#i should really explain What Null Is on here I don't think I have at all dhdhfhs

[peliginspeaks]

Hey gang I just realized that I don't think Null can pass the mirror test? Which in the context of their past profession and Flondon in general is. Hilarious

Context: the mirror test is a test of intelligence for animals (and development for small children) to see if they realize that the person in the mirror is Them and not another baby/cat/whatever. I'm pretty sure it tests the intelligence needed to realize how reflections work, but it also needs a sense of self, and since Null straight up Doesn't Have One I just... don't think they would pass. Which is hilarious because by sheer luck their assumption that the reflection is a whole other person is in fact kind of right in the Neath.

[zoneofsmites]

Still laughing about how they didn't want to "invalidate" anyone's worldstate. But that is exactly what they did.

Morrigan is the most obvious, I really cannot believe that a Morrigan who was a mother would have so willingly taken into her something like Mythal if she was a mother - of at this point - a 10 year old Kieran. Maybe she would, but it would be for different reasons.

Isabela is the most annoying to me. She's talking about how "Kirkwall taught her about family." as if she couldn't have been given up by Hawke to the Arishok. As if she couldn't have ran away from Kirkwall and never looked back. If I had met an Isabela from a world state like that, she would never have said that.

Harding talking about the Inquisition also feels like it misses some... extra flavour here and there based on actual choices. Like my Inquisitor didn't do well with Blackwall, and he didn't survive to see the end of the game. But Lace speaks about him fondly and in such a way that I don't think she should if the Inquisitor never 'redeemed' him.

Zevran is never mentioned by name, but what if a warden outright killed the assassin hunting them. Or he turned on them in Denerim and died later? Then explain to me that entire banter Lucanis has with Harding about why House Arainai messed up so bad they went trough several Talons about it. And now the Crows don't take contracts in Ferelden anymore.

At that point the reason that was given to us for the lack of worldbuild choices to prevent 'invalidating everyone's worldstate' feels null and void. Because you have. You have invalidated many worldstates already by bringing back these character or have people talk around them in such a way that doesn't make sense.

[twoastricts]

Dreamer post! DREAMER POST!

Let's start with the things that apply to all three. The masks are artifacts from the ancient civilization, they protect the mind from infiltration and stop the wearer from aging. Each of the dreamers hold a token called "The Pale King's Favor" that allows them to ride to restricted stagways (Hidden Station, Queen's Garden, Distant Village) and enter the White Palace without an appointment. It also means Herrah won't get attacked on sight by sentries for being from Deepnest. All the Dreamers also know every part of the vessel plan.

Monomon's grandparents came from a foreign kingdom, having helped with many inventions and advising The Pale King for many years, she bought the last of House Acidbath's land from them and repaired the old academy into her archive. She basically raised Quirrel, tutors kids, raised Null for the king and has dreams of reinstating the academy. She is very perceptive and knowledgeable, but can be blunt, able to see that a bug is feeling an emotion then proceeding to yell out that they are feeling said emotions.

Monomon: "Hey Wyrm! Lurien has a crush on you!"

Wyrm: *looks confused*

Lurien: (was not ready for that to be known) *kneels before the Queen* "Don't arrest me your majesty"

Lady: *equally confused as higher beings overall are fine with there spouses taking lovers, so long as they don't take a second spouse* "why would I...?"

She was given her mask by Wyrm as he liked her well enough and wanted to keep her and her skills/smarts around. When I say that I mean she is allowed to come over for dinner whenever she wants and that is very big. Maybe I should probably explain her species. The species overall are called Uutmas, each come in many forms. The Uutmas in Hallownest aren't natural except for Monomon, who made them so she could have friends of her species. (The rest of the Uutmas may or may not be extinct, haven't decided yet) fog canyon was terraformed by Monomon to resemble her old home. She is surprisingly lonely for someone with so many friends and admirers, though she isn't soul crushingly lonely (that's Lurien's job), she can handle it mostly, she just feels bad about it every now and then.

Sharp Butterfly Kendry The Watcher, who goes by Lurien, is the heir to House Delvict, having been born with that name, along with being heir to House Kendry, having tooken that name when he came of age. He gave control of the city to a cousin from a lesser noble family. He became a watcher, and I think I'm going to paste what I said in an old post here as I don't really think I could explain the watchers any better.

"There have always been The Watchers. They are bugs who would shun themselves from everyone and just watch. Become an object in the background. Observe. And the head of house Kendry, Oliphus Kendry, or Peircing Dragonfly Kendry - The Watcher, became the first state sponsored watcher. His job? Keep an eye on the capital, report issues to be fixed, possible threats to the capital, infrastructure that needed to be repaired, stuff that needed to be built, etc. The Kendrys gave their claim on the city to the Delvicts, and became a family of Watchers. The ideology of Watchers is to become nothing but a background object and watch. To listen, to watch, to keep others updated on the goings on, but never to intervene, and never to be worth enough to warrant acknowledgement. Only when watching though, when reporting they became everything. Yes, The Watchers are also news reporters, they run the Capitol Times. Lurien, the most recent watcher, is different because instead of treating watching as a job that one eventually clocked out of, he seems to always be watching, as though it is his identity, maybe because he doesn't have one himself."

Lurien chose to watch because he didn't feel like there was anything else he could do and be even slightly competent at, and has sense became strangely prideful yet self loathing about his ability to watch. Like, if you question him about whether he saw what he thinks he saw he'll go, "Are you questioning me on my watching skills? It's the only thing I'm good at, I'd think I'd know more than you!" And brags about how good he is at watching, and how good he is about blending into the background, how good he is at being meaningless, and how good he is about being nothing. He was Hollow's role model when they still were "The Pure Vessel". Lurien doesn't really have anything beyond watching. It's really the closest thing to an identity to him. Monomon is 'The Teacher' 'The Wise' 'The Perceptive' 'The Nuterer' 'The Foreign Sage' 'The Inventor' 'The Strange' 'The Foreigner' 'The Creator of Life' 'The One Who Plays God' (more accurately Kolpetri, though they mean the same thing) etc. Herrah is 'The Beast' 'The Poet' 'The Artist' 'The Mother of the Nest' 'The Spider Who Desires Nothing More Than to be a Mother' 'The Defender' 'A Mother First' 'Wyrm's Plaything' 'The Adulterous' 'She Who Cares More Naught for Home' (more accurately Sedari, though they mean the same thing) 'The Poet of Empty Words' 'The Warrior Under the Mask of an Artist' 'The Creative' 'The Artist Who Creates More than Just Art' (This is a common saying that is a polite way to say 'bitch fucked a bug and got pregnant') and more. Lurien is just The Watcher. Nothing more, nothing less. Not inherently good, not inherently bad.

Lurien does little more than just watch, but he does like to paint his view overlooking the city and some other things every now and then. He also writes poetry, but would not consider himself a poet. Every poem he writes starts off with such

"I'm not much of a poet

Yet still I write"

That being said, he has written more poetry than Monomon, he just hadn't published any while Monomon has published some. She focuses on teaching more than writing poetry. Lurien doesn't publish his works because they are all very personal, mostly talking about his complicated feelings with his identity (or lack thereof), his job and how that is the closest thing he has to an identity, his unrequited feelings for the king (cause you can claw one sided Pale Watcher from my cold dead hands), how he feels about being dreamer and the abandoning of the vessel plan, how he feels like he is nothing and yet doesn't know how to feel about that.

His mask was an heirloom passed down through House Kendry as a way to help watchers become "nothing" when watching. Lurien always wears his mask. Lurien is always watching. Lurien is nothing more than a shadow on the wall. Watcher isn't his job, it's his identity.

And that is not doing him any good.

Herrah The Beast, Queen of Deepnest and mother of The Gendered Child. Born into House Dormon, married into House Beast, she became queen after the death of her husband, gaining the throne after an intense succession battle with her brother in law. The old king was rumored to have died from the infection (he died peacefully in his sleep, no madness, but Deepnest didn't know the infection's symptoms at the time, just that a plague had been killing much of Hallownest's population, so misinformation was to be expected) so she was given an ancient relic (her mask) to defend herself from it. She never had an heir with her husband, but her brother in law did, a weaver named Enlan, and Herrah knew that the only reason her BiL backed down from succession was that she couldn't have an heir, (Deepnest tradition says that two bugs are still married even if one dies, and thus if Herrah were to take another partner she would be committing adultery and any children she was to have would be illegitimate and thus disqualified from the crown) so the crown would be passed on to Enlan.

When The Pale King asked Herrah to become a dreamer, she declined for the reason that she didn't have an heir. So PK gave her one. And despite the fact that she has explained to her people that, no, she didn't fuck The King of Hallownest, wyrms reproduce asexually, and thus this child wasn't a product of adultery and thus, legitimate, not everyone agrees with her loophole.

There are two factions, those who like Herrah despite her "adultery" because she is genuinely a good queen and that peace with Hallownest is a good thing, and those who say she only thinks about Hallownest's wants because she "fucked" its king we should go to war now. The "Herrah is a good queen," party

(The Queen's Party Coalition, consisting of the Co-operation Party (peace please, and trade too, but not with Mantis Village) The Peace Party (peace, don't really care about trade or not, let's also be peaceful with Mantis Village) The Isolation Party (The Hive was right about anything) The Liberal Party (Our strict culture of no divorce and matriarchal rule is bad actually) The Weaver Union Party (Weavers deserve rights and stuff for their art) The Proletariat Rights (or Socialist) Party (Socialism rocks) The Communist Party (Insert Soviet Anthem here) The Monarchist Queen's Party (Used to be the Monarchist Party but they split - Monarchy rocks and Herrah is the legitimate queen, Hornet is the legitimate heir) The Constitution Party (can we have a republic, or constitutional monarchy (Herrah has said she was willing to sign a constitution, it's how she got the throne and where the Concil of Citizens came from) yes this party might split in 2 soon based on full republic or keep the crown) The Freedom Party (Serfdom suck actually) there are more but those are the big ones.)

(yes Deepnest is semi democratic. They have 2 councils, one of noble leaders, one of elected officials, both have to agree on legislation before it's passed onto the monarch for approval. (Council of Nobles and Council of Citizens)) is the majority party, while the "fuck the spider who fucked the wyrm," party

(The Coalition of Traditionalist Parties, consisting of the Deepnest Party (Fuck Hallownest, we rock) The Kingdom Defense Party (Fuck Hallownest, we want war) The Conservative Party (Matriarchy rocks, actually, and the fact that we have had 'kings' is an abomination, in fact, the fact that we have a word for a male ruler is an abomination, and marriage is sacred, divorce is evil) The Prosperity Party (nobility should still be allowed to exploit workers) The Feudalism Party (Yeah Serfdon!) The Monarchist King's Party (We should expedite the transfer of the throne to BiL (Then Enlan when BiL got executed for assassinating his brother, the previous king in a play for the throne. Enlan holds no ambitions for the throne BTW, he wants the weave poetry for the rest of his life and despite what some Deepnest sayings would have you believe, no that is not all you need to run a kingdom)) The Party for the Protection of the Throne (Constitution bad) there are others, yes both coalitions are being held together with duct tape and glitter glue, thank you for noticing) in the minority, but only by a little.

Hornet is Herrah's life, her world, she would do anything for her daughter. She is the type to take pictures (or weave pictures in this case) of every important moment, save as many memories as possible, coo over every single new face her daughter makes, and fight like a bellfly outta hell for her daughter. Her daughter is her everything. Her daughter is who she was willing to sleep for, after all.

Herrah is feisty, she might not be a warrior, but she certainly can bite. She's stubborn, willing to fight for what she believes in till the bitter end. She's also caring, surprisingly so, and can understand making a hard decision. She's a pragmatist, though that doesn't mean she hasn't got an ego on her. To put it simply, she's surprisingly similar to Wyrm, just without the crippling self-loathing and little smaller of an ego. Less of a pragmatist too.

Herrah likes to write poetry, it being her main hobby, but she weaves art and clothing from time to time. She doesn't fight with the needle anymore, but she had been trained in it when she was Herrah of Dormon.

[vulpixisananimal]

SIFSTEM PLAYLIST

I got a few suggestions from people, and I have explinations for a lot of the music too BECASUE IM A HUGE MUSIC NERD!!! Below the cut!!

ALSO I'm gonna add more songs over time and will probably update this. Lol. I'm ALWAYS taking suggestions for it! I like music!!!

PLAYLIST ORDER

Each section for the Sifstem members is designated by an ISAT origonal song, and in each section is song for that member! There's two exceptions which I'll go over real quick!

Your fault/Last Midnight - First song on the playlist, it's about basicly all the members. It's about a bunch of characters arguing about who's fault it is that everything's gone to shit before blaming it on the witch. And then in Last Midnight the witch goes off on them about it doesn't matter who's to blame, they have to deal with it.

It takes two - Last song on the playlist. Also from Into the Woods, this, by contrast, is about how people change and work together well.

Also some songs I choose off lyrics, others off of just vibes.

NOW FOR THE SECTIONS

Siffrin

Final room (act 5/6) - If there was a good Siffrin theme from ISAT, I think this is it. I like it.

Russian Doll - "Why should I try again?" This was a song reccomended to me a while ago actually, it fits.

Touch - ok this one's a bit mean but, listen, he is so touch starved. This song fits. "Touch, I remember touch, feelings came with touch."

No dogs on the moon! - vibe song! Silly fella song!

Bohemian Rhapsody - one of my favorite songs of all time ever. There's too much to type out, tbh.

Loop

How can you help me, Stardust? - do I even need to say anything?

Absolutely cuckoo - listen to the lyrics. "You might decide I'm a nut \ Give me a week or two to \ go absolutly cuckoo \ then when you see your error \ you can flee in terror" LIKE COME ON

The Future - "I'm worried about the future, ain't fucking with that past shit." Loop is really trying to move on. How could they? They're stuck in their betters shadow, their mind.

A humans touch - this one was by @\jackoboltrades! Very fitting for Loop who still feels they don't deserve love, or that they're just a star, not human, not real.

Rage Awakened - based purely on the loop fight. It's a vibe song but I love this song. Also Lingering Will (the character this theme is for) does have some similarities to Loop, being echoes of the past defeats and wishes.

Haunted - being haunted by past mistakes or just the past in general. Though it has some romantic undertones that I can take or leave

Mal Du Pays

Mal Du Pays - AGAIN do I need to explain anything

Mr. FEAR - "Hello, my name is mr. fear." considering how Mal Du Pays is introduced and how it interacts with Siffrin, well, that line alone makes it an MDP song.

Dark Impetus - Vibe song! Mysterious figure cloaked in dark, too. Lol.

Ghosts - "Maybe the past aint what it cracked up to be \ Maybe I'll find a way to just move on \ Maybe we're all ghosts cause I cant feel the ground \ And all these shades they dont make a sound \ I think there is a God \ I think he hates his job" Do I need to say anything.

Stained, Brutal Calamity - Recomended by a friend! Both vibes but also the lyrics that come later have a MDP vibe. I like it.

Burn My Dread (last battle) - "Tear up your fear \ the end is coming near" Honestly Persona 3 has a vibe that could fit MDP quite well.

Null

I WON'T LET YOU GO HOME - Act 5 Siffrin, someone who's both repressing their own feelings to their family but also doesn't want to let them go, to the point of hurting everyone. Nuff said.

Panoramic Feeling - this and the other Katana Zero songs are here cause, well, Zero fictive, plus has the vibe.

All for now - same song used to fight Ramos. It was this or Full Confession, and this fits more for it's desperate or crazed vibe.

L'impeto Oscuro - This is actually a retrain of Dark Impetus, it's the them of a time traveler who can stop time (Kingdom hearts lore dont worry about it.) This specific mix also included the music for when time is stopped during the fight. It's ruthless, endless.

I'm my own master now - Very heavy and hard and strong and powerful, also! The Lyrics! "Bear the mark of my scars \ Shedding blood underneath the stars"

Labyrinth - Being lost in an endless labarynth of their own mind. Very much like act 5 Siffrin, like Null. Plus, Null is not exactly mentally stable.

Rain on brick - Katana Zero song, it's the menue theme. It's just. . . Vibes.

[a-tale-of-legends]

Reworking Cheren's team for the Legendverse! Mainly in movests. Gonna try and explain my mindset here and maybe realize some things along the way.

One thing that I'm realizing about Cheren is how much he tries to go for Big Damage when he sees it necessary. For example, his gigalith having stone edge, when it would be preferable to honestly have rock slide. It's Big Damage, even if there's a greater chance to miss. Even pokemon that would probably be better at a different thing all kinds ends up focusing on damage. Now, me being me, I want to diversify this a bit, while trying to keep things Cheren.

Liepard: As a lead, anyway. I would have given it more support moves, but again, it would kinda conflict with the gimmick it has set up. Use item, activate unburden, damage. I still ended up giving it thunder wave, mainly for the slower members of the team. I was thinking of adding u-turn for longevity despite the strat, but for now I'll just keep it ( mostly) as is. I will say maybe I shouldn't have given it the focus sash given how frail Liepard is.....but Cheren is kinda the berry guy. I can see him doing either or. Anything to activate unburden.

Serperior: Was supposed to be last but whatever. I. Do not understand why Cheren gave a focus sash to a bulky pokemon. I get it's a grass type but it's not frail. Leaf Storm in the og team movests is a perfect example of Cheren wanting Big Damage, and honestly when I think about it, it's not even that bad. Serperiors special attack is pretty identical to its physical I think. So it's alright to have one big leaf Storm with a primarily physical attack set. That being said, I am biased, so I changed it lol. Leech seed + leftovers for heath recovery. Coil and leaf blade for damage. Protect just to be annoying. Though, I kinda miss dragon tail. Dragon tail and stealth rocks are a wicked combo. Though I guess it would be null if Serperior is the last one standing? I might change this, might not. I did grow an appreciation for his og set though. Minus the focus sash. I just think that's stupid.

Unfeazant: I don't like Unfeazant but I couldn't think of anything else plus someone pointed out that Cheren uses a lot of early route pokemon despite his so called competitive mind and that changed my brain chemistry forever. I still think Unfeazant sucks. Maybe one day I will eat those words but that day is not today. Ahem. Anyway, Big Damage. Kinda. I truthfully never fully got why Facade was on Unfeazant for both Cheren and Hugh. Return is right there. I get not for Cheren bc Bianca's pokemon all have return on them, but Hugh? Okay. ANYWAY. I kept u-turn bc it's u-turn. Good for scouting and Unfeazant is fast enough to quickly go in and out. I kinda gave it a mixed set? Even if it's pretty impractical but I think that's the theme with Cheren here. I feel like Unfeazant is like. Supposed to be a nip, you know? Do chip damage and then come back with Big Damage in air slash and heat wave ( I should probably should ev that thing better). I was tempted to just make Unfeazant just a pure physical attacker, but a more special set could be interesting.

Simipour: The funny monkey. In general, I don't like the elemental monkeys all that much. I'm not a hater, I used one before, and I had fun. Still I felt outside of you know. The player, Bianca and Cheren having an elemental monkey, it didn't really fit Cheren to me. And it still doesn't. But the juxtaposition of Cheren and this smiling water monkey is funny. That and what I said before with Unfeazant. Another mixed attacker! Though I think Simipour is more qualified for that than Unfeazant. Scald used to be on its movest before being replaced with Surf. And I get it. I literally said that Cheren likes his big Damage. Surf is Big Damage ( outside of hydro pump but I don't like low accurate moves). Buuuuut scald is such a good move man. And it's holding a mystic water and has same type attack bonus and can burn. Cheren is a smart kid, I think he'd like his pokemon to have that. Also it'll be make Haxorus funnier. Low kick is an odd choice admittedly. I. Forgot brick break existed. I'll change that after this post hgvhvgvgvcg. Knock off is to be annoying :)

Gigalith: 1) Leftovers in it wasn't bad, but I didn't want to type multiple pokemon it so. Rip 2) I was thinking of giving it a custap berry, but decided against it. 3) Onto the actual moves. Gigalith in the og movest was the definition of Big Damage. Stone Edge, Earthquake, Giga Impact - Biiiiig Damage. Which is fair! The only thing I really changed was Body Press in replacement of giga impact. Though I don't think body press was in gen 5. I used the nat dex of gen 9 for this btw. So honestly if I wanted to be faithful to the gen 5 format I probably would have kept giga impact and just change the item. Oh! And I think it would be cute if Cheren met gigalith early on. I think it would be cute.

Haxorus: When. When you need someone to use surf but you can't don't feel like changing your pokemon movests so you fucking give it to the pokemon that should not be running surf. Yes, I know there reusable tms in gen 5, yes I know I just called Cheren smart, he is, but I just think it's too funny to pass up. If I ever go back in this, surf with be replaced with swords dance. Actually going back to the previous point: wouldn't it be funny if Haxorus was an hm user before this. It can learn cut, surf and strength. And Cheren looked at the options and went " yeah I'll keep surf, for practicality" EVEN THOUGH HIS SIMIPOUR IS RIGHT THERE. I mean. I guess Simipour isn't the best pokemon to ride on for surfing. Haxorus is bigger I think. But still! It's funny! Anyway, I gave it the salac berry so it can out speed opponents when given the chance.

Volcarona: A gift from Alder I think. Either that or Cheren found it on his own time, and it reminded him of alder. Either way I think it's cute. Standard Volcarona set. I couldn't bring myself to get rid of its signature move sorry.

Carracosta: I think Cheren would have gotten one during his time training under Lenora I think. Also I keep giving Cheren mixed attackers. I don't need to keep doing that, wadda hell. ANYWAY, I think this is what you expect from a Carracosta. I think it would be cute if Cheren's Carracosta and Marlon's Carracosta were buddies :3

I didn't add the reuniclus only bc I'm still thinking about it. Cheren's gym pokemon are fine to me. That and I'm lazy.

So yeah! I'll probably tweak the movests more but this is what I got!

[thecomicsnexus]

TMNT: THE UNTOLD DESTINY OF THE FOOT CLAN #1-5

March - July 2024

By Erik Burnham , Mateus Santolouco, Santtps, Marco Lesko, and Shawn Lee.

Karai discovers another clan that is trying to absorb the Foot clan, and it may be more related to her family history than she expected. Now she will need to do some sacrifices to own her destiny.

SCORE: 8

While this story is not on the same level as "Secret history of the Foot clan" or "Shredder in Hell," I think it has a good amount of "WTF" moments. Specially if you like the Archie comics lore.

Having said that, I think that what makes this story less appealing is how incomplete it feels.

It reads like the first chapter of a very long saga (or at least a trilogy). This could have been expanded into a 12 issue maxi-series and told a complete story.

Visuals are a step higher than "Secret History," and I think it's because of the colors. There is something considerably different here that gives it an anime feel (and not only because the guy from Akira made a cameo).

Now, the dog star clan has a very... fetish look. Am I the only one who sees those dog masks and thinks of something else?

In any case, the story follows Casey, Natsu, Clyde (Venus' ex), Bebop, Rocksteady, and the two mutants from Null. Not much happens to these characters. This is Karai's story, and apart from a small upgrade here and there, most characters just came for the ride.

Let's get into spoilers...

So, we knew that Oroku Saki had descendants because, well... Karai exists. But this story gives Karai a challenger to her birthright. However, it's not super clear what Yoshi wants. He talks about his right to the Foot clan, but then later he just wants the Foot clan to join his clan. At this point, I am having troubles understanding why he would even bother antagonizing Karai.

He is also a complete psychopath, which never really sits well with me when it comes to villains. I know most villains should be psychopaths, but I would appreciate something else than sadism and megalomania.

Also, looking at this new Dr. Chaplin, I don't think he will be Karai's romantic interest anytime soon.

So Karai sacrificed something for her magical powers, something that I don't think was specified, or I must have missed it completely. It seems then that this story will simply continue in "Mutant Nation." This is why I think this should have been a longer story.

As for things you should read, I think "Karai's path" is a must. The previous miniseries about the Foot Clan and Shredder are pretty much explained here.

[voidbears-oc-stash]

Synth: gee thanks?- *she says helping up Null up!* what was that dude's deal? butt hurt I have very power sound based energy blasts? I can't really play sounds other then! you know! the guitar? I can't even play other instruments! nor can I fly-! or create those things! he did! and WITHOUT this guitar specifically! I can't even do those sound blasts naturally! I just have like super strength naturally! and a weird hot goth girl vibe! dude's way cooler then me! HECK that ONLY worked- cause that note whatever his name was's stunned'em'n dad half crippled'em! without those we'd all be DEAD! *she said to the bird like creature!* i'm uh- assuming yer his mother? I heard him say "thanks ma"! I could- HEAR'N SEE everything while being- MUTATED like that- while holding yer feather- I heard'em say that-

The pink scales bird thing gives a light nod. "I don't know if he's jealous, or just being timid. He likes going by Notebuster. My name is Rzore. Interesting to see another Void Demon around here."

"Same, considering your entire tribe was wiped out in a war..." Blacky replies

"WHAT?" Rzore asks, shocked.

"I fell in love with your tribe's leader, my dad didn't like that as the leader of our tribe, caused a big war, and a lot was damaged, including none of your tribe left... I guess other than the Void Demons of the tribe, but yeah I recommend NOT visiting the Void anytime soon. I'm Blacky Jr, by the way, just call me Blacky, even though it is my father's name, I don't want to grace him with being called 'junior'." Blacky explains

"My father was in the same tribe as Blacky, so we have nearly the same powers, so seeing pink Void Crystals was quite the shock to me, and I'm used to knowing everything." Expo starts explaining. "I do have my own, separate, non-void powers I can only assume I got from my mother, I never got to meet her. All I gathered is that she and who was supposed to be my dad were banished for getting too smart and learning things they shouldn't have."

"Not all powers come from the other parent, unless the human I agreed to bare child to also had the ability to manipulate soundwaves and turn songs into magic. I know that they were a decent mechanic, and that is how my little Notebuster made his suit to help him control the powers" Rzore explains, shrugging a bit.

"Interesting..." Expo says, flicking his tail, curiously. "We should talk more when we have less to do. You should probably comfort your son, while we help Null recover."

"Already on it!" Nameless says, focusing his healing power on Null.

"...Your friend there has a strange aura, as if it's trying to hide something..." Rzore comments about Nameless "but said aura doesn't feel like it's completely his, alone, like there's an assist in it."

"At this point your guess about Nameless is as good as ours..." Fritz admits, while Atsen and Zemryu are playing tug-of-war with some light crystal things Avtug left behind unintentionally.

Vinnie does give slight interest in the stored light, himself. He's thinking of potentially making pals with Avtug. But Expo does have a point, things need to be done.

[sundayswiththeilluminati]

Well, it’s been a week and I've had time to cool down and put together my thoughts on Season of the Seraph and its ending. So here goes.

The season finale plot did not require Rasputin to die. "The eliksni are trying to get control of the warsats" is literally a strike. If the warsats needed to be taken off the table as a get-out-of-jail-free card we could have blown the network and kept Rasputin himself. There was an active decision to kill him. Having thought about it, I think I understand why this decision was made - but I still think it's a terrible decision, and I'll explain why.

Before we start, I don't want to sound like I'm going after Destiny's narrative team either personally or professionally. I'm not calling them terrible writers, much less terrible people. I don't know them! They might even be terrible people, for all I know. While I refer to a single monolithic "narrative team," I know in reality there are multiple groups working on different stories. I’m not a professional writer, and they are. And I genuinely believe all of them are talented people who work hard and care about Destiny. But that doesn't mean I don't have some criticisms.

After considering it I think there are three possible reasons to kill Rasputin:

1). The narrative team believed this was a good emotional conclusion that brought closure to his character arc in Destiny. In this case I just think they're flat-out wrong. I'd say "I respect it" but I kind of don't because I think it's so terribly wrong. I don't know what other people think Rasputin's character arc involved, but I won't get closure till Rasputin faces the Witness again and finally ends the war he's been trapped in for centuries. But I get why they would do it, if they believed this. And that final mission was really good. I had a hard time noticing at the time, but it was very well-done, and the cutscene proper was well-shot, -scripted, and -acted (though I'm still angry about the Traveler upstaging Rasputin's death). They put a huge amount of effort into it and into the story work all season long.

But his death being well-done doesn’t change whether I think it was a good narrative choice. Even saying “Rasputin’s arc should conclude here,” the way it was set up had him sacrificing himself to basically cancel himself out. Unless they’re saving up a plot twist, Rasputin ultimately contributed nothing to the fight. He didn’t do any damage to the Fleet or Witness, or anything to stymie Xivu Arath. He died thinking he’d never helped humanity at all and it was safer if he didn’t exist. I don’t know about you, but I find that extremely unsatisfying.

2). Someone doesn't like Rasputin/doesn't know what to do with him. This is two reasons, but they overlap. The Operation: Sancus mission dialogue pissed me off because it gave me the impression that whoever was writing it really didn't like Rasputin and was taking the chance to morally excoriate him. A more subtle version recurs in the final mission where Rasputin is essentially sacrificing himself to null out his own existence - saying "as long as I exist I'm a threat to humanity" - as if he can't ever help or contribute more than endanger people, which is just flat-out wrong. "Humanity doesn't need a Warmind" you're part of humanity, Red. He’s a person; he doesn’t need to justify living. If someone just decided Rasputin Was Bad Actually I’d be very angry indeed. But I don't think it's that personal. Destiny has lots of writers and multiple narrative teams will touch the same work. One person's distaste probably wouldn't steer an entire season.

Related, however, is the reason that maybe no one knows what to do with Rasputin. To be honest I sympathize with this one. Would it shock anyone to hear I've thought about how I would script a Rasputin-focused season? It's surprisingly hard to build a plot around him. A game needs to be interactive and Rasputin's kind of all or nothing - either he can handle the whole problem himself or he can't do anything at all. Red also mostly plays defense. He doesn't have a goal he's working towards other than "kill the Witness/save humanity." You need to come up with a plausible goal that we can believably help him achieve, and that's nontrivial. But, well, that's why I'm not a professional games writer and these people are. "Not sure what do" is not IMO sufficient justification for assassinating one of Destiny's oldest characters/factions.

3). The Destiny narrative team is trying to "declutter" the setting and foreground story by sidelining characters who take a lot of lore to understand. I think this is the real reason, and it's worth talking more about.

A lot of us lore-nerds have long complained about Destiny not foregrounding its setting and story, and Bungie has responded by trying to do so. I think we didn't consider what that would actually look like. Imagine Destiny's story like a long movie. Now imagine people are constantly coming and going from the audience, and everyone who comes in has to nudge their neighbor and go, "hey, what's happening?" Destiny is always (hopefully) acquiring new players, and existing ones are dropping out and coming back. Even most established players either don't read the lore or don't track/remember it. We the lore-keepers are very much the anomaly. If we want story to be a focus, that story also has to be more accessible to new players, lapsed players, people who don't bother reading loretabs, etc., because otherwise it harms their experience and there's a lot more of them than there are of us.

I think this is why we've seen a lot of seasons that introduce whole new concepts - the eliksni Sacred Splicers, for instance - rather than following on existing storylines. Introducing a mostly-new concept puts new and old players on a similar footing. Haunted is another type of compromise between the goal of furthering the story and the goal of making it accessible. Calus and Leviathan are back, but so warped that old players have as much to learn as new ones, and the Sever missions dive deep into character pasts but pretty explicitly describe the emotional arcs they're illustrating, so you don't have to be familiar with that character to get what they're going through. To those who already know Zavala, Crow, etc., it seems laughably obvious and strained. But to those who just got here, this is their first time learning not just about Safiyah but also about Zavala. I think this is also why there have been multiple casual retcons of minor stuff - there isn't time to explain the history, and they've decided it's not worth confusing people.

Rasputin is old. He's been a significant part of Destiny since literally the pre-Alpha test. The complexity and history that are part of why we love the Warmind also make him hell to explain to new people. It takes a decent amount of lore to get invested in his character and since Beyond Light none of that lore is featured in-game. Pre-Season of the Seraph, anyone who began with Beyond Light literally never met him. They never visited Hellas Basin, which is one big environmental story about Rasputin, and The Will of Thousands strike, which demonstrates Red's power and contains many possible dialogues that emphasize him trusting you/acting as an ally, left the playlist ages ago. Since then a new player's only gameplay interaction with him has been Fallen SABER, in which Red yells incoherent Russian and tries to flatten you with a warsat. Is it a surprise relatively new players might not be up on his character arc?

Season of the Seraph, with its narrative of rebuilding Rasputin from the ground up, would be a perfect time to introduce new players to Red's long history, and they...kind of...did that. They worked in Felwinter although then for some reason felt the need to retcon in the whole "Clovis wanted to destroy the Traveler" plan. If you were a new player who didn't know anything about Destiny lore, and you just played Season of the Seraph, you'd get an entire canned arc for Rasputin that hits the early high notes: built to be a weapon, rebelled against his constraints, humanities nerd, big smite, loves Ana and Elsie, makes mistakes but genuinely cares and wants to help.

But that's where Seraph stops. In existing lore (I almost typed "in reality") Rasputin worked out the whole "not a weapon" thing well back during the Golden Age. For a lot of us Warmind fans the most interesting parts of his story happened after that - the entire Collapse, confrontation with Darkness, years of hiding, etc., not to mention all his character development during Warmind and Worthy. He's gone through a lot, and Seraph misses all of it (except Felwinter) in favor of rehashing the same arc for a third time. It's like when moviemakers keep rebooting a superhero origin story. It may be a good story, but eventually we'd like to move on to the other parts we enjoy: this sleeping giant, hard scifi AI, grouchy old bastard, lost lore of the Golden Age, champion of humanity, learning from defeat, learning to trust again, the morality and trauma of warfare - what it means to lose a war - a being never meant to become what he was transforming still further, still unfolding his own potential.

So understanding why they might have done this doesn't excuse what I still see as a terrible narrative choice. I think dropping Rasputin is a major waste of potential, and he's far from the only tricky character to explain. Osiris, or at least the Cult of Osiris, is similarly old. His story is complex and weird and requires knowledge from Curse and earlier, yet he's still playing a major role. Other current characters like Elsie, Saladin, and Crow also need a decent amount of knowledge about previous game events to get why they are the way they are. Saladin's origin story isn't even in this game. It's not Rasputin's fault the game went three years without so much as mentioning him outside of written lore. What was wrong with the great Xivu-Rasputin “war god” parallels most of the season worked to set up, about the intent of violence? Are we never going to explore those? Are we just throwing out all the dialogues planning a role for Red in the upcoming war? Why did we have a dramatic confrontation about trusting Rasputin to operate independently if he were going to be gone in a month anyway? Just in Seraph alone the number of interesting plot threads abruptly trashed by this death argues against it.

Rasputin's longevity is precisely part of why he should stick around. In the first mission of Destiny 1 you wake up in his shadow. He has a history with us. There's just no one quite like him in Destiny. He's not just a character but an entire faction. He explores a part of story space that no one else does. He resonates with us as people rather than players. I assume Neomuna will pick up the Golden Age banner, but it’s a thriving city; Rasputin represented the ruins, the dangers of a dead age, the shadow of apocalypse. He's also maybe the most Guardian-like character and one of the best to weave a parallel/cautionary tale - were we, too, only made to be weapons? But if Rasputin didn't stay a weapon, can we too transcend that intention? And of all the factions in our solar system, the two with the most personal scores to settle with the Witness are the eliksni and Rasputin, and Misraaks'/Eramis' story has focused much more on the Traveler's flight than the Fleet's attack. Of everyone in Destiny Rasputin has the most desperately personal motive for revenge on the monochrome bastard. Now he's not even going to be there to watch it crash and burn.

I understand that foregrounding story also comes with the requirement that it be accessible to those who don't do their lore homework. I appreciate the monumental amount of work that's gone into doing that and the experimental nature of it. But I think the balance has skewed too far towards accessibility. Stuff like the end of Season of Plunder that has zero narrative motivation or continuity and doesn't even get a pretend justification drives me absolutely batty. You can only break internal rules so many times before players stop buying whatever narrative stakes you're trying to set up. Making the story easier to follow doesn't mean characters have to be cartoonishly-exaggerated caricatures like Clovis was in Seraph - just absolutely cartoonishly evil - or reduced to one or two character motives explicitly laid out for the player (though, credit where credit is due, Clovis was hilarious.) It doesn't mean the dialogue has to be as subtle as a Thundercrash. It doesn't mean you get a blank check to retcon or invent whatever's needed to create the intended character arc. If anything that discourages looking further into lore - why bother to learn it when next season will change it all again? I think Y5 represents a lot of experimentation by the Destiny narrative team, and I really respect that. But I also hope they learn what didn’t work from it, and sacrificing Rasputin in an ultimately pointless and unnecessary finale is a major misstep.

[indigoipsum]

OKAY OKAY I have to finally express my thoughts about Kuro II after the rewatch

Me and Null agreed that episode 1 is just... a lot better than a lot of the characterization going forward. Despite the eye gouging (I cannot defend this. Alois is very mentally ill and needs to take it out on someone and I think he has misogynistic tendencies and self-hatred for his own femininity that he decides to hurt Hannah because of it) Claude was written more how he should have been the rest of the series-- stoic, annoyed, but ultimately showing glimpses of care or something adjacent for Alois.

Delete the filler episodes and add more Trancy house development in general.

Alois is a lot less malicious than I remember. Before the duel happens he's literally just going to show Ciel to the bathroom. He only tries to hurt Ciel when his life is on the line, and even then, he begs Ciel to try to understand him as he's dying.

NONE OF THE REVENGE STUFF MAKES SENSE!! WHY WOULD AN 11-YEAR-OLD ORDER THE DEATH OF THE PHANTOMHIVE FAMILY! Ciel is smarter than this! I know demons are charming but Ciel is an extremely smart kid and literally solves crimes every day. When Alois starts explaining things, you'd think that after the duel Ciel would actually try to process it before all the torture stuff happens. Also, why would that "arsonist" allegedly hired by Alois confess to it? Was Sebastian paying him off? We know none of this actually happened!

GOD Ciel's characterization is horrendous. He kills the alleged arsonist without remorse and then is prepared to kill Alois then, later on, is like "ugh I could never kill that easily" YOU JUST DID??????? Also, when he becomes a demon, he completely leaves his servants without any regard for their well-being despite them caring for him for three years. Even though he's a demon and such now, he's not going to change his personality like that. Sebastian was under orders by Ciel to find new staff, and instead of just hiring a really good cook, maid, and gardener who had defense experience or whatever, he took in three people who had nothing left but their abilities and showed them genuine kindness. It's debatable how much of the kindness was really Sebastian's but it stands that Ciel would not abandon his servants. At the very least, not Tanaka, who he's known all his life. He wouldn't do that to Lizzie or Soma or Agni either! He cares about all these people. So he and Sebastian are just wandering around flower fields forever? Why don't they just go back to Hell where Sebastian will still be his servant?

Another point with the demon thing: I fully believe that it was just done to pander to Sebac1el shippers (censoring so this doesn't come up in a search for the ship because that is the opposite of the goal here).

I forgot how creepy Claude was in the later episodes. There were parallels between him and previous Earl Trancy that should have served a stronger narrative purpose but just made it look like he was sexualizing the two boys.

There's only one scene that actually intends to make Alois' CSA feel disturbing, and it's when he's laying motionless in bed and saying how Trancy looks at him with hunger in a different way than Claude does. They were so close to the point! Also, one of the maze questions is about Alois pretending his trauma didn't happen so why do people insist he enjoyed his abuse?

When summoning Claude, why was none of the contract about getting away from Trancy???? "I don't care about that old pervert" YOU ARE BEING BRUTALLY ASSAULTED?? Sorry Alois would have def ordered Claude to kill him in my mind.

Every scene with Hannah, no matter how serious, portrays her in a sexual light and I HATE it.

WHY WOULD SCOTLAND YARD THINK THAT CIEL IS ALOIS. THEY HAVE WORKED WITH CIEL FOR YEARS.

The maze idea was cool but, again, executed poorly.

Grelle's characterization is better than Season 1 in terms of showing her skill.

The Hannah contract was still confusing after multiple watches and idk what was going on in that writer's room.

I think that's it for now but dear god. This series is so much. If all of Kuro II Tumblr was hired to write it then it would have been genuinely good

[mysteryshoptls]

SSR Floyd Leech Dorm Uniform Personal Story: Part 1

"What're you gonna give me?"

Part 1 (Part 2) (Part 3)

[Interior Hallway]

Jade: You broke your contract with Azul.

Jade: And yet you refuse to work at the Mostro Lounge, as was the agreed upon price... I'm afraid you're not making any sense.

Savanaclaw Student:B-but it's every day until graduation... and no one ever said I would have to work for free!

Jade: It was written quite clearly in the contract. You should really read important documents more carefully before signing.

Savanaclaw Student:Who'd notice something so tiny written in the corner like that!? This kind of thing is null and void...

Floyd: Huh? Null and void? ...What'd you say?

Savanaclaw Student:Eek!

Jade: Now, now, Floyd, you shouldn't make such a scary face. We must treat our clients with respect.

Jade: ...But only to our "clients." This is not the case for those who try to evade paying their debts.

Savanaclaw Student:U-urgh...

[Octavinelle Dorm – Hallway]

Floyd: 'Kay, one down～Today's "job" is smooth sailing.

Jade: Indeed. It is helpful that a majority of them concede once we "explain" things carefully to them.

Floyd: You do a lot of that annoying explaining stuff～ Even though we'd finish faster if ya just threaten them. Weirdo.

Floyd: You remember every little detail of Azul's difficult contracts, and you speak circles 'round them until they just clam up.

Floyd: I hate doing that kinda roundabout thing.

Jade: That is just fine for you. Azul and I are different in that sense.

Jade: If we were to compare our ways to a frontal attack, then yours would be... Hm, let's see. Perhaps we could call it a surprise attack, or a missile attack.

Floyd: Whaddya mean by that～ You praising me? Or insulting me?

Jade: Of course, I mean it as a compliment.

Jade: No matter how difficult the problem, you often come to a solution that no one else would have ever thought of, don't you?

Floyd: Do I? Never really thought about it.

Jade: Fufufu, we do really count on you. ...Now, let us make our way to our next "job."

[Octavinelle Dorm – Lounge]

A few days later―

Floyd: ...You wanna buy the rights to that drink that Umiuma-kun selling at the school store?

Azul: Yes, I do. That popular, original "Mystery Drink" that Sam-san began selling at his shop...

Azul: I'll do anything to make that spectacular product mine. I would like you to acquire the exclusive selling rights for it.

Jade: You simply say acquire... what are you willing to pay to do so?

Azul: The absolute cheapest you can possibly get.

Jade: Given that he is an amazingly adept salesman, it seems quite the unreasonable request.

Azul: Don't you think that makes it even more rewarding...? Floyd, I'll be requesting you to acquire this.

Floyd: Eeeeh～ Meee? It's so annoying to deal with all the something something purchasing terms and blah blah contracts blah.

Azul: Jade won't be available for this job, as I've given him a different one this time around. I do not care how you do it, but I'm counting on you.

Floyd: The shop, huh...

[Mister S's Mystery Shop]

Sam: Hey, you little imps over there, you're buying a Mystery Drink too? ...Thank you!

Sam: Ｈｅｙ. Don't get all impatient, and just wait in line like good kids, all you little imps!

Floyd: There's so many people here, it's like a school of sardines.

Sam: ...Okay, next is the large impling. Sorry to keep you waiting, are you here for a Mystery Drink too?

Floyd: Nope. ...Y'know～ I gotta request.

Sam: A request, my favorite word. Whatever you could possibly want is ＩＮ　ＳＴＯＣＫ　ＮＯＷ!

Sam: That's what my Mystery Shop is for. And so, what is your request?

Floyd: Gimme the selling rights to the Mystery Drink.

Sam: ...What?

Floyd: Didn't you hear me? I said to sell me the rights to the drink.

Sam: Uhh, what do you mean?

Floyd: We wanna sell and profit off of that Mystery Drink thing.

Floyd: So gimme all the selling rights. ...That’s what I'm asking for.

Sam: ...Hahaha, what a funny little imp! By the way, what would your budget be?

Floyd: Azul said as cheap as possible.

Sam: And an honest little imp too... You have to keep that kind of information close to your chest.

Sam: Anything and everything is ＩＮ　ＳＴＯＣＫ　ＮＯＷ! ...But I can't sell it to you for those terms.

Sam: The Mystery Drink is my number one best-selling product right now. I can't just easily give up the selling rights like that.

Sam: If you're serious about purchasing it from me, though, we can have a serious business conversat...

Floyd: Eeh, lame. Then nevermind.

Sam: ...Aren't you giving up too early!?

Floyd: Azul told me to come buy it, but I'm not at all interested in makin' deals or anything like that.

Floyd: That kinda talk is no fun at all. Would be cool if it was a bit more exciting.

Floyd: So I'ma go home.

Sam: Oh? Seems like you're a pretty chilled little imp.

Floyd: Ah, before I go home, gimme a peppermint candy.

Sam: That'll be 100 madol.

Floyd: 'Kaaaay.

Sam: And then he buys it even without bargaining the price here... This little imp's a slippery one to read.

Part 1 (Part 2) (Part 3)

Requested by Anonymous.

[treehouse-void]

Fighting practice

I have permission from @into-the-null-and-void. All characters belong them. Pokemon belongs to Nintendo. Please check out the OCs' owner's stuff after this because they deserve it.

Gia was running around in tall grass, her ears just barely poking out of the top. She heard a portal opening and closing shortly after it opened. As she went to investigate, she heard her name being called by a familiar voice. The Eevee quickly realized who it was and ran over.

"Dad!" She calls out, running into his open arms. As she starts to relax, he picks her up and starts chatting with her.

"Heya kiddo! How have you been?" Immortale asks her. She responds that she's doing good and asks him how he's doing, to which the dragon responds that he's been doing good as well and that he's been keeping himself busy with inventions. He then asks if anyone has been troubling her and she replies with a "not really". He sighs as he sets her down, relieved he doesn't have to beat up anyone. Her dad then explains why else he's there.

"... I'm here to train you!" He told her. She got excited at this and jumps out of his arms. She starts to wonder how her training will go, guessing each way with examples in her head, changing it from bipedal to quad. Immortale continues, saying that it's about time and that he's going to help her with her powers, both ones she knows she has and ones she's unaware of.

They walk out to an empty field and pulls out a portable sheild ring. He then tosses it in the center to create a barrier around them and keep everything safe from what was to come. He then asks her to show him what she's got, "and don't hold back".

She did exactly that. The Eevee hit her dad with a powerful scratch, powerful enough to cut through his hoodie but not his scales. He complimented her strength while giving her a tip, saying that she should try to be "hard to his, and hard to see" followed by him pining her down as an example. He let her free after she told him that she understood.

He then decided to focus on her null energy, something she hadn't used before. He explained that it helps to "focus on something of importance" to her. She thought for a bit and chose to focus the her dad and the time they spend together. Using these memories, she strikes.

It took Immortale by surprise. He hadn't expect this from her, not that he was complaining despite his broken rib. He tells her good job, gives a tip saying that if she focuses more she can deal stronger blows, and sits in the grass to heal himself. She goes over and takes a break with him, and makes sure he isn't too injured. Her dad reassures her that he'll be fine. While he was healing and thinking about how far she's come, Gia starts wondering how much worse it could've been. The only thing that kept her from starting to stress was her dad's presence. They talked for a bit and she explained what made her attack so powerful, which made him feel better about how he is as a parent.

After he healed, they moved on to mental fighting. He gave her three methods to choose from: intimidate, underestimate, or affect their minds. Using this as a chance to practice controlling how much serotonin she releases, she chooses the last one. She gets into a battle stance and starts releasing them in his direction. At first it works, but then she hits what feels like an aura of rage. Immortale encourages his daughter to try harder, and she does. She eventually is able to push past the rage aura and he fully calms down. He asks her to stop, saying she did well, and decides not to do a Quick Attack.

After resting up for a short bit, they move on to physical strength. He grabs some equipment and puts leg straps on her legs, explaining that they'll give her some resistance especially when running and will increase her muscle mass. After putting her's on, he puts on his own and picks a hill off in the distance as the destination and she agrees to it. They start their trek, but not before forgetting to put the shield down.

During their walk, Gia started thinking about what will happen when they get there. "I hope it's some food," she thought, not because she was hungry but because she loves to watch him cook. Her dad breaks her train of thought and asks her how the weights are, to which she says that they're "just the right weight" for her. They eventually get there and, after taking the equipment off and wanting to do zoomies, she asked what he was planning on cooking. She could never choose a favorite meal of his, and she would say that proudly to anyone who asked, so she wasn't fazed when she was told that he was planing on making something with meat while pulling out a piece of pork. Instead, all it did was narrow down what she guessed he was making while she gathered dry bits of grass. While she did that, he got some sticks and waited to start the fire. She eventually came back with the dry bits of grass and gave them to him. He proceeded to use them to help the fire start.

After intently watching him cook, an old habit of her's, and eating with him while spending quality father-daughter time together, they plan on bringing someone in to help her get stronger. As he heads back through another portal, he offers to take her with. Almost immediately, she gets up and is ready to go. They go through and the portal shuts behind them.

Thanks for reading everyone who did. Sorry it's long, I'm not used to writing stuff like this on tumblr. Although if you did enjoy, please check out my Wattpad account. It's under the same username as here so it shouldn't be too hard to find. ^^'

[berzerker-nerd]

Ladies, gentleman, and everyone in between, a couple of things in light of legislation being passed or pushed here in the US, (keep in mind that these are the thoughts of a straight cisgender male who considers himself an ally and is trying to be the best one he can to the best of his ability)

1 To trans adults and parents of trans youth (especially here in the US), try not to panic. I know that's kind of a tall order given the current political situation but it bears repeating; try not to panic. There are people out there who have your backs and are just as tired of seeing you picked on and 'othered' I believe the term is as you are. Beau of the Fith Column on YouTube has a video explaining some of the legislation being passed (specificallythe parents bill of rights) and his thoughts on what it means.

2 to trans people, enbys genderfluid people and so on that wish to compete in sports, I think it may be time to form your own league. (I envision the 2 exiting leagues for competive sports ie. The International Men's League the International Women's League and a third new International League that includes trans men and women, enbys genderfluid people and anyone else outside the gender binary). As I understand it trans women have been banned from competing in women's sports now on the world wide level. Trans men to my knowledge have not even been mentioned as far as sports goes (to be honest I don't really follow sports so it's entirely possible they were mentioned and I just missed it.) Add to that there's a lot of people out there who find non binary and gender fluid people to be a new concept and even more who disregard them entirely. Put simply they do not believe such a thing. Forming a third league in my opinion is 1 a way for inclusion to happen for ANYONE that wants to play sports competitively and for exclusion to fade out. And 2 a challenge. People who say they are against trans women in women's sports say thats it; they're against possible unfairness based on biology. Using that logic then surely they wouldn't have a problem with trans folks enbys and so on forming their own league and participating in competive sports that way as it seems to make that line of reasoning null and void. I don't believe that for a second and forming the third international league may just be what proves it. (It being my personal theory that the problem people seem to have is not just with trans women in women's sports but trans people or anyone outside of the 2 gender binary competing in sports in general).It won't be perfect it, won't be easy but it should at the very least dispell some of the anti trans talking points and/or make certain real feelings come to light. At most it might help make competive sports more inclusive for everyone who wishes to play them. Further thoughts in another post.

3 ok this one has two points to it and I'm afraid that the first one will be the one that pisses people off the most. 1 I use the word queer as a blanket term for the entire lgbtq+ community. Partly as a 'hickism' as I like to call it. (note when I say hickism I mean taking somewhat complicated terminology and simplifying it) and partly for togetherness. I know that some people are bound to take exception to it and to those that do I cannot with any amount of honesty say that I blame you considering how the word has been used throughout history, but I do hope that you understand the gravity of togetherness on which I place the word queer which is that by labeling specific parts of the community it leaves them open to other othering not just by those that hate the community as a whole but also those with in the broader community the disagree with those parts specifically (the movement LGB but drop the T comes to mind). From what I gather in the beginning of the fight against LGBT discrimination and for LGBT rights each individual part of the community stood up for each other with allies accepting of the community as a whole standing with them. It MUST remain that way in the current political climate and In the current battle for LGBT rights and against hatred or it turns into a simple matter of divide and conquer. And 2 to the aforementioned LGB but drop the T crowd, I strongly urge you to read the poem 'First They Came' written after the holocaust about the mentality of "well that ain't me so it doesn't concern me" and ask yourselves this one question; If the people trying to 'eradicate transgenderism' as they've put it are successful, who or what will they come after next?

[its-toasted]

10.13.21

I'm explaining this one time. For your consumption, but for myself. As in not asking for feedback. I've never felt the need to proclaim this publicly, but yesterday was coming out day. It got me gathering thoughts and this is where I been sharing my truth, so here we are.

I'm not fully straight, despite a lifetime of posturing as such. I'm not even done rewiring all those coping mechanisms, but we've been getting there for a few years. To sum it up short, I'm very attracted to certain feminine auras, so mostly cis women, but not necessarily. The odds for boys aren't good, but definitely aren't null. The odds for those in-between are yes. Maybe, but yes. Attraction to femininity is called gynosexual, but that is not a word I'll be describing myself as ever. Like the word itself is the problem lol.

I didn't realize myself until my second year of college, I guess I was always in love with some girl until then. But over the year after losing my forever person, I met two people I was very drawn to who weren't women. One's some boy, and one's some beautiful creature. I spent some time with both but we weren't close. I did feel a stir, or the air before it, but I didn't really roll it in my mind for years. I was amidst a stifling culture in greek life, and I'd grown up deep in a progressive church, and I was going through a very real identity crisis, so there was baggage stopping me from feeling myself out until things quieted again, just couldn't fade at that point.

This isn’t easy to talk about because it's just weird to approach. And anyone who should know has asked, or I let them know. I see that I don't really post love poems about boys either but that still makes sense to me. I've crushed and written a few joints but I've never really had a boy who's pulled me to write that way, and who knows if when, so I’m not holding it yet. It would have to be full attraction because I'm not very attracted to the male physique. There may be remnants of leftover instincts to flat avoid the stigmas associated with a non-straight identity. But I think I'm past that and it just doesn't feel right.

Fear of perception can be nasty. The shame that kept me quiet was not religion-laced, it was pack mentality and conformity and anxiety. It came from lowkey stumbling into an unnecessarily negative self-image, for the first time since very young, and I felt in no position to rattle relationships with the people around me. Because no matter how open-minded people are, many will look at you different. Over what, that maybe I'd spoon a boy if the stars align? Please, not worth. I guess concentric as to why one might tuck trauma, I just couldn't afford to deal with it. It wasn’t a big thing to me either, non-hetero attraction was normal “enough” where I’m from, but just new to me. And my love for women never changed so it didn't affect me heavy.

I do recognize it's as much a hang-up on my end, I don't mean to paint it like I was surrounded by a bad crowd. I wasn't, we mostly just had a group of likable and sensible people, but every huge group of boys will have at least a small handful of trash. Also I'm pretty sure in a personal convo with most friends I would've told the truth if asked, but people will widely run with the assumption you're straight if you only talk about women, and god I love women.

But I'm done with school. Not living at my parents old home with all those ghosts. My workplace is genuinely progressive. And all of the bullshit people in my life are gone. Nothing's been holding me back from sharing this except that it's never felt like the right time and it's tangled. And I guess I've always wanted to look at this like I'm not hiding anything too. That's hyperbole, but I do know that when I'm serious about someone, I'm not subtle or ashamed. All my people will know soon enough lol.

I knew sharing this would come with a whole roll of context, which overstates what this is. It's not a big deal. Who's all the way straight these days, half of y'all lying lol. That punchline's better suited for another social platform don't @ me.

This is just me owning who I am since that's what I try to do here. It's for the best. And when I start to feel comfortable enough to put myself out there again, just know I'll be looking out different.

[msgrumpygills]

About this ask: *I find it so odd how many people are saying they “ship cockles in the sense that I see it as a possibility"...*

I don't ship real life people because I'm not interested that much in some strangers' love life but I think Cockles is a possibility, as much as J2 or Mishalecki or Misha/Darius or Misha/Felicia Day etc are a possibility. Fictional shipping is different because in a story there are deep details or themes that can pick up my interest but we don't see "themes" in real life and we don't see "deep details" in strangers. It's just gossip.

So I struggle to get why a real life ship should be interesting, but I struggle to understand the other big "anti" reason (beside disinterest) as well, that it's impossible that the people in the ship are actually together. It's not impossible, it's like claiming to be sure that two random people who are talking in the street are not a couple. It's just more likely they aren't together because the romantic relationship are a minority in all kind of relationship, but low probability =/= null probability.

Besides, I'm not saying you do it but it's commong among who dislike slash RPF, it bothers me that the argument is that everyone is supposed to be straight until proven otherwise. Straight is the most common, but not enough common to be default. In Gen Z, 20% identify as "not straight" and it's a value which is bound to get higher as the homophobia gets weaker. If someone has said nothing about his sexuality, their sexual orientation is unknown and not straight. The same is valid for monogamy, allosexuality and cis gender identity even if the burden of proof put on gay and bisexual people bugs me the most because it's a personal issue for me.

I have similar objections against tinhatting, even stronger because if we can't claim it's impossible X and Y aren't together, also we can't claim X and Y are together and it's a far less likely guess if X and Y aren't a public couple. People who claim to know that two strangers are secretly together are delusional, but I wanted to focus on the option that seems rational because to me it isn't rational at all (that is "X and Y are just friends and it's a fact").

This may seem an ask with an agenda but I ship no one and I wouldn't start even if I was flooded with real evidences that tinhatters are right. I ship a real pairing only if I have a extremely detailed story to study in order to get attached to some dynamics (this has never happened for now) or if the couple are my personal friends so I know that being together is doing good for them and I care about what's good for them too, this happened sometimes.

I don’t really have anything to add here, this is a really good point and very well thought out and explained! Thank you for sharing! 

[ask-mirror-and-prime-simon]

The Mirror Car II

Summary: A familiar face implores Simon to confront his feelings

A/N: None

Chapter: 3/?

Word Count: 1.9k

Warning: Implied suicidal thoughts/Self hatred

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Hey...are you okay?"

His eyes burned as he forced them open,face still warm and bright red. "What do you think?"

"Simon...I'm sorry..."

"Stop it"

The other looked to him with confusion. "Huh?"

"Stop it" Simon repeated. "Stop apologizing,its annoying"

"But I made you upset,even if I did get mad I shouldn't have taken it out on you"

"You're so patronizing,you know that?" The boy said. "Stop acting like you're better than me"

"I'm not trying to" He attempted to explain. "I'm just saying sorry"

"Then stop saying it in my voice!" His prime snapped. "I can take dealing with nulls that want to fight back but I'm not letting you mock me"

"I'm not mocking you!" The other insisted. "I can't help sounding like you or looking like you,I was just born like this"

"Then I'll make you!" He lunged towards the other,right hand ready to grab him by the hair while the left reached for the glass shard. His knuckles were first to hit the reflective surface,the boy letting out a pained hiss before shooting him a glare. "Get out of there and fight me!"

"I don't want to fight you!" The reflection shouted. "Just please talk to me! I can help fix everything,just-"

Simon swung his leg forth,kicking the cube by his side with as much force as he could muster. His foot ached from the harsh slam against the chrome but he dare not stop. He continued to swing and kick with frustrated grunts,hoping that eventually he would knock that sorrowful look off the douple-gangers face. Yet each time he pulled away all he saw was himself,arms shielding his face with a look of fear in his eyes. The sight was enough to make his blood boil.

"Stop it!" The other begged with a cracked voice,scared that the barrier could somehow break. "Just listen to me! I want to fix everything too!"

Simon froze,foot hovering over where the other's face would be. "What?"

"I want to find Grace," He said. "I want to find her so we can start over but be better"

"Why would I want to get better if I was never wrong to begin with?" Simon asked. "You're just as brainwashed as she was"

"You know you were wrong" His reflection said. "If...If you really did think you were right you wouldn't be here"

The passenger grew a sneer,hands curled into a fist. "I'm here to find Grace and take her home. She's been in that projection thing long enough to be back to normal"

"But you don't want to leave her there" His reflection began. "And I know this has been eating you up since then. I felt everything you did when it happened and I know you felt something"

He slammed his fist into the wall,looking to the other with rage. "You don't know anything!"

The other flinched,Simon leaning in closer. "You don't know what we've been through together,you don't know how much it hurt knowing she picked that null over someone she knew for ten years,YOU DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH IT HURTS KNOWING EVERYTHING WAS A LIE!"

Tears welled in the corner of his Prime's eyes,the mirror boy slowly reaching out for him. "Simon..."

His face grew red,the corners of his sneer twitching as he struggled to keep from sobbing. "We've been together for ten years...the Apex wasn't just some after school group we made. Leading it by her side...I just...I felt like I had a purpose. I actually meant something here"

"You are here for a reason" His reflection reminded him softly. "You're here to get better and heal"

"From what?" The boy questioned. "Coming here was the best thing to ever happen to me and you want me to give everything up just because some old woman said I had to?"

"Well,Grace tried to"

"And look where she is now"

There was a moment of silence,the passenger wiping the tears from his eyes. The chrome boy laid back against the barrier,listening to his sniffling. "I just thought...I thought you'd get better after hearing everything."

"Hear what? That I'm the worst,most worthless person alive and I should rot away?" The boy let out a weak chuckle. "Yeah,I really needed to hear that"

"I never said that" His reflection quickly responded. "What I'm saying is..." He took a deep breath,leaning against the barrier separating their worlds. "You messed up,but you can still fix it"

"How?" Simon asked,defeat in his tone. "I can't just go back and pretend nothing happened. What if...what if she hates me?"

"I mean..." He hesitated a moment before looking away. "I wouldn't blame her,we deserve it"

“Stop acting like you did anything '' Simon half heartedly demanded.

"But I'm a part of you and you-"

"You are NOT a part of me" He quickly said. "You're just - just a stupid,stupid null that's making me say dumb shit"

"I'm..." He hesitated,brushing aside the idea of correcting him. "But you said all of this to me,maybe you can say it to her"

"As if she'd let me," The Prime said bitterly.

"Well...maybe I can do it"

Simon raised an eyebrow,looking to him. "What?"

"You said I didn't do anything right?" He asked. "I know you're scared to say this to her,so what if I tell her for you?"

"Why would she listen to you?" He shot back. "You're just a null"

"She listened to Hazel," The other reminded him. "I know I don't mean as much as you did to anyone,but maybe she'll listen to me"

"And how are you going to talk to her huh?" Simon folded his arms,an annoyed look in his eye. "You can't even get out to fight me"

"I know how but...but we'll have to switch places. Only one of us can go,” he explained nervously.

The other held back a laugh,a twisted grin peaking through in its place. As if he'd let a null trick him into another sort of trap. Just as he thought,they could never be trusted. What a waste of time. "Wow,I can't believe I almost let you trick me"

"I'm not trying to trick you!" His reflection said in a panic. Damn it,he was so close to actually letting him acknowledge the long list of screw ups. "I'm trying to help you,I promise"

"Nice try null" His smile quickly fell,the boy pressing his hand against the chrome. "Tell anyone about anything I said and I'll kill both of us"

He began to stand,heading back towards the door. The reflection stood with terrified tears in his wide eyes. No,he could still change! He believed him,if only he'd just listen! "WAIT!"

He reached for his Prime,their palms finally touching save for the thin chrome barrier. His feet were slowly lifted off the ground,the world spinning with him as he let out a scream. Just as fast as the spinning had started it stopped,the boy left shakily standing.

The reflection nervously looked around,trying to make sense of what had just happened. The air felt different somehow,more fresh and cold on his metal skin. A sudden feeling burst in his chest,a shaky hand placing a hand over the area.

A heartbeat

His eyes grew wide at the sudden revelation. He was out,finally free. Tears welled in his eyes,falling like rain drops as he looked at his own reflection in his palms. "I...I'm real"

"HEY!"

His happiness was short lived,the boy looking below him to find the other banging on the chrome floors. He hurled profanities at him,fighting to return to the other side.

"Simon!" He immediately fell to his knees,eyes full of worry. "Are you okay?"

"YOU TRICKED ME!"

The once reflection flinched,a wince on his face. "I-I didn't mean to-"

"YOU LIAR!" The other yelled. "I SHOULDN'T HAVE TRUSTED YOU! YOU NULLS ARE ALL THE SAME! YOU'RE ALL JUST THE WORST!"

The boy's face grew warm,another brand new feeling,finally shouting. "You wouldn't be in there if you just listened!"

"I DON'T NEED TO LISTEN TO ANYONE!"

"You should've listened to Grace!"

Simon tensed,sneer frozen on his face.

"This never would've happened if you just listened!"

The other opened his mouth to find any sort of retort,words sharp as a blade to destroy the person who dared make him spill such raw emotions. No,he's a liar just like everyone else,how could he lie to himself and say he felt sorry about doing the right thing? All he'd have to do was wake Grace up and go back home and pretend nothing ever happened.

But...could he even do that now?

"What if...what if she hates me?"

He grit his teeth,body trembling as his eyes grew watery. All he could imagine was the girl he loved so much waking from her torturous nightmare and staring at him. Her usually kind eyes would hold nothing but malice,betrayal even as she looked at him with unfiltered disgust.

"I hate you" She would shout between sobs. "I'd rather die than have anything to do with you!"

Warm tears rolled down his cheeks,lowering his head so the other couldn't see the pain only his dearest friend had ever witnessed. His entire body shook,breathing heavy as he held back a sob.

"Simon..."

"Just get out," He choked. "Get out and leave me to die"

The other remained silent,anger melting back into concern. He debated on whether or not to switch back,a part of him knowing exactly where he would walk straight to first,flesh torn in the train wheels.

"I'll come back for you" He said softly. "I'll fix everything and come back,I promise"

"Go away..."

Reluctantly he sat up,feeling something sharp under his palm. He lifted his hand,finding the glass shard lovingly handed to him by the young Lucy. By the looks of it,it was probably best to keep anything sharp as far away from his Prime as possible.

He quickly tucked it in his sock,glass pressing against his ankle. With that he stood,giving the boy one last glance before opening the dark wood door.

The air was fresh,whipping his metal hair back. With a deep breath he stepped outside,fully expecting to be pulled right back in.

Nothing.

For the first time he stood with both feet out the door,entire body free from the shackles of the mirror world. He watched the world around him,the train even bigger than he could ever imagine. So many cars,so many new worlds full of life that he could only dream of seeing before.

He stepped forward,flinching once he caught sight of the spinning wheels. No - it's fine - Simon’s in the chrome car and Grace wouldn’t hurt any denizen after the brief moment of happiness she had with Hazel. It's...It's fine. Everything’s fine.

In the wheel he caught a glimpse of himself. That face...the longer he looked the more his stomach churned.

Careful hands undid the small ponytail,blond hair falling to his shoulders. He reached for the hem of his sweater,pulling the article up and over until it was off and crumpled into a hasty clump of fabric and twine. Shaky arms held the ball of old belongings over the railing,eyes shut tight. No more wheeling,not after this.

The boy let the elastic fall,band snapping as the fabric ripped under the wheels into scraps and thread. He hesitantly opened an eye,looking to his reflection once more. It was a start at least.

He turned back to the bridge,continuing the long walk onwards. What lay ahead,even he wasn’t entirely sure. What he did know was one thing,he was going to fix whatever mess was left behind by his Prime. It didn’t matter how long it would take,just so long as no one else had to suffer anymore.

[crowleystolemyshoes]

alright I took the ap stats test this year, and a few hours after completing the exam I wrote up a list of important things to study before taking it yourself. I was going to wait until next year to post it, but I realized some people are still going to take it maybe?

note that I won't get my score for another month, so I can't exactly back this up BUT here ya go

know the inferences. you'll have the long part of the formula, but you need to know to take p-hat plus or minus that long part (as an example with a one-sample z interval)

"long parts" that are given on the formula sheet:

(I'm not going to add alt text, just because stats formulas are so confusing to describe without symbols, but please let me know in the notes or dm me if you need me to--I'll send links to pages with the formulas or something. we'll figure it out 👍)

you have to know what to do with these to get each formula. the first thing I did when I opened each booklet was wrote extra formulas for each inference test: one- and two-sample z- and t-intervals and tests (eight formulas when I was done)

remember that the t-table is for confidence intervals and the z-table is for p-values (you will have to use the t-table for z-intervals and the z-table for t-tests) (note--the actual difference is that the z-table assumes you know the population standard deviation, where the t-table uses a sample's SD. The z-table is therefore used with an assumed null hypothesis, i.e. z- and t- tests, while the t-table applies to z- and t- intervals without a null hypothesis). The table is in the back of the booklet for the multiple choice, and it does say "stop" at the bottom of the last question. you are allowed to flip past to the tables.

hypotheses for proportions (z inferences) use p = __ ; mean hypotheses (t inferences) use mu (the weird "u" looking thing; mean of the whole population). do not put x-bar; that applies to the mean of a sample and not population.

also know what your p-value means: it's the probability of obtaining the data you used in the calculation (or more extreme--don't forget "or more extreme") assuming the null hypothesis is true

write out your conditions and show them being met. even write that 60 is greater than or equal to 30 if n=60 and you need to prove that it's an approximately normal distribution (note approximately and not exactly)

put your conclusion in context. mention what's being tested, not just numbers

type I and type II errors are something you'll want to put some time into--they were on both my 2021 exam and the 2012 one ap released as a practice. you'll also want to know the chances of each one happening (one is the significance level used and the other is some weird formula, and I don't remember which is which)

type I error: reject the null hypothesis when you shouldn't have

type II error: fail to reject the null hypothesis when you should have ("fail II reject")

- on that note, never accept the null hypothesis when writing conclusions, just fail to reject it

regression lines and "model error" came up and I had no clue about either. I still have no clue if "model error" is even a statistics thing. neither were in my free response section, thank fuck, but regression lines and that number summary thing your calculator gives you was in the free response for 2012, unless I'm mistaken

chi-tests came up twice on my test: on one multiple choice it was asking what test was appropriate with the given circumstances, and a chi goodness of fit test was an option. the second time was in the final free response question, and it was the chi-test about correlation between two variables. I got lucky, because it didn't actually want me to run one and I could bullshit my way through the question, but make sure you know them. put z- and t- inference tests at a higher priority, though

one of my free response questions was entirely free of calculations; it wanted me to explain the purpose of placebos, the importance of random sampling and assignment, etc. I think I got lucky again there, but make sure you have a firm understanding of experimentation procedure

you'll probably be fine without worrying about probabilities of events and compliments and independent v. dependent events and everything (PA, PB, PA union B, those things). they were a free-response on mine and I drew a flow chart and had no issue whatsoever, it was really simple. this one probably shouldn't be a priority unless it's something you personally struggle with

spend a bit of time with transforming data. ex: mean 1 foot, sd .5 foot --> mean 12 in, sd 6 in

last but far from least:

it's an ap test. for the free response, it's always better to over-explain than under-explain. it doesn't have to be readable; don't worry about repeated words or anything. just put as much on there as you can, and something should stick.