#string theory (experimental)

[star-lit-clementine]

do you have any recent wips?

(i love your writing, no rush!! id eat any fanfic u post)

//I sure do!! Here's one I was working on last week :))

Edwin had done it. 

For years, Kik had watched as he’d tried to find a way to separate the Gift from the Gifted, a way to single out the Gift itself for further research and testing. Proof that, maybe, there was more than just the ‘natural’ in our world. And at every turn, the project had avoided comprehension, as if baiting him, pushing him to madness. But this time… This time, it seems that it might have actually worked.

He could hardly believe it, staring in awe at the little ball of pure light hovering in the center of the mason jar he had Kik fill with little pieces of aluminium foil– twisted tightly into rods– in any hope to catch electricity, any semblance of energy and power. He’d wrangled together a rudimentary machine that would spin vials of collected blood– from his lovely assistant and niece– to automate part of the process of mixing the blood. The process required a speed and force he could not generate himself due to the density of the specimen he was working with. As it spun the blood, the force required– called the centrifugal force– separated the liquid of the blood, which would theoretically allow him to harvest the energy of the Gift from the blood itself, as the evaporation of the blood would allow him to extract what he wanted. And hopefully, in harvesting that Gift, producing something like electricity.

And against every odd, staring back at him is a victory that smells like sweet tangerines, like pine trees and cold forest.  It buzzes, glowing light gold and filling the room with its soft, warm ambience. Like sunshine after rain, like the break of dawn over a cold night, the entire room felt dark in the light of the little gold light. Edwin reaches, hesitant, before laying a finger on the glass. The result is instant: peace disturbed, energy striking the glass and finding a body, conducting and flying towards it, zapping the man like a bolt of electricity. Edwin stumbles back, wincing at the shock and trying to stop his hands from spasming. He looks down and finds that his hands now glow in dark red light, arcing and wrapping around his hands, bending with his fingers. Furrowing his brows, he experimentally moves his hands, finding that the Gift in his hands fit like ill-fitting gloves. Cumbersome and unnatural, it was not his. But… he could wear it. Use it, just not as well. 

Oh. Oh.

A slow, satisfied smile curves onto his cruel face. It’s unnatural, but only because Edwin Wright rarely found something that filled him with genuine glee. This was a breakthrough of incredible size, he could harness the power of the supernatural, he could turn water into wine– cultivate power. If he was a bug in a world of giants, now he had a stinger. He turns, glancing back to see where Katherine had gotten off to, and pleasantly surprised to find them standing a few paces behind him. Dutiful, compassionate child that they were, the perfect assistant and specimen. As he had raised them to be, but Katherine was a particularly gentle creature.  If only they weren’t so headstrong, so difficult to control. If only he could trust them, control them reliably… An idea comes to mind, one to solve the issue that had been causing conflict in this home recently. This power had given him a stinger, yes, but… it could be a web, should he desire.

Katherine leans to peer around Edwin, a few paces behind him, watching the light in the jar dance. They frown as they squint at the odd, sporadic arcing of the Gift bouncing off of the aluminium and hitting the glass. Dread was settling in their stomach as the realization set in that this was enough to prove all of his theories. This could prove, reliably, that some children were magic, and Kik knew that would be dangerous beyond reckoning. And yet, they couldn't help but lean forward, trying to get a better look at it, curious about the way it moved and twisted and radiated warmth. They shrink back, however, meekly smiling, when he turns around and fixes them with a knowing, esurient stare. He steps forward, and Katherine steps back without thinking, raising their hands defensively. He follows, snatching them by the arm and pulling them closer, his other hand clamping around their bicep roughly, caging their shoulders in his grip. 

“Well, Katherine, it seems like all our hard work has paid off.” He grins at the girl, watching as they begin to try and pull away from him. He grips harder, ignoring the way Katherine hisses in pain, and twists them to look at the jar. They notice that the jar is now filled with dark red light. “It’s just a taste of what you’ve got, but that’s alright. You’re a very powerful little lady. This is more than enough to prove that I can single it out, which is what’s important. That it can be harvested, taken. Although… this next part is gonna stay between you and me.”

He takes a deep breath, feeling the power pour through his body. The smell of oranges turns sour and bitter– rotting lemons and lime. Edwin pulls Katherine closer, lifting their arm to show sickly red light twisting around their wrists, drawing their attention to the strings now connecting them to Edwin. They gasp, the air squeezed from their chest, and look down. They find their chest glowing in red light as the magic ties itself around their ribs, around their spine, tightening painfully. Edwin drops Kik’s arms, letting them slump forward and wrap their arms around their chest. They drop to their knees, choking back a sob.

“My dear niece, my Katherine, my perfect specimen, you’ve proven just how very, very useful you are.” His tone is sing-songy, all the while he balls his hand into a fist and tugs, and Katherine gasps again, on the edge of crying out. 

“W-wait, what–” They choke out, clutching at their chest. They pull at the strings looping around them, but new knots form wherever they untangle them. Confusion and fear twists in their gut as they frantically try to get out of the web. Something about the way Edwin is looking at them makes them feel sick. The softness they recall in his eyes when they were younger, the smile that pulled at his lips when he saw them– they’d been replaced. Something colder, sharped, and hungrier filled its place. They don’t understand what he’s doing, why he’s gotten so violent. “Uncle, you’re– you’re hurting me–”

“I can’t have you running away anymore, you have to understand. But I know that you can’t live trapped in a little house forever. Poor little bird, caged and sad with no room to stretch their little wings. I do still care, Katherine, I do. I just need you to cooperate. But I think I have a solution to our problem.” Crouching, Edwin tilts his head, lifting Kik’s chin by grabbing it, smiling when Kik meets his eyes again. He tightens the strings with a cold sort of finality, knocking the air from Katherine’s lungs as their magic is bound under his own. “Try not to think about it like you’re losing something, because you aren’t. If anything, these will allow you more freedom. Now I can enforce the rules! Now I can make sure you can’t get yourself into trouble! This will be better for us, I promise, Kitty.”

He sighs, watching the horrified expression on his niece’s face. “You and I, kid? We’re stuck together. I need you, Kitty Cat, and, honestly, you need me! Who else is going to take care of you? I’m all the family you have left, and you’re still just a little thing. You need someone to teach you how to navigate this world– especially because you’re so special. Now, there’s no more running away. No more fighting. Now there’s only you and I.” Another smile, a little less sharp, and Katherine resists the urge to scream. They want to fight and claw and bite and tear– anything to get out of here– but they are shackled to Edwin with their own Gift. 

The last part of any family they had left, and yet Katherine does not recognize their Uncle at all anymore. Ever since he found that Black Book, ever since he saw their father die, he’d been obsessed with the darkness and monsters, and this obsession was ruining both of their lives. This was only keeping either of them from actually living, from doing anything more than twisting themselves up in a game they could never win. Katherine had at least had the hope of one day escaping, of maybe somehow convincing him to stop–

But… they weren’t sure he was in there anymore. Once, a long time ago, now, they thought he had hung the stars in the sky himself, that he was the most impressive and incredible researcher to ever walk the earth. They had helped him as a child with research willingly, interested in what he was doing and excited to be included and involved. He had held them in his lap, explained the stories and the worlds in the pages he was reading, made a game out of finding what details they were researching. In front of them was nothing more than a shell of the man who had been there when Katherine’s mother left, when their father died… The ghost of a once-great man, now somehow the biggest monster of all. 

In a moment of pure exhaustion, Kik Wright gives in, and faints.

___

//Hope you enjoyed!! I'm always down to show off my lil wips :))

@theorangestarwatcher, @disdoorted-crows

[infinityof6]

String ritual

[tanoraqui]

I’m so glad there are people in the Game Changer tag sufficiently obsessed with this show that they’re now building red string board conspiracy theories about how our beloved host Sam Reich might be possessed by the spirit of his (entirely fictional) evil ancestor Sam Dalton from the escape room episode. Normally I’d say that the evidence presented so far isn’t enough to beat the fact that they’ve never done some sort of “season arc” like that, much less a multi-season arc, and shown no sign of intending to do so—but on Game Changer, “they’ve never done something like that before and shown no sign of intending to do so” is EXACTLY why they would do something!

Incredible show. It’s mere existence is an ongoing experimental art performance. It’s also possible, of course, that instead of being possessed, Sam Reich has simply been replaced by his evil ancestor Sam Dalton, and is locked in a closet somewhere on set.

[star-lit-clementine]

[Kik breathes a little easier at that. They had actually been able to control the spell-- more than they had been able to before. The strings in their chest still tried to constrain them, but they were finding it easier to push them aside. Some of the strings begin to shrivel, rot.]

[The child leans against Starry, hesitant. As always, any touch is light and gentle. They still feel faint and light-headed, but yet they know they have to get up and clean themself off. Their hands are a little bloody thanks to the nosebleed. Oh, and they should eat, since they just lost blood. Or drink water.]

[Their eyes still fall closed anyway. They're awake, just barely.]

@thesiblingsoftheblackandwhite

[When Kik returns to the room, they look somehow more worn than ever. They still have their headphones on, their body is still sweating from the dance routine, but the energy is completely sapped from their body, the shards in their chest grinding against themselves in slow agony. The light is a little dimmer than it was before.]

"'M back."

[They close the door behind them, sitting on a stool next to the door and taking off their converse. Their hands are unsteady.]

@star-lit-clementine

They all turn to look at them.

…See? Intact in one piece. They’re fine.

And drained. I thought the walk was going to help?

[tobiomark]

Oh dear......

[yuri-is-online]

Love and Deepspace Timeline: MC, Philos, and the Aether Core

Look I finished Xav's myths card. I don't regret waiting until I was done with it to post his timeline because the last two nodes have more to do with MC than him, but I am in a state so we are making this to cope.

This is all speculation and should not be taken as fact, I have done two other posts, one on Zayne and one on Xavier and I will not be doing one on Rafayel please see this reddit post by u/joonmin for relevant information about his myths card blah blah blah.

This post is less of a timeline and more here to answer questions you very likely have if you: A) decided to browse reddit and saw people saying Xavier feels like the "cannon ro" [this is a gacha game there isn't one] but have never read any of his memories, moments, or dates B) read chapter 8 and went "none of this makes sense I feel like I am missing something" or C) just generally are confused about L&D's world building and what's up with MC. I have answers for you. Wibbly wobbly soupy answers. This post also has a TL;DR in case you don't want to see me break out the string board and just want the relevant bits of information about MC you won't get from the msq.

SPOILERS FOR ALL IN GAME CONTENT UP TO CHAPTER 8, VARIOUS MOMENTS, AND ANECDOTES RELATED TO ALL 3 ROS, PROCEED WITH CARE.

Current Timeline MC (i.e. The one we are playing as)

The game starts with MC's graduation from the Academy and first day as a fully licensed hunter. We learn a few things in this first chapter, namely that MC is combat trained, has a rare heart condition known as Protocore Syndrome that has no known cure, and that her decision to become a hunter has something to do with what she experienced fourteen years ago during the Catastrophe when the Deepspace Tunnel opened and Wanderers started invading earth.

Specifically MC describes something burrowing itself into her heart. She feels helpless, like prey, and has a strong desire to never feel anything like this again. Which is unfortunate because I have a feeling a lot of someones are going to be on her trail sooner rather than later.

In Chapter 5 it is revealed that MC has an Aether core fused to her heart. This sort of human experimentation is highly illegal and it is unknown who did this to MC other than our beloved Grandmother was directly involved. Grandma appears to have taken MC away from wherever this happened after the tests started to threaten MC's life.

This is known to Dr. Zayne and Dr. Noah, though neither seem to know more than what Grandma told them. Neither of them seem to fully understand what an Aether core is or what it is doing to MC's heart. Zayne in particular seems to find this extremely concerning.

Uncovering the mystery of the Aether core seems to be what will be driving the first arc so we will not be discussing it at length here. I do want to note that Xavier absolutely knows what it is, while Zayne does not but does seem to know more of the technical aspects of how it is effecting MC, and Rafayel is at least aware of it being valuable and maybe why exactly the people in the N109 Zone want it.

At some point in the past MC met and made a promise to Rafayel. It is my personal theory that this likely took place on Hat Island during the field trip MC talks about due to some of the comments made in Chapter 7.

MC and Caleb were friends with Zayne in childhood. MC's exact age is a bit fuzzy, but the game does seem to suggest she is younger than Zayne. She does not know why Zayne disappeared from her life or what led him to become a doctor.

Comments in Chapter 4 suggests that Caleb encouraged MC to become a hunter. He seems to be very supportive of her, but Grandma seems more interested in trusting MC's protection to Zayne.

On the surface MC seems pretty normal. Her memories from before the Catastrophe seem to be gone, if she had a mother and father or other blood relatives, she doesn't remember them anymore.

Philos MC (i.e. What is Going on in the Myths)

It is revealed in Xavier's When Shooting Stars Fall anecdote that Philos is Earth in the distant future. This has confused numerous people in the notes of my Xav's timeline so I am going to be insufferable and attempt to assist with a graph:

The MC you play belongs to the game timeline, the MCs (plural each myths card features a different one) in the Myths cards come from the Philos timeline. I have tagged the Game timeline as a "potential tangent" as the events that take place in game are entirely reliant on the existence of the Deepspace Tunnel, which is created in the Philos timeline.

At some point in the Original/Philos Timeline, Earth's core ceases to function. Humanity replaces it with a new, artificial core that causes noticeable weather changes and fuses all of the tectonic plates together, and begins a new calendar counting forward from the years since Earth ceased to be and Philos was born. As a result, we don't know what exact year Earth's core giving out happened in the Original Timeline. The artificial core allows almost all humans to "live eternal." They seem to be like Tolkien's elves in the sense they can live for an eternity but they start to get tired after a while and give up on life. This is why there is a royal family that needs a line of succession. Xavier is the Crown Prince of Philos, he meets MC in school and learns she has a rare disease called Protocore Syndrome which will not allow her to live forever. He attempts to cure this by finding a specific protocore she mentions, but fails to reach her in time and is forced to watch her die. This all happens in the year 214.

At some point MC is reborn and assigned to the same teacher as Xavier. She is to train to become his knight and serve as the leader of the Lightseekers, an order tasked with killing Wanderers. At some point during or before Xavier's coming of age ceremony, he learns the truth about Philos: the planet is dying due to the artificial core never having been meant to sustain the planet this long. The Royal Family's solution for this is to occasionally feed humans to the heart of Philos in Starfall Forest. When they do this, it creates Wanderers. As if that wasn't bad enough, Xavier learns that his father and the royal family have found what they think could be a permanent solution: there is a girl who has achieved true immortality. She is the only person on Philos who can die and be reborn constantly, and while they don't seem to know why she does this, the royal family believes this girl is the life force of the planet itself.

This girl is MC and Xavier does not want this to happen. He has a plan that he does not explain to MC, but it involves traveling back in time. He says they have specific places in time picked out, but we know from Xavier's Passing By anecdote that something went wrong with his team's attempt at time travel and now there is no guarantee that the MC he left on Philos as its Queen is still there.

So now we have two timelines: Original/Philos Timeline and Game/Tangent Timeline. But all of that is just taking Xavier's anecdotes and Myths card into account... so what happens if we try to plug in the other two ROs?

Rafayel

In u/Joonmin's reddit post they mention two very important bits of information: 1) It has been 30,000 years since the sea dried up and 2) MC is a member of the royal family of Philos, not by birth but because "she has a heart that’s been blessed by the gods" and has "awoken from the depths." If all three myths cards take place in the same Philos timeline as the one Xavier leaves, we can reasonably place Raf's myths card after Xavier's backtrack mission.

So the Philos timeline would look like this. I have a note for Zayne's card there as well, but if I had to get picky with it I'm slightly tempted to place his Myths card between MC's first death and her being reborn to meet Xavier again. The other explanation would be that there are three separate Philos timelines created because the MC was successfully scarified to the Heart of Philos. In Xavier's Myths 6 MC briefly takes a dip in the space time anomaly at the center of Starfall Forest which could also explain MC scattering across different timelines, but the in game spacepedia makes a point to say that there is a chance that life still exists on Philos:

So it could simply be that MC over there has been stuck in the exact cycle of death and rebirth that Xavier was trying to prevent. It could also mean that when they add that mystery fourth love interest there is an explanation for a fourth possible myths card. Anyway all this information leaves us with a set of timelines that currently look like this:

This still leaves a lot of unanswered questions. For example, if the Philos timeline is where this all starts, what version of it is? What caused Earth's core to give out in that original timeline? Is Rafayel and Lumeria's existence the consequences of clashing timelines or are mermaids cannon to this universe? What effect on the space time continuum did Xavier's actions have? And how much of this is actually going to be answered in game?

TL;DR

Philos is Earth in the future with an artificial core that started running out of power, and never should have been made in the first place.

The royal family fed some of their long lived humans to the anomaly in Starfall forest to keep the planet running, but then they found out about a girl who could constantly be reborn each time she died and had an idea.

An idea Xavier wasn't very keen on but who cares. They thought that "when the time was right" they would sacrifice her to the rift and leave her there to die and be reborn forever. They also did not think to ask her.

Oh yeah when they fed people to the rift they turned into Wanderers. So wanderers = people as mentioned in Zayne's Still in the Dark anecdote.

Whatever makes MC reincarnate might have something to do with Lumeria, or at the very least the Lumerians in Rafayel's myths card seem to think it does.

In game MC, current timeline MC knows none of this, and has no memories from her lives, past or future. This is consistent across all her incarnations.

Final Thoughts

The only reason why I think this way about timelines is because I watched Donnie Darko in a college theater class. People like to argue about that movie and how it is supposed to be interpreted, but generally speaking they all seem to think that Tangent Timelines and the Tangent Universes they spawn get deleted very quickly, so maybe that's why the game starts by talking about "being able to leave this loop" and why Xavier seems to think something bad will be happening to Linkon City soon.

Chapter 8 ends with Xavier attempting to send a message back through the Deepspace Tunnel to make contact with someone. Interestingly enough he calls this "Traceback II." This sounded familiar to me and sure enough the game starts by mentioning that exact same thing, it is going past a black hole and is what says that line "we are stuck in this loop."

I thought in previous posts that the Aether Core is what could cure MC... but now I think the Aether Core is likely what Philos's artificial core is called... so who created it in the first place? ｢(ﾟﾍﾟ)

The Deepspace Tunnel is a spacetime anomaly likely caused by Philos's existence since it was "never meant to exist." So why was it created? And by who?

[max1461]

Linguists deal with two kinds of theories or models.

First, you have grammars. A grammar, in this sense, is a model of an individual natural language: what sorts of utterances occur in that language? When are they used and what do they mean? Even assembling this sort of model in full is a Herculean task, but we are fairly successful at modeling sub-systems of individual languages: what sounds occur in the language, and how may they be ordered and combined?—this is phonology. What strings of words occur in the language, and what strings don't, irrespective of what they mean?—this is syntax. Characterizing these things, for a particular language, is largely tractable. A grammar (a model of the utterances of a single language) is falsified if it predicts utterances that do not occur, or fails to predict utterances that do occur. These situations are called "overgeneration" and "undergeneration", respectively. One of the advantages linguistics has as a science is that we have both massive corpora of observational data (text that people have written, databases of recorded phone calls), and access to cheap and easy experimental data (you can ask people to say things in the target language—you have to be a bit careful about how you do this—and see if what they say accords with your model). We have to make some spherical cow type assumptions, we have to "ignore friction" sometimes (friction is most often what the Chomskyans call "performance error", which you do not have to be a Chomskyan to believe in, but I digress). In any case, this lets us build robust, useful, highly predictive, and falsifiable, although necessarily incomplete, models of individual natural languages. These are called descriptive grammars.

Descriptive grammars often have a strong formal component—Chomsky, for all his faults, recognized that both phonology and syntax could be well described by formal grammars in the sense of mathematics and computer science, and these tools have been tremendously productive since the 60s in producing good models of natural language. I believe Chomsky's program sensu stricto is a dead end, but the basic insight that human language can be thought about formally in this way has been extremely useful and has transformed the field for the better. Read any descriptive grammar, of a language from Europe or Papua or the Amazon, and you will see (in linguists' own idiosyncratic notation) a flurry regexes and syntax trees (this is a bit unfair—the computer scientists stole syntax trees from us, also via Chomsky) and string rewrite rules and so on and so forth. Some of this preceded Chomsky but more than anyone else he gave it legs.

Anyway, linguists are also interested in another kind of model, which confusingly enough we call simply a "theory". So you have "grammars", which are theories of individual natural languages, and you have "theories", which are theories of grammars. A linguistic theory is a model which predicts what sorts of grammar are possible for a human language to have. This generally comes in the form of making claims about

the structure of the cognitive faculty for language, and its limitations

the pathways by which language evolves over time, and the grammars that are therefore attractors and repellers in this dynamical system.

Both of these avenues of research have seen some limited success, but linguistics as a field is far worse at producing theories of this sort than it is at producing grammars.

Capital-G Generativism, Chomsky's program, is one such attempt to produce a theory of human language, and it has not worked very well at all. Chomsky's adherents will say it has worked very well—they are wrong and everybody else thinks they are very wrong, but Chomsky has more clout in linguistics than anyone else so they get to publish in serious journals and whatnot. For an analogy that will be familiar to physics people: Chomskyans are string theorists. And they have discovered some stuff! We know about wh-islands thanks to Generativism, and we probably would not have discovered them otherwise. Wh-islands are weird! It's a good thing the Chomskyans found wh-islands, and a few other bits and pieces like that. But Generativism as a program has, I believe, hit a dead end and will not be recovering.

Right, Generativism is sort of, kind of attempting to do (1), poorly. There are other people attempting to do (1) more robustly, but I don't know much about it. It's probably important. For my own part I think (2) has a lot of promise, because we already have a fairly detailed understanding of how language changes over time, at least as regards phonology. Some people are already working on this sort of program, and there's a lot of work left to be done, but I do think it's promising.

Someone said to me, recently-ish, that the success of LLMs spells doom for descriptive linguistics. "Look, that model does better than any of your grammars of English at producing English sentences! You've been thoroughly outclassed!". But I don't think this is true at all. Linguists aren't confused about which English sentences are valid—many of us are native English speakers, and could simply tell you ourselves without the help of an LLM. We're confused about why. We're trying to distill the patterns of English grammar, known implicitly to every English speaker, into explicit rules that tell us something explanatory about how English works. An LLM is basically just another English speaker we can query for data, except worse, because instead of a human mind speaking a human language (our object of study) it's a simulacrum of such.

Uh, for another physics analogy: suppose someone came along with a black box, and this black box had within it (by magic) a database of every possible history of the universe. You input a world-state, and it returns a list of all the future histories that could follow on from this world state. If the universe is deterministic, there should only be one of them; if not maybe there are multiple. If the universe is probabilistic, suppose the machine also gives you a probability for each future history. If you input the state of a local patch of spacetime, the machine gives you all histories in which that local patch exists and how they evolve.

Now, given this machine, I've got a theory of everything for you. My theory is: whatever the machine says is going to happen at time t is what will happen at time t. Now, I don't doubt that that's a very useful thing! Most physicists would probably love to have this machine! But I do not think my theory of everything, despite being extremely predictive, is a very good one. Why? Because it doesn't tell you anything, it doesn't identify any patterns in the way the natural world works, it just says "ask the black box and then believe it". Well, sure. But then you might get curious and want to ask: are there patterns in the black box's answers? Are there human-comprehensible rules which seem to characterize its output? Can I figure out what those are? And then, presto, you're doing good old regular physics again, as if you didn't even have the black box. The black box is just a way to run experiments faster and cheaper, to get at what you really want to know.

General Relativity, even though it has singularities, and it's incompatible with Quantum Mechanics, is better as a theory of physics than my black box theory of everything, because it actually identifies patterns, it gives you some insight into how the natural world behaves, in a way that you, a human, can understand.

In linguistics, we're in a similar situation with LLMs, only LLMs are a lot worse than the black box I've described—they still mess up and give weird answers from time to time. And more importantly, we already have a linguistic black box, we have billions of them: they're called human native speakers, and you can find one in your local corner store or dry cleaner. Querying the black box and trying to find patterns is what linguistics already is, that's what linguists do, and having another, less accurate black box does very little for us.

Now, there is one advantage that LLMs have. You can do interpretability research on LLMs, and figure out how they are doing what they are doing. Linguists and ML researchers are kind of in a similar boat here. In linguistics, well, we already all know how to talk, we just don't know how we know how to talk. In ML, you have these models that are very successful, buy you don't know why they work so well, how they're doing it. We have our own version of interpretability research, which is neuroscience and neurolinguistics. And ML researchers have interpretability research for LLMs, and it's very possible theirs progresses faster than ours! Now with the caveat that we can't expect LLMs to work just like the human brain, and we can't expect the internal grammar of a language inside an LLM to be identical to the one used implicitly by the human mind to produce native-speaker utterances, we still might get useful insights out of proper scrutiny of the innards of an LLM that speaks English very well. That's certainly possible!

But just having the LLM, does that make the work of descriptive linguistics obsolete? No, obviously not. To say so completely misunderstands what we are trying to do.

[kacievvbbbb]

The Donovan Desmond Theory

In light of the latest chapter.

Donovan Desmond is giving serious Reginal Hargreeves vibes.

But like if I had suspicions that he was a bad dude or at least is involved in some bad things then that’s been cleared up a little bit in the most recent chapters.

I don’t know if I fully believe Desmond is an alien like Melinda thinks I think maybe he has a non human quality to him (like say something like Anya’s powers) combined with his general lack of human understanding it seems I think him being an alien is Melinda’s explanation for what is happening (or you now chances are he could be one but so far the story has remained fairly grounded and so im inclined to believe it will stay that way)

But what I think is most liek let is that he is the one behind the scientific experiments that Anya, bond and probably a whole lot of other dogs and children were subjected to that gave them powers.

Also

Look at the scars on his head. This is just a little lower than where Anya’s comes (which i think are kind of connected to her powers or atleast covering up something connected to her powers) sit. And honestly they just look like brain experimentation scars.

So initially I thought maybe he was the founder of the experimenting giving powers organization looking for a way to perfect or gain powers but now I think that maybe he was one of the first kids to be experimented on. Maybe he was the only one/ one of the only ones/ the most successful experiment, to survive the process and so they make him the poster child of the project and he grows up within it and they are essentially the shadow organization pulling the strings and orchestrating his life. That would explain why he seems to lack so much proper human socialization skills and why he appears odd enough that Melinda thinks he’s an alien.

Or maybe the original organization fell apart in the lead up to the first war and now he’s rebuilding it to try and continue the work or fix what’s wrong with him but I’m inclined to believe he just believes in the work.

All this to say that I think Desmond can read minds like Anya. I think the boys and his family might be part of some side experiment he’s running to see if these powers can be passed down through dna and so he got himself (or the organization set him up with) a family. I think thats the reason he spent a lot of time up close and personal seemingly monitoring Demetrius and his progress. Trying to see if he would develop any special abilities. But he doesn’t and that why Donovan seems to lose interest in his family.

But I think during this time Desmond teaches Demetrius (without explicitly explaining why or what they are doing) how to be impervious to having his mind read I’m guessing incase Demetrius did show promise and would be brought into the fold, and that’s why Anya can’t read him but he seems to have internalized this as simply just not having a stream of consciousness. The only time we hear his thoughts is when he’s thinking about things in the abstract and that’s probably the key to it. He focuses soley on what he is doing right then in every moment and so thereby doesn’t mule anything over enough to have an internal conversation with himself he was probably taught not to “waste time pondering”anything and just to act when it is appropriate to do so, disguised as a very strange business lesson. As he was probably being very intensely instructed on this. But Demetrius shows no signs of any developing powers so Desmond kind of just pushes him to the way side which must have been jarring to suddenly be so unimportant to your father after so many years of such intense observation

Which is why I think Demetrius harbors anger towards his father and doesn’t understand him because what were the lessons for and why did they abruptly stop and why doesn’t anything he do seem to bring them back? But he never really investigates this deeply because the act of not pondering was instilled within him deeply.

So yeah. I think Donovan Desmond can read minds I would also kind of say him saying “this was a worth while evening” after sitting in silence with his family makes me feel like he just read their minds (those of which he could read) and got what he needed to. Which also makes me believe he is still running some kind of passive experiment on them and that’s why he doesn’t want Melinda to interact with Damian so much maybe he’s going the opposite route and seeing if neglect will allow the boys to awaken their possibly latent abilities. I don’t know man I’m just tapping 🤷🏿‍♀️ Donovan Desmond just has the look of someone that’s been experimented on whole Demetrius has the look of someone who withstood all kinds of psychological torture from a young age. Take all this with a grain of salt

[reality-detective]

EXPOSED: The Hidden Network of 10,000 Deep Underground Military Bases (D.U.M.B.s) – A Global Conspiracy Unveiled

Beneath our feet lies a world shrouded in darkness and secrecy—a network of over 10,000 Deep Underground Military Bases (D.U.M.B.s) that stretch across the globe. These aren’t just military bunkers; they’re part of a sinister plan by the global elite to maintain control over humanity, operating far beyond the reach of any government oversight.

The Dark Underworld: 10,000 D.U.M.B.s Across the Planet Imagine a vast labyrinth of underground bases, hidden from the public eye, where the most horrific activities take place. Over 10,000 of these bases exist worldwide, with 1,800 in the United States alone. These facilities aren’t just military outposts; they are massive underground cities connected by high-speed trains, built for purposes that defy the imagination.

Unthinkable Atrocities: Human Captivity and Bio-Experiments Within these bases, unspeakable horrors are said to occur. Reports of human experimentation, especially on children, are whispered among those who dare to investigate. These facilities allegedly host bio-research labs developing weapons designed to target specific DNA, viruses meant to decimate populations, and other forms of biological warfare. These aren’t just theories—they’re terrifying realities hidden from the world.

The Elite's Secret Army: Engineered Super Soldiers One of the most disturbing revelations is the existence of engineered super soldiers, bred and conditioned within these D.U.M.B.s. These soldiers, created through a twisted combination of genetic engineering and cybernetics, are designed to be the ultimate weapons—loyal, fearless, and nearly invincible. Their purpose? To protect the secrets of these underground bases and to enforce the will of the global elite.

The Vatican-Jerusalem Tunnel: A Sinister Connection Adding to this web of deceit is the recent discovery of a 1,500-mile tunnel connecting the Vatican to Jerusalem, reportedly filled with a staggering hoard of gold. This treasure trove, transported by an armada of 650 planes, is rumored to be part of the Vatican’s secret wealth, hidden away for centuries and now uncovered as part of this global conspiracy.

A Global Web of Control: The Super Elites At the heart of this conspiracy are the so-called "Super Elites"—a tiny fraction of the global population who pull the strings from the shadows. These are the same elites who control the military-industrial complex, the media, and even the highest levels of government. Their reach is so vast that over 800 million individuals within the global military and intelligence complex answer to them, ensuring that their grip on power remains unchallenged.

The Puppet Masters: Rothschilds, Rockefellers, and Khazarian Bloodlines Behind the scenes, powerful families like the Rothschilds and Rockefellers, along with ancient Khazarian bloodlines, have been orchestrating this control for centuries. Their influence spans continents, manipulating world events to maintain their dominance. Their goal is not just to amass wealth but to control humanity itself.

The White Hats: A Glimmer of Hope But not all hope is lost. A group of brave individuals within the military, known as the White Hats, are fighting back. These warriors operate in the shadows, working tirelessly to expose the truth and dismantle the structures of oppression. They are the last line of defense against this global conspiracy, dedicated to restoring justice and freedom to humanity.

The Final Hour: A Call to Action We stand on the brink of a new era, where the truth will finally be revealed. The age of ignorance is over. The forces of darkness will be exposed, and the world will see the light of truth. But we must be vigilant and ready to act. The future of humanity depends on our willingness to confront the darkness and reclaim our freedom. The time for revelation is now—will you be ready when the final battle begins? 🤔

- Julian Assange

[youzicha]

18, 11

18. Is the physicists' sought-for "theory of everything" a chimera?

You really should ask a physicist about this! As I understand it, the basic fact that makes it debatable is that there is some technical issue which means you can't handle gravity in the same mathematical framework as the other forces. But what lesson should we draw from that? I guess we should be less confident that they got the description of the other forces right. But even before gravity people were unhappy with renormalization theory ("it is what I would call a dippy process"—Feynman), and meanwhile, supposedly there are formalisms like string theory that can accommodate gravity, it's just that it's impossible to make progress without a particle accelerator the size of the solar system. From my layman's point of view, it seems like there's not so much philosophical lessons to be drawn from the fact that renormalization failed. In some alternative history some other mathematical approach could have been popular, but everything would still be underconstrained just from lack of experimental data...

Conversely, I guess there were physicists in the 1980s who thought they would recognize the ToE just by its mathematical elegance and solve fundamental physics in their lifetime, and that hope seems very chimerical now.

11. Is hip-hop/rap more political than the Eurovision Song Contest?

This question feels like a throwback to 2015! Like, the reason hip-hop is considered political is that it's associated with Blackness, and hence with questions of race which (along with sexuality) is the most contested political issue; meanwhile the Eurovision is avowedly "apolitical", and as we all know "to be neutral is to be complicit". But now in the 2020s with wars in Ukraine and around Israel, nationalism seems less harmless, so maybe even the stupid Eurovision pop music can become controversial again.

I think ultimately rap is an artistic form, not an ideology or a movement, so you can't really say that it's politically significant in itself. Otherwise we again end up in 2015 when everyone was briefly convinced that Hamilton had achieved the great unified theory of politics and music...

[bugtoonz]

Urudrf uhm can you share Hoagie HCs :3 and Chad HCs :3 I don't see you getting much attention for that post and that makes me sad so I will compensate for it

this is so thoughtful, thank you!! although honestly, i’m really happy with all of the asks i’ve gotten so far. i’m pleasantly surprised by (and thankful for!) the amount of submissions, even if it’s not a crazy amount.

i have lots of thoughts on Hoagie. he really is such a sweet, goofy kid. unfortunately though, his dad is very much dead in my eyes. Hoagie misses him a lot, but Tommy doesn’t really remember him. In Tommy’s eyes, Hoagie is kinda like his surrogate dad. Unrelated to Sad Family Stuff, I also think that before deciding to work as a field operative, Hoagie strongly considering working as a 2x4 tech inventor/engineer at either moonbase or the deep sea science lab. he quickly changed his mind when he realized being a scientist meant that he would rarely be able to pilot any of his creations. he also really wanted to stick with wally, since the two of them have known each other since pre-k (the longest friendship out of the sector!). even though lots of people assume Hoagie loves school because of his natural intelligence, he actually really dislikes it. he’d much rather learn things through experimentation or hands on experience, and he’s so smart none of his classes challenge him enough to be interesting. i can def see him taking accelerated courses throughout his entire academic career in an attempt to get it over with as soon as possible. he probably ends up majoring in something like aerospace engineering or physics.

first of all, for Chad, his middle name is Mallory. it’s something we talked about in DMs, but it is so insanely canon to me now. he’s so embarrassed by it he’s even tried to edit it out of the super big computermabob. anyways, he also plays an insane amount of instruments. mostly strings. his favorite is the bass because of how simple it is, and he plays it in the scumbucketpunks. his parents hate it, but it’s one of the few hobbies he has that he truly enjoys. i am a big believer in the The Steve is actually a decommissioned Numbuh 100 theory, so i think that being able to hang out with his old mentor outside of the teen ninja setting is something Chad really clings onto, even if it is very bittersweet. honestly, most things in Chad’s life are either very complicated or bittersweet. poor guy. but i think he’s spent so long dedicating his life to the KND, galactic or otherwise, he isn’t even really sure if he’d be able to live a normal life if given the chance. he just wishes there was someone he could talk to without having to lie around all the truths he’s being forced to hide.

[winchestersheaven]

Smowkie recs McShep

i've been reading a lot of McShep fics lately and a while back i mentioned that i had plans to make a couple of fic rec posts. they're taking me forever to make, but here's the first one, finally!

@wonkyelk was one of the first authors i found, and i've read and loved SO MANY of their fics! wonderful author that made me fall head over heels for the pining!John and oblivious!Rodney trope! 💖

this is by no means an exhaustive list of the fics i loved from them, it's just a small number of the ones i read and enjoyed. my biggest recommendation with this author is to just go read their fics, it's great stuff and their language is delightful.

so here goes, in no particular order:

19 McShep fics by WonkyElk (under the cut, because this got long)

Of Sealing Wax and String 3562 words | Teen author's tags: First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, POV Rodney McKay summary:

Rodney had never had so much love in his life that he wasn't desperate to catch all the drops that he could.

Smowkie: there are too many things that i love in this to mention them all, so i'll just add my favorite quote from the fic: "[...] a thoughtful look, albeit one squarely aimed at the floor, which was hardly likely to appreciate it." 💖

You’re the Book That I Have Opened 1834 words | Teen author's tags: Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, Character Study, Angst with a Happy Ending, Short, Internalized Homophobia summary:

At eighteen, John Sheppard had known a lot of things. He knew how to dance, with exactly the right level of polite formality. He knew how to ride well and the proper care of a horse. He knew everything about the theory and mathematics of flight. He knew that being a fighter pilot was the absolute dream of his life. And he knew - knew - that he wasn't into guys.

Smowkie: lovely thing, chock-full of John feels, and with this quote: "They sat in silence for a while. Silence was something John could do. It never came out awkward or wrong, you could never blurt out unintentional silence, or get your bits of silence all mixed up and taken out of context." brb, crying about John Sheppard.

How to Disappear Completely 7276 words | Teen author's tags: Angst with a Happy Ending, Temporary Character Death, Feelings Realization, POV Alternating summary:

"Look, I know you don’t know me and you’re not aware of the fact that, if you knew I was missing - which you don’t, because I never existed and, even if I did, you wouldn’t have met me yet - then you’d be very, very upset about it … but I really need your help. And, actually, so does the universe."

Smowkie: this one is amazing! mild horror warning for the creepiness in the beginning, that was some well written discomfort! also, so much love the fantastic way WonkyElk chose to show Rodney's mood and vulnerability 💖

New Every Day 2047 words | Gen author's tags: Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, Angst, Short, POV John Sheppard, Character Study summary:

Sometimes it seemed like he had to relearn emotions, over and over again.

Smowkie: this one! what a lovely thing. all the John feels. i want to add a couple of quotes here too, but they're right at the end so i'm not doing that, sadly. i can quote "Especially Rodney" though, because especially Rodney 💖

Some Misunderstanding 6193 words | Teen author's tags: Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Human Experimentation, First Kiss, POV Alternating summary:

The path to Ascension was not a smooth one.

Smowkie: this one! UNCOMFY. really really good with a very interesting style, but oof, uncomfy! love it!

All You Need is … 1830 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Feelings Realization, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst summary:

The thing about love was, that it wasn't enough. It might fill you up and set you alight and hug you close and tear your heart out and pet you gently and hang like a slow-dragging weight around your neck: but, for all of its bullying and grandstanding, it skipped right over all the practical things and let you scramble around to fix those up - or not - as best you might; but definitely with none of its assistance.

Smowkie: this made me all mushy inside, it was great 💖

Flowers and Other Ambiguities 1289 words | Gen author's tags: Pre-Slash, Character Study, POV John Sheppard, Short, Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay summary:

The field was blossoming in such rich dark blues and purples, with an underlying green, that John was irresistibly put in mind of the ocean, his feet lightly stepping over the water, mindful of the lurking creatures of the deep.

Smowkie: this one holds a special place in my heart. it was one of the first McShep fics i read and it's what really sold me on the pining!John and oblivious!Rodney trope. it's such a wonderful fic, and the pining, man the pining 💖

But Soft … 1645 words | Teen author's tags: Fluff, Alternate Universe - College/University, Theatre, Short summary:

"I'm just suggesting, John, that, perhaps your speeches about Juliet, should not be notably less impassioned than your banter with Mercutio."

Smowkie: i’m generally not interested in AUs for McShep, but i had enjoyed so much from WonkyElk that i read this anyway, and BOY am i glad i did, because i adored this!

Not Early, But Not Too Late 810 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Realisations, Getting Together, First Kiss summary: 

Rodney finally learns the language.

Smowkie: this is just lovely 💖

A Matter of Mugs 2959 words | Teen author's tags: Post-Canon, Break Up, Light Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Getting Together, Oblivious Rodney McKay summary:

Rodney's emotional levels were generally at critical, but, right now, they were straining the banks and spoiling for a flood of world-drowning proportions. This wasn't because of a crisis, nor even anything so petty and ordinary as a mid-life crisis - not that Rodney was old enough for that, slap bang in the very prime of life as he was and intended to remain - but more of a build up of small things and not-so small things, stacking up awkwardly on top of each other and wobbling under the pressure and the terrible engineering choices.

Smowkie: this is a wonderful read, and i love how John comes first for Rodney long before he realizes his feelings for him. also Rodney and Jeannie bonding 💖 (to clarify the break-up tag: i've chosen not to add relationship tags in this post since all fics are McShep, but this fic has both the John/Rodney and the Jennifer/Rodney relationship tags, and the break-up tag is for Jennifer/Rodney)

One Stroke of The Moon 1378 words | Gen author's tags: Short, Episode: s05e06 The Shrine, Light Angst, Team as Family summary:

When the Avarro moon hangs lowest in the sky, ripe and full - so bright and summoning that your head becomes full of it and nothing else exists - then it is, that some climb to the very top of the trees, stretch out their hands and their hopes and touch her on the belly, with a reverent stroke. Those that touch the moon in this way are never the same afterwards. Nor would they want to be.

Smowkie: this is such a lovely thing. the team’s loyalty and love to Rodney is just 💖

A Staff, A Spear 2179 words | Teen author's tags: Character Study, Angst, Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, Short, POV John Sheppard summary:

For a time, he had no memory, no self; no pain. Until the sunshine cooled in his blood and the wine left him with a sigh, like a ghost, and his whole personality fell back inside him, with a thump. It was so heavy, being himself again, he could almost have cried.

Smowkie: the fic that made me make this post. this one really hits you smack in the face with John feels. it's heartbreaking and painful in the best of ways. 💖

Setting Parameters 4545 words | Teen author's tags: Hurt/Comfort, Action/Adventure, Virtual Reality, POV Alternating summary:

It absolutely wasn’t a holodeck.

Smowkie: i love a good holodeck disaster story, but this is so much more than just that, and i adore it. the McShep relationship especially, but also Teyla (and Ford too) 💖 much love! and my favorite quote: They rested against each other when they were done, in a way which, to the laymen’s mind, might very easily be confused with snuggling. guys, come on... xD 💖

A Pair of Shadows 2090 words | Teen author's tags: POV Outsider, Rodney and John are Stuck Together, Fluff summary: 

John and Rodney become joined at the hip. This is not metaphorical.

Smowkie: glorious outsider POV fic 💖

Opposite to Blue 1459 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Character Study, References to Depression, Angst with a Happy Ending, POV John Sheppard summary:

The first time that John had met Rodney McKay he had been brightly, regrettably, orange.

Smowkie: more John feels 💖 Rodney is such a sweetheart in this, and he pretty much killed me with the quote "the wiggly thing your voice did when you called me" 💖

A Sufficiency of Freedom 1342 words | Teen author's tags: Character Study, Short, Light Angst, Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, POV John Sheppard summary:

From time to time, people had asked John why he loved to fly.

Smowkie: this has such great imagery, a beautiful insight in John's mind 💖

An Anchor in the Mist 1620 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, First Kiss, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, POV John Sheppard summary:

Sometimes, when he was back on Earth, John would look around at the colours, the brightness, the busyness - the sheer number of people, the surrealism of it all - and wonder if it was actually real.

Smowkie: THIS ONE! i adore this one. it's John feels again, and it's hurt/comforty and angsty and sweet and loving and painful and happy and just beautiful. i want to live in this one 💖

To silent ash 1529 words | Teen author's tags: Angst and Feels, Post-Canon, Sad summary:

Dear Jeannie…

Smowkie: ah, pain. it's beautiful and so very sad. read the author's note before the fic and decide if you want the spoilers or not, but either way it's worth it imo, i loved it

Accepting a Complement 1433 words | Gen author's tags: Short, Feelings, working out a relationship summary:

He wasn't sure exactly when he and Sheppard had become 'those two' or 'you two' or 'that pair' to so many people. But, now that the phrase had jumped up and bit him, so to speak, he was very aware that he had heard it too many times to count.

Smowkie: this fic made me feel in love with McShep. i mean, i guess i am in love with McShep, that's sorta how i ship, i see something and fall in love. but this fic, yeah, it brought it out so much that i was just a mess reading it, the whole thing; giddy, grinning, the stomach thing that feels a lot like anxiety but isn't. yeah, i love this one, it made me so happy 💖

[nicoleeblossom]

König…👕

main masterlist📌

*·˚Don’t forget to reblog, follow, like, and comment on the authors’ or artists’ pages. Show them some love!

*·˚Broken link or @? Pop a note in the comments or my ask box.

Works by @lethalchiralium

So This Is Love: König needs to keep you calm

Middle of the Summer: You need sleep but König is terrified

Delicate + Ghost: You were glad you had them both, satisfying your needs

Works by @uhohdad

Experimental: Your heart quickens and you can’t help but take in his build, even from across the long lab table.

The Girl Who Conqured The Mountain

Flowers by @miniwheat77: König is placing tiiny white and purple flowers in your hair

Ghost in the Austrian Asylum by @prazinos: The two of you want him as well

Dilf König Pt 1 & Dilf König Pt 2 by @sweetiecutie: It started with fleeting glances in your general direction

Pervert König by @yawnderu: ''Mein engel...'' He starts, voice strained

Cock-warming w/ König by @stargirlrchive: So connected and the tension in your body eased away

The Invisible String Theory by @halcyone-of-the-sea: There’s something that keeps you here, on this base

Gentle Touch by @kechiwrites: By the time you get to his lower back, König is almost purring

Background Check by @credince--writes: You glanced at him, and saw him staring out the window, deep into the dark forest.

Pomegranates and a Phone Number by @mysticalmallard

GoddessReader by @quarterlifekitty

BestFriend!König by @luxcuriousao3

Dividers by @bernardsbendystraws

[kumokumiko]

*muttering, pinning up pictures and labels and red string on a corkboard labelled 'ANIS'* so like, obviously now that Rapi's backstory and character arc are more or less solved, everybody seems to be going ham on theories for Anis and Neon, because it's only right for all of our Counters girls to be treated equally, so. this is me collecting my thoughts about Anis, to get them out of my head and stare at them (and maybe laugh later, once reveals happen), using everything I know up to chapter 28 + events...

so, Anis has some kind of idol or performer background, and hints are all over the place:

- the post-credit scene for Footstep, Walk, Run features Anis thinking Rapi wants an autograph, she mentions being famous "even after retirement"

- Bond Story with Anis, she mentions doing promotional work before quickly changing the subject

- Mustang takes our first meeting in Chapter 4 as an opportunity to invite Anis to "come back", which she declines

now, LOTS of people are leaning into the theory that Anis is Pretty, because she just came up in FWR, this may have merit, who knows. I think it's DEFINITELY true that her former idol group is Twinkle Tristar, which is the group she mentions in her bond story that went defunct before some members branched off into the jewelry industry, because it would make sense that she wants to discretely keep tabs on her former co-stars. my support for this is merely that after Rapi messages the Commander in secret under the handle 'Pira' (lol) in Chapter 27, Anis finds out somehow, and then does the same, and the handle she adopts is 'Twinkle'.

so, if Mustang wants her back to reform Twinkle Tristar, or at least get former members back together for some other endeavor, would that mean it's a Nikke idol group? that seems obvious, but idk, something doesn't feel right. I just don't get the impression that Anis was a Nikke when she was an idol. her anecdote in chapter 16, about not thinking much about Nikkes or their rights, just feels like it would be her mindset when she was an idol, and so in that case, her being thrust out of the spotlight by becoming a Nikke might fit her feeling of it being a karmic punishment. Still, it's also possible that Pretty *was* tied up in this too, maybe as another Nikke who was part of the unit. MAYBE it was an experimental Nikke-human hybrid idol group, which was ended when Pretty was assassinated by the Nikkephobe at her last concert, and Anis, left with nowhere to go after the group collapsed, found herself shunted into a Nikke body under some tragic circumstance, leading to the cynical and hopeless outlook we find her in at the start of the story.

now, about Anis specifically...she's got wisecracks, she's cynical, she's often suspicious of others, she's got some pretty bad executive disfunction around cleaning (per Liter's bond story)...all of which feel like learned behavior and cope/depression that grew out of a steady downward spiral from the moment she became a Nikke. part of why I'm so intrigued by her is these little glimpses you get of the hope she used to have, small wistful comments about wishing things were better or concern she shows for the Commander when he makes some casual heroic declaration that she knows is the kind of thing that will earn him enemies, or make his life harder, but that she still respects all the same.

...I can't claim to know what the writers are cooking here, but if I'm even half-right on any of the speculation I've thrown at the wall here, I will be very excited-screamy when the reveal comes.

I love all the Counters girls, and while Rapi may be the Canonical Commander Wife, and Neon may be My Best Friend and the Most Underrated Counters Member whom I will ride or die for, Anis...she stole my heart. I need her backstory event / msq chapter so badly

[greenouillee]

I think a lot of my frustration with modern theoretical physics (especially string theory) can be summarised as, if we're handwaving the physical constraints, and we're handwaving the lack of experimental results, and we're handwaving the maths, then who's flying the damn plane???

[delphiniumarchangelmoon]

Oddly specific hobbies I think stardew valley characters would have

Sebastian- have you seen those custom doll videos? The ones where they like… rip the heads off Barbies and tear the hair out and re-build them? Scrub the faces off and repaint them? The intersection between artistic and morbid REALLY screams Seb to me I don’t know why.

I think Emily has a collection of succulents but she will only keep like, one category of them. She has every variety of a single type of succulent and that’s all she grows.

Look me dead in the eye and tell me Abigail doesn’t have the most baller isopod collection in the entire republic. I’m talking dairy cows, rubber duckies, the local native species, you name it. She has her own experimental crossbreeds. And this is no modifiedWalmart plastic container situation oh no, these guys live in massive glass terrariums with plants imported from each variety’s native location. She sells feet pics to buy isopod supplies. They live like kings.

Don’t ask me why but I feel like Shane was big into gravity falls while it was airing I feel like he was a big theory guy. He had a conspiracy board on his wall with red string and everything. He’s still chasing that high to this day (no one tell him about arg’s he would never recover)

The wizard is really good at Tetris. Like, ‘people you watch YouTube essays about’ good at Tetris, but he’s not a competitive person so he doesn’t go to events or anything.

Pam is a candy crush girlie buy my silence

I think Haley and Alex watched too many ghost hunting shows as kids and the moment they had their own money they bought like, a spirit box and an oujia board and whenever they’re bored and home alone they do like, seances n shit but they think it’s really silly so they giggle the entire time

Elliott collects shoes, like unwearable ass shoes. Huge platforms, glass heels, vintage boots, stuff that don’t match anything he owns. Just because he can.

Sam has the “adhd 10,000 hobbies curse” but the one that confuses people the most is his HUGE nail polish collection. He literally only ever paints his nails black for the ~rockstar vibes~ but he has this just BUCKET of polishes. He swatches them individually on those fake nails you see people use in nail art videos and he has a little notebook where he writes down how many coats it takes to be opaque, how long it took to dry, if the color matched how it looked in the bottle, etc. and then rates them on quality. it started as him trying to find a good set to gift Haley for her birthday but he ended up just becoming really hyper focused on it and now he has a literal catalogue of nail polish. It’s only a matter of time before he starts trying nail art to make use of them all but only time will tell if it sticks long enough for him to get good at it.

Harvey watches the most absurd soap operas. Even ones in languages he doesn’t know. Not even with subtitles he’s just here for the vibes