one had a bad word to say about Red. Vio, short for Violet, was the gatekeeper for the system and kept the four of them working on the same page. Bright and clever boy, his nose stuck in a book most of the time and willing to offer up the most random and yet useful information. Blue, the physical protector, was a little gruff and definitely someone you just got used to, but he cared deeply about his ‘brothers’ as they called each other, and the external brothers he acquired grew on him quickly enough too. It was a bit of a fight to get custody of him, but Rauru was the best there was, so it was only a week or two before the paperwork was going through for him.

Lullaby had a feeling this wasn’t the end by a long shot, and prayed that Hylia would be merciful about granting Time’s wish for a family.

She was going a little overboard.

(---)

Sheik wasn’t surprised in the least at the newest addition when he walked in the one day. No, mostly he was just confused as to why he hadn’t gotten a phone call before he got there.

Usually there was a phone call.

He was very upset by the way the boy looked, however.

This new addition, Warriors as he’d learn later that Time acquired yet another Link, was curled up in the corner of the couch with his scarf wrapped around him like a blanket, clearly trying not to be seen. Voices floated out of the kitchen, and Sheik picked up that Twilight brought him home, and was lobbying for a new brother.

Ah, that’s why there was no phone call.

Ruto went to investigate the conversation, so Sheik decided to introduce himself to his newest nephew.

Upon closer inspection, the boy looked about Twilight’s age, and had a bruise on his temple, maybe a day or two old now. Looking closer saw a few more on the left side of the boy’s face. Someone hit him, with purpose.

Sheik sat down next to him and said nothing, waiting for him to make the first move. Eventually, he poked his head out of his scarf.

“Hello,” Sheik offered once it became clear he wouldn’t be saying anything.

“Hullo,” he mumbled into the fabric, glancing away and back at his feet.

“My name is Sheik,” Sheik offered lightly. “Time is my brother,”

The boy looked up, eying him. “Twilight is your nephew?”

“Yes, he is,” Sheik nodded, smiling at him. “You’re a friend of his?”

The boy shrugged. “Kinda,” a beat of silence passed, then he shifted around. “He said I’d be safe here,”

“You will be,” Sheik agreed, trying to be comforting. “I can assure you of that,”

He hummed and snuggled back into his scarf.

“May I, if this isn’t overstepping, can I ask why you need somewhere to be safe?” Sheik asked after a moment.

He tensed up, eyes darting to him and at the doorway, and then back, wide eyes a little panicked.

Sheik was just about to apologize when the boy spoke.

“I ran away from home,” he admitted, looking away. “My uh, my parents aren’t, great people. I can’t go back, so I need somewhere else to go. Twi said I could be safe here, that his parents would fight for me,”

“They will,” Sheik said with enough conviction it almost startled him. “I know my brother, and he can’t turn away from someone in need, and his wife is the most strong willed woman I’ve ever met. You won’t find another pair of people more willing to go to war for you than them.”

He blinked at Sheik, then nodded, relaxing a little. “And, if my parents come for me?”

Sheik grinned. “My family is very rich, and we have a small army of very good lawyers. You won’t be going back there, I assure you,”

He smiled, and leaned over towards Sheik a little. “I’m Link,”

Of course you are, Sheik thought. He held out an arm for ‘Link’ to lean into, not getting attached to the name since it would be changing. The boy leaned into his side easily, deflating against him with a sigh. He looked so tired.

“Link,” Sheik asked carefully, watching his words. “Can I ask about the bruises on your face?”

The boy blinked up at him, biting his lip.

“They uh, my dad did that,” he admitted in a small voice, curling into Sheik’s side, and the sheikah pulled him in close to his side, hoping to provide the comfort Link was seeking. “Right before I left. I packed up and went through the window. My twin sister is still there, and I’m a little worried about her, but I can’t go back again. I, he,” he paused, sucking in a breath. Sheik rubbed his arm and side, trying to help him calm down, ignoring the tears on his shirt.

“I thought he was going to kill me,” Link finally admitted in a small, scared voice.

Sheik knew he never had very many parental instincts, and he and Ruto agreed no kids before they even got engaged, but for the first time ever Sheik felt that flare that Time and Malon described everytime something threatened their kids. It was then and there Sheik decided this boy would be part of their family, whether Time was the one who took him in or not. No kid should have to say that and mean it. No kid should be scared their parent was going to kill them.

Oh, the lawyers Sheik was planning on bringing down on whoever these assholes were would be many.

Time took the boy in, as Sheik predicted (thankfully), and sure enough the immediate support was immense. His parents never even put out a missing persons report. Sheik added child negligence to his list of growing charges to lay out.

Two months after Warriors moved in, he got a call from his sister. She got out and was safe now, and wanted to be sure he was as well. This made him very relieved. They met up once or twice, and seemed to be getting back to normal.

Two weeks later, Legend and Wild got suspended distracting Warriors’ parents so Twilight could sneak him out the back of the school. Four didn’t get suspended, but only because when Vio messed with the security cameras to cover up the escape he didn’t get caught. Time took all three out for ice-cream and junk food when he picked them up.

Lullaby saw an opportunity and took it without hesitation. Lawyers were called and organized, and without much wait there was an order for both of them to appear in court on child abuse and negligence charges. The kidnapping charge laid against them in retaliation was almost laughable.

A few weeks later, Time and Malon had full custody of Warriors pending a proper criminal trial for full punishment of his parents, at which time Linkle, Warriors’ twin sister, planned to testify as well. If they couldn’t get things settled before Warriors turned 18, then they planned to push through an adult adoption the day he did. A birthday present, Time had said. Lullaby laughed.

(---)

Sky was probably the most skittish of Time’s sons.

Lullaby wasn’t sure entirely why he was so skittish, but he was. He reminded her of a bird, or a rodent, or a cat who really, really didn’t want to interact with new people.

She had been briefed before she visited on Sky’s background. His social worker had been having trouble setting him up with a home where he’d stay for longer than a week or so, and in a last ditch effort had asked Time and Malon, with their long track record of housing troubled and unhousable youths, if they could take one more. They agreed.

Sky apparently had a friend, a bit of a troublemaker if Lullaby guessed correctly, who had gotten the two arrested. Time mentioned the event had Sky concerned about being ‘too much trouble’ and that ‘they’d get rid of him too’ or something. Time said this was ridiculous, as Sky caused him the least amount of trouble, but the boy was concerned about being thrown away again. He apparently had a few self-worth issues.

Lullaby found him on the back porch talking to the birds. Not in any human language, mind you, and Lullaby spoke many, but cooing and chirping back at them. He seemed very happy and at ease like that, singing at the birds.

“Do you mind if I join you?” She asked in a whisper during a pause in the conversation.

Sky jumped, eyes wide, and he squirmed a little when he saw her. “Uh, sure, I guess,”

She sat on the other end of the bench next to him, and calmly went back to watching the birds, and him interacting with them. He seemed much more at ease here than he did with people.

“Did you need something?” He asked, after a while, letting a blue jay grab a peanut from his hand.

“Not specifically,” she shook her head. “I had wanted to meet you, but nothing else,”

He blinked at her a little dumbly.

“Why would you want to meet me?” He asked.

“What do you mean?” She asked back, not sure what he was trying to say.

“Well, I mean, I’m not exactly special. And, it’s not like I’m staying,”

“I think you’re pretty special, most people can’t get birds to land on their hands like that,” Lullaby said gently, not liking how he spoke about himself. “And why would you think you aren’t staying?”

“I never stay,” he admitted, turning his eyes back to the birds, frowning. “No one ever considers me worth the effort,”

“You are very much worth the effort,” Lullaby countered, trying her best to keep her face soft instead of pinching up. “Trust me, however much effort you are, it is nowhere near the level of your brothers. Time wouldn’t have taken you in if he didn’t want you,”

“He’s just doing Impa a favour,” he said glumly, offering up more birdseed to the birds. “I won’t be staying forever,”

“I’m sure my brother has explained why that’s bullshit,” Lullaby said bluntly.

“But, I got arrested,” he mumbled.

“So have three of your brothers,” Lullaby pointed out. “Regularly. For much worse things. I promise you, that is not an issue,”

“But,”

“If you are going to say something bad about yourself again then I’m telling you right now I’m not going to listen to it,” Lullaby cut him off. “Time has told me a lot about you, and all of it is how much he loves you,”

“Really?” Sky looked up at her.

“You cause him the least amount of headaches of all his sons,” Lullaby smiled. “He adores you,”

Sky turned away, clearly trying to think that over.

“How about you tell me more about the things you enjoy doing,” Lullaby suggested.

“Huh?” Sky asked, turning back to her.

“I’d like to get to know more about what makes my nephew happy,” she smiled.

“Why?”

“Well, I’d be a bad aunt if I didn’t, especially since you’ll be sticking around,”

Sky looked like he didn’t believe her, but told her about his woodcarving anyways.

Lullaby was happy that as time went on Sky became less skittish and self-deprecating. He was a sweet kid, and as he got more comfortable and confident more of his true colours started showing through.

She felt a bit bad for Time, though. Apparently he was as prone to chaos as his brothers, he was just more subtle about it.

Time brought it on himself though. He should have known this when he adopted six boys.

(---)

The call about the next son had Lullaby’s head hitting her kitchen table, groaning loudly even when Ruto came to check on her.

Wild found a boy in the woods and they’d decided to keep him.

This was getting to be just a bit too much.

When Sheik and Ruto got to meet the boy, they were a bit taken aback. They had expected another Wild.

What they got was a quiet boy who mostly kept to himself. He was a bit shy, but he seemed to open up a bit more around Wild and, amusingly, Legend. He was a bit jumpy, but considering they had no idea how long he was in the woods that was expected.

What was surprising them most was that he did actually have a mother, who loved him very much, but who was very sick and so wasn’t able to actually take care of him, thus the wandering in the woods. His mother had been very worried, but physically unable to look. She had asked family to check but they gave up pretty quickly.

In light of her family being horrible for taking care of her son, and not knowing if she’d survive her illness, she asked Malon and Time if they could take care of her son for her since she clearly couldn’t trust her relatives and the boy’s father had abandoned them the moment she decided to keep him.

Time and Malon had taken one look at the boy and their sons, and agreed. They worked out an arrangement to keep the boy’s mother in the loop, and then they called Rauru. After which Time called his sibling.

This boy’s name was also Link. Sheik did not feel bad about laughing. Really, his brother had the weirdest luck.

They, for some reason, decided his nickname would be Hyrule. Why they decided to name him after the country, Sheik didn’t know. Apparently it was the only nickname he liked.

He had trouble reading, but he liked learning, especially if he could use what he learned to help people.

He fit right in, which made Sheik wonder exactly when his brother was going to stop adopting. He hoped it was before the ranch house ran out of room.

(---)

Eight. He stopped at eight.

Which was still too many, in Sheik’s opinion, but whatever.

The newest hellraiser at least didn’t come from the streets like almost all of the others.

This Link (because yes, his name was Link too) had recently lost his parents and his grandmother couldn’t financially support both him and his sister. So Time and Malon agreed to take care of him for her. The rest of their sons all acquired a grandma as well, it seemed.

They nicknamed him Wind, and he immediately latched onto his older brothers and started giving his new parents headaches.

When Lullaby and Ruto showed up next, she felt no sympathy for her brother. He brought this on himself.

She was more than a little pissed off when the brat stole her wallet though. Damn thief.

Time assured her that they’d talk to him about it. Lullaby wasn’t sure that’d help.

But, she reasoned, despite the chaos, Time was happy. Practically giddy. He lit up whenever he spoke about his sons, and he clearly loved them dearly.

Hylia had granted his wish for a family. She maybe went a bit overboard, but as long as Time was happy, so was Lullaby.

(---)

She wasn’t commenting on the ninth kid. She refused.

At least his name wasn’t ‘Link’.

[jackiebrackettt]

ctubbo pickpockets cranboo + there's magic involved au backstory moment hashtag pog! putting this under the cut just right now because i don't have a good intro paragraph and also this is super long. things are subject to change as i think about the plot more but this is what i'm working with currently:

SO. Quick overview of L’Manburg/Manberg (this is not the country the fic is set in)

L’Manburg - referred to as Manberg - is a country that was governed by Schlatt. It’s been around for a while so no characters had any input in its creation. Manberg City is the capital city and where these guys all lived however i’m also just going to refer to it as manberg

tubbo lived with tommy and wilbur and sometimes fundy in manberg. Tommy, wilbur and tubbo are “kinda brothers” with tommy and wilbur playing into it a lot more and tubbo not really sure where he stands because he showed up later. Not really that important just some context for the wording tubbo chooses when talking about them. Fundy is still wilbur’s son but neither tommy nor tubbo really understand that whole situation with regard to ages and just stopped asking

quackity, tommy and tubbo were all friends and quackity helped tubbo get a job as schlatt’s secretary for money so he could help support the family. Quackity is the vice president, schlatt is the president. quackity is sort of in denial about how bad schlatt is at this point in time. He kept warning tubbo that schlatt is kind of an asshole but tubbo wanted a job so yeah

a couple weeks in and tubbo realises he can sell country secrets to rebels trying to take down schlatt. He does so bc yeah schlatt sucks. Eventually wilbur catches on and asks tubbo to spy for him - as he is also a rebel trying to take schlatt down. Tubbo agrees but that means that wilbur had to let tommy into the rebel group or whatever and tommy became his right hand man you all know how it goes

Fundy is also part of this group but leaves eventually due to becoming disillusioned with wilbur’s tactics and asks tubbo and quackity to get him a job near schlatt. This is so he can spy but he doesn’t tell anyone. He also doesn’t rat anyone out to schlatt based on knowledge he got before he left, but he starts becoming sympathetic to schlatt’s ideals

Brief interlude to explain that this is a mix of early l’manburg plot and pogtopia plot. Wilbur hasn’t spiraled to the extent that he did in pogtopia and this rebel plot is mimicking him standing up against the dream team not necessarily the pogtopia versus manberg plot. This is specifically because i believe the events that lead up to pogtopia are what caused him to spiral so much and there’s not really a way for me to mimic those events in this universe. Also Fundy’s disillusionment happened post-revolution in canon but considering this is a more drawn out timeline i think it fits

Eventually they have a festival, tubbo gets caught, blah blah blah. Quackity and fundy agree to help catch him because they think tubbo is just going to get put in jail for a bit. Quackity specifically mentions to fundy that he’s going to go talk tubbo onto their side (or at least out of the politics game) afterwards and then if he agrees they let him out early

Obviously this doesn’t happen as schlatt gets him blown up via techno rocket launcher (no 3 lives system here). Niki (yes!! She is here!!) stands up to schlatt as she does in canon and when she gets threatened with death, wilbur steps up to take attention off of her so she can run, like in canon. Unlike in canon, wilbur does get shot and dies here. sorry wilbur fans ): i figured this was the best way to get him out of the picture bc a good chunk of the plot i have just doesn’t work with him there but alsoooo there’s no way they’d go anywhere without him? So yeah. Niki goes on from this to create her safe haven underground city - still mixed feelings on wilbur! Even though this is more l’manburg wilbur, he never communicated his plans with her and also he died for her

Not going into too much detail about this bc it might show up in fic but tommy does get tubbo outta there and then they fucking dip and leave the country after they hear wilbur’s dead. Which is what leads them to the city the plot is actually set in

Extra character moments:

Fundy is magic because he’s a shapeshifter. Because he’s a shapeshifter, he ages quickly in his younger years which leads him to being wilbur’s son but also older than tommy and tubbo. Magic is something that’s sort of innate in a lot of specific people (shapeshifters, endermen, etc) but for straight up humans it’s something you need to actively learn. Apart from being able to shapeshift, fundy’s strengths lie in potion making and dreamon hunting! After the festival he leaves the country as well

Wilbur knows about magic but tries to avoid talking about it. He’s also a potion maker and that’s how he got most of his money in manberg. Tubbo and tommy thought he was selling drugs and sometimes they’d break into his potion making room and brew some random shit up but they never tried it because they were worried it would kill them because they didn’t know what they were doing lol

Shortly after the festival, schlatt dies and quackity becomes the president. A lot of people think he killed schlatt and that’s also why a lot of people end up voting for him in the next elections. He changes the name back to L’Manburg

Tubbo lost 4 fingers in the explosion, and his sight and hearing isn’t too good. He lost his ring fingers and pinky fingers. He obviously has a lot of scarring from what happened

Tommy’s backstory subject to more info as i think more about how role in the actual plot of the fic

Techno was part of wilbur’s rebel group and to some extent was still trying to take down manberg government after the events of the festival. I’m not keeping up with him because it’s not that important

Dream straight up doesn’t exist in the current plotline so i haven’t thought much about him in the backstory plotline but he is technically there doing his “in the shadows pulling the strings” stuff. The reason he doesn’t exist is because i’m not prepared to adapt his plot with tommy or ranboo into the fic. One is too heavy for me and the other is too complex. This is a ctubbo centric plot and i’m keeping it like that