#pulp fiction imagine

[starcurtain]

Teyvat's "Most Down Bad" Award Goes to Alhaitham for a Second Year Running

Seeing everyone making fun of Alhaitham for his "stalkerish" tendencies in this event is funny, because I feel like a lot of people missed that "Be literally everywhere Kaveh is" has been Alhaitham's MO from the day Kaveh appeared in the game.

From only grabbing his house keys after Kaveh returned from the desert (he couldn't have had both sets of keys at the end of the Archon Quest unless he went home and got Kaveh's copy) to ditching conversations to get back to his house only after Kaveh came home, to showing up without any warning or explanation in Kaveh's hangout with some ridiculous excuse about hearing his voice through noise-cancelling headphones... Refusing to offer any help in the Temple of Silence story quest other than staying in the library with Kaveh...

Since when does Alhaitham willingly cover anyone else's duties?

But this trend of "Be everywhere Kaveh is" didn't start when they were adults. It was already in place when they were still Akademiya students--and it's a trend that didn't end even when they had their fight.

Even when they weren't speaking, Alhaitham dogged Kaveh's every step through published responses to Kaveh's research articles in academic journals. He insisted on keeping a line of communication between himself and Kaveh open, even if the only way to do that was through very public ideological clashes. Pulling Kaveh's pigtails to get his attention lolol. It's implied that, for at least the few years between their fight and Kaveh moving in, this was the only communication between them--Alhaitham's refusal to allow their connection to entirely fade away. (And the fact that this is revealed in Kaveh's character stories--through his precious journal that records the moments of his life that had the most impact on him--shows just how deeply he values the fact that Alhaitham didn't give up.)

Another relevant side note: Alhaitham never asked Kaveh to give up his half of their house. Knowing half of it belonged to Kaveh, knowing that Kaveh may one day want to reclaim his part of it, knowing that it was listed as theirs, Alhaitham moved into the house and made zero effort to change its ownership. He was completely fine with living in "his and Kaveh's house." The stories suggest it was only months later (or even longer) that Kaveh even noticed he had the house, and he transferred away ownership of his portion without Alhaitham ever asking him (or even seemingly wanting him) to do so.

Please, let that sink in. Alhaitham actively left his grandmother's (presumably comfortable) house to move into "his and Kaveh's house," with no apparent explanation for why, and after doing so, he made no attempt to change that "his and Kaveh's" label. He moved into the house with no promise that Kaveh wouldn't show up on the doorstep the very next day and move in too. It almost feels like another deliberate provocation--I've moved into our house, are you going to come stop me? LBR, if Alhaitham had had his way, Kaveh would have been living there with him from Day 1...

There's also the fact that Kaveh literally can't write on a single message board anywhere in the entire nation of Sumeru without Alhaitham hunting his messages down and responding to them (which absolutely no one else does, by the way).

"NUH-UH!" "UH-HUH." "NUH-UH!"

Alhaitham's own character stories tell us explicitly that one of Alhaitham's defining character traits is "He is never where you need him to be," yet somehow...

Shot, and chaser:

Any time Kaveh is in the slightest bit of need or danger or just wants Alhaitham near, Alhaitham is "coincidentally" exactly where Kaveh needs him to be, whenever Kaveh needs him to be there.

Alhaitham didn't just "happen" to run into Kaveh in Port Ormos, an entirely different city from where he was supposed to be working. He didn't just "happen" to read the same terrible book as Kaveh when we know he otherwise would not waste a moment of his time on poorly-written literature...

He didn't just "happen" to appear when Kaveh was upset and needed a distraction in the House of Daena during Kaveh's hangout. He didn't just "happen" to be sitting around waiting when Kaveh needed answers after the Archon Quest. He didn't just "happen" to find Kaveh's academic publications and every single message board posting and respond to them at length and in public.

Which is exactly what Kaveh's mother told Kaveh he needed.

What level of down bad is "Abusing your powers as an Akademiya employee to keep tabs on your crush's library loans"? Just asking for a friend.

The only person for whom Alhaitham just "happens" to be available is Kaveh, over and over and over again--because he is very deliberately making himself a constant presence in Kaveh's life.

(Like, out of all things, I think people really underestimate the devs deliberately paralleling the romantic relationship between Kaveh's mother and father with Kaveh and Alhaitham's relationship. If you want to point to one thing that says "These two characters are intentionally queer-coded," it doesn't get any more obvious than this.)

Alhaitham, are you not embarrassed to be this transparent??? 🫣

[spooky-activity]

A little after this happened, the two ran into some remnants of the Swarm! Just what is the Trailblazer up to?

[mmmmalo]

Nice observation from a mostly OK article about Pulp Fiction:

It is easy to miss, but Vinnie’s “incontinence”—and I mean this in the ordinary sense of the word—is the master key to the movie, and the monkey wrench. Everything bad that happens to Vinnie is signaled by what’s happening in the bathroom. The “fourth man” with the hand cannon is hiding in the bathroom when Vinnie and Jules make the “hit” in the apartment, but Jules takes the hint and Vinnie doesn’t get it. Vinnie is in the bathroom when Honey Bunny and Pumpkin pull their guns at the coffee shop to create the Mexican stand-off. Vinnie is in the bathroom when Mia Wallace mistakes his heroin for cocaine (saving them both from an impending and very disloyal tryst). And Vinnie is in the bathroom when Butch returns for his beloved watch, which is the end of Vinnie. We do see Jules in the bathroom once, and we do see Butch there once: each is washing off the stain of a former life he intends to leave behind. And Tarantino makes it very, very clear that Vinnie does not wash his hands, showing him emerging from the bathroom at Butch’s apartment immediately after he flushes the toilet, still fastening his belt. You think I’m making too much of it. If so, then why do Jules and Vinnie have an argument about washing their hands in Jimmie’s bathroom? And I quote: Jules: What the fuck did you just do to his towel? Vincent: I was just dryin’ my hands. Jules: You’re supposed to wash ’em first. Vincent: You watched me wash ’em. Jules: I watched you get ’em wet. Vincent: I washed ’em. Blood’s real hard to get off. Maybe if he had some Lava, I coulda done a better job. Jules: I used the same soap you did and when I dried my hands, the towel didn’t look like a fuckin’ maxipad.

[dirt-goth]

Recommend me problematic fiction books please.

Everything I've read in months has been like bios and depressing political analysis but every time I try reading fiction again I keep getting rec'd these YA tropey dumb books where the word Fuck is taboo 🙄🙄 Where is the cannibalism and violence and self recognitions through the most toxic parts of characters and ourselves🙄

[platonicosmos]

Hanging around with my friend Murakami 📖📚

[mourning-again-in-america]

ad hoc smol scott pilgrim inspired playlist:

"Find a Scott Pilgrim inspired playlist that doesn't contain a song from Metric" Challenge Rating: Impossible

[theresattrpgforthat]

Mint's TTRPG Library

Here is a list of links to the Collections I add Itch.io games to on the regular, where I often go to in search for games to meet folks' recommendation requests.

These collections are large and unwieldy. I'm not certain that they're easy to navigate, but if you want to do some browsing, you certainly have options!

Systems

Belonging Outside Belonging Breathless Caltrop Core Charge Descended from the Queen Firebrands Forged in the Dark Honey Games (Honey Heist) Into the Odd Lasers + Feelings LUMEN Par-AGON (Paragon System) PbtA Push Together We Go Troika (A bunch of Troika supplements) Tunnel Goons (AKA Goon Games) What’s So Cool About _?

Genre

Adventure - With Pulp! (Westerns, Dinosaurs, Spies, Time Travel) Bittersweet Futures (Post-Apocalypse) Botanical Adventures (Plants) Bring Me The Evidence! (Mysteries) Cogs and Steam (Steampunk) Delicious Delights (Food & Cooking) Dirtpunk (Revolution, Rebellion, Fighting) Eras Both Real & Imagined (Historical, Faux-Historical) Everyone Loves A Competition (Competitions, Sports) Fae and Fen (Faeries & Goblins) Fangs, Fangs, Fangs (Vampires) Grim & Gritty (Gritty & Grimdark Fantasy) Hearts & Threads (Romance) Manners & Mischief (Social & Political) Mechs and Tech (Mechs & Robots) Modern-Day Mishaps (Modern-Day Setting) Monsters & Mutants (Monsters, Monster Hunters, Pokemon - simulators) Neon Lights & Cyber Nights (Cyberpunk) Oh So Anime (Anime & Manga themed) Paranormal Activity (Ghosts, Cryptids, Death) Pastoral & Cozy (Cozy Games, Witch Games) Paws and Feathers and Scales (Animals) Sorcerous Intentions (Magic-Users) Stars and Science (Science-Fiction, Space) Sword & Sorcery & So Much More (General Fantasy) Teenage Hijinx (Teenagers) The Sea Calls (Oceans, Aquatic, Pirates) With Great Power (Superheroes, Magical Girls, Fantasy Superpowers)

Other

Abstract Games & System Bones (SRDs, Genre-less) By Pen and Paper Played (Epistolary Games) Funky Fresh Flavors (Miscellaneous) GM-Less Solitary Adventures (Solo Games) System-Neutral Settings (Adventures & Settings) The Art of Creation (Collaborative World-building) Two Can Play At That Game (Duet Games)

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Fantasy

The Fantasy Fiction Continuum

Fantasy - as a genre, begins when the author inserts an element of the impossible into his/her conceit, making it a fantasy conceit.

Fantasy Conceit - what the creator intends to explore in the world, it is where the constructed world deviates from the real world, usually in the form of geography, biology, physics, metaphysics, technology, or culture.

Fiction set in the modern age sits closest to Non-Fiction since it shares the existing real-world setting. Audiences understand and identify with the modern setting, and therefore the author does not need to inject as much imagination into explaining the world around the characters.

Historical Fiction - edges a little further into the realm of Fantastical. The author must describe a past world that modern readers are unfamiliar with by painting mental pictures of times, locations, customs, and cultures that no longer exist.

Overlaid Fantasy - the Fantasy Conceit and real world comingle. A major component is that it is plausible, which is to say it still adheres to our real-world natural and societal laws with the exception of the Fantasy Conceit, at which point it diverges. Subgenres: Urban Fantasy and the Superhero genre.

Historical Fantasy - requires more fantastical elements than its modern Overlaid Fantasy counterparts and therefore sits a little more to the right on the spectrum as the author applies his/her Fantasy Conceit to a bygone age.

Secondary Worlds - stories where we have left our modern reality so that our story takes place in a setting that is decided not-Earth. At this point all plausibility that existed in our Overlaid Fantasy is out the window in that the audience no longer has the anchor of the modern world with only the Fantasy Conceit being different, but must literally discover a new world. This subgenre should always be logical, as in they adhere to their own rules established at the beginning and remain consistent to them throughout. These stories contain pretty much all the subgenres that don’t explicitly take place on Earth, but may be grouped into Low Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, and High Fantasy.

Low fantasy - set in the real world; includes unexpected magical elements that shock characters, like the plastic figurines come to life in Lynne Reid Banks’s The Indian in the Cupboard (1980).

Sword and sorcery - a subset of high fantasy, it focuses on sword-wielding heroes, such as the titular barbarian in Robert E. Howard’s Conan pulp fiction stories, as well as magic or witchcraft.

High fantasy - in comparison to the above two subgenres, high fantasy contains the most magic and has more additional races.

Magical Realism and Nonsense - when logic disappears yet fantastical elements remain.

Sources: 1 2 ⚜ Writing Notes & References

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The Coprophagic AI crisis

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me in TORONTO on Mar 22, then with LAURA POITRAS in NYC on Mar 24, then Anaheim, and more!

A key requirement for being a science fiction writer without losing your mind is the ability to distinguish between science fiction (futuristic thought experiments) and predictions. SF writers who lack this trait come to fancy themselves fortune-tellers who SEE! THE! FUTURE!

The thing is, sf writers cheat. We palm cards in order to set up pulp adventure stories that let us indulge our thought experiments. These palmed cards – say, faster-than-light drives or time-machines – are narrative devices, not scientifically grounded proposals.

Historically, the fact that some people – both writers and readers – couldn't tell the difference wasn't all that important, because people who fell prey to the sf-as-prophecy delusion didn't have the power to re-orient our society around their mistaken beliefs. But with the rise and rise of sf-obsessed tech billionaires who keep trying to invent the torment nexus, sf writers are starting to be more vocal about distinguishing between our made-up funny stories and predictions (AKA "cyberpunk is a warning, not a suggestion"):

https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2023/11/dont-create-the-torment-nexus.html

In that spirit, I'd like to point to how one of sf's most frequently palmed cards has become a commonplace of the AI crowd. That sleight of hand is: "add enough compute and the computer will wake up." This is a shopworn cliche of sf, the idea that once a computer matches the human brain for "complexity" or "power" (or some other simple-seeming but profoundly nebulous metric), the computer will become conscious. Think of "Mike" in Heinlein's *The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Moon_Is_a_Harsh_Mistress#Plot

For people inflating the current AI hype bubble, this idea that making the AI "more powerful" will correct its defects is key. Whenever an AI "hallucinates" in a way that seems to disqualify it from the high-value applications that justify the torrent of investment in the field, boosters say, "Sure, the AI isn't good enough…yet. But once we shovel an order of magnitude more training data into the hopper, we'll solve that, because (as everyone knows) making the computer 'more powerful' solves the AI problem":

https://locusmag.com/2023/12/commentary-cory-doctorow-what-kind-of-bubble-is-ai/

As the lawyers say, this "cites facts not in evidence." But let's stipulate that it's true for a moment. If all we need to make the AI better is more training data, is that something we can count on? Consider the problem of "botshit," Andre Spicer and co's very useful coinage describing "inaccurate or fabricated content" shat out at scale by AIs:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4678265

"Botshit" was coined last December, but the internet is already drowning in it. Desperate people, confronted with an economy modeled on a high-speed game of musical chairs in which the opportunities for a decent livelihood grow ever scarcer, are being scammed into generating mountains of botshit in the hopes of securing the elusive "passive income":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/15/passive-income-brainworms/#four-hour-work-week

Botshit can be produced at a scale and velocity that beggars the imagination. Consider that Amazon has had to cap the number of self-published "books" an author can submit to a mere three books per day:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/sep/20/amazon-restricts-authors-from-self-publishing-more-than-three-books-a-day-after-ai-concerns

As the web becomes an anaerobic lagoon for botshit, the quantum of human-generated "content" in any internet core sample is dwindling to homeopathic levels. Even sources considered to be nominally high-quality, from Cnet articles to legal briefs, are contaminated with botshit:

https://theconversation.com/ai-is-creating-fake-legal-cases-and-making-its-way-into-real-courtrooms-with-disastrous-results-225080

Ironically, AI companies are setting themselves up for this problem. Google and Microsoft's full-court press for "AI powered search" imagines a future for the web in which search-engines stop returning links to web-pages, and instead summarize their content. The question is, why the fuck would anyone write the web if the only "person" who can find what they write is an AI's crawler, which ingests the writing for its own training, but has no interest in steering readers to see what you've written? If AI search ever becomes a thing, the open web will become an AI CAFO and search crawlers will increasingly end up imbibing the contents of its manure lagoon.

This problem has been a long time coming. Just over a year ago, Jathan Sadowski coined the term "Habsburg AI" to describe a model trained on the output of another model:

https://twitter.com/jathansadowski/status/1625245803211272194

There's a certain intuitive case for this being a bad idea, akin to feeding cows a slurry made of the diseased brains of other cows:

https://www.cdc.gov/prions/bse/index.html

But "The Curse of Recursion: Training on Generated Data Makes Models Forget," a recent paper, goes beyond the ick factor of AI that is fed on botshit and delves into the mathematical consequences of AI coprophagia:

https://arxiv.org/abs/2305.17493

Co-author Ross Anderson summarizes the finding neatly: "using model-generated content in training causes irreversible defects":

https://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2023/06/06/will-gpt-models-choke-on-their-own-exhaust/

Which is all to say: even if you accept the mystical proposition that more training data "solves" the AI problems that constitute total unsuitability for high-value applications that justify the trillions in valuation analysts are touting, that training data is going to be ever-more elusive.

What's more, while the proposition that "more training data will linearly improve the quality of AI predictions" is a mere article of faith, "training an AI on the output of another AI makes it exponentially worse" is a matter of fact.

Name your price for 18 of my DRM-free ebooks and support the Electronic Frontier Foundation with the Humble Cory Doctorow Bundle.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/14/14/inhuman-centipede#enshittibottification

Image: Plamenart (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Double_Mobius_Strip.JPG

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

[the-sappho-of-lesbos]

Lesbian Pulp Breakdown #2

Here for another pulp breakdown ! (Finally 🙈)

This one will also have spoilers and lots of triggering content. Please be warned.

This pulp fiction breakdown is for Lesbian Love by SV Miller. 100%, absolutely written by a straight man. This book is WILD, and significantly worse than the last one I posted about Alone At Last, which I didn’t think was possible. Because that one was a train wreck.

So in this one we have our protagonist Aggie; now Aggie is married to a man called Jim but she also sleeps around and has affairs a lot. The first three chapters, if I recall, were literally just her having affairs with other men and then getting mad at her husband for accusing her of having affairs. Her and Jim have a very toxic and volatile relationship, as well as being very inconsistent in the way they approach each other, the way the approach themselves and their marriage. It’s wild.

Anyway, she gets to the point where she’s like: I don’t want to be in this marriage anymore. I don’t like him. I don’t like what we’re doing. We’re always fighting, throwing things at each other and then we end up being intimate. She hated it. Then she found an advertisement for a sanctuary away from men that was supposed to heal her, heal the relationship and get her away from there; BUT to get there she had to have a lot of money so she ended up having even more of an affair and putting herself in very dangerous situations to get the money. Though when she did, phew, off she went - she was there. It was all secret and she was given these very weird and ominous directions to get there, she wasn’t allowed to bring certain things with her etc.

When Aggie is there, it becomes very clear to us, the reader, she has just entered a massive cult. It’s also when this book just dives head first into all of its problems.

This isn’t to say Alone At Last was a good book by any stretch of the imagination, however, it did hold little nuggets of positivity, mainly in the areas of acknowledging homosexuality was natural and not having the main lesbian character end up dead or in an institution. This book can’t even say it has that going for it.

This pulp genuinely felt like a homophobic pamphlet fever dream.

There was so much sexual assault in this book committed by a lesbian, but sometimes the author would jump around on if it was assault or not in a very uncomfortable way that felt like it was rooted in a fetish.

So we have our lead lady, Aggie, introduced to this lesbian commune that is run by the lesbian dictator Helen. A rich woman set on assaulting women, keeping them trapped in this isolated location, and “turning” them gay - or as this book likes to paint it, corrupting women to sin.

There is a massive emphasis all throughout the book about how broken, unnatural and wrong lesbians are, ( the very last line is “I feel … normal!”) while simultaneously sexualising them for male titillation. With big strong men to come in towards the end and save them all.

It tries to entice us into the plot with this evil lesbian cult commune plot , where women are forced to pair up with one anther in this instance Aggie is forced to be with both Helen and a woman called Grace ; Grace is also the character Aggie ends up snot being attracted to, but only because she is in a “perverse” place). These women are locked up in torcher chambers if they don’t comply to the Evil Lesbians or try to run away.

In the end this pulp is probably a textbook example of what people think of nowadays when they think of old school lesbian pulp. With terrible writing on top! It was genuinely a slog to get through. Even though it’s relatively small it took me 4 months to finish reading it because it was just so terrible and had no redeeming qualities about it. Just a terrible mess of assault, homophobia and horrible writing.

Let’s hope the next one is better.

[javierpena-inatacvest]

Movie Night

Summary: You and Javi are trying to pick a movie to watch together. When Javi decides to change into gray sweatpants to get more comfortable... something else besides movie watching ensues.

Word Count: 2.3K

Pairing: Javier Peña x f!reader (no use of y/n)

Warnings: SMUT (18+), established relationship, face fucking, oral (m receiving), mastrubation (f), praise kink, Javi in gray sweatpants (it deserves its own warning), reader has hair that can be held, Javi being a menace but still soft and sweet (because that's just how I roll)

A/N: This was inspired by an ask from an anon (thank you, non, Javi in gray sweatpants is everything), and I'm absolutely feral completely normal about it!!! Also, I had this gif in mind the whole time I was writing this because GOD DAMN 🥴🥵

This can be read as a stand alone, or as a part of the It's Never Too Late Series!!

“Forrest Gump?” 

“No…” 

“Jaws?” 

“No, not that either…” 

“Pulp Fiction?” 

“Not that one…” 

“Well ya gotta pick something Osita.” Javi sighed, laughing to himself at your indecisiveness as he put back the VHS tape choices he had pulled out for your weekly Friday night movie. Ever since the two of you had started dating, Friday nights had been exclusively reserved for you and Javi cuddling up on your couch, eating the pizza he picked up on the way home from work, and catching him up on the many movie classics he had missed since his time away in Colombia- a well deserved way to end both of your weeks. The first few weeks of movie night picks had been easy- mandating that Javi had to watch all of the Star Wars and Indiana Jones series (your two personal favorites) before moving on to anything else. You had let Javi pick what movies he had wanted to watch from there, mostly to curb any time wasted from your indecisiveness on choosing something. 

“Are you sure you don’t wanna pick?” You groaned, squatting down next to Javi as the two of you sorted through the movie collection under the TV stand. 

“Osita, I’ve picked like, the last 3 weeks in a row. I promise, I don’t care what we watch. I’ll make it easy on you. Here…” Reaching back into the TV stand, Javi pulled out a few random movies, scattering them on the ground before looking back at you. “I’m gonna go change out of my work clothes, pick something from these by the time I get back. Only 4 choices. Can’t be that hard, ya dork.” Javi chuckled, pressing a quick kiss onto your forehead before standing back up and making his way towards the bedroom. 

‘Fine…” You grumbled, shuffling through the choices that Javi had left. Reaching down next to you, you picked up “The Princess Bride”, deeming it the best of the 4 random tapes Javi had pulled from the TV stand, popping it in to the VHS player before settling back onto the couch, curling up in one of the blankets you had draped over the sides. “I picked something!” You shouted towards the bedroom, hearing Javi’s footsteps beginning to make their way down the hall. 

“See? Knew you could do it, Hermosa.” Javi’s voice trailed behind him as he stepped into the living room, playfully rolling his eyes at you. “So, what are we watching?” 

Truth be told, you hadn’t heard a single word Javi had said since you had watched him enter the living room- Not after seeing what he was wearing. 

He had changed out of his work attire and exchanged it for a fitted black t-shirt and gray sweatpants that left very little to the imagination. Javi had insisted to you that they really were the only pair of sweatpants that he had, but there was a part of you that was convinced he knew just how irresistible he looked in them, and that the sight of him in those pants made you absolutely feral. 

“Hmmmm?” You replied, visibly shaking your head to try and reel yourself in from the thoughts you were already having after seeing your boyfriend walk into the room in his new outfit. “Sorry, what did you say?” 

“I asked, what movie are we watching?” He nodded towards the TV as he sat next to you on the couch, legs splayed open in a way that had the outline of his bulge perfectly pressed against the gray fabric of his pants. You could practically feel your mouth watering as you looked down at his lap- you were trying your best not to stare, but you couldn’t help but swipe your tongue along your bottom lip breathing heavily as you looked up at Javi. 

“Or…” You smirked, working your way across the couch to crawl into Javi’s lap, straddling him with your legs on either side of his, running your fingers through the dark curls of his hair. “We could not watch the movie and do something else.” Your hands began to travel down Javi’s body, resting on his chest and grabbing at fist fulls of his shirt as your hips pressed down into his, feeling him starting to become hard underneath you, your kisses becoming desperate and frantic. 

“Something else, huh?” You could feel Javi’s boyish grin between the presses of your lips, his hands working their way up and down your body before digging into your hips as you rolled them against his lap. 

“Mhmmmmmm.” You nodded, reaching down to palm at Javi’s dick, straining against the fabric of his pants. “God, you look so good in these. You know what these sweatpants do to me, Jav?” Your kisses left Javi’s lips, slowly trailing down his body in hot, wet presses against the exposed skin of his neck and soft fabric of his shirt. You slid off Javi’s lap, kneeling on the ground in front of him, tugging at the waistband of his sweatpants, springing free his cock, already painfully hard and leaking with precum. Javi lifted his legs, shuffling his pants down to pool around his ankles, letting your hands and kisses wander up his thighs. 

“Fuck me, Hermosa…” Javi groaned, leaning his head back against the edge of the couch as you planted hot kisses along his length, one hand slowly stroking the base of his shaft, the other running up and down the skin of his legs. “You wanna suck my dick, baby?” 

You smirked, gently shaking your head from side to side, looking up at Javi. “I- I want you to fuck my mouth, Javi.” 

Javi’s eyes went wide, jaw immediately going slack as your words left your mouth, visabally taking a moment to process your request. He reached down to cradle your face, forcing your gaze up towards his. “Baby… I don’t- Hermosa…are you sure? I don’t wanna hurt you or anything.” 

Regardless of what either of you wanted in the bedroom, rough, soft, or anything in between, Javi’s first priority had always been making sure that first and foremost, you were comfortable. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t thought about your request before- as much as he loved going down on you, Javi absolutely lost his mind every time you went down on him, and the thought of you on your knees, taking his cock deep down your throat as he fucked your mouth had him rock hard. 

“Javi,” You giggled, biting down on your lip, raising an eyebrow at him, “I’m positive. I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t want to. I wanna make you feel good, baby.” Grabbing the hand gently cupping your cheek, you tugged at it, forcing him to stand up, running your hands up and down his thighs before removing one to lick a broad strip down your palm and wrap it around his shaft, slowly stroking it, making him groan. 

“Fuck me.” He muttered to himself, watching you wrap your hand around his length and taking him into your mouth, swirling the tangy mix of his arousal and your spit around your tongue. He ran his hand through the dark curls of his hair, trying his best to keep his composure, already so worked up from just the thought of what you were about to let him do alone. “If it’s too much, you let me know, okay? Tap my leg or my arm or whatever, and I’ll stop, no questions asked, I-” 

“Javi. I love you, baby. I wanna choke on your dick. I promise I’ll be okay.” You smirked, nodding in reassurance, hand still twisting around the base of his shaft, making its way up to thumb at his tip, red and leaking, sliding the mix of your saliva and his precum up and down his length. 

“Jesus. Okay, Hermosa. Open that pretty mouth for me, baby girl.” He reached down, thumb tugging at your bottom lip before sliding his hand along the back of your head, carefully cradling it as your jaw hinged open, sticking out your tongue for him to place his cock on. Your eyes batted up at him through heavy lashes, gripping around the back of his bare thighs as you let your mouth relax, his length hard and heavy against your tongue as you took him between your lips. He eased into your throat, setting a slow pace as his hips gently rocked as you took him deeper into your mouth, hearing him audibly moan as your fingertips dug into the skin of his legs, urging him to go deeper, pulling him closer to you. “You sure?” Javi looked at you, eyes wide as you nodded, humming against his cock in approval, as if he knew exactly what your little gesture had meant. 

Javi pulled back, pausing for a moment, a devilish smirk spreading across his face before pushing all the way back in, making you hollow your cheeks and breath through your nose, brushing up against the curls at his base, the sweet and musky scent of him filling your nostrils as you inhaled. “Oh fuck, Osita. Holy shit.” His voice rasped, hitching in the back of his throat watching your mouth fill with his cock. His fingers ran through your hair, tugging a little tighter as his thrusts began to quicken, his grunts and moans becoming louder with each push and pull. “Fuck, such a good girl taking me so well. So fucking pretty when you suck my cock baby, holy fuck.” 

His other hand met his first, cupping the back of your head as he fucked into you, hitting the back of your throat as tears welled in your eyes and drool pooled from your lips as his cock consumed your mouth. You loved sucking Javi’s dick because you knew just how good it made him feel- watching his face all blissed out, leaving him a moaning and muttering mess. But this? Looking up at him through your heavy lids seeing the pure euphoria radiating off of him? It was unmatched.

 You couldn’t help but rub your thighs together, trying to ease the ache that had rapidly been building between your legs, feeling the wetness pooling in the fabric of your underwear. Desperate to ease your own needs, you shifted one of the hands that was holding the back of Javi’s thigh, bringing it down to snake down your sweatpants and the waistband of your panties, humming in relief around Javi’s length as you rubbed your clit, already throbbing and pulsing before your fingers had even touched it. Feeling the absent grip of your fingertips in his leg, Javi looked down to see you touching yourself as his cock thrusted in and out of your mouth, making his jaw even more slack, while his pace became more frantic and sloppy. 

 “You touching yourself, baby? Fuck- sucking my cock like this got you all worked up?” Javi groaned through gritted teeth as you nodded up at him with watery eyes, hollowing your cheeks to try and keep from gagging as he brushed against the back of your throat. “Fuck meeee.” He whimpered, not sure how much longer he was going to last watching you, feeling the tingle at the base of his spine already beginning to grow. “Dirty fucking girl. I’m not gonna last much longer, baby- shit- be a good girl and make yourself cum on those pretty little fingers for me, yeah? Wanna see you- oh fuck- wanna see you cum for me before I fuck myself down your throat.” 

Sliding deeper into your panties, you felt the slick covering your folds as you dipped your 2 fingers inside your heat, the palm of your hand bumping against your clit while you touched yourself, feeling equally as worked up and close to finishing as Javi was. Saliva spilled from the sides of your mouth as tears slid down your cheeks as Javi’s cock filled every inch of your mouth, the veins of his dick throbbing along your tongue. You could feel your pussy begin to flutter as your hands slid in and out of your dripping entrance, arousal pooling in your belly with each brush of your palm along your sensitive bundle of nerves. Your whimpers and moans humming around Javi’s cock had him reeling, his fingers gripping tighter around the ends of your hair as he cradled the back of your head, as he pushed deeper down your throat.

 Suddenly, you could feel the coil inside you snap, your cunt clenching hard around your fingers as your orgasm ripped through you, your eyes squeezing shut and the breathing through your nose becoming heavier as you came. Knowing that you had hit your high, Javi sought relentlessly to reach his own, desperately thrusting into you. “Fuck me, Osita. Fuck. I’m so close baby, shit, gonna fill up that pretty mouth of yours. Meirda, Hermosa, ay dios mío, voy a-aahhhhhhhhh  (Shit, Beautiful, oh my god, I’m gonna-ahhhhhh).” With one more push of his hips, Javi’s spilled himself inside you, hot ropes of his spend coating the back of your throat as his cock throbbed, milking himself of every last drop before pulling back out of your mouth. Both of your breaths were slow and heavy, Javi’s hand resting under your chin, tilting your messy, wet face up towards his as you swallowed, taking his cum down your throat.

“Jesus Christ…” He whispered to himself, his jaw still slack and eyes wide as he looked down at you, a devilish grin now growing across his face. “Fuck me. Fuck, that was so hot. You okay, baby?” He asked, pulling you up to stand as you used the back of your hand to wipe the spit still dripping from the edges of your lips. 

“More than okay.” You smirked, pressing up on your tiptoes to plant a hot kiss on his lips, grabbing a fistful of his shirt. “We’re gonna have to get you new sweatpants, Jav.” You giggled, still laughing at the fabric pooled around his ankles. Javi tilted his head in confusion, reaching down to shuffle his pants and boxers over his legs. 

“Why’s that, Hermosa?” 

“Because if you keep putting on those sweatpants every time we’re supposed to watch a movie, I don’t think we’re ever gonna watch a movie again.”

Taglist

@cool-iguana @rhoorl @whyjuliaaa @bbiophiliaa @pertinentpostmortem @angelofsmalldeath-codeine @pedrobaby @fatima-marisa @beboldbebravethings @poodlebae @kittenlittle24 @3sriracha @jungchloee @perennialdoll247 @prettyinpunk85 @partyofone3413 @harriedandharassed @pedrohoe04 @theorganasolo @endlessthxxghts @beware-my-thorns @missladym1981 @messinadress @dappydelta @blackfemalenerd

[notaplaceofhonour]

imagine being an employee at S-Mart, and your coworker that everyone is like 87% certain went insane & killed a bunch of his friends & gf, is just chilling, talking up customers with wild stories about saving a fantasy kingdom from the undead. it’s a little annoying that he’s slacking off while you have to pick up the slack, but you’ve learned with this guy it’s more trouble than it’s worth to complain.

he tells the same story to every single girl that comes in, and every single time he acts like it’s something the girl he’s talking to should actually be impressed by—as if it’s something that actually happened. and you can’t tell if he’s joking around and just committing to the bit really hard as some weird form of flirting, or if he really is crazy enough to believe every word of what he’s saying. but bizarrely it’s working for him? she seems into it somehow?

and you’re not sure what to think. should you be worried for this girl? he can be incredibly charming, but he’s just a complete & total weirdo (and sometimes he really creeps you out).

like you remember this one time he literally told you he hacked up his girlfriend—an actual missing person that he is THE top suspect in the disappearance of—with a chainsaw attached to his hand. but he said it like he’s some kind of pulp fiction action hero, and (again) you can’t tell if he’s joking? (who would joke about something like that? who would just casually admit to that if they actually did it?) it’s so bizarre you tell yourself you have to have imagined it.

but there’s other stuff too. he refuses to wear just a normal prosthetic hand to work—he has like a whole medieval ass gauntlet for a hand?? clearly he’s read way too many comic books, and has a really demented sense of humor, but you’ve worked with this guy enough to know he’s a total incompetent loser. there’s no way he’s actually dangerous, right? he’s just a bit weird, that’s all…

and as you’re trying to figure all this out there’s this lady on bath salts that comes out of nowhere and she’s jumping around the place like she’s yoda, growling and yelling about how she’s going to swallow people’s souls and attacking people?? and to make matters worse your crazy ass coworker breaks a gun out of the display case and starts jumping on carts shooting at her??? and then the next day you come into work and have to just check people out at the register with this guy like nothing happened???????

[rad-roche]

Pulp Covers And How To Paint Them

With the rise of cheap printing in the early twentieth century, mass-marked paperbacks swept the world, each offering lurid thrills for obscenely low prices. Sex, sadism, and incredible violence for as little as ten cents. An easy purchase to slot in between fifty cigarettes a day and enough bourbon slugs to kill a small garden.

Pulp fiction is where some of the greats of American literature cut their teeth, including the big three, Raymond Chandler, Ross MacDonald and Dashiell Hammett. The contents of these stories, both the dizzyingly good and astoundingly terrible, have been absorbed and digested and remixed and regurgitated in nearly every permutation imaginable, fuelling pop culture some one hundred years on. This isn't an essay on that. Nobody likes to open a tutorial and be greeted with a wall of text. The history is for another time.

But it is about how to paint it.

Don't let the pre-amble intimidate you, it's not as hard as it sounds. You will need:

Painting software with some image editing capabilities. You don't need all the bells and whistles of Photoshop, but I wouldn't recommend something like MSPaint, at least not to start with. I'm using Clip Studio Paint.

A really beat-up paper texture. The grungier, the better.

A lightly-textured brush. Here are the specific brushes I use, 99% of which is the well-named rough brush. Try and avoid anything with any impasto elements.

Go to your colour-picking tool and use the 'select from layer' option. Doing all the painting on a single layer is going to make your life easier.

A complete willingness to make mistakes and, instead of erasing, painting over them. It generates much more colour variation and interest! Keep your finger off the E key.

Good reference! That painting is a master copy of Mitchel Hooks' art for Day of the Ram. Find a style you really love and want to learn? Have no clue where to begin? Do direct studies!

Let's not worry about whatever is happening in the background. It's probably fine. Let's get started! Pulp magazine art is a lot more varied than you might first think, so don't agonize over having a style that 'fits' or not. I'm also specifically aiming for something you'd see on the cover after printing, not the initial painting they would use for printing. The stuff I'll show here is a pretty narrow band of it, but here are some general commonalities. This is a painting by Tom Lovell.

Let's dig into this.

The colours are very bright and saturated, but the actual values, the relative lightness and darkness of them, are actually grouped very simply! You can check this by filling a layer full of black, putting it on top and setting its mode to colour. If the value of a painting looks good, you actually get a lot of leeway with colour. But here's what I think is the most important thing to keep in mind.

The darks aren't that dark, and the lights aren't all that light! Covers are paintings reproduced on cheap paper. Anything you wouldn't want to happen in the printing process, you lean into. Value wash-outs, lower contrast, colours getting a weird wash to them, really gritty texturing. So let's get painting! Here's my typical setup.

That bottom folder is the painting itself. The screen layer is the grungy paper texture. To get the effect you want, put it down, invert its colour, then set it to screen. That washes out your painting far, far too much, so to compensate, I put a contrast layer up on top. Fiddle around with the settings, but this is where mine ended up sitting.

Note I'm saying this before even starting the painting: you want to do this as early as possible. This is where the 'select from layer' colour picker comes in handy. You can paint without worrying about the screen or contrast layer. Something not looking right? Enable your value check layer and keep painting. When you turn it off, it'll still be in colour. Here's a timelapse so you can see what that looks like.

And when you check the values...

They're pretty simple! This isn't a be all and end all, but I hope it serves as a decent primer. I want thirty dames on my desk by Monday!

[venusianpulp]

Cult Classics vs Astro Notes

Which Cult Classic film would you be, based on your sign? You can look to your big 3, in terms of moon sign being your emotional state, rising would be the film you're perceived as, and sun would be most relateable... this is meant to be fun, so ENJOY <33

Aries - "Fight Club" (1999): An intense, adrenaline-fueled journey of self-discovery and rebellion against societal norms.

Taurus - "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" (1971): A story that indulges in the senses and teaches the value of practicality and appreciation.

Gemini - "Pulp Fiction" (1994): A fast-paced, witty, and multi-faceted narrative with clever dialogue and unexpected twists.

Cancer - "The Breakfast Club" (1985): An emotional exploration of the complexities of relationships and the importance of understanding and empathy.

Leo - "Moulin Rouge!" (2001): A passionate, dramatic, and visually stunning tale of love, creativity, and self-expression.

Virgo - "Inception" (2010): An intricate, layered puzzle that requires precision, analysis, and problem-solving skills to navigate.

Libra - "The Royal Tenenbaums" (2001): A quirky, aesthetically pleasing story that explores the dynamics of relationships and the pursuit of harmony and balance.

Scorpio - "Donnie Darko" (2001): A dark, mysterious, and psychologically intense journey that delves into the depths of the human psyche.

Sagittarius - "Into the Wild" (2007): An adventurous, philosophical quest for meaning, truth, and freedom beyond societal constraints.

Capricorn - "The Godfather" (1972): A powerful, ambitious, and strategic narrative that explores themes of loyalty, tradition, and the pursuit of success.

Aquarius - "The Matrix" (1999): A revolutionary, mind-bending story that questions reality and champions individuality and innovation.

Pisces - "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (2004): A surreal, emotionally profound exploration of love, memories, and the blurring of fantasy and reality.

These pairings are based on the general characteristics and themes associated with each zodiac sign, and how they align with the central ideas, motifs, and tones of the respective cult classic films.

ADDITIONAL... :)

CULT CLASSIC CHARACTERS: GENDER IS INTERCHANGABLE, it's the energy.

Aries - John Bender (The Breakfast Club): Bender embodies the rebellious, independent spirit of Aries. He challenges authority figures and social norms, refusing to conform to the expectations placed upon him.

Taurus - The Dude (The Big Lebowski): The Dude's laid-back, pleasure-seeking lifestyle and his appreciation for the simple things in life align with the Taurus vibe.

Gemini - Ferris Bueller (Ferris Bueller's Day Off): Ferris's quick wit, adaptability, and ability to talk his way out of any situation are classic Gemini traits.

Cancer - Amélie Poulain (Amélie): Amélie's emotional depth, creativity, and desire to help others from behind the scenes reflect the nurturing, imaginative nature of Cancer.

Leo - Margo Channing (All About Eve): Margo's dramatic flair, confidence, and commanding presence on stage and in life embody the Leo spirit.

Virgo - Clarice Starling (The Silence of the Lambs): Clarice's intelligence, attention to detail, and dedication to her work as an FBI agent reflect Virgo's analytical and perfectionistic nature.

Libra - Cher Horowitz (Clueless): Cher's charm, social graces, and desire to create harmony and balance in her world align with the Libra archetype.

Scorpio - Lisbeth Salander (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo): Lisbeth's intensity, mysterious aura, and ability to delve into the dark corners of the human psyche reflect the depth and power of Scorpio.

Sagittarius - Buckaroo Banzai (The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension):Buckaroo Banzai is a true Renaissance man, embodying the Sagittarius traits of versatility, curiosity, and the pursuit of knowledge across multiple disciplines. He is a neurosurgeon, particle physicist, rock star, and adventurer all in one.

Capricorn - Michael Corleone (The Godfather): Michael's ambition, strategic thinking, and commitment to family and tradition align with the Capricorn archetype.

Aquarius - Neo (The Matrix): Neo's journey to question reality, break free from societal norms, and champion individuality and innovation reflects the Aquarius spirit.

Pisces - Edward Scissorhands (Edward Scissorhands): Edward's emotional sensitivity, creativity, and struggle to find his place in the world while maintaining his unique identity align with the Pisces nature.

These character-zodiac pairings are based on the dominant traits and themes associated with each sign, and how they are embodied by the respective cult classic main characters. Keep in mind that this is a subjective interpretation, and there could be various other characters that also represent each zodiac sign in their own unique ways.

[the-first-man-is-a-cat]

“Even if you are a student of Yiddish literature, there is a good chance you have never heard the name Dovid-Moyshe Hermalin. He, like Roth, was an immigrant to America. He came from Romania in 1885, when he was twenty years old, and died when Roth was seventeen. One is tempted to imagine a meeting between the two, perhaps in a cafeteria on the Lower East Side, where you could get stewed fruit: the Yiddish writer in the last year of his life and the young correspondent for the New York Globe. But, with no record of its occurrence, to describe such a meeting is pure fabulation. Though Hermalin was among the most prolific and popular Yiddish men of letters in his day, he has been all but forgotten. This is likely because his writings would be classified post facto as shund, and thus excluded from the Yiddish canon. Literally, shund derives from a German term referring to the unusable remnants of an animal left over after slaughter and processing, but in Yiddish it means, more or less, “trash literature”, or perhaps more generously “pulp fiction”.8 Shund literature usually appeared in newspapers, and the stories were often titillating, full of sex and suspense, and written to sell. Around the turn of the century, vocal Yiddish intellectuals began to rail against shund, decrying it a poor representative of Jewish culture and deleterious for the impressionable Yiddish-reading public.”

[gormengeist]

My (GORMENGEIST'S) games!

Me and my small team have been cooking up original rpg systems for a couple years now, which has somehow spun into being my college job(!), thanks to all of you.

Consider this a small showcase of the biggest things we've put out so far, seeing as its itch creator day...!

GREED

Our bestseller, our cash cow, our insane idiot kid. GREED is an absurdist experimental OSR game. You may have seen it before in such hits as "check it out, you can play as John F Kennedy in this game." A wide, chewy game without combat crunch.

NUCLEAR KNIGHTS

Our largest game, and my personal passion project. A high-fantasy pulp-science-fiction dungeoneering game: wizards and rayguns and psionics and unicorns; heaps of treasure; masters, apprentices, breakthrough power-ups mid fight. All the coolest shit I could think of.

BUBBLEGUM WIZARDS 2 and BUBBLEGUM VAMPIRES

A diptych of relatively short games about an infinite, enmagiced, dangerous city, and two immigrant communities that live there (Wizards and Vampires). Meant to be pliable and imaginative, these are light city-pop games with lots of flavor.

PSYCHOPUNK

Full throttle analog cyberpunk. Uses a unique card-based system, meant to evoke old FPS' like Doom. Dripping with attitude and anger, Psychopunk is one of our earlier games but its clunk may also be its charm.