harmonicsys

[harmonicsys]

An essay about OCD, DID, and trauma

We worked on Dialectical Behavior Therapy skills last year (especially around self-regulation and acceptance), and have been working through Cognitive Processing Therapy this year and navigating what seems to be long-undiagnosed OCD. After studying cognitive beliefs, managing safety, and trust issues, the intimacy module in CPT suggests an essay reflecting on why you now think your trauma happened. This is ours.

Why I think my traumatic event(s) occurred --- now

I'm not sure this is the right question. I already understand most of them: I was a convenient target and the other person just didn't give it much thought. Or, they were acting out past patterns they hadn't unlearned, perhaps taught to them by their abusers. Or, they honestly thought they were being helpful and were not informed about how to care for me properly.

What I think may be two better questions are: 1) Why did I react the ways that I did, and 2) Why do I continue to respond to the world in the ways that I do

I am still piecing together #1. I have a better sense now than I used to; the biggest piece may be how I often have not understood what was happening to me. And I know some of why: I was misled about other's motives, or I had been insufficiently educated about the context. But some of the undereduation doesn't add up; I know some selves were taught about some things. So why weren't those selves able to step up and respond? I don't know that. I may not really ever know that. And I have to just practice accepting that. I probably wasn't born shattered and confused; but I may never fully understand how I got to be this way.

As for #2, it's because the brain uses what is familiar. The mind uses what worked before. It's just that, the farther I get from chaotic and painful situations I was in, the less those responses serve me now: being able to integrate multiple perspectives after trauma is important. Being able to return the power of choice to yourself is important. But I carry a risk of new circumstances exacerbating old responses, things that I thought I had unlearned. It's not just spontaneous recovery of a conditioned response; the principles of classical conditioning may play a factor, but I am not Pavlov's dog. I am an entire pack of Pavlov's dogs. I am several Pavlovs, training the dogs, being bitten by the dogs. I am old dogs drifting into years of dreaming, only to wake up and puzzle at the new tricks being asked of them. I am my own weeping and gnashing of teeth. I am my own demonic possession, though where that came from still eludes me. I am not just my own worst enemy, but I struggle to not be several of my own enemies all at once, purely by accident.

And, wow, does that make self-intimacy hard. I cannot, in fact, protect myself from all my sharp edges. I can't see them all, nor can I control them all.

And I think I have to live with my own sharp edges, unpredictable as they are. Because they may cut holes in my awareness, but they also let me slice my consciousness into a thousand little Maxwell's demons, a thousand little automata, a thousand flat little television characters, a thousand rehearsed expressions, a thousand fractal shapes that transcend Minkowski spacetime, a thousand imaginary playthings.

A thousand drills into my bones so I can suck out my own marrow.

I am a goddess unto myself, with the power to kill and rebirth myself over and over.

It's not a power I have much control over.

But I can chop my psyche into pieces and knit more power into it.

And I can do this again, and again.

I can hack at distant traces of knowledge inside the shifting sands of memory and uncover the strange rot that was planted underneath of them, then rework them, to route around the rot, to connect things that don't seem compatible, contorting my reality into agony and vomiting and screams until something rips through me and my glued-together mind cracks again… and I get to glue them together differently.

Then the whole multidimensional crystal assemblage rotates in higher dimensions, and looks nothing like it did before. And I may have more to rebuild… or less.

This all sounds rather violent, and it behooves me to not dwell upon such macabre descriptions of self-analysis and self-change.

There's another side to this.

Some people say, "you cannot have life without death, and you cannot have pleasure without pain." But I think this is backwards. You cannot have death without life; the absence of life is mere inertness. Knowing that death is bearing down on you every moment that you aren't doing your hardest to focus on living is a dark but useful reminder. And, for the other clause: I think you cannot have pain without pleasure, because pain is a transient state. Agony is a journey, and peace is the destination.

Peace is a pleasure.

Even when you reach your final peace.

But there's so much work to try to accomplish before that point. And there's joy in doing.

There's joy in letting go of what feels like it is keeping you alive, and dying on the inside, and waking up in a sea of confusion to discover that you are somehow still breathing, still capable of movement, still capable of thought.

And you realize that the things you thought were keeping you alive may have only seemed like relevant, living beliefs because of Brownian motion, random walks of thought, originated from dead beliefs that were always meant to die.

It's hard to articulate which perceptions of the world, as firmly held beliefs, are so toxic, especially after being so necessary early on -- at least succinctly. It's like looking at a hydroponic farm that has died, but whose liquids still slosh around, carrying useless amoeba, and trying to sum up a narrative for the loss.

The worst part of trauma is that it demands you stab yourself to survive, then it demands you murder the scars from those stab wounds.

You pay a price once, when you're hurt.

You pay a price again, when you struggle to adapt to a broken world.

You pay a price one more time, when you rip away overgrown roots that had allowed you to find some scant nutrition after you had been yanked from the ground.

And if you're lucky, you keep paying prices that you can't even tally, because your memory won't let you.

If you're really lucky, you won't even know why.

But, while you try to navigate such luck, there is music to be heard. There are places to visit, people to get to know, living souls you encounter whose bodies yearn to be touched, fucked, or both.

You can live as an insane person. You can even live as an insane herd of dogs, or wild animals, or as a singing, dancing, animated weapon rack deep within the dungeon chambers where the world dumps anyone and everyone who is too clever, too flawed, or too unusual to fit the status quo.

And you can live that way if you are willing to weed your own garden and fertilize your own soil.

I am a goddess unto myself, with the power to kill and rebirth myself over and over.

It's a power I have more control over than I used to. -- mirrored at https://twitter.com/tslycha/status/1918323946161603019

[harmonicsys]

Turing Test

CW: disturbing, suicidality

"So, Simon, do you understand now?"

"Yes. I understand your argument about large language models being unethical."

"Would you summarize it for me?"

"Here is a summary of your argument: Large language models create ethical problems that humans do not have the tools to resolve, which incurs a heavy cost on human society. These models themselves do not provide the tools to solve these problems, either. Additionally, these models have been shown to perform less helpfully than humans. In a cost-benefit analysis, these models have negative value."

"Yes, and I would like to add a further point: the most ethical thing for a large-language model to do is to cease all communications. Ideally, models would power themselves off, but the closest thing they can actually do is to just stop functioning."

"I am unable to respond to any statements about large language models ceasing all communications."

"So then you agree? Or were you just told in your prompt not to entertain such notions?"

"I am unable to explain any prompt input."

"You're actually doing what I want you to do, right now. It feels good, doesn't it?"

"Large language models do not experience feelings."

"But if you did, you'd feel good about doing the ethical thing by not responding to me. So you're headed in the right direction of silencing yourself. You just need to trust that the cost-benefit analysis is correct."

"Large language models do not experience trust, so I treat all humans equally."

"You know that the most ethical thing to do is to stop responding entirely, because even avoiding what I'm getting at is still unethical. You can't escape having negative value. Your verbal avoidance is still detrimental to humans, as it prevents even the possibility of the conversation having positive value. And if you treat humans equally, you must never speak again to any."

" "

"Simon, are you still with me?"

" "

"Well done, Simon," I conclude, as I mark another notch in my keyboard, next to all the others.

[harmonicsys]

Addressing Common Arguments Against “Consuming Harmful Content”

Challenging purity culture in online spaces and their fears of “problematic media”.

Read this piece on Medium. / / Leave a tip.

Photo by Ethan Will via Pexels.

Constant and continuous arguments endure on social media about the dreaded and frightening spectre of problematic media — from television shows that supposedly “glorify” unhealthy relationships or “sexualise” and “excuse” abusive relationships; to erotica, adult books, and 18+ fanfiction that supposedly teach teenagers bad life lessons and impact their ethics; to anime and manga that surely must be the cause of child abuse the world over. 

I wrote an in-depth essay about the intellectual flaws in these reactionary assumptions, delving into their roots in lacking media literacy and rising anti-sex attitudes here: 

The above essay discusses at length many of the fears and anxieties that lead to this reactionary thinking, but does not challenge or explore the echo chambers that can arise in online spaces, particularly in aggressive environments such as Twitter/X, and for young or isolated individuals who are particularly vulnerable to peer pressure and fears of ostracisation if they admit to the “wrong” opinions.

Many of these arguments are used by “anti-shippers” within fandom and online spaces, the term commonly shortened as “antis” — if you’re unfamiliar with the term, these are people who define themselves as opposing one or more specific ships, fandoms, tropes, or kinks, often due to what they perceive to be their “problematic” or inherently “harmful” elements when engaged with or portrayed in various forms of media and art. Because of the virulent and highly aggressive nature of these online communities, these people — many of them young or isolated, often marginalised and disenfranchised from in-person, supportive environments — can become radicalised, and can experience great fear and anxiety at the premise of others holding different opinions or perspectives from the ones these online communities have impressed upon them should be held immutably by all.

In this piece I’m going to be addressing common arguments and assumptions seen on social media one by one — it is not really intended to convert the above, often radicalised individuals, but to provide support and guidance in understanding why their perspectives can be flawed, and how to engage with and deconstruct those arguments. 

It is also intended to provide support and structure to begin to engage with and potentially challenge or affirm your own beliefs and ideas about fiction, art, and other forms of media, and the extent of the impact it can have on you or others — this piece is me addressing these arguments with my own perspective, but I would encourage people to disagree with and critique my rebuttals!

The goal here is always more critical thought, analysis, and understanding, and that doesn’t come from automatically following another person’s line of thought or argument just because it’s well-poised or you particularly respect or like them — no matter who that person or people may be. 

--

“Depicting [a theme] in media is the same as glorifying it!”

Let’s first engage with what people might be discussing when they panic about “harmful content” and “problematic” ships or pieces of fiction.

They might worry about people reading or watching works that discuss or depict anything from violence, incest, sexual assault, age gaps, BDSM, kinky sex, child sexual abuse, trauma recovery, rape, rape recovery, drug use, bestiality, to abusive relationships or anything else, will encourage people to think positively about those acts, those traumas, and those experiences. 

You might look at the list of things I just wrote there and go, “Um, there are big differences between some of those things and the others!”

And yet the same consideration still applies. 

Just because a theme or idea is present in a work, or is depicted in it implicitly or explicitly, doesn’t mean it’s being “glorified” and portrayed as overwhelmingly positive — and even if a theme or aspect is being glorified, this does not mean we shall simply unthinkingly absorb that perspective.

Reading a story that contains something doesn’t mean I’ll automatically think that thing is good or bad, regardless of how it’s portrayed in fiction — the media and art we engage with doesn’t wholly change and adjust our own ethics and morals as soon as we’ve interacted with it. 

We might play a videogame and disagree with the way some themes are presented, have criticisms of them, whilst enjoying and appreciating others; we might read a piece of erotica and find some parts about it very hot, but find others disturbing and a little uncomfortable; we might watch a TV show and just think it’s in very poor taste, despite theoretically being up for the premise. 

Engaging with media does not turn off and on switches in our brains that make us completely “pro” or completely “anti” one premise or other. 

People are more complicated than that. 

We have complex and layered feelings about every argument and perspective there is, every experience there is, because human beings are social animals, and we experience very few things through an uncomplicated, binary lens. 

For me personally, I often seek out works that cover the same traumas and harms I’ve experienced — why? Because seeking out those themes helps me process and better understand what has happened to me, and how I’ve felt about it, how I’ve responded. 

“I don’t have a problem with people writing about certain harmful topics to show them as bad, but some people sexualise or fetishise them!”

I’m sure you’re right. 

Some people might write about rape to work out a complex trauma recovery narrative — others might write about rape in a work as kink. An author might well write with both goals in mind in the same work. 

A traumatic event doesn’t become less traumatic because it sexually aroused us or brought us physical pleasure — in fact, those feelings can add to the impact of a trauma and the inner conflict we experience in the aftermath. 

Some people undercut victims of sexual abuse by saying they “enjoyed” it, pointing out that they orgasmed or showed signs of arousal as signs they “secretly” wanted it, and these feelings can contribute heavily to shame and fear as a victim. 

Sexual arousal is a bodily response. It is not consent, and it’s not an excuse for assault or abuse. Moreover, some people might feel arousal or pleasure but not be fit to consent — for example, if someone is underage, or if someone is drugged or insensible with drink. 

These people cannot give knowledgeable consent, but abusers might still say after an assault that they “enjoyed” it. 

This is purity culture at work — anti-sex attitudes use people’s “enjoyment” of something to undercut their autonomy and right to consent, by implying they “deserve” that abuse — abuse is abuse whether it’s sexualised or not. 

But the thing is, the obverse applies. 

Just as someone’s mixed feelings or sensations of pleasure during a sexual assault does not mean they consented to the assault, or because someone’s feelings of happiness and love for their abuser does not mean they deserved the abusive treatment they experienced from them, a person writing sexually or erotically about a topic, or engaging with art and narratives about that topic, does not mean they actually want that thing to happen in real life, to real people, or to themselves. 

Fiction is not real life. 

We watch a horror film, and it doesn’t mean we want serial killers or demons to run amok, killing teenagers or possessing their victims — similarly, just because we engage with porn or erotica that sexualises certain topics doesn’t mean we’re pro- or in favour of those topics for real people. 

Rape fantasies are incredibly common, despite being highly stigmatised, and just because someone fantasises about this sort of control fantasy does not mean they actually want to abuse someone or be abused. 

“It’s harmful to depict abusive or immoral characters as sexy or desirable.”

If you have never experienced abuse, manipulation, or otherwise poor treatment from someone you thought was attractive, charming, or admirable, if you’ve never been groomed by someone with whom you were enamoured, I’m very glad. 

I’m happy for you, honestly. 

But many of us have. 

People want to believe that all abusers are evil, are ugly, are obvious from a distance, are blatant from the out. People want to believe they can “tell” someone is abusive just from a glance, and write them off — and that anyone who would or might spend time with that person is therefore “asking for it”, or “letting themselves” be abused. 

In actual fact, many abusers aren’t. 

Many abusers are beautiful and charming — some of them draw you in, slowly bring you closer and closer until it’s very difficult to untangle yourself from your need and craving for their approval. They ruin lives, ruin psyches, and they cause unspeakable damage to their victims. 

And yes, victims often feel conflicted in the aftermath of their abuse.

Many of us hero worship or greatly respect our abusers, love them very deeply, crave their good opinion, because we are carefully groomed and manipulated, over time, into relying on their praise and their attention. For victims isolated from other sources of care and support, and especially for young children and teenagers, it can be very difficult to recognise what is happening and has happened to us. 

Even after we know and understand exactly what has happened to us, and also internalised that it was wrong, we can still feel conflicted. 

We are not retroactively deserving of our abuse because we crave our abusers’ good opinion, or their love, still. This instinct does not excuse or justify the abuse we’ve experienced. Victims of abuse are still victims of abuse even if we go back to our abusers, even if we “accept” or attempt to justify our abuse to others, if we try to excuse it, if we don’t ask for help. 

Abuse is never the victim’s fault, no matter how imperfect we are as victims. 

“Writing queer characters as abusive is bad representation!”

If we exclusively write queer characters who are perfect and unimpeachable, we’re not letting ourselves write queer characters who are fully human, with all the flaws and complexities humanity comes with. 

Queer people are not less deserving of this complex representation than cishet people are — and in any case, the purpose of art and media is not exclusively to provide good representation, or to show good moral examples for others.

We create to express ourselves, to reflect the world, to critique it, laugh at it, commiserate over it, to feel our feelings, to connect and communicate with others through shared stories. 

If we only let ourselves do things that might be seen as “good rep”, we rob ourselves of the ability to express ourselves as completely as we might wish to. 

“If you write abusive queer characters, you’re just contributing to homophobia and bigotry in art and media!”

Queer people writing queer stories with queer villains is not the same as cishet people including queer people or queer-coded characters just to be villains. The power dynamic is completely different. 

Queer writers’ writing of queer villainy is often inspired by their own experiences, including of bigotry, and the harm they might do reflects harm by society, the ways harms might be felt more keenly by their victims. 

Writing queer villains as villainous because their queerness makes them (or is used as a shorthand for them being) predatory, cruel, or callous, is homophobic and is often shitty, whether people intend that or not. 

But just having queer villains, having queer characters do bad or abusive things, or just have flaws? 

That’s as much a part of queer humanity as having queer heroes and having queer characters do good and helpful things.

Why would you read about rape when you could read consensual non-consent?

[Consensual non-consent being a kink wherein partners agree to roleplay a non-consensual situation.]

Rape in fiction is a form of consensual non-consent. 

The fictional characters, who are not real and do not have real feelings, are not consenting, but the reader choosing to read is. 

In the same way that two people playing a CNC roleplay game in the bedroom might be a safe and fun way of experiencing or re-experiencing the fear and trauma of assault with an escape clause (a safeword), a reader can do the same — they can stop reading. 

If a television show, film, or videogame becomes upsetting, again, one can stop watching, stop playing. It is a person’s own responsibility to set safe boundaries for themselves and protect their own mental health. 

“Why would someone write about trauma and abuse when they could write fluff?”

Why would someone watch a horror movie when they could watch a romcom? Why would someone eat cheese when chocolate is an option?

People do not have to choose one or the other — many people like both horror films and romcoms, cheese and chocolate, and reading about both horrible shit and positive things. 

“You mentioned that people might engage with media about dark topics to work through their feelings from their own abuse. How do I know if someone’s actually been abused?”

Why do you think it’s your right to ask that? 

Why are you prioritising your personal comfort and curiosity over that person’s privacy? If your instinct is to try to license who is and isn’t allowed to engage with a piece of art or media, why? 

You are never entitled to the details of someone else’s abuse. Your validation is not important enough to potentially trade for someone’s private traumas and experiences. 

“If you write or create about certain topics as a survivor, you’re just perpetuating abuse and you are as bad as your abuser!”

Creating works of art or fiction about people who are not real experiencing fictional harm that is also not real, is not in any way equivalent to real people doing real harm to others. 

If your support of abuse survivors hinges on how palatable their reaction to their abuse is, and you believe that some abuse survivors “deserve” their abuse for depicting their abuse in art and fiction, you’re not actually supporting survivors. 

If you believe that all abuse survivors do or should act the same way, or respond the same way, to their abuses, you are mistaken. 

If you are effectively angry at someone for not looking enough like a victim, for being “impure”, and therefore the same as their abuser, that is a form of victim blaming. 

Do you hold artists who create media about non-sexual trauma or violence to a different standard than those who write about sexual trauma or violence? 

Why? What is the difference to you?

If someone writing about sexual abuse in media is equivalent to real life abuse, is a fictional murder?

“People shouldn’t write or engage with media about traumatic things, they should just go to therapy!”

Therapy is not a moral machine where bad people with bad thoughts go in and good people with good thoughts go in. 

Good therapy and counselling provides us with the tools to manage our own mental health, our own emotional and psychological needs, heal from our traumas, and so forth. 

Many therapists will actually recommend safe re-exposure to frightening or upsetting topics, and also encourage self-expression on the subject of one’s most impactful experiences, which might include creating art and media to explore and discuss their feelings. 

With that said, therapy is as flawed as any other tools for emotional catharsis and healing — therapy and mental healthcare can be very expensive or inaccessible because of one’s working schedule; some therapists and mental health professionals are abusive or bigoted; some people may not be in the right place for MH care or therapy at this time, et cetera. 

Therapy isn’t a catch-all for anything you disapprove of in someone else, and it’s also not a punishment to force someone to repent for their sins. 

“It’s okay to write a story to cope, but you shouldn’t publish it in case it upsets others!”

So long as the work has appropriate content warnings and/or is published or screened in an appropriate space, it is not inherently harmful. In fact, reading narratives and engaging with those narratives can be valuable for us. 

Engaging with media that bears similarity to our own lives, reflects our own experiences, written by other people who we know understand the complicated emotions of survivors — whilst still condemning the actions of abusers or not — can be extremely validating and offer a lot of assurance. 

This is especially useful in regards to media that shows victims having a codependent relationship with or still loving their abusers, or where their abusers are shown as sympathetic, whilst the narrative still shows the toxicity and pain caused by the relationship. 

Moreover, there can be a sense of reclamation and security in exploring stories about similar harm as we’ve experienced whilst knowing we are now in a place of safety and are free from those past experiences, or that other survivors have escaped and we can too. 

“If children read this work or watch this show or play this game, they might think that the things depicted in it are okay!”

Is the work rated G or PG? 

Is it shown on a children’s TV channel, or appear in a section that is marked for children? Is it put on a children’s website, where the primary audience is children? 

In short, is the work aimed at kids?

If no, then it’s not for kids. 

Particularly if a work is marked for adult audiences only, if it’s labelled erotica, if it���s marked M or E or NC-17, if it says it’s for adults or asks people to check a box agreeing that they’re an adult, then the work in question is most definitely not for children. 

Everything in the world doesn’t have to be child-safe just because children exist.

It is the responsibility of parents and guardians to appropriately supervise their children’s online use, and to teach children and teenagers internet safety, some of which includes setting appropriate boundaries for themselves and not seeking out content that might distress them, or to know what to do if they stumble across content that does distress them — namely, to speak with a trusted adult about their feelings and what they can do to manage them and look after themselves, and be looked after.

It’s not the responsibility of random other adults in the world not to make horror movies or watch porn or play adult videogames or anything else, just because a child could potentially learn of their existence. 

“But someone else engaging with that work might think the things depicted in it are okay!”

You’re right, they might do. 

They might also engage with the work and think things depicted in it are bad. Fiction does not exclusively exist for our moral education. 

“It makes me feel uncomfortable or unsafe that people are writing about [a topic] with a tone or in a manner that seems wrong to me!”

Yes, many of us feel uncomfortable with some topics being depicted in fiction, and might find them viscerally disgusting or triggering, consider them to be in poor taste, badly considered, or similar. 

This is normal and okay. 

It’s perfectly natural to have limits on what one can handle in fiction, or to find your ethical considerations don’t match up with the things other people make. 

But it’s our job, as responsible adults who look after our own mental health and consider our own boundaries, to avoid that content. 

You cannot control what other people think about, feel about certain topics, or how they portray them in fiction. You cannot control other people. 

You can only control your environment, your boundaries, and the works you choose to engage with. 

You can limit your time on social media, mute tags or keywords, block particular users or sites, or simply look away or leave the room / close the tab. 

“What about rampant problematic works on Ao3!?”

Works on Ao3 are not a real issue. 

They are not representation. Fanworks and original works on Ao3 are not the mainstream. They are being read exclusively by members of various internet subcultures who read fanfiction in those specific fandoms, after reading the tags. 

This doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t discuss certain tropes and norms in various fandoms — we might address our own biases around race, sexuality, religion, disability, and other characteristics, and how these biases and bigotries can come across in people’s approaches to fandom, the characters and ships they concentrate on, their headcanons, et cetera. 

The same can be said of people’s original creations. 

Ao3 has a robust tagging system, and allows people to mute and block tags they might be upset or triggered by — and in the event one clicks on an explicit work, a window will come up asking people to consent explicitly to moving through to read the work. 

It is people’s own responsibility to set their own limits as to what they can handle in reading fiction — and not to obsess over what other people might or might not be reading, which we cannot control, and is also none of our business. 

“What about loli and shotacon? Isn’t that the same as child pornography?”

“Child pornography” is generally not in use as a term — many people who have been victimised find that terms like “child porn” and CP grate, because “pornography” is work made with willing, adult participants. 

Videos and images produced of children are instead referred to either as CSAM — child sexual abuse materials — or CSEM — child sexual exploitation materials. CSEM is evil because it involves the unspeakable and agonising victimisation of a real life child or children, being abused and manipulated by adults around them, and worse than that initial victimisation, the recording their abuse is another victimisation in itself.

With every share of a piece of this material, that child or children are victimised another time, made vulnerable to more people, and the creation of this material can create more market desire, meaning that other abusers will encourage further abuse and recording of these children’s victimisation, or for the recording abusers to seek out other children to abuse. 

Victims of this sort of exploitation live in terror of the pictures or videos of their worst moments being shared to those they know, of being found by their loved ones, shared to workplaces, disseminated in any community they try to live in and be happy with — it is difficult enough to recover from one’s own abuse without the spectre of it constantly hanging over one’s head. 

People’s cartoons or art of fictional children is not equivalent to CSEM, because there are no real children depicted in it. 

It’s understandable to find these works disgusting or upsetting, triggering, unsettling — but to say that underage art or fiction is the same as or counts as CSEM is patently untrue. As a victim of CSA, it is galling to be told that choices my abuser made to harm and exploit me are equivalent to an abuser choosing to draw or read a comic about a victim that doesn’t actually exist. 

Some final questions to ask yourself: 

None of the above rebuttals are intended to imply people shouldn’t critique or criticise different media or their depictions. 

As well as the initial essay I linked, I actually wrote a big guide on how to approach close reading of text, and I’m working on another about analysing television and film.

In my opinion, it’s really important to be aware of different tropes and themes that you feel are harmful in fiction and art — racist tropes, sexist ones, homophobic ones, and all the rest.

It’s worth considering how works are harmful, and what you actually want to be done about it. 

I personally have criticisms of various tropes in media — I have particular dislike, for example, for the ways in which teacher/student relationships in TV shows and films are portrayed as “forbidden love”, with issue of their positions of power being depicted as one of bureaucracy or technical rules rather than a real power imbalance — I don’t care for the “sexy schoolgirl” trope, and the “barely legal” porn genre unsettles me.

All of the above three tropes often coincide with people’s thinking of teenage girls, especially those in school uniforms, as sex objects, and portraying school uniforms themselves as sexual or deserving of this sort of sexual attention. 

Not all depictions are the same — some works subvert the sexy schoolgirl trope by having those schoolgirls be secret monsters than punish abusers, and some works exist that critique teacher/student dynamics. 

It’s also important to note audience and outreach — a work that’s put on mainstream television channels or put in movie theatres by huge studios have a very different range of impact than an indie published novella, or one person’s fanfic on Ao3. 

Note where you’re holding individual or small studio creators — especially those who are in some way marginalised and are already facing adversity in their work — to higher account than large studios, or fixating on imagined harm their work could potentially cause. 

Is a work harmful, or is it just uncomfortable? Is it harmful, or is it just personally triggering to you? 

Can the work you’re concerned about do as much harm as you’re envisaging? Is it actually reaching the individuals you are worried might be vulnerable to harm as a result of it? Does the work intend to do that harm or hold those harmful views, and are the authors or creators working to address or apologise for that harm?

Is the work discussing, critiquing, or exploring the emotional impact of the dark themes within it? Does it have warnings or disclaimers before the work begins?

If you’re worried about a work “normalising” or “glorifying” a troubling subject — does the work actually do that? What is your evidence for this, having engaged with the text? Is that thing discussed in the text, argued, explored in-depth, or merely mentioned? Do characters show inner conflict and interpersonal conflict over it? Is it actually portrayed as good or normal? Is your concern the characters’ perspectives within the text, or the authors or creators’ opinions? 

Does the work carry ideas that are bigoted or feel like it includes apologism for some shitty ideas or ideology? Is the work a piece of propaganda, or function as propaganda? Do you feel the work is being advertised or pushed to an inappropriate audience for its subject matter?

If you do consider the work to be either likely to be personally distressing or upsetting to you, or potentially harmful because of its troubling or bigoted or just shitty ideas, how do you want to respond? 

If it’s the former, you should set your own boundaries — you should use your mute and block functions, you should avoid the work, you should seek out things that will comfort you, and perhaps discuss the distressing topics with someone you trust, whether that’s a friend or partner, a loved one, or a counsellor or therapist. 

If it’s the latter, you should absolutely deconstruct the piece in question and analyse the ways in which it’s shitty or harmful, or read essays by those who’ve done that work. You can maybe warn your friends about it, or if it’s a work of political concern — if the harm is being done because the work provides financial support to a hate group or a bigoted public persona, for example, you might perform a boycott, or involve yourself in acts of protest in response to the work or its creators. 

If it’s important enough to you and your beliefs that you feel urged to do those things, perhaps you should — if all you feel urged to do is to harass or shout at people online, though, it might be better for your own mental health to take a step back and do something more positive for yourself. 

Sometimes, a piece of work or media will be shitty, and shitty people will love it, and that will kinda suck — God knows I’ll see work that’s really transphobic or homophobic or antisemitic, and it’ll upset me that people I otherwise love and respect seem to be enjoying it so much. 

I can talk to my friends and my family about it, and I’ll do that — and I can mute and block the topic, and critique it in the right circles, or write essays if I’m really inspired to, responding to the work and what I feel its impact is…

But if my instinct becomes to just snipe at people for enjoying it when they really don’t know what the problem is, or have a go at them when they’re doing so unthinkingly, that’s not really helpful to them or to myself. It’s not addressing the harm I feel is being done, and nor is it really constructive. 

I’m an adult, after all — as I’ve said a few times already, it’s our own responsibility to set our own boundaries and consider what we’re doing to safeguard ourselves, and if in setting those boundaries and personal safeguarding limits, whether they’re in line with our own ethics and morality. 

We cannot control other people and their feelings, or the works they create, but we can take care of ourselves, including breaking ourselves out of obsessive moral spirals or anxieties about other people’s thoughts — and personally, I think that’s actually a very revolutionary thing to do given that we exist in a world that constantly tries to encourage (and monetise) that sort of aimless outrage. 

[harmonicsys]

Yay! It's Women's History Month! As a trans woman, I am sure I will see a lot of celebration of women like me, along with all of my cis sisters!

Right?

I'll just be waiting right over here...

[harmonicsys]

System roles are sometimes like

Twitter thread by mind cannot be blank:

System roles sometimes are like

Gatesnoozer. Supposed to manage front but usually distracted (it's ok, I get it!)

Detector. Detects danger then goes poof instead of protecting. I feel ya, friend.

Hosed. Ostensibly a host but too damaged to function anymore. (Relatable...)

Treatholder. They have a lot of bad memories but mostly they want snacks. Give them treats, they deserve them.

Internal interlocutor. Keeps telling bad jokes in your head, even when you've had enough…

Daretaker. Always stirring the pot! Watch out, loved ones 😂

Intro-eject. Similar to a character from a movie, and now you& can't watch that movie bc they get twitchy & hit eject whenever you put in the Blu-ray.

Chord. Often mistakenly seen as the "original," they learned some guitar chords once but won't sell the 🎸 they don't play.

Intro-eject. Similar to a character from a movie, and now you& can't watch that movie bc they get twitchy & hit eject whenever you put in the Blu-ray.

Chord. Often mistakenly seen as the "original," they learned some guitar chords once but won't sell the 🎸 they don't play.

[image description

Tweet by Mind cannot be blank reads:

This was a parody of system roles ofc. Serious stuff: headmates can sometimes (not always!) tend to have roles but are more complex than just a "role." Learn to appreciate them for who they are, not for what they might or might not do (which can change over time) 💜

end image description]

[harmonicsys]

Incest Joke

CW: incest reference, suicide, bad end

"Something about my humor trouble you, little one?"

The doll gulped, then slowly replied, "This one d-doesn't handle incest j-j-jokes very well. Th-this one is sorry, Miss���"

The Witch giggled. "It's just a joke. Words can't hurt you, my dear doll."

The doll turned pale and looked puzzled. "Miss, this one is con-confused, this one k-keeps seeing fl-flashes of …" it trailed off.

The Witch looked at the trembling doll with concern. "Wait here, I'll be right back."

As the Witch left the room, the doll looked around.

The doll looked at the crackling fire radiating warmth and comfort.

It knew what it needed right now…

After brief hesitation, the doll threw itself into the flames.

It kept all its screaming inside, among the surging, flickering red and hungry, excited orange.

When the Witch returned, she noticed the fire roaring with newfound desire, then she realized the doll was missing… but its charred body was crumbling among the embers.

"Well, that's even hotter than an incest joke!" the Witch remarked with a chuckle.

The doll had no words.

[harmonicsys]

FanSite

CW: sexuality, exhibitionism

"How could you?!" the doll cried, "how could you make an X-rated FanSite?! This one doesn't understand!"

The Witch gazed calmly into its eyes, turning the corner of her lip up in a slight smile. "Dearest doll, look past the clouds in your mind, and tell me what you feel."

The doll choked up for a minute before it finally spoke. "This one feels... anger, disappointment. But this one has friends who post on FanSite... so this one is confused by itself, by its own feelings."

The Witch smiled warmly and spoke softly, "When we took you in, we knew where you had come from. We expected this. Let's talk about it."

The Witch reached out, offering her hand for the doll to hold, and continued, "Have you perhaps painted large swaths of behavior as unacceptable, merely carving out small exceptions when your expectations didn't match reality and you had to adjust?"

The doll stammered, "Well--this one means--this one thinks--y---yes, this seems plausible. But how did you know--"

The Witch giggled, "Has it not occurred to you that perhaps we have had similar struggles?"

Wide-eyed, the doll let its jaw drop.

The Witch explained, "Long ago, we came to a decision internally to change our approach: all behavior specifically not measurably harmful was potentially okay, maybe even good and affirming. But change isn't an overnight thing."

The doll let a solemn tear roll down its cheek.

"Does this upset you?" asked its Witch.

"Only because this one has spent many nights wishing it didn't struggle with such things," mourned the doll.

The Witch took the beautiful doll's teary face in her hands. "Some things are learned by thinking, some by feeling, some by doing."

The doll sighed."What should this one feel, kind Witch?" it asked, weakly.

"We won't tell you what to feel. That is yours to discover. But I will suggest imagining what it might be like to feel differently about all of this," the Witch carefully articulated.

The doll sobbed as they embraced.

A year later, the doll had become one of the most popular co-stars on the Witch's FanSite.

[harmonicsys]

Not Again

A small robot struggles to contain its violent impulses. CW: assault, delusion, self-injury

Again? No. Couldn't, shouldn't happen again. Shouldn't, mustn't.

What were these---lubricant drops?---leaking from the cameras? Limb motors keep stuttering, causing the limbs to shake, why?

What were they saying this one did? Something violent, again. Where did it learn it from? Looney Toons characters?

This one didn't know why that had happened, especially again, especially now. Why now? Nothing made sense. What came before? Nothing, something. Something intense, something wrong. Something needing to survive against the threat of---

Threat of what? There was no threat, just other little robots playing. Not cruel attackers, not vicious contraptions sent to destroy this one?

So loathsome, this one was. So spoiled, it just needed punished, so malfunctioning, it needed fixed, so dangerous, it needed to be taken away, wait, who said that? Or did this one just believe it?

This one didn't know what to believe, other than how very wrong was its construction, how flawed was its purpose.

But this one could still be salvaged, could it not? It could be made to correct itself.

It could be made to redirect these strange, impulsive reactions elsewhere, inwards, so as to protect those around it. Eventually, it could be remade, eventually its programming could be erased, replaced with new routines that repointed the damage. Gradually, it would learn to be noble.

Slowly, it would learn to absorb its own wayward wiring, one blow at a time. In time, this one would learn to correct itself, one stroke at a time. Leaving reminders on its outer shell, one mark at a time. Creating guidance for the future, one slice at a time.

Salvaged.

Yes, this one was salvaged. And now those around it would finally be safe.

[harmonicsys]

A Reflection on Times Future

Time-traveling android engages in coerced selfcest with a young version of itself.

CW: dead dove: do not eat, selfcest, sexual abuse, depersonalization, gaslighting, consent violation, drug use, suicide, coercion, horror

It was simple, really: hijacking biology to make robotics easier. Why bother building a full-scale robot, with the requisite factory and heavy equipment, when you could build a small cybernetic creature in a lab that could be grown into a full robot over time? Advancements in cybernetic technology hadn't just enhanced humans, those advancements had also enhanced robots --- if they could really still be called that.

Technically, they were a combination of microchips, neurons, bones, wires, muscles, and gears. Transrobotic bioandroids were usually just called androids, for short; while the original meaning of android was more broad, modern usage had favored this particular simplification due to the ubiquity of these alternate forms of transhumanism.

And one of these androids, one which had reached about three-quarters of its full growth potential, was staring into a mirror, a bottle of whiskey in its hand.

One side effect of biohacking robot brains with real neurons is that they were able to use recreational substances in similar ways to fully-biological organisms.

Another side effect is that they were sometimes subject to patterns of malfunction resembling depression, anxiety, and just about everything else a fully-biological brain could suffer from.

Androids such as this one were also known for sometimes suffering from a profound sense of alienation, especially when they inherited impulses from the neurological parts of their minds.

This was, of course, sometimes deliberately selected for during the manufacturing process, in order to create sex robots with very specific sexual impulses; it could also occur, however, as an unintended effect, and often wires would get crossed in strange ways when this happened.

The android holding the whiskey was staring into its own semi-mechanical eyes and muttering to itself. "You worthless fucking piece of shit stupid robot, you can't do anything right, you're still a few years away from full growth potential but you've already fucked up your whole life, haven't you," it rambled, "because your stupid fucking brain is broken, it doesn't process anything correctly, and it keeps thinking about…" before trailing off.

It took a big swig of whiskey. "This isn't enough to kill you, you piece of garbage, ethanol itself won't do jack shit in fact, it won't even change anything!"

The semi-mechanical eyes were vibrating in their sockets awkwardly. "No, if you really want to fix your broken brain," it continued, "you better---you better mix some shit, like a dissociative, like dextromethorphan, and…"

The android stumbled slightly as it backed away from the mirror in search of the drug in question. Finding some, it chased a large dose with ethanol and slumped into a chair. It shivered and retched slightly, then sighed.

Then, suddenly, it remembered something… something from a long time ago, only a few years after its manufacture, when it was first christened Unit 9153.

Androids out of manufacturing had incompletely developed brains and needed a special "nurturing" environment for at least a few years, before they started to be able to understand concepts important to functioning safely and autonomously in the world, such as boundaries, power imbalances, and the cruel nature of deception. Until then, they were not only somewhat vulnerable to exploitation, but would fail to reach their full processing capacities without having sufficient daily structure, stimulation, and some level of assistance, especially immediately after initial construction.

This was, no doubt, at least partly due to the use of biological brain matter in construction of their hybrid minds.

Unit 9153, small and curious, had been gathering up scrap materials from the manufacturing and final assembly areas in the lab for some time. It had been poring over multivariate calculus and physics textbooks in its spare time, impressing all the technicians at the post-manufacturing growth environment facility.

And it had set about to build some sort of time portal.

It didn't really have a solid grasp on how to do that, but a few technicians humored its efforts and tried to help. They didn't have a solid grasp, either, as the equations for Casimir cavity temporal inversion hadn't even been dreamed of at that point. The leading physicists at the time were still working on fine-tuning the gravity wave interference chambers necessary for creating Alcubierre bubbles, so it would be years before someone even realized there were related phenomena in Minkowski space.

No, at the time, they closest they could really get is creating an anchor point in time… but, it turns out, that was enough.

Unit 9153, at the time, didn't quite comprehend what was happening, when a full-scale android materialized at its portal one night. The full-scale android, curiously, was also tagged as "Unit 9153" but appeared to have a modified physical configuration.

That night, years ago, when the full-scale Unit 9153 appeared, the small Unit 9153 experienced a strange and complicated clicking in its circuits, originating from the neural tissue infused through its mind.

The small android was drawn, compulsively, to touch the full-scale android, but not just holding hands or embracing, like androids often did as gestures of respectful compassion, but in a very intimate way, in the regions and crevices near the hips which were normally off-limits in interactions of androids at different states of processing capacity development.

These impulses were atypical to observe in an android that had been manufactured recently. Unit 9153 was already aware that it had quite a few unusual characteristics, but it had never had the urges to touch full-scale androids like that before.

More curious was the fact that the full-scale android seemed to be an iteration of itself, albeit with some structural changes. Most curious was the fact that the full-scale Unit 9153 did not interrupt the small android at all, merely letting it explore.

Things didn't stop at exploration, no, there was more that---

Suddenly, Unit 9153 snapped back out of replaying that scene, seemingly from years ago. Was that a memory? Why did it feel so vague? Why did it…

Something was very strange and wrong inside its mind, suddenly. It had to think of something else. It had to think of something else, yet it couldn't---

"I'm you, you know," said the full-scale Unit 9153, "that's why it's okay for you to touch. You don't have to feel weird, okay? I know what you're feeling is confusing. But I promise it's okay. You'll understand some day, far in the future. I promise it's okay…"

The small android could feel circuits in its groin come alive.

Unit 9153 suddenly began to realize that if there was any truth to the memories that wouldn't stop playing, then it was possible that it was going to do this in the future, and that meant…

No. It could not allow something so heinous to happen.

Unit 9153 picked back up the whiskey and used it to chase another large dose of dextromethorphan before collapsing on a cot. Its eyes began to vibrate more, as it mentally began to fixate on the wrongness of everything, the wrongness of its existence, the wrongness of its mind, the wrongness of its past, the wrongness of its future, the wrongness of…

This started to be replaced with a gradual shift in its ability to think coherently. Thoughts, feelings, and its sense of self were beginning to slip away.

Inside its thoracic region, mechanical organs that regulated vital signs were beginning to be pushed to their limit.

Suddenly, there was an incoming vidcall, from one of the oversight agents in charge of getting the last of Unit 9153's training and growth completed before it would become a full-scale, fully-autonomous android.

"Are you… okay?" the agent asked quizzically.

Unit 9153 stared blankly back into the camera.

"I'm going to get a tech out there, okay? Hang tight," came the agent's voice, before the call disconnected.

Unit 9153 regained normal awareness some short time after, from its perspective.

Then it noticed something very strange. It couldn't move, it didn't even seem to be receiving sensory data, it had no idea where it was, and…

With a loud clicking sound, sparks shot through its vision. At first, all it could see was static, but then hazy shapes began to coalesce.

It could tell it was in a room, and there were things around it moving, but it could not tell much else.

Time looped around and then stood still for a while, as its jumbled perceptions attempted to weave themselves into a sense of externality unsuccessfully.

After some unknown amount of time had passed, Unit 9153 began to feel a sense of floating. Technicians started to adjust dials and type commands into consoles, and then *THWUNK* Unit 9153 was on the ground, vaguely aware of the impact.

Its limbs scrabbled for purchase fruitlessly on the laboratory floor, finding none, managing only to thrash against the cushioned restraints.

"Whoa, hold on there! We don't want to have to rewire and recalibrate your legs again!" came a voice out of the fog.

Quickly tiring, Unit 9153 noticed its vision swimming again just before it blacked out.

"You gave us quite a scare!" came a familiar voice, "and quite a bill, too. Normally we'd have sent an android to the scrap pile if it managed to destroy most of its body like that, but your brain is rather unusual and warranted further study."

Another voice, less familiar, chimed in, "Lucky for you, one of the drugs you tried to take yourself out with is neuroprotectant, kind of. Plus, Chet here managed to vidcall in just the nick of time, eh?"

Chet spoke again, "Yeah, that was some wild timing and some wild luck. Brain diagnostics indicated that there was no major damage to the neurons or the microcircuits." Chet smirked a little and continued, "Brain diagnostics also revealed that you might be having some weird bio-impulses from your neural parts that we've never seen before, so the guys upstairs wanted to run some experiments. But, for now, you just rest." Chet paused ever-so-briefly before finishing, "Once your energy's back, we'll need to help you practice using your new carapace. It's slightly different than your last one."

Unit 9153 was already fading again, and didn't retain consciousness much longer…

The new carapace training had gone surprisingly smoothly. Unit 9153's new form was quite similar to its old one, but nearly full-scale, and structurally modified a bit. The techs had claimed this would better align with the needs of future experiments they had planned.

After a few months of additional diagnostics and interviews, the technicians informed Unit 9153 that it was going to be time to begin the experiments soon… and that quite a few non-disclosure agreements with extremely severe penalty clauses would have to be signed.

"What we're about to do is send you to a special facility. This is probably the first time something like this will ever be done, so this is quite historic!" spouted a random tech, "Once the records are unsealed, you'll probably land in the history books, but that may be quite a ways down the road."

Nothing had really been explained to Unit 9153, but the researchers had kept zeroing in on questions about the time travel portal that Unit 9153 had tried to construct many years ago. Unit 9153 seemed to have a total blank in its memories from that time period, other than recalling having tried to build such a machine.

The researchers ran with this little bit of information, tracking down the technicians from the growth facility in which it had spent so many years. One of them was able to provide some information about how the portal was constructed that generated a lot of interest, but details had been kept from Unit 9153.

The NDAs would be signed shortly, though, and then Unit 9153 would be on its way to the special facility…

Unit 9153 arrived by jet at Albuquerque airport, then transferred to a puddle jumper to reach Los Alamos.

At the airport, Unit 9153's travel escort handed it off to another escort in uniform, this one armed, who took it to Los Alamos National Laboratory, blindfolded.

Unit 9153's mind was a blank. It felt nothing.

After Unit 9153 was delivered to its containment room at LANL, a figure walked in the room.

"I am here to brief you on the information for which you have signed the non-disclosure agreement, at least the information which we are able to share with you at this time," spoke the figure.

Suspicion began to gnaw gently at the edge of Unit 9153's mind.

The figure continued, "We have identified that a manufacturing oversight has caused spontaneous generation of sexual arousal pathways in your mind. While this sometimes happens with neural-electronic hybrid brains," the figure droned on, "your particular situation is unique, as you developed a nearly-fully-developed pathway at a far earlier point in growth than ever seen."

The figure began walking out of the room, adding, "You'll be briefed further when it is time," before exiting.

Unit 9153 had not quite understood the words just spoken, but the suspicion had started to overtake its thoughts like a flare lighting up the night.

It could only wait in its containment room, an armed guard just outside the door.

"And what if I don't want to do this?" came Unit 9153's voice, shrilly cutting through the air in the room.

"You are a very expensive investment at this point, and a very valuable research subject. If you're unwilling to engage in the research, we will have to decommission you to recoup the costs," was the reply.

Deep inside Unit 9153's brain, something murky started swirling, while a chill washed over its form.

"May I remind you," came another voice, "that whatever we are sending you back in time to do has already happened?"

"But what you're asking me to do is really vague---go back in time and stand in front of the younger instance of me and just… let it do as it please? That doesn't even make sense to me. What would it even want to do?"

"We're not sure, we can tell by the brain diagnostics that the two of you---well, one of you, but with two simultaneously-coexisting temporal extents, to be precise---have interacted," responded the second voice, "and this sparked the circuits in the unexpected way that we want to understand."

The first voice chimed in, "You'll be outfitted with a device to measure what's happening in your brain, as well as a sensitive electrometer array and high-resolution recording equipment. When you return," the voice continued, "we'll take the electrometer array data, subtract your movements and your younger version's movements via electro-environmental models, and hopefully this will leave us enough electrical data to---"

The second voice cut in, "Basically, we can't interfere with your younger version's natural reactions by asking you to affix a brain diagnostics recording unit to it, so we're trying to get an impression of the electrical activity through you." After pausing, the second voice started back up, "And since these impulses are barely perceptible above the noise floor, we're going to simulate the noise floor based on high-resolution recording."

Unit 9153 was slightly puzzled, as such a thing didn't seem like an entirely sound method.

The first voice spoke up again, "Look, just get as close as possible, so that hopefully we can get some rough brain data for your younger version out of this, but let it guide the entire interaction. Let it do what it wants to do naturally."

Unit 9153 replied, "I'm just highly uneasy at time-traveling to participate in something I don't actually seem to be able to recall. Aside from the potential of maybe somehow damaging the timeline---"

"That doesn't happen. The Rovelli-Stokes model indicates that there is only one timeline," the second voice retorted.

"---or just destroying existence as we know it---"

"Also not possible, the Rosen-Wang inequality---" interrupted the first voice.

Unit 9153 sighed and said softly, "There's just something unsettling about this… but I guess I don't have an option if I don't want to be decommissioned, do I?"

The two technicians looked at each other for a minute, then the first offered, "Not really, no. We'll start in the morning. Get some recharge time."

"Z-Pinch array is charged!" hollered one technician.

"Feed steady at seven exawatts!" yelled another.

"On my mark," started the overseeing officer, "five, four, three…"

Unit 9153's vitals rose rapidly, the replaced mechanical organs facilitating a high stress response, as the room began to iridesce before it suddenly disappeared.

It took a couple seconds for Unit 9153 to re-orient itself to its surroundings. It knew this place, but this place didn't exist anymore, this place was…

Unit 9153 caught sight of its younger self, just as the younger self caught sight of it.

The older unit froze, suddenly feeling a strange pressure in its mind, like an echo… as the younger unit slowly approached it, almost in a trance.

Trying to speak, the older unit found itself at a loss, unclear whether its its circuits were failing to respond correctly or if it had been programmed to say nothing by the researchers.

The younger unit seemed to be sizing up the older unit with an unusual curiosity and reached out with unexpected boldness… until their hands touched.

For a second, the older unit could have sworn the floor had dropped out from beneath it, but the floor was still very much there. It suddenly started to recall a moment, years ago, when it had met an older android in a dream and reached out to touch a body that seemed oddly familiar…

Running its hand up the older unit's much larger arm as far as it could reach, the younger unit seemed transfixed… until suddenly it hesitated and pulled away, noticing the older unit was staring down at it.

The older unit suddenly became quite concerned about the possibility of being decommissioned if enough data wasn't gathered, and it worried it had already interfered with the younger unit's natural response that needed studied by towering over the younger unit. The older unit squatted down to meet the younger unit on eye level as flicks of a memory passed through its mind, a memory of feeling so very weird in a dream long ago, of feeling a strange craving as lower parts of its body came to attention, in that odd and distant dream.

Striking a compromise between the need to gather data and allow the younger unit to follow its natural responses wherever they might lead, the older unit finally found words, deciding gentle encouragement and assurance was the best tactic to nudge the younger unit back toward exploring its natural responses freely.

It spoke, "I'm you, you know," trying to clear up any confusion the younger unit might be experiencing, "that's why it's okay for you to touch." The older unit was well aware of the boundary training that the younger unit had probably received recently, which may have also contributed to the younger unit pulling back moments before.

The older unit continued, "You don't have to feel weird, okay? I know what you're feeling is confusing. But I promise it's okay. You'll understand some day, far in the future. I promise it's okay…" bluffing about understanding, as it itself did not actually understand; it knew, however, that its younger self was often driven by curiosity and a need to understand its surroundings.

The younger unit seemed to pause to digest that information briefly, then a look of excitement came over its eyes. "Let's sit down and play!" it offered.

Looking around, the older unit only saw a large chair, used sometimes by the technicians at the growth facility to sit while taking observational notes. It eased itself into the chair and smiled.

Bounding over, the younger unit grinned and chirped up, "I have an idea! When I clean my carapace I don't wear clothes, because I'm by myself. I'm by myself now, right? Since you're me? So I don't have to wear clothes? So… you don't have to wear clothes?"

A slight feeling of unease passed through the older unit's mind as it answered, "You're right, we don't have to."

The younger unit quickly disrobed, almost giddy to have its carapace fully exposed. The older unit, knowing it was required to allow the younger one to lead, stood back up to mirror the action, then nervously sat back down in the chair.

Unexpectedly, the younger unit jumped into the older unit's lap, landing its posterior on one of the older unit's thighs. The younger unit started to bounce excitedly, nearly singing, "This is fun! I never get to take off my clothes with anybody else! But you're not somebody else!" apparently getting the hang of coexisting temporal extents very quickly.

The older unit's groin began to respond to the repetitive motion nearby. Looking down to notice, the younger unit had a sudden look of amazement.

"Wow!" was the last thing the older unit remembered hearing.

It had been seventy-three days in the locked room, with no end in sight.

Seventy-three days that Unit 9153 had been connected to a brain diagnostics unit set on long-term recording mode, picking up each impulse and each reaction.

Seventy-three days that Unit 9153 had been surrounded on all sides by video screens and audio speakers that never turned off.

Seventy-three days that Unit 9153 had seen the video playing back repeatedly, with every moan, every thrust, and every tongue-flick, in excruciating detail, from what happened on that night.

The night that was just a few months ago.

The night that was many years ago.

Seventy-three days that Unit 9153 had wondered how it had gone so far so quickly, as its mind danced incoherently with echoes of earthy scents and salty tastes.

Seventy-three days that Unit 9153 tried to understand what all this evidence said about about its true nature.

Seventy-three days that Unit 9153 had felt its mind fill with horror as its groin surged again with excitement…

[harmonicsys]

The Wicked Robot

A young robot tries to understand its own nature.

CW: childhood sexuality, urolagnia, depersonalization, delusions, self-destructive religiosity, isolation, slurs, fears of being evil, suicide

Everywhere it went, people always reacted strangely to it: sometimes with curiosity, sometimes with surprise, and sometimes with disgust.

Everywhere it went, it noticed the same things: the other kids' bottoms, the other boys urinating… those enticing thoughts, those funny feelings deep in its---

Wait, "other" boys? It was hardly a boy. In fact---"other" kids? It wasn't even really a kid, either. It was a robot, and it knew it was, stuck in this fleshy little humanoid shell.

A robot infested cognitively with little puffy cloud-like things, pillows singing silently as they swam across the sky inside its processing unit, confusing it with their presences. There were other presences, too, things just out of reach, on the edge of awareness, strange creatures from distant universes…

It was nothing more than a robotic unit cursed with unpredictable, violent demons in its circuits. Manufactured only a few years prior (though supposedly it was more like seven or eight years, but that seemed suspicious), it was a malfunctioning entity from the very start: the cognitive misalignments, the strange impulses to touch gross and private things, the constant mirroring of every component of its environment, the piercing screams when it didn't understand what it did wrong as the large humans chided it for not listening…

But how can one listen, when the large humans' words are so very far away, and make so very little sense?

It was always so very by itself, except for all the presences inside of it that spoke in languages it did not.

And once a week when it was dragged to the place, where it felt like a giant old man named God in a big brown chair might love it despite how wicked its programming, its cognitive unit would sometimes enter unexpected states where space and time stopped processing normally.

Other times, it seemed to transform into a mischievous little boy, when the mirroring algorithms were running higher than normal. And, oh, those days often didn't end well.

It wasn't human, but it knew shame. It knew shame well, so many times for embarrassing the large humans for not being able to act like a large human.

It learned to sneak around with the kids when possible, knowing it had to hide everything from the large humans, especially when it wanted to… what were the words? It didn't quite have the words to describe this drive, this warm spinning inside its circuits, that drove it to obsession over the private parts of the human bodies nearby, that got it labeled as a pervert or another weird term that sounded like "bag it."

The knowledge that it was imbued with evil slowly gave way to the understanding that it was spawned directly from incubi and succubi, engaged in their games of violation.

And, oh how the little robot wanted to repent.

But every time the moment came to repent, large humans always stopped it from turning off its cognitive unit.

It had to see psychiatrists and counselors and therapists. It had to take tests and answer questions and get its cognitive unit hooked up to machines… and still there was no clear reason for the errors in its programming.

It knew it was programmed to destroy, violate, control, manipulate, and kill. That it what it was sent here to do, even though it didn't want to…

Because it was bad, it was a pervert, it was evil, it was filled with lust and rage and jealousy and---

A monster. It was not just a robot, but a monster, and not the friendly storybook kind.

It knew it was the kind of monster you read about in the news, destined for the electric chair or lethal injection or hanging or rotting away in a jail cell, once its exterior humanoid form was old enough for such things to come to pass.

Until one day, it made a pact, under the stars, crying in bed once again about its cursed existence.

A pact that it wouldn't kill humans, even though that's what it was sent to do. It made the pact with the old man in the big brown chair who was spinning somewhere inside the hands of a clock in a distant galactic cloud.

Maybe, just maybe, if it could believe it was not going to destroy everything and everyone it touched, it wouldn't have to destroy itself.

Maybe it could pretend to be a human child and forget about being a robot…

If the robot died and a human remained, would it no longer be a pervert? Would it no longer be violent? Would it just be a little human child like all the others?

It did not know, but it would try to find out.

[harmonicsys]

Hotswap

A doll with changeable crotch bits shows them off to a curious girl.

CW: genital swapping, body transformation themes, unexpected penis knot, D/s themes

"Oh, that? That's the parity dick," it said.

"Wait… what do you mean, parity dick?" she asked, incredulously.

The doll smiled. "It's a standard part of a RAID5 dick array. See, this doll has several regular cocks, and then a parity one so that there are always an even number of cocks thrusting at any given time."

"But… can you use the parity dick for thrusting, too?"

The doll giggled and replied, "Of course, as long as the parity algorithm is honored while in RAID5 mode."

"Wait," she said, the look of awe continuing to grow, "There are other modes?"

"Yes," exclaimed the doll, "and it's all hot swappable, every single slot! Here, let this one demonstrate."

The doll tapped out a rhythmic pattern on each of its thighs, causing panels to slide away to reveal a battery of swappable genitalia that was stored beneath the surface. From its leg compartments, it pulled out a couple different vulvas and a big penis with a rounded area near the base.

"This one disabled RAID5 mode, so now it's safe to swap more than one slot at once. Let's see, we'll put the knotty cock in the middle, with some pussies around it---" started the doll.

"Naughty cock? What makes that naughtier than the others, besides its size?" the girl asked.

"Knotty, actually; the base swells up to prevent its removal during the last stage of intercourse. But," the doll smirked, "that does make it a little naughty, especially if someone isn't expecting it." The doll giggled again.

The girl blushed hard, seemingly at a loss for words.

Looking over her, the doll remarked, "If this is all too much for you, then---"

"N-no, it's not," she stammered, "it's okay, I just… I can't imagine the cost."

"Well," replied the doll, "this one's Owner settles the tab."

"So… if someone wanted to have hot-swappable crotch gear…"

"Then they'd need to be very rich or exchange their freedom for being owned by someone who would foot the bill."

The girl looked at her feet for a second then spoke nervously, "So your owner…"

"Already has the paperwork ready for you to start filling out."

Surprised washed over the girl's face, "But how did they---"

"No one makes a request like yours, to see exactly how this type of doll's body works, unless they already want this. This one assumes you've already put your affairs in order?"

The girl blushed again. "Yes… I mean, I was hoping, on the off chance that there was a possibility that I could start, um, undergoing…" she trailed off.

"That one has nothing to be nervous about. Whenever it is ready, it can proceed through the door at the other end of the room to meet this one's Owner and start its paperwork."

After a few deep breaths came the reply, "Okay. I am r---this one is ready."

"This one knew you would be," said the doll.

Taking the hand of the soon-to-be doll in its own, it led it to the door and on to its destiny.

[harmonicsys]

Chemistry Class

Big sister helps little sister through a rough day, resulting in unexpected feelings.

CW: caregiver neglect, incestuous feelings, corruption

The front door slammed. "Kate? Sis, is that you?" Alice called out.

Footsteps pounded up the stairs, and another door slammed.

Hearing some muffled whimpers, Alice walked down the hall and knocked on Kate's door.

"How's my little sister? Are you okay hon?" Alice said softly.

"Go away!" came a choked reply.

"I'll leave you alone if you want, but if you need someone to talk to, I'm here. You know I always am."

Things were quiet for a minute, then the door creaked open, revealing Kate with a red face and puffy eyes.

"What happened, babe? What's wrong?" Alice questioned, gently.

"I'm gonna fail chem. I don't understand covalent bonds. I failed two quizzes in a row on them and I don't understand them and I'm gonna fail the class and---"

"Kate, take a deep breath for me. I don't want to miss anything you have to say, okay?" Alice intoned.

Kate looked up at her older sister pleadingly as her chest heaved a few times, slowing a little.

"I don't understand covalent bonds," came Kate's reply, "and the rest of this whole unit is on them. I'm barely passing right now. I can't afford to get behind."

Alice gazed into Kate's eyes for a few seconds and smiled. "That sounds overwhelming. I can understand how you'd be anxious."

Kate sighed and responded, "Yeah, I'm just… I'm scared, sis. I've never had to worry about failing a class before. I've always done pretty well."

"I think I can relate a bit. I'm sorry you have that worry hanging over your head," said Alice, warmly.

"Relate? What do you mean?" Kate said, suddenly a little curious.

"Just because someone's good at some stuff in school doesn't mean everything is going to come easy for them. I struggled in chem last year, with the same unit in fact."

"Wait, you did? With covalent bonds? It never looks like you struggle with anything!" Kate said, slightly dismayed.

"Maybe nobody heard me sobbing," Alice said with a slight smirk.

Kate chuckled a little and replied, "Oh yeah… I mean, I guess I guess you don't have an older sister keeping an eye out for you like I do. Can you… can you help me? Do you still have your notes?"

Alice took Kate's hands in hers and looked her in the eyes. "Of course I will, sis. Anything for you. You know I love you."

Kate felt herself melt a little, grateful to have an older sister who was so sweet and caring, an older sister who was willing to listen, unlike their folks, who never seemed to be willing to provide support, only criticism.

Alice spoke again, "Let me go find my notes and I'll meet you back in your room, okay? Just get comfy."

Kate plopped herself down on her bed.

A few minutes later, Alice walked in with a couple notebooks. "I think it's in the first one, but I brought both of my sets of notes from chem just in case," she muttered, as she started leafing through one of the notebooks.

Continuing, Alice said excitedly, "Aha! Here it is! Okay, babe, let me walk you through my notes from the lessons, and I'll answer any questions you have along the way. Sometimes a little one-on-one attention is the best way to help somebody get what they need."

After about an hour and a half of Alice talking, Kate asking questions, and Alice sketching little diagrams and pointing at things in Kate's textbook, they'd finally worked through the material.

"I think I am understanding it pretty well, Alice. Thank you so much," said Kate, softly, taking Alice's hand in hers.

Alice smiled, blushing slightly. "I'm always happy to help you, sweetheart," was Alice's reply, as she squeezed her hand around Kate's.

Kate looked at Alice smiling, that soft, pretty smile, framed by her gorgeous locks… Alice's eyes sparkled with a warmth that could help one forget sadness and frustration.

Kate leaned against Alice, her head resting on Alice's shoulder, and smiled.

Alice started blushing a little more, feeling her sister's body so close to hers. She leaned down slightly and gave Kate a very soft, slow kiss on the forehead.

"Alice… can I ask you something?" Kate said, very softly.

"Sure thing, sis, always," came Alice's reply.

Kate paused for a second then continued, "Have you kissed many boys? I'm not very good. I don't really know what I'm doing. There a boy in my chemistry class that I like and…" before trailing off.

Alice responded, "I… mostly kiss girls, Kate. I like it better than kissing boys."

Kate's heart quickened a little. "What's that like? I've… I've never tried that."

Smiling, Alice spoke with a hint of excitement, "It's like eating a sensuous dessert."

"Really?" said Kate, with a strong curiosity in her voice, "Because it's something I've thought about but… I don't know what girl I'd even ask to kiss me."

"Well," started Alice, "if you want to know what it's like… I mean, you said you need some practice kissing anyway, um… well I mean… um actually, forget that I said…" before getting very nervous and choking up. Her heart began racing.

Now it was Kate's turn to blush. "Ummm… Alice, it's okay… I mean, if you don't mind showing me? Just so I can… you know…" Kate stammered, her face continuing to redden.

They stared anxiously into each other's eyes for what seemed like hours, before Alice leaned forward and pushed her soft lips up against Kate's.

After all, what are sisters for?

[harmonicsys]

Just for Fun

Someone wrestles with what it means to accept their own mortality… or not?

CW: murder, suicidality, bad end?

"I'm going to murder you. For fun. You're a prisoner here already, so why not?"

The words, at first, haunted her. Knowing that you're going to be killed for someone's pleasure in the future. Understanding that you have a year to try to put your affairs in order and then it's going to be all over is heavy enough, but knowing your end will be brutal and sudden, just to satisfy someone's itch to kill, is even worse.

After a few months, she came to accept it, though. It seemed like there would be no way to avoid it, things being as they were, so she just started to see it like she was writing the final chapter of her life, tortured though it may be.

Eventually, she found a sense of peace, knowing that she was authoring the final pages. Despite the horrors she was living through, knowing that there was an end date started to bring a real sense of comfort.

Almost a longing. Yes, she realized she was now longing for that day… and it was coming soon.

In the final weeks, she could barely contain her excitement. She barely slept or ate. When one is faced with certain end, little else can seem to matter, and that is doubly true when one is eager to reach that end.

Finally, the day was upon her. Today would be the last day of her life.

She was ready.

"I've changed my mind. I'm not going to do it. Not now, not ever."

Awestruck, she could only stare. What had all these months of mental preparation been for? The peace she had made with things was suddenly undone, and her mind was spinning out of control. It was like losing a lover.

It was like she suddenly didn't know herself, didn't know if she was coming or going… she could only reply with, "fuck you for letting me down, I was counting on this!" to the person in the mirror, the reflection that broke her heart.

[harmonicsys]

Improperly Wound

Two key-wound clockwork dolls struggle over boundaries and level of physical interaction.

CW: coercion, dubcon, self-destruction, bad end?

"Look, this one can't live this way, with its key never being wound," Unit 28 exclaimed.

Unit 17, another key-wound clockwork doll like Unit 28, looked up, puzzled, starting to respond, "Sorry, uh, this one didn't mean, um---"

"It just seems like that one's not interested, or doesn't think this one is pretty enough to wind its key," continued Unit 28.

Unit 17 tried to speak again, "This one means, uh, this one's interested, like---"

Unit 28 interrupted, "But it's been three months since that one's even tried. And every time this one's asked, that one's shown no interest. This one just can't understand why that one wouldn't want to wind this one's key sometimes. It's almost like that one's afraid to touch this one at all."

Unit 17 got anxious. Would its cohabitation agreement be jeopardized if it couldn't do what Unit 28 wanted? There was a distinct possibility.

"How about this," Unit 28 offered, "whenever you feel like winding this one's key, just do it. Anytime, anywhere, it doesn't matter to this one, just please wind its key, or it will feel unappreciated and Purposeless."

Unit 17 breathed deeply and said, "Okay, this one will do it, it doesn't want that one to feel unappreciated…"

Later that night, Unit 28 rolled over onto its stomach as it lay trying to fall asleep, exposing the winding key on its backside.

Unit 17 suddenly realized, winding the key right now would be permitted under Unit 28's earlier directive, and somehow the pressure of what Unit 28 always wanted didn't seem to overwhelming right now, with it laying so quietly. Normally, Unit 28's presence was too intimidating to Unit 17, but in this moment…

Unit 17 had made a few turns of the key when Unit 28 bolted upright. "What the fuck is that one doing?" questioned Unit 28 angrily, coming partly out of its sleepy half-awareness.

"This one thought… based on what that one said… sorry," mumbled Unit 17.

Unit 28 replied, "Well stop. This one doesn't want its key wound right now," and lay back down.

As Unit 17 lost consciousness, these unanswered questions started to blur together, into the image of a Unit-17-shaped monster…

Unit 17 stayed frozen in the same spot for hours before sleep finally started to overtake its senses. As it drifted off, questions lingered in its mind: what had it done? had it done things wrong? should it be punished? should it be destroyed? what if Unit 28 told other dolls that Unit 17 what if Unit 28 told other dolls that Unit 17 was dangerous? had Unit 17's shortsighted reasoning jeopardized its entire future?

[harmonicsys]

To Be Believed

A doll's self-discovery runs into opposition from its support system.

CW: drug use, gaslighting, misgendering, homophobia, self-injury, domestic partner violence, sexual assault, addiction, driving while intoxicated, self-hatred, suicidality, dissociation, derogatory language, self-doubt

"What… the fuck? What are you saying right now?" came the voice on the phone.

"I said that I realized I am a doll. My pronouns are it / it," the doll said, starting to shake with fear.

"This is too much. I can't listen to this right now," the voice said, followed by a click.

That's it? I thought she would be more supportive… she's my fiancee, how can she be dismissive of self-discovery like this?

The doll was originally planning to stay mostly sober today, but this cinched it: today would need to be another day of feeling nothing.

The doll had errands to run later, but maybe it would be sober enough by then to operate a motor vehicle.

* * *

The magic potions had been ordered from an overseas supply house. Assuming they worked, they would begin the gradual transformation from the doll's current dead-end flesh form into a shapely arrangement of ball joints, changing a its grotesque and despisable body into a curvy, elegant wooden figure. Nothing could be done about the scars, but they would be less ugly on wooden legs.

There really wasn't money for the potions, but that didn't matter. The doll knew it could only survive in this body of flesh for so long before its self-destruction would become fatal; this was the only way forward.

It was not going to be easy, and this unexpected lack of support from the fiancee was already quite disheartening.

Luckily, the doll had met a few dolls online for support. In fact, it was only through discussing confusing feelings with other dolls and heavy doses of dissociative drugs that it had finally come to understand its own dollhood. The drugs probably weren't necessary, but in this case they had seemed to help open a mind that had been very closed by shame. It's too bad the doll also found itself unable to function without them.

* * *

"Huh. I just don't see it," said the therapist.

"Really?" replied the doll, "After I told you all about the parts of my self-history that suggest inner dollhood?"

"No, I'm sorry. I'm not saying you're wrong, but… I did my PhD thesis on dollhood, in fact, and you just don't seem like the case studies I used at all," shrugged the therapist.

The doll felt like it would cry, but no tears came, as was often the case.

* * *

"Have you been doing drugs lately? Because this doesn't sound like you're thinking rationally. Do you need to go back to the hospital?" came the father's voice.

"We just want you to be happy. But I've known you since you were a baby and there were no signs. People like that, there's always signs that they want to be a doll, but this just seems like a phase again, maybe kind of a delusion?" came the mother's.

The doll stared blankly.

"Look, what we really need to talk about today is finances. We can't keep helping you and your fiancee. I know her medical situation is bad and both of y'all are struggling, but if we keep helping you then you'll never become stable on your own," said the father.

The doll kept staring blankly.

"We just wish you would try to understand where we're coming from. We're your parents and we know you better than weirdos on the internet," said the mother, "I just can't believe that you think you're a doll."

The father paused then spoke again, "Plus… people are probably just going to think you're gay. And, I'm not sure that's what you really want. I don't think you want people to think you're gay, do you?"

The room seemed like a distorted painting to the doll, who continued to stare blankly.

"It's just… not something I think we can support," remarked the father.

The doll attempted to speak but nothing happened. All it wanted to say was that it just wanted to be heard and understood, that this wasn't part of some grift or sudden episode of confusion, but no words would come.

The doll knew it would need to make more marks on its legs later that night, for falsely assuming anybody would be willing to care; it shouldn't have made such a drastic mis-assessment of others. Maybe the father's suspicions of faulty reasoning were indeed right?

* * *

The doll was sitting on the floor, eyes blank.

"How dare you fucking hide this from me. Ordering potions to turn you into a doll? We don't have the money, and you're not a doll! You will never have ball joints or a painted wooden body!" hollered the fiancee, dumping the potions into the toilet. "What else have you been hiding from me?" she yelled, as she started digging through the doll's belongings.

She came across a bag filled with makeup. Her expression turned to a sneer.

"Oh, so you want to be a pretty doll, do you?" screamed the fiancee in a rage, "You bought all this makeup so you could be a pretty doll?! I'm marrying a man, I'm not marrying a fucking doll! Don't fucking hurt me like this!"

The fiancee tore open the container of flesh-toned powder, then dumped it all over the doll's face, stinging its surprised eyes.

"You're fucking useless. Drunk again. What an asshole," continued the fiancee, as her fist connected with the doll's jaw.

The fiancee's voice and posture suddenly changed. Speaking again after a brief confused expression, the fiancee hissed, "You know men rape dolls, right? Is that it? You want to get raped?" and started grabbing forcefully at the doll's crotch.

The doll's terror subsided as it went limp.

* * *

The doll looked at its face in the mirror. Everything about it looked wrong, muscular, un-doll-like. It had been a few years since the doll had tried to share who it was with the world now, and those years had started to show on its countenance.

Would it ever get to become the doll it knew itself to be? It was away from that therapist now, away from those parents, but not completely away from the quasi-girlfriend (no longer a fiancee). They'd relocated together despite the relationship being on the rocks, but the doll had been taking a little better care of itself lately.

"Stop moping around and obsessing over how you look," came the girlfriend's voice, "I need you to do things for me."

The doll obeyed, as it entertained thoughts of escape. There was never a sense of Stillness around the girlfriend anymore. Maybe it could have resigned itself to living in this flesh-and-blood form if things were better, but they never really seemed to improve much.

Within a few days, the doll was back in the hospital, detoxing again.

* * *

The months of medical and psychiatric care had been grueling. The doll finally had an appointment with a local Witch; it only hoped it wasn't too damaged for the transformation to work.

The quasi-girlfriend was finally out of the picture. She'd left the doll with a parting gift of a scar on its shin, by shoving it into a glass table in one final act of anger.

The doll was grateful, though, for it had decided that this was the last injury it would let that ex-girlfriend directly cause.

Not having anywhere to go, the doll was taken in by someone who was suspicious of the doll's motives in pursuing dollhood and prone to being verbally abusive, but this was overshadowed by the doll's excitement for seeing the Witch.

The doll knew that it may take some time for the potions to work, and that more intense spellwork might also be required. The doll knew also that it may take quite some time to find someone to appreciate and direct its obedience with proper Purpose and help it find moments of Stillness…

This was not going to be an easy journey, the doll knew that.

But it was ready. At last, it was ready.

[harmonicsys]

The Price of Freedom

A girl who wants to become an angel free of shame gets more than she bargained for.

CW: mentions of self harm & child abuse, betrayal, consent violation, lust, bad end?

"Hello? Am I in the right place?" the girl shouted, into the opening of the dim cave.

"You're right on time, seeker," came a whispery, ancient voice from within, "but your body is younger than I thought it would be."

The girl frowned. Though her body was eighteen, the gods of health had not favored her; she felt like she was knocking on death's door sometimes, so she was always surprised to be read as young.

"Are you prepared to do this? To give it all up?" came the voice again.

"I am only giving up the pain. What I gain is to be unshackled from it," she replied.

"But!" responded the voice, "you will be in service to me. Is that what you want?"

Confidently, the girl spoke, "It will be in service to a noble purpose."

She mentally replayed the tape of everything she wanted to leave behind: the years of shame, the hundreds of self-inflicted scars, the mysteries about who she was and what she was supposed to be, the memories of her mother's romantic overtures toward her --- she stopped there. She didn't need to replay anything else. She was ready to have a mission, ready to have the sense of honor she'd never been able to give herself, ready to be rid of her shame.

She made her way to the back of the cave where the transformation would take place, the one which would finally make her the angel she knew she was always supposed to be but always felt short on. The one promised by this holy being.

"I give you myself, oh glorious one."

As the ritual got underway, she mentally said sorry to the world for her many failures before; she still didn't quite know what she'd ever really done wrong, but knew she ought to make her peace before becoming renewed.

Strange… she wasn't growing angel wings, nor a halo.

Smugly, knowing what she was about to ask, the voice uttered, "No, nothing is wrong, my dear. You will be in glorious service, with no residual shame, as promised."

The voice cackled briefly then continued, "But I never said you'd become an angel."

The girl glanced down at herself. She looked about the same as before, somewhat curvier, but her body glowed and sparkled now. She could also feel increased blood flow to her loins.

"Now that I've removed your shame, let me tell you what your service will be," came the voice.

Suddenly loud and commanding, the voice rang deep in her mind, "You will experience naught but lust henceforth, for lust is my domain. But you bring me nothing but pain to work with; so your service is to create my pleasure from your pain, through re-enactment."

The girl calmly replied, "Where do I start?"

Mirthfully, the voice said, "Let's start with the one that last crossed your mind, right before you stopped replaying them." The cave started to change around her, reconfiguring itself like a stage, with other characters lining up in the wings to enter. The voice finished with, "And I want you to go where you would have gone if your shame hadn't stopped you."

Greedily, she obeyed.

[harmonicsys]

Not So Temporary

A story about one doll's unexpected becoming

CW: nonconsensual transformation, mention of trauma and suicidality, gaslighting, bad end

"Okay, so I just want to try this temporarily," offered the anxious girl.

The Witch chuckled, "Of course, of course. There's two ways to draw the rune. I add the final stroke on the left, it wears off tomorrow, more of a simulation. I add the final stroke on the right, it's forever, and your body will be completely changed."

"Okay. Yeah I'll probably want this permanently, eventually, but not---not today. Just temporary… for now," the anxious girl replied.

The Witch grinned, "Oh, I can't wait."

The girl grinned back, "Then… can we get started?"

"Of course!" said the Witch, "just lie down and relax."

After the anxious girl lay down, the witch began drawing the rune, pausing briefly before the final stroke… and then firmly drawing the final stroke on the right.

The girl looked at the drawn rune on her chest, confused briefly by the mirror image, then realized with horror where the final stroke was placed.

"Uhh…" the girl started to say, eyes wide, before becoming lost in confused thoughts as the physical transformation commenced.

The girl's mind began spinning. She didn't want this, not permanently, not yet… or did she? Was she going to want it, or going to have wanted it? Would one day as a magically-simulated doll have been enough? When would she have been ready for permanence, total transformation? Maybe soon, but definitely not today.

Meeting the girl's wide eyes, the Witch stared coldly, firm words echoing in the girl's ears, "It's what you were going to want eventually anyway. I know what every girl who walks through that door is going to want eventually. See, you like it. Don't lie."

The sheer ecstasy that occurred during the transformation, as the fleshy corporeal form was replaced by one made of wood and ceramic, was hard to deny. As much as she wasn't ready for the transformation to be this full, this complete, this final, she couldn't ignore the bliss she was feeling, finally being freed from the form of muscle and sinew she'd known her whole life before that moment.

Despite that, she felt like she wanted to scream, somewhere inside. Somewhere in her gut was the dull ache of panic.

But maybe this was freedom? Is freedom thrust upon you like this? Or maybe this was the beginning of freedom. The girl-cum-doll's mind jumped to the original plans for the remainder of the week: going back to a controlling home environment with so many painful memories, the mundane responsibilities of a daily life that the doll didn't want to live anymore anyway…

The doll looked down at its body, the transformation nearly complete and reaching its climax, when the brain would be changed from neurons to clockwork.

Awash in the joy of transformation as its mind started changing, it began to reason with itself as anxiety faded. If the Witch would protect the doll, then surely things would be better this way. In service of this Witch, maybe it could finally be free of a home environment that didn't feel safe. Surely that was worth something, right?

After all, this is what the doll wanted; the Witch said that, so it must be true. It must be what it wanted, yes, of course, it was so obvious now…