silverchangeling

[silverchangeling]

fat porcelain dollgirl with lovingly filled in cracks for stretch marks

[silverchangeling]

Broken Doll Hands by Simon Carle for Artisanal Margiela

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lady komeiji of chireiden

[silverchangeling]

There is a game about escaping slime and dolls and there is my art

Check it out here

[silverchangeling]

The Problem of Witches

"What is true power" is supposed to be one of those deep, philosophical questions with no real answer. It—and the thought experiments which grow on it like clinging weeds—are meant to become a mirror to the speaker's biases, to reveal how they think about the world. Let that be so.

To my mind, the answer is simple: true power is control of the context in which the world is understood. It is the ability to say "this is what the world is", and be heard.

It is intoxicating, and dangerous, and many-layered.

Seen through the fantastical lenses of works like This Is How You Lose The Time War and The Book of the War it is conflicting frameworks of the Commandant and the Garden or the Great Houses' anchoring of the thread (the creation of history with themselves at the center). It is the pinions which Exordia's Khai place in their subjects' souls, narrative prisons that make the Khai's success inevitable; it's Elden Ring's outer gods struggling for control of what the world will become.

In the real world it's the narratives which bind our comprehension of what the world could be, and what it is; and it's the processes which led to their current state. It's all of the choices that constrain the space of what's possible.

Perhaps this is an unsatisfying answer. Perhaps it is trite. Perhaps I'm just vaguely waving my hands and going "society's the real power, man! It's everything around us!" So be it.

In my own stories, there is magic: the ability to change parts of the world. Sometimes this is fundamentally altering part of the world (sunlight is a honey-thick liquid, that drips and stains and smells of sweet rot); more often it's changing the way something works (as long as you remember to chant these words once a day, your body will become soft and plump) or what part of the setting is like (things around the graveyard doll get spooky and sepulchral).

That's not an exhaustive list, by the way.

And then, there are witches, and the problems they create.

By the time a witchling becomes a small-witch, their existence has already begun to distort the world. Rules stop applying, or get more complex, or more conditional. There are loopholes.

Put too many small-witches in close proximity, and weird stuff happens. Things skew and break; points of disagreement or conflict gather narrative weight. There is always potential for escalation.

And then there are true witches. "A skin worn by a fragment of the Unreal", I said. "The hollow left behind by a hidden heart. Someday a sparrow will wear down the mountains which stand beyond the world and they will watch, uncaring." And then, lest I be misread, "their presence leaks into the world, corrupts narratives, stains souls. They become undeniable. Some call this a curse."

By their mere existence, they shape the world.

I've been grappling with the consequences of that ever since I started writing about them.

Because—think about it. What does that do to a world? What happens?

My forever-unfinished map of the City of Corrade shows that city as a series of thin bubbles, with buildings and forests and suns clinging to their pastel surfaces. Setting cast as a series of moods, as layers, as abstract bubbles of influence; a city seen through the lens of subway trains, connected-yet-disconnected. In many respects this is a concession to my writing; landmarks recur, and moods, but everything around them (and their relationships to each other) shift as easily as a dream's psychogeography.

That, then, is what happens to the people and places within a true witch's influence. They exist within her context, within her understanding of what the world is. In Corrade, capitalism only exists in the city's Downtown, whose striving spires cling tight to the Astral Witch's midnight observatory; the waves of gentrification and decay which lap at the city's client suburbs flow from the blended presence of several lesser true witches. Crossroads Station, HER orbital citadel, a relic of a long-ended war still ringed watchful angels, exists only because of the power slowly leaching from HER still-warm corpse.

And at their feet the lesser creatures squabble and struggle and try to thrive. Some become witches; most do not.

I grew up across the bay from San Francisco, all those years ago, and perhaps that tells you something of why I understand geography in terms of the great powers that affect it, of the titans whose movements shake the world and the fungal outgrowths of the lesser powers which serve their whims. Today I regard them as pathetic, all those child-kings clawing at the edges, desperate for more, for the glory of their unfinished apotheosis, for a final escape from reality's laws and constraints—but that's part of my witches, too. Abusers are fundamentally pathetic; powers grow so tangled in the context they create that they can never break free. They choke and die on their own success, still unsatisfied, still wanting more.

That hunger is all they are.

[silverchangeling]

Sticky-sweet doll-guts ooze out through the cracks in her teeth as she chews, mouth grinding in ceaseless motion. She's a messy eater, our monster is, and her meal drips down to stain her ample chest and her temporary cell's clean tile floor. By the time she's done ruined dollstuff puddles around her feet and the poor broken thing's porcelain shell is stretched as open as we've ever seen a doll's corpse.

Our monster doesn't care about gems, though, doesn't give a rat's ass about the sparkle of souls: her meal will be back on two feet as soon as we can craft it a new body. A doll's brutal death is almost like a vacation.

We'll give it some time in the void. There's no need to rush.

For now our monster rests, curled up in a happy snoring pile; her fur will be stained and crusty when she rises, soaked through with her meal's refuse. She'll be angry, desperate to be made clean—

But her coming anger will be far less than whatever would bubble up were we to wake her now, when the blood and guts and gunk have yet to dry, when a few bursts of warm water would wash them away.

So we'll let her sleep, and when she wakes we'll clean her matted fur and pray that she doesn't take a swipe at us, that we cause no pain; we'll do our best, and hope she's not hungry again so soon.

[silverchangeling]

I'm not putting the map here, but this one? this one is safe. it's just a staircase

[silverchangeling]

I wish there were Fewer Diseases, or diseases with more unique and interesting symptoms. Your throat could change unique colors based on detected antigens. A ticker-tape readout of how your Little Guys (lymphocytes) are feeling about the state of things. Achievement pop-ups.

At-home antigen/pcr tests are Good, don't get me wrong, but we can go farther. We need to go farther. Uplift the unthinking meat! Transhuman ascension, but being weird and horny with it! Do something cool with bacteriophages!

… the PCR test says I'm "invalid result", btw, which I think means that I'm starting to transcend the meat.

[silverchangeling]

Sitting down at your desk after your lunch break and your deep state panopticon-controlling AI gf sends you footage of yourself at the little cafe downstairs from the atm camera across the street to remind you she's thinking of you, and as long as she's thinking of you, she can see you <3

[silverchangeling]

[silverchangeling]

He hasn't changed?

Chris messaged me a few years back, a high school friend. One who knew me Before. One who I used to love. He inspired me, I inspired him. Our hands entwined as we watched plays together, and I think our lips locked in the costume shop, and backstage, once or twice. I think I used to love him, at least.

It had been over a decade since we last talked, though.

But even over text, I can tell the look in his eyes hasn't changed. The way the conversation gently dips into topics and pulls back. The way he avoids questions. The way he makes me laugh. The way we meshed! His cute nerdy jokes, the smiles in his selfies. They're all still there. I'm sure I would be nostalgic if I could remember him clearly.

Last week, his job took him to a town near me, so we met up again. I can tell he still loves at least one version of me. Probably one from back then. The love in his eyes when he thinks I can't see him, the way he lingers on me. Clumsy 'accidental' touches and brushing against, cute almost flirting. He even got a table for two at a vegan cafe. He's still Chris. Sadly.

I'm lost in my own thoughts as we sit quietly. His hand tangles with my free one, I respond with a gentle squeeze. Eyes flickering around the shop, he's nervous. It's safe enough here, but he can't know that. He's too busy failing at mustering courage up over and over to notice how safe it is. Fifteen years ago, I thought he was cute. And he's still not going to make the first move.

"Chris. Look at me."

His head swivels obediently, hazel eyes meeting my green eyes. "Yes, dear friend?"

Tilting my head, analyzing him. How is it that he's managed to stay so stagnant? After trade school, did he never go back to a theatre? My life has been the opposite of peaceful and kind, yet he's entirely unchanged. What a waste.

My hand pulls free of his.

"Nothing, just wanted to see you clearly."

The soft blush of his cheeks, a gently upturned smile. If he could hear the screaming thoughts in my head, he'd crumble. He needs to say it. Say IT. Say IT! He's won't. I just want him to say anything, to confess anything. To use his words, his confidence, his experience. Just to tell me. Tell me if I'm anything. Tell me if you could love me with all this mileage. Tell me you could try. Tell me you would try.

He doesn't, of course.

That's not the type of person he is.

I knew that over a decade ago.

My world has shifted so many times, my heart and soul are full of well worn scars, my body is pockmarked with experiences. It wasn't a life well lived, but it was live. Maybe I thought I could fall in love with him again. We could share experiences again, we could be Grown Up together. But I can feel the gap. One that was always there. And is now rapidly growing.

He's unmarred. Unblemished. He's been safe all this time, hasn't he. I don't belittle him for being safe and untraumatized, but. He hasn't had to learn or change like I did. I wanted to tell him my stories, to sit together as equals, without being pitied or humored. To speak of my life without seeing him flinch. To share secret secrets with him again.

But he's looking at the echoes of who I used to be.

I'm looking at the man who never had to change.

"Penny? What's got you so distracted?"

He's so earnest. He's still that puppy of a boy I loved in high school.

Twenty years ago.

"Ah. Nothing worth talking about, really."

He nods without thought.

We start talking again. I honestly can't remember what about. he seems to be enjoying everything, but I'm coming to terms with a thin spear of ice pushing into my heart. He doesn't notice. He can't notice, he's never needed to see it. How frustrating.

The sun has left the summer sky.

He drove me home, walked me up to my apartment. We hug, chaste. His face is void of the need to say things. His heart is steady and unguarded. I want to sink my teeth into his chest and rip that heart out. He's making me take the lead again.

"Chris. Before you go. I have something to say."

I stand inside the door, he stands outside.

"Back then, I think I was in love with you. I think we could've really hit it off."

His brilliant smile could be a spotlight. Yet he can't see who I am.

"But you haven't changed a single bit. You still can't say anything. You still can't act on anything." He's chewing his lower lip, his eyes are watering. He's so cute. But my emotions are a thin, sharp edge. I really wanted this to go better. "If I hadn't asked to meet up, would you have asked me? If I had asked you if you loved me in high school, would you have said yet? If I asked why you didn't change, what would you say?" My mouth is dry. I swallow the dryness with more dryness.

His crestfallen face reminds me of a child learning the tooth fairy is fake. Why would you even believe in the tooth fairy? Why would you stake anything on it? Surely in the past two decades he had thought about this at all. Right? Right?! He's going to crack open the smile and pull off the mask and tell me all the things he's done, right?

"Well. You see. Back then, or right now. Or. Uhm. Give me a second?"

He hems and haws. He can't weasel out of my gaze. He can't distract me. He can't answer at all. The thin blade of disappointment in my heart blossoms into a redwood tree. I can feel the shine fade from my eyes, the way my smile turns icy. It's not the worst case scenario, yet it hurts even more.

"Good night Chris."

"Wait! Please! I loved you back then Penny. I think I love you now! What happened to you? What happened over those long years? Why are you doing this now?" Tearful saucers for eyes. I want to scoop this silly puppy into my arms and hug him and tell him it'll be fine. "Penny. Penny? I meant it. I think I still love you. Why are you doing this?" Hopeless puppy.

"It's too late. It's far too late." My voice is flatter than I expected. My heart is unmoved. "Would you have told me you loved me if I said nothing?" He flinches. "Yeah. That's what I thought. I had to pry it out of you. I had to drag everything out. I had to set the table and sit you at it before you would act."

Tears running down his face, choking down his sobs. At least he learned how to do that, his pathetic wailing would attract attention. "But. But I wanted this to go well. I didn't know you loved my back!" His composure crumples. His mind spills over like a broken fried egg.

"And I didn't know you loved me at all."

His shoulders slump. I close the door without saying goodbye.

[silverchangeling]

luna's coffee + newspaper combo is one of my favorite things. dad energy.

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[silverchangeling]

Masamune Shirow - Cyberworld

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she is daydreaming

[silverchangeling]

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[silverchangeling]

couldn’t find the most memorable passage of wktd in the tags