#which i find strange bc of how central it is to the films

[shehungthemoon]

Might get blacklisted for saying this but I really can’t bring myself to consider so much of TCW canon. From the gaping plot holes to the horrendously inconsistent characterization, sometimes it just drives me absolutely bonkers 😫 Does anyone else get bugged by the show a bit? 

[ofhoneyblood]

BRYCE ATLAS WINSLOW

pronouns: HE , HIM , HIS

age: THIRTY - EIGHT

species: HUMAN

nationality: IRISH , ITALIAN , AMERICAN

sexuality: PANSEXUAL / DEMIROMANTIC

sign: AQUARIUS SUN , LIBRA MOON , VIRGO RISING

occupation: OWNER & BOUNCER @ RED HOT PUSSY LIQUORS

+ traits: INVITING. FAIR. FUNNY. OPEN-MINDED. TOLERANT.

-- traits: GUARDED. DETACHED. DESPERATE. SELF-DESTRUCTIVE. 

faceclaim: MILO VENTIMIGLIA

soundscapes: HERE

aesthetic: HERE

yo yo you yo , it’s lydia ( yes , that’s my real name ) here with my noble beast bryce winslow ! i have had bryce as a muse longer than any other and it’s been literal years since i’ve written him so i’m extremely excited. this is the first time he will be milo though and i’m super hype to get things going ! i have headcanon after headcanon for him , so hit me up if you want to do something bc i am ready to do some shit !! again , i’m lydia ( or nary , nettle , snottie , etc. ) and i love a good name change , twenty five years old , pansexual demigirl ( she / her & / or they / them ) residing in the central timezone.

this is THIRTY-EIGHT year old BRYCE WINSLOW , the OWNER OF & BOUNCER AT RED HOT PUSSY LIQUORS BURLESQUE AND BOOZE who uses HE / HIM pronouns. he grew up in DUBLIN , IRELAND but came to pleasance in JULY 2006 ON HAPPENSTANCE AND TO RUN AWAY FROM HIS PAST and now enjoys spending his time at FOR KEEPS AND RED HOT PUSSY LIQUORS. BRYCE is written by LYDIA.

PERSONALITY

element: air ruling planet: uranus — planet of originality body part: ankles good day: communicative , original , open-minded , fair , logical , inviting , tolerant , funny bad day: guarded , detached , self-destructive , out-of-touch , irrational , desperate , lonely favorite things: dancing , teaching , team sports , anything with a cause or mission , independent films , working out , baths , animals , preserving plant life / flowers , reading least favorite things: injustice , drama queens , feeling isolated , owing money or favors , having to choose just one thing , personal questions , gossip , cigarette smoke secret wish: to experience total freedom how to spot him: a cute smile lighting up a tired face , quirky movements , tired eyes , long legs , big hands , flannel , old beat up truck where you’ll find him: backpacking or hiking , protesting , coaching a team , revolutionizing the industry he works in , the gym , red hot pussy liquors , alone at home , working on a project , taking a walk by northwood lake keywords: friendliness , eccentricity , teamwork , humanitarianism , technology , groups , avant-garde

first thing to know about bryce winslow is that he’s a free-spirit that prizes individuality and plays well on a team. he has been known to do things his own way , moving on a path different from everyone else’s. some call him eccentric , others appreciate his cutting-edge originality and authentic style.

one of the many ways that the irishman is a paradox ? he’s highly individualistic , but also an amazing team player. he might look like the fresh-faced guy next door on the outside , but inside he marches to his own beat. naturally popular , as he’s vibrantly social and loves to be among people , telling jokes and introducing thought-provoking conversation topics.

people truly do make his world go round , and he can become friends with the most random strangers. can be a bit of an alien — a little “ out there ” in his approach to different things. not that he cares about offending anyone ! loves a good casual connection , bryce can disengage as quickly as he connects. in fact , platonic pals sometimes get better treatment than romantic partners. 

while he can be a bit unsentimental on a one-on-one level , he can be moved to tears by the plight of animals , the environment or other social justice issues. yes , this big irishman is a bohemian at heart in some ways , but he also gets the job done. as a tenacious aquarius , he can be quite hardworking when he devotes himself to a goal. 

a competitive ( and lesser-known ) type a streak can emerge when he really wants something. nothing turns him on like progress , especially in the name of his grander ideals ! playing hard to get REALLY works on him lol

philanthropic and objective , bryce is in a lot of ways innovative and avant-garde. from experimental electronic music to community-oriented living , there’s nothing that this man hasn’t or won’t explore. as someone who loves being a part of a good group or team , bringing people together is also one of his specialties. 

intense bryce energy is cutting-edge , “ out there ” and even a little strange at times. a total nerd for all things futuristic , science fiction and wacky inventions. no topic is too cutting-edge with this irishman: extraterrestrials , stem cells , cloning , robots taking over the earth…yup , bryce will go there. 

while he likes to influence rebellion and detaching from reality ( c’mon bryce , back to earth ! ) , he likes to help others see possibilities they wouldn’t otherwise. the essence of his true energy is: community-oriented , original , open-minded , fair , logical , humanitarian , connecting , and inviting. 

the negative expression of bryce’s energy can be: guarded , detached , destructive , out-of-touch , irrational , and desperate.  reluctant to express emotions — the irishman prefers rational reasoning and cool-headed logic to the messy tapestry of the human feelings. 

one of his favorite authors is ayn rand , founder of the objectivist movement , and that’s pretty much all you need to know. objectivism has been a major influence on the libertarian movement , which has a real bryce flavor. it’s an organized system that also preserves individual freedom and limits government intervention. it’s very “ fringe ” and mainstream all at once , a fascinating paradox and something that really intrigues him.

playful gusts and a social butterfly whirlwind combines into a gale force of humanitarianism for all. bryce is a visionary , dreaming up quirky utopias and alternative realities that can shake up the status quo.  emotional detachment , unpredictable energy and rebellion are major factors in the irishman’s personality. not going to lie , he can be “ type a “ and totally quirky all at the same time ??

a stabilizer — the one who sets up a solid goal or foundation then starts building. bryce can take the enthusiastic idea that someone else sparks and craft it into something real. he picks up the ball when another passes it , running the distance to the goal. 

the trustworthy type who likes “ to-do ” lists and fancy titles. if a friend says , “ let’s go on vacation ! ” he’s already calling the travel agency , booking the tickets and hotel , and sending everyone a list of what to pack.

true believer in friendship and teamwork , so bryce tends to be more focused on a group than an individual. freedom is important to him , which is why he likes to keep things light on an interpersonal level. that way , he won’t feel bad about running off to the opposite corner of the world at a moment’s notice. 

at times , this nomadic strategy backfires , leaving him lonely and disconnected. in truth , the irishman is uncomfortable with too much intimacy. this free spirit belongs to the world and feels off-balance giving his considerable energy to just one person. 

while bryce’s friends get first-class treatment , family and lovers see a different side of him: moody , brooding , anxious and neurotic. he may pick one ( and only one ) person to open up to , getting attached to the point of obsession. 

learning to accept and express his emotions would help him avoid the massive freak outs and anger flashes that come from pretending everything’s cool when it isn’t. bryce appreciates a quirky or eccentric twist , enjoying colorful characters and people with counter cultural personalities.

BIOGRAPHY

bryce atlas winslow was born into a very straight lace , play by the rules , catholic family.  his father , matteo winslow , was an italian military man and his mother , deirdre winslow , was a cold irish homemaker. matteo was every bit the ‘ man of the family ’  and bryce grew up only answering to his father. deirdre would only every answer a question with ‘ ask yer da ’ or  ‘ dija’ ask yer da ? ’

she was a mostly spineless , god fearing woman that was afraid of her own shadow and that’s what made her such a good puppet for matteo. bryce’s father was a stern , angry man that only grew angrier when drunk , no one dared put even a single toe out of line with him around. 

( TW: implied child abuse ) with bryce being the first born and only son he was expected to be perfect , from a very young age he felt the pressures of that. it was like walking on eggshells , always afraid of making a mistake or displeasing his father. he did not have the fun , happy-go-lucky innocence a child should expect of their early years ; instead for bryce winslow there was not much more than discipline , hard work , and punishment.

for the most part , bryce succeeded at being the perfect son his father expected him to be — a robot more than an actual living boy. nothing more than a machine , a machine being bred for war. 

it wasn’t until the beginning of his secondary school , when puberty and hormones began blossoming , that things became precarious. voice cracks , uneven patches of hair…. oh , and a sudden sexual desire for the same sex. 

( TW: suicide ment. ) now , the winslows were catholic - extremely devout catholics - and bryce grew very self-loathing and afraid in this confusing time. he contemplated suicide , all because ‘ homosexuality was wrong ‘ and ‘ you go straight to hell ‘ if you engage in anything associated with it. it didn’t matter how good of a son you were , because ‘ man shall not lie with man. ‘  he kept it hidden for years , he also managed not to act on it until well into the last year of secondary school. 

despite bryce’s fears and shame , when he was sixteen he fell in love for the first time. first loves can be explosive , dangerous even and this one was nothing short of just that. the boy kept his forbidden love a secret from everyone , his family and father above all others.

all good things must come to an end though or so they say , for the boys it came far sooner than later. matteo , bryce’s father , happened upon a note from the boy bryce was seeing , cian , and in said note was all sorts of information including a meeting spot. as you can imagine , matteo flew from the house in a drunken rage in search of his “ sinner “ of a son only to catch him red-handed. 

( TW: assault , child abuse ) bryce managed to save cian from his father’s wrath , taking the brunt of the attack. cian watched as bryce was beaten , begging and screaming for the man to stop , that he was killing him. the drunken bigot was turning on the younger boy when bryce told him to leave and never come back , so that is what he did. 

( TW: implied abuse ) to this day , he has never laid eyes on his young lover and that was probably for the best. after his father had tired himself out and satisfied his rage , he left his son there in the dirt and the beaten boy didn’t bother moving. 

( TW: suicidal thoughts , conversion therapy ment. ) will to live depleted , too tired to go on , pain too much to endure — he just slept there until the next morning. he was awoken with a kick of dirt in the face , his father telling him that he was being sent to a ‘’ special ’’ facility where they would get rid of his ‘’ ailment. ’’ 

( TW: conversion therapy / facility ) time melded in the facility , but he estimated nearly a year of his life was wasted away in there. resistant and defiant for most of his time there , it wasn’t until his father visited him , the one and only time . that things changed. 

( TW: suicide ment. , homophobia ) his father brought news that his mother had killed herself but this was a vicious lie , a last ditch effort to get bryce to change his ways and boy , did it work ! hardly a month later , the young man was discharged from the facility only to find his mother was indeed very much alive.

matteo up and moved his entire family to england after bryce got out of the facility. his father gave him nonsense about wanting to get away from the bad memories , starting over new , and ‘ lead not into temptation ‘ by sending him back to school with ‘ sinners ’ and ‘ sodomites. ‘ 

so , bryce finished out the remainder of his schooling in england and went straight into the forces as per his father’s wishes. sadly for him , he would never become what he so longed to be. he had just finished boot camp and life had just started to seem somewhat normal - if you can call anything the winslow’s had normal - when he lost it all.

( TW: eye injury ) the young man was honorably discharged after an accident that left him legally blind in one eye , when he returned home after his short stent in the defense forces there was no longer a place in the family for him. his father quite literally disowned him all for something he had no control over , a mere accident , but there was nothing more disappointing to matteo than a son that was ‘ kicked out ‘ of the forces.

( TW: gang ment. , human trafficking ) fast forward a year , bryce had found himself in a gang. this part of his background is the most unresolved seeing as it’s not part of his original backstory. long story short , he was involved with the gang until he was twenty three but it all became too much for him after his boss tried to involve him in human trafficking. 

( TW: gang ment. , suicide , death ) when you join a gang you don’t usually do it thinking someday you might one day retire or quit said gang , but then as you get older you realize you’re not as tough as you thought. bryce was twenty-three when his mother finally really did ‘ commit suicide ‘ , the first time his father spoke to him since he returned home from the forces was only to blame him for her death. 

( TW: death ment. , implied murder ) honestly , it was just the straw that broke the camels back. bryce wasn’t allowed at the funeral or anywhere near it , he’s almost certain his mother’s death wasn’t by her own hand or an accident but he’ll never truly know. after he was certain she was in the ground , bryce fled to america in the hopes of outrunning the gang and getting lost in the melting pot. 

once in the land of opportunity , he got his hands on the cheapest ride he could find first and just started driving. it was well after his twenty-fourth birthday , right smack in the middle of a hot ass summer in ‘06 ,  that he found himself in pleasance of all places. he never had any intention at all to grow roots there , it simply happened.  

other than that , the man busies himself with drying and preserving flowers , taking baths , working out , and playing with his dog.  he parades around like this big , tough hard ass when in reality he’s quite the domestic goofball type.

ETC.

has a dog ,  it’s a beagle named shiloh literally 

a big hobby of his is preserving flowers in his spare time , he keeps a small book of pressed flowers and plant life on him a lot of the time in the chance he comes across something he wants to preserve

can play guitar and doesn’t have a bad singing voice either

legally blind in one eye , but doesn’t wear his glasses often

has a younger sister that he does keep in contact with , but not very well ( WC ? )

a guilty pleasure of his is taking baths ; he enjoys adding bath salts , flowers , and other so-called ‘ feminine ‘ products like bath bombs , etc. to them and honestly takes one nearly every day

he was born and raised mostly in dublin , ireland and has a thick accent that only gets thicker when intoxicated or angry. he does use a lot of uncommon terminology to american’s ( yes , i own the feckin’ book of everything irish. . . it’s that serious ) but i’ll lyk in the tags what it means unless i forget

@phqextras​

[soullistrations]

okay, @mithrilwren, since you expressed interest, here it is! (no need to respond--it’s just late and days later, so I figured you’d like to know)

my reactions to ep9 below the cut. spoilers, obviously.

Full disclosure before i go on: I read a spoiler that led me to believe finn was going to die in this one, so basically everything we got was an improvement to what i was expecting going in. The only other thing i knew was that KMT was criminally underused, as well. Other than that, blank slate with incredibly low expectations

I loved the theme of not being alone. It was heavy handed, sure, but the fact that each of the core trio started the film believing they were alone in some way (rey’s “i can’t feel them”, isolating herself bc she believes no one understands; finn’s “I thought i was the only one”; poe saying that last time they asked for help, no one came), and then each of them finds out they’re NOT, UGH let me tell you I cried. Actually, i started crying when Jannah mentioned her stormtrooper call sign, and basically didn’t stop crying after that. I’m just a sucker for that trope, y’all.

on that note, though, finn’s ‘believing he was alone’, like many other things with finn, could have been better executed/more obvious before the actual conversation with jannah--even just a mention in a previous scene, like rey and poe had, would make the parallel stronger

also, finn saying “you don’t understand, not like leia and I do”--I’m simultaneously so happy that we HAVE FORCE SENSITIVE FINN and so frustrated that it...didn’t go anywhere? i’ve had a couple days to think about it, and it’s so exciting, so vindicating that finn is force-sensitive, but at the same time, he only used those powers to sense when rey was in danger, but never once got the chance to help her out in those instances--or help himself out! Could you imagine how cool like a “danger-sense” thing on the battlefield would be? A half-second shot that shows that his connection to the force is more than just ‘Rey fell down a well!’ I can’t help but wonder what would have happened if rian johnson hadn’t nerfed finn’s storyline in tlj--would we have gotten more development of force-sensitive finn if there was more time for that development?

I get the sense that this is an incredibly new realization to him in tros, even though we’ve been seeing the evidence since ep7. I just want a scene where he got to tell rey. or something even more explicit then “how do you know?” “a feeling.”

but also, can you hear han solo screaming “that’s not how the force works!” from the afterlife, even as finn proves that that is, in fact, how the force works?

But looping back around to ‘you don’t understand, not like leia and I do”--HOW does finn understand? What is he feeling from the force? what pulls him? what does he notice? He can clearly sense both rey and kylo (even if neither of them can sense him....), but what else? Did he and leia talk about it when rey refused to talk to him about it? did leia sense something in him, but wanted him to come to her? was he going to tell leia after he told rey, but then never got the chance? there is so much wasted potential here, guys, and i know they were trying to tell some story about palpatine and skywalker bloodlines righting the wrongs of their ancestors or whatnot but....why bring in force sensitive finn and not give him that connection? why not do something other than just go “he’s got it! the force! yup!” and leave it at that? it would have been so EASY to do more! ESPECIALLY if tlj hadn’t had some half-assed rehash of finn’s emotional journey from tfa instead of like, a logical continuation of his character.

(can you guess my favorite character, guys?)

BUT REALLY, others have talked about it more eloquently than me, but finn deserved a more central role, because he is the emotional core of the movie. and has the most compelling backstory and character trajectory (that is sadly ignored). and is clearly positioned as a foil to kylo ren, but then NEVER GETS TO BE THAT FOIL after that first fight in ep7.

but seriously did you see that hug at the end? with finn in the middle, on the verge of tears, holding onto the two people he’s been trying to keep safe for the whole film? I’m gonna cry again.

poe and rey sniping at each other was very ‘i’m closer to finn’ ‘no i’m closer’ ‘finn take my side’ like did you see how rey looked when finn agreed with poe in that first scene? they figured it out eventually, but it was....unexpectedly great to see the growing pains in that relationship.

More things, unrelated (or less related) to Finn:

KMT deserved better.

Carrie Fisher’s lines were really shoehorned in in some of those scenes. The “be optimistic” line? That was a REACH. I know they’re working with what they’ve got but sheesh. 

I may be one of the few people that did not enjoy Adam Driver’s choice of loose, almost flippant body language once he Decided to be Good. The way he shrugs when he comes face to face with the Knights of Ren? It was annoying. I thought that, even though he was trying to change, he shouldn’t have dropped the intensity Kylo Ren has had up to this point. It just...rides the line of being a completely different character, and that’s not fair to the narrative. because ben solo is not a different character. ben solo is kylo ren, and he killed his dad and committed multiple genocides. you don’t just like...shrug and huff and smile in life or death combat because you decided to toss your emosaber into the ocean.

other than that, i didn’t think that kylo ren’s ending was bad. giving his life to atone for his original sin? Resurrecting the future of the jedi after massacring all hope of a future for the jedi so long ago? and then promptly dying and not kissing anyone? i thought it was poetic. and let me tell you i’ve never been a fan of kylo, and i don’t think he was redeemed in this act, or absolved of his crimes. and yes i’m staying out of the main tag and have no idea what others are saying, but i thought it was a fitting end.

also....say what you will about the force bond, but that moment with the lightsaber? was undeniably awesome.

(okay okay, i was talking to my husband later, and he was like “i didn't see the kiss as romantic. I saw it as a moment of ‘i finally see you’ before he died” which i’ll go with, honestly.)

but also....the force bond shut out finn from the force narrative of this last movie. and it didn’t need to. which is annoying.

i’m confused about poe’s backstory (and also it’s racist). weren’t his parents heroes of the resistance? didn’t he grow up with the resistance? wasn’t this previously established? jj what are you doing.

I loved jannah and the defected stormtroopers. the fact that the whole battalion laid down their weapons together...just another ‘we are stronger together’ moment that had me weeping.

but also....why is jannah the one getting the moment about finding her parents, and rey gets like, sooooo many backstory dumps about her parents and no one even mentions the fact that finn’s parents are out there somewhere too?

red racer chick’s line ‘they took all the children years ago’ was just....so quietly heartbreaking. can she talk to finn? or jannah? or one of the others? do the people of the galaxy know that the stormtroopers that attack them are kidnapped, brainwashed child soldiers? do they know? do weeping mothers pull on stormtroopers’ guns during raids, pleading with them to bring their baby back? do stormtroopers know that they were once taken from loving families? do they know intellectually and just not realize what that means until they are deployed (and by that point in most cases it is too late)? i need more on these stormtroopers.

there was probably more to mention, but i’ve forgotten it...so summary: i enjoyed some of the themes, and extremely low expectations did a lot for my enjoyment of the plot. there was a lot of info dumping and strange pacing that could at least partially, if not mostly, be blamed on inconsistent vision from abrams and johnson, but like...you’re adults working on an enormous movie trilogy. freakin’ sit down and communicate, and don’t just try to undo what the other has done in the previous film. so i mean...i had fun with my dad and husband on a long holiday weekend, but it’s not like, a work of art or anything. and i’m not saying it has to be, but at least there was some attempt in this movie to continue threads of character development. ....for some of the characters. so. inconsistent, with crumbs of The Good Stuff, but not enough to make it an actually good movie.

also KMT deserved better.

[girl-with-a-quill]

CHAPTER 7 Notes-The Journey To Us

These are the notes for Chapter 7, chapter that you can find here: 

https://archiveofourown.org/works/8273341/chapters/37275146

NAME ORIGINS (with a side of head canons):

Ife: a name common in Ethiopia, meaning ‘Love’

Halima: A name with Arabic roots that means ‘gentle and humane’. Halima is part of the Omo tribe, within the Boudalan, who descended from the Ethiopian contingent. They adopted part of the traditional clothes the real-life Hamer tribe from the Omo River valley, since this is what the performers trapped with them were using. Halima doesn’t know, but she is a direct descendant of the kind Captain Ife Salim, whose name was later used as a title for the advisor and ‘second’ of the Gen. The Ife’s main function is to remind the Gen of the core values of their people when she has to make hard decisions, particularly those relating to fairness and solidarity.

Faizah: A name with Arabic roots that means ‘victorious’. The current Gen was fierce since she was a child and is considered a mighty warrior who has won many battles.  

Nuru: An Ethiopian name that means ‘born during the day’, but in this iteration of my made up ndeshonasleng it means more like ‘the awakened one’. Like all Blinkas who inherit the strange extra-sensorial perception abilities passed down from the group that came out of a lab in Delphi (chapter 6), she had the milky film on her eyes when she was born, so her mother named her accordingly. Her father was from the MasMas tribe (descendants of the Maasai dancers and the Kenyan contingent) and her mother was Ndeshona (the Zimbabweans), so she wears the blue and yellow colors of her mothers’ tribe (that Ndebele women still use today).

Nyanga: what spiritual healers are called by the Zulu. In Zimbabwe, the Shona call them N’anga, but it’s pronounced similarly. Nuru is the Blinka of the Boudalan and was trained as such just like Sybil, but also carries out many of the customs a Nyanga would have (the closest equivalent would be a shaman).

Gen: the real word for leader the Boudalan kru uses is ‘Ishe’ which means chief and Lexa used to address her at first, but the people kept the nickname Gen in reference to their first leader, the General of the peacekeepers.

 RANDOM TRIVIA STUFF:

Ndeshonasleng: The ndeshonasleng is a made-up language for this story, though it stems primarily from Shona and Ndebele spoken in Zimbabwe, with some Swahili, common English and the weird English the Subjects created mixed in. My headcanon is that with time, the different languages merged a bit, with Shona and Ndebele being the most predominant since those were the languages the General and the historian/cultural attaché spoke. The latter in particular would’ve made a conscious effort to keep their history, culture & languages alive by teaching the children that were born. She would’ve ended up using her own languages more often, though obviously the others (Swahili, Arabic, Oromo) became a part of it. It’s supposed to be a bit of a fusion but also borrowed some linguistic structure from Trigeda if that makes sense? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  LOL

Ishe Komborera: The Ishe Komborera Africa song they sing when they arrive at the mine is a song that was the national anthem of about 5 or 6 countries in Africa at different times, so it’s a very recognizable tune, regardless of what language they sing it in. Due to my parents job, I lived in Zimbabwe a couple of years when I was a tiny kid and used to sing this almost daily at school. It’s the only words of Shona I kinda remember, lol Here is how it sounds (with the most hilariously random video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTjurMoqdYE

Libraries, maps, roads and knowledge in the ancient world:

Records: When William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, conquered England in the 1066 and became its king, he later commissioned the Domesday Book, a massive survey that recorded the population and ownership of every piece of land in England. Not unlike Lexa’s effort to map and create registries of everything in the Coalition. The Egyptians and the Romans were other civilizations that rose to such heights in part because of their almost obsessive and meticulous organization and effort to keep record of things: land, population, crops, etc.

Maps: The same crazy Normands eventually also were behind the famous Tabula Rogeriana, which was a world map with descriptions of each territory, created by the Arab geographer, Muhammad al-Idrisi, in 1154. Al-Idrisi worked on the commentaries and illustrations of the map for fifteen years at the court of the Norman King Roger II of Sicily. The text incorporates exhaustive descriptions of the physical, cultural, political and socioeconomic conditions of each region and each of the seventy sections has a corresponding map. It was a compilation of maps of the known world that remained the most accurate for 300 yrs! So what Lexa did in the previous chapter and is briefly mentioned here, with mapping out all the clans and lands, is not at all impossible and in the tradition of great visionaries.

Libraries: Ancient Egyptians wanted the Library of Alexandria to house all human knowledge and to do that, they did some pretty crazy things. They invited and funded scholars from Greece and elsewhere to come live there so they could produce more manuscripts. They made a law that all ships docking in Alexandria had to turn over all books aboard, so they could be copied by the scribes and then they would return the copies and keep the originals, lol. They hired book hunters to sail all over the Mediterranean to find more books to bring back. They even stopped exporting papyrus to other countries so only they could centralize the making of more manuscripts and scrolls! Also, the library not only housed scrolls, but also had lecture halls and classrooms, as it was a center for learning and producing knowledge. They did all this in 283 BC, that’s 2,300 years ago! Though the ancient library is gone, they built a new one on its supposed site and its magical. I went there once and had a super nerd-gasm.

Egyptians not only had the greatest library in the ancient world, with the library of Alexandria, but they also had a place called the House of Life. It was where priests learned to read and write, the place where scribes were trained, and where the children of the rich and the elite went to school to learn economics, law, astronomy, geography, mathematics. It was where the interpretation of dreams was taught. And, it was where papyrus with medical texts were housed and medical students would be taught by head healers, priests and scribes. You had to be a scribe first to a be a doctor, and they had both male and female doctors, mind you. I only recently found out about this House of Life, looking for examples that could demonstrate that the Library in Polis, the Keeper of Words, the scribes and judges training in Delphi, all that, could be plausible in less ‘advanced’ civilizations like the grounders if we were doing this way back in the day!

Roads: The via romana was the network of roads built by the ancient Romans throughout their history, some of which was so well built, parts of it still exists in many places throughout Europe and all the way to the Middle East. At its peak, there were 29 military highways radiating from the capital, and the late Empire's 113 provinces were interconnected by 372 great roads. The whole comprised more than 400,000 kilometres of roads, of which over 80,500 kilometres were stone-paved. It’s where the expression ‘all roads lead to Rome’ kinda came from. If the Romans can do it, so can Lexa! p.s. the map bellow just shows the main roads (during Hadrian’s period) to give you an idea of the enormous scale of the whole thing.

Boudalan cities: they’re inspired by the style of construction of Great Zimbabwe, the amazing 11th century city that was the capital of the Kingdom of Zimbabwe for about 3 centuries, built by the ancestral Shona. Because the peacekeepers were in a mine with rocks and mining instruments, they used what they had to build the wall of their first ‘bunker’ and given that Amos, their engineer, was of Zimbabwean heritage, he used it as inspiration for the settlement they built after outside and then that became their style or sorts. Except even more grand given his knowledge of modern engineering, etc. At least, that is my head canon.

CheMin: The CheMin, short for Chemistry and Mineralogy, is an instrument on current Curiosity rover on Mars. It identifies and quantifies the minerals present in rocks and soil. It can tell if there was water involved in their formation, deposition, or alteration, and also to find potential mineral biosignatures or indicators for past habitable environments (where life could have existed basically). At least, that’s what google tells me. What do I know?!

XRD: It’s an instrument that uses X-ray powder diffraction to determine the atomic and molecular structure of a crystal without destroying it to do so. It would be the type of thing that is used to determine if it’s a carbon-based crystal, for example, though I don’t know if portable ones exist.

Mines: You know there is an actual Mine Museum in Butte, Montana. So if there is ever a nuclear apocalypse and you’re in the vicinity, you might try your luck hunkering down there LOL😂