#types of technology transfer

[waifuoftomonori]

I'm taking myself too seriously.

Tomorrow we're doing the Comic Sans trick. And making it pink. (Yes, normally I prefer to hand-write, but I'll make an exception until I can break out of this funk.)

[moths-in-a-coat]

i honestly thought working at a college (in a sector dominated by customer service) that the people/students i’m helping are

i don’t really know? able to follow directions? or have some intuitive sense of how things work?

i just thought that people in college would make customer service easier compared to like working at a store or something

but, alas, if you tell a student to go to a website, often times you need to tell them explicitly, with clear instructions, that they need to open a browser like chrome, make sure a new tab is opened, to click onto the search bar, to type in the url, and explain that when i say “dot com” i do not mean type in “dot” but to actually use the period on the keyboard

i get that having access to computers consistently enough is sometimes a privilege for many households, but at the same time, schools have chromebooks or mandatory computer time, and, in my school growing up, mandatory computer classes AND robotics/progaming classes despite being from a poorer school district

i just don’t think i’ll be able to explain that, no, when i say click on something using a mouse, that you cannot click and drag it. you have to hold the mouse still and click it while holding it still one more time without losing my mind in some capacity more than i already have

[parkers-gal]

promise J.B.

summary: bucky is protective over reader, the new lab assistant and resident doctor at the compound

wc: 2k

pairing: bucky barnes x f!reader

a/n: no warnings (lmk if i missed anything). barely proof read. requests are open!

═══════════ ⋆★⋆ ═══════════

the first time he met you, he was expecting dr. cho’s usual lab assistant. it was meant to be a brief check in after his latest mission with sam, just a minor tweak to a piece of tech on his uniform. 

“hey, do you thin-” bucky strides in to dr. miller’s office, full tactical suit still on. he’d came straight from the quinjet, but glancing up from his arm holster he notices that dr. miller’s office is now replaced by your office. 

you look up from your lab report, a pile of open wires laying beside it as you twiddle with the machinery. “oh, i’m sorry. i think dr. banner forgot to notify you: dr. miller transferred to shield co-op missions. i’m his replacement.” you wipe the sweat from your hand onto your white lab coat and stand from your chair. “i’m y/n.”

bucky reads the nametag on your labcoat, dr. l/n. “oh.” his eyes move from the tag to your eyes. “sorry.” 

your smile immediately shifts whatever emotions he just had about the situation. your expression is soft and for a moment, bucky thinks you’re too innocent to be working in a business surrounded by violence. it provokes something deep in his stomach, something he can’t quite place.

“i’d be happy to assist you with whatever you need, though!” you smile again, this one giving bucky an even warmer feeling through his chest. “i already read all of dr. miller’s previous lab reports, and i’m just as good with needles as i am with technology.” you shift your head towards the mutilated hardware on your desk, then smile back at bucky.

he almost chuckles. almost. instead, he adorns a smirk, so subtle you might not have caught it had you not been staring at him, waiting for a reply. hesitantly, he steps forward, holding his arm out to show you what he needs changed.

that was four months ago. now, bucky looks for any excuse to head to your office, whether it be a slightly twisted wrist, a broken button on his suit, or even a question about a new weapon for his next mission. 

“what can i do for you today, james?” your back is turned to him. you’re busy fiddling with a microscope, but bucky can hear the smile on your face.

“bucky,” he corrects. “are you going to tony’s gala this saturday?”

you stop squinting and stand upright, turning to face him. you have a quizzical look on your face. “do doctors usually go to those sorts of things?”

bucky shrugs. “i think dr. cho has before.”

you hum, turning back to the microscope. “well, i do need to catch up with natasha…” you turn the knob for the lens. “is that why you came to see me?”

he pauses. you hear his feet shuffling and smile to yourself. “i just wanted to ask about… my… belt.”

you suppress a laugh and face him again “really?” you grin. “your belt?”

he hums, a tint spreading on his cheeks. 

“well, i haven’t had lunch yet, if you would like to get something for us, we can talk about your belt during my break.”

his head perks up at that. “okay, i’ll be back in twenty.”

he’s out of the room so quick and it makes you smile again. as you turn back to the microscope, somebody else enters.

“back alread- oh.” 

john walker. 

you have never been particularly fond of him, especially after a heated argument he had with sam and steve a couple months back. he works for shield, but sometimes they send him to the avenger’s compound to retrieve specific types of upgrades or get intel about an overlapping mission. 

“aw, don’t seem too disappointed, sweets.” he smiles, the image disgusting you. 

you walk away from the microscope towards a centrifuge sitting on the opposite counter. 

“what can i help you with?”

“what, i come all this way and i can’t just talk to you?”

you bite your lip. “i’m afraid i don’t understand.”

he laughs. “i want to get to know you.”

“like right now?”

“right now… over dinner…” he smiles again, the same disgusting one. “whichever you prefer.”

unsure on how to reply, you turn back to the machine. “i don’t know if that’s appropriate.”

“but it’s okay if you do it with bucky?”

“what about me?” bucky steps through the door with a bag of food in one hand. once noticing john, his jaw clicks. “what are you doing here?”

“just wanted to talk to the lady, that’s all.” he shrugs his shoulders. “is that against the law?”

“it is if she doesn’t want that.”

your gaze shifts to bucky. his blue eyes are piercing, and his gaze is colder than any he’s ever given you. you sense the tension growing the longer he stares at john. 

john interrupts the silence. “what’s the issue, man?” he steps towards bucky. it’s a small step, but it has bucky rigid. “it’s not like she’s taken. she’s free game.”

bucky scoffs. “if you speak about women like they’re prizes to win then you don’t deserve to speak to them.”

your heart flutters. after all he’s been through, bucky still chooses to be an amazing guy. your admiration for him only grows. 

“nobody said anything about that.” john raises his hands in surrender. “don’t get jealous… it’s not like she’s yours…”

his jaw clenches again. you can see his hands are balled into fists at his side. faintly, you hear the whirring of the metal plates in his arm. 

“i think you should leave.”

bucky steps aside, clearing a space for john to walk out the door. reluctantly, he leaves, but not before sparing you another glance and whispering a “call me.”

when he’s finally left the room, you exhale, glancing back to bucky and his tense shoulders. 

“thank you… for that.”

he blinks. his eyes finally find you and he blinks away the tension. 

“of course. you shouldn’t have to put up with that, especially in your place of work.”

you nod and a shy smile takes over your face. you move a strand of hair to behind your ear and turn back to the machine so bucky doesn’t notice your face. he does anyway.

“so, lunch?”

═══════════ ⋆★⋆ ═══════════

saturday evening rolls around and, after having double checked with tony and natasha about the validity of your invitation, you get dressed for the gala. the dress fits your form and drapes down to just below your knees. you pair it with a simple pair of heels and your favorite necklace. 

you hope bucky likes it.

stop. that’s inappropriate. we’re work colleagues. he would’ve helped out any girl that needed it, he-

oh fuck.

you notice him immediately. he’s sat at the bar talking to steve, legs draped off the bar seat, thighs thick even in his dress pants. his long hair is neatly swept back, and the glass of bourbon in his metal hand clinks from the ice. 

natasha spots you first. she was just by the entrance, and she immediately greets you.

“how are you?”

you smile at her, happy to be with her after having not had the chance lately. “good, busy in the lab as always.”

she chuckles understandingly. “seems like tony has everyone working overtime.”

she goes on about one thing or another, but at some point you tune her out because bucky has finally noticed you. you can tell he’s tuned steve out too. 

he can’t stop staring. granted, he always stares at everyone, but the way he looks at you differs from that so much. it has your knees weak and you can feel your heart pound a little harder in your chest. his tongue darts out to wet his lips and the faintest smirk appears on his face.

steve turns around to see what his best friend is staring at. noticing you, he leans his head back at the sudden enlightenment and faces bucky. he speaks lowly, “why don’t you ask her out?”

bucky jerks his head towards steve. “what?” he’s defensive at having just been caught. “why would i do that?”

steve rolls his eyes. “because visiting her office everyday is totally normal…” his tone is laced with sarcasm.

you’ve been spending too much time with sam.

“shut up.”

“so you don’t like her, then?”

“i-” bucky huffs. “i never said that.”

“well, i’d act fast.”

his brows furrow. “Why?”

steve points towards you and bucky’s gaze shifts from his best friend to you. there, john walker attempts to offer you a drink, and bucky can tell even from his distant spot at the bar that you’re smiling to be polite.

he doesn’t reply to steve, abandoning his drink and his friend at the bar as he makes his way over to you. 

“can i help you?”

john has to turn to look at bucky, his smile dropping. you can tell he’s aggravated by the presence of the former winter soldier.

“no, i think we’re good.” he doesn’t even attempt to make his smile look genuine.

“i don’t think we are.” bucky steps closer to you. his head dips down, lips close to your ear as he speaks in a low whisper. “you okay, peaches?”

you smile, giddy at the sudden pet name. you nod gently, grateful for bucky’s care, and try not to bite your lip from the interaction. 

“why don’t you go somewhere else?” bucky’s gentle tone is replaced with a stoic one, his annoyance for john returning.

“why can’t i just talk to the girl?” he looks at you expecting your defense.

bucky’s left hand wraps around your waist. his fingers rub your side softly, gracing your hip. your stomach flips in a fit of butterflies. the sudden act of affection has your knees buckling. you want him to pull you closer in case you collapse.

“she’s not interested.” 

john’s eyes widen slightly and he backs away, muttering something under his breath. you feel bucky’s metal fingers squeeze your side slightly. he turns to look at you. 

“i’m sorry about him.”

you can barely hold eye contact. “it’s not your fault.” a sudden boost in courage has you pulling your hand up to smooth out the lapel of his suit. “besides, you’re my hero.”

his eyes flicker with appreciation at having been called that. “yeah?”

you hum in agreement. his other hand reaches towards your face, tracing the hair that sits behind your ear, pinned up in the updo you’ve done for the gala. another stomach flip.

“in that case, does your hero get any reward?” he has a playful smirk, his tone light.

“i suppose…” you smile back. “got anything in mind?”

he pulls you until you're facing him directly. his other hand sits at your waist, too. now you can’t look away, forced to look into his eyes as he undresses you with them. he hums as if the answer sits on his tongue. his metal hand pulls you forward, forcing you to take a step closer to him. his flesh hand moves from your waist to your cheek, nose brushing against yours, delicate, like a dance. his breath fans against your face and your eyelids flutter shut. you exhale, a bundle of nerves leaving too.

his lips ghost against yours, waiting to see if you’d pull back or say you’re crossing a line. you don’t dare stop him. you feel his lips curve slightly; he’s smirking against you. before it grows anymore, his lips connect with yours, warm and supple and tender. he kisses you like every second is a promise, like he wants the world to know you’ll never be anyone else’s.

and now, you know it’s a promise he’ll never break. 

[the-shedevil-writes]

Please Please Please (Jake Seresin x Reader)

DESCRIPTION: Growing up with Rooster as your big cousin meant that you were always protected. He made it his mission to keep you out of trouble—whether you wanted him to or not. But after you're transferred to the North Island base, there's little he can do to stop you from being intrigued by the witty playboy pilot that is Jake 'Hangman' Seresin. Everybody's warning you not to... but that just makes the chase more fun.

WORD COUNT: 5.7k WARNINGS: Sensual jokes and innuendos, cussing, fighting. Your call sign’s ’Cowgirl’ ;) NOTES: Jake Seresin is so Short n' Sweet by Sabrina Carpenter. MY MASTERLIST - READ ON AO3!

Growing up with a big cousin like Bradley meant that every summer was spent in San Diego, basking in the hot summer sun and running around, causing trouble. Even though Y/n lived across the country in Alabama, she was incredibly close to her cousin. Technology got better as they got older, and things like texting and FaceTime made the distance after summer ended much more manageable. She looked up to him. He always gave her advice and took care of her. Of course, she worried about him when he decided to follow in his father’s footsteps and join the Navy Air Force. But nothing compared to his reaction on Christmas morning when she told him that she also had enlisted. A mix of pride, anger, and dread surged through him, but he eventually came around to the idea. 

After a few years of hustling, she eventually and finally got transferred to North Island. Bradley’s home. She was not just going to be there for the summer, but for the indeterminable future. 

When he found out, he ecstatically started preparing for her arrival. He told the Dagger Squad about his little cousin and how she was being transferred over. One night, he turned to FaceTime and explained all the members of the squadron he worked with. She had heard all of these call signs before, but had never put any names to faces. 

She stared at the Instagram post he was talking about over the phone. A group photo of all of them at this bar, which they apparently frequented. Bradley at the piano, and the rest of the pilots surrounding him. They seemed like a fun bunch. One pilot immediately caught her eye. A tall built blonde in the middle with a smirk that said ‘yeah right.’

“Who’s the blonde?” She asked

“Glasses or no glasses?” Bradley asked, the small square of him in the corner had him in his dark room.

“No glasses. He’s cute.” 

The sound that escaped him was a mix between a groan and a dreadful laugh. “Ohhhhh no. Oh no no no no. You are not getting with Hangman.” He said.

She smirked and raised her brows. They both knew she wasn’t one to back away from a bad idea. But this often led to tears being shed, and Bradley having to hold back his ‘I told you so’ for later on. 

“And why’s that?” She asked

“I think our moms would kill me if I let you get played by Jake Seresin.” 

“So he’s a player?”

He rolled his eyes. “And a major dick. Just… don’t. Why not Bob? Blonde with the glasses.” He offered. 

He wasn’t overprotective in the way that nobody could date her. That’d be unreasonable. He just felt that he could tell the difference between a good and bad decision. Bob was a clear good decision.

She looked the guy over in the picture and shrugged. “Ehhh, he’s cute. But he looks nice.”

Bradley looked straight into the camera like he was Jim from the office.

“The problem is that… he’s nice?” 

That made her laugh out loud, “Yeah! Bradley, you know my type. And it’s never been guys whose call sign is Bob.”

“You’ll love Bob, though. If you aren’t into him, you’ll at least be great friends.” He said. And that painted a picture in her head. San Diego beaches. A lovely work schedule, Monday through Friday. A group of friends already waiting for her there. And her days spent flying jets with her favorite and only cousin.

Touching down in San Diego felt incredible. Her whole body felt electric with the prospects of new beginnings. She had worked in many rural states so far, never in a city like this. She practically tackled Bradley to the ground when she found him waiting at the gate. It had been years since either of them had gotten to see each other in person. 

“Bradley Bradshaw! I didn’t know you existed outside of my phone.” She cackled.

“Hey, it’s Rooster to you now, Cowgirl.” He said, referring to her own call sign.

She fake shivered, “Weird. Weird!”

Her first week was spent moving into her apartment, and Bradley helped her put together furniture after his shifts. On Friday night, he insisted that she come to The Hard Deck. And who was she to deny a few drinks on her first weekend in North Island?

Walking up to the homey dive bar, a sense of adventure zapped up her spine. The lights inside lit up the dark beach, and she could hear the waves faintly behind the classic rock playing inside. They didn’t have anything like this in Alabama, that’s for sure. 

She didn’t get many opportunities to dress up nicely, so she decided to go all out. But now she felt a little overdressed in her white halter top and denim mini skirt. A pair of heels sank into the sand. Her blown-out hair lifted in the sea breeze. Even the people walking in front of her were in simple T-shirts and shorts. She swallowed. Maybe she overestimated ‘bar on the beach’.

She walked in and looked around for her cousin. After a few seconds of anxious scanning, she found him over by the pool table, playing darts. It wasn’t hard to notice him and his whole group, still in uniform. 

“Hey, Rooster!” She called happily, strutting over to meet him.

He turned around and smiled. “Hey, Cowgirl!” He ecstatically walked over to greet her with a side hug.

She didn’t notice the squad’s jaws dropping and the surprised looks they all gave each other. THIS was Rooster’s little cousin? Hangman, the most surprised, went from leaning down on the table, lining up his starting shot of pool, to slowly standing, taking her all in. 

Rooster led her to the table. “Guys, this is the little cousin I was telling you all about. This is Y/n.” He said, introducing her. 

She smiled and waved on instinct. “Hi.”

“Jesus Christ, she’s related to you?” Hangman said with a smooth voice, capturing her attention. The cute guy from the photo. And wow, he was even more better looking in real life. Tall, blonde, and muscular. His green eyes reflected back the amber lights above, as he stood leaning on his pool cue. He looked like a Ken doll, and his voice was like butter. She understood immediately how he garnered the rep that Rooster scared her of. 

“That’s Hangman.” Rooster disappointingly introduced, and he pointed to the rest of the gang, “There’s Phoenix. Bob. Fanboy. And Payback.”

She nodded, keeping track of the names. “Got room for one more?” She asked.

“Yeah. Of course.” Bob said, welcoming, sliding over so she could move into the space. 

She turned and looked around for a cue on the wall, but didn’t see any. When she turned back around, she found Hangman standing there with two in his hands. 

“I got you.” He said, handing her one.

She looked up at him, unable to resist the smile that grew on her face. The smile that Rooster knew very well growing up. The one that meant trouble. 

“Thank you very much.” She said, reaching for it, but he gently pulled it away first with a teasing look on his face. After a daring head tilt, she snatched the cue from his hand, purposefully making their fingers brush. Sure, this Jake Seresin was cute, but she could play that game, too. He clearly had never heard of Y/n Bradshaw. She walked past him, towards the end of the pool table. Nobody questioned that she was now suddenly starting the game.

She leaned over in her low-cut halter and mini skirt without a care in the world. Though it sure made Bob avert his eyes and give Rooster a scared look. She knew exactly who wouldn’t look away… Jake. She could feel his stare boring into her, and even with her focusing on the rack in front of her, she could guess the stupid smirk on his face.

“Your technique’s all wrong.” Jake started, “I can teach you, if you’d like.” Practically textbook flirting.

Rooster stared daggers into him. “I’ll kill you, Hangman.” He did his best to walk over and stick to his game of darts with Payback and Fanboy. But that didn’t stop the nervousness.

She chuckled and pushed the cue forward, sending the ball flying hard against the stack. They all scattered, sending many more stripes in than solids.

“I’m stripes. Bob, you’re on my team.” She said, calling him over with her head. 

Bob’s eyes widened, but he nodded and joined her with a smile. He seemed just happy to be included. It took all her effort not to laugh at Jake’s face dropping. 

Jake let out the tiniest scoff then leaned on his cue. “Losers buy a round for the squad.” 

“You sure seem confident,” She teased as Phoenix lined up her shot.

“I’m the only Naval Aviator here with a confirmed air-to-air kill. I’ve got good aim.” He bragged. 

“If you’re wanting a measuring contest, I can go toe to toe.”

“Oh really?”

Phoenix got her shot in naturally, and Bob went to take her place, finding a good spot to get a stripe in. But who cares what they were doing? It felt like they didn’t exist. It felt like the entire bar didn’t even exist, and it was nothing but this sweet, sweet tension between her and Hangman. That feeling when two people know they’re attracted to each other, so they’re treading the line between what’s too far and what’s not far enough. You could cut it with a knife.

“Well, I’m an early bloomer with a hundred carrier landings and two air medals.” She announced, walking closer to stand in front of him. She looked up and smirked, “One of them with V.” 

He whistled. “Guess, we’ve got ourselves a good game on our hands then, folks.” He said, but only stared directly into her eyes.

“Guess, we do, Hangman. You’re on.”

The game was tight. And it felt like she and Jake were playing their own game amidst Phoenix and Bob. Jake was good. He had dead aim and could get a solid from across the table straight into a pocket.  

But she had strategy on her side. She’d aim for what seemed like the riskiest route, but would get multiple balls in at the same time. Faster when she was on a lucky streak, slower when she wasn’t. Leading to the two of them neck and neck.

One of the last turns of the game had her and Bob with 3 balls left, and Hangman and Phoenix with two. 

“Shaking in your boots yet?” Hangman said lowly as she lined up her shot. It was tough. Trying to include the one ball in an awkward spot was almost impossible.

She shook her head firmly. “Nope.”

“Oh, you will be.” He said, leaning over next to her, trying to distract her.

“That a promise?” She asked quickly before shooting. The ball hit straight into the awkward one, sent it in, and bounced back to hit her last two remaining into pockets. 

Jake watched it with wide eyes. This woman. 

She smirked proudly. “How ‘bout you? Shaking in your boots yet?” All she needed to do was get the 8-Ball in on her next turn, and she and Bob would be winners. Unless…

“Not even close.” Jake started setting up his shot. 

Phoenix observed the board. “Hangman, we’re fucked. You can’t get that six in without hitting the 8-ball.” 

“High risk. High reward.” He said before shooting, without even a thought. And yup. He sank the 8-ball in too early. 

Bob and Y/n cheered with a high-five. “Nice work, Bob.” She complimented before Jake walked back over to them. “I drink Michelob Ultra.” She rubbed it in.

He shook his head. “How about you come with me to get this round?” He said.

She looked over at Rooster, who was playing some songs on the piano as Payback and Fanboy danced and sang along off-key. A mischievous grin formed on her face. “Sure.” She said, walking away with Hangman. Bob and Phoenix looked at each other with worried faces. 

As they walked over to the bar, Jake looked over at her. “Getting to buy you a drink is a pretty fantastic punishment.” 

“Dreadful, isn’t it?” She said.

“Horrible. Didn’t want to do it at all.” He replied just as sarcastically.

This felt… good? Even though Rooster had warned her so heavily about him, she felt that she had met her match. After plenty of lackluster guys and boring conversation, she was talking to someone who could keep up with her. But she didn’t want it to seem like she was falling for him. No- she couldn’t let this man have the higher court. She was not going to be just another girl for him. He was gonna have to square up to get anywhere past this fun flirting with her. 

They sat at the bar. “Penny, could I get five more of our usual and…” He looked over at Y/n, who sat with a proud smile, “And a Michelob Ultra. All on me.” 

The bartender nodded, “You got it.” She said, sliding over the mass of drinks and looking over at her. “A new face around here.” 

“Yeah, Hi! I’m Y/n, Rooster’s cousin.” 

And at that, Penny widened her eyes at Hangman, as if to say, ‘What are you doing?’ She took a surprised pause before going. “Well, welcome to town.” 

With that foreboding interaction, her stomach squeezed. What was any of that supposed to mean? But she mentally shook it off and looked back over at the gorgeous man next to her. 

“I think I know why your name’s Cowgirl.” He stated with a sly smile. 

“I think I know why your name’s Hangman.”

“It does hang.” 

Jesus Christ. That took her off guard, but she wasn’t about to let it show.

“It’s cause I’m from Alabama, dumbass.” “Texas.” 

Their dialogue was like a western shootout. Constant banter, and no time to breathe. 

“You leave people out to dry,” She said.

“Well, the women are usually-”

She raised a brow that told him not to finish that sentence. In a single look, she told him that she was not the type of woman to hear about his conquests. He tilted his head with a wavering smirk. An exhale escaped through his nose.

“I like you.” He said, wagging his finger at her. “You’re fun.”

“And that’s all you are. Fun.” She said pointedly, “I hope you know that tonight’s been fun, but I’m not looking to wake up in your bed.”

His face dropped. “You’re gonna listen to Chicken instead of forming your own opinion?” He asked, clearly a little taken aback.

“Well… I don’t fuck and find out.” She replied, opening her beer can with a hiss and strutting back to the pool table, waving hi to Bob and Phoenix. She looked back at Jake, who looked like he had just seen pigs fly.

The next week was her first week on base, and she couldn’t wait. She was itching to fly again. She hadn’t been able to since her move, and she needed it like water. They were training for a strike mission, something she was very familiar with.

She sat on a bench in the locker room, putting on the underclothes for her flight suit. Just a black tank top and underwear, as Phoenix did the same, a few lockers down from her. Her hesitant gaze could be felt. 

Awkward silence. 

“Phoenix, you seem like you wanna say something,” Y/n said with a chuckle, not even looking at her, as she got up to grab her flight suit. 

“I’m debating on warning you against Hangman or if you’ve already heard enough from Rooster.” The brunette replied point-blank, “You have to know he’s a bad idea.”

She shrugged as she set her suit on the ground so she could step into it. “I know he is. That’s why I’m not sleeping with him.” 

Phoenix raised her brows. “Right now. But you guys were practically one step away from screwing each other on the pool table at Hard Deck last weekend.” She said, and was met with silence as she pulled up the bottom half. “I’m just saying. He gets girls wrapped around his finger all the time. Don’t think you’re gonna change him to be a relationship type of guy.”

Y/n put on the arms of her suit. “Well, if he wants me, he’s gonna have to. I’m not that type of girl anymore.” She zipped herself up, “Trust me. If he wants to be stupid, it sure as hell won’t be in front of me.”

Phoenix shrugged. “Whatever you say, Cowgirl.”

Walking out into the hangar side by side with Phoenix was invigorating. She looked around, taking in the base. It felt a lot bigger than the ones she was used to. And the weather was gorgeous. A cool breeze whizzed past her face, not protected by her hair anymore, now that it was up in the sanctioned bun. 

Then she saw him. Hangman walking out with Fanboy towards the jet. He looked fantastic in a flight suit. The dark green sleeves were folded up over his elbows, and the sight of his tense forearms made her swallow like a Victorian man seeing an ankle.

He looked over and saw her, a grin appearing on his face. 

“Good morning, ladies. Cowgirl.” He said to the two, making Phoenix roll her eyes and walk away towards Fanboy. “You sure make a onesie look good.” He said once she left.

“Right back at you, Bangman.” She teased, making him laugh.

“I don’t mind that nearly as much as you think.” He said, crossing his arms. 

“Well, you should.” And for some reason, that comment got under his skin a little. She could tell by the way he tensed up slightly.

But before she could recover, Rooster came by. She wondered if he was just passing through or if he saw her talking to Jake and decided to intervene. “Hey, Cowgirl! Ready for your first day?”

She nodded excitedly, “Very. I’ve been waiting.” She said happily. 

Rooster patted her back, then looked over at Hangman with a warning glare that could turn a man to stone. But then Phoenix called his name from the distance, and Rooster looked over at his little cousin. “You’re gonna kill it. Be careful. Be safe.” He said before running over. But it didn’t feel like it was the planes he was warning her about.

After a moment, Jake looked back at her, “I actually wanted to-”

BZZZZZZ. The P.A. system turned on. “Pilots, please report to the flight line for pre-launch checks. Stand by for further instructions.” A gravelly voice said.

An excited smile lit up her face. “God, I’m so excited.” She said, practically radiating as she looked over at the line of Hornets. She didn’t even notice Jake admiring how pretty she looked when she was excited about something. She turned back, and his face returned to normal, hiding the small smile he had. “Sorry, what were you saying?” 

He opened his mouth, but then thought about it. “I’ll tell you later. We should go.”

The next few days were hard, but rewarding. Dogfights and practicing in difficult terrain. But she and Jake developed a lovely, banter-filled friendship between them. Every day, she’d walk into the hangar to find Jake had already grabbed her coffee. And they’d tease each other about their flying habits and mistakes.

“I mean, you fixate so hard on the kill shot that you forget about your position. It’s a rookie mistake.” She shrugged, sipping her coffee.

“What can I say? I just like getting what I want.” He said, leaning closer.

Her head turned, challenging. “Clearly…” She said softly, “But then you end up dead in the water.” She stated, breaking the tension and walking away towards her jet. Jake watched her with a gnawing ache in his chest that grew every day. 

Up in the sky, a week later, she and Jake flew, teamed up for an exercise. They hadn’t started yet, waiting for Maverick to catch up. 

Over the direct comms, Jake’s voice piped up in her helmet. “How’s your week been, Cowgirl?”

She smirked, looking over to see Jake in his jet giving her a two-finger wave through his canopy. “It’s been good.” She radioed in.

The loud rush of the air against them was calming, and it was nice just casually flying down the area with one of the most breathtaking views she’s seen as a pilot. The beach was not too far down from them, giving them a clear view of the ocean. 

“Just good?” He asked. She could practically hear the curl of his lips, “How about I make it great?”

“Didn’t know you had a spicy margarita in your pocket there. How’d you fit that?” She teased and saw him shake his head.

“Dinner. Saturday night. I can guarantee a spicy margarita. Or a Michelob Ultra. Whatever you’re feeling, Cowgirl.” He said, remembering her order from a few weeks back.

She thought about it. Maybe it was the adrenaline of being in a jet. Maybe it was her hankering for bad decisions. Or maybe it was the fact that he’d been well behaved. He’d been keeping up this amusing give and take with her for the past two weeks. He was a fast learner. He quickly learned to never insinuate that she was going to sleep with him. And to never bring up other girls. 

“It’s a date.” She radioed in and looked over to find him staring at her with a surprised smile. 

He spun his jet into a barrel roll, making her laugh.

“YOU’RE WHAT?” Rooster almost slammed the brakes on the blue Ford Bronco on their way to The Hard Deck. But they were in the middle of the street, so he just looked over at her, horrified, and back at the road. “Y/N! What the hell did I say about Hangman?” 

She crossed her arms, already annoyed. “He’s been so… sweet.” She said, shrugging.

“I’m sure that’s what all the girls in god damn San Diego say before he buys them a drink.” He said. 

She groaned. “Rooster!” 

“Cowgirl!” He replied worriedly. “I’m not trying to be a dick. I’m trying to be your older cousin who doesn’t want you to make bad decisions.”

“And when have I ever listened to you?” 

“Never. But this time, I’m telling you. This isn’t prom with Chad Garter. This isn’t that biker guy in your stats class. This is a guy I know for certain just wants sex.” 

“And how do you know that?!” She asked, exasperated.

“Because I’ve seen him pick up girls at Hard Deck.”

That made her laugh. She shook her head. “Oh, Bradley, I’m so glad you didn’t see me during my community college phase.” 

His eyes widened. “Jesus Christ, Ew! Don’t let me think about that.” He said, disgusted.

“Look, I’ve done my fair share of one-night stands, too. I can’t judge. And he asked me out on a date. An ACTUAL date. Dinner.” She said

There was a silence in the car as Rooster shook his head disapprovingly. She looked at him with pleading eyes. 

“And if he tries to go further than dinner, I’ll say no. And that’s that. It’ll be awkward at work for a bit until he mans up. But that’s how it always is.” She tried to convince him.

He looked over at her and saw the look on her face. The desperate look of his little cousin, whom he loved like a sister. And unfortunately, he knew her so well that he knew there was no stopping her. “If he hurts you, I’ll kill him. I’ll actually do it. And you’re paying for the funeral and my bail.”

“And it’ll be well deserved.” She nodded happily.

Rooster and her arrived a bit later than usual. They spotted the usual gang over by the dartboard, sitting around, taking turns. Except someone was missing. She didn’t see Jake, and he was hard to miss considering his height and stature. Rooster walked ahead, already towards the group, but she paused, looking around. 

Then she saw the stray khaki uniform sitting at the bar. The back of his blonde head was obvious. And with the flip of her stomach, she saw a beautiful woman sitting next to him in a gorgeous bodycon dress. She reached up and slid her hand up his shoulder, and he looked down at her with a polite smile.

That was enough. She wasn’t about to cause a scene, but she sure as hell wasn’t about to be played right in front of her eyes. She spun on her heels and walked toward the door.

Rooster, now noticing she wasn’t following, ran back over to her. “What? What’s wrong?” He asked, immediately reading her face.

“No. No, I’m stupid. I was just- He was just-” She stammered, and Rooster turned back to see Jake patting the woman’s hand. 

He turned back. “I’m gonna kill him. I’m actually-”

She grabbed his arm. “No. Don’t. Don’t make a big deal out of it. Otherwise, it’ll just make it worse.”

“No. No, he doesn’t get to do that to you.” Rooster said. “Not you.”

He turned back around and strode towards Jake, who was getting up from the bar now. “ASSHOLE!” Rooster yelled, pushing Jake back against the bar. The woman who was next to him yelped in surprise. 

“HEY!” Penny called out. The whole bar was watching now.

Jake looked around, confused and wide-eyed. “What the hell?” 

“You think you can just run through Y/n like she’s nothing to you, huh? Get her fucking hopes up like an asshole and then go home with another girl?!” 

Jake looked over Rooster’s shoulder and saw her standing there, covering her mouth in shock and embarrassment. He quickly realized what had happened. But Rooster kept going.

“I fucking told you. I told you! That if you did anything to her, I’d beat the shit out of you.” Rooster said, grabbing his shirt, but Jake pushed him back.

“I wasn’t flirting with her!” He finally said loud enough to make the bar go quiet. The upbeat classic rock from the jukebox was faint and clashing, just making the tension worse. “She was with me, and I rejected her. I felt bad. I was trying to be nice.”

Rooster looked over at the scared woman on the stool next to them. She slowly nodded, confirming his story. He stepped back, and they both looked over at Y/n, who just stood red in the face. Angry at both of them. Humiliated more than anything. She couldn’t stop the fact that tears were streaming down her face. And when she looked over and saw Phoenix and Bob’s worried expressions, that was the last straw. She stormed out of the bar. 

“BOTH OF YOU. OUT!” Penny yelled.

Rooster and Hangman walked out with their tails between their legs to find an empty parking spot where Rooster’s car used to be. Scarred tire marks were scorched on the pavement.

“Classic. Classic Y/n.” He said, throwing his arms in the air.

Jake couldn’t help the smile that brought him. “God, that girl is something else.”

“Yeah. That’s why she doesn’t need you, Seresin.” Rooster spat. “We should find her.” 

The blonde looked at him. “You know, you think you’ve got me all figured out, huh? You think I’m just some playboy genius trying to hit a big score.” 

Rooster nodded. “Uh yeah, that’s actually exactly what I think.”

Jake put his hands on the back of his hips and shook his head. He was actually gonna admit this. 

“You know she’s the first girl I’ve asked out on a real, genuine date in years?” Jake pointed out. He saw the surprise on the brunette’s face. Years? “For the first time in a long time, a girl’s got me so nervous I can’t stand it. Everytime I see her, the only thing I can think about is not screwing it up. So I’ll be damned if I let you or that random woman back there get in the way.” 

There was silence as Rooster just looked at him, stunned.

Jake huffed. “Get in the Jeep, Chicken. Let’s go find her.”

Rooster knew exactly where she’d be. Spending every summer there since they were practically born made it easy to know her favorite spots. They parked on the cliffside of a small beachside mountain. If you could even call it a mountain. It was just an elevated view of the whole beach. 

She sat on the ground with her knees to her chest, taking in deep breaths. Her hair blew in the higher wind. She could see Hard Deck as a tiny spot in the distance. That wasn’t there when she was growing up. A lot of the buildings actually weren’t there when she was growing up. It used to be nothing but sand and grass. And the newfound metropolis taking over was a little overwhelming.

The sound of a car pulling up startled her. She turned back and saw a white Jeep parking right behind her. It idled there for a minute before Rooster finally hopped out of the passenger side. Who the hell was driving then? She squinted her eyes, trying to see through the windshield, but from where she was sitting, the sun hit directly against it. A shadowy figure. Kind of looked like Bob?

“Hey, kid,” Rooster said, walking over and sitting next to her.

She didn’t say anything for a moment. “Thanks for humiliating me.”

Rooster sighed. “Yeah, for once, you were kinda right.”

“For once?” She raised a brow.

He chuckled, “Fine. Fine. I should’ve listened to you. I shouldn’t have gone to kill Hangman.”

She sighed, “You know, if he was actually flirting with her, I would’ve totally let you.” She said, and noticed Rooster look back over his shoulder for a second before turning back. 

“Yeah… Well, I can confirm now he wasn’t and he’s not six feet deep, at least.” He said, noticing that she still wasn’t happy. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m so humiliated. It feels like everybody has been waiting to watch me crash and burn with Jake. And that kind of just proved it.” She threw her hands up, then back around her knees. 

There was a small silence before Rooster put his thoughts together. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have embarrassed you. It’s just that you’re my best friend, and I hate to see you get hurt. You know I’d do anything to avoid that.”

“You told him to stay away from me?” She asked about what he said at the bar.

Rooster nodded and shrugged. “Yeah, after the first night. But he’s just like you, unfortunately. Stubborn as a mule.”

After a second, she let out a heavy sigh. “I can’t be mad at you. You’re my best friend, too, and you were just protecting me like you always do.” She said still a little defeated, “I just hope that Jake doesn’t think I’m batshit crazy now.”

“Well… about that,” Rooster started, then looked over his shoulder again before nodding his head.

She followed his gaze and watched Jake get out of the driver’s side of the jeep. 

“Oh!” She yelped, taken off guard. She wiped her face, hoping there weren’t any stray tears. 

Rooster looked at the two of them and saw the bashful look on Hangman’s face. He had never seen that look on him before. The vulnerable look of pure nervousness. She… she might be in good hands here. 

“I’m gonna park the Jeep down the hill.” He said. And when he got up, Hangman tossed him the keys, clearly having planned this. An effortless catch and toss.

She stood up and walked towards Jake as Rooster got in the car and started pulling away. 

“Hey…” Jake said. He gently brought his hands up to her face and moved some stray baby hairs out of her face. The wind was blowing them everywhere. 

“I’m so sorry.” She started, “I swear- all I saw was her putting her hand on your back and you smiling at her, and I-I didn’t wanna make a big deal out of it, but then Rooster saw.” She explained nervously.

“Don’t apologize. You have nothing to be sorry for.” He said firmly, he brought his hand to cup her cheek and brushed his thumb back and forth. Her breath hitched at that. He pulled away to put his hands back in his pockets, and she wished he didn’t. “I hope you know that I’m not just trying to… get you in bed with me.” He said, looking down, embarrassed, then looking back up to see her reaction.

“Everyone said you were.” She admitted.

“I’m aware. Very aware.” There was a small silence between them for a moment. “Do you still believe them?” 

She thought about it for a moment, staring up at him. Then she slowly shook her head. “No. Or at the very least, I don’t want to.”

His mouth upturned to a small smile at that. “Good.” He said, moving forward closer, “Because I’m… I’m serious about you. Ever since that night at Hard Deck, I can’t stop thinking about you. You’re just incredible. In every sense of the word.”

Now that brought a small smile to her face, and it was her turn to walk forward closer. “Hmmm… And there’s no other girls?” She interrogated lightly.

He shook his head with a smirk. “No, ma’am. Got my hands full with you.” He wrapped his arms around her waist, and she naturally put her hands on his cheeks. This just felt right.

“Good.” She said before closing in the gap between them and kissing him. 

They held each other so close that it was like they wanted to merge. Weeks of tension and banter, and forbidden nature, all exploding into this one gesture. Her lips soft against his. His hands calloused against her waist. The taste of evergreen between them. 

She pulled away and looked up at him, just admiring his features. He chuckled as he watched her examine his face.

“Still good for dinner tomorrow night?” He asked

“You’re on.”

[deception-united]

Worldbuilding: Questions to Consider

Government & authority:

Types of government: What type of government exists (monarchy, democracy, theocracy, etc.)? Is it centralised or decentralised?

Leadership: Who holds power and how is it acquired (inheritance, election, divine right, conquest)?

Law enforcement: Who enforces the laws (military, police, magical entities)?

Legal system: How are laws made, interpreted, and enforced? Are there courts, judges, or councils?

Laws:

Criminal laws: What constitutes a crime? What are the punishments?

Civil laws: How are disputes between individuals resolved?

Cultural norms: How do customs and traditions influence the laws?

Magic/supernatural: Are there laws governing the use of magic or interaction with supernatural beings?

Social structure:

Class/status: How is society divided (nobility, commoners, slaves)? Are there caste systems or social mobility?

Rights & freedoms: What rights do individuals have (speech, religion, property)?

Discrimination: Are there laws that protect or discriminate against certain groups (race, gender, species, culture)?

Economy & trade:

Currency: What is used as currency? Is it standardised?

Trade laws: Are there regulations on trade, tariffs, or embargoes?

Property laws: How is ownership determined and transferred? Are there inheritance laws?

Religion/belief systems:

Religious authority: What role does religion play in governance? Are religious leaders also political leaders?

Freedom of religion: Are citizens free to practice different religions? If not, which are taboo?

Holy laws: Are there laws based on religious texts or teachings?

Military & defense:

Standing army: Is there a professional military or a militia? Who serves, and how are they recruited?

War & peace: What are the laws regarding war, peace treaties, and diplomacy?

Weapons: Are there restrictions or laws regarding weapons for civilians? What is used as a weapon? Who has access to them?

Technology & magic:

Technological advancements: How advanced is the technology (medieval, steampunk, futuristic, etc.)?

Magical laws: Are there regulations on the use of magic, magical creatures, or artifacts?

Innovation & research: How are inventors and researchers treated? Are there laws protecting intellectual property?

Environmental/resource management:

Natural resources: How are resources like water, minerals, and forests managed and protected, if at all?

Environmental laws: Are there protections for the environment? How are they enforced? Are there consequences for violations?

Cultural & ethical considerations:

Cultural diversity: How does the law accommodate or suppress cultural diversity?

Ethics: What are the ethical foundations of the laws? Are there philosophical or moral principles that underpin them?

Traditions vs. change: Does the society balance tradition with progress? How?

Happy writing ❤

Previous | Next

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How lock-in hurts design

Berliners: Otherland has added a second date (Jan 28) for my book-talk after the first one sold out - book now!

If you've ever read about design, you've probably encountered the idea of "paving the desire path." A "desire path" is an erosion path created by people departing from the official walkway and taking their own route. The story goes that smart campus planners don't fight the desire paths laid down by students; they pave them, formalizing the route that their constituents have voted for with their feet.

Desire paths aren't always great (Wikipedia notes that "desire paths sometimes cut through sensitive habitats and exclusion zones, threatening wildlife and park security"), but in the context of design, a desire path is a way that users communicate with designers, creating a feedback loop between those two groups. The designers make a product, the users use it in ways that surprise the designer, and the designer integrates all that into a new revision of the product.

This method is widely heralded as a means of "co-innovating" between users and companies. Designers who practice the method are lauded for their humility, their willingness to learn from their users. Tech history is strewn with examples of successful paved desire-paths.

Take John Deere. While today the company is notorious for its war on its customers (via its opposition to right to repair), Deere was once a leader in co-innovation, dispatching roving field engineers to visit farms and learn how farmers had modified their tractors. The best of these modifications would then be worked into the next round of tractor designs, in a virtuous cycle:

https://securityledger.com/2019/03/opinion-my-grandfathers-john-deere-would-support-our-right-to-repair/

But this pattern is even more pronounced in the digital world, because it's much easier to update a digital service than it is to update all the tractors in the field, especially if that service is cloud-based, meaning you can modify the back-end everyone is instantly updated. The most celebrated example of this co-creation is Twitter, whose users created a host of its core features.

Retweets, for example, were a user creation. Users who saw something they liked on the service would type "RT" and paste the text and the link into a new tweet composition window. Same for quote-tweets: users copied the URL for a tweet and pasted it in below their own commentary. Twitter designers observed this user innovation and formalized it, turning it into part of Twitter's core feature-set.

Companies are obsessed with discovering digital desire paths. They pay fortunes for analytics software to produce maps of how their users interact with their services, run focus groups, even embed sneaky screen-recording software into their web-pages:

https://www.wired.com/story/the-dark-side-of-replay-sessions-that-record-your-every-move-online/

This relentless surveillance of users is pursued in the name of making things better for them: let us spy on you and we'll figure out where your pain-points and friction are coming from, and remove those. We all win!

But this impulse is a world apart from the humility and respect implied by co-innovation. The constant, nonconsensual observation of users has more to do with controlling users than learning from them.

That is, after all, the ethos of modern technology: the more control a company can exert over its users ,the more value it can transfer from those users to its shareholders. That's the key to enshittification, the ubiquitous platform decay that has degraded virtually all the technology we use, making it worse every day:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

When you are seeking to control users, the desire paths they create are all too frequently a means to wrestling control back from you. Take advertising: every time a service makes its ads more obnoxious and invasive, it creates an incentive for its users to search for "how do I install an ad-blocker":

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/07/adblocking-how-about-nah

More than half of all web-users have installed ad-blockers. It's the largest consumer boycott in human history:

https://doc.searls.com/2023/11/11/how-is-the-worlds-biggest-boycott-doing/

But zero app users have installed ad-blockers, because reverse-engineering an app requires that you bypass its encryption, triggering liability under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. This law provides for a $500,000 fine and a 5-year prison sentence for "circumvention" of access controls:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/12/youre-holding-it-wrong/#if-dishwashers-were-iphones

Beyond that, modifying an app creates liability under copyright, trademark, patent, trade secrets, noncompete, nondisclosure and so on. It's what Jay Freeman calls "felony contempt of business model":

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

This is why services are so horny to drive you to install their app rather using their websites: they are trying to get you to do something that, given your druthers, you would prefer not to do. They want to force you to exit through the gift shop, you want to carve a desire path straight to the parking lot. Apps let them mobilize the law to literally criminalize those desire paths.

An app is just a web-page wrapped in enough IP to make it a felony to block ads in it (or do anything else that wrestles value back from a company). Apps are web-pages where everything not forbidden is mandatory.

Seen in this light, an app is a way to wage war on desire paths, to abandon the cooperative model for co-innovation in favor of the adversarial model of user control and extraction.

Corporate apologists like to claim that the proliferation of apps proves that users like them. Neoliberal economists love the idea that business as usual represents a "revealed preference." This is an intellectually unserious tautology: "you do this, so you must like it":

https://boingboing.net/2024/01/22/hp-ceo-says-customers-are-a-bad-investment-unless-they-can-be-made-to-buy-companys-drm-ink-cartridges.html

Calling an action where no alternatives are permissible a "preference" or a "choice" is a cheap trick – especially when considered against the "preferences" that reveal themselves when a real choice is possible. Take commercial surveillance: when Apple gave Ios users a choice about being spied on – a one-click opt of of app-based surveillance – 96% of users choice no spying:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/05/96-of-us-users-opt-out-of-app-tracking-in-ios-14-5-analytics-find/

But then Apple started spying on those very same users that had opted out of spying by Facebook and other Apple competitors:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

Neoclassical economists aren't just obsessed with revealed preferences – they also love to bandy about the idea of "moral hazard": economic arrangements that tempt people to be dishonest. This is typically applied to the public ("consumers" in the contemptuous parlance of econospeak). But apps are pure moral hazard – for corporations. The ability to prohibit desire paths – and literally imprison rivals who help your users thwart those prohibitions – is too tempting for companies to resist.

The fact that the majority of web users block ads reveals a strong preference for not being spied on ("users just want relevant ads" is such an obvious lie that doesn't merit any serious discussion):

https://www.iccl.ie/news/82-of-the-irish-public-wants-big-techs-toxic-algorithms-switched-off/

Giant companies attained their scale by learning from their users, not by thwarting them. The person using technology always knows something about what they need to do and how they want to do it that the designers can never anticipate. This is especially true of people who are unlike those designers – people who live on the other side of the world, or the other side of the economic divide, or whose bodies don't work the way that the designers' bodies do:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/20/benevolent-dictators/#felony-contempt-of-business-model

Apps – and other technologies that are locked down so their users can be locked in – are the height of technological arrogance. They embody a belief that users are to be told, not heard. If a user wants to do something that the designer didn't anticipate, that's the user's fault:

https://www.wired.com/2010/06/iphone-4-holding-it-wrong/

Corporate enthusiasm for prohibiting you from reconfiguring the tools you use to suit your needs is a declaration of the end of history. "Sure," John Deere execs say, "we once learned from farmers by observing how they modified their tractors. But today's farmers are so much stupider and we are so much smarter that we have nothing to learn from them anymore."

Spying on your users to control them is a poor substitute asking your users their permission to learn from them. Without technological self-determination, preferences can't be revealed. Without the right to seize the means of computation, the desire paths never emerge, leaving designers in the dark about what users really want.

Our policymakers swear loyalty to "innovation" but when corporations ask for the right to decide who can innovate and how, they fall all over themselves to create laws that let companies punish users for the crime of contempt of business-model.

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

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

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/24/everything-not-mandatory/#is-prohibited

Image: Belem (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Desire_path_%2819811581366%29.jpg

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

[homunculus-argument]

"Captain, I have concerning information about the humans. Did you know that they have the technology to undo death and obtain various different types of immortalit-"

"Was there tangible proof for the claims, or is this something you've only seen mentioned in human communications?"

"Wh- Only in communications, captain. Why?"

"Those reports are fase. As a general rule, never believe human data that has only been recorded in their own communications. A vast amount of the information they transfer to each other is false, concerning things, incidents and specimens that never happened and do not, in fact, exist at all."

"What? Why? I thought their communications systems have an organic base in their own physical bodies, how could anyone have infiltrated-"

"No, they do that on their own. They produce reports of completely false, baseless data themselves, for their own amusement. They use their main means of communication to create falsified, fanciful information of incidents, situations and fictional people purely to entertain themselves and each other. More than two thirds of human communication consists of deliberately false, fictional data."

"But why would th- Wait. Are they doing it right now?"

"You fool! YOU BROKE THE FOURTH WALL!"

[both get sucked out into the vacuum of space]

[kjnger]

Astrological Observations

*Placements that give a youthful appearance Mars, Neptune, Uranus, or Mercury in the 1st house, especially with aspects to the Ascendant, as well as having an Aries, Gemini, Virgo, or Aquarius Ascendant.

Libra Ascendants can be as hardworking and determined as Aries Ascendants.

The 11th house represents financial resources we will acquire, bonuses, and financial status in old age.

Saturn is related to what we keep hidden in life.

The 12th and 5th houses provide insights into musical and artistic preferences.

21 degrees Sagittarius becomes more prominent in travel and vacation matters, especially in old age.

The Part of Fortune in a house brings extra luck, and transiting planets passing through it also have an impact.

In addition to 9 and 21 degrees, 12 and 24 degrees symbolize foreign lands.

The sign and degree of the 6th house indicate the types of people and friends who will support you during difficult times.

11 and 23 degrees highlight your unique qualities.

Pisces, Capricorn, Aquarius, and their degrees are often prominent in the charts of football players.

Capricorns, no matter how cold their character may seem, can be effortlessly funny.

Air signs and their dominance bring friendliness and a love for people.

Sagittarius and Gemini placements in love life tend to be either extremely lucky or unlucky; they often experience some form of betrayal.

ChatGPT was launched on November 30, 2022. Numerologically, the energies of 3 and 2 are significant, indicating strong communication and support. Additionally, in its astrological chart, the Moon and Saturn in Aquarius emphasize technological influences. Mars in retrograde Gemini further suggests its mission to assist people in communication and information transfer. The North Node at 11 degrees conjunct Uranus is also a strong indicator for AI purposes.

Asteroids related to landscaping and gardening talents:

Flora (8): Flowers

Gardenia (255587): Gardens

Gaea (1108): Earth and plants

Midari (15003): Plants

Pomona (32): Orchards

Hueretas (21636): Fruit and vegetable gardens

[melshifting]

― EXTRAS FOR YOUR DR ⭑.ᐟ

for any/all DRs <3

Cooking/eating extras

↳ #01 ～ Vegan, gluten-free or keto? You can effortlessly modify traditional recipes to suit any lifestyle while maintaining their original taste.

↳ #02 ～ As a master chef, you can instantly tell if a dish needs salt, a touch of lemon or more spices to make it stand out.

↳ #03 ～ Whatever the dish (meat, pasta, cakes, etc.), you instinctively know when it is perfectly done, preventing over or undercooking.

↳ #04 ～ Whether it's a cookbook, a video or a family heritage, you never forget a single step or ingredient of any recipe you've read or seen.

↳ #05 ～ It seems like you always have enough eggs, milk or spices for whatever you're cooking - you always have all the ingredients you need.

↳ #06 ～ Whether you're cooking for two or twenty, you intuitively measure the perfect amount of ingredients.

↳ #07 ～ Any ingredient you touch lasts twice as long - the food you buy doesn't spoil quickly.

↳ #08 ～ You can taste every detail and flavor of the food, turning even the simplest dishes into an unforgettable experience.

↳ #09 ～ Every bite automatically adjusts to the perfect temp for maximum enjoyment: ice cream that doesn't freeze your teeth, soup that never burns your tongue.

↳ #10 ～ Spiciness adapts to your taste and provides just the right level for you to enjoy without overwhelming your taste buds.

↳ #11 ～ Every meal you eat is efficiently digested, ensuring that you feel light and energized rather than sluggish or bloated afterwards.

↳ #12 ～ When you crave something, your mind searches for the perfect place / recipe to get it, so you're never unsatisfied.

↳ #13 ～ You can eat any amount of your favorite foods and never feel too full or tired, enjoying the taste without the disadvantages.

Technology/gadget extras

↳ #01 ～ Every time you take a photo or record a video, the quality is impeccable, as if you were using a high-end camera regardless of the device.

↳ #02 ～ Your digital devices automatically organize all your data, documents, and files in perfectly categorized systems without you having to lift a finger.

↳ #03 ～ No matter if you need to fix a device, solve bugs or recover lost data, you can solve technical problems instantly thanks to your knowledge.

↳ #04 ～ All your devices are updated with the latest technology to suit you and your needs.

↳ #05 ～ Your phone, laptop, and other electronic devices can be recharged in seconds just by being in the same room as the charger.

↳ #06 ～ Your voice is your ultimate password, unlocking all the devices and systems you interact with.

↳ #07 ～ You can instantly transfer data between any device, regardless of platform/type, with a simple hand gesture or a voice command.

↳ #08 ～ Your headphones automatically adjust the sound to your environment: they block out noise when you're in a crowded space or amplify sounds in a quiet environment.

Beauty extras

↳ #01 ～ You can easily change the texture/style of your hair without heat or chemical treatments. With a simple cream, your hair can go from straight to curly and voluminous, while remaining healthy.

↳ #02 ～ You never have to worry about your make-up smudging or smearing - it lasts all day, with no need for touch-ups.

↳ #03 ～ You know color theory inside out when it comes to wardrobe and makeup. You know what colors flatter your skin tone and enhance your features.

↳ #04 ～ Your nails grow long, strong and beautiful with minimal effort - you have a good system that helps stimulate the growth of your nails while keeping them strong.

↳ #05 ～ You always smell wonderful, not because of perfume, but because your skin naturally gives off a subtle and personalized fragrance.

↳ #06 ～ Your wardrobe has clothes that are made to adapt to your body as it changes over time - you'll never have to worry about clothes that don't fit anymore.

↳ #07 ～ You can pull any hair color with ease, whether it's natural or artificial. The texture stays soft, shiny, and healthy, regardless of color.

Health/hygiene extras

↳ #01 ～ Your immune system is optimized, so you rarely get sick and, if you do, recovery is quick and problem-free.

↳ #02 ～ Your skin naturally heals spots, small cuts or scars overnight, maintaining a smooth complexion without skincare.

↳ #03 ～ You never suffer from bad breath or a dry mouth, thanks to the unique ability of your saliva to neutralize bacteria, keeping your oral hygiene in good condition.

↳ #04 ～ You sweat only minimally, and when you do, it's never uncomfortable: your body naturally regulates odor and moisture, so you stay comfortable and fresh throughout the day.

↳ #05 ～ You can fight headaches or pains without medication - your body's ability to relax and heal itself makes you feel your best with minimal effort.

↳ #06 ～ Your body temperature stays perfectly regulated, meaning you never feel too hot or cold in most environments.

↳ #07 ～ You rarely feel muscle tension or pain. Even if you have spent hours sitting or training, your muscles feel loose and relaxed without a massage or stimulation.

↳ #08 ～ Your vision stays sharp and your eyes never get tired, even after hours in front of a screen. You don't need glasses or eye drops because your eyes stay moist and sharp naturally.

Security/safety extras

↳ #01 ～ You have learned simple but effective self-defense techniques that rely on impulse and precision rather than brutal force, making them effective in any situation.

↳ #02 ～ Your reflexes are finely trained, allowing you to react instantly at critical moments.

↳ #03 ～ You instinctively remember the faces / details of strangers who may seem suspicious, which gives you an advantage when for remembering a key factor if it is ever necessary for your safety.

↳ #04 ～ You never get lost because your sense of direction is strong; you can always find your way back to familiar places safely.

↳ #05 ～ You always know the quickest escape routes in any building. It's as if your mind automatically traces the exits as soon as you enter.

↳ #06 ～ You never lose your keys or wallet/wallet because your belongings emit a subtle signal you can easily track.

↳ #06 ～ Your cell phone has an unhackable emergency mode that sends out your location, emergency signal, and even live audio to a list of trusted contacts with just one tap.

[alostwanderernotfound]

PANDEMICS- Hostile Power Takeover? Learnings on Urban & Domestic Warfare, “Disease: Bacteria Part 1, Fundamental Considerations”:

Let’s say the hostile power is more technologically advanced & half robot/half machine or full machine, so seemingly unkillable. Organic beings are very vulnerable to having disease used as a weapon against them.

Disease can be a major benefit to this type of hostile power & it would be an incredibly powerful weapon. This allows the destruction of an organic-based domestic population & it can also allow the harvesting of resources to build new bodies and/or reuse of the entire body depending on the disease process.

There are many insidious ways diseases develop & spread. This process DOES NOT just occur in a laboratory. Remember that there are many different “groupings” of entities we refer to as pathogens or things with the ability to cause disease.

Bacteria are an important one. Bacteria & other pathogens can reproduce by multiple means. Here I’m going to speak about bacteria with the capacity to do Bacterial conjugation. This involves passing characteristic between two different bacteria similar to how sexual reproduction can pass on characteristics. This is overall an important conversation because a lot of the most complex & common life forms in our daily lives also spread these characteristics through similar principles through sexual reproduction.

> A lot of bacteria to our awareness are able to pass on characteristics. Bacterial DNA contains the “instructions”/“resources” for bacteria to either have or not have characteristics.

-Bacterial conjugation for example allows one bacteria to attach to a second bacteria & send resources to the second bacteria. After this process, the second bacteria is able to transform and display the characteristics transferred to it. Example: Bacteria A can change colors like a chameleon. Bacteria B cannot change color. Once Bacteria A attaches to Bacteria B and they are compatible, Bacteria A passes on resources to Bacteria B. Bacteria B then acquires the ability to change color. Bacteria B now can change color & has attainted the same advantage as originally only bacteria A had. Now Bacteria A and Bacteria B can change color like a chameleon.

- The other way characteristics form & occur in a bacterial population is through mutation. If a bacteria’s DNA is altered or mutates then it can produce a bacteria with new traits & characteristics. Radiation for example, like from X-rays, often causes mutations. Sometimes mutations do “nothing” we can really perceive with our eyes. But overtime, they will eventually create large changes and can produce huge benefits for bacteria. For example: A bacteria could have always have been wiped out from nuclear weapons then overtime from mutations it can acquire the ability to survive living inside an area with nuclear radiation.

-This is a very important concept to fully understand so that you can become cognizant of how insidious this process is when discussing what bioterrorism in the modern world can look like. Pandemics are not caused just from mysterious lab leaks. The practices we do everyday are still contributing to the next pandemic occurring.

-This also gives everyone a better understanding of how MRSA or an antibiotic resistant bacteria really was “made” inside our hospitals.

> Bacteria can possibly have random or genetically engineered characteristics.

-If there are 100 random bacteria on an isolated surface that formed there naturally, some will have favorable characteristics to cause severe disease. But, some bacteria will not have those characteristics to cause severe disease. The bacteria lacking these deadly characteristics, but are still part of the same family of bacteria, would be considered weaker pathogens (weaker pathogen meaning they would cause less severe disease in organic beings).

-**But it is important to remember, If someone purposefully put bacteria down on a surface there is a chance it will not be a random distribution in strength of bacteria & they will mostly all be bacteria with strong characteristics. That group would probably be closer to 100 out of 100 of the bacteria carrying the deadly characteristic.**

>There are 2 main basic premises (which can be further subdivided and added onto when discussing what makes pathogens strong, but for now I’m discussing a more fundamentals explanation) we consider when determining bacterial pathogen strength: number of bacteria & the amount of deadly/harmful characteristics each bacteria possess.

-Reducing the overall number of bacteria in a group of random bacteria does not always mean you make a pathogen less strong. (Example: Purposefully killing 50 bacteria out of 100 and now there are only 50 bacteria in the group.)

If you destroy many of the weaker bacteria & only leave strong bacteria to reproduce, pathogens overtime can get stronger & more deadly. So, by destroying only the weaker bacteria in a group of bacteria, you slowly make pathogens stronger through this natural process & it doesn’t have to occur inside of a laboratory. To make a bacterial pathogen less strong by focusing on decreasing the overall number of those bacteria that exist in our world, you would also have to consider how many of each strength you eliminate. This is because we currently we do not use practices that wipe out groups of bacteria 100%, so we must consider these two elements together instead of separate when evaluating pathogen strength. Example: Lets say there are 100 bacteria and you wipe out 90. Bacteria A can cause humans to be paralyzed. Bacteria B cannot paralyze humans. Out of the 10 bacteria still alive, if all 10 are Bacteria A then you have eliminated the chance people would be infected with the less severe version of the disease, with Bacteria B. In the long term Bacteria A now has a strong chance to reproduce & when Bacteria A infects people it would then cause paralysis in everyone & the population could collapse. In another scenario, consider if you wiped out 90 bacteria out of 100, but you did it purposefully. Out of the 10 bacteria left, 9 were Bacteria that were Bacteria B & couldn’t cause paralysis. The last 1 out of the 10 left was Bacteria A. Then when those 10 bacteria reproduced it effectively helps “dilute” this negative characteristic in this bacterial family. Based off randomness & probability, when there this group reproduces to the size of 20 bacteria only approximately 2 of them may carry Bacteria A’s paralytic characteristic & 18 will carry bacteria B’s characteristic that does not cause paralysis. So, even though we can’t stop the bacteria number from growing, since we mindfully intervened we can still divert the trajectory of the pathogen from becoming a pathogen with the ability to become “pandemic level” and/or very very harmful.

>Two ways pathogens can get weaker is by lowering the amount of bacteria in the world & by lowering its severe disease characteristics, but this these two categories have an important interplay.

-This is an oversimplified explanation of how disease spreads & evolves, but the fundamental principles are VERY important to the overall understanding of what’s occurring. Imagine a group of bacteria you count has 100 total bacteria. 50 of them carry a gene to cause paralysis in humans & 50 do not carry this gene. When 100 people come in contact with the 50/50 bacteria distribution and get sick only 50 out of 100 of the people get paralyzed. This allows the other 50 people time to work on vaccinations & interventions to stop everyone from eventually being paralyzed.

-But, if you kill the 50 out of the 100 bacteria that do not carry the gene for paralysis then your bacteria group went from 100 to a total of 50 in size. In the short term the spread of the disease is likely to go down, as it is less likely people will randomly spread 50 objects instead of 100. BUT, those 50 bacteria with the gene to cause paralysis will only reproduce with other bacteria that also have that gene. So this bacteria, since you wiped out the 50 that don’t cause paralysis, now ALL cause paralysis & anyone who comes in contact with this bacteria strain will get paralyzed. So eventually with time the group of 50 bacteria will reproduce to 100 & spread at the same rate as they were originally, but now they cause more harm to people.

>When you unknowingly touch a colony of bacteria on an object or life form, you pick up a random sample of random “strength” of bacteria.

>****PLEASE READ: you can ALSO pickup a sample of bacteria that is all “strong bacteria” but this is NOT usually a natural occurrence you will see & is suggestive someone or something altered the bacteria and purposefully put those bacteria there. A group of bacteria that looks like it formed organically vs one that was purposefully placed there can be differentiated with taking samples of surfaces and people & counting how many strong bacteria vs weak bacteria there are, but we as a population do not regularly test for this in this way. Due to this I’m going to speak with the viewpoint of natural bacteria groups that have a gradient of “strengths”. In an ideal world we would identity groups of bacteria that have gradients of strength of bacteria vs groups of all similar strength, as interventions to stop them from becoming strong pathogens work DIFFERENTLY.)

>After you touch those bacteria they attempt to multiply and stay alive on you. Then if you touch other things they can be placed on another surface or thing. Sometimes they are placed on other surfaces in an environment or you touch your body & they are placed closer to an entrance to the inside or your body & then they are able to enter your body.

-This process will cause one of the following to occur: bacteria will stay in the area you touched & colonize it, they will die when attempting to enter the body, the bacteria will give you a disease , or in some cases the bacteria will live symbiotically inside you & help your body. If a bacteria lives symbiotically with you & does not cause harm then we do not refer to that as a pathogen, but rather just as a bacteria.

>Anytime you wipe out a group of bacteria by taking out 100% it causes that pathogen to get weaker overall, but the issue is that we do not do interventions that wipe out 100%.

-Currently anytime you clean an object in the hospital with a sanitizing wipe, you always kill less than 100% of the bacteria. This leaves behind a certain % of bacteria & they will be the strongest of that group of bacteria, because they were able to live even though you applied a cleaning product on them. This means the strongest bacteria left, even though there are less after cleaning, are now reproducing over and over again & getting stronger.

-So, when there is an environment with a large amount of bacteria variability (so all these new patients with new exposures to new bacteria that travel and touch things all the time), with shared equipment, with not 100% effective methods to destroy pathogens, & this long list of variables, we slowly produce very strong & deadly pathogens inside of hospitals.

-IF someone purposefully puts deadly bacteria ontop of a surface inside a hospital and it is a group of 100 strong & identical or cloned bacteria with no difference in genetics then wiping them out through imperfect cleaning will overall reduce pathogen deadliness. This is because there are no “stronger” pathogens vs “weaker” pathogens. They are all the same strength in this example and therefore will always get weaker when you reduce their number because they won’t reproduce to be more deadly.

>People often think when people are trying to cause them harm that would only occur when someone makes a pathogen in a lab & then deceptively goes and places some near you. This is not accurate.

-With knowing this do you see how for a hostile power there is actually LESS incentive to going through with all that work & instead a hostile power can abuse the system to cause harm? If you expect biological warfare to ONLY come out of a lab, this means you would be looking for the wrong patterns of behavior & pathogens will spiral out of control.

A lot of practices we currently use now unfortunately heavily contribute to this process that causes pathogens to get stronger.

[videolari]

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[typewritingyip]

The Arcturus Missions

Part Forty Three - Deeper Connections

Part Forty Two

Warning: Violence

———

Compatibility is a finicky process, whether it is someone struggling through the written or physical testing, or just the system's lack of reliability. Compatibility is necessary to operate a mech suit based in the current technology.

All pilots, once found compatible, have implants installed at the base of their skull with connectors to their nervous system and the neural pathways of the brain. 

It creates an interface between the pilots and the suit that makes it possible to control the suit at large. There is of course the main system a pilot can control by hand, the monitors in front of them and the systems attached to the piloting seat, but some pilots have that deeper connections.

When that deeper connection is established, it is hard to pull away from and remove oneself from said connection. It can cause permanent damage to both pilot and the system, whether from lack of awareness to surroundings or an overload of the system itself during connection.

Pilots that start to experience these deeper levels of connection are generally in one of two situations, pilots that organizations want or pilots that will be reassigned to a new class when possible. Specific types of coding which typically are found in Hunter class and older classes such as REDACTED, are what have been found to cause these deeper levels of connection.

It matters less the level of compatibility initially, but the compatibility with the specific class. 

Pilots are often rotated out of their initial class when not immediately assigned to striker class for the safety of the suit, then the pilot. When they remain in the more intense classes for an extended period of time, without disconnection, it can cause severe damage. 

Recommendations are offered to the extended mech suit family by the leading scientist in the field, to rotate out their Hunter, Rescue, and older class pilots to striker units after the first five years. Remove the extended coding from both pilot and suit, then refuse transfers back.

Ten percent of pilots survive the reclassifying process. 

Severe damage from prolonged use of mecha connection is labeled as the cause on autopsy reports. 

Implants are removed upon the death of the pilot, as resources grow scarce and the need for pilots grows. 

This deeper level of connection, referred to as over-connection, has been said to cause abnormal situations. Pilots and suits in specific classes have previously been noted as experiencing abnormalities upon the reinforcement of the deeper connection.

Little is known of how the specific side-effects harm both suit and pilot.  

—

The thing spoke in some guttural language that Hound could not understand, briefly shorting his translator as it attempted to use the Cybertronian translation it was building to translate. His speakers shrieked in his ears and with a wince he killed it before setting up the next scanning for language. 

Shifting his stance, he was still breathing heavily, “I don’t know what you’re saying, but I doubt it’s ‘take me to your leader.’” He almost cracked a smile, almost, this was a worse situation than they were in when they crash landed on Cybertron. Worse still than probably the whole assault on New Kaon.

With a flick of his arm, his gun slid back into his hand and he leveled it at the weird Quintesson, they looked similar enough to know this was just a different type, “Alright then.” And he pulled the trigger as many times as he could as the mega-quint ran at him. Foot coming up to try and kick it off.

His back hit the building outside the ship, a good ten yards from the glass he’d been sent through. Alerts popping up throughout his vision, bright red and screaming at him. 

Everything from crush alerts to zero-g and of course impact alerts. More alerts than he got when the building fell on him and his head swam for a minute, “Oh fuck,” dragging his arm under him, he looks down at his destroyed gun. 

Shattered beyond repair and hand plating splintered, sharp pain shooting through it. For a moment he couldn’t breathe, thinking of his suit as his body before looking up.

It took several long moments for him to realize his comm wasn’t full of static but shouting, “Hound, answer!” Glancing up towards the ship, Jazz was waving, “Yeah, yeah, I’m here.” His head spun as he started to drag his suit up from the ground. Hand grasping at the wall of the building he’d slammed into. 

He just managed to dodge the spear thrown at him, it lodged in the wall, “I wish I wasn’t but I’m here. We’ve got a big enemy that is in the process of trying to destroy my suit.” Pulling the spear from the wall, he was still heaving for breath, “God damnit,” He hardly had a moment to get it up before he was stabbing the spear into the executioner. 

These things were big and fast, as well as seemed vaguely intelligent to have tools and some sort of language, “Holy shit, what is that thing?” Sideswipe’s voice was strained and Hound could only guess why at the moment, “I don’t know but it's what threw me from the ship.” He only had a moment to respond before kicking out at it, pulling the spear back sharply and stabbing it again. 

Green splattered across the ground with a far to satisfying squelch, Jazz looked back over and swore, grabbing hold of Sideswipe’s arm, “Hound needs our help.” With a glance, Sideswipe frowns, “Why?” 

“That is what command calls an executioner, if the flying Quints we normally fight are us without a suit then that thing there is their striker.” His voice rang in Hound’s ears, especially as he stabbed it again, kicking it off the end of the spear and jabbing it again, “Oh, that’s just wonderful. Why haven’t we fought one before?” His voice was harsh, he hadn’t meant for it to be so bad but he was grunting with the effort.

Risen from his piloting chair without even noticing, Hound kept jabbing it as the translator whirred somewhere in the cockpit.

Jazz eventually spoke up though he was still panting from the efforts of his own fight, “Because they are few and far between, thankfully and only used when they are close to getting what they want. Whatever the hell that is.” He spun and hit one of the approaching Quints, “Hound, just, hold on. Alright?” Grunting with the effort, he stalks towards the executioner.

”Yeah, I’ve got this.” And his foot collided with the chest of the so-called executioner before spinning the spear, raising it up to point at its chest. He heaved for air, closing his eyes for a moment to adjust his mask, but as soon as he opened them again he was thrown into another wall. Spear clattering to the ground. 

It laughed this deep and guttural laugh, then Hound got the ping of a partial translation, quickly turning it on, “What the hell are you?” His voice sounded horrible through the translation, dragging himself back to his feet, “I am your enemy, one who is thrilled to destroy you completely.” He blinked.

That wasn’t exactly the answer he was thinking he’d get, taking a slow breath, Hound crouches, “Yeah, good luck with that.” Then charged at the executioner, slamming into him and kept pushing as hard as he could till they slammed into the side of the ship. It went back to the typical Quintesson shrieking as Hound slammed his fist into it’s side over and over. 

Green was splattering up his arm and his hand was able to grasp something inside the body of this thing, so he pulled hard. Plating his knee into its stomach while yanking out its entrails. It screamed and started to bash its fist against the head of his suit, blurring his vision.

The further the damage, the more focused he got and it was just tunnel vision, the comms clicking off instinctually as he methodically starts to tear the thing apart. Warnings flashing through his suit, plating cracking and breaking as it screamed and laughed.

—

He couldn’t see Hound, but he and Jazz were retreating, starting to get overwhelmed by the sheer number of Quintessons crawling out from the remains of their ship, that and Prowl was in Jazz’s ear for the first time since they had started attacking these things.

Nearly as soon as Hound had been thrown from the spaceship, communications had cleared up, whether from something he had done or by preventing whoever was blocking the signals from getting out into Iacon, now there was backup approaching rapidly. 

“Fall back to four hundred feet, the seekers are going to hit the ship then we have a unit coming your way from central and will be there in less than five minutes.” Prowl’s voice was smooth, calculating, “We have some heavy craft coming in with bombs to try and eradicate the remaining Quintessons.” Sideswipe paused for half a second, even as he tore tentacles free from the body of a Quintesson.

Glancing towards the sky, he could see seekers streak past, moving to get into position, he blinked even as he hurles the Quint towards the ground and off the ship, “We can’t just carpet bomb this side of Iacon!” Sideswipe’s voice was higher than it typically was.

The chuckle through the line was unsettling, “Believe me, that is far from what they will be doing. It is banned on Cybertron even in times of war, article 468 of the Cybertronian Peace Agreement.” He paused and stared at the Quint in his grasp for a long moment.

”You had to put that in your peace agreement?” With a hum, Prowl disconnected and Sideswipe couldn’t help but shake his head. Cybertronians had all tried to kill each other even more than humans had it seemed.

Jazz almost ran smack into him, shoving, “We’ve got to move.” Swearing, he slid down the side of the ship even as more Quintessons started to peel themselves from inside, breaking open the plating on the exterior of their odd ships. 

He collided with the ground hard as a Quint wrapped it’s tentacles around one of his legs, “Fuck!” His head slammed into the monitors in front of him, his connection being yanked hard and he screamed from pain.

His vision blue screened like a computer.

It was like he couldn’t breathe when everything went blue then black, he couldn’t see even the hands in front of his face, but the sensors were still working. He could vaguely feel something grab him under his arm to pull him to his feet, “Sideswipe, we need to move!” Jazz’s voice was still clear at least.

Today really wasn’t going his way and all he really wanted to do right now was cry.

”I can’t see,” His voice broke and he swore as Jazz dragged him away from the ship, stumbling in the dark as he desperately grabbed at Jazz’s arm. If this had happened to Sunny, he didn’t even want to think of how bad it would have been for his brother. 

Crashing into the ground again, he groaned and pushed up, breathing far too quickly, hyperventilating, then Jazz’s hands pressed to his shoulders and his back hit the wall, “I’ve got you Sides, disconnect and fix your cameras. Your visor went dead.” Barely able to nod, he disconnects and tears off his helmet for a moment.

The cockpit wasn’t the most well-lit place but it certainly was brighter than the complete darkness his suit had decided to put him into. Dragging a hand over his damp implants, he dragged in slow and deep breaths. He wasn’t particularly scared of the dark, but losing one of his senses while in a fight was terrifying. 

It took him a moment to calm his racing heart, grabbing up his water pouch and taking a deep drink, “Oh god, please let this end quickly.” Setting aside the pouch, he picks up his helmet again and puts it on. Adjusting the visor on it for a second until it lit back up before returning to his piloting chair instead.

Taking up his connector for the implants, he holds it for a second, staring down at it. If he lingered he knew his mind would drag him into his past, distinctly where he didn’t want to spend anymore time that particular day. Adjusting his hold, he re-connects and straps back on his oxygen mask.

Seconds dragged on, sitting in the dark, and his breathing shook again. It was nearly a minute before everything came back online and he was shaking again, sighing, “Thank you.” His suit probably needed more maintances than he realized, leaning against the wall in an alleyway. 

Jazz was across from him, staring up towards the sky.

“Any sign of our reinforcements?” His voice wasn’t as strong as he had hoped for, but today had been one of the worst days of his life, so for now he’d let it slide. Shaking his head a bit, Jazz continued to stare, “No, but the first round of bombs are gonna fall here in a second.” Nodding a bit, Sides tried not to rub at his neck.

Looking out himself, he could see the Quintessons crawling all over their ship, and then Hound still out there. Tearing the executioner apart like it was nothing, “Damn.” Nodding a bit, Jazz sighed, “And that is one of the many reasons why hunter class is dying out. They lose themselves in the fight.” 

He watched before looking around, “Where are BD and Sunny?” Standing on shaky legs, he moves to go out, but Jazz catches his hand, “They’ve moved for cover, like we did, just stay put.” He stared out and tried to look around, to spot the familiar yellow or blue.

It was then that they were blown back, both slamming into the walls of the alley, “Can things stop blowing us up now?!” Sideswipe shouted, slamming his fist into the ground, then the wave of heat hit them, “Run.” Jazz sounded horrified, so he followed suit, scrambling after him.

”Why does everyone want to kill us today?” It was murmured, but Jazz shook his head, “Just run.” Sighing deeply, he followed, exhausted. He wasn’t a soldier, yet he was here on the front lines with everyone else. 

Just managing to snag Jazz’s hand, it grounded him, and he kept running. 

—

Breakdown thought this was one of the strangest days of his life, he was carrying Hound suit's severed arm while his own suit’s head was creaking with each step. Almost flopping from side to side like when his arm would fall asleep or if he sat on his foot too long. 

To his left was Sunstreaker, making their way between buildings and back towards the wreckage of the bar now as that is where their backup would link up. This had to be one of, if not the worst mission they had ever run. This is why the humans were separated, running head first into danger without a plan.

It was likely to get them all killed, stupid, stupid. 

“Any word from the others?” Sunny’s comms were growing patchy every handful of seconds, bleating painfully and Breakdown’s seemed to have disconnected at some point, probably when his cannon started to overheat, “No, after we got around that one skyscraper I lost connection.” Sunny’s hand rubbed at his neck, sighing. 

They kept walking together, quietly, trying to listen to the sounds of battle behind them. 

With the seekers above the main noise, the loud blast that made them both stumble almost gave Breakdown a heart attack, “What the crap?” He spun and tried to bring his cannon back online, it whirred once and promptly died.

Sunstreaker turned and stepped in front of him, both pausing to wait as more explosions happened in the distance. His heart was racing but he rested a hand on Sunny’s shoulder, “They all would have left before the Seekers started to bomb the area, we need to continue to the rendezvous point.” 

Nodding slowly, Sunstreaker turned back and kept walking though there was a slight hitch to his step. The poor boy was shaking like a leaf but kept on. 

He would never look down upon civilian pilots, they had more guts than most military ones he’d ever known, and he was glad to have Sunstreaker and Sideswipe by his side.

Their record, for how young they were, was incredible and it had made him very glad to have them on this mission. Even if it was their world sending them off to die, for the sake of saving it. This bigger picture was one he’d known his whole life, but this was not how he pictured it going.

Yet, here he was, with their small crew on an alien planet making friends and moving forward with a mission that was given to them thirty lightyears away from their current position. He doubted any of them would blame him if he decided to retire to one of the neighboring organic plants in a nearby system.

Sighing deeply, he shifted the hold he had on Hound’s arm. He’d never actually retire, he would die in this suit, just like M did. He was just glad it was far from the hands of his government, so they could force one of his younger brothers into it next.

They continued to walk in silence and he was grateful for it, glancing around, he sighed a bit. The walls around them were nearly the same shade of grey as the immigration office, he could picture it nearly clear as day. His implants oozed unpleasantly and he swore, trying to blink as he stumbled into the wall. 

“Hey, Breakdown, you there?” Sunny’s hand rested on his arm and he tried shaking his head but all it did was knock loose plating off.

The office was cold and grey, there wasn’t much to it but Breakdown kept walking down the alley. Putting his arm around Sunstreaker as he nearly stumbles. The desk was solid in front of him and his paperwork was hard to understand, half of it was in English. 

He only sat there for a few seconds before an older man came in, carrying more paperwork and setting it on the desk with a sigh.

”Breakdown, snap out of it.” He blinked hard and tore off his oxygen mask, grabbing up his water pouch to drink deeply. His overuse had never gotten as bad as the others, but it didn’t change; they all still struggled with it from time to time. So long as they lived here and fought for Cybertron it would probably stick around. 

Taking a slow breath, he nodded a bit, the head of his suit now lolled at an angle that his cameras had already adjusted for, “I’m alright, thank you Sunny.” They slowed as they came back to the rubble, just as other mecha started to come to it on the other side. 

Their colors were still bright and stood out against the grey that had coated this neighbor. Suddenly it hit Breakdown as he raised his hand, which held Hound’s arm, that they might not look their best at the moment, even as Sunny also waved to the approaching reinforcements. 

—

Everything ached and it was pretty obvious as to why. The Quint had thrown him through a building just as the bombs hit, then the heatwave made the metal of his suit nearly unbearable to be in.

Hotter than running drills in Death Valley. 

Even now he was grappling with the damned thing, even when it should have already bled to death. No, he kept ripping it apart and kicking it every time it got back up. This was worse than the worst fights he’d had anywhere on Earth, this felt endless. 

Though this was the end of the fight, kicking the shit out of it as it tried to shriek, “Just shut the hell up.” He was exhausted, almost more tired than he’d been after New Kaon, but it laughed cruelly, “My kind is not done with yours Cybertronian, no, we will not stop till your planet is ours once again.” 

He almost stopped, almost listened, instead his foot crushed the things head instead, panting from the effort, “I’m not Cybertronian. I’m human.” And he sat down on the ground, putting his arm on his head to breathe easier. 

Outside still looked like hell, bombs exploding and fire roaring, they wouldn’t leave anything left of that damned ship and in a way, Hound was glad. It meant he wouldn’t have to step foot back inside, but it also meant they wouldn’t have anything for Prowl to look at. To potentially figure out past the maybe-hard drive in his cockpit.

Disconnecting, Hound cried out and grasped at his implants. They were oozing and bleeding again for the first time in weeks, his whole body hurt. It felt like he’d been in a car crash, but then again, it was nor dissimilar to how his day had gone. 

Collapsing from the weight of his own body, Hound laid on the floor of his cockpit, next to the plating from his suit and the oversized hard drive. The bombs going off outside were still audible even there, in his suit and in the building. Grabbing his water pouch, he removes his oxygen mask then his helmet. 

It took a moment to drink slowly and deeply, trying to not drain the pouch but desperate for the water. 

“Ah god,” tears sprang to his eyes as he tried to breathe normally, grasping at his overly long hair. What he needed was a haircut, probably a shave too, but now wasn’t the time. 

The bar was destroyed, the music his parents coveted had been ripped out from under him like a rug in a cartoon. He hadn’t even thought of bringing music on the Odyssey, unlike the twins, it just had slipped his mind while they trained for being in space. 

Quintessons had tried invading Iacon, they had been just outside and nearly killed his friends. They wanted Cybertron and apparently Earth, for what he still had no idea but they wanted to kill everyone and everything.

Including him.

Including his crew.

Including Mirage.

Covering his face, he took a deep and shaking breath, and sobbed. Slamming his fist into the metal flooring of his cockpit, “Oh god, fucking, stupid.” Closing his eyes, he tried to calm down.

It was overwhelming, it was too much, and he needed to pull himself together so he could get back to his team. Whether that was Arcturus or his unit.

Slowly, the bombardment outside lessened and he got up, putting his helmet and oxygen mask back on, picking up his connector and holding it in his hands for a long moment. Tossing it lightly before reconnecting.

His eyes snapped open and he gasped painfully, the feeling in his arm disappearing again with shooting pain into his shoulder, “God damnit, fucking, stupid suit.” Shaking his head, he adjusted his visor and slowly rose, turning back to the executioner to hopefully grab it to bring it in.

Green ooze was what remained where it had been, but there was not nearly enough of it to its remains, “Fuck.” Dragging his hand down his face, Hound groaned, “Alright, find the others and don’t die. Yeah.” Nodding a bit, he steps through the hole he’d initially gone through.  

The outside wasn’t much better than the inside, if he had much to say, though most of the ship was burnt to a crisp and what remained was in fact charred remains, there were still Quintessons crawling around. Tentacles whipping out and feeling for its goal. 

His foot came down on one and then swiftly turned what remained of its body into green mist with a kick and once he did one, he had to keep going. Grabbing and tearing, kicking, then dispatching. It was one step then the next. 

———

A/N

This was meant to be out yesterday, but at 11 last night I did not feel like researching how the brain works or how the world is figuring out how to integrate tech into the human body to be perfectly honest.

But yeah, I hope to still have the next chapter out on Friday, I’ve already started to work on it so we will see how that goes, so wish me luck lol.

TAGS

@lunarlei68 @whirlywhirlygig @loop-hole-319 @pixillandjester @alek-the-witch @not-a-moose-in-disguise @goddessofwind8water @neurologicalglitch @dersereblogger @pixel-transformers @mrcrayonofdoom @wireplaces @twilightfreefaller @original-blog-name-2 @devilangel657 @robbin-u @miniartistme @starwold @tea-enthusiasm @valeexpris606 @celticdoggo @bird599 @agentsquirrelsgotrobots @aquaioart @thatwandercat @artdagz @seisha974 @halenhusky309 @leethepiper @cat-cassette @sirassban @cosmique-oddity @garbageenthusiast @xervias @azulabutterfly @fryseem @spring-mc @echo-circuit @aghostsnail @wooblewooble @ask-glory-haddock-and-others @nonsscrapheap @magichats @iminahole247 @omgflyingderpywhale @thetrexartist @naaaafam @elegantmantaray @emichusai @waterlilykitty @diabolichare @ham4ponyo @osqindaxend @sunnyvibesanddoodles @ratatatata248 @ijustneedausernaneplease4444444 @sprook-children @fooolisher 

And once again thank you to @Keferon for this amazing AU

[nasa]

Roman's primary structure hangs from cables as it moves into the big clean room at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

What Makes the Clean Room So Clean?

When you picture NASA’s most important creations, you probably think of a satellite, telescope, or maybe a rover. But what about the room they’re made in? Believe it or not, the room itself where these instruments are put together—a clean room—is pretty special. 

A clean room is a space that protects technology from contamination. This is especially important when sending very sensitive items into space that even small particles could interfere with.

There are two main categories of contamination that we have to keep away from our instruments. The first is particulate contamination, like dust. The second is molecular contamination, which is more like oil or grease. Both types affect a telescope’s image quality, as well as the time it takes to capture imagery. Having too many particles on our instruments is like looking through a dirty window. A clean room makes for clean science!

Two technicians clean the floor of Goddard’s big clean room.

Our Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland has the largest clean room of its kind in the world. It’s as tall as an eight-story building and as wide as two basketball courts.

Goddard’s clean room has fewer than 3,000 micron-size particles per cubic meter of air. If you lined up all those tiny particles, they’d be no longer than a sesame seed. If those particles were the size of 16-inch (0.4-meter) inflatable beach balls, we’d find only 3,000 spread throughout the whole body of Mount Everest!

A clean room technician observes a sample under a microscope.

The clean room keeps out particles larger than five microns across, just seven percent of the width of an average human hair. It does this via special filters that remove around 99.97% of particles 0.3 microns and larger from incoming air. Six fans the size of school buses spin to keep air flowing and pressurize the room. Since the pressure inside is higher, the clean air keeps unclean air out when doors open.

A technician analyzes a sample under ultraviolet light.

In addition, anyone who enters must wear a “bunny suit” to keep their body particles away from the machinery. A bunny suit covers most of the person inside. Sometimes scientists have trouble recognizing each other while in the suits, but they do get to know each other’s mannerisms very well.

This illustration depicts the anatomy of a bunny suit, which covers clean room technicians from head to toe to protect sensitive technology.

The bunny suit is only the beginning: before putting it on, team members undergo a preparation routine involving a hairnet and an air shower. Fun fact – you’re not allowed to wear products like perfume, lotion, or deodorant. Even odors can transfer easily!

Six of Goddard’s clean room technicians (left to right: Daniel DaCosta, Jill Bender, Anne Martino, Leon Bailey, Frank D’Annunzio, and Josh Thomas).

It takes a lot of specialists to run Goddard’s clean room. There are 10 people on the Contamination Control Technician Team, 30 people on the Clean Room Engineering Team to cover all Goddard missions, and another 10 people on the Facilities Team to monitor the clean room itself. They check on its temperature, humidity, and particle counts.

A technician rinses critical hardware with isopropyl alcohol and separates the particulate and isopropyl alcohol to leave the particles on a membrane for microscopic analysis.

Besides the standard mopping and vacuuming, the team uses tools such as isopropyl alcohol, acetone, wipes, swabs, white light, and ultraviolet light. Plus, they have a particle monitor that uses a laser to measure air particle count and size.

The team keeping the clean room spotless plays an integral role in the success of NASA’s missions. So, the next time you have to clean your bedroom, consider yourself lucky that the stakes aren’t so high!

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

[umbrace-rambles]

TBHX Top 10 Character Info

Actually let me just do a text version of the whole thing so I can easily edit it w more info in the future <3

As of Year 41 after Commission (Lin Ling's arc)

01. X

Real Name: ???

Age: ???

Birthdate: 6th of June (???)

Sign: Gemini

Height: 190cm [6'3"]

Weight: 75kg [165 lbs]

Blood Type: 0

Agency: None

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Gathering information, sweets (strawberry milk, carbonated drinks), piano, magic

Abilities: ???

02. QUEEN

Real Name: Liu Yuwei

Age: 27

Birthdate: 18th of October (14AC)

Sign: Libra

Height: 180cm [5'11"]

Weight: 62,5kg [137 lbs]

Blood Type: 0

Agency: DOS

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Heavy metal, horse riding.

Abilities: Can set any rules of her control within a boundary, everything inside of this boundary has to obey her.

03. DRAGON BOY

Real Name: ???

Age: 23

Birthdate: 14th of February (18AC)

Sign: Aquarius

Height: 178cm [5'10"]

Weight: 69kg [152 lbs]

Blood Type: B

Agency: Mighty Glory

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Classical music, local volunteer activities.

Abilities: ???

04. GHOSTBLADE

Real Name: ???

Age: 41

Birthdate: 28th of August (0AC)

Sign: Virgo

Height: 180cm [5'11"]

Weight: 76kg [167 lbs]

Blood Type: AB

Agency: Mighty Glory

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Assassination, cooking, general housework.

Abilities: ???

05. THE JOHNNIES (Little Johnny)

Real Name: ???

Age: 28

Birthdate: 8th of August (13AC)

Sign: Leo

Height: 170cm [5'7"]

Weight: 60kg [132 lbs]

Blood Type: B

Agency: DOS

Hobbies, interests and special skills: The internet, latest technology, asset management (which he has repeatedly failed at)

Abilities: ???

06. LOLI

Real Name: ???

Age: 18

Birthdate: 1st of December (23AC)

Sign: Sagittarius

Height: 160cm [5'3"]

Weight: 45kg [99 lbs]

Blood Type: 0

Agency: FOMO

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Mechanical engineering, work, long distance running

Abilities: ???

07. LUCKY CYAN

Real Name: Renamed Cyan. Original unknown.

Age: 21

Birthdate: 24th of March (20AC)

Sign: Aries

Height: 166cm [5'5"]

Weight: 53kg [116 lbs]

Blood Type: B

Agency: DOS

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Singing, playing instruments (especially guitar)

Abilities: Has absolute luck and can transfer it to others.

08. AHU

Real Name: ??? (assuming same name)

Age: 13

Birthdate: 4th of April (28AC)

Sign: Taurus

Height: 30cm [12"]

Weight: 10kg [22 lbs]

Blood Type: -

Agency: FOMO

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Sunbathing, patrolling, cat food evaluation

Abilities: ???

09. E-SOUL

Real Name: Yang Cheng

Age: 27

Birthdate: 11th of November (14AC)

Sign: Scorpio

Height: 185cm [6'1"]

Weight: 80kg [176 lbs]

Blood Type: A

Agency: Mighty Glory

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Bicycling, stage performance

Abilities: Various skills such as super speed and the ability to release electricity, condense it and fire it like a bullet. Can inject it into objects

10. THE COMMONER

Real Name: Lin Ling

Age: 21

Birthdate: 22nd of May (20AC)

Sign: Gemini

Height: 180cm [5'11"]

Weight: 75kg [165 lbs]

Blood Type: A

Agency: Treeman

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Creating PPT presentations and planning ideas

Abilities: Can punch real good

--. NICE

Real Name: ???

Age: 25

Birthdate: 11th of July (16AC)

Sign: Cancer

Height: 180cm [5'11"]

Weight: 75kg [165 lbs]

Blood Type: 0

Agency: Treeman

Hobbies, interests and special skills: Real state and stock investments, redevelopment projects

Abilities: Has all the abilities people believe a "perfect hero" should have

[literaryvein-reblogs]

more notes on: writer's block

It is an anxiety we feel when we are unable to transfer ideas from our heads to the page.

It is a feeling of inadequacy—that whatever we write will be unoriginal, unimaginative, or have very little value.

It is a temporary state in which we are so overwhelmed with the expectations of an assignment, instructor, ourselves (inner editor) that we can’t get started.

Techniques to Combat Writer's Block

Stream of consciousness writing

There are variations to this type of writing. In general, the ideas are the same: writing freely without considering grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, etc.

The most important aspect of this exercise is to just write.

Variations include: write what comes to your mind as you focus on your topic; write with your eyes closed; cover your computer screen and type freely; write slowly while focusing on each shaping of the letters; or set a timer/alarm and write non-stop for 10-15 minutes.

Change your location

If you usually write at a computer, try the kitchen or dining room table.

If you usually write at a desk, try a seat by a window. Or how about a coffee shop, a park, or the library?

Relaxation techniques

Take a break from trying to write. This will help you to rejuvenate (but come back soon)!

Take some deep breaths. People who tell you that physical exercise is important for mental activity are telling the truth.

If nothing's happening on the computer screen or paper, take a walk around the block. Hit the treadmill or tennis courts or drive to the gym. But take your notebook with you.

Fresh blood will be flowing through your brain and jogging might just jog something loose in your head. It happens.

Start in the middle of your writing project

Avoid the problem of getting started by starting on a part of the project that interests you more and then come back to the introductory matter later.

After all, your readers will never know you wrote the introduction last (another joy of word-processing technology!).

Talking aloud

Talk over your paper with a friend, or just blab away into a tape recorder (even better).

Play the tape back and write down what you hear in clusters of ideas or free write about them.

Accountability & community

Set up a time and place to write with someone else or a few other writers.

Start by talking about what you are working on, your struggle, and what needs to be done.

You can set a specific amount of time for everyone to write silently (an hour or a few).

Then come back together in the end to vocalize what you accomplished (and what you still want to accomplish if more needs to be done).

This goal setting, accountability, and community are highly valuable for the writing process.

more on: writer's block