#or did we abandon 99% of them. all the ones i find are inactive or barely active (bc op also got a job KJKJHFG)

[risingsunresistance]

i do really wish i could still watch harvey but the simple act of moving to twitch means i never catch when he's active, i never know who he's streaming with or what events or meetups he's in, and i think he also went from twitter to bluesky so i see him even less often now

[sparklyjojos]

.---[Disco Wednesdayyy 20/?] In which the narration Does a Thing, we get a cosmology lecture, and the man with the raven tattoo takes the scene [tw: lots of children death and mentions of child abuse, miscarriage mention]---

Last time we finished the second book, so it’s time to head into the third and final one, containing the part called simply “The Ark”. The book starts with our narrator, Disco Wednesdayyy--

Oh, pardon. Our narrator isn’t the 30-something American detective Disco Wednesdayyy, who we’ve last seen beaten up in a hotel room.

Our narrator is Odoriba Mizutarou, a Japanese teenager who grew up in an orphanage in Troy, Michigan after having been abandoned at birth. Mizutarou lives surrounded by alternate versions of people like ‘Norma Brown’ or ‘Sharon Styron’, is a lovable space nerd, and one of the first things we see him do is to fervently discuss how alternate universes and time travel may work.

In other words, HOLY SHIT WE JUST WENT JORGE JOESTAR.

Mizutarou tells us how weird his name is, and that while ‘odoriba’ literally means ‘dancefloor’, the word can also be understood as ‘the landing in between flights of stairs’, which sounds like it’ll be important symbolism. [Btw, I instantly like him. He’s a nice boy.]

When we meet him, Mizutarou is sitting in a high school cafeteria conversing with Norma Brown, who’s badmouthing another girl, Dana Sutoraimuzu [Strimes? Streams? I’m not sure how to write this surname in proper English, google only gives me Disco-related results]. Dana has a nickname ‘Chanel Chanel’, and Norma doesn’t like that since Coco Chanel did some highly problematic shit, although she recognizes that it’s just a random nickname that doesn’t have anything to do with Dana’s personality. Our narrator for some damn reason gets the following train of thought: ‘Coco Chanel’ -> the COCOC sequence of letters in that name ->  九十九十九. This is instantly dropped and stays unexplained (...for now).

---

Anyway, Mizutarou and Norma discuss different concepts explaining the birth and death of the Universe, drawing a space / time graph for each.

1) the steady state model (the Universe has the same density no matter the time and location, no Big Bang or any universal ‘death’)

2) the expanding universe model (the Universe began with the Big Bang and expands progressively faster, the possible outcome of this being the Big Rip, in which all existing particles and even spacetime itself will eventually be torn apart by the expansion)

3) the cyclic universe theory (there are multiple consecutive universes, each of them expands for a while and then shrinks back down in what’s called a Big Crunch, and from the resulting singularity the next universe expands)

[On the graphs, y axis = the size of the universe, x axis = time]

Norma has a theory of her own, but first she talks about the method for finding the sum of an arithmetic progression, or how can you find the sum of a giant sequence of consecutive numbers. You can use the formula n(a1+an)/2; take how many numbers there are in a sequence, multiply it by the sum of the first and last number, then divide by two. Norma actually takes the time to write out the entire reasoning behind this formula down. [Thanks for awakening my high school math class memories, Maijo.]

She brings attention to the fixed sums here (1+100, 2+99, 3+98... all equal 101). This observation inspired her to notice that if you took one of the universe charts given above, the expanding universe one, and divided it in half by drawing a vertical line crossing the middle of the x axis (‘time’), the latter half could be rotated and superimposed onto the first one. The Big Bang and the Big Rip (those sharp inclines at the beginning and the end) will then end up on top of each other. Norma claims that this means the size of the universe is, in a weird way, always fixed. [I think she means that the area under the curve in the first half is equal to the area above the curve in the second half. y axis = size of the universe, x axis = time.]

Norma claims that in her model, it’s not the ‘volume of space’ that’s oscillating, but ‘time’. Time at first flows forward, but after a certain point (the dotted line on that last graph) it starts reversing its flow. Norma thinks this may mean that two universes exist in parallel to each other, one in which time flows forward towards the ‘folding point’, one in which it flows backwards toward the ‘folding point’. If, say, Norma is in the time-forward universe a year away from the ‘folding point’, she would be two years younger than a ‘Norma’ from time-reverse universe who’s also a year away from the ‘folding point’. After the year passed, Norma would cross the ‘folding point’ and start living in the time-reverse universe.

[Here’s another graph. y axis = size of the universe, x axis = time, the ends of the curve are labeled ‘beginning’, and where the time ‘ends’ there are the ‘endings’.]

But in the end, Norma still thinks there’s just a single universe reversing in time, which would make time travel easier, since instead of jumping the border between the universes you’d just have to get to the ‘folding point’.

After they part ways, Mizutarou thinks about Norma’s theory. Maybe there were twin universes, born at the same time. He draws another graph of what he thinks is more probable here:

[y axis = size of the universe, x axis = time,  活宇宙 = ‘active universe’, 休宇宙 = ‘resting universe’]

Twin universes A and B both undergo cyclical expansion and contraction. When one is expanding, the other is contracting, so the sum of their sizes stays the same. The expanding universe is ‘active’ (things happen in it I guess?), the contracting one is ‘inactive’ or ‘resting’.

---

Mizutarou returns from school to the orphanage, a round two-story building called the Pineapple Home, in which there lives almost 50 kids of ages 0-12. High-school age Mizutarou is the only outlier.

A girl called Sharon Styron runs up to him and says that her cousin JJ has been kidnapped by Lord Whiplash [Maijo actually gives the English name as well, thanks dude], an evil guy who takes children to a dark place and beats them with a whip. Sharon claims that Lord Whiplash told her she’d be the next victim, and left a whip mark on her arm (she really has one). [Also, JJ is short for Joachim Joseph, we have an accidental JoJo here.]

Apparently Lord Whiplash told the kids some horrible things: that they’re somehow sinning by being weak, and that he’ll whip that sin out of them.

At first Mizutarou thinks it’s just Sharon making stuff up, but every other child is crying in distress. As it turns out two other kids went missing before JJ, and the orphanage staff wasn’t even interested. Not only that, it seems the entire staff went away somewhere and left all the kids alone, even the babies.

Mizutarou thinks that in that case, maybe the staff was always being abusive, and Lord Whiplash is a concept made up by the kids to help them deal with the neglect and abuse they received from the very people who should have protected them from harm.

Mizutarou gathers all the kids in the main room (there’s 45 of them all), and states that no matter what will happen, he WILL protect them. [I love Mizutarou, he cares so much]. Which is easier said than done: the phone doesn’t work, the kids are too young to send them to seek help, but he doesn’t want to leave them alone either...

...and then he realizes one of the kids is missing from the group, and at the same time, they hear screams, whipping sounds, and chilling male laughter from one of the rooms. Mizutarou runs in only to find the room empty, fresh blood staining the bedsheets. Whoever did this must have escaped through the window. Mizutarou runs outside to find him. Which is a mistake, because the door slams shut behind him. He desperately tries to break the windows or climb to the second floor, but nothing’s working. Lord Whiplash rampages inside the Pineapple Home, children are screaming, and Mizutaro discovers with dread that all the windows now have the following written on them with blood:

[弱悪強罰 = ‘weak’, ‘evil’, ‘strong’, ‘punish’]. Just like Lord Whiplash is yelling out in glee, weakness is evil, and the strong will punish it...

Mizutarou finally uses a car to ram through the door, which allows him to get inside. But the Pineapple Home looks clean and innocent like always. No sign of struggle, no children or Lord Whiplash around... at least until Mizutarou looks up at the round ceiling and sees the main room reflected in it upside down, but with a hellish twist: there’s blood and corpses of children everywhere. In the center of the mirrored room stands a half-naked, bespectacled man wielding a whip, a black bird-like birthmark or scar on his shoulder. The man is standing in the exact place where Mizutarou’s reflection should be.

Mizutarou realizes he has the exact same mark on his arm. Left over from when someone bit him--

The narrator remembers now: he’s Disco Wednesdayyy. [Here the narration swaps back from Mizutarou’s boku pronoun to Disco’s ore.] And the raven tattoo man is him.

(I know the real meaning of my name now, the narration makes one last quiet statement in Mizutarou’s voice. The name Mizutarou  (水太郎) may symbolize ‘the water child’, a reference to the term mizuko (水子), ‘a stillborn or miscarried child’. A child who was never born. Someone who never existed...)

---

“I am you,” the Black Bird Man says looking down at Disco as Disco looks up at him. “Me and the Nail Peeler both, we are your emotions. That means I’m on your side. It’s only natural; your emotions can’t betray you. Tell me, why did you really become a detective?”

“To save children!”

“Did you? Or was it because you wanted to see children getting hurt?”

“That’s not true! I love children! I don’t want to hurt them!”

The Black Bird Man sends him a gentle smile. “That much is obvious. You really do love children and would put your own life on the line to protect them. But that's exactly where the hate comes from. Because of your love, you start to suffer. After all, you're always surrounded by just poor hurt little children. You may have started your work full of virtue and love, but didn't it all turn bitter? (...) You create this suffering. You understand well the desire to somehow punish the weakness of those children who died [who were ‘too weak’ to survive the abuse from their kidnappers and so it was too late when Disco found them]. I am that feeling.”

Disco now realizes that all the children from the Pineapple Home aside from Sharon and JJ shared their names with all the children he’d found dead in his career. In the Pineapple Home, ‘he’ killed them the second time. Does it mean he hates his job? That he hates children...? “I would never kill a child!” he defends himself.

“And that’s why it’s not you who kills them. It’s your emotions given my shape who do that.”

“I don’t have any emotions about wanting to kill children!”

"Am I not the proof that you do? In the end, you feel fed up with all the pitiful children that had horrible things happen to them. There's no way to eliminate their weakness, but you’d still like it to cease. It's natural. And so, here I am. Not necessarily because you have a bad heart; it's just a normal human feeling. Kindness and love have their limits, and going beyond that, they turn into irritation. (...) You've found over 40 dead children, and over 200 that endured horrible events. (...) You got betrayed so many times, survived so many last-minute twists, got involved in car chases and shootings, you struggled through so much -- and it's only because of how weak children are! Of course you know you can't do anything about their weakness, but it still makes you feel sick! All the children in the world still and still continue to get kidnapped, used by their parents and relatives, exploited, molested, murdered. Every time, you risk your life, you lose friends and let people you care about be killed. You know this is still going to continue. (...) ...but you love them. Just like you said, you really love children. That is clear. It's precisely this love that causes the feelings of hate to surface."

“...”

“You're still hoping that I'm just a delusion of some scared children closed together in a room, are you? But these kids here have already moved to the  world of death. It's because of you. You created me, and used those children as victims for me. (...) You enjoyed the spectacle in plenty. Sitting in the guest seat, you raised your voice as if you really meant it, 'No, stop!'. (...) But this is the play you prepared. This is just but one scene acted out by me for your sake, pertaining exactly to your thoughts."

“...”

“I'm your emotions, and so I am your ally. (...) Emotions are a wonderful thing. I was born from stress to torment you, and you had me perform in such an extraordinary theater. ...I'm saying all this for your sake, you know? That suppressed stress of yours is what really hurts the children that are so dear to you."

“Kozue...”

“Her case especially is more than shocking to you. She turned your entire worldview on its head. Rather than the sense of tragedy that usually nestles inside you because of children dying, it was shock. You were plunged into chaos. Subconsciously, you created me to make Kozue feel that chaos too, to torment her.”

“...”

“I understand you don't want to accept that, but you’re a ruined man. (...) Even long before attaining the new worldview because of Kozue's case, you felt broken. You hated your job. That's why you never came back to America. You are already over. Through loving children, you started to hate them a little, eventually embraced this hate, and it's become quite terrible since then. You're already close to switching to the other side -- the one that abuses and kills children.”

“Don't say another word,” Disco speaks up. His body is trembling, but not with fear; a renewed will to fight is burning in him. “Your role came to an end.“

“Oh?”

“I really should thank you. It's fine now. It's fine for you to go away. ...when I look away now, you can disappear.“ A mirror reflects reality, but the things in the mirror aren’t real...

“You have to realize how horrible your situation is right now. No matter what, you can't follow from here in the same way you went about things before.”

“Well, then I’ll have to overcome you. Overcome my own consciousness.”

He looked away from what he now knew was his Feelings -- feelings of guilt. He transferred his own guilt into ‘Lord Whiplash’, and took a refuge in ‘Odoriba Mizutarou’. Then ‘Lord Whiplash’, or ‘the Black Bird Man’, helped him figure out his own feelings, served as his stepping stone.

If it wasn’t for Guilt cornering him, he’d still be running away, remaining in the comfortable fake world. Using his timespace-warping powers to run away was a mistake that his Guilt wouldn’t forgive. First the Nail Peeler followed him to the Pine House and scolded him for not caring about Kozue... then the Black Bird Man accused him of all those horrible things. Of course these accusations were overblown -- just like expected from Feelings of Guilt, they hyperbolized every little mistake -- but thanks to them he was able to contemplate his own identity. ...was what happened back there in the hotel room something his emotions made up, as well?

Alright, then. Let’s jump back into the fray. Somewhere, there must be the one who really attacked Kozue. Let’s go back to the real world and do what we can. The next clue was already given to him: the only people in the Pineapple Home whose names didn’t belong to dead children were Sharon and JJ Styron, so he’d have to investigate whatever events the real Styrons were involved with.

Everything has meaning, after all.

[moonbeammuses-a]

Mobile Rules

-NO MINORS.

I will NOT roleplay with anone under 18. PERIOD.

-I am Mutuals-ONLY.

I am also selective.

I have tons of things going on with life and can't (unfortunately) RP with everyone I meet. I wish could, but I don't have the time nor the energy.

Non-Mutuals can send in general asks about my muses or IM me with questions, but all In-Character interaction is mutuals-only. I also will not Roleplay via anon asks, so don't bother.

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I'll keep them as simple as I can. Lots of clarification in the details, but at LEAST read the main points. 

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I will NOT follow back someone who does not have a Rules and About page. I need to know that you are an adult, that your views on RP match or at least mesh with, my own, and what your expectations are for RP.

-Don't Follow me if you are Uncomfortable with NSFW content

This blog WILL have smut. I am 26 and all of my muses are adults, though I do have teen/childverses for most of them. 

It WILL have gore. It WILL have blood, death, torture, violence of numerous kinds.

There are villians in my muselist. There are legitimately insane, truly EVIL characters in my muselist.

There could be anything on this blog, including non-con scenarios (that are not romanticized, nor shied away from).

Bear this in mind before you follow me. I will not be lectured on my blog content after the fact. You are responsible for taking this into consideration BEFORE you follow me.

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ALL SEXUAL SCENARIOS WILL BE WITH MUSES OVER THE AGE OF 18. PERIOD.

I DON'T CARE WHAT THE AGE OF CONSENT IS IN YOUR STATE/COUNTRY/WHATEVER. YOU AND YOUR MUSE NEED TO BE OVER THE AGE OF 18 FOR US TO WRITE SEXUAL THREADS

I WILL NOT SEXUALIZE MINORS IN ANY CAPACITY.

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I figured that from you following me, you want to write. Great.

If I've followed you, if we are mutuals, I wanna write with you, too.

But don't IM me with "I wanna rp" and when I ask for ideas say "I dunno, who do you wanna put with my muse?" or something similar.

I have over 30 muses in my list. If I have specific inspiration for a thread, I'll come to you with it. Do me the same courtesy.

Dont come to ME for a thread and then expect me to have an idea. 

If you dont have an idea, thats OKAY. Tell me when you DO.

Mutuals can always like my starter calls for random starters or send me memes, but if youre gonna IM me to plot, come at me with SOMETHING. I'm not doing all of the work.

-Yes, you CAN send me that meme/starter

If the meme is on my page, anywhere, and we are mutuals, you can do the thing. Exceptions to this are memes that involve pre-established relationships or smut. I don't do pre-established ANYTHING without discussing it first.

HOWEVER, I am always down to plot a relationship between our muses, so we can send memes with abandon!

"But I've already sent you a meme!" Great, SEND ME MORE. More asks means more chance one will inspire me. I always feel really bad when I get just the one meme from someone I REALLY want to play with, but am uninspired for how to reply. You can always send multiples, and I encourage it.

Do NOT overload a meme with muses/questions. Be considerate about how many things you are asking for per ask. There is no hard line for this, but I'd prefer a max of 3 "parts" to an ask. An example could be one question for three muses, or three different questions for one muse. but don't send me several questions for several muses. I will ignore and delete the ask.

"But I've never sent you anything!" Great, let's start now. If we are Mutuals, I WANT TO PLAY WITH YOU

"But our characters are from different fandoms!" Great, let's see what happens when they meet! did one fall through a wormhole and end up in the others' universe? Was one cryo-frozen for centuries? Is it an AU? LETS FIND OUT! Just, again, no pre-established ships without chatting with me via IM! I won't bite if you wanna ask aout a pairing or a ship!

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If you’re an adult, there’s no reason you can’t send me an NSFW ask as yourself. Tag it OOC if you need to, I dont care, but no anon NSFW.

-Yes, you can turn the Ask into a thread, but MAKE A NEW POST

It's frustrating as hell seeing the exact same grey blocks of text on every single post in a thread, ESPECIALLY if it was an ask with a long answer. Be considerate of me, and help me be considerate of my followers, by turning asks into new posts if you want to continue a thread. I will endeavor to always follow this rule, as well.

BE AWARE: I will drop a thread that began with an ask when I lose interest UNLESS you tell me you want to keep it and there is mutual interest/inspiration. I have so many small threads going that came from asks, that i will 99% likely NOT remember to say anything. If you want to turn something into a plotted thread, TELL ME

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DO NOT PLAY MY CHARACTER FOR ME UNLESS YOU ASK ME. want my character to auto-block a hit? Ask me. Maybe they’re in a different mindset than you think and wouldn’t see it coming. I don’t care how small the action. ASK. ME. FIRST.

Also, in the same vein, don’t do a multitude of things without giving my character a chance to respond to any of them. Maybe they would have grabbed your character’s arm instead of just letting them storm off. Maybe they would have said something before your character made it across the room and out the door.

DO NOT try to force my muse to harm or otherwise take advantage of yours. Take a hint. If my muse is specifically avoiding hurting your muse, do NOT pigeonhole them into injuring your muse. Do not injure your muse because my muse refused to do so. Get your hurt kink BS somewhere else.

In addition, do not punish my character for inaction. If them not moving will lead to your character harming themselves, warn me first. Don't punish my muses for not knowing what to do by hurting your muse. 

-Don't Auto-Ship

If you want a pre-established relationship, whether it's romance, sex, family, or even friendship, talk to me first. If you assume my muse knows yours, that your muse lives with mine, anything like that, there is a 100% chance I will get uncomfortable and drop the thread, likely also unfollowing you.

IN ADDITION, Don't force ships. My character is not required to fall for yours, or even like them. If I feel you are forcing a ship, I will stop replying.

-BE ADVISED THAT THIS IS AN NSFW BLOG WITH POTENTIALLY TRIGGERING CONTENT

I am saying this again because it’s important. I am open to roleplaying with such content as torture, abuse, trauma, sexual assault, character death, etc. Please be advised of this, and use caution if any of these topics bother or trigger you. I do not Romanticize any of these things, but I have mature-themed threads where these things may occur.

IF ASKED, I will TRY to tag content that may be triggering, but do not always recognize potential triggers. I have ADHD and do not always tag before posting. Please be advised of the potential that something may not be tagged.

If you have specific triggers WARN ME. I will do my utmost to be respectful of your triggers but I cannot read minds.

-Contrary-wise, Respect My Triggers

I ask that rape, non-con, sexual assault, be tagged PLEASE. just because I can RP it doesn’t mean I am ok with being surprised by it on my dash.

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I understand that there aren’t always multiple paragraphs worth of information to contribute in a scenario. I don’t always expect as much. But I cannot do one-line RP. Nothing against those who can. I won’t.

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If I have created something specifically for MY muses, such as an aesthetic/moodboard, or a discussion of their psyche, or even a drabble, DO NOT reblog without getting my permission first. If your muse or blog is tagged in the post, you are more than welcome to reblog it and share it. Otherwise, ask me first. Content I put my heart and soul into writing out for my muses is important to me, and is not for others to use with their work.