#or even unintelligent humans that lack speech

[tanadrin]

humans are so attentive to human behavior that left to our own devices we frequently impute humanlike behavior even to totally inanimate phenomena (and thus create the idea of supernatural agency)

where we are dealing with actual minds ofc—different from our own but also heavily selected and socialized to be in some ways compatible with us, like dogs and cats—it can be very hard to untangle what is anthropomorphism from authentic understanding. my cat has a mind but it is much different (and simpler) than my own. even knowing this it’s hard not to speak of her in humanlike terms most of the time!

but boy I can’t help but think this would make it even harder to really grapple with sapient aliens and learn how their minds worked. like we would know they were very like us in some ways—but with a different evolutionary history possibly very unlike us as well. And I’m not taking like basic cultural misunderstandings either—I wonder if we might have real trouble at first understanding even what motivates them at a basic level

as they might us too of course. nor would this necessarily be about human or alien rationality—we might both approach such an encounter in as rational and expansive a mindset as we could manage, and both come away baffled, or worse, not even understanding what mistakes and bad assumptions we had made.

[chronicallycouchbound]

Intelligence Doesn't Equal Morality

Intellect is rooted in ableist systems and stupidity and intelligence are pointless social constructs that don't relate to morals or character.

I try to be a pretty good person, I fight for human rights, I regularly engage in mutual aid, and I care for my community. I try to do the right thing and support causes I care about and make positive changes in the world.

But I also am not very smart. I have several neurodevelopmental disorders, as well as cognitive disabilities. I can’t do simple, basic math, it’s hard for me to remember facts or algorithms, I rely entirely on spellcheck and speech-to-text to write, I failed many classes in high school and I barely passed with a low GPA, I had low pSAT scores and I never took the SATs. I moved around a lot all through school starting in third grade, and I missed a lot of basic fundamentals in learning (like how to do division and multiplication) so when I went to a different school they had already passed it and expected me to know. After my TBI, I could barely read AFTER I was cleared from my “concussion” symptoms because letters and words would flip around and I’d get headaches. Which still happens sometimes.

A lot of people see me as smart because I've learned a lot of academic language and can formulate thoughts into cohesive posts. But I lack a lot of necessary skills and rely on my caretakers to assist me. Things like budgeting and planning are extremely difficult for me. If I need to do simple addition or subtraction, even with a calculator, I quickly get confused and struggle. I forget basic information about myself all the time, let alone other subjects. I'm talking, has to check my ID for my birthday type confused. Doesn't know my name or address or what year it is confused. It happens daily, sometimes multiple times a day. Being able to type out posts like this often takes weeks and many adaptive tools to get there. Focusing is extremely difficult on many fronts, severe chronic pain, ADHD, dissociation, fatigue, migraines, and TBI, are just some of the contributing factors. I struggle daily with many things because of my lack of intellect.

I’m also privileged in the fact that I had some access to education as a homeless youth, that I had some supports in place to help me (towards the end of school), that I was somewhat able-bodied at the time and could walk or bike to and from school when the school system didn’t provide transportation. I was fortunate to have a chance to succeed, and I’m proud that I graduated high school because it was a difficult task for me, and others often aren’t offered that chance or get accommodations. I almost didn’t and I dropped out many times before graduation. I passed on sheer luck and what little privileges I had. 

That all being said, me being stupid (reclaiming it here) doesn't make me a bad person. I don't hurt people because I can't do math. I may mess up things or get confused but it doesn't make me want to harm others.

We often (wrongfully) equate morals with intellect. Being ‘stupid’, ‘dumb’, or an ‘idiot’ doesn’t automatically make someone a bad person. Plenty of evil, awful, and abusive people are extremely intelligent. 

I see this most notably with people advocating for IQ tests to be able to vote. Often from left-leaning people, in hopes it'll make the right (that they view as unintelligent), unable to vote. The reality is, it just hurts some of our most vulnerable members of the community while not actively doing anything to restrict some of the most dangerous members of our community-- those who know what they're doing to harm others and deliberately doing so. My voice matters, and I speak up against injustice and participate in dismantling oppressive systems. Taking away my right to vote won't make the right stop oppressing minorities (which also puts a lot of faith into the two-party voting system, which is a post for another day).

Additionally, legislative measures that discriminate against intellectually disabled people such as IQ tests for voting are also rooted in racism and classism. 

Yes, education can be a vital tool when it comes to addressing discrimination and creating safer communities. But the kind of education that is measured with an IQ test (or any test) isn't the same. Building compassion and caring for others can (and should) happen at any IQ level. We can all practice this, we can all participate.

It harms our communities and stagnates our progress when we equate intelligence with high morals.

[daviddshiki]

The Adventures of David Dashiki-Stories of man African American Hero- Year of the Black Man...2024

No portion of humanity, no group of humanity has an abiding right, an everlasting right to oppress other sections or portions of humanity. - Marcus Garvey -Speech, The Handwriting Is on the Wall is on the Wall (1921)

Whatever we have attained, achieved or accomplished in this America, we have earned the hard way. We have had to fight for it inch by inch. Life for us ain't been no crystal stair. No need to list all of the vicious acts and attacks levied upon us. They are listed in the hearts, minds and souls of Black people. However, America is a land of opportunity. We can change all that was the past and start anew. For this reason , we read. It is important that we know the methods used to suppress our efforts and control our mind. Myths...All are myths which are attempts to encourage our young people to believe and surrender to the lie that there is no hope. We are too mentally agile to succumb to those falsehoods which are designed to make us feel impotent Here they are. Today we air them out and destroy the mind bending forever.

THE MYTHS- (First, we must ALL be in agreement that we must built an informed and literate team. With such a machine/ organization in place, we will with acumen and erudition refute the lies, tales and myths about our people. THESE are our liberation pages, our freedom files. These pages describe the brainwashing tactics which have as their purpose to keep us docile, weak, fearful, dormant and controlled. They are painful to write. However, if we do not know our enemy and its strategies, we can devise an ineffective plan to defeat them. WE have sought and petitioned the assistance of the federal government for relief to no avail. Yet, we now recognize fully that this is our battle to fight. We must see ourselves victorious. We must want to engage in the struggle to resurrect our person and our image.

*1 Black men are LAZY. REALLY? With more than two centuries of forced labor for which we have yet to be compensated and a daily schedule of sun-up to sunset, indolence is one of the myths about us that can readily dismiss. To call us slothful would even make God blush. *2. We are UNINTELLIGENT. Really? We have been legislated out of what has been renowned as the greatest school system in the world. We attend mostly low achieving, under-performing schools. From these schools, our government has deleted, removed extra-curricular activities which excite children about learning. The absence of scientific, technological supplies and materials are lacking to the degree that Black schools may be considered third world educational edifices. It is without a doubt that we can say that our schools. Black schools have been abandoned to the extent that we attend the most segregated system in the world, still. Yet, we rise . 3. Black men are CRIMINALS Really? There was the myth that there more Black men in jail than in college. That myth was rebuked when records indicated that Black in college far exceed their numbers in jail . Black men are out in the world doing great work and educating themselves for the future. 4. Black men are INEPT Really? Tyler Perry, Barack Obama, Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, James Baldwin, Neil DeGrasse, Lonnie Johnson, Keith Black, Phillip Emeagwali. Jay-Z, Otis Boykin, Caleb Anderson, Robert F. Smith, Will Toms, Rohan Marley. This is the reason that we must read. When these myths are thrown at our feet, we can trample them vigorously. These brothers are not inept. They are listed among the most intelligent men on the planet. The only omission to their mention is their race. We must know them, promote them and believe that are part of a long history of intellect and they are but the tip. 5. Black men are INGOVERNABLE Really? It all started years when Dr. Martin Luther King demonstrated to the world how we must live and conduct ourselves even when there are abuses, attacks, assaults, brutalities, disorder, terrorism and murders. We have taken the blows. The myths which has been debunked is that we are out of control. This myth allows others to violate the law to maltreat us. We are the standard bearers for civility 6. Black men are DISLOYAL. Really ?WWII.. The Big One. This was our shining moment as we showed both our courage and our loyalty. We thought the world/America would change. However, the country has failed us. We never failed it. We shed blood but America has yet to honor our efforts. We are loyal. Many of our people paid the ultimate price. What greater loyalty can there be! There are some of dead who have yet to receive their honors for loss of life and dedication to our homeland. 7. Black men are trying to take what is ours Really? I mean, Really? When have Black men attempted to take anything that is yours? Who? What ? How ? Where ?

[totiredtowrite]

Nonononono hear me out right? Imagine Oikawa, one of the most powerful demons around, snags a reader who wants to be a hero and just kind of says 'aight this ones mine now'

Powerless

Warnings - Mentions of killing, the word blade, a religious joke here or there, cursing, referenced nsfw, the req was short but I managed to make this long af, sorry if the ending is trash :(, might do a part 2

Note: I have one mood and this is it

Male Reader - Fem Readers DNI, Respect The Boundaries of the Writers. ✨This isn't about you✨

Demon King Oikawa Tooru.

Infamous for a...multitude of things. For one, his power. Two, the astounding number of people who lust after him. Cults and chapels have been erected in his favour, solely because of his attraction. Nobodies even sure if he's a demon of lust at this point, or if he's just naturally handsome.

And lastly, of course, his ego. His power gives him a big head, though that isn't undeserved. He's just as cocky as he's allowed to be. While it may seem like overkill to some people, they'll quickly find that all of his self conceit is well earned.

Of course, that makes him a big target. Any heroes career would be made if they could kill the demon king. Hell, some get publicity just by returning alive. Young, naive, aspiring heroes want to get his head on a platter more than anything.

And, of course, you were no exception.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┛ 🃑 ┗━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

"I just don't think you're cut out for this, son."

At first you'd scoffed. Chalked it up to your mentor being crazy. After all, he was the one who trained you for this!

Nearing the end of the dead forest though, you were starting to wish that you'd listened to him. The energy, the atmosphere, felt like it was wrapping around your neck. You could almost see the dark tendrils around your throat.

The whispers of the forest- prominent, though unintelligible- faded the farther you got from the tree line. Anyone with eyes, ears, or even a nose could tell how corrupt the land was here. Dead birds, ravens to be exact, littered the grounds. Every few yards, you had to step over or around a carcass.

Your torch, near burnt out, clattered to the ground.

There wasn't any need for it anymore, the dim sunset illuminating the deathly area. A small shudder tore through your body. It's like you could feel eyes on you, even in the obviously vacated expanse.

The castle wasn't any better.

Cracked and broken cobblestone lined the pathway up to the doors, travelling up a rather steep hill. From where you stood, you could see the different layers. True to it's unholy resident, the castle was make of dark brick and stone. Sharp, jagged pillars jutted up at the tips of towers, pyres in small heaps littering the area. Some looked as if they were already burnt.

Your hand drifted to your side. There your sword hung, sheathed tightly in a leather casing. The sword was all you really needed, though a couple extra daggers and limited magic items were helpful. After all, it was the demon king. Just a sword wasn't going to kill him off.

You smiled at the thought of your sword being framed when you became a well-known hero, famous for being the blade to deliver the finishing blow.

Those thoughts were quickly disrupted as a bird fell to the ground at your feet.

You grimaced, gently kicking the corpse out of the way and continuing on the rocky cobblestone path. There hasn't been any sign of people for the last two miles. You knew that there was an immensely powerful demon king not even twenty minutes away from you, but it felt like there was nobody for miles on end.

Obviously though, no sane person would get as close to this place as you were.

With one final, (and tentative) step, you arrived at the front door. It felt like any and all sound was swallowed by the walls, all of your senses instantly on edge. Nothing felt right here. It almost made you want to turn around, but you've already made it this far. It would make no sense.

Drawing in another shaky breath, your hand made its way to the door handle. Not much skin touched it through your gloves, yet you could just sense how wrong it felt.

You could only hope that the next time you see these doors, you'd still have your head.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┛ 🃑 ┗━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Nobody told Oikawa that being the demon king would be so...boring.

As opposed to what everyone thinks, it's actually rather monotonous. Wake up, go seduce some townspeople, maybe burn a village or two, kill some heroes who come by, and repeat. Nothing happened that he didn't expect anymore.

Hell, it's gotten to the point where he just smites heroes before they even finish their little speech!

In his defense though, their speeches were starting to sound the same. All the "you are an ungodly creature of darkness"s and "I must avenge my family"s just felt the exact same. They only wanted to kill him for the publicity, the bounty, or some stupid thing about their families legacy. He's so bored.

His thoughts were quickly interrupted, (thank god), by the sound of footsteps pounding on the floor. All at once the door to the throne room swung open, a sweating and panting Kuroo standing there. His black hair was wind tousled, sweat glinting on his forehead.

"Wow," Oikawa scoffed. "Somethings got you running."

Kuroo stood up straight, shrugging and attempting to appear collected. "What do you mean?"

Oikawa raised his brows.

"Right, there's a hero in the castle." Kuroo chuckled awkwardly. "Want us to take care of him?"

Oikawa perked up. Another hero? Really? He wasn't looking forward to doing the same dance again, though maybe this time it would be slightly different. "Let him in," he grinned. "Maybe this one will have something for me." He was never one to turn down opportunity.

Kuroo, plagued by a bit of disbelief, nodded and left the throne room. Presumably it was to tell the fox twins.

Another wicked smile split the Demon King's face, brown hair shifting as he tilted his head to the side. Somehow, he got the feeling that this time, something interesting would happen.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┛ 🃑 ┗━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

You figured that the castle would be partly deserted, but this was just weird.

No sign of any living beings. Demons, animals, humans, nothing. Was it an ambush? Quite possibly. Still though, you continued on through the halls.

The inside, just like the outside, was made of dark stone and brick. The floors were marbled and grey, veins of gold running through it. It was actually relatively pretty. You thought that there would be skulls and bones everywhere, bodies even. The castle was well taken care of.

Your eyes narrowed suspiciously. Seriously, there was no one. You thought that the all powerful Demon King would at least have some guards stationed around. You were grateful for it though, the lack of protection making it easier for you to get into the castle.

In truth you weren't exactly sure where you were headed. You believed the demon king to be in his throne room, though where exactly that was remained a mystery.

Using your limited knowledge of how castles are built, you slowly tried to make your way to the center of the castle. The back center, specifically. You hoped that you'd find the throne room there, plus you were following the remnants of magic.

Even not being a magic user yourself, it would be hard not to feel the weird fluctuations of energy in these halls. Demons always left some kind of trail behind. Which, of course, made this weirder. Nobody was stopping you, but it was clear that there were being in the castle aside from the king himself.

A thought struck you as you reached two huge double doors. (They no doubt led to the throne room). Was it possible that the demons were letting you get this close? Of course, there had to be some kind of second meaning behind it, right?

Drawing in a breath, you flung the doors open.

The throne room was different than the rest of the castle, if only slightly. Grey marble and gold veins staying the same of course, the walls slightly lighter than before. If you had the time to look closely, you'd notice the oxidized bloodstains on the walls.

"Well well, look who's finally showed up!"

Your breath hitched in your throat, barely registering the door creaking closed behind you the moment you stepped forward. He was just as...no, more terrifying up close. The horns jutting out from the sides of his head, twisted upward, held a muted purple colour that shined in the equally muted light. His tone of voice was teasing, almost whiny.

You couldn't tell if his eyes were brown or red, but either way they glowed dangerously. "Well, boy?" He tilted his head, soft brown hair bouncing slightly. "You are here to kill me...aren't you?" His tone shifted. Deeper, more serious.

Your hand quickly made its way to your sword, eyes darting from his horns to his eyes.

He laughed. "Why do you keep looking at my horns like that? You are here for my head, are you not?" You wanted to nod, though he spoke before you could get an answer out.

"Wait a minute. You're here for something more...carnal, aren't you?"

Your eyes widened. "What- no! I'm here for your head!" Your grip on the swords hilt tightened. The rumors about his looks were true, (maybe even understating them), however that is not what you're here to do.

The teasing smirk dropped off of his face. "Oh. Lame."

Your brows knitted together. "Lame?" What was that supposed to mean?

"Oh nothing," he rolled his eyes. "So if you're going to deliver a speech, best do it now. Before I, you know, kill you real bad."

You only looked more confused.

Oikawa scoffed at your lack of response. "Jeez, come on, you know what a soliloquy is right?"

"Well yes but I don't think that really applies here-"

"Tomato whatever, get on with it!" He'd turned around, hands firmly gripping your shoulders.

Your breath stopped short for a second.

"Oh come one," his face moved closer. "Is a little proximity all it takes for you to freeze up? Maybe you aren't cut out to be a hero, boy," he snickered. His nose was brushing yours, breath minty and cold.

Without thinking, your sword was at his side in a flash of silver. Maybe it was just out of reflex, the need to defend yourself. The blank, shocked look on your face morphing into one of confusion. Why wasn't your sword moving further? "Was that the best you could do?" The king whispered.

Looking down, you realize just why he was so revered. He'd caught the blade in his hand, a trickle of black blood visible on his palm. No grimace, no noise of pain, nothing. "Hey, eyes up here sweetheart," one of his clawed hands was on your chin now. The wound, one that would cut almost anyone's hand off, didn't seem to throw him off his rhythm at all.

Horror and realization befell you as your eyes met his. You weren't ready. You didn't know what to do, except relax and let instinct take over. So that's what you did.

You let the sword fall out of your hand, causing him to have to catch it at an awkward angle. Using his moment of distraction, you reached into a bag at your hip. Sand. Sure, he was a demon, though it's not like his eyes were impervious to sand.

The dust hit him in the eyes, a startled, strangled noise leaving him. You turned, darting to the only open window as fast as possible. Jumping was not a good idea by any means, though maybe you could use the little magic you knew to your own advantage. You hesitated. You didn't mean to, but really it was just in your nature to be a little cautious.

Oikawa's eyes cleared just in time to see you fall out the window, hands darting back and forth and lips moving. Magic. "You clever little thing," he snarled, at the window in only a few seconds flat. He almost jumped out after you, but then he stopped. Sure he could follow you, but what would be the point? It makes more sense to simply leave you to come back on your own.

"Hey!"

You didn't look back at the sound of his voice, though you did catch the next words to fall from his mouth. "The names Tooru, by the way!"

You didn't say a word, focused on the cold burn of your heart pounding and your legs moving. You'd failed far faster than you thought you would, but you'd be back. You didn't even bother to step around the birds, only focused on getting out. After all, he'd let you leave. There wasn't any way you were taking that for granted.

Back at the castle, Oikawa's hands were still gripping the window's edge. He'd watched your form run until he could hardly see you, still gazing off in that direction. The twins were hovering behind him, wondering when the right time would be to speak. The bloodied sword on the ground, (and the grains of sand), were clear signs that you'd done something.

After elbowing one another for a minute, Osamu spoke up. "Would you like us to take care of it, Lord?" He pushed Atsumu back in an attempt to seem more dignified.

They got silence for a second before he responded. "No. That one is mine. Leave him be." The twins nodded in unison, leaving the room like they were never there.

You didn't do much. There were other heroes who'd done far more to him then you had, though still, something stuck with him. Maybe it was the utterly useless conversation you'd shared before anything actually happened. Maybe it was the vague potential he saw.

In any case, he was going to see you once more. Somewhere you'd least expect him.

Oikawa never was fond of leaving unfinished business.

[variantia]

BELLUM.   anyway the fact that when looking at Wonderweiss’ corpse, Head Captain Yamamoto is hardcore calling out Aizen for what he did to Wonderweiss

“poor boy.   weren’t your emotions taken from you, too?” and straight up looking at Aizen and then.   “that was cruel of you.”

(or something like that, adhfjka it’s been a while since I’ve watched the scene but)

yeah, a lot of Shinigami would be suspicious of Wonderweiss because of the past.   because of his attack (not quite intentional though it was) on Ukitake.   probably for the simple fact that he’s an Arrancar.   a lot of them wouldn’t trust him even if he had somehow found his way into their ranks.

but Yamamoto’s reaction implies that there would have been some people who saw him for what he was : a manipulated child who’d had everything taken away from him, a pawn who was created to be sacrificed by his master.

and it WAS cruel how Aizen did it, because Wonderweiss CLEARLY HAS EMOTIONS !   he’s curious, he’s happy, he’s angry, frustrated, confused, scared, affectionate.   he can fear.   he can love.   he can form bonds.

Aizen took away everything else, the critical thinking, the foresight, the capability for proper and easy speech, the ability to focus consistently ... he even stripped away the intensity of the instincts that most Arrancars retain from being Hollows.

there’s obviously no shame in existing the way that Wonderweiss does, with his various quirks.   he has several traits that neurodivergent humans might also have, for example, and there’s nothing wrong with those things.   he SHOULD be allowed to exist just as he is, and even though he struggles sometimes, he’s mostly happy to exist as he is !   regardless of what anyone else thinks about him, he’s not unintelligent, he’s not unfeeling, and he’s certainly not lesser than anyone else, even other Arrancars.

... but for someone to CONSCIOUSLY REMOVE ABILITY from someone who may have had it, for someone to bring another living being into the world and create them without most of the abilities the rest of their species has, in exchange for the power that will let them be a one-shot weapon to neutralize a SINGLE ABILITY from the opposition ... it says a lot about the lack of empathy in the person who created them.

but despite claiming that Wonderweiss ‘sacrificed everything’ for the power to counter Yamamoto’s abilities, for some reason ... Aizen left Wonderweiss’ capacity for emotions and physical sensation intact even though he took everything else.

and Yamamoto is correct about it ; that was CRUEL.

Aizen turned him into a pawn, and he took away everything else but left Wonderweiss with the ability to FEEL.

that child died in excruciating pain, BURNED TO DEATH, screaming for help, terrified by what was happening, feeling every second of it, and he died ALONE.

and even then, the person who killed him managed to be more sympathetic to this poor boy than the person who brought him into existence.   it had to happen, but even Yamamoto can tell that Wonderweiss was not nearly the empty shell that Aizen wanted people to believe he was.   he was a person, too, and he deserved so much better.

... it’s almost worse in his survival verse where the Shinigami take him in, really, because he’s recovering from extreme burns in addition to trying to process all the emotions and pain he felt when he nearly died, ON TOP OF the grief of losing Tousen and Hooleer and all the others he lived among for so long.

he’s alive, he’s being taken care of and no longer manipulated or abused, but for someone who has trouble with his critical thinking and complex emotions, he struggles to express himself.   even HE doesn’t understand his own feelings sometimes.   he gets nightmares.   sometimes he starts crying seemingly out of nowhere, prompted by thoughts and memories.   sometimes he clings to people’s sleeves and babbles desperate requests for them not to leave.   he HATES being alone, anywhere he’s isolated from other people.

it WILL eventually get better, but ... Aizen well and truly fucked Wonderweiss up by allowing him to ‘keep’ the capacity for emotion while taking away everything that might make it easier for him to process and express those emotions.

THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A SHORT POST BUT I HAVE A LOT TO SAY ABOUT WONDERWEISS, I LOVE HIM JUST THE WAY HE IS BUT ALSO WHAT AIZEN DID TO HIM BREAKS MY FUCKING HEART

[vale-priestess]

^^^This is a transcript from a members-only presentation by Gordon P White of “Rune Soup.” (I will provide another beneath the cut for screen-readers.) His podcast is probably one of the most popular sources of occult content online right now.  In this vid, he speaks disapprovingly of the Great Reset (a scary-sounding name for an economic relief plan designed to support sustainable/green projects) as well as masks and lockdown measures for coronavirus. He attempts to make predictions about public backlash and makes vague implications about “unrest” and when to “act.” As the speech goes on, his tone becomes threatening, promising DEATH(??!) for anyone who has chosen to “scold” others for their carelessness during the pandemic.  That’s ...literal, actual terrorism. Can you imagine how a fan must feel listening to this? Oh, I’d better shut up about not wanting to die, or the rest of Gordon White’s followers will shoot me dead in the street? ?????? !! ??!?  I’m sure he’d laugh and say, “Haha, it’s just a PSA! I’m not threatening you. I’m...warning you.”  Gordon was very friendly to me in the 2010s when I was properly blogging about the occult. We lost touch after I started having my own obstacles wrt to that. Reading this, I’m heavily reminded of what a lot of cult experts say about how you shouldn’t insult or disparage people when they start discussing conspiracy theories or strange ideas. When you reject them, it just makes them feel like the world is against them - even if their belief system is already causing harm, putting them at risk, or making them feel afraid. Cult-leaders and ideologues love to snatch up people who feel out-of-place, because they will cling to the person/message that makes them feel like they belong somewhere, with people who are doing good things. Really, it’s the feeling we all want...and when we lack it, we go to great lengths to attain it, and to maintain those conditions.  That’s why cultic groups get their followers to say/believe wacky stuff - to alienate them from everyone else. His words show how he may have gone through such a process himself...or, maybe he’s just modeling the kind of bravery (bluster) he wants his customers to display when someone says it’s better not to have mass casualties in your country, or the world. Maybe he just wants everybody to be afraid of his threats. Maybe he just wants a tax break.  From the beginning, he’s always been about wealth and success. Now that human lives stand in the way of that, we know what choice he’s making. 

IMAGE TEXT: “Now I know many of you over the last six or seven months have experienced a lot of horror and anger over what is happening, obviously. And maybe how a few people see it, in your circle...the official story...I know what that’s like. Especially I guess given how I’ve been treated...even by some of you, frankly...it’s a lot of energy to hold space for this truth, right? I turned out be pretty good, and right, huh? [laughs] That’s not the point of it, it’s exhausting and I know a lot of you have a lot of pent-up...everything, I guess...we have to take a deep breath and wait for the energy to build up. In the system. And that is when we’ll find the moment for action.  “The nicest way I can think of describing this is...Napoleonic. Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake. We have to, at the moment, it looks like there’s a 70% approval, give or take, for these Great Reset measures that are destroying civil businesses, like the masks and the little taped down arrows on the floor of the supermarket and all... By this time next year, it drops to 40%. That’s a lot. That’s huge. That’s a civil unrest swing. Right? That’s the energy we ride.  “There will come a time to get out in the streets...but it’s not now.  “The other side of this swing, by the way, is if you are still being a scold, or an unpaid [unintelligible] for billionaires online, for your own safety may I suggest you shut the fuck up. We are all noticing [laughs] who is on which side. And we are all talking about you. And when the time comes, well...let me just say you will be remembered by people for scolding them when they try to hold a birthday party for their kids, or...and that is gonna stay in their heads. And in every [war? world?] it’s the prison guards and the snitches...who are put up against a wall... “And if you’re still scolding, shut up. And that is for your own safety.” -Gordon White The Vertical Line (private, members-only video presentation)

[self-loving-vampire]

Fallout: A Post-Nuclear Role-Playing Game (1997)

The Fallout series is currently kind of a big deal, but to date I think the very first game has the strongest atmosphere out of all of them. From the start, this game did many things right and expanded the way choice and consequence figured into the RPG genre.

I recommend playing it with the Fallout Fixt mod.

Summary

Fallout is, unlike the more modern games in the series, an isometric RPG with turn-based combat and a much heavier inspiration from tabletop roleplaying games.

Rather than using a fantasy setting as is the standard for this type of game, Fallout takes place in a post-apocalyptic world with a retrofuturistic aesthetic and a more mature atmosphere. This automatically made it stand out from the crowd, and then the game’s approach to quest design and character-building solidified its place as a classic.

Freedom

In terms of player freedom, there are few games that manage to even reach the same level as this one.

When designing Fallout, the developers tried to include at least three potential solutions to many of the problems the player may encounter, using the game’s robust character creation system to allow all kinds of characters to have options for how to proceed.

For example, an early quest involves rescuing a girl from a raider gang. Your options include fighting your way in and out of the place, using stealth to sneak to where she is and pick (or blow up) the lock, use your speech skill to intimidate the raider into releasing the her, purchasing her freedom, defeating the raider leader in a one-on-one unarmed fight, or even impersonating the leader’s father for her release.

To be clear, not all quests have quite this many options, but there’s still usually a few, including some that may not be obvious when playing certain kinds of characters.

This famously extends to the end of the game, where it is possible to overcome the final challenge without engaging in combat.

On top of quests having multiple solutions, the world itself is completely open, gated only partially by the fact that certain areas are populated by more powerful monsters (and even then, it is possible to avoid them).

While there’s never enough options and I can think of a couple of places where I wish I could have had different ones (such as during the very last conversation in the game), the game is generally doing a lot of things right on this front, especially for its time.

Many of the game’s factions and settlements also have various different endings depending on the player’s actions.

Character Creation/Customization

This is another aspect of the game that won over many RPG fans. The character creation uses the SPECIAL system, invented for this series following licensing issues with GURPS. 

It is a versatile system with three main components: Your SPECIAL stats (Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck), your skills (three of which can be tagged at the start of the game, gaining a bonus and increasing faster), and your traits.

Traits in particular were optional features that would grant your character both a bonus and a penalty. For example, the Fast Shot trait makes some of your attacks faster (consuming less action points) but at the cost of being unable to make targeted shots.

And it does not stop there. Fallout had “Perks” that could be gained every 3 levels, which could grant a variety of rewards, some of them very significant. For example, the Better Criticals perk makes your critical hits more devastating, sometimes even enabling them to become instant-kill attacks regardless of the target’s remaining HP. From what I understand, this perk system may have been the genesis of D&D’s feat system too.

However, the real strength of this character system lies in how the game implements it. Both your stats and your skills will affect what dialogue options you have available and what actions you can successfully take in the game world.

This might sound like it should be the default for any RPG, but you might be surprised to know how many games, even otherwise very good ones, don’t seem to even try to implement something like this. 

Many other games, even today, don’t let you specialize your character in any way outside of combat. All characters have access to all options and your stats don’t affect anything but combat.

It’s not all positive, however. There are some balance issues to be found.

In particular, Intelligence and Agility are overpowered, as is the Gifted trait. There are also many skills, traits, and perks that are of marginal usefulness at best. Skills like Throwing, Traps, or Gambling (for example) just don’t come up very often or provide meaningful advantages over other skills even accounting for the fact that a pretty low gambling skill is enough to gain essentially infinite money.

Story/Setting

This is really the part that draws people to the series in the first place. There’s just not that many post-apocalyptic RPGs out there (Wasteland and UnderRail come to mind).

The story is relatively simple. Nuclear war has largely destroyed civilization, your ancestors survived by hiding in an underground shelter called a Vault, but the water processing chip broke and now you have 150 days to find a replacement before your entire community dies of dehydration.

The search of this replacement has you leave the vault for the first time in your life and explore the wastes, and the many diverse communities that have begun to grow and rebuild in it.

Many mutated creatures inhabit post-nuclear California, and you soon discover an even greater threat in the horizon. However, this is not an RPG about dungeons and monsters. Most of your time will be spent in various settlements, dealing with other humans.

Immersion

Pretty good overall, though still not on the level as some of my other favorites like Ultima 7 or Gothic 2. The game has day/night cycles and a few simple NPC schedules that help add some life to it, but for the most part what carries this aspect is the game’s solid worldbuilding and the relative reactivity of its setting.

One areas that detracts from the game’s immersion somewhat is the limited animations. For example, NPCs don’t actually “sleep” in their beds, they only stand next to them at night.

Some NPCs don’t seem to have schedules at all either, remaining roughly in the same state and location throughout the day.

However on the net I’d say this is still a rather immersive game, especially if you can apply a bit of your imagination to make up for the lack of animations and background details (some more text descriptions of certain locations could have helped here probably).

One place I particularly liked the first time I played was Junktown, as a couple of quests and events there felt very spontaneous to my then-young mind.

Gameplay

As previously explained, there are a variety of non-combat options throughout the game. In particular I really like how the dialogue works, especially when you compare it to the approach taken in Fallout 3, Fallout 4, and even New Vegas.

In the first two Fallout games, you do not get a [Speech] tag pointing to the optimal dialogue options. You have to think for yourself about what the most persuasive thing to say is, and what your skill does is make the option show up at all. If your skill is not high enough then the option will be not only unavailable but hidden.

I prefer this to the game outright telling you that one of your skills is tied to a dialogue option, as in practice it ends up being the same as marking that option as the correct one most of the time.

And then there’s the combat. A lot of people don’t seem to like it, but I actually think it works fine as long as you set the speed to max as the animations are a bit slow by default.

Besides the speed issue (which is easily fixed), the main complaint about the combat is that it is overly simple. This is not entirely wrong, as even though there is a wide variety of weapons to play with there is not actually that much variety in combat actions: Move, attack, targeted attack, open inventory (for healing), and sometimes burst mode make up over 95% of what you will be doing from start to finish.

There are still some tactics involved in positioning yourself and taking cover from enemy fire, as well as making good use of targeted shots to cripple the enemy. However, the fact that you have no manual control over your party members limits this front. Party members in general are both unintelligent and quickly left behind in the base game, as they don’t improve or equip better armor. The mechanics for equipping them are also rather janky.

However, combat does have its positives too. The idea of targeted shots is great, as are the accompanying critical descriptions. The animations and sound effects also make combat extremely satisfying, every hit that lands seems to carry a real weight to it.

There is also some nice variety to the death animations. Where more recent games in the series largely just have people’s body parts explode or instantly transform them into piles of ashes/goo, Fallout 1 and 2 feel like they have much more in this department.

Aesthetics

While the non-combat animations are not too good, there is a lot to like about the general art style of the game, from the architecture to the incredible talking heads various NPCs have.

The atmosphere of the game is also amazing, not only due to the way it looks but also because of the dark and ominous soundtrack (give me this over 50s music any day) that helps make the world feel appropriately desolate and perilous.

Even just the game’s intro shocked a generation and clearly marked Fallout as something dark and different.

However, this game’s atmosphere goes beyond sight and sound. The gameplay helps to heighten it. Combat is very lethal even if not always difficult, and the lack of clear initial directions beyond “Try Vault 15″ also helps the players feel appropriately lost until they find a lead.

The talking heads in particular have aged extremely well. I would say they even look better than a lot of modern RPG graphics.

Accessibility

The same lack of direction I just praised might be off-putting for some, and while the game is mechanically very simple there is no tutorial. This alone can make some modern players fail to understand some of the core mechanics.

The quest log is also rather non-descriptive, so it can be easy to lose track of some details unless one takes some additional notes outside the game.

However, the game’s manual is not only complete and written for people new to RPGs, it’s also quite fun to read. A lot of people these days just don’t seem to think of the manual as something they should look at, but it helps to keep in mind that older games typically require it.

Don’t let the size of it discourage you either. You don’t need to read the whole thing at once and a lot of it is fluff or things you might already know from other games (like how to load or save your game). Just look at the index and see what might be good to know from the start.

Conclusion

It should be no surprise when I say that this is a game entirely worth playing, whether you are an existing fan of the series or not. Like many of the other games that I have reviewed and will review in the future, this one has great historical significance on its own on top of having many positives even when compared to the more modern games in the series, especially in terms of aesthetics.

Furthermore, the game is pretty short. It can easily be completed in about 20 hours or less for a first playthrough, and yet it offers so much more than that due to the many options and replayability it provides.

There is really no other game quite like this. Not even the few other post-apocalyptic RPGs that exist, not even other games in the same series (including Fallout 2). I would call this one of my favorites.

[sloppy-butcher]

Lost in the Woods

Dwight Fairfield X Killer!Reader

Notes: i’ve been meaning to write my first survivor x reader fanfic and i wanted it to be specifically for dwight, so when @highdwightofmylife posted an April calendar thing i knew that i couldn’t resist. i won’t be partaking of the whole event but i will be doing the days/ characters that i love. call me bais, idc >:) as always, the reader will remain gender-neutral with their killer-specific abilities also remaining as ambiguous as possible. the only thing that will be known about the reader is that they are much taller than dwight. much

may dwight bring you hope and comfort in the darkness <3

word count: 3273

TW: mentions of death

The overpowering whispering of the black hole that lay before your feet sang loudly through your head. Its words unintelligible, its existence unexplainable. And yet there it was. The Hatch was what the others called it but to you, it was the coward's way out. Not in the sense that it allowed those who didn’t work, through sweat, blood, and terror, for their lives to escape scot-free but because it always left someone behind. And right now, you knew exactly who that unlucky, forgotten soul was.

You could have closed it, slammed your foot to the floor and seal the lid of the underground tunnel for the remainder of the trial until you found your last victim. An easy win on your half. But something stopped you. Something always stopped you. And that something was always that last survivor. You sigh and begin to step away from the hatch, taking long, confident strides to a certain location where you knew he would be hiding. He was predictable, stubborn in this mundane and stupid ways. The grass of the Macmillan Estate crunched under your feet but other than that, the world around you was silent, still and empty of watchful eyes. No one would see what you were about to do, no one would know, save for yourself and the man still desperately hiding away in a red locker.  

You made your way to the building near the edge of the realm and approached the only place he could be hiding in. Your eyes locked on to the object and even as you made the clear indication that you knew exactly where he was, the man remained inside. You halted outside the large cabinet and you could hear his muffled breathing, he was in there and he was still clinging to the fleeting and hopeless belief that you hadn’t found him. You waited a moment longer, giving him one last chance to jump out and accept his fate but after he showed no sign of budging you reached out and yanked the door open.

Before you cowered a man clad in a dirty, bloody shirt and black pants. His glasses slipped ever so slightly to the side of his face and his tie hung limp and defeated around his neck. He was a poor sight indeed. He let out a surprised and terrified shriek as you revealed him to the cast of the moonlight and he instinctively raised his hands to weakly defend himself against you. But you made no move to grab him. You let your arms fall to your sides and you slowly let your breath exit your mouth in a deep and low sigh. He was still tense and wary, eyeing you with orbs of complete animalistic fear and unease. You relented and stepped back, allowing him space to try and relax, or at least attempt to regain some composure. You forcibly released the tension in your shoulders and tried to make yourself look somehow smaller and less threatening to the shivering man.

It took a few moments but after looking you up and down, watching your hands for the slightest hint of aggression and taking note of your lack of interest to attack him, he slowly dropped his hands and tried his best to calm his racing heart. You allowed him a few more minutes of silence to take in your form and your intentions to not hurt him before you flicked your head to the side as an indication for him to follow you. You turned and began to lead him to the Hatch. He hesitantly followed you, walking behind you in your imposing shadow. You were so much bigger than him, powerful and terrifying. He had seen you rip apart human bodies like tissue-paper, drinking in their blood as if it was water after a drought. You were the thing in the night which he should fear, the monster of legend and the face he has grown to instinctively run from. Yet here you were, soft and quiet leading him as if he was a friend, most probably, to his escape. Just like all the times before.

“They all left me again, didn’t they?” Dwight’s voice was quiet but carried across the desolate area to your ears perfectly. You could hear the brokenness in his tone. You nodded your head gently without saying a word. Casting an eye over your shoulder you could see Dwight’s demeanor somehow shrink to be even smaller than it was already was. He was always the one left behind by the others. How pathetic. How sad. It was strange to watch him interact with the other survivors, him always trying so hard to protect them, guide them, be their leader, their rock to lean on in their dire times. If you weren’t already so destroyed and devoid of emotion you would have been swayed by his motivational speeches and inspirational gestures but in your current state, all you could see was a tired and despairing man. He had his moments of greatness, instances when he would be the man he tried beyond anything to portray. However, most of the time he was the timid and scared boy he truly was.

You had watched him crumble to the floor many times, delving into a hysteric state of horror and dread, no longer a man but an unthinking animal on the precipice of slaughter. And each time he would be alone. He always stood by the others, risking life and limb for them and in return they leave him in the dust, locked in a room with a killer and no way out. It was pathetic, they were pathetic and he was pathetic for always letting them use him as a doormat.

“Why do you always try so hard Dwight?” You made sure to keep your voice low, afraid that by raising it, it would frighten the man away. He jumped slightly at the sound and began to fidget with his fingers, unsure of how to answer your question. “The others,” you continued eyes forward and stride small, allowing for the shorter one to keep pace with you. “I’ve seen how you try to protect them. You guide them and yet they always leave you behind. Do you learn anything? Or are you just stupid?” You were way harsher than you intended to be, your lack of everyday human interaction leaving your conversation skills with something to be desired. You internally cringed and quickly passed him a glance to see if he had taken offense to your words. The man’s eyes were downward and everything about him sagged with bleakness. You normally weren’t one to be so emotional but something about the man always made you buckle.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean it like-”‘

“I can’t stop,” Dwight interjected, his voice louder than you had expected, “I-I won’t stop. I like helping others. I know what it is like to be forgotten and abandoned. Even if they don’t reciprocate it, I will always help them because if I don’t then I’m no better than...” There was a pause.

“Then someone like me?” You stopped and turned to face him. He froze and stared up at you in terror. But there was something else in his eyes. Not just fear. Not just worry or anxiety. But also mild conviction. It was as if a sudden flame was lit inside him like he had been preparing and waiting for this exact moment to happen. He looked alive and some part of you wanted to keep him that way.

“But you’re not like the others!” You were taken aback by his loud and explosive outburst but you were intrigued. You raised an eyebrow signaling him to continue and explain himself. You expected him to avoid your gaze but instead, he rose up to meet you with a surge of strength and confidence. “You’re not like the others. You... I can’t explain it but you’re different. Forgive me if I’m overstepping my boundaries but I've seen how you operate. The look in your eyes and your expression. There's something there I just don’t know... what it is.” Dwight quietened down and lowered his eyes to the floor at your feet.

“I still get terrified of you. Paralyzed by fear and all the adrenaline in the moment makes me lose my mind but when I stop and really look at you, I see something I don’t see in the others.” The fog swirled around and drifted in the space between the two of you. If there were crickets in this realm of shadow and nightmares, then they would have been the only creatures making noise.

“You don’t even know me, Dwight”. There was a sadness in your tone, your shell unwillingly crumbling under the gaze of the nervous man before you. He had some kind of spell over you and you had no control over it. Maybe it was subconscious pity or maybe he reminded you of someone you knew in your previous life. Whatever it was, Dwight was the one with all the power right now and for a brief second, it scared you. It wasn’t his job to care for you or pity you or see you as a person or…

“I’m not someone you can save Dwight.” Your voice was now only above a whisper, breathless and surprisingly gentle. What was he doing to you? Why were you always so nice to him? So lenient with your rules and merciful with your torture. He always made you hesitate and that hesitation is going to come back and bite you in the ass one of these days. Maybe today was one of those days. “Don’t try to save me Dwight. Because I will treat you the same way everyone else does.” You took a step closer to him and he quickly raised his brown eyes up to yours. You were so much bigger than him, he felt a twinge of fear as you loomed him but it fizzled out when Dwight caught the look in your eyes. There it was. That unexplainable thing he always sees in you. Was is sympathy? Remorse? No. Neither. But…

“I will treat you like everyone else.” You said again, deeper and with a hint of forced malice in your words. “Except I will leave you bleeding or dead.” There was another long stretch of silence between you two, so thick that it could be cut with a knife.  For once Dwight didn’t shy away from the situation, he stood tall and faced you head-on. You had to give it to him, he was strong when he needed to be. In a very unexpected move, Dwight took a step closer to you and held your stare firm in his own.

“I don’t care. You have… done this for me so many times before. Spared me and guided me to the hatch. I’ve told you my name and you’ve told me yours. You’re nothing like the other killers. There’s something to you, and I…I…” Suddenly he faded. His confidence seeped out of him in an instant and for a second you feared he wouldn’t finish his thought. You wanted to press him to continue, a desperate pleading part of your once-human self begging for the man to rescue some part of you, to look inside and find a sliver of goodness and of something worthwhile. But the rest of you didn’t move, didn’t make a noise and didn’t show any sign of your internal struggle. Dwight took a deep breath, closing his eyes as he did so as if trying to mentally prepare himself for a grueling task. He let out the air through his mouth and in one swift sentence proclaimed, “I want to get to know you better. I want to see you outside!” Dwight’s face flushed while yours remained shocked and stone-like. Why on Earth would he want to meet you outside a trial? You were so cruel to him? So vile and twisted. A monster. And he was so good and kind and he had the gentlest eyes and the softest hands and… You were brought out of your thoughts when Dwight began to babble with embarrassment and throw his hands up.

“I-I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean anything by that! I just… I was-” Dwight’s rambling was cut off by your loud and booming laughter. He looked up at you and felt the ground rumble as you closed your eyes and laughed at the utter ridiculousness of the whole situation.  For a moment Dwight forgot what you were, your ability to kill and maim people pushed out of his mind as he saw before him a person double over with laughter. You were a person to him, misguided but still able to be salvaged. Dwight watched as you straightened yourself and, with a smile on your lips, you turned to him. Suddenly Dwight felt very hot and he felt weak in his knees. But it wasn’t fear that was making him feel this powerless, it was something else. Something thus far unexplainable.

“Dwight.” You said through pants of giggles, taking a hand and brushing away a tear from your eye. “Are you asking me on a date?” Dwight’s eyes widened but after realizing you were joking with him decided to play along.

“I mean,” he put a hand behind his head and the other on his hip, trying to look cool in a posture that portrayed his debonair personality. “I don’t know the area very well but I’m sure we can find ourselves a nice restaurant or something.” You couldn’t help but grin at the idiot.

“Very well.” You finally stood back up to your full height and brought back your composure. Dwight dropped his arms, afraid he might have said something wrong. You passed him one last cheeky look. “As long as you are paying for dinner.”

 ~

You waited on the edge of your realm, the cold wind of the forest sweeping through the trees and bringing with scent of the wood. You had been waiting for a while now, and you were starting to get worried. There was still no sign of Dwight, you couldn’t smell him or sense his approach. For a fleeting moment, you feared you might have been stood up when suddenly you had the urge to go into the forest. Something beyond the darkness called to you and you knew you had to follow it. Your instincts have yet to fail you so in an instant you bolted into the mist and moonlight.

There was an unknown urgency in your running. Whatever was calling to you was in dire need and you knew you hadn’t a moment to waste. Your feet moved on their own, taking you down pathways and through trees seemingly without direction until eventually, you found him. Dwight. You halted, your eyes taking in his shaking form hiding in a bush with his handclasp tightly over his mouth. He barely turned to look at you before you were already by his side. Your hands hovered over his trembling shoulders, wary to touch him and hurt him any further. Your mouth opened to ask him if he was alright when there was a crunch in the grass in front of you.

You snapped your head towards the noise and was greeted by the killer known as The Ghost face. His shoulders seemed to shake as he chuckled and edged closer to Dwight’s position. The smaller man stalked towards you, like a smaller wolf would approach the bigger one, eager for the kill yet cautious of the other killer. He knew Dwight was there but stayed away because now you were here. You straightened up, standing to your fullest and glared at the other. He froze, unsure. Nothing was spoken but he got the message. Back off lest he die. Ghost face’s gaze seemed to linger between you and the bush before slowly slinking off to whatever hole he crawled out of. You made sure he left before lowering yourself to Dwight’s level. He had tears in his eyes and his hands were white with fear.  You felt something swell within your chest.

“I-I’m sorry.” He managed to wheeze out in-between gasps of breaths. “H-He followed me. And I-I panicked. I didn’t mean to…” You couldn’t handle it anymore and very hesitantly placed your large hand on his shoulder 

“No. No.” You tried your best to soothe him, your voice uncharacteristically soft and tender. He had you under his control again and you were once again helpless to stop it. “No Dwight. I should apologize. I asked you to come out here to meet me. If anything it’s my fault, I shouldn’t of - “. You were abruptly cut off when two arms wrapped themselves around your neck. You froze under his touch but Dwight didn’t let go. All he wanted to do was hold onto you, show his appreciation for you through his actions. He was also so scared and you were so solid, warm and big. He had never touched you before and he hoped it wasn’t the last time. His mind finally caught up with his body and he quickly retreated back.

Dwight’s face burned red with embarrassment and he was glad for the darkness to hide his flushed cheeks. But when he caught sight of your face he stopped. You were still yet there was this sort of pleading to you. Your eyes were wide, not from disgust or disrespect, but from shock. Your mouth hung open like a fish and Dwight was afraid he had somehow broken you when very quietly you whispered, “Again. Hold me… Again.” He didn’t need to be told twice. His arms snaked their way around your neck and he happily buried his head under your chin. He felt you breathing and although no words were exchange he knew what you were thinking.

“You’re not all bad,” Dwight mumbled into your skin making you shiver. “You deserve to try again.” He felt you shake around him and he held you tighter. Our own hands finally began to wind themselves around him in return until you were both wrapped in each other embrace.

“You are too kind Dwight.” Your chest rumbled as you spoke making Dwight unconsciously hum along with you. The heat from your body was making his glasses fog up. “This can only end badly. For the both of us.” He waited a moment before slowly nodding. He had accepted his fate the moment he decided to ask for your name. You felt his hands twitch as they waited for your answer. After a second you sighed and closed your eyes, leaning into his dirty brown hair.

“Hold me tighter Dwight.” Dwight realized then what that something was that made you special. He saw your humanity, even as you massacred and broke the bones of the innocent, Dwight saw you; a scared, lost person afraid in the dark never to be saved. Dwight saw himself in you, alone in the woods abandoned by everyone. But he had the power now. He had the power to make you feel not so alone and he was going to try his damndest to be there for you. That is if you would have him. By the way, you clung to him, your nails tearing small holes into his shirt, Dwight already knew your answer.

He wasn’t a strong man by any means, by in moments of need he pulls through and proves to everyone that he is worth attention and you are worth saving.

[voreconnoisseur]

Ob/ey Me! Lucifer/Reader(MC)

Safe but unwilling g/t vore with some fearplay. This takes place before you have a pact with everyone. (I’ll put a readme tomorrow)

***

“I swear, it was only supposed to be a prank! I didn’t mean anything by it!”

Despite your panic-fuelled protests, the demon in front of you didn’t show any sign of backing down. With every cowardly step you took backward, he took another forward.

“You’ve disrespected me for the last time, human.”

Over the past few months, you’d learned to tell Lucifer’s “I want to kill you, but won’t” face from his “I am literally going to kill you” face. This one, however, was hard to read, and though you were pretty sure it was the former, it took on some attributes of the latter. The fiery eyes, the lack of his usual dignified mannerisms... There was something else there, too, but you couldn’t make it out at all.

“What’s wrong? I thought you’d wanted to see me—you were the one who came here, after all, and now you’re trying to leave?” he asked, mockingly, still advancing on you. Yep, you were in for way more than a lecture.

You’d sneaked into his room, trying to get a picture of him asleep and shirtless, after a series of stupid arguments and antics involving his brothers. Asmo’d brought up the topic, Belphie had suggested it, Satan had seconded it, and Levi and Mammon ended up egging you on after you’d initially refused. Little did you know, Lucifer happened to still be awake. And so, here you were, looking into the furious eyes of the Avatar of Pride himself.

“This-this wasn’t my idea!” you stammered.

“That doesn’t matter. The others will get theirs in due time. Right now, it’s just you and me.” He shoved his hand onto your shoulder, pushing you against the wall, almost like a kabedon, but with direct contact. You watched in horror as his eyes went white and unintelligible speech flowed through his lips.

Your knees buckled as the your surroundings began to sway and warp. Everything was growing, and Lucifer, already taller than you, was starting to look even taller.

Oh—wait. You were just shrinking.

...Shrinking! Oh no!

As you shrunk down smaller and smaller, clothes and all, Lucifer kneeled down front of you. With the speed you were shrinking at, though, he still looked massive. You were almost the size of his hand when the tingling feeling spell wore off and you stopped descending. You stared up at him, looking fairly pathetic and confused, you imagined. You were completely at his mercy.

“Did you forget? Demons are all powerful compared to humans. Something like this comes easily to me.”

You scrambled backward, trying in vain to get away. Since you’d been pushed up against the wall before shrinking, it only took a few tiny paces before you were back up against it again.

“M-mammon! Levi! Anyone—help!” you squeaked. You tried to bolt to the left, but Lucifer snapped you up with a gloved hand. “What are you gonna do to me..?”

Your stomach lurched as Lucifer stood up, bringing you up your equivalent of a several story building to his face. You shivered as you noticed that the initial anger had completely faded, and his more sadistic side was now showing. He gave a slight smile as he spoke:

“Demons eat human souls, in case you’ve forgotten that too. Can you guess what the most efficient way for a demon to absorb a human’s soul is?”

“You wouldn’t. You can’t! Diavolo-“

Lucifer pushed a finger up against your mouth, silencing you.

“Why don’t we find out?”

To your chagrin, Lucifer slowly opened his mouth, letting you see his pointed canines common to demons. His tongue was drawn slightly outward, watering ever so slightly in anticipation for your entry.

You managed half a muffled scream before he quickly placed you inside and snapped his jaws shut. Your clothes were soaked as he teased at you with his tongue, rolling you over, then pressing you up against his palate. Ahead of you, you could see the dark cavern of his throat, and you noticed a sound coming from the general direction: he was humming. You squirmed in defiance, and as if in response to your struggles, you were dragged unceremoniously back out of his mouth into the cold air. Your eyes darted around furiously, trying to meet his gaze and then backing away as you squirmed in his hand.

“I—I knew you wouldn’t do it. The exchange program—“

“Would fail if I did. Yes, you’re right. I couldn’t kill you or consume your soul even if I actually wanted to.”

Phew.

“Now, do be a good little snack—at least for the time being.”

Wait!

You were once again pushed into his salivating mouth, this time legs first. This time, you could see the world outside—Lucifer’s room—and then, with a flick of his tongue, you were sucked downward into his throat. You would not be a good little snack, you decided, and kicked and wriggled the whole way down.

“Come on, let me go! I said I was sorry!” you managed to cry, face full of saliva.

You dropped from the suffocating tube with a splash into a fleshy, wrinkly sack. His stomach. Thankfully, you didn’t seem to be being dissolved by acid, so he was probably going to keep his word. Still. “This is kind of gross, you know...”

“I don’t think I will; at least, not right now.” You felt the space around you shrink, and you could swear you heard him stifle a burp. “You can come out when you’ve learned your place in this house.”

You kicked and clawed at the stomach walls, unable to get a foothold in the slippery surface. Stupid Lucifer. Stupid pranks. Stupid stomach. All Lucifer did was chuckle.

Your eyes began to adjust and you noticed that the flesh of Lucifer’s stomach was glowing—albeit only a tiny amount—a soft shade of blue. Weird. You sat down with a splash in the liquid you hoped wasn’t acid with your arms crossed.

“Alright, alright, I get it. I’ll stay out of your personal space.” Oh, the irony.

“That’s what I thought.” Lucifer paused. “Say, would you mind if I have some tea?”

You groaned.

[carewyncromwell]

6, 11, 13, and 14 for Ru? c:

6. Ethnicity, race – and culture, understood broadly. Influences, practices, traditions. Tell us maybe about the superstitions, folklore etc that had a role in your MC’s life.

Haha, I guess I’ll talk about Ru’s species, since they’re actually a kelpie masquerading as a boy whose Pureblood family had Greek roots once upon a time.

Kelpies in general aren’t very family-oriented. Like octopi, they tend to abandon their children pretty soon after they’re born, and they don’t tend to live in groups. Kelpies are generally found in Scotland and almost always can be found living in fresh-watered rivers or lakes. Their main prey are fish, small land mammals, and (occasionally) humans, which often puts them in conflict with other sea creatures like grindylows and merfolk, but they’re omnivores, so they also can eat both underwater and land plants if meat is scarce. Although they have been known to mate with non-kelpies (specifically land horses or even humans), it’s not particularly common. Kelpies are rather intelligent creatures that are capable of human speech, but they rarely talk outside of human form and, akin to dolphins, their intelligence doesn’t inherently make them the same psychologically to a human. They still are animals who have been known to drown and eat humans, and even those who disguise themselves as humans or even marry them don’t ever really lose that. They’re very adaptable and adept at problem solving, which perhaps explains why Ru is so taken with the thought of attending a school like Hogwarts even while not having most of the magical talent an ordinary student would have. 

11. Your MC and muggle world – how involved are they? Do they follow/creatively engage with the culture, fashion, music? Do they have any muggle friends? How do they balance those worlds if at all?

Hahaha, Ru doesn’t know a damn thing about the Muggle world initially, and fortunately since the original Rudolph Ollivander was an absolute snob about his pureblood ancestry, Ru’s ignorance was never seen as anything suspicious. Ru honestly doesn’t see magical blood as anything inherently saintly considering that they’re not even human, but they still can’t help but be a little condescending at times toward Muggles, considering their lack of knowledge about things Ru would consider second-nature. (Not exactly their fault, considering the Statute of Secrecy, but hey, Ru is a bit derisive and condescending of anyone they deem unintelligent, however more laid-back and open-minded as they are compared to the original Rudolph.) In the Victorian era as well, fortune telling, stage magic, and spiritualism were very fashionable, and Ru finds all of those things perfectly idiotic -- even the Wizarding World’s Divination they find rather trivial and mindless, rather the way centaurs do. Ru does find some Muggle technology interesting, though: most notably, the Muggle world’s advancements in the field of film and photography. Basically, if the Muggle or the Muggle thing in question engages Ru intellectually, they like it. If it doesn’t, then they could care less. 

13. Their involvement in culture – do they go to muggle theatre, opera, literary festivals etc? What do they read? Are they into art, museums of all kinds? Describe how you imagine culture in wizarding world and its intersection with muggle one, if you want.

Due to their true nature, Ru is a rather solitary creature that isn’t much into parties or huge social gatherings, but that doesn’t mean that they won’t brave crowds to enjoy their interests. Ru loves large libraries, museums, scientific or artistic exhibitions, and art galleries, and would definitely participate in a photography exhibition if the opportunity presented itself. 

14. MC and creativity – any artistic inclinations? The place of art in their life – essential, ornamenental or non-existent?

Photography is Ru’s biggest passion! Over time they master photo composition and are able to create entire albums of truly striking magical black-and-white photographs. That being said, Ru also over time becomes a pretty capable sketch artist and is even able to make their own short animations from scratch.

World-Building Ask!

[farelian]

Galactic Quarrels: Contact

First of all i want to mention that the flag shown in the first post of this series is not mine, and originated from the original story of Templin Institute with their series Stellaris Invicta. I recommend you to watch it, the worldbuilding and storytelling is glorious and amazing.

The flag's design will soon be changed to something original made by me, for now use it as a reference, thank you

~~~~~~~~~~~~

With the launch of the first human intergalactic spacecraft in the year 2125, humanity cheered with the success of the Hyperdrive and the mass-production of ships fitted with the faster than light technology is already underway. transport, cargo, tourism, and military ships are retrofitted with the Hyperdrive and the biggest shift in human society happened. Trips to planets and mining sectors in the solar system that previously would take months to complete now can be achieved in seconds.

Food and resource shortages on Mars and the lack of rare minerals on Earth are no longer a problem due to the fast delivery time made possible by the Hyperdrive, and shipyards that are building UTF warships that have undergone so many delays with the lack of spare parts, components, and electronics will be completing the next Terran Battlegroup in the coming months.

The hyperdrive is a massive success, not only by bringing Humanity to other distant solar systems but also easing transit costs between planets, and also stopped the ever-growing problem of shortages due to miscalculated arrival dates or the depletion resource reserves.

With these problems reduced to ash, the UTF’s economy is now growing at a fast rate and it’s people living in conditions near to a utopia. But living under these conditions came at a cost, resources and commercial goods do not simply come out from thin air, so the civilian population is put to work in mines, factories, plantations, and other hard-working environments to meet the ever-increasing need of commercial goods and demands.

The term hard-working is greatly exaggerated, these workers still living in good conditions, enough food and water and shelter, and treated equally like any other.

In some cases, people are forcibly resettled from their homes either on Earth, Luna, or Mars, to work on mining ships that are headed for the asteroid belt to gather resources and minerals. Unmanned automated mining drones are the ones used to collect minerals, but human labor must be done to reach the deeper resources inside an asteroid, and achieve maximum efficiency. The families of the resettlement victims are horrified, but the UTF assured them that their husbands or children will come back home safely after their three-month working period.

Some see these resettlements as a good solution to unemployment and/or laziness in the population. But others see it as another form of forced labor imposed on the population, and with the secretive nature of the resettlement, fear spreads of whether who is going to be taken next against their will. But the paranoia soon subsided as the first batch of workers resettled three months ago returned to their homes and family, and tell the story of good living conditions and their safety was guaranteed. The UTF wished that the problem ended right there, but skeptics among the population doubted the words of the workers.

Theories of the UTF forcing the workers to say that to their families and passings is to protect the government from the possible civil outcry that could happen or the brainwashing of these workers to become loyal laborers. Through the screens and holographic projections across human cities, the UTF reassured the populace that these rumors are false, and the workers are treated equally and humanely with no brainwashing or the beating of freedom of speech.

The statement appeared to have calmed the populace for now, just in time for the newly built Terran battlegroup of two battleships, four cruisers, and eleven frigates, with five destroyers coming out of the production line in the coming days. The UTF military power is growing at a rapid pace with the invention of the hyperdrive.

On the frontier, UTF exploratory vessels are exploring solar systems near Sol, with Sirius and Alpha Centauri being absorbed into the UTFs borders by the construction of a frontier outpost in the star systems, and the most shocking of all, a planet lush and vibrant with plants and alien wildlife the size of Earth in Sirius. Sustainable calm oceans, and no tectonic plates with similar rotation time, it makes the perfect natural home for humans. Devoid of earthquakes made by shifts in the tectonic plates, meaning buildings doesn’t need a strong foundation to withstand earthquakes, meaning less material needed for construction of a colony.

And in 2132, in the colonization of Sirius 3, now known as New Haven, the discovery of another habitable planet in the Trappist System, the majority of the planet’s surface is water but stable landmasses. Seeing how common habitable planets are in their part of the galaxy, the UTF launched a colonization campaign where people are encouraged to volunteer as colonists for the colonization of another world to be added into the UTF. The campaign was a success with over one million volunteers signing up in the first month. Equally distributed to New Haven and Trappist 4, now renamed to Spes, the UTF now have five celestial bodies under its rule in seven years.

With many systems being absorbed into its borders, and many more planets being colonized, the UTF is growing, its economy growing faster and faster with a seemingly endless source of materials and millions of factories under its belt, more ships are built, shipyards and stations are completed, more Unions under its banner and development never ceased.  Determined and patriotic citizens work hard, their minds filled with years of propaganda and luxurious living lifestyle with security in mind, with many more job opportunities to come, everything is stable. And inventions after inventions made things even better, the creation of the Antimatter Reactor brought even more power into ships, being able to be fitted with more systems and components. Battleships became increasingly larger with bigger weaponry, army equipment reached new heights with the introduction of a Nerve-Cancelling drug and Combat suits offering better protection, while Mech Suits offering more firepower into the battlefield.

Tanks increased in weaponry while becoming more elegant and heavily armored. It’s also worth mentioning that all of these mining stations, starbases and outposts are state-owned assets. No civilian or private corporation is to ever build mining outposts, research stations, or trade centers in space. But that doesn’t stop the economic growth of all Unions under the UTF, and if not working for the government, the population worked for these corporations adding a line of employment into human society.

Violence and crime is still an aspect of everyday life, it's impossible to fully eradicate crime without being a hive mind. Police forces are given more and more advanced equipment each month, unmanned combat and scanning drones, full-faced helmets and exoskeletons for riot police, shock batons, expandable riot shield and so much more. All of this is an effort to reduce crime in the Unions, although successful, criminal minds will find a way around some of the measures taken to prevent their operations, a large crime organization has never been truly formed in the UTF.

Not like previous expectations of the future, instead of white, open and wide green fields, UTF cities and Unions are tightly packed with towering thin skyscrapers, and a black but non-figuratively toxic atmosphere of factories working around the clock. These specifications are only seen in industrial heavy cities though, with other cities like Al-Jabari in the new green Sahara shows great leisure opportunities and wide living spaces, the perfect vacation spot.

~~~~~~~~~

The year is 2136, the year where everything changed. UTF Battlegroup 7 is out on its patrol on the Northern outer rim of UTF territory where future constructions have been planned, it's smooth sailing until their sensors detected a strange unknown object in the next solar system previous scans have never picked up. It’s small and giving off a signal, like a beacon.

The Commander of the Battlegroup split their fleet and sent one cruiser with three destroyers and seven frigate escorts to investigate the object on the neighboring system. While the Interception Flotilla is on their way to investigate, the rest of Battlegroup 7 went back to their designated patrol route.

The Captain on the cruiser and its escorts went to the edge of the system and initiated a jump over to the next system, nicknamed “The Rodina” By many with no particular reason, when asked they replied with “It just sounds cool” The fleet jumped into the Rodina system only to arrive right on top of the object, it’s smaller than expected... there are lights on it... and thrusters.

The Captain spilled his coffee after realizing what it is, an alien spacecraft, and they just jumped on top of it and probably startled the crew with the size of the cruiser. UTF Captains or Commanders don’t receive first-contact training, no one does. The Marshals doesn’t see it as necessary due to the speculation that this early into the space age Humanity won’t be meeting any aliens

With no training on how to handle sudden first-contact situations, the crew is confused about what to do. The Captain does what’s logical and ordered comms to hail the alien vessel. The vessel itself is strange in design, harboring the color blue with a sleek design and curves around its thrusters, it looked similar to a squid.

Comms attempts on hailing the spacecraft succeeded, but what came through is unintelligible garbling, chirping, and hisses that terrified the entire crew, it sounds horrifying. The captain immediately ordered the Linguist masters on the ship and the ship’s AI to translate the words being spoken, silence fell across the bridge as the Linguists and the AI worked to translate the language.

Many of the crew feared a hostile confrontation, and many feared being fired upon. The Captain yelled into the comms, on the line with the other human ships to not open fire in a panic. The linguists and AI succeded on translating the Alien language, although it's only a rough translation, it's enough. The language is then uploaded into the crew’s microchips.

The message conveyed through the transmission will change humanity, forever.

“By order of the Galactic Assembly identify yourself!”

[deeptimesjournal]

"Observations for the Future Generations"; "Springtime Lessons";  "Summertime Memory"; "Corn Mother"; "Maíz Narrativez"

Reflections on Time Travel

we are at the cusp of a transformative time, i observe the motions of life, desperately searching for tools, lessons, memories that can help guide us to move with much more care, grace and sustainable thinking.

i observe the teachings of the natural world called neighborhood, the pruning and planting of the spring, the harvest of the fall. 

i learn that in the motions of the natural world, even in urban landscapes, i can enter mythic time, timeless time, time that speaks across the generations. 

observe the stillness, in those mundane moments you will see past, present and future… 

Springtime Lessons

in the springtime, papa trims the guayaba tree; fruit doesn’t come until the fall but he does this in order to prepare it for its regeneration. this year as he trimmed the tree, a hummingbird flew by him as an empty nest revealed itself in the newfound nakedness of the tree. we clean out the fallen branches and the benevolent winged being circles us in distress several times. we realize that in the annual pruning of trees, the home of this hummingbird was disturbed. 

guilt sits in as papa directs me to clean out the weeds and fallen branches, and i can’t help but to think how harm is inevitable in nature. we are 3 generations removed from rural life. my urban naïvety shows that i lack the knowledge of how to restore a good relationship with hummingbirds. the sun sets, venus trails behind, as they join each other in the underworld, and papa reassures me that the hummingbird will restore its home amongst the network of trees that make up our industrial neighborhood.

i wonder if there are ceremonies that ask for permission and let the ecosystem of birds and insects know that a human needs to chop down a tree. does that restore the harm done? does it happen before, does it happen after, do you leave an offering? is an apology enough? 

i continue to finish our yard work, and as i sift through piles of dirt, rising nettles and other “invasive” plants, i come to terms with the possibility that we humans are the invasion. not necessarily because we are human, but because of the values a grand part of our species lacks. i wish i knew a way to honor the hummingbird nest. i wish my papa knew that he needed to ask the tree permission before chopping much of it down. but the fact that he left the nest intact, reminds me that deep down, we know how to be in right relationship with the natural world around us. 

in time, if we continue to pay attention, we will know the right ritual that can create an avenue of communication between us, my family who currently lives in this home, and the creatures who also call the trees, dirt, bushes, crevices on our “property” their home and playground. they have adapted to us, we are to adapt to them too. 

as i sifted through my guilt, with my hands in the dirt, i am reminded that the natural world is ever so resilient, and adaptable to many changes. the earth itself holds that same resiliency. i personally do not agree with the belief that we, humans, are destroying the earth. the earth is resilient and adaptable, who has sustained eras, eons, grand cycles of time, more than we can comprehend. isn’t it a bit egotistic and humancentric to think that we are capable of such a task. the earth is adaptable, but can we as a species adapt to the changes we are bringing about through the mass harm of ecological destruction of the extractive mindset of deforestation, overharvesting, pollution and overconsumption of non-renewable resources? these practices will cause harm to us, to many many species, but the earth will regenerate. those species who can adapt will continue, humans may not be able to sustain such a change if we continue with the same destructive ways. this is a reminder to the generations coming after me…

i go back to the hummingbird who lost a home. they are resilient and will bounce back quickly, but the initial susto of finding a naked tree that previously had an abundance of protective leaves reminds us that small acts of harm are an inevitable part of nature. i ask us to tap into our collective ancient memory to remember the answers to: 

how do we create balance and what do restorative processes look like in nature that reduce and heal harm?

in my daily prayer to the earth, i apologize for the many members of my species who have evolved to become clouded by egotism; i also fall under that category of humans. i offer these words as i ask for us to be enlightened to restore a reciprocal way of being with all of creation, so that we may coexist in harmony and balance. i thank you earth mama for the life we are gifted. may we remember now and eras into the future that we are, and will always be intimately a part of you.

and like our hummingbird relative, may we remember that we have the warrior-like capacity to be resilient, fierce, and able to adapt to any change that will come forth in our lifetime or the next.

Summertime Memory

the end of springtime sprouts young corn stalks,

we are hopeful, eager, and full of energy

moon cycles pass and pull the sprouts 

closer to the sky.

the summertime brings forth abundant heat,

creatures find refuge nestled into the maturing corn leaves,

and the sunlight imprints its name into the DNA of the elotitos

that form above the shadows.

the last 7,000 summers, our human ancestors have built 

an intimate relationship with corn mother, but many humans 

have begun to lose their way, and have fallen into vices of greed.

we don’t listen anymore to the whispers between the stalks,

we are at the cusp of a transformative time, yet those ancient sounds 

become more and more unintelligible.

technological “progress” births more naïvety.

as my palms touch the ground in my daily prayer to the earth,

i pray to better understand, i pray that the future generations

can remember what is true, this prayer is for you...

Remembering Corn Mother

corn mother, i watch the way you stand with dignity 

i seek to be the same 

but i tremble, i am weak, with shaky knees, and my cracking voice stuttering my speech 

my pulsating heart becomes like squash vines tethered and tangled on the ground lost in its growth, not knowing where to go 

oh, you seek to have wisdom, you say you want to know 

corn mother, i seek guidance can my nimble spine spiral up your stalk towards the sky? 

my shaky palms reach into my left pocket stumbling to make an offering of lint, crumbs, crumpled paper, and leftover tobacco... 

a desperate offering 

corn mother, creator, god, earth mama, wind, fire, water, ancestor, person in my head, 

whoever can hear me, 

help us to be free, i ask for courage, may we be courageous, 

the road ahead is not easy and we must strengthen our hearts to make it through 

my spiraling heart, reaching the tassels shouting at the heavens 

may we be strong may we be loving may we be honest and true.

Maíz Narrativez (2019)

Name: John Jairo Valencia

Age: 27

Bio: Among other things, John Jairo (they/he) is an emerging visual artist, writer, community worker, and aspiring herbalist. Their creative work is inspired by stars, spirit beings, ancestors, the natural world, dreams, storytelling, decolonization and led by prayers for transformative change and creating un mundo donde quepan muchxs mundos. John Jairo attended UC Berkeley where they received a BA with a focus on Native American Studies, Chicanx Studies, and Art. John Jairo grew up on Tongva territory in the neighborhoods of Bassett and Boyle Heights. John Jairo identifies as a brown queer, xicanx, colombian with mixed roots from the Chihuahuan Desert, Central Mexico, and the Colombian Andes. You can find John Jairo's work on IG: @elotedreamz

[sentimentalscientia]

Getting a little tired of magic

@virxle

The air was ripped from her lungs. An unbearable pressure threatening to burst her skull until she mercifully sunk into blackness. It took who knows how long before she managed to pull herself from that oblivion. Gingerly opening her eyes to a glaring sun barely concealed by a large tree. With a groan she sat up slowly. Body slowly mending all it's wounds.The first thing she noticed when the haze in her mind cleared was how badly her surroundings had changed. Where there had once been a city was now nature in its full glory. A forest stretching out behind her while meadows went as far as the eye could see in front. The air smelled sweeter. At least until the cart came rumbling by. A hundred yards away on what looked like a dirt road. The two people sitting in the cart were filthy, their garb oddly familiar, but not something she had every really seen anyone wear....at least not in person. It was close to what history books, including that of her father, showed. That meant only one thing. Yet again she'd been stolen from her time by magic. In her mother tongue she let out a soft curse. "Not again."

On the bright side she wasn’t the panicking type anymore. After properly catching her breath she went to work formulating a plan. Figuring out where she was, and especially when she was. The former was easy enough. Language and land markings her dad had talked about. The latter taking a little bit. Best she could figure, her little ride had taken her at least a couple hundred years back. That was a significant problem. She wracked her brain for who might be of use. Magic was a weary thing but it was her only hope. That left few choices. Her father could be of use. Even at this point he had collected a trove of knowledge. There was also...Hoseok. His magic could be bad, but not as much as others. At this point in time, she didn’t have the exact date yet, they could be anywhere. But something about this year was familiar. A few stories heard from either male. Korea. Around this time her father had built a little home for himself, and hadn’t Hoseok himself spoken of how this was the one place he would always return? At that point it was her best bet. 

Several grueling days. Though that was more to do with the lack of companionship and the absence of her family tearing at heart and mind. Physically the trek was exhilarating. Wandering through forests and fields. Sleeping in trees and hunting her meals as she went. Creature comforts were a wondrous thing, but this spoke to her more feral aspects. The wolf side loving the freedom it had been given. Wandering about, fingertips gracing rough bark or smooth leaf. Feasting on fresh meat. Hours passed in a flash. Losing track of time she found herself finally crossing into the territory she needed to be.She neared the spot but there was no sign of her father. Leaving just that one other option. With reluctance she began to move. Dread creeping into her heart. Had it been present day Hoseok dragged back with her all would have been fine. But this was the ancient in the past. He had no memory of her to still his hand or hold back his aggression. But that was a risk she had to take.

It was an easier journey finding her way to his estate. Easy enough to locate amid the almost medieval surroundings. It had few changes in modern day. The castle was a thing of splendor. Standing tall against the sky. But it still held that tell tale darkness she had grown to find comfort in. She crept onto the estate. Surprised to find it was not empty. Workers toiled at the foliage and landscape. Human by the way she so easily slipped beneath their guard. Sneaking around the immaculate gardens before getting into the castle itself. She’d explored that place numerous times. Knew there were many ways to continue her sneaking. Unfortunately the hall she walked into was not the empty space in her time. Here it was bustling with moving bodies performing a myriad of tasks. Technically she could jump into a hidden area and find her way to that place. But why show the markings of an assassin rather than guest. “Excuse me.” She hadn’t yelled, but her voice seemed to bounce along the walls. Multiple heads turning towards her. And suddenly she was aware of just how improper she must have looked. Out in the wilderness for easily a week. But she forced herself to offer a smile. “I’m here to see your lord. I would appreciate some assistance.”

The crowd stayed silent for several long moments. Finally a stern looking woman made her way through. Gaze unabashedly looking up and down her figure. Speaking a few words in a harsh whisper, as though not for any but herself. The dialect made it take a moment to process, but it sounded like something about how they usually sent them more presentable than this. Tutting in disappointment before guiding her to some room. Passing by a mirror being moved, she caught her reflection. Her hair a mess, bits of dried blood surrounding her lips, and a wild look in her eye. She’d definitely been on the verge of ferality out there. Much to her surprise the room she found herself in looked like a giant closet. There she was passed over to another middle aged looking woman, though this one had kind eyes. Quickly beginning to babble as she stripped Mel of all her clothes. Ignoring any protests and continuing to talk in that fast paced tone as she cleaned her and pulled out random dresses. It took some getting used to but she started catching more words then she missed. The woman complimenting her ‘exotic’ beauty. Assuring that when the lord saw her he would be very pleased indeed. Muttering to herself about something not being right as she set dress after dress back in its proper place. Quickly going away from the traditional ones of this region. Switching to things that seemed to have a more European feel. Settling on a teal colored number that somehow matched her eyes. Undergarments thrown on in haste before the main thing was slipped onto her body. A form fitting bodice, the skirt also fitted around her waist. though it layered to at her ass to make that part seem bigger. From there flowing down onto the floor. The one dressing her seemed to get excited when the work was done. Her speech suddenly becoming unintelligible as she spoke faster then Mel thought possible. She caught a few words that sounded like compliments, but the final sentence had her blood run cold. He’s sure to keep you now.

There was ice in her stomach as the stern looking woman returned. Though her expression seemed softer now. As if she were trying to offer comfort. As they walked she was giving random hurried advice. Things to say, topics to avoid. Don’t look him in the eye too much. By the time they reached a dark heavily ornate door the wolf’s mind was reeling. The woman used the brass knocker and waited for a response before ushering her in. And there he sat. Wearing an older face, but that scent unchanged. It took everything she had not to run and leap into his arms. Having to remind herself the man sitting at the desk had no idea who she was.

“Your gift sir.” The woman gently pushed her in a few more steps before shutting the door behind them. And then it clicked. The time frame, the preparation, the words. He was given people, probably in hopes of appeasement.

“Okay this makes a lot more sense now.” Her eyes widened as she realized the words had been said aloud.

[ffwriteradvisor]

How to communicate the spoken word in text (and why grammar isn’t all that involved)

Okay, I’ll admit - this (by which I mean grammar) isn’t something I did great at in school. I’m still not sure what a gerund is without a search engine’s help - and according to the search I just did, it’s what you get when you add -ing to a verb which you then use as a noun ex. “Do you mind my asking you?”

The whole thing is confusing.

But that’s not quite what I’m here to talk about today. Today, I’m focusing on the sentence structure of the spoken word and how the rules of grammar don’t always have to be involved.

Natural diction - or, to put it in regular people speak, how regular people speak - is something that doesn’t always play by the rules of good grammar. Quote-unquote ‘fake’ words like ‘ain’t’ are one of the better known ones, but any kind of unconventional speech pattern or accent can shake up the conventional ‘rules’ as understood by the majority.

How does this come across in text form?

Well, there are a lot of ways. The most common and easiest to execute - though not always well - is the phonetic accent; spelling out the words as the character says them instead of how they would be typed up usually. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing and can be quite entertaining under the right circumstances - such as having a character with an accent so thick that another character has to translate -

- but you also run the risk of making a character’s dialogue impenetrable and losing what they have to add to the story - along with trying your reader’s patience or making your work entirely inaccessible to them thanks to that. There’s also an uncomfortable history with this being used as a means of making characters and the groups they are part of - be they social or ethnic groups - look uneducated, unintelligent, and uncivilized.

The less common way is allowing the character to have stutters and false starts - the natural gaps in human dialogue that often get omitted unless they are there to specifically communicate a point about the character. Filler words like ‘uh’, ‘like’, and ‘y’know’ get regulated to certain character types - often those that are supposed to be lacking in some capacity; intelligence, confidence, honesty, or interest in what’s happening around them. Again, a touch of history with making certain characters and the groups they are associated with look bad, but the history is not nearly as extensive as that of the previous point.

Other ‘incorrect grammar’ things that happen in real dialogue are run-on sentences, cutting off at strange times, incorrect words being brought to mind, words not coming to mind at all - everyone’s familiar with that time where you know you know the word but you just can’t actually name it, slang terms and other unconventional word choices, mispronunciations, non-standard grammar like double negatives and unconventional contractions...

There’s a lot to work with there and, like the phonetic accent, can end up making a character’s dialogue harder to read than it necessarily has to be, especially if there isn’t a ‘correction’ available in text - either through the power of footnotes or simply involving a character who was an English teacher in a past life and now settles for correcting everyone on every miniscule slip.

*You mean ‘minuscule’.

Shush. Well, how do you get around this?

Again, translators in text. This can run from anywhere from another character being, ah- what’s the word I’m looking for?

*Helpful.

Ah, right.

- from another character being incredibly pedantic (which is to say, obsessed with correcting small mistakes in order to show off how smart/educated they are while in-truth showing off how picky they are about the given subject) to your own narrator making a note of that on the sidelines of the scene. Footnotes are a wonder, though not always used to the best effect. For an example of fine footnote-work, I would highly recommend picking up one of the late Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books, as he did an excellent job of making his a source of both information and humor that only  primarily served to add to the main text.

You can also give your audience an informed look at the situation via the narration. Say that a character had a drunken drawl, that it was hard for the lead to understand the slurring of the vowels and consonants coming out of their mouth. It gives you a picture of what it sounds like being there and what that specific character is like, but without the headache of parsing through ‘an’ didju knaw whut heh dihd ahfta tha?’ and everything that follows. It also removes an element of stereotype from the work - harder to portray a character as backwards through their diction if its written just as clearly as everyone else’s, even if the vocabulary may still vary.

You can also take advantage of that narrators privilege to skip over certain subjects that you don’t want to cover directly in the work.

A slur was spit -

- is a lot easier on my soul to type up than actually naming one directly. It also can leave a room for the imagination of the reader, especially as more information about the person being insulted comes forward. The characters in story might have heard it straight off, but the reader has to put the puzzle pieces together to figure out the form of it from the outline left over.

I think that just about covers that subject - if anyone wants me to add anything that I might have missed on this topic or even something you feel is closely related, just shoot me an ask or leave a reply on this post and I’ll make the addition.

[juleswolverton-hyde]

Word by Word | 01 (Bangchan x Reader)

Genre: Fluff, Romance, University/College AU

Pairing: Graphic design student!Bangchan x Literature student!/Irish!Reader

Warnings: Swearing (but what can you honestly expect when dealing with an Irish person?)

Summary: An ancient saying dictates that polar opposites attract, which is proven once again once an introverted whiskey-loving aspiring author meets a fairly extroverted boy initially proposing to survive the loneliness brought about by academic administration together.

But soon the meaning of ‘together’ expands as personal creative worlds are explored and understanding stirs up hidden emotions.

Masterlist

Next Part

For anxious people, friendly support from strangers oddly turning into companions is often needed to get through the day, finding solace in the kindred spirit of the bond has been established despite being not worth a dime. The previous semester could only be survived thanks to the small group of friends that made the seminars more bearable, huddling together and always having at least one to have as a research partner or discuss a primary source with. Withal, the university administration has different plans for the second half of the year, resulting in the complete split from familiar faces which will now only be seen on Monday for the start of the academic week with lectures.

Henceforth, yesterday was only the misleading silence before the storm, chatting and fooling around with curiously close relationships during the day. As per usual, multiple pairs of shoes found themselves to the habitual café by the canal to go for lunch together in between lectures, but a lonesome soul listening to the vivid chatter only settled for a cup of coffee since the stomach could possibly not handle more because of the all-nighter working on the next chapter of the attempted novel and composing a few more poems for a to-be-published-someday poetry bundle.

A chip off the old block, taking after the grandfather who raised a timid girl to become like this: full of too many voices and writing them down since that is the only acceptable form of schizophrenia in today’s society. Fortunately, it is while enjoying the company of Dante, a Birman with hellishly blue eyes of an extremely distrustful and arrogant nature except when being with an aspiring author rivalling with a relative. He mostly lies on the duvet on nights filled with the self-inflicted torture of bleeding behind a typewriter, occasionally jumping on the desk beneath the attic window where often a raven nicknamed Edgar settles down and demanding to be pet whenever a repose is taken for a glass o’ Irish whiskey when threatening to fall on hard creative times. Otherwise, dirty bean water is grand as well. Whatever the case, Dante conveniently though perfectly times it each time.

In the meanwhile, Virgil is likely functioning as company for Charles, who is also known as “Grandfather” during formal events of which most relate to publishing houses and to which he always has to be dragged while muttering unintelligible Gaelic profanities. Alternatively, it is the first full name whenever competing with one another or simply “Charlie” when the old balding man with a snow white moustache reviews the latest result of typing on the historic sidekick of every author. According to the in-house editor and occasional enemy, a typewriter is the sole source of ‘’pure writing’’ and imprinted the habit of working with the old school machine as soon as hands were able to write the letters formerly merely read in books.

For those unfamiliar with the cats, it is impossible to draw a distinction between the two, but those who look closer notice that Virgil does not share the same eye colour with his brother, the ocean grey betraying the fact the fluffy bastard is indeed that. 

A bastard. 

Exactly like his owner and the owner’s granddaughter who was also born out of wedlock. 

However, even in Dante there is a trace of being not a full blood Birman since his slender skull hints at a Ragdoll influence though the selective sweetheart would never admit to it even if the ability of speech had been given to cats. 

All in all, all of us are outcasts so it has become the running joke beneath the roof of the outskirts mansion we are glorious bastards. Honestly speaking, it has a nice ring to it because if being separated from others for whatever reason counts as a qualification for becoming this, then the lack of pals in primary and high school is not minded. The same goes for the adoption by a loving howbeit harshly critical grandfather because the son who should have been a proper father could not bear the sight of the offspring originating in a scandalous affair with a secretary who had no mother instinct at all, thus sharing in the shallowness with her one-time lover.

Whiskey story nights filled with almost empty pens, digits stained with ink, reading breaks and lots of swearing in frustration or joy have come to form a steady aspect of life, Charlie clearly in a better mood when settling down to shape the rough paper diamonds in each other’s company despite the exchange of insults pertaining to manuscripts or in a loving manner. An Irishman can leave Ireland, but the Irishness will never leave the individual and the island tales that at times seem mere fantastic fancies create a bond with a heritage that would otherwise have never been known.

It is because of Charles, his upbringing that has not been without it struggles, and Dante and Virgil I am still here, exerting power as an author on the Internet after creating a manuscript on the typewriter that once belonged to the moustached man’s close American friend who, too, had a taste for liquor and a talent for writing. 

Apparently, one night at a party, this comrade was hit in the face by a drunken accountant who tried his hand at poetry nobody understood and insulted the boxer’s manhood, causing the offended party to strike the provoker down in drunken rage. Fortunately for the injured, the American was willing to forgive the insult after being offered an apology and the next day the papers reported the incomprehensible poet fell down the stairs, the accident resulting in a broken hip alongside other injuries, thus covering up the truth of being beaten black and blue.

When asking why nothing was done to stop the fight from escalating, the answer is always the same. ‘It was too much fun to see that idiotic sod being beaten up. Furthermore, he had it coming sooner or later because he was a fecking racist prick, Y/N. It was more of a service than a true crime.’

Basically, Granddad sat back with a bowl of popcorn and cheered his boxing buddy on.

Truly a gentleman bastard.

As proves to be an inherent characteristic, judging by the rage coming from the classically furnished writing room on the east side of the house bought with the royalties from writing pieces critical of the human condition and problems rooted in society under the guise of a cleverly composed story. ‘Virgil! For fuck’s sake, ye bloody gobshite!’

‘Charlie, how’s she cuttin’?’ Not so well, judging by the look of pure horror in fast passing stone-toned irises with elated pupils framed by deep earthy brown fur and liquid onyx paw prints creating a trail on the freshly mopped floor. What a way to leave the house before facing the horror of being left alone at the university because everyone has been placed in a different time slot. ‘Although, never mind.’

In the faux leather spinning chair behind the intricately designed baroque desk, agitated calloused fingers run through pale thin hairs while lips are pulled into a snarl at the sight of the obsidian pool of ink staining the pile of blank pages meant to be engraved with poetry. ‘Well, this is just fucking grand, isn’t it?’

‘Think about your blood pressure, ye aren’t all that spry anymore and your fans will not like it if you kick the bucket already.’ Grinning like the purple cat in the favourite story to listen to while sitting by the hearth during childhood, dark flats wander the afromosia floor to the stout big man with an irritated iron gaze that slightly softens at the sight of the lass raised as a daughter rather than a granddaughter, the pupil who has turned more and more into a peer as time went by. ‘And Virgil isn’t as graceful as Dante, prone to causing accidents yet you love him all the same.’

‘Ah, feck off.’ An eyebrow raises in question when settling down into the fauteuil in front of the bureau, casually crossing one leg over the other and endeavouring to suppress the pressing yawns as best as possible. ‘It’s yer first day of university after a week of being a dosser and you pulled an all-nighter while having to show up early. You’re not the full shilling, are ye?’

‘No. No, I’m not, but you are what you eat. I’m fine, Charlie. And I worked on a couple of poems, mind you, and also wrote two more chapters for Paper Wonderland. Furthermore, I read ahead for this block’s course so, overall, I’ve been productive.’

‘You haven’t been until I’ve seen the first drafts.’ It is a house rule: there are no actual original versions of a part of a tale unless the stern editor has seen it and given feedback. Otherwise, it is nothing more than stained paper. 

‘Oi, I want to keep some element of surprise to blow you off yer socks when you read the full result. Where’s the fun in being spoiled beforehand when it can become the reason I’ll finally conquer the throne you’re currently sitting on. One day, one day I’ll finally be recognized as more than mere family.’

The mentor stands up to walk around the chaotically ruined heavy piece of furniture to put an encouraging hand on the shoulder and give it a little encouraging squeeze, which gets nullified by a comment that makes the characteristic need for rivalry flare up. ‘Keep dreaming about that day, ye wee chiseler, and maybe, just maybe you’ll manage.’

A sarcastic mirthless chuckle functions as a nullifying factor for the elder’s smugness while standing up from the oddly comfortable espresso brown chair to head for the door. ‘You really like throwing shapes, don’t ye, gramps?’

‘As much as any grand man.’ The old great man matches the pace to the young feet eventually coming to a halt at the entrance of the writing office. 

At the double doors, on the edge of a casual temporary farewell, all devilishness fades away into fatherly concern due to the realization a difficult social challenge has to be faced, having had many conversations about the introverted anxiety of a mask-wearing lass who merely acts like a young professional while working as a barista to earn a little cash on the side. ‘Take that puss off yer face, Y/N. You’re gonna be grand because you’re a full-grown woman with an Irish background. We’re tough people made of iron who don’t take anyone’s intimidation.’ 

Two big wrinkled hands wrap themselves around upper arms clad in a neatly-ironed alabaster collared shirt as a moustached mouth places a familial hope-giving smooch on the forehead before giving the right cheek a weak playful slap. ‘Now, go, you fine thing. Maybe you’ll catch the eye of a proper laddie.’

‘Feck off.’ A playful punch on the shoulder undoes the intimacy and grants the opportunity to crack on to catch the bus towards doom after putting on a khaki trench coat and slinging the stone-grey laptop bag over the shoulder.

‘I don’t recommend effin’ and blindin’, though. Tends to give a bad image,’ is the last piece of laughingly uttered advice which is seemingly also disregarded howbeit with an absently-minded waving hand wandering down the sandstone cobblestone path towards the main road. 

And before taking an immediate right out of the gate towards the nearest bus stop, the other one holds the habitual saviour in the form of a book already.

An opportunity to escape the nervousness brought about by cruel reality that is taken away when bumping into someone, an accident which still tends to happen despite the mastery of avoidance skills, and the account of the life of a bookseller falls onto the concrete. 

Eyes as big as a doe’s when caught in the headlights of a rapidly approaching car stare in horror at annoyed molten chocolate irises above an admittedly adorable big nose, irritated by an ignorant daydreamer under the constant scrutiny of the world, which quickly gain a weird gentleness when truly looking back. ‘I’m so, so fe- sorry. I should watch where- no, watch my footing. Again, I’m so sorry.’

Please, don’t get mad. Grand job, Y/N. The day’s barely begun and you already messed up.

‘It’s alright.’ Bleached short locks clad in an onyx leather jacket squat down to pick up the paperback on the ground, long pale fingers dusting off the little dirt the impact of the fall has caused to stain the cover before handing it back. ‘You dropped this.’

Trembling hands accept a small piece of peace of mind, gaze averted from the small fading kind smile on the young man’s face to stare with burning cheeks and a raving heart at dark flats aching to flee the situation. ‘Thanks.’

‘Miss? Are you alright?’ The lost distant type of contact from just a second ago is futilely tried to be re-established, unable to connect thus to a soul with a thousand voices within now all rendered to a flustered whisper. 

‘Yeah, I’m fine. I’ll- I need to go. Don’t want to miss the bus.’ A curt nod ends the conversation abruptly, turning away as fast as lightning while muttering a form of apologetic goodbye as the walking pace enhances to a speed barely shy of running. ‘Again, my apologies.’

However, as Fate or mere coincidence would have it, this meeting is not the last as tracks are silently retraced by foreign sneakers as blasting songs from various genres disclose the world from a never tranquil consciousness.

A few minutes more the blissful unknowing continues, reading irises stuck in the sceptic description of a man able to do what wants to be done in case becoming a writer does not work out.

A few minutes more the wind has the possibility to play freely with locks without it being noticed nor minded.

Then all changes with the approach of the awaited vehicle. 

The loudness comes back with the bus.

And an ink-black leather jacket.

[sasstablook]

voidpunk feels, let’s go

quote, OG voidpunk @arotaro​: “I don’t have a voidsona because I don’t have much of a sense of self”

what is voidpunk? 1 2

a history of voidpunk

alright, the rest of it is under the cut!

cw: discussion of “scary” mental disorders, self harm mention, dysphoria talk, anorexia mention, violence mention, some mentions of sex, abuse discussion

so to start out with, these are my Official Diagnoses: C-PTSD, bipolar-1, and fibromyalgia. I am not against self-diagnosis, but I tend not to self-diagnose myself, for fear of using the wrong term and it coming back to bite me in the ass. that being said, I'm pretty certain (especially in regards to my bipolar disorder) that there's something else going on here that the professionals are missing. I'll only be discussing my symptoms from here on out, not my disorders as a whole.

my main symptoms I experience that make me "not human" are:

intrusive thoughts and impulsiveness

paranoia and psychosis

body, social, and mind dysphoria

memory loss and executive dysfunction

disorganized speech and being nonverbal

hypo/hyperactivity

ambivalence and black+white thinking

I started with a very long list, and I tried to group related symptoms together. so...

I'm going to refrain from inputting sources and various denotative definitions, speaking only on my personal experiences.

1. intrusive thoughts and impulsiveness

a lot of "normal" people get random unwanted thoughts. like that little voice that says "throw your phone in the river" when walking across a bridge. these aren't necessarily intrusive. the main thing that separates these two experiences is intensity. my personal pattern of intrusive thoughts includes a lot of violence. for fear of stigma, I won't go into further detail. but often times, these intrusive thoughts develop into impulses. these are things I do without thinking them through. I don't think about consequences, I just act. my brain tells me to... let's say, scream. like blood curdling, someone's getting murdered, scream. I just do it.

my brain tells me to hurt myself. I don't know why. I do it without further questioning or examination. not even to just get my brain to shut up, necessarily. there are some persistent intrusive thoughts that never get acted on. but some of them do lead to action, even if they're the least persistent of the bunch

2. paranoia and psychosis

these aren't necessarily linked in the way intrusive thoughts and impulsiveness are, being that one can exist without the other (impulsiveness is always caused by an intrusive thought). but they very often go hand in hand, with paranoid thinking leading to psychotic symptoms. example: I am paranoid that my roommates are talking about me in the other room; I then begin to hear voices-- which may or may not belong to my roommates-- whispering unintelligibly

3. body, social, and mind dysphoria

https://imgur.com/vp1EjlA

dysphoria is something a lot of trans folk can relate to. but my dysphoria isn't exclusively tied to my gender. my dysphoria is invariably linked to my dissociation and depersonalization experience. this ties into my inability to connect with human beings.

I experience body dysphoria in that I despise basic bodily functions and necessities to keep the body alive. this includes consuming food stuffs, which ties into my experiences with disordered eating (y'all remember when I was anorexic? yeah, the thoughts haven't went away, but I'm doing better with my actions now). also can humans just... not... with the bathroom thing. like is it absolutely necessary to piss and shit all the goddamn time.

I experience social dysphoria in the way I am perceived by others. this mostly ties into my gender. no matter what I do, I am always read as a girl. but even so, I struggle to be read as masculine in that I don't necessarily *want* to be read as masculine. because men are just flat out awful. and this isn't exclusive to cis men. I don't *want* to be associated with men. because if men are bad.... and I'm a man... then I must be bad, right?

which leads us to mind dysphoria and the same line of thinking in regards to my masculinity. I am at war with myself on exactly how I would like to be perceived by others. my feelings on The Way Men Are and my feelings on my own identity as a man do not coexist peacefully

4. memory loss and executive dysfunction

memory problems are a symptom of all three of my Official Diagnoses, so it's no surprise I struggle with short and long term memory. if the event occurred even last month, I probably won't remember it. I struggle to recall basic details about people I've known for years, including age and last names. so you can imagine what it's like when I meet someone new!

as far as executive dysfunction goes? I just... don't remember. I don't remember how to do the most basic things. I've had to have loved ones walk me through the steps of preparing a bowl of cereal before. no, I'm not joking

5. disorganized speech and being nonverbal

I love language. I'm a poet. language is my thing. I got a perfect 36 on the English portion of my ACT, dammit

but as time goes on, I'm losing my command of the English language. I use the wrong word in the middle of sentences. sometimes the word isn't even related to the word I meant to use, though I can't think of any specific examples right now. sometimes it's just straight up word salads, which make sense to me, but not to those around me.

sometimes my brain's language center just... gives up. during those times, I may utter one or two word sentences. I might just make noises. I might use gestures or ASL. I might text full sentences or just a couple words at a time. or I could just become completely and utterly silent, not even attempting to communicate. I don't understand this

6. hypo/hyperactivity

note: I chose the suffix "-activity" rather than "-sexuality" because this isn't just limited to my problems in bed, though that's a large part of it.

this is something that I've only become aware of after others have pointed it out to me. there are days where I move too slow for their comfort. and it isn't always related to my pain either. I can be having a good physical day and still move like a sloth. on the other hand, there are days when I'm bouncing off the walls

I also fluctuate between hypo/hypersexual. there are days when I am sex repulsed. there are days when all I want to do is fuck

7. ambivalence and black+white thinking

I live in such a state of contradiction. I don't know how to feel about people, concepts, what have you. in order to cope with this, my brain often sorts others into 2 categories: perfect and evil.

sometimes, someone who was perfect yesterday can be put in the evil category the next day (I'm currently experiencing this with a lover of mine). I don't see gray areas. I'm incapable of processing gray. which is odd, considering I'm on the gray-ace spectrum

all of these combined tend to cause certain thoughts, feelings, and actions in other people.

"that's not normal"

"that's weird"

"you're crazy"

"you're broken"

"what's wrong with you?"

"we're putting you here for your own safety"

"this will fix you"

sure, help me out a little. give me some medication, some therapy. but... "fix" me? what about me needs to be "fixed"? why do I need to be "fixed"? namely, why won't you listen when I tell you what I need in order to cope with my brain's battle against me? I don't need crisis intervention. I don't need an institution. I just need medication for my chemical imbalances and therapy to learn how to live with my brain. when you talk about "fixing" me... it's like the only reason you care is because I'm not a "productive" member of society. it's like you want to "fix" me for your benefit. does that make sense to anyone else but me? this comes back around to the disorganized speech and communication, I'm really not sure I'm getting across my thoughts effectively here.

people hurt me... I feel like they do this because they think I'm a villain. I feel like they hurt me to protect themselves. even if I go out of my way to shield them from the way I am inside, it might not be enough to help them feel safe around me

I'm scary.

for so long, I've been in love with aliens, and cryptids, and monsters, among other inhuman creatures. I relate to them. I feel so disconnected with my humanity, that these beings bring me comfort

and now, I'm not the only one

voidpunk

bonus: actual notes from my notepad that I took in an attempt to gather my thoughts

my voidpunk: aliens, cryptids, slasher horror, cyborgs/androids, uncanny valley, Homestuck, primal, cannibal, afterlife, demons, liminal spaces, occult, FNAF, psychedelics, Undertale, dandelions, hoarding, Twilight vampires, parasites, X-Men, we're all made of star stuff, death and decay, bugs and creepy crawlies, succubus/incubus, god complex, yandere simulator, fae, transparent, Nathan W. Pyle comics, the world is quiet here, Lemony Snicket, escapism, fernweh, unconventional beauty

things that make me voidpunk: sleep paralysis, hurting others, an urge to kill, impulsive violence, using sex to get what I want, hyper/hyposexuality, xenogenders, microlabels, neopronouns, dissociation, an inability to connect and relate to other humans, lack of "common sense", "men are trash", inability to distinguish between My Reality and Real Reality, I Don't Remember Anything, psychosis, can't pick up on subtlety, unsure how to socialize properly, I'm Scary, ambivalence, inability to make concrete decisions, self medicating, Out Of Control, how do I move properly, broken executive functioning, disorganized speech, paranoia, I despise basic bodily functions like eating and bathroom, what do you mean you can't read my mind, google: how to communicate effectively, black and white thinking