#incorrect of swamp and sea

[incorrect-of-swamp-and-sea]

Jonah: I want a baby

Mercy: Go find one of our 8 adult children

[skyward-floored]

Or tell me more, anyway, I should say BAHAHA

Somehow I saw your first ask but didn’t see these ones?? oops asdskfbdjdvsdnd

Anyway certainly! I noticed you wanted to know about the third Zora group in swamp Link, so I’ll ramble about Zora for a bit if you don’t mind XD

So the reason Hyrule is so marshy is because hundreds of years ago, the Hylians and Zora went from being good friends to bitter enemies, and a war broke out, one that included a lot of warfare involving flooding and blocking rivers and destruction of dams and stuff like that. The swamp was probably half it’s current size before everything went down.

Anyway after the war, the Zora sort of separated, and now there’s three groups, though two are more similar than the third. There are swamp Zora (traditionally known as River Zora, though that’s kind of incorrect since there’s more Zora upstream), upland Zora, and sea Zora.

Swamp Zora live in the, well, swamp, and can handle both fresh and saltwater for as long as is necessary. Their scales come in shades of green, though their fins can come in more colors like red or blue, and most colors adjacent to them. They’re more stocky than other Zora, and not as tall.

Upland Zora live in Zora’s domain much further upriver, at the base of the mountains. They’re much more regal, and consider swamp Zora to be rather simple (in a negative way). They have a reputation for being stuck up, and only thrive in freshwater (though they can handle short amounts of time in brackish or salty). They tend to come in pastel colors, light blue and green, pink and grey. They’re bigger than swamp Zora, but are more slender, more like the Zora in tp for example.

Sea Zora live out in the ocean, though they have a settlement closer to the bay that’s near the swamp. They’re bigger than swamp and upland Zora, and come in very bright, bold colors, orange and pink and green and blue... pretty much every color you can think of. They look a little more like upland Zora, but tend to act more like swamp Zora, in general.

So yeah! That’s the general gist of them all. I’m still working stuff out, and deciding things, but yeah. I also have a little art of them, but again, still working on designs, and honestly I’ve drawn better ones XD Plus they’re not in color so that’s kind of a bummer.

[unwillingwriter]

Unserious [Drake & Josh]

Pairing (Technically): Drake & Josh (Platonic)

Ages: 18

Summary: Drake Parker is a very unserious person, whether it’s by choice or coincidence which makes people like Josh or Megan want to strangle him. Here are some occurrences of him being such.

A/N: Originally Posted on A03, I do not own Drake and Josh. Rightful owner to the characters and sitcom is Dan Creepy Schneider and Nickelodeon productions.

———

Drake Parker is an unserious person, an unserious person who downplays a lot of things. Whether it’s school and his grades, getting grounded, not remembering a girl of the week name, or importantly her eye color for some reason: seriously what’s so important about remembering such a small thing? Okay, maybe remembering a name isn’t such a small thing… but still! Eye color shouldn’t be that big of a deal in his opinion besides, he did remember Michelle’s eye color! Or was her name Sydney?… no no it was Cassie!

Anyway! Drake's point is!! He did remember her eye color. They were a deep sea blue with small hints of swamp green surrounding the pupil, melting into the blue like oil and water— see he could be poetic— and remember a simple eye color, so he didn’t understand why a cup of soda was dumped onto his head, for!.

“You’re wrong,” Josh says after making a buzzer sound that mocks one from a game show when the contestant says the incorrect answer. He sounded eerily close to one that Drake thought he had a buzzer under the counter that he was wiping down with a rag.

Drake squints at his brother as he picks apart his sticky hair, wincing when he seems to rip apart a knot that somehow formed, streaks of dried orange crush coloring his face.

“How am I wrong?” Drake asked, wiping his face with a damp paper towel Josh kindly gave him with his signature half smirk he gets when something happens to Drake. Only small things, of course, Josh isn’t a sadist. Aside from the doom buggy accident— but he wasn’t happy about the fact that he got hurt he was happy and excited about the endless possibility of Drake getting in trouble with Audrey and Walter. But of course that blew up in his face and had to take care of Drake for two weeks.

“First of all, her name isn’t any of those. Her name was Rochelle and second of all her eyes were green” Josh replies as he stacks the candy in an orderly fashion.

“Yeah, that’s what I said,” Drake says in a Duh tone, finishing up with cleaning his face and looking at the orange stain that seeped into the paper towel.

Josh stops stacking, looking towards his brother with a raised brow.

“What?” Drake questions.

“Do I still have soda streaks on my face?” he continues, touching his face in search of a sticky substance. Josh shakes his head at Drake, in both disappointment and amusement.

Drake never fails to amaze him.

“No, you still got stupid all over your face though,” He says with a shrug.

“Oh okay,” Drake smiles, then frowns.

“Hey!” He squeaks out, voice cracking.

Josh laughs, getting a damp paper towel thrown at him, the material smacking him in the nose and falling to the floor.

“Ew, I don’t want your Drake cooties!” Josh grimaces as he leans down in his station, picking up the discarded piece of tissue between his index and thumb fingers. Throwing it into the small waste bin under the corn dog machine. Josh’s personal touch, beat going around the counter every time.

It was Drake's turn to laugh.

“Cat-like reflexes my butt” He snickers, trying to run his fingers through his hair. Flinching when he feels small bits getting ripped out his skull saying a string of ow’s and owies.

Josh rolls his eyes at Drake.

“Where did you get that kind of eye color from anyway?” Josh asks, genuine curiosity peaking.

“I don’t recall any of your past girlfriends having those”.

Drake shrugs his shoulders, both not knowing or caring.

“Beats me, hey wanna watch a movie with me? It’s terrible movie Tuesday” Drake says with a small grin on his face, eyes sparkly. As if he didn’t just get soda dumped on his head just three minutes ago and had a huge dark stain on his brown shirt, hair sticky with the smell of orange crush soda.

Josh gave his brother a face.

“What?.”

“I’m working,” Josh says, his tone screaming ‘duh isn’t that obvious?’.

For Drake Parker?, Nah.

“When do you go on break?”

“In ten minutes but-”

“And how long is your break?” Drake cuts in.

“An hour, but Drake-”

“Perfect, then you get to start your break early. Ain’t that awesome?” Drake asks with a smile on his face as he hops over the counter grabs Josh by the bicep and drags him to Theater One where DragonBall Evolution is playing.

“Drake if Helen finds out”

“She isn’t gonna, she never finds out that Gavin sleeps on the roof and he still works here. Crazy Steve is crazy and still works here. You work the hardest out of them both without having something mentally wrong with you, so if she fires you it’s her loss man— you put out 110% all the time and that’s way too much for a simple position.” Drake practically rants, while he drags his stepbrother through the double doors ignoring the blonde employee whose name he doesn’t care about remembering. If you work at the Premiere and you’re not Josh he’s not remembering your name.

Josh smiles at his brother, a soft somber secret smile that he only shares with Drake if the teen happens to say something that ruffled his feathers in a good way.

“Wow Drake, that's a pretty nice thing to say…”

“Besides, if she fires you, no more free tickets for me. So I’m hoping she doesn’t find out.” Drake adds, snorting through his nose.

Aaaaand moment ruined.

Josh could feel a familiar throbbing in the side of his head. Eye twitching. He thumps Drake in the back of his head with his free hand, not too hard but hard enough. Drake lets go of Josh's arm when they reach aisle three, rubbing the back of his head.

“Ow!” He groans glaring at his brother.

“What was that for?!”

“For being you,” Josh says bitterly, Drake thumps him on the back of his head in return making Josh cry out, rubbing the back of his head. He huffs.

“Headaches!, you give me headaches!” Josh shouts as he points at his temple, a big frown on his face. Drake keeps the glare.

They stare at each other for a while till they scream in sync and collide with one another, the shadows of their bodies big on the walls of the theater as the commercials on the giant TV play, illuminating a gentle white then blue light. Drake knocks a few hits in Josh’s head till his brother picks him up and practically body slams him on the floor, Drake swears he sees stars. A blossoming warmth of pain took over the back of his head, sinking through his brain and shooting out to the front of his forehead. He’s pretty sure his head connected with the arm of one of the theater chairs before he hit the ground while he and Josh are having a slap fight on the floor.

If Josh wanted, he could’ve been a wrestler. Screw the fancy science shit and math and some other smart stuff Drake has no idea about and doesn’t care for.

After some time Josh tries to help Drake get his head out from the chair he manages to get his big head stuck in between, trying to unclip the backboard of the chair. Drake lets out a strangled sound.

“Got it yet?” The teen wheezes out.

As he says it, Josh loses his grip and its normal weight squishes Drake's neck making the boy sputter out air.

“Ack!— Josh!”

“Shit— Sorry— why did you try squeezing through there?!” Josh hisses out, loud explosion sounds echoing through the empty theater while two teens looked like absolute buffoons. Josh hooks his finger around a piece of metal on both sides of the seat, pressing his thumbs against the metal button that’s used to change the height of the seat.

“I’m skinny!” Drake throws out there as if it changes anything and it doesn’t make his grand idea any stupider.

“Yeah, Skinny, not small. You’re not five Drake” Josh bites back. His legs are on both sides of Drake's body as he pulls on the backrest, digging his finger into the metal ball ignoring the burning pain that printed into his skin— turning red.

“You scared me okay! you hit my rib”

“Because you kicked me in my nuts!”

“Well excuse me for saving the world from tiny Joshies” the Guitarist wheezes, his face turning red while trying to pull his head out. Seriously though, what was he thinking?

“Think I’d be returning the world a favor if I leave you stuck here?” Josh asks in a calm voice, threatening, evidence somewhere within’ his voice but his continued action on getting the backrest off his brother's neck meant something else.

Drake keeps his mouth shut.

After successfully getting Drake unstuck after about fifteen odd minutes (with the help of Crazy Steve— if Drake claims that he didn’t pee a little on himself out of fear, he didn’t) the boys managed to finish the rest of the movie after an hour, after that hour Josh went back to work and after two more hours Drake waited for Josh to finish up work so he could drive him home.

Silence filled the car, while they cruised down the road passing streetlights and freeways. After a bit, Drake starts to snicker to himself as he pulls up to a red light drumming his fingers against the wheel. Josh cranes his neck to look over at his stepbrother. His brows drew together with a small smile creeping onto his face, the corners of his eyes crinkling a bit.

“What’s so funny?” He asks his voice light and joyful.

“Oh, nothing it’s just that, my head being stuck in between the seats reminded me of something,” Drake says, talking under his breath like he’s embarrassed, which is news to Josh— Drake doesn’t get flustered much, he makes it his mission to make others flushed.

“What did it remind you of?” His brother questions, seeing the way his head tilts a bit in his preveal vision. The street light casts a soft glow on his face.

“Don’t hit me.”

“I’m not gonna.”

“You don’t know that”

Josh snorts through his nose.

“Just tell me.”

“Well… it kinda reminded me of this porno where this smoking hot mom gets stuck in the dryer and her stepson or was it son in law?… anyway he supposably tries to help her get unstuck but of course, it’s a porno so the plot doesn’t make sense, and she could obviously get out by herself and him fucking her doesn’t make sense with how it’s supposed to help her predicament but— anyway I’m getting sidetracked— my point is—.”

“You have a point?.”

“Shut up— anyway— my point is that me getting stuck like that just gave me that image, the only difference is that you actually helped, not saying that you wouldn’t have but— I mean— I’m gonna stop talking” Drake finished with a huff feeling as if he’s digging a grave for himself the more he talks, eyes still on the road, feeling the burning gaze of his brother on the side of his face.

Silence fills the car again, Drake could feel his cheek start to color. When is this light gonna turn green for crying out loud?

“Drake… you are the most unserious person I know…” Josh says, voice soft and quiet. Soft out of disappointment or amusement? Drake doesn’t know. He can’t really tell sometimes.

Drake side-eyes Josh. Josh is looking dead at him.

When the light finally turns green, Drake doesn’t hesitate to start driving again. After some time when the boys reached the curb of their house, Drake noticed that Josh's eyes were deep sea blue with specks of swamp green around his pupils.

He doesn’t bother to think about why he confused Rochelle’s eyes for Josh’s.

Drake Parker is an unserious person, so when Josh tells Drake that he’s gonna start working out again. Drake couldn’t help but laugh from the top of his loft, looking down at his brother who was wearing his old gym clothes with dumbbells by his black sneakers. Josh's jaw slack eyes squinted searching for the secret joke Drake seems to only be aware of.

“What’s so funny?” Josh questions, his eyes squinting more to the point Drake couldn’t make out the color anymore.

“You wanna work out,” Drake says, still laughing a bit, his cheeks heating up from how hard he was smiling. His hand gripping the neck of his guitar, one leg kicked over the other like a weird-looking P.

“Yeah… Why is that so funny?”

“I just don’t see why you would want to, you fucked up your foot last time. It looked like an angry grape that disliked being attached to you” Drake laughs, imagining Josh's messed up foot from two years ago.

“The only reason why my foot got messed up was because you shot me with your potato launcher!” Josh explains, flailing his arms in a wide motion trying to make Drake see the bigger picture.

“Which you gave to Megan, thanks a lot by the way” Drake replies sarcastically.

“I didn’t trust you with it” Josh huffs as he begins to bend over to grab the dumbbells readying himself as the instructor on the TV speaks.

“And yet you trust our evil prankster little sister with it instead, Ah yes ‘cause that makes perfect sense Josh” Drake scoffs not understanding Josh's logic sometimes, he was supposed to be the smart one out of them.

“Why are you working out anyway? you look perfectly fine to me” Drake shares, facing his attention back down on his guitar as he messes with some of the strings, trying to find a new tune. Singing a few words in his head as he strums along like there’s no issue.

“Because I’m getting big again” Josh lifts the barbell on the count of three holding the object above his chest and holding his breath.

Drake snorts “Yeah, sure, and I’m malnourished— Breathe Josh”.

Josh gasps, taking a deep breath. Soon dropping the barbell, without crushing his foot this time taking lines of air through his nose and out his mouth.

“You know what malnourished means— actually scratch that, you know the word malnourished?” Josh asked, sounding genuinely shocked. Which makes Drake roll his eyes in subtle annoyance and irritation.

He knows those words probably mean the same thing but he doesn’t care much about that little fact.

Yes, he does.

He knows his grades are shit but Jesus Christ a little faith would be nice.

“Ha ha you’re so funny,” he says giving Josh a sarcastic smile as he looks up from his guitar, flashing all his white teeth. It was Josh’s turn to roll his eyes.

“Anyway as I was saying, you look fine to me, sure you’re getting chubby around the face but so what? You look fine man so if someone is giving you a hard…” Drake slowly stops talking when it hits him, he starts to squint at Josh who seems to think the floor under them is interesting now.

“Josh”

“Hm?”

“Is someone… making fun of you dude?” Drake asks as he stares at his friend, tilting his head.

Josh looks up to meet Drake's eyes, opening and closing his mouth trying to get words to come out only air leaving his lips as he sputters.

“Who?” Drake asks.

“No one I just wanted to—.”

“You’re not big Josh, you just got a bit wider that’s all,” Drake says his brows drawing close to each other, he lays the guitar on his bed, leaning forward making the box spring squeak from the shifting weight. “So I’ll ask again, who’s making fun of you?” Drake says with more authority.

“No one.”

“Ah yes ‘cause I’m supposed to believe that after three years of building confidence and wanting to lose weight on your own accord and reaching that said goal someone didn’t manage to Wiggle their way into that large head of yours after you gained the slightest bit of weight from eating— which by the I don’t see at all, so I don’t know what they're seeing” Drake speaks. It didn’t make sense to him, Josh looked fine, he was just getting fat in his cheeks, and that was mostly because Josh started to eat unhealthy for the last week.

After Mindy broke up with him, again.

And Drake asked Megan to ship her to Australia, again. Josh didn’t need to know that of course.

“Drake” Josh sighs, eyes closed while he rubs his temple.

“Come on man— don’t look at me like that— Josh— hey! don’t walk away from me!” Drake calls after as he hops down from his loft chasing his brother out of their room.

It took three weeks, including some help from his devious little sister. But Drake found who was making his brother feel shit about himself, like yes okay. When Drake first became brothers with Josh he thought he was a geek— a nerd sure and he would make fun of him for it but he never once made fun of Josh for his weight, he understood how self-conscious he was about it even when he would seem confident with it. How he would walk the halls with that big goofy smile that Drake came far to adore, smiling himself when he would see it. It was an innocent sweet smile, it was better than Drake’s and his mischievous smile along with his charming one, he won’t tell that to Josh out loud of course— he still has a reputation to uphold.

What was saying?

Oh, right!

Drake never made fun of Josh for his weight, and he found out who was the jack-off who had been making fun of Josh’s newly gained weight— which again, wasn’t bad! He’s only a little wider! And has chubby cheeks again! he’s a fucking semi teddy bear!.

Clark Housewhite was the asshole's name, he was a senior with no brain— which leads to his first question, who the hell has a last name like Housewhite? What was his ancestor’s thinking? Drake stood by his locker looking for the tall brunette, Drake had Chemistry right now but couldn’t bring himself to care for which he knew he’s gonna get an earful from Josh and their teacher for later. Clark usually went to the bathroom around this time and that was the perfect time to strike.

Drake was in the middle of clipping his nails when he heard the sound of heavy boots hitting the floor, making Drake's head shoot up, flicking his head to the side to move his bangs out of his face. He’s taller than Drake gave him credit for but hey, fuck it.

Drake clears his throat when Clark nearly passes him. Clark stops in his tracks and slowly turns towards Drake, Drake’s still leaning against his locker as he watches the jock's eyes meet his. The guitarist gave the larger gentleman a smooth smile.

“Clark, can I talk to you for a second?” Drake requests, holding onto the strap of his backpack as he pushes himself off from the lockers not breaking eye contact.

“Um… sure? Whatcha need dude?”.

When Josh got home he instantly rushed upstairs to tell Drake something, shouting a quick hi to his parents over his shoulder as he stormed up the stairs greeting Megan who was in the middle of exiting her room, screaming when Josh nearly ran her over, calling him a boob. Josh wasn't phased, he was more attentive in telling Drake the news not being able to do so sooner since Drake disappeared from school around chemistry. Josh throws open their room door with a giant grin on his face.

“Drake you won't believe what happened, some moron thought it was clever to start a fight with Clark Whitehouse— which by the way is a weird last name but hey, anyway, he had the meanest black eye ever. No one has ever once landed a hit on him, whoever did has a mean fist—.” Josh said excitedly while he was setting his book bag down on his bed taking out his textbooks and assignments that were due in a week, stopping mid-sentence when he looked up toward his brother's bed dropping a textbook on his mattress when he took in Drake's current appearance. Drake's back was pressed against the wall of his bed, arm in a sling and cast, face battered and bruised a split lip— his left eye swollen shut, the right almost unscratched but also closed. Did he fall asleep like that?

Josh slowly walks over to Drake’s bed climbing the ladder. He was careful to not make too much noise if his brother was sleeping.

“Drake,” he says softly, Drake doesn't react. Josh places a hand on Drake's ankle, softly shaking him.

“Drake?” he says, keeping his voice gentle. Drake groans in response, slowly opening his eyes— well eye… his good eye.

“Wha?…” he asked, his voice groggy and filled with exhaustion.

“You were the wise guy who got into a fight with Clark?…”

“…No”

Josh smiles, that knowing smile that has Drake avoiding eye contact. Which makes him grimace in pain.

“Thank you, Drake” he smiles warmly.

“I have no idea what you're talking about,” the teen said in a monotone voice, not looking at Josh still, ignoring that kind smile he knows he doesn't deserve half of the time. His heart drummed in his ears.

Josh shakes his head climbing up the rest of the ladder to help Drake lay back on the bed. It was the least he could do for the guy after getting his butt kicked by a guy who was twice his size. Drake grumbled a thank you, hissing when he twisted incorrectly.

Josh doesn't question how Drake knew it was Clark, but later when he brings up a can of doctor fizz for Drake and sees Megan sitting on the bed near her brother brushing his bangs from his face in a gentle manner, it helps with his hypothesis on how Drake found out. A smile creeps on his face when he hears Megan say something about shipping Clark to Ohio by tomorrow morning, watching Drake give the young girl a lazy smile, shoulders shaking in weak laughter while he says something to Megan that he can't quite hear but judging by Megan's pout. Drake said no. Megan lifts Drake's hand slowly and carefully— his good hand and presses a soft kiss on his red knuckles, blowing air on them.

If Josh's memory serves him correctly, he remembers Drake telling him a story about how when Megan and himself were kids– when Megan still loved him he claimed— when Megan would get hurt and cry and run to her big brother for comfort, Drake would kiss her booboos then blow on them, and gift her with a huge smile and ask ‘Pain Gone Meg Meg?’ and she would nod and hug him tight. Seeing the way Drake's eyes get glossy, he could tell the motion brought back those memories.

Josh silently backs away from the room leaving the Parker siblings alone, it was always nice to see the two get along. Maybe not when they're messing with Josh.

Drake is an unserious person, just not with Josh’s weight apparently.

Drake is an unserious person so when Megan ends up telling Drake about some dude named Jacob Reff who broke up with her— seriously what's with dudes and having weird names?

He busted out laughing, one hand on his stomach and the other on his knee. Wheezing, tears in his eyes as his laughter continues— lungs burning from his joy. Almost cackling. Megan stares at Drake, still sitting on the couch of their living room, her puffy red eyes squinted at him, watching the way her brother seems to lose it over her pain. She guesses it's deserved.

Drake coughs and hacks a couple of times, Megan raises a brow while he does. Drake wipes a tear from his eye, seeming to get himself under control. Clearing his throat as he pats his chest.

“I’m sorry, I'm sorry,” he says trying to keep a straight face but snickers nonetheless, shoulders shaking as he breathes heavily from his nose.

“You done?” Megan asked, her tone annoyed.

“Nope,” Drake answers truthfully as he resumes laughing all over again. Megan huffs as she wipes her tear-stained face.

“Did he finally find out that you're a she-demon in disguise of a thirteen-year-old?” Drake questions, taking deep breaths. Shit his side hurt from laughing so hard. Megan glares at him, a strangled sound making itself known in the back of her throat as she stands from the couch, walks up to her brother, and kicks him in the knee hard replacing Drake's laughter with a grunt.

“You are such a boob” she bites out, masking her hurt with anger as she brushes past Drake and towards the stairs to hide away in her room.

“Hey, it's not my fault you decided to date some idiot with a stupid name. He didn't deserve you anyway!” Drake calls after her, but his words fall on deaf ears, Megan is too mad to hear her brother's stupid words. He's a jerk. He never takes anything seriously.

The next day at school Megan walks towards her locker to get her books for homeroom after she collects her items she readies herself to start heading to homeroom stopping dead in her tracks when she hears rattling from around the intersection of lockers, on normal days Megan would mind her business but for some reason this time she wanted to see what the commotion was. Megan walks towards the corner peeking her head around the corner, eyes landing on Jacob who was struggling with getting his locker open. Megan wanted to duck back behind the corner of the lockers and carry on with her day, seeing Jacob filled her with unwanted pain and resentment, an old saying from Drake floating in her head.

"We're Parkers, we don't get our hearts broken. We break them instead” That was after a girl Drake liked— someone he actually saw a future with broke his heart. Amelia Tomson. Megan hated her. And still hates her, she feels she's the thing that set a change in her big brother's personality, not just their father who walked out on them.

Megan didn't like this feeling, this angry twisting feeling in her chest, continuing to watch Jacob struggle with his locker, the preteen sighed about to walk away but gasped at what happened next. It all happened within a second but for Megan? That shit was in slow motion.

When Jacob finally managed to get his locker open, his jet-black hair was suddenly covered in deep red liquid spreading out from the impact, painting the area around him, from the inside of his locker to the floor to a bit of the ceiling. Other students stopped and gawked at Jacob. Megan's jaw was unhinged, deep brown eyes wide as she stared. She looked past his profile looking at the note that was taped on the inside of his locker door, seeing a small handmade gadget that even a five-year-old could make. Megan read the note.

“I heard that you like red”.

Megan looks at the floor noticing a sharp pencil discarded on it, catching a red glimmer on the tip, a purple rubber band loosely wrapped around the metal part of the eraser— wait— her brain stops for a second, a rubber band, a makeshift gadget that looks like a slingshot, a sharp pencil preferably sharpened to a shorter length, odd liquid… all that was missing was… Megan looks up towards the ceiling above Jacob's locker. And yep there it is!, a ripped blue balloon that was securely taped by three layers of tape on the mouthpiece. There was only one person she knew who would pull such a thing, who taught her that prank when she was only four and it had her laughing for days that she advanced into her own with a paintball machine.

Drake.

Wait… if Drake did this doesn't that mean that he…

Jacob screams in disgust. “Raw fish!!” the boy yells as he runs down the hall taking chunks of meat out of his hair and racing to the bathroom. His face was stained with droplets of liquid, the smell of raw seafood following the boy. Megan scrunched her nose laughing to herself, if Megan was guessing the right fish that her brother picked, Jacob wasn't gonna get that smell out of his hair or off him anytime soon.

Since the show was sadly over, Megan starts to head to homeroom, slowly stopping when she remembers what Drake said last night, what she blocked out when she was aggravated at him for being an ass.

‘He didn't deserve you anyway!’ Drake's voice echoes in her head, bringing a small smile to her face.

When Megan returns home and walks down the hallway towards her room, she stops and turns on her heels heading towards Drake and Josh’s room, she enters the room unannounced, Josh is doing his homework on his bed and Drake is sitting on the couch messing with his guitar like he usually does on Friday afternoons. He seemed to be playing something somber at the moment, it's a blurry memory but she believes their dad used to play that tune. Megan silently walks up from behind towards her brother, wrapping her arms loosely around his shoulders, pressing her cheek against the top of Drake's head, tightening her arms just a bit around him, and pressing a kiss on top of his head after. His hair tickling her nose, smelled a bit like lavender, he must borrow Josh's bath soap.

Drake presses a hand on Megan's arm, softly rubbing it as if this isn't something new for them.

“You alright Megan?” he questions cautiously, like something was gonna happen like Megan was planning something and it was gonna happen after his baby sister either let him go or didn't. The thought made Megan laugh a bit, smiling.

“Yeah, I just love you,” she says in a soft voice, one Drake and Josh aren't used to. It makes Drake uneasy but that doesn't stop Drake from… comforting his sister?.

Megan gives him one last squeeze before she releases him, messing with his hair, and walks out of the room without another word.

Megan wasn't too far, she could still hear her boobish brothers talking.

“Is she sick?” was the first thing Josh asked

“I don't know… is a piece of my hair missing?” Drake followed up which made Megan snicker, of course, Drake would worry about his hair.

“I feel like I just got the touch of death… if I die bury me with my guitar,” Drake says, sounding a little freaked out.

Megan rolled her eyes fondly at her idiot brother, but in her own way, she loved and adored him. Josh as well but you get what she means.

Her amazing, unserious brother. Who can get pretty serious when he wants to.

Drake Parker is an unserious person. And it bites him in the ass. But truthfully, he feels like this time it's not even his fault.

Drake rubs his eyes tiredly from beneath his glasses—don't laugh at him— his head hurts and so does his body, his brain feels like it was on a stove in a pot filled with boiling water. It felt too stuffy for him. Drake Parker, musician and singer a teen who could write nearly a hundred songs within a day couldn't write a simple fucking essay on what gives his life meaning and what brings him peace and warmth when he feels like he's gonna sink into the depth of darkness that creeps in the back of his mind like a toxic ex that would visit him in the debts of night, that would attack him on the day a certain deadbeat left his and Megans life forever, shit the giraffe on his back burned from thinking about him.

A lot of people would say and claim that Drake was a free spirit, he gets through life with his charm and good looks alone. But he knows the hidden message behind those words. He's nothing special and no one special, so what if he can sing and play the guitar, even the drums? That's not gonna help him in the near future…

What if his dream doesn't work out… it's not like he had a backup plan, he wasn't like Josh or that creature that wears a skirt, Mindy.

School wasn't made for Drake, so what would make him believe that he could survive college?

Ugh, when did he get so depressed? Jesus.

What was he doing? The blurriness begins to clear up after he blinks a couple of times meeting with the blank page of his paper, oh, right, his essay…

Something that makes him happy… Something that gives him meaning and that warm feeling. He could always write about music but that feels like an obvious statement that would land him a big fat F anyway with Ms. Hayfer and her booger-infested nose. Truthfully it doesn't matter what he writes, he’ll get an F either way since the old bat just fucking hates him that much, even when he does get the answers right. It's amazing that for the past four years, none of the teachers ever noticed that he was practically failing at a class not because he was simply bad at it but because a sad pathetic woman who needs to get the attitude screwed out of her or something hates his guts for no real reason.

The next thing he knew his notebook was flying across the room from his bed toward the door, which for some reason Josh decided to walk in at the worst moment ever, the black school notebook hit Josh right in the bridge of his nose making Josh face switch from that happy go

lucky look to a look of pain, groaning as he held his face, Drake flinched when it hit Josh, grimacing at the sound of impact.

“Ow, dude what was that for?” Josh questions, pain in his tone and irritation ringing somewhere in there. His eyes are hard as they stare at Drake then ease up when he watches the expression on his face. Drake's eyes were red and puffy, bitterness swimming in those dark brown eyes, cheeks red, the vein in the center of his head bulging out.

Josh leans forward picking up the abandoned book, striding across the room towards Drake’s bed.

“Sorry, why was your face where my book was going?” was the first thing Drake said when Josh reached the ladder, rubbing his eyes beneath his glasses again, and letting out an uneasy breath. His head was throbbing.

Josh ignores the comment, more concerned about why his brother looks like he is on the verge of crying, Drake wasn't one to cry. Hiding his more troubling emotions with charm and charisma, bad puns, and childish games.

“Wanna talk about it?” Josh questions, handing Drake back his notebook, the musician gratefully taking it from his hold mumbling a thank you as he tosses the book somewhere on his bed. Running his fingers through his hair pushing his bangs back.

“No, it doesn't matter man”

“You assaulted me with a notebook and my nose hurts”

“How was I supposed to know you were gonna open the door as soon as I threw the book?”

And they were bickering. It only lasted three minutes due to Josh climbing up the ladder and pressing his hand over Drake's mouth to shut him up.

Drake's eyebrows go up to his hairline, squinting at Josh after.

Josh removes his hand slowly, not breaking eye contact, eyes laser-focused.

“Gonna ask again, what's up?”

“This stupid essay man, it's half of my grade and I have no idea what the hell to write. It's not like it matters regardless since Ms. Hayfer makes it her life goal to make mine a living hell— failing me every chance she gets. Might as well not write anything at all” he says, his face going through the motion of every emotion he's feeling at that exact moment— Josh watches with an unchanging expression.

“Drake…”

“No! It doesn't matter, Josh. No matter what I write I'm gonna get an F and fail and go to summer school then fail summer school and repeat the twelfth grade as you are at some big shot college like Stanford or Yale or Harvard or whatever smart college for brainy yacks like yourself and that creature along with Craig and Eric and not be my manager anymore ‘cause you'd be busy doing something better for yourself and forget all about me as I'm some loser who couldn't graduate on time because I didn't take school seriously and some sad teacher has it out for me!” he blurts out as he shoots up from his bed-hopping off the side of the large platform, landing gracefully on the floor with a thud. Heading towards the door slamming it behind him when he exits.

What… What just happened?

Josh was left stunned.

Drake Parker is an unserious person, so when he receives his diploma from Ms. Hayfer herself he has the biggest shit-eating grin on his face, his burgundy cap snug on his head, the tassel tickling his ear. Hand on the other side of the diploma, that his teacher seems to be having a hard time giving him, a small game of tug a war happening between them, Drake manages to rip it out of her hold with one last firm tug, his smile never changing. Ms. Hayfer gave him a bitter forced smile, making Drake wanna double over in laughter, enjoying the struggle the witch was going through watching him graduate on time— which is mostly thanks to Josh who made sure he didn't give up after his little break down a month ago.

“Say it,” he says, a smile still present on his face.

Ms. Hayfer lets out an annoyed sigh, her face souring.

“Congratulations” she mumbles

Drake cups the back of his ear leaning to her a bit mocking an innocent look.

“I'm sorry I didn't quite catch that, mind repeating that?” Drake asks, puckering his lips the way Josh does when he knows he's being a little shit. He could hear his peers behind him snicker at his silly comment.

“Congratulations for graduating Drake Parker,” she says, sounding like she was choking on the words as she said them.

Drake's arms shoot up in the arm as he does his battle cry reaching pitches no other normal human could reach. Cheering.

“WOOHOO! I MADE IT BABY!!” He cheers happily making everyone laugh, bowing to the audience, the laughter growing.

Right as Drake is about to step off the stage, he hears it before he sees it. A high-pitched whistle then a wet splat, his jaw drops when an orange paintball hits Ms. Hayfer right in the side of her face, making her cry out, small drops landing on her black blazer that had gold stripes. Drake couldn't hold it in, he let out a high-pitched laugh pointing at the woman with his diploma, the auditorium filled with laughter from students and families. He runs off the stage before she can even grab him, laughing the whole way down the steps, circling the stage cheering, family, educators, and students joining in his cheer as he races to his assigned seat, high-fiving Trevor who sits next to him. Drake notices Josh a few rows down smirking, following Josh's view he notices Megan who wears the same smirk down in the audience, holding something small and silver in her manicured hands.

Oh, oh he loves them.

After the ceremony, students are standing with their families outside of the school hugging one another and cheering. Drake was just finishing up hugging Audrey and Walter— squeezing his little sister for the first time since forever— she let him— pressing a firm kiss on the crown of her head, earning himself a soft punch to his rib, making him laugh.

He hears him before he sees him.

“Hug me brotha!!” Josh says in that weird goofy voice he does like he's making an announcement. Drake curled his head so fast that he could feel the muscle in his neck sprain. Eyes wide and bright racing to Josh in max speed practically jumping in his arms and hugging the other tight, as Josh held him up in the air hugging him just as tight, like when they were fourteen and first became brothers and instead of screaming out of fear, Drake screams out of excitement and pure joy. Josh proudly held Drake up in the air, Drake for once not caring if anyone saw them, this moment was one that he will forever remember. And he had no issue with that.

“We made it dude!”

The sound of a camera going off happens, but neither one could care less. Just happy. Giant smiles on their faces.

March 8th, 2015, Drake Parker is twenty-four and is still a very unserious person. Not by choice, he came to realize that on his own. Maybe a little .

Drake was currently sitting in a leather seat, elbow resting on the arm of the chair, mouth kissing his knuckles, attention fully on the stage before him. He could feel his heart jackhammering against his chest plate, threatening to break through and let itself known to the world like some scene out of a horror flick. Now he wants to watch a horror movie when he goes home. Nice.

Drake counts back from ten all the way to one, practicing his breathing exercise that his therapist taught him after his car accident back in 2008. Drake takes a couple of deep breaths, flinching— nearly jumping out his skin when he feels a gentle hand rub his arm in a soothing manner.

Drake opens his eyes again looking towards his left where his little sister was sitting, Megan was looking at him with a gentle expression. Smiling at him in a way that reminds him of their mother— which he’s thankful for— kind tender eyes on her newly mature features, it feels like it was only yesterday that she was nine and tormenting him and Josh. Drake looked past Megan to see their parents talking in hushed tones but they seemed happy enough, unaware of how nervous their son seemed to be. Drake closes his eyes for a moment again, exhaling and opening his eyes again. He nods towards his sister, she returns the gesture removing her hand folding them together on her lap, her posture remaining straight. Smoothing out her white dress after a bit, checking herself out in her compact mirror checking if she had any loose strands of hair in her high ponytail. Putting it away when she doesn’t find any. It almost makes Drake laugh.

And she says he’s obsessed with his hair, little brat.

Drake shakes his head, paying attention to the stage again. Listening for who won a Grammy from each category of music.

That’s right you heard him. Drake Parker is sitting in a chair at the Grammys in Hollywood. When Josh got the call and told Drake, Drake couldn’t believe it. He still can’t.

He never thought he would officially meet the queen herself, Beyoncé!. And don’t get him started on the Princess of Pop Britney Spears. When she first spoke to him on the red carpet Drake felt as if he was on cloud nine, and when she hugged him, it was all over— Drake thought he was gonna pass out, if Josh was with him he knew his stepbrother would’ve laughed at him. Especially if he got to witness how red he turned when Beyoncé told him he was so handsome.

If anyone was to ask Drake if he was a Yoncè and Britney fan instead of just rock and roll— the blues, a bit of jazz and classical music, the last one thanks to Josh. He will deny it till the day he dies and just say he respects them and their craft.

Drake clicks back into focus when he sees Bruno Mars walk up to the podium after Selena Gomez performance, clapping along with the crowd, even though he has not a single clue what she sang.

“Thank you Selena for that wonderful performance” Bruno Mars says, with his charming smile clapping with the audience, his tan skin somewhat red from the beating lights.

“And now with great honor I would like to announce the Grammy winner for best selling song for rock, number one best seller, top of the charts on build boards!” Everyone holds their breaths, Drake tenses up in his seat watching as Bruno opens up the golden envelope, his smile never changing.

“And the Grammy goes to… rising star Drake Parker I Found A Way!!” Bruno announces with a cheer, Drake jaw drops as everyone else around him cheers, clapping the starting intro of the song starts playing. Drake looked around, his mind not keeping up, Megan was shaking his arm in excitement telling him to go. Drake stands cleaning his throat as he fixes his black suit and navy blue tie adjusting his circular glasses that framed his face perfectly— Megan’s personal touch. The navy tie, Josh’s idea. The shiny dress shoes his mother helped with.

Drake hugs Megan who pats his back, pressing a soft kiss against his mothers cheek and shakes Walters hand with a big grin on his face pulling away as he walks out his row and down the aisle towards the stage fixing his side bangs as he walks up the steps of the stage walking towards Bruno, accepting the Grammy in one hand shaking Bruno’s hand in the other side hugging him stepping up to the mic. Looking at the hundreds rows of celebrities, staring up at him and smiling at him in encouragement.

“I… heh” Drake clears his throat, a watery smile climbing his face.

“Shit I honestly don’t know what to say it’s just that— I didn’t think I would win y’know? I didn’t think I would make it, thought I would have to wax surfboards and probably work at a run down diner that no one really knows about but has the best pie” Drake says, laughing a bit, causing the rest to laugh with him.

“I.. listen I downplay a lot of things and I take a lot of things unseriously but this? This moment right here? Is the most serious thing that has ever happened to me, besides becoming a big brother, becoming a brother to someone else and having to share my room for five years with that person. Actually making it through high school and graduating on time”

Drake wipes his eyes from under his glasses.

“Stupid tears”. That earns another chorus of laughs.

“Sorry sorry, anyway this Grammy doesn’t just count as my achievement and success. This Grammy counts as an achievement for the best manager and step brother in the whole entire world. Josh Nichols who sadly can’t share this moment with me tonight since he had a highly important test today— get that degree bro. I wouldn’t have made it up till now without you brother thank you! I love you!” Drake holds the Grammy up with a giant smile, tears running down his cheeks freely, voice cracking.

“To all the people that didn’t in believe me, fuck you I made it you hating ass bitches, special shout out to my English teacher Ms. Hayfer and the creature that wears a skirt and claims she’s a girl Mindy Crenshaw. Much love to my biggest haters couldn’t have done this without ya either” He chuckles, everyone claps and cheers.

“And Josh if you happen to be watching, I would say I’m sorry but come on… we both know I’d be lying. Thank you Hollywood and my family goodnight!” He finishes off, walking off the stage as his song plays again as he holds up his Grammy while the people laughed and cheered making his way back to his seat.

Was Drake Parker still an unserious person?, yes. Was he still petty after a couple of years?. Yes.

[top-wing]

no one is making arguments about what species of bat are the mcbats so i end up arguing with myself LMAO

i think their designs are based on California Leaf Nosed Bats and regarding their habitat in north america (bats of canada don't seem to have leaf noses). their way of flying/taking flight from hanging upside down is also similar in a way.

but they sleep with their wings wrapped around their torso which is actually large fruit bat behaviour. plus they eat fruit so like. fruit bat. like you could argue it's just the show making it easy for them which yea fair but shh i am overanalyzing. let's assume we take everything face value, and since they have shown characters eating uncommon types of foods too (penny eating sea slugs, crocs having swamp juice? or whatever) they could have shown the bats eating insects.

"they don't wanna include obvious pred/prey themes" aeeeek loud incorrect buzzer noises. this topic (?) has been a main point in one of the episodes so the show doesn't really seem to have a problem with that.

so what are they. honestly idk i have no conclusion. there's a genus, Artibeus, which are Neotropical fruit bats. they are still in the americas (Central and South), and some of them have the appearance of the design (?). I'll take one species, (which was moved to a different genus actually lmao oops) Dermanura watsoni, not because i have knowledge if they actually fit the species or anything, i just think they're cute and look similar enough with the mcbats lmao

[hotcocoandmarshmallows]

The poll is 50/50 DID HE MAKE IT?????

To me?

To me, he is forever trapped. The wave is crashing in front of him, and he is trapped in a tunnel of water. If he slows down, he will be flung upside down and crashed into the sea floor. If he speeds up, he will be swamped in his boat and sink like a rock.

He will never reach land. He will never see her again. But he lives. And he can hope. All he has is hope. Maybe, maybe, one day he will be saved.

But for now, he is stuck. Forever just out of death's grip. Forever rowing with all his might to stay .2% ahead of the wave. The wave who's only goal is his death.

But y'know if he lives in your interpretation he lives. My take on this isn't correct or incorrect, interpret that .2% how you will.

[aiweirdness]

New Disney villains

Earlier I tried an experiment where I tried to get the GPT-3 neural nets, trained on a huge collection of internet text, to generate new Disney princesses. From just two example wiki entries, I got incorrect reimaginings of existing princesses (Snow White apparently has a magic wand, a fake shoe, and a stolen chicken), and brand new princesses (Banks Afloat, pirate of a swamp in a suburb of Buffalo). The princesses were, in general, extremely powerful. So for balance I decided to see what the villains would look like.

I summarized Disney Wiki articles for Ursula (occupation: sea witch) and Scar (occupation: lion), then asked GPT-3 to fill in the next entries.

DaVinci, by far the largest of the GPT-3 variants, tended to complete the list with real Disney villains, but do it somewhat incorrectly. Apparently Gaston is now a chef.

Name: Jafar Occupation: Ruler of Agrabah Powers and abilities: Ordinary magic, Killing by staring, Induce Fear into others, Shrinking (and later restoring people to normal size) Likes: Evil, snakes, power, being high and mighty, getting rid of meddling fools, starting fights, manipulating others, treasure, exploiting blind trust, parading around in his cool suit, smooth jazz, winning, looking at himself in the mirror Dislikes: Willful insubordination, lamp oil (although his men practically bathe in the stuff), being taken for a fool, that song "A Whole New World", magic carpet rides, shady deals that go sour, not getting proper respect

Name: Cruella De Vil Occupation: High-class fashion designer Powers and abilities: Ordinary witchcraft Likes: Red, black, white, length-changing, scary things/concepts, classical paintings, dogs, white animals, money, cruelty/cruelty against kindness/animals, dingo-didi-dango, Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, not getting proper respect, brief moments of calm, Johnny Cash, her car (the black Cadillac) Dislikes: Any kind of dog, snakes, rabbits, bad publicity, good publicity, common or poor people in general, feeling unnoticed, hearing her own name, poor sales, Chihuahuas, spinach, playing the clarinet, Dr. Facilier, being double-crossed, losing to the heroes, having a cold, tight clothes, the sound "eeh-eeh!", her accountant

Name: Gaston Occupation: Chef Powers and abilities: Utter confidence, presence, charm Likes: Acceptance, feeling dashing and irresistible, being respected, apple turnovers, wooing ladies, Lillian, making and eating food, fame, lavishing praise on himself Dislikes: Insults, being ignored, being used like a tool, people who disagree with his ideas

On the other end of the GPT-3 size spectrum we have Ada, who completed the list of Disney villains not with existing villains but with its own original characters. Some of them are quite powerful indeed. I do have questions about some of their abilities though.

Name: Cowhell Occupation: Ice Dragon, Bleaths and Dinchyshire Powers and abilities: Second-hand telepathy, magic resistance, control over unknown monsters, and magic control (for high enchantment) Likes: Power, water vapors, fun, flying, cheerleading, thlynde, eatin eels Dislikes: Red wine, sunbathing, fairies, excessive negative thoughts, fighting, crazy gladiators, having to dress strictly in sasquatch fashions

Name: Another Advertisement: Personality: One of OsFreeNs Giants? Powers (best): Dry swimming, Breakthrough, Healing, some form of phoenix fly-speedy or a/the flying material or a/the magic element Dislikes: Solids with bad Prawn factor, Fishn in cages, anger and constant noise in the room

Name: Glaucous (Captain) Dislikes: Methinks those cows will go fast enough regardless of this poor storm! Paraphernalia: Large voids, severed heads, eyeball beast Likes: "Combat" (including using his magic remotely), toying with more obscure topics, asking complicated questions, judging people by their actions (except the rational type), so much time with his children, brag-good and evil characters

Name: McGilling / Maridly (Meredith) Occupation: Hersey mermaid Powers and abilities: Missimension, super strength (albeit in the form of the Moon), healing, survival of the fittest nature, how to be an attribute of water Dislikes: Power plant, those who mess with her due to her powerful mermaid magic (and inner strength), the rule of Mrs. Fairfax, power/control over water

Name: Kal Occupation: Nunchuck. Paraphernalia: Infusion of Mud, Large, Small Cumulus Needle, Additional Cape (designed by Ursula), Hood (as she is a witch), Cloak (as an elf), Glasses (as an elf), Semblance Powered by Cakes Dislikes: Hiders, plants

Name: Hildave Occupation: Lady Python Powers and abilities: Terraforming, turning others children into lizards, healing, conversation, age bending, telepathy Likes: Her clothes, other people, talking, age bending, eating, talking, animals Dislikes: Narcissist, having enemies, talking bad of others

Name: Unicorn Occupation: Unknown Powers and abilities: Another personality, can transform into a variety of different species, transport and carry airbags (union van). A practical genius, investigator extraordinaire, and gifted poolroom rapper. Dislikes: Losing one's purse, judges, corrupt corporations, depravity, cruelty, anonymity, aggression, TV, exhaustion, work reduction, dinosaurs, anything that goes the opposite direction

If you detect a slight sea-witch theme, I don’t think it’s a coincidence. Unsure whether Ursula and Scar were two random villains or part of a trend, the characters on average seemed to split the difference and come up with characters who were animals (preferably sea animals) with witchy powers. This was the most evident in the middle-sized GPT-3 variants, Curie and Babbage, who seemed to be big enough to detect a trend, yet not big enough to be accurate about existing villains. Become an AI Weirdness supporter for bonus results from Curie and Babbage - or become a free subscriber to get new AI Weirdness posts in your mailbox.

[goodnightkisseu]

Time To Heal - Chapter 3

→ pairing: sehun x reader

→ genre: fluff, angst, struggling musician sehun x rich reader

→ word count: 3,554

→ warnings: none

→ summary: you had your life planned out for you ever since you were a little girl. However, when your friend, Baekhyun, takes you with him to his old hangout, you meet someone, someone you were willing to risk your parents’ criticism to be with. His name was Oh Sehun. But, in the end, what you really should have asked yourself, was if Sehun was ready to face your parents…

→ masterlist // exo masterlist // time to heal masterlist

→ [prologue] [ch.1] [ch.2] [ch.3] [ch.4] [ch.5] [ch.6] [ch.7]

→ updates taglist~: @chanyeolol @meryljill-111192 @sehunscutiepie @hi-cupid

note: this week’s chapter takes a small break from the last chapter’s drama. we get to see how the pair met! I don’t have much to say in terms of notes this week, but thank you so much for supporting this fic. it means a lot! 

Also, please let me know if you would like to be tagged in this story~

- ash <3

The heavy bass boomed from the speakers, pulsating through your body as Baekhyun led you through the busy dance floor. The throngs of people made navigating the venue difficult, and there were a couple of times that you were almost separated from your friend. But, Baekhyun made sure to hold on tightly to you, just so that you wouldn't get lost in the sea of people. The club was small and packed at this hour. The price to get in was low, far cheaper than any place you had been to, and the atmosphere wasn't bad at all. You understood why people wanted to be here. There was just something about it that was different from the high establishment clubs that you would typically frequent with friends. This was more low-key, more intimate. Maybe Baekhyun was right after all. You needed a change of pace.

You were in your final quarter before graduation, and truthfully, it was more stressful than expected. Though you had tried to offset your remaining project classes with simpler ones, you still ended up with a lot of work. Your project classes required endless hours of research and design, while your general courses required a lot of textbook reading. Once you added your internship into the mix that you worked at once a week, you found that you had a hard time balancing it all. You were stressed and overworked, and honestly, Baekhyun hated seeing you like this. So, one night, he showed up at your room and insisted that you take the night off, suggesting that you go with him to meet up with his childhood friends. He posited that getting away from your work and your usual circle of friends would allow you to truly relax. At first, you had declined. You felt like there was a lot of work to be done, and you couldn't just take the evening off to blow off some steam. You had lists upon lists of things that needed to be completed. Nowhere on that list was drinking into the early morning. Still, to say that you weren't curious of Baekhyun's previous life was incorrect. Unlike you, Baekhyun had grown up quite differently. His family wasn't from the elite circles. They had actually come into money due to an angel investor. Someone who had taken great interest in his father's small startup, and with that starting capital, the company was able to pick itself up. They produced the product that his father had patented, and the returns soared. Within a year, Baekhyun's family went from a small town to high society. The change was shocking for all of them, and it took some getting used to. You could tell that there were things Baekhyun still struggle with now, though his outgoing personality usually covered that all up. You and Baekhyun had become close during your time in school. Your parents had initially tried to set the two of you up on a date. But when you all realized that Baekhyun was more of a friend to you than a future spouse, your parents stopped pushing it. Still, in your friendship becoming deeper, you came to realize that, no matter how much Baekhyun hung out with your crowd, no matter how he tried to talk like the rich kids did, deep down, he was still that boy from a small town. He kept his two groups of friends very separate, but the fact that he was inviting you to meet the people he grew up with, you knew that it was a difficult thing to do. He was letting you in, and you couldn't brush that off. So in the end, you agreed to go. You slid all of your coursework back into your backpack and headed out with your friend to have a good time. Momentarily, Baekhyun stopped on his quest across the dance floor, though he held onto you tightly so that some unsuspecting male wouldn't pull you away. He took the chance to look around, eyes scanning the surrounding area, looking for a particular set of people. Your eyes followed his, and for the first time, you noticed the tables and booths that lined the back walls and perimeter of the club. Each one was filled with groups of people. Some patrons were drinking together, while others doing more than that, all in the name of a good time. Your eyes were so fixated on the upper level that you almost didn't feel Baekhyun pulling you closer to whisper in your ear. "I found them! They're on the far side of the club, at the second table from the end. It's their usual spot. Let's go!" he told you, leading you the rest of the way off the dance floor. You meandered through the loitering patrons off the dance floor, Baekhyun being a fantastic guide. You could only imagine that he had done this countless times in the past, but you didn't dare ask. As you moved further from the dance floor, the music grew more muted. It still rang through your every fiber, of course, but back here, at least you could hear those around you speaking. With Baekhyun leading the way, you were able to take in what was going around you. It was just other groups of people, making the most of their Friday night. When your friend slowed down, your eyes moved forward to see what was ahead. You only saw a handful of tables remaining at this point, but the one thing that caught your eye was an individual that stood as soon as he saw Baekhyun. He waved frantically in your direction as the pair of you approached, only stopping when the two of you were close. "Dude, what took you so long? We've been here for nearly half an hour. We started without you since it felt like you were a no-show for the evening," the male complained. The first thing that you noticed about this particular friend was his height. The booth sat on a slightly raised platform, but it was evident that he was tall by nature. He had lovely eyes, and his voice was something that you could see girls falling for. Just as you were giving him a once over, he became aware of your presence, leaning to look around Baekhyun and get a better look at you. "This a new girlfriend of yours?" he questioned, brow slightly furrowed. "I thought you were seeing a different girl. Did you change your mind already?" Baekhyun didn't have to turn around to know that you were intrigued by his friend's comment. He was always very open with you about the people he was seeing, but he hadn't quite mentioned his significant other yet. This wasn't quite the place to talk about her, however. Instead, Baekhyun just shook his head, ignoring his friend's earlier inquiry. "Naw, she's a friend from my classes. She's the one I told you about. My actual friend. She was going to spend the evening in working on her homework, but I thought that she'd have a much better time spending it with us," he explained, all the boys in front of you nodding in response. "Ah, so she's one of the rich girls you're usually hanging around," the tall male blurted, earning him a slap on the side of his head once he was seated. Though you didn't know who he was, you appreciated the gesture. Even if your background warranted the title, you hated being referred to by wealth. It felt odd. "Chanyeol, watch your mouth. She's our guest for the evening, so don't be rude," he reprimanded. He had an older air about him, and you could only assume that he was older than you by his mannerisms. "You are more than welcome here. Baekhyun has told us how busy of a quarter this is for graduating students. You must also be swamped by work and looking for an outlet to blow off some steam," he added, giving you a smile. The male then gestured for all of the boys to scoot inward, and with a bit of trouble, they did just that. Moving towards the center, left the two ends of the table free and you and Baekhyun were quick to fill them. Since you had departed that evening, you had grown used to being attached to Baekhyun, and now you were separated. Even so, the boys were quick to ease you in by introducing themselves. They started things off with the male that you knew as Chanyeol. He was the one that stood to greet you. The one that hit him was named Minseok. Now that you got a good look at him, he had a very young face. But much as you had guessed, he was indeed older, regardless of his youthful appearance. Sitting quietly in between Baekhyun and Chanyeol was Kyungsoo. He hadn't said much, nor had he really reacted. But when it came to greeting you, he gave you a small bow and the hint of a smile, welcoming you to the group. Next to Minseok was Jongdae, whose feline-like lips curled into the most mischievous grin as he introduced himself. You had a feeling you would have to be worried about him, but not for an ominous reason or anything. And last, but surely not least, sitting right next to you was Sehun. When you had initially taken your seat, you didn't get a good look at him. But now that you were face to face, you felt utterly awestruck by him. From your point of view, he was beyond handsome. He had that look that was almost too good to be true, the look that a lot of guys in your social circle tried to achieve. His eyes felt like their pierced right through your heart. His facial features looked like they were sculpted from the most elegant marble. Everything about his just seemed to be too much, too good. So when he asked for your name, it was no surprise that you stuttered it out, having become nervous in his presence. Still, whatever nervousness you had was quickly washed away. The boys very easily let you into their circle, doing their best to make you comfortable. But not without asking some questions, of course. They were mostly curious as to how you knew Baekhyun, and if their friend was a different person around the wealthy. You told them about the entry-level course the two of you took, wherein you became partners for the entire quarter. That partnership turned into a full-on friendship. The two of you went to parties together and did your coursework together. You listened when Baekhyun had a bad breakup, and you were also the one to get him home when he was a little too drunk. You told them that he didn't seem much different, except that he was more relaxed here. They, in turn, jeered and teased, saying that he never talked about that sentimental stuff with them. After all of their teasing, they told you about themselves, and Baekhyun's life before he joined your ranks. They didn't skip out on any embarrassing details, like the time they made him act a fool in front of this girl he had a crush on since grade school. You could tell that Baekhyun was dying having to relive it all, but you enjoyed learning more about your friend. You were particularly surprised to learn how they had all met because Sehun was trying to put together a band back in grade school. Something that started on a whim was now the thing they pursued, looking for that glamorous recording contract. Even more so, you were astounded to find that Baekhyun had also been part of the band. Apparently, as a kid, he had always wanted to sing for a living. It had been his talent. However, when Baekhyun's life shifted, there was no way that he could continue on with the guys. He couldn't make it to practice, and his life completely changed. The boys still kept in touch, but there was no way that Baekhyun could continue to be their singer. "Actually, back in the day, when we had just gotten serious about pursuing careers in music, Jongdae and I used to fight all of the time. We both wanted that lead singing position so bad," Baekhyun told you with a small smile. It looked a little sad to you, given what you knew now, but you didn't push on it. "Their fights used to get so heated that Kyungsoo and Minseok had to physically separate them," Chanyeol pointed out. "It's a miracle we still have a band, honestly." "You're over-exaggerating! It never got that bad," Jongdae countered. Though his insistence was met with a scoff from Kyungsoo. "Apparently Baekhyun hit you so hard in the head that you forgot about that black eye..." With more alcohol in them, they continued to bicker, Baekhyun joining in as well. Seeing them like this made you giggle. Though Baekhyun was far more relaxed around you, this was not a side of him that you were used to seeing in front of your mutual friends. He held himself differently around them. It was nice to see him more comfortable and having fun in his own way. As the boys continued to rowdily argue amongst themselves, over that noise, you heard someone call your name. You were just about to take a drink but were quick to turn and face the individual, seeing Sehun's eyes on you. His gaze was really something else, and if your cheeks weren't red from the alcohol, they were definitely red after making eye contact with him. The two of you hadn't said much to each other at that point. Chanyeol and the others definitely drove the conversation. Though you had to admit, the few times that Sehun did speak up, you were utterly enchanted by him. You knew he was the type of person that women would likely fall for. Stoic, handsome, an absolute charmer, and you guess that it worked on you too. "The others won't tell you this since they aren't very good at expressing it. Their pride often gets in the way, so they don't talk about their feelings very freely. But, on everyone's behalf, I would really like to thank you for taking care of Baekhyun for us," he told you sincerely. You could feel the heat rising to your cheeks at his simple, but pointed words. "You don't need to thank me. Baek is as much my friend as he is yours. He's a good person. There's not much I have to do except make sure that he gets home okay," you pointed out sheepishly. Sehun smiled at you then, an expression that you hadn't seen much that evening. "We worried about him, you know. We worried about what would happen to him, getting thrown into a completely different class after his family got all of that money. I'm glad that he has someone like you looking out for him. You're very kindhearted." "I don't think the transition was easy for him, but he's doing well," you admitted. "But one thing that you guys never have to worry about. You will always be his home. I mean, look at how happy he is right now," you teased, hearing Sehun laugh for the first time that evening. It sounded so full and genuine. "I suppose you're right. Even if Baekhyun isn't physically with us, we do seem to be the place he comes back to," Sehun agreed. You could tell that he had more to say, more that he wanted to know, but Sehun lost his opportunity. The other boys pulled you both back into their ridiculous conversation, now talking about their next gig. And just like that, the night got away from all of you... From that moment on, you found yourself hanging out with Baekhyun and his old friends on a somewhat regular basis. Baekhyun was relieved at how well you fit into his little friend group, and so he invited you to more of their outings. When the two of you had time away from internships and classwork, you would grab dinner with them. If the stars aligned and you could disappear for the evening without your other friends knowing, you and Baekhyun would go to their shows. Just as Baekhyun had fallen into your life, so had five wonderful people. After spending so much time with them, there was one thing that you were well aware of. You were developing feelings for Sehun. Initially, you had thought that it was just a mild crush, something you would get over in a month, but when it evolved into more than that, you knew that you were in a bit of trouble. You tried to not make it apparent, spending more time conversing and interacting with the other boys than you did with Sehun. But the moment that the two of you were left to your own devices, whether it be the other boys running ahead, or talking about a topic amongst themselves, you had to interact with Sehun. And every time you did, you swore you felt something there, something more than just friendship. Sehun was very different from that first time you met him. He was far sweeter, and gentler than you had given him credit for. By your third meeting, he had completely broken out of his shell, that stoic image no longer something you associated with him. He was more playful and shared the same energy that the other boys did. Though there were times that the charmer would jump out of him in any given situation, he could be just as fun and entertaining as the others. Your sudden closeness and interest in Sehun did not go unnoticed by Baekhyun. He saw every laugh the two of you exchanged. He saw the loving gazes and the smallest touches. Sehun was always the most prominent advocate of getting you home quickly when you had too much to drink, a stark contrast to the other boys who wanted to keep going. The evidence was there, and Baekhyun confronted you about your feelings towards Sehun. And being the good friend you were... you denied it. You refuted every little thing that he brought up. The two of you were close, and you had become good friends with his friends over the last year. You didn't want to upset him by admitting that you had fallen for one of them. You all had a good thing going... even if every bit of proof that Baekhyun threw at you was real. You would continue to deny it. This only got you so far... and it all came crumbling down the night that Sehun stopped by. Rarely did Sehun come to visit you or Baekhyun on campus. He usually stayed away like the plague, unlike the other boys. But that night, he had come looking for Baekhyun. Unfortunately, you had to let him know that your dear friend was out for the evening, getting dragged to some party. He looked a bit bummed about it, but it didn't seem to bother him much. Out of the blue, he asked if he could still stay for the evening, not having any plans of his own. Though you told yourself that it was a bad idea, you agreed anyway, his presence always welcome. You had some work that you had to finish for your internship that night, and though you told him you could do it later, Sehun insisted that his appearance not interrupt your plans for the evening. Instead, he sat silently by your side, watching as you worked, hands moving around the designs as you searched for the ones you needed. Sehun never spoke, his eyes just following your every move, eyes tracing over each of your features. Unconsciously, Sehun reached a hand out to brush some stray hairs behind your ear so that he could get a better look at you. The action seemed to knock you right out of your trace as you turned quickly to look at him. The moment your eyes locked, you were both done for. Sehun took the opportunity and leaned in to tenderly brush his lips against your own. Once your lips met, you could feel yourself melting under his touch, your eyes closing at the softness of the kiss. There was no denying how you felt for each other then. Your bodies made the move that neither of you dared to speak into existence. Of course, this wasn't something either of you could keep a secret. The moment that you both settled into the kiss, the front door opened and Baekhyun came right in, eyes taking in the image of his two friends kissing. He told you both to just bite the bullet and date, that it was more awkward watching the two of you dancing around each other. And the rest after that was history. After a year of getting to know each other, of pretending that there wasn't something there, it finally happened. Ever since the night you had met him, you knew that Sehun was not someone that you were willing to lose…

[incorrect-of-swamp-and-sea]

Jonah, praying: Dear God, please have Mercy on my soul. And body. And legal documents. Amen.

[basalt-dnd]

The Dimorpha Aquatica, a quick collection of mermaid variations. As usual, there’s some lore I wrote to go along with each type of mermaid (written from the perspective of an anthropologist’s notes), which you can find below the cut. 

The art used on the cover page is "East of the Sun and West of the Moon", from a Norwegian folk tale. It was illustrated by Kay Nielson in 1914.

Igniasces: ‘Mermaids’ of Elemental Fire

A dissertation by Nadian Shale, an Earth Genasi anthropologist studying elemental cultures. Presented in her study, “Efreeti and the Plane of Fire”.

It was a well known tale among elemental researchers; the Efreeti king Dionellem had build a wondrous trade empire. He lived in a fine palace in the Cit of Brass, and took great delight in the luxuries he owned. His caravans sold the finest metals of the plane of fire, and the richest cinnabar found anywhere in the realm. 

On a fateful day when the fiery king reluctantly signed a trade contract with a Marid empress, everything changed. He, himself, went to meet her to bring the prized metals that her people could not forge in their watery world. As he approached the meager section of her castle that stood above the water, he saw her servants. They were sleek, fish-like people. ‘Mermaids’ or ‘merfolk’, they were called. 

The entitled king grew furious. For so long, he had believed that he had more than any other genie ruler could ever hope for. He did have more gold, more jewels, and a larger palace than Meradis, the Marid. But Dionellem did not have what he wanted- the mermaids. There was no hope for the survival of such creatures in his homeland. 

So when the deal was done, he returned to his palace and demanded the best mortal sculptors, mages, and elementalists be brought to him. Under his commission, they created what would be known as Igniasces- or ‘Ignan merfolk’. They were true elementals, unlike their water-dwelling counterparts. Their bodies were of volcanic stone interlaced with dripping lava veins. The Igniasces had nails and teeth of obsidian shards, and they could boil a mortal to a crisp with a touch of their magmatic hand. 

Like he could not protect other fire elementals from the dangers of water and ice, the same went for Dionellem’s merfolk. They swam in magma as if it were water, but they would become stone if they touched water. It was an unfortunate weakness, but Dionellem didn’t mind. He had his own merfolk, now. What he did mind is that they were not created with reverence or preference to him. No, they had no desire to serve him, at all. In his anger, he banished the new creations to far edges of the plane of fire and the volcanoes of the mortal realms. It served them right, for not appreciating that he created them. The Igniasces didn’t mind their banishment- they were free of him, after all. 

Igniasces society is far simpler than that of humans, because they cannot reliably make tools or gather resources due to being made of magma. They are usually solitary or found in small groups within volcanoes and underground magma reservoirs. As elementals, they do not require food, water, or sleep. They spend countless hours making towers and other structures by splashing lava and rapidly cooling it into obsidian using water. A volcano inhabited by Igniasces will have curled towers that look like waves of black glass. More recently, they have built stone boardwalks to allow mortal traders entry into parts of their volcanic towers. Still, much is undiscovered about the fiery mermaids due to the averse conditions in which they live. 

Tundrin: Mammalian Mermaids and Climate Adaptation 

A dissertation by Nadian Shale, an Earth Genasi anthropologist studying mermaid dimorphism. Presented in her study, “Merfolk of the World”.

The largest of all mermaids, Tundrin are also one of the only to have a unique language. The sounds of their speech are thought to be similar to the sounds of a whale’s song. This observation isn’t entirely incorrect- Tundrin have been shown to work with whales and swim with pods of migrating whales. Their language is almost like a dialect of whale-songs. Because of the low frequency of their songs, it can be heard for many miles and works well for communication while they migrate. 

Another difference between the Tundrin and their tropical, fish-like relatives is that they are mammalian. They cannot breath under water but instead hold their breath for lengths of time. Despite common belief, Tundrin do not breath through their mouth or nose- which are used for eating and smelling, respectively. Between their shoulder blades is a small blowhole that lets them take breaths without fully surfacing, which is far easier considering their bulk. Like whales, they store blubbery fat to keep warm in arctic climates, and have tough skin as a means of protection. 

Even though their large tails make adequate weapons against predators, many Tundrin carry hatchets. These aren’t for defense so much as for utility- they use the hatchets to chop holes in sheets of ice so that they can surface to breath. Young Tundrin have difficulty surfacing to breath, and usually swim directly above their parents and are boosted up to breath until they learn how to do it on their own.

These arctic dwelling ‘mermaids’ feed themselves by hunting seals, cod, sea birds, and sharks. Unlike humans, they can digest uncooked meat with no problems. Tundrin spend much of their time around pods of whales, but they tend to hunt in groups of other Tundrin, or with orca whales because of their dietary similarities. 

Leech-Folk: A Misleading Name

A dissertation by Nadian Shale, an Earth Genasi anthropologist studying mermaid dimorphism. Presented in her study, “Merfolk of the World”.

Contrary to their name, Leech-folk don’t have leech-like tails or thrive off of blood. They have the tails of lampreys, and are barely carnivorous at all. They feed primarily on algae and swamp-plants. Though they may eat frogs, fish, ducks, or crocodile meat, it tends to be rare.

For the most part, Leech-folk are merfolk adapted to living in bogs, fens, and marshes. They are entirely amphibious, and can breath underwater and above water with ease. 

Leech-folk may be more advanced than their ocean-dwelling relatives. This is due to their proximity to land, which allows them to interact more readily with land-dwelling races. Areas where Leech-folk live may even create floating trading posts or entire floating towns, anchored to the lakebed with heavy stones and chains. These floating structures have well-like holes inside buildings for Leech-folk to emerge through, and boardwalks that they can climb up to by scaling nets. 

Fisherman in these floating areas will go out on canoes and set nets with the help of Leech-folk. The ‘Leeches’ are well known for their skills in herbalism, net-making, and other skills vital to swamp life, which helps them get along well with surfacers. Often, Leech-folk will trade crocodile leather, medicinal herbs, nets, daggers, and fish-hooks for commodities they can’t come by living underwater. This includes most metal weaponry and many fabrics.

Like many mermaids, Leech-folk have strong ties to oral storytelling. This is because they cannot reliably keep parchment, books, or other written records underwater. While they can chisel into stone, it isn’t effective because of the time it takes to record information. Much of Leech-folk culture surrounds group storytelling, and on their holidays they spend hours telling lore and personal experiences around baskets of fireflies for light. 

Piscava: The Eels of Hot Springs

A dissertation by Nadian Shale, an Earth Genasi anthropologist studying mermaid dimorphism. Presented in her study, “Merfolk of the World”.

Hot springs, volcanic ponds, deep caverns, and the run-off areas of geysers seem like they would be barren of life. This isn’t so. Piscava are eel-like mermaids that thrive in these environments, though they can also live in tidepools and mineral-rich ponds. 

Perhaps the most similar to ordinary merfolk, Piscava have an important difference in that they cannot easily breath out of water. Many Piscava don’t come to the surface at all, especially those that live around hydro-thermal vents or in volcanic caverns. It’s too difficult for them, and they can’t be out of the water for more than a couple hours at a time.

Aside from their limited ability to breath air, Piscava are far more hardy and resistant to heat than their oceanic relatives. Interestingly enough, their culture has been warped by this. Instead of worshiping ocean gods, forces of the moon, and other mermaid deities, they revere the sun and volcanoes. While they aren’t aligned with fire as Igniasces are, they have strong ties to the volcanoes they live near. Many of their clerics and druids become powerful and respected ‘volcano mages’. These mages are sought out among Piscava for their wisdom, decision making, and religious guidance.

The Piscava tend to be referred to as ‘Eel mermaids’ or ‘Grey mermaids’ because of their appearance. In rare cases, a Piscava may have slightly translucent skin, entirely white skin, or soot-black skin. All three of these traits are seen as blessings from volcanic forces.

[graywyvern]

( laura ostteen in dallas filth / @artistvaro )

Ritmo de la muerte y vida.

"I take the pen and I begin. I do this repeatedly to no avail. I’m waiting for a voice to pour through the words I put down, and each day the voice does not come. How do I describe disappearance? I expect never to understand its meaning." --@anostrebor

Fig B.: Swarthy Swamp.

"RETURN OF THE DAEMON

Floating jelly-slick, the word again crawls up, loosens again and sprawls on last season's prophylactics, bald umbrellas, soleless shoes, a palpitating bloom returned to the wintry beaches of the ear.

The same year after year I stand, watching tide bear it in, hear the rush of children shrieking to the strand, the stamp of drunken feet around the glare of that translucent form reared up in air.

But crones like me are slow at our amens. When we come tonight to bend our knees, all ritual fires done, it will only be to swing an axe into the gaudy hulk and strew it, limb by limb, back to the sea."

--Lorita Whitehead

Lovecraftian House.

" '...but do you know that in Paris they have been conducting serious experiments as to the poissibility of curing the insane, simply by logical argument. One professor there, a scientific man of standing, lately dead, believed in the possibilty of such treatment. His idea was that there's nothing really wrong with the physical organism of the insane, and that insanity is, so to say, a logical mistake, an error of judgment, an incorrect view of things. He gradually showed the madman his error and, would you believe it, they say he was successful! But as he made use of douches too, how far success was due to that treatment remains uncertain...So it seems at least.' " --Crime and Punishment

Stage Set for an Unwritten Opera.

[diarrheaworldstarhiphop]

The internet makes sense in metaphors. Superhighways, clouds, pages, links. Facebook is a town square. Wikipedia, a kind of brain. So what about 4chan, the imageboard site where users post just about anything, with anonymity and impunity? If you trust 4channers themselves, it’s the internet’s soul.

Well, that’s alarming.

4chan has never been a nice place. Most people don’t spend time there, but most people feel its effects, everything from fake news to doxing. Outsiders prefer different metaphors: Cesspool. Swamp. Sea of trolls.

There was a time, a couple of decades ago, when trolls didn’t really exist online—but communities of prototrolls were beginning to crawl out of the primordial ooze of the early web. One was a Japanese collective called Ayashii Warudo, sometimes translated as Nameless World, where users engaged in edgy, brazen banter and banded together to raid rival sites.

Across the Pacific, American geeks were eyeing their Japanese counterparts lustily. They fetishized everything about Japanese culture, not just video­games and samurai swords but manga and hentai (anime porn). Naturally, they found their way to places like Ayashii Warudo, and one enthusiast, a New Yorker named Christopher Poole, set out to create an English-language alternative. He ported over the ethos, populating the site with Japanese-style boards like /h/ (for hentai) and /y/ for yaoi (gay male hentai for a female audience). Announcing his creation’s existence in October 2003, Poole wrote: “regging [webspeak for registering] 4chan.net. brace for faggotry.” The tone was established.

Now the site is a .org, but other than that, little has changed. If you believe 4chan’s own reporting, the community is still mostly made up of young men interested in Japanese culture. (Though you’re supposed to be at least 18 to join, the mean age is presumed to be closer to 15—Poole’s age when he created it.) The design remains proudly undesigned. And because each message board is limited to 10 pages of posts, most messages get bumped off the server within a day, if not hours. It’s pretty much unusable for the uninitiated.

Not that you’d want to be there. The most popular boards on 4chan are typically /pol/, a place for what they say is “politically incorrect” (read: racism, misogyny, homophobia), and /b/, a nominally random board home to all the creepy porn and violent imagery banned from the rest of the site. Users are in it, they say, for the lulz. They make swatiskas trend on Google, tell Justin Bieber fans to self-harm, and leak celebrity nudes. And Gamergate, the smear campaign against female game developers? 4chan.

Indeed, nearly every evil of the internet begins, or picks up steam, on the site. To invoke yet another metaphor: It’s a breeding ground. (The fact that 4chan has been called so many things suggests a feeble attempt to make sense of chaos.) Many of the recruitment techniques of the so-called alt-right were piloted there; many white nationalists started out as 4channers. It’s unclear if or how one ages out of the site—but it is clear that it unleashes trolls on the real world.

That’s fairly well known these days. What’s less appreciated, however, is that 4chan has also given birth to good—or something like it. Consider Anonymous, the hacking collective that picks as its targets groups like Nazis and Scientologists. Also: Remember lolcats? Have you been Rickrolled? 4chan and 4chan. The site traffics heavily in exploitables—funny images begging for manipulation. Give that Pikachu a face!

There isn’t darkness without the light, it seems. So it’s probably fair to say 4channers are, at least a little bit, right: Their haven is the soul of the internet, the deep source of its sights and sounds, for worse and, occasionally, for better.

Yet this cannot last. At 15 years old, 4chan has reached adolescence. Up till now, trolls—children—have been in control. It’s not so funny anymore. After all, even the lost boys had to grow up.

it’s time to grow up, shitlords

[minyboy]

I got a request to make some non-muscular male Martial Arts Kids. Well that's as un-buff as I can make a team of crime fighting marital artists. Their scrawny arms are about to fall off.  and now bios, but first a word from our sponsors... me! Disclaimer!  I wish to assure everyone that all the Martial Arts Kids I make are friends and are friendly towards each other. But they also are human. They are diverse set of characters with different backgrounds, beliefs, and upbringings, yielding unique points of views. That's why we have diversity. Like any group of friends, there will be conflicting points of views, it's not malleolus, it's human. To have the world be perfect and everyone always liking everything everyone else does is bad writing and badly reflects on the creators. So there is no ill intent in the characters, they are just people trying to figure their way in the world just like anyone else. Thank you. Bios from left to right.

Jaymore Holmes (Jay) Age 9:

Jay is a smart but sometimes timid person. He will fight when he must, but often does his best to avoid conflict, and thanks to his creativity and intelligence he’s pretty good at avoiding them. Since he is a 9 year old child, this kind of makes sense. Jay can get very shy at times and stammers when he is nervous, it can make it difficult to talk to him. Jay hides a huge rock collection from his peer, he is too embarrassed to show them for it is incomplete and maybe a bit silly to him. Jay is trying to find his way in the world, but it’s a big and scary place and he’s just a kid.

Likes: playing video games, running, listening to the radio, mayflies, his grandma attending museums, going to the movies, charity work, podcasting, travelling, reading, walking away from the market

Dislikes: the color blue, being outdoors, bugs, open flower fields, loud people, dinosaurs, tea, eating fish and telling bad jokes

Ryan West  Age 12:

Ryan used to have a passion for art, but one day seemed to lose all his love for it. He is not wandering from place to place in life trying to find a new passion (besides the Martial Arts Kids, of course). He's a brave boy, kind, caring to his fellow humans, but he often has a bit of distrust toward them and snakes around people he can. When he can’t he can become very grumpy when talking to anyone for too long. For some reason he blinks excessively and is always on the lookout for… something.  Sharon Briggs keeps on trying to set his single dad on random dates. It’s a kind thing, but she’s not very good at it because she just chooses at random. He appreciates  it, even if it makes him concerned from time to time . Ryan has a poor judgement of character and often misunderstands or makes incorrect presumptions, which can lead to trouble. Ryan is a  kind, brave person, but wishes to find his purpose in life without too much social discomfort.

Likes: butterflies, boxing, Sharon, barges, art, waking up early, bees, birds, talking cows, crystal balls, his mom, volcanoes, extinct animals and wandering around aimlessly all day long laughing.

Dislikes: horror books, his art, Valentines Day, Shakespeare, cosmetology, Nightwing’s red costume, squids, indie music, Sherlock Holmes later books and guitars.

Ziggy Williamson Age 14:

Lab technician by day, surfer dude by afternoon, he goes to bed at night.  When Ziggy’s not surfing the afternoon away or kicking bad guys' butts, he helps Nunu in her laboratory as a technician. While he works more on the biological side of things he does have an interest in the machines he uses and that’s why he partners up with Nunu. She can be cold to him but they work well together and enjoy each other's company, usually. But one can not be friendly to another all the time, that would be pure madness or pure apathy.  Ziggy is a more laid back dude but He has big hopes and dreams for this future, but very few believe he wants to do anything about  them. Sadly sometimes he believes  these people. Nunu is some of the few people who believes in him, or at least what he creates.  Ziggy hosts a local surfing club with numbers like Aina, Maeve and Celesta. He wishes to use what he learns to help fight evil and clean up the local beaches, then he plans to sell his inventions for profit. Most don’t take him seriously, but he’ll work hard to one day prove them wrong, or right.

Likes: wild life, swamp scum, Nunu, traffic signs, people with manners, inactivity, surfing, the beach!, strategy games, lizards, and waking up early.

Dislikes: magic shows, noses, patterned socks, long fingernails, cold days, hard work, not beginning believed in, his will power, blepharism,  and willow trees.

Myong Si-U Age 16:

Myong is a young aspiring film director, but he has not filmed anything… yet. He has many plans for stories he wants to tell and he wants big local names in them, like Kerry and River. Not Brandy, for she is too popular and legendary for him to have a chance, or so he thinks. Myong comes from a poor family, he lives with his uncle and aunt because his parents passed away at an early age. He is friendly to all he can, trying his best to make the best impression on everyone, for that is the best way, it’s not what you know, it’s who you know. He plans to know all the important people, if they like it or not.  Myong has a severe phobia of sharks, no one knows why, he loves to go swimming often, but he can’t stop talking about them in horror when they are mentioned. Coming from a poor background  Myong will do anything to get ahead and that can make him very untrustworthy and a bit standoffish. He wants to make his dreams come true, but can Myong not stare in the abyss to do so?

Likes: movies, Kerry, musicals, dandelions, shiny things, sandwiches, camera, getting free stuff the movie Treasure Island, Christmas, extravagant period clothes from the 1870’s, oceanography and Dominos Pizza.

Dislikes: sharks, being ignored, his teacher Ms. Quinn, stand-up comedy,  hot water,  candy-making, stories about plucky young magic-users, purple bread, candles and sharks.

Oliver Canmore (Ollie) Age 18:

Ollie is a immigrant from Belgium, he moved from a younger age. He is a very calm person, he speaks the same despite being angry, upset, happy, etc. often looked at by other members as a  big brother. Ollie has a passion for cooking and soap making. They often spend their free time making soap. When he’s not being creative or kicking butt he is a groupie of Brandy, for she has many groupies. In fact Brandy sometimes loses track of  who is her groupie and Ollie can feel that. Ollie will defend Brandy from any criticism and  will look out for the other members, often looked upon as the big bother of the group, he can never escape that image and he’s ok with that even with River’s friendly teasing of it. Ollie has trouble focusing on one thing and often aimlessly goes from one passion to  the next never truly mastering any one of them. Ollie is kind and has many passions, but can he focus on something that matters to him or forever stay adrift on the Lost Potential Sea?

Likes: Brandy, duh,  sound of a ticking clock, deep sea diving, cooking, singing, caring for people, soap, shampoos, Skyrim,  parasols, fast cars, breakdancing and snow globes.

Dislikes: hand fans, fantasy books from the 1940’s,sensation of heavy bass, fireworks, loud noises in general, manga,  gnomes, musicals, and the sensation of the color yellow.

[riverdamien]

A Hard Kind of Prayer

A Hard Kind of Prayer

Gospel :Mark 4:35-41With the coming of evening, Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Let us cross over to the other side.’ And leaving the crowd behind they took him, just as he was, in the boat; and there were other boats with him. Then it began to blow a gale and the waves were breaking into the boat so that it was almost swamped. But he was in the stern, his head on the cushion, asleep. They woke him and said to him, ‘Master, do you not care? We are going down!’ And he woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Quiet now! Be calm!’ And the wind dropped, and all was calm again. Then he said to them, ‘Why are you so frightened? How is it that you have no faith?’ They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who can this be? Even the wind and the sea obey him.’----------------------------------------"I love the line,"Lord, don't you care?"because it is so typical of our reactions.Yes, there is a God, but what is he like?Yes, there is a God, but what is he like?Mark is trying to tell us, and like as not, we can't hear.The sound of the inner wind is deafening us.

"Lord, don't you care?"We may have to wait out the prayer,wait out the days or weeks,without coming to the quietudewe feel we ought to be able to have.

"Lord, don't you care?"And that is all we have to offer.So wait there. Offer itDon't thrash and gnash your teeth wanting to be other thanthe weak and self-interested little disciple in the boat.

The worst aspect of a nervous upheaval--guilt, anger, despair and whatever else is messing up the deeps of our personalities-is trying to counter desperation with desperation."I have to be good.I have to be the opposite of what I feel:serene, accepting, and peaceful.I have to trust."

Maybe the kind of trust the Lord is asking for is precisely my putting up with  the experience of knowing, that I am fiercely pulling at his jacket to wake him upand make him into the God I want to be able to please.

It's a hard kind of prayer.But it acknowledges surrender to the ministrations of a sea I cannot understand.Sr. Miriam Pollard----------------------------

    This week one person I encountered stands out. I will call him, Sam, sitting on the corner of Clay/Haight. Sam is around forty, clean-cut, sitting with his backpack, eating candy. He looked very sad.

    Sitting down with him, I simply listened. Sam shared of his wife overdosing on Fenoyal, and almost dying, and he was arrested for the possession of the drug, he talked of his young baby girl dying in an auto accident, and of trauma going back to his childhood.

    Sam talked of always failing, and believed he was a victim of his parents, the police, and society in general. He let trauma victimize him.

    Leaving I  handed him my business card and told him to call any time. Feeling totally drained and reflecting on our conversation thoughts of my own trauma came to mind.

    There has been trauma throughout my life, from being raised in a segregationist community to recently witnessing a young man kill himself, and at every turn, there has been support to lift me up and walk with me. Jesus has always been there.

    As I continued down the street talking and chatting with so many young women and guys whose lives are full of trauma am reminded of the quote:  "that the street transforms every ordinary day into a series of quick questions and every incorrect answer risks a beat down, shooting or pregnancy."

    More and more as trauma becomes known affecting every one a quote comes to mind:

"When we become truly ourselves,

we just become a swinging door.

We are purely independent of

and at the same time, dependent upon everything. Shunryu Suzuki

        We are dependent upon each other, and in the words of Aesop, "No act o kindness, no matter, no matter how small, is ever wasted."

    Each of us is called to be compassionate and as Fr. Henri Nouwen describes

"Compassion is Being With":

"Let us not underestimate how hard it is to be compassionate. Compassion is hard because it requires the inner disposition to go with others to the place where they are weak, vulnerable, lonely, and broken. But this is not our spontaneous response to suffering. What we desire most is to do away with suffering by fleeing from it or finding a quick cure for it. As busy, active, relevant people we want to earn our bread by making real contributions. This means first and foremost doing something to show that our presence makes a difference. And so we ignore our greatest gift, which is our ability to enter into solidarity with those who suffer. ...

Those who can sit with their fellow brothers and sisters, not knowing what to say but knowing that they should be there, can bring new life into a dying heart. Those who are not afraid to hold a hand in gratitude, to shed tears of grief, and to let a sigh of distress arise straight from the heart can break through paralyzing boundaries and witness the birth of a new fellowship, the fellowship of the broken.

    The Divine is always present and will assist us in being lifted up, seeing our trauma as a result of circumstances, and assist in transforming our lives.

Whether we live in poverty, on the streets, middle class, or wealthy, we can come to terms with our trauma. We can live out the hard kind of prayer, in being the presence of the Divine in the fellowship of the broken! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, DMin.

PO Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

www. temenos.org

415-305-2124

[seeking-his-plan-blog]

Dinosaurs and the Bible.

Friday, March 23 - Day 35 of Lent.

I am not going to try and find the answer to this, but I will share my thoughts on it from my Bible-reading and research. One theory supporting dinosaurs in the Bible is that dinosaurs were created by God, became corrupt and then were wiped out in the flood. Another theory is that they even went onto the ark with Noah, but were wiped out afterwards.

The traditional depiction of dinosaurs as gigantic and ferocious lizards makes it hard to believe that God would have included them in the garden of Eden. Yet, before sin corrupted life, isn’t it possible that dinosaurs might have been peaceful?

Isaiah 11:6-7 shares this picture of heaven:

   “ The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb,      The leopard shall lie down with the young goat,      The calf and the young lion and the fatling together;      And a little child shall lead them.      The cow and the bear shall graze;      Their young ones shall lie down together;      And the lion shall eat straw like the ox. "

Perhaps animals were always made to be peaceful, but when the forbidden fruit was eaten and sin was introduced, so was death and corruption. After all, we have proof that serpents could walk and climb trees before the fall of mankind. So anything could have been possible.

Here is an interesting set of verses from the book of Job, which is deemed one of the oldest books in the bible. He describes a creature, the “behemoth” that fits the description of a dinosaur (brackets are added by me):

15 “Look now at the behemoth,which I made along with you; he eats grass like an ox. 16See now, his strength is in his hips, and his power is in his stomach muscles (big stomach). 17 He moves his tail like a cedar (big tail); the sinews of his thighs are tightly knit. 18 His bones are like beams of bronze, his ribs like bars of iron. 19He is the first of the ways of God (biggest thing that God has created, big as He is); only He who made him can bring near His sword (only God can come near him). 20Surely the mountains yield food for him, and all the beasts of the field play there. 21 He lies under the lotus trees, in a covert of reeds and marsh. 22The lotus trees cover him with their shade; the willows by the brook surround him. 23 Indeed the river may rage, yet he is not disturbed; he is confident, though the Jordan gushes into his mouth, 24 Though he takes it in his eyes, or one pierces his nose with a snare."

Some think that this description matches that of a hippo or an elephant. However, neither a hippo nor an elephant match the description of the tail moving like a cedar tree, as elephants’ and hippos’ tails are tiny! Furthermore, the phrase, “He is the first of the ways of God”, in the original Hebrew translates to “he is the BIGGEST animal that God created”. Although the elephant and hippo are large, they are not even one tenth of the size of a Brachiosaurus, the largest dinosaur ever to exist. Take the Brachiosaurus and try to apply it to the above description. It works! Furthermore, the phrase, “Only He who made him can bring near His sword” directly states that no mere human can approach this creature with a sword. Ask yourself, how easy is it to go near an elephant? Granted, it’s not the simplest thing, but don’t tell me that no human could possibly ever near one with a sword. A dinosaur makes more sense here.

There’s another similar description of a dinosaur-like creature in Job 41:1-2,7,12-32. This description is interesting because it references the Leviathan, a creature who is of the sea and breathes fire. The history books of many cultures refer to ‘fire-breathing dragons’ in their ancient tales. It’s a wonder why, across  many different cultures, it was always a dragon, and not like, a lion or something. That is because the fire-breathing dragons are likely based on truth. The Leviathan also has armour that makes iron look “like straw”, and arrows “cannot make it flee”. The descriptions indeed do not fit any earthly creature that we know of, and could reference dinosaurs that existed before the flood.

Remember, only after sin was death created! You cannot have death before sin, and sin only came in the Garden of Eden.

The common belief of how dinosaurs became extinct is that a large object from space (meteor or the like) hit the earth, and raised enough dust to block out the sun for months. Plants and animals died. But this doesn’t explain why some life-forms survived and others didn’t. Why was extinction selective?

From a biblical perspective, a likely reason for the extinction of the dinosaurs is the worldwide flood detailed in Genesis 6-7. After the flood, mankind changed from being able to live about 900 years, to gradually only living 80-120 years. It was possible that God made a class of very large animals perish in the flood, because He knew that the strength of man would decrease, and that such animals would not be able to be controlled by feeble man anymore. 

Alternatively, a theory in which the dinosaurs survived the flood is still biblically sound. I mean, consider this: If the flood drowned the dinosaurs, it certainly would never have drowned the sea dinosaurs. Everything that exists in the sea before the flood still exists today. But the fact is that approximately 95% of the world’s seas have not yet been discovered. Let that sink in for a moment. Who knows what could still be down there?

If dinosaurs escaped the ark, the dramatic change in climate due to the falling of the “waters from above” that are referenced in Genesis 1:6, would have caused many dinosaurs to perish in the sudden heat, as well as being an explanation for the drop in the life-expectancy for humans (because the sun was now shining directly on them, without the water blocking the sun from above). So, dinosaurs started dropping like flies. Furthermore, in the same way that hunters kill bears and other wild beasts who are a threat to their families, in a world where dinosaurs and man co-existed, it is only natural to assume that man hunted dinosaurs for thousands of years (according to this theory). 

How many bears, crocodiles and tigers are on suburban land today? Zero! And how many bears, crocodiles and tigers were on suburban land 100 years ago? Many! Dinosaurs were hunted and endangered as men continued to hunt them, as our very own familiar beasts are.

There are even theories to suggest that small dinosaurs (the unhunted), as well as the deep sea dinosaurs, still exist today! There have been numerous sightings of ‘sea serpents’ ‘monsters’ (Loch Ness, for example, a beast that has been sighted individually over 9000 times), and dinosaur-like creatures in countries all over the world. There is a swamp in the African Congo, which remains approximately 80% undiscovered and is the home to many natives. Scientific expeditions out there have recorded the natives reporting many sightings of ‘Mokele-mbembe’, a water-dwelling creature that looks identical to a dinosaur. 

I don’t believe it to be mere coincidence that the different monsters sighted in Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the Congo and many other countries are all of similar size, shape and likeness to a dinosaur. More specifically, a chilling amount of them, from report, bear specific similarity to a Plesiosaurus. How can that be coincidence? Or anything else, especially given that the natives in the Congo -- who drew pictures of a Plesiosaurus when asked to produce an image of what ‘Mokele-mbembe’ looked like -- have literally zero communication with any other country in the world.

If this stuff interests you, please watch the first link provided below, as I can assure you there are hundreds of stories of similar sightings all over the world.

Another theory is that in God’s 7 days of creating the earth, the story did not mean literal days. After all, as Peter says in 2 Peter 3:8:

“But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.”

By this logic, the ‘day’ in which God created “the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind,” (Genesis 1:21) could have lasted a lot longer than our 24 hours of a day.

If you have time and would like to dive into the theory of creationism+dinosaurs, this lecture is an excellent one to watch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsQIF7Yh3hI

Nobody was around to see what actually happened to dinosaurs. I wasn’t. You weren’t. Even Charles Darwin wasn’t. It seems that prior to the 19th century, the oldest historical text to follow was the Bible, and other reliable texts such as ancient wall-paintings, texts, myths, legends and stories (a lot of which included ‘fire breathing dragons’ or creatures of the like). For this reason, before the 19th century it is probable that many subscribed to the theory of creationism, or whatever was taught/proved as fact by these texts. After 1801, the beginning of the 19th century, technology made enough progression to welcome in other feasible theories based on what radioactive and carbon dating could ‘prove’ (please see link below for dispute on this by evolutionist-turned-Christian John Mackay). Is it possible that Satan used this technological development to plant incorrect theories in our minds about dinosaurs, so that we and our children would doubt the Bible? 

These are all very interesting questions. I have recently been listening to John Mackay, a man who used to be a devout evolutionist, but now devotes his life to disproving common theories of evolution. His interview below is definitely worth a watch!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24T7ebvjdq4

And here is a clip of him debating Richard Dawkins casually! :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DH2_j7bpsLo

Regardless of when or for how long dinosaurs existed, there is certainly support in the Bible that dinosaurs did, in fact, exist, and perhaps even in the time of mankind. Whether their extinction was by a meteor or the great flood, the integrity of the Bible does not suffer. If, for some reason, someone found a little dinosaur running around in some deep forest TODAY, it would not really affect our understanding of the Bible or our faith. Whereas, evolutionists would have to redefine and change their whole system of thought if they found a dinosaur in today’s world. 

The importance is, it doesn’t matter! Our faith is still the same! And it’s great!

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[trash-raccoon]

Of Broken Bonds and Corrupted Core - Ch. 1

Summary: In an attempt to protect his teammates, Lance let himself be captured in a rescue mission gone wrong. He thought he was ready for anything the Galra and Druids threw at him, but he was proven wrong when Haggar herself took over and tried to make him into the Galra Empire’s newest weapon. As it turns out, having the ability to manipulate the elements was something intriguing, and Haggar wanted him around to serve as the Ice Mage of the Empire. It didn't matter that Lance didn't want to. It wasn't like he had a choice.

Sequel to Of Seas, of Streams, of Falling Rain, of Naval Hurricane. While it could be read as a stand-alone, reading the previous work is highly recommended.

Can be read in AO3 or FF.net.

Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4

Read under the cut:

What they expected from the Galra Empire when Zarkon fell was for the empire to replace him with someone and try to continue his reign. After all, ten thousand years of stepping all over people all over the universe and having no heir was just plain weird.

What they didn’t expect was how good Lotor would be in what he was doing and how much more efficient the Galra could be in squashing the Defenders of the Universe’s already low morale so thoroughly by spreading devastation everywhere, including the planets they’d freed before.

It was only then that they realized the only reason they survived Zarkon was because he was so fixated on the Black Lion. Lotor, who had none of that fixation, made scarily effective yet seemingly effortless attempts – successful attempts – at beating Voltron. He didn’t need to go for Voltron or the Paladins. He just needed to strike the ones they’ve freed and let them work even harder from before and let all those people hail Voltron, completely overwhelming them with so many distress signals from so many familiar planets.

There were so many planets needed to be rescued at the same time, and there was only one Voltron. Soon, the Voltron Alliance began to break apart as more members lost their hope when they realized not even the legendary defender could win against the Galra.

“We can’t let this happen,” Shiro declared resolutely after losing another member of the Alliance. “We need to strike, bring Lotor down like we did Zarkon, or this will never end.”

“Are we sure we want to do that?” Hunk asked nervously. “Last time we made an all-out attack things didn’t go so well. We lost you. And the Galra probably upped the security too so we need to come back with better strategy.”

“Then we will get a better plan,” Shiro assured. “We’re capable of it.”

“If I may,” Kolivan spoke up, and all eyes were on him immediately. “If we want to come up with a better plan, I suggest we free some more of the Galra’s prisoners. There is a prison ship used to contain many of the universe’s greatest minds, in which many scientists, scholars, engineers, and many more are imprisoned. The Druids conduct experiments on them to get their knowledge out of their brains. If my intel is correct, those knowledge is then used to make plans, so if we could infiltrate that ship and free the prisoners, taking down the empire should be easier.”

“If your intel is correct?” Keith repeated. “Is there a chance that it’s incorrect?”

“Yes,” Kolivan replied. “That ship is handled by the Druids and drones only. No Galra has stepped inside the ship except for dropping and picking prisoners, which is why the information is incomplete. However, we do know that they have the universe’s brightest minds. They would be at least as valuable as Slav.”

“Wait, if they’re as valuable as Slav, how is Slav put on Beta Traz instead of this weird experimental ship thingy?” Lance asked in confusion.

“That would be because of how I see all possibilities,” Slav answered, drawing attention to him for the first time. “The Galra didn’t want to experiment on me because they want all those possibilities. Experiments could mess that up and make me unable to see all those. Though, that doesn’t stop them in at least four alternate timelines, and if I fall to their hands again there is no reality in which I am not thrown to that prison ship.”

“The experiments have high possibility of breaking the subjects’ minds,” Kolivan explained. “It’s possible to mend it back together, but it’s rare.”

“If taking down this prison could make taking down the empire easier, why haven’t you suggested it the last time?” Pidge asked. “I mean, I get that lack of intel probably makes it extra dangerous, but it’s not like the risk isn’t worth the results.”

“Because of the Druids,” Kolivan sighed. “Fighting them is dangerous because how they could damage your body and your quintessence. They are powerful. You’ve fought Haggar; you should know this. However, with the situation now, I believe going to Alpha Kaj would be the best course of option as of now.”

“I can see why you believe that,” Allura said thoughtfully. “I suppose it is dangerous going there, even now, but I don’t think this is something we can brush aside. Where is this Alpha Kaj located?”

“It moves around,” Kolivan approached the control deck to show a star map. “But it doesn’t warp or make wormhole jumps. The latest intel from a Blade who was tasked to drop prisoners there show the prison was in the area of the brightest star in Neba galaxy, near the fifth planet closest to the star. It should still be in the general area.”

Coran stepped closer. “Well, it looks like the Neba galaxy is only a wormhole jump away,” he began, “but I suggest we go there without the wormhole jump, in which case it would take three to five quintants. We’re facing Druids, after all, so extra training on quintessence manipulation might be needed.”

“I thought the Paladins can manipulate quintessence already?” Kolivan asked.

“Only a little,” Shiro replied. “Lance is the most capable, since he can make tidal waves and icebergs out of nothing by now. Hunk can make earthquakes, Pidge can will plants to life though she needs seeds, and Keith, while still unable to make fire, is able to generate intense heat. I’m still not able to do anything, though.”

“Well, you were held captive for weeks so you get a pass,” Lance pointed out. “Plus, I had a head start so I really shouldn’t be counted.”

“And, uh, I don’t think I can help anything with earth powers in a prison ship,” Hunk said, holding his hand up as if in a classroom. “Everything’s metal. It’s not like I can metalbend anything.”

“Not yet,” Lance grinned confidently. “You’ve got earth nicely. If The Last Airbender is anything to go by you’re going to be metalbending soon.”

“Wait, does that mean I’m technically a waterbender?” Pidge asked aloud. “That plantbender person from the swamp was bending the water in the plants, right?”

“Pidge, no, you’re special! You do woods and vines and leaves, not the water in it!” Lance gasped dramatically. “I mean, you can get flowers from seeds without the dirt and water. That’s awesome.”

“Plus we now have our own farm!” Hunk pointed out. “No more space goo!”

“Hey, the goo is good for your health!” Coran protested, though he seemed pleased at the prospect of having their own farm as well.

“No offense, Coran, but we like Hunk’s cooking better… tastes like home, somehow. And you’re the best space uncle, but I’m sorry to tell you that you’re not the best cook around. And… we kind of need variety because eating the same food every day is kinda…” Lance gestured vaguely.

“I don’t see what’s so bad about eating the same kind of food every day,” Keith commented. “At least we have something to eat at all.”

“Look, Keith, just because you eat the same kind of canned food all the time in that little shack of yours and can live with that doesn’t mean others can do it too.” Lance’s response drew a squawk from Keith, but they’d known the Red Paladin enough to know that Lance’s jibe had been spot on.

“That’s it, as soon as the space farm is ready for harvest I’m gonna make you the best banquet ever,” Hunk swore to Keith. “Just you wait, Keith. Best. Banquet. Ever.”

“Putting that aside,” Allura spoke up, a small smile playing at her lips, “we should begin preparation. This would be similar to the prison breaks we’ve had before, I presume?”

“The concept should be similar, but we have Druids’ magic against us so I suggest we should be more careful,” Kolivan responded. “Perhaps we should play it safe and only free the most valuable prisoners, make it a quick job. Slav, any input?”

Slav hummed for a moment before answering, “Your chances aren’t too great. There are too many realities in which you end up being seriously hurt.”

“The risk of getting hurt is always present in any mission,” Shiro said with a lift of a brow.

“There are also too many realities in which one of you are taken by the Druids.”

Silence fell in the control room, dark and heavy. Slav continued on talking as if he didn’t notice it. “Some even have two or more of you taken by the Druids. The realities in which you escape completely unscathed are just two, three if you are lucky.”

The silence continued. Lance broke it by clicking his tongue. “Well, it wasn’t like our chances with Zarkon was any better? We came out of that relatively okay. More or less. Somewhat. In a manner of speaking.”

“Slav, if this succeeded, will it help us win?” Allura asked.

“In most of the realities, yes,” Slav nodded.

“Then I say it’s worth the risk,” Allura concluded.

Hence how the team found themselves in Alpha Kaj, sneaking into the ship to free the prisoners in it. Considering that the Druids ran the ship, the group decided they should act more carefully and sneaked the prisoners off few by few instead of wreaking havoc. Letting all hell break loose meant they’d probably have to deal with drones and Druids head on, after all, and they were pretty sure battling Druids head on would leave to one sided curb stomp with them being stomped on. Keith, at least, had insisted on it, and Lance wasn’t going to argue with the guy who could make the entire control room into a sauna with a single glower and melt metal with his touch.

Pidge, as usual, had hacked into the ship’s mainframe and accessed the blueprints, leading the rest of the team to the prisoners, which were divided into two groups. She purposefully led them to free prisoners who could either help them or whose escape could probably delay the Galra’s expansion or attack. It was hard and trying, at times, because some of the prisoners were already damaged by all the experimentation and info-squeezing the Druids had committed them into. Though, to be fair, he mission went pretty well overall.

Lance begun to feel a lump of nervousness knotting at the base of his stomach when after the fourth trip to smuggle more prisoners no hiccup had interrupted their process. Things didn’t usually go this well for them. It felt foreboding.

As seconds ticked by and more prisoners were smuggled away from their cells, the feeling grew within Lance and he started to feel jittery. He tapped his fingers to his bayard, chewing on his lips and trying hard, so hard, to keep himself from doing things that could attract attention.

“Lance, you’re starting to get distracting,” Hunk whispered softly when Lance’s tapping got more frantic.

“Sorry,” Lance tightened his grips on the bayard and stiffened his fingers to stop himself from tapping, then quickly loosening them again when he realized stiff fingers would probably not help much in case of a sudden need to fire at something. “I just feel… sorry.”

“Too easy?” Hunk asked with a strained smile. “Same, dude.”

“As thrilling as this discussion is I would prefer if we could keep silent and focus on the mission,” Shiro’s voice rang through the comm. “This is our last trip, anyway, so let’s not say anything that could distract us.”

“Yeah, let’s not jinx ourselves,” Keith agreed. “Shiro and I have gotten to the next cell, Pidge. Locks?”

“Sure thing, just a sec. I’ll undo the locks on Lance and Hunk’s end too, so you can all get to the pods pretty much at the same time.” There was a beep from the comm link, and after a bit they could hear Pidge’s triumphant, almost silent yes. “Alright, locks are now not functional and the doors to the cells I’m directing you to will open at the lightest push of your fingers.”

“Thanks, Pidge,” Shiro said, a hint of pride in his voice. Lance smiled, liking the fact that they had Shiro back after being separated for so long. Missions always felt better, more focused and somehow easier with him around.

Hunk gestured to Lance to move quicker, and he nodded. They followed the path Pidge had sent to them and quickly made their way to the cell in question. Inside which was an alien lady with long, long silvery hair with streaks of gold that cascaded down to the floor, tips a strikingly contrasting black. She wore her hair like a robe around her, pulling the strands around her shoulders like cloth with which she fought away the cold as she curled into a ball. She looked humanoid for the most part, though her skin was a shade of ivory white that made her look like a statue. Her lips were gold, her nose pointed and long, and she had four pointy ears instead of two. She had three eyes, though, two in the upper part of her face much like any humans would have their eyes and one standing vertically at the very center of her forehead. The two were a shade of silver-grey, while the single eye glowed an ethereal gold.

“Paladins,” she greeted, her voice husky and lilting as though she was half asleep, “I have been waiting.”

That gave Hunk a pause. “Uh, you have?”

She pulled her lips into a smile. “My people have always had the ability to see the future. Snippets, broken vision that no one could comprehend. For some reason, my vision has always been more coherent and easily understood. That is why the Galra took me.” She gave a bow. “I thank you for coming and rescuing me, Paladins. I am Pythia of Castal. We Castalians have foreseen the coming of the defenders for so long. It is an honor to finally meet you.”

“Pleasure is all ours, milady,” Lance returned the bow gracefully and offered his hand. “We’re in a tight schedule, though, so I suggest we move quickly. Shall we?”

Pythia nodded and reached out, revealing seemingly unnatural long fingers that reminded Lance of long, leafless twigs in the middle of winter. The skin on her hands were deep, sleek black instead of the flawless milky white her arms and face were, and a glance to the floor revealed that her feet were also black, and her toes, too, were unnaturally long. She pushed herself upright and she immediately towered above both Lance and Hunk, and Lance knew instantly that she’d be taller than most Galra around. Overall, she looked like a girl version of Slenderman, except she actually had a face and looked more ethereal than creepy. So perhaps some kind of fae?

Then she suddenly jerked back and pulled her hand away from Lance’s, the single golden eye flashing brightly for a tick. She blinked a few times – all three of her eyes – and stared at Lance intently. “Ah.”

“What? What is it? Why did your eye shine? Was that normal?” Hunk stared at Pythia, worry in his eyes and slight panic in his voice.

“It happens when Castalians receive a vision,” Pythia answered, still staring at Lance.

Lance chuckled nervously. “I hope that was a vision of me sipping margarita by a pool surrounded by pretty ladies such as yourself,” he joked, only half hoping that his guess was somewhat true. The way Pythia stared at him made him think otherwise, but a guy can dream.

Her face contorted in… was it pity? She reached out and took his hand again, enveloping it in her long fingers gently. Her golden eye shimmered softly. When she spoke next, her voice was heavy, and she sounded truly awake for the first time. “Child of ocean and ice, you shall abandon your hope. You shall cast away your precious ones and you shall be alone. But fear not, for what was once lost may yet be regained.”

Lance stared.

Hunk coughed. “That sounded… ominous.”

“Why would I cast away my precious one?” Lance asked.

“I do not know,” Pythia answered, back to sounding half asleep again. “My vision is often disjointed, though much less so compared to the rest of my people.”

“Anyway, we really should move,” Hunk nudged them. “Can’t waste time here. We need to get out, like, ASAP.”

“Right,” Lance straightened and grasped Pythia’s hands that still held his. “Come on, it’s this way. Keep yourself as quiet as you can. We need to move quickly.”

The tall alien lady nodded and followed, surprisingly silent despite her size. Her hair trailed behind her like silk, and Lance wondered briefly what kind of haircare aliens used. He made a mental note to ask her about it later.

They soon reached the hangar, meeting up with the rest of the team. Standing with Shiro and Keith was a tiny alien dude, only reaching up to Shiro’s waist in height. His skin was an interesting shade of algae green, and his cat-like eyes looked around the room warily. Behind them was a pod, inside which several other freed prisoners huddled together.

Keith motioned to them, clearly wanting them to move quicker. They complied.

They were only three paces closer when purple lightning bolt struck the floor between their feet, though. Lance whirled around in alarm, raising his bayard and started shooting at the oncoming Druids.

“Fuck,” Keith cursed, generating heat in response to the sudden worsening of the situation enough to make the room suddenly feel stuffy. It was most likely unintentional, given that he didn’t have good control over his powers yet.

“Dude, mind the heat,” Lance protested as he put his hand up and twirled his finger, making a light snowfall to neutralize the temperature. Keith muttered a quick apology as he activated his bayard.

“Paladins, up front!” Shiro yelled, flesh arm gripping inactive bayard while the other arm glowed Galra purple. “The rest, go inside the pod. We’ll cover you.”

The freed prisoners didn’t need to be told twice. Pythia snatched the green alien up, ignoring his surprised, indignant squawk and rushed into the pod, leaving the door open to wait for the Paladins.

The Paladins quickly got to work, but to say the battle was frustrating would be severely underplaying it. Each and every time they struck – each and every time they knew their strike would hit – the Druids would poof away and rematerialize elsewhere, suddenly throwing purple lightning strikes at them. Soon, it became clear that their chances to actually defeat the Druids was pretty much a zero.

Shiro gritted his teeth, glancing at the still open pod. The Druids were strong and they were slowly being pushed back – closer to the pod, but sooner or later the Druids would take back the prisoners and would probably jail the five of them for good measure. Even better, they’d probably continue the messed up experiment they did to Shiro and did the same for the rest of them.

“You people back there, close the pod!” Shiro yelled to the freed prisoners. “Go to the white ship waiting outside. You’ll be safe there.” He turned to the other Paladins. “You go with them.”

“What? No!” Keith protested immediately. “I’m not leaving you!”

“Shiro, we just got you back! We’re not going to just leave!” Pidge added.

“We’ll fight these Druids and escape together, Shiro,” Hunk grunted through gritted teeth while sending blasts after blasts to the Druids that never connected.

Lance’s eyes darted around, looking at how his fellow Paladins struggled so against the enemies, how the Druids easily avoided their relentless attacks without effort, how the prisoners waited, staring in frozen fear.

All of them but one.

His gaze connected to Pythia’s, and for the briefest moment her golden eye twinkled and Lance instantly remembered her seemingly ominous message. She stared at him without words, simply waiting for him to make his decision. It didn’t take long.

“Pythia, close the pod, now!” Lance yelled, and Pythia nodded. Before his mouth even closed, Lance’s eyes glowed ethereal blue as he called forth the power of the ocean and glacier to his fingertips. With a single slash, he raised a wall of ice that separated the Druids from them. He didn’t know if it would actually stop those pesky space dark magic practitioners, but he could at least try.

The ice chipped and cracked immediately. Okay, so he probably couldn’t guarantee their safety. Fine. He’d hold them back somehow, even at the cost of himself.

“Lance? What are you doing?” Shiro asked, trepidation in his voice.

Lance met his eyes. Met the eyes of each and every member of his team. “Please be safe,” he said, a little breathlessly.

“Lance – “

Shiro didn’t get to finish his sentence. Lance had raised a tidal wave that immediately washed them away, pushing them into the pod just before it closed. Lance watched through the dissipating water and the glass of the pod, making sure they were safe and sound, if a bit wet and coughing and hacking from swallowing a mouthful or two of water that he pushed to them.

Behind him, the ice cracked more, ominously. Absently, Lance willed it to last longer.

Hunk launched himself to the now closed pod door, glaring at him and yelling something he couldn’t hear. Lance smiled weakly at him, which spurred him to punch the glass.

The ice wall behind him broke, falling into thousands of tiny pieces. An attack hit him squarely in the back, making him grunt and fall to his knees. He didn’t break his gaze to the now retreating pod, however, staring at how Keith pushed Hunk a little so he could press his palms at the glass, staring wide-eyed at Lance. The taller boy sent him a smirk that immediately turned into a grimace when another attack hit him. Lance launched needles of ice and slaps of ocean wave blindly, hearing a Druid grunt behind him and more rushing forward.

As the Druids surrounded him, Lance watched Keith pound at the glass, fire blazing across his back – orange and red and angry and desperate. So this is what finally enables him to make fire, Lance absently thought as Druids began to crowd around him. He forced himself to smile as he watched the pod moved, away, out, as his teammates watched in horror while he was overpowered by the Druids despite the ice that he threw at them.

Let him be overpowered. Let the Druids take him. He didn’t particularly care as long as his friends were safe.

As the hangar gate closed, pod safely out, Lance ceased all effort to keep the Druids back. A pair of metal bracelets immediately circled his wrists, keeping them locked behind his back, and Lance instantly felt his ability to summon water and ice being sealed away. So, a kind of space handcuffs that kept him from fighting in more ways than one. That was just great.

The Druids pulled him to his feet. Lance flashed them the biggest smile he could pull.