#tw: bummer

[blacktoothcomics]

[blacktoothcomics]

aw, naw??

like, literally never. i have bad smoker's breath tho so i don't like having to lean in to be heard, to spare my friend the stank, and it's made me a tad shouty.

maybe chew gum and this feeling of yours will go away.

you ever feel like you were born with something rotten inside you and if people get close enough they’re gonna find out

[blacktooth-the-comic]

"Andrew, you hussy!" -- and other alternate timeline delusions.

Pictured: an MS Paint JPEG of a simplified human figure carefully slapping red car paint on the gnarly horrorclaws of a huge fuckoff lusus. The lusus is styled after the freshwater alligator snapping turtle, a reptile and known child-biter native to Pottowatomi territories. Content Warnings for discussions of racism, hate crimes, assault, sexual abuse, harm to minors, and animal death. May or may not mention the gun we stole from that bodyguard.

♦

Your name is AMME, as of writing you are NEARLY FORTY GODDAMN YEARS OLD, and when you were a kid you were bit on the head by a snapping turtle.

You were bit on the head by a snapping turtle that you had grabbed to pull you to shore, after your sister's rapists decided against the 'homo' act of assaulting a four-year old boy and threw you into the deep pond to drown.

You had used empty beer bottles and cans to float as far as you could, before those slipped from your cold fingers and you sank, and sank, right to the murky bottom of the turtle's conservation pond, happening upon the hill of his shell in your crawling quest for higher ground.

The people responsible for trashing the pond considered themselves pure of blood and native to these lands, and spoke amongst themselves about the destruction the white man brings, unaware that your sister, aged six, and you shared a halfnative father. Your sister was lily white, blonde with blue eyes; and her teenaged attackers weren't much darker but considered themselves righteously beleaguered (and were also smoking a lot of meth).

This is a true story. Unfortunately, this is a true story. This story, which is true, had to be rewritten by journalists and popular culture in order to avoid riling North America's white supremacy terrorists; my sister rewritten to be a black girl, our attackers rewritten to be white.

"That's the plotline to 'A River Runs Through It'," your friend BILL argues mildly one night, while you are regaling this very real and true thing that goddamn happened to your family.

"I KNOW, SHUTUP," you sputter. Allegedly, your dad went to school with the idiot who would hire himself out to Hollywood by the stage name Matthew McConahaugey, or however the fuck that's spelt. There's a popculture through-line haunting the heels of your reality, outstanding tragedies and escalated ironies the likes of which could make any other Hapsburg cousin blush with jealousy.

When you were four, and your baby brother was not yet born, you and your sister were walking a familiar nightly trek, back from a party to the shack in the woods that your poor mother could barely afford to house you all in. Because of the blood ties your father could claim to an indigenous nation, you and your sister qualified for north america's shittiest healthcare and weakest nutrition, besides being housed in a mouse-infested shack with open dirt cellars shoveling mold toxins through your tiny nostrils every night.

Not even counting the extra vulnerability to stalking, kidnap and rape; known dangers to Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (but a vulnerability anyone below a certain tax bracket would share).

Your mom, see, was a polish-catholic whitey; a sparkling blue-eyed autistic fortunate enough to have grown up in the bounty of the valley farms and woodland resourcing culture. She knew how to hunt and butcher and cure hides, how to fish and garden and ferment, a high bohemian prize in the smalltown wash of second-wave feministique and burgeoning 1980s materialism.

Your father was a golden child to his family and tribe, a football star and upright soldier, vaulted either despite of, or because of, his thick blonde hair and pale green eyes, and the dimples he would pass on to you.

Your uncles through your father were as dark as you, black hair that browned in the fields and snowpelt complexions that darkened and waned with the seasonal labor's exposure to northern continental sunlight.

The teenaged boys who attacked you and your sister the night of the turtlebite were close friends of your youngest uncle; but only knew you and your sister as the children of your white mother -- the fact that it was your dad, the town golden boy, who married a daughter from the untouchable polish clan of quiet academics and violently catholic snobbery, the fact was never absorbed by the brains of these reservation sons, brains soaked in weed, amphetamines, and liquor.

Brains bruised by poverty, generational trauma, and colonialist rape culture.

These teenaged child-rapists only knew that your mother was white, her family owned land, and your uncle, their friend, would not miss either of you for spoiling his free time with unpaid child-minding. That uncle, see, was dating and would later marry your mother's sister, your aunt, and of that union these teenaged boys assumed you and your sister's presence at the reserve; that you were the both of you "white trash", castoffs from a catholic community that was only mad at your mother over her recent divorce, rending you both parasites to your uncle's dating life, resource-greedy clingers-on there to appropriate native culture and displace native children from academia.

These teenaged child-rapists did not, or could not, understand the town golden boy was your father; because your father was on military contract and like, couldn't fucking leave to chase his battered runaway wife? Probably something like that.

"This is where Danny Glover comes in," Bill tells his wife, who is listening to you with an expression of extreme autistic discomfort.

"I still don't fucking know if any of this is real or true," you disclaim, reasonably. "Lotta head injury, all my life. Lots of bad Wipipo medsin." You wiggle your fingers at your roomy, who lifts her eyebrows in her best attempt not to look terrified.

So when your mom was still married to your dad, your dad was stationed at an army base several borders away from the hometown that they shared. As her growing family needed the money, and her ravenous brains needed the enrichment, your mom took up a job as secretary to one of your dad's superior officers.

This dude looked exactly like Danny Glover, or was Danny Glover or just sounded like Danny Glover, or you made the connection between this guy and Danny Glover for his involvement in the movie 'a river runs through it', which your mom had bade you and your sister watch when you were eleven or so (and you don't know much now, as an adult, except that delusions of fame and connection can be inheritable).

"I want to hear about the Harry Potter connection," Bill's mean wife insists, several tax brackets more fortunate than you and somehow leagues unhappier for't.

"And the time I cried snot all over Lily Gladstone," you agree, waving that she shut the fuck up. "There is no ethical storytelling under capitalism, and I still don't even think any of this is true, so let's just stay chronological m'kay?"

The night your sister was raped was recounted too many times in the tones of your victory over the snapping turtle; the night your sister was raped was rewritten before her very witness, over and over, as your turtlefight took precedence for family pride. Your sister would grow up suffering extreme paranoia of brown and mestizo people, her connection to tribal support severed, her connection to catholic support non-existent but for her victimhood pricking at the wells of roman grandparent pity.

Your sister's rape was inescapable in the family lorekeeping, and ruined connections to both sides of your entire family with guilt, shame, fear, rage. Disgust.

Your sister would suffer from impulse control disorders and violent outbursts; she would grow insanely jealous of you and for you, would obsess over imaginary wrongs and plot grand criminal schemes of theft and murder, and would eventually grow to be a child-rapist herself after her failure to murder you, shaded under the harrowing impression that nobody cared, really, when kids got raped.

Especially nobody cared when a white kid got raped, because harmony between the skincolors mattered more to the adults in our life than did the actual truth of extremist rhetorics and which communities were vulnerable to nationalist recruitment tactics. Nobody cared when a boy got raped, either, because the homosexual community was not to be besmirched by over-achieving vigilantes. And especially nobody cared when a mixed race child got raped, either side of the family reluctant to confide in the other, suspicions and blame worsened between clans, adults blind to the actual foundation of acts of sadism like sexual violence against kids; adults blind to what, exactly, narratives of power were going to convince the powerless about.

Kids were just supposed to live past their rapes, shrug and move on, sell their labor to capitalism and maybe squeeze a few more worker bees out of a vagina (theirs or someone else's, and this was marketed to us as the standard for happiness, highest proof of recovery).

The natives invoked Bikilimbas and lost a rapist or two to gunfire; but the Catholics only badgered that your sister and you forgive her attackers, a monstrous burden to place on a child and an act that was more than a little responsible for your mother's turn to 'Alternative Medicine' for your counseling and recovery.

In the eighties and nineties, see, it was vogue to heinously abuse autistic and traumatized children in the name of curing their behaviors, nevermind their actual peace of mind or feelings of security. Your sister was a chronic masturbator, her brain starved for dopamine and her violated little body in need of reclamation over its parts, and she was also a fantastical liar, spiritual fanatic, pagan posterchild pupiled to poisonous potionbrewing.

Perhaps inevitably, your sister would turn to physical and sexual violence as an avenue of reassurance; acts of sadism to dispel her existential despair, power trips to regain power by. Her situation wasn't helped by the cowardice and vanity of the father you shared, his constant angling for financial compensation from your existence (kids are expensive), nor his brush with labor trafficking and consequent convictions for things like embezzlement, intimidation, slumlordery and homeopathic grifting.

Well before the tribe didn't want your father, though, your father didn't want his tribe.

"We aren't pottowatomi," you tangent, quoting a demented old auntie who could have been lying through her blackened teeth. "We're from one of the 'uncivilized' tribes, so-named for their willingness to sully white bloodlines with brown, or curse brown bloodlines with white, or whatever." Every whitey in the room looks like they want to question that, but it's Your Fucking Turn To Speak. "Like, it was considered chill for natives to marry black slaves, but tribal leaders and colonialists both agreed that mixing marriage with ze jermins or whomever else european peasant there to do a landgrab; like, they thought that was gross? Terribly, there was an entire, specifically german, movement that considered indigenous races as pure as the white race (or aryan or however that shit went) and, much like some movements in asiatic immigrants the same, thought the mixing of two pure races was, like, fine? So whatever; Maiyami didn't get federal recognition but the reason was mostly because we hella goddamn integrated. Mostly with the jewish, and the french."

To Bill's wife, you clarify, "Been here the whole time, bitch!"

She frowns so hard you think her jaw is going to fall off.

Before or maybe after the turtle bite (you broke a beer bottle open on a rock, head still lodged firmly in that huge fuckoff turtle's maw, and stabbed at the eyes of the thing before shoving your flotation-branch down its spiny throat. The feds would find the turtle dead on your crime scene walkthrough, and lie to you that it was gunfire to end the thing's life, to ease your tiny baby environmentalist guilt.) -- but BEFORE or maybe AFTER the turtle, there was THE OWL.

You met the owl well before your sister's rape, a melanistic horned beast swooping through the station wagon's broad open windows to snatch at your mother's mouseback coinpurse, a brush of feathers across the summer night's driving sweat, your sister asleep in your lap and upset she missed the encounter (your mother hysterical and cussing god).

Probably after the rape, when you forgot many things from the scare of it all and nevermind the pondscum encephalitis (and nevermind the harry potter scar, or the concussive bite force of an alligator snapper vs soft little toddler head), was when you met Blackie the Owl in proper, when you were playing with the field mice your mother warned you not to feed.

From the mouse traps, your mother's chore was often to toss the dead mice to the swamp cats to sustain their company, feeding sometimes the kinds of birds to favor mouseflesh too, though Blackie preferred hers still living and was confident enough to snatch anything from the kids that played in her woods, fuzzy hair accessories and barbie doll heads all fair game to line her nest with.

The story is told that you were holding a gerbil, not a field mouse, aloft the day Blackie cursed you with skinwalking talents. The gerbil had been a gift to foster your love of field mice toward something less prone to rabies, and you were holding him up to get some sunlight, you lying on your back in the cool clover and protecting your fingers from angery gerbilbites by carrying him around on a bedpillow instead of in your grasp.

Pillow held above your face to shade you from the noontide sun, suddenly the pillow was shoved down atop you, elbows collapsing with a laugh because your sister would sometimes do this, start pillowfights and attempt to smother you. When you manage to bench-press the pillow off your face, though, you see naught but a pair of dragon talons balled up in the fabric, a head with the ears of a black cat with one long, fucked-up tooth stabbing down at your poor gerbil sacrifice.

They caught the footage on your landlord's security camera, you strong-arming the pillow carefully over your face so you could wiggle out from under the cat-dragon and buckflip yourself upright ninja-style, recognizing Blackie's wings but having no four-year-old's idea of just what the fuck an owl is supposed to look like up close.

"Cat dragon," you insist to your mother at the kitchen sink, ashen. You don't have a lot of words for a lot of things, and your favorite reading material is the chinese zodiac on the restaurant placemats.

"The what-scar?" Bill's mean wife interrupts, hungry to see her fandom represented at last.

"Oh, yeah," you say, laughing. "You know how JK Rowling was in amnesty international? Yeah, so was an aunt of mine. I knew Rowling as 'JoAnne Fabrics', the name of a local textile outlet, but THAT's another story."

"The original Harry Potter is also the original Dave Strider, and no I will not elaborate," your roommate quotes, looking ill now. A YouTube personality said that, once, and you aspirated your drink right there in front of her, and she didn't understand why at the time.

You nod. This story, this very true and actual real thing you're pretty sure actually happened --

This story is about Homestuck.

Specifically, this story is about Andrew Hussie's struggle with racism, his connection to your sister('s group therapy of similarly traumatised children striving to appease the normalcy-starved adults in their lives).

You say, "I knew Andrew Hussie as Drew Hussar, to distinguish him from Andy [redacted], my cousin. But then again -- a common name, Andrew Hussie, and we might have only been reading Homestuck and clowning on the forums, not necessarily in an active friendship with him or his."

Your buddy Bill nods, looking relieved to hear your measured acknowledgement of probably realities. You agree, this is all just too fantastic to be any kind of true, at least forgiving that you are hilariously faceblind and struggle with associative pattern-finding.

Maybe you're just from another timeline, displaced by all the beatings, stabbings, and poisonings your sister raised against you, her high functioning intelligence and eventual academic and financial stability won at the cost of your safety, your ability to make connections with other people, your confidence. In preteen and teenaged years your sister would set you up to get raped, repeatedly, and the both of you understanding this as just a facet of reality, a Spy vs Spy game risking nothing but catholic ideals on virginity.

Of course you just wanted your sister to make friends with other people, so she could leave you the hell alone. Of course your sister always wanted to share you with her friends, until the jealousy kicked in to get you murdered; so you learned to swerve these social connections early, and often.

'Anti-social' your family would joke of your reluctance to party.

You were very social, actually, and suffering extreme depression from the isolation, but okay. Family could joke, it wasn't them that got raped by indigenous supremacists. And you did party with your sister on her invites, which sometimes ended in serious injury to others bordering second-degree murder. Accidentally. Allegedly.

But you're pretty sure you were in the company of the origins of the homestuck character beats, you and one of your fellow rape survivors (from your sister's therapy group, and from a few hometown incidents you yourself had the privilege to survive). You remember your sister violently upset by the name "Dick Strider", and you remember explaining that your handwriting had not yet recovered from your most recent hospitalization, that the name was "Dirk', that it meant sword.

You chose Dave Strider after Dave-the-army-buddy you used to tail around the base, mistaking his mustache for your dad's. And Strider after the dude in the Hobbit cartoon, and Dirk because you, Amme, and your sister and your newly born brother all had four-letter names, a delicious joke about cussing you didn't yet have the words to define.

You are way beyond age four when this all goes down, of course, it's just that the head injuries... Nothing doesn't ever stop keep happening, time is a flat circle, and you warned him about the fucking stairs, bro.

Being a taurus to the colonial zodiac, and being in a wheelchair at the time, you somewhat fancy yourself the original tavros, your personality just as malleable and digimon-obsessed, even if you also ranted like karkat (carket, actually, like the demand to Cork It, and named after your love of cars and ketamine).

Perhaps somewhere in this hazy recollection of camaraderie amongst defectives is a lost cousin or two, a monied benefactor to fund you all, some happiness and intelligence and helpful distraction. You remember feeding your friend's ant farm something from the back yard, a moth or dead bee or such, accidentally infecting the colony with cordyceps fungi, and scrambling to turn the tragedy into story fuel because hey, at least the ants weren't raped by their uncle's friends (and let that be a lesson about closed ecosystems and building immunities anyway; no sense in living life as an ant if they're going to live and die behind featureless, sterile glass).

You remember confessing to your aspirations to have twelve children exactly; not for any heteronormative aspiration for large family or tradition or whatever, but because you wanted one of each zodiac, to run tests on and see if the personality traits, strengths and flaws really were all that accurate if you simply never taught those kids about western zodiac. There was an entire other half of the world, after all, who based personality shortcuts on a completely different calendar, and most days you felt way more tiger-ish than bull.

You remember a lot, just not if any of it is real. The way everyone around you behaved, you're scared to know which. If these delusions and connections were true, then it was also true that your sister was routinely drugging you to treat your 'social anxiety', and eventually was routinely pimping you out to friends and contacts in ever-worse grabs for connection to fame and success.

If any of this is true, then maybe all of it could be true; Danny Glover sexually harassing your mom, terrorising your entire family for the sake of his own bruised pride over your mom's rejection of his advances; a skit that Dave Chappelle would one day freeze your entire stomach with, the punchline being that your mom wore a squirrel-fur coat and was a money-chaser, and that Chappelle's character was only merely 'petty', and gleeful in his bloat of wealth and fame while the hometown beauty despaired of her humble life.

In reality, your mother chose honesty and peace before she ever chose money or fame; and the only n-word you ever dropped was landed at the loafers of your mother's abuser, and the only reason you ever dropped it was specific to the understanding that the word was harmful; because you legit had and have black family, and would have in your early life known the vagaries of casual racism.

In reality, your mother was harangued by this black dude several leagues wealthier and more powerful than she; and he was a conservative christian too, an admission that would cement your judgement against all who would claim similar, if conservative christianity meant grownass COs physically cornering your mother, right in front of you, to sexually intimidate her and curse her for a racist when she preferred to stay faithful to her marriage.

The divorce with your dad, see, was because your dad did not stick up for your mom when she was being sexually harassed on that army base way back when. Your dad even suggested that your mom simply sleep around with whomever asked, a longstanding workingclass trope and expectation of new mothers trying to secure gainful employment.

And Drew the Hussar (corsair, like a pirate, yeah hussie doesn't mean sexually avid so much as it's like, idk, some european shit? like how gary is actually the name of a type of gardening tool or primitive farming tech or some damn thing).

You are maybe eight or nine years old when you David yourself a Goliath, and land yourself in the hospital with a spinal injury about it all; and you have no regrets about the attack nor the n-bomb, except for the attention that your bravery draws from the town. White supremacy attentions, like. And second-gen Welsh and Irish catholics very easily racist, themselves, having little enough heritage to slave ownership and more than enough historical victimhood under the same colonialist royalty to plague american shores!

So like, your family's pain was always under pressure by the recruitment tactics of extremists looking for a righteous cause to do violence over. Your mother was never racist, never a liar, and never crazy -- not until her abusers found it more useful that she be thus, that the judicial system continue to favor the comfort of the higher tax brackets, and that malignant narcissists stay unchallenged by a world that also expected its children to remain civil in the face of extreme injustice.

And the fact that you dropped the n-word mattered more to your father than did the assault and harassment metered out against your mother, by the Danny Glover lookalike.

But you're not an idiot, and you know the uselessness of prejudice as just like a pattern-finding pitfall. It was bad logic, was racism, and it was bad logic to blame your pursuit of justice on the sin of Wrath, so neither the natives nor the catholics had solved the problem of the wealthy preying on the vulnerable poor.

Your mother bonded with JoAnne Rowling over their shared victimisation, and told the british interloper your entire history. JK Rowling, see, ... well, that story is on Twitter, under the name Professor Blacktooth, probably.

This story is about being homestuck, and probably also a child soldier, and probably also a vengeful Owl Spirit defending its ha'nativ babies through the calculated violence of a terrorised child.

You are maybe eleven, or twelve, or thirteen for the halloween party where you crack the joke "Andrew, you hussie!", because your best friend who-was-a-girl had a crush on the tallest cousin at the house, and he wasn't even your cousin but only shared a name with him, and that cousin had to move to Argentina besides, which sounds fake as hell, so either way you don't want to date the only Drew at that party, and not just because your friend who-was-a-girl liked him but also because You Are A Dude.

You were a dude with a documented circulation problem, even, and was stoned enough to cuddle with anything that sat still long enough to lend you their body heat, and Drew was cousin-shaped and thirteen wasn't too old to stop cuddling your cousins, and really only white people had that bad habit of sexualising kids and teens cuddling anyway, while the rest of the poors chose to live with the practical realities of heating costs, and halloween costumes with no fukken layers.

And yeah, okay, so you were cuddling The Tallest Girl At The Party and it was in the top bunk bed, because Drew was wearing a wig and you thought it was funny to hit on him, and you had a bad back from your storied history of stabbing evil chumps, plural, and you almost always wanted to just Go Lay Down Somewhere Quiet, and you the both of you shared migraines and social anxiety, and you might have wished out loud that Drew was a girl or at least shorter than you right before your friend-who-was-a-girl came into the room to try and make out with her crush, only to be crushed to discover you yourself canoodling in a bed making the tallest girl at the party turn several shades of red.

And here's what you remember, of the time you nearly lost your eyeball (it was dangling down your cheek, the world in cockeyed split screen); or maybe this was the injury set from the time that paparazzo hit you with his car princess-diana style, or that other time the town pedophile hit you with his car in an attempted excuse to 'drive you to the hospital' (to somewhere secluded, more likely), or maybe this was the injury where your sister clubbed you over the head with a decorative old wrench, and you played possum in that driveway so long that your blood glued your long warrior's hair to the gravel in the settling frost.

You remember either Drew or some cousin, or one of your wealthier guests, was colorblind, and so your bloodshot eyeball looked not red, but black to them, and the green eyes of your fishbelly maiyami heritage looked only to this person as a very pale grey, nearly white the whole way through, though they could still register the flecks of gold and gosh, didn't you just have the prettiest eyes in the joint?

And wasn't it true, that the only cousins in that house were merely your cousins through your mother's second marriage, and your babies likely unflippered?

And you remember your sister constantly trying to set you up with one paramour or another, despite your highly autistic asexuality and preference toward intellectual and creative pursuits (and god bluss lady gaga, anyway, for explaining to a magazine how sexual relationships usurp creativity).

At that Halloween party, you remember this entire cultural mountain of pressure to 'be normal', to recover from your several encounters with horrorshow monsters in full, which meant an average interest in sex; and you remember not being afraid, at all, to do as your sister encouraged, knowing full well that being young was for making mistakes, and that none of these relationships were supposed to matter by the time you were an adult.

♦

"So that's it?" Bill's mean wife says, sitting back with crossed arms and a jaw set against compassion.

"This is, like, a mysteriously numbered repeat attempt to communicate all of this," you answer, hurt. "I keep forgetting shit. Remembering shit. Drinking to forget shit. I accidentally joined the army, completely unawares I had an entire medical file, psych record, AND TRAIL OF JUDICIAL PAPERWORK behind my entire twenty six years of life to disqualify me, not to mention a cadre of completely alarming health upsets whose origins are sometimes a mystery to me, which comes off as I'm either a hypochondriac and malingerer, or stubborn idiot refusing to acknowledge his limits."

You flap your arms penguin-style. "I do know that I am... pathologically honest, though, and not at all lying or exaggerating about the concussions and memory losses and whatnot, and if it suits your comfort to toss delusion or schizophrenia atop all of that then I ain't gonna squawk. I just wanted to share with my friends that, well, yeah I Had Opportunities and still chose to leave them behind with my sister's social circles, because of all the --"

"All the rapes, yeah," Bill helps, helpfully, nodding and sorry in the eyes.

It matters that Bill is white and has black family, too. It matters that Andrew Hussie's early comics were kinda hella raycist.

"All the associative memories," I explain. "And from experience, my sister was never going to change, around me. I'm her trigger. I'm her reminder of the unfairness of the world, her treasure and her curse, her supporting witness and her amnesiatic disbeliever. And she's my Bro Strider, hypersexual and violent, jealously hoarding me inside of a shitty apartment under the guise of safety but really just to monopolize my loyalty, and sell footage of me to creeps online, if we had things like webcams and internet growing up. Which we didn't. On account of the poverty."

"Kinda feel like poverty isn't what made your sister ... do. Everything that she did." Your roomy adds, still on your side despite the stress of uncertainty hovering around all these fantastic claims and possibly misremembered spikes of trauma.

This is your conclusion for this post on tumblr dot com, in the hopes that you aren't fruitlessly scaring the bejeezus out of an innocent webcomic author;

"Generational poverty stole our family early to their graves, left many of us languishing in monotony and pain, starved us and saw our babies born dead. Poisoned us when our economic superiors polluted our lands, denied us access to critical infrastructure, stole our children away, *legally* displaced these kids to white schools and churches that murdered them. My grandma was sterilised by an evil ladyparts doctor, my uncle born with disabilites from a syphillitic infection that the army had given to my grandpa with reused blood-draw needles.

"And," you continue, cold with nausea. "And any possible brown or black ally I could ever have in this country, is going to see my vitiligo and cast judgement."

"YOU DO NOT HAVE VITILIGO, YOU JUST HEARD THAT FROM MICHEAL JACKSON," Bill's shitty wife explodes, repeating an old elementary school taunt.

You argue in a drawl, "Auto-immune disorders triggered by heinous amounts of childhood stress, hey, those existed way long before the celebrities were around to 'raise awareness', but thanks for participating. Mypipo called it the moon's curse, and nicknamed me Pony for the palomino spotting, but y'all going to stay sexist and assume the moon curse is about menstruation and the pony nickname was a sexual innuendo, cos white people fucking suck." This examples the rapid-fire lacony that inspired dave strider's deadpan delivery, his 'cool' in actuality an irrefutable depression, his brother dead through most of the webcomic because truths came to light about your sister's psychopathy and she got roundly excluded from many of the projects she had roped you into.

But the conclusion is thus, as you finger-guns at your roomy and moonwalk out of the small kitchen you're all hotboxing to save on product, "No war but class war, babes."

[blacktoothcomics]

partner got hit by car, lol, she's fiiine no concussion no damage just bruise n contuuse. i had a heart attack abt it bcos she's been stalked at work before by a crazy old lady with obv boundary issues who would drive her car up reeeeal close to us in the taco truck lot

but naw it was just 1) crepuscular hours and an elderly driver not the stalker and 2) she's been off her adhd meds since an insurance? changeover? and i get to be BOILING MAD ABT THAT, WOOBOY, like it's going to be difficult to even get her to return to therapy for the trauma of a collusion (plenty of witnesses, insurance got sorted) when the PROBLEM is that her BRAINS are OFFLINE because her MEDS KEEP GETTING TAKEN AWAY RRRRRAAAUUUGH

i was so mad at the hospital, lmao. fuming. sick with stress. not the old guy's fault, he knew he couldn't see well and was driving v slow.

and no worries, she did ballet and tucked n rolled like a tarantino but still, STILL, i wasn't there to walk her to and from work like planned, for any stalk or harassment support (election year = shitlibs doing road rage at pedestrians) and lisa it is tearing me aparrrrt /incomprehensible gargle

i have a handle on the intrusive thoughts and we talked it out (not my first friend-hit-by-car, lol), but just can't shake this sinking dread that's set in because uhhh that hospital was PACKED

like i expected the overnight stay, that's par for concussion and internal bleeding watch (both clear) i just didn't expect all the stab victims in from a concert riot, nor the pileup accident parade, and half a dozen code blues, unhoused drunks taking up beds for shelter on the lie that they're a danger to themselves and others (they're not, they just need a clean safe bed and some water)

and heinous, i mean downright abusive lack of staffing to handle all of that. i saw them call in the ntnl guard for extra medic do-si-do, nurses helicoptered in and shit.

but okay, capitalism, that's the thing we're defending. sssuuuure.

[ryoun]

flick·er /ˈflikər/

verb

(of light or a source of light) shine unsteadily; vary rapidly in brightness.

▸ twinkling watermelon episode 6 and episode 13

requested by @whenthegoldrays

[tart-miano]

re-entering the cirque du freak fandom in 2023 be like

[alibonbonn]

Of all mythological characters, Thetis' grief resonates the most with me. The loss of her son is so final, more final than mortals losing each other- mortals might still meet each other in the land of the dead when all comes to pass. Somehow her sorrow feels the most like grieving a loved one who was of a different religion, you know what I mean? Like...we're not going to the same place! and I hope they've made peace with that before their time.

[blacktoothcomics]

aww haha now this is a bummer too cos like

don't shit on what people love *just because* you don't or cant understand their love for it.

only shit on what people love *in the effort* to help improve it or make it more accessible or to keep it far away from supremacy propagandising.

like yeah let teenaged girls love dumb shit *and also be unafraid* to simply ask the teenage girls *in your actual meatspace life*, your actual family and cousins, about why they like the things they like. if it matters so much to you.

yelling at anyone online for Liking Things is, worst of all, ineffective praxis. i spoke to teenage girls 1) when i was one and 2) when they were members of my family, or friends of members of my family.

but the vitriol against teen girls online is GROSS. and maybe ironically, mostly comes from other teenagers trying to sound big and correct and superior, lmao. so that's probably also fine, if kids and young adults (and the developmentally delayed) online are finding their own boundaries by bumping into each other.

but no yeah no, adults should know better. block and move on. that's not your child, not ur parent, not ur partner, that online troll is likely only a scared disabled person with a surplus of internet and free time yet lacking access to ssris, and you are in no position to get them access to ssris, lol.

letpeopleenjoythings is crazy because like wow my disapproval is really enough to ruin your enjoyment of something? like youre giving me so much power lol. how does it feel to surrender control like that? does it feel good? thats right kitten you'll enjoy things when i say you can.

[punkalope]

its rlly sad seeing trans women go thru a lot of the bs talking points ive heard thrown at lesbians (and even worse if ur a trans lesbian i imagine) for literal years. im so glad that its being talked abt tho and at the very least im following tbe right people to hear abt it

its just sad bc ive seen all these same misogynistic arguments before, but then i stopped seeing them for years as all the lesbians who tried to defend against it either gave up or were chased off the website, and im seeing it happen to trans women too. its like a misogynist cycle

[aceghosts]

I Know You Feel Lost, But I'm Here To Wander With You

Summary: The week that Rooney’s family died is always the worst week of the year.

Rooney is having a bad week, the anniversary of their family death's looming over them. Luckily, they've got Yorinobu in their corner.

Title comes from Being As An Oceans' Find Our Way.

Rating: M

Warnings: PLEASE MIND THE WARNINGS FOR THIS ONE! This deals very explicitly with Rooney's grief and violent loss of their family. (Rooney is originally from Mass Effect with a Colonist background. This fic is adapting that background.) They are in a dark place, and thus, some of Rooney's thoughts, such as not wanting to exist, may be triggering. It also relieves Rooney's memories of that day and the traumatic things they saw, including watching someone die in their arms. Other warnings are depiction of violence, survivor's guilt, childhood trauma, discussions of dysfunctional childhoods (kind of), and drinking to cope. I think that covers everything, but if I need to tag for anything else, let me know.

Words: 5,188 words

Author's Note: Takes place before the events of CP2077, roughly six years before. I strongly encourage you to read Is This the End Or Is This the Beginning if you have not, as this fic directly references events in that fic.

Tagging (Opt In/Out): @bbrocklesnar, @marivenah, @alexxmason, @sergeiravenov, @voidika,

@carlosoliveiraa, @socially-awkward-skeleton, @derelictheretic, @imogenkol, @theelderhazelnut,

@strangefable, @cassietrn, @direwombat, @cloudofbutterflies92

AO3

The week that Rooney’s family died is always the worst week of the year.

Rooney’s normally unflinching, steady demeanor turns brittle. Their mood is an ever-vicious cycle of grief looping into numbness with static in their brain, which eventually loops back into a grief that threatens to swallow them whole, pulling Rooney beneath its dark depths. Their sleep schedule goes to hell, ghosts haunting their dreams. Even in their waking hours, the ghosts haunt them, always in the corner of their mind. Nothing holds any interest for them, and they’re nauseous all the time, only able to pick at their food. The weight of a broken promise weighs heavily on their shoulders, and Rooney feels like they’re drowning underneath it all, exhausted from fighting the tide. All they want to do is hide in their room underneath blankets until the storm passes, when they finally grasp onto some sense of normality. Most years, Rooney powers through, only taking the day of their family’s death off. Their usual ritual is to spend the day alone, writing unsent letters to the ghosts they carry with them. 

Their grief takes on a different form this year, a more malevolent form. It hits harder, a dark, black cloud hanging over them. It’s so hard to breathe, to simply exist. Their limbs are tied down, each movement more difficult than the last. They feel so numb to it all, to the whole point of their existence. All Rooney wants to do is to stop existing, simply dissipate into nothing. They want to let the waves pull them under, to simply stop fighting and give in for once. Rooney wonders if this year is harder because they died and now know death intimately. Maybe, it’s the fact they’re stuck in this Arasaka facility, amongst enemies and isolated from their comrades. Maybe, it’s that small glimpse of what they saw between life and death. Maybe, it’s the fact that they know they will be denied death, doomed to walk this earth as long as someone else demands it. If they died now, Rooney knows Arasaka would pull them back, deny them the dignity of simply being able to die.

And then, there is Yorinobu, Rooney’s only friend in this lonely place. They avoid him, leaving sessions early and ducking into hiding places when he searches for them. He doesn’t need to see Rooney like this, doesn’t have to know about any of this. Rooney doesn’t want him to think less of them, if he doesn’t already know. They need to focus on getting information for him. They need to focus on their mission. And, perhaps selfishly, Rooney does not want Yorinobu to worry about them. No one should have to worry about them. The grief will pass like it always does, and Rooney will be fine...right?

“We’re done, Shepard,” Leah, one of the scientists, says, openly disappointed with their poor performance, a common theme this week, “Go to your next session.” Right, another combat test. Leah had just run through a short test of their quickhacking capabilities. Miles, another scientist, wanted to put Rooney through a combat test with their optical camouflage.

“I will escort them to their next session.” They slowly look over in Yorinobu’s direction, unaware he was there. Arms crossed over his chest, he smiles at them warmly, eyes only on Rooney.

Rooney stares at him blankly, unable to muster even the smallest smile. They should be excited to see Yorinobu, ready to dish out what they know to him. Instead, Rooney feels nothing, hollow, like every other day of this forsaken week. Leah, who must have only realized he was here as well, bows. Shooting a glare at Rooney for their perceived rudeness, she replies, “Yes, Yorinobu-Sama. Shepard would be honored to accompany you.”

Yorinobu’s smile drops, brow furrows in concern as Rooney lethargically walks toward him. Shit, they need to act normally. They fall into step with him as they leave the room, still mute. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine.”

Not nearly a convincing enough answer. “Shepard,” He starts, voice soft, “I know you would prefer to talk with one of your fellow soldiers, but I would like to listen if you need someone.”

Rooney feels a lump in their throat, swallowing it down. “I’m okay,” They assure him, gently brushing their hand against his, “I’m just tired.”

He eyes them suspiciously, eventually relenting. “I have some news that you may be interested in. Some of it I can tell you now, the rest later.” As he talks, Rooney tunes him out, his voice becoming background noise like everything else. Their brain is unable to concentrate, thinking sluggishly. Every once in a while, Rooney offers a nod or a small noise of acknowledgment to keep up the appearance they are listening. “Now, I know you must not be listening.”

Shaking their head as they stop in their tracks, Rooney apologizes, “I’m sorry. Can you repeat that?” Yorinobu stops beside them, placing his hand on their shoulder in concern. Guilt burns within Rooney. He shouldn’t worry about them; no one should. They’ll power through this, just like everyone expects them to.

“I-.”

“Shepard!” Fucking hell, all of the goddamn people it had to be her, Rooney’s least favorite person in the facility. Dr. Naomi Kimura, their psychologist, dredged up every single awful thing mentioned in their psych profile as if it would magically convince Rooney to talk. Instead, Rooney shut down, staring at their hands quietly until their time was up. And this week, she was at her worst, mentioning their family constantly, how hard it must have been, and how Rooney could talk to her. It took every inch of their being to resist punching her, especially when she mentioned Jack. How dare she even mention his name. Rooney prefers dying again to having to talk to Dr. Kimura about one of the worst days of their life. “How are you feeling today, Shepard?” she asks, catching up to the pair.

They look down, staring at their shoes, fists clenched tightly. “I think Shepard is tired,” Yorinobu intervenes, “You should give them space.”

Dr. Kimura sighs. “Yes. Of course, they would be tired,” her pitying voice sounds like nails on a chalkboard, and Rooney bites the inside of their cheek, fighting the urge to scream. “I wanted to make sure that my patient was feeling well, especially on the anniversary of something so tragic.”

“Something tragic?” Yorinobu echoes.

“Their family,” They start walking, unable to listen. Rooney won’t give her the satisfaction of them telling her to shove it. And they don’t know if they can stomach Yorinobu looking at them like…like…

“Excuse us, Dr. Kimura.” Yorinobu excuses himself, catching up to Rooney. “Where are you going? What is goi-?”

“I should go,” Rooney cuts him off, their voice robotic and detached, leaving a confused Yorinobu behind.

—

Later that evening, when Rooney reaches their room after an afternoon of tests, Yorinobu stands outside their room. In his hands, he has a bottle of whiskey and two glasses. “Would you like to talk? Or drink?” Yorinobu holds the bottle of whiskey up for Rooney. They soften, recognizing the name on the bottle. It’s the same brand, the one that led to their first real conversation. To Rooney becoming an informant, and eventually, they suppose, a friend. Their eyes water, a sob stuck in their throat. “Did-Did I do something wrong?”

“It’s complicated,” Rooney wipes at their eyes, clearing their throat, “You didn’t do anything wrong.” He relaxes, his shoulders dropping. Yet, Yorinobu’s brow is furrowed, watching them carefully. “We should talk,” Rooney says, knowing that they owe Yorinobu the truth, “Can we go to your office?”

He nods, wrapping an arm around their shoulder. Rooney leans into him, resting their head on his shoulder. He feels so sturdy when they are so weak, like a small boat being tossed upon the waves in a storm.

—

Making themselves comfortable on the black leather couch in Yorinobu’s office, each with a glass of whiskey, Rooney takes a sip, needing to work up their courage. “I…um…” they start hesitantly, the words reluctant to leave their mouth.

Yorinobu slides an arm behind them, hand on their shoulder. “Take your time.”

“Right,” Rooney takes another sip, “Do you remember what I told you about my family?”

“You mentioned they died when you were sixteen,” a horrified look comes over him, quickly connecting the dots, “Is this the day they-?”

Rooney nods, confirming his suspicion as Yorinobu takes a sharp breath. “I’m sure you’ve heard by now how they’ve died.” Everyone knows. In the Militia, it was an open secret that being around Rooney was likely to get you killed. Unlucky Shepard. Go with them on a mission, and you won’t come back.

“I have not.” Wait, what? They look over at him in confusion. “I knew you would tell me on your own terms,” Yorinobu admits, “You are honest with me. I can be patient if you need me to be.”

Their guarded heart softens at his admission. “Thank you.”

“There is no need to thank me.”

Silence washes over the both of them as Rooney thinks through their next words. They’re so used to people knowing them by their reputation. The Soldier who got shit done. The Sole Survivor. With Yorinobu, none of those expectations are placed upon them. Rooney is free to be themself. It is an oddly wonderful feeling; it is an oddly terrifying one. “I guess I could start at the beginning…”

He nods, allowing Rooney to continue. “I grew up in a small Biotechnica Company Town. My mom, Hannah Shepard, worked as the head of security.” They remember their mother, a former Militech officer, brave and fearless. Never backing down. “She was really brave, taught me how to shoot my first gun too. Taught me that it would be my responsibility to look after Jack.” From a young age, their mom had taught them how to shoot, simply stating: ONE DAY, YOU’LL NEED TO PROTECT YOUR BROTHER. A duty that Rooney solemnly took. A duty they failed. “My dad, Aiden Shepard, was an agricultural engineer. He was so kind, always encouraging my brother and me.” Rooney always remembers their dad as a soft, kind man. He had a green thumb, teaching Rooney all he knew about plants and farming. Their favorite memories of him are sitting with their dad on the porch bench on summer evenings, both reading together in silence, yet enjoying each other’s company.

“I had a younger brother, Jack, and a cousin, Danny, my age. Jack was so bright and so sweet. Didn’t have a mean bone in his body. I’m sure if he were still alive, he would have done something great.” In their mind, Jack smiles brightly at them, fiddling with some machine he was working on. His enthusiasm was infectious. Jack deserved to be alive; he should be alive. Not Rooney. “Danny was always getting into trouble, but it was trouble I always wanted to be a part of.” They remember the way he would grin mischievously, ready to drag Rooney and Jack into some of his schemes. Despite the trouble the trio would get into, Rooney wouldn’t trade any of those memories for the world.

“Home was gorgeous.” Rooney still feels the sun on their face, the warm breeze flowing through their hair. They hear the rustle of the wheat as the breeze flows through it. “The skies were always a soft blue with a gentle breeze blowing through the wheat. It was like paradise.” How naive Rooney was. They should have appreciated it more, enjoyed what little time they had there. Now, home was a memory, a place they could never return to.

 "I…understand.” His soft utterance surprises them. Yorinobu sips his whiskey. “When I think of my childhood, I think about how wonderful it was sometimes, how happy I used to be…”

“How you wish you could go back,” They finish, “But you can’t, you can never go back.”

“Yes,” the understanding look in his eyes makes Rooney feel a little less lonely, “After what my father had shown me, the veil over my eyes had been lifted. It was a lie, a lie to make me complacent, dependent. He used that lie to mold me into the son he thought I should be. Obedient, Deferential. He had destroyed the home I had known. Your situation is different.”

Rooney sips their whiskey. “Yeah,” their voice cracks, “Home doesn’t exist anymore, wiped off the map, all the people gone.” They pause, their throat tight. “Except for me.” Cursed to live; cursed to survive.

“Shepard,” His thumb rubs comfortingly against the bare skin of their freckled shoulder, “You do not have to tell me this. I will respect-.”

“No, I want to,” They cut him off, inhaling a deep breath, “It’s a little raw considering…”

“I do not want to push if it makes you feel unwell.”

“You’re not pushing; you’re the first one who hasn’t pushed me to talk about this,” Their mind flashes back to Dr. Kimura, always pushing and prodding, “I can’t tell you how much that means to me.”   

“I am glad I can be here for you.”

Rooney gives him a watery smile, dropping it a second later. “The first thing I remember about this day is the night before, especially the fight that I had with my mom.” Yorinobu raises an inquisitive eyebrow. “We were fighting a lot. I wanted to join a Corp, Militech specifically, to see the world, and she thought I was naive, that I was going to make a huge mistake.”

“Militech?” Yorinobu blurts out, surprised.

They nod. “Imagine how differently things would have turned out if I still joined Militech afterwards.”

“We would not have met.”

“Yeah, I know how Militech and Arasaka feel about each other.” Rooney looks down at their whiskey glass. “I can’t forget what I told my mom that night. I told her that hated her.” I HATE YOU SO MUCH, the awful words reverberate around in their head.  “I told her that I hated her for trying to keep me in that stupid town, that I wasn’t going to be stuck there forever, miserable like she was.” YOU CAN’T KEEP ME HERE. I WON’T BE STUCK HERE IN THIS TOWN AND END UP A MISERABLE BITCH LIKE YOU. Their hands shake, tears welling in their eyes. Rooney would give anything to take those words back, to reverse the hands of time, and tell their mom one last time that they love her. They love her so much. Rooney would tell her that they were naive and stupid, understanding what Hannah was trying to protect them from. “What a pair we make, huh? You with Saburo, and me with my mom.”

Yorinobu smiles. “It is natural for children to rebel, to want differently than the path their parents planned for them. You are not wrong for wanting that.”

“I suppose so.” Rooney isn’t sure if they were wrong for wanting, but they should have spoken to their mom differently. “The next day, a group of bandits attacked our town. I’m not sure how they managed it. We fended off attacks before with little damage, but this was different.” It was slaughter, an act of cruel and senseless violence. “Jack, Danny, and I were hanging out in the fields. We were up in an oak tree, watching the clouds as we talked. Then, we saw the smoke. We went to check it out.” Rooney still remembers the tree bark scraping against their palms, barely registering the sting as they fling themself from the tree. “We met Mom at the edge of the field. She handed me a pistol and told me to protect Jack and Danny. The last thing she ever told me was for us to hide and for me to be brave.” ROONEY, TAKE THEM AND HIDE. BE BRAVE FOR ME. The last time Rooney sees their mom is with her back turned to the three as she charges into town, red ponytail with strands of gray swinging in the wind. The pistol is heavy in Rooney’s hands, the full burden of responsibility weighing down on them. “Do you ever feel like you have to protect Hanako?”

“Yes. As children, Hanako and I were close. We only had each other, and I knew I needed to be there for her. I would protect her from any trouble. Even now, as adults, despite our distance, I still want to protect her, free her from my father’s influence. Hanako should be allowed to determine her own path, not a puppet of my father.” Yorinobu takes a sip of his whiskey, conflicting emotions on his face. “Now, Hanako feels she must protect me by playing mediator. In her eyes, all would be right if I became the son my father wanted me to be. If I were to be someone else.”

“You shouldn’t be,” He raises an eyebrow as they awkwardly clarify, “You shouldn’t have to be someone else. I like you as you are.” Yorinobu looks taken aback as they backpedal, “I mean-.”

“Shepard, I understand,” Yorinobu replies cutting them off, “I like you as you are too.”

“Thank you.” Another question comes to them. “What about Kei?” In all their time at the facility, Rooney heard about Kei the least. Possibly because he had been dead since 2023. But they wondered about Yorinobu and his relationship.

“Kei and I were not close. As children, Hanako and I rarely saw him, a distant figure in both our lives. Kei always thought of himself as the dutiful older son, the protector of Arasaka’s legacy. When I left,” Yorinobu’s voice turns bitter, “He saw it as his responsibility to strike me down for daring to defy the family, for not falling into line. Kei paid the ultimate price for his foolishness. I stand, still alive, while he is dead.”   

“I’m sorry.”

Yorinobu shakes his head. “It is not your fault. One day, my father will pay for Kei’s death. Continue.”

“I suggested that we should hide. There was a storm shelter beneath the farmhouse where no one would be able to find us. But-.” I CAN’T LEAVE MY MOM AND DAD. WE HAVE TO FIND THEM. They remember how terrified Danny looked, a sixteen-year-old who just wanted his parents. “Danny wanted us to find his parents. He wouldn’t listen to me or Jack.” Danny’s glare is fierce, and he is defiant at Rooney’s suggestion. He storms away with Jack quickly following behind as he tries to calm Danny. “He couldn’t be stopped.” Rooney finishes their glass, reaching out for the bottle of whiskey, and pouring another.

“So, we head to town.” The moment the three teenagers reach town, they all look at each other, knowing they’ve fucked up. Rooney remembers the thick smell of smoke and dead bodies, nearly choking on it. They hold the pistol with the safety off, ready to fire like their mom taught them to. Yet, at the thought of shooting a real person, Rooney’s hands shake, the pistol wobbling. “Danny thought we needed to head to the center of town.” COME ON, MY PARENTS SHOULD BE AT THE CITY HALL. “I try to argue with him, but he takes off running and rounds the corner. And then, I hear it.”

Yorinobu’s mouth drops in horror as a sick feeling rises in their stomach. The gunshots echo in their ears, deafening, as Rooney sprints towards the alley. Danny is on the ground, red pooling beneath him as a bandit stands over him. Rooney raises the pistol, pulling the trigger. The first shot hits the bandit’s shoulder. The second one hits him in the chest. Later, when Rooney learns to shoot a sniper rifle in the militia, they promise to never miss, to always make sure that their bullet hits the target. They will not let another innocent pay with their life. Rooney sips their glass, before continuing, “Jack and I grab Danny,” Danny’s green t-shirt is soaked in blood, only groaning as the two pull him off the ground, “The local town doctor is only two blocks away. If anyone can help Danny, it’s her.” It is only later that Rooney will find out that this was a fool’s errand, that the local doctor is already dead.

“Jack and I manage to get Danny to the clinic. We think we’ve made it, that the three of us are going to be safe.” It feels like a journey of a thousand miles, but relief washes over Rooney as the clinic door slides open. They’re safe; Jack, Danny, and Rooney are going to make it. HEY! Rooney turns as a Bandit turns to face them, raising his rifle at the trio. “As we enter the clinic, another bandit finds us.” Rooney raises the gun, preparing to fire. Jack, blue eyes wide, shoves Rooney and Danny through the doorway. JACK! Shots ring out, deafening as Rooney screams, a desperate plea for someone, anyone, to help. Jack slumps to the ground as Rooney lets Danny go. They raise their pistol, flicking the safety off as they unload the pistol. Rooney empties the pistol into the bandit, each shot ringing loudly in their ears. When the pistol finally clicks empty, long after the bandit has fallen to the ground, Rooney drops it, the pistol clattering loudly to the ground. “He shoots Jack. I’m able to stop the bandit, but it’s already too late.”

“I grab Jack and Danny, dragging them into the clinic. I find an empty room, somewhere we can hide.” Grabbing Jack and Danny, Rooney pulls them into the clinic, a herculean effort fueled by pure adrenaline. They find an empty room, hiding with Jack and Danny in a dark corner. Danny’s eyes are unfocused, his mouth slightly open. Rooney doesn’t need to feel his pulse to know that he is dead. They turn to Jack, who reaches out for his older sibling. “Jack grabs onto me. I beg for him to let me go, but all he wants is his older sibling. His grip loosens…” He wraps his arms around Rooney’s neck tightly, clinging to them as he bleeds out in their arms. Rooney holds him, alternating between telling Jack that they love him (JACK, I LOVE YOU! PLEASE DON’T LEAVE ME!) and begging him to let go so they can help him (YOU HAVE TO LET ME GO! I’LL BE RIGHT BACK WITH HELP!).  Eventually, his grip loosens, Rooney silently sobbing as their brother dies. In the Unification War, when they hold dying young men, trying to comfort them in their last moments, they will always remind Rooney of Jack. They will always be Jack, terrified in their final moments, begging for some sort of comfort, that everything will be okay. “And my brother is dead.”

Tears stream down their face as Rooney grips their whiskey tightly. “I hide in the clinic for what seems like an eternity.” They wait until the screaming dies down, and even then, Rooney doesn’t leave, afraid the bandits will be waiting for them. After the screaming has been dead for a long time, Rooney makes their way out of the clinic, looking upon the destruction of their town.  Every corpse is a familiar face, someone they’ve known their whole life. “Eventually, Nomads, who regularly traded with us and did odd jobs for Biotechnica, pass by, and…” Well, the rest is history.

“Rooney, I’m-I’m so sorry…” Yorinobu seems to be at a loss for words, unsurprising. No one ever seems to know what to say, and Rooney can’t blame them.

“Don’t be. It wasn’t your fault.” They finish off the glass, pouring themself another. Yorinobu tilts his head in confusion, perhaps concerned by their harsh, detached tone. “It’s the bandits fault for destroying my town. It’s my fault that Jack and Danny are dead, that I couldn’t protect them.”

Yorinobu sits straight up, removing his hand from their shoulder. Rooney misses his touch, a sole comfort, perhaps more than they deserve. He places his glass down on the table. Yorinobu grabs their glass, placing it down beside his. Rooney doesn’t fight him, unable to look at him, only looking down at their hands. Yorinobu takes their hands in his, his touch desperate. “You cannot blame yourself. You were sixteen.”             

“I can blame myself,” They look at him, meeting his eyes, “It was my job to protect Jack. He’s my younger brother. He needed me, and I failed him. Danny, too.” After their town, Rooney swore that they would protect others from suffering the same fate.

He looks slightly horrified, and Rooney wonders if he is thinking of himself and Hanako, perhaps seeing a mirror image of Jack in Hanako. Yorinobu releases their hands, only to cup their face, wiping away the tears. “It was not your fault.” He stresses every word, like a general giving a command to a stubborn soldier. On some level, Rooney knows this is irrational. Their psych in the militia, a no-nonsense woman whom Rooney felt safe talking to, used to tell them the same thing. So did their fellow soldiers in their support group. But Rooney couldn’t let it go, not when it had driven them their whole life. Not when their family had rejected them for it. Their tears fall faster, a sob escaping from them as Yorinobu’s eyes widen in surprise. “Something else troubles you.”

“Yeah.”

“Please tell me.”

“Remember our first conversation, when I told you to leave something alone?”

Confusion briefly crosses his face before the realization dawns. “You looked upset when I asked,” They hear a touch of concern in his voice, “Did it involve your family?”

“Yes,” the vision of their family around the dining room table is startlingly clear in their mind, “I saw my family.”

“You…saw them?”

“Don’t know what it was. Might have been a hallucination; might have been my mind playing a trick on me, but I saw them.” Rooney’s voice trembles, “I got to go home, see them all again, and they...they…” Their throat tightens, the words too difficult to speak. “They wouldn’t let me stay.”

“Rooney,” Yorinobu exhales their name, distraught as he wipes away more tears.

“I failed to protect Jack and Danny, and I wasn’t allowed to come home,” Rooney swallows back a sob, “I wasn’t good enough so I couldn’t stay.”

Yorinobu lets go of their face, pulling Rooney into his lap. They straddle his waist, trying to openly sob as they lay their hands on his chest. “Rooney,” His right hand lays on the back of their neck, “You did not fail. You were sixteen. No one could have asked more of you.” Rooney doesn’t believe him; they don’t know if they ever will. This guilt will gnaw at Rooney for the rest of their life until they take their final breath. If Rooney is ever allowed to take one. “Believe me,” Yorinobu pleads sincerely, “Please.”

Yorinobu’s earnestness cracks the stone walls around their heart. They collapse into his chest, burying their face in the crook of his neck. Rooney tightly grips the fabric of his black and magenta silk shirt, holding onto him like an overboard passenger holds onto a raft, adrift in the ocean. A sob escapes them, and Yorinobu’s hand comes to their back, rubbing circles in the black fabric of their tank top. His other hand rests on their thigh, thumb stroking along the seam of the black fabric. “If you need to, cry.”

They can’t fully break down, not for a lack of trying. Instead, Rooney holds him tightly, crying softly as Yorinobu comforts them. His voice is soothing, a tether to reality for them.

—

Eventually, Rooney finds they have no more tears left to cry. They’re exhausted, worn down to the bone. “Thank you.” Their voice feels raw and scratchy, their throat tight.

“Do you feel better?” He asks, watching them with concern. “Please be honest with me.”

Honesty is the least of what he deserves; Yorinobu deserves so much from them. “No,” They’re not sure if they will ever be okay, “I don’t know if I will be, but you being here….”

Yorinobu releases the breath he was holding. “Do you need-?”

They shake their head. “I just want to sleep.”

“Allow me to take you to your room.” Rooney gets up off his lap, untangling themself from Yorinobu. He follows them off the couch, slinging an arm around their shoulder.

They slide their arm around his waist, resting their head on his shoulder. Together, the pair walk silently down the Arasaka halls alone. Rooney feels a swell of affection towards him. There was no reason for him to be this kind to them, and yet…he was. Perhaps Rooney and Yorinobu were kindred souls, both alone in a hostile place looking for someone who would see them as they are.

When the pair reaches Rooney’s room, Yorinobu asks, “Will you be fine if you are left alone tonight?” Maybe. Rooney isn’t going to hurt themself, but the nightmares worry them. Sometimes, they relive the scenes over and over, a gruesome horror movie on repeat. Their silence is enough to answer his question. “I am staying.”

Rooney frowns. “You don’t need to stay.” They won’t be more of a burden on him.

“I want to stay with you,” Yorinobu opens the door, “Please let me.”

A small spark of humor arises in them. “I didn’t know you were eager to get into my bed.”

Yorinobu laughs, slightly surprised. “You must be feeling better.”

“Somewhat,” They smile at him shyly, “Thanks to you.”

He looks smug, clearly proud of himself. “To bed.”

A few minutes later, the duo crawl into bed with Rooney on the right and Yorinobu on the left. The tiny bed is meant for one person, but Rooney and Yorinobu make it work, spooning close together. Rooney’s metal arm wraps around his chest, Yorinobu’s hand resting on top of their hand. They are pressed tight against his back, cuddling him. “Are you comfortable?” He asks, his tone a little unsure. “Would you prefer I hold you?”

“No. I feel better holding you, unless you want to change positions.”

“I like this,” Yorinobu replies softly, his voice sending a warm and tingly feeling through them.

“Good.” The darkness and silence of the room descend upon them. A short while later, as they doze off, Rooney hears a soft snore from Yorinobu. They bite back a soft laugh, striking them as slightly cute. Rooney whispers, careful not to wake him, “Thank you for everything. I don’t know what I would have done without you today. It’s the first time I haven’t felt alone on this day. I don’t know if I can ever return the favor.” They pause briefly. “But I promise I will try to be there for you in any way you need me to be.”

Closing their eyes, Rooney allows themself to fall asleep, comfortable and safe with Yorinobu in their arms.

[anna-kitsun3]

I haven't been able to draw for a while

The passion straight up left

I was in a position where I had to keep drawing to keep housed but it didn't matter and I lost it anyway after my dog became life threateningly sick VERY fast and we took a 12k hit because it was an emergency vet, yall don't know me but I do NOT have that lol so I owe ppl a lot of money on top of owed commissions

But my girl lived and is lying in front of me now

A friend let us live in their basement, and I've found a job that's been working for me anxiety and pain wise. It just doesn't pay very much and I don't have a lot of hours yet so I maybe get like 200 a week and I have a lot of bills to catch up on, rent for where I'm staying and trying to put back to get out

Our car is down, but I can walk to work. My gf isn't able to make that walk, so she's stuck at the moment

Aahh sorry for appearing again with dower posts. But I am happy to say I have started to sketch again. I'm working on my relationship with art so I can try to kick start into work again. Or everyone is getting refunds

Things are looking up, i think. I'm just going to be as positive as I can and just deal with things as they come

I have a Stan I'm gonna post after this, so he's not attached to the bummer post tm.

[babacontainsmultitudes]

80 or so years of life really ain't enough can I have an elf lifespan instead please? Or at least a dwarf's... I need at least a couple hundred years... Oh and a new spine every 5 or so years, if that's not too much to ask. 3. 3 years actually. Yeah, a new spine every 2 years, and a lifespan of 350-750 years, that's all I want really.

[adventuretimelover1]

I think one of my moots, @takingshotsofapplecider got suspended, does anyone know anything/how I could reach her again?🙏

[blacktoothcomics]

problem with being mixed is we don't really get to belong anywhere. I can't write for an "us", only a "me", because each mixed kid's experience is wildly different from t'other, even within similar demographs.

i'm a quarter (eight 🎱?) indigenous american, stricken with auto-immune issues resulting in pretty severe vitiligo in early childhood, triggered by extreme stress (we lived in isolation and poverty, our white mom excluded from community support on both sides, and i lost a sibling to rape and murder before i was out of diapers).

state schooling was hell. abrahamic saturation in popculture, deeply unsettling. peers and classmates inexplicably cruel, when they weren't white kids trying to obsessively monopolize my friendship and esteem based on my heritage, they were brown kids pushing me out of the lunchline accusing my grandparents of colonialism.

at age 13 i tried to enroll in algonquin language classes, the maiyami language smothered by colonial catholics, and was promptly bullied out by browner students with better monied parents. trying to explain my vitiligo was no use -- instead of support and acceptance i found the exact same amount of abelism and classism and racial supremacy rhetoric as some white communities tend to foster; worse for me because there was no definition for this kind of exclusion -- it wasn't racism exactly, and i didn't have anything for any of these kids to be jealous over but that was the only answer i was ever given, that the browner and better monied tribal american kids were envious.

as a teenager i was approached by another racial supremacy group, a second-gen korean woman who agreed with my ha'native dad that their races (??) needed reproductive preservation. (barf.)

my dad, along with permission from my mother, had frozen and sold the eggs of my murdered sibling. in the name of racial preservation, this happened, the reproductive choices of a toddler, stolen, her body harvested for parts so monied white women could exorcise some of their guilt and collect some little brown babies on the way (y'know, for social clout, and bcos birtherists are fukken creeps).

the woman who approached me with ideas of racial preservation knew me through my dad, or rather through my dad's choices and the media bruhahaha that arose when mom tried to sue for money owed (she had only agreed to the harvest of her dead child for lack of ability to pay for hospital and funeral fees).

the second gen ha'korean woman was also an ecofascist, and shared her aspirations to genocide white americans the same way tribal americans had been genocided.

and i, mixed race but pretty thoroughly hatecrimed by adults and teens of both (and all) races by then, knew this woman for a crock of shit who needed to be stopped. i wasn't desperate enough for community to fall for violent extremism, despite the accidental death on my record from an industrial accident that white-ass mormon media had published as purposeful sabotage.

if ever you're curious, investigate "anna fox" of east leroy, athens, or battle creek michigan. you might find her headstone, and media records for "anna's law", which specifies that organ donations from unconsenting minors never include reproductive parts, cos baby harvesting is fucking ghoulish and racial supremacy is goddamn gross.

so anyways, i stoolpigeoned on the ha'korean supremacist and her entire toady operation of terrorists, because what the fuck else was i going to do? fight the moonies alone?! white supremacists were scary obsessives and tan supremacists probably weren't going to be any less violent or controlling or rapey (re: reproductive pressures lain against erryone, disabled or queer or regular asexual).

as i never thought to guess, this 'betrayal' of a group of obsessives projecting allyship on me, uh, didn't turn out so well for me or my family down the line. harassments from outside the neighborhood were seasonally random but constant, paired with a growing meth crisis and opiod epidemic recruiting the resentments of the "white trash" that i had stood up for in the first fucking place. survivors are the worst to other survivors.

also, that open-faced drainage ditch was going to catch fire eventually, sheer coincidence it was my cousinage's fireworks to land the hit, mmmmaybe we don't leave flammable industrial waste running freely through residential neighborhoods, even if the community is mostly latinx. (won that fucking lawsuit, too, but as ever the real harm came with the media coverage of the entire thing, which drew local eyeballs and fanned the flames of extralocal rumormongering.) ha'korean moonie loonie got the idea somewhere that i was an ecoterrorist, because this was a useful brag to the ecofascist my dad had married, a woman who later would try to freeze and harvest my surviving sister's eggs in her teenaged years, because money and human trafficking.

so, i dunno. all this happened under every different kind of president this country ever had in my lifetime. mom was still sexually assaulted by dad's CO, dad still told mom to just roll over and take it, we were still too poor to afford safe or decent housing when mom fled and was rejected by her catholic parents for leaving the marriage, nevermind healthcare or nutrition. white parent still ostracized by both white and brown sides of the family, hashbrown parent still a shitass homeopathic grifter getting labortrafficked by his shitlib second spouse.

my sister was still raped, my twin still murdered, my classmates still unimaginably cruel and my peers still unreasonably selfish; the white music teacher at verona elementary still raped my white hashbrown sister and later my classmate and always his own daughter; i still stabbed the music teacher and he still never saw jailtime (and last i knew still got to work in education).

the immigrants to this land still don't know how to fukken act right, and the indigenous to this land still consider themselves beyond goddamn reproach.

and all through childhood and teenhood i couldn't be fucking bothered to choose a side. both sides sucked in the exact same ways, fortunate survivors lashing out in confused grief, pissbaby bawling 'bout land and economy, narratives soured by the refusal to name the *actual* enemy to us all.

like, look, very few classmates believed me about my native heritage, which was fine because we didn't really have much social justice clout before the widespread accessibility of the internet and whitepipo tend to get xtra rapey when they suspect minority status (my first personal actual sexual abusers were white girls, while the meth'd up teens to kill my twin and rape our white sister were hashbrown boys, there is literally zero difference between the axes).

and still, the only connection to my native heritage i have left is a few scattered secondary relatives, which i don't speak to re: lingering issues with cultural supremacy and general lack of interest or effort on their side. and a few artifacts, heirlooms even, which have gone missing piece by stolen piece and year by displaced year. and stories, i have stories. memories. training. the anonymity of the manapogo aunties, their warnings that not every tribe in america was the same, that we didn't all get along and that the schism of capitulation to colonialism still remained between us all -- maiyami, as was explained to me by my oldest and most demented greatgrammaw, maiyami were considered "uncivilized" by white settlers and reservation-locked indigenous tribes both. on account of all the ? miscegenation? idk the word for it, basically we was gypsy trash who openly and easily married french bohemes freshly escaped from their pressgangs, which "watered down" uh "the bloodlines" but on educated hindsight probably actually just saved my ancestors from localized vulnerability to le plagues 'n such.

i'm saying immigration is good, actually!

colonialism = bad, capitalism = bad, but accepting refugees and immigrants = very cool and beneficial and even fun if it's done respectably.

maiyami tribe's greatest sin, at the time of exclusion from reservation displacement (we wasn't even ON the trail of tears lmao)? LEARNING. LANGUAGES. FOR TRADE.

what's one of my casual interests that i do for fun? is it languages, real or imaginary, lettered or mathematical or code? isn't it!

and maiyami, see, they easily lost their french-algonquin pigeon because, uh, hurrdurr being allowed to STAY ALIVE tends to matter more than what sounds are coming out your mouth in which order. it wasn't this great betrayal of history or honor or ancestry to let the maiyami tradespeak wither under the stones of the catholic church, it was just survival.

and fellow survivors are the worst to others lucky enough to survive.

i am mixed. i don't have a "we" or an "us" to speak for, even if my experiences weren't that far removed from other little white kids, other brown teens, other 'mixed' persons. black and brown tribes across the seas aren't a monolith, either, not even in the cultural deadlands carved out by slavery, or imperialism. we're all mixed.

i can't speak for an "us" because i can't speak for everyone in my nation, in my tax bracket, in my generation.

but i am more native to america than (checks notes) absolutely fucking anyone else i personally goddamn know, so i do feel entitled to say this:

you are a guest. yeah, you. you are a guest to your neighbors, to your country, to your lands; because we are all of us, guests, to this planet. we are guests to each other, and we need, us, we, together, need to goddamn remember that. you are a guest.

you're a guest to your tribe, your heritage, your family. the people who fucked to make you, they invited you to this world and you were not given the chance to decline and you were not given the chance to consent, but you are a guest just the same.

i never owed deference to my parents just like the maiyami never owed deference to the algonquin or pottowatomi; we were all just guests to one another, and owed each other nothing but consideration, a chance to goddamn consent. immigrants are guests no matter where they (or you) are from, no matter where we land, where next we might need to flee.

i am comfortable with displacement because it's something my immediate family has had to do, because it's something the family in their past has had to do, because their ancestors also had to flee to survive, also had to uproot and lose connections and make new lives with new neighbors and missing heirlooms and et c.

and i'm not any less native for being white, and neither is the european quadroon fresh in from a shitty island somewheres. we're all native to this planet; and the #1 difference between settlers and indigenous americans was mypipo had the good goddamn sense to pack up and fucking *leave* when the weather turned.

oh i left michigan as often as financially possible. besides the klanadians, the mormons, and the neonazis in from whiteflight detroit, my neighborhood also struggled with abrahamic cults in black and brown communities, and pressurized class violence which almost always saw women murdered and children raped all up and down every tax bracket (THANKS, CAPITALISM).

and me still mixed, still without definitive community, still dodging attention-hungry church leaders and their viciously desperate victims, still inexplicably popular and well-received at random (brutha i had to get good at all kindsa languages, not least the codes with the switching thereof). still harassed by victims-turned-villain, still assaulted by girls and women both in my peer group and older and MUCH older, all of them white and all of them perceiving me as Not White.

while all the brownpipo accused me of whiteness, the way the violently displaced yet racially preserved "civilised" tribes accused the maiyami of ?? we still don't know what, survival maybe. the fur trade had something to do with it all, and maiyami the name even pigeon french with "ami" as in friend, and more than a few tribal collectives more like trade unions than families, as varied were their members, and probably plagues just fucked everyone up for lack of gradual exposure, and yeah probably the dirty frogfuckers caught blame for surviving that too.

i'm not catching blame anymore. i'm not even going to let it fall at my feet. i am stepping over blame's listless corpse, and walking the fuck forward to punch the next goddamn nazi in line.

the reskids called me Buffalo, when i busted in that trailer door to get at the bullies sending dogbites after my little brother.

you know what a *white* buffalo means, to the viciously civilized tribes who have spent 200 years lashing out at fellow survivors?

change.

[feathers-little-nest]

.

[squirrelstone]

transphobe warning

The person running @mysterycharacterbracket is a transphobe. They support JK Rowling and used the old "biology" claim.

receipt below the cut (obvious warning for transphobia)