#anyway end rant i just...needed to get that out of my system because ive seen it all over my dash lately

[arlecchno]

laughs in currently on summer break ,,,,,,

speaking of that tho , ive been busying myself by playing video games so much LMAO me and my silly visual novel names ( because im too lazy to play anything that needs me to put actual effort into it hahahhahahaha - )

SO THE STORY RIGHT - its a think me and my friend have been workin on since like the end of 2021 n its like set in a royal fantasy like au , fantasy monsters are something that havent been brought up in the discussion but we have cool magic stuff LOL . the most stuff thats defined is the very basic plot idea , the MCs r named Ashe Najimek ( prince , any pronouns ) , Rin Vasilios ( princess , she/her ) , and Kiole Soubaki ( king , he/him ) . dont question ANY of these last names because najimeks is just a keyboard smash and the rest were chosen by my friend they have no significant whatsoever LOL . aaaanyways , rin and ashe are basically from this mainland where all the kingdoms are secretly feuding with eachother but in order to maintain peace for the citizens they wont start an actual war . basically its every kingdom for themselves except for their silly trading systems . ashe and rins kingdoms are like at eachothers throats now since ashe and rin were born with the most magical power their lands have ever seen and its that trope where “child gets born into power and parents use them for own benefit causing child to rebel” yada yada but WUH OH WHATS THAT IS THAT 🫢🫢😨😱 GASP ANGST ?!?????!???? yeah lets go were tormenting our characters today baby ‼️‼️ the full book will go into the struggles of rin and ashe and how they end up as a result of how they take their circumstances . and how they become friends bc of those circumstances . lovely friendship . oh and theres two others that are their guards . Sio and Erza Eztli . theyre twins n stuff . THEY WILL GET DEVELOPMENT TOO WE JUST SHANT SPEAK OF IT NOW . im planning to make them long lost siblings tho lmao ! omg ive gone on such a long rant and i still havent talked about kiole . anyways so kiole is the token mentor character which i will not go into detail because SPOILERS MAYBE . he rules the edgy edgy kingdom of DEATH AND DARKNESS and all the other kingdoms have kinda outcasted his so nobody knows the fucker outside of whispers from the shadowed souls themselves MUAHAHAHAH - ahem anyways .

HERE ARE OUR MCSSS i love them awaaaaaaa

GOSH THO GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR SCHOOL STUFF THAT SOUNDS LIKE SO MUCH BYE 😭😭😭

i also JUST read chapter 5 recently and like …

( for context my friends name / nickname is roof )

ANYWAYS THATS IT FOR NOW CYA LATTEEEERRR !!!!

RAHHHHH HELLO TO YOUUUU!!!! hope you're enjoying your summer break 🫂

AND YOUR STORY TOO!!!!!!! that sounds so interesting already and ROYAL FANTASY AU⁉️⁉️⁉️⁉️ SIGN ME TF UP BRO I LIVEEE FOR FANTASY AUS bro you got me hooked with the storyline and characters already and it's still in the works 🤞🤞 their last names are soooo creative too like even if they're a keyboard smash or whatever,,,, still so intriguing like yes sign me up AGAIN!!!! wish my keyboard makes up random and cool last names lmao

THE MCS...... please let me touch their hair i swear they've GOT to have the most silkiest hair in their kingdoms like excuse me let me bow down to them and ask them for tips and tricks 😞🙏

thank you hehe school is.... yeah whatever school's been the same for me but i thrive to live up to the day asphodelus finally ends LOL i need to get that series done before i'm even more burnt out

LMAO YOUR FRIEND'S NICKNAME BEING ROOF IS GOLD 😭 fun fact i was literally like brain dead trying to figure out some bad humour to insert in those lines but somehow ended up with that... (may or may not be a bit of a self insert because i totally don't stare at my own ceiling and wished i was the ceiling instead hahaha definitely haven't.... ever.....)

HOPE YOU'RE DOING WELL THESE DAYS AND I'LL CYA LATER TOOOO💌💌

[invisiblerxch]

hello. Today I gave an entrance exam for a backup (college) plan. It was my first time giving a competitive exam and it went horrible ( atleast in my head)

Reasons for why it went bad? Well there are plenty.

With the change in education system due to pandemic, everything is fast paced and completely new. I think I realize what it's like to be an adult. Not long ago I used to called myself a child but I think I need to grow up and keep up with the world now. Admittedly the main reasons for why I did bad in the exam is solely my fault. I rushed it, wasn't aware, lazy, all over the place, didn't keep with entrance exams date or the syllabus and didnt prepared for it earlier.... i could have, I should have but i did not.

Not long I didn't even wanna apply for the exams for colleges due to being tired with continously giving exams (only few weeks before I had given my last high school main exams that was a month long process)

I didn't manage my time well, I didn't take it seriously. Thinking I'll hop in the last days and you know some how make it.

That's a lie actually. These exams aren't easy.

I keep thinking about my situation.

What makes me so entitled to even think that the universe would pick me and make me smooth sail all my problems? How pathetic.

Looking at all the other peers who are giving there best for months long, have devoted time in practicing and being productive. They are better. And there is no denying.

I was foolish. And Im sad. I didn't knew that I was delusioned to the point I forgot where I stood.

I stand nowhere.

My reality is that I'm not working for my future. And that I've been ignorant for it a long time. I see other kids all aware, excited and always striking ahead in opportunities.

And what have I done ? I've been giving excuses of depression and being stuck at one point. Im simply not excited for life anymore. I fantasy about the American dream in my head uk the girl boss being rich and sh*t. But in all truth I've been having hard time grasping my life conditions. I'm aware of lot of stuff about myself. I know I'm not eating well (or at all) sleeping too much, using social media to distract myself.

I fee like my mind has degraded and my body doesn't responds to me anymore.

I've seen people moving forward. I've seen everyone I knew moving forward to the point I'm not even surprised.

A lot of things are making me bitter. I'm not smart, don't consider myself pleasing, have identity crisis and have anxiety.

I try to feel jolly good for the people around me for their friendships, hobbies, relationships, simply for how they live.

Idk why I keep them all in a pedestal but deep down I really hate seeing people being happy. Not because I want something worse for them. It's just I'm jealous because i feel that certain happiness can't be mine.

Pandemic shut me off completely. I thought I was healing and all but all I've been doing is being caved in a room. The moment I thought I was coming out of my shell the stress of multiple exams hit me. And I couldn't take it, made excuses to get lost in my dreamland and wasted time. Now I suffer.

Maybe it's me being over dramatic ( ik I am) but I learned that time really doesn't give a shit about ya. Lmao

And as I keep ranting, the more I write the more I really wanna punch myself. I sound like a crybaby.

But anyways as I come to conclusion of whatever I wrote. I think at the end I still want to pat myself in the back.

Again I did horrible in my exam and got another main one coming. I dont wanna start with extra positivity and "you'll be fine/okay" bullshit. Those words seem vague idk why...

I just want to try. I really wanna try. The entrances are country wide and is hella competitive. One side of me thinks that absolutely in no way "i" would make it. But another part of me just really wanna give my best shot.

It's just I don't know how.

How do people accomplish themselves? Ive always wondered that... maybe its time for me to adapt and learn as well.

Anyways just a rant. I kept thinking about how horrible I gave my exam today and thought by distracting I would get over it. I couldn't. I just wanted to acknowledge it.

But I got no friends who would listen to me talk this long hahah... I guess I just wanted to speak it out loud.

Universe if you listening. Pls just give me strength to believe in myself once again.

#examstress #rant #howcanthisreachouttootherpeoplesoicanfindfriends #examcoping

[magioffire]

saying that writing diverse characters is a ‘trend’ is so fucking disingenuous. guess what, writing characters of color, intersex characters, and lgbt characters isnt a ‘trend’. y’all need to think about the words you use lmfao 

[screechingtrashcalzonewombat]

"Apopalictic Astral Asending" Reavaluate disassociate my self worth...

The galaxies have birthed an uncontrollable being ....

I've feel as tho Ive seen myself split in two ..

Witch side do u wanna see if ur lucky I'll let you choose .

Cause in the end I loose..

One of hate one of love could both be from up above..

Or down below ...

I've began to show signs of delusions as half my mind goes an tells me it's only mild confusion. As my body fights my brain an heart to escape theys terrible illusions.

Yet the other half tries to start a fusion of body an mind an all the suddently my thoughts are no longer mine..

But a evil so Divine that its wound it's way threw time itself I've fealt the damage the energy dealt. I've yelped in anquish an pain been stuck for 7 long years in the rain with nothing to gain .. I can barely fathom to explain im not fully on earth I'm on another astral plane but i fear i flew out of my lane I've gone insane never wanted fame Ever fealt like bat man I mean oops Bruce Wayne. Nah fuck hes spoiled a wet rat infact I'm more like hulk duck when I'm near i wearly see I'm drowning inside my mind but no one can hear my dear I fear I've lost control again but cant compute I've been booted out of the system I've clawed hit an kicked to try to get to the top but i outta of known I've been ripped an thrown from my throne ive been shown what this beast can do but who woulda thought a demon bought my soul ..a jackal a goul.....you'll see me shift into numbness I suposse it was my own dumbness for being to open now cause of me my body an mind are broken an stole. as I weep an shutter an i try to speak but only stutter I found myself weak in defeat ....as ik this demon reaching its peak will plunder an pillage the town I've found I'm bound to this beast nowhere to run not north south or east I can run it will feast on my soul until the end of time ..

For diamonds cannot compare to the rarity of a soul nor a bowl of Ruby's an jems rolled in gold .....

A bold statement you say........

.. theres no ray of light here they stole it away buried it in your mind but how can u define being locked trapped in yourself ...

You've dealt your own fate ...

Wanting ansers u dint deserve ..

Did you like your just dessert's...no?

Dose it hurt ..... After you itll kill children's childhood freinds like bernie & eart ....whent bizzirk an bashed there brains makeing bloody rains

curking on everyone with cutlery forks an knifes* slice *cook big bird with chives after I've shanked him 900 times... 100 more woulda been devine serve him drink to dry alone cooked an ripped him to the bone but not quite alone u may not be home inside but u can still watch...I thought I taught u better than to close ur eyes dont beg or look surprised look away an I'll adopt another stray to do the same a slow sweet death cure's my hunger anyway

.the wines innocents blood bitter sweet to the taste of the tounge

no one thought it capable I seemed...looked ...so young..

They dint know it had just begun it wasn't me but the evil half committing crime with glee an fleeing repetavidly revealingly images to my mind of times & crimes so sickening I thought I'd die forever scetched seered into my mind .binded with no power as one towers over you using your power you cowar for how dose one define the disasbalment of there an every defined mind while ur inner demon dines on flesh making a mess of your vessel you cant even wrestle your way to the light to stay only break down in defeat that your so far away you've became an internal mess cant even stand on ur feet the beast has u chained in defeat u cry an apologize looking for answers as of how to stop.....an then...you hear a voice .." you outta stayed silent instead of talk back. U shouldn't of complained do u still think ur life used to be pain...... . Ur a sack of shit ur wit is less than that of an ant not to rant but I'm not done yet I have ur soul now I'm never letting go no no no I have plenty more so much to show many souls to reap an emotions to subdue after all u said yes.....

...did you forget ur the one who started this.

mess ......you dressed your mind with fantasy an fiction word to the wise never mess with other worldly friction an your itching for a way out but I doubt ull get there before the end of time .after all you had a devil an an angel on ur shoulder an you chose wrong this time. Only took 666 times but I'm patient an always waiting for 6 years hating an burning flesh waiting for a prayer a call after all Lucifer was once an angel an the most beautiful you just dint get to see from what angle he had beauty wrath an determination but u humans resulted in his isolation incarsorason. So now we will end up being humanity's enialation when were done there entire selves with evaporate for the demons have released self hate to pro create creatures in confidence we annihilate the fate of the human race at least the trace slight like us able to bust threw dementions so weve mentioned a start to find the inordinary soul an heart ......humanity was doomed from the start.. you stole our purpose our reason to be......humans sit in sin an glee.

Your humanitys Pride is overbearing never genuinely caring ..

Greed is sweeping the nation its reached ever state an it's got a hot heaping plate of corruption for mankind's consumption greed is grotesque in its steps of the darkest quest to corupt ur mind an want. .want..want until that's all you are is wanting more

Lusting over losely draped garments you've tarnished ur soul .

Envy of what you do not posses but for all you know that information an life would make you a mess but ud still test ur envious tendencies.....

Glutton glutton what have you gained it's not knowledge no for it's to plain rather glutton uve found a urge that wont go away....

Wrath an vengeance blood draw too no one stops till some dies him or you....

Sloth last but not least cant forget you cause uuuh wait what that fuck do u do....you sleep an sulk sit slither out of simple tasks an that's why ur not 1st no ur last like humanity just ask ....

So soon the day will draw near the the number 4 is what you should fear our dear old freinds were sending up for a visit so they can reddit ur fate for each a horse an a trait the first out the door with bow in hand riding a white horse with bow in hand

..

Conquest the start of the final test leading the restthere dark version of light on a white stallion he leads the way an soon will follow hades anyway.

War was next on a red steed he rode prepared to purge an quench new blood for the wars an battels would just begin brother against brother an close of kin witch to win?

Famine foe of all on a black horse with the courses hair so fair merely bone but dont let his appearance fool you hes for he is full devouring your greed taking away everything you want or need an now ur rationed to nearly starvation stretching farther than destination world wide sensation...

Pleage reaper of souls slowly apears steadly trotting riding a very sickly steed looking pale an almost gruesome green with sores an sickness best keep a distance. For he shall be the bringer of death an reap you all one by one to the four you shall fall...

Will you be spared are you true....

Are you happy with your life what did you do...?

Rapture no you still must die.....

Say good by to this earthy chapter theres so much more that manifest after.

But only your earthly husk must rust an fall your all energy of grate mass....

It's time to take the task of self evolvment an enjoy an enlightened installment

this world was just step wrench ur third eye wide open an accept the token of eternal life.

Grinded it to atoms a flash of dust all together ur a self fulfilling must memory pass u in a rush.....

. sudently ur bodysuit is gone ....

But it dint felt like it quite belonged.

You were 7 grams of light matter to be exact an sudently you've cracked the atmosphere ..steering energetic waves my metal psyche caves to the new information flying threw stars consolations.

Suddently speeding at the sound of light the stratosphere seems to disapear ..

My fear is gonewithout a trace an freedom transferred in its place

but am waved in infatuation to find out about out true destination...

Restoration of the soul the goal of a higher self being achieved as I crash into the sun 1500°

I feel a warmth like no other each being hues of light I might of missed earth if not I heard a voice but a mental push no need for speech just thinking it shall be done said by the the brightest in the sun.

Rejoice at last but ur journeys yet to pass ..

This is merely were you start ....

Our flames grew high with frantic waves not wanting to give up the new life we were just gave

Suddenly our flames grew dim as we felt a swirling deep from withn sudently the surface of the sun turned to tin an bent in a cracked an caved with itself our time an space sending us ascending in alignment the same assignment.

Because the sun has begun to change ina twisted way a black hole some could say.

As all of our astral beings were ripped an tore apart at the seams we all merged an formed one all knowing creative being an sudently everything I've know has little matter I'm past a point of human chatter i understand infinity the holy trinity I down in the milky way an experienced every life I've relived it twice I've spliced my genetics into over 2000 million beings I've seen good an bad in between experienced every tragedy to build my strength an studyd every thesis an theory thread an chain nearly drove my vessel insane even took knifes threw my veins in anger yet it failed I was just a trailer.ive seen love hate an anger

Comprehension compasing many others I have love an understanding past many beings there anger seems to brush by me cause I'm with 2000 souls an minds that have formed one to reach a state I can medidate in the milky way an force your negative away .

Our astral self has accumulated complete power an understanding by costuming to our full potential our old body's merely a rental.

Gentle at first then bursted into power showered in knowledge I know now much that I wondered before but now I want more an I've thought till I an 2000 shared beings head hurt cause my girth of knowledge will now never be enough it's tough cause now I must find .... how to ascend again but for now i must defend my vast mind defind crime ...?

Keeping 2000 vast voices locked away so I can focus an try to learn anyway leaning in to vast places is I the 1st 2nd or 3rd or other many plains I cant quiet place I'm traveling threw them all searching for everything I couldn't before .

This life isent like the countless other this life I like it has interesting teathers

I've surpass Angel's an there feathers an vison of a hawk.

I've surpass demonds and there demonic temping talk ..

I've walked on water as I was ripped apart an I felt my self rebuilt every cell of my being got hit with rods of power lightning not even myself can fight me god like abilities the universe as built in me theres ben a spiritual shift a tilt in me somthing generations of DNA sprawled out in a numerical display my old life experiences is the price I pay so that I can be god even if only for a day

I think I'll sit an think somewere in the outter spink of the universe I've cursed myself with knowledge an now I'm aware step into my astral space....

If you dare...

[nightmaretyrantvantas]

So I have a rant and a half build up of rambling about my very first Percy Jackson Oc Elysia and I need to let it spill so all of you get to hear this info dump about her and my feels

Im putting a trigger warning here I made her when I first read the whole series a few years back. Her backstory isnt the happiest. So im going to put trigger warnings for mentions of (but not going into detail of) abuse, self harm, suicidal thoughts, so if you cant handle mentions of that please dont read this I dont want to upset you

Anyways I have years of work into this bab of mine and I need to get it all out

Also An important thing to note is the timeline of her(and my other ocs) stories. Basically it kinda takes place...as if Trials of Apollo didnt happen?? Sorta? I made her before it ever came out and set her story after Blood of Olympus before trials of apollo was announced so its basically diverges after Blood of Olympus...if that makes sense...I hope it does. 

So basically....At the start of her story Elysia is 13 Nico is 16(from what I remember its been about two years since I read the books so please forgive me)

Ok this might jump around alot because im kinda word vomiting and info dumping about her so if something doesnt make sense please feel free to ask me to clarify I love to

OK SO MY BAB

So her full name is Elysia Angela Melina and shes a Daughter of Hades. At the start when she gets to camp shes 13.

Im going to attatch two pictures ive drawn of her to the post here

This is her with a referrence sheet of her at 13-14 and the digital picture is one of her at the present time that I tend to write about her at age 16.

So Elysia doesnt have things easy. She comes from an abusive household that really fucked her up mentally and emotionally before she got to camp. She ran away at 13 after getting kicked out of her sixth or seventh school and thigs got ugly at home. Stuff happened and she was brought to camp(im refining and probably going to redo how that happens) and well...she doesnt exactly fit in.

Shes on the shorter side for her age and shes lanky and skinny(partially from both skipping meals and sometimes only eating when she can sneak food at home) and she comes onto the scene wearing oversized hand me downs in all dark colors and long sleeves thats got a clear fearful and insecure posture and stance and is always trying to blending into the background and hide from being noticed. Shes got a thick mane of not very well cared for black hair and eyes so dark in color they look completely black, sometimes even in the light with pretty dark bags under them highlighted by really really too pale skin. So it makes her an easy target to be bullied ya know? But she silently takes it like she always does while clutching this beat up little backpack she ran away with as shes put in the Hermes cabin until she’s claimed(which has a 1-3 day delay depending on the god, because a lot of kids come to camp especially at the start of summer) 

When she gets claimed she freaks out and panics because everyone is staring at her and shes suddenly the center of attention because it happened in the middle of the campfire.

So begins the bonding with her big brother.

Shes got alot of inner turmoils and traumas and problems and inner demons and as a result she has undiagnosed anxiety disorders, depression, and some PTSD along with a very low amount of self-esteem and confidence in herself from the ordeals of before reaching camp. Though once shes at camp and she eventually settles in she starts recovering bit by bit. She slowly gets close with nico(it starts kinda awkward for both of them and she comes off really quiet and shy and terrified of sudden movement so its a little hard but they overcome it)

 By the end of her first year at camp shes gotten close to Nico but has a really hard time making friends with other campers her own age so she ends up sticking close to Nico and following him like his shadow because theres a period of time that heś the only person Elysia feels even remotely safe and comfortable around. And as a result at first she spends alot more time with Nico’s friends and various members of the Big Seven and she gets close to them as well(more to her siblings at first but she gets there shes a nervous bean give her time)

Though in the middle of that first year she meets a girl that soon becomes one of her best and closest friends, a daughter of Hephaestus named Karter Becks(the second oc for this fandom I made) and I’ll get to more about their friendship later.

So by the second year at camp shes settled in a little, shes decidedly become a year-rounder because she would rather be eaten by a harpy than go back to “that horrible place”as she dubs it(not to mention its very very dangerous for her outside of camp)

More things about Elysia!!!

At thirteen she had absolutely NO control of reign of her abilities. She couldnt raise or summon the dead, her shadow travel was horribly spotty and half the time she couldnt even do so correctly and her most experience with spirits is that she can sense them and she can hear and speak to them but she cant really see them( they appear as really really blurry shapes that hurt her eyes to look at for too long) of course she beats herself up over this lack of skill, mostly because she(stupidly but understandably) compares her lack of teaching and training and beginner skill level to Nico’s at the time current skill level. Yeah its dumb and yeah in the back of her mind where her common sense is she realizes this but she cant stop herself from doing so, just like she unfairly to herself compares her sword fighting skill to older campers that have been there longer. 

She eventually gets her own sword of Stygian Iron, because no matter what else she tries no other swords feel...right to her. They’re always too heavy or too light too awkward to hold dont work right with her swings or just dont feel right to her so at some point shes overthinking herself to death about it and beating herself up for being too picky when Karter suggests innocently that she tries swinging around her brother’s sword. “After all Elys, whats the worst that would happen, that it feels too heavy?” 

But what ends up happening is that though its too heavy for her, it still feels...right. The best way to describe it is that she feels more connected to her powers and to herself in a way. After hearing that she gets her own of Stygian iron and its...perfect to her. Its not too heavy on her wrist or too light to wield. And afterwards she actually starts getting some more confidence which helps her improve a little faster than before.

Once Elysia is fully apart of camp life it takes a long time for it to fully click that her belongings...are hers and her likes and interests and likes are respected. They wont get taken away or threatened, she doesnt have to hide what she likes or pretend she doesnt like one thing or another. She’s free to be her own person for the first time in her life and she struggles for awhile to adjust to that and accept it. Those struggles result in alot of scattered breakdowns and even one or two...relaspes that for once in her life she has a support system of her half brother and half sister, his friends, her two close friends, and chiron to catch her and help her back to her feet. She has people to lean on and depend on and not have to be afraid of and this helps alot into her recovery and acceptance of herself and her mental illnesses. It takes her two of the three years shes been at camp for her to get at the better place shes at when shes 16, where she now has a small group of good friends, shes managed to bring up some of her self-esteem and self  confidence, shes been clean for a year and shes in therapy for her PTSD and depression and shes opened up more to those around her and shes not the terrified jumps at her own shadow kid but a more quiet but kindhearted and sometimes even giggly teen whose slowly getting her life back together with plans for the future.

But on the topic of things she likes...

This girl loves-no ADORES animals, all kinds mythical or not. She didnt show it at first but she was so SOOOO excited when she realized the camp had Pegasi even though she tried to keep a distance from them because she realized she made them nervous. Oh man you shouldve SEEN her when Chiron took a group of campers her age into the woods and they caught a glimpse of a passing through unicorn. She was giddy about it for DAYS guys. She just...she has so much love and admiration and excitement for animals its so cute you guys.

Elysia also loves(ironically) learning about Mythology, from all over the world. Its her special interest and when she finds and buys a old broken touch screen phone(or one of those touch screen i-pod or something) and gets Karter  to fiddle with it and (eventually after shenanigan filled misadventures of trying to upgrade it to not be detected by monsters and fix the cracked screen) she fills that thing to the brim of downloaded auidobooks of different mythologies as she can and she listens to them when doing schoolwork(she ends up having do be “homeschool” by online classes because things just do not go right when trying to attend schools outside of the protected borders)

She also loves anything soft. Especially stuffed animals. Oh my god she loves stuffed animals, well into her teens. She had one she managed to bring with her to camp that is her ultimate comfort object, a older beat up and been through a life time of ringers and back stuffed husky doll that she cherishes and takes care of like one might take care of gold. Over time (once they found out her birthday--October 5th) she starts getting stuffed animals as presents or just even as little splurges on herself . She also loves soft blankets soft clothes soft anything. She loves the texture and feel of it and it makes her happy.

She’s an aspiring writer and songwriter and can even sing a little but she has no confidence in her ability in any of those. But she has boxes and piles of notebooks and journals filled with little cartoony doodles and pages upon pages of stories and songs shes been writing for years now

Fun fact during her first year at camp Percy and Annabeth dropped by for a visit during their winter break to visit friends and I have this whole little story I might post about hoe when Percy’s walking to go meet someone he finds Elysia sitting alone at the beach doodling animals in her journal and he goes up to her(shes sitting all curled up so at a distance it probably looked like she was crying or something) to see if shes ok and because Nico had been telling him about her via iris messages and updates since she got there but he didnt get to meet her during the summer(stuff happened and she kinda hid from alot of people) but he finds her and he sits with her(after announcing his presence because Nico has told him about her being very jumpy and easily scared and that at that point hes the only one she really opens up to so dont take offense to it) and they sit for a bit and Percy asks her about her doodles and she just, for the first time like ever, she starts to open up because she gets so freaking excited and hyper about it that she just starts babbling away about her doodles and the animals of them and then about animals in general and she goes on this whole, like 30-40 minute info dump/ rant about them complete with diverting tangent questions that she answers herself before continuing with this just lit up and openly happy and ecstatic expression as she goes on and on while hes sitting there just listening to her and smiling down at her partly nostalgically because at that moment she reminds him so much of how Nico was when he first met him and you got him started on Mythomagic and that shes being so open about her excitement and then she looks at him and realizing what she was doing and she shuts herself up now panicking about how much she just word vomited on her big brother’s friend and more importantly this huge shot demigod Son of Poseidon whose saved the world not once but TWICE and who is probably very busy too busy to be hanging around with her--you get the idea of her panicking until Percy slowly reaches out his hand and she nods to let him know its ok and he ruffles her hair and tells her its ok he liked listening to her and holy shit I went on a tangent about that. 

She also has alot of sweet bonding moments with Nico and Hazel because they teach her about having a loving and caring family and what thats like and its really sweet and cute and emotional

Did I mention she likes taking Nico’s shirts? Oh yeah she likes “borrowing” Nico’s shirts, and some of his jackets, mostly t-shirt and long sleeved shirts because once they get close his scent and presence really relaxes her nerves if she gets anxious. Of course its not stealing, its just borrowing and eventually giving back on laundry days...or he just lends it to her without being fully aware of it. Its cute because shes so short that they end up really big on her and she loves flapping the sleeves and the feeling of being engulfed in the safety of his presence without him even being there

ANYWAY COUGH COUGH 

uhhhhhhh....yeah thats alot about her huh I think i’ll leave you all with that to take it and make sense of and I might make a part two(or you guys can ask about her too) 

and yeeeeeeeeeee thats my PJO oc Elysia Melina!!

@phantommoonpeople 

@kid-crashed

@demidorks (im sorry if im bothering you by tagging you youre one of the pjo blogs I follow and one of my favorites)

[thehardkandy]

As someone who genuinely wants to help people in her life, I feel like... so offended by the part of the self-help industry I’ve seen. I ended up just going on this rant to someone, but the long and the short of it (again, that I’ve seen through b’s fiance) is that it’s basically a decentralized MLM with people saying  "look, ive pulled myself up by my bootstraps and become successful by telling other people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and becoming successful, so you can too!!!"

and it’s so full of just shitty messages of, “if you want to be happy, you have to be happy, otherwise you’ll just want to be happy!!” and I type that out, and I’m not shitting you that IS almost 1:1 summary of a chapter I heard in the book playing at home yesterday.

It makes me so fucking mad. Like you have power and control over your life--to a degree. The point of failure, though, is that none of these tools are actually helpful to the people who most need them. It just makes the people who do, but want to believe that, well, believing is enough get shit on again and again and again because they’re just like, “wow I’m not happy yet so I must just not want it!”

I don’t think you can genuinely help someone with books like that. It’s like using a supermarket PA system to say, “if you want your groceries, you just have to find them in the aisles” and pretending that’s adding any fucking value. Like, yeah! You’re right! But you’re not helping anyone find the stuff, especially not their specific needs.

I want to help people in a meaningful way. That means imagining people as being selfish in the in the most positive way possible. That means finding the language they want to speak with. That means hoping they’ll outgrow me and anything I can offer. That means not just finding what questions they need to be asking about their life, but helping them find appropriate answers.

I don’t even think I can quite put into words what I want to be giving to people, but it’s just a sort of... excitement and thrill in selfishness. A development of your internal motivations. An understanding of what it means to ground yourself so that even when you’re completely stranded, you’ve still got something to define yourself by.

I used to be so cynical, believing that people only want to help themselves. But now I revel in that, because I’ve noticed something amazing--when you’ve been situated in the right way, being selfish won’t just bring yourself joy, it will bring joy to the people around you. Do you ever smile to see the passion someone brings to a project you don’t even understand? Have you ever seen the loving look of a friend or partner when you’ve gone off the rails talking about something you love? 

That’s what I want for everyone--the space to feel and to see those passions. If you don’t know what passion is, I want to help you find it. If you don’t yet have someone who gives you that smile, I want to be the first to do so so that you can see how good it feels to bring out the mutual joy of your selfish desires. 

Compromises and rewordings are necessary to communicate your selfish desires in the right way to the world, but again, that’s what I want to help people do. Compromise doesn’t mean watering down what you love. It means marrying what your obscurity to a more common love you still share. That’s super fucking hard! But it is possible.

Anyway, that was a long, incoherent wall that probably makes absolutely no sense, but I felt the need to say it. I just think people deserve so much more than bullshit canned advice that boils down to, “you get what you deserve.”

No, you don’t get what you deserve. You get what you get, and sometimes all you can do is wait around until what you get is what you want. In the meantime, you build yourself and your language to communicate yourself, and I wanna be able to help people do that, man.

So I guess I’ll summarize my point in this way: I want to give people the language that defines themselves. It’s taken me so many years to find mine, and I would do anything to pass on what it feels like to manage that to others.

[meliecho]

The 1K - an original sci-fi story

The 1K

by Meliecho

Story Summary:

1,000 children between the ages of 6-18 are abducted from Earth mere hours before the turn of the 21st century, and scattered across the galaxy in order to preserve their lives, their planet, and a precious hope the galaxy so severely needs. William Kade and Terra Kitridge are two of these children. This is their story, and the story of how they are used to further a last-ditch plan of desperation to end a 2,000 year war between the two major galactic powers.

Chapter 1

chapter summary: 

William Kade always dreamed of traveling to space. However, his and 999 other kids's lives are changed dramatically when an unknown alien race kidnaps them hours before the turn of the 21st century.

Chapter 1

December 18th, 1999. Ohio. Earth…

The chunky television in the living room played a news report through the old farmhouse.

“What’s out there? No one really knows. Man has speculated for centuries, mapped our star system, named the planets, and created gods in order to explain the vastness surrounding our blue world.”

Will watched from the round dinner table through the archway between the rooms. He shoveled a spoonful of Mac and Cheese into his mouth, barely registering the fact that it was food and not just a simple motion. The ten-year-old’s attention rested solely on the screen. His big brown eyes took in every frame.

“We look up at the stars, we listen to Carl Sagan’s speak of the cosmos, and study Stephen Hawking’s discoveries. We dream about what we might encounter among the billions of stars burning in the heavens, and we send satellites into orbit and beyond to be our eyes and ears into the unknown. The Hubble telescope has already shown us incredible images we would never have otherwise witnessed. Why? Because we are earthbound. But although we are young, we are curious and brave. In the words of Carl Sagan, ‘We wish to pursue the truth no matter where it leads. But to find the truth, we need imagination and skepticism both. We will not be afraid to speculate, but we will be careful to distinguish speculation from fact.’

“That is what drives the path-finding team of scientists and engineers at NASA. With the invention of the new Solar Nexus - a net of satellites in high orbit maintained by the International Space Station--, we can harness energy from our sun to power the world’s first inter-system ship. This ship will be capable of transporting not only goods and machinery to our closest neighbor, Mars, but transporting people, and someday, be the vessel that leads us into a new age of a lunar colony and life among the stars.

“The prototype --the Nova Star-- will be open to the public at Cape Canaveral for only one day. Scientists, astronomers, and space enthusiasts from all over the world will gather to get an up-close-and-personal look...at the future of mankind.

“Join us on New Years Eve for a live broadcast as we take you on a tour of Earth’s first inter-system vessel, and usher in the new millennium--”

The picture winked out.

“Dad,” Will whined, “I was watching that.”

“It’s daydreams and nonsense,” his father flicked the paper, folded it, and rested it by his own plate.

“It’s cool! We can have a space ship! We can explore the galaxy and be like Indiana Jones, but in space!”

“Indiana Jones fought Nazis. Not aliens,” his father countered.

“We don’t know that. Those face-melting angels were probably aliens. They went after the Nazis all like, ‘Rawr!’ And they were all like, ‘wuuaaah! Blaarrrgg!’” Will dragged his fingers down his face, making guttural sounds and pretending to melt into a puddle of goo.

“No face melting at the table,” his mother chided gently. “It’s hard to get out of the carpet.”

Will stopped the dramatics of a grim death-by-ancient-relic, and went back to eating. “Can we watch it on New Years Eve?”

“We always watch Dick Clark. It’s a tradition.”

“Yeah, but,” Will’s voice huffed with the blandness of repetition, “this is cooler than an old man! It’s space! Please, dad?”

“Charlie, let’s watch it,” his mother nudged her husband in the side. “Even if the space ship doesn’t work out, I have to admit it is pretty neat. Like when Kirk landed the Enterprise in the middle of San Francisco.”

Charlie rolled his eyes. He knew his wife was a sci-fi nerd, but he’d hoped she’d at least settle down some after Will was born. Thanks to her, he now knows most of the script to Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, and Star Wars IV, V, and VI.

“See? Mom gets it,” the young boy gave a cocky smile in victory. “Oh! I forgot. Last night, I picked up that weird signal again over the radio.”

“I listened to it once already. It’s white noise.” Charlie said.

“No it’s not! There’s a weird blippy pattern to it.” Will spoke around a mouthful of macaroni and cheese. “Noise is all ‘kkkrrrrr!’ This was all ‘kkkrr beep boop bleep!’ and something that sounds like a million people talking at once. I read that stars emit radio waves. Maybe this was--”

“Noise.”

“It wasn’t noise!”

“I was a member of the US Signal Corp for 20 years. When I gave you my old CB radio, I wanted you to learn how to navigate the airwaves. Not keep your head in the clouds.” He picked up the paper. “Besides. If it’s that important, the boys at NASA probably already picked it up. If it’s something of serious importance, I’d have gotten a call.”

“You were their best decoder, dad. Can you listen to it again? Please?”

“Leave it alone, Will.”

Will reached over for the remote, but his dad smacked his hand away with the paper. He grumbled, pouted, and said, “Whatever. Not like you’d believe me anyway.”

“Will,” his mother scolded.

Charlie leaned forward. “Repeat yourself, son. I don’t think I heard that,” but by his tone, the muffled slight clearly reached him.

Will glanced up to his dad, but kept his mouth shut.

Charlie reclined back in the chair again. “That’s what I thought. Go to your room.”

Will’s jaw dropped. “But--”

“Now!”

Silenced, Will slammed the spoon against the plate. The chair scratched against the old cube-print linoleum floor as his feet thundered up the stairs. The sound of his bedroom door slamming against its frame echoed downstairs.

Molly sighed. “Every time. Why can’t you two get along?”

“We have to fix the problems here on the ground before we go looking for problems out there,” Charlie’s face softened. “He needs to understand that. If we can’t fix ourselves, we can’t go anywhere.”

“It’s because NASA built the ship, isn’t it,” she uttered softly, knowing full well she was treading on emotional hot coals. “It’s been three years. When are you going to let this go?”

“Hughs is an idiot if he thinks this will work. He doesn’t see the big picture. He never did.” Charlie dropped the paper onto the round kitchen table -- signaling that the conversation was over --, picked up the remote, and moved to the living room recliner to watch a football game.

Molly picked up her son’s half-finished dinner. “Maybe letting him dream is a way to fix ourselves.” She covered his plate in plastic wrap and stuck it in the refrigerator. Her son could down twice this much food in one sitting. He would be hungry later.

* * * *

Will turned on his small t.v., picked up his SNES controller, and dropped cross-legged on the floor surrounded by dirty clothes strewn across the rug. The sounds of Super Mario World covered the silence. Snow drifted lazily to the ground outside the window, so he couldn’t go lay out on a blanket in the backyard like he usually would and get lost staring up at the stars. Well, he could, but he didn’t want to get pneumonia before Christmas.

He abandoned Blue Yoshi at the Star Road bonus level and shut off the game. Curious and a little bored, he turned on the old military radio and worked the dials carefully. He listened through monitor headphones too big for his head for a half hour before finally tossing them onto his desk in frustration. Nothing. Maybe his dad was right. Maybe it was just noise.

----

December 31st, 1999. New Years Eve…

Y2K theories had circulated for years. No one knew where it started, but the concept that the Earth’s fledgling internet, and every digital system on the planet would shut down frightened some enough into preparing for Dooms Day. Most people shrugged it off and went about their lives. Others feared the global shut down would set off every nuclear weapon on the planet, wiping out humanity. But everyone knew that instant ramen manufacturers had never seen a greater profit rise in the entirety of their companies’ existence.

Will didn’t buy into any of that, no matter how much the old people in their small town ranted about the end of days. He was sure the clocks would just turn over, and that would be it. He and his mother had gone to the local market to pick up a few groceries, but found that the apocalypse preppers had bought all the milk, most of the meat, a ton of non perishable goods, and first aid.

Frustrated, she purchased what she could, and made the trip in their SUV to the next town. Fortunately, they fared a little better. They enjoyed lunch at a local Denny’s, and made it home to have an uneventful night

That is, until 11pm rolled around.

Will was over the back of the couch in seconds, and had the t.v. tuned into the news. The reporter had just started going on about the details of the Nova Star. Will was entranced. He was so excited, he’d put on his long sleeved black henley with a small NASA logo to feel like he was part of it. “This is awesome! Hey, dad, aren’t those the guys you worked with?”

“Some of them. There’s some new faces.” Charlie put on his jacket and went to the backyard to chop wood. He’d tried to let his son enjoy this, but he didn’t want to have anything to do with the Nova Star project anymore, not even watching them parade their work to the media.

Molly sat next to her son with a bowl of popcorn. Will didn’t hesitate to take a massive handful and shove it into his mouth as he watched the tour of the Nova Star begin.

With everything that her only child held an interest in --video games, computers, that old radio-- they had their shared love of space, and Indiana Jones.

The media crew had lead their viewers through the cockpit and down to the living quarters of the ship, showing off all of the exciting wonders of the newest space-faring technology when all the lights in the house went out. It plunged the remote homestead into darkness.

The shock of sudden darkness sent fear spearing up Will’s spine. He knocked over the popcorn bowl and curled up around a pillow.

“Molly? Everything all right?” Charlie called in through the back door.

“We’re fine!” Molly called back.

“I’m checking the fuse box. Bring a light!”

“I’ll be right there!” She brushed her hand over Will’s hair. “It’s ok, Will, it’s just a power outage. Probably a tree branch took out a power line. It happens in winter.” She knew that even though he could pick up almost any insect, amphibian, and fearlessly explore the areas around their house, the only thing that would terrify him was complete and absolute darkness.

She felt her way to the kitchen to get a spare flashlight out of the junk drawer and handed it to him. He turned it on.

“Guard the house, Indiana. I’ll be right back.” Molly ruffled his dark hair and got a second flashlight and her coat from the entryway closet. She went out back to help her husband check the fuse box.

Molly held the flashlight as her husband flicked all the switches.

“Well, the fuses check out. There’s just no power,” Charlie threw each switch again for good measure.

“I was right. It was probably a downed tree.” She turned off the light and walked out to the backyard. She folded her arms tightly around her middle for warmth. Without the convection layer of clouds, it made being outside that much colder.

Charlie put his arm around her. “So much for New Years Eve; Dick Clark, spaceships, or otherwise.”

Her eyes rested on the arm of the Milky Way galaxy draping through the center of the clear night sky. “You know, without all the lights, it’s really beautiful.”

Charlie exhaled. “Yeah.”

“What arm are we in again?”

“The Orion-Cygnus arm. We’re not facing the core of the galaxy right now, but we will in summer.”

“Will comes out here, you know. He’ll sit out here and just stare.”

“Mmhmm. You used to do that as a kid, too. He gets his love of space from you.”

“No,” she shook her head. “He gets his love of nerd stuff from me. He gets his sense of adventure from you.”

He chuckled at that. “A hell of a combination.”

“Well, look who he’s combined from,” she smirked.

He chuckled at that.

“Maybe the new century is a good time to start a new resolution. Start off small. Who knows what he can do if we let him.”

“Molly…”

“He’s smart, Charlie. Work with him. Take him to NASA. If you want him to see the world that you think needs fixing, then show him. He might be the one to fix it, but he needs you. As smart as he is, he can’t do it alone.” She brushed her hand down his face, feeling the stubble of facial hair beneath her palm. “None of us can.”

Charlie grumbled. NASA’s headquarters wasn’t a place for kids, but she was right. It was part of the real world, and Will needed to see it. “Fine. I’ll take him after the holidays. But if anybody asks, this was your idea.”

She smiled and leaned in closely. “I’ll take full responsibility.”

He couldn’t help but kiss her and run his fingers through her long black hair. That gentle smile always warmed his heart.

The two stared up at the sky for a moment before she shivered and nudged her husband to head back.

A pulse of red light struck them in the back, and Charlie and Molly fell to the snow.

* * * *

Will scooted off the couch, keeping a vice grip on the flashlight. This was his home -- he’d lived here since birth -- but in the darkness, it felt like he’d entered another realm.

The house creaked around him. He spun, looking for whatever made that sound, then shook his head. “Get a grip, you dumb dork.”

A light static and crackle split the deathly silence. He aimed his flashlight at the stairs and swallowed. That sounded like his radio. He should check it out. Indiana Jones wouldn’t run away.

Will’s feet didn’t move for a good ten seconds.

Stealing his resolve, he went upstairs to his room.

The green light of the radio exuded a dull, eerie glow throughout the room. What scared him more were the sounds coming from the radio itself. Without power, the light shouldn’t be on, let alone the radio receiving a signal. His heart pounding with fear, but his curiosity overpowering it, he turned the knob to clarify the signal. The electronic beeps were still present, but were more like morse code than before. He could pick out different letters, enough to hear ‘246. Kade,’ but any speech in the background remained unfamiliar syllables and plosives.

Kade... That was his last name, but what did 246 mean? Someone out there was using morse code and talking about them for some reason. He had to tell his dad. This was definitely not noise.

Abandoning his fear, Will hurried downstairs, put on his winter coat and boots, and rushed outside into the cold snow. His warm breath clouded in the air. “Dad! You gotta hear this! Dad!” He ran around to the back of the house to the fuse box. “Dad? Mom?” They were gone. No one was there. Will shone his flashlight on the ground. The melted snow beneath the overhang protecting that part of the house showed their footprints walking away.

He peaked around the corner. “Mom?”

His parents lay on their backs with their eyes open.

“Mom! Dad!” Will hurried as fast as his small legs could carry him to the middle of the large yard. He dropped at his father’s side. “Dad! Are you ok?! Mom!”

Neither moved, but light puffs of warm air escaped their mouths. They were alive, just paralyzed. Charlie’s mouth moved slightly. “Run,” he whispered.

“Dad, no!” Will pulled on his father’s hand to try to pull him to his feet.

Charlie’s hand trembled as he fought the bind. Molly twitched beside him, fighting her own battle.

A glaring light lit up the wintery yard, blinding him. Will covered his eyes and stumbled back. He blinked upward as enormous lights shown down on their position.

“Run!” Charlie screamed.

Will instantly took off across the yard. A red pulse hit the snow at his right, forcing him to dodge in an arch. He evaded one more hit to his left, but the third landed its mark. Will’s entire body froze. He struggled to move even a finger, but it had him completely paralyzed.

A rush of warm air blasted the snow into swirls of white clouds around them. Will faced the lights from a craft larger than his house as a long ramp lowered and a single individual descended it quickly. It looked like a man in a dark armored uniform, but his face was covered by a protective mask with orange tinted eyewear.

Will’s heart threatened to explode from his chest as he breathed rapidly in fear.

The man passed a scanner over Will’s wide brown eyes, then spoke. The language mirrored that of the transmission Will had received off and on for the past few weeks.

A sharp pain pricked in the soft space behind his right ear. Will let out a small squeak of surprise. He felt a tingle brush through his mind like someone had taken a feather and gently swiped it all over his brain. The sensation died seconds later.

The man said something to him.

Will couldn’t think straight.

Irritated, the man rolled his eyes, grumbled, and then said it again, more impatiently.

Will’s eyes shifted to stare at his mother and father fighting the paralysis.

The man said something else in frustration then gave up and picked him up.

Will wanted to fight, but his body refused to obey him. He watched his parents helplessly as he was carried up the ramp. The panic built, and he did the only thing his body would allow: he let out a terrified, wordless scream. The ramp closed, shutting his parents and home out of sight.

The ship’s atmospheric thrusters sent more snow clouds billowing through the air as it rose above the trees, pivoted, and disappeared across the sky.

All of this took no more than two minutes.

Molly and Charlie were left alone in the winter stillness of their yard. They could move enough to grip each other’s hands as the bind gradually wore off, but remained in the cold staring at the empty sky.

The power returned ten minutes later.

They continued to lay there even as the news switched over to the countdown.

“...5...4...3...2...1…”

A hot tear streaked down Molly’s face to drip into the snow. “HAPPY NEW YEAR!”

* * * *

tbc

* * * *

((I really wish I could translate what the alien said as he carried Will into the ship, but it would break the mood. The alien said, “246 Acquired. Let’s go. It’s colder than tits out here.”))

[spidey-d00d]

Sober Pt. 2

Words; 1670

Warnings;  Reader has an addiction, Detox

A/N; Here is the long awaited pt. 2 of Sober. Sorry for saying it was going to be out the other day, I started procrastinating and then 4th of July and then more procrastination. 

[NOT MY GIF]

Hours turned into days, and days into weeks. You were about to hit a month on the streets. You had scored more Oxy, but you were almost out of money to get food. Right about now, it was either a meal or a few more pills, and you were leaning towards the pills a lot more than feeding yourself.

You didn’t have anyone else to live for anyways. The people that took you in for 7 years don’t want you near them anymore. They think you are a loss cause. They think there isn’t any hope for you, which there isn’t. You are drowning yourself in pills, who would want to be near that.

You looked out on the lively streets of Queens, New York. You had walked all the way from the upstate facility, down to the place you had been multiple times to get Peter Parker for Tony. You weren’t here seeking Peter this time though, you were just passing through. You didn’t have a certain place in mind, but all you knew is that it was going to be out of New York.

The world seemed to work without you. You never doubted that it wouldn’t, but it was so fascinating that no one seemed to know that you weren’t going to be part of the society anymore. Standing up from you sitting position, you fixed the backpack that you had been carrying everyday for weeks, and started walking again.

You stopped by a little corner shop to grab a water bottle, and then turned down a small alleyway. Pulling out the small clear baggy full of the small pills, you grabbed 3 and swallowed them without an issue.

You were already on a high, but you needed more. You didn’t know why, but the craving was too strong to ignore. You started getting a little dizzy after walking a few feet down the crowded street, but you chose to ignore it. ‘It should be gone soon.’ You told yourself. You walked a little more, trying to shake off the weird feeling that you had, but you couldn’t. It wasn’t going away, and soon it got worse. You lost your balance, heard a lot of voices, and then passed out on the hard, hot concrete of Queens.

The smell of chemicals and the sound of sneakers squeaking against tile filled your senses. You were blinded by a bright light bouncing off of the off white walls. Squinting and rubbing your eyes, you looked down at your body that was laying down, but not on the the concrete, in a bed, and you were in an ugly hospital gown with a bunch of tubes and wires hanging off of you.

You went to go and sit up, but you were too weak to even pick your arm off of the bed. You felt like your body was sitting in a fire, but it also hurt so bad. You also had a killer headache that was amplified when the sound of a door opening and closing very loudly, followed by 2 loud voices came into earshot.

You groaned in pain that was radiating off of your head and shooting pain to the rest of your body. You hadn’t had the chance to identify the people because you were more preoccupied with how much pain you were in.

After a few minutes of you letting the pain settle down, you open yo eyes to be met with 2 sets of eyes that had a lot of eyes that had a lot of emotions running threw them, but the most prominent ones were Hurt, Anger, and confusion.

You couldn’t look into them anymore because it was making you feel like a failure or a disappointment, so you looked down at your hands.

“Wh-Why-Whe-” Tony started trying to ask a bunch of questions at one but he was just confusing himself and everyone around him.

“Okay, that is enough of that.” Steve said sighing and turning back to you.

“What he is trying to ask is why did you leave and where did you go?” He said, with a stone face, something he did when he was either beyond pissed or he was thinking, and right now, you knew it was the 1st option.

You just ignored them in hopes that they would leave you alone and not question you anymore.

“Y/N, why the hell did you leave?” He asked in a more stern voice than before.

“Because you didn’t need someone who can’t get through a death without popping pills! Death comes with that job, and I can’t do it! You didn’t know what to do with me or how to help me, and when you 3 don’t know what to do, it’s a loss cause, there is no fixing it. There is no fixing me.” You started out yelling but finally simmered down towards the end.

They just stared at you in shock. They had no idea what to say or what to do. Tony was looking at you like he does with a project he is working on and he is trying to figure out what to do with it, and Steve's’ face had softened a bit, but not by much.

“We told you that we would never kick you out. Yeah, we didn’t know what to do, but that was because we felt like you didn’t want our help. You isolated yourself from the world and your family. You didn’t tell anyone until days after, and then you up and fucking left. We have looked for you everyday for the past 3 and a half weeks, so don’t say we didn’t want you.” Tony piped up in his dad voice he only used for when you and Peter got in trouble for touching or doing something you weren’t supposed to.

You still didn’t look up. You felt like your body was on fire, and you were putting things together and figured out that you were in the middle of a detox, the worst part about the drug.

“Can you answer me on why you thought we didn’t want you?” Tony said softly, totally condredicting his little rant he went on just a few seconds ago.

You stayed silent for a little while, thinking on what to say, trying to formulate a response in your head before saying anything. “Because I am an issue. I can’t get through a death without resorting to my old ways. I just wanted to be perfect like the rest of you, but I ended up back at square one, 7 years of sobriety down the drain.” You whispered, your tears starting to build up.

“None of us are perfect and you know it. Everyone of us have our flaws, and we all have our own way of coping with death. Yeah, we have all been through a death of a loved one, we know the pain, but the thing that you and Loki had was so strong, that I wouldn’t be suprised if it took you 10 years to grieve.” Tony said, setting his hand on your covered leg, in a soothing way.

Steve was just staring at you with his blank face, and his arms crossed, like he was deep in a thought.

“I just want to get better T.” You finally let the dam break and the tears started flowing.

“I know kiddo.” He smiled weakly, “I know.”

“Can we just go home please? I promise I will try and get better. I just want to go home.” You hung your head low.

“I think we can arrange something.” He nodded his head towards Steve.

“Yeah, I will get the doctor to sign the discharge papers so we can get you to Bruce.” He said smally, and walked out of the room leaving you and Tony alone.

“Does he hate me?” You asked, not having to say who ‘he’ was because there was only one other person you could be talking about.

“I don’t think he hates you, just is worried about you. You are like his little sister and then you disappeared so..” He trailed off. You just nodded and the room was left silent.

.

About an hour after that last conversation, you were allowed to leave to go under Bruce’s care, which might have been worse than being in the hospital, but at least you were home.

They had you on house arrest, and F.R.I.D.A.Y. Watching you constantly, besides when you were changing of course. You weren’t allowed to be alone anymore. You got where they were coming from,, but you also felt bad that they had to worry about you this much. It made you feel even more guilty about everything that you put them through.

You had finally gotten out of the sick stages of the detox, but now you were in the craving stages. It hurt so much not to have the drug in your system, not having it there to dull the pain inside of you.

You spent some of your nights crying so much that it woke Steve up and he came into your room to hold you and calm you down. Besides that, you guys didn’t talk that much. You could feel the disappointment radiating off of him from miles away.

Bruce had put you on many IV drips to keep you hydrated seen as you refused to drink anything. He also had you bed bound for a few days, but even when you were told you were allowed out of bed, you stayed there because you couldn’t handle the stares from the rest of the team.

They all had returned back to the compound about 3 days after you left, and they had the same looks as Steve did. You couldn’t stand yourself anymore because you made them hate you now and you didn’t know how to fix it. You made a huge mess in your mind and in your life and it was just a cluster fuck to clean up.

[feynavaley]

What really bothers me about the way we as italians approach writing is that we don't forgive any type of errors. No matter how small or big they are, they are unforgivable. Also repeating any world more than one (1) time in a sentence is considered an error (sometimes is also considered inappropriate to use the same word twice in two near sentences too) or so my teacher taught me. English writing is far more permitting in this regard

I see what you mean here, but I actually have conflicting feelings about this.

I mean… I understand a couple of typos if you’re writing something like a fic, without an editor or anything, I would personally point them out so the writer could correct them but I wouldn’t think any less of their writing because of that. When it comes to professional writing, however… yikes. I agree that professional writing should be completely free of mistakes – also because it’s not that hard, in Italian. As I’ve said, I haven’t seen a red strike for a grammar mistake in my schoolwork since I was 11 (first year of middle school). So, it’s perfectly doable, if you just pay a bit of attention.

But, the problem here actually resides in our school system, because nowadays, everybody is more focused on being innovative than actually teaching,  otherwise, the children will be bored. The thing is – studying grammar is a boring and tedious work, and it also requires some effort from the child, but it’s fundamental, in my opinion. However, in the last few years requiring any kind of hard work from children (and students in general) has become almost a taboo, you cannot even flunk children anymore, no matter their grades and how much they did or didn’t apply themselves, and this has ended up truly lowering the instruction level in general, that used to be excellent in Italy, and in particular, people’s usage of grammar. (of course, this isn’t so black and white, it’s actually a nuanced issue as you have to take into account different kind of special needs children – but, believe me when I say that Italy truly went overboard with this. My mother is a teacher and my father has some teaching hours as well, I know what I’m talking about.) Anyway, the conclusion of this rant is: I don’t think that Italians are too stuck-up with grammar, I think that this is the right approach – however, you have to give people the right instruments to properly learn grammar, which is getting more and more uncommon, and you also have to tailor your approach to the context – an internet forum is completely different from a professional setting. But, if you’re talking about school, I think that teachers are right in not tolerating even a single mistake as their job is to teach you to write using correct Italian – and this includes grammar, too.

Back to your question, you’re actually conflating two different issues here: grammar and style. While grammar is completely objective, the style is more of a grey area, and there are probably some people who are too rigid about it. However, the example you mentioned is actually quite a fair advice, in general? Of course, it depends on the specific context, but, as far as I know, repeating the same word within a single sentence is frowned upon in English, as well? At least, it sounds quite awkward, unless it’s a specific stylistic choice, but you can usually recognize it when it is.

Anyway, I’m not sure if English is actually more permissive in general (spelling aside, that, as I’ve already mentioned, is a different issue as it’s much harder than the Italian spelling) or if the general level is simply lower than it is in Italian. And honestly, if it were the second case, I’m not really sure that I would call it positive…

[bronzeflower]

Who The Fuck Writes A Ten-Page Rant?????

Chapter 12: Two Future Visits???

Also on ao3

-- apocalypseArisen [AA] began trolling turntechGodhead [TG] --

AA: dave!!! AA: youll never guess what just happened!!!

TG: yo ara lay it on me TG: if you say ill never guess then i guess ill never guess but youve piqued my curiosity here and ive absolutely got to know what you want to tell me TG: although presumably youre going to tell me regardless of whether or not i actually guess

AA: you would be correct

TG: ara im dying TG: i need to know this sweet ass thing that just happened TG: i might die if i dont find out soon TG: there i go TG: on my deathbed TG: struggling for breath and doing my goddamn best to make words come out of my mouth TG: and you of all people know exactly how much i talk TG: holy shit that last moment at my death i can barely speak TG: but i manage it just enough to say my last words TG: put a whoopie cushion on dirks seat at my funeral TG: everyones in tears TG: the most perfect last words

AA: alright! ill tell you!!! AA: sollux proposed to me!!!

TG: holy shit!!! TG: thats fantastic!!!! TG: what do people do when someone proposes TG: do we celebrate TG: should we celebrate TG: that certainly seems like something worth celebrating TG: should we have a party TG: just TG: holy fuck TG: when did he propose how did he propose TG: lay all the deets on me

AA: so remember when i told you he had something he was working on that he couldnt show me because it was a surprise for me AA: it turns out that it was a video game AA: it was really cute and sweet and it was a game about finding fossils AA: it was at the very end when the fossils spelled out will you marry me AA: and thats how sollux proposed to me!

TG: thats absolutely adorable oh my god TG: i dont think i can handle this cuteness TG: satisfaction may have brought me back the the cuteness killed me again

AA: dave! AA: you cant die yet!

TG: well i wasnt planning on dying quite yet because i still have shit to do TG: and if i died i would start wandering the world as a ghost because i had unfinished business TG: youll have to burn my body TG: or put it in a museum TG: that would be kick ass TG: thats where i want my bones to be when i die TG: ill make a museum and then all the little kids will be able to see the creators bones scattered about in a glass case TG: it will even have my shades on my skull TG: and the kids will go TG: woah thats one sick ass skull what a cool dude

AA: the coolest AA: but i wanted to tell you that im coming into town for the wedding! AA: im going to take some time off of work so that i can have a proper wedding with all my friends and stuff

TG: !!!! TG: holy shit!!!!! TG: what are we going to die i have no idea TG: i just i havent seen you in person in so fucking long TG: oh my god TG: aradia im so excited holy shit!!!!

AA: im also very excited!!! AA: however the wedding is going to take a while to plan and i will still be working during that time so im not coming for a few months AA: i just wanted to tell you that i will be there eventually

TG: i honestly cant wait

AA: i cant wait either AA: i do have to go now AA: afterall my work is never done AA: i will troll you when i have some free time <>

TG: sounds great <>

-- apocalypseArisen [AA] ceased trolling turntechGodhead [TG] --

You wonder who you gush to first about the news.

-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT] --

TG: rose rose rose rose rose rose rose TG: guess what

TT: Did you perhaps learn how to use punctuation?

TG: no and your girlfriend didnt either

TT: That’s cold, Dave. That’s really cold. TT: But, please, do tell this secret that you have been withholding from me for so long.

TG: aras gettin married to sollux!!!! TG: isnt that fucking some fucking fantastic shit TG: like holy shit my moirail is getting married

TT: Your moirail?

TG: its a recent development TG: anyway shes getting married and shes coming to town in a few months and rose TG: rose TG: im so fucking excited rose like holy shit TG: i havent seen ara in ages and now shes getting married TG: im just so fucking happy for her

TT: I’m happy for her as well. TT: Please, tell her congratulations for me. TT: Who’s she getting married to?

TG: shes getting married to her boyfriend of like five years i think TG: i know theyve been dating for a while but i dont really know exactly how long who knows TG: but his name is sollux and i dont really know much about him outside what aras told me but he seems like a pretty cool dude TG: and i trust her judgement anyways

TT: Be sure to give her my congratulations.

TG: ill be sure to do that TG: now if youll excuse me im gonna tell literally everyone about this

-- turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT] --

-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gardenGnostic [GG] --

TG: jade youll never guess

GG: im going to take a wild guess and say that someones getting married!

TG: holy shit i guess you did guess TG: never mind then

GG: no! GG: dont go! GG: i dont know the details yet!

TG: well if you insist TG: shes getting married to sollux who ive never actually met but he seems like a pretty cool dude from what ive heard from him TG: and shes coming to town in the next few months after planning the wedding and finishing up the job she has right now TG: and so well get to see her!!!! TG: jade ill get to see aradia!!! TG: holy shit you might actually become friends!!!

GG: !!!! GG: i cant wait!!!!!!

TG: anyway ive got to relay the news to john now TG: hes the last to know

GG: i wont spoil the surprise for him GG: but if you wait to too long rose might!

TG: oh shit youre absolutely right TG: i gots to go TG: be sure to tell me about those cars youre working on later k cause they seem cool as shit

GG: will do!

-- turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering gardenGnostic [GG] --

-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering ectoBiologist [EB] --

TG: john TG: john TG: john TG: hey there johnny boy

EB: i’ll listen to whatever you have to say, dave, but you have to promise to never call me “johnny boy” ever again.

TG: alright alright i promise TG: but i also promise that what im going to tell you is going to blow your fucking mind

EB: try me.

TG: aras getting married!!!

EB: what! EB: holy shit, dude! EB: god, i haven’t even talked to her in such a long time. EB: and now i’m hearing that she’s getting married? EB: just, wow.

TG: yeah i know right TG: shits groovy

EB: did you really just use the word “groovy” in a completely unironic context, dave?

TG: yes TG: ive moved passed liking things ironically egbert TG: you got to enjoy things as they come and let no one shame you for liking them

EB: that’s some solid advice, my dude

TG: anytime

-- turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering ectoBiologist [EB] --

Welp, you’ve messaged your main best friends about the wedding, and you’ve mostly got the excitement out of your system, at least until Aradia gives you more details about the planning of her wedding, and you're also going to assume that Aradia is going to message her other friends about the wedding.

Might as well do some work, and, by that, you mean it’s time to review some stuff that you may or may not have been procrastinating reviewing. But it’s time to take action! Make yourself a better person and stuff like that. One destruction of the thing you’re supposed to be doing at a time.

“Now, everyone wants to know how well these nail polishes work, and I am clearly the person to go to if you want to know about nail polishes because I paint my nails all the time, which you would see if you’ve watched my other videos.”

You make a mental note to put photos of your clearly not painted nails over the screen during the editing process.

You first start out doing what you always do in your videos, which is describe the object you’re reviewing in great detail.

“Okay, so this nail polish is kind of liquidy, like all nail polishes I’ve seen are, and this one that I’m holding is a blue one. Like, a blue that’s one of the prettiest blues you’ve ever seen, like the feeling when it’s slightly rainy outside, and you’ve got all your work done, so you’re just sitting there, listening to the soft rain, holding your favorite warm beverage and a feeling of calm washes over you, and everything is okay. You know. Like that.”

You turn the nail polish bottle around to see what else you could describe.

“There also seems to be bits of glitter hanging around in there. They look silvery like the sound of rain. Or the sound of a coin clanking against the ground. Mmmm, no, that would be a gold color, so let’s stick with the sound of rain.”

You then describe the bottle the nail polish is in, including what the font looks like and the color of the lid (white).

“I do have these other colors that came in the set, so I have a total of five. One for each finger. All of them have the same silver glitter as the blue one so that you know that they are from the same set or brand or whatever.

“The other colors are green, red, pink, and orange. Honestly, they could have gone for the complete rainbow, but they didn’t because they’re cowards. Where’s my yellow? My purple? With the colors they gave me, I can’t do the full gay rainbow. How are people supposed to know how bi I am without purple?

“Anyway, let’s get to describing each of these colors. This green- like a grassy meadow. It’s the smell of flowers, but then you sneeze because you’re allergic to pollen.” You pick up the green polish and hold it up so the viewers could see it. Then you put down the green polish to pick up the red one.

“The red is firey, and it’s probably my favorite out of these colors. It looks like someone shouting encouraging words at you but in an aggressive way, so you’re not really sure if they’re insulting you or not. Spoilers, they’re insulting you while telling you how much they love you because they can’t let anybody know they’re emotionally vulnerable.”

You then pick up the pink nail polish.

“And the pink- prettiest fucking pink you’ll ever see. Like a song that makes your heart thump and burn from thinking about the one you love, you know? Kind of also makes me think of cookies. Like, sugar cookies, especially the ones shaped like hearts. It’s a very lovey-dovey sort of color.”

And then, at long last, you pick up the orange polish and gazed at it.

“And, finally, we have this orange polish. Now, it looks exactly like an orange smells like. Or like salty orange juice. Why would you put salt in your orange juice? A prank? That’s the only conceivable reason I can think of, but I’m not here to judge people for their eating or drinking habits. But, now that we’ve looked carefully at all these polishes, it’s time to actually get to the painting part.”

You open the orange polish because you were already holding it, and you examine the consistency of the nail polish.

“Yep, that’s nail polish alright. Let’s put that shit on our nails and see what happens.”

You proceed to messily paint your nails. There’s nail polish everywhere. You somehow get nail polish on your face. You have no idea what happened. You look later- there’s nail polish on your foot. You don’t know how it got there.

You do, in fact, manage to paint all your nails, however messy the end result ended up being, so you are proud of yourself for managing to do that much.

After recording the video and making sure you actually recorded all that, you uploaded the footage and decided to edit it later.

After an hour or so of scrolling through mindless memes, you get a message on pesterchum.

-- tipsyGnostalgic [TG] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG] --

TG: guess who the FUCK is comign to town next week TG: *coming TG: that’s right TG: me TG: ur fav sis

TG: oh shit this is fantastic TG: dont tell rose that youre my favorite sister though TG: i would never hear the end of it

TG: ur secret is safe with me TG: *wonk* TG: anyway TG: i was just here to tell you that. TG: dont be a stranger

-- tipsyGnostalgic [TG] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG] --

Holy fucking shit. You can’t believe you got news of some of your favorite people coming to visit in the same day. Granted, they weren’t arriving in the same time period, but still.

You can’t believe Roxy is coming next week!! You are so ready to spend time with Roxy. It’s going to be a blast.

[mistyeyedpea]

I've been feeling so stuck lately.

I ran a fever today, which honestly isn't unusual for me since I get low grade fevers from time to time. My body likes to freak out on me. Because I dont have a ln actual diagnosis for what I go through I feel like it drives me a bit nuts. I tell doctors what I can remember, but honestly I've lived.my whole life thinking most of the things I felt and experienced were normal and doctors are so uninterested, unmotivated and unwilling it makes the mundane task seem so painful. Its even more painful when you tell them for years you have these symptoms and they only write down what they think is necessary enough to explore. The rest is dismissed as being anxious, paranoid, dramatic... its ironic isn't it? How you go to get help and these very people continue to perpetuate the pain and suffering you go through. I wouldn't go down such spirals if I had answers.

The craziest part is when you have been doing research all your life, and having lived experience with chronic physical and mental conditions... but because I appear fine on the outside, to someone who doesn't know a this about me.... to deny me is absurd. I wouldn't designate a label that isn't meant for me, but this ableism in the medic field... it needs to stop. The stigmas need to stop. Doctors need to understand that its okay to not have all the answers. Whats not okay is harming them further by gaslighting, invalidating peoples lived experiences. Where is the compassion?

We as patients, as people, can be highly aware of our issues where as some arent. I happen to be someone who's highly self aware. I observe everything from sensations to what and how I feel... I monitor my own person. I once saw a post that said "having anxiety is being hyperspace of your own existence" and they really hit the nail on the head there. I feel my anxiety stems from be being highly sensitive to what I feel and my surroundings.. I feel anxiety is just a symptom of other conditions...

It drives me crazy that I am only realizing how many signs were missed. How did people not notice? I had to learn to adapt all my life on my own... immersed in it day by day I learned to survive. It hurts me almost everyday. Im learning to let go of this feeling. This feeling that I was a victim of the system that couldn't understand me, rejected me. It made it harder to understand myself throughout the years. But now I understand..

I know that as the years go by and im alive i learn more, and I know that doctors do too.

Despite all I have been through, and still continue to go though, I push through this painful existence hoping one day, ill actually be seen. And that ill be in the hands of a doctor who won't judge me when I tell them my concerns... cause I have many.

I literally stayed up all night the other night cause I couldn't sleep.. trying to remember to document articles of research I find trying to keep them saved on favorites. I often forget how to find the favorites page so I started a notes with the links.

I started doing this in the event a doctor tries to get smart with me... I truly don't have the patience or bandwidth for it anymore. They dont do it in a nice way. They do it in a condescending way. At least the people ive dealt with..

I am a person who was born female so naturally... this is fucking oppressive as is.

I tried talking to my mom about me being Autistic and having adhd, and how im finally accepting it because for years I had "episodes" which i now know, were fucking meltdowns.

I could go on about it, but I dont want to get off topic.

My mother asked me "wow so you finally got diagnosed?"

The last time I went to an Evaluation the man I met with was a total douche who told me I was a hypochondriac had conversion disorder and my anxiety was what was causing everything... He also went off my previous diagnosis and asked me very broad questions about their symptoms to which I replied yes or no... I met with this man for less than 20 minutes and he literally went off my old diagnosis.

He knew nothing about me other than what we talked about and my previous medical records. He made stigmatizing statements when I told him about my body pains and how its possible fibromyalgia, he said he doesnt diagnose women til their thirties.

When I mentioned that I suspect im autistic he basically laughed in my face and told me im not autistic and if I want to see "the autism room" so I can "see" what "autism looks like"

I didn't contact these people back for a long time after that because it took so long to process.... medical gaslighting is real. And gaslighting in itself is insidious as it makes our imposter syndrome so much worse. We question our own existence and realities which attributes to even more mental and physical anguish... psychologically so damaging and these people have no idea.

I think I may have a case with them.. but anyways...

I learned to live in this mind. In this body. In this life to the best of my knowledge and abilities. I have to remind myself its not my fault im chronically overwhelmed or feeling behind. Im coming to terms to the fact that I am disabled. I hate to limit myself, but I have to acknowledge this in order to accept myself and release the internalized abelism.

I have to accept that I never was and never will be like other people and that's okay.

I also need reminder that being diagnosed doesn't make you (autistic). Being (autistic) makes you (autistic).

I put autistic in parentheses because you can literally change it out and tweak it to fit almost any medical condition and it holds true.

Anyways im signing off. I think I've done enough ranting for the night.

Perhaps I'll rant again and plunge deeper. I try to not give to many details but as a neurodivergent person I can't help but go on tangents at times. I'll forget what I thought if I dont write them down, so letting my brain puke words is the best mental exercise I can give myself.

If I do end up seeing a therapist, it makes it alot easier to sort myself.

I have also been trying to orient my mind with art. I try to think of the art I can make .. but when the time comes, im blank. All these ideas for my mind to run into a wall...

Sometimes I wish I had a therapist as a friend.. or a psychiatrist.

It would be good to have someone invested in you the way a friend would ... signing off

[bobert-drake]

ScottWarren ficlet thing in which Warren and Scott discuss the aftermath of a mission gone wrong.

Uhh the ending is a little messy but yeah here we go

—

Scott was five seconds from sleeping when he heard the door to his room creak open. The visitor was humming to himself and made a displeased noise when his shoes squeaked along the tile floor. As they drew closer to his bed, Scott tensed.

A hand was placed on his bicep, and Scott couldn’t bite back the grin that spread across his face when he felt warm breath on his forehead, followed by a pair of soft lips. Long hair tickled his nose. He puckered his lips and blew a puff of air in its direction.

The visitor startled back for a split second before returning to his side. “Awake?” murmured the stranger, gingerly rubbing calloused fingers over Scott’s hand with the IV in it. It was familiar, comforting, and although Scott had known it was Warren as soon as he’d heard the squeaky shoes, it had come as no less of a surprise that he was here with him.

“Mmh,” was the response that Warren received, as well as a gentle head-butt to his arm. “Hey, wanna gimme some water?”

Scott cracked his eyes open to watch as Warren glanced around for a bottle. Locating it, Warren brought it up to his lips and slowly tilted it, letting the cool liquid coat Scott’s parched throat. Afterwards, Warren took his sleeve and wiped the drops from his chin, and after pecking his cheek, sat back in his chair and stared.

He hadn’t let go of his hand.

Scott cleared his throat after a minute - or at least tried to; the painkillers that he’d been doused with made it so that his mouth was constantly dry, but the nurses had warned him that too much water would overload his system. He’d much rather suck down a bottle anyway and face the consequences afterwards, though. Medicine and hospitals freaked him out majorly, and his friends checking up on him every few hours was a welcome distraction, but it only went so far.

He’d been flung through a brick wall during a mission gone awry, and broke three ribs, sprained his wrist, and suffered a minor concussion. Warren had sat with him when the medicine was administered, clutching his hand tightly and whispering reassurances to the younger man. When he’d been forced to leave after hours of keeping a sleeping Scott company, he went, figuratively, kicking and screaming.

His eyes were tinged red like he’d been crying, and Scott knew he had. Warren, though outwardly it may not seem like it, had a big enough heart to serve ten people a lifetime, and his friends took up the majority of the space there; Scott, recently, more so, since they’d begun this cute, flirty, not-dating. It mostly consisted of kisses and hand-holding and cheesy dates and sharing milkshakes, and that was sufficient enough for both.

They’d have to eventually sit down and talk about what exactly they were doing, and where it would leave them in the future. For now, the two were content to pretend like it was nothing serious. It worked. They worked.

“Jean’s coming over later to have dinner with me,” Scott murmured as Warren brushed a lock of hair from his forehead. It would have been imperceptible to anyone who didn’t know him as well as Scott did, but Warren’s soft smile twitched just slightly. “We’re having jello and hospital potatoes.” Warren’s hand came to rest on his stomach.

“Oh?” He was trying to act disinterested. It showed.

Scott hummed and reached up to play with his fingers. “Yeah, yep.” A beat of silence passed before he added, “Y’know, she feels terrible for what happened-“

“Good,” Warren hissed. “She should. You got hurt because she wasn’t paying attention. I told you, she’s too new at this. She hasn’t had enough training to be out in the field.”

Scott waited for Warren to come up for air before sighing loudly. Not this rant again. “It was partly my fault-“

Warren gave his hand a hard squeeze. “No, not your fault. Her fault. Are you sure she’s even really fit for this team-“

“Why can’t you two just get along?” Scott snapped suddenly, surprising both of them. He closed his eyes at the resulting flash of pain in his side. “I feel like it’s always a battle with you guys. She did this, she said this. Come on, babe,” he added softly after a moment.

Warren’s eyes were downcast and the tops of his cheeks were pink when Scott glanced back at him. Deep down, he felt guilty for snapping at him, but presently he just felt sad and confused that his lover (?) and friend were at odds.

A shaky breath was drawn in before Warren spoke. “...I’m just so tired of seeing human-passing X-Men.”

Wow. That simultaneously was everything and nothing that Scott predicted he would say.

The statement wasn’t out of the blue, per se; both knew too well of the acid attacks on a group of street-performing mutants in downtown New York recently, and it was no surprise to learn that every member of the group had some non-human feature. It was events like these that riled Warren up the most.

Jean Grey had been added to the team just a week prior to that. When Warren had seen her at first, he’d hoped that she had some other, secret physical altercation. That she was like him, or Scott.

“No,” she’d responded when he’d asked, with a bright smile that could have rivaled the sun itself. “Just me and my mind stuff.” She’d wiggled her fingers in Scott’s direction, and he’d laughed and retuned her grin. Warren hadn’t laughed. In fact, he’d already aimed for the door and headed upstairs by the time Scott had turned around to introduce them formally.

Scott had looked helplessly back at Jean. “I’m... sorry about that. He’s.. well, uh-“

“Sensitive?” Jean offered with a sad smile.

“Yeah.” Sensitive. Passionate. Angry with the world. “He really is.”

Jean had shrugged and cast a longing glance towards the window, which looked strange and distorted with the rain that had fallen that morning. “That’s good to be, these days. We all need something to help us tough it out, right?”

Scott hadn’t been sure that this was the reason Warren had stalked off, but he’d nodded along anyway, because Jean was right; it helped to be fierce in a world that wanted nothing more than to put you down at every opportunity.

Back in the hospital room, Scott could see the shine in Warren’s eyes when he met them, sliding his hands up Warren’s arms and holding him there.

“I’m so tired of having to hide what I am,” Warren finally choked out, and tightened his grip on Scott’s hospital gown. “Why did I get stuck with these things-“ he tossed his head back, gesturing to the wings bound tightly against his body underneath his clothes- “and she gets to walk around without ever having to worry about someone finding out?

“Why do human-passing mutants not face the same shit that we do? They don’t have to be afraid of getting shot or kidnapped or beat up every time they walk outside. They don’t have to cover themselves up and pray that no one stares at them too closely.” Tears were rolling down Warren’s cheeks now, and Scott could feel his own eyes pricking with those unshed.

“It’s not fair, Scotty,” Warren murmured, trembling slightly. “And I’m tired of half of our team being mutants who can do that.”

Scott tugged Warren down until his head was tucked snugly underneath his chin, and stroked his hair, his neck and shoulders, everywhere that he could reach. Kissing the crying man where he could, and shedding a few tears himself.

No, it wasn’t fair, and it never would be fair. But they were all fighting the same fight, and the only difference was that some more than others would walk away from it.

“That’s why we fight” Scott reminded him. “That’s why we go through all this; so that mutants in the future won’t have to. So that they can express their mutations in public and not be afraid.”

Because one day, it wouldn’t be like this. Scott felt Warren’s pain and he held him through it. He kissed him and he loved him. And weeks later, when he would come face-to-face with a group of Purifiers, he’d hit them just a little harder than usual.

One day, he repeated to himself. One day, one day, one day.

[circular-time]

Spare Parts Liveblog 8 - Disc Four

In my liveblog, I’ve been posting links to Spare Parts on Spotify for those who haven’t bought it (I have; it’s so cheap). For what it’s worth, it’s even CHEAPER this weekend -- 99p. Big Finish is having a Mondasian Cybermen sale.

Also, I forgot to mention: Just as new Who adapted Big Finish’s Jubilee to make Dalek, it also borrowed (although not quite as extensively) from Spare Parts to make The Age of Steel / The Rise of the Cybermen, for which Marc Platt received an acknowledgement.

So anyway. I’ve been kinda beat today and have only just gotten to Part IV. Let’s whip through this; I still have to watch this week’s new Who.

I’d mentioned that it sounds odd to me now when I hear early Big Finish, before they got the rights to all the classic Who themes, and all the eps start with what I think is the 1970s theme. @ironic-disingenuous-sadness​  pointed out the earlier-classic-Who theme fits this story rather well.

Track 4.1: “Shelter”

We’re back to the Doctor very much nonconsenting a medical procedure, and the cyberized Committee declaring WE WILL SURVIVE. Scary cybermen are scary.

(here we go again...)

Oh, Pete’s doing awesome speechifying again. The ranting BEGINS while he’s being scanned.

“Only cold logic stifles their natural urge to SCREAM IN AGONY!” (as he’ll be doing again shortly, I’m sure. Always do what you’re best at.)

And this is where Sally Knyvette was needed: she can give it right back.

“How can you do that to your own people?!” “Because we’re dying! That’s why we’re screaming!”

She goes on a long rant too, the first time we’ve really heard what she’s feeling behind the wine-deadened mask of indifference.

Jeng and the Committee argue over priorities: the Doctor made them promise to keep the city going, but it’s a choice between activating the propulsion system to move Mondas out of the nebula that’s shaking it apart, or shutting down the city.

“Sacrifices must be made,” the battlecry of those not making the sacrifice to save themselves.

Even now they’re divided in what to do. They finally decide to process all the citizens into Cybermen to save them. Of course. It’s then end.

The Hartleys discuss Nyssa being taken away, doubtless to be processed (aieee!) like Yvonne. They’re watching the iceflow envelope parts of the city. Is this establishing something in a classic Who ep I haven’t seen (missing eps/recons?)

The Palace broadcasts that all citizens should go to the Palace. “Shelter will be provided.” Mr Hartley scoffs; he knows it’s a lie.

Although in a way it isn’t— they’ll be well protected in their cyber-suits. Just dead.

Track 4.2 - “Logical Deductions”

Nyssa gets dragged past the Doctor, who tries to save her by (to her horror) suggesting she can help Allan with the cyber-process since she’s so good at bioengineering. Which, apparently, she is. Allan decides to requisition her, but Jeng barges in to say all citizens are being processed. Including Allan.

Who freaks out with the classic Mad Scientist line: “I CREATED YOU!” “And I am superior. Be proud while you still have the capacity.”

Ah, there we go. Of COURSE the scan means the Doctor has to scream. Agony Acting Peter is off again.

And in between screams, fighting the Committee in his mind, one of the best Who speeches ever.

How did this start? Just a few hip replacements and breast implants - vanity's a killer, isn't it? And where will it end? Sleek, heartless scavengers cobbled together from space junk and other people’s bodies— but you’ll look ever so STYLISH!! *screaming*

There’s a long pause when they ask him to evacuate Mondas using whatever means he used to get there. It’s too late for that... isn’t it? But it would’ve been one way to save the people. Except it’s a means he almost never uses; the TARDIS is never a lifeboat. (Seriously considers it in Equilibrium though.)

YOU WILL BE LIKE US. I will never be like you!

Again, this is the real horror of the Cybermen— Assimilation, in a form even worse than the Borg (which came several decades later).

oops, more screamy Pete.

The Committee finally achieves consensus (”disjunction means extinction...”) and all agree to join as one mind. “We are the future... we are the future...” the voice changes. It is now the “Cyber Planner” which appears in early classic Who.

Track 4.3 - “We will be like you”

I wish recent Big Finish still had track names like chapter names; they’re so creepy.

Anyway poor optimistic Nyssa is waiting for the scan to finish and the Doctor to come back. Allan’s being cynical and fatalistic again.

Out in the city, the civilians have woken up to their doom but it’s TOO LATE; they waited while their neighbors were rounded up and their rights curtailed in the name of Security until they have no power left.

They’re having an angry protest in the city’s main square, burning the tree. Mr. Hartley and Frank are there, refusing to submit, even though it’s bitterly cold. Then they try to storm the Palace — only to be captured. The Cyber-planner puts their own security ahead of the propulsion system, overriding Jeng’s wishes. “Resistance must be crushed.”

Back in the palace, the scan finishes, door opens— no Doctor! A moment later a new, improved Cyberman comes out.

Nyssa thinks it’s him. The Doctor is now a Cyberman like the ones who killed Adric! Her voice— ouch. Poor Nyssa. She has been through such HELL since meeting the Doctor.

And here’s another of my favorite moments.

Allan’s given up and is drinking heavily —Knyvette being awesome again— trying to get Nyssa to join her in toasting the end of the world.

Nyssa’s gotten over her shock, like she always does, and gives a pretty damned good speech of her own.

[We must do something] “Who cares?” “The Doctor would care!” “Anything to encourage oblivion.” “Please, listen to me!” *breaks the woman’s bottle* “You STUPID little—” “He’s gone. The Doctor’s dead. Worse than dead. And Adric’s dead too. So many people killed because of your Cybermen. So where’s the Committee? I have to stop this once and for all!”

I love it when Nyssa lays the verbal smackdown, and I thumb my nose at those fools who think Sarah Sutton can’t act. She’s better now than she was when she was 19, of course, and even then she was pretty good.

And there Nyssa goes again, once again ready to take the Doctor’s place and finish his work when she thinks he’s dead. She is too damn brave for her own good. And she never gives into grief while there’s lives to save.

But before she can get herself in worse trouble...

“The Doctor was a gift... he was our last resort.” *door opens* “Oh dear, you make me sound like Southend-on-Sea.”

I love the Doctor’s stupid quips at the worst possible moments. (And happy reunions.)

Allan belatedly informs them (she was mocking Nyssa) that the new Cyberman was Dodd.

“Where is he now?” the Doctor says. “Oh? It’s a he when it’s someone you know.” Good point, Allan.  She doesn’t approve of what’s happened, but she’s still proud of her “invincible” creations.

Team Nerd reunited— Doctor needs something to sabotage the Committee, Nyssa suggests using Allan’s wine store, much to her annoyance.

Track 4.4 - “Consider the Grape”

I think the Doctor gave that grape-quote earlier in the story?

Ouch. The roof’s falling in, and the citizens have no choice but to rush into the arms of the Cybermen.

Nyssa’s still furious. “You’re PATHETIC” she tells Allan and clops her one when she tries to stop the Doctor from numbing the Committee’s nutrient bath with alcohol.

The Doctor and Nyssa wonder again if they can change history. Ironically they’ve switched sides of the argument— the Doctor’s so determined not to have himself used as the template for the Cyber-race that he’s considering changing history after all, while Nyssa wonders if they should since it’s the only way to save these people’s lives. He wants to have a hand in steering the creations based on him.

Another irony: Allan’s so proud of her Committee, her “children” that she’s willing to sacrifice the planet to save them (?) Jeng disagrees.

The Hartleys rescue Nyssa and the Doctor from being collected. Alas, Frank holds Nyssa back to apologize, and they get caught for processing. *whimper* (And everyone’s being rounded up for processing in the palace.)

This story doesn’t let up.

Track 4.5 “Death is Just a Bowl of Cherries”

The Cyberplanner sends Allan for processing, of course. They grow up and turn on you.

Allan’s finally gotten angry. The Committee are directing all power to processing to make more “walking dead”, rather than saving the city OR the propulsion. And when she’s stuck in line she’s defiant. Embraces her end with a bit of courage.

The Doctor’s keeping the Cyberplanner busy while Mr. Hartley summons the cybermats to save the day. And screaming again. They override Jeng when he tries to activate the propulsion system.

Track 4.6 “Logical Conclusions.”

Nyssa’s just about ready to be processed OF COURSE while the Doctor’s chitchatting with the Cyberplanner. DOCTOR SHUT IT.

Finally the cybermats overwhelm the Cyberplanner, allowing them to divert power to the engines and send Mondas back towards Earth.

The Doctor and Nyssa think they’ve put Mondas on better footing: the Commitee’s out, Jeng is out, and the Cybermen are helping repair the roof. Hartley is in charge of the reconstruction.

But sadly this story, like Genesis of the Daleks, can’t actually do a damn THING to alter the monsters’ future. The ending is horrifying: Jeng returns, and the processing will begin again— all the survivors the Doctor and Nyssa helped will shortly be converted. At least the Doctor and Nyssa leave before they’re caught or even find out that sad truth.

And I’m still not 100% sanguine about an EU story where the ONLY thing that changes is that the Cybermen are now based partly on the Doctor!

But it’s a hell of a story, dealing with some of the heart and soul of the whole “Can we/should we change history?” problem of Who, some fine speeches, some incredible courage on the part of both Doctor and Companion, and a little side commentary on organ harvesting/human rights/universal healthcare/cost-cutting/”sacrifices must be made.”

[toxicandmanic]

kinda been stuck in a loop of apathy and nihilism lately.

ive been able to rationalize any emotion or feeling away until its meaningless, and ive been dissecting everything around me to find that everything comes down to nothing.

everything happens around me and it all feels like a waste of time. everything feels like a waste of fucking time.

but thinking about it that way makes me think about what time is. it’s something we made up. it couldve had any name or system put to it. years mean nothing. numbers mean nothing. everything is divided into such small parts that it all becomes the same fucking thing and that one thing is something we have no meaning for whatsoever.

with fucking religion, religion as a way to justify beliefs means nothing as well, if you ask a christian how god came into existence they wont have an exact answer.

figuring anything out means nothing.

we cant figure out what exactly anything means because its all meaningless at the end of the day.

so watching everyone run around, making a big deal out of trivial, meaningless things, is laughable to me. im so far from any sense of meaning, or sense of anything for that matter, that i feel like fucking god.

i feel so far above everything. i can see every connection. im separating myself from as many systems as possible. i dont want anyone to control me because they dont know whats best for me.

i may not have all the knowledge in the universe, but the fact that i am self aware enough to see things the way i do makes me feel as if im more intelligent than anyone else.

and i know how this would look from everyone elses point of view.

but god.

thinking about it, i almost never fucking see anyone have the mindset i do. and when i do see any sort of representation of this mindset its regarded as “toxic”.

sure, it can be seen as toxic. by the people with less self aware mindsets. i just. god damn. i kind of hate knowing how everything works. its hard to enjoy actual emotions, other than the feeling of being “right”.

but im not right! no one is! thats my fucking point! nobody is right and nobody is wrong. its all created. its all made up by us and it can be deconstructed by us. but people arent self aware enough to want to deconstruct it. they need meaning to stay alive.

whats crazy is that im past that point! i dont need to have meaning to stay alive! everything means nothing and we will never know how anything actually came to be, we will all die and move on to who knows where.

the meaning of life is to let it be meaningless.

anyways! that was a fun rant. time to go get high to feel something that isnt just numb.

[mc-dankenstein]

yup here’s another vent post it’s not really like last time where i was basically in the middle of a fucking breakdown but there’s just too much pent up shit i need to figure out and deal with and i feel like i’m going insane?? uni is literally sucking my will to live from me. or, well, what was left of it i guess. like, i knew it was gonna be bad, but it’s just so much worse than i could’ve ever imagined?? btw this is just gonna be me dumping out all of my stupid problems and pretending they’re valid when in reality they’re just so insignificant compared to what so many people are going through so please just stop reading, i’m not in the mood for sympathy or ppl trying to “make it better”, i know your intentions might be in the right place cause i truly have found some wonderful friends here who i know care abt me, but i cannot find it in me to try and pretend something’s better because of our conversation rn, nor do i have the strenght or the time to actively try and make it better myself. i’m just ranting to get this shit out. of. my. system. bc i feel as if i’m gonna explode otherwise. things are not good. i’ve been crying a lot more and a lot more frequently again, i’ve been having attacks and i’m once again feeling super fucking anxious all the time. i can’t talk to my family about it, i can’t talk to my friends about it, bc the result is always either them telling me “it’s normal” or me bursting into tears out of fucking nowhere and i can’t let them see that. ive been studying nonstop for months now to the point where i can’t sleep properly anymore cause the only things going through my brain are a countdown to my next exam i’m probably not gonna pass and the thought i could at least use the time i’m wasting by trying to sleep to study more. and like everybody’s been telling me it’s okay, no one passes exams on their first year anyway, but we all know that’s not true. even my mom’s been trying to be supportive in her own way but i know it’s just her trying to make me feel better when she’s actually so fucking disappointed in me, she’s always been, especially since i started manifesting all my stupid anxiety symptoms i’d been trying to hide for so long, even if she tries not to show it i know i’m just a disappointment to her. she’s been calling me to ask me how i’m doing and to tell me to relax a bit in between study sessions and each and every time i’ve been on the verge of tears and i had to try and calm my sobs so that she won’t hear them through the phone. it just hurts so fucking much to be so far from what she’d deserve from me, and it hurts to be back to square one after literally everybody told me about how much i’d changed and how much better i seemed to be doing, how much more confident and strong i looked and i feel like a fucking moron for allowing myself to believe what they said. for a while i actually thought “y’know what? i actually am doing better” and yet here i am now, studying my best years away and not even getting any actual results from that other than frustration, anger and disappointment, i still have not passed a single goddamned exam and everybody around me feels like i’m stable enough to carry all of their emotional luggage as well as mine. and i feel like shit about phrasing that last one that way bc it seems like i’m not a supportive friend who only wants to see the people i care about thrive and be well when i like to think i am. this has been such a shit year, right from the start. and it still makes me sick that i wasn’t there for all of them when they needed me the most. in the span of less than two months my new uni friend, the only person i feel like i’ve connected with since i moved to the other side of the fucking country, has been opening up to me about her own anxiety problems, her bad relationship with her family and the fact that uni gave her panic attacks for the first time in her life; one of my best friends from home told me she attempted suicide, and i still can’t think about that without blaming myself for disappearing bc my brain just couldn’t handle shit then and i needed some time off from people in general, so i didn’t text her, i didn’t call her, we just briefly saw each other when i came home for less than a week in may and then a whole week of silence. i KNEW her past experiences, i KNEW she’d been having a lot of issues with depressive episodes and i KNEW she needed me and yet i did the asshole thing and just couldn’t pick up the fucking phone to send her a single text cause i couldn’t handle a conversation with another human being when i was about to shut down completely, and i didn’t know anything about what happened until i finally did text her a week later abt some stupid shit i’d seen on youtube and she told me everything got so bad that she tried to drink bleach and end it all. i would’ve been too late and i didn’t even realize. if she succeeded i would’ve sent that text and nobody would’ve answered. and i’ve been trying to react in the way i think is best for her, and she says i’m really helping bc i know how she feels and what she’s going through, but in reality i honestly don’t know what i’m doing and she’s the second person i know other than me who’s been suicidal, and she’s the second person i’m so terrified to talk to sometimes, even though i know from my own experience they need to have someone who cares about them to reassure them and just be there, because i’m scared shitless i’ll say something and fuck everything up and make it worse for them. i talk to them like i’m so strong since i’ve been through the same things and put up this mask of someone who’s actually better now, but i actually sincerely and honestly have no idea how to handle the situation. and then there’s my other best friend who i honestly have been treating like shit. she’s going through so much and i’ve been so distant and she doesn’t deserve that. even typing this out is exhausting and it’s making me feel so fucking guilty bc i have another exam tomorrow and i should be studying instead, and everyone keeps telling me “just relax, you’ve done enough” or “it doesn’t really matter wheter you pass it or not” except that it does. it does for my mom, it does matter because it would prove that i’m not really wasting my time and my parent’s money to be in a university where i so clearly don’t belong, it does because every time i’ve tried i’ve gotten so frustratingly close to passing that now i’m just fucking angry. i think i had a train of thought i wanted to follow in the beginning but now idk anymore and i’m tired and angry and i seriously need to go study so fuck it, i’ll leave it at this.

[steamy-cup-of-doom]

Anger rant

Alright, whos ready for some angry fucking sibling rants? I hope you said me me, because thats what you get As a preface i need to say that my father is black, my mother white, and that both of my sisters are full blooded relatives of mine. As ive grown, ive grown more and more disappointed with who my eldest sister actually is. As the youngest of three, with two older sisters, i was was always impressed, and have a point of view many of my peers do not. My second eldest sister has always been pretty transparent as to who she is. Of course, over time, i got to know her better, and knew different sides of her. And i thought the same was true of my eldest sister as well, but that was not the case. When i was young, my eldest sister, lets call her Jen, was like a shining beacon of unity and equality, an unshakable landmark of justice in a sea of discrimination. And then, the cracks in the cement at the base of her pedestal began to form oneday in a conversation about Star Trek: The Next Generation. Apparently, there is an episode whose purpose was social commentary on the patriarchal society that has somehow managed to persist to the day, in which the crew stumbles upon a planet which is gorverned by a matriarchy. And there were things said like, “Youre smart-for a man.” or “men cant do __ thats a womans job.”which i am fine with, and have even enjoyed in other forms or series. But, what caused the crumbling of my awe at jens righteous glory, was that one day, she was talking of this episode with her friends. She said, and i quote, “I would fucking love that shit. I would be at the front of the line, and id give it to all of them as bad as we get it.” and i was crushed. I was so shocked, i was actually numb, and i didnt even really feel the weight of it on me for a couple hours. And one reason why this hurt me was that she wasnt joking. She said this with sincerity in her eyes. And thats wrong. I strongly believe that if you would agree with jen, then, well, you are part of the cancerous growth on the side of feminism wwhich i like to refer to as ‘Extremists,’ and you are part of the reason that so many people hate feminism. No one who speaks as an advocate for civil rights or equality in any form or fashion should ever, EVER advocate the oppression of another group because of what has befallen them. Martin Luther King Jr. wouldnt have taken a million dollars if he would have turn a firehose on a group of innocent white people, nor would he have used the term “cracker” lightly, or at all, unless expressing his dissatisfaction at the actual term. Jens true fall from grace, however, hasnt stopped. No, it continues with her hitting another branch on the tree of hypocrisy every time she hurls the phrase “Little/white boy” like the most putrid of insults that would poison her and cause her grievous bodily harm if it remained in her mouth, Or everytime she brags about being sustained on white tears, or discredits someones complaint or hardship because theyre a “white bitch” or a “white asshole.” Now, jokes are one thing. i ve been known to, albeit ironically, take part in a joke much like this. But to state and present that as your own honest to god opinion to others is something quite different. And now, on to the straw that broke the camels back, the thing that sparked this in the first place. Tonight, while frantically working on a project that is a hefty portion of my grade in essentially three of my classes, i was beginning to stress out a bit, as its due tomorrow. After about an hour of ripping my fucking hair out, i realise that the little tablet computer i was working on didnt have a goddamn word program on it, which i would need to reformat and correct the resume and references copies for my project. At this point i was quite annoyed, and fairly snappy, despite my best efforts. So, when asking jen if i could use her laptop to finish up, my mother decided it was best if she were to call down to jen in her room in the basemant as opposed to me. “Nope” came as the simple reply to my request. When she was asked whyshe would not let me, she said “i dont wanna.” so. I proceeded to attempt to boot up our old desktop computer with the 1997 copy of microsoft word and a windows vista operating system which was the same model as optimus primes great fucking grandfather, to finish this. In literally over an hour i managed to go in and capitalize an s. That is all. Needless to say, i was at my wits end. I couldnt speak in coherent complete sentences, i was actually shaking, and i took several breaks to go out side and break wooden object over my knee. Now, it wasnt the fact that i needed to get my assignment done that had me so bothered, but the fact that upon seeing her brother in such an exasperated state that i was borderline non-functional, and, naturally, pretty goddamn short with people, her first instinct wasnt to agree to help me, but to get angry, refuse again, and continually say how she was in the middle of doing things, and, on top of that, just didnt want me to use her computer.now, i might be in the minority here, but if i were to see my sibling that i had known for 18 years, and never once in all that time seen him lose a handle on his temper after the age of about six so frustrated that he has to visibly physically struggle to keep his anger in line and fail a few times, my first natural inclination is to help them in whatever way i could. The best part of this situation is that it took me maybe a bit more than five minutes on her computer. Anyway, thats it for my venting this time. Im not correcting typos because i just dont care enough, but yes, i see them.