#you're at war against these robots because like reasons or something

[leofromsomewhere]

clone wars high school au but the events of the show are actually happening in the d&d club

[emotionallyattachednerd]

Lose Controll ❙ TP Dreadwing x f!robot reader ❙ NSFW 18+

Word count: 1800+

Warnings: Smut ( rough interfacing and spike in valve ) dom Dreadwing and angst. NSFW 18+.

Notes: You asked for it anon and you got it. Really enjoyed working with this darling beast. Sorry for the delay. I decided to make the reader his significant other so hope that's alright. Also might've gotten a little dark and controlling along the way with a angst sort of end so hope that twist is alright. 🥰

Coffee ☕

The storm was harsh, nothing the war ship couldn't handle, but that's not what has you worried. Dreadwing wasn't answering his com and you weren't able to find him anywhere on the ship, and after what felt like yours you finally return to your private quarters and wait there for him, only to end up pacing the room, making you look like you've lost your mind. Perhaps you have.

Then finally, he returns, soaking wet that proves that he was outside for whatever reason. But he seems lost, broken, like not even the sight of you was enough to make him smile just a little.

"Primus...Dreadwing, where have you been? I've been trying to get a hold of you." Your words fade as you continue to gawk your optics at him while he passes you as if you weren't even there, and you don't like this one bit. "Don't you dare ignore me! What happened?"

"Nothing." That wasn't convincing.

"Well something happened to put you in this sour and miserable mood. Why have you been ignoring me?" You continue to throw questions at him, both annoyed and worried for him.

Watching him sit on the berth and keep his optics averted down on the floor before you approach him, your tone lowered when you see that he's hurting. "Darling, please talk to me."

"I don't want to talk about it." His tone is gloomy, his optics still not meeting your gaze.

Talking about emotions wasn't his thing, you know this already, and on a rare moment he might open up as you will too. You were together, not bonded, but you've been through a lot over the past years together. You loved him and always stuck by his side no matter what. When he found out about the news of his twin brother it broke his spark, though he didn't show his mourning for him to anyone else but you. Now here you both are as you try to get through to him.

"Alright, fine." You sigh before stepping in front of him and touch his shoulder plating lightly. "How can I help you? I'll do whatever you want."

"Anything?" He sounds curious.

"If it helps you, then yeah."

The silence lingers in the room, a calming peace you might call it, and a part of you thinks you might've gotten through and he'll open up about what is bothering him, at least this is what you had hoped for.

Dreadwing finally looks at you, optics staring into your own, like he's trying to start a flame between you both. This confuses you as he's never looked at you in such a way before. He looks almost feral, a beast slowly crawling its way out right before you.

"On your knees."

"Excuse me?" You're baffled by his demand.

"On. Your. Knees."

This time he grabs a tight hold on your arms, tugging you off the berth to stand in front of him again. You feel your vents hitch from the sudden action and the growing tightness he held, your entire frame tense as you stare at him. There's no emotion in his face, nothing.

You finally moved onto your knees, slowly sinking, with your optics fastened onto his own as you kneel before him. He retracts his panel and his enormous spike springs out into your view, hard and throbbing close to your face.

"Use that mouth of yours."

"Are you being serious?" You have to ask him, because this is beyond the Dreadwing you know. He may look tough, primus he is strong and a skilled warrior, but when it's just the two of you he's always gentle and loving to you. Never controlling or dominant. What's happened that has changed him?

His answer is by gripping the back of her helm and pulling you towards his erect spike. His leaking tip brushes up against your cheek plating leaving a trail of trans fluids and making you give out a short grunt from the contact. He's dead serious.

Your servos are placed over his upper thick thighs, digits digging into the soft metal armour, throwing him a stiff stare, before taking his spike in your servo and giving him a tug along his throbbing base. Whatever got him riled up, you'll help settle him back down.

Shuffling forward you coil your glossa across his leaking tip and give him a firm suck, swallowing his leaking trans fluids with a satisfied hum before you start to slowly take more of him. Working both your servos at his base you feel every throb and ridge running along him, you mouth opens wider so you can take more of him, using your glossa to glide across every bumpy ridge, slowly bobbing your helm down along his spike and taking as much of him as you can.

You almost had him all the way, but his size doesn't seem to make that possible so you gently squeeze and pump what you couldn't take and start to move your mouth along him, every pulse from his cable vibrating against your glossa.

As you work him you hear his heavy moans lingering deeply in the air. You can't look up due to him having his servo pressed behind the back of your helm, at first pushing you only a little against him forcing you to relax your intake as best as you can.

You think to yourself that you may as well use this moment to get off yourself as you dip your servo down between your thighs where you've already retracted your panel and your valve was eagerly waiting to be touched. Letting out a fluttering moan you rub your sensitive node and press a digit into your depths, working yourself as you suck Dreadwing off following his demand you continue to try and give him the best damn blow job you've ever given him. It's not often you go down on him, he always likes to frag you face and face, more romantic like.

Not tonight.

He suddenly pushes you down on him more, forcing a whimpered gag to leave you while you focus your intake to relax more for him as you pump two digits into your soaking valve.

This changes when he stands up abruptly and thrusts his large hips against your mouth, forcing another muffled whimper out of you as he keeps both servos against the back of your helm as he pretty much face frags you, small drops of his trans fluids escaping from the corner of your mouth and pooling against the floor.

He only does this for a moment before he lets go of your helm and you pull away, coughing and venting harshly while feeling both aroused and a little overwhelmed by his actions.

In the silence he tugs you up a little harshly, kissing you firmly, before pushing you against the berth, face down. This is also new. With more silence he positions you the way he wants, pushing your shoulder down and lifting your waist up so your aft is level with him, kicking your legs apart and positions his leaking tip against your valve.

He thrusts, firmly, his frame pressing up against your aft as he fills you completely. The stretch is sudden causing you to hiss out. Dreadwing is rather thick, which you love, but everything is just so different tonight as your mind is sent into a frenzy by both Dreadwing and the growing arousal that boils through your frame.

There's a tight hold at your hips before you feel him snap his waist into you over again, spike firmly entering and leaving you over again. Your body rocks against the berth, scraping metal hitting your audios as you try to relax yourself and hold onto anything for leverage.

"Frag...Dreadwing." You sob his name mildly through your burning arousal. He's fragging you so firmly, rutting against your aft like a feral beast in heat. Each smack, each grunt given by him, it adds to your own arousal, already feeling yourself stimulated by his surprising actions as you lay there and take it like a good femme.

Both his fluids and your own mix together, running down your legs and pooling against the floor, the berth creaking with every harsh movement given to you by him.

His grip doesn't loosen, in fact, it's tightening, and you know without a doubt you're going to have dents left against your hip plating. Dreadwing, your love, your handsome warrior, fragging you to his desire, using your body and letting out whatever anger that was trapped in him out through you. His heated grunts only grew more feral, spike throbbing like crazy, and you know he's getting close.

He's on your back than, his intense fragging never ceasing. His fierce growls filling your audio making you quiver with ambition, growing a liking to the rough treatment that you respond very positively through. Than it happens.

You feel yourself break loose through a rapid overload as it erupts through your entire frame and sends shocks through Dreadwing's throbbing spike. His harsh vents crackle as his movements stagger before he collapses against your back, full weight, forcing a grunt out of you as his warm fluids fill and soak your depths.

Your body lays there front first against the berth with him laying on top of you, his weight slowly starts to strain your own so you try to shift out from under him. He gets the silent message and finally removes himself from you, only for you to hear him making soft half broken sounds. He's crying.

"What the frag?" As much as your valve aches, your concern was on Dreadwing again. Despite what happened just now, you didn't care. You both got off, overloaded, it was fine and you did get aroused by the change.

Dreadwing is almost curled up against the berth before you are at his side, caressing his face plating and holding him close as you settle yourself against his side, letting out comforting purrs into his audio to try and give him any form of comfort that didn't have anything to do with interfacing.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be, it's fine."

"I hurt you..."

"You didn't." You say to him, trying to be convincing. Maybe he did, but you weren't mad about it. A little rough interfacing was fine. "I'm fine, I promise. Now please, lay down. We'll talk more after some recharge, and you're going to explain everything." Perhaps he might open up once he's gotten some good nights rest.

Finally he's listening and you both end up curled up in the berth together, him clinging to your side with his helm resting against your chassis. All you can do is continue to stroke his helm and let out soft purrs that he seems to be liking.

"I love you, my beautiful warrior." You hear him say next, making you smile calmly.

"As I love you, darling."

The storm outside eases, but another is already starting to brew.

[cerastes]

How do you rate the gacha booty shooter?

NIKKE sure is a game! It's the funnest mixed bag I've played lately. As a side game, it's been pretty good, because it's good at what it does good, and not terrible at its weak points, leaving you with a pretty "Ok :)" feeling overall.

So what's up with Nikke? Yeah, let's have a talk about that so I can explain a bit by what I mean with "fun mixed bag".

Nikke's setting is the same old tired, you've seen it a million times: Once day, humanity was almost decimated by a mysterious enemy that came out of nowhere... We call it... The Enemy! They were simply too strong, so humanity had to deploy its strongest weapons: Anime Girls. And you are the lucky Authority Figure that commands the Anime Girls to defeat The Enemy! But... The Enemy and Anime Girls have more in common than it seems...!?

Replace "The Enemy" with "Rapture", "Anime Girl" with "Nikke", Authority Figure with... Technically "Commander" but more on this in a bit, and you've got Nikke. In other words, the game's setting and premise are just a few word swaps away from being Punishing Gray Raven, Snowbreak, and a bunch of other properties. But here's the thing: Whereas Punishing Gray Raven tells you its story with all the charm and pizzazz of a Wikipedia article, and Snowbreak... Uh, stands there staring at a wall Blair Witch style because nothing ever fucking happens in Snowbreak, Nikke actually has good moment to moment flow. Allow me to elaborate.

Read More break here because I wrote a lot more than I intended:

Nikke has probably the dumbest premise to open with: The Nikkes are basically superpowered cyborg girls (war machines with human brains) that look like supermodels on purpose because they were created, in the game's own words, "with the ideal form in mind". That's all a wordy way of saying they are super hot girls with very powerful guns and superhuman physical capabilities. The dumb part is that Nikkes are treated like absolute shit in-universe by humans. You're telling me humanity is making cyborgs -- not even full on robots or AI, these are straight up people getting turned into weapons -- that are hot as fuck and have tits bigger than my head and asses that could crush cars under their sheer heft and then decided to hate them and treat them like shit, and also these cyborgs are the ones actually keeping humanity alive? Well yeah we need a reason for the Main Character (you!) to be Special and bond with them, so your thing is that You Don't Treat Nikkes Like Shit. In fact, you care for them.

Now, this is all absolutely fucking stupid, but then, the game sort of... Realizes how stupid it is? And some may say "this was always the plan" but to me personally it feels like they kinda realized how god damn stupid this all was as a premise, and they started veering the car mid-trip because for a while this all feels REALLY sincere, not in a foreshadowing way, but then you have some developments such as "no yeah, Commanders are a dime a dozen, are brainwashed into seeing Nikkes as walking garbage and that they'll be heroes, risk their lives for pennies and are extremely expendable", and there's also what I consider a really good and consistent thing the game has done: Nikkes were always a desperate last minute rushed product as a concept, so the safety measures in place so that they don't rebel against humans were never perfect.

This is what I mean by the moment to moment being good: The plot is absolutely whatever, the setting is something you've seen a million times, but the actual scene by scene, beat by beat, is fun. On the micro level, the game knows how to be entertaining and interesting, and when they expand these micro nuggets of gold to a macro level of writing, it's when they end up with their best bits of narrative and world building. I want to use two examples about the whole safety measures thing: Crow and Rose.

Crow is a Nikke that hates humans and is part of a squad of known dangerous elements that Missilis, the most irresponsible of the Big Three companies, is responsible for. This squad is Exotic, and Exotic works with you (your squad is named Counters) on this one mid-game chapter. The thing is, they never really intended to work with you, and Crow wanted you dead because Crow wants to spark a Human Vs Nikke conflict in the Ark (humanity's last big home), because you might quell the hostility between both sides. But, Nikkes can't intentionally kill humans (accidents happen and a Nikke may be ordered to subdue a human, but they are hardwired to not be able to shoot at them or kill them). So, how does Crow go about it when she betrays you? She has her squadmate Jackal plant a steel plate on the ground, and then shoots the plate in a way that the bullet ricochets and hits you. NIMPH, what's used to, among many other things, make sure Nikkes can't turn on humans, was so, so easily circumvented, and this is consistent with what we've been told about the Ark and Nikke in universe development in general: It's sloppy, it's lazy, it's not good. Rose, the other example, is a Nikke from a flashback story around a hundred of years before the start of the game. Rose was a prototype Nikke that was geared for melee combat instead of ranged combat, as all Nikkes are, and she was one of ten such units. Basically, Rose realized that their human Commander was intentionally trying to get them killed until one remained, which would be deemed the success of the line in Darwinian fashion. Rose got so immensely, justifiably angry at this that she plotted to kill the Commander. How can she do this, though, with the NIMPH that prevents her from doing so? Well, Rose was an actual swordmaster, and what she did was wear a blindfold, convince herself that what she was slicing was not a human, but a Rapture, and then she easily killed the shit out of him, unimpeded by her system. The NIMPH, end of the day, is sloppily made, highly dependent on the mental state of the Nikke, and easily circumvented. This is a very important plot point throughout the story, and the way they show this in multiple ways is really good.

Another thing I like is how the game goes about the player's title. It's technically "Commander" but the truth is, most every single Nikke calls you a different way relative to your relationship with them or their impression of you. Rapi and Anis some of the few that call you Commander, because they are in fact your subordinates, but Rapi says "Shikikan" while Anis says "Shikikan-sama" in a sarcastic way initially and after a while in an affectionately playful way, Neon calls you "Master" (Shishou) because she likes the way you use firepower, Liter calls you "Greenhorn" because you are, well, that in her eyes, Moran calls you "Partner" (Ototou, "little brother" in Japanese) because she's the head of a crime syndicate and she considers you as a cool person under her protection, the sports inclined ones call you "Coach", the school themed ones "Teacher", Viper, the flirty one, "Honey" or "Darling" depending on the scene, and so on, the old timey Scarlet calls you "My Lord", the religious Rapunzel uses "Believer", and the coarse, rough around the edges Snow White just uses "You" (Omae). It's a great touch that I like when it's done.

So, basically, you have a charming combination of a setting that's been overdone infinite times with plot beats that vary between legitimately good (the NIMPH and its logistics) and legitimately bad (Whatever the fuck Chapter 18 was, to name one case), and moment to moment that's really charming and entertaining.

The gameplay is honestly extremely unbalanced, and the sheer disparity in strength between units of the same rarity makes you wonder if they have anyone in the team that actually cares about balance, but honestly, putting the issues of balance aside? It's fun to point at stuff and shoot a million bullets and rockets, and they even get pretty creative with the fights sometimes in terms of enemy types and how they use them against you, so gameplay balance is awful, gameplay itself is suprisingly good for how simple it is.

I know people are going to be like "Dreamer, You Didn't Even Rate The Asses" so okay here:

First of all, the ergonomically perfect ass of the VIXEN that lured me into the game in a moment of weakness, Scarlet:

And next up, the Clothed But Massive Ass of Snow White

In fact, I appreciate the variety, because if it was just bare cheeks and panty shots, it'd be kinda whatever to me, but bodysuit ass and clothed but noticeably huge ass? Fresh, to be honest.

Also notable is that progress in entirely gated by passive production of resources and daily stuff because there's no stamina system. Bold!

But yeah feel free to ask more specific questions, but this is pretty much how I've felt about it.

[destinysbounty]

Yo what if you went off about s3, it'd be cool

The love triangle, the quick tech development, whatever you want, I wanna know what you think

(I saw you in the tags of that post, please gimme the analysies. pretty please)

The entirety of my thoughts on Ninjago's technology are long and vast and complicated, and I could probably make a full video essay on just that topic alone. But for the sake of simplicity, and also because I'm too lazy to write a 10k-word essay with screenshot evidence on why Ninjago tech isn't actually anachronistic, I'm going to just focus on the season 3 issue for now.

Now, one criticism that often gets lobbed at Rebooted is the matter of the technology. How did Ninjago suddenly become a hyper-futuristic technoscape in the span of what couldn't be more than a year? At first glance, I can understand how that might feel unrealistic. I used to feel the same way! But it actually makes total sense when you realize that this technology probably already existed, if only in a beta form, for years before s3 started.

But wait! If the technology already existed in some form, then why wasn't it used? Why did Ninjago only become a cyberpunk dystopia during s3??

The answer to that question is something that sounds like a no-brainer, but should probably be said anyway: just because a technology exists, doesn't mean it is democratized. That is to say, just because a society has made certain technological advancements, doesn't mean everyone in that society can actually access those advancements. Look at any country in our contemporary world - richer and more industrialized communities typically have better access to cutting edge developments, whereas more rural communities may not even have reliable internet access. Even Ignacia, which is one of the most rural communities we've seen in the entire show, was depicted as having landlines and telephone poles in the very first scene.

Moreover, it's reasonable to assume that robotics and digital technology has existed - and fairly advanced - for decades in-universe.

My evidence? The creation of characters such as Zane and Unagami. Both were invented roughly 40 and 20 years pre-canon respectively. Coding, and especially programming an AI like both characters are classified as, requires the existence of a computer. Which means that computers existed as early as the Serpentine War. (Unless Zane is the product of magi-tech, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Especially since Zane's original body also has other functions that, to my knowledge, wouldn't be possible without programming. For now, I'm proceeding under the assumption that Zane was created purely with technology.)

For these reasons I would argue that certain technologies, and in particular digital technology, have existed in-universe for a lot longer than we might think at first glance - but due to what appears to be some very extreme wealth disparity, technology has only recently become more widely accessible within the last few decades.

Think about it. Most human settlements we see are fairly small and rural, except for Ninjago City. Ninjago City is the only city we've seen on-screen in the entire series (with a few small towns here and there, but it's mostly just villages). And even then, the cost of living in Ninjago City itself is astronomically high. There's clearly something funky going on with this country's distribution of wealth.

With that in mind, it makes total sense that the tech we see in s3 was at least in development a lot earlier than anyone might realize. It's just that it was too expensive and exclusive for anyone in the general public to actually use it.

Now, let's look at this in the context of Rebooted.

Imagine you're a multi-millionaire tech mogul and the CEO of a very powerful tech company. The city is in shambles in the wake of an apocalyptic battle against Lego Satan. You take this opportunity to spearhead the reconstruction efforts. On top of being an impressive PR stunt, this is also great for business as it presents you with the perfect opportunity to populate the city wholesale with your own products: flying cars, holographic floating streets, AI vending machines, elaborate VR and AR setups, mechanical spider wheelchairs, the whole nine yards. The government probably even writes you a big check to make this process more accessible to your consumers - I mean, to the citizens of your the shiny new corporatocracy you may or may not have stumbled into creating. Whether or not you employed lobbyism to get this check is neither here nor there. After all, this is for the greater good! And to finally seal the deal that this city has become a Borg Industries outpost, you rebrand Ninjago City to New Ninjago City. This isn't just a city anymore, it's a corporate asset. It's an ad campaign. It's a way of life.

This also explains why all the tech mysteriously vanishes after s3 ends: supply and demand. A robot apocalypse is, among other things, bad for PR. I don't wanna think about the existence of a Lego Stock Market because that will hurt my brain, but a robot apocalypse is definitely what I would classify as a "black swan event" (an unpredictable crisis that severely disrupts the stock market). The company starts faltering financially because of all the public backlash, people stop buying and investing in their tech, their stocks start to crash, and Borg Industries has to roll back on their infrastructural monopoly. And so the technological status quo is (mostly) restored.

The theme of s3 isn't "technology bad" - at least, it shouldn't be. If you're as brainrotted as I am then the theme of s3 instead becomes, "maybe you shouldn't let one sole company have a total monopoly on your society's infrastructure because they might accidentally start a cyberpunk dystopia". And that is a...disturbingly apt moral for our current day and age (cough cough Amazon).

...can you tell I've been listening to The Fine Print by Stupendium on loop for too long?

[tgrailwar-zero]

Not really? Our physical body got wrecked a long time ago. We’re actually just voices given a humanoid shape by the Freyr. After we lost the Origin War we got sent into an endless repeating loop of holy grail wars and mindwiped over 6 billion times. Not to mention, I’m not even sure how much of The Interlopers was actually us and not just pre-programmed gunk considering our robotic nature back then.

Think of it like a computer where you replaced all the hardware after smashing it with a hammer, wiped the hard drive and software until it was dust and you had to buy a new one, and started it up again in an entirely different spot then last time. We got glimpse of memories in a dream, we were the ones trapped in their tomb, and we do feel responsible for their actions. So legally and morally, yeah, we’re The Interlopers.

Though we go by Patchwork Gestalt now.

DURYODHANA: "Alright then."

DURYODHANA: "Nope, he's dead. But that's part of why I called you here... alright, I'll only say this once, so listen up."

He cleared his throat, beginning to pace a bit, clearly preparing himself to be speaking for quite some time.

'I was summoned near the back end of the Origin War. Not by any official systems, but in the aftermath of where my Karna and that Arjuna had fought and ravaged the land. It was apparently one of the most grand battles of the Origin War, the two Archers putting everything they had against one another. Nobody knew who the 'victor' was. Some called it a stalemate with them destroying each other.'

'Anyways, I suppose the concept of a 'deadly clash between Pandava and Kaurava' and the dense magic in the land was a suitable catalyst. Maybe it was something else. Luck? Fate? Who knows. My Karna was already gone, but I figured I had to have been called for some purpose, so I began wandering.'

'When I found him... when I found Arjuna, he was already beginning to fade away. Whatever skill he had been surviving off of wasn't enough, he was starving himself of mana. Self-inflicted penance, if I know Arjuna at all. As soon as I arrived, he started talking. I didn't even have to ask. Frankly, I wasn't going to, but I guess he had something to say and he'd be damned if he vanished without saying it.'

'He spilled everything. How his mind had been taken by a dark curse, and the same had happened for his allies. How he had said and done unforgivable things in the name of a monster that his divine father had put his all into challenging. How his heart would never know peace, that sort of thing. Apparently, Karna had struck him with such a destructive blow that it served to temporarily shake whatever curse was on his mind and body, and he returned to reason. With that, he had tricked his Masters into using all three Command Spells on him in order to finish off Karna, and then- now that they had no formal power over him, he went into hiding. And, once he told me everything, he stated that he'd simply let himself fade away as penance. So I'd guessed right, because if there's one thing about the Pandava, they're predictable.'

'…With that lore dump dropped on me, I started to leave. Clearly he was dealing with his own stuff and it wasn't my problem. But he stopped me before I could leave his little pity cave to ask a favor.'

'He had discarded something important. That, if his Masters proved themselves worthy, could collect and assist them on their journey of redemption, if that's the path they chose to take. If they didn't, then it'd simply remain in stasis. Simple as that. He wanted me to guide them to that item. That if they ever broke free from 'his' curse and could enact justice, then it was rightfully theirs. He wanted me to lead you to it, since he wouldn't be able to.'

'I very reasonably asked, 'Why would I ever help you?' which I think is a fair question. We weren't exactly friends after all. I didn't owe him squat.'

'He responded, 'You don't have to do it for me, but you're a Heroic Spirit, and that monster is still out there. So please, I implore you, help me leave at least one legacy in this world that isn't darkened by violence. Be the hope for them that I couldn't be. Be the hero I was unworthy of being.''

'…'And if that's not enough, Karna gave his everything to protect this place for the sake of ending that monster. So if not for me, then for him.''

DURYODHANA: "Talk about a cheap shot. Though considering this is Arjuna we're talking about, 'cheap shots involving Karna' are his trademark."

'Still... At that point, I knew he was desperate. Entrusting his hopes and dreams to me? His legacy, to me? Me, his enemy? The man was so damn earnest that I didn't have much of a response to that one, so I agreed to his terms. He laid out everything, I committed it to memory, and then I left him to whatever fate he decided for himself.'

DURYODHANA: "...That's the long and short of it. I figured if I used one of Arjuna's epithets, it'd eventually lead you to me. Plus, it didn't hurt to hear a bunch of people singing my praises like that. But I still don't know if you're 'worthy', and I figured this was a good enough chance. If you can't win this tournament, then what hope do you have to beating that freak in the Moon Cell?"

MUSASHI: "Oh, Archer..."

[fountainpenguin]

130 Reasons Why I'm Fairy Trash

🧡 Orange Train Collection - AKA, High Fantasy

(July 2016 - Ongoing)

"What? Everyone in my family? Including me? No, I'm not a witch." "Oh, but you must be. You see, I only talk to witches, and only when I want to. Ask your grandmother." Kevin bit his lip. "But–but magic isn't real. I'm going to be a scientist who builds robot friends and babysitters. And before I do that, I'm going to be a dentist until I can support myself on robots alone. I can't be a witch!" The cat winked. "Sure, hon. And I can't be a korrigan who broke Da Rules by falling in love with a crazy Fairy-hunting human. Guess we're both a bit insane."

- FOP works with a heavy focus on high fantasy worldbuilding, regardless of character or genre.

- Also, deep dives into bits of lore that I think are acquired tastes.

- I've moved all 'fics that qualify here, even if they're not 130 Prompts, so browse or avoid at your preference.

⭐ Any Rating - Everything in the 130 Prompts is G or T. However, Orange Train is a catch-all that can include M or E

Read on FFN | Read these works on AO3

130 Sums | Full 130 Prompt Series (AO3) | Other Arcs

Cloudlands AU - Detailed warnings & other AU info

#130 arc guides - More posts like this

More Fairly OddParents 'fics

What goes in Orange Train?

- Cloudlands AU Worldbuilding: Condensed Version ⭐ If you're easily squicked, consider reading either the above link and/or the Cloudlands AU warnings above before proceeding. If those are too much for you, you won't want to see what's under the cut. Orange Train details below. This post contains simple explanations of Cloudlands AU worldbuilding, like anatomy and culture. -> Ex: There's an explanation of how to rescue a baby from a pouch, which is the same way joeys are rescued from dead mother kangaroos IRL, because that does happen in a 'fic in the Orange Train series. This and other descriptions below may be upsetting to read unless you're mentally prepared. #Long post [7,800 words]

Author writes about complex non-human societies and does not inherently condone any viewpoints presented by characters or the societies they live in.

⭐ Reminder: Any rating. #ScarletPenguin

Works marked as 🧡 Orange Train contain deep explorations of high fantasy worldbuilding.

The purpose of the info below is to give a heads up for many deep worldbuilding details in case you find something here that squicks you out (so you can decide to avoid Orange Train works when reading actual 'fics).

- C-C-C-Combo! - Fairly OddParents, Danny Phantom, T.U.F.F. Puppy, and Bunsen Is a Beast all co-exist in the Cloudlands AU timeline.

-> A T.U.F.F. Timeline

-> How the Four Hartman Shows Co-Exist

- War Scenes - Bickering, politics, action, setting damage, manipulative schemes, and main character injury

Ex: The war from Season 7's "Balance of Flour" confirms Anti-Cosmo was an adult with a position of power during the war (He played Tiddlywinks against Jorgen in the original attempt at a truce before they switched to the annual bake-off). Thus, it's heavily implied all our main cast fae were old enough to fight. The May Blossom War messes up the Earth to the point "T.U.F.F. Puppy's" animal races become the dominant species (See above)

-> Wars of the Fae

Timmy's Secret Wish - Timmy freezing time for 50 years is canon in Cloudlands AU. Every 'fic accounts for it as appropriate

-> Ex: People get confused when trying to remember how long ago an event happened

-> The Burger World employee (Kenny) wasn't affected because he wasn't on Earth until Season 7 (See also, "Shouldn't Have Survived"). He appears again in Season 10 and my 'fics depict a slide towards him getting more and more confused. Don't worry about it.

-> Poof aged only when he wasn't on Earth (with Foop tied to his life and aging alongside him).

Jimmy-Timmy Power Hour - The crossover is also canon, but Jimmy Neutron and friends continued aging since they're from a separate dimension. Timmy and his friends call it The Bulgyverse.

Technically, the canon is that there is a Jimmy (and a Carl and a Sheen, etc.) who exist in Timmy's version of the world, but he's not doing high tech stuff on a planet-affecting scale (His chaos is localized to Retroville).

-> The Timmy that does exist in the Bulgyverse doesn't have Fairies, but genuinely does have fairy-like computer programs.

That said, Shirley's pizzeria is canon and it has an entrance in both dimensions. It appeared in Come What May Chapter 4 ("The Pizza Place Where Worlds Collide"), where we saw it had portals to... Well, any Nickelodeon or Nick Jr. show you could think of.

-> No one really uses them, so it's just a giant thing we lampshade. Kevin Crocker finds it baffling, but the popular kids think it's a cool place to hang out.

It's worth noting that Evil Jimmy Neutron jumped from the Bulgyverse to Timmy's universe to escape his dying planet (J.N. episode "The Trouble with Clones").

-> In "Swim," he's seen hanging out with people on Unwish Island. He goes by James and gets a kick out of bothering Nega-Timmy.

24 Fae Planes - Fairy World and Anti-Fairy World have many layers. For example, Pixie World is very close to Earth, and Fairy World hovers above Giant Bucket of Acid World (in line with Season 7's "Crocker Shocker").

My 'fics depict characters traveling up and down. Notably, you need a Bridge (like the Rainbow Bridge) to go up a level, but you can drop down just by jumping.

The lower planes (where the show and most of my 'fic content takes place) are pretty stable, but the higher up the levels you go, the more wild the magic becomes. Nature spirits (such as Mother Nature, Father Time, and the Grim Reaper) live on Plane 23, which is sometimes considered to be Fairy Heaven.

Plane 24 has a magical life-giving fountain and is occupied solely by the nature spirit who embodies Reality. His ex-wife is the Hocus Poconos, who embodies Unreality. He never got over that break-up.

-> In Cloudlands AU, Foop was sent to Plane 24 after "Playdate of Doom" and had to make his way back down. Along the way, he got tangled up with alt versions of his parents from another reality who were very abusive towards him. That's known as his Pivotverse experience and it severely messed him up. He still flinches around his real parents even though he knows they're not the same people.

-> The 'fic about this is called Identity Theft, which has been planned for years but never posted because I'm indecisive :') ... Maybe I should make a separate AU for Pivotverse. I was just gonna keep it in this one 'fic, but it might be fun to do more.

-> Fae Cosmology

-> Overview of the 24 Fae Planes

Foop's alternate personality - Foop's alt personality is canon from Season 7 on (Most obvious in "Playdate of Doom" and "Spellementary School," but if you're familiar with details like their body language, traits like cheeks and eye highlights, and music cues, you can tell when they switch in many other episodes).

-> Ex: "Man's Worst Friend" is a pretty obvious one, and those elements are consistent in "Terrible Twosome" even though Foop was going through the Terrific Twos at the time.

-> In Cloudlands AU, the alter is named Hiccup. He's mostly nice, but very overprotective, VERY jealous, and increasingly bitter over time. He also has a sassy, savage streak and will just dunk on you for no reason.

-> Hiccup has a massive crush on Sammy Sweetsparkle and many other people, especially "bad boys." This includes Cavatina Sanderson (despite Cavatina's deep-seeded desire to kill Foop), so... y'know. It's fine.

The Refracted - Gold and white bird people exist in this universe. They tend to be holier-than-thou and see Fairies and Anti-Fairies as impure. They keep to themselves in the upper planes. They're a hunting and gathering people due to their bird biology; they don't have cities.

They're allowed 3 Robes who sit on the Fairy Council (the Peach, the Rose, and the Lilac), but they never show up as a protest for being "above" this.

Artemis Cairo (Chief Sunchosen) is the de facto leader, but only if you take her seriously. She founded a town called Town. It's going great. Artemis appears as a child in Frayed Knots and an adult in "Think Positive." Jorgen, H.P., Anti-Cosmo, and Anti-Sanderson are all a bit intimidated by her.

Pixie refracts are based on the purple-crowned fairywren, so they're purple and brown (paralleling the canon from "Clash With the Anti-World" where anti-pixies are green with yellow hair).

-> Class Overview: The Refracted

-> #Pious gold and white bird people yep

-> Old art of Chief Sunchosen & Dame Sanderson

Courts - Fairies and Pixies belong to the Seelie Court. Anti-Fairies and Refracts belong to the Unseelie Court.

-> In Cloudlands AU, this doesn't mean much beyond giving us a nice collective term for Fairies and Pixies when discussing their insect biology. Very common terms in 'fic.

Drakes & Damsels - Terms for male and female Fae, respectively. Mentioning because I'll use those terms in this post.

Non-Human Biology - The Fae have insect, bat, and bird biology. This includes reproductive parts. They're technically marsupials and have pouches like sugar gliders.

-> Poof and Foop shed their exoskeletons and took more humanoid bodies in "Evolution Hopeful".

-> My Fae have a very detailed breathing system intertwined with their magic. See also, Fae Magic.

-> Fairies are elastic and heal very quickly. Some of their play can seem very violent to humans (Ex: Wanda playing "Wandaball" in the last 10 seconds of Season 1's "The Same Game," which is a game where she bashes Cosmo's head with a cinderblock and laughs about it). Cosmo demonstrates quick healing in Season 5's "Fairy Idol" by jabbing himself in the eye several times.

-> Fairies can only be killed by non-magical means (Inspired by episodes like "Abracatastrophe" where magic doesn't affect magic along with "Poltergeeks" and "Scary Godcouple" where Cosmo and Wanda nearly die to sharp blades and the Crocker Pot, respectively).

-> Fairies turn to dust when they die (Inspired by "Fairy Idol," where Jorgen thinks Cosmo and Wanda are dead when he finds dust on their beds, his exact line being "No! They've turned to fairy dust!").

--- Anti-Fairies turn to smoke (a nod towards Foop being born from a smoke cloud). Refracts turn to mist.

-> Anatomy is played more realistically than in the show. For example, wings flap. Also, Anti-Fairies have claws and opposable toes. The common anti-fairy subspecies (who are based on Mexican free-tailed bats) have white toes and longer tails than the usual puffs of their species.

--- Fun Fact: My Anti-Fairies are based not only on bats, but also pink fairy armadillos! They have scutes protecting them from Fairy magic (which isn't supposed to affect them in canon) and Cosmo and Wanda's magic bounced off armadillo scutes in Season 7's "Teacher's Pet". However, Anti-Fairy bellies have soft hair and that's where they CAN be affected by magic. That said, I tend to draw them fluffy because I like to.

-> Fairies sweat their excess magic constantly. It secretes from their skin, creating a light magical veil preventing people from immediately recognizing magic unless they look closer. This is called the Principle of Observation and plays into episodes like "Nectar of the Odds" and "Crocker Shocker," where Cosmo released sweat and sparkles that could be used for magic.

--- Baby, You're a Rich Man and Pink and Gray are both good examples of this in practice.

--- Pixies are based on eusocial insects and swarm when they smell one of their own is injured. In Rich Man, Sanderson gets separated from H.P. and cuts his skin on purpose in the hopes his boss will find him. (It IS self-harm, but he's also elastic and heals quickly). Chloe accidentally triggers the swarming instinct in "This Is a Box" when she kicks H.P. in the face.

-> Forehead domes swing open and some sensitive parts are kept in there. Fae have cores, which are bits of magical enamel (like their crowns) that develop to reflect their personality. In canon, we saw that Wanda's is a radar [Multiple episodes], Cosmo's an empty storage chamber ["Mind Over Magic"], and H.P.'s is a laser cannon ["Fairy Oddlympics"].

--- Anti-Fairies' cores match their counterparts'. Also, it's worth noting Sanderson's is a pencil sharpener until he gets a core transplant late in Origin of the Pixies. If you know where this is going then you know where this is going.

-> In Chapter 2 of Frayed Knots, Anti-Cosmo rescues his "unborn joey" of a cousin from his dying aunt by cutting off the teat in her pouch (This is how you rescue baby joeys from dead kangaroos because their mouths are fused to the nipple in this early state).

-> Anti-Fairies have a type of embryonic diapause like actual bats. In other words, Anti-Fairy babies must reach 3 months of gestation, after which they will be born the following Friday the 13th. It's possible for an Anti-Fairy to be pregnant for over a year depending on how far apart Friday the 13ths are.

-> All Refracts are born exactly 3 months after the host counterpart; my lore for Season 7's "Anti-Poof" is that Foop and their Refract counterpart (Poppy) were born the exact same day, so the smoke cloud that absorbed personality traits from Poof was much larger than expected.

Fairy Reproduction - In the old days, damsels would die after mating. Cupid's family prevents this by using arrows to deliver a burst of magic. Fairies don't mate often as it's painful for them (and they have heat cycles anyway, so they're only interested occasionally).

-> There's one scene in Origin of the Pixies where H.P.'s sister begs to know why he's so stressed about intimacy; he finally snaps "My pleasure isn't worth her suffering." Yeah, he's got issues with it...

-> Cupid's arrows force a mating couple's magic to turn yellow when they fertilize eggs. This is the only color of magic that lasts after death (See also, Colors of Magic).

-> One of the plot points in Origin of the Pixies is H.P. having extreme anxiety that his offspring were fertilized with purple magic - which fades after death - because he was unable to hit yellow's joy requirement and Cupid's family never saw him because he reproduces asexually (and thus didn't show up in their records).

Fairy culture leans towards having separate beds for sleeping and mating. In fact, bedrooms have a special connected room for mating (the yidreamu) due to how important and precious it is for them, especially back in the day when a damsel knew she'd die (so mating was reserved for the end of the life as it was).

-> Damsels spend time recovering afterwards and cannot reproduce again during that cycle (though a drake can). Cosmo and Wanda used their yidreamu in "Repeat." In one Frayed Knots chapter, Anti-Cosmo hesitates to barge into a yidreamu even while searching rooms to check everyone had evacuated in a fire; it's so deep-seeded in their culture that he was embarrassed to even look at it.

The Fae have heat cycles; the common fairy subspecies (and the pixies since they're mutated common fairies) come into heat for 18 months just once every 500 years. Most of the time, everyday intimacy is snuggles and some kisses.

-> Fun Fact: Wanda and Cosmo hit their cycle in Season 5 (The season they both express interest in other people multiple times & leading up to "Fairly Odd Baby" as Season 6's debut episode). They're happily monogamous, but hormones are messy...

-> There are 35 Fae subspecies (if you include Pixies who were later separated into their own Class). Back in the day, Cupid's family organized all species in a list according to their heat cycles to make it easier for individuals to determine who was adjacent to them in schedule.

--- Unfortunately, this led to a deeply rooted caste system that still guides their culture today. (See Fairy Social Ladder).

Fairy damsels leave mating plugs (i.e. the part that breaks off and once upon a time would've led to their deaths, in line with their insect anatomy). This gets mentioned on very rare occasion, such as late Origin of the Pixies and Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Pixies.

-> Poof has a small crisis when he realizes he's spent his whole life writing fanfics with Fairies who mate like humans. Also, his roommate teases him by saying some people like to keep the plug as a memento (They do not... I think).

Will o' the Wisps - Wisps are one of the Fairy subspecies. They're a mutation of common fairies whose damsels recover quickly and can mate multiple times a cycle. Their genetics are horribly unstable and a lot of their offspring die, so... /double thumbs up.

-> Long ago, Cupid's family took the wisp holotype (Ilisa Maddington) captive and forced her to reproduce a bunch to preserve her species. Apparently, Ilisa mentally broke and would kill any of her offspring who didn't show the butterfly wing gene (believing they weren't hers), so... she had a rough life. We talk about her life a lot.

Wisp damsels keep harems and that leads to fanfic drama. H.P. was forced into one when seeking milk for baby Sanderson (Origin of the Pixies). He doesn't necessarily resolve the issues that come with this or have a healthy ending to that plot arc, but... it sure did happen.

-> Goldie is in training to be her species' ambassador (and required to uphold expectations regarding her own harem). She struggles with Harm OCD in "Watch and Learn."

-> Poof stresses out in some works (especially Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Pixies & "All I Ever Wanted") due to fears that Goldie doesn't respect his consent. Which he's afraid to bring up with her because of the aforementioned harm OCD she has in regards to her people being stereotyped as aggressive and forceful with their partners (and because his memory is pretty bad anyway since he's on peppermint so often).

--- Yeah, there's a lot going on. Read my Poof/Goldie works with caution 😬

Pixie Reproduction - Pixies have obligate asexual reproduction that kicks in when they're adults due to their Wolbachia pipientis infection (i.e. the real-world bacteria that causes many insects to reproduce asexually). All pixies are genetically identical to H.P. (with one exception).

-> The main plot point in Origin of the Pixies is H.P. trying to figure out what is happening to him and how to take care of all the pixies he produces (1 every 500 years in line with his heat cycle, seeing as he's a common fairy with a mutation).

-> H.P. has one non-identical biological daughter named Commelina. If you can guess how that happened before we get there (considering Wolbachia destroyed his ability to reproduce the standard way)... congrats! It's pretty awful and he's extremely messed up about it :D

-> Sanderson has his eldest (Cavatina) during the Gray Train arc of the 130 Prompts series.

Anti-Fairy Reproduction - Anti-Fairies cannot reproduce on their own, as they're reflections of their Fairy counterparts. 3 months after their counterparts mate, Anti-Fairies are flooded with an incredible amount of hormones and magic (the honey-lock instinct) that immediately sends them out to find their partner and mate.

-> "But doesn't that cause a lot of trauma-" yes. They don't have a choice /fingerguns.

-> One of the main plot threads in Frayed Knots is Anti-Cosmo trying to outfox the honey-lock, with his grand plan being to find someone else to mate with when his instinct kicks in. Thus, he'll sire an offspring born outside these universal rules, who'll go on to be the host counterpart of a new Fairy-Anti-Fairy-Refract trio.

--- Frayed Knots has a lot of theming around this type of thing. For instance, when Anti-Cosmo explains this plan to Anti-Wanda, the first thing she does is point out that he lacks a piece of anatomy he needs to make that plan work (because Cosmo has it). We get nitty-gritty about that sort of thing.

-> Oh yeah, Anti-Cosmo also stole sperm and eggs from the Eros Nest while he was interning and fertilized them with his own magic. Things got pretty messed up. Don't worry about it.

Like bats, Anti-Fairy drakes have barbs on their reproductive organ, and Anti-Cosmo has no shame in narrating that. It's glossed over in Frayed Knots, but blatant in the E-rated versions of "Cageflight" and whatever else gets an E chapter. (Can be found in Red Train or under my ScarletPenguin pseud, but I'm not linking directly in this post).

Anti-Fairy drakes carry their baby for 13 days before passing it to their partner by pressing their bellies together. In "Think Positive," Anti-Cosmo mourns the death of his unborn son because he dropped little joey Foop while transferring him to Anti-Wanda's pouch

Anti-Marigold (Goldie Goldenglow's counterpart) is an anti-wisp. While will o' the wisps are famed for being temptresses who keep harems, anti-wisps often get taken advantage of due to their four pouches to hold four babies.

-> To clarify: Anti-Fairies are forced to mirror their counterparts and some Anti-Fairy drakes forcibly dump their babies on random damsels. This happens a lot with anti-wisps, who are looked down on for being moth-like instead of bat-like; it's also a nod to moths being prey for bats.

-> Anti-Marigold's crop top rides high enough to slightly show her four pouches when I draw her. Poof jumped a bit when he brushed his hand over them while putting a painkiller charm on her stomach in "All I Ever Wanted."

⭐ Fae Culture - #RD species ref - Long, detailed posts for each magical culture. /slaps each one- These babies can fit a good 20k words in each of 'em and they're perfect if you're interested in the nitty-gritty.

Fairy World's population consists of roughly 75% damsels and 25% drakes. Damsels are born more often because back in the old days, they would die after mating (like many male insects, though it's male Fairies who give birth in FOP canon).

-> In modern times, Cupid's family now shoots every couple with a burst of magic to ensure damsels don't die. On very rare occasion, someone slips through the cracks, but his family are extremely devoted to their job.

-> Cupid's family were blessed by the nature spirits and have incredibly intense magic. They split it between triplets and kill any of their own offspring who aren't born triplets (and forbid anyone other than the Triplet of the Morning from reproducing- See also, Cupid's family tree).

-> His family also run the Eros Nest: a zoo containing every fauna species in the universe, which appears in Origin of the Pixies and Frayed Knots when they kidnap H.P. and when Anti-Cosmo interns there.

-> It's worth noting that in Cloudlands AU canon, Cupid's married to a beautiful will o' the wisp named Psyche and his mom is not happy.

> 2020 post about ZZ & ZW sex chromosomes for Fairies & the masculinization effect of Wolbachia pipientis on Pixies [Parallel of IRL Wolbachia's feminization phenotype for infected insects]

-> 2018 post about Fairy, Anti-Fairy, and Refract views of trans members in their culture & types of body adjustment magic

--- tl;dr - The Fae envision several different sexes. Fairies see gynes and drones as sexes alongside kabouter drakes and kabouter damsels. Anti-Fairies have a special designation for neurodivergent individuals [Ex: Anti-Cosmo's divus displacement disorder, which is an Anti-Fairy parallel of bipolar disorder that he treats with pheromones; Anti-Fairy culture believes he has a nature spirit tangled with his soul and sharing his body]... Lots of little nitty-gritty going on there, always traced back to Anti-Fairy zodiac culture].

That said, Fairies are supportive of gender transitions because they believe suppressing yourself weakens your magic and/or causes harm to your health [Magical back-up is part of their culture; they get nervous]. They're very big on being yourself.

--- Anti-Fairies believe in reincarnation and take body dysphoria as proof of their beliefs. They believe souls have no gender, but it's your role as someone experiencing many incarnations to take each one seriously and love the body and role given to you. Some people criticize this belief due to the possibility that this is just a way for the extremely patriarchal Anti-Fairy culture to keep damsels submissive because "it's their fate right now; they'll have their chance when it's their turn to be drakes; we all take our turn."

Generally, Anti-Fairies [who follow Zodii beliefs] consider it an insult to the nature spirits to change your body. This doesn't just mean gender presentation, but everything- Their culture has strict rules about bodies, including only being allowed to shapeshift into one form your entire life (predetermined by lineage), they're only allowed to wear clothes in specific colors, their underwear needs to match the color of their year of birth on the zodiac, stuff like that.

--- Anti-Cosmo has a whole crossdressing arc in Frayed Knots where he convinces himself that changing his clothes is okay as long as he doesn't change his body. The nature spirits are incredibly fluid in their bodies and gender, so idk where the Anti-Fairies got the idea that it would be an insult. Lots of different cultures and beliefs!

--- The Refracted are not very supportive of trans individuals, but I don't know what you expected because they think everything in life is sinful except breathing, praying, and eating. Owning possessions? Learning to read? Practicing magic? It's all bad.

--- Pixies don't really know what's going on in their bodies. They're designated drakes at birth due to having reproductive parts historically associated with ZZ chromosomes, but some pixies have ZW chromosomes and don't know it. That's just the way of Wolbachia! Wilcox and Smith are two notable ZW pixies, Wilcox being the first one Wolbachia pipientis's masculinization property was discovered in (Frayed Knots) & Smith's pheromones giving him an attraction boost both for being a gyne and for having ZW chromosomes. Smith is the only ZW Gen 2 pixie gyne, so his 'double attractive' status is unique and everyone thinks he's sexy.

-> Cloudlands AU only rarely plays with transformation magic and gender (We do have some interesting cases like Foop using a pendant in "Blue Angel," which is a special type of indirect magic that flies under the radar in his culture; I write Foop as genderfluid as he gets older, and one of the most important Anti-Fairies in history [the first High Count] used they/them pronouns, so... It's an interesting culture to explore, but may not be for everyone).

--- If you're interested in gender magic, you might like Reedfilter Rules AU, where Anti-Cosmo flips between gender presentations using magic for comfort and enjoyment (As in, not for a scheme or joke); there are neat details about his culture's naming traditions and how they're fluid with his presentation. H.P.'s spouse in RR AU does a hard reset of identity every 500 years. A very different but equally interesting society to explore in 'fic.

Seelie Courters have pheromone-based cultures while Anti-Fairies have sound-based culture and Refracts have sight-based culture.

-> In "Minion," both H.P. and Sanderson were affected by the Fairy Elder's pheromones, as she is the most powerful individual in Fairy World. Just being in the hallway nearby flipped Sanderson into a calm, authoritative state and H.P. into a flirty one (with Sanderson unable to maintain his gray suit - instead changing it to yellow - and using hand gestures that H.P.'s "no fun" pheromones usually suppress).

-> Anti-Cosmo asked H.P. if he could translate the scents of candles in "Yellow Flower Number 9," to which H.P. replied that he was "trying not to" because "It's gross this close to Valentine's Day."

-> Anti-Fairies who kiff-tie with nature spirits (discussed below) smell strong to Fairies. In late Origin of the Pixies and Frayed Knots, Sanderson waffles on his loyalty to H.P. because Anti-Cosmo's scent is overpowering to him (since Anti-Cosmo is bonded with the Water spirit and Sanderson was born in a Water year).

-> Fairies can smell when a fellow Fairy is no longer a virgin, because it upgrades their pheromones.

Drake Fairies who eat a significant amount of jelly during their first 3 months of life develop into gynes, whose behavior somewhat mirrors queen bees IRL. They have freckles, attract drones to serve them, and fight each other to the death. Drones are attracted to pheromones; gynes and drones engage in preening behaviors (insect-like licking behaviors) that satisfy them both (Ex: It helps them breathe better because it straightens out their magic).

-> By "serve," I do mean things like errands and chores. In Cloudlands AU, gyne/drone dynamics are completely non-sexual (with very rare exceptions such as H.P.'s rival (Jean Reddinski) taking advantage of his drones in Origin of the Pixies, which is considered sexual abuse in-universe and he faces consequences).

-> There is a lot of face-licking and neck-licking in these 'fics; it's a whole thing, baby... They are bugs, your honor...

-> H.P., Big Daddy, Poof, and Finley (see the tomte section below) are all gynes. Most pixies (including Sanderson) are drones. Only one gyne in the immediate area can be dominant; others are submissive. One of the side effects is that they become more pliant to orders. Due to pheromone suppression, gynes are sterile unless they're the dominant gyne.

-> Gynes don't kill on sight, but their instincts flare up when a fellow gyne challenges them. In Origin of the Pixies, H.P. struggles not to kill his vice president and heir (Longwood) many times. Multiple characters die in my 'fics, especially during gyne fights.

-> Finley gets his aggressive urges out by playing video games. Finley is the dominant gyne over Poof and yes, it is incredibly dangerous that they're living together. Poof never refuses when Finley wants something from him because he lives in fear that Finley will see it as a challenge and decide to kill him. Poof would probably win because he's captain of the saucerbee team and Finley plays video games all day. But it's complicated...

-> Gynes tend to have strong-scented pheromones and are usually considered attractive. Insects tend to find non-virgin insects more attractive than virgin ones (If I'm recalling my research from many years ago correctly; I believe it was the pheromone change). It gets a lot harder for gynes not to kill each other if both have the upgraded pheromones; they're way more aggressive.

--- This is mentioned now and then, such as H.P.'s insistence that his vice president must stay a virgin until he's gone, or the huge spike in tension between Poof and Finley when Poof's pheromones flip to their non-virgin state (Finley has a disability preventing him from doing the same; see the tomte section below). It's... never a secret (especially among gossipy high schoolers) who is and isn't a virgin.

-> Reddinski was significantly more dominant than H.P. back in the day, and H.P. was unable to be near him without flipping to a completely different personality (influenced by Reddinski's pheromones) where he was more nervous and submissive (See the Origin of the Pixies chapters "Almost" & "Senseless").

-> The Anti-Fairy parallel of a gyne is a pilot. They don't have pheromones or special behaviors, but they have purple freckles and are born with black stripes on their face (two things Foop has in canon- his stripes of course being his mustache and goatee).

-> The Refract version of a gyne is a plume. They're born with blue "ribbons" above their brows that usually go down to their hips or even past their feet (think bird-of-paradise courtship decorations). No pheromones or behaviors here either, though pilots and plumes are generally considered flashy and attractive.

-> Frayed Knots Chapter 7 - "Full House" - Spellementary-aged Anti-Cosmo visits a hive estate after accusing his gyne principal of being abusive to his drones.

-> Preening Signals

-> Freckle Distribution in Gyne Fairies

Wishbirthed individuals are uncommon, but not unheard of. Their official designation is luz mala, or "bad light." Their magic is highly unstable and strong emotions affect their surroundings (as in "Fairly Odd Baby" or "Anti-Poof").

-> If I'm remembering canon correctly, Juandissimo and Poof are the only Fairies who've been shown to do magic without a wand (Poof in both "Terrible Twosome" and "School of Crock," Juandissimo when he snaps his fingers and sends a blast of magic from his fingertip to Cosmo in the latter half of "Fairy Fairy Quite Contrary."

-> Canonically, Juandissimo was unable to hold a job for long after he and Remy separated because he was constantly crying ("Remy Rides Again"); dialogue heavily implies Juandissimo's tears ruined the food he cooked even though such a thing presumably would've been subtle if he had human tears.

-> In Frayed Knots, Juandissimo interns at the Eros Nest and babysits Cupid (and his siblings). In both Knots and Origin, Juandissimo's arc is about his journey to becoming more confident after a lifetime of being shamed and looked down on for his status as a luz mala. In "Whatever," he has a breakdown and wails that he's good, not bad.

- Some Fae are born tomtes, meaning they can't use magic. In their society, this is considered a disability. Finley - the pixie who rooms with Poof, Foop, and Sammy Sweetsparkle at boarding school - is the most notable tomte character. His hat doesn't float and he can't fly because his wings can't sustain his weight.

-> Finley will die if he engages in intercourse because his body would not have enough magic to sustain his life. This comes up now and then, such as when his roommates chat about their love lives.

-> He will also die if he gives birth, which is bad news for a member of a race that reproduces parthenogenetically when they come of age :')

-> Finley can only use magic on Gray Tuesday, when the Head Pixie takes Santa's powers and splits them between all the pixies. Finley looks forward to this every year in his youth (Ex: "This Is a Box"), but grows sour as he ages since it reminds him of what he can't have.

-> As mentioned, Fairies (who have insect biology) must adhere to specific reproduction practices (i.e. Cupid shooting them) or they risk dying after intercourse. Finley's disability means Cupid's arrows won't save him (His body can't process that magic).

When they become godparents, Fairies link their magic with the appendixes of their godchildren. This helps them locate their godchild, get a better understanding of what they're wishing for, and allows them to draw energy- Wishes made by children are drastically more powerful than random spells Fairies can do otherwise.

-> Juandissimo screeched in pain in "Whatever" when his godchild was injured. In the opening flashback in "Looking Back," Juandissimo passed out when Remy went into shock from extreme pain.

-> Fairy Court removed Gary and Betty's appendixes at age 8 after the Pixies won the right to adopt them (Pink and Gray).

Anti-Fairy culture revolves around fate and the Fae zodiac. The zodiac plays a big role, so it's a good idea to become at least a bit familiar with this part of the lore. (See #RD nature spirits)

There are many nature spirits (Father Time and Mother Nature are good examples), but the zodiac spirits - 7 brothers who were imprisoned in their cloudland temples during war - are a very big deal.

The zodiac culture influences everything from what colors an Anti-Fairy is allowed to wear to whether they're allowed to be more dominant or submissive in intimate relationships. Childhood betrothals are very common, and seemingly random due to Anti-Fairies trusting in fate.

-> Anti-Cosmo (born in the Water year) has a crisis in Frayed Knots when he realizes he prefers being the submissive partner and is stuck in a culture where he's forbidden to do that except with Anti-Fairies born in either the Love or Fire years.

-> Foop wasn't betrothed as a child since he was in Abracatraz, but Anti-Cosmo discusses this in Frayed Knots (and is paired with a woman who isn't Anti-Wanda). Fairies find child betrothals especially strange, but it's important to the Anti-Fairies.

-> Anti-Cosmo and Anti-Wanda really want Foop (a scientist born in the Breath year) to marry Anti-Coriander (a doctor-in-training born in the Leaves year). Healthcare falls under the Breath spirit's domain and science under the Leaves spirit's domain, so in Anti-Fairy eyes, Foop and Anti-Coriander are in perfect balance and thus... their society's OTP.

In Frayed Knots, Anti-Cosmo turns his body over to the Water spirit once he becomes High Count (as is custom; this is called a kiff-tie). They struggle a lot to make that work.

-> Throughout the 130 Prompts (and other works about Foop), he grumbles about being raised with the expectation that he'll turn his body over to the nature spirit of Breath. He'll almost certainly be shunned if he refuses.

The Anti-Fairies who were dining with Anti-Cosmo in "Fairly Odd Baby" are called the camarilla court. There are 14 members if you include Anti-Cosmo and Anti-Wanda, so each of the 7 zodiacs are represented twice. The camarilla court advises the High Count and Countess; they play special roles like planning events and watching the border.

-> If the camarilla is gridlocked, ties are broken by another party: the First General (who wears a red cloak to represent Tarrow, the father of the zodiac spirits).

Karmic Weaves

Anti-Fairies care a lot about karma and the influence you have on others. A karmic weave is an ethereal manifestation of your influence on other people and when it shimmers into view, it takes the form of glowing rainbow clothing.

-> H.P. is known for having an especially dramatic one since he runs a shipping company (and because he's a head of state, and because all pixies can trace their ancestry to him, and because he influenced Flappy Bob who made the wish to change the planet, etc.)

-> See also, Karmic Weaves

-> Frayed Knots is named for Anti-Cosmo's karmic weave, which becomes tangled, frayed, and knotted as he spends his life lying about things that grow increasingly complicated. Anti-Cosmo is notable for deliberately "acting against his fate" (in his case, he lied about who he was betrothed to and it spiraled from there): something Anti-Fairies generally don't do, as trying to "dodge fate" is extremely taboo in their culture... which means he can never admit to his growing web of lies.

-> Foop and Anti-Marigold tangled their weaves during their Tarrow dance in "Watch and Learn." When their solid bodies reformed, Foop's hand was stuck inside Anti-Marigold's skin. They fixed it, but it was uncomfortable for all involved.

-> Anti-Cosmo took some of the Head Pixie's karma in Frayed Knots Chapter 27, "Tangled Threads", and used it to boost his own magic... which went poorly, since Anti-Cosmo's meddling tangled their weaves (and thus bodies) together, so they both fell off a building when A.C. tried to fly.

Anti-Fairies and bad luck - Anti-Fairies' role in the universe is to bring balance. They're genuinely cleaning up Fairy messes, but they're portrayed as the ones causing messes. Sometimes they do cause messes, but a lot of the time, they're the cleaning crew.

-> Anti-Fairies disperse stinky magic. If left to fester, it will become violent and attack; in Frayed Knots, we see this presented as if evil spirits or demons are leaping from another dimension to hunt people, especially Anti-Fairies (their favorite food). Fairies can't see these spirits (umbrae), so they don't really get it.

-> In other words, Anti-Fairies take something that could cause devastating harm to a person and disperse it into much smaller pieces of bad luck. They ARE sending you bad luck, but they're preventing things that could kill you.

-> They still do evil things, but I often portray Anti-Fairies as jealous, bitter, and lonely more than truly evil. The vibe I'm going for is people hating bugs or scavengers for being "gross and creepy" when in reality, they're important in the ecosystem. Sometimes they get angry and lash out... especially at Fairies (who've hurt, imprisoned, and shunned them for a long time) and humans (who can't really fight back).

-> In Frayed Knots, Anti-Cosmo trains as a demon summoner. He doesn't show much of this onscreen because... honestly, it's not as interesting as it sounds, but it basically means he's the emergency cavalry for his friend group to call in if things go wrong. He gets to call the shots and (against all odds) he's good at it.

Anti-Fairy culture is sociosexual (mostly themed around IRL bonobos). Physical touch is a very big deal for them, and they tend to be more open about sexual things since they can't reproduce unless their counterparts do.

-> "Physical touch" covers things like pressing bodies together, nipping at each other, roosting together, snuggling, bundling (i.e. wrapping wings around each other), and sexual things.

-> Fairies are stereotyped as "brawn over brains," especially since gynes fight to the death sometimes. Anti-Fairies are stereotyped as "brains over brawn"- Their culture isn't big on fighting. In "You'll Never Know," Foop challenged Anti-Cosmo to a duel and Anti-Cosmo remarked that he'd "raised a fairy."

-> There are 13 levels of intimacy important in their culture, ranging from friendly to letting nature spirits possess your body.

-> The iris virus is a sexually transmitted disease with a side effect of adding color to Anti-Fairy eyes. It's passed ceremonially between noble families, although Anti-Cosmo and Foop were born with theirs. Anti-Wanda got hers when she gained higher status.

--- In Frayed Knots, Anti-Cosmo has a meltdown over Anti-Wanda passing the virus to important figureheads in ceremony despite this being extremely ingrained in his culture for many generations... He's very jealous. "But doesn't he chronically cheat on her-?" Yes.

--- Anti-Cosmo's first heir (Talon) was born with red eyes. Foop displaced him by being born with colored eyes, as it's considered a blessing from the nature spirits (despite it being an STD he inherited).

--- Refracts also have red eyes unless they get the iris virus. In their culture, it's shameful to have the virus (even though they're also bound to the whims of the honey-lock and can't always choose their partner). Yay, victim-blaming! (We do not yay for that).

-> Anti-Fairies have a tongue-piercing culture... It's a nod to bats being one of the only animal species to practice oral, so you can probably guess how their barbs play into this.

-> Frayed Knots discusses sociosexual things, but glosses over some details (Ex: Anti-Cosmo tells us when he does ceremonial things with his friends, but doesn't give the nitty-gritty).

--- You can find alt versions of some chapters (Ex: versions rated E) in Red Train or under my ScarletPenguin pseud on AO3. It's not something I've posted much of historically because I think it's funny to write something as extreme as a sociosexual culture while censoring it, but maybe in the future.

-> We gloss over this culture pretty hard in the 130 Prompts, which is strictly G and T works. The in-universe explanation is that after the War of the Angels (Season 7's "Balance of Flour"), touch culture tapered a bit and during Foop's youth; it's currently in a numb "socioromantic" era and picking up its broken pieces.

Anti-Fairy culture is very patriarchal and much more sexist than Fairy culture (while Fairy culture tends to be more racist than Anti-Fairy culture).

-> They also have the 75% - 25% gender split, but interpret this as "Nature says drakes should have multiple damsels..." which is pretty in-line with their bat biology.

-> Colonies are led by creche fathers. In modern day, Anti-Cosmo heads the Blue Castle Colony and one of his responsibilities is looking after all the pups, even if they're not related to him. In his youth, that colony was led by High Count Anti-Bryndin, whom Anti-Cosmo considers his step-father (despite them not having a very close relationship... the feelings are not necessarily reciprocated).

-> When drake Anti-Fairies come of age, it's expected they leave their birth colony and join a bachelor colony. Anti-Cosmo depicts this in Frayed Knots. Damsels stay with the birth colony and technically become "one of the creche father's damsels" at that point until they're legally married to someone else.

-> In Frayed Knots, one of the reasons Anti-Cosmo chooses to overthrow Anti-Bryndin is A.C.'s discomfort with his leader coming on to people who don't want him to.

-> "Was it Anti-Wanda-" Yes (More or less). And his mom. And obligatory jealousy regarding his fiancée.

More Anti-Fairy details - They roost upside-down, their native language is Vatajasa (a language themed around clicks and squeaks), and they're forbidden to shapeshift into any form other than the single animal associated with their family line.

-> Changing yourself away from "your fate" is very frowned upon in Anti-Fairy society (and Fairy culture is all about embracing yourself).

Names are very important in Anti-Fairy culture; I believe Foop has 6 different names. Technically he's in the records as Nebula; Foop is a nickname, plus he has names like Anti-Poof and so on.

-> Anti-Fairies use names given by their parents when they're young (which is also given to the Fairy counterpart as their middle name, thus allowing Anti-Fairy parents to name their kids). They switch to their anti-names when they become adults. Those given names then become their "private names" and are to be spoken aloud only with intimate partners.

-> It's a running gag that Foop doesn't know his betrothed's private name because they were only introduced to each other as adults and she can't tell him until they're married. He has a very bad habit of calling her his mistress's name instead (i.e. Anti-Marigold's private name is Kelsia) because he grew up with Anti-Marigold since he was a baby and called her Kelsia for 150,000 years. (RIP...)

-> Foop is very defensive of Anti-Fairy name culture even though he sometimes thinks it's stupid. Poof has a hard time remembering Goldie's counterpart uses the name Anti-Marigold; he always calls her Anti-Goldie. Funnily enough, he also did that when they were young, so Foop would always correct him with "Kelsia." One of these days, he'll probably call her Kelsia when he's trying to switch to using Anti-Marigold and Foop will throw his arms up in frustration.

It's worth clarifying that Anti-Cosmo runs the executive branch of Anti-Fairy government (He runs things like search and rescue, military, and infrastructure) while the Anti-Fairy Council handle judicial things (like crime) and many interracial politics (like scoring Foop the right to have a "scary godchild," which is one of the truce-related things they have to negotiate with the Fairies).

-> Fairies have Da Rules, but Anti-Fairies have their Traditions and Customs book, which their Council manages.

-> Fun Fact: All members of the Anti-Fairy Council seen in the show are pilots.

Yugopotamian Culture - Not much to mention here beyond "Hey, things that are unpleasant to humans are often desirable to Yugopotamians," in line with show canon.

-> It's worth a reminder that Mark comes from a violent culture. He likes when Vicky hurts him and states in the show that what she does to him is in line with his planet's courtship customs (except the kissing).

Potentially, we could delve into this in 'fic and it might be violent or upsetting, but I don't have specific plans. If we see specifics, I expect canon-typical Vicky things like blades (since it's canon that she gave Mark a ton of scars somehow), so heads up.

Witches - First generation witches are individuals with one magical parent and one non-magical parent. Their descendants are also classified as witches. Season 3's "Which Witch Is Which?" canonized an old relative of Crocker's (Alden Bitterroot) as a witch.

-> The Fae can't reproduce outside their own species (special rules about magic and breathing don't allow them to shapeshift while they're that aroused), so no witches have Fae parents.

-> Notable witches include Denzel Crocker, Kevin Crocker, Elmer, and Happy Peppy Gary. Being male witches, they have XYZ chromosomes; they pass as having Klinefelter syndrome on human scans, but there's a lot going on under the surface.

-> In my lore, male witches are sterile and witch heritage only passes through the mother's line, so technically Alden is a great-something uncle of Crocker's and not a direct ancestor. Elmer's mom, Crocker's mom, and Crocker's half-sister (Kevin's mom) are also witches.

-> Ed Leadly's motivation for hunting magical creatures is the reproduction ("Opportunity" & "Trying Too Hard") and/or just because he thinks random magical creatures are neat (hence offering to pay 17 million dollars for Sparky in Season 9's "Dog Gone"). This terrible man has been divorced multiple times and at this point he just wants a partner who's interesting and fun, and I respect it.

-> Witches of the Fire Tribe (i.e. those who are genie-descended) can pass their magic to others through body fluids like kisses. In Pink and Gray, Gary is pressured to kiss Betty throughout his life even though in his own words, it makes him "feel like rental equipment." This plays a lot into their messy relationship as they get older, especially after Betty loses her magical memories and forgets WHY Gary was so reluctant about kissing her.

-> While not discussed in detail, it's heavily implied Gary was born with an STD (considering that H.P. and Anti-Cosmo took one look at his DNA and immediately switched their plan from "let's transfer blood to Betty so the magic transfer is permanent" to "Uh... We're gonna stick with kisses."

-> Witch magic is so powerful, it can't really be destroyed. Come What May is a Kevin-centric 'fic about life in the Crocker house, where generations of stinky magic buildup (See Season 5's "Talkin' Trash") have caused it to essentially become alive.

-> Witches are very long-lived (hence Alden still living at the bottom of his well at the end of "Which Witch Is Which?" - Living hundreds of years is expected. Because witch magic can't be destroyed, they're reborn as animals when they die... familiars, in fact!

-> Denzel and Kevin Crocker are Foop's familiars in future 'fics like "You'll Never Know" and "Approval."

-> Witches

The Fae also have magical kisses; each race has their own.

-> We know from canon that Anti-Fairies have acidic tears ("Timmy's Secret Wish"), so I gave them acidic saliva as well.

-> Fairy kisses spike your joy/pleasure and Pixie kisses clear the head.

"Power Pals" confirmed candy and soda get Fairies drunk; soda is sometimes seen during celebration scenes (such as H.P. and Sanderson kicking back after they took over Fairy World and Earth in "School's Out! The Musical").

-> It's impossible for Pixies to get blackout drunk because they rebound to the sober state when they start to tip. They tend to be sugar addicts because of this (paralleling how the wasps I based them on are also social addicts).

-> In Cloudlands AU, I play with the idea of sugar as substance use. As he gets older, Poof develops a peppermint addiction because it gets him high, which allows him moments of respite from his incredible amounts of trauma. In "Repeat" (before he really started), he pleaded with his dad not to think he was "taking mint" because "he's a good kid."

-> He's tried to quit multiple times. Anti-Marigold was surprised when she found Poof peppering up in "Temptation." He had a breakdown in "All I Ever Wanted" when explaining why he struggles to quit.

... That's everything I can think of that falls in my mental category of "deep worldbuilding people might not want to be surprised by because it might squick them out." My apologies if there's anything I missed.

-> That said, don't forget to check the AU warnings linked at the top- There are things I warned for in that post that aren't deep worldbuilding and thus aren't stated here.

Orange Train's works delve deeper into this type of content than 'fics without this series label, so keep an eye out and and browse or avoid as preferred.

You may also like the Riddledeep Masterpost, which contains links to all my worldbuilding posts (More polished on that sideblog than my initial musings on the main blog). -> Before I used the name Cloudlands AU, I called this FOP worldbuilding Riddleverse Classic, so you may see that term in some posts. -> I'm in the process of copying Riddledeep posts to the AO3 work So, You're Studying the Cloudlands... - You can subscribe to it on AO3 if you would like to read there instead.

Read on FFN | Read these works on AO3

[krastbannert]

Started replaying Horizon: Zero Dawn for...whatever reason (it's an awesome game, I don't need a reason), and I had a few thoughts.

I wish there was more of Rost - both before and after his death. He single-handedly raised her, was the only real adult figure (hell, the only person, really) in her life for her first nineteen years of existence, and he only gets a few training scenes, and a few mentions later on in both HZD and HFW. I feel like he deserves a lot more time than that - Aloy starts the game out angry, and then it just sort of fades out and doesn't really get brought up again. Feels weird.

Teersa is awesome. Makes Aloy's lantern, gets her into everything she needs to be in, and in the end goes, "You know, I have no idea what you're talking about, Aloy, but fuck it, let's do it." She's cool. She confuses though when she says that the Nora tribe is near extinction, then a few minutes later says half the War Party was able to come back, and then minutes later, you're able to walk around Mother's Crown, which is still thriving and barely looks like anything has happened to it. Just weird to me.

On the subject of confusion, Rost says when he takes Aloy outside the Embrace that first time that because they're outside the walls, they need to be silent - and then he proceeds to spend the entire time talking to Aloy. Just something funny I noticed.

Bast should have lived. I hated him and his attitude when I first played the game, and I still do, but you know what? His first - and, sadly, last - act as a Nora Brave is to put aside everything he knows and believes to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with someone he hates on principle, outnumbered and outgunned, against an attacker they don't know. That, I think, says a lot about him. You can make the argument he's standing with Vala, not Aloy, but it's pretty evident that the Nora are a very communal society, so to my mind, he's standing with everyone up on that mountaintop. And now all I can think about is what he could have become, if he had lived. I think it could have been a very good story about letting go of hatreds and toxic traditions, about growing to see the world as not all black and white, about learning to see past titles and labels, and about becoming more than what you thought you were. All in all, now, 6 years after playing the game, I think I really believe that Bast deserved a chance to prove himself.

What fucking witchcraft did Guerilla practice while making this game that it still looks this fucking good? Seriously - it looks a little dated, sure, compared to newer games, but it still looks and plays really damn good. It's either a testament to Guerilla's employees and their dedication or to their craft that HZD still holds up as well as it does, or someone over there in Amsterdam is delving into the black arts. (Possibly both.)

The climbing really doesn't feel that different from HFW. Much more limited, yeah, sure, but otherwise it feels about the same.

Not having the Shieldwing from HFW is so, so confusing. I keep forgetting it's not a thing in HZD. So many times I've found myself about to jump from insane heights and having to stop myself from doing so.

Fighting Corruptors is frustrating - and fun. They're batshit insane robots, especially in the early game, and I love it. That said there have been a few times where arrows seems to just sort of...fly through them, and that's actually genuinely frustrating.

There's this interesting sense that the world as the Carja, Oseram, and Nora know seems to be falling apart at the seams, with bandits moving in everywhere, Meridian having so many conflicting viewpoints that it almost seems to be a pot about to boil over, with the cold war between the Carja and Shadow Carja, with wounds still fresh from the Red Raids and the Carja Civil War, and not everyone accepting the end - I think it's really well done.

[miss-andromeda]

Instead of Just Invisible - Excerpt

So I decided to give you guys an excerpt of the next chapter of All's Fair, called Instead of Just Invisible 😊

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And as they crossed rooftops with skateboards in tow, Donnie noticed something. Andi's apartment was only a few hundred feet, and her light was on. And if he looked closely...yes! She was still awake, reading a book in her bed. 

He knew what he had to do.

"Hey, I'm gonna make a quick detour!" Donnie called to his brothers, then took off towards her apartment - completely ignoring Leo's protest of staying with the group and Raph and Mikey making fun of him for going to see his "girlfriend." Whatever, he didn't just want to see her. He had questions - and ideas to run by her. 

Though, to be fair, seeing her was always welcomed as well. 

He started running to her apartment with an odd sense of adrenaline, wanting to catch her before she went to bed. It wasn't a necessity, so to speak, but he had started to see Andi as his right-hand woman when it came to new creations in the lab. And because of that, the new idea that he had in his head couldn't really wait until the morning. 

Well, he supposed it could. But he didn't want it to. 

He breathed a sigh of relief when he made it to her window, still seeing Andi snuggled up in bed and reading War and Peace. She was still awake, good. He lightly tapped the window with his knuckle, smiling bashfully when she jumped and looked around, a slightly startled look in her eye. When she saw him, though, she playfully glared at him for scaring her, but put her book down and got out of bed. 

Now that he was seeing her in full, he had to admit that she looked adorable. She was wearing a loose pink top with a scribbled black heart design on the front, white sweatpants, and her hair was up in a loose bun - a stark contrast to how put-together she always looked with her sweater dresses and hair bows. 

It was sweet to see how she looked when she wasn't working. 

She pushed up the window and smirked lightly at him. "Is there a reason you're blessing me with your presence?" She asked, lazily leaning against the side of the windowsill. "At-" She then turned around to glance at the digital clock next to her bed. "-11:24 pm?"

Donnie chuckled nervously as he rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah, sorry for the unexpected visit. The others and I snuck out." He admitted, laughing to himself when Andi gave him an impressed nod, but let him continue. "And I figured, since you were still awake, I, um...wanted to ask you something." 

"What's up?" She asked as she started to fiddle with some stray hairs that had fallen out of her bun. 

He smiled at the endearing mannerism, but cleared his throat to avoid the risk of getting distracted. "So, there's this idea that I have. What if we create an alternative for fighting traditionally, you know, close combat?" 

The look that she gave him said that the gears were turning in her head - and he loved that. "How would we do that?"

"What about we create an awesome robot that can fight battles for us? Kind of like a battle mech, except more compact and it can be controlled with a remote? Doesn't that sound cool?" He was getting more excited with each detail that he threw in, and the smile growing on Andi's face told him she was interested. 

"I like it." She agreed. "I would suggest AI, but that hasn't really...developed yet. Tons of kinks that still need to be worked out. But if we used an antenna, not only do we ensure a stronger and more efficient signal, but we still have control over it." She was now smiling brighter than before as she nodded. "Yeah, I'm in."

"Great."

Just as he was about to take his leave, though, she called out for him. "Wait, I need to ask you something too!" She then snatched her unfinished laser gun off her lab desk and held it in front of her. "Um, I'm having some issues getting this stupid thing working. Got any tips?" She then followed up by explaining what she had already tried; thermal detection and now a plasma container. And still, nothing.

Donnie hummed as he started inspecting the unfinished gun. "What about lithium-ion technology? You can install lithium batteries in the storage, then convert the energy into a strong charge beam." He suggested with a smile, which only grew when Andi took the gun back and started to think it over - while also mumbling to herself. 

"And lithium batteries are not hard to acquire...I'd just need to connect a fiber optic wire from the stock to the muzzle..." She told herself, then started smiling. "I can do that." She told him with a newfound excitement. She might finally have this thing finished before she turned 30! "I can absolutely, 100%, completely do it."

Donnie laughed at her intentional redundancy. "Well, how about I either let you work on that or finally get to bed?" He suggested, then pointed back to the rooftops. "Knowing my brothers, they probably already ditched me when I left to see you."

Andi snickered to herself. "If that's what it's like to have siblings, I'm almost glad I'm an only child." She admitted, but nodded in understanding and gave him a fond look. "So, I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Of course. You have to help me with this robot, after all."

"Promise." She affirmed, then thought of one more thing to add as he was beginning to ascend the side of a nearby apartment building. "Thanks, Don! You're the best!" She called out with a bright smile as she closed the window, then went back to her bed to finish the chapter she was on. 

Donnie was so relieved she did that, because he knew that if she saw him in that moment, she would notice the hearts rising out of his head, as well as the lovestruck sigh that escaped his lips.

When he finally made it back to his brothers, all three were giving him a knowing smirk. 

It was Raph who ended up breaking the silence; he put his hands into fists and put them to his temple, and in a high-pitched voice, said, "Oh, Andi, I love you so much! What's that? You want to get married right now? Okay!" He then started making kissing noises with his lips to finish, making Leo, Mikey and himself laugh and Donnie roll his eyes, his smile being replaced by a scowl. 

"Are you done mocking me?" He asked, and once the three of them finally stopped laughing, Leo gestured forward. "Yeah, let's go. We're probably gonna end up burning the candle at both ends, and besides-" He then started snickering to himself as he started running again. "-we've got more than enough time later to talk about Donnie's girlfriend."

Raph and Mikey snickered again as they started to run after him (or rather, Raph did while Mikey jumped on his skateboard), while Donnie ran after them, yelling about how Andi was not his girlfriend (admittedly, despite the fact that he really wanted that to be the case,) and that the fact that he went to see her did not constitute the idea that they were together.

----------

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[yournightowl]

Your Nightowl #025

Across every culture and throughout every time period, people like giant robots. The Colossus of Rhodes is basically a mecha. The statues constructed outside the pharaoh's tombs were also, basically, mecha. There's something about bigass robots that appeals to a deeply buried part of the human psyche. Maybe there's an evolutionary drive that compels us to want to be able to shake the earth with every stomp. They have to be giant, mind you- lots of people hate the little vacuumers or the waddling trashcans or toasters with feet of the world- But if it's big, humanoid, and very dangerous, it's guaranteed to be popular.

And now, as a self-labeled historian, living in a self-defined "bad future", i can shout this with confidence loud enough for it to echo back through history:

We have mechas now, and they suck. (◑v◐)

Going by the numbers, evaluating them as military assets- they suck. They're stomping, awkward, clumsy piece of equipment, good only for sinking excess budget into at the end of the fiscal year. Probably their biggest issue is their range; Jets can fly to the mission site, and trucks can carry lots of soldiers there, but mechs need to be ferried everywhere by some other piece of equipment- usually trains. And trains need tracks, and tracks are only built along certain common routes... you get the picture.

That problem's then compounded by the fact that almost all modern conflicts take place around the tropics. Lots of rain, heat, moisture, mud, and vegetation. The jungle's inhospitable enough as it is when you're a normal human (+_+)- So how well do you think a giant, rust-able, heavy-as-shit human would fare?

Even if they manage to finish a mission without getting stuck in the ground, (✿◠v◠) the maintenance is a nightmare. Water and dirt and critters can get into every crevice, and they're too goddamn big to tarp over.

So why do we even have them? 乁( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡ °)ㄏ

On one level, I do think the budget-sink explanation is real. We have the money, so why not, right? if we don't spend it, that's money that's not circulating. You might think that that's a stupid reason to build weapons, but you have to remember- the world is run by stupid people, and a lot of them are also manchildren (in a gender-neutral sense).

But the thing is, manchildren are easily distracted and quick to move on. ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ So you would think that their enthusiasm for giant robots would wane after the fourth or fifth time they saw their tricked-out hyper-mech fall flat on its face into quicksand.

So why do we even have them?

Mechs fare poorly in war conflict because of environmental factors. When you put them in a different environment, they perform their job quite well. And the conspiracy theorist inside can't be convinced it's an accident that the one environment mechs overperform in is the urban environment. They can quickly reposition on roads using the wheels built into their soles. They can actually take cover because there are buildings big enough for them to hide behind. (✿ ❛‿❛)ξ▄︻┻┳═一 Guerrilla attacks that would devastate infantry are like pinpricks against their armor. And a giant robot standing behind the police line is incredibly intimidating if you're just a protestor trying to find your courage to throw the first stone.

Bullet-proof, closed-circuit, and frightening as hell. The same mechs that do horribly in military service are unstoppable as police assets.

You've probably got the impression by now that i don't like mech fanboys (also gender-neutral), but i'm not feeling much schaudenfreude here. i take no pleasure in telling them that their childhood dream got corrupted a decade ago- turned into more window-dressing for the police state.

outside the pilot seat,

your nightowl

PS- i found a new name for mechs on an old engineering forum- Wankers. If your parents ask, it's short for "Walking Tanks."

[kellanved-ammanas]

TF2 Drabbles: RED Spy/BLU Spy - You're Going to Bail, Aren't You?

Summary: Could you do Red spy x Blu spy? Where the spies are talking to each other, working on a conjoined mission to take down a threat targeting both sides. Red is being slightly panicky, anxious about this threat. Then you have Blu... He is completely calm, stoic, and chill. In other words he doesn't give a fuck, but not for the reasons one expects: He doesn't truly care if he lives or dies forever, but he does care if the others do. He doesn't know how to express much of any emotion genuinely, forcefully taught at a young age to hide all emotions. So for Blu, it may seem he doesn't give a damn, but he really does. So much it hurts. Red figures this out when Blu calms him down, holding his hand and reassuring him that they'll figure this out. Blu sounds like everything is fine and dandy, but Red finally sees how Blu really feels by looking closer: the slightest emotion behind the mask he'd been wearing all his life. I just wanted some hurt/comfort, hopefully this isn't too much.

~

In only a matter of months, the war against the robots had gone from a stalemate to them winning pretty handily to Respawn being destroyed. Meaning if any of them died, it would be permanent. And if the two Engineers couldn’t find a way to fix or rebuild it, that’s how they were set to spend the rest of the war. Not a comforting prospect given what they were up against.

Probably the only reason they hadn’t been overrun already was because the robots didn’t know their efforts to bomb the base into the ground though mostly foiled, had gotten the Respawn room. Keeping what part of the base it was in hidden, preventing anyone from aiming for it specifically, had been their most important and well kept secret. An investigation had revealed that seemingly no one had leaked it accidentally, it was just plain dumb bad luck that the robots had hit it.

Everyone was shaken by their return to proper mortality. Not that the threat of permanent death had ever been gone completely, there was always the chance Respawn would mess up and bring someone back wrong in some way or fail outright. But it had been so reliable for so long, everyone had made the unspoken agreement to not discuss it, pretend it wasn’t there. Now death was much more of an immediate threat, not something to be ignored, especially in the middle of a war against a robot army.

Pierre wandered through the base, his invis-watch on, stopping to eavesdrop on various conversations. Still no one outright talked about it, that wasn’t the kind of thing that was easy to talk about under even the best circumstances. There was tension to everyone though and it wasn’t the tension from combining RED and BLU into a single team, that had long since faded.

They were all frightened. Even the Medics were less nonchalant in their bearings as they worked in the lab to make more medi-gun fluid – a life safer but alone it could only do so much to prevent death. The Soldiers a bit more subdued and actually somewhat careful as they drilled on the gun range. Tavish was drinking in the common room – likely wherever his BLU counterpart was, was doing the same just alone or with the other folk Pierre wasn’t sure the location of – joined by Mundy, Jeremy and both Pyros. They were playing poker; alcohol and gambling, a good way to avoid the topic even if it hung over the table like a rain cloud about to burst.

The Heavies weren’t too far away, sitting at their own table and sharing a bottle as well. Their conversation was in Russian, not Pierre’s strongest language. But even if he couldn’t parse the meaning of their words, their tone was serious. Likely they were having a deep conversation about life and death. Out of everyone – almost everyone anyway – those two seemed to be taking it the most stoically. Enviable.

The Engineers were working in what was left of the Respawn room. Pierre didn’t step in to listen to whatever kind of conversation they might be having lest it be about how unlikely it was that they could fix it in a timely manner. Instead he continued down the hall, turning into where the bedrooms were. He could go and find out what the rest of the team was up to and later probably would but for now he was fine with his patrol being done.

Louis was still in the room they now shared, seated on the cushioned chair by the coffee table, reading a book. The very picture of relaxed and unbothered. Pierre could just about slap him.

“You’re back.” Louis’ tone as he lowered his book was just as unbothered as his posture and behavior. “Anything interesting to report about the rest of the team?”

“No.” Pierre walked over and sat in the other chair by the coffee table. He was too anxious to sit still for long but he could force it for a little while. “You’re awfully relaxed.”

“Yes. I am sure that it will be fine. Dell and Con are two of smartest people alive, they can fix it.”

Pierre didn’t doubt for a second that if given enough time, those two could rebuild Respawn as if it were brand new, perhaps even make it better somehow in the process. “Can they do it in time though?” With how many robots there were versus only the eighteen of them with no Respawn, they weren’t likely to last long. They could maybe hold the base for a while but… they were bound to lose people no matter what. And eventually they would lose everyone.

“We can only hope that they can and give them the space or whatever assistance they need in order to do so. In the meantime, there is no use worrying about it.”

True. There wasn’t much to be gained from worrying about it. But… Pierre had grown soft whilst working for RED and had only gotten more so since the teams had merged. It wasn’t just his own life or even just his and his son’s that he feared losing but everyone’s else too. He’d let himself grow attached, make friends and maybe even fall in love again. Something that was perhaps a bigger mistake than he ever would’ve thought.

“You’re going to bail, aren’t you?”

Louis was quiet for a moment, his face unreadable even without the mask as he met Pierre’s gaze. “What makes you think that?”

“You’re relaxed as if you really, truly aren’t even a little concerned for your life, let alone anyone else’s. Which is fine. Understandable even. Leaving is the most logical thing to do in this scenario. When the robots come tomorrow – or whenever they do – and kill everyone, it’ll be the perfect cover to fake your death and run away. The higher ups won’t even consider looking for you to punish you for not fulfilling your contract. I wish you luck in it.” Pierre stood and started to walk away.

He didn’t get two steps before Louis grabbed his wrist. It wasn’t forceful, he could’ve broken it easily and marched away, but didn’t. Instead he looked down at Louis, waiting for him to say his piece.

“You’re wrong.”

“Trying to save face, huh? I guess it’s good to know I don’t mean absolutely nothing to you. If you’re planning to ask me to run away with you, I must decline. I… just can’t do that.” He couldn’t bear to leave his friends and estranged son to such a fate.

Louis’ grip tightened on his wrist. “You’re wrong.” It was the first time any emotion whatsoever had shown in his voice since they’d found out Respawn was busted. “You’re wrong. Please do not assume that about me. I would not leave you or any of them to die, not if there’s even a chance I could prevent it. Even if the only thing I can do is delay it, I will by whatever means necessary.”

That was… fear in his voice, fear and desperation, still reigned in but there for sure. His grip was tight enough that it almost hurt as he looked up at Pierre. Mask of indifference finally cracked, his gaze was almost pleading now, pleading that Pierre understand him and the things he couldn’t say. … An act? No, probably not. He’d been good at faking no emotion whatsoever but that was always easier than pretending to feel something one didn’t. And what would there to be gain from such an act anyway?

“It seems I may have been mistaken in my reading of your response to this situation. I apologize.”

Louis grip relaxed as he looked away, almost as if he were ashamed by such a display, as mild as it was. “I…” He paused to take a deep breath, steadying himself before looking at Pierre again. “It is understandable how you came to that conclusion. I don’t fault you for it.” Even though it had clearly hurt him enough to crack his mask, he was no longer letting that show. It was impressive but also… sad. Did he really feel the need to hide his emotions even now that they might all be dead in a matter of days?

Well it’s not like Pierre was exactly talking about his feelings on the matter much either. Really what was there even to say? ‘I don’t want to die.’ ‘I don’t want my friends or son to die.’ ‘I don’t want you to die.’ Emotional conversations were hard when they were real and not done as part of a spying mission.

Pierre returned to his chair. He lifted a hand, placing it on the coffee in offer to Louis. After only a moment of hesitation, Louis took it and even returned Pierre’s light squeeze. Even if they couldn’t talk about it, they could sit here and just be with each other for a bit.

[akystaracer22]

James kept sending glances at the Staccek representative. His palms clutching his desk so tightly that his knuckles were white.

Human's were judged to be in the top 20 most dangerous races in the intergalactic council, and for seemingly good reason. A history bloodied by war and fuelled by destruction, and a prey based race becoming the apex predator of their home world.

It was an open secret how violent, yet intelligent humans were. It lead to them being feared, kept at arms reach, and generally left alone. What a terrible fate for a species that just wanted to make friends.

Then there were the Stacceks.

The Stacceks, who were seen as a peaceful and harmless version of the humans. Who looked virtually the same, except that they had reportedly never committed murder in their colonies, no had a single war waged. It was an idealistic dream that many species fell in love with.

Trades with human's were abandoned in favour of working with the Stacceks. Allies were lost, and it was almost impossible to even attack a Staccek without the entire species being ostracised.

Which is why human's were seen as jealous of the Stacceks.

So of course, to try and "mend the rift" they sat the Staccek representative right next to James.

He stiffened as the Staccek representative turned to him during the brief break the council held during the day, a placid smile on it's pale lips as it opened it's mouth to speak.

"You're Alone In A Crowd."

James flinched, violently. It's voice was exactly like his own, exactly. Alarm bells rang in his mind as every instinct in his body was screaming at him to run, to get to his ship and get to the nearest Terran colony so he can get support.

He just barely managed to reign in the instinct to ask what it was talking about.

"Everyone Here Considers Human's To Be The Most Dangerous Race In The Council. Look Around."

He didn't need to, he'd know what would be waiting for him. Secretive glances and guards training their attention solely on him. It pissed him off when he started. There were species here with venom that could kill in minutes and yet it was him that was treated like a maximum security prisoner.

"You See? You Are Alone. No One Considers Us A Threat. But You Do. Why?"

And wasn't that the question. Why did Stacceks provoke the fight or flight?

The answer slipped from his lip's before he could stop it, "You fit in the Uncanny Valley, and no species like ours has a complete lack of bloodshed. It just doesn't happen."

"The Uncanny Valley, The Phenomenon Whereby A Computer-Generated Figure Or Humanoid Robot Bearing A Near-Identical Resemblance To A Human Being Arouses A Sense Of Unease Or Revulsion In The Person Viewing It."

James nodded regretfully, but froze at the Stacceks continuation.

"You Are Correct In Your Assessment Of Us. We Indeed Have A Past As Blood Filled, If Not More So, Than Yours."

"...What?"

"Indeed. However, Unlike You Human's, We Have The Mean's To Disguise That Past From The Rest Of The World. Allowing Us The Freedom That You Humans Are Lacking In."

"Wh- How-"

"Tell Me, Human. How Would You Go About Hiding Something From Another?"

The Answer was obvious, "Illusion's, but that's-"

"A Matter Of Simply Having Patience And Good Reason To Do So."

"...Why are you telling me this."

"Because You Are A Member Of The Single Most Feared Species In The Universe, A Species With A History Of Jealousy Between Our's."

And at that, the Staccek's appearance glitched for a moment. And for a single blink, James saw something else. Something ancient and terrifying and unnatural. The abomination looked unholy, and a single glimpse in one of it's many eyes revealed a hunger that could never be sated. He understood now why his very being screamed at him to get away and get help.

This thing shouldn't exist. Whatever this species was, it was an affront to the very concept of life itself.

"Not A Single Individual Would Believe A Humans Words Against Ours."

There is only one alien race that humans fear; a race that can send them into a panic almost immediately. It just so happens that race was voted the most harmless in the universe. One was recently voted a seat in the intergalactic council next to the human judge, who was silently shaking.

[maguro13-2]

Suletta : Twas the curse, Shinra's curse? That is the question. So where did you abandoned me in this time? I guess beinng stuck here wasn't so bad, so did they abandoned me space. I'm alone and no one would hear me--Hey, I can see Seattle from over here! Why am I still on earth all of a sudden?

Kyouko : That is a no and a yes, and you are correct. They did not abandoned you in space. You're still on earth with me the whole time. I had nothing to do with your little abandonment here at a place like this, would you?

Kyouko : You could use warp star to get off here and find your way back home. That is where you could escape your abandonment.

Suletta : Wait. You mean I'm not abandoned in space? I'm still here on this planet. I should've been abandoned in the cold reaches of space. Tis the curse, a Gundam's curse. What part of earth is this place? Have I been used as a puppet all along, no it was Mom who did all of this, and of course Aerial.

Kyouko : That is true, one can't pay a steep price for their crimes against all for their sympathy, greed and power is sought the destruction of humanity when humans and machines start a war. That was your mother's foolishness, this was her plan all along and you've blinded by the cold eyes of the curse itself.

Kyouko : But hey, guess what? You're gonna like this. But I know what really happened something to this paper right here.

(Shows paper)

Suletta : Wait a second, this paper and these plans. These are just like the ones back in the beginning of the show! The Gundam, the company, my abandonment, Miorine's betrayal and start a war to create a bad future? Now I know what's going on, I wasn't turned against on, I was fooled with...

Slade's voice : "MIND MANIPULATION"!

Suletta : Mom! She played us all like a bunch of fools! Her plan was to start the many conflicts and would take on a conquest for world domination! So that's why Miorine wants to betray me, not just me, Miorine, Guel, Aerial, all my friends, she used all of us.

Kyouko : And you have stumbled upon the truth by a mere accident. Oh what can a sorrow can be forgiven?

Suletta : She betrayed her own people for robots, for Aerial! Why that no good...This heartless me, this murderous rampager, this love for Miorine, this is not us! Tis the curse, Gundam's curse! Now that is the question!

Kyouko : Bravo, Mercury Shakespeare. You solved the riddle, and now you must have your revenge, not just revenge...I meant "Payback". Hold still, cause there's something attracted to your heart, and I know how to fix it. And I must say...

(holding supernatural strings attached to Suletta)

Kyouko : These are the strings contaminated by a heart fill with darkness and I cure it.

Suletta : Wait a sec, these strings. I've been controlled nothing more than... those guys from Kingdom Hearts! The heartless! They set me up for this!

Kyouko : Guess what? The reason you were betrayed and thrown out like garbage, because the heartless were planning to bring Gundam villains straight to the realm of darkness, their home world. So I sent a warp star to bring back you back to earth right here on this iconic landmark in America.

Suletta : And exactly what landmark did they the have the nerves to abandoned me on top of it?

Kyouko : Standing on top of it, course. The majestic and iconic Mount Rainier.

*closes on out to show Mount Rainier*

Suletta : So they abandoned me here on this volcano the entire time, was this all part of their plan to start a war without me?

Kyouko : You are correct, this is was due to mind manipulation, it was your mother's plan all along to bring conquest to bring an end to the many conflicts to humanity's arrogance.

Suletta : Wait, if they abandoned me on Mount Rainier, then what state did they abandoned me at?

*zooms out to show the State of Washington*

*Rumbling*

Suletta : [Yells] Noooooooo!

Kyouko : Hold still, this won't hurt a bit!

Suletta : No Don't!

(she cuts the strings)

Suletta : Huh? I'm free! I'm finally free from mom's control! Mom's manipulation and Miorine's betrayal were all caused by this curse, the curse from my dead sister who has been plaguing with me from the start. And now I'm going to put an end to my sister's curse, once and for all.

Kyouko/Ophelia : Do not worry...I know how to fix all of this.

(her voice slowly shifts into Ophelia's)

Kyouko/Ophelia : To reunite the ones that you loved, you must find a way to put an end to this curse, thoug it is a matter of time till you discovered upon hearing the truth to everyone that spread and justice comes in with a steep price to pay for there sins. And as for them, it is time for anyone to die.

"Meanwhile back at Japan..."

*ringing phone*

Chuchu : Oh hey, Suletta. How was Washington and stuff? Look about Miorine and that, we all agreed that she---Wait, hold on a second...

Cuchu angrily : Those guys did what to you!?

Aerial : Uh-oh. That can't be good.

*DOOR BANGS*

Chuchu : You A-HOLES! What have you done!?

Miorine : What are you talking about!? What do you have something In business, can't you see that we got rid of your little Tanuki friend. I just had throw her away and I was using her the entire time.

Chuchu : And where did you left Suletta on purpose, Bridezilla?

Miorine : I had to leave her behind so that I would start my own company.

Chuchu : By leaving her in the state of Washington?

(grabs her by shirt)

Chuchu : ALRIGHT, THE JIG IS UP! Some bride YOU TURNED OUT TO BE! I demand... Witnessess. Who do you think you are, leaving someone in Washington that you don't understand!? Don't worry, I had no choice to fix that as a caution....

(scene flips)

Chuchu : Witness testimony! Now that I brought you all here as witnesses, I'm gonna give you a lesson with extreme prejudice and evidence.

Miorine : Please! Let me go! I'll do anything for you!

Chuchu : OBJECTION, MRS REMBRAN! Suletta is a kind person and she treated us with dignity!

*Suletta shaking*

Suletta : Uhh...Yes I am! I am here

Chuchu : Alright! Who's idea was it for her to be abandoned on top of Mount Rainier. What was Suletta doing in the middle of Washington state!? As if someone ditching anyone in America?

Suletta : They're trying to hrow me away, like space trash and wants to repalce Guel as bride? Heck no! This was all a set up to my sister and mom! And I know how to seek Justice with my own eyes!

Guel : [To Miorine] You told me to replace who?!

Miorine : But Guel wait! I can explain! I was only using Suletta to betray her so that we can be together!

Guel : By getting us involved for a crime that we didn't committ? You are a liar, and i didn't say that I was the marrying type, you stupid girl!

Chuchu : You used us all to betray her? After we did nice things to you!? Why you supreme dunderhead! I can't believe that someone jerk wanted to use all of us for greed and power!

Suletta : Don't you realize that's cheating and fraud? You are going to reimburse to end this stupid Gundam curse!

Chuchu D You think you can get away for a petty crime, so that you could become a CEO and make Guel as your groom to start a family for your own future?

Miorine : You have no idea what you're talking about? I only did for her mother and her sister, so that I may look like a loser to Tanuki girl and her tooties friends of her's. Tough that, ya fat toots.

Chuchu : (gasps in shock) Did you just call me...

*Flames Roaring+Train Whistling*

Chuchu : (furiously) TOOTS!?!

Suletta : You did not just said that to her.

[Buardian Robo by Sota Fujimori plays]

Chuchu : THAT DOES IT! You just messed with the wrong girl, sister! Don't worry, I have something for you. The gloves are coming off.

Miorine : Hey, what are you going to do on punishing us? What do you have against me for my crimes?

(puts on volgin's gloves)

Chuchu : Something that I should've done to punishing those that were morons a long time ago...by kicking your stupid ass!

*ELECTRIC ZAPPING*

Chuchu : (with Ren's insane laughter)

Miorine : Wait! You can't do that--huh?

*they are revealed to be tied to chairs*

Miorine : What's going on? Who tied us up.

Suletta : I did. Cause I'm forcing you to reunite with me, and you should not be a hetero even if your bisexual. Cause I had a little help from my Yuri friends.

(a group of Yuri couples are ready for torment)

Miorine : (To Persephone) You foolish woman! You've been using me all along! You! You manipulated me for this!

(Persephone is being held hostage)

Persephone : Please, Miorine! Do what they told me to do! I'm already atoning for my sins!

Miorine : I knew should've told my doctor about this.

Chuchu : (laughs evilly) Time to teach you a lesson about the true meanings of humans and machines from their own errors, a lesson of pain!

*Electric Zapping*

Miorine : Look! I'm sorry! I'll pay you all back for using you all! I didn't mean to do this! I was in going to start a future, wait. I'll give you all my assets, I'll write you an apology, how about apologize to anyone by doing community service? Please, I regret to atone my--

Chuchu : Too late, cause here comes the chuchu express of pain!

Miorine : No! Please! Have mercy on me! I was just wanted to be in the robot business!

Chuchu : Sorry, but mercy have left you...in another place.

*sounds of the group getting tortured by chuchu*

All : (yelling in pain)

Miorine : I'M SORRY! FORGIVE ME! WHY DID HAVE TO DO IT! WHY DID HAVE TO DESERVE THIS!?

Chuchu : (laughs maniacally) JUSTICE HAS DONE RIGHT! JUSTICE FOR SULETTA! THIS IS WHAT YOU GET FOR ABANDONING HER IN AMERICA! I TOLD YOU ABOUT USING US AS PUPPETS ON A STRING! SO THIS IS YOUR KARMA OF TODAY!

Suletta : Ah sweet justice.

Aerial : Suletta! Help me! She's going to fry me! She's going to fry me!

Miorine : That is it! We are not using Aerial again!

(scene flips to the hospital)

Miorine hospitalized : Oh...I feel so stupid. And I learned my lesson.

Miorine, also : Note to self : Abandoning someone at the top of Mount Rainier in Washington is not a place for abandonment.

Aerial : Not cool, bro. Also, I am real sorry for how Persephone has treated me like a real jerkbutt to you. I should've listened to the truth.

Guel : Why did I feel so worthless? Also, I'm dumping you for real, so the wedding's off.

Miorine : But, but but...

Guel : No butts. I quit this stupid job!

Miorine : Then fine! Who needs you! I don't need men or I don't need anyone! I can do it all by myself!

Aerial : That is it, I'm never going solo again. Oh well, I got what I deserve.

Suletta : We had no choice but to shun you all of this, and you should never leave me for someone who I defeated. Also, I apologize for how mom used all like puppets in the blame game. Humanity is nothing more than a stubborn race.

Miorine : I was wrong, everybody. I knew I was regretting everything. I atone for my sins and therefore, starting my own future with a man is wrong. I'm a lousy bride and a horrible girlfriend.

Miorine, Also : (To Suletta) Sorry for getting you involved into this incident like that.

Suletta : That's a real shame about you, I warned you and you did heed my warning.

Miorine : From now on, I'm making Suletta being my Groom again!

(everyone cheering)

Master Hand/Announcer : VICTORY!

"FORGIVNESS ACCEPTED!"

*cues Unused Jingle by Jun Senoue*

Miorine : When it comes to pride month.

Chuchu : Oh...In that case, we can all agree that same sex marriage could be or not could be a sin and therefore, we just realized getting married as same sex couples has been legalized in Japan.

Miorine : Oh that reminds, I still I had that keychain that I had for Suletta and me, it was our gift.

Suletta : Keychain? That's it! I'm gonna put an end to my sister's curse, by trapping her soul into this keychain!

Chuchu : So do we agree on fixing all of this?

Miorine : Yes, I'll do with you all. I promise I pay you back, I promised! I'll do anything right for myself and fix my mistakes. Just please, what do you want to do with me?

Chuchu : Just sign this treaty not to make any wars in our planet and I'll let you go of everything for the world that you left to ruin and destroy due to mind manipulation!

Miorine : Ow...I hope anyone who can find my spleen! Alright I'll do it!

*signs the treaty*

Suletta : Great, now watch and learn.

*Drumroll*

Suletta : (clears throat) Heed my words, O great powers of darkness....!

(chuchu secretly records)

Suletta : ... Release to me one of the tortured souls! Let me infuse him with my life-force and awaken him to the world of the living! Immaculate being...

Aerial/Ericht : Suletta! Noooooo!!!

Suletta : Appear before me now!

*MAGICAL ZAP*

(everything is in reality)

Suletta : So you see. This was our keychain that is a symbol to our marriage.

Miorine : Well, I owe Suletta a big apology for how we did.

Nyaan : That's real cool.

Miorine : (To Machu) And that's why I atone my sins and converted into everything.

Suletta : So we're officially married now.

Machu : That's really a great story, but don't forget that you left Pandora opened by accident.

Suletta : Uhh, what?

(sees the company on fire)

*Flames crackling*

Miorine : DAMN IT!

Suletta : I told anyone Beyblade was dangerous!

Machu : I wonder why does that always happened?

*What's New Scooby Doo music plays*

Nyaan : We're glad that we finally get to take your place, you two deserved to be happy.

Suletta : Yeah, well..We would've gotten away with it, if it weren't for these wonderful meddling fans.

Chuchu : And don't forget us too.

Nyaan : There's something we can have something else.

Machu : So how about some cake and ice cream. It's on the house.

Nyaan : Let's all get some Cake and Ice Cream!

Guel : Oh boy, I'd like to get some cake and ice cream.

*chuchu shuts door on his face*

"So now you understand that we learned

[the-firebird69]

Black Sabbath ~ War Pigs

This monster Trump is made too many mistakes with us who's going to hell right now this is Newfoundland and he has a facility there and he's been capturing people and hauling them up there and is grabbing them during the trial and he's telling them that they have to face the music and stuff like that and he's saying he planned the trial and he planned to accuse himself any plan to have this code which meant something no somebody bringing the code out and it's our son and daughter and they said it's not really his code but he's using part of it and badly and he's going to lose but this is not the reason why and then Max are out of their minds you can't handle it you can't handle this s*** head being stuck to him he's a freaking f**** and he's used to stopping them himself he was amazed he said look on closing news that's weird it did it again sticking his face in his it's like if you don't get your face out of mind I'm going to burn your f****** face off like I had a bit off still waiting for that to happen again so here we go

:: HUGE HUGE HUGE ARMIES ARE HEADING TOWARDS NEWFOUNDLAND MASSIVE MASSIVE ARMIES OF WARLOCK GIGANTIC NUMBERS THEY'RE GOING TO WIPE TRUMP OFF THE FACE OF THE MAP

And that's what you get Trump for messing with us

Thor Freya

So what I lose another facility and yes information on the rest of them so I'm going to go to town here and all the people that oppose me

John remillard AKA Trump

We're going to get a list of crimes together against you Trump and we're going to stop you ourselves because we have to you make it sound like the robots are already there we have to actually check we're going ahead of these people if we find out it's all robots you're a Deadman

Terry c AKA Clint Eastwood

Don't know I can see it now you shooting me what pleasure and joy comes to me and a friend says probably cuz I like getting stupid he's going to use hollow points cuz I'm suggesting it well that's great news. I have to tell you something I'm sat next door bothering for a while what he's saying is don't just stay here and burn at the last place and he almost got me he said I now look at it like this he wants me away from him because I'm after him and he says no you're a moron f****** everybody is playing up because I'm a I'm a juvenile delinquent holding all this money tormenting him the senior f****** killing all my people says that's right stupid let's try holding on a little tidier f****** f**

Trump

Olympus

[doom-nerdo-666]

Something i may or may not've mentioned in that "Doom fanbase analysis" post is whether or not some fans want Doom to be more popular and that correlating with how they take the fanbase's history/activities into account.

Specially in a "post Funko Pop/TBBT nerd" era.

Because it's important that people learn about certain things and there's also a point where not every piece of media needs to reach Star Wars/Pokemon levels of success or fame.

It may suck that DE lost against TLOU2 at the VGA's 2020 but knowing how people hate game journos and certain events, you have to question if it was even worth it.

As if you're asking for the approval from people who rate that one baby Wii game above God Hand.

Like how people already acknowledge that the film industry has its own corruptions, yet shout "animation is cinema" because they want to see animation being treated seriously at the Oscars (And it's always mainstream/corporate level animation, not something more unique or artistic for some reason).

Maybe it has to do with people looking into parodies or content from the likes of Dorkly or Robot Chicken and thinking "they need to do something about a thing i like" for some weird reason, when they could've looked into more genuine fan projects.

Doom was always popular but then there's also how people view it differently and all that mess i talked about.

Because there's also the clash of people that almost want Doom to be a "bigger brand" and that contrasting to people whose activities also make it seem like a "could've been public domain/free" entity.

Between Sakurai having a small talk about Doomguy in a Smash direct and Trent Reznor having associations with Quake due to "mutual fandom" with id, it can be neat seeing someone famous liking something even it they don't have to also care about the Cacowards or the latest source port update.

But it won't change the fact that certain fanbase activities may matter more than if Chris Pratt talks about how he spent years slaying Marauders in the original Doom while getting a role to play Doomguy in a Doom movie.

(Yes current/meme example, i know)

Another thing is what more popular franchises do to remind you of their mainstream status.

Like Call of Duty trying to be Fortnite and adding The Boys or Nikki Minaj, since it's a series that was always for mass audiences.

There are dedicated COD fans and even those that care about specific games or modding but Activision doesn't even consider them at all.

Why? Because it's a series that they see it as existing for the same of yearly releases and money.

ZeniMax/Bethesda occasionally get greedy when using Doom but even if you take away the wad/mod scene, you still get the idea of a dedicated fan image that would get mad at certain things.

Maybe that's why Mick Gordon said "Doom fans aren't like Disney fans, you piss them off and they'll burn down your house" or something.

And a bit of a "cursed" thought: What if Epic Rap Battles of History does like a "Doomguy vs Isabelle" video?

Would people care if they add specific Doom references as opposed to basic stuff like "rip and tear" and Daisy?

Or would they just be fine simply seeing Doom in the spotlight, even in that manner?

[novella-november]

Yep! At least for me, enemies to lovers is not "genocidal fascist falls in love with his personal torture victim" --

Instead, a good "Enemies To Lovers" in a Romance is when two people who believe they are on complete opposite sides of an issue are somehow forced into a situation where they have to work together, and being in close proximity, working together, protecting and saving each other probably out of initially selfish reasons slowly evolves into actually getting to know each other, genuinely caring about each other, at some point realizing the initial thing that made them enemies is either:

1) a lie -- one side was being misled

2) a misunderstanding - both sides were working towards the same goal but neither realized it because of outside forces trying to sabotage both (good for an anti-capitalist story)

3) No longer relevant - maybe each side was fighting on behalf of some far-flung group, and both of those higher groups have wiped the other out, leaving their minions to flounder with no orders (could work for both scifi and fantasy in particular; robots being programmed to follow orders just stop receiving orders one day and slowly learn how to follow their own will, and similar for magically-enslaved people fighting in a magical war)

The biggest thing for "Enemies to Lovers" is that the thing that made them enemies to begin with *cannot* be something earth shattering, like

"Side A is going around slaughtering anyone born with Trait B without remorse until Main Male Character fell in love with A Woman with Trait B and takes her as his bride (probably against her will) while continuing to slaughter other people with Trait B but he feels a bit bad about it until he realizes his wife is the Only Good One"

Or anything even remotely similar to the above, because thats just. Gods no please do not do that. That is so much racism and atrocities there.

Much like how discrimination in your Fantasy/Scifi World should not be based on established facts (because you're just doing a racism), your Enemies need to *not* be fighting over life or death atrocities if you want them to become true Lovers.

If one of your mains has to compromise on their staunchest most sacred belief in like, "don't commit war crimes" for your Main Relationship to work..... That relationship ain't gonna be working for long.

A good, thrilling Enemies to Lovers for me is one where both mains start out as genuine rivals who are forced into circumstances that make them band together, and slowly realize over the course of their interactions that not only were they fighting for no good reason, but that they have come to like and even love their new companion...

Not.... Not whatever is going on in whatever "romance" books robert-the-foul is reading and us insisting is a good representation of the genre.

The fact that I am going into series that proclaim themselves as "soulmate romances where they're perfect for each other" only to find the main pair can't even stand to be in the same room together without it turning into a screaming match is really disappointing and unfulfilling, especially when its a completed series that never really progresses the relationship past this despite having multiple characters *say* how much they've supposedly changed and are good for each other.

Making a much longer post short:

If you are writing a Romance, especially one you want your readers to root for, please make sure you take the time to include lots of little scenes that show that:

your characters actually are *friends* as well as lovers,

they enjoy spending time with each other on a casual basis

they respect as well as love each other

they try to communicate their feelings clearly instead of bottling their ire up til it explodes in violent arguments

neither of your characters are genuinely afraid of the other when they're angry

that they do not threaten each other with bodily harm during arguments, or use physical force

they respect each other's consent, and respect their partner's wants and wishes when it comes to physical affection.

pretty much to sum it up: do your characters actually enjoy being with each other, or is the entire relationship built on lust and dramatic arguments and nothing else?

Because if your relationship is the latter, your readers are more likely to want them to *break up* rather than *stay together*.

[tydy-the-megnet]

It's a Da– I mean, a Hate

With enemies like this, who needs friends? Or however that saying goes.

Day 6: Enemies

Pidge hated that she didn't hate him. Lance McClain. The ultimate flirty pretty boy Casanova with a penchant for bad jokes and incorrigible cockiness. And her lab partner in physics 2. He slacked off, distracted her, and flirted habitually.

And worst of all, Lance was really, really good-looking. And so nice, and honestly very reliable. He wasn't smart with math or physics, but he managed to keep her from starving herself when she got too into one of their projects. He wouod distract her and practically force her to take breaks, thus risking their grade.

And she hated... that she couldn't be mad at him for it. Because she really liked him.

Crushes were stupid, Pidge decided.

Lance was like her nemesis in a psychological war that he didn't know he was a part of. Every time they got together, Pidge would try her best to maneuver around him to keep them on track for work, and then he'd counter with something like–

"Holy crow! You have the limited edition gold disk Killbot Phantasm I!?"

–mentioning her favorite game.

"Yeah!" Pidve scooted over to his side in front of her shelf. "I won it as first prize for a robotics competition."

"Wow, you really are a genius." Lance said, smiling at her. He even had the nerve to pat her on the head. What a jerk.

"Wanna play?" She found herself asking. She felt like a little goblin sneaked inside her head, controlling her from within and forcing her to go along with his ideas. Now she was even suggesting alternative activities herself. She'd been corrupted by his back-of-the-class-ness.

She got back at him by thrashing him with a final score of 134-33 in the face off mode.

"Wow. Good at physics and phantasms, what can't you do?"

Her face heated up against her will as she looked into his impossibly blue eyes. He must've been hypnotizing her. Again.

"Like you said, I'm a genius." She smirked. Chalk that up as a win! He even admitted she was–

Wait, it was a compliment. Pidge's smirk evaporated into the aether and she grimaced at the "Player 1 Wins" screen.

"We need to get back to work."

Lance groaned. Now that was a win. Pidge smiled to herself as she opened his textbook to the current chapter.

"You know," Lance started as he picked up some of their papers from the table. He organized them—not even bothering to color-code them, Pidge noted with disdain—and continued, "This project is due Friday."

"Yeah, which means we don't have much time left!"

"Yeah, true. But it also means we're almost done."

That was right, Pidge realized. They wouldn't have as much of a reason to hang out outside of school, because their work was done. Until the next project anyway. Her mind cleared, and she thought about how she'd go back to how things were before: getting her homework done in a timely fashion, keeping her grades up, and constantly besting her personal records in Killbot Phantasm. Maybe head out to the arcade one weekends and dominate some of those machines in a way Lance never–

"Yeah, I'd love to go to the arcade this Saturday." Lance smiled, and Pidge jolted, suddenly knowing that she said that last part out loud. And worse, invited Lance.

"Uh, cool." She said stiffly. "It's a da- I mean hate."

"What?"

"I hate you."

They stared at each other.

"Y-you do?" Lance asked. He sounded more confused than upset, though. "Didn't you just ask me ou-"

"No." Pidge said firmly. "I said I was gonna go to the arcade and get high scores you could never hope to beat. That's not a date. That's uh... um, a challenge."

"Oh." He blinked, then smirked, "Well then, Miss Holt– you're on!"

"This Saturday, then. At the Voltron Garden Arcade. Two o'clock."

"I'll be there. With my game face."

"Is it any better looking than your regular face?"

"Oh, it's way better."

"Wow."

Pidge thought she was going to combust. What was happening? Her words didn't match the way her heart was pounding and her stomach was flipping.

It wasn't a date. This wasn't flirting. And she definitely didn't like him. This was just to gamers going face-to-face and—and now she was imagining his face. His dumb, stupid face. Kissing her face, no less.

"Well then, now that that's settled." Lance spoke and Pidge balked. What was settled? Nothing was settled, they hadn't kis–uh, played yet. "Shall we?" He held out his arms, like he was gesturing for them to go. But it was Wednesday. Not Saturday.

Pidge was losing it, she decided. Unless he was offering to kiss her now? That was crazy, though. They hadn't even held hands. She didn't even want to hold hands. Is that why he was holding his hand out? She hated these mind games.

"Pidge?" Lance scooted closer, and Pidge watched him, eyes darting between his eyes and his lips. They were kind of shiny.

"Pidge, are you okay?"

No, she wanted to say. She was not. He wasn't playing fair any more. He went from those annoying gestures to practically making out with her. Why was he so close again? Pidge's eyes went blurry and unfocused behind her glasses. Her gaze stayed locked firmly on Lance's lips, ignoring his concerned cerulean gaze.

"Piiidge? Pidge! Pidmmm–" He kissed her.

Or did she kiss him?

Someone was kissing someone. What was Lance thinking? Now she was getting nauseous and her heart was racing faster than ever, and Pidge stopped to consider he might have poisoned her.

But how? She had gotten the snacks earlier, and there's no way he got anywhere near her peanut butter cookies.

... and okay, maybe she didn't hate it.

Pidge leaned back, falling to the floor. Lance followed her, lying over her and keeping their lips glued together like two protons in a helium atom. Her hands grabbed onto his shirt, balling up the fabric and gently tugging him toward her. Pidge almost didn't even notice her own action, dazed as she was.

But she very much noticed his hands in her hair, his elbows propping him up, and his smooth lips engulfing hers.

He had a big mouth.

Pidge squeaked, and then felt more than heard Lance's chuckle as the sound rumbled through her. It was nice.

Then her breath came short, and with a loud 'smack,' Lance parted from her. A line of spit trailed between their mouths, and Pidge's half-lidded eyes lazily moved to look into Lance's own.

"Do you really hate me?" He breathed. His pupils were really dilated, she noticed. "You have a really fun way of showing it."

She stared, uncomprehending. Her chest was rising and falling with each heavy breath. Her glasses were askew, and slightly foggy. His hands were still in her hair, and hers were still in his shirt. She focused on these.

"Mm. Fun." She answered in a daze. "So, uh..."

Lance smirked at her, "Do you really wanna get back to that project?"

Project? Project. Pidge groaned in her mind, her eyes closing in silent chagrin. That was right, they had work to do, and Lance had distracted her again. She hated him so much.