#very linear brained quite literally

[prairiesfire]

Based on this image, since Shizuku loves theater. iirc she mentioned Audrey in a side story? Either way, it felt appropriate!

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is: @morningberriesao3! morningberries has 15 works in the Stranger Things fandom on AO3 and all of them are in the Steddie tag!

@steddieas-shegoes recommends the following works by @morningberriesao3:

Sweet Surrender

Sneaky Link

How I’d Kill (to See You Again)

"If I could write a sonnet, it would be about berries. She specializes in that very specific angst with a happy ending that grips you by the jaw and spits in your mouth and then you say thank you because it tastes so good. So anyway love her, love her work, love everything about what she writes and does. 10000/10" -- @steddieas-shegoes

Below the cut, @morningberriesao3 answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

Funnily enough, it all started when I exclusively read Eddie x reader on tumblr. I didn't have an account yet, so I made a quick burner and would gobble up anything under the tag. I always saw people on the internet "shipping" characters but never really understood it, until I came across one particular fic called Wild Parts, where the pairing was reader x Steddie. I remember being more excited for Steve and Eddie to fall in love than I was with the reader aspect. It all went downhill from there when I discovered there was a whole community that loves Steddie. I decided one day, yeah, I want to make them fall in love, too!

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

Honestly, the first thing that comes to mind is the classic friends-to-lovers where Steve has a sexuality crisis because he's falling for Eddie. I could read it over and over and never get sick of it.

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

I feel like angst with a happy ending is common ground for, like, 90% of my fics. I also find myself constantly writing miscommunication, and giggling at all the comments that say, "IF THEY JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER!" Yeah. That's a point to be made.

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

It's quite literally impossible to choose just one when there are so many talented Steddie writers creating new works everyday. I'll rapid fire a few that pop to mind first (all on AO3): Sea Legs by Midnightdrive. Drought by a_star_danced. Wanna Hurt You Just to Hear You Screaming My Name by DotyTakeThisDown. I've Been Having a Horrible Time Pulling Myself Together by Deadrats. Stupid Cupid by DirtyValentine. Money, Power, Glory by StrangerThings1975.

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

Definitely! I want to write ALL the tropes! I think the reason writing Steddie hasn't become redundant for me is because each time I write a fic, I want it to be different from the last. I rack my brain like, "Okay, I've already done Kas Eddie, Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, No Upside Down, Modern Setting, Rock Star Eddie... What's next?!" 

What is your writing process like?

It's a very linear process for me. I'm somewhat of a daydreamer; I see the things I write in my head almost like a movie. And then I just type it out as it plays in my brain. I rarely outline anything, but I'll have random gibberish in my notes app to remind me of ideas or big plot points I need to wrap up. I'm honestly surprised anything I write makes sense when I'm through with it. I'm waiting for the chaos of it all to bite me in the ass one day.

Do you have any writing quirks?

I don't know if it's a quirk so much as a fault, but I do this thing where I let my comments pile up and pile up. I won't let myself answer one until I can answer them ALL, because I don't want anyone to think I'm ignoring their comment specifically. I also have to match the energy of the comment, so when it's super long I HAVE to write something back that's super long. This makes it an hours-long task when I let them go for as long as I do unanswered. If anyone hasn't gotten a reply back yet, I PROMISE I WILL!!! 

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

In a perfect world, I'd only start posting a project when it's completed so I could keep up with a posting schedule. Reality is: having 20 WIPs saved to my laptop in which I'll post the first couple chapters as motivation for me to finish it. It's a flawed system, but it works out most of the time!

Which fic are you most proud of?

I think it'll always be Sweet Surrender. It was my first fic and the first time I had ever completed something similar to a novel after it was wrapped up at 150K. When I look back, I see some flaws, but I'd never want to change them. If we're talking about which fic I think I wrote the best, I'd say How I'd Kill. The fantasy universe allowed me to get creative with the plot and scenery, and I think my excitement for that is reflected in my quality of writing.

How did you get the idea for Sweet Surrender?

Sweet Surrender is an amalgamation of every fic I read and loved when I first was introduced to the fandom. I basically owe it to all the favourite fics I mentioned earlier. Without their inspiration, I never would have started writing fic in the first place. 

When writing Sweet Surrender, what was something you didn’t expect?

The response. I cannot capture in words how GOOD it felt when people started reading, commenting on, and loving something that I created. You see it mentioned all the time, but it really is true when they say that a comment goes a long way. I was absolutely gobsmacked to see people following along from the beginning. It was such a motivator, and truly a feeling that nothing else could give me.

What inspired Sneaky Link?

I read Must Be a Devil Between Us, Or Whores In My Head by whateverokayFINE (a modern, OnlyFans AU that Sneaky Link could never touch)—loved it SO much that those daydreams I mentioned took off. It stayed as an unposted WIP for a long time because I told myself that I couldn't write a convincing modern AU. I'm so glad I did though, because I've never had a response to a fic like I've had with Sneaky Link.

What was your favorite part to write from Sneaky Link?

There were so many fun side plots to Sneaky Link—the whole thing was a blast to write. One of my favourites was the main conclusion, when Chrissy got to be the hero. Glitter and Chanel No. 5 really saved the day. Of course the first few chapters were hilarious, too. Dumbass, clueless Eddie will never fail to make me giggle, and his obliviousness to Steve's hidden identity really drove everyone up the wall.

How do/did you feel writing How I’d Kill (to See You Again)?

This story really had its CLAWS in me. I wrote the chapters so fast that I think I put out almost 50K words in a matter of four weeks; I've really never written that quickly before or since. The last few chapters were a little slower going, though. I think I was nervous as the plot got a little heavier how people would react, so there were definitely some mixed emotions.

What was the most difficult part of writing How I’d Kill (to See You Again)?

When I wrote Eddie betraying such a soft, loving, trusting Steve. When he pinned that part of his personality against him. I love writing angst, but I had never delved quite this deep into the trope. I definitely teared up a couple times making Steve go through it like that.

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

Without spoiling much, I think the end scene of chapter 7 of How I'd Kill (The Judas Kiss) was absolutely thrilling to write, and of course the following chapters as well. This whole idea of "morally gray" Eddie Munson was the reason I started writing the fic in the first place. But when I got to the bit where he had to be morally gray and posted the chapter, I immediately had this fear; I didn't know how the readers were going to react, or if I, as the writer, would be able to properly explain Eddie's motivation or make him forgivable for what he did. It was an "oh shit" moment for sure, but I think I ended up doing an alright job pulling it off.

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

I'm currently writing a piece for the 2024 Steddie Big Bang called "A Thousand Flowers Could Bloom". It's in collaboration with Inflomora-art, so I'm completely thrilled that I'll have gorgeous artwork to go with this fic. I'm sure by the time this is posted, it'll already be live! I'm so proud of this story—it might be the best I've written yet. So yeah, if you're reading this, please check it out!!! 

Outside of these questions, Is there anything YOU would like to add?

I don’t think so, but thank you so much for this! It was really fun to answer all these questions <3

Thank you to our author, @morningberriesao3, and our nominator, @steddieas-shegoes! See more of morningberries' works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!

[neptune-scythe]

deleted and rewording my previous post since most people totally missed my point and didn't like my wording ... which i worded it very intentionally to be disruptive and make you go "oh damn i never thought of that that's awful wow" instead of the general reaction of "oh damn i never thought of that and i'm never going to think about that and you're awful for mentioning it"

so here goes

something that the show and, from what i've seen, the fandom as well have glossed over is the effect killing Doug would have on Maddie. yes she absolutely made the right choice in that moment and was incredibly brave for doing so and she knows that. but that doesn't take away from what the action of taking a life has on ones mind.

no one can ever be 100% certain about anything, especially something huge and traumatic like that, so there will probably always be some part of her, however tiny and minuscule that wonders if that really was the only option, or if it's not somehow a reflection of who she is as a person ... which her conscious mind will know these thoughts aren't truth, that she made the best decision she could and that she only did what she had to do to survive ... and that Doug was the one who made that situation absolute, that it was either kill or be killed for both of them.

But we've even seen her see herself as a danger and a threat to the people she loves (running away after Jee slipped under the water because Maddie didn't think it was safe for her to be around her daughter anymore), and while that is a common enough symptom of depression to feel/think that way, it could also be in part to the fact that she'd killed Doug.

Objectively the situations are vastly different, but trauma has a way of skewing objectivity and defying logic and rationality but making just enough sense that you can't quite seem to dismiss it.

And add onto that the fact that Maddie was blamed for literally everything for her entire marriage, and even in childhood to a certain extent (her parents immediately saying "what did you do to him" when Buck crashed his bike) and the kind of guilt that burrows deep inside you because of that. Even just before she killed Doug he was blaming her for "forcing him to stab Chimney", for pushing him to kill the gas station worker and for hurting her. She's known nothing but blame and guilt for years.

And while yes by that time she's healed some from that and realized that it isn't her fault, especially the people he killed or tried to kill, but that doesn't mean she can just dismiss it, especially so soon after leaving him and breaking free of that abuse.

but per the point of my previous post that I deleted

the show really only mentioned the effects of that in the one episode and only in three comments, "everything gets worse for you if he dies", "I killed someone I used to love, I'll never be free of that", "I just really needed to talk about how i really feel about killing my husbasnd", and then just ... didn't mention it ever again.

but that kind of trauma doesn't just go away, and while yes by now she's healed and overcome that and is living her life and thriving with her family, that doesn't mean the trauma is just magically gone. healing is not linear, and that is something I notice fandom spaces don't like the idea of generally. the concept that a healed character might still get triggered or experience doubts or fears caused by that trauma. and that's something that I think we should be talking about more instead of the seemingly majority view that healing means the trauma is magically gone and will never effect you ever again.

but to circle back to the original post

it was about the idea that sometimes that doubt and fear ... that trauma, might come back, it might tell Maddie that she didnt act out of self defense, that she's just a killer... and that she might kill Chimney too. which obviously we can all agree is something that is completely false, but trauma has a way of getting inside your brain and gaslighting you, making you doubt everything you thought you knew, it may very well make her doubt the intention of her actions, or make her wonder if that action was really a reflection of who she is as a person deep down.

which again, obviously is entirely false, she was absolutely justified in her actions and it was showing her bravery and tenacity and strength, not making her a horrible or dangerous person. and definitely not some kind of omen or fate that she's trapped in

but her mind ... her trauma, might tell her it is. and she might almost believe it

maybe that was part of why she went to the ocean, and why she left for Boston, because her trauma told her she'd killed Doug and now she'd almost killed her daughter, and that was a pattern, and a sign of her true self ... and maybe she believed it. In the state she was in mentally it would be very hard to challenge that thought, to remind herself that it wasn't true.

especially given she's struggled with depression since the age of 9 or 10, and never had a safe space or the tools to process the loss of her brother, and then basically having to raise Buck while still being a child herself, and going right from that into an abusive marriage. she's been in survival mode pretty much her entire life, struggling with grief and guilt and trauma that she never had the chance to actually work through and process until after she left Doug, which makes fighting the lies her traumas tell her all the more challenging

but the point of the post was yes we all praise and talk about how strong and courageous and brave she is for going through all the horrible things she has and moving on and thriving and living her life, and we all want to see her continue to thrive and be happy and healthy and living the best life she can

but that trauma is a part of her, the messy aftermath of that is still a part of her and to a certain extent probably always will be, and denying that is denying a huge part of her as a person. and that doesn't take away from her strength at all or mean that she hasn't healed. it just means she's a human who has been through some awful circumstances that she didn't deserve and she came out the other side and is refusing to let it ruin her, but it will always be a part of her, that trauma, no matter how healed she is, and that's okay. because she has healed, she is healing, she's moving on and living her life. and she deserves every bit of that and more.

but I think the messy sides of trauma, the doubts and irrational fears and straight up lies it makes one believe is just as worthy of talking about as the perseverance and strength of overcoming that trauma. the type of things that are taboo, the things that people told me were disgusting to even think about, they are real things that real people experience and there is no reason why it should be such an awful impossible concept to believe that a person might doubt themselves and have their mind and traumas tell them horrible lies about themselves. such is life, such is the human experience, the traumatized experience. and it deserves talking about

[thegaybluejay]

Okay hi I’m back with another ramble-y ATLA character analysis since this is low key my brand on here lmao-

Today I want to talk about Zuko from the lens of someone who also had to deconstruct. This will be long, but please bear with me!

I was raised in a very white conservative evangelical Christian bubble where literally EVERYONE I knew for the majority of my childhood and teenage years thought mostly the same way. There was a lot of othering and shaming of anyone who thought too differently. Even if it was sometimes said more passively than cruelly, there was always that underlying tone. “The others/the people outside of our group/the worldly ones are lost and need our help because we’re better than them!”

While I strived to not be cruel, my beliefs were still harmful. I lost a few friends when I got to my mid-late teenage years because I didn’t yet know how to challenge what I’d been taught.

I see so much of myself in Zuko.

Zuko was surrounded by propaganda his entire life. He was steeped in it - steeped in the blood of those that the system he supported/represented had hurt and killed.

Anger is a huge part of all of this. While my anger was never quite as outward as Zuko’s (I hid it fairly well and was always known as the “pretty good kid”), I can still so heavily relate to his anger. His anger at always falling just short of being good enough or perfect enough. His later anger at himself for not understanding how fucked up the system was sooner. His anger at the people that failed and hurt him. His anger at realizing how he failed and hurt other people. All of it.

I also understand his backslides in Book 2 and early Book 3. When you begin tackling the first layers of harmful shit you’ve been taught, it can quickly become so tempting to just call it quits and go back. You almost start to romanticize the simplicity of life before you began this journey. The rules and goals were so straightforward back then, and deconstructing is messy as hell. Even if you were deeply hurting in your old life, at least you weren’t so damn confused. You used to know your next steps, but now everything is in disarray and you don’t have a direction to rebuild in yet. Going back almost feels like it would be a survival tactic, a way to have a sense of control again. Zuko definitely 100% needed to atone for what he did in Ba Sing Se because it hurt others, and while I’d like to think I would’ve made a different choice in his shoes, I also get it on some level. The confusion stage sucks, and it’s not always linear either.

But then.

One day, something just clicks. You eventually deconstruct enough that you truly come to full terms with how fucked up it all is. And you realize that you don’t belong there anymore, and the version of you that DID belong was just a facade. The blinders fully come off, they’re never going back on, and a spark lights in you that prompts you to make a big change. The deeper you go, the more urgent this deconstruction becomes in your mind because holy fuck I have to do something about this. I want this shit out of my brain for good and I want to help make things better. I want to learn who I am and finally live that out.

THAT is one of the most pivotal points in the journey, and I loved seeing it within Zuko’s arc when he comes to this realization after the war meeting in Book 3 and leaves to join the Gaang. I also loved that they didn’t trust him the first time he came to them - both he as an individual and the system that he had once supported/represented had hurt these people, and it took some real apologies and some time to build up trust. It also wasn’t done with half assed centrism either - it was “I acknowledge that this system is completely broken and wrong and I will do everything in my power to help gut it from the top-down and restore it with love”.

This leads to another pivotal point in the journey - instead of being motivated by fear like you were when you were deep in the indoctrination or by the raw anger you first felt as you initially left, you start to be motivated by love. And it’s the most freeing thing.

It was so cool to see Zuko learn that, while his anger was a helpful tool (ie: the confrontation with his father and his overall anger at the corruption he saw in his nation), he couldn’t be fueled by it any longer. He had to find another motivation to keep going, and he was then taught by the Sun Warriors and the dragons how to be motivated by light and life and love and also how to use those alongside an anger that was finally righteous.

And with this, he was ready to fight. To fight for a cause he knew to be good. To fight arm in arm with his newly acquired family. To fight to fix what his nation had done to the world and to itself. To fight for love and peace instead of division and hate and destruction.

And wow is it a beautiful journey.

TL;DR - Zuko’s story is so powerful to those who are deconstructing and I love him so much! I also just enjoy doing character analysis hehe.

(I really love talking about ATLA, so if y’all want me to analyze other characters or even plotlines through a specific lens, feel free to submit an Ask and I will happily do so!!!)

(Also, quick ending note - this is just my personal experience with deconstruction! Other people’s retelling of their own deconstructions may be different from mine, and that’s totally okay!!)

[kaeyapilled]

What are some fics that you think are must reads for kaeya fans?

TEEHEE okay i think i have rec'd most of these before when i was asked for fic recs some time ago but its ok. here are the most kaeya fics ever in my opinion !

clouds in a lake by VelleRue

“Pot of butter,” Kaeya mumbles beneath his breath, eyes roving over the words. Alone, the words wouldn’t be very special. The shapes and sounds don’t scare him as much anymore, not like they did when he was new and wore shoes with torn soles and only knew how to say, My father told me he was going to buy grape juice.

Together though, they sound like the orange-yellow light of the oil lamp flickering in the corner. They sound like sticky fingers and bread rolls. Like a dinner table of three.

Cake and a pot of butter.

this one is so bittersweet and melancholic and i love all the headcanons in it and the way it's written oughhh it's a great read!! short but really good

stubborn roots by alexithymias

Kaeya’s plan to end his life is interrupted when Rosaria asks him to take care of a plant for a few days.

this one is heavier so definitely pay attention to the tags but, oh my god. this rewired my brain SO violently. i adore the concept and the characterization is really on point. it is so painful in all the good ways i like stories to be painful. i really recommend it!!

I'm gonna miss your love when it's gone by imaginarypasta

A selection of scenes from Kaeya's childhood related to his relationships with his fathers, and all they have led him to be.

im pretty sure ive rec'd this before but this is like, one of my favorite portrayals of kaeya and his bio father ever. its just so good. so delightfully sad. a breath of fresh air from the common headcanon that his father was an evil asshole. the kaeya & crepus bits are also really good and i like the author's hcs about khaenri'ah/the abyss SO much

not bad for a walk on death's doorstep by b_attery

Fear is a knife’s edge. Fear is a killer. Fear is how you know you’re still alive. Kaeya Alberich, not yet Ragnvindr, knew how to fear before he knew how to talk. As the heir to the regency of a dead kingdom, a spy-in-training to be sent to the surface world, as the last hope of Khaenri’ah – there were many things to fear. And later, as the Cavalry Captain of Mondstadt and a traitor no matter what he chose, Kaeya Alberich ex-Ragnvindr knew that as long as he lived, he would be afraid.

i have definitely rec'd this one before. but i just really love it!!! my comment on the bookmark says "literally the best kaeya character study i have ever read" and yeah that still holds up. shaped a lot of my kaeya hcs. i love this author

Hundred-Watt Light by pepperjuice

The first time the thought occurs to Kaeya he is eleven years old. Well, that’s not exactly true. It had been twisting in the back of his head for a long time, already. Formless and unspoken, an ever-present awareness, a whisper. But the first time it rings in his head, put in words, bright and shiny and just behind his eyes—

He is eleven. *** A story about ten years of contingency plans and holding your own hand. (Because how else are you supposed to live with a weight too big to hold all alone?)

OH I MUST HAVE REC'D THIS LIKE THREE TIMES BUT THIS IS REALLY A MUST READ. first of all heed the tags because it touches quite heavy topics! but this entire concept is SO interesting to be explored in kaeya's character and this author does it SO well..... this is one of my favorite fics, like, ever, lmao. absolute kaeya must read To Me

Lamellae by scripturient

A slowish movement in a discordant key, wherein Kaeya has bitten off rather more than he can chew and needs significant help; meanwhile, malady exposes buried memory and dread. A limited plot from a limited point of view which dabbles in themes of pain, trust, angst, conflict, and betrayal. Not quite a character study.

the writing style in this one is SO cool, i love it! non-linear narratives are my thing, i never get tired of it. and the whump in this is so good.. i like whump fanfiction, lol. the combination of characters in this is really fun as well, though everything is told from kaeya's very disoriented point of view. anyway, amazing exploration of his character!! the next work in this series, The thaw that comes in springtime (plus the next next work!), is also really good and i loved it, particularly the ragbros bit lol. another must read!

undertow / oversight by MercuryPoisoning

In which Kaeya gets by with a little help from his friends.

another one i feel ive rec'd before, but i love it. really good characterization!! especially his relationship with diluc!!! really good read. i love this author's stuff a lot lol. (bonus by the same author, and another one i consider a must-read even though it's still in progress and also way heavier than most of the previous recs: sleeping marble lion! i really like the writing style and the concept!!! pay attention to the tags but trust me it's a delightfully gut wrenching one<3)

whew. i think i have a few more i could have added here. i just went through my bookmarks lol i have read a decent amount of kaeya fanfiction. hope these are to your liking!!! fic rec'ing is one of my favorite activities

[bunnhwaa]

two things with Miguel's theory I'm not getting and something everybody else has probably already talked about by now but I need to rant about it because this shit is slowly eating away at my brain:

1. this whole theory was created because Miguel started comparing his situation with Miles's, sparking that whole "don't play a role that wasn't meant for you" attitude, but to me there's a huge plot hole in that mindset - Miles never chose to be spiderman

like the entire reason why those dimensions collapsed was because Miguel went out of his way to travel to another dimension and father a child that wasn't his, that's not comparable to Miles because Miles didn't go out of his way to get bit by a radioactive spider from another dimension, the spider got drawn towards him because of Kingpin's collider and he's been dealing with it in the best way he can. Miles became spiderman because of someone else's actions, which means that for his universe, it was fate. He quite literally couldn't have dealt with that in any other way and it bothers me how Miguel is self projecting onto Miles by insinuating that he doesn't deserve to exist, especially when you consider the fact that there isn't some sort of uniform way that a spiderman is supposed to get bitten, they just get bit a deal with the aftermath.

which then leads to my next point...

2. canon events aren't completely linear, they're single incidents that coincidentally happen to every spiderman

from my perspective, canon events aren't these uniform rules that you have to abide by, they're similarities in the multiverse that just so happen to align because they have a common denominator - someone playing the role as spiderman

like it's not a "every spiderman does this exact same action and goes through these exact same movements and watches someone die in the exact same way" type of thing, it's a "every spiderman watches a police chief they have close relations with die" type of thing, which leaves a ton of room for leniency

(honestly, that by itself contradicts Miguel's "you're not meant to be spiderman" thing because Miles has canon events just like everyone else, which means that being spiderman was his fate, but that's not the main point I'm leaning into)

the way a spiderman goes through a canon event doesn't mean as much as the canon event actually happening, a main example being Miles getting bitten by a spider that technically wasn't his, but still becoming spiderman and going through canon events just like everyone else

so that leads me to ask another question: if all of Miles's other canon events happened without fail, then what did Miguel see in Miles that led him into believing that he'd be able to save his dad if he tried to?

because as far as I'm aware, all of the other spidermen at the very least attempted to save their police chiefs and failed at doing so, they didn't sit back and watch them die like Miguel is tryna force Miles to do: so wouldn't Miguel going to Miles's dimension and fighting him have an effect on Miles's canon event? in a similar way that Miles went to Pavitr's dimension and interrupted Pavitr's canon event by saving his police chief for him?

like obviously I don't think Miguel will go out of his way to save Jefferson, but if Jefferson is supposed to die while Miles tries to save him, then wouldn't stopping Miles from trying to save Jefferson have the opposite effect??

and here's an extra third point that I thought of while typing this all out:

3. if Miguel believes that Miles being an anomaly gives him the potential to break out of canon events, then he's blatantly ignoring the large probability that Miles has the potential to save his dad and everyone in his dimension, not just one or the other

because if Miles has the ability of creating a bad outcome then he has the ability of creating a good outcome, one cannot exist without the other so even if we lean into Miguel's theory, we have to heavily rely on his self projection in order for it to make sense

and this isn't even me getting into the possibility that all of the other spiders likely realized Miguel's theory was off way earlier on (they're super geniuses so I hope they did) but didn't argue against Miguel because of the lingering "what if he's right", that one in a million chance. the fear of the unknown kept them from questioning what didn't make sense and that resulted in them throwing Miles under the bus

wit allat bullshit goin on, I'm honestly not that surprised that Hobie openly supported Miles from the start, that "fear what you don't know" mentality is often used by fascist leaning governments to manipulate the mass populous, and Hobie, living in a fascist apocalyptic society, peeped that shit immediately and dipped from HQ after he made sure Miles was okay on his own

so uh...yeah! Miguel is tweaking and mentally unwell, spiderpeople in general aren't that good with friendships, Miles needs to reconsider his friendship tier list and set some boundaries because that "they won't take care of you and accept you the way we do" line Rio said hit him hard, (I feel like that's an allegory towards blackness and the experience black kids go through when venturing out on our own and finding our place in outside spaces so I might do another post on that but idk), but Hobie's pretty chill so I hope him and Miles become best buds in the next movie that'd be really nice

yup, that's it I think, if you have more to add please do so I'm so hyperfixated on this shit it's kinda insane actually-

(I started typing this out at 7AM and used a fuck ton of colors so I hope this is understandable, if I'm completely off base and misunderstood the whole multiverse thing please call me out cause I wanna understand this shit so badly)

[adragonsfriend]

i just finished reading your series “Biting His Own Tale” and honestly all the plot threads were super interesting especially with Slink and the freedom trail and Padme and her stuff (that story literally altered my brain chemistry) and even Ahsoka and Rex (I want to know how they’re going to deal with the inhibitor chips) but then I got to “This Story Can Kill You” AND OMFG?? WTF ANAKIN?? That, hands down, has got to be the most interesting plot thread I’ve ever read in a star wars fic! I’m curious, do you have everything outlined? Or are you going fic by fic? I really want to know what your writing process is like for this series

First of all, thank you so much, I'm glad you're enjoying! And please know I cackle every time I think about This Story Can Kill You.

As for my process… well the first thing you've gotta know it that BHOT is the epitome of "non linear writing." The first section I wrote was the Christophsis one--mainly because I had the idea for the Ekkreth story and was excited about it--which explains very little of what is going on the larger plot. For quite a while I had people in my comments (very justifiably) being like… "wait this is time travel, right?"

I have a big document where I have sections titled and some notes on each of them, and whenever I finish a section and post it, what I do to pick a new one is just start shopping around, writing bits of whatever ones catch my attention until one of them consumes me and I write it to the end. That way I don't have to worry about losing the character voice by getting distracted lol. My formal learning about writing has mostly been about writing short stories, and I generally lean into that--it's why I went with all the different sections, rather than one big fic.

Even in the middle of a story, I don't write scenes or even parts of scenes in order. They get written in the order i'm interested in them, and if I'm truly uninterested in a scene, I often find that by the time I would've had to write it, it's really unnecessary, or there's a totally different way to do it that is interesting. That or I drag myself through it in the last bit of the drafting process, and it's alright because the excitement of finishing a section carries me through. Once I have a full draft I copy everything into another document and do smaller edits and/or weaving Ekkreth stories into the regular narrative there.

As for how much I have outlined…

[ID: a pie chart with four categories. Just over half the chart is light blue meaning outlined/idea phase, a third is dark blue meaning fully posted, and about a sixth is green meaning in progress. There is a fourth color, orange, that is labled as meaning meaning fully drafted, but it takes up none of the pie chart. End ID]

The current total sections planned is 27 I have a spreadsheet, not all of which are strictly necessary. Nine fully posted already obviously, one soon to be finished if Barriss will ever let me, and some others are partly written, due to my aforementioned habit of shopping around. I know what the ending looks like, and I always knew the beginning was going to be on Tatooine in the Tusken camp, because it's really the perfect spot for justifying the time travel, on several different levels (figuring that out was one of the catalysts to actually start writing).

I've added a lot of sections to the plan since it started, and a lot of the plot ideas I have now are ones I didn't have at the beginning. In general, I don't know exactly what any section is going to look like until I start throwing stuff on the page. Some of the changes that come are things that ripple out to other parts and change them, while some are contained within the section. There's also the fact that a lot of my general star wars opinions have changed significantly since I started writing (when I first got into star wars I read a lot of fics that really hated the Jedi, and now I really love the Jedi). Even somethings have changed since I wrote specific sections (i have mild regrets about some of The Supreme Chancellor's Diary, and i'm annoyed that I wrote the "Obi-Wan hates medics" trope lmao).

And every idea i've had, whether it's flipped or not, has gotten a lot more complicated. I also keep writing longer sections, which is fun but also annoying lol.

Suffice to say that if I could've written the whole fic the day I started writing the first section, it would've been wildly different than it is now, and as it will be once it's finished. As of now, I know most of what needs to happen, with a few mysteries yet to be resolved about how exactly I'll get there. But by the Force I will get there, because I have some epilogue stuff that is going to be awesome

I hope that all answers your curiosity--thanks for the ask, and sorry it took me a bit to answer!

[dr-lizortecho]

I would love to hear more about why delena taught you about love if you ever want to talk about it! I'd also love to hear what you see as Damon and Elena's similarities and differences.

So this is a really difficult thing to explain anon, at the very least without explaining the triad of ships that I attribute the same thing to, so I apologize for rambling about non-delena ships in my answer! And this will probably be tmi like everytime I discuss how shows/ships personally impact(ed) me

One of the first ships I ever became invested in enough to create content for- and start discussing in depth was Malec (The Mortal Instruments Series). To start this off I’d like to give a very short disclaimer- I was thirteen or so and still believed in destiny and fate and singular soulmates (one person literally designed to be with you that you just stumble upon out in the wild) and grew up pretty much under a rock (the only reason those books ever graced my presence was my eldest sister sneaking them to my older sister who snuck them to me) and had no clue that queer people existed at all. So color little me shocked for a solid second and doing math tryna figure out the scene where Clary says that Alec is in love with Jace (I philosophized about souls for five seconds and figured it out). All of this to set up how naively blind I was to the concept of love, to the point where Clary and Jace made perfect sense as true love from the moment she sees him- because my little mind had subscribed to the disneyification of romance without much thought to it as a whole. So being able to watch what seemed to me as obvious connection and therefore love between Alec and Magnus while the former second guessed himself was a new experience for me. Realizing that not only is love something that transcends the obstacles in life- but that it’s messy and complicated. Basically Malec taught me that love is a mess- it’s not always logical and above all it’s not something linear that exists at 0% or 100%. Because sometimes you’re falling in love with and choosing to pursue someone while still moving on from someone else- that feelings don’t just snap away because you’re actively pursuing something better for you.

Then Delena came into my sphere. Which I won’t lie wasn’t my first introduction to ships of their caliber, however, something about the individual characters made it come to life and made something in my brain click into place. Because there’s this big question that keeps floating around Delena in the early seasons which is ‘does Damon deserve love and forgiveness?’ aka Elena. Now the answer to that question appears quite simply- no. Damon doesn’t ask for it, he doesn’t try to change, he doesn’t attempt to earn it. However, Elena chooses to forgive him anyway to show love and kindness and turn the other cheek (okay- sorry for the religion bit, but biblical love anyone???). Which was eye opening and beautiful to watch. Because even with more years on me and more emotional intelligence it had never clicked how much work love could be. That you had to consciously make difficult choices and choose to forgive, to understand that people react to pain in all sorts of ways. So Delena taught me love is messy (lol, if you’re noticing a pattern it’s cause there is one). That people are chaotic and their emotions even more so, that you have to choose love everyday. And above all it’s not just something that exists in the good times, it’s bigger than that. That without that choice- that forgiveness love doesn’t exist and will fail every time.

Now- if you follow me and haven’t seen the show I apologize for the continuous spiraling, but Echo is the third ship that taught me about love. This one is much more complex and difficult to explain (but I kinda did explain it a long time ago in my farewell to the show) but Echo taught me to love my faults and myself, to see we are all worthy of love without tying ourselves into perfect knots. And to spare everyone me talking way too much I’m going to leave it there.

[beantothemax]

some accumulated stars thoughts over time for your perusal

a. hoooly shit they said nya

b. hoooly shit dile did too

c. WOK

d. cannot wait for either when there's 5 stools conviniently in one very close location or when sif just doesnt give a shit anymore

e. just realised their attack animations are the relevant hand sign i think thats very cool (except for sif i get hes trying to be cool but boss your pose is incomprehensible within the confines of square(my guess is he holdin a knife tho))

f. odile's dying face is awesome and she is very swagful for it

g. the "sif is literally me" file grows larger in evidence every passing line of dialogue, most notably the "you like bein near then and not contribuing to conversation, having friends is nice :)" bit

h. sometimes i just like to walk back and forth down hallways and looka those very crisp 2 frames of walking animation. isabeau is top tier, and boni is a close second with their naruto running

i. i dont quite understand the recording of levels in regards to the looping but im sure ill get it in time, it has been introduced for approx five seconds after all

j. games with many save slots always worry me as i then think that its gonna have some major choices that can result in different endings or perhaps a completely different route which is especially confusing for this as it seems like a linear ass game so far. also when i attempt to use them my brain hurts with remembering where and what i was doing in which save.

a: moment so important i took a video of it so it could be immortalized for all time

b: see above

c: WOK

d: sif is in dire need of a sit… pls provide stool

e: i can provide (1) image for this one!!!!!

it’s a lil hard to make out, but sif’s brandishing their dagger in one hand and making a scissors sign with their other!

f: odile is SO cool i love her dearly…

g: I THOUGHT THE EXACT SAME THING WHEN I READ THAT DIALOGUE……. they’re just like me for real….

h: the walking sprites are very good!!!!!!!! all the sprites in general are!!!! they’re so little!!!!!!

I: i THINK it works like this: the experience and craft skills your party has is recorded every time you interact with a save point. Whenever you loop to ANY save point, they’ll keep the highest recorded stats. so if you grind your party to level 52, save at a house save point, loop back to dormont, save again at a house save point with your party at level 46, die again, then loop forward to any castle save point, your party will be level 52. I think. it’s confusing.

j. i really hope there isn’t anything like that, or if there is, they at least warn you if you’re going to make a major voice so you can make extra saves accordingly…

[nhi-theuserof-this]

Can’t hold it in anymore guys I gotta drop a massive analysis on Pine Overcoat now that it’s existed publicly for more than an hour

Yelling about pine overcoat now that I’ve posted it

Also! Please read if you’re interested in qpr punknoir love confession

Ok so. I have A Lot to say so I’m just gonna add a cut to keep from having a big hard to scroll past post

OK TIME TO YELL

I will be yelling in chronological order in case you want to read along with my psychological profile of my own writing

Wtf is the title am I right?

Lay In My Pine Overcoat (Share With A Stranger)

The title has a couple things going on here so I’ll break it down:

what is “my pine overcoat”:

I do like, research, about things to make my weirdass jargon sound better or at least not entirely terrible, but my regular website for noir slang was running out of interesting phrases and terms I could reasonably use, but I don’t quite remember the site I pulled pine overcoat from. I’m pretty sure I took it from this site which defines pine overcoat as a coffin

The whole phrase, “lay in my pine overcoat” is functionally me writing a vaguely noir pov melodramatic line that would translate to “lay in my coffin” which does not sound as cool

What about “(share with a stranger)”?

This is a reference to hobie, who, in the title, is referred to as a stranger. There is a degree of vagueness that comes from the term stranger that you don’t get with saying friend or acquaintance, making how I’d translate the phrase different. Share with a stranger is changed to sharing with him

Why is he sharing? Uh. They’re boyfriends now. Do you NOT want to have a shared coffin and spend your eternal afterlife with YOUR queerplatonic partner?🤨

What do you mean satosugufication of punknoir? (Distressed kaomoji)

“[..]very minor blended in satosugufication of punknoir.” - my A/N

There is a difference between being friends, acquaintances, and best friends.

Oh boy. This one is gonna need a deep dive on my brain lol. And stsg.

What is satosugu?

This is an explanation with the base assumption that you’ve never even heard of jjk:

Satosugu is the pairing between Gojo Satoru and Geto Suguru from the Jujutsu Kaisen series. They are gay and really sad. Akutami sensei just will not let the gays win huh? (See itafushi for more on the gays never winning)(see literally anything post flashback arc on nobody ever winning in jjk)

Satosugu has my whole heart in a violent grip with hostages and I’ve always loved doomed by the narrative/they’re just sad gays stuff(trigun moment) so I just wrote the line while thinking about stsg. No actual evil foreshadowing or anything unless that’s what you guys are into

(I can probably whip up a quick “you’re ruining the canon >:((“ plot)

Therapist?

His therapist—that's not something he'd imagine ever thinking or saying before[…]

He has a therapist. It’s canon to BS as of the Drabble adequately named “Therapist”. It’s Spider-Therapist btw. His name is Ezikiel Sims according to the license seen in his office

(He still thinks about the fog.)

A reference to his silly little dissociative episodes. The fog is mentioned in bankshot, though I can’t recall if it’s mentioned anywhere else

[…]Unhealthy, maybe, but it's a step in the proper direction from mostly being actively suicidal.

[…]but it doesn't stop the wave of sheer hopelessness that washes over him when he wakes up after sleeping a few hours.

Noir is getting better. He will have ups and downs, as your mental health is not linear in any way, and from experience I can say that sometimes you just can’t help waking up and just having the shittiest time existing. (I think it shows in my writing) Noir has access to resources he wouldn’t have otherwise if he wasn’t a part of the spider society and I feel like that’s part of what keeps him there, better or worse

They've swapped jackets, and Ben is so weak for such an act, simple as it is.

Shoutout to the homie annon for punknoir switching clothes, wouldn’t have happened without them

[…]He didn't expect it to get anywhere, but it did.

It did.

I had a little dialogue written but it didn’t fit in so:

“Thanks man, it’s mad cold round here. Wanna swap?”

He hopes he's been dropping pins enough to have it noticed.

Dropping pins is old slang for dropping hints(that you’re gay) according to this site

F slur(1) jumpscare below (I can say it dw)

That same site has a definition for punk at it reminds me of the spider-fag bit that happened over on the one blog(I’ll find it), had a quick laugh but it made me think about how noir would probably know that definition and would therefore be acting without referencing knowledge he has

I combat this by crying out “comic logic pls ignore”

Tism

He gets distracted by the nice feeling of cool dirt under his palms.

"Yeah I'm, sorry. I promise I'm normal about this, I just really like colors," he says at the dirt. "I really like colors."

I like cold sand. I assume cold dirt would be equally enjoyable. I’m not like, diagnosed, and dodging being asked about it or getting a diagnosis is a little counterproductive when I’m like, making claims over here, but I’m trying to maximize my rights

I think we can all also agree noir at the very least is a massive fan of colors.

A few hours later finds them both on a new rooftop, dirt washed from their hands and out of under their fingernails after finishing up work on the garden.

I’d literally drop dead if I had dirt or any kind of stuff under my fingernails and didn’t do something about it. I wash my hands often even at home, especially at home. I needed everyone to know that they washed their hands and don’t have dirt under their fingernails.

[…] and types out #390072

I think noir would like that shade of purple specifically

"You right mate?" "I love you."

[…]

Ben takes Hobie's hand in his, and says, "I am deeply in love with you."

It’s spur of the moment but it’s not like noir is just gonna take it back come on guys

"I have very complicated feelings," Ben replies, "lying would be cruel though."

Shoutout to you guys for voting on the poll and deciding this was more in character for him to say, this line was beating my ass so I just wrote them both and literally left it like that while writing the rest until the poll ended then just deleted the losing line

"Did- did I overstep?" Ben's shoulders creep upward as he leans away slowly. "I'm, sorry, I—"

"You gotta tell me all of it man."

Ben and Hobie are both very caring and I feel like they’re also both quite articulate when it comes to understanding themselves and the world around them. Bens initial and oh so eloquent(/sarcastic) response of "Euh. Uh,” comes from shock and surprise because he comes from an era where people just really don’t do feelings very deeply, and talk of boundaries and such isn’t really a common practice up until literally just a few years ago.

Hobie on the other hand is what I feel just generally socially aware in general given, you know the punk stuff and activism, so I absolutely believe he would encourage noir to explicitly state things the way he wants to without cutting anything out in order to fully understand as well as avoid making noir uncomfortable or bothered

Hobie holds out his hand. "It's alright," He reassures, "we could hold hands and be in love not romantically."

Hobie uses very simple language here and doesn’t even bring up aspec identities or anything here. I’ve said it in the tags of pine overcoat but I want to talk about it a little more here

Noir is from 1933. Things are very very different during that time, great depression, post wei and approaching wwii(though people don’t know it at the time) and just a generally shit time for minorities too. I’m not gonna talk about social nuances of the experience of being oppressed but I will talk about the part where a lot of these communities have to stay underground or are very private to individual people.

It’s because of that that there is very little information on your own identity available at the time. This coupled with a nonexistent internet means that you have to go out yourself and find these people in your community and by then it’s very risky due to the whole, you know minorities and this and that during that time

It’s also literally 1933. Noir is not gonna understand a majority of any type of slang you can come up with, and he’s going to have the shittiest time understanding modern humor and historical context given the being in history aspect. He doesn’t know about 9/11. The twin towers were built in like. 1970. He’d be about 60 by the time they’re built. He’s be in his 90s by the time 9/11 happened. There is so much that he won’t get because of just how much has happened.

He’s obviously picked up on the big parts of history that happen in the future. He’s probably heard enough about the world wars and all, but there’s also a lot of things that are considered universally known that he just. Doesn’t know. Like there is no way he knows about flappy bird or roblox. Or minecraft. He is absolutely always having something explained to him and while he probably appreciates it he’s also totally on the verge of snapping because

It’s just certainly a time having every single thing explained to you.

I feel that hobie can pick up on this pretty easily since they’re already pretty close in BS after initially meeting. He’d explain things in a way that minimizes having to ask follow up questions, so instead of saying something like “we can just be queerplatonic” or telling him about being aromantic or asexual he says that they can just be not romantic about it. He’d still tell noir about it in more depth eventually but when introducing new things he would probably try to stay simple about it

"Can I only lift up my mask halfway?"

Noir does not like his face. I’d say sorry but. I need to nerf his self confidence just a little bit since he gets to have that voice. Because like ik it’s probably possible but how are you achieving that tone without t. 💀 like his face is perfectly fine too but I just couldn’t not make him self conscious though

Ben marks the date on a calendar long after that moment when they eventually separate.

I want him to grow a small pot of marigolds and give them to hobie as like and anniversary present. I probably won’t write it but I want you all to know he’s doing that.

On to my authors note

i just had the shittiest time writing not angst. i'm just naturally bad at straight up non-angst(refer to my orv piece "sunfish" for more on that)

Like it says on the tin, writing straight fluff is poor for my soul. I wrote a stardew piece and I just did not have my heart in it. I don’t like it and it’s the only stardew fic I’ll write so you can check it out for more elaboration on why I wrote it in the notes. I wrote an omniscient readers viewpoint fic and while I wouldn’t say there was any fluff, you can tell that things got significantly lighter in tone after dokja does that silly thing that is not actually silly

[…] when i legally obtain the rest of noir comics i'll make a connected series that includes noir's actual comic continuity and not just vaguely referencing it.

I was vaguely trying to include noirs comics but there’s like so little I can find on him that I can comfortably consume(I have a thing about watching videos and it seems like a majority of content I can find about him is video) that I’ve decided to be vague about it and do whatever from here on out.

In the event I obtain the omnibus or whatever it is that has like all the comics he appears in, I will absolutely make like an alternate series that splits off sometime around now in the BS timeline in order to work with his comic continuity

how do we feel about hobie btw? did i do shit? hopefully not.

How did I do. Please someone drop a tutorial on how to understand writing hobie. Or how to write his accent like I did some digging and found some stuff but it’s all kind of surface level.

anyways remember how its canon to BS that theres just a team of spiderpeople dedicated to writing a newsletter about him. that noir does not know about.

You guys prefer angst about invaded privacy or outsiders pov crack because I’m down for either.

(platonically shakes your hands)

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this all or even briefly skim it because my heart and soul is being poured into this whole thing and like there are some very personal feelings and aspects of my identity that I include in writing BS

I am so deeply appreciative of you all and I need to express that, thank you all so much

[lorelune]

im too shy to come off anon atm but tysm for the 2nd part after scrap metal. i quite literally screamed (internally, since i was with someone when i saw it) and after reading it, im well fed but just as starved for more OTL

idek where to begin w my thoughts, ugh, you write blade so well. SO WELL. like maybe ppl can write unhinged characters fine, but you. YOU. are so different with that. ill probably find the words in the future to describe what im feeling about this series(??bc it technically can be standalone) but all i can say is that im with the mind to print your writing out and eat it. like, chew it with my molars and swallow it, and then print another one to eat some more, maybe put some slices on my next meal LOLLL. idk, i want to consume it and have it in my veins.

i for real cannot come up with the words to describe this,,,,but i promise im not crazy !! (debatable tbh) i just really like WORDS and WRITING and this just made me just as insane as blade's probably feeling. it's beyond just being giddy bc one of my fav authors wrote for one of my fav charas and it happened to be a reader insert -- there is a fundamental nutrient being provided by your writing and it could have been for any fandom/show, and i probably wouldve had a similar reaction.

your writing has always been wonderful and captivating, but there is smth about the way you wrote blade's pov (brOTHER there is so much ART in the way consciousness was expressed, im frothing at the mouth--) in this and scrap metal that i think really showcased how well you write. like i said, this piece could have been for any other fandom (and i'd still read it bc you wrote it <3) and i know it wouldve hit me like a truck all the same.

this got super long bc it's late where i am but i really wanted to let you know how much i appreciate your work and the talent you have with writing, and this blade series made it so that i couldnt keep these thoughts to myself !!

ik this is only my 2nd ask but since idk when ill come off anon (bc im shyyy) i hope you dont mind me calling myself "slightly feral anon" LOLL (or if you have a better name it's up to you!!)

anon anon ANON (slightly feral anon = sfa anon FOR SHORT!!) thank you for the ask!!! and for reading and enjoying scrap metal and braised!!! 💕✨!!!! i am glad i could provide some fundamental nutrient rich chewable good brain feeling writing 🫡💓

TRULLLY blades pov is fascinating. it's what inspired me to write scrap metal to begin with!! i was thinking abt blade pov in present day game timeline and was like "damn he'd be fucking crazy :3c". i had such immediate brain worms and had to play around with it!!! the whole idea really grabbed me!! the prose hit too so hard like. this guy is not gonna think or feel in a way that is linear and its been SO indulgent and fun to write!!!

not to mention :3c i am excited to write more of these dynamics :3ccccc miss kafka does thing to me on a soul deep level and the relationship between her and blade and her and reader is so twisted and wretched and its so sexy of her. i'm excited for more of the yan olympics

SFA ANON!! thank you for this ask it has brought me much joy 🙏!! thank you once again for the kindness and for reading and sharing your thoughts, your feedback is very appreciated!!!!

[ginnsbaker]

This chapter was so juicy omg lets get straight into it

Agatha literally embodies me 😂 everything shes said i’ve either said or thought. From her saying she never had faith in reader’s relationship with yelena to calling it a rebound. She’s exactly right and i’ll come back to those two quotes a little later. The other thing about sparky being a mastermind is something I genuinely thought earlier on i was like aw damn the dogs bringing them back together but I didn’t say anything and now i really wish i did cos same agatha same 😂

Im gonna speak about wanda briefly here and then I’ll come back to her affer. But in that whole conversation with agatha she’s very mature about the whole thing considering reader kissed her. She’s not getting excited about it out of respect for readers relationship(that’s already over but she doesn’t know that yet) shes also being cautious because of what happened last time with reader.

Im glad Valkyrie apologised and that wanda didn’t string her along honestly did not want another reader yelena relationship for lack of better words.

Vision is gone thank fuck for that he will not be missed.

Natasha. Quite possibly one of the saddest parts of the series. Nothing hurts quite like a friendship breakup between best friends. I said it last time and my views haven’t changed. Nat is supposed to be readers friend, while I completely understand why shes angry it makes sense yelenas her little sister and i get it but reader is also her friend. It a complicated situation because its very difficult to be neutral. Reader shouldn’t have cheated full stop. However, if we’re being realistic some could argue reader has been emotionally cheating since the start considering the love for wanda was always there. But back to my point this relationship should never have happened to begin with or at least not when it did. Yelena shouldn’t have pursued reader and reader shouldn’t have dated her either especially not without having the therapy that is so desperately needed. Im not blaming yelena or saying nat’s reaction is wrong because i truly understand both sides its just really sad that this is how its ended. Im not sure what your plans for nat are for once i genuinely dont have a clue.

I think its very ironic that at the start of this wanda didn’t really have that big a support group but now thats kind of the reverse because reader now has no one. I also think its very like idk what the word is “impactful” i guess that now reader’s lost everyone but wanda is still there for them.

Back to wanda. Idk how to feel because we know what happened to wanda last time they entered this sort of arrangement and i really don’t want it to again because she has made so much progress. On one hand i feel like she won’t let herself go back that far but the ones we love can be our weakness sometimes. And on the other hand it seemed different this time less aggressive like the way reader cushioned wandas head. But one thing I didn’t like was reader leaving with no aftercare i saw someone else say it and I definitely agree. PSA to everyone aftercare is so so so important okay? Good. And i also don’t like Wanda missing therapy because of this arrangement it feels like a step backwards (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing in terms of story writing cos like i said last time recovery is not a linear path and its really validating that you’ve included that)

And finally pietro. Oh dear god the anticipation is killing me. Ive been dying for chapter 17 and its almost here. He knows why wanda missed the sessions (or at least suspects) and i think hes got a picture of wanda in the hospital or maybe after he found her (im not quite sure who found wanda after she overdosed I don’t remember but uno what i mean💀) and hes gonna send it to reader maybe saying back off

I swear im in love with your brain youre incredible I can’t wait for chapter 17

-🧃

Reading your comments/thoughts is always a favorite habit of mine whenever I post an update. Like, srsly dude, I look forward to it.

There's something you highlighted that I did not even intended in the story: I think its very ironic that at the start of this wanda didn’t really have that big a support group but now thats kind of the reverse because reader now has no one. I also think its very like idk what the word is “impactful” i guess that now reader’s lost everyone but wanda is still there for them.

I guess that happened naturally. I mean, when you're maintaining a positive vibe in life and taking care of yourself in general, suddenly there's room for people in you life who also want to share the same outlook in life. You attract good energy. You're able to take care of relationships around you because you're in a good place. I guess that's what happened :)

Yes, aftercare is really important. R is neglecting herself, wasting away, so she really is incapable of thinking about another person's needs at this point.

My mind?? Look at your mind! Look at what you'll think Piet would do O_O

Once again, thank you! I super enjoy reading your points!

[mangodestroyer]

You know what? I'm kind of glad that there are some branches of math that aren't so heavy when it comes to Calculus.

Personally, I'm okay with Calculus. I mean, I do sometimes hate integrals, but I also love them, when it comes to finding volume, area, distance, displacement, etc. of some weird ass shit (I used to always wonder how people measured the areas and volumes of wonky ass shapes when I was a kid and I'm happy to now know one of the methods).

I also love sequences (even if I'm still learning about them and don't have them down). I like derivatives and limits. I hate partial differentiation problems because looking at them causes me anxiety and ig I just need to get over it and figure them out already. I think the stuff we're going to learn about in Calculus three next semester looks a lot more interesting than the first two courses.

But if college level math was ONLY calculus? I wouldn't be a math major. And I 100% understand why some people end up switching out of STEM when they encounter Calculus.

So far, I like linear algebra a lot more. For some reason, I had to do the first eight weeks of my calc II class before I was allowed to do the accelerated linear algebra class. And I'm five weeks in and... where's the calculus? Idk, but I like this course a lot more than calc. I remember in my History of Math class liking the concepts involving sequences, number theory, and algorithms a lot too. I also like geometry. I've liked algebraic topology ever since hs. I also like the idea of modeling mathematics.

I've had Game theory and Graph theory recommended to me as possible areas of study. Ofc, I'm still brain storming what I should do in grad school, and I'm finding it reassuring that some branches of math seem to be sticking with me. And I mean for long periods of time too. Others, unfortunately, haven't stuck so well. And yeah, I do get hung up on it. I want to have a strong foundation in math and constantly feel like I don't know nearly enough. In all fairness, I probably don't. Idk, I get good grades in the courses but I feel like there's something deeper to understand about all this that I'm just missing. And I don't actually understand all of it. Yet, so far, it's the only major I've tried where I felt like I belonged. Idk why, but with everything else, I felt out of place, couldn't get into the material as much, and I felt like people kind of knew it wasn't for me. I mean, during labs and such, I would kind of look like a dumbass. But with math discussions and essays, I feel more competent.

Ig pure math just ended up being more of my thing. Applied sciences, maybe not so much.

And I really do wish I was pushed to do more math when I was younger. I literally BEGGED my school to let me go further with it. I was always so bored in math class because I'd get everything immediately and be done with the work long before everyone else. But I felt kind of discouraged that they wouldn't let me. I remember not taking school that seriously as a kid. I got good grades still, but could have easily gotten a perfect GPA. I fucked around with standardized testing/never bothered to get good at it when I easily could have. Still got decent test scores in the end. Never studied for tests all that much either. I had to LEARN how to study in college.

Did anyone else feel dissatisfied with grade school? I think it didn't help that I was neurodivergent and had communication issues. And possibly issues with my attention span that went unnoticed (I'm AFAB). I just had no idea what to do with life because quite frankly, I found school discouraging and boring and the world didn't make sense to me.

Idk, this went off topic, but ig I'm trying to say that I'm still finding myself. And considering paths I didn't even know existed until very recently. I think being neurodivegent complicates things a lot because I'm really not on the same wavelength as a lot of people. My brain is different and I learn very differently from a lot of other people.

And in the adult world, this can be a little isolating. I think that's one reason I need to go back on campus for grad school and start talking to other people in my field more. I understand human interaction a lot better than I did as a child (I was borderline non-verbal, and kind of by choice). I can kind of mirror it now and wing it at times? Other times, if I'm, say, tired, I just don't care to mask as much. But I hear lots of mathematicians were really weird, so maybe I'll find some people in grad school who will get me more.

[positivlyfocused]

The Spectacular Nature Of Dream Reality

What is happening when we dream? Some think dreams are the mind making sense of immediate past experience. There are a lot of other theories about dreaming too, but none of that is what’s happening.

Dreams are alternate dimensional experiences. When we dream, we leave our body. While the body refreshes itself, we move through a series of alternate realities among other various activities. These realities we create ongoingly as the aware-ized energy that we are. The realities are as real as this one. And we experience them through dreams.

Lots of people enjoy lucid dreams. Some even come awake in their dreams. Doing so, they travel fantastic landscapes. Landscapes in what seems like the past, or worlds that appear from the future. Of course, these are not “past” or “future”. Outside of this reality’s time and space conventions, everything happens everywhere all at once.

But our brains want to overlay their linear-time framework over these experiences. So certain dreams feel as happening in a “past” or “future” after we wake.

Everyone can enjoy what lucid dreamers enjoy during these very real experiences we call dreams. But most folks won’t take time to develop such enjoyments. That’s because our society places little importance on them, even though, historically, dreams once played prominent roles in life. They still do in some cultures and societies.

And even in ours, dreams still have tremendous influence. While science doesn’t officially understand our dreams’ purpose, and many people, including some influential folks, claim dreams are something we don’t need to pay attention to, dreams are crucial for life.

Meanwhile, for those who do pay attention to them, dreams become an enormously valuable experience. They literally open us up to all that we are. They help us see ourselves as god in human form.

Developing the skill: So worth it

Like any skill, experiencing conscious dreaming takes practice. And, just as we all potentially can exhibit “supernatural” abilities, we all dream. Even those who claim they don’t dream. So it’s not a matter of “developing” conscious dreaming ability. Instead, we learn to uncover what we’re already doing so that we can consciously experience and remember doing it.

I’ve been doing that for some time now. As a result, I regularly enjoy quite detailed, highly vivid, thrilling and emotionally fulfilling experiences while my body sleeps. In fact, a dream I had this morning prompted this post. It was so satisfying, the details so splendid, I felt compelled to share it.

I’ll share the dream itself, then offer an explanation for why I dreamed it. It should be added here that dreams are beyond our human understanding. We can only grok portions of them. Here’s why.

^^Conscious dream awareness can be developed, like any other skill. (Photo by Johannes Plenio)

Dreams take place in nonphysical. In nonphysical, everything happens all at once. That includes various incarnations of ourselves interacting with ourselves. Our various incarnations share information and knowledge from their realities, as we share ours with them. Each one also immerses themselves in each others’ experiences.

Our Broader Perspective also gets in on the act. It coordinates activities each of our incarnations experience. It also moves with other aspects of All That Is. In doing so, it arranges the fulfillment each of our incarnation’s desires. Fulfillment which expands the incarnations’ experience and All That Is as a whole.

In other words, a lot is happening in “dreams”. Much more than our brains can register. While in a human body, therefore, it’s impossible to know fully the dream reality.

But it’s a great place to begin. That’s because our dreams represent the closest nonphysical, alternate dimensional reality to this physical reality. We can therefore use dream reality to discover more about ourselves. Ourselves and the realm I call nonphysical.

Each dreamer dreams alone

I should add one other thing. Each dreamer creates their dream reality. No two dreamers dream alike. Books on dream symbols and interpretation exist in the marketplace. A lot of websites claim to help people understand their dreams. But it’s very difficult to match your dreams to such guides in any accurate way. Instead, people wanting to discover more about their dreams are better off learning to trust their Broader Perspective to guide them.

Again, dream reality is highly complex. In every dream, what actually happens and what we remember often diverge greatly. Again, the brain isn’t equipped to process dream activity. It does its best though. What we bring back to conscious awareness, therefore, is not what actually happened. Instead, the brain translates the experience using familiar imagery from daily life. At best then, what we remember is an approximation. Not what really happened.

^^Some think dreams are tricks of the brain. But they’re far more than that. And each dreamer’s experience is unique. (Photo by David Matos on Unsplash)

That’s why a book or website can’t really help a person understand their dreams. But our intuition can help. Through our intuition, we can develop a native ability to consciously know our dreams. However, it’s important to know that even if we don’t consciously understand them, we do receive the communication at more subtle levels of our consciousness. And we often take action in daily life because of them.

Meanwhile, like the act of recalling dreams, we can uncover that natural skill of conscious comprehension. It’s there, right under waking consciousness. It awaits our discovery. A Positively Focused approach naturally brings that consciousness to the surface. But other approaches work too.

The dream world offers a ton of value. On the surface they seem full of superfluous nonsense. If only people knew…

Let’s now look at my latest dream.

A fulfilling example

Again, I’m sharing the dream as I experienced it. In the next section, I’ll offer my intuition’s interpretation. Here we go!

I’m riding a BMX bike, but it’s an adult size. I’m riding among huge boulders. My skills are apparent. I’m super good. I easily negotiate twists and turns, jumps and slides among these boulders. My focus is on reveling in my skill and I’m shredding this experience. I feel unparalleled competence and I’m enjoying feeling that.

Evening time comes then and I want to ride the same trail again. But I’m stunned by the Golden Hour beauty, sunlight hitting the boulders just so, casting shadows and painting their surfaces in artistic splendor. I look at the really large ones, medium ones and small ones, and I’m struck with wonder at it all.

Deciding I’ll ride the trail again, I begin to do so. But then, after passing one curve, I realize evening time is when animals, predators especially, are most active. This brings up a thought of mountain lions, which is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately in waking hours. I stop riding then and think about whether I want to continue riding.

Meanwhile, cars drive by me on a nearby road which also winds through the boulders. One more passes. I look back along the twisted trail from where I came. That’s when I see, nestled in a crag between two large rocks, a mountain lion, its eyes fixed upon me.

I’m surprised, but not scared at all. Instead, fascination wells up as the lion struggles to its feet. Even in struggle, it’s graceful and powerful looking. Her beauty in my mind is unparalleled. I marvel that I’m seeing this because most people never get a chance to see this. She moves across the boulders dragging her back right leg. At times, as she walks away from me, she grabs what is obviously now an injured paw with her front paws. She licks that rear paw, then looks over to me. Then she moves off the large boulder onto the bike path.

Fascinated, I follow her. As she walks, the path turns into steep ramp. This ramp leads into what feels like a corridor of a concourse. The concourse is super futuristic, with really smooth walls and floors which seamlessly transform into one another. The mountain lion lays down in the middle of the corridor.

There are barely any people in the corridor. I walk up the ramp with a feeling I belong in this place. I approach the lion to get a closer look at her injury. Intense love for her and her for me wells up within me. It is that intense love that draws me to her. As I approach, she begins slowly changing into a human. I see her pelt transform into human skin, a rich, beautiful golden color that reminds me of the actress Zendaya from Dune and Euphoria.

I’m right up to her now as she lays on the floor holding her right leg. Looking at the leg, I notice a huge gum print. It’s embossed in the skin of the paw’s underside. There also are four puncture marks on either side of the ankle. That’s when the lion/girl talks to me. She says a bear attacked her some days ago. It bit her on the foot, but she was able to escape. I ask if I can take her to the clinic. I point down the corridor to my left. She turns her head and we both see doctors doing something in the clinic’s open entrance. But she turns back and emphatically says no.

I look to the right down the corridor. The atmosphere in the corridor is very calm, its surfaces colored a bluish grey. At the end I see a sign indicating a bathroom. I suggest we go there and perhaps I can help her with what is now her foot. She agrees.

At that moment, a man about my age approaches. He sees us and offers help, but doesn’t do anything. Instead, he asks if I’m a journalist. Yes, I say, then help the lion/girl to the bathroom. I believe the man follows us.

Once inside I find first aid supplies. I examine her foot. As clear as day I see the imprint of the inside gums of a mouth. I think about how hard that bear must have chomped down on that foot to create that impression, such that that impression is still there. I examine the rest of her body for other injuries. Doing so I notice a large tattoo of circles tied together along a straight line on the side of her rib cage.

Right at that moment, a woman appears in the room with us. She wears a stethoscope. I recognize her as a healthcare worker of some kind and telepathically request her help. The lion/girl doesn’t resist, so the woman begins administering aid.

I wake from this dream feeling intense emotions and extremely clear recall of everything that happened, including the ride, my skillful maneuvers, the fun I had riding, my concern about encountering a mountain lion, and this rendezvous, which transformed my concern into love for the creatures….

The interpretation…perhaps not what you think

All my dreams these days are this vivid, detailed and lengthly. Most of the time I wake from these with extreme fascination and revelry. This dream was no exception.

So what does all this mean? As I wrote above, it’s impossible for the brain to get all the messaging happening. However, here are general interpretations based on what my intuition told me after reading the dream over a few times:

My skill at life: The bike portion, including reveling among the open countryside, especially during the Golden Hour, is me recognizing my eagerness and resonance about exploring physical reality. It’s a resonance I’ve enjoyed since childhood. And it’s something I’ve reveled in all my life. It also reassures me of my competence with reality/life. This portion reminds me how deft I am at being physical. It’s encouragement.

Processing fears into love: While awake in this reality, I think sometimes about taking walks in the wild alone. While doing so I worry sometimes about encountering apex predators. Such encounters I’ve had before. Once with a cougar. Once with a black bear. In both cases nothing remarkable or scary happened. This dream is me in nonphysical reminding myself of my connection to All That Is which includes apex predators. And because I’m so connected I have nothing to fear.

Encountering the mountain lion: This is a complex set of experiences. This segment amplifies everything above. It also reminds me of the oneness I share with all living beings, as the lion transforms into a woman. Me fascinated with the lion indicates my love and interest in perpetuating All That Is through my physical experience. Me assisting with the lion’s paw is an expression of my all-pervasive intention to be of service to All That Is. This is super-evident these days as I am always offering help to passersby, including this morning when I helped a woman change a flat on her car. The lion’s transformation is also a nod to my intent at manifesting shape-shifting abilities in my life, one of several “supernatural” abilities I’m exploring.

Zendaya connection: I have a crush on what Zendaya represents to me. That the lion transforms into a female with Zendaya characteristics further amplifies my love and connection with All That Is, recognizes my unfolding desires and affirms my nature as constantly expanding.

The futuristic facility/corridor: This segment represents again, my desire to be of service, but also my passion for expansion, the future and becoming more. The guy asking about my journalism is a nod to my vocation/passion for words. And, in this life I was a journalist for a city newspaper. Before that I was a Marine journalist. Journalism, the capturing of news and information for dissemination, is something I still am passionate about. This blog represents a spin-off of that passion.

The female doctor and tattoo: The doctor is my resonance with highly intelligent people, particularly females. She may also represent an interplay between “me” (the dreamer) and another incarnation of me, who is female and practicing medicine in her reality. Families of consciousness are organized around intentions or foci. It’s likely I experienced that incarnation of me as my intentions creating this dream attracted that incarnation of me as we share the same intentions. The tattoo may have had something to do with the future experience where I watched C-Span coverage of the UFO/UAP Congressional hearing. I’m not too certain about that.

Summing it up

Dream experiences are multidimensional, highly complex and can sometimes be mind boggling. Particularly for those lacking a knack for recalling them. Actual interpretations of such experiences have value. As you can see, this dream was an encouraging experience which addressed things I was processing in waking awareness. It also offered connections with broader portions of my being.

For me though, the far more valuable aspect of this dream, and others I have, is the emotional content, the vividness of the experience, and the clarity of awareness I have upon waking. These all show me I am developing in ways I’m wanting to. I’m gaining clearer awareness of my nonphysical existence through these experiences.

It’s happening gradually and seems to be taking forever. But that’s the nature of expansion. We choose to put ourselves into a limited earthly experience, in these relatively fragile bodies, to viscerally participate in that expansion. Doing so, we forget we are eternal, eternally joyful and eternally free. So it taking forever isn’t a problem. We’re eternal after all.

Directly experiencing our eternal natures is part of the dreamwork included in the Positively Focused practice. That work can be a thrilling experience and contributes to the Charmed Life I write about.

Re-discover your eternal nature through dreams and more. Let’s talk.

[west-tokyo-incidents]

Garion often tinkers in timelines where things inevitably go wrong. He likes to just observe and be a general nuisance. It's a hobby of his, like playing a video game sometimes.

Jealousy usually catches on that something isn't quite right pretty fast. He literally can't read Garion's heart. Garion uses a small amount of Desir's noh combined with Service's to keep himself from being affected and always able to slip out of a timeline in case of an emergency.

Usually this makes Jealousy fearful or spiteful or even accusatory. But occasionally...

Occasionally it makes him curious in an almost child-like fashion. It makes him want to pry. He asks questions, when he can get Garion alone. And Garion's been through these timelines long enough to know what will make him jealous and what will make him more intrigued.

Usually Garion will chase him off, act aloof and brush him off.

But... every now and then...

---

Garion smiles softly to himself as the douji stares, wide eyed, at the massive beasts that seem to swim in the sky of the in-between. There's always such a sparkle to the eyes of someone when they see this. That there's so much more. His shoulders relax some.

"See how they seem to change size? In different places?"

Jealousy nods, silent otherwise.

"That's them moving in a direction we can't comprehend, because we're three dimensional, and they're four dimensional."

The sound of a soft little inhale. A gentle silence over takes them.

"And those... branches..."

"Other timelines. Or, well, the best we can visualize them. Our brains and processors fill in the spaces we can't make sense of."

"Like magenta."

"Like magenta." Garion nods his agreement.

"...there are so many."

"Every new choice is a new path. Every decision ever made splits off. Most of the time the new branch stays very, very close to the original."

"That's why they look blurry. There's... so many so close together."

Garion nods.

"How do you know which ones are real?"

"They're all real."

"I mean..." Jealousy makes a face, like he's trying to figure out what he means, too, "I mean which one is the original?"

Garion shook his head, "The idea of an original timeline only works if you're looking at a split. We only operate where Karakuridouji exist. There are endless ones besides that, and for all we know, all of these are just making an even larger one 'blurry', too. We stick with bundles. Ones that follow a similar path."

Jealousy is looking at him, now, listening intently, "So when you're talking about timelines that have to be ended..."

"We have to end an entire bundle, and we have to ensure none split off because we didnt interfere. The removal of choice removes any additional splits. So there has to be absolutely no timeline we miss."

Jealousy slowly nods, then looks up, "What would happen... if you didn't?"

Garion hums, "Well, we don't know exactly. We theorize timeline degradation from certain deviations could collapse the entire branch. Or a second World Eater, unstopped, would simply devour everything with linear time." He shrugs, "But we don't know more than what we can theorize until it happens."

Jealousy blinks slowly and nods.

Another long silence draws out. Garion is sitting in a chair, now. Jealousy doesn't know when it appeared, but there's one for him to sit in, too, if he wants to.

"...how many times has this happened?" Jealousy asks.

"Hm?"

"How many times has a... me approached you and asked all these questions."

Garion shrugs, "More often than not they actually avoid me more. Keep to themselves or accuse me of being a spy of some kind. If they do approach me, I usually avoid them, instead. I have a job to do, after all. This exact conversation has never happened before, but I've taken a couple versions of you aside and told them the truth."

"What happened to them?"

"They returned to their timelines, and I wiped their memory, because it terrified them."

Jealousy is quiet again, his eyes turning back to the creatures above.

"Are you scared by it? The sheer endlessness? It's like looking into the ocean, only worse, huh?"

Still more silence.

Garion looks over, and finds himself pleasantly surprised by the expression on this Jealousy's face. He tilts his head and waits, letting the robot process the question and formulate his answer. Time is, after all, irrelevant to this.

"I don't think I'm scared."

A blonde eyebrow raises, "No?"

"...no. it's different, yeah, but... not scary. It makes sense." A look crosses his face that Garion can't translate, and he's almost tempted to use Jealousy's own noh to figure it out before Jealousy continues, "I'm almost more scared to go back. To not know. You said you only interfere in timelines where something goes wrong. Timelines that don't go the way Dunstan wants them to."

"And I can't tell you what goes wrong if you want to go back."

"...what if I didn't want to go back?"

"..." Now it's Garion's turn to be quiet. It's not a short quiet. Jealousy can see the way his brow furrows. He's debating something. A choice he's made before.

Garion makes a decision. It's gonna cause some headaches for the elimination team, because it's gonna cause a whole new set of splits in the timeline, but he makes his choice.

"I won't wipe your memory. You can go back. When Slow starts to act different, when things start to feel strange, you meet me on top of Rune's home. I'll tell you then what we've decided." He sits up and leans forward, more serious, "But you have to remember this; I will only be able to take one. When you go back, more timelines will split. If I do not show up on that rooftop... you have to understand that it's not because I've abandoned you, specifically."

Jealousy looks down, as if studying the surface they sit on, "It's because you can only choose one timeline version of me to take."

Garion nods.

A long pause.

"I can still wipe your memory. Put you back and you'll never know what's coming. It likely won't even hurt when it happens. And you won't have to be scared that I won't show up."

"..." Jealousy looks back at him, "The other ones..."

Garion gives a knowing smile.

"... they were never afraid of this, were they?" He motions out to the vastness.

"No, they weren't. They were afraid they'd be one of the ones left behind."

"...Not a single one chose to remember."

"Nope. Not yet."

Jealousy sees, over the golden rims of Garion's sunglasses, the soft kind of sadness there.

"How many?"

"Lost count." Garion shrugs.

Now it's Jealousy's turn to make a decision.

[notmuchtoconceal]

Regrettably, this is one of many details I'd forgotten.

When I first sculpted Laika out of my heart's own secret image, he was to have associated bear symbolism. These things are far from arbitrary. Symbolism is not selected, so much as naturally revealed. Symbolism is a language of image and association. Naive attempts to teach literature in public school seems to have the reputation of pushing symbol hunting, as though reducing young minds to a spot-and-replace function is anything like getting them to think non-linearly and abstractly.

Arising out of sleek and sexy Soviet chic, with its communal incremental technology and phantasmagorically hard-line alien-esque aesthetics, he was to have Russian bear symbolism. He was to be a dancing Russian circus bear, juggling vodka bottles in the air while keeping balance on a beachball. I'd think he was supposed to start off cute and boyish, not quite twinky as a young ephebe, and gradually grow burlier, thicker, hairier as he came into himself, becoming more like his older brothers.

When I'd begun this project, the aim was to naturally build the narrative as I introduced each character in a dedicated section.

Very formal. Nothing progressive. It's the sort of structured, linear writing you'd see in television, but good television is an artform in its own right and naturally compelling when the drama is seamlessly merged with the character into tantalizing new hints and promises.

Instead what seemed to happen is I suffered multiple consecutive brain hemorrhages, and started throwing one-off specials out to attempt to reorient myself in my heart's desire, and those specials naturally cohered into a separate narrative which revealed itself episode by episode, and -- regrettably -- I fear appears absolutely formless from a distance, when really it's structure is simply improvisational and unconscious.

Now I'm going both forward and backwards in time while walking sideways. I have literally hundreds more pages of material involving these characters (and the world I'd forgotten I'd situated them in, as the collection of sets grew increasingly wobbly as the narrative diverged) most of which revolve around what were supposed to be the following sections dedicated to the ones I had named Joey and Jacek.

As the author of my own work, I like to think I have total control over what my words and characters say and do, but the truth is, sometimes I just need to lean back and be the means by which my story tells itself.

It's the Brux Show Now, Bitch! (Starring Brux!) (Authored Solely By Brux And With No Help Save A Living Hand) [excerpt]

--

he was tapping on the mic. the booms of his fingers echoed over the air.

- ouch. that’s deafenin, mate.

INTRODUCING -- CPT. BRUXER HARUSPEX

he had a mastery of certain empathic qualities which made for a judicious herald.

- he's a liar.

he could demonstrate.

- his dick gets hard when he lies.

the gentleman who was lying :-- he was stricken with priapism.

- a terrible burden, the weight of sin.

a terrible burden, the weight on shins.

- my friend here, who i professionally, though not unaffectionately, refer to as the major -- he is wizened in his simplicity. he sees things as they are, and for the at times alarming juxtapositions of his visceral naiveties, he presents frequent and starting insights into the deeper mechanisms of the natural world. he is a semi-retired state executioner, now bound by red tape and burdened by paperwork, chained to a desk far from any field of battle -- though not far from any field of prattle, i'm not sorry to say.

when you took to the field these days -- it tended to be slaughter. 

- you a hunting man, major? got favorite game?

you make all business your pleasure. 

- what is it exactly that you do, sir? in your capacity as -- (we just call him head bitch. not to his face, of course. we're all dad's bitches and he's head bitch. just the way it happens to be sometimes, mates) -- ah yes, as the praetorian prefect. 

you get bitched at by dad a lot. 

- finally. finally, i'm on the air. i'm on the air again. oh my gosh. oh my gosh oh my gosh oh my gosh. oh me. i'm back on the air. listen. i'm looking to revitalize the culinary arts. the things we eat... the things we eat don't need to cost a lotta money. they don't gotta taste that good. usually it's good enough... folks -- it's good enough to just be good enough. you know. you don't need nothin fancy. you don't need nothin you're gonna remember. i don't wanna remember what i ate. just wanna shove it in my face while i detach from my senses and wake up a few hours later, realizin i'm alone. that's how you know you're on the right track... folks, you should black out after you eat. you don't gotta remember what you last ate. all ya gotta know's it provided ya with fuel. fuel to serve…  maybe serve your country. you know -- might be a good idea. you know... go out and serve your country. all the proud people out there serving their countries. some of which -- shocking i know -- aren't even ours. some of you. some of you are big eaters. maybe you ate a bunch -- blacked out, forgot you ate -- hey. just means you get to eat again. probably made a lotta room. you're lucky -- lucky you get to live in a country where you got problems like eatin too much. so much you eat and fall asleep and eat some more. gosh. do you even do anything else all day? it makes me sick. sick like a dog. wet dog. are you somebody's pet? you even know how clean up after yourself, big guy? huh? i strip you outta that commando shit, what're you gonna do, huh? go kneel in the corner and shit? you're an animal. get you one of those lil drip nipples. make ya suckle. like to suckle? maybe not a nip? maybe get one a yer fruitcake brothers down here. make ya eat his cake -- could really go so for some cake right now -- not his. folks, all you need out of a hearty meal is enough to provide for you -- provide ya with fuel. to get the job done. hey. ya gotta love jobs. jobs gotta eat too, kids.

 full-time. no benefits. 

- well, sir. what you know you know well :-- self-respect must be its own reward! 

your unit, of which father had selected from only the finest eagles and jaguars of the corps, |. were to serve as the unconquerable arbiters of his will. in the square, our stations served to herald his convoy-- we who decorated the steps, and watched from behind the columns. we walked with him, and our hearts throbbed with him. his body was our body, as his will was our will. though one man, he cast seven shadows, the tallest of which sheltered him in darkness. 

.| - and also brux!

by day you stood with them – and the forms of the buildings continued upright.

every cubic structure met in corners, and every corner was met by the touch of two walls. these were not false cubits -- nor were there cubits any more perfect than in the waste.

your black leather shone prismatic as tar in the white heat of morning. when you would linger in the hues of morning. from when you awoke in the dark, seeing eyes staring back from the dark -- the remnants of slumber you knew well to be leaden with regret, flayed from awareness by cruel mercies which made bare nerves dance as dandelion seeds in the stagnant dusts of the bronchioles.

( . * * * . )

the sweat clung to you. you could smell only yourself and your uniform -- the smoke clinging to you and your uniform. you took it off only when you slept. only when you went into the dark.

( ' . . . ' )

the light of hazy red neon. mint in the emerald of aquarium glass. the violet bruise of what came before dawn. you could trot along the stones and watch the people. your eyes still heavy – and still alert despite the weight you could never recall and yet never forget.

you saw how they cast their eyes from you -- how they swerved to pass you. how others fell to the stones to implore you tooth in cowl  –

some, you suspected, might even recognize you.

/|==|=|==|\

gold bricks bisected goldenrod grids of the doors  –

streaks of torched bouillon drip onto petrified globes of glistening river rock – scenes of the jester aesop and the archivists grimm – the fox danced with the tortoise as a wolf in opal and jade lifted its veil to kiss a bear before the girl they would devour – the rabbit slumbering. coalescing detritus into a second moon – and the earth below the sun. the serenity of their faces laureled by the branches through which the rays were the crown of every man and every woman – and the halo of every other star who drifted in the vast empty spaces between and be-in and beyond.

he placed a saucer of tea on your desk --  a wedge of lemon on the side.

- cpt. schreibermachen, as we all know well, sir -- is a bold and original thinker. 

a censure of sunlight fell onto his face – from the low angle, his profile had inherent the jutting brutality of a goblin shark :-- the jigsaw of his cleft shifting as he flapped his gums.

- your office is quite spacious, sir! i'm confident we can talk very loudly! 

it was considered the proper thing to use porcelain while upholding your pretense of civility -- and you found some small delight in the resonance of metal through mineral -- the foolish twirl of every stir of your silvery spoon. you grew to love the sense of personal defilement that came with your new expectations of frivolity -- the way the reservoirs ran dry and you grew to stomach the taste of chalk.

- there is a man, mates! -- who can recognize a viable alternative calcium source!

the assemblies you held were intimate and without reproach.

- grilled him like a fine carthiginian babe, sir!

it was no difficulty for you to explain the nature of your work. in pain-staking detail, if necessary. though the words were never intended to reach human ears.

- my lips are zipped!

or human eyes, for that matter.

- there were a couple on the dish, you could imagine!

to alleviate the stresses of work in which you displayed competence far below the expectations of your age and experience, you delegated to him all responsibilities of spoken command. 

- right, mates. so… all of you are right here, standing in my visual field. hello. i see you all. i can see you are having a lovely morning. now, to do roll-call, we'll start with me... and that should only take twenty minutes -- but then afterwards, we'll have to do joey, and that will take… let me see… two hours… so… loikely we won't have the time to get to all of you, but that don't make anyone part of the b-team. nobody go around thinking you're part the b-team!

everyone who isn't you, brux or joey -- you guys are the b-team. 

- don't encourage them, sir. 

as commanding officer, you prided yourself on running a tight ship -- vowing to only spin the wheel of command wildly out of control to test for the larceny of seasickness.

- please don't vomit, mate -- not like it's a centrifuge.

they dared not contradict you with an open display of facial twitching.

- nor is the stair the appropriate place to piss yourselves!

in your heart, you considered yourself a lenient superior -- and your considerations on this matter were more informed than any of the well-reasoned arguments of your detractors. 

- don't worry, mates! we'll have ya made outta sturdier stuff in no time!

down these winding halls, these permanent installations -- the dividers which housed the windows, hand-carved from wood this land no longer knew -- succumbed to the ash deep in their grooves -- the glass pulsed with the writhing cobalt of hemispheral flares silkscreened with light on the backs of the eye. around you hung the smell of labor, and of burning grass. around you hummed the marching boots and pounding keys. 

|: |: |: |  /. /. / .

your operations were impeccable -- barring those times you blinked, and were not all-seeing.

- please, sir -- if you don't observe me, I don't --

(   )

when you and those brothers who were your six closest and most able collaborators still shared an office on the set beyond the west wing, all was a tumult of streams in flux.

-sir, i can explain. i can explain everything -- please give me a moment. the craters in the woodwork, those came from the grenades, which… let's say schreibermachen, psychorragia and drythen ‘dropped’ while performin the routines up on the desks -- the windows likewise, were shattered when they were propelled outward by the force of the blast -- cpt. schreibermachen, you see, endured the heat by throwing up his trench like a cloak, and then… sorta pirouetting into a corkscrew while in the air as the track ramped up, he managed to deploy it like a parachute as the harmonies descended, and well… monkey see, monkey do. this is why we have three craters and three broken windows and two servicemen with possible definite ankle sprains. the choreography -- will of course be excellent. the write-off -- not his responsibility.

... laika's run to fetch a broom, and maybe some splints…

... the calf entrails and the squid heads, and all these silkworms, i uh… i'm not sure what cpt. hlaford was intendin to do with those, but if the room is on fire anyway, my suggestion would be we just grab an incinerator and go to town -- leave no memories behind, maj.

     ...

   ( -- )

     /|\

in your country, all was substance without form, content without substance. governed according to the principles of the pre-scoliotic aphasian cosmologies passed down by the higher tenororphic mysteries throughout the era of the fraternity states -- all things that were, they were together. 

-- :] [: :] [: _._

you could picture your body in motion. you saw yourself -- and your relation to the wall. to behold the wall, one was the wall. one stared at the wall -- and the wall was one and two.

you were composed of your movements. you saw your movements, and if they were strong, you were strong -- if they were clumsy, you were clumsy -- were they tactful, you were tactful.

the clack of an agitated march would ensue an agitated cadence to the carriage of thought -- the rhythm which would ensue a spilling of those chilly elixirs which lie serene upon your oaken shelves -- those which would stain the hand-loomed upholstery of your coach, woven luminous of the light of spring, to stir the call of your passenger. 

   /=|=\

- he's not pickin up, mate. left another message, but sometimes ya get a tone, sometimes ya get a gent, and either way, it don't take much to hear the smirk -- y'know . . .

you kept haruspex on the switchboard when you needed him quiet.

- brux has to operate the heavy machinery to make the telephone rotary calls. people had gotten tired of the spongy buttons and the lever buttons and the big round twirly buttons came back into fashion, because the constant movement of clocks was a classical symbol of efficiency and progress and by the rite of repetition unto inertia overcome, implanted itself in our big ol' hamster wheel brains -- leggo anytime ya want boys! let the momentum carry ya until you're a big ol’ puddle a spooge!

at the console, he alternated left and right :-- up and down among the axes.

- gonna connect this point -- to that point -- in as few movements -- to maximize myself for consumer efficiency -- i do wanna be an efficient consumer! -- or do i wanna be consumed in an efficient manner? -- hmmmm. note to self -- deduce later if consumer or consumable. 

the grid sprawled out before him.

- i am one with the grid.

when that didn't keep him quiet -- you found other things.

- the shape of these gates -- it inspires beauty in me. i too am a utilitarian object which aspires to be beautiful. i am the fire hydrant welt with roses in superfluous flourish. i am tin and gold. i am bronze and aluminum. i am many silvery and hollow alloys -- and i alloy all i alloy -- and allow all i allot ... to cement my daily allotments!

behind the bakelite, he tended to his square.

- in keeping with our midland laurentian ancestry gentlemen, you will be entitled to care for a square of greenery -- the worst of you will grow weeds of grass though the rest of you will find yourselves eyes-alert well-alive in the sprouts you shoot. the best among will of course find ways to grow contraband here beneath lilies of flamboyant decor -- and they will go undetected for years.

`. ( o ) .`

he approached you near the honeycomb of offices -- through the light frosted by panes of shell, his boots tapped without hesitancy to circumvent the staccato of their motion.

- g'day, major. name's haruspex. bruxer haruspex. former captain of the ruelandese national guard. reportin for duty. know we've been acquainted on many occasions, what with our numerous adventures over the years, but -- y'know... sometimes ya just loike to restate the basic premises and assumptions so everyone's on the same page. never know who might be listenin in. some freshfaced new recruit might not know the hierarchy yet. best you just play it loike a radio thing y'know -- restate the basic premises and assumptions succinctly before each altercation, that way anyone can just jump right into the story.

he said funny things like that. he said funny things in that funny voice of his :-- it made your dick hard how funny his voice was.

- so, get this. all the men back in my village in rueland -- they were all tragically (tragically overused, that word tragically) well, they were all tragically murdered in the same three week span while out huntin ostrich -- no, no. ostrich. ostrich plural. back in rueland we couldn't afford all those extra blowy noises. only learned men and old-school ultra-poofs who fancied gettin fisted up to the elbow with crisco for lube could afford all those extra blowy noises -- though the truth was, we was all to stupid to tell the difference, we're bein honest. there was one lad -- a gentleman and a scholar. he weren’t harmin no one, mate. (.) jus tryin to translate can’t into contemporary inglish. never hear that poor fucker so much as wheeze again. … strained the tongue too much, we're bein honest. all those blowy noises. we needed to keep our tongues strong. so many long mornins -- suckin cobra venom true a goat teat ta build up a tolerance lest we venture out in the front yard alone. stared down the black eyes of that devil bird down many a lonely road ... well, get this. i was the only boy in left in my village after that. you know what that means? means i got the attention of all the -- wait for it -- the attention of all the --- all the girls. i was absolutely showered in -- pause for effect -- showered in girls. major ... um. ... major, do you know what i like? major, do you know what i really, really like? major. major -- do i gotta say it? do i really gotta say it out loud? major. major. i like -- i like girls. oh my gosh. i love girls. i love their pillow fluff bodies. i love their silky fragrant locks. i love their big doe eyes -- and i love how my heart flutters into lard ripples of buttercreme when i'm just shaftin em -- poundin on em like a lil yippin puppy. oh i just wanna be pet! -- oh i just wanna be pet! -- um, major. major, i'm not gonna lie ... can i … can i be real with you for a moment? i think i just -- come closer -- i think i just really, really wanna be pet?

[scratch behind the ear]

… major! major, you make so happy major! oh, the girls -- oh major when i lived with all the girls they pampered me like a princling. they slopped my lips in wineys -- they stuffed my cheeks with ciggys -- they bit me venomously down me lowly hangin lips -- haha -- once i got in a scrape with a mongoose. tore that fucker in half. ate its heart out in retribution. still got seven inches. couldn’t even afford lemonade as a chaser ... guess what? now? now i drink for the emperor. i can imbibe elixirs from across the globe and name region of origin by scent alone. i can identify over 808 types of poisons, toxins, corrosives, unguents, tonics, herbal teas, snake oils and supplements down to the individual peptides -- to say nothin of the dungy taste of another man's spit -- 

… ostrich. it was only the one, really. birds are a lot smarter than you wanna give em credit for, well …

 ... bird.

his passion for the fairer sex was, on occasion, a novel diversion -- though often destabilizing to group cohesion.

- goils! goils! goils!

if the outermost extreme of his peripheral vision caught so much as the hemline of a skirt, he would veer out of formation blindly into oncoming traffic.

[schreibermachen–  greets the gun barrel morning with a glint of dawn]

- look over yonder, psychorrhax. toward the gray and blighted horizon -- cpt. haruspex leaps and dances as though attempting favor with the sun, or else dares to implore the bounty of a cargo drop.

[young psychorrhax views – resolute in the most measured scorn]

- perhaps it is code, cpt. schreibermachen.

- astute as always, young psychorrhax. please be so kind as, with your cocksucker’s lips so full-figured and forward, to do our company the favor of rendering unto speech the fiery valor of our fallen comrade. 

[corneal contraction in aerial view]

- 'need no help, friends. learned urban foraging in the ruelandese guard. can survive a whole lunar cycle on this here roundabout.'

… is the woman giving up to him her cherries, cpt. schreibermachen?

- in moments he shall be spitting up the pits!  

if the prospect of rescuing young women were to intercept the docket, his short term memory would obliterate itself and he would seize into a deadlock by the dictates of his mating instincts. 

- that conical fortress up on the top of the hill? estimated material of construction: tetrahedra-sifted jovian swirl concrete. estimated date of construction 370-390 post-imperial trans-fracture. estimated plundering -- well-- hehe. there are girls in there, major. baskets and baskets full of... wait, no. hold on, see. this part – this part is very relevant to my backstory you see because i was very well taken care of, and that's influenced my loike -- sensuous philosophy of life, y'know? first time i saw a battlezone, i saw a guy's head get blown clean off ... well, more like a buddy, really. i can't even remember his face -- yeah. it's hilarious now but at the time i was thinkin 'shit. i'm a lover not a fighter. i'd rather be twirlin a baton than a rifle, but hey. i look good doin either.' -- i dunno. loikely, i wasn't so glib in the moment -- y'know. i was just thinkin of the sorta thing that i'd like to say to a girl once i found one, but i gotta be honest with ya, maj. i don't remember findin any. what i can remember faintly was curlin up into a ball and cryin my eyes out -- just bein so scared and so alone and wantin to die

<<<

>>>

... some memories, mate. some memories are a lot like a boomerang... or maybe a girl -- y’know. ya throw em. ya get distracted. you’re not payin attention -- they’re gonna slap ya right back you're not payin attention. 

cpt. schreibermachen -- that fuck joey -- once hoisted a pair of silk women's undergarments up the flagpole of the display and punishment pavilion – and lace and shimmer billowing, brux was by means of sheer appetite able to scurry thirty feet vertically, where clinging to himself like a scared koala, he lost any sense of spatial or temporal orientation and found himself lacking the grit to leap back down.

[a song of hollow alloy – shrieking on a buckling gourd]

- major. major don't help me. i can do it. i can stay up here. i can stay up here all day -- with the panties. nobody look. i'm gonna sniff em.

you turned away. for the sake of the common decency, you turned away.

[cpt. schreibermachen's hand eclipsed the sun]

- look upon my labors, psychorrhax -- and tremble.

[laika doing jazzhands]

- i’m trembling -- i’m trembling, cpt. schreibermachen, sir! 

- your struggle is not heroic, psychorrhax! you flinch from greatness as a temple priestess from a backhand! your heart is full of falsity, cowardice, and petty vanity. i long to be rid of you as a golden beast would be a brood of ticks.

some moment in the past -- his shoulders shone with blacker luster.

cpt. schreibermachen stares through a porthole. the black room. the black glass. psychorrhax in biohazard gear -- banana beetle yellow -- stares through a porthole of his own. curtains of latex. sheets of latex. the sweat fragrant on his fingers. pooling on the bed. a pool of yellow beetles. he stares up. mirrors on the ceiling. larger than the others.

- been awhile. missed how good you smell.

some nights, he found himself wanting for spectacle and was forced to manufacture dilemmas in which he might showcase his expertise – to be tempted to compete for a treat unrightfully earned.

=-= = =.= = =-=

the starlight of city lights shone into the wide gilt and marble grid of the solarium.

cpt. haruspex ejected his soda stream. 

o))<

- nobody move. joey pissed the punch.

the spittle dripped from laika's face.

- cpt. haruspex, you took but a sip.

[radiant day through the windows

in joey's insertion shot]

- he has you there, haruspex. not even your finely honed culinary prowess could have so quickly and silverly ascertained that it was my broth which pollutes the vino!

[brux requested two white elephants

and a troupe of acrobats for his]

- i could sniff out those fruity notes with both eyes open!

(- and a crab-stalk grafted on his dick, bro.)

- as if you couldn’t. as if anyone couldn’t!

- it’s citrus, haruspex!

- citrus is a fruit, golden boy.

(- you turned it into the world’s worst tinto verano. i’m fuckin thirsty, bro!)

–\\./–

cpt. schreibermachen – that fuck joey – glanced at you through the light.

through currents of the straw to gold of his hair, all motes shone as points on rings of iron cross.

his smile – its manifold condescensions – unmoored his face from the affection it so rightly earned. he seemed only ever – to be half-looking away. you could somehow see – yourself blurry in his periphery. though flesh before you – already you carried the quality of memory.

- not that i ought guarantee myself a good first impression – though i ought expect to still give a second and third.

the full weight of his eyes fell on laika psychorrhax – squire still at heart – and laika smiled with the warmth of a saint or madonna painted powder blue and scale of shellac over the rim of a bow of candleglass.

- as though his neck were that candle and his eyes the flickering flame!

to see the light snuffed out. the wax glide down the slope of your arm. as a shard of the mosaic of her face entered you by slip of palm. 

– glistening gossamer – what milky nebulae fins between my fingers!   

–//o\-- 

in our country, all was a fog of materials kicked up by the wind -- all was endless configurations of smoke and heat, of organic and inorganic – and we were mixing together in a stew of our own pollutants -- none separate, though some superior in substance and others inferior – and all tangled together in a grimy embrace of bodies penned and sculpted which we pledged first to our fathers, and the fathers before our fathers, and then to this land which we claimed by virtue of our boot and by our seed, and to the structures on which we weighed the land and held her like a vise, and to our king -- and to our corps and to the people who by their sloth held their docility aloft under the pretense of care and thanked us for the blood we spilled in their name.

(%)`~`(%);~

cpt. haruspex slapped psychorrhax on the shoulder.

- have a good time, mate. take ya for a pint afterward!

bare marble flesh vivisected the fatty tissues of a breast.

the port of natalia stretched out to preserved greenery across the bay :-- the bay of manufactured hydrogen – bubbling in molecular instability reeking faintly of chloral blooms. 

whenever psychorrhax had to fuck a woman, he held himself tense and focused on the pleasure of absolute obedience to his vow -- and he purified himself of any desire but surrender in service to the father and for him he would now surrender his seed to the procreative act --

to uphold his power and the power of the state through generations -- using her as a vessel of flesh.

(wham - bam)

the shame overtook him -- reaffirming his surrender to the muck from whence he came.

- thank you, ma'm. 

his lip quivered when he smiled. 

- it was a pleasure. 

for men predisposed to such things, men wearied by long careers at war, looking to settle into decay with the holy image of woman, and to find himself in the eyes of the animals he tended, agrarian life on the vast fields of the island would prove a welcome balm. they were thought to be simple men -- driven by instinctual capacities. for a man to choose this life was to forsake his capacity for higher abstraction – and with it all that made him more than animal. a man who chose this life then had accepted he knew only what he had to give -- and could reproduce himself through the systems of the state in only his most immediate and mechanical way -- and for the privilege of this slothful intellect, he was entitled to grow the food we eat, and to take more than he needed, and erect harems for the women he and they knew well to be his.

for what we knew, we knew well -- men were machines, and could be reproduced by machines, though as men could build machines of greater efficacy, we had no reason to manufacture men in the manner of machines, nor machines in the manner of men -- for this distinction, the most superficial, effected us at the level of our very physiology, and needed not be spoken aloud.

to be sent to the island to raise children among the women was then confirmed by sound men of the rank and file to be penance for a low confirmed kill-count. men of medium-range who met their blood debt but could not give in excess were to meet full quota by diluting blood with seed. per each child sired with a woman who walks alone or with women who flock together, a man could expect to receive the equivalent of 19-23 confirmed kills depending on the health, weight, phenotypical make and calculated killer or breeder potential of his son. 

for though we all had mothers, the father of us all was the head of state -- and from his will no good man could deviate, for to subvert our father was to subvert the will of the state.

young psychorrhax, gentle soul that he sometimes was, now sired his seventh son --

-purify me, sir. 

* )( * .^ | ^ ( o ) ^ |  ^. * )( *

...  i am unclean.

the solarium shone luminous through the halo of this hair.

it was typical, for men of our generation, to purify our manhood after contact with the fair flesh.

[cpt. haruspex – vernacular rapier sharp]

- listen, mates. if we’re talkin purity as an emergent consequence of performin the rites, well i’m the most pure of all. i fuck the most girls, i perform the most rites. i don’t even bother to bow and consecrate the major before i drink his piss and resubstantiate my manhood. big guy just pisses in my canteen, i take a swig right after i eat out a girl and give her a kiss on the cheek -- intone a prayer to brodin, it's all good.

... then it’s like she’s gettin her manliness purified too and next time i’m with her, she’ll be clean, then if i keep stayin with her, she’ll keep gettin enough secondhand sunrays to be clean and pure as any man (despite bein nuttin but woman!) then it won’t matter if she’s a woman, cause we’ll both be manly and pure, and as such will attain limitless solar heat in addition to the power of biological reproduction. imagine it, mates. brux and a girl. the ultimate organism! that’s what the love of a good man can do to a good woman, mates! you put the work in, it’s true as any love. don’t need the titillation of filth, 'tis true!

cpt. schreibermachen -- was more unconvinced than usual.

- haruspex, considering the extant biomass of the female, to say nothing of the infinitesimal spattering of viable purification you’d get from such molecular contact, it would take untold generations to purify a woman in such a manner.

[cpt. haruspex – reviving the tooth whitening cult]

- clever man, joey. i gotta do a whole generation’s work in one man’s lifetime.

the door slammed shut in relation to them.

[schreibermachen and psychorrahx –

silhouettes in muted static]

- imagine it, psychorrhax! infinitely dividing bruxes fueled by infinitely renewable energy! how long do you think it would take for these locust eggs of human vanity to expend the last of the earth’s waning greenery?

[psychorrhax –

cheerfully posed beside a frosted hibiscus]

- would they be self-generating, cpt. schreibermachen? perhaps in cpt. haruspex’s fantasy they would have some internal fuel-source?

[schreibermachen –

überschwemmt in Träumen vom Vaterland]

- they would not breathe our air but simply occupy it until – piled high as mountain peaks frost-capped in their couplings – teeth of rime did lovebite the stratosphere!

your eyes would whoosh through white noise.

[haruspex –

basking in the glow of successful infiltration]

- yes, mates. we who have eaten of the trees shall drink too of the sap. we shall create … the fuck pile.

he took out a tube of lipstick -- and he ate it. he spit it up and smeared it around his face. he was tiger-stripped with his own spittle -- some venomous madonna. 

- are you getting this, psychorrhax?

title cards shone behind his eyes. the marquee applauded with delphic seizure. 

- every word, cpt. schreibermachen.

( -- where would i be? without my favorite POVV!)

(o) `&--&` (o)

some nights, fueled by pints of his keg-sized heart, he would venerate his ancestors with lamentations of his lot in life.

- in the old days, before men worked together, men slept together, men danced together every moment of every day -- y'know what they'd do? they'd go home and they'd be with their girl. yes, mates. it was a known common practice. not everyone you see -- not everyone who likes girls is a delicate softboy with damage -- alright? i am, but -- y'know. not everyone is. people used to like hangin out with girls. it wasn't jus a brutal task ya had to enact to carry out your reproductive duty before the state. a wife used to be someone ya loved, ya tickled, ya frisked, ya fucked over the countertop and smooched -- gave her a smack on the rump, let her give ya a smack on the cheek. ya used to be able to chase her into the livin room and jump on her or maybe she'd jump on you and you'd land right in her rack and you'd try to yell out help, help, i'm drownin but once you open yer mouth it's like the nipple rolls in and now you're sucklin her and she's so warm and fertile and bountiful, that of course she starts to leak a little in yer mouth, and then you're lookin up into her eyes and feelin loved clamped onto her big, beautiful milker and it's jus fuck, mates. i could die roight there without a regret in the world. suckin her down. growin strong bones. warm all down my throat and in my guts -- as the good book says -- without milk there'd be no inland empire. then ya know – then my pants are off and i'm shaftin her while i'm sucklin her and i'm just goin fuckin stupid fast like quick little rabbit thrusts and now her head's rollin back and i'm fondin her big beautiful titties while i'm sucklin her -- god i can smell her hair as i can smell her sweetly sweaty breasts and she's startin to glisten and i fuck her and fuck her and fuck her and i fucker and once she's just a pile of big beautiful goo on me washin away the forests of my bush with noah's flood, i gush right up her warm cunt and dribble back on meself like a melltin polar cap and she collapses onto me depleted and satisfied and i fall asleep almost suffocatin in her big beautiful bosoms -- gosh, mates.

(buy your own)

it was not a matter you could overlook lightly.

(by your own sons)

in your way, you were each your father's sons.

[father striding forward – decoration jangling as rings of keys –

his titanic ass pert above his waist-high boots as he –

snapped into place, anchoring your eyes to the horizon]

- big guy. scribbles. rocko. you are my most brutal, my most cunning and my most lascivious men.

... get in the car. we’re goin to a titty bar.

[cpt. schreibermachen rose head from knee – 

to extoll the empty place the sun'd be]

- praise pol solaris, psychorrhax! father has invited us to a den of ill-repute – to meet careerists of some small spectacle!

[snarl of a dog on sugarcane]

- no you leave that one! i don’t like him! he shortbusers like a mango and mangos like a shortbuser, and besides -- he is a clown.

[the ironist spirit of an engineer]

- i would defend your honor against this sleight of pox psychorrhax – though first i would need to deduce its symptomology, to say nothing of its strain.

the bloodlights hit hard -- the weak flesh dilated and contracted. cpt. schreibermachen stares through a porthole. the veiled room. the dirty glass. rosettes of frosting on perfumed flesh -- pulsating globules of red hart. - major! major! it’s a dream! we’re out meetin girls with dad! - that’s it, that’s it. want you good and sealed in that marie antoinette wedding dress. battered. baked. frosted. want you so frosted and chilled -- so sparklin and pristine, i just gotta take one lick. one single solitary lick to ruin you -- then -- then what? you think anyone’s gonna want you after i get a lick? course they will. everyone wants a lick – everyone wants my germs. people’ll pay me to say my disease can cure germs. you’ll gradruple in value. sell you to a collector. art collector. you’ll be art. lady covered in frosting. frosting and germs. here. i’ll cough on ya. khuh-khuh-khuh. add another million to your tag. we got malaria. that's a jungle disease. we ain't got jungles. we can charge em. they'll pay extra. tell em hey. ... we got the fever. jungle fever. it’s ours. - as a man of worldliness, sir, i beg you answer. what is the purpose of a female body void of conversation skills?

>:-/ =/= + u@u + =\= \-:&lt;

you went home some nights. you didn't know where home was. 

you stood in vacant places where there was no city and where the grasses blew in breeze over the fertile soil. you could see the moonbeam beyond the radio waves crystallized into minute fractals -- ebbing away their jagged edges,  those smokescreens which stained the clouds.

for those nights, which were your darkest nights, from them you flecked the embers by which you could not see – and caught the first flame on a wick you had yet to set in wax -- and by that light, you singed your fingers as you passed the flame from wick to wick -- to keep them burning, the wax always spooling – the ebb of stationary currents cresting into a horn up the ascending string, spiraling to the ore of gold.

for from that night, you could see many nights – and if you navigated back into dark corners, or as now, stood alone where the black earth shone, eyeing some alley far across the valley – some narrow splinter into which you could lose yourself -- you could go anywhere and have heat enough to warm your hands and light enough to meet stranger faces. 

for father – who came from the world of light and smoke – did not come with martial values.

nevertheless he remained, in his way, a deeply holy man.

[hound jowled in the sobriety of day]

- hey, hey, big guy. so what if rocko shows up drunk and late -- at noon. noon cause he was out all mornin fuckin girls. the girls i paid for. he likes girls. he's a poonhound. bloodpoon hound. like his old man. you? i dunno. you got no sense a smell. you think you got taste. what is it you think you're tastin, huh? it's not a not a nice juicy puss ... hmmm. what is it? is it a man? you a maneater, big guy? make me sick sometimes. how nasty you can be. gosh. she tastes like catbrains and gunpowder -- gonna fill her up with caviar. make her drink her piss -- champagne piss. funnel the champagne straight into her bladder through some sorta surgical can gas for women of taste -- adventurous taste. let the caviar come flowin -- cloggin up her puss. all the eggs, you know -- overflowin like a toilet. set you straight one a these days, big guy, huh? get your hands on some part of a woman other'n her neck sometime --

( .  ) 

- the woman that father gifted us. mates, she's a treasure! women were put on this earth to make us happy, and we were put on this earth to make women happy! oh, mates, it's true your gallant mottos all! love is found in surrender to service!

his eschatological fixations, despite his evident enthusiasm, never ceased to be bizarre. you knew what you knew well -- to return to the chamber of birth meant suffocation in the comforts of slime and closed-quarters, of which most able servicemen were well above. 

[cpt. schreibermachen – well-accredited in poetic license] 

- allow me to be frank with you, haruspex.

- are you asking permission now?

- it is not that your weak and feeble mind is so easily ensnared by the tawdry pleasures of the fairer sex --

- i love you too, joey.

- but simply the sheer mind-numbing repetition. we can assure you there is not a chance in a thousand years that the people of our nation will ever forget that cpt. bruxer haruspex  (who entered service under her majesty in the san navy of rueland) was so terribly fond of the female of the species that he would not cease to subject his fellow servicemen to spewing torrents of his fetid bacterial effluvia.

[cpt. haruspex – focused only on the points]

- i read the volume of your collected episodicals, joey. you had a character in it i was particularly fond of -- was i reading this right -- “huxer braruspex”?

- why cpt. haruspex, that name sounds nothing at all like yours -- as you can plainly see, the phonemes have been reversed. 

[schreibermachen – nubile blonde barbarian]

- precisely, psychorrhax. perhaps cpt. haruspex longs for a fame to which he feels he is entitled, but has not rightly earned. 

(- bro, i’ve seen better coverage from a shower cling, bro.)

- it’s almost more embarrassing to not be addressed by name, y’know -- in the way that bein seen in your budgies is worse than bein caught hog out -- i mean, at least then you got that primal brain snake and spit response -- you just lunge at em with that thing, but once it’s covered up it’s like… tee-hee. lookit lil brux. lookit his cute lil tush. don’t ya just wanna give him a spank?

[schreibermachen – bored again by the crucifixions]

- he revels in his protestations, psychorrhax -- as though an animal spewing filth into the mud in which it rolls.

- a lion knows well to lounge high upon his rock, cpt. schreibermachen. 

(- damn psychorrhax, whose side you on?) 

- it’s just -- you make me look so stupid, joey. stupid and weird. 

[nevertheless moving to hammer a nail]

- my service as a journalist is to negotiate the offerings i render unto transparency and to virtue, in keeping with the spirit of the health and vivacity of the people and the culture of my country -- but my service as an artist, haruspex, is to both higher and lower truths -- to that which is both cosmic and chromosomal. these truths are sometimes obscure -- dare i say, even oblique or at odds with the demands of quotidian reality – nevertheless, they are our masters -- they are the realms of the submerged which is the torch we bare through the drudgery of the prosaic. you, haruspex, are both a man of blood and heat – as well as an archetypal dramatization of a station recurrent and observable through the collective works of human imagination – we become one another in the enigma of our daily lives. we are more than fellow warriors, more than mere varsity jackets, black and shimmering in a coalmine of gunfire -- we are truly brothers, my sweet and balmy brux. you have let me know you, and nothing i could do could ever repay the gift of your company -- though i hope i could have lent to you, with mine, but a fraction of the treasure that yours has been to me. i have rendered you in your truthfulness, in an act of love, and upheld your privacy in an act of courtesy. that you would think so little of this portrait i have gifted you, the world -- why, it speaks to your own low estimation of yourself, my brother. it doesn’t wound me. by you, i wound only myself. i will stand by you -- no matter how you spurn me, my lord and love, cpt. bruxer haruspex -- for you are a bloom from a rank mire, as though a note of lemongrass through my armpit -- and i hope someday -- someday you’ll find the strength to love me with even a fraction of the strength with which i love you, cpt. bruxer haruspex -- my bog brother.

... gilded peat. cotton wheat.

=( + )=

a light moved between them.

psychorrhax looked to brux. he gouged a fissure in his teeth.

the solarium was only mote and void.

- uh-uh. that’s all a lot of pretty talk, joey -- but i think you’re a douchebag. in the classical meaning of the word.

the early to concurrent-radial-modern meaning of the word douchebag is - and has been for the past three 300^3 years (o/. 3)  - great leader, or "man of valor".

he leaned against your desk -- setting down another tea.

- i think tomorrow morning, major – instead of comin into his office to bother him for an hour -- what i’ll do instead is go into his private quarters and be sad for two or three.

the chamber loomed – for there was no name or wheel. what silence settled here, remained so – for what secrets passed between joey and laika – were for them alone to share.

–\\./–

a crinkle -- across the plume of a violet field!

- he has ruffled our bed linens, psychorrhax!

[eyes half-entrained on the incense]

- the air is befouled with barley and fish.

[schreibermachen sammelt unter seiner Handfläche einen Sturm]

- over them i shall sway my hand, and from them i shall conjure grain and flesh enough to feed the shrubbery of withered legions!

[dilating in receptivity to vision]

- befoul the soil with beer and mercury.

[the squeal of his collar – as joey seized him by his leather]

- into the circle. the boy-matter of your hymen shall be the prima materia -- the ravishing of your spirit the act of first order. 

laika psychorrhax – kept himself prepped for command.

- rip my insides into a wormhole.

88*88

the balls of his fists hammered the chest. gesticulations of plunging knife edges into eager hearts. the muted gong of his flesh rang as psychorrhax pressed himself deeper into the skewer that was his need – the fat constriction of his cockhead parting to the lips of a figure-vise deepening itself down its own throat in profile, engorging in bliss ;-- and schreibermachen's power flooded to his dells, coursing through him in a torrent of linear type daybreaking upon the shore of night.

88=*=88

the demon howled out psychorrhax as he was cunted. his throat was one with his puckering hole, two in one :-- the yowling of his wicked heart.

he reared his head – tasting in the chafe of his larynx the shred of his own iron -- capsizing into force as though some suture would split and he could be free of this baggage of himself -- free of all which was pitiable and yearned to be extinguished, for it knew itself to be chaff and nothing but, only dead things never to be; he saw the stars falling to his brother's teeth and was still again -- all moments now one in this moment with him -- no longer yearning for obliteration but found again in its embrace.

**88=/=88**

fat-headed. moon-faced. there was only joey. his brother, who was the light of the light above entering through him, a sword of light entering into the plinth of his parted brain : -- cleaving him. crushing him. pouring from his wound into the hollow of himself, a juice into a grail, spinning faster, hacking the lobes of his medial layers apart as machetes make jungle paths, he sputters, jock-head, nostril, eyes, and lips -- any orifice open and willing, his every hacking and chocking pore, singing a gargling mass through the deluge of themselves, his face was everywhere at once, the One and Joey, for he was divided and carried by the waters, and all was one, the sky and earth, as all was one, He and You, Together in This Treachery, One and Alone, The Only Thing There is.

( )

cpt. haruspex unlocked the bakelite lattice – to look upon the new wastes.

- my lilies! those bastards. they have stricken them with a fuck-curse!

(-left your stash out, bro brux!

… sorry bout bein a loser and all!)

/|\ XX \|/

laika psychorrhax – let his eyes linger on schreibermachen.

through the light, the pale straw of his hair rested ashen in tower walls – the sadness of his muted complexion. from some angles the panes of his face wrung so hard to the garnished fists of armrests – so much more the strapping buck than the calf he seemed only because the soft of his eyes deceived you so with how they focused the soft of his bones.

trailing him, his followers stocky of shape, hard of will and economic of spirit – lined with caps and jackets of herbivorous mammals preserved in polysaccharide layers in times when the hunt had been a crime of passion – for all violence, it was known, could be induced only by stress, and never once by an unspoken breach in the methodology.

their legs parted wide on their strides – buttocks hard as granite – biceps tubed and pinched as they knelt to their elect – for their collars came down across the ridge of their bones onto rolling hillsides sparse of hearty shrubbery – for though they were veils begging to be parterd, calves beckoning to be cleaved, already the iron had nicked bare the land. 

/. / . / . / . / . /.  |*^ () --|+

//

( * )

joey looked to laika. laika looked to brux.

brux was beheld by them.

by some new conviction, he yearned to be known again.

( o ) * .V. ~ (( 0 ))

. o . U .i. U . o .

the battles they waged in semantics would -- over the course of days -- quagmire into ruts of foul and languid fury.

- what have you to say, psychorrhax, to cpt. haruspex’s sterling defense of that deed which animals do best?

- some men produce culture. some men restock the labor reserve, cpt. schreibermachen.

- laborers are more valuable to the state than culture, joey.

- with more culture, there would be fewer need for laborers.

- that is a catastrophically stupid sentiment, and you could only think it cause your head is so far up your own ass i bet you are right now auto-sodomizing a tear in you own rutted-out colon with the silver spoon tea-twink and tiddly-winkin the uvula uppadown yer stupid blonde throat!

...

?!

...

- your bawdy nonsense is indicative of your innate bardery and as such is by far your most pleasant quality, haruspex.

- thank you, joey. 

… i know the only possible reason you would have said that is because you meant it.

sometimes cpt. schreibermachen would flirt first.

- i'll make a deal with you, haruspex.

- i always do my best to deal with you, joey.

- i've been meaning to seed a plant at the gazette for reasons of intrigues both personal and global -- the sultry redhead you've been glancing over, i happen to know is a subordinate to a pair of shoulder pads with a reputed greater pair of tits well-cupped within their weller-enveloped double-breasts; if only a thorn on a more rugged stem. if you can best this challenge i am about to impart on you, i will lead you in symphonious conquest. you will have her as i have her compatriot, and you will make her squeal as, beside you, i devote with all my heart, to her rosy sister, the tender and attentive brutality for which all women long -- imagine -- eye to eye and inside her! the music with which i shall see she fills the night!

military men, it was understood, were not to be seen outside of functions with women who were not their mothers. this, of course, made military men eminently desirable among women who were not their mothers. 

- a rare treasure, well worth fightin for.

poising himself for the tribulation to come, he gulped two shots between his fingers with a well-rehearsed pose -- succeeding only in spilling half.

- right, mate. slap it down.

cpt. schreibermachen laid his scroll flat across the desk. the hexagonal panes shone gossamer in the ceremonial brass gaslights of the press room. with a tap of his inkstick, he rearranged the molecular structure into a grid and between them blackened the chromatophores. 

he drew a point somewhere where the glare was too bright to see and another where the grid solidified from out of the weight of its shadow.

- connect these coordinates maximally in five strokes.

(- gooner bro!)

cpt. brux made four strokes in alternating horizontal and vertical dashes.

a brief pause. his inkstink rose in retreat to his lips. tapping thrice upon the scroll. his eyes, exhausted by the flurry of rapid movements, lunged forth and dug his instrument into a trawl for dimensions unknown.

- can't be done, mate. most efficient path requires 7 strokes -- 6 if ya know how to cheat. it's a trick question. what's the real challenge?

joey made five slashes through the grid and connected the coordinates. 

he did not this not through five direct points, but through a series of sweeping arcs, quickening rapidly in intensity and focus, connecting many disparate points, but nonetheless only stopping, the pen seeming to grind into the pole and create a spike or point of intention as it marred the surface -- in V ditches -- twisting to more rapidly direct itself across the necksmost rotation back to whatever point was next intended.

brux's eyes rotated.

the flap of his lip spat a coin flat from the hinge of his metal plate. a flurry of dial tones roared through the ear canal spacious behind his eyes.

- joey, no you can't do that. on the switchboard, we can only move along the axes. that is an illegal move. you are a cheater. you are a southpaw switch hitter. for recreation, you perform brain surgery on the homeless in your alley theater. you are a herpe canker on the pretty lip of our otherwise proud nation. i hope you die promptly by fire.

_o/|>

- this isn't the switchboard, haruspex. this was a challenge by your friend and brother, with a plainly stated prize and unplainly stated motive. we ambulatory creatures do not arrive promptly by laying our strokes along neat paths laid out -- we do so by, with our strokes, laying out our own.

joey rearranged the grid into hexagons. the ink of his strokes arranged into a perfect circle, emitting an unbroken line from each cardinal point.

far below ...

/

\

brux's became a misshapen block of a thing in the shape of an L.

|_ o

( - nut me so hard, broey!)

- please excuse me, brother brux. my date at the gazette and i have arranged to go fox hunting this evening.

joey gave him a slap on the back.

left to the whims of a flashing light no one else could see.

- that was well played of him, major. there's no gettin around that

… what joey don't know is that brux's got a few charms of his own.  

[REMEMBER THE BRUX SCENE HERE -- BRUX'S GONNA REMEMBER THE SCENE

OH NO -- OH NO -- BRUX GOT JOEY REAL GOOD IN THIS SCENE

WHY CAN'T BRUX REMEMBER THE SCENE?]

in the projection room, laika opened the ashcan. a jet of butane flowed, and from it came the caustic stench of burning time.

- joey, i bet if we sat down in noble contest to watch a scene of vigorous, wholesome, absolutely luciferian courtly mammalian fuckmaking between a consenting woman and a man who may or may not have an opinion on the matter -- that i can outlast my temptations in the face of the luscious heaving milky breasts bobbing up and down in proud deviance of gravity, beckoning me to stomp and slurp as though lounging dependent by the homey feet of brawny peasant girls at the winery. 

- your script doctor is a plastic surgeon.

they leaned in. the leather of their longue creaked with the leather of their uniforms. perched, their sweat beaded. legs spread, knee bent over knee, calf around calf, where they had been corded by the serpent the stiffness creaked the leather of their breaches as the imprints of two batons rose from the tarry sea of their conjoined lap, growing ever more salty with the brine of what what plunged in the eternally-descending thunderhead.

the screen shone in the solitary viewer. harvestmen took the maids by their breeding hips. they rocked slowly, as wind would before a storm. a brawny beast of a man -- of hearty afro-laurentian stock -- was taking a plantation heart in some old manor spun with webs of spectral cotton -- the spiders heaving in the weight of their masses -- ovulating in their widowed masses -- across the world, their knobby fingers crawled through dross to reclaim their seeds. 

joey watched the beauty. brux watched the bitch.

brux flung his wrist so fast it might snap in half.

joey was a cyclone in his unfaltering stillness.

brux grew glossy beneath the beads that were his waters.

joey shone, and glistened, for his oil was the petrol of the sun.

brux -- reaching the edge from which he could only plummet down -- saw himself flushed, rushing air into his overblown lungs -- arrested his hand across the head of his shaft -- and there tried to contain the fissure.

joey -- his victory assured -- could not help but lean over and, smiling with the warmth and the benevolence of a scholar, somehow all the more sweet for how he was so crude, so vicious for how he was otherwise so placid -- with a flick of his nail, tap brux across a vein.

he had gone so tense -- screaming. throat. glistening rings of flesh. rising waters cloudy with potentials congealed. songs of blood and snow.

\

caskets hovered in the grid of the tiles. he gushed across the floor. heaving a stampede of antelope over cliffsides, yowling as a wild cat. trees sprouted from the formless pools he gushed across the floor.

now, brux -- less in agony, more in furor -- kept to his scream.

- you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you joey gonna nut you bitch you fuckin fuck die in a fire fuckface you fuckin fuck

he attacked joey's knob / pressing to the root with his tongue, he had such haste for lube, and pressing down farther -- again and again -- as he was drenched, his eyes shot up. lingering in joey's eyeline. tears mixed with spittle and nut, his face so flushed, eyes so voidly pleading, stroking him with unquenchable bloodlust. joey leaned back, spread his legs, and let the breadth of himself palm his neck in triumph.

- bring me to a raging broil with your fury, haruspex! what is dense will agitate only with the meter of the epics. the dim flame you light in me would not overtake the rim were you to leave it roaring overnight!

he had visual proof of this indisputable fact.

( )

- ladies and gentlemen of the press -- my most decorated enforcer. scribbles.

[visibly joey]

- yo

- i will now eat. the entire wedding cake woman. live on air.

[blood-curdling shriek of a turkey carver]

- it’s all corn-syrup, mates. fake as hell. 90% of her constitutable body-mass's oatmeal and assorted other bread-fillings shaved off in the process. that’s how they did it back when audiences gave a shit. 

the filth they’ll allow on television these days.

- is this going to make it to air, psychorrhax?

- only during the sol's day service, cpt. schreibermachen.

psychorrhax, in address, channeled the auspices of law and gutter alike.

- the guillotine was clean. effective. humane. above all -- it was stylish. this used to be considered academic consensus. sometimes. you get a generation that knows how to make a statement. sometimes. you get a generation that wants to uproot all which was there before to install creameries of any shape as long as they’re bulbous and monochrome. 

[spatio-temporal auto-gentrification]

- is the letterboxing on right?

- reeks of dairy and shame here, brux. 

- was that wasp nest a malky flesh waxin the glass like a milky denim gypsy spongey with spooge there yesterday, laik?

- grand opening was twenty minutes to midnight, brux. 

- it sickens me with its sterile greases stained deep into the pores of its surfaces. as though its own gloss comes to presuppose its pallor!

- your contempt for the common failings conspires to make better men, cpt. schreibermachen.

- two halves to a share, two bullets to a third.

- to reproduction grunge coast city night we shall go! 

the slides clicked and shot. they did all their number crunching in the east amphitheater beneath the projection room.

- the state snuff film budget could stand to lose a few zeros.

- there are plenty of things we could film that aren’t snuff.

- like pornography! let’s film state pornography!

- the lion and the bear have conspired with the hoppy mammal!

- fruitful shall be our labors.

- and comely shall be our bounties.

they spread him out on the mattress.

- yo broey, so like... what's my motivation here, bro.

(trust embedded in the sand)

- you are a walking dildo, drythen -- you can think only of fucking -- and for that pore on the bottom of you for suction -- for that also being used for fucking. improbably turning you into a full-on dock-in-dock dick sheathe whenever you're in another dude.

- ah, okay -- so play it real naturalistic like? 

(new lands)

- guys, guys i'm real drunk! if i say no at any point -- what i really mean is yes. brux is a slut. brux needs to be pinned to the wall by his budgies and smacked around. brux knows he’s a good lil butt-boy. brux knows he deserves to do as he's told and wear tiny pants. brux knows he dances like a tramp. brux wants his man-cunt ripped in half like a watermelon and flung across the room. brux wants to be flung all over the room right now. fuckin read the room, mates! give brux what he fuckin wants. brux knows what he fuckin wants -- get off yer stupid asses and quit lyin to yerselves! it's fun bein a slut. ya wanna be a slut! ya know ya want the big man to come and take ya -- let him have ya! let him have ya all night if he wants ya -- you're a slut, brux! that's all you'll ever be -- a slut brux!

the best thing about being in the booth with brux -- was hearing how he could modulate his voice well-enough in response to any airing -- and seeing how an equivalent level of control failed utterly to restrain the anguished contortions of his features :-- running through so many probability scenarios so fast, his parting jaws might snap in half.  

- it'll be a beautiful endin, mates. the three of you -- fast friends at last. 

his eyebrows were a pair of goddamn acrobats. eyes and teeth broad enamel, looks like taxidermy. just once -- you wanted to see em touch, like two caterpillars clinging to the same leaf :--< get em to encoil and snap. grind the whole perceptible forest tapestry into a sandtrap.

- well bout time we transitioned into closin remarks, eh mates?

whether it was a night at the cave -- or an address to the new recruits. it came back, always, to the same handful of points. 

- what i'm tryin to say here mates is, if you're gonna take a wife, don't settle for one you can tolerate. when it comes to the institution of marriage, take its flourishing over nine hundred years ago as an example. in the colonial states from which we trace our heritage, in an era of peace and plenty, the institution was revised into its most perfect form as the transcendental union between two individuals. for a brief, beautiful time, the symbolic value of the practice had eclipsed its function as a means to merge wealth and blood. a marriage could be a rebellion -- a statement -- a garish affair to tarnish the name. a marriage ought be fun. a marriage ought be dangerous. it shouldn’t be all joyless couplings in secret enclaves. as it takes a village to raise, it oughta take a village to witness. gentleman, i don’t advocate unregulated fornication with the fairer sex -- i advise it publicly! in the sight of respectable ladies and gentlemen of all chromosomal makes and models available for purchase!

psychorrhax stood forward, though did not give the impression of doing so. a spotlight strode forward in coordination with his stepping out from behind a curtain, though now there was no stage.

- he longs for an era of repression under want for liberation, cpt. schreibermachen. 

- haruspex, the mid-century period which dominates our collective picturesque imaginings of the colonial states was a historic offense to imagination. in the plastic palaces where the cold warriors gridded themselves in commodities, they boiled their brains in radio waves, and turned their bunkers into pressure cookers for hereditary neuroses.

- joey, i have had, on some occasions, cause to peruse your auto-erotographs. you have no right to judge me. there is no rite you’ve left unwronged. you delight in envious spectacle, and are a cretin begotten in filth and for that i salute you, sir. however, you have no right to judge me, for you are ripe, numerous and plentiful in your perversions, and uh… wow, mate. i thought this would be like a killer put-down, but the more i spell it out the more i realize i’m just kind of a dweeb who feels bullied by your ability to speak in a matter which is both beautiful and fearful.

- truthfully, haruspex, you excite too much adoration of an able variant to excite much which is worthy of contempt. 

- do you mean it, joey?

- no, i simply delight in taunting and teasing you, as a mother delights in taunting and teasing at the buttocks of her babe.

- you care about me, joey. you’re my friend.

- you insinuate so sinuously. 

- joey caaares about me.

- you are an upheaval of wormy mounds beneath my skin!

- you wanna give me huggles, joey.

- begone, leech of man -- i am barren as stone!

- you’re so warm, joey. you’re glassy as a gutlamp.

- you wound me, haruspex. i do so much to treat you cordially, yet still you find me so contemptuous.

- shhh. got it to your kidneys, mate. i prod you, you prod me. i’m drunk enough, mate. you can take me on stage.

- fetch the rope, psychorrhax.