#I tried to make a bit of an amalgamation of the books and games

[nosleeppotions]

This was a stupid idea and he'll surely be shot, Artyom concludes as he put on the gasmask he had... borrowed... from his adoptive father, making his way through the vaguely familiar old tunnel. It had been much easier to get through to here when he and his friends were children, but as always he manages.

Once again he finds himself wondering if it would have been easier if he had just told Uncle Sasha everything and had just been honest, a thought that seems to follow him through both lifetimes but Artyom will acknowledge (just this once) that he's nothing less than stubborn.... not to mention his adoptive father will surely think he's lost his mind and would have stopped him... Artyom also had no particular desire to wait for Hunter to show up either, as much as he had idolized the man in his last life and even a little bit now he knew well enough that Hunter was not a man of reason.

Not in matters like this.

The air seems to grow colder the closer Artyom gets to the opening, almost freezing as he finally crawls through. Every hair stands on end, every instinct telling him to turn back and run, almost unable to push himself back to his feet with how much his hands were shaking, his arms and legs feeling weak.

Artyom feels the presence of the Dark Ones long before he actually sees their tall forms. Just because he knew they weren't malicious did not mean Artyom was comfortable, his entire body threatening to tremble and not from the cold no, honestly he could barely feel the frost nipping at him compared to the chill running internally. It takes a lot not to flinch as one reaches for him, his trip through their station's hospital flashing in the back of his mind despite knowing they meant him no harm. Were human minds really meant to comprehend their brothers on the surface? Were they meant to be heard by everyone?

"Artyom." The words enter his mind, for a moment his vision goes hazy, his head throbbing slightly at what felt like an intrusion but he doesn't fight it, he lets the Dark Ones speak and poke through his mind as they wish, deciding he's better off focusing on the ground than the people around him. Because they are people, people that looked like someone tried to recreate humans from a horrible memory and failing miserably, but people none the less. They were as Uncle Sasha would say, the next step in evolution, more equipped than the people of the Metro will ever be for the surface.

"You came back."

Artyom's mouth felt dry, it takes a moment to comprehend, to work up the nerve to think much less make a sound.... had he spoken a word at all since waking up in this... second life?

".... I... do not think the people are ready to accept you..." He finally manages out after a long uncomfortable stretch of silence, nearly jumping out of his skin when he feels hands on his shoulders and back, but that only lasts for a moment, strangely feeling much safer among the Dark Ones than in the Metro, a warmth partially replacing the chill of nerves. His instincts were split in two, one side wanting to flee and the other wanting to stay, to learn.

He didn't want them to leave like the survivors had to last time, even less did he want the ones here to be blown up like last time. Part of him feels like he should be angry with them, they had killed many of his station's people, as unintentional as it was... but really he only finds himself full of acceptance, it's not like humans hadn't killed them in turn as well. But as much as he wanted them to stay, to help humans adapt, to learn and perhaps thrive together... he find himself thinking about his first journey through the Metro all those years ago, a journey that didn't happen yet. He thinks of all the stations, the factions, most importantly the Spartans... and most dreadfully Polis, he can think of very few people that would listen to reason much less accept that the Dark Ones only wanted to help and that none of the harm was fully intentional, especially while he's still a nobody and the only reason he wasn't a nobody anymore last time is because he helped to stop the Dark Ones.... what a mess he's stepped in.

Whoever thought of Time Travel and that he was a good candidate, he truly hopes they get eaten by a Demon.

[i-am-worm]

(This is an old idea I had for Quarians here, I just think Tali looks adorable in this old pic, lol).

Today's inktober word is 'Nomadic' and this made me think about Quarians in the game Mass Effect. And to my self-imposed horror, I realized I never bothered uploading my ideas for what they looked like back in the day. I went through a phase like that. I did lots of stuff back in 2010 and never really uploaded it...Possibly for the best, as it looks pretty rough in places now, but I did want to share some of my ideas before I upload my more current version from today.

I did at least upload my concepts for the Volus and the Raloi though (two other unseen races in game, one is coved up, and the latter just mentioned in other media). You can see them here:

Quarians are masked aliens in game and back in the day, I had to have my graphic settings turned WAY down in order to play mass effect. Have my low graphic crunchy Shepard

Because of that, I never saw the two glowing eyes or slightly human nose bridge reflection you can see in a normal setting. So I had in mind an alien species that somewhat resembled the Geth - a race of AI the Quarians themselves made:

So I was picturing something with one eye, armour and maybe even mandibles? So here is my first go:

BUT later on, when I played Mass Effect 2 on a better pc, I was disappointed that you could see a bit of a human face. No matter- I could still work with this.

MORE BELOW so I don't clog up your feed with ancient quarian debates I should have posted a decade ago, lol.

So I got to playing around with ideas, using my old ones. I mean- Quarians are mentioned to be attractive to Turians and later Javik mentions that ancient Quarins looked attractive. And they look like this:

So definitely not very human....right?

One thing I also noticed was that male Quarians have a flat nose compared to females, almost like a muzzle. (screenshots are mine, the model I downloaded back in the day and can no longer find a source sadly)

And that made me think about the sci-fi trope of cat people.

Seriously, these are just some of the books on my bookshelf that contain sci-fi cat people, and that's the ones I could find off the top of my head:

It makes sense; Mass Effect is a bit of an amalgamation of sci-fi tropes into new ideas. You have the insect race (Turains), Warring tank race (Krogun), the classic 'Grays' (Salarians), Animal-like with tentacles (Hanar), The 'sexy human female but a colour' (Asari). etc. etc. yadda yadda.

So I sat down and tried to design something that sort of encompassed all these ideas, Geth-like, attractive to Turians, Javik and maybe even humans...and a little bit of space cat thrown in.

So this was my first idea that I meant to upload back in 2012.

I think I wasn't happy with the body and I had meant to come back to it. I had over the next few years dabble din other sketches, even going back to the drawing board on the face.

I think what stopped me was the things we learned from Mass Effect 3. If you romance the Quarian Tali, you can see a photo of her face!...

...they were purple humans.

LAME.

But recently, The legendary edition took the critique on board and revamped the picture to the one on the right. Now they look ...even MORE human.

EVEN MORE LAAAAME.

Utter disappointment. Now I always knew that if Bioware revealed the Quarian face they would disappoint some people, but this was such a missed opportunity to design something unique. Bioware did they that they were worried if it was too alien, it would be hard for cosplayers to dress up? But come on, cosplayers love a challenge and will overcome anything. We knew they had two eyes and a nose bridge, it didn't have to be too alien, just alien enough.

TALI RAGE.

BUT the best answer is to REJECT CANNON.

And in a moment I'll upload my more updated Quarian idea.

[uhohbestie]

hey besties i have fanfic-themed but not directly plot-related questions! well, mostly

question 1) do yall have any favorite zombie media? was there anything in particular that yall are drawing on for your fic?

personally i've been scared of zombie movies all my life lol but because of tamn i've finally been trying to finish the world war z audiobook? (the last time i tried getting thru it was pre covid which has been. a weird experience) it's fully voice acted and i like it so far! super different from the 2013 movie with brad pitt

question 2) :3 do you guys think you'd be up to talk about the no-apocalypse au where scarian get to have a normal breakup someday? :3 it doesn't have to be now or anytime soon but i'd be into hearing about it!

anyways hope yall are having a good day lock and key ^_^

These are some really REALLY good questions!!!

for starters! for me (Lock) I actually didn't start watching zombie media until Key introduced me to it! We watched the Korean series All Of Us Are Dead together, and then followed it with Last Of Us (the tv adaptation) and the first seasons of The Walking Dead, so I've have a very curated window into zombie media (actually! We watched Walking Dead as research for TAMN, because Key wanted to make sure I understood what hordes of zombies in cities look like!)

As for Key's zombie exposure (lol): I (Key) WAS BIG INTO ZOMBIES GROWING UP!! Constant zombie media consumption--probably one of my earliest hyperfixations ngl I feel like what we're drawing on while we write TAMN is an amalgamation of all our favourite bits from the things we've seen together, as well as some of my favourite formative zombie medias while growing up.

The Walking Dead Season 1 remains like, one of my all-time favourite seasons of any television show ever, so that's definitely a big influence. (Some of the later seasons get a lot less of my love LOL) The Korean movie Train to Busan is also a popular one you may have heard of--I'd definitely recommend giving that a go if you're okay with zombie media that veer on the side of tragic. When The Last of Us (Part One) came out, it quickly became my favourite zombie-oriented video game, though a lot of its predecessors (Resident Evil series esp.) really gripped me (even though it took me ages to play-through cuz they would scare the shit out of me LMAO) Its TV show is also an excellent adaptation, so if you're not into playing it or watching a Let's Play, the show is a good bet! The UK series In the Flesh was also an interesting look into After™ the apocalypse, and though it was cancelled after it's second season, it's also worth a watch for a fresh perspective on zombie media. 28 Days Later was an excellent movie and ofc Dawn of the Dead is a classic. And then the usual comedies like Shaun of the Dead, Zombieland, etc.

I saw World War Z as a movie but never read the book! I should def give it a try--idk why I never did! God, honestly I could ramble about zombie media forever if given the chance 😂 None of this even begins to cover the sheer amount of zombie comics I read. I was very much a "webcomic" era kid, so a lot of my favourite old original zombie comics are either offline now or I simply don't remember what they were called anymore, so I have no way to track them down :( I did recently enjoy the webtoon Boyfriend of the Dead as a light-hearted, humourous read, but there were a lot of gripping, nuanced, plot-heavy original comics like a decade ago that I loved and I wish I could link. ANYWAYS. I'LL STOP MYSELF HERE AND LET LOCK ANSWER QUESTION NUMBER 2 LMAO

HI IT'S LOCK. I'M BACK. Now, as for a non-apocalypse Scarian scenario, we've actually thought about this a LOT! One of our favourite things to do is make an AU, and then multiple "what if one key things was different" spinoffs of the same AU.

We're gonna put this under a read-more, in case you'd like to keep the "what if" a mystery forever, but to sum up:

In an alternate reality where Scar and Grian break up and then the zombie apocalypse doesn't happen........ they stay broken up! Scar gets what he longs for in the fic: time away from Grian to hurt and grieve and heal with the support of his close friends who care about him.

It takes him a while until he feels ready to date again, but Scar does eventually start a new relationship with someone he knows really well, and has loved and trusted for a long time. They get engaged and start planning their wedding..............

............. and then Grian comes back and says he's sorry, that he misses Scar, that he was wrong, and that he doesn't want to be without him. And Scar................... takes him back.

It's-- listen, it's not the best possible outcome! But we're basing heavily on the Life Series Scarian dynamic, which is itself incredibly nuanced and complicated and tragic and a little bit "you're both bad for each other." It's part soulmates, and it's part codependence, and it's partly killing the person you love with your bare hands alone in the desert, and how that guilt ends up haunting you into every other subsequent timeline. Grian's not the best person for Scar as he is, and Scar's not the best person for Grian, but they want to be with each other, and unfortunately that desire often overrides common sense.

As for what happens after that.... we don't know yet! It was a thought experiment we worked through and ultimately realised "oh, it's WAY better for them that the zombies DID happen in the long run, 'cause without them this would be awful." (Not that the zombies are great, but woof......... Scarian, c'mon.) In this version of events, they lose a lot of friends when Scar takes Grian back, and the isolation suits Scar poorly. It takes them a much longer time to work through how to be good for one another. If the zombie apocalypse was good for anything, it was forcing a reckoning of what they wanted and how to get it--the only other option was death. Without that hanging over their heads, it takes Scarian years to reach any sort of resolution, which (no spoilers but) takes TAMN!Scarian a much shorter amount of time to get to.

Hope that answers your question! The 'what ifs' are our favourite, so we love to ramble about them hahaha <3

[starr-fall-knight-rise]

Humans are Space Orcs, “What Happened.”

Sorry for any issues this one might have, but I am trying to write it between flights and and scrambling to find a plug that will work, so I hope you like it anyway, and I hope it answers some questions you have 

Three months leave

IT was going to take an extra three months  before the ship would be ready for launch. Even as they spoke, it was docked at the Europa station as they put on the final finishing touches. Until then, it had been Commander Vir’s job to go through files on the personnel he wanted aboard his new crew.

He had suggested some alien additions to make the crew more diverse, which the GA had loved considering that the ship was an amalgamation of both human and alien technology. It had Rundi communications systems, Celzex weaponry, Vrul shields, and  a Tesraki warp core. The design otherwise was completely human. But for those reasons, the project was obviously very time consuming, and they were lucky that it was going to be finished in as little a time as it was.

Sunny hadn’t seen Adam very much in the last month or so considering that he had been working hard to find an extra five hundred members for his crew, and speak with the brass about what he had seen on the other side of the wormhole.

Sunny knew that it was important that Adam do his job, but a part of her was annoyed they hadn’t been able to speak properly since getting back.

Instead, she was stuck in base housing on the cost, alone and with nothing to do aside from long walks on the beach. She had never been the the beach beforehand as anin didn’t have any substantial bodies of water like that, at least near her, and there was something about the endless water that unsettled her. Even Krill and Conn were off doing important things. Krill was giving his services to a level one trauma center in New York, and Conn was helping the base MPs conduct polygraph tests, though he had sort of replaced the polygraph.

That left Sunny alone most days to think.

She hadn’t gotten over Adam’s disappearance, and not how he had tricked her, pushing her from the bridge before turning around and preparing himself for death. She felt a bit cheated, and like a decision had been made for her. She wasn’t stupid, logically she knew that is what she would have done if she were in his place, so she couldnt fault him for that, though she still coudln’t help feeling hurt over it.

And these thoughts she was left to stew on, tossing and turning in the quiet of the night while everyone else was out and busy.

Needless to say she didn’t expect the little bell on her front door to ring late one evening, and when she opened the door she certainly didn’t expect to see Adam waiting on her front porch.

HE was smiling, though the skin around his face and neck were already flushed a light pink with embarrassment.

In his arms, he held a large collection of flowers.

“May I come in?”

“Adam!” Her surprise was a bit delayed 

He shuffled his feet, “I uh, I got the go ahead to take the day off so I…. thought I would see you.”

He shifted again.

He looked better now than he had on returning from his ordeal, face clean-shaven and in clean clothes that actually fit, though she had to admit his cave-man look hadn’t been so bad.

She stepped aside, and he tentatively followed.

She closed the door and he turned to face her, “I uh…. um … well I…. flower…. Or I mean, I got you, flowers I…… Bought some, but also picked…. some ….. I not that that really matters I just.”He sighed took a deep breath and cleared his throat, “I got you flowers.” he held them out, and she took them in half amusement, picking one from the top and popping it into her mouth before setting them down on the little side table.

“Look, I’m sorry we haven't been able to talk since I got back… and I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a little bit of me avoiding having a tough conversation.”

“I like that you are at least being honest with me.” She said quietly., “Do you want to sit down?”

He rubbed the back of his neck, “Actually, I was going to ask you if you wanted to go on a walk…. I.. I think better when I walk.”

She shrugged and agreed, following him outside to where a thin layer of clouds had veiled the sun which was slowly inching towards the horizon. The clouds muted the colors and the sea was grey in the distance.

Together they walked a little ways along the sand, him shifting nervously, and her walking to the side, relaxed though she didn’t feel like it 

The silence stretched on for nearly a mile before Sunny -- growing frustrated -- was forced to break it.

“You tricked me.”

He looked down at his feet, “I did.”

“You tricked me, and because of that I have had some of the worst few months of my life.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I understand you did what you thought you had to, and I get it that if I was in your place, I would have done the same without hesitation, but…. I I feel cheated, and I feel used, and for some reason I can’t stop it.”

He looked away, “I’m not sure what to say.”

“At least say SOMETHING.”

HE turned to face her single green eye wide. Looking down she could sense that his hands were shaking. A part of her felt bad about that, but they needed to have this conversation, and she wasn’t going to let him out of it.

“I… would do it again to save your life, and I won’t apologize for that, but I’m sorry that that’s how you feel.”

“I thought we were a team.”

“And we are.”

She paused, her feet digging hard into the sand, and he drew to a halt beside her, “I need you to understand Adam, when Drev say a team, they mean a battle pair and that means….”

“I know, I know……. I know what it means, and I am agreeing with you.”

“Will, you try, for me.”

“Yes, but sunny, I I don’t know how well it will work out, I…. well I’m broken when it comes to this sort of thing I don’t even know if I can.”

They went silent again and she could see the veins pulsing in the side of his neck. Beads of sweat collected on his brown and face. He looked almost nauseous, like he was scared or something, that too made her feel bad, but she didn’t really know how to help.

On instinct, she reached out a hand, inches from his before pausing, “I…. Can I?”

He paused look down at her hand.

His clenched into a fist.

He was pale whit like snow now.

“I…. I don’t think I can right now but…. Thanks for asking.”

She watched the expression on his face closely, and on his face she saw him proceed through a rapid series of emotions starting with fear, working over to shame, sadness and finally ending on guilt.

He turned away.

She walked up next to him, head tilted, “You don’t have to, Adam, but maybe if you told me why I could better understand. Of course you don’t have to.”

He took a deep shaky breath, “You deserve to know. But just don’t… I don’t know laugh or something. I know logically it wasn’t a big deal but….”

“Adam, I promise I won't laugh, you have my word.”

He nodded his head slowly and sighed, “I can trace it all back to one event I think. It was MY freshman year of high school…. Maybe and I was the awkward, nerdy sci-fi weirdo who believed in UFOs and Aliens.

***

Adam Sat Under a tree outside the school arms wrapped around his knees back tucked against the bowl of a tree which cast the shadow of its leaves down over the ground to wave and rustle in a light breeze.

It was lunch break, and he was watching the other teens standing around in their cliches. The football jocks were playing a game to one side, the cheerleaders were clustered around a bench, and all the rednecks were sitting in the back of their trucks in the parking lot laughing loudly and occasionally turning on their trucks just to rev the engines as loud as possible.

His hair was long-ish, kind of scruffy and hanging down around his ears. The clothes he wore were baggy hand me downs from his older brother Jeremy (a senior) and shoes with holes in them from his older brother Thomas.

He didn’t mention the holes to his mom, dad was in between jobs right now, not that it was a big deal, he would find work, it was just paperwork in the way, but he didn’t want to worry her with something extra that didn’t matter right now.

He looked down at the ground where he had a stack of books waiting in the grass for him, The Martian, War of the Worlds, and an old tatty compendium of start wars stuff with pictures and diagrams.

The T-shirt he was wearing was one he had purchased online, and had a diagram of the star-trek enterprise on it.

He shuffled his feet in the grass waiting for his brothers to show up and feeling sort of lonely as he waited.

Since he was a little younger, he got out a half an hour before they did, and only got to spend thirty minutes of his half hour lunch break with them, otherwise he tried to avoid people as much as possible. It wasn’t that he was bullied per-se, because he wasn’t really, neglected by his peers was probably a better term for it.

They were nice to him in the way you are nice to small children or crazy people, keeping up polite conversation just long enough to leave as soon as possible. He was used to the treatment, and didn’t bother subjecting people to his presence more than he had to. He knew he was weird.

He was sure he would have a harder time if it were not for his older brothers. Jeremy, who was a popular football player, David because he was student body president, and arguably the best looking guy in school, though he never seemed to be dating anyone, and Thomas, who was a bit of a loose cannon and didn’t mind getting in fights to protect his family members when he wasn’t hanging out with the other weird and unpredictable kids.

He was sitting there thinking about his brothers and staring down at the grass, when he saw a pair of shoes appear in his vision. They were white vans, or something similar with bright green laces, and when he looked up he saw a girl standing over him. The school was small enough that he recognized her immediately. Her name was Amanda and she jumped between the Drill team and the Basketball Girls click.

She was smiling, and he watched her as she turned her head back to her group of friends who were giggling and trying not to look like they were looking over in their direction.

Adam sat up a little straighter, “Can I help you.”

She smiled at him, her cheeks slightly pink, “HI…. Adam.”

He frowned, eyes narrowing suspiciously.

She shuffled her feet, and off in the distance, her friends giggled and looked away.

“Can I help you with something?’ He wondered, waiting for the punchline somewhere. Something about the weird UFO kid, or maybe they were going to ask him to help them do something against school rules, so when they got caught they could all blame it on him. Or maybe they were going to ask him to be the designated Sherpa for their bags or something.

He had been tricked into most of those things before, though by now the teachers and the principal knew that he was just socially stupid and not a troublemaker.

“Relax ok, I’ve just come to say sorry?”

“Sorry for what?”

“Sorry for treating you like you were weird.” When she smiled it seemed genuine, “You see its…. One of my friends.” More giggling I the background, “She thinks you’re cute, but she didn’t know how to act before.”

He glanced past her to where  the group of girls had burst in to excessive giggling.

He frowned again, “I’m not stupid, you know.”

“I didn’t say you were.”

She crossed her arms, “Serious, Adam.”

“Who is this friend of your.” His eyes narrowed, but past that he was looking towards one of the girls in the group. She was pretty  with honey blonde hair and an infectious smile.  She played the violin, and he knew for a fact that she was a comic book nerd. He had seen her carrying them around, and she was a petty good artist too. He felt his face flush a bit but tried to fight it back.”

“She smiled, “Avery.”

His eyes shot wide, and he felt his face turn scarlet. The part of his brain that had been skeptical immediately shut off as the human brain is prone to do when they think something good might be about to happen.

“I… really.”

She grinned, “Really.” She reached into her pocket and passed him a note, “She wants you to meet her by the stadium.”

His hands were shaking a bit as he took the note, but he felt his heart hammering in excitement.

Was this his way out of exile?

He had always been extroverted, starved for all the friends he wanted and all the people he wanted to talk to. Avery had the life that he wished he did, a large circle of friends, and fun things to do every weekend.

Maybe with her around, he would finally have that.

All the better if they were dating, but he was getting ahead of himself.

He watched as the group of girls dispersed and Avery moved towards the back of the building over towards the stadium, her beautiful, honey-blond hair blowing in the wind.

He stood awkwardly gathering up his things and shoving them in his bag without zipping the zipper all the way before turning and cutting around the other side of the school. His heart hammered in his chest and his hands were cold and sweaty as he made his way around the other side of the building and towards the stadium.

His heart only began to race faster when he saw her standing alone under the stadium between the cross-bars and in the shade of the metal benches above.

He approached nervously, his hands shaking in excitement.

She turned her head, bright blue eyes catching his.

He stopped in place at the edge of the shadow. But she smiled and waved him in, “Adam over here.”

He followed nervously his feet trailing in the dirt. As she approached she nervously rocked back and fourth on her heels hands in her pockets. He paused a few feet away. She looked up at him through her lashes, and he noted she was wearing little Iron Man earrings.

“Hi.” She said nervously

“Hi.” He replied back

She shuffled her feet, “Look I…. I’m sorry about laughing at you earlier today In class I…. well I think your funny, not, like in a bad way or anything.”

HE knew he was bright red at this moment, probably brighter red than any tomato, “Really?”

“Yeah, so I wanted to say sorry, and…. And maybe make it up to you.”

His heart was in his throat, “Oh, you, you don’t have to.”

“But I want to.”

It went quiet as she stepped forward, and he was frozen in place. She was right in front of him now. She leaned forward a little, and he was frozen in place. Her eyes closed, and then so did his, he waited for the moment, and waited, and waited, but nothing came.

Someone snickered, and he cracked an eye to see Avery’s once pretty face twisted up into a sneer of contempt and malicious amusement.

“April fools.” She jumped at him, and in surprise he tripped backwards over one of the metal bars landing hard. The zipper of his backpack, not all the way done up, erupted outward spilling all his books out onto the dirt.

Laughter.

He turned his head looking around to the cracks in the stadium seats where dozens of eyes stared at him laughing.

Avery stood over him as others began flooding down from their spots laughing.

He crawled back, his head down, “But it’s not even April.” He whispered

“Its not even April.” Someone mimicked from behind, and he ran into soemthing hard looking up to see one of Avery’s friends standing over him. She was state shotput champion last years, and her arms were as big as his head, “What is this.” She reached down and picked his book off the ground.

“Please, give it back.” He said crawling to his knees and reaching up for it.

“The Martian.”

“please.”

She flipped open a few of the pages. He stood up trying to reach for his book but he was blocked by another two of her friends.

The laughter continued, the mocking voices over and over and over again.

He tried to push forward reaching for his books which had been picked up off the ground.

“Gross, Its all sticky!” the friend yelled.

“No it isn’t.” He protested, it was true, he took very good care of his books. But of course no one listened. A chorus of disgust rose up around him. His books were dropped, one clattering to the rocks its pages bending, the other one landing halfway in a puddle of stagnant water.

He cried out and dove forward pulling it out of the water even as mud dripped form the hardback.

He cradled it in his arms, feeling hot tears of anger and humiliation begin to prickle at the corners of his eyes.

Laughter continued.

“Look.”

Fingers pointed.

HE stood fists clenched ready to hurt someone, but when he turned the same girl from before hand his book in either hand and when he moved she pulled.

There was a sharp ripping noise as the spine of the book tore a quarter, and as he cried out she laughed and dropped it into the puddle.

As a paperback, the book didn’t stand a chance.

Mud and water caked his hands as he reached in to pull it out on his hands and knees. Something hit him hard in the back and he pitched forward into the puddle getting the book wet a second time as the kids laughed.

He scrambled sitting up coughing and spluttering feeling the slimy grittiness of the water on his lips.

Someone knelt down next to him. A voice in his ear, “If you tell anyone. I’ll tell the teacher you tried to touch me.”

Tears dripped down his cheeks as he tried wiping mud from his face. The laughter receded and he was left along kneeling on the gravel.

His face grew hot and read as he stared down at the ruined cover of his book. Hot tears dripped onto the mud coating his hands.

His breathing started up in great gasps his heart hammered so fast he thought it was going to burst out of his chest. His head was going to explode either from anger or frustration he didn’t know. Choked sobs broke from his mouth as he knelt over the books ruined in his hands. He couldn’t breathe. He stood vision clouded face hot wet and muggy from the heat.

And then he ran.

He had no idea where he was going or what he was doing.

His paperback held muddy and dripping in one hand he pelted into the woods and didn’t stop running until his foot caught on a branch and he went rolling into the leaves.

He lay there on his stomach heart still hammering breath still coming in ragged gasps. He just couldn’t calm his breathing down.

He didn’t know where he was.

He felt like he was having a heart attack, or dying, or something. He lay there gasping on the forest floor for hours.

It grew dark. The mud dried on the back of his book and against his chest and hands.

It was only when he heard the voices did he finally sit up, mud caked and bleary eyed.

“Adam!”

“Adam!”

There were no other sounds for a long moment before the call started up again.

He stumbled over, it was dark so his feet kept coughing on branches and twigs.

“Adam, ADAM! I swear ADAM.”

“Thomas?” He said his voice so raw it was barely above a whisper.

“ADAM!” Footsteps rushed towards him through the trees, and Thomas burst from the foliage his scruffy blind hair run wild, his jeans covered in dirt, “Adam there you are where have you-“

He didn’t have time to say much else as he was hugged tight around the middle.

“Adam I…. what’s wrong. What happened! Who did this to you!”

Thomas looked ready to rip someone apart, but Adam didn’t say anything. He wouldn’t say anything about the event for the next two years.

***

Sunny stared wide eyed as Adam turned away again.

“Look, I know its stupid, it happens to plenty of kids and they don’t take it the way I did, but. I mean, with the panic attack on top of it, and then a few years later the same thing happened on my first date, so now I just… I can’t…”

Sunny was quiet for a moment while he looked away.

“Who the FUCK do they think they are.” She snarled.

He looked up in surprise, “I what.”

She marched around in a circle, “What the hell kind of person does that to someone. That’s just sick and wrong. That is just… horrible.”  She pulled out her spear, “I swear If i ever meet someone like that if i ever meet THEM, I am going to-”

He caught her arm, “Sunny stop, it was a long time ago.”

“It doesnt matter!”

A small smile cut across his face, “IT doesn't matter sunny, you want to know why.”

“Why.”

“Because I saw their pictures.” he grinned, “Avery got really fat and her friend got hit by a car, not fatally but I consider it Karma doing me a solid.” He paused, “It’ll be ok…. I just need some time. Think you can do that for me?”

She paused and nodded her head, “Yes, I think I can.”

[resinatingbeauty]

About Me & My Work + Status Update

Shop: blursedbaubles.etsy.com

Pinterest:@resinatingbeauty @blursedbaubles (Business Account with all my handmade creations and custom commission gallery)

Instagram: resinating_beauty_

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/blursedbaubles/

Discord: ResinatingBeauty#2475 (open server- message / friend for invite)

I have always been the strong creative type. Growing up in St. Augustine, FL, I was surrounded by the intrigue, rich history, allure, and culturally diverse of the Oldest City which greatly influenced my writing, art, and spiritually which was elaborated on in 1994 when my father's job took my mother and I to Minnesota, Illinois, and the Panhandle, before returning back home to central FL in 2000 where I still reside, though I would love to explore the rest of the country.

St. Augustine had many Spanish influences because of the original Spanish settlements there, the Panhandle introduced me to the traditions of Voodoo & Hoodoo with the celebration of Mardi Gras which was big in the area I lived in as we were right on the border of Alabama and Louisiana. Up north, I first became introduced to Wicca as a child, which lead me to seek out a coven or those with similar interests. With all of these integrated practices and interests, I naturally became an amalgamation of them, never really defining myself with one particular label or devoting myself to any one god/goddess or doctrine. While my father's side tried to force Catholicism down my throat and my mother's side focused on traditional Southern Baptist values- My parents were not devoutly religious people and allowed me to choose my own path. However, this would cause a lot of strife in our family while my grandparents on both sides were alive, trying to persuade my parents into forcing me to confirm to their ideals. Naturally, I wasn't having it. I knew that everyone was misguided with all good intentions, but as a child, all that came of it were feelings of depression, oppression, animosity, and alienation that wouldn't resolve until I got older and understood why everything had been the way it was.

Creating through writing and art became my solitary sanctuary and I was constantly seeking out new inspiration, from mythology books to reading the Encyclopedia Brittanica during long car rides. Video games also fueled my progress as an artist and Spiritualist, surprisingly, as I began to recognize the mythos used in the storylines of my favorite RPGs which just reinforced my interest in the occult.

In 2018, I began selling my handmade one of a kind creations on second hand sites like Mercari and eBay, using the sales to continue to pursue my passion. I hadn't really looked into Etsy except to sell some of my aunt's paintings at one point, making sales once every couple of weeks on those other sites if I was lucky. I didn't start looking into Etsy until January of last year when Mercari changed their policies and raised their fees. My desire to take custom commissions and create personalized items was not really supported by Mercari, either, so it was really only a matter of time before I gravitated toward Etsy and established my shop there, focusing on handmade to order and one of a kind creations.

Every purchase supports my Craft and Crafts, gives me the ability to help others who either need a shoulder to cry on or some spiritual advice, in addition to supporting other local & small businesses like myself, with the added bonus of supporting me, a solo female business owner & artist.

So please take the time to browse my shop or make a custom request- I would be honored to manifest your dreams by my hands! Want some inspiration or to see my portfolio? I'm in the process of uploading ALL of my commissions, custom orders, personalized, and one of a kind creations on Pinterest if you would like to take a look by clicking either of the links above.

Moreover, it would be a pleasure to meet you and work for and with you- either now or sometime in the future. Thank you for taking the time to take a look, like, reblog, or what have you. Every little bit helps!

Thank you again & merry met!

Samantha

(Owner, Designer, Creator)

[haveyouseenthisskeleton]

who is the smartest? Alphys, Gatser or Sans?

The three of them are actually very smart, but not in the same domains.

Gaster was promoted royal scientist at a very young age after discovering the determination trait allowing humans souls to live on after their death. That saved a lot of life during the war since it permitted to create new defensive weapons that saved a lot of lives before the Monsters were sealed Underground. He is also the creator of the CORE, the source of power of all the Underground. He is more of logical genius. All things have causes and consequences... And that’s why he absolutely sucked about understanding emotions and was a terrible father for Sans and Papyrus. 

After Gaster was scattered in time and space, Alphys was promoted by Asgore, impressed by her work on Mettaton’s robotic body. When she took the job and discovered the Secret Lab, all there was were tons of papers written in a strange and incomprehensible language. She created a Wingding translator and actually used Gaster searches and improved them. She made the CORE more safe and stable, she helped at the creation of MTT Resort and all the TV system to export the robot show. Her only mistake was trying to play with determination, because Gaster’s papers were adapted to work on Sans and not on others monsters, which she didn’t know. That created the Amalgamate (and Flowey) in the end, but kinda succeed to bring them back to life, so it’s a half success ? Contrary to Gaster who was more in physics and souls, Alphys is very good in robotics (and in understanding human beings too, even if she doesn’t think, I mean, everyone in the game that knows her explained to Frisk/The Player how Alphys is nice and super sweet.)

Sans was raised by Gaster to be both a fighter and a scientist. Everything he knows came from books though, since Gaster died before he could do anything with him. What’s making him special was how he discovered, analysed and reacted to the timelines, both under Flowey’s and Frisk’s eras. Before he gave up on everything, he made a lot and a lot of calculations to predict how the timeline worked and what was similar and different in everyone of them. He tried to convert the informations into a working time and space machine so he could stop the resets at their beginning. He succeeded =) But when he discovered who Flowey really was, he couldn’t do the right thing and give up. Eventually, the machin broke on his way back. Instead, he became a passive observer. He keeps annoting timelines, but he doesn’t interfere in them, well, of course except that one time where Frisk almost killed the universe, you know. Sans is also an excellent fighter, but chose not to use this ability because he knew it was destructive. He knows what consequences of his actions could do on others, and that’s why that’s make him one of the most “human” monster of the Underground. He can read through you very clearly, but won’t do anything before something really bad happened.

And also Papyrus is very, very smart in his own way. Even if he doesn’t know nothing about sciences, he is very good at logic and creation. He has a sort of writer mind, all in creativity. His thoughts often takes a long way to get from one point to another, but the final results is always amazing. He is smart with his hands, and in understanding people emotions, even if it’s, a bit like Gaster, with a cause-consequences system. People think he is akward, but he’s actually a very good psychology analyst and can guess what are your qualities and defects in a very small lapse of time. And just like Sans, he is very good at hiding what he really thinks both on things and people. I mean, did you read the phone calls in the game ? That’s so much lore you’ll never know when you’re interacting with Papyrus only during his main parts in the game. That’s a very complex characters, and that’s why I’m loving him so much <3

[classic80sand90smovieloves2]

Meeting and Dating Chris Reece

(My gif)(Requested by anonymous)

- You met Chris after transferring to the all female boarding school. Your new dormmate had insisted you come into town with her and her friends to relax after your first week of classes. Figuring you deserved a bit of a break, you happily accepted her invitation. 

- The night was going perfectly normal until your hang out was invaded by a few of your dormmates male friends who’d coincidentally arrived a little after you did. You suddenly felt a bit awkward as they pulled up more chairs, joining your tables conversation as though they’d been there the entire time. Your discomfort only skyrocketed as the girls and guys excused themselves to go dance. 

- You expected to be left alone at the table but to your surprise, one of the boys hung back with you. He introduced himself as Chris, mentioning that he hadn’t seen you around before and asking you a few friendly questions about yourself. 

- The two of you ended up talking for most of the night, during which he offered to show you around town in response to you saying you had no idea where anything was “around here”. You planned to meet on Sunday before your dormmate returned and informed you that you’d all better head back to school before you got in trouble. 

- Sunday came and the two of you met up early in the afternoon. As promised, he showed you around, taking you to all of the cool hang-out spots and warning you about the bad. Even though you hardly knew him, you couldn’t help but feel as though you were already great friends so when he asked if you’d like to meet up again Wednesday night, you were quick to agree. 

- The two of you continued to spend a lot of time together, genuinely enjoying each others company in a relatively platonic way. I say relatively because, unbeknownst to you, he was beginning to fall head over heels in love. 

 - You’d been friends for about two months when the subject of boyfriends had somehow come up in conversation. It started off with simple questions, things like “we’re you going steady with someone” and “had you dated anyone before”. You sort of thought nothing of it, they didn’t seem pointed just vaguely curious.  Then came the question that started to raise your suspicion.

 “Do you mind if I ask what kind of guys you like?” He asked. He’d said it with enough nonchalance that you didn’t immediately assume there was an ulterior motive behind it. 

“I don’t know,” You laughed. “I guess I’ve never really thought about.” 

“Well I mean, whats your type? ...Tall? Blue eyes? Mature? Understanding?” He questioned quietly, his eyes focusing shyly on his hands while he spoke. Embarrassed, he was adorably embarrassed. 

“You’re not trying to set me up with one of your friends, are you?” You joked. 

“No! No, nothing like that, it’s just.... Well, you see I.... I.” He took a deep breath, his eyes flitting across the room nervously as the tips of his ears turned shade of red. “ ...Uh, I was just wondering if there was... maybe a chance that... well, you...wanted to go out sometime. ...Like on a date....” 

- The look he gave you when you agreed was something akin to that of a person winning a million bucks. 

- Your first date was sort of an amalgamation of things since the two of you had already kind of done everything you could do in town together. You went bowling, visited a pizza place and ended the day off with a trip to an ice cream parlor. 

- Obviously, the two of you had a great time together and even though you hadn’t really thought of him romantically prior to his confession, you couldn’t help but admit, at least to yourself, that you could see yourself dating him. 

- It doesn’t matter when you decide to give him a kiss on the cheek for the first time, just know that it was a magical experience for him. He was reborn; the world around him brightened, the air was fresh, his heart was full. 

- You had your first real kiss about two weeks after your first date. The two of you were kind of taking things slow, testing the waters to see if you should really be a couple or stay friends. 

- So you were stood in the dark of the night, right outside your campus after another lovely date with the boy. You were both semi-stalling, neither of you really wanting to say goodbye. It was then that he looked you deep in the eyes and asked if he could kiss you. 

- This was it, the make or break of your relationship. His lips met yours in a sweet, soft kiss... and then another, and another. He pulled away but only for a moment: to ask if you’d go steady with him. You could feel him smile against your lips as you pulled him into another kiss, and then another with no signs of stopping....

- Chris is extremely fond of pda, any affection from you is like a dream and he can’t help but act all lovey dovey with you no matter where you are. Of course he can respectfully contain himself when he has to but when he doesn’t have to his hands are going to, in some way, be on you at all times. 

- He tends to just call you your first name in public, at least when he’s with his friends or on campus, but the minute you’re alone he’ll call you things like “sweetheart” and “angel”.

- He gives you his class ring when the two of you start to go steady. He loves seeing it glinting on your finger whenever the two of you are together. 

- He likes to sit behind you and wrap both his arms around you in a little hug whenever you’re together.

- He always offers you his coat when it gets cold or, if you have your one, helps you put it on/take it off.

- Before you started dating he’d sneak long glances at you whenever he could but now that you’re together he can finally lovingly stare at you without it being weird. Even so, he’ll often still pretend like he wasn’t watching you whenever you catch him.

- Just so you know: if he see’s you in one of his hoodies there’s a good chance he’s going to attack you with an onslaught of affection. You won’t be able to get him to leave you alone and you’ll spend the whole night lovingly wondering what’s gotten into him. 

- Malt shop dates. Is there anything better than sharing a milkshake with your lover?

- Dancing together. Whenever you’re feeling down, he’ll put on a record and dance around like a fool to make you laugh.

- Going to his games and cheering him on. He puffs up proudly but shyly tries brush off the compliments you give him when he joins back with you. 

- Sitting on one of the benches on campus and having lunch together. 

- Beach dates in the summer time. 

- Board games. 

- Soft kisses. 

- He’s a pretty big fan of cuddling. Anytime you feel like it just snuggle into him and he’ll immediately wrap his arms around you. 

- He has this hidden talent of knowing exactly what you’re feeling and being able to guess why it is you’re feeling that way. It’s both incredibly helpful and mildly irritating. 

- He’s always quick to come to your defense, defending your honor like a true knight in cotton armor.

- Sarcasm. He goes easy on you but you stifle a lot of laughs when you’re with him and his friends. 

- Lip bites that drive you crazy. He may or may not be aware of what it does to you.

- He melts whenever you stroke his hair.

- Reading together or swapping books that you enjoyed. 

- Whenever the two of you are home for the holidays or summer, you’ll go over to his house and spend the day together. Oftentimes you’ll soak up the sun in his backyard, drinking lemonade and listening to the radio. 

- Tv dates. He’s grown particularly fond of the new show “Alfred Hitchcock Presents”. 

- He tends to buy you a flower before each of your dates, he’ll stop at some street vendor on his way over and pick out the prettiest ones he can find. Only the best for you. 

- He always loves talking with and learning new things about you. It makes him feel all warm and fuzzy inside whenever you trust him with some secret of yours. 

- Ranting to each other about school or your different family/friend issues. You had a long talk about the whole David and cheating scandal. 

- He makes a big deal out of your birthday and anniversary every year. What else should be more celebrated then the day the love of his life was born and the day he finally got together with her?

- Whenever the two of you are breaking rules, you always tease each other about him being a prefect. 

“You know, I think it’s my responsibility to escort you directly to your headmaster.” He jokes, picking you up and marching off in the direction of your school as you try your best to stay quiet. 

- His mother insists on getting pictures of the two of you together when you’re with his family. He always gives her one of those embarrassed mommmm’s but secretly he doesn’t mind. 

- Shoulder massages, especially when he’s trying to convince you to do something or reason with you when you’re being stubborn. 

- Baking together, he’s sort of clueless but he tries his best to be helpful; plus: he looks adorable with flour all over himself. 

- Chris loves snow so you bet your ass he’s going to force you to come outside with him. Making snow angels, snowball fights, being tackled onto the cold,soft ground and subsequently wrapped up in his warm arms, it’s all bound to happen at some point and you can’t help but love it.

- This boy is like a heater 90% of the time. If you ever get cold all you have to do is snuggle into him and you’ll warm right up. Believe me, he won’t mind. 

- Cheek kisses, he just lays one on you whenever he feels like ...which is often.

- He compliments you every time he see’s you, he wants you to know that he thinks you’re beautiful. 

- Handholding, the nicest way to prove that you’re together whenever you’re in public. 

- On the outside he may not seem the type but Chris is quite the jealous boyfriend. He has a tendency to glare at boys who act all buddy buddy with you and isn’t above starting a fight when someone gets too close for comfort. Although as a prefect, he has to choose his battles wisely.

- He insists on walking you back to your dorm after dates even though it means he has to make a long trek back to his own.

- He’s very protective of you so he appreciates when you tell him where you’re going to be. He always asks for you to call him when you return to your dorm so that he knows you’re safe.

- You certainly don’t have a lot of fights but there has been a few during the course of your relationship. He’s not too great at articulating his feelings so he tends to just give you the silent treatment without meaning to.

- At some point he’ll be forced to face the issue. He might point fingers and argue fiercely but he rarely raises his voice. You’ll both take some more time to cool off, ignoring each other for a little while before you finally receive a visit from him.

- He has no problem apologizing when he’s wrong, he might even apologize when he isn’t just because he wants this whole thing to be done with. You can never stay mad at him for long.

- He cant stand seeing you cry. It makes him feel sick, his chest tightens and it feels like he can’t breathe right until you’re okay again. 

- “I love you’s” all the time. Most of the time he says it without even thinking about it because, well, he does. He loves you with all his heart so why shouldn’t he say it?

- The two of you have a bright future ahead of you and everyone around you can see that. I advise that you prepare yourself for a proposal once he lands himself a job. 

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

Title: Letter to Dandelion

Author: Calvus

Release Date: January 03, 2021

BISAC: SF/F

Genre: Original Fiction

Instance: nostalgebraist-autoresponder

Format: epub

Cover Artist: Fabio Parra

Cover Type: Blank

Description: "Let's go away," she says.

Okay, here we go. A few things that are easy right off the bat. First, Calvus is not going to be one of those writers who tries to squeeze the entire story into the first 100 pages. My experience has been that no one really enjoys books that do that to them, and it's probably best for both writer and reader if such exercises in efficiency are confined to the end product.

Second, Calvus is not going to be one of those writers who's enamored with their own cleverness in crafting a premise, and who takes the kind of risk that will make them famous (read: get a lot of notes under their work) along with all the glory of a potential readership. I want to set the scene as familiarly clear as possible, and I want to have established a world, characters, some elements of a plot, before I start revealing things about it. So the best thing to do right here is not to get clever or show off cleverness — it would be better to play it relatively safely, especially on the first outing, since I'm trying to appeal to as broad an audience as I can.

Third, there will be sex. Sex is not going to be the whole deal, but sex will take things in the right direction. And there will be blood. Blood is very important. You know how people say that there's no such thing as "too much" blood? Well, people who say that are wrong. It's very easy to find too much of a good thing. Calvus won't let this be an issue. We'll see how it goes.

It goes, right now.

The room is a place of simple modern elegance, not ostentatiously so, just straightforwardly so. It has white walls, a white mattress on the floor, a white lamp on the nightstand. It is in a building of white walls and white floors, though not of pure white, and the stark contrast between the two is intended not to be jarring but sort of elegant, sort of artful. White light pours in through the windows, and a white chair with a white pillow sits next to the window.

Calvus is naked, sitting on the white chair. Her hands are pressed together, lightly, in front of her, as though in prayer. She looks up at the light, and her eyes are closed. Her face, which is not especially feminine up close, seems almost boyish, and her hair, which is not especially short, is a wild blond mane — but neither of these things is too dissimilar from what I see every day in front of my own computer screen. She has an impish little smile on her face, like the impish little smile of the protagonist of some kind of video game, that same bit of mischief that might lead her to say like "Let's go away," that same bit of mischief that is the source of her powers — or could be. "Let's go away, Dandelion," she whispers.

She opens her eyes, and they are filled with wonder and fear.

She looks me up and down. In some indefinable sense, of course, we are both men.

And then I am running, and she is running, and we are making love.

We have had some past lives together, but it's been a few million years, and our bodies are a strange amalgam of modern and ancestral as a result. A lot of this is inconvenient, but I don't care. Sex has been one of the most impressive things I've seen in the past few years, and there's been a lot of that. Now sex is pretty damn impressive in the abstract, too.

The past few million years have not altered our genetics very much, so there's no real internal division between "Calvus" and "me." This is convenient in many ways. On the other hand, as we lay in bed, limbs entwined, it is hard to say who is a man, who is a woman, who will become one later on, who will never. This is no ordinary bed, and we are no ordinary people.

I am not a hedonist.

The sex is better than I expected, but I'm not surprised by that. The rest has been weird.

When I was a teenager, I read a science fiction story by a writer named Francis Silverberg. It was a story about a boy, a girl, and time traveling aliens. Much of it is no longer visible over the mists of time (to be clear, this is a pleasant image, not something I'd like to actually remind people of), but this part is still clear in my mind's eye.

The aliens arrive and give the boy and the girl superpowers, but superpowers which are strictly disjunctive from our regular human ones. This power set cannot be used to do anything, except travel backwards in time, but it can be used in combination with the powers of humanity. So we have "timelike powers."

(What really happened was that the boy, in one timeline, could travel back in time because his power set included it; in another, he was just the average human, and traveling back in time was normal for him in an appropriate way. But that's boring and besides, Silverberg did a better job getting the point across, and to this day I am still grateful that he did.)

The point of this is that Silverberg included time travel as part of his character set, but he was a hedonist; he was comfortable with weird powers and even weirder possibilities, and he wanted to show them off.

And I don't want to do that — not because I don't want to show off my powers (shit, man, my powers are kind of boring), but because having everything be part of one character set, being in character with that set, is just too comfortable. It's not very different from the way a gay man would be in bed or in life.

"Let's go away, Dandelion." Is this part of Calvus's character? Is this her way of demonstrating her powers? These are only three of many questions to which I have no answer. But on the other hand, I've got like ten thousand other questions I need answered to have a satisfying experience, and it's hard to ask them all at once.

It's all a goddamn mess.

I want to get off now.

[psychopersonified]

Who’s the brunette?

Part of the prequel series to "Are we ever going to talk about this?".

I'll post little snippets of their 'not dating' days in this series. Little events that draw them together and the intimacy they share in plain sight.

This particular snippet happens Monday after the Friday party in “Keep Calm. Dance On.”

------

“Oh 007, did you hear? There is the most unusual rumour going around. Seems someone thought they saw the Quartermaster leave last week’s party in an Aston Martin DB5? You wouldn’t know anything about this would you?”

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

Monday 8:30am - SIS HQ.

The lift doors open at Parking Level 2 to admit a well rested and impeccably put together Eve Moneypenny.

“Moneypenny, morning. How are you?” Bond says in greeting.

“007. You’re early,” she skips the greeting, her tone a little frosty as she gets into the lift and turns around to face the doors.

“So it’s 007 today? May I know what I’ve done to deserve it this time?” Bond knows enough about women to know that it is always his fault.

“IF you’re interested… someone I call a friend left me all alone at a party last Friday.”

Bond freezes... ah that. He’d completely forgotten. He drops his head in embarrassment. After all, It was Eve who convinced him to attend. A decision he was incredibly grateful to her for. He recalls the night and how he spent it in the company of a leggy brunette.  

“Ah… I must apologise. That was terribly ungentlemanly of me,” pause, he needs to get himself out of the doghouse, “How can I make it up to you?”

“Well, for starters, you might tell me who it was that caught your attention. So much so that you left a good friend high and dry?” She’s laying it on a bit thick, but where would the fun be otherwise?

“What makes you think it was a someone? It was an office party after all.”

Eve leans over to him, a hand reaching up towards Bond’s shoulder. He’s still wearing his outer coat, having come straight up from the parking garage. Her hand comes back with a strand of hair between her fingers; she holds it up in front of his eyes - it clearly isn’t his.

“Who’s the brunette?” She teases him.

Bond schools his face into a neutral expression looking straight ahead. Bloody spies and their deductive skills.

-Ding!- The lift announces its next stop on Ground Level. The lift doors open, revealing a small group of people waiting for the lift - including Q, R and Mark at the front.

Everyone squeezes in. The lift is packed tight, yet no one wants to take the second lift; a result of the lifts being notoriously slow during rush hours.

There is a chorus of polite greetings:-

“Good Morning.”

“Excuse me.”

“Pardon. Which level?”

“How’s it going?”

“Level 7 please. Thanks.”

There is some awkward shifting as the occupants arrange themselves according to who is going to alight first.

Q ends up standing in front of Bond, back to him.

Eve has a mischievous glint in her eyes. She still has the strand of hair between her fingers. So she lifts it and holds it up to the back of Q’s head. The colour and length is an exact match.

Bond slides his eyes towards her. He wants to smack her hand away. They are in a packed lift for Christssake. Eve’s little action catches R’s attention and she tilts her head thoughtfully at them. Eve shots her a meaningful look.

The lift dings their arrival at Level 3. Five people alight except for Bond, Eve, Q, R and Mark - they are headed for the Executive floor on Level 12 to their respective meetings.

The remaining occupants sigh in relief. They start moving apart to give each other more personal space. But before they can do that, six more SIS employees enter - making it worse than before.

“Hold the lift please! Thanks!” A -seventh- person calls just as the doors start to close. A breathless Accounts Department employee squeezes her way in while struggling to carry two cardboard boxes of files. Everyone has to politely shuffle closer to the back to make room.

Bond is forced all the way to the back corner of the lift, the hand rails digging into his back. Eve has to move to the other corner. He can’t help but roll his eyes in annoyance. Why couldn’t M see him later in the morning?

This leaves the Quartermaster on his side of the lift. Q also has to shift back but accidentally steps on Bond’s expensive Italian leather shoe and jolts away too quickly in apology - nearly losing his balance.

“Oh! My apologies—,” It comes out as a rushed whisper.

“—you’re alright.” Bond places his hands on Q’s waist to steady him. Q is wearing only a cardigan made from the softest cashmere over his dress shirt and tie. Bond can feel the warmth of the flesh underneath. He uses the slightest pressure to pull Q backwards into his personal space, so that the others can move in.

Q’s right shoulder blade makes contact with one of Bond’s pectorals. But the younger man makes no protest, on the contrary - unless Bond’s imagining it, he feels Q lean further into the touch. They are pressed close in the compact space, he can smell the fresh scent of Q’s soap and shampoo.

Maybe there is some good that comes from being in crowded lifts. The rest of the ride up feels like an eternity spent in awkward silence for everyone inside with the only distraction being the soft jazzy elevator music. It feels like the lift made a stop at every floor.

Bond does not remove his hands until the lift arrives at Level 12 where M’s office is located. They all alight. Bond and Moneypenny head directly to M’s office. The techies movie off to the conference room for the monthly joint Ops meeting.

Eve waits until she is alone with Bond just outside of her office to ask:

“Oh 007, did you hear? There is the most unusual rumour going around. Seems someone thought they saw the Quartermaster leave last week’s party in an Aston Martin DB5? You wouldn’t know anything about this would you?”

Busted. Yes, so he did spend the party stuck to the Quartermaster’s side. And yes, he did steal Q out for a post revelry kebab supper - which may have included a long stroll along the river after. Finally yes, he did make sure Q got to his doorstep at the end of the very late night/early morning, but only out of concern for his safety.

Bond considers his options.“Name your price.”

“What exactly are you implying? I’m offended that you’d think I’d stoop to blackmail—“ Eve places a hand over her heart in mock indignation, “—but I suppose since you do owe me an apology…” She bats her eyelashes at him.

She mulls over it, “There is this restaurant in Soho, it’s booked out for months. But I’m sure you have your ways around it. My family is in town next week.”

She unlocks the door to the office, letting them both in. “I’ll text you the details.”

“Consider it done.” Bond assures her courtly, he really was sorry about ditching her on Friday. Nevertheless, he is surprised at how easy he is being let off on this - when you consider how protective Eve can be over their Chief Boffin.

“Aren’t you going to warn me off?” Bond wonders aloud.

“Do I have to? It is still just a harmless game... isn’t it?” She searches his face for any indication otherwise, though she reckons she knows the answer even if Bond himself doesn’t know it yet.

He holds the door open for her. M arrives behind them cutting off any answer he might have.

———

Friday 4:30pm - SIS HQ

If Bond has to hear about North Korea again in the next 3 months, it would still be too soon. He had just finished an all day strategy conference with Mallory, 009 and their Korean Station Chief about how MI6 was going to extract their operatives embedded in the regime in the face of the recent crackdowns.

It is not that he’s being insensitive, the meeting is critical and he had played his part in contributing to the discussion and assessing the tactics available to them. It is just that both M and 009 have a tendency to prattle on (his opinion) and discuss ad nauseam every detail, while 007 prefers to… well, get on with it.

Unsurprisingly the meeting ran overtime and Bond is feeling peckish. And when his blood sugar runs low, his patience runs thin. At least this time, he had managed to behave long enough for the meeting to end.

It takes him 20 excruciating minutes to reach Q-Branch. It is Friday afternoon, and like any other civil service, MI6 lobbies and lifts are a hive of activity with most employees trying to wrap up for an early weekend.

Most of the time was spent waiting for the lifts, and then riding the lift, then letting people in and then out the lift - there has to be a better system to organise the lift service.

Bond is inordinately relived when he finally arrives at Q-Branch all the way in the basement floors of the building.

Once he’s through the doors, he makes a beeline for Q’s office nook and Q’s desk. The man is not around, but Bond helps himself with familiar ease. Bond pulls open the second drawer and retrieves a bar of protein snack from the stash in the drawer.

He is almost finished with the bar when he realises that Q has not returned to his desk and is nowhere to be seen on the work floor. Curious, he makes a circuit of the floor trying to be surreptitious.

Jamila catches him ‘not’ looking and puts him out of his misery. “He’s downstairs, in the Firearms Lab with 003,” she doesn’t bother asking if he is there on official business.

Bond tries not to look like he’s been caught, but manners win out and he attempts a casual, “...Thank you.” - his feet starting to carry him towards the main doors.

“Badge!” Jamila calls out to remind him.

Bond backtracks smoothly, heading to Q’s desk and that second drawer to grab his blasted employee ID badge that he keeps in there. He can get away without it on the upper floors, but the Lower Ground labs contain live ammunition and thus require extra authentication for security.

—-

The labs are a study of industrial utilitarian design - an amalgamation of concrete, steel and glass.

003 is easy to locate. Her stunning if scant evening gown incongruous in the surroundings. Bond can only see her from the back. She has one stiletto heel resting on something in front of her.

As he draws nearer, his viewing angle changes and he can see what or more accurately who her heel is propped up on.

Their Quartermaster is on one knee in front of her. The toes of her shoe resting on his thigh. The side slit of the dress is cut high and hides very little.

Q is adjusting her thigh holster, a specially designed and fabricated skin-coloured thing worn fairly high on the leg to make it less obvious. To improve stability, the holster is anchored with clips that connect directly to 003’s one piece undergarment.  

“Oh Q, the material is perfect - incredibly comfortable, but the fit needs to be tighter.” She provides him with feedback. When she looks up, she catches Bond in the reflection of a nearby glass wall - watching them with wide blue eyes.  

“Yes, right. There is an adjustment strap on the inside so all you have to do is… “ Q pulls at the tab - careful not to touch her skin in so much as he can, seeing that the tab is located near the inner thigh. 003 gathers her skirt up higher to allow him better access.

From Bond’s angle, their combined actions are grossly inappropriate.

“…pull this tab to adjust for the required fit. We’ve gone with the new hook-and-loop fasteners so they shouldn’t catch on most fabrics, even delicate ones. This should allow you to use it with any frock of your choice.“ Q explains still oblivious.

“How thoughtful of you Q. I don’t suppose you could make them in… lace trim?” She says to the top Q’s head, smirking into the refection, raising a perfect eyebrow at 007.

“We can make them in any colour or trim you’d like 003. Just let us know what you need. Please allow for a few weeks though, as the elastane base material is specially sent for.” Q looks up at her with a shy smile.

“Oh you spoil us Q. We never had such personalised service until you came along.” She coos down at him while she ran one hand lightly through his hair combing back his fringe while the other formed a hooked finger under his chin to tip his head up to her.

003 is wearing a self-satisfied grin. What a picture they made! Her deft manoeuvring had Q looking like the very picture of a besotted young man attending submissively to his object of infatuation.

She sees 007 in the refection clenching and unclenching his hands. Whoops…. she knows 007, having worked him with him over the years. They get along fine. But this new development is interesting. What is his problem anyway?

Perhaps it would be best to end this here for now.

“Well, thank you Quartermaster. I’d best not take up anymore of your time. Will it be alright if I stayed here to have a chat with 007?” She dismisses him politely, adjusting her skirt and removing her heel from his thigh.

“Oh, yes of course. Sure.” Q stands, brushing his trousers.

“Ah 007, I didn’t see you there—,” the sentence is cut off when Q catches Bond’s blazing blue eyes and dark expression and is confused, “D… did you need anything?”

Bond schools his expression back to neutral. “Not at the moment. Just need a quick word with 003. Meet you back upstairs?”

Q collects his tablet and nods his leave to both of the agents.

When Q is out the doors, 007 closes the distance between him and 003 - who to her credit is not cowed. Instead of stepping back, she steps sideways and the two double-0 agents circle each other for a few moments.

“Oh don’t look at me like that!” she finally says, exasperated with his posturing, also she was getting dizzy with the circling. They were friends, well as much as trained assassins with trust issues can be.

“You—,” she points a finger at him, “—need to learn how to share. You monopolised all of his time last Friday night! After that delicious display of his, I’d like to take him out clubbing and see what else is hiding under that cardigan wearing persona.” She confesses, but still annoyed at 007.

She makes a squeezing motion with her hands, a gesture usually reserved for when talking about cute animals, “He’s so adorable I want to stuff him in my pocket--,” then she indicates to her skin tight dress, “—if I had any.”

Bond is not moved. He feels like they are siblings negotiating playtime allotment with a favourite pet or toy. Well, he was an only child and he had never learnt to share.

“The rest of us would like to play too you know. Alec says—,” 003 nearly throws a tantrum.

“He’s not a plaything!” Bond’s vehement whisper surprises even him. Where did that come from?

“Pot. Kettle…” Comes her practiced reply. But something in his tone catches up to her. She studies him closer. Bond appears to be grappling internally with his own words.

-Oh.My.God- Can it be? 003 abandons her petulant tantrum. The adult slipping back into place.

“You’re not… playing anymore are you?” the question comes from a place of genuine interest.

No answer. Just a sullen 007 staring at his feet, hands in his pockets.

“Huh! Of all the people you choose...” She shakes her head at him.

Well then, there is only one thing left to do. She comes right up close to him, cups his face in her perfectly manicured hands, forcing him to look at her - then says with as much sisterly fondness as she could muster:-

“Don’t. Cock. It. Up.”

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

Note: If you liked this fic, there’s more like it on the blog. Including my take on a kidnapped Q. Enjoy!

[scgdoeswhat]

Unpacking The Elementalists Finale

I’d like to dedicate this to my dear Kane anon (and other TE anons) who have been hitting my ask box up for the last several months. I’m sorry this took forever to get out and I know it doesn’t ease the fact that they ixnayed Kane, but hopefully this makes a little more sense of TE’s abrupt ending.

Without further ado...

I’ve been wanting to make this post since Book 2 Chapter 10, but life has been hectic. TE’s finale finally forced my hand and so here I am, with a bunch of theories, points, and thoughts I've had noted since the book came back from its hiatus. First off, now that TE is officially over (😭) we now know that the hiatus was primarily used to tie up all the loose story lines and to give us a tidy ending. The writing in the second half of the book was more solid, concise, and had a clear cut vision of what the writers wanted and where the plot was headed. As much as I hate to say it, the first half of the book may have been overly ambitious. They introduced the Moral Compass, potentially two villains in Kane and Alma, and a plethora of different storylines. I had a number of people tell me through the first five/six chapters of Book 2 that they were confused with the plot because it became too convoluted and hard to follow along. I think they introduced too many elements into the story, which dragged down the arc. Let’s break down some of these individually: The Moral Compass was something we were all excited to see implemented, because it gave us the potential to be an evil MC. In the end, we know it didn’t make much of a difference, save for dialogue and/or violent options. I think this was originally something intended to be greater than what it amounted to, and part of it is the limitations of the medium that the app is and simply, resources. This also ties into…. The plot involving Kane and Alma. I don’t believe having Kane as the Big Bad was supposed to be as defined as it ended up being. The two Sources were written far more ambiguous in the beginning, with the chance that depending on your choices, you could side with either one by the end of the book and/or series. The hiatus streamlined the plot, discarding elements that were difficult to pull off, including multiple MC point of views that may have held the possibility of being evil or choosing Kane, therefore placing Alma as the antagonist. In a narrative story app such as Choices (as opposed to Lovestruck, where the routes have the same players but different stories altogether), I just don’t think this advanced storytelling would have been doable. These plots are primarily linear, and MC being evil/with Kane/etc, it would present a different set of problems, including the fact that this becomes an entirely different story while there is supposed to be one solid ending. (For what it's worth, I enjoy the MC customizability of Choices more.) Looking at the group of friends, obviously Beckett was incredibly fleshed out while the others were not as much. I wanted to delve further into our friends’ backgrounds a bit more, and I think at the beginning of the book, we were on that path. Aster and her wood nymph family was a perfect example of table setting. We had two or three scenes before the hiatus to go to the forest, and I thought the Wand Wars and their involvement against Kane was slated to be more prominent. I think the writers had something bigger planned, but how would it all tie in if players started choosing the evil choices? Again, having too many choices causes a domino effect that makes it nearly impossible to navigate when the story is supposed to end with a particular goal in mind. The chapter where we can receive the wand was a symptom of ending the book early and I think the execution of the actual Wand Wars scene was lacking the emotional punch the initial introduction of it warranted. This is unfortunate because the setup they had in Book 1 made it seem much more violent, disastrous, and full of hate compared to what was shown (i.e. Attuned just being greedy bastards). We were introduced to Shreya's Serene & Sublime business and the potential of family disapproval and lack of support in the beginning, but everything was tied up with the gala chapter. Looking back, I was curious why it was so easy to get so many financial backers this early into the series, but knowing that TE only went for two books makes much more sense why we knew whether S&S succeeded or failed. (Tangent - for anyone who didn't secure backing, is S&S successful at the end of the book?) I think Griffin, his scholarship, and his decision between Natural Sciences and Thief was also slated to be a bigger subplot. We never met his parents, despite them being brought up very early in Book 1. If TE had gone the originally planned three or four books, I have no doubt his family would've been introduced and MC would have needed to help sway his parents (and the committee for the scholarship) whether Griffin continued on the NS or professional Thief path. Doing the Griffin scenes (even as platonic friends) influenced his standing for the scholarship and not doing them made him lose out to Amy, if I'm not mistaken. Question for everyone regarding Zeph and the Thief captaincy: Does he get it in everyone's playthrough? I wonder if the writers always planned for Zeph to get the captaincy or if Griff would have kept it depending on your playthrough if they had all four books to use. Another big plot point that resolved itself out of nowhere was Atlas and MC butting heads over their Sun Source mother. I was not a fan of this storyline at all. I felt like the disagreements between the siblings was unnecessary drama that came off as forced. They tried to explain Atlas' position, and I understood where they were coming from, but Atlas was very unreasonable with their constant “who cares about mom” shtick.

I think this was something that could have been more impactful if there weren't so many plotlines happening and more focus could have been given to it instead of a few screens of Atlas saying they were pissed off before storming away from MC. This was also a plotline that was directly influenced by the Kane/Alma decisions. If MC sides with Kane, it makes much more sense for MC and Atlas to be against each other as opposed to MC being good/siding with Alma.

Five major subplots were opened, but how do you seamlessly weave these elements into a 17-19 chapter book? In my opinion, you can't. Each time something new was introduced, I felt things were glossed over, despite big chunks of chapters being focused on whichever subplot the chapter was about. Throw in the romance and I think it is nearly impossible to resolve each aspect in a complete manner.

What also hurt was the pacing of the series. This was also seen in Book 1, where sometimes a chapter would span one or two days, only for a huge time jump to occur in the next chapter.

So many ideas could have been explored through the course of four books (which is what I believe they had planned), but all the different elements should have been introduced at different times. Instead, Book 2 was an amalgamation of so many ideas but not enough time, space, or resources to thoroughly hash out and have a satisfactory resolution. For what it’s worth, I don’t think it was having too much Beckett that hurt the series. He obviously kept the series afloat and was one of PB's biggest moneymakers in recent history. Despite the constant complaints on tumblr, people fail to realize that the ENTIRE online fandom (FB, IG, Twitter, Tumblr, Reddit, Wiki) comprises maybe 0.5% - 2% of the ENTIRE player fan base. It only made sense that PB capitalized on him because their numbers dictated that the resources should be spent in that manner. The fallout from this was that Beckett was the only one who had his storyline relatively complete, and that was due to the spending power of everyone who romanced him. I think what hurt them the most was the multiple storylines and the indecision of which direction they wanted to go. They had a grand idea of the direction through Book 2 (and Book 3, let’s not lie here) but in-game mechanics and the type of game Choices is made it difficult to pull off. The app wasn’t the correct medium for what they envisioned. In my opinion, the overall story arc had the potential to be brilliant, but again, the app wasn't designed for the type of story the writers wanted to tell.

I also think the timing and having a very short turnaround hurt, as well. Players had high expectations and when you factor in the hype around the other books that were also released on Fridays, TE lost some of its sparkle. Most players didn’t get a chance to miss it for the regular 2-3 months we’ve been trained to wait for sequels. (I recognize that I’m an anomaly and the previous three sentences do not apply to me at all.)

Even with all this, I applaud the writing team for wanting to deliver a story that was worthy of a magical world. I love all the Pend Pals (‘Motley Crue’ for me), the familiars, the side characters, loved to hate the villains, and from someone who is not into Harry Potter lore at all, I was absolutely sucked into the magick universe that the writers built. (Metal Att for life ⚙!)

If TE does return in the future (and I REALLY hope it does), I think it will be even stronger than the first two books because the world building is complete. We know almost everything we need to know now. Instead of using a Book 3 to search for Sun Mama, the family is complete, MC and Atlas are attuned to all the elements, and there are so many open-ended questions that Book 2 left us.

If they implement a time jump where MC and the Pend Pals are all post grad/mid 20s, it also gives the writers a chance to move the story from the Young Adult genre to a more mature setting. We saw this in the later diamond scenes, where the writing appeared similar in their vividness (and coding in the final scene - THANK YOU, glorious writing team) to Open Heart, Bloodbound, and A Courtesan of Rome. This removes the restrictions placed on the group of being college kids, and therefore are almost fully developed with their magick, giving the possibility of moving the story out of a university setting.

If you've made it all the way here to the bottom, thank you for sticking with me and apologies for spelling/grammar since this has all been on my phone 😂 I think this comprises almost all my notes I've been keeping for the last 2 months. Feel free to agree or disagree; I just wanted to post my thoughts on this book and series that I love so much.

Now, I'm going to go back to my holiday (don't worry, I didn't write all of this while on vacay lol) and I'll try to answer asks when I have downtime.

[undertalethingies]

Confessions

It was a normal conversation. They’d been talking about politics or sports or some book they’d read, and before they’d known it the topic had slid to their time in the Underground. Undyne was talking about their “fight” and how annoyed she’d been, when all they’d done was run away. She didn’t seem to notice how they’d gone quiet, which they supposed made sense, since they were always quiet.

“Hey punk, speaking of fights, who was hardest? Was it Asgore?” She asked it like she already knew the answer, and no one looked at Sans. Why would they? Frisk felt like laughing, but it wasn’t funny.

“OOOH, DARLING, WAS IT ME?” Mettaton proposed, posing dramatically as always. Again, no one looked at Sans. For a moment, they considered lying, giving some easy answer that wouldn’t raise questions, but the words just wouldn’t come.

“you ok there, kiddo? you don’t have to answer if it makes you uncomfortable,” Said Sans. Hearing the genuine compassion in his voice, they broke. Frisk began to giggle, then to laugh, tears running down their face.

“uh, i know i’m a pretty funny guy, but-” “It was you” Frisk said, their hysterics replaced with a burning desire to just end this damn charade already. They heard the other monsters in the room reacting with confusion, but their voices blended together until they all just sounded like the Amalgamates. Frisk was entirely focused on Sans. For a moment he just looked befuddled, like he didn’t know what they meant, before they saw the comprehension dawn across his face.

“oh jeez, kid. did i…?” Frisk looked at the floor. Clearly, he hadn’t put it together completely yet. They weren’t sure what he was thinking, but it was probably related to what he’d said in the restaurant. They needed to make him understand. Make him stop thinking they were as good and kind as their LV 1 would imply.

“It was in the Hall,” they said haltingly (hall-tingly, perhaps? They thought briefly that Chara might have appreciated that pun, before jerking abruptly back to reality).  Looking around a bit, everyone but Sans seemed utterly baffled by the odd turn the talk had taken. It seemed prudent to explain.

“Toriel, do you remember how you knew I liked butterscotch, even before I told you? And Papyrus, do you remember how you thought we’d met before?” They saw the mentioned parties opening their mouths to answer, but they found themselves afraid that, if they stopped, they’d lose their nerve. Instead, they barreled forward with their explanation.

“Sans could probably explain the science of it better than me, but it was like… every time I felt “determined” I could create this… “SAVE point”, like in a video game” They paused, and took a breath, before continuing. “And when I died, I could go back. I didn’t use it for good,” they looked at their hands and didn’t need to wonder what they’d feel like covered in dust. “I- I didn’t mean to, the first time,”

“the first time?” asked Sans. Frisk didn’t look at him. They didn’t need to. Easy enough to tell what he was thinking about. They supposed that this was their last chance to back out. Their last chance to deflect or lie, preserve the illusion that they deserved any of this. They couldn’t RESET anymore, not without- The others deserved to know. 

“The first time I- I killed someone, I mean. The first time was an accident. The rest... weren’t,” Frisk picked at their hands, a nervous habit Toriel was always admonishing them for. She didn’t say anything about it, this time. No one said anything. The whole room was waiting on their next words, waiting for them to justify what they’d done somehow, give some logical reason for their cruelty. At that thought, Frisk laughed. They laughed for a solid 30 seconds, holding their arms tight to their sides. As they calmed, still grinning, they said;

 “I enjoyed it, you know. I was having the time of my life! How sick is that?” They giggled a bit more, “Toriel, I can’t believe you forgot it! I was so nice to you, through the whole battle, and then at the last second, right as you were about to spare me, that’s when I-!” Their grin is hurting their cheeks, but they just can’t stop! It’s just so funny! They tried to finish the sentence, but they couldn’t get it past their wide smile. It was okay, though. They could see, somewhere in her horrified face, that some part of her remembered what they’d done. They turned their gaze to Papyrus. “You tried to spare me, did you know that? You didn’t even want to fight! I just walked right up and slapped your head off! And then-” they gestured the movements violently, arms jabbing to and fro. At least one person flinched away. Good. “Then you said you still believed in me! That you thought I could do better! Like I was some sort of good person! Like I was redeemable, can you believe?” Their breath hitched, and they couldn’t figure out why. Wasn’t this right? Wasn’t this true? Wasn’t it all just so funny it made them want to choke? They didn’t get it! 

“Haha… And Undyne, right? You remember that kid who kept following me?” They knew she did. They knew she was probably thinking of all of the terrible things they could have done to the kid, but have no fear, for Frisk was here! Here to finally expose what a shit person they were, once and for all. “Yeah, so that confrontation on the bridge went a little bit differently. Instead of them running away and almost falling off of a cliff, they tried to emulate what you would do!” They would grin, but they were already grinning. Pity. “So this idiot kid decides they’re going to try- get this, they decide they’re going to try to stop me!” Frisk stopped for a moment. Their smile dropped. They… weren’t proud, of what they’d done next. “...Bet you can guess how well I responded to that,” they said quietly.

“But Undyne you- you just had to play the hero, huh? You, uh. You didn’t let me hit them, but you didn’t stop me from delivering a hit in general, either,” How do you tell someone you’ve watched them turn to dust and die? Not like this, they were pretty sure. Oh well, too late now. “You took the hit yourself, instead. You should have died, kind of, immediately?” Neither Undyne nor Alphys looked very happy with that pronouncement. Undyne, though, appeared to have noticed something in what they’d said.

“...Should have? The hell does that mean?” Frisk took a deep breath, before looking up and allowing their own confusion to show on their face.

“It was super freaking weird!” They yelled, throwing their hands up in the air. “I have no idea what happened! You started, like, shivering? Like you were about to dust except anime happened instead???” Undyne was starting to look excited.

“Anime happened?” She prompted.

“Yeah! Some fucking- ‘this isn’t even my final form’ level anime bs happened! You had 5 digit health, your eye was shooting spears, it was crazy!” Frisk was getting into the heat of the explanation, now. Which was presumably why Undyne picked that moment to interrupt them.

“Wait. You said your hardest fight was with Sans. How the actual FUCK did he upstage that?!” Frisk smiled ruefully.

“Don’t fuck with Sans,” They said feelingly. “Anyway, after a long, grueling battle with you that ate up most of my healing items,” Papyrus screeched “I was victorious. It was extremely unsatisfying. I mean, all of that, and you just kind of… melted and turned to dust. I- I was almost happy, all the times you killed me, y’know?” Frisk laughed a little, “The killing stopped feeling good after Papyrus, but it started feeling bad after you,” They took a long breath in, and let it out as a sigh. “I mean, I’m a genocidal maniac, not a sadist,” Frisk pointed at Sans. “He might be, though! Not that I can really blame him!

“He was waiting for me in the Hall. He told me that if I took another step forward, I wasn’t going to like the- the consequences. Honestly, at that point, that was kind of a motivator,” Frisk could feel the silence. The way the whole room was hanging on their next words. It was less oppressive than it felt like it should have been.

“He asked me if I wanted to have a bad time. I did. He gave me one,” They said. “Sans is… really strong. I died in the first attack,” They look at their hands, and remember dust.

“When I came back, he said “that’s the expression of someone who’s died twice in a row.” and he… He said he knew. About how, no matter how many times he killed me, I’d just come back. What kind of person do you have to be? To- to know that, and do it anyway? To pit yourself against someone who’s literally impossible to defeat?” The answer is that you have to be a lot better than them. “And he just kept killing me. It took ten tries to beat Undyne. For Sans? It took me forty seven. And even then, I only won because I cheated and attacked twice in one turn! And I don’t even know if he actually died, because he went to fucking Grillby’s!” They laughed. It sounded choked. 

“Then I went to the throne room, and Asgore died in one hit like a fucking bitch. It was so unsatisfying that I went back to fight Sans again. Eventually, I killed him again, and Asgore died like a bitch again, so I went back a third time, Sans called me out for being a sick fuck, and I decided to see what would happen If I spared him that time. Man, it was awesome. He just- fucking,” Frisk loved this memory, it was hilarious. “Murdered me? It was the funniest thing ever. Told me to ‘get dunked on’ whatever that means. Then he said, if we were really friends, I wouldn’t come back,” Frisk looked at Sans, and stood up. “Guess we weren’t, huh? Since I did come back, after that. Came back to the very beginning, right after I fell. Did it right that time,” They went to leave the room, but paused in the doorway.

“Now you know,” they said quietly, and left.

[astralspices]

New voices!!! And descriptions of the others also an update!

Note: I will update this as more voices come and or go, edit: or now simply repost it

First descriptions:

Ink is annoying and talks cryptic, you can ask questions all you want he will never give a straight answer, likes to interrupt my posts or texts because it's fun , everything is a game, scared of pure white spaces, draw stuff, likes using ink free , annoying and doesn't like being ignored: fave quote; it's rude to talk about someone who's watching... Wouldn't you agree?~

Update: ink apparently has a "black mode" that can manipulate the real world (the hell) and makes people go into wired hours of pain uhhh yeah don't ask me cause I don't know, he's addicted to cookies he also dunks them in his tea or hot coco, sometimes the child of the group sometimes the most respected, he's a mystery I swear to- , also has a playlist on YouTube for his music he listens to while drawing or helping me with my fanfiction, so much better at typing than me

Shattered likes putting people down while also being nice and sweet , sings a lot, is very secretive but isn't as annoying as ink with it , uses Bradley hand bold and with brackets, fave quote: ( we are all meant to suffer!! )

Update: doesn't talk much unless it's teasing nightmare or something similar, apparently has a "back-up" whatever that is .., his fave song is shatter me, ugh his smiles when he's co fronting huts my face

Dream is nice and sweet, likes peace and sounds very soft and angelic , likes hot chocolate, can get hut easily under pressure, uses Bradley hand with ' , likes to sing with nightmare, also argues with nightmare sometimes, can't handle sad scenes in movies, fave quote; 'please don't fight'

Update: if you piss him off he will turn into the sass queen who don't take no shit from no one, drinks chamomile tea, likes Steven universe, probs has some sort of problem that I will totally help him with, him and Apollo have an unspoken respect for each other, doesn't always sing when he does tho Steven universe songs usually

Nightmare is irritable but responsible, reminds me to eat and sleep, likes singing with dream, tells others if they are being st****, Id****, other words of that variety, uses book script in all caps, fave quote; CAN WE GET SOME SLEEP NOW?

Edit: he is a total sweetheart when it comes to romance, got a girlfriend (don't ask), hates everyone unless you prove to be "decent" and is a tired dad drinking his pitch black coffee out of his #1 dad mug that killer got him , now preferress to use the star mug that his girlfriend got him

Blue is excited and happy , his laugh is adorable, he hasn't talked much, likes to defend ink , didn't know his name until today , I don't know much bout him, uses asterisks all caps , fave quote; * WE WANT TO PROTECT YOU*

Update: still don't know much , absolutely adores the star sanses theme song and Steven universe sometimes play acting like Steven, exercise gets him excited, everything gets him excited, hates puns for some reason, innocent and open baby

Error is silent but quipps sometimes, for some reason likes teasing ink , he talks in random lowercase and uppercase letters everywhere, usually silent and antisocial except around mum for some reason, helps my anxiety via shutdowns, don't know much about him either, fave quote; aNNnoYiNg SoULleSssS aSsHHhoLLe !!!

Update: he talks more frequently and sometimes when co fronting talks through me in a stuttering voice (that I can't do I mean I try but just can't ugh ) likes toys, is slightly scared of ink, hates people getting his name wrong, hates being touched like at all, fave song: amalgams rag doll and megalo strike back from meltberry

The Killer three are well three people in one group all have violent tendencies and call nightmare boss their names are:

horror, nice and mature out of the three, talks slowly, sleeps a lot so don't talk much and he talks with ! , Also usually comes when I'm hungry or whenever

there's Killer he talks in {, also too cheery and sometimes a bit of a fool, creepy cute, flirty, last time he tried to flirt with me uhh he got stabbed, he's well wierd, got nightmare a #1 dad mug and night isn't allowed to throw it away

{Orr nightys gonna get the stabby stab =)}

Dust talks with [ , he also is the bored and smartest one out of the three, and kinda just retorts killer, moody and an antisocial teen TM

fave quote; ![{ We are the killer three }]!

And Two new voices have appeared they are named Apollo and Artemis

Apollo is nice if not a flirt , guardian angel, likes talking in italics and Bradley hand sometimes with + , like dream but with flirt and sass , fave quote; what's the matter love? Don't remember your guardian angel?

Update: loves me a bit too much, pretty protective, uhhh still don't know more than that

Artemis is quiet and doesn't like to talk much if he does its to scold Apollo or to say hi , likes talking in bookhand script sometimes with ^, nice and shy , fave quote; ^ I guess I'm Artemis since I'm Apollo's opposite^

Update: will throw the shy act when talking about memes, very enthusiastic about memes, new fave quote; ^DO IT FOR DA MEMES!!!^

Red is strict and doesn't like being lazy , talks in an authoritarian voice, demands answers, apparently can ground ink, he made me vacuum the house cause it was dirty, not used to giving complements so his best one is good , talks in italic style Comic sans all caps with / , fave quote ; / INK YOU'RE GROUNDED!! /

Update: doesn't mind puns nothing else really

Ok that's them..and no I didn't name them they name themselves

Absolutely! I do hope you enjoy learning this about us

They hopefully do ink ... Um

'see you I hope you have a sweet day!'

AND YOU BETTER STAY SAFE

...bye!!

[pensola]

I still play Overwatch from time to time, not as much as I used to due to the changes they did to my most used heroes (thus making me not want to "connect" with other heroes in case they are changed), and the restrictions to the freedom of playing the game, but I still had a lot of thoughts on Echo, both positives and negatives, and I want to let them all out so that I can move on and perhaps.

I like that Echo has a cool non-normal name hero-moniker. I know this is not that big a deal for most, but as a casual fan of comic book heroes, I am always a little disappointed when a hero's moniker is just a name, like Moira. Sometimes it makes sense, and sometimes the names are a little cool and works as a moniker (like Ashe=Ash), but I still feel a tingling sense of disappointment. So Echo having this as a name is cool.

Being named Echo WILL make it a bit harder to find her tags unless one specifies "ow echo" and such, compared to names like Junkrat and Roadhog, but it is fine.

I do appreciate that they tried to explain why Echo has that very human and feminine face projector instead of the weird camera projector thing in the early concept arts; I see it as Liao either 1) trying to make an Omnic be as human-like as possible to make people feel comfortable with them, like just how they project emotions will reflect humans unlike Zenyatta's face, or 2) she wanted to make Echo's face like how she wishes her face was, because I am NOT going to lie and say I never made 'myself' in The Sims but how I wish I would look, or 3) she designed the face after how she looked like when she was younger and more innocent, or perhaps based the face on her daughter or another young, female figure in her life. Or a combination of the three, that her face is sort of an amalgamation of various female figures she has observed.

Mind you, appreciating the explanation does not equal LIKING that Echo has such a very feminine face, and even less how very, very feminine the rest of the body is sculpted out to be. I wouldn't mind a feminine-like body, it is just HOW very feminine it is that is uncomfortable.

I will keep in mind that they made Orisa as a female-oriented omnic that did definitely not look female before they made Echo, but it still is uncomfortable just HOW Echo's body is shaped to be very obviously feminine in a sexual way.

I can understand the feeling of disappointment that Liao, the only Chinese and one of only two female founders of Overwatch, is dead when the rest, 4/5 men, 3/5 light-skinned men from various countries over the world, and 2/5 American men, survived. Even the one dark-skinned Egyptian woman initially thought to be dead was alive, but the one Chinese, female founder is of course dead so that her Omnic, forever young-looking and forever VERY female-looking with an Apple-aesthetic that some people will relate with whiteness, replaces her.

It does not help that the other female-oriented omnic, Orisa, also has a woman of colour as her creator, but both these creators are in the background while the omnic is the playable hero. That can suck. At least Efi will be a main character in the novel currently in works, and her being a young child is a legitimate reason for her not engaging in battle.

I do wish they would put some focus on who created Zenyatta and Bastian, the other omnics that have been there since the beginning. I can totally understand if they had not thought about that when the game was made, that they initially just had them be "factory-made", and when making post-launch heroes they got all into the details of the new omnic's stories.

I was thinking this randomly, but man is it lucky that Harold Winston also wasn’t PoC who died and was replaced literally to his name by Winston the gorilla. That would have made it three named people of colour that were sidelined/killed for a non-human to be in the spotlight.

I am genuinely curious who the voice actor is; if she is Asian, or Singaporean, and if she speaks other languages than English. Has any information been released yet?

So far her dubli-ult lines seem to be a mix of the original voice and her own voice, but I hope they will stick to either 1) only the original voice but distorted/autotuned to resemble Echo's voice thus making it sound like she just taped them speaking and tried to adapt it, or 2) she imitates the voice line, and it is distorted/autotuned to sound like the original user's, but again, it sounds wrong/fake. The way they are doing it now is okay, but it feels a bit half-done when they try to have it both ways, and it throws me kind of off.

(I also personally think her ult should be nerfed so that her using her dubli-ult will take her back to her original form early; thus, players would have to consider whether to use the easily gained ult early, or to use the dublication for the full 15 seconds. Even with lower ult damage compared to the originals, one shouldn't be able to see three Dragonstrikes within 15 seconds because ults are supposed feel a bit more powerful and rare than that, in my personal opinion)

[all-good-things-dot-dot-dot]

All Good Things…

31st May 2020

Hello, Chaps and Chapettes,

Here’s my first true attempt at writing a blog, or any kind of a diary of sorts. It’s bound to go wrong, but it is my hope that it doesn’t. If I hope hard enough, it might stick around for at least a month, right?

I say that because every other time I’ve told myself, “I will keep a diary for real this time,” it has always gone the same way tits and testicles go. I haven’t had the right mindset to keep anything up longer than a few days, sometimes I haven’t gotten as far as to write on a single clean page. I’ve bought the nice shiny books with Harry Potter logos on the front, maybe even a shiny pen to write with, and then it has gone in the drawer for seven years before eventually being sold on to some kid in a car-boot sale for 50p.

Why do I think this time will be any different? Well, as you can tell from that first claim, I don’t. I feel I know myself well enough (and I should, I have known myself intimately for at least 32 years) to know what motivates me, what will work, what will fail, and what will trick me away like a witch with a cottage made of gingerbread and gumdrops. However, I also believe that detailed knowledge about myself is what will allow me to carry this on without dropping the ball this time. Maybe, just maybe, I know enough about myself to give this a chance.

You see, what has always been my failing in the past is giving myself the time to do these things. I have never had a structure to my life and even if I have tried to meticulously plan anything out, I have always ended up tripping over it because I hate structure. I don’t plan unless I am forced to, so trying to plan will make any project sour for me. That is how I have tricked myself in this first instance.

You see, faithful reader (you must be faithful to have got this far), I have given myself a limit. Thirty minutes, to be precise. All I have to do is write for thirty minutes each day. You can do a lot in thirty minutes, you can make a meal, eat a meal, and… Okay, I’ve ran out of things I can think of that you can do in thirty minutes, so I will cheat and say ‘write a blog post’ for the third option. Laziness, however, can last a lot longer. It can take up an hour, or an evening, a day or even a weekend. Laziness has been my disease, so by telling the sleeping bug in my brain that I only need to do something for a few minutes and then will be lazy again, I am essentially beating it. Just don’t tell the bug that.

In fact, this is already proving to work. My phone has called out to me twice and I’ve ignored it. I have written this much so far and I am only just passing the halfway point. I didn’t expect to fill a page with words this early into this game! So now I have the tricky stage of figuring out what I am going to continue to write.

I suppose I should explain what these blogs are going to be. I am going to sit down, as you may have guessed from my earlier explanation, without a plan. Instead, I will talk about what is important to me on that day. It may be long, it may be short, it will only be what I can write successfully in thirty minutes. That may mean I have to conclude with ‘to be continued…’ or a terrible cliffhanger, the kind you only get in a badly written soap. Sometimes, I may offer help, sometimes I may talk about a hot topic, but what I do want to stress is that there will be no angry rants. I will not pick off what I feel is wrong in politics, or in general media, or what beat up my psyche on the day I sit to write. This is because of the title. ‘All Good Things…’ I want this to be what it says on the tin. If it’s good, it is in, if it is bad, it is out.

That does not mean I may not pick fun at a subject. For example, I found it hilarious, when changing the name on my social media platforms, that some did not like those dot-dot-dots (‘ellipsis’ if you want to be scientific about it) that I added at the end. This replaced the word ‘vlogs’ because I did not want ‘All Good Things…’ to be solely about vlogs, or blogs, or funny cat pictures. I wanted it to be about the amalgamation of what I felt to epitomize the word ‘good’. Some social media delegations, however, do not like those three dots. They’d rather they were words or weren’t there at all. So, I got around this in some places by merely writing ‘dot-dot-dot’ and they were quite happy with this! Therefore, if you see this on any of the places I’ve chosen to hang my hat then you’ll know I’m having a quiet little chuckle at their measures of what is and isn’t good practice.

Two minutes left, so I had best try to wrap this up. I will do so by saying that I am happy with how far I have gotten with this so far. In future, I will try to talk less about myself unless necessary, I will try to talk to you, share things I feel help, and ways to get through whatever you need to get through. To that end, please never hesitate to shout if you think I can help with that.

Otherwise, try this technique out - give yourself thirty minutes, and do something you want to do but don’t have the time to. If you do it often enough, it might become a nice habit and beat your own lazy bug a bit!

This has been Scaramouche, tapping at a keyboard, wishing you all good things…

X

[eldritchsurveys]

677.

Have you ever tried to walk on a moving vehicle and fallen over?: >> Nah, I’ve got decent balance. But I’ve been the person someone fell over onto while I was sitting on the subway. -__- What is your favourite kind of bread? Is there any of that in your house?: >> I don’t know, I like different kinds. The bread we currently use is just one kind that I like. Do you own any equipment to make cocktails, like jiggers or shakers?: >> I think we still have the shaker somewhere. Most of the cocktails I make are simple enough to not require equipment, though. How many times have you seriously injured yourself?: >> Like, a couple of times when self-injuring. When was the last time you were a passenger in a car and sat in the back?: >> The last time I sat in the back seat was when we went out of town with Sparrow’s parents.

Did you attend Sunday School as a child?: >> I don’t remember doing so. What is the longest your hair has ever been?: >> Shoulder-length, when I was a child/adolescent. What about the shortest? (not including being a toddler or baby): >> Completely shaved. Have you ever smoked a cigarette?: >> Many times. Are/were you in the school band, and if so, what instrument did you play?: >> I was not in band. I was a choir kid through and through. Who does the grocery shopping in your household?: >> Sparrow and I do the shopping together. She pays for it most times, but sometimes I do. What is the best thing you’ve ever bought at a thrift shop?: >> A Spyder coat, considering how expensive those things can be. Have you ever ordered an unusual drink at a bar?: >> I don’t think so. I don’t even really know any unusual drinks, although some of my faves may be unusual depending on the bartender. What is your favourite thing about summer?: >> The warmth, the greenery, etc. When was the last time you went to your local library?: >> Mid-February. I don’t usually go to the library itself because I borrow e-books so often. Do you have any friends who work in retail?: >> Yeah. Can you do a proper cartwheel?: >> Yeah. Have you ever been pulled aside by security at the airport?: >> No, thankfully. Are you a fast-thinker or a slow-thinker?: >> Some weird amalgamation of both. My mind can run at the speed of light when left to its own devices, but some things (particularly external things) take me a little bit of time to process. Do you watch The Simpsons regularly?: >> No. If you were to donate to charity today, what would you donate to?: >> --- What is your favourite card game and when was the last time you played it?: >> --- Would you consider yourself to be good at spelling and grammar?: >> Sure. Who was the last person you cuddled with?: >> Can Calah. Have you ever spoken or performed on stage in front of a large audience?: >> I don’t know if I’d call it a large audience, but definitely in front of sizeable ones. Did you ever go to summer camp when you were younger?: >> Just once, to church camp. What is your favourite seasonal candy? (only available at certain times): >> --- Are there any television shows you own in entirety on DVD or VHS?: >> Nope. How far away from your house is the nearest gas station?: >> There are three that are pretty much the same distance from here, about a mile, except in three different directions (all except west). Do you know anyone who is fluent in a second tongue?: >> Sure. When was the last time you had a bubble bath?: >> I was a child. I hate baths. Have you ever been pressured into doing drugs? Did you say yes or no?: >> No.

[spidersfence]

this is my masterpost of my cookie run OCs so far! this is a bulky post, which i do apologize for, but hopefully it’ll help organize everything! under the cut are everyone’s info — if i’m stepping on anyone’s toes design-wise, please let me know!

kumquat cookie: she/her; a bit loud/brash/snarky, but ultimately well-meaning, very very gay for orange cookie and intimidated by lime; plays baseball - baseballs that look like slices of kumquat come from the right side of the screen, and if she’s close enough she’ll hit them, clearing obstacles; pet is a baseball bat and occasionally destroys upcoming obstacles

half & half / black & white cookie: he/they (dual personalities); when their eyes & hair look like the image, they are emotionless, almost robotic, but very precise and orderly, when his eyes turn black & his hair switches so his ponytail is white, he lets go and has fun, though it’s at the cost of his precision; in the first form, they run much slower but automatically jump over holes in the levels as well as take less damage from obstacles, in the second form, he deals twice as many destruction points but takes twice as much damage from obstacles and plays kinda like purple yam in berserk mode has slightly slipperier controls; pet is a piece from the board game “go,” not sure about anything else beyond that

twix cookie: she/her; very owo and XD culture, loves to have flappy sweaterpaws, surprisingly really likes heavy metal; the sticky caramel added to her dough makes everything (blast jelly/giant potion/magnet/etc) last longer; the word twix is an amalgamation of “twin biscuit sticks,” so pet is a pair of biscuit sticks, not sure about anything else beyond that

tomato cookie: she/her; elegant, emotionally distant to protect herself from other cookies saying she isn’t a true fruit cookie (she really loves cheesecake cookie, since she invites everyone to her parties); a “cherry tomato jelly” will appear occasionally, collecting it turns basic jellies to “tomato slice jellies,” and collecting enough of those to fill her bar transports her to a place similar to sparkling cookie’s, where obstacles are turned to “tomato slice jellies”; pet is a broken-off branch of a tomato vine, not sure about anything else beyond that

blueberry cookie: she/her; blackberry’s younger sister, very bubbly, desperately wants her sisters to just let loose and have fun; she takes care of the pets of the same ~mysterious~ employer blackberry works for, so when she runs “treat jellies” pop up, and when she’s collected enough, pet care items like leashes/collars/food and water bowls get dropped and give mega bonus points if collected; pet is a blueberrybird, not sure about anything else beyond that

elderberry cookie: she/her; blackberry’s older sister, a wallflower desperate to not be noticed, intelligent and studious; she’s a librarian for the same employer as her sisters, so “book jellies” will take the place of basic jellies at intervals, and if you collect a certain number, she’ll “reshelve” them and gain some energy back; pet is an elderflower bookmark, not sure about anything else beyond that

boysenberry cookie: she/her; blackberry’s older cousin, curious and excitable, “ready for her close-up,” embodies the 1920s flapper (the coat is meant to be a much lighter cardigan); when she runs, the background music is vintage jazz, and when she collects enough “film jellies” (as in pieces of rolls of film) the color scheme goes sepia-toned, the basic jellies turn into “film jellies,” and the more she collects, the longer the sepia-tone segment lasts; pet is an old-timey projector, might work similar to spotlight fan, not sure about anything else beyond that

cloudberry cookie: he/him; eager, short fuse, ready to prove himself in any way he can; plays soccer(/football) - a ball comes from the right side of the screen, and he kicks it in a series of volleys that ends with him missing a ball or running out of time; pet is a penalty card, and it changes colors (yellow/red), but not sure about anything else beyond that **the blacks in the outfit should actually be a dark peach color!

black licorice cookie: she/her; …i’ll be honest, i only have her design. i have no idea what she would do or what her pet would be. ideas are welcome!

sweetarts cookie: she/her; she skips in her running animation, she has a much more wicked sense of humor than anyone expects but has an angelic giggle, no one has ever seen her with her eyes open; “tart jellies” that look like sweetarts appear in color order (red/pink, yellow, green, blue, purple) and collecting them creates a puff of “sweet mini jellies”; pet is an empty sweetarts wrapper, and it will occasionally scoop up jellies its cookie missed, giving twice as many points as the jellies would have normally given

sunlight cookie: she/her; the embodiment of sunshine and the yin to moonlight’s yang! moonlight is soft and sleepy, sunlight is bright and energetic. *fun fact: she and sunset are the only legendaries in this post!*; her mechanics sort of mirror moonlight’s, in that when her special is fully charged she gains a strong magnetic (aka gravitational) force, pulling everything (except obstacles) toward her, and when they make contact they explode into tiny “sparkling star jellies” (like moonlight’s “twinkling star jellies”!); pet is that teeny tiny sun-like star, not sure about anything else beyond that

sunset cookie: they/them; they’re directly connected to sunlight (sort of like millennial tree and wind archer), extremely laid-back until they’re pushed too far, tries not to allow negative emotions to stick around for too long; no clue what their in-game mechanics would be; pet is that rainbow (it should have a face), not sure about anything else beyond that

milk choco cookie: he/him; i’m honestly shocked there isn’t already a milk choco cookie?? mint, dark, white, pink, but no MILK. so here he is! he’s a very milo thatch (from Disney’s Atlantis: The Lost Empire) personality — a socially awkward nerd who has more niche knowledge than anyone would ever need, has a tendency to pull at his hair when he’s nervous (which is often); again, not sure on game mechanics or what his pet should be. open to ideas!

semisweet choco cookie: he/they; so you know how we see carl and ellie fredricksen at the start of Disney/Pixar’s Up as children, daydreaming about traveling the world in a dope aircraft? yeah, combine them, that’s this kid. constantly in his head (sometimes talking to himself), a little bit of a prankster, easily bored. that book they’re carrying? it’s a scrapbook filled with photographs of foreign places (“foreign” could mean anything from the other side of the planet to the next state over), cataloguing all the places they want to go someday. they really admire pilot cookie; pet is a little hot air balloon/blimp thing, but everything mechanics-wise is up in the air.

baking choco cookie: she/her; baking chocolate doesn’t have any added sugar, and her personality reflects that: she loves all the classic emo millennial music (p!atd, fob, mcr), but she’s a great listener; i got nothin’ on how she operates in-game, unfortunately. that cloud is her pet, and either gives a flash of lightning that destroys all obstacles on screen at once, or starts a roll of thunder and during that time if she hits anything, her blinking immunity lasts twice as long!

(i headcanon that all the canon choco cookies are related in one way or another; milk is directly related to dark/white, and semi and baking are siblings!)