#well this is actually a leftover of something that I haven't even posted yet lol

[sol-consort]

Regarding the human kink thing when it comes to turians, some people actually do be nesting, omega-verse style. Imagine being a human assigned to a turian ship, and you just over here in your bunk, innocently arranging the pillows and stuffies, while these guys are just standing there, slack-jawed and harmonizing their subvocals lol

[updated post]

A/B/O is not for me, but I dig the concept of aliens being intrigued by plushies. They are weird when you think about it.

The weird part isn't the plushies–it makes sense for warm-blooded mammals who value skinship to enjoy cuddling soft things, hugs are fundamental for your health—No, The weird part is how the most popular plushies aren't human shaped.

You could argue dolls, but dolls aren't used as plushies. They're more hard and sturdy, something that can withstand being played with. they have joints and brushable hair. Dolls are puppets to tell a story with, a psychological form of play through creativity.

I want you for a moment to imagine an advanced civilisation of bears with me.

With metropolises and bustling economy, they haven't mastered space travel yet but they've been eyeing the planet closest to them, bringing back rocks from the moon, etc.

In one apartment complex, there lives a bear family. The furniture is more accommodating to their larger build, clothes are more of an accessory to them considering their luxurious fur coats keeping them warm.

It's nighttime, tomorrow's a Sunday and mom bear has to leave to work early, she's currently washing the dishes leftover from the wonderful dinner the family just had. Her wife, however, is putting their son to bed. it's his second week in elementary bear school! he's unhappy with his seating arrangement in class however, the teacher placed him too far from his best friend.

His mother promises to have a chat with the teacher about it when she drops him off tomorrow, the son bear is very delighted and roars happily. A big yawn escapes him as his eyelids get heavy.

In his arms, there lies a cotton friend. His most beloved treasure, the most precious inanimate object to his heart. His plushie!

He adores it. It makes him so happy. It helped make him feel safe when he first started sleeping alone after his moms got him his own bed.

Now, I need you to tell me what does the plushie look like?

For me, these are the options that instinctively came to my mind when attempting to imagine what sentient bear cubs living in a 21st century would gravitate towards in a plushie.

A) a teddybear, more fluffy, abstract, and cartoonish looking

B) a plushie in the shape of a honeyjar

C) a plushie in the shape of a fish–more specifically, salmon or trout

D) fuck idk man leave me alone

When compressed down to their core, in the most simplfied form, the choices are:

A) Identity

B) Food

C) Food

D) How did you get into my house?

-

With that long analogy out of the way, when you compare that limited selection to the actual things humans have already turned into plushies, it just doesn't make sense.

Food, yes we have plushies of food but also of animals we do not eat. rabbits, cats, dogs, dolphins, bugs. We have plushies of predetors even, things that once hunted us down, beings that still could very well kill us if we meet face to face, tigers, sharks, bears themselves even.

Animal cartoons are much more popular amongst kids. Fables about talking animals have been a stable genre ever since humans invented writing. Animal plushies are popular amongst adults too.

Plushies of inanimate objects, of plants, of fictional characters and fantasy creatures.

I'm willing to bet that humans already made plushies of verans since the first year they came into space, that they sold out on earth immediately. Hell, I'm sure there are plushies of reapers, of protheons and even of turians and other species.

Not even abstract ideas were spared from being into marketable plushies! isn't there a series designed to raise awareness for mental illness?

The whole meme of "turns your fav into a marketable plushie" spread so much because it is true. If there is one thing humans love, is making plushies of anything not human.

And that's the weird part to aliens, the big boy of human anomalies. "Why do they want to cuddle literally everything in this universe? and how come plushies of other humans is the last thing on that list"

You try to explain it to a salarian once but they just look at you in confusion. What do you mean you sleeping with plushes resembling your species is "weird"?? Don't you humans like hugging each other so much? Yet cuddling the soft imitation of a reaper each night isn't weird to you????

That's not even mentioning how the bear society analogy is flawed because we are biased by nature. We projected the bear society onto our human agriculture and based it upon our own popculture.

When in reality they would hold very different values, a different emotional range. They'd be as diverse as the other alien species in mass effect, sharing more resemblance to them than to humans.

We see someone sad, and we have this need to touch them, pat their shoulder, rub their back, hold their hands, and give a hug. Bears let their children walk on their own while we carry our young more, much like aquatic birds in more ways than we'd think.

A/B/O nesting isn't my cup of tea, but with turians, it's easier to digest. Yeah, they are birds. It would be literal nesting. That's kinda cute.

We like caves, it's also cute. Would turians prefer the top bunkbed? Anyway.

Birds usually throw clutter away from their nests, anything that's not a straw or building material is disposed off to make space for their eggs.

While we like the opposite, clutter fucking rocks! at least for humans.

We have a mattress, then a mattress cover, then a sheet.

Then we have pillows, stuffing, then pillow covers, decorative pillows.

After it, multiple blankets! a soft one, a heavy one, an airy one. Sometimes, blankets come with blanket covers.

Finally, the plushies arrive. Multiple of course, some for decorations, others well worn with cuddles. Sometimes a gaint big one to fully wrap all of our limbs around.

Sometimes our beds have crumbs from food we eat in it, othertimes it has a stray sock we took off while in bed and forgot.

Most of the time it has our phone in it, a pet joins us there, book we're reading, laundry we were supposed to fold but forgot, a bag, or several outfits as we get ready to go out.

That's a cave, much like bears leave the skeletal remains of their prey, we have crumbs from the cookie we suddenly craved at 3am.

Nests are neat and clutter-free, at least the bird ones, always getting cleaned from waste. Eggshells are thrown out as they hatch, baby birds waste are immediately disposed of.

Lizard nests aren't that different.

Because the equivalent to a nest foundation isn't the blankets, plushies, or pillows. it's the house foundation itself!

The concrete walls and the sturdy floorboards. The whole bedroom is already a well-built nest. The bed is just an extra cushion. The fluffy material and loose feathers birds leave at the very top, so the twigs don't scratch the fragile eggs.

So, in conclusion. Turians and Salarians would get VERY overwhelmed in a human bedroom, let alone a human bed with plushies, stuffies, and blankets.

They're like, "Are you expecting a baby???" When they notice what their brain consider is extra protective fluffing for eggs.

Turians even more because of their lack of skin nerves, hard plating, and all. Their outershell makes it hard to appreciate soft things, let alone hugging them, when they can barely feel it.

Salarains? They're softer, more squishy, and they might enjoy the way it feels against their skin. Most reptiles do, and they're the closest thing for reference.

They're warm-blooded, but they do originate from a fully tropical planet + they're amphibians and might have used to be semi-aquatic? Meaning that while they still produce their own bodyheat, it wouldn't be that much to begin with. Space is definitely much colder to them than to a human.

That's why hugging a human is so nice to them! They can leech off of your body heat as their very own sun–or at least a substitute for a heatlamp.

But plushies and blankets are a different story. With blankets, they might make them cold or freeze since they blocked whatever light or heatlamp the salarians must need for sleep when they're not wearing their temperature adjustment suits.

And if you sleep next to them under the blanket, your trapped body heat will cause the temperature to rise above what's comfortable for them and risk overheating them. Same with the fluffy sheets, pillows or plushies.

there's the risk of overheating them with your body as the blanket traps in the heat. it will happen slowly, but that just makes it more dangerous. A slow simmer of rising body temperature as they realise what a death trap a human bed actually is.

Plus, salarians only need one hour of sleep per cycle, it seems very excessive to them that you'd build a whole room and make the biggest piece of furniture in it solely for the purpose of sleep. All of those plushies just to hug to sleep?

Drell, who breathe through their skin, would view blankets as a total nightmare. Their clothes already need a lot of adjustment to accommodate their conditions, only certain material is airy enough to allow them to get a lungfull, and you want to suffocate them with cotton or polyester?

They know you only breathe through your nose, but it still...makes them feel uneasy. Seeing you covered completely in stuffies and thick blankets, only your head poking out. Much like what it would feel for us to see someone go to sleep underwater with a flimsy mask connected to an oxygen tank. Now, this is truly a death trap–the salarians were right.

As long as you forgo the blanket and...allow them to fully strip down, they will give this whole human bed thing a try. Silk or satin sheets and pillow covers feel the best against their skin, smooth surfaces that seamlessly glide, air particles passing through it with little trouble.

Anything fluffy, feathery, or with fur will irritate their skin. It's like something brushing against your nose. They sacrifice a lot of comfort when it comes to indulging the human need to cuddle, but most drell rarely complain as they accommodate to your need, even if it meant you'd be slightly cutting off their air circulation.

Maybe their society is exceptionally polite? Maybe devotion and sacrifice for the ones you love are just ingrained in their biology? It would explain their endless royalty to the hanar despite how staying on that planet is literally killing them.

Oh yeah, owning a humidifier in your room will cause them a lot of pain and discomfort. Turn it off, or if you really want to woo a drell, get a dehumidifier.

Krogans would fucking love our beds tho. Might make fun of it at first, but they secretly also want a soft mattress and plushies to cuddle with.

Get close enough with a Krogan, and they'll start crashing in your room and taking naps on your own bed whenever the chance presents itself.

Don't the asari sleep in pods? I'm thinking of that sex scene in ME, she fucks you in a pod. That's something. At least...Liara gets used to human beds?

-

Anway! having established all of that definitely vital and necessary world building, I can finally talk smut about the turians! the original context of this request!

One look at a human's bed and their minds are definitely going south. First of all, human, you're in desperate need of a mate because your nest is a mess! Why do you have so many different fabrics? Aren't you worried you'll suffocate yourself with a plushie or too while sleeping?

Second of all...they didn't know humans were this soft. You mean, most humans sleep like this? In very comfortable beds? Even like...the army tough ones? Oh, that's why they get so excited for shore leave? so they can return to their actual comfortable nests–sorry yes "beds" and have some decent sleep?

huh.

And none of you are expecting children, correct? This is just how the average adult human goes to sleep?

Turians don't have the heart to tell you that they associate soft beds–ones like yours—to the human equivalent of a heart-shaped bed with rose petals scattered around, candles illuminating the room and a very deliberate lack of condoms.

They try not to...think about it whenever they come into the room. A bluish hue adorning their cheeks, trying to avoid eye-contact as they explain that uh...fuck, they accidentally glanced towards your bed and forgot what they came here to say.

I talked before how jarring it's to them that humans easily allow others on their bed, be it human or not. You just casually invite your friends to sit on it? The same sheets you sleep on each night? the one so heavy with your delicious scent they can practically smell it the second they stepped foot into this room?

And now you're telling them to take a seat, even handing them one of your plushies to keep in their lap. What's a friendly gesture and a show of trust is being very very badly misinterpreted by their brain chemistry, their biology going haywire at what they consider the declaration of "Get me pregnant" Whether you're actually capable of it or not.

-

Sidenote, the angara might be the only ones to share our bed preferences, not only that but show enthusiasm at the mention of plushies.

The only difference is that their society values plushies that resemble people more, angara like them. The dolls and plushie lineup are very intertwined.

Cuddling very intimately with someone isn't sexualised either, nor presented under a romantic light necessarily. Their society prides itself on love and affection; they're direct with expressing their emotions.

A single angara family can have many mothers and fathers, tens of sisters and brothers. Cuddling and sharing a bed is very normalised even far into adulthood.

They might be the ones giving humans the wrong idea by immediately inviting them back to cuddle on their bed after only the second meeting. Just because they decided they like you :) It's the equivalent of going out for coffee.

Protheoans, meanwhile, fall on the opposite spectrum. Javik doesn't have a bed, does he? He never asks for one either. They're a society of warriors, they value strength and abhor tenderness. Brutal honesty is their forte.

But...they also read each other's emotions through touch.

While beds are a foreign concept, plushies are not. Javik can sense the history of a room just by directly touching its floorboards. Plushies and other sentimental objects must be valued very greatly in their society, doesn't he hold onto the disk of memories from his time back before being frozen?

He understands why his own species came to value plushies, but why the hell does yours do it? You lack his abilities, all humans do.

You try to explain it to him, but it just sounds like you're describing vague and badly done emotion reading with extra steps.

He concludes that humans must hold traces of these abilities. It just translates into safety and the need to cuddle others. Also, it is clearly inferior to the protheon's advanced ability, so yeah.

Javik dislikes your bed but likes your plushies and actually welcomes cuddling. He remains stoic throughout it but you can feel him poking through your memories.

Same with your plushies, he asks that he may keep one as a relic. A piece of your soul, your history is encased in it like an artifact in amber.

Touching it almost feels exactly like travelling in time to meet your old self, getting to part the curtians of space itself and get a front row view on the person you used to be.

Plushies immortalise you to protheans, who would've thought.

-

I had so much fun with this an analysis it <333 I know it isn't exactly what you had in mind anon, I'm sorry, A/B/O is listed as a "no" in my requesting list. But the concept was so good I had to approach it in a different direction.

I hope you still enjoyed it!

[minhamaniac]

Dear My Friends (2016) - Opening

[velociraptoraddict]

1) oh man, would you believe me if I told you late December of 2019? 😂 (I made it my new years resolution to write more, and pretty much haven't stopped since lol)

2) oh! Yeah I think I know which one you mean! It's adorable and I think it's name starts with a K?

3) I love purple too X3 though I think green would be my top choice (but the two combined? *Chefs kiss*)

4) oh yeah? I've heard great stuff about his work but haven't actually checked any of it out yet

5a) oh man that's a tough one, there's so many XD hmm, I really love the shapeshifting too! It's a little tricky to write, and I feel like they don't change their shape in story as often as they do in my daydreams but I think it's a really neat ability! I also like how Loughran are a legitimate hive mind (Irkens are a bit more of a pseudo hive mind, as they get orders and such from the Control Brains and are sorta linked to them via their PAKs, but they're not all connected to each other, so they are still considered individuals with separate names and personalities all with their own goals (to an extent) just like real insects (yup, I don't consider ants or bees as true hive minds either, though I'd argue that some fungus might fit the bill 😃))

5b) And I really like my origin story for them too. Like how they went through a sort of rapid evolution, starting out as a single almost mindless entity that sorta "awoke" when that research party landed on their planet and by splitting up and having one part Bond with someone the rest gained that knowledge, then they divided further and started shuffling Bondmates around to learn about different perspectives and eventually developed their own society.

Sadly, we don't get to see much (if any of this) with Chomp since they're perma-Bonded with Kailah. And, because they were sent away from the rest of the Loughran before they could properly sync up, they're lacking in the whole "knowledge department" from that development, which is why they're so vague on the details about their own kind, and part of why they didn't realize sooner that something was wrong when they landed and awoke on Earth without being connected to the whole

5c) fun fact: Chomp's personality actually comes from their previous Bondmates. ie, anxiety from the squirrel, fear and paranoia from the two rabbits, the analytical/patience of a predator from the fox, and anger from the badger. The crow gave them flight, I know it's not really a personality traits but it comes up a lot XD (also, Chomp tends to prefer their crow form when they have to become something small, and that's a leftover from that Bond as well).

Another fun fact branching off from that; Chomp's voice is described as "several over lapping voices, mostly masculine but with a hint of Kailah's own inner voice" actually alludes to their previous Bondmates! Loughran pick up the inner Voice of those they Bond with, so if a Loughran has only Bonded with one person, then they'd only have that one voice (which I bet would be super confusing for that person XD like you're having thoughts that aren't yours) and if they've had hundreds of Bondmates then their voice would echo as such. That's why in the prologue, Chomp doesn't actually speak, just acknowledges through emotions, because they hadn't Bonded with anyone at that point

😅 sorry if I went off on a bit of a tangent there, but I have so much Loughran lore that I haven't even found a place to squeeze into the story yet, so it's just swirling around in my head lol There's more, but it goes into spoilers for the Pod so you'll have to wait for that (unfortunately probably another chapter or two (or eight lol), 15 is SUPER Dib focused with him working on his glasses, seriously, it's like 80% inner monologue and going through the motions of fixing them 😅.

And SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS 16 will feature Zim post forest adventure, and 17 is going to be Friday, probably Dib's pov? Not sure yet, but Saturday is where the answers should start revealing themselves...so depending on how many chapters Friday lasts (XD seriously, I don't know why it's taken me 100k words to get through half a week lol) we should see something from the Pod front shortly >_> END SPOILERS

Hey, I'm going to a bit of writing editing which means I'll be looking at my phone every 2-7 minutes so how about we play a game or something? Send me an ask or DM or you could even start a chain message here.

Come talk to me, ask me questions, tell me some impressions that I give off. Give me some fun random facts off the top of your head. Ask me for facts. Tell me a story from your childhood. Ask me to tell more stories from mine

What's your favorite color? Favorite animal? Favorite dinosaur? Favorite mythical creature? Favorite cryptid? Favorite book? Favorite joke? Favorite movie?

Tell me about a book or show you're currently working through, maybe I've seen it or I'll check it out and we can bond over it 😊

Let's talk

Let's get to know each other

Let's have some fun this Friday night!