#he's closer to him than he's ever been

[sev-ille]

This makes absolutely zero sense, but I think it would be so fucked if Wreck had to take on Nice's role after Nice's death, rather than Lin ling.

He finally gets to be the hero but it's not what he wants. Meanwhile, he's still grieving over Nice. Every time he looks in the mirror, Nice's face stares back but it's not quite the same. It never will be.

And he experiences being consumed by the power of perfection the way Nice would have. He thinks to himself 'The whole time, was this the weight you had to carry? How could you endure so much?'

DOES ANYONE SEE THE VISION?

[shanklin]

Stanford never became friends with Fiddleford.

Instead he got himself a different small friend group who cares a lot about him. At least about the Ford he pretended to be in college.

A kind, soft spoken formerly bullied genius who researches very dull stuff in Oregon and definitely not anything weird. Their Ford would never break any rules or ignore safety measures [unlike that other student they heard about during their college years.]

And then Ford stops answering their calls and loses his grant. 

It’s time for an intervention and they start pestering Ford with letters and calls until he finally agrees to meet them at a science convention, but he’ll take his brother with him.

They’re relieved! Ford is with Shermie! They like Shermie! It's a good thing that Ford still has one brother who isn't a good for nothing selfish criminal who destroyed his entire future!

If they ever get their hands on Ford’s evil twin they’ll make sure he’ll regret ever messing with their friend. Ford is too nice for revenge. They aren’t.

Meanwhile at the not-yet Mystery Shack, the Stans freshly survived their own angsty canon divergent tale of two stans AU and locked Bill out of Ford's mind like a week ago.

Stan: I don’t know how long Ford will keep me around but this will be good for him. He needs some friends to take care of him after I inevitably get kicked out again!

Ford: I only agreed to this because Stan insisted and I still haven’t found a way to thank him and apologize. I hope all my “friends” die in a fire.

[hibernating-stag]

The way I read Robo-Ky is that he IS mostly as sophisticated of a machine as he describes himself as, he's built with everything he'd need to go toe to toe with the fighters he's supposed to collect data on. He's got programs to read vitals, all sorts of ranged and close quarters weaponry, several ways of replenishing power... he has got it all.

However. Robo-Ky is held back by Being A Little Stupid. It's endearing, but by God is he A Little Stupid.

[fandom-geek]

albrecht entrati has the most arse-backwards methods of harm reduction i swear to god

...anyway. as ppl may have guessed, i wrote this post before i did the new year's eve do-over. i'm still deeply suspicious of how he knows about the operator and the drifter both existing in the same timeline or why albrecht is interested in tau, but hey, he can't eat all the blame for that - yonta admits to disabling the reliquary drive's safeties before the jump [1]. the zariman wasn't meant to reach tau in one massive jump.

but first! the kalymos sequence. "protect the vessels. repair. rebuild." the thing that leads albrecht to declaring it complete? the drifter befriending and growing close to the hex, and using that trust to save their lives.

i have questions about whether albrecht was in duviri at the same time as the drifter and knowingly left them behind, or if duviri's void nature means it always existed once the drifter created it and albrecht arrived before them. but either way, the "repair" and "rebuild" of the kalymos sequence seems to mean... fixing the drifter's isolation and rebuilding their support network? absolutely insane, i love it.

like he theoretically could've gone about it a ton of different ways, but instead forced the drifter's hand by telling them to let a city blow up and then shooting them and amir for good measure.

this man is literally the most normal orokin we know of.

and what does this mean for my thoughts on his involvement with the zariman? well, he realises in his trip to duviri that euleria created the tales to teach children how to protect themselves from the void, and the tales went on to be a foundational part of the entrati's involvement in the zariman.

you've also got the lanthorns (aka lanterns), which map voidspace onto realspace. this is presumably to make navigating the void safer. there's the exolizers, which are decorated with entrati obols, which reduce void contamination and prevent void cascades. and then there is, as melica frequently reminds us, albrecht's own archives which were used to form the curriculum. you've got the safeties on the reliquary drive - a drive which is still actually free of void corruption, even as it creeps as close as it can get.

albrecht was an outsider in orokin society. he'd been humiliated for who knows how long during his failed void experiments. drusus thought him a madman "fit for the asylum". parvos granum boasted of stealing from him without consequence in a society obsessed with ensuring the orokin were treated appropriately. once he learned of the zariman, would albrecht have had the power to stop it, even knowing what danger they faced?

then there's his line about "the unholy zariman parade". that could be a man who regrets his involvement and what his "all for the greater good" methodology did to those onboard (especially when you consider the zariman wasn't meant to do the trip in a single jump). or it could be a man who knew that zariman was fucked and worked with his daughter to do everything they could to save those onboard from the void?

and he still failed them, to the point that a child had to make a deal with the thing that he unleashed to escape and one version of them got trapped in the "execution circus" for centuries. that another child consigned themselves to oblivion to protect the origin system against that monster. that countless more were forced to become comatose child soldiers, who eventually turned on their abusers and murdered them all. no wonder he talks about repentance and absolution, huh?

[1] i footnoted this entirely because yonta is insane and i love her. [Angel rank] Yonta: "I'd figured it out! How the Zariman could jump all the way to Tau in one big bold leap, disabling the safeties in sequence. If I had it to do again, we could make it."

[stalling]

…….

[oceandiagonale]

Actually, Guzman is his spanish name.

OH YEAH some other folks pointed that out too, makes sense since it's an irl Spanish name (probably why I see it around a lot!) 😳

(normally it's a surname, I've only seen it used as a first name once in a blue moon -- but also in the pokemon world it's pretty clear that naming conventions aren't the same lol)

[arundolyn]

ohhhh my fucking god nobody needs to like know any of this medical tmi but it is literally 11 pm and if im kept up one minute longer when i just laid down trying to go to sleep by my mother YELLING REPEATEDLY that she needs to pee. im going to actually go insane. she got a catheter in. Yesterday. it is working. she won't listen to anyone when they tell her that this is the case. help me jesus. im sure if a nurse comes to check on her tomorrow they'll probably get the same response. my brain will simply explode

[m00ngbin]

Mag 161 and 162 btw. I mourn them deeply

[imtheiliad]

like i’m so excited and ready for my new chapter but this is so incredibly sad. being close to my brother has kept me going through so much and we might not even get to fully celebrate that

[grymmdark]

I've gotten to know my grandfather so much more after his passing than i did when he was alive.

[kariachi]

Yet more for that Argit pokemon series.

The best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry. Yes even if you get that one thing you swear is gonna help.

~~

Every pokemon center has a corkboard available for public use. Advertisements for jobs or events, requests for items, missing pokemon and person posters, all and more go up on the board for use by locals and those passing through. Argit checks them every evening before heading out, though there’s normally nothing worth the bother. Sometimes there’ll be a strong trainer looking for challengers, then they’ll consider the odds. They’re even starting to consider maybe sticking around for a battling competition if they see one advertised. Gimmighoul struggles to pull its weight, but salandit is strong, and they’ve managed a good seventy-percent win rate so far.

For the most part though it just people looking for pokemon, items, or skills they don’t have. That being the case, it hadn’t taken long for them to settle into a rhythm. Come downstairs, skim the board for anything with potential, and leave for the day. Exchange a few words with the nurse on duty when they got back, but otherwise ignore the other trainers. Why bother, when they didn’t intend to stick around or group up, and anything anyone had to offer would be up on the board with the rest of the nothing?

Probably it said something, about the quality of trainers around or about Argit themself, that it took until the sixth stop on their journey for anybody to properly catch their attention. A human, either an adult or almost, they aren’t great at telling, sat at one of the tables with a black and orange ghost-type hovering over their shoulder. On the table is a sandwich, a mug, a few papers, and a sign saying ‘Gourgeist To Good Home’.  Curiosity has their feet moving before they even realize, and their ear twitches as the human notices their approach as grins broadly.

“Hey there,” they say, standing and reaching over the table to extend a hand to shake, “I’m Jules, and this is pumpkaboo!” Argit takes the hand cautiously, tries to maintain a firm grip as they shake.

“Argit and salandit,” they say, hopping onto the chair Jules gestures too more to see over the table better than anything. Salandit hops onto their lap, then the table, it and pumpkaboo immediately setting to inspecting each other. “What’s up?”

“Pumpkaboo here is shaking to evolve and would love to travel.” Jules gives a depreciating little laugh, running a hand through their hair. “I just don’t have the space for a large gourgeist, don’t care for travel, so I was figuring a passing trainer would be it’s best bet.”

They slide one of the papers across the table. It’s a fact sheet about the pokemon in question, loaded with information a trainer might need to know. Ghost/grass type, large size, all shots, no pokerus. Hasty nature, good perseverance, knows confuse ray, disable, shadow sneak, and bullet seed. Ability is pickup.

Argit’s ear twitches again. What was that they’d said, way back when? That if gimmighoul couldn’t pull their weight maybe they could trade it for a pickup pokemon like they’d intended to catch. Without a thought their tail curls protectively around their bag. It isn’t pulling it’s weight, and despite the empty pokeball sitting in their bag they haven’t found a pickup pokemon.

Over two months it’s been though. That’s a long time. It left it’s chest to comfort them just weeks ago.

“What about you guys, what do you have going on?” Jolting slightly, Argit’s eyes flick up from the paper and their plodding thoughts. Jules is smiling at them, and an ear follows pumpkaboo as it floats over and begins inspecting Argit now. From the way salandit just watches it do so, they assume the pair get along well enough. With a deep breath to knock away the tightening in their chest, Argit slaps on a smile.

“Been travelling here and there, don’t really have a destination right now.” Sure there are no bad vibes so far, but they’re not telling anyone where they’re headed. “Haven’t been at it long but, I grew up around ghost types, got one myself already, know how to handle them.”

They also, again, aren’t sure they could afford another pokemon. They can do math, with three they’ll be paying more to keep their team fed and healthy each week than they do feeding themselves. Just to add another ghost to the team, bundle up on those weaknesses.

“Oh, that’s perfect,” Jules says, a hint of relief in their voice as they reach out and carefully scratch salandit’s head. Argit’s proud to say that as much of a skinny runt as they are, it looks in as good a condition as you can expect from a travelling battler. “If you’re interested, here’s the species I’d take in trade.”

They hand over another piece of paper, this one a simple list. It doesn’t, to Argit’s relief, have gimmighoul on it. Instead there’s almost a dozen other pokemon, each of which that Argit recognizes is, they’re pretty sure, relatively small when fully evolved. Well, at least Jules understands what they need from these things.

“Think I saw some of these on my way in,” they say as they go down the list, “can’t you just go out and catch one of ‘em yourself?” Jules laughs again, giving pumpkaboo a wistful look as it begins to join the perusing.

“If I could go out and catch my own pokemon,” they say, “I wouldn’t have gotten one I’d have to say goodbye to so soon.”

Argit hums a near understanding- saying goodbye isn’t easy- and refocuses on the papers in front of them. A grass type would help with salandit’s ground and water weaknesses, and that ground one would only get worse for the team if they ever got gimmighoul evolved. But those dark, ghost, and eventually fire weaknesses, and the extra care costs… Pickup would be helpful though, could easily double the amount of money they made. In that case pumpkaboo would more than pay for itself. And there’s that stupid- team cores made from fire, water, and grass types are a whole thing, they’re pretty sure…

Pumpkaboo draws their attention with a wispy mewl, floating in front of Argit’s face. Yellow eyes meet yellow eyes, and they can’t help but smile a little more honestly when it mewls again, drifting curiously from side to side. With a little huff of a laugh, Argit drops a hand on it’s head, warmth rising in their chest as it shoves it head deeper into their touch when they begin scratching.

“Give me a couple nights, and I’ll see what I can get ya.”

~~

The first thing Argit does, once arrangements have been made, is go actually get a room for their stay secured. The second thing is sit down at a free computer and look up what’s available in the area. One of them they don’t trust themselves to be able to catch, but a few of the others look promising. Then, they have to go buy three pokeballs. It’s an expense they don’t like, and they do have one still that they found along the road, but the odds of successfully catching something are better with more than one ball to throw.

Besides, if they’re considering what sort of core they want to build into their team? Then there’s no denying they’re going to be doing more battling going forward. They do get more money per battle than they do most days hocking stuff, and with a new, stronger pokemon on the team they can hopefully win more of them against opponents with, hopefully, more money. Plus, with a pickup user around Argit will, with any luck, be able to split time more between item hunting and battling. But, if they’re going to focus more on battles, then they’re going to eventually need to balance out their team better, and that’ll take pokeballs.

Like keeping the one that had been used on gimmighoul, they’re making a calculated investment.

Once all that is done and plans are in place, they take the rest of the night to acquaint themself with the town before turning in for the day.

Most of the pokemon on their narrowed list are easy enough to find, but it still takes them until the third night to find the right one. Despite all evidence, they are not their ma, and while they don’t know if there’s any specific rule about it, it does seem in like something she’d do- catch a pokemon for a trade without letting it know she wasn’t keeping it. Instead Argit spends two nights wandering up and down the paths outside of town, trying to figure out the best way to tell the pokemon what’s going on. Eventually they settle on just saying it at the start of every battle with the appropriate species.

That this has, on most occasions, led to the pokemon immediately turning and leaving, is more than a bit disheartening. More than a bit annoying as well. Still, they keep up, despite the voice in their head telling them to just catch one of the stupid things and be done with it. They are ten-years-old and desperate to be better than that. So wasted time it is. Over, and over, and over. Not even to mention the pokemon that salandit has just been too strong to weaken enough to catch without driving them off, or gimmighoul too weak to even bother without it’s backup.

Eventually, though…

“You wanna live in a small place in town?” The skwovet blinks, beady little eyes pulling away from salandit and towards Argit. “Looking for a pokemon for somebody in town, nice enough, but no travelling, not a lot of battling I don’t think, and their place is small.” It continues to stare, long enough that Argit wonders if it understands what they’re saying. Enough that salandit turns to them, itself now confused.

The skwovet turns it’s attention back to the fire-type and enters a battle stance.

“Poison gas,” Argit calls, heaving a sigh of relief as a cloud of purple fumes streaks from salandit’s mouth, engulfing the skwovet as it puffs up it’s fur. All the fur makes it difficult to see any telltale purple tinge, but there’s no sign of it eating a curing berry as the gas clears in the breeze. “Ember it!”

As the skwovet throws itself forward, it’s met with a face full of embers, colliding with salandit’s tail as it swings it. The force of the blow sends both pokemon toppling head over tail, scrambling against each other until their settled enough to break apart and face each other down once more. Skwovet cringes a little, nose crinkling, but it stands firmer than salandit does. Argit’s ears tilt back. This is one of the stronger ones then, and much as they love their pokemon, high defenses it does not have.

“Get evading,” they call, and the words have hardly left their muzzle before salandit is releasing another plume of poison gas at it’s feet. Already poisoned, the nose crinkling is an easy sign, the skwovet wastes no time in throwing itself into the cloud. A smirk slips onto Argit’s face as aggravated squeaks erupt from the gas, realizing salandit’s moved. The purple cloud works it’s way around the field, pokemon releasing gas as quickly as it can to shield it’s exact location. It’s in real trouble if the wind kicks up, or if skwovet gets lucky, but it’s fast and all it needs is time. The normal-type throws itself at where it thinks salandit is again. Misses again.

A third time. The skwovet is chittering more fiercely.

Fourth. It wavers, just slightly, as it eyes the moving cloud. There are brief flashes of salandit and Argit can tell it’s noticed them. Smart, for a skwovet, too.

Fifth

“Ember!”

If Argit was a better person, they would feel bad for the poor normal-type. An order timed right as it moved and suddenly it finds itself sailing just in front of it’s target, in prime place for a full blow to it’s side as salandit flings fire free of it’s tail. As it is, they have to bite back a snicker as it chatters away even more angrily than before, tumbling across the ground and barely managing to get back to it’s feet. By the time it does they have a pokeball in hand, missing the first throw (thankfully nobody but the pokemon are there to see it) and nailing the second. In a flash of red light, skwovet is inside.

It shakes twice before catching.

Salandit is breathing heavily when Argit scoops it into their arms, chittering praise and stroking down it’s back as they approach the ball. They heft it in their hand a moment, give it a weighing toss, before sticking it in their bag.

“Don’t know if Jules is looking for a security pokemon,” they say as their attention turns to checking the damages against their starter, “but I think it’ll do the job anyway.”

~~

“Oh, aren’t you a cutie-patootie!”

Jules, it turns out, likes the skwovet. Which is good news, because Argit isn’t getting them another one. They can’t afford to get them another one. Not unless they start eating skwovet. Dip into the emergency fund that is gimmighoul’s coins.

They may not survive that.

“I take it we got a trade then,” they only half ask. It only takes a moment for Skwovet to launch itself up onto Jules’s shoulder, pumpkaboo already in conversation with salandit.

“Yeah.” Jules laughs as they say it, scratching skwovet’s little head. “Ready when you are.”

The trade station is just on the other end of the pokemon center, a complex machine that swaps identifications and registry information and stuff. Argit had never seen one until they first entered a pokemon center (all the pokemon their ma gave out were, for all intents and purposes, their ma’s until death) and even now is a little bit wary of it. They’re careful, as the return skwovet to it’s ball, to make sure that their eye stays on it. As if if they look away salandit or gimmighoul’s will appear in it’s place. It’s a long moment they spend looking, and it gives them something to focus on besides the tearful goodbye between Jules and pumpkaboo, complete with hugging and teary eyes that leave something Argit doesn’t want to acknowledge lodged in their throat.

When they’re finally done and call the ghost-type back into it’s ball, they seem to have an easier time inputting their trainer id than Argit does. They hesitate less on putting skwovet’s ball in the machine though.

For some reason, Argit realizes, they expected something flashier out of the machine. It dings, it shuts, a depiction of a pokeball spinning and transforming into a great ball, an ultra ball, a premiere ball, a master ball, appears on the screen, sings again, and opens. The ball on their side is older, scratched and dinged like gimmighoul’s. While they’re still reaching for the ball, cautious, Jules has already grabbed one clean new one on their side, releasing skwovet to their own tears and the pokemon’s very obvious pleasure.

Argit takes a deep breath as they hit the button on pumpkaboo’s ball and hold it as a mass of white light emerges. As it grows and grows until it’s taller than they are. Not by much, but by enough to make them fidget. The mass solidifies, bursts in a scatter of light that has salandit hissing, leaving behind another orange and black pokemon. Tall, with long, limbs? Maybe? And a face etched into it’s belly. Their brain supplies ‘gourgeist’ just in time for the pokemon to cry out in joy and fling it’s limbs around them.

The world freezes for a moment, instinctual panic and the need to keep their quills flat warring with each other in the heartbeat before salandit is flaming and hissing displeasure. Gourgeist thankfully gets the message, slipping away to just float in circles around them with sorrowful little moans. The way their limbs hover just outside of touching distance, like they want to try again but aren’t certain, is warm is Argit’s gut.

They flash their new pokemon a smile, an honest one, reaching over and up to scratch around the curl? stem? at the top of it’s head.

“Welcome to the team.” To their side, salandit settles down as gourgeist croons, leaning hard into their touch. “Hope you don’t mind work, ‘cause we got a lot of it waiting.”

“Argit.” Jules is smiling when they look, bittersweet. “Thank you.”

“Not a problem.” It was a problem. They just hope it proves worth it in the long run.

“Still, take care of gourgeist for me? And visit sometime, maybe?” Argit nods, even though they know that if all goes to plan they’ll never see this place again. Never see this region again. Taking care of the pokemon, that at least they- They’ll make it work.

They will.

They have a plan.

“Next time we swing by, I’m sure it’ll lead me right to ya.”

~~

A little local battle competition with a cash prize goes up on the board about a week into Argit’s stay, and they decide to stick around, see how well they do. They’ve got a fully evolved pokemon now, after all, and the cash prize is very attractive. Any cash prize is attractive at this point.

First place sits tantalizingly out of their reach, but the entry was free and they do get a brass third place medal and seventy-five bucks.

It’s enough to serve as a proof of concept.

Argit still ends up breaking into a local store at the break of dawn, to make up the big difference now there’s three pokemon to feed. For the whole little ‘excursion’ they feel like they can’t breath, gritting their teeth against their ma’s smirk in their mind. As soon as they get back to the pokemon center they shove the money into gimmighoul’s chest, where nobody will look. The whole rest of their time in the area they feel like there’s a blazing target on their back, but no one suspects them (no one ever suspected them-) and all they need is to get to get to a bigger place, one with more trainers. One with ruins nearby, now they’ve counted out the coins and realized how fast they’re getting gimmighoul to evolution.

They can’t hock them, not when they’re halfway there.

There’s a new plan. Better plan.

This one’ll work.

[adanseying]

As a Kandreil enjoyer and known Kandrew lover, I think it’s weird and embarrassing as hell when Kandreil/Kevin stans who’s least favorite pairing in it is Andreil try to frame them prioritizing each other more and more as the series goes on as somehow insidious or toxic. Like, you can dislike the direction For Sure and wish it was written differently, but be honest that it’s because of Kevin being your favorite (perfectly valid, I also react disproportionately when my favorite character is hurt by something narratively vs when it’s other chars even if I like/love them) and has nothing to do with *problematic messages about romance* (BAH!) or whatever you are trying to frame it as being the concern instead. 

[floralovebot]

helia is obv meant to be androgynous and bishounen but I get why people would think he was designed to be a woman initially because his name is a woman's name actually. helia is a girls name. also, compared to avalon or other long haired characters, he's also somewhat more different.

I don't think it's too far fetched. some language groups like greek fans could have other pov. in latin american spanish his name was changed to helio for this very reason.

i know his name is feminine. that still means nothing tbh

sky is a popular girl's name in the west. does that mean he's automatically a girl? like no of course not. no one is arguing that sky is a woman just because of his name. griffin is a masculine latin name. don't see anyone questioning her. if his name is the Only proof people have that helia was meant to be a girl, that's weak when other characters also have feminine/masculine names that don't align with their canon gender.

also, you need to ask yourself, what is different about helia? like actually answer that question. what exactly makes helia different from characters like palladium, valtor, or avalon. it's not his body - helia has the same muscular body the other specialists have and he's one of the few male characters we see shirtless on screen. it can't be pacifism - he's not a pacifist and pacifism is not a feminine trait. it can't be art or poetry - neither of those things are feminine traits/hobbies. it can't be his fashion - he's just wearing a shirt and jeans. if anything his wardrobe would be considered more masculine compared to the crop tops the other specialists are wearing (even for the time). it can't be his personality - nabu is also wiser and gentler, timmy is also a simp, brandon is also caring.

so what exactly makes helia different from other long haired male characters?

nothing. that's your answer.

the only thing that makes helia So different is that other long haired male characters are often coded as white Or specifically have darker skin, so fans don't feel the need to question their masculinity (which is a Whole other discussion). helia is not coded as white. even fans who don't consciously realize it are still picking up on that coding. these white fans then feel comfortable questioning his masculinity because they've done that to men of color for decades. it's not just asian men either. white people love to question the masculinity of all men of color, regardless of race or skin color. that's how they demean them. how they separate them from white men. they uphold certain racial and gender stereotypes and then demean any man who "doesn't fit that". which in their eyes, is all men of color.

it's like this: man of color doesn't adhere to western/white/european cultural standards > white people realize, don't like, insult them, and try to make them feel like they need to adhere > white men prioritize the patriarchy and feel the need to glorify it > in order to insult men of color, they specifically call out and question their masculinity > white people around the world think this is genuinely innocent because it focuses on gender instead of race > white racists get away with it

listen, i know at first this seems like a really harmless and maybe even amusing topic. "oh helia is so pretty people think he's a girl ahahah". and for some fans it is genuinely harmless. they just think he's too pretty to be a man. and then they realize, laugh it off, and don't question it again.

unfortunately, that's not the case for a lot of other fans. it's not innocent. it's not harmless. it's white people picking up on racial coding and questioning his identity because of it. you guys don't do this to other characters. you don't do it to sky, who also has a "feminine" name. you don't do it to palladium, who is slimmer and has a gentler, nicer personality. you don't do it to saladin. or nabu. or ogron. or gantlos. or anagan. or tritannus. or nereus. or king neptune. or king teredor.

all of those names are male characters with long hair.

i know it's nice to assume that this is innocent and genuine. but unfortunately, that's not the case. this is an example of something that isn't innocent for a majority of adult, white fans. even if they're not doing it On Purpose. subconscious bias is called that for a reason.

[silentsialia]

Redbull doing all of this "wait until summer break" like that can't put Yuki and PR3 in the same redbull car during a private test to truly see who's better. Like why re-sign Checo if y'all are gonna do a strange humiliation ritual again? Just setting up a bunch of fans to be angry

[alexjcrowley]

.

[namelessprince]

hm. ashe being the Girl could go one of two ways. either i stick closer to pd or i get a little silly with it.