#PPE elements

[fatecantstopme]

Lustful Agony

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x plus size!reader

Summary: It's sex pollen, aka my favorite trope.

Warnings: cursing, use of pet names, an insane amount of smut, dubcon (cuz sex pollen), unprotected sex (p in v), oral (F receiving), masturbation (F).

"Would you please be careful?" you snapped.

Your partner froze and offered you a sheepish smile. "Sorry, doc. I wasn't paying attention."

"I noticed," you huffed. "There are any number of things in here that could kill us, so tread lightly."

"Maybe I should wait here."

You glanced in his direction and nodded. "You know what? Good idea. Stay there and don't touch anything."

You continued on through the dusty lab, hoping to find at least one working computer, but after 20 minutes, it seemed hopeless. Every computer had been destroyed and most of the paper files had been shredded or burned. All that remained was hundreds of glass vials filled with various liquids and gases that did gods-only-knew what.

"I'm starting to think this might be a burn and run," you called back to Bucky--still standing where you'd left him on the other side of the lab.

"If we blow this place, is there gonna be a toxic cloud?"

You shot an annoyed look in his direction. "I said 'burn', James, not 'blow'. We're not blowing up a lab filled with unknown chemicals and biological agents."

"Right, yeah." He looked at the ground, feeling slightly embarrassed. He always seemed to make a fool of himself in front of you and he hated it. He never wanted to be the fool, especially around you.

Your well-trained eyes scanned the room again before falling on a secured biological containment chamber. You knew that would be the best option for storing items for burning. All you'd need to do was get all the bio vials into the chamber and light it up.

You crossed the room to the chamber, feeling Bucky's eyes following you. He hated being in a position where he felt like he couldn't protect you, but he was out of his element here. As the resident hazardous materials expert, this was your area of brilliance.

You grumbled in annoyance when you noticed the lock on the containment chamber was activated. You were familiar with this particular model, and if you were lucky, these Hydra assholes hadn't been smart enough to bother changing the code. You input the pin, silently crossing your fingers, a smile spreading across your face when you heard the distinct sound of the mechanism unlocking.

You lifted the hood slowly, hoping to find the chamber empty. You had a momentary thought that you and Bucky should be wearing appropriate PPE, but the thought occurred to you too late.

A sound of surprise escaped your lips as a puff of sweet-smelling pink dust blew into your face from inside the cabinet. The tactical suit and gloves you were wearing did nothing to protect your respiratory system from the unknown substance.

The dust seemed to dissolve almost instantly, fading into nothingness before you could even alert Bucky to the hazard. He, of course, had heard your surprised gasp, thanks to his super soldier hearing.

"Doc? Everything okay?" he called worriedly.

"Not sure," you replied. "I, uh, I got hit in the face with some pink dust...and I'm willing to bet it's not fairy dust."

Bucky's blood ran cold. "Pink dust?"

"Yeah, smelled like some kind of super sweet candy--or those sugary wine coolers I drank in college."

Any color that remained in Bucky's face quickly drained. "Look at me."

His tone was so firm, it frightened you. Bucky normally joked around with you, but you could hear the fear in his voice and it scared you more than anything else.

You turned to face him and his expression confirmed your fears. "Do you know what it is?"

Bucky nodded. "I think so, but we won't know for sure for at least 30 minutes, possibly longer."

"Am I going to die?" your voice was so soft--so small--that even he almost didn't hear it.

"Not if I can help it."

When your eyes met his piercing blue orbs, he could see the terror reflected in them. He wanted to go to you, help you, but he knew he couldn't--not if you still had even the slightest trace of the dust on you.

"You need to rinse off before we get out of here," Bucky said calmly. "If it's what I think it is, then I can't get that stuff anywhere near me."

"Why? What'll happen?"

Bucky's gaze didn't quite meet yours. "I will tear you apart and not even realize it."

His words cut you like a knife. You knew deep in your soul Bucky would never hurt you, but if this substance could turn him into a wild animal, you wondered what the hell it was going to do to you.

You'd spotted a decontamination area when you'd first entered the lab, so you slowly made your way there, careful to avoid getting anywhere near Bucky.

Bucky radioed in to Sam to give him an update on the situation. You heard him describing what had happened and asking for another team to be sent in to destroy the facility.

You stood under the spray of the shower head and let the water pummel your skin. The pressure was almost painful, but you knew it was necessary to ensure the substance was no longer on your skin. You'd inhaled it, so you were screwed, but there was no reason for Bucky to be too.

After several minutes, you felt comfortable saying you were clean. You just wanted to get the hell out of this lab and back home.

You voiced as much to Bucky, but he shook his head slowly. "You're not gonna make it all the way home, (Y/N)."

You didn't like Bucky's use of your first name in this context...he always called you 'doc', and the change made you feel like death was around the corner.

Your face must have given away your fear because he continued. "I just mean you won't make it home before the symptoms start. Once they do, you won't want to be around anyone."

"So what do we do?"

"Safe house. It's our only option."

You groaned inwardly. You had zero desire to stay in that drafty little cabin another night, but you trusted Bucky's instincts, so you simply nodded.

Bucky was quick to usher you back to the quinjet, filling you in on his conversation with Sam. "He'll send in another team in full Level A hazmat gear. They'll take care of the place."

"Okay."

"You alright, doc? How you feelin'?"

"I feel fine so far. Just moderately terrified."

"Don't be. You're gonna be fine."

You wanted to believe him--really you did--but there was something in his voice that made you question if he even believed it.

By the time the jet touched down by the cabin, 25 minutes had passed since the moment of infection. Bucky still hadn't told you what you were dealing with and it was driving you insane.

You followed Bucky into the cabin and watched him drop his bag on the floor. He turned to look at you, eyes clearly sizing you up, checking to see if you were okay.

"Just tell me," you whispered--somewhere between a plea and a demand.

He sighed deeply. "How do you feel?"

You closed your eyes and took mental stock of your body, seeking anything out of the ordinary. "I feel hot, but that could just be the anxiety."

"How hot?"

"I don't know, like feverish, I guess."

Bucky groaned and the sound sent a wave of need through your body--a need that shocked you to your very core. This was absolutely not the time for your stupid crush to rear its head.

"Please don't hit me, okay? I'm just gonna touch your hand."

"Why would I hit you?" you asked a second before his flesh hand met yours. The feeling was pleasant and it warmed you from the inside out, until he removed his hand. You inhaled sharply as an intense pain you couldn't describe shot through you.

Bucky jerked his hand away, his worst fears confirmed. "I know what it is."

"Please," you whimpered.

"It's a biological agent Hydra developed when their attempts to make a useable super soldier serum failed. It was designed to induce a euphoric sexual state that would result in agony and possible death if penetrative sex was not performed and an orgasm was not achieved."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"Hydra believed they could create super soldiers the old fashion way--by breeding them. Sprinkle some of the magic dust on a super soldier and he'd fuck his way through a room full of women without a single care for their well-being. They called it 'sex pollen'."

Your breathing was labored as pain began to spread through your body. You tried desperately to ignore it and focus on Bucky's words. "What happened?"

Bucky couldn't look at you as he responded softly, "None of the women survived the mating process."

You realized now what he'd meant back at the lab. You didn't really want to know, but you found yourself asking the question anyway, "Did they do it to you?"

Bucky closed his eyes, desperately trying to push the dark memories back down. "Yeah. They did."

"I'm sorry," you whispered.

Bucky shook his head, banishing the memories. "It doesn't matter. What matters now is how we handle this."

"If the sex pollen had that kind of effect on a super soldier, what's it gonna do to me?"

"I imagine it's going to be significantly worse for you if you don't...umm--if you don't reach climax."

"So I have to orgasm? Seriously?"

"I wish it were that simple."

Before you could respond, you doubled over in pain, an agonized groan escaping your parted lips.

Bucky rushed to you without thinking and laid his hands on your arms. You let out a pained whine and he pulled away, suddenly remembering what was happening.

"It feels like my skin is on fire," you cried.

"I know, doll. I know."

It was killing Bucky not to be able to help you. He was your protector in every situation, but he couldn't protect you from this. He knew exactly what kind of hell you were in for and it nearly broke him.

The waves of pain subsided and you were able to pull yourself upright. "Well this is fun," you mumbled.

"It's gonna get worse, (Y/N). Much, much worse."

"That's comforting, Buck. Thank you."

He gave you a sad look. "You can't do this alone."

"What do you mean?"

"The pollen was designed to force the creation of life...the only way to alleviate the pain is to give the pollen what it wants."

Your brain had become too muddled to understand what he was saying. "Plain English, Buck. Please."

"You, uh, you have to have sex."

"So you're saying I can't just masturbate this away?"

Bucky shook his head. "You have to have sex and your partner has to umm--ejaculate inside you."

Another wave of pain raked its claws through your skin, but you managed to stay upright this time. "What happens if I don't?"

You saw the look of sadness on Bucky's face and you knew you wouldn't like his answer. "You'll die."

"Well, fuck." You winced, reaching out to grab the back of the couch for stability. The pain was only increasing and you knew it was a matter of time before you couldn't take it any longer. "How sure are you that I'll die?"

"I mean, I don't know any regular humans that survived contact with the pollen. They were used as test subjects during its creation."

"I swear, Hydra gets more disgusting every time I learn something new."

Bucky was dying to help you. Seeing you in pain was agonizing for him and he knew his pain paled in comparison to yours. He would do anything for you--all you need do was ask.

"I'm gonna try waiting it out," you said firmly.

"What?" Bucky said, shock evident in his tone.

"I'm sure as hell not gonna force you to fuck me, Bucky. So I'm gonna wait it out."

"(Y/N), you're not forcing me to do anything. I'm offering to help. I don't want you to die."

You shook your head. "I'd rather die than force you into this."

"I'm offering--"

"Don't," you snapped. "No matter what you say, I'm going to feel like I'm forcing you to do something and I can't deal with that. So please, let me try to handle this alone."

Bucky knew for a fact he could overpower you with ease, especially when you were in such a state. He could make the pain stop and you would be glad for it in the moment. But he couldn't do it. He would never ever hurt you like that, even if it meant watching you die. It just wasn't something he was capable of.

"Okay, doll."

You could tell he didn't want to agree, but you were glad he wasn't arguing. All you wanted to do was tear your clothes off and try to find some sort of relief. The fire burning under your skin was intensifying by the second.

"I'm gonna take a cold shower and lock myself in the bedroom. Please stay out here."

Bucky simply nodded. He wanted to sit on this couch and listen to the sounds of your pain about as much as he wanted to get shot in the face. But he respected you too much to ignore your wishes.

You dragged yourself into the bathroom and stripped down to nothing before climbing into the cold shower. The frigid water seemed to help at first, but you discovered the effects were short-lived.

You leaned your head against the cold tile and let out a pained sob. You wanted the pain to stop so badly, but you didn't want to involve Bucky. You couldn't. Bucky was your closest friend and partner. His was the relationship you valued most in life and you wouldn't risk it for anything. It didn't matter you were in love with him. It didn't matter you'd wanted him from the moment you'd laid eyes on him. What mattered is you knew he didn't feel the same.

Bucky had a new girl in his bed several times a week. You were pretty sure you'd never seen the same girl twice in the three years you'd known him. Each one was a tall, blonde, model-thin, gorgeous woman. You didn't check a single one of those boxes. You didn't think Bucky was shallow, he just had a type. He was one of the hottest men you'd ever seen, so it only made sense for him to be with the hottest women.

You didn't think you were ugly, by any means. You just weren't his type. You were shorter, very curvy, girl-next-door average. You'd accepted it long ago and vowed to never tell him how you felt for fear of jeopardizing your friendship. Your current situation was as close as you could get to your biggest fear and you weren't willing to risk it. You loved him too much to lose him entirely. Even if he insisted he was willing to help, you knew he would come to regret it. Things would be awkward between you and eventually your friendship would come to an end.

"Not worth the risk," you muttered to yourself.

The cooling effects of the shower had long since worn off, so you turned off the water and grabbed a towel. As you wrapped it around your body, you found it was too small to cover everything and the scratchy material was painful against your overly sensitive skin.

You dropped the towel to the ground and opened the door a crack. "Bucky?"

"Yeah, doll?"

"Um, the towel hurts my skin, so um...please don't look while I walk to the bedroom."

Bucky inhaled deeply, calming himself. Sure, he wasn't impacted by the pollen, but the fact that your naked body was a few feet away from him certainly did.

"I'll close my eyes."

You tentatively opened the door and peeked out. You could see Bucky sitting on the couch, eyes closed as promised. You quickly rushed from the bathroom to the open bedroom door, shutting it behind you. In your haste to get out of sight, you neglected to lock the door.

You nearly collapsed onto the bed, the need to feel some relief the only thing on your mind. Normally, you would have been embarrassed to even consider touching yourself when Bucky was so close by, but this was an extreme circumstance. You mentally told yourself you needed to be quiet at the very least, given his excellent hearing.

You tried to get as comfortable as you could, but it was impossible. The only parts of your body that didn't ache were the ones you were actively touching. You slipped your dominant hand between your legs and felt another wave of embarrassment hit when you felt just how wet you were.

The moment your fingers brushed between your folds, you let out a loud moan. You slapped your hand across your mouth and hoped Bucky mistook the sound for one of pain.

Bucky was breathing heavily as he sat on the couch less than 10 feet from the bedroom door. He could hear every tiny little sound you made, even as you desperately tried to stay quiet.

He knew he shouldn't be turned on by those sounds--not when you were experiencing something so awful--but he couldn't help it. He'd dreamed of hearing you moan for him a hundred times before. It took all his will-power to not bust down that door and give you what you needed.

You let out a particularly obscene moan and Bucky had to stifle his own. His cock strained against his pants and he hated himself for being turned on. He tried to tell himself it wasn't his fault--he'd wanted you for years--but he couldn't shake the feeling of shame.

Ten minutes went by and the sounds coming from the bedroom continued. Bucky gripped the back of the couch with all his strength, determined to not give himself even a modicum of pleasure from this.

Another five minutes passed and he heard you let out a pained sob. His heart skipped a beat and he listened closely for any more noise. He heard the distinct sounds of you crying and his resolve broke. He immediately went to your door and knocked.

"Doll? You okay?"

"It hurts so much," you whimpered.

He leaned his forehead against the door. "I know, sweetheart. Please let me help you. Please."

He could hear you writhing around on the bed, whimpers of pain reaching his ears and making him tear up.

"I can't--it didn't work," you cried. "I'm so hot--it hurts."

"Please, baby," Bucky begged. He placed his hand on the doorknob, dying to turn it and get to you.

"Bucky," you whimpered.

The pain in that one simple word made his decision for him. He turned the knob and was surprised to find the door unlocked. He opened the door a crack, but kept his eyes away from the bed.

"Let me help you," he pleaded again.

Your eyes roamed his gorgeous figure and you let out a choked sob. Nothing else mattered in that moment--all you could think about was him.

"Make it stop," you begged him.

Bucky's eyes snapped open, meeting yours in a desperately hungry look. He didn't say a word, didn't even allow his brain to process the deeper meaning of what he was about to do. You'd asked him to help you--to stop the pain--so that was exactly what he was going to do.

He stripped out of his tactical suit as fast as possible, leaving himself in his boxer briefs, cock straining to be set free.

You reached out a hand to him and he went to you without a thought. He climbed onto the bed, hovering over you as his eyes scanned your face.

"Are you sure about this, doll?" he asked softly.

"I need you," you whimpered back.

Those three little words shattered the sliver of resolve he'd had left. His lips met yours in a hungry, devouring kiss--all teeth and tongue. His hands latched onto your soft curves, touching every inch of skin he could reach.

Everywhere he touched felt like ice against your burning skin. The sensation both incredible and painful all at once. Whatever bit of shyness or insecurity you had was wiped away by the sheer intensity of it all.

Bucky's lips attacked your neck, your jaw, your collarbone--nipping and sucking bruising marks into your skin. While it felt good, it wasn't nearly enough.

"Need more."

Bucky nudged his knee between your legs to spread them wider for him. "I know, baby. I know."

He quickly descended down to your aching core, blowing hot air against it in a teasing manner. You whined and scratched at his scalp, reminding him this was not the time for teasing.

He flicked his tongue between your pussy lips, seeking out your clit immediately. The second his tongue brushed against it, you cried out in pleasure--the first real feeling of relief you'd had since you'd been infected.

Bucky smiled to himself as he settled in to properly feast on your pussy, reveling in the essence of you against his tongue, invading all of his senses.

You gripped his hair in one hand and the sheet in the other, gyrating wildly as Bucky ate you with abandon. The pleasure was blinding, but you could still feel the undercurrent of raging fire flowing through your veins.

Bucky seemed to instinctively know exactly what you enjoyed, following your body like he had a roadmap to your pleasure points. He sent you over the edge with ease three times before finally coming up for air.

You reached for him, still hungry for more. "Bucky."

"I'm here, baby." He kissed you deeply, hands gripping your hips tightly. He wanted to take his time with you, but he knew he couldn't--you needed more from him and you needed it now.

He was quick to discard his underwear before lining himself up with your entrance. His cock nudged against your aching hole and you both moaned.

"Please, please, please, please..." you begged.

Bucky knew what you needed and he wasted no time sheathing himself inside of you. You cried out in pain as his cock stretched you more than you'd ever experienced before. The pain quickly subsided into pleasure and the pollen seemed to sense its purpose was near.

You felt a surge of need and you begged him to fuck you. "I need it, please, Bucky."

"I've got you, sweetheart." He began to thrust gently, trying his best not to hurt you. The sensations began to overwhelm him as much as they were overwhelming you, prompting him to move faster--losing himself in the feeling of you.

"Fuck, baby. You take my cock so well."

Your pussy fluttered in response, a soft whine escaping your lips.

"Best pussy I've ever had. So tight and wet for me. Made for me, weren't you?"

You nodded rapidly, not really registering what he was saying.

"How many times you think I can make you cum, baby? Six? Seven? Think the pollen can get you there?"

Your eyes widened at his words. Unsure if that was possible even with pollen.

Bucky grinned down at you. "I think I can get seven. Bet this pussy will give me whatever I want, won't she? Gonna make my girl scream my name all night long."

You felt the coil in your belly snap as another orgasm rushed through you. You clung to Bucky, a string of profanity spilling past your lips.

Bucky didn't let you come down from it before pushing your body towards another orgasm. He wanted to feel you gripping his cock like this as long as possible--especially since he might never feel it again.

"Baby, you feel so good," he murmured, placing soft kisses to your face. "Love the way you're squeezing me."

"Feels so good, Bucky," you moaned.

"Fuck, been wanting to hear you say that for so long. Needed to be inside this tight little pussy so badly. It's better than I ever imagined."

Somewhere in the back of your mind, you wanted to ask what he meant--if he'd really imagined it, but you were too far gone to articulate a coherent thought.

As another orgasm crashed into you, you momentarily wondered if it was possible to die from overwhelming pleasure. You'd been in so much pain for so long and the sudden change to blinding pleasure was incredible. It was unlike anything you'd ever experienced.

"How many more can you give me, sweetheart?"

"Wanfeelcum," you mumbled incoherently.

"What was that, baby? Too fucked out to speak?"

"Wanna feel you cum, Bucky," you begged.

He was already so close to the edge he nearly lost control at the sound of your voice. But if he was being honest with himself, he didn't want this to end. He was scared if he came, if he gave you what you needed, then you'd be satiated and it would all be over.

"Need to feel you cum on my cock at least one more time, baby."

You whimpered, but nodded your consent.

Bucky picked up the pace, hitting your sweet spot with each thrust. You weren't sure whether it was the pollen or his skill, but you went flying over the edge of blinding pleasure with an intensity you'd never experienced. You screamed his name as the waves crashed over you, pussy gushing juices as you squirted all over his cock and abdomen.

"Fuck yeah, baby. So fucking sexy..." he murmured. "Gonna fill you up. Give you what you want."

"Want your cum," you begged.

"That's right, pretty girl. Gonna give you my cum. Fill up this sweet pussy till you're stuffed."

"Yes, Bucky! Please!"

Bucky's hips stuttered as he came, filling your pussy with ropes of warm cum. Bucky kept thrusting slowly as he whispered your name into your skin over and over like a prayer.

Slowly, the haze created by the sex pollen began to fade, leaving you completely blissed out. Awareness of what you'd done began to creep in, but the feel of Bucky's weight on top of you kept you in the moment.

He finally slowed to a halt, but his lips were still pressing into your hot skin. After several more moments, he raised himself up just enough to kiss you sweetly, making sure you felt his adoration.

The moment he rolled off you, the full weight of what you'd done hit you like a ton of bricks. If your body would have cooperated, you would have turned over onto your side, curled up in a ball, and cried.

Bucky felt the sudden shift in your demeanor and he felt his heart clench in his chest. "(Y/N/N)..."

"I'm sorry," you whispered.

Surprise lit up his face. "What?"

"I shouldn't have done that--I'm so sorry."

"I'm gonna stop you right there." He sat up a little so he could look down at your face. You wouldn't meet his gaze, but he continued anyway. "Don't you dare think for a single second that I did something I didn't want to do. You were in pain and I couldn't let that stand. I would do anything for you, (Y/N). Anything. I don't regret it and I'd do it again in a heartbeat."

Your eyes finally raised to meet his and you saw nothing but honesty in his gaze. You knew he cared about you, but you were still worried you'd crossed a line neither of you could come back from.

Bucky stared at your face, taking in just how incredibly beautiful you were. He was trying to commit it to memory--never wanting to forget any bit of it.

"Thank you," you whispered.

Bucky shook his head. "You don't have to thank me, doll. Like I said, I wanted to." He paused for a moment, a silent war raging inside of him. He seemed to make a decision and once he did, the words just flowed from his mouth. "I mean it, (Y/N). I've wanted to for years--wanted you for years. I never wanted it to happen like this, but fuck baby...here we are. I would do anything you asked of me, okay? I'll rip my own heart out and light it on fire if you ask me to. So if you ask me to pretend this never happened, I will, but I need you to know I don't want to. I want to make love to you over and over again, hear you scream my name, watch your beautiful face as you fall apart for me...I want you. I will always want you."

You were completely breathless by the time he stopped talking. The words coming out of his mouth weren't what you'd ever expected to hear. "You want me?"

"I've always wanted you. Every part of you. Inside and out."

"What about all the other women?"

"What?"

"The ones you bring home all the time."

He touched your face gently, turning your head to look at him directly. "They're fine for a night, but they're not you. They were a poor substitute for the woman I really wanted, but couldn't have."

"Bucky..."

He looked a little crestfallen, mistaking your tone for rejection. "It's okay if you don't feel the same--"

Your hand gently pressed against his lips, shutting him up instantly. "If I could move properly, I would have kissed you to shut you up."

His eyes lit up and a small smile played on his lips.

"Of course I feel the same. Of course I want you. I only pushed you away tonight because I didn't want to lose you. I was afraid you would regret it."

He leaned down so he was inches away from your lips. "Oh sweetheart, I could never regret anything to do with you."

Your lips curled up in a sweet smile. "Really?"

"Mhmm."

"Buck?"

"Hmm?"

"Any chance we can make love? I wanna be in the moment...really in it."

"Right now?" he asked in surprise.

You nodded.

His lips met yours in a loving kiss. "I'm more than happy to oblige."

You grinned as he rolled back on top of you, lips pressing against yours hungrily.

"I'll make love to you as many times as you want. Whatever you want, I'll give you. Just ask."

"Anything?"

"Anything."

You smirked slowly. "Then I might have some ideas..."

"Oh really?"

"Oh yes." You pulled his face down to yours to whisper some of your inner desires into his ear.

"My god," he murmured. "You're gonna be the death of me."

You laughed lightly and he joined in before pulling you in for a passionate kiss, dead-set on giving you everything you wanted and more.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

sorry if this question has been asked before, but do you know if potionology in twst is essentially just how we do chemistry but with more local / native magical materials added into the mix? ignoring how they use cauldrons

I'd say the two are similar, barring some exceptions (such as slightly different equipment, ingredients, preparation methods which involve magic, and the fact that high school students aren't allowed to make actual medicine, ie potions in Twst, irl).

Crewel is noted as overseeing the Science department and classes, which is where chemistry would fall in real life. A lot of the items you'd wear are basically personal protective equipment for the lab. And, in Vil's Labwear vignettes, Science Club's advisor (not explicitly stated to be Crewel) allows Rook to use the lab but "[required] a list of chemicals and formulas [they'd] be using, a detailed schedule, a fire prevention plan, and so on", all safety precautions a lab runner would have prepared in advance before loaning out space to students.

I don't know if I'd say that potionology is a true equivalent or a substitute for chemistry though...? It should be noted that chemistry exists in Twisted Wonderland as its own subject and is something that seems to be considered when potion brewing. It feels more like a component or basic knowledge you would need in order to make potions rather than potionology being "just chemistry, but magic".

Trey says in his Silk Adorned vignettes that, "They add certain metals to the fireworks mixture that burn in different colors. Barium makes yellow-green, lithium gets you red, and sodium produces yellow. Not many humans can use magic, so we turn to chemistry for stuff like this [...] I'm pretty sure you would've gone over flame tests in class... Anyway, the fireworks in the show will change colors based on the same principle as well." Note the elements from the periodic table and the mention of a lesson about flames in their science classes!l Chemistry must exist as its own subject for non-mages, and chemistry also exists as a basis of knowledge for mages to build upon for potionology, alchemy, etc.

In NRC’s Science Club, they indulge in non-magical sciences, not just magical ones, despite the extracurricular being for an arcane academy. For example, Trey states he researches cakes and baking/cooking processes while Rook has been shown to create explosives and write wildlife research papers in extended Twst content.

If you need additional resources for potion-making in Twst and related topics:

Subjects at NRC

PPE and general lab safety

Do you need magic to make potions?

Types of potions + poisons and healing potions/magical medicine in particular

Ingredients (both magical and non-magical)

You can also check out my resources masterlist for other useful lore posts!

[monstersandmaw]

Do you think a dragon riders clothing should be realistic in writing? This is something that came up with friends, and i got curious on a writer perspective since i am not one. I have a masters on filmography and a tesis on the world history of fantasy movies/series BUT i do not understand much of writing. The duality came from this: some of the friends said it should be realistic, comparing it to bikers gears. It should protect the rider. And some said that it depends on the fantasy setting of the world the rider is in. If he can use magic as protection instead and so on. For me, in movies and series, it all depends on something called suspencion of disbelief. If you are able to make the watcher think "well, it makes sense" or not question the outfit AT ALL, then you can make the rider wear a bikini and it doesn't matter. But my other friends said it was different for writing (they are also not writers) and this has been BUGGING ME because i have no idea if it really is different. So i decided to ask directly to some of my favourite fantasy writers.

Love this! As a biker myself, I come down on the side of 'comfortable/flexible but offers the max amount of protection for that'.

I think it should mostly be wind/element proof, because I feel like that's probably the dragon rider's greatest danger, providing that they're strapped into their saddle (I'm convinced riders would require some kind of equipment to allow them to do the most daring manoeuvres). If there's magic the rider can access to prevent falling or to throw up a shield against aerial attack, then that's fine.

I haven't seen House of the Dragon, but from this image, Aemond seems to have a high necked top/jacket, gloves (essential because holy crap wind chill is a thing), and some nice tack (saddle with handles and equipment?!) to hold onto and keep him in place. He loses points for all that loose, long hair though (see below). You'd definitely want to have some kind of goggles/eye-protection because your eyes are gonna be watering like hell, and if you happen to encounter a fly or insect at a Mach Dragon, it's gonna hurt.

Like horse-riding gear (jodhpurs, (English) chaps etc.) it could also be designed not just for comfort and flexibility, but also for grip and a secure hold with your leggies. Slight heel on the boots if there are stirrups on the saddle to prevent the boot from sliding too far through, fleece lined for warmth in the cold air.

Again, as a biker with long hair, I think it's safe to say that if the rider has long hair, they're gonna want to plait it, or wrap it with something like a balaclava because brushing that tangle out is a NIGHTMARE after even a short ride/flight XD.

In general, I tend to come down on your side of thinking though. If it works in the world and (like all armour or PPE shall we say) if it looks comfortable and easy to move in, then I'll buy it, no matter the medium (film/tv/writing)

Finally, I can say that leathers in themselves are not warm. You need layers.

Folks, add your thoughts in the notes/reblogs!

[ohnoitsz1m]

Okay since the fandom seems to be agreeing with me lately now seems like a good time to talk about it. Gordon Freeman being a trans woman is so real and important to me and it has narrative significance.

THIS IS AN INTENTIONAL TRANSFEM READING OF GORDON FREEMAN. I AM NOT CLAIMING THIS IS VALVE'S INTENTION, I AM POINTING OUT AN OVERLOOKED POSSIBILITY AND ATTEMPTING TO START A CONVERSATION.

Specifically, at least during the events of the games, she's closeted or maybe her egg hasn't even cracked yet.

At every turn throughout the games she's pushed into being something she's not, something that doesn't come naturally to her. She never asked to be the One Free Man, she never asked to be saddled with the responsibility of being Humanity's Savior, she didn't go into the job expecting to be fighting for her life against aliens and humans alike. She was a theoretical physicist from the start, but that was taken from her. Her labcoat and ponytail traded in for an HEV suit and a crowbar. Sure the suit was part of her job, but it's not like you sign up under the impression it'll be power armor to defend you against the US military. It's essentially an armored hazmat suit. It's lab equipment turned power armor.

In HL2 she loses her ponytail and gets a new suit explicitly designed as power armor. There's no place for her as a scientist in this world, she needs to either man up or die. So she does what she has to to survive and becomes the soldier the world demands her to be- the savior everyone tells her she is.

She's never given a choice in any of this, had she not taken the g-man's offer he would have left her to die on Xen, from the second the game starts it's decided that she's not going to be the theoretical physicist she was meant to be, some unfathomably powerful outside force has decided this for her, possibly long before she even set foot at Black Mesa.

The game quite literally holds Gordon's autonomy juuust out of her reach and punishes her for trying to reclaim it (see: hl2 ep2 reaffirming that G-Man still has power over her despite the Vortigaunts intervention, aaand hl:a ending where Gordon is replaced by Alyx as the G-man's employee.)

Okay so what does that Mean for her tho? How does this relate to the trans experience? Why is she specifically transfem? Ok so here's where the actual interpretation starts.

So I imagine, pre-rescas Gordon would probably have been close to her egg cracking. (Remember! A lot of us didn't know until we were older!) She's thriving in her chosen field, got her labcoat and ponytail, he HEV suit isn't replacing her lab clothes, it's part of the uniform. It's PPE! She's in her element. She's experiencing who she really is, what feels right to her. This is right to her.

Then the rescas happens, you could read this as turning off the TV iykwim. The HEV suit become something else, instead of the protective lab equipment it was designed to be it becomes armor, concealing who Gordon really is, and building up a false masculine image that would later be reinforced by G-Man, her coworkers, and the rebels. From the lack of her ponytail to the HEV mk5 being literal armor, Half-Life 2 really tries to cement this identity for her. She couldn't be herself if she wanted to, the world doesn't NEED Gordon Freeman the theoretical physicist. It needs Gordon Freeman the One Free Man. Nothing about her new identity is her own, it was forged out of doing what she had to do to survive and built up not by herself but by everyone around her. Basically pressure into remaining closeted for ones own safety.

G-Man, I feel like adds a lot to this reading, being a primary force associated with Keeping Gordon In Line, threatening and punishing her for deviating from his design, and quite literally tells her that he's chosen this For Her (see: HL2 ending, ep2 intro, heart-to-heart, hl:a ending). G-Man is the patriarchy. Pushing her into a masculine role, taking away her autonomy and identity with violence, threats, and punishing her for even considering stepping out of the role that was decided for her.

NOW. Now..for rambling about my own writing.. I have these old screenshots from rambling about her a while ago. This is specifically about a post-canon Gordon Freeman, egg cracked or beginning to crack. This is a timeline where she's given the space to figure herself out. She doesn't turn off the TV here.

Imm suuuper tired (only had 3 hrs of sleep) so ill leave it there. I hope this was coherent, I am open to further discussion on the topic

I will say tho: this post is specifically about transfem Gordon Freeman, amab nonbinary works too, but my point is, this is NOT the place to discuss TME (transmisogyny exempt) Gordon. Make your own post about it, please.

[creatingblackcharacters]

wanted to ask an opinion on a hypothetical worldbuilding element i'm mulling over rn!

my basic idea is this: i have a sci-fi setting, with some gross bio-tech elements. to fit in with this vibe, i thought "maybe the pods the space engineers have on their ship have a weird goop they sleep in instead of a soft material, that would be kinda gross and fit with the vibe!" let's say Matrix pod style. this isnt super important, just the next part.

of course, as someone with straight hair, if this were a real thing and it *was* kinda gross and gooey, no biggie, i could just comb it out of my hair. but i was considering how it might work for one of the engineers with long locs. "would he have to protect his hair?" was my first thought, and then "does the weird space goo moisturize or absorb into hair?" was my second. so i did some research into how people take care of locs, and a consensus seemed to be: "yes! moisturize/soak your hair to prevent breakage!" but i'm not entirely sure still on the logistics of like, an overnight 8 hr nap in some weird space goo.

would it be a cop-out to incorporate into my story that Weird Space Goo has already been engineered to accommodate for different hair types and protective styles? i mean, The Goo isn't real in the first place, but i don't want to just brush it off as if i didn't think about it, you know? it would make sense with my worldbuilding for the people who designed the ship to have thought about and accommodated for people of different body types, hair types, physical ability, etc.

Tbh, I feel like it would be far easier to simply design a protective hair cap 😅 it would look like a bonnet or loc bonnet, but scientific. it's my real world pessimism, but as a scientist who's had to jury rig hooding PPE because they were clearly not designed to protect those with locs or braids, it makes far more sense to design caps that keep our hair sealed and protected. In fact, everyone would benefit from such a tool!

As for what you researched, gotta be honest, I don't think any of those people were considering an overnight soak in goo every single night lol. Because we do have styles where we go to bed with leave in conditioner in our hair... In caps lmao! I also wouldn't want to wash my locs every single day, even if it did soak in. What if I have in a style? What if I just got them redone? What about the weight that would add to my hair and neck?

So yeah, I do feel like it's a little bit of a cop out, but only because there's options that could be considered beforehand. But again, that's my real world "unintentional" discrimination experiences speaking.

[attackedastoria]

New displays available for fall/Halloween! All featuring naturally foraged elements and bones, plus tiny ladybug specimens 🌿

Sh○ppe

[mechatronophilia]

[WHAT IS THIS?]

a pro-transition blog centered on becoming some kind of scientist, technician, or other specialist. also, a blog about the inherent romance of industrial machinery and the people who maintain it. also also, a mechanosexual/techum blog with forcemasc elements.

[WHO ARE YOU?]

meatgrinder, he/him, 20s. on my 2nd attempt at college. guy with a dream and a plan. fixing my gpa. coming to fuck your computer.

[WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS?]

ate too many screws as a kid

[WHAT DO YOU POST?]

normal silly forcemasc image edits but with a science/machinery angle, and sometimes the edits are just objectum/techum/mechanophilia. heavy emphasis on going back to school and/or learning a trade. hypnosis that makes you smarter. i'm also horny for hazmat gear and other PPE

[WHAT WON'T YOU POST?]

as a rule i'll never post intox (i am a recovering alcoholic), fauxcest, underage, or detrans. anything else will be tagged and easily filtered.

don't add intox or detrans to my posts, idgaf what else you do. don't be a shithead; autonomy and craftsmanship aren't exclusive of any ethnicity, gender, disability, etc.

don't talk to me about plurality/multiplicity or send me detailed descriptions of personal trauma.

[twistedminutia]

A Million and One Minutia: PPE and Elements

Gray and the science club discuss protective equipment and the basic elements of the universe.

Read the rest of the chapters here and crossposted to AO3 here.

I’m going to preface this by saying that I like Rook. He’s a pretty decent guy. He got me a bunch of feminine products at the beginning of the school year, something he apparently does for everyone at the school who has a period and hasn’t figured out how to ask Sam for them yet. He’s got an uncanny amount of knowledge on everyone at school, but I’ve never seen him use it for anything seriously untoward (unlike a certain someone I could mention). He’s over the top and yes, pretty unsettling if you’re not used to it, and, okay, he can be pretty insensitive. But I’ve never actually seen him be straight-up cruel.

That being said. Sometimes he’s kind of hard to be around. Primarily because his response to a nice, safe activity is ‘wow, this is boring! I wonder how we can spice it up!’

I eye the cauldron. It’s sparking. It’s been sparking for the past few minutes. “So. You’re sure that’s not going to explode?”

“Well, one can never be truly sure about anything,” Rook hums as he hefts the wooden paddle. “But I doubt we are in any significant danger!”

“Okay, one, how much do you doubt it, and two, how much danger is significant?” I ask. Rook just laughs merrily and goes back stirring the potion.

I’m supposed to be taking photos of things, to get some good shots for the science club writeup in the newspaper, but I can’t decide whether I should or not. On one hand, having the camera in front of my face will probably give me a decent shield if whatever’s brewing in the cauldron does decide to go off like a bomb. On the other hand, using the camera as a shield stands a decent chance of destroying it, and considering how expensive Crowley implied it is, I almost think I’d rather have my face melted off than work off that debt.

I am wearing safety gear- Professor Crewel doesn’t let anyone into the labs without it. But I’m not sure how much it’ll withstand an explosion. Or acid. Or any of the other things that might come out of that still-sparking cauldron.

“Hey, Gray.” Trey steps into the room, the door swinging momentarily open, then shut. I get a seconds-long glance at a few nervous freshmen peeking around him like little ducklings. None of them are brave enough to venture in. To be fair, I’m not either- Rook grabbed me the moment I showed up.

“Ah, le Chevalier de Roses!” Rook casts a hand out toward Trey. “Have you come to take a peek at my experiment?”

“More or less,” Trey says. “I thought we agreed on doing experiments that wouldn’t scare the freshmen anymore.”

Rook’s eyebrows go way up, though I can’t tell if the surprise is affected or genuine. “Hm? But this is not a frightening experiment! A simple light discharge potion! It’s quite safe!”

“I think the sparking is scaring people,” I offer. Rook’s eyebrows go up further.

“But these are not unsafe either! They’re not strong enough to catch on the floor- hair, perhaps would be another story, but that is why we tie our hair back in the lab, and as for our safety gear… well, it is safety gear for a reason.”

“I don’t know if a lab coat is going to do well if sparks hit it,” I say. “I feel like it would at least smolder a little.” We did have a big lab safety runthrough from Professor Crewel at the beginning of this semester- students don’t usually go into the lab for their first semester apparently. We didn’t have a fun little video for it, which was kind of disappointing, but he gave us the basic ‘wear your lab coat, goggles, and gloves in the lab at all times, no running, keep long hair tied back, here’s where the fire suppression devices are, and DO NOT try to stop a fire by dumping a water spell on it’ spiel. Apparently, if you’re a mage, your first instinct to seeing a fire is often to summon water magic. But since a lot of potions have some kind of oil component to them, it can lead to a much bigger fire. They have a sort of magic fire extinguisher along with a regular one, with the magic extinguisher being just a glass ball you throw at the fire that explodes into expanding foam.

Trey adjusts his goggles. He must have prescription ones, or just a weak prescription for his glasses, because those are tucked into the pocket of his lab coat. “Our lab coats are enchanted, so they’d be able to withstand some sparks hitting them.”

“They are?” I ask. “Professor Crewel didn’t mention that, I think…”

“All PPE you’d wear into a magic laboratory like this one needs to be enchanted for safety,” Trey says. “It’s a bit like our dorm uniforms- it acts as magic armor, plus some added spells for heat resistance and fire suppression.”

I look down at my labwear. It doesn’t feel any different from the coats we wore in my lab classes back home. Maybe a little higher quality, I guess, like a sturdier material, but there’s no indication there’s magic. “Can you tell if something’s been enchanted like that?”

“Oui, trickster!” Rook hums. “Mages can check if there is an enchantment, though someone without access to magic would need to use a device.”

“Ah,” I say. Well, I guess it’s not like I really need to go around checking things for enchantments. Until Ace learns something to jinx my bedsheets, I guess, because he would be willing to do that to me. “That must be convenient, to be able to enchant things to be fire retardant.”

“It’s not as handy as it sounds,” Trey says. “You have to get a mage to do it, and not all mages are skilled at enchantments. Vil could probably manage a lot of this with his signature spell, right?”

The question’s directed at Rook. He still stirring his potion, the sparks having become more intense, practically dancing over the surface of the pot. He doesn’t seem worried about it. “I believe the Roi du Poison’s spell would certainly be able to bless something to become fire resistant, but I am uncertain how much energy he would have to expend to make the effort something close to permanent. His spell is certainly powerful, but the flexibility means that its effects are not always long-lasting.”

Trey nods. “I thought it might be something like that.” He sees my expression and adds, helpfully, “Single-use signature spells tend to be better at duration than ones with a lot of flexibility, depending on what the spell is doing. My signature spell has a lot of flexibility, since I can overwrite any one characteristic with another, but it would be hard to maintain it for more than an hour or so in one shot. Riddle, meanwhile, can only do one thing with his signature spell, but he can keep a collar on someone almost indefinitely, provided he wants to do so. Vil could probably maintain his own spell for longer than I could, but it would take a decent amount of effort, depending on what he’s doing.”

I nod slowly. Magic’s complicated. I looks easy, most of the time, but I guess it requires a lot more thought and care than I usually think about. Magic can do this and that, but not this and of course it’s impossible to do that and then signature spells are a whole other ballpark of weird. I try to keep up, but I’m working at a seventeen-year disadvantage. I guess I’m lucky people like Trey are willing to take the time to explain things to me.

“We were talking about lab gear,” I remind Trey. “You were saying that this stuff’s complicated to make?”

“As far as I know. It takes a couple of enchantments to make the magic permanent, or at least permanent enough, and even then, because it’s in a high-stress environment, the protection needs to be redone every few years. Assuming the clothing survives that long.”

“Survives that long?” I repeat. “I thought the magic was supposed to make everything invulnerable.”

“Nothing can truly be invulnerable, trickster,” Rook says. “And the protective wear here is armure sacrificielle!”

“He means that if the lab coat is caught in magic that would destroy it, it activates safety precautions that destroy the coat in order to create a shield. And some potions can be a little volatile when you make mistakes or experiment with them, so…” Trey casts his eyes over to Rook. The potion’s glowing now, the sparks so thick over the surface that you can’t make out the individuals anymore.

“That’s helpful,” I decide. At least if the potion blows up, it might not kill me, then. I’d probably have to get the camera under it in a hurry, though… Actually, speaking of the camera. I should probably finish up what I came here for. “Rook, do you mind if I get a photo of the potion? That won’t mess you up or anything, right?”

“Non, dear trickster! Take as many as your heart desires!” Rook says. I snap a couple photos of him stirring, trying to get the glow of the potion to act as a natural light source. One manages to catch Rook right as he’s looming over the potion’s surface, so he almost looks like a mad scientist. Perfect.

“Did you want to see any of the other experiments?” Trey asks as I tuck my camera under my lab coat, against my chest. “I can show you around.”

“Yeah, I could get some photos of those, too,” I say. “Do you mind, Rook?”

“Not at all! There is something quite meditative about working on a potion in one’s lonesome,” Rook said, not taking his eyes off the surface.

“Okay, let me grab my things,” I say. I start to gather up my bag, which I’d deposited in the corner, and place my camera in there. “Are there any cool projects to look at?”

The science club is one of my favorites to visit, most of the time. Not only is the company pretty good, but the variety of things people do is fascinating. Experiments with plant growth, magitech, alchemical experiments, biology studies- every person here has something they’re interested in and the little twist of magic makes everything new, if also a little alien. I spent half an hour just looking over someone’s project on how a magically infused area impacted the biology of the local animals.

“There’s a chemistry study someone’s doing that looks interesting,” Trey says. “Pure chemistry, too.” He sometimes tries to find science projects that don’t involve any magic for me, maybe trying to make things feel a little more like home. It doesn’t really work, but I appreciate the thought.

“That sounds cool,” I say, swinging my bag up onto my shoulders. “I can’t believe it, but I think I’m looking forward to chemistry class next year. I hated that class when I took it last year, but chemistry seems pretty normal here.”

“We probably have the same base elements, otherwise you wouldn’t survive here,” Trey muses. “Oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon, sodium. You’d need them to live.”

“At least that’s the same,” I agree. “The stars are different, but there’s still a hundred and eighteen elements on the periodic table.”

“A hundred and twenty,” Trey corrects. We’re just about to reach the door, Rook waving after us, but I pause.

“I thought there were a hundred and eighteen,” I say. “I was pretty sure…” I suppose it’s possible for me to be wrong- chemistry was never my subject. But I had to memorize the elements of tests, and while I couldn’t recite all of them, I at least remember one hundred and eighteen blank spaces staring back at me.

“I’m pretty sure it was one hundred and twenty,” Trey disagrees. “Hold on.” He pulls his phone out of his pocket and starts tapping something into it. A triumphant smile tugs at his mouth. “Aha. Here. I was right.”

He holds out his phone to me. He’s pulled up an image of the periodic table. It looks mostly recognizable- the taller bars at the ends, the relatively flat middle, the weird section that sits beneath the rest of the table. A couple of those have different names, which makes sense. I guess Einstein didn’t exist here, so no Einsteinium. But what draws my attention is another small box, sitting close to the right side of the periodic table. Two elements that I have never seen before.

“What are those?” I ask, pointing at them.

Trey pulls his phone back to look. “Thauman and Mystium. They’re magically conductive elements, and two of the main components of magestones.” He thinks about that for a second and something like a slow wince crosses his face. “Which… you don’t have in your world.”

“There are magic elements here?” I say faintly.

“Magically conductive elements,” Trey says. “They’re supposed to be elements whose structure allows them to engage more readily with magic, despite not being living things. Mystium allows magical transmission. Thauman is good for controlling blot. Add them together and they make excellent magic tools.”

It makes sense, you know? It makes perfect sense. Magic exists as a new form of energy- why shouldn’t there be new elements, too? And I know about magestones. I’ve seen people using them for ages, even seen a mine they come from. They’re not something we have on Earth, so they must be made of something different than just regular gemstones, but…

I remember feeling this way when I learned about the stars. Looking at the sky and then looking at the solar system Riddle had drawn out for me and realizing… oh. We really are different.

There are two extra spots on the periodic table for elements that are linked to magic. There are only one hundred and eighteen elements. Now there are one hundred and twenty.

(It’s a nicer number, at least. More even. Maybe I should be grateful about that.)

“Gray?” Trey says. His voice sounds like it’s coming down a well- distant and sort of echoing. “Are you okay?”

I thought I was doing so well, but my eyes are misting over. I haven’t cried in ages- didn’t actually think I was capable of it. And this is such a stupid thing to cry over! I don’t want to cry in front of Trey and Rook. I think they’d be relatively nice about it, I guess, but… they’d also be sort of pitying about it, or, in Rook’s case, a bit over the top, and I don’t want that either.

Fortunately, the tears sort of peter out after only a couple seconds and it takes only a single swallow to get my voice back under control. I’ve gotten pretty good at it, actually. “Yeah. It’s just… weird.”

“I bet,” Trey says, with no real understanding. It’s not his fault, but it is a little frustrating.

Rook, who’d been doing nothing but listening and stirring the entire time, pipes up. “Perhaps it is best not to have more elements to dig up in your world, Trickster. There have been wars fought over resources like Mystium.”

“It’s not like my world hasn’t had wars over stuff like that,” I say. “We mine things too. I think we’re slightly more oil-reliant than your world, too.” I don’t know if this is the case everywhere, but at least on Sage’s Island, not a lot of people seem to own cars. There’s a lot of public transport, though. Ace and Deuce also talk more about using public transport in their own towns, but I don’t know if that’s a Queendom of Roses thing or not. Epel definitely mentioned his family having a car, at least… And they do use plastic pretty regularly here, so they must be drilling oil somewhere…

“Rook’s right about the wars,” Trey says. “Once people learned you could use magestones to control blot, there were massive fights over the stones. Some of history’s worst wars were over resources like that, especially once mages started becoming more organized and a few kingdoms were established around powerful mages.”

Wars over resources. Another way our worlds aren’t so different, even if this world is a lot more peaceful. “Trey,” I say, hesitant, “you don’t have to if you don’t want to, but… could I see your magic pen?”

Trey shrugs and lifts it out of his lab coat pocket. “Here.”

I’ve held them before- Grim got a pen even though his magestone isn’t attached to it, and he’s more than eager to let me write notes for the both of us. The pends themselves are nice. Definitely the fanciest pens I’ve ever held. They’ve got a nice weight to them, the ink has a smooth, flowing quality that makes them easy to write with, and there’s even a spell on them that makes sure the ink never dries or runs out. And a spell that auto-returns the pen if it’s lost- more than thirty feet away for more than ten minutes and the pen, which has apparently been ‘attuned’ to its owner, will teleport back. Given that I usually carry Grim’s actual pen for him, this has led to several occasions where the pen vanishes off my person and zaps back to him because we’ve been separated for too long. Usually he just tucks it into his ribbon when that happens, and I’ve started making sure I have another writing utensil on me.

But I’ve never really held the pen with a magestone on it before. It gives it some extra weight, though not as much as I would have thought from attaching a rock to a pen. Trey’s magestone is bright red, but if you look carefully, you can see tiny specks of black clustering along the lines between the facets. Blot. I know it’s normal to generate some amount of blot from casting magic, and there’s barely any here, but it’s still a bit unsettling to look at.

“All of the magestones here are cut in the same way,” I say. “Is there a reason for that?”

“Oui, Trickster!” Rook hums. “Standardization of size is one reason- it would be unfair for one mage to have un petit magestone while another gets un énorme stone! But while the cut magestones are also more beaute, shaping a magestone in a particular way allows easier direction of magic and greater containment of blot!”

“Some people argue different cuts work differently, but supposedly there’s a certain pattern that makes it better for focusing magic and blot,” Trey explains.

I nod. “Like when you want to use a diamond or something for a laser, you have to cut it in a certain way so it magnifies the light.”

“Exactly,” Trey agrees. “The shape of the pen helps, too- or, at least, that’s the tradition. It’s supposed to mimic a magic wand. Anything that conducts magic along the length of it acts as a focus to a spell.”

“Not every school follows such a tradition, bien sûr,” Rook says. “Some mages wear their magestones on a finger, allowing the magic to follow that as it would a wand. And some mages wear them over their chests, stating that such allowed them to cast directly from the heart! Quite a romantic notion, non?”

“Is there really an advantage to having the magestone on the pen?” I ask. Grim doesn’t use his pen because it’s generally unwieldy to point it at things using his paws. But if it would make things easier for him…

“Riddle’s shown me a few studies that say it can help a mage target their spell,” Trey says. “But it’s probably a psychosomatic thing to help control the magic. Like, most people can use their signature spell without reciting the whole incantation, but because a signature spell is such a deep part of your magic, it’s much easier to do it when you’re chanting something to focus it.”

“There are some advantages to channeling magic through an object!” Rook chimes in. “Brooms are the preferred tool of flying for this reason- the long, straight handle works as something to gather and project magic along while the branches at the end provide a large surface area to dispel flight magic from. It is quite an elegant design. Why, these stirring paddles are much the same!” He hoists his paddle out of the potion, which has started emitting a faint humming. I eye the surface with a certain amount of caution. “Magic is projected along the length of the stick and then diffused by the greater surface area at the end!” A couple drops of potion drizzle off the paddle and hit the glowing surface. Showers of sparks erupt in their wake. The humming intensifies.

“Rook,” Trey says, stretching an arm over me to usher me back. “Did you swap the firefly essence for glowworms when you were making that?”

“Non!” Rook says, placing the paddle back into the potion. “But I did allow for some extra sparkstones, as they-”

The potion explodes.

It’s a silent explosion. I don’t mean the explosion makes no sound, though, by definition, it doesn’t. I mean the rolling wave of light that emerges from the cauldron actively seems to snuff out any sound that it reaches. I can feel the wave of oppression slam into my eardrums with a feeling not unlike when you need your ears to pop and they won’t. Everything goes white for a second, there’s an enormous pressure in my head, and I can’t hear anything.

And then it fades, rapidly dying down until I’m blinking the last of the dazzle out of my eyes and I can hear Rook and Trey speaking. Their tone is a bit strange, though. They sound panicked.

The smell of smoke reaches me a second before my eyes fall on the source of the commotion.

Fire. There’s fire, not the fire safely contained under a bubbling cauldron or on a stove burner, but a spreading fire, licking across the floor as it follows the path of the spilled potion, sending up acrid smoke that will choke me while the oppressive heat gets closer and closer and everything withers under heat and everything that can burn will burn and when it gets hot enough everything can burn-

There’s a noise I register first as a faint hiss, then as the sound sort of like a whipped cream container dispensing, only much larger. And then the fire is doused under a foamy blanket of white as Trey uses the fire extinguisher on it.

It’s quiet for a few moments. Rook has his magic pen pointed at the basin the cauldron usually sits over. The fire there is out- students usually set and maintain the fires they use for potion-making. Rook must have extinguished the flames as soon as he realized the fire wasn’t controlled. But they were already spreading by that point, and a mage’s control over fire gets more tenuous the further it spreads from their initial fire. A mage can set an initial fire and control it all they like, but the further it goes from the initial set point, the harder it is to extinguish on command. Rook’s fire hadn’t spread far, but given the magical source it was feeding on, it might have escaped him more readily than he’d been expecting.

(I know a lot more about magic now than I register most of the time, and it’s still less than half as much as everyone else here.)

Trey must have made a grab for the extinguisher as soon as he realized there was a fire. He sets it on the ground will a dull thud. Nothing appears to have been damaged. The potion, now a sort of silvery white color, is spilled across the floor. Part of it is covered by deflating white foam. There aren’t any scorch marks. The floor is stone, so the fire wasn’t able to spread any further than the potion. If the potion had hit the wooden shelves and the fire had been able to follow it there, we might have been in trouble. But Trey managed to extinguish it before it could get that far.

Trey, who is now looking at me. “Gray? Are you okay?”

It’s when he asks that I start to register my body again. My back is pressed into one of the wooden shelves, as physically as far away from the fire as I could retreat. One of the shelves is digging into my back, just left of my spine. I’m not crying- in fact, my eyes are completely dry, since I apparently haven’t blinked in a few minutes. My breathing is weird- tiny, tepid gasps of air that barely move my chest.

Rook and Trey are both looking at me now. I take in a slow breath and step away from the shelf.

“Sorry. I wasn’t much, uh. Help, was I?” I say, trying to make my tone light and joking. It just comes out kind of strained.

“Je suis désolé, trickster!” Rook says, looking stricken. “I did not mean to frighten you! Are you injured?”

“No, I’m fine,” I say. “Totally fine.” Trey is still looking at me. He’s got a really good Mom Gaze- like when your mom looks at you and you can feel the actual weight of her stare trying to press information out. Fortunately, I am relatively immune to Mom Gazes. “The fire freaked me out for a second. Probably good that Professor Crewel isn’t here, right? I’d get a lecture about how to properly manage an alchemy fire.” I try for a laugh. It comes out mostly correct, if maybe a bit too hysterical.

Trey sighs. “He probably would. Don’t feel too bad about it. Most people panic when there’s fire. I just grew up in a bakery, so fire safety was drilled into all of us kids from a young age. Just remember, Professor Crewel keeps two fire extinguishers in the lab. One in the cabinet, the other wall-mounted, on opposite sides of the room.”

He points them out to me. I nod along. In fairness, I don’t think it’s totally my fault that I don’t remember Professor Crewel’s safety lectures, because fifty percent of it was just DON’T USE WATER MAGIC ON THE FIRE. I spent half the lecture tuned out because it wasn’t relevant to me, then realized Grim had also tuned out and spent the rest of the lecture trying to impress upon him the importance of the first half.

Rook leans over the cauldron, peering at the remains of the potion. “Very odd,” he muses. “According to my prior research, the sparkstones shouldn’t have caused quite such a violent reaction.”

“Can I see your notes?” Trey asks. Rook produces a fortunately-undestroyed notebook and they both lean over it for a moment. I wander over and catch a glimpse, but it must be some third-year alchemy stuff, because it’s incomprehensible to me.

“You’re right,” Trey decides. “The sparkstones reacting with the rest of the ingredients could have caused a lot of sparks, but they should never have caused that much of an explosion.”

“None of the ingredients should have,” Rook agrees. “And I am certain I added nothing by accident. Which leaves the mystery of how the sparkstones- ah.”

Trey looks up from the book. “Think of something?”

“Sparkstones on their own would not have caused such a reaction,” Rook says. “Unless there was coal dust mixed in.”

Trey’s brows go up, then down. “Oh.”

“Not an uncommon contaminant, not where sparkstones are mined,” Rook continues, looking more serious than I’ve ever seen him. “But certainly something that should have been noticed by the school supplier.”

“I’ve gone over a few of the purchasing ledgers with Professor Crewel,” Trey adds, “when we’re looking at the club budget. For what the school is paying for the sparkstones, there shouldn’t be a single speck of coal dust in there.”

Rook attempts to click his fingers, but he’s still wearing the thick rubber gloves of his lab uniform so it comes out more like a muffled squeak. “The supplier has been shortchanging us!”

“Making the school pay premium prices while pocketing the money they should be spending on the filtering and cleaning,” Trey says. “We’re lucky we figured it out before the second-year alchemy class next week, they’re supposed to be making a heating potion.”

“We need to find Professor Crewel at once!” Rook says. “I believe he would be in the botanical gardens at this time, overseeing any students collecting herbs.”

Trey nods. “We’ll have to hurry- and don’t clean anything up, Professor Crewel will want to inspect it.” He looks over at me. “Sorry about not being able to get you that photoshoot, Gray. Maybe next week?”

“It’s fine, this is clearly more important,” I say, shaking off his apology. “Go get the professor. I’ll head out, I should find Grim anyway.”

Trey nods and he and Rook leave the room at a half-jog. I stand in the center for a few more minutes, breathing slowly. There are no embers flickering in the basin the cauldron sits over, just a couple small logs and smears of soot and ash. Cold sweat prickles along the back of my neck as I look at it. I don’t mind the fires on my stove, or even ones in a fireplace, though I guess I do keep my distance. Even Grim’s flames are okay- their blue color seems almost friendly, somehow. But seeing fire magic makes my stomach twist and watching a fire race outward, licking its way across everything it could burn…

…I want to check on Grim. I turn, gather my things as quickly as possible, and hurry from the room, leaving the partially-burned potion behind.

Read the next chapter here.

[materialsscienceandengineering]

Chemical Safety: Mercury

Though mercury's toxicity has meant that it is used less and less often, some laboratory procedures and research still require the use of this element. Both long term (chronic) and short term (acute) exposures can cause health issues primarily from inhalation of mercury vapors but also through physical contact. Mercury typically targets the central nervous system and, in high doses, the kidneys. Hazards typically arise from accidental spills or equipment breakage (old thermometers, etc.) and mercury spill kits require safety equipment not found in more generalized spill kits. Certain mercury compounds require the uses of specialized PPE, in particular gloves. At higher concentrations, respirators may also be required to avoid vapors.

Sources/Further Reading: (Lab Manager) (Stanford University) (Penn State) (ILPI)

Image source.

[chaserainbows]

Week 13

(the semifinals, again)

Now we get to the actual intended challenge before the finale and it's A R O A S T

We have some mean bitches left in the cast (and Peter) so let's see how it goes

GRIMSLEY AND CYRUS SLAY

Grimsley does have the look of a mean gay that will get to the thing about you that you're insecure about and Cyrus is finally in his element getting to insult and judge people with a straight face and pretend it's comedy

Peter actually does a fine job along with Scholar but Touya bombs

Because Touya's an anxious mess of course he'd bomb the challenge that's about standing in front of an audience and trying to make them laugh

The category is trains (as in long trailing fabric not necessarily actual trains) but you KNOW Cyrus designed his outfit so that he looks like a living train

Peter does the best out of everyone combined and Touya does a great job designing his outfit like a giant set of Volcarona wings to symbolize him making an effort to get over his phobia but we'll have to see if it's good enough to get him out of the bottom 2

Meanwhile Grimsley and Scholar do fine but since it's right before the finale the bar is high

CYRUS WINS THE CHALLENGE AND MAKES TOP 4

LOOK AT HIM GO

Grimsley gets a top placement as well and earns his spot in the finale but the runway cost him the win

The bottom 3 consists of an eldritch horror another eldritch horror and Touya the biggest eldritch horror

Technically being the only normal human you'd think that Touya would be the least scary of the 3 but we know that's not true

Peter's runway earns him the third spot in the finale and with that we're left with Scholar and Touya fighting it out for the last spot

They had opposite trajectories in this season with Scholar starting off weak but really picking up the pace right at the end and Touya starting with a win right from the beginning but later on in the season becoming better known for dodging elimination

Will Scholar be the one to put an end to Touya's reign of terror or will our favorite shortie claim another victim

COUNTRY JUMPSCARE

This song is actually really good though it definitely has Scholar vibes but trust Touya to turn it out to basically any genre

SCHOLAR WILL NOT MESS AROUND WHEN GOING AGAINST THE LIPSYNC TERMINATOR HE KNOWS THOSE WORDS

And they're both doing great but something unexpected is happening

It seems that Touya might actually be getting outshined

Is it the end of his reign of terror?

SOURCES SAY YES

DIVA EMERGENCY TOUYA WAS ELIMINATED FOR REAL THIS TIME

In the end his track record was gonna eliminate him anyway but you have to respect the hustle of lipsyncing 9 times and giving great performances every single time one thing about Touya is that he's PERSISTENT

And with that Scholar has earned his way into the top 4 with an absolutely wild trajectory

Meanwhile in Untucked Cyrus entered his social era and the gang's once again discussing the hottest guy in the cast

The debate is answered by the way it's Alder

The final track record update goes like this

Cyrus' win right at the very end was decisive to get him into the finale but he's still far behind everyone else, considering he was eliminated before though this is a huge victory

Scholar's track record somehow completely averaged itself out and he's entering the finale with a perfect 3.00 PPE score which is definitely crownable if he can dominate the finale

Meanwhile Peter's dip into the bottom 3 meant his score tied with Grimsley and they're both the frontrunners going into the finale, Peter has higher highs with 3 wins and never landed in the bottom 2 but Grimsley has more high placements overall so it'll really come down to the finale

that is

If they can make top 2 to begin with because there's one more twist

NEXT UP THE FINALE

[gsdcf]

Store Adventure in Nora Anton + Hivis

Part 1

After work, I had to accompany my boss and his daughter to the big Swedish furniture store today. She has just moved into her first own apartment.

My boss does not miss an opportunity to humiliate me publicly and so I had to go through the furniture store in my complete PPE work uniform. Everyone should see me as workie. 

With my chunky rubber boots and my bright yellow Hivis jacket, I followed the two through the furniture store. Because his daughter would be embarrassed, I was not allowed to wear my helmet at the store. 

After what felt like an eternity, we left the furniture store and my boss paid an amount equal to my weekly wage.

When I started carrying the things into the van, my boss called me to further humiliate me.

"Didn't you forget anything? The helmet belongs to your PPE."

I looked at him in disbelief "YES, SIR, BOSS!" The young woman giggled. Now I did my task in a full PPE uniform with a helmet at this busy parking. 

In addition to my boss, his wife, his daughter and her fiancé were waiting for me in the apartment. Everyone pushed impatiently until I had carried alone the things into the apartment.

Although ridiculous, I left the helmet on so as not to give an opportunity for humiliation. But a more violent humiliation should follow.

It already started with Miss daughter arranging photos for her Instagram account. Myself screwing on the floor with the family in the background watching, she pushed herself to the foreground for her photos.

Part 2

While I was assembling small furniture, my boss discussed the various PPE regulations with his future son-in-law. My boss was fully in his element and showed the fiancé all the details of my PPE. Why I would have to wear rubber boots and helmet for transporting and assembling was explained on the basis of regulations.

"Can he take off the rubber boots so that I can take a look at them? And the helmet?" Immediately the boss commands me "Present your helmet and boots to my future son-in-law!"

So my PPE wandered from the fiancé to the women until the daughter said "Phew, the boots stink of sweaty feet!"

Part 3

Part 4

[handlersandhumans]

Handlers and "Humans" Mechanics Masterpost

Here's a relatively complete masterpost of the mechanics/technologies of Handlers and Humans, as well as a few of the new players.

SPOILER WARNING for Handlers and "Humans" and Armored Core 6

C Wave Mutation: General term for sapient consciousnesses within the Coral, spontaneously generating from it.

Coral Flow: A phenomenon where the Coral microorganism was altered in the circumstances surrounding Rubicon III and Raven. Poorly understood, but hypothesized to be a link between as-of-yet uncounted disparate universes.

Coral Colony: A self-sustaining source of Coral, filtering in material from its surrounding environment and producing new Coral. Rarely forms C-Wave Mutations unless connected to larger bodies of Coral.

Liquid Coral: Coral that does not self-propagate unless connected to a living Coral Colony. Can still be used as fuel.

Inert Coral: Coral that has expended its energy, hardening into a crystalline substance that can be extremely toxic if inhaled or touched with bare skin. Hypotheses suggest that certain ways of burning Coral may cause harmless variants of Inert Coral.

Coral Combustion: The process of burning Coral to generate power. Can be done with liquid Coral, but with a Coral Colony it can be performed indefinitely provided that the Colony can access the necessary materials to grow.

Coral Siphoning: An alternative Coral Energy Source, generates power from the growth of Coral Colonies. Less powerful energy output than Coral Combustion, but considerably more humane.

Coral-Augmented Human: A human that has had their capabilities enhanced by Coral-sourced technology, allowing for a vast variability of enhanced capabilities. These include: Enhanced data processing, piloting aptitude, and memory recall; longevity due to replacement of organic tissues with more stable elements; theorized telepathy.

C-Weapon: Any weaponized vehicle or regular weapon made possible by the use of Coral. Does not have to be Coral-firing or Coral-based (Ex: Weevil Drones and Ghost/Antigen/KITE mechs) but merely has to incorporate Coral-sourced technology.

Stomata Facility: Clandestine facilities built by the Rubicon III Research institute for the storing of specially designed C-Weapons and for operational command.

IC Craft: A C-Weapon created with a similar design ethos to the modern Armored Core, designed to function piloted and unpiloted.

Interconnected Human: A project by Hal Schrafer, former head of the RRI. Stated goals were to create highly-augmented humans/humanoids suited to various high-criticality tasks related to the defense of Rubicon III. In actuality, the Interconnected Humans were designed to "tap in" to the Coral Flow phenomenon, theoretically allowing abilities such as precognition and analysis of alternate timelines.

IB-C02-MMP (Manned Mobile Platform): The 2nd set of IBIS series crafts, possessing high levels of airborne prowess and large loads of ranged weaponry. Bears a red-black design schema, oftentimes abandoning any humanoid shape.

IB-04-LLD (Last Line of Defense): A custom-built IBIS series designed for IH-18 Percolozoa. Bears a chrome and blue-silver color scheme, often employing stylized designs intended for use over long periods of time. Interestingly, the 04 line was never built, yet it exists in Stomata Facility Iota, including two that are modern ACs in everything but internal design. Radiocarbon dating suggests they were built before the modern parts that make them up were even designed.

IB-06-ECHO (External Coral Handling Operations): An odd set of IBIS craft, consisting of pink-white frames and an Ephemera headpiece on each. None of these crafts possess cockpits, and close analysis of the internals may cause nausea, vomiting, dizziness, stroke, internal bleeding, [DATA REDACTED ON ORDERS OF DR. SCHRAFER], reddening and peeling of the skin, open sores, acute Coral Exposure even while wearing proper PPE, and purpura in the eyes. IB-06: ECHO-4999999999999999999 possesses an anomalous resistance to damage and the strange property of creating 9-based imagery in areas around it. Further study required.

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

Characters unique to Handlers and "Humans":

Hal Schrafer: Ex-head of the Rubicon III Research institute and father of Walter Schrafer, now Walter Nagai.

Celyria: A C-Wave Mutation encountered by Hal with knowledge of alternate timelines.

IH-04 Columbidae: An Interconnected Human with less invasive augmentation/design than the others. Possesses significant abilities in the departments of: Debate, Societal Planning, Social Interaction, and Infrastructure management. Nickname: Loverboy.

IH-09 Mantodea: An Interconnected Human that was never human in the first place. Instead a complex, Coral-based Artificial intelligence has been built into an android with realistic human features. Designed for Espionage, Assassination, Corporate and Governmental Warfare, and Advanced Planning. Nickname: Ghost.

IH-18 Percolozoa: An Interconnected Human blending human and mechanical parts, gone beyond the measures of standard human augmentation. Designed for Long-Term Combat, Tactical Command, Psychological Warfare, Advanced Hacking, and Piloting Skill. Nickname: Sweet-Tooth.

IH-27: Eurypharynx: A Coral Colony that has had human neurons grafted into it, housed within a humanoid robotic suit/shell/android. Designed for Advanced Combat Planning, Advanced Piloting Skill, Advanced Martial Capabilities, and Team Tactics. Nickname: Firebrand.

For Members of Overseer, that list will be created another time.

[basiliskfree]

(I watched too much history clothes making videos to have Lamp textiles)

For the most part Lamps don’t have the same pressures or need for clothes as Humans. Most finding the restriction of clothes really uncomfortable and annoying on their flexible bodies. Outside of some rare PPE Clothes are pretty much not a thing for hivemind lamps, so the fact all Ships have at least one auto loom and leather growing system was confusing at first to the humans studying them. Turns out textiles can make useful tools and for the speculum Lamps this tool use became used for art

more under Cut

This systems were mostly used instead for tool making, woven textiles are used in bags, Filters and netting for hydroponics. The two types of fibers produced are a polyester like material  (that is about as breathable as polyester) and a Kevlar-like material used in strength base tasks. A ship will usually have one small auto loom that will have two settings a plain weave or hexagon net. Other weaves and things like knit fabrics are just not a thing most Shipped lamps wouldn’t even view these materials as something to make clothes out of.

Mostly do you the power in their Leathers. These Materials are grow into many shapes, functions and forms. The Leather is  the same cell structure as lamp skin and can be grown and shaped to do pretty much anything the Lamps need. Need a Screen? Just grown a section of the Colour-change layer on top of a light production layer. Need a circuit board? Lamp DNA can make single atom wires for all your 3d circuit board needs. This Leather can ether be tanned for strength or kept “Live” for auto repair and some functions (you do have to feed your computer sugars do to this at times). Most Lamp tack is build using systems like this and for Spectrum Lamps if they are make clothes it will be out of this too.

On to Clothes there are two main Cultural views about it one from the Shipped and the Other the Ship-less

For the Shipped Clothes are ether Costume for plays (pictured are Two common characters in Lamp theater The Singer and The Silent) or PPE all of which tends Leather to be grown into a pattern, with it’s Stems formed from a “glue” that makes the separate edges grown into one piece before it’s tanned; leaving a seamless look. Lights and display elements are common as Lamps are very extra about there theater and the extra power draw is fine as these are not clothes meant to be worn for more them an hour.

For the Ship-less Clothes are more an everyday thing used to protect from the dust storms common to the “wastelands” outside of Greenwich (The one Lamp City). As the Name suggests these lamps don’t have Ships to call home, and with what little Living leather they can trade for are not going to waste it on clothes. These Lamps instead have a culture of weaving, taking the fluffs of a Common food crop and turning it into a range of different fabrics. They also tan the hides of parasites that is then sewn together into sheets. often in to geometric patterns.

[violetfoxviolarose]

I've only just learned about the A Brush With Bekah and the radioactive paint drama, and I just gotta say, from my "nuclear energy is so fucking misunderstood" soapbox . . .

Once again I am begging people to actually look up how radiation and radioactive materials work. For the love of god. 😭

Yellowcake (the compound used in Bekah's paint) is >99% uranium-238, which emits alpha particles only as it (notably, very slowly) decays. Alpha particles can't even penetrate the skin. You could stop the decay coming off of her paint swatch in her original video by covering it with a piece of paper.

It's only dangerous if it enters the body, i.e. through breathing it in or eating it. And, notably, Bekah in her video that I've linked, is shown wearing the appropriate PPE for working with yellowcake (yellowcake is a dust, not a vapor, that respirator she was wearing was fine lmao). The only main concern with it is its heavy metal qualities, not unlike cadmium or lead (also used in paints). She also disclaims in each video to not try making any of her paints at home, since her whole thing is creating historical paints that are hazardous.

Thinking that a tiny amount of paint with yellowcake in it was going to do the same level of damage that abandoned enriched radioactive elements (see: Goiânia, Samut Prakan, which were cesium-137 and cobalt-60 orphan sources respectively) is absolutely asinine. And this is before getting into the sheer delusional territory of making 80+ videos about this creator and how she's somehow a "danger," without researching and figuring out that you're exposed to more radiation from a dental X-ray then you are from yellowcake paint (even if you stood next to it for a year)! it's roughly 1.66 micro Sieverts. You get magnitudes more radiation from taking a commercial flight.

(the ever-incredible xkcd is the source of this)

Anyway, absolutely crazy behavior on behalf of Argon or whatever their name was. While you probably shouldn't go buy yellowcake, it's not going to permanently destroy the environment. The amount of radiation it gives off is minute. Everything about this scenario pisses me off and it never should have escalated to 80+ """callouts""" and doxxing somebody. I hope Argon gets their just desserts.

[sunnydaleherald]

The Sunnydale Herald Newsletter, Friday, April 11th

ANDREW: Spike? It's you. It's really you! (hugs Spike, sobbing) My therapist thought I was holding onto false hope, but... I knew you'd come back. (sniffles, releases Spike from the hug to look him in the eyes) You're like... you're like Gandalf the White, resurrected from the pit of the Balrog, more beautiful than ever. (hugs Spike tightly around the neck) Ohh... he's alive, Frodo. (sobbing) He's alive.

~~Damage~~

[Drabbles & Short Fiction]

Get Through (Buffy/Spike, PG-13) by veronyxk84

Big Bad Wolf by Kittenwritings (Angel/Cordelia/Doyle, G)

They Say the Family You Choose is Better by Greensword101 (Tara/Vampire Willow, T)

Packing Up Memories by TheClowniestLivInExistence (Janice/Dawn, G)

Pretty, Pretty Dolly by unendingwanderlust (Darla/Drusilla, E)

Comfort by Descended_from_Hufflepuffs (Cordelia/Doyle, G)

The Coffee Budget by TheClowniestLivInExistence (Fred/Lorne/Wesley, G)

Drusilla by X59 (Drusilla, G)

Those Summer Nights by MollyPollyKinz (Spike & Dawn, T)

conspicuous and relatively abrupt. by tenderjock (Halfrek/Anya, T)

one more time by ripslayer (Buffy/Faith, T)

[Chaptered Fiction]

Potential Friend: Season Two, Chapter 17 by srmcd1 (Buffy/Angel, T)

The Buffy Chronicles: Life After Sunnydale, Chapter 49 by sweetmelodykiss (Buffy/Spike, E)

Lost and Found, Chapter 28 by sixofstakes (Willow/Tara, T)

Kingdoms of Amalur Reckoning: Rise of Faith, Chapter 3 by era30 (Faith, Kingdoms of Amalur crossover, M)

Buffy and the Slayer, Season 1, Chapter 2 by SunnydaleSentinel (Buffy & Dawn, T)

Here Be Monsters, Chapter 2 by girlpire (Angel/Spike, E)

always gray, never simple, Chapter 1 by welcometocaritas (Lilah/Wesley, M)

There for you., Chapter 2 by SidneyPrescottFan (Buffy/Faith, G)

Goodnight Blue Eyes, Goodbye Green, Chapters 1-2 (complete!) by xaeyrnofnbe (Buffy/Spike, Supernatural crossover, G)

Drusilla Black, Chapter 1 by Lou16A03 (Drusilla, Harry Potter crossover, M)

the Scholar, the Spirit, and the Witchqueen, Chapter 9 by perfectlyGoodInk (Willow, T)

The Plan, Chapter 4 by NotYourGrave (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

The Pryce of Tyme, Chapter 3 by Joan963z, Ragini (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Multiplicity, Chapters 13-14 by simmony (Buffy/Spike, R)

Have a Little Faith, Chapter 3 by Melme1325 (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Sojourns in Heaven, Chapter 2 by elements (Buffy/Spike, Adult Only)

Can't Get No Satisfaction, Chapter 1 by Melme1325 (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Seeing Clearly, Chapter 228 by JoeB (Ensemble, multiple crossovers, FR13)

X-Heroes, Chapter 4 by JoshuAB (Xander, multiple crossovers, FR18)

The battle of the rhymes, Chapters 20-21 by JSBirsa (Buffy/Spike, R)

The Zeppo In Time, Chapter 3 by CheekyKitten (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

[Images, Audio & Video]

Artwork: Family Portrait by TheClowniestLivInExistence (Angel, Darla, Drusilla, Spike, Buffy, worksafe)

Artwork: Down, Riley! by MadeInGold (Maggie & Riley, worksafe)

Gifset: BEST OF BTVS: Willow Rosenberg — Season Two by clarkgriffon (worksafe)

Gifset: When did the building fall down? I don't know.... by dramaism (worksafe)

Gifset: Giles and Spike + PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) by whatisyourchildhoodtrauma (worksafe)

Artwork process video: Buffy the vampire slayer fashion illustration by Cara Beatrice Studio

Fanvid: Buffy x Angel | I, Carrion (Icarian) - Hozier by LMN

Fanvid: Sexy Naughty Bitchy Faith btvs amv by Little Guy

Fanvid: Buffy & Spike | you gotten into my bloodstream by SweetAndBitterCherry

Fanvid: Buffy vs Faith - Headstrong by juliaroxs241

Fanvid: Buffy and Angel - National Anthem by juliaroxs241

Fanvid: Buffy Summers - Sanctuary Ending by Juliaroxs241

Fanvid: Buffy Angel Spike Riley - You Oughta Know by juliaroxs241 (vidder uploaded multiple other videos)

Vidlet: do i wanna know? [spike] by Aurora Edits

Music video: Buffy the Vampire Slayer theme - Nerf Herder Cover by Vincent Dron

Music: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Theme (on ukulele) by Steven Watson

Video: The Masters lair(Buffy the Vampire Slayer) final part [The Sims 4] by Drusilverine

[Reviews & Recaps]

Video: TOP 5 DES MEILLEURS ÉPISODES DE BUFFY ! by Don Mickael

Video: The Harvest | Season 1 Episode 2 Review | Does Buffy Hold Up? by BuffyBot

Video: Regarder BUFFY CONTRE LES VAMPIRES en 2025 : une bonne idée ? by Ali'N Ripley

Video: Witch | Season 1 Episode 3 Review | Buffy The Vampire Slayer by BuffyBot

Podcast video: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season 4 Episode 6 - Wild at Heart by Sh*t 90s Shows Taught Me

Podcast video: Buffy's Angels: Peace Out by The Franchise: A Film Podcast

Podcast video: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season Five, Episode Two: Real Me by Slayed! The Buffyverse Revisited Podcast

Podcast video: Buffy's Angels: Empty Places by The Franchise: A Film Podcast

Podcast video: I Watched Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 5 by Brandy Talks TV & Movies

Podcast video: S5E06: Family by One Girl in All the World

Podcast: Special 63 - Buffy The Vampire Slayer S1E9 The Puppet Show (ChuckyVision Crossover) by Film Stories

Podcast: Season 5, Episode 8 - Buffy The Vampire Slayer [movie] by You Run Podcast

Podcast: Buffy talks episode 7 [Halloween, Lie To Me and The Dark Age] feat. WHENLOGICDIES by Beware the Moon Podcast

Podcast: 141 Get It Done S7 E15 by RuggedAngel Productions

Podcast: 373 Buffy - The Vampire Slayer (1992) by Devils & Demons - Der Horrorfilm-Podcast

Podcast: Once More, With Spoilers: 1.12 Prophecy Girl | A Buffy the Vampire Slayer Podcast by Buffering: A Rewatch Adventure

[Recs and Search]

Fic rec: My, she was yar... by fortes775 (Buffy/Spike, R) recced by Priceless

Fic search: Does anyone have a link to that spuffy fic where the nerd trio tries to kill Buffy by trapping her inside a horror movie, but... by lierdumoa

[Fandom Discussions]

every time I put on witch I can’t help but find the line “they have cheerleading coaches?” so ridiculous by camellcat

There is no “mantis girl” who Xander “dates” by coraniaid

Buffy saving Willow with a speech at the end [of S6] would have fit better than Xander by roseraintears

there was no narrative need to push [Willow] into a random relationship in season 7 by femmedefandom

Where did the fanon idea that Buffy can’t cook come from? by femmedefandom

willow’s “Buffy, be happy. We got you out, we really did it”. will grate at me forever by youhavethesun

Given that everything, everyone or deity ages [what age could The Master have been?] by ILLYRIAN

Episode battle: The Gift vs Chosen - as series finales AND as episodes continued by multiple posters

Angel and Spike Double Standards continued by multiple posters

Watchers - how were they ‘chosen’? continued by multiple posters

Was Liam really a bad person? by foreseethefuture

What would happen if these two [Liam and William] met? by CakeOLantern

When/if did Willown *actually* surpass Giles? by Ill_Assumption_4414

Do protection spells ever work? by Tsole96

This scene [in Amends]! And then the snow 😭 by debsidaye

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[bethammfetameen]

Made a OC for Project Nexus! I lowkey don't really like madness combat, but project nexus is cool, and I like the lore. Here it issss!

B-210 (unknown real name) used to work with an agency affiliated with A.A.H.W, working in an underground lab in a desolate location, unknown by the government. They would illegally collect radioactive metals, to create and experiment. They had bigger plans than the AAHW's main focus, they wanted to create unstoppable isotopes.

Her fascination with nuclear science was not just interest, it was obsession. It was like art. Secretly, away from the eyes of the agency, she had been working on her own project, just for fun. A Polonium-210 gas, so concentrated that it’d theoretically have the power to kill as soon as it was inhaled, without pain or any sort of suffering. Just instant cellular collapse.

One day, an accident happened. Just days before she perfected it, there was a spill, and it seeped out from her secret compartment of the lab and instantly killed the workers nearby. She didn’t mean to. Everybody was quickly evacuated, and she got into massive trouble. They called her a liability and she was fired. They couldn’t call the police, the government couldn’t find out about the agency.

The next day, while she was at home, there was an accident with the reactor. Or sabotage. She didn’t do it. She didn’t know who did it. As it turns out, it was by their opposing team, the Status Quo–but we’ll get into that after. She went back to the lab. Gas mask and protective PPE on, ensuring she would be okay. (She also gains a better immunity to radiation, but this is jyst draft, its not all figured out.) When she got there, she stole as much as she could. She collected her Polonium gas, and multiple other elements, and brought it to a nearby abandoned wasteland.

From there, just a few days later, she perfected her gas. It was perfect. To her, it was a true form of art. But she didn’t know how to test it. She wasn’t gonna harm any animals, and she wasn’t gonna harm people either… well, until about a week later where she got a knock on her door. It was the leader of the Status Quo; Doc, or, his alias, 2BDamned (really edgy name, i know, but that's an actual character.) Turns out, he had been spying on the lab. And he saw her working on her creation behind the backs of the AAHW, and believed she would be of use to his much smaller team. Still angry with the AAHW for abandoning her and insulting her and her art, she agreed. Her instantly deadly gas would be put to good use.

I LOOOOOOOVE NUCLEAR SCIENCE!!!! this is so edgy bro but I don't care, I'm free. I will draw her at some point! She's basically just an edgy self-insert let's be real 😭