#tell me if this design needs more void gear references.

[robotsafari]

vanitas my awesome bastard child.

[suryp]

Date: unknown

Year: inconsequential

Region: central Tartyryn straight

The snow crunches beneath our feet, the wind howls like the devil, and while we all show fear, I've reason to think my brothers know not that we walk over a frozen sea, more than 30 metres deep with fish heavier than our entire platoon. I doubt my commander knows, either, but that suits our real mission just fine.

The mission. Ha. Everyone knows the only safe spots for a town are off shore, we've already done the math, there's nothing out here worth finding.

Good thing Commander Reijean is such a greedy fuck, then.

"HALT!"

Thats him right there. Most would say he just wants to prove himself, but I know better. All humans hide their worst traits, tone 'em down for the public. We're all worse than we seem on the outside.

"..."

"whats out their c-"

"shut your trap private, I won't have my skill split be-"

*Crack*

"Mission complete, I suppose"

In an instant, Clark pulled out the rifle on his back. it was cheap shit, like all the gear for this trip was, but He's among the best "weapons guys" I've ever met.

Fortunately, the gun jams, and he vanishes into the blizzard.

"Clark? Buddy? Clark? Clark!"

"Circular formation, weapons up, we are-"

"...Commander?"

Just a few more to go. Our platoon used to be larger, but wandering for days on end through an empty void of ice and snow will take its toll. Just a few weeks ago, we might've won this fight.

Good thing banshees are smart, then.

"SpLit up!"

"Commander?"

"Split Up!"

"h- He's right. we're no more than a larger target like this."

"Just gotta find the right time for it."

Sabotage wasn't the plan, and it leaves a bad taste, but there's nothing for it.

"Now."

"..."

"..."

*Cr'Ack*

"..."

*Crunch*

"..."

And finally, a blood curdling scream cut short, by a few extra holes in the lungs.

I stand up, spread my arms wide, and make myself the most clear and easy target I can."

-...-

Two hours later

The blizzard dies, I see my siblings dead in the snow. Three have a mulch of bone and Metal shards, alongside frozen blood, in place of their heads. Commander has a crushed neck. Charlie's kevlar is punched through, frozen blood all along his chest.

There's a sixth carcass, some ornitherian, I think, though it's hard to tell considering how much was eaten. The ribs are gone, and only Two and a half legs remain.

I begin to walk off. A meal, even the frozen remains of a hippogriff corpse, is the last thing I d-

*crunch*

"..."

"you not fight me. why?"

"..."

"all humans try to kill us. take sea from us. take tyk'yk from us."

"...take egg from us."

"..."

"you not fight. why?"

-

alright thats a wrap! The official intro to Fisher and the Flame and the world of... well, I suppose she doesn't have a real name yet but hey, we can make this work.

for a bit of context regarding appearances, if you need that, "Ornithere" and "Hippogriff" refer to pterosaurian animals, most similar to (and heavily based on) Trollman's "Cuvier's Isle" a small spec one-shot. It does not refer to the serinean animals of the same name.

Banshee are a bit easier to describe, being a rough combination of Utahraptor osstramaysi and a Leopard Seal, very similar to @tales-of-kaimere's *Updated* xuul design, along with the Adzakoordu and the White Cockatrice, as well as the Tamakai.

The narrator, Jake Fisher, is getting a drawing, by someone who appreciates men far more than I.

now go read about kaimere on Keenan Taylors twitter, bluesky, deviantart, and youtube channel, along with trollman's various sickass works on the same websites.

-

edits: minor word changes, removal of unneeded dashes, and Commander is now cishet, because killing the first queer confirmed in story feels a bit too rude.

Reijean is still his name tho, since there has to some reason this unit was sent out.

also added a new tag. sorry y'all.

(im just gonna use the most extreme and broad tags that, since im exceedingly apathetic but do want to tag things correctly)

[guynamedultimax]

What if Kirby had a traditional fighting game?

Listen, I know I should’ve done more “FNF fighting game characters” but i doubt anyone cared for that, and even then I lost a bit of interest, so if you actually cared sorry about that, you can still come up with whatever you want for the characters I didn’t talk about!

That being said, I think all Kirby fans here know Kirby Fighters 2. Personally speaking most of it was just the same as Kirby Fighters Deluxe BUT there were five playable Dream Friends. FIVE. Priority to the Copy Abilities a bit too high, isn’t it HAL? Sometimes it feels a bit barebones if you ask me. So I’m here to discuss what would a non-platform Kirby fighting game be.

THE GAMEPLAY

It’s the same as any basic fighting game, there isn’t really that much that the Kirby franchise can offer to make the genre a bit more varied, and that’s mostly due to the fact that Kirby makes friends wherever he goes and combat is pretty much straightforward in these platforming games, the crazy stuff comes from learning specific moves with each copy ability/character in the games and that’s also true for this game.

THE PLOT

I have quite a few ideas for how this can go:

-It’s a “what if” re-telling of Kirby Star Allies where Hyness’ ritual (somehow) also causes space-time rifts across the entire universe to be generated, pulling in Kirby villains from previous games but also allies, which would ALSO explain Dream Friends in the game’s canon a bit more properly.

-It happens in an AU. Plot would basically be Kirby Battle Royale’s but instead of shooting a loadshit of Kirbies onto Kirby, Dedede would just call upon all of their friends to fight for that cake before things escalate and Dedede loses control of the tournament to greater evils, forcing him to work with Kirby to stop the threat, be it old or new.

-Another AU idea but this time it’s original/based on Milky Way Wishes. Galactic NOVA appears every thousand years above Pop Star’s skies, and everyone tries to fight for the right to get the wish. Villain wouldn’t necessarily be ONLY Marx though, most of the Kirby villains could easily win against him if they get to NOVA and get their wish granted. Which means yes, all plots happen at once and Kirby has to deal with everyone at once.

-The least interesting idea: it’s Kirby Fighters 2′s plot but without tag team duos and with all Kirbies replaced with the roster.

THE ROSTER

Now we’re about to have some fun.

RETURNING CHARACTERS: The Dream Friends (and Kirby, of course)

-First up, all Dream Friends are coming back. You don’t even need to change their movesets that much, just add/tweak things, but just for funsies (and for a specific reason too) we’ll also give them specific copy abilities or more than one to categorize them.

-Kirby is the specific reason. He has the same moveset as his Smash Bros incarnation, although he incorporates more copy abilities (and also super powerful stuff like the Star Rod that he usually uses in endgame fights) in it now due to being a traditional fighting game. And yes, he still has his inhale. Using it will have the inhale be replaced by another move in-game, the closest one to a “neutral special” in the opponent’s arsenal. His copy ability is therefore, Smash Bros. And since the game has multiple super moves, we can make his gimmicks from the Kumazaki games the super moves: his level 1 would be a random Super Copy Ability from Return to Dreamland (cutscene is random everytime but damage is always the same), his level 2 would be using the Robobot Armor to stomp foes around, ending with a giant ground pound/fist to the ground and his level 3 is Hypernova Kirby due to the inhale being one of his most unique properties.

-Meta Knight and Dedede will also have heavy Smash influences but they’ll also use techniques from most of their boss fights, such as Meta Knight splitting himself in four clones temporarily for an attack or Dedede actually pulling out an axe instead of his hammer for some attacks based on his Triple Deluxe incarnation. Their copy abilities would formally be Sword and Hammer but with heavy Smash Bros inspiration. Meta can also call in for the Meta Knights to help him in one of his unique super moves. They’d all be there except for Sailor Dee and Captain Vul (one’s an alternate costume and the other is never seen outside of dialogue text).

-Bandana Waddle Dee’s moveset incorporates both Spear and Parasol, but due to the Spear being his most used tool he’ll be categorized with that.

-Marx is the first character with Unique as its own copy ability due to his arsenal being entirely based on his boss fight. Inhaling Unique characters doesn’t always allow Kirby to get copy abilities but when it happens he usually has their most basic move replacing the inhale. Gooey is in the same situation, but i have no idea what would Kirby get from him as an ability since he’s technically player 2 in the Dark Matter trilogy’s first 2 games. Rick, Kine and Coo would technically be categorized as Unique only because they have Fire, Water and Wind in their moveset. You could say they’d be stance characters while Marx is a zoner and Gooey a rushdown character.

-Dark Meta Knight is categorized as Mirror, and Adeleine (with Ribbon as an assist of course) is Artist. Daroach would be Animal, which is missing since its debut in Squeak Squad, as far as I can remember, but he naturally still retains his moveset of calling the Squeaks to help him.

-It’s pretty easy to categorize Magolor as ESP, and Taranza as Spider, while I have no idea what would Susie’s ability be even. Spark? She is mostly around in the Robobot Armor to be fair. The Three Mage-Sisters would be treated equally to the Animal Friends

THE NEWCOMERS

-NAGO, CHUCHU & PITCH: The other set of Animal Friends. I theorize a moveset revolving around the Cleaning ability like in Star Allies would be easy to make, although it can also incorporate moves from other abilities that have been in Dream Land 3.

-CHEF KAWASAKI: I think it’s safe to say this one is pretty easy to do just like the returning Dream Friends. He has a unique moveset in comparison to Chef Kirby that also has him use Kirby’s Final Smash from Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

-LOLOLO & LALALA: Aside from pushing boxes and Gordos they can be the Ice Climbers of the game, and most importantly one of their super moves could have them fuse into their original form in the anime to reference that further.

-SHADOW KIRBY: A clone (in terms of moveset) for Kirby that lacks the inhale ability and has more attacks based on his appearances in Amazing Mirror (and also on Kirby’s unique ability to split in four in these games) and the Kirby Fighters spinoffs. Simple as it is.

-THE MIDBOSSES: They all play the same as their fights too, so doing a paragraph for each of them would be a bit redundant. I chose to add minibosses in because most of them are pretty iconic among Kirby enemies and some of them are also technically friends of Kirby’s. I picked Bonkers (whose coconut throwing and some special moves could make him different enough from Dedede if you ask me), Mr. Frosty (also because we don’t have an Ice-based character in the game), Buggzy (which I can see being the ultimate grappler), King Doo (because we don’t actually have a Waddle Doo in the roster and he’s technically not only their king but also the most unique of them) and Grand Wheelie (look, I like Wheel as an ability ok? it’s like playing as Sonic in a Kirby game)

-KNUCKLE JOE: Taking stuff from both his Star Allies moveset and his Assist Trophy from Ultimate PLUS a few references to the anime and you have the ultimate Shoto character in the Kirby franchise. Ryu mains, this is the character for you.

-GIM: Look, my three favorite abilities are Yo-Yo, Wheel and ESP, in no particular order, so I HAD to include him and the Grand Wheelie. Magolor covers for ESP enough. This lil fella looks more unique than most of the generic Kirby enemies and even among the copy ability ones he’s always been a bit of an oddball due to being a robot. The trickshots you can do with this copy ability make Gim perfect to camp, so he’d be a pretty good zoner as well.

-TAC: He’s been a Helper in Super Star where he also has an unique moveset. Expanding on it and on Tac being generally a copy ability thief could mean more copy abilities can be implemented in a moveset, probably even more than what Kirby can do. Also his design just screams potential to me.

DLC FIGHTERS

WAVE 1: Spinoff Dream Friends

Cuz these guys have been done dirty by Star Allies’ devs. Elline would be the other Artist character in the game and call for Claycia’s assistance in specific attacks. Prince Fluff would play mostly just like Kirby himself did in Kirby’s Epic Yarn and implement specific transformations in some attacks, ending with the tank one from the end of that game. Then we have Gryll. If you know how to make a Tetris/Puyo Puyo based character in a fighting game then good for you, I absolutely don’t know how. What I KNOW however is that she has a float like Peach’s in Smash Bros and I-No’s in Guilty Gear.

WAVE 2: Dream Villains

These guys would all play exactly like their boss fights. Hyness and Sectonia would remain mostly unchanged while Haltmann in terms of moveset is the same as Susie, just without every non-Robobot move that she has.

WAVE 3: Clash of Blades

THAT’S RIGHT, IT’S ALL ANIME SWORDFIGHTERS. They all pull from their boss fights, but Morpho Knight is gonna be a bit more unique compared to Galacta, Dark Meta and Meta Knight, having in the swordfighter equivalent of Akuma’s Raging Demon. Meanwhile, Dark Matter Swordsman and Galacta Knight are completely faithful to the source material, but they’d probably be a bit nerfed due to Galacta’s universe-breaking powers. (you can bet that if we get the remaining legendary heroes who sealed Void Termina in future games they’d be their own separate Wave 5 DLC pack)

WAVE 4: Revival of Old Faces

Nightmare and Drawcia are back and they’re here to stay! Their movesets don’t really need that much changes. Void however is an entirely different beast. He’d be a mix of Kirby, both Zero incarnations and Dark Matter. His design wouldn’t just be giant orb that switches between Kirby and Dark Matter faces, he’d be Kirby-sized and with legs and stubby lil arms like the pink puffball. And you can bet your ass he’d be broken as fuck.

SKINS

If a character’s appearance changed across the series’ history (like Marx Soul, Girl Blob Gooey, Shoppe Magolor, Mecha Knight, Dark Taranza/Taranza in the Super Kirby Clash games, Masked/Shadow Dedede, Anime!Knuckle Joe, Parallel/Pres. Parallel Susie, EX versions and so on) they’d just be an alternate skin/palette swap for the specific character. Multiple characters of the same species with little changes (like a normal Waddle Dee or Sailor Dee, or literally all Kirby colors including Keeby) are the same. I’m also debating on how Dark Mind would be a skin for Nightmare or if there’d be a skin inspired by him for the Dark Matter Swordsman. Zero and Zero Two would probably be turned into palette swaps/outfits for Void (imagine a white Kirby cosplaying as Zero Two that’d be so cute lol).

ATTACKING ASSIST CHARACTERS

Characters who appear in other characters’ attacks. Like the aforementioned Squeaks, Meta Knights and Claycia. Normal Dark Matter would appear in DM Swordsman’s attacks in some capacity outside of the eye laser and the Gordo Throw would return from Dedede’s previous Smash incarnations alongside the Waddle Dee Throw from Brawl. And naturally Magolor can call in the Lor Starcutter for one of his super moves. I am actually considering giving Tac the ability to throw random items/enemies at opponents, with the Bomber being one of these. It’d be a very RNG attack with the Bomber being the best outcome, blowing on the opponent’s face.

HELPERS

All characters in the game can be called on for an Helper attack, that can help you in some form against the opponent by either damaging or tampering with the opponent or by having you get healed or with some buff. Outside from the playable roster enemies that give you copy abilities would also be Helpers, but the specific ones I’m not so sure on.

BOSSES

Characters you can fight in Arcade mode, in Story mode or in a specific Boss mode. There’d also be a Ganon’s Fury (Hyrule Warriors) inspired mode where you’d play as the bosses pitting them against each other. I specifically picked Dyna Blade, Whispy Woods, Landia, Star Dream, Kracko, Great Edge, Pyribbit, Ice Dragon, Fire Lion, Masher, Grand Mam, Metal General, Kibble Blade and Pon & Con.

STAGES

There’d be quite a lot of stages, but I haven’t thought out specific ones except for Green Greens, Butter Building, a Ripple Star stage, one for Dedede’s castle with stage cameos by Tiff, Tuff and Escargoon from the anime and every final boss’s fighting arena.

THE MUSIC

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is gonna be nothing compared to this one. We’re getting all the important music from all pre-Kumazaki games, all music from Kumazaki games and spinoffs, and online arrangements with focus on orchestral (Desolo Zantas), metal (GaMetal, of course) and EDM (Acid Notation, Qumu and various others), including stuff like Itoki Hana’s vocal arrangements. We’re going all out on this one.

Aaaaand that’s it. Thanks for coming to my TED talk. Stay hydrated.

[weirdmarioenemies]

Name: Vivian

Debut: Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door

So, Paper Mario: The Origami King came out last week! I haven’t played it, and besides that it’s brand new so I don’t think we feel like spoiling it or judging it yet. I am not going to mention it for the rest of this post.

Now for a different Paper Mario game that I haven’t played, but am totally willing to judge, let’s talk about The Thousand Year Door, which came out sixteen years ago, today! This was not planned, but boy is it working out. The Thousand Year Door, we need to talk. We need to talk about Vivian.

Vivian, as you can probably tell from the picture starting this post, is a FLAWLESS character! Everything about her design is perfect. I love how wispy she is, I love her huge pink striped hat, I love that her hair obscures her eyes, and I love her pink rosy cheeks. And she’s purple! Purple is my favorite drink. Even without being a marine invertebrate, I think Vivian hits just enough marks that I can safely say that she’s a top-tier character design. I aspire to look exactly like Vivian does.

Vivian was the youngest of the three Shadow Sirens, alongside Beldam in the blue hat and Marilyn in the yellow hat. I say “was,” as she quits being on their side to join Mario instead, as tragically, Vivian’s sisters are incredibly cruel to her, regularly blaming her for their mistakes, and insulting her. Although specifically sent to fight Mario, she quickly realizes Mario is nicer to her than her sisters ever were.

Vivian is awesome, she’s a shadow gal with strong magic powers that can drag Mario into the void to avoid obstacles and enemies. She’s a bit insecure, due to the ridicule she received from her sisters, but that doesn’t stop her from being one of the best characters ever. She’s also transgender! Which is... actually a double-edged sword kind of!

On one hand, I think there is a sort of abstract joy in knowing that this awesome ghost gal is canonically transgender. She’s one of my Best Characters Ever (not to infringe on Mod Chikako’s copyright) and she is a transgender woman much like myself! No wonder I want to be her. Vivian’s character design simply rocks too much to be cis.

...Unfortunately, whoever was writing The Thousand Year Door didn’t quite handle this situation with the most tact and care. If you don’t recognize Vivian as a canonically transgender character, in which case, where have you been, then that’s probably because the whole thing was erased in the English and German versions of the game, while left in tact in every other language, including the original Japanese. And how was it handled? Well...

So in the original version of the game, Beldam’s insults towards Vivian were very much geared towards her being transgender, often calling her a “man” and slinging transphobic insults at her. While it could be argued that this is being portrayed in a negative light, since the other Shadow Sirens are antagonists for most of the game, this doesn’t change the fact that a number of “good” NPCs seem to treat her with a sort of weird hesitation. Even Goombella! GOOMBELLA I say!

The game very much seems to treat her Epic Transgender Existence in the “used to be a man” sort of light, and even in Super Paper Mario, her catch card description refers to her as a “boy...”, a sort of portrayal that makes it, as best, questionable whether or not Vivian was written with positive intent. Oh Super Paper Mario catch cards! How have you betrayed me like so! While it’s great that a character like Vivian is trans, at best it’s just handled sloppily, and at worst it appears to be actively malicious towards her. It might not be quite on the same level as Birdo, but... that’s a really low bar to pass.

While it’s a pity that certain translations completely erase Vivian’s transgender identity, it may be for the better, considering how sloppily it was handled more often than not. Poor representation can prove to be more damaging than no representation at all. I’m certain there are people who have found comfort in Vivian’s character and story, and that is a good thing! (I mean, if anything you can probably tell I sort of have!) But it should also be acknowledged that this doesn’t necessarily mean Vivian’s story was well-written, if it was even written with positive intents.

I like Vivian. I love Vivian. I wish her post didn’t have to end up like this, because she deserves so much better than this. Obviously, the world has changed in the past sixteen years, and I hope that if Vivian were to make a return, it’d be in a world that is kinder to her. But that’s two “if”s in one, considering that Nintendo still, unfortunately doesn’t have the best track record with handling trans characters, and besides that, weird restrictions have been placed on the Mario series ever since the Wii era.

But who knows? Maybe if Odyssey is an indication, Nintendo’s opening up to the idea of doing more daring things with the franchise, and acknowledging more of its history. Maybe a mainline game will acknowledge Paper Mario before Paper Mario acknowledges Paper Mario. And who knows? Maybe someday, she’ll come back, and it’ll be in a game written by better, kinder people...

And maybe then we’ll be able to play as her in Mario Kart. C’mon Nintendo. This is main material right here. You’ve given Vivian enough slack, now let her enjoy the joys of Waluigi Pinball. She deserves it.

[imagine-loki]

Stolen Kisses, Stolen Memories

TITLE: Stolen Kisses, Stolen Memories CHAPTER NO./ONE SHOT: One-Shot AUTHOR: Just A Shy Anon ORIGINAL IMAGINE: Imagine you wake up in a strange bed, in a room you have no memory of entering. A quick peek under the sheets reveals you have nothing on. When you look up, Loki is starring at you, leaning on the doorframe, wearing only a towel.

“Tell me pet, how much of last night do you remember?”

RATING: Teen NOTES/WARNINGS: Implied smut but nothing explicit

***

I woke with a gasp, jarred from a rather chaotic dream. My eyes were slightly stuck together from sleep.

When I shifted to peel my eyes open and sit up, something struck me as odd.

My eyes flew open, unsticking.

The bed I was lying on was not mine. “What on Earth…?” I whispered.

I was in silk sheets with a mahogany bed frame in what appeared to be a sleek modern apartment. The type you’d see in a movie. Maybe some rich lawyer’s New York apartment or something.

I shifted again and that same feeling of something’s odd echoed through my mind.

Maybe it was the sheets. They were silk and…

Touching my skin.

I peeked under the sheets. “Eep!” I squeaked, holding the sheet protectively over my chest to try and maintain some form of modesty. What the what was going on?!

When the sheet was tucked around my chest, I noticed that one of the three doors in the room was open.

A man stood there, a towel wrapped around his waist. His had sleek, curly black hair and eyes that pierced right into me. His arms were folded and he was leaning against the doorframe. There was a smirk toying with the edges of his lips.

“Tell me, pet, how much of last night do you remember?”

Last night…

***

“Come ON, live a little!” my friend, Megan, protested, shoving me toward the karaoke stage at the bar.

“I live plenty enough, thanks,” I replied. “I’m not THAT good.”

“I disagree. You have a great voice and I highly suggest you get your rear in gear and sing a song!”

“I’m not drunk enough for that.”

“You’re never drunk. You never drink!”

“Someone’s gotta be the designated driver,” I pointed out sarcastically. “And I’m the best driver here.”

“Fair enough but pleeease?”

“You ARE drunk,” I said, pushing her lightly back into the booth where our friends were hanging out. She flopped back into her seat with no resistance. Yup. She was definitely drunk.

I’d seen too many lives destroyed by alcohol to want to drink myself. Both of my uncles were alcoholics and I’d grown up watching it destroy their families.

“Please sing? Just one song. For me,” Megan pleaded. “Do Shallow! From that one movie with Lady Gaga!”

“I never saw that movie. Never had time.”

“Oh so you had time to rewatch Avatar: The Last Airbender three times but not the Lady Gaga one.”

“Okay one: it’s called A Star is Born and two: Avatar: The Last Airbender is like the best piece of media in the world.” I knew the song because it was on the radio all the time, but hadn’t seen the movie it was in.

Megan groaned. “Please? Just one song.”

“As long as you promise not to film it.”

Megan beamed. “Deal,” she said.

I went over to the list of songs that were there for karaoke and peered over it. Sure enough, Shallow was on the list. But it was a duet and I wasn’t about to ask any of our friends to come up with me.

“Thinking of doing Shallow?” a man’s voice asked from behind me. I yelped and jumped, whirling around.

“My friend wants me to but I don’t have anyone to duet with,” I said—then beamed. “Get it? Duet? Do it? No?”

The man chuckled. “Ah. I see. Wordplay,” he said. He was tall, slender, black-haired, thin-faced, and British. His smirk was slightly crooked—not in appearance, in the sentiment behind it. “Would you care to sing it with me?”

“I, um… I…”

He leaned past me to the DJ. “The two of us will sing Shallow,” he said. The DJ nodded and waved us up the stage. The man pulled me by the hand up the stairs. “I’m Loki, by the way.” He took one of the mics.

I gave him my name in return. “Loki, like, the Norse God?”

“The very same. Clever girl,” Loki said. The guitar opening of the song began. Loki smiled at me and began to sing while I found my mic.

He had a smooth voice that was too British for the country twang of the original recording of the song. I decided not to think about it.

I took up the female vocals after the brief interlude. I heard Megan and my friends cheer for me. I blushed red and looked away from the bar patrons, keeping my eyes on Loki. He was smiling at me with a sort of melancholy as I asked if he was tired trying to fill the void.

As I kept singing, a sort of trance fell over me. I was hypnotized by his eyes. He was pulling me further and further in. We kept stepping closer until our bodies were touching.

“I’m off the deep end, watch as I dive in—I’ll never meet the grou-ou-ound!” I belted out, inches from Loki’s chest. He smiled at me as I kept going. He met me at the harmony flawlessly. He had such an incredible singing voice. I was finding it hard to even THINK about looking away from him.

Wow. He was handsome too. Like, the not-fair kind.

I got a break from my trance when I got to do the vocalization no accompanied by lyrics that allowed me to just belt.

“I’M OFF THE DEEP END—WATCH AS I DIVE IN—I’LL NEVER MEET THE GROU-OU-OUND! CRASH THROUGH THE SURFACE—WHERE THEY CAN’T HURT US—we’re far from the shallow now.” He grabbed my hand to reel me back in for the harmonies for the last few seconds, returning me to my trance.

Once it was over, he stooped down. I lifted to my tiptoes and met him.

The kiss caused the crowd to cheer, and me to fall deeper into my infatuation with this stranger—this Loki.

***

“I remember… the kiss, after karaoke. That’s it,” I said. Loki smiled. He crossed the room and perched on the edge of the bed, pushing his fingers through my hair. “Did I… get drunk?”

“Decidedly not,” he replied. “Allow me to enlighten you.” He bent forward and kissed me.

Memories rushed into my head.

Whispers and giggles in a darkened booth. Stolen kisses from both of us. An invitation. An acceptance. Going home with him. Making out. Shutting the bedroom door by falling against it. Whispers in the dark. A question. An answer. Clothes getting removed. A fade-to-black—if you will.

I pulled away from the kiss. “Why… why couldn’t I… where’d my memory go? I wasn’t drunk…”

“Ah. I believe that might be my fault. I might have accidentally siphoned them out of your head. Unintentionally, of course.”

I stared at him in confusion. “… What? What are you talking about? What does that mean?”

Loki smirked at me. “You asked last night if my name was ‘like the Norse God’ and I said, 'the very same.’ Because I am the very same god to whom you were referring.”

If I weren’t so confused I might have fainted from the shock. If I were a lady in an 1800’s novel. “Huh? Wait… seriously?”

“Yes. Were you not living here when I attacked New York?”

“No. I moved here about a year ago for work,” I said.

Loki tsked with that crooked grin—so charming on the surface but belying a wickedness underneath. “Even better, pet,” he purred, brushing a few strands of my hair out of my face.

Wow this man was alluring. I knew I should have been scrambling to find my clothes on the floor of this bedroom and running away at the speed of sound but something about him just made me want to slam my lips into his and pick up where we left off the night before.

Nope. I wasn’t going to do that. I wasn’t that kind of person.

“So… you accidentally siphoned my memories.”

“Yes. Occasionally my magic likes to behave in its own way. For the most part I have control of it but… it’s magic.”

“… Right,” I said.

“Forgive me, pet. I didn’t mean to take them.”

“Stop calling me that! I told you my name!”

“You did,” he agreed. But said nothing else. He just smirked at me, kissed my forehead, and got up. I flopped back down in his bed and stared at the ceiling. There were so many questions bubbling in my mind like an unwatched pot left to boil.

“I’m guessing this was a one-time thing,” I remarked.

“You sound more like you're hoping that’s what this was.” He chuckled. “But it doesn’t have to be,” Loki added suggestively.

“I don’t do the whole friends-with-benefits thing.”

“What about the boyfriend thing?”

I snorted, keeping my eyes on the ceiling. “In theory. Never had one before. But that’d sure go over well with my parents. 'Hey look, Mom and Dad, I’m dating the god who tried to take over the world!’ Yeah right.”

“Ah. So you’re a good girl. A rule-follower.” He chuckled to himself, apparently amused with me.

“For the most part, yeah. Except last night.” I knew that if I looked away from the ceiling and back to him, I’d turn into complete putty in his hands and just fall right into that trance—I’d be under his spell (possibly literally?) and would readily agree to anything he suggested. I couldn’t do that. The only way to maintain my dignity was just not to look at him.

“Perhaps your friend was right. You need to live a little. Date someone that would put a single blemish on your impeccable reputation.”

“What, you?”

A brief, thoughtful pause. “I don’t see why not,” he remarked. “Last night was incredibly enjoyable and I didn’t expect myself to catch feelings from it, but I believe I might have. There’s something in the air between you and I. Something even I can’t explain. I look at you and I feel entranced—and as someone who usually does the entrancing, being on the receiving end is quite a shock to my system. So, if you’d be interested in pursuing a relationship, I would be too.”

I sat up again, this time in surprise. Loki was now in dark slacks and a black button-down. “You feel that too? I thought you were putting a spell on me!”

“I assure you, I am not. I’ve done nothing magical to you except unintentionally take your memories. The allure I feel from you is entirely unrelated.”

Well… at least that was mutual? I had no idea how to handle this situation.

After a moment, I sighed. “Give me your number and three days. I’ll think about it.”

That earned me another smile—this one slightly less crooked. “You have yourself a deal, pet.”

***

3 days later—

***

“Loki,” a voice on the other end of the phone said as the call connected.

“Hi. It’s me.”

“Ah. Good morning, pet. Have you made your decision?”

“I have.”

“And what decision have you come to?”

“I came to the decision that…” I sighed. “Can’t believe I’m doing this… I wouldn’t… mind… dating you.” Clearing my throat, I facepalmed. “I mean… I’m down for being in a romantic relationship if you are.”

“Delightful. Let’s meet for lunch and discuss it, shall we?”

“Discuss” sounded like a euphemism for make out somewhere private but I decided to overlook that for the moment. “Yeah. Let’s do that.”

[nadziejastar]

How Isa Became a Seeker of Darkness

So, I obviously think the idea that Isa willingly became a Seeker of Darkness is ludicrous. Terra became a Seeker of Darkness by having his rage exploited. Riku (Replica) became a Seeker of Darkness by having his jealousy exploited. I thought it would be interesting to speculate more in-depth on what emotional weakness Xehanort exploited to get Isa to fall to darkness.

Secret Ansem Report 2

I have made a grave mistake. My study of the "darkness of the heart" began with a simple psychological test and quickly snowballed. Spurred on by my youngest apprentice, Ienzo, I constructed a massive laboratory in the basement of my castle.

Unbeknownst to me, my six apprentices then began collecting a large number of subjects on which to perform dangerous experiments into the "darkness of the heart." As soon as I found out, I called my apprentices together and ordered them not only to cease their studies, but to destroy the results of their research thus far.

Upon his advice, I decided to review the data obtained at my basement lab. That is when I discovered the "Ansem's Reports." Though they bore my name, the only one I had written was number 0. Apparently he had gone on to pen numbers 1 through 8 himself. Yes — the first subject in my foolish experiments.

Zexion has a weapon called “Taboo Papers” which is part of Wild Gear. This may be a reference to the reports that Ansem the Wise discovered before he realized the dangerous experiments his apprentices were conducting without his knowledge. Saïx’s Wild Gear weapon is called “Crescent” and it is shaped an awful lot like the astrological symbol for Black Moon Lilith. This is the reason why I think both of these weapons are referring to the experiments on darkness.

The Tower: When the Tower card appears in a Tarot reading, expect the unexpected – massive change, upheaval, destruction and chaos. It may be the loss of a loved one or any event that shakes you to your core, affecting you spiritually, mentally and physically. There’s no escaping it.

Wild Gear is “The Tower” in Luxord’s deck, and it is very appropriate for the concept of Black Moon Lilith.

The Two of Pentacles: This suit represents something supportive that is available to you. The figure-eight image is a symbol of immortality and eternity. The card is a sign that you have to believe in yourself even if you aren't feeling confident.

“The Tower” is shaped like the Two of Pentacles.

Axel's weapons have a lot of alchemy symbolism. Saïx is a moon-based character, and his weapons are heavily based on astrology. One weapon is named “Astrologia” and another is named “Horoscope,” and they both incorporate astrological symbols into the design. Both of those weapons hint that Isa is associated with the zodiac sign Cancer (ruled by the Moon). The weapon named “Twilight” hints that he is also associated with the zodiac sign Pisces (ruled by Neptune). These two water zodiac signs are the most emotional ones---the polar opposite of Saïx, who shows almost no human emotion. There’s also a weapon shaped like the symbol for the asteroid Vesta, known as “The Guardian of the Sacred Flame”. Astrologically, Vesta defines how you see your mission and truth in life and the world.

Black Moon Lilith is the geometric point in the sky that marks the furthest point of the Moon’s orbit around the earth, the apogee. It’s the mathematical point that’s exactly in between the Earth and the Moon–essentially, empty space. It is a dark void, which stays approximately nine months in each zodiac sign.

In an astrology chart, Black Moon Lilith represents a person’s primitive impulses and behavior in their rawest form. Psychologically, it is a point that represents how we react to emptiness and isolation. It brings up deep and primal issues like repressed feelings of rejection, rage, and the refusal to give in. 

One of KH3's most important themes is "facing your fears". Knowing where Black Moon Lilith is located in a birth chart can reveal information related to the shadow self. It reveals our deepest fears and how we project those fears onto others.

Black Moon Lilith in Cancer

The Black Moon Lilith in Cancer reflects a deep fear of abandonment. Cancers are the nurturers in society, but are prone to feelings of loneliness and lack of support. Lilith in Cancer brings up issues around dependency and co-dependency and detests people that come across as needy or clingy; this is a part of themselves that they dislike and therefore project these issues onto others.

In Cancer, the shadow is caused by the fear of abandonment and it manifests as intense separation anxiety. I think the writers were inspired by this idea with the plot for Abrabah in 358/2 Days. Aladdin was reluctant to rely on his best friend Genie even though he really needed help, and the novel hinted that there was a parallel to Axel's past with his best friend.

Aladdin: See, Genie and Carpet took off to see the world. It's what Genie always wanted, so I wished him the best and all, but...

Goofy: You miss him.

Sora: Man, things must be REALLY quiet with Genie gone.

This theme was continued in KH2, where Aladdin really missed Genie, who had gone away. He felt lonely. Saïx appears to be very ashamed of this aspect of his human self and projects this “weakness” onto others, like Roxas. He also has mixed feelings towards Axel due to this issue.

“Bet you don’t know why the sun sets red. You see, light is made up of lots of colors. And out of all those colors, red is the one that travels the farthest.”

Something interesting is that the Cancer zodiac sign (ruled by the Moon) begins on the day of the summer solstice, which is the longest day of the year. Day 255 is called "The Longest Day" and it's when Axel tells Roxas about the red sunset. Black Moon Lilith is the furthest point of the Moon’s orbit from the Earth. It represents total darkness---an empty void. I think it's cool how the Kingdom Hearts writers incorporated astrological concepts into the story like this. But how does all of this relate to the plot?

Secret Report 4: Experiments of the Heart – Notes on Subject X, Excerpt 2

Secret Report 4 is obtained after clearing Battlegate 4 at Toy Box: Galaxy Toys / Kid Corral.

My pilot studies used a handful of subjects, but none possessed the fortitude to endure them. Ultimately, all suffered mental collapse. I knew it would be a heavy blow to lose a subject as unique as she. Upon discovering the tests I've been conducting, my master demanded that I cease my work immediately and destroy what research I have compiled. Worse still, he ordered the release of my remaining subjects. She is gone. Where is Subject X now? Has "wise" Master Ansem hidden her away? —Xehanort 

In KH3, one of the reports on Subject X was found in the Kid Corral. This is also the world where Young Xehanort learned that he can create vessels by putting a heart into an empty puppet. Young Xehanort split the world in two, and separated Andy’s Toys, in order to test the strength of their bond. 

Young Xehanort: In this world toys have hearts. And those hearts come from a powerful bond. So what happens when those bonds are stretched to their limit? When they are worlds apart, can cloth and plastic hold on to their hearts? All I needed was a wedge to widen the divide---someone like you to fill them with distrust and doubt. And that chasm you created can be filled with a vast darkness.

Young Xehanort took Buzz through a portal in the Kid Korral, then revealed that the darkness in him was born when he was separated from Andy. This loneliness created a chasm that Xehanort was able to fill with darkness. Sora and Woody dispelled the darkness of his isolation by surrounding him with the light of their friendship. 

“Well, I think you can be inseparable, even if you’re apart. It’s like, if you feel really close to each other. Like best friends.”

I wonder if Young Xehanort did something similar with Lea and Isa using the Datascape, which is itself another world. And since Lea and Isa’s connection was so strong, Isa’s heart didn’t collapse and he became the unique Subject X, the most prospective candidate for becoming a vessel for the X-Blade. Saïx seems to have huge issues with being alone. He said there was no meaning in fighting alone and got really upset when Sora said that he wasn’t alone. Lea and Isa lost their hearts right outside of the Datascape. It looked kinda similar to when Axel brought Xion back and collapsed afterwards. That was the last time he saw her. Maybe Lea went inside the Datascape to retrieve Isa, who was put in there as part of the experiment. 

“You’re letting yourself get too attached to them.”

“Right, sir, of course, sir.” Saïx spun on his heels.

That was all he wanted to say to me?

But just as Saïx started walking away, he caught a barely audible murmur—

“You’ve changed.”

He listened to Saïx’s receding footsteps, and his gaze dropped to his own feet.

“You sure I’m the one who changed?” he said under his breath.

There's also various hints in the story that Isa was very clingy towards Lea. Since he was described as a quiet boy who only came out of his shell for Lea, this is a very believable personality trait. It seemed like this was supposed to be an important aspect of Isa’s character and would explain some of Saïx's warped personality traits. I also like that we can fight Anti-Saïx during the fight where Roxas is trying to leave the organization. Isa's fear of abandonment was probably the weakness that was exploited by the apprentices. Axel remarks that Saïx has changed several times in 358/2 Days. And a few of those times, it seemed related to the clingy and needy aspect of his personality. One instance is when he said Axel was getting too attached to Roxas and Xion. And in the manga, they reinforced this idea by hinting that Isa became easily attached, like he did with Pluto. 

“I thought I told you not to get too involved.” Saïx swung his chair, turning his back on Axel. Axel could feel nothing but a will of rejection from that back.

“Just look at it. I won’t say any more than that.”

For Saïx to say that, he probably doesn’t intend to tell me any more. 

Axel stared at Saïx’s back. 

The two of us have definitely changed since those times.

“…I wonder which of us it was that changed,” muttered Axel, and Saïx’s shoulders trembled for just a second. Without waiting for an answer, Axel left the room.

Another instance is when Axel was trying to get Saïx to open up to him by putting his hand on his shoulder. Then Saïx coldly brushed his hand off and refused to tell him anything. This cold rejection made him think how much things had changed between them.

Within one of them, Terra, I sensed something. The boy, though well-intentioned, seeks power single-mindedly. And that kind of hunger is a seedbed for darkness. I had found my vessel.

Black Moon Lilith is all about emptiness, incompleteness, being estranged, and feeling like you are lacking something or someone important.

“If your best friend goes away, you’re sad, and if you get to be with them, you’re happy,” Naminé added. “Isn’t that how it is, Axel?”

“…That’s about the size of it.” Axel nodded and sat down on the remaining empty sofa, staring at the sea-salt ice cream he held.

Maybe this is why Isa was viewed as a better candidate for a vessel than Lea. Xehanort may have found him a better seedbed for darkness due to his emotional dependence on Lea and his vulnerability. Master Xehanort turned Terra into a Seeker of Darkness by exploiting his desire for power. I think Isa's darkness was fueled by loneliness. The same feeling Axel suffered from for the entire story, causing him to chase after Roxas like a lost puppy. 

Sora: Your “loneliness” only made Buzz and Woody’s connection stronger.

Since they both shared the same pain, I think it would have made their connection stronger in the end.

[official-alan-dabiri]

Official-Alan-Dabiri and the 5 Stages of Grief

Okay, I’ve been doing some grieving for the esports side of Heroes of the Storm, and I’d like to kind of put my thoughts out here for my three human and three-hundred pornbot followers. I’m just going to step outside of what has been mockingly referred to as my “blizzard fursuit” and be real for a minute here. Hi, I’m Rob. I am a Heroes of the Storm player since alpha, and a Heroes of the Storm esports fan since before the custom game mode had been added, when maps were random and they had to be cast afterwards off of replays. The recent announcement of the cancellation of HGC and Heroes of the Dorm hit me - and the rest of the community - very hard. So I’m just going to touch on the stages of grief as they pertain to this event, and my feelings on the whole matter.

For those of you here for silly patch note commentary, fanart, and moba memes, I’ll put this behind a read more out of respect for your dashes.

Denial

I think Denial is the shortest stage we’re facing here. Denial came when there was no announcement of 2019 HGC for two months, and some of us shrugged it off. At Blizzcon, outward-facing Blizzard employees assured the fans, the casters, the players, and other esports-attached people that HGC would be back in 2019, and be as big or bigger. I’m not going to say that they lied, but their statements fed into the idea that this would be fine, and some people latched onto that in the wake of the expanding silence before it was finally broken.

To be in denial is a defense mechanism. It is denying that this is happening in order to numb our emotions and make it through the first wave of pain. Here, denial is the shortest stage because this is so believable. In the wake of so many questionable moves Activision-Blizzard has made lately, the severity and suddenness is a shock, not the event itself. This is really happening. Professional-level Heroes of the Storm is dead. And of course it is. After all, these are the numbskulls who made a mobile game the centerpiece of Blizzcon 2018, right?

Anger

I just want to preface this by noting that I, personally, never move past anger. I may struggle through it, but that anger never goes away. After the loss of my maternal grandfather to COPD over twenty years ago, the smell of cigarettes still enrages me. So please understand that when I say that I will never forgive Blizzard for this, I am not being melodramatic. I will be angry about this for a very long time.

Anger, however, needs to be appropriately directed and channeled. I’m upset at losing my weekend HGC fix. I’m upset that my amateur team no longer has a pro scene to watch together and work to emulate. And I’m very upset that Heroes of the Dorm is gone, since it was the catalyst that drew many of my friends into the game in the first place. This loss is the end of an era of entertainment. But that’s not the real crime here.

Hundreds of people - some of whom I admire and idolize - across the world are now unemployed. Very abruptly. Right before Christmas. Forty players, per region, are now out in the cold, along with any coaches and managers the team might employ. Add to that the casters, production staff, and analysts? Those people just got hosed. Some of those players dropped out of college to be here. Some of those players dropped out of college literally this fall in preparation for the 2019 season, after being picked up after the region’s playoffs, or fighting their way up in the Open Division and through the Crucible. There are people who have leases they’ve signed based on income that just got ripped away from them. Blizzard just brutally smacked down every one of them, tore away their jobs, and smashed their dreams.

And they did it in a blog post. That was how most of the players and casters learned about this. This wasn’t an event that was common knowledge, and the announcement just broke the NDA for them all. They have been living their lives up until literally the blog post, making plans dependent on HGC 2019. They found out they got fired by reading the news. And Blizzard selfishly kept this under their hats for this long to make sure that no players, sponsors, or other organizations got spooked before they were already locked in to Blizzard’s other esports. This was the worst way to do it. It’s unforgivable.

Bargaining

The bargaining stage is about seeking control over a terrible situation. It’s looking for how things should be when how they are is unacceptable. And for this announcement, there are a thousand different ways that would be preferable to this.

For one thing, I would love if this just weren’t happening. If only the HGC were just on a limited budget. If only the HGC was following a different, cheaper format. If only either HGC or Heroes of the Dorm were gone, and not both. For another, I would love if the call had been made six months ago. Cancel the crucible, make sure everyone has months of notice before the doors close to seek other work, or go back to school, or whatever. Literally any notice whatsoever would be preferable to this. Even if it’s just all in NDAs and the public doesn’t know, half of my anger is mitigated just because I know those folks aren’t entirely hosed.

Of course, the greatest bargain at all is to go all the way back. What if they’d designed the HGC better? The HGC was set up to ensure its own demise. The pros being paid salaries by Blizzard was great for their financial security, but those salaries elevated them above everyone else. The rest of the scene withered. Was Tempo Storm ever going to play against an open division team? No. Never. Maybe a scrim if they had connections, but nothing serious. In the days before HGC, those players had a really high chance of getting matched into the best pro team in round 1 just because of the seeding. Amateur tournaments are few and far between right now, and most of them go without casters, or have inexperienced casters who don’t have the platform to bring these games to a sizable audience. The part of the scene that still exists is now tiny to the point of invisibility. If HGC had been designed on a points system like it was for the first blizzcon, though? Those structures would still exist, instead of having been steamrolled over to build the now-derelict HGC parking lot. Scaling back Blizzard’s involvement with that system would have been a minimal change.

Depression

A lot of the community seems to be in this stage. A lot of people think this was a deathblow to the game itself, and, to be honest, it might be. The announcement was accompanied by the news that the development team is shrinking, and that content will be coming out slower, but with no indication of how slow. There is no shortage of doom and gloom, with people predicting no new hero for months - or even years - and balance patches being made by devs with no resources to test or monitor the results.

Ultimately, this is a downer. I’m not going to tell you it’s not bad. The lack of a pro scene to aspire to immediately kills the interest of a nontrivial number of players, who thought they could one day break into that world, whether as a player or as a caster. And the lack of those players kills the motivation of content creators, who are making build guides, tier lists, and learning-related content for those players. Make no mistake, this scene will shrink because of this. Your favorite pro players, streamers, youtubers, and other content creators might just move on, looking for other games to excel in, and take some amount of their audience with them.

Even if you weren’t part of this community, (why are you reading this, then?) Heroes of the Storm ranked 12th on the most influential esports of 2018. The loss of this is going to spook literally every sponsor across all esports, planting the seed of doubt that this is a worthwhile use of funds when it could all vanish overnight at the whim of the game’s publisher.

And even if you don’t care about esports, the professional level of the game had an effect that rippled down through all levels of play. Do you remember suddenly seeing Xul in your games a whole lot earlier this year? Do you remember Alarak suddenly being a contested pick in the last two months? Surely you noticed that the “solo lane” role suddenly became a thing last year when Blaze and Yrel were added, couldn’t main tank, but still had high win rates. All of that was the pro scene trickling down.

What happens now? What’s going to take the place of that influence? I don’t know. All I know is that when the playerbase looks up to see the highest level of play now, there’s just a void where HGC was.

Acceptance

Regardless of your feelings on the matter, though, Heroes of the Storm existed before HGC, and will continue to exist afterwards. It might end up being a much sparser community, with the pros moving on and the content creators in exodus, but we’ll still be here. I mean, I will, at least. They aren’t pulling the plug on the game, no matter what some angry nerd says about false hope. We’ve got years of gameplay and years of snarky patch notes ahead of us. Not to mention that all Blizzard content is HotS content. I’ve got Overwatch heroes to steal from Jeff, and Starcraft units to turn into poc, and lore-defying skins to slap on everyone in between. Heroes of the Storm is here to stay, and anyone who says otherwise is planning for a future calamity that’s still decades away.

That said, there are still high-level Heroes of the Storm tournaments happening. As I believe I mentioned previously, I have a team in Heroes Lounge, and that league has confirmed that they’re not stopping anytime soon. Similarly, the Nexus Gaming Series is gearing up, with sign-ups in January. In fact, there’s a number of options for community tournaments, both to participate in and to watch, with more undoubtedly coming, once the pros and casters finish their grieving and come together, looking to make it clear that they care about the game more than Blizzard does, and they’re willing to show it.

We all care more than blizzard does, or we wouldn’t be this upset. So let’s keep our eyes to the skies and give our support to whatever comes out of this. Because if the death of the pro scene would kill this game, it’s up to us to support a semi-pro scene ourselves to keep HotS alive.

[bioticgoddess]

Songbirds and Baby Bats (XI)

Series Summary: Jason Todd returns from the dead and, after the events of Under the Red Hood, he goes from Gotham to Bludhaven in search of himself...and an old friend. But getting your life back is never easy and Black Mask has enlisted the aid of Gotham’s other Crime Families as well as a few ghosts of Batman’s past. He’s coming for the Red Hood and everyone of his allies.

Always fun to play with photo editing when you need a pic off instagram. I don’t own any of the images of Ian Lang/CD828 as Red Hood. None of them. As per usual, save for my OFCs, I own nothing. That said...Welcome to the show and donate to their Season 2 Kickstarter - there are only 7 days left! 

--

PART XI

Jason sat at the workbench with his helmet in hand. It had been designed to take significantly more punishment that the last fight alone had done to it. He had, however, also been derelict in maintaining his gear since sliding back into the void he’d left in the lives of Dick and Amy. Sighing, he plugged the helmet into his laptop. Watching the two pieces of hardware talk to one another, he tapped absentmindedly at the keyboard. At least the problem didn’t seem to lie with the software. That was a small favor,  he had no desire to sit and fix code.

God that could be boring. He’d much rather reinstall a microchip with a set of tweezers and a soldering gun. 

“Hardware. That’s not...so bad,” his voice trailed off as the door to the bed room swung open. Looking up treated him to a view of Amy in an over-sized shirt and running shorts. The former stolen from his duffel bag. “Hey,” he smiled, nodding for her to come over.   

Holding up a hand, she turned the corner into the open kitchen. “Coffee first,” she yawned, nearly tripping over their boots. It had been over a week since the incident at the construction site and they still hadn’t moved those from their place in front of the freezer door. “Shite...balls…feck.” 

Chair scraping across and nearly crashing to the floor, Jason shot up. “You okay,” he called, taking a step towards her. One of her hands was on the counter, the other held up to stop him, she tiptoed around one of his boots - laying on its side like a fallen domino. At least he’d made a fresh pot of coffee when he got up...before dawn. The cabinet clanged open and she nearly dropped one of the mugs as she drew it down from the shelves, cursing again. It was a process and the woman had visible not slept well. When she finally finished the voodoo that was pouring herself a cup of coffee and padded from kitchen to workbench, Jason asked, “How late did you end up working on this stuff?”

Their gear, armor and base layers aside, was spread out on the workbench. That included his firearms, neatly stored in cases of different materials that spilled onto the floor and formed a row against the wall.  “Too bloody late,” she yawned over the rim of her mug. It was his way of saying he didn’t remember if or when she’d crawled into bed and expressing concern for her that tugged at the back of his mind.

“The discharge mechanism diagnostic is done by the way,” he thumbed at her dismantled gauntlets and heard her mutter something that sounded like an okay before dragging the rolling chair along behind her. He watched her spin the chair around and straddle it. Her arms were propped against the back, coffee in hand. Dropping back in his own chair, Jason sat facing her. “I looked over our intel. All that data we followed to Black Mask and then...Dustan.”

“Aye?”

“It was bait. Meant to get us away from doing what we do best: Cracking heads and...re-purposing the mobs’ shit.”

“Back to basics then?”

“You know it.”

“Destroy the drugs, turn in the guns, and so on.”

“The drugs I can get behind. Was wanting to keep the weapons though.”

“You’re mad love.”

He shrugged, leaning back in his chair and throwing his arms behind his head, nearly knocking his laptop off the table in the process. “AH!...You know you want to rob ‘em blind to!” A broad, sparkling smile beamed back at her. It had a disarming quality that worked on everyone except his adoptive family, and Barbara Gordon.

“Dia ár sábháil**,” she muttered, taking a swing from the black and gray striped mug in her hands. The eye roll she gave him included the fully involved head bob for effect. Jason laughed almost despite himself. A half second later, coffee warming the length of her throat, Amy continued, “Someone has to make sure you, ya know, stay alive.”

His face clouded over for a split second. He knew she was teasing, knew it was meant to be in jest, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t kicking himself for getting killed all those years ago in for the first place. Then it was gone. The Broadway smile that had faltered snapped back into place, his blue eyes looked like clear sapphires, and all that remained was a puzzled look on Amy’s face. “Jaybird,” she coaxed, a hand on his knee, “Love, where did you go?”

“Hm?”

“It was quick but you...you weren’t here were ye?”

“I’ll tell you about it later, okay?”

“Okay…” She’d resolved not to press when that kind of dark shadow fell over him. There’d been a professor in her gen-ed psychology class who’d made a point of impressing upon the students that pressuring someone with obvious PTSD or similar potential issues would likely end with them being not only shut down but also out. That was the last thing she wanted. Jason was back, provided he stuck around (in every way that implied) then it meant he’d inevitably open up. She patted his knee as he turned his attention back to the readouts from his helmet.  “Why not tell me what’s going on with that?”

 He’d started clicking through the screens, visibly furrowing his brow on the third one. “Um...well, some of the circuits on my HUD aren’t working right.” Flipping the red egg over in his lap, Jason’s fingers glided along its seams until he found the internal release. A pop echoed in the room and it separated into three loosely conjoined parts: a front and back of the helmet itself and the inner lining used to both cushion it and protect the internal electronics. “Looks like,” he followed a trio of wires that traveled along the jawline to the lenses and hung his head. “I found it.”

 Withdrawing his hand from the cluster of red and black, a section of frayed wire and snapped plastics filled his palm. “That, is part of the the circuit and wiring harness that actually lets me see.” Hanging his head he tapped the computer keyboard with his other hand, the ocular lenses lighting up. “It gives me biometric feedback like what the old man has in his cowl, not as complex as his gear but more so than your mask or Dick’s. Unlike you guys, if this is broken, I’m pretty much walking around in the dark with sunglasses on. This,” he set the circuit and wires down, tapping the brow of his helmet, “Thing has no peripheral vision, what so ever.”

 “Where did you get it,” she’d scooted forward and was leaning in to look at the small circuit boards and frayed wired as best she could against the chair back. “These are…”

Chuckling to himself, Jason answered proudly, “I broke into the R&D facility for Wayne Tech’s Korean offices. Knocked out the security, whole deal. It was fun.”

“Dunno about you,” her eyes were locked on the one-inch squared chunk of circuit board in her hand. Turning it over, the crack and separated or corroded components painfully visible. “But this is beyond my ability to fix.” That knowledge sat like a knot in both their stomachs. “And breaking into the main offices of Wayne Enterprises is-”

“Next to impossible. I know.”

“It’s the only place that’s actually meant to keep us out.”

“C’mon, it’ll be fun.” He had no point of reference to promote this kind of confidence. “Hack a few consoles, override the computers -”

She laughed, sparing a glance from the circuit assembly, “I repeat: You’re mad.”

--

“How did I let you talk me into this,” Jason could hear Wren paced back and forth on her  perch. She’d taken up position  the roof of the office high rise across from Wayne Tower. Her voice was edged with concern and knew that, despite her walking a rut into the roof, her eyes were him. He’d given her his sniper scope for just that purpose. When he didn’t answer, preoccupied with the roof access console, the Irish woman's’ voice chirped in his ear again, “You sure that patch job will hold for this?”

Chuckling across their comms he offered, “ Yes it will; also this is fun and you’re an excellent partner.”

“Well, provided we don’t get caught. How are you planning to thank your partner?” 

“Dinner,” he promised, overriding the pass codes finally. The lock popped open with a soft click. “Steak, I’ll buy and cook.” Pulling the door open, he drew a pre-cut strip of duct tape across the bolt to prevent it re-engaging. He also put a thin piece of rubber in both to top and bottom corners so it would appear closed on cameras, all while remaining ajar a few millimeters.

“I’m sorry, you cook now? When did this happen!?” There was level of incredulity mixed with the disbelief in her words, he was amused. It wasn’t unwarranted. Pre-Lazarus pit bath, he’d been unable to make more than general breakfast items, spaghetti, and a few simple meals. Chili was the most complicated thing he’d dabbled in at the time. Post-Lazarus pit, he’d had to figure out how to prep a wider array of meals in order to survive.

Trailing back over the awful black and red calendar that served as the last several years Jason pinpointed at least the location where it started. “Somewhere on the Mediterranean coast. Not sure what country though,” he whispered, splicing and cutting the wires on one of the door leading from the roof access stairs to the executive suite level. “Memory serves,” he grumbled, changing the subject,“There are some spares in the Old Man’s office”

He could hear Wren sputtering on the other ends of their communication channel. Clearly the news he’d learned to cook had her spinning. “And it’s edible?”

“Yup,” he chuckled, the locking mechanism chiming as it disengaged. A gentle twist of the knob, another strip of duct tape across the lock to prevent it from catching. Once more he left it partially ajar, unlocked and closed softly enough the weight didn’t force it closed. Ahead of him stretched the corridor that included two the offices of the CEO, CFO, and COO as well as Bruce Wayne’s own. The spotty telemetry helping him skip past and around the security cameras and sensors.

Getting into the offices was the easy part, especially Bruce’s own. Never failed to surprise him that the old man didn’t take greater precautions. And, as the grand wooden doors swung open, he realized why. “Fuck.”

“Jay?”

“There’s enough security in this room that it makes Luthor’s look like an open bar,” he grumbled, getting the fractured scan of the room. It was big and equipped with everything from retinal to pressure scans. “Also I can make baklava now too.”

She giggled and he grinned, tip toeing past a number or laser sensors. “A nice dinner date will be perfect then.”

“Glad someone’s going to appreciate my cooking,” he had three safes to choose from. One, he remembered, held spare electronics for the Bat family gear. Another held a handful of emergency weapons and grappling guns. The third, behind the portrait of Thomas and Martha Wayne held company relevant documents and information.  “You got any ideas Irish? The telemetry scanners are just functional enough that I -”

“The one behind the portrait of Bruce with Dick and Alfred,” she cut him off, still watching from across the the alleyway. “You’re cute when you puzzle over something.”

He chuckled, “Of course you know. Alright, let’s hope the part I need is there.” Carefully he crossed to the large portrait, the urge to take out his combat knife was strong but he knew slashing the damn thing was going to get them caught. Gingerly he slid it aside, turning so his back held the stupidly heavy portrait and it’s ostentatious gold painted frame back. It gave him access to the digital lock staring at him from the wall. “Oh shit.”

“Everything alright?”

Nervously he answered her, uncomfortably admitting this lock was beyond him, “He...uh...yea...no. I can’t open this.”

“Beg pardon?”

“I have seen this lock once and it nearly got me caught and killed.” He laughed nervously frustrated, “The short version: I tried to get into the Batcave when I first got back through the vehicle access. That was, um...a mistake.”

“Story for later. You want me to come over?”

“Hahah,” he reached into his jacket, pulling out a small explosive device, “No, I have another plan. Just, um, just be ready to run like hell Little Bird.” He affixed it to the locking mechanism keypad, tapping a four digit code into its interface and shifting to grip the portrait he added, “On my mark.” He hefted the painting off the wall, it was longer than he was tall and nearly sent all six-feet of him falling backwards with its unwieldy size. Leave it to Bruce to have something overwhelming in such a prominent place. He set it on the opposite wall, near a painting of Wayne Tower. Go figure.

Wren didn’t have a real opportunity to respond before Jason dropped on the far side of Bruce’s giant desk. No sense playing fast and loose with this little gadget. His need for the circuit board out weight even the shrapnel of a desire to reconcile with Bruce. The old man would get over it. Not like what was about to happen could really be considered unexpected. After all, this was how he did things. “Mark,” he hissed over comms, squeezing the small detonation switch tucked in his left hand.

The following explosion was enough that Wren saw it from her point across the way, peering in the window with the sniper scope. The average person on the street wouldn’t see or hear it. That didn’t mean, however, that the security personnel half a dozen floors down were unaware or that Batman hadn’t been alerted to the intrusion. “Shite Jay,” she cursed.

“Get going.”

“Not til you leave that building.”

Shaking his head, Jason stalked back to the now open safe. Putting his legs into it, he yanked the heavy steel open. There were two shelves: One holding waterproof strong boxes with microchips in it, the second held a full utility belt for a Robin. Oh yea, that was coming too. He slung it over his head and let the belt drape awkwardly around his chest before tucking the two small boxes into the pockets of his jacket.

It took him a minute to get situated. “Okay, and out the window,” he answered the silent panic coming from Amy across the way. “Please tell me you’re moving,” getting the windows of the executive suite open was the easiest part of their night.

Grappling hook engaged, it dragged him across the street and onto the next roof a heart beat before the security personnel opened the door. At least there’d be nothing in the safe to out their dysfunctional little family. They couldn’t have that happen. “We’ve got incoming,” she warned.

“Well that was quick.”

--

They’d narrowly gotten away from Downtown Gotham and Batman without issue. There was no guarantee Jason hadn’t, towards the end, been caught on camera but it was something he’d deal with later. At the moment, getting them the rest of the way back to Bludhaven was his top priority.  He could fix his helmet later, now that he had the parts. Right now, he had a promise to keep. Sitting in the passenger seat, whole body leaning against the door and head lolling forward as she slept, was the one person in the family he knew he had to make amends with.

Alfred would forgive him. The man probably already had. Dick had basically done the same, surprisingly. But Grayson had always had the over-protective brother complex. As for Bruce? That was still no loss.

He changed lanes, left hand on the wheel while his right came to rest on Amy’s thigh. Their haul and their masks were in a backpack in the seat behind them. Not for the first or last time he smiled and whispered, “It’s good to be back.”

 ----

Dia ár sábháil. = Lit “God Save us” But it could work of “Good Lord” and “Oh my God!” Source:  https://inirish.bitesize.irish/3649

[damonbation]

How to Make a Thousand Bucks an Hour

Another summer evening skate-n-scoot outing with Mini Me

It’s Back to School time here in Colorado, which means both my son and I will be hanging up the swim shorts and kayak paddles and getting back to more serious business for a while.

It has been a slow and endlessly sunny and leisurely summer, and a nice break for both of us, which has been very relaxing and a great time for bonding.

But relaxation has its limits. At some point all that Chilling Out fades its way into Complacency, and our natural Human nature starts to work against us, telling us to conserve energy and not really do much of anything. And laziness begets more laziness, and life actually becomes less fun.

You can see this effect in our activities. I’ve only completed two blog posts over the entire summer holidays, and together we have put out only two YouTube videos. Spending more time at home and less at the MMM Headquarters squat rack has caused me to lose at least five pounds of leg muscle that I had wanted to keep. Little MM has spent a lot less time practicing on the upright bass and putting out songs, and a lot more time playing video games and getting sucked into the “dank memes” and “Trove” channels on Reddit.

It has been a fun break, but as the freshly polished school buses awaken with the sunrise, it will be even more fun to get our own lives cranking into a higher gear as well. And if you’re reading this, it means I am off to a great start!

Complacency Is Expensive

This laziness was affecting my financial life, and your financial life too. I had let thousands of dollars of uninvested cash build up in my checking account, where it was sitting around earning nothing. My credit card bills had come in, been automatically paid, and filed themselves away without me even reviewing them for fraudulent transactions or wussypants spending on my part. And I had a growing mini-mountain of things I need to do regarding insurance, accounting, and legal stuff in both my personal and business domains.

And yet once I got my act together last week, I cleaned up the whole mess and set things straight in less than an hour.

It’s not Just Me, it’s You

When I talk to friends and family, I notice a common theme: they tend to set up certain “hassle” things once, and then ignore them as long as possible unless some absolute crisis comes along and forces them to make a change.

“Oh, I just do all my insurance stuff with Jim Schmidt’s Insurance office downtown, because my parents referred me to him when I first moved out for college.

Even better, his wife Jane runs a loan brokerage, so she handles all our family’s mortgage needs!”

On this surface, this sounds fun and folksy and like a nice way to do business. And that is exactly the way I like to live: keeping my business relationships as casual and fun as I can. But when it comes to money, complacency can come at a price, so at the bare minimum we should find out exactly what price we are paying.

For example, just recently a coworking member came to me and asked for some financial help. And as always, I suggested we start by looking at big recurring expenses. So we dug into the details of her insurance and other major bills streaming in from ol’ Jim and Jane, and found an interesting breakdown:

Required liability coverage on a 2010 Subaru Forester: $580 per year

Optional collision and comprehensive coverage ($500 deductuble): $360 per year

Home insurance on a 2000 square foot house ($500 deductible): $1450 per year

Mortgage interest on a $300,000 loan at 4.85%:  $14,550 per year

Student Loan interest on an old $35,000 student loan at 5.5%: $1925 per year

Total: $18,865 per year.

It’s no wonder my friend was having financial stress – she had interest and insurance costs that were soaking up half of a reasonable annual budget before she could even buy her first bit of groceries or clothing.

So, right there we did a quick round of phone calls and online quotes, and streamlined a bit of the insurance coverage by increasing the deductibles. Within 90 minutes (she did most of the work while I had a beer and swept the floors of the HQ), we had the following new set of options:

Subaru liability coverage: $380 per year ($200 savings) through Geico

Removal of collision and comprehensive (in the unlikely event of a crash, they could afford to replace the car with less than two months of income) ($360 savings)

Home insurance on a 2000 square foot house ($5000 deductible): $650 per year ($800 savings) through Safeco

Refinanced mortgage to 3.375% through Credible.com*: $10,125 per year ($4,425 savings)

Refinanced Student Loan (also Credible) to 3.85%: $1347 per year ($578 savings)

New total expenses: $12,502 ($6363 per year in savings!!)

It is hard to even express the importance of what just happened here.  My friend just did two hours of work in total while drinking a glass of wine,  and dropped her annual expenses by over $500 per month, or six thousand dollars per year. And she will of course invest these savings, which will then compound to about to about $86,000 every ten years. 

Even if she has to do this annual round of phone calls and websites once per year to maintain the best rates on everything, she will be earning about $3150 per hour for this work. Hence the bold title of this article, which you can now see is very conservative.

The Optimization Council

The first Optimization Council meeting at MMM HQ

So you’re convinced. $3150 is enough to get you to pick up the phone, but how do know who to call? Who is going to be your coach if you don’t live near Longmont and thus can’t just join the HQ and have Mr. Money Mustache tell you what to do?

The great news is that all of this knowledge already exists, right in your own circle of friends. To extract it, you just need to gather them together and get them to talk about it.

Earlier this month, I floated exactly this idea with the members of my coworking space, proposing that we form a group with the witty name “The Optimization Council.”

The Council would meet every now and then to talk through life’s biggest expenses and opportunities, and harvest the wisdom of the group so we can all benefit from the best ideas in each category.

The response to this idea was overwhelmingly positive. So we called a first “test” meeting earlier this month and a small group of us talked through the first few categories, sharing not just names like “I use Schmidt Insurance”, but details like, “We have $250,000 coverage with a $1,000 deductible and our premium is $589 per year.”

The meeting was so lively that we quickly ran out of time, but resolved to meet again soon to figure out more things together. I served as the scribe using a shared google doc – here’s a snapshot of that to give you an idea of our topics:

So Yes. There is some thinking and work involved. But there’s also an opportunity to drastically improve your short term cashflow and long-term wealth, and break your friends out of their cautious shell to help them get the same benefits.

As we learned long ago in Protecting your Money Mustache from Spendy Friends, most people tend towards complacency, and following along with the group. Which leaves a big gaping void at the top of the pyramid where the leadership role waits unfilled.

If you are bold enough to climb into this spot (which really means just sending a few emails and Facebook messages, procuring a box or two of wine, and making a large tray of high-end nachos for your guests), you can all reap the rewards for decades to come.

And instead of avoiding this little chore like a hassle, dive into it like a gigantic shower of fun and wealth. After all, this is pretty much the core attitude of Mustachianism Itself.

In the comments: we can start our own Optimization Council right here. If you have found a good deal on any of the categories of life, feel free to share a quick summary of your location (state), and details of the company and product/service/price that you found is the best. To avoid spam filtering, please use names but not direct links.

A Note about Credible:

Watchful readers may have noticed I also mentioned this company on Twitter recently. After a few months of skepticism that the world needed yet another financial company, I was convinced by some conversations with the people running it and a Zoom video of the customer experience from a senior employee, with some very candid commentary on their design choices.

I like it because they import the lending models from their large supply of hooked-up finance companies, then run the rate comparisons on their own server rather than farming out your personal information to each separate lender. It saves you from filling out multiple applications when collecting rates, and also saves you from getting on everyone’s spam list (they don’t sell your contact information, which is a rare thing among loan search engines).

It was a hard model for them to get going, because the banks naturally want to have your information so they can spam you.  But now that they have a growing presence in the market, lenders are forced to come through Credible to get access to this pool of qualified people. After enough testing with people I knew, I found the experience is worth recommending.

So I also signed this blog up with their referral program  – please see my Affiliates philosophy if you are curious or skeptical about how any of that works!

With all that said, if you want to try it out, here are the links:

Mortgages and Refis

Student Loan Refis – $300 bonus with this link

from Money 101 http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2019/08/22/1000-per-hour/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[andrewdburton]

How to Make a Thousand Bucks an Hour

Another summer evening skate-n-scoot outing with Mini Me

It’s Back to School time here in Colorado, which means both my son and I will be hanging up the swim shorts and kayak paddles and getting back to more serious business for a while.

It has been a slow and endlessly sunny and leisurely summer, and a nice break for both of us, which has been very relaxing and a great time for bonding.

But relaxation has its limits. At some point all that Chilling Out fades its way into Complacency, and our natural Human nature starts to work against us, telling us to conserve energy and not really do much of anything. And laziness begets more laziness, and life actually becomes less fun.

You can see this effect in our activities. I’ve only completed two blog posts over the entire summer holidays, and together we have put out only two YouTube videos. Spending more time at home and less at the MMM Headquarters squat rack has caused me to lose at least five pounds of leg muscle that I had wanted to keep. Little MM has spent a lot less time practicing on the upright bass and putting out songs, and a lot more time playing video games and getting sucked into the “dank memes” and “Trove” channels on Reddit.

It has been a fun break, but as the freshly polished school buses awaken with the sunrise, it will be even more fun to get our own lives cranking into a higher gear as well. And if you’re reading this, it means I am off to a great start!

Complacency Is Expensive

This laziness was affecting my financial life, and your financial life too. I had let thousands of dollars of uninvested cash build up in my checking account, where it was sitting around earning nothing. My credit card bills had come in, been automatically paid, and filed themselves away without me even reviewing them for fraudulent transactions or wussypants spending on my part. And I had a growing mini-mountain of things I need to do regarding insurance, accounting, and legal stuff in both my personal and business domains.

And yet once I got my act together last week, I cleaned up the whole mess and set things straight in less than an hour.

It’s not Just Me, it’s You

When I talk to friends and family, I notice a common theme: they tend to set up certain “hassle” things once, and then ignore them as long as possible unless some absolute crisis comes along and forces them to make a change.

“Oh, I just do all my insurance stuff with Jim Schmidt’s Insurance office downtown, because my parents referred me to him when I first moved out for college.

Even better, his wife Jane runs a loan brokerage, so she handles all our family’s mortgage needs!”

On this surface, this sounds fun and folksy and like a nice way to do business. And that is exactly the way I like to live: keeping my business relationships as casual and fun as I can. But when it comes to money, complacency can come at a price, so at the bare minimum we should find out exactly what price we are paying.

For example, just recently a coworking member came to me and asked for some financial help. And as always, I suggested we start by looking at big recurring expenses. So we dug into the details of her insurance and other major bills streaming in from ol’ Jim and Jane, and found an interesting breakdown:

Required liability coverage on a 2010 Subaru Forester: $580 per year

Optional collision and comprehensive coverage ($500 deductuble): $360 per year

Home insurance on a 2000 square foot house ($500 deductible): $1450 per year

Mortgage interest on a $300,000 loan at 4.85%:  $14,550 per year

Student Loan interest on an old $35,000 student loan at 5.5%: $1925 per year

Total: $18,865 per year.

It’s no wonder my friend was having financial stress – she had interest and insurance costs that were soaking up half of a reasonable annual budget before she could even buy her first bit of groceries or clothing.

So, right there we did a quick round of phone calls and online quotes, and streamlined a bit of the insurance coverage by increasing the deductibles. Within 90 minutes (she did most of the work while I had a beer and swept the floors of the HQ), we had the following new set of options:

Subaru liability coverage: $380 per year ($200 savings) through Geico

Removal of collision and comprehensive (in the unlikely event of a crash, they could afford to replace the car with less than two months of income) ($360 savings)

Home insurance on a 2000 square foot house ($5000 deductible): $650 per year ($800 savings) through Safeco

Refinanced mortgage to 3.375% through Credible.com*: $10,125 per year ($4,425 savings)

Refinanced Student Loan (also Credible) to 3.85%: $1347 per year ($578 savings)

New total expenses: $12,502 ($6363 per year in savings!!)

It is hard to even express the importance of what just happened here.  My friend just did two hours of work in total while drinking a glass of wine,  and dropped her annual expenses by over $500 per month, or six thousand dollars per year. And she will of course invest these savings, which will then compound to about to about $86,000 every ten years. 

Even if she has to do this annual round of phone calls and websites once per year to maintain the best rates on everything, she will be earning about $3150 per hour for this work. Hence the bold title of this article, which you can now see is very conservative.

The Optimization Council

The first Optimization Council meeting at MMM HQ

So you’re convinced. $3150 is enough to get you to pick up the phone, but how do know who to call? Who is going to be your coach if you don’t live near Longmont and thus can’t just join the HQ and have Mr. Money Mustache tell you what to do?

The great news is that all of this knowledge already exists, right in your own circle of friends. To extract it, you just need to gather them together and get them to talk about it.

Earlier this month, I floated exactly this idea with the members of my coworking space, proposing that we form a group with the witty name “The Optimization Council.”

The Council would meet every now and then to talk through life’s biggest expenses and opportunities, and harvest the wisdom of the group so we can all benefit from the best ideas in each category.

The response to this idea was overwhelmingly positive. So we called a first “test” meeting earlier this month and a small group of us talked through the first few categories, sharing not just names like “I use Schmidt Insurance”, but details like, “We have $250,000 coverage with a $1,000 deductible and our premium is $589 per year.”

The meeting was so lively that we quickly ran out of time, but resolved to meet again soon to figure out more things together. I served as the scribe using a shared google doc – here’s a snapshot of that to give you an idea of our topics:

So Yes. There is some thinking and work involved. But there’s also an opportunity to drastically improve your short term cashflow and long-term wealth, and break your friends out of their cautious shell to help them get the same benefits.

As we learned long ago in Protecting your Money Mustache from Spendy Friends, most people tend towards complacency, and following along with the group. Which leaves a big gaping void at the top of the pyramid where the leadership role waits unfilled.

If you are bold enough to climb into this spot (which really means just sending a few emails and Facebook messages, procuring a box or two of wine, and making a large tray of high-end nachos for your guests), you can all reap the rewards for decades to come.

And instead of avoiding this little chore like a hassle, dive into it like a gigantic shower of fun and wealth. After all, this is pretty much the core attitude of Mustachianism Itself.

In the comments: we can start our own Optimization Council right here. If you have found a good deal on any of the categories of life, feel free to share a quick summary of your location (state), and details of the company and product/service/price that you found is the best. To avoid spam filtering, please use names but not direct links.

A Note about Credible:

Watchful readers may have noticed I also mentioned this company on Twitter recently. After a few months of skepticism that the world needed yet another financial company, I was convinced by some conversations with the people running it and a Zoom video of the customer experience from a senior employee, with some very candid commentary on their design choices.

I like it because they import the lending models from their large supply of hooked-up finance companies, then run the rate comparisons on their own server rather than farming out your personal information to each separate lender. It saves you from filling out multiple applications when collecting rates, and also saves you from getting on everyone’s spam list (they don’t sell your contact information, which is a rare thing among loan search engines).

It was a hard model for them to get going, because the banks naturally want to have your information so they can spam you.  But now that they have a growing presence in the market, lenders are forced to come through Credible to get access to this pool of qualified people. After enough testing with people I knew, I found the experience is worth recommending.

So I also signed this blog up with their referral program  – please see my Affiliates philosophy if you are curious or skeptical about how any of that works!

With all that said, if you want to try it out, here are the links:

Mortgages and Refis

Student Loan Refis – $300 bonus with this link

from Finance http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2019/08/22/1000-per-hour/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[ruffsficstuffplace]

Of Rocks, Romantic Rivalries, and Rune Rangers (Part 10)

“Weave! Weave!” Lance cried.

“I’m trying, I’m trying!” Keith shouted back as he fired a standard issue AFA assault rifle, the stock braced against his shoulder, the barrel of it jerking wildly from side-to-side.

In front of them, the holographic swarm of tiny ankle-biters kept on coming, some of them getting blasted into magical dust by the bullets, most of them smashing into the barrier just in front of Keith with gleeful grins and high-pitched giggles.

“Gah, this thing won’t point where I aim it at!” Keith cried as he reloaded his gun.

“That’s because you’re still trying to fight the stabilizers and the targeting system!” Lance yelled. “Work with the gun, not against it!”

“Sweet Shepherd, is there anyway to turn them off?!” Keith snapped as he lowered the rifle. “Why the fuck would you ever make a gun that tries to fix its own recoil and aim for you?”

“Because, that’s how you end up getting the most accurate and reliable guns possible!” Lance replied. “I can pull up the statistics right now that show all AFA-licensed weapons have a higher overall accuracy rate than any other brand, human or Fae made!”

“Yeah, well knowing my gun shoots 93 of every 100 bullets perfectly straight isn’t going to matter if I can’t actually get it to fire where I want it to, let alone hit anything!” Keith said as he cast a dirty look at the rifle. “Fucking aim-assist…’”

Lance scowled. “Hey, don’t blame the magitech for a user-side problem!”

“Oh, so I guess it’s because of your top-notch teaching skills that I can’t shoot for shit with this thing!” Keith said as he put the rifle down on the counter.

The target practice holo shut down, Keith and Lance spent a few moments shooting daggers at each other, before the two of them groaned and backed down.

“Damn it, we really should have spoken up when Pidge paired us all off, no way in hell I’m learning how to shoot any of these if it’s you doing the teaching...” Keith said as he gestured to the rack of human-made firearms on the side.

“Agreed,” Lance said. “Probably should have taken up Allura on that offer of more Water Fist training.”

Keith chuckled. “Yeah, knowing you, you’d probably fare even worse than I did just now.”

“It can’t be that bad, can it? Basic was just a whole lot of drills and learning the moves, meditating, and ‘getting into the Flow,’” Lance said, moving his arms and legs like he was going along with an invisible current. “What’s up with advanced?”

Keith put a hand on Lance’s shoulder. “Let me put it this way...”

Crash!

Allura drop-kicked Shiro through a door and into a break room, jagged splinters flying everywhere. Hologram office workers dashed out of the way or got knocked down to the floor, their screams and panic filling the air as the two hit the ground.

Allura quickly sprang back up on her feet, Shiro scrambled up to his feet and to the counters on the far side of the room. He frantically grabbed at most everything he could throw—ceramic coffee mugs, metal utensils, aluminum soda cans—but her hypersensitive ears and superior reflexes let her dodge them all with ease.

Shiro came to the end of the counter, and to the holy grail of any office: the Auto-Cafe machine. He randomly punched order buttons, freshly made recyclable ceramic mugs fell out of the dispensers, brimming with more fake, holographic coffee, grabbed them just as Allura grabbed his head.

Wham! Wham! Wham!

Shiro desperately looked around in-between Allura giving him an extreme close-up of the menu. He noticed a rectangular box just to the side of the machine, the lid half-way open, glimpses of real, non-holographic frosting and pastry crumbs inside. He grabbed a jelly- filled donut with his prosthetic arm, and put it right up to Allura’s face.

She didn’t notice what he was doing until she had gooey, sticky, spicy-sweet firemelon jelly sprayed right into her eyes.

The golem in the testing chamber put its hands to its “ears,” seemingly screaming in agony as Pidge and Hunk blasted it with one of their recreations of Mero’s singing. From the way it fell to its knees, laid completely flat on the floor, and violently shook before it went still, they could tell it was another failure.

Pidge shut off the speakers, and the two of them waited for the last of the purple-pink waves of magic to dissipate or get absorbed in the walls before they pulled the ear-muffs from their heads. Hunk started to read the stats on a monitor, Pidge activated her recorder.

“Track #17 also failed,” she said. “Subject not only showed any signs of subversion or aggression towards target dummies made to resemble Celestial Guard and assorted allies, it also seemed to have suffered in extreme, horrific agony, before shutting down from the trauma.

“Highly suggest destruction of actual audio file, while keeping exact frequency for reference and possible recreation in the future; no telling what will happen if this leaks out.”

Hunk sighed as he compared the readouts from the other sixteen tests. <Looks like whatever Haggar did with Mero, it was one heck of a one-hit wonder,> he said. <We’ve got almost exact replicas of the sound, but we don’t have that something that makes it brainwash people.>

<Could be from the use of black sand, void steel, pure vitae, or the many other exotic materials we’re not getting our hands on, ever,> Pidge said. <Maybe we should just look at improving our gear’s magic defense in general, emphasis on sonic attacks.>

<Sounds like a plan,> Hunk said as he and her left the control room. <I’ve already got some prototype designs we can punch in the fabricators right away!>

Elsewhere, Shiro shoved Allura’s head into the scanner of one. He slammed the cover on top of her head, the machine fired up, dutifully making a 3D mould of Allura’s face: eyes closed from the glare of the beam, her left cheek smushed against the bottom, her lips curled into a scowl.

Allura threw her foot up into Shiro’s crotch; as he reeled from the pain, she pulled herself out, and shoved Shiro’s head into it, before slamming the cover on him, too.

The machine ejected the half-finished mould of Allura, and started making one of Shiro’s face.

Lance stared at Keith, unable to decide if he should look annoyed or horrified. “You’re shitting me right now, right?” he asked.

Keith shook his head. “Nope, completely serious. People and folks have died from advanced training, let alone master level.”

“But this ‘training’ sounds crazy and ridiculously dangerous!” Lance said after Keith finished explaining. “And that’s really saying something, considering what else we put ourselves through.”

“Avalon is crazy and ridiculously dangerous,” Keith said. “You may think you’ve got a taste of it back during your field trips with the AFA, but until you live out in the Country full-time for a year or two, you really don’t know what the wilds are like.

“It’s why I trusted Fae weapons more than human ones—they’re designed to take a helluva beating from anything and everything, fire just fine even if you after you just unburied it from two tons of sand and shook it out, and I know they’ll get the job done, unlike this piece of shit,” he said, gesturing to the assault rifle still on the firing range’s counter.

“And yet the bulk of weapons in active use for military forces, human or Fae, private or government, are all from human manufacturing,” Lance countered. “Are you saying that the billions of soldiers, justices, and watchers out there are basically using NERF guns and bats?”

“No, but I am saying is that they’d do the whole realm a favour by using real weapons, without fancy computers doing all the work for them,” Keith countered.

Lance scowled. “Okay! That’s it! I will not let this insult to my race—of which half of you belongs to, might I add—stand!” He gestured to the other rack of firearms on the side, all Fae-made. “Pick a weapon, any weapon, and let’s see if I can’t kick ass with it like I do my rifle!”

“Alright, Mr. Badass, if you want to get your ego torn to bloody pieces like that, who am I to complain?” Keith said as walked over. He looked over the selection, briefly debated giving Lance a log-cannon just to see him struggle to carry it around, but decided against it.

“Here,” Keith said as he gave Lance a repeater, a wrist-mounted machine pistol. “Rapid-fire, stock-issue weapon meant for versatility and ease-of-use over accuracy and raw stopping power, just like the AFA AR.

“Need some help loading and reloading it?” he asked as Lance strapped it on. “Newbies tend to keep taking their eyes out with the canisters the first couple hundred times they do.”

“I’ve got this!” Lance said as he braced the repeater on his other arm. “In fact, give me some ammo, and I’ll load and reload this thing like pro, first try.”

“Don’t keep me in suspense!” Keith said as he threw one at him.

Lance caught it. He slapped the release lever, slammed the canister in, and locked it into place. Keith watched as he spun the firing cylinder and peeled off a burst of bolts, then gave Lance a thumbs up.

Lance grinned triumphantly, slapped the release lever again, upon which the canister flew up into the air and hit him in the eye.

“GAH!” Shiro cried out as the staple-gun canisters bounced off his face.

Allura ducked to his blindside, and pounced on him; Shiro tried to dodge, but the tears blurring his vision made it impossible.

Thud.

The two were on the floor again, Allura on top of Shiro. “Not so fun being blinded, is it?!” she cried as she began to punch him in the head.

Shiro turned them over, and started blindly punching at her. Allura pulled her own reversal, and two began to roll and roll along the length of the now deserted office, cursing and punching all the while.

Bang! Allura stubbed her toe on the leg of a wooden chair.

“Ow! Ow! Ow! Fuck!” Allura cried as her pinky toe began to throb.

Shiro stopped, and looked concerned. “Shit, Allura, you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she muttered.

“Good, I was worried for a moment there, Shiro said, before he headbutted her.

Crack!

Pidge and Hunk continued headbanging o one of their favourite Ice Lord tracks.

<Oh yeah!> Pidge said as she lowered the volume. <It’s definitely going to be “Soul of Steel!”>

<You sure?> Hunk asked. <The vocals on ‘Emerald Blaze’ might help screw up the resonance of a sonic attack even more—plus, the bass-line is better.>

<True, but it might help to be able to focus on the lyrics to try and ignore the attack itself,> Pidge said. <With Emerald Blaze being mostly screeching and screaming, someone might think it was just Mero’s song all over again.>

<Shall we test it out on the golems and see which is more effective, or if it’s going to be a matter of personal choice?> Hunk asked.

Pidge smiled. <Of course! We’ve got effectively infinite materials and funding here, right?>

<To the fabricators, then!> Hunk said, standing up and dramatically pointing back to the machines.

Pidge giggled, before the two of them got back to work.

<Hey Pidge, I’ve been meaning to ask, did you and Allura have that talk you needed last night?> Hunk said as they started punching in designs for the fabricators.

<We did, and it was pretty great,> Pidge replied as she did the same. <Thanks for pointing me to her, Hunk; it gets kinda hard to ask her, since well, you know...> she looked away, her cheeks turning light pink.

Hunk pushed the “Start” button,  then patted her on the shoulder. <I understand. Have you ever thought of just telling her? Get it off your chest? I’m sure you and Allura can work it out.>

Pidge’s eyes widened and her ears pulled back, before she frantically shook her head. <Oh, no, I can’t! Especially not now that--> she quickly shut her mouth.

<Now that what…?> Hunk asked.

Pidge paused for a moment. She debated telling Hunk for a few moments, before she mentally slapped herself and reminded herself that this was Hunk. <I’m pretty sure Allura and Shiro are dating,> she said.

Hunk blinked. <Huh?>

<I’ve been noticing it for a while now, the way they’ve been stealing glances at each other all the time, how they’re suddenly so much less professional around each other, and their going off on that coffee date just cemented it,> Pidge explained.

<I’ll admit they haven’t gone out and confirmed it, but it’s just so blatantly obvious, you know?>

Hunk looked conflicted for a moment, before he said, <I don’t know, there’s still a chance you might be wrong, right?>

<Eh, true, but I wouldn’t bet money on that...>

Hunk nodded. <So what’s your plan now?>

Pidge shrugged. <Go see what my other options are, I suppose. Support them as much as I can as their friend. Try not to cause unnecessary drama between them.> She paused. <Well, any more than I already have, anyway...>

Hunk’s eyebrows rose. <… Pidge, what did you do…?>

Pidge looked away, her cheeks red once more. <Well… you know how I had a sleepover with Allura last night, right?>

Hunk nodded, eyes wordlessly asking Pidge to continue.

<Well, after our talk, I kinda… pretended to fall asleep so I could snuggle up to Allura, and she kinda… snuggled back. I’m afraid Shiro’s going to take it the wrong way since he’s human, you know?>

Hunk paused, before he laughed. <Oh man, Pidge, the way you were saying that I thought you and Allura--> he made a sexy animal noise.

Pidge’s cheeks burst into flames.

Hunk reached out and put his hand on her shoulder again. <Dude, Shiro’s too chill of a guy to freak-out over something like Allura snuggling with you. Besides, have you even felt your fur lately? You’re soft like a cloud, who wouldn’t want to snuggle up with you if they could?>

Pidge nodded slowly. <Hah, yeah… guess I’m worrying over nothing.>

<Pidge, trust me: even if Allura feels the need to bring up last night, it won’t put that much of a wedge between them. They’re the most mature of all of us, no way they’d ever get this petty!>

At the same time, Allura and Shiro staggered into a restroom, the both of them battered, breathless, but still out for blood. The two of them grabbed the sinks for support, and glared at each other.

“Having an off-day, Allura?!” Shiro snapped in between pants for breath.

“Sort of, didn’t get a full night’s sleep!” Allura replied as she slowly started to walk towards him. “Stayed up for most of it being with Pidge, you know!”

Shiro scowled. “I thought we already made it abundantly clear you and Pidge didn’t have sex last night!” he cried as he tensed up, getting ready for combat once more.

“Oh, we didn’t, you’ve got me there.” Allura grinned evilly. “Dosen’t mean that’s we didn’t PLENTY of other things, though!”

Shiro’s eyes widened.

Allura dashed forward, grabbing Shiro and slamming his head into the counter.

Crack.

The ceramic fractured. Stunned, Shiro could only stagger along as Allura dragged him into a nearby stall. She threw him onto the toilet, he grabbed the edges of the bowl, while Allura grabbed the back of his head and chest.

Shiro’s eyes widened as his face came ever closer to the sparkling, very real water.

Splash.

Allura quickly waved a hand in front of the “Flush” sensor.

She grinned as the sound of rushing water and garbled, panicked screaming echoed on the tile walls.

Shiro pulled himself out, collapsed on the side of the bowl coughing up water and wheezing for breath.

Allura stood up and casually leaned on the wall. “For clarity, ‘other things’ was talking about her personal problems, and helping her through them,” she hummed. “It was really lovely— you could say we had quite the bonding moment last night!”

Shiro wiped the water from his face, before he gave Allura one of the dirtiest, most hate-filled looks he had ever made in his entire life.

Allura just grinned back.

“Training’s over!” she chirped, making gestures in the air before the props and scenery around them began to disappear. “I must say, Shiro, you did remarkably well today, being able to keep up with me and trade blows for as long as you did, but I’m afraid you still have a lot to learn if you’re going to become an adept at the Air Fist, let alone a master.

“After we cooldown and patch ourselves up, we’ll review the footage together and I’ll offer you some pointers,” she said. “At the very least, I can say with full confidence that you’re much better at fighting than you are with romance!”

Shiro scowled as he pushed himself up. “You realize all these insults just makes me all the more determined to completely beat the ever-loving crap out of you next time, right?” he asked flatly.

Allura beamed. “That’s the point! I’ll admit I had reservations about numerous traditions with the Air Fist, but I have to admit: this was fun!”

“For the winner, at least...” Shiro grumbled.

Together, the two of them left the Raucous Room, already thinking about how they were going to utterly destroy the other next time.