#Spectrum Spools

[leiselaute]

Belong - October Language from "October Language". Released 2018 april 20 via Spectrum Spools

[musicollage]

Brett Naucke ‎– Seed. 2014 : Spectrum Spools.

! acquire the album ★ attach a coffee !

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Great Expectations 1

No tag lists. Do not send asks or DMs about updates. Review my pinned post for guidelines, masterlist, etc.

Warnings: this fic will include dark content such as noncon/dubcon, power imbalance, age gap, and possible untagged elements. My warnings are not exhaustive, enter at your own risk.

This is a dark!fic and explicit. 18+ only. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.

Summary: Professor Holmes' class is your most difficult, but he's about to make it even more challenging.

Characters: Sherlock Holmes (modern AU)

Note: It was a drabble then it weren't.

As per usual, I humbly request your thoughts! Reblogs are always appreciated and welcomed, not only do I see them easier but it lets other people see my work. I will do my best to answer all I can. I’m trying to get better at keeping up so thanks everyone for staying with me.

Your feedback will help in this and future works (and WiPs, I haven’t forgotten those!) Please do not just put ‘more’. I will block you.

I love you all immensely. Take care. 💖

You're not certain. Not at first. But when are you ever confident in anything?

Yet you're assured by the dark curls and vibrant eyes, the slanted brows never devoid of judgment. More than anything, it's his posture that confirms his identity. Professor Holmes is staunch and indomitable even as he browses shelves of antique style pens; crystal, wood, and brass. He considers each as he would every word of a term paper. 

You're doubt turns to what to do next. Do you say hello? Or pretend you don't see him? Would he know either way? You're fairly convinced he can't pick you out of the lecture hall. 

So you do what you do best and fade into the scenery. You trail along the shelves and dip around the other side, putting your attention to the spools of thread, organized in a perfect spectrum of hues. As you mindlessly touch the thread, your mind wanders back around the row.

You would never expect to see the professor there, though honestly, you've never thought of him outside the classroom. You avoid that as much as you can, you stress enough over his unattainable standards. His is the only class which has you below an A. 

You contemplate the silver twine. You've been looking for the very thing and yet the price is much above your budget. All that for some shine? 

You move on, turning around to the balls of wool and needles arranged from thinnest to thickest. Your ears are pricked by the familiar timbre. The professor's voice carries as easily as in the lecture hall. You try not to listen but you can't help the instinctive decipher of each syllable. 

"Are these genuine silver?" He asks, presumably of a passing associate.  

"Um, I'm not sure, sir," the squeaky adolescent reply is met with an impatient sigh. "I work in the back." 

"Work in the back doing what? Sorting stock? Do you not know what you put on the shelves?" Professor Holmes' disapproval is unmistakable.  

His tone make you want to run. It is the same detest wrought into the feedback scribbled in the margins of your assignments. If it isn't perfect, it's not acceptable. 

You should go. You don't have the money to waste on hobbies you don't have time for. Nor do you relish an encounter with the very man responsible for your lack of free time. 

You make sure to walk toward the far end of the aisle and avoid any possible sighting. The very thing you meant to distract yourself chases you from your procrastination. Two days before your paper is due, and you've not even touched the readings due for that week's class discussion. 

📕

You’re barely awake as you claim a seat in the melancholic lecture hall. The coeds are silent, only yawning between slurping from paper cups, or slumping dangerously over the narrow armrests. There’s a dour commiseration in the air; a sort of resignation. 

Papers are handed in and yet the outcome is almost assured; Professor Holmes will surely find at least a dozen reasons to dock marks. Sometimes it seems even the font can draw his ire. Yet, there is more to be done. He will expect a lively discussion before that three-hour block is done and if he doesn’t get it, you will all sweat for it. 

You flutter through your notebook. Unlike your other courses, the paper is crinkled and the writing is erratic. Each week sees you with at least another twenty pages added to the reading list. You don’t understand how anyone can keep up with it all; the work alone is as much as all your other classes combined. 

You jump in your seat as his even-keeled voice rolls through the air. He hardly has to project as his baritone fills the large room. You look up and fumble for your pen. Professor Holmes doesn’t permit devices. The last person caught merely looking at their phone was dropped from the course. 

You chew the end of the pen as he begins his introduction, but not without a sharp remark about your midterm papers. It’s as if he’s already made up his mind that you’ve all failed. There’s no bell curve in this class, just an impossible mountain. 

“To make it simple,” his accent lilts off his tongue, “I’ve decided we will do things a bit differently this week. I will have you sort yourself into groups and each will discuss an assigned article. At the end, we will reconvene and you will nominate a member to present your conclusions. You may use our usual guiding questions for these purposes.” 

You nod and furrow your brow thoughtfully. The idea of splitting into groups is daunting on its own. It’s one thing to put your hand up amid the wide sea of your peers but it’s another to parse yourself down into a smaller group amid strangers. Despite weeks of sitting side-by-side, you don’t really know anyone. They all seemed to have made friends before that and made no effort to find any more. 

“Well, off you go,” Holmes flicks his fingers, “you’ve two minutes to arrange yourselves. I’m no kindergarten teacher, certainly you can figure it out.” 

There’s a low murmur then a lull before anyone moves. You hear the chatter that connects the smaller pairings to each other; aren’t you in my econ class? Oh, you were at the Delta party? You gather your notebook and stand, searching for an in. 

“Um,” you approach the nearest cluster of bodies, “room for one more?” 

It’s as if you’re invisible. You wince and clear your throat. Before you can try again, a deeper ahem comes from behind you. You crane to see over your shoulder. Professor Holmes stands at the end of the row, one brow arched as he crosses his arms. His old-fashioned vest strains as his chest bulges against the buttons. 

“Eh, she’s in need of a group. Have some manners.” 

You’re surprised by his intervention, but grateful. You try to smile but it’s probably more of a pathetic simper, “thank you, professor.” You nod and turn back to the other students. 

“Uh, sorry, yeah, can I tag along?” You ask. 

They shrug, none of them daring to ignore Professor Holmes. You sit at the edge of the group, heat speckling up your back in embarrassment. The others as good as ignore you as they go back to complaining about their papers. 

“I didn’t sleep,” a blond you think is named Ethan mutters, “fucker had me tearing out my hair.” 

“Yeah, I was supposed to go to a Barbie party but I need this class,” a pretty redhead rolls her eyes. 

There’s at least ten other students circled between three rows. You glance around at the others as they bow and chatter in kind. You shuffle your notebook in your lap and lean in, trying to seem involved. 

“Right then, you,” Holmes points to your group, “take Jones et al,” he moves his finger towards the next group, “Halloway,” he continues down the list of readings as silence pervades the space.  

It isn’t until he bids you to start that anyone dares speak again. The professor paces at the front of the room, hands in his pockets, as his longs stride take him from one end to the other. As you watch him, he seems to sense it, and his blue eyes meet your own. He hardly reacts before he puts his attention back to his repetitive route. 

“Alright, so Jones et al,” you redirect your attention as your peers continue their griping over lost sleep and shitty coffee. “So uh, we should go over main arguments first--” 

“Didn’t read it,” Ethan scoffs and two girls giggle. 

“I don’t know how that tight ass thinks we have all day for the stuffy bullshit,” another guy snorts. “Some of us get laid.” 

You blanch and chew your lip. You look around and receive only agitation and indifference. 

“Since you’re such a smarty pants, why don’t you do the presentation, huh?” The redhead chirps, “you always have so much to say.” 

You frown. You only put in what you need to get a decent mark. You’re hoping the discussion grade can save you from your disastrous first assignment. Besides, aren’t you all facing the same foe? Shouldn’t you be allies? 

“Well, we should talk about the article a bit. Did anyone else read it?” You insist. 

You don’t get an answer, only scoffs and sneers. Shoot. You look down at your notebook and shrink into yourself. It’s just like high school. You’re the one building the diorama by yourself until midnight. You’re the one doing all the talking in the class debate. 

You scribble notes in the margins as the other garble on about some party and the new cafe opening up at the Student Centre. You keep a hand on your neck as the heat builds under your skin. You should’ve just stayed on your own, not that you have much of a choice. None of them even want to acknowledge you. 

Professor Holmes calls time and you pop your head up, catching your glasses before they can bounce off your nose. You fix them as the lecture hall hushes and you all twist and turn to see the professor. He walks up the centre aisle and points to the group in the very back. 

“You, come on,” he demands. 

There’s crinkling of paper and scratchy coughs. A guy in a polo sweater stands with a cluster of lined paper in hand. He reads out with fractured syllables as if he can’t make out the writing. Professor Holmes sighs and you glance over at his scowl. He’s not impressed. 

“Right, and beyond the obvious, what were your final reflections? Did you have a single thought about the author’s narrative on the consequences of the railway on colonized communities?” He pauses and waits, tapping his clefted chin. Silence. “Mm, absolutely compelling,” he remarks dryly. 

You gulp as your group fidgets. Holmes jabs a finger at another group, calling out a student by name, “thank you for volunteering.” 

The woman with the buzzcut stands, looking nervous as she peers around her group members. She sways and wets her lips, playing with the ring around her lower lip. She laughs nervously before she begins, pausing and umming and ahhing. 

“Enough rambling,” Holmes shakes his head and turns toward your group. Your eyes go wide as the rest peek over at you. You rise as the professor stands just at the end of the rows. “Ethan, you seemed to be doing most of the talking, let’s hear it.” 

Ethan grimaces and sends you a look. He shakes his head. You shrug. You don’t know what to do. You offer your notebook and Holmes clucks. 

“I’m sure he can do it himself, he’s a big boy,” Holmes insists, “let’s hear your take on Jones et al. They have some rather interesting arguments about the cultural significance of the Silk Road, did they not?” 

Ethan exhales and stands, a tick in his jaw as he faces the professor. You chew your cheek as he stutters, “well, what we were talking about was that... er, the Silk Road... um...” 

“Yes, yes, you made some rather intriguing arguments about the Gammas, didn’t you? And how you have so many important things to do, eh? Well, Ethan, if you can’t keep up, you don’t have to bluster,” Holmes reproaches, “your boasting does suggest incompetence over importance.” 

Ethan chokes. There’s a low titter of laughter from further back as the rest of your group stares at their hands. You hug your note book and lower your head as well. 

“Come on, then,” Holmes wags his fingers and calls your name, “stand up. Let’s hear something coherent.” 

“Oh, uh,” you lift your chin as Ethan falls into his chair with a snarl. You get up and focus on your notebook. You swallow tightly before you get your vision to clear, “typically when we think of the, er, Silk Road, er, we fixate on, uh, on uh, on the movement of goods such as dyes and, and, and rice...” you can’t help your stuttering. You just know the professor will have your throat next, “but Jones et all argue that, ummmm, um, the movement of peoples and contact between various cultures is just as... as important--” 

“Ah, yes, someone has done their work,” Holmes proclaims with a clap. 

“All of you. One thousand words on your groups assigned article by the end of the week. You may drop them off at my office.” 

“What?” Several students burst out in shock. 

“It is an individual effort, yes? Not a group project. You have until Friday at 6pm.” 

“Professor,” a woman whines from the back. 

“Would you like a thousand more words?” He turns to face the lecture hall completely, “no, alright then. I can be generous. You may go early so that you can catch up on your readings.” 

He smirks and tilts his head smugly. He spins on his heel and strides down the low steps to the front podium. You glance down at your notebook and slowly flip the cover. 

“Fucking browner,” Ethan growls. 

[inbabylontheywept]

Burning Bridges

“I am Kalrose, commander of the Second Armada of the Akaviri. We are on our way to a peacekeeping operation in the Pegasus cluster. Humanity is not our enemy, but it will be if you continue to detain us in your piss puddle agrarian star system. Step away from the FTL launcher and no one will die. Remain in front and we will plow through your craft. Either way you will not stop us.”

The human freighter acting as a makeshift gate in front of the launcher did not move. If anything, it centered itself more, in order to better face the Akaviri flagship head on.

Then it broadcasted back.

“Your ‘peacekeeping mission’ in the Pegasus cluster is a genocide. We will not stand back and let you commit this atrocity. We may not have the men or the ships to destroy your fleet, but we don’t need to destroy your fleet in order to keep you from reaching the battlefield. Our piss puddle’s name is ‘Zion.’ In time, you will call it ‘Home.’”

Kalrose barely had time to ponder the nature of that threat when the launcher fired up. The EM readings on his ship went mad, and in that brief fraction of a second, he realized he’d miscalculated. Gravely.

He didn’t know how many thousands of safety protocols had been bypassed, but the amount of power flowing to the gravitational core in the center of the launcher was easily nine times larger than the maximum rating. A micro singularity formed within the space lens, and cladding ripped itself off the hull before spiraling at near light speeds around the artificial black hole.

Kalrose had always imagined such a catastrophe as something like a fireball, reds and oranges, lots of shrapnel and clanging. Upon seeing it in person, he realized how foolish that was.

Red glows were for pokers left in hot coals. This was, for one brief moment, a star fueled on steel. It was never going to be orange.

It could only be white.

The accretion disk condensed further, the energy of the reactions happening near it somehow fueling the gravitational anomaly at the center. His comm system moved into a death scream as the material’s blackbody radiation moved past the x-ray spectrum, pure friction converting the material to energy more efficiently than even a fusion reactor could manage. The heat generated finally caused a full structural collapse, the spine of the station melting enough to wrap the whole barrel of the launcher around the spiraling singularity, twirling it in loops like thread around a spool. The reaction was accelerating now, even without electricity being able to fuel the gravitational collapse, the radiation pressure alone managing to hold the system in a highly fragile state of tensegrity. He recognized the feedback loop that was happening, radiation fueling gravity, gravity fueling radiation, on and on until-

There was no air for noise in space, but he could almost imagine the roar that the expanding cloud of ionized metal should have made as it blew past. There it was. The end of the loop. It had run out of matter to feed on, so without a balance to the compressive force it expanded outwards.

He was fortunate that the explosion was violent enough to atomize the particles. Even a fragment the size of a grain of sand would’ve been enough to take down his flagship. As a lone ion, it could be deflected by the same magnetic field that kept the crew safe during FTL jumps.

He stared numbly at the monitor.

One third of the Akaviri fleet, stranded in a farming system. Not even a shot fired.

He realized that the comm system’s scream had been replaced with the quiet pulse of an incoming broadcast. He accepted it without question, too lost to even be angry.

“Take your time recovering your senses. When you’re ready, just send us a message back. We’re going to need every hand we can on the harvest. There’s no one out there we can reach for help after this. It’s just...Us.”

[ggomos-maribat]

7 | the heroes of Paris

Part 7 of Marinette Dupain-Cheng is Dead | Masterlist

Something was different about Adrien now, something that was telling Tim that he wouldn't be as generous as the last time. If he really wanted to find the truth about Marinette's death, he thought, he wouldn't have kept things from us. He had a hunch on why Adrien called off the investigation, but he needed to confirm it first.

"You wanted to see the box?" Adrien slipped his hands into his pockets. "Be my guest."

"You're letting us look just like that?" Tim stood up and headed for the dusty memento on the shelf.

"If Marinette were alive today, she wouldn't deny you the chance."

Does he know what we know? Tim wondered. No . . . he knows. He definitely knows. Adrien was observing them carefully, as if they were his prey. He didn't even try to mask it under some kind of warmth—he knew he had all the answers they needed.

Okay, now I kind of don't want to open it, thought Tim. But Jason went ahead of him, opening up the lid to reveal spools of yarn arranged into a spectrum. The pink box looked pretty mundane until Tim caught sight of a string peeking out from the side. With a pull, everything unfolded to reveal a secret compartment.

Tim slowly picked up one small figurine from inside: a small wand with a golden star on top. The knick knacks inside seemed to have two categories, ones that looked like everyday objects and ones that were painted red with black spots.

Jason picked up a piece that looked like a power strip, but with the Ladybug pattern on it. "What are these?"

"Some kind of mementos of akuma attacks." It just dawned on Tim. "Half of these are the akumatized objects, and half are the lucky charms Ladybug used."

His sleep-deprived self had seen files on these a couple years ago, when the situation in Paris had been revealed to the world. There was a figure of Alix Kubdel's rollerblades, which led to her akumatization to 'Timebreaker', and a patterned traffic cone, which Ladybug had summoned as her charm for the fight. Even a replica of the Bee Miraculous was there, which contained Chloe Bourgeois' akuma when she was Queen Wasp. Almost every object was in that box, each one extremely detailed in its crafting.

Almost like the one who made this had seen the objects up close . . .

Tim noticed something else buried under the mementos—he picked up a hardbound book of sorts, pink with no words on the cover. They opened it up to find nothing but photos inside, ones taken from a certain perspective, depicting views that Tim was quite familiar with from his vigilante life. There were photos taken from rooftops, ones looking down from the top of the Eiffel, many of Chat Noir up close, even a couple that seemed like they were taken from outer space. Obviously, the photos wouldn't be easy to take without the possession of some kind of power. After flipping through, there was a wax-sealed envelope attached to the last page, along with a pressed red rose.

Tim glanced at Adrien. That just about confirms it, he decided.

They returned the box back to its original state. A heavy feeling settled on Tim.

"Will you hear me out a second time?" Adrien asked.

Tim nodded. "Of course."

The second talk with Adrien was a far cry from the first. The air was thick, and the dark clouds outside cloaked the room in gray.

"As you've found out . . . Marinette was Ladybug," Adrien began. "She was the beacon of hope in Paris. She was the one person who could never be akumatized under all circumstances. But she was too young when she was entrusted with a power she couldn't even understand back then. In fact, in her first battle as Ladybug, she almost passed on the Miraculous to someone else because she just didn't have enough confidence in herself."

A young hero, Tim swallowed down the lump in his throat. But unlike us, it wasn't entirely her choice.

Adrien's shoulders sagged. "So on top of her responsibilities, she had that burden to carry. She could never tell her parents or friends, because associating with a Miraculous was like putting a target on your back. She was victimized by Lila, but she could never let her emotions out because Hawkmoth might put her under his control at any time."

He laughed a little. "To this day, I still can't understand how she did it. Akumas would come to her, but she'll just close her eyes and they'll fly away. The things Lila did put her close to tears, but she just wiped them away and continued with her day like nothing happened. Sometimes Hawkmoth came close to winning, but she'd take just a couple minutes to pick herself back up and think of another way to defeat him."

The diary. Tim's thoughts flashed to the entries he read. Putting into the missing context, the words became heavier, deeper. A pit slowly formed in his stomach, coaxing out a feeling of nausea. She was so young, and yet she carried all that with her. No wonder she wrote like a traumatized fighter—she had seen too much.

He recalled helping Bruce analyze the akuma attacks recorded in Paris' history with Hawkmoth. There were a handful that even destroyed the world, others opening up destructive alternate timelines. She lived through it all. She saved everything but had to suffer through those memories . . . oh god. If Bruce were to find out, he'd be devastated—the world's betrayal of Paris left everything at the hands of one girl.

Looking at Jason, Tim could see that he was pale-faced as well. If only we found out earlier. If only we could've done something . . .

"Why did you call off the investigation then?" Jason finally spoke. "What about justice for Marinette's death?"

But Tim replied instead: "No, it's exactly for Marinette's sake when he did that." He looked at Adrien. "You're Chat Noir, aren't you? You knew all about Marinette's identity, and you had to stop the investigation to keep the police from finding out."

Adrien cracked a smile. "As much as I want to find answers to her death, I can't let her secret be revealed to those who shouldn't know it. It's the one thing I can do for her, to protect her and the Miraculous."

"So when Ladybug also disappeared . . ."

"It was because Marinette chose to, and then she died."

"Then isn't it Hawkmoth who killed her?" Tim pressed on. "It's a direct motive."

Adrien shook his head. "It can't be Hawkmoth . . . Hawkmoth is dead."

Jason's jaw dropped. ". . . What?"

"It was in our final battle with him," Adrien recounted, fiddling with his thumbs. "He successfully took my Miraculous, the ring, and a couple other ones from the box but his body gave in under the strain from using multiple Miraculi at once."

There was a harsh contempt in his voice, deep bitterness seeping out. "Hawkmoth was a despicable man. He became addicted to the power of the Butterfly and Peacock Miraculi, and then to the promised power of the Ladybug and Black Cat combined. What he wanted was to rewrite reality to bring his wife back and he wouldn't hesitate to take advantage of anyone's negative emotions just to make them disposable pawns."

Adrien's jaw clenched. "He didn't even care about what his son felt the whole time."

It all clicked in Tim's head. "Hawkmoth was . . ."

"My father," Adrien confirmed. "Gabriel Agreste."

It fits . . . Gabriel Agreste's death was announced around the time of the supposed 'final battle'.  It was never publicly announced what the cause of death was.

The model heaved out a sigh. "Marinette and I actually argued over what to do afterwards. She didn't want to expose him as Hawkmoth and said that his death was his repayment. I thought that was too light of a punishment for him, nevermind that he was my father. We faced backlash when we announced our decision. The people of Paris wanted to condemn him but . . . there was no one to condemn anymore. Because of that, Marinette was convinced that I would be the one receiving hate if we revealed his identity, and anyone affiliated with Father's brand even if they were innocent."

"But to be honest, I wouldn't mind being hated." His gaze lowered. "All those people who suffered because of him deserve the truth. But Marinette was more stubborn."

It was a conflicting situation, Tim agreed that Gabriel Agreste went away too easily.

"If Hawkmoth's dead, then what happened to Marinette?" asked Tim. "Is there anyone else who has a vendetta against her?"

Jason answered, "That just leaves Lilia Ross."

"Alibi, remember?"

"Outside help."

Tim huffed out. "So we're back to square one." He turned back to Adrien. "Is there anyone else who knows about Marinette's identity?"

"There was one, but she passed away from old age before Marinette's death and Hawkmoth's defeat."

Tim leaned back. They had two ways to look at it—either Marinette's death was linked to her identity as Ladybug or her civilian persona was targeted instead.

"What about the box? What's in the envelope?" Jason pointed out, gesturing to the shelf behind them.

"It's related to our responsibilities as holders, so I can't tell you about it. I've actually told you more than you should know," Adrien replied, "But I assure you, it has nothing to do with her death."

"You won't tell us about it, but you trust us with your identities?" Jason cocked an eyebrow.

A cryptic smile stretched on the Parisian's face, one that looked unsettling on him. "It's because I trust that you vigilantes would know the importance of a secret identity."

Tim stiffened. He figured us out in more ways than one. "You know?"

"I wouldn't be giving you so much information if you were just strangers." He shrugged.  "I may be retired, but I still have magic after all. I understand that you have the capabilities to look into this so I'm helping you as much as I can."

It was a delicate balancing game. They had a hold of Adrien and Marinette's identities, while Adrien potentially held the truth to the whole family's. Bruce is going to kill us when we get home, Tim shivered slightly.

"I'm not blackmailing you or anything—please think of it as a safety precaution," Adrien clarified, "You can still ask more questions and I'll try to answer them."

"Fine," Tim conceded. They had just learned more of the truth in exchange for their identities . . . maybe it was worth it. "As Miraculous holders, you have those creatures—your 'kwamis', right?"

"Yes."

"Was Marinette's kwami not with her that day?"

"Marinette stopped wearing her earrings after Hawkmoth's defeat."

Jason took his turn. "Is it true that Marinette, Ladybug, was the Guardian of the Miraculous?"

Adrien paused for a moment before saying, "Yes, she was Guardian at that time."

"Who's the Guardian now?"

"Ah, that's confidential."

Tim frowned. No, this won't work. We need every detail we can work with to solve the mystery. Is there anything we can do to make him talk?

"Is there a chance someone found Marinette out after the last battle?"

"I think it's unlikely—she was always careful about her identity. If someone did, then she didn't tell me."

Tim thought back to the small knitted pouch. "There was a drawing of that box inside a pouch that Marinette gave to Luka Couffaine. Did he know anything about her identity?"

Adrien shrugged. "It's not much of a clue without proper context, and as far as I know both Luka and Kagami don't know."

With so many secrets and so many factors, plus the involvement of magic, Tim could only sense the case getting more complicated. They needed the full dynamics of how Miraculi worked, and not just bits and pieces that concealed the whole picture.

"There's one more thing we want to ask," said Tim, "Felix Fathom. Was he tied in any way to this case?" 

Taglist: @hammalammadamdam @toodaloo-kangaroo@missmadwoman@afanofmanyships@atomicherringpersonjudge-blog@wheredostarsgowhenyoudie

[alphaman99]

As more & more counties get more solar farms.....

From a STEPHENVILLE resident, George Franklin:

I should start by telling you what bonafides I have for writing this. I am a retired aerospace engineer. A literal rocket scientist if you will. I worked on MX (Peacekeeper) Space Shuttle, Hubble, Brilliant Pebbles, PACOSS, Space Station, MMU, B2, the Sultan of Brunei's half billion dollar private 747 with crystal showers, gold sinks and 100 dollar a yard coiffed silk carpets. I designed a satphone installation on prince Jeffry's 757. I did all of the design work for the structure of Mark 1V propulsion module currently flying on at least 3 spacecraft that I know of. Some of the more exciting projects I have worked on are not shareable. My personal projects include a spin fishing reel with a 4.5 inch spool which is entirely my own designed, machined and assembled. It has 2 features that are patentable. A unique true flat level wind and a unique line pickup mechanism. I am also am FAA certified glider pilot and FAI certified gold glider pilot. I fly both full scale and model sailplanes. I am Microsoft certified and ComTIA A+ certified.

Solar panels are at best about 20% efficient. They convert 0% of the UV light that hits them. None of the visible spectrum and only some of the IR spectrum. At the same time as they are absorbing light they are absorbing heat from the sun. This absorbed heat is radiated into the adjacent atmosphere. It should be obvious what happens next. When air is warmed it rises. Even small differences in ordinary land surfaces are capable of creating powerful forces of weather like thunderstorms and tornadoes. These weather phenomena are initiated and reinforced by land features as they are blown downwind. It is all too obvious to me what will happen with the heat generated by an entire solar farm. Solar farms will become thunderstorm and tornado incubators and magnets.

Solar panels are dark and and they emit energy to the space above them when they are not being radiated. This is known as black-body radiation. Satellites flying in space use this phenomenon to cool internal components. If they didn't do this they would fry themselves.

So solar farms not only produce more heat in summer than the original land that they were installed on, but they also produce more cooling in winter, thus exacerbating weather extremes.

So I conclude with this. There is nothing green about green energy except the dirty money flowing into corrupt pockets.

There is not such thing as green energy. The science doesn't exist. The technology doesn't exist. The engineering doesn't exist. We are being pushed to save the planet with solutions that are worse than the problems.

[becausegoodbye]

Lesbian Inflorescence

For the longest time, I was so cautious and ashamed about reading lesbian stuff. I felt unerringly drawn to it, but I had such a powerful internal prohibition against being an intruder in that space – a shameful interloper sullying it for everyone else – that I mostly avoided it. It's only now, well into my second year of transition, that I feel like those old walls are fully breached, and I'm finally free to read all the deranged lesbian novels and sappy yuri and horny dyke poetry I want.

The amount I want, it turns out, is kind of a lot. Here are some recent favourites.

*

Monique Wittig - The Lesbian Body

This experimental French novel from 1973 hits a high watermark of sapphic insanity that I'm not sure has ever been equalled. Most of it is the narrator and her lover performing surreal erotic surgeries on each other: digging through the viscera and loving each other from the inside out. Long past the point where an ordinary person would be expected to have died, these women endure: grinning and licking each other's brains, spooling small intestines in their hands, always finding more of each other to love. Absolute engulfment.

Sakaomi Yuzaki – She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat

On the other end of the spectrum entirely: the sweetest manga imaginable about two neighbours slowly wending their way into becoming each other's most important person, through the central mechanism of cooking and eating together. Page upon page is devoted to the wordless erotics of Kasuga methodically eating large amounts of food while Nomoto grins at her starry-eyed. They make a refuge for each other from the world, and everything they need is already there. It's so fucking great.

Bonus treat: there's a live-action TV show that's also a complete delight. I watched it through with my girlfriend (always over breakfast, the rule delightfully became), and while it's even slower to build than the comic, it also has gorgeous performances from both leads. You can find video files and fan-made subtitles for season one and season two here, provided by the lovely Furritsubs.

Beautiful Barbarians: Lesbian Feminist Poetry

I'm obsessed with this collection. Published by Onlywomen Press in the UK in 1986, each author is given a photo-bio and at least four poems, and they come to you like a series of sit-down conversations with older wiser women handing you earthenware mugs of tea and instructing you how to pay attention. There are a variety of styles and concerns, but the connecting thread is the aliveness, the nearness, the groundedness. There is breath in all of these lungs, and in yours.

Takashi Ikeda – The Two of Them Are Pretty Much Like This

Another lovely, quiet, slice-of-life yuri manga, with delicate attention to the relationship dynamic between its two leads (already in a relationship and living together), and a lot of lived-in insights into their work as a voice actor and romance writer respectively. I love the way Wako and Sakuma are always touching in this: lovingly flopping over each other, encouragingly patting a head, lazily stroking a thigh. I sent a genuinely ridiculous number of panels from this manga to my girlfriend, all giddily captioned "us!!!" It's gorgeous.

There's one fact about this manga that's kind of odd, and that is that it is – putatively – written by a man, Takashi Ikeda. I've generally avoided yuri written by men (for obvious reasons), but this one struck me immediately as an exception. It was only once I got to Volume 4 that it became clarified for me why. In that book, a new character is introduced: a highschool baseball player who also lives in their building, and who's very nearly the first male character of the entire series. (Whatever others there are are all extremely minor and incidental.) This kid sees Wako and Sakuma out together, mistakenly believing that tall, deep-voiced Sakuma is a trans woman – and not just any trans woman, but one who's pulling it off amazingly, with a cute girlfriend and a loose comfy style and an enviable ease about her – and immediately understands, "Oh God, I want that."

The kid has a bunch of normal egg doubts ("It's not like I hate my body ... and I'm aware that I won't look good in women's clothes ... and there's no way I can be the ace of a weak baseball team if I have a woman's body ..."), but the force of the revelation is obvious. She's a young gay trans woman, and seeing Sakuma and Wako together clarified the vision of that for her. It also, at the same time, clarified for me why this series is able to be so good.

Takashi Ikeda, you can take hormones! If you want to be a woman, you can literally be one! It's a messy process, but it really does work!

I know there are different schools of thought about how rude it is to draw these kinds of inferences about others, but honestly: it just makes so much sense of the whole series. I suspected even before the transfeminine storyline in Volume 4, just because of how lovingly observed Sakuma and Wako's dynamic was and how utterly peripheral men are to their world. (More precisely: I voiced to my girlfriend my suspicion that the author was a closeted trans woman or a cis lesbian using a masculine pen name. Either way, a straight man was off the table!) The introduction of the transfeminine highschooler – and that one devastating page especially: the scrunched-up face in the bath, the lurching memory of that want, the flash of a different body – was just the cherry on top. Politely, babygirl: no cis guy is writing and drawing that. Not like that.

It's silly, but I desperately want to tell this mangaka that I have never met: I promise it's possible. You can have this kind of relationship. You can look at your body with actual affection and pride, because you chose to make it more what you want it to be. I know it seems unfeasible now, when the obstacles are so much nearer and more clarified than the rewards, but once you start: all you'll be able to regret is not having started earlier. You don't even need to go through doctors if you don't want! DIY hormones are available with just a bit of intrepid Googling. Wanting it is the only requirement. This can happen for you.

And I don't say this from the position of someone who's transitioned flawlessly and completely, who's had a panoply of surgeries and is read as a woman in 100% of social situations. I'm in a much clumsier middleground than that. The world at large doesn't quite get it, and likely never will. But where it matters most – that is: in being loved by my girlfriend as a woman, having her experience my body top-to-bottom as a feminine body, and finally living as a lesbian in a way that it's just laughable for anyone to deny – I'm already there. I thought it would take so much longer, but I'm already there. And it honestly makes all that other stuff, all the other difficulties, pale in comparison.

(Drawing of us by Sardonic Tuna, commissioned by my girlfriend and sent to me literally while I was putting the finishing touches on this blog post. Lou I love you so much 😭)

[knightofleo]

Belong | Who Told You This Room Exists?

[scienceinenglish]

LSD1 inhibitor ameliorates autism-associated traits in new mouse model. We need to talk.

In findings published March 26 in Molecular Psychiatry, a team of researchers from Tokyo University, Juntendo University, and RIKEN report that they have successfully created a new mouse model of autism spectrum disorder in what they have named Kmt2c+/fs mice. Then things get weird.

Short version: The model worked even better than they thought it would. It seems this histone gene, which is only different in a small fraction of autistic humans, affects a large number of other genes also associated with autism. And then they gave the mice a drug that affects the histone, and it 1) changed the expression of those other autism genes and 2) made the mice act in a way that most people would call "a lot less autistic."

And we'd better start the hard conversations about that now.

They engineered the animals to have only one functioning copy of the lysine methyltransferase 2c (KMT2C) gene, which encodes one of the catalytic units of histone H3 lysine 4 (H3K4), instead of two. Histones are large molecules that act as spools when DNA coils up into its inactive state. They also allow the DNA to unspool so that it can be transcribed and produce the proteins and regulatory elements that keep living things running. A few people diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder have KMT2C haploinsufficiency, meaning that they have only one active gene, like the mice, but most autistic people have two active copies, like other humans.

When the mice were old enough to run a maze, the researchers ran exercises to assess their sociability, rigidity, cognitive function, and other traits that they defined as associated with autism (the mice were also hypersensitive to sound, but it's not clear if the scientists measured this). For example, they put the mice in enclosures that gave them the choice of either spending time with another mouse or hanging out alone. The Kmt2c+/fs mice chose to spend time alone significantly more often than wild-type (Kmt2c+/+) mice did.

Then the researchers examined gene expression a little further. They found the experimental mice also showed upregulation of the expression of other genes already known to be associated with ASD, something the scientists had not included in their design.

"This was somewhat unexpected," said study co-author, Dr. Atsushi Takata. "KMT2C mediates H3K4 methylation, which is thought to activate gene expression, and thereby KMT2C haploinsufficiency was expected to cause reduced expression of target genes."

In other words, less expression of KMT2C appears to mean more expression of genes affirmatively associated with ASD.

The researchers then gave the mice vafidemstat, a brain-penetrating agent that acts on lysine-specific histone demethylase 1A (LSD1A) and has been found to render histone problems less severe. The treated mice showed less social impairment, and the differences in their gene expression relative to wild-type mice became less pronounced.

As the research paper says as it draws to a close, "This indicates that histone-modifying drugs would be effective not only in patients with KMT2C haploinsufficiency, which represents a tiny proportion of individuals diagnosed with ASD, but also in a broader patient population with specific types of transcriptomic and epigenomic dysregulation." Or, translated into press release, "The results open doors to future research to strengthen the foundation for the pharmacologic treatment of ASD and other neurodevelopmental disorders." Give an autistic organism a drug that affects one gene, and it will in fact affect many genes, making the organism act more neurotypical.

And we'd better start the hard conversations about that now.

Each study is one tiny step toward understanding, and the researchers are professionally clear about the work that remains to be done before their findings can be used in drug discovery, but there are a few things to keep in mind as we head down this road:

First, ASD itself is poorly understood, partially due to unclear diagnostic criteria that were only somewhat remedied when the DSM-IV became the DSM-V. In a hundred years, we may find that today's ASD is really five or six different neurotypes with overlapping presentations.

Second, scholars of prehistory are beginning to speculate that ASD, ADHD, dyslexia, and other conditions considered disabling in today's 9-5+ job market may have been beneficial to early human communities, even if they pose a problem at the individual level today. Some people with ADHD feel more alert and productive at night. There was one guy in the village who didn't mind night watch duty. A big part of autism is about seeing the world differently. Only one adult needs hear the tiger break a twig before it pounces on a posse of tribal toddlers. Medicating ASD out of existence could rob humankind of something that we don't yet fully understand.

Third, our school systems already have a habit of reaching for drugs out of convenience. The Body Keeps the Score cites the use of antipsychotic meds "to render 'difficult' children more tractable."* Autistic students are often inconvenient. There are autistic adults who describe the applied behavior analysis (ABA) interventions they received as youngsters (sometimes the only intervention covered by insurance) as functionally torture to make them pretend to be normal. The capacity for abuse of any autism-ameliorating drug treatment already has a fully developed infrastructure.

If these findings described an avenue for treatment of epilepsy, we'd shout hooray and move on. Offer epileptics a way to no longer have epilepsy, and almost all of them will cheerfully agree. Offer the parents of epileptic children a cure for epilepsy, and they will gladly consent on their child's behalf. The patient will likely grow through all stages of youth and adulthood with few conflicted feelings about this. The thing that is making an epileptic person unhealthy is often epilepsy.

This is because epilepsy is a disease, not an identity. Ask an epileptic if their epilepsy is an essential part of who they are as a human being, and most will give some version of "no." Ask an autistic? If you've met one person with autism, you've met one person with autism, but you're more likely to get a "yes."

Autism is part of how autists see, hear, think about, and interact with the world. It can be a disease, but not always. It can be a disability, but not always. It is an identity. The thing making an autistic person unhappy can be autism, but more often it's the way other people react to autism.

Even if we assume that some autistic individuals would benefit from drug intervention that brings them closer to what we think of as normal health, there is likely to be a large swath of autistic individuals who would be better off without it but are not in a position to refuse. Autistic children are often more work than their parents and teachers expected and do not always involve the same emotional and social rewards as their neurotypical counterparts. We should expect a large cohort of parents ready to jump at the word "cure" and a large number of strapped school systems ready to demand they do so. It isn't as if no one's doing it now.

We may be a long way from "Here is a pill you can take that will make you not autistic any more," but it's not the first time many autistic individuals will have had to deal with the idea. Autistic adults can tell stories of being medicated or threatened with medication for failure to hide their neurodiversity thoroughly enough.

Some of the nineteenth-century scientists discovering genes for the first time were asked whether their work could be used to improve humanity. The response, imperfectly paraphrased from my years-ago read-through of The Gene by Siddhartha Mukherjee, was that we would need "radical social equality" before we should even attempt radical genetic manipulation.* We had to know not only what each gene does but how it got there and what the true implications are. Similar caution is called for here.

Nakamura, T., Yoshihara, T., Tanegashima, C. et al. Transcriptomic dysregulation and autistic-like behaviors in Kmt2c haploinsufficient mice rescued by an LSD1 inhibitor. Mol Psychiatry (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-024-02479-8

*Quotations are from memory and may be imperfect.

[prismaticpichu]

Happy Friday y’all!! You made it! Hope it was an amazing week full of progress and good food!

Here’s a random fic crumb fresh from the WIP not-folder! The plot that’s baking is prolly pretty obvious xD (I also learned that writing the pupper’s perspective tends to split my writing style right down the middle- and I’m having fun with that bisection!)

“Sephiroth?”

The SOLDIER's head jolted up, emerald eyes blinking just as rapidly.

Well. He was definitely getting better at responding to his name.

"Yea—“ Shoot. Zack swallowed the syllables mid-throat, masking the blunder by clearing it. "Yes?"

It was Heidegger who had barked at him, two sharp brows furrowed in... annoyance? Offense? An idle drift of his gaze revealed that everyone in the briefing roof was staring at him, an awkward spectrum of different emotions pinning him down: some eyes were dark, some bore impatience, a majority crackling with shock—as shocked as these masked people could be.

He was about to open his mouth and ask what gives... before suddenly becoming very aware of the heavy, glistening weight pressing down on his hand. Lips stitched shut, he willed his eyes to float right.

...Oh for Ifrit's sake, what was wrong with him? The General of SOLDIER was not supposed to have an entire pound of hair all caught up in his fingers! Especially not twined around each digit like a spool.

Many, many more things in his body twisting, Zack unsnarled his hair and straightened. He could not blush. He could NOT.

"Please, continue," he said Seph-smoothly, like a velvet bass, and prayed that it would be enough to drive their attention away.

It did not.

President ShinRa's air of probing radiated with policelike intensity. “What are your opinions on the matter, Sephiroth?" The man laced his fingers together, a frown causing the edges of his leaden face to wilt. Searching.

Blessedly, Seph's body didn't sweat easily.

It took what had to be an applaudable amount of willpower not to swallow. He thought not letting his gaze flicker to the clock would be enough—more than enough. Sure, looking like a bored Zack Fair in the 4th grade wasn't part of the plan, but neither was actively contributing. He hadn't been listening! Everything was just a dazed, torturous blur of statistics and... something corporal; there was nothing for him to even remotely paw at for an answer.

"Sephiroth, what is the matter with you?" Hojo's voice was much more scolding, condescending, something of an urgent warning prowling underneath. The man was eyeing ShinRa without looking in his direction, and the fraction of ShinRa's focus that wasn't latched onto him was reciprocated onto Hojo in return.

What would you say... what would you say... c'mon, what would you say, bud, help me... Oh who was he kidding. Seph would have listened to every word even if it was tearing him asunder from the inside.

“I'm indifferent," he finally answered, time too fragile to hold anymore. It seemed ike an adjective that encompassed Seph regardless, so... score? He just had better agreed to something Seph really couldn't care less about. And if he didn’t—

Almost immediately a flare of horror and regret shot through him, storming with heart-clapping paranoia. Gaia, oh Gaia what if he agreed to destroy the slums? The church? What if they asked him if they could change Seph's hair? Seph cherished his hair! He would never forgive himself. What if… what if he approved removing any and all second-in-commands for SOLDIER? He would never see Seph again…

The eyes lingered on him for just a moment longer, just a torrid, humid moment before ShinRa leaned back and regained some degree of satisfaction; Heidegger scoffed; Palmer took a tired sip of his drink; Tseng's quirked eyebrow descended. Hojo's glare was the last to fade, only turning his head away in a purposefully slow manner. Leaving his little watery handprint.

"It's settled then," Heidegger continued, leaving no room for amendments. "We will reduce the water pressure in the facilities by 20%."

And all again, all eyes were on him when Zack let out a long, heavy sigh of relief.

[icouldhyperfixatehim]

a tag game of mysterious untitled origin - thank you for tagging me, lovely @morkofday 🥰🥰

Current time: 10.15PM

Current activity: nightly pre beddy byes tumbling time. interspersed w making inroads in my many open wiki tabs - tonight i'm reading about nixies

Nøkken by Theodor Kittelsen

Currently thinking about: the aforementioned nixies and other water based folkloric spirits. the episode of the cryptonaturalist podcast where strange lights lure a man who wants to play music w someone from his porch and into the dark. that my feet are cold. whether the river's going to flood again tonight like it did last night.

Current favourite song: listen, all of unreal unearth has been thrumming through me in one long spool of constant inner soundtrack since august and that's just my truth.

Currently reading: in regular reading - our wives under the sea by julia armfield. in personal reading i hesitate to put here but want to bc it's honestly a great resource for people supporting a loved one with a psychotic spectrum illness, and i want everyone who needs to know about it to know about it - i'm not sick, i don't need help by dr xavier amador

Currently watching: lucky my love, heaven official's blessing, love senior, last twilight, well dominated love [awful title but xuan lu is in it so i'm giving it a whirl]. also bob's burgers, the new series of planet earth on the beeb, we bare bears, and yellowjackets 🤍

Current favorite character: shauna shipman

Current WIP: crochet cardigan for mother's christmas [I wasn't able to get it done for her birthday 😔] and knitted socks for brother and father's christmases. personal writing project which is largely stalled right now 😔😔 but i WILL get back to bc it is important to me ✊✊

tagging: @akkpipitphattana @liyazaki @panncakes @philologique @forcebook

[kickerofelves]

Who Told You This Room Exists? — Belong

[lordsofcorbina]

Gear Spew!

I would have to say compared to a lot of my friends I fall very low on the gear ho spectrum.🙂 It really doesn’t matter if you hand me a rod with a Hatch reel, Abel, Tibor or whatever other reels folks covet. As long as the damn thing works properly I’m going to be happy.

A reel does not need to be built overkill for the task at hand either.

So with that said, Danielsson reels fall into that category and at a great price.

These are quality designed and manufactured Swedish made reels that take less then ten days to arrive from Sweden.

This reel was ordered on a Monday and was delivered on Friday!

You can set three different drag settings. One for a light inertia start up, medium or heavy.

Unlike some other reels extra spools are inexpensive if you desire a spare or two. These reels are completely sealed and pressure tested.

You are ordering these reels direct from the factory so you’re are not paying a middle man markup.

This reel will be attached to my two handed rod but is made for a single hand rod in the 7wt range.

This is replacing a Lamson Litespeed that served me well but has given up functioning properly.

Ok as you were!

[alphaman99]

A Solar Panel Reality Check

Tom Grimshaw

A Solar Panel Reality Check

As more and more counties get more solar farms.....

From a Stephenville resident, George Franklin:

I should start by telling you what bonafides I have for writing this. I am a retired aerospace engineer. A literal rocket scientist if you will. I worked on MX (Peacekeeper) Space Shuttle, Hubble, Brilliant Pebbles, PACOSS, Space Station, MMU, B2, the Sultan of Brunei's half billion dollar private 747 with crystal showers, gold sinks and 100 dollar a yard coiffed silk carpets. I designed a satphone installation on prince Jeffry's 757. I did all of the design work for the structure of Mark 1V propulsion module currently flying on at least 3 spacecraft that I know of. Some of the more exciting projects I have worked on are not shareable. My personal projects include a spin fishing reel with a 4.5 inch spool which is entirely my own designed, machined and assembled. It has 2 features that are patentable. A unique true flat level wind and a unique line pickup mechanism. I am also am FAA certified glider pilot and FAI certified gold glider pilot. I fly both full scale and model sailplanes. I am Microsoft certified and ComTIA A+ certified.

Solar panels are at best about 20% efficient. They convert 0% of the UV light that hits them. None of the visible spectrum and only some of the IR spectrum. At the same time as they are absorbing light they are absorbing heat from the sun. This absorbed heat is radiated into the adjacent atmosphere. It should be obvious what happens next. When air is warmed it rises. Even small differences in ordinary land surfaces are capable of creating powerful forces of weather like thunderstorms and tornadoes. These weather phenomena are initiated and reinforced by land features as they are blown downwind. It is all too obvious to me what will happen with the heat generated by an entire solar farm. Solar farms will become thunderstorm and tornado incubators and magnets.

Solar panels are dark and and they emit energy to the space above them when they are not being radiated.

This is known as black-body radiation. Satellites flying in space use this phenomenon to cool internal components. If they didn't do this they would fry themselves.

So solar farms not only produce more heat in summer than the original land that they were installed on, but they also produce more cooling in winter, thus exacerbating weather extremes.

So I conclude with this. There is nothing green about green energy except the dirty money flowing into corrupt pockets.

There is not such thing as green energy. The science doesn't exist. The technology doesn't exist. The engineering doesn't exist. We are being pushed to save the planet with solutions that are worse than the problems.

[xasha777]

In the year 255 BC, the Roman Republic, stretched thin by the strains of the First Punic War, made a decisive yet enigmatic choice to withdraw their forces from Northern Africa, leaving behind the nascent city of Carthage to lick its wounds. The annals of history held little but speculation on this sudden retreat—until the discovery of a singularly astonishing relic, unearthed by archaeologists in the year 2224 AD: a portrait, preserved miraculously in a subterranean chamber, depicting a woman with eyes like twin solar flares, a chromatic shade of red never seen in the human spectrum.

The historians of the new age, equipped with data-spools and cybernetic enhancements, were not content to let the image rest in archival silence. Dr. Livia Cassius, a leading expert in neural cryptography, took to the task of uncovering the truth. Her hypothesis was that this was not mere art but a visual key to an encrypted historical account—a story hidden in the annals of time.

Upon analyzing the image, Livia's retinal scanner unlocked a cascade of ancient data, encoded into the very pixels of the portrait. It revealed a story of a clandestine pact between Rome and a previously unknown faction: the Red-Eyed Ones.

The record spoke of a woman, whose name had been erased by time, simply known now by the moniker "Red-Eyed Lady". She was not of Earth but hailed from a distant star system. Her kind had sought refuge on our planet, offering knowledge and technology far beyond the Roman comprehension in exchange for asylum. Her eyes, gateways to a powerful intellect, could see the patterns of the universe and manipulate the energies that bound atoms together.

The Carthaginians, embroiled in war, had also been in contact with the Red-Eyed Ones, seeking an advantage over Rome. Unwilling to be part of a terrestrial war that threatened to exterminate a peace-seeking race, the Romans chose to withdraw, leaving a contingent of sentinels—men and women genetically altered to communicate with the Red-Eyed Ones, should they ever need counsel or aid.

As Dr. Cassius delved deeper, she found herself looking into the eyes of the Red-Eyed Lady, not through a portrait, but face-to-face. The relic had served its purpose as a temporal bridge, and the Red-Eyed Ones had been waiting for humanity to reach a level of technological and spiritual maturity to interact once more.

The Red-Eyed Lady spoke of her people's history with humanity, of conflicts avoided and wisdom shared. She explained that the Roman withdrawal was a turning point, a decision that allowed for a peaceful coexistence in secrecy, avoiding the annihilation of her people and sparing the Earth from a war of cosmic proportions.

Dr. Cassius, now a sentinel herself, was entrusted with a mission. She was to prepare humanity for the public revelation of the Red-Eyed Ones' existence and their role in our history. As she emerged from the chamber, with eyes glinting a subtle red, she carried with her the beginning of a new chapter in human history.

The tale of the Red-Eyed Lady was no longer a secret encrypted in an ancient image, but a beacon of our shared future with the stars.