#tried to keep it informative and concise

[bookwyrminspiration]

What’s aftg about

imagine lacrosse but slightly to the left and it turns out it's secretly infiltrated by the mafia for some reason

aftg follows "Neil Josten", who's about to graduate high school and running from his past when he gets the deal of a lifetime--he's signed to play Exy at the uni level for a team who's main requirement is needing a second chance.

it's stupid beyond measure for Neil to join up--the publicity when he's trying to hide, a teammate who knew who he used to be and could recognize him if he's not careful, how dysfunctional the team is. but by god does he love to play exy, and if he doesn't sign, he'll never have another chance to play

and neil's good at being stupid. but with a team made of tragedies, even basic communication is a herculean task, much less getting to championships. their tension isn't made any easier by their most famous player, the best exy player signed with the best team until, suddenly, he had to transfer to this mess after his playing hand was broken--in a skiing accident, reports say.

turns out the reports aren't quite true, and there's an ugly underbelly to the heart of the world of exy. one most players don't know about. neil should run, before he's caught, before this all implodes and kills him, but all he has left is the game. and his new team's rumored-insane goalkeeper who immediately notices something off with neil's backstory cuts him a deal. is it enough?

this doesn't cover everything for the sake of spoilers, but that's the basic premise. sports and mafia and trauma and running and fighting. i personally had a delightful time watching it all play out and can definitely see why it's so popular :)

[cicada-candy]

You gotta post your Tombsona!!! Or at least tell me about it :D

Eheheh okay okay,, this reminds me I need to go. Fix my AF page for it but :)\/ my creepy bastard of a tombsona.

RAZE

(verb: to completely destroy (a building, town, or other settlement).)

Sort of foil to Armstrong (my fave the loml) they're like. The atomic part of the atomic age. Instead of Space Race Era Scifi its more based on Scifi horror like War of the Worlds or Bodysnatchers (Uncanny Valley Speedrunner, truly a giver of heebies and jeebies all around.)

They're specifically representative of like. Joyful Nihilism. Fuck-It-All incarnate. I'm not!! Entirely sure about its relationship to its hosts yet (Like what attracts it to people yk?) But alas

As for like. Inter-media relations: Tesla & it are doing horrifying science partners, it and Armstrong are Being Horrifying Creatures under there partners and it and Rust are lighting shit on fire buddies 🤙✨️

Anyway yeah,, I luv themb and I should draw them again hmmm

[winterrrnight]

mystery of love

PAIRING: husband!soft!rafe cameron x wife!fem!reader

SUMMARY: rafe started to get more busy with his business, and you couldn’t help but start to feel neglected by him.

WARNINGS: soft soft SOFT rafe, he's so lovesick for his wife it is crazy (no it isn’t that’s practically canon), slightly suggestive content but it’s written with a fluffy intent, usage of nicknames like goddess & baby, and just loads of sweetness over all, very very slight angst (?) and intentional use of lower case

EDITH SPEAKS: this fic is more on this, you can’t look at that picture and not think that’s rafe, cause it is! thank you so so much to @glimodejun who commented their idea which prompted me to write this 🫶🏼 i was supposed to write a blurb but I got carried away, clearly, and this is pushing 2k words 😁

anyways, please please reblog if you liked this and feedback is always appreciated! thank you so much for reading 🫧

navigation || join my taglist || requests || series masterlist

oh will wonders ever cease? blessed be the mystery of love

↶ೃ✧˚. ❃ ↷ ˊˎ-

it was starting to get a little out of hand.

you always knew how important rafe’s business was to him, especially after he inherited it all from his father. the burgeoning fire in him to make the business bigger and better than it had ever been and be so much more powerful than his father, who couldn’t give him an ounce of attention or praise his entire childhood was one of the biggest things fueling his motivation.

that, and wanting to give you everything you could possibly need in great abundance so that you never felt you were at a loss of anything under his roof.

so you knew he tended to sometimes spend longer hours at the office, to get everything done, to not let a single mistake fall into place in front of his eyes, everything perfectly coordinated and right up to his standards.

he always made sure to call you or send you a text if he was going to be late, informing you why he was going to be late, the tentative time he should be back home, with a small ‘i love you’ and ‘i miss you’ accompanied with the occasional red heart he only ever used for you.

since the past few days, unfortunately you hadn’t been receiving the texts you always did. if you did, it was short, something along the lines of ‘i’ll be late’. but no explanation as to exactly what had been keeping him busy, and no words of endearment at all. he started coming home really late, most of the times when you had tried your best to stay up till he comes home, but the exhaustion would always defeat him in the race and you’d be out like a light.

and the next morning wasn’t close to being better than the night. if you were lucky, you would catch him getting ready for work, and you would always prompt him to stay for at least breakfast. but he would be in a hurry and shake his head no, saying something like ‘i have to leave, it’s important’ and leaving you with a chaste kiss to your lips.

whatever you’d ask, his answers to you would be short, concise and quick, and you felt as if you’re catching the subtle drift of vexation and annoyance in his tone. was it actually there or were you just imagining it? you didn’t know.

and if you weren’t lucky, you wouldn’t even get to see him leave. by the time you would be up, you would only feel the cold wrinkled sheets next to you, the faint scent of him lingering in the air as a burning memory of the love of your life.

this specific night, exactly one week after since the first day this peculiar behavior of his started, you were seated on the edge of the bed after a shower, applying your lotion on your arms as you prepared yourself for another night of waiting for rafe, falling asleep in the process, and letting it be a mystery solved only by some higher power if you would see him in the morning or not.

as you were rubbing the lotion into your skin, you couldn’t help your wandering mind. how were you supposed to deal with this situation? were you supposed to confront him and demand answers? or were you supposed to tread slowly? you knew you were nearing the end of the american fiscal year; 30th of september being right around the corner. it involved loads of financial and accounting work, preparing end-of-year accounts and statements, and what not. so him being busy felt justified. but he should be able to spare a moment to at least send you a proper text, shouldn’t he?

no, you shake your head. you’re his wife, for god’s sake. you shouldn’t be reducing your worth down to some text. heck, you should be getting proper calls from him. you’ve been so wonderfully patient, not complaining for a second for the past week. the least you can get is a proper conversation with him.

as you made up your mind firmly, your thoughts were cut through firmly when the door to your bedroom opened. you looked up to see rafe entering inside the room, his blazer off and resting on his shoulder, and his sleeves messily rolled up to his elbows.

“hey,” he muttered as he closed the door behind him, keeping his bag on the side and disappearing behind the washroom door.

“hey,” you said quietly, your gaze fixed on the floor as you heard the washroom door close. you remained seated on the edge of the bed, clad in a satin black robe which he swore made you look even more of a goddess than you already did as you waited for him to come out.

you heard the shower run inside for some time, after which the door opened and you were greeted with rafe sporting a pair of grey sweatpants, his upper body bare with some water droplets still trickling down his skin.

as he came out, he saw you in the same position at the edge of the bed as before. “hey why aren’t you going to sleep hm?” he asked as he busied himself with applying his moisturizer to his face.

“no reason,” you muttered, your back to him as you kept your gaze down at your feet.

rafe was very quick to catch the dejection in your voice, and before you knew it, he was making his way around the bed to you, standing right in front of you as he looked down at you.

“baby, look up please,” he murmured softly, one of his hand coming to rest on your cheek.

you lifted your head up to meet his gaze, your eyelids heavy as you look up at him through your lashes. “yeah?” you mumbled.

rafe exhaled softly at your bleak tone. he sank down on his knees in front of you, his gaze coming to your level.

“listen baby,” he sighed softly, placing both his hands on your thighs right below the hem of the robe. “I… I haven’t been the best husband the past week and I’m… so so sorry about that,”

his heartfelt words reached your ears and caused your eyes to widen, your mind started to work away the gears to process his words.

“I haven’t been giving you the attention and love I vowed to give you on day one,” he whispered looking deep in your eyes, his own eyes softened to such an extent it had you melting completely. “I haven’t been communicating well with you I…” he muttered, running one hand over his prickly buzzed hair, “I didn’t mean to do that baby I’m so sorry…”

you wanted to say something, anything, for that matter, but you were rendered completely speechless when you started feeling him press kisses over your thighs.

“I hope you can forgive me,” he whispered into your skin, “I hope you can forgive me for everything I did… I’ll make it up to you I promise…”

your lips parted to let out shuddering gasps as you felt him slowly move the satin of your robe up to reveal more of your thighs, his lips pressing kisses against your inner thighs and trailing over your outer thighs.

“I’m so sorry… so sorry, my goddess…” he whispered. “i won’t ever do this again… you’re my top priority, always, and there will never be a second where you don’t feel that way…”

his words left a searing mark on your skin, his lips trailing up to your left hip bone. one of his hands came to rest on your right hip, rubbing gentle circles onto your hip bone through the satin of your robe, and his other hand shifted your robe even higher to grant him more access to your skin. his lips landed on your hip bone and he pressed the most tender kisses along the bone, a soft gasp escaping your lips at his actions. your hand came to rest on the side of his face, your head leaning back as you felt the sensations of his lips on your sensitive hip bone thrum all throughout your body, lighting up each and every nerve that constituted you.

“I love you so much…” he whispered against your skin, starting to gently suck on your skin, his eyes fluttering shut. a hum of pleasure tumbled past your lips, your own eyelids getting heavier. “I love you so so much darling and I’m…” his lips started to trail over your lower abdomen, pressing kisses through the soft satin of your robe that still covered your upper half, “I’m never making this mistake ever again I promise... please forgive me…” he pleaded, his lips making over to your other hip bone and kissing on it, before gently sucking on it the same way he did earlier.

“you only deserve the best…” he murmured, lips trailing a path down to your inner thigh again. “just the best… cause you are so amazing…” he whispered, nipping on the soft skin of your inner thigh. your fingers curled over the nape of his neck to give you some leverage, soft gasps leaving your lips, your eyelashes fluttering, and your chest starting to heave from every kiss and nip of his lips and teeth.

his both hands now rested on the sides of your thighs as they gently kneaded into the flesh and his lips peppered insistent kisses all over your inner thighs. he looked up from your thighs up to you, a pleading expression in his eyes, his lips slightly parted as breaths escaped them.

“please forgive me, my beautiful goddess…” he implored, his voice a mere whisper. “please please forgive me, I’ll never do the same I promise…”

you looked down at him, your fingers trailing to the side of his face to gently cup his cheek. he snuggled into the warmth of your hand almost immediately, his eyes closing for a moment as he let out a soft sigh, letting his lips press a chaste kiss to your palm.

“I forgive you, rafe…” you whispered.

that made him look up at you, his eyes widened and the pleading expression draining out to be replaced with a hopeful one.

“yeah? you do?” he asked, squeezing your thighs in return.

“yeah,” you whispered back, giving him a small smile as you trailed your fingers to the side of his neck, gently scratching your nails against it. he let out a soft exhale at the sensation, letting his head drop to your thighs as your fingers made their way to the back of his neck, continuing the scratching motion. he almost purred in your lap at the feeling, nestling his face into your thighs.

“thank you…” he whispered against your skin. “I won’t disappoint you again, I promise,”

you let out a gentle sigh as you looked at his buried face in your thighs, your expression softening more.

“I know you won’t,” you mumbled, leaning down to press a soft kiss to his head.

that night, he held you in his arms and kept you pressed against him, his warmth lulling you in the most beautiful slumber you had experienced in that past week. he made sure you fell asleep comfortably, his lips always pressing random kisses to whatever part of your skin he could succumb to, whispered sweet nothings stumbling past his lips to your ears to alleviate you to great heights.

↶ೃ✧˚. ❃ ↷ ˊˎ-

TAGLIST: @runningfrom2am @saccharinesammie @maybankslover @totalswag @madelynie @chenslucy @ietss @elle-mp3 @viawritesstuff @wallsdreams @mistress-amidala @sadfury @sage-burrow @jamesbuckybarneswify @xxxlaura @thatsthewaythechrissycrumbles @callsignwidow @starkowswife @drewstarkeyswifehoe @jjchaer @f4ll-for-you @wearemadeofstardust0 @drewsmusee @rafegirly @addriaenne @leighbronk @rafesdrew @bejeweledreverie @raf3sgff @aerangi @drewstarkey1bae @moneymaybank @spideysimpossiblegirl @noahkahansorangejuice @rafesgiirl @theoraekenslover @fals3-g0d @personalfavsthatarerandom @b1mb0slvt @babypoguelife @ilyrafe @ladyinbl00d @thisisntannie @zyafics

[sneakyxthexclown]

How Blitz Saved Stolas in Mastermind

Something I've been wanting to do for a WHILE is talk about a very, very specific scene in Mastermind. Seriously, it's, like, two sentences long, but it really stuck out to me, and I've been thinking about it since November. (Apologies if other people have talked about this before!)

Let me preface by saying, I LOVE English and writing. I minored in English with a writing concentration in undergrad, and I used to work in my college's writing center. When I didn't have appointments, I would study grammar rules and shit like that. While English is, in fact, a very stupid language, it is still quite fascinating.

The thing that really stuck out to me in Mastermind is Blitz's use of something called "passive voice" during the trial.

For those who may not know, passive voice is a way of constructing your sentences. It makes it so that the object of the sentence comes before the verb, and, in a sense, it can "hide" the subject. This is different from active voice, where the subject clearly does the verb to the object. For example:

Active voice: I (subject) kicked (verb) the ball (object).

Passive voice: The ball (object) was kicked (verb) by me (subject).

I've had MANY teachers tell me that using passive voice at all is a big no-no, and that's due to a couple of reasons. First, passive voice tends to create a more complex sentence, which can be harder for readers to interpret. And second, some people consider it too informal or "not proper" for writing because it's not as clear or concise as active voice.

HOWEVER

Passive voice is often still accepted when a person wants to remove blame or hide responsibility. For example:

The lamp was broken. The car was wrecked. The bank was robbed.

See how you still know what happened in all of those instances, but you don't know who did it?

That is exactly what Blitz does during the Mastermind trial.

After he admits to stealing the book (or "attempting" to steal the book as he says), he then states,

"Point is! It was given to me, okay? I was allowed to use it."

Instead of:

"Point is! Stolas gave it to me, okay? Stolas allowed me to use it."

Passive voice. Why?

To keep Stolas out of it. To protect him.

I believe that if Blitz had mentioned Stolas's name earlier, it would've been a surefire way to not only save Millie, Moxxie, and Loona but also his own life. I mean, look at how fast Satan was willing to change his tune once Stolas "confessed." Couldn't Blitz have just said, "hey, dude. Uh, actually, the royal who owns this book let me do all this, soooo, isn't he the one who should be in trouble here?" (Now, maybe Satan wouldn't have bought this since he wasn't willing to listen to most of what Blitz was trying to say that day, but that is an entirely different conversation.) He could've done that by using active voice.

But he didn't. He intentionally kept Stolas out of that entire conversation. In fact, Blitz never even mentions Stolas's name until Andrealphus already brought him up, until Blitz admits that he could've killed Stolas himself. But that still doesn't put any blame on Stolas. If anything, it just makes Blitz look more guilty.

I think we can all agree that Blitz isn't the type to throw his friends under the bus. Obviously, if Blitz and Stolas were on good terms, he would do anything to protect him. But they weren't on good terms.

This all takes place after the Full Moon, after Apology Tour, after all the screaming and the raging and the storming off in tears. Prior to the trial, the last time Blitz and Stolas saw each other, Blitz left still under the impression that Stolas was mad at him, that Stolas wanted nothing to do with him.

And even still, he didn't acknowledge the fact that Stolas did allow Blitz to use it (despite him stealing it first). Even though they weren't even close to speaking terms, Blitz still protected Stolas that day.

He could've tried to save his own ass. He could've been petty about the deal and said, "here, Stolas, this is what you get." But he didn't. Because even though Blitz has his own valid reasons for being mad at Stolas, he still loves him. And he'd still do anything to keep him out of danger.

Blitz tends to prefer actions over words (e.g., that's why Blitz gets upset when Stolas gives him the crystal. He interprets Stolas's actions as "you're throwing me away.") Stolas tends to prefer words over actions (e.g., that's why Stolas gets upset when Blitz roleplays with "I love you/I'll stay with you." He interprets Blitz's words as "this is a joke to me.")

But that day? They both chose the opposite.

Stolas's actions saved Blitz. And Blitz's words saved Stolas.

Isn't that neat?

[strawbairicake]

5 random headcanons about wuthering waves characters in no particular order! 

warnings: none! pure fluff!

word count: 601

author’s note: came up with these while recovering from being sick. apologies for any typos in advance! hope you enjoy! <3

taglist: @your-sleeparalysisdem0n, @threnodians, and @sheyfu!

brant: 

very touch-starved but will almost always initiate physical touch before thinking better of it. if you notice him doing this, please hug him or hold his hand. 

kids gravitate towards him and absolutely love him. they like playing little family-esque games and Brant is their biggest supporter of this! the crew has to physically pull him away from the children. but he promises, and keeps said promises, to return and play some more! 

he’s an animal magnet, and he takes time out of his day to feed and or pet the animals. birds gravitate themselves toward him most. 

if he gets caught doing something a little silly by the crew, he runs past you and puts his hat on you. you never know how he’s able to do that. 

he is so pretty, and if you like makeup and put some on him, he looks even prettier, it’s unfair. putting blush on him gives him an almost innocent look, it’s very cute. 

jiyan: 

spars with you regularly to ensure you’re still agile and aware of your surroundings. he’s also very quiet when he approaches you to do said spars so you better be on your guard! 

he really likes holding hands, but he loves holding pinkies with you more. don’t ask him why, though, he won’t be able to give a concise answer. 

dogs randomly walk up to him sometimes, and he makes sure to return them to a safe place if their owner isn’t in sight. 

abides by the sidewalk rule, and i will DIE on this hill. you both could be having a discussion and he just carefully and methodically swaps your positions the second he notices something from the opposite direction coming at you. 

turns into putty if you take down and play with his hair. it’s so long and fluffy! you’ve gotta get his hair routine, it’s unfair how good his hair looks! 

jinhsi: 

likes physical touch but can be unsure as to initiating it. she tries for you, though! you’ll see her reach out, hesitate, before her hand returns to her side. you’re the one to initiate touch if that’s your thing.

likes holding pinkies with you- a small reassurance that you’re with her. 

you bring her food and snacks when sanhua finds you to inform you jinhsi’s overworking herself. 

 when she’s not busy, she likes to cook for you. she’s actually a really good cook and makes really cute food; think of japan and their café’s food!

she absolutely loves stargazing with you- it’s quiet and serene, but it’s so nice to spend quiet time with those you love. no words need to be said, just being in each other’s presence is enough.

carlotta: 

definitely dances with you (like in the 2.0 story!) for fun. she makes it fun and enjoyable if you don’t know how to dance, too! a very good teacher, probably trained to do this by her family.

teaches you how to use guns and or weapons in general if you want to learn. 

she likes giving gifts and initiates physical touch a good bit of the time. if you’re holding hands, she’ll intertwine your fingers together before bringing your hand up and kissing your knuckles. 

if you happen to like reading and an anticipated book is coming out, she goes out of her way to get a special edition of said book for you just to see the reaction on your face. 

a really good caretaker when you’re sick- brings towels to put on your forehead, medicine (and knows when the next dosage is), and is very sweet when you’re not feeling well. 

©lia-lillies 2025. do not repost, copy, translate, modify, or use for AI.

[inkie-does-whump]

Screw it, Imma talk about the body horror instead of finishing the Ranchers fic (this is gonna have several parts, cuz I have a lot to say, so keep an eye out for more!)

Trigger warning for mild body horror. Duh.

It starts with Jimmy, the guy with the perpetually broken body. It's inconvenient for Jimmy to be out of commission for so long (people wanna hit the Canary, who can blame them? He has a very punchable face) So the Watchers start trying to figure out how to heal him faster. They don't like to heal him with magic, cuz it's really draining, they prefer for subjects to heal naturally (maybe with some assistance from medicine/technology)

The solution they came up with is false bodies. The Watchers could use dark magic to move Jimmy's conciseness into life-sized dolls that could be easily replaced or repaired (the reason the Watchers prefer this over healing is cuz this is more like necromancy type stuff, which they're good at. They suck at healing magic. Dump stat)

Anyways, they didn't tell Jimmy they were doing this. All he knew was that his routine "check ups" to the medical center were getting longer and more frequent. They would check his wounds, test for things like his reflexes and nerve damage, and then he would be hooked up to a machine with a bunch of wires while the Watchers monitored and took notes. It took a while for them to figure out how to get the magic right, but eventually (during the E2 SMP) they succeeded in transferring him into a doll.

The first one was plush, but they eventually backtracked and made later ones from plastic, cuz the plush was super easy to break and cracks in the plastic could be fixed by melting it back together with a heat gun.

Jimmy was, rightfully, horrified with the body he found himself in. He had a panic attack in the medical center, and the Watchers dragged his new body to his room so he could calm down in his panic box. He didn't leave for several days.

Which was fine. Plush doesn't need food or sleep. Even his strained breath is unnecessary.

This did lead to the Watcher's first problem though. Jimmy could no longer be controlled through tranquilizer, which was one of the main ways the Watchers managed to get him through transportation without screaming and thrashing. Drugs were useless, meaning the Watchers had significantly less control over him. They began studies on transferring into organic bodies instead of plastic or plush (I'll expand on this more in a post about Amnesia Colds)

Jimmy's brain does a bad job at coping with its new home. Stress makes his seams break. A glimpse of glass eyes or red circles on his cheeks sends him into a full blown break-down. Breathing his hard with all the cotton in his lungs. He finds himself coughing it up at late hours of the evening, heaving for air he doesn't need.

He's been crying more than normal, and it's getting on people's nerves. The subjects in the lab (Empires2 SMP) are finding it hard to sleep through it. It makes Joel's manic episodes worse, and eventually Jimmy is thrown to the wall like the ragdoll he is, and has the voicebox torn from his throat.

Fwhip is the Watcher's Assistant in this lab (aka, an admin. For more information, check out my post on Xisuma) and he finds Jimmy limp on the floor of the practice room, cotton pouring from the tear in his neck, glassy eyes unfocused. He tries the best he can to stitch Jimmy back up with the supplies in the practice room, and eventually Jimmy comes back to reality.

He wants to cry, but no sound escapes him.

Jimmy turns to Fwhip desperately, panic setting in. Fwhip doesn't know how to help, so he helps Jimmy back to his room and urges him to rest. Instead of getting in bed, Jimmy sits in his panic box quietly.

Eventually the Watchers have to restore his body, but Jimmy is stuck with no voice for weeks. The Watchers prefer it, but a few renters complained that he never screamed when they hit him anymore, so his voicebox was restored quickly after that.

(Sometimes Joel sits in his room, pulling the string of the voice box and listening to his brother-in-law's voice play, dead and monotone.)

Body horror part two link :3

[scribescrawls]

I think what really surprised me about tfone Starscream was how serious he is? I think? Like, most Starscreams I saw likes to waste time gloating or getting distracted by pettiness and such, while in the movie as the conversation gets derailed a lot by the characters, Starscream is the one who tries to focus on the task at hand — which is identifying them on whether they're spies or not and gaining information to sabotage Sentinel.

There's also the fact that 90% time Starscream talks viciously and his inflection is always hectic with barely restrained anger/impatience, when Bee identifies them as the High Guard, Starscream suddenly changes his tone when recounting what they experienced and he sounded waaaayy calmer and saner. Like, it sorta gives us a glimpse of who Starscream was prior to the Betrayal and the toll of the exile bearing down on him – he's focused on the job, speaks calmly and explains concisely. Idk the tone change really left an impression on me, that "huh maybe that's who Starscream typically is before any of this happened?"

There's also the fact that he doesn't dupe or speak with manipulative venom — he's pretty upfront with their intentions, their past, and who they are.

Yeah, I agree with all of this! It's really interesting to me too! Also yeah he's pretty upfront about their intentions and about their past/who they are like you mentioned which is pretty interesting to think about! Part of it I think is because I think he does mean it that if they were spies he would have killed them and neutralized any potential threat. You can be honest if the people you tell will be too dead to tell anyone else about it. I think part of the seriousness also comes from what is at stake if he makes a mistake as leader. The weight of over 70 lives are in your hands. You make one wrong decision and people you've known for over 50 cycles, probably even hundreds if not thousands of cycles, could die. Not only that, but the High Guard as far as they know are the only ones alive who know the truth about Sentinel's betrayal before this moment, so if they die the truth dies with them. And if the truth dies with them any hope of justice or revenge, whether it's to avenge themselves, the 13 Primes, or even for Cybertron itself are gone. It's a lot of pressure for anyone to carry and even more so for the leader who has to make the call on who to trust and bear the responsibility if it all goes wrong.

I also personally headcanon that working directly with the Primes also contributed to his ability to stay on task and work efficiently and hone his leadership skills. I agree that the tone shift you mention might be a glimpse of what he was like pre-Sentinel betrayal. The movie implies that the 13 Primes were competent leaders, so if he was bad at his job I don't think they would have tolerated allowing the head of the High Guard to be bad at his job in the middle of a major war. I think Starscream still has his flair for dramatics and vanity/pride (his throne and the way he struts lol), but in some ways there's a balance to it where he's still on task as you mentioned trying to extract as much information they can use to their advantage against Sentinel while also assessing the loyalties of his prisoners and keeping everyone else from getting side-tracked.

Also I don't even blame him for being so done and impatient with everyone as leader because have you ever tried to do a group project with more than ten people for an extended period of time who all have differing ideas and who keep veering off-task? It's a nightmare. Now imagine that situation for 50 cycles and multiply that number by like 10 and on top of that the entire group is hangry cause you're all probably starving from the lack of energon and everyone is an emotional powder keg from the betrayal, exile, and death of the Primes not to mention all the danger of just living on the surface while being hunted down by the Quintessons. Like Starscream is probably angry over everything, but I think he's mostly very stressed and so so tired. Let this old bot nap for a few years pls, he's so TIRED.

Although I do believe he would have killed Orion and Co. if he determined they were spies or too big of a security risk to keep alive, I personally headcanon that he was contemplating letting them live. I think Bee's enthusiastic reaction to the High Guard and Orion's positive mention of their reputation did actually make Starscream more convinced that they weren't spies for Sentinel, but even if he contemplated trusting them to an extent I think he's also probably weighing the pros and cons of killing them and if it is worth the risk to keep them alive. But also weighing if they could be potential allies when they are sorely lacking any.

Like before D-16 started walking off, Starscream was being aggressive and shooting down Orion's ideas and dismissing his hope of a 'unified Cybertron', but what's fascinating is that Starscream and Orion were having a discussion even if they were disagreeing on a course of action. Like he's giving off angry/impatient/aggressiveness vibes in his tone, but he is willing to talk with Orion. It haunts me all the 'what-if- scenarios' that could have happened if D-16 hadn't interrupted/tried leaving and the fight between Starscream and D-16 never happened in that moment. Like would Orion and Starscream have come to a compromise, would Orion succeed/fail in getting Starscream to work together, would they still have to fight Starscream to prove themselves whether it's D-16, Orion, Bee, or Elita who fights him. How would Orion's optimism clash and/or mesh with Starscream's cynicism if they worked together? Like there's so many possibilities.

Although even if Starscream was leaning toward letting them live, I personally don't think he'd reveal that to Orion and Co. immediately because people are willing to reveal more secrets and be honest if they think their life is on the line. Also because considering what happened the last time they all trusted someone (Sentinel), I don't think Starscream would be willing to risk putting his trust in strangers he met only a few hours ago until he can confirm without a doubt that they won't betray him and the High Guard. I think he would have kept them as 'prisoners' under observation for a while continuing to play up the 'I will kill you at any moment if you step out of line or betray us' while simultaneously creating new battle plans implementing their new allies into the equation. There's a bit of calculated manipulation/scheming in that, but also an interspersing of honesty in it too.

Like I know D-16 essentially calls Starscream a coward for not attacking Sentinel, but I think what fundamentally differs between the two in terms of their approaches to confronting Sentinel is that even though both are driven by anger, D-16 is working from an angle of 'I have nothing left to lose' mindset and Starscream is looking at things from an 'I still have too much to lose' mindset. In the final scene when D-16 confronts Sentinel stating he's not afraid because he has nothing left to lose because Sentinel took it all, I headcanon this greatly differs from Starscream's mindset because it's not that Starscream is afraid of Sentinel as a person, but I think he's afraid of everything he could lose if he makes the wrong decision if he acts impulsively.

I think having more experience in war and those 50 cycles of exile as leader have taught Starscream that you pay the price for making the wrong decisions in blood and the lives of those under your command or even your own. And it's even worse when you have an emotional attachment to those you command. Like I do think part of it is self-preservation, but I think he did care about the High Guard to an extent considering how long they've been together and I think he probably feels responsible for keeping them alive. So to simply charge in in righteous anger not only means you could get yourself killed, but you could get your troops killed, the truth of Sentinel's betrayal could die with you all if it fails, and you would have gotten everyone killed on an impulsive gamble that you ordered and all that struggle to stay alive all those 50 cycles and the deaths of the 13 Primes would have been in vain. I personally don't think it's fair to simply call it pure cowardice when you consider the consequence of acting without caution. Like I do think it's important and brave that D-16 stood up to Sentinel the way he did, but I am sympathetic to Starscream's situation and think he did perfectly fine in his decisions as leader of the High Guard.

[genericpuff]

Do you have any entry level recommendations for someone looking to learn a bit more about Greek mythology? I’d love to read up on it but I’m not sure how to find reputable sources and avoid Americanisation.

I mean, at the risk of sounding crass, you're likely going to run into Americanization no matter what you do because America itself was built on many cultures, especially that of Greek philosophy and storytelling.

Buuut if you mean you wanna read some actual Greek myth content that AREN'T modern American spins on classic tales, Emily Wilson is a popular choice for many people dipping their toes into translated mythology as her translations are both simplistic and concise in their language choices as well as fun in their structure to read both internally and orally (iirc her translations are done in iambic pentameter which is very familiar to anyone who's ever read Shakespeare). I've been working through her translation of The Odyssey, it's been pretty enjoyable :)

I've also heard great things about both Lattimore and Fitzgerald, the latter of whom I will be reading next after I finish Wilson's translation. That said, I haven't read either of their works yet, so take my recommendation of them with grains of salt! (I hope you enjoy them though if you check 'em out! If you beat me to it, let me know how they went!)

OH also, I know it's sorta the opposite of what you're likely looking for as it's VERY influenced by modern contexts, but thanks to another anon I recently got into Destripando la Historia which is a super fun animated Youtube series that retells the stories of various different gods from different mythologies. If you're into stuff of the goofy anime variety, you might enjoy them, it's a Spanish series but you can turn on captions to read the translations! It's super beginner-friendly, it covers a lot of different stories and myths without getting into so much detail that it's overwhelming (but gives you a good kickoff point to start with!) and the songs and animations slap, Afrodita is one of my favorites haha

Overall the biggest advice I can give you if you're trying to avoid fanfiction-y / "Americanized" retellings is just to cross-reference. If you find a retelling you really like but aren't completely sure of its legitimacy as a functional retelling, keep reading, watching, and learning more. It's a skill like any other, and the more you read, the more you'll be able to pick out what's a legitimate retelling from studied scholars vs. what's fanfiction that you don't need to take too accurately or seriously LMAO

And honestly, nothing wrong with the fanfiction stuff! Mythology, in its very nature, changes over time, it's an inevitability and many of the myths we still draw from today are often derivative in and of themselves from even older versions that pre-existed them (see: Ovid).

it's okay if your introduction to Greek myth is through derivative fanfic, stuff like Disney's Hercules and even Lore Olympus ARE fun to consume for a lot of people and make for a good entry point into learning more about the myths!

What's frustrating - and what I tend to criticize the most here - is when the fanfiction gets advertised / sold as legitimate retellings; when the fanfiction grossly misrepresents the actual mythology and yet tries to claim it as legitimate anyways which results in fanbases that are running around with completely false information claiming it as fact. If you can give the team behind Hercules credit for one thing, their rendition may not be completely accurate, BUT the folks who made it never bragged about how much smarter they were than other people about Greek myth or call themselves "folklorists" when they didn't even have any formal education/training/etc. in it cough like another creator we know cough 💀 If we want to make a comparison between LO and a Disney film in terms of how it grossly misrepresents the themes and cultural contexts of the original stories it was drawing from... Disney's Pocahontas does exactly that 💅

So if you want to avoid any "grossly" Americanized versions of Greek myth that are borderline disrespectful to the stories they're drawing from... yeah, that's usually a pretty indicative red flag LMAO

But outside of those very specific scenarios, just have fun with it, there really is no "right or wrong" way to engage with the mythology if you're simply just wanting to learn more, the beauty of it being mythology is that it's very diverse in its mediums and thus you don't have to be restricted to learning about it exclusively through academic translations or lectures. Of course, there are cultural intersections with these myths that shouldn't be ignored, we always have to treat it with care when engaging with it so that we aren't overwriting another culture's traditions or beliefs - but if you're simply wanting to learn about and entertain yourself with some amazing stories that have quite literally stood the test of time, do so however you see fit :)

[radioactive-earthshine]

Best comics to read for Barry Allen? :0

For just a basic read through for this character I would recommend these comics. No, this is not exhaustive, I tried to keep it concise to give someone a good well rounded understanding of this character while not being hundreds of comics.

The Flash (1959)

#110 Wally becomes Kid Flash #323-#327 The Trial Issues #350 the final issue of his series

Crisis on Infinite Earths

Sad, Barry dies helping to save everyone.

Flash and Green Lantern: The Brave and the Bold

An amazingly canon-compliant little love letter to Barry Allen and Hal Jordan's friendship. These are a compilation of stories that take place before COIE.

Final Crisis

Barry comes back to life permanently after showing up intermittently and haunting the narrative throughout the last 20 years of comics.

The Flash: Rebirth

This is a great series that shows Barry's perspective from suddenly being brought back to life in a world he isn't sure he wants to be in.

Blackest Night

You will read the main Blackest Night title, Green Lantern (2005) #44 and Blackest Night: The Flash. It has a lot of emotional scenes as Barry again comes to terms with being alive.

For what it's worth, the whole event is worth reading even if there are moments that make me want to punch a tree. It's huge though, so your mileage will vary.

The Flash (2010)

Only 12 issues long, 13 with the secret files issue. This is the closing main Flash title of the pre-Flashpoint continuity and is an important lead into Flashpoint.

Flashpoint

Look, there's a lot of misconception for what this event was, what actually happened, and who was "at fault" so it's just a good idea to read it so you are well informed.

The Flash (2016) by Joshua Williamson

Where he is now in comics with Barry written by someone who took a lot of love and care to weave together Barry's history to try and make a new continuity that makes sense. He pulls in references from the silver age of comics and paints a haunting landscape where Barry remembers his pre-Flashpoint life, but there are holes that he fills in as more memories come to him.

Naturally, there are dozens of other single issues I could recommend but to start this is a good list. The biggest chunk of reading in all of this is Williamson's run.

[mysticiiisms]

Myst but there's survivors and stuff.

Finally got around making some kinda proper informative sheets for the fan characters that inhabit this blog 😌✨

The middle text came out a little too tiny though, so I'll copy it below for anybody who has trouble reading!

Emmit

A survivor from the Stoneship Age. The eldest son of Branch and named after one of his best friends. Most of his people were executed or overworked to death, looking for gold in submerged caves. Only a group of youngsters remains, and he's part of the responsible teens taking charge. He owns a prototypical submarine named Lodestar that his father built some years prior and uses it to navigate what's left of Stoneship.

Limai

A survivor from the Channelwood Age. Son of Ngulu, a high priest and executioner in Achenar's cult. One half of his people was killed either as sacrifices or for treason, the other was massacred by Sirrus' underlings during a hostile resource raid. After fleeing the attack, he has been living as a hermit in a neighboring, heavily forested island. Although some underlings tried to reach into this island and later hunt him down, he ended up successfully killing all of them.

Ruqaya

A survivor from the Mechanical Age. The unplanned result of an affair between Sirrus and Sayida, one of his Mechanical followers. She had a very spoiled and sheltered upbringing due to her mother's "higher" status, and therefore had no idea of the political upheaval unfolding outside. Eventually her home was attacked and her mother murdered, so she was forced to evacuate in a steamship full of workers, being the only upper class member to survive. She's currently discovering and developing her machine handling skills on the elusive Western Island.

There's a lot more that I have thought of regarding these three but I wanted to keep the post concise, you can always ask if there's anything in particular you'd like to know!

Thanks for the likes and support!

[bullet-prooflove]

hmm, jeff clarke as character and items could be a ice cream cone, cop car and a crossbow ? for the character & three items thingy cx hope u have amazing weekend !

Tagging:  @kmc1989 @witches-unruly-heart @telepathay @iworldlywriter 

Thank you so much, it's been ages since I have written Jeff and I have missed him. So the hardest part was the ice cream cone.

Jeff meets you on site during a call out. You’re perched in the passenger seat of a squad car, leaning across a patrol man with a crossbow bolt sticking out of his chest. Blood trickles down his shirt as his breathes come out in ragged rasps. You can’t focus on that at the moment because you’re occupied with the wound in the patrolman’s right thigh.

“The bolt is pinning him to the seat.” You say calmly as Jeff reviews the situation through the shattered driver’s side window. “But that’s not the big problem. The glass from the broken windshield has nicked the femoral artery, if I take my fingers off he’ll bleed out in minutes.”

“You’re a doctor?” He asks as he opens the driver’s side door to give him more access.

“Just transferred into Med.” You tell him, tipping your face up towards him for the first time.

You’re beautiful. Wide soulful eyes that make his heart beat a little faster in his chest, a face that men would go to war for. Doctors shouldn’t look like this, he thinks, not like they were sent from heaven above.

“Ambos still ten minutes out.” He finds himself saying as he snaps back into the moment, already he’s tugging on a set of latex gloves. “But I’ve had some trauma training in the Marines so I can assist.”

“I need your shoelace.” You tell him as your gaze fixes on his. “If we can get this tied off, you should be able to move him for when the ambulance arrives.”

Jeff complies with your request, untying his boot before he hands you the lace. It’s  an artform what you do, your motions are deliberate, concise. There’s no hesitation, just the methodology of a woman who knows exactly what she’s doing. He can’t explain how attractive he finds that.

“Any idea how we ended up in this position?” He asks you as he turns his attention to the bolt that’s jutting out of the officer’s chest.

“I came out of the ice cream shop and there was just a lunatic with a crossbow standing in the street. He must have been high. The cops tried to intervene and…” You use your hand to gesture to the bolt. “I dropped my ice cream cone and everything. I didn’t think he’d actually do it.”

“What flavour?” He asks you and you raise a quizzical eyebrow as he withdraws the padding from the emergency kit they keep on the truck. “Your ice cream?”

“Oh, mint choc chip.” You tell him as you start to pack the wound with Jeff’s help.

“I’m more of a rum and raisin man myself.” He informs you, tilting his head to survey your handiwork. “I think we’re about ready to get to work on the bolt, don’t you?”

Love Jeff? Don’t miss any of his stories by joining the taglist here.

Like My Work? - Why Not Buy Me A Coffee

[vertical-sekai]

Introductory post!

WHAT IS VERTICAL SEKAI?

Vertical SEKAI is a fan made alternate universe of Project SEKAI made by @shiraoyagi .

It is a unitswap based on the number order of each character in the files. These numbers are organized vertically to create new units rather than how they are done horizontally in the original game. To demonstrate (because I couldn't find a more concise way to word this), I created a chart.

The above image shows how the numbers are organized by unit in canon. For reference, 1 is Ichika, 20 is Mizuki, and 21 is Miku.

The below image shows how the numbers are organized by unit in the Vertical SEKAI AU.

DISCLAIMER: I did not shuffle the VS numbers because they serve the same function in this AU as they do in the canon game. Ideally, I'd sort them vertically to determine their default unit placements, but unfortunately, by doing this I would create a massive plot hole in AURORA's lore, so I decided against it.

I don't expect anyone to know the character numbers off the top of their head, so I'll also list the units properly below (with altered unit placements to reflect the story).

re:birth*

Ichika Hoshino (Guitar and Lead Vocals)

Haruka Kiritani (Bass)

Akito Shinonome (Drums)

Rui Kamishiro (Synths)

Three people who have given up on their dreams join a girl who reaches for the faint remnants of hers.

Their SEKAI is the Park SEKAI. Miku and Len are the first to appear there.

Forever Dream!

Kanade Yoisaki

Saki Tenma

Airi Momoi

Touya Aoyagi

An unconventional idol group that aims to save someone with their performances.

Their SEKAI is the Stage SEKAI. Rin is the first to appear there.

(FD!'s Stage SEKAI is significantly different from MMJ!'S Stage SEKAI, they just share a name and a basic concept [a stage]).

AURORA

Tsukasa Tenma (Composer)

Honami Mochizuki

Shizuku Hinomori

Mafuyu Asahina (Lyricist)

An unassuming group of street musicians that took Vivid Street by storm overnight.

Their SEKAI is the Wonderland SEKAI. This SEKAI contains only Tsukasa's feelings. Miku and KAITO have been there a long time.

The Phoenix's Castle of Ashes and Ressurection

Kohane Azusawa (Scriptwriter)

Emu Ootori (Lead actress)

Ena Shinonome (Set, makeup, and costume design)

Shiho Hinomori (Director)

A theater troupe that is keeping the magic of a theme park's oldest stage alive.

Their SEKAI is the Castle SEKAI. Luka is the first to appear there.

day.light

Minori Hanasato (Illustrator)

An Shiraishi (Lyricist)

Nene Kusanagi (Composer)

Mizuki Akiyama (MV Editor)

An online music group that mourns impossible dreams.

Their SEKAI is the Abandoned Livehouse SEKAI. MEIKO is the first to appear there.

(I know I'm bad at naming units, but I tried my best... some of these names may be subject to change in the future)

So now that we have the basic mechanics of the AU laid out...

WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF THIS ACCOUNT?

This account is basically how information about the Vertical SEKAI AU will be distributed. It is basically an ask blog.

You can either ask questions to me on this blog directly, or you can ask questions to the characters in the AU, and in that case, I will try to respond as in character as possible.

In Vertical SEKAI AU canon, these questions are given to the characters (when addressed to them) in the form of fragments of feelings that float around their SEKAIs (similarly to how after lives work in canon). This means that in character questions can only be asked to characters who have access to a SEKAI, so... sorry, NPC enjoyers (although I'll still answer questions about them myself)!

Tags on this blog will be sorted as follows:

#vertical sekai au as a general tag for the AU.

#oc ask for questions directed towards the Project SEKAI OCs.

#cr ask for questions directed towards me, the creator of this AU.

#non ask for posts that aren't asks. This is for original content I make and upload of my own will, in other words.

I will add more sections to this post in the future if any frequently asked questions come up. Thank you for reading!

*update 3/6/2025: re:birth's name has been changed to re:(in)carnation

[abyss-seer]

Jay Enhyphen Astrological Reading

Warning this post has mentions of SA, grooming. Again these are just predictions, take it with a grain of salt, either its a hit or a miss. Don't overanalyse it. So let's start with how all this started, basically, I was feeling called to do an Enhyphen read. So yeah I asked chatgpt. With this prompt

"Chatgpt choose 1 Enhyphen member for me, shuffle all the names of the members in the Enhyphen group and then pull the most random name among them all, then do a random tarot card pull, after shuffling the deck 3 times along with reversals and pull the most random card for me."

Random or not, this is what chatgpt pulled for me with the moon card in reverse which got me a bit intrigued cause.... Well why don't you guys see it as well? This is moon card upright and reverse.

Can you see how the reversed card highlights the lobster 🦞. Now lobster reminded me of something.

Yeah the "No doubt" music video by Enhyphen. This just felt like an extra cue to do this read.

For your information the dude in thumbnail is him.

So I asked my cards to give me a card.

Well I guess the answer is pretty obvious, we are going to talk about his chart to find out things that are written in the stars......

Let's go !

Sun in Ashwini, Moon in Pushya

In square, has some problems with ego engagement, ego tries to hurry him making him impatient, emotions tries to prepare him making him slow. Everyday patience impatience struggle.

Mercury in Bharani

Very contained speech, precise, speaks only when necessary. Concise with his words

Sun in Ashwini

Very bold appearance, very daring, ready to jump in danger for his friends. Brave personality. Sun is in Ashwini (the exaltation). Well respected for his unbiased, no nonsense attitude. Sun in Ashwini gives fame, makes a person the "official " face card.

Moon in Pushya

Very serious in his emotional side, seriously an emotionally invested human. Auspicious placement. Very royal placements, can have a very rich ancestory with 2 luminaries hence royal planets sitting at exalted position in his chart. Heavily nurtured well in his childhood. More information can be known through house placements, which we don't have at the present.

Moon in this Saturnian nakshatra, makes one disciplined in an emotional, has a well mental balance, knows how to control his emotions.

The squre with sun and saturnian nakshatra's tussle can cause suppression.

Venus in Krittika

Love life can include a lot of PDA, very show offy with his girlfriend and his girls. Materiol gorl might be his type.

Mars in Rohini, Saturn in Rohini, Rahu in Mrigashira, Ketu in Jyeshtha.

Right off the bat, I do not like it. Indicates a lot of negative experiences came via adults, superiors and people who were jealous of them yet elder to them. This type of energy from elders, seniors and hatred from big people like these caused a lot of struggle with the comfort, luxury in life. This person might have gone through a lot from these seniors, if they didn't cut off these jealous people off of their lives, they'll continue to suffer from growing any further. Again how much will they suffer depends on house placements. But if these elders aren't cut out of their lives, looks like their growth will suffer as in having assassination attempts or contracting mental health illnesses via these superiors or authority figures.

Now mars and saturn gives sadist, masochist and seriously BDSM vibes.

But what I hate is Rahu in Mrigashira and Mars in Rohini.

This person will feel inclined to do or may end up getting attracted to all sorts of abusive stalkers, oppressors, people who use their authority for malicious purposes due to their subconscious (Ketu) relating to such people as powerful. If they have yet to learn the power of learning forever and rebelling against the authority. Cause authority and superiority makes them comfortable, but they need to learn how to not keep on sitting in their preferred comfort zone and learn more to rebel.

There's a quote that comes to mind "Rebels are and will always be far more intelligent than powerful people because only dumb people who can't be anything more than what they are already good at doing will incessantly hold onto power, while the rebels keep on learning to find new ways to find a way through the world of powerful "

Okay I made up that quote, lemme search that quote once, wait.

Rebels are always smarter than the rich and the powerful because they are forced to think, adapt, and challenge systems instead of being comforted by them.

The powerful are often dumber than rebels because power can breed complacency, while rebellion demands awareness, courage, and sharp thinking for survival and change.

So this person needs to chase the ways to free themselves under the crippling nature and shadow of the powerful individuals behind them rather than blaming the society and taking their frustration and anger out on its innocent people who subconsciously believe the authority behind just because they (the society) don't know much. This individual needs to sought out ways to bring enlightenment and light to the individuals in this society.

Jupiter in Ardra

Largely a very heavy placement. Jupiter debilitates in Gemini, plus jupiter in rahu nakshatra Ardra, doesn't fares well.

Hallucinations, delusion or someone who completely gets lost in obessesive ideas of Aliens, computer, technology, because jupiter sits in 3rd pada. Okay their remedy is to sit in silence and take time to process their emotions, themselves and them, cause Ardra is a nakshatra of taking time for yourself, its a Rahuvian concept of taking time for yourself. Cause life doesn't waits for anyone. Life just flows, we are meant to flow with life. But Ardra says wait lemme stop and process it all. Given how jupiter is in Gemini they need to think in that sense, or write or sing or communicate their feelings out loud about what they want to be or do in life.

The thing about these last set of placement is if this person doesn't learns to create a space for himself to process his emotions, that inner frustration, suppression and anger within them can lead to a lot of exhaustion or maybe combined with the desire to make a new pathway, they might end up doing something harmful to either themselves or others (their anger and frustrations might run really deep) especially if they are working under authority figures who hate or are jealous of them

18+ ahead

Mars Saturn conjuction here makes someone a Daddy, Kinky, BDSM, blood-letting smex and what not types.

Not saying this happened or can happen, but mars saturn in Rohini can really really love submissive, obedient, almost lolita typa girlies, who listen and obey their every order.

I don't like how mars the lord of star Mrigashira, and ruler of Aries (with sun and Mercury conjuction) sits in Rohini (In folklore Rohini was chased by Mrigashira because Mrigashira was trying to assault Rohini). And the way his Rahu sits in Mrigashira scares me.

This can literally indicate some weird type of situation where in worst case scenario the natives with these types of placements can have a past of getting SAed, or groomed. Rahu if manifested badly through Mrigashira can manifest really bad results. I have done some Mrigashira readings from clients before. Jyeshtha, Vishakha, Ashlesha and Mrigashira should really be careful of the abusers surrounding them. These placements have a tendency of getting attracted to these people, because they are so desensitized and normalised to abusive people.

Ok Venus in Kritika natives can be very show offy in their love life. When they fall in love, everybody, literally everybody with eyes, ears and nose knows it. Its there, their way of loving people is very apparent. Some sort of malefic aspect like Rahu can be seen with natives tending more towards voyeurism or public smex activities (verandah smex, beach smex, office widow smex).

In Jay's case given how their saturn and mars are conjucting this Venus. Their love lives is regularly monitored (saturn influence), mars is conjucting saturn (so their passion is mostly discreet and private), Venus in Krithika might sometimes cause slip ups where you can easily catch this person's wandering eye towards the person thus person is interested in. The malefic aspect of mars and saturn might cause them to feel internally frustrated and maybe you might catch their frustration of not being able to look at the apple of their eye, due to so many eyes on them. Mars being the lord of Aries, with sun and mercury in aries, they might get immensely frustrated at their siblings, sister (if any) or their father figure or authority for catching them falling in love with someone 😭. Given how mercury sometimes representing girl sibling is in Bharani (the nakshatra of female yoni). Natives with this placement may have fears of his female siblings trying to hit on their partners to form lesbian relationships

[magiclyney]

A Mission in Fontaine

Scaramouche and Coviello(OC) are summoned to Fontaine for a mission where they must face a mysterious underwater foe while also attempting to not tarnish the Fatui’s image.

Mostly just Coviello Character building stuff, showing his thought process during a mission. If you haven’t read my fic Red Skies and Blue Birds I suggest you do if you want this to make sense bc this was originally chapters from that that I removed to keep the fic concise. But if you want to raw dog this that’s also fine ig, I can’t stop you.

CW: violence, discussions of the handling of corpses(?)(idk)

Words: 4,680

“It’s been attacking civilian divers too.” Furina explained, “We have no idea if it's a person or an animal, but either way it’s intelligent. We’ve put out warnings around the city and placed guardes on the beaches in the east to warn divers.”

“Has it attacked any ships yet?” Coviello asked.

“Thankfully not, but we should try to stop it before it gets bold enough to try.”

“Has the Fatui been effected?” Neuvilette asked.

“Of course we have. We wouldn’t have deployed two harbingers to a location if we weren’t being directly effected by whatever this is.” Scaramouche sat in silence as the three of them spoke, eating the slice of cake he was provided slowly so Furina wouldn’t offer him more of it. “We didn’t even know what was happening to begin with, just that our divers and researchers would go under and never come back up.” Coviello responded.

“And the teams we sent to investigate also wouldn’t come back up.” Scaramouche added.

Furina glanced between the harbingers, “Don’t take this as an insult to your abilities- I am aware of the harbingers strength- but what makes you so confident that your colleague wouldn’t end up the same way?” She said to Coviello, “Is he an immortal too?”

“My mother is Beelzebub.” Scaramouche responded. Furina’s eyes flashed a look of familiarity before she composed herself and changed her expression to one of interest. Neuvillette however seemed instantly interested, though he seemed to pretend not to. “She abandoned me before I could even read or write, not that she even tried to teach me, and I eventually wound up here.” He knowingly looked at Neuvillette, who had a slight grin. He knew that the Iudex wanted to judge all of the archons for their crimes, and he wanted justice. It looked like Neuvillette couldn’t wait to put “child abandonment” on the electro archon’s record.

“Well that definitely helps your case. I’m not entirely sure on how archon reproduction works but you should have a natural connection with the elements, right?” Furina asked.

“Yes?” Scaramouche replied.

“Then you both would be able to breathe in the Fontainian oceans without an oxygen tank.”

“Yes, that is why we were both sent.” Coviello nodded. “The Fatui have to plan a few weeks or months in advance to send out a harbinger, it’s based on who is available and who would work best for the mission.”

Furina took a bite of her cake and bobbed her head from side to side as she chewed, “Hm, you know I guess that makes sense.”

“This mission benefits both Fontine and The Fatui.” Coviello said, getting the meeting back on track, “The two of us should be qualified to solve this issue for both parties. All we need is information right now.”

“We do not have any more information right now. We have told you all that we know.” Neuvillette replied sternly.

Coviello sighed, leaning back in his chair to think. He looked up at Scaramouche and stood. “Then thank you for your cooperation. Please inform the Guards that we will be diving in the area to subdue the threat. Have a good day.” He bowed as Scaramouche began to stand as well. Furina nodded in response to Coviello’s request.

The harbingers began to walk towards their hotel. “So what’s your plan?”

“We’ll be going under in the morning. I did some research on the way over here, reading all of the recent news about the missing divers, and do you want to know something interesting?” Scaramouche looked at him curiously, “Not a single one of the missing divers was a vision holder. Plenty of vision holders go diving every day. It's a much cheaper hobby for them and yet there is not a single report of a single one of them going missing, nor have any of them reported seeing or sensing something dangerous in the area. That means it is targeting specifically non-vision holders who need to bring oxygen tanks with them.”

Scaramouche glared at him, “So what was that whole meeting for?”

“One, to get any additional information that the government may be keeping from the press, of which there unfortunately was none. And two, to prevent a scandal. If we were stopped by the guardes on the beach and then snuck into the water anyway there’s no doubt that the press would hear about it and the Fatui’s reputation in Fontaine would falter, but we gained Furina’s permission. She should send the Guardes stationed on the beaches a notice that we will be looking into the situation. This way we may actually improve the Fatui’s reputation in Fontaine.”

“Alright then smartypants. What’s the rest of your plan?”

“If everything goes perfect, this will be a two day operation.” Coviello held open the hotel room door for Scaramouche and they sat down on their respective beds. “Day one, we go down without oxygen tanks and suits and find the remains of our fallen comrades. We investigate how they were attacked and do our best to bring their bodies back up to the surface for their families. If everything stays on schedule for day one then we move onto the procedure with day two. We go down with fake oxygen tanks and diving suits to lure it out, when it attacks we use this.” He pulled out a serrated hook. “It’ll get stuck, we play dead, drop the gear, and follow the elemental trail.”

“What if, when we find the bodies they’ve been eaten?”

“Then we do our best to decipher what happened. If my hypothesis is correct and it is targeting oxygen tanks then those would very likely be left behind, I can’t think of any creature that eats metal. We can study those.” Coviello kicked off his boots and laid down on his bed, “Though the day two plan would have to change slightly. No- lets just change it all together. When it attacks we let it happen.” Scaramouche looked at him slightly offended. “We play dead after only a little bit of damage has been done, I’ll put up a small shield around myself and you discharge electro into the water. Superconduct will electrify everything around you, hopefully getting the creature, and if your attack is strong enough maybe even killing it.”

“And if that doesn’t kill it?”

“Hopefully it’ll paralyze it enough that we can kill it with a blade or other means. If it doesn’t get paralyzed and instead flees, then we go back to the original plan. I'll get the hook into it and we’ll track the path that the elemental energy leaves behind after dropping all of the gear. This plan is subject to change once we’ve gathered more information off the bodies.”

“We may need more manpower for day one.”

“We have the rest of today to find it.” Coviello sat up and put his boots back on, “I think it would be best that we speak with Furina again. At least tell her of our vision holder theory and then go to the Steambird to put out an ad in the morning. We explain everything, so that vision holders who are squeamish around bodies don’t come with us and get in our way.”

***

They decided upon a location for everyone to meet up while looking around for Furina, and she ended up coming along with the harbingers to the Steambird, “I’m all booked tomorrow so I wouldn’t be able to come along, but I can always help you get that ad out for tomorrow.”

“Thank you so-”

“If-!” She interrupted Coviello, “If you also do the same thing for the Fontanian divers and their families as well.”

“Of course.”

The doors to the Steambird’s office opened eagerly for the Hydro Archon and the owner ran up to the trio. “Has something happened? Why are you two coming to the Steambird office together?” He said, completely ignoring Scaramouche. His eyes lit up, "Are you announcing your relationship?”

Scaramouche looked at the other two as they groaned in irritation. He grinned and chuckled.

“No!” They said in unison, clearly having been asked similar questions before and were getting tired of it.

“We’re just here to put out an urgent ad for tomorrow morning.”

“The Fatui have also been targeted in the recent attacks on divers in the east, so we’re going to be going under to investigate.” Coviello said, motioning between himself and Scaramouche. “We’re looking for volunteers to help us. Specifically volunteers who have visions and aren’t squeamish around bodies.”

“They hypothesize that whatever has been attacking divers specifically targets divers with oxygen tanks and other diving equipment, so vision holders who do not need such items would be safer.” Furina continued.

The owner nodded, “We’ll do that if you also allow us an interview to go along with it.” He looked at Coviello and Scaramouche.

“If we have to.” Scaramouche sighed. Furina went away on her own, and the owner led the harbingers to an office with another reporter, and they sat outside for a moment until she was ready for them. “What was that thing about a relationship with Focalores again?” He spoke in an extremely teasing tone.

“She invited me to watch a play with her once, seventy years ago. Reporters like to look up into Furina’s box to see what she’s doing and when they saw me they spun a wild story. Apparently the romantic pairing between an archon and a sinner of Khaenri’ah was extremely appealing. But there’s nothing, it was all just made up and they apparently still haven’t dropped it.” Scaramouche chuckled at the Conductor’s exasperated tone of voice.

“Hi! I’m Charlie, I’ll be interviewing you!” The young reporter said, her eyes shining at the opportunity to interview two out of the eleven Fatui harbingers.

“I’m the Conductor, number four. This is the Balladeer, number six.” He shook her hand and glanced at the cryo vision on her wrist, Scaramouche also saw it. They stepped into her office and she started.

“So, you’re here about the missing divers recently right?” She asked.

“Indeed. A group of Fatui divers went missing a few weeks ago, and we finally arrived to begin a search. Based on the research we’ve managed to do above the surface we believe that whatever is causing the disappearances wouldn’t target vision holders.” Coviello said. Scaramouche leaned back to let Coviello do most of the talking.

Charlie paused for a moment, “Yes- that does seem correct, there haven’t been any missing vision holders yet.”

“We plan to locate the bodies of those that have disappeared to investigate. This will be early in the morning, but around noon we will resurface and wait for extra manpower. The entire point of this ad is to hopefully get at least a few volunteers to help us bring the bodies back up to the surface for their families. I will see what I can do about financial compensation for those that show up, but we will at least have lunch and dinner for them.”

“Oh catering! I might show up!” Charlie joked and continues to write.

“We would really appreciate that, but please do remember that we will be dealing with decaying bodies, so if you are queasy we wouldn’t really recommend it.”

“Oh it’s fine! It wouldn’t be the first or last time. Besides being able to write firsthand about the situation would allow me to make a much more accurate report.”

“We should have our subordinates secure some body bags,” Scaramouche suddenly thought, “We could have a group bagging the bodies and another group of people bringing them up to the surface.”

Coviello nodded, “Yeah. We should probably be doing a lot more to involve the Guardes. Why don’t you do that while I’m here?”

Scaramouche stood and walked out of the building and stopped the first Guarde on patrol he could find. “Excuse me, where are your headquarters?”

“If you need to report something you can do it right now.” The Guarde said politely.

“No. I’m the Balladeer, number six of the Fatui harbingers.” The Guarde looked at him with a mix of shock and horror, “We’re partnering up with the Fontainian authorities to retrieve the bodies of the missing divers. My partner wants to work more closely with you so that we know we are doing everything correctly and have the proper supplies.”

The Guarde relaxed slightly, “Oh! Thank you. Yes, I’ll bring you to the headquarters.” The guarde began walking him to the headquarters, “You know, my sister is one of the missing divers. Do you think there’s any chance she’s alive?”

“Maybe if whatever is making these people disappear is only kidnapping them, but we sent down a large group of skilled fighters and divers and none of them have surfaced. If this thing was human they would’ve been able to fight it off. I wouldn’t get my hopes up.” The Guarde’s face dropped and he nodded. Scaramouche thanked the guarde and stepped into the HQ. He explained the whole thing over again and the guardes agreed.

They set up a place for everyone to meet up, the beach closest to where the Fatui’s missing divers would’ve been and where the current Fatui camp is. The harbingers, volunteers, and a few vision holding Fatui would bring the bodies up to the surface and the Guardes would attempt to identify them and notify the families.

***

Scaramouche laid down in the hotel bed with his new pajamas on, it was colder in the hotel than it was in Coviello’s house. Coviello walked out of the bathroom, his hair was damp and unbraided and he was dressed in what seemed to be old clothes. The fabric had been worn down by age and the garment itself was no longer in style, but it was comfortable enough for a second life as nightclothes. Coviello sat down on his bed and grabbed his brush, beginning to yank the tangles out of his wet hair and occasionally wringing water out onto the carpet. Once it was sufficiently dry he brushed through it one last time, before he set the brush down and began to braid his hair.

He was looking down at the ground, his eyes seemed unfocused and he was looking at nothing in particular. Seemingly seeing more with his hands than his eyes. Scaramouche watched mesmerized as he braids his hair. They sat with an awkward silence lingering in the air, Scaramouche played with his own hair as he waited for his fellow harbinger to finish to not distract him.

Coviello sighed and shook his head once he finished, “Is it even?” He asked, turning his back to Scaramouche.

“Yeah, it is.”

“Good.” He flopped down onto his bed.

“This’ll be the first time I see you in action, are you really as strong as they say?” Scaramouche asks.

“I hope I live up to your expectations. Whatever your expectations of the fourth harbinger look like.”

“I was told you’re quite fast and that your flames burn hotter than those of normal pyro users.”

“Then I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed. Not because those things aren’t true, but because underwater my movement is impaired and pyro abilities are weakened.” He summoned a flame to his hand, its blue glow illuminating and warming the room. “Every flame has a bit of blue in it. Even if you look at the bottom of a small campfire you may see the faint hint of blue in its flame. That blue is the hottest part of the flame. A majority of pyro users could conjure up a blue flame like this if they tried really hard, but for me it's the opposite.” The flame began to flicker and turn into a more natural red and orange and the heat dissipated slightly. Coviello closed his hand and extinguished the flame, but not before it returned to its blue color for a split second.

“Interesting. How do you not get burned? How does your sword not melt?”

“Well, iron’s melting point is greater than the heat that my flames produce, so all I have to do is not use the flame constantly to give it time to cool down again. But in the situation that I do keep the flame constant for an extended period of time, it will eventually melt. This is true for all pyro users, it would just happen quicker for me. And as for your other question, you’ll have to ask a ratawahist student or something. I don’t understand it at all.”

Scaramouche cuddled up under the blankets, hugging himself to try and use the little body heat he could produce to warm himself. Coviello turned out the lights and laid down as well. Scaramouche technically didn’t even have to sleep, but he had the feeling that Coviello would get upset at him if he stayed up all night. So he pulled his knees up to his chest to cling to the little body heat he could create. He shifted around on his cot, trying to at least pretend to sleep. Not long after he finally found a comfortable position he heard a shifting next to him. ‘It's nothing. Just Coviello moving in his sleep.’ He told himself, until he felt a soft hand on his shoulder. He flinched and tensed his body. Until he felt a warm sensation spread through his body.

He let his body relax as the hand left his shoulder, leaving the heat behind. Coviello walked over to the radiator and turned the temperature up, then laid back down on his bed, “Goodnight.”

---

Scaramouche thought back to the early morning investigation from the previous day, it was so odd. There were the obvious signs of decay, but that was really the only sign of damage on the bodies. They’d simply drowned. Their oxygen tanks had been destroyed and there was evidence that they’d tried to make it back up to the surface, but never actually made it. This thing wasn’t just hunting for food, it was seemingly hunting for fun, picking on things it knew it could easily kill.

Coviello paced up and down the campsite as his subordinates silently observed. He was wearing a diving suit, they were supposed to go under in thirty minutes. He seemingly wasn’t the only one disturbed by this whole thing, all of the other human volunteers that had seen the scene were also disturbed. As the news spread of what they’d found, it felt like the air grew heavy amongst everyone who knew the truth. Scaramouche just couldn’t understand.

He heard Coviello tossing and turning for hours the night before, he barely even ate breakfast that morning. The Court of Fontaine was unusually quiet that morning when the harbingers left their hotel. They could only guess that Charlie had managed to write her article immediately after returning from helping with the volunteering.

“Conductor.” Scaramouche stated firmly, “We need to be getting ready.”

“I know, and you can just call me Coviello at this point. There's no need to keep using codenames.” Scaramouche placed the oxygen tank down in front of Coviello just as Neuvillette stepped into the camp.

“Monsieur Neuvillette?”

He looked down at the oxygen tank. “Is that what your plan is? To go down there and lure it out by pretending to be divers?”

“Yes?”

“I’m afraid I cannot allow that.”

“What?”

“It’s simply too dangerous.”

Coviello sighed, “Then get us a mannequin. We’ll use that as bait,” He said, without missing a beat.

Shock flashed across his face. “And where do you suppose I’d get one of those?”

“Fontaine is Teyvat’s fashion capital, there’s gotta be a designer or shop willing to give up an old mannequin for a good cause.”

Neuvillette huffed in approval, “I suppose I can’t argue with that. I will go and find one for you, but if when I return you two aren’t here anymore you will be tried in Fontaine’s court of law.”

“Understood.” Coviello sat down again.

“You seem stressed.” Scaramouche stood next to him.

“I just have a really bad feeling about this.”

Scaramouche huffed, “Are you backing out?” He teased, crossing his arms.

“No. Of course not. I just can’t seem to quell this pit in my stomach.”

***

The mannequin was rigged up. Neuvillette had somewhat put them on the spot so they had to come up with something quickly. They managed to hand it off a ledge and let it flow with the current, only praying that the creature was dumb enough to not notice that it wasn’t an actual human. The harbingers hid in some seaweed, keeping an eye on the mannequin from a short distance.

“I have a feeling this may take a while.”

“We have to be patient.”

“What if it's not stupid and we waste our time?”

Coviello sighed, “Hopefully it will at least come to check it out first.”

“Why did the Iudex have to poke his nose into this?”

“I don’t know, okay?” Coviello’s calm demeanor didn’t quite seem to fit the circumstances.

“Do you think he could’ve been trying to get us to back off?”

“We can’t say anything for sure.”

“Are you not at least a little upset over this?”

“Yes, I am!” His voice suddenly had an edge. “But I can’t linger on it, we have to just move on for now. We can’t get distracted.” Scaramouche was quiet.

The mannequin remained untouched.

“Humans are so inconsistent.”

“Elaborate?” There was a hint of offence in Coviello’s voice.

Scaramouche hesitated, feeling that he had made a mistake. The only thing he could hear was the soft sound of Coviello’s breathing. He chose his words carefully, “Everytime I grow to expect one thing from you it changes.”

“No shit.” Coviello turned to look at Scaramouche. Scaramouche met his gaze, “We aren’t a hivemind. You can’t expect every individual to act the same, humanity isn’t changing, the people you’re around are.”

The mannequin remained untouched.

Scaramouche stared silently, forcing himself to remember that Coviello was much older than his appearance implied. He wasn’t sitting next to a guy in his early twenties. He was sitting next to someone over a century old, with all the experience to back it. Maybe Coviello had this exact conversation in the past with someone?

Coviello took a few deep breaths before rising to a standing position, “Balladeer. Keep fighting to subdue it even if I’m injured.”

“What?”

“Killing and restraining that thing is your goal, I am secondary.” Coviello said fearlessly, as his entire body was tense as his eyes darted around. His nails dug into the palm of his hand. The only thing Scaramouche could hear was Coviello’s deep, panicked breathing.

The mannequin remained untouched as a sudden cry of pain echoed through Scaramouche’s ears and red filled his vision. Coviello gripped the side of his chest with one arm and reached out with the other. The creature writhed against the restraints that formed around it, strings of pyro energy seared into its scales. Scaramouche kicked off the ground, launching himself towards the creature. He grabbed its tail and pulled a dagger from his belt and slashed through its stomach. That attack alone would eventually kill it, but Coviello was losing blood quickly and he was choking and coughing.

It was then that Scaramouche realized the extent of Coviello’s injury, his lung was punctured, he was going to pass out soon.

Scaramouche then swam towards its head, knowing that Coviello could lose his hold at any moment. He slipped the blade under its scales and cut around the head, hoping to sever something important. Anything to just make it die faster. It continued to screech and writhe, though it was growing weaker. Finally he stabbed it through the eye and it began to sink.

Coviello’s strings disappeared and he collapsed. He raced Coviello up to the surface where a team was waiting for them. “It ambushed us. No idea why. It completely ignored the mannequin.”

Coviello was laid out on a stretcher and carried off. Neuvillette walked up to Scaramouche, “Did you see what has been attacking?”

“Yeah. If it isn’t already dead, it will be soon.”

***

The only sound in the hospital room was that of Coviello’s labored breathing. He was slowly waking up after surgery. The doctors had to drain the water and close the punctures in his lungs then make sure his broken ribs would heal correctly. Scaramouche led Neuvillette to the body of the creature and they brought it up to the surface for research.

Scaramouche walked into Coviello’s hospital room and sat down next to him, pretending not to care that much. “How are you feeling?”

“Awful.” His voice was raspy and sore.

“Really? I never would’ve guessed.” Coviello tried to laugh but ended up gripping his side in pain, “Sorry. We’re being transferred back to Snezhnaya soon, that’s where you’ll finish your treatment.”

“Okay. Go pack up our stuff. Most of mine should already be mostly packed, but please double check for me. Make sure we don’t leave anything behind on accident.”

“Do you want me to bring you something to have here in the hospital and on the journey?”

“I’m fine. Just let me rest.”

Thankfully, Coviello’s legs weren’t injured in the attack, so he was able to walk. Blood loss and shortness of breath were still issues, but he was able to walk himself from boat to boat as they made their way back to Snezhnaya. One of Dottore’s clones -a younger one- accompanied them from the harbor to Snezhnaya. Supposedly to make sure that Coviello was healing correctly, despite not actually being a doctor, but ended up focusing on how an immortal’s body reacted to something that would kill the average person.

“It was weird,” Coviello said, “Like I was drowning and breathing at the same time.” The clone sat hunched over a notepad, scribbling down everything Coviello said in a handwriting that only the Dottores could even begin to understand.

Scaramouche waited patiently for him to finish before joining the conversation, “Alright smart guys- any idea why it attacked despite Coviello being a vision user?”

Coviello began to object to something before shaking his head, “Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it just preferred to attack non-vision users and decided to go for a challenge.”

“What if it saw you put up the decoy and wasn’t happy that you tried to trick it?” The clone suggested, still hunched over the notepad and writing.

“Plausible, but this is out of our hands now. The Fontainians will do their research and come to a conclusion eventually, so I guess we’ll just have to stay updated on the case.”

“It’s made international news already. Everyone is already talking about it and the ‘two wildly beautiful harbingers of the Fatui who stepped up and saved the day.’ It has been quite entertaining.” Both Scaramouche and Coviello sighed, “Multiple newspapers from across Teyvat have requested copies of your portraits.”

“By the archons.”

“What? Is your portrait embarrassing or something?” Scaramouche asks, grinning.

“Nope, just 100 years old.” Both Scaramouche and the clone began to laugh, “It was made right after The Cataclysm, I had short hair, I was in pain physically and emotionally. I look half dead. It’s hardly the image of a ‘wildly beautiful harbinger of the Fatui,’ or whatever. It’s just the portrait of a survivor of The Cataclysm.”

“I was half expecting you to deny that you aren’t that attractive.”

“It’s something I’m used to at this point, and I do usually try to maintain my appearance, people usually just complain that I look too feminine. I’ve even been mistaken for a woman a few times.”

“You do have quite the feminine figure.” The clone’s comment visibly embarrassed Coviello, and he quickly covered himself with a blanket, suddenly claiming that he was cold.

The rest of the trip was silent. Even the trip from the dock to the house was quiet. The only words that escaped Coviello’s lips the whole time were quiet thank you’s for the assistants.

Freya was sitting patiently at the door when they arrived, she rubbed herself up against their legs and purred. She followed Coviello down to his room as Scaramouche stayed in the kitchen to brew some tea for himself.

—————-

First off yes Charlie is like, Charlotte but 400 years ago lmao.

Second: what was the real reason the sea monster attacked? (Yes you can figure this out just from what is in this text, I even emphasized a few things in post to make it clearer for the reader)

Third: thank you for reading this omg 😭

I know this was a long one so I super appreciate it.

Forth: constructive criticism is encouraged as always, I post because It gets my works out to people I don’t personally know and can’t judge me irl but can still give me criticism and help me improve as a writer. So anything, even if it’s small, is appreciated :]

[bonefall]

Hearing Loss Research Dump

Heyo!! You probably reached through the footnote at the end of the Hearing Loss Guide for Warrior Cats! I often get asked questions like, "How do you make these guides?" and "Do you have sources?" So this time, I tried to keep a bit of a loose "journal."

Unfortunately it got disorganized after a few sessions (since this project ended up taking about 2 - 3 weeks to do) but, hey, hopefully it helps.

I have dumped all of my sources here and explained my thought process as I went along, so that you have a good foundation to go forth and do your own research.

I may update this post with more information and links, or remove sources if, for some reason, it is revealed that the source was harmful or not credible. SO, PLEASE feel free to recommend good educational organizations, documentaries, and blogs here on Tumblr willing to take questions.

This post is set to "no one can reblog" so that you're always seeing the most current version of this post. Just in case a source gets challenged, or one of the sensitivity readers wants their name removed, or I end up adding important corrections, etc.

This is Version 1.0, and it was updated on 1/2/2024.

The research "dump" post is messy, because it's a Bonus Thing that's supposed to go along with the very pretty and ~concise~ Herb Guide that I created.

Session 0

I had wanted to do this for a while, but this RIDICULOUS thing that was said to an Anon and then shared with me almost gave me an aneurysm. I asked if my followers wanted this boosted to the top of my priorities, they said yes, and here we are.

In the process I also looked for input, especially from deaf/HOH followers. I made a note to include tinnitus, unilateral (one ear) hearing loss, and I'm considering doing a second guide just for how to TREAT the ear infections I mentioned would lead to a lot of hearing loss in RiverClan.

An outline of the Herb Guide post was written just before I did any real research, so I had a general idea of the aspects of hearing loss I wanted to talk and learn about.

Sat down to start my research the next day.

SESSION 1: The Basics

My first step is always just a basic internet search, including a pit stop at Wikipedia to read the article, and then follow the sources or find a place that explains the concept more deeply.

Because my project's about anthropomorphic cats, I always start with humans first, then swing over to a search on felines. I'm usually alternating between them because that is how my mind works, hearing something in one and then linking that to some sort of question about how that would look in cats.

From Wikipedia, the World Health Organization, and the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, I learned that "Hearing Loss" is the blanket term for all lack of hearing, and "Deafness" is when it totally prevents you from understanding speech.

Like blindness, most deaf people can hear a little. Stressed that.

It's also here that I started with cat hearing. First I looked at Purina, but it wasn't a great find, besides a link to common signs of ear infections which I put in my back pocket lmao. I came across Dr. Pippa Elliot's article for Petful.com, and this one is MUCH more informative.

I started thinking critically about a lot of that info. Cats have a much higher range of hearing than humans, a feline society would actually catch hearing loss loooong before humans would catch it in a pet cat. Plus the whiskers. The article actually mentions that when you check a cat for hearing loss, you have to avoid blowing wind on the whiskers or even vibrating the ground.

Very sensitive animals, fascinating. Anyway, back on humans,

There's also FOUR TYPES of hearing loss. Conducive, Sensorineural, Mixed, and Auditory Neuropathy. I also went and found a good explanation from the CDC to double-check Wikipedia.

And it's a good thing I did! Wikipedia did not mention Type 4 at the time of my research, and the CDC's article is VERY straightforward and informative.

Types;

Conducive: Sound can't get through the canal. Usually a blockage.

Sensorineural: A problem with the hearing organs or the auditory nerve.

Mixed: Both of these at once

Auditory Neuropathy: The ear detects the sound, but doesn't send the signals to the brain properly.

From what I can tell from the National Institute for Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, Auditory Neuropathy is less well defined and can have overlap with Sensorineural. Sometimes it has to do with damage or malformation of the inner ear hairs, other times it's completely unknown and just assumed to be a brain issue.

So according to that definition, Auditory Processing Disorder is a type of auditory neuropathic hearing loss.

Then I started watching Christmas movies and forgot I was doing research oops. Time waits for no man, nor muppet. Very important that once a year you watch movies that make you cry and also Gonzo is there.

BUT. Throughout this project, I was constantly finding new sources on "the basics" that explained things in different ways. I didn't find all of these in that one session, but I will dump them in a straight list here.

Straight statistics of prevalence of hearing loss in the UK

Two types of inner ear infections (got cut from the guide because I was trying to stay focused on the disability itself, not causes and ear ailments)

Congenital deafness (Helpful, but again, was trying to keep the guide focused on general disability writing advice, not explain every single reason why a person could be deaf. That's for one's own research!)

Degrees of hearing loss (But notably I've also seen these thresholds shift around. This one says deafness starts at 95 DB, but I did also see 81 elsewhere.)

A guide on soundproofing which put the affects of noise on your ears into perspective (helpful with comparisons to degrees of hearing loss)

REALLY GOOD GUIDE ON HERTZ AND DECIBELS (And also comparisons of different decibel levels, in relation to the thresholds of hearing loss)

Tinnitus

SESSION 2: Comparing human and cat hearing

I felt like I had a good understanding of the basics here. The four types, some considerations for cat biology, some tidbits to mention like most people with hearing loss still being able to hear a little, etc.

NOW I'm going to finish reading any sources I opened up in side tabs, and learn about the side effects of hearing loss that I've seen so far. Tinnitus was requested specifically.

But, I felt pretty confident at this point, so I started actually working on the guide itself. It's good because that's when I start getting really specific questions like, "Just how sensitive IS a cat's hearing next to a humans?"

Found this article comparing human and feline hearing, and also went for a source on common causes of ear infections in cats, and compared them to common causes of ear infections in humans. Basically everything WE get, and more. I also remembered a vet that I worked with explaining that humans don't get ear mites because our ear canals are shorter, but honestly I don't really want to hunt down a source on that.

Bottom line is that it seems that cats get ear infections significantly easier than humans.

SESSION 3: Paying attention to deaf and HOH experiences

Started loading up some videos on Youtube, and follow along with presentations from deaf speakers, awareness charities, and so on.

ADHD protip: If you're like me and often feel the need to get up and walk around when you're trying to focus on something, playing flash games on Neopets or a similar petsite while keeping a video popped out is a great way to help with executive function impulse stuff. Firefox and the program Freetube both allow for you to pop open a small window that you can move around your screen.

I absolutely adored this video from Montfort University, which collected experiences from people who were actively losing their hearing. I'm feeling that a lot of folks are probably anticipating the Herb Guide with the expectation it'll talk about fully deaf warriors like Snowkit (And BB!Whitewing, who is deaf in Better Bones), but one of the most important things I'm learning is that partial and unilateral hearing loss is both common, and important to talk about.

That section on people forgoing hearing aids is so bitter. The way that they were reluctant to even "admit" they had a disability (feeling as if it "doesn't count"), felt like hearing aids were for "old people" so they resisted getting a device that would really help, and that one woman who finally realized what her own mother must have been going through when she was in her shoes...

Jeez, man. Ableism really hits us all, doesn't it? You'll reject the small bits of help that were SHAKEN out of the pockets of an uncaring world, just so you don't have to admit you might need it.

I am vaguely aware that there's buzz within the deaf community about hearing aids, with some deaf people actually having extremely negative feelings on them. I didn't manage to find those people though, besides what I remembered from Tumblr posts explaining that cochlear implants tend to destroy what little hearing remains. I also didn't know what sorts of hearing aids exist, just basics.

In any case, it's not what my guide's about. Clan cats wouldn't be able to make devices like that-- so to compensate, I tried to stress that forcing warriors to "assimilate" to able-bodied society is bad compared to "accommodating" them. But I did make a little aside note on the guide itself as a PSA.

ANYWAY I'm keeping that pinned in my mind as I go through this. A LOT of these speakers are talking about their implants and how much they changed their lives, so I'm taking things with a teeny grain of salt, knowing I'm probably not getting the entire hearing-impaired community's feelings on this.

Rachel Kolb's Tedx talk was DEEPLY insightful, she is an absolutely fantastic presenter and her statistics are gutwrenching. I'm also paying close attention to how she described her speech therapy classes, how tactile the lessons are, how she had to hold her hand to her teacher's throat and learned that the trick to an N and an M was to speak it through the nose...

The theme of this part of my research has really been "heartbreaking," honestly. Next I watched this one from a BBC interview, where the speaker talks about how much EFFORT they have to make to listen to others. The casual cruelty of hearing people just not caring enough to reach out and make sure she can follow along in the conversation.

I know it's maybe not the same thing, but I teared up a bit at some parts, because that's something I've also felt as someone who's ADHD/Autistic. How much it hurts when people won't even take the goddamn time to clue you in. Like you're not worth it

Even if it's just for a silly cat community, I really hope the weeks of effort and hours of reading I put into this guide and journal makes someone feel seen. You're worth the time. I promise I mean it

Anyway,

Like The Basics, I kept finding more things as I went through my research, outside of this session.

Struggles of deaf people in life and the workplace

Social struggles, particularly in the digital age

Cochlear implants: Pros and Cons (It was really not relevant to my project here, BUT, I figured it was important enough to even mention in an aside on the main guide.)

Really interesting passage from a married couple losing their hearing

"What is it like to be deaf?" Mentions the link to memory loss in people who are hard of hearing due to the brain "discarding" misheard sentences.

SESSION 4: Relevant questions.

This is the point I was asking more targeted questions, as I was actively writing the bulk of the guide, because in spite of everything this remains a cat project. If I was about to write something and then realized I didn't actually know like... WHAT causes it, HOW it happens, How COMMON a thing is, I would go and find out.

For example I knew that Snowkit had a higher chance of being born deaf, but didn't exactly know why, or how it happens, or how much higher of a chance that was. So, I looked up white cats with blue eyes, and looked up the percentages associated with deafness in them.

Apparently it's rapid degeneration, instead of the inner ear just not forming properly. I could go down that rabbit hole and learn more about why, but at this point, I'm far enough along that I need to start deciding when something isn't really helpful but just interesting. It's REALLY easy to get distracted at this point in making these guides.

That lead to to look at how people tend to handle their deaf cats and make their lives better, which also lead me to a good source on how to clean a cat's ears. That's another thing I had to halt at; because this guide is about DISABILITY, not about treating ear ailments.

When you're doing research this way, I find it helpful to "limit my scope." I've mentioned this technique/skill/advice in the past with some of my cultural expansions for the Clans too. You can see how maaaaassive the guide I wrote got even while staying on topic; it easily could have gotten bloated by even MORE tangential knowledge.

But I do plan to make an ear treatment guide at some point, as well.

I then started trying to learn more about rodent squeaks. How high in hertz they are, when different animals make them, how loud in decibels, etc. I couldn't find very much, because sound/hearing in general is actually WILDLY understudied, especially in terms of non-human animals.

But I did find this article on mouse vocalizations, specifically, and this webpage on various animal hearing ranges.

(though the webpage begs ppl to be careful about making comparisons between the numbers on the page, because they come from different studies with different parameters. But like. somehow i think this is good enough for funny cat project)

Lastly on this topic, I tried to find a good source on whiskers and how well they can "replace" hearing, and ended up finding this EXCELLENT article on allllll sorts of hearing loss related things in cats. It's got it all. Whiskers, common causes, tests. It's great.

SESSION 5: Sensitivity readers

I'm trying to be extra careful with this guide, with the knowledge in mind that this one was highly requested and likely will get decent reach. So, I figured it was more important than usual to speak to disabled individuals who could advise me, to my face, instead of only relying on what I'd seen in my research and secondhand information.

(especially since my style in writing these guides tries to be "simple," trying to limit how much medical speak I use and explaining terms in-depth when I need to use them.)

I spoke to @sylsoddsandends, @s0ulfulsapph1cf, and one more. While talking to them, they brought up even more to me that I hadn't considered.

For example, I did not know that unilateral hearing loss (affects one ear more than the other) actually resulted in a loss of "distance perception," the same way that I don't have depth perception because I've got low vision in one eye. I grabbed a scientific paper to read about it and went forth.

I also got a ton of good feedback about how much I stressed that lipreading is difficult, added some advice on a unilateral HL cat would stand, brought in some notes about chronic pain, so on. I then went to preview it to a bunch of personal friends to give it a couple more once-overs for typos and flow and such.

The last thing I did was reach out to those sensitivity readers again, and ask their permission to link them here. I don't have permission from the last reader yet (which is on me, I should have asked sooner). So there will be an update here if/when they get back to me.

POSTMORTEM

Nothing here yet! I will make an attempt to collect any follow-up questions and such down here.

[thefandommind]

Parenting Fails, featuring Etmon Banage

This post will contain spoilers for the Spirit series, including minor spoilers for Spirit Oath. It also obviously covers bad parenting.

SO. Etmon Banage, Rector Spiritualis of the Spirit Court, and Miranda Lyonette's mentor. He is a very powerful and respected wizard, who honors his duty and responsibilities to the highest regard.

He's also a shit parent. His son Eliton running away at 11, and he just, let that happen.

Now, he can have the best intentions, he wanted to teach his son discipline and respect for spirits, and keep Eli from taking influence from Sara. These are concepts that us as the reader learn to gravitate to over the course of the series; uneducated unemphatic wizards are bad. We also get to see that he somewhat succeeded in teaching Eli these morals, as he shares a respect for spirits and hatred for enslavers (which he didn't learn from either the spirit deaf Giuseppe or the narcissist Sara).

But even with the best intentions, his actions is where he dropped the ball.

We see from Eli's experiences with his father that he was too strict, too serious, didn't listen or care about anything but being a spiritualist. And we also get to see Banage confirm this with his words towards his son in Chapter 24 of Spirit War.

I'd like to note, a great deal of Banage's abuse comes from his own regrets and insecurities. Which is what makes him such an interesting character to read, because I get to piece together bits that are revealed in the story into a bigger picture. In Spirit War, we get two major pieces of information about Eli's parents, Banage has attempted to enslave a war spirit once in his life, and Sara is a horrible person. (We get to find out how the relay is abused in the fifth book, but already in the fourth we see that this character is willing to harm any spirit if it suits her means. She doesn't "enslave", but then neither did the Duke of Gaol before he finally did.)

Banage knows both that he has been pushed to attempt enslavement, and that Sara is crafty, secretive, and ambitious, and so it makes sense he would fear that the worst qualities in him and his wife would come to manifest in his son. But his fears get in the way of actually respecting and caring for his son.

This is where I bring in Miranda as a treat and then turn around and use her to bash Banage once more.

Because Miranda is Banage's favorite and apprentice. This is hammered home often in the books, but to make it concise, Miranda is just the perfect Spiritualist. She is everything Banage wanted Eli to be. Dutiful, obedient, driven, stubborn. (These are of course in part also characteristics of Eli, if they weren't, they wouldn't be very good foils of each other.)

AND YET I CAN ALSO PRESENT EVIDENCE OF HIS SHIT PARENTING WITH HIS ADOPTED DAUGHTER TOO.

Main sources being he never tells her Eli is his son and just sends her after him, doesn't warn her about Sara or anything, yells at her a lot, and doesn't often stand by or listen to her. I swear if he just fucking gave her information instead of keeping it from her.

Not to say I don't think he's grown as a father/mentor, he certainly has regrets and tries to be better. It's shown that he never really connected or made time for Eli outside of lessons and rules, never got to know him as his own person. But there are also moments where we can infer that he did make time for his apprentice. He knows her morals, but is also shown to understand and respect her personality and choices, even if they clash with his.

But back with Eli, Banage clearly never knew him very well, this is explicitly shown in the confrontation in the watch tower. We as the audience also can figure this, as by then we know Eli's character, and it clashes with most of Banage's idea of him.

This is where I'd like to say, Sara is also on the shit list, but for different reasons.

Sara, while only having a few scenes and relevance, is shown to be cunning and ambitious, and she doesn't let thing such as moral high ground get in the way of innovation. This is a great character to have, it lets us delve deeper into the intricacies of how the spirit world functions and what it can do. It brings us a different kind of spirit abuser then what is previously given to us.

It also shows a different kind of abusive parent, instead of a hands on but emotionally distant parents, you have the completey distant parent.

And while Banage was most concerned about Eli's power, wanting to keep him from abusing his will for the better of the spirits, grooming him to be a strong Spiritualist---Sara was intrigued by Eli's power for her own motives later in his adulthood. She had no connection with him as a child, she simply didn't care or want him.

Banage being the one out of the two who wanted his child, also doesn't make him a good parent. (Going off of my theoretical script and taking a moment to be hypothetical. It always read to me that Josef is slightly older then Eli, like I don't feel like checking to see how it's implied rn but in my mind rn Josef is 27 and Eli is 26 during Spirit War. Because math, and also Theresa was pregnant during the first war, and Sara wasn't described as such. Banage himself describes him and Sara being freshly married and already having marital problems leading up to and after the war---basicaly I'm saying Eli was an accident or a badly planned "let's try fixing our marriage with a child" and that in my opinion, is a very very bad idea that sane people don't do.)

NOW YOU MIGHT BE THINKING, WHAT ABOUT GIUSEPPE?

And even if you aren't, you are now. And I have much to say about Eli's adopted father.

So while Banage is introduced as Eli's estranged father relatively early in the series, just as early as get Eli's first tense "meet the parents" and we are instead introduced to the original Monpress. Which is a beautiful writing decision, used to make the audience question what the hell is happening with Banage and "Eliton", and also to give Eli's past and skills some explanation. It's great, but right now I will happily point out what the few scenes with Monpress the Elder mean for our thief's development.

Eli is shown to be frustrated and at odds with his adopted father in book two. They argue about his potential, his skills, and his life decisions, all of which we see happening with Banage later too. But with Giuseppe, we see a father figure who is actually trying to parent his son.

My biggest source for this is opera and principles.

It's not actually, but my main point for Giuseppe actually being a good mentor, other then Eli's genuine trust in him, is his decision to take Eli to the theater.

Giuseppe teaches Eli everything we see in Eli, that we also see in Giuseppe---that we don't see in Banage. Thief skills, lock picking, poisons, art history and appraisal, obviously things under Eli's apprenticeship. But we also get to see non heist personalities show through in the both of them, they both enjoy wine, and while Eli doesn't seem to much enjoy the opera, Giuseppe has a known love of theater and spread that influence onto his son. It's obvious he taught him things he needed to know, skills Eli looked for in a mentor, and things Giuseppe wanted to imprint on him as a father figure. And that is a huge part of parenting, showing your child the world, through your experience. That's something Banage tried but ultimately could only do as a Spiritualist, and not as a father.

But another part of parenting is seeing the world through your child's experience.

And in the time Monpress had, he accomplished that in spades, by showing up in Gaol.

First he tried to keep his apprentice from falling into an obvious trap, which showed how much he cared. But then he stuck around, even when the world was going crazy, and it long past had anything to do with him. Giuseppe Monpress is spirit deaf, and yet he showed in Spirit Rebellion that he could listen to Eli's explanations and also respect his decisions--even support his decisions. Eli tried to give him outs, let his mentor leave when the enslavement on the city got bad knowing a thief would want to leave, but Monpress decided to stay and try and help him, because he knew it was important to Eli to defeat the Duke. And even when he left Eli, he immediately went to find Josef, who Giuseppe probably believe would have a better chance in helping them he could.

It's this act that shows that now only does Giuseppe believe he should help in duty as Eli's mentor, but he also believes he should help because he couldn't stand to see him in trouble because he cares.

I also think Eli's grievances with Giuseppe come from frustration, not at Giuseppe really, but at Benehime. We find he can't be a sneak, he needs this bounty to be high and with that comes the challenge of needing to be public. But we also see Eli takes a lot of inspiration from Giuseppe, like his phrases and mannerisms, his catsuit he'd never admit to keeping.

These are all ways that show Eli's relationship with Giuseppe is closer then just a mentorship.

And I'd also like to add that Miranda is in a similar relationship with Banage. Her father Simon Lyonette was also abusive, and she's closer to Banage then her father. Banage and Miranda are shown to have clicked because of their shared morals and occupation, just as Eli and Giuseppe did, but Banage had also managed to grow as a person and parent. He's not perfect, and throughout the story Miranda even realizes and has to adjust to this. But Miranda still gets to have moments with Banage where he shows her the world through his experience, and he learns through her experience as well.

I could add more and more to this, Sara and Banage's parenting or lack there of is very interesting to me, like Sara's "I remember how you always did love a deal.”, as the audience we know by that scene that it's true as fuck. Sara being able to read Eli better then Banage could, but Banage spending more time with him then Sara ever did, such great concepts.

But this post is getting long, so for now I'll leave it here.

Moral of the story gentleman thieves make better fathers then towerkeepers do™