#that sonic is always travelling out fucking Somewhere

[sonicunleash]

sonic literally has so much love and whimsy for the planet. i like to imagine like 50% of his free time is just spent going Places and seeing all he can see. he can go pretty much anywhere he wants just with his two feet so why not?

[teecupangel]

Consider:

Not a specific story idea or pitch. An overarching umbrella idea with a common set of rules, like Yew Branches.

Desmond Miles has come unstuck from reality.

Of course, there are many versions of Desmond Miles, and many have ended up on other worlds, in other stories. AO3 can attest to that, you can attest to that. The Eye makes such a handy button for throwing Desmond headlong at the barrier between realities until he breaks through somewhere interesting.

What unites this Desmond, these Desmonds, all under one theme, is that he doesn't travel alone. Whether he ends up in Westeros, in deep space, flying dragons in a war with France or trying to take down the Shinra corporation, he always arrives with a companion.

A *small* companion. One might even say, a toddler-sized companion. Because they are, in fact, toddlers.

ie, imagine that whenever and wherever you try to cross Desmond over somewhere after the Eye, he ends up with one or more other characters from the AC canon as toddlers dragged along in his wake.

Rules for the companions:

- They always start out somewhere in the age range of 2-5

- only people who at some point handled a piece of Eden can be companions

- They don't start out remembering their entire first life, but gradually remember it as they grow older, at about the age they experienced it. ex, Ezio would remember the hangings when he's 17. But once they reach the age where they first made contact with a piece of Eden, they remember the rest of their former life all at once.

- Desmond instinctually pings as "safe" to them, even if they have no idea who he is

.

But yeah I don't have a specific story idea I'm throwing your way

I was just sitting here thinking man

it would be really interesting if in all the various let's crossover Desmond with other properties fic

he wasn't alone

and then I thought, I know, let's make him responsible for small children he has a pre established emotional attachment to in dangerous environments

that will be fun for everyone

If you add in ‘pre-established emotional attachment’ then we’d be cutting off any character after the Desmond saga. Although…

To be completely honest, Desmond would be dumb enough to form an attachment to a random baby he finds next to him because of his own sucky upbringing and you did specify that this could have crossovers so just imagine (on the top of my head)…

Desmond taking care of a very curious and prone to wandering around baby Altaïr while trying to wonder where the hell all these weirdass creatures are coming from? Oh… and apparently there’s this dude who has this weirdass dagger that can control time for a bit but Desmond and Altaïr are immune to it? “Also… who the hell just calls themselves ‘Prince’? Do you not have a name?! Altaïr, don’t touch tha-! Ah, crap.”

Really, really, reeeaaaallllly out there idea: So Ezio’s voice actor also voices Sonic in most games… how about Desmond and Ezio being stranded in one of the Sonic games and Desmond is still human so he’s super confused at what the hell is happening but Ezio seems to like the blue hedgehog who really goes fast which is nice, he guess?

Put Desmond and Ratonhnhaké:ton in Hamilton! Like, it acts and feels like they’re in the right timeline for the American Revolution but there are no Assassins or Templars and Desmond can’t even find Ratonhnhaké:ton’s village so he doesn’t know if Ratonhnhaké:ton even exists in this world. Hell, Davenport Homestead is just a goddamn empty field that Desmond got after asking around and now he’s building a homestead, he guesses??? Then comes the singing! Just singing coming from different places at different times like it’s the goddamn musical episode of Scrubs and Desmond and Ratonhnhaké:ton are just there going “What. The. Fuck.”

It would be so easy to push Desmond and baby Edward into a Pirates in the Caribbean crossover and, yeah, it would definitely work but… if I may… Desmond wakes up stranded in a small boat with baby Edward in his hands. The first ship to find them? the Revenge… being sailed by Captain Bonnet… who was kind enough to let them stay and be part of the crew. Also, Bonnet just being awkward around Edward because baby Edward thinks something is terribly wrong, that this isn’t the Bonnet he knows but that’s weird because he doesn’t know any other Bonnet. He only knows Desmond will keep him safe. Then they get first-row seats of Thatch and Bonnet falling in love and… well… they’re definitely not in Black Flag, that’s for sure. XD

You know, I was thinking of maybe one of the Joan of Arcs movie could be a good backdrop to punt Desmond and baby Shay in it. Then I realize… how can I make Desmond just go “fuck it, I’m done. I’m just done with everything. We’re going to live as hermits.” and I realize that throwing him into something that has fantasy-bullshit in it would be fun. Like… Jeanne d'Arc video game… complete will all those monsters as the backdrop for the Hundred Year War XD (and maybe, just maybe… Desmond gets his own transformations as well much to his chagrin)

Desmond having to deal with baby Arno while there’s a freaking rat plague in A Plague Tale: Innocence and joining forces with Amicia and Hugo as they run away from… well… pretty much everything. (look, it’s not set in French Revolutions but I kinda like the idea of Desmond and Amicia interacting. Otherwise, go Les Mis I guess?)

Desmond becoming a better father to Evie and Jacob Fyre while he’s in some kind of gothic-inspired setting like maybe Dishonored or Bloodborne? Dishonored would be entertaining because he would definitely be the stabby-stab-stab option that even Corvo goes “… maybe tone it down a bit?”.

And now, for something different: Desmond waking up in the middle of the desert surrounded by dudes in black robes and a baby in his arms that he’s pretty sure is named Bayek but he doesn’t know why he knows that’s the baby’s name. Then he finds out he’s in Egypt and he’s being interrogated by these people called the medjays if he knows anything about a curse and someone called Imhotep and he’s just confused. Then he finds out he’s in freaking 1926 and apparently there’s some mummy dude who can do the nine plagues (really? Like why? How???) and he gets sucked into this whole deal for reasons he doesn’t even understand.

Now, it would be easy to, you know, push Desmond and Kassandra to something like Disney’s Hercules or maybe 300 but, if I may suggest, throwing them into the world of Ubisoft’s Immortals Fenyx Rising? Hey, it’s made by the people who made Odyssey so Kassandra would be in her element and Desmond would be the tired dad just trying to stop his daughter from flying into the goddamn sun… literally. (And if you’re itching for a Percy Jackson x Assassin’s Creed AU with Desmond in it, there’s one in AO3 :))

Look. I was bound to make a God of War crossover idea and it was either Kassandra or Eivor. I had been contemplating a The Last Kingdom crossover with Desmond and Eivor but that’s mainly just me being a Harry McEntire fan so GoW crossover with Desmond and Eivor it is, with Kratos now having to deal with being a single dad to Atreus AND helping Desmond be a single dad to Eivor who may or may not like kicking Atreus for some unknown reason.

Of course, this doesn't just have to be crossovers.

You can have something like:

Desmond being the single father of Ezio and Ratonhnhaké:ton while the Third Crusades is happening and it's really hard not to get sucked into that, especially when Ezio brings Altaïr to their little house just a few weeks after his demotion because he looks 'lonely'

The entire plot of AC3 gets derailed because Desmond is there with a baby that Haytham is pretty sure is his father having been reincarnated

The angst potential of baby Arno growing up knowing only of papa Desmond and uncle Shay and getting his memories of Shay killing Charles Dorian later on.

Becoming part of the Alamut Assassins and having to go "No, Eivor, stop kicking him!" every time his adopted daughter sees the new recruit. What was his name again? Basil? Was it Basil? Desmond is pretty sure it's Basil ("It's Basim." "Yeah, sure, whatever you say, Roshan.")

Elijah being able to resurrect his supposed father but now has to deal with the fact that he apparently has three younger brothers and, seriously, being a Sage did not prepare Elijah for the strange family he's supposed to be a part of

[latin-dr-robotnik]

Another evil question: the Classic games :) you can include CD or Mania at your leisure :p

Oh, you doing this for a certain other game I also have explosive takes, huh? (I'll get around to writing that article, I promise we'll get it out of the door eventually :P)

I'm considering whether to count Mania or not, but I'll probably leave it out because it's more asks for me (#stonks) and because we're gonna talk about old, pioneering games on limited hardware; and as much as I love Mania, it's not any of that.

I'll add a different game to make up for it...

Warning: Sonic 2 fans, you may want to consider scrolling further below the break...

Sonic the Hedgehog (1991)

Very solid game! It's a textbook example of first game syndrome, and most of the time I feel retrospectives don't take this into consideration. It's Sonic Team's big first shot at a series born out of a desire of replaying Super Mario Bros level over and over again, each time faster, and that influence shows a lot as designers tried to balance fresh new ideas with NES-era platforming traditions.

Great music, nice foundation for future Sonic zone tropes (I'm a sucker for Spring Yard Zone), gave birth to Starlight Zone and managed to stick the landing and kickstart a whole series. It did a ton of good things despite feeling so archaic.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2

*sigh* now, this game...

I mentioned during the Advance series ask that Ad2 suffered from a problem this game suffers, and it's streamlining things a bit too much.

Sonic 2 trades a lot of the time you spend exploring and finding goodies for more straight line progress, and while you can hunt for 50 rings to get to each special stage, the fact you can do it from any checkpoint removes most of the exploration element from the game. Don't get me wrong, there are still things to find (do you guys know about the Chemical Plant 2 shortcut? There's always someone who doesn't know, even I learned it in my teens haha), but most levels leave me feeling empty and like I just held right for a minute or two and called it a day. Not really that fun tbh.

To make up for it, they made this game cheaper. Questionable enemy placement in later parts, special stages with horrible blind turns into bombs possibly killing millions of runs over the past 30 years, and the entirety of Metropolis Act 3. Everything from Metropolis 3.

There's a big elephant in the room, though, and it's the fact this game is very rushed and borderline unfinished in some places (I'm sure the Mystic Cave pit was a massive oversight, they forgot a spring present in other pits of the zone, they're not as sadistic as Dimps, that's for sure). That's why making an article about "I fucking hate this game" is hard to justify; the game almost died under the pressure of its own ambition, and it took a ton of work to even get it out of the door as it did back in '92, so I'm cutting a bit of slack there.

Still, it's my least favorite game from the classic era, it's not the type of sequel I prefer or envision for Sonic after the first one and I don't like playing through most of it, less so if it involves those fucking half pipe special stages. It doesn't make me actively mad like Ad2, at least not through most of it (fuck Metropolis and Wing Fortress, absolute wastes of space) I just feel bored while playing.

Sonic CD

I remember that, during one podcast I did where I mentioned my favorite Sonic games, this one ranked somewhere in my top 5. I think it was #3 or maybe 4? Can't remember. Point is, I fucking adore Sonic CD.

It's rough around the edges, it does the opposite of Sonic 2 by putting roadblocks for those trying to go fast, and sometimes sign placement is dumb (level designers had a field day putting future signs really close to past signs just so an unsuspecting player will hit the former while trying to time travel, it's quite a troll but I respect it lol), but I really enjoy the fact you have a mission in each act to go to the past and destroy at least the robot generator. It takes a while to learn the levels and to learn some of the cryptic shit level designers somehow thought a normal player would find (looking at you, Wacky Workbench), but if you don't like that you can hold on to 50 rings at the end of each stage (it's easier said than done) and get the 7 Time Stones via some of the coolest special stages out there (it's not as confusing as it seems, guys.)

But the real reason why I love this game is that it's filled with tons of charm. Animated intro and ending, two soundtracks, some of the most beautiful levels in Sonic history and peak classic Sonic aesthetic. We actually talked about it during our time assessing what went wrong with Classic Sonic's music in Forces, but JP CD is everything Classic Sonic is and should be, and Mania actually agreed with it too! (I can't find the link on mobile so, if you have it, add it below so we continue crosslinking each other :P)

Lovely game, a favorite of mine. Stardust Speedway Past best track ever, also the debut of Metal Sonic and our best girl Amy. this game just gives me life.

Also this game happens before Sonic 2 I'm sorry I don't make the rules.

Sonic 3 & Knuckles

Peak Sonic the Hedgehog, everything

The interesting thing about this game is that it almost suffered the same fate as Sonic 2, but somehow they made it work and kept a very high quality standard. It's has a great balance of the holy trinity of Speed-Platforming-Exploration, with faster zones and slower ones, easier and harder, all building up to the cinematic climax starting in Lava Reef 2 and up to the end of each campaign, a real feat for a 1994 2D platformer.

It has some problems building a consistent difficulty curve, but I think most levels are crafted with such expertise that it doesn't become a big issue, with maybe the exception of parts in Sandopolis (people still haven't learned about the true beauty behind Sandopolis Act 2 with no lights on, I'm not joking btw.)

As for everything else, it's incredible. Great music, great levels, great story, bosses aren't really anything special most of the time but it created the very first Super Sonic true final boss fight in the series, and OG Sonic 3 players know true fear from Big Arms. I did a whole post on the great set piece in Lava Reef 2's boss fight. It's long, it's memorable, it allows you to explore and find special stage rings, it has the best special stages, co-op allows you to share an entire campaign with someone else, you also have the competition mode and it's simply impossible to ignore just how superior this game truly is.

Biased? Well, it's my favorite Sonic game of all time.

Bonus: Knuckles' Chaotix

I've seen some of y'all talk shit about this game and I had to step in.

Chaotix is a very experimental game, and it doesn't succeed with most of its ideas, but I actually respect the fact they went ahead and created 4 different times for the game, a hub, a very primitive partner system, and overall a more open and free-flow type of game. Levels are lush and beautiful, with lovely chill music, special stages are interesting and it has a lot of crazy things going on.

I saw the lack of enemies and chaotic (lol) level design being mentioned as the bigger flaws of the game, and tbh I prefer that route instead of Dimps-ing the whole thing with cheap enemy placement. It's still a core flaw of the ring tether system but personally speaking I don't really mind it that much.

Is it the worst game? I don't think so. It can be boring at times, and borderline infuriating in that particular act of Amazing Arena where I couldn't find the exact route I had to take to reach the mandatory clock for 45 minutes straight (I think it was act 3), but for what it is I don't think it deserves too much heat. I may be biased because it's Vector's debut with lovely sprites, though.

Anyway, I think that's all, is it? If it's not, there's still tons of time for asks lol

[neutral-emerald]

SILVER THE COSMIC TIME-JANITOR (or: dude, what's with all the alternate futures)

silver the hedgehog has a very simple backstory. he's a kindhearted, sorta-naive but altogether very driven psychic hedgehog here to save the world by time-traveling to the past (also known as present-day) to prevent the apocalyptic future he was born into from coming to pass!

[ID: A screenshot of Silver from Sonic 06. He’s glowing with cyan energy as he flies over a dark, post-apocalyptic city.]

...wait, if he's time traveling 200 years into the past to completely change the shape of the timeline, how do the stars manage to align such that he manages to be born at the exact same point in the new timeline with the exact same genetics? how are his parents born? does silver have parents?? and how does he do this no less than THREE SEPARATE TIMES??!

hey everyone, i'm tumblr user neutral-emerald here to make good on the idea i vaguely gestured at yesterday and point out silver's wildly inconsistent backstory(s) and then explain to you how this isn't just sega playing hopscotch with the concept of time travel, but actually TOTALLY EXPLAINABLE if you don't mind a whole lot of conjecture and "fuck dude i just think it'd be cool."

LET'S GO.

before i get started, a few things to establish.

first, this is about… half serious, tops. it’s less of a theory and more of an observation of something that’s weird and then throwing some possible explanations at it because i am a massive sucker for time-based nonsense. if you wanna take my observations and build your own conclusions, go for it. i’m not your boss.

second, i'm basing my conclusions off of both the games and the idw comics. the conclusions i draw are applicable to either continuity, but the logic does rest a decent amount on the comics, so just a heads-up in case you were expecting pure game canon from this.

and third, i'm working off like half a brain and very intermittent checks of the wiki and cutscene compilations, so there's probably many things i'm missing! if you notice something i said was wildly off-base, go ahead and correct me in the replies and i'll either edit the post or explain to you just how that detail doesn't actually matter, depending on whether it. y'know. matters.

with that out of the way, let's get into the first topic of discussion!

part 1: the future is inconsistent, y'all

now, i'm not sure if you've heard, but in the year 2006 sonic team released this little indie game creatively entitled Sonic the Hedgehog. it was a smash hit, won countless awards, and for some reason went down in history as a messy, incomplete bugfest. but that's not what matters. what matters is that it introduced Silver the Hedgehog.

silver hails from 200 years in the future. the world is a bleak, fiery place, and has been since the monster iblis was unleashed after princess elise's death. silver was born into this world, which we know since it's literally the first thing he says in his story.

[ID: A cropped line from Silver's story in Sonic 06. "This world was devastated before I was born."]

i'm not going to drag you through a beat-by-beat summary of the entire plot of sonic 06, you should know it already. silver meets mephiles, gets lied to about who caused the apocalypse, mephiles yeets him and blaze into the past, he tries to murder Sonic the Hedgehog™, and so on. eventually he helps kill god, and then sonic and elise travel further back in time to kill god even deader so that none of the game ever happened, and the bad future into which silver was born never happened, thus thoroughly scrubbing silver's existence from the timeline!

...until.

sonic rivals.

i'm not going to speak much on sonic rivals, mostly because i'm not super familiar with it. but what matters is that silver is back! he's still from the future, he's still here to change the past, and most importantly he wasn't deleted from existence by the destruction of solaris, unlike everything else from sonic 06 including everyone's memories of it. and obviously, whatever state his future is in, it's not the same as it was in sonic 06.

now, i don't have a single clue what is going on in rivals 2, so do inform me if there's some big information i'm missing from that one. all i know is he's fixing yet another possible apocalyptic future, like always. correct me if i’m wrong, i don’t have the patience to trawl through it myself.

then we've got sonic colors, in which silver is again from the future. notably, he’s definitely not from an apocalypse!

[ID: Some screenshots from the DS version of Sonic Colors, again cropped to just the text. Tails and Silver are talking to each other.

Tails: What's the future you came from like, Silver? Silver: A lot brighter than this. Silver: The sky is blue, and everybody's got a smile.]

sonic generations doesn't add much. again, correct me if i'm wrong, but i don't think we learn anything about what kind of future silver is from, and he's definitely not here to fix it this time. that's sonic's job! he's just hanging out like everyone else.

now, up until this point the future has been reasonably consistent, setting aside my somewhat abstract understanding of the rivals games. there's nothing to say that silver's not coming back in time from the same point in a single timeline, which is the one and only version of the future ever since the destruction of sonic 06.

UNTIL.

[ID: Two panels from the comic Sonic Forces: Stress Test. In the first panel, Silver looks worried as he lands in front of Knuckles, who looks skeptical.

Silver: We've got big trouble! Eggman— Knuckles: How can you be here? I thought you returned to the future?

In the second panel, Knuckles looks away with a self-assured grin, while Silver looks more panicked.

Knuckles: Oh wait— I must be dreaming! Silver: What? No! I've come back with a dire warning from the future!]

i have a lot of issues with sonic forces, especially with how its story is written. something i do NOT take issue with is the supplemental comics, mainly because they are WONDERFUL evidence for my crackpot time travel theory.

like i said, up until this point we don't really know whether silver has been experiencing separate instances of the future, or simply traveling back in time to prevent an also-time-traveling eggman nega from messing things up in the past. but here, we get some very juicy information:

[ID: Knuckles and Silver again. Knuckles has his arms crossed and is looking at Silver, who has a nervous look on his face as he slams a fist on the palm of his other hand.

Knuckles: Come again? Silver: Something happens that brings the world to ruin! But the historical records are sparse or make no sense. I came back to hopefully head off whatever's about to happen and save the future.]

silver travels back in time to prevent a terrible apocalypse. this is not the beautiful future silver came from in sonic colors— but this is the same silver. everyone recognizes him. he recognizes everyone. and yet, the future he came from is different.

part 2: silver is a walking paradox

allow me to remind you of what i pointed out when i was talking about sonic 06. silver was born into the iblis-apocalypse. considering no elaborate timeline nonsense happened to him before the events of the game (by his reckoning) i think we can safely assume he was born like a regular person with parents.

in the first post-06 timeline, silver was probably also born. let's be charitable, acknowledge that sonic team doesn't overthink the butterfly effect like i do, and say that silver was born to the same parents, because the universe likes to keep things nice and simple and contrive itself to make this particular character exist in this time period.

so, it's entirely fair that silver comes to exist in a post-06 timeline at the equivalent point in time, aka 200 years in the future. it's also fair that he travels back in time to prevent some kind of apocalypse, because that's his narrative role! it's what he does. when it's time for him to exist in the story, that's what he's there to do.

what isn't fair is the fact that it keeps happening.

[ID: A panel from the IDW comics. Sonic is stretching his legs while looking faintly exasperated at Silver, who is nervously holding his arm.

Silver: Er… No. I came back because defeating Eggman didn't save the future. Sonic: Couldn't even play along. Had to bring the mood down. Sonic: *sigh* Okay, what happened this time?]

[ID: The following panel, cropped to just Silver's text bubbles narrating over a starry sky.

Silver: When I left, my time had been conquered by the Eggman Empire. Everyone lived in fear, choking on polluted air. Silver: When I went back, the Eggman Empire was gone— but so was everyone else. Silver: There was nothing left. No people, no animals, no machinery. Only water and sparse, metallic plant life.]

allow me to summarize my understanding of all this: silver is from the future. normally, the future is good. sometimes it isn't. when it isn't good, he goes back in time and fixes things, then returns to the future to check if that fixed things.

the least conjecture-y interpretation i can come up with is that sometimes silver will go into the past, then go back to the future but end up in a Bad Timeline and thus go into the past again to fix things. there's no weird warping directly between bad timelines, he only gets there by way of the past.

but that's boring, so here's my PREFERRED interpretation.

silver hails from a good future, but sometimes it just changes. he's unstuck from time— if something weird happens in the past, he's the only one to know that the passage of fate was changed, because he went to bed in one timeline and woke up somewhere categorically worse, and the only way he can fix it is by figuring out just what caused this and going back in time to fix it.

or, to say it in a meme:

[ID: A picture of someone lying in a hospital bed with a nurse standing next to them, edited so that Silver is in the bed.

nurse: sir… you've been asleep for 2 hours silver: oh boy i can't wait to wake up in the same timeline i went to sleep in]

part 3: how did this happen?

it's one thing to point out that silver doesn't experience time like a normal hedgehog, and another thing to explain how and why this happens.

fyi, this is the part where i go wildly off the rails and start saying whatever i want. there's a ton of explanations one could come up with, most probably stemming back to sonic 06. i'm just going to go with my own, and probably not come up with a whole lot of concrete evidence because i'm just spitballing. this is me having a fun time. going "heeheehoohoo time traveling hedgehog go brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr"

so. something i haven't touched upon is that in all games after sonic 06, silver can time travel. we never see him do it, it's never explained how he does it. all we know is that he's doing it under his own power.

which is kinda odd, don't you think? should he be able to do that?

in sonic 06, we see three mechanisms for time travel. first is the chaos emeralds. if two people perform Chaos Control with a chaos emerald apiece, they open up a swirling rift in the air which can send them to different points in time and space. silver can't be doing that, for obvious reasons— he's only one hedgehog, and he's not exactly running around with a chaos emerald at all times. that can't be how he does it.

second is a time machine eggman built. that obviously can't be it; the machine doesn't exist at all after the timeline gets wiped, and again, silver is doing this on his own. he's actively antagonistic towards eggman, even. absolutely not this one.

third and finally is mephiles, who can make big purple orbs to take himself and passengers to different points in time. this obviously can't be it either, for similar reasons to number 2, right? after all, mephiles is one half of solaris, who was destroyed before he could be split off. he doesn't exist to be silver's time-traveling uber driver.

...right?

well, obviously. i'm not going to try and tell you that mephiles is secretly alive and shepherding silver back and forth between timelines for no reason. that's ridiculous. no, i'm going to try and tell you that silver is mephiles.

or rather, he's solaris. or RATHER, he's the new solaris, sorta-ascended to the role of Time God after the old one got blown out like a birthday candle.

like i said, i'm going wildly off the rails and as such don't have any concrete evidence to explain why it's this instead of something else, but hear me out. after elise blew out the flame of hope, the universe was left in an interesting situation. someone needs to be in charge of the flow of time, but the previous time-god was just unceremoniously destroyed. but all the power and energy of a time-god has to go somewhere, in some form, in some time.

with nothing else to go off of, the role of time-god starts flipping through every notable being it had interacted with. they're all solidly accounted for in the timeline, except for one. silver the hedgehog was born into a timeline that cannot exist. silver the hedgehog does not, and cannot exist. silver the hedgehog interacted quite a bit with both sides of solaris— he spent a substantial amount of time fighting back iblis, and associated with mephiles, even being one of the few people to directly experience his time travel abilities. silver the hedgehog tried and failed to absorb iblis into himself.

here's my theory: after sonic 06, the universe reasserted itself such that silver was the new Solaris. silver is not consciously aware that this is what he is, but he knows that he can time travel. sometimes the timeline will rearrange itself around silver. he is unaffected by this because he is a higher being unaffected by such petty trifles as "an origin" or "paradoxes".

silver the hedgehog probably doesn't have parents. he sprang into existence one day and everyone just kind of went with it, himself included.

oh also something i thought was neat but couldn't think of where to put:

[ID: More cropped dialogue, this time from Team Sonic Racing.

Silver: I'm fine. It's just, something bad is gonna happen. I can't explain it. I just feel it. Blaze: Have your travels through time given you precognition? Silver: I don't know. Maybe they have. Or maybe I'm just thinking too much.]

silver might be becoming psychic in a future-vision kinda way. that, or he’s riddled with anxiety. possibly both.

TL;DR

silver hails from no less than three separate timelines, his existence is a tangled web of who-knows-how-many grandfather paradoxes, and i choose to believe that he's god.

if anyone who cares more about evidence wants to gather up like, little one-off clues that support or conflict with my conclusions, go right ahead. or just throw your own arbitrary headcanons for what's going on with this at me. or incorporate these ideas into an au or something! i just want more people thinking about what the Fuck is up with silver post-06, because by god there is a WHOLE lot of potential packed in there

anyway thanks for reading make sure to like comment and subscribe—

[stingslikeabee]

𝐏𝐄𝐎𝐏𝐋𝐄 𝐈'𝐃 𝐋𝐈𝐊𝐄 𝐓𝐎 𝐆𝐄𝐓 𝐓𝐎 𝐊𝐍𝐎𝐖 𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐓𝐄𝐑 !

1. alias / name: Mari and/or Mari-chan.

2. birthday: September 19th!

3. zodiac sign: Virgo (my Virgo sun is STRONG).

4. height: 1.72m, you guys can google and convert this for a change. :) Metric system rules, guys, it makes sense.

5. hobbies: Writing and reading, obsessing over very random and obscure things like the personal filmography of my favorite actors, learning new languages, making my own travel guides when I go abroad in ridiculous detail, playing JRPGs and hoping for a platinum trophy and getting frustrated somewhere along the road (with some few exceptions).

6. favorite color: As a kid it used to be pink, as a teenager it changed to black, blue and silver and these days I can probably go with mostly anything that it’s not too bright like neon orange or yellow (I’m too pale, I look bizarre near to these hues).

7. favorite book: I have lots, but I tend to always say ‘The Never-Ending Story’ by Michael Ende. Don’t get me wrong, I love a LOT of books but I just enjoy this one a lot and it has a special place in my heart.

8. last song: I think it was ‘Mata Hari’ by Efendi? This song is so catchy, holy fuck. It’s queued as a FFXII audio track for Melissa but maaaan please give it a listen and hate me forever because it will worm its way into your brain.

9. last film / show: Last movie was the ‘Sonic’ movie! And honestly, after all the rework they did for the bad reviews on how Sonic looked, it’s actually pretty entertaining. :D Last show is ‘How to Get Away with Murder‘ - we just recently started s01 after we finished all new episodes of the Shaman King remake.

10. recent reads: I’m reading ‘Roadside Picnic’ by Arkadi and Boris Strugatsky, which gave me pretty neat ideas about a VII correlation with the Northern Crater. 8D Before that I read ‘Kindred’ by Octavia Butler and my next one is going to be ‘Redshirts’ by John Scalzi.

11. inspiration: For Melissa and my take on Honey Bee Inn, it was basically a combination of Sucker Punch, the Japanese nightlife culture and a random tumblr post about the inn and the Turks. But for everything else, from threads, to verses to AUs - literally anything can make me have a weird idea, mostly books and shows (like my surprisingly developed VII version of Snowpiercer, or a recent obsession with Alice in Borderlands or how I’ve been trying to link Mel to other videogame franchises as Mortal Kombat or Yakuza and stuff). 

12. story behind url: It’s a Ricky Martin song! No, really - I wanted something that had a ‘bee’ reference because of the obvious queen bee/Honey Bee Inn aesthetics and I don’t recall what sort of googling led me to it - but the sentence ‘she looks like a flower but she stings like a bee’ was too perfect. That fit how I saw Melissa - a beautiful woman with a fierce mama bear spirit ready to go ballistic after people who wrong her (or her loved ones). :D The fact she may ultimately end in danger herself is just a tiny little detail.

13. fun fact about me: I got inside the Fuji TV building in Odaiba once for dinner with some of the TV executives (I was hanging out with my friend who lived in Japan at the time, his mom worked in the TV business here in Brazil, an invitation was made for dinner and we tagged along - I barely remember the details) but man. It was one WILD experience, I had never been inside a TV studio before, and certainly not one featured in Digimon and so many of my teenage memories? We crossed through that big, giant suspended ball for pictures, we got into some of the rooms where people produced a few shows (there were Yamapi posters EVERYWHERE) and it was the first (and only) time I tried blowfish sushi because, as my friend elegantly put it at the time, ‘this sushi is so expensive that whoever prepared this surely got it right so you can eat it without dying from the poison’. Spoiler: I survived.

tagged by: stole this from at least a couple of people on the dash because it looked cool!  tagging: absolutely no one, keep the thievering alive, be like Robin Hood! Not that I’m rich, but Robin was kinda cool.

[couldnt-think-of-a-funny-name]

yes I’m back to scream about rory williams again. I saw an article that said 11 was terrible to him and they hated each other??? in what world??? 11 clearly respected and cared about Rory. Rory got over his jealousy by the time season six started, and just because he wasn't afraid to call the Doctor out on his bullshit doesn’t mean he didn’t consider him a best friend??? Just because Amy was the Doctor’s best friend doesn’t mean he can’t care about other people??

Rory’s jealousy in season five was completely understandable- and the Doctor understood that, and tried to include him and coax them into working on their relationship to get Rory to trust him. When Rory tried to make it a you vs me situation during Vampires in Venice, 11 shut it down. He’s not romantically interested in Amy and he wants Rory to know that, even though he knows Amy’s confused. Even in later seasons, after Amy’s figured her feelings out, he’s still wary about crossing boundaries in Rory’s eyes, making sure no one misunderstands his physical affection for anything other than friendly. And then as they know each other even longer, he starts getting more physically affectionate with Rory too- more hugging, more closeness without it being weird, they kiss a couple times, they were all cuddling on the couch watching a movie with the Doctor in the middle and Rory didn’t have a single problem with it for God’s sake.

He trusts Rory from almost the moment he meets him- even Amy, he almost took her home after she tried to hide the star whale secret from him. But he knows Rory is quick to catch on, compassionate and a roll with the punches type person. We see in Hungry Earth how positive he is that everything on the surface is going to be fine, because he left Rory in charge and he believes Rory’s fully capable of keeping the humans calm and helping the silurian. He trusts Rory is capable enough that he sets him lose on a cyber ship with his sonic screwdriver. He trusts Rory to help him when he’s fixing/tinkering with the TARDIS even though Rory isn’t a time lord engineer and the Doctor’s protective of his ship. Hell, the opening of Impossible Astronaut tells us that Rory is one of the people in the world the Doctor trusts most. And while Rory is under absolutely no delusion that the Doctor is an unbeatable miracle worker, he still trusts that the Doctor will do every single thing he can to save them from a dangerous situation. The Doctor respects Rory because he believes he is a truly good person (and we all know the Doctor has very specific, hard to meet qualifications for that definition). And from Rory wanting to do the Doctor’s funeral ‘the right way’ in Impossible Astronaut, it’s easy to assume that despite his lack of hero worship he also respects the Doctor for being a good person. 

Even without bringing River into the mix, they consider each other family. The Doctor says he’s scared of Amy and Rory ‘fading away’. Not just Amy. The both of them. He buys Rory stuff he only mentioned liking in passing just to show he cares (”You bought me my favorite car????” “You showed me a picture and said ‘that’s my favorite car!’ “). He’s so invested in their marriage that he saves them from divorce. He tried to give the Ponds a moment alone with their newborn daughter and Rory fully ordered him back into the room because the Doctor is his family. The Ponds set a place for him at the dinner table every single night just in case he stops by (what the fuck I am still frothing at the mouth over that that’s the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard what the fuck). They poke fun at each other. They joke around about who’s turn it is to deal with Amy when she’s in a bad mood. The Doctor thinks Rory is funny and brilliant in his quiet way and Rory thinks the Doctor is ridiculous and magnetic. 

Listen like...we’ve seen the Doctor travel with people he doesn’t want there before. He is always, without fail, bitchy about it. If he didn’t truly care about Rory, it would be obvious. He was torn up when Rory was erased and ecstatic when he came back, and we never once see him offer to take Amy somewhere alone. While yes, he is emotionally closer to Amy, he still always directs all his attention to The Ponds, plural, because they’re equally important to him. Even Rory’s sweetly clueless dad understands how deep the friendship between the three of them is.

listen I just,,,,,miss my fave little trio so much and won’t stand for slander. they’re friends. thank you goodnight 

[bbyhaikyuu]

Captains as Older Brothers || Headcanons

Ushijima Wakatoshi || Kuroo Tetsurou || Oikawa Tooru || Sawamura Daichi || Bokuto Kotaro

Warnings: Just some swear words here and there. gn!reader.

I actually have two brothers, one older and one younger. So this one is probably influenced by my experiences

M.List || Requests

Ushijima Wakatoshi

Everyone is surprised that you're his younger sibling?? I mean, you're a ball of sunshine and Wakatoshi is... Wakatoshi.

What they didn't know is that precisely because of your older brother, you were able to become the person you are today.

He was the one who kept you distracted while your parents fought. The one who shouldered everything just to let you have a normal childhood. And the one who demanded that both of you should always be together. He practically raised you in a way.

The type of brother who rarely bickers and just lets you win? He mature like that.

The dorm rooms for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd years are separated but you visit each other frequently, be it for homework, movie nights, or just plain gossiping ya'know?

Tendou naturally became your brother too. The best one to talk about the manga and animes because all your brother does is read the advertisements on jump.

Occasionally treats you with food whenever you do good at exams.

Found out about the love letters you've been getting. Rejects them for you lmaoooo.

Probably because you've told him about the person you kinda like. You can't really tell your mom about these stuff because when you were a kid and told her about liking someone, you just got a long ass lecture.

Wingman Wakatoshi nii-san? Hell yeah. Although he can just threaten them and everything will work out.

Best head pats. It's a fact.

Originally was against the idea of letting you play volleyball. But after seeing how passionate you were he just went— ah, fuck it

You still were far from matching his strength in spiking, but it doesn't mean you're not good at it. (you're the best according to nii-san. Don't tell Goshiki)

Has the softest smile when you're around. His team is actually dumbstruck seeing him that way.

Practically has the whole volleyball team looking after you.

Kuroo Tetsurou

The type of older brother that basically imparts all his knowledge unto you.

I have always been this kind

Yeah but loves to annoy the shit out of you. You're just lying on your bed? Mf will suffocate you with his body. But he can tell when you aren't really in the mood to play around anymore.

You and Kenma always occasionally make fun of him. Or give him the stink eye. Depends on what shit he said.

Oh yeah remember the way he taught Tsukki about blocking? He likes to be straightforward with his words and criticism.

Midnight drives and food trip. It's like a monthly bonding thing you guys have. Might also turn into a driving lesson.

Also drives for you when you go out with friends. Fetches you when it's already late at night because he doesn't trust public transport that much.

Usually let's you experience and learn some things on your own. But steps in once it feels like it's too dangerous or if he feels like you can't handle the aftermath.

He wants to be considered as the best older brother. Kinda regrets letting you meet the rest of his team. They all baby you and even Lev's older sister loves you.

Getting bullied? Try to hide it from him? No chance, he got eyes and ears everywhere. He's ready to throw hands. Even the rest of the volleyball team got their fists ready.

Brings you along whenever he comes over at Kenma's house because you and Kenma seem to get along more than him.

Might have tried to set you and Kenma up. He failed.

You and Kenma decided to ignore him for like a week. Profusely apologized after 3 days and swore he won't do it ever again.

Has a quote that goes "It's the older brother's job to annoy his younger sibling."

Honestly a good brother 11/10. Would bring a speaker and food into your room just to cheer you up. Makes fun of you after when he knows that you're over it.

Oikawa Tooru

CONSTANT FIGHTS

Either verbal or physical. This bitch won't back down.

You both lost count of how your mother threatened to handcuff you both on a pole for a whole day.

But don't be fooled. He brought out the best of his team. He can do that to you too.

Likes to give you shitty nicknames. One of his fangirls thought it would be a good idea to call you that and Oikawa overheard it. "Who do you think you are to use that nickname? " istg that girl ran away like lightning. Sonic could never.

Honestly you just fight everywhere. Iwaizumi either stops you both or joins you in bullying shittykawa.

You know that thing where you just stand in the doorway of his bedroom and like, stare at him for a good minute and leave without closing the door? Yeah he hates that.

Honestly when he's feeling down, he just goes to your room, flop down on your bed, and talk his heart out. He thinks you're just scrolling through your phone and not listening to his rambles, but thats not the case. You rarely give out advices because you know that he just wants to lift the burden off his shoulders when he talks about his thoughts.

You rarely play volleyball, but will play with him just to make him feel better.

Being Oikawa's sibling means you're crazy good even if you rarely play. People are confused.

100% helped you during your first heartbreak.

Will probably break down your door just because he wants to try a tiktok trend with you.

When the fight gets a little out of hand. Neither of you says sorry. Just pop your head into the bedroom and ask him if he wants to eat. That always solves the problem.

Never says it but he is extremely proud of his sibling. Secretly boasts about you to your teammates.

School heartthrobs. You don't really care though unlike your hoe of a brother.

Asks you to come along with him to do his practices. Never lets you go home alone

Tries really hard to be the best older brother. Of course you love him.

Sawamura Daichi

Play fighting. A lot of play fighting. Either through volleyball or wrestling.

He knows he's stronger than you so he usually tries to match his strength with yours.

Will not hesitate to put you in a headlock if you keep being an ass.

Does a pretty good job of keeping you down. I mean, he is scary when he's mad. A look or a smile can make you shut up already.

Knows when something is bugging you. Will not hesitate to ask you about it so that he can help you resolve it as fast as possible.

The type to give you a piggy back ride if you still felt like shit.

Actually asked Chikara to make sure Tanaka and Noya limit their interaction with you because he knows that those two are up to no good. After quite some time and persuading, he finally trusts them enough to be around you.

Pranks. A lot of pranks. Daichi has boomer tendencies so he probably won't know about the latest trends. Sugawara is very supportive of your plans too.

One time you almost got hit by a stray ball. He ran faster than Hinata.

Doesn't say it but he gets jealous when you hug Asahi. Who couldn't resist hugging that teddy bear?

Will ruffle your hair whenever you did something great. You kinda got accustomed to it.

Actual fights never really happen? You retort once or twice but that's pretty much it.

Knows how to cook and bake. With you being his personal critique. He bakes your favorites every Sunday.

Knows when to bother you and when not to.

Older brother instincts is one of the best of the best.

Bokuto Koutarou

A f f e c t i o n. Lots and lots of it.

Will hug you out of the blue. Or throw you out somewhere, depends on his mood. You don't mind though.

You are a perfect balance between Bokuto and Akaashi's personality. Like their love child.

You don't really have an emo mode though, just a really strong aura that can match your brother's. Akaashi was thankful because he didn't want to take care of two Bokutos. His system can't handle it.

Bokuto emo mode? Call him nii-chan along with some compliments, that'll do. That's why you're always needed when they have a game. And when you can't come, a quick call from you is usually the team's plan B.

Usually takes you to his practices if you have nothing else to do. Will probably or maybe already has taught you everything he knows.

Tried to smuggle you with him during his summer training camp. He got caught by Akaashi and got lectured by your mom.

Travelling is normal for him because of volleyball. Expect a lot of souvenirs and gifts. He spoiled you so much and he doesn't even realize it. You don't take it for granted though.

You fought once. That was it. He went on full emo mode. You never try to bicker with him again.

The type to send you snaps and tiktoks of the most random things. Even at three in the morning. Not that you're asleep (Don't tell mom.)

Will try to smuggle you again. You woke up to him trying to stuff you in a suitcase.

Will give you infinite amounts of piggy back rides despite your age.

Kuroo and Hinata knows about you because he just doesn't stop talking about his precious sibling.

Feeling down? Expect Bokuto to go into nii-chan mode. Will not hesitate to slap a bitch. Or take you to explore the city and buy you food and stuff. Remember the way of the ace T-shirt? Yeah, you have a matching one.

When he feels down, but not like his emo mode, he just usually plops down next to you and start talking. Feel free to give out advices, he'll always say that you're the smartest and the best.

A great older brother indeed. He doesn't even realize it.

Gif Sources : Ushijima, Kuroo, Oikawa, Daichi, Bokuto

[gayforthe13th]

If you're up for a prompt idea, 13 and the Master end up married (like Vegas 24 hour chapel style) and have no recollection of it happening the next morning

Hi i fucking love thoschei. Thanks for coming to my TED talk

   When the Doctor woke up that morning her first thought was, okay, this isn’t my bed. The second thing she thought happened as she opened her eyes and shifted, only to be met with a solid form blocking her from rolling over. Someone’s arm was around her waist. Her fight or flight kicked in almost immediately, she sprang out of the bed within seconds but her actions had caused both her and the other person to fall to the floor in a heap of tangled legs and arms. The groan the mystery man lets out is familiar, too familiar. With a gasp the Doctor untangles herself from him, sitting up and looking down upon the Master’s groggy form as he blinks the sleep out of his eyes and surveys the room. “What..the hell?” he mutters, pulling himself into a sitting position. For a moment it seemed like time had frozen, the two aliens sat on their knees staring at each other in utter confusion, and then the Master blinked, and all hell broke loose. 

   “What the hell are you doing here!?” the Doctor snapped, standing on wobbly legs. A massive pain spread through her head, she shut her eyes tight and tried to find its source. Hangover, she had been drunk. 

   “Me!? What about y-” the Doctor opened her eyes and found the Master frozen, staring at the ring on the finger he was pointing at her so accusingly. “That wasn’t there yesterday…” The Doctor gulped, oh no. Slowly, she lifted her hand, her eyes trailed down to her ring finger, and she found herself staring at a matching ring upon her hand. 

  “We didn’t…” she mutters.

   “Oh,” the Master’s confused stare turned into an amused one, a grin slowly spread on his face as his eyes locked with the Doctor’s, “but we did.” 

   As the Doctor scrambled to grab her things and get away from him as quickly as she could she also scrambled to remember why she was ever there in the first place. The Master was quick to catch up to her as she raced out of the apparent hotel they were in and onto the busy streets of a city she failed to recognize right away. Luckily, the Master had recognized the city, and the planet, and the fact that his last incarnation had been banned from traveling to both. “The gift of a new face,” he said as the Doctor pulled out her sonic and proceeded to try to locate her TARDIS. The Master couldn’t seem any less worried, his anger having faded in favor of glee as soon as the Doctor had begun to get increasingly upset. He followed her towards her ship. She could only hope that her friends were not inside, or worse, lost within the city somewhere. 

  “How did we even end up here? Where’s your ship?” she asked as she pushed passed people, tugging the Master along by the cuff of his sleeve. The Master merely shrugged, offering no explanation though she was sure he could remember about as much as she could about the situation. As they turned into an alleyway and neared the ship a sudden flash of memory hit the Doctor in full force. She could only see bits and pieces, a small chapel, someone muttering in broken Gallifreyan, the grin of the Master’s drunken face. She came back with a gasp, leaning against the Master’s weight as her vision cleared. Quickly, she shoved off of him. “We got married.”

   “Yes dear I’ve gathered,” the Master snarked, there was a bite to his words she couldn’t place.

   “No! N-not just married by the customs of this planet but married by Gallifreyan law!” the Master’s ever-present grin seemed to drop almost instantly, his gaze turned cold, in a flash she was shoved against the brick wall of the closest building.

  “I cannot be married to you,” he growled, but there was something deeper to his threat. The Doctor tried to get a fix on the hidden meaning of his words but he spoke immediately after, “we need to fix this. Now.” with two hands on his chest the Doctor shoved him away from her.

   “We can’t! The only way to do that is at a Gallifreyan court and thanks to someone Gallifrey is fucking gone!” the Master had the nerve to flinch at her words, his gaze fell to the floor. “You think I want this!?” the Doctor continued, “you think I want to be married to you? To be in any way associated with you!?” 

   If the Master could shrink in on himself and collapse she’s sure he would have, his tough exterior melted before her eyes, his gaze held to the ground as he took a step back from her like her words had punched him in the gut. She felt bad. For a moment, she was staring at her friend again, not the guy who destroyed her planet, but the one riddled with nightmares and fear and a sound he couldn’t escape from. She shook her head, no this wasn’t the friend she once knew, she couldn’t let him get to her like this. Pulling her keys out from her pocket and opening the TARDIS doors she pushes them open and leans against the side of the ship. “Are you coming?” she asks. The Master’s eyes flick from her to the ship, then back towards the opening of the alleyway. 

  “No,” he says finally, “after all, you wouldn’t want to be seen with me.” The Doctor frowns, reaching out she grabs his arm before he can pull himself away.

  “I’m sorry,” she says, sincerity laced her voice, she could feel the Master flinch beneath her fingers. “We’ll figure this out…” she says, leading him gently to the open doors. 

  “Liar,” the Master says, but he follows her inside anyway. The doors shut once the two Time Lords are safely inside the TARDIS’ walls and the Doctor has made her way over to the console. 

  “Try to remember what happened as best as you can, maybe there’s something we missed.” 

  “I can’t!” the Master groans, leaning against the crystal pillars he clutches his head, “it’s just flashes.”

  “What do you see?” the Doctor sidles next to him, waiting as he clenches his eyes shut and breathes heavily through his nose. 

  “Just, you. We were at a club somewhere, you must have found me.” the Doctor nods, waiting for him to continue. “Then, we got drunk. Or, I got more drunk than I already was.” he opens his eyes, shaking his head as if dispelling the memories from his mind. The Doctor sighs, sure she was glad she had found him but giving the current circumstances she’d rather not have. The Master doesn’t meet her gaze, instead, he pushes himself off the pillar and circles the console. “Let’s just pretend this never happened, I’m sure you’ve been married before. Won’t be hard to do it again.” 

  “Stop that,” the Doctor makes her way towards him, but he avoids her with ease. 

  “Well we can’t exactly get a divorce so let's just forget it. And if you ever find yourself wanting to get married again just find a nice little planet where they won’t stop you.” 

  “Master-”

  “And I’ll just be on my merry way, and we never have to see each other again-”

  “Koschei!” the Master’s mouth shuts with an audible click at the mention of his name. The Doctor finally catches up to him, taking a hold of his hand. He looks like he wants to pull away, her grip tightens. “I thought you weren’t the one who runs,” she teases. 

  “No,” he bites, “but I’m giving you a chance to.” the Doctor bites her lip, considering her options for a moment. She had him back, and that’s exactly what she had wanted, and maybe this would give them a chance to fix what went wrong to start over. She wanted that more than anything. Gently, she squeezes his hand, lifting her free one to his cheek. 

   “I’m not running now,” she says as he sucks in a shuddered breath, “we can work this out, you and me.” the Master stares at her apprehensively, his mouth opens as if he wants to say something but he closes it again. “It’s just marriage Master, nothing major needs to change.” Her words are meant to reassure him, but for a moment it seems like they do the opposite. He recoils, pulling his hand from hers. She tries to reach out again, but he’s speaking before she can get anywhere.

  “Do you understand how long I’ve wanted this?” he asks. He looks like he’s waiting, maybe for her to yell at him, to be disgusted. When she does nothing, he continues, “all our lives Doctor, that’s how long.” He takes a deep breath, then releases it letting his shoulders relax, “but it’s never me who gets you in the end,” his voice wavers, “I’m meant to be the bad guy. I can’t control how destroying makes me feel, it’s like an itch I can’t scratch,” he scratches his bicep for reference, staring into the space beside her, “you’re an itch I can’t scratch..” the Doctor reaches forward again, placing a hand atop the one on his arm, feeling it settle beneath her. “You’ve always been what I wanted. But I don’t want it like this.” 

   Before she can think, she’s pressing a kiss to his cheek. It’s soft, barely there, but his eyes widen regardless and he looks to her for an explanation. She takes his hand again, lifting it to her lips to press a kiss to his knuckles, then turning it to kiss the inside of his wrist. Then he’s leaning down and she’s kissing him instead. It's soft, tentative, almost like he’s afraid she won't be there when he opens his eyes. The kiss is slow, his hands find their way to her waist and when they pull apart he’s leaning his forehead against hers with his eyes still squeezed shut. “You know I want you to,” she whispers, her breath ghosting his skin, “always have..we just fell off at some point. I want to get back.” The cold metal of the ring pressed the skin of her waist is a tingling reminder of the life she wants to have with him. She knows he feels it too when her hand is on his neck, and her ring tingles against the nape. When she’s kissing him again, the feeling of their lips is coupled with a pleasant cold against both their skin.

[land-of-brains-and-chocolate]

i’ve finally fucking done it i’ve gotten the tragic backstory out of my system. i’m free. i’m free of the softness. hardcore head chomping only from now on

They feel different, definitely. New. Remade. More alive than ever, more aware. With every thread of their being that is neither one nor the other, neither claimed nor given, they are more. They are the building blocks for someone else.

Still, they are two-in-one. There are experiences they haven't shared. Understandings they've failed to reach. There are still things that require them to communicate. They're not just a person, but a relationship.

They find themselves wishing for perfect unity, sometimes. They know it'd get awfully lonely, though.

"Is now the time?"

It certainly seems like it could be. There's a sense of safety, or as close as they get, these days, in sitting on a rooftop, off the ground, away from everything. It's tinged by anxiety as the symbiote realises what he's referring to.

"I can tell you're trying to think of other things that require our attention," he says, "but we haven't taken the time to rest since we doomed and subsequently saved the world. There are limits."

Eddie thinks back to it. The separation, the invasion, the reunion. There's a tightness in his chest, then, that travels up to his neck, down his arms, into his stomach, all over. The symbiote can't open a channel of communication. It's either blanking out or overwhelmed. Maybe all at once.

It hasn't locked up like that in a long time. Not with him.

"It's okay," he says, trying to relax. "You don't have to." He pictures pressure, lifting with every breath.

"If there's anything you want to talk about, I'm listening."

They look out into the lights of the city, weak against the milky early morning sky. Eddie sits cross-legged, chin propped up on his elbow, weary down to his bones. A soft breeze gives him goosebumps, and in focusing on the sensation, slowly, they fall back in sync.

The memory appears vague, at first. Viewed at a distance. The symbiote doesn't offer it to him, exactly, doesn’t draw attention to it, but it's right there, right there in their mind. When he recognises it, Eddie automatically reinforces it with the brief flashes he got to see, a memory of a memory, until it is reconstructed.

The symbiote sits in a cage. It is sad, and angry, and afraid, but in a sharp, alien way, not yet shaped and given context by anything familiar. It is assaulted, from all sides, by the knowledge that it shouldn't be - not-it could be, and it could not-be - with nothing else for it to know.

The present symbiote thinks of it with disgust and pity, both. For what has yet to happen to it, for it to not realise it. For it to have been like this, when it could've not been. For it to not have learned to hide in time, having had to be taught.

Eddie thinks of the symbiote, the one he never got to know, too. What an innocent creature, he thinks.

And even in its cage, the symbiote thinks of the mind of another, the inescapable draw of it. The other's capability for endless strangeness. The wish to share their emotions, to have them directed at it.

It thinks of that.

For everyone to see.

For everyone to punish.

The memory fades away. Others take its place, but they aren't available in any coherent and concrete form. They are, more than anything, a series of states, flickering into their mind as one impact after the other. 

The symbiote is seen. It is described. It is opened. It is seen. It is described. It is opened. It is seen. It is described. It is seen. It is convicted. It is seen. It is filled.

Every muscle in Eddie's body locks up. His jaw feels like it's gripped in a vice. He can't breathe, but his heart is beating like it's trying to escape his chest cavity. The pain is solid, physical. It allows him to distance himself.

Eddie thinks. He thinks them back to the cage. He clings to every impression. The sky, oddly purple, perhaps cloudy. The crowd of aliens, the way the symbiotes seeped in and out of them, the faint fear and despair the hosts broadcasted into the network, the pleasure the symbiotes took from it. The slight twitch of their facial protrusions. Their smell, vaguely like leather.

Eddie puts together detail after detail, until the monotone drone of their mind lessens, until they come back to themselves.

Eddie aches.

It's sorry. It's so sorry.

Eddie hardly hears it. Eddie is standing, in some way, amidst the crowd. He looks up at the symbiote in its cage. It liked this species, he thinks. Anger flares up inside him, but only for a moment. It’s already over, after all.  

No one reacts to him when he takes a step forward. No one reacts to him when he climbs the odd apparatus. The symbiote is small and confused and not the one he knows, not quite, but it's more real than any of them.

"A sonic cage," he says, "right?"

Eddie reaches through it, effortlessly.

"Bad design on their part," he says. "It might stop you, but it won't stop your Other."

He can't quite reach it, at the back, where it's slumped into a puddle, so he crosses the barrier. It's a tingle across his skin. The symbiote looks up at him, wide-eyed.

He touches it. It doesn’t flinch away. It's never had to flinch away, and this time, it never will. It's curious, it's hopeful. It runs up his arm, presses up against his chest. It can feel his heartbeat. It wants to feel more.

"I'm here to protect you," he says, and it's never thought of anything like that, but it feels like something it's been holding inside, somewhere. Some yearning.

In bright sunlight, Eddie blinks his eyes open.

The symbiote is draped across him, purring in short bursts, as if feverish, shivering. Slowly, Eddie raises his arms around it. He runs his fingertips over it, then dips them inside, carding through its silky mass, over and over, top to bottom.

For the moment, the symbiote's mental blocks dissipate. Their thoughts tangle around each other, nudge each other, strengthen each other.

Most prominently among them: They're dead.

The corner of Eddie's mouth curls upwards.

There's nothing but vicious joy attached to the thought.

They picture it, all of them, disintegrating. In such immense pain, they'd rather let themselves fall apart than bear it. And it was driven by the symbiote's pain. The very pain they inflicted on it was their downfall.

Justice at its most efficient and most excruciating, truly.

For a second, the symbiote thinks, they were all one, they were all connected. It was part of the largest empathic network it's ever established. They all felt the same. But it survived. They didn't. They'd never been made to hurt like this. They'd only done the hurting.

It was stronger than them.

"Of course," Eddie says, eyes soft. "Of course you are. People like that are never strong. They may be powerful, but they're always... weak."

He pauses, thoughtfully, then gathers a pile of goo in his hands, and it rises, rounds out, grows eyespots, until he's cupping the symbiote's cheeks.

"You're worth all their lives and more."

There's something like a dull thump, like a massive leap of his heart, out of rhythm. The symbiote killed them. Not alone, but it did. That was one thing. It was right to do so, it knew that, knew that for all the species they subjugated. They brought and deserved nothing but death. But still... Some part of it still thought...

For so long, all it knew of itself was that it was wrong. All this time, it haunted it. Drove it not to be like them, but not to be like itself, either. To be like nothing and no one, in order to be so much as accepted. And now, that wrongness is supposed to be a badge of pride. Of triumph.

It churns with it. All the more, when Eddie brings their faces closer. Wanting still burns, sometimes. Wanting anything. Being anything. But his lips brush against it, and the burn subsides.

"I think," he says, quietly, mouth moving against its smooth surface, "it's up to us to decide what's wrong, now." He pulls back. "Who needs to be punished. Who needs to be protected. It's up to us alone. They’re gone."

It's up to Venom. Venom never would’ve let any of this happen.

"And it's up to me," he continues, "to decide whether I want you."

The symbiote stills, only for a moment, before it realises how hard he's trying not to smile, and headbutts him, gently.

"Which I do. Shame certainly won’t stop me.”

Fair enough.

[radellama]

Thanks for the tag @hellishgoat !!

Name: Rads

Gender: male

Star sign: Aires

Height: 170cm

Time: 6.41pm

Birthday: 18 April (autumn bday hell yeah)

Favourite band/group: nothing but thieves

Fave solo artist: Jamie cullum

Song stuck in my head: hostage by nbt

Last movie: I watched Edward Scissorhands last night! Was so nice to be reminded how much I adore that movie

Last show: I'm watching derry girls with my roommate rn

When did I create this blog: 2014...15?? I dunno I was still in school lol it was years ago

What do I post: literally whatever the fuck I want lol. You can often tell when I'm thinking about/watch something cause I'll spam stuff. It's always been a mess like this so :P

Last Google search: kids on a slope, was trying to show my roommate the show to see if she knew what it was. I watched it years ago and I liked the jazzy vibes

Other blogs: made an art blog too keep all my art shit together, and my chrono trigger blog. Oh also I have a blog made specifically for my ct star trek au lol, I wanted somewhere to show off any art and lore that I could categorise nicely in order not to clog up my ct blog with my own shit lmao. The rest are just url hoards

Do I get asks: on occasion. It's always nice hehe

Why I chose this url: just wanted to take the numbers off and have a sleek look, couldn't have just adellama tho so put more of my nickname in it Lmao

Following: 588

Followers: 229

Average hours of sleep: anywhere between 4-7. I have trouble sleeping lmao

Lucky number: 9

Instruments: I own a little ocarina collection, but I'm not very good at playing lmao. I can play like one or two songs but I haven't practiced in years, they're more a fun lil collection for now

What am I wearing: my Avengers pyjamas lol. I was wearing my sonic pjs but it's too fucking hot rn so wearing my short sleeve and shorts with avengers all over them Lmao

Dream job: honestly just something I can be creative with. I've always wanted to do something revolving around storytelling, so last year I started uni to get into film making and understand everything about making movies as much as I can. I worked as an editor last year at a local advertising place and that was really nice, was mostly in office and whenever I went on shoots with my boss I was just the helping hand and that kinda the vibe I want. Just working hard in something I know how to do pretty well so I can be confident in the end product - so I feel like doing concept art or cinematography or directing. Gotta learn a whole lot more about writing, I get excited about good concepts but I still need to learn a lot about how to get it across well with good writing Lmaooo so it's good I'm studying

Dream trip: I'd like to see Japan and Korea one day, new Zealand too. Tbh tho when covid has been taken care of, I wouldn't mind traveling around Australia more in the future and get to know the country. But I'd wanna go with a friend or two or something lol, not by myself haha. I've moved around so much growing up I didn't really care about traveling, and tbh I'm still a bit lowkey, atm (when covid is well and truly taken care of, I'm not silly) I'd only really travel to visit friends Lmao

Favourite food: I fucking love spaghetti bolognese lmao.. And tonkatsu... I like a good deal of Italian and Japanese food lol.

Nationally: Australian

Favourite songs: ummmm.... I'll just pick a few songs I've recently been obsessing over

Nbt - take this lonely heart

Gotye - out here in the cold

Jamie cullum - edge of something

RY X - hold me love

The neighbourhood - w.d.y.w.f.m

Last book I read: just finished skulduggery pleasant a week or two ago, just haven't really had the mood to read recently cause it's way too hot lol

Top 3 fictional universes you'd like to live in: uhhh, I gotta confess I watch a lot of dystopia universes Lmao and they're all terrifying or ugly jgfdghh. Uhm?? Living in an idyllic ghibli landscape? I would love to live in the castle in the sky landscapes they're gorgeous. Maybe also 1000ad from ct, they're having a nice chill time. Aaaand, maybe Vellie village from owl boy (before the attack lol) cause FLOATING ISLANDS

[blightarts]

PROLOGUE

Next Chapter: Coming Soon

Disclaimer: All Endless Summer and Choices rights belong to Pixelberry. Also, jokes here are not meant to offend anyone. 

MC x LI Pairings: Quinn x M!MC, Jake x F!MC

Word Count: 4799

Tags: @princessstellaris​, @mechaspirit​, @xo-endlessmayhem-xo​, @skyila​, @choicesyouplayandmore​, @i-miss-trr​, @mysteli​, @brightpinkpeppercorn​, @aquamarvel​, @marmolady​, @sceptilemasterr​, @endlessly-searching-for-you​, @ohmyeightpastlives​, @choiceslife​

Blue eyes open to a new day. A young man in his early 20′s wakes up on his bed, with ruffled black hair and drool near his lips. One thing keeps repeating in his mind as he blankly stares at the ceiling.

“Everything in its own time.”

The man sighs and sits up straight.

Casey: That’s the only thing I believe in… for about a week. But as of now, there is little progress in restoring my friends’ memories and helping them back up to who they used to be during our adventures in that isla—

Suddenly, there was a loud bang on his door which scared him. The door opens and in comes a young blonde woman, also in her early 20′s and with blue eyes. It’s Casey’s older twin sister, Emily Summers.

Emily: Hey, Casey! Breakfast is ready! We got a big day today!

She grabs the collar of his shirt and drags him out of bed, towards the dining room.

Casey: Forget what I said. My overly-ecstatic sister is always dragging me, literally and figuratively, back to optimism. But who can blame her? She wants to be with everyone again, especially Jake.

Emily: Stop talking like Deadpool.

Casey: What? The writer likes jokes that break the 4th Wall.

(Note: You guys will read a bunch of jokes that break the 4th Wall. 😆)

The young woman rolls her eyes and chuckles as she puts her little brother on his chair, next to their roommate, Zahra Namazi, who chuckles at their antics.

Zahra: You two should audition for a sitcom, cuz your everyday shenanigans is making even me laugh.

Casey: Thanks for the compliment? I guess?

Emily just sips her coffee and stares blankly, internally giggling. Casey notices the red tint in his sister’s eyes, realizing that she cried herself to sleep, thinking about Jake, then he sighs. Soon, after the three finish breakfast, the twins go to prepare for the first day of the Hartfeld Science and Technology Week. As they get dressed, they head for the door, but not before turning to Zahra.

Emily: Zahra, you not coming?

Zahra: Why would I go to a stupid event with stupid people attending?

Emily looks at her, unamused. She turns to Casey for help who gives his sister an “I got this” look.

Casey: You know… there could be some tech in there you could hack into and use it to mess with those stupid people.

Zahra looks at Casey with a raised eyebrow.

Zahra: You present a very compelling argument, Summers. Alright, I’ll go, but I will be sitting at a discreet location so people won’t easily know it was me messing their stuff.

Casey: Great!

Emily gives Casey a double thumbs up before the three leave their dorm. They arrive at the central campus, where the event is being held. The twins see some of their friends at different places, all except one. Emily sighs as Casey pats her shoulder.

Casey: Don’t worry. Wherever he is right now, he and Mike are alright.

Emily nods and gives her brother a weak smile.

Emily: You’re right…

She shakes her head and turns to a nearby smoothie stand.

Emily: Gimme a sec.

Emily runs to the stand to order a smoothie, trying to hide her obvious pain. Casey sighs at this and just stands there, waiting for his sister to come back while looking for their best friend, Diego Soto. Soon after, Emily returns and spots Diego already with Casey.  She grins.

Emily: Heyyo, Diego!

Diego: Heyyo, Emily….yo…

Casey: Close enough.

The three share laughs before being interrupted by a tapping sound from the stage’s microphone. The school dean is onstage, ready to give the opening speech for the event.

Dean: Greetings, students. Welcome to the first day of the Hartfeld Science and Technology Week.

As the dean is greeting the students and giving his speech, the twins start to feel a slight pain in their heads. Diego notices this and whispers to them.

Diego: You guys okay?

Casey: Yeah, it’s just… we haven’t felt this kind of headache since…

Diego: Since…?

Emily: …La Huerta…

Diego: “La Hoopla”?

The pain continues to hurt the twins as they look around, searching for the source. It wasn’t a success but they do spot their friends. Casey’s beloved, Quinn Kelly, is by the fountain, having a heated conversation on the phone, possibly with one of her parents. Estela Montoya is backstage, talking to someone the twins cannot see from their point of view. Sean Gayle is with Michelle Nguyen, arguing about something, while Craig Hsiao is in between them, trying to stop the fight. Raj Bhandarkar is at his food stand, selling snacks to fellow students. Zahra is on a bench, trying to hack into some of the tech present in the event. Grace Hall is at the back of the audience, twiddling her fingers and paranoid ever since her arrest. And Aleister Rourke is also at the back of the audience, arms crossed and annoyed at everything around him.

Casey: Everyone… is… here…

Emily: Almost…

The twins then feel their hearts suddenly sink, as if they’re sensing something ominous coming. Even with this pain, they can still hear the dean’s last lines for his speech.

Dean: And now, may I introduce to you, our sponsor for this event, our great Emperor. His Eminence, Mister Everett Rourke!

Most of the audience clap with joy. Some just clap normally or don’t clap at all. And very few glare at the man, including Casey, Emily and Aleister.

Emily: Great, as if we couldn’t get any more headaches…

Casey: Sshh…He’s looking right at us…

Everett spots the twins and gives them an evil smirk before starting his opening speech for the event.

Everett: Hello, students of Hartfeld University. You know? Knowledge is power, but only a few can wield this power, and even more so, only very few could utilize this power to its highest potential. With this power, you could become Gods… like who I am right now…

During the speech, Everett is being broadcasted by a news crew, showing the footage live around the world. Somewhere in Costa Rica, two familiar grown men, laying on their hammocks and sharing bottles of beer, watch the broadcast.

Jake: This news is boring. Change it.

Mike: Nah, too lazy too.

Jake: Jackass.

Mike: Nitwit.

As Everett continues his speech, the pain the twins are experiencing gets more intense as they start to hear a screeching sound. Emily drops her smoothie because of this as it spills all over the ground. Diego, confused with what to do, tries to ask for help but before he could do so, a loud bang is heard from afar. A sonic wave travels from the source of the bang and reaches the Hartfeld central campus, knocking down everyone and interrupting Everett’s speech. Quinn drops her phone on the fountain. Sean falls on Michelle. Estela falls along with the person she was talking to, revealed to be her mother, Olivia Montoya. Raj’s food stand falls apart and his snacks drop to the ground. Zahra drops her laptop and it gets broken. The rest of the gang falls over normally.

Michelle: Get off!

Sean: Wha… What was that?!

Craig: Well, whatever it is, it sure knows how to literally drop the bass.

Estela: Mom! You okay?

Quinn: My phone!

Raj: My snacks!

Zahra: My laptop!

Random Student: My leg!

The news-broadcasting camera falls on the ground. Jake and Mike notices this while watching their TV.

Mike: Woah. What do you think is going on out there?

Jake: I don’t know. But I’m having an unusual sensation right now… it’s like… this is all familiar to me…

Mike soon notices Jake glowing.

Mike: Jake!

Jake: Wha—

Jake takes notices of his situation and sees Mike glowing as well.

Jake: What the fuck is happening?!

Mike: This ain’t like any hangover I’ve experienced befo—

The two are then transported to the Hartfeld central campus, next to Casey, Emily and Diego, who immediately notices them.

Emily: J… Jake?!

Diego: Woah! Those are the wanted fugitives, Jake McKenzie and Mike Darwin!

Casey: What are they doing here…?

Jake quickly sees the American flag near the campus, realizing that he and Mike are in USA, a place they shouldn't be in.

Jake: Fuck, we shouldn't be here.

Mike: How did we even get here in the first place?

Jake: I dunno, kid. But we gotta get outta here fast.

Mike: We're not Sonic the Hedgehog!

Jake quickly keeps Mike quiet and they try to sneak away from the public. No one seems to notice this as Diego is more occupied looking after Casey and Emily while everyone else tries to get back up on their feet. But suddenly, a large crack in the sky appears, catching everyone’s attention.

Sean: Great, now what’s that?!

Aleister: That’s…

Aleister sort of realizes what is going on and goes onstage to confront his father. But before he could do so, the crack becomes larger and a large spirit entity comes out of it. It is Vaanu, or at least, what remains of it. Its presence releases a second sonic wave, which blasted Aleister away from Everett. Vaanu reaches and grabs Rourke in anger.

Vaanu: Everett Rourke! Do you not care for the consequences that come with your unforgivable sin?! You are not a god. You have tampered with the decision that decides the fate of this world. And now this world is falling apart because of you.

The masses panic and run away, pushing each other and only caring for their own safety. Casey stands up, despite his pain. He runs around, looking for Quinn.

Diego: Casey! Where are you going?!

Emily: He’s going for her…

Diego: “Her”?

Emily: Quinn Kelly…

Emily stands up and asks Diego for help.

Emily: Diego…

Diego: Yes?

Emily: I want you… to help me… reach him…

Emily points to Jake, also running away with Mike from danger, which shocks Diego.

Diego: You want me to help you get close to a wanted man?!

Emily: He’s… an innocent… and kind… man…

Diego looks into Emily’s eyes, as if she’s telepathically saying “Please” to him, and eventually, nods.

Diego: Alright, I trust you in this.

Diego helps Emily up and guides her to Jake and Mike. Meanwhile, Sean, along with Craig, tries to calm the panicking masses.

Sean: Everyone, please. Stay calm. Don’t push each other. In a single file line, please!

Craig: Listen to the man! Come on.

Michelle takes a more aggressive approach as she smacks people with her purse.

Michelle: Hey! The guys said no pushing, you idiots! In a single file line, now!

Some people nod and follow her orders, scared of her more than Vaanu’s presence.

Sean: Uhh… thanks?

Michelle: This doesn’t make us even. Now get your ass to safety while helping everyone.

Sean nods and continues helping people while Craig follows him. Michelle went a different direction to help other people. Meanwhile, Raj runs away, holding his snacks in his arms, but clumsily dropping some of them.

Raj: This is totally not the mushrooms I had this morning! This is all too real, dude!!

Grace runs along with him, scared for her life.

Grace: I don’t wanna die… I don’t wanna die… I don’t wanna die…

On the other hand, Zahra, all alone and away from the majority of the people, runs to away from Vaanu and everyone.

Zahra: These punks can take care of themselves. I don’t give one single fu—

Suddenly, she spots a disabled student, struggling to get up with her crutches. Zahra groans in anger and runs towards the student.

Zahra: Damn you, whoever’s deciding my destiny!

She gives the disabled student a piggyback ride as she runs away from the danger.

Zahra: I blame you for not being near those goody-two-shoes football players, so they could help you instead.

Student: Umm… thanks?

Back near the stage, Aleister gets up after being blown back by Vaanu. He spots his father being grabbed by the entity and grits his teeth. He turns to see Estela and Olivia being helped by I.R.I.S. and Lila.

Aleister: Sister, everyone!

The four women spot Aleister.

Estela: Aleister? What are you doing here?

Aleister: Confronting our father about what he did.

Olivia: What he did?

Aleister: He must have done something. Knowing him and his ego, it must be meddling with time, space or reality itself.

Lila: Nonsense! His Eminence would never do that!

I.R.I.S. places a hand on her son’s shoulder.

I.R.I.S.: Aleister, come on. Let us get to safety.

Aleister nods and points to the running crowd.

Aleister: Let’s go with them.

The women nod and follow Aleister to the crowd. Meanwhile, Casey eventually finds Quinn. She is struggling to run away with lots of people running faster around her. Her breathing is slow and she is getting slower. Suddenly, a random student accidentally bumps into her and she falls to the ground.

Casey: Quinn!

Casey tries to help her but his headache gets worse, causing him to scream in pain and fall over, next to her. Even with this severe pain, he crawls towards his beloved, muttering her name. Quinn looks up, spotting Casey reaching to help her. She recognizes him during their first encounter after Casey and Emily wakes to Rourke’s world.

Quinn: You… I remember you…

Casey caresses Quinn’s cheeks with tears in his eyes. He gives her a hopeful smile.

Casey: Quinn, it’s okay. It’s gonna be okay. I’m here…

Quinn smiles back before falling unconscious. Casey holds Quinn’s hand before also falling unconscious. On the other hand, Emily and Diego reach Jake and Mike.

Emily: Wait!

Jake and Mike turn to Emily. Jake makes heavy eye contact with her, slowly familiarizing her. He stops in his tracks. Mike stops as well, right in front of him.

Mike: Jake, what’s wrong?

Jake: This lady… I feel like I’ve seen her before.

Emily collapses from Diego’s arms. 

Diego: Em!

Emily: I’m fine… Get to safety…

Diego: Not without you!

Jake and Mike rush to Emily’s aid.

Jake: Here, let me carry her for you.

Mike: Get to safety, buddy.

Diego pushes Jake and Mike away.

Diego: Why would I listen to criminals like you?!

There was a long silence between the three.

Diego: I don’t know why Emily has a fixation on you, but I’m not giving her to dangerous men like you!

Mike: Listen, we don’t have ti—

Jake stops Mike and steps forward.

Jake: Listen. We maybe criminals in the eyes of the public, but right now, your friend is in need and I don’t think you can carry her on your own and away from that thing. So, let me help, Short Stuff.

Diego glares at Jake’s eyes and exhales deeply.

Diego: Fine. But I’m only letting you save her. I’m not letting you near my best friend again after this.

Mike: That’s fine by us.

Jake carries Emily in his arms and runs away, with Diego and Mike right behind him. Emily, struggling not to fall unconscious, reaches to caress Jake’s cheek and smiles.

Emily: Nice to see you again… Top Gun…

Emily falls unconscious while Jake feels both relief and confusion after hearing what Emily said. As everyone runs further from Vaanu, it opens its other hand and shows Rourke what it has. Everett’s eyes widen to see the Crystal Heart of Vaanu on its palm.

Everett: It can’t be!

Vaanu: This time, you will not get in the way of this world’s destiny. 

Vaanu crushes the Crystal Heart and shatters it into three shards. It then opens three portals to three different timelines, before hurling each shard to each timeline. Rourke protests.

Everett: What did you do?!

Vaanu: I have sent my Heart’s shards into different timelines in order to keep this world intact long enough for the Catalysts to restore it into the way it’s supposed to be.

Everett: You insolent...!

Rourke grits his teeth in anger and activates something on his watch. Soon, the Omega Mech appears. Vaanu, prepared for the machine’s arrival, drops Rourke on the ground and grabs the robot, crushing it. This surprises Rourke, who starts to back away in fear. But before he could run away, Vaanu hurls the Omega Mech behind him and fires a celestial beam to it, causing an explosion. Broken shrapnel pierces Rourke’s back, heavily but not fatally wounding him. The explosion then blows him towards a pole and his body collides with it, knocking him unconscious. Vaanu looks onto the running crowd, spotting Casey, Emily and the rest of the Catalysts.

Vaanu: Everything else falls into your hands now… Catalysts…

Vaanu raises its arm and snaps its fingers. It then fades away as the crack in the sky and the portals disappear. The panicked masses notice this and have stopped running.

College Professor: Is… is it gone…?

Dean: I think it is…

Student: We… we’re safe now, right…?

Aleister’s group, noticing the disappearance of Vaanu, run back to look for Rourke and they eventually spot him on the ground, wounded and unconscious.

Olivia: Everett!

Lila: Your Eminence!

Aleister: Father!

Estela: No!

I.R.I.S.: Scanning vitals.

The group crouch around him.

Olivia: I.R.I.S., status!

I.R.I.S.: Vitals are stable but he’s still bleeding. We need to give him quick medical attention.

Lila: Alright, let me carry him to the—

Estela: Mom…?

The group turns to Estela, who is glowing and slowly fading away.

Estela: I don’t feel so good…

Olivia: What the... No, no, no…!

Olivia holds Estela close, as the latter clutches her mother, not wanting to let go.

Estela: I don’t wanna go, Mom… I don’t wanna go…

Olivia turns to the group for help.

Olivia: What is happening to my daughter?!

I.R.I.S.: It is as if she is being transported a different place… or a different time…

Lila: Like… she is being sent to either the past or the future.

Aleister: That is the case...

Olivia: Then help her!

I.R.I.S.: I am truly sorry, Olivia… but there’s nothing we can do here…

Olivia turns to Estela with tears in their eyes.

Olivia: It’s going to be alright, Dear. Look at me.

Estela nods, speechless as she completely fades away. Meanwhile, the people look to the sky, questioning if whatever just showed up is truly gone.

Sean: Where did it go…? What did it want…?

Craig: Uhh… Sean…?

Sean turns to Craig, who fades away like Estela. Sean is left speechless and sees himself fading away as well. His face shows both confusion and fear before he is completely gone.

Michelle: Sean! No!

Michelle tries to reach for the fading Sean but she fades away as well. Raj and Grace watch in horror but then soon realize that they are fading away too.

Grace: No, no, no—

Raj: This has to be some sort of tri—

The two are then silenced by their disappearances. Meanwhile, Zahra sees her hand fading then her entire self. She sighs and shakes her head in annoyance.

Zahra: Motherfu—

On the other hand, Casey and Quinn remain unconscious to each other. No words. Just Quinn fading away, leaving Casey alone. Meanwhile, Emily is laid on the bench with Diego comforting her. Jake and Mike discuss what just happened.

Mike: What do you think is going on here?

Jake: I don’t really know but I don’t wanna stick around to find out. We gotta find a way back to Costa Rica someho—

Diego: Woah!

Jake and Mike turn to Diego who starts to fade away. 

Diego: This is crazy! Like Infinity War cra—

Jake goes to help Diego but the latter disappears completely.

Jake: He's... gone...

Mike: Jake…?

Jake turns to Mike, who is looking at his own fading hand. They look at each other before Mike fades away entirely. Jake, in silence, also notices himself fading away. He turns to Emily, still unconscious, and crouches near her.

Jake: I don’t know who you are yet… but I promise… I will find you…

Jake smiles and pats Emily’s forehead gently before disappearing. After Mike and most of the Catalysts disappeared, a portal opens above Casey and Emily’s unconscious bodies and Vaanu’s hands carefully scoop them up and pull them in the other side of the portal. The people in the central campus of Hartfeld are left bewildered and traumatized by what they have just witnessed.

“Everything in its own time.” 

Two pairs of blue eyes open upon hearing these words. Casey and Emily wake up, no longer in pain. They look around and see nothing but a white void.

Casey: Whe… where are we?

Emily: I don’t know. I don’t even remember how we got here.

Casey: Last thing I remembered is seeing Quinn.

Emily: Mine was Jake.

The twins stand up and walk a few meters in the white void until it starts to take form into a familiar purplish dimension, with prismatic crystals laying around and a purple moon in the sky.

Casey: Looks like the dimension where we met Vaanu.

Emily: And before we made the choice of fucking up everyone’s lives.

The twins sigh, realizing their mistake of siding with Rourke and thinking that they might make their friends’ lives better.

Vaanu: That is not entirely true.

Vaanu appears in front of Casey and Emily.

Vaanu: You did choose to side with Rourke, but that is not the whole story.

Emily: What do you mean?

Vaanu: That truth is not mine to tell.

Casey: Well, what is the kind of truth that Em and I should know right now?

Vaanu taps the twins’ foreheads and shows them a vision of what it did to Rourke and the Crystal Heart.

Vaanu: Rourke did something that goes against what we all agreed upon. He messed with things that he should not have control over. And thus, with my remaining strength, I had to punish him and scatter my Crystal Heart into different timelines in order to keep this world from self-destruction. However, time is limited. I am tasking the two of you and your friends to collect the shards and make it whole again.

Casey: After that, we’re going to decide again, like last time?

Emily: Well, this time, we’re gonna choose the one where everyone is happy, except Rourke.

Vaanu: That is not entirely the case.

Emily: Huh?

Vaanu: When you chose to side with Rourke and had the Omega Mech utilized my power, stored within the Crystal Heart and you two, the both of you became completely human.

Casey: Like, Emily and I are no longer a part of you?

Vaanu nods in agreement. Casey and Emily look at each other for a moment, realizing that if they did manage to repair the Heart of Vaanu and restore things to how they are supposed to be, they can stay and be with the people they care about the most.

Vaanu: I suppose you two already know what I am implying.

Casey: Yeah. The three shards of your Crystal Heart each have a third of your full power.

Emily: And if we managed to put them back together, then you can be whole again, the world is saved and the two of us can stay here, with our friends and family.

Vaanu: Exactly. An ending befitting everyone’s needs.

Emily glares and points upwards.

Emily: Calling you out, Pixelberry!

Casey chuckles at what Emily is doing.

(Jk, love you, PB. Keep doing great on your books. 😆)

Vaanu then opens three portals, each leading to a timeline where it sent its Crystal Heart shards.

Vaanu: Behind these gateways are the timelines where I sent the shards. I have also separated your friends and sent them here to help you two in your quest.

Casey: Alright, simple enough.

Vaanu: However, once you enter either one of these gateways, you will be sent to a time one month after I have already sent the shard and your friends.

Emily: So, our friends get there on Day 1 and the two of us get there after a month?

Vaanu: The two of you are quite adaptable compared to your friends. Besides, it will be easier for you to find them once they have gotten familiar with the world they are currently living.

Casey: Makes sense.

Emily: Can you at least tell us which of our friends are in which timeline?

Vaanu: That is for me to know and for you two to find out on your own.

Emily: ….Cool!

Emily puffs her cheeks and cross her arms. Casey pats her back and gives her a motivational smile. Vaanu then guides the twins to each of the portals, giving them a background on the timelines they lead to.

Vaanu: This gateway leads to the Arcane Era; a time where technology is rare and magic is everywhere. Humans are able to use magic and wield spellbooks to better utilize this magic. The world is also split between the Natural Realm and Spirit Realm.

Casey: Sounds like something from an isekai-genre (Other world) anime.

The three then approach the second portal.

Vaanu: This gateway leads to the Dragonic Era; a time where dragons, wyverns and large beasts roam the land, along with humans. They were once allies, however an unforgivable sin done by the humans sparked a war between them. That was their history. In the present, the descendants of the humans are studying these creatures and uncovering their past while the creatures are behaving like animals in your world.

Emily: Sounds like something out of a video game.

The three then approach the final portal.

Vaanu: This gateway leads to the Dystopia Era; a time where I did not confront Rourke and sent away my Crystal Heart shards to the different timelines. In this timeline, an old enemy takes over and kills Rourke. This enemy then terrorizes the land and is planning to expand his control to the entire world. But a rebellion is standing in this enemy’s way.

Casey: Sounds like something from the Terminator film series.

Vaanu then gives each of the twins a special bracelet that contains the Hadean Zodiac signs of their friends.

Vaanu: This will help you find your friends. When one of the signs glows temporarily, it means they are nearby. The signs will permanently glow once your friends have their memories restored.

Emily: Thank you.

Emily smiles and admires her bracelet. Casey does the same.

Vaanu: Have you two decided on where to go first?

The twins nod.

Casey: I’m going to the Arcane Era.

Emily: I’m going to the Dragonic Era.

Vaanu nods back.

Vaanu: Excellent. Now once you two have reunited with your friends and reclaimed the two Crystal Heart shards in their respective Eras, you can tap your bracelets and you will be sent back here. You and your friends must go to the Dystopia Era together and reclaim the final shard before Rourke wakes from his slumber. He won’t be in a coma for too long, and his allies are making sure that you will not accomplish your goal.

Casey: Understood.

Emily: We won’t lose this time.

Vaanu then extends each of its hands towards the twins and gives them each an outfit, matching the Era they have chosen.

Vaanu: Now, it is time for you two to be equipped with the proper attire.

Casey receives a pair of matching silver and crimson gauntlets and boots, an Eastern waistcoat, arm-gloves to go with his gauntlets and a sleeveless crimson shirt with a cape-like bottom. Casey also gets his hair tied to a rising ponytail and his bangs dyed crimson. The young man grins at his new look.

Casey: Dang! I look smokin’!

Meanwhile, Emily receives a set of leather armor, including a black long-sleeve leather jacket, a brown leather vest, a pair of brown leather bracers, a pair of leather greaves, and black short leather trousers. She also receives a pair of goggles and a slingshot-like attachment to her left bracer. She delights on her new outfit.

Emily: Sweet! I look like a hunter!

Vaanu nods and slowly starts to fade away.

Vaanu: You two are ready. And now it is time for me leave the rest to you.

The twins notice Vaanu disappearing.

Emily: Vaanu!

Casey: Wait. We still have no idea what to do.

Vaanu points up, to the stars in the sky.

Vaanu: Worry not, Casey and Emily. The stars will guide you.

Soon after, Vaanu is completely gone, leaving the twins to their task. The two look at each other with determination in their faces.

Casey: Last one to get back here with our friends and the shard owes the winner a meal.

Emily: Oh, you are so on!

Casey and Emily bump their fists then go in for a handshake.

Emily: Take care out there.

Casey: You too.

They then face their respective portals with determined grins before letting go of each other’s hands and running towards their goal.

--- END OF PROLOGUE ---

[thanksjro]

Eugenesis, Part Six Scene Five: Siren Was Wrong, Somehow

Optimus Prime greets Frenzy and Thundercracker at the door. Thundercracker, clearly and understandably confused, asks what’s going on.

Oh man, that’s my favorite Tame Impala song.

Optimus calls for Soundwave to be sent up and holy shit I can’t believe he’s still fucking alive.  

Optimus, this would be a whole lot more poignant of you if you actually knew what happened to Thundercracker. Come to think of it, how do you know what happened in 1986? You haven’t been to 1986 yet. This was your idea, how did you come up with it?

Over at Delphi, the Sharkticons are trying to break down the door, and Ratchet’s wondering just what’s taking Soundwave so long.

I dunno, Soundwave, I think killing Sharkticons with your tits out would have been a real power move on your part.

I’m not drawing Soundwave with his tits out, by the way.

(Not for free, anyhow.)

The doors burst open and Sharkticons flood in, followed by the Quintessential Flying Fucks- yes, all three of them. Looks like Sevax didn’t run after all. Which is good, because while they’re busy punching Ratchet, Fulcrum and Soundwave- dunno why they’re using their fists, but okay- someone recognizes them.

One day, Sevax. One day, I promise you we will get your lore.

Soundwave is intercepted by Optimus and pulled to safety, meeting up with Thundercracker.

Once again, lying about the future has awarded no points and is swiftly corrected by the rest of the world. You’d think Optimus would have learned from the time he screamed at Nightbeat.

Optimus has a plan, and it’s very loud. Frenzy will be firing off decibel charges, while Thundercracker pairs them off with sonic booms until- well, until. Soundwave is here to let everyone on their side know to shut off their auditory processing with the power of telepathy.

Y’know, you could have probably not have had to pull Thundercracker out of the time stream if you’d just kept Siren at Delphi. Being loud is kind of his thing. Just a thought, Optimus.

Soundwave sounds off the message, and everyone gets it. Everyone including the Quintessential Flying Fucks.

Frenzy and Thundercracker do their thing, and it’s pretty effective at shutting the enemy down.

Anyone who didn’t turn their hearing off has their head explode. It’s gross. And awesome. I guess Optimus didn’t need to really know about 1986 to know that this would work, and the whole “ultimate Autobot” thing looks like it was actually a ploy to get Thundercracker to the future anyway. That tracks. Still wish he’d thought of Siren beforehand though.

It takes over an hour for the sound to die down enough that folks can undeafen themselves without bleeding from their eyes.

This is about the time that Quantax wakes up from a noise-induced blackout.

Always with the lubricant in this novel, I swear. There are other fluids!

Quantax, who actually knows when to quit unlike some people, sees the writing on the wall and decides it’s time to leave. But where to go?  

He loads up into a ship and hightails it to the wormhole. As he leaves, the Quintessential Flying Fucks take notice, and decide to see what he’s up to.

Optimus finally boots his auditory suite up to the melodious sound of Nightbeat screaming at him through his communicator. It’s time for Optimus and Thundercracker to head back to their own time, because that wormhole ain’t sticking around for much longer. Optimus tries to take control of the situation, but Nightbeat’s not having it. Optimus and Thundercracker need to get here NOW, before they both get stuck thirty years in the future and cause time-shenanigans to happen.

And we all know that the sequel is almost always worse than the original.

Back on Aquaria, Ultra Magnus and Galvatron are a little lost.

I don’t know how they survived, but good on them.

Gang’s all back together, and they’ve even got the Matrix. Good job, guys! Death’s Head leads the rest of the team to a line of Tridents, because he’s luckily been here before and actually paid attention to what was where.

As they climb down a ladder, a warp gate pops into existence on the far side of the hangar. It’s Xenon, because we’ve only seen the first stage of his boss fight.

Siren, you are just having a day, aren’t you buddy?

Everyone else fires back at Xenon, who starts screaming that he is the alpha and the omega, and will outlive the stars as HE carries the Lifecode and therefore is immortal, even if his plan to repopulate didn’t go over so hot. He sinks back into the warp, presumably to begin brainstorming on another nefarious plot.

Or maybe not. Sucks to suck, Xenon.

Our ragtag team of giant robots load into a Trident, but not before we get some truly, deliciously, completely self-indulgent fanwank.

Oh, so tasty. This is retribution for Galvatron ripping Death’s Head’s arm off in the Fire on High! storyline in the Marvel UK comics.

Well, that’s ominous.

But enough wanking, it’s time to go. Everyone loads into a Trident and they’re off. The planet is cracking apart around them, and Ultra Magnus is trying to fly a ship he doesn’t understand with one hand. Also, his head feels funny, like it did when he came online for the first time. But I’m sure that’s nothing to be worried about. The base crumbles into ruin behind them, and God is surely destroyed now, if it wasn’t already.

I can’t believe killing god is a Roberts’ writing staple. What the fuck.

The boys escape orbit just in time, as the planet crumples under its own weight. Siren- yeah, he’s alive, don’t worry about it- notes that he doesn’t see Death’s Head’s Trident anywhere. That’s when they see the Thermopylae being eaten alive by Scraplets. It’s gruesome, about on par with what was left of First Aid when Prowl found him.

It’s been a long holiday season for Magnus, if you couldn’t tell.

You know, the last time a giant robot regrew his arm without so much as thinking about it, we found out he was a creator god. Considering we’ve already seen the death of a higher power, I’m wondering just where the hell this will be going.

Magnus, lets Siren take over with the driving, as he sinks into the backseat and fugue-states out while holding the Matrix like a security blanket. Aquaria explodes in the background, because Roberts likes to make things explode.

Jumping back in time a few minutes, we see what’s happened to Death’s Head; his Trident’s engine decided to bow out while he was still somewhere in the stratosphere. Thinking quickly, he pulled out his handy-dandy MacGuffan- a time-trigger.

You see, back when he was working for Rodimus Prime to off Galvatron, Death’s Head stole this little doohickey from Wreck-Gar, who had stolen it from Galvatron, who honestly kind of needed to have it taken away because he has a bit of a time-travel problem. All he has to do is press the button, and he’ll be safe and sound in the year of 2007.

Yeah, that didn’t really work out so hot.

[bluewithpurplepolkadots]

Quarantine Q&A

I was tagged by the most beaut  @thatdoodlebug . Hi! Hope you’re doing alright.

Are you staying home from work/school?

Technically both. I typically work outdoors but I’ve basically been doing all those office things which I have to do. Like look at management plans. Joy. Not sure how long that will last though, my job is kind of built half on the idea I’m doing physical work outside like at least 4 out of 5 days a week soooo... who knows what the future holds. We get like emails daily on updates across the organisation and it says a lot that now I think things are calming down a little when we have a major change every other day as opposed to every day now.

I try not to think about it too much honestly when I shut off my work laptop. 

If you’re staying home, who’s there with you?

I live alone. Kind of wish I lived in a flat which allowed pets now honestly. I mean some tenants are breaking the rules anyway on that but I’m not a snitch. Just too much of a loser to break the rules myself. Because I’m the one who would get caught.

Are you a homebody?

Before this all happened, I’d argue I was closer to that end anyway. But I’m used to being outside a lot more then this. And like I did have plans this year to go further afield.

What movies have you watched recently? What shows are you watching?

Last movie in theatres was Birds of Prey. At home I’ve been watching some of the Ghibli films I never have before and some of the ones I already have on netflix. Also Sonic Boom which is good to switch your brain off to. Recently also rewatched Hilda there. 

Also have been watching some of Disney Hercules, The Weekenders and The Owl House as it comes out. The Owl House is pretty great so far honestly so if you can watch it I would. 

I should finish Steven Universe: Future at some stage but I’m not really feeling it for whatever reason.

An event that you were looking forward to that got cancelled?

Mere weeks before things got more serious I was contemplating booking a trip to Amsterdam because I wanted to go somewhere before Brexit fucked things over travel wise. I was aiming for September. Oh well.

What music are you listening to?

Recently bought this on itunes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZAIEAG6Vgk

Otherwise white noise rain music to sleep to. My upstairs neighbours are really annoying and I usually get something once every couple of weeks but lately it’s been every other night. You don’t need to talk loudly to each other at 3am. Please shut up.

What are you reading?

Harry Potter fanfics, I’ve been mining the ones where OCs are paired with canon characters, some, okay most,  have been of questionable quality. (Dear god is there anyone capable of writing Sirius in character? Whether the writer loves him or loathes him it seems the answer is at least: not many). 

One good one though I’ve read is one where Harry is a widower (Ginny who died three years before the fic is set and he’s still suffering from) with his three epilogue kids and he ends up in this slow burn with an OC muggle woman. They just kissed after like more than 25 chapters. I liked it anyway. Can’t remember the name of it though and it’s still a WIP. 

Also if the internet gives out I can always read ‘Dread Nation’ by Justina Ireland or the third book in the Dr Greta Helsing novels (by Vivian Shaw) I forgot I had. (Seriously they were both in this delivery package I got two months ago and I somehow forgot about them when I got them). 

What are you doing for self care?

Distracting myself. When outside I go to the beach I’m fifty steps from. I’m also playing the Pokemon Dungeon Game I never played before this having played the two earlier ones; The Gates to Infinity one. I can get why people say it’s the ‘worst’ one of the dungeon series but eh it has its charms in any case and it’s still a nice little game. 

@the-barefoot-hatter, @cleverlittlepenguin, @rantingrandall, @moonlight-monster,

Also if you see this. But only if you want to.

[walriding]

☕️🧙🏼‍♂️✈️💻💳💸🛠🤖🌯🏢🌗👮🏼‍♂️🌎💊🌡🔪🔫🧖🏽🗣💪🏼

star wars hcs || accepting

alright let’s go lesbians

☕️- Do they drink caf or tea? If so, how do they take it?

      Caf -- preferably with an obscene amount of sugar in it, when it’s available. Tea is alright if he just wants something warm, but caf is a more effective wakeup. And hot chocolate is there for when he doesn’t even want the energy, just the sweetness.

🧙🏼‍♂️- Do they believe in the Force? What is their opinion of Jedi in general?

      Before Murkoff -- no. He grew up on a planet with historical ties to the dark side, but most of what he learned in school and heard from friends always sounded like legends more than anything. And it always seemed so far-fetched that people could wield this vast, universe-binding power. Aside from that, the Force wasn’t something that ever concerned him. Going to Coruscant for university gave him access to more archives and resources, and was able to find out more about the Jedi and their former ties to the Republic. Presuming most records and texts outlining the ways of the Jedi are no longer publicly accessible, Miles doesn’t know enough about them to form much of an opinion. Generally, he doesn’t like people who consider themselves to be above others -- and if he knew about more of their practices (and failings) his viewpoint likely wouldn’t be very positive. His frustration over the New Republic’s refusal to act against the growing threat of the First Order was career shattering, so he’d probably feel seemingly aggravated over the Jedi’s positions.

      After Murkoff, he doesn’t have much of a choice but to believe in the Force. Even if he does do his damnedest to ignore it.

✈️- Are they a decent pilot? What do they like the fly the best?

      Absolutely not. He’s leery of heights so he doesn’t like flying, and the claustrophobia of prolonged space travel gets to him rather quickly. He usually sucks it up because having to move between planets tends to be inevitable, but he’d prefer a land vehicle any day.

💻- How are they at code slicing?

      Not the best, not the worst. Miles can bypass certain measures -- locked doors, computers with simple security -- but nothing overly complicated. He won’t be reprogramming droids anytime soon, for example. Most of the time, if he’s in need of encrypted information, it’s either coming from one of his contacts, or he’s buying it off of a more skilled slicer.

💳- What is something that they would never do for any amount of credits?

      Generally speaking, anything Miles does for credits is something he’d be doing himself for free. His morals can’t be bought, and he’d rather be broke than do something he’d regret.

💸- What is their financial situation? How do they make their living?

      A little better-off than he is in his mainverse, just because he held a steady gig for longer, but he’s still firmly working class. He makes his credits from freelance work nowadays, and from the occasional payments made for funneling intel to the Resistance. The latter doesn’t happen often as he rarely wants to be repaid for what he simply views as the right thing to do, but there are times when he needs the money.

🛠- Are they a competent Mechanic? What kinds of things are they good at/not good at fixing?

      Answered here!

🤖- How do they treat/view droids? Are there any significant droids in their life?

      Answered here! 

🌯- What is their favorite food? Is there any significance to it?

      Anything from home. Both of his parents were good cooks -- a skillset Miles didn’t inherit -- but Miles rarely returns to Onderon. First it’s because of work, then it’s because of the threats he doesn’t want to bring to his family. Although he’s always felt a disconnect between the ways of Onderon and the ways of his parents, there’s still something comforting about the tastes of home.

🏢- Do they prefer densely populated planets or sparsely populated ones?

      Something in between. Onderon was a very pocketed planet to grow up on -- vast expanses of uninhabitable wilderness dotted with walled cities. Miles values greenery and open spaces, but quickly gets bored on extremely rural planets. The endless cityscape of Coruscant, by contrast, is a little much for him. He likes the option of having the ability to see some trees and avoid people, or enjoy the economical and cultural benefits of a more populated city.

🌗- Are they an early riser or a Night Owl?

      Early riser, though he’ll often stay up all hours of the night if he’s working on a story. He likes getting an early start on things, though, and going for a jog / run if he’s somewhere it’s safe to do so.

👮🏼‍♂️- How do they regard authority? Are they generally on the side of the Empire or the Republic?

      Miles Upshur has never respected authority in his life, in any universe, but he’ll take the Republic / New Republic over the Empire / First Order any day. That being said, he doesn’t appreciate how often any iteration of the Republic seems perfectly willing to stick their collective heads in the sand during times of crisis. But that’s a complaint he has about the galaxy at large -- the frequency with which suffering goes ignored. Gripes with the government aside, he’s not a fan of space fascism.

🌎- Are there planets/regions that have a negative association for them? Why or why not?

      The fringes of the Outer Rim that border on Unknown Space. The only reason why Miles knows where Murkoff held him was because Lynn picked him up from the planet that held their facility -- otherwise, they made a point of keeping that information from him. It terrifies him that that place might still be out there, that it was even there to begin with without anyone knowing about it. He’d rather stay on the map, in places that have been better explored and documented.

      At a more specific point in the timeline -- fuck Korriban in particular.

💊- What is their opinion on the spice trade? 

      Complicated. The fact that spice itself is mined by slaves is something that he hates, not to mention the all of other problems wrapped up in the peddling of a highly addictive substance -- so he feels like a hypocrite for having used it. His addiction problems came as a direct result of what Murkoff did to him and he kicked all but the more harmless drinking and smoking habits a few months after his escape, but it was still an (obviously) dark period of his life. And one that he’s not particularly proud of for a multitude of reasons.

🌡- Do they get sick often? Is if a trait of their species or unique to them?

      Only when he really runs himself down. Again, for a few months after getting away from Murkoff, he was in bad shape -- and was generally sickly even if he wasn’t infected with anything in particular. His immune system’s fairly strong, but when he’s running on fumes he might catch something, as most people would.

🔪- Do they generally carry a vibroblade? Why/Why not? 

     It’s his weapon of choice. The reasons are mentioned in the blaster ask linked below, but the tl;dr is that melee weapons have more of a ‘last resort’ feel to them, rather than a blaster that can kill from a distance. A vibroblade is more effective at close range -- meaning more time to assess whether something incoming is a threat, or that the attack was sudden and deliberate. Miles would always rather ask questions first, retaliate later, aside from particular extenuating circumstances where he’s after someone.

🔫- Do they generally carry a blaster? Why/why not?

      Answered here!

🧖🏽- Water Showers or Sonic Showers? Why?

      Answered here!

🗣- What is their primary language? What other languages do they speak and/or understand?

    Galactic Basic is his first language, but he knows a smattering of others. Onderonian is considered a dialect of Basic, so there are certain slang terms he uses that might not be instantly recognizable to offworlders. Miles knows a conversational amount of Rodese, Durese, Twi’leki, and Binary, plus some other languages commonly used by spacers, travelers, and criminals. There are a few other languages he can pick up on and understand, but can’t speak. Basically, he’s traveled enough and interacted with enough species and individuals to bullshit his way through a lot of conversations. 

      And he’s made a point of knowing curses in a fair number of languages. 

💪🏼- Are they good in a fight? What sorts of combat/fighting style do they prefer?

      He can hold his own to a certain extent, though chances are he’ll try to avoid or straight up run from a fight before he engages in one. He’s not much of a fighter, but he can throw a punch and he’s reasonably adept with the vibroblade he carries on him. The lightsaber he eventually picks up is another matter.   

[crusherthedoctor]

Sonic Villains: Sweet or Shite? - Part 13: MEPHILES

There are some villains I like. And there are some villains I don’t like. But why do I feel about them the way I do? That’s where this comes in.

This is a mini-series of mine, in which I’ll be going into slightly more detail about my thoughts on the villains in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, and why I think they either work well, or fall flat (or somewhere in-between). I’ll be giving my stance on their designs, their personalities, and what they had to show for themselves in the game(s) they featured in. Keep in mind that these are just my own personal thoughts. Whether you agree or disagree, feel free to share your own thoughts and opinions! I don’t bite. :>

Anyhow, for today’s installment, we’ll be covering the malevolent spirit of Sonic the Hedgehog 2006, and #1 Shadow cosplayer across the nation: Mephiles the Dark.

The Gist: On Sonic's 15th anniversary, a little game was released. You might have heard of it. People like to bring it up a lot, regardless of the time or reason. It's called Sonic the Hedgehog, ostensibly, but we tend to call it Sonic '06.

It did not live up to expectations.

But what's the story?

Life was suffering for poor Silver the Hedgehog. His world was ravaged by a fire monster, he could never truly defeat said fire monster no matter how hard he tried, and his sole companion was only there because the writers didn't understand how backstories work. Things appeared to be looking up for him though, when he was approached by a mysterious black hedgehog, who offered a permanent solution to the hero's seemingly fruitless quest. Silver looked at this hedgehog with no mouth, slitted eyes, and ominous deep voice, and accepted the offer without hesitation.

"If only they knew..." *wink*

The completely trustworthy hedgehog reasoned that in order to destroy the Flames of Disaster, Iblis, Silver must destroy the one who unleashed it in the first place. The "Iblis Trigger", if you will. Who is this catalyst though, according to this perfectly benevolent hedgehog? None other than Sonic the Hedgehog, the hero of whatever Sonic's world is called this week. No more Sonic, no more Iblis, so says the absolutely well-intentioned hedgehog. Silver accepts all of this without question, because his intelligence ranks somewhere between "potato" and "Madoka Magica protagonist". He's then sent on his way by the definitely good-natured hedgehog through the means of time travel. This is barely questioned as well.

Meanwhile, in the present day, Shadow the Hedgehog is doing his duties as a new member of G.U.N, as they were fortunately able to make amends and can now look back and laugh at the time they killed his friend. His mission is to assist fellow agent Rouge the Bat in the kingdom of Soleanna, and when he catches up to her, she reveals a peculiar discovery: a tool known as the Book Scepter of Darkness.

Even the PS3 lighting couldn't contain its power.

After a brief discussion about the kingdom's history, they made their way through the ruins of the ancient Soleanna castle, where Anti-Furry Activist Dr. Eggman was waiting for them, in the hopes that they would politely give the Book Scepter of Darkness to him. The two comrades tussle with some of the doctor's robots, but the Book Scepter suffers in the midst of the crossfire, and is destroyed completely... releasing a slightly phallic surge of dark energy in the process. Eggman promptly gets the fuck out of there, and the darkness soon takes the form of Shadow himself... and the same hedgehog that would appeal to Silver's wishes. He also knows who Shadow is.

"Fucking hell, this is my design...?"

His name? Mephiles the Dark.

Not Mephisto.

Not Mephistopheles.

Mephiles.

The Dark.

Mephiles the Dark.

Mephiles the Evil.

Mephiles the Hoodlum.

Mephiles the Wrong'un.

Mephiles the Right Prick.

So you know he's a villain who demands to be taken seriously.

Mephiles quickly sends Shadow and Rouge on what he dubs "a one-way ticket to oblivion", which is actually just the same place where Eggman forcibly sent Sonic away to, alongside his buddies Tails and Knuckles. It's Silver's time period, the one plagued by the Flames of Disaster. Shadow contemplates these recent happenings as the colour palette suddenly dies for no reason.

A minor disappointment in an otherwise high-quality gaming experience.

Since the computers in this horribly ruined world still work better than Windows Vista, they use one of them to figure out the nature of their plight, and maybe check out Craigslist while they're at it. They are understandably concerned about the answer, as a madman with time travelling capabilities is no laughing matter. Shadow takes this potential threat very seriously, and he will not be distracted under any circumstance.

When they meet up with Team Sonic, they decide to work together in order to figure out how to get back to their time, because friendship truly is magic. Along the way, Shadow and Rouge discover the dusty form of a sleeping E-123 Omega, and they leave him there. Because friendship truly is magic.

Soonafter, the five of them encounter Iblis, and a tedious battle ensues until Iblis itself gets bored and fucks off. Using the power of two Chaos Emeralds, they induce Chaos Control, which in this game means...

*spins Deus Ex Machina wheel*

...they go back in time. Alright then.

So they do. Except for Shadow, who catches sight of the evil Mephiles the Dark and immediately gives chase. Mephiles has a surprise for him however... another Shadow. An imprisoned Shadow. Mephiles claims that he was used as a scapegoat for what happened with Iblis, which naturally unnerves the Ultimate Lifeform.

RAW EMOTION

Mephiles offers Shadow to join him in his cause for justice, under the belief that humanity hates Shadow, humanity fears Shadow, and humanity will make a martyr out of Shadow the first chance they get. Unfortunately for Mephiles, Black Doom said all this beforehand, and he's dead now, cause Shadow ain't taking this shit anymore. He made a promise to the Professor and Maria, and he intends to keep it. It's time to live up to his family name, and face Full Life Consequences™.

They fought.

Shadow won.

With a little help from a non-dusty, present day Omega, who was sent by Rouge.

Mephiles escaped with his time travel prowess, and Shadow and Omega followed after him. They arrived back in the present, but with no sign of the deadly demon. Meanwhile, said demon was reiterating to Silver that Sonic is totally the Iblis Trigger he's after, absolutely, dead-on. Silver barely questions him once more, and as punishment for his extreme foolishness, Shadow finds him and teaches him a lesson in pain.

"I'm Shadow the Hedgehog. Get shanked. This is who I am."

During battle, they accidentally induce Chaos Control together, which summons another time portal that Shadow somehow already knows in advance where it'll take them. They travel to ten years prior, where they find the then-alive ruler of Soleanna, the Duke, attempting valiantly to harness the energy of the omnipotence known as Solaris. Instead, he gets an explosion in the face, and Solaris divides itself into two different entities. Aggressive flames, and a mass of darkness... Iblis and Mephiles. They were two halves of the same being the whole time.

The two hedgehogs split up to stop the two halves from escaping. Thanks to the Book Scepter of Darkness the dying Duke gave him, Shadow successfully seals the formless Mephiles away, thus explaining how Mephiles knew who Shadow was ten years later. Shadow and Silver eventually return to the present, but not before Silver laughs in the face of Sonic continuity and gives his blue Chaos Emerald to the young Princess Elise, the daughter of the recently Wasted™ Duke.

After reuniting with Rouge, and after obtaining a brand new Book Scepter of Darkness, Shadow and her learn that E-123 Omega is engaging Mephiles, meaning they must head to Wave Ocean (head to Wave Ocean?)... ... ...Shadow and her learn that E-123 Omega is engaging Mephiles, meaning they must head to Wave Ocean immediately. (Sorry about that, I'll fix it in post.)

Omega was indeed engaging Mephiles. Very easily at that. Yet Mephiles took his humiliation in stride and escaped while laughing all the way. Omega confesses to Shadow that he is in fact the one who will go on to imprison him in the future. Rouge reassures her old friend that even if the rest of the world turns against him, she'll always be at his side no matter what. Shadow in turn expresses gratitude for one of the only instances of good writing in this game, and the three of them leave for Dusty Desert, where Mephiles is hiding away like a Scooby Doo baddie.

When they finally confront Mephiles, he tries the exact same tactic that failed to bring Shadow over to his side to bring Shadow over to his side. He did not succeed in bringing Shadow over to his side.

"Ugh, blackcurrant."

They fought again.

Shadow won again.

And with the new and improved Book Scepter of Darkness, he seals the villain away once more... for about five seconds, before the Book Scepter unexpectedly tears itself apart. The fiend has apparently developed an immunity to this old song and dance.

"Now for my next trick, I shall make my credibility disappear!"

He then summons a whole pack of Mephiles's's's's's to do away with Team Dark. But unbeknownst to him, Shadow has a trick of his own up his non-existent sleeve. By removing his inhibitor rings, he could become even more needlessly overpowered for a limited period of time. This was more than enough to send the army of clones flying like skittles.

Alas, the real Mephiles escaped yet again. And this time, he topped himself by fulfilling IGN's dreams and killing Sonic the Hedgehog himself. The older Princess Elise, his latest friend, was grief-stricken.

RAW EMOTION

Unable to keep her emotional turmoil in check, the princess wept, which released the mighty Iblis into the present time. As it turns out, this was Mephiles' real plan all along. He intended for Silver to kill Sonic so that Elise's ensuing tears would unleash the flames, but he finally decided to do the deed himself. Using all seven Chaos Emeralds, which he warped them to where he was like it was nothing, Mephiles rejoined with Iblis once more, and Solaris was officially back in business to corrupt reality as he saw fit. Time distortion? Environmental disasters? Soulja Boy game consoles? It's all the work of Solaris.

But while Solaris was fucking time and space's shit up, Sonic's friends (and Silver) gathered all the Emeralds together, and with some... curious assistance from Elise, they brought the dead hedgehog back to life. In his super form, no less. Shadow and Silver were granted some of Super Sonic's power in order to turn super themselves, and the Hedgehog Master Race obliterated Solaris so bad that he reverted to his original form of a tiny white flame... which was soon blown out by Elise, despite knowing that time would reset itself in the process. The threat of losing her memories with Sonic took a toll on her, but with the hedgehog's own encouragement, she pulled through regardless.

Merry Christmas.

Thus, from the Soleanna Festival onward, everything started over. This time around, the festival could commence in peace, as Eggman wasn't there to menace the princess with his golden udders. For the Flames of Disaster, Iblis, Mephiles, Solaris... they were all literally forgotten by time itself until Generations. Why they were now holding a festival for a god who never existed remains a mystery, but Elise couldn't help but feel that the "wind" was strangely familiar, and pleasantly so.

That same wind enjoyed a good night, possibly aware of what he had to go through to get there.

"That's a lovely full moon. A lovely full, whole, complete, non-fractured moon. Would be a shame if something happened to it."

The Design: Mephiles spends his initial scenes as a shit recolour.

"This is my Chaos Emerald OC, his name's Genocide the Blitzkrieg."

On the other hand, he spends his later scenes as a shit recolour.

He can't believe it either.

Which is a shame, because there is an appeal in the concept of a shadowy being made of crystal. It's just incredibly undermined by how it's mimicing Shadow's form, and for little justified reason at that. Outside of a single quip about him being Shadow's shadow, Mephiles doesn't really do anything to warrant the "Evil Shadow" angle he's apparently going for, which makes his recolour status even more pointless.

(And yes, I know his chest hair kind of looks like Solaris. That doesn't mean his design is suddenly good or clever.)

The Personality: Remember how Black Doom was a complete and utter void of evil for its own sake? Good, beause Mephiles is exactly the same, and it could be argued that he's actually worse than Mr. Ten Packs a Day.

Oh sure, you say. He might have a motive in the form of wanting vengeance for being experimented on. Too bad this is not established in any way whatsoever with what we see of Mephiles in the game proper. When he's not transparently fooling Silver, he spends all his time cackling and taunting. Any time he brings up humanity is when it involves Shadow's expense, not his own. His goal to rejoin with Iblis isn't given any tragic or sympathetic angle, and is purely to serve as his Cause Even More Destruction Card. Even Shadow lampshades his lack of motivation beyond craving destruction, and you can’t say his imprisonment in the Book Scepter of Darkness made him go mad, because even before he got sealed the first time around, he was already threatening Shadow with death.

And make no mistake, not all villains need to be especially sympathetic. Villains who are just cruel or selfish bastards for petty reasons can work just fine. Eggman does it beautifully in this very franchise. But Eggman is also funny, brave, intelligent, and has a clear motive beyond evulz that's backing up his actions, despite that motive's simplicity.

What else is there to Mephiles?

His weird attempts at being cryptic...?

"Is Lara-Su Chronicles legit?"

His lackadaisical Crash Bandicoot impression...?

Cortex Laughs Back

There's just nothing to this guy. And for a character with his backstory, it's all the more noticeable and disappointing. But hey, at least he's a cunning schemer and a powerful opponent, right?

Well, about that...

The Execution: I'm going to get straight to the point. I don't like Mephiles. I really don't like Mephiles. Next to Scourge the Hedgehog and Eggman Nega, Mephiles is one of my absolute least favourite characters in the entire Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, adaptations included.

"But why is that?", I hear you not asking. "Why do you detest him so? Is it his design? Is it his lack of personality? Is it his story?"

Those are all key ingredients, yes. But more than anything else, it's that he's played up to be a cunning mastermind, and is regularly applauded even by '06's detractors for being a cunning mastermind... when in reality, he is one of the absolute dumbest characters in the whole franchise. No, that is not an exaggeration. Silver and Elise in the same game were far from flawless, but Mephiles deserves much more ridicule than either of them. He is completely undeserving of the kudos he frequently receives for his supposed magnificent bastardry, and I'm about to tell you why.

Strap in, folks.

We're about to go through why the evil plan of poor Leslie makes no sense whatsoever.

Well done in advance if you don't fall asleep.

Too late.

1. He could have fused with Iblis at any time he wanted. Despite what many fans claim, NOTHING in the final game so much as implies that Mephiles needed certain requirements to fuse with Iblis. Meaning he could have completed his mission at the beginning of the game, from the moment he met Silver for the first time. Instead, he’d rather monologue to Silver and butcher the English language.

Guess I'll go and done that.

Let’s put that aside for a moment though, and assume that Mephiles needed the Chaos Emeralds to fuse with Iblis. That’s reasonable, except...

2. He could warp all seven Chaos Emeralds to his destination immediately. That’s an incredibly useful ability to have, especially when you're plotting something as major as reuniting with the other half of a god-like entity. He has no reason to not use this ability as soon as possible, aside from him simply forgetting he could do it.

Well, Silver had to have some vital role in his plan, surely...?

3. He had no use whatsoever for Silver. He goes out of his way to rely on Silver to eliminate Sonic, but he could easily kill Sonic himself with no trouble at all. Nothing is preventing him from killing Sonic. He’s not trapped somewhere. He’s not been sapped of his powers. All he’s guaranteeing with Silver is giving himself a potential enemy in the future when the jig is inevitably up, and sure enough, in the rare moment when Silver actually questions him, Mephiles dodges the query in the most suspicious manner, and always gives vague, shifty half-answers.

Fig A: The Twitter defense.

He’s only complicating things even more for himself, and again, for no reason. His only potential motivation for manipulating Silver is because it’s the evil thing to do. And the only reason Silver falls for his ruse is because he was made to be a complete idiot in order to make Mephiles look smarter than he actually is. Not that Silver was alone in that department...

But you think “Well, maybe Mephiles is tricky, but not actually that strong. So he needs Silver to kill Sonic since he can’t do it on his own.” It would explain why he’s a damage sponge in his boss fights, and why he relies on minions and clones to do all the work, right?

Nope.

He eventually kills Sonic himself anyway. Which leads us to...

4. He has no limitations to his powers. You might be inclined to assume he would be weak, yet smart, in contrast to Iblis being strong, yet dumb. Admittedly that would make logical sense, and it would tie in thematically to their motifs of being the consciousness and the raw power of Solaris respectively.

But that’s not how it went. Maybe that was the intention (again, note how he’s something of a sitting duck when you get past his minions), but in cutscenes, he’s as much of a powerhouse as the likes of Shadow. Which reinforces the fact that he wasted his time with Silver, because he could have - and did - kill the Blue Blur with his own hands.

But at least he actually killed Sonic, right? After all, that was the key to unleashing Iblis courtesy of Elise’s tears, yes? Weeeellll...

5. He could have killed Elise instead. Elise’s crying is NOT the only way to release Iblis from within her. As the report that Tails read in Crisis City confirmed, Elise had died in that time period due to being aboard the exploding Egg Carrier, and Iblis’ presence is very prominently felt in that time period’s future. So Mephiles could have killed the princess herself and achieved the same results, without ever needing to bother with Sonic and/or Elise’s emotional connection to him.

Okay then, what about Shadow? Mephiles was pretty serious about swaying the Ultimate Lifeform over to his side... wasn’t he...?

6. He wasted his time with Shadow too. Like Silver, his frequent mind games with Shadow served him absolutely no benefit in relation to his goal to reunite with Iblis. He wasn’t even truly invested in turning Shadow evil to begin with. Whenever Shadow tells him to fuck off back to the Antarctic, Mephiles shrugs it off every time. It’s just a game to him, and it’s a game that prolongs his objective even further. Compare this to Black Doom, who at least was genuinely committed in getting Shadow to join him, and as dumb as it was, at least Shadow was actually a vital part in Doom’s scheme.

"It's just... I wasn't ready before... I wasn't sure if I could commit..."

Despite everything however, he still managed to become Solaris in the end. How did he lose then...?

7. He threw the Chaos Emeralds away, thereby giving Sonic’s friends a chance to nab the Emeralds themselves. Which of course revived Sonic, turned him super, and you know the rest. He could have kept the Emralds to himself, or maybe even destroy them outright. Instead, he was generous enough to hammer the final nail in his coffin.

Also, what did he intend to do afterwards? When all of time and space was destroyed, would that have included himself? Or would he have sat around with his thumb up his arse in a featureless void for all of eternity? Your guess is as good as mine.

And finally, let’s go over a few leftover arguments:

“But Crusher, he still KILLED SONIC!”

You’re right, he did. But how did he kill Sonic?

Not by beating him in a fight.

Not by using genuine brilliance.

No... he killed Sonic by distracting him with a light, and stabbing him from behind.

This is hardly flattering for either character. Sonic gets a laughably undignified death, and Mephiles’ method of execution is extremely unimpressive. And on top of that, the dynamic between the hero and the villain falls flat, because there is no dynamic. Sonic himself doesn’t have any kind of connection or relationship with Mephiles, because up until his death, he saw Mephiles a grand total of once. And even then, he knew nothing about him, not even his name. So the person who killed Sonic the Hedgehog - from Sonic the Hedgehog’s point of view - was literally just “some guy”. (Sonic didn’t even acknowledge his existence. It was Knuckles who did that.)

“But Crusher, he still played the other characters for fools!”

You know who else can do that? Del Boy. :P

Mephiles only looks like a master manipulator because with the sole exception of Shadow, the rest of the cast suffered the same fate as Silver. Instead of Mephiles being genuinely intelligent, everyone else is made insanely stupid to hide the fact that Mephiles himself is stupid. Instead of him achieving his goals because he’s legitimately talented or brilliant, he “achieves his goals” because the plot hands them over to him on a silver platter.

“But Crusher, Eggman makes mistakes too!”

That’s true. Eggman does make mistakes. However, there are two small but significant differences that render this comparison moot:

1. None of Eggman’s blunders are on the same tier as Mephiles’ fuck ups. An Eggman mistake is putting an obvious weakspot on his giant boss mech. A Mephiles mistake is going out of his way to jeopardise his entire plan from start to finish.

2. For all his intelligence, Eggman has always had a comedic, goofy edge to his character, so the occasional questionable decision is expected and par for the course for that particular character. Mephiles does not have that excuse. He was intended by the writers to be suave and slick, meaning he has a lot more to lose when he makes consecutive dumbass decisions.

......

I think I’ve made my point. Mephiles the Dark’s reputation vastly overshadows his actual capabilities. To appreciate what he could have been, or what he was meant to be, is one thing. But I’m looking at Mephiles for what he is, in the final product. And what he is in the final product, is one of the worst villains this franchise has ever had. People can laugh it up about Infinite, or the Deadly Six, but they have nothing on this guy. No amount of Dan Green can save him, and while I don’t like to put all of a character’s fans in the one basket, I do strongly believe that at least a sizable margin of his popularity stems from the fact that he’s a hedgehog. Either that, or the fact that he killed Sonic, despite how underwhelming that kill really was.

I’ve went on long enough about Mephiles. Anything else at this point would just be redundant. Here’s a bunch of old memes I’ve made in the past at Leslie’s expense. Enjoy.

Also, his name is dumb.

Crusher Gives Mephiles a: Thumbs Down!

[theskyexists]

Spyfall part 1 (spoilers)

Ok so.

I was pleasantly surprised.

I really was.

I thought this was going to be another disaster ( which for me watching a chibs ep means: I am stewing in frustration during and afterwards I think what in the heck was that,  it doesn’t make ANY sense)

I appreciate how the trailer (the good one) was almost completely taken from this first episode - that was well done. I’m not as happy that the motorbiking was much more fun and cool in the trailer than the episode in which it didn’t really involve any stakes only reinforced by all the bullets hitting the motorbikes - harmlessly??

I have to say - that twist. Uh.............???? All I could think was, really? REALLY?? Already? Huh?? I couldn’t believe it. I literally was like - surely not. You’re not now implying this. How can you reboot Missy after ONE series break? That’s really...like, it did not feel right. And I’ll be honest, I was just straight up disappointed by a male Master. Then I thought, well, maybe we’re going to get a worthy opponent for the Doctor.....? :/

However, I like the actor. He gave O a lot of humanity - interestingly. Like O as a character - bit sad he doesn’t exist.

I actually liked the directing, i noticed that the very, very up close stuff - it now really gave a little more subtle panic vibe. The music was.

The pace seemed high to me - so check. Chibs fixed a big problem of mine.

Lots of character moments. Check. Though not being a native speaker and having no access to subtitles i had to really listen very VERY hard for those interactions. I liked the ‘iced tea - possibly.’

We briefly get to find out how the companions are dealing with travelling in combination with their regular lives. Check. Alright then. Graham even discusses it - the temporal disorientation.

The companions are PUT IN DANGER. check, fuckin hell finally. There’s just a bit of suspense in this.

Loved the decided focus on Yaz and Ryan. Check. Ryan being a normal kid not trained for this shit and Yaz smoothing the conversation, taking risks, asking sharp questions, modelling herself after the Doctor - I really like how they contrasted that.

I suspect Ryan casually noticing the weird statue in the glass case is going to be relevant however. (if not - sigh)

Really really liked how Chibs really worked at NOT undercutting the Doctor -  giving her clear moments of authority and genius and unaffectedness as the Doctor is supposed to get.  ‘i got an upgrade’ and having the Doctor chewing people out, interrogating them, negotiating with them - WITHOUT getting self-conscious or self-deprecating - lots of confidence - all of that helped along by multiple special agents coming for the Doctor - implying the need for more force, C mistaking Graham (i like that lil moment) but losing his argument to her, O being such a fan, and the Doctor sassing so much - he really worked on rendering her authority.

He only put in two moments:  ‘I don’t understand’ and ‘I think it’s laughing at you Doc’ - ‘I know that!’ which was so similar to the Tsuranga Conundrum I guess Chibs is going to buckle down on this specific stuff (and I can see how the Doctor sometimes simply admitting to not knowing might be a deliberate and interesting choice) - well if it’s balanced like this it’s alright. NOT so happy about this RANDOM SPY DUDE telling her to go back inside - which is clearly something Chibs wanted to emphasise AGAIN because that bit was completely isolated, that she should listen to other people - always just your regular self-sacrificial well-meaning men!!! (turns out lol they always get killed if she listens to them but the narrative doesn’t acknowledge that.) And i Hate it.

Also actually, that ‘i don’t understand’ was about multiple earths, and she’d just heard that the aliens were going to conquer the ‘universe’, implying they were from somewhere else. Like, if the very normal viewer (me) can see the writing on the wall, then why the fuck can’t the Doctor. I just wish Chibs would stop emphasising his need for his character not to figure out the plot at that moment - at great cost to the character and accompanying power fantasy.

Most of all, I thought the acting was great. Jodie built in a LOT more calm and authority (the script explicitly allowed her that) but also lots of quirkiness. Graham really got a wonderful supporting role dynamic with the Doctor as he does at his best - emphasising her go go go attitude and genius, and Yaz got to have a near-death experience. Bit weirded out that once again, it’s not the Doctor who deals with the fallout of a mission which she’d explicitly sent Yaz on. I also got some VERY ominously heterosexual vibes from Ryan and Yaz there....mostly because of the sister angle.... hmmmm

I liked the topicalness of ‘VOR’ and the dependence of national governments on their expertise and resources but I have no idea where it’s going or whether Chibs just wanted to point out: yeah tech giants (esp google) are powerful. kay. true.

Liked the Doctor doing some computer stuff bc it tickled that women programming narrative.

Loved Graham and Ryan bantering. Loved the moment in the TARDIS with the creatures getting in and Yaz pulling Doctor to attention. Loved the moment that the Doctor was playing a totally different game from blackjack extremely seriously. hahaha. strangely enough loved the moment between O and Yaz in the casino as well though I don’t know what it means. Maybe nothing. (MAYBE YAZ BECOMES THE MASTER)

Anyway as a viewer who’s not super good at theorising - i was like.....????????

A lot of stuff is uh - strange. e.g. Why can the scanner identify 93% human dna but not the 7% alien (or whatever it is) dna? Not sure why Yaz would be able to wipe the camera images of them from a distance (???) but then Barton got them recovered no probs. The car stuff took a bit too long but eh. I also in retrospect have no idea why they’d try to assassinate them via car. Also let’s not talk about everybody sprinting at the same speeds as a plane during take-off.

Anyway. The ‘monsters’ sure are - not exactly scary - but a bit typical. I liked the implication of them not being from this universe bc it’s a bit different. But if the Master is in league with them it’s uhhhh well it’s quite typical. I enjoyed this episode riffing on the spy genre. That is to say, they carried it off - watching the preview i was like...why spies??? but they asked the same question and it worked.

I feel like it would have been possible to make this a little bit more scary, just a little bit more scary. I appreciate that them playing with the lights was supposed to be  that - but surely there’s a more scary way to represent creatures not from this universe - for horror purposes? there is such a primal fear you can tap into.

ANYWAY

the Master literally spelling out ‘everything you know isn’t real’ or whatever makes me feel hopeful about this being not just the face of it all. Multiple universes, multiple masters?, and Yaz got hella zapped and then zapped right back into the midst of the team? interesting huh....

what a weird episode to start off a season with and whether he makes it work or not - that IS quite brave.

forgot to say: they really love instantly killing off their famous guest actors. think Fry did quite a good job with what he got.

also one more thing i LOVED; the Doctor threw herself against the door of the cockpit when the bomb went off in some sort of attempt to protect her companions. wanted that from the Sonic Bomb in Tsuranga (it just fit) and glad i got it here.

when part 2 gets here i might still think: what in the heck that didn’t make ANY sense.