Steve's pinning his polaroids up on his wall when his new roommate walks in.
Steve's immediate thought is oh, I'm gonna hate this guy.
Shaggy hair, leather jacket, rings glinting off his fingers, electric guitar slung over his back. Hot as hell, but compared to Steve's polos and perfectly coiffed hair, they could not be more different.
The guy looks like he had the same thought. His shoulders slump as he takes in Steve's appearance.
A man comes in behind his roommate, toting a suitcase full of clothes. "Oh, are you Eddie's roommate?" he says to Steve, who shakes himself out of his thoughts.
"Yes, I am." he says politely. "I'm Steve Harrington."
The man sets down the suitcase. "Wayne Munson." he offers, shaking Steve's hand. "I'm Eddie's uncle."
He nudges Eddie forward, who lets out an almost inaudible groan. "Eddie." he says snippily, shaking Steve's hand.
This'll be a fun year, Steve thinks.
They don't talk. Steve didn't think he was going to be best friends with whoever he got saddled with, but he thought they could at least be civil to each other. Their room is split down the middle. Eddie's half is absolutely covered in posters and music and cutouts of magazines. Steve's is...almost as blank as his room back home.
He misses the shitheads.
No one can ever tell them that. They'll get even more insufferable.
Once or twice, when Steve comes back from a class, he'll catch Eddie peering at Steve's pictures, but he’ll jump away before Steve can call him out on it. It's awful. Steve misses Robin.
It takes him a horribly long amount of time to stop flinching awake at every little sound. He'd stored his nailbat under his bed, out of sight of Eddie, but every time someone yells in the hallway or shouts in the room next door, Steve startles awake, already grabbing his bat. Luckily, Eddie sleeps like the dead, because Steve's not sure he'd be able to explain the weapon without breaking his NDA.
It's three A.M., early November, when there's a knock on their door. Steve isn't asleep yet, so he stands and answers it.
Eight people pile in, talking in hushed whispers. They slam into him, knocking him over.
In the middle of the hug, Steve counts his kids. It's Dustin, nestled against his side, then Lucas, El, and Will under his arm, Max draped over his back, Erica leaning into his shoulder, and Mike on the very outskirts of the group. He pulls them all in tighter, and they all yelp and squawk at him.
"Let us go, Steve!" Erica says, annoyed.
"Nope." Steve says. "You came to find me at three in the morning, you can tolerate a hug."
"Shoo, move." another voice says, and all the kids part like the sea. Robin pushes her way through the group and hugs him tightly. "I don't know how you do it." she says to Steve. "Driving all these nerds around, it's exhausting."
He buries his face in her hair. "Missed you, Robbie." he mumbles.
She leans her head against his. "Missed you too, dingus."
Steve pulls back. "You got your license!"
"I did!" Robin jingles her keys happily.
Eddie sits up, and everyone in the room freezes. "Wha's happenin'?" he slurs sleepily. Then he registers all the people in the room. "Whoa, what the fuck?"
Steve stands up, brushing himself off. "I'm sorry, man, I didn't know they were coming." He shoots a glare at the group, who looks appropriately cowed. Minus Dustin. Steve can now see whose idea this was.
Eddie swings out of bed. "No, it's- wait, are these the kids from your polaroids?"
"Yeah," Steve says. "Dustin, Mike, Lucas, Will, El, Max, Erica, and this is my best friend Robin."
"Awww, you have polaroids of us?" Max teases over his shoulder. "That's sweet."
Steve reaches behind him and tussles her hair, shoving her gently. "Shut up, shithead."
"Your room is cool." Mike says. "Not Steve's side. But this part is cool!"
Steve glares at Mike, but Eddie grins big. "Thanks! I'm Eddie Munson." He shakes Mike's hand.
"Is that a DnD poster?" Will says. "That's amazing!"
"It certainly is!" Eddie says. "I used to DM back in high school. Played a bit too."
The nerdier section of the group reacts appropriately, oohing and ahhing, while Max and Erica just roll their eyes and nudge each other.
Steve hesitates. “I know these guys don’t really do anything on Saturday afternoons, and I think they’ve been wanting to start another campaign. Would you mind if they come up, maybe every weekend, and you can…” he doesn’t know enough about DnD “…run a game for them?”
Eddie looks amused. “You mean DM a campaign?”
“Yeah, that.” It’s an olive branch that Steve’s offering.
Eddie takes it. “Well, how can I turn that down? Sheepies of the Harrington flock, how would you like to join a new campaign?”
“I’ll keep the rest of you occupied,” Steve mutters as the guys (and El) start talking excitedly. “Max, Rob, you guys wanna find the closest arcade and set some new high scores?”
“Only one person will be setting high scores.” Max says, gesturing to herself, but she looks excited at the prospect.
Steve lets Eddie and the kids talk for a couple more minutes, then claps his hands. “Okay, it is three in the morning and I have a nine A.M. class tomorrow SO! I have enough blankets for all of you to sleep on the floor if Eddie doesn’t mind-“ Eddie shrugs. “Or Rob can drive you back home.”
Steve looks around and Robin is already in his bed, cuddled up like the blanket hog she is. “Okay, well, sleepover here it is then.”
He whisks out his ungodly amount of throw blankets (courtesy of Joyce’s knitting spree) and the kids get together in their usual movie-night-at-Steve’s cuddle position.
Will’s got his head on Mike’s shoulder, Lucas next to Mike, Max leaning on Lucas, El’s head in Max’s lap and her legs thrown over Dustin’s lap, and Erica with her back against Dustin’s shoulder. Sometimes Robin and Steve are wedged into the pile somewhere, but just as often they’re tangled up under six different blankets across the room, which is why Steve whispers “Scoot over, dumbass,” as he climbs into bed next to Robin.
Eddie watches them assume their positions with an expression of what could be awe on his face. “When I saw those pictures,” he whispered, “I thought they were like your siblings? Or maybe old pictures of your friends. I didn’t think you were a soccer mom.”
Steve glares at him, but unlike earlier in the year, there’s no heat behind it. “Hope you like coparenting then, because these guys need to be watched 24/7 or they’ll run off and start the apocalypse.”
Eddie laughs like it’s a joke. To him it is. He hops back into bed. “Goodnight, weird little family.”
The kids murmur a collective sleepy goodnight, and Steve shuts his eyes.
It’s the most relaxed he’s felt since he moved in.
part two!
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My three year old daughter came home with a Minnie Mouse figurine, distraught. The plastic toy was missing an arm, and my daughter insisted she couldn’t play with it because it was broken.
I told her that she could still play with it! That some people were born without an arm or that they might get hurt and lose an arm, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t still play or have fun. I explained that some people might get a prosthetic or just have a stub. And she asked what a prosthetic was. I showed her a picture and she was like, “oh! A robot arm!”
When my husband came home, she thrust the toy at him and told him, “Minnie needs a robot arm.”
He was very confused, but he prints and paints miniatures from various table top games. My daughter refers to them as “daddy’s statues.” She knew he could help Minnie. So he dutifully printed her out a robot arm from a warhammer 40k model on our 3d printer, and then they painted it pink and purple together.
All of this to say, look at Minnie Mouse and her new prosthetic!!
[Image description: three photos of the abovementioned Minnie Mouse figurine. One hand is the classic giant gloved Minnie Mouse hand: the other is a robot arm, palm upraised toward the viewer, clumsily painted the same bubblegum pink as the rest of the figurine. /end ID]
Image ID courtesy of @wanderingthunderstorm
Here’s a post about how to create smoother miniatures for the anon. It’s about your printer. (Includes more typical examples of my husband’s miniature painting).
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Such is life! Behold, a new Post published on Greater And Grander about Republicans Defend Robots' Rights To Own Guns
See into my soul, as a new Post has been published on https://greaterandgrander.com/republicans-defend-robots-rights-to-own-guns
Republicans Defend Robots' Rights To Own Guns
As the debate about the rights of robots rages on, conservative politicians have found themselves taking a bold new stance: they want robots to have the right to carry firearms under the second amendment.
According to these lawmakers, robots are just as entitled to their second amendment rights as human beings. "The constitution doesn't discriminate against those who were assembled in a factory," declared Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-FL), who (rumor has it) is a robot in disguise programmed using PornHub.
Critics of the proposal have expressed concern about the potential danger of arming robots. "We don't even trust humans with guns, and now we want to give them to machines? That's just asking for trouble," warned Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), who we suspect is secretly a member of the Society for the Prevention of Artificial Robotic Killing (S.P.A.R.K.).
But supporters of the plan argue that robots should be given the same level of trust as human gun owners. "Robots are programmed to follow the law and obey their owners, so there's no reason to think they would use their guns inappropriately," said Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH), who clearly has never seen The Terminator.
The idea of robot gun rights has gained traction among some conservative voters, who see it as a logical extension of their belief in individual freedom. "If a robot wants to carry a gun to protect itself, who are we to say no?" said Mary Smith, a resident of Tulsa, OK, who is rumored to have a robot best friend.
While it remains to be seen whether the proposal will become law, it's clear that the debate around robots and their rights is far from over. As technology continues to advance, questions about the relationship between humans and robots will only become more pressing. But for now, at least some conservative politicians are standing up for the second amendment rights of our robotic brethren, because what could possibly go wrong with giving guns to machines that can't even feel emotions?
#BeautifulSatire, #Politics, #RobotsForKids, #RobotsMovie, #Satire, #Satirical
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