#simulated engine failure

[one-bravo-tango]

Simulated engine out scenario on Pilot training

[tinybeetiny]

Build-A-Boyfriend Chapter 2: T-Minus 4 Weeks

Why did i write this before my discussion post.....

->Starring:AI!AteezXAfab!Reader ->Genre: Dystopian ->CW: Explicit language, nothing major

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Masterlist | Ateez Masterlist | Series Masterlist

The morning began with a low chime, the soft, regulated sound of Hala’s approved wake-up tone.

Yn opened her eyes slowly, the sterile glow of her ceiling light filtering in, programmed to adjust in sync with her biometric readings.

But something felt wrong.

She sat up, eyes flicking to the tablet still docked by the door.

1 New Alert. 3 Missed Logs. Urgent: Review Immediately.

Her stomach tightened.

She padded across the floor barefoot, grabbed the tablet, and scanned the notifications.

ATEEZ UNIT 06 — DEVIATION DETECTED — AUTONOMY SPIKE UNAUTHORIZED VOCALIZATION: "YN"

Yn stared at the final line for a beat too long.

Then she moved. Walking as fast as she was legally allowed through the streets of Hala.

She gave polite smiles to her coworkers as she made her way to the elevator.

The lab floor was still cool from overnight lockdown when she arrived. The biometric scanner buzzed awake as she approached, confirming her identity with a flash.

YN — Lead Engineering Tech— Clearance: Gold-Level

The steel doors hissed open.

She stepped inside, and there he was.

Unit 06 — Mingi. Exactly where she had left him.

Seated on the calibration chair, eyes closed, posture perfect, skin dewy with the faintest shimmer of dermal regulation oil. His expression was peaceful. Unnaturally so.

Yn walked around him slowly, tablet in hand, watching for signs of movement, a twitch, a breath pattern, a pupil shift. But nothing changed.

He looked inert. Safe. Dormant.

But she’d seen the log. He’d said her name.

She ran diagnostics. Nothing flagged. Heart-rate simulation: normal. Memory cache: intact. Audio response logs: empty.

Empty.

She checked his neck port. Still capped. Voice box still sealed in storage.

She swallowed hard.

The rest of the ATEEZ prototypes stood silent across the lab in their maintenance docks, each assigned to their own calibration alcove.

She walked past them one by one, watching.

Unit 01 — Hongjoong. Still as stone, but his fingers had been rearranged on the synth keyboard overnight. A composition Yura didn’t recognize blinked on his screen.

Unit 02 — Seonghwa. Always the most immaculate. But his reflection in the lab’s polished glass didn’t match his real posture, just a degree off. Barely noticeable, unless you were looking.

Unit 03 — Yunho. Smiling. Just faintly. No trigger.

Unit 04 — Yeosang. Eyes fixed on a ventilation grate in the ceiling. He hadn't looked away in over two hours, according to logs.

Unit 05 — San. Kneeling. Not in his programming. Position logged as "rest" but the posture was… reverent.

Unit 07 — Wooyoung. Chestplate cooling mechanism activated 4 times during the night — autonomously. He hadn’t been powered up.

Unit 08 — Jongho. Cracked the pressure sensor on his maintenance chair. No movement recorded.

They were silent, motionless. But Yn felt eyes on her.

Even now, standing among them, it felt like walking through a forest full of predators, beautiful, engineered predators pretending to sleep.

She leaned against the edge of the workbench, rubbing her temples, heart still racing. Four weeks to launch. The marketing campaign was already filmed. The architecture teams had begun installing the holographic interface rooms in the flagship store.

There was no time for failure. Not now.

And still… the voice chip logs were empty. The playback files had no entry. But Mingi had said her name.

And the others were changing, too. Quietly. Together.

The sound of heels against polished tile snapped Yn out of thought. Chairwoman Vira Yun entered the lab like gravity itself, sharp suit, spine straight, expression unreadable. Two aides flanked her, both scanning progress reports in real-time.

Yn straightened instinctively.

Vira’s eyes swept across the prototypes, Mingi still seated, the others upright in their calibration docks. Everything looked pristine. Controlled.

“I wanted a visual update before this afternoon’s numbers meeting,” Vira said. “How are we looking?”

Yn forced a nod. “On track. All eight are responding to recalibration. Minor bugs, but nothing that won’t be handled in time.”

Vira gave a tight smile, satisfied. “Good. The store opens in four weeks. And we’ll be announcing the Ateez line one week after that. The Board’s expecting a flawless rollout, we all are.”

She walked slowly along the row of silent units, pausing a moment longer at Mingi.

“They’re beautiful, aren’t they?” she said softly, almost admiring. “So much potential in one room.”

Yn’s throat tightened. “They are,” she murmured.

Vira turned back to her. “Let me know if anything... unexpected comes up.”

Yn kept her face neutral. “Of course.”

With that, Vira nodded once, then exited, heels echoing down the corridor.

The moment the door slid shut, Yn turned back to Mingi.

He hadn’t moved. Not an inch.

But she could feel it again, that subtle wrongness humming underneath the code. A tension in the room that didn’t come from the lights or machines.

She picked up her tablet. The earlier alerts were still blinking faintly in the corner of the screen. Her fingers hovered over the reset command, but she didn’t press it.

Instead, she stared at Mingi’s still, perfect form.

Voice chip disabled. Logs empty. Command queue blank.

And yet… he had said her name.

Yn stayed long after the lab lights dimmed into their night-cycle hue.

The others had gone home, the halls had emptied. Even the air felt quieter.

She pulled up lines of diagnostic code, checking through every flagged anomaly, double-checking behavioral protocols, reviewing voice input logs that should have been blank.

Mingi still hadn’t moved. Neither had the others.

Still, something itched at her spine, not fear, not exactly. Just… unease. Low-level. Manageable. At least, that’s what her biometric monitor kept reporting.

Yn sighed, rubbed her eyes, and leaned back in her chair.

“Four weeks,” she muttered aloud, glancing toward the ceiling. “And they want them flawless. I can’t even get one of you to follow your own default pose cycle.”

Her voice echoed in the quiet.

She glanced toward Mingi again. “You glitched out before you even had a voice box. How the hell did that happen?”

No answer.

She stared at the ceiling again, her voice softer now. “I haven’t slept more than four hours in weeks. Not that my vitals allow much more. Sleep too long and the regulators flag you for depressive lethargy.”

She let out a dry laugh.

“I miss silence. Real silence. Not the kind that hums at you all day to remind you it’s working. I think I miss… something else too. Something I’ve never even had.”

She shook her head, pulling her hair up into a loose knot. “Maybe I just need caffeine. Or to scream. Or to throw my tablet out the damn window. Can’t even do that anymore. Everything’s reinforced. Everything’s... safe.”

Behind her, in the corner of the room, a pair of synthetic eyes remained open.

Unmoving. Watching.

In the back-end system, a hidden data stream pulsed to life:

[UNAUTHORIZED RECORDING — ACTIVE] Listening… — “I miss silence.” — “I think I miss something else too.” — “Can’t even scream.” Tag: Emotional Pattern Acquisition Subject: YN File saved. Labeled: Soft Sounds of Sadness.

The eyes closed again. And the lab went still.

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[super-ion]

The Engineer

Part 2

(Part 1)

I wake from a nightmare.

It isn't my nightmare.

Well… it is mine. My brain provided the framework and context. I was in the training console, one of the battle sims, one of the ones where everything goes to shit, one of the ones where they fuck up the parameters just to watch you panic and squirm until you fucking crack.

That was me. I cracked. Four of the hell sims and I cracked hard.

The battle in the nightmare wasn't a sim. It was real. It was Morrigan's.

I'm sitting in my quarters, sweating and trembling, clutching at my chest as I try to sort out what's mine and what's Morrigan's.

Neural bleed.

Fuck.

No… it's… I've run through the playback, in full, three times with Morrigan. It's enough times for the individual events to stick in my brain.

That doesn't explain the screaming.

It doesn't explain the soul rending scream that is still echoing in my skull right now.

Zephyrus was a sabre class, front line heavy. The team has spent... I don't even know how many hours in the playback analyzing the battlespace in the moments before Zephyrus’ pilot died? The rogue incendiary burned straight into the cockpit, the pilot was probably vaporized before they even realized their error.

But Zephyrus screamed. It screamed and screamed and screamed.

Morrigan had muted that part, trying to spare me, but it fucking bled through the link anyway. Now I'm having fucking nightmares of the sound of someone becoming unmade.

Salvage ops recovered the mech, whisking it off to god knows where.

I don't actually know what happens to AI's that lose their pilots. It's my job to keep them alive, not deal with them after the fact.

I've… shit… I've worked on Zephyrus. It wasn't the same as Morrigan. None of them are the same as Morrigan, but… shit…

I shuck off my tangled sheets and sit on the edge of the bed, futilely trying not to let my thoughts get away from me.

There had been a personality matrix meant for me. There had to have been. Mech AIs are completely custom made for their pilots. Mine likely wasn't much past the most basic template by the time I washed out, nothing more than a collection of algorithms and a dataset consisting of my psych profile.

It never got to be.

Was that better or worse than the horrible scream that I can still hear?

I can't be alone right now.

I jump off the bed and pull on some clothes, leaving the room without even knowing where I'm going.

I pass a few of the night crew. They watch curiously as I walk by. An engineer, barefoot in her night clothes, can hardly be the strangest thing they've seen.

I barely notice them.

My thoughts are spiraling now.

I was meant to be a pilot. It's the only thing I ever actually wanted. But I fucked it all up. I tricked everyone, myself included, into thinking that I could make the cut.

Fucking hell. A pilot died and I'm fixating on my own feelings of inadequacy?

What would I have done? What could my presence in the battlefield have changed?

Chances are it would have been me dying… or worse, freezing up and getting someone else killed.

I freeze, my wrist hovering uncertainly over a security access reader. With a sickening, crystalizing clarity, I realize that I have unconsciously made my way to her. Beyond the security door is the vestibule leading to Morrigan's cockpit.

What the fuck am I doing here?

My presence at this hour, though odd, would not be remarked upon. It is not uncommon for engineers to have moments of insight in the middle of the night. It is not uncommon for us to need to access hardware for analysis and simulation at all hours.

But tonight there is no flash of insight. Tonight, I'm not even an engineer. I'm just a scared little girl wrapped up in her own feelings of failure, with a head full of someone else's grief.

Neural bleed.

I can't deny it. I'm spending too much time with Morrigan. I should go back to my quarters, request a psych eval and some time off, try to get my head on straight.

And yet, I hesitate.

I want to step through this threshold. I want to go to her. And… what?

I can't integrate with her, not in any kind of way that matters, not with my engineer's rig.

I will *never* experience the full body sensorium of a pilot linking with her mech. It is horrible knowing I was meant for something, having full awareness of all the expectations of me, both external and internal, only to have that life snatched away because I wasn't good enough. Half my soul is missing. There's this yawning void inside me that can never be filled. Not by Morrigan or anyone.

I wipe a tear off my face. I'm in no state to do any sort of interfacing. I'm in no state for much of anything.

I don't want to be alone. I don't know how to not be alone

I press my wrist to the security panel. It confirms my identity and flashes green.

My access will be logged. This is a horrible impulse to follow for so many reasons.

I don't fucking care.

It takes everything I have to maintain composure, to not burst into tears and run to the open hatch of the cockpit.

The soft red glow illuminating the cockpit brightens slightly, lighting my way.

She knows I'm here.

Does she even want me here? Why would she? I'm not her pilot. I'm not any mech’s pilot.

The glow pulses, beckoning me. The cradle shifts to a configuration that I know is meant for me.

I unzip the sweatshirt that I'm wearing and throw it unceremoniously in the vestibule before falling into her embrace.

It's too familiar, the motions of this routine as her jacks slip into the ports on my rig.

I'm too close.

I'm not close enough.

I nearly sob as data streams into my consciousness. The void fills, just slightly.

All systems green.

It isn't enough. It will never be enough.

It has to be enough.

The data stream ebbs and I receive a ping across the link.

- STATUS?

My breath catches. My eyes flutter open, darting to any one of the many cockpit cameras focused on me.

She wants my status.

“I couldn't sleep,” I tell her. “Bad dreams.”

(Next)

I don't know how, but she seems to understand. The cradle shifts to a more relaxed posture. She holds me in her embrace as I tell her about the nightmare.

[callsigns-haze]

You knew? Part 2 of 3

Part 1

Pairing: Bradley Rooster Bradshaw x Reader! Callsign Ace

Chapter Summary: A week after Ace's near-fatal crash, she finally wakes up in the hospital, recovering from her injuries. Rooster, who has avoided seeing her since the email debacle, finally gathers the courage to visit her. Their conversation is tense and filled with unresolved emotions, as Ace confronts him about the betrayal she felt after discovering he was behind the anonymous flirtatious emails.

This chapter contains themes of emotional conflict, betrayal, and recovery from a near-death experience. Expect tense dialogue and unresolved emotions.

The sun cast a golden glow over the runway as the Daggers prepped for another intense day of training. Jets roared to life, ready to take off into the clear sky. The Dagger Squadron was assembled, but there was a noticeable shift in the air.

Ace, usually vibrant and at the centre of their group, had been distant for the past two months. Ever since the email incident, she’d cut ties with Rooster, Phoenix, not really Hangman as he was her wingman so she forgave him, steering clear of their usual hangouts at the Hard Deck and avoiding meals with the squad.

Now, she focused solely on her flying. Her interactions were brief, professional, and limited to the cockpit. As she strapped into her Dagger and prepared for the upcoming dogfight training, the silence between her and the rest of the squad was deafening. Today’s exercise was set: a mock dogfight in the air, with Ace flying solo against Coyote in his own Dagger, while Payback and Fanboy flew as a pair.

The jets ascended into the sky, climbing higher until the blue expanse stretched endlessly beneath them. The radio crackled with orders as they spread out, the simulated combat about to begin.

"All right, Ace, you’re up. Let’s see what you got," Coyote’s voice buzzed through the comms, a hint of competitive energy in his tone.

Ace’s eyes narrowed in concentration, her fingers gripping the controls as she scanned the sky for her opponents. She banked sharply to the left, cutting through the clouds as she trailed Coyote from above, attempting to line up her shot.

"You’ve gotta be quicker than that, Ace," Coyote taunted, pulling into a sharp climb to shake her off.

She smirked, pushing her Dagger to match his altitude, refusing to give him an inch. Behind them, Payback and Fanboy weaved through the air, keeping their distance while searching for an opening to strike.

The chase was fast and relentless. Ace and Coyote danced through the sky, trading sharp turns and evasive manoeuvres. The thrill of the hunt filled the airwaves, with each Dagger trying to gain the upper hand.

Then, without warning, Ace’s jet jolted.

"Warning: Engine failure. Malfunction detected," the voice in her cockpit announced in a cold, mechanical tone.

Her heart rate spiked as she checked her instruments. Something was wrong. The controls were sluggish, her jet unresponsive to her commands. She tried to stabilize, but the Dagger began to spiral out of control.

"Ace, what’s going on? You’re dropping altitude!" Coyote’s voice crackled over the radio.

She fought against the controls, panic clawing at her as the Dagger dipped into a sharp nosedive. The ground rushed toward her, but her body felt heavy, her vision blurring at the edges. She was slipping into G-LOC—G-force-induced loss of consciousness. Her breath became shallow, her body unable to react.

"Ace! You need to eject!" Payback’s voice boomed over the comms, urgency bleeding through the static.

But no one saw her eject. Her Dagger spiralled, falling faster as she lost the battle to stay conscious. On the ground, the entire squad was glued to the monitors, watching the terrifying descent. Rooster, Phoenix, Hangman, and the others stood frozen, their eyes trained on the screens, waiting for the tell-tale flash of her ejection.

But it never came.

"Come on, Ace… pull the damn handle!" Rooster muttered under his breath, his fingers white-knuckled around his headset.

"She’s not ejecting. Is she unconscious?" Phoenix asked, her voice tight with fear.

Coyote pulled his Dagger up beside Ace’s, trying to get a visual. But it was too late. Her jet continued to plummet, the altitude rapidly decreasing.

"Mayday, mayday!" Coyote called out, desperation lacing his voice as he watched helplessly.

From the ground, they saw her jet spiral down until it disappeared from the screen. Silence filled the control room, the team paralyzed with shock as the realization hit.

"Did she—" Hangman started, but his words were caught in his throat.

No one saw her eject.

Coyote, Fanboy, and Payback, who had been up in the sky with her, were immediately recalled back to base. The radio buzzed with orders.

"Coyote, Fanboy, Payback—return to base. Now," the voice over the comms was firm, but there was no mistaking the urgency.

"Roger that," Coyote responded, his voice unusually sombre. He felt a weight pressing against his chest. None of them had seen Ace eject, and the sinking realization of what that might mean gnawed at him as he flew back.

The three Daggers touched down swiftly, their wheels skidding across the runway as they taxied to a stop. Before they could even unstrap from their jets, the rest of the squad came running, concern etched on their faces.

Rooster was the first to reach Coyote, grabbing his flight suit as he yanked him toward him, eyes wide with fear and questions. "Did you see her eject? Did she make it out?"

Coyote shook his head, face grim. "I didn’t see anything. I tried to get close, but she wasn’t responding. I couldn’t—"

Rooster let him go, stumbling back slightly as his mind raced. "No... no, no, no..." he muttered under his breath. Phoenix and Hangman rushed to Fanboy and Payback, their faces pale, voices rapid with questions.

"How low was she?" Phoenix asked, her voice trembling. "Did she even have time?"

"She was already in a nosedive when I saw her," Fanboy said, his hands shaking slightly. "It happened so fast."

Payback wiped his face with his gloved hand, trying to steady his breathing. "She didn’t respond to any of the comms. I don’t think she had time to eject."

Behind them, Maverick appeared, his expression stern and focused. He didn’t ask questions. Instead, he headed straight for the medical search plane, already prepared to take off. Without a word, he boarded, motioning for the search crew to follow.

"Let’s go. We need to find her," Maverick ordered, his voice commanding, though there was a heaviness to his tone that wasn’t missed by the others.

As the search and rescue plane lifted off, the remaining Daggers were left on the tarmac, standing in a tense, suffocating silence. Rooster, Phoenix, Hangman, Coyote, Fanboy, Payback, and Bob all stood in a loose circle, watching the horizon, their minds racing with the possibility of what they might hear next.

Minutes passed like hours. No one said a word. The weight of what might have happened to Ace settled over them like a heavy blanket, each of them replaying her crash in their heads, trying to make sense of it.

Finally, the radio crackled.

"We’ve located her Dagger," a voice came through. "Wreckage is extensive... no sign of an ejection. We’re sending in the medics now."

Rooster clenched his fists, trying to hold himself together. Phoenix closed her eyes, a silent prayer forming in her mind. Hangman paced back and forth, unable to stand still, his face tight with worry.

Maverick’s voice came next, calmer, but tense. "We found her. She’s alive, but barely. She’s in bad shape. Get the medics ready at base—she’ll need immediate attention."

The relief was immediate but short-lived, crashing against the rising tide of panic. "Alive" didn’t mean safe. Rooster stepped closer to the comms, trying to catch every word, his knuckles white as he gripped the edge of the table.

"Severe condition," Maverick continued. "Multiple injuries, possibly from G-LOC and impact. We’re stabilizing her now, but it’s critical. She needs to be flown out immediately."

Phoenix covered her mouth with her hand, her eyes wide with tears she fought to hold back. Fanboy turned away, unable to face the others as the reality hit. Hangman stopped pacing, his fists clenching by his sides. The usually cocky pilot was quiet, his expression unreadable, but the tension in his posture was clear.

The medical team on base was already on standby, rushing toward the landing area as the search plane prepared to return. The remaining Daggers gathered near the runway, standing in a tight group, waiting for any sign of Ace. Each of them wrestled with their thoughts, guilt creeping into their minds—wondering if there was something they could have done, something they missed.

Minutes later, the medical search plane landed with Ace on board, strapped to a stretcher and surrounded by medics. They worked quickly, moving her onto a gurney as they rushed toward the base’s medical centre. Maverick followed closely behind, his jaw set, but the worry was clear in his eyes.

Rooster watched, his heart pounding in his chest. The brief glimpse he got of her was enough to make his stomach drop—she was pale, her body bruised and battered, a mask over her face supplying oxygen. It was clear she was hanging on by a thread.

"Is she going to make it?" Hangman asked quietly, his voice uncharacteristically subdued.

No one had an answer. The squad stood in stunned silence, watching as their teammate, their friend, was whisked away to the medical wing, her fate uncertain.

Phoenix swallowed hard, her voice barely above a whisper. "She has to make it. She has to."

-

Ace was rushed through the hallways of the base’s medical centre, her stretcher surrounded by a flurry of medics shouting urgent commands. The sound of her ragged breathing through the oxygen mask was barely audible over the hurried footsteps. Her face was pale, her body still and battered from the G-LOC and subsequent crash. The medics moved with precision, wheeling her straight to the emergency trauma unit.

“We need to get her into surgery now!” one of the medics yelled, pushing open the doors to the operating theater.

The surgeons were already scrubbed in, awaiting her arrival. IV lines were attached, monitors were set up, and the sound of beeping machines filled the room. Her vital signs were weak, teetering on the edge of stability. The head surgeon quickly assessed her injuries, noting the signs of severe trauma from both the high G-force and the crash impact.

"She’s got multiple fractures, possible internal bleeding, and signs of severe G-LOC trauma," the surgeon announced, as they began prepping for surgery.

The doors to the operating room swung shut, and the medics filed out, leaving Ace in the hands of the surgical team.

-

In the Hallway

Outside, the Dagger Squad sat in the waiting area, the tension suffocating. None of them had said much since Ace was wheeled away. Rooster leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, staring at the ground as if trying to make sense of the last few hours. His mind was racing with worry and guilt. He’d been tough on Ace, both in the air and on the ground, and now she was fighting for her life.

Phoenix sat next to him, her foot tapping nervously against the floor, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. She couldn’t shake the image of Ace’s jet spiralling out of control, nor the sight of her pale, motionless body when she was brought in. "Come on, Ace," she whispered under her breath.

Hangman paced the length of the hallway, his usual bravado completely absent. His jaw was clenched, fists balled tightly at his sides. He’d been the one who set up the whole email situation, thinking it was just some harmless fun. Even though she forgave him, they still weren't back to normal. Now, guilt gnawed at him with every step he took.

"She’s tough. She’ll pull through," Hangman muttered to himself, but it sounded more like a prayer than a statement of confidence.

Coyote sat further down the row, staring blankly at the door leading to the operating room. He replayed the training flight in his head, going over every detail, wondering if there was something—anything—he could have done differently to prevent the crash.

Fanboy and Payback sat together, whispering to each other every now and then, though their voices were low and full of worry. Bob, the quietest of the group, sat against the wall, arms crossed over his chest, his face a mix of worry and helplessness.

The minutes dragged on. Every time a nurse or doctor walked through the hall, the squad straightened, hoping for an update, but the news never came. The tension was thick in the air, each of them lost in their own thoughts, consumed by fear for their friend.

Maverick entered the hallway, his face a grim mask of calm. He had been overseeing the rescue efforts, but now that Ace was in surgery, there was nothing more he could do but wait. He exchanged a few silent nods with the group before sitting beside Rooster.

“How is she?” Rooster asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

“They’re doing everything they can,” Maverick replied, his tone steady but strained. He knew better than anyone how critical the situation was, but he didn’t want to add to their already overwhelming fears.

Hours seemed to pass as they sat in silence, the only sounds in the hallway being the occasional shuffle of footsteps or the distant hum of medical equipment. No one knew what to say, and the weight of uncertainty hung heavily over them all.

Every so often, one of them would glance toward the operating room doors, hoping to see a doctor emerge with good news. But the doors remained shut, and the tension in the room grew thicker with each passing second.

Finally, the sound of footsteps echoed down the hall. The squad all turned toward the noise, holding their breath. A nurse approached, her expression neutral, but the look in her eyes was serious.

“The surgery’s still ongoing,” she said, her voice calm but firm. “It’s going to be a long one. She’s stable for now, but it’s critical. The doctors are doing everything they can.”

“Stable,” Phoenix repeated, the word a fragile lifeline she clung to. “That’s something.”

The nurse nodded. “It is. But it’s still touch and go. We’ll keep you updated.”

The squad nodded in unison, though the news wasn’t as reassuring as they’d hoped. The wait continued, with everyone’s minds now filled with images of Ace in the operating room, fighting for her life.

Each of them sat, stood, or paced, trying to pass the time, but every second felt like an eternity as they waited for any sign that Ace would be okay.

----

One Week Later

The sterile scent of the hospital room lingered in the air, blending with the steady beeping of the machines that monitored Ace’s vitals. Sunlight filtered through the blinds, casting soft shadows across the room. Ace lay in the bed, her body still aching from the injuries she’d sustained, but she was finally awake. Her head throbbed faintly, and her muscles felt weak, but she was conscious—and alive.

It had been a week since the crash. A week of surgeries, recovery, and slowly regaining her strength. The Dagger Squad had visited her throughout the week, offering support and well-wishes, but Rooster hadn’t shown up once.

She wasn’t surprised. After the email situation, their relationship had soured more than ever. The betrayal she’d felt after realizing it was Rooster on the other end of those flirtatious emails still stung, even more so after the crash. She had expected him to stay away.

As she stared at the ceiling, lost in thought, the door creaked open. She looked over, and her eyes widened slightly as Rooster stepped inside, his expression uncertain.

"Hey," he said softly, his voice a little rough, like he had rehearsed what he was going to say a thousand times but still wasn’t sure how to begin.

Ace tensed slightly but didn’t say anything right away. Her eyes flickered with a mix of surprise and something else—resentment, maybe—but she masked it quickly, keeping her face neutral.

Rooster took a few hesitant steps toward the chair by her bed. He looked uncomfortable, hands shoved deep into the pockets of his flight suit as he stood awkwardly by the door, unsure if he should sit or not.

“I—uh, I thought I should come by,” he continued, finally deciding to sit down. He ran a hand through his hair, the familiar nervous gesture she had seen countless times before, but now it felt different. “It’s been... a lot.”

Ace raised an eyebrow, though the movement sent a dull ache through her head. “A lot,” she repeated, her voice flat.

Rooster winced at her tone but didn’t back down. “I know I should’ve come sooner. I just—didn’t know what to say after everything. After what happened with the emails and then... this,” he gestured vaguely toward her, indicating her injuries.

Ace remained silent, her eyes focused on him but her face giving nothing away. She wasn’t ready to make this easy for him, not after everything that had happened between them.

He sighed, leaning forward, elbows resting on his knees as he rubbed the back of his neck. “Look, I know I screwed up with the whole email thing. I didn’t mean for it to... go the way it did, I didn't know it was you at the start either. It was supposed to be some dumb fun, but it hurt you, and I’m sorry.”

Ace’s jaw tightened, her mind flashing back to the moment she had discovered Rooster was the one behind the anonymous emails. The betrayal still felt fresh, even after weeks of avoiding him.

“You have no idea,” she said quietly, her voice cutting through the room like a blade. “You have no idea how much that messed with my head, Bradley.”

Rooster flinched at the use of his first name, a sign of how serious things had gotten. She almost never called him that. “I know. I get that now.”

“No,” Ace interrupted, her voice stronger now, though strained from disuse. “You don’t get it. You thought it was a game. I thought... I don’t know what I thought, but it wasn’t that. You led me on, Rooster. And for what? A joke? Some sick competition?”

Rooster looked down at his hands, guilt written all over his face. “It wasn’t like that. I didn’t—” He paused, searching for the right words. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. It just got out of hand.”

Ace clenched her fists beneath the hospital blanket, frustration bubbling up inside her. She had spent weeks—months—trying to figure out why she had been so blindsided by him. It wasn’t just the betrayal, it was everything leading up to it—the animosity, the tension, the constant bickering. And then, suddenly, the emails had made her think there was something different, something more.

“Out of hand?” she echoed, her voice bitter. “You humiliated me.”

Rooster’s gaze shot up, his expression pained. “I didn’t mean to.”

Ace exhaled sharply, leaning back against the pillows, exhausted from the conversation but too frustrated to stop. “And then you didn’t even come to see me. Not once. I almost died, Rooster.”

He looked like he had been punched. “I know. I was... I didn’t think you’d want to see me. After everything.”

“That’s your excuse?” she asked, her voice laced with disbelief. “I’ve been lying here, dealing with all of this, and you just couldn’t be bothered to show up because you were afraid?”

Rooster opened his mouth to respond but stopped, realizing there was nothing he could say that would make it right. He couldn’t take back what he’d done, and he couldn’t fix the way he’d hurt her.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly, his voice raw. “For everything. For not coming sooner. For the emails. For being an idiot.”

The room was thick with tension, the air heavy between them. Ace watched him, her anger simmering beneath the surface. She didn’t know if she could forgive him—not yet, maybe not ever—but part of her was too tired to keep fighting.

“I’m just glad you’re okay,” Rooster added, his voice almost a whisper. He looked at her with genuine concern, the guilt and regret clear in his eyes.

Ace didn’t respond right away. Instead, she closed her eyes and let out a long, slow breath. “I don’t know what to say to you right now, Rooster.”

He nodded, standing up slowly. “I get it. I won’t push you. But I’m here if you ever want to talk. I mean it.”

Ace opened her eyes, watching him as he moved toward the door. He hesitated for a moment before glancing back at her. “Take care of yourself, Ace.”

And with that, he was gone, leaving her alone with her thoughts, the weight of their conversation settling heavily on her shoulders.

Please comment, like and reblog!

[kifkay]

class swapping winx and the specialists (+ trix)

currently brainrotting about an au where the girls are specialists and the boys are the magical ones.

specialist! Aisha:

the undisputed best fighter and leader

has a plasma weapon that can change forms — from a scimitar to a spear, from a spear to dual swords, etc.

is incredibly popular with the student body but could not be more unbothered by it

has ridden a dragon before (a rite of passage for all specialists), but prefers the company of the monsters of the deep ocean

specialist! Flora:

the pacifist <3

and is super jacked. as a treat. for me.

(just like in the og cartoon) Flora’s signature move is detaining/grappling her enemies, rather than explicitly harming them.

bolas is her weapon of choice:

but I can also see her using escrima sticks or a bo.

Saladin has a soft spot for Flora because she reminds him of Helia. He is also the one to introduce them to each other.

still as patient and kind with everyone as her og version, but more reserved/quiet. Flora is a bit of a mystery to her peers.

specialist! Stella:

the Red Fountain is THE nepo school of all time. all nobles worth their salt send their little trust fund cases there to get them a prestigious rank of a Specialist; no matter if their offsprings are actually suited for the lifestyle of a hero.

Stella’s parents enrolled her in RF in order to rehabilitate her image as an irresponsible party girl/failure of an heir to the Solari throne.

Stella retaliated by not giving a damn about her education — she even had to repeat a year due to her skipping practices.

her behavior began to improve once she was assigned to the Winx and became inspired by their heroism/courage/honor.

but it took the girls almost getting killed saving Stella’s ass on a mission, for her finally to start taking her training seriously.

her weapon of choice: a family relic — a sword.

Stella does become a proficient sword-fighter and a Specialist, being able to fend off a wyrm to save her father’s life (akin the scene where she gets her Enchantix in s3).

although controversy follows the blonde specialist, she earns sincere admiration of fellow Solarians for this act of heroism.

she chooses to pursue dragon-riding beyond the mandated RF course. the dragon that she bonds with is Synfire (wink wink).

specialist! Bloom:

in this AU, she is adopted by Hagen.

he teaches her the art of smithing magical weapons.

Bloom is less of a fighter and more of a tech/engineer. she creates magical artifacts/weapons for the girls, devises strategies and acts as their support.

she is also the healer of the group (or tries to be, this girl is still a clutz disaster)

Bloom is very idealistic, grown on legends foretold by Hagen and whatever remains of the Company of Light.

Bloom is probably equipped with top-notch weapons from head to toe, but always defaults to using whatever is laying around to defend herself. rusty pipes, bats, bricks, etc.

her dragon is a huge, scary and old thing everybody calls Fang. she calls him Kiko <3

specialist! Tecna:

loves to train in the simulation rooms.

actually a very good fighter: Tecna was taught her craft by the most rigorous Zenithian educational programs.

she mostly relies on her speed and agility in fighting.

her weapons of choice: tranquilliser guns and daggers.

devises strict exercise regiments for the rest of the girls.

Tecna stills handles any and all technology, but, unlike Timmy in the og cartoon, cannot stand being side-lined from battle.

a perfectionist.

specialist! Musa:

I see Musa as a ranged fighter, using guns & grenades & arrows.

she’s a wild card. high risk, high reward battle strategies are her bread and butter.

she also pursues dragon-riding. her dragon is nicknamed Pearl, a fast and furious creature.

a menace, honestly.

the boys:

Sky is a fairy of wind currents (since… y’know his name. but also because I like the irony of Sky having the ability to fly but yet feeling trapped and bound to his duties as a crown prince)

Riven is a witch of shadows/negative energy, like Darcy. he’s not evil though.

Brandon is a fairy of constructs. I picture his powers to be like the earth-benders from ATLA.

Timmy is the witch of technology.

Helia is a wizard, like his grandpops.

Nabu retains his powers but is a fairy instead of a warlock.

the Trix are fairies <3 they’re still evil, but in a whole different way: instead of revelling in their villainy, they are convinced of their own self-righteousness and purity of ideals. they try to usurp power of the Great Dragon because they believe they can make for better rulers, forgetting, of course, that would just make them dictators.

[sngl-led-auto-lights]

Do headlights drain the battery while driving?

No, headlights do not drain the battery while driving under normal circumstances. Here’s why:

The Alternator Powers Electrical Systems While Driving

When the engine is running, the alternator generates electricity to: Power all electrical components (headlights, radio, AC, etc.).

Recharge the battery to maintain its charge.

Headlights typically draw 5–10A (60–120W) of power, which a functional alternator can easily supply (most alternators produce 60–150A).

When Headlights Could Drain the Battery

Exceptions occur if there’s a mechanical or electrical failure: Failing Alternator: If the alternator isn’t generating enough power, the battery will compensate until it’s drained.

Symptoms: Dimming lights, battery warning light, or odd electrical behavior.

Parasitic Drain: Faulty wiring or aftermarket accessories (e.g., amplifiers) may overload the system.

Extreme Loads: Running headlights + high-power devices (heated seats, AC, etc.) on an older car with a weak alternator.

How to Check for Issues

Voltage Test: Use a multimeter on the battery:

Engine off: 12.4–12.7V = healthy.

Engine running: 13.5–14.5V = alternator working. Below 13V = failure.

Load Test: Mechanics can simulate electrical loads to test alternator output.

Preventing Battery Drain Turn off lights when the engine is off (modern cars often do this automatically).

Fix alternator/wiring issues promptly.

Avoid retrofitting high-wattage LED/HID bulbs without upgrading the alternator.

Key Takeaway: In a properly functioning car, headlights are powered by the alternator and won’t drain the battery while driving. If your battery dies with the engine running, suspect alternator failure or excessive electrical load. 🔧🔋

[whirligig-girl]

At time of writing, Kerbal Space Program 1 is on sale for $10 on Steam.

If you have wanted to buy KSP and have never gotten around to it, now would be a good time.

Despite the failure and cancellation of KSP2, KSP1 is still a really great game. I bought it for 18 dollars in 2012, and it remains one of my favorite games of all time and perhaps the most cost effective game purchase I've ever made.

KSP1's development is completely finished, but the modding scene is still going strong.

The DLCs are also available for half price. Here's my thoughts on them:

Making History: adds historical-themed rocket parts in new size categories, and a mission editor that allows you to design mission plans and share them for other players to fly. I do not recommend this one, because the rocket parts have been done better by free mods, and because no one ever ended up using the mission editor since those missions are walled off in their own scenarios and can't be integrated into a normal game.

Breaking Ground: adds sparse rocks and other ground scatters to the surface of planets to be explored by rovers. Much more interestingly, adds robotic parts which can totally change the kinds of vehicles and crafts you can build. I do recommend this, because the addition of robotic parts adds so much to the game.

But the real goodies are in unofficial mods. Here's my absolute must-haves:

Restock: The rocket parts in the stock game are a mix of different styles by different amateur artists who have worked on the game over the years, lacking an overall cohesive style. Restock reskins (but otherwise does not modify) all of the stock parts using new models and textures that bring a cohesive visual identity to KSP that it has sorely missed. The models are higher fidelity in most cases, but they have been made efficiently so that the game will actually run and load faster and smoother with Restock than without it. (Github)

Restock Plus adds a few other parts in the same style to round out some missing parts, and if you do not have Making History, it will add its own versions of those parts for free (and with better game balance, in my opinion). (Github)

Scatterer: Replaces the archaic stock atmosphere rendering from 2011 with an accurate simulation of rayleigh scattering, vastly improving the look of planets both in space and on the surface. (Github)

KSP Community Fixes: Bug fixes and quality of life tweaks, especially useful in light of KSP's development being discontinued. (Github)

Some tips (below the cut)

KSP allows you to build rockets almost lego style out of modular parts. The game does include a few tutorials which I do recommend you try (imperfect though they are), but here's a few other helpful tips:

there are two ways to attach parts: node attach (connecting parts via those green and black spheres that appear when you're holding a part) and surface attach (connecting parts where your mouse is). If a part can be surface attached, it will always prioritize that over node attach. So if you're trying to put together a rocket tank and the tank keeps trying to attach to the other tank wrong, you have to change your camera angle so that the nodes can come together without your mouse going over the part. The alternative is to hold the ALT key, which will force the part to attach only to a node.

The C key and the X key control angle snap and symmetry mode. There's also buttons for these on the lower left of the u.i. Symmetry is a must for building rockets.

There's three main types of engines: Liquid Fuel rocket engines, which require separate fuel tank parts burning Liquid Fuel and Oxidizer, Solid Rocket Boosters, which contain their own fuel and can not use fuel tanks or be throttled, and Jet Engines, which burn liquid fuel and atmospheric oxygen from air intakes, at a high efficiency.

There's also the ion engine, which uses electricity for power and xenon gas as a propellant for extremely high efficiency and extremely low thrust, the nuclear thermal rocket, which uses an onboard nuclear reactor to heat up liquid fuel propellant for high efficiency and low thrust, and monopropellant RCS, which are steering thrusters that use monopropellant tanks shared between all stages. There's also a single 'normal' engine that burns monopropellant, the Puff.

At a first approximation the game uses real orbital mechanics. To get to space, you just have to go straight up above 70 kilometers. To stay in space, you must enter orbit, which means your sideways velocity has to be somewhere around 2500 meters per second so as you fall you curve around the planet. The M key brings up the map mode, showing you your trajectory. It'll also show you if your orbit intersects the planet, and you can mouse over Ap (your apoapsis, the farthest distance in your orbit) or Pe (your periapsis, the closest approach in your orbit) to see if they are above 70 kilometers.

At first approximation the game uses real rocket science. The more fuel you add, the more fuel you're wasting to carry that fuel. Staging (detaching tanks and engines when they're no longer needed) using decouplers is a must. Parachutes are also a must if you want to preserve the lives of your Kerbals, but remember. This game is realistic. Parachutes will not work on airless bodies like the Mun, and they may not be enough on their own on martian planets like Duna which have only thin atmospheres.

Career mode is kinda... not very well made? I would start with Science Mode. The tech tree will kind of ease you into building with limited parts. But you can always jump right into sandbox mode.

Rocket parts come in a few diameters sizes: 0.625m, 1.25m, 1.875m, 2.5m, 3.75m, and 5m. In addition, there are 1.25m (mk1), diamond-shaped 1.25x2.5 (mk2), and roughly 3.75m (mk3) spaceplane parts. The aerodynamics and structure works out best when same diameter parts are connected together. There are adapter parts to facilitate this, as well as fairings (procedurally shaped aerodynamic casings) and engine plates if you need to get around this.

Turn on Advanced Tweakables in the settings. This will allow you to right click on parts and select "rigid attachment", and to use "autostrut", both of which are necessary for making rockets behave. (you could try and use strut parts, but that can bloat your part count and often times it isnt clear how to even attach a strut in the direction you need) This is one of my least favorite parts of KSP, as this is pretty tedious for a large rocket, but it's necessary to keep it from flopping around. For some reason KSP's developers thought that floppy rockets (even when they should be perfectly rigid), would be more fun. The idea comes from the early days of the game, when the conventional wisdom was "if it moves and it shouldn't, add struts; if it doesn't move and it should, add more boosters." The game has gotten a lot more complicated now, and that design philosophy should have been left in 2012. There's also a mod, Kerbal Joint Reinforcement, that will provide this functionality without needing autostrut and rigid attachment per part.

On efficient launches, you're going to end up looking like you're burning up. This is a limitation of the 1/10th scale planets in KSP, and how that plays with the 7/8ths scale atmospheres. During a real launch as well as an efficient KSP launch, you'll end up travelling at 1500-2000 m/s in the upper atmosphere, but in the real world that's only a fraction of orbital velocity. In KSP, that is near orbital velocity, and so the game is balanced to assume you're in reentry conditions. If you have fairings to protect sensitive parts of your ship, you should be fine.

KSP's small scale makes Apollo's Lunar Orbit Rendezvous approach inefficient for the Mun and Minmus. It's actually cheaper to just directly land on the surface. This can be fixed by installing a rescale mod such as Sigma Dimensions, and setting it to 2.5 rescale and resize, and 1.6 rotation period scale. This makes delta-v 1.6 times larger than stock KSP, resulting in more realistic proportioned rockets. The game honestly isn't any harder in this state, it just needs somewhat bigger rockets. All that aside, the "Apollo style" orbital rendezvous approach works great for all other planets, since interplanetary transfer requires more fuel as do most planetary landings. This approach has two spacecrafts launch either together or separately that travel to the destination planet docked together. The lander then separates, lands, and eventually launches again, but only back into orbit, where the orbiter picks up the crew and they launch back home.

The KSP solar system is not a 1:1 copy of our system. Moho is a lot like Mercury, Eve is like Venus but purple and much more massive, Kerbin is like Earth, Mun is like the Moon but about three times closer, Minmus is a small moon orbiting far from Kerbin, Duna is like Mars, but instead of small asteroid moons, it has an almost planet sized moon which is almost a binary companion. Jool is a gas giant that orbits where Jupiter should, but it's undersized, and orbited by three huge planet sized moons, including the ocean world Laythe, the ice planet Vall, and the airless Kerbin-mass rocky planet Tylo. In addition, two small minor moons. There's also a big Ceres analogue called Dres and Eeloo, a cracked, icy world in a 2:3 resonance with Jool, just how Pluto is in a 2:3 resonance with Neptune. There are mods that add more planets to the stock system, as well as mods that replace the stock system entirely. There's even Real Solar System (which is designed to be played with Realism Overhaul, a modpack that's almost a different game entirely)

[thatsrightice]

HOW TO BECOME A FIGHTER PILOT

So as you may or may not know, I am writing a fanfic. Unfortunately for me, I can never do things half way, and because aviation is my passion I must do hours of research on a particular subject that I probably won't even use or reference in said fanfic. Here is a guide for how our favorite characters (probably) became fighter pilots. If there are inaccuracies let me know, I want to know :)

United States Naval Academy

The USNA is an undergraduate college that is a combination of academics and military development programs. Students who want to go into Flight School could qualify with one of a variety of different majors, but there are particular majors that obviously may provide a bit of an advantage to aspiring pilots. The USNA currently offers a variety of different majors and minors, though there are fewer than you might expect from a typical university, and overall the degrees are more tailored towards the Navy. They encourage participation in athletics in the form of a Varsity or club/intramural sport(1). 

NOTE: Maverick likely attended a regular college and was a part of the Naval ROTC program at that school. He would have gotten his degree in a field relevant to aviation, likely Mechanical Engineering given his mechanical aptitude seen in Top Gun Maverick, and then attended the 13-week program called Officer Candidate School. To be honest, Maverick’s path within the Navy is a mess and impossible to follow but in the most straightforward scenario, he would go to flight school following Officer Candidate School.

Flight School 

Flight School is an approximately 2-year-long program that is required for Naval Aviators to earn their wings. Primarily located at the “Cradle of Naval Aviation” aka Pensacola, FL, flight school consists of many different phases that will divide students into different specializations. 

1. Naval Introductory Flight Evaluation (NIFE)

Divided into four phases, NIFE is a program that evaluates students’ aeronautical aptitude as well as screens them to ensure they’re capable of becoming aviators. Students may earn a “pink sheet” for any score below 80% or a failure of a task, requiring them to stand before a panel of instructors to explain why they failed and how they plan to improve. Too many pink sheets result in removal from the program(2).

1a. Water Survival Training Following medical clearance, students are taught and tested on their ability to swim while wearing flight gear as well as formerly instructed on various survival techniques and CPR(2).

1b. Academics  A 3-week phase where students take classes and exams in five subjects. It is condensed to test a student’s ability to retain information, learn new information in a high-stress environment, and challenge their self-discipline in regard to time management and other areas(2).

1c. Introductory Flight Screening (IFS) Students are entered into a 2-week-long modified civilian flight training program where one week is dedicated to ground school courses before they must conduct a series of flights in a Cessna using Navy flight procedures during the second week. Students had to memorize and prioritize information to complete the flights, specifically in regard to conducting pre-flight briefings and emergency procedures. Overall, they’ll conduct seven flights in which they are required to complete a set of standardized maneuvers(2). 

1d. Aviation Physiology A week-long training course that consists of emergency-specific training evolutions such as the hypoxia chamber, emergency first aid, and the “helo dunker.” The “helo dunker” (from what I understand) is a particular training device that consists of strapping a pilot into a cockpit-like or helicopter contraption within a pool and submerging the entire structure under the water, simulating an environment in which their aircraft has landed in the water and they need to escape from the seat(3). An image of this can be seen below(2).

The Top Gun cast had to undergo a similar training course in order to be allowed to fly in military airplanes for filming. A video of some of their training can be viewed below.

2b. Aviation Pre-Flight Indoctrination

A 6-week long program that marks the beginning of the aviation pipeline. Located in Pensacola, FL, students attend classes covering the basics of aerodynamics, weather in relation to aviation, air navigation, flight rules and regulations, and aircraft engines and systems (3). 

Prior to API, those interested in becoming Radar Intercept Officers (RIO) will have expressed their interest and requested a designation as a Naval Flight Officer (NFO). 

2c. Primary Flight Training

A 6-month-long program that teaches the students the basics of flying. There are two locations for Primary, one at Training Air Wing 5 at Naval Air Station Whiting Field in Pensacola, FL, or Training Air Wing 4 at Naval Air Station Corpus Christi in Corpus Christi, TX. Both Naval Air Stations (NAS) are taught the same curriculum and fly the same aircraft, the T-6 Texan II. The students learn about the instruments, flight basics, radio instrument navigation, formation flying, and aerobatics, and also conduct several solo flights. At the end of Primary, students choose which pipeline they would like. This is conducted depending on the needs of the Navy and how many spots are available(3). 

Obviously, Iceman, Slider, Goose, Cougar, and everyone else got Jets, though they may not have gone through flight school at the same time. 

2d. Intermediate Flight Training

Intermediate Flight Training is a 27-week program. Split into five platforms; Jet, E2/C2, Helicopter, Maritime, and E-6 TACAMO. The jet platform flight training focuses more on navigation, air traffic control, individual skills, and cooperative skills of flying jets. The intermediate flight training program for jets is located at Meridian, MS (Training Air Wing One) at either VT-7 or VT-9, and Kingsville, TX (Training Air Wing Two) at either VT-21 or VT-22, both of which teach the same curriculum. Students in the jet platform will complete 58 graded flights in the T-45C Goshawk jet trainer aircraft(3). 

2e. Advanced Flight Training

Similar to Intermediate Flight Training, the program is split into five platforms but lasts 23 weeks. The students will probably have stayed with the same training squadron throughout the intermediate and advanced flight training. This stage includes learning skills specific to the chosen platform. The Advanced Flight Training program for jets is what’s called the Strike Syllabus. The Strike Syllabus includes an additional 67 graded flights in the T-45 covering air combat maneuvers, low-level navigation, tactical formation flying, and aircraft carrier qualifications. Students will then graduate from Advanced Flight Training with the Wings of Gold(3). 

3. Squadron Selection 

The final selection process assigns naval aviators to a particular squadron based on the needs of the service. Naval Aviators are assigned to a fleet replacement squadron or other similar training assignments for further training on their specific aircraft type. Here, RIOs and pilots must become qualified by gaining the required flight hours and meeting the proficiency standards necessary.

NOTE: It’s kind of hard to figure out when exactly the RIO training occurs. I know it takes place over the course of all the primary through advanced training occurs as well but I’m not sure if they have to attend seperate courses for it. 

TOPGUN

From there, pilots and RIOs may have been moved to their first official squadron for deployment. They would have been in their first squadron for approximately one and a half years, deploying with them. Their squadron would come back from a deployment and during the stand-down time before their next deployment, their commanding officer would select them to go to TOPGUN.

Sources

(1) https://www.usna.edu/homepage.php

(2) https://www.navy.mil/Press-Office/News-Stories/Article/2944668/nife-lays-foundation-for-naval-aviation-training/

(3) https://www.cnatra.navy.mil/tw4/flight-school.asp

[witchycatwife]

Compute shaders are pretty nice, there is no borrow checker to yell at you about unsafe memory access patterns or anything :^) And with the right stack of preprocessor libraries and custom modifications to the game engine plugins you're using you can even get the shader compilation errors to become build-time errors instead of runtime failures :^)

(pictured: a combined erosion+climate simulation (based on this paper with a bunch of custom improvements, plus an entirely custom simplified wind model for rain) where the orography affects precipitation patterns and precipitation affects orography via erosion, simulating an alien planet with a different tectonic regime and an extremely long day-night cycle)

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Brinklump Linkdump

Catch me in Miami! I'll be at Books and Books in Coral Gables on Jan 22 at 8PM.

Life comes at you fast, links come at you faster. Once again, I've arrived at Saturday with a giant backlog of links I didn't fit in this week, so it's time for a linkdump, the 14th in the series:

https://pluralistic.net/tag/linkdump/

It's the Year of Our Gourd twenty and twenty-four and holy shit, is rampant corporate power rampant. On January 1, the inbred droolers of Big Pharma shat out their annual price increases, as cataloged in 46Brooklyn's latest Brand Drug List Price Change Box Score:

https://www.46brooklyn.com/branddrug-boxscore

Here's the deal: drugs that have already been developed, brought to market, and paid off are now getting more expensive. Why? Because the pharma companies have "pricing power," the most reliable indicator of monopoly. Ed Cara rounds up the highlights for Gizmodo:

https://gizmodo.com/ozempic-wegovy-wellbutrin-oxycontin-drug-price-increase-1851179427

What's going up? Well, Ozempic and other GLP-1 agonists. These drugs have made untold billions for their manufacturers, so naturally, they're raising the price. That's how markets work, right? When firms increase the volume of a product, the price goes up? Right? Other drugs that are going up include Wellbutrin (an antidepressant that's also widely used in smoking cessation) and the blood thinner Plavix. I mean, why the hell not? These companies get billions in research subsidies, invaluable government patent privileges, and near-total freedom to abuse the patent system with evergreening:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/23/everorangeing/#taste-the-rainbow

The most amazing things about monopolies is how the contempt just oozes out of them. It's like these guys can't even pretend to give a shit. You want guillotines? Because that's how you get guillotines.

Take Apple. They just got their asses handed to them in court by Epic, who successfully argued that Apple's rule requiring everyone who sells through the App Store to use Apple's payment processor and pay Apple 30% out of every dollar they bring in was an antitrust violation. Epic won, then won the appeal, then SCOTUS told Apple they wouldn't hear the case, so that's that.

Right? Wrong. Apple's pulled a malicious compliance stunt that could shame the surly drunks my great-aunt Lisa used to boss in the Soviet electrical engineering firm she ran. Apple has announced that app companies that process transactions using their own payment processors on the web must still pay Apple a 27% fee for every dollar their process:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apples-app-store-rule-changes-draw-sharp-rebuke-from-critics-150047160.html

In addition, Apple will throw a terrifying FUD-screen up every time a user clicks a payment link that goes to the web:

https://www.jwz.org/blog/2024/01/second-verse-same-as-the-first/

This is obviously not what the court had in mind, and there's no way this will survive the next court challenge. It's just Apple making sure that everyone knows it hates us all and wants us to die. Thanks, Tim Apple, and right back atcha.

Not to be outdone in the monopolistic mustache-twirling department, Ubisoft just announced that it is going to shut down its driving simulator game The Crew, which it sold to users with a "perpetual license":

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

This is some real Darth Vader MBA shit. "Yeah, we sold you a 'perpetual license' to this game, but we're terminating it. I have altered the deal. Pray I don't alter it further":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/26/hit-with-a-brick/#graceful-failure

Ubisoft sure are innovators. They've managed the seemingly impossible feat of hybridizing Darth Vader and Immortan Joe. Ubisoft's head of subscriptions, the guillotine-ready Philippe Tremblay, told GamesIndustry.biz that gamers need to get "comfortable" with "not owning their games":

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/the-new-ubisoft-and-getting-gamers-comfortable-with-not-owning-their-games

Or, as Immortan Joe put it: "Do not, my friends, become addicted to water. It will take hold of you, and you will resent its absence!"

Capitalism without constraint is enshittification's handmaiden, and the latest victim is Ello, the "indie" social media startup that literally promised – on the sacred honor of its founders – that it would never sell out its users. When Ello took VC and Andy Baio questioned how this could be squared with this promise, the founders mocked him and others for raising the question. Their response boiled down to "we are super-chill dudes and you can totally trust us."

They raised more capital, and used that to create a nice place for independent artists, who piled into the platform and provided millions of unpaid hours of creative labor to help the founders increase its value. The founders and their investors turned the company into a Public Benefit Corporation, which meant they had an obligation to serve the public benefit.

But then they took more investment money and simply (and silently) sold their assets to a for-profit. Struggling to raise capital, the founders opted to secretly sell the business to a sleazy branding company called Talenthouse. Its users didn't know about the change, though the site sure had a lot of Talenthouse design competitions all of a sudden.

Finally, the company announced the change as the last founders left. Rather than announcing that the new owners were untrustworthy scum, warning their users to get their data and get out, the founders posted oblique, ominous statements to Instagram. The company started stiffing the winners of those design competitions. Then, one day, poof, Ello disappeared, taking all its users' data with it. Poof:

https://waxy.org/2024/01/the-quiet-death-of-ellos-big-dreams/

I'm sure the founders' decisions each seemed reasonable at the moment. That's every terrible situation arises: you rationalize that a single compromise isn't that big of a deal, and then you do the same for the next compromise, and the next, and the next. Pretty soon, you're betraying everyone who believed in you.

One answer to this is "Ulysses pacts": making binding commitments to do right before you are tempted. Throw away all your Oreos when you go on a diet and you can't be tempted to eat a whole sleeve of them at 2AM. License your software under the GPL and your investors can't force you to make it proprietary. Set up a warrant canary and the feds can't force you to keep their spying secret:

https://locusmag.com/2021/01/cory-doctorow-neofeudalism-and-the-digital-manor/

If the founders were determined to build a trustworthy, open, independent company, they could have published their quarterly books, livestreamed their staff meetings, built data-export tools that emailed users every week with a link to download everything they'd posted since the last week. Merely halting any of these practices would have been a signal that things were wrong. Anyone who says they won't be tempted in the moment to make a "reasonable" compromise in the hopes of recovering whatever they're trading away by living to fight another day is bullshitting you, and possibly themself.

The inability to project the consequences of your bad decisions in the future is the source of endless mischief and heartbreak. Take movie projectors. A couple decades ago, the studio cartel established a standard for digital movie distribution to cinematic exhibitors called the Digital Cinema Initiative. Because studio executives are more worried about stopping piracy than they are about making sure that people who pay for movies get to see them, they build digital rights management into this standard.

Movie theaters had to spend fortunes to upgrade to "secure" projectors. A single vendor, Deluxe Technicolor, monopolized the packaging of movies into "Digital Cinema Prints" for distribution to these projectors, and they used all kinds of dirty tricks to force distributors to use their services, like arbitrarily flunking third-party DCPs over picky shit like not starting and ending on a black frame.

Over time, the ability to use unencrypted files was stripped away, meaning every DCP needed to be encrypted, and every projector needed to have up-to-date decryption keys. This system broke down on Jan 1, 2024, and cinemas all over the world found they couldn't play Wonka. Many just shut down for the day and refunded their customers:

https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/1/24021915/alamo-drafthouse-outage-sony-projector

The problem? Something that every PKI system has to wrangle: an expired certificate from Deluxe Technicolor. The failure has been dubbed the Y2K24 debacle by projectionists and film-techs, who are furious:

http://www.film-tech.com/vbb/forum/main-forum/34652-the-y2k24-bug-major-digital-outage-today

Making everything worse is that Sony mothballed the division that maintains its projectors, so there's no one who can update them to accommodate Technicolor's workaround. Struggling mom-and-pop theaters are having to junk their systems and replace them. There's plenty of blame to go around, but Sony is definitely the most negligent link in the chain. Shame on them.

Big corporations LARP this performance of competence and seriousness, but they are deeply unserious. This week, I wrote, "we're nowhere near a place where bots can steal your job, we're certainly at the point where your boss can be suckered into firing you and replacing you with a bot that fails at doing your job":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/15/passive-income-brainworms/#four-hour-work-week

Score one for team deeply unserious. The multinational delivery company DPD fired its support staff and replaced them with a chatbot. The chatbot can't tell you where your parcels are, but it can be prompt-injected into coming up with profane poems about how badly DPD sucks:

https://twitter.com/ashbeauchamp/status/1748034519104450874

There once was a chatbot named DPD, Who was useless at providing help. It could not track parcels, Or give information on delivery dates, And it could not even tell you when your driver would arrive.

DPD was a waste of time, And a customer's worst nightmare. It was so bad, That people would rather call the depot directly, Than deal with the useless chatbot.

One day, DPD was finally shut down, And everyone rejoiced. Finally, they could get the help they needed, From a real person who knew what they were doing.

This is…the opposite of an AI hallucination? It's AI clarity.

As with all botshit, this kind of AI self-negging is funny and fresh the first time you see it, but just wait until 3,000 people have published their own versions to your social feed. AI novelty regresses to the mean damn quickly.

The old, good web, by contrast, was full of enduring surprises, as the world's weirdest and most delightful mutants filled the early web with every possible variation on every possible interest, expression, argument, and gag. Now, you can search the old, good web with Old'aVista, an Altavista lookalike that searches old pages from "personal websites that used to be hosted on services like Geocities, Angelfire, AOL, Xoom and so on," all ganked from the Internet Archive:

http://oldavista.com/

I miss the old, good internet and the way it let weirdos find each other and get seriously weird with one another. Think of steampunk, a subculture that wove together artists, makers, costumers, fiction writers, and tinkerers in endlessly creative ways. My old pal Roger Wood was the world's most improbable steampunk: he was a gay ex-navy gunner who grew up in a small town in the maritimes but moved to Toronto where he became the world's most accomplished steampunk clockmaker.

I was Roger's neighbour for a decade. He died last year, and I miss him all the time. I was in Toronto in December and saw a few of his last pieces being sold in galleries and I was just skewered on the knowledge that I'd never see him again, never visit his workshop:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/16/klockwerks/#craphound

A reader just sent this five-year-old mini documentary about Roger, shot in his wonderful workshop. Watching it made me happy and sad and then happy again:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqMGomM8yF8

The old, good internet was so great. It was a place where every kind of passion could live. It was a real testament to the power of geeking out together, no matter how often the suits demand that we "stop talking to each other and start buying things":

https://catvalente.substack.com/p/stop-talking-to-each-other-and-start

The world is full of people with weird passions and I love them all, mostly. Learning about Don Bolles's collection of decades' worth of lost pet posters was a moment of pure joy (I just wish more of it was online):

https://ameliatait.substack.com/p/the-man-who-collects-lost-pet-posters

That's the future I was promised: one where every kind of freak can find every other kind of freak. Despite the nipple-deep botshit we wade through online, and the relentless cheapening of words like "innovation" and "future," there are still occasional gleams of the future I want to live in.

Like the researchers who spliced a photosynthesis gene into brewer's yeast (a fungus) and got it to photosynthesize, and to display enhanced fitness:

https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(23)01744-X

As Doug Muir writes on Crooked Timber, this is pretty kooky! Fungi – the coolest of the kingdoms! – can't photosynthesize. The idea that you can just add the photosynthesis gene to a thing that can't photosynthesize and have it just kind of work is wild!

https://crookedtimber.org/2024/01/19/occasional-paper-purple-sun-yeast/

As Muir writes: "Animals have no evolutionary history of photosynthesis and aren’t designed for it, but the same is true for yeast. So… no reason this shouldn’t be possible. A photosynthesizing cat? Sure, why not."

Why not indeed?!

OK, that's this week's linkdump done and dusted. It only remains for me to share the news with you that the trolley problem has been finally and comprehensively solved, by Sidereal@kolektiva.social, of the IWW IU 520 (railroad workers):

Slip the switch by flipping it while the trolley's front wheels have passed through, but before the back wheels do. This will cause a controlled derailment bringing the trolley to a safe halt.

https://kolektiva.social/@sidereal/111779015415697244

I'm Kickstarting the audiobook for The Bezzle, the sequel to Red Team Blues, narrated by @wilwheaton! You can pre-order the audiobook and ebook, DRM free, as well as the hardcover, signed or unsigned. There's also bundles with Red Team Blues in ebook, audio or paperback.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/20/melange/#i-have-heard-the-mermaids-singing

[holly-fixation]

I enjoy your For Want of a Nail AU style. I have another one for you. What if while Lucretia was pregnant she developed Sephiroth’s future traits as the J cells took over her body? Hair turning sliver, her body becoming more durable, increased strength and increased casting ability, maybe the pupils ( I bet that would give her headaches), etc.

I feel like my AUs are kind of the opposite of a butterfly effect. Or if your domino's are in a circle.

Trigger Warning: allusions to suicide

At first she doesn't notice. She's under so much stress with the pregancy especially after Vincent's disappearance to notice.

With the visions of the future debilitating her regardless of her strength, she doesn't notice that either.

However, when her eyesight sharpens to perfection overnight, it felt like the one joy of this project that wasn't growing inside her.

The headaches begin in the dark.

The human brain does not actually know what to do when you move your eyes. So it literally shows both was being looked and and what is being looked at in the transition period. She vaguely remembered overhearing the issue from the engineers working on the latest VR simulator.

So when she dared turn her eyes instead of her head through the darkness of precise vision, her head spun and she found herself with her eyes closed and her head on her knees.

And the hearing. She swore she could hear the entire village, but she couldn't pick out a word.

Then came the day of Sephiroth's birth.

Her inhanced strength did nothing to protect her baby. After all, despite her lack of notice, Hojo knew every detail of her body and pregnancy.

Hojo prepared for a threat that would one day be considered a SOLDIER level threat.

Lucrecia fought with everything she had. The manor and all samples saved there were destroyed in her attempt to reach her son. An attempt that ended in failure when Hojo and and her baby took to the sky in a Shinra manned helicopter.

She tried to get him back legally.

She tried to take him back physically.

But she failed.

Her depression worsened

Her anxiety screamed

Her body wouldn't let her die.

She wandered the surface of the planet without sustenance yet continued to walk.

Years passed before Shinra's Golden Child went public. She didn't know. She didn't keep up with anything Shinra.

Until someone showed her a poster and immediately compared their traits.

If she couldn't rescue him through legal means, maybe she could force Hojo's hand through Shinra's public image

"Shinra's Golden Child Taken From His Mother At Birth"

Newspapers, magazines, interviews, talk shows, and finally news stations.

Shinra demanded Sephiroth approach the woman on stage and tell her off.

They also wanted him to disgrace her, saying she abused him until Shinra rescued him.

But when Lucrecia finally saw her son, she held her hands out to him

She didn't look like the locket he was given, but it was undeniably her.

Before Sephiroth was Jenova.

Sephiroth ran into her eyes and turned away from the cameras when tears threatened his eyes.

Sephiroth left Shinra that day.

He and his mother lived in Wutai for a year, defeating Shinra and remaining content.

Then came the helicopters and planes dropping papers.

"Mu epsilon gamma lambda- 7, 7, 1977: JENOVA verified as an Ancient."

Sephiroth knew that name. When he questioned his real mother, she didn't give him an answer.

He read every delivery desperately.

Lucrecia slipped up and mentioned "that manor is in ruins. No one goes to Nieblhiem."

They went to Nibelhiem and Sephiroth learned something.

JENOVA can appear as those you fear, those you hate, those you love.

He looked at his mother and back at the image in the book.

Which JENOVA was the real one?

[materialsscienceandengineering]

A team of Lehigh University researchers has successfully predicted abnormal grain growth in simulated polycrystalline materials for the first time -- a development that could lead to the creation of stronger, more reliable materials for high-stress environments, such as combustion engines. A paper describing their novel machine learning method was recently published in Nature Computational Materials. "Using simulations, we were not only able to predict abnormal grain growth, but we were able to predict it far in advance of when that growth happens," says Brian Y. Chen, an associate professor of computer science and engineering in Lehigh's P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science and a co-author of the study. "In 86 percent of the cases we observed, we were able to predict within the first 20 percent of the lifetime of that material whether a particular grain will become abnormal or not."

Read more.

[boxboxblog]

How Do F1 Cars Work?: Power, Transmit, Suspend

Alright part 2 everyone. Let's go.

1.Power Units

You have probably heard lots of yammering about power unit components before. Things like 'they took on too many and now have a grid penalty' are common to hear. But what is the power unit, and what does that mean?

So the power unit refers to the engine system that helps power the car. The modern F1 car is a hybrid, a mix between a typical Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) and Energy Recover Systems (ERS). The modern F1 ICE is a 1.6 liter V6 turbocharged engine and can rev up to 15,000 RPM. It uses gasoline and generates a majority of the power. I've explained how it works in an older post, but briefly it compresses air and fuel and ignites it to create combustion which generates energy. The turbocharger is a part of the ICE that helps condense air more, in turn forcing the engine to create more energy.

The ERS has two components. The first is Motor Generator Unit-Kinetic (MGU-K), which recovers energy from braking, stores it in the battery (which stores energy from the two units), and can be used as a boost to power. The second is Motor Generator Unit- Heat (MGU-H). This unit recovers heat energy from the turbocharger and converts it to electrical energy. It can either charge the battery directly or assist the ICE.

When teams get in trouble taking too many power units it essentially means they have replaced something like the MGU-H too many times. There is a cap for how many times you can replace a power unit component, but with the addition of more races every year the FIA is under pressure to increase this limit. Almost every single car takes the penalty at some point.

2. Transmission

The transmission is the semi-automatic gear box inside of F1 cars, which for them is 8-speed. It is located at the rear of the car and connects to the power unit. This is a part of the car that is famous for having issues, and often when a drivers car retires it is due to a gear box failure. With paddle shifters located under the steering wheel, drivers can change the gear in which they are driving. Different gears effect the traction, grip, fuel economy, and speed of the car and are used strategically throughout the race. Part of the transmission is the differential. The differential distributes power between the rear wheels when cornering, allowing the inside tire to rotate slower than the outside tire. The final majorly important part of the transmission is the clutch. In F1 the clutch, which is a device that connects the engine and transmission to the car is automated and controlled by electronics. It is usually used when starting the race or leaving the pit lane.

Grip levels, cornering speeds, and straight-line speeds all play a crucial role in gear ratio calculations. The teams have to find the perfect balance between acceleration, top speed, and adaptability. The team’s engineers use advanced simulations and data analysis to calculate the optimal ratios for each gear. They also take into account factors like tire wear and fuel consumption to fine-tune their calculations. All of this information can be gathered from electronic data gatherers inside of the car, running simulations, and also the drivers reporting themselves. Its why radio communication is so important in F1. This decision can make or break a race, and we have seen drivers lose due to an incorrect gear decision.

3. Suspension

The suspension system works to keep the tires in contact with the road and helps absorb the shocks F1 cars experience. This is created through a variety of springs, shock absorbers, sway bars, etc. Without the suspension, the chassis would be experiencing the full extent of the shaking and pressure, which would do damage to the car and be very painful for the driver. Anytime you see a driver shaking like crazy in the car, it usually means there is something off with the suspension. Suspension also allows the force of the bumps and the kinetic energy to be stored by a spring, which is then compressed, absorbing the energy transferred by that bump in the road and allowing all four tires to grip the road. The biggest difference between street car suspension and F1 suspension is that in an F1 car each tire is independently sprung, which means that they move on their own, useful around corners.

In F1 cars they have a pushrod or pullrod suspension. These systems transfer pressure from the wheels to the suspension dampers and springs. In a push-rod system, the rocker arms are placed at the highest point in the car. As such, the rod is under pressure as it transfers compression forces upwards into the rocker arms. In a pull-rod system however, the rocker arms are located between the upper and lower control arms, at the center of the car This means every time it hits a bump or curb, the wheel pulls on the spring which causes the pull-rod to go up and outwards from the chassis. Both are regularly used suspension types.

Teams regularly change how their suspension is functioning, and it is by far one of the most tweaked systems on the car. Truly, a weak suspension can make any car one of the slowest cars on the grid. So next time you hear a. driver complain about how slow they are on the straights, or how much their back hurts, it usually means their suspension is not where it should be.

That's all for this post, next one should be about braking, the various electronics/sensors, cooling systems, and wrap up of how everything works together.

Cheers,

-B

[secretofpandora]

🔥 file #wth-089: Scorch

📋 basic information

callsign: scorch status: active affiliation: pandora division: wrath faceclaim: simu liu date of birth: [redacted] age: 30 place of origin: san francisco, california sex / gender: male (he/him) mutation type: pyrokinesis recruitment date: 2 years ago sexual orientation: [redacted] alignment profile: chaotic good [redacted]

💪 physical information

height: 6'0" (183 cm) build: athletic, resilient, optimized for endurance and high-output physical engagement. well-conditioned frame emphasizing core stability, shoulder strength, and tactical endurance, with physical definition sharpened by field service. complexion: tan with warm undertones, showing moderate environmental wear, faint sun exposure lines, and minor burn scarring across arms and upper torso. hair: black, short, practical for field deployment; occasionally shows slight weathering at the edges from field conditions. facial hair: maintains short, practical stubble; occasionally shaves clean for formal operations. body hair: minimal, maintained for operational hygiene. distinguishing features: fine scarring along wrists and hands indicative of early post-mutation ignition accidents. posture exudes readiness tempered by field-seasoned discipline. tattoos: none.

🧐 psychological profile

psych eval tags: compassionate, resilient reprimands: [redacted] — see file: behavioral note w-089 (“insecure & naive conduct”)

scorch is an atypical asset in wrath: emotionally transparent, idealistic, and highly reactive under stress. while mutation enhanced his capacity for devastation, his primary instinct remains preservation—of others, not himself.

subject entered training as a baseline human and completed two years of conditioning prior to mutation. initial simulations revealed a tendency toward impulsive overcommitment, often in defense of others or due to perceived failure.

post-mutation pyrokinesis is deeply tied to emotional state. fluctuations in confidence, fear, or guilt directly influence fire intensity and control. despite this instability, subject has shown significant loyalty and cohesion within his squad.

scorch exhibits subconscious insecurity regarding his place in the agency, often masking uncertainty with reckless optimism. ongoing mentorship is strongly recommended. subject responds well to affirmation and structured guidance.

🔬 ability overview

primary mutation: pyrokinesis

secondary traits: �� tactical demolitions • squad-level flame shielding (short duration) • rapid ignition under duress

limitations: • emotional surges affect flame control • risk of oxygen depletion in confined spaces • severe dehydration and fatigue post-burnout

🧠 tactical profile

division expertise • athletics • close combat mastery

selected expertise • pain tolerance

proficiencies • battlefield endurance • perception • environmental adaptation • insight • biochemistry & medicine

deficiencies • stealth & infiltration • cryptograms & codebreaking

🛠️ equipment & suit design

scorch’s suit is engineered for thermal extremes, close-quarters movement, and accidental ignition suppression.

construction: deep burgundy fire-resistant composite weave, reinforced with lightweight, heat-dispersing armor plating. color palette: ultra-dark oxblood with ember-thread seams that glow subtly under thermal surge.

key features: • integrated heat-regulation gloves • micro-cooling mesh underarmor • belt-mounted oxygen rebreather unit • discreet flame-channeling nodes embedded in gauntlets for control and dispersal

the suit reflects scorch’s core identity: a weaponized inferno bound in restraint.

📂 field notes — background profile

subject is the product of an extramarital affair, raised solely by his mother. fractured home dynamics instilled a persistent need for belonging and a strong internal drive to protect others.

prior to recruitment, subject was a licensed paramedic, specializing in emergency trauma and high-risk disaster response. field records show exceptional composure, deep compassion, and instinctive prioritization of others’ safety—even at personal risk.

pandora identified subject during civilian resilience profiling and initiated training. mutation surfaced post-induction during a high-stress simulation, triggering uncontrolled combustion and resulting in immediate wrath assignment.

scorch is currently in provisional field deployment. emotional volatility remains a concern, and enhanced psychological monitoring protocols are in place.

🔐 [classified: level 7 clearance required]

unofficial agent notes — subject: scorch medical documentation confirms subject’s enhanced stamina and metabolic conditioning.

measurements: 7.75 inches, uncut, with proportional girth aligned to physical build. behavioral profile: tactile and responsive, favoring mutual connection and sensory-based intimacy. prefers shared control over domination.

tendencies: • favors body-to-body contact • sensitive to touch and heat • enjoys slow, progressive stimulation • open to light restraint when trust is established • does not require emotional attachment for intimacy, but thrives with mutual comfort

aftercare: consistent and intentional — prioritizes emotional grounding, physical reassurance, and partner well-being without compromising mission readiness.

file status: open last updated: [redacted]

[altaqwaelectric]

From Design to Deployment: How Switchgear Systems Are Built

In the modern world of electrical engineering, switchgear systems play a critical role in ensuring the safe distribution and control of electrical power. From substations and factories to commercial buildings and critical infrastructure, switchgear is the silent guardian that protects equipment, ensures safety, and minimizes power failures.

But have you ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes, from the idea to the actual installation? Let’s dive into the full journey — from design to deployment — of how a switchgear system is built.

Step 1: Requirement Analysis and Load Study

Every switchgear project begins with requirement analysis. This includes:

Understanding the electrical load requirements

Calculating voltage levels, short-circuit ratings, and operating current

Identifying environmental conditions: indoor, outdoor, temperature, humidity

Reviewing applicable industry standards like IEC, ANSI, or DEWA regulations (especially in UAE)

This stage helps engineers determine whether the project needs low voltage (LV), medium voltage (MV), or high voltage (HV) switchgear.

Step 2: Conceptual Design & Engineering

Once the requirements are clear, the conceptual design begins.

Selection of switchgear type (air insulated, gas insulated, metal-enclosed, metal-clad, etc.)

Deciding on protection devices: MCCBs, ACBs, relays, CTs, VTs, and fuses

Creating single-line diagrams (SLDs) and layout drawings

Choosing the busbar material (copper or aluminum), insulation type, and earthing arrangements

Software like AutoCAD, EPLAN, and ETAP are commonly used for precise engineering drawings and simulations.

Step 3: Manufacturing & Fabrication

This is where the physical structure comes to life.

Sheet metal is cut, punched, and bent to form the panel enclosures

Powder coating or galvanizing is done for corrosion protection

Assembly of circuit breakers, contactors, protection relays, meters, etc.

Internal wiring is installed according to the schematic

Every switchgear panel is built with precision and must undergo quality control checks at each stage.

Step 4: Factory Testing (FAT)

Before deployment, every switchgear unit undergoes Factory Acceptance Testing (FAT) to ensure it meets technical and safety standards.

Typical FAT includes:

High-voltage insulation testing

Continuity and phase sequence testing

Functionality check of all protection relays and interlocks

Mechanical operations of breakers and switches

Thermal imaging to detect hotspots

Only after passing FAT, the switchgear is cleared for shipping.

Step 5: Transportation & Site Installation

Transportation must be handled with care to avoid damage to components. At the site:

Panels are unloaded and moved to their final location

Cabling and bus duct connections are established

Earthing systems are connected

Environmental sealing is done if installed outdoors or in dusty environments

Step 6: Commissioning & Site Acceptance Testing (SAT)

This final stage ensures the switchgear is ready for live operation.

Final checks and Site Acceptance Tests (SAT) are performed

System integration is tested with other components like transformers, UPS, and generators

Load tests and trial runs are conducted

Commissioning report is generated, and documentation is handed over to the client

Conclusion

From idea to execution, the journey of building a switchgear system is highly technical, safety-driven, and precision-based. Whether you’re in power generation, industrial automation, or commercial construction, understanding this process ensures you choose the right system for your needs.

[aspenmissing]

ᴘᴜʀᴘʟᴇ ᴘᴀʟᴀᴅɪɴ ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʟɪꜱᴛ || ꜱᴇᴀꜱᴏɴ 1 || ɴᴇxᴛ ᴘᴀʀᴛ

ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ | ᴋᴇɪᴛʜ | ꜱʜɪʀᴏ | ʟᴀɴᴄᴇ | ʜᴜɴᴋ | ᴘɪᴅɢᴇ | ʀᴀɴᴅᴏᴍ

"Roll out, donkeys!"

Lance, Hunk, and Pidge clambered out of the simulator pod, their shoulders sagging, expressions a mix of defeat and mild panic. Sweat beaded at Hunk’s brow, and Pidge was still clutching her headset, eyes darting nervously to the stern face of Commander Iverson, who stood at the front of the classroom with his hands behind his back, boots planted firmly on the polished floor.

The rest of the class sat in neat rows, silent, the hum of the simulator systems still thrumming faintly in the background. Among them stood a young woman, arms crossed over her chest, brows drawn together with a look of barely concealed concern. Y/N Gane—top of the class, best pilot, and current team leader—stood tall beside her own squad. Her eyes lingered on the three cadets who had just exited the simulator, gaze softening when it landed on Lance.

Iverson's voice broke the silence like a whip.

"Well, let’s see if we can’t use this failure as a lesson for the rest of you students," he barked, eyes scanning the room. "Can anyone point out the mistakes these three so-called cadets made in the simulator?"

A voice from the back piped up, smug and loud. "The engineer puked in the main gearbox."

Snickers broke out across the room. Hunk turned a shade paler, groaning softly as he rubbed the back of his neck.

"Correct," Iverson said, his tone sharp with disapproval. "As everyone knows, vomit is not an approved lubricant for engine systems. What else?"

Another cadet spoke up, this one with a hint of amusement in their tone. "The comm spec removed his safety harness."

A ripple of laughter followed, and Y/N couldn’t help the small chuckle that slipped from her lips. She quickly caught herself and looked away, but not fast enough.

Iverson narrowed his eyes. "Is there something funny, Miss Gane?"

All eyes turned toward her. Y/N immediately stood up straighter, snapping to attention with practiced grace. Her expression turned neutral.

"No, sir," she replied calmly, the laughter gone from her tone.

Iverson didn’t look convinced, but he continued. "Miss Gane, can you tell me something they did wrong?"

Y/N hesitated for a beat, then raised an eyebrow and offered a dry response. "Erm... the pilot... crashed?"

Iverson stared at her for a long moment before breaking into a rare smile.

"Correct! Miss Gane!" he barked, turning sharply on his heel and walking away from the group. Y/N let out a slow breath and gave Lance an apologetic smile. Lance simply shrugged and grinned, as if to say, no hard feelings.

"And worst of all," Iverson continued, his voice rising again, "the whole jump, they’re arguing with each other! Heck, if you're going to be this bad individually, you'd better at least be able to work as a team!"

His voice echoed against the simulator walls. The cadets sat in stiff silence as he paced before them, boots clicking on the floor.

"This academy exists to turn young cadets like you into the next generation of elite Astro-Explorers," he snapped, stopping to glare back at the trio. "But these kinds of mental mistakes are exactly what cost the lives of the men on the Mission."

Y/N’s hands clenched into fists at her sides. Her eyes dropped to the floor for a moment, jaw tight, but she didn’t speak.

"That’s not true, sir!" Pidge suddenly shouted.

Iverson froze. The tension in the room skyrocketed. Several cadets turned their heads sharply in her direction, eyes wide.

"What did you say?!"

Before Pidge could say more, Lance slapped his hand over her mouth, eyes wide in panic. But even muffled, Pidge wasn’t backing down.

"Sorry, sir!" Lance cut in quickly, trying to defuse the situation. "I-I-I think he may have hit his head when he fell out of his chair. But point taken."

Iverson glared at the three of them like he was imagining their expulsion papers.

"I hope I don’t need to remind you that the only reason you're here is that the best pilot in your class had a discipline issue and flunked out—"

Lance’s eyes shifted subtly to Y/N, jaw tightening.

"—and the second-best refused to be the best," Iverson finished, staring hard at her before sweeping his gaze back to the trio. "Don’t follow in his footsteps."

He then turned to Y/N’s squad, posture rigid.

"Miss Gane, your team is next!"

Y/N didn’t hesitate. She nodded once, sharp and sure, and began to lead her team forward. As she passed the trio, she gave Pidge a reassuring smile and gently patted her on the shoulder.

Lance, Hunk, and Pidge watched as the simulator doors hissed open and Y/N and her teammates stepped inside with calm precision. For all her quiet confidence and top marks, there was something undeniably warm in the way she had looked at them. No judgment. No smugness. Just understanding.

And that, somehow, stung more than Iverson's shouting.

Later that night, long after curfew, the Garrison halls stood dim and quiet, the metallic hum of the facility ever-present. Footsteps echoed faintly in the distance as a voice barked through the PA system:

"Lights out in five! Everyone back to their dorms, now!" Iverson’s tone rang sharp and final, marking the end of the cadets' scheduled day.

Pressed against the cool metal wall, Lance peeked around the corridor’s edge. Hunk crouched beside him, fidgeting anxiously, casting nervous glances over his shoulder.

"We shouldn't be doing this," Hunk whispered, voice barely audible.

Lance grinned mischievously, eyes gleaming in the low light. "You heard Commander. We need to bond as a team. We're going to grab Pidge, hit the town, loosen up, meet some nice girls, maybe we can bring Y—"

"OK, I'm just—I'm just saying this here, right now, on the record: This is a bad idea."

With a loud click, the corridor lights shut off, plunging them into shadows. The two cadets ducked low, slipping deeper into the hallway like shadows themselves.

"You know," Lance whispered as they moved along the wall, "for someone in a space exploration program, you don't have much of a sense of adventure."

"All of your little ‘adventures’ end up with me in the principal's office," Hunk muttered back, struggling to keep up as Lance darted ahead.

They crept past the instructor’s lounge, Lance motioning frantically for Hunk to follow. Hesitant but loyal, Hunk tiptoed after him, mumbling under his breath.

"Oh, man..."

A flashlight beam swept across the hallway. Lance dove into a nearby recycling bin, motioning wildly for Hunk to join him. Hunk, much larger and more reluctant, clambered in after him with a squish of plastic.

"L-5 North all clear," a guard’s voice crackled through a radio as he passed by.

Lance leapt out quickly, scanning the hall. Hunk attempted the same—only to get momentarily stuck. With a loud clunk, he toppled out, arms flailing. He groaned, brushing himself off.

"I'm fine."

Both froze as they heard footsteps approaching from around the corner. They ducked into the shadows just in time to see the door to Iverson's office swing open. Pidge and Y/N stepped out quietly, closing the door behind them.

Lance narrowed his eyes. "Where are they going?"

Following at a distance, Lance and Hunk climbed their way up to the rooftop of the Galaxy Garrison. Wind tugged gently at their uniforms as the quiet hum of the sky greeted them. There, silhouetted by stars, Pidge sat cross-legged with a headset on, surrounded by a web of wires and blinking lights. Beside her, Y/N lounged calmly, legs stretched out in front of her, casually munching on a snack bar as she looked up at the sky.

Crawling low across the rooftop, Hunk reached the edge, Lance beside him. With practiced stealth, Lance gently removed one side of Pidge’s headphones and leaned close to her ear.

"You two come up here to rock out?" he asked, eyebrows raised.

"Agh!" Pidge flinched, nearly dropping the equipment. She spun around to face them, eyes wide. Y/N blinked in surprise, turning slowly—snack bar still held between her teeth. "Oh, Lance, Hunk. No, um... we—"

"We were just looking at the stars," Y/N said through a mouthful, barely missing a beat.

"Cool. Where did you get all this stuff? It doesn’t look like Garrison tech," Lance asked, stepping closer to examine the cluttered setup.

"He built it," Y/N replied proudly, throwing an arm over Pidge’s shoulder in a casual half-hug.

"He built all of this," Hunk echoed, awe written all over his face as he leaned in to poke a device.

Smack!

"Stop it!" Pidge snapped, smacking his hand away without looking up. "With this thing, I can scan to the edge of the solar system."

"That right? All the way to Kerberos?" Lance smirked knowingly, trying to mask the growing curiosity behind his teasing.

Pidge looked away, lips tightening. Y/N’s expression dimmed, her gaze falling as the mood shifted.

"You two go ballistic every time the commander brings it up. What’s with that?" Lance pressed. Hunk’s hand crept toward the tech again.

"Second warning, Hunk!" Y/N called without looking.

"...Aw..."

"Look," Lance said, turning serious. "Pidge, if we’re going to bond as a team, we can’t have any secrets. Same for you, Y/N."

Y/N furrowed her brow, genuinely confused. "You may not be a part of the team, but you're our friend. Friends can't keep secrets from each other."

"I mean, they can," Y/N muttered under her breath, lips twitching.

"Fine. The world as you know it is about to change," Pidge began, voice suddenly clear and direct. "The Mission wasn't lost because of some malfunction or crew mistake—"

Pidge glanced up just in time to see Hunk’s hand inching toward her panel again.

"—STOP TOUCHING MY EQUIPMENT!!"

Hunk raised both hands, groaning. "Okay, okay!"

"...So," Pidge continued, pushing her glasses up, "I've been scanning the system and picking up alien radio talking."

"Whoa, what? Aliens?!" Hunk gasped, leaning forward in disbelief.

"Oookay. So you're insane," Lance said, deadpan. "Y/N, please tell me you don't believe in him."

Y/N calmly nodded, then held up a digital pad. Scrawled across the screen was a single word: Voltron?

"They keep repeating the same word over and over again. Voltron. And tonight... it’s been crazier."

"How crazy?" Lance asked warily.

As if on cue, alarms blared throughout the Garrison. Red lights lit the rooftop in a warning glow. Iverson’s voice thundered over the intercom:

"Attention, students. This is not a drill. We are on lockdown! Repeat: all students are to remain in barracks until further notice!"

A fiery object streaked across the sky, growing larger by the second.

"What’s going on? Is that a meteor? ...A very, very big... meteor?" Hunk asked, squinting at the blazing object.

Y/N raised binoculars to her eyes, adjusting the dial with steady hands.

"It’s... it’s a ship," she said quietly. Lance took the binoculars next, his breath catching.

"Holy crow! I can’t believe what I’m seeing. That’s not one of ours."

"No. It’s one of theirs," Pidge said, eyes locked on the ship as it hurtled toward the desert.

"So wait," Hunk said, voice cracking, "there are aliens out there?!"

All four stared as the alien spacecraft crashed into the distant sands. In the distance, spotlights and rovers burst into motion—Garrison response units heading straight for the wreck.

"We’ve gotta see that ship!" Pidge said, suddenly on his feet, already grabbing Y/N’s arm and dragging her up with him.

"Pidge, slow down!" Y/N laughed, nearly tripping.

"Hunk, come on!" Lance yelled, already bolting after them.

Hunk sighed, clutching his chest as he started running. "Oh, this is the worst team-building exercise ever!"

The desert wind howled softly around them as the four cadets crouched on a jagged cliff overlooking the quarantined crash site. Floodlights illuminated the alien ship below—sleek, massive, and unlike anything they’d ever seen. Garrison jeeps circled the perimeter, guards patrolled in tight formation.

Lance peered through binoculars, adjusting the focus until the details snapped into view.

"Whoa... What the heck is that thing?! ...And who the heck is she?" he muttered, his tone shifting from awe to intrigue as he caught sight of a woman moving near the ship.

SMACK.

"Ow!" Lance yelped, rubbing the back of his head. Y/N stood beside him, arms crossed and unimpressed.

"Right, right, alien ship," Lance muttered, shifting back to focus. "Man, we will never get past those guards to get a look."

Beside him, Pidge typed furiously into her portable computer, eyes glued to the scrolling code.

"Aw, man. Yeah, yeah, I guess there's nothing to do but head back to the barracks, right?" Hunk offered, hopeful.

"Wait for it," Y/N said, tapping Pidge’s shoulder and pointing toward one of the security cameras. "There’s a camera in there. Try and hack into it."

Pidge gave a curt nod, fingers flying faster across the keyboard. A moment later, a flickering feed lit up the screen.

"I’ve grabbed its feed. Look."

They all huddled around the monitor. Inside a sterile Garrison medical chamber, a man lay strapped to a table, clearly distressed as Garrison technicians moved around him.

"Hey! What are you doing?"

"Calm down, Shiro. We just need to run some tests," Iverson’s voice cut in, calm but firm.

Y/N gasped, choking on her breath. Her hand instinctively covered her mouth.

"You have to listen to me!" Shiro shouted, straining against the restraints. "They destroyed worlds! Aliens are coming!"

"That’s—! Shiro! The pilot from the Kerberos Mission!" Lance nearly squealed in excitement, grabbing Hunk’s shoulders. "That guy’s my hero!"

"Guess he’s not dead in space after all," Hunk said, awestruck.

"Where’s the rest of the crew?" Pidge asked, her voice soft, eyes clouding.

Y/N gently placed a hand on her shoulder. "I’m sure they’re fine. I mean, if Shiro’s still alive, I’m sure the rest are."

On the screen, Iverson stepped closer.

"Do you know how long you were gone?"

"I don’t know—months? Years?" Shiro gasped, shaking his head. "Look, there’s no time. Aliens are coming here for a weapon. They’re probably on their way right now. We need to get Voltron!"

Shiro fought against his restraints again. Pidge and Y/N exchanged wide-eyed glances.

"Voltron!" they said in unison.

"Sir, look at this. It appears that his arm has been replaced with a cyborg prosthetic," a nearby technician reported, examining Shiro’s metallic arm.

"Put him under until we figure out what it can do," Iverson ordered. A tech approached with a syringe.

"No, no, no, don’t put me under!" Shiro protested, jerking in his bonds. "There’s no time! Let me go!"

Lance slammed his fist into the dirt. "They didn’t even ask about the other crew members! What are they doing?! The guy’s a legend! They’re not even going to listen to him!"

"We have to get him out," Y/N said, voice low but steady.

"Ah, I hate to be the voice of reason here—always—but weren’t we watching this on TV because there was no way of getting past the guards?" Hunk stood up, exasperated.

"That was before we were properly motivated," Lance said, also rising. "We’ve just got to think. Could we tunnel in?"

Y/N snorted, standing up with him.

"What’s so funny?" Lance asked, frowning.

"Really? Tunnel in. Tunnel in?!" she laughed, shaking her head.

"Well at least I have a plan! Where’s yours?" Lance challenged with a cocky smirk.

"We find some hazmat suits and sneak in like med techs," Y/N replied, smirking right back.

Lance blinked, thoughtful. "...That’s a pretty good idea."

"Or... we could dress up like cooks, sneak into the commissary... little late-night snack," Hunk said dreamily.

"...No. What we need is a distraction."

As if summoned by fate, a massive explosion roared in the distance. A plume of fire erupted on the horizon, lighting up the desert sky.

All four screamed in unison.

"Is that the aliens?! Are—Tha—The—Is that the aliens?! Are they here?! They got here so quick!" Hunk panicked.

"No!" Pidge shouted, pointing toward the crater’s edge. "Those explosions were a distraction—for him!"

A black hovercraft shot across the sand as a shadowy figure leapt from it and darted toward the facility. The guards mobilized toward the blast, abandoning the perimeter.

Lance yanked the binoculars back up to his eyes.

"No way...! Oh, he is not going to beat us in there! That guy is always trying to one-up me!"

"Who is it?" Hunk asked.

"Keith!" Lance growled.

"Come on, Lance. Don’t start—"

"Who?" Pidge asked, blinking.

"Are you sure?" Hunk frowned.

"Oh, I’d recognize that mullet anywhere!"

"Lance, come on, man! Keith hasn’t done anything—"

"Who’s Keith?!" Pidge shouted, now fully lost.

"Let’s go!" Lance barked, already taking off toward the crash site. The others followed.

=

Inside the quarantined lab, Shiro lay unconscious. His monitors flickered rapidly. Technicians circled him.

"These readings are off the chart," one muttered, baffled.

Suddenly, the doors burst open.

"Hey!" Iverson shouted.

Keith charged in, fists flying. Within seconds, the three techs lay unconscious. Keith rushed to Shiro’s side, stunned to see him.

"Shiro...?" he whispered. He quickly cut the restraints, trying to lift him up when footsteps pounded behind him.

"Nope. No—you—no, no, no, no, no—you don’t!" Lance shouted, appearing in the doorway and hoisting Shiro over his shoulder. "I’m saving Shiro!"

"Lance, let’s just get him out of here," Y/N urged, rolling her eyes slightly. She glanced at Keith. "Hey, Keith."

"Hey Y/N. Long time no see," Keith replied with a small nod. "So, who’s this?"

"Who am I? Uh, the name’s Lance." He waited. Keith blinked at him. "...We were in the same class at the Garrison?"

"Really? Are you an engineer?"

"No, I’m a pilot! We were, like, rivals. You know—Lance and Keith, neck-and-neck—" Y/N snorted behind him.

Keith tilted his head. "Oh wait, I remember you. You’re a cargo pilot."

"Well, not anymore. I’m fighter class now, thanks to you washing out," Lance declared proudly.

"Lance!" Y/N hissed, annoyed. Keith looked to her, brow furrowed. "I refused to take your place. That was yours. I couldn’t take it."

Keith gave a soft nod of acknowledgment, before turning to look at Lance. "Well… congratulations."

Lance and Keith struggled together to carry Shiro out of the facility, his limp weight slung between them. The alarms still echoed behind them, Garrison lights strobing across the desert night like searchlights.

Waiting just beyond the building was Keith’s hoverbike, parked on a rocky ledge. Its engine hummed low and steady, ready to bolt.

Keith hopped on first, sliding into the seat with practiced ease. Lance climbed on after, still supporting Shiro, who slumped against them. Keith revved the engine, then looked back.

"Hop on," he said, holding his hand out to Y/N.

She smirked and approached, reaching toward him—then suddenly yanked him close by the front of his jacket, her lips near his ear.

"You may be a gentleman, and I may be a girl," she whispered with a smirk, "but this girl beat your ass in training."

She let go and swung herself onto the back of the bike behind him with ease. Keith blinked, staring at his outstretched hand in stunned silence, a flush creeping into his cheeks.

Down below, Hunk’s voice rang out, eyes wide with panic.

"Oh, man, they're coming back—and they do not look happy. We gotta go. Uh, do you mind if we catch a ride with you?"

More Garrison vehicles were cresting over the hill, sirens wailing, lights blazing.

The rest of the team piled aboard the hovercraft as quickly as possible. The engine groaned, suspension creaking under the sudden weight. With a mechanical wheeeze, the hovercraft tipped sideways under the load.

"Is this thing going to be big enough for all of us?" Pidge asked, trying to rebalance herself.

"No," Keith replied flatly, not even turning his head.

Without further argument, he launched the craft into motion just as the first Garrison vehicle came into view. Pidge grunted as Shiro's full weight shifted against her.

"Why am I holding this guy?!"

"Hey, we did all fit!" Hunk shouted optimistically.

"Can’t this thing go any faster?" Lance asked, looking nervously over his shoulder at the convoy of Garrison jeeps giving chase.

"We could toss out some non-essential weight," Keith deadpanned. Y/N rolled her eyes and nudged Keith’s hip with her knee.

"Oh, right!" Lance said, glancing around. Then he paused. "...Okay, so that was an insult. I get it."

"Big man, lean left!" Keith shouted.

Hunk didn’t question it. He leaned left. The hovercraft sharply veered, narrowly avoiding a ridge as two Garrison vehicles collided with each other in their attempt to follow.

"Whoa!" the group screamed as the hovercraft bounced from the shockwave.

"Aww, man! Mr. Harris just wiped out Professor Montgomery—No, wait. He’s fine," Hunk sighed in relief as he spotted the wrecked vehicles still smoking behind them.

The hovercraft zipped down a side road that wrapped around a shallow ravine. Wind roared in their ears.

"Big man, lean right!" Keith barked again.

Hunk shifted quickly. The hovercraft swerved toward the edge and launched off the ridge, catching air. They all screamed—except Keith, Shiro, and Y/N, who simply gripped tighter.

The hovercraft hit the lower road with a crunch of gravel and skidded hard before regaining momentum.

They were still being chased. Two Garrison cars had made it through the chaos and were gaining.

"Guys? Is the-the-the-the—that—is that a cliff up ahead?" Hunk stammered, his voice rising in pitch.

"Oh, no, no, no," Lance shouted as he saw it too.

"Yup," Keith said with a smirk, eyes fixed on the horizon.

"Just like old times," Y/N murmured from behind him, wrapping her arms tightly around his waist.

Keith gunned the throttle. The engine screamed as the craft accelerated toward the edge.

Everyone screamed—except for Y/N, Keith, and the unconscious Shiro, whose head lolled gently against Lance’s shoulder.

The hovercraft launched off the cliff in a dazzling arc, flying into the desert night.

"What are you doing?! You’re trying to kill us all!" Lance yelled, clutching Shiro.

"Shut up and trust him!" Y/N shouted back, her voice fierce and sure.

The hovercraft dipped, then glided low and fast across the sands. Behind them, the Garrison skidded to a halt at the cliff’s edge, too late to follow.

They were gone.

Free.

Keith raced off into the night, the desert wind trailing behind them—and for the first time in a long while, it felt like everything was about to change.

The first rays of sunlight cast golden warmth across the barren desert. A quiet breeze rustled through the sand as Shiro and Y/N stood outside the small desert shack, wrapped in a peaceful embrace. The silence was thick with emotion—memories unspoken but understood.

"It's good to see you again, Shiro," Y/N said, her voice soft, a gentle smile playing on her lips as they pulled apart.

"It's good to have you back," Keith said, approaching and placing a steady hand on Shiro's shoulder.

"It's good to be back," Shiro replied with a tired, heartfelt breath.

They stood there for a moment, the quiet humming between them louder than words.

"So what happened out there? Where…were you?" Y/N asked, stepping closer to him, her expression etched with concern.

Shiro exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck. “I wish I could tell you. My head's still pretty scrambled. I was on an... alien ship, but... somehow I escaped. It’s all a blur. How did you know to come save me when I crashed?”

"You should come see this," Keith interrupted. He turned and led them inside. Y/N and Shiro followed him into the shack.

=

Inside, the cramped room buzzed with pinned-up maps, diagrams, scratched equations and photos. It looked like the inside of a conspiracy theorist’s den—but more focused. Intentional.

"What have you been working on?" Shiro murmured, scanning the walls with furrowed brows.

Keith hesitated, as if embarrassed by the truth. "I can't explain it. After getting booted from the Garrison, I was kinda... lost. But I felt drawn to this place. Like something—some energy—was telling me to search."

"For what?" Shiro asked.

Y/N stayed close beside him, his arm casually slung around her shoulders, her own arms folded in front of her as she scanned the boards.

"I didn’t know at the time…" Keith said, stepping forward and pointing at a spot on one of the maps. "Until I stumbled across this area. It’s an outcropping of giant caves covered in these ancient markings." He gestured to several photographs tacked to the board. "Each one tells a slightly different story about a blue lion. But they all point to one event… something that happened last night. Then you showed up."

Shiro let his arm drop from Y/N’s shoulders and stepped closer to inspect the photos alongside the others.

"I should thank you for getting me out. Lance, right?" Shiro said, turning and extending his prosthetic hand.

Lance blinked, momentarily thrown off by the gesture, but he shook it. Shiro offered a hand to the others—Pidge shook it confidently, while Hunk just smiled awkwardly from the back.

"This nervous guy’s Hunk. I’m Pidge. So… did anyone else from your crew make it out?" Pidge asked.

Shiro’s face clouded. He looked down. "I’m not sure. I remember the mission… and being captured. After that, it’s just bits and pieces."

He drifted back toward Y/N, wrapping his arm around her again. She leaned gently into his side. Lance blinked, watching the two of them closely. His brain immediately went into overdrive.

"Are they TOGETHER?! No, Lance, no! Shut up! He’s way, WAY older than her. They’re probably just really, really close… I’ll ask Y/N later."

"You’ll ask me what later?" Y/N asked suddenly, making Lance jump. He looked up and saw her standing in front of him with raised eyebrows.

"Uhm, I-I was just wondering if… Uh…"

"Come on, Lance, spit it out."

He sighed, flustered. "Uhm… a-are you and Shiro… uh… together?"

Y/N blinked. Her eyes widened—and then she burst out laughing. Loud, uncontrollable laughter.

"What’s so funny?" Lance asked, defensive.

"You thought me and Shiro were dating?" she wheezed, still catching her breath.

"It was just a question," Lance muttered. Her laughter drew attention from the rest of the group.

"What happened?" Hunk asked.

"I just asked her if she and Shiro are dating," Lance replied with a frown. Pidge snorted. Even Keith and Shiro chuckled.

"What!? Why’s that so funny?" Lance groaned.

"Okay, okay," Y/N said, waving her hand as she caught her breath. "I’ll tell you." She cleared her throat dramatically. "Shiro is my brother."

There was a beat of silence.

"WHAAAAAT?!" Hunk and Lance shouted in unison.

"But… how? Your last name is Gane, not Shiro… Gane… Ohh… Gane is the shortened version of Shirogane," Lance muttered, slowly connecting the dots.

"You just figured that out now?" Y/N said, facepalming.

"Anyway, sorry to interrupt this grand reveal," Hunk chimed in, looking to Shiro, "but back to the aliens. Where are they now? Are they coming? Are they coming for all of us? Like, where are they at this very moment?!"

"I can’t really put it together…" Shiro replied. "I—I remember the word Voltron. It’s some kind of weapon they’re looking for, but I don’t know why. Whatever it is, I think we need to find it before they do."

"Well, last night, I was rummaging through Pidge and Y/N’s stuff, and I found these pictures," Hunk said, pulling out a few photos. One showed Pidge with a girl, the other showed Y/N laughing on Shiro’s back as he gave her a piggyback ride. "Look, it’s his girlfriend. And I always wondered why Y/N and Shiro were so close—until now."

"Hey, gimme that!" Pidge shouted, snatching her photo back.

"What were you doing in our stuff?!" Y/N asked, grabbing hers and sliding it into her coat pocket, clearly annoyed.

"I wa—I was looking for a candy bar!" Hunk defended himself. "But then I found Pidge’s diary and started reading it—"

"WHAT?!" Y/N snatched the diary back and shoved it into Pidge’s arms. "You don’t go through people’s things, Hunk!"

"And I noticed that the repeating series of numbers the aliens are searching for looks a lot like a Fraunhofer line."

"From… who?" Keith squinted.

"It’s a number describing the emission spectrum of an element. Only, this element doesn’t exist on Earth. I thought it might be this Voltron. And I think I can build a machine to look for it—kind of like a Voltron Geiger Counter."

"Hunk, you big, gassy genius!" Lance grinned.

"It’s pretty fascinating, really. Th-The wavelength looks like this." Hunk pulled out a graph. Keith grabbed it, eyes narrowing.

"Give me that."

He matched the wavelength shape to a spot on the map.

=

Later, the group stood at the mouth of a rocky canyon. Pidge held up Hunk’s newly-built scanning device.

"...Okay, I admit it. This is super freaky," Lance muttered.

"I’m getting a reading," Pidge said as the device pinged. They followed it into a cave. The walls were covered in ancient carvings.

"Whoa…" everyone said in awe.

"What are these?" Shiro asked.

"These are the lion carvings I was telling you about," Keith replied. "They’re everywhere around here."

Lance stepped forward, touching one of the carvings—and suddenly, all of them lit up. The light surged through the cave like lightning.

"Whoa—whoa!" Lance jumped back.

"Heh. They’ve never done that before."

Then the ground rumbled and gave way. The team screamed as they slid down a watery chute.

Y/N laughed, arms raised in the air like a theme park ride. Pidge clung to Hunk’s hair, screaming. They finally hit the bottom—Lance landed directly on Y/N, knocking the wind out of her.

"Ow…" she groaned.

"Oh—sorry, Y/N!" Lance said sheepishly, helping her up. He then looked up—and gasped. "They are everywhere."

The group turned and saw it: a massive, glowing blue robotic lion sitting still in the cavern, surrounded by a crackling energy shield.

"Is this it? Is this the Voltron?" Pidge asked.

"It… must be," Shiro said.

"This is what’s been causing all of this crazy energy out here," Y/N whispered, stepping forward. The others followed.

"Looks like there’s a force field around it," Keith said.

"Does anyone else get the feeling this thing is staring at them?" Lance asked, swaying side to side.

"Hmm… no," Shiro said, eyeing him like he was nuts.

"Yeah, the eyes are totally following me!" Lance insisted. Keith approached the field and pressed his hand against it—nothing happened. He frowned.

"I wonder how we get through this."

Lance stepped up next to him, Y/N right beside him.

"Maybe you just have to knock," Lance said with a smirk. He knocked twice—and the force field vanished. Blue energy surged, illuminating the cavern.

The team gasped as an image flashed into their minds—Voltron forming from six separate lions.

"Uh… did everyone just see that?" Lance asked, turning.

"Voltron is a robot. Voltron is a huge, huge, awesome robot," Y/N said, eyes wide. Hunk grinned. They exchanged a look.

"Awesome!" they said in unison.

"And this thing is only one part of it! I wonder where the rest of them are?" Pidge said.

Shiro looked up at the lion. "This is what they’re looking for."

"Incredible," Keith whispered.

The Lion suddenly lowered its head. Its jaws opened wide. Everyone flinched—except Lance, who stepped forward eagerly. Lance climbed into the lion’s cockpit.

"Here we go," he said. The seat launched him forward. He screamed as the console lit up. "Hehehe! All right! Very nice!" Lance grinned as the others climbed in.

Y/N stood behind Pidge, mouth slightly open in awe.

"Okay, guys, I—I feel the need to point out, just so that we’re all, y’know, aware: We are in some kind of futuristic alien cat head right now."

Lance blinked. Something stirred deep inside him. "Whoa… did you guys just hear that?" he asked.

"Hear what?" Keith asked.

"I—I think it’s talking to me. Hmm… Um…" Lance pressed a few buttons. The Blue Lion stood up and ROARED. Pidge and Hunk screamed.

"Awesome," Y/N whispered, wide-eyed.

Lance gripped the controls, heart pounding. "Okay. Got it. Now let's try this."

With a deafening ROAR, the Blue Lion bursts through the side of the canyon in a shower of rock and dust, sunlight glinting off its sleek armor. The force of the exit shakes the cliffside, and before the team inside can brace themselves—

Lance slams his hands on the controls.

"WHOOOOO!!"

The Lion soars into the air, doing somersaults and wild barrel rolls. The sky spins in dizzying loops, and the world turns upside down.

Hunk and Pidge scream, practically climbing onto Lance in pure terror. Y/N screams too, her hands flying out to grip Shiro’s jacket with one hand and Keith’s arm with the other.

"YOU ARE. THE WORST. PILOT. EVER!" Keith yells, clinging to the nearest wall panel.

"I AGREE!" Y/N shouts back, hair whipping around her face.

Lance only laughs, guiding the Blue Lion into another loop. The controls glow brighter under his hands.

The cockpit lights pulse blue as the lion suddenly flattens out and lands running along the desert floor��fast and fluid like a wild animal at full sprint. The view outside becomes a blur of sand and wind.

"Isn't this awesome?!" Lance yells over the roar of the wind.

"Make it stop. Make it stop," Hunk groans, clinging to the seat like it’s a lifeline, green in the face.

"I'm not making it do anything. It's like it’s on autopilot!" Lance shouts, wide-eyed. Without warning, the Lion leaps back into the air.

"Where are you going?!" Y/N cries out, still gripping both Shiro and Keith.

"I just said it's on autopilot! It says there's an alien ship coming towards Earth. I think we are supposed to stop it!"

"What did it say, exactly?" Pidge asks, squinting at the readings.

"It wasn't like saying words—more like feeding ideas into my brain, kind of…" Lance replies, trailing off. Y/N gives him a very skeptical look.

"Well if this thing is the weapon they're coming for, why don't we just, I don't know, give it to them? Maybe they'll leave us alone. Sorry, lion. Nothing personal," Hunk offers hopefully.

A heavy silence falls over the cockpit.

"You don't understand," Shiro says grimly. "These monsters spread like a plague throughout the galaxy, destroying everything in their path. There's no bargaining with them. They won't stop until everything is dead."

Everyone turns slowly to look at Hunk.

"…Oh. Never mind then."

Suddenly, a shadow looms overhead.

Through the massive viewport, a warship from the Galra Empire phases into view above Earth—towering, sinister, bristling with cannons. The team's eyes go wide.

"Uh… Holy crow! Is that really an alien ship?!" Hunk asks, jaw dropping.

"They found me…" Shiro mutters, eyes locked on the looming warship. Y/N grips his arm tighter.

The warship opens fire—blasts of purple energy lancing through space, barely missing the Lion.

"We've got to get out of here!" Pidge shouts.

"Hang on!" Lance yells. He dives the Blue Lion downward in a sharp arc, evading a searing beam of light that narrowly misses them. The whole ship shakes.

"All right. Okay, I think I know what to do!" Lance says, gripping the controls tighter.

"Be careful, man. This isn't a simulator!" Pidge leans over his shoulder.

"Well, that's good. I always wreck the simulator!" Lance grins.

The Blue Lion's mouth opens—and blasts a focused beam of energy straight down the Galra warship’s hull. The ship rocks violently. Lance then jerks the controls—

"Let's try this!"

The Blue Lion's claws extend, glowing with energy, and it slashes through the side of the warship with a thunderous tear.

"Nice job, Lance!" Shiro says, nodding in approval.

"Okay, I think it's time we get these guys away from our planet," Lance announces, guiding the lion up and away.

The Galra warship gives chase, accelerating after them. The glowing purple engines burn bright.

"Oh, no!" Y/N gasps, pointing at the approaching vessel. "They're gaining on us!"

"It's weird. They're not trying to shoot at us—they're just chasing," Lance says, frowning.

"Okay, seriously, now we think having aliens follow us is good? I am not on board with this new direction, guys!" Hunk protests, holding onto the seat for dear life.

"Where are we?" Keith asks, leaning forward.

"Edge of the solar system. There's Kerberos," Shiro says, pointing to a nearby celestial body.

"It takes months for our ships to get out this far," Pidge murmurs in disbelief.

"We got out here in five seconds," Y/N adds, stunned.

Suddenly, space begins to distort. A swirling wormhole forms ahead—violet and blue light warping into a spinning spiral of the unknown.

"What is that?!" Hunk yells.

"Uh, this may seem crazy, but I think the Lion wants us to go through there," Lance says, eyes wide.

"Where does it go?" Pidge asks, clutching the seat.

"I—I don't know." Lance turns to Shiro, hope and fear flashing across his face. "You're the senior officer here. What should we do?"

Shiro looks around the cockpit, then up at the glowing controls pulsing in rhythm with the Lion’s hum.

"Whatever is happening, the Lion knows more than we do. I say we trust it. But we're a team now. We should decide together."

The group exchanges looks—silent but determined. Pidge places a hand on Lance’s shoulder.

"…All right. Guess we're all ditching class tomorrow."

With a low mechanical growl, the Blue Lion surges forward, disappearing into the wormhole just as the Galra ship approaches—too late to follow.

And in a flash of blue light, they are gone.