#(he was from the nation of origin package was from

[sarasa-cat]

Me: refreshing email every 5 minutes to see if my much deserved gift to myself has cleared the hold up at customs inspection.

[malestransforming]

Chronivac Twins

The moment I saw this AI image, I knew I had to write something. Probably one of the hottest things I have ever seen.

Special thanks to @octuscle for the image inspiration. Here is a link to their original story.

- - - - - - - -

Empty beer cans filled the table in front of the two men. The room was silent, the TV showing the console home screen, and darkness was creeping in from the night. The night was winding down, and the two friends were enjoying peaceful moment before the night truly wrapped up.

Mason breathed a heavy sigh, comfortable in his current state. He was clearly drunk, but happily drunk. He fished around in his pockets, feeling for the recent purchase he had received that day: a brand new Chronivac tablet. He pulled it out of his pocket, powering it on for the first time, watching the screen suddenly brighten, flashing the Chronivac logo. 

“Check it out!” Mason suddenly exclaimed, surprising even himself with his boldness. “I got this new Chronivac in the mail.”

Beside him sat Chris, Mason’s best friend since grade school. Chris was drunker than Mason was, with his eyes closed and his body still, but he too was in happy state of intoxication. 

“Oh yeah? What is that?” Chris slurred from the other end of the coach. The back of Mason’s head was resting on the top of the sofa, leaned back in an almost unnatural position. A massive drunken grin was plastered on his face, highlighting the comfortable state he was currently in.

Mason held up the sleek tablet to an oblivious Chris. A loading screen flashed again as the system booted up. 

“Yeah, it’s a tool that lets me change a part of my body. Actually it will change a part of both of us. They had a deal on the twins package.”

“Cool…” Chris breathed.

“Yeah. I know you have been feeling down lately, so I thought it would be nice to spice things up for you. Plus, you know you’re my bro. We’ve been buds since we were five years old. I figured it was time we made it official.”

Mason began tapping at the screen, swiping at different sliders and dials. There were dozens of different settings with labels like “Hair”, “Muscle Levels”, “Race/Nationality”… Mason balked at the overwhelming choices and options, but forced himself to stay focussed; this was a change he had wanted for a while.

“So I was thinking of doing some kind of mixed race. Hmm. Japanese and Mexican? I don’t think I’ve ever seen that before. I bet that would look hot. With jacked muscles, like body builders. And since we’re gonna be twins, you’ll get it too. Sound good to you Chris?”

Chris only smiled and laughed to himself, the way drunk people often do. It was clear he was not fully present in the moment. Mason took Chris’ drunken laughter as a sign of agreement and continued with the settings page. He slid up the muscle slider to the max, added jock personalities and details such as personal trainer and fitness influencer. He double checked the ‘Race’ tab, making sure that Japanese and Mexican were both checked off. Pleased with his work, he continued on to the last section, “Target Selection” and “Transform”. He allowed the device a few moments to calibrate before confirming the two bodies in the room. He double checked that the “Twins” button was selected and hovered over the Transform button.

“All right bro. This is it. See you on the other side!”

And with that he tapped the button. The screen went blank for a moment, creating a quick sense of panic in Mason’s heart, but reappeared with a white, animated progress bar.

Mason looked down at his hands and arms. “I don’t feel any different,” he said. 

He checked the screen again. The progress bar had moved up by one pixel and showed a time remaining of 1440 minutes. 

“Oh shoot! I set the transformation duration to be 24 hours. Well that’s okay. When we wake up tomorrow, we’ll definitely see some changes! Next time you see me Chris I’ll be be a huge muscled-out bro. And a completely different race. And so will you! We’ll be twins. Pedro and Miguel. We’re gonna be so fucking hot.”

A gentle and rhythmic breathing came from the other end of the couch. Mason turned his head and grinned at Chris who had passed out on the couch. 

“See you in the morning, Miguel,” he whispered. 

-

Bright sunlight was pouring into the apartment. The morning was late, but the day was still young. Chris stirred on the sofa; he was now lying horizontally on the couch, shirtless and in his underwear. He blinked his eyes in the sunlight, rubbing his eyelids with a balled up fist, and stretching against the soft cushions of the sofa. His broad feet pushed against the far armrest, and his arms stretched off behind him. He sat up, and noticed his first change.

Looking down at his chest, Chris saw his pectoral muscles had ballooned out in front of him to a God-like proportion. He cupped his chest, making note of how his nipple had slipped down below his eye line, and squeezed the new muscle. 

“What the fuck?” He exclaimed. “Why do I have tits?” 

Mason launched himself off the sofa and dove into the bathroom. The flickering fluorescent light clicked on, revealing the extent of Mason’s initial changes. Below his chest were the unmistakeable beginnings of 6-pack abs. Mason ran his fingers over top of his stomach, remembering the slight beer gut that had been there the night before. 

He leaned in closer to the mirror and begin poking and prodding his face. His nose seemed wider and his eyes were narrower. His lips were plumping as well, into two thick pillows. He ran his meatier fingers through his darkening hair; it seemed thicker, curlier and shorter than it had before. He pulled a strand and watched it bounce back into place on his scalp. 

The sound of a door slamming brought Chris out of his trance. He stepped out of the bathroom and back into the main room.

“Bro!” Mason called from the entry-way. “Are you up?”

“Yeah! What the fuck is happening to me?” Chris replied in anguish.

Mason came around the corner and Chris immediately became aware that the changes he was going through were also happening to Mason. Mason appeared to be several inches shorter, and Chris noticed that he was roughly eye-level to himself now. His chest and abs were similarly large and muscled as Chris’ were, except Mason’s shoulders and arms were much wider. Veins pulsed across Mason’ skin and over his bulging biceps. His nose and eye shape seemed strangely familiar, as did the plumpness of his lips. Mason noticed that Chris’ hair was shorter on top with a shaved, faded appearance on the side.

“Mason, what the fuck is happening? I pass out drunk and wake up all top heavy like this! And then you waltz in looking like that! What the fuck?”

“Chill out bro,” Pedro said. “And my name isn’t Mason anymore. It’s Pedro. And your name isn’t Chris, it’s Miguel. You’re turning out to be such a hot twin.”

Chris/Miguel was unable to get anymore words out as sharp pains coursed through his arms and legs. He hunched over, wrapping his growing limbs around his torso. In front of his eyes he saw the muscles in his arms and legs double, triple and quadruple in size, into massive slabs of muscle. His trap muscles ached and burned as the fibres inside re-stitched themselves, growing to match the mass of his arms and chest. Across the room Pedro grinned in anticipation, as his adonis belt thinned out, becoming lean and chiselled, into his tight pelvis and butt. 

“Miguel, we’re going to be so hot!” Pedro’s voice was deeper and more coastal sounding. His jock-instincts were bubbling in his brain, overwriting whatever personality he had before.

“Don’t call me that. My name is Miguel. I mean Chris.” Chris stammered. “How did you even do this?”

“Bro, it was the Chronivac. I told you last night. Just embrace it. I paid good money for this twins package.”

“I need to call them. There has to be a way to reverse this.” 

With a wide stride, Chris/Miguel walked over to where his phone was, but doubled over as a burning pain seared through his stomach. He squeezed with his hands, feeling the muscles underneath swell and grow under his touch. Before his eyes his abs went from flat and empty to being completely ripped. His waist got tighter as his adonis belt and hip muscles also tensed and flexed, just like Pedro’s had.

“Bro, I have a six pack!” Chris exclaimed, his voice cracking as it matched the timbre of Pedro’s.  

“They match mine, bro!” Pedro said.

Chris shook his head. If he could just call the company and explain what the problem was, then he figured he could stop the changes. He found his phone and brought it to his face, waiting for Face ID to unlock. The phone vibrated in his dark and meaty hand, refusing to unlock. In the black mirror of his phone, he saw a completely different face than the one he was used to. His nose was wider, and his jaw was leaner. His eyes had narrowed into Asian-like features and his hair was shorter and darker than before. His face was looking identical to Pedro’s, right down to the plump lips.

In a panic, Chris typed in his passcode and Googled the number for Chronivac. The phone began ringing.

“Hello?” said a voice on the other end.

“Hello, is this support? My name is Miguel, I mean Chris. My name is Chris. I don’t own your product, but my brother Pedro — I mean my best friend Mason does. He used the Chronivac on me last night and I woke up with big muscles and my face is looking Japanese and Mexican? And the same thing is happening to him! He says we’re becoming twins. This has to be against your Terms of Service! I didn’t agree to this.”

A dark skin spot formed on the back of Chris’ hand, spreading across his skin and up his bulging arms. His skin was darkening, to match his new ethnicity. 

“It sounds to me like it might be too late to intervene. Our records show Pedro and Miguel Watanabe.”

“That’s right,” Miguel interjected. He was Miguel, not Chris.

“Yeah,” the agent continued. “So your brother got the Twins Package, and since you are legally twins now, there’s nothing that can be done to change back the transformation. But it’s going to be great being a pair of super hot Latino-Asian influencers, right?”

“Yeah,” Miguel replied absent-mindedly, and in a voice that was deepening. “Thanks anyway. Peace.” 

He hung up and tossed the phone aside. Pedro wandered over and wrapped his hand around his twin brother’s shoulder. 

“It’s at ninety-nine percent,” Pedro said, indicating the transformation process on the Chronivac. 

Miguel felt another spasm in his thighs and legs and saw his skin was now completely browned and tanned now. His legs were thick and bulging, and so was the rest of his body. A wave of emotions came feelings rolled over his brain, and Miguel stood silently in place as his brain and personality adjusted to match his new physique. Pedro stood still for a moment too, as the twenty-two year old twins realized they could speak English, apanese and Spanish and had a long history of lifting weights and posting work-out videos on TikTok. The transformation progress bar clicked up one last pixel to one-hundred percent, snapping the twins out of their daze. 

“Bro,” Pedro said. “You wanna get a workout in?”

“You know it!” Miguel said, high-fiving his twin brother with a grin. 

[mediumsizedpidegon]

I'm unable to stop thinking about OG!Mobei-Jun. We never meet him like we do Luo Bingge but I have such a strong image of who he is.

To reference a text post I am obsessed with, if Luo Bingge is a male power fantasy, original Mobei-Jun is the ‘one man as an island’ belief. The idea of ‘one man as an island’ is basically the same as the lie of complete self sufficiency.

It means; you don’t NEED help. It means: you are an island, a city, a nation within yourself, and so you are all you need. It means; you aren’t weak and you can do EVERYTHING yourself. And while this isn’t an inherently male concept (everyone can be influenced by it) it does tend to be extra emphasized in male spaces. It’s certainly part of the toxic masculinity package. Because in toxic masculinity, other men are competitors. Rivals. Enemies. You crush them to get what you want and you do it alone.

Airplane takes Luo Bingge and turns a story about the cycles of abuse into the height of male power fantasies. And Airplane thus takes Mobei-Jun and projects his desires to be a one-man-island.

Because islands aren’t lonely. They can’t feel lonely. (You are a one man island and you don’t need people so that means you chose your aloneness. you have control over it.)

And here’s the thing: complete self sufficiency is utter HORSESHIT. ITS A LIE. IT DOESNT FUCKING WORK.

Since complete self sufficiency is a lie, translating Mobei-jun from book to real person gets wayyyy more complicated.

So my view of OG!Mobei Jun is someone who has frozen himself into complete indifference. He’s a man who desperately wants to belong to someone or something but has forgotten how. He’s a closeted romantic who has gouged out all the soft and vulnerable parts of himself. He moves through life as if everything is beneath him and less real than him because if it isn’t then he’ll fall apart spectacularly. He’s a man who’s sat so long with solitude that it’s crystallized him into a moving statue. He’s a flesh and blood person but he is so incapable of letting his guard down that the entire world sees the mountain he wants to be and not the cracks where the illusion fails. He doesn’t know how to live. He refuses to die.

OG!Mobei-Jun is the myth of self sufficiency. And it eats him alive.

He can’t trust his family, so he raised himself while "overseeing his future realm," leading to him being malnourished and touch-starved. He can’t trust his servants, and so he learned how to put on everything himself— in simple styles so that he could do them even injured. He can’t trust his advisors, so his kingdom is governed by fear and precedent rather than understanding. He can’t trust his palace, and so he is short on sleep and good food and relaxation: after all, he must do everything himself and thus he must know everything.

In comparison to SVSSS, original Mobei-Jun is noticeably thinner. He wears makeup to hide the dark circles beneath his eyes. The wound from the Huan Hua dart never healed right: and neither did many, many others. Compared to our Mobei-Jun, he looks…. brittle, with the vicious fear of an animal backed into a corner.

SVSSS Mobei-Jun is taller, bigger. He has that extra essential “I’m not alone and being taken care of” weight. Even just by looking at him, you can tell that he is miles steadier, with people he can trust at his back. He’s not constantly shaking with a combination of touch starvation and paranoia. He has less scars and the ones he does have look better taken care of.

SVSSS Mobei-Jun is just.... a complete antithesis to his original self. A complete deconstruction of the self sufficiency myth.

A one man island wouldn’t be rescued like three times like a damsel in distress! A one man island wouldn’t have a devoted servant to care for him: to heal his wounds and give him food and drink, a place to rest, and information more valuable than gold. A one man island wouldn’t know gentleness if it clubbed him in the head!

I guess what I’m trying to say here is that Shang Qinghua has a MONUMENTAL impact on Mobei-Jun’s life and his entire perception of the world and himself.

This is a man who could have friends! This is a guy who is unguarded enough to actually fall in love! This is a dude who might be close to some distant family members! This is a guy who might have HOBBIES or THINGS THAT MAKE HIM LAUGH!!!! The ripple effect goes and goes and with Shang Qinghua smashing his ‘I need to do everything myself’ belief, Mobei-Jun can relax and actually trust people! Other people even!

Imagine a Mobei-Jun that has not just Shang Qinghua but!! A half sister he really likes!! A couple great aunts he can ask for advice!! Some cousins that have children that call him uncle!! A friend or two!!!!

THIS IS NOT A MAN ALONE!!!

[greenishghostey]

Dungeon Master meet Prop Master | part 3

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Drama Club!reader

Summary: The blossoming relationship between you and Eddie was still new but you were both already in too deep. Turns out that your friends love a little romance gossip too.

Warnings: I've decided that this series will be 18+ eventually, so please DO NOT engage or interact if you are underage. More fluff, friendship banter, swearing, a very vague understanding of the US education system.

Word Count: 5,236

Authors Note: So this chapter is a bit more dialogue-heavy and goes into friend group reactions to Eddie and specs' budding relationship and where it will potentially go. This was going to be the first half of one chapter but I felt it was better as a stand-alone piece.

Part 2 /// Part 4 (Coming Soon)

Friday at school was surprisingly busy, with most of your classes hitting the first assignment stage. You loved a long-winded, formulaic piece of homework as much as the next person, but your mind had been busy. Eddie kept your mind so fucking busy. Even your favourite classes were a little bit tuned out by the sound of a boyish snort, metal rings tapping a steering wheel and “specs”. You were in a near-constant state of fluster, removing your glasses to rub your eyes or pinch the bridge of your nose. Your mom had asked if you were sick while eating breakfast. She asked if it was a boy. God, she made it sound so juvenile. You were legally an adult. However, she was right on the money - not like you were going to tell her that.

You had a giggly, schoolgirl crush on a boy who was nice to you. 

But “nice to you” wasn’t doing him enough justice. He was exceptional to you. The closest thing to Eddie’s comfortable presence you could think of was Penny - the person who had been your rock since elementary school. Eddie Munson had achieved that astronomical status within, what, like, 4 hours? 

Fuck, if he actually did have a weird cult thingy going, you might just have to look into joining. Maybe he gave out welcome packages along with the Hellfire shirts. An introductory pamphlet and a complimentary goat skull or something. You could bring snacks to the ritual sacrifices. 

You had a study period before lunch and took the opportunity to be a hermit in the library, trying to power through as much homework as you could in an hour and ten minutes. 

English gave you an essay on The Crucible, which was convenient since you were already knee-deep in annotating the play for prop and set ideas. Colonial melancholy mixed with fire and brimstone was your current plan. Now you just had to add in a few notes about John Proctor’s inner demons and how Arthur Miller was, unfortunately, a “national treasure”. The usual English class spiel that Miss Samson would slap a lovely A or B on. If you found yourself feeling adventurous, you could even pepper in some gender commentary discussion points. 

Woodshop was the only assignment you couldn’t make some progress on from your little library alcove, which was a shame because you were strangely excited about it. The project was simple enough for early in the year, making a small storage box with divided sections inside and a hinged lid. But you had a potential plan for your box if everything went well. 

Eddie had a zip-lock bag to keep spare game dice in. He had shown you the polyhedral cluster fuck of colours while you helped with Hellfire redecorating. It was cute that Eddie had collected so many spare sets just in case someone forgot to bring theirs on a Friday. He explained that he tried to get a wide enough range of designs so that they would work for every class and race - whatever that meant. Such an extensive collection deserved a proper form of storage and display, so you planned to give Eddie, and his club, another donation in the form of a dice box. Originally, you were going to give the box to your mom to keep her funkiest, fanciest jewellery, but your dad beat you to the punch on her birthday. 

Mr Kennedy, your shop teacher, might even let you carve a pattern on the lid too - flames or a skull, something befitting the Hellfire vibe. Mr Ken always liked you because you were interested in his subject rather than seeing it as an easy grade for senior year credits. 

Giving Eddie a gift, regardless of how practical it would be, was maybe a little much. He had already lightly teased you for “donating” aged paper to Hellfire so they could have more immersive maps and in-game documents. But that was friendly and with good intentions - he did really want that brown paper. If he seemed apprehensive, you could easily pass the dice box off as a peace offering from the drama club. From one group of oddballs to another. 

You polished off the introductory paragraph of an essay on the Reconstruction Era. The name Ulysses had stopped looking like a real word after reading it so many times in your History textbook. The bell rang, and you heard shoes squeaking and doors slamming outside the library's silence. You and Penny always met at your locker before heading to the cafeteria, so you made your way through the halls, weaving between hoards of backpacks, denim and school spirit.

In your opinion, the lockers in Hawkins High were pretty shitty real estate. Too narrow, stupid stiff locks, and they always smelled weird. It was unlikely that they were cleaned out properly when the owners graduated. Some crumbs and a sticky stain had welcomed you in freshman year. You were playing Tetris with your textbooks when you heard your name being yelled down the emptying hallway, followed by an icy bellow of, “We need to talk, young lady!” Penny was always really good at projecting to the back of the room. It was one of the main reasons Miss Butler loved her so much. A ginger, permed head came bounding over to you at a rate of knots, skidding to an abrupt stop in her grass-stained tennis shoes.

“I didn’t do anything. You can prove nothing - Shit, are you okay?” You sniggered, watching Penny pant and lean against your open locker door. She must have bolted to you from across campus; her bangs were sticking to her pale powdered forehead. 

“Quit laughing,” she was clutching her side like she was in agony, “I ran from the fucking track field to get here as soon as possible. We need to talk. Now.” Penny straightened up, crossed her arms and fixed you with a stern look. This particular look was reserved for when you forgot to fill her in on gossip or when you stole chips from her during lunch. You hoped she had some of those little pretzel chip pieces in her bag.

“Since when did you know where the track field is?” You joked with a similarly pinched look on your face. It was a mystery as to why she seemed so miffed at you. Ben hadn’t struck out with the costume designer, Lily, again. No one in shop class had narrowly missed losing a finger. The Hawkins gossip pool was rather dry. What a shame.

Penny flapped her hands in your face, “Shush!” She snipped. It was like you’d told her she wouldn’t ever get that Oscar she always dreamed of. Like you had pissed in her cornflakes that very morning. “Munson does business out past the track field.”

Ah. Crap. You should have called her last night after dinner and told her about that. About Eddie and you. Whatever you and Eddie were. Friends? Acquaintances?

You felt your eyes widen, “Oh, forgot you were doing that today. How’d it go?” You asked innocently. As much as you wanted to play dumb, you couldn’t make it convincing. The warmth painted across your face, and your sudden interest in your locker shelf was a dead giveaway. 

“Well, a freaky little birdie asked me if I was “the friend of specs” and called me ‘Pennies’ the entire deal.” The nickname was sort of sweet. It was better than if Eddie had called her Penelope like her parents did. She would have slapped him with the weed baggie if he’d done that. 

“To be fair, a lot of people you know have glasses. Plus, he’s in our grade, even if he’s been around a while. Isn’t he in Home Ec with you?” You knew he was in that class with Penny. She talked about how out of place he looked in an apron with his hair tied back and without his heavy silver rings. Apparently, he was pretty good at cooking and could fix a jammed sewing machine in under a minute. She’d called him a “domestic demon”, in a nice way, of course. Honestly, you had started to wish you had given in to Penny trying to bribe you to take Home Ec with her. A fucking apron. 

“Yeah, and he’s Mrs Collins’ favourite. Now, stop interrupting me. How much do you think he charged me?” Penny pressed. The situation was beginning to feel like a bad cop style interrogation very quickly. You could sense where Penny was going - to be honest, you could read her like a children’s book. 

“You said it was gonna be like 30 bucks, right? Seems reasonable for illegal stuff.” For the ‘weed parties’, $30 was possibly even a bit too generous. Eddie could use a better business plan.

“Yep, that’s what Connor told me. But that’s not what happened.” 

Connor! That was his name. You had been so sure it was Keith for some reason. He looked like a Keith with his product-saturated hair and gym shorts that were too tight to be comfortable. It wasn’t even like he had anything to show off in the shorts. Now, Eddie, you could tell there was something stunning in his dark jeans. If only you’d had gym with him.

“Where are you going with this exactly, Pen? I’m hungry. All the good juice boxes are gonna be gone by now. You’ve stuck me with crappy orange.” You whined. The orange juice they had in the cafeteria was rancid. It was sickly sweet to the point of tasting like children’s medicine. Apple juice was the superior choice, but everyone in the school agreed on that too.

“He charged me 15 bucks! He smiled and was like, “ah, friend of a friend discount, don’t worry about it”.” Penny said in a mimicking voice, her eyebrows were almost in her hairline, and she was a few seconds away from shaking you down for information. 

“Oh.” 

Fuck. Well, now you would have to spill the beans about your wonderful little evening in the drama room. Part of you was itching to talk about it, and you knew that Penny wouldn’t be too judgemental of Eddie. However, you also wanted to keep it to yourself for a little longer. Hold the warmth of your meeting close to your chest and only have Eddie to share it with.

“Yeah. Oh. Firstly, when did you become chummy with Munson? Secondly, what did you do to get a 50% discount!?” 

“You wanna go scream it on the roof? Shut up. He came by the drama room yesterday, and we hit it off, I guess? He’s really sweet and gave me a ride home since it was dark out.” You said, leaning in close and tempted to slap a hand over Penny’s mouth because she was going to start shrieking eventually with this level of gossip.

“…Do we need to clean the room?” Penny grimaced, pulling away from you.

“Ugh! Jesus, Pen!” You swatted at her with your backpack. As if you would soil your beloved drama room. Eddie would have to, at least, take you on a date before you entertained that idea. Like a pay for your dinner and brush hair behind your ear before kissing you sort of date. The fact that that scenario had started to morph into a fantasy was mildly concerning, but it maintained a solid PG-13 rating.

“What? Excuse me for making assumptions based on fifty fucking percent!” Penny exclaimed. Thankfully the hallway was empty, but her voice still echoed off the rows of lockers. 

“We hung out, and that’s all. I swear on your hair.” You huffed. By swearing on Penny’s crazy, fiery mane of hair, she would know you were telling her the truth. You just really loved the hair. “What did you think I’d done anyway?”

“I dunno. Some girls say the other drug dealers around Hawkins asked them to flash their tits for a discount. Thought you might be going through a rebellious phase?” Penny wiggled her eyebrows. God, she really was gunning for you to let loose one day. “He is cute in, like, a funky way. His eyes are the size of my mom’s fancy dinner plates, though; it’s weird.”

You rolled your eyes at her, continuing to sort your locker, “Eddie’s not that kind of guy,” You stated firmly, “besides, you’d get too jealous if someone else got that much of my attention.” Easing the slight tension of the conversation with a little friendly jab. The “cute” comment wasn’t even going to be discussed or acknowledged. Penny huffed and slammed your locker closed once you gathered your lunch. 

The two of you continued the Eddie conversation. Penny needed to know every syllable that you and Eddie had said to each other. She needed to be able to visualise the interior of his van. Any speck of information was not a request but a necessity. As you had hoped, she wasn’t being judgemental in her pestering. Just being a concerned best friend. You had never expressed any real interest in a guy to her in the years you had been best friends - well, any guy that you knew in real life anyway. Robert Downey Jr in ‘Tuff Turf’ awakened something in you when you saw it during winter break. The movie wasn’t all that great, but you had learned that big brown eyes and endearing charm were “your thing”. An educational experience, if nothing else.

The “Eddie territory”, as Penny dubbed it, was new for everyone involved. No threats had been detected so far, but as you stressed to your friend, it had less than 24 hours. The one piece of information that you withheld was the promise of future Thursdays in the drama room. You were the unofficial Hellfire interior decorator now. 

The cafeteria was as you had expected, buzzing with life and smelled like really sad mac and cheese. Your eyes glanced towards the lunch counter and took note of the lack of juice. God damn it. You linked arms with Penny and started navigating your way towards the usual table - a mix of drama club juniors and seniors, their plus ones, and a few other “artsy fartsy” types who needed people to sit with. 

You slid into your usual seat quickly and swung Penny into hers with just a little more force than was necessary. That was for the implied flashing comment earlier. Subtle and immediate karma was a beautiful thing in your friendship. You dug into your sandwich, the chatter of the table fading to background noise in your mind. 

Your head was still unbelievably busy. Not even a turkey sandwich and tomato soup could put you fully back to normal. Penny nudged you with her elbow and pushed a zip-lock bag of pretzel pieces towards you. Like a little peace offering for her dramatics. But then she had to ruin it, “You only get five; I will count. My mom and sister eat them, too, so I can’t bring as many. Meaning you are on rations.” You were in the midst of your first real battle with emotions and hormones, and she was getting stingy with the goods. 

“Can I get the extra salty ones you don’t like?” You asked, blinking at her with your best puppy dog eyes. They were shit, but at least it guaranteed she would give in quickly just to make you stop. “Pleeeease, Penelope. Sweetest Penny-lope.”

Penny shuddered at the use of her full name and the silly nickname you used when you wanted something. It was like she was born as an 80-year-old woman and her parents just went with it. At least “Penny” was a cute nickname, very her. She turned her nose up at you and sighed, “Ugh! Fine, but if you take the kinda burnt ones, you’re not getting that Siouxie cassette back.” 

“Well then, you can kiss that Bon Jovi t-shirt you left in my room goodbye,” You threatened. Your fingers wiggled into the zip-lock bag to gather your pretzel rations as you and Penny dissolved into giggles and snorts. 

Lunch continued much the same after that. You and Penny tended to stay joined at the hip at the lunch table since drama kids were just strange. But it had always been like that. It was you and your beloved Penelope against the world. On the road to Broadway, or at least off-broadway, if you were being realistic. Lily, the club costume guru with the most impressive black springy coils you had ever seen, kept glancing over your shoulder, eventually meeting your gaze. 

You raised your eyebrows in question, mouth full of salty snacks, “Mmmm?” 

“Eddie Munson is, like, trying to stare through the back of your head,” Lily whispered, her blouse almost dipping into the cup of your thermos. 

You didn’t dare turn around. Not because you were embarrassed about people knowing the two of you were kind of friends, but because you would melt into the gross tiled floor if he waved. If the corner of his mouth so much as twitched into a smile, you’d flatline for a few seconds. Due to Lily’s observation, your heart picked up until it pulsed heat through your veins. God, this was the fucking pits.

Lily leaned in a little closer, her voice just above a whisper again, “Is he bothering you? Need me to go say something?” Lily Warren was quite possibly the sweetest girl in your entire grade. But, this was the one time you wouldn’t need her help when it was offered. Part of you wanted to go chat with Eddie, maybe make yourself known to his friends, like he was with yours. Minus the drug dealing, obviously. The distinct bark of his voice rang through the cafeteria, and several people at your table either grimaced, rolled their eyes or scowled in his general direction. It broke your heart to have the evidence that Eddie was like sunshine personified while most people around you loathed his existence. “If he messed with you, I swear to god.”

“No messing, I promise, but thanks, Lils. He came by the drama room yesterday for club stuff. Probably just let his eyes wander and remembered he knew me.” Your reply wasn’t entirely untrue. You didn’t think he had been staring a hole into the back of your skull like Lily had said; his gaze just tended to appear that way. “It’s just Eddie being Eddie.” You hummed, suppressing a smile. However, your heartfelt introspection was short-lived as Penny snorted into her can of Tab. 

-

“Eddie?” Jeff asked, nudging his friend in the rib, trying to pull his attention away from the other side of the cafeteria, “You good, man?” 

“Fabulous,” Eddie mumbled.

Eddie was off in a world of his own. He did that sometimes. It was similar to a robot powering down - his eyes glazed over, he sat straight as a rod and barely moved an inch. But this time, it was different; Eddie was deep in thought, putting all of his attention into a specific spot a few feet away from his seat. The drama club table. Jeff and Eddie had walked to the cafeteria together and were, surprisingly, the first at the table. The freshmen, Dustin and Mike, were probably still trying to get their bearings about the school or were still in that kiss-ass phase with teachers.

Jeff moved in his chair, positioning himself to try and catch a glimpse at what Eddie was honing in on. If it was a person, they could probably feel his stare like a ghost hanging on them. “Whatcha looking at the drama girls for?” There was a smugness in Jeff’s voice - Eddie didn’t appreciate the attitude, even if he was bringing it on himself.

“Glasses girl has a cool sweater. Orange and black are complimentary colours, ya know,” what a bullshit answer. He was losing his edge, and it was all your fault. You had him making up colour theory facts. Black and orange only worked together when it was Halloween - and on you, but that was beside the point. 

Before Jeff could start an entire interrogation, the rest of the Hellfire club members arrived. Gareth and Simon were in the middle of a discussion about which spells Simon’s Cleric, Rothgär would learn once he levelled up - the favourite option so far was Holy Aura, so he could blind enemies with Godly light. Dustin and Mike were trailing behind the older boys, having two conversations at once. One was about the upcoming campaign that evening, and the other was about how much of bitch their chemistry teacher was - Ms Wheaton was quite the battleaxe, Eddie could remember all too well. He and Loise went way back. 

Gareth was the first to notice the uncharacteristic silence from the head of the table. No all-mighty knowledge coming to weigh in on the spell discussion, no greeting, absolutely nothing. Just Eddie looking almost a touch flustered and focusing so hard on his lunch that he was going to burst a blood vessel in his eye. Soon, each of the Hellfire boys noticed Eddie being… not Eddie, expressions morphing into concern and curiosity.

“You guys want a picture or something? An autograph, maybe?” Eddie snapped, taking an aggressive bite of his slightly bruised apple, his face twisting at the sour taste - Granny Smiths, man, he needed to start buying the other green ones. 

“Dude, are you sick?” Gareth asked, “You’re being quiet, and it’s fucking weird.”

“Yeah, usually we can’t get a word in when we sit down,” Dustin pointed out, “you were kinda weird this morning, too, when you picked me up.” 

Eddie had been super weird that morning. In a good way. In a way that he hadn’t felt in a long time. His mind was still going a mile a minute because of that clumsy little wave you’d given him. Eddie was a fan of dramatics; anyone within a twenty-mile radius of the guy could see that, plain and simple. But, he never thought he would be in a position where he almost swooned, like some damsel NPC in his campaigns. You being friendly and talking to him like he was a person was pretty damn good, then you had to go and call him a “sweetheart”. His hands hadn’t been that clammy since the middle school talent show before he and the guys went out on stage. 

“You been looking at funky sweater gal all day, huh?” Jeff loved every second of that lunch period. 

“You’re on thin ice, Fulton,” Eddie mumbled, shooting a glare at his friend, who was still basking in his smug glory. That was when the absolute avalanche of questions started. 

“Shit, why didn’t you say, dude! Who is she? She hot?” Gareth immediately honed in on the mention of a girl. A potentially hot girl. Christ, he needed to get laid or just go on a date - something would be better than nothing. A handhold would probably do him a world of good. 

“Since when were you actually into girls around here?” That prodding comment came from Dustin. He was craning his neck in all directions, trying to scope out the women in the room. Like he knew Eddie’s type. Eddie didn’t have a type. “Nice to him” was all the type he needed. “Is there some goth or metal girl that’s new or something?” Dustin whispered to Mike, who shrugged his lanky shoulders. Eddie had slid down in his chair; teenagers were hard work. No wonder parents complained about them all the time.

Simon, the stand-up guy that he was, had decided to busy himself with eating and reading through his campaign notes, sniggering to himself when he re-read a good joke he had made last week - “every warlock requires his war key”. 

“Si?” Eddie poked at Simon’s book, “you get first rolls tonight. Your initiative is 20 from now until 10:30.” He and Simon shared a knowing smile and nodded. Always good to conduct business with him. 

“BULLSHIT!” Mike yelled. He tried to speak with a low bite to his voice, resulting in a wavering crack. Eddie used to do the same thing, thinking it made him cool, so he couldn’t judge the kid too harshly. 

“How is that fair?!” Gareth whined, eyebrows furrowing harshly. He was still trying to scope out the object of Eddie’s interest, though. That information was a teeny tiny bit more critical than Eddie’s piece of shit, made-up rules. 

“Cause I said so and because he isn’t about to go and bug every chick in here to see if I’ve breathed near her!” Eddie barked. 

He could sort of understand Gareth foaming at the mouth. Massive virgin that he was. Jeff just lived for gossip, which explained his enjoyment of the situation. But Dustin and Mike said they had girlfriends - they had no excuses. Were they both raised in a fucking barn? “Besides, there’s no fucking point in keeping it to myself now anyway.” 

Eddie was embarrassed. Eddie never got embarrassed. Especially not in front of his brethren and the underlings. It was just like in his van again, when you were being all cute and cool without even trying. 

“Knew I could wear you down. So, what’s her name? Where’d you meeeeet?” Jeff sang, resting his chin on his palms. If he started batting his long eyelashes at Eddie, he was getting kicked off his chair. 

With your identity about to be revealed, each of the boys turned to face Eddie, eyes wide with curiosity. Their depressing cafeteria macaroni cheese was going to get so soggy.

“In the orange polka dot sweater. Big glasses. She’s the prop girl for the drama club. I went to do Hellfire set up yesterday, and she was still doing drama-y stuff,” Eddie explained, gathering his friends closer so he didn’t announce anything to others in earshot. “To make a long dick short-”

“Dude, ew.” Jeff cringed. 

“To make a long dick short! We hit it off. Like really well. She made that sick prop sword I use as The Sun Strike-“

“Made it?!” Dustin, Mike and Simon gasped. The three of them were the characters putting in the most work to find the sword. Simon’s character was a cleric for the Sun goddess who blessed it, so everything worked out very nicely.

“Quit interrupting! But yeah, that’s what I said too. She handmade all of the weapon props in that one big box. How fucking cool is that?” 

“Is she cool with us using it?” Gareth muttered, a grimace worming its way onto his face. “I asked Janie in my math class for a pen, and she looked like she wanted to slap me.”

“Nah, specs is cool. Actually, she was super psyched that we named it and made it into the legendary slayer of midnight.” Eddie’s Dungeon Master voice began to creep up his vocal cords, “The bearer of brilliant fire. The almighty-“ 

There was a giggle. A little shit type of giggle. “So she’s got a nickname already?” Dustin sniggered, cutting Eddie’s dramatics short. He was having the time of his life seeing Eddie practically swooning over you. 

“Wears glasses, aka specs. Therefore, she’s “specs”. What’s the issue?”

“Nothing, nothing. Forget I said anything,” Dustin mumbled, a goofy little grin plastered across his face as he dug into his lunch. Eddie was used to all eyes being on him at the table - he thrived on the admiration and comradery that came from Hellfire. However, he was not a fan of the teasing. Sure, he would definitely be joining in if it were Jeff, who was into a girl, but this time it was him, so it made him feel flustered. It was uncomfortable being the centre of attention for a fluffy, fuzzy reason.

“Found her!” Mike whisper-yelled, shaking Gareth’s arm so he could laser focus in on you and your dotty sweater. The boys also noticed Penny, who was leaning on your shoulder with a big grin on her face. Gareth could swear he heard angels singing songs about her.

“Damn! She talked to you?” Gareth pressed. He tried to cover up a laugh since he knew Eddie would either kick him under the table or make his character’s life miserable in their session that evening.

“You’re on thin ice too now.” Eddie cursed, crossing his arms, “For your information, I also gave her a ride home. Might want to brush up on your game, Campbell.” 

“She willingly got in your shit box!?” Gareth wasn’t trying to push Eddie’s buttons, but it was almost too much fun. “Aw, she must like you.” Eddie was going to strangle the junior. However, he also wished that Gareth was right - sarcasm be damned. 

“Probably gave the poor girl a heart attack,” Jeff mumbled to Simon, trying to speak quietly under the cafeteria noise so Eddie wouldn’t blow a gasket. 

“Great to finally know what you guys think of me. Really! I’m touched.” Eddie scowled. Only a peppering of malice was in his expression; he knew everyone meant well. Plus, they were right about the van. It was well and truly a shit box. “I bare my soul to you people, and it gets thrown right in my face….” Eddie turned his attention back to his apple, which was now beginning to brown.

Dustin patted Eddie’s shoulder encouragingly. It was a sweet gesture. The teasing chatter had come to an end, but each of the guys still had a small smirk on their faces. It wasn’t every day that they were the ones able to get Eddie all riled up in that playful way that friends do. That brothers in arms do. 

“Eddie,” Dustin said with a genuine smile on his face now, “I saw a girl in that exact sweater putting a note in your locker when I went to the bathroom during History.” The sound of a chair strapping and clattering to the floor rang through the cafeteria - some cheerleaders passing by the table almost jumped out of their scrunchies.

Eddie had a general tendency to move rather sporadically and quickly. He bounced around a lot, mostly to burn off excess energy that usually struck him at around eleven every day. That being said, Eddie felt as though he was nearly breaking the sound barrier while running from the cafeteria to his locker after Dustin finished his sentence.

-

The little scrap of lined paper read, “I hope the set goes down well with your guys today. Let me know everyone’s thoughts on Thursday, please! Meet you at 3:30!” it was signed off with a small doodle of a pair of glasses. 

Eddie quickly glanced around him to make sure that the coast was clear. When it was confirmed, he started drumming his hands rapidly on his locker door. Soon, his entire body joined in on the celebration, and he was cheering through clenched teeth. No one needed to see him looking this type of ridiculous - it would ruin his long-established reputation. 

“Fuck yes, I’ve still got it!” He grinned, thrusting his fists into the air. Eddie was almost dancing his way up and down the hallway. Power sliding on his knees was actually sounding like a fantastic idea. He’d willingly take the friction burn to his kneecaps because you were meeting him on Thursday at 3:30 sharp.

Tag list: @fan-girl-97 @lunatictardis @eddiesprincess86 @kimmi-kat @strangerthings1983fan @moviefreak1205 @becca-alexa

[is-the-battlemech-cool-or-not]

Greetings, Clanner.

I am Hauptmann Theodora Marten-Steiner, of the 3rd Lyran Guard.

My brother Dieter informs me that you are the one who has provided him with the machines he has been sending me, and I must admit I find myself intrigued.

So, I have decided to make contact myself, and see what sort of mechwarrior my brother had made contact with.

In the interest of building relations, I would ask that you give your opinion on my machine, an Atlas AS7-K3 I like to call "Gewitter". I shall make my judgment of you from there.

-Hauptmann Theodora Marten-Steiner, Anton company, 3rd Lyran Guard, 1st Lyran Guards Division.

(O.o.c., I'm aware that this isn't actually an AS7-K3, but I couldn't find any good pictures of one in Steiner livery.)

An Atlas that flies is a humbling prospect, and the K3 is a good variant of the original design. A Gauss Rifle, two ER Large Lasers, an a Streak SRM-4 are a decent weapons package, of somewhat lacking in short range options - though I suppose you have the famed Atlas fists in assist there. The ECM suite, Ferro Fibrous armor, and uprated engine make it more survivable than its predecessors as well.

You have chosen your steed well, Hauptmann. It paints you as someone who values the ability to hit foes from long-range and from unexpected angles, while being assured of your continued survival. Perhaps a slightly unconventional choice, what with your nation's stereotypical love for close-range brawling Assault 'Mechs. But stereotypes are only true to a degree, after all.

[pokemoncenter]

On Pokedexes

While the electronic model popularized by Professor Samuel Oak is what comes to mind, in truth, the idea of the Pokedex is much, much older. In fact, the oldest surviving "Pokedex" is one of the eleven volumes of Naturalis Historia, written by Pliny the Elder in 77 AD (estimated). Though his methods were... bizarre, and his research extremely incorrect, the value of his work can not be overstated.

Through varying eras and locations, building off of Pliny the Elder's work, the idea of a Pokemon encyclopedia was an appealing one throughout history. Many, many people tried to make a definitive encyclopedia, but Pokemon simply change too quickly, and can escape too easily, for proper study. The most complete known Pokedex from history was Professor Laventon's Encyclopedic Monster Index of Hisui (estimated circa 1850).

The modern Pokedex, however, came about in 1996 from Professor an idea of the aforementioned Professor Oak. Abandoning the traditional methods of individuals using careful information, Professor Oak's idea was groundbreaking- A series of sophisticated measurement tools in a small, handheld package, connected to a Trainer's Pokeball system, allowing a Trainer to input data with incredible ease. Though this system was not immune to misinformation or mistaken measurements, overall, it became much easier to gain data. Professor Oak then entrusted this original model Pokedex with a Trainer from his hometown named Red, who then became famous for his dismantling of Team Rocket.

(It is known that Professor Oak made two of these original prototype Pokedexes, the fate of the second is unknown- Perhaps he kept it, or gave it to a family member, or simply scrapped it.)

However, this original Pokedex model, known as the model HANDY505, was merely a prototype, and as a result riddled with problems. It only had the space for around 150 species of Pokemon in its memory, which was barely sufficient for only the Kanto region- and for that matter, it had no recording ability for locations or habitats outside of Kanto.

However, Red's collection of Pokemon and filling out of the prototype was more than sufficient proof of concept for Professor Oak to receive more League funding, and he set about improving the Pokedex to a vast degree- The National Pokedex (often argued to be called the International Pokedex) was completed, and the sensor and measurement tools of the Pokedex were refined, even being able to extrapolate probable habitats from captured members of a species.

With the completion of the model HANDY910 used in Sinnoh, however, Professor Oak seemed to have finally been content with the advancement of the Pokedex, and in 2007, he did the one thing that would change the study of Pokemon forever:

He made the Pokedex open-source.

Now many researchers and scientists worldwide can create their own Pokedex. And each version of the Pokedex connects and works with each other, allowing for linking and gathering data on Pokemon in ever greater quantities than before. Whereas in Laventon's research, he had to catch vast quantities of Pokemon himself and study each of them individually, the Open-Source Pokedex Project allowed for scientists and professors worldwide to receive massive amounts of data from individual species just by simply looking into the collected information from the massive amounts of Trainers in the world, crowdsourcing research.

To this day, many variants on the Pokedex are still being created, trying to achieve the most useful and most complete version. Alola has a Rotom inhabit its Pokedex, allowing greater recording of information while the Trainer's hands are freed to focus on the Pokemon itself. Galar managed to compress all of this into a phone application, losing some sophistication in measurement tools in favor of greater convenience. Paldea's takes the form of a "digital bookshelf", where each Trainer's notes are recorded into books and sent to a central location for study. And the rush does not seem to be dying down- Every region, every scientist, seems to want their personal version of the Pokedex to be the best, to finally be the most complete, to know all there is to know about Pokemon.

Studying and learning everything about Pokemon is how we humans express our love for them.

[nevermoreternity]

𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗣𝗢𝗦𝗧𝗠𝗔𝗡. 𝗔𝗡 𝗔𝗡𝗔𝗟𝗬𝗦𝗜𝗦.

"According to the tales, the postman

has made a reputation regarding

himself. Yet there are still many

mysteries surrounding him, which I'm

more interested in rather than the

secrets he's holding for others.

Now, who is Victor Grantz exactly?"

"Victor Grantz" is a name listed in two parts; a first name and a surname.

The first name of 'Victor' has many meanings depending on the country someone is born in. However, it has Latin origin which is translated to 'winner' or 'conqueror.' Despite the fact it's one of the earliest Christian names used by several saints and popes - representing Christ's Victory over sin and death - it is not associated directly with a biblical name. On the other hand, the last name of 'Grantz' is more often found in East Germany, which would often be used as a habitational name in various places in the north-eastern areas, named from Salvic grancia 'frontier border'.

"Victor Grantz is a support class character that is often said to be well rounded due to

the various buffs he holds. Overall a decent character to pick and master, however I

myself have read and wrote my own perspectives on his lore and personality. As any

other character made from the game, Victor's only semblance of lore and personality

would be from the deductions, letters, and sequences of events from others'

perspectives. Because of this, many write him according to their own thoughts

similar to the majority of other characters."

𝗖𝗔𝗡𝗢𝗡 𝗟𝗢𝗥𝗘.

Victor was born in an unknown nation (implied to be Germany) and was born to anonymous parents. It is currently undecided on what happened to them or even who they are in terms of lore for Victor. Yet eventually, he would be scouted into the mafia to be their 'secret carrier' in which Victor would deliver various things for them. His main correspondent would be a man they called 'Big Daddy' who by this point is likely some higher up. Victor would have a routine with his dog Wick. Every time the bronze bell would ring in their town, they'd be ready to deliver mail. It's said that Victor delivered letters and packages to people that Big Daddy had connections with, always keeping his lips sewn shut whether from fear or the fact it was his responsibility.

We would soon find out that Victor ends up witnessing a tussle between a member of the mafia and a police officer. When he finds out, Big Daddy is far from happy about the altercation. Victor would become more anxious about his place in the world following the event, the sudden stability of his job being the only thing he's used to in life. At one point later on, there's a fire that takes place in a local house, resulting in the death of a police man and several individuals' injuries. Yet despite the dangers, Victor would end up running into the fire head first to help, able to contain it in the end due to his interference. Big Daddy would write various notes and monitoring records after the fire attempting to brush it aside, writing phrases such as "Everything's normal. But if the "Postman" won't keep his mouth shut, like the cop, I'll get rid of him too." and "Don't say anything. You stick out like a sore thumb. We won't mind burning that dog again."

It's implied that Big Daddy had caused the fire in an attempt to kill the police man mentioned beforehand. Clearly, this plan was successful, as the words in the ninth deduction 'Possession' would confirm the death of the policeman.

Victor's various translations about his character introduction give their own perspective on his persona, yet all of them start with the fact that Victor is 'strange' and they all end with him accepting the invitation to the Oletus manor with glee.

An obvious fact is that Victor, after reading his lore and simply just looking around, is someone who values written words over verbal communication. This is possibly due to his obsession with letters and his view on secrets because of his job and environment, leading to being considered mute by others. It's implied that he is selectively mute considering he does speak to Wick on different occasions.

Seemingly, the reason Victor went into the fire originally was because Wick was inside, as the note threatening Victor to keep quiet of the incident states the word 'again' which could mean many things. Has Victor gone through various threatening cases where Wick's life was on the line? Or is it simply a case of particular wording? I do personally believe Wick had been in that fire with the policeman, 'conveniently.'

In conclusion, Victor worked for the mafia. The letter sent from Oletus manor was his first letter ever received to himself which led him to easily head towards the location fully trusting the sender's sincerity.

𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗦𝗢𝗡𝗔𝗟𝗜𝗧𝗬 𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗦𝗣𝗘𝗖𝗧𝗜𝗩𝗘.

A man of secrets who holds things dearly. Having issues with being social yet craving for the sense of company much like others, Victor could be considered to have emotional unavailability. That along with a tendency to be apathetic at times, detachment from other people, and avoidance. Canonically he has scopophobia which is the fear of being stared at. This likely originated from his past in which he became paranoid due to working in the mafia. The other canon traits he has is being socially awkward, kind-hearted, and quiet. There's not much to go on with those few traits, but at the same time, there's many things that can connect to them.

He is considered SOCIALLY AWKWARD because of his inability and disinterest in having face-to-face conversations. Victor had mentioned himself that he had an obsession with watching others' expressions and feelings whenever they opened letters. I feel like we could say he's not the best chatter to converse with, but he is socially aware. I mean that in a way where he is likely more in-tune with others' emotions than he might realize, his brain always subconsciously seeking for that change of expression — from smiles shifting to frowns to eyes brimming with tears. Yet despite that, Victor would still struggle to let his own emotions out; an act of hypocrisy he's likely self-aware of.

KIND-HEARTEDNESS is a positive trait. It lines up with being empathetic, which I genuinely do think Victor is. However, he has cases of showing indifference when it comes to certain issues regarding humans rather than, for example, his dog. This could stem from the mafia as it seems like that environment was very much an 'all men for themselves' work space, which would lead him to be more 'selfish' regarding his survival. He'd be aware of someone's suffering and would merely watch from afar. Though I admit that sentence could be contradicted by the fire incident. The reason he did run inside however is implied to be due to Wick rather than the people trapped in the house, even though he does end up helping out more than likely planned, leading to cause many to trust him. A win-win scenario for everyone but his coworkers. He's a nice person at heart but it's just been snuffed out, whether because he's accustomed to surviving for himself or the fact he has trouble with expressing it, the manor game he was in showing more of that side.

Being QUIET is an expected trait. Whether it be the fact he's mute or just generally reserved. His past with secrets and the thought of paranoia whenever people talk or stare at him causes him to fall silent. It makes him the perfect person to be a secret keeper. Victor knew that and Big Daddy thought so as well. In a way, he's a bit of a push-over. I don't think he's that much of a people pleaser. Yes, he may be helpful, but would he bend his back over for someone? Not exactly. His level of being a 'pushover' originates from the fear of being replaced, lacking the sudden emotions people present to him so openly. It's a drug he's accustomed to. Take that away and he'd face his own shortcomings. Big Daddy makes it clear that he can and could replace him, and what's better to ensure that doesn't happen than to become quieter than a corpse? Victor would find out that fitting into a certain criteria, looking a certain part, and keeping low under the radar is the best way he can live his life 'peacefully', even if that peace is temporary. He'll try to postpone the end as much as he can.

Overall Victor's main issue is that he's so attached to letters, in particular, the words and straightforwardness of them. Of course we all know someone can easily write up a fake sounding sentence to appear as something they aren't. Such as a not so sincere apology. But to Victor, he treasures the experience, as he doesn't view it to have any hidden meanings. With actual conversations, there's many things a person needs to keep aware of. The tone of the words, the current topic, the sentence suddenly leading to a different shift in the discussion. All those are hard to keep track of especially if one's not used to it. Letters allow Victor to read back easily the words in front of him instead of asking the person to repeat themselves. It's an easier solution and a much kinder way to express himself rather than face the eyes of the person staring at him as he attempts a half thought-out response.

He's gullible and a bit naive due to putting so much trust in written words. But as I have thought before, it isn't really his fault. Much like issues the other characters face. With the implied lack of proper care given from his parents and anyone else to support him, the closest support being Wick, he's easily influenced. In a sense, I believe Victor likes animals so much because of the fact they don't 'lie' or 'pretend' like people do. If a cat doesn't like what you're doing, it'll hiss. If a dog wants your attention, it'd bark — I think that's his logic. It's understandable and a bit pathetic. That's also why he clung onto the letter sent by the manor so much. It was his first letter he received to himself, not written to anyone else, nor written by his own hands, someone actually wrote something and knew about him enough to want to reach out to him. You can tell how alone Victor truly is despite the fact he's able to live every day with food and a home. He's still incredibly alone and isolated, writing letters to himself because of the lack of his own partner to send one back to him.

𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗦𝗢𝗡𝗔𝗟 𝗧𝗛𝗢𝗨𝗚𝗛𝗧𝗦.

Regarding the symbolic part of his character, I feel like he's very contradictory in a positive way. He's mute yet words become his way of expressing thoughts and feelings. He doesn't like being vulnerable but wants others to trust him with secrets. He wants someone to write him letters but struggles to make connections. In a sense it's relatable, the idea of wanting someone loyal to you and to trust you fully, matched with the fear and paranoia of 'what if' scenarios resulting in a lack of action. Within canon he's part of group three, which honestly is a whole other topic and separate post.

Victor was still the 'main' person in that group, the vital connection. As a postman he made it his own duty to deliver the various communications within notes from the other three. Not having an issue with the rule of not speaking and probably fostering himself into it as soon as the cycle he was so comfortable with began again. There are notable moments where his past came back, like when he was found by Ganji. His body instinctively went into a defensive or submissive position as he mentions that he was reminded of another 'unpleasant person' within the interaction — a reference to Big Daddy, maybe even implying he would be physically beat with how small the actions were. If you read his full lore it's easy to notice the connections.

I find it very ironic he died in a fire, with his inability to let go of the things he held most dear to him, secrets written within sheets of paper. The first fire he had survived and was considered to be a hero. The second time around, he didn't have any thoughts except to make sure something else, the letter, was safe before his own survival. It led to his head being lit in literal flames. I was very distraught about the death when the news first released, although it was expected. The fact he was connected to fire in the first place is easily overlooked. Victor doesn't have a fear of fire which I would assume he would have. The things he loves the most being paper, which can be easily burnt, the fact he had to save Wick multiple times from the threat of being burnt, and even the fact of the original house fire he had gone into was likely not his first time with flames. I think these experiences led to why he bolted into the fire in the manor.

Victor could've been used to the fraying of his clothes and the smoke in his lungs but he wasn't used to actually having letters burn. Letters were important to Big Daddy too if you think about it. He wouldn't just burn important secrets so he decided to burn the second closest thing to Victor's heart which was Wick. So with that mindset, he ran straight into the fire. But this time, the last time, he couldn't make it out. It's unknown if something fell and trapped him or if he just gave up on escaping, possibly tired of running. Running metaphorically or even literally. Victor has run from most of his problems, being silent about his issues, attempting to please his peers, and being kept in his comfort zone for so long. This is only up to his second-to-last letter entry, so when the last one appears in a few months, this'll likely be updated.

"In the end, Victor Grantz was a

person filled with contradictions,

a man who wished for a change

yet couldn't escape the cycle he

was so selfishly trying to keep."

— analysis end.

[aniron48]

Love Letters - Day 9

Here we are at the end of our choose your own adventure, friends. I've said this before, but it's been an absolute delight, doing this with all of you, and writing this together. Your choices shaped every step of the narrative, so if you've enjoyed the story, you should feel proud (and if you didn't, uh, not it? 😉)

If you need to catch up on a day or two, you can find the other installments here. I'll keep this post pinned for a day or two as well, and may put the finished version up on ao3 eventually. Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Day 5 Day 6 Day 7 Day 8

Last, but not remotely least: my wife has been making noises about joining Tumblr, because I told her about this, and she wants to read it in its original form. I hope she does, because all of this is for her. 💜

Conclusion starts below the cut!

And tomorrow at noon, as instructed, he would meet Q in front of the Fighting Temeraire. 

At precisely twelve o’clock, Bond walked into room 34 of the National Gallery. Q was already there, this time, a reversal of the day they’d met a little over a year ago. He’d swapped his anorak for a wool coat, his suit for a navy blue cardigan and a white button-up, and, in a nod to the day, he sported a navy blue bowtie with tiny white hearts on it. So much had changed, since the last time they’d been here, much of it because of the man waiting for him on the bench, looking at a Turner painting.

“James,” Q said as Bond approached. “You got the package I sent?”

“Yes,” Bond said. “It’s the best thing anyone’s ever sent me, Q. Even without the exploding pen. Though thank you for that, by the way, I still haven’t managed to clean up all the confetti hearts. I even found some in my pants, last night.”

“How in the world—actually, never mind, I’m not sure I want to know.”

Bond gestured to the envelope Q was clutching in his right hand. “And you got your letter as well, I see.”

“Yes,” Q said. “I, ah—I haven’t opened it, yet. You’re going to think it’s silly of me, but I was too nervous.”

Bond sat down beside him. “Don’t be nervous,” he said, taking Q’s hand in his own. “You can open it with me, if you like.”

Q nodded. He squeezed Bond’s hand, and then released it, taking a shaky breath as he opened the envelope and began to read.

My darling Q,

A wise man recently told me that I should be honest above all else, in my letter to you, so I’ll start with a small confession: I have read countless love letters in the last few days, preparing to write my first to you. It was the best thing I could have done, but not for the reason you might think: it showed me that there are as many ways to tell someone what they mean to you as there are people in the world.

I needed to know that, because so many of the traditional idioms people use to describe love didn’t seem to fit the way I feel for you. Take “falling” in love, for example. I haven’t found that to be particularly apt. I’ve fallen from any number of things—helicopters, buildings, construction cranes, moving cars—and loving you hasn’t been like any of that.

I’m beginning to suspect that I’m doing an absolutely shit job of writing this letter, but the thing is, so many people treat pain as a kind of virtue, as something that must be surmounted before you gain anything of value. It’s astonishing how untrue that really is, though, and it’s equally astonishing how long it took me to learn it. How the only reason I’ve begun to learn it is because loving you is the only thing in my life that never hurts.

I’m not trying to say that relationships are effortless. I’m not that daft. What I mean is—loving you isn’t falling at all, Q. It’s a lie-in on a Sunday, with you in my arms, and the cats at our feet, and the certain knowledge that all of me is welcome there. That all of me is home, because by some miracle you know me better than anyone, and you love me anyway.

So much of my life is a fight, and you remain the most effortless surrender.

I love you with all of me, Q. And I always will.

Love,

Your James

Q sniffed, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket to swipe at his face. “Don’t look at me. I’m not crying.”

“Of course not,” Bond said. He reached out to wipe Q’s cheeks with his thumbs, and rested his forehead against Q’s. He stayed there for a long moment, leaning into Q, feeling the warmth of his body alongside his own.

“We’re quite the matched set, aren’t we?” Q asked eventually.

“I’d say so,” Bond said. “Oh, and there’s one more thing.“ He reached into the leather satchel at his feet, and pulled out the snow globe he’d bought in Bath. “I bought this to throw Moneypenny and Tanner off the track, but do you know, it’s rather grown on me.”

Q shook it, and watched as snow fell on the replica of the Bath Circus. His smile widened.

“It’s perfect,” he said.

“By the way, I presume that Moneypenny and Tanner aren’t actually having an affair.”

“Do you know, I’d convinced them to go down with me to Bath to mail your package, since we all had the Saturday morning free—I thought we’d make a day of it. If you’d taken the train into Bath, instead of driving, you might have run into all of us. As it was, I had to take the train back by myself. But I gather I had the more comfortable journey.”

They sat in silence for a while longer, looking at the Fighting Temeraire on the wall.

“Does it still make you melancholy, when you look at it?” Bond asked.

“Maybe a little. It’s a melancholy painting, in many ways. A painting about change. But then, not all change is bad, is it? Something ends, and something else begins. Maybe there’s hope in it, in its own way.” Q shifted on the bench, turning to look at Bond. “And what about you? Do you still just see a bloody big ship?”

“Well,” Bond said, considering. “There are actually two ships, sailing toward the viewer, aren’t there? The older, wiser, stately ship, and the younger, cheekier ship there in the front, dragging the older one into the future whether he wills it or no. It’s a metaphor, you see.”

“A metaphor for what, exactly?”

“The ships are a metaphor. The painting’s actually about shagging.”

“Oh my god. And here I was starting to think you were a romantic.”

“I contain multitudes.”

“I do love you, you know,” Q said. “In case you needed reminding.”

“I do,” Bond said. “Frequently.” He reached up to tuck a stray curl behind Q’s ear. “And I love you too. Obviously.”

“Obviously.” Q looked down at his watch. “Do you want to have a look around? I took the day, but if you have to be back at work—“

“There’s nowhere I need to be,” Bond said. “We have time.”

The gallery slowly started to fill up with people, students and tourists and docents giving tours, eddying around the pair of them like boats in a harbor. Some of them may have noticed them sitting there, the agent and his quartermaster, looking for all the world like an ordinary couple on a Valentine’s Day outing. Others never noticed them at all. But they stayed for a long while, and then they were gone, and when they left, they left together.

[cartoonfuel]

Billiard Gloves

Tomura Shigaraki x Villain!Reader

** SLIGHT NSFW ** (still earns a Teen rating tho)

Anonymous Ask: can you write a shiggy x villain!reader where the reader gives him some sort of gift and then he takes things a little too far? sfw or nsfw doesn’t matter to me... thanks!

A/N: The formatting of this was a bitch so I copied your Ask and just pasted it here, Anon (I’M SORRY, I’M STILL LEARNING HOW TUMBLR WORKS)! Thanks for sending in a request! <3

Synopsis: Your gift seemed like a great way to score brownie points with Shigaraki. Unfortunately, you end up scoring more than anticipated.

Rating: TEEN

Warnings: Shigaraki being creepy af, one-sided attraction(?), this is not smut imo but it could be in someone else’s idfk, slight dark content

Word Count: 1.4K

~~~~~

“Surprise!” You beamed, handing a wrapped package to your boss, Tomura Shigaraki.

“For me?” Shigaraki retorted harshly, Kurogiri cleaning up the bar behind him.

Smile unwavering, you nodded. “For you! Open it!”

You had joined the League of Villains only a couple weeks ago. It was Himiko Toga who lured you in, gushing about her convictions and the reasoning behind being a part of the League. She then had the brilliant idea of inviting you to join, most likely because of the usefulness of your quirk. She was a close friend of yours, after all—so why not take a leap of faith and be part of a team?

This particular team wasn’t pretty, of course, with you, Toga and Twice quickly becoming an infamous trio of naughty villains. Dabi drove you mad almost daily as you had to put up with his constant teasing and eerie personality. Spinner and Mr. Compress were oftentimes barely noticeable and Kurogiri was the mom of the group. Tomura was most definitely the toughest character to impress. You wished he didn’t have to look so gloomy all the time. Logically, you concluded his cold demeanor had something to do with his destructive quirk. He sometimes drawled on and on about how annoying Decay was at times, and you couldn’t help but feel sorta bad for the guy. You’re sure it must’ve been a difficult power to grow up with.

And so, you bought him billiard gloves! These gloves only cover the thumb, index and middle finger of each hand. You were perplexed as to why he hadn’t thought of doing this before. Now, because of you, he’d be able to drink a glass of whiskey on the rocks in peace!

"What's the occasion?" Kurogiri inquired, putting one final glass away in a cupboard.

"If you must know, it's October 16...National Boss Appreciation Day! In America, that is. Y'know, cuz I'm originally from America."

Shigaraki just glared at you.

You rolled your eyes. "Oh, just open the damn box, dude."

He groaned, snatching the gift from you with raised pinkies. The villain disintegrated the wrapping paper and box altogether, two black gloves gently falling to the floor.

"Gloves?" Kurogiri commented.

"Are you dense?" Shigaraki snarled at you, getting out of his seat. He knelt down to pick up the gloves, eyes widening the moment he noticed holes for the ring and pinky fingers. "Oh."

"Ah, billiard gloves. How thoughtful of you," Kurogiri said as he made his way around the counter.

"Kurogiri, one whiskey on the rocks, please!" you requested, causing him to stop in his tracks and sigh. "For my friend, here." You stole one of the gloves from Tomura and insisted he hold his hand out. Despite feeling mildly annoyed, he complied, allowing you to slip the glove onto his hand. Kurogiri poured Shigaraki’s drink, handing it to him with grace. In turn, Shigaraki picked up the beverage and raised an eyebrow.

As expected, nothing happened, Shigaraki’s glass remaining intact.

He sipped at the drink, coughing afterward. “What the hell is this, Kurogiri?”

“Whiskey on the rocks,” Kurogiri responded. “But we are all out of bourbon.”

“How’s it feel?” you butted in, grinning at the leader of the League.

“How does what feel?”

“Holding it with all five fingers, duh.”

“Kurogiri,” Shigaraki suddenly snapped. “Will you excuse us?”

“But your glass—”

“Get out, please.”

“Certainly. Just leave your glass on the counter when you’re done.” With that, Kurogiri warped away in a cloud of obsidian fog.

Uh-oh. This was new. You’re alone with Shigaraki and he didn’t even bother to offer you a drink to make things less awkward? Asshole.

“What game are you playing?” Tomura sneered, sliding his other hand into the second billiard glove.

You scoffed. “Come again?”

“Are you secretly trying to infiltrate the League or something? What kind of manipulation is this?”

“Whoa, calm down. If you hate the gift just say it to my face, don’t act all cryptic.”

He pat the barstool next to him, and with all five fingers too. Lucky bastard hadn’t even thanked you yet. “Sit.”

Geez, that was off-putting. “No thanks, actually. Permission to escort myself to bed instead? It’s late.”

“Denied. Now sit down.”

You furrowed your brow in frustration. “If you insist.” You pulled the seat out and sat, immediately crossing your arms. “Happy?”

“Give me your hand.”

You cleared your throat. “Why? Do you plan on regifting my gift? I don’t really care if you do, but generally people don’t tell—”

“Shut up and do as I say,” Shigaraki barked, causing you to jump.

“Fine.” Hesitantly, you held your hand out. “Now what?”

“Don’t move, please.”

You had never felt so uncomfortable in your life. “Uh…sure?”

He took your hand in his, delicately setting each finger on your skin one by one. First his thumb, then index, middle, ring and pinky.

“Um…Shigaraki?”

“Stop talking,” Tomura said, surprisingly less aggressive than usual. Despite telling you what to do, his tone came across softer. “I’d like to test out these gloves.”

Oh.

“I guess that’s okay. We could play catch or something.”

“Or something.”

Oh.

You shuddered, his hand continuing to consume your own. “Doesn’t it sound better to test them on something living? In which the stakes are much higher? Normally I would kill you if I did this.”

And then a lightbulb went off inside your head. “Don’t forget which one of us is technically Quirkless right now, Shigaraki.”

Shigaraki didn’t say anything as his hand began to move up your arm at an agonizingly slow rate.

“It’s you,” you added. “You’re the Quirkless one.”

His other hand shot forward to cover your mouth, quickly silencing you. “I thought I told you to be quiet.” His usual voice had returned, your eye twitching as a result. He backed off, slumping in his seat. He was right, because typically anyone in this situation would already be dead. However, those handy-dandy little billiard gloves did effectively nullify Shigaraki’s Decay, making these unfolding events seem a little less daunting.

“Carry on then,” you said with reluctance, grimacing at him all the while. Finally, you decided to zip your mouth shut, hoping that doing so would somehow end up being a power move. You knew you were capable of stopping this weirdness, but the last thing you wanted was to get off on the wrong foot with Tomura Shigaraki. Besides, it was definitely interesting to see him so curious.

“Perfect,” Shigaraki replied, his fingers entwined with yours. “After all, you wouldn’t want to ruin your gift to me, would you?” His opposite hand landed on the inside of your thigh, you attempting to resist the powerful urge to brutally kick his ugly face in.

“Of course not,” you murmured, your voice trailing off to prevent getting in trouble again.

Before you knew it, the hand on your leg had glided underneath your shirt and was latched onto your stomach. You wanted to vomit. This was not in the League of Villains job description. “You’re very warm,” Shigaraki observed, stating the obvious. “If only you could understand.” His hand inched up and up. “Can…?” Wasn’t he going to finish his goddamn sentence?

You glared vicious daggers at the man, knowing exactly what he wanted. “Whatever,” you hissed. “Have at it.”

He stood up and hunched over you, both gloved hands shooting underneath your top and cautiously fondling your chest. There was no hiding this blush of yours and you refused to make a peep. Looking up at him, you stared with mixed emotion, completely shocked by the current situation and whatever it was going on inside this guy’s head.

All of a sudden, one hand moved to wrap around the back of your neck, the other staying put. “Your heart’s racing.”

“Well I’m scared and half expecting you to try and kiss me,” you blurted without thinking, eyes wide.

Tomura’s eyes met yours, and then you noticed him glance down at your lips and back up again. “Kissing has nothing to do with testing my billiard gloves.” With that, Shigaraki backed away from you. “You’re dismissed,” he snickered as he exited into the hallway. “Next time you give me a present, maybe I’ll promote you to Lieutenant.”

Feeling both relieved and defeated, you swiveled in your chair and fell face-first onto the counter. “This was a mistake.”

~~~~~

A/N #2: IDK IF IMMA WRITE ANYTHING THIS SPICY AGAIN IN THE FUTURE BUT IF I DO CAN IT BE WITH SOMEONE LESS CRUSTY please and thank you

Have a lovely day, Lovelies!

[campbluesky]

I feel like the wide shot at 38:23 in S2 Ep10 of Z Nation perfectly captures how Murphy is in the group at this point. Ostracized. The group has treated him like less than, like a package since day one. They treated him poorly and he didn't fit into the group well to begin with. It didn't help that literally all of them except for 10k knew each other. Of course, theres the episode where they finally start seeing him as a friend, but only because he brings them supplies. And despite them saying that, their attitude towards him doesn't change. He is still Murphy. And of course, he slowly becomes more zombie looking, making the group ostracize him even further, except now they're treating him as less than human. They're treating him as a zombie. Despite clearly being something in between human and zombie. He gets even more disconnected from the group and slowly starts gaining a connection to the zombies. They stop going after him, he starts to see himself in the zombies, and he starts to feel bad about killing them. Then, he can stop them, stall them, make them back off. He can make them understand, he can teach them to play fucking patty cake if he wants, they would listen and understand. He sees himself in the zombies and starts to feel one with them. He feels deeply connected to them. He feels like they're his people, his flock. Hes deeply, deeply connected to them, feeling deep negative feelings about killing them and hurting them. And the group disproves. The group tells him that he is going to need to make a choice eventually. They justify the killing of his people by saying that it's just survival, not even willing to make a compromise. And they're still. Treating him like shit. He is not a part of the group. He is a prisoner. He is their cargo, their package, their cure. That's it. They have made that abundantly clear. He is not one of them. He is not a human. He is not a part of the group. He's just Murphy.

Green text = edited in after the original posting

[luimagines]

Fck it Droid AU headcanons? Or just a small thing with Skydroid / Twidroid?

Droid au lives on forever

Let’s introduce the rest of the boys

Masterlist

Content under the cut!

Sky

Model SKYLNK

Programmed to be a domestic droid

Babysitter, cook, butler

Tutors the small children, watches over them, and takes care of pets as well

Due to it’s softer programming, when working in the public, it tends to work in bedside manner

Like nurses and nannies

The kind to work in hospitals and elderly living

Not necessarily the newest model on the block, but is one of the most affordable one

Commonly seen in the homes of the middle class

This droid is known for having very little drive deviate from orders

There’s very little facial expressions for newer models

Some, however, have been seen to mimic the facial expressions of the people they serve due to the acclimating programming naturally found in all droids 

The droid is built for handy work around the house

But not designed for hard labor or any heavy lifting

Perfect designed to keep things moving smoothly through the unit it’s assigned to

However- newer models have been seen to come with relationship programming (a new project from Hylia.Inc) 

Further development is yet to be seen

Time

Model TIMLNK

One of the few adults droids on the market

Versatile for many upgrades and job applications

Heavy work? Built for it

Domestic droid? On it

Teacher, hospital nurse, secretary? Just download the needed package for him to take on what job you need him to do

There are certain things that maybe a bit awkward for him to do

Like translating or babysitting

But it works in a pinch

Also sought out as a companionship droid

Takes on a lot of brunt work

While he has a lot of packages that came with time (ha), he is used more for heavy work, like cargo or supply shipments

Isn’t so much for public availability despite the company’s best efforts to expand his roles in society

Not very expressive due to the shift in attention when he was being designed

This is probably why he’s not bought for public use even if he can do the jobs

But he is programmed to be hard working and the robotic equivalent to compassionate 

So this guy never really stops working if the data received can be interpreted as contributing

Legend

Model LGNLNK

Teenage Domestic droid

Known for it’s extensive programming

In the highest demand due to the versatile talents that goes into him

Is used beyond domestic circumstances

Is typically found in place of a translator for political or high standing communal events

Can cook

Clean

Teach

Can directly call emergency services 

Known for the original intention of keeping younger children company or for acting as a Jiminy Cricket for older children

Also originally advertised for older couples who wanted a younger energy in their empty nest

As since branched out to include the other features and is the more commonly seen droid out in public

Also the most customizable out of all of the publicly made droids

Is the only droid available beyond national borders

Other, more advanced models are in progress

Hyrule

Model TRVLNK

A multi-purpose droid

Designed for human relation work or bedside manner

Typically a nurse droid

But not designed for domestic use

Is designed with high grade professional use in mind

Is commonly found in nursing homes or in children’s hospitals

Is also a part of public staff in very highly populated common areas

Like carnivals and amusement parks and zoos and museums and the like

Also acts as tour guide in many other places where travel agencies send tourists for their holiday vacations

Is one of the few droids on the market that can connect to GPS

When droids begin to start working for the public division, they were at first found in buses, driving people from destination to destination

Naturally this upset many people and bus use fell around 19%

But with time people got used to it’s features and the buses ran on time for a change

Not to mention his pleasant demeanor and over all cheerful disposition in his programming made this model likable by many who had to see him on a day to day basis

Four

Model FSWLNK

Meant to be the successor to the WNDLNK model

Used as a child support droid

But also a family companion for lonely, childless adults who want youthful energy in the household

Because of his youthful appearance but older programming, this model tends to be used for public service more so than private ownership

Even if this model is seen nearly in every family friendly public space, there are a few who do accompany children as a family owned appliance

The reason he’s more corporately owned than privately is because he is also used as a child safety surveillance system

Like at public places where children can easily be lost

Like at the zoo, museum, festival, carnival, you name it

They are looking for kids without supervision or who appear to be in danger

It took a lot of training to get that programming even marginally successful

Because they need a lot of of the droids on surveillance, they tend to wear different colored uniforms so people can identify what job that specific droid is doing

Can also be found in child counseling offices or therapy clinics (physical therapy included)

One of the more easy going personality programs

Easy to get along with and easy to like

Is programmed to work with multiple units despite the success in privately owned facilities

Wild

Model CALLNK

Meant for high paced, highly demanding work

A public service droid by nature

Meant to work in the police force

Also found in office facilities 

Or a high scale kitchen where orders have to leave in the matter of minutes

Used as a security droid in a lot of places as well

But more so as a security droid for high profile individuals

Meant to defend and protect no matter the cost

Even if it includes damage to self in the process

Not very expressive in nature

Due to the difficulties and intricacies in programming, they forgo any need for there to be a personal expression in this particular model

So he’s always straight faced no matter what the circumstances are

It’s very unusual for this model to be found in the private or commercial sector

As mentioned before those who use this model for private use are high profile people and people with money

One of the most expensive models on the market

Very few even know he exists

Wind

Model WNDLNK

Child Domestic Droid

One of the first models made by Hylia.INC

Made as an support companion

Later tweaked for homes where children are wanted but not available for whatever reason

As support companions they were designed to help children with special needs, whatever it may be

From reminding children to take their medicine on time, to helping them keep to a schedule and remembering chores as well as simply being emotional support 

The concept was at first a personified tablet

But later on, newer models became more life like and more attuned for family life

Even more later on, they were designed for aforementioned concept of lonely adults who wanted to have children without the cost or mess or real children (Take that as you will)

Is sensitive to temperature

Occasionally feels “hunger” to simulate taking care of another human

Very playful in nature

Few models can be seen in schools with a little more money to float around, helping children where Paras are hard to find

Typically used in school with younger children as the older ones tend to be a little put off by his young appearance

A people pleasure by default, but no one knows if it’s based on his programming or on his need to see though with his missions for the day

Warrior

Model WARLNK

Consort Droid- built for relationships

Has been used for espionage purposes

Doubles as a security droid as well

Is seen typically working a desk job as well

Secretary models, am I right?

Someone has to handle all the forms and PAs and meetings and names and appointments

Not just desk jobs, but also customer service

Is very much used for the public service

Only the rich have it for personal use since it would have added features regarding said spy ware and filtrations mannerisms

Or just to have a pretty thing around

Some people are into that so he’s also for them

Service with a smile~

(potential angst for android War? Definitely.) 

That being said, due the upgraded systems used for both security work and espionage

WARLNK models have also been integrated into public police forces

Public opinion varies heavily on either side

But their effectiveness cannot be ignored when investigating a crime scene

Twilight

Model TWILNK

Heavy work load droid

Handy man is all aspects

Meant to be put to work

Known from farms to construction sites

Programmed to be very loyal to the cause

Lives to serve so to speak

Needs to receive feed back to know if it’s contributing to the community

While not the typical domestic droid, some houses have been known to have a model or two around

Some companies rent out their models to the common folk to help with renovations, or moving, or landscaping, or plumbing- even electrical work

In this au, a lot work for “Got Junk?” 

There has been the one in a million celebrity that has managed to find customization locals and renovate the model to be that of an escort droid

But that’s a very expensive process

And frankly, it’s easier to change the hardware than the software

Is also the occasional nursing droid

Known to be working in nursing homes and independent living units, where it might be required to lift an entire body as dead weight for whatever reason

Is the strongest droid on the market

[rabbitcruiser]

International Dark 'n Stormy Day

Sailors and cocktail enthusiasts rejoice,  this year June 9 is International Dark ‘n Stormy Day. This delicious  and potent highball was created in an accidental collaborative effort by a family of Bermudian rum makers (you know the Goslings, don’t you) and some seasick sailors. Members of the British Navy stationed on Bermuda in the 1920s brewed ginger beer as a remedy for seasickness. Some intrepid sailors began adding a dash of the Goslings’ locally made Black Seal Rum to the ginger beer, transforming a dizzy-tummy remedy into one  of the most popular and widely-recognized cocktails to date. So pour  yourself a tall glass of Goslings Stormy Ginger Beer with a topper of Goslings Black Seal Rum and raise a toast to the gifted minds who  brought us this liquid masterpiece.

Sailors  and cocktail enthusiasts rejoice, this year June 9* is International  Dark ‘n Stormy Day. This delicious and potent highball was created in  an accidental collaborative effort by a family of Bermudian rum makers  (you know the Goslings, don’t you) and some seasick sailors. Members of  the British Navy stationed on Bermuda in the 1920s brewed ginger beer as  a remedy for seasickness. Some intrepid sailors began adding a dash of  the Goslings’ locally made Black Seal Rum to the ginger beer,  transforming a dizzy-tummy remedy into one of the most popular and  widely-recognized cocktails to date. So pour yourself a tall glass of  Goslings Stormy Ginger Beer with a topper of Goslings Black Seal Rum and  raise a toast to the gifted minds who brought us this liquid  masterpiece.

Five Fast Facts:

It has a specific recipe

While  mixing other rums with ginger beer might taste good, a cocktail just  isn’t a Dark ‘n Stormy unless it utilizes the unique flavor of Goslings  Black Seal Rum.

Hall of Famer

The Dark ‘n Stormy was awarded #19 on 2020’s list of the World’s Best Selling Cocktails.

The Best Mixer Around

Goslings Stormy Ginger Beer is the #1 Selling Ginger Beer Brand in the U.S.

The Taste of Bermuda

The Dark ‘n Stormy holds the title of Bermuda’s National Drink.

A Global Phenomenon

Goslings Black Seal Rum is exported to more than 20 countries. Making the Dark ‘n Stormy a truly global cocktail.

History of International Dark 'n Stormy Day

It  was a dark and stormy night…well, it’s more likely that it was a nice  and peaceful day in the spring of 1806 when James Gosling — the eldest  son of wine and spirit merchant, William Gosling — embarked on a journey  from England to America with 10,000 pounds of merchandise.  Unfortunately, after 91 days at sea, his charter ran out, so James and  his crew decided to head for the nearest port: St. George’s, Bermuda.  Instead of moving on from Bermuda to America, he and his brother Ambrose  set up shop on King’s Parade Street in 1824. Over the years, the  Gosling family perfected their blending technique until they created  their unique black rum, originally referred to as “Old Rum” up until  World War I. In the early 1900s, they began packaging their rum in  repurposed champagne bottles and sealing them shut with black wax. From  that moment, the rum became widely referred to as “Black Seal.”

In  the 1920s, the family’s rum caught the attention of Royal Naval  Officers who were brewing their own ginger beer. They added a hefty  splash of the dark rum to their sparkling drink and accidentally created  a delicious and iconic cocktail. According to legend, the cocktail got  its recognizable name when an old fisherman claimed the drink had the  “color of a cloud only a fool or dead man would sail under.” On June 9, 1980, the Gosling family trademarked the cocktail, protecting the  integrity of the drink’s recipe the world over, and forever ensuring  that a cocktail can only be advertised as an authentic Dark ‘n Stormy if it contains the key ingredient – Goslings Black Seal Rum.

International Dark 'n Stormy Day timeline

1806 James Gosling Arrives in Bermuda

En route to America, James Gosling instead makes a home on Bermuda, and a rum-making legacy is born.

1824 Bermuda's Wine and Spirit Merchants

Ambrose Gosling arrives to Bermuda and he and his brother set up shop on King's Parade Street in St. George's, Bermuda.

1920s A Storm is Brewing

British  Royal Naval Officers tried adding Goslings Black Seal Rum to their  ginger beer — an old sailor claimed the drink looked just like storm  clouds.

1950s Tall, Dark, and Handsome

Francis  “Goose” Gosling (6th generation) designs signature Black Seal logo, and  the name is officially changed from “Old Rum” to Goslings Black Seal  Rum.

1980 A Proper Cocktail

The Gosling family trademarked the Dark 'n Stormy cocktail, mandating that  the only way to list it is with the use of ginger beer and Goslings Black Seal Rum.

2009 Goslings Introduces Stormy Ginger Beer

With the addition of Goslings own brand of ginger beer, the Dark 'n Stormy is completely in the family.

2012 Dark 'n Stormy In a Can

Gosling releases a ready-to-drink Dark 'n Stormy in a can in the U.S. making this beloved cocktail even more enticing.

International Dark 'n Stormy Day Activities

Enjoy a glass (or can) of the refreshing cocktail

Dress up as a sailor

Create Dark 'n Stormy Cuisine

If  you're celebrating International Dark 'n Stormy Day, then it's only a given that you indulge in the deep and sparkling flavors of a Dark 'n Stormy. Whether you like it layered in a glass or in Goslings quick and convenient can, the only way you can go wrong is by not drinking it at all!

The Dark 'n Stormy is the sailor's drink of choice, so it's only right that  you take on the part of a sailor after drinking one...or two. However, please drink responsibly, just because you're dressed as a sailor  doesn't mean you have the alcohol tolerance of one. Trust us, we know.

Ginger, rum, lime, these are all wonderful flavor profiles for a myriad of culinary concoctions. Try your hand at baking Dark 'n Stormy cupcakes, or blending some Dark 'n Stormy ice cream.

Why We Love International Dark 'n Stormy Day

We get to drink our favorite cocktail

A drink with history

It stems from a family business

When there's a full day dedicated to the creation of our favorite cocktail,  it's only right that we take the time to indulge. It's called being festive. Whether you're a professional mixologist or just play one at  home, nothing could be simpler than mixing up a Dark 'n Stormy.

This  cocktail comes with a story — the more we learn about it, the more we love it. How many other cocktails can say they're the sailor's drink of choice? Probably not many, because they can't talk, but you know what we mean.

There's  something about a family business that lets us know that everything was created with care, attention to detail, and affection. The Gosling family has been in the rum making business for over 200 years, and as hey've grown into the rum company that we all know and love today, they've maintained the integrity of their one-of-a-kind Bermuda rum.

Source

[terrence-silver]

Do you think Terry Silver's a xenophobe?

Yes.

And it's complicated.

And yet it's not at all complicated.

But, yes.

I think when he puts someone into the 'enemy' box, irregardless of their origins, everything about them suddenly and automatically becomes the subject of loathing in his eyes, including their background, for example. Their shoe size, their eye color, the way they walk, talk, think and the fact that they're, oh, I don't known, from Burkina Faso, all become a target of his ire, collectively, like a big package he wants to step on. Whereas, Terry is fully capable of being a hypocrite with double standards (he doesn't see it that way, but even if he did, he doesn't care) of having allies and friends of the same race, ethnicity or nationality and being entirely fine and even abjectly defensive of everything about them to the point of fighting their battles for them, tooth and nail, including being devotedly protective of the very same background he might loathe on someone else. He's an absolutist. He either hates your guts or is the most biased man alive entirely in your corner.

Now, does he have his own personal prejudices that stem very deep?

Mainly from his time in the war?

Maybe some he's been taught, considering he's been technically born more or less sometime in the midcentury?

Oh, yes.

But, at the same time, you're either with him or you're against him, is what it boils down to for a man like Terry, who has an Us Vs Them mentality. You being with him or against him weighs a lot in how he views a person and how he treats them. How respectful he'll be. How much he'll bother at all. It's this willful tunnel vision where he's fully aware that he might treat one person with derision, haughtiness, mockery and even violence and then take another person who's similar in every fashion to the first one and be willing to put down his life for them if it ever came down to it. The only difference between person A. and person B. is that he considers one of them an ally and he considers the other a foe and as such, it's open season on his foe and he feels entitled to offending, discrimination and looking down on them however he so pleases. Perish the thought of doing the same thing to someone he considers one of his people, his guys, his men, his friends, his affiliates.

[dweemeister]

Best Animated Short Film Nominees for the 96th Academy Awards (2024, listed in order of appearance in the shorts package)

This blog, since 2013, has been the site of my write-ups to the Oscar-nominated short film packages – a personal tradition for myself and for this blog. This omnibus write-up goes with my thanks to the Regency South Coast Village in Santa Ana, California for providing all three Oscar-nominated short film packages.

If you are an American or Canadian resident interested in supporting the short film filmmakers in theaters (and you should, as very few of those who work in short films are as affluent as your big-name directors and actors), check your local participating theaters here.

Without further ado, here are the nominees for the Best Animated Short Film at this year’s Academy Awards. The write-ups for the Documentary Short and Live Action Short nominees are complete. Films predominantly in a language other than English are listed with their nation(s) of origin.

Yet again, this completes this year’s omnibus write-ups for the Oscar-nominated short films for the upcoming Academy Awards:

Our Uniform (2023, Iran)

Director Yegane Moghaddam used to be a primary school teacher in Iran and often “observed the students… struggling with their uniforms and headscarves all day.” These observations informed her film and narration in Our Uniform, which won Best First Film at Annecy (the largest animation-only film festival, in the French Alpine resort town of the same name) in 2023. Only the fourth ever non-Western/European and non-Japanese nominee in this 92-year-old category – following 2014’s Bear Story (Chile; that year's winner), 2020’s Opera (South Korea) and 2021’s Bestia (Chile) – Our Uniform adopts a unique style never before seen in this category. Instead of traditional cel animation with ink and paper or computers, Moghaddam nearly single-handedly painted images directly on clothing fabrics (pants, jackets, shirts, scarves – all from her personal wardrobe) to illustrate the memories her narration shares. These memories, of attending public school in Iran, invariably intersect with Iran’s theocratic politics. There are references, never pedantic, about government propaganda as part of the school curriculum, and the segregation between boys’ and girls’ education. Most vividly, Moghaddam remarks on the restricting school uniform and compulsory hijabs for girls at school, issues which enflamed protests against such laws beginning in 2017 (and spiking after the death of Mahsa Amini in 2022).

Moghaddam, who cites graphic novelist/director Marjane Satrapi (2007’s Persepolis, 2011’s Chicken with Plums; the former I consider among the finest animated films of this young century) as her primary artistic inspiration, curiously does not contain as much messaging in her film as one might expect. As an Iranian citizen who currently has no plans to officially distribute the film within her home nation due to fear of retribution, how could she? But the film’s slightness cannot distract from its painstaking, loving artistry. Without relying on inventive camerawork, Moghaddam uses the natural pockets and folds of her clothes to suggest dimension and personality. To Moghaddam, all clothing has a personality and personal history to the wearer, even compulsory clothing, all of which she uses to wonderful effect. What originally began as a fun side project that Moghaddam had no expectations for gifts audiences a truly original viewing experience.

My rating: 7.5/10

Letter to a Pig (2022, Israel/France)

Qualifying for the Academy Awards after winning the Grand Prize for Best International Short Film at Anima, the Brussels Animation Film Festival, in early 2023, Nal Kantor’s Letter to a Pig sees a Holocaust survivor retelling a story of survival to a group of largely disinterested and scornful teenagers. As the elderly man recounts how he wrote a letter to a pig that inadvertently saved his life, a handful of students start insensitively snorting. Quietly, Letter to a Pig adopts the standpoint of one of the girls in class, half-listening at first. Here, Kantor seamlessly switches between the man’s memories and the reality of the classroom, through heavy rotoscoping to outline her figures, mixing it with live-action footage for the limbs or eyes, but only using a few ink scribbles to outline facial features and hair. Generally, the more movement either the schoolgirl or Holocaust survivor show, the more scribbles and live-action footage that appear. For all other figures, they remain mostly abstract.

As a young man, the Holocaust survivor recalls how filled with rage he was, long after his near-death encounter. Now, physically unable to exact retribution on those who harmed him, he tells the students “you are my revenge” – passing along his trauma to those not realizing what they have just received. The schoolgirl’s vision in the surrealistic final minutes is her absorption of the Holocaust survivor’s story. This masterfully drawn finale is the emotional apex of Letter to a Pig, fully justifying its black-and-white palette (with one exception: pink for the pigs, considered an impure animal in Judaism) in service for its profound sense of dread. Symbolizing memory, the pig appears throughout the film as a savior, a monster, or something worthy of mockery, depending on who is on screen. It is in these final moments Letter to a Pig leaves the audience with pressing questions. Can one impart painful memories without the trauma that gives such memories form? Most urgently, can we choose not to act on the trauma we inherit? May it be possible not only in dreams.

My rating: 8.5/10

Pachyderme (2022, France)

Stéphanie Clement’s Pachyderme, like Letter to a Pig, is an unsettling short film that delves deeply into the mind of a troubled character. In this film, a young woman named Louise (Christa Théret) recalls her days visiting her grandparents in Provence (southeastern France) during her childhood. The sun-bathed rural landscape is picturesque, the grandparents’ house gorgeously stylized. Beyond this, some of Louise’s recollections feel incomplete, with no apparent structure or chronology. That might read as a criticism, but Clement and screenwriter Marc Rius fully intend for Pachyderme to seem fragmented. The film strongly implies – and some viewers will pick this up earlier or later than others – that the grandfather sexually abused Louise. In reaction, Louise, while recounting her memories for the audience, has repressed her memories and is showing signs, in her narration and in her visual recollections, of disassociation. I do not recall ever seeing disassociation, a common symptom of those who have been sexually abused, portrayed as cinematically as seen in Pachyderme. It is best exemplified, metaphorically, in the scene where our protagonist disappears into the wallpaper (this scene was originally the first bit of test footage made for the film).

But perhaps there is no better visualization of all Pachyderme has to say than the moment where Louise’s grandfather notices her index finger bleeding. He grasps her hand, and his hands dwarf hers. The simultaneity of Pachyderme’s picture book visuals and its horrifying implications show the viewer a woman who has not fully processed what has happened to her. It is not helped by the defensiveness of Louise’s grandmother following the grandfather’s death. Family denial, too, is playing a role in how Louise is choosing, consciously and subconsciously, to remember the past. In its eleven minutes, Pachyderme passes in a dreamlike haze, its illusory moments enabling the viewer to more closely connect to Louise’s (both the young adult narrating the film and the child on-screen) feelings. Unlike many nominees in Best Live Action Short Film down the years that addressed childhood trauma (it's a long-running trend for that category), Pachyderme prioritizes healing in as cinematic a way as possible.

My rating: 8.5/10

Ninety-Five Senses (2023)

If the names Jared and Jerusha Hess are familiar, that is because this husband-and-wife directorial team also made Napoleon Dynamite (2004) and Nacho Libre (2006). Some of those same comedic sensibilities carry over to Ninety-Five Senses, which qualified for the Academy Awards by winning Best Animated Short at the Florida Film Festival in 2023. The film features an old man named Coy (Tim Blake Nelson, a Coen Brothers regular whose voice fits the narrative here) reflecting back on life – a reverie that jumps, hops, and skips across time and place. At first, Ninety-Five Senses, with its wildly shifting style changes, does not seem to have much of a point or purpose. But the film gradually reveals itself: first through the subtle shading of what appear to be prison bars and, later, the mountain of discarded food cartons sitting on the table in front of Coy. We soon realize that Coy is in the final hours or minutes of being on death row, and he is describing to the audience his internal peace before he meets his fate.

Ninety-Five Senses is not here to make a point about capital punishment, incarceration, or the terrible actions that landed Coy in prison. Foremost, this is a film that attempts to capture the last gasp of humanity of an individual before their execution. In contrast with the drab grays whenever Coy is seen in his cell, his flashbacks are intense – a fount of color, with both crude and elegant character designs, hand-drawn and computer-generated (sometimes appearing side-by-side). Not every vignette – of which there are five, one for each human sense – showcases as much aesthetic excellence as the others, such as an early instance where Coy recounts his childhood. That vignette does not evoke the respective human sense it covers as well as it thinks it does; the art style of that vignette also recalls hand-drawn television animation, but flows too smoothly to exactly replicate it. In any case, this is a promising first foray into animated film for the Hesses.

My rating: 8/10

War Is Over! Inspired by the Music of John and Yoko (2022)

War Is Over! (you cannot make me write or say the full title ever again) has the basics of a promising animated short film. Yet its simplistic take on humanity and warfare and close association with John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)” condemns the film as pure hogwash. On second thought, I retract “hogwash”. That is an insult to Letter to a Pig and to porcine animals. This is self-congratulatory treacle from director Dave Mullins and co-writer Sean Ono Lennon (the son of John and Yoko). In a supposedly alternate World War I reality, a pigeon delivers messages between an Allied and a Central Power soldier on opposite sides of No Man’s Land. The messages contain chess notation, as they, somehow, began a game of chess with each other without ever meeting. One day, at presumably Christmas, the two armies inexplicably charge toward each other and, amid gunfire and a mass mêlée that should leave many more soldiers dead than shown, our two soldiers encounter each other on the battlefield in combat shorn of its gruesomeness.

Despite the film using the Unreal Engine for its animation, I admire the film’s lighting effects, character movements, pigeon animation, sound effects, and art direction for the otherwise sanitized trenches. That may be all the positives I can offer.

The contrived scenario sinks even further when our two chess-playing soldiers discover a critical message from their pigeon messenger. Cue the second-most embarrassing needle drop among this year’s fifteen short film nominees (somehow, the closing moments of The After are worse than this). Unlike The After, War Is Over! feels as if constructed around its respective song. Is this now a glorified music video? In an instant, the film reduces the tragedy of the Great War to something akin to a soft drink commercial or that “Imagine” video (could we stop disrespecting John Lennon and his fellow Beatles?). The sanitized depiction of war and farfetched resolving actions undercut the film’s message, embarrassing itself as it lurches through its excruciating final minutes. That the first credit in the end credits read “music and message by John and Yoko” rather than director Dave Mullins leaves an even more sour taste. At the heart of War Is Over!, Mullins and Sean Ono Lennon want us to know that war is bad. I never could have guessed!

My rating: 4/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found in the “Ratings system” page on my blog. Half-points are always rounded down.

From previous years:  85th Academy Awards (2013) 87th (2015) 88th (2016) 89th (2017) 90th (2018) 91st (2019) 92nd (2020) 93rd (2021) 94th (2022) 95th (2023)

Two other films played in this package as honorable mentions: Wild Summon (2023, dir. Karni Arieli and Saul Freed; 6/10) and I'm Hip (2023, dir. John Musker; 6/10).

For more of my reviews tagged “My Movie Odyssey”, check out the tag of the same name on my blog.

[mariacallous]

Last December, weeks after assuming office, Argentina’s far-right president Javier Milei presented the National Congress with a package of reforms in response to its most dire economic crisis in decades. Milei, a former TV pundit and self-proclaimed “anarcho-capitalist” who campaigned on a promise to “blow up” the system, was following through on a promise to take whatever necessary measures to fix it.

Milei has hardly been shy about what measures he has in mind. Under the guise of “a public emergency” in the omnibus bill, Milei intends to assume sweeping new executive powers that would allow him to bypass Congress on major policy issues. The reforms—from the privatization of major industries to the gutting of labor protections—are a radical attempt to restructure the Argentine economy. They are also a pretext for consolidating power.

Yet the provision most likely to tighten Milei’s political grip is also among the least obvious. Originally found in a few short lines tucked into the otherwise sprawling bill, and now potentially being considered separately, is a wholesale change to the country’s electoral system. Milei’s proposal would adopt the American electoral system for its lawmakers, known as winner-take-all, in place of its proportional system of representation. That could tilt Argentina’s political field in a way that weakens the opposition and strengthens Milei’s own hand.

Like most democracies worldwide, Argentina elects its lawmakers through a proportional electoral system, where a party’s share of seats in a legislature roughly mirrors its share of the vote. In the 2023 national election, Milei’s La Libertad Avanza (LLA)—a coalition of far-right parties—won 28 percent of the vote and, in turn, 27 percent of the lower chamber’s seats up for renewal. While proportional systems vary considerably in their design from one country to the next, as a general principle, all aim to ensure that seats correspond to votes. They do so by electing multiple representatives from each legislative district, and then allocating seats to parties based roughly on their vote share: If a party in a six-seat district wins 50 percent of the vote, it would win three of the six seats.

Only a few major democracies, including the United States, use winner-take-all, the main alternative to proportional representation. Winner-take-all systems instead use single-member districts, where dominant parties often enjoy an outsized advantage by securing seats out of proportion to their support. Consider a state like Massachusetts, where the dominant Democratic Party typically wins around two-thirds of the statewide vote but is awarded 100 percent of the state’s congressional seats. Republicans don’t constitute a majority in any of the state’s nine districts, so they are unable to win the single seat available—shutting them out from representation entirely. Nationally, it’s common for one party to win more U.S. House seats than their vote share would warrant.

Certain authoritarian leaders have picked up on the benefits afforded to them by the American style system. In 2011, new electoral rules in Hungary designed by Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz party introduced single-member districts for more than half of legislative seats. It then won 67 percent of seats with only 45 percent of the vote. In both 2014 and 2018, Fidesz secured supermajorities with less than half the vote. In El Salvador, Nuevas Ideas, led by Nayib Bukele (the self-styled “world’s coolest dictator”), recently slashed the size of its legislature from 84 to 60 members, making it more akin to America’s unusually small Congress—another way to produce nonproportional results—and has promised to adopt winner-take-all elections next in an effort to dilute the opposition. In 2009, as public opinion began to turn against Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, his party reduced the number of legislators elected under proportional rules. Chavez’s party safeguarded its majority in the legislature despite losing majority support, winning 57 percent of seats with 48 percent of the vote.

As Harvard political scientist Pippa Norris explains, winner-take-all systems “manufacture majorities” by design, exaggerating a dominant party’s electoral wins. In Great Britain—the system’s country of origin—postwar governments received, on average, 54 percent of seats on 45 percent of the vote. For a political party committed to democracy, a seat bonus may be harmless. But for one committed to dismantling it, it offers a dangerous leg-up. Changes to an electoral system can offer a veneer of democracy—elections still happen and votes are still counted—while allocating power to a party out of proportion to its actual support.

Winner-take-all systems, unlike proportional ones, are also uniquely vulnerable to gerrymandering, amplifying the seat bonus effect. After the introduction of single-member districts in Hungary, Fidesz took the pen on map-drawing, and in 2014 won 88 percent of single-member seats with 45 percent of the vote. Milei intends to do the same. His proposal for switching to winner-take-all is coupled with language that hands responsibility for drawing new districts to the executive branch, led by him. Milei is likely taking a cue from the American experience with gerrymandering—but also from Argentina’s. In the 1950s, populist president Juan Perón briefly replaced Argentina’s proportional system with winner-take-all. Aggressive gerrymandering by Perón’s party followed, slashing the opposition’s seats from 47 to 14 in a single election—despite increasing its own vote share by only a couple of percentage points.

A switch to winner-take-all in Argentina could help the LLA to juice-up its electoral prospects without actually having to appeal to a majority of voters. But it could also make it structurally more difficult for the opposition to fight back. Proportional electoral systems typically give rise to multiparty democracies, like Argentina’s. Winner-take-all systems, by contrast, tend to generate two-party systems, like America’s. A switch to winner-take-all would almost certainly flatten Argentina’s multiparty landscape—shrinking the playing field of opposition and consolidating the right behind Milei.

Argentina’s politics are organized around coalitions of parties, and the two main coalitions—the center-left Peronists and center-right Radical Civic Union (UCR)—dominate. In 2023, the LLA, an insurgent coalition of the far-right, captured the presidency, but won only 15 percent of congressional seats, and combined with allies, one-third. Another third belongs to the center-right UCR and its allies. Under winner-take-all rules that encourage two-partyism, the LLA could pave a path toward consolidating the right—and around itself. Indeed, in the United States, an insurgent far-right did just that, consolidating conservatives behind a new far-right leader within the only party available to them. It is unlikely that the LLA will jump from a minority to a majority anytime soon without some mechanism that forces the right to line up behind a single banner.

As most of the democratic world trends toward proportional representation, Argentina’s reversal would mark a major step backward. But that, most likely, is the point. In democracy after democracy, multiparty coalitions have been instrumental as a bulwark against authoritarianism. Last year in Poland, for instance, a pro-democracy coalition put aside its differences to defeat the authoritarian-nationalist Law and Justice party—placing Poland on a path to reverse years of democratic backsliding. In 2015 in Finland, the dominant center-right party formed a coalition government with the authoritarian-nationalist True Finns, which abandoned its most extreme promises when forced to compromise with its more moderate partners. For now, Argentine politics is still a multiparty game, and the LLA—still a minority outfit—must contend with its country’s coalitional politics. But Milei is eyeing to change it.

In the lead-up to Argentina’s Dirty War, military governments turned to violence, coups, and outright bans on the opposition, then went on to kill more than 30,000 Argentines. Milei appears sympathetic to Argentina’s decade of dictatorship, playing down the military’s atrocities as “excesses.” His vice president argues that both sides were to blame. Perhaps unsurprisingly, in response to the hundreds of thousands of Argentines who have taken to the streets since his election, Milei’s reform package proposes that any “intentional and temporary congregation of three or more persons” be considered a demonstration and punishable by up to six years in prison. His security services are already cracking down on dissent.

Milei may yet flirt with this darker period of Argentine history. But there may also be less of a need. Electoral systems are a democracy’s software, humming quietly in the background and rarely paid much mind. It’s for this reason that tinkering with them can be appealing: They operate on outcomes subtly. They can generate a helpful seat bonus that turns a minority win into a majority one, or give a party the power to gerrymander, or make it all but impossible for other parties to survive—all done lawfully and without much fanfare. Manipulated smartly, they offer a quieter path to more power.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Last May, President Joe Biden sat with family members of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor in the White House as he signed an executive order he called the “most significant police reform in decades.”

One of the more notable promises in the order was setting up a “National Law Enforcement Accountability Database,” that would collect detailed information about officers who committed misconduct. The deadline to launch it was Jan. 20, the same day that five Memphis police officers were fired for the beating death of Tyre Nichols — a killing that has once more ignited national debate about policing. The Department of Justice has yet to announce the database, and did not respond to multiple requests for comment on its status.

Deadlines for other initiatives in Biden’s order, like new standards for credentialing police departments, appear to have also come and gone without acknowledgement or public results.

The administration had a very low bar to clear Biden’s promise of “significant police reform” at the federal level, as congressional gridlock has stymied every legislative proposal in recent years. That’s largely why a number of prominent civil rights groups hailed Biden’s executive order as a positive first step, while also complaining that it didn’t go far enough. (Other groups, like the Movement for Black Lives, were more critical, arguing the order represented “minor reforms that tinker on the edges of a racist system.”)

Udi Ofer worked closely with the White House on the order at the time, as director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s justice division. Ofer has since left the ACLU and is a professor at Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs. He said the rollout of the initiatives in Biden’s order appears to lack “urgency and level of commitment.” Ofer said there are many people in the administration who care about advancing police reform, but “it can't be a priority only on the anniversary of a police killing or when a new tragedy grabs headlines.”

Such is often the case with police reform efforts. The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act passed the House in 2021 after the historic protests that followed Floyd’s killing. But the bill died in the Senate and was largely forgotten in 2022, as national political attention shifted elsewhere. Many of the bill’s provisions are similar to those in Biden’s executive order — such as the misconduct database — but would carry the weight of federal law in a way that executive orders do not. A new president could undo Biden’s order with the stroke of a pen.

The George Floyd Act would also do some things that the president cannot, like weakening qualified immunity — a legal doctrine that gives police broad protection from civil lawsuits — and lowering the threshold for charging abusive officers with federal crimes.

This week, in the aftermath of Nichols’ death, some of the key lawmakers involved are talking about a new push at bipartisan negotiations. The original proposal did not have a “duty to intervene” provision — requiring officers to step in when others are behaving abusively — but some lawmakers are floating that as an addition now.

At least 17 states have passed duty-to-intervene laws since 2020, including Illinois, Massachusetts and Nebraska — just a few of hundreds of state-level police reform bills that passed in the same period. In Tennessee, home to Memphis, the legislature considered a duty-to-intervene law in 2020, but it did not pass. State lawmakers there are also raising the possibility of a broad police reform package once again.

It’s actually been more than two-and-a-half years since Americans were promised a national police misconduct database. Then-President Donald Trump also signed an executive order in June 2020 that mandated a database of “improper use of force.” That effort stalled under Trump, and the Biden administration halted it as it contemplated its own version.

The database Biden ordered would require federal law enforcement agencies to submit misconduct data, and the federal government would use incentives and encouragement to get state and local agencies to participate.

But such a database has serious limitations for curbing abuse. While several officers indicted in Nichols’ death had a history of minor disciplinary infractions, none had been involved in any kind of incidents that would have landed them on the proposed national database. These kinds of databases are mostly aimed at preventing “wandering officers” who are accused of serious misconduct in one department, from winding up in another department.

Even though the problems with policing in the U.S. run far deeper than what a database like this can capture, it can still be “a part of chipping away at the culture of policing,” said Damon Hewitt, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. “I think it's worthwhile, so long as it is not viewed as an end-all, be-all.” His organization was also involved in helping the White House develop the order, and he hopes that the increased attention will prod the administration to hasten implementation.

The misconduct database is not the first federal effort at tracking police violence to be rolled out slowly or incompletely. In 2015, then-FBI director James Comey called it “embarrassing and ridiculous” that the federal government kept worse data on police killings than efforts by The Guardian and The Washington Post. That same year, the FBI announced an effort to collect use-of-force data, but it didn’t actually begin until 2019.

That program is voluntary and only 66% of agencies nationwide participated last year, limiting how much of the data the FBI can release by law. So even now, lists kept by The Washington Post, the activist group Mapping Police Violence, and by volunteers at Fatal Encounters are much more comprehensive than what the federal government reports.