#I cannot escape my own thoughts and it's killing my ability to be creative

[homicidal-slvt]

I have this issue where I see people talking about how bad others interpretations of certain characters are and then I start going "Oh no what if my interpretations suck. What if people hate them. Am I mischaracterizing and don't realize it??? Oh god oh god oh god"

And then I just panic, burn myself out and become unable to write.

[nerdy-the-artist]

Maytroid 2024 is here!

I am so excited to get to work on these new prompts. Last year, my entries for each day were fairly sloppy, and I was new to the series, so I was lacking a fair bit of information. Now, I’m armed with more knowledge and am eager to use it.

For those who haven’t seen what I did for Maytroid last year, what I’m going to be doing instead of art is something more writing focused. These little text entries are mostly styled after the scans from the Metroid Prime series. Matter of fact, this new set of prompts actually lends itself much better than last year’s, as I have a lot more leeway to play to my own strengths than last year (I still don’t know what the fuck I’m gonna do with Gorea). These are all canon to my own Metroid AU currently, though as things change in development, these may become out of date. They will give the vibe my stories are going for, but these shouldn’t be held to as the absolute canon for them. I’ll be posting these week by week, around 7 at a time, starting today.

Day 1: Ridley

Transcript of Security Footage

Several individuals in this footage cannot be identified at this time. They shall be identified as Pirate 1, Pirate 2, and Pirate Major.

Ridley: What I want to know… is why he is not in custody.

Pirate Major: I gave them their orders, they knew he was to be brought in alive, and instead they killed him.

Pirate 1: You told us to take care of him! We thought you meant an execution, not milk and cookies!

Pirate Major: Insolent Wretch! You say such things about your orders in front of our Commander?! You know how we handle that sort of insubordination!

Pirate 2: Cool it, we’re already in hot water.

Pirate 1: We’re in hot water because of the life of some winy little nobody that begged for his life with money he didn’t even have.

Ridley: While your insolence is… aggravating… I am willing to forgive this misstep.

Pirate Major: What?

Ridley: He was an insignificant pawn. We can always find another. As I was saying, I am willing to forgive this on one condition. Did he die in pain?

Pirate 2: Yes. He did suffer before he died.

Ridley: What methods or torture did you employ?

Pirate 1: Waterboarding. Works wonders on humans. I always liked how they sound when they cough and gasp for air.

Ridley:Mmmmm… was blood shed before his end?

Pirate 2: Yeah. My partner here has… quite the way with knives.

Ridley: Do tell.

Pirate 1: Slashed his wrists. Those arteries gush lots of blood from humans. And we started pulling teeth when he lied.

Ridley: Delicious. You have escaped capital punishment, but you will still be serving as guards for the Metroid containment units. For further forgiveness, you will need to be more creative with your implements. I find Revine’s death, by your account, to be quite dull. Your are dismissed, unless you wish to enlighten me further.

Day 2: Fiery

Scan of Pipe System in Norfair

“These pipes appear be delivering superheated magma into the Norfair region. Given the proximity to Ridley’s personal quarters, likely explanations include terraforming the area for Ridley’s own comfortability, additional protective measures, or the intentional destruction of Chozo artifacts not deemed useful. The latter is most likely, as the immediate area was once a Chozo burial tomb. It is now completely submerged in magma, disintegrating much of the artifacts within.”

Day 3: Winged

Scan of SA-X Mutations

“This X-Parasite copy has suffered some form of destabilization of its copying abilities. Abnormalities include a malformed, beak like structure around the mouth, several atrophied fingers, several hypertrophied fingers, small patches of feathers, and an extraneous structure protruding from its back resembling a Chozo wing bereft of feathers. These unusual deformities could be the result of DNA infusions during childhood complicating the process of anatomical replication within X-Parasite offspring. This individual seems to suffer great stress from its predicament, but it is unsafe to assume that its combat functionality is greatly hampered. Adaptation is this species’s main trait.”

Day 4: Pirate

Scan of Space Pirate Elite

“Subject is a member of an unknown species known only from individuals working within Ridley’s special operations group, The Revenants. This group acts as Ridley’s personal enforcers and assassins, fanatically worshipping their commander as a literal God of Death. They wield melee weapons personalized to their unique fighting styles. Each weapon is charged with electricity, giving them an additional ranged attack capability. They have operated since before the Galactic Federation, making a name for themselves in fighting Chozo warriors. Their endurance, agility, and strength cannot be overstated, in spite of their gaunt appearance.”

Day 5: Mecha

Scan of automaton codenamed Mecha Ridley

“Subject is a battle ready drone, seemingly created by Ridley’s fanatical special forces, the Revenants. Mecha Ridley is heavily weaponized, as there could be no altar to the God of Death without the ability to take a life. Weapons include flamethrowers, guided munition launchers, and superheated claws. Mecha Ridley’s armor is highly durable, but greatly hampers mobility compared to its inspiration. Additionally, as a cult idol of worship, advanced artificial intelligence was not prioritized during production. Mecha Ridley displays average combat intellect for a war drone. Recommend staying moving and outsmarting the automaton.”

Day 6: Fang

Scan of Rundas’s Necklace

“Rundas appears to have begun collecting Metroid Fangs as trophies since last he was approached. Assuming one fang was taken from each Metroid he has eliminated, he has defeated 15 Metroids in the two months since he was last seen. Unfortunately, his ego has grown with his kill count.”

Day 7: Cunning

Scan of Abandoned Home

“Old Bird and Grey Voice’s abandoned home has been left mostly in tact, minus the usual signs of neglect. However, there appear to be a plethora of traps lain around the home. Various grapple snares have been detected, alongside explosive charges, beam emitters, and microphones. Much of these systems appear to be inert, and once reported directly to Mother Brain. It is clear she anticipated you might return here before confronting her. Given her destruction, several trap systems remain completely dormant. Still, any approach must be made with great caution.”

[legobiwan]

Whumptober #2

“pick who dies”

Notes: This got out of control. I was going to add an Obi-wan + Anakin section but I had to cut myself off as I do have other things I need to get to today. This is less whump than...a set of pretentious character studies with THE LINEAGE (including Rael) and an excuse to explore the trolley problem within a Star Wars setting. I blame my recent Hannibal obsession for what you see below. First part here, rest under the cut. Note, I am a musician, not a philosophy student, so allow for some creative interpretation here. 

General Whumptober tag

Whumptober 2020 #1

~~~~~~~

(excerpt from “The Padawan’s Guide to Philosophy.” Eds. Masters Thrife-Foran & Ugaaalich. 616th e. Coruscant, 940 ARR. Holobook.)

Premise:

You are out for an afternoon walk in the outer regions of Thymilla, a moderately-populated city on the planet Ungar. On your walk, you pass by a set of hovertrain tracks, which branch into two separate arms - one an extension of the main track, the other a smaller offshoot which leads to a cargo loading zone, about fifty clicks south of where you are. (Diagram 3)

As a hovertrain approaches from the north, you hear screaming, the words of the driver becoming clearer as the hovertrain barrels towards the switch. The brakes of the train have failed and there is no chance of repair. If the train continues on its current path, it will kill five workers making repairs on the track. If you pull a switch, the hovertrain will divert to the offshoot, where it will kill one worker at the cargo loading zone.

Because of an anomaly in Ungar’s atmosphere, you cannot access the Force.

Do you pull the switch or do nothing and allow the train to speed forward?

~~~~~~~

“Your thoughts, Padawan.”

Dooku shifted on his meditation pod, the firm material groaning as he uncrossed his legs from the lotus position, gingerly setting both his bare feet to the cool, tiled floor of his Master’s chambers. The young man allowed himself a small wince with the action. Yoda might have been able to keep that damnable position for hours, probably days on end, but Dooku was just a few months shy of his eighteenth life day, and another recent growth spurt seemingly focused all on his legs made sitting for any long amount of time…uncomfortable, to say the least.

Which was likely why Yoda had had him trapped him here for the past three hours, running through one ethical thought experiment after the other, poking his literal and metaphorical gimmer stick precisely at each gnarled and swollen joint in both his body and thoughts.

To act - to pull the switch - would mean to commit premeditated murder, even if it were for the greater good. Hardly a Jedi-like action. But then again, they had been taught - indoctrinated, really - with the idea that is was acceptable to sacrifice one life for the lives of many. A supposedly fair trade-off, although Dooku had seen enough of the Jedi’s relationship to the Senate, had seen enough of the Council’s internal politics, to know that two lives did not necessarily hold equal weight.

But to not act - to let the train barrel through, to leave it up to the will of the Force...Dooku clenched his teeth. That seemed more in line with the Order he was coming to know, was consistent with the Council’s lack of action on Protobranch, when Sifo-Diyas had seen the calamity that was to befall the planet and yet the Council, his Master, had done too little, too late, preferring to allow events to transpire as they would, the Jedi only impassive bystanders.

What was the point of their abilities, their training, their place in the universe, if they weren’t able to change the course of events for the better?

“I suppose,” Dooku began slowly, coming to stand, suddenly not caring if he was maintaining his proper meditation position. The young man padded towards the slightly shuttered windows on the other side of the room.

“I suppose it depends on the relative worth of each life,” he said, turning away from Yoda as to not see the subtle moue of distaste Dooku was certain would cross the old Master’s face.

“Is not all life sacred, Padawan?”

Dooku barely bit back the dark chuckle threatening to escape from his chest. Only in the holos and classrooms and the empty rhetoric of the Council was all life sacred. The Jedi could do so much more, he could do so much more to change the galaxy and yet the Order allowed itself to be chained to politicians, leashed like akk-dogs until receiving command.

No, Dooku thought. There was no balance - not here and not in the Force.

“From the information you’ve provided,” Dooku said, ignoring Yoda’s question. He peered through the slits of the rotor blinds into the watery illumination of Coruscant’s night sky. The dome of the Senate building rose through the rain like an oddly-shaped umbrella, shielding those in power with its wide beadth. “We can assume both parties of victims are of equal social standing, being manual laborers. Because of this, we must find other ways of determining their worth, their ability to enact change in the galaxy.”

Dooku clasped his hands behind his back, daring to turn to face his Master’s displeasure.

“The question becomes whether you want to hold sway over the transit network of a forgettable city, or the imports and exports that may go off-world. Exports which might include valuable resources or even smuggled goods. Items which could affect the governance of our imagined city and therefore, by extension, an even larger part of the populace.”

“Which is why, in this case,” Dooku concluded, his posture straightening, “I would choose to allow the hovertrain to continue its course and save the cargo worker.”

Yoda folded both claws over his gimmer stick, frowning. After a moment, he let out a small grunt, his features now inscrutable.

“And see yourself as the final arbiter of worth, do you, my young apprentice? Stand you above all others holding a golden scale, you do?”

Don’t we, as Jedi, hold these scales every day and yet choose to ignore them? Dooku thought.

“Someone,” the young man replied, “will make the judgment regardless. Is it not better for the Jedi to use our powers to make such decisions?”

This time Yoda did let out a wet sigh, shaking his head.

“Dangerous, these thoughts are, my Padawan,” Yoda grumbled, gesturing at the meditation pod. “Sit, young Dooku. Much we have to discuss.”

~~~~~~~

“Your thoughts, Rael.”

Rael Averross slung an arm over the back of Dooku’s couch, sleeves of his Master’s borrowed robe hanging long near the tips of his fingers. It had been the third time that month Rael had “misplaced” his own robe, his Master’s foisted upon him in the wee hours of the morning, Dooku grunting something about “Jedi propriety” before shoving Rael out the door. (The things were a damned inconvenience, and made him look like something straight out of a space station ghost story, to boot. Was it so surprising he showed up to Dooku’s quarters in a state which his Master referred to as “half-naked?”)

Rael bit his lip, trying to not think of all the times he had actually been half-naked in the Temple. Those were fun times. Unfortunately, Dooku could probably mind read them out of him right now if he weren’t so concentrated on this thought experiment.

“Why not save them both?” Rael drawled amiably, scratching at the beginnings of a beard with his other hand as he hoped to distract his Master from any hint of his past indiscretions. It was about time, too, he thought. Never going to look my age going around all smooth-faced like a transparisteel window surface.

Dooku gave a small smile. “You cannot, Rael. Those are the rules of the scenario.”

“Rules,” Rael scoffed, picking at the hem of Dooku’s overly-fancy robe before suddenly launching to his feet, unable to contain his restlessness. The younger Jedi paced up and down the length of Dooku’s couch, grateful his usually strict Master was allowing him this indulgence. Not that Dooku had any problem sitting still for what felt like forever - stiff as a board, that one - but Rael was too jittery, too full potential energy to keep his thoughts in neat line with his body. “Rules are meant to be broken, Master,” Rael gave a swift chop with his hand in illustration. “You’re the first one to tell me that.”

Rael heard his Master let out a soft snort in response. Only Dooku could make such a noise sound dignified. “I suppose I did,” the older man answered evenly.

“So there you go! Blow up the train and everyone’s fine.”

“And kill the driver?”

Rael spun to face Dooku, the other man’s eyebrows raised not in condemnation, but genuine interest. It was days like this Rael truly appreciated having Dooku as a Master. Sure, he was as pretentious as any big-city Senator, a hard taskmaster in his lessons, and an even tougher dueling trainer - but at the end of the day, Dooku only expected Rael to follow Dooku’s rules, and not the Order’s.

And as much as Rael chaffed under any collar, he’d take Dooku’s version of the Code over the Council’s any day.

“I mean, the driver is the one in control of the train,” Rael shrugged. “Sure, it’s an accident, but the they were going to be dead either way once they hit those other bodies. Probably would go flying through the window and bash their skull in. This way, you save six lives,” Rael gave his best used speeder salesman grin. “Buy five, get one free.”

That little addition did cause his Master to roll his eyes.

“You are…” Dooku pressed his lips together, sitting back in his chair, crossing one leg over the other. It was as close as Dooku ever got to a casual posture. “Colorful rhetoric aside, you are essentially advocating for pre-emptive action. Very interesting, Rael.”

“Interesting as in,” Rael pulled a sour face, imitating Dooku’s proper Serennian accent, “‘And now I will assign you five Jedi moral precepts to memorize and write a five-page essay about’ or interesting as in ‘I will now have you learn the complete codified law of the Umbargans, whose entire military strategy revolved around non-preemptive attacks.”

Dooku chuckled - actually chuckled - at Rael’s minor impertinent outburst. “Neither, Rael. Although, I must say you have provided me the perfect means by which I may punish you later on.” Damn, dug my own grave with that one, thought Rael. 

“No,” Dooku continued, “I merely find your stance on this matter to be refreshingly…original.”

“You mean the Council wouldn’t approve?”

It took his Master a full minute to answer, his gaze shifting beyond Rael, beyond the confines of their shared quarters, Dooku seeming lost in some memory.

“Hardly,” he finally said. “And that is for the best.”

~~~~~~~

“Your thoughts, Padawan?”

Qui-gon Jinn sat motionless on the small patch of grass, listening to the susurrations of the light breeze in the Room of a Thousand Fountains finger through a nearby thicket of Borto reeds. Across from him, Master Dooku sat in a mirrored pose, long legs crossed over the other in the lotus position, expression unreadable, his presence in the Force - or, his effect on the Force presence on the vegetation around him - one of controlled expectancy, a single blade of grass erect and ready despite the buffeting winds.

“We shouldn’t have to choose, Master,” Qui-gon replied, trying to steady his own uneven thoughts and emotions. Although he had been Dooku’s Padawan for almost five years now, Qui-gon still found himself worrying his responses to thought experiments like these would not pass his Master’s high and stringent intellectual standards.

“In an ideal world, Qui-gon, we wouldn’t. But as you have learned - as I have shown you - the status quo rarely measures up to our ideals.”

The status quo, Qui-gon thought. Code for the Senate, for the Council, for the Republic at large. That much he had figured out, had learned from Rael, whose ability to translate Dooku’s sometimes opaque rhetoric to something more digestible never ceased to amaze Qui-gon.

The status quo. The more years he spent with Dooku - with Rael, when the younger man was around - the more Qui-gon understood. Perhaps he always had a predilection to question, to challenge what was “known,” the dictums etched in stone handed down from the Council to the Council’s Masters to its Padawans. But with Dooku’s guidance, and with his own exploration of the Jedi prophecies, Qui-gon had developed his own sense of right and wrong, of how the galaxy ought to work in consonance with the ideals of the Jedi Code and his own moral compass.

“In that case, I would ask the Force for guidance,” Qui-gon replied, thoughts slipping back to the many hours he had spent in the Archives, poring over ancient holocrons. The Force had provided for the seers of old, why shouldn’t it provide now?

“Perhaps the Force cannot provide all the answers,” Dooku countered, as if reading his mind.

Qui-gon frowned, tilting his head. “Is that not what the Jedi teach, Master? What you teach? To follow the Force?”

“To a degree,” Dooku assented, rare amusement curling the side of his lips. “But the Jedi work in symbiosis with the Force, and even that is within a certain self-imposed definition of what the Force may or may not be capable of.”

Self-imposed definition? Qui-gon ran his hands through the soft grass at his sides, no longer able to keep that perfect stillness now that Dooku had so upset his equilibrium. Had his study of the prophecies not proven that exact point? That the Jedi of now no longer regarded the Force with as open a mind those of millennia ago?

“The Force is more infinite, has more potentialities than the confines of what we could possibly hope to study in a thousand lifetimes,” Qui-gon hedged.

“And so you hope to use prophecy to save these doomed beings?” Dooku retorted with a small wave of his hand. Ah yes, the hovertrain problem, Qui-gon grimaced. He had almost quite forgotten about the whole reason for this conversation.

“I would hope to…” Qui-gon cocked his head, watching a pair of butterflies flutter over a Byrsonima crassifolia, fragile leaves fluttering in their wake. An action - or a lack of action. If he saved one life or saved five. What would the repercussions be? How could he know he was making the right choice? How could the Order know, if not for guidance from the Force, in all its possible iterations?

And yet, the study prophecy of was considered at best, an esoteric hobby - at worst, a dangerous arm of mysticism by much of the Council.

Which is why your Master encourages you to think beyond the dictates of the Council, Qui-gon concluded.

“Yes, then,” Qui-gon stated, suddenly more confident in his answers. “I would hope to ameliorate the situation by using a similar mindset of the prophets. One of openness, wonder, and possibility - to find my way in this situation.”

“And just how far would you be willing to take supposed,” Dooku trained him with an enigmatic expression, “openness?” The word weighed heavy with implication.

Qui-gon started. What exactly is Dooku trying to get at here? Hadn’t it been his Master who had introduced him to the prophecies, to the Force beyond the dictates of the Code? So far, Dooku had not steered him wrong, and yet just as the nearby Byrsonima crassifolia cast a long shadow over the open grass, so did Dooku’s unspoken entreaty.

But before Qui-gon could cobble together an answer, Dooku seemed to break out of his trance, chuckling slightly as he got to his feet. He extended a long arm to Qui-gon, who took it without hesitation, coming to stand at his Master’s side.

“Meditate on the answer, Qui-gon. For now, I believe it is past time for dinner.”

~~~~~~~

“Your thoughts, Padawan.”

Obi-wan Kenobi shifted in the overly-large, overly-plush velvet chair which threatened to swallow him whole. He and Qui-gon had been dispatched to Barstovia, a little-known desert mining planet in the Mid-Rim. A simple mission, really, overseeing a trade deal between Barstovia and Ord Mantell, opening up some shipping lines of the rare fermenium mineral to the Republic. A wholly forgettable mission, if Obi-wan were being honest, except for the fact the diminutive race of Barstovia seemed to prize, of all the unlikely things, oversized, over-upholstered furniture.

While Obi-wan struggled with a crimson throw pillow the size of his torso, his master, Qui-gon Jinn, sat across from him, perfectly serene in his eight-foot tall, royal blue armchair.

“Well, Master,” Obi-wan said, words strained as he punched the pillow to his side with un-Jedi-like ferocity. Of all times for Qui-gon to pull out a thought experiment.

“The prevailing wisdom would say to sacrifice one life to save five - a utilitarian outlook and the most practical, at least on the surface.” Obi-wan pushed down on the seat of his chair, trying in vain to straighten his posture, to lend his answer some form of credence beyond his words. Inevitably, Qui-gon would hold the exact opposite opinion from Obi-wan’s, and while Obi-wan had often kept his feelings to himself under the guise of “picking his battles,” he preferred to express his thoughts while at least looking the part of an almost eighteen-year-old Padawan, and not some child stuck in a chair too large for him.  He struck at the recalcitrant cushion one last time. “But as Jedi, we often prioritize a single being or beings if they hold an important role.” 

“In the short-term,” Obi-wan grimaced suddenly, pulling an impossible second pillow from under his right thigh, “we would lose four lives over one, granted. But in the long-term, that single life lost might mean the eventual deaths of hundreds, perhaps thousands.”

“But you do not have this information, Padawan,” Qui-gon replied, a crease of annoyance in his brow. Obi-wan noted there was no accompanying crease in the cushion of his Master’s chair. “All you know is the number of beings.”

Obi-wan bit down on a caustic reply. Yes, I know that, Master. I hadn’t gotten to my point yet. But when did Qui-gon actually ever listen to him?

“Yes, Master, this is true,” the younger Jedi answered, Obi-wan impressed with the evenness of his own response despite his increasing irritation. “Which is why I would endeavor to save them all.”

A beat. a raised eyebrow coupled with a subtle sigh. “Quite the feat, Obi-wan,” Qui-gon finally said, his words laced with skepticism. “How would you accomplish such a thing?”

How in the world is he not drowning in that chair? Obi-wan thought, distracted by his Master’s impenetrability, despite the audacious situation. There was Qui-gon, halfway across the room, composed and neat - well, as neat as Qui-gon ever got - against the regal backdrop of the humorously-sized chair while Obi-wan floundered in a sea of crimson, just out of his Master’s reach.

And wasn’t that the perfect metaphor for their troubled partnership?

Obi-wan wiped at his brow. “It’s quite simple, Master. The hovertrain could be diverted, or at least impeded by a third party inserting themselves into the equation.”

Something in Qui-gon’s expression shifted at the statement, earlier annoyance now melting into something closer to concern. The older man leaned forward in his chair, for the first time exhibiting a pang of discomfort as he battled the voluminous material.

“And who might that be?” Qui-gon asked, batting at the tsunami of beige woven blanket at his side.

“Myself, of course.”

Dead silence met Obi-wan’s words.

Wrong answer, Kenobi. Absolutely the wrong answer. Disappointment was written all over Qui-gon’s body language, even emanating from his usually controlled Force signature. Obi-wan fell back into the chair, not bothering to fight the dunes and valleys of velvet threatening to overtake him, averting his gaze to some preposterously-sized side-table and vase. Hopefully, his failure to provide the correct response would be the end of this increasingly uncomfortable conversation. Qui-gon would assign him some reading and meditation, and let the matter rest until they returned to Coruscant.

But Qui-gon only peered at Obi-wan with a piercing stare, apparently not ready to give up on the exchange.

“You would sacrifice yourself to save the others?”

Obi-wan found himself mirroring his master’s movements.

“Isn’t that what it means to be a Jedi?” he asked, genuinely perplexed. “We are servants of the Republic, of the Force - if our actions can save lives so that Republic may continue in peace - “ Obi-wan’s mouth opened and closed, trying to form the words that would express his devotion to the Order, the Code, his own sense of honor - but found himself gaping like an Ithorian cuttlefish.

Once again, Qui-gon fell into contemplation, back arching against tall, bulbous pillows, brushing his mustache with a single finger. A minute, then two went by, the only sound the clicks of a nearby chrono. Over eighteen feet tall, the clicks sounded more like the steps of a lurking gundark than a timepiece, doing nothing for Obi-wan’s nerves.

Finally, Qui-gon broke the uncomfortable semi-silence. “Don’t be so hasty to throw away your own life, Padawan. As you rightly said, the death of a monarch may cause the deaths of many others down the road. But you cannot know how many lives would remain unsaved if you were to treat your own so lightly.”

Obi-wan’s eyebrows rose. That had not been the reaction he was expecting.

“But how am I to know when that sacrifice is necessary?” he asked automatically. Obi-wan would make that sacrifice gladly, although...to be perfectly honest, he would prefer not to die as a seventeen-year-old Padawan. 

“The better question is how you can work to reach a more productive option rather than coming to such a dire conclusion.” Qui-gon’s voice softened. “I am serious, Obi-wan. You have much to offer the galaxy. Don’t let your strict adherence to Jedi ideals extinguish your star too early. Not only would the Republic be at a loss, but…” Qui-gon looked away, staring down at some invisible pattern in the corner of the room. “I would, as well.”

Obi-wan’s mouth dropped open. “Master, I - “

“Ah, Master Jedi!” A new voice squeaked from the gargantuan entranceway. “Thank you so much for waiting,” proclaimed the three-foot Minister of Commerce, Parhary Hatch, bedecked in a long, flowery robe whose velvet train stretched back several feet. “Please, if you would,” he gestured towards the tall archway.

“Yes, of course, Minister Hatch,” Qui-gon replied in his diplomatic voice, jumping neatly off the chair, his landing as elegant as a Coruscanti ice skater.

Obi-wan frowned, joining his Master in a slightly less dignified, but no less effective maneuver. They had been on the verge of…something, some kind of understanding, or at least a truce. Whatever words had remained unsaid between would likely stay so, the moment gone, the trip back to Coruscant, and then to a Hutt outpost taking priority over these types of conversations.

Another time, then, Obi-wan sighed to himself, following the slinking violet trail of the Bartovian minister and his Master into the long corridors of the palace.

[godsofhumanity]

What are some of your headcanons/characterizations for the other titans in your CronusXRhea story?

the stuff under the cut, i have to stress, is all from my comic, and i know a lot of it isn’t supported by actual myth, but that’s where the creative license comes in i guess!

EDIT: i had some new thoughts about these titans and i decided to give them a little more shape,, but i didn’t want to delete my original thoughts, so my old ideas are striked-through (struck-through?) and my new ideas are just normal.

the order of the characters** here is major characters to minor:

CRONUS | titan of time. has the ability to freeze time, and make it reverse, but not to go forward because technically speaking, there is no one “future”- different decisions result in different scenarios happening, so Cronus can’t really control that. personality wise- he’s smart, loyal, determined, but he’s also willing to bend the rules, believes in the philosophy “no such thing as cheating”, paranoid, and a little insane.

RHEA | mother of the Olympians. doesn’t have any particular powers. she has the ability to heal minor wounds, and she's good at fighting- with a weapon and without. she’s ambitious, witty, kind, and passionate. she doesn’t hesitate to step into the role of a leader, and is prepared to take great risks if she believes the cause is just. Rhea's also a bit of trickster- she has an awful sense of humour which is why she gets along with Cronus and Iapetus so well. she enjoys pranks.

OURANOS | father of the titans, god of the Heavens. he’s created by Gaia after she desires someone to be her equal and unconsciously brings Ouranos to life. as a consequence of being Gaia’s “equal”, although he’s not a primordial himself, he has power on par with them. personality wise- he’s arrogant, cocky, condescending, possessive, powerful, cruel and scary. he has pretty much no redeemable qualities. he hates his children and gets rid of the Cyclopes and the Hundred-Handers because he believes that they could potentially pose a threat to his relationship with Gaia; he is extremely jealous of Gaia’s love for her children, and his need for her to only show him attention is his primary motive.

GAIA | mother of the titans and other “monsters”. Gaia has a somewhat ambiguous personality. she values her children above all, and doesn’t hesitate to kill Ouranos after he throws her beloved children, the Cyclopes and the Hundred-Handers into Tartarus where she cannot reach them. she is neither good nor evil, she is simply motivated by her maternal nature. she has no favourites amongst the titans, but is pleased when Cronus takes on the challenge of deposing Ouranos. however, she later is more than willing to help Rhea then depose of Cronus because she doesn’t care for arrogance, and, once again, hates Cronus for when he repeats Ouranos’ mistake and imprisons the Cyclopes and the Hundred-Handers.

COEUS | titan of magic and witchcraft (in my AU that is!!). his wife is Phoebe, and for the events of the story, they have only one child born- Asteria. Rhea seeks Coeus’ help when she requires a potion to make Cronus’ vomit back out her children, and to also strip him of his powers. Cronus also seeks Coeus’ help in creating a potion to amplify his powers, and though Coeus is reluctant to help, he is forced to after Cronus threatens to have an “accident” befall his family. personality wise- Coeus is rather timid, he prefers to sit on the sidelines and warns Rhea that her plan to depose of Cronus may result in Cronus himself killing her. he is kind and well-natured, and though sometimes he has moments of self-doubt, even after Cronus threatens him and his daughter, he doesn’t rat Rhea out to Cronus and tell him about the potion he made for her, so there’s that.

MNEMOSYNE | titan of memory. her main role is in the Castration of Ouranos arc. when Cronus activates his time powers for the first time and reverses time back to when Gaia first gathered the titans together, Mnemosyne is the only one who remembers that all these events have actually happened before. personality wise- she’s generally pretty chill. she’s kind and generous, and also rather talented when it comes down to the arts, and this is something that is reflected in her children, the Muses.

OCEANUS | titan of the oceans. Oceanus is the eldest of all the titans, and perhaps, the wisest. his power is to communicate and control sea-life. when Gaia gathers her children and tells them about her plan to depose Ouranos, Oceanus is reluctant to take action because he knows how powerful their father is, and he knows the risk is great. Cronus calls him a coward for this, but Oceanus is undeterred. although he does help his siblings fight Ouranos, he is always cautious of the consequences of failure. he takes Rhea’s side against Cronus. personality wise- Oceanus is level-headed, wise, and stoic, but he doesn’t like taking risks.

TETHYS | titan of the oceans and rivers. Tethys is the wife of Oceanus, and her ability is to control the rivers and the seas. she, like Oceanus, is cautious about taking down Ouranos. she supports Oceanus when he advises against Gaia’s plan, but also joins him when he agrees to fight with Cronus. Tethys takes Rhea’s side against Oceanus. personality wise- she is noble, and righteous, and hates arrogance above all else. 

IAPETUS | Iapetus is perhaps the only other titan to rival Cronus in terms of cunning. he takes Cronus’ side throughout the whole story because he believes that he plays to the winning side. Iapetus isn’t exactly selfish, but he does seek to protect his own hide first. he takes Cronus' side during the Titanomachy because he believes in Cronus- Cronus is the one who liberated the Titans from Ouranos, and that means a lot to Iapetus. although Iapetus is older, he's always looked up to Cronus, and they've always been thick as thieves. Iapetus is Cronus' right-hand man and the trust that they place in each other goes both ways. when Cronus reveals to Iapetus what really happened to his and Rhea's children, Iapetus' admiration for Cronus is so strong that he's not even horrified by Cronus' atrocities- rather, he proclaims that his loyalty is even more steadfast than before. there is no stage where Iapetus doubts/betrays Cronus. personality wise- he enjoys playing games and tricks, and he is one of the chief architects of the plan to castrate Ouranos.

HYPERION | titan of light. he is married to Theia, and doesn’t really have a significant role in the story. he doesn't really "choose" a side during the Titanomachy, but the magic of Crius forces him to take Cronus' side. fortunately for him, he escapes punishment in Tartarus when his children (Helios, Selene, and Eos) beg Zeus to have mercy (which he grants). personality wise- he’s generally a fun guy, never gloomy and always positive. he's a little narcissistic though, and he loves flattery.

THEIA | titan of brightness and sight. she’s married to Hyperion, and is the eldest of Gaia’s daughters. her only real role is when a young Cronus jokingly says that he’ll make Theia his queen to irritate Rhea. personality wise- she’s kind and loving, though more quiet and timid than her other sisters.

PHOEBE | wife of Coeus and mother of Asteria (and Leto but Leto isn’t born yet in the story). again, she doesn’t really have a role, but personality wise- she’d be very artsy, and generally chill. she has some degree of prophetical powers, and Zeus makes her an oracle during his reign until Apollo is born (and then Apollo takes on that role).

CRIUS | titan of the constellations. IRL, Crius doesn’t really have much of a mythology- there’s no role listed, just that his wife was another goddess named Eurybia and he had a few kids, and then was chucked into Tartarus. so, he also doesn’t have much of a role in my story either, but he also takes Cronus’ side, and ends up in Tartarus with Iapetus because of it. idk why, but i imagine his personality being similar to Oceanus’, and so, Crius helps Cronus because he thinks that Cronus is in the right, and takes second place in terms of loyalty to Cronus (Iapetus being number one). Crius is one of the most intelligent from the Titans, and he's pretty crafty, though he isn't evil. Crius serves Cronus for similar reasons to Iapetus.

EURYBIA | goddess of mastery over the seas. her main role is as Crius' wife, but I wanted her to take Cronus' side not because she particularly believes in Cronus' cause, but because Crius fights on his side- so it's more of a question of allegiance to family rather than allegiance to authority. Eurybia's siding with Cronus causes lots of heartbreak within Crius' family :/// but i just didn't like the idea of having every wife in the story being sidelined and not fighting. on her wikipedia page, Eurybia is described as having "a heart of flint within her", so i imagine her to be very headstrong and powerful, and i just can't imagine that she sits in silence while her husband goes fighting. personality wise- she's very friendly, confident and bold, where Crius is a little more aloof.

THEMIS | titan of justice. again, pretty much no role in the story. she takes Rhea’s side of course (since she’s on the side of justice), and with Rhea, is one of the first to agree with Cronus’ plan to get rid of Ouranos, and she’s enthusiastic about it as well. personality wise- she’s similar to Rhea- she’s headstrong, loyal, and outspoken.

**only out of the Titans + Gaia + Ouranos

[amaltheeia]

Another writing warmup, because Proteus gives me the creeps and I’m projecting that onto Shockwave.

warnings for: stalking, threats of violence (implied), just proteus

His first mistake is taking the balcony exit.

For those with aerial alt-modes, it provides a quicker escape from the noise that is the interim conference centre. Meetings here are rare--usually only for the select few that occupy what he’s started calling the inner circle--but the Senate building is under modification. Something to do with Sentinel and the guard introducing tighter security measures. Cameras, audio equipment, the whole brigade. 

He’s not one to lay down on these things, but Proteus has him beat. Argue against them, and you’re apathetic to the safety of the general public. As he’s pushed out of the fold, he’s had to learn some hard truths about what the future is going to be like. A lot of giving, not so much taking.

But speak of the undertaker: there Proteus is. He can’t be missed, not with his gold trim that reflects every ray of light that crosses him. He’s glowing like some kind of deity. To many, he is: he’s become a symbol of malfeasance, the protector of the corrupt.

He hopes to sidestep him and be on his way. Unluckily for him, Proteus turns just as Shockwave exits, and waves away the mech he’d been talking to, mid-speech.

“Senator Shockwave,” he calls out. It’s loud enough for everyone in the general vicinity to hear. “Come join me.”

He knows what he’s doing. To ignore him would make Shockwave look rude. Proper social etiquette leashes him, dragging him over to Proteus.

He walks close enough to be heard, and then spits out the first excuse that comes to mind. “I have work at the Academy, I’m afraid.” He forces a smile onto his face. “Another time, maybe, so I can fully appreciate what you have to say.”

“Oh shush. Spare a click, come here.” His voice hardens, as if to push Shockwave into believing it’s an order. As if to make matters more humiliating, he points down at the ground to where he wants Shockwave to be.

Shockwave tests the weight on his pedes, then walks over. He eyes Proteus with suspicion, keeping a reasonable, but far, distance between them. 

Proteus takes note with a soft grunt that pushes hot air out of his vents. The exhaust fans over Shockwave, a brief pause in the cool night air.

“I’m sure you don’t scoff and moan as much when you’re asked to speak to Dai Atlas.”

“Because Dai Atlas and I are friends.”

“Ouch,” Proteus says, smiling. “No time like the present, however.”

Shockwave can’t tell if he’s joking. To play it safe, he doesn’t chuckle. Proteus doesn’t like being made into a humorous subject.

(He’d hate hearing about the jokes the outliers make. They get pretty creative.)

He hopes the pursuing silence will convince Proteus this is a waste of time, but for the second time that night, he doesn’t get lucky. Proteus is still circling his kill.

Proteus eyes him thoroughly. “What colours are you thinking of next?”

“What?”

“You scratch at the finish on your fins when you’re thinking of a colour change.”

It stabs at something deep inside of Shockwave, a fear he didn’t realize he could have until the words left Proteus’ mouth. The other Senator wastes no time elaborating on it either.

“What’ll be this time--oh, let me think,” he raises a hand to his temples, “what colour haven’t you done in a while? It’s getting hard to remember, with how often you change it.”

Shockwave pauses. It’s an odd question, one he’s not sure is asked with complete innocence.

No point in lying though. “Blue and red, if you must know.”

“Blue and red,” Proteus repeats. His mouth curls. “It’ll be hard to tell us apart.” As if it’s supposed to be a compliment to him.

“Not your shade. Something lighter,” says Shockwave, almost overlapping Proteus before he can finish.

A dark shadow passes over Proteus’ face, taking the humour along with it. The Proteus he knows from the closed Senate sessions comes out, and gone is the benevolent persona he wears for his constituents.

“I don’t see why you’re so,” he grits his denta, “hostile to me. You do all this work to counter us and always leave with nothing to show for it.” 

“You wouldn’t understand why I do it.”

“I don’t. You turn on the very system that gives you what you have now.”

Shockwave shrugs. “I’m afraid we were never meant to compromise. You see what you’re doing as justified, as I do my own ambitions. That won’t change. Respect our differences, and there shouldn’t be any trouble.”

“That’s what you choose to believe. We all have a choice.”

“Not when it’s concerning what’s right.”

Proteus’ face twists. “Cut the slag,” he snarls. “We don’t exist in a binary. It’s not good and evil, it’s just better or worse. Good mechs do horrible things all the time, but it’s for the greater good. You just never learned that.”

“Or maybe you just can’t see it, because it wouldn’t fit your vision.”

On cue, Proteus looks up at his sky spies, no doubt with a few lenses pointed at them. “You do right by the criminals and leakers that come to you for help, instead of what’s best for everyone. That’s why our visions are different. If you had your way, the whole of the Senate would collapse.”

Shockwave flexes his fingers, saying nothing.

“Speaking of criminals: that cop of yours, Orion Pax, was out by the Ark-1 Monument a cycle ago. He seemed happy to see you. How about that?” says Proteus, with only a hint of glee. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say he’s back from the dead.”

Shockwave flinches, though he keeps his faceplates clear. “Were you spying on me?”

“It’s not spying if it’s in public, and you’re a very distinctive mech.”

Proteus has the added size to intimidate him with. Shockwave takes a step back from the balustrade.

“What I do outside of the Senate is none of your business.”

He can’t move much farther back without drawing the attention of others, which is exactly what Proteus wants. An audience only ever benefits him.

“Not when you’re a Senator.” Proteus’ voice has turned deep. “What’s the concern? If you’re not doing anything wrong...”

“It’s an invasion of my privacy! You have no right.”

“We’re living amid the Clampdown.” The words spatter like acid. “No one has the right to privacy. Since you’re always so up our afterburners about practicing what we preach, I thought you’d be pleased.”

“Pleased? Forgive me for not finding the thought of you hanging over my shoulder reassuring.”

“Oh, don’t be like that. I’m protecting you.”

Shockwave tenses up. The urge to shout profanities is off the scale, but he knows it will only give Proteus ammo.

Proteus takes over: “Call them what you will--I think Decepticons has become the universal term. Someone like you--high profile--is at risk.”

“Well, call it luck that I befriended a police chief then.”

Shockwave looks over his shoulder, trying to discern whether it’d be a good idea to depart from the conversation now.

Proteus advances on him, forcing himself into Shockwave’s line of sight. The look of satisfaction on his faceplates Shockwave’s tanks churn.

“Orion Pax cannot protect you. It would be wise to reassess where you have put your allies.”

“I don’t need the protection of anyone, thank you.”

“Really? In times like this, you need more than a police chief to be sure that those conspiring against you aren’t about to get the upper hand.”

“Meaning you?”

It tames the other mech’s expression. “Oh, come now. As I said, it’s not too late to give up this pursuit of yours.”

“I’ll take my chances.”

Proteus takes him by the arm before he can step away. Shockwave pulls, but Proteus won’t release him.

“Don’t test my patience. I’m giving you a chance here.” He leans in close. “If you know what’s best for you, you’ll darken that shade of blue, Shockwave, and accept my offer.”

“I don’t need handouts, especially not from you,” he growls, taking his arm back.

He prides his ability to keep his voice stable, considering it’s Proteus he’s talking to. There’s something larger than them that’s being propositioned here. Accepting anything he says, even something minor, will spin into some big conflict, he’s sure.

He quits while he’s ahead, turning his back on Proteus in a way he’s sure will be bruising to the ego. Leave Proteus without the last word and he combusts on the spot. 

Which he does.

“You fancy him!” Proteus shouts, as if an accusation. The words singe his backstruts. It makes Shockwave turn, out of fear someone else will hear and speculate if Proteus continues.

Proteus’ grin is not kind. He shortens the distance between them once more. “You always did have a thing for dissenters. A shame; power should be kept in the Senate.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“He’s an Autobot, yes?” Without waiting for an answer, he proceeds. “Self-proclaimed, and all. Mechs like him, they won’t last long. He’s going to keep speaking up, and it’ll be the death of him.”

The thought of Orion and death in the same sentence makes his spark ache. Anger quickly replaces it, surging up and out of his voice box before he can hold it back.

“You don’t touch him.” He shakes with fury.

“Always so emotional.” Proteus smirks. “How about I make you a deal: I don’t touch him, and in return--“

Shockwave points a finger at him. “There’s no ‘in return,’ you don’t touch him.”

Proteus grabs his hand and takes it in his own. His grip threatens to disfigure the joints. Trying to provoke him, no doubt. Or at least, that’s what he chooses to believe. The other option is a lot less pleasant. 

“You don’t call the shots here,” he hums. “So you should probably think about being nicer to me. For both his sake and yours.”

Shockwave doesn’t humour him with another word. He’s down the winding steps and headed Primus knows where before Proteus can say any more. Consequences be damned, he won’t subject himself to another minute of that nonsense.

His first thought is to go to his sanctuary, his School, but armed with the knowledge that Proteus has been following him, it isn’t a risk he’s wanting to take. Those ice-cold optics pierce him long after he’s gone, following him into the next cycle and then on.

He doesn’t know the extent of Proteus’ envy. His anger, he’s familiar with. It's made to look restrained, but can easily be minded if you know him personally. 

Envy? Oh, it makes bigger mechs devolve into an entire moral upheaval. And Proteus never had morals to begin with. He loathes to think about what he’ll do to Orion, and how he’ll justify it when the dust has settled. All in the name of a conquest.

Suffice it to say, he’s more worried about Orion than he is himself. That’s his second mistake.

[renaroo]

Super Brothers (1/12)

Disclaimer: Superman and associated characters are the creative property of DC Comics. Warnings: Child Abuse, Gender Dysphoria, PTSD and Anxiety, Character Death Rating: T Synopsis: Jon Kent knew he pretty much had the perfect family life, but something still felt wrong with himself. At the height of feeling like an alien in his own skin, however, his world got turned upside down when his parents took in a troubled child who embodied everything he felt he lacked. However, becoming a brother ended up being the smallest of the trials brought by adopting Christopher Kent. And being best friends with Damian Wayne has not exactly helped keep a neutral perspective on the matter.

A/N: I have made no secret over the last few years just how disappointed i’ve been by the treatment and reintroduction of Chris Kent, aka Lor-Zod, in DC Comics. This little guy is one of my favorite comic book characters in existence, and it feels so dirty to see what has become of him. For a while, I’ve wanted to do a story that really tried to rectify the Rebirth version of Chris and the continuity at large with the core of the character I love, so this story is my attempt at that. I can only hope that I bridge that gap gracefully.

On the other end, I didn’t want to erase Damian or Jon and all the positives I have seen with their relationship and additions to the DCU at large. For their parts in this story, I want to focus on being in the middle school age range, all the confusion that entails, and open a dialogue about issues of gender and acceptance. 

Obviously, these are a lot of heavy topics, and I am certain that despite my intentions, there can and will be things I mess up. My hope is, when that happens, you all can keep an open dialogue with me on the subjects. I want to learn and better myself and my portrayal of the issues. 

That being said, please pay attention to the warnings throughout this fic. I will touch on dark subjects, and I don’t want anyone to read and feel unprepared for the subjects broached, which is part of the reason I chose to make an opening scene that is rather dark and disturbing on some levels. It won’t be ALL dark and uncomfortable, but I want to make this plea now rather than later. 

I hope the story is still worth your read <3 Thank you for your time!

Chapter One: The Cost of Friends

Jon hates this.

At the absolute worst of times, his tiny body reminds him of just how unreliable it is. He can’t count on it, it’s not consistent — it’s not a Superman body no matter how hard he tries to fit it in as one. His limbs are gangly, his bones poke through pale kin, and his messy black hair curls untamed out from around his ears. It’s not good it doesn’t do what he needs it to do.

And at that moment, Jon’s terrified that it’s about to get himself and his best friend killed.

Ordinarily, being half-Kryptonian, Jon would easily burst through chains and bindings without a second thought. And he’s still strong, he tore through the ripe around his waist like it was taffy, but the chains keeping his legs and neck locked to the floor aren’t budging. And Jon’s getting progressively tired.

There’s something strange about this macabre carnival where he and Damian take the center ring. Of course, there is, because it’s Professor Pyg and he’s the stuff of nightmares. But beyond even that, the spotlights on them show with a heavy red glow that is making Jon sluggish and weak.

So weak that he’s less than a circus ring away from Damian and he still can’t get to him.

“Come now, come now, wait your turn,” the grotesque villain squeals in delight toward Jon. “Little Bat has been scheduled for this appointment for such a long time! You must be patient, my little bird. So patient. Everyone has their time with the professor.”

“Superboy!” Damian snarls from where he is tied up, flat and without his utility belt. He’s laying on a gurney that looks far from sanitary and, if Jon didn’t know better, it might even look like Damian is actually concerned. “Focus! Red sunlight radiation shouldn’t dull your brains as much as it does your strength!”

Blinking, Jon looks up to the spotlights again and can see, with what vague telescopic ability he still has, that there is something unusual about the spectrum of light coming from them. “Is that what this is?” he asks, voice small but filled with relief all the same.

“Oh, my, I cannot, must not, pass an opportunity to educate my subjects, inform them of their peril,” Professor Pyg pantomimes his way from the circus ring with Damian toward the center stage with Jon.

Immediately, Jon feels his body stiffen on instinct. He looks warily at the flabby, disgusting pig mask as the rest of the pudgy and unkempt professor makes his way toward Jon. He knows he should be focusing on getting free, but it’s a difficult thing to do when he’s being approached by unmitigated evil and brutality.

He isn’t sure how Damian gets his suit on every night if this is what Gotham patrols are really like.

“It is your body,” Pyg snorts and chortles.

A cold splash washes over Jon. “My body?” he repeats with wide eyes.

“Get away from him, Pyg!” Damian roars, his gurney shaking and rocking with struggle.

“It isn’t right, doesn’t fit on your bones,” Pyg bemoans, jerking out his hip and slithering his own arms around his chest and waist. He sways back and forth on his feet with a sashay of his hips. “It misses the shape of your spirit, the delicate frame of your face. And it’ll only get worse with age.”

Despite himself, Jon feels his struggle slow to a complete stop. His eyes widen as he looks at Pyg. There is a chill that travels from the base of his spine up, standing all his hair on end.

Deep inside of Jon’s chest, muscles tighten and his heart thunders. He feels a shiver move from his core. No oh no oh no oh no. HIs guts churn, his jaw trembles.

“Oh, you feel it, don’t you, that deep deep down,” Pyg continues, approaching. “You’re in the last years of it being passable, of being acceptable. Before your bones grind and the sinews snap into shapes thick and unbecoming of your gentle nature. I see what you are, in that deep deep down, because I am an artist who shapes and molds my subjects out from their souls.”

“You’re a monster,” Jon whispers, his voice giving up halfway through.

Pyg’s eyes shine with something dangerous through the outsides of his mask. He reaches forward and cups Jon’s cheek with his itchy gloved hand. Jon doesn’t even know when he got so close; when he started towering so tall over Jon.

“You’ll be one of my finest Dollotrons,” Pyg promises, rubbing his thumb just under Jon’s eye. “But your clay’s too strong, have to soften you up, get you nice and fleshy, then I’ll shave and I’ll cut and I’ll shape you right up.”

It doesn’t come off as a promise, so much as it does a threat, one that terrifies and unsettles Jon deep down within himself.

Jon’s mind draws a blank, his eyes wide and unfocused and he attempts, desperately, to come up with some intelligent response. But he can’t, not while a fear racks his every nerve and turns his muscles to stone.

It takes Jon completely and utterly by surprise when a familiar whoosh in the air flies overhead before glass crashes and electricity sparks. He catches a glance at the familiar shape of a Batarang lodged into the spotlight directly overhead.

He’s instantly overcome with relief.

Pyg releases his cheek and steps back wildly, looking around. “No! Not now! My art is not ready!” he cries out before letting loose some piglike squeals and sobs.

Looking toward Damian, Jon expects to see his friend released but is surprised to see Damian still trapped. He squints, uncertain of what’s happening when a second then third Batarang plunge into the remaining red sun spotlights.

“Batman?” Jon wonders out loud.

“Ugh,” Damian lets out in frustration before struggling with even more force against his bindings. “Overdramatic, sanctimonious, can’t believe—“

Dollotrons are racing onto the tent floor while Professor Pyg whines and bemoans his ultimate fate, but as the lights extinguish one by one, the shadows take on a new form.

She moves like a dancer, each step and hit against the army of zombified victims perfectly paced and timed. She is all in black, save for her golden accents and bat, and she spares not a single motion. A kick becomes a launch for a leap becomes a smack becomes a twirl becomes a fist to the face of the blubbering Professor. And each and every movement grows in its momentum.

Jon has never seen anything like this outside of super speed, and he certainly hasn’t seen it using the shapes and silhouettes of the shadows like a comforting show curtain. He has so many questions and so many concerns that he forgets himself and getting free. Even if he could, with his body still unresponsively slow and dulled from the radiation.

Damian, at the least, is in motion, finally getting one of his hands free and using the points of his gauntlet to slice through the leather of the other bindings. He is muttering to himself, annoyed and embarrassed based on the flush in his cheeks. It’s not a rare sight but it is unusual for Jon to see Damian this way around one of his multitudes of siblings.

The shadowy bat launches into a final attack, knocking out the last of the Dollotrons before pouncing on the escaping Professor Pyg like a hungry lioness.

With her full weight on Pyg, the Bat narrows her eyes and for the first time can really be seen by Jon as she reaches over and yanks Pyg’s disgusting mask off of his face. Her lips curl in displeasure, but it doesn’t take away from her fair features or the delicate, smooth control she has over her body.

“Wow,” Jon hears himself say as Damian reaches his side and begins pulling out a small blowtorch for the chains. “Is that your sister?”

“SHH!” Damian hisses.

Jon strains to listen to whatever is being said between the Bat and Pyg, but it gets him nowhere, only words at a time coming in clearly as his powers remain in flux. Regardless, Pyg is squirming and blubbering too much for it to matter anyway.

“Took her damn time,” Damian snarls, letting Jon lean on him as he glares toward his sister.

“She saved our lives,” Jon reminds him.

Damian’s nose curls. “Tt, debatable.”

Cassandra apparently finishes whatever minor conversation she was having with Pyg and flips him over, handcuffing him swiftly. She’s powerful and strong without losing her leanness or size, it mesmerizes Jon in a way. By the time she looks up at them, her expression has completely changed.

“You okay?” she asks them both.

“No thanks to you,” Damian says at the same time Jon gets out, “All thanks to you!”

Something approximating a smile crosses her face before she gets to her feet and reaches up to her ear. “Oracle. Done.”

Looking at Cassandra, Jon feels like he’s found yet another new hero. “Whoa, your sister’s awesome. And cool. And so in control,” Jon tells Damian, his strength returning. “You’ve got so many siblings, can I have your sister?”

“Father would be displeased, otherwise I’d say yes,” Damian huffs in that way that Jon cannot tell, for the life of him, if it’s sarcasm or not.

***

Damian watches as his friend flies off.

It took the better part of an hour as well as a stop at Big Belly Burger for Jon to feel up to the task, but the half-Kryptonian flies home after departing from them and Damian watches him go.

Cassandra, as it turns out, is also there. She leans back against her motorcycle — a sleek but redundant design, like any of the numerous other bat-themed motorcycles or vehicles any of their extended family has access to — and watches Damian more than Jon.

They haven’t had much time with just the two of them. Their paths rarely intersect. And Damian is pretty sure he prefers it that way.

His cheeks are still on fire from the embarrassment of being rescued by her.

“I would have gotten out,” he informs her, crossing his arms. “Pyg was distracted and far away from me. I was working on my restraints.”

She tilts her head at him, a frown tight on her face. “Distracted you, too,” she points out.

And Damian knows she’s right about that, he was distracted. Just the look on his friend’s face, the growing horror and dread. Jon isn’t used to the types of villains that Gotham can throw at people, the psychological toll it takes. Damian is, or at least he likes to think he is, but Jon still can be scared and surprised.

But what looks crossed Jon’s face at that moment were unexpected even to Damian. He had never seen anything like it. Jon had been soaking up every word and phrase like it had been ripped straight from his dreams.

It was enough that it frightened Damian for his friend, and he didn’t even know why.

Over the course of an hour and a Big Belly Burger, Jon had refrained from mentioning a single thing about it.

That, too, was very unlike Jon.

Such things could be dwelled on at another time, though. Damian had the pressing matter at hand of his own reckoning. And his so-called sister.

Without looking up to meet Cassandra’s gaze, Damian kicked at the ground. “What are you going to tell father about tonight?” he asks.

“Truth,” Cass answers unhelpfully.

Gritting his teeth, Damian looks back at her, eyes narrowed and angry. “That’s not fair, you know,” he growls at her. “You never come around, never work with any of the rest of us, and then you pop in and judge us from on high. No wonder father speaks highly of you. You’re just like him.”

Her brows come together in a way that wrinkles her forehead. It’s hard to read her expression, even with her modified mask and hood. “I’m not,” she says. Her words sound final, but she apparently thinks better of them and shifts her weight from one foot to the other. “Judging you. I’m not.”

Damian looks her over. She hasn’t moved from her bike but her arms have dropped to her side. She is looking at him rather intently and it makes him want to squirm in his combat boots.

“Tt, sure you’re not,” he finally snaps back. “You’ll still tell father that I was captured by Professor Pyg.”

“Yes,” she said too casually.

“And that I let Superboy get captured, too,” Damian glowered more at that one, his eyes rest on the asphalt beneath his feet. He kicked again.

Cassandra paused slightly longer with that one.

When her hand snaked its way onto his shoulder, Damian flinched bodily. He slapped her hand away and twisted around to get away on instinct. He hated that — no one should be able to sneak up on him. He was trained by League of Assassins, he had been prepared since before he could speak to be on guard.

But Cassandra had, too.

She looked at him passively. “Not your fault, happens,” she said, in reference to Pyg.

“That’s not what father will think,” Damian snaps.

“I’ll tell him,” she promises.

Damian stares at her for a moment, sizing her up and considering all the ways he could make her more respectful to him. But it fizzles out quickly. He knows, as much as he resists the thought, that he isn’t upset with her.

He’s upset with himself.

“In the League, they trained us that there is a cost to every relationship formed,” Damian informs Cassandra like she doesn’t intuitively know from her own history. “Partnerships, even necessary ones, would cost you heavily. They could be deadly. And more relationships than strictly necessary should be avoided. All this family and friendship that is just around me all the time now. I don’t want to pay the cost for them.” He looks to the skies where Jon once flew. “I don’t want my friend to pay for them either. It’s not worth it.”

Cassandra stays quiet, but she places her hand on Damian’s shoulder again. He doesn’t attempt to knock it off this time.

“Sometimes it is,” she tells him.

But Damian isn’t so sure. Especially not hearing it from her. Cassandra does not work with others to the same degree as the rest of their family. She doesn’t go to school. She doesn’t join teams outside of father’s pet projects. She doesn’t operate in a daily partnership like Damian has with Grayson or father.

She seems to be living by those lonesome standards that the League taught Damian. And all anyone can do is praise her.

What sort of lesson is Damian supposed to learn from that?

***

Jekuul feels oppressively hot outside of the crystal palace.

Lor has watched his parents stand, looming in the skies, over the land’s natives as they constructed the palace for them. He watched as their eyes glowed threateningly each time the native population faltered, and he remembered how easily their bones cracked and snapped when corrected by the general and his lieutenant. It was equal parts thrilling and terrifying to witness.

Inside the palace, things are smooth and temperature regulated. The pantries are stocked with foods far greater than anything Lor had tasted within the Phantom Zone, but still foreign and sometimes unexpected.

If he questions what was on his plate, he is quickly reprimanded.

So he doesn’t ask.

It should be easy, if not simple, to follow the rules at this point. Stay in the palace, eat when told without questions, listen to his lessons from the Sunstones without fault.

He is the Last Son of Krypton, and he is supposed to inherit everything the universe owed them for their lost greatest civilization. All he has to do is stay in place, not ask questions, don’t be, don’t move.

But he was not born on Krypton, nor was he born on Jekuul — New Krypton, by his father’s declaration — he was born in the perilous depths of the Phantom Zone. A prison.

Inside of the Phantom Zone, there was no movement, there were no questions, there was not being or doing or screaming or aging — that had been the only thing he’d ever existed and it was torturous.

Outside of the Phantom Zone, he thought, things are supposed to be different. He is supposed to move and change and grow, he thinks.

So even though there is every reason not to leave the palace, Lor-Zod leaves in the oppressive heat and feels the sun against his Kryptonian skin as he flies under the two yellow suns.

As he moves across the lands, the violet skinned natives of Jekuul fall to their knees and avert their eyes. They whisper and whimper in a tongue completely foreign to Lor-Zod and it feels, well. It feels good.

Lor-Zod knows that they react this way to his parents, but to have even adults of the alien race fall in reverence to him, he feels more powerful. He feels like the Last Son of Krypton that his father insists he is.

He wonders, vaguely, if it is something his father would like to see.

Deep down, Lor hopes so. Because it is easy for Lor to imagine what his father would think or say when he doesn’t like something Lor has done. He has no concept of what would happen when he makes his father pleased.

He is nearly at the end of the primitive village when Lor’s eyes fall on an unusual sight.

One of the Jekuul natives, a young female no older than Lor and having not yet earned her yellow stripes, stands and stares up at Lor. She doesn’t drop to her knees or avert her eyes.

For a few seconds, Lor continues flying, arching his head back to watch for the girl to finally do as she is supposed to but she never does.

Aggravated and surprised, Lor turns in his flight path and descends, landing promptly in front of the girl.

“Why aren’t you kneeling?” he asks before his feet are even secure.

She stares at him, head tilting. Her black eyes are large and reflective, Lor can see himself in them.

He huffs at her, crossing his arms like he has seen his father do so many times before. “Don’t you speak Kryptonian?” he sneers.

After a quiet moment, she scratches at her head and looks around. That seems to answer Lor’s question for him.

“You’re supposed to kneel,” he groans. “Look, like this,” he says, bowing down to one knee and lowering his head. He’s seen so many others do it before.

Then he hears laughter.

Lor looks up and sees the girl covering her mouth as she giggles before she gets down on both her knees and dips her body down in a silly, teetering display. A mockery. Then she gets back to her feet.

“No!” Lor snaps, getting back to his own feet and grabbing her shoulders.

At first, she stiffens, surprised, and looks at him wildly. Her hands grip onto his wrists and she seems afraid.

“Like this,” Lor repeats, then pushes down on her. He dips with her, down to the ground on their knees. But when they both lower their heads, they immediately smack foreheads.

It feels like nothing to Lor, but for the girl, she jolts back and begins rubbing at her skull.

Instinctively, just like he follows his parents’ motions, Lor reaches up and rubs at his own head. They stare at each other as they both sit there on their knees, rubbing their heads.

Then, despite himself, Lor giggles.

The girl giggles.

They both giggle.

Once the giggles subside, they are both sitting on their knees in the dirt and staring at each other expectantly. They don’t speak the same language. They aren’t remotely the same and, yet, Lor has never felt more of a need to communicate with someone in his life.

He points at his chest, at the house emblem emblazoned on his armor. “Zod,” he tells her. “Zod,” he repeats.

For a moment, the girl is quiet, absorbing his words, then she points at her chest and the purple skin. “Jekuul,” she says.

“No, not what you are,” he mutters, catching on quickly. “I’m not…” He is a Zod, though. Maybe more than he is a Kryptonian, if only in his own mind. He sucks in a breath and tries again. He points at his face. “Lor,” he tells her.

Understanding fills her expression and she points at her own face. “Ti’ahl.”

And, maybe for the first time, Lor feels a wide smile cross his face.

From that moment on, their afternoon is filled with delight.

Ti’ahl points at every structure, every creature, every plant with words and phrases that will not stop saying until Lor repeats. Repeatedly, Lor picks Ti’ahl up easily, flies her from location to location, lifts up every boulder and animal they come across as she claps in delight.

It’s thrilling — and Lor laughs more than he has ever laughed before in his life.

By the time the second sun begins to set, a chill quickly crosses the lands, and Lor can see Ti’ahl gain a shiver. It makes Lor feel bad to see Ti’ahl uncomfortable in any way.

“Hold on,” he calls to her at one point, slowing her run through the grass. He reaches up and carefully unclips his cape from his armor. Grinning, he floats toward Ti’ahl and drapes her with the heavy fabric.

After Lor ties the cape closed over her neck, Ti’ahl looks down and touches the knot. A funny look crosses her face and she looks at Lor.

Ti’ahl leaps onto a nearby rock, standing tall and crossing her arms. “ZOD!” she declares herself.

Realizing what is happening, Lor giggles and drops obediently to his knees. “I kneel!” he laughs.

At first, Ti’ahl joins his laughter, but then she becomes strangely quiet.

Confused, Lor looks up at her. “Ti’ahl?” he asks before realizing that a shadow has crossed over them both.

Heart sinking, Lor twists around and sees his father, arms crossed, standing over them both. He looks displeased.

“Father,” Lor gets out, voice thin.

“Is this how I find the Last Son of Krypton? Kneeling before his lessers?” the general snarls. He drops his hands to his sides as Lor begins to stand up and easily kicks Lor back down. “If you lower yourself in the dirt for a mongrel child, you will stay there for your leader, do you understand?”

Breath catching in his throat, Lor nods. “Y-yes, Sir.”

“To the palace. Immediately,” General Zod orders, his gaze carrying over to Ti’ahl. “There will be a price to pay for this, Lor-Zod. Let us see if you are grown enough to pay it.”

Lor cannot bring himself to look at Ti’ahl as he leaps to his feet and takes off in the air. His blood is rushing to his ears, tears building up in his eyes even before he reaches his top speeds of flight.

It isn’t until he was home that he realized he had left his cape.

[cyberkevvideo]

My Changes to “Way of the Wicked“, Extras 2: Constructs

Part of me never thought I’d be writing another entry for this series, but here I am. It definitely helped that I’ve seen more people bring up that they’re playing the adventure path, but they’re doing it with different editions (3.5 and 5e D&D, PF 2e), and recently I’ve been seeing a lot of vloggers converting 3.5 monsters to 5e. All of this combined together and got the creative juices flowing.

As always, for space reasons, I’ll be cropping the encounter build.

I do not have a Patreon or a Kickstarter, but I do have a Ko-Fi page (linked) for those who would like to support my work. There is no pressure or obligation to do so, however, but a like and a share would definitely be appreciated. Of this and my older work.

Finally, before get to it, I hope everyone’s staying safe right now.

When I was reading a newer GM discussing how they were enjoying Book 1, but felt it needed something more during the jail break arc, I wondered what that could have been. And it’s not like there’s only the one jail break aspect of the AP either. The GM is able to add more throughout the game whenever they need to bring in new players, or characters are killed and they need to be replaced. During those times, you’re definitely going to need something more than a few guards here or there. That’s when I remembered that in 3.5, there was a chain golem in Monster Manual II. Unfortunately, there aren’t one of these Pathfinder (likely due to copyrights), but one of the jobs they had the potential of getting programmed for was as jail guards. There was even a variant version I’d read about where it was given one of the powers of the hangman golem and it could just look like a pile of chains. How terrifying would it be to be a prisoner and seeing an animated humanoid made of chains walking down the hallways through the day and night, only to watch it turn into a pile of chains in the corner after it was done with its patrol? And if the guards wanted to be really mean, they could put chain piles throughout the prison. You would never know. And it’s not like a standard prisoner can fight a golem.

https://www.deviantart.com/mauricioeiji/art/Chain-Golem-18973217

But the standard one from 3.X is only a CR 5. What about the later scenarios where the PCs are going to be exponentially more powerful? Well, thankfully someone was kind enough to convert and make such a creature. Well, sort of. It’s from 4e and reverted back to 3.5, but still. Easy enough to convert over to Pathfinder 1e. And of course, what better way to represent it than with a mini of incredible size?

You can find the stats for this sucker here. Personally, I’d lower than by 1 CR and make it Large size, as Huge is way more difficult to patrol through a dungeon or jail. Not only that, you’re pretty much done with jail breaks by the time you’re done Book 3. At least with regards to it being referenced, so unless you’re having one added to the king’s castle, a CR 15 is more than sufficient with all the other encounters in Book 3.

Lastly, bringing it back to two things I brought up early, how else would you spice things up in Book 1? Or maybe even Book 2? Well, I originally said that you should sent bounty hunters or other inquisitors after the escaped prisoners. There’s no way they’re just going to believe that the 4+ most heinous criminals in years, who managed to escape the inescapable Branderscar, would just die in the swamps. Even if a majority believes it, you’re going to have at least a few people who are going to investigate further until they’re completely satisfied.

So what do you do? You send out a terminator. No, seriously. Back in 3.0, you had a construct called the Hangman golem. Pathfinder calls it a rope golem because that’s exactly what it is. The difference is the original hangman was also an assassin. You found who or what you needed to, wrapped the noose around it (usually from above), and judgement was served right then and there. This time won’t be any different. The PCs left the prison in either their prison garb or guard uniforms. Their original clothes could still be around somewhere instead of being burned. I mean, Branderscar was going downhill. They could have gotten lazy with that too. Then it’s just a matter of sending the golem in their direction and wait it out. And it’s a golem. If it doesn’t ever return, they’re going to know something is up. This thing could show up any time during Book 1, or maybe it shows up during Book 2 when the PCs are performing the ritual for 666 days.

Now, while I have a link to the original and will be sharing it, I also did my own stats and changes to the original rope golem brought to us from the Tome of Horrors Complete. Anyone who wants to advance it further, I highly suggest using the original and taking elements from that, in addition to the standard advancement rules.

Like with previous entries, “--” are supposed to be bullet listings, but they don’t transfer very well from Word Document to Tumblr.

THE HANGMAN (CR 7; XP 3,200) Variant advanced rope golem LN Medium construct Init +2; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision; Perception +0 DEFENSE AC 20, touch 12, flat-footed 18 (+2 Dex, +8 natural) hp 76 (10d10+20) Fort +3; Ref +5; Will +3 DR 10/adamantine and slashing; Immune construct traits, magic Weaknesses vulnerability to fire OFFENSE Speed 30 ft. Melee 2 slams +15 (2d6+5 plus grab) Special Attacks constrict (2d6+5), squeeze the breath, strangulation (1d8+5) Spell-Like Abilities (CL 6th)    At will—locate creature STATISTICS Str 21, Dex 14, Con —, Int —, Wis 11, Cha 1 Base Atk +10; CMB +15 (+19 grapple); CMD 27 Feats Ability Focus (squeeze the breath)B, Skill Focus (Stealth)B Skills Stealth +5 (+45 when unraveled); Racial Modifiers +40 when unraveled SQ unravel SPECIAL ABILITIES Immunity to Magic (Ex) The hangman is immune to any spell or spell-like ability that allows spell resistance. In addition, certain spells and effects function differently against the creature, as noted below.  --A disintegrate spell affects it normally.  --A rope trick or animate rope spell deals 1d6 points of damage to the golem per three levels of the spell caster (e.g., a 6th-level sorcerer deals 2d6 points of damage to the hangman if it casts rope trick or animate rope).  --A mending spell heals the rope golem of 2d6 points of damage.  --Fire-based effects and spells affect it as described in its fire vulnerability above. Squeeze the Breath (Ex) If the hangman constricts a grappled creature, it also attempts to squeeze the air from the creature’s lungs. If the creature fails a Fortitude save (DC 17) it is dazed for 1 round. Creatures that do not need to breathe are immune to this ability. Strangulation (Ex) The hangman deals 1d8+5 points of damage with a successful grapple check. Strangulation damage is in addition to constriction damage on subsequent rounds. Because the hangman seizes the opponent by the neck, a strangled foe cannot speak or cast spells with verbal components. The hangman is not considered grappled while it is strangling an opponent, and can move and attack normally, but it cannot move more than 10 feet away from an opponent while strangling it. Unravel (Ex) Once per day as a standard action, the hangman can unravel its form to become a heap of tangled ropes that fills a 10-foot-by-10-foot area. While in this form, the hangman cannot attack or move, but it gains fast healing 10. The hangman can reform into its humanoid appearance as a full-round action.

https://www.realmshelps.net/monsters/block/Golem,_Hangman

As I mentioned above, I also added the original hangman golem from 3.X for reference. You’ll notice it has similar and different weaknesses as well.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Next time, we’ll do an entry all about outsiders who’ll come down from above who’d come after our PC villains. One in particular is a 3.5 conversion that I never expected, and had completely forgot about until I noticed there seemed to be something missing from the original iteration in the Pathfinder bestiary. Boy howdy I was correct in that assumption.

[teamdoesminecraft]

I've noticed you really like your lore for MC/TC. Can I ask then, what's the timeline of events? I know when they were created, but like a short timeline, starting when how the world was made to present day, if that makes sense. Thanks!

Ohhh I haven’t thought about @crystalfloe ‘s and my Canon Minecraft Lore in a while, it’s been touched up quite a bit since my last lore post.... I’ll be basically rewriting it as I go !!TL;DR: Sage makes Steve who turns into Herobrine, Sage and his Devs make True/SSundee/Lox/Seto, Herobrine makes Bajan/Husky, Sage makes Jerome to kill Bajan, and Steve/Sage simoultaneously fuck up and make Sky as an overpowered child and nerf him together.-Long ago, the world was a seething mass of untamed code. Some of this code pulled itself together into sentience: an entity named Sage.-Sage began manipulating the code for the first time. He was the first Player to access creative mode. He created:A dimension (grass, stone)Simple mobs (pigs, cows)

-Sage wanted to share his creative-mode capabilities, and so made slightly more advanced mobs. Endermen were simple creatures, capable of basic neutrality and hostility, and could interact with the world by moving one block at a time.-Sage realized that these were not the Players he was trying to make, so he set out to make an actual Creative Mode Player.-Sage made Steve, who lived in the single dimension and was capable of building great things.-Steve wanted to create new mobs, much like Sage did. He created:Creeper (aw man)SpidersThe Ender Dragon-The Ender Dragon destroyed the single-dimension world, leaving it barren, broken into pieces, and yellowed out (the End).-Sage managed to trap the Dragon on a single island. Sage then banished Steve to a second dimension (the Overworld, which had a bedrock layer below it, separating it from the End), and made a new gamemode for him: Survival Mode.-Steve wanted to right his wrongs, and so began searching for a way to get back to the End.-Sage didn’t want Steve back, so continued implementing coding changes:Monsters (creepers, spiders) would appear at night to hunt Steve and hinder his progressZombies and Skeletons, that were only just Steve’s former bodies, to continue to push his progress farther back-Sage attempted to remove Steve’s coding from the game entirely when he got too close-Eventually, Steve was “deleted,” more or less-No he wasn’t. He was a “ghost” of code, able to still grasp some of his prior Creative Mode abilities; to prevent Sage from finding him, he made the third dimension, the Nether (between the Overworld and the End, covered on both sides by bedrock), where Sage would be unable to find him-Sage tried to make two Creative-Mode Players again: the Devs. He created Jeb and Dinnerbone.-The three of them began populating the Overworld, realizing the End was almost unsalvagable. (This is the point where our canons and AUs start splintering, so it might get a little messy)-Sage made TrueMU first. This was the start of most Players being Survival-Mode only: he had no Creative-Mode abilities. -True was more or less on Sage’s side for a while, until, after a series of deaths/respawns, he realized how little Sage cared. True left at this point to escape to the Farlands (an area of the Overworld the Devs hadn’t yet tamed).-A long period of time passed, during which many other Players were created. (for those Yogs fans, Xephos was made very early, and was a pseudo-dev, until he also ran away from Sage to go do strange experiments on his own).-Jeb made SSundee during this time (traumatic backstory tbd)-Dinnerbone started creating more hostile mobs to provide extra challenge to the Players. Jeb started creating more passive mobs to populate the world and make it more interesting for the Players.-Signs of Steve started appearing again, as a half-glitched ghost. To prevent people from siding with Steve, Sage created Villagers. Villagers firmly believe Sage is true and correct all the time, and spread this ‘doctrine.’ They also tell the tale of a murderous entity known only as Herobrine (a name Steve would later whole-heartedly adopt).-Villagers have no hands, so they can’t build or create and potentially turn against Sage. Instead, their arms are conjoined in front of them.

-Some Villagers don’t believe Sage is the best, and break away from society to either form patrols or live in large, communal mansions. These Illagers practice things normally Villagers aren’t supposed to; many of them break their arms into two separate pieces. They hold weapons, build mansions/monuments, and practice magic.-A Player named Seto, originally made by Jeb, somehow found himself subsumed into Illager culture. He was raised in a Woodland Mansion and learned various magic from an Evoker.-Herobrine saw all these players being created. He knew he couldn’t enter the Overworld without being hunted, so he decided to make a Player of his own: Bajan.*Note: Herobrine has made other Players besides Bajan (notably Hypixel and Honeydew)*Double Note: in almost every other set of Lore we have, Bajan was either made or adopted by Xephos (I have no idea why)-Bajan was designed to master combat and, ultimately, defeat the Ender Dragon. His dogtags read HB002, marking him as Herobrine’s second creation. -However, Sage discovered Bajan, and wiped his memories/mission statement to prevent him from reaching the End.-Sage created a “monstrous” Player to hunt Bajan down and prevent him from respawning: Jerome-Naturally, this failed spectacularly, and though they were designed to destroy one another, they’re now best friends. Due to their combatative natures, they enter tournaments like the Survival Games often.-Realizing this approach was flawed, Herobrine took a different approach. The Stronghold he had been building, with a half-finished portal to the End, was underwater. So HB created a Player who could guide people to the Stronghold: Husky. He wasn’t extraordinarily combatative, but it was his job to find Players who could be and bring them to the Stronghold.-Sage did not like this, so had Dinnerbone create the Guardians to deter players from deep-sea exploration.-Herobrine wanted to try something new: he wanted to make his own Dev.*Note: it’s been discussed (but not solidified) that “bad end” Yogscast members, like Israphel/Lalna, are HB’s Devs, created later.-Sage was also developing a new Dev at this time.-Herobrine waited until Sage wasn’t paying attention (all players must be created at the Overworld Spawn to prevent complications), and began interfering with the code.-Sage and Herobrine fought for a while over this new Dev. However, when fully-formed, this Dev went on an uncontrollable creative-mode rampage.-Sage and HB teamed up for the first and only time to stop this Dev. They gave him an amulet (made of endstone and blaze rod) to suppress his powers, and created the Hardcore gamemode just for him. They wiped his memory (they knew what happened if you tried to delete a Dev, as evidenced by Herobrine) and dumped the newly-named Sky in a village.*Note: in at least one AU, Sage made Alex, who was then “used” by HB. After a series of corruptions, Alex’s code was repurposed and turned into Sky ala reincarnation.*fun fact: Sky is the only Player who cannot access his inventory. he’s gotta carry everything with him. always-Around this time, Dinnerbone created Lox (traumatic backstory TBD).-The “Plot” begins when Sky’s amulet becomes separated from his body, and he inadvertently teleports himself and Lox out to the Farlands. They are immediately interrogated by True.-True, knowing how Sky works, decides to initiate the Quest (which he won’t tell them too much about). This Quest has them meeting the various other members of the Team, becoming closer, and just bein real good pals.-No we don’t know how it goes or how it ends-sometimes they kill the Ender Dragon and Sky just resets the entire world with his Dev powers because Sage has gone nuts? -we really genuinely have no idea and we wrote it

[mei-rin-blossoms]

♥️ ♣️ Send a playing card to my ask box! ♦️ ♠️ @ask-zhang-qing

A♥️ - Who was the first person your muse ever fell in love with?

Canonically? Sebastian Michaelis. But during out adventure here, on tumblr?  I don’t even remember. My goodness, it’s been 7 years! I have never thought I’d stay here for half this time!

2♥️ - What’s your muse’s family like?

This depends on the verse and on the thread. Usually, since her family is dead, the only family she has is her friends. But yeah - in modern verse, she sometimes does have her father, who is simply abusive.

3♥️ - How would your muse react to a confession of love?

Blush. Maybe even faint. She is not used to hearing that someone likes her, let alone feel anything more.

4♥️ - What are your muse’s thoughts on starting/raising a family?

Mei-Rin is in a true need of a family. Although she has been an assassin, she’s soft at heart, and really wishes to find someone with whom she could spend her life with, and who would be the father of her children.

5♥️ - What was your muse’s most heartbreaking separation/divorce/etc?

Canonically none. During the 7 years of my rping here, I guess it’d be the break-up she had with @darklyevermore ‘s Alan, or maybe when @bone-biscuits-and-marmite ‘s Undertaker left her when she was expecting.

6♥️ - What sort of charity work has your muse done?

None; though, when she sees someone in need, she tries to share whatever she has. Still, she’s quite poor.

7♥️ - Has your muse ever cheated or been cheated on?

She is not quite the person who would cheat, and I cannot really remember any thread in which she would be cheated on.

8♥️ - How well does your muse perform in social situations?

Honestly? She’s just as socially awkward as I am. Therefore, she’s simply terrible. She’ll faint, stutter, maybe even run away.

9♥️ - Has your muse ever had unrequited feelings for someone?

Yes. Usually it is this way. Canonically, it’s Sebastian, but there have been some threads in which she was in love with people who did not love her back.

10♥️ - What was the last party or social event your muse went to?

Uh... I can’t really remember? She’s not the party person, and she’ll rather stay away from these kinds of things. Though, if I recall it well, it was a masquerade.

J♥️ - Who does your muse consider their best friend?

Finny and Bard, and she won’t ever be made to choose just one of them. They are her brothers.

Q♥️ - Who is someone special that your muse always thinks about?

Canonically, there are a couple of such people, starting with her young Master, through Sebastian, and ending with her fellow servants. As in rp, I think this person is @a-murder-of-muses ‘s Ryat. Just because they have known each other for a long time. Like, really long.

K♥️ - Who does your muse look up to as a role model?

Sebastian. He’s the perfect servant, and she wishes she could be one, too.

A♣️ - What’s your muse’s strongest talent?

One would say, her perfect aim. I say, her devotion and unconditional love. If she loves, she loves forever, and no matter what. And this is a kind of talent.

2♣️ - What topics of conversation does your muse enjoy the most?

Every. Sometimes she needs to talk about idle little things, like books. Sometimes she needs to talk about life. It depends on the situation.

3♣️ - How creative is your muse?

Not really creative. I think she’s mainly too scared to accept her own creativity, and therefore, she won’t develop it.

4♣️ - What does your muse have the most passion for?

I think books. She loves reading (even though she mainly reads romance books), and if she was given a day off, she would most probably spend it lying in the garden full of flowers and reading.

5♣️ - What would your muse change about their current lifestyle?

Probably she would wish that it was not necessary for her to kill anyone ever again. She would wish to be just a maid, and nothing more - as long, of course, as her young Master is happy.

6♣️ - How do your muse’s “gut feelings” usually turn out?

Mei is not the best at forecasting. Sometimes she’s scared something will happen, and it turns out to be completely untrue - but she’s mainly afraid that it she has hopes everything will be all right, she will be deeply disappointed.

7♣️ - Has your muse ever felt “trapped”, either figuratively or literally?

Yes. For the great part of her life, she has been trapped, doing a job she has never wanted to do. Now, she’s trapped by her own mind and memories, from which she cannot escape, and she doubts she ever will be able to live a free life.

8♣️ - What is your muse the most stubborn about?

She. Won’t. Have. Anyone. Take. Care. Of. Her.

Like, she’s a strong and independent woman! Well, of course she’s not, and she needs lots of help, but she hates to admit that, and she’ll need to get really comfortable with someone before she lets them take care of her. 

9♣️ - What is your muse’s proudest accomplishment?

The fact that she’s more and more competent as a maid. That no longer does she break everything, and sometimes she is almost good.

10♣️ - When was the last time your muse took a vacation or trip?

She hasn’t had a vacation in a long time. But, if you can say it was a trip, she went on a spying mission with Lan Mao.

J♣️ - Who does your muse trust the most?

Bard and Finny, canonically.

But, as in many of the previous questions, it’s verse-dependent.

Q♣️ - Do other people consider your muse charming?

She is sure people don’t like her, and see only the worst things in her. But that’s not really the case, some actually see her as an endearing one.

K♣️ - How important is integrity to your muse?

It’s really important. Of course, she has her own moral system, with which some would not agree, but she believes that things that have to be done simply need to be done, and there are no excuses.

A♦️ - What is the most important message your muse has ever received?

Canonically, I don’t remember one. In some of the threads, it’s usually a message that she’s got a job. That actually changes her whole world.

2♦️ - How important is money to your muse?

It means nothing to her. Of course, it does make life easier, but she believes one can be happy without it - or sometimes it’s even easier to be happy without any money - because money means trouble.

3♦️ - How does your muse handle indecision?

Very poorly. She’ll look for advice, but she’s bad at asking for it, so in the end, she usually makes very poor decisions.

4♦️ - Is your muse more of the patient or instant gratification type?

She feels temptation quite often, but - surprisingly enough - she is quite patient. She loves the thought of how wonderful it’ll be to indulge after a long time of waiting.

5♦️ - How often does your muse change plans?

Not often. Something really important needs to happen for her to change her plans. Usually she won’t plan if she’s not certain it’s the right choice, so it’s hard to make her change her mind.

6♦️ - Is your muse responsible with their money?

Since she’s been poor her whole life, she’s definitely a responsible one. As I mentioned before, she feels tempted rather often, but she’ll think twice before spending money, and quite probably, she’ll rather save than spend.

7♦️ - When was your muse the most down on their luck?

Once again, thread-dependent. But canonically, I think it’s the beginning of the manga, when she does everything - everything - wrong, especially breaking her glasses, which means she really cannot do anything right, for she simply doesn’t see.

8♦️ - Has your muse ever received money or gifts from a mysterious benefactor?

No, never. And even if she did, she’d try to find out who it was, so she could somehow pay back.

9♦️ - How much money does your muse spend on average?

As much as it’s necessary for her to live a normal life. Sometimes she gives in to the temptation, and buys herself a book.

10♦️ - How financially successful is your muse?

Probably more successful than one would believe she’d be, considering she is but an orphan. But actually, yeah, she’s poor.

J♦️ - Who does your muse do the most business with?

Her fellow servants.

Q♦️ - Has your muse ever been gossiped about or participated in gossip?

She hates to admit that, but yes, sometimes she, too, enjoys gossip. She’ll rather avoid spreading it, but she likes to hear some news. As for being gossiped about, I can’t remember such a situation.

K♦️ - If your muse were to start their own business, what would it be?

Either a coffee/tea shop, or a book shop. There was a thread where she had a flower shop, too.

A♠️ - What was the most painful loss your muse had to go through?

Losing her childhood friends, Yan and Hao. Also, that moment when she thought she had lost Sebastian forever.

2♠️ - How often does your muse wish to be left alone?

Quite often. She doesn’t like to be in a large group of people, and sometimes even Bard and Finny are too much. However, she cannot be completely alone for an extended period.

3♠️ - Does your muse ever let anyone see them cry?

Sometimes, yes. But usually not; once again, she hates when people may see her as weak, and tears are a sign of weakness.

4♠️ - What’s the worst injury your muse has ever recovered from?

As a punishment, she was usually beaten. There were times when her boss almost beat her to death, and yet, she’s still alive - just scarred.

5♠️ - Has your muse ever had to change their lifestyle in a major way?

Yes. First, when her parents died, and she needed to get used to the street life. Then, when she was forced to become an assassin. And after that, when she started her job as a Phantomhive maid. Recently, when Ciel returned, and they were all kicked out of the manor.

6♠️ - Does your muse believe in fate/destiny?

Yes. But she also believes in one’s ability to change it.

7♠️ - What’s a hard truth that your muse has to learn/has learned?

That things hardly ever go the way we want them to go, and it’s better to just grit your teeth and go on, even if it hurts.

8♠️ - What does your muse work the hardest for?

She wants to be a proper servant and prove her worth to the world.

9♠️ - Has your muse ever felt forced to change?

She feels that all the time; after all, she does not want to be an embarrassment or shame, and this is what she believes she is.

10♠️ - How does your muse cope with grief?

Not well. Mei-Rin isn’t good at coping with any emotions, because she’s really sensitive, and therefore, she’ll cry a lot, and sometimes grief would make her almost unable to function normally.

J♠️ - Who would your muse most likely end up in jail with?

Finny and Bard.

Q♠️ - Does your muse manipulate others easily or are they easily manipulated?

She is quite easily manipulated. Threaten her friends, or play with her emotions, and she’s all yours.

K♠️ - What is one thing your muse considers a grave injustice?

The fact that there is so much suffering in the world, and there is nothing one could do to change that.

[philippmichelreichold]

Science Fiction Felinoids

Home

One of the challenges of science fiction writing is populating the stories. One can use humans, but human motivations and cultures can be limited in scope and range. The anwser lies in using other physical forms than the human-- the lizard-like Gorn from Star Trek TOS co mes to mind. I imagined but never wrote about kangaroo-like aliens. A popular shape for aliens is that of the cat-- felinoids. Here are 5 Science Fiction felinoids of my acquaintance--

Even when cat-like in shape, aliens can be very human in values, thought patterns and motivations. It's not easy to create and alien mind from the inside out. We can create an alien with human like thoughts and then set its behavior and one end of the spectrum of human behavior and play it off humans whose personalities stand in contrast to that of the alien. And so it is with van Vogt's Coeurl. Coeurl in "Black Destroyer"/'' The Voyage of the Space Beagle'' is the last survivor of a dying race. He is decadent and depraved and not nearly as bright as he thinks, despite his abilities. After first conatct, he kills a number of the human explorers, not realizing how obvious he is. We can see the smugness of the house cat in him, but he also fits within expectations for human depravity. He is contrasted by the scientifically and intellectually trained and incredibly well adjusted humans of the Beagle. They have him neatly sorted and classified fairly quickly. He is however not without resources and builds a tiny spaceship with which to escape the humans when his luck turns. Despite ihs briilliance in adaptating human technology, he is emotionally and fundamentally disabled by his depravity. This disability leads to the sort of despair which is seldom a survival trait.

An alien way of thinking can still be human in nature but insane by human standards-- to the point that what we consider normal would be regarded by them as hopelessly and tragically deluded. Algis Budrys created such a race for Shadow on the Stars. Farlans in "Shadow on the Stars" are militaristic and inherently paranoid-- to the point where anyone militarily skilled enough to pose a political threat to his superiors is dealt with quickly and terminally. It is thus that Farla has become beset by a younger, stronger enemy while her Navy is led by preening idiots. Seeking remedy, the Farlans turn to a reservist named L'Maranid. L'Maranid makes short work of Farla's enemy with a series quick victories that shatters them into a collection os successor states. But the paranoid nature of the Farlans is destined to work to wily Earth's advantage.

Some aliens seem not so alien in thinking once one gets past cultural biases. The Hani of CJ CHerryh's Compact Space are traders in a multi species trading compact. They are newcomers to the game and feel inferior to Compact members who've been around longer. Their society is matriarchal, with males dispossed and treated as inferiors as a matter of course. Much of their literature is dedicated to the poignant brevity of males. C.J.Cherryh often writes about strong women coming to their own. Human examples are Signe Mallory of ECS Norway and Ari of Cyteen. And then there is Pyanfar Chanur. Chanur's rise parallels and powers the Hani's rise in Compact Space. Of as great an import as Chanur's elevation of the Hani in Compact space is the sexual revolution initiated by her taking her dispossesed and disgraced husband aboard as working crew.

The Kzinti of Larry Niven's Known Space are more alien in their thinking that the others, though they weren't always so. Larry Niven describes the Kzinti of his first story, "the Warriors," as humans dressed up in cat suits. A telling conversation occurs when the Kzin captain askes if they should be running from Angel's Pencil, the human ship and intended prey of the story. Kzinti in later stories would never consider asking such a question. They would "scream and leap" into battle as a matter of course. This impetuosity leads them into a series of defeats, especially in the First Man-Kzin War with its destruction of five invasion fleets in battles in Sol system and then off Wunderland in Alpha Centauri space. The reimagining of the Kzin in the many volumes of the Man-Kzin Wars should make and interesting paper or two.

The itiji, the cats in Golva's Ascent (Asimov's March 2012) by Tom Purdom are alien in culture and motivation. Though they lack hands, they posses sophisticated language abilities and understanding of advanced math, logic, ethics and tactics. They have evolved as hunters with a strong sense of ethics and compassion. Their natures stand in stark conquest to that of the brutal human interlopers on their world. Golva, like the jaguar in "The Snow of Kilimanjaro," is compelled to climb the heights and explore. Unlike that famous jaguar, he lives to tell about it.

Golva is a young itiji polymath and visionary. He has decided to be the first to scale the heights above his home. He encounters and is captured and experimented upon by a group of human explorers. They are unhindered by any conscience or compulsion. Eventually the brutality gets to be too much for one member of the expedition and she assists him to escape back to the lowlands. Golva's erstwhile tormenter makes the mistake of pursuing them. He shortly learns that superior tech and cruelty need not suffice in having one's way. The itiji are very good at coordinating rescue and the use of force. While his captors had thoughtlessly spared Golva no pian in interogating him, the itiji response to the human attackers is carefully considered and limited to only that which is needed to stop the attack.

External links

These five are but a small sample of fictional felinoids. A longer list is on Wikipedia

Black Destroyer at baenebooks

Aldrys Budris on Wikipedia

Golva's Ascent by Tom Purdon

Gorn at Memory Alpha

Larry Niven

On Sexism and Feminism among the Hani

Copyleft of my material

Essentially, my work is Creative Commons Attribution-Required, Share Alike. Adapted from their Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license summary--

You may Share-- copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format Adapt-- remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially. I cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms. Attribution-- You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests that I endorse you or your use. No additional restrictions-- You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that restrict others from doing anything the license permits.

Providing a link to my source document should suffice in attributing me. Where any condition(s) I place conflicts with the Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license, my condition(s) shall prevail.

Copyright of material that is not mine

Images used in reviews are from ISFDB unless otherwise indicated and are copyrighted unless otherwise indicated. Copyrighted images are presented here under fair use. You would need to contact the copyright holder to use them. They are not covered by my creative commons licensing.

[consultinggallifreyanfallenangel]

okay I’m so upset.

after watching the first ep of spn this season I had this INSANELY IN DEPTH fanfic idea and I was like HOLY SHIT I HAVE TO WRITE THIS OMFG LKAJF:ALJFKLDJF and I was putting it off and putting it off because I just kept thinking of more and more twists and backstories to go with it. Then the second episode aired, and I was like, welp.. Maybe I’ll wait until hellatus so I can use some canon in the newer episodes..

AND THEN FUCKING MICHAEL PARTIALLY STOLE MY IDEA!! So no If I write it i will look like I am super un-creative and just used part of the story...

Please ignore any typos I’m just throwing this together real quick. I’ve been thinking about this non stop for two weeks now..

Here is a quick, unorganized, mess of what the main events in my fanfic idea are:

like my idea was supposed to take place right after that scene in 14x01 where *SPOILER ALERT* Sam kills that demon and is all like “There will be no new King of Hell. Not today. Not ever. And if anyone wants the job, you can come through me. Understood? So, What's it gonna be?" and the demons hesitated for a few seconds then smoked out and Sam's all like "That's what I thought.“ I was gonna write a story where one of those demons is my OC and is so done with Sam’s shit that he decides to start his own super army to take back Hell. He knows he can kill Sam pretty easily if he got him alone, but that’s not good enough for him. He doesn’t want to just capture or kill him he wants to PULVERIZE him. And Michael is being a pain in the ass killing tons of monsters and any demons that get in the way so it pisses my OC off to the point that he wants to kill Michael. And take over Heaven because why not.

My OC was gonna come up with the idea where he wants to give monsters demon strength in addition to their own strength to become wickedly strong. At first he tried demon blood, it barely has any effect, and the few that it did work on, ended up turning against him.

Then he has the idea to ditch his meat suit and possess different monsters. Vamps, Shifters, Djinns, etc.. They each had different sets of pros and cons. Eventually he realizes that werewolves are his best option, due to their strength and agility. He possesses different werewolves and works his way up in packs trying to find the most powerful Alpha.

There are different breeds of wolves some only change on full moon, some can change whenever they want. Some have absolutely no control of their change others have little, some have complete control.

As he works his way through the ranks, he still isn’t satisfied. He wants to find the STRONGEST Werewolf there is. Eventually he learns of Fenrir Greyback, supposedly the most powerful werewolf that ever lived. He learns of Hogwarts from so many collected memories of student werewolves he has possessed. But the more and more he heard about Greyback, the more he learned about how little he was actually able to control his powers and that he was a hot-mess and crazy killing machine.

Disappointed by this, and about to leave Hogwarts and settle for a different wolf, he finds out about Remus Lupin.

Not only was Lupin a werewolf, he was also a WIZARD, and an Defense Against the DARK ARTS Professor at Hogwarts. Amazed by this information, my OC decides he HAS to possess Lupin. Lupin didn’t have complete control over his inner Moony either, but he was a better organized individual and he did have ALL of the knowledge and ability to preform dark spells that can inflict serious damage and easily kill. Greyback had the ability to perform magic as well, but he was killed by a couple of students, verses Lupin who was killed by a powerful Deathe Eater that took many lives. If he can control Lupin, he would not only has his werewolf strength and agility combined with his own Demon strength, but also ALL of that magic, and easier control of his inner wolf, Moony.

He can take down Sam, Michael, Heaven, Hell, and everything between..

So he finds out as much as he can about Lupin and devises a plan. He easily gets himself (as a student) into trouble at Hogwarts so that he can meet with the Headmaster of Hogwarts, Professor Minerva McGonagall. After they’re alone in the office, he jumps her, beats the shit out of her and FORCES her to take him back in time to back before Lupin is killed. It just so happens to be around the time the Order of the Phoenix was prime and before any serious attacks on Voldemort have occurred.

My OC isn’t strong enough to time travel without the help.

Long story short he possesses Lupin, petrifies McGonagall and goes back to the present and begins his rein.

Throughout his story-line, I was going to have cuts to Sam and Cas searching for Dean. Michael killing everyone he considered liars, trying to weed out the population to only people he could trust, Jack trying to learn how to be human and training to become a hunter with Bobby, and Mary working with all of the survivors from the alternate Earth taking down any monsters they can and watching for signs of Michael for Sam and Cas.

After Lupin is taken from the past and McGonagall is found by Kingsley Shacklebolt, she explains everything to him and the rest of The Order. The whole Order is extremely upset but have so much going on with Voldemort and the Death Eaters that they can’t do much about it. Plus Lupin being gone is one less member which doesn’t help their situation, so sending more members after him, will only cause harm to them. Meanwhile, Sirius Black refuses to not do anything and demands to go with McGonagall back to the future.

McGonagall and Black, back to the current time, try to meet with the current Minister of Magic, Hermione Granger, only to find out the second they return to the future that EVERYTHING changes. The plans made by The Order are altered and don’t work out, mostly due to missing two members and having different ideas for priorities. Greyback never died, Voldemort took over the entire Wizarding World and magic is no longer a secret to muggles who are terrified of everything happening.

Sam and Cas hunt Death Eaters in addition to monsters (which has been a normal thing since 1998 when the Battle of Hogwarts failed horribly.) Shit is chaotic AF. A few weeks later after a lot of extremely traumatic events. There’s going to be an insanely intense fight between Michael and my OC as Remus. McGonagall and Black are there hiding planning on waiting for my OC and Michael to fight each other almost to death than jump in to intervene.. Meanwhile, Sam, Castiel, Mary, Bobby and Jack are there hiding out waiting for the exact same thing to happen and try to save Dean. They accidentally meet at the scene of the fight, almost fight each other then find out they’re on the same team and decided to work together to stop the madness. There’s going to be an insanely painful scene where Sirius as Padfoot is fighting my OC as Remus/Moony and Sirius is going to be seriously injured by him and Remus will be fighting with Moony internally trying to force the demon out and self harming trying to escape to reality. He almost kills his Padfoot. Similar to that parallel in that scene in SPN where Cas almost kills dean and Dean breaks Naomi’s mind control on Cas, Padfoot will eventually get through to Remus enough for Remus and Moony to team up for a few seconds for just long enough to overthrown the demon, but the demon escapes.

No amount of exorcising can kick him out of his body, Sam and Castiel have tried relentlessly, but he used Lupin’s magic to hex a make-shift force-field to trap his demon soul into the body. When Lupin overpowered the Demon, there was a second where the hex was broken due to lack of concentration and he was able to smoke out of there.

Meanwhile, Michael isn’t giving up and things get so bad that it has come down to, stop trying to save dean, and just kill Michael. With the demon gone, everyone is now trying to kill Michael/Dean and it is pure carnage and mayhem. Eventually they succeed by combining multiple killing spells and and being stabbed by both Ruby’s Demon killing blade, Cas’ angel blade, and a shotgun blast to the head, all at the same time.. Michael and Dean are both obliterated. It seemed like extreme over-kill but it was just barely powerful enough to kill the Arch Angel.

The scene is incredibly painful and Cas tries and tries and tries to heal the damage but it’s too late. Dean is gone. Cas doesn’t give up, he keeps trying and trying until he is so physically exhausted he cannot physically use another ounce of his Angel juice. All he was able to really do was patch up most of his scars and mend some of his limbs back into place. Sirius and Remus, although extremely weak also tried to help, with their magic but both failed.

Minerva felt horrible watching and nobody noticed her slipping away, probably to prepare a potion to go back in time.

But then she comes back, with the Philosopher’s stone. Thought to have been destroyed by Dumbledore and Nicolas Flamel years ago. Apparently right after the Battle of Hogwarts, Minerva back in time to stop them from destroying it, so she can use it to talk to Dumbledore and so others can use it to talk to their loved ones who had passed away during the war in her timeline. She has had this stone in her possession ever since. Never once using it’s true power of Resurrection. She knows that the stone can only be used toe resurrect one soul before it destroys itself, so she’s been keeping it locked away somewhere only she knew the location for it.

She didn’t even hesitate, she went to work straight way. She used the stone and with a brilliant flash of green light and a collection of ghostly voices and an almost theatrical scene that took everyone’s breath away, everyone stared on at Dean. Nothing happened. Hours go by, Cas refused to leave Dean’s side and Sam tried to force himself to accept the reality of he situation and plan what to do with his body.

McGonagall gives Remus and Sirius ALL the information they need to actually stop Voldemort. She doesn’t tell them anything about their deaths. They asked her about that topic earlier on. She said that they didn’t die in her timeline, but that they must be dead in the current reality because of Voldemort, which is why they can’t find themselves. She lied to them because she can’t risk having more alterations to the timeline that could have catastrophic results again. She is very much away that she is basically sending them to their deaths for the greater good, and she is going to have to live with that for the rest of her life. She will never forgiver herself, but it is what must be done.

Sam, Cas, Mary, Bobby and Jack, distraught take Dean’s remains to Lawrence, Kansas. Planning on burying him properly where their story started.

Sam and Bobby dug the hole while Mary and Jack built a casket of sorts for him. They don’t want to burn his remains, its not something Dean would've wanted. They close the lid of the casket and carefully lower him into the ground. They say all that they can’t think to say and start to bury him.  They all lingered afterwards, not wanting to leave. After about half an hour of staring at his grave, Sam starts to walk back to the car. They have a long drive back to the Bunker where he can properly mourn.

Cas, however, doesn’t step away from the grave. He is knelt down with his with his hands a few inches deep into the dirt just over the grave. He is still in shock and refuses to accept this. After awhile longer, his sadness turns into anger. He becomes uncontrollably angry and slams his hand down as hard as he can, disheveling the dirt around him. He looked up to the sky and is seconds away from screaming at Chuck for letting such a horrible thing happen. But just as he’s about to leap up to his feet and scream, a faint tapping noise catches his attention.

All of his anger suddenly gone, he, kneels forward and presses his ear almost to the ground, listens intently. He doesn’t hear anything, but he waits; still not giving up hope. After a few seconds of silence, he heard the sound again.

tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap....

He screams to Sam. “Do you hear that?” Sam quickly joins him, and listens. He hears nothing. Mary and Bobby and Jack hurry over and also hear nothing. They think Cas is making it up because he doesn’t want to accept it.

Cas insists on hearing a tapping noise and grabs the shovel out of the car and starts digging.

Bobby makes a move to try to stop him, saying don’t bother, the boy’s dead. Cas angrily shoves him away too hard and starts frantically digging. When he’s about halfway down and has screamed Deans’ name half a dozen times already, sudden Sam started to hear the tapping. Sam was doubtful for a second but then as Cas started digging deeper the sound started to sound like a knocking. Sam and Mary realized in unison that the impossible might have actually occurred. They both started digging with their hands alongside Cas as fast as they could. Still uncertain, with tears blurring their vision.

Cas still screaming Dean’s name and digging faster and faster. The knocking started sounding like banging, and there was another muffled sound accompanying it.

Almost through to the casket, the banging was getting louder and louder and the muffled voice was Dean’s voice screaming “Cas!” over and over again. They thew open the casket and destroyed the door in the process.

Dean was alive!! The stone worked! It took just over twenty four hours, but it worked!

Dean was groggy, and in a lot of pain. He could barely lift himself into a sitting position.

Cas hugged him tight then quickly healed his wounds as much as he could, before he and Sam lifted him out of the grave and onto solid ground.. Sam, Mary, Jack and Bobby each got a chance to hug him. All of them laughing is disbelief.

“Don’t let me say yes to another dick with wings--.” Dean coughed up some blood. “--Ever again.“

“Yo-ou bet.” Said Sam with a smile, trying to hide the break in his voice.

[theultimateegghead-blog]

Salt Fortress, the tf2 mercs ranked for how frustrating they can be to fight against.

I have been playing a lot of Team fortress 2 lately. Mostly for the Halloween event but also because I have friends that I can’t see IRL that play TF2. Well, as I have sunk over 200 hours into this game, I have fought against every class. I have won many fights, I have lost many fights. I am the middle ground player, I am often in the middle of the scoreboard of a heated match. Not bad, but not perfect. Well, a general rule of TF2 is that each class is a nightmare if played by a skilled player or a joke if played by an inexperienced or bad player. I have meet both skilled and bad players of every class and I wanted to make this list of how frustrating each class is against. I will be reviewing their abilities, strengths and weaknesses and so on. Keep this in mind, I do not main any class, so I have fought these guys as multiple classes. This is not a specific class vs class list, more so just a general list. Without further ado, lets see my thoughts on overcoming the 9 classes of TF2.

9 – Engineer

The Engineer is a defensive class that mostly prioritizes in area denial. The engineer’s main role is to construct various buildings to aid the team. These buildings include a sentry gun, an ammo and health dispenser and a one-way teleporter to help get his team to the front lines quickly. An engineer can be a nightmare if he gets creative with where he puts his buildings down. There can be times where an engineer somehow manages to construct a nest and a teleporter in your base. This can be a frustrating nightmare, but it mostly happens when you are unfortunately playing alongside an incompetent team. Most engineers are big targets when their buildings are destroyed, but some can fight back with deadly accuracy. Engineers will generally not stray far from their building nest, so they are easy to ambush if you can overcome their buildings. Because of this they are not the most frustrating class. They rarely take the time to hunt you down and make you miserable and can be pushed away with enough force given. Novice players will build in large groups and will become huge targets for enemy players. Now if an engineer has a friend, such as a pyro, also known as a Pybro, things can get a bit tougher.

*********

8 – Medic

The medic, true to his name, prioritizes on healing. The medic is a high priority target. A medic can combo with a heavy, soldier, demoman or pyro and can utterly destroy the enemy team. With various tools at his disposal, such as damage resistance, invincibility or guaranteed critical hits. The medic should be the one to take down first. Medic’s usually hide behind their companion and will flee if their companion is killed. They have a few ways to defend themselves. A nail gun, a crossbow and melee weapons are some of his offensive tools. Even though he is primarily a healer he can do some nasty melee damage. Medic’s who primarily try to be offensively based are often considered a joke. What is annoying is when a medic is healing a spawn camper. If you are a spawn camper, you are on the naughty list. Overall, Medic’s are at their most dangerous if they are healing someone, they can be a decent threat alone but are not hard to defeat in a 1v1 battle.

*********

7 – Pyro

The Pyro is an interesting class. Most Pyro’s pose little threat unless they are within close range. Even them it is not an immediate victory for our friendly arsonist. A skilled Pyro can be very annoying. With the new jetpack, a Pyro can get the jump on you almost as much as a soldier or a demoman. If you are not careful, you’ll become a human bbq. Some Pyro’s are skilled enough to deflect rockets and bombs, making him a counter for soldiers and demoman. The pyro can also be a menace for spies. If you are going against a skilled pyro, you and your team can be in for a bad time, but on the other hand there is always the pyro that just rushes you endlessly. So, the frustrating factor depends on the Pyro’s skill level.

*********

6 – Spy

What keeps the spy so high on the list is the consistency of player skill. A skilled spy can be an absolute nightmare to fight against. However, a large number of spies are inexperienced and make many mistakes that give away their location. While a new player will have a harder time fending off this absolute monstrosity of a class, more experienced players are aware of the tell-tale signs of an enemy spy. Spies can kill any class in one shot, can destroy engineer buildings, can disguise as an enemy player and can go invisible. In return they are not the tankiest class. The spy’s tools can provide more frustration when fighting against him. The spycicle can make his inherit weakness to pyros a little easier to circumnavigate, and the infamous dead ringer which allows him to fake his own death. The spy is the most inconsistent challenge of all the classes. With some people turning invisible at the perfect moment, jumping off a stairwell or some scenery and backstabbing a pursuing heavy. Then there are the spies that disguise in plain sight and run straight for the enemy. At their worst moments they are nothing more than a mild nuisance, at their best they can be a team killing monster.

*********

5 – Heavy

The heavy is the most tanky class in TF2. The heavy is slow and lumbering but can be a major threat to the enemy team. Armed with a minigun, a shotgun or food and his fist, the heavy is deadly to take on in a 1v1 battle. The Heavy is often seen with a medic nearby healing them. While they are easy targets for spies and snipers, they can rip apart anyone in front of them quite easily. Heavies can eat certain food items to restore health at the price of being left open for a while. What makes a heavy dangerous is that even inexperienced players can pose a threat as well. Some heavy variants include the Tomislav sniper heavy, the friendly Hoovy, the fat scout and so on. Heavies can be annoying to fight and will almost always beat down others especially if they are being healed by a medic. However, if you can exploit the Heavy’s slow movement, he can be defeated in close range.

*********

4 – Soldier

The soldier takes little skill to play, but a lot of skill to master. A soldier can ambush you out of nowhere Be a nuisance for engineers and can overall be a deadly adversary for an enemy team. Soldiers don’t need to be precise with their aiming as splash damage can do the job for them. Soldiers are able to rocket jump and can pop up at the least expected times. They sometimes tend to peek and shoot around corners, making them harder to defeat. Any soldier, regardless of skill level can be dangerous, some can even buff their allies and make a push all the more troublesome. While soldiers are by no means invincible, a skilled soldier might take a good amount of effort to defeat. There is a reason soldier is one of the most played classes.

*********

3 – Sniper

The Sniper, true to his profession, is a sniper. He fights at long range and thus most cases you cannot engage in close range combat unless you sneak up on them. The Sniper can pick off classes pretty easily with his headshots. Medics, Heavies and Engineers are usually the prime target for a sniper, with most skilled ones being able to take down almost any class from across the map. Sniper also has some close-range weapons and defenses for when things get dicey. Sniper is the class of choice for most hackers and cheaters as well, luckily, I have yet to encounter any particularly nasty hackers. One of Sniper’s biggest weakness is the fact they get tunneled vision while scoped in, so they are easy to ambush. However, if the sniper is armed with a bow and arrow they are much more alert to their surroundings. Snipers can be annoying and difficult to counter and can quickly ruin a good game.

*********

2 – Scout

Scouts are among one of the most annoying classes in any class-based shooter. The scout is weak but fast. He has a powerful gun and is so mobile that he can appear and ambush players from almost anywhere. They jump and spasm around when fighting you and are the hardest classes to hit. To compensate, he is weak health wise. He does not need a lot of punishment to go down. Every game is guaranteed to have a scout or two, as he is a very all-purpose class. Also, a lot of scout mains I have had the misfortune of meeting were some of the biggest jerks. Though this isn’t to say all Scout players are jerks, my brother is a scout main and he’s a cool dude.

*********

1 – Demoman

This is the last thing you see when your fun dies. This lass can ruin anyone’s fun. Sniping from far away? Oh, look at that demoman just jumped across the map and blew you up. Building a sentry nest? Nope, Demo just showed up and blew everything up. Don’t even get me started with Demoknights. Demoman is a class that always manages to escape with only one hit point. They can be the most annoying class to fight against, as even a novice player can just spam bombs and get kills. Demoman can virtually counter any and all classes with his extremely versatile sets. On top of that, most spawn campers are Demoman. Oh, Tavish, I love your character, but I hate having to fight against you… ********* Regardless of who you main, regardless of how you play, this is not a call out. Have fun. Im just joking around with this list. I love TF2 and its wonderful cast of characters, they are some of the most comedic and well written video game characters ever. However, if you play TF2 odds are you have played a match or two with an enemy player that made you want to rage, maybe. Well, thats enough venting for now, see you next time.

[themadlostgirl]

Not Dead Yet (Part 57)

*Okay. I know this is super duper late but in my defense I have gotten the flu and am still recovering from a brown recluse bite. I have had no energy to do anything but puke and lie in bed wishing for death. That being said I did kinda drag my feet on this latest chapter. Hope it was worth it. More to come soon!*

Pairing: Reader x Peter Pan

Warnings: language

“Wakey, wakey,” I dropped the cage containing our newest Lost Boy down to the ground. “Big day ahead of you, Baelfire.”

Strangely enough this morning I was not the first awake as was usually the case. Peter had woken up before me and was busy riling up the boys for their fun. He was really intent on turning Baelfire into a Lost Boy and wanted no mercy from anyone in terms of training. Usually we put the boys through hell but always show it is in good fun on their first day so they understand how Neverland functions. With Baelfire though I got the impression Peter wanted the boy’s spirit broken entirely so he could be a complacent and obedient Lost Boy.

Considering his background and that the second he was brought to the island he has done nothing but fight back against us trying to make him like one of the others was a fool’s errand. He wouldn’t want to be a part of our family willingly. He’d have to be forced, practically brainwashed, I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. Still I had my orders and I wasn’t going to try anything when the boy in question is the Dark One’s son.

A pained and drowsy groan came from inside the cage. “Best not to dally,” I opened the door, “We’re all heading to training and you are coming with.”

Baelfire was more alert now and looked at me through the clear opening. I could practically see the gears turning in his head. I pointed my club an inch from his face, “Don’t even think of trying to escape. You won’t make it out of camp.”

“That’s what you think, I was able to fend for myself in London well enough. The streets were a harsh place even before night fell,” he crawled out of the cage.

“Good for you,” I gave him a little pat on the head, “I’ve been a Lost Girl living in Neverland for the past dozen of decades. I’ve killed pirates for fun and fought a dark fairy that would make your daddy dearest look like a street magician. If you think you can run with us but you couldn’t even lay a finger on me if you tried.”

“Seriously?” he reached out to try and poke me.

I rolled my eyes and knocked his hand away. “Do not underestimate me. That’s every new boy’s mistake. Come along, I told you Peter is going to put you through the ringer and he intends to deliver on that.”

Getting to the training field I saw Peter waiting with an almost giddy smile. This cannot be good news for our latest recruit. I approached him and tugged lightly on his ear.

“Morning pet,” he turned his mischievous smile to me, “Need something?”

“Just don’t kill him, alright?” she knew he wouldn’t really but also knew that he was a sadistic little bastard that would hold no mercy in trying to break him. It doesn’t help that Baelfire would not go down without one hell of a fight if his initial reaction to being brought to Neverland was any indication.

“I’ll try,”

“Okay, I’ll leave you to it then,” I walked over towards the others and was sparring with Cubby while taking quick looks at what Peter was putting Baelfire through. Basically the poor kid was getting the living hell beaten out of him by some of the others boys. He was putting up a good fight and with a sword in hand he was holding his own but it was going downhill fast.

After calling a pause in my training with Cubby I stalked over to Felix who was taking a break in the shade.

“Hey,” I sat down next to him, “Nice morning?”

“It has certainly been an amusing one,” he gestured to where Baelfire was once again knocked to the ground.

“He’s either going to break by the end of the day or Peter is going to accidentally kill him. He’s got such a violence hard on going right now I doubt he would notice right away.”

“No he’s not, Pan has been waiting too long to have this certain worm under his thumb.”

“What is the history there?” I asked, “I know Peter and the Dark One’s backstory but how does that equate to the son? Another long and complicated story?”

“Sorta,” Felix shrugged, “Admittedly I don’t know as much as you about what his history with the Dark One is but I do know he would do anything to anger him. Taking away his son and turning him into a Lost Boy would be the pinnacle of this.”

“So it is just to annoy someone? I don’t know if that is perfectly keeping within his character or just petty.”

“Take a bit from both baskets I’d say. What about you? What are your thoughts on this fresh meat?”

“He certainly has a lot of fight in him and under different circumstances he’d fit in perfectly without having to be broken down first. Mostly I just want to keep him alive.”

“Why do you care if he stays alive other than that’s what Pan wants?”

“He’s Wendy’s brother, I promised myself that whoever the shadow brought back in her place I would keep safe. Some sort of reassurance that Wendy hadn’t been swapped out just to have her brother be subject to torture. Even if she could never know it made the guilt easier to swallow.”

“You do know he’s not actually her brother,”

“Brother in spirit, Felix. We’re not related and you’re still my brother, can it not be like that for others?”

“Point taken,” he got up, “Although you are the most infuriating sister one could ever have.”

“Thank you,” I stood up as well, “Care to help me pull the others off of Baelfire before they damage him past repair?”

“I’ll watch you try,”

“Thanks brother,” I punched him in the arm and stalked back towards the group of boys that Baelfire was trying to keep at bay. Five against one hardly seemed fair.

I jumped on one of the boy’s back and knocked him into another boy sending them both falling to the ground. The other three turned their attention to me and moved to take me out. I struck the closest back with a swing of my club before ducking out of the way of one of the other’s arrows. I advanced quickly as he notched another arrow and dove between his legs pulling him down as I did. The last boy had Baelfire in front of him like a human shield. Without a pause I drew my dagger and threw it hitting the last boy square in the shoulder. He dropped Baelfire and tore the dagger out of his arm.

While he was distracted I kicked him in the center of his chest and he was down too. “Give,” I held out my hand and he gave me back my dagger. “Go patch yourself up, Mason. Take the other idiots with you.”

Baelfire was sitting back on the ground trying to catch his breath. “You’re welcome,” I handed him the canteen off my belt.

“For what?” he sneered at me.

“Keeping them from pummeling you into a coma perhaps?” I nudged him again with my canteen urging him to take it, “Drink. You’ll feel better.”

“Thanks,” he muttered finally taking the water and downing it like a madman. “I see what you meant earlier. Not one of them landed a single blow.”

“Partly because it was a sneak attack but yes.” I grinned proud of my abilities. After decades of fighting all humility had been lost. The only people who posed any challenge anymore were Peter and Felix. Peter was obvious because of his magic but Felix was just inhuman. Every time I got close he always managed to pull out on top and it infuriated me to no end. It was my goal in life to manage a win during a spar with him.

“Now why did you do that, pet?” Peter came up behind us, “It was just getting interesting.”

“Interesting? It was getting painfully predictable, chief.” I raised an eyebrow at him. “Isn’t the king of pretend supposed to be more creative?”

“Shouldn’t my Lost Girl not question me?”

“As queen of Neverland I say I cannot only question you but overrule you.”

“You let that little golden crown go to your head,” he snatched the flower crown from my head.

“Well yes, that’s where it goes,” I tried to grab it back but he held it out of my reach. “Peter, give it back!”

“Make me,” he smirked.

“Fine,” I grabbed the front of his tunic and pulled him down in a hot opened mouth kiss. He kissed me back hungrily caught up in the moment. I slipped my hand from his tunic to the back of his head keeping him close and bit down hard on his lip.

“Mmpf!” he tried to pull back but I kept him in place before grabbing the flower crown with my other hand. Once I had it back I relinquished his lip, the taste of blood dancing on my tongue.

“Y/N!” Peter pressed a hand to his bleeding mouth, “That was dirty and underhanded!”

“Just the way you like it,” I put the crown back on my head.

“True,” he reached to grab me but I sidestepped him. I knew what he was thinking and I had other things to focus on other than an angry shag.

“Should I know what’s going on here?” Baelfire was still sitting on the ground watching the scene.

“Come on, kid,” I pulled him up, “I’ll help you patch up. Peter, we’ll finish this later, yes?”

“Of course,” he grinned. The blood from his mouth had stained his lips a deep red and it dripped down his chin. That should not have been as hot as I found it.

Shaking off my dirty thoughts I pulled Baelfire away from the training grounds and back to camp. Some of the other boys had already returned and were going about the rest of their day. We walked past them with their whispers and pointing fingers. I ignored them and sat Baelfire down while I collected some bandages, aloe, a needle and thread.

I went to work fixing him up. He didn’t show any discomfort getting sewn up like others did. “Y’know, I was a little surprised I didn’t need to chase you down.”

“What?”

“I left you alone and you didn’t try to run away. Kinda disappointed to be honest. Don’t tell me Peter broke you already.”

“Never.”

“Good. You got some fight left. I like that.”

“Of course, I'll never stop. Don't think for a moment that just because I didn't try and escape this time I won't bolt the second there is another opening.”

“I look forward to it.” I finished off sewing him up and started wrapping the shallower cuts with the bandages. “But I gotta know, why didn't you run?”

He shrugged, “Too tired after that training.”

“You’ll get used to it.”

“I don’t want to get used to it. I want out of here. I want to go back to my family with the Darling’s.”

“If it was up to me I would have sent Wendy home and that would have been the end of it. No other Darlings or Dark One’s sons. You coming here and being who you are is only confusing me. I am loyal to Peter but I also don’t want to follow his orders into brainwashing you into a Lost Boy when it is obvious you don’t want to nor will never be one.”

“What are you saying?”

“I can’t help you get off the island, that’s gotta be all you. But I can give you a tip.”

“Which is?”

“There’s a grove full of magic beans, hidden, west side of the island. Get to it and you’re out of here. That’s all I can say.”

“And how am I supposed to get to it? Like you said, I won’t be able to make it out of the camp without someone noticing.”

“Like I said, that’s gotta be you. Figure it out.” I stood up, “We never spoke of this. Rat me out if you get caught and I swear on my father’s grave I will make every moment of your incarceration a living hell. Understood?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Now get up, I’m throwing you back in the cage.”

“Y/N!”

“Stop whining!” I hauled him up and dragged him back to the cages, “There could be worse places we could be keeping you.”

“Where could be worse?”

“Do you want to find out?”

“No,”

“Then walk,”

I locked him back up and went about the rest of my day. Peter found me shortly after training ended and snuck up behind me scooping me up in his arms. “Caught ya!”

“Yes you did,” I chuckled as we were whisked away in a whirl of wind. He set me back down as we re-appeared on top of Dead Man’s Peak.

“What are we doing up here?”

“Needed to harvest some more dreamshade,” he shrugged going to one of the vines and cutting some from the thicket. “Also I needed to take us somewhere to talk where we wouldn’t be interrupted.”

“Peter, you know I’m an anytime anywhere kind of girl but going at it against a rough mountain kinda detracts from the pleasure.” I was still sore from training too so the idea of being pinned to a hard rock wasn’t high on my list.

“Come now, I thought you were tougher than that,” he was focusing on filling the vial in his hand full of poison but I could still see the edge of his smirk off the side of his face.

“I am but it doesn’t mean I want to put myself into an uncomfortable position for your benefit.”

He corked the vial again and turned to me fully. With a small sigh I trailed my thumb over his now healed lip, “That being said I am sorry about earlier,”

“For what?”

“For biting your lip so hard you started bleeding like stuck pig.”

“That all? Nothing else you wanted to apologize for? Beg for mercy in some way?” he had slowly been backing me into the mountain wall mere inches from the thicket of dreamshade vines.

“No...what are you going on about?” I froze. Something was wrong. He was smiling but his eyes were calculating and cold.

“Baelfire, magic bean grove, you giving him tips on how to escape,”

“I don’t know what you’re--”

He slammed his fist into the stone next to my head making the entire mountain shake. “Don’t lie to me. I am the king of lies and I know when one is told.”

“How did you know?” I muttered.

“Next time you make your little escape plans don’t do it in the middle of camp with a dozen listening ears that aren’t afraid to throw traitors to the wolves. Ignoring how big of a hypocrite you are I would like to know why the hell you are trying to help him leave. You know that I don’t want him off this island.”

“Why? Just so you can have the pleasure of knowing that if Rumplestiltskin knew his son was here it would make him mad? He has no purpose but for you to torture him for your own childish satisfaction! He’s not going to give into you without one hell of a fight.”

“A fight he will lose and will eventually submit to as a Lost Boy.”

“And then what? You get a warm little fuzzy whenever you see him walking around camp with no mind of his own? Seems a lot of trouble to go through for something so fleeting.”

“I thought you knew me.”

“I thought you were more big picture oriented. Instead of putting all this time into breaking one boy shouldn’t you be focusing on finding the Truest Believer or do you not care that even now your life is ticking away one grain of sand at a time?”

The vines of the dreamshade had been inching their way closer and had crisscrossed my body from my ankles up to my waist. I tried my best not to move for fear of cutting myself through the material of my clothes.

“I have plenty of time, pet.” he said casually but he wasn’t letting up on the vines.

“That’s what you thought before. Now you have a fairy on the island that is keeping your curse at bay because you were more focused on playing than saving your own neck.”

The vines were up around my arms now and winding across my shoulders. I could feel them getting closer to my neck but I didn’t back down. I kept my eyes locked with Peter’s daring him to tighten them. To poison me.

His face cracked in a smile that scared me more than the dreamshade. Had I finally gone too far? Why was he looking at me like that?

“Look at you, you’re terrified,” the vines shrank back until I was fully free from their thorns but I felt no safer. Peter replaced the dreamshade in pinning me to the stone his hands coming up to cup my face. “I could never harm my Lost Girl.”

“Peter, I…”

“Shh,” he kissed me softly but there was no warmth to it. “I want to show you something.”

Another whirl of wind encased us. Peter was keeping me in place as we stood high up in a tree. Below I could see the bean grove. Without a word he turned my face so I could see someone running this way. Baelfire.

“But how did--”

“Seems your dear Baelfire has a surprising talent at pickpocketing.” he tapped the empty sheath at my hip. “Looks like he’s taken your advice, pet. He’ll be home free very soon.”

“What about the guard?” I searched but no one else was in sight.

“You were supposed to be guarding it this afternoon, remember? Would have made it easy for him seeing you there to let him by but this is much more interesting.”

“What are you going to do?” I know Peter. He isn’t just going to let him go.

“Something you’re not gonna like,” Baelfire made it to the grove and started looking through the stalks for a bean. Peter was concentrated on the grove and with a wave of his hand the stalks shot back into the ground one by one. The lush green grass withered away and the surrounding trees started to decay as well losing all their leaves.

“What are you doing?” I yelled at him but he didn’t stop. The grove continued to deteriorate until it was nothing but a barren landscape. All light seemed to be sucked into the darkness leaving the area almost pitch black. Around the grove huge walls of dreamshade started to crop climbing high into the sky.

Baelfire was still in the middle of it trying to find a way out. The ground settled and what lay before us was no longer a grove but a dark hollow. No light. No life.

Peter dropped us down into it. Baelfire turned with my dagger raised in his hand as if to try and ward us off.

“Good try, Baelfire, you were so close,” Peter flicked his wrist and the sharp snap of bone echoed in the unnatural silence.

Baelfire dropped to his knees clutching his now broken arm. Peter collected my dagger from the ground and handed it back to me. “Y/N…” Baelfire hissed through the pain, “I thought…”

“Thought what? That you could trust her?” Peter scoffed. “She’s my Lost Girl, what did you expect? Since you’re going to be here for a little longer you should learn this now,” Peter wasn’t looking at him anymore but at me. “You can’t trust anyone.”

He was gone again before I could blink.

(First) (Previous) (Next)

[madefate-a]

the big headspace meta. | shiro & trauma psychopathology. 

> the big character meta. 

> quick & dirty key points guide. 

okay ! after the better part of a year, it’s here: the Big Meta on what, exactly*, is going on in shiro’s head. asterisk on exactly for a few reasons, the largest being that psychology is not so black and white as to have a simple plug and play causality chain. there are certainly touchstones in terms of diagnoses, and it can be incredibly helpful to have these guideposts in terms of understanding why and how changes in the body and mind occur, but the way those diagnoses present are different in every single person, and no one label ( or multiple labels ) is a definitive way to understand or categorize someone. with comorbidity at play, there are multiple axes at work in the human response to any trauma. and, well, it’s a show about space magic. so we need a little wiggle room.

and, of course, I am in no way a professional. this meta is merely meant to more fully flesh out some of the whys and whats of shiro’s mental state, behavior, and reactions to things. some of these I do try to weave into my portrayal, for the sake of healing and realism, while many others might be true but not a facet of what we see under most circumstances. I will attempt to source my information wherever I can, but please know that psychology is not my area of academia and don’t have access to scholarly / peer reviewed sources, nor necessarily the ability to understand denser medical material. I will be avoiding the DSM, though, because fuck the DSM. 

time for some trigger warnings. below the cut, there’s going to be discussion of the arena, which includes captivity / enslavement, death, injury, medical experimentation, memory loss, loss of agency / consent, and everything that goes along with that setting and time period. I don’t intend to be gratuitous, extremely vivid, nor darker or more brutal than what we can reasonably extrapolate from the s1 / s2 show, with a few things cherry picked from seasons 3 & 6. ( where we cultivated a better understanding of haggar’s abilities and motivations. sort of. ) there will also be discussion of trauma psychology, including PTSD and CPTSD, sensory deprivation / isolation ( as in: the void ), body dysphoria, disordered self images, and mourning. what there will not be is condoning of using mental illness as a way of othering or dehumanizing people, or otherwise proving some kind of inability / incapability. 

ultimately, my goal is to simply better understand shiro -- not to create and in and out box of if this, then that, but simply to understand how circumstance and trauma inform behavior, and then how to use this knowledge for a character arc full of Healing and the reclamation of agency. 

so, here we go !! 

PTSD & CPTSD: a brief overview

the easiest place to start is the most salient: PTSD. it is not necessarily textual to the show canon* ( *which, of course, I always take very lightly ) as in, it is not said out loud. however, it is clearly portrayed in the visual narrative with some of the more recognizable symptoms: flashbacks, freezing ( ep o2 ) and frightening thoughts ( ep o9 ). tellingly, without the ability to avoid reminders of traumatic sites, these symptoms are often triggered under those conditions ( galra battleships, fights that mimic arena experiences ). 

newer then PTSD in the field of trauma psychology ( originating in 1992 ) is the idea of Complex PTSD, or CPTSD. CPTSD is a way to explore the changes that occur in individuals in situations of captivity, prolonged trauma ( as opposed to single-event ), or otherwise loss of agency. at the current time, CPTSD is diagnosed with a cluster of symptoms, and is often associated with abuse in childhood. still, there are some symptoms within these clusters that affect shiro, both on their own and as they overlap with PTSD. 

which we’ll get into, right after we figure out where this all starts ! so -- 

the traumas. 

it starts with the galra. 

sort of. but we’ll touch briefly on that later. for all intents and purposes, shiro’s trauma is courtesy of the galra. thanks, sendak. I’ve done some work fleshing out the arena between HCs and writing, so you can check out some of that: 

the arena, pt 1.  

gotta lose that arm.  

the champion.  

nightmares after the resurrection.  

aftermath of that arm. 

the black lion. 

body basics. 

as a fighter, and a leader, you bring hope. 

the big character meta 

the shorter character meta 

but we do need to run down a few of the things that are relevant to symptom presentation. during shiro’s time there, he experienced both single and repeated instances of trauma, and while they both contributed to the overall environment of that year, it’s important to understand that while some things were chronic, others were not. 

single-instance experiences 

separation from the holts 

loss of his arm 

chronic / repeated experiences 

loss of freedom of movement 

untreated injuries 

restraints 

physical / life threatening danger 

need for self protection 

forced performance ( both in the arena and as an act of self preservation around guards ) 

semi repeated experiences 

helplessness to touch ( haggar, most saliently ) 

interrogation ( initial, as well as a few sessions of haggar’s memory extraction ) 

killing ( many fights, but not all, end in victory or death ) 

nonconsensual anesthetization ( with the galra, and at the garrison upon his return ) 

medical experimentation & examination ( most of it for information gathering purposes ) 

conditioning to believe that he would become a weapon / attempts to sway him to the galra without brainwashing ( see fic linked above ) 

this is where the overlap between PTSD and CPTSD comes largely into play -- it would be impossible, and unnecessary, to try to draw direct lines between experiences and the consequences of those experiences. rather, it’s far better to look at how all of these contributed to a certain environment or mentality: 

everpresent danger / no one to trust 

loss of choice and agency 

conditioning to use power in a specific, and deadly, way 

we know that shiro did not lose himself entirely. from the flashbacks to his escape, we know that o1. ) shiro fought for his freedom until the very end, and was never swayed to compliance by haggar or any druid / galra, and o2. ) that he exhibited qualities that made him a symbol of hope. this cannot be accomplished if he behaved in accordance to haggar’s designs and lost himself to rage or following orders. this is important! because resistance and a desire to retain a sense of self and purpose are through lines that follow him long past the arena, and are what allowed him to keep as much clarity and focus as possible. this quality, in fact, is what allows him to hold any semblance of trust in others after he escapes -- trust that he gives to allura, keith, and the black lion. which brings us to the other major event that we need to consider -- 

let’s talk about death. briefly. 

here’s a perfect example of where the lines of mental health blur and overlap: some of the reactions he has are a result of the combination between putting his faith in the black lion and team voltron, and dying in the process. this is going to be a brief section -- mostly because there’s a more Descriptive and Creative and Prettily Worded fic coming dealing with the specifics of Life in V*ltron’s Void. but we do need to touch on the mental and physical trauma of losing his body and existing in the void and -- yes, yes it can spiral into a much larger, longer topic. I’ll try my best to compress! 

part one: the reckoning. 

there’s really no getting around how scarring it is to know that your body has been destroyed. that single instance, though, is processed much, much later than it occurs. that’s because in the void, he couldn’t physically react to the knowledge -- with no heart or nervous system, shiro could not properly process nor react to the loss of his body. it was more learned and known than felt, which in and of itself makes the process more difficult than it might be otherwise. ( might be -- we’ll never know for sure. ) the loss of his body will come into larger play down the line when he is dealing with issues of his body, as well as understanding and mourning kuron. 

part two: the physical. 

shiro spends the better part of the year with no physical body, and no sensations. none of this registers in the void, because that is the nature of the void, but as strange as time feels there, he absolutely feels this when he is brought back. this will get touched on in the latter half of the meta, but it’s important to know that everything is delayed, distorted, and simply not felt in the void. 

part three: the mental. 

as the forbidden season tells us, every moment in the void was a struggle to stay conscious. this fluctuated, depending on shiro’s mental strength, as well as what was happening around himself. he spent every conscious moment trying to reach any of the paladins -- keith or kuron particularly, as they were the ones piloting black and, thus, had a better chance of hearing or sensing him. his best opportunities for someone to hear him came when v*ltron was formed and all the paladins occupied the same physical and mental space. losing the connection he almost formed with lance informs much of shiro’s actions after he is restored. it was proof that his emotional isolation might have been the reason that he was unable to connect with the others, and spurs him to be more open down the road, lest the consequences turn deadly again. 

the smaller instances: fighting with haggar, his family, illness 

another important thing to note that there are other contributing factors at play. his fight with haggar after rescuing allura provides a visual motif that he cannot unsee: himself, irrevocably stained in the darkness of her magic, looking ruthless and deadly. it is a large contributing factor to the shape his self image issues take. 

also, let’s talk about the few things that began to shape his mental landscape before the galra: the loss of his parents at age 18 and the diagnosis of his illness at 19*. I go more in depth into the illness in the big character meta, so check it out if you like, and both of these are my own, personal headcanons since we received no ages on either from the Powers That Be. ( truth be told, I wasn’t expecting him to deal with so much shit -- I placed these timeline events when he was older to try to mitigate the angst. incredible. ) both of these contributed to being confronted with helplessness or loss of control over his life, as well as a heightened sense of responsibility that found an opportunity to fester when he began to blame himself for the holts’ capture, in any attempt to restore agency*. ( *but we’ll get to that. ) 

the symptoms. 

getting back to PTSD and CPTSD. 

oh yes, that good, good full circle-ness. so we’ve arrived back at the start, but knowing that all of this is less than a line of dominoes than it is a spiderweb, with different strands sometimes tugging the same things. let’s lay out the symptoms that shiro is dealing, all to different degrees and at different frequencies: 

PTSD 

Intrusive Memories, which include: 

Recurrent, unwanted distressing memories of the traumatic event

Reliving the traumatic event as if it were happening again (flashbacks)

Upsetting dreams or nightmares about the traumatic event

Severe emotional distress or physical reactions to something that reminds you of the traumatic event

Avoidance, which includes: 

Trying to avoid thinking or talking about the traumatic event 

Negative Changes in Thinking and Mood, which includes: 

Negative thoughts about yourself 

Memory problems, including not remembering important aspects of the traumatic event 

Feeling detached from family and friends 

Changes in Physical and Emotional Reactions, which include: 

Always being on guard for danger

Trouble sleeping

Trouble concentrating

Irritability, angry outbursts or aggressive behavior

Overwhelming guilt or shame

Misc. / Specific 

Difficulty being physically vulnerable -- ie, without armor or unable to see where exits might be 

The trigger of being restrained / someone unexpectedly grabbing or holding his chin / face in place -- this is something haggar would do 

Symptom list courtesy of mayoclinic -- if you peruse, you’ll notice that he does not exhibit every symptom of PTSD. 

CPTSD 

CPTSD is less extensive than PTSD, and, in shiro’s case, secondary to PTSD, as many CPTSD symptoms are fostered in childhood, as the direct result of the violation of trust in guardians or authority figures. Shiro’s symptoms include clusters: 

alterations in attention or consciousness 

alterations in self-perception 

and specifics: 

Changes in emotional regulation, such as dysphoria, as well as changing expressions of anger ( inhibited, and explosive ) 

Episodes of depersonalization 

A sense of being different from all other human beings 

A sense of defilement or stigma ( irrevocably stained ) 

A belief that no one can understand ( “they don’t know what you know” ) 

A feeling of a non-human identity ( sometimes slips and thinks of himself as a robeast or weapon ) 

*** An inflated sense of responsibility. Shiro uses responsibility as a way to feel that he has some semblance of control over himself and the world around him. 

for this one, I did reference the wiki -- apologies, the more trustworthy sources are behind paywalls! 

Sensory Issues 

The sensory issues largely come from his time in the void. I break it down a little more thoroughly >> here << so if you want to, check that out. Essentially, he has phases after his restoration to a body, immediate issues and lasting ones. 

immediate issues ( the roadtrip home timeline ) 

a lack of energy, which manifests as inability to participate in longer conversations / conversations with more than one or two other people, frequent naps, and listlessness that comes with feeling heavy in a physical body 

attention issues, which manifest in difficulty holding long conversations 

overstimulation, which manifests in shiro being very physically sensitive to all senses: touch, sight / light, sound, smell, and taste. 

lack of appetite, which is mostly due to the fact that he has to get used to eating again. 

lasting issues 

intermittent tiredness -- he naps much less frequently the stronger he gets, but he never quite gets to where he used to be in that regard. 

openness -- shiro gets a lot more emotionally open with people; terrified by being stuck in a realm with no exit and how he failed to connect with any of the paladins, he is less likely to be closed off entirely the way he was previously 

a fear of being lost / not being heard -- both in waking hours and in sleep, shiro gains a persistent fear of no one knowing where he is, or otherwise not being heard or seen 

dysphoria -- shiro struggles greatly with being in kuron’s body 

his nightmares change after the void -- they become a combination of scattered memories from kuron, as well as nightmares of drowning or not being heard when he yells. he also wakes up from them differently; before the void, he used to wake silently. now he might physically roll out of bed, choke, or touch himself in some way ( press a hand to his chest, or splay his hand around his throat ) 

What Doesn’t Change 

everything, basically. 

yes !! I just wrote up an embarrassingly long meta on shiro’s trauma and how it affects him. but at the end of the day, shiro is still shiro. he loses none of his ambition, drive, humor, optimism, hopefulness, compassion, or sense of fun and adventure. he is not afraid of space, the front lines, or giving his all to keep the earth safe. no matter the severity of his symptoms on any given day, he is still a decisive leader, empathetic and supportive, and still holds seeing the world, and the universe, as his dream. 

none of what he has gone through or deals with now defines him. it merely explains some of his behaviors and gives him a tangible place to start on his journey to healing. 

[theonlyjelly-iwillput-inmybelly]

Light Sides, Dark Sides, and Instincts Theory

So I’ve seen a ton of really awesome theories floating around after the introduction of our first Dark Side, the Snake Boi, Driving-a-Lemon, 1-800-Lemon-Law, whatever you want to call him. I’ve seen a TON of theories that Virgil was once a dark side who ‘saw the light’, if you will. These theories also say that he has had a past with Deceit because Virgil was once a Dark Side. These theories are so cool and I’d love it if that were the case! But I’d like to offer you my own theory on the taxonomy of the sides: Virgil is neither a light side or a dark side. Instead, he is his own category: Instinct.

So, the sides we have now are Logic (Logan) , Morality (Patton), Creativity (Roman), Anxiety (Virgil), and Deceit (???). Before I get into why Virgil is his own category, let me try to define what I believe Dark Sides and Light Sides are.

What the fuck is a Light Side and what the fuck constitutes it?: The Light Sides are the parts of Thomas and hopefully us all that have been instilled in us by societal norms as ‘good’. These are traits that are learned and are generally seen as being good/beneficial to possess. Of the five sides, I believe that Logan, Patton, and Roman fall into this category.

Why Logan?: While it can be argued that Logic isn’t inherently good or bad, I believe that in Thomas’s case it is good because it is employed to further Thomas’s education/help keep him alive. Logan is, I believe, closely linked to the fight-or-flight response. My view on the manner is that Virgil, as the canonical fight-or-flight response, is the will to survive, the will to fight and or flight while Logan is the means of doing that. Virgil is the raw material for survival and Logan is the program or processor that makes survival, or whatever task that is necessary for survival and or happiness (these things often go hand in hand) happen. He helps Thomas solves his problems. But the most important factor as to why I categorize him as a light side is the fact that he was learned. 

Most babies do not come straight outta the womb with logical thought; there’s an app for that! We call it school. Logan is common sense. If you’ve spent any amount of time around newborns, you know that nothing really logical is going on in that head. Sorry baby lovers. You have to teach them everything. When you do that, you’re instilling in them logic! While humans have the capacity to be some of the most advanced creatures on this planet in terms of brainpower, that capacity is not full from birth. Logical thought is not born, it is taught. People have to go through years of training in order to gain logical thought and common sense; some still fail to do that. 

Why Patton?: Patton represents Morality, and if you encounter an infant, oftentimes they possess no or a very slight sense of right and wrong. Again, you have to teach babies everything (’BUT DAAD WHY IS IT BAD TO PUNCH THAT MEANER???). Children, I believe, aren’t exactly born with a sense of right and wrong in them. Sure, they know eventually not to touch hot things (even then they have to be reminded), but that is because that shit hurts. That’s another response. In Patton’s sense, right and wrong is in terms of morals; for example, it is generally accepted that is is wrong to kill, but good to treat others with respect. While hopefully the offspring you encounter aren’t plotting murder, children do not know this upon birth. This is not instinctual. It is instilled in them by the lessons of society. They are taught what is right and wrong. Kindergarten or its equivalent is basically ‘ alright fuckers this is what is right and wrong’ school. We are taught this information on repeat for our entire lives that it seems instinctual, or second nature, but if we detach ourselves from our views and think critically, we can see that we have been thoroughly jaPED. In the case of Patton and Thomas, Patton is used to steer Thomas along the mapped out ‘good path’ of society; Patton is the one who tells Thomas not to lie, and to be nice and all of that. His job is to be good, to do the societal right.

Why Roman?: While many argue that we are born with innate talents (I have been told many times that I have an innate talent for writing), the level of creativity seen in Thomas is most definitely not from birth, but taught. Sure, people might possess certain inclinations for certain creative outlets, but holy shit do they have to work and work and be taught and be taught in order to reach mastery. You think William Shakespeare came straight outta womb-ton being able to write like he did? Hell to the no my dude. Certain types of creativity are also praised or shot down based upon societal standards: (See: ‘Don’t Hug me I’m Scared”). Creativity is taught to most in some form; only some of those students retain the talent and work to nurture it. In Thomas, Creativity is good because he uses his creative whimsy for good things like acting, singing, and writing, and not bad things like fighting and killing. So in the case of Tomothy, Creativity is good!

Conclusions: Logan, Patton, and Roman are Light Sides because they are taught facets that are used to the benefit of Thomas and they keep him in society’s good books. 

What the fuck is a Dark Side and what the fuck constitutes it?: As of now, the singular Dark Side is the part of Thomas instilled in him by societal norms as ‘bad’. These are traits that are learned and are generally seen as being bad/detrimental to posses. Of the five sides, I believe that Deceit falls into this category.

Why Deceit?: (Bitch have you seen him how can he not be a dark side???)  Deceit is at his bare minimum Thomas’s desire to lie and his ability to dupe. Going back to Morality’s argument, children are not born with a sense of right and wrong. They are born with a sense of hunger and scream. The babies I have encountered don’t understand why it is wrong to punch my arm when I hold them, and the slightly older ones don’t entirely grasp the whole ‘lying is wrong’ thing. While I don’t believe there are courses in schools entitled “How to Lie”, children are nonetheless taught about lying. They may learn it through parents, older relatives, school, the media, whatever. It is all around us, and hard to avoid.’Monkey see, monkey do’, if you will. Maybe they see an older sibling escape punishment for eating mom’s chocolate by saying that the dog ate it and placing the wrapper near the dog bowl prior to confrontation (bad analogy, I know). They then might try to lie to escape punishment as well. It is learned that lying is a possibility, but, depending upon the environment, is generally shot down as being bad because of the societal mandate that lying is wrong. Liars are made, not born.

Conclusions: Deceit is a Dark Side because he embodies a socially deemed wrong trait that is learned and not instinctual. Also, it’s canon that he’s a dark side because the others said so (blows gently raspberry). 

Light Side and Dark Side Conclusions And Shit: The main thing I am trying to get across here is that these four sides all, in my opinion, largely embody traits that are not instilled in humans from birth. While it may not seem like it at times, these traits are pretty much taught to us and drilled in our heads at a very young age (and yes, this includes Thomas!).  

AND NOW, INSTINCT

What the fuck is an instinct, and what constitutes it?: According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, instinct is “an innate, typically fixed pattern of behavior in animals in response to certain stimuli”. What I translate that load of flim flam into is a metaphor; they’re a set of codes and instruction in humans that is extremely hard to eradicate and ignore. The instinct people are most familiar with is the survival instinct, which is exactly as it sounds. An instinct side, to me, embodies a trait that is not taught and cannot be removed. Of the five sides, I believe that Virgil falls into this category.

Why Virgil?: Anxiety, as has been canonically stated, is essentially the flight-or-fight response that is instilled in Thomas and hopefully all humans (if not natural selection has got its kiss for you idk what to tell you #bye); true, he encompasses more than that, but for the most part he is a response, one that is a bit heightened in Thomas because, unfortunately, he suffers from an anxiety disorder.  From birth, humans have some form of the fight or flight response; the survival instinct is innate, and shows itself in babies by how they cry at scary things and Scream for the food (idk babies well sorry). 

There is, in my view, nothing inherently good or bad about the survival instinct; while no one gives you a sticker for having it, no one really punishes you either. It’s just something everyone has. It’s the program that is burned onto computer chips, it’s Cortana on Windows 10 (because damn how you remove that bitch). It just is. It’s instinct. No one teaches you how your endocrine system system and brain work together to get you out of dangerous situations; I certainly haven’t seen any power-points on it (’Slide One: How to create adrenaline: step one, tell your adrenals to pay their damn rent...”) Because it’s just natural! You hear a noise that’s spooky and unexpected? Bitch, you probably gonna jump! You ever tried to be a pedestrian in any major city? Gurl, you’re alive because your bitch ass endocrine system and fight or flight response told your ass to run when that car come hurtling at you. Dog snapping at you? You become that ninja because you don’t want to get hurt, because your fight or flight response is telling your ass to fly like the wind, Bullseye! For me at least, all thought and feeling (except fear) escapes me whenever I’m in a life threatening situation; it’s just mind numbing action. That is largely what I think Virgil is, with some added sass and other stuff. For the most part, his core function is not taught. It is not learned. It is born. 

Conclusions: Virgil is neither a Light Side or a Dark Side because he is an innate instinct. Virgil, I believe is both bad and good in equal amounts that they eventually cancel each other out. he is good in that he aims to protect Thomas, and he is bad because holy fuck anxiety disorders suck. He’s lumped together with the light sides I believe because he a) acts for a good reason in Thomas and b) makes for good content. My point is, because he is not taught, he is his own category. 

DISCLAIMER: This is all just my opinion, my take on the matter. I also know nothing, and am probably seeing things where there is nothing. Again, I love seeing how active the fandom is and how many theories are being put out there; I lap up the ‘Virgil is/was a dark side’ theories. This is just me saying “That’s so cool, dude! Want to hear what my headcanon is?’ I’m not trying to say that anyone is wrong here. I’m not trying to say that I’m right. This is just a neat idea that popped up in my head! I’d love to hear what you guys think of this. (Read: please don’t attack me for having opinions I love and respect you all I just want to join in on the theory party). If I somehow offended you, please let me know and I will rectify it. Sorry this is long. I also wrote this really late, so sorry if nothing makes sense XD

Thank you for coming to my TED talk. Have a blessed day. 

[zaphkielraziel]

A Tale of Two Swords

So near the start of this D&D campaign I'm in, I was given the opportunity to ask for any item I desired. I choose a pair of rapiers and I quickly learned that they drained strength from those who were stabbed with it, something I dearly needed seeing as everything but constitution and intelligence was below 10 (all ability scores are now at least 10).

As we travelled across Texas (we're playing ourselves in the real world), I found the swords to be sentient. I wanted to try and work with the swords (which I took to calling "leech" in Latin), but they absolutely hated me due to my scrawniness and low strength. All it wanted was to be fed and it got that oppurtunity when a barbarian joined our group.

When visiting Fort Worth, my then party of three (plus two NPCs) stumbled upon Ashe and Zane, a barbarian and sorcerer respectively. We found ourselves in a fight against a bunch of mummies with zombies slowly encircling us and drawing closer. I decided to loan the swords to Ashe and they liked her a lot. Partway through the fight, Ashe had maxed them out before falling unconscious and becoming attuned to them in that time.

As she woke up, me being the petty bastard I am decided to amputate her and get the swords back. I crit failed and stabbed myself in the foot, gaining an enemy in my own party. Things continued as normal until we stumbled upon a portal leading to the Feywild. In there, the swords became more powerful and we soon found ourselves in deep shit.

My first impulse was to get a new weapon, so I choose Myrtenaster from RWBY, since Dust from the show was also a thing. Ashe and I along with our druid Jacob and new bard Marisa decide to visit the college of magic where we would spar and I could get use to my new sword as well as my newfound magic resulting from me multiclassing into sorcerer. We were however stopped by tbe guards at the entrance based solely on us all being human and Jacob's attempt at explaining started to dig a hole for us. My attempts at backtracking made it worse and the swords were getting hungrier than ever, forcing Ashe into a wisdom save. Her failure officially started combat and seeing no other way out, I created a steam cloud around us.

Rather than escape like Marisa or let myself be detained almost right away like Jacob I tried to be of some use in the fight, only really helping accidentally when my wild magic kicked in. We were detained easily but not before Ashe killed three of the five guards we were fighting. Jacob and I were released after a brief interrogation, but Ashe wasn't going anywhere.

Despite everything, Jacob chose to stay at the police station while sending me to let everyone at the tavern know. Our rogue Terrance, Marisa, and I decided we'd head back while Zane hooked up with out NPC cleric. On the way, Marisa and I instead chose to start performing music as a way of making gold seeing as we were both broke as hell. Meanwhile, Ashe was slowly being taken over by the swords and eventually succumbed, only having the time to tell her guard to run. She broke down her cell and killed nearly everyone. Jacob called on the god he served and restrained Ashe with a tree while Terrance used his magic gloves to pull an Edward Elric before the two retreated, leaving only the guy who interrogated Jacob. The last thing he told Jacob was to get the headmaster of the College of Magic. The officer made it so that getting close would be asking for death, so Ashe threw a sword at him, quickly killing him.

The police were barely handling the situation when the headmaster arrived. Terrance managed to somewhat get Ashe detained by using gravity Dust, making the pair float in the air and only staying in place due to a magic force field. After shotgunning her, Terrance was pulled down by the headmaster who put Ashe into her own head. It was there where she fought the embodiment of the swords with Terrance and Jacob arriving two turns after. It's around then when Marissa and I started our encore with a crowd so big, they thought all of the chaos happening at the police station was just the sound of others being excited by the random concert.

Ashe was losing badly with multiple failed wisdom saves leading to her will dissolving. Terrance and Jacob made dents with the latter taking advantage of us being in her head by creating a small squadron of soldier who were quickly wiped out and led to the creation of a willpower check consisting of charisma and wisdom combined (because you are asserting your own will onto the world while fighting against its own will).

The trio barely hold their own Zane through our cleric. still in bed together, manages to enter the fray. Having been through similar scenarios in other campaigns, he took things to the next level through creativity and the use of a minigun he willed into existance. Terrance was taken out shortly after, but Zane ultimately prevailed with a critical hit. Everyone in Ashe's head woke up where they were prior to entering with Ashe, Terrance, and Jacob entrusting the headmaster to purge the sword of the souls it stole from its victims before getting Ashe got shitfaced at the tavern following her living nightmare. Zane went for a round two with our cleric while Marisa and I made 200 gold in tips as well as 300 from an official sponsor who gave us a card and everything.

So I missed out on an epic fight where the laws of physics and even the very rules of the game were meaningless beyond the typical combat rules. But there's no doubt things will only escalate from here and I cannot wait for what's to come.