#I started adding the sort of footnote

[lies]

My best bird photos of September 2023* according to eBird's users

House Wren, Common Yellowthroat, Turkey Vulture, Wilson's Warbler, White-breasted Nuthatch

*sort of

[cupofikeu]

𝐈𝐈𝐈. MONCHERY

footnote izzy couldn’t wait until september ・ kim sunwoo x gender netural reader + word count 1033 genre fluff .. initial one-sided enemies .. fanfic writer au warnings what happened to less than 500 words? where did that go?

fanfic writer! sunwoo who hadn’t foreseen himself tumbling into this pipeline.

like many victims before him, he was just a reader. while he had an appreciation for all forms of literary art, it was the stories that stemmed from canon events, people, and universes that had his utmost interest. the concept of fanfiction was so cool, the way an imaginative mind can show their admiration for a masterpiece by adding complementary works.

(that’s how sunwoo planned to lay it out for eric after he got too curious over all the open tabs on the older’s laptop. turns out it only takes a spew of word vomit, a buy-one-take-one offer from the local pizzaria, and eleven story recos to recruit his roommate into the fold successfully. it hasn’t produced the same results with his other friends, but he’ll get there soon.)

he’s a sucker for fluff—wait, scratch that, he’s very passionate over the mushy, creepy-crawly inducing, soumersaulting side of romance. it’s like a puppy and their favorite toy; shuffle a few sweet scenarios his way, and he’ll plop himself in a solitude corner to cover his mouth, giggle, maybe even deliver a small kick or two at the air. the difference between sunwoo and a floof is he’ll take his time to pick out which parts to screenshot then type, backspace, consider being coherent, only to ramble about how much he loved it, and reblog it.

his own stories should have been a sort of love letter to the genre. but no, they had to be pieces of his villain arc.

spoiler alert: it’s your fault.

you, who seemingly consumes nothing but tragedy. your stories that lure innocent hearts in, only to traumatize them with your tear-jerking climaxes and shattered hearts as souvenirs. don’t get sunwoo started on all the times he’s begged for a happy twist, only to spill another bucket of tears (and reviews) when you feign ignorance and publish another bittersweet chapter.

calling him petty is.. fair. it’s all a matter of preference; yours just happens to stand at the opposite end. but did that stop sunwoo from opening his own writing space under the guise of sharing his own cheesy tales with the community?

(obviously not.)

a large mountain of dust bunnies wips, a couple hundred followers, and several amazing mutuals later, sunwoo’s yet to achieve his initial dream. between the brainstorms and breakdowns, he’s found himself less determined to change your taste in exchange for learning more about you.

like, you don’t write angst because you have an acquired taste in making people feel hurt. you create all that art to make them feel, and it just so happens that sadness is your speciality. he’s discovered a few more things, such as you can’t write without music blasting through your speaker, the paragraph alignment must be justified, and your ideas seemingly make more sense when you share them with someone.

“let me see if i heard you right, which i hope i didn’t..” you were doing this on purpose, he can read it through your muffled snicker. still, he plays the role of disappointment—nudging his glasses upwards and exhaling a deep sigh for the extra pinch of drama. “..you want to take jinnie’s pain, double it, then pass it to the half innocent second lead?”

sunwoo’s never considered himself the funniest one in the room, let alone someone who can tickle others’ sense of humor quickly. then your laughter plays through his laptop’s speakers, and all of a sudden, he feels otherwise. perhaps you were a siren in one of your past lives. it’d explain how you get him to minimize his draft tab, rest his head on his open palm, and enjoy the view unfolding behind the screen.

“nope, nuh uh. sit back up and pay for the damages.” sunwoo tries to scold you, but lacks the will to actually be grumpy. he’s caught in the way you laugh with your whole body, head tilted back and hands smacking your desk.

the low hum of your background music fills in the gaps of the silence. sometimes, sunwoo forgets you’re out of his reach—an easy mistake to make after having one too many video calls with you. as he watches you recover from your amusement, he catches himself slipping up again, silently wishing he was there to adjust your chair for you. so he could brush the baby hairs back and squeeze your aching sides.

“a sacrifice is necessary, ddeonu,” you argue on behalf your idea. “if i’m gonna give hyejin and hanbin a happy ending, someone needs to be sad. otherwise, everyone’s gonna suffer. does that sound like a fair deal to you?”

sunwoo pouts and pretends to think about it. “fine, but only because they’re my endgame.”

but is that the actual truth? or is it because his stomach does somersaults whenever he remembers that you’ve only begun dabbling in merging the two genres because he asked? or maybe it’s that impulsive urge to make you the base of his muses’ personas every single time he opens a document? or could it be those times eric caught him feeling so giddy because of someone instead of something?

it’s a cliche and well-loved trope; the opposites falling for each other. and yet, sunwoo can’t help himself from sneaking another glance at your profile before shifting to another open tab. he’s still got deadlines to meet, plotlines that are waiting to be unraveled, and your dulcet humming jumbling his thoughts.

it’s chaos; his type of chaos.

maybe it’s meant to be this way. perhaps he was destined to fall into this rabbit hole and traverse all the way to where he is now. or maybe all this analyzing and theorizing between the lines could be a side-effect from drowning in a tsunami of soulmate au fics.

how would sunwoo know? he too was a character in an incomplete story. maybe he’s not even a main character in yours, let alone the love interest. still, as he listens to you ramble about another potential plot hole in your thought process, he sneakily adds a comment for his writer.

if you can, don’t let me fall in love alone.. pretty please?

𓆩♡𓆪 ─┈ forehead kisses (w/ consent) for @stealanity @yudaies @from-izzy

[bonefall]

Hearing Loss Research Dump

Heyo!! You probably reached through the footnote at the end of the Hearing Loss Guide for Warrior Cats! I often get asked questions like, "How do you make these guides?" and "Do you have sources?" So this time, I tried to keep a bit of a loose "journal."

Unfortunately it got disorganized after a few sessions (since this project ended up taking about 2 - 3 weeks to do) but, hey, hopefully it helps.

I have dumped all of my sources here and explained my thought process as I went along, so that you have a good foundation to go forth and do your own research.

I may update this post with more information and links, or remove sources if, for some reason, it is revealed that the source was harmful or not credible. SO, PLEASE feel free to recommend good educational organizations, documentaries, and blogs here on Tumblr willing to take questions.

This post is set to "no one can reblog" so that you're always seeing the most current version of this post. Just in case a source gets challenged, or one of the sensitivity readers wants their name removed, or I end up adding important corrections, etc.

This is Version 1.0, and it was updated on 1/2/2024.

The research "dump" post is messy, because it's a Bonus Thing that's supposed to go along with the very pretty and ~concise~ Herb Guide that I created.

Session 0

I had wanted to do this for a while, but this RIDICULOUS thing that was said to an Anon and then shared with me almost gave me an aneurysm. I asked if my followers wanted this boosted to the top of my priorities, they said yes, and here we are.

In the process I also looked for input, especially from deaf/HOH followers. I made a note to include tinnitus, unilateral (one ear) hearing loss, and I'm considering doing a second guide just for how to TREAT the ear infections I mentioned would lead to a lot of hearing loss in RiverClan.

An outline of the Herb Guide post was written just before I did any real research, so I had a general idea of the aspects of hearing loss I wanted to talk and learn about.

Sat down to start my research the next day.

SESSION 1: The Basics

My first step is always just a basic internet search, including a pit stop at Wikipedia to read the article, and then follow the sources or find a place that explains the concept more deeply.

Because my project's about anthropomorphic cats, I always start with humans first, then swing over to a search on felines. I'm usually alternating between them because that is how my mind works, hearing something in one and then linking that to some sort of question about how that would look in cats.

From Wikipedia, the World Health Organization, and the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, I learned that "Hearing Loss" is the blanket term for all lack of hearing, and "Deafness" is when it totally prevents you from understanding speech.

Like blindness, most deaf people can hear a little. Stressed that.

It's also here that I started with cat hearing. First I looked at Purina, but it wasn't a great find, besides a link to common signs of ear infections which I put in my back pocket lmao. I came across Dr. Pippa Elliot's article for Petful.com, and this one is MUCH more informative.

I started thinking critically about a lot of that info. Cats have a much higher range of hearing than humans, a feline society would actually catch hearing loss loooong before humans would catch it in a pet cat. Plus the whiskers. The article actually mentions that when you check a cat for hearing loss, you have to avoid blowing wind on the whiskers or even vibrating the ground.

Very sensitive animals, fascinating. Anyway, back on humans,

There's also FOUR TYPES of hearing loss. Conducive, Sensorineural, Mixed, and Auditory Neuropathy. I also went and found a good explanation from the CDC to double-check Wikipedia.

And it's a good thing I did! Wikipedia did not mention Type 4 at the time of my research, and the CDC's article is VERY straightforward and informative.

Types;

Conducive: Sound can't get through the canal. Usually a blockage.

Sensorineural: A problem with the hearing organs or the auditory nerve.

Mixed: Both of these at once

Auditory Neuropathy: The ear detects the sound, but doesn't send the signals to the brain properly.

From what I can tell from the National Institute for Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, Auditory Neuropathy is less well defined and can have overlap with Sensorineural. Sometimes it has to do with damage or malformation of the inner ear hairs, other times it's completely unknown and just assumed to be a brain issue.

So according to that definition, Auditory Processing Disorder is a type of auditory neuropathic hearing loss.

Then I started watching Christmas movies and forgot I was doing research oops. Time waits for no man, nor muppet. Very important that once a year you watch movies that make you cry and also Gonzo is there.

BUT. Throughout this project, I was constantly finding new sources on "the basics" that explained things in different ways. I didn't find all of these in that one session, but I will dump them in a straight list here.

Straight statistics of prevalence of hearing loss in the UK

Two types of inner ear infections (got cut from the guide because I was trying to stay focused on the disability itself, not causes and ear ailments)

Congenital deafness (Helpful, but again, was trying to keep the guide focused on general disability writing advice, not explain every single reason why a person could be deaf. That's for one's own research!)

Degrees of hearing loss (But notably I've also seen these thresholds shift around. This one says deafness starts at 95 DB, but I did also see 81 elsewhere.)

A guide on soundproofing which put the affects of noise on your ears into perspective (helpful with comparisons to degrees of hearing loss)

REALLY GOOD GUIDE ON HERTZ AND DECIBELS (And also comparisons of different decibel levels, in relation to the thresholds of hearing loss)

Tinnitus

SESSION 2: Comparing human and cat hearing

I felt like I had a good understanding of the basics here. The four types, some considerations for cat biology, some tidbits to mention like most people with hearing loss still being able to hear a little, etc.

NOW I'm going to finish reading any sources I opened up in side tabs, and learn about the side effects of hearing loss that I've seen so far. Tinnitus was requested specifically.

But, I felt pretty confident at this point, so I started actually working on the guide itself. It's good because that's when I start getting really specific questions like, "Just how sensitive IS a cat's hearing next to a humans?"

Found this article comparing human and feline hearing, and also went for a source on common causes of ear infections in cats, and compared them to common causes of ear infections in humans. Basically everything WE get, and more. I also remembered a vet that I worked with explaining that humans don't get ear mites because our ear canals are shorter, but honestly I don't really want to hunt down a source on that.

Bottom line is that it seems that cats get ear infections significantly easier than humans.

SESSION 3: Paying attention to deaf and HOH experiences

Started loading up some videos on Youtube, and follow along with presentations from deaf speakers, awareness charities, and so on.

ADHD protip: If you're like me and often feel the need to get up and walk around when you're trying to focus on something, playing flash games on Neopets or a similar petsite while keeping a video popped out is a great way to help with executive function impulse stuff. Firefox and the program Freetube both allow for you to pop open a small window that you can move around your screen.

I absolutely adored this video from Montfort University, which collected experiences from people who were actively losing their hearing. I'm feeling that a lot of folks are probably anticipating the Herb Guide with the expectation it'll talk about fully deaf warriors like Snowkit (And BB!Whitewing, who is deaf in Better Bones), but one of the most important things I'm learning is that partial and unilateral hearing loss is both common, and important to talk about.

That section on people forgoing hearing aids is so bitter. The way that they were reluctant to even "admit" they had a disability (feeling as if it "doesn't count"), felt like hearing aids were for "old people" so they resisted getting a device that would really help, and that one woman who finally realized what her own mother must have been going through when she was in her shoes...

Jeez, man. Ableism really hits us all, doesn't it? You'll reject the small bits of help that were SHAKEN out of the pockets of an uncaring world, just so you don't have to admit you might need it.

I am vaguely aware that there's buzz within the deaf community about hearing aids, with some deaf people actually having extremely negative feelings on them. I didn't manage to find those people though, besides what I remembered from Tumblr posts explaining that cochlear implants tend to destroy what little hearing remains. I also didn't know what sorts of hearing aids exist, just basics.

In any case, it's not what my guide's about. Clan cats wouldn't be able to make devices like that-- so to compensate, I tried to stress that forcing warriors to "assimilate" to able-bodied society is bad compared to "accommodating" them. But I did make a little aside note on the guide itself as a PSA.

ANYWAY I'm keeping that pinned in my mind as I go through this. A LOT of these speakers are talking about their implants and how much they changed their lives, so I'm taking things with a teeny grain of salt, knowing I'm probably not getting the entire hearing-impaired community's feelings on this.

Rachel Kolb's Tedx talk was DEEPLY insightful, she is an absolutely fantastic presenter and her statistics are gutwrenching. I'm also paying close attention to how she described her speech therapy classes, how tactile the lessons are, how she had to hold her hand to her teacher's throat and learned that the trick to an N and an M was to speak it through the nose...

The theme of this part of my research has really been "heartbreaking," honestly. Next I watched this one from a BBC interview, where the speaker talks about how much EFFORT they have to make to listen to others. The casual cruelty of hearing people just not caring enough to reach out and make sure she can follow along in the conversation.

I know it's maybe not the same thing, but I teared up a bit at some parts, because that's something I've also felt as someone who's ADHD/Autistic. How much it hurts when people won't even take the goddamn time to clue you in. Like you're not worth it

Even if it's just for a silly cat community, I really hope the weeks of effort and hours of reading I put into this guide and journal makes someone feel seen. You're worth the time. I promise I mean it

Anyway,

Like The Basics, I kept finding more things as I went through my research, outside of this session.

Struggles of deaf people in life and the workplace

Social struggles, particularly in the digital age

Cochlear implants: Pros and Cons (It was really not relevant to my project here, BUT, I figured it was important enough to even mention in an aside on the main guide.)

Really interesting passage from a married couple losing their hearing

"What is it like to be deaf?" Mentions the link to memory loss in people who are hard of hearing due to the brain "discarding" misheard sentences.

SESSION 4: Relevant questions.

This is the point I was asking more targeted questions, as I was actively writing the bulk of the guide, because in spite of everything this remains a cat project. If I was about to write something and then realized I didn't actually know like... WHAT causes it, HOW it happens, How COMMON a thing is, I would go and find out.

For example I knew that Snowkit had a higher chance of being born deaf, but didn't exactly know why, or how it happens, or how much higher of a chance that was. So, I looked up white cats with blue eyes, and looked up the percentages associated with deafness in them.

Apparently it's rapid degeneration, instead of the inner ear just not forming properly. I could go down that rabbit hole and learn more about why, but at this point, I'm far enough along that I need to start deciding when something isn't really helpful but just interesting. It's REALLY easy to get distracted at this point in making these guides.

That lead to to look at how people tend to handle their deaf cats and make their lives better, which also lead me to a good source on how to clean a cat's ears. That's another thing I had to halt at; because this guide is about DISABILITY, not about treating ear ailments.

When you're doing research this way, I find it helpful to "limit my scope." I've mentioned this technique/skill/advice in the past with some of my cultural expansions for the Clans too. You can see how maaaaassive the guide I wrote got even while staying on topic; it easily could have gotten bloated by even MORE tangential knowledge.

But I do plan to make an ear treatment guide at some point, as well.

I then started trying to learn more about rodent squeaks. How high in hertz they are, when different animals make them, how loud in decibels, etc. I couldn't find very much, because sound/hearing in general is actually WILDLY understudied, especially in terms of non-human animals.

But I did find this article on mouse vocalizations, specifically, and this webpage on various animal hearing ranges.

(though the webpage begs ppl to be careful about making comparisons between the numbers on the page, because they come from different studies with different parameters. But like. somehow i think this is good enough for funny cat project)

Lastly on this topic, I tried to find a good source on whiskers and how well they can "replace" hearing, and ended up finding this EXCELLENT article on allllll sorts of hearing loss related things in cats. It's got it all. Whiskers, common causes, tests. It's great.

SESSION 5: Sensitivity readers

I'm trying to be extra careful with this guide, with the knowledge in mind that this one was highly requested and likely will get decent reach. So, I figured it was more important than usual to speak to disabled individuals who could advise me, to my face, instead of only relying on what I'd seen in my research and secondhand information.

(especially since my style in writing these guides tries to be "simple," trying to limit how much medical speak I use and explaining terms in-depth when I need to use them.)

I spoke to @sylsoddsandends, @s0ulfulsapph1cf, and one more. While talking to them, they brought up even more to me that I hadn't considered.

For example, I did not know that unilateral hearing loss (affects one ear more than the other) actually resulted in a loss of "distance perception," the same way that I don't have depth perception because I've got low vision in one eye. I grabbed a scientific paper to read about it and went forth.

I also got a ton of good feedback about how much I stressed that lipreading is difficult, added some advice on a unilateral HL cat would stand, brought in some notes about chronic pain, so on. I then went to preview it to a bunch of personal friends to give it a couple more once-overs for typos and flow and such.

The last thing I did was reach out to those sensitivity readers again, and ask their permission to link them here. I don't have permission from the last reader yet (which is on me, I should have asked sooner). So there will be an update here if/when they get back to me.

POSTMORTEM

Nothing here yet! I will make an attempt to collect any follow-up questions and such down here.

[mythserene]

LEWISOHN: Let's crowdsource this bastard.

Check a footnote.

Whether you heroically tear straight into him like @wingsoverlagos or you find one thing like @delightfullyatomicfest did, it matters! What I hoped for and imagined from the beginning was some sort of crowdsourced work. There is too much for any one person, and one of the biggest problems with Beatles' sources is that they're not all equally easy to get to for everyone. And although this has become personal for me, it is an objectively huge problem for all Beatles fans and scholars that the man who has collectively been called the Beatles historian has—and I cannot say this clearly enough—BEEN JUST MAKING SHIT UP.

He literally ends ‘Tune In’ with a fabricated line that he sources to John Lennon. (!!!)

(Which I might not have realized for ages—if ever—if not for this @wingsoverlagos post)

Lewisohn has no shame.

And while it may seem like we are screaming into the void right now, I will tell you that we are not. I fear jinxing anything so I won't say more now, but our work is not in vain. People are paying attention. How can they help but pay attention? It's too shocking a betrayal. Too great a breach of trust. It has become overwhelming and impossible to ignore, and it has happened so quickly. Just by a few people taking the time to do the work.

And what is obvious now is that if you take a piece of source material that's referenced and go through it you will find butchered and fabricated quotes. And whether you do it that way or just check a footnote that interests you PLEASE TELL ME what you find! 🙏🏻

I am trying to gather all this up in one place. An ammo dump, if you will. If you want credit, tell me how you want to be credited, linked to, and any combination thereof. (I don't like taking credit for things I don't find, anyway.) But either shoot me a message or @ me or all of the above so we can collect all together and it can have the cumulative effect it deserves. (I will respond, but sometimes I am gone for a few days at a time, and occasionally for up to a week. I always come back, though.) #crowdsourcelewisohn

I have also set up an email for collecting funky footnotes: exactwords.lewisohn@gmail.com (At this point I'm only checking this once a week.)

If you look, you almost certainly will find.

If you have any Beatle magazines or Pete Best's book, "Beatle!" you could be a superhero. (One chapter of Best's book is available online, but I haven't been able to find the rest.) Or if you have any less-available source material I am urging you—begging you—to jump in and check some footnotes. With Lewisohn as bold as he is in the easily searchable things just imagine the license he's taking in the rest. But whether hard to find or commonplace, check a source. It adds up and it kind of feels good to uncover some bullshit.

For your edification and motivation I am adding a clip — lightly edited to take out some Lewisohn devolutions (so here's the queued up link) — of Mark Lewisohn bragging and basking in the praise of being called a historian who should be ranked alongside the great LBJ biographer Robert Caro, of him saying that the Beatles should appreciate anyone writing a biography of this high a standard about them, and a momentary lapse into deep resentment that they don't appreciate him. And then he gives his little speech about the Beatles being about “truth with a capital ‘T’” and how he is writing a biography to match that truth.

“Truth” is a word Mark Lewisohn needs to keep out of his mouth. If you feel like he should be struck by lightening for uttering it, that is exactly what I am talking about.

We are that lightening.

Honestly, what AKOM started is so awesome. It gave this an outlet. (And I still go back and listen for both source material and motivation.)

It's sickening to listen to this now. Sickening because Lewisohn has been making us all his dupes for far too long. We have been his marks, and there's almost nothing I hate more than being conned.

[wingsoverlagos]

Lewisohn vs. Searle

Forget, for a moment, that I said I wouldn't clog up your dashboards with a million citation comparisons. I have found a quote that is so brazenly manipulated, I had to share it.

This quote is pulled from an interview of John Lennon conducted by Malcolm Searle on June 15, 1964, in Melbourne's Southern Cross Hotel. Lewisohn cites it twice (the other quote is below the cut - it's rephrased slightly, but the meaning is retained), and some kind soul uploaded it to YouTube.

Tune In 20-32 vs. interview by Malcolm Searle

Here's the quote as it appears in Tune In, a simple statement about John's immediate connection with Neil Aspinall:

It's a simple quote. Straightforward. In case the name "Neil" wasn't clear enough, Lewisohn emphasized that John was "talking about the Beatles' first and original full-time assistant."

This is incorrect. You can hear John's words at 7:52. Transcript [emphasis mine]:

Well, Neil – he’s our personal road manager, well he was in from the start. He went to school with Paul and George, and the other fellow, Derek, we’ve known for about a year, but he’s sort of one of those people that clicked soon as you meet him.

There's no room for error here. The person who John refers to as "one of those people that clicked as soon as you meet him" is Derek Taylor. Of his relationship with Neil, John simply says that Neil was around from the early days due to being a schoolmate of Paul and George. This is even more noteworthy when we look at how the rest of this paragraph in Tune In plays out:

There are no other citations for this paragraph - that footnote after "their protector" talks about Neil's relationship with the "road manager" title - so the only source we have here is a quote that's actually about Derek Taylor. For the record, I don't think Lewisohn needs to cite each of Neil Aspinall's personality traits, so long as they're established elsewhere in the book - if we have evidence of him being "sharp, blunt, mentally strong, bright, funny, opinionated, mouthy, loyal, honest" elsewhere in the book, that phrase can stand on its own.

But there are a few specific phrases here that do warrant a citation. First, that bit about Neil "[getting] along very well very quickly" with John, also with George, and "to a lesser extent" with Paul. That explicit differentiation of one of the core three from the others needs supporting evidence. So too does Lewisohn's assertion that "John made sure Neil was man enough to stand up to him." This isn't a nebulous claim, so why doesn't Lewisohn tell us how John "made sure" Neil was "man enough"? Surely he has evidence for that and isn't just spit-balling?

I'm not a Neil Aspinall expert--I know he kept to himself, mostly, and perhaps that led the people around him to be close-lipped about him in return. But surely someone this close to the Beatles, someone in the inner circle - surely the Beatles said something about him that's worth quoting, rather than a manipulated quote about Derek Taylor followed by a bunch of uncited editorialization?

Tune In 17-35 vs. interview by Malcolm Searle

Audio clip at 3:08. Transcript, emphasis added to quoted phrases:

Ringo we met in Hamburg. He was playing with another group, and, y’know, we thought we liked his style but we’d only just got up the other drummer so we couldn’t do anything about it, but when we got the chance, we did.

Unmarked omission, and the word order in the first sentence is re-arranged ("Ringo we met in Hamburg" vs "We met Ringo in Hamburg")

Sources:

Lewisohn M. 2013. The Beatles: All These Years Vol. 1: Tune In. New York (NY): Crown Archetype. [ebook]

Searle M. 1964 Jun 15. Intervista John Lennon in Australia con Malcom Searle. Uploaded 2019 Feb 9, 8:44. Accessed online 2024 May 14. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVpX7Xuz09I

[writernopal]

Happy STS! Today I have a riddle: what comes first? The title or the story? 🤭 To expand, I'd love to hear the creation order of one (or several) of your stories. Did you think of characters first? Plot? World? What was the final piece?

Happy belated STS, Tori!

I'll answer this for AASOAF!

Did you think of characters first? Plot? World?

It all started with Fay. She was a custom character I made in the video game called Divinity Original Sin II to play a Pirate mod that had been created by a community member. I was on my, like, 5th play through of the game when she came about and for some reason I got really attached to her and I started imagining what her life would be like after the events of DOS2 and it sort of ended up departing into the early world of AASOAF.

She went through a few iterations before I landed on who she is now but as that was happening another big piece of the puzzle came into the picture: the birth of Wilkes and my Lizardfolk obsession LOL. He was just a set piece at the time and one of the love interests I thought it would be fun for Fay to have in passing. But then I went head first into developing my Lizardfolk because I wrote a scene where I was describing him hearing something and I realized that he probably didn't have any ears and that kind of fucked me up HAHA.

Anyway the story started centering around Fay and Wilkes relationship more and I was like 'alright, this guy needs some lackeys' because Fay had a pretty well established crew by that point. Enter Axtapor! He, again, had like no lines and was just there to deepen the roster a bit. He was originally supposed to be blue but I realized I had too many blue lizards at that point so I was like 'uhhhh okay what's a color i dont have? lavender? yeah.'

Around that time I also realized that Fay had like, SO much plot armor and was low-key getting on my nerves so I was like 'alright, I need someone to counterbalance her.' And Mariel came into being! She actually started out as Fay's best friend's maid with a Big Secret who gets dragged into the whole pirate drama by accident and then I was like, 'okay what if she also falls in love with a pirate and its a struggle for her bc she's like lawful good?'

So I paired her with Axtapor and then it was just like. The sky fell because the AASOAF we know today was born. I made some tweaks to Axtapor after having a few revelations in that discovery writing and actually brought Mariel's stakes into the story more prominently and added a more central antagonist and the rest is history!

What was the final piece?

The Pale Kings, actually. They were footnotes in Mariel's story in the beginning but they didn't becoming the oppressive horror they are in the series until I actually started mentally plotting AASOAF 1.

[polutrope]

Not a character ask, but I hope it's ok? Anyways, wanted to drop by and thank you for articulating why recently it has been itching me whenever fics/posts/etc put Maedhros as the best and better parent of the E&E twins! And on a related note, do you have any thoughts whether (going with the narrative idea of cascading events starting with sparing the twins) searching for Elured & Elurin shouldn't have been also connected to those, and technically therefore should've been attributed to Maglor in the published Silm (or rather, connected to aforementioned chain events), as well?

(In reference to this.)

Totally okay, and thank you! I am happy to see from the reception of that post that I am not alone.

I love this insight! It certainly fits with the themes of pity and repentance in the series of events I talked about (i.e., pitying and raising Elros and Elrond, being glad at the appearance of the Silmaril in the sky, "Less evil shall we do in the breaking", and finally casting the Silmaril away and wandering in pain and regret).

I like your term "cascade" for these events. I talk at the end of the this bio about pathos and why I think these four events are a large part of why readers finish the Silm especially sympathetic to Maglor.* In that vein, let's dub this the "Pathos Cascade" 😁.

*Not all readers, of course. Without judgment of either pathway, I'd be curious to see how reception (of Maglor, but also more broadly) changes depending on whether someone came to the Silm via fandom or not.

I had thought in my original post that the only mention of Maedhros searching for Dior's sons came from a marginal note on the Tale of Years -- the briefly sketched annals that Tolkien revised in the 1950s, published in War of the Jewels -- in which it is Maidros/Maedhros who fosters Elros and Elrond. Which would support the hypothesis that it's part of the "Pathos Cascade"!

But Christopher in a footnote reminded me that the "failed search" element actually first entered the story in The Later Annals of Beleriand (written sometime between 1930-37, published in The Lost Road):

"The young sons of Dior, Elboron and Elbereth, were taken captive by the evil men of Maidros' following, and they were left to starve in the woods; but Maidros lamented the cruel deed, and sought unavailingly for them." (Annal 306[506])

(Yes, Elured and Elurin's names changed a lot. The servants became Celegorm's in The Tale of Years.)

In the Later Annals, Maglor is still the one fostering Elrond ("Elrond was taken to nurture by Maglor," Annal 329[529]; Elros conceptually existed by 1937, but Tolkien never added him to this particular text). So that's a point against the hypothesis.

However, we're talking about evolving and unfinished drafts, so it doesn't mean Tolkien might not have reassigned the search to whichever brother he eventually decided should get the "Pathos Cascade". Or not.

(Sidenote: It's not like either Maedhros or Maglor is unrepentant in any version -- they are both the "sympathetic Feanorians" -- but still, in every draft only one of them is firmly connected to the sort of pity and "letting go" we see in the "Pathos Cascade".)

Regardless of Tolkien's intentions, it fits well, and I like it as a way to support my take that all four surviving brothers search for the sons of Dior (for complicated reasons that I won't get into). Perhaps it's hypocritical of me to simultaneously insist that only Maglor should be a parental figure to Elros and Elrond, but it helps me make sense of events. As the discussion around this has shown, there are other ways to do so, but this one works for me.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk about the Silm's textual history. I know dissecting this stuff is not everyone's cup of tea, but I love it.

[mwolf0epsilon]

The Umbaran Pathogen - Day 8: Dissociation

Summary: It's not the sudden outbreak of strange localized rashes that tips off the medics that something might be wrong with the men. What really clues them in is the behavioral changes.

Warning: N/A

Twitch belongs to @gaeasun Pitch belongs to @lost-on-kamino

Prev / Next

[In which the events on Umbara are worsened by an unknown pathogen taking hold of both the 501st and 212th. These series of drabbles will follow a non-linear timeline based on the AI-less Whumptober prompt list for 2023.]

THIS STORY IS ALSO ON AO3

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As soon as the 501st and 212th parted ways, Dogma's bizarre infected rash had all but slipped from the medics's minds. It was, after all, just an unusual blemish that would eventually go away if he used the topical cream he'd been prescribed. A very innocuous matter that would ultimately be rendered as an insignificant footnote on the sergeant's medical records.

At least that had been what they had assumed...

Now that more cases of the same localized lesion had cropped up (all of them fairly freshly afflicted, and less of a mess than what Dogma's own skin had looked like after he'd scratched it raw), they weren't so sure. If anything, they were left confused by this sudden bout of allergic reactions that were plaguing the vode.

That said, as shameful as it was to admit, they hadn't taken it as seriously as they probably should have, when things were still relatively tame. Instead they'd simply tried the same topical cream treatment they'd advised Dogma to follow, and once again hoped for the best.

That had been a huge mistake on their part.

The rashes themselves hadn't really tipped them off to this being a much more grievous event. Umbara was a strange planet with some very strange foliage. Skin allergies caused by the pollen and unusual flora wouldn't be that unexpected, considering none of the clones had really been inoculated against potential environmental hazards from planets that should have been the Republic's allies.

What changed their minds on the seriousness of the outbreak, were the gradual behavioral changes. The state of subdued calmness that kept those who had rashes in a sedate and almost listless manner. The vacancy behind their eyes as they suffered through brief periods of confusion followed by episodes of dissociation.

The men were not in their right minds. Whatever was afflicting them was clearly both physical and neurological. And what's worse, they had very little time to sit down and attempt to diagnose the issue for sure. Their gear far too limited for a more exact analysis.

And especially not when the enemy began to throw everything they had at them, in an attempt to bar any sort of progression they made towards the Umbaran Capitol.

"It can't be an allergy." Coric shook his head as he turned off the small flashlight he'd been using to examine Lichtenberg's absent gaze. The pupils at least seemed to react to the light, and his tear-ducts still worked remarkably well, but otherwise the trooper hadn't shown a modicum of discomfort at being exposed to a sudden bright light. It was like looking at a dead man's eyes. "Meningitis, maybe? We have no idea what we've been breathing in since we landed. A bacterial infection sparked by some kind of airborne fungus might explain things..."

"Then why are only a few of us succumbing?" Kix asked, clearly in disagreement at Coric's assessment. "And why wouldn't our initial scans detect some kind of spore on arrival?"

"And what of the rashes?" Pitch added, pointing towards the listless Lich's neck. "They all start in the exact same place. I could understand the infected rash causing an intense enough fever that they'd become incoherent. But we still have no idea what's causing the rashes themselves, or why the men are reacting so badly to them..."

"It can't be airborne, otherwise we'd all be sick for sure..." Twitch agreed with the two of them, seeming to be just as at a loss for what to think of this. Still he tried to rationalize what could be behind these strange symptoms the sickly troopers had displayed, starting with the highly localized skin abrasion. "Could be a bug bite, maybe? Some kind of mosquito that carries an as of yet unknown tropical disease?"

"That is an option." Sponge nodded. "But it still doesn't explain why there's so few afflicted... We've passed by all kinds of stagnant pools of water and other such breeding grounds for disease carrying insects. Only about 12 of the men got sick."

"Maybe it's rare?" Twitch offered.

"Might as well add that to the list of potential suspects." Coric sighed, bringing up his datapad and glaring at the very limited pool of information they had. They hadn't really managed to compile all that much, since the men all got sick around the same time. "What are we missing?"

"Aside from an actual concrete vector and an identity for our mystery illness?" Kix rolled his eyes. "Medical supplies. A functional medbay. Something less basic than a scanner and field triage..."

"Not to mention a Chancellor that doesn't call our General off planet to do little gods only know what..." Sponge bitterly remarked, still upset at the news that Skywalker was bailing on them and leaving the 501st in some unknown replacement General's hands.

The medics all fell into an uncomfortable silence. An uneasy quiet that was only broken by Lich's incessant scratching at his blighted skin. Attention all turned towards him, there was at least some relief at finding that life had returned to his eyes. Although the absolute look of miserable discomfort wasn't too reassuring.

"Quit scratching, you'll make it worse dipshit!" Sponge huffed, pulling Lich's hands away from the back of his neck.

One might balk at the thought of a medic insulting their patient but, considering the lengthy history both clones shared at this point, it wasn't unusual for Sponge to spit a quick insult at Lich specifically.

It was less of a derogatory term and more of an affectionate jab that was absolutely dripping with concern for Lichtenberg's well being. Sponge was the one who signed off on all of his medical flimsy-work after all. They knew his particular streak of bad luck when it came to injuries out in the field.

This? This was threading new waters for them...

"C-Can't help it... It itches!" Lich gulped uneasily, looking towards their primary medic with something akin to barely restrained fear. "It itches all over!"

The heavy gunner tugged his hands free from their cantankerous vod, and went back to scratching wildly. Only, instead of scratching his neck he was now frantically raking his nails over his back and chest in clear desperation for relief.

Sharing a concerned look, all five medics approached the uncomfortable trooper and pulled the top half of his body-glove down to expose his torso.

To their horror Lichtenberg was right in saying he was itchy all over.

The rash had disseminated downwards and over towards his front. Pus-filled blisters and boils littering the surface of his reddened epidermis, reminding the older medics somewhat of that one time Commander Tano had attempted to cook some kind of quiche recipe from her home-planet, and had ended up with something visually out of a horror holo.

Kix and Coric still gagged at the memory of poorly cooked nuna meat dripping with a disgustingly milky cheese sauce.

"It's spreading..." Twitch whispered, looking somewhat perturbed by the new development.

"Sithspit... Look at his neck..." Pitch pointed in horror.

The initial point where the rash had first appeared looked crusted over. But something was strange about the scabbing process. It didn't look like your regular dried clot. What should have been the familiar dark reddish brown of dried up platelets, looked more like some kind of cluster of black scale-like material.

Sponge squinted at it, seeming to give the stuff a quick visual appraisal, before shaking their head in absolute disbelief at what they were seeing.

"Reminds me of... Of barnacles, almost..." They kept their tone even, but the horror in their words was palpable. "Whatever this is, we definitely need a fully equipped medbay, not just our scanners and medikits... We're in over our heads."

To make things worse, Lich had quieted down again. Stuck in yet another dissociative episode, no doubt. His usually cheery expression completely blank and neutral. Eyes emptier than the void of space.

Whatever this was, was so much more serious than they'd initially thought. No topical cream was going to be a quick fix. Which seemed to dawn on the youngest of them.

"Wait... If Lich is this bad and he's only just recently started feeling sick..." Twitch bit his lip nervously as he looked at his older vode. "T-Then what about Dogma? He came to us with the same rash three days ago..."

Good question, as ever since he'd come to them, they hadn't actually seen much of the sergeant. He wasn't with Tup, who had mostly just been hanging out with Fives and Hardcase. Something which Sponge had commented on briefly that morning.

They had thought it very strange.

Now they were all beginning to worry about his apparent absence. If the more recently afflicted soldiers were this bad off, then what of Dogma who, to their knowledge, was the very first one to come down with the mystery illness? What had become of the sergeant?

[hambrababy]

A Journey Through an Internet Anime Rumor on Takeyuki Kanda

There is a rumor that’s spread about anime director Takeyuki Kanda’s sudden death in 1996 that has nothing to back it up. As best as I can tell, it remains unfounded and almost certainly false. The rumor is that he died in a car crash, but the only available information on Japanese sites doesn’t mention that at all. The oldest source I could find for that rumor was an uncited English Wikipedia article written by an account later banned for bad edits.

The only confirmed detail on Kanda’s death is that he suddenly passed away at the age of 52. That much, at a minimum, is confirmed by an official interview on the VOTOMS website with Ryosuke Takahashi that mentions Kanda’s passing, specifically in its third footnote.

I was (and still am) working on a separate, more fun article about a series of anime image albums, but I got sucked into this rabbit hole over the last few days. I figured I’d tell the story of how this unraveled, as well as share some thoughts on anime rumors in general.

Hey, Maybe Someone Should Check Wikipedia

I was chatting with people from Inka Subs about Vifam, and Ralem, one of the staffers, posted the credits of its 1920’s Chicago gag spinoff OVA short. The credits are in English and contain a bunch of names and inside jokes on the staff involved, and one of them was for the director “Drunkard Kanda”.

Takeyuki Kanda was a seasoned anime director who worked on many shows over his career, and he was Vifam’s series director, hence the shoutout. A tidbit I’d heard through the years and repeated myself was that Kanda died while directing the Gundam: The 08th MS Team OVA because he got into a fatal car accident. Because other staff noted his tendency to drink, that carried the implicit connotation of an alcoholic car crash, which would explain why the OVA had a director change part way through. It’s a short, somewhat dramatic story that gives a grim flourish of sudden crisis to the production of The 08th MS Team.

Except I thought for a second and realized that I wasn’t sure where that detail actually came from. I’d heard it so often, but where did it come from originally? Just to double check, I went to his English Wikipedia page to see if it was sourced there.

It was soon apparent that something was wrong. The Wikipedia page for Kanda was barebones, and it hadn’t been updated since June 13th, 2021. The article at the time had this as its bio paragraph at the start:

None of this information was cited whatsoever. There were no formatted citations, no in-text descriptions, and no links of any kind except external ones to IMDB and ANN. The page had a huge “this article needs additional citations for verification” warning slapped right at the top since 2019, but nothing had been done to fix anything.

I switched over to JP Wikipeda to see if it was listed there. I don’t know Japanese myself, but even from cautiously using both Google Translate and DeepL with the page, there’s no mention there of any sort of car crash, which was also checked by the Inka people who knew Japanese.

I looked back through the history of the page to see where that detail could have possibly come from, and it turned out that unverified detail was there from the page’s inception in 2015. That’s also where I noticed that there was an additional unverified detail about Kanda being “heavily inspired by Stanley Kubrick and Steven Spilberg [sic]” (and 20 days later even added Nicolas Roeg). The user who made that page had not only received warnings from other Wikipedia editors for adding unverified information even before the article was written, but was repeatedly blocked and later permabanned for sockpuppeting, unverified malicious edits, and personally attacking other editors.

Needless to say, the car crash detail is very suspect and unreliable. There’s no reason to believe it’s real based on the existing current evidence. Other Inka members checked through JPN sites with pages about Kanda, and none of them mentioned a car crash. Checking on my own, it’s not mentioned in the Pixiv encyclopedia, the NicoNicoDouga encyclopedia, nor even a fan-site Sunrise encyclopedia. All of those are user generated and don’t have sources themselves, so even the details that are there are unverified.

There is official interview on the VOTOMS website with Ryosuke Takahashi in 2010 where mentions Kanda. The third footnote only confirms that he suddenly passed away at the age of 52 in 1996, with no mention of the cause of death. The note does mention he shared drinks, but there are no further details beyond that.

It’s possible somewhere out there, there’s some obscure contemporaneous Japanese article or coverage where something like that maybe happened. But until any actual proof emerges, there’s no reason to believe the car crash rumor is true, or any of the other details on those JP sites for that matter. The only verifiable detail is that Takeyuki Kanda suddenly passed away at the age of 52 in 1996. If anyone has more reliable information to add to this, please share it.

Other Wrong Listings

The next “official” source I could find for that car crash rumor was ANN’s encyclopedia page on Kanda. The detail has no information on its source unless logged in, but I initially thought it could have maybe had some reputable source.

After logging in, its only listed source was that same Wikipedia article. AniDB's page also has that detail but again only lists Wikipedia as its source.

With all this looking like a mess, I decided to remove that detail from Kanda’s Wikipedia page myself. I also submitted an error report to ANN and to AniDB, both of which are pending at the time of this post.

I decided to later check the 08th MS Team Wikipedia article to correct the information there as well, and that’s where another oddity popped up. It had “citation” on Kanda dying in a car crash, but it was an anime blog that gave me a fake virus warning pop-up ad upon opening. That blog post had no source listed. There was also a link to a different anime blog saying that the episodes were delayed after of Kanda’s death (though they don’t mention the rumor, good on them!), which is at least a more plausible inference based on the release schedule, but still not confirmed. I deleted those sections as well.

I think that rumor is now at least dead on Wikipedia and hopefully soon ANN and AniDB, but by that point it had likely spread for years. I’m thankful people shared my description of this on Twitter, but that’s still a small subset of a niche of a niche on an unrepresentative website. Who knows how far that unconfirmed detail has spread?

Something Was Wrong on the Internet

Despite my attempt to tell this somewhat as a story, all of this was rather basic. Checking a Wikipedia article to see if it has a citation takes seconds. Even with blunt use of auto-translator software, which itself is very imperfect even in the most narrow and careful possible circumstances, checking JP Wikipedia and other bio sites had no mention of anything close to an auto accident. Finding reliable anime information is a thankless task, but doing the most basic fact-checking to see if a detail has a confirmed source is relatively simple. Anything unsourced on Wikipedia is always suspect, and even things with sources there need checking to see what they’re linking too.

It’s commendable that English staff databases and editable encyclopedias even exist, but those also have structural issues. On ANN, you can’t see the source listed for something unless you’re logged in, which seems like a rather serious flaw for a public encyclopedia that’s the most public-facing source of Anime staff information aside from smaller sites like AniDB and AniList. Having an editor manually approve changes is a good deterrent from false info getting posted, but it does make it harder to speedily correct things aside from using error reports to put tiny red warning circles.

As much of a weird obsession this has been for me over the last few days, and as much as it feels good to see this attempt at a correction getting shared, it is still emblematic of a larger problem.

Wrong and misleading information is a longstanding issue in English anime fandom and companies, especially when communication was more limited, but even the long-debunked ones remain nigh-unkillable even now. How many times has the “Ghost Stories flopped” rumor been spread even though it was totally wrong? Or the rumor about where Toriyama “intended” for Dragon Ball to end that’s not only inaccurate across the board but also includes outright hoaxes? Or the lacking knowledge about the anime production process as a whole?

Even from my own experiences, small details can cause these kinds of issues if they remain unchecked. A few 0079 mecha on the Gundam Wiki had to have their articles reformatted because their model numbers were lifted from made-up details posted to Japanese Wikipedia years ago from a doujin site, including the Gaw and the Dopp (thanks to editors MatokoLee and SuperFeatherYoshi for pointing these out!). The Dopp one was copied into the Wiki in 2011, but no one had bothered to verify them for so long because there was no immediate reason to suspect they were wrong. This isn’t as egregious as the prior examples since all the tech specs for mecha are fictional (and sometimes contradictory), but even the tiniest pieces of incorrect anime info can linger on for years.

I won’t give other specific rumors any more oxygen, but this still happens with tons of recent shows. One detail from an interview or one comment from an animator on twitter can get spun into something totally unfounded from the original basis of what they were trying to say, and then those misconceptions only get more repeated and exaggerated the more users and sites they pass through.

To some extent, a certain amount of this is inevitable given the language and cultural barrier for English anime fandom. But since anime has grown far wider from its initial niche, it’s almost even easier for bad information to spread quickly while corrections and actual well-researched information can’t catch up. Running actual news and press sites is challenging as online news faces many economic struggles, and there’s little incentive for individuals or influencer-type people to concern themselves with accuracy. It’s easy, and frankly more entertaining, to mythologize about so many aspects of anime production and history, to spread speculation, or to share funny or gripping details that sound true enough while never bothering to do the most basic checking on any of them.

I sometimes wonder if it is possible to make some kind of website cataloging and debunking common anime misconceptions and rumors. Kazenshuu’s rumor guide is the most comprehensive in debunking anime-related rumors, even if it’s only for Dragon Ball. Wikizilla’s misconceptions page (thanks Chungris!) is also another good example, as is TFWiki’s  “urban legends” page. But there needs to be a way more centralized way to broadcast these kinds of rumor-debunkings rather than individual people happening to find them years later.

The obvious takeaway from all this is for people to be more cautious, which seems straightforward enough, but that only gets so far. My blither takeaway is that more people, myself included, should just learn Japanese. There’s a whole world of anime magazines, interviews, websites, and more that could clear up tons of longstanding rumors and even provide new details never accessible beyond Japan before, but so much remains untranslated. I have paid people to translate things I really wanted to access before (thanks Windii!), but realistically that’s an expense I can’t incur that frequently.

Life is already getting busy for me, but I think there’s merit to devoting enough time to learn some Japanese. Anime is a hobby, but it’s a hobby I love and want to learn as much as I can. Relying so much on secondhand info spread through random people, having to use flawed and unreliable auto-translate programs to skim websites, or being lucky enough to know fansubbers with actual Japanese knowledge isn’t a sustainable substitute for actually knowing things.

Learning Japanese wouldn’t fix everything. Bad information and rumors still spread among JP fans too. Even official sources from companies can intentionally mislead, while faulty memoirs and recollections from animators can get things wrong. But the English anime community needs more serious, verifiable (and far less scattered) work on sourcing anime history and news. If any of us can move that needle and stop wrong info from spreading, then that’s already more valuable than any amount of casual waffling, opinionating, and speculation that only begets more wrong information.

So be the annoying pedant who asks where someone got the detail they’re sharing. Don’t spread something that sounds too neat and simple without bothering to check. Don’t take anything for granted. Learn Japanese and look things up yourself. Demand better of others and yourself.

By the way, this shouldn’t overshadow Kanda’s extensive career in anime. I haven’t finished Vifam yet, but I highly recommend it. Watch the shows Kanda worked on and played a huge role in shaping. Let that be his legacy.

Postscript: Some Better Sources

This is by no means an exhaustive list and I don’t mean to snub anyone, but I figured I’d at least post a few people I know are more thorough with things to steer this post towards a better direction.

Regarding Gundam, I can recommend Mark Simmons’ UC-focused website, Feez’s Turn A blog, and the translations on the Zeonic Website. They have lots of old interviews and production details translated that are invaluable for understanding the behind-the-scenes of Gundam.

For anime production information more generally, I can recommend the Full Frontal team and the SakugaBlog/Booru team. They’re doing some of the best active work in covering current anime creators and detailing the current state of the industry with high quality translations and original reporting of their own.

Windii has been an immense help for me in the past, and she’s actively soliciting to translate and preserve tons of anime (and lots of Sonic) related stuff.

This is with the clarification that I don’t watch anime youtubers, but I can at least say MercuryFalcon has some very well-sourced videos, especially his Toei Fushigi Comedy one.

None of these are perfect, but they do a solid job of translating information that I’d like to see more of. Again, apologies if I forgot or don’t know about other people, but I figured I’d shout out a few of the ones I do know.

[queenofbaws]

oooh! May I have a (Control) Trench/Northmoor thing? Been a while and I loved what you did last time. Preferably something soft and light-hearted?

(I'm currently too clammed up and angsty and generally blah to write anything, so *someone* has to do it.) <3

catch me catching up on some not-quite-six sentence sat(or)sunday!

The interdepartmental bulletin had gone over like a lead balloon - at least in the executive suite. Its phrasing had been cheerful, almost irreverent, peppering in all the buzzwords du jour: synergy, community, appreciation, morale, describing the exercise as everything but what it actually was.

A bad idea.

Trench had seen the surveys go out - neat, painstakingly organized things they were - and for a good week after the copy machine had cooled off, each pneumatic THWOOP! of an incoming mail tube made him wince. There was no way in hell this didn't break bad, no. Way. In. Hell.

Yearbook superlatives were still yearbook superlatives by any other name; and maybe he wasn't some high-falutin' expert on the matter, but he was pretty damn sure this sort of juvenile popularity contest counted as archetypal, no matter how wild and/or wacky the categories were.

Whoever's idea this little team building exercise had been, well...he hoped they realized they were playing with fire. If not metaphorically, tempting the Oldest House with a tasty morsel of iconography, then, uh, literally. They might literally find themselves set aflame.

The thought occurred to him again when the day finally came and he found himself standing in front of the corkboard in the Executive wing, his eyes moving with slow, calculated saccades across the pages of dot-matrix printing posted up there. Perhaps, he thought - perhaps - they'd skirted the Oldest House's wrath through careful consideration (the sides of each sheet torn off perfectly at the perforations, the proper usage of an even number of Bureau-issued nondescript thumbtacks, the wise omission of any of those digital smiley faces the younger agents seemed so fond of those days), but he'd seen Broderick's name on the list. He'd seen the title he'd been awarded.

No one was out of the frying pan yet.

Like the cliche alone betrayed him, a familiar warmth filled the room. Without glancing away from the list, Trench swirled the (now steaming) coffee in his mug and took a sip. "Director," he said by way of greeting, not without the faintest upward tick to the corner of his mouth.

"Had one of these in high school, you know," Northmoor answered, all bluster and proud swagger as he joined Trench at the corkboard. "Most likely to succeed. You believe that? Like somehow, in someway, the whole graduating class was prescient. Who woulda thunk, huh? Oh, if only they knew..."

Ah. All right. There he'd been, expecting the water coolers to be bubbling over while the wallpaper glue melted off the damn drywall, and yet there was Broderick, grinning like the cock of the walk. Trench was still fully, fully of the opinion that this whole mess had been a bad idea - an awful one, really - but now he added an asterisk to that thought, a footnote down at the very bottom of his mental write-up of the scene:

The superlatives had been a bad idea.*

*But funny, too.

With his mug, he gestured towards the corkboard, offhandedly asking, "You've seen it already, then?"

"On my way in, yeah," Northmoor answered, folding his arms and squaring his shoulders in a self-assured stance as endearing as it was obnoxious. "Great way to start the day - really puts a spring in your step, doesn't it? Seeing how the rest of them think of us?"

Trench hummed a soft "Mhm" of agreement into his coffee, experience having taught him to savor it now, while he had the chance. Soon enough, he suspected, that wouldn't be the case.

"You hardly sound enthusiastic about it. Here, what'd they give you? Hmm...Zachariah...Zachari - ah, there you are!" His finger traced its way down the list from a safe distance, the paper darkening in a spot or two along the way. "Most likely to benefit from a vacation. Ha! Hey, you have to hand it to them, they're not wrong." Without waiting for a response, he continued, obviously just excited to share his own title. "Try not to look so grim about it, Deputy. I mean, it's not what I was voted, but c'mon...not everyone can be Hottest in the Bureau."

Echoing himself, Trench once more hummed in agreement. "True," he said flatly, hoping against hope there wasn't anything on his face suggesting how close he was to snickering. "You'll have to excuse my candor for saying so, but I don't think anyone here has a leg to stand on if they argue you're not the hottest one in the Bureau. That's just simple fact."

He waited. That probably made him as much a part of the problem as whoever it was who'd put the surveys out in the first place, but he did it. Trench waited until Northmoor turned to look at him, his grin sideways and shining and perfectly fetching; Trench waited for that very moment, and then, perfectly calm, fanned himself with the case file he'd been holding in his other hand.

The grin didn't drop all at once. But it dropped. Doubt flared in Broderick's eyes, then realization, then fury, then actual honest-to-god embers. The room positively wilted in the ensuing heat pouring off of him as he whirled around, shouting at some poor pencil pusher to "GET ME THE NAME OF WHATEVER CLOWN THOUGHT THIS COCKAMAMIE BULLSHIT UP," and Trench? Why, he loosened his tie. Kept fanning himself. He set his coffee mug down as its contents began to boil, and he forced himself to admit maybe there was a bit of truth behind those superlatives after all.

He probably wouldn't get a suntan from watching Broderick burst into flame upon realizing the whole Bureau had joined together to make a horrific pass at wordplay at his expense, but the ambient heat he was putting off was the closest he'd come to a tropical vacation in at least ten years, and if he was honest with himself...yeah, yeah, he was benefiting from it, all right.

[inkykeiji]

currently missing tag!tomu so much!!! i keep rereading the little facts post you made about him a while back and aaaaaa i just love him so so so much!! are there any more facts and/or stuff you can share about him? luv u clari hope you’re having an amazing night eeee

ah i miss him, too!!! >.< hmmmm okay, i can give you a couple of silly lil facts about him.

⁎ he is the eldest out of everyone in his group of friends, but this isn’t why he feels such an immense duty to ultimately taking care of and protecting all of them. this responsibility he has imposed on himself stems from two different places: 1. he thinks he is the most mentally sound, intelligent, and stable out of all of them and thus feels like he has an obligation to keep an eye out for them, and 2. he is by far the richest and wealthiest out of all of them.

⁎ since he bleeds gold, he will very often offer to pay for things for his friends, especially when they don’t have a lot of money left or are waiting for their next payday (y’know, that stretch of a couple of days before you get paid again). he gets extremely offended, almost unreasonably so, when they refuse his help, as if it’s some sort of personal attack on him, and he will often force them to take his money.

⁎ a secret: dabi doesn’t know, and he will never know, but once he started seriously dating reader, tomura began adding juuust a little extra cash to dabi’s ‘paycheques’, every extra cent given taken directly from tomura’s personal allowance. he doesn’t do this for reader, knowing she too comes from a comfortable background and has her own allowance afforded to her every month, he does this for dabi, now knowing that he has another mouth to feed and dreams of being the sole provider for reader. and he does so in a sly and strategic way, gradually increasing the amount paid every month—enough to make a difference, but not enough to be suspicious.

⁎ on that ^ note, he’s a bit of a bleeding heart under it all (a characteristic taken exactly from canon tenko). he feels so very deeply for those he cares about, but he also feels deeply for randoms on the street, animals, any living thing suffering a hardship. this is one of the reasons he never does deliveries (the other being that he doesn’t have to). this is also why he decides to go see keigo himself, and why he sticks around after keigo shoots up. he cannot, in good conscious, leave him alone to suffer the consequences of his own actions—and this is a part of tomura that he hates about himself. his father says it makes him weak and susceptible.

⁎ he sees his friends, his found family, as belonging to him, which only adds to the desire to take care of them in every way feasible. he owns them, they are his.

⁎ he reads philosophy books for fun, and will often become hyper-fixated on the most random theories, rabidly consuming every piece of literature and scholarship that he can get his hands on, then will proceed to regurgitate the information to you, complete with his own footnotes and criticisms.

⁎ i’ve already noted that he’s pretentious in a previous ask pertaining to him, but his pretentiousness extends to his taste in video games as well. more often than not, dabi and jin have no fucking clue what game tomura’s going on about because it is so goddamn obscure and abstractly artistic. (and yes, tomura thinks he is better than them for playing such artsy games instead of consuming the popular junk).

⁎ tomura collects strays—the rejects of society, the oddballs exiled to the fringes due to their own trauma—because he himself is a stray who got lucky, adopted into a filthy rich household. in a way, he feels a subconscious pull to pay it forward, but he himself doesn’t even recognize this (def goes back to his inherent big hearted nature).

[tossawary]

Love Third Transmigrator Mobei Mom!! The comedy of the situation is so good.

Vital info though, if we can ask, would the third Transmigrator be a fan of Shang Quinhau (like casual) or another “fan” like Shen yuan?

Thank you! Honestly, my current notes have this Third Transmigrator as not really being a fan at all, because I thought that would be the funniest third option to Airplane Bro (the author) and Peerless Cucumber (#1 anti-fan). Also, I thought it suited someone in the position of Mobei-Jun's parent, from the position of Mobei-Jun not knowing WTF is going on with Shang Qinghua EVER.

My dad has spent the past year or so reading a LOT of webtoons, manhuas, mangas, whatever, and so we've had a few conversations about xianxia and wuxia and harem and isekai stuff. He says that quite a few of them seem to be based on web novels.

So, I thought it would be funny if someone (probably an actual fan of PIDW) attempted to make a graphic novel for PIDW, then some English-speaking rando reads the unofficial English translation of the unofficial graphic novel for PIDW. There are probably only 30 chapters at most and ENG Rando didn't read the last 5 because they got bored when the harem stuff continued even inside the Abyss. Luo Binghe wasn't even the Demon Emperor yet. Mobei-Jun hasn't even shown up yet, except maybe in the bonus art at the back, and ENG Rando thought MBJ was the artist's OC or something.

(Also: Chapter 13 was just Chapter 12 posted twice to the shitty online manga website for some reason. Chapter 21 and Chapter 22 were posted in reverse order. And the translators changed like six different times. The second translator was really fond of not translating some basic nouns in favor of adding a billion footnotes. The third translator kept writing/typoing Luo Binghe as "Lou Bingo" and this lasted for 10 chapters. Chapter 8 was only translated into Spanish and so Google Translate was needed. These are the problems of a foreign webtoon reader.)

ENG Rando only read this because it was listed first on the "NEWEST UPDATES!!!" list and they liked the art. And then it started to be a Sunk Cost sort of thing. Then morbid curiosity.

ENG Rando transmigrates because they died in a car crash on the way to work or something, still thinking about PIDW. Even the System was not expecting this. Neither Airplane Bro nor Shen Yuan have transmigrated yet. ENG Rando gets a kind of crappy personal System until the Senior System can work things out, and maybe this Junior System isn't even fitted with a proper English Language pack for whatever reason, so ENG Rando and their Junior System have to communicate mostly through emojis.

ENG Rando is assigned the temporary role of "Beta 2". This is interpreted by some of the characters they meet as "Beida" (which is a fanon name used for Mobei-Jun sometimes, because it's a rival university to the one Shang Qinghua's name sounds like).

Later, when MBJ is forced to introduce SQH and maybe also SQQ (Shen Yuan) to his mother and the transmigration thing is known by all three transmigrators, Airplane Bro has to suffer his future mother-in-law saying about the unofficial graphic novel of PIDW in a heavy English accent: "I was worried that I was accidentally reading hentai. You wrote 20 million words of that?"

[ysabeauwilce]

there's only one bed

thinking how i adore the only one bed trope the forced intimacy the lying breathless so close so far thinking do i dare will they dare what will happen breathing in the same air the rustle of sheet an exterior effigy interior roiling i have to say its probably my all time favorite trope

which is why i find it so hilarious within the context of OFMD because mostly throughout history there truly only one fucking bed! (if there was a bed at all--lots of pallets on the floor back in the day). historical blackbeard and stede bonnet probably never slept alone in their entire lives, siblings, servants, spouses, slaves, parents, even rich people shared beds because beds (furniture and fixings) themselves such a scarce and fabulous commodity that people actually bequeathed them in their wills, as famously shakespeare did with his second best bed.

perhaps the most famous there's only one bed in all of literature:

"'But avast," he added, tapping his forehead, "you haint no objections to sharing a harpooneer's blanket, have ye? I s'pose you are a goin' a whaling, so you'd better get used to that sort of thing.'"

No footnotes we die like Badmintons but of course that's from Moby Dick (and yeah I'm aware that the next two pages are reasons why people don't like to share beds but we're talking the middle of the 19th century and separate beds were starting to be a thing)...(along with worries about sanitation sexual purity etc.)

I had it in mind to write a fic where Stede has never slept alone and isn't about to start now (sort of like Lincoln forcing his secretary to sleep with him when Mary was away) so he makes Lucius sleep with him instead. When Ed finds out about *that* oh does a plan start form in his tactical genius brain.

But I didn't write it because I'm lazy. Someone else should. It's a great idea.

I give it to you.

[talesofsorrowandofruin]

Fun Fact Friday

Thanks for tagging me, @jessica-writes22! :D This is a great idea!

Rules: List as many fun facts about your OCs, writing process, or WIPs as you want. I’ll do this for the Death series, since I haven’t talked much about it on Tumblr:

Originally the story was a gender-flipped retelling of Hades and Persephone. Another major influence was the German musical Elisabeth, which is where I got the idea of Death following multiple generations of royalty around.

The setting was very vague during the outlining and first few chapters. At first I imagined a pseudo-Victorian England setting. (Some hints of this remain in the gas lamps and airships.) About ten chapters into book 1 I decided to swap the pseudo-English setting for a pseudo-Chinese one, inspired by my love of fantasy and historical Cdramas. And along the way I considered a pseudo-Japanese setting inspired by my love of Takarazuka; hints of this survive in names like Rurika.

Speaking of names, I had fun adding references only I’m likely to understand. Emperor Zizhen, mentioned only in a footnote, is named after Ouyang Zizhen from Mo Dao Zu Shi/The Untamed. Rurika is named after retired Takarazuka actress Miya Rurika. Zenda, the province Gialma comes from, is named after The Prisoner of Zenda. And Tinuviel, of course, is a Tolkien reference.

Death is the easiest character to write, and Kilan is the hardest. Gialma, Varan and Kiroshnoy are my favourites to write.

Gialma was originally supposed to be just a typical would-be usurper. When I actually started to write him I found he wasn’t like that at all. And sort of accidentally he became the character who’s most like me: we’re both shy and terrible at socialising.

Malish is based partly on Calormen from The Chronicles of Narnia and partly on the historical Ottoman empire. Nirne’s name is based on Narnia but it’s inspired by imperial Russia.

Like most of my WIPs I came up with the story as I wrote it. So if you think something comes out of nowhere, that’s because it does.

[kimberlyannharts]

I genuinely think if Boom’s going to make an effort to tie its lore together like they did in MMPR 104 they NEED to start adding those footnotes like [*as seen in (insert issue/book here)!] because the series has gone on for SO long and its lore is spread between so many different series and spin-off books that it’s almost impossible to keep straight without some sort of guide.  ESPECIALLY when some lore contradicts what’s been established before, so a guide would help make it clear what exactly is canon and what’s been retconned

[stormblessed95]

I am the tarot anon and thank you for answering and for clarifying the word's meaning as I said what I found and I admit I was wrong-word but still my point about the tarot stands as the reader said that on a outer conscious level it is very equal but on a subconscious/soul level it is much like a parent child or brother relationship and in fact JM sort of stops JK from growing up on an soul level which she said is not there consciously also JM is jealous of JK on a soul level. want JK 2 B happy

Bro. Sending me this 4 times doesn't make it any less irrelevant. You are relaying on tarot reading of someone who did not consent nor have their energy open to reading instead of on ACTUAL content. If you believe in tarot reading you should KNOW that is not the way to get an accurate reading, even if long distance readings are done and possible, it's still done with the other person being aware of and open to being read, making it so that your energies can connect. That's the ONLY way to get any semblance of accurate reading. I'm assuming this tarot reader did not actually have any semblance of participation from jikook in anyway.

Glad you can at least admit you were wrong there too. I highly suggest you educate yourself further too. Jimin is not jealous of JK, rather he is his biggest hype man, and vice versa too. He also is the one who encouraged him to debut as a singer and not quit to just be a dancer. JK mentions often how he looks up to Jimin and learns from him. Jimin encourages JK to try new things and to simply be himself. He HELPS him grow and encourages him to do the things he wants to do. And their relationship is far from brotherly or parental. Again, you don't have to think it's romantic, but if you think that the things they do together is typical of a parent child relationship, or a sibling relationship, message me. We can figure out where you live and who you should contact because if these are the actions you associate with your siblings or parents, I am extremely concerned for your home life. Like at the very least say they are best friends with questionable boundaries. That is at least true.

Look, again, because I'm so nice, for the they aren't acting like brothers research you should go do, ill help you get started again here, where these are things that are definitely not brotherly:

Skinship moments that are just again, definitely NOT brotherly:

Moments that are just full of sexual tension and are NOT brotherly or parental:

I am NOT going to keep doing this with you though. If you choose to believe a stranger over the members, that's fine I guess. You do you. It's weird, but that's on you. If you read these and want to CONTINUE re-educating yourself, don't send another ask, feel free to go through my masterlist. Feel free to DM as long as you aren't going to keep using tarot as proof they are brothers or anything else. I promise, I'm much nicer in explaining things if you come out of anon and sound less like a troll.

Good luck.