#they are fundamentally misunderstanding it

[eskellion]

Fun fact this was actually asked of a science/biology teacher of mine when I was in school, and he said that it’s actually more likely for life to be like us than not like us. Because of the way molecules and atoms interact, it’s way more likely that alien (animal) life is predominantly carbon-based oxygen-breathers that need water to survive.

Every day of my life it drives me insane we don't know what kind of other life is in the universe and that we've likely never guessed anything close to it. Like it might not even be meat creatures like we have. It might be shit like calcium cube beings that communicate only by exploding to death. A rich ecosystem of sentient ice crystals that form their lifeless planet's rings. Something that appears to be a planet and is in fact a trillion species of living vapor swirling in a ball. But we can't possibly be the only things with art and media and politics and culture. What is a living vapor's equivalent to media? Does it have a way to record and share ideas? What does it imagine? What happens in its closest equivalent to a romance story? Or a fairy tale? I'm so mad that I'll never know what's going on in any of their lives.

[getvalentined]

Thinking a lot recently about the constant comparison of Oblivion to Skyrim, particularly claims that Oblivion is superior in every way strictly by virtue of quest length and the greater grandiosity of the organizations in Oblivion, and I think there's been a fundamental misunderstanding of what's actually going on with Tamriel during the time period of Skyrim. Even though it's like...one of the core concepts of the main storyline.

Putting most of this under a cut for length, but I just...I think people misunderstand what's going on here. This is not a "One Game Good Other Game Bad" post, it's an analysis of a major, key difference in story basis between the two that I think gets lost in the (frankly asinine) argument about which is superior.

See, everything in Skyrim sucks. Every organization you can align yourself with is falling apart. Literally every single one.

That's the point.

To summarize:

The Companions (equivalent to the Fighters' Guild) are about a dozen strong, literally cursed, and their most beloved leader gets murdered very early in the storyline.

The College of Winterhold (equivalent to the Mages' Guild, not to the Arcane University) has seemingly only been saved from collapsing into the sea because a master of Restoration fused himself with the structure itself when the Sea of Ghosts tried to tear it down a little under a century ago and his presence is constantly physically "healing" the foundation.

The Thieves' Guild has lost the favor of every possible patron deity, having been outright cursed by Nocturnal after one of her Nightingales murdered another and stole the gift she offers her champion, while the boon that the organization's founder claimed from her in ages past (the cowl) is missing.

The Dark Brotherhood has been all but completely dismantled, the Night Mother's tomb in Bravil having been raided and struggling to persist without a Listener for over a decade; the bodies of the Night Mother's children have been lost and she's essentially being smuggled from region to region in an attempt to find a safe place to continue operations.

The Empire itself has been kneecapped, forced into a traumatic treaty by a fascist regime determined to strike the beliefs and culture of anyone not Altmer off the face of the planet; the Thalmor have gone so far as to torture and radicalize the figurehead leader of the Nords in order to use their own nationalism and superiority against the Empire, sparking a civil war that will further weaken the Empire and allow the Aldmerri Dominion to destroy it wholecloth.

This extends out into the rest of the world, too! We have confirmed existence of Hist-deaf Argonians. The Dunmer are floundering to recover after the quadruple-whammy that is the fall of the Triumverate, the destruction of Vivec City when Baar Dau finally made impact, the Red Year, and the Argonian uprising. The Bosmer are literally endangered due to habitat loss following a super-isolationist cultural shift due to wars with the Khajiit and Altmer. The Void Nights were devastating to Khajiit culture and population in ways that have yet to be fully explained.

The world is falling apart. Everything is dying.

And then Alduin shows up.

We all kind of talk about Alduin carrying on as World-Eater through the course of the Skyrim storyline like it's him being a piece of shit, since he'd started it ages ago and was just displaced in time to land on the Last Dragonborn's head in the Fourth Era, but I don't think that's the case.

Based on the state of things, I think Alduin arrived right on time. I think it's the end of the world. The only reason he "should" be stopped is because the Last Dragonborn has the capacity to stop the world from ending in a more down-to-earth sense than just defeating Alduin: they can't save everyone, but they can "fix" every single organization that's holding "the world" together.

They can align with the Imperials and keep the civil war from further crippling them, keeping the Empire from being too weak to push back against the Aldmerri Dominion.

They can save the College of Winterhold, the only group in the right place at the right time to stop the Eye of Magnus from opening, and in doing so make sure that the Psijics are able to put it somewhere nobody else can find it.

They can lead the Companions, cure the curse for those members who don't want to run with Hircine after death, which bolsters their spirits enough to keep doing what they can even when everyone else is trying to kill each other. A single neutral martial force in the middle of a civil war.

They can regain Nocturnal's trust for the Thieves' Guild, restore the Nightingales, and in doing so they can return the luck that was stolen from them as punishment for Mercer Frey's transgression. They can even reclaim the Crown of Barenziah and award the guild with a paragon to increase their newly-regained luck.

They can hear the Night Mother, becoming Listener for the Dark Brotherhood to restore the balancing force of Sithis in the world, purify the most broken Sanctuary the Brotherhood has ever had, and finish a story set into motion way back in the Third Era—Emperor Titus Mede II is murdered under the order of a Motierre, a descendant of a mark the Brotherhood specifically kept from dying during the Oblivion Crisis.

The Last Dragonborn can't do anything outside Skyrim—there's nothing they can do for the Argonians or the Bosmer or the Khajiit, and they can only do very little for the Dunmer via work in Solstheim—but they can work with every single guild or guild-adjacent group, strengthening the Empire to stand against the biggest threat to Tamrielic culture since the First Era, and in doing so they can make it so the world isn't ready for Alduin to eat it.

The Hero of Kvatch exists when Tamriel, and presumably Nirn as a whole is in the prime of its life, that's what makes the Oblivion Crisis such a big deal. This is a world that isn't ready to give up, it still has the strength to fight, it just needs someone standing at the head to direct it. The Last Dragonborn comes into the story when everything is falling apart and nothing really feels worthwhile, when it's hard to see why the world is worth saving. They have the chance to prove that there's still some life left here, that the world isn't too far gone to save—Alduin arrived right on time, it's the Last Dragonborn's job to change that.

I can see how coming from Oblivion to Skyrim would feel disappointing and hollow, but I'm pretty sure that's literally the point of the story.

Oblivion tells you the world is worth saving because it's got so much left to live for, even with the odds stacked so high against it. Skyrim asks you whether a world that's dying is still a world worth saving, and it's up to you to prove that it is.

[nevadancitizen]

-> CH. 9: UNSAID UNDERSTANDINGS

synopsis: you come to an understanding with arthur and formally introduce yourself to that ex-o'driscoll.

word count: 3.2k

ships: Arthur Morgan/Modern!Reader, Van der Linde Gang & Reader

notes: content warning for one use of the r-slur (reader uses it to describe themselves) & also sorry for the big gap between chapters, studying for finals has been eating up my time TT-TT

TOSoA taglist: @one-green-frog , @photo1030 , @mavenhavenn , @its-yummi , @fatherbangboo , @shackspossum , @swedesfics , @literallyrousseau , @xprloki , @pedifero , @6esi , @xnorthstar3x , @scorpio-echo , @eafv2323 (if you'd like to be added to the taglist, just ask <3!!)

THE OLD SOUL OF AMERICA MASTERLIST

So far, Jack and Charles are the only people to ask you directly what the future’s all about. Charles, because you opened up to him first; Jack, because he’s a child and doesn’t know any better regarding manners and tact.

But one man has you asking questions more than anyone else. Who else could it be besides Arthur Morgan? Of course it’s Arthur Morgan…

It’d take an entire army’s worth of eyes in the sky and boots on the ground to trail him and figure out what he’s truly thinking. First, he points a gun at you, makes fun of you, deliberately misunderstands what you say, and laughs at you. Then? Then, he offers you his cot after you faint – he technically didn’t even offer it; he just laid you up in it. You’ve only really seen this kind of erratic behavior from… well, you haven’t even really seen it before. He’s just acting weird.

But it begs the question. Does he care? Does he actually, really care? Or was he just trying to fulfil some secret obligation you don’t know about? Did he lose a bet? Does he feel guilty? You don’t think so, because if he felt guilty about pointing a gun at someone, you couldn’t even begin to imagine what he’d feel when he pulled the trigger.

Arthur is a goddamn mystery. You’re being given the pieces to solve the puzzle that is him, but the more you’re given, the more confused you are.

You’re sure he feels the same. In the morning, you offered him coffee (at Hosea’s insistence), but at the end of the day, you were yelling at him. Maybe you’re the mystery and not the other way around.

Well, actually, on a fundamental level, you are a mystery – but not because you’re hot and closed-off and are secretly an international spy with a menagerie of lovers. You’re a nervous mess that claims to be from the future that could barely hold down one man. No one knows what’s going on, least of all yourself.

But that doesn’t stop things from continuing to happen. As much as you want to press pause and fuck off somewhere else for a while, you can’t. This isn’t Adam Sandler’s 2006 hit Click. And honestly, if you could be anywhere right now, you’d be in Adam Sandler’s 2006 hit Click. It sure as hell would be a lot less stressful than slumming it in 1899.

Adam Sandler wouldn’t have to fetch water like goddamn Cinderella, you think to yourself as you dip the pail Grimshaw sent you with into the river. You stand up straight and set the bucket on top of your head, balancing it with a hand on either side. “Oh, I’m Happy Gilmore, and I’m so happy because I live in a time with running water and easily accessible plumbing!” Fuck off entirely.

You sigh sharply, but try your best to shake off the lingering jealousy that must’ve confused your longing for a normal life for a longing to be Adam Sandler. You’re… pretty sure you don’t want to be Adam Sandler, anyway.

The ground underfoot is a bit steep, but nothing you can’t handle. The rubber of your boots are wet from standing in the shallows while collecting water, but it almost kind of seems to be helping with traction against the dry ground. The weight on your waist from the filled canteens hanging from your belt seem to be helping you keep your balance, too.

A man comes down the trail, riding on a horse. He pulls the reins when he’s a few yards away from you, causing the horse to stop.

“Hello,” he greets. “May I ask how you’re doing on this fine day?”

“I’m… I’m okay,” you say. You adjust your grip, bringing one of your hands up to the lip of the pail. “I’m going back to the, uh… homestead. With water. For… my chickens.”

“Chickens!” The man says, his voice enthusiastic. “It’s gettin’ to be summer – they must be laying a lot of eggs, right?”

“Yes,” you say. “Lots of eggs. The – the general store can’t get enough of my eggs.”

You put on a grimacing smile and try your best to ignore whatever awkward mess of words just came out of your mouth. The man seems… charmed rather than put off by anything you just said.

Before he can say anything more, thundering hoofbeats storm up the trail from behind the man. Arthur Morgan descends on this little picturesque moment between strangers, his horse’s hooves digging into the ground as he pulls to an immediate stop.

“Hey!” He barks. He draws his pistol, but keeps it aimed at the sky. “Sir, I gotta ask you to keep your distance. That’s an accomplice of Landon Ricketts – dangerous criminals, both of ‘em. I’ve been sent to hunt and capture ‘em.”

The man grips his reins tighter, an almost shocked look passing over his face when he actually processes Arthur’s words. You can’t even speak to refute what he said.

“You – really?” The man asks. “Why aren’t they reaching for their gun, then?”

Arthur points to his temple. “Brain’s crippled from a lawman pistol-whippin’. But make no mistake – this one’s killed hundreds.”

The man looks you over, his eyes wide. “My! I wouldn’t imagine a simpleton capable of such things…!”

“I’m not,” you say, a mix of anger and anxiety bubbling in your stomach. “You’re – I don’t even… Who’s Landon Ricketts?”

“The stuttering, the confusion,” the man says, waving a hand. “It makes sense. Well, good luck on collecting your bounty, sir!”

He spurs his horse, then he’s off like a shot. You don’t even have the opportunity to say goodbye before he’s out of earshot.

“What the hell was that?!” You snap at Arthur. “I’m trying – I was just talking to him!”

“He was gonna rob you,” Arthur says, as if it were the most obvious thing ever. “I don’t know if you can find it in yourself to appreciate it, but I could’ve just saved your life.”

“You didn’t do jack shit!” You throw the pail on the ground, splashing his horse’s hooves and legs. “You rode up, called me dangerous, then called me slow. What – which is it? Am I a danger to you? Or am I just some retarded piece of shit?”

Arthur looks away, then back to you. “Now, I never said –”

“Which is it?” You bark. “Am I a danger to you? Or to myself?”

“You’re… not dangerous,” he admits slowly. “And you ain’t mentally crippled, neither. I was just tryin’ to get him away – can’t you see that?”

“Oh, so you’re justified,” you say. “You’re justified because you’re this – you’re this big man, big Arthur Morgan. Big Arthur Morgan who gets to do whatever he wants. Big Arthur Morgan that doesn’t have to apologize for what he’s done.”

“I apologize that that’s how I had to go about gettin’ rid of a potentially dangerous man.” He sweeps an arm out towards the direction the man rode away in. “Need I remind you – you don’t even know how to draw your gun!”

Your hand flies to Uncle’s gun in your holster, then your arm snaps straight. You look down the barrel at Arthur. An uneasy silence settles over the two of you.

You can feel the blood rushing through every artery, vein, and capillary bed in your body. It roars in your ears. Sweat drips down the middle of your back. Your finger rests on the trigger, the metal cold against your warm skin like iced fire.

You’re paralyzed. So is the world around you. So is Arthur. He just looks down the barrel back at you, blinking and breathing and beating his heart like nothing’s wrong.

“Do you know what it’s like?” You ask, your voice shaking despite your efforts to steel yourself. “To wake up just to have a gun shoved in your face? Because I have. Because you pointed a gun at me, and – and you haven’t even tried to apologize!”

“I know what it’s like,” Arthur says, his voice rumbling and quiet. “I’ve been shot, I’ve been stabbed – hell, I’ve been knocked unconscious more times than I can count. What point are you tryin’ to make?”

“I’m…” You take a slow breath in, then out. “I’m trying to say… I don’t – I don’t know. I just… You’ve been such a dick, and I haven’t said anything because I’m a nice person. But you just keep – you keep being such a little fucking shit about everything!”

“You’re pointin’ a gun at me,” Arthur says. “I don’t think that’s very nice.”

“Shut up!” You snap. “I just – I just want an apology, but you can’t even do that, can you? You don’t think of anyone but yourself.”

“The hell do I need to apologize for?” He asks, incredulous.

“For pointing a gun at me!” You shake the gun in your own hand for emphasis. “Y’know, the thing that could actually kill someone? The thing you have used to kill someone? Where I’m from, pointing a gun at someone is enough to get you arrested!”

“Oh, and I’m sure your sheriff is doin’ a wonderful job enforcin’ that rule,” Arthur says, his tone growing more impatient. “Now can you put the goddamn gun down?”

“Can you apologize?” You counter. “I just want to know. Are you physically capable of apologizing? Of saying the words, “I’m sorry”?”

“I’m sorry.” Arthur pulls on the reins of his horse, causing him to shake his head back and forth. “Are you happy now?”

Though he actually did say the words “I’m sorry,” his tone obviously holds no sincerity and serves as just another mockery. But, you relent. He is physically capable of saying “I’m sorry.” You holster your gun.

“Somewhat,” you say. You bend down and pick up the bucket you threw. “I’m… I’m gonna go get water. Don’t wait up.”

You turn and start walking downhill, once again balancing the empty pail on your head. The filled canteens on your waist now weigh you down instead of grounding you. There’s slow hoofbeats behind you.

You don’t turn around. “Are you seriously following me?”

“You have proven yourself to be a bit hot-headed,” Arthur says. “I’m tryin’ to keep you outta trouble.”

You bite your tongue and keep your eyes forward. Yes, maybe you are a bit hot-headed, but that’s only when it comes to Arthur… and George Foreman, you guess. You’ve done a lot to keep your anger in check, but it’s hard to keep it there when he tempts you so.

The river laps at the soles of your shoes, then splashes onto the tops of them as you wade further in. Arthur stops on the shore, water just barely reaching his horse’s hooves. You bend down and get a bucketful of water, then set it on a rock jutting out of the river. 

You glance over your shoulder at Arthur. “Where’s your canteen?”

“Here.” He detaches it from his saddle and holds it up. “Why?”

You hold your hand out. “I’ll fill it.”

“Don’t piss in it,” Arthur warns. He tosses it to you, and you catch it with ease.

“What the hell?” You unscrew the cap and dump out the old water. “I have a grudge, I’m not insane.”

You let a little river water trickle in the canteen, then put your palm on the opening and shake as a crude form of cleaning. After a few seconds, you pour the water out. You dip the mouth of the canteen into the river, letting it fill. You screw the cap back on and underhand throw it back to Arthur.

“Thank you,” he says as he clips it back onto his saddle.

“Don’t get used to it.” You pick up the now full pail, hefting it up with a grunt and balancing it on your head. You walk out of the river, then start uphill again. Arthur keeps pace beside you on his horse.

“What… what’s his name?” You ask. “Your horse.”

“Belmont,” Arthur says.

The horse does kind of look like a Belmont – his coat is white, sprinkled with black dots of varying sizes. He’s tall, and looks more agile than strong. You wouldn’t really expect Arthur to choose that type of horse, but you suppose he is still a mystery to you.

“You got a new horse, too,” he says, as if offhandedly. “She got a name?”

“Bronya.” You adjust the way the weight of the bucket is resting on your head. “It’s Russian.”

“Huh,” Arthur hums. “Can’t say Russia holds any prevalence in my life.”

“Yeah,” you say. “I… wouldn’t really expect it to. Not a lot of, um… Russian immigrants nowadays.”

Arthur goes quiet, looking out at the treeline. Well, that’s what you assume he’s doing, because you can’t really move your head all that much when you’ve got a bucket on top of it. You can feel through instinct that he’s not looking at you, anyway, and that’s kind of the only thing that matters to you.

The rest of the walk to camp is mostly silent aside from Belmont’s hooves hitting the ground and your quiet cursing when water spills over the lip of the pail. You greet Bill (who’s on guard duty) with a smile, while Arthur greets him with a tip of his hat. 

When the hitching posts are about twenty feet away, Arthur dismounts and takes his hat off, then stuffs it in his saddlebag. He sends Belmont toward the other horses. You stop and look over at him.

He looks a bit… different without his hat. You’re not sure if he looks better or worse, but he certainly looks different. The sun that drips through the trees highlights some strands of his hair and makes them look a sunflower blond, while others the sunlight doesn’t touch look more like a golden brown. You know at least a dozen women that would kill to have hair like his.

“I was gonna offer my help,” Arthur says. “But if you’re just gonna stare, I can go.”

“What?” You swallow, harsh against your dry throat. It registers that you were, in fact, staring, and that Arthur is offering to carry the water pail. “Oh, yeah. Um, sure.”

You lift the bucket off your head and hold it out. Arthur takes it, then hefts it on top of his head without a whole lot of effort.

“Where’s this goin’?” He asks.

“The kitchen’s wash basin,” you say. “I need to go replace the canteens on the horses.”

Arthur just grunts in response, lumbering away towards Pearson’s wagon. You turn and make your way towards the fenceless corral – it’s just an area where Grimshaw decided to put the horses when everyone first arrived, really.

You start to match the canteens with the horses; a deerskin canteen for Bill’s Brown Jack, a canteen with silver inlays for Dutch’s Count, a plain black leather canteen for John’s Old Boy. They all seem happy enough to let you, a virtual stranger, approach them and pet them before you clip canteens onto their saddles.

Bronya paws at the ground as you come closer, her ears pointed forward. Her saddle is hanging on a post nearby, making her sort of look naked in a silly, horse way. You pat the corner of her jaw, smiling up at her.

“Hey, girlie,” you say softly. “How’ve you been doing?”

She just snorts in response. She doesn’t look stressed, or very worried about anything at all. In all honesty, she just looks happy to be alive.

“Is – is that one yours?”

You snap your head towards the voice to see the O’Driscoll standing there, a brush clutched in his hands. He looks nervous, like he’s constantly feeling something akin to your anxiety.

“She is,” you say. “Have you been, uh… taking care of her?”

“I have,” he says. “I hope you don’t take no offense.”

Your eyebrows furrow. “Why would…? Whatever. Thank you.”

“It’s no problem.” He switches his attention over to Brown Jack, brushing over his thick neck. “What, um… what’s her name?”

“Who, Bronya?” You say. “I mean, uh… yeah. That’s her name. Bronya.”

This is going just great. Your anxiety is bouncing off his anxiety, gathering more nervous energy and ricocheting back to you. It’s like a game of tennis singles where both players are scared and it’s not entertaining at all and everyone loses and everything sucks.

“M-my name’s Kieran,” he blurts out. “Kieran Duffy.”

You nod politely and give your own name. He nods in response.

“Weren’t you, uh…” You point over to another area of camp. “Weren’t you tied up? Why’d they let you loose?”

“I told ‘em where I thought Colm was,” he says. “He wasn’t there. But I saved Arthur’s life, so they, y’know… they didn’t put a bullet through my brain.”

Oh, great, you think to yourself. This guy saved him in what was probably a real life-and-death scenario and I pointed a gun at Arthur over a verbal dispute? Christ, and who am I, using words like “verbal dispute…”

“Well.” You shrug one of your shoulders. “I guess you earned not having a bullet in your brain.”

“I guess I did,” Kieran says.

Bronya nudges your hand with her nose and flares her nostrils, carefully playing with your fingers with her weird horse lips. It feels… kind of gross, for lack of a better term. But you’ve had baby spit-up on you, you’ve had to clean bathrooms at retail jobs, and you’ve been Hep-C positive before. “Gross” things don’t really bother you anymore.

“Bronya, stop that,” you chastise softly. You feel like you’re talking to a child. “You’re being weird.”

“You know she – she feels safe?” Kieran asks.

You turn your head and look at him. “Huh?”

“She’s…” He puts a finger close to his lips. “When horses are, um, gentle like that. It’s a sign that they feel safe.”

“Oh.” You turn back to Bronya, then pat the side of her neck. “Well, I stole her off a drunk, so… I think she’s just glad to be away from him. I think anything would be preferable to living with a drunk.”

Kieran gives a half-hearted laugh, then turns his attention back to Brown Jack. You glance over your shoulder at him. He has his back to you, but you’re sure Kieran still has his ears perked up just in case you were to rush him and attack him. He’s more like a scared horse than a scared man.

“Y’know, Kieran,” you say. “Thank you. For, uh… saving Arthur. I don’t really… I don’t really like him, but he’s a… cornerstone. A cornerstone for the gang. So… yeah. Thanks.”

It almost sounds like you’re unsure that the words coming out of your mouth are actually yours. Are you actually thanking someone for saving the life of a man that threatened yours? You are. And… maybe it wasn’t as bad as you’re making it out to be. It’s 1899 – what’s some gun-pointing and some life-threatening between friends?

“I’m just tryna earn my keep,” Kieran says.

“You’re doing good,” you say. “I mean, you’re… you’re doing a whole lot more than I am. The horses are an important part of our lives. Do you, um… do you know a lot about them? Like, taking care of them, I mean.”

“Oh, I love horses.” He glances over at you, then quickly away. From the brief eye contact, you can see how his eyes lit up when he started talking about them. “I’ve been takin’ care of ‘em my whole life. It – it feels like my purpose, y’know? Like I was meant to take care of ‘em.”

“I understand,” you say. “Were you taking care of them while you were, uh… with the, um…”

You wave your hand in a vague motion. You want to say O’Driscolls, but you’re unsure if it would be impolite or breach some kind of outlaw code of conduct.

“Yeah, I took care of their horses,” Kieran says. “But I weren’t one of them, okay?”

“I get it.” You comb your fingers through Bronya’s mane absentmindedly. “You… were doing what you had to do to survive. Doesn’t mean you’re proud of it.”

“Yeah.” His eyes flit to yours, then away again. “Exactly.”

You look Kieran over. He still looks scared. Of you, of everyone else – you don’t know. But he’s doing what he has to to survive. You sincerely hope he doesn’t look too much into you in turn. (If he does, he’ll see that you understand that sentiment more than anyone else alive.)

[biocheminpics]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Any academic who disparages other fields fundamentally misunderstands the point of academia.

[steddieficrec]

Very Long Fic Recs

(almost as long as Eddie's tongue)

however wild by Ayes, itskleo

(10/10 I 102,215 I Explicit)

Prince Steve has always been told to stay out of the forest. And he does… when he’s awake.

Keep it Steady, Eddie by outofmygourd

(16/16 I 104,812 I Explicit)

Eddie Munson doesn't mind working at the Family Video Store. It's a nice sense of normalcy (not to mention money) and he gets to see Robin more because of it. However, between working together and sharing the same best friend, he's also been seeing a lot more of Steve Harrington.

He wants nothing more than to enjoy mindless fun with his friends now that everything with Vecna is over, but Eddie's finding it hard to move on from what happened. Even if the strangest thing in his life right now was simply the fact he and Steve Harrington might actually be friends.

(if someone asked me at the end) i'd tell them put me back in by Library_of_Gage

(40/40 I 110,024 I Explicit)

Steve is a modern boy dealing with modern problems: existential dread, anger at a world he can't fix, and the inescapable feeling that he'll never be able to name what's missing from his life. And then his parents buy him a house, an alternate dimension in desperate need of help yeets him to the 80s to fix things, and he falls in love with a maybe-murderer-but-not-really metalhead along the way.

Bad Omens by Lihhelsing

(15/15 I 110,320 I Explicit)

In the 80s, Eddie Munson and Corroded Coffin rose to fame under H&H Records management. With two successful albums, the band started their second national tour in 1989 and seemed to be on the path to becoming one of the greatest metal bands of all time. But something went wrong somewhere, and the tour was cut short when Corroded Coffin announced an unexpected hiatus.

No one knows exactly what happened, and the members of the band were radio silent. Until now.

After almost 8 years, Corroded Coffin is back and things seem to be good, or so Eddie Munson hopes, because between making music again and hitting the road knowing very well how the tour life was partially responsible for his breakdown in 1989, he needs things to be good.

And as if things weren't complicated enough, Eddie seemed to think it would be a good idea to invite his ex-boyfriend -and the love of his life– to tour with them, now that child star and famous pop singer Steve Harrington wanted to broaden his musical horizons.

It's like Eddie Munson is asking for something to go wrong as he tries to balance his new tour, his rocky relationship with his ex and the fact that all his past secrets don't seem to want to stay hidden.

Sing if You're Glad to be Gay by VTHX (V_Haley)

(25/25 I 120,520 I Explicit)

Months before Will Byers disappears, Steve Harrington is outed, bullied, and shunned. Eddie would be overjoyed to find another gay kid in Hawkins if it wasn't THAT gay kid.

you remind me of someone (it's probably you) by katdeerly

(15/15 I 136,736 I Mature)

‘I'm sure I'll see you soon no matter what.’

Steve startles. ‘What? Why?’

‘You're marrying my sister, aren't you?’ There's something guarded, almost teasing in Eddie’s tone and when their eyes meet, Steve can’t read the truth. It might be disappointment; it might be hope.

‘Oh, no, no, I'm not – not her fiancé. That was a misunderstanding.’

Take the Money and Run by thisapplepielife

(22/22 I 143,931 I Explicit)

“Rules. Like, there’ll be no eating in my car. You’re not driving my car. No heavy metal,” Steve keeps listing, “you’re not picking up women and fucking them in m-”

“I'll try to control myself,” Eddie interrupts with a quip, a smirk. Fucking girls in Steve’s car, or anywhere else for that matter, isn’t going to be an issue, unless something pretty fundamental shifts in him.

Steve continues, completely ignoring Eddie, “You’ll wipe your feet. You’re not dragging dirt all over my car. No hitchhikers. No cutesy road games. No smoking in the car. I’m not paying for all the gas.”

“Ass, gas or grass, got it,” Eddie says, like he's taking this very seriously. He is not taking this seriously.

Or: Road trip!

Money, Power, Glory by StrangerThings1975

(26/26 I 292,494 I Explicit)

Steve starts paying Eddie for sex once he discovers that Eddie doesn't just deal drugs and perform at the Hideout.

(Steve doesn't mean to fall in love with him, but he can’t help himself.)

[redrosydiaz]

everyone i see saying "omg oliver really said eat the rich!!!1!111!!!!" are COMPLETELY missing the point of that movie. it was not an "eat the rich movie", it wasn't about class in that sense AT ALL. it was very much about desire and obsession and consumption. not class!!

[the-wandering-wayseeker]

Repeat after me:

The Jedi taught emotional control, not repression.

The Jedi took kids with parental consent, they did not kidnap them.

The Jedi did not hold people against their will, they could leave the Order at any time.

The Jedi were not "just as bad" as the Sith.

[absoluteocellibehavior]

I know literally no one fucking cares except me but I’m so close to doing a post on prayer beads because so many draw Oscar in a rosary and the beads are *so* close. So closeeeeee.

Give that priest some accurate Catholic drip. Let that father slay.

[sturionic]

HALT! Americans seeking to confidently and wrongly explain other countries' politics, and Canadians who failed 6th grade social studies:

Since I've just seen this for like the 20th time today, let's go over real quick some hot topics about the Canadian political system.

Did Prime Minister Trudeau "use the tariffs" as a power-grab to hold onto his seat? No, he did not. PM Trudeau resigned his seat and then agreed to stay on until the Liberal Party of Canada chose a new leader. He abided by the timeline he set, and did not stay a second longer than would have been expected of him under due Canadian process. He is now fini.

Did the New Democratic Party and the Conservative Party initiate a government shutdown? No. The Governor General initiated Parliament being prorogued (which they usually do under the advice of the sitting PM) - which is not remotely the same thing as a USA government shutdown. "Proroguing" parliament is basically hitting a big ol' pause/reset button on any legislative and funding decisions in progress. Everything else in the government continues on as normal. Whether a given Canadian agrees with the current rationale or not, the fact is that Canadian governments do this all the time. The NDP and Conservatives pledged to a future no-confidence vote, which does unseat the current PM - but this is still not the same thing as a government shutdown, and now the situation may change as the PM went ahead and beat them to it by resigning on his own.

Mark Carney is, as of Sunday, Canada's new PM-Designate. Was he (GASP) unelected?! Is this undemocratic?! This one's for the gajillion Americans I've seen spouting this garbage all over social media. Jesus christ no this is not how Canadian democracy works. If you see other Americans saying this, smack them upside the head for me, please and thank-you. Canadians do not elect the individual Prime Minister. In a federal election, you rock up to the booth and are given a ballot listing the MPs (Members of Parliament) for your riding (electoral district) - the idea being that you're voting for a local person who will then go forth and represent your riding's interests in Parliament. Your vote for an MP is also a vote for the political party they are attached to, unless they are an independent. The Prime Minister is elected by the party. Justin Trudeau stepped down as PM, so it is the responsibility of the LPC to elect his successor, and they chose Mark Carney, who won against several other LPC candidates running. No doubt Carney will trigger a general election soon, and the Canadian populace will have the chance to decide whether they like the LPC with Carney at the head any better than they liked the LPC with Trudeau at the head. 4. Are you saying all of this because you're a Liberal Party apologist/Trudeau defender/Carney fan?! No. The Liberal Party of Canada are a bunch of fucking ghouls and it shrivels my very soul that the federal NDP have fucked up every hand they've been dealt since 2015; so our viable choices are "party of fucking ghouls who have been sitting around in a dark room jerking each other's withered tallywhackers for the past century" or "Party who are very open about the fact that they are going to turn around, drop their pants, and sell the whole country to the USA for 50¢ the literal second they're elected." You can hate Canadian politicians or Canada as a country all you like. That said, holy shit, can we not confidently mislabel other countries' politics as 'undemocratic.' It is really, really, CRUCIALLY, FUCKING VITALLY important right now not to accidentally fall ass-first into the American government's strategy of "trying to make Canada look like an undemocratic backwater in need of 'saving'" because that is how the American government sets the stage for invasions of other countries. Please. Do better.

[lesbianjackies]

hold my hand and say it with me: jackie taylor is not a femme

[auroras-void]

Death. Before. Detransition.

Not in a million years, would I ever want to be cis.

(Maybe it's "Untransition" in this case though?)

Not directly what this is about, but I feel the same spirit applies.

Transness isn't an affliction I have fought to cure and relieve myself of. It is a journey, of self discovery and reconstruction.

To wish that I could skip that journey, even to be flown directly to it's end, would be to rip out enough of my soul to render me unrecognizable. It is a fundamental misunderstanding of what this is, who I am, and what this is for. There is no final destination here. There is no end to self discovery, to building yourself anew as you see fit.

The suffering is painful, so much of it is needless, unfair, cruel.

But if you ask me if it was worth it. My answer is and will always be:

More than you can possibly imagine.

"I wish I was cis" can mean either "I wish I was cis as my assigned gender" or "I wish I was cis as the 'opposite' gender from what I was assigned." And vice versa for the "I wish I was trans" answers.

–

We ask your questions anonymously so you don’t have to! Submissions are open on the 1st and 15th of the month.

[rowanisawriter]

fic is a safe space, probably one of the last safe spaces. by safe i mean safe from the pressure of caving to advertisers. you can write fic about anything and not worry (shouldn’t worry) about what’s popular or what an advertiser oriented algorithm will pick up. what i mean by this is that you don’t have to bring this advertiser friendly behavior into fic. heroes can make bad decisions, people can fall out of love, villains can win, villainous organizations can win, redemption doesn’t have to happen, etc. make things a little messy if you want to, because life can be messy and art is a reflection of life. not what the advertisers have decided for us life is like, real life. this is one of the last places where this is still possible

[bethanythebogwitch]

I checked some of your other responses and you apparently think you beat Gutsick Gibbon in a debate on this topic. You are either a troll or completely delusional.

Thinking you know better than a community of people who have spent their lives studying a topic is both supremely arrogant and shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how science works. A scientific consensus is not a piece of dogma that must be defended against all reason or evidence to the contrary the way religious beliefs are. Science is a collaborative and self-correcting process. Individual scientists are constantly checking, refining, and correcting each other. Scientists can be positively vicious to each other when they find flaws in each other's views and conclusions. That's a good thing. Individual scientists have biases, blind spots, and topics they are unaware of. The process of peer review and the continued process of refining, replicating, and questioning previous studies ensures that those biases and blind spots are corrected. That's why scientific frauds and hoaxes like the Piltdown man or Andrew Wakefield's vaccine studies are caught and corrected by other scientists. There cannot be a massive conspiracy in science to

Science does not have dogma. The very idea of an unquestionable statement of faith is anathema to science. Everything is open to question and nothing is sacred because it is through questioning and testing our beliefs that we find out which ones are true or closest to the truth. This is not how religious organizations work. Most of the major creationist "science" groups like Answers in Genesis publicly post statements of faith declaring that they will never accept scientific conclusions if they conflict with their fixed belief in a young earth. Though they don't seem to realize it, these statements are declarations that they are not doing science, they're creating propaganda.

It is a common saying that proof does not exist in science, only mathematics. This is because proof in a mathematical sense is absolute and science is constantly improving. However, we can honestly say that some thing have been proven in the colloquial sens of that word, that is proven beyond a reasonable doubt. There are topics for which the evidence is so overwhelming that they are functionally proven. Evolution, the ancient age of the earth and the universe, germ theory of disease, heliocentrism, round earth, and so on are so well supported that they are effectively impossible to be wrong. This does not mean they are dogma. They are constantly being studied so out understanding can improve. Any new theory (that's theory in the scientific meaning of the word as a body of well-supported facts, not theory in the common usage) seeking to supplant them would have to explain everything those bodies of facts already explain. If you want to supplant the theory of evolution, you need a new theory that also explains everything that the theory of evolution covers, including the fact that evolution happens. We've seen new species arise out of existing populations both in controlled conditions in the lab and in uncontrolled conditions in the field. A new theory seeking to overturn our knowledge of the age of the earth and the universe would have to also cover all the things we know about the ages of those things, including distant starlight, geological processes, archaeological evidence that shows there were already established civilizations at a time yecs think the first humans were magically conjured out of clay, dendrochronology, the fossil record, the genetic clock, planetary formation, and an overwhelming amount of other evidence.

Religious people often say that accepting dogma is wisdom. In fact, it is the exact opposite. By believing in something no matter what the evidence says, you are abdicating understanding and refusing to learn what may actually be true. The truth is out there, and it is through constant examination, questioning, and communication that we will discover it. To ignore and deny all that the scientific method has discovered and continues to discover is akin to a delusion: a fixed false belief that will not change in response to evidence. It is effectively the same as a person in a flood denying that the flood is happening, even as the water rises to cover them. Misinformation and dogma are dangerous because they affect the very way we think and thinking is the most important thing we can do.

I don't think anything I say here will convince OP that they are wrong about yec. Like I said, they are either a troll or so invested in their false belief they are effectively delusional. However, there may be people who read this post and do have a desire to understand the truth or who are on the fence. For those people, I hope this helps you understand what science really is and how it works. The world is far stranger, bigger, and more wonderful than the people who wrote religious texts ever imagined. Science is the method we used to explore and understand it. I hope you'll join us on that journey.

Also, OP is blocked because I'm done feeding the troll.

Handbags from T-Rex skin!

This means aDNA can survive 10's of millions of years? According to scientists this is not possible, yet here it is. Creationists love this kind of thing because the only explanation is that dinosaurs were created by God 6,000 years ago and perished when the Garden of Eden's ecology collapsed and man was expelled from the Garden...

Again we see the embarrassment on the faces of Evolutionists unable to explain their own findings, that indeed the impossible is happening before our eyes and the Bible has been affirmed time and time again.

[myprongsfootera]

I cannot stop thinking about that "Sirius killed for James, died for Harry, but lived for Remus" post

No.

Stop it.

I want to squirt water like "bad fandom"

Sirius stayed sane in Azkaban solely to avenge James's murder and try to protect Harry. It was about the two of them and Peter. If Remus ranked on the list it was a very distant fourth.

When Sirius came back, his *sole focus* was how to protect Harry. He lived alone as a dog feeding on scraps for most of his time post-Azkaban. He was only with Remus a tiny fraction of the time at the end, and even then it was with a primary focus of how to work together to protect Harry.

James's son.

It all comes back to him for Sirius.

He killed, lived, and died for James. All of it. Over and over, he was willing to do all of it for James.

Fucking Remus, who?

[knightobreath]

people need to stop being so toxic about the dsmp. i get it isn’t everyone’s thing but it isn’t this super evil minecraft server of groomers. that was one guy and the allegations came out at the end of the dream smp’s lifespan. also, despite being in the title, dream hardly played on the server and never streamed or recorded his gameplay. he was basically just there for promo!! the vast majority of dream smp fans weren’t dream stans, they were there for the dozens of other creators playing on the server. in fact, there has even been beef between dream smp fans and dream stans!! anyways, it’s just a roleplay series, and i don’t see people sending death threats to fans of streamed dnd campaigns.

[a-calico-rabbit]

Ohhh yeah þat’s disgusting. My uncle’s working on a case like þat wiþ someone far lower functioning. Treated like shit, and it’s so awful. Þese companies—psych wards and retirement homes, specifically—seem like þey go out of þeir damn way to higher þe most miserable, deplorable asshats in þe world. Recreational puppy kickers. I’m so sorry you had to go þrough þat; it’s an awful, stupid system based on a fundamental misunderstanding of þe basics of human behavior and psychological.

you are my newest moot and so I am starting a friendship by telling you that I haven't slept in 40 sum hours.

Rookie numbers