#the world go round

[roach-works]

pokemon theory i just thought of: new pokemon appear in the pokemon universe when they're designed in this one. they're created ex nilho but they have retroactive realness; they weren't here yesterday, but today they've always existed.

pokemon researchers have had to suss this out on their own over decades, and it's a really unpopular theory, made worse by the fact that no one can come up with a better one. from their perspective pokemon generate spontaneously but in both chronological directions, and the similarities of many pokemon seem to be detived from a conscious and creative understanding of the world--their world, though? what other world could there be?. there are ice cream pokemon and pokeball pokemon and sword pokemon and trash bag pokemon.

there are so many pokemon with both wings and a beak. is this like swords? is there an ur-flying type that this class evokes? there are so many canine pokemon. but what is a canine? is there such a thing? there's only one set of sword pokemon, right. one tea-set line. is *feline* a coherent category? would the ur-feline have two legs or four? why do so many pokemon have humanlike bodyplans-- but then again, why so few?

pichu has always been the prior form of pikachu. why didn't it get counted in order? why do we call it that instead of saying pikachu is the middle evolution of the pichu line? why can so many trainers remember finding this out well into their journeys? why didn't ash start with one?

this is why pokemon researchers do a lot of labwork, drink heavily, and use ten year olds for field research. you can't have an existential crisis if you don't even know what time is yet.

[ningadudexx]

who up journeying to they west ⁉️⁉️⁉️⁉️ 🚶‍♂️🚶‍♂️🚶‍♂️🚶‍♂️🐎

the first one is a screenshot redraw of this frame cause it freaking rocks 🔥🔥🔥

the show has been out since 1986 and also the novel has been out since the 16th century.... but ill spoiler warninf just in case... anyone in audience from the 16th century tonite ⁉️🙋‍♂️🙋🙋‍♀️

[uncharted-constellations]

The entire ALBW team

Links about to become Lorules #1 hytopian fabric exporter

[sluttybibuck]

im at the destiel anniversary. im at the buddie canon. im at the combination destiel anniversary buddie canon during the presidential election even

[ask-the-pioneer]

"I've always been captivated by them. Something about the shiny exterior, how they glimmer when you tumble them around in your hands. My younger self would obsess about them, a childlike fascination. Even back then I instinctively knew they had value. My mom would use pearls I found to pay for a safe passage at scavenger tolls. We tried to bypass those points as much as we could, but sometimes it was unavoidable."

"It's a looong story…. I was found roaming the wilderness by my mentor, who brought me to er, an entity, called an interator. Do you know of iterators? Apparently they are what was left of an ancient civilization that once inhabited these lands. I couldn't wrap my head around it at first. Iterators are massive, absolutely huge, like mountains. Do you see that big structure of a regular, smooth shape?"

[She points towards Five Pebble's can in the distance]

"That is an iterator's «superstrucute». A mountain, the entire thing… is a person. It still sounds crazy when I say it."

"Ah, right, my name… like I mentioned, I got lost and my mentor found me. He brought me to his iterator. If my memory serves me right, his name is «No Significant Harassment», or NSH for short. I recall thinking at that time, «Harassment? I hope he won't be cruel to me». I had no concept of iterator names, their meaning, why it's three or however many words long. It was incredibly confusing to my young mind, though looking back at it I consider myself very lucky. The iterator was, dare I say, «god-like» (his own words), but benevolent. I saw how well he treated Hunter – my mentor – and it made me trust him more, even though I was scared and wary in the beginning."

"Would you believe it if I told you… there are stories written inside the pearls? That those things I’ve been obsessing about all my life are used for storing information? I had many of them leftover from when I lived at a scavenger outpost. One cycle, NSH noticed my interest, and – I wish Hunter had told me about this sooner, but – the iterator shot at my head with something…? And suddenly I could understand everything he said. Not that he said much, because I started crying loudly and ran straight out of there, haha. But before I bolted, he gave me one of his pearls as consolation. I think he felt bad for the scared little me."

"After that, he would eagerly read all the pearls I brought to him. That is how I learned more about the culture of the peoples who were here before me: the Ancients, their customs, why the iterators were built, and much more. It was like the knowledge of the entire world was suddenly revealed to me – to a seemingly insignificant being, a tiny speck in an endless ocean of life. It both made me feel very important, and very small. And, yeah, it has intensified my obsession with pearls beyond mortal limits. What if I could write into a pearl? I could archive the history of my entire species! All the stories my mom told me when I was small? All the places I’ve been to? Or other scugs have been to…"

[Her eyes widen, sparkling with glee]

"Y-yeah… that would be nice… sadly I am what I am – a slugcat. I don’t know how to do this very advanced stuff at all. I have no means of doing this. I once asked NHS for help, but there’s only so much he could guess from my frantic signing. I don’t think he understood me, in the end. But he did appreciate my efforts, and I was given a title – the Pioneer, like a person who is the very first to explore something uncharted. Apparently no slugcat before me thought of reading from or writing into pearls? I find it a little hard to believe."

"This one! This is a very special kind of pearl – it contains an ancient poem from which my name originated. See, my name was a gift from NSH the iterator. It’s spelled: «Mirmyntasseth». The best way I would describe it, is… it’s a name for a feeling, or an experience. The way it was explained to me, is that the word «Mirmyntasseth» is an expression of seeing a marble roll on a flat surface, then hitting another marble. Ah, right, you may not know this – a marble is like, like a pearl, but translucent and even more ornate. I was told that marbles were used by the Ancients for entertainment. They had a game where you rolled one to hit another. I'll admit, I can see the appeal. Throwing rocks is fun, although I image this game was considered a more dignified pastime."

[She tumbles the dark pearl in her hands, admiring its luster]

"The poem inside this pearl, one of its verses spells: «Eight Marbles Cast in Stone». The poem itself is long… very long… I had the iterator read it to me once, and we had to stop in the middle because the rain was coming. Maybe I will ask NSH to read it again, when I’m back at his superstructure with Hunter."

[Her gaze trails off to somewhere far away for a moment, a subtle grimace on her face. She closes her eyes and shakes off the thoughts that cloud her mind]

"So, um… yes… that is why I am called Eight Marbles Cast in Stone, or Marbles for short. I like how it sounds, it has a nice ring to it. And it’s a gift from an iterator, a god-like being. I consider it a great honor."

"…that said, I wonder why he didn’t just name me «Pearl»? Wouldn’t that make more sense? Maybe it didn’t sound cool enough. They’ve used pearls just to store information. I guess it’d be silly to be named «Dirt» because you doodle in dirt, or «Batfly» because you love eating batflies? Hmm…"

[dustbunsinspace]

Part of 🟢 Leo gets Overwhelmed au🟢

Aah, I’m so happy I made it in in time! 💙✨ Merry Christmas, tumblr nation! Here’s a little comic about 03 Usagi and Leo going so see the Rockefeller tree after the events of the Christmas Aliens episode.

Little post about events earlier that night

Also this is literally how maskless Leo looks to me, he’s so moomincore ;

[katerinaaqu]

Isn't it freaking adorable how both Odysseus and Penelope could remember down to exact detail what clothing she had packed for Odysseus before he left for war even 20 years later?!

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

And she packed them herself. She didn't use the help of any servant or slave to do it. She wanted to prepare her husband herself. What is even more is that all the clothes were of vibrant colors which had me thinking;

What if Penelope deliberately prepared vibrant colored clothes for Odysseus solely so that she could see him from afar for as long as possible?! And man I can so imagine her doing the same! Like standing on the top of the hill where the palace is, wearing a vibrant dress that floats in the wind, holding baby Telemachus in her arms and watch Odysseus's bright tunic on the ship and Odysseus turning his head to look up at that aetherial figure on the hill almost leaning over the ship to see her JUST FOR A LITTLE LONGER until he cannot see her anymore and this is where he keeps looking at his island becoming smaller and smaller to the horizon, shedding tears of goodbye

🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

Man ninjas are cutting onions around me again!!!

[nixiecat]

^ girl leaving the hookup at 4:30pm the next day in a stolen 100gecs hoodie and thigh highs

[putterphubase]

Don't be too moved. The point is the last line: "Please mind your own business."

THE ON1Y ONE (2024)

[imperatorrrrr]

[captainkirkk]

✩ WEEKLY FIC ROUND-UP ✩

All the fics I’ve read and really enjoyed in the past week-ish. Reminder: This list features any and all ratings and themes. Please look at tags and warnings on ao3 before reading.

The Nine Worlds series (Hands of the Emperor)

nothing less than the world by ariex09

At least there wasn’t an audience for the look Ludvic turned on Kip and the too neutral way he said, “Tor?”

Kip could feel himself flushing - in Astandalas this was the kind of thing that had lost him jobs before - but he had the excuse of, first of all, amnesia, and second of all, “He didn’t give me any other name!” Kip hissed. “He deflected me off the topic twice!”

-

AU where the landslide at the Liauu happens several years earlier, and the younger Kip has a rather different experience of the future.

diving for a flame pearl by ariex09

It took me an appalling three hours and thirteen minutes to even realize that Kip was gone.

Ah, but that was too charitable. Once we had a timeline together, we discovered that Franzel had seen Kip last, turning in for bed at twelve minutes before midnight, and it was not until Shoänie went to wake him at dawn that anyone knew he was anything but asleep in bed. This meant that by the time the knock on my study door came, shortly past the third hour of the morning, Kip could already have been missing for more than nine hours.

-

In which Cliopher goes missing midway through The Hands of the Emperor. Fortunately, he has friends and family willing to do whatever it takes to bring him home.

A nap at the feet of the sun by SunInGlory

Prompt: Cliopher somehow falls asleep on HR’s robe, and rather than wake him, HR has one of the guards cut that part of the robe off of him. Just looking for something soft and sweet here, but of course go in whichever direction you’d like. Bonus points if Petty Treasons era.

---

Cliopher decides to take a nap. Okay, perhaps decides is too strong of a word.

Stranger Things

Robin's Guide to the Care and Feeding of Your Newly Adopted Former Mean Girl by formosus_iniquis

She extends a hand, ignoring the laugh it gets her, “Welcome to Hawkins, I’m Robin, occasional Dustin babysitter.”

The girl’s smile pulls lopsided at her mouth, kissed with a bit of irony and undeniably charmed. “It’s nice to meet you Robin,” her voice is soft, and a little unsure. Wavering like Becky Simpson’s tone deaf oboe playing, unsure of what pitch and timbre to land on. “I’m Stephanie Henderson, Dustin’s cousin.”

The bit crumbles immediately between Robin’s fingers.

“Stephanie? You went with Stephanie? Are you kidding? We workshopped so many names!”

Marvel

Three Kinds of Learning by luchia

Erik intends to recruit Raven's supposedly amazing, all-powerful older brother. Instead, he finds himself dealing with Charles Xavier, a weak, tweed-addled professor who seems to think powers don't matter nearly as much as personality. Erik's misconceptions are blown apart when Raven goes missing.

SVSSS

In Durance Veil by Mikkeneko (+ podfic)

Right, the villain's beautiful daughter, who had caught a glimpse of the Protagonist from afar and, naturally, fell madly in love at first sight. She'd used her knowledge of her father's lair to sneak into the dungeon where Luo Binghe was being held and eventually proved the key to his escape, betraying her father for love. "So, you want to try to find some random girl who's willing to sneak in past the guards to Luo Binghe's prison and..."

"What random girl could we possibly trust? I'll do it myself!"

"You know what," Shang Qinghua said. "Somehow I feel like I should have expected this."

---

Shen Qingqiu self-detonated at Hua Yue City, but he didn't die. Instead, he wakes up to a world where Cang Qiong is victorious and Luo Binghe has been imprisoned beneath the mountain. What's a poor transmigrator to do? He has to find a way to free the Protagonist before he breaks out and razes the Sect to the ground! Clearly, the best way to do this is to pretend to be one of Luo Binghe's future wives.

Clearly.

Harry Potter

A Place That Fits by BitchesLoveAngstImBitches

Harry had been prepared to save Sirius’ life, no matter what the cost. Harry put himself in danger, and Sirius had come running, and it was the last thing he ever did.

And then it turned out Harry’s life wasn’t even worth saving: Neither can live while the other survives.

At the rate of Voldemort’s rising power, Harry would be lucky to survive the year.

Sirius had died trying to help Harry. He’d died for nothing.

-

Harry is struggling in the aftermath of the Ministry battle to come to terms with Sirius' death. His isolation and mistreatment at Privet Drive only make things worse. Remus Lupin checks on him in Surrey, but with both of them grieving, his assumptions about Harry might only hurt him more.

[wizardemotions]

i had to get the slytherins out of my head. also the dynamic i personally imagine for eighth year drarry

[tripamania]

in the kinda-sorta-distant future. next sunday, a.d.

bonus:

[bugeyedfreaks]

I know it might seem hokey or corny and I've talked about this before, but I genuinely love that the girls basically can be revived with love. 💖

[stelar-time]

[shakingparadigm]

what is the theory that ivan manipulated the event where till and mizi met the wagyein?

It's not a theory, actually! It's confirmed that Ivan orchestrated the whole event. The true reason as to why however is still unknown. The information provides more context to this scene, though:

During the earlier times of ALNST the most rational explanation for this scene was that Till ran after a flower crown (presumably Mizi's) and Ivan followed him in out of curiosity. Now we know that Ivan was conveniently just standing there because he was waiting.

Side note, I find it heartbreaking (and maybe a little funny, sorry) that Till most likely didn't notice Ivan in this scene. That's just like him, isn't it. Always too busy running after Mizi while Ivan trails behind, an ever-present shadow.

I'm not sure how Ivan manipulated the circumstances for both of them to end up there, but it is confirmed that everything was intentional. What strikes me most is how they describe this particular scene:

I can't copy down what they said word-for-word (Patreon info), but they described Ivan watching "creepily" as Till and Mizi are faced with danger. We know that Ivan was familiar with the Cerberus wagyein beforehand, enough to touch its teeth and even to rest himself inside its maw. To Ivan, the wagyein is not dangerous, but to Till and Mizi, it could be. Ivan prepared the wagyein, led them there, and watched "creepily" from afar as Till fell on his knees, seemingly injured.

The closest I can get to making sense of Ivan's "scheme" is that he wanted to see how other children would react in a dangerous situation. Ivan's always been an observer, after all, and he's learned to survive by copying the more "normal" behaviors of his peers. This situation occured when Ivan was still young and had not yet developed his more charming mask, so perhaps he staged this encounter to study a situational response, to learn and mimic the emotion of fear. And what better subjects for the experiment than two of the most expressive and reactive humans of their batch? It helps that he was already fixated on Till beforehand, too. I think Ivan became irreversibly obssessed after this incident, especially since it's framed as a turning point in Ivan's life, comparing Till to the stars.

This is just my attempt at an interpretation, though. It could very well be for another reason. He most likely chose Till and Mizi specifically for personal reasons, not just for reaction. I'm still not sure on the purpose behind the whole thing.

The team wanted to capture Ivan's "dark emotions" through the shot of his stalking, which could relate to his more sinister intentions. His gaze can be read in a few different ways, though. Curiosity, interest, fear, etc. Maybe that's why they decided to redraw the shot in ROUND 6.

I think this better sells the feeling they were trying to convey.