#tetris red clouds

[rook2ii]

OC doodles from the last couple months that I never uploaded✨

I was originally gonna have this as one post but trying to tag it was hell, so I split it up. These are the OC based ones.

Oracle and Natalie

My coresona, Rey (ft. Wheatley)

Doodles of some OCs of mine from Red Clouds (ft. Oracle, Tetris, The Butterfly Sisters, Nightstar, Crow, and North)

What I think I would look like as different things. Kinda dubious on the DCA one tho.

I liked the bugsona one I did so I doodled her again. Her name is Vivi :)

Attempts at drawing Natalie in different art styles. The top left one is supposed to be Vivziepop's style, the two next to it are supposed to be Steven Universe, and the one at the bottom is Equestria Girls.

Doodle page of Boill (ft. his partner, Chip)

And a doodle sheet of Crow that I did a little bit ago that made me wanna make this post in the first place. I think by making them more square, it makes them more interesting and funner to draw :)

[videogamesskies]

Tetris (arcade) (1988)

[resignedbiology]

Cake for An Angel

🎂 aka the most almost belated Happy Birthday to Hiori 🎂, featuring the fluffiest Hiorin, as well as Karasu and Shidou making Rin's life a living nightmare in the best way possible, as always.

“I swear to god, working with you is like talking to a fucking calculator —“

“ — and I wouldn’t be so pissed off if you just followed the instructions —“

“Ok I’m colouring the frosting pink since neither of you answered when I asked.”

“Shidou, if you say ONE more word —”

Rin knew he shouldn’t have asked Karasu for help, and if he was completely honest, he couldn’t even remember how Shidou had gotten involved in the first place — oh, right. He’d stumbled into the France Stratum’s kitchen for exactly three reasons. First, it was Hiori’s birthday in approximately an hour and twelve minutes. Second, Rin had completely forgotten said birthday. Third, Karasu had mentioned at some point that he had some baking experience. At this point, being stuck in a kitchen with two other sleep deprived boys who were all trying to make a cake near midnight — he was considering cutting his losses and just being honest to Hiori about his bad memory for birthdays.

Said blue haired birthday boy was sleeping soundly in Rin’s bed (something they both hoped was allowed, despite the fact that they’d never asked). Trying to keep this particular group of footballers quiet was a mission god would give up on. Karasu was the best person to try, but when he inevitably failed, he started to raise his voice anyway. Rin had finally focused himself on a task, at least; cutting slices of fruit into geometric shapes was keeping him quiet enough. Shidou was the least likely candidate, and yet —

“Shh, crow for brains, yer gonna wake the blueberry up,” Shidou chuckled, taking the electric mixers out of Karasu’s hand, handing him a spatula. “You’ve gotta fold angel cake batter anyway, I finished the egg whites so you don’t have to make your wimpy arms tired! Stiff peaks and all, just like —“

“Yeah, yeah, yup, I got it,” Karasu mumbled, taking the spatula and bowl of cloud like foam. Something about the antennae haired menace’s tone when he said stiff peaks was suspicious — it sounded like it was going to be followed by something horrendously lewd about a certain red headed Itoshi brother. Karasu had no intention of dealing with another one of Rin’s rage fits hearing Shidou talk about what he and Sae did after the U20 match. Admittedly… he couldn’t really find it in him to blame Rin much for his reaction. After mixing, he put the cake in the oven, using the greased pan he’d prepared earlier.

“Wait, are we making buttercream or whipped cream —“ Rin interrupted in a mildly hurried tone, flicking his gaze back at the other PxG players.

“Whipped cream, buttercream’s a pain, even if it’s tasty,” Shidou answered without any raunchy tilt to the words whipped or cream, thankfully.

“Okay. I’ll make that. Shidou, can you finish cutting these shapes?”

“Boss-y, just like your bro —“

“Nope!” Karasu exclaimed in a hush, grabbing Rin’s pyjama collar in one fist and Shidou’s in the other. “No. We are here to bake a cake.”

“Because a certain someone forgot.“ Shidou teased, sticking his tongue out at Rin with a grin.

“… you’re lucky I care about Hiori more than I care about hating you.”

“The Itoshi brothers, such hopeless romantics.” The blond trilled.

It was a miracle Rin hadn’t ground his teeth down to dust just from having to share a team with Shidou, but after some extensive conversations from Hiori about not spending so much energy on someone who was purposefully trying to rile him up, it was a little bit easier to ignore Shidou — a little bit. By the end of it, just three minutes before midnight, the three boys were left flour and sugar dusted, scented like vanilla and cream. A light and airy cake sat on the counter, frosted with a little bit of lemon whipped cream and topped with pieces of fruits cut up into Tetris pieces. There was a few extra intricate shapes of garnishes, lemon peel twists and decorations made from strawberry leaves. 

“Didn’t know you had that kind of knife skill, Shidou.” Karasu muttered with earnest surprise. 

“Got bored one weekend in Middle School and snuck into a cake decorating class. Got kicked out when the teacher realised I’d eaten a bunch of the cakes. Still made off with three of ‘em though.”

“That… makes sense for you.” Rin huffed out a breath, pinching at the bridge of his nose.

“Yeah, they’re awful pretty — did Tabito tell ya I liked tetris, Rin? Guess I did love it a whole lot back then.” A voice giggled out from behind the trio.

“Holy shit —“ Rin spun on his heel, almost needing to cling to Karasu’s shoulder to prevent him from wheeling face first into the floor. His shoulders relaxed as soon as his tired brain pushed past the shock, lungs puffing out a soft exhale before he took a few steps forward, looping his arms around Hiori’s waist and sinking to rest his cheek onto his boyfriend’s bedhead. “I mean — happy birthday. It was supposed to be a surprise —“

“Can it, Rin,” Hiori was still chuckling through his words, the warmth of his voice betraying his own sleepiness. “It was still a surprise — sorta. Y’all are real loud, y’know? All three of ya!”

“But ya like the decorations, so I’ve done my part. Goodnight, lovebirds, my job is done here!” Shidou cackled, heading off to his dorm.

“Happy birthday, Yō. Yer lucky — he’s not a bad kid, I guess.” Karasu patted the couple on their shoulders, shaking his head with a tired smile before leaving the quiet hum of the kitchen’s cool toned lighting.

“Now that yer sous chefs are gone… really, this is amazing, Rin, I didn’t expect ya to do any thin’ for me,” Hiori muttered, smiling at the little moment of quiet the two of them could finally share. “… now, Rin — I love ya and all… but yer still covered in flour, and it’s gettin’ all over me.”

“We can take a shower together later.” Rin deadpan teased back, digging a fork into the cake so he could offer Hiori a bite, finally cracking a smile when the shorter boy got the whole bite in one go. Reaching a hand up to brush a little spot of frosting off of his lover’s lip, he changed course and kissed it away, earning a soft, surprised squeal out of Hiori.

“Rin, yer a menace, just eat the cake!” he laughed, grabbing another fork from the drawer and leaning his elbows on the counter to take another bite.

“Had to let the birthday boy get the first bite.” Rin quipped past a mouthful of fruit and frosting.

[karaokulta]

🚀 ¿Estamos realmente listos para la próxima ola de Innovación Tecnológica en Gaming? 🕹️ La industria del gaming nunca ha sido conocida por jugar a lo seguro. Al contrario, ha estado en la línea del frente de la revolución tecnológica desde que el Tetris empezó a encajar bloques en nuestras mentes. Pero, querida red, ¿hasta dónde puede llegar el pixel para transformarse en una experiencia que rivalice incluso con la realidad? •• ☄️ Realidad Virtual que Más Real no Puede Ser ☄️ •• Imagine sentir la brisa de un mundo virtual, o la adrenalina de la carrera en tus venas sin salir de tu habitación. La RV está transformando más que nuestro entretenimiento; está redefiniendo lo que significa experienciar. Es un portal a universos paralelos donde, sin duda, las posibilidades son infinitas. ••🤖 La AI No Juega Juegos... los Crea 🤖•• Inteligencia Artificial que aprende de tus movimientos, que se adapta a tus estrategias, y que incluso podría estar diseñando los niveles por los cuales te aventurarás mañana. Suena como ciencia ficción, pero es la hoja de ruta para el futuro del desarrollo de juegos. ••🤩 Experiencias Multisensoriales 🤩•• El gusto y el olfato son las fronteras finales en inmersión gaming. Imagina aromas y sabores que cambian tu percepción del juego. ¿Un desafío demasiado grande? Nunca para esta industria. ••💾 Nubes en el Horizonte... de Juego 💾•• El cloud gaming ya es una realidad palpable, pues permite jugar desde cualquier dispositivo sin necesidad de hardware pesado. La evolución de este servicio promete un universo en el que no habrá límites para jugar. El gaming está en una encrucijada tecnológica - entre lo tangible e intangible, lo hiperrealista y lo abstracto, la tradición y el umbral de lo desconocido. Y ahora, unas preguntas para avivar el debate: 💥 ¿Qué tecnología crees que transformará nuestra forma de jugar en la próxima década? 💥 ¿Es el fin de los dispositivos de juego tradicionales y la bienvenida a una era de gaming omni-accesible? 💥 ¿Nos acercamos a una era de realidad alternativa donde, quizás, nuestra realidad actual se quede corta? Invito a la comunidad a compartir sus perspectivas visionarias, prácticas, y sí, incluso aquellas provocativas. Déjame tus comentarios abajo o menciona a quien pueda aportar algo de magia gamer a esta conversación. 🎮 #GamingFuturo #InnovacionTecnologica #RealidadVirtual #InteligenciaArtificial #CloudGaming 🎮

[bisexualbaker]

Now with descriptions!

[Image descriptions follow]

Image one: The Tetrominoes (Tetris pieces), labeled with their respective letters: I (long, narrow, cyan); O (yellow square); T (purple, T-shaped); J (dark blue, looks like a backwards L); L (orange, L-shaped); S (green S-shaped zigzag); and Z (red Z-shaped zigzag).

Image two: "Did. Did you tag this tetris spoilers".

Image three: Personifications of J and L looking over the poll results. J is a Black person with shaved sides and short locs, wearing a plaid button-down and suspenders. L is racially ambiguous and is more femme-presenting. J looks neutrally interested, while L seems to be struggling to find something nice to say. "Wow you all put… a lot of thought into this."

Image four: Personification of I, a thin, glasses-wearing type, looking at theresults on his phone and seeming a little smug about being in second place. "Yeah, that's about what I thought they'd be."

Image five: O, a rather blocky guy with a goatee, wearing a polo shirt. He is unimpressed, possibly because he came in last place. "No accounting for taste, but a lot of you clearly just suck at Tetris."

Image six: S (15.1%) and Z (11.2%), side-by-side, looking at the results on S's phone. They are wearing near-identical puff-sleeved dresses, but the frills on S's are more rounded, while the frills on Z's are sharper. S has short, curly hair and down-turned eyes, while Z has short, straight hair. "How the hell are you so much more popular? We're the same shape!" Z exclaims. "It's because I'm bouba and you're kiki, obvi," S replies. "What does that even mean??" Z demands.

Image seven: T, a typical hunk with short, wavy hair, going into complete WTF mode over having taken a full third of the vote, and also possibly blushing a little.

Images eight through fourteen: The official Tetris piece gijinkas. Tee is a cool looking guy with a throwing disc; Ess is a cute girl with poofy hair and an umbrella; I, surprisingly, is still a glasses-type, but seems a little meaner in this interpretation; Zed is a large, round-ish robot; O is an orange sphere sitting in a cloud, holding up two "O" Tetris pieces like Mickey Mouse ears; and Jay and Elle are dressed identically (except for colors) and posed back-to-back, perhaps to push a "twins" type image for them. Ex is wearing poofy pantaloons with suspenders, gloves, a ruffled shirt, and a huge smirk.

[End descriptions]

Explain yourself.

[servin-up-surveys]

survey #191

Do you have a large dog? If not, are you afraid of them? No, we literally have a chihuahua lol, but I'm not scared of them at all.

Has anyone ever told you that they loved you, and you didn’t say it back? Yes.

Who is your favorite photographer? Anastasiya Dobrovolskaya. She's well-known for a portrait of three different colored hair women holding three differently colored foxes.

Were you shy in high school? Not very, no.

Did the last guy/girl you kissed have any piercings? No.

Do you actually love your parents? Yes. I feel some amount of soreness and aching over my dad, but I still love him.

Do you know anyone autistic? My niece and very likely myself; I'm finally being examined for it next month.

Do you like your girlfriend’s/boyfriend’s parents? I love his mom, even though I very much disagree with her religious beliefs and how intense she is about them. I never got to meet his dad; Girt's told me that we would've disagreed on a whole lot, and he's always described him as having been a hardass, but I certainly still respect him and how dedicated a husband and father he was.

Do you like Polaroid photography? Yeah, it's very aesthetically pleasing to me.

Who was the last family member of yours that died? One of Mom's cousins recently did.

Do you have any gay family members? Yes, another of Mom's cousins, possibly second or third, idr.

Would you be upset if you caught your boyfriend looking at porn? No, I'd only be upset if he tried to hide that fact from me.

What is your favorite type of cat? Oriental shorthairs.

Who of the opposite sex has seen you at your worst? Either Jason or Girt, I can't decide which instance was really my true "worst."

Were you raised by someone other than your parents? No.

What’s the last chore you did? I emptied the dishwasher.

What is your favorite jungle animal? Probably tigers, or clouded leopards. Or red pandas... lol idk, there are so many.

Is your father injured? He has back problems, but that's all I know.

Are you part Native American? Not to my knowledge, no.

What are your pets’ names? Roman, Venus, and Cookie, whom we didn't name.

Have you ever worked two jobs? No.

What are the names of all the dogs you’ve ever owned? Trigger, Angel, Teddy, Dale, Delilah, Cali, Bentley, and Cookie are the ones I count. I think we briefly had Harley, my older sister's former dog, but it was very short-lived, and we also had a dog for like, not even a week before Cookie, and I can't remember what Mom named her in the brief time she was here, she just wasn't for us.

Would you ever get a face tattoo? It's doubtful. If I do, it would absolutely be something very small and subtle.

Who in life have you felt the strongest need to protect? Probably Jason when he had bronchitis, apparently my "mama bear" response only exists for partners and it's weird.

What is the cruelest thing a person has ever said to you? She basically called me a liar about being traumatized because I "did the same thing to her" and don't even get me fucking started on this shit

Who have you most feared in your life? My dad.

What is your strongest reason for your opinion on abortion? What goes on in someone's own body is fucking nobody else's business. You don't wanna share it with another growing life form, that's your goddamn right.

What one natural thing would you most like to see? Aurora borealis.

Do you like the game Tetris? No, it actually really stresses me out lmao

What’s the most rebellious thing you’ve ever done? I'm unsure.

Have you ever wanted to be a model? No.

Do you like your name how it’s spelled? Actually no, I prefer "Britney" since that's how you *actually* pronounce it.

Who was your first online friend? It was Mazzy!

Your last ex: how did you two get together? I actually had a dream of us together and woke realizing "... oh" lmao.

Does your mom dye her hair? Yes, she's self-conscious of her gray so adds more brown occasionally.

What’s the best kind of video game? (Adventure, shooting, etc) Horror is what I have the most fun with.

Do you know anyone who has road rage? My younger sister does.

Have you ever had a controlling boyfriend/girlfriend? No, I ain't playin that game.

Have you ever tried to break up anyone because YOU liked the guy/girl? So actually no. In the situation where my best friend's boyfriend liked me when I was 12, even though I flirted back, I didn't actually want them to break up. I was just being reckless and dumb and not truly realizing my actions had consequences until he was saying he loved me. I also never actively tried splitting Jason and Ashley up, though boy trust me my bitter ass wanted to, but I had just enough self control to not go 100% child.

Do you draw fanart of anything? Not regularly whatsoever, but I have before.

What was the last music video you watched? Did you like it? "Sport frei" by Lindemann, and it was fine, yeah.

What’s a condition you have that you haven’t been officially diagnosed with? I am like 99.99% sure I'm a high-masking autistic, and apparently ever since childhood, some people (including my mother ofc) have wondered, we just never truly looked into it.

Which one of your parents do you think is smarter? I know Mom is.

Have you ever supported anyone’s Kickstarter? If so, what was it? No, but I would if I had my own income and was exposed to one I really liked.

What band has the power to make you cry by splitting up? Oh Rammstein for sure lol, their retirement probably isn't too terribly far off and it already scares me lmao, I need ONE concert.

Would you feel funny if you kissed somebody of the same sex? I've done this before and no, I didn't feel weird.

Can grills be sexy on a guy? I think they're unattractive on anyone.

What’s your favorite comic book/graphic novel? I don't read these and never really have.

Do you prefer original or sour Skittles? Sour.

Do you find it easy to pass the time or do you get really bored? One of my primary depression symptoms is anhedonia, do the math.

Have you ever been in a Catholic confessional? Yes, don't do this shit to your kids btw, I still hold bitterness over being forced into this as a child.

Who was the last non-relative you rode in a vehicle with? Girt.

What was the title of the last song you listened to? "Altes Fleisch"

Who is the lead singer of your favorite band? Obviously Ozzy himself; Till Lindemann.

Do you expect to be married in the next 2 years? No.

Have you ever had an allergic reaction to an insect? No.

Who IMed you on Facebook last? My friend Summer.

Is there an item that you bought on a whim, but now consider it a crucial part of your life and you would or have purchased it again? Possibly, idk.

What flags do you have in your room, if any? None.

What was the last thing you ate? A sandwich.

What kind of natural disaster is most common where you live? Hurricanes.

Do you or your parents rake your yard? No, it's very environmentally unfriendly anyway.

If you’re not straight, who was the first person you came out to? Sara.

What do you think of the ‘Healthy At Every Size’ movement/philosophy? I don't agree with this, and mind you this is coming from an obese person. I believe it's perfectly possible to not equate one's worth to their weight (like being fatphobic, which is absolutely evil) while still not encouraging bodies that by definition cannot function in a truly healthy manner. I more so believe in "unhealthy at any size," which is just meant to imply that someone's external appearance doesn't automatically decide their health; everyone's body is different, and what goes on inside doesn't always match the exterior.

Where did you meet the last person you swapped numbers with? She's my boyfriend's mother.

Who was the last person to add you as a friend on Facebook? Ariel, who owns the horses I recently took photos of.

[dogboyklug]

[id: 2 images.

the first is a drawing of maguro sasaki and amitie from puyo puyo.

amitie's wearing his normal clothes, while maguro's wearing an edited version of his puyo puyo tetris outfit with a long-sleeved shirt under his sweater and a waist skirt with a puffy underneath.

amitie's red puyo hat, which has wings, is falling off and has a surprised expression.

amitie has wings, which are light brown, pink, yellow and blue.

he's doing bayoen, and there's a star in his open eye.

maguro has a surprised expression.

both of his eyes are visible, and they're full of sparkling stars.

amitie seems to be sitting partially on maguro, one hand going behind them so that he can do the spell.

maguro seems to have been flailing slightly, and his legs are going out at an angle beneath him.

he's also gripping his skirt

they're both floating in the clouds, there's no visible ground, and the sky is a bright blue.

in the second image, there is no shading, showing the original colors.

end id.]

IGNORE THE POST I MADE LAST NIGHT I. MESSED UP THE SHADING. IT'S FIXED NOW.

[mmmmalo]

Hiveswap Reread Pt. 1

Current takeway is that in the same way that Psycholonials focuses on China paranoia (plot: a leftist Chinese-American infects the world with revolution alongside the "China virus" of Covid 19) Hiveswap is very much about Red Scares directed at Russia, Cold War nuclear anxieties, and those fears' persistence past the end of the USSR. Like the game's set in '94, but Jude still won't touch Tetris cause it's got Commie germs.

Trolls emerge from anxieties, so the red scare may go a ways towards explaining why Fozzer is a communist (until he isn't) and Boldir took her wardrobe from a SPY VS SPY cartoon. The structural power of slurs in Homestuck trained me to seek potential terms of perjoration so I looked up Russian stereotypes and was reminded of the country's popular association with bears, which turned my thoughts toward Bronya Ursama (ursa mama > mama bear). It turns out "nyanya" (няня) is a Russian word for babysitter! and "bronya" (броня) itself means Armor. My first instinct was to read Armored Mamabear as a reference to Alphonse Elric, since Bronya's clapping motion is reminiscent of the alchemical prayer performed by those who attempt Human Transmutation -- a suitable topic for the brooding caverns -- and Alphonse in particular dreamed of motherhood, repeatedly storing life in the belly of his casings. There's even a moment where you the reader "CLAP YOUR HAND over your mouth to keep from GAGGING", implicitly connecting Bronya's gesture to an Alternian paradigm of birth, vomiting.

But perhaps instead of "vomiting", we should say "purging": the name "Armor" also seems to designate Bronya as a feminine Stalin (meaning 'Steel'). "There's no leader, but do as I say" positions Bronya as leader within a very old joke mocking the persistence of heirarchy in a political system (Communism) ostensibly aimed at eliminating class division. "Protect the Mothergrub" becomes "PROTECT THE MOTHERLAND". Bronya's pronounced terror towards possible purges marks her as a stereotypical subject of Stalinism, but she's also positioned as the purger: "babysitting" acquires a morbid connotation through Alternia's deadliest ass, such that Bronya's odd sense of responsibility (she says she can't be friends with someone she can't TAKE CARE OF) implies not only a need for control but also a need for killing power in all relationships. Only trust who you can crush.The successful route (which avoids purges!) involves persuading Bronya to relinquish her iron grip and trust the People to lead themselves. The route looks at Stalin and goes I Could Fix Her.

I laughed the moment I started Bronya's route: her designated song, the Phantasmagoric Waltz, sounds like it came straight out of the Nutcracker, Tchaikovsky's famous ballet. The joke suggest Joey's love of ballet might function as a signifier of Russian culture in Hiveswap -- and perhaps her love of tap dance would likewise become an American signifier? Joey's dream of uniting the dance styles would then suggest achieving unity of opposed political entities... but I worry that "unity" implies "domination". Joey shuns guns but her tap shoes are sometimes discussed as though they are guns, eg when Joey claims they would blast a pile of garbage apart. So the (eventual, not yet) combination of dances would come to represent war? More to that point:

My initial notes emphasized the element of interactivity, but if the gyroscope functioned as a representation of an atom, this would effectively be saying that Joey's tap shoes are nukes? (This approach is colored by One Piece, which uses a large orrery within a Tree of Knowledge shaped liked a mushroom cloud to represent nuclear capability. ) In which case "unity" would mean outright destruction.

Either way, Joey's itchy trigger toes become parcel to the general air of (nuclear) war anxiety that pervades the story. I suspect Joey's outspoken hatred of animal death is similarly a reaction to Laika, the dog who died aboard Sputnik-2 (one of several test satellites whose flight path above the US initiated panic over potential orbital missile strikes). The flashlight is our satellite symbol: Jude's treehouse (like Terezi's before him) locates him metaphorically in the numinous aether*, using a flashlight to blink morse code messages like a satellite beaming information down to Earth. When Joey finds her own flashlight, she refers to it as a tomb for all the Pogs she finds inside instead of batteries. Pogs means dogs here: it's a nightmare of finding a satellite filled with dead Laikas. Puppy Surprise is having puppies!

* I also wonder if (again inflected by One Piece) if Jude's burning fall foliage might represent a mushroom cloud? But I'll focus on the other approach for now.

So a fear of orbital missile strikes (and an urge for preemptive strikes?) is linked to the weaponization of the flashlight. One of the paintings in the hallway features a horse scared of lightning (violence from above!), the bolts of which Jude has stickered over with an alien invasion (violence from above!) whose tractor beams of abduction resemble the rays of a satellite flashlight. Unsure what to make of Joey turning the invasion into birthday party though...

Brief diversion from Red Scare speculation: the game seems to imply that Jude's pet is Lord English? in addition to being a serpent, as others have already concluded. The toy castle at the foot of Jude's door, the one with Lord English's winking face for a gate, has a counterpart across the hall: in the other painting (Venus of Urbino), a dog at the foot of the bed has been modified with a sticker of a winking dog's face. The shared expression marks Lord English as a pet... but just as importantly, the parallel draws a line between the reposed/nude Venus ("churched up" with some clothing by a prudish/bashful Joey) and Jude's room. 5 interpretive angles occur to me, not necessarily mutually exclusive:

1. The myriad KEEP OUT signs on Jude's door can be superimposed onto Venus, relaying a sense that Joey views her attraction to women as improper (as the clothes she drew on might've already indicated), and/or a sense that the world around Joey disapproves

2. The nudity is superimposed on Jude, suggesting a repressed attraction to her brother. Earlier Joey expressed annoyance that the clouds (juxtaposed with Jude's tree house) were "ephemeral and UNTOUCHABLE" a sentiment which if redirected at Jude suggest annoyance with the incest taboo.

3. The two above combine into an antisemitic gesture, a desire to "church up" (ie convert) the Jews. This relies on pun drawn from Alternia: "archery" is rendered Jewish by fixating on the "ARK" component, part of Alternia's tongue-in-cheek depiction of a post-ChristianGenocide world. The plush Sufferer in the hall (struck by one of Jude's many arrows) invokes this facet of the fantasy -- it also meshes with the fear of Russian missile strikes invoked by Jude, perhaps leaning into the old conspiracy theory that Communism was a Jewish plot.

4. Supposing for a moment that Joey were a trans girl, we could integrate Lord English (or rather, the serpent he represents) into the equation: the phallus becomes the guard dog of femininity, the beast preventing its attainment... a glimpse into Joey's school life reveals that kids call her a POSER when she tries to talk about GAMES, which might be leveraged towards Joey experiencing transphobia: the association of girls with roleplay is part of Alternia's underlying transphobia, as best I can tell. Unless it's just plain old misogyny to say girls are categorically "false"? Perhaps both...

But there's a bit on the staircase to the attic where Joey remarks she would like the plush caterpillar more if it were to spin a chrysalis (ie become a fairy), which again scans as trans imagery in the context of the house's immersion in Alternian lore... I presume the remark is self-reflexive, but I suppose Joey might simply like if all icky boys became girls, Jude included? But then after saying that dancing on the stairs is dangerous (you could break your legs!), she dances ballet for the caterpillar alone and incurs the risk -- this scans as an invocation of Tavros, whose accident was parcel to Alternia's denigration/depictions of f*gs (read as a blanket term for "feminine men"... though it's possible "masculine women" are being denigrated in the same breath? Bluh)

5. Back to the Red Scare: in the wake of Bronya and the Mothergrub, perhaps we might read Venus as representative of the Motherland! The apparent desire for union with the feminine (in terms of romance or identity) would fall victim to the same violence haunting the unity of tap and ballet: it means destruction, conquest! Those godless (ie Jewish??) communists need to be Churched Up, PERMANENTLY....

...or something like that, that's my understanding of the conspiracies at play so far. Next time, we go downstairs!

[coldshrugs]

unusual muse associations

@impossible-rat-babies and @amlovelies tagged me for this, thank you both!! 💗

i'll tag @syrcus @unclegoths @rickety-goose @yloiseconeillants @lvllns @trvelyans @kingdom-dance @chill-bunn-sage @grapecaseschoices @jakubdumortain @the-rogue-mockingjay (no pressure)

going with teddy malone for this one ✨

SEASONING: mango habanero

WEATHER: balmy, sweat-slicked summer days

COLOUR: sunny yellow, burnt orange, brick red, pearlescent white

SKY: bright saturated blue, dotted through with puffy white clouds

MAGICAL POWER: if she had one, instantaneous teleportation

HOUSE PLANT: rubber fig

WEAPON: kitchen knife; hEr kEyBoArD~

SUBJECT: literature, english

SOCIAL MEDIA: discord, insta, goodreads

MAKEUP PRODUCT: lipstick, a shade of red

CANDY: jolly ranchers, peach gummies

FEAR: abandonment/manipulation, not being accepted, heights

ICE CUBE SHAPE: novelty tetris ice tray

METHOD OF LONG-DISTANCE TRAVEL: flying

ART STYLE: none

MYTHOLOGICAL CREATURE: fawn

PIECE OF STATIONERY: customized pad with orange lines and matching daisies

THREE EMOJIS: 🌼✨🧐

CELESTIAL BODY: a comet

[jonnnysuh]

How To Write Good // Vernon

A/N: It all started with watching Vernon’s English tutor series and now we’re here omg. This is my first series so please give it some love <3 kind of unedited so lmk if there’s any mistakes! PART ONE | PART TWO | PART THREE

PAIRING: Vernon x You

GENRE: enemies to ???, fluff, student!vernon, tutor!vernon

WARNINGS: swearing

WORD COUNT: 2.7K

SUMMARY: There’s the crisp air of campus, the rush of something new, and a four year degree ahead of you. Your college experience doesn’t go off as smoothly as you’d hoped when you fall asleep on course selection day and are stuck with left over electives. Struggling to get through your creative writing class, you have no idea how you’re going to get through this semester. Fate steps in when the stranger you fought in the library might just be your only chance at passing. This is all just part of the college experience… right?

Orange leaves began surrounding the burnt red brick pathway, and the small green hills of the campus quad.  Fall was fast approaching, without much warning.  The bright summer sky, now often clouds of gray. The wind brushed past you, causing your hair to fly up. Your legs brushed together quickly as you tried to make your way through campus to get to your Writing in the Arts class. You swore to yourself that you wouldn't sleep through course selection but sometimes sleep was an actual priority to you...and it so happened to be on that day.  Not your first choice, but definitely miles ahead of  Economic History on the list of leftover electives.

You flipped over your wrist to take a look at the time on your brown pleather watch. 8:12.

Professor Hampton was an older woman, who always kept her sandy brown hair in a slick tight low bun. She had enforced a rule that the doors to the lecture hall would shut 15 minutes past the hour. If you didn’t make it then you’d have to get notes from a classmate. Maybe it’d be fine if you had a friend in the class that was actually punctual, but you had often sat alone in the same spot in the far left corner of the class room.  Time was definitely never on your side as you reckoned you only had 3 minutes left until your trip downtown was rendered useless. 

You swung the thick metal door open, and began pumping your legs forward, not stopping until you reached the top of the stairs. To your luck, the lecture hall was on the exact end of the hallway. As you took longer strides, your gray backpack bounced behind you. Finally arriving at the end of the long hallway, you came face to face with Professor Hampton, who had a scowl so thick you’d think it was drawn on with a felt tip permanent marker. Without an ounce of forgiveness, that old lady secured the door shut, eyes keen on your betrayed face just a few centimetres from hers.

With the little pride you still had, you contained the urge  to bang on the door repeatedly and say "OPEN UP."

If you hadn't had time to get ready that day, or missed your bus, dammit this would've been the boiling point that would've driven you to  kick the wall. Your saving grace was that there was a cute guy typing away on his laptop in this hallway and you'd be damned if you were about to look a fool.

It was that moment, you knew that if you were going to pass this class without sacrificing a wink of sleep, you were going to have to make a friend that was good at writing notes. And quick.

—

The next day, you navigated your way through the twists and turns of the library, never having had been there a day in your life. You swear you’d gone in a circle at this point. You promised your best friend, Taylor that you’d secure a spot for your impromptu study date. Although you both had good intentions, you knew it was more than likely going to become a gossip session that involved sometimes looking at class material.

Among the rows and rows of occupied tables, you finally found an empty table, situated next to the window that overlooked the architecture and art buildings. You settled in the chair, slipping your laptop out of your tote bag , and typing mindlessly to look busy while you waited for your friend. With a look around the room, you wondered if people actually studied at the library or if they were just faking it like you.

You were so immersed in your game of Tetris you almost didn’t hear the voice that said , “Hey, I think you’re at the wrong table.”

You paused your game and surveyed the empty wooden table you were sitting at.  You blinked slowly at the brown haired man.  “I was here first.”

“That might be true but I booked it out for the hour.” The stranger stood with a slight slouch, sporting a backwards snapback and a deep green hoodie. He didn't look like the type to hang out around the library- but then again, neither did you. You swear you had seen him before, but you couldn't place where.

Did I go to high school with him?  you thought.

What if he was ugly and had a glow up and that’s why I don’t recognize him?

You took a closer look at him.

Nah. I don’t think he’s ever been ugly in his life.

“Look. My name's right here." He leaned forward, showing you his screen.

[TABLE 9] 3:00pm - Vernon C.

You pushed the phone away, unimpressed. "But you showed up late."

"It was only 6 minutes." Vernon scoffed, as if his tardiness would automatically forfeit him from his table.

"Well, have you ever heard of finder's keepers?"

Vernon nodded, his voice pointed. "But have you ever heard of fair and square?"

You tried your best to conceal the fact that you were somewhat amused by his elementary-level comeback.

"Could you look into your great, big heart to share?” You pouted tauntingly.

"Oh, yeah, because you need a table to play Tetris." He responded sarcastically but it was as if he had crept into your mind. You dreaded the idea of being on your feet trying to find another place for your game.

Your best friend rolled in between you two innocently, confused at the interaction at hand. It was like a kid walking in on their mom and dad fighting for the first time… except dad is a Tetris-hating stranger you just met 3 minutes ago.

“Sorry I’m late, Y/N.”  Taylor interjected, trying her best to mend the atmosphere with a grin.  Vernon's posture went notably straight as he exhaled, returning a sweet close-lipped smile. You couldn't help but notice the way he looked at your friend- you squinted at the shadow of the difference between this Vernon and the one that basically told you to fuck off only moments prior.

Without a doubt, you knew he was suffering from the "Taylor Effect".

Taylor was your textbook girl next door; equipped with a warm demeanour, and a confidence that was endearing rather than cocky.  You could tell that Vernon was trying his best not to stare so obviously, but he was failing miserably.

Because everyone gravitated towards her, many found it odd that she chose to keep you as company. Sometimes you thought she stuck around only because your personalities were so starkly different and would emphasize how great she was, but time and time again she proved she was notable on her own accord.

"Did I interrupt something?"

You and the man shared a look.

Vernon had a feeling that if he let you speak first, that you might ruin his chances with Taylor, and there was absolutely NO shot that he was going to tell her what had just happened. You were quick to take advantage of the situation.

“Vernon just wanted to take the tab-“

He shook his head, "No, no, no I was just leaving."

You raised your eyebrow, smugly.

“I'll see you later,” He bid.  Your eyes widened as he went closer to you, clasping his hand around yours and pulling you forwards into an almost embrace. He dapped you up. Vernon dapped you up. What? Did he think you were bros now?

Ya, right. You thought. This is my first and last time in this library. You will never see me or my Tetris again.

And with that, he swung his backpack over his shoulder  coolly and headed down the long carpeted aisle in the other direction.

Only a few moments later did he return to go through the north exit. “Wrong way.” He mumbled, charting past both of you.

—

“So you don’t know anyone in that class?” Taylor said in disbelief as you two sat at the table you had only marginally won.

“No, I missed the first two weeks so by the time I actually went to class  they already had their groups.”  you responded, blowing air out of your mouth in frustration.

School had only just begun and Taylor had swept up a bunch of friends, including you, in just this one semester.

You, on the other hand, were awkward, but not in the forgivable way. You never knew the right thing to say, and your sarcasm drew a fine line between a joke and the truth. You felt like you always had to bite your tongue to hold a decent conversation with someone. In turn, this scared a lot of people away, and resulted in a small but good group of friends that understood you.

For some reason though, you did well with confrontation. That was the only time you could force yourself to not care about what someone else thought about you. Other than that, your communication skills were almost useless.

“So go up to those kids and say hi.” Taylor responded.

You knew your best friend was being well meaning, but sometimes she felt like she oversimplified your problems because she saw it through her own lens. Of course it would be easy for Taylor to do so, but for you it would be a different story. Your stomach turned at even the mere thought of introducing yourself to the group of strangers that always sat all the way in the front of the lecture hall.

“I’ll just figure it out. I don't know how to just talk to people."

“What about that guy that I just saw you with? What was that about?”

You cleared your throat, fixing your attention to your laptop screen. Getting work done suddenly seemed more interesting.

“No, no, no look at me.” Taylor dragged your laptop away.

You begrudgingly looked at your friend. “What about him?”

“Who was that? He was kind of cute.” She cupped her cheek with her hand and sat closer, clearly interested. It was rare to see you with anyone other than your usual friend group so Taylor was invested in your endeavours outside of it.

You knew that if you told Taylor about your weird argument with a stranger, that she’d explain that you were unfriendly, that you needed to be nicer, etc. etc. You didn’t need a lecture today.

“Just some dude who finished using the table.”

Taylor chuckled, “What kind of guy says bye like that to a person he just met?”

Her guess was as good as yours.

—

ONE WEEK LATER

Determination is setting 25 morning alarms, pre-picking your clothes and opting for an on-the-go breakfast in order to just make it on time for class. You took your final strides towards the class slowly, knowing you finally had time on your side. Would it be crazy to call waking up at 6am a victory? Doesn’t matter, you were just so happy, you could answer Professor Hampton’s questions… that is, if you listened.

At the bottom of the lecture hall, sat the aforementioned groups, while the top were lonesome stragglers looking at their phones in an effort to look less lonely. You knew they were probably just reviewing their settings; turning their wifi on and off.

Professor Hampton cleared her throat into the microphone at the front of the class, prompting you to pick up the pace to your regular spot at the far left corner.

No way.

Your speed slowed down again, as you craned your head to get a better look at a brown-haired boy sitting by himself.

Despite the numerous empty seats to choose from, your caffeine rush assisted you in making the possibly dumb decision of sitting exactly right next to him. He seemed unbothered, though as he didn’t look up to question it.

Professor Hampton played her slides, while you pulled out your laptop out of your tote bag.

“Hey.” You whispered.

The man’s light brown eyes flickered towards you.

“You’re in this class?” Vernon whisper-exclaimed.

It registered in your brain that this might’ve been a mistake.

You nodded.

Vernon kept his focus on the front of the class, his pencil swivelled  away on his lined paper. You had never seen anyone actually take real-life notes before. You scanned his paper, pleasantly surprised at the organization.

“Why did you dap me up last week?”

“I honestly don’t know what I was doing.” He admitted.

Boys do dumb things around pretty girls. You'd seen it happen so many times with Taylor.

“She’s cute isn’t she?”

“Who?” Vernon was quick to play dumb, but he clearly knew. 

You were fascinated by how he was writing and listening to you at the same time.

“Taylor—my friend.”

Vernon squinted his eyes, either to think or because he couldn’t see the projection clearly. It made you wonder why he sat in the back of the class if that was the case.

“Yeah, she is.”

Bingo.

You silently relished in your impromptu decision to sit next to a stranger.

“What would you say if I got you a date with her?”

Vernon put his pencil down. “You strike me as the kind of person who wouldn’t do that out of the kindness of your heart.”

You snorted. “You’re right.”

Vernon let out a deep sigh, pushing his hoodie sleeve up his arms. He relaxed back in his seat and stared at you as he waited for your proposal.

“What is it?” His deep voice was littered with impatience but it was clear he was at least curious.

You weren’t  prepared to gain his full attention. Your mind went several ways as you collected your thoughts to be as concise as possible.

“I’m struggling in this class, okay? I can’t always make it on time, and creative writing? Not really something I’m interested in.”

“Then why’d you take the class?”

“Why does anyone do anything here? For the credit.” You responded as if the answer was obvious.

Vernon’s raised eyebrows was enough to tell you that he was actually passionate about this subject— which was perfect for you if you wanted to pass the class.

“How do I come into this, though?” His patience running thin from your incredibly interesting backstory.

“If you tutor me up until midterms and I pass, I’ll get you a date with Taylor.”

He shook his head “What if you fail?”

“Then you can take that as a reflection of your teaching skills,” Vernon rolled his eyes. Okay maybe that was a bad joke. “but on the plus side you’ve gained a new friendddddd.”

Professor Hampton gave you two a dirty look on her way back from shutting the lecture hall’s door. Vernon picked up his pencil to look busy and you tapped on your trackpad to turn the screen on.

“And what if I say no?” Vernon said between his teeth, catching the professor glare right at him with her scowl turned up to one hundred.

“Then I’ll shit talk about you to Taylor so you never have a chance.” You threatened. Your mom always urged you to use your brain, and boy, were you using it.

“You want me to teach you how to be creative?”

You shrugged. “I mean, how hard can it be?”

Vernon looked down at his notes contemplating his choices. He was silent for so long that you actually started typing notes.

“Y/N” Vernon whispered. You seemed to be fully immersed in the lesson now. Your eyes absorbing the information... Maybe writing was kind of fascinating.

“Y/N” He tried again, snapping you out of a trance.

“My bad.” you apologized. “I didn’t know the interesting part of the story was called the climax like ew—”

“I can only tutor you on Thursdays between 6 and 8 in the library. Bring your laptop and be prepared to learn.”

You knew you didn’t have class at those hours, so it should’ve been fine, but you also dreaded staying after school longer than you had to.

“What about 4-6?” You pleaded.

Vernon looked offended at your counter offer. “No. 6-8”

“4:30…?” You tried once again.

Vernon snorted at your no-quit attitude. “You wanna pass or not?”

You stuck out your hand defeatedly and Vernon shook on it before either of you could change your mind. Vernon was your new tutor.

Maybe Taylor was right. All you had to do was go up to someone and say “hi.”

And blackmail them. And use your friend as bait.

Making friends was easy.

[underwhelmingalchemist]

Actually, I love being a cluttered person.

I love spending time in my room filled with pillows and shelves of knick-knacks where everything is decorated for Christmas and is lit by red LED lights

I love having a closet that can accommodate every aesthetic from jeans and a t-shirt to cottagecore scene kid to forest gremlin to full lolita coord and never sticking to any single aesthetic, even if I'm reusing the same core pieces over and over

I love teaching myself to sing, and to make edits, and bake things I've never made before, and sew, and craft with foam, and make props and costume pieces, and crochet, and fold paper stars, and write new genres, and learn about odd bits of culture and history, and cosplaying and making videos and dancing and anything else that might strike my interest all at once

I love listening to every genre of music and having my playlist skip from metal to bubblegum pop to country, without any particular devotion to any one artist or band, picking up bits and pieces from every tiktok I come across or album that was recommended to be years ago or music my mom used to listen to when I was a kid

I love consuming any media that catches my interest, from anime to indie films to marvel movies to media analysis to children's cartoons to documentaries to video essays to tiktoks to podcasts without any visuals at all

I love being in a hundred fandoms all at once, and creating content for as many as I can and cosplaying and writing meta posts and making video edits and memes and shitposts and writing fanfiction for dozens of pairings, plenty of which involving the same characters shipped with different people because I can't choose just one

I love my blog of random bits and bobs I've collected, with shitposts followed by fandom pieces and poetic phrases and a video that made me laugh

I love my gender and all its messy complexities, and how I want to go on T but still wear lolita and skirts and makeup but also do drag in both the king and queen categories and put on a performance both onstage and off that seems both feminine and masculine and some secret third option and it's all so chaotically off-putting but makes everyone around me gradually feel more at ease with themselves

I love my attraction and how I'm ace but also enthralled by the concepts of kink and romantically attracted to whoever my mind feels like that day, with preferences that swirl and shift in some nebulous cloud of identity that nobody could ever quite figure out, least of all me

I love dating two people and getting to text my boyfriend about my day and talk to my queerplatonic girlfriend about her plans to marry her boyfriend and tell both of my partners that I love them and kissing them and making plans for the future with both of them

I love my body with all of its squishy curves and rolls, and getting to decorate and customize it however I want, whether it's putting stickers on it or dressing it up in fun outfits or putting color around my eyes and painting on little designs

I love being talkative and knowing a little bit about everything because I remember reading about it a while ago, just like I remember when someone tells me about their favorite TV show or how they had a fight with their boyfriend a couple weeks ago or if they just started a new game, and crying with people in the same day I'll laugh with someone different

I love doing a hundred things at once, and putting on a podcast on while I play video games and monitoring my texts and discord servers I'm in, and finding the most overstimulating music to blast through my favorite pair of earbuds just because I like the bass and how it crunches

I love using language in ways that might seem a bit out of place, like trying to make things fit in a box together and saying I'm 'Tetris-ing it together" or calling certain sounds "crunchy" or telling my boss that I "had to go on a sidequest" when I had to deviate from what I was told to do, or just using the word "scrungly" at all

All of this makes up who I am, each piece making up a small part of a larger whole, no one bit able to exist without the other

I love all my clutter, no matter what form it takes

And I love being a cluttered person.

[jihyuncompass]

Unexpected Changes

It’s time for a very special fic for a very special boy who lives in my head and my heart. Happy birthday Shawty I love you <3

I want to give a very very special thanks to my wonderful friend @otherlandshark​ for giving me this idea, your mind never ceases to amaze me and I love you so very much. 

I would also love to give thanks to everyone who has encouraged me or helped me with this fic. There’s several of you, some of which aren’t on here. But thank you all, from the bottom of my heart. 

Summary: You decide to surprise Shaw for his birthday, but some unexpected events get in the way. 

Shaw x MC

Word Count: 4.1k

Warnings: Some cursing, adult jokes. 

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

Leaning forward you squinted at the calendar in front of you checking it, you confirmed the date, June 21st. The date was circled in a red pen, the little box for the date had Shaw’s B-day!!!!! Written in the same red felt pen. You smiled to yourself as you reached out to your phone left face down on the table beside you. 

You’d half expected a text from Shaw already, after all he usually was the one to text you first. Yet when you checked your notifications you didn’t see anything from him. You sat down at the kitchen table, considering if you should text him first, maybe he was sleeping in today, his finals should be done by now so maybe he was taking a day to rest. Even if that didn’t really sound like Shaw’s style. 

As it turns out, you didn’t have to wait too long to decide if you should text him or not. Your phone screen lit up with a text message, the contact image of a young lavender haired man. 

Shaw: Do you remember what today is?

MC: Oh I know this one!

MC: It’s monday!

Shaw:....

Shaw: Care to try again? 

MC: Ah fine, it’s the 21st of June!

Shaw: You’re not wrong, but do you know what else it is? 

MC: Hmmmmm 

Shaw: Hm?

You knew very well that Shaw’s birthday was today, but still you wanted to tease him a little bit. Maybe just to get back at him a little bit for his usual rounds of teasing you. 

MC: Maybe you should remind me what today is, since it seems I don’t know

Shaw: Or, how about we meet up? 

Shaw: With my finals I’ve haven't had the time to entertain you 

MC: Oh today? I’m not sure if I have the time…

Shaw: You can’t be that busy can you? 

MC: Shaw it’s Monday! I have a job you know 

MC: Buuuuut 

MC: It is a bit slow today, perhaps I could take the day off. 

Shaw: Meet me at the park.  Don’t be late. 

MC: Hey!!! I should be telling YOU that!!!! 

Putting your phone back down on the table you quickly rose from your seat. You had preemptively taken the day off, preparing for today weeks ago. Today was not only his birthday, but also right after his final exams for school. Both events in your eyes were worthy of a celebration. 

First, you got yourself dressed and ready, putting on the carefully chosen ensemble, an outfit more in line with Shaw’s personal style than your own, but one you knew he’d appreciate seeing you in. 

You pulled out the large picnic basket from your closet, putting it down on the table while you opened your fridge door to grab the neatly packaged and wrapped food you’d spent the night before putting together. Once you finished your personal game of picnic basket tetris you carefully snuck in a picnic blanket on top. 

The last step was the gift wrapped box sitting on the other side of your dining table, the gift was wrapped with the shark wrapping paper you’d special ordered on a whim the week beforehand. You slipped the box into your bag, trying to keep it at least a little bit hidden from view. You slipped on your shoes as you held your bag in one arm and the picnic basket in the crook of your elbow. 

The bright blue sky was the first thing you noticed when you stepped outside. The warm new summer air swaying the newly bloomed flowers on your path. The summer breeze was just warm enough that you felt a bead of sweat appear on your brow as you walked to the park you had arranged to meet at. 

Since the weather was so warm for the first time in what seemed like forever it looked like everyone in the city was outside today. Families walked into ice cream shops, groups of friends wandered into stores and restaurants. Couples holding hands walking down the sidewalk hand in hand. 

The park wasn’t any less busy, it took several rounds walking along the park to find the perfect spot to get yourself set up, after walking the perimeter for a while you found a good spot you could get yourself situated. 

Your phone rang just as you finished pulling out the last items from your picnic basket. Once the items were set down you reached out and quickly answered your phone without even really checking the caller ID. 

“Hello?”

“I’m almost there, where are you?” Shaw asked on the other end. 

“I’m sitting under one of the trees, just walk around I’ll wave when I see you” 

Shaw sighed on the other end. “You can’t just find me?” 

“Nope! You have to find me. I’m not moving.” Shaw dramatically sighed. “Just come find me. Trust me it’ll be worth it.” 

“Alright,” Shaw said. “I’ll find you, I can see the park now. Be ready.” He hung up the phone just a moment after that. 

Your eyes swept around the park looking for him. You looked for that familiar lavender hair or that patented leather jacket he seemed so very fond of. Still, it was hard to see through all the crowds of people, the way they crowded up the paths and sidewalks and made it even harder to see anyone specific. 

Once you saw that lavender hair sticking out of the crowd your hand was raised in the air, waving wildly to try and grab his attention, and as some of the people thinned out you could clearly see Shaw walking down the sidewalk, his eyes also looking around the park to try and find you. 

After waving your hands for a few more moments, Shaw's eyes met yours, a spark of recognition crossing his face, and then, his facial expression slowly changing as he noticed where you were sitting, and the assortment of food that you had put around yourself. All for him. 

He stopped just a few steps away from you, you could tell that he was trying to hide his exact facial expression. Trying to hide it with his classic cool and unbothered face, but his eyes didn't lie, and the way they seemed to be sparkling. 

"What's this?" Shaw asked as he looked down at the set up. You smiled and motioned to the blanket you had spread out on the ground. 

"Happy birthday Shaw." You said, his eyes looked like they were glowing. His pupils wide as he took it all in. His mouth was slightly open, like he couldn't quite believe what it was that he was seeing in front of him. "What are you doing just standing there! Come on, sit down." 

After a half a moment of him staring he sat down on the other end of the blanket. He still wasn't saying much, almost uncharacteristically quiet. 

"What do you think? I tried to make some things I know you like. It's no hotpot but I couldn't quite figure out how we could do hotpot in the park, but since the weather is so nice I figured that a picnic would be nice!" 

Shaw looked at you, and in the moment that he was staring at you it was like an instant change. He cleared his throat and let his usual cool and collected expression return to his face, looking cool, calm, and collected like he had been expecting this the whole entire time. 

“It doesn’t look too bad.” He finally said. You smiled at him, a comment like that from Shaw was quite the compliment. “You did all this?”

You nodded. “Yeah I made all this last night and this morning.” You handed him a can of coke and a can of pepsi, his two favorites. “Consider this a double celebration, we’re celebrating your birthday and you finishing your finals.” Shaw looked up and down at the picnic food on the blanket and you sitting on the other end of the blanket. 

Shaw’s usual smirk reappeared on his face as he popped the tab open on the can of coke, taking a long sip. “I suppose I can admit you made an okay show of pretending to forget today.” 

“I would never forget!” You said, “I’ve had the date written down on my calendar ever since I found out when your birthday was.” 

Shaw’s face was unreadable, he hid his expression by sipping on his soda. Trying to keep his face away from you, as if by looking at you it would reveal something he wasn’t ready for you to see yet. 

Maybe you would have asked if he was okay, or try to say something to make him face you again. But before you could do anything about that thought your attention was broken by the raindrops that fell right on top of your head. 

The rain started to fall faster, dark rain clouds overtaking the whole no-longer blue sky. You looked up at the sky, as the raindrops started falling faster and harder. Within seconds it was pouring down rain on the once warm soil. 

It seemed to take Shaw a bit longer to notice the rain that was soaking his hair and clothes. Once he noticed his eyes went upwards to look up at the now darkened sky. 

Although he didn't say it, and neither did you, you had a very good feeling that you knew what had caused this sudden rainstorm. 

Looking around the park, the once happy families and couples were packing up their things, running for shelter or to their cars, no one seemingly prepared for any kind of sudden rain. Even you, who should have prepared for this possibility, hadn't even considered the idea that it could rain. Especially with the person you were with. 

"Shit, the food!" You quickly tried to repackage and rewrap the food you'd brought, trying to keep it from getting wetter and ruined. 

"It's just a little rain" Shaw said looking up at the sky, he must have known the rain's origin. There's no way that he couldn't have known what caused this. 

“I would say it’s a little more than a little rain!” You tried to shove them back into the basket. "Also I don't want all this food getting wet and soggy." You pushed back some of your wet hair as the raindrops ran down your face and neck. 

Quickly you put all the food back into the basket, and motioned for Shaw to stand up, the blanket below you was already soaked, and the mud started to stick to the other side. You bit your lip and you tried to fold it up the best you could. 

“Did you bring an umbrella?” You asked him, Shaw shook his head. 

“Didn’t think it would rain.” You glared at him. “What?”

“You don’t just keep one on you in case of sudden rain? That seems to happen a lot around you.” You hugged yourself to try and keep warm as the rain soaked your clothes. 

“I didn’t think I’d need it.” Shaw said. “Besides, it’s June.” You resisted the urge to remind him that not only does it rain in June but the time of year doesn’t seem to matter when you have an Evolver who makes it rain whenever he’s in a good mood. 

Trying to hide from the rain under the tree you held the picnic basket close. “How about we go back to my place, we can eat there.” Shaw picked up your other bag, the one with his present hidden in it, biting your tongue you tried not to make clear that you didn’t want him seeing the contents just yet. But he didn’t try to look. 

“Here.” Shaw shedded his jacket and handed it over to you. You took the jacket, wrapping it around your shoulders, the arms a little too long and the jacket not quite fitting, but it was comfortable, and you could feel the lingering warmth from his body heat on it. 

“I’ll follow your lead.” Shaw said casually, shoving his hands into his pockets. 

Looking out to the rest of the now deserted park you mentally mapped the quickest way home, the two of you would be soaked, no doubt, but at least you could get back. 

Together you took off into the rain, trying to walk beneath any kind of cover you both could find on the way back. You held Shaw’s jacket close, as you did the scent of peppermint and light cologne was easy to pick up, an almost comforting smell. 

Throwing open the door to your apartment building you both breathed a sigh of relief when you were out of the rain, so filled with relief it took a few moments to realize something wasn’t right. 

“Someone turned off the lights.” You commented looking at the dark lobby. Shaw punched the up button on the elevator, to no avail. No elevator sounds, no lighting up on the button. 

“The power’s out.” He said, pushing wet hair out of his eyes. “Probably the heavy rain.” 

You withheld the groan growing in your throat. “Seriously?” You tried the elevator button 

yourself, with no better result. 

Shaw didn't seem nearly as bothered as you did, or at least he pretended like he wasn't bothered. He looked to the door leading to the stairs up. 

"Come on. I won’t carry you up the stairs." Shaw said, pushing open the door. 

You followed up, slowly trudging up the long stairwell, your socks squelching uncomfortably in your shoes. Your hair dripping with the rain, Shaw's jacket being the only thing giving you the smallest bit of comfort at the moment. 

The two of you eventually made it up to your floor, and down your hallway to your door. You couldn't waste any time with sticking in your key and getting through the door. 

Your apartment was dark, just like the lobby, no lights on, not even the stove or oven. The apartment was completely dark beyond the small amount of light coming in through the window, and completely silent without the hum of the fridge or your computer. 

You set the picnic basket down on the table, rushing to the bathroom to grab towels. Grabbing the biggest towels you had in your cupboard. Tossing one to Shaw and using your own to dry your face and hair first. 

"I'm gonna change clothes." You told him. Then looked him up and down. “I’d offer you some of mine but I’m not sure they’ll fit.”  You racked your brain, there must be something you could offer him. “I could ask my neighbor, he’s a little shorter than you but maybe-” 

Shaw shook his head. “Don’t worry about it.” 

“But-”

“I’m not that wet.” Shaw said as he dried off his hair, the lavender strands still damp when he pulled the towel away. Shaw looked you up and down, that mischievous look reappearing in his gaze “You on the other hand-” He said with that tone that could have suggested anything. 

“Shaw!” You said as your cheeks flushed red. His smirk intensified at your flustered face, and you did your best to reel it in. After all that was the reaction he was hoping for. You huffed and pulled out a set of clean clothes from your closet. 

You left him in the living room while you changed clothes, drying your hair further in the darkness of the bathroom. You probably should have predicted a result like this, but it was too late to go back now. 

In dry clothes and sufficiently put back together you ventured back into the living room. Shaw stood with his shirt in his hands as he set it on your clothes drying rack in the corner of your apartment. 

Although his back was turned to you, you quickly averted your gaze from him as the flush returned to your face. You kept your eyes on the ground as you put away your other damp clothes to be washed and dried once the power was back.

“Oi.” Shaw said, You kept yourself from looking directly at him. “Why are you staring at the floor like that? Did you break your neck putting on a shirt?” Your face turned an even brighter red color as he spoke. 

“I-” You turned your head away. “I’m just thinking.” You tried to steer the conversation in a different direction. Maybe so he wouldn’t try and pull an even more embarrassed reaction out of you. 

Shaw’s slit brow raised up, his classic playful expression returning in full force. “What could you possibly be thinking about?” He said, walking towards you. Still feeling too flustered to look at him, you grabbed the throw blanket from the couch and tossed it at him. 

“You’re probably cold right? There’s no heating right now so you must be freezing.” Your words came out faster and maybe a little more jumped than you’d typically like. Watching him out of the corner of your eye he unfolded the blanket and placed it over his bare shoulders, relieving a little bit of your embarrassment. 

The picnic basket still left on the table caught your eyes once you felt calm again. The basket was still a bit wet, raindrops clinging to the top and sides of the basket. The bag with Shaw’s present is also just as damp. Glancing from the picnic basket to the blanket around Shaw’s shoulders, an idea formed in your head. 

“What’s going on in your head?” Shaw asked, poking your arm playfully. 

You smiled and looked at him. “The rain ruined my original plan but, I think I know what we can do to still celebrate.” You picked up one of the other throw blankets on the couch, and unfolded it and spread it on the living room floor. 

Shaw caught onto your plan pretty quickly, you handed him the picnic basket and pointed to the blanket. “You get this all set up, I’m going to go and find some candles so we can have a little bit of light.” 

You arranged your candles and flashlights around the blanket so there was at least some light overlooking your picnic food, even if some of the items had become slightly soggy from the rain. 

“Nice atmosphere.” Shaw joked. 

You rolled your eyes at him. “We can always eat in the dark.” 

“Nah.” Shaw said as he took a bite of the sandwich you’d made. “The dark is for other things.” He gave you a suggestive look as he said that, making your face turn red again. 

“Don’t be gross!” 

Shaw’s suggestive smirk only intensified. “I saw how embarrassed you were when you came out here. I know what I look like. You can-”

“Shaw stop it!” You said louder, trying to hide your flustered expression in the shadows left by the candles and flashlights. “I don’t care if it’s your birthday, I will make you go back out in the rain.” 

Shaw’s expression changed, but you still saw that mischievous spark, although that was just a regular feature of Shaw’s face. “You sure do get embarrassed easily.” He said as he took another bite. You ignored his comment, not interested in humoring his dirty mind further. 

“I’m surprised you didn’t have other plans today.” You said, looking up at Shaw. “I figured you’d go to Live House or hang out with the band.” 

Shaw shrugged. “Birthdays aren’t that big of a deal.” He said, sipping on the new can of cola you’d gotten him. “Besides, I knew you had something planned.” 

“Wait, how did you know?” 

“You’re not very good at surprises.” Shaw set the can of cola down as he picked at the side dishes. “I will give you one thing though, I wasn’t expecting this.” 

A smile broke across your face. “Do you like it?” 

Shaw looked back up at you. “It’s alright, you didn’t do too bad.” 

“Well,” you sat up straighter and leaned for the closed bakery box you’d set next to the picnic basket. “I still have a few surprises left in me.” You set the bakery box between you. Shaw’s expression changed as you opened up the top. Revealing the birthday cake you’d gotten for him. A simple cake frosted in blue with a dorky looking shark frosted onto the top, Happy Birthday Shaw! Written in black frosting below it. 

Shaw’s face shifted through a variety of emotions in a few seconds, at first confusion, surprise, and then he started laughing. Covering his mouth as he laughed. 

“What is that?” Shaw said between laughter. “It looks so childish.” 

You huffed, “It’s what the bakery had! And I figured you wouldn’t want a boring cake!”

Shaw managed to get his laughter under control as he looked at the cake again. “Let’s hope it tastes good for your sake.” He said, handing him a fork you both dug into the cake, not even bothering to slice it. 

The cake was sweet, and thankfully unaffected by the rainstorm, the cake flavor was fairly basic but the sweetness was enough to make it good. Shaw also seemed pleased with the flavor, taking bite after bite of the cake without complaint. 

Once the two of you had pretty much eaten the entire frosted shark you both considered that more than enough cake for the two of you. Now, it was time for your final surprise. 

Shaw was still focused on the cake when you pulled out the two gift wrapped packages, holding them out for him. 

“Your final surprise of the day, I promise.” 

Shaw took the two boxes, setting one down and unwrapping the other. You watched him intently as he ripped away the wrapping paper. 

A slight surprised noise came from Shaw as he looked at his gift. “A children’s fossil dig kit?” He held the box in his hands, the front showing two children digging in the play sand for plastic fossils. He gave you a bizarre look. 

“I thought it’d be fun! Little field work practice.” 

“It’s for children.” Shaw said. “Do I look like a child?” 

You reached for the toy. “If you don’t want it I’ll just return it then-”

Shaw pulled the box away. “Nuh uh, you don’t get to take a gift back. This is mine.” Shaw set the box down beside him, out of your grasp. You settled back where you sat, even if he wouldn’t say it, you knew he did like the gift. He picked up the second item, much smaller than the first, barely bigger than a stack of envelopes. 

Tearing the wrapping paper away, once again he seemed a bit confused by the gift in his hands. A stack of notecards, hole punched and held together by a binder ring. Each one with slightly different writing on it. 

“This is?” Shaw asked you, giving you a look. 

“It’s a coupon book, for my time and for favors. If you want to drag me along to a concert or an antique fair, you can use those, and I can’t say no.” 

“And I can use these for any kind of favor?” 

You nodded. “Yep! Anything at all.” 

Shaw looked back at the coupon book and then at you. A particular look in his eye. As he looked at you, you watched as the blanket that had been around his shoulders started to fall. 

Opening the binder ring he handed you one of the notecard coupons. “I’m using one right now, my first request.” Shaw scooted closer to you, so close you could feel the body heat radiating from his bare torso. “I want you to spend every one of my birthdays with me.” 

“Every single one?”

Shaw nodded. “Every single one.” Your eyes were locked together, your wide eyes against his slightly troublesome gaze. Still you weren’t worried about what was going on in his head. Beyond that troublesome gaze, there was also the softness in his face, the way he looked perfectly calm, and perfectly happy. “I think I have another idea for a coupon to use right now.” 

Smiling gently at him, you reached out to hold his hand, not breaking eye contact for a second. 

“I think I’ll let this one be a freebie.” 

Shaw leaned closer, until your foreheads were practically pressed together. 

“Perfect.” He whispered, closing the small gap between you. His soft lips pressed against yours he pulled away just a centimeter after one long kiss.

“This, I think, is the best gift I’ve gotten all day.”

[heres-someart]

I have the issue of hyperfocusing on an idea and not stopping until I have completed that idea. This idea (which took almost 11 hours to complete) was born from simply how much Captain Sparklez and friends make references to the myth of Icarus while playing Tricky Towers. I, completely reasonably, drew Captain Sparklez with wings in response

Click for better quality [ID: Captain Sparklez is crouched with one hand visible in front of him and the other behind a 4-long, green tetris block. He is wearing his Minecraft skin’s jacket and glasses, brown pants, and brown boots coupled with a red witch’s hat. He also has two large, golden wings. To his left, there is a s-shaped, red tetris brick on top of a grey-blue, t-shaped block. One the left of those bricks, there is the top of another 4-long, green brick. In the background, there is a sky with a blue-purple gradient and a cloud. There is also the artist’s signature next to the s-block: a circle with a line down the middle and a dot on either side of the line End ID]

[dangerouscommiesubversive]

electric desires had unraveled all my wires (now i'm in a box for safekeeping)

Fandom: Kamen Rider Ex-Aid Characters: Dan Kuroto, Hojo Emu, Poppy Pipopapo, Kujou Kiriya, Hanaya Taiga, Saiba Nico Song: "Cabinet Man," Lemon Demon (playlist here)

It starts with Emu saying, “Poppy, does it ever get crowded in there?”

Poppy blinks. “In where?”

“In your cabinet. I really don’t think it’s fair expecting you to babysit Kuroto like that, you know? Especially when we could definitely get him a cabinet of his own, customize it to have a firewall that keeps him from getting out.”

“Oh! You know, that might not be a bad idea.” And then she frowns. “What game would we get for him, though? Kuroto, what game are you a Bugster for?”

“All of them,” Kuroto says, unhelpfully. He’s on a programming binge again, eyes fixed on his computer screen as he works on something he won’t explain to anyone. He’s run through two lives already, Hiiro had to scold him about it. In fact, he’s focusing so hard that he’s not even moving his mouth—everything he says just emanates from the air about two inches to the left of his head. “But if you’re going to be displacing me from the housing to which I’ve become accustomed, I expect something suitable for an entity of my importance. A Polybius cabinet would be acceptable.”

Emu groans. “Polybius doesn’t exist.”

Kiriya appears with a fizz in the middle of Emu’s sentence. “Hey, ace, Poppy, promising news from the path lab. What doesn’t exist?”

“Polybius. It’s a video game that drives you crazy, but it’s just an urban legend.”

“Are you suggesting that I, the god Dan Kuroto, don’t deserve something legendary?”

“Can it, God,” Kiriya says, cheerfully, “go play dice with the universe somewhere else, I’m busy trying to clean up your messes.”

A furious red exclamation point pops up in the air over Kuroto’s head. “I do not play dice with the universe.” His disembodied voice vibrates with offense. “I play Tetris, and I am winning.”

Poppy frowns thoughtfully. “I suppose we could put him in a Tetris machine, that would be restrictive enough I think.”

“Put who in a Tetris machine?” Taiga walks in without looking at anyone, focused on a clipboard in his hands.

“God.”

“Don’t call him that, Kujou, it encourages him.” Taiga turns a page in the document he’s reading. “Put him in one of those games that comes with a light gun if we’re not keeping him with Poppy, I could use something for target practice.”

More exclamation points, clustering above Kuroto’s head and monitor like a little angry cloud. “Don’t try me, Snipe.”

“Right, because you’ll do what? Jump out of a pipe at me?”

Emu claps a hand over his mouth to stifle laughter just as Parad is materializing next to him with a cheery, “Who’s jumping out of pipes? Is it Genm or someone else? I haven’t seen him jump out of a pipe lately.”

“Oh! Parad! Perfect! What game do you think Kuroto is the Bugster for?” Poppy bounces on her toes. “Emu was suggesting maybe we could get him his own cabinet so he’s not just living in mine.”

Parad squints at the exclamation points still orbiting Kuroto. “I don’t know, but whatever you decide, he can’t have a Tetris cabinet, puzzle games are my thing. Could we get him a Polybius one?”

“No, we can’t get him a Polybius cabinet, those aren’t real.”

“Can we put him in a Whack-A-Mole machine so I can hit him with a hammer?”

“Whack-A-Mole isn’t a video game, though.”

“No, but I’d really like to hit him with a hammer.” At Poppy’s steady, disapproving look, he sighs. “Ok, fine, no Whack-A-Mole. Oh, we could put him in a Tekken cabinet and I could play him against N. What, what’s everyone staring at?”

Kiriya and Taiga are staring, Kiriya with indulgent incomprehension, Taiga with irritation. Emu is still trying not to laugh. Kuroto, radiating offense behind his increasingly thick veil of bright red exclamation points, says, “I think I’ll come back when you’re feeling a bit more respectful,” and fizzes off into the curtained alcove containing Poppy’s DoReMiFa Beat machine. The exclamation points remain for a moment before dissipating.

Before anyone else can speak, Nico walks in, a heavy nursing textbook under one arm, and scowls when she sees everyone else. “Well, I was looking for somewhere quiet, but obviously that’s not happening.”

Kiriya grins at her. “So what kind of arcade machine do you think we should move God into, ace killer?”

“Ooh, ‘ace killer’ is new, I like that.” She stares into the air for a moment, looking thoughtful, and then says, “House of the Dead, obviously. Or maybe Bloodborne, we can custom one. Now nobody talk to me, I have an exam to study for.” Having finished speaking, she goes to the couch, curls into a small ball at one end, and buries her face in her textbook.

Taiga’s forehead wrinkles. “And Bloodborne is…what?”

“I don’t know, but it sounds unsanitary, I’m into it.” Kiriya’s grin gets wider.

“I’ll consider Bloodborne,” Kuroto shouts from behind the alcove curtain, “as long as I get sufficient processing power.”

Emu and Poppy say, simultaneously, “Absolutely not.”

[repentantsky]

The difference Between JRPG’s and WRPG’s, and why we should stop comparing them

If you’re like me, you love RPG’s of many different genre’s. Whether they cover fantastical realms like Skyrim and Final Fantasy, or more technologically advanced ones like Borderlands or Star Ocean. 

Like all genre’s most RPG’s of different genre’s also suffer from different problems because of tropes and reused settings that people can grow tired of, but talking about RPG’s from two different parts of the world, is a whole other problem. Japan for example, is mostly marketing itself to Western players, while Western RPG’s, are mostly marketing themselves to Western players...uh wait, why does that make them different? 

It’s all because of style choices. See, Japan like most countries, has a lot of traditions that make a lot of it’s products fairly same-y. As I said that happens with everyone, but Japan has to try harder with smaller series to get western appeal, which is required to have a successful selling game, unless it’s a mobile title, since those all do really well in Japan, because people can just game on their way to and from work. I digress, but Japan is so rooted in tradition, that you can watch an episode of Gigantor, the anime that is considered by many to be the first anime ever created, and Demon Slayer, and notice a lot of similarities in the way the characters are speaking, because Japan has always made their shows where actors talk like they would in real life, which isn’t always true in other acting platforms around the world, which of course means, this translates to video games. 

Specifically what it means, is that Japan has to hop a cultural barrier that Western games don’t, and they have to rely on a lot more tropes, because there are only so many ways to translate the same basic plot of a JRPG, for Western audiences, before things become too cliché. A lot of RPG’s are successful in doing this, like the aforementioned Final Fantasy, and other JRPG’s are coming through with successful games to, like Fire Emblem. Persona and Shin Megami Tensei, Atelier, and several others. All of the games coming through lately, lead people to believe that JRPG’s are a thriving genre in the west, but that’s not really true. 

If you were to ask any random person what the most successful JRPG of all time was, a lot of people would probably think of a Final Fantasy game, but not even Final Fantasy 7, has come close. In fact the only JRPG that even made it to the top 10 best selling games ever, is Pokemon Red/Blue/Green/Yellow as a collective, with four different versions. The next best selling one is Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal, and in fact, only 11 of the top 49 best selling games of all time, are RPG’s, and all of the JRPG’s are Pokemon titles. Final Fantasy 7 has still been wildly successful, as the original has sold over 11.8 million units, and the remake over 5 million, but the fact of the matter is, that even though RPG’s as a whole are the biggest genre of the top 49, the few that made it are exceptions to the rules. In fact, of the top 10 best selling games of all time, 6 of them are by Nintendo. The other 5 excluding Pokemon, are Wii Sports, Super Mario Bros. Mario Kart 8/Deluxe, Wii Fit/Plus and the original Gameboy version of Tetris, which itself is on there twice because EA’s version is number 3. so you’re actually better off in Japan, not making a JRPG. 

There’s a lot more that can be gleamed from looking at the list, so you can check it out here if you want: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games 

The point is that JRPG’s, aren’t always as successful as people think they are. I mean sure, you don’t have to be on the top best selling games list to be successful, but Persona 4 Golden on PC is considered a massive success for selling only just over a million units since it’s release, and the Tales of Series, which is one of the longest running in gaming, as recently as April of this year, had it’s sales numbers made public, and Tales of Symphonia, the undeniable Final Fantasy 7 of the series, sold a total of 940,000 units in the United States, and the game, easily the most successful title from Tales of, only managed 2.4 million in total. None of this is to say, that JRPG’s are struggling, because most of the ones I brought up are shining examples that they aren’t, but going back to that top 10 list, Minecraft and Grand Theft Auto V,  just the top two of that list, have sold 345,000,000 total units. That not only beats the entire mainline series of Pokemon, it’s only about 2.5 million short extra, of beating the original 151′s total sales, with how many spare units the two games over Pokemon’s  300,000,000 million total sales mainline games, which means likely, the two of them will beat the series out at some point in the future. 

Western RPG’s, don’t often suffer from as many problems, because they don’t have a border to hop, and it shows with Elder Scrolls, which has sold 58 million total copies with only five mainline games, and 30 million of those came from Skyrim alone. It took Pokemon, the undisputed champion of JRPG sales, 20 mainline games to reach 300 million, which means arguably, by the time Elder Scrolls reaches it’s 10th installment, it will have caught up to Pokemon’s first 20 games total sales. Borderlands, which is arguably the Tales of to Western RPG’s in most people’s eyes, has actually outsold Elder Scrolls with only 4 mainline entries, one of which is considered bad by many, with a total of 60 million total units sold. The better comparison, surprising for many I’m sure, for a Tales of comparison, is actually Fallout, which has sold 13.51 million units, to Tales of 23.5 million units. 

Enough about numbers for a few minutes, 3 paragraphs about it is a bit much, but the fact of the matter is, Japan struggles more overall to make successful RPG’s in the West, than the West does in the West, and it’s all due to how much of a challenge it is to hop that border. 

Outside of sales numbers, the other major difference between JRPG’s vs Western RPG’s is how they are classified. Generally, when someone thinks of a JRPG, they think of a fantasy world, with leveling, where rare items can be won off bosses, but your main way of improving stats is to level up, and have enough money to buy the best equipment at each new town you enter with a shop. However, a lot of games have been getting that label slapped on them by their marketing teams or fans, and some of it is just wrong. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is one such game, despite the drops from enemies being the only correlation between BoTW and JRPG’s. The correlation was made by fans, which might seem like an innocent mistakes, and in fact could be nothing but that, but then there’s Monster Hunter, which actually does have two JRPG’s attached to it, in the Stories 1 and 2 games, but who took the reigns of JRPG to market, calling Monster Hunter World, a JRPG. despite it having few differences from other Monster Hunter action games, outside of having a story, and having nothing more to do with JRPG’s than Zelda. A lot of fans of Japanese games will classify simply playing as a fake character an RPG, which normally would be fine, but in games, that’s not how genres are defined. If that were the case, all of Yakuza’s games would be JRPG’s, instead of just Like a Dragon, and in fact most games would be RPG’s, and they obviously aren’t. Bubsy 3D RPG anyone? No? Ya sure? Yeah I didn’t think so.   

The west has the exact opposite problem of under classifying it’s games as RPGs. While sure, you wouldn’t call Halo an RPG, unless you know, Master Chief was shooting an RPG, you absolutely should call Ratchet and Clank one. Think about it, your main playable characters all have HP, most of them have weapons that can level up, and the action setting of these games, basically should make Ratchet, a response to Level 5′s Dark Cloud series, which did all the same things for combat. However, it’s just seen as series of action games, despite it also being a lot like Borderlands. 

The point is, there are a lot of things that differ JRPG’s and WRPG’s from sales, to marketing, to style and so many other factors, I would run out of characters available to me, before I get through them all. There’s nothing wrong with these genre’s being different, but people classifying them as similar, could harm either since they don’t often jell that well together. So please, think before you compare, and for those rare RPG’s, where you can’t tell the difference, makes sure you find out where they were developed, because a lot of games you might think are JRPG’s, could in fact be Korean or Chinese. 

[unpack-my-heart]

from out of nowhere (you came strong as stone)

This is the first story I’ve written since ... fuck knows when. It’s short, bittersweet, and I hope you enjoy it.

The summer that had taken too long to arrive ended on a sticky, sweat-slow September morning. Richie lay beached on his sea-foam bed covers, counting his breaths,

in and out,

in and out,

in and out,

His mother hasn’t seen the inside of his room since mid-April, and since then, the floor had become littered with the remains of food devoured long ago, a graveyard of chip packets and half-eaten candy bars grown furry with neglect. He’d lived the last few months in relative solitude, Diogenes in his barrel, his only reassurance the inevitability that this too shall pass.  The days had gelled together into a gelatinous clump of anxiety-infused monotony, a self-imposed isolation that had Richie desperately wishing that he’d tried harder at school from the beginning of his senior year.

Like the stem of a plant locked in darkness, Richie’s skin, blue-veined and sun-parched, twisted and turned on his bones, sunflower seed freckles waiting under his skin, waiting to be called to the surface by Helios himself. He’d spent day after day after night after night with his nose buried deep into various textbooks on subjects he couldn’t pretend to find interesting anymore, until, one afternoon, he was done. It was all rather anti-climactic, the walk from the exam hall to his car, the sun waving frantically at him from behind the thin icing-sugar dusting of cloud in the sky, you’re done, you’re free, your life is your own! Richie had pulled his prescription sunglasses down over his eyes, and climbed into his rust-bucket Ford, leaving the sun hanging bloated and ignored in the sky.

And now, as he lay on his bed, legs stuck in the air, parallel to the wall upon which they rested, all Richie could do was count his breaths and wait for Eddie to arrive.

Most of Richie’s life had passed him by as he waited for Eddie. When they were children, knee high to grasshoppers and twice as bouncy, he’d waited at Eddie’s house, hopping from foot to tiny foot, waiting for Sonia to baptise her son in sun-cream, waiting for the moment that Eddie would finally emerge from the dark, womby house, a thick film of white cream on his face, a sticky-sweet toothy grin. When they were middle-schoolers, Richie would wait for Eddie at the arcade, feeding quarters into the greedy machines as quickly as he could, trying desperately to stall for time, to hog the machines until Eddie would arrive, face crimson and knees knocking awkwardly as he walked, his long overdue growth-spurt still clinging to his bones.

Read the rest under the cut or on AO3

And so, now they’d finished high school, emerged not quite boys but still not men, Richie was still waiting. He spent the summer waiting for Eddie to finish his summer homework so they could go and watch the kingfishers dancing in the reeds at the barrens. He waited for Eddie to finish work at the library, standing in the parking lot, the August air wrapping itself around him, tickling his sunburnt skin. He waited for Eddie to open his window, witching-hour late, so he could clamber through and wrap himself around Eddie, terrified Tetris-pieces clutching at each other after nightmares, hoping that they were each braver than each other.

It's been nearly two hours since Eddie got out of church. The image of Eddie, knelt on the floor of St Benedict’s, hands clasped tight, so tight, eyes screwed shut, set Richie’s stomach alight, a forest-fire, destructive, lethal. The image floated in Richie’s brain for a while, Eddie knelt on the cold, stone floor of the church, Eddie knelt in the shower, rivers of water flowing across the parched plain of his back, Eddie knelt on Richie’s grimy carpet. So fucking dirty.

Richie grabbed his half-interested dick, squeezing it just so, just enough, a whisper of friction. Half-interest turned sailed straight to undevoted attention, and Richie sighed. The air was too hot, stifling, judgemental, and his hands were already damp with sweat. Sliding off the bed with a grunt, Richie slunk into the bathroom, locking the door behind him.

 *

 Another hour passed, and Richie was still waiting. The worst of the heat had gone, had sunk into the scorched grass, and the sounds of midsummer started floating back through Richie’s open window as people emerged from their houses. Children, screaming in delight, having wriggled free from the desperate clutches of their parents who stood, sunblock in hand, defeated. He’d run the water in the shower as cold as it would go, but it hadn’t been of much use. He’d come, gasping, face red with embarrassment and the release of a tension that had sat coiled in his abdomen for what felt like forever.

They’d spoken about it once.

They’d been at the library, Richie browsing the fiction shelves blindly, fingers skating over the spines of books he never had any intention of reading. They’d walked home together, an unspoken arrangement, and Eddie followed Richie up past the old well house on Neibolt street, and didn’t turn down the dusty track. They barely spoke as they walked, and Eddie kicked an old glass beer bottle all the way to Richie’s street, before sending it skittering into the undergrowth.

“Have you ever –”

The question died in Richie’s mouth before he’d realised he’d been half way to asking it. Eddie looked up from where he was lying.

“Huh?”

“Aw,” Richie started, throwing the elastic band ball he’d been working on at the wall, “never mind, Eddie Spaghetti.”

“No, come on, you can’t do that. Have I ever what?”

“It really doesn’t matter, Eds.”

thunk, thunk, thunk went the ball against the wall, a rhythmic heartbeat.

“I’ll fucking garotte you, Richie. Have I ever what?”

thunk

“Are you going to let this go?”

thunk 

“We both know the answer to that question.”

thunk, thunk –

“Have you ever wondered what it’s like …”

Eddie stared at him, slack-jawed, almost bored.

“What it’s like to what?! Stop being so cryptic, you’re not smart enough to pull it off.”

“What it’s like to suck someone off, like … a dude?”

Richie expected Eddie to react in one of three ways. One, to punch Richie on the nose and flee from the Tozier house never to return again. Two, to admit that yes, he had wondered what it’s like to suck someone off, why, isn’t Richie very perceptive for asking such a question. Three, to shrug his shoulders, all ‘nope, never have, never will, now stop fucking pining after me’.

Instead, Eddie just blinked.

“You’re killing me here, Eds. Are you gonna say something?”

“I’m thinking.”

“What is there to think about?” Richie babbled, motormouth running at full speed, max-fucking-horsepower, “it was a dumb question, just a joke. A classic Richie jest, heh. Don’t sweat your pretty little head about it any longer –”

“I’ve thought about it.”

Blink.

“Do you want to go and see whether Bev’s finished her shift? I fancy getting out of here, s’too fucking cold in your house,” Eddie yawned, standing up and stretching his arms above his head.

And that was that.

After that day, they never sat down and had a conversation about why they look at each other for slightly too long, eyes meeting over shitty diner coffee at two in the morning after an evening of tomfoolery in Mike’s barn. They never acknowledged that, when they walk home together after leaving the diner, six dollars left in a neat pile on the edge of the table, Richie would grab Eddie’s hand, and hold on tight, fingernails digging in, just scarcely, just enough. If Eddie thought it was weird, thought that Richie had a screw-loose and needed tightening, he didn’t mention it, he just rested his hand in Richie’s vice grip, barely holding on himself, but he didn’t need to. Richie had him.

They never acknowledged that when they said goodbye, Richie would duck down, face hovering next to Eddie’s, and he’d kiss the soft spot behind Eddie’s ear, a secret pressed into Eddie’s skin.

 *

 Eddie showed up close to midnight, when the sun had been chased across the sky by the moon which shone brilliantly in the sky.

 [Eds: 23:42: are you gonna let me in?]

[Eds: 23:42: i brought you something]

[Eds: 23:43: seriously trashmouth this branch doesn’t feel like it’ll hold forever]

[Eds: 23:44: OPEN YOUR FUCKING WINDOW]

 The window was barely half open when Eddie tumbled through it, limbs knocking together awkwardly. He’d had a growth spurt last year, shot up several inches in one summer, and Richie often found himself staring at the criss-cross silver slithers across his back when they went swimming at the quarry. Eddie hated them and had spent ages on the internet looking up remedies for stretchmarks, had even gone to the doctor, convinced that he’d need a skin graft, but Richie loved them, wanted to trace them with his tongue.

“I wish you’d let me use your door like a normal fucking person, asshole,” Eddie groaned, rubbing his elbow where it had fought with the sharp edge of Richie’s desk and lost.

“You really think Went would let that slide? Anyway, you’re a fucking liar if you don’t find this way more romantic.”

“Romantic?”

“Yup, romantic.”

“You’re a fucking idiot.”

Eddie was right, of course. Richie was a fucking idiot, with his heart glued messily to his sleeve.

“Here,” Eddie says, thrusting a small, wrapped package at Richie’s chest. His face has gone an odd colour, almost the colour of the marshmallows Richie’s mother decorated her apology hot chocolates with. “Just, don’t say anything until you’ve opened it, okay?”

The package was wrapped in newspaper,

‘the senator staunchly denies the accusations of …’

‘the next few days will be mostly dry, with the occasional …’

‘Mick Jagger, 77, has been caught with …’

“Stop reading the fucking wrapping paper, Jesus Richie,” Eddie snaps, and Richie looks up.

Eddie’s standing in the middle of Richie’s room, and he looks … panicked. Not the sort of panic that Richie is so used to seeing painted on Eddie’s face, panic that his mother will find out he’s snuck out of the house, panic he’s flunked a test, panic he’ll be late for his shift, panic he got some of Richie’s spit on his face when they’ve laughed with heads bowed close together. This panic, this is different.

“Eddie…” Richie warns, voice low, gravelly. “What is it?”

“Just … open it,” Eddie says, and there’s no bite, no sarcastic-witty-‘shut-the-fuck-up-Richie’-Eddieness. Richie doesn’t recognise the look on his face, can’t match it to the bank of Eddie expressions he keeps in his mind.

The paper comes away easily, and Richie’s left clutching a blank CD in a clear case.

“A CD?”

Eddie rubs the back of his neck with his hand, still not looking at Richie straight.

“Yeah, it’s … I thought about just sending you a link to a Spotify playlist but this … it felt more real.”

“Real? Eddie …”

Eddie shakes his head. “Shut up, okay. Just … listen to it. When I’ve gone, listen to it.”

The room feels smaller. The memories of them sitting here, playing video games on Richie’s dads old gamecube when they were seven, of watching horror movies about killer clowns and monstrous body snatchers when they were thirteen and Eddie would shriek loudly into Richie’s shoulder before punching him, of sitting and staring at the walls, a joint balanced precariously between Richie’s lips, Eddie bobbing his head along to Chris Cornell’s voice seeping out of Richie’s shitty speakers, the memories pushed at Richie’s arms, at his legs, squashing him. The room felt smaller, and Eddie, standing there, with his ridiculous determined expression and a set jaw, felt huge.

“Uh..,” Richie stammered, dumbly, staring at the CD in his hands.

“I’m gonna go now, okay? I think … I think it’s best if I go now. Text me, when you’ve listened to it. Text me and … yeah. Listen to it when I’ve gone?”

Before Richie could answer, before he could look at Eddie in the face, the room was empty.

Richie threw the CD on his bed, staring at it as if it might grow legs, arms, a mouth – as if it might speak to him, “this is what you think it is! It can’t be anything but this! Listen to me and find out! It’s what you always wanted!”

Richie stared at it. The insignificant chunk of plastic lying on his bed innocently, provocatively, as if it didn’t contain the secrets of the universe, as if it didn’t have the capacity to change Richie’s life in several short yet monumentally significant minutes. He’s almost sure he won’t’ listen to it. He grabs at it gingerly, holding it between his thumb and forefinger as if it’ll burn him, as if it’s something disgusting. He drops it in his overflowing waste bin, before marching out of the room, and down the stairs. The house is silent, and Richie stands in the sitting room, unsure what to do now.

Half of him wants to throw open the front door, and hot foot it to Eddie’s house, clamber in through the downstairs bathroom window that never shuts properly, tiptoe past Sonia passed out on her La-Z-Boy, pin Eddie against the wall of his immaculate bedroom, and demand that Eddie take it back. He wants to thrust the CD at Eddie, wrapped in the stupid newspaper, and leave. Pretend it never happened. It would be easier this way, nothing would have to change. They could go back to stolen glances across the room, clasped hands on intoxicated walks, dry presses of mouths to secret spots that no one else knew about. Easier.

The other half of him screams at him, begs him, to dig the CD out of the bin, to scrape the pencil shavings and the toenails off of it, and to put it in his Walkman, and to listen to what Eddie had to say. Hell, it might not even be what Richie thinks (hopes, dreams, dreads) it might be, it might be something mundane, a new album Eddie has found online, a new artist he thinks Richie will like, a recording of his new, perhaps ill-advised, stand-up comedy routine, and …

Not an expression of undying love, a token of affection, a symbol of everything Richie means to Eddie …

Wrapped up in a neat little plastic bomb that threatens to detonate and lodge shrapnel in Richie’s, till now, carefully-guarded heart.

Shit.

 *

 Most of Richie’s life had passed him by as he waited for Eddie. Only now, on this sweat-sticky summer night, Eddie waits for Richie. Impatiently.

 [Eds: 01:54: have you listened to it?]

[Eds: 02:13: this isn’t fucking funny]

[Eds: 02:43: Rich?]

[Eds: 04:20: im sorry]

 The sun filters in through the living room window, reborn. Richie’s still sitting on the sofa, head in his hands.

 [Eds: 05:12: Richie seriously]

[Eds: 05:45: listen to track 3 again]

 Track 3. Richie hasn’t listened to track 1, the CD is still lying in the waste bin, rejected, a grenade with the pin still intact, but waiting, ready, willing. It feels inevitable, really. Richie knows that, eventually, whether today, tomorrow, next year, thirty years from now, he’ll listen to that CD and he’ll run to Eddie. He’ll run, and it’ll all be different, the kind of different that sends electric-shock excitement shooting down Richie’s spine, and anticipation collects in his pores, seeping, oozing, unstoppable. It’ll be different. Richie needs, craves, different.

But, and it’s a huge, omnipresent but, they can’t go back from different. They can’t decide that actually, things were better the way they were, let’s stop being different and go back to what came before. Different is permanent, a deep gash that scars but doesn’t disappear, a tectonic shift, Atlas shifting his grip on the world, never again to place his hands exactly where they were before.

Whether it’s worth it, to take a punt on different, to screw his eyes closed and hope for the best, to jump into the void and hope it catches him with velvet-plush arms, Richie doesn’t know.

His phone buzzes, a long, prolonged clattering against the wooden coffee table.

[incoming call from: Eds]

Richie ignores the phone.

He sleeps the day away, a sleep that doesn’t quench his thirst for oblivion as he dreams vividly, dreams of difference and soft hands and eyes that roll and squint and of premature laughter lines etched on soft, youthful skin.

 *

 When Richie wakes up, it’s dark. He has 17 missed calls, and two texts.

[Eds: 14:52: don’t freak out, okay. I made that tape because I can’t bear the thought of you going off to college and of being such a fucking coward that I’d let you go without telling you. I’m sorry if it’s all weird now, but at least I’ve been honest with you. If you don’t feel the same, it’s fine, honestly. It’ll stop being weird eventually.]

[Eds: 17:19: I’m still coming to wave you off tomorrow, just FYI]

Ah. Tomorrow. The day Richie bundles himself into his father’s Subaru and leaves Maine for Chicago, the Windy City, the city that never sleeps, the city that Eddie won’t be in. Ay, there’s the rub.

Leaving Eddie behind as they are now, friends, best friends, best friends who look at each other for too long and hold hands in the dark, feels like a sucker punch that Richie can never recover from. Leaving Eddie behind as something different …

It’s half past eight and the CD is still in the bin, but now, Richie is in his bedroom, staring at it, daring it,

Make it different.

 *

 It takes him two hours to pluck up the courage to dig the CD out of the bin and put it in his Walkman. Another thirty to press play. He skips straight to track 3, fingers shaking.

 You have always been my safe home I walk, I run, I burn out into you You have always been my safe home My whole world has moved on

 Fuck.

Immediately, different settles over Richie like a thick smog. As soon as the song stops, before he’s even spoken to Eddie, it’s different. He can feel it, taste it, touch it in the air. And, as if he knows, as if he’s watching Richie at that very moment, Eddie texts.

 [Eds: 11:13: I love you]