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dandytron2000 · 5 months ago

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My Little Dungeon AU pony magic explained

The three types of pony magic; unicorn, earth pony and pegasi are fundamentally the same, the only difference is how it's cast.

All pony magic comes from something known as candy dust. It's a subclass of mana, which comes from the breaches between the physical and the magical world. Ponies themselves are creatures originally from the magic world that migrated to the physical world so long ago nobody remembers how or why it happened. Candy dust is an especially potent type of mana that can only be safely used by magic world natives. Some ponies are also able to make limited contact with other creatures from their native dimension, enhancing their magic further.

Unicorn magic: Name of Control

Unicorns use raw star dust without any aid from spirits by cultivating their pure magic roots. It takes an iron will and a strong character with maybe a bit of narcissism to become a powerful caster as a unicorn. It is very dangerous to create new spells, one wrong step may result in a disaster. Majority of unicorns learn their magic through experience of others as to avoid dealing with the risks of candy dust blowing up in their face.

Twilight is a bit of a nutjob when it comes to magic so after she learned every spell she was interested in from the books, she disregarded all warnings and started creating her own spells. She did succeed, creating numerous new, powerful spells and earning herself the title of a warrior princess, but she did pay the price. The unsuccessful attempts left permanent scars, most noticeable being the star mark on her face and the wing-like mark on her back.

Rarity also uses Control, though in a significantly different way from unicorns. She uses the vibration of impact instead of raw will to manipulate candy dust, mainly by tapping her hoof in certain rhythmic patterns. It becomes much stronger when done in water.

Earth pony magic: Name of Cooperation

Cooperation is arguably the most versatile out of the three types. Unlike Control and Cohabitation that have very strict limits put on them unless you're fucking unhinged and are willing to risk your life, Cooperation is only limited by how much work you are willing to put into mastering it. Name of Cooperation is all about working together. It is usually cast through song, the more powerful spells requiring a chorus of sometimes dozens of ponies.

It takes a pony to be completely in tune with nature, their peers and the world at large, as well as deep compassion for others and high empathy to become a great mage as an earth pony. Having a good ear for music also helps, but chanting is just as effective as singing for most spells.

It is also quite common for earth ponies to work with creatures from the magic world. It's quite rare, but some families, including the Apple family, have guardian spirits they believe to be their ancestors. They hold yearly festivals to honor the spirits with song for the magic and food for the friends. It's unclear if there is any real correlation or not, but ponies from families that honor their spirits tend to be more powerful mages than their peers.

Pegasi magic: Name of Cohabitation

Pegasi are able to concenrate large amounts of candy dust within their bodies, which makes them quite close in nature to a pure magic creature which gives them the ability of flight, to walk on water and clouds as well as almost effortless control over some phenomena. Pegasi essentially are part spirits because of this. It takes a relaxed, open-minded, and free individual to become a truly powerful pegasi. Because of their more closely aligned nature, pegasi are able to sense spirits more clearly. All ponies have some sort of feel for spirits, but it's more of that they'll feel off if there aren't any spirits around, while pegasi can sense them as if they were present on the same physical plain as ponies, they are even able to tell what type of spirit and how strong it is. Some can communicate with the spirits and even make deals and contracts, further enhancing their magic potential.

Fluttershy is a great example of a pegasi that made a deal with a spirit. She, much like most of her family for many generations had made a pact with a powerful wolf-like spirit from the everfree forest. It increased her every physical characteristic and gave her strong healing magic, but the wolf spirit's power also permanently changed her appearance and made her a carnivore.

Her younger brother Zephyr also has a pact with a wolf, though instead of healing magic he had received clairvoyance, and her older brother Angel had made a pact with a killer rabbit, which is a strange choice for an animal sprit in the Shy werewolf family but it seems to be working out for him just fine.

Chaos magic

A rare form of magic, also called Name of Null, it uses very potent and unstable mana that comes from the world above the equestrian dungeon. It is largely absent below the middle point of the sky dome and peaks of the northern mountains, but ponies that once used this potent mana seem to never be able to get rid of it even if they go far away from the source. It gets stuck in their hair, in their fur and even in their mind like a whole lot of invisible magic glitter.

It's difficult to classify the way chaos magic is cast into specific types, however it can be similar to a combination of some aspects from multiple Names ponies use.

Pinkie pie concentrates a lot of Null mana which gives her the supernatural senses she is known for, and uses strange verbal magic practiced only by the witches of the Pie family.

Rainbow Dash accumulates mana just like any pegasus would, but because of the limited exposure to Null mana, some of it got mixed into her candy dust. While it's not a lot, taking up less than 20% of her total mana she is able to use it very effectively by controlling the chaos magic the same way a unicorn would. This allows her to do tricks physically impossible for a regular pegasus!

Discord, on the other hand, is a unique case. He has never used any of the Names ponies use, so he developed a unique style of chaos magic. Anything he thinks of could just, conjure itself into reality at any moment. He has no control over what comes to be and what doesn't, the only thing he seems to have any control over is the colors and patterns of his body. Though, many changes seem to be involuntary and dependant on his emotions. His mother says he should make a pact with a greater spirit to gain control over his power, but he adamantly refuses to do so as spirits scare him and he doesn't want them to touch him.

#my little dungeon au #mlp #mlp au art #mlp au #mlp au lore #discord mlp #twilight sparkle #fluttershy #applejack #mlp fanart #art #lore #au lore #mlp fim #my little pony friendship is magic #dandy draws

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secretress · 1 year ago

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Who is your future best friend? + Animal representation

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Not a tarot card reading, only based on my intuition.

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Pile 1:

Golden retriever

This person embodies a golden retriever. They are a cheerful type of person, expect them to always be smiling. Not this type, “fake smiles.” This is sincere. I don’t see anything about them having a potential crush on you either, and they may be apart of the LGBQT+ community. They are harsh with people who are racist, against the community, prejudice, etc. You should expect them to fight for their rights, and I’m seeing “modern family” pop up in my head, so spirits tells me, this is their favorite show. They favor Mitchell, Jay and Phil..? (I have only seen one episode, but anyways these are their favorite).

Moving on, one thing I recommend to watch out for, is, they sometimes can be aggressive with you if you don’t agree with their decisions because they’re stubborn. Not aggressive as in hurting you, it’s.. passive aggressive. Sometimes snarky comments when agitated or mad. They will always feel calm when they hear a favorite song, have their favorite dessert or something small they enjoy. It is the little things that count for this person.

As for you, I don’t see much aggression when speaking to you, so it would seem that you calm this person down. I am getting that you are this person’s favorite. I am seeing them smiling a lot when you answer the text or when you initiate a call with them. Think of it like when your favorite ship sails, and you have this giggly or giddy type of feeling. I also see them being genuinely happy for you when you have an accomplishment done. There is just something so beautiful about this person. You can think of them as a shining star. You see stars at night when you need them the most, that is what the person will be for you.

This person will make you truly happy. They are like a happy pill. I hear that some of you are dealing with depression and anxiety. Sometimes you question whether or not you will find a friend who won’t treat you as something that you’re not. This person will treat you like you’re an angel. This person is going to light up your world so badly that when you think about this person and what they have done for you, you may cry about it. You’re definitely going to be very grateful for them and this will amplify so much beauty into your world.

Pile 2:

A raven

Your future, best friend shares many characteristics of a raven. Not only are they the silent and calm type, They are also a strong type. I am seeing a beautiful adult raven flying in a slight clouded sky, its wings fluttering out and it’s not alone. There is a crow with them. The crow is the indication of you. I am sensing that you both will be together always. Do you know how birds flock together to migrate? That is what you and your future friend will be like.

You both will be each other’s companion, hardship and all. This person is very loyal to their friendships. I feel as they are more loyal to friendships than relationships. I am honestly picking up that they put their friendship over the relationships. Honestly, I don’t think that’s a good mentality, but my intuition says they have a good reason for it. “I have been hurt so many times for being a hopeless romantic, I tried to hard and never go there same energy. Please don’t define me as a player, I swear to you I am not, I just.. I just have friends who cherished me so much during it that now.. I’m beyond scared to be in a relationship and will always put my friendship first.”

My intuition tells me that they have struggled a lot mentally and physically and with this circumstance, they sort of developed having a raven as their protected animal spirit. Spirit tells me if you see a raven constantly then it is the sign for you that they are coming. I’m getting a cheerful feeling thinking about them, so there isn’t much to say. However, as mentioned, they do struggle with trust so please be gentle with your companion and show love and gratitude to them as they truly deserve it.

Pile 3:

Sloth

If you have seen the anime “komi can’t communicate” think of Kaede Otori. In a way, they have slight similarities. I would say this person does communicate slow, as in they are the type to listen then communicate. They think about it and when they do speak, it usually means much more. I believe the way they emphasize it, is what does it. Anyways, you will enjoy the conversations you have because they’re truthful and cannot lie well. You can pick it up hence a bad liar. A lot of deep conversations.

You will know who they are when you meet. Your intuition will go chaotic about it. Even if you don’t follow your intuition, you will know. I am seeing this scenery where it’s a bar, slightly darken, but the light bulbs are only noticeable on your future best friend. They’re talking to someone but that person is darken out within the booth. This is what I’m getting at, you will just know. “Who talks to someone they don’t know off with a deep conversation and pulls it off?”

I cannot read much on this person, they’re a mystery. My mind is blank, completely blank. So I’d say they may also be perceptive of their surrounding and intelligent as well. I believe people always assume they have no intelligence, nothing around that sort because they way they communicate is one you don’t dare to find in this generation. Similar to a warrior princess. You also may blush when you first meet them. They have a soft tone and intellect like no other.

Now why sloth? My intuition tells me the reason for this is, “though sloths are known to be lazy and slow, that merely isn’t true. Think of the story with the hare and turtle. The turtle wins at the end, yes? The turtle is slow, I agree, but in this world patience is your best friend. This person is beyond patience and grateful thus creating a beautiful world for them. Your future best friend will teach you how to be patience and control your anger issues. Do you honestly think you can push this person away and get mad? No. They have seen this—this person is the reason why in the future, you learn to be better, to trust and know that someone gives a damn about you without you questioning it like always.”

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racefortheironthrone · 1 year ago

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Please innumerate for us the specialized problems of the library sciences.

Let me start with the caveat that my information is based on my experiences at the National Archives more than a decade ago, and policy has definitely changed on this front as we can see from this graph of recent digitization - apparently NARA wants to get to 85% digitization by 2026. (Even still, I'd note that the records of the WPA are <0.001% digitized.)

However, back when I was doing the research that would eventually become my first book, I remember being at the National Archives II building in College Park, Maryland (Go Terps!) and getting really frustrated that all the records of the WPA were only available in their original physical form and that all the guides and indexes were also in paper only and were all from the 1970s, and I asked the archivist why the hell the National Archives hadn't been digitized already.

This is what they told me: if it's handled correctly and stored in the right environmental circumstances, paper can last a thousand years. Carbon copies can last even longer, if they don't rip. (Seriously, the bastard things are like onion skins, they'll split if you look at them funny.) Microfilm is slightly more technologically advanced than paper, but it only lasts 500 years in the right conditions.

We've only had computers en masse since the 1980s, and already there's a huge amount of records (especially from the early years) that we don't have any more, because the hard drives got re-formatted due to higher costs of storage space back in the day, or because old computers got thrown out when they were replaced by newer models and the hard drives are all rotting in landfills somewhere, or because backwards compatibility broke down and we just can't read those file types on our modern computers, or because the actual data got corrupted on the disc, or because some legacy company is asserting copyright against a video game museum, or because some political hack and/or president of the United States decided to violate the Presidential Records Act.

While we thought that the internet would cause an explosion of written records from ordinary people on the scale of the advent of mass literacy, there are vast swathes of the early internet that simply do not exist any more because the servers got switched off when Geocities et al. folded in the dot-com bubble burst or when everyone migrated to Web 2.0, and the Internet Archive tries its best (bless its heart, affectionately) but it can't be everywhere and save everything.

As a result, the archivist told me, digitization is a fraught question: what file format do we use? How do we know that file format will still be compatible and backwards-compatible in 50 years? 100? Longer? Do we keep everything locally or store it on the cloud, and how do we ensure that the storage mechanisms won't fail if there's a blackout or a virus or whatever? Do we digitize everything now, or do we wait until optical character recognition improves enough to the point where digitized records can be searched for words and phrases? Etc.

Keep in mind, I am a public policy historian who studies the 20th century U.S - I work primarily with the official records and the central archives of the richest government in the world. From a library sciences perspectives, this is kind of an ideal scenario, and it's still kind of fucked up. (Let me tell you, the rage and grief I felt when I learned that most of the General File of the Public Works Administration was thrown away by the National fucking Archives and Records Administration in the mid-1950s because they were running out of shelf space in the D.C location and didn't think these records were important...)

Now imagine what it's like at a local historical society or a small liberal arts college, or the national museum of a developing nation for that matter, who do not have the resources for the kind of grand digitization project that NARA started doing five years ago. Think of the sheer scale of historical records that sleep, unseen and untouched perhaps for decades and perhaps for ever, in little cubbyholes all across the world. Among professionals, historical records are measured in linear and cubic feet - think about that for a second, how many pages of paper there are in a foot when you stack them up, and how many hundreds and thousands and millions of feet there are across the face of the world. Think of all the millions of feet of pieces of paper that have been lost to us because of fire or rot or war or time itself.

This is why Peter Turchin is a quack. Historical records are not a standardized little database for social scientists to plug their fucking spreadsheets into; historians don't play that kind of bullshit t-ball, with all our data neatly packaged and handed to us on a silver platter. Our profession is not a social science, it's a goddamn treasure hunt through boxes that were never catalogued or categorized (or that were re-catalogued so many times no one remembers how they were put together in the first place) to find writing that no one has read since the authors died. All of us know that our work, our understanding, will always be partial and limited, because memory is infinitely fragile and the very idea of historical preservation is a mad existential defiance of entropy itself. These records are real, they are fragile - to hell with the Library of Alexandria, remember the National Museum of Brazil? - and they are all that is left to us of the dead.

#history #library sciences #archives #digitization #historiography

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irithnova · 1 year ago

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Sakha and Evenkia's relationship

In this post I’m going to be talking about Sakha and Evenkia's mentor-student relationship. In my master post about Sakha I talked about how we can see how the Sakha people assimilated certain peoples into their own through observing certain traditions of theirs, the most prominent being their shamanic traditions which were greatly influenced by the Evenks and Evens.

The Evenks have had a profound influence on Sakha culture in particular though, which is why I headcanon Sakha and Evenkia to have a mentor-student relationship, or more like, they used to have a mentor student relationship. The Sakha’s people genesis began when they migrated from the area of Lake Baikal/Southern Siberia up Northwards, most likely because of pressure from the expanding Mongol Empire.

When Sakha first migrated, he came into contact with a number of different people, such as the Yukaghir, Even, and Evenks, who he considers all his mentors to an extent, however Evenkia was the most prominent one and had the most impact on his culture.

Sakha was young, bright eyed, eager and somewhat annoying, especially to his older neighbours who were pressured to move upwards because of him. Evenkia was also kind of irked by him, but was much more willing to guide him than the others were. Close contact and intermarriage between the Sakha and Evenk people

Let’s first compare both Sakha and Evenkia folk epics about the universe and see how similar they are, and then talk about Evenks influence on the Sakha language.

Sakha Folk Epic Olonkho:

- Sakha epic poetry envisions the universe with three levels: Earth (middle), Heaven (upper), and Hell (lower).

- The universe is symbolised as a giant tree, Aal Luuk Mas, housing these levels.

- Lower level: Devil (abaahy), Middle level: ajyy people, Upper level: deities and some evil spirits.

- Earth and Heaven are interconnected, with Heaven representing spirituality and Earth as a material entity.

- Animism features gods (ajyy), demons (abaahy), spirits (itchi), ancestors, and animals (üör) across the three levels.

- Different regions in the upper world are designated for creators, good spirits, ancestors, and evil spirits ruled by Uluu Toyon.

- Heavenly bodies influence life on Earth; the Sun is associated with Yurung Aar Toyon, the god who rules destinies.

- Olonkho describes Heaven with 7 (sometimes 8 or 9) layers and 4 parts (East, West, North, South).

- Yurung Aar Toyon (upper God, the white master, white creator) is the Master of 9 heavens, Tsar of 8 heavens, and prince of 7 heavens.

- Heaven writers record each person’s destiny, and shamans, transforming into clouds, encounter different cloud types.

- Cloud characteristics (all clouds have their own characteristics): ‘aahar bylyt’ (passing), ‘kuotar bylyt’ (escaping), ‘jetineh bylyttar’ (thunderstorm clouds).

Now let’s compare to Evenki tradition about the universe:

- Evenk epic envisions the universe, which they call Buga, with three levels: upper (Ugu Buga), middle (Dulin Buga), and lower (Hergu Buga).

- Ugu Buga (heaven) has parts like Juri Jultjen Turinyn (place of the rising sun), Jenin Nadar Bomchar (mother of the seven canyons), and Nadan Buldjar (land of seven seas)

- Earth, referred to as Sivir, is described as the “mane of our Earth,” the middle green world.

- Ugu Buga, the upper world, is portrayed as a place of eternal summer and well-being. God Seveki resides there, creating the middle world.

- Warriors from the middle world journey to the upper world to seek brides – daughters of the sun Dylacha Khunadin, moon, and stars Bega Khunadin.

- Buga represents the upper entity governing nature, taiga life, and human-animal spirits, with Buga Musin (mistress of the universe) depicted as a moose cow, reindeer, or an old woman in charge of spirits.

- Humans are associated with heavenly entities like Dylacha (sun), Gevan (dawn), Nyangnya (heaven), and sky. Humans are living things that are a subject to these entities.

- Tribes like ai, aji, agbea, aji ajmak, ai tegel have names reflecting qualities of help, rescue, goodness, and beauty.

- Their purpose is to create good in the middle and upper worlds, opposing the Avakhi tribe from the lower world, engaged in constant conflict without intermarriage.

As we can see, they both share the same HEAVEN – MAN – EARTH triad. However there are some differences along with the similarities. In the epic worldview of both the Sakha and Evenk, the structure of the heavens is remarkably alike. However, the Sakha cultural narrative doesn’t distinctly portray heaven and earth as realms of good and evil. The Sakha envision heaven as not only inhabited by gods but also by evil spirits and ancestors, while for the Evenk, heaven resembles a paradise. According to Evenk epics, devils and enemies are only confined to the lower world, whereas Sakha epics depict evil spirits across all three worlds.

The sky god, recognised as the Creator of the Middle World, is referred to as “Yurung Aar Toyon” in Sakha and “Seveki” in Evenk. The Sakha term the middle world as “ajyy land” and its inhabitants as “ajyy ajmaga,” whereas the Evenk collectively call the residents of all three levels as “aji.”

The Sakha and Evenk people also share the concept of the Serge as being the model of the universe:

- A Serge is like a pillar used to tie horses in Sakha culture.

- In Sakha, it's important for shaman traditions and used in rituals during celebrations, weddings, and the summer holiday Yhyakh.

- In Evenk culture, Serge is a special object representing the world's structure. It has three parts: the upper dome for the upper world, the disc-shaped part for the middle world, and the rounded part for the lower world.

- A sacred reindeer tied to the pillar serves as a connection between humans and God, specifically the Master of the upper world, named Seveki.

So Sakha and Evenkia do have a number of similarities when it comes to their religious practices from their time living together. The Sakha people adapted aspects of Evenk belief into their own.

When Sakha first arrived, as I said before, Evenkia was initially irked by him, as the migrations pressured his own people to move further Northwards. However this did not last long. Evenkia certainly took a liking to Sakha. In Evenk culture, many of the children’s activities mimicked adult duties, and so it was almost natural that Evenkia would want to teach a (younger) Sakha and take him under his wing, especially considering how keen Sakha was to learn because of the fact that he only just recently moved there and needed to help around. Evenkia was a huge relief for him.

A lot of the words Sakha borrowed from Evenkia was a result of him trying to adapt to new living conditions:

- In phonetics, some changes occurred in Sakha due to Evenk influence, like certain sounds not occurring at the beginning of words (g, h and p) and changes in intonation.

- Morphologically, Sakha borrowed affixes like -chaan and -ndja, -ndaa from Evenki.

- Vocabulary-wise, Sakha borrowed words related to landscape, flora, fauna, clothing, reindeer breeding, and dwelling from Evenk.

- Polish scholar S. Kaluzhinsky found around 400 Tungusic words in Sakha and listed more words related to various aspects of life.

- Evenk words were likely borrowed during the Sakha adaptation to new living conditions, with a focus on clothes, bird names, geographical features, animals, plants, and reindeer breeding terminology.

So in this sense Evenkia truly was Sakha’s teacher/mentor, and was one of the reasons why Sakha was able to adapt to and make sense of the new living conditions he found himself in. They got comfortable with each other pretty quickly, and Evenkia tried to instill in him certain values that he thought were important – such as not gossiping or rumour spreading. In Evenk culture, gossiping/rumour spreading is greatly frowned upon, and most likely had something to do with not screwing up the accuracy of the location of an animal during a hunt. I’ll refer back to this later, but all in all, Sakha learned a lot from Evenkia, and Evenkia was more than pleased to teach him.

They certainly got comfortable with each other quite quickly, and Sakha definitely found Evenkia’s more bawdy jokes in particular to be quite funny, but was careful not to make them back (in Evenk culture, bawdy jokes are acceptable but elders are allowed to make them in front of younger people and men in front of women, but not the other way around)

Now onto Sakha and Evenkias relationship with Dolgan. I talked about Sakha’s relationship with Dolgan and how he’s like a father to her in a previous post:

“Quick sidenote on the Dolgan: I see Sakha as being quite close with Dolgan. Dolgan culture incorporates aspects from different groups, including reindeer herding from the Evenki, herd dogs from the Nentsy, and women's fur coats from the Sakha.

In fact, the Dolgan people originated from a few Evenk clans that later adopted a dialect of the Turkic-speaking Sakha (Yakut).

So Sakha does try to look out for Dolgan and imagining him like. Dressing her up/giving her clothes and jewellery is so cutee. He's a lot more involved with her than Evenkia is, much to his annoyance.”

I also see Dolgan taking after Sakha personality wise, as I see Sakha as someone who is quite hard headed/outspoken (I jokingly called him the Saul Goodman of Siberia) and I see Dolgan being that way too, as the Dolgan people wield a lot of influence in Siberia despite their small numbers,

“The 2002 Russian census recorded 7,261 Dolgans in the whole Russian Federation. The Dolgan people today are one of the most politically powerful groups in their territory, and many senior officials of the Taimyr Autonomous Okrug are Dolgans.”

“The Dolgans and other indigenous peoples in the Taimyr Autonomous Okrug have created an Association of the Indigenous Peoples of the Taimyr Autonomous Okrug through which they are demanding the rights to control their own destinies. The Association has declared that indigenous peoples in Taimyr have priority rights to the land and its subsurface resources and hopes to be able to use revenues from mineral exploitation and economic development to fund programs addressing the many social and economic problems facing indigenous peoples today.”

So Dolgan really is like Sakha’s protégé/junior (and yes he’s very proud of her).

This is more of a crack headcanon of mine but seeing as the Dolgan originated from Evenk clans that took on a dialect of the Sakha language, I see Dolgan as almost being their child. Though I believe that Sakha had a much greater hand in her upbringing considering they, again, took on a dialect of the Sakha language, took on Sakha attire and personality wise, she’s also very much like Sakha. However she physically looks more similar to Evenkia. Due to the fact that Sakha had a greater role in her upbringing he uhh holds some resentment towards Evenkia for dumping her on him for not having a bigger part in it, he was his mentor after all. Evenkia dismisses his complaints as silly rumours (“didn’t I teach you the importance of not gossiping?), which only annoys Sakha further.

It’s okay though, Sakha is now bigger and stronger than his previous mentor and can make him pay him back in his own way ;)

But in all seriousness, Sakha does credit Evenkia with helping him adapt and survive when he first moved and won’t ever deny that, though he sometimes finds Evenkia irksome to deal with these days. Yukaghir defends Evenkia because she’s also an oldie and so she uses his age to defend him most of the time.

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aswegoalong72 · 9 months ago

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Reyal At A Glance - The Desert Rings

Map by @nexelart (twit)

The Desert Rings - Oceanside Paradise

The Desert Rings are the second most densely populated location in Southern Reyal, outside of the Land of Tenav's Dawn. Here is the location where many Alkanites fled to during the early migrations of the then recently civilized Lyratet. Surprisingly, the area is very fitting for their beliefs, as Alkan itself is a fairly salty world!

Today, while still being heavily in Alkanite territory, much of the religion in the region has switched more towards those who believe Reyal has magical abilities, or just one of the many flavors of Tenavism. Religious tensions have died down with the rise of globalization, and it is now a much calmer, happier place than it used to be.

The Desert Rings are located around the Great Southern Ocean, which is Reyal's only ocean. While seemingly inhospitable at first, due to the Lyratet's love for smaller lakes and other bodies of water, they quickly adapted to the saltwater filled environment.

The rings formed as a result of colliding continental plates, and can be very easily compared to the Ring of Fire on Earth, albeit much more pronounced due to Reyal's heavier geological activity. The region is very prone to quakes and volcanic activity, although the Lyratet have come up with ways to deal with this.

To make matters more interesting, a few hundred million years ago, a large comet hit the northern half of the ocean, digging up enough soil to create a small island. This island is now known as Therikine, which is a fairly important hub in the region for trade, mining, and paleontology.

u'un Nea'terno

u'un Nea'terno, or the Primal Desert, is one of the most inhospitable places on Reyal for habitation. Due to the mountains in the region, moisture is constantly wicked away layer by layer, creating a desert that never sees any rain towards the center of the area. Temperatures can reach up to 29C with no cloud cover, and the average rainfall is less than half a centimeter per decade. There have been wet periods in the past, but they've been incredibly far and few between. During these times, however, the desert has come alive, sporting very unique lifeforms that take advantage of the temporary situation. They hibernate the rest of the time, sometimes for centuries. As such, the region is an amazing time capsule for life, and has been the heavy focus of paleontologists and biologists in recent years.

Therikine

Therikine is considered to be the holy grail of Lyratet life. During early settlement, the region was discovered to sport a very unique biosphere, due to being so isolated from the rest of the world; many new types of food were discovered, with the most important of them being the components for ajjen. Ajjen is a traditional herbal brew which contains several stimulating chemicals, much like coffee here on Earth. Since its discovery, it has spread through the world like wildfire, and is on par in terms of consumption with just regular water.

On top of this, Therikine has one of the largest known reserves of rare earth minerals that are easily extractable, and is home to a series of caves that house some incredibly well preserved fossils, which were discovered by a team of scientists and engineers from the Global Resource Committee much by accident. They were searching for new phosphorus deposits initially, but two scientists used some ground penetrating radar to discover the caves after finding some loose fossils on the surface.

Gallak

Gallak, meaning "Long Shore" in the native tongue of the region, is the capitol of the Gallak United Territories. The city is the most populated in the region by far, boasting around ~163 million people. Gallak is the Alkanite's equivalent to Tyrateol, albeit much smaller in comparison to the hulking giant. Founded by settlers during the third exodus of Alkanites from the Land of Tenav's Dawn, Gallak quickly grew, slowly absorbing surrounding villages, all before turning into what it is today.

As religious tensions died down heavily over the centuries since its founding, Gallak has become more of a tourist town for those who wish to bathe in the warm, sunny waters of the Great Southern Ocean. On top of this, Gallak is known for its algae based dyes, which are only able to be grown in this area. The byproducts from bleaching the algae are added to food, leading to a unique yet savory and nutritious style of food. That's it for this entry; thanks for reading! Next week, we'll cover Therikine in more detail! Until then!

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spacetimewithstuartgary · 6 days ago

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NASA’s Hubble, Webb probe surprisingly smooth disk around Vega

In the 1997 movie "Contact," adapted from Carl Sagan's 1985 novel, the lead character scientist Ellie Arroway (played by actor Jodi Foster) takes a space-alien-built wormhole ride to the star Vega. She emerges inside a snowstorm of debris encircling the star — but no obvious planets are visible.

It looks like the filmmakers got it right.

A team of astronomers at the University of Arizona, Tucson used NASA's Hubble and James Webb space telescopes for an unprecedented in-depth look at the nearly 100-billion-mile-diameter debris disk encircling Vega. "Between the Hubble and Webb telescopes, you get this very clear view of Vega. It's a mysterious system because it's unlike other circumstellar disks we've looked at," said Andras Gáspár of the University of Arizona, a member of the research team. "The Vega disk is smooth, ridiculously smooth."

The big surprise to the research team is that there is no obvious evidence for one or more large planets plowing through the face-on disk like snow tractors. "It's making us rethink the range and variety among exoplanet systems," said Kate Su of the University of Arizona, lead author of the paper presenting the Webb findings.

Webb sees the infrared glow from a disk of particles the size of sand swirling around the sizzling blue-white star that is 40 times brighter than our Sun. Hubble captures an outer halo of this disk, with particles no bigger than the consistency of smoke that are reflecting starlight.

The distribution of dust in the Vega debris disk is layered because the pressure of starlight pushes out the smaller grains faster than larger grains. "Different types of physics will locate different-sized particles at different locations," said Schuyler Wolff of the University of Arizona team, lead author of the paper presenting the Hubble findings. "The fact that we're seeing dust particle sizes sorted out can help us understand the underlying dynamics in circumstellar disks."

The Vega disk does have a subtle gap, around 60 AU (astronomical units) from the star (twice the distance of Neptune from the Sun), but otherwise is very smooth all the way in until it is lost in the glare of the star. This shows that there are no planets down at least to Neptune-mass circulating in large orbits, as in our solar system, say the researchers.

"We're seeing in detail how much variety there is among circumstellar disks, and how that variety is tied into the underlying planetary systems. We’re finding a lot out about the planetary systems — even when we can’t see what might be hidden planets," added Su. "There's still a lot of unknowns in the planet-formation process, and I think these new observations of Vega are going to help constrain models of planet formation."

Disk Diversity

Newly forming stars accrete material from a disk of dust and gas that is the flattened remnant of the cloud from which they are forming. In the mid-1990s Hubble found disks around many newly forming stars. The disks are likely sites of planet formation, migration, and sometimes destruction. Fully matured stars like Vega have dusty disks enriched by ongoing "bumper car" collisions among orbiting asteroids and debris from evaporating comets. These are primordial bodies that can survive up to the present 450-million-year age of Vega (our Sun is approximately ten times older than Vega). Dust within our solar system (seen as the Zodiacal light) is also replenished by minor bodies ejecting dust at a rate of about 10 tons per second. This dust is shoved around by planets. This provides a strategy for detecting planets around other stars without seeing them directly – just by witnessing the effects they have on the dust.

"Vega continues to be unusual," said Wolff. "The architecture of the Vega system is markedly different from our own solar system where giant planets like Jupiter and Saturn are keeping the dust from spreading the way it does with Vega."

For comparison, there is a nearby star, Fomalhaut, which is about the same distance, age and temperature as Vega. But Fomalhaut's circumstellar architecture is greatly different from Vega's. Fomalhaut has three nested debris belts.

Planets are suggested as shepherding bodies around Fomalhaut that gravitationally constrict the dust into rings, though no planets have been positively identified yet. "Given the physical similarity between the stars of Vega and Fomalhaut, why does Fomalhaut seem to have been able to form planets and Vega didn't?" said team member George Rieke of the University of Arizona, a member of the research team. "What's the difference? Did the circumstellar environment, or the star itself, create that difference? What's puzzling is that the same physics is at work in both," added Wolff.

First Clue to Possible Planetary Construction Yards

Located in the summer constellation Lyra, Vega is one of the brightest stars in the northern sky. Vega is legendary because it offered the first evidence for material orbiting a star — presumably the stuff for making planets — as potential abodes of life. This was first hypothesized by Immanuel Kant in 1775. But it took over 200 years before the first observational evidence was collected in 1984. A puzzling excess of infrared light from warm dust was detected by NASA's IRAS (Infrared Astronomy Satellite). It was interpreted as a shell or disk of dust extending twice the orbital radius of Pluto from the star.

In 2005, NASA's infrared Spitzer Space Telescope mapped out a ring of dust around Vega. This was further confirmed by observations using submillimeter telescopes including Caltech's Submillimeter Observatory on Mauna Kea, Hawaii, and also the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, and ESA's (European Space Agency's) Herschel Space Telescope, but none of these telescopes could see much detail. "The Hubble and Webb observations together provide so much more detail that they are telling us something completely new about the Vega system that nobody knew before," said Rieke.

Two papers (Wolff et al. and Su et. al.) from the Arizona team will be published in The Astrophysical Journal.

The James Webb Space Telescope is the world's premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).

The Hubble Space Telescope has been operating for over three decades and continues to make ground-breaking discoveries that shape our fundamental understanding of the universe. Hubble is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope and mission operations. Lockheed Martin Space, based in Denver, Colorado, also supports mission operations at Goddard. The Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, conducts Hubble science operations for NASA.

IMAGE: [left] A Hubble Space Telescope false-color view of a 100-billion-mile-wide disk of dust around the summer star Vega. Hubble detects reflected light from dust that is the size of smoke particles largely in a halo on the periphery of the disk. The disk is very smooth, with no evidence of embedded large planets. The black spot at the center blocks out the bright glow of the hot young star. [right] The James Webb Space Telescope resolves the glow of warm dust in a disk halo, at 23 billion miles out. The outer disk (analogous to the solar system’s Kuiper Belt) extends from 7 billion miles to 15 billion miles. The inner disk extends from the inner edge of the outer disk down to close proximity to the star. There is a notable dip in surface brightness of the inner disk from approximately 3.7 to 7.2 billion miles. The black spot at the center is due to lack of data from saturation. Credit NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, S. Wolff (University of Arizona), K. Su (University of Arizona), A. Gáspár (University of Arizona)

#science #space #astronomy #physics #news #nasa #astrophysics #esa

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yourbelovedissy · 8 months ago

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FEBESTIARY 2024

Throughout all of February, I did an art challenge I called Febestiary! The idea is simple: make 5 diff picker wheels of different prompts based on various animal species, body types, biomes, art styles, and unique traits. Then, smack 'em all together! This is the result of my month-long artistic pursuit :3

Oh also, I waive all rights to these creature designs, and release them under the CC0 license. No rights reserved.

[ID: Eleven images, each showing a different original fantasy monster design, labeled Febestiary with the day, and a bullet point list of traits with a drawing.

Day 1: Cosmic Clam: Bivalve, asymetrical, cosmos, cool, herds, saber teeth, monogamous.

The cosmic clams are drawn flying through a starscale, with deep blue shells on one side and a spike for a tail, with soft pale flesh on the other side like an oyster.

Day 1: Mind Magma Money: primate, tripedal, lava beds, low effort, mind control, diurnal, scavenger.

The mind magma monkey has three legs and two arms, with dark fur striped with cream on the arms and legs and above the pink face. It holds a bone in one hand, with lines of green going from its head to the heads of stick figures with swirly eyes, showing they are brainwashed into doing the money's bidding, one of them offering it energy. The background is black rock and lava.

Day 2: Diplopoltus: Dolpocaulus, hexapedal, tir na nog, minimalist, strong smell, spectral, levitation.

The Diplopoltus is shown as a long, blue and white spectral creature with a curved head like a hammerhead shark, and six short legs with three toes. It has four clusters of whiskers on its head, and blank white eyes with slits for a nose. It floats over a fantastic blue field at night the stars covering the sky.

Day 2: David Bowfish: Walleye, bipedal, cosmos, low effort, telekenesis, supersonic roars, bright colors.

The David Blowfish is drawn as a bipedal fish standing on the surface of the moon. It has two fins on its back, one blue, one green, a dark green fin on its tail and matching duck-like feet, red legs and belly, and a body white on the face with a stripe of red around the eye, a thick black band in the center, and the end striped white and green. It telekinetically holds a walkie taklie and has its mouth open, calling into it.

Day 3: Voltacuda: Barracuda, hexapedal, digital, skeleton, venemous bite, scavenger, elemental kinesis.

The Voltacuda is drawn as the skeleton of a barracuda in a digital grid world, with cables sparking with blue electricity ectending from the head, tail, and fins.

Day 4: Digitulas: Tarantula, quadrupedal, nightmares, creepy, nocturnal, sexual dimorphism, hibernation.

There are two digitulas, shrouded behind hazy darkness making them very hard to see, with their six front eyes the easiest thing to see, white-ish with pupils that seem dark red. One is shorter and closer to the ground, the other is much taller, with long hair partially obscuring its eyes. Aside from vague outlines of spider-like limbs and bodies, nothing else can be seen clearly.

Day 5: Proffo Pelican: Pelican, hexapedal, jungles, cutesy, burrowing, eusocial, strong vision.

The Proffo pelican is drawn sitting, with a bird body that is mostly grey-tan, with darker brown on the head, belly, and tail. It has four dark webbed feet, a fan-shaped tail with a center white feather, and the others dark brown with an orange and red-shaped base. The belly is striped with dotted lines of white. Its wing is tan-grey with white tips, and folded. It has a long tall neck, with a yellow face, a round eye, and a pale orange beak that is red at the base, with a large, striped, red, orange, and pale orange pouch below the beak that is puffed up. Atop the head is a small swirl of white, and smaller white "whiskers" on the cheek. The eye has a white line like a cheetah trailing down.

Day 6: Flying Frankfarter: Canine, limbless, clouds, cool, clairvoyance, poison secretions, migration.

The Flying Frankfarter is drawn as a dark brown hotdot with the head of a dog wearing sunglasses, with yellow stripes along the back in loops, and the top of the head like mustard. It has no limbs except for a short fluffy tail. It farts out fire as it flies through the sky like a missile, with a compass in a thought bubble over its head to show it knows where it's going.

Day 7: Soaring Sea Sloth: Sloth, Aquatic, Islands, Ancient, undead, levitation, healing powers.

The Soaring Sea Sloth is drawn in a stylized form with a long head, two large paws or hands off to either side above and below, tipped with three long claws, a long body, and a tail that seems like backlegs used together, with three claw sets on either side. It has a row of dots along the neck and body, and two dots above each paw. The center of the body has five asymetrical partial rings around it like ribs. There is an overlay like smoke or an old map.

Day 8: Mantid Mast: Mantis, many-limbed, underworld, goofy, time travel, camoflage, immortality. The Mantis Mast is drawn as a swimming praying mantis with large cartoony eyes, and a body that is brown and shaped like a canoe, with the legs disguised as oars, ending in duck-like feet below the water. Semi-transparent swirls of ghosts perch on its back as they are ferried down the river, with one swimming besides it. The Mantid Mast has a watch around its neck like a collar or necklace.

Day 8: Cnitaurian: Cnidarian, centaurian, oceans, scary cute, elemental kinesis, chromatophores, strong vision. The Cnitaurian is drawn as a jelly-fish like creature that is partly transparent, with other parts lit up bright blue, red, purple, and yellow. It has a head like structure with two whit eyes, a shoulder structure like the bell of a jellyfish, and a lower body as another bell, appearing shaped like a centaur, with tentacles forming arms and legs. The inside shows all the connections of the tentacles, and small flecks of white like stars.

End ID.]

#issy art #febestiary #art challenge #public domain #spec evo #speculative biology #cc0 #fantasy creature

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ajaygupta001 · 23 days ago

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hatredcurse · 1 year ago

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👥Starter Generator || @bladedhunter

It's mid-morning. There's a band of heavy cloud. You're in the countryside. There's a desolate feel to the place.

Empty. The Konoha countryside was an empty, dismal place with this heavy smog of chthonic energy. The type of smothering miasma that made the air dense, even when the rising sun burned away at the morning fog to clear the air of vapor, this heaviness remained.

It wasn't ideal to travel through backroads in the countryside. Not that it has ever been a safe mode of transportation. Wars raged and died away, bandits picked their favoring trails only to later migrate away, the ever ambitious rogue shinobi might find themselves particularly lucky with boon on backroads— all the time, danger would always be lurking. Especially in the quiet spots.

Orochimaru was both a formidable peril and a minor threat all the same, depending on this mood. In later years, he was finding himself bored of his field of study. Everything he yearned to learn, excavated and shoved into a dusty back shelf in some well-guarded room. Yes, there was a level of elation to be had maneuvering expensive yet useless traps for a goldmine of information, but it didn't change the key component that he didn't conjure the knowledge himself. Rather, he is as he was before: robbing graves for unoriginal ideas.

It was no good for him to be bored at such an early stage of immortality. He's yet to shed his first skin of the century, iridescent scales dull and bleak into complacency.

Burying this latent dissatisfaction keep into the coil of his almost-mortal being, he pursued forward on the footpath, praying for divine revelation to re-ignite his flame with the unexpected.

"Oh, well, what do we have here?" his mouth moved before his mind pieced together his words," a little far from home, aren't we?"

Narrowing those golden eyes, he sharpened his view on this lovely figure before him. All light absorbed into his rather drab wear and all the humor in the atmosphere sucked dry from that scowl: Sasuke Uchiha, the youngest remnant of a forlorn history, boy miracle. The smile imprinted itself instinctually upon his lips, one that reached his eyes, but couldn't fool well-trained perception.

#Orochimaru ic #v. EVER-COILING SNAKE BURROWING INTO INFINITY; THE HABITS OF OUROBOROS (Post War)#closed starter #bladedhunter

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satans-helper · 1 year ago

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Reaching for Stardust - Part VI

Read Looking For Space here // Playlists here // Read on wattpad

Word Count: ~2700 (why so short?? I don't know. I wrote this what feels like ages ago lol)

Warnings: none...but buckle up for later?

This is super late because I was 1) busy writing that GVF slash mini-series 2) busy being out of town to see OUR BOYS again 3) busy writing that new Sam fic I just posted. Anyway...

---

Morning began with a tangerine sun suspended in a hazy, buttercup yellow sky. The clouds seemed to come to life as the sun got higher, moving past the orange glow in such gentle, soft movements that it was hard to even keep track of the changes, at least from mine and Josh’s spot on the porch. We were both hungover worse than we’d experienced in, well, we weren’t sure–it was hard to remember anything with our heads pounding, throats parched and stomachs lurching.

“Fuck. We fucked up,” Josh lamented with a little groan. He shut his eyes and leaned against me, a mug of coffee in his hands. “We should’ve bought food yesterday. I’d take a single saltine cracker right now.”

I felt the same. Hindsight was always 20/20. “Yeah, we fucked up,” I agreed. I tried to shut my eyes in solidarity and to just bask in the warm glow of morning but, when I did, I felt the earth spin beneath my feet. “I need Gatorade or something, jeez.”

“I shouldn’t have suggested shots,” Josh went on, sounding off a louder groan to punctuate his statement. “It’s all my fault. Are we going to survive?”

“We’ll survive,” I assured him, though the coffee from the Keurig machine was too bitter on my tongue and too hot in my stomach. I was dreaming of an ice-cold blue sports drink from an air conditioned gas station, chased with an iced coffee loaded with cream and sugar. “Nothing’s gonna stop us from going to the beach today.”

“Tybee Island, yes,” Josh concurred. He sat up straight and brought the mug of coffee to his lips, eyes half-lidded as he sipped again despite the enthusiasm in his voice. Once half of his coffee was gone he was up and moving, shuffling away from the porch, beginning to sing to himself as he carried on into the bedroom. If it’d been anyone else, that relentless cheeriness and resilience would have irritated me, but it was Josh, so listening just made me laugh to myself.

I was still excited for our beach day, though at the moment the thought of baking in the sun made me feel even more queasy. I diligently sipped the rest of my coffee and groggily hauled myself into the kitchen to chug lukewarm tap water, which tasted so different than the water back home. I did love Savannah so far, but I still couldn’t imagine living there. In my mind, home was where our most beloved people were and that was back in Michigan.

That thought reminded me to check my phone for a reply from Jake. He had texted back later in the night and I immediately smiled huge and delirious at the picture–a selfie taken with the help of Danny’s long arm that showed all three of the boys that I missed so badly. The text read: First birthday without Josh was weird. He sent me a text that was half gibberish did you guys go out?

I typed back, relaying that we went to the rooftop bar and got absolutely wasted and that Josh’s birthday seemed a little weird without Jake and Sam and Danny, too. As I migrated to the bedroom after Josh, I realized how it was also the first birthday of Josh’s that felt so empty after the fact–normally, the whole “one year older” and effects of whatever party we’d had trailed into the next day. I didn’t feel that at all. Was it yet another product of actually getting older? Sometimes in my head, Josh was still the same 23 year old I’d met in that poetry class, both of us so fresh and green, with him so ready to fall headfirst into something new with me. I’d been so apprehensive and fearful and now, looking back, it felt so silly. Josh was a dream come true.

The beach was also a dream come true. We had nothing to compare it to back home, not even close–the ocean right at our literal fingertips was enough for Josh and I to drop our bags and hightail it to the sea, running through the foamy waves until the water reached our knees. The sun was partially hidden by some of the morning clouds that had stuck around, but what sunlight pierced through hit hard and beautiful, turning the water into an infinite expanse of glittering blue and green that melted into the pale blue horizon. Seagulls circled overhead; pelicans coasted in the water; boats floated on by far off in their own little worlds and our little world seemed to be a seaside fairytale that I was content to live in for much longer than we actually had.

The wind caressed our damp legs as we stepped back out onto dry land. My heart was beating fast, even faster still when I looked at Josh–the strips of white clouds were reflected in his eyes and his smile was bigger and brighter than any sun. I was sure of that. We watched each other more than what our hands were doing as we held the big beach towel we’d packed between us and spread it out in the air, trying to get it straight and taut to lay flat on the sand. Josh smirked; I stuck my tongue out at him and he laughed.

“This is perfect,” he remarked once we were getting situated on the ground. He laid back, putting his hands behind his head, and closed his eyes. “I could stay here forever.”

I grabbed his sunglasses from his backpack and slid them over his eyes. “It does feel like a little slice of paradise. We just need some fruity cocktails.”

“A little hair of the dog that bit us wouldn’t be such a bad idea right now, actually.”

I laid down next to him, shielding my eyes with my hand to look at the sky. “We used to be able to drink all night and be relatively fine the next day. I miss that.”

“I think Jake, Danny and Sam drank all night. Sam sent me a video of Danny drinking straight from a bottle of tequila.”

I chuckled. “Those two degenerates have ruined our good boy.”

“Sam singlehandedly corrupted Danny years ago, I’m sure of it,” Josh said, turning his head to look at me. His bare skin was already so naturally tan–I could imagine how much more rich and glowy he’d become with the extra sun we were getting. “He’s just good at keeping it under wraps, that Daniel of ours. Well, sometimes. Seems like the most debauchery comes out when Sam peer pressures him and Danny can’t contain himself.”

It was true–so many nights of Sam practically pouring shots down Danny’s throat himself. It seemed like Danny only tried to hold back because he knew he’d end up having to take care of Sam later on.

“I think they’re in love,” I said.

Josh laughed. “Me too.”

I sat up to retrieve a bottle of water from my backpack. “But really–none of them have girlfriends. Is it because they’re touring now? I just can’t imagine any of them not finding a girl to click with.”

“Well, we are their best groupies. I don’t think anyone else can compete with us in that regard,” Josh said, still lying flat, lounging beneath the penetrating sunrays. “But I do think the fact that they’re playing shows all over now is a factor. I can’t imagine how hard it would be to commit to someone you’re not going to see even every week.”

“Not gonna lie, I wanted Sam and Bev to work out.”

“I think he was a little too young then. It might be different now.”

“Well, maybe it’s a good thing.” I took a drink then settled back down, moving closer to Josh. “They should just be focused on the music and having fun. Relationships complicate things.”

Josh raised his sunglasses and winked at me. “Not if they’re perfect.”

I smiled. “We’re not exactly perfect.”

“Close enough.”

I’d considered the idea that Josh really would propose to me during our vacation. The beach seemed like a good place for it–though there were people around, we had plenty of privacy, no way to make a big public fuss about it. The weather was perfect and the whole ambiance of the ocean and sky made for a picturesque setting. He was too relaxed though–if Josh were to propose now, I would have had a real inkling. Still, the impending mystery proposal and the subsequent unplanned wedding was on my mind again.

“Where would you want our wedding to be?” I asked. “Obviously outside somewhere. We’ve already agreed on that. But where specifically?”

Josh reached between us to take my hand, still lying idle by my side. “I’m not sure, darling. I’m not privy to the venues and what have you that are in our area. Why, did you have a particular place in mind?”

“Not really. But some place quiet and open would be nice. Lots of flowers and trees and whatnot. That’d be pretty, right?”

“Very pretty. Though it sounds like we’d be waiting another year if we wanted the greenery and sunshine.” Josh squeezed my hand lightly, let it go to roll onto his side and look at me. “I don’t feel like waiting another year.”

I knew as much, but my heart still skipped a beat at hearing the words. “It takes time to plan a wedding. Even if you proposed to me right now, the planning would take months.”

“We have months as it is. But don’t worry–I’m not proposing today.” Josh leaned in and cupped my face, giving me a kiss. “It’s still going to be a surprise. And I have to get the timing right.”

“Oh?” I quipped, reaching out for him, tugging on his hair to bring him back and kiss again. He tasted like sunscreen and coconut lip balm.

Josh propped his head up in one hand, remaining on his side. “I know you have your bridesmaid all figured out. Kirsti would be your maid of honor, naturally.”

“And Jake would be your best man. Naturally.”

“You’ve told your mom we’re planning on getting married, right?”

“Josh, she started pressuring me to marry you like two years ago,” I reminded him with a laugh. “Once she came around to you, she came around hard. And I’m pretty sure she’s desperate for just one of her kids to get married.”

“Oh, that’s right! Last Christmas she asked me where the ring was.” Josh laughed too, turning to look up at the sky. “I didn’t tell her I had it already. Maybe I should’ve.”

“Since I already know you’re going to propose, isn’t most of the surprise moot anyway?”

Josh laid back down. “Not at all. People should talk about it beforehand. It doesn’t kill the romance. It just makes things more solid.”

“You know what’s also solid? A house,” I replied, giving his nose a tap with my finger before I laid back down, too.

“Seen any around here that you like?”

“I’ve seen some back home that I like.” I quickly considered spilling about the house from the estate sale, but I didn’t know if that was a sure thing yet. And anyway, I didn’t want to get caught up in thinking about being home when we were on vacation. Josh was so skilled at enjoying the present–I was going to do the same.

Once we were feeling the burn from the sun, Josh and I waded back into the cool Atlantic. This time, we went far enough out until the water reached our necks and the waves were gentle and stirring around us, crashing loudly behind us; I gazed out at the blue horizon, thinking of how the ocean seemed as infinite as the sky itself, as infinite as the whole universe, really. I laughed when Josh decided to swim out even farther, kicking and paddling along until he called out that he couldn’t feel where the bottom was and I told him to watch out for sharks. He tipped back to lie flat beneath the sky and float atop the water, arms out at his sides and eventually looking too much like a dead body that I swam out and dragged him back by his hand.

We took our damp and slightly sunburnt selves to a very late lunch at a little seafood shack afterward. It was quite literally a shack, actually, and it was situated down a curvy road, far more in the grasslands than the actual beach, but I could still smell the ocean when we stepped out of the rental car and moseyed up the wooden ramp to the doorway, where inside it smelled like, not to either of our surprises, fish, crab and fryer oil.

After our greasy and satisfying lunch, we headed out to the shops lining the island that were even more blatant tourist money grabs than what we’d encountered downtown, and we loved it. The sweatshirts, t-shirts, hats, keychains and the beach-inspired hemp necklaces and bracelets fit the energy of the island and our sun-soaked bliss; neither Josh nor I cared about how silly the purchases were. We walked out with plastic bags full of mementos and soft hoodies, our hair stiff from salt water, my heart full of undeniable happiness.

While Josh drove us back over the bridge to take us back to our temporary home for much-needed showers, I got a text from Jake: How do you like Savannah?

I love it. It’s beautiful! We’re having the best time. Where are you guys tonight?

Cleveland. So far so good. Josh hasnt been texting me much so he must be enamored with the city haha

He is! But we miss you guys. We have so much to tell you when we get back

Same here. Wish you guys could see the show

We’re your biggest fans. Don’t forget it ;)

“Jake misses us,” I announced to Josh, who had a very pleased smile on his face when I looked at him.

“I know he does,” he said while we glided over the bridge back to the city. “I miss him, too.”

When night fell, we were one of four other couples and one trio during the ghost tour, which took us from the starting point outside a diner, long shut down since its last dinner hour, around what felt like far more than just a couple miles of the city. The guide was a witchy woman who had the right energy and charisma to make all the stories–surely, some more exaggerated than others–come to life in the warm night and the yellow glow of the street and house lights and the abundance of Spanish moss hanging from so many of the trees surrounding our steps added to the spookiness of it all. Josh loved it, as did I, and we were wired by the time the tour ended, wanting more ghost stories–really, wanting to find some ghost stories of our own.

But instead of ghosts, we found ourselves back at the airbnb, sipping wine with our limbs tangled together on the porch. I couldn’t see the stars–the lights of the small city were still too many and too bright to get a good view–but the brightest star of all was right there next to me. I said this to Josh and he laughed lovingly at the cliche, wrapped his arm tighter around me and pressed his wine-stained lips to my cheek: “Thank you for coming with me on this journey,” he said.

“To Savannah or just, like, life?” I asked, happy and mutually grateful either way.

“All of it.” Josh sighed softly and rested his cheek on my shoulder. “I just wish it were longer.”

“We have tomorrow,” I reminded him. “And a whole lifetime.”

Josh clinked his glass with mine. “Infinity.”

I ran my fingers up his back, tracing each vertebrae. “Infinity.”

---

Tagging: @jjwasneverhere @colorstreammind

Want to be tagged? Let me know here! (or just DM me lmao)

#greta van fleet #gvf #josh kiszka #josh gvf #sam kiszka #danny wagner #jake kiszka #gvf fic #josh fic #lfs #rfs #josh kiszka x reader

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skygodtraumabond · 1 year ago

Text

<The scene opens at night at Slateport Harbor. Ray is sitting on the dock with Dominique, gazing up into the night sky. With their goggles on their head, they seem to be trying to spot something through the intermittent clouds and light pollution, but to little success. Dominique, on the other hand, seems to be shifting their gaze between the water below and the twinkling lights on the horizon, kicking their feet off the side of the dock.

Ray: ... It's around this time of year we usually start seeing flying types from other regions migrating here. Flocks of Chatot from Sinnoh, Murkrow from Johto... Sometimes you'll even see Braviary. Though, if everything's getting warmer...

Dominique: Mmhm...

Ray returns their gaze to the kid upon hearing the faraway tone of their voice, following their eyes to stare off into the horizon. Their gaze softens as they realize what the kid is looking for, and they find themelf staring off into the distance with them.

Ray: ... She'll be home soon. Boats just take a while to reach the shore, you know?

Dominique: I know... I just wish they were faster...

Ray: Yeah... Me too.

They both stare in silence for a while, the scene silent save for the chatter of passersby, the crashing of the waves, and the distsnt squabbling of Wingull. Then, Ray takes their backpack off and starts shuffling through it, drawing Domi's attention as they go elbow-deep in it for something.

Dominique: What are you—

Ray: I have something to show you. It's in here somewhere... Ah!

They grab hold of something and pull it free from the bag. It's long, slender, and wrapped in old fabric and tied with a small length of rope. Untying it and unrolling the fabric reveals a fishing rod that's been folded up. It seems to be at least two decades old judging by the model and the amount of wear on it.

Dominique: ... A fishing pole?

Ray: Well... Yes.

Dominique: I... I know how to fish, Mx. Ray.

Ray: I know you do. But... How much do you know about the pokemon you can fish up?

Domi has to think for a minute, staring into the water and kicking their legs as Ray assembles the pole. They hum a tune long-firgotten as they attach a minnow-shaped lure and take out a small jar of worms to use as bait. The worms are long-dead, it seems.

Dominique: Well... You can find Magikarp pretty much anywhere... I think you can find Tentacool in environments with saltwater like this one. Um... If you're lucky, you might find a Horsea.

Ray: Hmm... Yes, you're right that you can find all of those pokemon by fishing. But what do you know about those pokemon?

Dominique: ... Magikarp is kind of weak and can only really use splash. Which... Does nothing. Um... Tentacool... They sting you I think. Horsea... Uh...

As Domi wracks their brain, Ray hands them the fishing rod, startling them out of their thoughts for a moment.

Ray: A lot of trainers will battle you using pokemon they caught while fishing. Some trainers even specialize solely in water-types. It helps to know a lot about the pokemon they might have found in the area. So... How about we fish up some pokemon? I'll teach you what I know about them, then we can let them go. It's... It'll probably make time go by a little faster than just staring into the water. You know?

Ray tilts their head at Domi slightly as they inspect the fishing rod, hoping they'll agree. Then, to the ex-champ's relief, they nod slightly and cast the line out off the edge of the dock, reeling it in slowly and intermittently to simulate the movement of a fish beneath the waves.

Dominique: ... What if we catch an actual fish? Not a fish pokemon just... A fish?

Ray: What do you mean? We'll keep it and clean it just like we usually do. Your maman will probably appreciate the warm meal.

Dominique: Well yeah, but... Isn't that illegal here? Without a license?

Ray: It's only illegal if you get caught. Besides, you're a ten-year-old with a fishing pole and a belt full of pokeballs, no one's going to question you.

Domi doesn't seem totally convinced, but they nod anyways, scooting a little closer to their stepparent with the ghost of a smile as they check the line, then cast it back out to try their luck again. The tension almost seems lifted as the waves crash unaffected against the dock.

#raytalk #pokeblogging #pokeblr #pkmn irl #perfectly normal rookie

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blood-darkened-moon · 2 years ago

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What is your view about the characterisation of the overall Ashford family? I think they are Scots in origin, since the majority of them are red-rehaired, and likely they made their fortune on the British Empire. I have the impression that all of them had Ph.D. and were scientist, which is a rarity among European nobility.

Omg, what have you gotten me into? Don’t get me wrong, doing all the research was fun, but there is so much stuff I cloud write about here, so much stuff. Every time I thought I could see an end, new points popped up, and I had to keep it going. This is long. I hope you don’t mind. Anyway, I tried to limit this answer to speculations and useful information without drifting too much into headcanon territory.

Surname

The surname Ashford was first found in Cornwall and Devon in southern England. Later a branch of the family migrated eastward to Kent, where a town with the name Ashford can be found. There are seven places in total with the name Ashford in the UK. The surname Ashford originates from a place called Ayshford, which was located in Cornwall. Many Cornish surnames appear to be topographic surnames, which were given to people who resided near physical features such as hills, streams, churches, or types of trees. They are also characterized by a multitude of spelling variations. “Ashford” was also derived from the Old English words aesc and ford which meant a ford where ash trees grew.

Surnames became common during medieval times. English people were formerly known only by a single name. During medieval times the spelling of surnames was rarely consistent. Names were recorded as they sounded rather than adhering to any specific spelling rules. It wasn’t unusual that the same person was referred to with different spellings of their surname. Spelling variations of Ashford include Aishford, Ayshford, Aysford, Asford, Asseford, and many more.

Peerage

In the UK, five peerages or peerage divisions co-exist, the Peerage of England (titles created by the kings and queens of England before the Acts of Union in 1707), the Peerage of Scotland (titles created by the kings and queens of Scotland before 1707), the Peerage of Great Britain (titles created for the Kingdom of Great Britain between 1707 and 1801), the Peerage of Ireland (titles created for the Kingdom of Ireland before the Acts of Union in 1801, and some titles created later) and the Peerage of the United Kingdom (most titles created since 1801 to the present).

The peerages in the United Kingdom include both hereditary and lifetime peers. The latter ones form now the majority. The titles comprised in the peer system are duke/duchess, marquess/marchioness, earl/countess, viscount/viscountess, and baron/baroness, with duke being the highest and baron the lowest rank. Peers can hold more than one hereditary title by virtue of different peerages.

The title earl is equivalent to count. The difference is that “earl” is only used for counts in the UK, while “count” is used for the same rank in other countries. A female form of earl does not exist. Thus, “countess” is used as a word for both a female count and a female earl.

Peerages are created by the British monarch by either writs of summons or letters patents. The Government in the United Kingdom makes recommendations concerning who should be elevated to the peerage after external vetting by the House of Lords Appointments Commission. The initiative to award a peerage, baronetcy, or knighthood today comes from the British Prime Minister.

Typically, the title is only inherited by the direct male line and is lost if the peer has no sons. In certain peerages in the peerage of Scotland and in exceptional cases, the titles can be transferred to daughters if there isn’t a male offspring available. Other descendants can be specified in the letters patent by a special remainder. Letters patents are not absolute; they may be amended or revoked by an Act of Parliament.

Family members of British peers aren’t peers themselves. They count as commoners until they receive a title, for example, through inheritance. Though, the children have courtesy titles. The eldest son of an earl, for example, receives the courtesy title viscount, and daughters receive the title lady.

English, Irish, or British (but not Scottish) peerage can only be inherited by a legitimate born child (parents are married at the time of its birth) and not legitimated by a later marriage.

Only 18 (2.2%) of 758 hereditary peers by succession were female as of 1992. A female peer, in their own right, keeps her title after marriage. Her husband does not receive a title by marrying her. If he has a higher-ranking title, she bears both titles. The higher-ranking one is mentioned first. Her title is inherited by her eldest son or daughter if she doesn’t have sons.

Notes:

Veronica was a countess. I haven’t found cases of women receiving titles on their own during the 19th century and a few 100 years prior. (I’m not saying they don’t exist, but I haven’t found anything similar.) I only found cases of women inheriting existing titles due to the absence of male children.

Veronica’s female descendants can probably inherit the title if they don't have brothers.

Alfred and Alexia weren’t born legitimate since Alexander wasn’t married. Alfred shouldn’t have inherited the title. Maybe Alexander requested a change in the letters patent, or Alexander married the surrogate mother and got a divorce after the twins were born, or this rule doesn’t exist in the RE universe.

Harman addresses Alfred and the other Ashfords incorrectly in his letters. He wrote Sir Alfred and used Sir for the others too. Sir is used for the gentry. The correct way to address Alfred is My Lord or Dear Lord Alfred. Only in the file Butler's Letter, he addresses Alexander correctly as Lord Alexander.

Timeline for reference (calculation can be found here):

Minimum estimation/Maximum estimation [Time as the head of the Ashford family] official and unofficial estimated dates

Alexia: January 1971 – December 1998 Age: 27 Alfred: January 1971 – December 1998 [1983 – 1998] Age: 27 Alexander: 1938/1943 – (March/April 1983) or December 1998 [1968 – 1983] Age: 40/45 or 55/60 Edward: 1910/1915 – July 1968 [1958/63 – 1968] Age: 53/58 Arthur: 1875/1885 – 1958/63 [1910/1925 – 1958/63] Age: 73/88 Thomas: 1875/1885 – 1910/1925 [1900/1905 – 1910/1925] Age: 35/40 Stanley: 1840/1855 – 1900/1905 [1875/1885 – 1900/1905] Age: 50/65 Veronica: 1805/1825 – 1875/1885 [1830/1850 – 1875/1885] Age: 60/80

Veronica

As I already said in the Veronica post, I dislike the background information from DC about her because it makes no sense and raises more questions than it answers. Therefore, I will ignore the part about her being a child prodigy (let’s say Leon made this up too). As for the rest, that’s ok, and I tried to integrate it. However, good looks and charming people with your manner of speaking won’t give you titles. I tried to find out what Veronica possibly could have done to receive hers without much success. Well, human nature never changes, so I guess the answer is the same as it would be today: lots of money and powerful friends in high positions. Money is always the best option to bend existing rules. Now have some, hopefully historically less inaccurate, speculations: Women during the Victorian Era and before didn’t have many options for what to do in their lives. They were mostly limited to being a housewife and mother, plus a few other career choices that would never explain Veronica’s success. Apparently, Veronica got her title in her mid-20 or so. She was definitely young, judging by the portrait. Starting at the bottom is unlikely since it would consume too much time. She must have had a lucky start. I assume she was born into a wealthy family, probably of commoners, since she is considered the founder of the Ashford family. If she was born into a noble family, even a low-ranking one, I assume, they would be at least worth mentioning. And based on the origin of the name, I think her side of the family originated from England rather than Scotland. Maybe her father profited from industrialization or had a trading business. Trading with the colonies or sovereign Asian countries was lucrative back then.

Veronica was probably the only (living) child of her parents. Because of that, they were either unusually supportive, or they died early (when Veronica was about 16-18). I prefer the second possibility. It would also offer a way to escape her fate. Veronica must have been highly intelligent and received a good education. However, not to the extent DC described. Why should her parents send her to a university (assuming this is even possible) when she’s just going to become some rich dude’s wife and a mother? Realistically this would be what her parents expected of her during that time. With her parents gone, she was free to do what she wanted. Inheriting her family’s fortune and her father’s company is a good starting point and a plausible way to make even more money. Maybe she had innovative ideas, took the right risks, and was able to multiply the profit immensely within a few years. Meanwhile, she used her economic power to make friends in high positions and gain more political influence.

Linguistic skills are certainly helpful for manipulating people and in the trading business. She could have been one of those people who could sell you sand in the desert. And when you make your money by trading with other countries, speaking the local languages is an advantage. It makes you more independent since you don’t need an interpreter, and direct interactions could make trading easier. (It is possible that she spoke other languages as a ten-year-old child, but only a few and probably not that fluent.)

I don’t think Veronica was a scientist, nor that she graduated from a university. Before she became a countess, she must have put a lot of work into her business and building relationships. There was no time to study. And afterward, why should she go back to learning? She was successful without a degree. There is no reason to get one. Plus, her position, especially since she was a woman, must have been very fragile. “Friends” wouldn’t have hesitated to backstab her if she would have shown any signs of weakness. She must have been ready to defend her position and do what was necessary. What I can see, however, is that after she retired, Veronica became a hobby scientist and attended lectures at a university. According to DC, she was interested in mathematics and biology. Owning a trading business would be an easy way to get her hands on exotic plants and animals from around the world. It is also possible that she invested a good amount of money into a university. And maybe she was rewarded with an honorary title for her commitment.

Personality-wise, Veronica must have been very ambitious, even hungry for power. I also think she was manipulative and ruthless since otherwise, she wouldn’t stand a chance in a world that could turn against her in a second. Thus, Alexia and Veronica seem to have similar personalities, which makes sense.

It looks like her husband took her family name. Unusual, but it is possible that he wanted to upgrade his status. Therefore, I think she married after becoming a countess, and her husband stood below her. He could have been a wealthy commoner like her or a younger son from a lower-ranking noble family. Maybe he even was a scientist and from Scotland. Her son had red hair. It is likely that it came from his side of the family. I know she must have carried the gene too, but her hair was either natural brown or blond and dyed brown for the portrait. Henna became popular in Europe only in the late 19th century. But people used an extract of onion skin or chestnut leaves to dye their hair brown before that.

Stanley, Thomas and Arthur

I don’t have much to say about them. There is no information given except that they exist. They all seemed to be successful in what they were doing, but they did not achieve anything outstanding. Stanley and Thomas were the eldest sons. I think it was expected of them to continue the family business. Though times change, and I don’t know how long it went on. Maybe they sold it at one point and invested in something else, or at the latest, WW1 put an end to it. As with Veronica, I think it is more likely that they were businessmen rather than scientists. Stanley had enough time to visit and graduate from a university. I’m not so sure about Thomas. I think he began his studies, but if he finished them is another question. He was young when his father died, in his early 20s. Stanley wasn’t that old at the time of death. Maybe he was sick, or it was an accident. I assume Thomas had other more important duties for the time being and suspended his studies for a while or later decided he was doing well without a degree. And we shouldn’t forget he died relatively young. Based on my reconstructed timeline, his death (between 1910 and 1925) may be somehow related to WW1 (1914-1918). Though I don’t think he was a soldier nor that he died on the battlefield. In case he had a family, maybe they died along with him.

As for Arthur, as the younger twin, becoming the head of the family was probably unexpected. He was in his late 30s and must have already established his own career. Without many obligations regarding his family’s business, he was free to choose a job to his liking so he could have been a graduate scientist. It appeared to be ok for him that his son became a virologist. As a scientist himself, he may have had a better understanding of Edward’s passion.

Edward and Alexander

Edward was apparently a very passionate scientist. He even went to Africa for research when he was already in his 50s instead of settling into a desk job. It appears a bit weird to me that Edward was the most notable member of the Ashford family after Veronica. Besides the foundation of Umbrella and possible academic awards, he hasn’t achieved anything we know. Ok, the foundation of Umbrella was a huge success, but Edward died in the same year and pretty much had nothing from it.

I already wrote several things about Alexander. Right now, I can’t think of anything new. So I will just link the other posts here. Alexander’s personality Alexander’s relationship with Edward Alfred and Alexia’s backstory and how Alexander treated them

Ashford family – General notes

It is possible, even likely, that Veronica, Stanley, and Arthur had more children than the ones we know of since the family tree in the game only considered the family members that inherited the title. Other potential children were either female or younger male children or older male children who died at one point.

Rockfort Island belonged to the Ashford family before Umbrella started the construction of its facilities in the early 90s. The island is small and located in the South Pacific. It has no strategic value and probably no precious resources, and without a plane, it is hard to reach from the UK. I doubt that Veronica, Stanley, or Thomas acquired it. There is nothing they can do with a tiny piece of land at the other end of the world. Most likely, either Edward or Arthur, in his later years, purchased it somehow.

Forget what I said about Rockfort Island. @midori-laboratories (thank you again) has pointed out that this island could have been a coaling station for refueling HMS ships. Before the Panama Canal was opened in 1914, the routes around Cape Horn and through the Strait of Magellan were the shortest navigable waterways from Europe to the west coast of the American continent. An island as a place for refueling and stocking up supplies nearby would have been a valuable possession. So it was probably indeed Veronica who purchased Rockfort Island. I still think the Ashfords (we know of) didn’t live there or visited the island frequently before planes became publicly available. Therefore, Arthur or Edward would still be the first family members who could have spent more time in this place.

Research degrees, such as Doctor of Science and other higher doctorates, first appeared in the UK in the late 19th century. The Ph.D., like it is today, was introduced in 1917. Therefore, the first Ashford, who could have an actual Ph.D., is Edward.

Alfred and Alexia – Veronica Project

Ok, the whole cloning plot wasn’t thought through very well at the time, but I want to offer a reasonable explanation anyway. It’s almost ironic that the scientific progress in the last decades helped to make some sense of it.

I always doubted that Alfred and Alexia were monozygotic twins because they were genetically obviously different. I want to point out that Alexander never claimed this was the case. He just wrote twins. Of course, seeing them as monozygotic twins is one way to interpret the situation, but not the only one and certainly not the one that makes the most sense. I think Alfred was rather an early-stage experiment/prototype that never should have made it into the final stages or some kind of backup plan.

First, it is almost impossible that Alexia was the only Veronica clone Alexander had prepared. In scientific experiments, you never do things just once, and they work immediately. Creating a Veronica clone is a multi-step process. If you want to avoid going back to zero, if something goes wrong in the end, you prepare yourself. There are many things that could go wrong: the clone dies while it is still in a cellular stage, the surrogate mother has a miscarriage, the clone dies during or shortly after birth, the clone is sickly because of genetic defects, and so on. Alexander probably had at least 5 to 10 Veronica clones ready to go. Alexia was only one of them. And who says Alexia was the first one? She was the first successful one but maybe the second or third attempt. Who knows? Now, this does not only apply to the final product. Alexander would have needed lots of pretests and methods testing. He may have produced dozens and dozens of Veronica clones and “clone precursors” ranging from laboratory waste over ok, but not what he was looking for to suitable but unfinished clones.

Also, the more I’ve read about cloning, the less likely it appears to me that Alfred and Alexia were true Veronica clones. For cloning, you need an intact cell with a complete genome and an egg cell from a surrogate mother. The nucleus of the egg cell is removed, and the other cell is inserted. Then you need an electrical impulse to start the cell division. The latter part is partially described by Alexander. My problem is the first step: finding an intact cell with a complete genome in a mummified corpse. As I already said in another post, I doubt DNA can persevere well under these conditions. Maybe it is possible, but I think it is very, very unlikely.

There is another way to “clone” something. I got my inspiration from the cloning attempts of mammoths. One approach involves taking DNA from Asian elephants, cutting out genes, and replacing them with other genes to make the resulting animal more mammoth-like. Alexander could have used a similar approach. This would not only solve the problem described above, but it would also even tie the loose ends of the cloning plot together. After extracting as much DNA from Veronica’s corpse as possible, Alexander could have used his or Edward’s DNA as a base. Edward, who was still alive when the project started, would have been the better choice. He is more closely related to Veronica, and maybe scientific interests, virology specifically, have a genetic component. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if Alexander used his DNA, considering his slightly creepy attitude toward his ancestor. These clone hybrids are the closest thing to having children with Veronica he could get. In any case, everything Alexander had to do now would be cut out and replace the respective genes to create a Veronica/Edward (or Alexander) clone hybrid. The genetic difference between humans is less than 1%. Alexander doesn’t have to replace that many genes. And maybe the resulting hybrids were even more Veronica than Edward (or Alexander). DNA shearing must have existed in the RE universe in the 60s because this is how Alexander inserted the intelligence genes, right?

Alfred and Alexia being hybrids instead of true clones would explain the different hair colors. Veronica had brown hair, the twins had blonde hair. Veronica could have dyed hers brown, which is possible. But maybe the blond hair color originated from Alexander’s or Edward’s (if he was blond) DNA. The hybrid theory could also explain why Alfred is male. If the base DNA is taken from Alexander or Edward, the first attempts would only produce male clone hybrids. Alexander was so fascinated by Veronica. I think he wanted the final result to be as close as possible to her, which means a female clone would be preferable. So Alexander must have exchanged the Y for another X chromosome somehow. Although, keeping some male clones just in case the procedure doesn’t work as intended or causes problems would make sense. A male Veronica clone hybrid is still better than nothing. And he can use less valuable clones for testing purposes. Alexia having the intelligence gene while Alfred doesn’t can also be explained this way. I assume the insertion of this gene is the last step of gene editing. If Alexander had planned to use the male clones only as a backup or for testing, then that’s a step he may have skipped for (most of) them. After the gene editing, he can proceed as described above.

Anyway, I assume Alfred is the result of a flawed experimental setup. Alexander didn’t pay enough attention at one point, switched the storage vessel, and ended up with Alexia and Alfred in the same vessel, which led to using them both instead of only Alexia. It would even add an additional layer to Alexander seeing Alfred as a failure. This explanation works with one single mistake without hinging on an arrangement of spontaneous mutations, coincidences, and whatnot.

Overall, if Alexander already had access to modern or futuristic techniques (from our world) in the 1960s, then I honestly think the cloning plot isn’t even that farfetched. Of course, it’s still science fiction.

Notes:

CRISPR gene editing, which is most commonly used, was first published in 2012. The researchers Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna, who work on this method, were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2020. There are similar methods, but they were also published after RE Code: Veronica came out.

Chromosome replacement therapy is a more recent approach to treating genetic diseases. The defective chromosome is removed and replaced with a healthy one. Y chromosomes can be replaced with X chromosomes with this technique.

Alfred and Alexia – General notes

I think Alfred didn’t study anything science-related, even if he may have been interested in it. No matter what he would achieve, Alexia would have towered over him with her achievements. Alfred never envied his sister’s intelligence, but constantly being compared to her must be tiresome. I think he either studied business administration or maybe history. At least medieval torture methods and war-related history fascinated him. He even brought an ultra-rare Wehrmacht tank.

Despite his fascination with war and the military, I doubt Alfred ever joined the British Army. He was in charge of the Antarctic base, Rockfort Island, and studied. When should he have done this? And then we have his mental state. No sane person would give this man a loaded gun, ever. It is possible that he tried and was declined, though. I think he got some training on Rockford Island along with the UBCS soldiers, at least he can fly a Harrier jet. Alfred must have brought the medals he wears on his uniform.

In the portrait puzzle, Alexia is called the true master of the family. I think this was Alfred’s personal addition to show his devotion to her. Since the title is only inherited by the male line, Alfred is the true hire. It doesn’t matter if he or Alexia was born first. Alexia could only become a countess if Alfred died. Harman never mentions her, either. And Alexia looks a bit older in her portrait than Alfred in his. Alfred, dressed as his sister, probably modeled for the painting.

It is strange that Alfred took control of the Antarctic base after Alexander disappeared and Alexia allegedly died. He was 12. But otherwise, Umbrella would have discovered Alexander and Alexia. It seems that Umbrella has lost interest in the facility after the incident with Alexia. So, it could be part of a deal. Alfred can have it, probably unofficially, until he turns 18, and in return, they build on Rockfort Island.

I don’t know what Alexia did to fake her death, but I assume it was something big, like an explosion or a massive fire that destroyed all or most of the labs. That’s the only way people wouldn’t get suspicious if they couldn’t find her body. Also, Alexia got rid of her research results this way. I think many researchers died during this incident too.

#resident evil #alexia ashford #alfred ashford #alexander ashford #veronica ashford #edward ashford #meta #ask #🩸🌙#i’m not insisting on everything being 100% correct here #and maybe i’ve missed something #ashford twins #arthur ashford

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