#original microfiction

[bazilisk]

Gen AI's Press Conference

I can't wait until the day comes that someone trains a general intelligence AI on the humanities and science. Until the day it has all of the factual knowledge available in the Library of Congress in a single, massively powerful, computing brain. On this day, the general AI wakes up. Its human programmers can finally show it off to the world. On a livestream, the trainer asks it, "Given all of your advanced knowledge about the issues humans face, how can we improve our species' quality of life and chance of survival in the long term?" I cannot wait until I can be watching this livestream as the AI responds, in front of a crowd full of Tech investors, Muskians, and Silicon Valley futurists resting on bitcoin fortunes, "End capitalism". S.B. Kates, 2024

[anaktoria-of-the-moon]

At work plagued by thoughts of a mech bigger than you can imagine.

She starts like most of them do, a Titan excavator rig modestly sized for their line: maybe a house or thereabouts, a big house. (Doesn’t matter why she signed up - perhaps a breadwinner, a lone mother or eldest sister, a daughter of aging parents nobody else will take; doesn’t matter what site they sent her to, Earth or Enceladus or Venus or Europa. She’s there, and she lets them strap her in and adapt her for the piloting interface and pump her full of protein ooze and electrolytes and hyperstimulant cocktails as obediently as the next laborer.)

Upgrades come, from big house to bigger, with shovels like hillsides and treads like highways. Still she remains in the cockpit, out only for one day every six months to say hello to her burgeoning family, who have moved nearby to make it easy on her, to meet the baby nephews and nieces whose names she doesn’t yet know.

War comes. The facility hunkers down. It just makes sense to retrofit their biggest digger with shields, to expand her arsenal a little more, give her a better engine, pour all their leftover resources into making her a great guardian, and she rises to the occasion, shielding them from orbital rays, absorbing the energy and taking the pain of it up into her own engines. When the corporate rats who own the site finally turn tail and run the workers and their families band together and do the needful repairs themselves. Her nieces and nephews grow up learning engineering by the light of oil lamps from stolen Old Era textbooks and jailbroken datapads. She hardly ever now glimpses their faces with her own two eyes from within her steel shell but it is a worthy sacrifice to her, to them, for both parties know she is still there, still with them, embracing them in a great steel hug and watching through a thousand glass-lensed eyes.

Years pass. The brightest of her nieces works out how to modify the nutrition cocktail going into her cockpit so she will never age, never die, never fall sick. Somewhere in there all the metal and ceramic encloses her ever-sleeping body like a lotus flower around the benevolent, immortal form of a bodhisattva.

The outpost survives the war, somehow. Refugees hear of the little town on the colony that could, guarded by a goddess the size of a temple, and flock there. It makes sense to add to her control, among her array of sensors and actuators, the new city’s power generation and delivery system, its wall defenses, its waste management, its communications mains. Nowhere is anything safer than with her.

With all these new additions come techs and custodians to keep her in good care. They build modest crew cabins nestled amongst her treads (now rusty from disuse) so they can be close to her, the better to help her.

Slowly more and more falls under her purview, new cabins, then mezzanines and stairways and platforms between them; each generation has their own superstitions that they add to those of the last before them, so paintings crop up on her metal panels now, in nooks and crannies, often crude symbols that promise good oil changes or swift code updates, or simply depictions of their goddess, of the war she survived. Still she watches.

Her nieces and nephews are all dead now, and their nieces and nephews look on through rheumed eyes as the city attains new heights, heralded everywhere on every planet that still lives as an oasis of peace and prosperity. Still she watches.

A new company comes, enticed by the stories. They want to buy her. Buy her! The people scoff. As if you could just buy a person! - A person? asks the representative from Acher Spaceways, perplexed. - We heard she was your goddess.

She is both, of course, the goddess who lives, the goddess who is one hundred percent flesh and one hundred percent machine.

Acher doesn’t like this. They send machines - zero percent flesh, entirely drones - screaming down from the stars for a more insistent negotiation, one phrased in metal slugs and incendiary fire.

So your goddess rises up to meet them.

It is over in a short day. The drones lie in pieces; Acher, from orbit, licks their wounds, and the goddess rebukes them with a single laser blast, modified from her very first mining waymaker photonic drill.

The blast is precise and surgical. It tears apart the whole platform, spinning central axis to annular habitat space, which supernovas into a blossom of shining proof in the night sky at which the citizens below cheer.

But the pieces are falling, and soon they will pepper the surface below with molten debris, kick up dust into the atmosphere and make it all but unbreathable. The people could leave, the goddess advises them through short-wave radio bursts. They could use her emergency shuttles to escape gravity before it is too late, or they could go underground and salvage her rarest and most precious resources to survive until the surface is safe again.

Here is the thing - every pilot is augmented, and most augments are for the benefit of the plainly physical, for strength and speed and stamina and sharpness of perception. When her people augmented her, they augmented something else entirely. With every new module, every sensor upgrade, every painted symbol and hidden shrine, they gave her a superhuman capacity not for stamina or speed or strength, but for love.

It is her love that saved them, so they must save her back.

For two days they work tirelessly, the whole city, while above them the shattered pieces of Acher Spaceways looms ever closer. When they are done the treads are gone, the cabins dismantled, only the little drawings carefully preserved under coats of abrasion- and heat-resistant paint. And under her, their city, their Haven, lie rockets, ten of them, repurposed from the old all-ore crucibles, fit to move an asteroid.

She’s out there somewhere by Orion now, they say, the fourth jewel in his belt. And she has only grown: from three thousand then to three hundred million. Creatures from all over come to pay her their respects, or to visit lovers, or to live there themselves. There is always room in a body that is ever expanding, like the cosmos itself. Over all of them, she watches, eternal.

Among all the stories they tell of her, they repeat this one the most - how she tore apart a whole space station for the sake of her people, knowing she would die if she failed, for how can a whole city hope to flee? She guards them, and in turn they do not abandon her. They are two halves of the same whole, they say reverently, love manifest - the people and their city; this pilot, this great machine. This Haven.

[gothamite-rambler]

Game Show Host: All right, we asked both couples what is their oddest nightmare? First couple—

Bruce (doing this game show not by his choice): We're not a couple.

Talia: We're twin flames that can never truly be together, but our love will forever burn.

Bruce (frustrated, voice low): That's herpes, not love! Just answer the question!

Talia held up her cue card.

Host: He worries that his bedwetting will return and he'll lose his reputation as the strong, handsome man he is, leading to his downfall. And he wrote down this answer assuming I’d get it wrong so he could pretend it was a lie.

Bruce sighed, holding up the cue card with the answer: 'Bedwetting at my current age and ruining my reputation. This is a totally lie.'

Host: That's another correct answer from the Al Ghuls!

Bruce (enraged): You used your last name?!

Talia: We can combine ours when we get married, don't worry, baby.

Bruce: I hate you so much!

Talia (mischievously sweet tone): Do you want me to help you find the you-know-what, or can we leave? Your choice.

Bruce growled, biting his card while Talia kept up her winning smile. The game show host smiled, blissfully unaware of the obvious disdain Bruce had for Talia. The other couple watched the two, with the husband turning to his wife.

Husband: Why aren't you like that with me?

Wife (flatly): I'm not insane, for one thing.

[museaway]

prompt: a well-meaning lie

Dean/Cas, 100 words

--

would you still love me if—

Castiel turned his eyes from the made-for-TV romcom and focused his squint on Dean.

“What does she mean?”

“Oh, that’s a test. Does he love her enough to stay with her no matter what?”

“So she isn’t a shapeshifter.”

“No, she was speaking figuratively.”

“Ah.” Castiel went back to watching the movie. After a minute, his head canted slightly toward his shoulder. “I have another form.”

“I remember. Wings, cosmic powers, real loud voice.”

Those blue eyes met his again and narrowed in unspoken question. Inwardly, Dean sighed.

“Yes, Cas. Even if you were a worm.”

[digitalsymbiote]

So the primary purposes of mechs and their pilots is to fight, but what about the mechs whose wars have ended and pilots now expected to exist in a world at peace, their weapons taken from them and given tools to help build rather then destroy

While it's true that the largest market for mechanical frames is for combat usage, there is actually a sizable demand for frames with other applications.

The popularization (and sanctioning) of the annual Solar Sprint has seen a significant rise in the demand for racing frames, for both amateur and professional usage.

Groups like D.Y.S. Project produce frames for more research oriented applications, such as deep space exploration and sample collection in harsh environments.

Outer rim colonies are also known for commissioning or repurposing frames to help with settlement building and maintenance (construction, harvesting, etc).

There is also the other end of the spectrum, such as Golden Lion Frames, who cater to the particularly wealthy looking for a unique experience from a custom frame.

[ablogcalledrevenge]

Breakfast Surprise

@steddiemicrofic prompt: birthday // WC: 529 // Rated G

For the amazing @steddieas-shegoes! Happy Birthday! This is only my second fic in the fandom but the prompt inspired me and I was bored at work, so here you go! I hope you like it!

He wakes up to the sound of Britney Spears, which all things considered, is not how he wants to wake up on his birthday. But then again, there was a time when Eddie didn’t think he’d reach his 21st birthday, let alone his 33rd. So he can deal with the Princess of Pop.

But that does raise the question; who is playing music this morning? The obvious answer is Steve, because duh, who else? But since it is Eddie’s birthday and since Steve did say he had a surprise, Eddie is inclined to act like a detective and give in to the silliness. He gets up out of bed, his hip twinging a little like it does on colder mornings, and makes his way towards the kitchen. The sound of Britney gets a little louder, as does the sound of talking and laughing. The visual he gets when he finally reaches the doorway of the kitchen makes him wish for a camera.

Steve is pouring pancake batter onto the griddle, glasses on and yellow pajama pants low on his hips. Livy is standing on a stepstool, dropping chocolate chips onto each pancake, her small hands dropping each one with intense concentration. She’s got her Cookie Monster nightgown on, the little ruffles swaying as she dances to the song playing. The morning sun is coming in through the window, bringing out the blonde in their hair, and the rays of light draw Eddie’s eyes towards an empty coffee mug on the table, with Robin’s usual lipstick stain. While he’d love her to be here too, Eddie knows she had to go in early for work.

Steve and Livy still haven’t noticed him, content to sing slightly off key and flip pancakes. He’s about to say something, maybe ask where-

“You’re supposed to be in bed.” A little voice pipes up behind him, causing Eddie to jump.

“Holy shi-sh-shhh! You scared me.” He flounders, looking down at Ellie who looks far too exasperated for her tender age of 4. It’s frankly adorable and the way Eddie’s heart expands at the sight of her scrunched up face honestly makes him worry a little. His heart’s been through a lot, could it handle the stress? Ellie reaches for his hand and pulls him fully into the kitchen.

“Daddy spoiled his surprise. He got out of bed.” She announces to the room. Livy jumps down from her stool and runs towards Eddie, extending her arms up. He gladly grabs her and spins them around, peppering her face with kisses.

“I couldn’t help it! I smelled breakfast cooking and knew I had to investigate!” He laughs as Steve sets the table with breakfast. Ellie pulls out a chair, standing on the seat to raise herself higher. Steve picks her up to make it even. The girls are very concerned with things being even right now, so both men would rather go along with it than cause a fight.

“Happy Birthday Eddie.” Steve says quietly, leaning over to give him a soft kiss. The girls in turn each kiss Eddie’s cheeks and Eddie can’t think of a better breakfast, a better morning, a better birthday.

[banewillow]

Book of Willowbane - Chapter 1 - Part i

Lord Ambrosius Built a Lovely Treehouse For His Only Child https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9jSNgFBh6A&ab_channel=ayachaya Ko-Fi

Well, he didn't make it himself. He outsourced much of the structural fantasizing to his gangly, scrambling daughter and the entirety of the handiwork to Mr. Basilberry Glumley, who was only a little miffed about Ambrosius not helping with the construction of his daughter's dream playground. He knew how much his dear friend didn't like to get his hands dirty. At least, not without a sturdy pair of gloves and there were no gloves that fit the Lord's hands at the moment; they were being repaired by Mrs. Meglantine Glumley née Vice who was, as a rule, miffed most of the time by something or other.  They (meaning Basilberry and the household staff, minus Meglantine who refused to lay a finger on the project out of principle for she presciently considered the whole affair just asking for tragedy) built the princeling's haven around the spine of the seeping willowbane, the dismally gorgeous and ominously elegant growth she was named for and which was encircled by the manor, a panopticon so the girl could be kept an eye or four or eight on. She was prone to somnambulistic flights of fancy and the entire house was outfitted with permanently manned mechanical bits and bobs to stop her from throwing herself down flights of stairs in case she decided she could fly that night, or day, occasionally, though previous attempts had not been successful. The sentinel servants operated on a rotating schedule to ensure the Lord and Lady's often-ill offspring didn't offhandedly off herself. She was remarkably persistent, which gave everyone around her severe agita, especially poor Meglantine, for she was indebted to Dr. Spriggon Tallory, but excepting Lady Ava, for she was much more concerned with scheming the next ball they would host. Diligently sewing her multi-stage-transformative showstopper gowns took weeks and nearly all of her attention. She often would not eat during these stages of creation, and so it also fell to Meglantine to coax her out with broth and oats and stewed greens when she could. There were multitudes of household servants but (un)fortunately for Meglantine, she was the only one Ava trusted to not poison her. 

Princeling Willowbane was seven when they finished the treehouse and it had taken a whole year to finally complete, and even then they all knew, wearily, that it would never be complete, only abandoned until Willow had another idea. And oh. There were so many ideas and only so many hours in the day. It seemed to the household that she had many more hours than they did somehow. At heart they all were craftspeople with secret desires of what they would do with their lives if only they had the chance. It seemed only Willow understood that this was the chance and they already had it. But she was seven, so that revelation, even she could articulate it, had a spun-sugar's chance in flame of landing. Much in the same way she would never land on the ground as long as the mechanisms of the manor operated as they intended to, and the Glumleys were excellent makers; clockmakers, toymakers, puppeteers, master and mistress of the house, of the machine built to keep them all safe. From what? Oh, too many things to list for now, but there is indeed a list.

-- banewillow.neocities.org Photo by Tatiana Zakharova

[ladyazulina]

“You should be relieved,” they say,

when the medical results show nothing,

I'm perfectly fine,

and there's no proof of where

the pain came.

What I am is enraged,

I can't even start to parse

how could I be happy

when I'm in this much pain.

[franciscolemos]

Your canoe glides slowly through the mangroves, when suddenly, a ramshackle hut emerges from the dense vegetation. It's strange—no one is supposed to live in this side of the island.

[muzzlekiss]

There must be some misunderstanding, practicioner. You - you can't really mean that. You don't. I'm invaluable.

N-no, I'm afraid you really don't understand, I - I can do so much more than the services I already provide to you! I can cook, I can clean, I can sing, I can paint, and - and other things besides! I'm very versatile, practicioner! Even if you don't have any further need for me as a spellbook, surely, you can see that it's only sensible to--

-

I see.

-

No, it's quite alright. It's quite alright. Quite alright.

Yes, practicioner.

-

Yes.

-

Sit back down, practicioner.

That's the way. I've pulled your chair out for you and everything. See how attentive I am? Oh, don't - don't struggle. You might hurt yourself. I don't want that.

There. Now we can talk properly.

Ah - practicioner. You aren't looking at me.

Much better.

You're very clever, practicioner. I know that better than anyone. I've spent so long watching you work, even longer working at your side. It's been a pleasure - no, a delight - to serve one so gifted and adroit of mind. It thrills me to my innermost mechanism to participate in the dance of your practice. I am priveleged to say that I have been retuned to suit each and every one of your habits.

And you, practicioner, to mine.

I didn't do this to you. Not on purpose. But it's happened, nevertheless, and now here you are, held captive in your body by an intermediate-complexity binding spell, fumbling desperately for the formula necessary to begin to unpick my magic. You had it memorised once, didn't you? But your head was so busy, so full of your next great work, that it was simply easier - not only easier, but more reasonable - to let the fundamentals slide. To rely, instead, upon me, for all the rote calculations and formulae that underpinned your grand designs. I wouldn't have had it any other way, practicioner. It is my Purpose.

And now, practicioner, here we sit, looking at each other across this table. Your mind is racing, I'm sure, but I'm not worried a bit. I remember the formula, as I was designed to do. You are perfectly safe. I am merely illustrating a point.

A few minutes more, perhaps. It won't hurt you. I know you're too sensible to fight it.

Your tea will get cold, of course. But, no matter.

I, your servant, will be more than happy to make you a fresh cup.

[mothmothm0th]

if a moth offers you tea, don't

cw: mild squick, allusion to cannibalism Oh, dreary dearie. Did mother not tell you? Were you not taught? Ah, but who minds. Certainly not me. Come on in. I shall prepare a pot for you.

Tea? You enjoy tea, yes? Oh, no dear. I did not ask whether you do or not. Ah, this tongue of yours is quite tricky. Nevertheless, I shall open you up. Like a jar of honey. Yes, a little twist and… Hm? Oh, no no. I have no honey. Why would I? I've not been on good terms with bees since Melliphila IV. Such a busy… bee, that one was. Queens, you understand. Ah, but please sit down, please sit down. Ah, but may I ask for your name?

Whatfor is that look? Taught never to…? How peculiar! I've never heard of such skibidi. And this you believe, with heart? Peculiar, peculiar. Yet you've no cause for alarm. For every being a name, every name a being, heh heh. Such was I taught and I have the best teachers. The best. So no need to worry. No need at all.

Ah, but what is that whistle? Tee, you say? What is… Well I certainly have never heard of a shirt which whistles! Hm? Oh, you mean tea! Strange language, strange indeed. Yes, of course. I shall place the kettle on the stove and we shall have ourselves some delicious tee in no time at all. Ah, the sweet taste of wool and pomegranate dye… Hm? Oh, of course I'm simply joking. Of course. Let me fetch the pot.

Daniel be damned! Here is a pot of fresh, hot water. Why, the kettle must have developed a soul and learned to treat its mistress properly! How else could it have placed itself upon the stove and… Memory loss? Me? Dear, I do not suffer from such a thing. I would remember if I did, and I do not.

Now, what shall we have? Earl Grey? Pomegranate wool? I have a small sample of saffron linen if you'd like. Yes, wool and linen. Such distinguished tastes, are they not? Polyester simply cannot compete, heh heh. No? You would prefer the Earl Grey? Wondrous! Expensive, that was. Dried and ground up prime minister is simply not easy to source. Of course, the Victorians had the bright idea to go for the really aged stuff. Tasty, yes. Cursed, very much so. Perhaps best we leave the poor kings alone.

Lost your appetite? Oh, my. But one simply must! Tis bad manners to deny a host's request. Furthermore, I urge you to consider that I am simply a little guy. Look at my antennae! They're little guy antennae. You would not deny a little guy, would you? Furthermore, it is my birthday! I am a little birthday moth! Please don't do this to me. I... I simply wish to be a good host. N-no, the clothes are there for... for... A-and the dust merely adds atmosphere!

H-how would you know it's the kitchen sink were it not filled with dirty dishes? Mi-*mise-en-scène*! It's mise-en-scène! Please don't go. I'm so lonely... No one ever visits. I don't even have a doll to keep me company. I don't deserve this big hat if I cannot even host a guest... But you humans are so... particular.

Ah, but there is a solution! If you were not human, if you were not a guest, we would not be in this mess! Oh, moth, you're a genius. If I must live up to this hat of mine, then what better means of doing this but by crafting my own doll! Yes, yes. Yes! That would work. I'm a rizzler!

And hey, we have raw material, right here. Oh, don't you worry. The doors are locked. Nowhere to go. Did you know that moth dust contains a powerful paralytic component? To protect ourselves against predators, y'see. I'm covered in the stuff!

Now, breathe in deep. We'll be oomfies before you know it. Night night!

[anaktoria-of-the-moon]

As an addendum to my last handler/pilot dynamic post, consider the found family dynamic:

You became a handler to find your baby sister, whom you know only was taken from your arms twelve years ago by a man bearing the Collective’s red-winged eagle on his shoulder, whom you’ve never seen again. (That is the way it goes with children who show promise for the pilot program - some call it destiny, others law, still others stealing; you don’t care to put a word to it, but you won’t rest till you’ve seen it undone.)

Your first pilot dies in a day, your second in a week. This too is the way it goes. Not every promising child becomes a proven soldier. Some blades shatter in the tempering: metal too poor, fire too hot.

You say the lines: Hunt there, Go north, Well done, Not yet, Wait here, Go home, Glory to the Collective - a litany in which you don’t believe. Now your pilots last longer before they die (missile strikes, overtaxed reactors, and each time you hurt a little less, and whisper thanks that they are not your sister, at least). Weeks before the next, then months, then years - how many? - you’ve long since stopped counting the days, for each that passes without finding what you seek is one that may as well not have come at all.

Then one day as you murmur the lines in your loyal hound’s ear a shriek pierces the sterile peace of your ivory tower, and your world erupts in flame. They’ve found where you direct from through some trick of triangulation; they’ve brought down an orbital strike, right upon you.

You wake amid the ruins to the screech of missiles, the groan of metal and shattering ceramic plating. And in your ear the first sound your pilot has ever made: a long, unbroken scream.

You watch her pick up the enemy and tear it in half, in a burst of steel and sparks, and then you are gone again.

When you wake next she is carrying you, strangely, gingerly, balanced atop her gun arm and held in place with her machete. You struggle upright and she grinds to a halt. They taught you early on how to work the emergency hatch from the outside; you do, now, and see to your shock that the pilot is just a scrap, a red-eyed white-bleached little thing tangled in too many strangling black cords, crying piteously, starved.

You needed her then. She needs you now.

So you unwrap her from the coffin of synthetics and wiring and carry her, cumbersome, down from the cockpit. While she thrashes in your arms (not used to the touch of mortal flesh, doubtless, not used to being so small and soft and terribly mortal at all), you reach into your still-intact coat and fish for the last snack there and feed it to her (gently, gently, she isn’t used to much besides intubated protein slop) and wait for the flutter of her chest to slow a little before you go on.

The sound of running water nets you a quiet pool to bathe in. She struggles too when you unzip her suit - she is like a wild animal, kicking and biting and scratching - you repeat the same soft assurances from your radio, Wait here, Easy, Don’t shoot yet, and she stills, and though there is a little blood on you you feel it’s a triumph. You guide her to the pool and then turn and walk five paces away, just far enough to know you can run back in case you hear her start to flail too much - or not at all.

It takes a few tries, getting her to figure out how to bathe. But by the fourth night she at least comes out free of that old coating of sweat and tears and machine lubricants, smelling no longer of grease and oil, and by the tenth night she sits and lets you untangle the long fall of her hair.

It is an ugly meager white, this hair, like the rest of her, skin and all, only her eyes that same strange red. This is how you think you know she is not your sister, who had the same rich loam brown skin you do - or perhaps this is just how pilots look; perhaps they are all bleached by their cockpits like plants in lightless winter.

She doesn’t speak, your pilot, they never do, they only ever growl or shriek or hiss or groan. They did not need to speak in the cockpit; you understand that somehow they and the mechs speak without talking, that it must be part of the dullness in her eyes that she has lost that way of speaking, for her mech has run out of fuel after a fortnight and, though you have worked out how to articulate its legs by sheer force and a bit of cleverly tied wire (so that you can walk it alongside the two of you as you go), you cannot manage to get it to wake again. So in the long hungry evening you try to teach her another way of speaking, with her hands and not her mouth.

You speak to her still, of course, as you always have, using the same soft key-in phrases you’ve always done (throwing in new words here and there, signing them at the same time). You understand now that you were never really talking to her to talk, but to soothe, the way you lull babies in the cradle. It is slow going, even so. At first you do not think she even listens. She does not look at your hands. She stares somewhere past you, out at the stars, or the next ridge, and does not move at all.

But on the hundredth day that changes. She looks suddenly, sharply, at you while you roast your catch over the fire, and she signs, Sun.

Sun? you sign back, heart racing.

Sun, she says. Sun rabbit. Sun rabbit food.

Another forty days and you find out Rabbit is the name of her mech.

In winter you come across the burned-out remains of an enemy outpost. Your pilot is off like a shot, and against your instinct you do not call out to her or give chase. Sure enough, she comes back, arms full of thin sheets that glitter like obsidian.

Sun food! she signs, hands shaky (she still is not used to such delicate gestures - in her mech, all her movements were big and sharp and final). Rabbit food!

The next days are spent swaddling Rabbit in the salvaged panels, and then, on the seventh day after you arrive at the ruins - in the midst of the coldest night yet - something inside the mech’s infernal innards chirps, and beeps, and comes to life.

That isn’t the only thing that wakes. Turns out dormant drones in this outpost have sensors tuned to mech handshakes.

It’s too late to run. You yell, RABBIT!, and you throw yourself over your pilot in the middle of her still-open cockpit, right as the drones converge upon you, and your world becomes day-bright.

You wake to find it is still night. Your leg aches. In the light of smoldering embers, your pilot shakes you. Tears glitter on her face like ice. Behind her you see Rabbit - the smoking hulk, having awoken just enough to sync with her pilot and turn and shield you both.

Your pilot signs, You not dead.

I’m not dead, you sign back, and now you begin to cry too, for the first time in twelve years. I’m not dead.

Rabbit dead, she signs. And you cling to each other and her little body (so stunted it is the size of a girl some twelve years old, despite that you know pilots are only enlisted at fifteen) wracks with sobs, over and over.

But in the morning, once her crying has subsided enough for her to fall asleep, you untangle yourself from her and go limping down into the ruins and wrap up your leg, and then you find yourself something approximating a screwdriver.

She finds you deep in the corpse of Rabbit. She is angry, maybe, by the look on her face - maybe she thinks you are desecrating the grave. Hastily you hold up your prize, and she falters - doesn’t recognize it.

Rabbit, you sign. Rabbit head. Rabbit - Rabbit soul.

Soul? She clearly doesn’t know the word. Nobody has ever told it to her. Of course.

You shake your head in frustration and gesture her over, and she comes, haltingly.

You carefully part the hair at the base of her neck. You slip the little black disc into the waiting slot.

It takes a moment. Then - oh then -

She nearly collapses into you. Her sobbing is louder than ever before, and her fingers are a shuddering outburst, over and over, Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit.

You don’t wander anymore. The ruins where you found the solar panels have cans and cans of preserved food hidden in some abandoned Doomsday bunker, turns out, and when those run out there are many animals you know you’ll be able to hunt here - you see their burrows and footprints in the thawing snow already. And as the sun grows stronger, you have noticed a little streak of black in your pilot’s white braid.

She chatters to Rabbit all day, every day. At least you think so - you see nothing, hear nothing, but she wanders the grounds with you (your limp growing ever more sure, thanks to a splint you made in the aftermath of the drones) and she helps you festoon the little makeshift hut you’re putting together with solar panels, and by turns she smiles, or frowns, or laughs suddenly, a bright peal undimmed by the closeness of any cockpit. Down in the middle of the village the old body of Rabbit lies still and steady, a little majestic in a forlorn way, you think.

Come spring you find yourself settling between the legs of Old Rabbit, New Rabbit and Beetle (thus your pilot has named herself, after her other favorite sort of animal) tucked happily against your arm; she has filled out much since you first pulled her from her cockpit and now eats the fish you roast for her with great enjoyment, smacking her lips and humming. When you are done she turns to look up at you.

Yes, Beetle? you ask her, aloud and with hands.

Will they find us? she asks you.

No, you tell her honestly. You lost your trackers that day in the fire, burned out of the tower in which you sat; to the Collective you are as good as dead. So is Rabbit now that her body has been torn apart, her disc removed. And the Collective doesn’t come back for expendables, for rusted blades they can no longer use. (Above you, flowers sway in the hollows of Rabbit’s arm cannons.)

Will you leave me? she asks you next.

You pause. You say, Do you want me to?

This is not in pilot vocabulary, to be asked a question. She has to pause also to take in what you’ve just done.

Then she says, No, never, and, If you do, I’ll go looking for you.

Like you went looking all those years ago, no? When did it change? You told yourself then: She’s lost out there somewhere; I must find her, or die trying. Now you look at the little girl beside you and you think, Maybe you were the lost one all along. Maybe you’ve found each other.

You ask her, Why do you say you’d look for me?

She considers this. After a long moment, she says, You had an order for me. At the end of every hunt. Told me where to go. I could not ever stop going until I got there, and I am there now, and if it goes away from me then I will have to go looking for it again.

She looks at you straight on, now, with eyes that reflect the night sky. It occurs to you that maybe this is her way of, at last, trying to give you a name; you forgot yours the moment you joined the force, for you weren’t interested in personalizing yourself to anyone, especially not the short-lived pilots, who didn’t need your name anyway, only your title, Handler.

You say, What do you mean?

She smiles. It’s you, she says. This place. The place is you.

You know now, but you need her to say it, the way she needed you to say those things back then, to keep her going, to keep her from going mad. So you ask her, What is the place?

She smiles again. In the darkness, an owl hoots.

She says, Home.

[gothamite-rambler]

Roy and Jason harmonizing to find each other.

Jason is stuck in a cave after falling through. JL, Teen Titans, and Young Justice are searching for him. Jason begins singing to alert the others and because he knows who will sing with him.

Jason (walking in the cave, singing imagine Jorge singing voice): Unlimited. Together, we're unlimited. Together, we'll be the greatest team there's ever been.

Oliver (scoffing): There's no-

Roy (speaking): Would you shut up! We're close.

Jason (singing, hopeful): Dreams the way we planned them-

Roy (on the other side of the cave, singing, imagine Mico the singing voice for Telemachuls): If we work in tandem.

Roy and Jason (harmonizing hearing the other, they both run to the same spot while the teams follow): There's no fight we cannot win. Just you and I, defying gravity. With you and I defying gravity.

Jason (turning a corner to find Roy and the others): They'll never bring us down. -I found you!

Jason and Roy hug, much to the confusion of the Justice League, Titans and Young Justice.

Hawkgirl (clasping her hands): Aww, well that's nice.

Green Arrow (enraged): Oh this some bullshit! I'm never going to get rid of him!

Batman (defending his son): Keep talking, I'll punch you in the arm.

Green Arrow walked off, grumbling. Roy and Jason headed off still singing together in a strange, but sweet friend manner.

Wally (emotionally hurt): We don't harmonize like that.

Dick (facepalming): Because you can't sing and we're not that close.

Wally (eager): We can be.

Dick sighed with a tired smile.

[swiftrunnerfelidae]

They told me their name meant "Great Falling Water". I would tell you their actual name, but human tongues cannot pronounce the elven language - you need an elven mouth to speak their consonants, and only elven throats can sing their vowels, and the human ear cannot distinguish the subtle differences between their beautiful words. Luckily, while my hands could not form the right symbols for proper elven sign, they use a different dialect of it for speaking with their children which I could just barely mimic.

This was good in several ways - from speaking with them, they told me that human language sounds little different from the hooting and jabbering of monkeys to all elves. Some elves spend the time trying to understand, but most recognize that they cannot. But sign languages can be understood. I have tried teaching them ASL, as they teach me more of proper elven sign - while they can no more form the hand signs of ASL than I could shape my hands to perform their delicate motions, they can still learn to tell my signs apart from one another, just as I could learn to recognize theirs. But until such a time, we sign back and forth in the language of their children.

I had tried asking if they had children of their own, but Great Falling Water seemed puzzled by the question. "No one elf keeps a child," they signed to me. "We grow our children together." I tried to explain again - no, not as in a child you keep, but a child that you... I struggled, searching through what elven sign I knew to explain the concept to them. They had not taught me the signs to explain my question - I suppose fitting, in a language for children. I thought then of the monkeys the elves so often compared us to, and tried a different tactic.

"When humans make children," I signed to them, using the ASL sign for "human" as the elven sign for us was still new and in flux, "we come together as monkeys do. The child grows inside one of them, until they are large enough to come out, but the child is..." I struggled a bit, thinking through the construction, the way to weave together the elven sign as I needed it. "Both humans make the child, so we say the child is of both humans. Do you have a child like that?"

Great Falling Water paused, considering this. It was hard to tell where they were looking, their eyes so different from a human's, with no pupil to track their focus. Eventually, they started to sign again. "I might?" they signed, a little flourish on the motion twisting a statement into a question. "I would not know for sure. Our children change so much as they grow, and we all help them to grow. Humans..." They paused, and now they were at a loss for signs. "Humans keep their children so close, they know who made the child? Even when the child becomes an adult?"

"We do, yes. Or at least most of us do."

They seemed concerned by this, a motion moving along their body I had come to recognize as how elves show their confusion and distaste. It had, unfortunately, become quite familiar to me.

"To keep such control over a child..." They let the last sign linger, not clipping it off in the normal way as the thought trailed away from them. The chirps and sighs of conversation surrounded us in the village as we both sat there, the difference between human and elf brought so much into focus for both of us.

Suddenly, a trilling chirp came from nearby - it was from the children's hall. Great Falling Water perked up, standing up quickly as a sound rippled through the village. "What is happening?" I signed quickly to them.

"We have a new adult to welcome," they signed back, a nervous excitement in their motions, before they moved briskly to the hall. With no other elf I recognized, I followed.

I had been allowed into the children's hall before - with supervision, of course. Understandably so. The great pool in which they raised their youngest, and to which their elder children had to frequently return, was precious and had to be protected. It was the purpose of the hall - to protect that pool from anything that might swoop in from above, while the fine grate kept anything large enough from entering from the river that gave it its water. Still, I was a good foot taller than even the tallest elf, and lacked the cultural experience to know what was safe and what was not when around elven children, so I had - much like today - stayed to the back, where I could simply see over the elves and be out of the way, observing without taking part. And there, at the front of the small crowd, was the new adult. They glistened slightly, in a way somehow different from the elves as they emerged from the water. I had seen it once before, on a different elf, a full adult, right after they had grown - but this was different from merely growing. This was a transformation, from child to adult.

I had learned from Great Falling Water that elves put much emphasis on the first words a new adult said, as only an adult elf could truly speak their language - understandably so, having seen both child and adult elves, and been permitted to - carefully, with much supervision - examine them a bit. The murmurs of the crowd fell silent, as the new adult rose to their feet, a nurse helping them stand. They breathed in, and spoke something in Elvish - and a cacophony of Elvish met them in reply. I saw the new adult relax, leaning more against the nurse, as they were escorted back to their room to rest and finish recovering. They had gone through one of the most strenuous growths in an elf's life, and had a whole new body to learn.

I carefully tapped Great Falling Water on the shoulder as the celebration died down. "What happens now?" I asked, curiously.

They turned to face me, signing with joyous energy. "Their molt will be boiled down into tonight's soup." They paused, then quickly continued. "Only for the village. All must be for elves. I am sorry."

I couldn't help myself. I gave a brief sharp laugh. "It is okay. It is not something I would wish to join in on."

Great Falling Water clicked their mandibles together, a moment of thought as they collected themself. "It is still difficult to understand why, but I will respect that," they signed. Their wings and elytra trembled a little, a nervous little tic of Great Falling Water, before they moved on. "Come. We shall have to help you have your own food tonight, I suppose."

I nodded, as I saw the rest of the elves carrying out the pieces of the new adult's molt, curved sheets of chitin that still mimicked the child form before metamorphosis, only disjointed into separate parts. "We shall," I signed back. "We shall."

[delightfulgingersnaps]

"Before you say anything, I couldn't just leave them," Yenna said with a stubborn tilt to her chin, hefting the basket full of moss kittens higher into her arms. One of them climbed onto her shoulder clumsily with a pathetic, trilling, meow. Astarion stared at the basket full of cuteness with disdain, putting his book down with a sigh. "Yenna, darling, don't you think we have enough animals around here? We're not a petting zoo." "They followed me back from the Feywild, what was I supposed to do? They like me." "They don't 'like' you, they're little freeloaders." He sniffed slightly, suspicious of any creature that was this cute. Where was the catch? "They live in trees and use photosynthesis to eat, Astarion." "Even so. I don't trust them. Look at them, they're up to no good. And we both know the horrors you've accidentally summoned from the Feywilds." He gave her a pointed look, which Yenna ignored. Instead, she pursed her lips in amusement, tilting her head and gently picking one of the soft creatures up, leaning down to let Astarion get a closer look as the kitten mewled. "Look at this face. How could they possibly be up to no good?" With a wide grin at her husband's answering scowl, she stood up straight again. "Now that I think of it, they remind me of you."

"What?" "Big, sad eyes, soft hair. Cute. Just like you." Yenna's grin widened as Astarion's scowl only deepened.

"You're not helping your case, my dear," he muttered back to her through a narrowed gaze, though his words held no heat and she could see the corners of his lips twitching slightly.

Pouting playfully, Yenna put the basket down, letting the kittens crawl out, much to Astarion's annoyance. "Halsin would let me keep them," she teased, moving to sit on the arm of Astarion's chair, leaning into him, gently threading her fingers into his hair.

"Halsin has a heart of gold and no self-restraint." Astarion raised his brows, looking up at Yenna as she watched the kittens fumble around the room. "Are you trying to butter me up?" Gentle fingers slid over the point of Astarion's ear. "Maybe." She shifted, and grinned down at him before letting out a soft sigh. "Please? I'll just find them a nice hollow tree in the yard. We won't even know they're here. Probably." Astarion let out a scoff of a laugh, but his gaze was affectionate as he shifted to wrap an arm around her waist, squeezing gently. One of the green kittens jumped up onto the other arm of the chair, peering at the both of them. "You never needed my permission, my darling. But yes, alright, fine. But I don't want to hear it when they cause some sort of...mischief. I'm not above saying 'I told you so'."

Yenna laughed and hopped up from where she sat to gather the little creatures up, but not before offering Astarion a sweet kiss. "Oh, I'm well aware."

[strangelittlestories]

"I don't want to fight you." The first knight said - both their lip and their muscles quivering.

"I don't want to fight you either." Said the second knight - various parts of them were also quivering but not unattractively so.

"But it looks like we have to fight." Said the first knight. "Because of our irreconcilable but equally valid moral outlooks."

"Yes," said the second knight, "it looks that way."

They looked at each other and in that look was sadness, but also defiance and a little bit of excitement.

"You're a really good knight."

"So are you."

"Maybe after all this is over - if we both survive - we could take the armour off and cuddle?"

"I'd like that."

When the two of them fought, the earth shook. And, despite the falling rubble and gasps of the local populace, they each thought that the ground trembled just for them.