#Predefined forms

[deepikadpblog]

Mastering Efficiency: Navigating the power of Workflow Form Generator

In today's fast-paced business environment, efficiency and productivity are key to success. Workflow generators play a pivotal role in achieving these goals by streamlining, managing, and automating complex tasks and processes. Acting as digital assistants, these tools help organizations create, organize, and execute tasks seamlessly. 

This blog article explores the transformative capabilities of workflow generators, highlighting their importance in simplifying workflows, ensuring consistency, fostering collaboration, adapting to scalability, enforcing compliance, and providing visibility into processes. The article also outlines the step-by-step process of creating forms using a workflow generator, emphasizing the significance of both custom and predefined forms. 

Ultimately, workflow form generator is presented as a strategic imperative for organizations seeking to excel in today's dynamic business landscape.

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#Workflow generators #WorkflowFormGenerator #Efficiency and productivity #Streamlining processes #Task automation #Simplifying workflows #Custom forms #Predefined forms #Task creation #Drag-and-drop interface #Task management #Data collection #Competitive advantage #Scalability #AgamiTechnologies 

[odileeclipse]

In the Presence of Truth {"Sage of Truth" (SMC) x Reader} PT 2

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Shadow Milk Cookie settled into the seat beside you with an air of quiet amusement, his presence both grounding and unnerving. Up close, the details of his mismatched gaze became all the more striking, the eerie glow of his cerulean and gold eyes holding an intensity that seemed to peel back layers of pretense. It wasn’t just that he saw it felt as though he understood, as though he could pluck your scattered thoughts straight from the air and weave them into something coherent. “Let us begin,” he said, his voice smooth yet commanding. You swallowed hard, your parchment still a mess of ink-stained errors, a battlefield of numbers and theories that refused to align. Shadow Milk Cookie glanced at it, his expression unreadable as he took in the frantic scrawls. Rather than offering immediate critique, he his finger along the parchment’s edge, eyes flickering back toward you. “You are thinking too rigidly,” he observed. “You attempt to fit the answer into a predefined shape rather than allowing the concept to form naturally.” You blinked. “I… don’t understand.” Professor Almond Custard Cookie leaned against his desk, watching the exchange with wary interest. “You wouldn’t be the first,” he murmured under his breath.

Shadow Milk Cookie chuckled softly, the sound low and knowing. “Knowledge is not meant to be forcefully contained. It must be understood, internalized. Here, allow me to demonstrate.” With an effortless movement, he reached for a fresh parchment and quill, his elegant script forming a diagram an intricate illustration of magical resonance fields under celestial influence. His explanations came in measured, deliberate tones, never rushing, never expecting you to grasp concepts immediately. “You view mana stabilization as a fixed equation,” he continued, tapping a specific point on the diagram. “But it is, in truth, a dynamic balance. Think of it like… breathing. Inhaling, exhaling. Expansion, contraction. There is rhythm. A natural cadence.” You hesitated, processing his words. No scholar had ever explained it that way before. Everything up until now had been rigid formulas, memorization, the pressure to solve rather than to understand. Shadow Milk Cookie was asking you to feel the answer, not just recite it.

Tentatively, you reached for your quill, mirroring the motions he had drawn. Your lines were shakier, less confident, but as you followed his guidance, the equation began to make sense in a way it never had before. Professor Almond Custard Cookie, arms crossed, let out a thoughtful hum. “I must admit, that’s… an unusual approach.” Shadow Milk Cookie merely smiled. “Truth is rarely found in convention alone.” For the first time in weeks, the weight pressing on your chest eased. You weren’t miraculously enlightened, nor had you suddenly mastered the subject but for the first time, you felt like you were on the right path. “Shall we continue?” the Sage of Truth prompted, tilting his head ever so slightly. You inhaled deeply, steadying yourself, then nodded. “Yes.”

Shadow Milk Cookie…no, the Sage of Truth sat with a composed patience that made your nerves tangle further. Even as you hesitated, he remained steadfast, his gaze unwavering, expectant yet unpressuring. The weight of his presence pressed down on you, not in suffocation, but in silent encouragement. There was no condescension, no mockery just pure, unwavering certainty that you would learn. That you could learn. You gripped the edges of your parchment tighter, struggling to find where to even begin. Your thoughts swirled like ink spilled over a page, spreading outward in a chaotic mess. The Principle of Arcane Equilibrium. Lunar mana stabilization. Celestial harmonics. You had seen these terms in your notes, had copied them from the board, but the meaning behind them remained just out of reach. The Sage of Truth leaned forward slightly, steepling his fingers. “Let us begin at the foundation,” he said smoothly. “Tell me, what do you understand about arcane resonance?”

You swallowed, feeling your professor’s eyes on you as well. It was a simple question. One you should be able to answer. And yet, your thoughts stumbled, grasping at fragmented knowledge that refused to piece itself together. “I-It has to do with mana flow,” you started hesitantly, shifting in your seat. “How it interacts with… external forces?” You winced at how uncertain you sounded. Shadow Milk Cookie did not look disappointed. If anything, he looked intrigued. “A fair starting point,” he mused. “However, ‘interacts with external forces’ is far too vague. Be specific what forces? How do they affect mana flow?” You floundered, scanning your notes for an answer, but all you saw were half-finished scribbles and hastily written corrections. “I-” The words caught in your throat. Professor Almond Custard Cookie sighed heavily. “(Y/N) Cookie…” His tone was weary, but Shadow Milk Cookie merely raised a hand, silencing him. “I see now,” the Sage of Truth murmured, tilting his head slightly as if you were a puzzle to be examined. “It is not ignorance that holds you back. It is hesitation.” You blinked. “Hesitation?” “You grasp at knowledge but do not claim it.” He tapped a gloved finger against the wooden desk. “You doubt yourself the moment you speak. You are afraid of being wrong, and in that fear, you deny yourself the chance to be right.”

Your breath caught in your throat. How… how had he seen through you so easily? Your professor had pointed out your struggles before, but never quite like this. Never so precisely. Shadow Milk Cookie continued, his voice calm but firm. “Truth is not found in perfect answers, but in the willingness to seek them. Even in error, there is progress.” His heterochromatic gaze bore into you, gentle yet inescapable. “Do you truly wish to learn?” You clenched your hands into fists. “Of course, I do,” you said, the words leaving you with more force than intended. His lips curled into a satisfied smile. “Then let us move forward.” He gestured toward your notes. “Forget perfection. Forget your fear of being incorrect. Simply tell me what you think the answer is?” Your throat felt dry. Your mind raced with possibilities, most of which you were certain were wrong. But his words echoed in your head. Truth is not found in perfect answers, but in the willingness to seek them.

You inhaled slowly. “Mana flow is affected by celestial cycles… The lunar phases alter the frequency of arcane resonance, which means…” You paused, daring to glance up at him. He nodded, encouraging you to continue. “…which means that during a lunar eclipse, the lack of direct celestial influence causes the mana field to destabilize. So, to stabilize it… you’d need to use a principle that counteracts that absence.” Your voice wavered, uncertainty gnawing at you. “Is that… the Principle of Arcane Equilibrium?” For a moment, there was only silence. Then, Shadow Milk Cookie’s smile widened ever so slightly. “Now that,” he said, his voice brimming with approval, “was a well-reasoned answer.” Your breath left you in a sharp exhale. He wasn’t dismissing you. He wasn’t telling you that you were wrong outright. For the first time in what felt like forever, you had strung together a response that held weight. That held potential.

Professor Almond Custard Cookie let out a soft huff, shaking his head. “Unbelievable,” he muttered. “I say the same thing for weeks, and yet he gets through to you in a single conversation.” You flushed. “I-It’s not that I wasn’t listening to you!” You could only feel the pit in your stomach growing…maybe not speaking was better. Every word spoken felt like one more dig at your grave…you practically had one foot in. Your professor merely waved a hand. “Oh, I’m not offended. Frankly, if it takes the Sage of Truth himself to make you finally push past that mental block, so be it.” He shot Shadow Milk Cookie a look. “You’re stuck with them now.” You stiffened. “W-Wait” Shadow Milk Cookie chuckled. “Ah, how fortunate.” His eyes gleamed with something unreadable. “It seems our discussions have only just begun.” Your stomach twisted. This was going to be a very, very long mentorship.

The weight of the evening’s lesson still pressed heavily upon you as you finally stepped out of your professor's office, your parchment clutched tightly in your hands. The cold evening air of Blueberry Yogurt Academy greeted you with a sharp breeze, carrying the faint scent of parchment, melted wax, and the lingering traces of magical incense from the hallways. You exhaled, shoulders sagging with exhaustion. You had survived. Somehow. Behind you, Professor Almond Custard Cookie remained in his office, no doubt relieved to finally have a moment’s peace. You could still hear his parting words in your head "You’re making progress. Keep at it." though his voice had been tinged with exasperation. Whether he truly believed you were improving or if he was merely grateful to have you off his hands for the night, you weren’t sure. What you were sure of, however, was that walking back to your dorm in the dimly lit corridors of the Academy gave you far too much time to reflect on the night’s events. Your thoughts circled around your earlier conversation, looping in a relentless spiral. 

"You doubt yourself the moment you speak."

 "Truth is not found in perfect answers, but in the willingness to seek them."

"Do you truly wish to learn?"

You swallowed, your fingers tightening around your notes. The Sage of Truth no, Shadow Milk Cookie had spoken to you as if your struggles were not a burden, but a simple step in the process of learning. As if you were not lesser for failing. He had made it sound so obvious, as if understanding should be as natural as breathing. And yet, even now, you weren’t sure if you believed it. Your footsteps echoed softly against the ancient stone floors as you turned the corner toward the dormitories. The corridors of Blueberry Yogurt Academy were eerily beautiful at this hour, bathed in the pale glow of enchanted lanterns that floated gently overhead. The stained glass windows, depicting past scholars and grand celestial phenomena, cast fragmented reflections against the polished floors. The halls were nearly empty, save for the occasional scholar or staff member drifting by, their murmured discussions fading into the night. Then, you noticed him. A few steps ahead, walking in the same direction as you, was Shadow Milk Cookie. You froze mid-step.

His long robes, embroidered with ancient sigils and lined with deep celestial blues, trailed elegantly behind him. The soft glow of the lanterns illuminated his features sharp yet composed, his heterochromatic gaze focused forward in quiet contemplation. There was an effortless grace to his stride, a presence that commanded both reverence and curiosity. He walked like one who belonged in the halls of academia, as if knowledge itself guided his every step. You swallowed hard, your breath catching in your throat. It was one thing to sit across from him in a study session, where his attention had been directed solely at you. That alone had been overwhelming. But now, watching him in his element, unbothered by the presence of others, was something else entirely. He was a legend within the Academy. A beacon of intellect, respected by scholars far beyond these halls. Countless students, yourself included, had looked up to him, studied his theories, marveled at the sheer depth of his understanding. He was a figure so revered that it seemed almost unnatural to see him doing something as mundane as simply… walking back to his quarters.

You barely realized you had slowed your pace, allowing more distance between you. The last thing you wanted was to seem as if you were following him. Unfortunately, it seemed he had already noticed your presence. "You need not linger in the shadows, you know," he mused, his voice smooth, carrying just enough amusement to make your stomach twist. You nearly tripped over your own feet. "I wasn’t!" He stopped, turning slightly to glance at you, and you felt yourself shrink under the weight of his gaze. There was no judgment in his expression, only quiet interest. "Our paths align, it seems," he continued, tilting his head ever so slightly. "Surely, there is no harm in walking together?" There was a simple logic to his words. A logic that did little to calm your nerves. Your hands tightened around your parchment as you forced yourself to nod. "O-Of course not," you managed to say, though the words felt clumsy on your tongue. He resumed his pace, and you hesitantly stepped forward to match it, though you kept a respectable distance between you.

For a moment, silence stretched between you, save for the sound of your footsteps echoing against the stone. You risked a glance at him, taking in the way his gaze remained steady, lost in thought. Even in stillness, there was an air of quiet brilliance about him an unshakable confidence in the way he carried himself. You wondered, not for the first time, what it must be like to think as he did. To see the world through his eyes, where every fragment of knowledge seemed to fall perfectly into place. …How had someone like him ended up offering to help someone like you? Right…Because the professor insisted so. You imagine it’s because he was at his wits end with you.  The thought made your stomach churn. "You are quiet," Shadow Milk Cookie observed, not unkindly. "Is your mind burdened by today’s lesson?" You flinched. "I…Um- No! I mean- Yes? I mean…" You let out a quiet groan, rubbing your temple. "I just… I still don’t understand why you would bother." He stopped walking. You barely had time to react before his gaze was on you once more, sharper now, as if you had just presented him with a particularly intriguing puzzle. "Why wouldn’t I?" he asked simply. You stared at him. "Because you’re you." The words left your mouth before you could stop them, but they were true. He was him. A scholar unlike any other. The Sage of Truth. A role model to so many. And you were… you. He regarded you for a long moment. Then, to your utter disbelief, he chuckled. It was a soft sound, quiet yet unmistakably amused. "Ah," he mused, shaking his head. "You place me upon a pedestal so high that you fail to see the truth, even when it stands before you." You stiffened. "What truth?" "That I am merely a scholar, much like yourself." He stepped forward slightly, and you felt your breath catch. "I seek understanding. I seek knowledge. And I seek to share that knowledge, just as those before me have done. That is all." You swallowed hard, unable to tear your gaze away. "You believe I stand beyond your reach," he continued, his voice quieter now. "But tell me… Is that not an illusion of your own making?" The words settled deep within you, leaving you momentarily speechless. He did not wait for an answer. Instead, he resumed walking, as if his statement had been nothing more than a passing remark. You, however, were left rooted in place, your thoughts spinning wildly. Was it truly an illusion? Or had you simply convinced yourself that it was?

You hesitated for a long moment, his words lingering in your mind like an unsolved equation.

"Is that not an illusion of your own making?"

Something about the way he had said it so effortlessly, so assuredly made you feel as though you had been caught in the act of deceiving yourself. As if the way you saw him, the way you saw yourself, was nothing more than a fragile illusion you had crafted without realizing it. And yet… You gripped your parchment a little tighter, your steps quickening until you fell into pace beside him once more. "If…" Your voice wavered, but you forced yourself to speak. "If illusions are so easily made, then… isn’t truth an illusion in itself?" For the first time since the conversation had begun, Shadow Milk Cookie stopped walking entirely. You nearly stumbled forward from the suddenness of it, but when you turned to face him, his expression had shifted. Gone was the amused scholar indulging in a casual discussion. In his place stood the Sage of Truth, eyes gleaming with something deeper something unreadable. Slowly, he turned to face you fully. "An illusion…?" he echoed, his voice quieter now, almost thoughtful. Your throat tightened. Perhaps you had spoken too boldly, questioning something so fundamental to him. But it was too late to take it back now. "You said I place you on a pedestal," you said carefully. "That I see something in you that isn’t real. That my perception of you is just… an illusion of my own making. But… isn’t truth also shaped by perception? Isn’t it possible that what we see as truth is just another illusion? Something we convince ourselves of?"

Silence stretched between you. The Academy halls, once vast and endless, now felt small and confined within the weight of the question hanging in the air. The lanterns above flickered gently, their glow casting shifting shadows against the stone walls. Then, to your utter shock, Shadow Milk Cookie smiled. Not his usual, knowing smile the kind that came when he had already deciphered the answer before the question had even been asked. No, this was something else. Something closer to satisfaction. "Ah," he breathed, eyes alight with intrigue. "Now you are asking the right questions." Your breath hitched. He clasped his hands behind his back, tilting his head ever so slightly. "Tell me, then," he said, his voice smooth, measured. "If truth were an illusion, then what makes it different from any other falsehood? What separates reality from deception?" You opened your mouth, then shut it again. How were you supposed to answer that? His gaze never wavered, patient yet expectant. He was not dismissing your question. No, he was indulging it feeding it, waiting to see where you would take it. The realization sent a shiver down your spine. Even now, after hours of struggle, after making a fool of yourself in the lecture hall and in office hours, he was still encouraging you. Still pushing you to think, to question. Not because he doubted you, but because he wanted to see if you could reach the answer on your own. Your hands clenched at your sides. Perhaps… perhaps that was the difference. Perhaps truth was not a static thing, an unshakable force that simply existed. Perhaps it was something sought after, something earned.

A beat of silence stretched between you, the weight of his question pressing heavily upon your thoughts. Try as you might, no answer came, not one you were confident in, at least. You swallowed hard, gripping your parchment as though it might somehow grant you clarity. Your mind twisted and turned, sifting through everything you had ever learned, everything you had ever questioned. But no matter how you approached it, the answer remained just out of reach. Slowly, you exhaled. Then, with great reluctance, you admitted, "I… don’t know." Shadow Milk Cookie watched you carefully, his expression unreadable. He did not scoff, nor did he look disappointed. If anything, there was something almost expectant in his gaze.

You hesitated before speaking again, your voice quieter this time.

"When…" You shifted your weight, forcing yourself to meet his eyes. "When is our next tutoring session?" The moment the words left your mouth, you wanted to sink into the floor. What were you even saying? You had spent the entire evening resisting his help, yet here you were, asking for more? But it was too late to take it back now. Shadow Milk Cookie blinked once, then let out a soft chuckle. "Ah…" His smile was small but unmistakable. "So you wish to continue?" You fidgeted, heat creeping up your neck. "I mean…" You cleared your throat. "I still can’t answer your question. And I doubt I’ll figure it out on my own." His eyes gleamed, a knowing amusement dancing within them. "Perhaps not yet." Your fingers curled around your parchment. "So… when?" For a brief moment, he simply observed you, his heterochromatic gaze searching. Then, with a slow nod, he said, "Tomorrow. Same time." Your breath caught. So soon? You had expected him to at least hesitate, to question if it was worth his time to continue tutoring a student who struggled so much. And yet, he had answered without a second thought. He had already decided. You nodded stiffly, unsure of what else to say. "Alright… Tomorrow, then." "Indeed." He inclined his head slightly, the candlelight catching the silver edges of his robes. Then, without another word, he turned forward once more, resuming his steady pace down the corridor. You lingered for a moment, watching him, still unable to fully grasp how you had ended up here. The Sage of Truth, the scholar admired by all, had willingly taken you under his wing. And, whether you were ready or not… Tomorrow, it would begin again.

The night air was crisp, carrying the faint scent of parchment and old stone as you walked the winding path toward the dormitories. The lamps flickered gently, their glow casting elongated shadows across the cobbled walkways. The Academy was quiet at this hour, only the occasional distant murmur of scholars deep in discussion broke the silence. And yet, despite the stillness, your thoughts churned like a storm. You had asked him when the next tutoring session would be. And he had agreed. The realization sent a fresh wave of regret coursing through you. You wanted to take it back. To insist that you had only spoken in the moment, that you didn’t actually need his help, that you were fine struggling on your own. But you couldn’t. Professor Almond Custard Cookie had already made you his problem. You could still hear your professor’s resigned sigh from earlier, the subtle relief in his voice when the Sage of Truth had offered his guidance. That had been the final decision. The moment Shadow Milk Cookie had taken an interest, your fate had been sealed.

You weren’t just his student now. You were his baggage. And worse, you didn’t want to fail. No matter how humiliating it was to struggle under his piercing gaze, no matter how small you felt in the presence of someone whose mind operated at a level you couldn’t even fathom… you knew the truth. You weren’t going to make it on your own. Your grip tightened around the strap of your bag as you risked another glance at him. He walked with that same effortless grace, his long robes trailing just slightly with each step, his expression thoughtful but unreadable. He didn’t acknowledge your unease, nor did he seem weighed down by the burden of tutoring someone as hopeless as you. Because to him, this wasn’t a burden at all. That, somehow, made it worse. You exhaled slowly, willing your nerves to settle. The dormitories were just ahead. Soon, you could retreat to your room, bury yourself under the weight of your own thoughts, and figure out how you were going to survive this. Because tomorrow, there was no turning back. 

The next day the afternoon sun cast long shadows over the courtyard, its warmth doing little to ease the weight pressing on your chest. You sat slouched on a stone bench, a half-eaten pastry in your hands, letting the idle chatter of your friends wash over you. “You’re lucky you weren’t in class earlier,” Hazelnut Biscotti Cookie groaned, stretching out beside you. “Professor Caramel Chiffon assigned three new readings. Three. And he hinted at a quiz. An unannounced quiz.” Chai Latte Cookie snorted. “Sounds about right.” Earl Grey Cookie adjusted his coat, ever composed. “Frankly, I don’t understand why you’re complaining. It was a straightforward lecture.” Hazelnut Biscotti rolled his eyes. “Easy for you to say, Mr. ‘I Read Ahead for Fun.’” Chai Latte turned to you then, raising an eyebrow. “Wait, weren’t you supposed to be in that lecture?” You hesitated, fiddling with the edge of your sleeve. “…Yeah.” Hazelnut Biscotti sat up, grinning. “You skipped?” Earl Grey frowned slightly. “That’s unlike you.” “I needed a break, okay?” You sighed, rubbing your temple. “I was so lost yesterday that Professor Almond Custard Cookie actually sent me to the Sage of Truth for tutoring.” They went silent. Then Hazelnut Biscotti whistled. “Whoa. That’s, uh… That’s serious.” Chai Latte’s eyes widened. “Wait, the Sage of Truth? Like, Shadow Milk Cookie?” “The one and only,” you muttered, slumping against the stone bench. “And before you say anything, no, I don’t know how this happened. One second I was getting grilled in office hours, and the next, he was standing there, offering to help.” Earl Grey’s expression turned thoughtful. “That’s… quite the opportunity. He doesn’t just tutor anyone.” You groaned. “Yeah, thanks, I know.” Chai Latte leaned in with a sly smile. “And you didn’t immediately pass out from embarrassment?” “Oh, I wanted to,” you admitted. “But now I’m stuck. Professor Almond Custard basically assigned me to him like I’m some kind of lost cause. I can’t back out without looking like an idiot, and I really don’t want to fail.”

Hazelnut Biscotti chuckled. “So what you’re saying is, you’re the Sage of Truth’s baggage now.” You shot him a look. “Please don’t put it like that.” Earl Grey folded his arms. “Well, are you actually going to his tutoring sessions?” “…Yeah.” You exhaled, rubbing the back of your neck. “But I’d rather keep it quiet. The last thing I need is everyone knowing I need extra help, especially from him.” Chai Latte gave you a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, we won’t tell a soul.” “Thanks.” You exhaled. “I just needed a break today. I can’t handle another hour of feeling completely stupid.” “Understandable,” Hazelnut Biscotti said with a shrug. “One bad day is not gonna kill you.” Earl Grey, though still looking skeptical, didn’t push further.

The conversation shifted to lighter topics, who had actually blown up the alchemy lab, whether the Academy’s bakery was secretly using illegal enchantments to make their pastries addictive, and speculation about which professor would crack under stress first. It was… nice. Until Hazelnut Biscotti suddenly grinned. “Oh, this is interesting.” You blinked. “What?” Chai Latte hummed. “A rather esteemed scholar seems to be gracing us with his presence.” Earl Grey smirked. “And he’s not alone.” You followed their gaze and your stomach dropped. Shadow Milk Cookie. Walking through the courtyard with two other scholars, deep in conversation, his presence as commanding as ever. His embroidered robes shimmered in the light, his expression composed, thoughtful every bit the revered academic you’d always admired from a distance. And he was heading this way. Panic seized your chest. If he sees me, he’ll know I skipped class. Without thinking, you grabbed Hazelnut Biscotti’s sleeve and yanked him closer. “Hide me.” He choked on his laughter. “Oh, this just keeps getting better.” Chai Latte barely stifled a giggle. “Wait, why are we hiding you? You like him, don’t you?” You gawked at her. “What?! No! That’s not-” “Ohhh, this is priceless,” Hazelnut Biscotti wheezed. “I don’t like him!” you hissed. “I just don’t want him to know I skipped class!” Earl Grey raised an eyebrow. “So, the great Sage of Truth personally tutors you, and instead of actually attending lectures, you’re hiding from him in a bush?” You buried your face in your hands. “I wasn’t planning on hiding in a bush, but if that’s what it takes-” “You’re ridiculous,” Chai Latte giggled, before glancing over at Shadow Milk Cookie’s group. “Okay, okay, he’s almost past us, just don’t move.” You froze, heart hammering. Shadow Milk Cookie’s voice drifted closer, measured, inquisitive, effortlessly drawing his companions into discussion. And then He paused. You stopped breathing. Earl Grey, ever the calm one, muttered, “You definitely look suspicious right now.” Before you could respond, Shadow Milk Cookie resumed walking, his group moving past without so much as a glance in your direction. As soon as they were gone, you collapsed back against the bench with a heavy sigh. Your friends immediately lost it. Hazelnut Biscotti doubled over laughing. “You should’ve seen your face-” Chai Latte wiped away tears. “You so looked like a guilty student caught by a professor” “I was a guilty student caught by a professor!” you groaned. Earl Grey smirked. “You’re just lucky he didn’t see you.” You exhaled, feeling utterly drained. “I really hope so.” Hazelnut Biscotti leaned back with a grin. “Either way, that was hilarious.” You shot him a glare…But at least you weren’t caught. Probably.

Chai Latte Cookie leaned forward, propping her chin on her hand. “So… what’s he like?” You blinked, still recovering from your near-exposure. “Huh?” “The Sage of Truth,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows. “You’ve actually talked to him now, right? So what’s he like?” Hazelnut Biscotti Cookie grinned. “Yeah, is he really as mysterious and wise as everyone says?” Earl Grey Cookie sipped his tea, ever composed. “I’d imagine he’s rather intimidating.” You hesitated, shifting uncomfortably under their expectant stares. The truth was, you weren’t entirely sure how to describe him. You had only met him once well, formally, anyway. Sure, you had seen him before, standing at the podium in grand lectures you never attended, passing by in the halls with that effortless air of authority. But actually sitting with him, discussing your academic struggles? That was different. You exhaled. “Honestly… I don’t know yet.” Chai Latte raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean? You met him, didn’t you?” “Well, yeah,” you admitted. “But it’s only been one session. And most of that was just him trying to figure out how bad I actually am at this.”

Hazelnut Biscotti snickered. “That bad, huh?” You groaned, covering your face. “Don’t remind me.” Chai Latte Cookie nudged you. “Come on, though. First impressions? What was it like sitting across from the Sage of Truth?” You thought back to yesterday how he had arrived in the office so suddenly, brimming with discoveries before shifting his attention entirely to you. How effortlessly he had unraveled your mistakes, yet without a trace of condescension. How he had challenged you, his golden gaze expectant, patient, assured. “…He’s sharp,” you admitted after a moment. “Like… really sharp. It’s like he already knows the answers but wants to see if you can get there.” Earl Grey Cookie hummed. “That makes sense. A true scholar guides rather than simply provide.” You nodded. “Yeah, but the problem is, I couldn’t get there. No matter how he rephrased it, I just” You sighed. “I couldn’t keep up.” Chai Latte frowned. “Did he get frustrated with you?” You shook your head. “No. If anything, it was worse. He was patient.” Hazelnut Biscotti winced. “Oof.” “Yeah,” you muttered. “It made me feel even dumber.” Earl Grey considered this. “Patience can be more unnerving than reprimand. It forces you to confront your own inadequacies.” You stared at him. “…Yeah. Exactly that.” Chai Latte nudged you again. “But come on, there’s gotta be more to him than just being smart.” You hesitated, thinking back to the way he carried himself so composed, so sure. How his words carried weight without force. How he had looked at you not with disappointment, but expectation, like he truly believed you could improve.

“…He’s confident,” you said slowly. “Not in an arrogant way. Just… assured. Like he doesn’t doubt himself. Ever.” Hazelnut Biscotti whistled. “Must be nice.” Earl Grey nodded. “A scholar of his caliber would have little reason to doubt.” Chai Latte smirked. “And? Is he at least nice to look at?” You nearly choked. “What?!” She grinned. “Come on, you can’t tell me the robes, the hair, the mystique don’t at least add to the appeal.” Hazelnut Biscotti waggled his eyebrows. “All the scholars love him, you know. And not just for his wisdom.” You buried your face in your hands. “I am not discussing this.” Earl Grey shook his head. “This is hardly relevant to his academic prowess.” “Exactly!” You gestured to him. “Thank you!” Chai Latte just laughed. “Okay, okay, we’ll drop it. But you are going back, right?” You exhaled, slumping back. “Yeah. I don’t really have a choice.” Hazelnut Biscotti grinned. “Well, if nothing else, at least we’ll get more firsthand reports on the great and mysterious Sage of Truth.” You groaned. “You all are the worst.” Chai Latte beamed. “And yet, you love us.” You rolled your eyes, but despite yourself, you smiled.

A/N There will be more interactions with the sage dw but I need to build the world it would be super unrealistic if we had no friends LOL And I know there's a canon Earl Grey Cookie but I only realized after I finished sooo it's up to yall to picture him as the canon or come up with your own appearances all the other cookies mentioned are made up <3

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[keferon]

This is such a complex and nuanced topic that I can’t stop thinking now about artificial intelligence, personhood, and what it means to be alive. Because golem!Prowl actually seems to exist somewhere in the intersection of those ideas.

Certainly Prowl does not have a soul. And yet, where other golems depicted in mimic au seem to operate primarily as rule-based entities given a set of predefined orders that define their function, Prowl is able to go a step further — learning and defining his own rules based on observation and experience. Arguably, Prowl is even more advanced in this regard than real-world AI agents we might interact with such as ChatGPT (which still requires humans to tell it: when to update it’s knowledge, what data to use, and what that data means) currently are. Because Prowl formulates knowledge not just from a distillation and concentration of the most prominent and commonly accepted ideas that have come before.

He shows this when he rejects all the views that society accepts — resulting in the formulation of the idea that Primus must be wrong. And in a lot of ways, Prowl’s learning that gets him to ultimately reach that conclusion seems a lot more closely related to how we learn. He learns from observing the actions of those around him, from listening to what the people closest to him say and from experiencing things for himself. And this also shows in the beginnings of his interaction with Jazz. Prowl may know things like friendship as abstract concepts, but he only can truly come to define what they mean because he is experiencing them.

In some ways then, what seems to make Prowl much more advanced in his intelligence is that the conclusions he ultimately draws — the way he updates his understanding of the world to fit the framework he’s been given — is something he does independently. And this is what sets him apart.

So is he a person? Given his lack of soul or spark perhaps not. But then again, what truly defines humanity, for lack of a better word? Because perhaps there is not a clear and distinct line to tell when mimicry and close approximation crosses over to become the real thing.

But given the way that Prowl learns and interacts with the world around him, it does not seem too far-fetched to say that he is alive. And further, that he seems a fairly unique form of life within this continuity. Therefore, is he not his own individual? In much the same way that the others this society deems beasts and monsters because of their unique abilities are also individuals.

It’s just really interesting to think about.

(But I will stop myself there, because I did not initially think this would get as long as it did and I feel like I’ve already written an entire thesis in an ask at this point!)

DAMN That’s a really really interesting essay you got here👁

If we take an artificially created algorithm based on seek a goal -> complete the goal but then give it learning capability of a real person. At what point it’s gonna just become one? And if it gains the ability to have emotions. Could they be considered “real” if it’s processing them in it’s own way completely unknown to us?

I love making stories that force me to question the entire life hahdkj

[chocodile]

Amaranthine Magic System PART III: Spellcraft for… Everyone Else (Including Unicorns)

This is Part III of a three-part worldbuilding set.

Part I - Part II - Part III (you are here)

So, we’ve now established how magic works and how it can be manipulated by a wizard. But wizards aren’t the only ones capable of using magic... as mentioned in Part I, even a tree can do it. How does THAT work? Surely it must be pretty rare, right?

Well, actually, a number of plants and animals have evolved to harness magic. Something about them—either a physical organ, body part, or some sort of instinctual behavior—is able to warp magic in a way that happens to be beneficial. Some examples:

A predatory cat that can use magic to bend light around itself and appear “invisible” thanks to the molecular structure of its fur

A mole that can vibrate its claws in such a way that they increase the charge of magic in the earth around it, causing solid stone to temporarily liquefy

A flower whose roots absorb magic from the earth and use it to resist freezing, allowing it to bloom all winter long

A bird who sings at a strange, disorienting, warbling song, the vibrations of which interfere with the magical frequencies used by its most common predator

A carnivorous plant that paralyzes its victims not with venom, but with numbing bolts of magic produced by a specially evolved structure whenever it detects nearby movement

You may notice that, with the exception of the carnivorous plant, all the other examples are simply using magical energy already in their environment rather than producing it themselves. Which brings me to the next detail… magic can be “cast” from two types of sources:

“Enchantments”/Ambient casting/passive casting: Happens by gently shaping the background radiation of magic already in the environment, like most of the examples above. It is typically done by passing the magical energy through some sort of physical structure in order to alter its frequency. Most enchanted jewelry functions on this principle. Studying animals that perform passive casting can be useful for wizards to learn new casting and enchanting techniques themselves, and many methods of spellcraft are based on patterns of magic wave manipulation first observed in nature. 99% of animals and plants that use magic fall into this category. Also, this sort of magic waxes or wanes in power depending on the ambient background magic radiation levels of the area… your magic locket may fail you at the worst possible moment if you take it someplace with very low magical background radiation levels.

Active casting/”Casting spells”: Magic where the power source comes from within the creature itself and can be actively turned off or on, such as the carnivorous plant example above. Animals and plants that are capable of active casting are typically quite dangerous indeed, though their bodies tend to make for incredibly valuable spell ingredients and materials for crafting magical devices. Luckily, this ability is extremely rare in nature… the ability to truly “cast a spell” is found almost exclusively in wizards.

As a half-celestial, Ambroys sits at sort of a weird position. He technically is an active caster, as he has his own magical field and he can summon his abilities up at will (or, more often in his youth, accidentally) using his mind/will as the primary trigger. However, half-celestials and half-infernals have the shape of their magical “filter” predefined by their heritage and physical anatomy—it is not consciously shaped the way a wizard’s is. They may be able to choose which of these predefined forms their magic takes, and may even discover new variations on their powers throughout their life, but they can never consciously teach themselves brand new spells from scratch, and will never be able to switch fluidly through several different types of similar magic without interruption the way a wizard could.

To Hyden, this makes Ambroys closer to a beast than a person, magically speaking (no offense, of course). He can’t talk spellcraft with him because he’s not doing anything on purpose… he’s just brainlessly clicking his silly little claws together to dig through rock like the mole mentioned earlier. He will never truly understand all the complex mental hoops Hyden jumps through every time he conjures up a flame to light his opium pipe, even if Ambroys can do the same exact thing by just thinking “ok, fire time now”. It’s just not the same, you know?

Aaand that wraps up the Amaranthine magic guide! This should hopefully provide a clearer view of how everything works in this setting. :)

[mariacallous]

Amid Donald Trump’s recent attacks on transgender people, many critics of his Administration have cited the German pastor Martin Niemöller, whose 1946 poem “First They Came” describes Nazi Germany’s progressive targeting of maligned groups. Indeed, on the first day of Trump’s second term, he signed an anti-trans executive order decreeing that the federal government recognize only two sexes, male and female; since then, his Administration’s pursuit of groups that it deems enemies—immigrants, college protesters, white-shoe law firms—has progressed rapidly. But Trump’s anti-trans actions are not just opening moves in a battle against vulnerable groups. Nor are they simply fanning the flames of right-wing moral panic. The push to eradicate so-called “woke gender ideology” is also part of the assault on the government itself. The right understands this. It’s time the left did, too.

The administrative state, a term thrown around with much derision in conservative circles, is simply a label for what the government does to keep America running. In fulfilling its duty to attend to the health, safety, and welfare of the population, the state builds roads, regulates toxins, records deeds, issues identity documents, and studies birth, death, and disease. Whether passed by Congress or state legislatures, laws cannot specify all the minutiae involved in protecting the health and safety of the people. If a state legislature passes a law requiring its restaurants to maintain safe and sanitary conditions, its members are not sitting around deciding the correct food-storage temperatures.

Executive agencies exist, in large part, to make such determinations. Since the New Deal, they have developed tools—forms, protocols, expert reviews, and rules and regulations—to achieve goals set by legislatures. To implement broad legislative mandates, administrative agencies must create systems that categorize information about the public they serve, breaking down the population into discrete categories based on whatever classifications best support a particular purpose. A person’s identity can be sorted many ways, depending on the context: by age, marital status, income, occupation, residency status, parental status, and more. These categories aren’t timeless ontological judgments—they’re practical tools that help the government fulfill its duties.

One of those criteria is sex. Administrative agencies have often defined sex not to fit large philosophies about gender but to help themselves do their job. Until recently, when Republican-controlled state Houses began passing anti-trans bills, the Department of Motor Vehicles in almost every state allowed people to have an “M” or “F” gender marker different from their sex at birth. This is practical: it is in law enforcement’s interest for the D.M.V. to insure that applicants’ appearance, including their sex, matches how they’re described on their identity document. New York City’s Department of Homeless Services instructs unhoused people to “choose placement in a shelter type (men’s or women’s) that feels safest for them based on their gender identity” because the agency is tasked with trying to keep people off the streets. But when Departments of Health predict population changes, for instance, they rely instead on a definition of sex at birth, since it allows them to track sex ratios.

Sometimes agencies’ decisions help trans people; sometimes they don’t. But there is usually an underlying rationale that calibrates a particular definition of sex to an agency’s purpose. In other words, when it comes to governing, sex is not an input, with a predefined meaning, determining the state’s rules. It’s an output, a creation of those rules, reverse-engineered to fit what an agency needs sex to do. When senators tried to bait Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, at her confirmation hearing, into offering up a strict definition of “woman,” she gave the answer anyone familiar with sex in the administrative state would give: “If there’s a dispute about a definition, people make arguments, and I look at the law and I decide.”

Trump’s executive order—titled “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government”—instead declares that sex is binary and immutable, “grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.” Female “means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell.” Males belong, at conception, to the sex that produces the small one. That definition—nonsensical because there are no distinguishable reproductive cells at conception—applies to all agencies and programs of the federal government.

A deluge of policy reversals has followed.

The Administration prohibited trans girls and trans women from participating in women’s sports, banned transgender people from serving in the military, reverted to putting sex at birth on federal identity documents, tried to transfer trans women to men’s prisons, and began requiring federal employees to use the bathrooms aligned with their birth sex, among other actions. “Gender” was replaced with “sex” on federal forms, and references to trans people on federal websites (including the National Park Service’s page about the Stonewall Uprising) were removed.

The assault on administrative flexibility is most visible at the National Institutes of Health, where rigid definitions actively prevent scientists and researchers from carrying out the work Congress mandated them to do. (Before Trump was elected, Russell Vought, who now leads the Office of Management and Budget, had explicitly called for “unwinding policies and procedures that are used to advance radical gender, racial and equity initiatives under the banner of science.”) By mid-May, the N.I.H. had cancelled more than six hundred million dollars in research grants related to transgender health. Even grants that included small numbers of transgender patients were affected. Jason Flatt, a researcher at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, lost funding for a study that would have analyzed the medical records of two hundred thousand people in the course of ten years to understand more about dementia. “Of those two hundred thousand, only four thousand were L.G.B.T., but that was enough to have the award cancelled,” he said. “Basically, they’re saying all my grants are cancelled because they also include trans people.”

Scientists and researchers understand that sex is a multidimensional category; in their research, they choose whichever dimension of sex and gender—chromosomes, reproductive organs, genital phenotype, hormones, or psychological or social factors—best suits their purpose. The diktat defining sex obliterates the nuanced, purpose-driven tools that allow agencies to support this work effectively. In March, the Trump Administration gleefully publicized the slashing of N.I.H. studies on what it called “transgender” mice, even though these studies were designed to study the effects of hormones on disease, fertility, and H.I.V.-vaccine efficacy which had little to do with what the right wing has derided as “gender ideology.” (One of the studies sought to examine the effect of estrogen on asthma; researchers hoped to understand whether biological characteristics associated with sex play a role, and, if so, which ones.) The Department of Veterans Affairs recently carried out a study on the rate of prostate-cancer diagnoses among veterans who are trans women; if the study were to be ongoing, it would now be forced to represent its subjects as men with prostate cancer, erasing data that could lead to findings about how hormone treatment might affect the treatment of prostrate cancer. “Trans wasn’t incorporated into biomedical enterprises just for the advancement of trans health,” a researcher at the N.I.H told me. “It was because trans people are an edge case that helps us think about sex and gender in smarter ways for the betterment of the entire population.”

The scale of the Administration’s funding cuts is so large that it can be difficult to parse the logic behind some of them. Many rejections have been cursory, simply informing researchers that their projects no longer meet agency priorities. Such a lack of precision may be intentional. The N.I.H. researcher told me that the breadth and vagueness of Trump’s anti-trans and anti-D.E.I. executive orders encourage anticipatory compliance. “It’s in the vagaries where they amass power, since the vagueness has to be interpreted.”

Trump’s “Defending Women” order doesn’t just erase transgender people; along with the Administration’s attack on D.E.I. initiatives, it signals that the concept of gender itself has become a chief target. It is nearly impossible to study disparities in health outcomes without studying the social, cultural, and psychological traits that typically fall under the banner of gender. During the first year of the pandemic, for instance, more men than women were dying of COVID-19, and news organizations were quick to point to biological sex differences as the cause. But, when researchers from the GenderSci Lab at Harvard combed through the data, they pointed out that gender-related social factors could also play a significant role. How else to account for the fact that men were more likely to die of COVID-19 than women in New York, but not in Connecticut? If the Administration forces various agencies to excise gender from the study of health, the government won’t be able to gather the evidence needed to justify policies that would benefit a wide range of people, including, in the case of COVID, men.

To say that Trump’s executive order is a wrecking ball is to vastly understate its scope and impact. Wrecking balls follow an arc. Trump’s order is like a tornado, crashing unpredictably into departments, reports, standards, forms—and now scientific practice. The goal appears to be not just making villains out of gender and sexual minorities but, by dismantling the health, safety, and welfare infrastructure of the administrative apparatus, targeting the same women that Trump’s “Defending Women” purports to protect. Much of what the administrative state does is mundane. But if basic indices of public health and safety cannot be measured accurately—if agencies cannot do the work they’re chartered to do, the part of the state that attends to the health and well-being of the population withers. That may be the point. 

[ryuzakemo128]

Beneath Your Depths ..... Do You Feel Anything?

Pairing: Poly! 141 x Reaper! Forensic Pathologist! Female Reader

Masterlist - Prequel - Part One - Part Two - Part Three - Part Four

Content Warning: Graphic description of you and what you really look like. You are Death aka the pale horse, the grim reaper, the main dude bossing around the little reapers under your employ thing. Prequel to the series of one shot parts I have written before this one.

Note: If you prefer to remain unaware about how I want to depict you. Feel free to skip this one. It won't affect the future parts or anything. Just like an extra plate of food, you are always free to say no thanks, I already have enough here.

I won't add a summary either because I don't want to spoil anything for this one, and I want to know if anyone will like this or not.

You are always certain you knew everything there was to be in life and death. Knowing both worlds so intimately. What else could you be?

Abhorrent. Antediluvian. Colossal. Eldritch by some people's standards. The creature standing before the four of them, the four men, it was nothing like they have ever seen before.

Ethereal. Most of the time you are formless. An incarnate of death in flesh, a silent spectator of mortality's dance. But now, as you stand before the creature, the air thickens, and your form solidifies. Price's eyes narrow, taking in your sudden presence. Soap's hand tightens around his combat knife. Ghost's grip on his rifle relaxes slightly, his gaze flicking to the side to assess the new player. Gaz's eyes, however, light up with an unreadable emotion.

Necromantic as you are in fact one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. You were huge. Bugger than any monster they have come across in the past. So otherworld, outer worldly and powerful, you could feel the tremor of fear emanating from the men. Fear of death. Common among humans. Uncommon amongst other monsters.

What did they have to fear from you? You were just as freakish as they are right?

A primeval they called you. A creature related to the beginning of everything. A creature so old none could possibly comprehend you without taking the overarching risk of madness over taking them.

Some priests and nuns claim you as unholy. But you are as natural as the earth beneath their feet and the air in their lungs.

After you consume someone or something a putrid smell clings to you, your flesh, your bones and the essence of your blood. Yes. You have blood. Yes. You can bleed. No. You are incapable of dying. But you are able to appear dead to anyone who would have or have tried to kill you in the past.

Your exoskeleton is there if someone where to squint hard enough to see the shape beneath the endless smog surrounding your gargantuan form. Born of star and moon, you have no reason to harm outside your predefined nature.

You have no reason of knowing why they were there before you. They weren't supposed to die just yet. There time had not come close to arriving. You knew this. Your body knew this and your soul declined their intrepid touch.

Necrotizing the living and bringing them unto the other side where they were supposed to come to when it was their time to go. Ritualistic in behaviour but never quite fitting in. This creature before them is you.

Predatory in nature much like the sharks, the bears, the wolves, and the many animals that kill in order to endure.

Insidious, malevolent, deranged and yet eerily benevolent. Not outright kind mind you. Death is anything but kind in the hearts and minds of mankind. But for you? It's a job. Its a promise. Its a wish. Its a release.

You don't wish to end things for the sake of ending them. No matter how many might find that hard to believe or reject it completely.

The ghastly chthonic array of the deceased walking past you like you weren't even there. Like you weren't the only who brought them there. A cycle of nature you were in tune with without having to remember the tune or even explain the why of it. Wave after wave like the ocean eroding away stone and metal beneath its watery depths.

Macabre. Visceral.

Charnel. Sepulchral. Thanatoid.

Abysmal in some aspects and reflected in most cultures as something or someone most feared. Yet here you are, a being of the void, standing in front of men who have seen hell and lived to tell the tale. You look into Price's eyes and for a moment, you see a flicker of recognition, a glimmer of understanding that you are not here to do harm but to uphold a balance that has been skewed.

It didn't matter what they thought of you, You have a schedule to keep in time with. You can't afford to mess any of it up. With each heavy footstep away from the four men. Each thump on the ground beneath your feet resonated through the air like a silent drum beat. You felt the tension ease slightly as your form grew more indistinct.

Price spoke up, his voice a gravelly rumble that seemed to echo around the abandoned warehouse. "What the fuck was that?" Soap's eyes didn't leave the spot where you had been standing, knuckles white around the grip of his knife. Ghost was the first to move, holstering his weapon and walking towards the spot where your ethereal presence had been. He knelt down, inspecting the ground with a keen eye.

"Looks like it left something behind," he said, picking up a small, gleaming object that looked out of place amidst the dust and grime. It was a tooth, shaped unlike any creature they had encountered before. The serrated edge and crystalline sheen hinted at a power that was beyond their understanding.

A small piece of obsidian with red under glow just beneath the surface.

[kanguin]

"Wall-E was a fatphobic movie" I'm sorry, where, in all of its run time, did it make the assertion that the humans aboard the Axiom were lazy and to blame for their situation? Where did it mock them or assert they had less value because of being fat? Where were the insults and negative comments directly aimed at the obesity of the passengers? Did I miss the narrative where the fat passengers were completely incapable of doing anything and failed to make a stand against the autopilot? Did we watch different movies? Or did some people just fail so completely at competent media analysis that they saw characters who were portrayed as "fat" and "helpless" unitilizing "mobility aids" and conclude "oh this movie hates fat people".

Before I get into this, a few things:

I am fat. Very, very fat, fatter than 99% of adults in the US. Probably fatter than you, maybe not, who knows! I feel very comfortable determining what does and does not feel insulting to me as a fat person.

I am disabled. I have chronic pain, joint instability, and various other conditions that make my life hell but aren't "literally can never walk". I feel VERY comfortable speaking on portrayals of disability and mobility devices in media because of my own experiences.

I like the movie Wall-E. It is cute, speaks to me in many ways, and can be something of s comfort at times. But it's not sacred, it's a product of Disney, and is not free from criticism. There ARE things to criticize in Wall-E, do not get me wrong, but this isn't one that holds water, imo.

Anyway. Onto the meat and potatoes.

In reduced gravity environments like a space vessel, even with some form of artificial gravity, people need to do extra exercise to combat muscle atrophy. And as muscle atrophy kicks in, fat stops being burned and starts to accumulate. That's a literal fact of how the human body works in low-G environments, and if you watch the commentaries for Wall-E included on the DVD, you'll know that the writers knew this because they poured research into it to get it right. The writers wanted to tell a story where a megacorporation obsessed with corner cutting and automation left an unfeeling computer in charge of the lives of generations of people, and explore how that mindset in time would lead to the complete reduction in autonomy of human lives. And to do so, they followed muscle atrophy and sedentary existence with constant advertising to its logical extreme.

The chairs the characters move about in are on paper mobility aids, but in the story were explicitly said to be marketed as luxury recliners, and explicitly shown to ONLY be able to follow the predefined paths on the ship, and any deviation on board was very explicitly shown to be met with force and manipulation. Effectively speaking, a mobility aid ceases to be a mobility aid when the autonomy of the person using it is removed. A wheelchair that the user has control over is a mobility aid. But a wheelchair that only allows the user to enter company approved stores and locations is a tool of control. To argue that a movie in which something that COULD be used as a mobility aid, but is instead is being used to control the movements of people, is making negative comments on mobility aids, is about as shortsighted as arguing that a movie where cybernetic augmentations and prosthetics are used to control people is making negative commentary on prosthetics. The issue is corporate control, not disabled people existing.

The most damning thing for the idea that Wall-E's central narrative is fatphobic is that the fat humans on the Axiom are not shown to be any less human than we are because of their fatness. The moment they are ripped away from their 24/7 distractions and the blinders are ripped off, they get up, start looking around, and try new things. They're never once shown to be lazy, inherently lacking in initiative, or unwilling to change their circumstances like fatphobic narratives love to make us out to be. And most damning of all for this idea, in the credits, when everyone has returned to Earth and started growing food, they continue to use the machines that helped them before, and they continue to be fat! It's not even model reuse, brand new 2D animation is made showing years of crop growth and human activity, and the people continue to be fat! Because that's realistic, that's just as realistic as the people being fat in the first place.

At the end of the movie, there's no narrative of the fatness being a problem to be solved, and no abandonment of technology and assistance, because the struggle in Wall-E was never against fatness or reliance on technology, but against corporate control of human lives. Wall-E as a movie is very enthusiastically pro humanity and pro technology. Wall-E's entire existence as a man-made robot character enamored with the things humans left behind, things that reflected who we were, speaks volumes to this theming. Even AUTO was shown in the end to never have been truly evil, because he was just following his orders to keep humankind from going home. The true villain of Wall-E was always Buy-n-Large, and in a broader sense megacorporations as a whole. From how Buy-n-Large created the problem with endless trash and countless satellites, to how Buy-n-Large sold humanity the solution in the form of luxury cruises you just KNOW not everyone could afford, to how Buy-n-Large continued to control generation after generation of humanity, the ire in Wall-E was always focused on corporations, not fatness or disability.

As a fat, disabled person, I'm kind of personally insulted that people will overgeneralize fatphobia and ableism to the point that they will ignore the facts that there are, in fact, negative things that can cause weight gain, and that things that help disabled people can sometimes be used as tools of control. It is such a painfully surface level reading to assert that all stories in which fat people exist but don't have agency or good physical health are fatphobic. In cases like Wall-E, it would actually raise a lot MORE questions if the people weren't all fat. Questions like "how are they not gaining weight?", "why is there a healthy diversity of body types if nobody is active?", or even "why have the writers deliberately chosen not to represent these characters as being fat when they objectively would be?", just to name a few. It's a fairly basic thing to say, but there has to be a clear, coherent message against fat and disabled people in a narrative in order for claims of fatphobia and ableism to hold water. If the story you claim is fatphobic or ableist just has fat people of lesser ability who are fat and less able because their lives are controlled, and no overarching themes blaming them for their circumstances or insulting them for their condition, then you do not have a compelling argument.

[nichelink]

Nichegroup: A newly coined and mostly likely niche dynamic between a group of acquaintances that differs from social norms, but is consensual and aware of potential risks. It may come with specific predefined roles and tasks, or be casual. It's a sister term to nichelink.

compared to nichelink, this term is slightly more relaxed, because i want it to be accessible to both casual "haha our friend group is kind of like a cat colony" and to people like myself who crave a semi-organized specific dynamic where one person is dominant over others in their group. it still uses the age rating system that nichelink does, but i personally picture that most of the terms coined for this will end up with lower age ratings because of the room for relaxed and casual identification.

examples of nichegroups could be:

a cat colony

a pokemon team and their trainer

the programs on a computer

a warrior cats clan

other things which are specifically meant to be applied to a group of people/your group of friends if you took "our friend group is like [thing]" seriously

nichegroups can be serious like i just said, but they can also be more relaxed. it can be a whole Thing that your group agrees to, such as you deciding which person will have what role and having a discussion of what they can and cannot ask the others to do, or it may be more casual. either way, i suggest having a formal discussion, creating a contract, or having some other kind of guidance when you bring up to your group that you want to do this, so that everyone involved knows what it's going to entail, even if it only ends up being a simple "can we x?" "yeah sure" and that's it. nichegroups should not be done with implied consent.

some reasons people may use this term:

attraction types like drift attraction, pack, considatore, peculic, forms of social or platonic attraction, etc

lightheartedly deciding you'll treat your group like [insert thing]

desire for companionship with people who understand your [insert any identity that relates to being alterhuman, having atypical dysphoria, etc]

anything dysfirming, really.

grammar:

nichegrouping: the state of being in this kind of relationship with someone else. “we’re nichegrouping” “we might start nichegrouping since we're all dogkin”

nichegroup: 1) the specific terms themself. “i coined a nichegroup,” “definition: an all-ages nichegroup where…” 2) the relationship itself. “our nichegroup scheduled a party tomorrow,” “his last nichegroup broke up”

nichegrouper: someone who participates in nichegroupings or wishes to.

nichegroupies: the people in your nichegroup (general term, you can also just call them your groupies, friends, partners, or whatever word is used in the definition of a term, such as calling them "gems" in the definition later in this post)

nichegroups are titled as [thing] Nichegroup, but you can drop "nichegroup" when you're talking about it outside of the official title because this can make sentences really fucking long. here's an example:

Diamond Court Nichegroup: a 16+ relationship dynamic agreed upon in a group of people where one (or more) person(s) are the "diamond", and the others are the "gems" of their "court," akin to the relationship between a diamond and the gems in their court in Steven Universe.

this may include, but isn't limited to:

finding Diamond+Pearl nichelink appealing but choosing to do it in a group, and/or one member of the group also being in a Diamond+Pearl nichelink

the diamond "assigning" a specific gem type to the members of their court

tertiary or alteraffectis attraction terms like performer, bonding, evoic, oric, aish, loben, preisen, etc

people in the group using the gem presentation system, being gemhede, crysgema, etc

following diamonds devoted

the diamond dressing up the gems, shaping them, having the gems perform menial tasks for them, or having them entertain them when bored

the gems being recovering r*dqueers and/or f*lt members and the diamond giving them a safer outlet to express their desire to be influenced/changed/owned/etc

the gems wanting to be "owned" and "used" for any reason, really

the diamond making decrees of how the gems should behave, within reason

everyone can coin nichegroups, some nuance/info and post templates are under the cut:

Thing Nichegroup: a(n) All-Ages | 16+ | 18+ relationship dynamic agreed upon in a group of people where one (or more) person(s) are | is the "[thing]", and the others are the "[thing]".

if it's Fiction-Based, add "akin to the relationship between a [thing1] and their [thing2] in [media]."

this may include, but isn't limited to:

basically, here i just list things that occur to me that might make someone seek this out. for example, someone who is pokemon alterhuman might seek out a pokemon related nichegroup because they miss being on a team and want that relationship with a trainer and the rest of their party again, one where they explore, have allegiance to the trainer and obey them, but have their own life and personality still. and then i go, okay, so pokemon don't exist in the real world, how can they emulate this online or offline?

if i know of atypical dysphoria related terms like dissomei, desirdae, non rq transid, alterpathy, etc, i will also include those

if i know of, or can find on @tertiary-attraction-archive or @alteraffectis, an attraction that involves wanting to do or be [thing this term describes], i will add that

and then i also try to think of "what is something that's not considered 'healthy' by normal people's standards but could easily be replicated with care and consent to make people with atypical dysphoria happy?"

[and then please link to this coining post and tag me]

other notes:

every rule about age ratings i already mentioned for nichelinks still applies here. if it involves erotic content, it's automatically 18+. if it involves modifying someone's identity or training them, it's automatically 16+. i will continue to update the faq on the nichelink carrd to add a nichegroup page, so i really implore you to read that over if you haven't yet.

there is some crossover between nichegroups and nichelinks, and if you aren't 100% sure whether your relationship should be one or the other, that's okay. and: people in a nichegroup can also be in individual nichelinks, whether separate from the nichegroup's theme or related to it.

nichegroups should never encourage harm on purpose. by nature, this term cannot include asking your nichegroupies to self injure, not drink or eat, or engage with content that will trigger their delusions or triggers. please affirm your identities within reason.

for the reasons above, please do not make nichegroups based on cults.

i haven't finished it yet, but a template for the flag will be in the archive soon.

tagging: @nichelinker | @radiomogai | @relationship-type-archive | @beyond-mogai-pride-flags // ask to be untagged

everyone can coin but i would like to "claim" the cat colony one, i have some ideas for it so i want to be the one to do it lol.

[duckprintspress]

Books with Queer Autistic Characters for Autism Awareness Month

April is Autism Awareness month, and we’re here to share (more) of our favorite queer autistic or autistic-coded characters! Last year we shared six books; three of those are back this year, and we’ve got 5 more. You can see the 2024 list here. The contributors to this list are: Sebastian Marie, Neo Scarlett, Tris Lawrence, Linnea Peterson, Terra P. Waters, Shadaras and boneturtle.

An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon

Aster has little to offer folks in the way of rebuttal when they call her ogre and freak. She’s used to the names; she only wishes there was more truth to them. If she were truly a monster, she’d be powerful enough to tear down the walls around her until nothing remains of her world.

Aster lives in the lowdeck slums of the HSS Matilda, a space vessel organized much like the antebellum South. For generations, Matilda has ferried the last of humanity to a mythical Promised Land. On its way, the ship’s leaders have imposed harsh moral restrictions and deep indignities on dark-skinned sharecroppers like Aster. Embroiled in a grudge with a brutal overseer, Aster learns there may be a way to improve her lot – if she’s willing to sow the seeds of civil war.

Once Stolen by D.N. Bryn

No one with half a brain would rob the jungle’s most notorious energy cartel-but their power-producing stones are the only thing that soothes Cacao’s mysterious pain, and after being banished from his homeland for similar thefts, the lonely naga is desperate enough to try.

When his ramshackle thievery goes wrong, a chaotic escape leaves him chained to the cartel’s prisoner: a self-proclaimed hero with a hidden stash of power stones so large that Cacao would never need to steal again. He’s determined to get his hands on it, even if it means guiding the annoyingly smug, annoyingly valiant, and even more annoyingly beautiful hero back home. But their path runs straight through the mist-laden and monster-filled swamp that exiled Cacao, with scheming poachers and a desperate cartel leader on their tail.

The selfish and the self-righteous can only flee together for so long before something snaps…

The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester by Maya MacGregor

Sam Sylvester has long collected stories of half-lived lives—of kids who died before they turned nineteen. Sam was almost one of those kids. Now, as Sam’s own nineteenth birthday approaches, their recent near-death experience haunts them. They’re certain they don’t have much time left.

But Sam’s life seems to be on the upswing after meeting several new friends and a potential love interest in Shep, their next-door neighbor. Yet the past keeps roaring back—in Sam’s memories and in the form of a thirty-year-old suspicious death that took place in Sam’s new home. Sam can’t resist trying to find out more about the kid who died and who now seems to guide their investigation. When Sam starts receiving threatening notes, they know they’re on the path to uncovering a murderer. But are they digging through the past or digging their own future grave?

Ellen Outside the Lines by A.J. Sass

Thirteen-year-old Ellen Katz feels most comfortable when her life is well planned out and people fit neatly into her predefined categories. She attends temple with Abba and Mom every Friday and Saturday. Ellen only gets crushes on girls, never boys, and she knows she can always rely on her best-and-only friend, Laurel, to help navigate social situations at their private Georgia middle school. Laurel has always made Ellen feel like being autistic is no big deal. But lately, Laurel has started making more friends, and cancelling more weekend plans with Ellen than she keeps. A school trip to Barcelona seems like the perfect place for Ellen to get their friendship back on track. Except it doesn’t. Toss in a new nonbinary classmate whose identity has Ellen questioning her very binary way of seeing the world, homesickness, a scavenger hunt-style team project that takes the students through Barcelona to learn about Spanish culture and this trip is anything but what Ellen planned.

Making new friends and letting go of old ones is never easy, but Ellen might just find a comfortable new place for herself if she can learn to embrace the fact that life doesn’t always stick to a planned itinerary.

May the Best Man Win by Z.R. Ellor

Jeremy Harkiss, cheer captain and student body president, won’t let coming out as a transgender boy ruin his senior year. Instead of bowing to the bigots and outdate school administration, Jeremy decides to make some noise—and how better than by challenging his all-star ex-boyfriend, Lukas for the title of Homecoming King?

Lukas Rivers, football star and head of the Homecoming Committee, is just trying to find order in his life after his older brother’s funeral and the loss of his long-term girlfriend—who turned out to be a boy. But when Jeremy threatens to break his heart and steal his crown, Lukas kick starts a plot to sabotage Jeremy’s campaign.

When both boys take their rivalry too far, the dance is on the verge of being canceled. To save Homecoming, they’ll have to face the hurt they’re both hiding—and the lingering butterflies they can’t deny.

Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle

Welcome to Neverton, Montana: home to a God-fearing community with a heart of gold.

Nestled high up in the mountains is Camp Damascus, the self-proclaimed “most effective” gay conversion camp in the country. Here, a life free from sin awaits. But the secret behind that success is anything but holy.

And they’ll scare you straight to hell.

All Systems Red by Martha Wells

In a corporate-dominated spacefaring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. Exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids, for their own safety.

But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn’t a primary concern.

On a distant planet, a team of scientists are conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied ‘droid—a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked its own governor module, and refers to itself (though never out loud) as “Murderbot.” Scornful of humans, all it really wants is to be left alone long enough to figure out who it is.

But when a neighboring mission goes dark, it’s up to the scientists and their Murderbot to get to the truth.

Navigational Entanglements by Aliette de Bodard

Việt Nhi is not good with people. Or politics. Which is a problem when the Rooster clan sends her on the mission against her will, forcing her to work with an ill-matched group of squabbling teammates from rival clans, including one who she can’t avoid, and maybe doesn’t want to.

Hạc Cúc of the Snake clan has always been better at poisoning and stabbing than at making friends, but she’s drawn to Nhi’s perceptiveness and obliviousness to social conventions—including the ones that really should make Nhi think twice about spending time with her.

But when their imperial envoy and nominal leader is poisoned, this crew of expendable apprentices will have to learn to work together—fast—before the invisible Tangler can wreak havoc on a civilian city and destroy the fragile reputation of the clans. Along the way, Nhi and Hạc Cúc will have to learn the hardest lesson of all: to see past their own misconceptions and learn to trust their growing feelings for each other.

You can see these and other queer reads with autistic characters on our Goodreads book shelf. Alternatively, buy yourself a copy through our affiliate shop on Bookshop.org! Duck Prints Press Bookshop.org affiliate shop.

Love talking books? Join us on the Duck Prints Press Book Lover’s Discord server!

[uinferno]

I will say. Warframe 1999's dialogue system is super interesting in the way it leaves the door open for minor character details in regards to Drifter. Quite often, you'll be asked about your family, and there's always a split dialogue option, one for a Drifter with a sibling and one for a Drifter with no siblings. When Eleanor asked about my Drifter's parents, it gave a selection of answers from positive to negative. While this isn't anything particularly novel, many RPGs I've played usually give 0 shits about the PC's backstory, or are predefined in such a manner, or gives the PC some form of amnesia so their backstory is unknown, or some variant of the three. Yet here, I feel like I can do much more roleplay purely on how I decide Drifter takes about their past.

Granted, the broad strokes of Warframe's backstory are predefined. You were a kid, you were put on a spaceship, hell broke loose, you killed your parents, then timelines split, and one got trapped in a pocket dimension, and the other becomes a ninja. There's a pretty solid point A to point B shared by every possible Drifter. However, the system still lets you focus and color each experience depending on everyone's Drifter. My Drifter was an only child with a shitty homelife who regards her past with derision. Meanwhile, someone else's Drifter had a much nicer life that the Zarimen truly destroyed, and the game permits both characterizations.

[multiplicity-positivity]

Here’s some positivity for HC-DID systems!

Highly complex DID, or programmed DID, is a colloquially coined label for systems who have faced programming in some way as an aspect of their trauma history. This form of DID can occur as a result of ritual abuse, organized abuse, and/or mind control, and can leave systems with purposefully formed alters, polyfragmentation, complex internal structures and splitting patterns, and more. HC-DID systems are important members of our community, and deserve to be shown kindness and positivity and treated with respect! Here’s to all the HC-DID systems out there!

🌱 Shoutout to those who are questioning if their system is complex or highly complex in some way!

🌺 Shoutout to HC-DID systems who cannot remember any of their trauma or effectively manage triggers!

🌿 Shoutout to systems with programmed alters who are working to understand how being programmed has impacted their life!

🌼 Shoutout to HC-DID systems who are unable or unwilling to learn about programming at all!

🪴 Shoutout to HC-DID systems who learned about their highly complex nature through therapy or some other form of recovery!

💐 Shoutout to HC-DID systems whose alters have highly specific or specialized roles!

☘️ Shoutout to HC-DID systems with clusters, side systems, or subsystems that are difficult for them to interact with or understand!

🌹 Shoutout to polyfragmented HC-DID systems with a very high alter or fragment count!

🍃 Shoutout to HC-DID systems who have no fully formed or developed headmates, with all alters or parts having a predefined program, role, or purpose!

🌷 Shoutout to those in HC-DID systems who are afraid of their own systems or who are scared of interacting with certain parts, alters, or memories!

🌾 Shoutout to those who wish it was easier to talk about and try to understand their own experiences as HC-DID systems in plural spaces!

To any HC-DID system who sees this, we want to let you know that we see you, we care about you, and we want to support and uplift you however we can! Your voice matters, your system matters, and we are so very proud of all that you have accomplished. Know that just by taking it day by day and trying to live your best life, you have achieved so much, and you deserve recognition and celebration!

We genuinely hope that you can find peace, rest, comfort, recovery, and self-acceptance in your future. Know that no matter how much or little you know about your system, you are real, your trauma was real, and you are deserving of respect, kindness, and understanding today and every day! We are wishing the very best for you and your system, and are rooting for you in all that you do. Thank you so much for reading, and have a wonderful day!

[eri-pl]

Silm reread interlude 4: Lay of Leithian canto 8-10

…because the War of Wrath reread is waiting for the event.

We start with Huan's backstory, and a mention that in Orome's house there is strong wine and hunting songs. Oh, an Orome is called Tavros. And he "alone of Gods had loved the world before the banners were unfurled of Moon and Sun". Huh.

His hounds are immortal, unless they get themselves in the Doom of the Noldor. And Huan is "A wolf-hound, tireless, grey and fierce". Also, can see through all shadows and mist, can track months-old scents, and "No wizardry, nor spell, not dart, no fang, nor venom devil's art could brew had harmed him; for his weird was woven."

I love the worl "weird"! (It is basically fate, but it's like a textile — the verb for making it is "to weave"). So, in simple words, his fate was predefined. As we well know.

(Also, not all of Orome's dogs are grey and I think not all are wolfhounds.)

C&C. "Curufin spake: 'Good brother mine[…]" First, arbitrary past tense forms are back! Second: this is a rather …unique usage of the word "good", but ok. Well, maybe compared to Curufin Celegorm deserves it. But also, ha says this partially for show, as later he whispers some other stuff, so I guess he tries to sound like a good guy. Anyway, this opening feels very ironic to me.

They conspire, consider Orodreth to be stupid and want to know how's Finrod. Not out of care for him. Also, a fragment I liked: "and if he bear a Silmaril — I need declare no more in words; but one by right is thine (and ours), the jewel of light; another may be won — a throne. The eldest blood our house doth own."

I love how ominous he is. I will use "I need declare no more in words" as a threat in my posts. XD

Also, a good explanation of their motivations.

Huan's immunity to magic is a trait of all Orome's hounds: "[Huan's] old immortal race and kind no spells could ever turn or bind." And it's in various different places, but Huan's voice (and of all those hounds in general, I think) is deep, low and like a bell. I love this.

The people of Nargothrond seem to know that Luthien is held against her will and not care? Or maybe this line is about the fact that she realizes that she's kidnapped: "Too late she knew their treachery. It was not hid in Nargothrond that Feanor's sons her held in bond, [….] who had little cause to wrest from Thû the king they loved not and whose quest old vows of hatered in their breast had roused from sleep."

Also: 1. They did not love Finrod. Obviously. 2. Again the Oath is presented as something that sleeps and wakes.

Canto 9

We are back at Thû's island. Beren frees Finrod from his oath to Barahir, because he did a lot already, and more than needed. Peak Finrod moment (no, not that kind. The slightly other kind): Finrd says that even if he tells Thû that they are Finrod and Beren, Thû will break his word and kill them, because bad guys are Like That.

Oh, and Beren "thou"-s Finrod (we don't see what Finrod does but he would do the same), which is vely lovely, because this means that Finrod shown Beren that he can treat him like a friend, not like a might Elven king who had seen the Trees etc etc.and so on. :)

And then Thû replies to him, because he was, of course, eavesdropping. And now he knows who they are. Finrod, my dear, I really like you, but this wasn't very wise. ;)

Thû is planning to keep Finrod for ransom (and fun torture) and kill Beren. The rest of the situation goes as usual. Plus we get another title refernce when Finrod frees himself.

Their farewell is not as good as in some other versions. and then we get another stanza in present tense, for… reasons?

Beren dreams of singing, sings when dreaming (?), we get a mention of a constallation called the Burning Briar (which is the Big Dipper, iirc. Rather this than Orion. Those two are Varda's "Morgoth, we'll get you" signs.) "the Seven Stars that Varda set about the North, were burning yet, a light in darkness, hope in woe, the emblem vast of Morgoth's foe."

Lúthien replies. Song-rescue order inverted! That is unusual.

Thû has a black hood! Also, Tolkien repeatedly uses "sable" to mean "black', luckily I read some basics of heraldry and I know the word. He recognizes Lúthien by her song and plans to capture her as in the usual story. And yes, he does stand on his high tower and smile before getting wrecked.

Description of werewolf!Sauron includes gems like: "its fangs more gleaming-sharp and dyed with venom, tornment, and with death." Mmmmm… lovely isn't the best word for it, but the poetry is so good…

And now we learn that Thû has been made by Morgoth.: "the foul spirit Morgoth made and bred of evil". Very non-later-Legendarium.

More lovely poetry: "O demon dark, O phantom vile of foulness wrought, of lies and guile, here shalt thou die" and so on and so forth, unless you give me your island. Also: "thou"! Not "you"! Adding insult to injury. :)

[In case it needs a clarification: "thou" is informal, so it's used between close friends and family and to someone of a lower status, or as an insult. It's a bit like calling someone "bro" instead of "sir". When Beren and Finrod do it it's because they're close friends. When Luthien does it to Sauron is to disrespect him.]

In addition to giving her the island, Lúthien demands Sauron Thû to release his spell on it. In the Silm she removes the spell herself. So we are told that he "betrayed his master's trust". So Morgoth trusts his minions. Funny. Not impossible, but ironic.

Prison crumbled, people freed, surprisingly no single very direct title reference.

Canto 10

We start with nice things: "Felagund laughs beneath the trees in Valinor". This is lovly, this is much better and more evocative than in the Silm, where he just walks beneath them.

C&C get cancelled in Nargothrond and people speak about them in a Mallory-like style: "'Let us slay these faithless lords untrue!' the fickle folk now loudly cried".

They aren't amused, and the description is again great: "Scornful, unbowed, and unashamed stood Celegorm. In his eye there flamed a light of menace. Curufin smiled with his crafty mouth and thin."

The usual misadventure of C&C vs B&L, Curufin is mentioned to have mighty arms, also gets very nearly strangled. Celegorm curses Huan: "Curse thee, thou baseborn dog, to dare against thy master teeth ro bare!"

Baseborn? Orome would like to have a talk with you. At this point, probably the kind of talk that involves a bow, and doesn't involve talking.

We get another (3rd at least) nor/nor about how fearless or invulnerable Huan was. :)

Lúthien adresses Beren as "my lord" (HUH :/ ) and tells him to not kill Curufin, because it would help Morgoth if they killed an ally in war.

Curufin's knife is made by the Dwarves (singing slow enchantments. I imagone Disa from the series.), not by Curufin. Also, it deals magically unhealable wounds.

Beren yeets Curufin! "uplifting him, far him flung, and cried 'Begone!', with stinging tongue; 'Begone! thou renegade and fool" Also, this is another great burn in this lay. Also tells him to go and rethink his life. Which Curufin really should have done.

Aaaand Celegorm curses Beren. …my guys, seriously… "We curse thee under cloud and sky, we curse thee from rising into sleep!" I wonder when did Curufin sign the papers to let Celegorm curse people for him, but I suppose he gladly would.

Also, even Celegorm's arrows show us that he's evil: "a dwarvish dart and cruelly hooked".

There is a part which I don't understand, I have no idea what is said. [after they shot Beren] "though Curufin with bruised mouth laughed, yet later of that dastard shaft was tale and rumour on the North, and Men remembered Marching Forth, and Morgoth's will its hatered helped."

Morgoth is actively hunting for Lúthien. Well, his minions are.

[swaps55]

After I read your latest Mezzo chapter (Chef’s kiss!) I started another reread of the whole series. (The fifth? Sixth? I lost track ^^) Anyway, I just came across the “MSV Fleur de Lis” incident that ends in Wong being expelled from the team and consists of one of the few (if not the only) glimpses we get on how Sam is around children.

Not for the first time I thought about your take on whether or not he and Kaidan will be having kids in the future. I can totally relate to Kaidan’s way of thinking - not wanting to “burden” Sam with another responsibility but making it possible for him to live a life just for himself. And nobody else.

I was wondering - do you think they’ll talk about this? Is that a decision they make together? Or is it just Kaidan who decides for the both of them without actually telling Sam? Will that ever be a topic? What would Sam do if he realizes at one point that Kaidan gave something up for him? Assuming Kaidan would like to have kids ..

This is a really excellent question with a complicated answer because their writer makes it complicated. Kids are unfortunately a very sensitive subject for me to write about (this question is absolutely fine or I wouldn't have answered it), so in essence I am making this decision for them and backing into why it's in character, because a life with kids is not something I can write about.

I'm saying this mostly to give a peek into some of the writing process. Especially in fanfic, where events and decisions and character beats can come predefined, sometimes the question you have to ask yourself isn't "how does this character respond to X," it's "this character responded to X with Y, why did that happen?" In this case I am defining the character response to this question because it's a boundary for me, but now it's my job as the writer to make sure that decision feels in character.

Anyway - do Sam and Kaidan talk about this decision? Probably, even if it doesn't wind up on the page. You're right - Sam is good with kids. I wanted that glimpse you get in Cantata to show that. There's a Cantata-era story I really, really want to find the time to write that is based around the thought that sometimes we become the people we needed when we were young. I think part off the reason Sam is good with kids comes from the fact that he grew up with an inattentive, distant parent, so he gives kids his full attention. Also, he had an interrupted childhood. There's a part of him that didn't get to be a kid, so kids bring out the kid in him that never got to be.

But I do think the fact he is so much like his mother would scare him when it comes to the possibility of parenthood. He might bring up kids thinking that it's something Kaidan might want, and Sam's a giver. But he'd probably feel a lot trepidation over the suggestion, and relief when Kaidan kindly, but firmly says no.

Kaidan knows Sam, and knows how easily he'll compromise himself to make someone he cares about happy, so he might keep it close to the vest why he doesn't want kids. Because if Sam sniffs out that it's because Kaidan doesn't want Sam to have to feel that pressure, he'd probably push back thinking he's taking something away from Kaidan.

But I think Kaidan believes it for himself, too. They have given up so much and done so much, that they deserve to be a little selfish. He's shared Sam with an entire galaxy for years. In many ways, Commander Shepard will always belong to other people. So wanting to keep Sam for himself is something I can see him feeling, and wanting to relieve Sam of the need to give up more of himself for kids would make it easier for him to want that out loud.

I think I might have said this before, so forgive me if I'm repeating it, but I do think that Sam has a lot of contact with Tuchanka after the war, and a sort of unspoken trend of krogan mothers bringing their young to Sam as a form of "pilgrimage" gains steam in the aftermath. He makes a lot of trips to Tuchanka, and krogan are known to bring their children to the orchard.

Helping to bring future generations to the krogan would be a type of 'fatherhood' Sam would be very, very proud of.

[renum-crimsonvale]

❔ working on a reference sheet for myself. i am a shapeshifter, so the colors on what i am doing apply to all forms i may take that don't already have predefined colors.

[queerstudiesnatural]

i'm such a sucker for complex non traditional relationships. qprs, polyamory, open relationships, friendships that read like romantic relationships to outsiders but are considered friendships by the people involved. friends who kiss, romantic partners who don't kiss, relationships you simply cannot define. we have too many rigid tropes when it comes to relationships in media, i think we should just say fuck all that and create relationships that are unique to these specific characters and that might be harder to package and promote but that are infinitely more interesting than whatever we've been getting the same of for the past few centuries. ​cishet boy meets cishet girl and they fall in traditional monogamous love and get married is so tired. give me love triangles that end in throuples, give me queer people who never come out via speech but instead pay attention to each other and kiss because they both realised they liked each other, without having to give defining speeches about it. give me presumably straight characters who aren't afraid to fall in love with a same gendered character, give me presumably gay characters who aren't afraid to fall in love with a different gendered character. give me trans and nonbinary characters who don't make their partner have a sexuality crisis because "oh no it makes me queer" or "oh no it makes me straight". give me well rounded characters who form relationships with other well rounded characters without having to throw definitions at the audience all the time or stick to predefined tropes. i want messy, i want silly, i want unexplainable, i want love in all its forms, pure and simple.

[lipstickshateau]

okay i literally can't sleep because i keep thinking of this tragedy of the predefined downfall and how any choice odysseus made would ultimately lead to the same consequences because all of them had just been doomed from the very beginning and there was no way to alter that

and

it all took a form of a small verse, not even a complete poem, yet there's a certain ring to it so i might even finish it later.

is it a blessing to be divinely favoured?

or is it a crippling but finely disguised curse?

you once had a firm say in your own verse

yet now the gods have already decided the odds

and they - how tragic! - are not anymore in your favour.