#automated crosspost

[envyxquincydog]

CATWEEDNAP IS IN DANGER?!?!?

[theorist-fox]

Some type of skin (and two keys)

Simon 'Ghost' Riley x Reader

Currently crossposting previous works from AO3.

Inspired by "Some type of skin" by AURORA (I have an obsession and it's a Norwegian pale lady)

Summary: Johnny's passing has left you devastated. Simon is there to pick up the pieces, while you, although unconsciously, mend his tired heart.

CW: talk of grief, death and loss, angst, broken promises, hurt/comfort, soft Simon Riley but also angry Simon Riley. Mention of pharmacological drugs.

Masterlist 🦊

The air felt clogged; thickened and uncomfortably warm. You tried to blame it on the closed window and the unrelenting sun that reflected against the glass, but the truth was that you felt awkward in your own skin. The uniform clung to your body like a prison. Once, it had been your armor: the breathable dark green cotton of the tee, the black leather of the belt cinching your waist, until the thick camo trousers. They all felt bulletproof.

Yet, ever since you’d witnessed that bullet tearing a hole into Johnny’s head, each piece of clothing had turned into something akin to a goddamn straitjacket. It replayed in your head ad nauseam until it turned into a living nightmare. Until you saw his bloodless face in everyone around you, until you felt a hole in your own skull, as if his death were an omen of your end, as well.

For the first time in the years you had worked with the task force, you were the one who called for a meeting. Well, it was an informal encounter more than anything. A text you had sent simultaneously to all of them.

“We have to talk. Room 4A in HQ 10AM?”

By mere habit, you’d also sent it to Soap; it wrecked your heart to see the red alert on the right side of your bubble, the small Not Delivered right below it. The cracks shattered further when you received the automated response telling you that the number didn’t exist.

How could it not, when you had accumulated thousands of hours on phone calls? How could it not, when you could scroll for days on the chat and never find the first text he’d ever sent you?

You had tried, one of many sleepless evenings: your thumb almost ached due to the mere motion. Fingertip up. Swipe down. Fingertip up. Swipe down. You found it, then. Something old, ancient. The bubbles were green because iPhones still didn’t have the feature that allowed you to text using internet between Apple devices.

“glad to have you on the team. big boss gave me your number. this is soap anything you need im a text awya.”

“aywa*”

“away !!!!”

You'd laughed and it quickly morphed into strangled cries, until your vision got foggy, and your lids yielded. You fell asleep clutching the phone to your cheek.

After having spread his ashes on the Scottish Highlands, everyone had made the sensible decision of taking time off – a sort of unsanctioned compassionate leave. On the other hand, you stayed buried in the tight office you had in Stirling Lines. You couldn't handle the silence that your empty flat would bring. Granted, that didn’t mean you spent much time talking to passersby here at the headquarters, strangers and colleagues alike.

You hovered around the hallways like a specter – paled and depleted. Utterly unavailable to anyone who decided, for reasons unknown to you, to waste their breath on your person. You’d hear grieving words tossed your way, and you'd nod warmly at those. Polite. Affable. Like you��ve always been, even now that the light had been sapped out of you.

Johnny brought it with him - the light. The sun of the team: beautiful yet deadly. Necessary, but dangerous. Lethal only to those who tried to unravel his equilibrium, warm and inviting to the ones who embraced his person.

Now that he was gone, there was darkness – the world dimmed to pay its respects.

It had been eight months. During those, you had worked tirelessly to concoct a plan to have your revenge. Price sometimes knocked on your door only to find you hunched over blueprints and notes. The look he gave you each time was nothing short of pitiful. He didn’t try to stop you, but you could feel the disappointment seeping through your bones and grating them to dust.

Gaz brought you coffee, sometimes. He often came to your office, knocked softer than Price – a knuckle against wood, compared to all four of them incessantly rapping against the door. Sometimes, it wasn't coffee. Sometimes, despite how bad it might have looked, Gaz spilled a few drops of Rozerem in your chamomile tea, hoping it would force your eyes closed for some rest.

All of them, drove from their respective homes only to come and check on you. You wondered if they had an unofficial shift schedule, shared between them both.

Ghost, though. Ghost stayed. 

Angrier than you. Insatiable. Raging. Went for runs at ungodly hours, when the sun wasn’t even about to peek from the horizon. He monopolized the gym of the headquarters; an easy task for him, all he needed to do was use his thousand-yard stare against the unlucky lad who dared cross the threshold. When he felt like the punching bag had taken enough of his gauzed fists, he would come to your office – sweaty and bruised. He rarely bothered to shower. He’d sit next to you, and he’d help.

Everyday.

Ever the detached bastard he'd always been, he grew closer against his better judgment. Albeit it had been years since you had joined the task force under Price’s will, Ghost had always stood several steps away from you. Yet, lately, he’d woven himself to you like a spider spinning an intricate web. He wrapped you in a cocoon, and differently from the eight-legged creature, Simon didn’t want to drain the nectar of life.

He wanted to be your armor. A panoply of rustproof iron: encasing you in chainmail, helmet, and all.

It’s why, now, as you sat on your own at the briefing room table with the increasing temperature in the room, guilt ate you from the inside. Termites feasting on wood.

The first one to enter was Kyle. Pretty brown eyes looked at you fondly, as if they were taking in a long-lost friend. He sat next to you, exchanged a few tentative words, and smoothed the hair away from your forehead. He didn't care about the grease clinging to them, instead, he grazed short nails against your scalp as he told you about his week.

You were eternally grateful for him and his tactful ability to make you feel normal when life seemed to have turned askew.

Price walked in a few minutes later. Stoic as ever, but with kindness in his blues. He held a tray in his hands, four paper cups of steaming coffee balanced on it. He set it on the table and slumped on the chair in front of you. He asked you how you were doing. You answered that you were fine. You asked it back. He answered the same. No one believed a single word.

Ghost made you all wait. You explained that he was probably at the gym, or having a late-morning run around the training grounds. If they were worried about you, the concern for Ghost was something even greater. While only Price knew of the intricacies of his past, it didn’t take a doctorate in psychology to understand that whatever had forced him to wear the skull mask was something that still haunted him in the present.

You remembered it vividly, that one evening. Life had battered you both, kindred spirits in what seemed to be the inability to grieve properly.

You, with your head propped on the armrest of the narrow couch in your office. He, slumped on the cushions as he cradled your calves in his lap. A hand absently brushed the thick cotton of your work trousers. His eyes were to the ceiling. His empty stomach growled incessantly, much like yours – both running on fumes, caffeine, and nicotine, or the occasional shared bite stolen from the cafeteria after its closing time.

As your eyelids were about to flutter closed, you heard the rumble of his voice vibrating in his diaphragm, close to where he held your feet.

“Hooked by the ribs,” he said.

The inquisitive look you sent him was missed because he didn't divert his eyes from the ceiling.

“Buried alive,” he strained, “Crawled outta my own grave.”

It hit you later, that he was sharing. You slowly sat up, pushing your torso with your tired arms. You moved gingerly, afraid a mere shift in the air would cause him to sew his mouth shut. While you had an inkling that whatever happened to him must have been gruesome and cruel, those few words (which you were sure, merely scratched the surface) already caused your stomach to churn.

“They used me, tried to break me and they did.”

Your jaw worked. Propped on your elbows, you gulped down the stone in your throat. Eyes glued to the unmasked profile – to the crooked nose, flattened by punches and butts of guns, to the divot between his lips, to the absent brown eyes with their halo of pale lashes. His fingers curled around your ankle and his thumb brushed over your sock.

“Killed my family,” he went on, and you wondered if he was talking to you at all, “Killed my nephew, too.”

Barely noticing how your eyes glazed over with treacherous tears, you bent your knees over his thighs and scooted closer. The only indication that he had acknowledged your presence and wasn’t simply musing out loud was how his palms shifted: from your ankles, up to your calves. He furled his fingers around the meaty part, while his other hand blindly went to look for your neck. He rested his palm against the side of it, let his thumb trace the outline of your jaw.

“Took everything from me, turned me into this,” he muttered, and his brows furrowed while his pupils danced over the chipped paint of the ceiling.

Half of the times you were given the luxury to gaze at the face beneath the mask, you’ve wondered where those scars came from. What kind of heroic deed had he carried out that caused each mark, or what awful act he must have committed that ended up leaving perpetual memories of it, etched in his flesh.

Never, not once, you thought someone else purposefully did it to him. Someone so cruel, so brutal, that made him regrow his skin – like a snake, shedding his frail past to build a thicker armor.

“The army left me to rot, y’know," he whispered, and although you weren't answering (truthfully, you were barely breathing) he knew you were listening.

“But not Price,” his thumb pressed into your cheek, “Not Price, nor Garrick, or you – or Soap.”

It was grimly ironic how such an idiotic callsign could bring this remarkable heaviness on your heart. The silence lingered after he uttered it, either a way to pay respect or a simple inability to continue right afterwards. Because that’s how it felt like.

Months ago, when his body flattened against the concrete of a forgotten underground tunnel, the word Soap met an end. Forever, there will be nothing else to add right after it, if not things you already knew, or heavy silence.

“Can’t lose any more people in this life,” he sighed, “Johnny must be the goddamn last, y’hear?”

You heard.

You craned your neck to the side so your cheek would slot in his palm. Saltwater dampened your skin and moistened his calluses.

“Deal,” you croaked.

He nodded, taking in your word, digesting it. A stupid promise, really. No one can pledge such a thing, but at that moment he cared very little for it. Especially when he felt your lips press against his palm.

“Deal.”

You bit your thumbnail in silence, then brought it in front of your eyes to look at the red indent around it. A droplet of blood seeped through the crack, and you suckled on it to soothe it.

Ghost abruptly walked in, the door almost flying off its hinges. He closed it behind him but didn’t take a seat. Instead, he rested his back against the shut threshold and folded his arms in front of his chest. A nod of his jaw that shifted the fabric of the balaclava was all he offered.

Now that everyone was in, the moment you had been dreading the most arrived. Albeit you had been planning this for weeks, your stomach still felt like it had swallowed a rock.

You stood up, wonky on your feet. The chair screeched as it slid back.

“I’m retiring.”

If the silence was thick before, now it felt like a boulder.

When volcanos erupt, it’s rare for lava to burst into the air and fall like sizzling rain over the landscape below it. What kills every living creature, it’s the dust that settles afterwards: it's scorching hot, stops life in its tracks.

The moment the words bubbled from your throat like molten lava, the residues puffed out of your crater and deposited on everything surrounding you. The room now felt like a ghost town, with each breathing soul inside turned into a forever statue.

The only thing that moved was Simon, who wrenched the door open and left.

It had been weeks since you last saw him. Well, you did see him: Stirling Lines wasn't that big. But he didn't see you. He didn't knock on your door anymore and barely acknowledged your presence if he found you in his vicinity.

It felt pointless to continue your search for attribution if he wasn’t looking for it with you, so with a quick swipe of your arm, you trashed every blueprint, every post-it note, every map, and leaflet. Maybe that would grant Soap some rest as well.

A signature away from your departure, you were lying in your bed, ready to knock yourself out with a few droplets of benzodiazepine. The route to the comatose dreamless night that awaited you, though, was interrupted by a series of raps against your door.

After years in the military, you had developed quite the remarkable hearing – if one was willing to exclude the tinnitus. It meant you could recognize whose footsteps belonged to whom, whose breathing was coming from whose mouth, and which knock pertained to which hands. You knew these knuckles, indeed. Hastily tossing your legs over the edge of the bed, you padded your socked feet against the linoleum of your private quarters. Fingers shakily curled around the doorknob, and you yanked the door open.

It wasn’t like in movies, when after such a long absence time slows down when your eyes touch, no.

It was raw, irate, and spiteful.

Simon placed a thick hand on your shoulder and shoved you aside to barge in. You barely managed to recollect your balance when he slammed the door closed behind him. He looked around the room as if searching for something but not being quite sure of what. Habit, you thought.

Brown eyes that never showed much of the constant turmoil brewing in his head now landed on you sizzling with hatred.

He yanked the mask off. It fell limply to the ground.

His cheeks were flushed, whether from the warmth that had been building behind the cheap fabric of the mask or from hot anger, you couldn’t tell.

"We had a deal.”

It ripped the air from your lungs, vacuumed them clean, and ironed them flat. Your hand flew at the base of your throat, fingers nervously rubbing against your collarbone.

His voice was clouded by an unbreachable fog of anger. You felt as if you were sailing through the ocean on a moonless night, only darkness ahead of you and a single oar in your hands. That’s how it felt to navigate through Simon Riley, even now that you had managed to have a grasp on the person he was.

Your pupils traveled along his person to settle on his face, not jaded like usual but contorted in a scowl. The strain at the junction of his jaw wasn’t a new sight, nor were the taut tendons of his neck.

Sometimes, he’d fall asleep on the couch in your office; your head on his shoulder or cradled in his lap. You’d wake up then, at the sound of teeth grinding. Bruxism in his sleep, jagged sounds that made your hair stand on end. Gingerly, you used to lift your hands and press the tips of your fingers at his jaw hinge, massaging the spot until he stopped.

You wished you could do it now.

"I’m sorry," you replied calmly, trying to quell his spirits and failing spectacularly.

He took hasty steps around the room, pacing like a lunatic. You didn’t have the guts to walk closer to stop him, not yet. What left his lips next, though, made you want to crumble to the floor like a house of cards.

“Leaving ‘cause I told you all tha’?” he snapped, “��cause you can’t handle another broken case to add to your file?”

Fear of approaching him left your body like steam from a cup, indeed that’s what you did. As he relentlessly paced around the cramped space of a military-issued room, you stopped him with a gentle hand on his bicep.

He froze and yanked his arm away. Your palm like blistering coal against his skin.

You knew he was as hulking as they come, you knew he was built like a goddamned brick house, and you knew he towered over you (he towered over most, in your defense). Yet, nothing could have prepared you for the way he languidly turned to face you, looking down. You craned your neck back, otherwise your eyes would only meet his collarbones, peeking through the loose black tee he was wearing – casual comfort clothes he wore to sleep at night, those few times he did.

"Never think that,” you stated, stressing the adverb, “Never think that.”

You swallowed thickly, yet your eyes never wavered, "I – It’s complicated,” but it truly wasn’t.

Your expression softened, but you knew it would do little to smother the flames in his eyes, ready to flatten the entirety of the room.

"After Johnny, I couldn’t anymore,” you whispered, “I can’t, Simon.”

The defeated tone of yours had the bite of a skillfully honed blade. It cracked his ribcage open and stabbed the heart he didn't think he owned anymore.

He murmured then, eyes narrowed, “The fuck you mean you can’t?”

Your mouth curled down and you rolled your lips between your teeth. The tip of your tongue soothed a crack in the skin.

"I'm scared," you wheezed as if the words were difficult to utter. Scared of loss, scared of death, scared of pain, scared of scars, both physical and mental. Scared of the future, scared of your past and his, scared it would haunt you until you'd turn cold and stiff - all the people you've killed and those who survived. Fear, in its unfettered, most gut-wrenching form.

He tongued his cheek, somewhat irritated by the statement. He let the words stick like molasses to his eardrums, muffling each sound. Simon wasn’t a stranger to fear; he walked with it hand-in-hand, a faithful companion that never left his shadow. Yet, he hated that you were feeling it because in his mind you didn't deserve it.

He would have liked to tell you that, but words always failed him when he needed them the most.

"Thought you’d have grown thick skin by now," his voice was low, controlled, and deadly. Meant to hurt, meant not to graze but to cut. It was all he knew, how to hurt – especially when he was aching as well.

You looked up at him through the furrow of your brows, brief anger flashing in your eyes. You set it aside, instead opting to cast your gaze sideways. You cupped your elbows in a sort of self-reassuring hug, thumbs indenting in the flesh of your biceps.

"I wish I did,” you murmured, “Can’t grow that type of skin, it seems.”

He wanted to rebuild the cocoon he had so carefully crafted around you. He wanted to go back being the shield that kept you from any harm. The chainmail that prevented each stab.

He wanted to be that skin you didn’t seem to grow, like a reptile losing its inborn ability to replenish its flesh.

Johnny’s passing took his cold heart and thrashed it. The bond he deepened with you afterwards made it regrow. He wondered, when he'd look at you during those days, as you leeched your brain dry over blueprints and notes, if you were aware of it.

You scared him most delightfully, and he thought whether his heart should reveal itself to be more than a muscle, or a fist covered in blood.

That's why the resentful look in your eyes felt like fresh water on the fire in his chest. How could he let you drain yourself dry over this, when you had been the only light the moment his world blew out each candle.

So, his anger took the backseat, and he sighed. Drawn-out, long, and tortuous.

“Where you goin’, then?” he said, softer.

You felt it, the sorrow of his tone. It made your head swivel in his direction. You blinked, opened your mouth to answer, and hesitated.

“Bury,” you breathed, “Bury St. Edmunds.”

His eyes narrowed in thought: you could almost see the map of England he had cast in front of him reflected in his pupils.

“’s about a four-hour drive from here," his voice trailed off.

"Yeah," you mused, slightly confused by the abrupt switch in his behavior. But you weren’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth, were you?

Instead, your hands slid up your arms soothingly, "Found a nice flat there, in the city center.”

You shrugged, trying to act as if it wasn’t a big deal, although Simon could tell it was by the way your eyes twinkled at the mention. Something new, something fresh that promised a new beginning, away from bloodshed and loss, closer to warmth and familiarity.

Closer to home.

"It’s nice. It has a small balcony that faces the cathedral,” you went on, sounding almost bashful, “Was thinkin’ about growing my own herbs? Like basil, and such.”

He didn’t reply or move. Barely breathed.

Just stared.

Stared at the soft expression on your face, at the way your lashes framed your eyes. Stared at the way your lip trembled, ever so slightly, as you blabbered about such ordinary things like balconies, and churches and bloody herbs.

He could already picture you with dirt under your bitten fingernails as you dug into brown, ceramic vases, refusing to wear gardening gloves.

He could hear your bare feet padding against the hardwood floor as you went on to brew your tea. Or the squeaking sound of the cushions of a leather couch as you dropped on it, without a care in the world, holding a book by its spine.

You truly disarmed him in that simplicity – a dress he realized he would’ve loved to see you wear more often.

You seemed unaware of the subtle awe that glinted in his pupils, since you went on to add how the flat had a guest room – although it completely flew over his thick head. What did reach his eardrums, though, was what you said next, "And it has two keys."

He snapped out of his reverie and swallowed.

"Two keys," he echoed.

His willpower felt as thin as an ice slab under the blistering sun. It melted pitifully and turned into a warm puddle in his chest. Nothing could’ve stopped him as his feet marched to you, closing both physical and emotional gaps.

He palmed your cheek and whispered with certain hoarseness in his voice, "Two damn keys.”

Your heart swelled three times its size. You swore you felt the indents left against it by each rib. Leaning your cheek against his hand, like you’d done many nights before, the most subtle of smiles graced your features.

Simon vowed he’d fight tooth and nail to see it grow.

You whispered, then, "If you want, you can just drive those four hours 'n pop in. I'll make you a cuppa, maybe take you for a tour around Bury.”

His eyes softened – crinkles at the corners and brows twitching in the middle.

"Four fuckin' hours for a cuppa and a tour,” he mumbled, "What are you, the Queen of England?"

You huffed a chuckle, pretending to find his sarcasm annoying by adding a roll of your eyes. Truthfully, you’d pay good fucking money to hear it daily.

"I'm gonna need the spare key, though" he whispered, his thumb brushed your cheek reverently.

You lifted your hand to trace his often-cracked knuckles with the pads of your fingers, “Not a spare key – your key.”

Simon swallowed thickly again. He ran his tongue over his teeth, clamping his jaw shut. His gaze hardened, his pupils danced about your face, awfully concentrated, as if he were refraining from doing something.

His sudden silence made your resolve waver. You removed your hand from the back of his, curling your fingers as if you were touching some hot surface. It stayed there, furled in a loose fist in the space between your chests.

“You could come and spend your leaves there," you whispered tentatively, "Leave your things at my flat, so each time you come over they're already there."

It took all your courage to speak, but you knew the die had been cast already. The only thing left for you to do was to simply go for it and take the damage, or leave victorious.

"Until it's full of you,” you released a shaky breath, “Until it's your little flat, too."

Simon’s breath suddenly shortened. He'd never felt at home, not even when he was supposed to have one. He'd come close to it when his brother got clean and managed to build a family for himself, or when the task force was tight-knit, with Johnny chatting his ear off with his incomprehensible Scottish lilt. But it was never his.

This, though.

He’d be damned if he let it slip through the cracks of his fingers.

"Until it's our flat," he breathed.

His other hand reached out as well, and he placed it on your opposite cheek, "Until it’s our little flat.”

You’d be lying if you said those weren’t words you had been reciting in your head ever since you put in your retirement request. Ever since you started looking for a flat that could host two people instead of one.

Indeed, you’d naively thought that the moment they would be uttered (if ever) you would have been ready for them. But you weren't, not at all – they felt like a gut punch.

You had to bite your lip to repress tears that had treacherously made their way into your eyes, now glossy and a little wide. To think that you were able, somehow, to give him some reprieve from a life that seemed to not want him, gave you incommensurable joy.

"Our home," you croaked.

"Our home," he echoed languidly, with a thick voice, as if it hurt to speak, "Our bed. And our bloody balcony on the cathedral, and our sofa, our kitchen, and – “

He paused. Swallowed, seemingly torn. Words seemed to fail him again, but he didn’t let them – not this time. He’d fight through the fear of it all being the umpteenth joke life was taunting him with. Not you, never you – his one good hand in a lifetime of poor draws.

"And every – fucking – thing in between."

You chuckled. It’s wet with tears and disbelief.

Oh, to see him thrive in anticipation for something, instead of dreading what life has in store for him.

Your hand left the gentle grip it had on his knuckles, and you cupped his face as well – mimicking how he was holding yours.

"Every," you whispered, "Bloody, fucking thing," and nudged your nose with his, "In between."

Your lips landed on his instantly.

It was stupidly clumsy at first because you were both torn in half between what felt good and what was right. His tongue slipped between your lips as soon as you parted them for air; your teeth clacked together. You chuckled against his lips; he drank it like an oasis. His life parched of what you could give him, what you were giving him.

It took him a moment to get used to the sensation, to adjust to you. But when he finally did, he kissed you back ravenously, nothing shy from desperate. He craved your touch so fiercely. A push and pull of wandering hands, tangled in your hair and yours in his.

You were finally back where he wanted you, in the cocoon he crafted just for you, made with his flesh. Bulletproof arms around you, holding tighter—as if his ribcage could open and he could store you there, where you'd be forever safe.

He placed his foot between your legs, pushing them open. You complied when he gently nudged your knee so you’d fall back against the mattress.

Eventually, your lips parted. You and Simon shared a breath.

You were positively flushed, breathless, and limp in his grasp. He thought he'd never seen anything this breathtaking.

You smiled, all teeth and creases at the corners of your eyes, cheeks tipped pink as they pushed against your eyes – little crescents he’d look at for days on end.

Simon was left a little dumbfounded, though, when you squirmed under his weight to extend an arm. He followed it with his eyes and saw your hand struggling to fumble with the drawer of your nightstand. You pulled out a key and held it in the space between your faces. 

"Your key," you whispered bashfully, as if unaware that the mere sight sent Simon's heart into arrhythmia.

You placed a soft peck to his lips, "To our home."

Simon let out a staggered exhale. He wrapped his fingers around the key, closed his fist around it.

A symbol of a new beginning, one that Simon finally didn’t dread. Something good rippling through his life like fresh water, even amidst the mud of shared grief and loss.

We're good people,

And we both deserve peace.

"To our home," he whispered back, "To our home."

And let breath be air, 

And love the things I know might disappear.

And the last light of the sun

I let it slow me down

I'll crawl where everybody runs.

[splatoonna]

Cross Platform Support, Expanded!

@kydzs - Hey there!! We are pleased to update you all further about our last post made July 8th. We are now providing automated Splatoon news automated on Bluesky 🦋 and Mastodon 🐘! And that's not all! Additionally, in the future, you will be able to get news directly in your server with our Discord bot!

BUT WAIT THAT'S NOT ALL!! In the future, we will ALSO be providing everyone with...JAPAN SPLATOON UPDATES!! In addition to splatoonna updates, we will total 3 bots per platform: - Tumblr - Bluesky - Mastodon

One new account will bring posts directly from splatooonjp to each platform above, and the secondary new account will auto translate these posts into english :3 because why not? Oh and of course, pearl bot will support bringing these three forms of updates to your individual discord server as well!

Get the game news without human delay! ✊ Happy squidding!!

[primnroses]

— Explaining Konohagakure’s Barrier Team from Naruto to Boruto:

The information presented in this post has been checked and revised. My aim is not to hate or to discredit any of the characters mentioned. Please read about me for further information.

This post will contain evidence in picture format directly from the manga Naruto (1999 - 2014) created by Masashi Kishimoto and published by Shueisha in 1999. I will also use information from the official databooks.

This informative post will explain the role and utility of the Barrier Team from its debut in Naruto to its role in Boruto. I will use information present in the novels and the Boruto manga because it includes character development within canon compliance.

This meta is crossposted in AO3.

I give my permission to use or share this thread with informative purposes as long as you credit me.

I do not support the anime or the work of Studio Pierrot in regards to Naruto because I consider it over exaggerated and beyond biased. Furthermore, these fillers include some actions that these characters are unable to do in the canon according to official sources and they also generate unnecessary debate.

This meta does contain anime scenes from Boruto because it is a monthly manga draft that depends heavily on anime for context.

Please, take this into consideration.

This meta will include a small discussion from my own point of view about the Barrier Team and its members. There will be criticism and complaints, comparisons with other characters, previous leaders, etc.

The Barrier Team (結界班, Kekkai-Han) is an organization formed by sensor-type shinobi and regular shinobi in charge of maintaining the Sensing Barrier, a giant sphere surrounding Konohagakure and its outskirts, which detects any foreign chakra that crosses the border of the village and the area around it. Many years after the Fourth Shinobi World War, it has been mechanized and transformed into an automated sensing system managed by chūnin and a few sensor-type shinobi and currently led by members of the Yamanaka Clan (although the manga doesn't provide an official title).

HISTORY

It's unknown for how long this team has existed, but the Barrier Team debuted in chapter 415 of Naruto. Based on its development, Konoha has kept a Konoha-wide exclusive sensing technique through the ages and, among their ranks, they count with sensor-type shinobi like Hyūga clan members.

This team also has their own unique crest in the shape of an inverted triangle with three circles inside, worn by their members in their clothes in armbands or hats.

Sensing Barrier and Sensing Water Sphere according to the fourth databook.

Naruto:

During the era of the Fifth Hokage, the Barrier Team was a rather small team located in a room (most likely inside the Hokage Residence) where the large Sensing Water Sphere was guarded and monitored by three sensor-type wearing Shinto robes. According to the fourth databook, Kakoi, one of the sensor-type Shinto priests, was "The leader of the Barrier Team" at the time of debut (結界班の長, Kekkai-Han no naga).

Kakoi's profile in the fourth databook, page 209.

The Sensing Water Sphere represents the invisible Sensing Barrier around Konoha and the periphery, and the role of the Shinto priests was to inform of any unfamiliar chakra signature that crossed this barrier. When someone or something charged with chakra bypassed the barrier, the Sensing Water Sphere rippled around the area where the aura had been detected; a team of stationary chūnin were automatically sent to the location of the disturbance to investigate the threat.

The Sensing Barrier is the village's last line of defense against intruders. In the outskirts of Konoha, the village has several lookout posts with shinobi who are the first ones to visually detect intruders in the area. Pain was able to successfully bypass the Barrier because he had taken down the lookouts, who would have otherwise alerted the village first.

The lookouts from Naruto chapter 418.

Unofficially, the Barrier Team used to be divided in two groups:

The Detection was the division formed by the sensor-type Shinto priests and the lookouts.

The Interception was the division formed by chūnin, with Izumo Kamizuki and Kotetsu Hagane among these shinobi, in charge of investigating the threat and fighting the intruders. 

The Barrier Team headquarters and both divisions in chapter 419.

The Sensing Barrier extends from the small portion of forest before the very entrance and walls of the A-Un gate, to the portion of land behind the Hokage Rock, according to the view the manga offers, from the right side view. This means that anyone entering the barrier will be detected before they reach the main gates of Konoha, but not if they halt before the barrier itself. Only Pain could come undetected to the very limit of the barrier due to the visibility his Rinnegan granted him; however, the exact spot of the barrier is most likely unknown to non-Konoha shinobi.

According to Pain, it's revealed that the Barrier Team has a special jutsu to get through the barrier without being noticed applicable to ANBU and probably Konoha shinobi, which allowed Itachi Uchiha and Kisame Hoshigaki to enter without alarm thanks to one of the Akatsuki being a former Konoha ANBU.

The view of the full sensing dome from the right angle (Hokage Monument to the right, A-Un Gate to the left) in chapter 419.

The Sensing Water Sphere, the Sensing Barrier and the sensor-type Shinto priests, or more specifically Kakoi, and all the staff members in the Detection group in the current era, are symbiotically connected with each other. This means that Kakoi’s sensory range and the rest of the staff, only correspond to the range of the Sensing Barrier and not farther, just confirmed by the presence of Pain and his summons by the limit, undetected. This detail also applies to future leaders who are currently replacing Kakoi.

Kakoi's symbiosis with the Sensing Barrier when he only detects Chikushodo (Animal Path) upon bypassing in chapter 419.

The role of the Barrier Team has remained the same through the eras, meaning that their job is to sense disturbances detected by the Water Sensing Sphere and inform shinobi teams to attack the possible threats. The Sensing Barrier has always remained Konoha–wide too. 

Although the Barrier Team doesn't appear again until the Blank Period and Boruto: Naruto Next Generations, we could see a similar version of it during the Fourth Shinobi World War but on a greater scale. 

Ao, a former ANBU and outstanding sensor-type from Kirigakure, was appointed the captain of the Sensor Division during the conflict. Alone, he could detect the presence of the reincarnated shinobi among the hundreds of White Zetsu clones in every division of the Allied Shinobi Forces through his Sensing Water Sphere, including natural energy which only a few selected sensors can perceive.

Ao maintaining the Sensing Water Sphere and sensing the White Zetsu army in chapter 525.

Blank Period:

The next time the Barrier Team appears is in the Sasuke Shinden and Sakura Hiden novels:

According to Sasuke Shinden, after Pain’s attack, Konoha set up a more powerful barrier. However, the exploding humans could bypass the Sensing Sphere because they were Konoha shinobi, and thus, they are not considered intruders. The novel also confirms that the Interception group still exists and they also send messenger shinobi to alert the Hokage.

In Sakura Hiden, we notice a few modernizations. After Sakura Haruno defeated Kido Tsumiki, Kakashi arrived at the scene but was shortly cut by an instant Mind Body Transmission message from the Barrier Team alerting him of ANBU leaving the village.

Sasuke Shinden (above) and Sakura Hiden (below).

This detail is key to the development of the Barrier Team in Boruto, as telepathy via Chakra Transmission Communication Device becomes one of the most used tools by the team.

Boruto:

By the era of the Seventh Hokage, the Barrier Team has continued to function the same was as before, with the exception of a few changes:

Although there aren't any significant changes in headquarters, the Hokage Residence was reconstructed after Pain’s invasion and so was the Barrier Team chamber. The location of the team has been confirmed in the anime to be inside the Hokage Residence.

The room has decreased in size and the area for the Interception Team has been replaced, in favor of a new Detection Team about the same size as the previous one and with the same amount of people monitoring the Sensing Barrier, although instead of Shinto priests, the members are now regular chūnin.

In the manga, the room only takes a corner of an unknown location in the Hokage Residence. The automated sensing sphere has been replaced by monitors instead.

The Barrier Team headquarters in the anime and the manga.

According to Kashin Koji, Konoha used to have a Sensory Team led by members of the Yamanaka clan.

However, this information is false and in Boruto this is one of the most retconned plot points.

Kashin Koji explaining the "role" of the Yamanaka clan in episode 211.

THE YAMANAKA CLAN IN KONOHA

To understand this retcon and the differences between the Barrier Team from Naruto and Boruto, first we need to understand the role they had in the story:

Originally, the Yamanaka clan, or more accurately Inoichi Yamanaka, was in charge of the Analysis Team by performing Psycho Mind Transmission on targets that couldn't be interrogated by Ibiki Morino.

Unlike the other shinobi clans from Konoha, the Yamanaka is a relatively small family with Inoichi as the parent generation and his daughter Ino, and later two members added by the end of the story who were Fū and Santa. We know that there are no other members because Inoichi’s subordinates in the Analysis Team are all shinobi of other ofamilies such as Mawashi Dokuraku, Tonbo Tobitake and Aoba Yamashiro, and Fū Yamanaka was an ANBU. Aoba is also the only person other than Inoichi capable of performing Psycho Mind Transmission as seen in chapter 507 and Sasuke Shinden.

Currently, Inoichi and Fū are dead, Santa's whereabouts being unknown and Ino is the only one that remains from the small family. In Konoha, only Sai, Ino and Inojin are members of the family, while Konan is a filler character.

Despite this, the Analysis Team has completely disappeared, instead now mental interrogation is performed by different individuals without a clear route or a hint of the previous established organization.

However, I must add that following Ino's development in Naruto as the only living and remaining family member, it was never implied that she would follow her father's steps as a mental interrogator, with the following material such as novels focusing on her role as a telepath.

Following this fact, it's clear that the Barrier Team's members aren't Yamanaka either from what we see in the manga. Members of this clan have distinctive physical characteristics that make them easy to identify, like the long blonde or light colored hair, blue eyes and the ponytail (their clan's trademark worn by men and women alike). The shinobi from the team that we can see in the manga don't have the trademark Yamanaka look. Another point is that if they were Yamanaka, there wouldn't be an automated sensory system because the members would be able to sense and communicate without the technology, just their innate abilities.

The Barrier Team as we know it now in Boruto exists so that regular shinobi can sense, track and communicate thanks to the technology the automated system provides without external aid or third parties. If they were reliant on anybody outside their headquarters who is not linked to the mechanics and machines, and could sense, track or communicate by themselves, they wouldn't exist.

One point worth mentioning here is that the Yamanaka Clan isn't known for being tracker sensors of that caliber. They use Yin Release to project their own senses, this way controlling other people or animals to take advantage of their abilities or delving into target's senses, which Masashi Kishimoto described as a form of sensing in the third databook. They are able to sense qualities of people's chakra that are nearby with less effort than regular non sensor-type, due to sensing being an ability that all skilled shinobi possesses in more or less degree. By using Mind Body Switch, Ino controlled a bird to find the Akatsuki members Hidan and Kakuzu even though they were nearby, meaning she doesn't have sensing skills past her own vicinity and surroundings, therefore needs to use other beings in order to track people. 

Mind Body Transmission doesn't use sensory skills to connect people either, it is a telepathy area like Bluetooth and people who are inside the range of the transmission can enter communication. One example of this is in Boruto, when Ino can keep a communication range in 100km or the Barrier Team receive messages from other villages, but is unable to sense anyone outside the village gates.

Personally, I think Masashi Kishimoto freestyled a little with this ability because it doesn't have a databook description.

Ino's sensing through controlling other species and the Mind Body Transmission range.

Moreover, the people in charge of the Barrier Team were Kakoi and his team of Shinto priests. This information was fixed in the anime, acknowledging the presence of the Shinto priests and Kakoi after Ukyō Kodachi rewrote the history of Konoha. 

Among the many plot points of Boruto that were originally taken from Naruto and rewritten, this one is one of the more obvious within worldbuilding.

Kakoi described as a predecessor of the Barrier Team in episode 177.

THE NEW BARRIER TEAM

From Naruto to Boruto, the Barrier Team has gone through many changes.

Ukyō Kodachi has renamed this team as Sensory Team or Sensory Unit in the manga. It could possibly indicate a restructuring from their new mechanized system now being different from its previous Shinto organization, but it is currently being called by its original name: Barrier Team.

To shed more context into the new era, according to Ino Yamanaka, the Barrier Team has been mechanized and modernized to replace sensor-types with an automated sensing. The Sensing Water Sphere has been replaced by a Scientific Ninja Tools sphere that detects intruders whose chakra has never been identified or saved by the database automatically and an alarm that triggers upon contact inside headquarters.

In the manga, the Sensing Water Sphere has been replaced by screens and the area only takes about a corner.

The new automated system also includes a database with the imprint of Konoha shinobi memorized in it, so anyone not registered within the system will be spotted.

Ino Yamanaka explains the new sensing system made by Katasuke Tōnō and its design in the manga in episode 177 and chapter 81.

The range of the Sensing Barrier has decreased drastically, to the point of only covering from the gates to the Hokage Monument, instead of adding the periphery and the forest like previously established.

They have also eliminated the lookouts that provided a first line of defense in case there were people lurking around the area.

This is confirmed by Delta and Kashin Koji speaking on a tree branch by the A-Un Gate and passing undetected by anyone and Delta moving around the trees by the wall, even though they were within the previous range established by Kakoi in the Pain Arc. As soon as Delta crossed the walls, she was detected, but not before.

Delta and Kashin Koji (to the left) right by Konoha's main gate, A-Un, undetected and Delta being undetected while moving in chapter 30.

The new Barrier Team didn't think about erasing the chakra signature of the deceased Jiraiya either, therefore, Kashin Koji, a Jiraiya clone, is able to come and go in and out of the village undetected. It also doesn't detect objects such as drones, so enemies can use their non chakra-powered devices for surveillance or other tasks.

Led by Ino Yamanaka herself and the other shinobi, the Barrier Team only counts with the Detection group, formed by three chūnin in charge of sensing, or rather, looking at the screens for any intruder and informing anyone they must. According to Shikadai Nara, the Interception group has been disbanded, now only informing Naruto Uzumaki and Sasuke Uchiha of danger so they can take care of it themselves. 

The new Detection group informs via telepathy using the Chakra Communication Device, a tool used by the Allied Shinobi Forces to connect each division scattered across the map with each other. This device can cover greater distances than a regular shinobi, therefore we see Mind Body Transmission users, as well as regular shinobi (probably Yin Release users) from the Shinobi Allience's Intelligence Division and other members of each division, wear it.

Despite adult Ino being able to cover at least 100km with Mind Body Transmission unaided, we also see her wear it during The Last: Naruto the Movie to receive messages from other villages.

The new Chakra Communication Device from the Barrier Team is a much more modern version of the previous one used by the Alliance. Moreover, all communications performed by the Barrier Team, the content of all mind transmissions, are stored in their own database in order to be analyzed or monitored. The Chakra Communication Device is connected the the rest of the automated sensing system to save all images, chakra prints and telepathy relays.

The telepathy device has a stationary version and two portable versions. Ino using it in the Blank Period and the modern version used by Barrier Team in chapters 537, 520, movie and episode 177 and chapter 84.

As aforementioned, the role of the Barrier Team continues to be that of detecting unfamiliar chakra signatures and informing certain individuals to go and investigate. This time, as soon as someone is detected, Ino could at times contact headquarters to ask them if the presence is registered by the database, and, if not, she will contact Naruto and Sasuke to investigate. Other times, headquarters will perform this task without her aid.

Moreover, they can only detect things charged up with chakra, but not objects like Delta’s drones or shinobi erasing their chakra. This is pointed out by Kawaki, who can fool the Barrier Team by erasing his chakra signature and complains that they are “incompetent” and “only rely on sensing chakra”. This hinders Konoha’s protection.

Delta sneaking a drone in Konoha to search for Kawaki. Kawaki complaining about Konoha's sensing system in chapters 30 and 77.

It seems that the new modernized version has not only decreased the sensory range of the Sensing Barrier of Kakoi’s time, but it also appears to be unable to deploy a boosting sensing system. In fact, Boruto was flaring his chakra on purpose while he was still inside the village. However, nobody in the Barrier Team was able to pick this up.

Not only does this inaptitude make it impossible to predict upcoming danger before bypassing the A-Un Gate, but it also makes it an impossible task to follow enemies when they have fled away from the borders.

Ino explains they are unable to trace anything beyond the gates or erased chakra in episode 291.

For this same reason, Naruto Uzumaki had to step in and track Kawaki and Boruto by himself with Sage Mode.

When Kawaki and Boruto Uzumaki left the village, the Barrier Team could not detect them 40 kilometers outside Konoha because they were too far away from their limits. However, Naruto could finish what Ino or headquarters could not, even despite not having Kurama’s power for the extra boost.

Boruto flares his chakra to no response. Naruto detects Boruto in the battlefield against Code around 40 kilometers away with his sensing skills in episode 292.

One of the most interesting details about the new Barrier Team is that they are self-sufficient and automated because they possess technology to detect chakra imprints without the use of sensor-types, as well as being able to perform telepathy via Mind Body Transmission thanks to their Chakra Transmission Communication Device without external aid. 

From the script's point of view, this clearly makes the role of their leader very questionable but it's not surprising that this is the case because of the retconned nature of the team.

We have already witnessed the Barrier Team function perfectly without the presence of members of the Yamanaka clan, not only during Kakoi’s time, whose job and abilities are the same and above the current Barrier Team, but also during this era. 

This is because the upgraded system with the machines and the automated design exists so that its members, regardless of their background, can perform their duty alone. There is nobody enabling their telepathy or their sensory range. If that was the case, there would be no point in that technology if an outsider or anyone else was doing all the work.

There have been many chapters where the automated sensing and the staff detected (or undetected) chakra signatures using their alarms and their screens, and also contacted Shikamaru Nara or other people through telepathy using their Chakra Transmission Communication Devices.

Since before the start of Two Blue Vortex, the Barrier Team is finally demonstrating that they're indeed the self-sufficient team they were created to be, with any chance of external aid or any other member outside headquarter's participation unnecessary. The leader role has been changed, with Ino now using Mind Body Transmission if anyone asks her personally, rather than keeping the connection linked to the system if the users want to keep their conversation privy to the database or anyone that might be interested, while the Barrier Team focus on their original task: detection and communication.

One worker of the Barrier Team detecting the Grimes and Boruto and alerting Shikamaru Nara. Other worker also contacts Shikamaru about Kawaki erasing his chakra in chapters 81 and 77.

How does the Barrier Team work and what is their role?

Detect chakra signatures that bypass the Sensing Barrier.

Inform the Interception group and send them to investigate. In the new era, inform Naruto Uzumaki and Sasuke Uchiha telepathically.

DISCUSSION

How important is the Barrier Team?

The Barrier Team has experienced a surge of utility in Boruto compared to Naruto.

Originally, they were introduced quite late in the story. Konoha has experienced invasions since Orochimaru infiltrated during the Chūnin Exams disguised as the Kazekage, although their role during Pain’s invasion was decisive to demonstrate that Konoha has countermeasures against enemies looking to enter the village. 

The equivalent of Konoha's Barrier Team was the Allied Shinobi Forces's Sensor Division and the Intelligence Division, but made into one united group.

The Sensor Division worked in tandem with Muta Aburame to discover that the enemy possessed an army of White Zetsu ready, and their captain, Ao, was also responsible of discerning the reincarnated Edo Tensei from the White Zetsu and informing Darui that Ginkaku and Kinkaku were among the ranks.

The Intelligence Division worked in tandem with multiple shinobi carrying a portable Chakra Transmission Communication Device to receive information from each division and also relay plans from Headquarters to each division.

In Boruto's Konoha, the Barrier Team performs both tasks within a smaller range like Konoha.

Ao senses the White Zetsu among the Edo Tensei and the presence of the twins in chapter 525. Sakura Haruno discovers White Zetsu's way of copying unique chakra imprints to fool sensor-types in chapter 540.

So, the Barrier Team is essential to safeguard Konoha from the inside. Detecting anyone on the spot that has entered is one of the first steps to keep its villagers safe.

In Boruto, the Barrier Team suffered a downgrade compared to the previous appearance. Also counting 15 years of technological advancements that could have been implemented within their ranks, but haven't happened. Because of Kara’s interests in Kawaki, who is currently protected by Konoha, they must maintain their Sensing Barrier in top condition to detect enemies.

A mistake made by Ukyō Kodachi, who made the Yamanaka clan responsible of this team, is that he made people without tracking feats in Naruto, a representative of sensor-types in Boruto, as they don't sense chakra for tracking purposes, they overtake senses. Choosing a group that can't at least sense outside the village limits leaves much to be desired about Konoha’s resources and their range of chakra sensor-types.

Meanwhile, the plot purposefully chooses to forget other essential sensors that have completed tracking duties since Naruto multiple times and whose abilities don't rely on chakra such as Aburame clan members with their bugs for surveillance and close communication, the Hyūga clan members with their 20km or ore visual range, or the Inuzuka clan members who can track people across vast distances based on scent alone.

The failures of the Barrier Team:

One of the reasons behind the surge of importance of the Barrier Team is due to Kara’s interests in Kawaki and Code’s desire to destroy Konoha. The reminder of their existence makes them susceptible to mistakes and inefficiency provided by the writer to facilitate the plot, therefore they shine for their lack of resources and skills; and their lack of applying experience to reforming the new system learning by previous mistakes.

After fighting a large scale global conflict with reincarnated bodies and White Zetsu able to imitate shinobi chakra signatures (i.e White Zetsu impersonating Neji Hyūga to assassinate Sakura Haruno), Konoha’s new automated database and sensing system has not flagged chakra imprints from deceased shinobi like Jiraiya, prompting Kashin Koji to walk into the village as he pleases. 

Moreover, they rely solely on detecting chakra, making shinobi like Kawaki and Boruto, who can erase their chakra flare thanks to their Karma, and Karin, who can erase her chakra at discretion, to be able to enter or escape the village without being detected by the system or lookouts who are extremely apathetic. Not to mention none of the gates have lookouts like the ones in the War or use other sensing methods like Inuzuka clan, Hyūga clan (who used to be members) or Aburame clan alternative sensing skills that do not require sensing chakra. 

Hyūga with their eyes, Inuzuka with their noses and Aburame with their beetles being pivotal in tracking and sensing. in chapters 419, 467 and 540.

The sensors working for the Barrier Team are very limited to sensing only what lies inside the Barrier, making their sensory feats only Konoha-wide or Sensing Barrier-wide. This sensing symbiosis with the Sensing Barrier is a problem, which means that sensors’ skills scale to a machine rather than having abilities of their own. This problem results in them only sensing people when they have already entered Konoha, but not their approach, thus not preventing anything. If the enemy masks their chakra, these efforts are useless because they will not be detected.

This is more apparent for Ino Yamanaka, one of Naruto's classmates with a prominent role as a Mind Body Switch user in Ino-Shika-Cho/Team 10 in the prequel, who was made into the face of a sensing team and given prominence as someone that could potentially meet the standards, but has done the bare minimum required by the plot.

Rather than a character flaw, this is a mix of lack of quality writing, failure to follow the pre-established roles and the writer's necessity to change certain plot points to meet his own personal preferences.

After having no tracking feats in Naruto, she has been retconned and given a Konoha-wide sensing range equal to the Sensing Barrier’s Konoha-wide sensory to give her a new role in the story that she didn't have before. However, after she debuts being able to sense Delta enter Konoha like a competent new Konoha sensor, her role gradually becomes questionable when she's unable to sense people outside Konoha, thus becoming a plot device to reintroduce Naruto's Sage Mode.

Given the new Barrier Team's circumstances, it's interesting why the writer would turn the Sensing Water Sphere into a self-sufficient machine but have a person lead them from a flowershop.

The Yamanaka clan has been completely retconned, turned from a family introduced as intel gathering experts to something different. This point makes their inclusion all the more forced and nonsensical. 

Inoichi Yamanaka and the Analysis Team using Psycho Mind Transmission.

It seems that this disparity has made the Boruto writing team question their decision.

Because of the lack of tracking skills, Barrier Team’s automated sensing and Chakra Transmission Communication Device, Mikio Ikemoto has already decided to use the team without Ino and instead use her like a private telepathy link as it really doesn't interfere with headquarters' performance. She keeps fulfilling this role but rather unofficially as Shikamaru's personal communication line.

Could they be redeemed?

The greatest disadvantage of the Barrier Team is their small sensing range and their inability to rely on other sensing methods than chakra perception. 

After exposing the main problems related to not erasing deceased people’s chakra imprints from their database and failing to boost their system in case of emergency, there are a few points to make in order to make the Barrier Team a competent and compelled facility:

Reuse Kakoi’s greater Sensing Barrier to track Konoha’s forest area before the A-Un Gate.

Use other sensory and perception techniques from other clans like Aburame’s beetles, Hyūga’s Byakugan and Inuzuka’s ninken/sense of smell to counter shinobi’s ability to erase their chakra signature and keeping a wider range of search.

Put the Akimichi clan in the lookout by every gate like they used to guard the Logistical Support & Medical Division during the Fourth Shinobi World War, this way being able to see approaching danger and fighting them before their entrance to give Konoha time to elaborate a plan.

Considered the most powerful shinobi village, using past experiences and the full power of Konoha's shinobi forces, their clans and their technology, could prevent infiltrations; as well as giving each member of a clan their deserved time to show their abilities.

Note: The Fourth Shinobi World War has been replaced by global conflict to avoid mature content flags.

[mollyrealized]

Hello, if you are checking out my Tumblr because of the transcript thing, I am going to try to do some sort of automated crossposting or something, but I have a newsletter you might like, it is at thinktrove.org. Basically just cool miscellanea and occasional stuff. I am also ancient Gen X but a newly hatched trans, and also doing some personal trauma work, so all of that is maybe something of interest. In any case, glad you guys liked the transcript, was glad to do something small for Neil after all the niceness he does for people with his ask answers and other stuff.

[knittinglizards]

accidentally followed someone from the for you page and as an automated recommendation from it have discovered that prolific sff writer Diane Duane is on here reblogging star trek gifs and crossposted twitter threads about voting

[katherinestasaph]

postcardposting #5: babeular juxtapositioning (crosspost)

new on the blog: a deepish dive, via postcard, into a bit of old web history

for more automated updates, there's a feed now

[skysometric]

Official Deprecation Notice: Twitter Accounts

it's no secret that Twitter has been rapidly losing its luster over the past year, to the point where the site has become frustrating to use, and my social media presence there has become challenging to maintain. as a result, i have begun winding down my use of the site, with intent to close down all presence on Twitter by the end of the year.

what exactly will this process look like?

i have begun closing down my side accounts, effective immediately. if you're familiar with these side accounts, you can find almost all of them on Tumblr or Bluesky instead (Mastodon alternatives also in the works).

NowUKnowGaming has always used an automated crossposter, and as such will remain on Twitter as long as it is economical to keep the crossposter running. you can also find alternative sites for NUKG on its front page @ nowuknowgaming.com.

as for my main Twitter account @skysometric, i intend to wind down all original posts there over the coming months. my only remaining presence on that account will be from an automated crossposter with links to all my new blogposts, videos, and livestreams. by the end of the year i will lock my account entirely, and my bio will be set to redirect people to my links page. at this time, i do not intend to delete my account.

as for what you can do to help...

if you would like to keep following me, you can follow me here on Tumblr or use my links page to follow me on another social media site. thank you for your continued support!

if a site is not listed on my links page, i might still have an account there (@skysometric everywhere), but i make no guarantees for whether i will maintain that account.

i still refuse to use anything owned by Meta, so no Facebook, Instagram, or Threads. sorry!

if all else fails, i'm on discord. i'm sure you can guess my username!

finally, i would like to mention that there will be no loss of data from deprecating my Twitter account – i have downloaded backups of my accounts and i will be making a public Twitter archive site using that data! these accounts have a lot of important and meaningful personal history, so i want to preserve that legacy in the most respectful way i know how... with web design, of course 💖

by the time i deprecate my Twitter account, it will be about ten years old – so thanks for sticking with me for all this time, and i'll see you on the other side of wherever we all choose to end up!

[secularbakedgoods]

Turing didn't see this one coming

This is a crosspost of my newsletter! If you’d like to get posts like this direct to your inbox or RSS reader, you can subscribe here.

There's a weird, funny thing about running an online business where people are so often forced to interact with chatbots and "knowledge bases" that they'll just assume any customer support process they have to deal with is automated. So when you hear from your customers at all, it's in the form of messages that read, in their entirety, like this:

download not working need refund

To my customers' credit, once I message them back they usually notice I'm not a robot and start talking to me like a human being. Which is itself kind of a nice reminder: not everyone who's rude to you is doing it on purpose. Many of them, in fact, would've been perfectly polite if their expectations for the encounter hadn't been utterly fucked by forces outside their control.

Last Week of the LGTBQ+ Romance Book Giveaway

As of this mailout, there's still a few days left of the LGBTQ+ Romance Book Giveaway on Prolific Works. You can get 21 queer romance books — including my novelette "Jay Moriarty Violates the Official Secrets Act" — for free until February 28!

New on Ko-fi: "Jay Moriarty vs the Machine God," Chapter 5

Chapter 5 of "Jay Moriarty vs the Machine God" is now up for all supporters on Ko-fi. If you don't want to read the story in serialized form and would prefer to get it all at once, you can also buy the entire novelette as an ebook.

This Week's Links

The abuser economy

A disturbingly large volume of writing and texts on sales encourage you to do things that in the context of personal relationships would be considered coercive or, in an intimate context, sexual assault. You're encouraged to violate consent, be relentlessly pushy and never take no for an answer, and encourage people to act against their best interests in order to make you happy. In a word, many, many hangouts of salespeople become rooms full of the kind of creep that you would do your best to avoid at a party.

Here's a PDF Version of the CIA Guide to Sabotaging Fascism

Last week, I wrote about the “Simple Sabotage Field Manual,” a World War II era guide to resisting fascism for normal people. At the time, it was the fifth most popular book on Project Gutenberg, a website that hosts public domain books. It had been downloaded 60,000 times over the last month.

---

For those wondering, I'm still in Portfolio Hell but have elected not to include the story where Sebastian Moran gets pegged.

-K

[zeedropcrosslister]

Boost Your Sales with ZeeDrop Crosslister: The Best Cross Listing App for Online Sellers

In today's competitive eCommerce landscape, efficiency and visibility are key to success. ZeeDrop Crosslister is the ultimate tool for sellers looking to expand their reach and boost their sales across multiple marketplaces. Here’s how ZeeDrop can revolutionize your online selling business:

Why ZeeDrop Crosslister is the Best Cross Listing App

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[starrwulfe]

Content Creators: Substack’s dumpster fire should also be the one lit underneath your @$$

If 2010-2020 was the Great Social Media Consolidation, looks like 2022 and beyond are gonna be the Great Innanet Decentralization, and I’m 1oo% present for it. Thanks to our friends #indieweb and #fediverse, you already know how easy it is to plug into some great communities on the interwebs while keeping your content under your control and being able to keep a record of the dialog around it at your own site.

If you’re reading this on my website, then just look down where on a traditional blog there’d be a “leave a comment” doohickey there for you to fill out a form and say how you feel about what you read. But here you can just comment on any of the syndicated sites where this same content exists and it’ll find its way back here via “a series of tubes” I’ve arranged. And with some hacky tomfoolery, my comments here will flow back to wherever they need to go in most places. To me, this is what real social media is supposed to be like– Your media on in a space you control and interact with the right circle of people you want to see it. And if you want, you can network your site with others, forming a mesh network of sites. That’s the premise of decentralized social networking I’ve stressed again and again here.

Today on of my “transit content” friends I’ve followed for years is finding out first had why this is a good idea, thanks to the whole Substack debacle. Reece Martin (@rmtransit@mstdn.social) who runs RMTransit on YouTube experienced this firsthand by having to make the hard decision to move his popular Substack newsblog to WordPress, but to me that means he just upgraded. By switching he’s able to:

Immediately take advantage of RSS feeds, newsletters, and the mobile app.

A whole ass ecosystem of plugins to make your blog do everything except tuck him in at night.

Implement the ActivityPub plugin and publish content into the fediverse

Grab the Indieweb plugins and use Webmentions and syndicate comments and content with other blogs

Use the above with Bridgy and crosspost, backfeed and more with more SNSs

Use IFTTT, Zapier and more to automate external things like kicking off a job to auto post his video content on his new blog when he comes out with a new video on YouTube.

I’m happy he decided to go this route and I hope others out there do the same. If your message and voice are your livelihood, there’s no excuse for not using all the products available to make sure it stays that way.

[retellingthehobbit]

@pelahnar ahhh thank you!!

I think one of my biggest problems is that, especially early on, I’ve been poorly organized and failed to do the “boring” website organization/maintenance that makes a webcomic actually retain any readers. While some of my chapters get some attention in isolation, people often trouble have finding the rest of them, learning there are others, or following along. Which is my fault really XD.

I once had this mentality that I could just draw the pages, not worry about anything else, and people would figure out how to follow the comic on their own— but that’s not really how things work 😂. Even in my own experience, there are plenty of webcomics I’ve been unable to get into because it was too hard to figure out where they were being posted or how to follow along.

It took me a while to start crossposting to Webtoon and Ao3, and even years after starting to crosspost people still are surprised to learn the comic is on those sites. And I think it’s because I haven’t made that clear enough to people. It also took me far too long to put together a separate Tumblr sideblog distinct from my main blog, and then to have that blog contain a master list of links to the chapters in the pinned post. : P

I definitely need to make a website as a central hub for the comic, the way other artists do with their own comics, but. AHH. 😭. Designing a website is a lot of work. I would either need to spend weeks learning how to do that and putting it together, or Id need to spend at least a few hundred dollars hiring someone to build a website for this personal project that Im not making any money off. I’ve noticed that lots of webcomics I love partner with Hiveworks, which has an internal team that helps build well-formatted websites for artists so they don’t have to do it, but those kinds of partnerships aren’t reallly an option for a copyright-violating fancomic. (And technically, Webtoon can take down my comic for that reason at any time 😂.)

My other option is to use a site like comicfury, which has prebuilt webcomic websites— but comicfury could easily go under, the way similar websites have, and it would kind of defeat the point. The whole purpose of having a website is to have something you “own” that can’t be taken down on a whim; I’d hate to put in all this effort into a Comicfury site and then have it shut down.

(And i’ve tried Wordpress, but afaik their ‘webcomic’ themes are either all extremely outdated or don’t work anymore.)

It’s just so many things to manage? Posting on Webtoon, posting to the image hosting site I use for Ao3 embeds, Ao3 itself, and Tumblr; I have four Tumblr sideblogs; then then also other social media sites like Instagram and Tiktok 😆. Just the process of *uploading* a chapter of this comic takes hours! I’m aware that other people find ways to Automate posting but I haven’t.

Uploading to yet another website would be even more work, and I would only do it if it were my own website; but I can’t make my own website until I learn how or am willing/able to throw lots of money at someone; and anyway, alas that these evil days should be mine. So many things to organize, so many blogs to run!

I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread. I need a hiatus, a very long hiatus….

….And when you combine the organizational problems with the fact that my update schedule is very inconsistent, it’s a wonder anyone has figured out how to follow this comic at all 🤣😂🤣🤣 I’m very thankful people are so determined.

One day I will bite the bullet and figure out how to make a website, but until then! My comic will just be around. I doubt it will ever be like a Real Webcomic until I get the organization down and make a Real website, but that’s just life sometimes

….I think some people might believe this fancomic is more popular than it is XD. One or two people have talked to me like this comic is very popular or something but it’s usually more like

Its more popular than a lot of webcomics but I want to stress that (from my side) this feels like a very small operation 😂, especially given the level of time I put into it. I’m not unhappy about that, because I don’t draw this to get popular! I draw it because I want to! I would draw it in a void! And I enjoy having a small enough reader group that I recognize familiar usernames who comment often, can reply to all comments, and can have conversations with individual people and stuff. but it is just a thing.

My point is that I’m not Sansukh or any other (deservedly) Uber-popular hobbit fanfic with thousands of subscribers, I’m still just a little guy, so I do appreciate every comment/share a lot! 😂

[flatluigi]

mastodon still just feels like the worst parts of IRC and discord put together attempting to look like a twitter, and every time i look at cohost i just go 'what use do i have for cohost that i don't literally already have been using tumblr for for a decade'

i don't really like twitter but its use case was pretty clear for me (shortform, immediate updates from anything i was pretty interested in) and removing API access is going to kill a lot of things! no more API means no automated posts by bots but it also means no more crossposting -- the people you follow who did move to another service and just share those posts as tweets aren't going to be able to do that easily anymore, and likely will just no longer do so. also, twitter embeds are probably going to get fucked!

[heliopauseentertainments]

Life Sentence

A prompt for @megop Week 2022 on Tumblr. Prompt Day 3: Laughter / No Escape

Continuity: TFA Rating: Teen Relationship: Megatron/Optimus Prime Characters: Megatron, Optimus Prime Warnings: Imprisonment, Starvation

Summary: In which Megatron receives a curious visitor in prison.

Disclaimer: I have not consumed the leaked season 4 content.

Crossposting: In a reblog

Fic under the cut

Ever since Lugnut had been released on early parole for good behavior, Megatron had sat in relative silence. The cells near his in this cramped Autobot prison—clearly meant to house smaller Cybertronians than the height his kind often reached—were unoccupied. The other Decepticons remaining in custody were in other cell blocks. Perhaps the Autobots thought the isolation would torment him, drive him mad, cause him to suffer. That was part of their idea of punishment after all: suffering.

If he didn’t suffer, then he wasn’t getting what they believed he deserved, was he?

The Autobot regime seemed to mistake “physical discomfort” for “suffering.” They overlapped, yes, but they were hardly synonymous. There were many ways to suffer and little did they know that Megatron had already done plenty of that in his life, long before the war, long before his self-imposed exile to the far edges of the galaxy with his troops while they searched for the AllSpark.

Struggling against Autobot control after the civil wars. Struggling against his own former leader—Megazarak had not gone down easily—to bring the Decepticons from simply spouting heretical  Destron rhetoric to being a people of praxis, actively liberating themselves from the tyranny of others. No one even remembered the Destrons anymore, their language, culture, and purpose nearly forgotten. No one remembered how they were used for their planet’s defense and then ignored. A footnote in Cybertronian history written by the Protectobots and their Autobot successors.

That wouldn’t constitute an appropriate punishment for what they had considered to be his crimes. Perhaps it wasn’t an appropriate punishment. It was all so long ago when the war, his war, had been a losing battle without the AllSpark and without space bridge technology. So long since they… banished themselves to find it.

It hardly mattered what had happened or why.

Megatron had failed. He was in here until he ceased functioning, whenever that might be. Tomorrow. Millions of years from now. What they thought of his condition and accommodations in this prison was of little importance.

He took some measure of solace in the fact that the Autobots wouldn’t be getting their wish, not exactly.

Physical discomfort meant little to him. Megatron would sit and wait for either fate or opportunity. His sentence had been “indefinite,” confinement until death but no death sentence to expedite the process.

Death by time and time alone.

Torturous, in theory, given their long lives.

His rations, delivered to his cell by an automated chute, had started to become imperceptibly smaller. It was difficult to grab them with his hands in cuffs, but he managed. Those rations were likely the only reason they hadn’t clamped a silencing mask over his jaws. Perhaps they intended to slowly starve him. Perhaps they would deny him maintenance until he simply rusted in place.

The sound of a heavily armored door clanging open drew his attention from staring at the blank space on the floor between his feet. Neither the guards nor even the prison’s warden had been by in over a month. Were it not for the ration deliveries, Megatron might have thought that the prison had been abandoned, left to rot with him in it.

Deliberate, measured footsteps approaching down the hall of cells alerted him to a visitor. Surely, they were here for him, given his lack of incarcerated brethren. But who would come to see him?

Into view walked the small Autobot who had been responsible for his capture and defeat on Earth. A frown was firmly set on his face. Did he come bearing news? Did he come to gloat?

What was his name again? Megatron was sure he’d heard it before during the course of the trial, but he couldn’t recall it. This was the mech who had argued that he should be given a life sentence as opposed to death. He was the one responsible for Megatron’s drawn out fate. Had he somehow thought he’d been doing Megatron a favor?

“What an unexpected surprise,” he said, shifting his weight on the narrow bench that served as his only furniture to better see his visitor. “What could possibly bring you down here to my purgatory, Autobot?”

They lapsed into silence, as though the Autobot was searching in his processor for his words, but Megatron continued, not giving him a chance.

“Here to mock me? To gloat in your victory? To—”

“No, actually.”

There it was.

Now that little upstart had found his voice. The determined frown remained in place.

“Then what, dare I ask, drags you down here to me, Autobot?” The cuffs on his wrists rattled as he attempted, out of habit, to gesture. A fruitless motion, restrained as he was like this.

“Well, first off, I have a name that’s not ‘Autobot.’ It’s Optimus.” Ah, at last. A name to put to that irritating little face, the one he associated with his downfall. This saved Megatron the embarrassment of having to ask what it was. “Secondly, I came to ask you some questions.”

“Oh, really.” He huffed. “Well, luckily for you, Optimus, I have nothing better to do and nothing but time at my disposal.”

 --

After that first round of questions, general in scope and related to their planet’s overall history, Megatron had been surprised when Optimus continued to return to his cell. Sometimes within the same month, sometimes within the same week…. Rarely, Optimus would return the very next day with more questions, more that he wanted—needed—to know. The first questions had seemed like things the Autobot could have learned in any public archive, albeit with a distinctly pro-regime slant, of course.

As the visits—which Megatron couldn’t imagine were sanctioned by Optimus’ superiors in any way—continued, the questions became more specific and more about pieces of history missing from the governmentally-established canon. The information the young Autobot sought was information only Megatron could provide, as one of the last still living Cybertronians outside of the Autobot-dominated educational system. There were other Decepticons around, sure, but they had more interest these days in assimilating to survive in mainstream society, at least that was what Optimus reported. Lugnut and Blitzwing had apparently even gotten work doing demolition.

Although, worse, Megatron was almost ashamed to say that he had begun to look forward to Optimus’ intrusions into his isolation and solitude. Optimus was the mech, the nobody Autobot out of left field, that had been to the one to bring him down in the end.

Now, staring down at the relatively minuscule bot, Megatron watched his face for clues. He’d only just finished explaining to Optimus about the conflict between the Destrons and Protectobots, both factions now long since forgotten. Was Optimus truly interested or merely letting the information wash over him? Then again… if he weren’t truly interested, why would he have kept coming here?

Optimus had tended to say little beyond his questions during these visits, seemingly content to let Megatron talk at length. Was he after more than the words? What was this quick-witted bot up to? It was hard to say what Optimus was thinking, blinking up at him from far below.

“You’ve come to me multiple times,” Megatron said, leaning closer to the energy bars of his cage. His cuffs rattled against the sore plating around his wrists, the circuits tender from the constant contact for years on end. The stiff, slowly rusting struts in his back ached at the motion. “But what I fail to understand is for what purpose you ask me these things. Now it’s my turn to ask you something, Autobot.”

No. They were beyond that by now. There was no need to reduce this small Prime to his faction. Optimus clearly had taken the effort to learn more than what had been shoved down his throat by the regime since his creation.

“Optimus, why do you come here to talk to a prisoner? Your enemy? Was it not you who worked so tirelessly to put me here?”

There was a pause, Optimus clearly carefully considering his answer. He was in no physical danger, Megatron restrained, weakened, and caged as he was, so there would be no reason for him to hold back. He could speak freely and had done so on many previous occasions.

“You were threatening a planet of innocent civilians that we had to protect. It was necessary.” Ah, yes, altruism. A virtue espoused by the Autobots at large, but really only embodied by this one little Prime and the inexperienced team he had commanded on Earth. The Autobot government paid it little more than lip service and he and his Decepticons had long since forgotten it. One of the many casualties in the fight for survival.

Yet Optimus continued, having more to say for himself.

“The historical data on public record is full of holes and inconsistencies. It’s been bothering me for awhile now. Something just wasn’t right. I thought you would be a source to fill the gaps.”

“Is that so?”

“I’m not finished.” Optimus held up a finger in admonishment before resuming. “I know you’re not an unbiased source, not by a long shot, but there were things I had to know and I knew you weren’t going anywhere any time soon.”

Another pause. The little Prime was right. Megatron wasn’t going anywhere. He would be here until he ceased to function. He hadn’t even seen a guard, let alone the warden or a medic in ages. The only interruptions to his silence were the shrinking rations, the pain where some of his plating had begun to rust together from lack of movement and maintenance, and Optimus’ questionably legal visitations.

Optimus sighed, letting his shoulders and arms drop. His determined gaze drifted away for a moment before returning to stare Megatron directly in the optics.

“If you had the chance, what would you do differently?”

What a strange question.

“Differently?” He scoffed. “It hardly matters, Optimus. There’s no point in daydreaming about impossibilities.”

“Just… just think about it.” Optimus turned away to leave, but spared a glance at Megatron over his shoulder first. There was something sincere in those blue optics, something genuine that Megatron wasn’t able to quite make sense of. There was more here than Optimus let on. “Maybe you’ll remember what it is you wanted back then, before the war. I think… I think, after all those years in exile and Dr. Sumdac’s lab, you’ve forgotten.”

 --

It had been more than half a year since Optimus had last visited. Perhaps something Megatron had said had driven him away. That was probably for the best. A young Autobot hero probably had better things to do than cavort with an old, disgraced warmonger on his last legs. Yes, much better things to do.

The thought crossed his processor that perhaps Optimus' visits had been part of further torment. Offering friendship and then taking it away…. No. He banished the thought as unlikely, given the questionably legal nature of what Optimus had wanted to talk to him about.

Megatron’s plating had begun to stick in place when he tried to move about his tiny cell. There had never been room to stand and walk, but he used to be able to at least stretch a leg or his arms a little from his cramped little bench. His rations had shrunk to being less than half of what they had been when he was first locked away. The Autobots weren’t even hiding it anymore. He hardly had the energy to stir beyond fetching the ration and chugging it. Then he would sit still for hours on end, powering down to conserve his limited energy.

Truthfully, Megatron wasn’t certain why he bothered to prolong the inevitable with power conservation techniques. Why was he bothering? Was it in hopes of making it to another visit from Optimus? It had already been so long. There was no reason to think he would return. Besides, what did that little upstart bring him aside from a curious ear and momentary company?

A treacherous part of his spark kept hoping that any second now, he would hear that heavy door creak open again and footsteps approach his cage.

The odds were low of a visit tonight, as it was already late and the lights had been turned off save for the energy bars of the cells. A mercy to simulate night, a reminder of the passage of time as it was easy to lose trust in one’s own chronometer.

Just as Megatron had begun to debate powering down for the night instead of wallowing in his loneliness, the bars of his cell blinked out of existence with a soft zap. The door to the cellblock was thrown open and hurried steps echoed off the empty walls.

Blue optics came into view, now the only source of light aside from his own red ones.

“…Optimus?” He had to be dreaming. This was some foolish hallucination brought on by his hungry, struggling processor.

“You were right… about some things.” The blue crossed the threshold of the cell. Something tugged his hands and with a click the cuffs fell away. A bright, full cube of fuel came from nowhere, perhaps hidden in a compartment or kit of some kind that Megatron couldn’t see. “Not everything, but some things… and now I need your help. Drink this.”

Somewhere in the distance, an alarm blared. Then another, closer. Another one. Then in a moment the cellblock was full of red light and a siren sounded.

“Hurry! We need to go!”

[presumenothing]

automation, the perils of

In his defense the Taobao sales this year had been really good. Just because he’s… well, definitely not single anymore doesn’t mean he can’t take advantage of Singles’ Day discounts.

Plus the user reviews had looked decent, and if he’d had uncharitable-possibly-slightly-evil thoughts about cats and robot vacuums that’s between him and his browsing history.

(Or, the adventures of Stabby the Space SID Roomba.)

aka 1.7 words of crack-taken-seriously(?) for fan_flashworks on dreamwidth + "snake tribe" on my @guardianbingo​ card. link in post source and reply, ao3 crosspost to be added!

edit: now on ao3!