#to be continued obviously

[vera-keller]

switchblade | masters of the air | taster pt. 2 a/n: did anyone ask for this? no lmao prepare to receive my [redacted] [redacted] anyway (lore accurate mariner quote)

It is at Thorpe Abbotts that Mariner decides coming here is functionally a grounding. Try as she reluctantly might, she simply cannot imagine herself flying a B-17. The controls are all wrong, or at least she thinks they should be. Her hand will automatically reach for the throttle that is supposed to be on her left and instead it will grasp at nothing, empty space. And when she tries to locate and operate the weapons control systems she will be immediately humbled by the reminder that she is no longer responsible for controlling the guns in this aircraft.

No, there are other people in the aircraft for that. Nine other people, in fact. Nine other people to navigate and operate the radio and fire the top turret and ball turret and so on and so forth. Her job is simply to keep the aircraft flying, the most rudimentary definition of what a pilot is.

She supposes Tillotson wasn’t spewing complete bullshit when he said that she had a particular skill set that could – the keyword being could – make her a valuable bomber pilot. And that was that she knows the vulnerabilities inherent within every bomber. If she knows these vulnerabilities, if she knows what enemy aircraft will be aiming for when they inevitably fly into an onslaught of them, then she knows how to circumvent them.

Like that’s going to happen, another voice in her head says. You can’t even do evasive manoeuvres in this toaster.

Frustrated, Mariner slams her fist down on the metal beam that she is sitting on. An officer walking in her direction flinches at the sound.

“Lieutenant Mariner?” he asks.

Mariner looks up at the insignia on his shoulders: a gold oak leaf, horizontal, stem pointing his collar. The insignia of a major. Rank has been pulled, albeit indirectly. She jumps down from the beam and salutes him.

“Sir,” she says. “Sorry for startling you.”

The major smiles politely in answer, a lopsided though somewhat guarded smile that seems to suggest tolerance. He’s young for an officer of his rank. In fact, he cannot possibly be more than a few years older than Mariner, yet he has obviously been entrusted by his superiors with a rank normally held by men who have a greater advantage of age on him. Mariner wonders what that must have taken. What buzzwords are on his resume? Strategic vision? Tactical acumen? Effective communication? Team player? Maybe, like her, he has a father who makes a habit out of overextending his influence. After all, nepotism has been here long before she was born and will continue to remain here long after she is dead. It is the beginning and the end, the first enemy and the last, et cetera.

But this officer doesn't seem to be one of those. He doesn't, for starters, wear his insignia as though it is an accessory that he knows looks better on everyone else.

“Don’t worry,” he says. “I’m not that easily startled. But it did take me a while to find you. You were supposed to report directly to me, but I had to ask around until Lemmons helpfully told me he saw someone who might have looked a little like you head straight into the hangar.”

“Just trying to get an up close and personal look at the tin can I’ll be flying, sir.”

The major nods, as though he can understand the sentiment of a pilot wanting to evaluate a new plane to which they have been assigned, though Mariner doubts he’d understand exactly how much she despises the idea of getting into one of these things that reminds her of a bee in that neither, according to all known laws of aviation, should be able to fly. But the major doesn’t seem to be reading into it at all. Instead, he looks up at a nearby B-17, and Mariner instinctively follows his gaze. The same aircraft she has spent the past ten minutes disparaging in every measurable way, shape and form in her head, and imagining herself shooting down in aerial combat, which would have been an amusing pastime were she not going to be piloting one of these planes herself. Yet he’s looking at it as though it’s an old friend.

“That’s no tin can, Mariner. That’s a B-17. She’s not as sleek or nimble as a fighter, but she’s sturdy, reliable and strong, and she can take a beating like no other. I couldn’t ask for a better plane to fly in. You just transferred from the 157th?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ve seen your records. You’re a solid Mustang pilot. You might find it harder to get used to the B-17 than I did, but she’ll grow on you. I’m Major Gale Cleven.”

“Olivia Mariner.”

Belatedly Mariner remembers that Cleven absolutely knows who she is already. Even through the embarrassment, however, she can appreciate the fact that if he is aware of the real reason for her reassignment, he’s consciously choosing not to mention it. She looks back up at the B-17 and tries to see it the way she imagines Cleven must, a literal flying fortress, but all she can think is that it is an ugly aircraft that is much too large to the point where its largeness looks like a mistake.

“You said she can take a beating, sir?” she asks, knocking on the aluminium.

“She certainly can. She’s earned her reputation for toughness, that’s for sure.” He reaches out, swipes his hand along the nose of the aircraft, as though wiping away dust that has collected there in a familiar gesture. “She’s designed to withstand heavy enemy fire and still deliver her payload while bringing her crew home safely.”

Mariner nods sceptically, her eyes narrowing slightly as she studies the bomber. “Okay, so she can tank enemy fire. But can she evade it altogether? That’s what’s going to make all the difference when it comes to bringing the crew back.”

Cleven offers a knowing smile at Mariner’s bluntness, as though he has long figured out that she would ask that question sooner or later, and it is clear she has opted for sooner. “She’s no Mustang, Mariner, but she’s no slouch either. If you want to manoeuvre the B-17, you have to go easy on the yoke. Besides, when you’re in a formation flying together, you have the strength of numbers. Each pilot requires both practice and discipline to maintain formation, and when you’re out there in the air, everyone watches each other’s back. That’s how we fly our missions and that’s how we come back in one piece. All of us, together.”

And there it is. The inevitable cattle prod in her side. This conversation is getting a little pointed for Mariner’s liking now, considering the reason she was bumped out of her former squadron was supposedly because of her inability to adhere to a formation. She wonders if Cleven knows this already, whether Tillotson has included some kind of addendum on her report about her apparent Achilles’ heel as a fighter pilot. Excellent, Tillotson, she thinks irately to herself. You can’t get me to stay in a formation, so you put me in an aircraft where I’ll literally die if I don’t. Very well played. Have you been taking lessons from my father? Maybe the two of you should sit down together for a drink sometime and discuss all the many methods you might choose to employ for colossally fucking up my life. Dickheads. But she does not say any of this. Instead she asks, in a perfectly calm and even tone of voice that a perfectly calm and even individual might use, “Who will I be flying with?”

“We’re putting together a crew for you,” Cleven tells her. “Rest assured. You won’t be integrating into the unit alone.”

Then he pauses for a brief moment, glancing up at the B-17. “As a pilot, you’ll learn to appreciate her strengths,” he says. “She’s resilient and a force to be reckoned with. And in the end, it’s not about the plane you fly, but how you fly it. Wouldn’t you agree, Lieutenant Mariner?”

Mariner considers this. Her gaze drifts from Cleven to the B-17 obfuscating her peripheral vision that is almost certainly going to be the death of her within the next six months, but she actually thinks about Cleven’s words. Superior officers tend to attempt to get through to her in one of two ways: either through the carrot or the stick. Neither works on her: she sees through the carrot immediately – thereby also identifying a superior officer that is more interested in placating his men than leading them – and any and all stick wielders are classified as delusional self-important men throwing tiny-fisted tantrums and asserting themselves through the little power they are afforded by the chain of command, thereby immediately and permanently losing her respect. Tillotson falls in the third category of simply being annoying. Yet Cleven doesn’t seem to fall in any prescribed category. This could simply mean he’s better than others at concealment. But it could also mean he doesn’t see her as something to be managed. 

“You’re right, sir,” she says, pale blue eyes appraising the aircraft with a measuring gleam. “I think I know exactly how I’m going to fly this.”

Cleven actually cracks a smile. “That’s the spirit, but maybe you should take her out for a test flight before you get too sure of yourself. I’ve booked you in for three hours this afternoon. Come by the hangar at 1500. We’ll see if you can get her into the air.”

Mariner nods, a single dip of the chin downward. “Trust me, I can do much more than get her into the air.”

“Good,” Cleven says. “Because that’s what the Krauts are gonna be expecting. Why don’t you go get yourself set up? Irvine will show you your room and get all the admin sorted out. Report to the hangar at 1500 sharp. And Mariner?”

“Sir?”

“Try not to beat up the metal beams too much while you’re in here. The acoustics in the hangar aren’t exactly forgiving in terms of the echo. A lesser man might have pissed himself.”

The corners of Mariner’s lips lift into an almost imperceptible smile. She’s not going to tempt Cleven to thinking she’s actually warming up to him, of course, even though she appreciates that he seems to be allowing her the courtesy of a clean slate, something that should be frustrating her instead because she hasn’t done anything that has warranted the necessity of a clean slate in the first place. Being reassigned to the 100th is miserable enough without a superior officer like Tillotson trying to turn every patrol briefing into a veritable circlejerk. But Cleven isn’t Tillotson, and Mariner’s almost imperceptible smile seems to be enough for him already, because he takes the hint and smiles back – politely but not clinically – and walks away as though this interaction has been the most natural thing in the world for him.

Huh. Perhaps she now has, for the first time in her three-year career, a superior officer she can actually get along with.

Left to her own devices, Mariner looks resentfully up at the B-17s, their cumbersome-looking metallic bodies glinting with rays of sunlight that come in from the open sides of the hangar and reflect off the painted aluminium. They look back down at her, unblinking.

Whoever was responsible for designing the shape of their noses should be shot, Mariner thinks. The entire structure is an area of stress concentration. Any impact applied to it would lead to mass structural failure across the entire aircraft, not to mention that it would instantly kill the bombardier. Why is the bombardier stationed in the nose section anyway? She reaches out a hand, runs it along the nose as Cleven had done earlier, and feels no additional affection for the aircraft as she absently imagined she might have done. 

It’s the pilot. Not the plane. Mariner repeats this to herself like a mantra, as though the act of repetition might somehow will the statement into becoming reality. A part of her finds it to be a frustrating restriction: if she fails to master the controls of a B-17 then it would be entirely on her, a reflection of the limitations in her abilities as a pilot. It would give Cleven ammunition to use against her if he so wishes, and she doesn’t like the idea of giving anyone any kind of ammunition to use against her.

But another part of her challenges this assumption. It’s all in your hands, she thinks. Exactly how you want it. You alone control this aircraft. Just you. You decide whether it rolls or turns, whether it pulls up or dives, how to operate it to best meet situational needs. You decide whether its purpose is to simply tank enemy fire or if you can turn it into what you want it to be.

She might as well train herself to start thinking this way; she doesn’t have much of a choice otherwise. Fortunately for her, she’s already figured out an alarming plethora of ways she could shoot a B-17 down. Now her role is to defend it. More than defend it: her role is to evolve it. Cleven is right. The B-17 would never come close to a P-51. But while aircraft cannot change their structural components, the pilot is at perfect liberty to change their tactics, and it’s convenient that doing so is the mark of a good pilot anyway, which she is. Exactly how non-manoeuvrable is the B-17 anyway? She privately hopes that Cleven is actually right, that the aircraft is unbreakable. Because whatever doesn’t break will bend.

If I can’t find a way, then the others definitely have no chance, she thinks to herself. And then, Jesus Christ, shut the hell up, Mariner. This is no time to get cocksure. You haven’t even gotten in the aircraft yet.

Mariner pauses.

She looks up at the B-17 in front of her. At the hangar full of B-17s in front of her. Unmanned. Fuselage and bomb bay doors in plain sight. Exterior steps attached.

Unless…?

A full crew of ten is not needed to fly the B-17, surely. Any plane can get off the ground with just the pilot alone. Especially a pilot like her who is accustomed to flying single-engine single-seat fighters, where – once you’re up in the air – there’s no one to help you. Besides, how different can the controls be, anyway? They’re all the same in every aircraft. Elevator, ailerons, rudder, throttle, trim tabs. She could make her way around the controls in her sleep. A small, determined smile curves her lips.

She’s taken off and landed successfully more than a hundred times. She’s a lieutenant and an ace pilot. She’s served in both the RAF and the USAAF on a technicality, and operated multiple different fighter aircraft while she’s at it. She’s hardly a fresh-faced flight school graduate; she doesn’t have to wait for Cleven’s supervision for a simple test flight. In fact, Cleven will probably appreciate that she’s showing initiative and actually making an effort to integrate into the 100th. Maybe if he relays a glowing report of her back to Tillotson – fuck that bitch, Mariner thinks, but he’s still her superior officer – he might expedite her reassignment back to a fighter squadron. Where she belongs. Maybe she’ll even get to have her old P-51 back.

With that in mind, she steps up into the B-17 before her, mindful of the bulkheads as she ducks into the cockpit and slides deftly into the pilot seat. The flight controls and instrument panel look similar enough to that of a P-51. Engine gauges, altimeters, attitude indicators, turn coordinators, compasses, throttle quadrant, the usual assemblage. Everything needed to get this tin can, which she must now grow accustomed to as her designated aircraft for the next several months, up into the air. She can figure them out in no time.

So she sets the fuel selector valves. Checks the propeller pitch controls, like she has done countless times before.

And she cranks the engine.

–

��Sir?”

Gale Cleven looks up from the report wedged behind the cylinder of the typewriter on the desk before him at Master Sergeant Ken Lemmons, who stands in the doorway of his office, his breaths coming out in short, shallow gasps, his face overwrought with evident distress. Cleven pauses, his brows furrowing.

“What is it?”

“Lieutenant Mariner? The new pilot?” Lemmons’s face is white with panic.

“Yeah, I just spoke to her in the hangar. What happened?”

A hint of reluctance washes over Lemmons’s features, as though he is still privately hoping very much that he won't have to be the person to relay this information. But he eventually speaks.

“Sir, Lieutenant Mariner crashed a B-17 on the runway.”

And then Gale's day takes a rapid turn for the worse.

[crumb-crumblet-s-crumbington]

return to sub level 50

[inkskinned]

probably time for this story i guess but when i was a kid there was a summer that my brother was really into making smoothies and milkshakes. part of this was that we didn't have AC and couldn't afford to run fans all day so it was kind of important to get good at making Cool Down Concoctions.

we also had a patch of mint, and he had two impressionable little sisters who had the attitude of "fuck it, might as well."

at one point, for fun, this 16 year old boy with a dream in his eye and scientific fervor in heart just wanted to see how far one could push the idea of "vanilla mint smoothie". how much vanilla extract and how much mint can go into a blender before it truly is inedible.

the answer is 3 cups of vanilla extract, 1/2 cup milk alternative, and about 50 sprigs (not leaves, whole spring) of mint. add ice and the courage of a child. idk, it was summer and we were bored.

the word i would use to describe the feeling of drinking it would maybe be "violent" or perhaps, like. "triangular." my nose felt pristine. inhaling following the first sip was like trying to sculpt a new face. i was ensconced in a mesh of horror. it was something beyond taste. for years after, i assumed those commercials that said "this is how it feels to chew five gum" were referencing the exact experience of this singular viscous smoothie.

what's worse is that we knew our mother would hate that we wasted so much vanilla extract. so we had to make it worth it. we had to actually finish the drink. it wasn't "wasting" it if we actually drank it, right? we huddled around outside in the blistering sun, gagging and passing around a single green potion, shivering with disgust. each sip was transcendent, but in a sort of non-euclidean way. i think this is where i lost my binary gender. it eroded certain parts of me in an acidic gut ecology collapse.

here's the thing about love and trust: the next day my brother made a different shake, and i drank it without complaint. it's been like 15 years. he's now a genuinely skilled cook. sometimes one of the three of us will fuck up in the kitchen or find something horrible or make a terrible smoothie mistake and then we pass it to each other, single potion bottle, and we say try it it's delicious. it always smells disgusting. and then, cerimonious, we drink it together. because that's what family does.

[maddie-grove]

As someone who’s living with a middle school social studies teacher, all the posts along the lines of “why did we never learn about this historical event in school” just make me go “because your teacher was supposed to cover all of US history in one year, and they didn’t get to the Revolutionary War until Halloween because they were urged to slow down the progression of the lessons because a more senior teacher was running behind, and they didn’t get to the Civil War until Valentine’s Day because the school kept scheduling every special event during social studies because there’s no end-of-grade testing for that subject, and they didn’t get to WWI until May because they were sick for a few days and the substitute couldn’t do much more than babysit, and now they’re having to do the entire Cold War in two days, so that’s why you didn’t hear about the lesbian inventor of the circus peanut. They would have loved to tell you about the lesbian inventor of the circus peanut!”

[emacrow]

Clockwork was in the middle of mentoring Danny about his Duty as High King leading him by his shoulders before he felt a awful core wrenching pain before he quite literally pulled through the afterlife and back into the living. Pt 1

Now Clockwork haven't been alive for an awful Long Long time since he was beaten and killed by his Children during his madness phase, so suddenly awakening in a sacrificial alter, the feeling of gravity weighing him down, eyes blurring, ears ringing with a loud noise that kept going badump ba dump as he was experiencing what possible the worst tremendous sensitivity overload of being brought back from the very dead and into brand new mortal flesh.

The Justice League and dark Justice were in the middle of stopping the forbidden ritual from some crazed Cultists who somehow found the skull, some of wonder women's blood, ancient artifacts of time belonging Kronos could only stood frozen in shock to see in horror and a bit of mesmerized fascination.

As the skull began to glow a ominous greenish blue glow of Magic form by blood then bones, muscle then flesh with very very long blonde hair that kept going down while the rest began quickly making a neck, a chest, arms, and the rest of the remaining of the naked body.

What the cultists didn't expect at all was Kronos's new body was a women due to the misread of a certain someone who thought the blood of the main head descendants of Greek meant wonder women and not a male descendants. Along with a much more different oopsy was the gasping little naked toddler that was looking wide eyed gasping heavily at the suddenly drag along as he being held tightly by the now Female Kronos's arms.

>> part 2

[tubbytarchia]

Shark toothed mermaid didn't know how to kiss her sailor crush

[svtskneecaps]

i also just want to point out the qsmp members' commitment to like never letting the inactive members die. like dantdm logged on twice and is canonically dead and everyone continues to blame mysterious happenstance on him. spreen is canonically dead and yet people are still like namedropping him even tho the house façade he built has been demolished and also probably consumed by a mountain. they meme on kameto who's barely been on except that time he was a fed spy that was iconic as hell. they just immortalize their members and they're always so happy to see old faces come back and it lowkey makes me emotional lmfaoo like missa barely logged on for a while but goddamn nobody forgot his name bc philza can't go one day without mentioning him and mariana barely logs on but every time fit saw the homeless mariana in roier's city no matter what he'd stop dead and tell it "come home" and when slime came back to the server for elections after having logged off for the last like two months everyone was still excited to meet him bc the others had kept his memories on the server fresh and alive, maxo died canonically in the nuke and pierre pasted his face all over the server, luzu vanished for months and we never forgot him either thanks to the computers and foolish's wack ass family tree. like when purgatory teams were chosen and team red constantly joked about how it would be so over for the other teams once germán logged on despite the fact that germán had only ever logged on ONCE, the way they cheered when they snatched rubius in the split of green despite the fact that rubius hadn't logged on more than twice since march. they just keep the names alive all the time and it's like

it just makes me really happy to see. like it makes me really happy. like the admin team and the members alike are like 'no way in HELL are we letting your memory go' like damn once ur on isla quesadilla you really are stuck as an islander forever :D

[aalghul]

I think it’s really funny how Tim had at least one parent besides Bruce (who was not explicitly his parent for the longest time) for most of his time as Robin and yet nobody contests that he has been Bruce’s son, Dick’s brother, etc. since far before his actual adoption. But with Duke it’s a whole debate every time.

“Duke’s parents are still alive so it’s disrespectful” Tim’s stepmom was alive but unable to take care of Tim, when he was adopted by Bruce. Is it disrespectful to her to say Tim is Bruce’s son? Or does this argument only apply to Duke?

“Bruce didn’t adopt Duke, he was just his guardian” Do you know who else Bruce also didn’t adopt for his entire childhood? Or is Dick no longer Bruce’s son in any way whatsoever?

“Dick actually called Tim his brother” Jason’s included Duke as one of his brothers.

[14dayswithyou]

Hi, Howdy! Hey! I really love your novel!! I got a little confused by the 4 day, may maybe you help me please? who is it? why we got the bad end staying the night in Ren’s apartment and he disappear of the home screen? I can’t understand “unset memory” game, sorry if I wrote smth wrong or smth sounds rude, I swear that I didn’t mean it if happened, I’m really a fan of the novel, I’ve been playing the game since day 1 or 2 I guess, probably day 1, english isn’t my first language, but I tried lol

⌞♥⌝ I hope you don't mind me answering these as bullet points!! ^^

"It" will be revealed later in the game! So I won't reveal too much right now.

You can only get the Dead End in Day 4 by staying at Ren's apartment — the rest of your choices before that don't matter. I'd also pay closer attention to the black smoke and Ren's reaction towards it!

Ren disappears from the home screen because he promised to help the player out (and stop them from getting the Dead End again). Try replaying the game again from the beginning for a surprise!

"Unsent Memories" was another visual novel (initially being written by @10chimes / @unsentmemory, though the project has since been dropped and handed back to me /pos) and is set in the same universe as 14 Days With You. Its storyline and characters are completely separate from 14DWY, so you don't have to worry about them while playing 14DWY.

[orb-weaving]

Recognition

[hotasfahrenheit]

this kiss was stupendous

and not just because it looked great, which it did obviously but-

-it's the pause in the first gif, the look in the second gif, it's the way that God glances up at Diew's eyes to gauge if this is okay, if Diew is comfortable, if Diew is enjoying the kiss and the physical contact, it's the way he leaves space in between the kisses and leans back just a tiny bit in the third gif to make sure that Diew is actively choosing to continue kissing him

it makes this scene just so good

[floral-and-the-machine-blog]

I love how one of the defining characteristics of the Locked Tomb series is that it’s purportedly lesbian in nature, and yet the yuri is so toxic it’s barely edible

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

practicing for scares, i imagine!

[infizero-draws]

idk when i'll get around to designing skizz and mumbo, but here's my wild life grian design :)

[aenslem]

🥵🥵🥵

[star-trek-smash-or-pass]

Kathryn Janeway (lizard form)

"Happy Threshold Day!" - me

(the information about which lizard pictured is Janeway came from memory alpha, I accept no responsibility)