#that's a different story. and also i get it if you're on mobile and maybe can't see the pic as well

[declawedwildcat]

Can we like, collectively agree not to reblog posts that are just screenshots of a tumblr post? It's one thing if it's a deleted or unrebloggable post and there are reasons to still share it, but when it's a regular and active reblog chain – often ones I've just recently seen on my dash normally – there's no reason that the meme account screenshot of the same post should have thousands of notes

[cure-icy-writes]

i think the reason i like the murderbot diaries so much is because the dystopia feels very real and relevant in a way that no other "oppressive government fearmongering" has, and because murderbot is such a compelling protagonist.

this is an autistic person who is struggling and angry and terrible at having emotions. it lives in a capitalist hellscape where people are disposable. it's traumatized as hell, but it's easier to consider itself disposable than confront the terrifying reality of personhood.

(it confronts the terrifying reality of personhood.)

it likes escaping into fiction. it has a fucked up relationship with pain and its own body. and it reads so strongly as disability coding to me, how it doesn't see the bullets or the chunks missing as horror but merely annoyance. it's fundamentally different from those around it, in ways that they struggle to understand. (they make a distinct effort to understand.)

this is an autistic person who is not like you, who suffered in ways that you cannot understand, in ways that would horrify you. this is just another tuesday.

this world is not kind. there is legal fine text that destroys lives and there is hereditary indenture and contract labor where you're forced to still pay for preventative medical care out of your paycheck and no one says slavery, but everyone knows what it means.

these people are kind. they will watch your favorite shows to help understand you, they will forge documents to give abandoned people their freedom, they will allow you to be near them because they like you. these people are proof that there's love in the world, and you can come out of your shell if you are ready to see yourself as a person.

science fiction is one of the genres that has the potential to be amazing, but is quite often just plain shitty to disabled people. and, to people in general? "oooooo look how scary it is, people have all their basic needs fulfilled by technology!" when technological advances are what gave housewives the time they needed to actually get jobs and put together the feminist movements, when this new technology that the narrative regards with such disdain could provide disabled people with newfound mobility and independence.

it speaks of a truly dismal view of humanity, the belief that without strict labor under capitalism to keep us all in line, we would just fall prey to our vices. and I think it also speaks to a loathing of one's self, to think that humans are not capable of self regulation, to think that pain and suffering and punishment are somehow moral and virtuous. that humans need to be punished constantly, that suffering will bring them closer to something like god, to something like goodness.

but murderbot doesn't do that. murderbot says, "i have seen humans do horrible awful stupid things. they can't be trusted with weapons or security and they shoot me all the time and it sucks. but they make stories and art. the people in the entertainment media gave me the tools to contextualize my own emotions. they are my coworkers. i don't care about them. i got shot in the back protecting them but i didn't care about them. okay fine maybe i care a little. they're annoying. i'll eviscerate anyone who hurts them. they're mine."

[writingoddess1125]

Just a Quick Headcanon

Zoro as a New Parent

Based of Roronoa Koro a OOC of mine

Story Here <<

Support on Ko-Fi I'm poor!

• When Zoro learns about his son, He is both nervous and pleased to start as a father.

• He had experience with children had been a bit limited in truth but he had babysitted children around this young before so he figured the knowledge would be useful.

• A newborn baby was very different from a fully up and mobile one Zoro realized- but was fortunate to be able to experience this.

• It really wasnt-

• "You support the back of his head gently" You instruct as you watch Zoro awkwardly hold his 4 day old son with both hands. Clearly worried about hurting him or doing something wrong

"He's so small-" He whispered softly as if unsure if his voice could wake the child. It was too adorable.

He watched as Koro yawned softly and rubbed his little face with his little hands and snuggled hack for warmth- you practically saw Zoro's heart melt

• Koro is kuckily a very easy baby, maybe it was him being a newborn or just being Zoro's son but he wasn't a difficult boy.

• He rarely cried or fussed, would eat very well and slept often- Very Often.

• Koro and Zoro have a lot of similarities- but the one most prominent was that sleeping one-

• After a few days Zoro would introduce Koro to his crew with your blessing. You agree to two at a time of course and allowed it-

• Since Koro at this point had his eyes open he was looking around everywhere- Clearly wanting to see what was going on at all times.

• Zoro had Luffy and Chopper meet First. Luffy surprised and shocked to see that his First Mate had a son. You finding it really sweet to see the wonderment in the infamous Captian and a talking reindeer.

• "Woah! He looks just like you" Luffy says almost in shock as he holds Koro- The newborn staring confused at the smiling man

•Chopper also holding Koro and giggling excitedly as well as starting to tear up. "H-He's so cute!" Chopper said now fully crying while holding Koro who's bottom lip was starting to quiver as well.

• After this it went Nami and Usopp- Nami of course voicing how weird it was Zoro had a kid while Usopp promoted himself to the baby his status and making up stories to entertain. Koro however seemed to not be amused by any of them.

• Koro was starting to get irritated by being held when Robin and Franky came in. He did not like the cold hands of the robot and just stared at Zoro when Robin held him- Zoro already able to read his sons face which clearly said 'Make them leave me the hell alone-'

• And last was Sanji- Zoro was of course snide and rude to Sanji who happily returned the favor before letting the man hold his son. Much to your surprise however Koro seemed to just be staring hard at Sanji

• "Why is he looking at me that way?" Sanji questioned as Zoro scoffed-

"Cause he's a baby wai-" He sported as he heard a noise- you all did and everyone stared at Koro who was making a series of different cooing noises and squirming around as he stared at Sanji. He didn't seemed distressed at all only curious as he continued his gurgles and coos.

• "...I hate you-" Zoro said as he looked right at a very cocky Sanji, clearly Koro liking Sanji quite a bit.

• After this Zoro stayed in your village for a few weeks, letting his crew go ahead and come back for him later.

• With this Zoro takes time to help you raise your guys son. Allowing time for you to sleep inbetween feedings- helping with diapers and also helping you post partum.

• Truthfully he had been a God-Sent.. Calling doctors for you and talking you through your depressions and anxiety-

• The moment that damn near made you want to kiss him in joy was when he found out you had a clogged milk duct and he came in with a warm container of water with some Epsom salt.

• "You're a life saver-" You say when you see the container- Even though this should hurt your pride your tit hurt way worse-

• Zoro would stay by Koros side fir hours, Holding him and playing with the newborn. However does freak the fuck out when the embelical cord fell off.

• "It just falls off!?" He yells when he sees you set it to the side.

• Zoro adores his son and treats him as the most precious being on earth-

• It couldn't make you happier

Bonus!-

• Zoro will send a letter and a photo of his son to Mihawk. Truthfully he found what he did impulsive and didn't know why he did such a thing-

• When Mihawk gets the letter of the arrival of the new Roronoa he feels both surprised and a sense of pride. Keeping both and even showing Perona who squeals and jumps at seeing the cute baby.

• In less then a week a large crate filled with very expensive baby items arrives along with some stuffed toys that creep the hell out of you.

• The legendary Mihawk will even arrive himself to meet Koro- Zoro surprised that his teacher came and you terrified that a former Warlord was holding your son-

• Mihawk stares at Koro, holding the baby like an expert and silently staring. Koro doing the exact same and even scrunching his eyebrows as if mildly irritated that Mihawk was looking at him that way.

• The Warlord cracks a smile at this and nods in approval. Koro reaching for the Cross necklace to try and chew on which Mihawk easily slips away from the baby. "When you are older-" He stated calmly.

• "You have a strong son, I can see he will grow into someone great" Mihawk says calmly.

• "Sensei... I wanted to name you Godfather of my Son" Zoro said calmly, Mihawk looking surprised by this but nods non the less.

• "I will accept" He stated calmly and smiled softly at the boy. Clearly pleased to have a god-grandson to spoil.

[whumpinthepot]

Hamster Interactive Story

Chapter 12. Decision

Prev - Masterlist

Content: Giant/tiny, tiny whump, pet trope/whump, kidnapping, cages, loss of mobility aid (prosthetic leg), solitary confinement (non descriptive), manipulation, power dynamics, fear, female cast

Ashley’s Pov

Poll winner: Let Hamster decide what to do with Soap Scrub. 

ART, WRITING, AND POLL UNDER THE CUT

-

A row of ideas fills your mind on what to do with this pest. Just as you’re thinking of chucking the whole jar out, you look at your little girl's face. Hamster’s eyes are full of worried tears and it dawns on you to get her input on the matter.

Placing the jar with the tiny man inside in a different room, you return to converse with Hamster. Admittedly you sway the options in your favour when speaking to her. Picking her up, you wipe her tears and brush back her curly hair. “Do you want him gone sweet pea? I can get rid of him for you,” you roll the words slowly, “Or, would you like a new friend?” A careful smile spreads across your lips while you rub her back gently. “I think he could warm up to us. He could be a new model for our blog. Who knows, if we got rid of him he could get hurt again. He would be safer with us don’t you think?” 

Hamster frowns slightly with pressed lips. You can only guess her worries and reassure her. “Don’t worry honey bunny, I would never let anyone hurt you. Ever. If he’s not nice we can make him go away after all.” 

Hamster hums and then nods her head. She smiles some, and dare you say she’s starting to get excited by the idea. You give her a little kiss on the cheek and explain that it might take some time to become his friend. She’ll have to be patient with him. You also tell Hamster that she gets her cast taken off in the next few days, giving her more to look forward to. 

Once that's settled, you go into the room where the pest was left alone. He’s there in the jar with his head slumped against the glass. He becomes alert when you get closer. 

You rest your arms on the dresser with your face close to the jar to talk to him. “I know it was you who scared her before. Tell me what happened.”

The man reacts exactly how you want, and goes rigid. “I- I never hurt her. Ask her. When she fell off the counter a mouse was going to attack her, and I scared it off.”

“And then?” You raise a thin brow. 

“And then, what? That's all that happened,” he defends quickly. 

You watch him for a second as his eyes dart around, then break the news to him. “I’ve decided to keep you. It's that or I sell you and who knows what could happen to you then. I won’t hurt you as long as you never upset Hamster. M’kay?” 

“You have to be kidding me…” Tears well up in his eyes and he cradles his bandaged hand. “Can’t we make some soft of deal? I- I can do what ever you want if you let me go after. Then you’ll never see me again, I swear.”

Furious, you pull the jar closer just to startle him, who does he think he is trying to negotiate as if he has any leeway. “That is the deal, little boy. You’ve caused a lot of stress to my pet, and now you’ll pay it back to her with nothing but kindness. Do that and I’ll make sure you’re comfortable, well fed, and I won't hurt you. If you don’t, well… I’ll sell you and who knows where you’ll end up. Snake food? Some kids live Barbie doll? Neglected, starved, forgotten in a tiny. Little. Jar?” You tap the glass with your long nail between words. “The choice is yours.” 

The man is left speechless with his mouth gaped open and his hair sticking out everywhere. You take a second to breathe deeply to calm down. The thought that you're taking this overboard clouds over you - but he really did cause a good amount of grief for you last week. "So, tell me your name or I'll come up with one." You smile, feeling just slightly sadistic. "Maybe Rat, Pest, or maybe Hamster can choose."

“It’s Soap.” He chokes out in a tiny voice.

You snort at the strange name, but wild pets are usually an odd bunch so you don’t hound him on it. 

“It's nice to meet you, Soap.”

The next few days you set things up as a precaution. Making sure there are no other wild pets in your home, getting Hamsters cast off, setting up an escape proof cage for Soap, and isolating him just enough for him to crave the company of yourself and Hamster. On the fifth day of leaving him in the dark alone, you enter the spare room to check in. He’s sulking, hidden under a toy that you’ve given him in his cage. 

“Soap?” You use a softer tone than the last time you two spoke, “Are you ready to come out? What would you like to do?” You give him a few options to choose from and offer to give him his doll leg back if he cooperates. 

—-

(Multiple options may be used depending on the top poll winners)

Thank you @alittlewhump for looking over my chapter <3

Tag list: @frogkingdom @verkja @whumpsday @octopus-reactivated @marvel-gt @rsitb-second-account @fallen-grace-smd @winged-wolf-s-collection-of-arts @kyp-the-spacekiwi @ilasknives @hollowgast1 @redd956 @zobodahobo @alittlewhump @blackrosesandwhump @angst-after-dark @sandygarnelle @coppercoyoti @kim-poce @mayisreallygay @smoll-stace @demondamage @vickytokio @whump-in-the-closet @sunshiline-writes @coyotehusk @cypresscove @shadowsnowdapple @whumpy-wyrms @re-whump @whumpninja

[yurisorcerer]

I'm not gonna pretend I have anything super new or innovative to say about Mobile Suit Gundam. It's one of the most-analyzed anime ever, and I pale in comparison to some of the people who *have* analyzed it, but here I am, thinking about it regardless.

For context, I am watching this as part of a---as she called it---"comet swap" with my good friend @charaznablespeteevee, where I watch a mecha anime she is obsessed with (Gundam) and she watches one I am obsessed with (Code Geass). I'm not sure if I'm going to write a big long post like this about every episode (since I'm going to *try* to watch at least one per day, that would get quite exhausting), but I am liveblogging it more informally over on the worst website on Earth, if you're willing to put up with that Nazi-infested hellhole long enough to read some posts from yours truly.

In any case, Gundam and Code Geass. are many differences between these, the main ones being that Code Geass is more recent and also not widely hailed as a masterpiece of its form. It does *draw* notably from Gundam though despite having very different artistic aims and a different tone, so watching this makes sense in a way. I spent way too much of my teenagerhood obsessed with Lelouch, and now I'm watching the anime that his archetypal grandfather came from. (Goddess have mercy on my soul.)

My experience with Gundam as a franchise prior to this is very limited, but I do have some. For reference, I have seen all of:

Gundam 00, back when it aired on the SyFy channel when they had an anime block many years ago. I really liked this as a teenager but I don't remember it super well.

The Witch From Mercury, lesbian space combat, with a notable Code Geass staff connection. WFM was not perfect or anything but I loved it a lot and Suletta is very dear to me. I actually bought an Aerial gunpla a few months ago that is currently sitting unassembled in my closet.

the first Gundam 0079 compilation movie. Now, it might seem weird that I've seen this and am now going back to watch the TV series. But, while I remember the general outline of what happened, I was SUPER sick when I watched it, and I only remember what happened really, really vaguely. While I have some idea of the general outline of what's to come, I'm mostly going in genuinely blind.

like 4 or 5 episodes of Victory Gundam, which I liked but kind of fell off of. So we're giving the franchise a proper second go here.

I'm a mecha fan more generally, and I'll get into some of that as I write these, but for now that's the relevant stuff.

Anyway, my main impression of 0079's first episode is actually a structural one. It's REALLY well put together. We introduce the setting, we introduce our main characters, and we introduce the main conflict, all very economically and with a lot of style---more style than some shows with significantly less room to work with manage, in fact---and I'm immediately invested in the fate of our main character, Amuro Ray.

From what I gather here (and a little bit from outside information), my impression is that of a kid who loses his innocence very, very rapidly over the course of this story. Here, the space-hab-thing he lives on is attacked, and he ends up in the cockpit of an experimental superweapon called a Gundam (maybe you've heard of them?). I LOVE how the Gundam is framed here, like some kind of genuinely scary war machine. It's an intentionally othering effect i mostly associate with later mecha anime, especially those with outright monstrous mecha like Evangelion or even The Big O, so to see it here in such a comparatively early series in the genre is impressive.

The episode's climax sees him kill two soldiers from the enemy nation of Zeon, but it's not a triumphant thing, really. He's portrayed as kind of not really knowing what he's doing, flailing around inside this gigantic walking tank / mechanical war god. But then when he *does* figure things out, well, he has to deal with the fact that he just killed two dudes. Going by the cliffhangery ending here, it doesn't seem like his troubles are over, either.

[hyenafu]

How does one move around Heaven without wings? Medians, Cherubs, invading Demons... Similarly, are there Angels that can't fly, due to disability or never earning the pendant?

Medians aren't meant to move around Heaven on their own. They're all kept in one place--the bowl-like bottom of Gaia's tower-- for the most part. I say "for the most part" because it's fun to imagine how and why some Medians would get out. Like a secret club of Fairies, or Jakkai who are really good at climbing to places they're not supposed to be. Heaven is a bit restrictive, but the Angels are dedicated to keeping Medians comfortable. I don't want people to think of Heaven as a jail. It's better to think of it as a kind of resort where you're expected to stay within designated areas. Most people who wind up in Heaven would be goody two-shoes with no problem following the rules, but there are troublemakers in any group. It's not like Medians would be harshly punished for getting out, either. Cherubs are also not meant to navigate Heaven on their own. Having wings is a privilege that must be earned. If they need to go somewhere on a different floating island, then they are brought there by adult Angels. As for disabled Medians and Angels alike-- I've been thinking it would be cute if Heaven had magic clouds that could be used as mobility devices. Something like Lakitu's cloud or Goku's Flying Nimbus. Maybe on their own, they can only hover, so Medians couldn't use it to ascend to other islands. But they can be towed by an able-bodied, winged Angel, enabling the rider to be escorted more easily to different places. I know this is unfair to disabled Angels who deserve their autonomy, but, well... like our own Earth, Slightly Damned's Heaven has a lot of room for improvement. Kieri's flashback primarily deals with her life as a warrior Angel, so I don't know if/when this detail about Median mobility devices will make it into the main comic. But I'll think about it some more and try to include it on the main website's lore when I work on it this year. As for invading Demons: the logistics of their invasion has yet to be discussed, and I do intend to touch upon that in the story soon. But the short answer is: wind Demons fly and can carry other, smaller Demons. Some Demons would be good and climbing and foolhardy enough to make big leaps. Imagine earth Demons throwing smaller Demons like Piantas chuck Mario, lol. They could also bring things like ladders and rope in order to aid their own mobility.

As badass as it would be for Demons to invade on airships, I don't think I can justify that leap in technology. However, Demons invading on hot air balloons is a really funny mental image. Sometimes I decide on making things canon just because they're funny (see: most of the animals in Medius), so... stay tuned to see if Demons invade Heaven with an air balloon shaped like a middle finger emoji!

[sapphire-mage]

So You Want to Get Into Classic Final Fantasy? (A Guide to Final Fantasy I-VI for Those Who Want To Check Them Out)

You may have seen recently that the HD Remixes of Final Fantasy 1-6 are coming to Switch and PS4 in Spring (or that they're already on Steam or mobile), and you might be thinking, "Should I try one of them?" Maybe you've played VII/VII Remake or XIV, and you're like, "Maybe I should give one of these a go!" Maybe you're thinking to start in numerical order? Maybe you already have one in mind?

Either way, I want to throw my 50 cents into this conversation as someone who has played every number but 11. This isn't going to be a critique. I like all six of them. To varying degrees? Yeah. But I'll be honest about pros and cons of each. Let's begin, shall we?

GENERAL TIPS AND INFO:

-Take note that ALL of these games are turn based combat JRPGS. They may have something different between each of them, but they are all turn based combat driven.

-FF1-FF3 have a turn based style where you can decide the actions of all of your characters, and their actions will be played out on a basis of their speed, kind of like Pokemon. FF4-FF6 allows characters and enemies to act freely while you decide their next move, which can be more dangerous, but take note, there is a 'Wait Mode' you can activate that will stop the flow of battle while you scroll through the magic or item menus.

-If by some chance, Final Fantasy isn't vibing with you: By all means quit. Maybe pick up one with a story that interests you more. Maybe turn based combat isn't your thing. Maybe you want a better leveling system. Maybe you would rather do more modern adaptations. It varies, but don't be afraid to step away. If it's not your thing, it is not your thing. That's okay.

-When it comes to any of these games: Wait until they are on sale. Square tends to put their games on sale pretty often, and pretty often, those sales are a steal. So keep that in mind!

OKAY! Let's begin!

Final Fantasy I

Despite being the first in the series, it's a difficult sell as 'your first Final Fantasy' or 'your first classic Final Fantasy'. But it isn't a bad choice, especially if you have a decent amount of JRPG experience anyway. The story exists, but more in a 'world building' way and not a 'character' way. It is also the shortest out of all six being discussed here.

What may be a pro or con for some is that the main four characters are self-inserts. You choose their battle job (a choice that is permanent, by the way), name them, and then use them for battle and adventure. But they barely speak a word of dialogue, if at all. This is bad for people who want characters to feed off of, but great for people who want to put their OCs as the characters (I'm those people at times).

General Tip: Feel free to use whatever character class selection you want, but for a general idea: Warrior is powerful but expensive to keep powerful, Thief is the fastest but slightly fragile compared to the other two fighters, Black Belt is almost has powerful as Warrior but significantly less expensive, White Mage has access to insane healing spells but very expensive, Black Mage has access to insane attacking spells but very expensive, and Red Mage has access to half the spells W and B Mage have but has the versatility to use a sword and both of their spell options.

Final Fantasy II

This is the Final Fantasy that I have to inform you is 'The Bad One'™ of the six. Personally, I love this game. Has a surprisingly deeper story than you'd expect, dealing with a rebellion trying to bring down a facist overlord (which is awesome). But it is probably the hardest of the six. Walk in the wrong direction and high level monsters will eviscerate you.

It also has a very unique leveling system. Where most games in the series require EXP and give you stats as you level, this game gives you stats as you USE those stats. Want your HP and Defense to go up? Take some damage, and you'll have a chance to level those stats. Want your Fire spell to grow stronger? Use the spell in battle, and the spell will grow stronger with your MP and magic power, possibly. Want to get better with swords? Keep using swords, baby!

Also, has the coolest villain of the first three games in the form of The Emperor. He looks like The Goblin King from Labyrinth and is such a bastard. Very entertaining.

General Tip: Keep characters focusing on a specific thing, but have everyone be a 'mage knight'. Give each character a weapon to focus, and a magic type to focus (white magic or black magic, don't cross types). If you want a very specific suggestion, consider making Firion and Guy handle weapons of your choice, but use white mage to heal. Have Maria use a bow, but utilize black magic and being your mage.

Final Fantasy III

It is my least favorite of these six, but it is a beloved game in the series for a reason. Most importantly, it is the game that inspired a lot of XIV. Hell, XIV fans may recognizes many songs (including the above one), enemies, and characters throughout.

The big thing I should mention is that this game has two versions on Steam: The Classic Remix (sprites, insert characters that you can name but have no character arcs) and The 3D Version (3D figures, actual main characters with names). The decision is yours and yours alone, Steam users.

Otherwise, this is the first game to allow a Job Sytem. As you progress, you unlock jobs that your characters can select and become, but you can't do it as freely as you may like. Also, when your character is that select job (let's say Black Mage, for instance), they can only be that job and nothing else until you change it. Once you do, the skills and abilities that character was able to use before may not be usable anymore unless you change them back. You'll see.

General Tips: Kind of figure out what kind of jobs you want each characters to handle, and stick with they general realm for each of them. Fighters be fighters, mages be mages. There may be times where you'll want to break that, but that's up to you to strategize.

Final Fantasy IV

We're finally reaching the 'epic stories' of Final Fantasy now, so I'll be talking a bit more about story. IV is the first real dramatic epic that Final Fantasy is known for being, and the characters and story prove that. Is it the best in the series? Arguably not, but it is very good. Dealing heavily with themes of redemption, revenge, and forgiveness.

From a gameplay stand point, it's probably the most challenging of the 4-6 era. There isn't that much freedom with your characters, as each of them have their designated skills, abilities, and talents set from the start of leveling to the end of leveling. And you can't change those things. So instead, you need to level your characters, figure out how to best beat the upcoming bosses, and use what you have.

And the music is fantastic in this game. Songs ranging from gorgeous melodies of feeling safe and home, to some stressful and tense songs as you come face to face with the enemy. You may recognize some from Endwalker, as Endwalker pulled a lot from this game.

General Tips: Learn everything that your characters can do, and utilize them to the best of your ability. Maybe your healer needs to focus on buffing or attacking, while another character heals with magic or items. Maybe you need to better research your enemies with what you have. Everything is creativity in this game with your limited options.

Final Fantasy V

I'm not gonna sugar coat it: This is my favorite in the series. But I'll try not to be biased. For starters, the story steps down from its epic roots to be more comedic. Somehow, this game managed to be a parody of FFIV and every Final Fantasy that would follow V, before any of them would be created. You'll have a lot of goofball good guys and bad guys, while also having a mean as hell main villain who has a strange, almost comedic origin story.

CW worth noting: There is a character who goes through some gender clash. Basically, you're introduced to them as one gender, when it is revealed later that they only disguised themselves as that gender because people of their born gender don't get respect in their occupation. Feelings on how this character was handled vary, but the character is beloved regardless and stays true to themselves to the end. I wouldn't say it was outright transphobic, but I wouldn't say it was handled with grace (one piece of dialogue makes me wince). And it may get some side glances from players now. But ultimately, the cast and fans accept and love this character regardless.

The music is very Pokemon Hoenn region: TRUMPETS EVERYWHERE! Somebody was having a trumpet party while this game was being made. Still, the music is great, especially the boss themes as you go further into the game. The track you're listening to is my personal favorite from this game.

But I haven't even spoke of the strongest aspect: The gameplay! It has a job system like Final Fantasy III, BUT you can carry over things you've learned from previous jobs! Got a Black Mage, but you want to utilize Time Magic? Good news, you can equip the Black Magic you've mastered while using Time Mage! Want to try out Monk, but you want to keep stealing items with your Thief? Have your Thief master 'Steal', and then equip it as a Monk. The strategy and creativity is unlimited!

General Tips: At the start of the game, you have access to a job known as 'Freelancer'. On the surface, this job is useless. But later on, you'll find that it automatically equips ALL passive abilities (ie HP +20%, Dual Wield, Equip Armor) without using up any of your slots! So take note: Freelancer is a secret endgame class! Strategize with that in mind! LEARN WHAT PASSIVE ABILITIES YOU CAN!

Also: Don't. Underestimate. Blue Mage. If you can figure things out, Blue Mage is insanely powerful. Then again, I speak as a devout Blue Mage fanatic.

Final Fantasy VI

As far as epic Final Fantasy games go, this is the biggest and baddest one from 1-6. Action, comedy, romance, horror, tragedy, joy! Everything and more in this theatrical adventure! By far, the strongest story of the six in my eyes and the eyes of many. Often argued to be one of the strongest stories of the entire series even beyond the classic six, and I agree! Lovable main characters all around, some kick ass female characters who take the forefront over most of the guys often times, and a psycho clown who serves as the central villain! I would argue, from a story stand point, this game is the quintessence of classic Final Fantasy.

Music is out of this world. Some of the best tracks you'll hear in the series, along with an opera song that will warm your heart and a final boss theme that will make you question what anyone saw in a certain One Winged Angel.

And then there's the gameplay. While I will admit that I find V's gameplay better, VI's gameplay is still quite good. Like IV, all characters come with skills and abilities that are unique to each character, which makes party formation important. But once you get past the first act, you gain the ability to teach magic to ANY CHARACTER IN THE GAME (except two late game secret characters, but you don't have to use those)! As long as they keep a certain item equipped, they were learn the spells those items have to offer over a span of battles. This turns all of your characters into battle mages, and creates for some interesting strategy.

THE ONLY DOWNSIDE is the final act. The final act removes every party member from your team but one, and with that one, you have to reunite EVERYONE. And those quests vary in difficulty and time, although almost all are optional. And that wouldn't be an issue save for the fact that the final dungeon will force your to create THREE TEAMS of FOUR PARTY MEMBERS (maximum, you can enter with one party member on each team if you want). As such, you might want to consider leveling and teaching spells to as many party members as you can. This hurts a lot of fans of this game, but it never bothered me.

General Tip: This is less of a general tip and more of a demand. When you get your airship for the first time, UNLOCK MOG! I don't care if you think or were told Mog is bad. If I can beat the final boss with him, you can make use of him! Look up how to unlock him and make sure you do it! Hell, it may make the final dungeon easier, cause you'll have him as a party member. You can always recruit him later, but during that early part of the game (before you lose every party member), Mog can learn a water dance ability that is surprisingly useful. But that's just me. Some people hate Mog, but I'm not some people.

--

--

--

--

Alright, that's all six. Now, from a stand point of which of the six should be your first. Well... Ranking them from best to worst starting option...

Final Fantasy V or VI

Final Fantasy IV

Final Fantasy I

Final Fantasy III

Final Fantasy II

This isn't ranking them in quality, but whether they are a good starting place. At the end of the day, I would recommend picking up V or VI if you've never played a classic Final Fantasy. If you've never played a Final Fantasy period, then maybe also consider VII, IX, or X. But that's up to you (and if I do a post on those).

As for whether you should pick V or VI...

IF YOU WANT CRAZY GOOD GAMEPLAY AND DON'T MIND THE STORY NOT BEING TOO SERIOUS, play Final Fantasy V.

IF YOU WANT CRAZY GOOD STORY WITH SOME PRETTY GOOD GAMEPLAY, play Final Fantasy VI.

Or play both. They're both really good.

If you've played one or both or want a reason to pick up one of these others:

Play Final Fantasy I so you can connect with the most classic of the series, as it won't take up too much time.

Play Final Fantasy II if you want a real JRPG challenge that rips you from your safe zone.

Play Final Fantasy III if you want to connect with a lot of the creation of XIV.

Play Final Fantasy IV because it's awesome.

Play Final Fantasy V because it's awesome.

Play Final Fantasy VI because it's awesome.

So yeah, that's everything. Again: You don't have to play any of these. Or all of these. You could play VI, and I promise, I won't be like, "Wow. You didn't play V? Cringe." If someone does, screw them. Play and try what you want to play and try. I'm just here to guide the way.

As for 7-15... Maybe I'll discuss them. But that's up to you for now.

[solarpunkani]

So it's Solarpunk Aesthetic week and I'm trying to do homework while listening to lo-fi but my brain started thinking of Solarpunk game concepts so here are my rambles.

What if someone made a like. Not reverse Stardew Valley, per say but like. And this was inspired by some tags by @bleedingedgeavoidancetactics BUT

You inherit a great big booming agricultural business from your mysterious and distant uncle or whatever. And its run like you standard agricultural practice. But the goal of the game is to make it as sustainable as possible. You come in like right at the end of one season, so you're getting to see how its run already, while also talking to the community and specialists and such to discuss how to make changes in future growing seasons to like. Fix. Like. Do more permacultury things, still get yields needed to sustain the surrounding community but with less negative environmental impact and beginning to have good environmental impacts? (Could also have dating sim side elements if you wanted)

Or maybe a game where like. It's after a disaster of some sort, and a group of survivors/nomads find an abandoned city. And you can work to turn the materials from said abandoned city and the preexisting infrastructure into a solarpunk society? Like a city-builder game, and you're starting on the edge of this abandoned city creating like gardens and such (maybe the starting area is like a suburban neighborhood you find?), and you can send expeditions deeper into the city to find other supplies you can use to create new structures for the society you're building? And maybe this is a kind of game where you can individualize building placement and decorations to an extent, and maybe visit your friends' settlements? Or at least it'd be fun to show pictures online? (This one's inspired by a mobile game I play that I THOUGHT was gonna be like this but everything is already PRE SET)

Or a guerrilla gardening game, where you're like. A guerrilla gardener, and you're sneaking around at night sowing seeds and watering plants or planting plant starts and trying not to get caught by like. I dunno. Guards??? Police officers??? and then during the day you can take actions to protect the plants from... I dunno. And you can go to a store to buy more materials/seeds/stuff, and your home base is like a huge seed starting zone where you can craft a certain number of seed bombs/start a certain number of seeds depending on how many you have in your inventory. And each method has a few stats--efficiency, survival, and risk--so like, just sprinkling seeds would have low risk and high efficiency but low survival stats, seed bombs could have medium efficiency and low risk and low-medium survival depending on the recipe you use to make them (maybe you can learn/discover new ones as you go along), and different sizes of plant starts have lower efficiency but higher survival and higher risk. And the risk could factor into how long it takes to plant the thing but also how likely it is to be discovered by the guards or whatever during the day. And also in your daytime persona, you can make friends and organize a community that can start banding together to protect the plants from guard interference? Maybe the game starts out mostly in black and white except for your night character's green cloak and your day persona's yellow shirt, but people you can befriend also have colored shirts, and the more guerilla gardening you do the more things start to become colorful. (This one's inspired by a story idea I've had rattling in my brain and a separate animation I considered doing a few years back)

I'm not a game designer or a coder or anything, I'm just an artist. But I'm sitting here chilling and I thought these could be cool ideas. If anyone wants to use them to inspire their stories and such by all means GO FOR IT this is an endorsement

[uroboros-if]

Please please share some coding/designing wisdom. Your game is so damn pretty 😭😭😭 Could you tell us what template you used and how hard it was to make it look like it is today? I imagine so much work must have gone into it

😭😭 I am no expert, but these are just my rationale/methods behind the visual choices I made!

For the template I used—I used Vahnya's Template! However, this post by @/manonamora-if has a whole section for templates that I wish I saw or checked out before making my IF! In another lifetime, I might've just used nyehilism's template to achieve the bottom sidebar instead of torturing myself learning how to do it... ;;

Below, I go into detail the timeline of designing Uroboros, as well as advice through the process I went!

Design Timeline

I started designing the UI late October 2022, and kept fixing, changing, editing it well into February and maybe a little bit of March 2023.

October 2022 - Early iterations of the design. Looked for stock images and began implementing it to add a background to the sidebar and the actual passages. Swatched some color palettes and began implementing them into the IF. Later decided to make the sidebar on the bottom instead of on the side. Also, added a title screen.

November - Testing different backgrounds for the IF's sidebar. Added a textbox to the passages, also worked on the black fade transitions.

December - Finished working on the sidebar background for both light and dark theme, began work on the background of the IF instead.

January 2023 - Finished working on the dark and light theme backgrounds! Started work on drawing the skill icons for light and dark theme, and finished!

February - Changed the title screen to look better on mobile, created a circle logo, added a border to the textbox. Also, made further edits for light theme.

March - Just remade the "Uroboros" logo.

If you're wondering why it took approximately 5 months to get to the final version—don't worry! I wasn't working only on the design for 5 months. My partner helped make the edits for the design, while I worked on coding them in and writing.

I spent a lot of time trying to get a grasp on Javascript, SugarCube, and HTML all throughout this time as well, to know how to fluidly add these things. Meaning, while I was working on these visual elements, I was also figuring out how to do the "looking" mechanic, black and white transitions, figuring out how Tweego worked, radio buttons, and so on.

Do note I've been busy the entire time throughout, so perhaps you can do this much quicker than I can!

The "Secrets"

1. Please—look at IFs you love! What are some visual aspects of other IFs that you love and want to include in your story? I started by analyzing parts of other IFs that I love. I liked Wayfarer's textbox; I liked how the choices looked in When Twilight Strikes. I liked the textboxes in the beginning of Zorlok. Find the things that amaze you about other IFs, and implement it your own way!

This seems like super basic advice—but trust me, once you think, "How can I put this in my game?" you will not only be able to have it, but most likely, you'll also learn a LOT.

While seeing how I could make the radio buttons, for example, I started researching. I googled "How to live change text?" and then I found out about jQuery, how to use the replace macro, etc. etc. JUST from researching how to do exactly one (1) feature.

2. What is missing in other IFs? Think about your own reading experience. I didn't like the clunkiness of some, how the sidebar is on the side when space on a mobile-screen is severely limited length-wise. So, I put the sidebar on the bottom.

I didn't like how other choices look in IFs, so I wanted a way to do mine that's nice and elegant(though it's still a little hard to read, admittedly).

Again, researching how to do the things you want opens many doors for you. I learned how to style <li> and change how bullets look, learned how to style links in Twine in general, etc. etc. again with just this ONE thing I wanted to change/add.

3. Don't do the work all by yourself. I struggled so hard because I hate asking for help. I was happy to Google other people's problems, but I never thought to open up my own thread or ask anybody in the community for help. Please, not only ask, but also—your work doesn't have to be completely original.

Use templates. Look at manon's amazing masterlist of things you can implement. I also have a few macro's that you can use, like multipronouns for MC, that does the work for you, for free.

Rip people's codes—respectfully. I'm not saying from other IFs, but online in other places. If they appear on help forums or are publicly available through places like CodePen, chances are that they're open-source or licensed in such a way that anyone can use it (e.g. MIT license).

Again, here is Manon's masterlist, which includes custom macros you can use in your game (Chapel, HiEv and Cycy are my high recommendations)! Additionally, here's my code for multipronouns here and my code for setting RO genders here.

4. MAKE IT READABLE!! Even if you want your game to look pretty... please, I'm begging you, make it easy to read. This is the most important thing ever.

I have a short attention span, and so does my partner. We reviewed the game to make sure we are NOT compromising the reading experience with our design. As much as we want fantastical backgrounds, we wanted to make sure it was at least not distracting. As much as we want gaudy styles, we want the actual passage to be suited for the long haul.

The most, most important part is to enhance the reading experience--not by adding things on, but by making it simple and intuitive. As someone in the computer science field, the user experience is CRITICAL. Put yourself in their shoes, think about them first and foremost.

Twine is amazingly customizable, and its powers can be wielded for good and evil. Plenty of amazing writers but inexperienced UI designers, especially from CoG, get into Twine. CoG almost completely takes away the design element, so Twine is a whole new ballpark.

Uroboros has a lot of pomp, but the actual textbox is uncharacteristically simple in comparison. The simplicity against an otherwise fantastical, but non-distracting background helps give it elegance. The sidebar, in contrast, is very eye-catching—but, it's also out of view most of the time, and isn't built for long reading.

To add on, make sure it's readable on mobile. I guarantee 80% of your readers are going to be reading your IF on their phone, and probably at 3 AM, so you will want the mobile to look as good as PC, or even better.

Closing Thoughts

Anyway, as basic as this advice is, this is really what guided my entire thought process behind my visual choices! -- Picking and choosing what you like from IFs, figuring out how to do them through research, and making sure your IF is built to be read for a while.

Thanks so much for asking, thinking that I have wisdom to impart!! 😭🫶💕

[sophieinwonderland]

The Plurality of... The Hybrid Chronicles: What's Left of Me

Over the past couple weeks, I've been listening to book one of The Hybrid Chronicles, What's Left of Me.

And it is AMAZING. Fantastic story with a fantastic narrator!

As always, expect huge spoilers ahead!

A World of Twin Souls

The Hybrid Chronicles takes place in an alternate reality where every person is born as two people. Each has their own name. Each has motor control of the body at different times and can switch who is in control. And they communicated with each other internally with mindvoices just like most systems.

This is how it is in the beginning, at least.

There's a recessive soul that usually fades away naturally though childhood. Usually around 4 or 5. Some take longer. If the recessive soul doesn't fade away, if they don't "settle", then the two become a Hybrid.

If a child reaches 10 and hasn't settled yet, they're sent away to nightmarish institutions.

The history the government gives explains that Hybrids are all terrible and chaotic. At some point in the history of The Americas (The whole supercontinent appears to have one centralized government in this universe) people rebelled against the Hybrid leadership, massacred the Hybrids, and took control of their new Hybrid-free nation.

The Americas became intensely xenophobic and trade was cutoff from the rest of the world.

The government of The Americas pushes constant anti-hybrid propaganda, showing the other nations as violent and destructive because of their hybrid leadership.

A weird note on names: One of the least believable things about this story to me is that parents give their children two names. It seems like it would make much more sense for them to just call each soul by the same name. Maybe with a number attached. For example, you might just have Addie 1 and Addie 2 instead of Eva and Addie. Then when the recessive soul fades away, it will feel less like your child just died. Because it seems really messed up that there's just a world where you're expected to name two children, knowing that one would be guaranteed death. (In real life, it's common for places with high infant mortality rates to not name their babies immediately.)

But then again, maybe some people tried that, and it just resulted in one of the souls choosing a different name for themselves anyway. And then if that soul with a different name settled as the dominant, then the parents get a child with a name they didn't choose. I suppose I could accept that headcanon. 🤷‍♀️

Eva and Addie

That brings us to the main characters. Our viewpoint character is Eva, a recessive soul who has lost motor control of the body. But she didn't fade away completely. She shares a head with Addie.

The two have to constantly hide who and what they are from the world, lying to everyone and saying that only Addie survived.

At the same time, Eva longs for nothing more than to be able to move her fingers again. To talk to people outside of their body.

The relationship between these two characters is the heart of What's Left of Me. The two are like sisters. They comfort each other when they're hurt or scared. They fight with each other. They fight for each other. And they are both willing to sacrifice for the other.

Addie has to wrestle between her desires to remain "normal," and to support Eva and let Eva be herself.

As a system, something I often hear come up from singlets is a question of why you would let someone take control of your body.

And I think this amazing bit of dialog when Addie and Eva find a way for Eva to regain her mobility encapsulates it perfectly.

When you care about someone, of course you would be willing to give up time for them. Even if it's hard sometimes to step away from the reins.

At its core, this book is about pluralphobia. In part, from a society that is openly hostile to plurals. But it's also about internalized pluralphobia. It's about Addie and Eva's self-hatred instilled into them by a world that refuses to accept them.

It's about their own struggle to be able to accept themselves.

This is such a poignant quote and it stuck with me more than anything else in the book.

So far, most of the excerpts from this are focused on the general premise of the book and the relationship of the protagonists. What I'm going to say next is more spoilery as it's from near the end of the book. If what I've mentioned already as enticed you to read it for yourself, this is a good place to stop...

...

...

...

Acceptance

Through the story, Eva gradually regains motor controls and the two start to accept themselves more.

And I must say that it's an amazing journey. I love seeing Eva so excited to talk to people and even just move her fingers for the first time in years.

Every new milestone is so well-written. (And the narrator does an incredible job playing the characters in the audio book.)

And it all culminates in this exchange, with Eva in full control and no longer hiding, or ashamed to be who she is.

Proud. Determined. No longer afraid to be who she is.

Parallels to Real Pluralphobia

The ages of settling are interesting to me. If it's not done intentionally, it at least feels like a pretty big coincidence.

I recently mentioned my feelings about imaginary friends and the belief that many of them are sentient beings. Through that lens, you can see a lot of parallels.

An imaginary friend in childhood may be treated as if they're real by the rest of the family, just playing around. It's often seen as a normal thing. But as a child ages, imaginary friends are more stigmatized. Children are expected to outgrow them. And most will disappear.

Except when they don't...

And then having people in your head is suddenly treated as an illness. You're suffering psychotic hallucinations or a dissociative disorder. Much like with hybrids, you're treated as if you're "sick" or "broken."

And the age range of this is pretty close. Most imaginary friends fade away during early childhood. This is also when self-states are alleged to become fully integrated and why 10 is usually considered the maximum cutoff for the trauma that causes DID.

Stigma of plurals as "dangerous" is persistent through our media in the form of the evil alter trope, and through media that portrays malevolent psychotic hallucinations as self-conscious entities with their own identities and personality.

There's not some huge government conspiracy in real-life. But the connections are definitely there between the fear of hybrids in The Hybrid Chronicles and the pluralphobia and ableism plurals experience in the real world.

And with our country's history of ableism, even being forcefully shipped away to an institution for being plural would have been a real fear 50 years ago.

On mechanics of Manifestation Types and Emotion Influence...

Having compared the plurality of the book to real plurality and to imaginary friends, I should mention that the souls of the book are exclusively fronters. There are no inner worlds, nor do either Addie or Eva have external visualized mindforms.

And even when she lacks control, Eva seems to almost always be attuned to the body.

Another thing the book handled really well, I thought, was the sharing of emotions between the two and how they can both experience emotions from the other, while clearly identifying those emotions as belonging to the other soul.

And with this excerpt, I feel I should also give a shoutout to the unique formatting choice to denote their mind speech. Though, full disclosure: the audio book can be confusing sometimes when that formatting doesn't exist and you have to depend heavily on context clues to figure out if something was said in their head or through their mouth. Sometimes I didn't realize that something had been verbalized... or not verbalized... until a few sentences later.

Conclusion

What's Left of Me is a fantastic book exploring (whether intentional or not) plurality and pluralphobia in an alternate universe where everyone is born with two souls. It's such a great story, and the dynamic between Eda and Addie is handled amazingly.

Writing this felt weird. When doing The Plurality of… Batman (Failsafe), I was focusing on one character who happened to be plural and ignoring most of the story aside from what was relevant to that.

Likewise, The Plurality of… Skyward - Diones dealt with a single alien species. None of these really felt like I was writing a review of the whole work.

But with What's Left of Me, the plurality is so central to everything that it's practically unavoidable. It's seeped into every layer of the worldbuilding and the characters.

I still left a lot out. There are a bunch of hybrids in this book and a lot I could say about each of them. Maybe I will another time. I chose to only focus on Addie and Eva to keep this from getting too unfocused and avoid giving much more away than I needed to.

And that itself is a situation I haven't been in, where I feel like I need to omit a lot of the plurality in a story just because there's SO MUCH there.

It's a plural world where about half the characters are plurals.

And I only talked about the main two.

There is just too much plurality in this book to cover it all in a single post. So do check it out for yourselves.

And as always, thank you for your time. Have an amazing day! 💖

[biscuits-of-bagend]

DnDoc, Space Band #3 - Childhood Favourites

Kind of want to make a playlist of Rogue's music library now... any suggestions? I'll explain the whole 'Space Band' thing and what that is in the real world at the bottom of the chapter.

Part 1 Part 2

Previous story: DnDoc, Coming Home

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Rogue's music selection was displayed on a large touch-screen set into one of the walls and Ruby's face passed through various expressions as she scrolled through it.

   "Taylor Swift, nice, Queen, of course, Linkin Park…" Ruby looked around the room then back at Rogue. "Sounds about right."

   "Hey, they're great," said Rogue. "You don't realise how lucky you are for music in twenty-first century Earth."

   "Ooh, you have music from other centuries?" said Ruby.

  "And other planets," said Rogue. "Hang on. Listen to this."

   He tapped the screen on a song called Rock the Socks off the World. A short sharp riff blared out of the speakers then a young-sounding male voice starting singing about rocking the socks off of planets. Rogue bobbed from side to side and nodded his head up and down.

   "Space Band?!" the Doctor cried.

   Rogue looked round and saw the Doctor standing near the entrance where they'd left him. He had looked up from his sonic screwdriver and was staring at Rogue, mouth held open.

   "They were my favourite band when I was little!" said Rogue. He laughed and said, "Will you two leave me and my music taste alone?"

   "No no, I love Space Band," said the Doctor.

   "Also they're actually called The Earthlings. People just get confused because of their song 'Space Band.' They were from Earth, originally," Rogue explained to Ruby, "But they've played all over the galaxy."

   "They're fantastic," the Doctor said. "But I haven't listened to them since I was like, a hundred."

   Rogue closed his eyes and breathed out nervously. "Forgot about that. The age thing."

   "Ah," said the Doctor. "You… okay with that?"

   Rogue nodded. "You just look way too good for it so I keep forgetting."

   The next Earthlings song had started, a two minute fifty-nine second track commenting on its own length from beginning to end.

   Ruby thought for a moment, then said, "I can see how this would be awesome if you were a kid."

   "Ten-year-old me thought this was the greatest band in the universe," said Rogue.

   "You ever been to see them?" asked the Doctor.

   "No, I always wanted to, but we were quite a mobile family and our paths just never crossed. I've seen the livestreams, but never in person," said Rogue.

   The Doctor cocked his head to the side and listened to the sonic cloud for a moment. "Oh boy, careful everyone. Step the wrong way and I reckon you'd fall into the Space Band audience right now, unless the sonic's just got really into drum solos in the last ten seconds."

   "The portal…" Rogue screwed up his eyes and tried to work it out. "It took me to music, to my Kylie-obsessed ship, so it could get fed? And now it wants to go see The Earthlings for dinner? …That sounded more sinister than I meant it to."

   "I think you're right," said the Doctor. "And most people who made it that far into the forest had no music left to offer it."

   "Did you ever work out why you were immune?" Ruby asked, looking up from scrolling through the rest of Rogue's music library.

   "Honestly, no idea," said Rogue. "I guess just different biology. I'm from a whole different dimension, so the bacteria just didn't know what to do with me."

   "Maybe, could also be the TARDIS protecting you. You were in there for a little while," said the Doctor. "And nothing's as magical as the TARDIS."

   Rogue smiled across the room at the Doctor. "True."

   The Doctor moved the sonic screwdriver slowly back and forward through the air. "Excellent, the cloud's latched on. If I put the sonic screwdriver in its console slot back on the TARDIS I should be able to take us wherever the cloud feels like showing us. Right now, I reckon that would be a Space Band concert. So, what do you say, Rogue, would you like to make your ten-year-old self's dreams come true?"

---

Part 4

SO, Space Band. It's a children's novel written by Tom Fletcher, one of the guitarists and singers from McFly. He and the rest of McFly made an album to soundtrack the children's novel and it is genuinely really fun. I ended up reading the book as like, research for this last week? And frankly, it's excellent. If I was 10 years old it would probably be my favourite book in the world... or should I say universe...

@off-traveling-in-the-stars @casavanse @monster-donut @letsargueacrossthestars (let me know at any point if you no longer wish to be tagged in each post)

[lynmars79]

When sharing stories on Tumblr, what makes for good tags to put on them?

Well, that depends. And there's likely people who do a lot of original writing on Tumblr who may have different answers, but:

I have a specific writing tag I use for both original and fanfiction ("Lyn Writing") as it helps me find things in my archive/blog search, and if folks are using those auto-tagger addons that just copy your tags, or the auto-copy of tags in mobile or other addons, it doesn't put "my writing" on their blog (which I get annoyed by).

For fanfiction, I'm going to tag the main fandom tag, and any relevant characters. Things like specific seasons, episodes, expansions, books, etc as necessary, especially if spoilery.

For original fiction, I might have an "original character" tag. If it's stuff I'm going to repeatedly post I make tags for specific OCs (or places, concepts, etc original to my writing). Usually in that last case, it's again a housekeeping method to make searching my own blog easier.

For either, there might be genre, general themes, ideas, concepts, or warnings I feel might be needed ("poetry, horror, romance, hope, names, family, violence"). Maybe some jabber commentary ("in which I try to write silly songs, OC just wants to take a nap"). If it's for a writing challenge or prompt that gets added, too, especially if the organizer has a requested tag or two to use ("DWC2024"). Sometimes I might use some Ao3 methodology to determine a few things (ratings, relationships, warnings, etc).

In the end, it's not too different from other posts one wants to be able to find, and/or tell people at a glance what's in the work, and what Searches it pops up in. For the question of "how easily do you want to find things on your own blog later," consider if you are keeping links on a page or post somewhere (also back up your work elsewhere always), and how easily do you want others to find your original stories? Do you have a specific writing tag on your pinned post or in your description?

Words and phrases in the body of a work, as well as in the tags, will pull up in the Search. Don't use tags (especially fandom tags) unrelated to one's work; that's a quick trip to "Blocked and Reported as Spam."

I also recommend anything over (my personal limit of) 500 words go under a cut. It's a delicate balance of "get people to read" when that's already difficult, so gotta hook them to hit that "Keep Reading" link, or stretch out dashes and annoy people who then scroll past (or block you or the post).

Original stuff likely won't be noticed often. The folks who do get noticed tend to have larger followings already, and/or are posting their stories as replies to writing prompts to start and getting noticed when folks trawl the notes of those posts.

A lot of it is, frankly, luck, and who reblogs to show a wider audience and then if any of them read and reblog, and so on.

So figure out the tagging scheme that works for you, link to friends and in Discord servers you're in, and reblog yourself a few times to catch followers with different timezones. Know only original posts show in the Search, not reblogs (even a reblog by OP). Write and post for the fun of it and keep expectations realistic so far as wide recognition, but honestly in the end, somewhat consistent posting, with consistent and clear tags, will slowly grow an audience over time.

[l0velyrand0m]

Old Soul - The First Avenger

This is the second chapter for my captain america/bucky barnes fic (full story on wattpad, l0velyrand0m). Posting the second chapter to see if i get any interest, if so i'll continue posting, but the main story is linked below.

The first chapter is also pinned at the top of my blog <3

"Hey there, grumpy," Bucky said, finally catching up to Eliza as she strided confidently down the street. "Mind if I walk with you?"

"Screw you, Bucky," she retorted in reference to the "grumpy" comment. She wasn't grumpy, she was pissed off. And she had every right to be.

"Maybe later," he replied, making her scoff. "Look, remember earlier when I said you were twenty-four? So he couldn't control you? Same goes for him."

"But I'm protecting him, Bucky," she strained, tears threatening her eyes. She sucked in a deep breath. Elizabeth Rogers didn't cry. "There's a difference. He's gonna get himself killed."

And then it hit him. Why Eliza had been so adamant about Steve's enlisting. About his lies. About his sacrifice. She was scared to lose him like she'd lost the rest of her family. And to an understandable extent - she would be alone.

"Lizzy, look," Bucky said softly, taking her hand in his. "It's gonna be okay. I swear to you. They're not gonna take him. He's not physically capable of doing that. But if you don't take this position. You're gonna regret it."

"I know," she sighed. "He'd be mad-"

"No, Liz," Bucky stopped her. "He's gonna be so proud of you."

Eliza raised her head and looked at Bucky in the eyes. Her own brimmed with hot tears that threatened to spill. Her lip trembled.

Bucky took her in his arms as she let out a small sob. "I can't lose him too. I can't lose either of you."

"Neither of us are going anywhere, doll. You gotta believe in us."

•••

"Welcome to camp, Miss Rogers. I'm Chester Phillips," the colonel said as he took Eliza's hand, and shook it firmly.

"It's an honor, Colonel," she replied.

"This is Agent Peggy Carter, she's here to supervise the division."

"Basically, I'm your boss," she said with a genuine smile. Her accent caught Eliza off guard at first, but it was certainly nice for the ears. "But somehow I think you'll be the only other competent person in this camp."

The Colonel walked away, leaving Peggy and Eliza to walk to the different tents.

"As the division's mobile nurse, you'll hang around me and take care of the boys as you see fit," Peggy explained, handing Eliza a clipboard with some personal files on all the soldiers.

The two girls came up on a line of soldiers waiting for their orders.

"Recruits, attention!" Peggy yelled, grabbing everyone's attention. "Gentlemen, I'm Peggy Carter. I supervise all operations for this division."

"What's with the accent, Queen Victoria?" one of the men shouted, a sly smirk on his mouth. "I thought I was signing up for the U.S. Army."

"What's your name, soldier?" Peggy requested, calling out the special soul in the crowd, this made Eliza snicker quietly. She'd gathered enough information on Peggy in the few minutes she'd been talking with her to know what was going to happen to the guy.

"Gilmore Hodge, your majesty," he said sarcastically.

"Step forward, Hodge," Peggy instructed. And he did so, smirking. "Put your right foot forward."

"Hmm," he hummed. "We gonna wrassle? 'Cause I got a few moves I know you'll like."

Peggy punches Hodge hard in the face, causing him to physically inch back a couple paces, clutching his nose.

"Agent Carter," Colonel Phillips says as he drives up.

"Colonel Phillips," she greeted.

"I see you're breaking in the candidates. That's good!" he turned to Hodge, who was still very much in shock from Peggy's surprise introduction. "Get your ass up out of that dirt and stand in that line at attention 'til somebody comes tells you what to do."

"Yes sir," Hodge apologizes quickly, running back into line.

Phillips now turned his attention to the recruits in line. "General Patton has said that wars are fought with weapons, but they are won by men. We are going to win this war because we have the best men..." Phillips trailed off as he noticed one of the men were shorter, much more frail looking than the rest. Eliza felt a pit grow in her stomach as she looked down at her clipboard and sifted through the pages.

Steven Grant Rogers

Brooklyn, New York

07/04/1918

Her head shot back up as she scowled at her brother, making dead eye contact as Phillips spoke. He finally took notice, cringing as she burned a hole in his head with her angry gaze.

"But every army starts with one man," Phillips says, catching Eliza's attention again. "By the end of the week, we will choose that man. He will be the first in a new breed of Super Soldiers."

•••

"Are you crazy?!" Eliza reprimands as she follows Steve to his barracks. "What the- What did I tell you? Did that whole angry outburst mean nothing to you Steve?"

"It meant you don't believe in me."

"Oh for Christ's sake, stop doing this. Stop putting words in my mouth. You're being very unreasonable right now."

"Sometimes I wish you would swear, so I could tell how you really felt."

"Oh trust me, I'd get us both kicked out of this camp if I was swearing right now. I can't believe you!"

"I don't wanna hear this."

"Well you're gonna!"

"Rogers!"

"What?" the twins said in unison as they turned to look at Peggy Carter.

"Agent Carter, I apologize," Eliza spoke quickly.

"Me too," Steve added.

"Okay.. Elizabeth, come with me. You.. off to wherever you need to be. Bye now," Peggy waved him off. "What was that?"

"Nothing. Unreasonable patient," she shrugged.

"I can tell the Colonel to have him sent-"

"No! Well..." Eliza had to think about her next words very carefully. Or there was a good chance she wouldn't be speaking to her brother any time soon, and not just because he was now in the military. "No. It's fine. I'll speak with Erskine about it later. What did you need?"

"Hodge is in the infirmary and requests that you look at his nose," Peggy said with a roll of her eyes. "He's fine, I didn't punch him that hard."

Eliza chuckled, "Yeah, I'm sure. I'll be over there as soon as I can. Thank you."

"No problem," she replied. "We leave in about fifteen for a bit of running practice for the men. You have to come to make sure none of them keel over and die."

"One of em might," Eliza muttered bitterly.

"Pardon?"

"Nothing. Gotta go attend to the crybaby, I'll see you in ten."

Eliza rushed to the infirmary tent, ducking through the opening to see Hodge complaining to one of her assistant nurses about his nose and the tiny trickle of blood that trailed down his upper lip.

"Gilmore Hodge, my pleasure," Eliza strained. Ever since his little theatrical performance, she decided she didn't much care for Hodge.

"How-do-ya-do, doll?"

The term felt weird hearing it from his mouth. The last person to call her that was Bucky. Whom she was beginning to miss ever since he left after their walk only just about a week ago.

"It's Nurse Rogers, for you, Hodge. Please," she told him.

"How about Lizzy? Liz?"

"Absolutely not. We're done here. Shut your mouth before I get Phillips to send you home. Got it?"

"Spunky. I love it. We'll talk soon, Liz," he says as he got up and walked out.

She was livid with the man. The audacity to take her name. Her nickname from Bucky, and drag it around so carelessly. Somehow, it hurt much more than she expected it to. Bucky was her best friend, and basically an older brother to the two. When he told her not to let anyone call her any derivative of "Liz" or "Lizzy" back when he coined the nickname in the first place... it made her want to punch Hodge. Right where Peggy had before.

But she didn't have time to chase him down just to scold him. He'd enjoy that. And she wasn't going to give him the time of day.

She took in a deep breath, packed her kit, and headed towards Peggy in the jeep next to the starting point of the recruit's run.

"So how was Hodge?" Peggy asked. "Dream man?"

"I'll kill him myself if he doesn't do so in the trench," Eliza chided.

"Oh damn," Peggy smiled. "I love your attitude. I can tell how well working with you is gonna go."

Eliza smiled at Peggy with a feeling of worth.

This was the start of a wonderful friendship.

•••

"That flag means we're only at the halfway point," Sergeant Duffy explained, his voice extremely loud. Eliza wondered how his vocal cords still worked at this rate. "First man to bring it to me gets a ride back with Agent Carter. Move, move!"

Eliza sighed. "Don't worry," Peggy said, leaning over so she was heard. "No one's come close to getting that flag in 17 years I've heard. No one's getting a ride back with us."

"Rogers! I said fall in!" Sergeant Duffy yelled. Eliza whipped her head around to see her brother pull a pin at the bottom of the pole. The pole toppled over, the flag brushing against the ground about seven feet from him.

He strolled over, unhooked the flag, and handed it to Sergeant Duffy (who looked as if he'd seen a ghost) with a small "Thank you, sir". He climbed in the car and sat on the other side of Peggy, who was grinning uncontrollably and watching the Sergeant's reaction with glee.

The others continued running off, and the car drove away.

"Smartass," Eliza mumbled. Steve caught her word however, and his face dropped. He leaned back in the seat and let his hands fall in his lap.

"Don't let her get to you. She doesn't like anyone in this division," Peggy told him. "That was rather clever of you."

"Thank you, ma'am, but I don't think that's why she's upset with me."

[totesnothere04]

Day to Day Norm: Deleted Scene

300 Follower Special, this is completely in Norm's perspective. I hope you guys enjoy! 😁

Norm Spellman x F!Quaritch!Reader

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the fanart, screenshots, or gifs.

Warnings: Major angst (to me atleast). It's nowhere near as long as an actual chapter since it's a deleted scene, but I've added a little more detail than what was in it when it was in the actual story. Also, I'm terrible at writing angst so I'm sorry if it's not as sad as you'd like for it to be.

I also wanted to take a second and acknowledge my prolonged leave of absence. I had a severe anxiety attack that had me in physical pain for nearly a week after it. I haven't had the motivation to write because I'm afraid of spiking my anxiety again, but I'm trying my best to get back into writing longer stories again.

Avatar Masterlist

Norm's POV

I was standing right outside of the mobile unit with Jake in my human body since my avatar had been shot in the shoulder. It was a good thing that I stayed here instead of running off because Simmens was able to find his way here. I had been able to keep him back until Jake came crashing down through the trees and killed him. But now... Now we had won and all that's left for us to do is get the rest of the human population to leave Pandora. I'd beable to continue my research and settle down with (Y/n), and maybe even have a couple of kids. I heaved a sigh of relief that it was all over and I sat down on the stairs.

Jake took a few steps away as he started talking to someone, probably Neytiri or (Y/n) since Tsu'tey is gone. Jake's face remained stoic for a moment, then shock, a quick flash of sadness as his eyes cut over to me, and finally his hand fell from his neck. He stood still for a moment before he took a deep breath and his head hung for a moment. He finally lifted his head as he turned to me and I looked at him confused.

"What's wrong, Jake?" I ask him as I try to read his expression. "Oh God... Is Neytiri okay?"

"Neytiri is alright. Colonel Quaritch is dead, he died protecting Neytiri." Jake said and finally looked me in the eye. "Norm... (Y/n)'s gone." Jake finally said quietly, and it felt like all the air had been knocked from my lungs. I'm sure that if I had been standing my legs would've given out from under me. Everything dulled out and a high-pitched ringing took over my hearing.

"You're..." I take a deep breath. "You're sure that she's gone?" I ask him quietly.

"I'm so sorry Norm. Neytiri is bringing her body to the Tree of Souls." Jake says. His ears are drooped and his eyes are filled with tears. "As her mate it's your job to... Prepare her for burial. I'll help since she claimed me as a brother."

After Jake ensured that my avatar had been treated for the gunshot wound in my shoulder, I linked with my avatar. The moment my consciousness was in my avatar I could feel it. The pain my avatar was feeling from losing (Y/n). I took a deep breath and got up from the mat I was lying on and walked in a sort of haze. Walking to the area Jake said (Y/n)'s body is in. The moment I got to the tent her body is in I hesitated to open the flap. A hand on my back startled me and I turned my head to find Jake.

"I'm with you the entire way." Jake says and gives me a small sad smile, and I take a deep breath as I open the flap. The shape her body was in was... grotesque. Bullet wounds riddle her torso and her blood is smeared from where large hands had picked her up. I drop to my knees beside her and reach out to her with shaky hands. A sob tears itself from my throat as my hands make contact with her cold skin. The tears are free flowing and the sobs are loud and painful. Tearing at my vocal cords like a thanator as my throat constricts, and my eyes burn with how many tears are escaping my eyes. So many different types of pain coursing through my body right now that I can't think clearly. The pain in my throat from the sobs, the pain in my eyes from the tears, the pain in my shoulder from where I was shot, but none of them compared to the pain in my tswin. The feeling of the severed connection is the worst pain I've ever felt. Both physically and mentally.

"I don't-" I started to try and speak but I couldn't. My throat was just too constricted for words to form.

"I know. I'm so sorry Norm." Jake says and sets two bowls of water down on either side of (Y/n)'s body and a rag in each bowl. A large bowl of water sat next to her head and for a moment all I'm able to do is stare at her. I picked up her arm and held her hand with both of mine... My beautiful mate. Jake goes to remove her top and I stop him.

"What are you doing?" I ask still feeling protective of her privacy.

"I'm removing her top so we can clean her." Jake says confused and I shake my head.

"Right... Sorry." I say and decide that I would be the one to remove her blood-soaked clothes. I look at her face and remember the first day I saw her in her avatar. Smirking next to Grace as I chased Jake through the avatar yard trying to get him to go back inside.

"If you need a moment you can take it. I can clean her if you need a breather." Jake says and I take a deep breath. Jake takes a moment to observe me and he sighs. "Norm... It's not healthy to try and bottle up your emotions."

His words broke a dam and everything I had been trying to hide came crashing. My chest tightened and I let everything pour out of me. The anger, the sadness, everything. Tears coated my cheeks, sobs tore through my vocal chords, and I held (Y/n)'s hand, desperately wishing for her to come back. Jake seemed surprised by my outburst but he quickly jumped over (Y/n)'s body and held me. To me, it felt like everything was falling apart around me. The world as I knew it was crumbling and I couldn't stop it. My lungs burned, my ears were ringing, my eyes ached, my throat is searing with pain as I think of all the good times with (Y/n), and how we won't beable to make anymore of those memories. All I had now was good memories and nobody to share them with...

But there's also Miles. He's only a baby and wouldn't remember either his sister or his father, but I could try my best to make him feel loved and appreciated. The way his sister would've tried to make him feel. I can't duplicate her loving personality, but I can try my best to treat him the way that she would have. My best chance to make her happy, and still have a connection to her.

'I have to make her proud.' I think to myself as I look at her face and I bring her hand to my lips and plant one last kiss on her knuckles. I let myself ride out this wave of pain, knowing that soon I would step out of it and dedicate myself to more than just my research.

Miles needs me, and I need him. I might not be his father, but I'll be the best big brother figure he could ask for. For both of our sakes.

Taglist: @nisaoneil810, @drinking-tea-and-be-obsessed, @ducks118, @avatarlover67, @kenzi-woycehoski, @isimpforfictionalppl, @belos-simp69, @vivangothic, @dyingofcookies, @levilovely1, @perseny, @criticalroleobssedperson.

If your URL is in red I was unable to tag you.

[my-castles-crumbling]

TO CAMP ANON

Hi love! Someone sent some advice to you, so I'm putting it under the cut because it's a bit heavy. I hope you're doing well <3

I’ve been keeping up with your tumblr and your asks and stuff, and I hope it’s okay but I had something to say to Camp Anon.

I sort of inferred the situation through your answers Cas. When I was a kid I was often in group at church with other “rebellious” kids. I know now that we were all the queer kids who hadn’t realised yet (credit to them, maybe some of them had) and then when I turned 16 and partly figured myself out I started getting invested in peoples stories.

By that point a lot of the kids I’d gone to church with were also closeted, and we started talking to each other about ourselves and our experiences.

And turns out a few of those kids went to conversion camps. The summers before and after I found out. 

One of the kids was a year older than me and is still a very close friend of mine. She’s actually taking a course to be a therapist now.

And there were a few things they said (and my friend still says when she decides to talk about it) that I thought maybe you should know. 

It seems like from Cas’ answers to the ask, that Camp Anon has been somewhere before and I presume is going somewhere else again this summer? (Parents don’t usually send kids the same place twice in a row)

Look, I have some advice that’s gonna suck but I think you should hear it. You need to know before you go to the camp what sort of level/type the camp it is. 

There are ways to find out and i’m gonna list some here and just do as much research as you can (safely) because if you’re unprepared it will be difficult to leave if you need to.

So the camp has to find away of telling parents what it’s like without directly saying it. It’s often found in quotes.

Theres a big difference between “helping your child” and “healing your child” and “fixing your child”. 

Helping usually means giving quotes and bibles and doing straight kid activities (whatever that means).

Healing usually means a lot of churchy sessions, “explaining” what’s wrong with you, being more delicate

And then fixing means being absolute dickheads. 

There should also be a website somewhere, or a form or something that your parents had to sign. Sometimes that can be over an email or sometimes it’s a letter. It’s just another way for the camp to cover their asses. Whatever is written inside it should give a vague message about the danger level, how many things they want to cover themselves for.

Also- about recording the camp. If you do decide to (no pressure, always prioritise your safety), focus on filming the other kids around you. If your phone is caught or found, if the videos start of silly with other kids in (as long as they know the risk of being caught with a phone too), it’s unlikely someone will scroll through all the videos, which will mean even if they’re deleted, you won’t rise too much suspicion. 

You can also hide videos in other places, like take a video you have and put it in a draft on your tumblr account, and then delete it from your phone. That can be done on Insta too. It does require internet but I assume you have mobile data.

Also camps without phones will still have wifi for adults, sometimes this is free wifi. If it is, don’t use it (if possible).

Also, sometimes the location of the camp on fliers won’t be the real location. For example, it might be the location of the church you go to, but the place you sleep might be one road over, so stay awake. Keep an eye on road names if you move from the location your parents dropped you off at (in case someone needs to come get you, and then can’t find you). 

It is illegal to say that being queer kids can be “fixed”. It’s against the law for camps to do this. Conversion therapy is illegal and wrong. Morally wrong and literally wrong. Not a thing. Doesn’t work. Total fucking bullshit.

And be careful. I know there’s a temptation to bring a weapon (like a knife) with you to these places, and it makes sense. But these kids have been through a lot, like you, and can be really depressed and have mental health issues. And you don’t want a kid to do something bad to themselves with a knife you brought with you to the camp. 

(Cas here: just remember if that ever happens, it's NOT your fault)

Just think it through. 

And be careful who you talk to, some of these kids believe the stuff they’re told. It’s not their fault but don’t assume everyone will agree with you about the situation. 

I don’t want to get too involved, I understand this is an overwhelming thing and reaching out just to talk about it was so brave. If you’d like I can ask my friend, who’s been to places like that, if there’s any personal advise she can give.  Or not, either way is fine. 

And finally, the area I grew up in had a terrible social services place nearby, and when you called the number for social services that school gave you, they’d just send someone from there. There was a kid I used to know who called social services on his family and the guy who showed up was friends with his dad. 

Idk if you have good social services or not but do some research first if you can ❤️

(Cas again: let me know if you want me to reach out to this anon to ask any questions or to get info from their friend! We support you <3)

[electrosweaters-arts]

Question!

Is Victor in the cryptid college universe? What’s he like, if he is?

Victor IS in CC! In fact, he's already appeared in two pages during the prologue

He's kinda a silly little guy but I'm going to PREFACE real quick by saying: Victor in CC is probably the MOST canon-divergent in terms of personality you're gonna get in CC, at least depending on your interpretations of the OG book characters, but he's pretty different from how either of us actually view him in the book.

CC Victor isn't an exactly an evil mad scientist trope or anything (being a mad scientist in CC is basically like being a mathletes nerd but a bunch of you keep dropping random children off at other peoples houses) but he's just a bit of a general asshole, SPECIFICALLY because placing him in a modern college where EVERYONE is a monster changes who the character is a Lot. A lot of his base traits come from the book, but amplified as a parody like we do with all the CC characters (so yes he does get tropey on purpose) + some changes based on how being in a monster college changes his and the creature's story.

While not uncommon for mad scientists in this universe, he's pretty self-centered, he believes himself to be the superior scientist of his class and can often be rude and dismissive of other students' work. (Though he IS actually incredibly good at what he does, he's top 3 in the class and would most likely be #1 if Griffin didn't have a grading bias towards experiments that can help him with world domination)

(going to be using some LOVELY sketches from @internetwerewolf now <3 theyre the person currently drawing episode 1 of CC <3)

Also, before I forget to mention! CC victor is gay and autistic and both he AND both of the creatures have chronic illnesses that leave them with a lot of joint pain. Their illnesses are based off my own so since *I* don't have a medical diagnosis for my joint issues I can't put an exact name to what they have but ???? maybe Fibromyalgia? again, can't put a name to it but their joints are stiff and HURTY. Adam and Victor's symptoms usually manifest in more invisible ways, from time to time they will need a mobility aid of some sort but most days they get by with painkillers and compression-wear. (Mary almost always uses a crutch or a cane and from time to time will use a wheelchair)

And oh right, the creatures! Let's talk about the creatures, I'd say they're pretty important to Victor's character, wouldn't you? (^another @internetwerewolf doodle of Adam and Mary at Victor's dissertation)

Starting with Adam, Victor made Adam in his first semester of Freshman year at CCU (if you don't know, the school Oracle acts as the head of admissions for the school and is particularly in charge of inviting new mad scientists to the school, which is why characters like Victor or Jekyll were accepted and allowed to know about monsters before having made their experiments themselves, the Oracle knew that they would make them eventually) his reasons for creating and then abandoning the creature are mostly the same as in the book, the death of his mother gave him a fascination with restoring life to the dead but once he actually gave life to the creature he was horrified an ran out on it. Adam was left in Victor's dorm room alone for about 3 weeks before being found by an RA and due to school policy on mad science experiments he was given free room and board for the course of his college degree, he was also taught english directly from classes at the school and found a copy of Paradise Lost among Victor's old things, which gave him the idea for the name Adam.

Adam never actually killed anyone in CC, but he DID ask Victor to make him a family member. He was incredibly lonely from being unable to connect with any of the other students and wanted someone like him, Victor obliged before he and Adam got into an argument which ended with him partially destroying the other creature and leaving Adam to do the rest of the reanimating work himself. (This is why Mary is not quite made right, the stitching on her limbs is very loose and she's missing an eye)

The creatures' and Victor's overall relationship is rocky at BEST, most days they can't STAND each other and squabble any time they pass each other in the halls. Though Victor's family is all still alive AND Adam got his second creature so from time to time they can get along, if a topic in interesting enough for both of them Adam and Victor can hold a conversation for a few hours, and they will sometimes help Victor out if provided a good enough reason to. Mary's less likely to talk to Victor but that's mostly because she just...doesn't like talking to people. They treat him like a shitty dad, and as seen in the prologue they DO like to rough him up a bit from time to time for fun but they wouldn't ever really want to KILL him. (Hyde would. Hyde wants to kill him. Adam has to hold him back from it.)

This was WAY longer than I expected, kinda incoherent, feel free to ask any follow up questions if you'd like! I LOVE talkin about these guys :3