#among other things...but i digress

[ilovemesomevincentprice]

Vincent Price - Service De Luxe (1938)

Baron of Arizona

The Long Night (1948)

Various Vincent Price kissing stills

[unknownarmageddon]

Oh is it a trans thing???

it is yea

[sendmyresignation]

I didn't finish Girls to the Front partly bc I got distracted but partly bc I heard a few other people saying it felt biased or lacking a further critical analysis, I'm curious it it references any of the women who were involved in DC hardcore or hardcore in general, re the books assertion that hardcore is overly technical and masculine point thay you alluded to in your tags. I know that it was still a very male dominated scene but the continued way that some people act like the women who were there didn't matter or aren't worth discussing has always irked me, and I'm curious if you had thoughts

sorry, i just got the time to answer this! i wanted to be able to give some quotes so it didn't look like i was pulling anything out of my ass. but yeah, so while the book does occasionally mention women in hardcore, Marcus has this rhetorical strategy where she brings them up, but not without first diminishing their existences and then dismissing their contributions.

There's reasons for this, I think, actually. One is that she really wants to sell this idea that punk was more influenced by women in the 70s and then, suddenly hardcore happened and the "macho-ism" of hardcore meant that the 80s lacked the previous generations female presence: "its penchant for louder-faster-harder performances and frenetic slam dancing were catnip for boys anxious to blow off adolescent steam... [the mosh pits] drove most girls to the sidelines". This is true... but only to a certain extent and is also a generalization, the other thing is I think she just reallllly wants to make riot grrls this supreme influence on women in the 90s, like there were sooo few women in DC (not out front, not as personalities, as she quotes from Jen Smith). But, by writing off the entirety of the 80s, she loops hardcore and posthardcore together?? like rev summer bands were explicitly challenging the violence and the "hard" rhetoric with vulnerability- spiritually v connected to riot grrl. and, ofc, rev summer was conceptualized by amy pickering! like she is directly responsible for not just the term but is herself the catalyst (Marcus says: "The scene's previous golden age... was what Fire Party's Amy Pickering had then dubbed Revolution Summer" which I feel removes a lot of her involvement, esp when Marcus criticized the fact Fire Party rehearsed religiously for months before performing live, therefore they weren't a part of the summer itself and also stood in contrast to the Olympia-riot grrl values of anyone-can-play diy). She also, in an attempt to re-enforce this riot grrl linage into The Canon excludes women in DC who weren't direct inspirations on riot grrl (so for example, Chalk Circle is mentioned a hell of a lot in these histories bc she was a mentor for Olympia grrls after moving to Cali, wrote a precursor zine that a lot of riot grrls read, and was in a band with Kathleen Hanna, Holly Rollers always gets mentioned bc of Juliana Luecking, etc) but Pickering and others gets left out bc she's an imperfect role model (wanted her band to be seen outside the paragram of gender, she worked at Dischord, booked shows, was friends with most of the hardcore scene). Unsurprisingly, then, Marcus v. conveniently leaves out the black women in DC; Pickering's band included drummer Nicky Thomas (who is literally never named in the book, only Pickering is mentioned when talking about Fire Party which i find particularly egregious) and their first show was dedicated to Toni Young of Red-C and Dove who were legit hardcore bands.

She also is weirdly inconsistent about the contributions of female instrumentalists (that idea of personalities...); again, the members of Fire Party outside their vocalist are never mentioned, Unwound is briefly offhandedly namedropped but Sarah Lund's name never appears, Christina Billotte is mentioned and quoted when she's involved in riot grrl (Autoclave-era; later she would grow distant from the DC meetings) but is only passingly mentioned when Slant 6 is formed and none of her bandmates are named, Maria Jones is name dropped as a significant presence in DC because of the Holly Rollers connection but none of the other bands she was in are shared, including the all-girl, all openly queer Broken Siren, I could go on and on and on. Unless you were a frontwoman or directly involved in riot grrl, you were not relevant enough for Marcus to care about, which I find frustrating. who gives a fuck about female vocalists when the "technical" nature of guitar or drums makes them much more gender-locked positions in rock music? again, there's also a divergence about proficiency, as if attempting to perform complex, serious music was like.... giving into the masculine musical culture? which i find incredibly essentialist and insulting to women invested in their craft. Ultimately I find Marcus incapable of adequately accounting for the variety of women and their reasoning for being in a band during this period and it does a disservice to the history to simply pretend any woman not Doing It Correctly is worth forgetting or dismissing. so, hopefully that answers your question lmao. id still recommend girls to the front, if just because it presents riot grrl pretty unedited and the timeline is super helpful when dealing with a very fragmented small subculture and seeing that it gets preserved. but MAN did a lot of the analysis get on my nerves lmao

[system-of-a-feather]

pst

btw

if anyone doubts that our oldest sister is shitty

she works for

Amazon

and not as a poor unfortunate person who got a starting job that makes it so they can barely meet their needs

she chose it as a preferred selection

*shivers*

[hadesknockedupintheunderworld]

Which era of Archie Sonic did you enjoy more? Pre reboot or post reboot?

Hmmm that's a good question. Idk I think I liked some of the writing post reboot better and I did like the new characters. I also personally think the removal of the love triangles specifically made the comic so much more enjoyable for me and opened up for better characterization for Sally. However, reading post sgw I did miss some of the old charcters (rip all those claimed penders ocs) and their now unresolved storylines, was sad at the loss of certain character struggles (like Rotor who was struggling between his health and wanting to be in the field again), and I missed how pre sgw had just some of the most insane or out of the blue plot developments/world building choices.

In terms of enjoyment, though, I'd have to say post reboot for the following reasons:

1. I enjoyed pre reboot for what it was more often than not, but I had my most fun during Flynn era. I liked how the Penders era moved things to being more serious, but I often felt like he had good and interesting concepts/ideas without the writing to back it up. Meanwhile, while Flynn wasn't perfect either, I felt like he was able to make a lot of those established relationships more believable to me, and while he also made some batshit plot choices he had more of the writing skills to back it up. This is all to say that aside from some stuff at the very beginning of pre reboot, it was a long while before I was able to really enjoy what I was reading instead of just taking things I liked where I could. Post reboot was a lotta Flynn, so despite the loss of characters and plotlines I enjoyed greatly, I at least felt like I could enjoy everything post reboot.

2. It didn't have all of those Sonic based love triangles. I know I know I'm a multishipper I ship Sonic with a lot of people but by god. I just could not take the Sonic/Sally drama anymore. Bunnie/Antoine was fine. Flynn actually made me believe in Julie-Su and Knuckles as decent partners. But by that point (and this is coming from someone who loved Sonic/Sally before reading the comic) everything going on re-Sonic and Sally's romance prospects with the opposite gender and each other was like beating a dead horse. And for Sally specifically, she had been recharacterized so so so many times pre-reboot just for the sake of drama that she often...didn't feel like her own character. So post reboot with the love triangles and the romance with Sonic removed I felt like we could really see who she was as a character and a clear vision of her ambitions/cares. I could feel like who she *is* wouldn't be changed on a whim for the purpose of plot.

3. As they say, people get better with practice. And while I thought some of his pre-reboot stuff was interesting, I felt like by post reboot era, Flynn had grown better at depicting the nuance of living under the eggman empire.

ㅤ

So yeah I guess I'd say, gun to my head? Post reboot. But it's really more complicated than that. I did enjoy both a lot, and especially in the last like 80 issues pre reboot. Pre reboot was wild an interesting in a way that I enjoyed with characters and storylines I loved, but it wasn't always written amazingly and contained much too many ongoing love triangles and mehhh canon relationships to me. Post reboot gave certain characters more time to shine as characters, reverted the pre reboot growth of other characters, delivered some of its nuanced situations better, and was largely written nicely, but you could often feel that the post reboot team was now restricted in a much different way than they were pre reboot (like, pre reboot's struggle was keeping up with existing storylines and relationships and keeping things true to what they have been, but post reboot's struggle feels more like it may have had some of Sega's restrictions we see nowadays).

In the end, though, I miss characters and storylines from both pre and post reboot after the cancelation.

[doeshapedcloudsv2]

I mean I GUESS they’re bookshelf speakers

[lesbiradshaw]

It’s really interesting and annoying to me how so many ppl seem to misunderstand /misinterpret Steve’s character. He’s not a rule follower per se - but ppl think that cuz of his “language” comments. Trump supporters think he’s on their side when he would despise maga and everything it stands for. Steve literally fights for what’s right - equality and justice for everyone (not just Americans). He would hate bigots and he clearly doesn’t trust the gov. I hate how he’s so misunderstood but U get it

sometimes you just gotta

[tbhimnoteasyonmyself]

Akk's flirting is bad but MY GODDDD is it accurate!!

[ladybonheur]

A professor tells me to call them by their first name: That's it. I've peaked. I'm gonna get a good grade at academic interpersonal relations. Which is both possible to achieve and normal to want.

[chibiko]

my mother is an interesting creature. when distance separates us, she's funny, charming, and cool, even. i become somewhat blind to her abusive streak. sometimes i need to remind myself of the things she's said to me and the ways she's treated me. distance has treated my memory of her with kindness...

[jinjeriffic]

DPxDC and OOC

I've had a couple of posts cross my dash recently where people lament that a lot of the dpxdc fandom writes characters very OOC and how we're proliferating these characterizations among each other. I figured I'd add my own two cents.

I think the fundamental discrepancy comes from trying to reconcile two canons with vastly different tones.

Danny Phantom is a comedy superhero show operating on cartoon logic. Why do ghost experts Jack and Maddie never realize their own kid is a ghost? Why is the status quo restored at the end of every episode? Why does Danny shoot an ectoblast out of his butt that one time? Because it's funny. It's cartoony action fun where the plot is resolved in 22 minutes, there's never any lasting consequences and it's aimed at kids.

DC meanwhile wants to be taken Seriously. Heroes get beaten within an inch of their life, traumatized, killed and even the good guys do messed up things (often to each other). Yes there's action and puns, but also horrific violence, actions have consequences and it's (mostly) aimed at adults. When a main character dies the comics show their family and friends mourning and things are very dramatic. Even though at this point we, the audience can pretty much expect every death to be undone within 2-5 years of publishing, but I digress.

So how do we, the fanfic/fanart creators reconcile these differences when we make our crossovers? We either make DP more serious and somber, or we make DC more comedic.

Suddenly we have a DP verse where the Fentons' bumbling obliviousness is elevated to serious neglect or outright abuse. The GiW are no longer a minor annoyance, they are a serious threat with genocidal plans and a desire to vivisect the protagonist. When actions have consequences, we imagine Danny as dealing with serious PTSD from having to be a solo superhero and witnessing his family's death that one time (and maybe also getting vivisected). Danny is not just a teen superhero, he's now the Ghost King with serious responsibility on his shoulders.

On the flipside, if we make DC more comedic we tend to exaggerate character traits for comedic effect, focus more on the interpersonal dynamics (especially the Batfam) and have the characters act more casual and silly. Suddenly the Batfam goes from a group of seriously messed up individuals who have trouble communicating with each other and fight all the time to Batdad "Kids if you don't stop killing criminals you won't get dessert ffs" Bruce. Violence is played for laughs instead of taken seriously. Yeah they fight, but they still Love Each Other.

And THIS IS PERFECTLY FINE. It's transformative work! And trying to reconcile these disparate fandoms is hard! Fandom is a labor of love. We do it for free. We do it for our own entertainment. And no one is forcing you to read fics you don't like. DLDR and all that.

[punctuation-completionist]

since today is punctuation day, i figured i'd talk with you about my favorite punctuation that is sadly not in unicode

(my apologies if these crop weird)

these six marks were invented by french writer hervé bazin in his essay plumons l'oiseau (or 'let's pluck the bird')

while the essay also had aim to switch the french language to a more phonetic writing system, it also gave us six new punctuation marks!

from left to right and top to bottom these are, the acclamation point, the authority mark, the conviction point, the doubt point, the irony mark, and the love point. so let's go over what these all were supposed to convey! (or at least what i expect they were supposed to)

the acclamation point was meant for praise, goodwill, and enthusiasm (ie "Well done [acclamation point]")

the authority mark was meant to be used in situations where the exclamation was serious and involved a degree of command or urgency (ie "Get in my office right now [authority mark]") i think this— along with the love point and irony mark— shows how a lot of these punctuation marks were a bit like early examples of tone tags, i'll get into it more later

the certitude point was used to show sureness in a fact. (ie "It's absolutely positively true [certitude point]") i think this might be the most useless of the bunch but whatever. i digress.

the doubt point is kind of the opposite of the certitude point, used when you aren't sure of something (ie "It should be done tomorrow [doubt point]") also it should be noted that the example used above is not the only way you'll see the doubt point, some also have it looking like this

the idea of irony marks has been widely suggested, for example the poet/art critic/song writer (i think, this guy's only wiki page is in french and i am guessing a bit on the word 'chansonnier') alcanter de brahm suggested an irony mark that resembled a backwards question mark (not to be confused with the percontation point which indicated a rhetorical question) and belgian inventor (among other things) marcellin jobard suggested a point that looked like an upwards arrow (this △ on top of this |, i can't paste it)

^ de brahm's mark

all that to say, bazin's mark was based off of the greek letter psi (Ψ) which some of you may recognize if you are familiar with the greek language or comics that shall not be named. it's used in situations of irony (ie saying "Wow, that sure was brilliant [irony mark]" if someone did something stupid)

and our last point is the love point, known for being so adorable, and indicating love or affection after a sentence (ie "Thanks a lot bud [love point]")

now we can obviously see that some of these are very similar to tone tags! the love point could be like a /pos, the irony mark is kinda like a /sarc, the authority mark could be like a /srs . i just thought it was interesting i guess. i don't have a point (heh) here exactly except that i guess people might actually need these punctuation marks ? so unicode? give me the love point or give me death

anyways so that's some fun niche history for y'all! hope you enjoyed

[askablindperson]

In what way does alt text serve as an accessibility tool for blind people? Do you use text to speech? I'm having trouble imagining that. I suppose I'm in general not understanding how a blind person might use Tumblr, but I'm particularly interested in the function of alt text.

In short, yes. We use text to speech (among other access technology like braille displays) very frequently to navigate online spaces. Text to speech software specifically designed for blind people are called screen readers, and when use on computers, they enable us to navigate the entire interface using the keyboard instead of the mouse And hear everything on screen, as long as those things are accessible. The same applies for touchscreens on smart phones and tablets, just instead of using keyboard commands, it alters the way touch affect the screen so we hear what we touch before anything actually gets activated. That part is hard to explain via text, but you should be able to find many videos online of blind people demonstrating how they use their phones.

As you may be able to guess, images are not exactly going to be accessible for text to speech software. Blindness screen readers are getting better and better at incorporating OCR (optical character recognition) software to help pick up text in images, and rudimentary AI driven Image descriptions, but they are still nowhere near enough for us to get an accurate understanding of what is in an image the majority of the time without a human made description.

Now I’m not exactly a programmer so the terminology I use might get kind of wonky here, but when you use the alt text feature, the text you write as an image description effectively gets sort of embedded onto the image itself. That way, when a screen reader lands on that image, Instead of having to employ artificial intelligences to make mediocre guesses, it will read out exactly the text you wrote in the alt text section.

Not only that, but the majority of blind people are not completely blind, and usually still have at least some amount of residual vision. So there are many blind people who may not have access to a screen reader, but who may struggle to visually interpret what is in an image without being able to click the alt text button and read a description. Plus, it benefits folks with visual processing disorders as well, where their visual acuity might be fine, but their brain’s ability to interpret what they are seeing is not. Being able to click the alt text icon in the corner of an image and read a text description Can help that person better interpret what they are seeing in the image, too.

Granted, in most cases, typing out an image description in the body of the post instead of in the alt text section often works just as well, so that is also an option. But there are many other posts in my image descriptions tag that go over the pros and cons of that, so I won’t digress into it here.

Utilizing alt text or any kind of image description on all of your social media posts that contain images is single-handedly one of the simplest and most effective things you can do to directly help blind people, even if you don’t know any blind people, and even if you think no blind people would be following you. There are more of us than you might think, and we have just as many varied interests and hobbies and beliefs as everyone else, so where there are people, there will also be blind people. We don’t only hang out in spaces to talk exclusively about blindness, we also hang out in fashion Facebook groups and tech subreddits and political Twitter hashtags and gaming related discord servers and on and on and on. Even if you don’t think a blind person would follow you, You can’t know that for sure, and adding image descriptions is one of the most effective ways to accommodate us even if you don’t know we’re there.

I hope this helps give you a clearer understanding of just how important alt text and image descriptions as a whole are for blind accessibility, and how we make use of those tools when they are available.

[edgeray]

*presses my face against your tank* HELLO RAY !!! :D I AM FINALLY HERE !! MY BRAINCELLS HAVE COLLIDED AND PRODUCED A THOUGHT !!

or, er, sort of? more like a vague vibe, but i digress. basically, consider: pining arle. how does she realize her feelings for you? how does she cope? how does her behaviour around you change? does it? what is she thinking the whole time? when would she consider making a move? essentially i would like to see you psychologically pick apart this woman. go as in depth into her brain or inner monologue as you want !!! the set dressing can be canon or an au, i’ll eat it up regardless :)) and as a professional angst writer i know you can write some absolutely monstrous (/pos) yearning and i’m frothing at the mouth thinking about it 🤤🤤🤤 lookin forward to your thoughts but also take your time with it !!! godspeed 🫡🫡🫡

An Unfit Role 

(Arlecchino x GN! Reader)

A/N - Oh sev… you spoil me too much. You truly do. Somehow this turned into very ‘Arlecchino is a person'-esque and I don't know how but oh well. I don't know if this answered your questions very well, but hopefully this is what you mean by psychologically picking apart her! Was this enough pining? Content warnings / info - uhh none I think. just a lil bit of angst, 1.4k words

Arlecchino is many things. The Fourth Fatui Harbinger, a Snezynayan diplomat, the head of the House of the Hearth, and simply ‘'Father.’ She takes on many roles, and enforces them with an iron fist, every facade meticulously practiced and rationalized. Perfected as if she were an actor on a stage, every action and step is calculated beforehand. And if external factors or unpredictable variables crop up in the midst of her play? Well, a good actor knows how to improvise. Arlecchino is well aware of her roles, has memorized the lines and drilled through every movement. The Knave has many feats from each character she plays. A flawless performer, in those aspects.

A lover is not a character she can play. Someone who loves. It is a role that she cannot hope to touch, one she cannot imagine assigning herself too. She is far too inexperienced in what it pertains to. Her perception would grossly mischaracterize it, painting a rather crude display of what she knows of but doesn't know. After all, how could one act without an adequate example? No actor would want to showcase a poor impression of an original source material, an actor presents only their most remarkable qualities. A good actor knows what they cannot act, and it is this where her talents reach their limit. It is what her role as a ‘Father’ stems from; this inability to express something far too fragile and flimsy for her to hold. 

Of the few showcases of others playing the role, Arlecchino is knowledgeable enough that they are simply inept showcases. The Tsaritsa, who has shown the capability to act, and yet chooses to conceal her abilities from her audience. Crucabena, an unqualified actor, whose words dripped with far too much venom for the soft-spoken voice that she used. Perhaps Clervie was the only accurate and genuine actor able to play the part, but one cannot appreciate the traits of an unfinished story. And the naive Peruere, who could hardly imitate her counterpart, was maimed by Arlecchino’s own hands. It is here that she learns that the role of a lover earns no applause, because it adds little to the plot, and so it lacks a function in her story.  

Despite this, she finds herself in this scene, where she plays a character unlike her usual, an entirely new character involuntarily thrusted into her by the cruel machinations of her mind. 

It is a subtle thing. First, she was just the Knave to you. But somehow, among your presence, her facade slips, and she dons another character. 

She becomes a character who knows of nothing but the way her sight is captured by a singular person, a character whose dead heart begins to beat, daring to flutter back to life after it was painfully wrenched out of her chest by her favorite story's ending. She becomes acutely aware of this role when her eyes linger on you a moment longer than need be, when she indulges your empty but no less engaging conversations, when she familarizes herself with the particular fauna scent you carry. When she closes her eyes, your smile flashes through her mind, she knows she's fallen. 

An actor knows when to quit, when they misfit the character they're performing. And yet her mind remains stubborn. Acting a role one does not fit will only damage the actor's reputation, and she intends on abandoning it. But it is difficult for her to dismiss how much she yearns for a warmth that the blood flames in her veins cannot bring. It is difficult to deny that she is not momentarily blinded and stunned by your beaming expression, even when you are not looking at her. It is increasingly more difficult to control the pulsing underneath her skin. This is a character she cannot control, instead, it often feels that the character controls her. 

It is an unseemly, disgusting appearance for her. If it were physically possible, she would plunge her very own cursed, clawed hands into her chest, to grasp onto this fickle, volatile organ and crush it just to exhaust the remaining embers of a futile hope. If only it were as simple as that. Love is far too much of a complicated role for her, and yet it is somehow inescapable. Some sort of torment placed onto her by the archons. 

She can long, she can reach, she can prance around you, but never can she touch. For love imprints its scorch marks deeper than any weapon or assault. One of the lessons her story has concluded to. 

So, instead, she reduces its role to a minor character. She lets her stares remain, but she observes you from a distance. She does not dawdle a second longer besides you if she needn't be. She dresses the role of a lover as an observer. Everything she touches with these wretched, blackened hands soon turns into nothing but embers and ashes, and so the only way that you will remain is away from her.

On her desk, sits a vase with a single flower. It is your favorite flower, the flower that you smell of. It does not move from its place, nothing is done to it besides being watered. Its stem is so brittle, and the petals are far too easy to wither away.

(It is a reminder, every time she sits at her desk. Oh, how'd she like to stroke the patels with as much tenderness as she could muster. How'd she like to cradle it in her hands, this source of life, despite being so delicate, is so beautiful. How'd she like to be able to wake up everyday, and view upon this blossoming flower. But she is not a gardener. She knows nothing of how to make a flower bloom.) 

Humans are the only viable actors for the role of a lover. A curse is not. 

(In her dreams, sometimes you are in place of Clervie. Yet, like Clervie, the only moment she is able to cradle you is when her sword impales you. She will not let another flower wilt, she will not burn another flower.)

It is why you baffle her. Why do you gaze upon her with that expression, as if her claws are not one one more inch from piercing your skin and ripping into your flesh? How do you take her hands in yours, somehow slotting them as if they were always meant to, when they’re soiled with vulgar blood? Her cutting words and sharp tongue, how do they not dissuade you? How do you see her blackened skin, and not be driven away by such a mark of impurity and depravity? 

How could you not tell that she is improper for the role that you seek?

She wonders if a flower is a poor description of you. She wonders if you are instead a Sundew ensnaring a spider, unwilling to let it escape. No, perhaps that is not fitting for you, because you are unaware how effortlessly she can char you–unaware of the imminent danger that comes with keeping such a venomous creature.

Arlecchino is many things. She is a coward, if only for you. She cannot abandon her role, but she cannot perform better, floating in the state of inadequacy that she so despises. Playing a lover makes her foolish, and it is a compromising role. 

She is foolish, but she is despicable. She is selfish. And though she is perfect actor, even performers must fail to succeed. One day, her mental will and patience crumbles. She requests you into her office, your doe-eyed expression widens when she gives you the flower that sits lone in a glass vase on her desk. She tells you that you plague her thoughts, every feeling and emotion is muddied when they concern you, a culmination of things not within her grasp, not within her control. 

It is your performance that finally teaches her what she lacked before: playing the role of a lover requires another. It is a role dependent on another character, otherwise it cannot succeed. It matters not how experienced one is with the other, as long as the characters are committed to it.

There is another lesson that she learned from you.

“I cannot act as a lover.”

“Why must you act to love me?”

Love is a fickle, unpredictable thing. There is no words to be practiced, no actions to be scripted. 

Arlecchino is many things. A lover may be one of them. 

[sovasleepy]

hot and cold

[gekko x gn!reader] - you're an agent with such a seemingly cold exterior - both physical and metaphorical - but being gekko’s saving grace might change some minds about you.

warnings: the agents kinda make assumptions about the reader, a little hurt/comfort if you squint real hard. brief mentions of injuries, unconsciousness, very minor swearing

notes: tbh a “reyna being a motherly figure to gekko” vibe popped out a little too hard but i digress. requested by anon, i hope you enjoy!

kingdom's agents were well trained.

from the freezing temperatures of russia, to the most humid days on bermudian islands, the agents were resilient to all types of weather. today wasn't supposed to be particularly challenging in that aspect. a routine mission in some section of los angeles didn't sound particularly hot.

in fact, it had been the least of your worries about two hours ago.

you respected all of the agents on the protocol, especially considering the facts that not only were you newest addition, but some of the agents on this particular trip were among the first.

reyna, omen, cypher, and gekko stood next to you as the jet approached the site you were landing at. it felt almost childish to you that you were more nervous to be around your own coworkers than you were thinking about the fact that you could be lying dead any minute now.

they hadn’t ever directly been mean to you.

omen, bless him, was never any good at showing too much concern so you didn’t mind the cold shoulder you often felt from him.

cypher had his own secretive issues, and so did reyna.

that said, you never quite found your place amongst the agents. granted, you hadn’t been here too long, but the creeping and perpetual sense of being unwanted bothered you. to add to this, your abilities directly harmed the abilities of other agents. thus, your training sessions were always against your coworkers, which didn't always seem to sit well.

speaking technically, your ability did revolve around the manipulation of heat just like phoenix's did... only, you controlled the absence of it. the reaction of his abilities made fire, and yours made ice. this meant that you and phoenix either paired a little too well.

or not at all, depending on how one wants to look at it.

and then there were the other agents. kay/o's body produced a little heat, but ultimately couldn't produce enough to shake the ice. the same for killjoy's bots, cypher's tech, chamber's utility, sova's bow, even harbor's water.

and so you began keeping to yourself.

except for on missions, when communication was key. only your communications were down, and had been for some time.

the only people you could find were dead. slouched, bloodied bodies against buildings or in doorways seemed to mock you. luckily, none of them had been the faces of those on the mission with you.

that was until you heard a weak warbling. you called back to whatever created had made the noise, and was met with another weaker sound. still, you followed the creatures direction. after a few moments of sifting through debris, you were met with the dusty and bloody face of gekko.

dizzy sat curled up in his lap. his arm was limp, but bent as if he had been holding her close. for a brief moment, you thought he was dead. however, his chest rose and fell and slow, scarily shallow breaths. he was alive at least. the next thing on your agenda was to find the source of his unconsciousness, and hopefully stop it.

you knelt down to his level. he was slouched against the wall, head lolled to his left. there were splotches of dried blood on him, just the occasional mark on his clothing or his skin, but it didn't appear to be his.

his outer thigh had a darker patch of blood, thicker and definitely coming from him. however, the wound didn’t seem like it would be severe enough to have led to his current state. something else was wrong.

you continued to inspect him. his skin was pale, but cold and sweaty. this had to be the cause, right? but there was something deeper than that, those were simply more symptoms. you looked around and observed where gekko was. the trail in the dirt around him wasn’t footsteps, but was instead the markings of gekko half-dragging himself to where he was sat.

but yet he wasn’t in any danger at the time. the only pair of footsteps that had been close to him belonged to an already-dead enemy. so he dragged himself there for what? the shade that surrounding buildings and debris provided?

of course.

your alignment with the cold also gave you the benefit of not feeling the heat so harshly. it was the middle of a californian summer afternoon, of course it was hot.

heat exhaustion. that’s what was wrong with him.

you allowed yourself to feel the cool of chilled air surround your arms. you passed a hand over dizzy and wingman, who made weak noises of thanks. as much as you would like to help them, gekko needed you more right now.

you sat down beside him and pulled him onto your lap, his head on your stomach and him situated half on and half between your legs. you didn't want to turn him too cold too quickly, worried that the rapid change might cause him more harm. to the best of your ability, you slowly chilled your own body and the air around you.

one hand was placed on his forehead and the other arm hung over chest in an attempt to disperse the cool. dizzy, apparently feeling better, wormed her way up under his feet. elevating his legs was supposed to help too, right? maybe she knew that.

faintly, you heard a noise come from gekko’s earpiece.

“mateo? answer me, mateo. are you okay?”

the voice belonged to reyna. you hadn’t enteracted with her as much as you would’ve liked, but you respected her nonetheless.

you took your hand away from his forehead. after unbinding your own broken earpiece and tossing it, you leaned down to get closer to his. pressing the small button on the side, you spoke into it.

“hello? this is y/n. gekko is with me. i think he’s going to be fine, but he’s unconscious, and i really don’t know what i’m doing.”

“y/n?” the voice belonged to cypher this time. “how about you? are you alright? your communications and vital signs went down. we thought we lost you.”

“i’m… okay, i think? a few bumps and bruises, but nothing too bad apart from the earpiece i’ll be paying for.”

“good.” reyna spoke again. “omen is here, too. we have mateo’s location and we’re on our way. a medic is with us. just keep him alive until then.”

“got it.”

rushed as it may be, the concern they showed you warmed your heart. but everything felt like it was going to be okay. help was on its way, everyone was alive, and the mission was successful.

“just me and you guys,” you spoke, looking down at wingman and dizzy, who looked equally worried.

true to their word, the jet landed close to you roughly three minutes later. reyna was the first one to step foot off the aircraft, and the next thirty minutes went by in a blur. when your brain finally settled from its adrenaline high, you plopped down in a chair next to gekko’s bed in the makeshift-infirmary of the jet. reyna stood at the end of the bed. her arms were crossed and she wore her usual stern and hard-to-read face.

“the doctor said he was be alright, y’know.” she spoke after what felt like twenty minutes of comfortable silence.

you looked up from where you had been spaced out, staring at gekko. wingman was on the floor at your feet and you were absently letting him play with your fingers. however, he stopped to look up at reyna too.

“i hope so. i was… scared. honestly, i was beginning to think you guys would have left me. not that i would blame you. everything was down, you had every right to assume i was dead.”

“never.” she spoke. there was a chilling certainty in her voice. “you are an asset.”

“i suppose.” you paused for a beat, debating whether or not to finish your sentence. “i adore you guys. all of you. i think i just have a hard time finding my value to you all.”

you were met with silence. it festered, feeding the anxiety already unfurling within your chest. finally, reyna spoke again.

“admittedly, it’s hard to join the protocol and feel like you fit in. mateo felt the same way when he first joined, too, but the feeling goes away eventually. he wanted to speak to you, y’know?”

“he did?”

“all the time. he has this… fantastical way about him when he speaks about you. like he has all these… emotions or something built up, and instead of talking to you he’s trying to fit them all into two sentences while i’m still drinking my damn coffee.”

you couldn’t help but smile. you were always so nervous to talk to him, yet you never took the time to consider the fact that maybe he was nervous to talk to you too.

[adobe-outdesign]

Pokemon review: Ditto

(No review requests in the inbox right now, so I'll be doing this. No random generation this time as most Pokemon have been reviewed at this point.)

Ditto is probably one of the most straightforward ideas for a shapeshifter you can get—it can become anything, so its base form is nothing but a simple blob, similar to the classic RPG dungeon slime. In all honestly I do prefer something like the Zorua line that has a unique design by default in addition to copying other Pokemon, but Ditto is undeniably pretty cute. I like its silly little :) face and the sort of implied arm nubbins.

One thing I will note about Ditto is that it's never been consistent color-wise; sometimes it's a lavenderish purple and sometimes it's bright pink. It's not really a problem per say, but it is strange that it's never had a standardized color after all these years. (I personally like the pink more, for the record; the purple feels a bit washed out, a common problem among Gen 1 mons.)

Another notable thing about Ditto is the way its transforming works. People generally associate it with shapeshifting everything but it's face, resulting in normal Pokemon with hilarious :) faces. This has been seen everywhere from the anime to the TCG cards.

However, this... isn't really a thing in the games. This idea was introduced in an episode of the anime, wherein the face thing was a flaw that one specific Ditto had that got fixed by the end of the episode. In the games, Ditto can and does shapeshift with 100% accuracy. While they do occasionally use this for interesting gimmicks (such as SV having random wild Pokemon be Ditto), I'm honestly a big fan of the :) face transformations and think that should've been the norm. It adds so much personality and flavor, which is much needed in a Pokemon that just mimics others and has very little going on in its true form.

I also might as well point out that there's been a long-standing theory that Ditto is the result of failed attempts at cloning Mew. This has already been confirmed to have not been the intent in interviews, but honestly, I do like the idea even if it was completely unintentional. There is just something a bit odd, even by Pokemon standards, about a blob that just can shapeshift into anything that isn't a legendary/mythical (like Mew) and is actually transforming (unlike the Zorua line, who are just disguising themselves with illusions). Like, it definitely feels weird to just see an undisguised Ditto out and about in the grass in SV after a reset. But I digress.

Bizarrely, at one point Ditto was considered for an evolution in Gen 2 with this screaming thing that evolved via a metal coat of all things. Not only does it not feel like an evo so much as a Different Ditto, but it's also just strange to give a evo (or a regional, or anything, really) to a Pokemon who's entire thing is being other Pokemon. I'm not even sure how it would differentiate itself mechanically—maybe the idea is that anything it shifts into would gain steel typing or something? Either way, best this was scrapped.

Overall, a super simple Pokemon with a straightforward gimmick, with its only issue being that it honestly isn't quite gimmicky enough.