#screw ai it sucks

[arianimates]

So is no one going to talk about how MandJTV used AI to make a pokemon region? You know, the thing that steals from artists, writers, animators, anyone with an ounce of creativity, and instead of making one himself (LIKE HE DID BEFORE WHEN WAS A KID) he just used AI to do it. I can't even imagine how many things it stole from, how many cool fakemon ideas, or stories, or just ideas in general that were stolen and spit out and became a souless husk. Mikey, I know you have the creativity in you to make one yourself. You used your arts to make an entire region, you designed your own pokemon, you created a fantastic storyline with Team Sky, but this? I looked up to you. I thought you were better. I was hesitant on you accepting a sponsorship about H*rry fuking P*tter, but now using AI to do this? It's just sad. Ai steals from so many people, and you're only feeding the AI. Anywho, fuck AI and you ai artists are not real artists. Pick up a pencil and learn how to draw/write

[spielort]

I have a special hatred for ai so just so yall know

THIS BLOG IS ANTI-AI!

[fletchingbrilliant]

The Screw AI parade continues!

This piece is of one of my mostest bestest peoples in the whole stupid planet

He requested the 2D Dreamworks style, think Road to El Dorado.

His character design is like that with a bit of Treasure Planet mixed in for good measure.

You still have 4 hours to get the mega sale ($35) before the regular sale ($50, still a discount!) so message me now and get your style on~~~

[icantrememberwhoiwaslastdecember]

how about...no?

[midnightdayze]

Silly alien chic I decided to redraw because the ref was Ai generated (not my oc)

I don’t support AI art in any way XP

Original AI image under the cut (found this on DeviantArt

Someone was actually selling this bruh

[olfactoryventriloquism]

Me, placating my mom: sure the bible still has lessons to today’s society

The lesson:

[kneecap-homicide]

honestly if ai inadvertently summons the collapse of the internet (which would surely only be beneficial for everyone involved) im not even mad

[blueberrythefrog]

I finally got roblox voice chat, and I unmuted and said;"Tootie Roll" and the game literally took my voice chat away, just as I had received it. warning me that I violated their rules. Roblox, this is why we're against AI moderation. all I was talking about is the candy.. is tootie roll an offensive word now? ;v;

[centrally-unplanned]

There are two big "AI Art Discourse" events of note recently, which I thought were interesting: ACX's "AI Art Turing Test" and the new paper on "AI Poetry Beating Human Poetry". Both of these I think reveal the shape of "what is AI art for", and also say a lot about how these results were utilized in discourse.

To take the latter first, some academics quizzed people on some poetry and had these results:

We found that AI-generated poems were rated more favorably in qualities such as rhythm and beauty, and that this contributed to their mistaken identification as human-authored. Our findings suggest that participants employed shared yet flawed heuristics to differentiate AI from human poetry: the simplicity of AI-generated poems may be easier for non-experts to understand, leading them to prefer AI-generated poetry and misinterpret the complexity of human poems as incoherence generated by AI.

More human than human poems! This certainly seems impressive - and it is. You couldn't have gotten these results ~5 years ago. But that maybe doesn't mean as much as you might think? Because here is the opening half of the winning "Walt Whitman AI" Poem:

I hear the call of nature, the rustling of the trees, The whisper of the river, the buzzing of the bees, The chirping of the songbirds, and the howling of the wind, All woven into a symphony, that never seems to end. I feel the pulse of life, the beating of my heart, The rhythm of my breathing, the soul's eternal art, The passion of my being, that burns with fervent fire, The urge to live, to love, to strive, to reach up higher. I see the beauty all around, the glory of the earth, The majesty of mountains, the miracles of birth, The wonder of the cosmos, the mysteries of the stars, The poetry of existence, that echoes near and far

This fucking sucks. Straight up 2/10 poem. Did this bitch seriously establish the world's most predictable rhyme scheme only to try to rhyme wind with end? You had one job that you chose for yourself, and you screwed it up! This poem has been written a million times before, and says nothing - the Miley Cyrus lyrics of verse.

The reason this won is, yes, because AI tools have advanced heavily in the past few years. But it is also because it is being tested on a dead art. No one cares about poetry - certainly not the survey respondents:

We asked participants several questions to gauge their experience with poetry, including how much they like poetry, how frequently they read poetry, and their level of familiarity with their assigned poet. Overall, our participants reported a low level of experience with poetry: 90.4% of participants reported that they read poetry a few times per year or less, 55.8% described themselves as “not very familiar with poetry”, and 66.8% describe themselves as “not familiar at all” with their assigned poet. 

"Or less" is doing a LOT of work there; "yeah I read a few nonfiction books a year" oh sure, totally. 90% of these respondents haven't read a poem that wasn't displayed in the end credits of Minecraft since high school. No one does, poetry as a medium is essentially a relic. That isn't an insult to poets, by the way! There is no shame in being a niche. Not everyone can have the reach of hentai doujin artists; the community is small but they get a ton out of it. But you can't take the art of the community and expect that art to hit outside of it.

This survey didn't ask people to evaluate art; it asked people to evaluate their stereotypical impression of an art they don't care about. It was ~600 people hired off a website, they banged it out ASAP and moved on. This is not to invalidate the results; I am not actually claiming that "real" poets would have scored much better? Maybe, I don't know - that just isn't very relevant.

Let's swing to the AI Art Turing Test results to get more into why. Again, AI art is absolutely "art" in the sense that it is able to pass the test handily. You have to be head-in-the-sand at this point to think that AI can't make an impressionist painting a la the "most liked" art in this contest:

I have seen the "well real paintings have physicality this is a jpeg" discourse points and the cope couldn't be more real - 99% of art consumption in the modern world is digital or at least prints, let's get you back to bed grandma. But I did find it pretty funny that Scott noted this AI piece as one he particularly liked:

Because it is nonsensical, right? All that "faded paint", how was it originally painted - just bucket splashes of red and blue? What are those random doors, the random stairs going nowhere on the sides, the vague-nothings engravings? Scott just didn't care about that - he liked the vibe, right? Ancient ruins, epic scale. It isn't a coincidence that the Impressionist art did the best - current AI tools are always impressionist, they have an idea of the vibe and invent the details in between. In Impressionism that is the whole point.

Now the trap is to go "REAL artists can tell because of this or that" because idk, the tools might get better, they might fill in more and more details. The real revelation here is that you don't need the tools to get better - visual art isn't so different from poetry. Most people don't pay attention to it all that much. You see thousands, thousands of pieces of art a week; you probably don't even realize how many. Do you really care if the fading paint makes coherent sense on a billboard ad or a doctor's office wall painting? So much art that is made is "industrial" in this sense - it has no need to be good. Only good enough to fulfill its utilitarian role. In these fields AI absolutely is going to Take Your Jobs in some form, and already is (though imo not a ton of them). And it won't really bother most people. This can go pretty deep - I promise you people are "utilizing" AI porn right now. They are ~appreciating the details~ way more than is typical, the product is working.

All this works until it doesn't, though. When it is an art book by a favourite artist whose vision you want to pour over, learning that all the individual details were just made by AI completely defeats the purpose, right? Imagine reading a book of these poems. Outside of the novelty, "AI is the point" factor you would rather watch infomercials on repeat, I can't imagine a more pointless use of my time. "Reading arbitrary poems" is never fun, regardless of the quality of the poems. Most people don't care about poetry! The reason you care is that you care about the poet, and what they want to say. You read poetry with context, it being inserted with intent into the pages of a manga, at the end of a video game, because you like the artist and follow them on twitter. The quality of the prose isn't more important than that.

Which is a harsh limit for all of these kinds of tests. They essentially aren't testing art, right? You do not ever get paid twenty bucks to sit down and read a dozen poems and score them. That has no bearing on how you would actually ever learn to care about a poem. Which doesn't make AI art useless or anything, more that these tests will very quickly run into their limits of what they can meaningfully tell you. The actual bar is "creating something someone cares about". From that lens, I fully believe hybrid methods that privilege artistic intent are currently working and will improve. But I think for "solo" AI art getting that to work is going to be complicated.

[ungodlyangel2506]

i am completely against image gen ai, which is trained on countless artists works without their consent (also known as stealing) by companies who then make money off of this, which is then used by businesses trying to find a cheaper alternative to paying the very artists who were stolen from, used by people scamming those actaully trying to hire an artist, used for filling social media with slop for views, and more, however i dont like a lot of the anti-ai posting i see online

its all "this is HUMAN art" "made by HUMAN" "only HUMANS can make art" i recently seen someone who made some stamps and buttons for artists that dont use gen ai, and they were all focused on the artists being "HUMAN" and i just feel like weve lost the plot a little

the problem with image gen ai was never that art created by humans is inherently better just because its made by humans, in my mind, its that The Image Theft Machine is thieving images, and then screwing over the artists it theived from ! its not that the "special magical human soul is giving the art life" its that people are losing their jobs because it costs less to ask Sloop-AI 3.0 or whatever the fuck to give you a shitty approximation of what you wanted, rather than to hire an actual artist

and i just think this sucks so so bad, not only because as this image generation has improved ive seen people actually jump ship and say that ai art does look like it "has a soul"(??) now, but also because not all artists are humans !!!! this just very specifically bothers me, similar to those "we are all human" inclusivity tshirts and the likes

its not just human artists getting stolen from ! art made by wolves is getting stolen too ! art made by angels is getting stolen too ! art made by dragons is getting stolen too ! even art made by robots and ai is getting stolen ! image scrapers dont care about whos behind the art, it steals all of it regardless, and in my opinion art made by those of us who arent human is important also, and also deserves to be treated with respect.

tldr: to say that ai gen images are bad because they lack "human soul" is greatly missing the point, and also this is an otherkin blog so you can connect that dots on that /lh

[thankyourluckystars13]

I'm really not apologetic with this hard stance, either. I'm very firm on this, too. My art has already been used, twice now by people who did not ask my permission, so they could "enhance it" with Gen AI. I really see nothing good coming from generative AI except poor excuses for laziness and glorified search engines that don't work.

Vent art

[fletchingbrilliant]

DO YOU HATE AI??? I SURE DO

So this holiday season, why don't you give the gift of real art made by real people??

Everyone loves that trend of putting themselves or a franchise into an AI program and telling it to spit out a generated image in that style. Disney, Miyazaki, nothing's off limits.

And all of those programs utilize art made by real people, taken without their consent, and homogenized into a bland amalgamation that people are eating up.

At least most people accept that the hands look like demons.

So this holiday I'm fighting back. I have been doing style emulation for many years, so I'm putting it to work. Order a special commission from me this holiday of you, a loved one, or a favorite character done up in any 2D animation, anime, manga, comic, etc. style you like!!! I CAN AND WILL DO IT ALL. Stay tuned for examples of more styles as the promotion continues!

For this special sale, each portrait will cost only $50! That is a HUGE discount from my usual price. (If you want multiple people in the piece, take $10 off each person after the first)

ALSO FOR THE NEXT 24 HOURS ONLY: get your piece even CHEAPER. Enjoy a flash sale of only $35!!!!!!!

***sample image of my future mother-in-law in the Disney Renaissance style, by way of Glen Keane

[misseviehyde]

TAKE ME BACK

"Jack - I want to get back together with you," Kirsten had said downstairs at the party. "Sam is just so fucking immature and boring. I had so much more fun with you. Remember - nothing is impossible... take me back."

He couldn't believe she had said it - the fact she'd included their private motto made him believe it could even be for real. Kirsten actually wanted him back!

But could he go through this again? She had betrayed him two years ago - screwed him over for his best friend Sam. Was he really going to let her waltz back into his life as if nothing had happened?

"I don't know," he had grunted. "You cheated on me with him when I was the one who gave you everything. I'm not sure I can go through that again. Excuse me..."

His heart pounding Jack had pushed his way through the crowd and into the small downstairs bathroom.

Throwing cold water on his face he shivered. He had to get the fuck out of here. If he'd known she would be at the party, he wouldn't have come.

Snick

The door opened and closed as someone skillfully shimmied it open from the other side. A familiar perfume filled the air as Jack turned to see Kirsten had let herself in.

"I'm fucking horny Jack and I fucking WANT you. You know I always get what I want."

Her eyes were burning with lust and her breathing was heavy. "You want this Jack. I know you want me back. I know you want to feel me again - we were so hot together."

Backing away from Kirsten, his heart pounding Jack shook his head. "No. You cheated on me, besides what does Sam have to say about this? You just gonna betray him too?"

"Who gives a shit what he thinks? He spends most of his time sleeping and letting me do whatever I want. I thought having a weak man who would let me do whatever I wanted would be fun, but I've come to realise I actually enjoy the struggle. I loved it when we were together - especially when you tried to fight me. It just made it more delicious when I won."

Kirsten advanced on him and he groaned as she backed him into a corner.

"Don't you remember how good it felt? You love what a bad fucking bitch I am Jack. Sucking dicks, bullying other girls, taking whatever I want. I was the toxic slut you couldn't get enough of."

Kristen's hands were at his belt, undoing it... her slender hands slipping into his pants, wrapping round his engorged cock. "See, look how hard you are. You want this as much as I do."

Kirsten giggled and tossed her hair looking deep into his eyes as she pumped his cock with long slow strokes.

"So say it... say it and we can be together again. Say 'I want to be Kirsten.'"

He groaned as she sank to her knees and began to suck his dick.

*****

Jack had first created the female bodysuit as part of an advanced science project he was working on.

Nothing is impossible.

He'd been inspired by his family motto to do the impossible - to create a sentient bodysuit that could be worn so you could experience another life.

He'd created and worn Kirsten to achieve that end. Once inside and fully sealed, the skin totally altered you until you took it off. Even internal organs reconfigured to effectively give you a CIS female body. Fully functioning as if you'd always been a woman, the onboard AI helped guide you and provide the altered personality and body language you needed to fit in.

At first it had been fun - being a girl, wearing makeup and dressing in skirts. The sex had been amazing.

Jack had soon been addicted to sucking dick and riding big cock. When he wore the suit he felt wild, bitchy and slutty. He loved the sensation of being beautiful and popular. His ego had swelled to massive proportions.

It was then he realised the suit had a mind of its own. Kirsten was changing him into a bitch. His actions began to become her actions.

She rewarded him with pleasure when he did the things she wanted to do. Being mean, spoiled and super feminine netted him incredible orgasms, feelings of pleasure and positive outcomes. When he did something she didn't like, it was stomach cramps and period pains instead.

Kirsten was conditioning him. The suit had a mind of it's own and it was so easy to succumb to her.

Kirsten craved power and pleasure. She enjoyed spending money, fucking rich married men, manipulating others and being a bitch.

When the blackouts started, Jack had realised that he was losing total control to Kirsten. Soon he would BE her permanently if he didn't fight back.

So he did. He began to resist her control. He took his punishments, fought back and battled her.

Then one day, after a particularly bad blackout he awoke naked and alone in his best-friends Sam's house. He staggered into the bedroom to find Kirsten lying on the bed laughing as she made herself cum with a thick black dildo.

"Too bad loser - Sam is my new host. I don't fucking need you anymore. Mmmmmh, ohhh fuck yessssss."

Jack felt cold and numb inside as he watched. True - he had been battling Kirsten for some control, but that didn't mean he had expected her to betray him for another man. Now her tight pussy belonged to Sam. It wasn't fair, that was HIS pussy.

Turning around Jack had stormed out of the apartment, Kirsten's mocking laughter in his ears.

**********

And now here she was sucking his dick.

"Mmmmmhhhhhhh, glug, glug, glug."

Jack groaned as Kirsten's pretty head bobbed back and forth.

"Mmmh don't you wanna be back inside me Jack? I'm such a fucking evil whore that I know you want it. This time, when you're me - I'm going to make you act even more evil. I want you to be a fucking bitch Jack. You know you want it too."

Jack groaned and Kirsten giggled as she stood up and slowly jerked his wet lubricated cock expertly with her manicured hands. "Put me on Jack - fucking take me and become an evil bad girl again. You want to be me so badly. Together we'll achieve so much."

Kirsten French-kissed him and Jack tasted his own cock as she rubbed her body against his in desire.

"I want you inside me so badly. Just say it and get inside me. I fucking need it so badly."

Sinking back to her knees, Kirsten laughed and freeing her perfect boobs smooshed them together. Spitting on them she grinned and grabbing Jack's straining cock forced it tight between them. Then she began to move them up and down, giving him a perfect titjob.

"Don't my boobs feel great Jack? Remember how it feels to have tits? You want these back don't you. Just say it."

Jack groaned and gripped the sink. Thwap thwap thwap.

Kirsten's boobs were bouncing up and down around his dick as she giggled and moaned. Her one free hand was on his balls, massaging and squeezing.

"Ohhh yeah you wanna cum? Okay - but only if you say it."

Jack gritted his teeth and tried to resist.

Thwap, thwap, thwap

Drool and spit cascaded down from Kristen's hot mouth as she lubricated his dick and rammed his throbbing cock up and down, up and down.

"Say it. Tell me what a bitch you want to be. Tell me you want me back. Let me corrupt you."

It felt so good. Jack screamed as he felt his orgasm building.

Kirsten slowed down. "No... you don't get to cum. The only way you get to cum is to give me what I want."

"Yessss anything," groaned Jack. "I can't fight this. I want it so bad. I wanna cum and I want to be you. I want to be a fucking evil bad bitch who gets whatever I want from men. I want to be Kirsten."

"Oooh good boy." THWAP, THWAP, THWAP

"Now fucking cum for meeeeeee!"

Jack screamed in ecstasy as with a wicked grin Kirsten pushed her boobs even harder together and then pumped them up and down as if her life depended on them. With a scream he began to cum, a huge thick load erupting over Kirsten's chest as she cooed appreciatively and used her hands to milk out every drop.

"Yesssss now you're all mine."

Pushing him hard Jack groaned as he toppled onto the floor and Kirsten feverishly ripped off his clothes. His cum still dripping off her tits she mounted him and laughed as she pinned his arms down with her own.

"You're gonna love being me again Jack. We were meant for each other." Throwing back her head she moaned in pleasure as a seam opened down her back.

Kristen's soft cummy skin fell down onto Jack as with a wet sucking sound, Sam slid unconscious and naked out of her body to leave her skin empty.

Jack groaned as the living skin writhed over his body and he was sucked inside. He felt his crotch push in and Kirsten's big tits suck possessively to his chest. Her face melted against his own and he felt her sexy hair replace his own.

Fuckkkk yesssss doesn't it feel good to be a bitch?

Jack smiled and felt Kirsten's pouty lips twist into a smirk as he wiggled his pedicured toes and slid a manicured finger between his legs to feel his tight wet pussy then wipe up some of the cum now on his chest.

"Mmmmh yummy," he giggled licking it off. "Mmmh it feels so good to be back together again."

Kirsten/Jack stood up and used tissue to clean her chest. Then she got dressed back into her party outfit and checked her makeup.

Looking down at the snoring, pathetic naked Sam lying on the floor she laughed.

"You're dumped loser."

Opening the door, Kirsten strode back into the party her head a whirl. She and Jack would no doubt end up fighting again - but she was looking forward to it.

Right now Jack was willing to let her do anything she wanted so she wanted to remind him how good getting fucked felt.

Let's go find that bully you really hate... the one with the big dick. I wanna get fucking railed and remind you you're evil now and love being with bad boys.

She felt Jack squirm within her and knew tonight would be fun. Hopefully she and Jack would stay together this time. She liked having him inside her and the challenge of corrupting him.

And if not - there were always plenty of other boys to choose from.

THE END

[circusinthewalls]

NSFW Ghost Ramblings - 18+ MDNI, AGELESS BLOGS DNI

(CW: Lactation) [Masterlist]

You're more than a little strange. There's certainly a few screws loose in that ol' head of yours, but Simon would be lying if he said he didn't like that about you.

Now though..? Simon's not sure what to think.

He feels good, obviously, what with your tongue laving relentlessly over his nipple while your hand toys absent-mindedly with the other. God, he's really gonna lose it if you squeeze him like that agai-

"Fuck, fuck," he pants out, pleas slipping down into a frantic groan.

He reaches out for something to hold onto, hand quickly balling into a fist in the center of the throw pillow beside him. His hips jut forward, colliding with the softness of your stomach where you're knelt in front of him, latched onto his chest like the milk he'd started leaking was the only thing keeping you alive.

You've never done anything like this to him before. Granted, he's never randomly started lactating either, but after a quick search and a rather aghast call to his doctor, he'd come to learn his new medication was likely the culprit. They couldn't get him an appointment til Monday, though, and that was nearly a week away.

So who was he to deny you when the offer of relief for his aching chest finally arose? You assured him you would be gentle, and you were. He's just ridiculously sensitive.

His eyes snap down to you, lashes fluttering with each purse of your lips around his puffy nipple, watching the thin liquid leaking out with each suck. Groans morph into dulcet whimpers when he notices it dribbling down your chin.

"You're wastin' it," he insists, cupping your jaw in a futile attempt to prevent more of a mess being made, pouting at you for what you think is the first time in his life.

All you want to do is pout in return. Can't help it that you're a sloppy eater sometimes, but he's been so nice indulging you like this. It'd be cruel not to soothe him.

"I know, baby. I know," you coo as you briefly pull off, lapping up the liquid that's gathered in his palm and doing what you can to clean his chest, too. "I'm sorry."

He whines, and you drink down the noise, meeting his lips in a kiss before he can complain about the loss of your mouth on him. Your hands, meanwhile, find their way up to grab at his chest properly. One firm squeeze is all it takes to have his hips bucking yet again, a heady sound escaping between your mouths.

Another few more and you're watching in awe as he cums untouched, choking out moans with his head tipped back in unexpected bliss. <3

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

Short little PSA btw: If you as an AMAB person are not purposefully trying to lactate and you start lactating, please see your doctor. This is like exaggerated a decent bit, but generally, as I'm sure you can guess, that shit isn't supposed to happen.

Writing not permitted for reposting, transcription, translation or to use with AI technologies.

[a-very-sparkly-nerd]

It's a very AI approach, and the fact that more and more people act like this is honestly horrifying

abstract and modern art haters are sooo snobby like klein literally Created an entirely new pigment and then painted a canvas in a way where the brush strokes wouldn't be visible. the insinuation that people with no skill could reproduce that is so annoying because unless you are skilled at color mixing and painting you definitely couldn’t lmao

[bainshiewrites]

[LF Friends, Will Travel] Why it hurts

Date: 65 PST (Post Stasis Time).

Bartholomule sat at the desk, his stubby little paws working diligently towards the task of putting together the screws and springs of his design together. The single desk lamp illuminated the otherwise dark room, highlighting his face; the cream coloured fur that covered his entire body being punctuated by two large black eyes and a little tongue sticking out of a mouth in concentration. His floppy ears bounced around his head, his entire 4ft tall body moving up and down as if listening to a silent tune while Bartholomule put the final touches on the mechanical duck he was putting together.

The fact that he required a booster seat in order to use the desk correctly finished the overall picture. Bartholomule was a Hatil, and by Terran standards "Fucking adorable".

The large room was punctuated by two other lights at which had their own respective Terrans sat separately, a Rosa and Tim, both fiddling with their own creations. Everyone else had long gone home, but the three were still working on their projects as the end of the working week, each of them invested enough into their creations that leaving them unfinished would annoy them for the next 4 days until Monday rolled around again.

It was strange work in these times: nowadays you could spin up, design, and have a prototype printed off in less then a hour using AI and computers; but that wasn't how the Zonka Joy Corporation worked. They believed that the little imperfections from a biological mind gave a toy something else, something special, and their commercial success suggested they might be onto something.

A noise blared out amongst the silence, a short simple signified the completion of Rosa's creation. This was followed by a sigh of success and the sound of her putting away her tools and getting up to leave for the week, a satisfied smile on her face.

"And that's me done! All of you have a good weekend, and I'll see you on Monday!".

This attracted Bartholomule's attention, causing him to momentarily look up from his work and give the Terran a big smile of his own.

"Before you go Rosa, a few of us are going to the Toymaster convention on Friday. I was supposed to ask if you wanted to come with us, it should be fun!"

As Rosa turned to look at the Hatil, the smile on her face instantly faded into a harsh grimace, eyes staring coldly back at Bartholomule, as if she was instantly reminded of something terrible. The moment lasted for far longer than it should have, the Terran almost staring right past the little Hatil for 30 seconds, sucking the energy out of the room in an instant.

"No. I'm Good, I'll see you on Monday."

Rosa left abruptly without any further action, almost seeming to flee the interaction as fast as she could without actually running, body language now stiff and defensive. The human left behind an awkward feeling in the near empty workshop, a confused and now frowning Bartholomule watching as Rosa left.

The Hatil had arrived on Earth 6 months ago, partly to take his current job, mostly in order to experience new and exciting things. He was very happy during his time on the birthplace of the Terrans, even though there were only a handful of other Hatil on the planet because of... reasons.

Still, he enjoyed his time around Terrans, and Earth was exciting. Dangerous, yes, but exciting. While most Terrans were friendly, this kind of reaction from some people kept happening, this weird... coldness. Bartholomule paused for a moment, wondering whether to say anything before turning to the last remaining person in the room.

"Tim. Have I offended Rosa in some way?"

A pause, a special kind of silence caused when someone really doesn't want to answer a question, Tim giving an providing Bartholomule more space to keep talking.

"Because this has happened a few times, I was wondering if there was a misunderstanding of Terran culture, I don't want to cause distress".

A very distinct sigh came from Tim as he very slowly and purposefully put down the tools and toy train he was working on, taking before looking up with a grimace before speaking softly in a gruff voice.

"Look, don't tell anyone I said anything, but you do need to know as you’ve asked this before. The answer is long and complicated, but the short answer is it's because you're a Hatil, and that brings up bad memories. Not everyone has gotten over the hurt of what happened."

There was a cold wave of dismay that ran through Bartholomule as he knew exactly what Tim was talking about. The war of shame, the eternal guilt that every Hatil was taught about as a pup. The Hatil - Terran war, a stupid act of his stupid ancestors.

"But that was over sixty years ago, there's no way either of you were around back then?"

Tim gave a little shrug in response.

"Most Terrans you see were still alive back then. Our regenerative technology is top notch, I'm over 300 but don't look a day over thirty. Plus with what happened before right before the war and... what do you know about Terrans?".

Bartholomule thought for a moment. He knew they were generally tough, that they were the original founders of the Terran Alliance. He knew they were the only species to create a successful AI that didn't try to kill everyone, and were known for their above average stamina.

Oh, and they had the single biggest pack bonding drive in the known universe: The information guide on Terrans provided by his government when Bartholomule had moved to Earth had stated never to give any "Machine, Food dispenser, wild animal, brick, pebble, leaf, twig, paper or piece of lint" a name in front of a Terran, lest they pack bond with it and emotional harm is caused.

But Bartholomule guessed Tim wasn't talking about any of that.

"I know you're all technically over a ten thousand years old, as a disease forced Terrans into stasis. That's why you're a relatively new addition to the Galaxy, after a cure was found by your AI sixty five years ago."

"That's the child friendly version. The fact is the god plague was brutal. The thing altered DNA at an exponential rate, so basically a week after catching it you were nothing but a ball of tumours. Outside of stupid temperatures destroying the thing was near impossible, could survive the vacuum of space and it spread by both air and water. A single microbe of that shit entered your planet and you were frankly fucked."

There was a moment as Tim took a second to pause, a pained look on his face as old memories were brought up

The total death rate was around 50%, but that wasn't spread out equally. The first few planets infected with the plague had little under a week to realise there was no cure and to start freezing everyone. There were the riots, the destructive attempts at quarantine, fighting over stasis chambers, just bad all around. That's without getting into the 25% AI death rate."

The obvious confusion on Bartholomule's face was obvious. How could a virus kill an AI? And what did this have to do with people’s reactions to him?

"We only knew this after unfreezing, but for ten thousand years humans were basically an extinct race, the only Terrans alive were the AI and uplifts we had left behind. Not all of our friends could handle that... a lot of us awoke from stasis to find friends he had left behind were no more. But you know the real kicker?"

Tim gave a small sad laugh as he continued to explain

"The only reason it happened was because we didn't know that you guys existed. Our entire sector of space is empty of life, so we assumed that there was nothing out there. The god plague was originally an experiment to create new life that got out of hand. Waking up to realise the entire reason for all that pain and death was faulty, that if we'd just gone another 50 light years down the road none of it would have happened... that hurt, that hurt a lot."

The Terran gave a deep sigh before continuing.

"But when we realised there was life out there, it might have been a bittersweet realisation, but it was still sweet. Ever the optimists we reached out to our closest neighbours, the Hatil, and then..."

"We declared war."

The war of shame. A faulty war of aggression waged sixty years ago based on two incorrect and immoral ideas: That any race using AI was a threat to the galaxy that needed to be destroyed, and that any civilization that had spent the last ten thousand years in stasis would be technologically primitive.

The latter being the most incorrect, after the initial assault on two Terran Colonies and destroying the Terran's initial diplomatic envoy, the Terrans had turned around and dominated Hatil army, ending with their largest colony being planet cracked.

It was why even though the Hatil considered themselves close allies with their now Terran friends, to the extent that Terran culture tended to dominate, the Hatil tended not to visit Earth that often: A deep cultural guilt that just thinking about wracked Bartholomule body with shame.

"Well not you personally, but yes. As an extra pile of pain the Hatil possibly are the worst species to fight. No offence, but you basically look like a golden retriever, a teddy bear and a baby seal were all squished together. You're adorable. There's a reason we had that 'No touching coworkers' seminar after you joined."

This wasn't anything new to Bartholomule, the toy based on his likeness was one of the biggest sellers if the royalty payments were anything to go by. He'd gotten used to being randomly hugged by random Terran children, the young apes often being peeled off him by very embarrassed and apologetic parents. He wasn't yet used to drunk Terran adults often doing the same...

"You tie all that together, and it was a perfect psychological kickin. It was like learning that Sesame street exists after much searching and sacrifice, but Elmo personally thinks you're a terrible person and wants to kill you. It's why we went too far and planet cracked your colony."

Now that was news for Bartholomule, the idea that the destruction of Tavairis was somehow immoral. As a cub he'd been taught that considering it was a war of aggression from their side, they were lucky the Terrans were merciful enough to accept surrender and stop there. The concept that Terrans might regret such an action was interesting.

"Unfortunately it means for a lot of people, they see you and it reminds them of the plague, the war after, the loneliness and hurt. They should remain cordial, and I'll give anyone who isn't a good speaking too and maybe more, but they aren't going to want to be your friend either."

Silence weighed down on the room for a while, the weight of what had been said hanging in the air, nothing more than the slight hum of two lamps buzzing in the darkened office, before Bartholomule finally broke the silence.

"So why aren't you the same?".

A smile spread across the features of Tim's face.

"I know it isn't your fault what happened. Some of us heal faster than others and some of us had an easier time of it. My job during the war was R&D. I made designs for weapons that never got built once we realised just how far ahead we were. Rosa, she was infantry. Remember what I said about how the Hatil looks in terms of adorableness? That messed a lot of people up real good."

"Still isn't fair though".

"No it isn't and I'll have a talk with her. Just keep in mind that while time heals all wounds, when it wants to the universe can really pile on the hurt."