#the first one is Sufficiently Advanced Magic

[lovelylovelyartist]

Reading Arcane Ascension Series again and uuuuuugh my children, my sweet sweet traumatized children, I just want to wrap each of the characters up in soft blankets and yell at any adult that tries to talk them into life threatening quest shit, "THEYRE 17, LET THEM BE KIDS FOR A LIL LONGER, FFS"

[vixensdungeon]

Alright, time to talk about one of the hot button issues in D&D today: skills, and how they've evolved over the 50-year lifespan of the game. We'll start, of course, from the beginning.

Dungeons & Dragons (1974)

So there actually isn't a skill system here. But the primordial origins are there, in the various neat little procedures of adventuring. Firstly there are languages. Humans know the "common tongue," which at this point isn't a single language, it just refers to the local Lingua Franca. I think all non-human player characters are assumed to be in 20% of other creatures who speak the language along with their own one. You also know an alignment language (Lawful, Chaotic, or Neutral), and one additional creature language for every point of Intelligence above 10.

NPC reactions. This is rolled on a simple 2d6 table for recruiting hirelings. Another 2d6 table is for monster reactions.

Surprise rolls. There are no stealth or perception skills, and adventurers are simply assumed to be sneaking around while in dungeons, with surprise rolled when monsters are encountered.

Doors can be listened at and secret doors found, with simple d6 rolls.

There's also a chance of getting lost in the wilderness, which sort of implies a general ability to not do so in most situations.

And that's basically it! You can already see several different skills we know today forming in the primordial soup.

But you feel like something is missing, right? Ah, of course! We must take a little detour to

Greyhawk (1975)

Did you know that in the original game, the only classes were fighting man, magic-user, and cleric? That's right, the now classic thief would not be introduced until the first supplement! And with them came for the first time actual named skills.

Thieves could open locks, remove traps, listen for noise, move silently, pick pockets, and hide in shadows. Additionally they could read languages, treasure maps, and even magical scrolls at higher levels.

Now, these skills are only for thieves, so what are other characters to do? Well for most of them, nothing. It simply is not a fighter's job to pick pockets, or a cleric's job to open a lock. Certainly an item can be forcefully taken from an NPC, and a door bashed open, so they are not completely helpless in these tasks. But the thief simply excels at doing such things with superior ability and grace. And of course any character can hear noises behind doors, thieves are simply better at it. Moving silently and hiding are two slightly odd skills, as they overlap with surprise rolls but don't interact with them. It can be assumed that a thief moving silently can scout ahead and report back without actually encountering the monsters they find, and a hiding thief can let wandering monsters pass by even when there isn't sufficient cover (as only shadows are needed, other characters can obviously still hide behind cover if they are aware of the need to do so). Other characters can also climb using ropes and other tools, but won't be able to climb sheer surfaces unaided like thieves can, so again the thief can simply do something general in a superior manner.

There are many classes with their own skills to be found in various magazines, but I'm not going to dig through them. So let the totality of original D&D skills be the above.

Next time: we get Advanced

[dduane]

The first part of that last message got me curious -- given how long-running of a series YW is, how do you keep track of All That when writing a new entry? Copious amounts of notes? Re-reading the entire series backlog? Keeping a fully-functioning simulation of the entire YW universe running in your head with perfect accuracy? (only mostly joking with that last one)

And somewhat-relatedly, did you have any plan or idea when you started for how long YW would run? Or was it more of a "I'll keep writing about this universe until it stops churning out ideas," type of thing and that point just (very thankfully!) hasn't happened yet? I know for per-book purposes you're a proponent of outlining (I swear I'll try writing to one one day Q_Q) but do you also apply that to a series as a whole?

Let me take this backwards, as it may make more sense that way.

Particularly when doing series work, outlining is more vital than usual for me. (Which is saying a lot.) Some of the most basic reasons for this are laid out over here.

The simplest one, though, for series outlining, is logistical. Without having achieved a sense well in advance of what events (or effects of events) are going to be most formative or important (or both) for the characters in a series, you won't have allowed yourself time to think about them enough. And to fail to spend enough time on this is to cheat both yourself and the books in the series. (And your readership.)

If you're smart, you learn very early on that attempting to save time by shortchanging or omitting the planning stages is potentially profoundly destructive. You need to have a plan... and you need not to let anyone make you ashamed of needing one. Putting off your detailed character-interaction and event planning in the name of some magically occurring fit of inspiration, or theoretical bid toward creative spontaneity, will serve neither you nor your creation. You can throw "Hail Mary" passes all you like... but you'd better be damn sure there'll be someone in the end zone to receive. ...If not Herself.

...And just in case you're worried, your initial plans can be really loose! They don't have to jump out of your head full-formed like some local war goddess after somebody hits her dad in the head with an axe. The plan for the Middle Kingdoms books—after The Door Into Fire dumped me gasping by the side of the road and left me a few minutes to breathe—was nothing more than "Now that his boyfriend's finally upped the ante beyond all expectations, Freelorn finally gets off his feckless Would-Be Robin Hood shit and gets to work becoming king." I then spent the next decade thinking purposefully about how that was going to happen, and writing the second book in the series—while sufficiently working out the fine details of the climax (and beyond) to then be able to get busy executing the third book. Even though there was a change of publishers between the beginning of that series and the end of it, the basic dead-simple MK plan from a very early stage quickly became detailed and robust enough (because the series was short enough) to withstand the change. Not least because I'd been thinking about it in a general way since the early 1970s... and continue to do so, pretty much daily. The Door Into Starlight is still hanging fire...

YW has been a different story—quite literally—because the only plan extant at the start of things was, "Everybody slowly gets older (and slowly closer)." I always knew there were going to be more than the original three: there was way too much interesting ground to cover to just stop with those. (I've never yet succeeded in finding out who started the rumor that there were only going to be three books. Over time it's become one of those things you just shrug at and move on.)

(Adding a break here, because this does go on a bit. Caution: contains publishing skullduggery, plans ganging aft agley, approximate word counts, software recommendations, and value judgments.)

("Now wait just one minute. 'Feckless would-be Robin Hood shit'? Can she just say that??")

The circumstances surrounding the writing of Deep Wizardry and High Wizardry, though, made it plain to me that I was not going to be at the then-publisher (Dell) all that much longer. By the time HW came out, they were already starting to pull away from midlist books and authors in order to spend that part of the budget on best-sellers... so it became plain to me that attempting to construct a long arc with/at that publisher would have been folly. Because who could be sure what was going to happen next, and blow everything I'd built to smithereens?

Sure enough, when I finished A Wizard Abroad, Dell declined to pick it up (even though the books had been selling steadily and increasingly strongly in paperback). This annoying validation of my concerns—and my shiny new agent's—made it plain to me that further books in the series were going to need to be thematically driven, rather than mostly character-event-driven, and almost entirely capable of being taken as standalones. Any long arc was going to have to be one that could be suspended, or reworked, with little warning. Because what happens to you once, in publishing, doesn't at all mean you're immune to it after that.

It wasn't until the YW books were picked up by Harcourt in the mid-90s, with a strong editorial team behind them, that I felt confident enough to start building longer-arc material into the books, beginning with the arc that kicks off in The Wizard's Dilemma and more or less completes in Wizard's Holiday and Wizards At War. There is a secondary (and I assume, generally less obvious) arc that picks up material still unhandled in the "War Arc," and deals with it in A Wizard of Mars and Games Wizards Play. But plans for those stories' management were already nailed down in electrons as soon as 2001, because I had made some early choices about where I was going with the characters and their situations; and as new books came out, my editors agreed with me that the choices had been sound, and should remain.

I'll say this only because I've said it before: there is one piece of business planted in So You Want To Be A Wizard that has never been explicitly dealt with/followed up on in any of the books, and is at the core of YW #11. For the moment, it's safest merely to say that I do not willingly leave loose ends hanging. Beyond that, I'll leave you all to your own deductions.

...Now. How do I keep track of all this stuff? (The urge to mutter "With great difficulty" and run off into the wings is strong. But never mind.) :)

The question's fair, as there's a million-plus words' worth of it in the series at the moment. ...Mostly my guide remains the books themselves, in ebook form (in their NME versions. If I need to, I refer back to the traditionally published versions as necessary). I normally have a general memory of where a given event happens or where a given issue comes up for handling. I then pull that copy of the ebook(s) in question, and do a search on various useful target phrases until I find what I'm after, and where it leads.

For new work, or stuff not yet committed to what passes for canon, I do have lots of notes. Some of them are actually out in public, at the currently-being-revised Errantry Concordance (though they're not in any form that anyone but me will recognize). Others are tucked away in the notes sections of pertinent Scrivener files—this being one of the most valuable things about Scrivener, as far as I'm concerned: the ability to store project notes in the project itself as opposed to "all over the damn place." Others yet are in my iPad, as either typing or dictation, and get transferred to other files/formats as necessary.

But the very first thing that happens, when a new work comes into train, is an outline. Sometimes a hilariously simple one, sometimes one with more detail in the middle than at the beginning or the end. Doesn't matter what shape it starts in. All notes, scraps, prose chunks, random thoughts, and midnight cogitations, get slotted into place in this until it's ready to be organized and sent off to an editor. And this outline—no matter how fragmentary or how polished—remains ready to hand at all times until I've finished with correcting the book's ARC and am looking at the release date.

And then I zip it up and put it away where I can find it later if I need to... because some other plan, still in the building stages, may need something in that one that never happened, but now has its chance. Because in YW, as everywhere else in my work, it's so often about the things that have always almost happened... until they do.

...Anyway: HTH!

[transmutationisms]

being reductive here but i do think the covid pandemic has & continues to expose a very specific strain of techno-optimistic or utopian thinking wrt medical technologies in particular---this idea that you can simply solve a massive socio-technical problem (disease spread) through a solely technical intervention that thus requires no input or cooperation from the average person besides a vague sort of 'pro-science' stance. you see this first with the crowd who thought the 'post-vaccine world' was one in which things ought to immediately 'get back to normal' but you also see it with those who seem to believe that eg a risky recreational event (parties, bars, &c) would be magically transformed in a binary manner into a wholly 'safe' one if only people were to wear masks. in this sort of politics there is no real understanding of risk as being along a spectrum or varying according to numerous factors including people's social behaviours; instead it is a technical problem solved instantly by a singular technical intervention. there's no need then to engage in larger and messier conversations about things like capitalist de/valuation of biopower, or disabled people's right or ability to participate in society. you sidestep the whole issue because you have applied the right technical means to simply dispense with the political problem. obligatory i wear masks when i have to be in public and i am boosted and blah blah but i'm under no illusion this means i can't get or spread covid (or other diseases). but more to my point here, i think this mode of thinking has dangerous consequences for all manner of social theorising that's simply answered with a lazy appeal to technological 'development' or advance---assumed to be something we can magic away if we throw enough money at pharma companies or weapons manufacturers or whoever else. what this ultimately does is stifle political consciousness and bolster the power and epistemological authority granted to institutions tasked with producing and protecting hegemonic forms. and my point here is not 'anti-science' or techno-pessimistic either; again, i am profoundly grateful for many a technological intervention into my life and i will continue to avail myself of them, including medtech. however the fantasy that problems of political and social forms and arrangements can be solved by sufficiently advanced technology is both foolish and dangerous.

[star-lights-up]

I'm having thoughts again (it's a very dangerous thing, thinking is): Cherik matilda au, with Jean as matilda. Honestly, it'd probably be a jean-centric fic, background cherik, because i mean miss honey doesn't have a love interest in the original lol. (Oh, right, Charles = miss honey. Erik also kind of = miss honey. they're sharing the role.)

ALSO i'm basing this on the book and the original movie, not the musical and musical movies. I love all incarnations of matilda but I am too tired to work in the whole premonition story thing.

So Jean is just chilling. She's like two years old and already she can cook and clean and pretty much be self sufficient. Her parents are self-absorbed assholes who don't really pay her any mind, and her brother is a little shit who's older than her and never home anyways.

She goes to the library, and she reads. She expands her horizons. She learns. She develops a yearning to see the world outside of her lonely little life -- she may be self-sufficient, but it doesn't mean she doesn't want any friends.

Now, when she's six, she tells her parents that she really should've started school already, and her dad makes a deal with this terrifying man to send her off to Hellfire Elementary (sounds like a great place for kids, amiright?)

There she meets Ororo, who's funny and nice, and then there's Logan, this older kid who's absolutely TERRIFYING (at least he thinks he is, jean's calling his bs). He warns them about the headmaster -- Shaw. The truly terrifying one.

Shaw in this isn't really the kevin bacon shaw. He's like if shaw lost his fucking marbles and became a really buff lunatic. He throws a girl wearing her hair in pigtails over the fence. It's insane.

Then Jean goes to her class. The first years have two teachers -- Mr. Lehnsherr and Mr. Xavier, who tells them just to call him Charles as long as Shaw's not around.

The classroom is kind of amazing. They've got art by students hanging everywhere and cute little posters and vases of wildflowers, the doors opened to the school grounds and filtering in the last of the warm summer air. To Jean, it feels magical. She's finally at school. She finally feels like she's going to get to be in the world. She chats with Ororo and some kid named Scott before the bell rings.

(Now for teaching duo cherik! I'm thinking for them, this is an established relationship fic. )

They've both been hurt by shaw (more on that later) to the point where they've become more muted versions of their personalities.

Charles is kind, as he always is, but in this he's very soft-spoken and stuff. Even as he smiles warmly at the kids, checking on the girl with the pigtails, Jean notices this deep sadness in his eyes.

And then there's Erik. He's quiet, very matter-of-fact when he does speak up, methodical. He's very gentle with all of the children, though, and Jean sees him tracking Charles with his eyes, as though he's sure something awful will happen to him as soon as he lets him out of his sight. Again, his eyes hold some deep sadness, some hidden pain.

As the lessons begin, they're shocked by Jean. Her reading, her writing. Her incredible math abilities.

( found this cute little line from the original book, and i wanted to adapt it (very erik-core):

"It's not fair," Ororo says, "How can she do it and we can't?"

"Don't worry, Ororo, you'll soon catch up," Mr. Lehnsherr says, lying through his teeth. )

After class is over, Charles wants to talk to Shaw, try and get Jean in a more advanced grade. Erik doesn't want him to go. They go together, and Shaw pretty much yells at them and threatens them until they leave.

They decide to think of another way to go -- they can't have jean just sitting in class, learning how to spell r-a-t when she's read shakespeare already.

Back at home, for another week or so, Jean's life continues much the same as it always does. Her parents: the assholes. Then her father takes her and her brother into work one day, telling his son he needs to learn the family trade. Jean's just there.

He shows them all sorts of illegal things he does to the cars before he sells them -- sawdust in the engine, running the miles backwards until the car seems barely used. It's not legal. Worse, it's not safe.

Jean speaks out and gets yelled at.

So she finds some superglue and glues his stupid hat to his head the next day. And so starts her rebellion.

Charles and Erik decide that perhaps it's best to speak to Jean's parents directly. Cue creepy CGI cherik from the last stand. No, no, I'm kidding. They just show up there, try to talk to the greys, who really aren't having it, and before they leave Erik sneaks a book behind a coat rack, Jean smiling at him from where she's hidden on the stairwell, having listened to the whole thing.

Jean plays another prank on her parents for treating her teachers so bad (blabbermouth parrot in the chimney. Mrs. Grey is convinced they've got a ghost).

Meanwhile, at school, Charles and Mr. Lehnsherr give her all these workbooks with more difficult math and language and science, apologizing that they can't instruct her directly or get her into a more advanced class but promising to help if she has any questions (she doesn't).

Anyways. Then we get to the interesting part.

It's been a while, and Jean's seen the horrors of Shaw. He made a boy eat a whole cake in front of the school. he throws kids out windows. And there's this terrible thing called the chokey.

Shaw comes into their classroom to teach his monthly class -- Charles and Mr. Lehnsherr quickly hiding all the art and decorations in the room.

Ororo sneaks a newt into shaw's water. Pandemonium breaks out. Shaw starts targeting poor scott, of all people, who's not capable of breaking a rule.

Something in Jean snaps. And the glass tips over, sending the newt right onto shaw and shaw right out of their classroom.

After class, she explains it to Charles and Mr. Lehnsherr. She shows them what she can do. With just a little bit of anger, she can push the glass over.

The two teachers glance at each other (after being quite shocked, of course), then Charles asks if she'd like to have tea, and talk about this more, if her parents wouldn't mind.

Jean knows that they most certainly don't care where she is, and agrees.

Charles and Mr. Lehnsherr bring her to a small cottage, surrounded by wildflowers. The walls are whitewashed. There are two little windows. Charles spreads cheap margarine on the toast. Mr. Lehnsherr pulls two chipped mugs out -- there doesn't appear to be a third. The kitchen is just a shelf, really, with a little portable stove.

Charles asks Jean if she'd be willing to get them some water from the well out back. She has a wonderful time doing so, never having drawn from a well before.

She and Charles have tea and toast, sitting on the crates that are the only furniture in the whole of the tiny cottage. Mr. Lehnsherr sits cross-legged on the floor, leaning against Charles's crate a little and not eating or drinking anything.

Jean, as a small child -- because, yes, no matter how smart and independent she is, she's still a small child -- asks a few questions that might be a little too personal, inquiring about just how poor their salaries are to live like this.

"Why shouldn't you ask?" Charles says, after Jean apologizes. "You were bound to ask in the end. You are much to bright to not have wondered. Perhaps... Perhaps we even wanted you to ask."

Erik nods his head, saying his solemn voice, "You're our first visitor, after all."

Quietly, a little sadly, Charles begins to tell Jean a story. He once lived in a large brick house in town. His mother passed when he was born, and his father was absent until he died, leaving him in the care of an uncle. The uncle brought with him a ward, Erik.

The uncle was an unkind man. He forced them to work around the clock, doing the household chores and the cooking and anything else he could think of, like they were servants and not young children. He would beat them if they disobeyed -- and even when they didn't.

They managed to go to the teacher's college about forty minutes away when they both turned eighteen. They could've gone to university -- but the evil man wouldn't allow it.

"How did you get away?" Jean asks, equally riveted and in deep sympathy for her kind teachers.

They tell a story of being forced to sign away their salaries to the uncle, since apparently they "owed him thousands" for being just barely fed and clothed for ten years. With the little that they got to keep, it seemed they would never get a place of their own...

But Mr. Lehnsherr, on his early morning walks, stumbled into a small, empty cottage. He went to find out who owned it, and the farmer, after insisting he didn't want to live there, agreed to rent it out for ten pence a month.

Charles and Mr. Lehnsherr (who, at a point, sighed and told Jean just to call him Erik since they're not at school) quietly packed their things, informed the evil man that they'd rented a house, and rushed out the door.

While Jean is happy for their triumph, she's aghast of the idea of the evil man still living in Charles's old home. He says that his father's will was apparently destroyed ("no prizes for guessing who," Jean says, and Erik huffs a laugh) and his uncle produced a piece of paper saying the house was to go to him -- Charles is sure it was counterfeit, but there's nothing he can do.

"He still owns my family property a town over, too," Erik says quietly. "Won in much the same fashion." His hands are balled into fists, his face mournful and angry. He doesn't elaborate, and Jean and Charles are smart enough not to push.

Jean asks who the evil man is.

With a glance at his partner, Charles says the name "Shaw."

After the initial shock, the conversation changes, and Jean eventually excuses herself to go home. Charles and Erik apologize for keeping her so late, walking her to the end of the dirt road and back to the sidewalk.

Before they part, Jean asks a few questions: what did Charles's father call him before he passed? Charlie. He hated it. What did charles and Erik's parents call Shaw? Sebastian. His first name. And what did he call their parents? Brian, Charles answers. ...Edie, Erik whispers after a moment of hesitation.

Jean practices her new gift at home. It's not long until she can lift things at whim, pointing at them or staring at them or just thinking of it. She plots. She plans. She practices what's needed for her plots and her plans.

The next time Shaw comes into their classroom, he's startled by the whiteboard chalk floating into the air, beginning to write a message:

Sebastian, give my Charlie back his house. Give him and Erik their wages. Give Erik his land. Then get out of here. If you don't, we will get you. We will get you like you got us. We are watching you, Sebastian.

There is a great commotion as Shaw passes out on the floor in shock. He's carted out of the school. He leaves the brick house within a day. Reportedly, Brian Xavier's will turns up. Charles and Erik move into the great house. Charles is appointed headmaster of the newly christened "Big Friendly School." (Note: this is taken from the source material. I don't think charles would name something after himself in this au tbh). Jean is a welcome visitor anytime.

Then, one day, arriving back from the brick house in the evening, she finds her parents packing up the car. They're moving to spain, they say. Her father has been caught, which they don't say, but is clear.

Jean runs all the way back to Charles and Erik's house. Jean begs them to let her stay -- she doesn't want to leave, and she certainly doesn't want to be trapped with her parents forever in a foreign country.

Charles and Erik come with her back to her house. She takes some adoption papers out, which, funnily enough, she's had since she was tall enough to use the copier at the library! Boss move, Jean.

her parents don't fucking care, so they sign the papers. Charles and Erik are pretty much about to cry. They're parents, now, something they never thought they could be. They hug Jean, something her own parents never did, and don't bother to watch them leave.

Now, they all live in the big brick house together, and it's a house full of reading and laughter and life, all three of them, daughter and her fathers, finding a kind of happiness they never thought they'd be able to have.

and that's it. Why did I spend two hours writing this. 😂

[labelleizzy]

You have to understand what is happening on a mythic level, okay? What we have here is a relatively rare phenomenon: advance warning of an imposed culture change. It is critical to understand what the people who are going to be in charge believe to be true.

As you read this, remember mighty Achilles had a heel.

Everyone has a heroic self, and among the leadermen a coming they are strong and smart and capable; unafraid and fearless, they know better than anyone else how things should be done. The heroic challenge - they have been unjustly prevented from setting things right by a thorny poison wall. Through heroic exertion - generally the use of violence, trickery, and expendable companions - victory is achieved. The wall is severed and the hero prevails. The hero is rewarded with buxom adoration, many children, some degree of material success and the regard of the lesser, non-heroic people.

For thorny poison wall, understand laws, regulation, and the acknowledgement of universal human rights.

Within the myth, the hero in confidently invincible. Outside of the myth, confidence does not guarantee success. This can be quite a shock to the system. It is important to push back. The hero may still kill their opponents, but eventually someone will get him. Even immortals die from time to time; it's the rebirth thing that saves their ass.

Why is it so important to this hero to control fertility is because on a very deep primal level they understand it's their only route to divinity. As much as they value innovative accomplishment - and heroes by definition are surrounded by novelty, they are always the first in a strange land - they cannot through their own efforts ascend to being any greater than they are. Women, specifically via the provision of children, make heroes into better men, at a minimum, and via sufficiently obedient behaviors, into the closest to Godhood as they're going to get.

When you say but that's gender essentialism, let me clarify that that's exactly the point. The existential threat inherent in independent women is the disruption of the heroic path to divinity. They may say it is a mission from God, but in fact, it is a mission to be God.

And how do we defeat would be Gods? We don't believe in them. We certainly don't treat them with the fear and dread they desire. There is no respect or veneration due. That thorny, poison wall will hold. They that hold it may bleed, but the wall will hold. It may get cut but as long as one thorn remains, it will grow back. Regulations and laws are written in blood. They are sacred words in their own way. But they must, like all magic words, be used, guarded, and protected.

You may not live long, with what's coming. But in myth, you live forever. Their way of being a hero is not the only way. And somebody has to save our ass.

If you were waiting on a call, this is it.

(author requests anonymity)

[elodieunderglass]

Delicious in Dungeon and Weasel Heart in Defiance are wonderful (as is the Sharpe story; my inner teenage crush on Sgt Harper was immediately rekindled).

My ask is a silly one. I'm writing a story where a spell/knot of spells/magical algorithm briefly posessess a weasel. That's actually pretty normal in my setting -- but normal doesn't make a good story. The spells should dissipate after their task is done; instead of fading away it retains the weasel-shape and weasel-spirit (not the weasel itself; it goes home just fine) and becomes Something Else. (Her name is "I.")

The ask: what advice would Bee offer to the newly enweaseled? (Provided she's willing to advise without hire, of course. Don't want to cause any issues with the union.)

(In reference to the absurd crop of daemon AUs I’ve randomly written this year, and Bee the least weasel from Weasel Heart / His Delicious Materials)

Thank you so much! I love this!

Bee does have a secret weakness for silly and trashy fiction, according to a joke scene in HDM that I’ll never probably be able to fit in anywhere, so she would be super into The Assassins of Thasalon by Lois McMaster Bujold. This is part of the Penric and Desdemona series, in which wild demons (scraps of elemental chaos) sometimes possess animals and imprint on them, picking up their intelligence; after passing through human hosts they become humanised. In the setting, a person who catches a sufficiently advanced/humanised demon becomes a sorcerer and can do chaos magic. In Assassins the characters meet someone who has taken on a wild new weasel demon. So her first advice would be to passionately insist that your weasel ought to pick up this story, because it’s Representation. She would REALLY like to be part of a mustelid book club. Would “I” like to be in the book club with her -

(This is where she slightly diverges from her human, who, to Bee’s annoyance, in the belief that it would help him avoid a conversation, has claimed in front of witnesses that he “couldn’t read.”)

For more advice she offers VERY reasonable retainer! daily rates payable in advance.

[shadowgast-recs-weekly]

Science Fiction: A Shadowgast Rec List

This week, we have science fiction! Check under the cut for 7 fics that include a lot of space and other sci-fi tropes, and don't forget to comment and kudos if you like them!

The Schwarzschild Solution by dawl_and_dapple (13650, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

A series of meetings between Caleb and Essek across the galaxy.

Reccer says: Loved the build between them and the picture of the universe they live in

A Tapestry of Stars by Cinderstorm (127981, Not Rated) Reccer's Content Notes: Choose Not to Warn, Rape/Non-con, Dubcon/Consensual Non Consent, Domestic Abuse, WIP

Caleb and Essek end up in a political arranged marriage - in space!

Reccer says: There's so much politics and intrigue and feelings!

into the desert of your pitiless faith by burningdarkfire (24913, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Essek is a newly-arrived ambassador in Rexxentrum, Beauregard is his assigned cultural liaison, and Caleb is the consecuted soul at the back of his mind. Empires and Dynasties do not serve: they consume. (A Memory called Empire AU)

Reccer says: So lyrical, and fascinating - you don't need to be familiar with A Memory Called Empire to read it, but reading this fic might make you want to read the novel, and that's a double win in my opinion.

calling occupants of interplanetary craft by principessa (1273, General) Reccer's Content Notes: None

Essek Thelyss, the sole Vulcan on the USS Eden Horizon, would quite like to be left to his experiments, and for the rest of the crew to stop calling his intellectual discussions with Commander Widogast 'weird science flirt lunch dates.'

Reccer says: It's a lot of fun!

you must first invent the universe by renquise (3466, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

The Mighty Nein are getting ready for a big fight. Caleb can't seem to sleep while they wait, so he ends up talking with the ship instead.

Reccer says: Absolutely fascinating world building!!

such a constellation by Chrome (6362, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Exhausted and disillusioned with Starfleet in the aftermath of the destruction of Romulus and the loss of his friend, Romulan maybe-spy Essek Thelyss, Caleb Widogast retires to his parent's farm in Germany with the intent to view the stars through a telescope from now on. But an unexpected arrival changes everything, and Caleb discovers that the wider universe may not quite be done with him yet.

Reccer says: This is a fabulous fusion that encapsulates the wizards so perfectly in a different story. Worth every second of the read!

Sufficiently Advanced Magic by SaltCore (5880, General) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Have you ever wondered what would happen if Caleb and Essek met Spock, Captain Kirk and the protagonists of the Locked Tomb series? No? Me neither, but I sure am glad I found out!

Reccer says: For one, the origin story of this fic is uniquely wholesome - it came to be as a result of all three pairs reaching the finale of a shipping tumblr poll, to extend an olive branch and honour the ships' place in their fandoms' hearts. Secondly, it's SO funny. There's humour in every little detail and it gives me a Douglas Adams vibe. The characters' voices in their POVs are distinct and endearing too. I keep returning to it when I need my spirits lifted.

Aeor is for Lovers is an 18+ Shadowgast Discord server. The above fanfic recommendations were pulled from our community for this weekly event. All fics, unless otherwise specified, will primarily feature Shadowgast. Have any questions about what this is? Check out the FAQ! Next week, we’ll be back with Established Relationships!

[renguro]

My first dunmeshi OC, Pickpen who is very precious and close to my heart I'm really not certain what to type here other than uh explodes x1000 look at him if you think i haven't been putting out enough canon content it's his damn fault

(adventurers bible style profile writings under the cut if you wanna know more about him also you can ask--)

Raised within the confines of the dungeon, Pick has adapted to become an intensely clever and self-sufficient young man. Through a combination of actions to look trustworthy, and then breaking the favor he curries without the other person even realizing it, he lies and cheats his way through every interaction to get exactly what he wants. Though his actions make him look two-faced, this half-foot would argue it’s all for the sake of survival, and that he just happens to be better at it than everyone else. Though half-foots using magic is nearly unheard of, Pick is an extremely advanced magic user, weaving illusions to be somewhere one moment, and gone the next. Just how did he acquire these abilities…?

True Name: Pickpen Roys Age: 15 years old Race/Gender: Half-foot / Male Birthplace: Northern Central Continent Family: Father (deceased), Mother (deceased) Physique: Roughly 95cm / BMI 20 Likes: Everything he hasn’t had Dislikes: Rabbit, Mushrooms

[rhodes-knightwife]

Okay! So, first chapter - and cutscene chapter - of Path of Life! There's a lot there, so let's take it by characters, shall we?

Starting with Rhodes and the Abyss Hunters, I should preface this by saying I do not have the right context for this event. I have not played Under Tides, I have not played Stultifera Navis, and I have not played most of the main story. I know some things through the grapevine, but I am mostly in the dark. With all that said, while seeing Kal'tsit actually concerned for the Doctor's well-being made me feel like I woke up in some alien planet, hearing more about Skadi and Specter's lives before they became Bloodborne characters is delightful, as is seeing Laurentina post-treatment in a way I'd never seen firsthand. Gladiia is interesting enough so far, but without the context from previous events I can't comment on her much. This line was funny though:

When it comes to the Iberians, Irene and Jordi are quite fun, though I do know that I also lack context on their end. Their personalities are made clearer though, and Jordi's struggle is laid out plain and presented sympathetically; I do want to see him find himself in a meaningful way. And the buddy cop dynamic between Irene and Secunda promises to be fun, I appreciate Underflow's no-nonsense sort of attitude.

And speaking of, the main star of the show - Ægir itself. What a god damn introduction. I felt GENUINE fear when they picked up signatures from the SKY and we were greeted with this:

Seeing Ægir come in with such a show of force and a display of superior tech all in one sells perfectly everything they're about. Progress, yet also arrogance in a way that's so effortless it almost can't possibly be malicious! (Almost.) From the greco-roman names and the almost cyberpunk take on togas and tunics, they go HARD into being presented as superior, enlightened, and thus alien. Any sufficiently advanced tech may as well be magic... and not all magic feels like it's meant to be understood.

I have no idea if Clementia is a villain or not, but I truly hope she is, because if so she'd be one of my favorite kinds. The kind that in a sense, believes she truly knows best! She comes at you with a sword, yes, but also with open arms and a warm embrace... you almost can't believe she'd ever do anything to harm you.

(Almost.)

[comicaurora]

I know you done content on hard versus soft magic systems but what is your opinion on crunchy versus smooth?

I will use atla to explain.

Season one The power system is well defined but basic Air Water Earth Fire. Simple to understand very straightforward (smooth)

By the end of the legend of Korra, you have several sub-categories and completely new categories as well (crunchy)

ah, a greebled magic system

I like complicated "crunchy" yet rigidly-defined magic systems, because they give the creator a lot of stuff to play with while also giving them constraints to operate in that dictate a lot of what can and can't happen with the plot. The danger, of course, is in introducing a form of magic that actually makes no sense, or something that devalues other elements of the system because its impact wasn't fully reasoned out, or carving off a part of an existing magic chunk and making it inaccessible for unjustified reasons.

I also feel like sometimes the extra crunch of a magic system can betray a lack of creativity on the part of the creator - having to invent entirely new magics instead of considering new applications for the old ones.

Bloodbending? Lightning-bending as an advanced firebending technique? Combustion Man as a unique one-off assassin? That armless waterbender lady with a completely new martial arts style? Zaheer using airbending to kill the Earth Queen? Dope new applications of existing concepts that make the magic system feel large, fluid and powerful. These are extensions of existing concepts that feel logical, or at least understandable.

Airbenders Who Abandon All Earthly Connections Can Levitate Now? Weird and kind of retroactively disruptive that it never came up before.

By The Way Lavabending Is Its Own Special Weird Thing Now Like Metalbending Was? Feels like we needed to invent a reason for this sidelined character to matter.

There's a risk to carving off too many chunks of a magic system, I think. Avatar started simple: everything the heroes could do or figure out was an extension of first principles. Lightning is kinda like weird pure fire, so lightning-bending made sense as an advanced firebending technique with a big risk of blowing up in your face. Bloodbending is literally something any waterbender can do once they realize it's possible - the horror of it is that it's a forbidden technique that becomes impossibly easy just by knowing about it. Toph figuring out metalbending by virtue of having a completely unique and incredibly granular sense for the earth around her ALSO worked, because (a) "metal can't be bent" has been firmly established several times and is clearly common knowledge, and (b) she was clearly the first person who'd ever had that combination of skill and disability and she was building her style from the ground up.

By the Korra timeline, however, we start running into things like lavabending, which should absolutely not be its own weird thing. It's just rock. We've already seen Kyoshi bend lava. If I recall correctly, the show doesn't sufficiently explain why lavabending is a weird separate thing from earthbending, making it feel like a logical component of the earthbending powerset is being arbitrarily gated just to make an otherwise disregarded character Slightly Important by being able to do it.

Stuff like that makes the magic system feel less internally solid. "Why CAN'T this magic do [thing]" is an extremely important question for a worldbuilder to be able to answer, and an overly greebled and partitioned magic system often can't explain why magic X and magic Y are totally separate. Skills and techniques and personal preferences among casters are fine to explain why something may or may not be possible for someone, but "what magic can and can't do and WHY" is something that I think should be as firmly, logically coherent as possible.

[yellowocaballero]

'there's such a thing as too honest' sounds interesting to hear about <3

Yes!!! That's actually a Flash fic :D. There is an unmentioned and unposted "New Wave!Steph and Tim harrass Superman" fic, and this is the "New Wave!Steph and Tim harrass Flash" fic. I have an extremely specific vision of the Flash. This is my design.

I've never posted it because I wanted to post the Superman fic first and I never finished the Superman fic :). Someday tho!

I seriously have this whole internal idea and schema for Barry and Wally and this is just my excuse to write it. Wally and Linda's relationship is largely sourced from my other Wally story, which I'm still inordinarly fond of. I grew up in a fantastic Natural Science museum, and you can tell.

Un-copping characters under the cut. Yet again, this is my design.

“I have a secret to tell you.”

It was practically impossible to get the undivided attention of an assembly of elementary schoolers drunk off life, but the man standing behind the table at the front of the room managed it. Maybe it was the way he said it - soft but clearly audible, conspiratorial but welcoming. 

Or maybe it was the bow tie? The bow tie was hypnotic. Stephanie was hypnotized. 

With great relish, the man in the bow tie and white lab coat announced to the group, “I’m the king of Atlantis.” The group broke into giggles, and Bowtie affected a faux-hurt look. “What, don’t believe me? Don’t I have enough muscles?”

“Aquaman can talk to fish!” A third grader at the front volunteered imperiously. “And he controls water! He’s Jake’s favorite superhero.”

Next to her, a boy shoved her arm. “It’s the Flash, I said the Flash -”

“I’m pretty socially awkward around fish - but that coelacanth fossil in the Paleontology exhibit can talk and talk for days.” Bowtie held up his hands in faux-defeat. “I admit it, I’m not King Arthur. No long and flowing golden locks on me.” It was literally always so funny hearing people call him that. He couldn’t have picked a more on-the-nose landlubber name. “There’s one big difference between us, besides our stunning good looks: King Arthur controls water with magic. But I control water with science.”

The crowd rippled with incredulity. Next to Steph, Tim was still disinterestedly playing the new Link’s Awakening on his Gameboy Color. Tim always had his head ducked over some game or phone when they were on Batman business. He insisted it was part of his cover as Disaffected Teen ™, but Steph was pretty sure that he just completely failed to find a kid’s science museum demonstration interesting. 

On Steph’s other side, another slightly-too-old-for-this kid sat with a chemistry textbook on his lap. He was pretending to be fully engrossed in the textbook - which looked like it was for high schoolers and not a twelve year old - but Steph could see him sneak peeks up over the textbook every few minutes. Steph had to agree with him: there was something magnetic about Bowtie. It wasn’t just the charisma or sense of humor, either. There was something about him that drew you in. Steph had to presume it was his negative charge. 

“Let me guess: science and magic can’t do the same things, right? Dr. Fate, Zatanna Zatara, all those heroes - us normal people can never do something that cool, right?” Tim snorted softly. Bowtie continued setting up his experiment, taking a deflated balloon and using a hand pump to inflate it.  “But Superman doesn’t fly with magic. Superman flies because of his biology! With some special biology, some amazing science - anybody could be a Superman. Because, as Arthur C. Clarke said, ‘sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic’.”

“What about the Flash?” A kid cried. The other kids murmured in agreement. The kid sitting next to Steph jerked his head up to look at Bowtie, eyes shining. “Flash’s magic!”

Bowtie took the balloon off the pump, tying it neatly. He arched an eyebrow at the kid. “Really? The Flash’s given a few interviews where he says differently. We got any Flash fans in the audience?” The entire audience broke into the loudest claps and cheers of the night. Bowtie’s grin widened. “Mr. Popular. Last time I checked, he gave an interview to CCN explaining his powers. Anybody know what he said?” 

“That his only superpower is speed!” The kid said instantly. “He doesn’t have intangibility powers, like everyone’s saying - he just vibrates his atoms so fast that they can pass through solid surfaces! He can’t control the wind, either - he creates tornadoes and whirlwinds by spinning the air with centrifugal force!”

“Looks like we have a Flash mega-fan in the audience.” Bowtie grinned again, and the embarrassed kid ducked his head back into his textbook, cheeks as red as his hair. “The Flash goes pretty fast. We don’t actually know how fast - he’s never found his upper limit. But that’s not his real weapon. Without his real weapon, he’s just some guy who runs fast. Does anybody know the Flash’s real weapon?”

“Science,” the kid whispered worshipfully. 

In tattered chorus, the assembly of children cried, “Science!”

Bowtie laughed. “You got it. Who knows - with enough knowledge of science, maybe any of us could be the Flash!” Tim and Steph glanced at each other and rolled their eyes. Leaning against the wall behind them, seemingly engrossed in a newspaper, Bruce was undoubtedly losing respect for this man by the second. “Who here wants to learn a superpower now? Anybody?” The crowd went wild, and the man gave a little bow. “If the people demand it! Now, I need a volunteer from the audience. Jake, how about you?”

With impressive efficiency, Bowtie managed to rub a balloon on the heads of several enthusiastic children. Tim glanced at Steph out of the corner of his eye, and she shrugged in agreement. A long time ago, when he first took this job, he probably rubbed the balloon on his head himself. These days, that was probably a bit more dangerous…

“Take a look at the chalkboard behind me. You see it? This is a diagram of an atom. We have another class on the atom, so stay tuned for that if you’re interested. Now, the little guys flying in circles around the bigger part is called electrons. When we rubbed the balloons against our hair, we just collected up a bunch of electrons. And these electrons have a negative charge. Remember that, it’s important!”

Bowtie turned on the faucet in his desk, letting thin stream of water flow from the faucet into the little sink built into the desk. “This balloon’s like a magnet now. It’s full of negative charges, so it’s looking for something with a positive charge. And this water has just what it’s looking for. So let’s look carefully…”

Bowtie held the balloon next to the stream of water. Sure enough, the water began to bend towards the balloon. The kid next to Steph was paying full attention now, the pretense of a textbook left abandoned on his lap. Bowtie pulled the balloon further and further away, sending the water spreading out from the sink in a flowing ribbon that stretched out halfway along the table. 

The children ooh’d and aah’d. The kid next to Steph looked excited too, but Steph noticed that he looked a little confused. On Steph’s other side, Tim clicked his tongue. 

“That water’s stretching real far for some balloon static electricity, huh,” Tim muttered quietly.

“Yeah,” the kid said, as if Tim was remotely speaking to him. “I did this at home forever ago. The water only moves a few inches.” 

“Look at that,” Tim told Steph. “The water only moves a few inches.”

“He’s so cool,” the kid whispered. 

“Look at that,” Steph told Tim. “Bowtie’s so cool.”

“Bowtie?” the kid hissed, affronted. “He has a doctorate.”

“Dr. Bowtie,” Steph allowed. 

All three of them sat patiently through Dr. Bowtie’s explanation of static electricity. And Steph thought she was good with the kids who come through Dr. Leslie’s clinic. Dr. Bowtie made her look like a chump. With a few strategic jokes, some physical comedy, audience engagement, and the inherent mysticism of the bowtie, the kids were captured. Even the patient adults standing around the back wall were engrossed. Although Steph was pretty sure that the moms in the back were more interested in Dr. Bowtie’s pretty face. He was alright. Cass was prettier. Tim told her to stop saying that Cass was prettier than women, men, and the Grand Canyon, but it was true. 

They all clapped politely when he finished. The kid had gone back to his textbook, making careful annotations in the margins. A group of kids attacked Dr. Bowtie with sheer enthusiasm, which was pretty expected, but Steph saw plenty of adults walk up to him and shake his hand too. It was obvious to an expert in body language: even the adults admired Dr. Bowtie highly. Everybody around him looked at him with respect and awe. You could hardly tell just by looking at him joking around and adjusting his bowtie, but the humbleness was part of the mystique. 

But Steph was cheating. She already knew all about this guy. Uncle Clark had asked her very politely to stop putting together extensive dossiers on their targets, but Bruce had looked at him as if he was crazy. Steph had to agree with him. As if they would ever approach dangerous people without a background check? Uncle Clark had also asked them to stop calling them targets, which was slightly more fair. Uncle Clark had an overdeveloped rigamarole of kindness. It was the Kansas. In Gotham, stabbing you was a handshake.

Once the crowd thinned out, leaving Dr. Bowtie to clean up his station in preparation for the next group, Bruce finally rolled up his newspaper. Steph and Tim glanced at each other, but Bruce made a small hand signal as he walked towards the front. They quickly stood up and ambled in his wake, chatting meaninglessly about what five star restaurant they’d check out after this. The Central City Michelin situation was dire, but apparently there was a legendary burger place. Ohio was a desolate land.

Bruce stood on the other side of the table, waiting until Dr. Bowtie crouched down behind his desk before removing his baseball cap and sunglasses. He tossed them over his shoulder and let Stephanie catch them, stuffing them in her purse. 

“That was an awesome show,” Bruce announced. “Never seen anything like it. How long have you been doing this, Dr. Allen?”

“Please, it’s just Barry.” Barry stood up, holding a glass flask in one hand. “And it’s been -”

For one microsecond, Barry looked shocked. His hand twitched open. And just as quickly, his hand twitched closed and his expression smoothed out. Nice. Somehow disappointing. Steph loved the ‘holy shit, it’s Bruce Wayne!’ heart attack. Can’t you tamp down on the superspeed and drop the flask anyway? For the entertainment value?

“Just a few years,” Barry said smoothly. He looked at Steph and Tim, loitering behind Bruce in different levels of disaffectedness. “The show’s not really designed for high schoolers, but I hope you two got something out of it anyway! We have a show for teenage audiences later today.”

“I learned so much about electrons,” the girl who spent the last eighteen months swallowing forensic textbooks said solemnly. The boy who spent his thirteenth rotation around the sun making bombs gave him a thumbs up. “Bruce was the one who made us stop by, though.”

“I had no idea electrons were so interesting,” the med school dropout said earnestly. To be fair, he was a dropout.  He shook Barry’s hand firmly, before passing over a business card. Barry took the card, and his face twitched slightly when he looked at it. Another missed opportunity for shock. Sad! “The name’s Bruce Wayne. Would you mind lending me a bit of your time? I already talked it over with Ms. Landis - and you have a free hour before your next show, right?”

Slowly, Barry said, “Yes, I do. I’m sorry, Mr. Wayne, can I ask what this is about? Ms. Landis didn’t…mention this…to me.”

“Mention what?” 

The red headed kid popped up at Barry’s elbow, blinking in confusion between the four of them. Barry’s eye twitched again. Steph didn’t blame him - mostly because Tim’s dossiers were very thorough. 

“That I have a business meeting after the show.” Barry patted Wally on the back. The two looked nothing like each other, but there was some indefinable similarity anyway. “Wally, why don’t you catch up with Linda in the Exxon exhibit? I think I have some stuff to talk to Mr. Wayne about.”

Wally had never looked so wounded. “You said that you’d eat with Linda an’ me at the cafe after the show” He turned his righteous attention onto Bruce, who looked politely attentive. “If you wanna talk with my uncle then you gotta make an appointment.”

Barry’s face twitched again. “Mr. Wayne, this is my nephew Wally West. Wally, this is Bruce Wayne.” Wally still looked unimpressed. Tim looked a little incredulous that somebody in this world didn’t know who Bruce Wayne was, but Steph didn’t know how to break it to him that normal middle schoolers weren’t hip on other city’s billionaires. “You know how Linda’s parents work at a Wayne Industries biotech lab?” Wally nodded, uncertain of where he was going with this. “That’s Wayne.”

“He’s rich?” Wally looked at Bruce with new, appraising eyes. “So that’s what rich people look like…”

Bruce grinned at him, sticking his hands in his pockets. Barry looked a little like he wanted to die. “Sorry for stealing your uncle, kiddo. But what’s that book you got there? Isn’t that for high schoolers?”

Wally brightened, pulling out the textbook from underneath his elbow. Steph couldn’t help but be a little surprised - it was advanced high school Chemistry, for juniors and seniors. “I’m on the pressure and volume chapter! Uncle Barry’s been helping tutor me. Did you know about Avogadro’s Law? It’s the rule that equal volumes of gasses at the same temperature and pressure have the same amount of particles!”

“Wow,” Steph said, impressed. “I didn’t know what an atom was when I was your age.”

Wally lowered the textbook, squinting at her dubiously. He pointed at the chalkboard, which still had a well-drawn image of an atom on it. “Even little kids know about atoms, dude.”

Steph crossed her arms, amused despite herself. “Inner city Gotham doesn’t really have guys like your Uncle Barry. We’re all scienceless orphans.” 

“You caught me,” Tim said, seemingly bored. 

“That’s actually what I’m here to talk to your uncle about,” Bruce said lightly. “The Wayne Foundation’s thinking about expanding into science education outreach. We’re focusing on inner city Gothamite kids like Stephanie here - oh, Barry, this is my ward Tim Drake and his girlfriend Stephanie Brown, say hi -”

“I could do with less science, frankly,” Tim said. 

“You’re just still pissy that Mr. Freeze robbed us so many times.”

“I just think Batman and Robin could have done a better job catching him.”

“They did a great job -”

“Before he stole five hundred thousand dollar’s worth of tech and research.”

“But we’re looking at donating funds to free children’s programming at museums across the nation,” Bruce said beatifically. “I’m thinking about investing into this program, and your boss said that you were the real shining star of the department! I’d like to speak to someone passionate about the program, and apparently there’s nobody more dedicated than you, so if you have some time to chat…?”

Even Wally understood what that meant. In their endless quest to harass other superheroes, Bruce had sneak attacked another unsuspecting middle class suburbanite. Barry’s boss had officially thrown him into the lion pit of businessmen and put him in charge of securing hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding. Bruce said that this was his way of seeing how they operated under pressure. 

And Steph could already see that Barry was the coolest head she would ever meet. Which - duh. He was a total cheater. Anybody could be chill if they had thirty internal minutes to chill out. Barry obviously took a few mental minutes to recover from the power of Bruce’s pocketbook, but he didn’t waste a physical second before looking down at his nephew. “Hey, Wally. Could you give Stephanie and Tim a tour of the museum while I talk with Mr. Wayne?”

“Of course I could,” Wally said, unimpressed. “I practically live here.” 

“Consider it practice for your future life as a docent,” Barry said importantly. He ruffled Wally’s hair again, making him grin. “Thanks, kid. I’ll be back in a flash.”

Wally groaned. “That’s so bad.”

“You’re funny,” Bruce said. Steph and Tim fought dual winces. If they were in costume then Bruce would be tearing the man a new one for ‘cuteness’. “Where’d you get your doctorate, Barry? I went to Harvard myself, but some things you just gotta get out of the way.”

“He has a doctorate in education from Brown,” Wally informed Bruce imperiously. Steph had never met a kid who was the expert in his uncle’s life, but judging by Barry’s embarrassed look he would have skipped over the Ivy League part of the equation. Which - what? “He’s got a bachelor’s in Chemistry and Physics from Ohio State and a master’s in Applied Physics from University of Chicago! Pretty cool, right?”

“Dude,” Tim said, “pick a field.”

Steph elbowed Tim, but Barry just looked a little embarrassed. “I was going to go into forensics. But…well…you know. Life happens.”

“The cops told him to ignore some evidence and he refused so they fired him -”

“Let’s say a little less, Wally.”

A failed cop. Counter-intuitively, Steph was surprised. Guess he hadn’t learned his lesson until later in life. Bruce (Gothamite) and Uncle Clark (Literally Uncle Clark) had known that path would be a fool’s errand from the start. 

“Physics to Education is a big jump,” Bruce said. He already knew the answer - they had copies of Barry’s personal statement in his Brown application - but a cornerstone of interrogation was asking the same question in different ways. Liars couldn’t keep their stories straight. “Why the change of heart again?”

Barry shrugged helplessly. “I wanted to help people. Don’t you, Mr. Wayne?”

Bruce didn’t say anything. 

Of course he didn’t. He didn’t understand at all. As he hadn’t understood Uncle Clark, as he hadn’t understood J’onn J'onzz, he didn’t understand Barry Allen at all. The two other people on Earth most like himself - present company excluded - and he was faced with a horrendous and complete lack of understanding.

How could he? Bruce had poured his life into creating justice and vengeance and fighting against cruelty. It was Bruce. He had fed his life into his mission, and it was just barely enough to succeed. He couldn’t afford to half-ass this. For a very long time, nothing else had existed in his world. 

Uncle Clark and J’onn J’onzz hadn’t needed a teenage girl to beat the power of hope into his brain. Uncle Clark was dedicated to Superman with his entire heart, but it wasn’t why he got up in the morning. J’onn was just a sentient person who couldn’t stand to see people suffer, and maybe his own altruism had saved his broken heart, but he was powered by empathy and kindness. 

Barry and Uncle Clark had weird definitions of helping people. To them, it was as simple as making people smile. Giving them a bit of hope in their day, or restoring optimism to a tired crowd. A lesson that sparked an interest in science, a newspaper article that opened up a reader’s mind to new perspectives - to them, that was enough. If they were ordinary people, it would have been enough. 

Bruce did not respect the complete lack of hustle. There was a reason why he only hung out with Alfred, Steph, Tim, Leslie, and Gordon - the only other real hustlers in the world. Bruce was an ordinary person, and gratuitous acts of million dollar philanthropy were nowhere near enough. Nothing was enough for him - not even Bruce. But he liked Uncle Clark and J’onn J’onzz and Barry Allen anyway, and Steph knew that was what he really didn’t understand.

“Paleontology, huh?” Tim asked Wally. He turned off his Gameboy and stashed it in his cargo pants pocket. “You got any T-Rexes?”

“Oh, man,” Wally said. “Do we ever.”

[kwali21]

Sahara

Species : Red fox Gender : Female Age : 26 Rank : Knight

PROCEDE WITH CAUTION

Glyph user, domain of interest seem to be weapon making and some elemental manipulation (see the "Glyph magic" chapter below for further details). Extend of fighting and glyph capabilities are unknown, as she flee when encountered. Used as an information gatherer.

Glyph magic

Glyph appear as magic circle from wich one command is given. They are extremely versitale, as the command, born from gathered knowledge, can be almost anything.

To create one (for example : make a hammer) everything must be known : what it is, how it's made, what's the weight, size, materials, how does surface react when impact with it… It can take days to months to create a single one and if the possessed knowledge is'nt sufficient, the user won't be able to write down a glyph. Given that, glyph user have, usually, 1 or 2 domains of interest in wich they train (weapon making, elemental manipulation, healing…), having 90% of they're create seal in those domain, the 10% left are in fields that support the principal interest or go in completely different directions, the best have been known to have up to 300 hundred different glyph. The resulting creation aren't lasting if separate from the caster (to continue with the hammer example, it will disappear in under a minute if knock out of the user's hand).

Advance glyph manipulators are capable of : -Conjuring glyph where they are looking, up to 20 meters away from them. -Convergence : the use of two glyph simultaneously, creating a new effect; again knowledge must be possess as they must understand how the glyphs react when put together.

End of report.

Sahara have been with the cult for almost half of her life. She lived her 14 first year in smuggler's sanctuary, a place quite infamous, the name being pretty explicit. Useless to say that when you take a preteen, that only know the life of street orphan, out of this type of place, you got yourself quite a loyal follower. She didn't even know how to read before joigning in (not a good thing for a glyph user, as they are true knowledge hoarder).

When discover in her usual mission for the cult, she flee immediately and is quite good at scampering, meaning that no space riders as ever truly fought her. It is probably for the best as she will react with extreme aggression if feeling corner. In this case (almost) nothing is above her, clawing, biting, throwing dust in the eyes, pulling adversary to take friendly fire... She will be fighting with a "kill or be killed" mentality, an habit she kept from the sanctuary.

The sand rose at her belt was her only possession back at the sanctuary, it is extremely precious to her. In term of character she is calm and never raise her voice, she is also a deeply lonely individual, who crave companionship but remain extremely caution and distant from other (again due to her childhood in the sanctuary). The cult save her in a way, but in the long run it does not give her the much needed solace. Prayer, missions and red smoke kept her from thinking too much about it, but it doesn't fix the problem, only let it fester.

AU belong to @onyxonline

[fairytale-poll]

ROUND 1C, MATCH 14 OUT OF 16!

Propaganda Under the Cut:

Spinderella:

They are Cinderella Spiderman style. She chose to keep her powers after midnight so now she no longer has the ability to fall in love. 🥺

Cinderella:

Alright so, background: Girl Genius is a steampunk webcomic; they fill their hiatuses with mini arcs, one of them was a Cinderella parody, and despite being *checks notes* almost 15 years old and only like 20 pages, it stays living in my mind rent free. Half because it's deeply hilarious and half because it was the first real crumb towards the ot3 (I'm not crazy, the signs do point to it being endgame I swear) The Propaganda: - both love interests get to be the prince (constant bickering ensues) - they host a combination ball/science fair (because they are all mad scientists, obviously) - Cinderella reverse engineers her fairy godmother's magic wand ("any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from science!" "what's with the quotation marks? who said that?" "me!") - it ends with her taking over the kingdom with a giant mecha army. truly the perfect fairytale ending It starts here: https://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20081121 but if you want an image the best one is probably: https://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20081215

[ckret2]

I MAY HAVE just had a Ford kin moment reading your latest chapter. I legitimately read Bill saying "magics not real" and my first thought was "huh I wonder why he believes that. Maybe something about the semantics of the definition? or the context?" It SOMEHOW did not occur to me that sometimes Bill lies and is a liar. At this rate I am going to forget he's a triangle next. Great chapter by the way!

SDLHFLK Bill claims to be a trapezoid and everyone wonders which corner is actually a very tiny 4th side before remembering that sometimes he just lies recreationally. Calling that a Ford kin moment is so funny/accurate.

But actually: yeah, you're supposed to think that!! I wanted you to briefly take him at face value, and wonder: what's his definition of "magic" for him to say it's not real, is this an "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" deal, does he know too much about the true inner workings of magic to call it that word anymore? What do we know now about Bill that we didn't know before, that he exists in a world where chanting bad Latin raises corpses into zombies and he can say "what's happening here isn't magic"?

But also he lies. In three days he might say "computers are magic, kid!" and expect you to take him just as seriously.

I think truth is malleable to him. Most of the things he says live in the fuzzy space between honest and dishonest, and even he doesn't settle on which they are unless he says something later on that retroactively establishes the level of (dis)honesty of the thing he said earlier. His idea of reality isn't steel-hard facts but soft mushy clay, and he squishes it around with his words not based on what he thinks is true but based on what feels right.

"Magic isn't real" means "magic isn't the proper mental framework through which to examine the current phenomenon or phenomena like it, therefore right now I am dispensing of it as an option to ensure that we examine the situation exclusively with non-magical tools," and also means "magic literally isn't real, you're mistaking other things for magic," but also magic literally IS real and Bill's just fucking around, unless magic isn't real and I'm the one fucking around by calling Bill's claim into question. The ambiguity goes all the way down, my friend. Magic is subjective; what is magic? Can you define it? Maybe Bill and the invisible narrative voice just have different definitions.

I think that while he said "magic isn't real" Bill believed magic wasn't real, but he probably changed his mind within thirty seconds. It's really easy to sound confident in a lie when you buy your own bull.

[belit0]

PLEASE Izuna 1? But can I make a special request that he not use any degrading language (ie bitch, slut, and the like) and instead more nice/praise like pet names?

IT TOOK ME A LONG TIME BUT FINALLY, HERE I AM!

1)Izuna: Keep moaning my name like that.

NSFW PROMPTS!

He knows it must be taking a terrible amount of willpower for (Y/N) to hold on at this moment, not to close her legs and hide between the sheets, to pretend nothing happened. It's her obedience that turns him on so much, how she tries her best to please him, to make him happy, to give him what he wants.

Izuna can't keep his mouth from between her legs, torturing her abused clit over and over again with a tongue that won't rest, having already made her come about three times by bringing out his talent.

The Uchiha believes all his years of bouncing between woman and woman trained him for this, preparing him for the moment when he genuinely wants to please the girl of his dreams, that one he chose to spend the rest of his life with. (Y/N) doesn't know it yet, but she has him in a choke hold, completely smitten and unable to think of anyone but her, ruling his mind and motivating him to be better.

He refuses to believe a woman finally conquered his heart, but the feelings he has for her are undeniable, making him experience a warmth in his chest he has never felt before.

The first few dates, contrary to what had always happened with other girls, were harmless, with no sex, and normal outings. It was a month before he dared to kiss her, and a few more before even mentioning suggestive advances.

When he started bragging about his otherworldly pussy-eating powers, she simply scoffed, laughing at him and thinking it was all empty promises. Izuna became determined to prove she had no idea who she was dealing with, and this very night, he decided to fuck her for the first time. After a romantic dinner and mood setting, he laid her on the bed approximately an hour ago, not letting her up and making her come over and over again.

He still used nothing but his tongue, not even needing his fingers, and (Y/N) showed concern after each orgasm for the integrity of his jaw. She offered to switch places, claiming to have understood his point and acknowledging the magic of his mouth, but the Uchiha brought her back down by dragging her legs towards him and attacking again.

"You're such a good girl, getting all wet for me. You're all mine, aren't you?"

Izuna asks as he wipes his chin, having achieved her fourth orgasm with nothing but his jaw. He rises from the bed and surveys his work. (Y/N) tries to catch her breath in rapid gasps, her chest rising and falling in agitation, legs spread and surrendered to the side of her body with no strength to move them.

The girl nods her head but does not provide a verbal response, and the Uchiha is not satisfied, "Say it, (Y/N). I want to hear you, now." He can see her bite her lips, and knows she's embarrassed to admit what the two have known since the moment they met. Both of them were devoted to each other when their eyes first connected, and even as strangers, there was an unseen force drawing them together. She belonged to him, as much as he belonged to her.

"I'm yours, Izuna."

"That's my pretty girl. Now quiet, love, I want to hear how preciously wet you are for me, it's intoxicating." He demands while undressing, having denied her any touch of his body until she was sufficiently ready for him.

He climbs over her form, and leads (Y/N)'s exhausted legs to wrap around his waist. The girl follows his silent instructions smoothly, yielding to his will and ready to be used as he desires.

Before the main course, he gently slides his fingers along the outside of her cunt, brushing with a terrible stillness against her clitoris, triggering a reaction of hypersensitivity. He kisses her before she can moan, stifling the sounds with his lips, swallowing every exclamation of pleasure to hear the noises happening between her legs.

He knows she's embarrassed, but it drives Izuna crazy to have evidence of the effect he generates in her body.

His fingers rapidly stroke that spot, double digits making her see stars as Izuna steals her breath with kisses, and as she is about to finish for the fifth time, the Uchiha moves his hand out of the way to replace it with his cock.

They both moan simultaneously, and he allows her to scream out to the four winds as he assaults her neck with wet kisses, his tongue leaving a wet trail from her earlobe to her nipples.

"Shit… keep moaning my name like that, such a good, beautiful girl." He keeps a slow pace, letting her get used to the overstimulation and allowing her used clit a rest. (Y/N) receives and gives everything she has to offer for Izuna to continue until he decides enough is enough, to the point when he determines to cum.

It doesn't appear to be soon; I can tell you that much.

"Make no doubt about it, pretty one. I am going to use you as I need, but you've been so good, you get to decide how. So, tell me, how do you want it, my love?"

"Slo-ow first...fa-ast when you need!" She slowly gets used to the sensation, and her body gradually relaxes, molding itself to Izuna and no longer feeling extremely sensitive. She knows once he realizes this, he will eventually pick up the pace he wants, fucking her brutally and the way he likes it.

Her pussy is going to be exhausted, red, and swollen, but her man will take such good care of her after this, she doesn't even care.

The Uchiha follows her instructions, and when he notices (Y/N) no longer has trouble cooperating with the stimulation, he progressively increases thrusting, forgetting her pleasure to seek his own. She surrenders to his choice and allows the use of her body in achieving the peak Izuna wishes to reach.

"I told you, pretty girl, you have no idea who you're dealing with."