#but it's really weird how most people actually can be neutral and those who claim they can't can they just happen to be assholes 💁‍♀️

[jade-curtiss]

I think the only weird thing I have with (c)afab people that makes me unable to really connect is when they take for granted I can relate to their experiences given what they assume my assignation to be...and then...they project an experience I can't relate to even if I tried. Experiences so foreign to my reality I couldn't even try to pretend I can 😑

[rockofeye]

This is Not Okay.

(I see your asks and I am working through them, promise)

In the last few years, I have generally kept quiet on the amount of unpleasantness that has come bearing the title of Haitian Vodou. I am not the Vodou Police and people have a right to be wrong and make (sometimes terrible) mistakes. Additionally, people genuinely do not want advice or feedback when their mind is made up and they have found what they think is the real deal for them, and that's okay. I don't need or even want to get involved since folks are presumably adults making adult decisions, and I don't need to invite myself to any/every fight where my name is not invoked...or even when it is!

And yet.

Sometimes, it's too much to stay quiet because silence can get people really hurt, or worse. While folks are entitled to their mistakes and entitled not to educate themselves or do due diligence on the people they are granting access to their heads, there's just something that doesn't sit right with me when it's egregious. Long time followers know I have only spoken directly once or twice.

This is egregious, and it's going to get someone killed:

I have received this at least 5 different times today and have had folks genuinely seeking the lwa ask if this is a solid option. I do not know the person behind this and I would hope this is some sort of massive misunderstanding on their part. However, even so, this is awful.

Let's break this down a bit.

Advertising an initiation right off the bat with how many spots you have available says that you are not concerned with who comes in the door or why they are there. Advertising initiation as something to buy is weird even without the bargain basement 'FIVE SPOTS AVAILABLE'. Sosyetes do not need to advertise and recruit; folks come by reputation and general attraction to what the sosyete does.

The fact that there is no information about what sosyete is mounting this is a red flag. No one can undertake initiation alone. It's impossible because the very mechanics of initiation require folks from outside your lineage to come and verify that the work is being done completely and in accordance with the general principles of the religion.

Trying to cast doubt on other places as a way to build credibility is gross, and it is super ironic that they are advertising this as an answer to scams and people who do gross things. Do those things happen? Absolutely. Is this the way to solve it? No. Grift cannot neutralize grift. This is grift.

The big blinking neon red flag sign is the kwakwa/asogwe hybrid initiation. This is not possible and communicates several things, the largest of which is that this person has not received appropriate guidance in either rite because even the most barebones education tells you that this is not possible and could never be done.

Further, this communicates a lack of respect for both rites. The balls it takes to decide that you are going to take it upon yourself to change a religious practice and throw a bunch of stuff in a blender to come up with something new is WILD. This is outright spiritual arrogance that ignores the place of elders, culture, history, and the actual revolution that birthed these things.

Claiming that a person will receive everything they need in one step is lacking in clarity and breaking from the culture of Haitian Vodou, tchatcha and asogwe lineages alike. That is not how initiation works; the process of initiation unfolds over days and weeks and the process of becoming a competent manbo or houngan unfolds over years and even a lifetime. No initiation is a drive through endeavor and should not be treated as such.

'Without the worries of ties to a spiritual house' tells me this person lacks rootedness and perhaps ties to a spiritual house of their own, which is sad. It is not possible to be a manbo or a houngan in any lineage without ties to a specific lineage/spiritual house. It's not possible. Every lineage of Haitian Vodou is based on the lakou, or the compound or yard that a family and community is built around.

What lakou we are associated with tells our stories and gives us our roots, whether we are Haitian or not, or related to our lineage head or not. These stories are vitally important, we cannot function without them and we cannot take Haitian Vodou out of the context that it exists in. We are collectively built from the story that our spiritual ancestors told themselves when they dreamed of liberation and undertook the truly revolutionary action of revolt against French colonizers.

Trying to undo that to package initiation as something unrooted and without community is a slap in the ancestral face and is impossible. It's not Haitian Vodou. We do not stand alone. If you have no community, who will endorse you as a houngan or manbo? How will anyone know you actually are one? I can give you the names of a dozen priests who were active participants in my initiation and can confirm that I have the right to hold the asson. If you have no spiritual community, you do not have that...and you do not have the right to hold the asson.

Learning is different in Haitian Vodou; we learn as we develop and there is no initiation that grants you the immediate access to the inside of your initiator's head. Info farming is not a thing. We learn as we develop, which is why relationships and community are so important. Going through an initiation doesn't give you all the knowledge. Initiation doesn't even teach you things, you learn after because during the process you do not have the right yet to know. Framing all of this as withholding information shows a lack of cultural fluency. Do people withhold in ways that can be harmful? Sure, because there is fault everywhere....but this is not how you solve that, at all.

Most asogwe receive their po tèt; some take it home and some choose to keep it in the temple they were initiated in. Some houses have specific regleman around that, and there are individual circumstances that would keep someone from having theirs but those are instances that people would work out ahead of time. Further, if someone is not comfy with what the lineage they are initiating into does with po tèts, that it something to work out before they initiate, which is why discernment is so, so important.

There are not multiple kolyes given during initiation. In an asogwe lineage, a kolye is made during the initiation process for you specifically and it is large and worn on the body in most places. We do not receive kolye for individual lwa nor are they consecrated in separate ceremonies; this is directly taken from Orisha traditions.

A kwa kwa and a bell are not an asson, and genuinely only a fool would try to bring that to Loko, the progenitor of all asogweman. You cannot mash things together and say they are an asson because you want them to be, or that Loko will give it. I can't even be charitable about this, it's straight up wrong and completely unethical. No one does this. No one.

'Head seals' is wild and someone is going to get hurt. The job of protecting the head is with the lwa, not in the hands of someone doing work. Further, a correct and complete initiation precludes the possibility of problematic possession because the lwa are there to sort that out. Additionally, taking it upon yourself to 'seal' the head a child of Ginen in the name of Ginen is awfully arrogant...are you really going to say you can overstep the lwa and/or do a better job than them?

The work of initiation is incredibly delicate because you literally have someone's head in your hands. People can die when things are done incorrectly, either in the moment or in a long and winding road of calamity. Every single manbo and houngan I know has a story about this. We know what happens when things like this are undertaken because we've either watched the fallout or had people come to our doors in deep suffering because incorrect and inadvisable things have been done to them.

Paying for any initiation through Etsy should speak for itself. That is not how houngans and manbos do business.

What is unsaid in this blurb is that this is undoubtedly happening in the US, because it would never be allowed to happen in Haiti. This says a lot and it's a giant can of worms to open, but when have I avoided that? Initiation does not happen in the US for a lot of reasons. Some folks want to say it can, but it really can't. This is not the post to get into why and I can write more on that later, but that's the long and short of it.

Perhaps finally, my friend Sankofa made a really astute point in another forum: beware anyone in any African Traditional or African Descended religion trying to sell you something ceremonially unique. Our ceremonies are largely the same for big reasons, and an individual saying they are doing something new, like mixing tchatcha and asson or initiating you to your dead ancestors and putting ancestors on your head, is a massive red flag. This is not how culture and traditional religion function. This is not what the ancestors built for us, and this is not what we pass down.

Please, please be careful with your heads. I meant it when I said that people will die because of stuff like this. Please be discerning about who you trust with your head and your life. Take your time and see lots of ceremonies. Pray. Listen for the voice of the lwa which can sound a lot like your intuition. And, for the love of Ogou and Metrès Danto, don't buy initiations on Etsy.

I hope the person behind this post can reflect on what they are doing and re-evaluate their choices. In a perfect world, they would consult with their elders and their mama/papa kanzo for guidance and really, really listen. If they don't have elders and/or an initiator, they should refrain from offering things like this until they do. Different choices can always be made, but spiritual work done out of ignorance, malice, or greed that harms someone can never be taken back.

[womenaremypriority]

(I promise this is relevant to people who don’t play the sims)

So, in the Sims 4, you can choose between having a masculine and feminine style for your sims hair, clothes, etc. Thankfully, you can mix and match between the two, and it’s not locked in that female and male sims have different options like it was in previous games. You can also make transgender sims with an update(this post is also not about trans people.) This way, you can choose between making a woman or a man, and it will default for the man sims to be able to impregnate others, to pee standing up, and to have a masculine frame, and vice versa for women, but you can mix and match. But what is also in the same drop down menu, is whether a select sim has a masculine or feminine style of dress. The man sims have masculine selected, and their clothes default have that filter you have to remove, while woman sims have feminine selected, with the same filter. And I just find it crazy, that feminine and masculine styles of clothing and hair are considered so inherent and so obvious that it’s like that. I’m not saying I don’t understand why, because most people will design the sims like that, and it’s still a step up from the previous games. The pieces you can choose from aren’t completely limited, it’s not as if the only things in the feminine catalog are dresses, skirts, and blouses, but there’s still a distinct difference between the two. And while you can choose the other style, or not filter through the two, some of the masculine styles don’t fit right on the female frames, and it’s clear they made the outfits with only one sex in mind. For me, I find it most obvious how ubiquitous and inescapable gender roles are when it’s mundane stuff like this- and while you can also choose to filter between sporty styles, preppy styles, basic styles, etc, that’s harder to find, and the masculine-feminine dichotomy is the most important and obvious in game. I find it depressing that such a ridiculous, cultural, and even subjective categorization is considered so important in style. It only holds us back and is so meaningless. You could claim that ‘masculine’ style is just a way to say ‘made for masculine frame’ and vice versa in the game, but the outfits and hairstyles for each one still have a clear theme. Even if you know these categorizations are meaningless and not inherent, they still hold a part of your subconscious. Most people, even relatively progressive and open minded people, don’t realize how much these stereotypes are everywhere. Another mundane example- when searching for content to put in my game, if I see a little decorative dress (not something to wear) that you can place in your house, my subconscious associates that with a little girls room, and not a little boys room. But why? There is no reason that it couldn’t be. No reason at all. And when people make houses or rooms for their characters in the game, they act as if one of the most important considerations if whether it’s a man or a woman living there(and not just for obvious small things that actually relate to sex, those things don’t even really exist in game.) People who are generally open-minded and I know don’t want to box people in, but still can’t help but primarily divide people’s interests, style, and overall vibe into gender categories. Even things like sports and video games, despite being quite different, are considered to have commonality because of the body configuration and genetics of the people assumed to be interested in them. Everything we do, as humans, our outfits, our bedrooms, our living rooms, our interests, has to fit into this weird dichotomy that reflects something seemingly completely unrelated- our birth sex, which is just a neutral category we’re born with- and even people who know that strict gender roles are silly can’t help themselves but divide everything we do by those lines, no matter how inane or random, and it shows in everything we do, but primarily, in little pixel versions of our lives.

[direwolfrules]

Star Wars As Star Trek AU

Exactly what it says on the tin. Specifically, Star Wars: The Clone Wars as Star Trek.

The Various Political Entities

The Federation- The Republic becomes the Federation, and the Jedi and GAR are now Starfleet. The Jedi in this AU are typically high ranking officers on ships. The Council are all Admirals except for Obi-Wan, who pulls a Picard and declines promotion for as long as he can. There is no Force, but I'm going to make them more sensitive to psychic phenomena, or in the case of some Jedi, just straight up psychic if the species fits.

The Senate is now the Federation Council, the Chancellor President of the Federation.

The clones are still clones, but because of the general good vibes/hope for a better tomorrow thing Trek has, they all got citizenship as soon as they were discovered. The Anti-Augment laws are just going to be thrown out the window for the most part. Because they inconvenience me.

I don't know, the Kaminoians are all Soongs now, because if anything Morally Dubious and Unethical happens, it's typically the work of a Soong.

The Hostile Superpower- The Separatists either replace the Cardassians or the Romulans, or maybe a weird mash up of both. There is a Neutral Zone buffer in the Outer Rim between the two major powers, but unfortunately a Federation starship violated the treaty, so now it's war time. The violation was baited by former Starfleet Admiral Dooku, who defected.

The Mandalorian Empire- Mandalorians replace Klingons, for obvious reasons. I can easily mash up events and stuff to make them work. Like, the Khitomer Massacre can easily be mashed together with Galidraan, the most major change I'd have to make is it's not known House Vizsla was behind the Massacre. Also, I kinda have a specific plot point for the Children of the Watch that would work with a canon Klingon storyline (please, please tell me your guesses. I want to see if anyone can figure it out from the clue(s) in this post).

Also, I can make Korkie/Alexander parallels, because I am a Korkie Kenobi Truther.

The Mandalorians are ruled by the Aii'aliit (closest thing to parliment or meeting of the clans, literally means clan of clans). Noble Houses are all represented on the council, and those Houses all have vassal Clans. Adonai Kryze is alive in this AU for plot reasons, and he's the High Chancellor of the Council (I'll look up or make a Mando'a title later). Satine's the Ambassador to the Federation, and Bo's joined the Mandalorian Protectors.

The Mandos have had a complicated legal debate over the status of the clones for years. After the Galidraan Massacre House Mereel lost a lot of status, so suddenly giving a House with a claim on the Mand’alor title several million soldiers seems...less than prudent. And what's to say the Clones aren't a trap from the Federation, meant to destroy them from the inside out. The memory of the Dral'han and the Taung Extinction Virus (I'm co-opting the Augment Virus) run deep in their people.

The Hutts- The Hutts are the Ferengi. I...don't really think I need to explain that one.

Resistance is Futile- And, because I enjoy breaking my own rules, the Yuuzhan Vong are now the Borg. That's right, I'm bringing the EU into this bitch. Listen, the parallels between the two threats make it too tempting not to do.

The Main Cast

Aboard the USS Resolute, a Venerator-class capital ship and flagship of the Federation fleet we have:

Captain Obi-Wan Kenobi- A man who just wants to putter around the galaxy with his found family and get into wacky space hijinks. He keeps turning down promotions to Admiral, partly because he feels like taking a desk job will be absolute torture and partly because he doesn't think anyone else will be able to keep Anakin from blowing up the warp core.

While on the surface Kenobi looks like a Picard style captain, he's actually closer to a Janeway. No, I will not elaborate on this, it's just how I see him.

Commander Cody Fett- Obi-Wan's second in command. Hyper competent, under caffeinated, and wondering what he did in a past life to deserve serving on the same ship as Skywalker. At least his Captain is a decent sort, even if he is a bit too crazy. And too flirty, but Cody's pointedly not thinking about that.

Thanks to the Kaminoians' fuckery (I'm undecided on how willingly involved Jango is in this timeline) Cody has trouble connecting with his Mandalorian heritage. He tries to study the writings of Tarre the Unforgettable and participate in the ceremonies and culture, but it's hard. The Mandalorian Alii'aliit hasn't been able to come to a consensus on whether or not the Clones are actually Mandalorian, and House Mereel's disgrace after Galidraan doesn't help matters.

Lieutenant Commander Anakin Skywalker- Head of Engineering. Captain Kenobi's unoffical/official little brother, who got assigned to the Resolute partly because he's such a brilliant engineer, and partly because there's genuine worry that without Obi-Wan there to serve as a functioning brain-cell, Anakin will blow up the warp core.

He's married to Naboo's Representative on the Federation Council, Padme Amidala. Their marriage isn't a secret here, which just means they're insufferable everywhere. Anakin has more demerits from outlandish PDA than from almost-blew-up-the-warp-core incidents, which is saying a lot, because there have been quite a few incidents.

Lieutenant Commander Rex Fett- Head of Security. This poor man. This poor, foolish man, made the horrible mistake of befriending Anakin Skywalker at the Academy and now he gets dragged into all the man's crazy schemes. Said schemes usually involve Rex eventually getting thrown through the air, because of course they do.

He's the designated Ahsoka and Anakin wrangler. Jokes on Captain Kenobi, if the idea doesn't involve potentially blowing up the warp core Rex just might join in with the chaos.

Ensign Ahsoka Tano- I wanna say she's the helmsman. She graduated from the Academy at a young age, and has kinda latched on to Admiral Plo Koon as a father figure. Plo Koon is thrilled by this, because it's Plo Koon. The man once stopped a civil war through pure dad vibes.

She's everyone's unofficial little sister and somehow always manages to finagle her way onto away missions. Her and Anakin aren't allowed to be alone together because they'll probably blow up the warp core.

She programs the best holodeck simulations; a large portion of them are dedicated to combat and hunting (she needs to fulfill the Togruta instincts somehow and it's very hard to do so in space). Some of them though, are just silly things like a traditional Barolian amusement park or Starfleet Academy but everything is a musical (Say, you know the usual "trapped in the holodeck" episode?).

Also she may or may not have a crush on the cute Mirialan junior Lieutenant in Astrometrics. The one that Lieutenant Commander Unduli has taken to personally mentoring.

C-3PO and R2-D2- Honestly, almost the same as canon, but the Trek "what makes a sentient" episodes focus on them. "The Measure Of A Man" is C-3PO fighting for rights not just for himself but for all droids.

Commander Kix Gilamar- CMO of the Resolute. A lot of clone doctors took Gilamar's name, because the man looked at all these sad, small children and decided to care. The clones with the Gilamar name are still under House Mereel, so it's not an added complication legally. (Listen, the whole reason Gilamar exists is because the initial Kal Skirata toy design looked too young, so I'm giving him Skirata's adoption instincts)

This guy has the dubious pleasure of serving with some self sacrificial weirdos. Like, Kenobi's diligent about going to medical, but in a crisis he won't let Kix treat him until everyone else gets checked and treated and Kix is very annoyed by this, because triage. Kix logs the most hypospray sedative usage out of any CMO in Starfleet.

[littlebigmouse]

TMA MAG47

Not Sascha is back! Why is she so creepy and why does no one notice, ahhhh

Also Michael. Hm. A lot happened here. Almost all of it unhelpful.

Okay no.

Theory time.

Michael seems to be the "owner" of the creepy hallways, and given the way he spoke about having no identity etc I feel I can make a stab in the dark that he's one of those fear avatars everyone keeps talking about. (This is one of the only things I knew about the podcast coming in, that there is some sort of fear categories?? With fear 'avatars' I guess?)

So I suppose these avatars are people shaped representations of fear. Cool Cool cool. Take a hike with your Fear of Heights! Have a beer with your Fear of the Dark! Take your panic to the disco!

That is a really cool concept, hands down.

No idea what Michael is the fear avatar of, though, fear of creepy dark hallways? Isolation? Basements? Getting lost? Whichever it is, he can freely access the archives and stab the workers, so that's cool. Makes the whole place feel extra safe after the worm infestation a few weeks ago.

The things he said were interesting though, and we do love Jon for asking the creepy guy with a knife questions before calling for help, or an ambulance. I wish Jon had called for Sascha though, imagine Not-Sascha coming face to face with Michael like "who the hell are you" and Micheal going "You're not the chick I saved" and Jon going "??? What the hell does that mean!" And Not-Sascha going "No wait I totally recognise him! Evil Michael!" and Michael yelling "No you don't, I have no idea who you are!" and Jon going "I am experiencing severe symptoms of bloodloss!"

Anyway, that didn't happen, so instead Michael gave us information: He said Not-Sascha is lying to Jon, which is weird, because I don't think anything she said was outright wrong? Either way, that means they're probably not working together, otherwise Michael wouldn't call out his own... agent, or whatever.

Secondly, he informs us that there is a war?? So the different fear categories are fighting each other? What for? And why is the institute relevant for that? If all the objects in the archives have something to do with the fears, are they having "Night in the Museum"-level battles in the storage rooms after dark? if not, why not? Are the fear avatars all after the items in the archives?

We know a bunch of people are fighting, who are presumably the fear avatars, and for some reason the Institute is relevant for this. Hm.

Last point: Since ol' Mikey here is associated with creepy tunnels - Didn't Jon get lost in the tunnels under the archives and experience something quite similar to what happened to Mrs Richardson? Because a) wouldn't that have marked him as one of Michaels targets too, and b) is that how Michael can just move in and out of the archives freely? Because he literally (lives/is) their basement?

Well honestly, claiming usual neutrality in this regard feels fake then - sure, Michael can claim having the archives taken by Jane Prentiss (who was most likely also taken by one of the fear people, no?) too early would have ended the story too early UPSET THE BALANCE, but if I was living underneath a potential battleground and suddenly found my home infested with heaps upon heaps of flesh eating worms because the upstairs neighbours keep duking it out, I would have taken measures to keep them out of the house too.

Since Michael just stabbed Jon, however, we cannot assume he'd fight to protect the Institute in any way beyond that, though. At least I feel confident assuming he doesn't actually really want anything with the Institute, because he could have just.. idk, taken/done what he wanted.

Getting back to my earlier thought regarding Prentiss: Her statement made her out to have had a pretty normal life before she was infected by the worm disease. That means she either is a regular person who got involved with the Worm Avatar (and we shall still meet that character, altho in which case I don't wanna), or she was somehow turned... Which would imply that Michael may have also once been human? That is, of course, if there is only one fear avatar per category and not a whole bunch of freaky people-shaped beings running around sharing a hive mind. That's uh. Huh.

I'm not sure what's more interesting - human's getting infected/so consumed by fears they turn into them, losing all their humanity and identity, or just these Eldritch Fear Creatures living among us, wearing human suits to interact with us, but otherwise being completely removed from us.

... If the first one is possible and humans can be turned into ... whatever exactly Michael is.. I uh.. Am afraid. For the characters. Who are all. Very human.

Let's hope they just get eaten by worms, I guess.

[shinra-makonoid]

Honestly I'm starting to kind of understand why some trans people claim they're male when their genotypic is female.

Like... If XX cis men exist because of genetic differences, why should we care we have XX and "weren't born AMAB"? Our experience of life, current and past, was probably influenced by our trans status, and today I personally don't think much about how I'm "so different from men", I rather think about "how different I'm from women I know" and how it's weird because I was born a female.

I was watching a French guy claiming to talk about the science regarding sex in the context of trans and intersex stuff. He was mostly neutral but still with a bias for women and claiming "since he's a cishet white male he's probably out of all of this and can have a neutral eye" which I think is bullshit.

Anyway, he started saying that we should make some changes regarding ID sex or in general for the healthcare so that people know what sex people are, because "truth is important". But in the end, there's not much difference between a guy who's XX and another guy who's XX, except basically one is born with a dick and balls, and another one wasn't.

If the scientist community found interesting to group trans men and De la Chapelle syndrome together, would that change the dude's mind about how to really categorize trans men? No, because it's not the categories that are really important to that guy, it's "what genitals people were born with". The focus on chromosome is an excuse.

He wanted to keep some day to access to the genitals people were born with, in the context of scientific studies, but again, I don't think it's that important? Firstly because most trans people are actually aware of the sex they were born as and will usually make sure to be careful with it (for example if you register as a bone marrow transplant volunteer you won't claim you're male because you understand they mean the chromosomes, just like a De la Chapelle guy won't put male (but we can't actually give our bone marrow, because of T, but you get where I'm trying to say)), but also because our numbers are so tiny it's probably inconsequential in regards to researches. If you have 2 trans people out of 100 people in your very important scientific study that controls for the sex of participants, it's not gonna change the numbers, if you have a sample size that is legit. And honestly, as a trans person, I'd stay out of scientific studies focusing on biosex because I wouldn't want to have any part in messing any science up, but that's me.

And honestly, I don't think males and females are that different in terms of physiology, to justify doctors always knowing your chromosomical sex. I got hurt on my leg once, got registered male (I didn't ask anything about that, my social security is still female), didn't say anything, all was ok, doctor doesn't need to know I'm a XX guy to treat my leg. Most doctors in the ER prescribes meds based on weight not on chromosomes and you have to make a very specific exam to identify someone's chromosomes.

Of course depending on the genitals you have you have to access a specific care in regards to those bits, yes, but they don't need to know whether you were born with it or not, simply if it works right or not.

Like... Actually calling yourself male as a trans man is not a big deal at all, and that video convinced me of it, despite the fact that it was arguing the opposite lmao

[wack-ashimself]

'The Lobster' may be the single darkest satire on dating/marriage ever made....

I was gonna give a synopsis, but go read the wiki. There's too many on the nose and subtle situations that add to the overall narrative and themes which is where I'd like to focus.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lobster

>Forced marriage or you are thrown out of society (even used/killed.)

>Extremes: either you MUST marry or you MUST be single. Nothing in between is respected by either mentalities. And there can be no middle ground. Punishment on both sides (default is being turned into an animal).

~~Side note: This movie was one of the most violent movies ever for a satire. First a dog is kicked and stabbed to death, THEN, a woman is buried in a shallow grave, bound, while wild dogs come and slowly eat her alive.!!! WTF MAN!?~~

>People would rather die than be forced into a body (or relationship) they don't want (being forced into an animal, so they kill themselves first.)

>Enjoying pleasures outside of a relationship is not good (or solo).

>Enjoying pleasures in a relationship is not good (they really did cover BOTH extremes).

>You must look neutral/good at all times as to attract a mate.

>Flirting is sin.

>Having shallow/stupid similar characteristics/hobbies are a good reason to marry.

>Lying is how some relationships start.

>Lying is how some relationships last.

>Lying is how you can still betray yourself and loved ones (In the end, he goes to blind himself so he feels more connected to the one he loves who was blinded, tells himself and her he's going to do it, but...it hints he chickens out.)

>When confronted with the truth, you may still either accept the lies or easily ignore them/get over them (f'd up scene where they make a husband admit he doesn't love his wife by forcing him to shoot her...turns out: no bullets, let's them both go, and now she knows how easily he would have done it. They do not show it, but I would have LOVED a conclusion to see what happened with that couple.)

>Even if everyone hates it, is against it, etc, we will still do it because 'it's always been that way'/ease/stupidity/fear. A big theme of this movie was humans hunting other humans to...shave time off their unfair prison sentences. All because society/government told them to. Slaves punishing slaves. Cops punishing the vulnerable for a raise.

>Even the extreme side of the 'good guys' can be tainted/too radical. Slicing lips, blinding people, and hinted castration...(turn me into a flamingo any day, am I right?)

>When you are turned into an animal, they never once promised your safety. So someone who hated you could hunt/kill/eat you! That says a lot about...everything...everybody. It's how the movie begins!

>How people who claim you are their savior will literally (it happened) use you as a human shield just to push their agenda/save their own ass.

>Sexism. Women NEED men to be men, and men NEED women to be women. They even did this thing where they tied one hand behind your back because 'two is better than 1' is a big theme. Fuck you; those TWO hands are on ONE body. Terrible example.

>Oh my fav one I forgot till I was writing this: kids are used to keep unhappy couples together/distracted, are used more as a parental showcase rather than individual people, and their pains and suffering are easily shrugged off by adults AND parents alike.

There was a lot of weird background choices, but I do got to ask: a BIG road construction going on in the background of the final scene? WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? Was that even a choice or just actually happened to be happening while filming? THAT bugged me. Cuz if it didn't mean anything, it was a huge distraction. (Maybe the theme we are all always working on ourselves/relationships?)

Either way, probably only....glazed over the many topics I wanted to discuss, but I haven't had a movie make me think this much about dating in a while. SO fucking layered, can be interpreted so many ways, DARKER than anything I usually watch, but because 'it went there', you got to see some social commentary not everyone will touch on. I mean, killing a dog, burying someone alive, and kicking an innocent child (who later tells her mom to kill you?) Not many movies go there....

Thoughts? Additions?

[simplyotometrash]

Hello! I have a bit of a specific request, but I've always had a really dumb laugh, like a hyena cackle and as much as I hate it other people seem to find it funny. So I was wondering what the characters would think of an MC who has a really weird laugh, they usually try to hide it but when they start laughing, they just can't stop. You can do any characters you want but if you could, would you include Diavlo? I feel like he'd be the most receptive to a funky laugh

Yes! 1000x yes! I have a very hyena-like laugh and if I REALLY get going? I snort.

Brothers + Diavolo x Gender-Neutral MC

Genre: Fluff

Warnings: None

MC Has a Funny Laugh

Lucifer:

Lucifer had to do a brief double take because that laugh reminded him way too much of Belphie. It was so similar but then he could hear it as distinctly you.

He was going to have to get used to that sound because he couldn't be on edge hearing it just because it's like his trouble making youngest brother's laugh.

He does like the sound once he gets adjusted and can easily hear the difference!

The hyena laugh is a sign of your comfort because you don't like letting people just hear it if you can help it.

He unintentionally makes you laugh because this man's sense of humor can be summed up as dad jokes.

If you find dad jokes funny then be prepared to be laughing your ass off.

He doesn't mind it. No one else in the house laughs at his jokes. It's nice to have someone laughing for a change.

Levi called his jokes cringy and he doesn't really get why.

Lucifer is just glad that he makes you laugh. That's all that really matters at the end of the day, no matter how bad his jokes are.

Mammon:

He LOVES the sound of your laugh. Absolutely, positively loves it!

His brothers often call his laugh obnoxious but you never did. You always liked his laugh. He feels the same about yours. He loves yours.

I think he's a cackler and his brothers find it obnoxious and never trust him when he's laughing anyway.

Mammon can and will tickle you to make you laugh if you're okay with being tickled.

If not, he'll have to try and tell jokes without fucking up the punchlines or getting nervous.

Which shouldn't be too terribly difficult so long as you're the only one listening to him tell his jokes. No one else is allowed otherwise he will definitely mess up.

No one's allowed to make fun of your laugh, not even you! He'll gently fight you.

Just don't call him out on purposefully trying to make you laugh or tell him he's trying too hard. Please do not discourage the baby. He's working very hard for you.

Leviathan:

Levi probably is insecure about his own laughter once you guys get closer and start dating. He worries it sounds weird.

He first heard your laugh while you guys were watching "Oh No, I Died and Got Brought Back in a Strange World in the Body of a Slime!"

There was a particular scene that just struck you as absolutely hilarious and you devolved into your true laugh.

And Levi loved it. You claimed it sounded funny and weird, he said it sounded perfect!

Levi is one of those who makes a point to get you to let out the real laughter whenever he can.

If you're dating Leviathan, it's safe to assume you have similar humor to him, too. You will be sent funny videos and memes more often than you already were.

Levi brings out all of the comedy anime he owns just to watch them with you. TSL gets put on hold specifically for this until he gets burned out on comedy.

Tbh I think Levi is a snorter and that's why he was so insecure about his own laughter.

You guys love making each other laugh because you think his snort is cute.

Satan:

The sound of your genuine laughter made him smile the first time that he heard it.

He had a feeling you were hiding your actual laughter because you felt insecure or awkward simply because it sounded "funny".

He does let you know that no laugh actually sounds weird. Laughs are different from person to person.

Yours is unique to you and it's just one of the many things there are to love about you.

Don't let him catch anyone making fun of your laugh. They will be beaten black and blue. They won't be saying jack shit when he's done with them.

He doesn't have a full-body laugh like you do. He's got his snickering, which cannot be trusted if you're Lucifer, and his normal laugh.

The normal laugh is quite soft.

Your laugh feels warm to him. It's so lively and pleasant to listen to in his opinion.

Satan will always stop whatever he is doing if he hears you laughing because it's one of his favorite sounds.

Asmodeus:

There was a moment of shock at hearing your hyena laugh for the first time, but it wasn't a bad shock.

No, Asmodeus considered it music to his ears! You were laughing a genuine laugh that had you doubled over and wheezing by the end of it.

This was a sound to be cherished!

His own laughter isn't loud or obnoxious. He's a giggler. Very adorable giggles that you don't want to ever hear at your expense. And you never will.

He isn't going to try to make you start hyena laughing, that should happen naturally!

Sometimes he doesn't quite get your sense of humor. Especially if it's anything like Levi's. He tries to brush up on the things you find funny just so he can laugh with you.

If you EVER feel insecure about your laugh then Asmo will be right there to lift you back up.

You can be insecure, there's nothing wrong with it, but Asmo will make sure you know that there's nothing to be insecure about.

He absolutely has recorded your hyena laughter (with consent) so he can listen to it when you go back to the human world.

Beelzebub:

Loud, booming laughter with this big teddy bear right here.

Beelzebub has a laugh you can hear from several rooms away. It's loud and very distinctly him.

Your hyena laugh doesn't even faze him. He thinks it's pretty cute and it also reminds him of Belphie's laugh. So it's a double win in his eyes!

You better be ready if he finds out you're ticklish and that tickling will bring forth the hyena cackle. You will be tickled until you tell him to stop.

All he wants to do is hear you laugh. Baby boy loves the sound more than anything else.

You also make him feel reassured about his own laughter. Normally he just does a deep chuckle instead of a proper laugh because he's been teased about how loud his genuine laugh is.

If you're insecure about your laugh, he'll make sure you know how much he loves it. You do the same for him.

Insecurity who? Beelzebub has said this is a no insecurity zone today, bitches.

Won't go out of his way to bring out the hyena laugh, but he relishes the moments when it happens.

Belphegor:

Belphie isn't allowed to say shit even if he wanted to. This demon hyena laughs until he can't make a sound and resorts to breathless seal clapping.

That's the real laughter of Belphegor when he gets going. Not his snarky snickering.

You guys have the same sense of humor so if one of you gets going, the other one does too.

You guys probably have a running contest between you to see who can get the other one hyena laughing and you bet your buttons that Belphie is keeping score.

He honestly really likes hearing you laugh like that. It's a nice sound to his ears. It means you're happy.

And happy is all he really wants for you. He vowed when you guys began your relationship he would make you happy.

It's sappy and Belphie hates being a sap, so he'll never admit to this out loud.

It can be suspicious when you two have devolved into hyena cackling.

Lucifer especially gets wary when Satan's joined in laughing at whatever it is.

Diavolo:

Absolutely LOVES the hyena laugh the moment he hears it.

He's one of the ones that has a loud, booming laugh when he gets going. A very loud laugh.

But laughter means joy! He thinks your laugh perfectly encapsulates that!

Diavolo makes it his mission to hear your laugh as often as he can.

It's not like it's hard since he knows you so well and you're comfortable enough to laugh your hyena laugh around him.

No one's ever allowed to talk shit about your laugh or they'll be answering to the prince himself.

This man will go to Leviathan as straight-up ask him "what is a meme and which ones are funny?" like an old man just so he can send you memes.

Levi sends him memes in their private chat CONSTANTLY after this question because he has someone else to share them with now!

He just wants to hear you laugh as often as possible.

[flightless-rising]

Made a new Flight Rising iceberg and also wrote an explanation.. man, this took way longer than it should have.

Anyways, I hope you enjoy :D

Iceberg explanation

( If there are any mistakes please let me know and I’ll edit this asap. Also, English isn't my first language so please forgive me for any grammatical errors)

EDIT 28/06: Added some new info! Thanks to everyone who tagged and responded with new stuff to add, I really appreciate it!

The Sky

Naomi

Back in the day, whenever you bought or sold something on the auction house a message would show up in your inbox confirming the transaction. These messages were sent by one of the dragon couriers: Pearl, Spitfire or Edgar.

On January 2016, a strange glitch occurred that replaced the images and names of couriers with the ones of a female fae named “Naomi”.

It goes deeper than that, though: if you looked up her name in the user search menu, a clan would pop up with over 15 million dragons.

It was quickly discovered that all exalted dragons had somehow become part of her clan. Naomi herself apparently didn’t exist, and clicking on her page redirected to an error page. This was later fixed and the original Naomi page can be now visited.

What exactly caused this glitch is still a mystery and today Naomi is still a well-known piece of Flight Rising history.

Missing Tidelord

In the official lore, the deity of the water flight disappeared in early 2018, as described in the short story “Hear Today, Gone Tomorrow”.

In the follow up story (Mixed Elements) posted in April of the next year it is confirmed that the Tidelord is still missing, but alive. This coincides with the fact that the Tidelord account hasn’t made any forum posts aside from festival announcements.

Emperors

Emperors are a type of unobtainable dragon that are formed when several Imperial corpses are left in close proximity to each other, which then fuse forming a multi-headed chimera.

Emperors are described in the lore as having an animal-like behavior and destroying everything in sight. They are extremely difficult to kill, which is the reason why in-universe Imperials have such strange burial rites.

An emperor named Luminax is first described in the Raising a Family short story, and their sprite can be seen walking around on the world map.

The Surface

Old color wheel

Originally, there were only 67 available colors for dragons. On June 8th 2016, 110 more colors were added, meaning that currently there are a total of 177 colors available.

When making a custom progenitor dragon, it is only possible to choose among the 67 original colors because it would be otherwise unfair for those who made their account before the new colors were added.

Imperial breed scrolls

Imperial breed change scrolls are one of, if not the most, rare type of item on the site. They were given only to those who pledged 30 dollars or more on the original Flight Rising kickstarter.

At the time, this was the only way of obtaining an Imperial dragon, which meant that the breed as a whole was pretty valuable. Now that Imperials are abundant this is no longer the case, but First generation Imperials are still extremely sought and probably the most expensive type of dragon on the site.

There were also other items that were only given to Kickstarted backers, namely Skycats, Bonefiend, Golden Idol and Cogfrog familiars, and those are also pretty much impossible to obtain.

Baldwin breed change

When Baldwin was introduced in 2015 he was originally a Pearlcatcher. On September 14th of 2016 however his site art started to gradually change, until his transformation was completed five days later.

In-universe, Baldwin started to change after a lightning strike hit his cauldron during an experiment, which made him slowly mutate into the breed we now know as Bogsneaks.

Trans Fiona

When Fiona was added as a trading post dragon people speculated that she was trans, because the female pose for Skydancers only displays two antennae, while the male one has four.

Since Fiona has four antennae in her site art, many wondered whether it was an oversight or actually intended. Aequorin later confirmed in a forum thread that Fiona is indeed trans.

Boolean

Speaking of rare items, the Boolean familiar was only given to a handful of Flight rising beta testers and as such is extremely rare and valuable.

Plaguebringer coli team

On the Plaguebringer’s page she is listed as being part of a coliseum team.

As of now we have no clue as to why this is, and even more strangely she is the only deity that does this.

Boston & Hope

This story is a bit complicated. I’ve scoured the forums in search of info but it seems like there are still some pieces missing. I’ll try my best to explain anyway.

So, for a long while the Lightweaver was the only deity that had other dragons aside from herself in her lair: these dragons were a Spiral named Boston and a Tundra named Hope. Strangely, they were both Earth dragons and apparently have been there since the beginning (?). When asked why (this happened back when deities would interact on the forums) the Lightweaver responded that they were having a dinner party together.

In August 2014 during a pretty heated dominance battle between Shadow and Light Boston and Hope disappeared from the Lightweaver’s lair.

The Shadowbinder now had them, and both their elements were alsochanged to Shadow. The two deities acknowledged this and changed their broadcast messages accordingly.

If I had to guess this was some kind of inside joke that the admins had, although some people got angry that the Shadowbinder now had both Hope and Boston. Some time later(?) Boston was returned to the Lightweaver and for some reason his element was changed to wind.

I don’t have any more info on the matter but if some of you do I would appreciate it if you tell me.

Shallow Waters

Eyepocalypse

On June 8th 2018 eye type variants were introduced. This update was pretty controversial for a bunch of reasons, and the topic is still discussed today. The majority of people(?) seemed to be upset by the fact the “best” eye types (primarily goat, primal and multi-gaze) could only be displayed on dragons that were born with them, and the fact that every dragon born prior to the update couldn’t have these eye types at all displeased a lot of users.

Another problem was the fact that most of the non-special eye types (i.e the only ones that could be applied to already existing dragons using a vial of Scattersight) were not clearly visible on the grand majority of adult dragons.

A smaller(?) complaint was that two of the primal eye types, Shadow and Plague, were seen as kind of disturbing by some people.

Three years later staff attempted to fix this issue by adding Eye type vials for every available eye type. This resulted in a market crash for special eye typed dragons, as now these eye types could be applied to any dragon. The value of Scattersights also tanked, and the people bought them and hadn’t used them yet lost money as now they were infinitely less useful.

EDIT 28/06: Goat isn’t actually obtainable via breeding, faceted is. Bad mistake on my part.

Also, Scattersights were given away freely by Galore on Flight Rising’s fifth anniversary in 2018 and could not be bought afterwards. I admit that I thought people could be able to buy Scattersights due to how upset people were that the value went down, but whatever.

Courier Breed

The courier dragons (Edgar, Spitfire, and Pearl) are part of an exclusive dragon breed that is currently unobtainable. Even though their eye color still reflects the flight they were born in, in-universe they are considered to be “neutral” and they are granted free access to all domains. This raises the question as to which deity created them, as every other dragon breed (Bogsneaks being the only exception) has been created by one of The Eleven.

Multiaccounting

According to the site’s terms of service, no one is allowed to have more than one account. This is pretty standard for pet sites, as having multiple accounts grants unfair advantages and can mess up the site economy. This doesn’t completely stop people for having more than one account, and the practice as a whole is called “Multiaccounting” or “having multis”.

Some people only do this to have multiple clans or reboot their account without deleting their old one. They mostly do no harm but it is reasonable that the site wouldn’t allow this because of how easy it is exploit.

The real harm of multis comes from a practice called “funneling” which is when someone creates multiple accounts only for the purpose of giving items to their main account. This practice violates the game’s rules and can result in a ban. Funneling is not limited to multiaccounting though, and having an account only to feed another is against the site’s rules whether or not the account in question belongs to another person or not.

Some people fear of being banned for multiaccounting even if they haven’t done so, especially if they share a computer with other people.

Purble

“he purble” is probably among the most famous Flight Rising memes.

In 2016(?) a rant was submitted to the original Dramarising blog by a very angry user that wanted to buy an XXX Purple Ridgeback back when triples were pretty expensive, but got beat by someone else.

I’m not going to copy paste it here because in my opinion it’s one of the funniest Flight Rising related posts ever and I don’t want to spoil the experience of reading it for the first time. You can find it pretty easily by searching it up.

Tert Picking

This is something that refaced recently, even though I’ve seen people talking about this for a while. Some people vividly remember being able to pick their custom progenitor’s tertiary color, even though the developers have made it clear that such thing would be impossible. This is without a doubt just one of those weird situations where a lot of people somehow remember the same thing wrong.

Still, it’s fascinating just how many people claim to remember doing picking their tert.

Swiftwings

Swiftwings were a dragon breed that was scrapped in development. The design was rejected because it didn’t fit the 2 arms 2 legs 2 wings format that every dragon design had to follow before the introduction of ancient breeds.

The reason for this rule is that otherwise it would mess up apparel placement. Although the concept was scrapped, echoes of the design were scattered throughout the site: for example, the empty dragon slots that were present prior to 2019 had the silhouette of a Swiftwings dragon. They are also mentioned in the April Fool’s update of 2018.

“Real” Lore dragons

Most people don’t know that some of the dragons featured on the lore stories are actually real, and you can visit their pages. This is the case for Tetra, Cracklinne, Velya, Liefa, Garote and Mirth, which are currently chilling in Aequorin’s lair.

All of the other dragons in the developers’ lairs are not canon and are used to test bugs and features on the site.

The Middle ground

True deity names

When the site first started the deities used to have actual names instead of titles. Some of these names were based off of the site founders’s usernames on other sites.

The names are the following:

Amogayvhi - Gladekeeper Xhaztol - Arcanist Rhenik - Tidelord Akiri - Flamecaller Thrage - Stormcatcher Undel - Shadowbinder Jhortanas - Plaguebringer Ghurab - Windsinger Artaios - Earthshaker Rhiow – Lightweaver

As you can tell, Xhaztol, Akiri, Thrage and Undel are the usernames of some of the admins of the site, and the flight they are a part of corresponds with the previous name of their deity.

No leg coatls

On January 16, 2015 an iconic thread was posted in the flight rising discussion forum, which displayed a photoshopped image of a coatl with its legs removed. Quickly the thread devolved into a general photoshop thread were people took official site art of dragons and modified it.

The thread was eventually locked due to spam and quote pyramids, but spiritual successors of the original “phoatlshop” thread still exist today.

Dress slot unlocking

A thing that a surprising amount of people don’t know is the fact that when buy an additional apparel slot, the slot opens for every dragon in your lair and not just the one you bought it on.

This is something I also discovered very recently and it’s kind of funny that so many people that have been on the site for very long don’t know this.

Clanbound scatterscrolls

I think the wiki explains it best, so I’ll just copy paste this here:

“Tri-Color Scatterscrolls suffered from an issue where they would only scatter a random range from colors 1-47 (white through sunshine) rather than 1-67 (white through rose). They have been fixed and are now functioning correctly with a random range within the 67 color set. The affected timeframe was from August 15th, 2013 until September 22nd, 2013. The admins allowed users who were unsatisfied with their bugged Tri-Color Scatterscrolls to receive the same amount of them back in the form of Clanbound Scatterscrolls to try scattering their own dragons again with the full color range.”

Beta Mirrors

Ever wondered why they’re called Mirrors?

According to Undel, the main artist of Flight Rising, mirrors originally were supposed to have every part of their body “mirrored”, meaning they had two sets of eyes, two pairs of wings, two tails, and so on.

This design ended up being too cluttered and looked weird shrunken down. The name was kept the same, even though the only mirrored part of the design are the eyes.

Dragons are evil

If you read the “Beastclans on the rise” lore bit, the dragons come across as… very evil, stealing territory from the beastclans when they have been living on Sornieth way longer than the dragons have and killing them for loot.

Furthermore, in the Bounty of the Elements lore bit the Beastclan rebellion guided by Talona is seen by the dragons as unreasonable and wrong even when in canon Beastclans are framed as the innocent party.

The Depths

Scroll of Divorce

In the alpha stage dragons were supposed to be monogamous and could only breed with the dragon they were “paired” with. To break their bond you had to use an item called “Scroll of Divorce” which even featured broken marriage rings in the art.

If I had to guess, this item and the concept as a whole were scrapped because the idea of dragons having “weddings” and needing to divorce before breeding with another dragon felt kind of weird, especially in a game targeted towards teens.

First Festival

The first Holiday festival in Flight rising history was the 2013 Brightshine Jubilee. The items that were available for this festival only are incredibly rare, particularily the Light Sprite which is one of the most valuable items on the site. Apart from that and the fact that the skincent contest only had 6 winners, not much is notable about it.

Offsite drama

Flight Rising has had its fair share of drama both on and off site, but due to the fact that it’s against the site’s rule to discuss user drama on the forums most of the notable drama happened off site (mainly tumblr).

Egg rot

Egg rot was a very early mechanic that was pretty quickly removed from the site. If you forgot to incubate your eggs, they would “rot” and no longer hatch.

It’s the reason why in the nesting grounds the text reads “Eggs healthy” and also the reason why on the stats section of the Account settings it says “Eggs discarded”. The mechanic was removed because it heavily punished casual players and the frequent downtimes of the site meant that even if someone logged in every day they could still have their eggs die.

Also, the images of egg rot look extremely cursed.

Pablo

From what I could gather, Pablo is a dragon which became somewhat popular after user “Desmondtiny” wrote a very long and detailed backstory of them being the Arcanist’s lost boyfriend.

I’m pretty sure it gues deeper than that but I couldn’t find any further information. As usual, if you know something more let me know.

Latest News

On November 12, 2014, a glitch(?) occurred that let anyone post in the Announcements thread. Anything that was posted went directly to the front page, which resulted in quite a bit of chaos.

This was fixed only half an hour later, but the screenshots people have from that time are extremely funny.

Lameforger

On the 2014 Flameforger’s festival announcement Undel accidentally misspelled “Flameforger” as “Lameforger”, which prompted the official account of the Flamecaller to respond aggressively. Lameforger is still jokingly used by users, even after the typo was fixed.

Festival of one (1)

On the first day of the 2014 Greenskeeper Gathering a glitch occurred which switched the site banner for the Starfall celebration banner instead of the Greenskeeper one.

It didn’t end there, in the coliseum Magical shards dropped instead of Bladed Flatleaves, even though skin chests dropped as normal(?).

The weirdest thing about it all was Joxar’s Space inventory, which didn’t display any items at all and had glitched dialogue.

The event was nicknamed by the fanbase “Festival of 1” and even the deity’s official accounts acknowledged the incident.

Vape Juice

As far as I know the original forum thread as been lost, but the vape juice fiasco will always remain cemented in Flight Rising History.

A company called Vape Daugz was making vape juice with Flight Rising dragons plastered on their packaging, completely violating the site’s policy.

The company’s site still exists, and browsing through their products I found that the products that previously had Flight Rising dragons on them still exist, but now feature completely different packaging.

I have no idea whether they changed the packaging spontaneously or staff did something about it.

I think there’s a potentially interesting story buried down there, but we’ll likely never the truth behind the Flight Rising vape juice.

The Abyss

Humans

There’s been some speculation over the years as to whether or not humans are canon in the Flight Rising universe. Some people believe that the “Mages” of the second age in the official lore are actually humans, but we can’t be sure because they are depicted with long robes that cover their whole bodies.

The idea of humans existing in canon has spawned a couple of memes, most infamously Thomas.

Plague healers

Again, I think the wiki explains this one better:

“According to Aequorin, Plague healers are an interesting bunch because rather than administer treatments that counter illness, they use a mixture of magic and contagion that stress the affected dragon further, allowing them to reach a stronger, healed, and resistant state faster than other elements. Plague healers will treat physical injuries with sutures, bandages, and braces, but they won't clean the wounds or apply ointments."

Akitla

As described in the original thread, Akitla was a dragon that user “qunii” saw on the front page, but noticed that she wasn’t accompanied by the username of the person owning them.

After clicking on her, an error page loaded. It was discovered that putting her color combination or ID in the search bar would result in an error page. This was later fixed, and both Akitla and her mate were now displayed as being exalted to the Arcanist. T

here are some theories as to what happened to the Akitla’s user, some think that she belonged to a deleted account, others that it was the result of an incomplete account creation.

As with a lot of things on this iceberg, it will likely remain a mystery forever.

Arcane sprite book

“what is the arcane sprite reading??” is probably one of the oldest still active threads on the forums.

On September 25, 2013 user “Kaadashi” started a joke thread were they wondered what exactly is the arcane sprite reading, and playfully suggested that it could be erotic fanfiction. People went crazy of course, and started to wonder what kind of juicy secrets were hidden within the pages of that book.

I don’t want to say too much because I really don’t want to spoil the experience of reading through this very cursed tread.

Sunshine

Sunshine is one of the most… interesting lairs on the site, and certainly one of the most well-known.

They(?) have a lair (almost) completely full of triple basic sunshine dragons, most of which are Tundras. So far they have collected about 320 triple hundred Sunshine dragons, almost all of which are also named “Sunshine”. They’re not all the same, some of them have apparel, some of them are gened and some have unique art and descriptions.

They’re dedicated and I respect that.

EDIT 28/06: Apparently some people seem to think that the sunshine-dedicated lair is based on a meme concerning the announcement of the color wheel expansion, which became so discussed that the itself site broke. The two things are unrelated however, as the Sunshine lair has been around for much longer.

The announcement of the color wheel expansion was cryptic, with only a few post showing off differently colored coatls and then 3 pages of reserved posts, with no explanation whatsoever.

Simple Farmer

Another very famous thread is the “I am but a simple farmer” thread started by user “someKindOfGenius”. It’s not really about anything specific, it’s just a rather silly thread were people photoshop flight rising dragons onto various crops.

Still, this thread is iconic so I had to include it.

Dragon Deaths

Way back in 2014 former flight rising programmer Thrage revealed on a forum thread that way back before the beta, dragons could actually starve to death if left unfed.

Yep.

Obviously they had to remove this mechanic because it would have been extremely harsh to casual players and make people frustrated with the game.

Zalvador

User “manojalpa” became fairly well-known for the extremely dark lore they(?) had written for their Clan, it was so dark in fact that every single one of their dragon’s bios had to moved to their tumblr where they couldn’t be easily seen by the site’s mainly underage usebase.

Their lore centered around their progen dragon, a tundra named Zalvador, which behaved and had the same powers as a flight rising user: buying dragons off of the action house, having “breeding projects”, exalting dragons, etc.

These things seem pretty normal when done by a player, but when taking them as actual real things that happen in universe… yeah, it was way too morbid for the site.

The Pit

Black linen neck wraps

For some weird reason, the apparel piece “Black linen neck wrap” when put on a male pose Coatl wraps around the dragon’s throat instead of it’s neck. It’s kind of subtle and hard to see, but if you compare it with the female pose the difference is clear. This is probably just an art error, although it’s weird that it hasn’t been fixed yet, since linen wraps are a very old piece of apparel.

Another weird thing about linen wraps in general is that the wing wraps just sort of… go through the membrane? This is not possible. These dragons are in pain.

Icewarden ears

Another very remarkably popular thread is the Icewarden ears thread.

In 2014 user “Llanai” simply makes note of the fact that the Icewarden has teeny tiny ears.

As we have come to expect from these threads, it quickly devolved into nonsense.

Forbidden Snapper lore

Snappers used to have a way different lore section that was changed because it deemed too similar to the lore of another petsite.

This is what the original section read:

"Snapper dragons do not sleep, but exist in a constant state of reverie. They receive and catalogue all experiences and stories told within their dreams. This persistent state of awakened dreaming awards them the longest memory of any dragon species. They are living encyclopedias, and any dragon who is seeking difficult-to-obtain information will have the most luck unearthing it from a Snapper clan - provided they have the patience for it. If you want two dozen quick answers, talk to a spiral. If you want a fully developed answer, camp out around a Snapper. These dreamers move at their own pace, which varies from dragon to dragon. For some, the awakened dream can prove to be more interesting than their surroundings. This leads to a focus upon the dream, and the waking world as filtered background noise. Interacting with these sleepwalkers can be a trying and repetitive task. Other Snappers may be fairly lucid, with a focus upon their surroundings and the constant hum of the dream pushed aside."

Bee movie script

I’ve seen this story around the forums a few times but I’ve never been able to learn the details.

From what I’ve heard someone copy pasted the entire bee movie script into their clan bio in a drop down text format, which completely broke the page for anyone who visited it. This was fixed, apparently, although I have no clue as to who this user is.

EDIT 28/06: Zeus

Zeus is an XXX gold g1 permababy imperial that used to belong to user "happywing".

Their account is now locked because Zeus was created with the use of a duplication glitch on an imperial breed change scroll, which is obviously not allowed (although I've heard some people say that the dragon was hacked in altogether). Before the account was locked, people speculated that Zeus was the most valuable dragon on the site, because an XXX g1 imperial is impossibly rare.

Wegg shaming

On July 2017 user “Dreamnorn” made a thread were they(?) claimed to have a dream where everything was the same except people used the term “wegged” when two dragons would lay only one egg in a nest.

Ex. Aw man! I’ve been wegged again! = Aw man! I bred two dragons and they only had one egg!

The dream ended up being prophetic, as the term catched on and people started to use it unironically.

The practice of “Wegg shaming” I think refers to the trend of people posting pictures of the dragons that “wegged” them in order to “shame” them.

Plague nest skull

The site art of the plague nest features an unique dragon skull that doesn’t match with any currently existing dragon breed or creature: It appears to have two sets of eyes, like a mirror, but also long and curled horns.

It’s probably just for decoration and it likely doesn’t have any significance whatsoever, but personally I believe it would be pretty cool if when they eventually release plague ancient it at least somewhat resembled this skull.

EDIT 28/06: On second thought, the skull doesn’t seem to have two pairs of eyes, It just has the generic shape of a carnivore.

Rock bottom

CAPTAINPLANET

…this is CAPTAINPLANET. Somehow, user “Decres”' managed to overlay a Fae skin on top of a Tundra, creating this horrifyingly fascinating abomination.

I have no idea how she did this, and she seems pretty adamant to tell.

EDIT 28/06: People have pointed out that this skin overlay glitch was actually somewhat common (although I still haven't found another dragon like CAPTAINPLANET). What you had to do was breed change a dragon while attaching a skin to them in another tab.

This glitch has been patched and such thing is no longer possible.

Lair 46264

A cursed lair.

Dreams

I’ve seen a lot of people, both on forums and on Tumblr, sharing dreams they had about Flight Rising.

A lot of people dream of just being on the site, while occasionally weird things happen.

I’ve read of people who dreamed the distribution of a new breed, buying an exclusive item, a new Fiona feat or Swipp trade, or just browsing the forums.

The most common type of Flight rising-associated dream I’ve seen however is being caught multiaccounting and having their account banned.

I’m no psychoanalyst, but I think it’s pretty clear that these nightmares stem from the paranoia of being banned from their beloved petsite instead of showing any actual intention of doing the “crime” in question.

Anyways, I think it’s fascinating how so many people dream about this site, and it reminds me of the dreams people claimed to have about Mario 64 where completely new levels were added or a scary monster appeared.

Dragon Slime

Dragon Slime was an infamous thread which was supposed to be start off point for an ARG.

It was deleted because it was considered too “spammy” and also because ARGs are banned from the forums. The thread has been lost, unfortunately.

EDIT 28/06: Thanks to @randompurple-fr for providing screenshots of the dragon slime tutorial! You can find them here

Cucumber

Cucumber is the only dragon ever to have been exalted with a skin, which is something that should not be possible. This raises some questions as to what exactly did the person that exalted them do to achieve this, but we have no way of knowing who Cucumber belonged to.

EDIT 28/06: Actually, we do know who used to Cucumber belonged to! Its owner was Osiem: an official flight rising artist. I couldn’t find the thread where they(?) acknowledged the glitch though, if someone has it please let me know!

[stellocchia]

Since I really enjoyed yesterday's stream I decided to do one of my overly long analysis on it

So, here's my analysis of (DSMP LORE) Healthy Competition

Dialogues will be color-coded as usual, so here's what I used: Phil, Wilbur, Ranboo

As always I am incapable of brevity, so everything's under the cut

The stream starts with a conversation between Phil and Wilbur in which Wilbur admits that he hasn't been to visit Phil in a while, which makes Phil's later threat about throwing him out feel that much more ridiculous since Wilbur clearly doesn't really live with him either way...

"Alright, it's got one for Phil, one for Ranboo, and one for Techno. Is that all that live here? Just you three?" "Yep, just us three, just chilling"

The only reason why I'm singling this out is that it was right after the mention of Techno's birthday and Wilbur was pointing at the seats occupied by the 4 members of the Syndicate so it feels slightly weird that Niki wasn't mentioned at all. But also it's technically not a lie, she doesn't live there and she only comes around for the Syndicate meetings.

Another thing to add is that Wilbur did notice the chest Ranboo left for him and consciously decided to ignore it.

"I must admit I've come to you with a bit of a- a bit of a proposition. You're into propositions Phil? Are you a bit of a 'propositions' kinda guy?" "Oh, depends, depends. You- you've had some pretty... let- let's just say, uh- not- not a great track record on propositions that you've had in the past" "Alright... I mean, I'm trying to move past that"

I wonder what exactly Phil is referring to here. Because, like, Wilbur did bad things, don't get me wrong, but what's his track record with "propositions" in particular? Because he isn't talking about "Tommy, let's be the bad guys" here since he doesn't know about that. Is he talking about Wilbur founding L'Manburg? But then again, I don't think Wilbur interpreted it that way. I think that, from Wilbur's reaction, he clearly interpreted it as a jab at him exploding L'Manburg (which is the one thing he's trying to move past) which would be extremely hypocritical from Phil since he did the exact same thing but worse.

Also, I really do think that Wilbur is trying to move forward. He's lonely and he has the lowest possible opinion of himself so it doesn't feel weird that he'd want to move on. He isn't putting the work in it right now and he hasn't really changed, but he does seem to want to (though I think he may not know how).

"He [Quackity] didn't seem afraid of me, which is cool. Not many people- I mean you don't seem afraid of me. You aren't afraid of me, are you Phil?" (little look into Wilbur's mind and his fear of isolation once again. And this is fear of isolation, he's worried that other people are afraid of him and therefore are only waiting for him to step out of line so that all their fears would be confirmed)

"'Cause I'm not afraid of you [Phil]" (bold words for someone who spent who knows how long lying to his dad because of a crippling fear of disappointment...)

"Technoblade spent his entire time taking down the establishments, what he left is, as predicted, a power vacuum for a new establishment to come in" (in case it wasn't obvious, Wilbur is not the biggest fan of anarchy. And he actually got this one criticism spot on, indeed all taking down L'Manburg did was getting 4 new governmental-like structures to sprout in its place)

"Phil, I want to make a burger van" *Phil sighs and walks away* (I'm more sure now that Phil really meant "creating L'Manburg" as Wilbur's bad track record with propositions)

Wilbur repeating 4 times that he has no ulterior motive with the burger van managed to make me think the exact opposite. That said that ulterior motive may just be to create a safe little home for himself and Tommy for all we know honestly. Also, the whole thing with Phil trying to convince his grown-ass kid to go play with the neighbor kid and Wilbur throwing a tantrum in response was hilarious...

"If he's [Ranboo] shit you gotta come help me okay? If he's shit you've gotta come be burger boy with me, okay?" (he still is mistrustful to an extreme and pretty childish admittedly)

"Why is he [Phil] treating me like a kid?! Why is he treating me like a little baby?" (remembering how Wilbur treated Fundy I think it may be a family problem)

Another interesting thing to point out is that Wilbur was openly scared of the spider attacking him here, and fights it off, but he doesn't move away from the explosion later on and he didn't move away from the exploding creepers last stream. Other people already made this connection, but I do think it may be a sort of way to punish himself. Specifically, it's brought up later on that he thinks he got off easy for what he did, so he's using what he hurt others with (explosions) to hurt himself now as a sort of punishment for that. Which is another indication of just how much his stay in Limbo didn't help with his mental health.

"Am I being- is this [Ranboo having both cows and wheat] a setup?" (the paranoia never left)

"Ranboo I'm gonna go out on a limb here: do- do you wanna be friends?" "Su-sure yeah, I don't see why not" (I think that at this point it was still just Wilbur following along with what his dad told him to do and trying to find out more about Ranboo. That does seem to change later down the line)

"And then we decided that it [the 'cookie' outpost] was too much trouble so we kinda just left it" (So we have confirmation that the cookie outpost was abandoned)

"We're not gonna annoy Quackity" "That's good" "We can't annoy- we can't annoy him because we're simply put- we're simply put gonna be making...- I got the real estate! He's giving me the area and we're gonna be making a competing business"

Wilbur says this as if he wasn't perfectly aware that this would annoy the sh*t out of Quackity. As if the point of it wasn't exactly to annoy Quackity. Or well, annoying him isn't the end goal, it's just the means to an end. We don't know the actual end goal (though I think Wilbur still wants to either be let into Las Nevadas or actually instate a rivalry between them as he said, one of the two).

"We [he and Quackity] were a part of the same cabinet during New L'Manburg or whatever" "Cabinet?" "Yeah a cabinet is like-" "Was this- was this with Tubbo?" "Yeah yeah" (...) "So you were part of the old L'Manburg? I didn't know that actually, I thought you were a bit of an independent"

Once again: Wilbur is missing A LOT of knowledge. He wasn't aware that New L'Manburg had a cabinet and he wasn't aware that Ranboo was ever part of the country either. He has a lot of misconceptions about what happened during the time he was dead so it really shouldn't be a surprise to anyone that his views on a lot of things are as warped as they are. Wilbur is getting to his conclusions with an incomplete and sometimes wrong set of data.

"Do you dislike anyone Ranboo?" "Not too much I don't think. I mean there are other people I don't, like, agree with what they've done of course, but I think that everyone is just a product of what they've gone through and everything so if you understand that then you understand the person!"

There is nothing inherently wrong with Ranboo's reasoning here. It's true that most people are a result of their environment and, once you understand what they've been through you can understand them better as a person. It's also fine that he personally doesn't want to hold grudges. But that way of thinking isn't applicable to those who have been hurt by others, sure they can reach an understanding, but an understanding of a person doesn't justify shit and doesn't change shit unless that person works towards repairing old broken relationships. It just all sounds like a nice way of thinking about things in theory, but in practice, it just takes away responsibility from those who have wronged others to fix things and moves it to those who have been wronged. (Ranboo isn't advocating for everyone to think that way though, but I know the fandom will).

Either way, they arrive in Las Nevadas and Wilbur talks about how their place doesn't benefit the consumer and puts down 3 signs.

"I've been trying to think of a name for it [his and Tommy's area], I'm thinking about 'Paradise'"

There are two possible reasons for the name that I can think of:

1) It's in reference to Las Nevadas itself and how Las Nevadas is based on Las Vegas, the famous city of sin

2) It could be a reference to Tommy insistently calling Las Nevadas Paradise in the last stream and Wilbur trying to convince him that their place is the true Paradise

Wilbur does decide to make the Burger Van right at the border which really feels like a very obvious provocation. The other thing is that he makes it clear that he wants the van to be red and white which could be a random choice, but really feels like a reference to Tommy (since they are famously his colors) or an imitation of their opposition. Or both considering how much Tommy liked the restaurant of the opposition and the fact that Wilbur is still trying to convince him to stay.

"I'm not very fond of blue" (at this point it's obvious that Wilbur has quite a bit of pent-up animosity against Ghostbur. I wonder if it is because it still feels like people liked the ghost more than him...)

"Like, the Cookie Shop, I don't even know if it was a cookie shop, to begin with, because it was a little... fortified if I'm entirely honest, I realize that now" "Really?" "Yeah did you not see- oh wait- that giant stone structure?" (Ranboo really did fail to realize that the cookie shop was actually a military outpost, huh?)

"See, I like Tubbo. He's strong-headed, he doesn't let people push him around, you know?" (this is both an interesting change in what he thinks of Tubbo if he actually thinks that and further confirmation that Wilbur isn't a fan of people he considers to be 'followers')

"Why do you claim that you're so 'peaceful' and 'neutral' and yet somehow appear in almost every conflict this server's had since I died?" (since I saw people claiming this is manipulation already, just know that it isn't. He's just confused because, admittedly, Ranboo is a confusing guy and Wilbur doesn't really know him at all)

"Ranboo, why did you come to help me?" (...) "And then also I just think, you know... you can, you know- I think- I think you're an alright person, you know? So I wanna- I did kinda wanna get off on a better foot with you then what happened-" "Why?" "Just because I don't really like having the thought that people don't really like me" "Nonononono not the bit about the right foot, the 'why don't you think I'm a bad person'" "Well I mean, I think that you did bad things, but like, I think that you also went through things that made you that way and then I also think that you've changed now (...) but I think that now you've- apparently you've been away long enough that I think that if anyone goes away for that long eventually they'll have a thought about their morality and everything and maybe become a better person because of it"

I know this quote was absurdly long, but it is one of the most interesting conversations of the whole stream and it is really important and it tells us quite a bit as well. For one thing Wilbur was left quite emotional from someone simply admitting that he's an "alright person" and that they think he's capable of changing and this does bring him to open up to Ranboo right after. What Ranboo says to be exact is that anyone would have changed after going through what Wilbur went through and that change could be positive and while I completely disagree with it, it's clearly something that Wilbur needed to hear.

Now as to why I disagree with the notion that 13 years of semi-complete isolation could change anyone for the better should be rather obvious. But if it isn't, well, that's torture to put it simply. Psychological torture. Just like abuse it's one of those things that only cause trauma and a worsening mental health state and we see this with Wilbur because he didn't change, he only became more self-deprecating. Hurting someone doesn't make them become a better person all of a sudden, that's really not how it works. Hurting someone makes them become more traumatized.

"I think I scare people" ( as I said, immediately opening up about his insecurities)

"I think that a lot of people share your idea, but they share your idea in trying to- trying to keep me from hurting them" (for a bit here Wilbur talks about how he feels like everyone else is just waiting for him to step a foot out of line, which does really show that he's still interpreting all his interactions with people through the lens of his paranoia and self-deprecation, because no one is really interacting with him with that objective in mind)

"Dream's had his comeuppance and I've not" (this seems to be the crux of Wilbur's insecurity. This idea that he got off scot-free for his crimes, the idea that the only difference between him and Dream is the punishment that's been bestowed upon them which, of course, is wrong, but he doesn't know this, because he doesn't actually know why Dream's in prison)

"I've been investing into the wrong areas Ranboo, I've been investing into the wrong people" (This is either a reference to Tommy, to Phil, to Quackity, or to all of them)

"We're kindred man, we get each other" (the reason why he thinks that is because he seems to think that Ranboo has a similar type of paranoia to what Wilbur experience himself and he's not entirely wrong. Ranboo is deathly afraid of conflict and of being disliked so much so that he never stands up for anything in fear of angering others)

Little definition of "neuroticism" for you all since Wilbur kept mentioning it: neuroticism, one of the Big 5 personality traits, is typically defined as a tendency toward anxiety, depression, self-doubt, and other negative feelings.

I'd say it's quite fitting for both characters...

"I feel like life dealt us the same cards and the difference is that you built your trust by showing people your cards whilst I- I keep them close to my chest and I feel like that may be the big difference" (I felt like this was interesting. Especially knowing how much Ranboo actually doesn't share and how much he actually also keeps close to his chest)

They talk about tubbo in general for a bit and about what's been going on the server in general. Ranboo also that he's part of both Snowchester and the arctic commune (mostly the latter though).

"This has been chill, this has been good, I'm excited to show Tommy. What's your opinion on Tommy?" "Oh, he's- he's great. Tommy's awesome" "I agree I agree" "Definitely gone through a lot but I think that it's made him a good person" "Well you seem to think that everyone going through something at least gives them some merit you said" "I mean, yeah. I mean if- if no one- the only really bad people are the ones who are just evil because- just because and they don't have any reason why"

Included the whole thing here because if I stopped at Ranboo saying that Tommy going through trauma is what made him a good person it would have sounded really bad. As things are I think that that was just poor wording on his part and that this mostly goes back to the mentality he expressed before about how people sometimes do bad things because of the environment they're in pushing them and this idea he seems to have that actual hardships (like 13 years in Limbo or whatever he knows about what Tommy has been through) can encourage people to be better which is... sort of naive honestly. Again, trauma isn't a catalyst for the betterment of a person, and any improvement Tommy has made came from his self-reflection, not what he's been through.

After they're done with the van Wilbur brings Ranboo to their competing establishment and asks him to smash the windows, which Ranboo does with no hesitation whatsoever. After that Wilbur proceeds to place down one single block of TNT in a corner and Ranboo starts being a little more hesitant.

"You trust me right?" (I feel like that was a trick question considering how their common paranoia is the thing that Wilbur praised in Ranboo before)

Wilbur hands Ranboo the flint and steel to detonate the piece of TNT which Ranboo does, albeit with some hesitation.

"You passed the test, good job man, you go back to the van (...) Ranboo- Ranboo... I'm proud of you man. You've taken a side, you've proven that you can choose a side"

Quite a few people have already pointed out how similar this scene was to the time Wilbur tested Tommy in season 1 to decide if he was fit to be his right-hand man. In both situations, Wilbur gave someone a chance to cause some destruction against someone on the opposite side. Tommy passed the test by refusing to do so and showing that he was willing to uphold his morals and what he believed in. Ranboo passed the test by doing the exact opposite, by showing that, as much as he talks about how he chooses people and not sides, he's not willing to prove that even when all he would need to do to do so is doing nothing.

And it's an interesting scene to analyze as a parallel to that, but it's also interesting to note that Wilbur knows about Ranboo and Tommy griefing George together. He knows that Tommy was the only one to face any consequences for it (not that exile was actually the consequence for the griefing, but this is from Wilbur's point of view). Now putting this in the context of Wilbur seeing himself in Ranboo and thinking that he himself got off scot-free explains this next part perfectly in my opinion.

It explains why he made sure to leave this sign:

To me at least. This is only a theory honestly, we don't have an actual full explanation. But I do think that Wilbur may feel like the both of them never got the comeuppance they deserved, which is why he did something that's sure to get a reaction from one of the most powerful people on the server. Though considering that he also left 2 diamonds as retribution + a chest with all the materials he picked up it could have also been Wilbur's idea of a bonding moment and he could actually really be proud of Ranboo.

[spanishskulduggery]

Hi! I'm very curious about something regarding the Spanish language. I'm currently studying A2 Spanish but I had this question and my teacher did not seem too willing to discuss it. Here it goes:

I know that Spanish has, something my Spanish teacher says, linguistic gender. I was wondering how do the people who don't align themselves with the gender binary (masculine and feminine) speak/write in it? I have read this article about Spanish speaking people from US adding "x" Or "@" and people from Argentina using "e" to make the words gender neutral.

Thank you so much for responding, whenever you get to it. Also love your blog. ❤

Short answer, in general speaking terms people are tending towards the -e now because the other two are very hard to actually speak, and because Spanish-speakers feel the -e is more authentic

What you're most likely to see in Spanish is masculine plural as the default, or in written things you might see todos y todas or like un/una alumno/a "a student", or like se busca empleado/a "employees wanted" / "looking for an employee"

If it's something official or academic you typically include both [todas y todas] or you go masculine plural [todos] unless it's specifically feminine plural

-

Related, linguistic gender applies to all things, not just people. Why is la mesa "table" feminine, but el libro "book" masculine? Just linguistic gender. I can tell you that most loanwords (that aren't people) in Spanish are masculine, and that there are certain words that come from Greek are masculine, and that -ista words are unisex most of the time... And I can tell you there are some words like testigo or modelo that are unisex and don't change for gender. Aside from that, speaking about nouns and grammatical gender... those particular things are harder to parse for regular people, but if you go into the field of linguistics you can explore that more deeply. Some of it is source language (i.e. "it came from Latin this way") or things like that. And in general when talking about nouns it's unimportant and not considered sexist, that's just how it is.

There is such a thing where it gets a little too far the other way and people will say "history? what about herstory" which is a nice thought but the etymology has nothing to do with gender there

When it comes to people - and when it comes to gendered attitudes - that's where it gets more confusing and more complicated.

I believe there was an experiment where people had French and Spanish speakers [I believe it was Spanish] try to identify how a "fork" would sound. French people gave it a more feminine voice because "fork" is feminine in French, while Spanish speakers gave it a more masculine voice because it's masculine in Spanish.

Whether we like it or not, certain gendered things do influence our thoughts and feelings and reactions. A similar thing in English exists where the old joke was something like "There was a car accident; a boy is rushed to the ER and the surgeon but the father was killed. When they got to the ER the doctor said 'I can't operate on him, he's my son!'" and it's like "well who could the doctor be?" ...and the doctor is his mother. We associate "doctor" as masculine and "nurse" as feminine.

There's a gender bias in our language thought patterns, even though the language changes. And that does exist in Spanish too, to different extents.

There are certain cultural and gendered stereotypes or connotations attached to certain words, many tend to be more despective or pejorative when it's women.

For example - and I know this has changed in many places or it isn't as prevalent - el jinete "horseman/rider", while the female form is la amazona "horsewoman/rider". Because la jinete or la jineta was sometimes "promiscuous woman".

There were also debates about things like la presidente vs. la presidenta or what the female version of juez should be, whether it should be la juez or la jueza

Most languages with gendered language have varying degrees of this, and all languages I'm aware of have gendered stereotypes related to professions or cultural attitudes in some way, and not just for women, and not all in the same way with some of them being very culturally based

-

The longer answer involves a bit of history, and I'll be honest, some of it is contested or considered a little controversial in Spanish-speaking countries particularly in the conservative parts (which honestly should come as no surprise)

The first symbol that I know of that came about was the X

First piece of contested history: As far as I know, it was the trans/queer and drag communities in Latin America who started the trend of X. When there were signs or bulletins that had the gendered endings - specifically masculine plural as the default plural - people would write a big X through the O. This was a way of being inclusive and also a very smash the patriarchy move.

Some people attribute this to women's rights activists which may also be true, but a good portion of the things I read from people say it was the trans/queer/drag communities in Latin America doing this.

I've also read it originated in Brazil with Portuguese; still Latin America, but not a Spanish-speaking country.

Where it's most contested is that some people will say that this trend started in the Hispanic communities of the United States. And - not without reason - people are upset that this is perceived as a very gringo movement.

That's why Latinx is considered a very American-Hispanic experience

-

The arroba (@) is relatively new. I remember seeing it in the 2000s. I don't know if it existed earlier for gender inclusivity.

People used it because it looks like a combination of O and A, so it was meant to be cut down on saying things like todos y todas or niños y niñas in informal written speech

I remember quite a few (informal) emails starting like hola tod@s or muy buenas a tod@s or things like that

I think of it more as convenience especially in the information age where you never knew who you were talking to and it's easier than including both words, especially when masculine plural might be clumsy or insensitive

Still, it's practically impossible to use the @ in spoken Spanish, so it's better for writing casually. You also likely won't be allowed to use the @ in anything academic, but in chatrooms, blogs, or forums it's an option

-

I love the E ending. And the gender neutral form in singular is elle... so it's él "he", ella "she", and elle "they (singular)"

The -e ending is I think became more common within the past 10 years though it might have existed longer than that. These sorts of changes tend to come from the queer or trans communities and tend to be more insular before becoming more of an outside thing that then the general population finds out about

It came about because there are some adjectives in Spanish that end in -e that are unisex. It's not an A, it's not an O, but it's something grammatically neutral for Spanish

It's not as awkward as X, and E exists very firmly in Spanish so it's not perceived as some outside (typically gringo) influence

The good news is, it's pretty widespread on the internet. Not so much in person (yet), but especially in Spain and Argentina at least from what I've seen, particularly in the queer communities and online culture.

The only issues with it are that for non-native speakers, you have to get used to any spelling changes. Like amigo and amiga, but to use the E ending you have to add a U... so it's amigue.

That's because there are certain words where you have to do spelling changes to preserve the sound; gue has a hard G sound like -go does [like guerra]... but ge has the equivalent of an English H sound [gelatina for example]. Another one is cómico/a "funny" which would go to cómique. Again, because co has a hard C/K sound, while ce is a soft sound more like an S or in some contexts TH/Z sound; like centro is a soft sound, while cola is a hard sound

Unless you make it to the preterite forms where you come across like pagué, alcancé, practiqué with those types of endings... or subjunctive forms, pague, alcance, practique ... Basically you'd have to be exposed to those spelling rules or you'd be really confused if you were a total beginner.

It all makes sense when you speak it, but spelling might be harder before you learn those rules

The other drawback is that the E endings are sometimes not applicable. Like in damas y caballeros "ladies and gentlemen" there's not really a gender neutral variation on that, it's all binary there. And while la caballero "female knight" does exist, you'd never see a male variation on dama; the closest I've ever seen is calling a guy a damisela en apuros "damsel in distress" in some contexts where the man needs rescuing, and it's feminine una/la damisela, and it's very tongue-in-cheek

There are also some contexts like jefe vs jefa where I guess you would say jefe for "boss" if you were going the neutral route, but it's a bit weird because it's also the masculine option.

I can't speak for how people might feel about those if they're non-binary or agender because every so often you kind of get forced into the binary whether you like it or not

I totally support the E, I just recognize there are some limitations there and it's quirks of the Spanish language itself

Important Note: Just to reiterate, E endings are the ones most Spanish-speakers prefer because it's easiest to speak and doesn't have the American connotation that X does in some circles

-

Where it gets very "Facebook comment section" is that you'll see many Latin Americans traditionalists and conservatives claim that "this is just the gringos colonizing our language" and "grammatical gender doesn't matter in Spanish". They'll say that the "gender movement" is an American feminist movement and that it's a gringo thing and doesn't reflect actual Latin Americans or Spanish-speakers

Which on the one hand, yes, English does have a lot of undue influence on other languages because of colonization, and American influence and meddling in Latin American politics is a big important issue

But as far as I'm aware of the X (and especially the E) were created by Latin Americans

The other issue I personally have is that any time this conversation comes up, someone will say something like somos latinOs and claim that masculine plural is gender neutral

To that I say, first of all, "masculine plural" is inherently gendered. Additionally, there is a gender neutral in Spanish but it's lo or ello and it's only used with "it" so it sounds very unfriendly to use on an actual person... and in plural it looks like masculine plural and everything applies like masculine plural

Second, the reason masculine plural is default is because of machismo. It's more important that we don't possibly misgender a man, so it has to be masculine plural. It's changed in some places, but growing up when I was learning Spanish, if it was 99 women and 1 man you still had to put masculine plural

I'm not opposed to there being a default, and I understand why it's easier to use masculine plural, but some people get very upset at the idea of inclusive language

...

In general, my biggest issues with these comments come when people act like non-binary/queer/trans people don't exist in Spanish-speaking countries, like English invented them somehow. So it's nice to see linguistic self-determination and seeing native speakers using the E endings.

[sslow-dancer]

“You Need Some Help?” (Josuke Higashikata x Reader)

Warnings: none!

tags: gender-neutral, gender-inclusive, josuke x reader, sfw, fluff, new school, new kid

Description: It’s your first day at Budogaoka High, Josuke notices your confusion and agrees to show you around the school. Along the way, he introduces you to his friends and decide to hang out.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You walk down the streets of Morioh, doing your best not to get distracted by the numerous signs of shops you pass by. Your knees occasionally hitting the new school bag you have in your hands.

It was a new town, new school, new people to you and your family. However, despite having to create new (probably awkward) introductions in this town, your parents seemed extremely happy when you all arrived. Going from living in Osaka all the way to Morioh was a drastic change. Osaka was constantly loud and full of tourists, you almost felt like you saw more foreigners than Japanese citizens. Though, you still miss those loud noises and tourists in a way. Morioh is quiet, receives visitors in the warmer seasons and rather friendly for the most part, making your parents even more excited when you moved there.

You look at the time on your watch, it reads, 8:00AM. You sigh stopping in the middle of the sidewalk, meeting the entrance of the school. Your eyes dart at the multiple groups of boys and girls around your age laughing and communicating with their friends as they enter and hang out around the school. You bite your lip, scanning around to see if there’s anyone who can help you navigate the school. Gosh, I don’t want to be late! you think.

“You need some help?” A curious deep voice asks behind you. Your eyes widen, a little startled at this person’s sudden question. You turn around, you’re in aww when you perceive the person in front of you.

The person is a boy of around 6-foot height, his hair in a 1950s-like pompadour, a chiseled face, sapphire eyes and is wearing a uniquely decorated school uniform. You almost blush at his rather handsome appearance, but you manage to stop yourself from doing so. You stutter,

“y-yeah. I do. I’m uh- new here.” you laugh slightly, hoping he doesn’t point out your nervousness. Though to your surprise, he only replies politely with a kind smile on his face,

“Oh okay well, I can show you around-“

“Thank you so much-“

“but first, I’d like to know your name.”

You cringe at your rudeness of interrupting him, you clear your throat, ready to give him your name and your sincere apology,

“I apologize for interrupting your words but um, my name is L/N F/N. I go by my first name. It’s very nice to meet you.” you immediately bow after you’re done answering.

“Higashikata Josuke, nice to meet you.” he says with a bow back. Josuke smiles when he sees you nervously kicking at the pebbles on the ground. ‘They’re kind of cute’ he thinks. He breaks the silence,

“Now that that’s done, let me show you around. We got time for most of the school, I think.” He leads you to the entrance, you follow next to him as you both walk up the steps. He stops abruptly, his eyes scanning around the schoolyard,

“That’s weird...”

“What’s wrong?”

“Well my friends usually meet me around this time so we can go to class together, but they’re somehow not here yet. Huh, weird.” You bite your lip, he lets out a sigh,

“It’s whatever, I’ll just see them later. Let’s go. I don’t wanna be responsible for you being late on the first day. Come on.” He waves you over to show you around the first floor. You nod, placing your bag over your shoulder as you follow him in.

Though the school is large, Josuke managed to explain the different sections and hallways pretty well. You were impressed at how the map wasn’t very useful. He’s nice enough to lead you to your first home room class.

“So basically this is it, here’s your room and hopefully you remember your way around after.” You chuckle at his statement. You point,

“You aren’t part of 1A?”

“Oh no, I’m part of 1B but it’s not far from here. If ya want, I can wait outside for you once class is over.”

“Oh no! That’s alright, thank you though. I think I’ll be fine.” You chime, smiling at him. Josuke smiles, he waves at you,

“Well I’m off, I’ll see you later?”

“Yeah!”

And with that, the bell rings and you’re off to first period.

~ Time Skip ~

You practically sprint out of your seat once dismissal arrives. You were rather hungry despite having lunch earlier, the bento your mother prepared you that morning didn’t fill you up. You rush out the class to avoid getting pushed by multiple students gathering outside the schoolyard to walk home, get picked up and wait for the bus. You’re surprised to hear your name get called out once you’re close to the gates,

“Hey! Hey! Wait up!”

You turn around to see Josuke, his body pressed against the front doors stairs’ railing with 2 other guys standing next to him. They both turn their heads to look at you, one of them slightly taller than the other. He waves again to get you to come closer,

You blink, walking back towards their direction. He smiles when you meet face to face, he holds his hand out to them,

“These are my friends, Okuyasu and Koichi. Okuyasu, Koichi, this is Y/N.”

You blush, you aren’t one to be introduced to people, you’re usually the one introducing yourself. The slightly shorter one, Koichi, smiles and nods at you,

“It’s very nice to meet you. Josuke was just telling us about you!”

You nod, blushing even more at the fact that you were even worth speaking about. Okuyasu furrows his eyebrows, putting his hands in his pockets as he looks you up and down,

“Huh, you are pretty cute-“ Koichi nudges his arm harshly, Okuyasu lets out an “ow” and frowns as he backs up from you.

You giggle, “it’s okay Koichi,” you turn to Okuyasu and nod, “I bet he meant no harm.”

Josuke rubs at his neck, waiting for the slightly awkward introduction to end. You look behind you and sigh,

“I gotta go. It was lovely meeting you all but I’m really hungry and need to get back home-“

“You’re hungry? Well actually, we were just about to get some lunch together at that new Italian place that just opened. You wanna come?” Josuke asks curiously.

You bite your lip, looking at your watch. You let out deep breath and nod. ‘Josuke did ask so nicely so.. why not?’ you think.

You all decide to walk down to the restaurant. You make quick conversation with Okuyasu and Koichi. Josuke walks next to you, keeping quiet. He takes a few quick glances at you, wanting to speak but getting too shy to do so.

You are met with the friendly welcome of the main and only chef, Tonio. You learn that he’s originally from Italy and opened his restaurant in hopes of bringing people health and happiness with the help of his dishes.

You all spend around an hour there, talking and laughing as Tonio prepares the courses for you all. You are surprised when you learn about the bizarre things that happens to one’s body when one eats his meals. You about threw up when you gobbled up the pasta that Tonio claimed would help your sudden stomach pains. You were almost scared that he was trying to hurt you and that Josuke and his friends played you but luckily, that was not the case and definitely not something you’d expect out of the boys you met.

Josuke slightly glares at Okuyasu as he tries to continuously flirt at you. He didn’t know why he felt a sense of frustration but he did know that he wanted to speak to you. Perhaps it was jealousy? Though Josuke didn’t want to take that into consideration.

You wave a goodbye to Tonio, smiling as you think about how much you’re going to tell your parents about this place. You let out an exaggerated sigh of satisfaction as the four of you exit the restaurant. You jump excitedly,

“That was so fun! Thanks for inviting me guys.” You say with a huge grin on your face. You didn’t know you’d open up this fast but in a way, you were glad that you did.

“Sure! We’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” Koichi says, waving at you. Okuyasu walks next to Koichi, waving too “you stay cute, alright?”

You giggle nodding, waving as you watch them walk down the sidewalk. You turn to Josuke,

“Hey, aren’t you going down with them? Oku told me your neighbors.”

“Yeah but um.. I was hoping I could walk you home..”

Your eyes widen, his suggestion making your heart flutter. Josuke laughs nervously,

“That’s unless you don’t want me to! I just thought ‘cause it can be a bit dangerous to walk around this late especially when you’re new in town and I-“

You cut him off, “I’d love if you did that. Thank you.”

It’s Josuke’s turn for his heart to flutter. He was beginning to think that he liked you, but not so much in a friend kind of way. But then again, he had just met you so he didn’t know why he was acting so shy.

You lead him to your house, which was luckily not to far from Tonio’s place. The walk was fairly quiet, but not awkward at all. You enjoyed the silence shared between you two. You stop in your tracks, facing him,

“Well, this is it. Thank you again, I wish for your walk to be safe too.” You say to him, he smiles. God his smile is so cute, you think. Wait, what? Why am I thinking that?

Josuke sighs “yeah, thank you.” You notice the quietness in his voice, you chime,

“Hey, you alright? You didn’t talk much when we were with Koichi and Okuyasu.”

“I’m fine...I’m just-“

You nod for him to continue, he sighs,

“I- I wanted to ask if you’d like to hang out with me alone sometime after school this week? I wanna get to know you better...”

You blush at this. You look down at your feet, biting your lip as you think about hanging out with him. Well he is pretty cute...

“Again, if you’re not comfortable with that, that’s okay too! I’m not gonna force you or anything-“

You giggle at his nervousness, you nudge at his shoulder,

“Quit trying to take everything back. Of course I’ll hang out with you. After school, right?”

Josuke is taken aback by your confidence, but he manages to nod. You smile,

“Imma go. I’ll see you tomorrow?” You say, walking up to the front door. He nods again.

Josuke blushes hard once you’re out of his sight. He mentally beats himself up for being awkward as he walks back to his house. Though after a while, he manages to crack a smile once he realizes he was still able to ask you out.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A/N: Hi! So I’m back :P

[theres-an-impulstor-among-us]

Friday Night Stabby best quotes part 29 (10/09/21)

so Pearl is still filling in for Joker and yes I did watch seven out of eight POVs for this session, that’s why this quotes thing is so long :)

...

Evil: I forgot how to play this game. Endless: Go to electrical and die, Evil. That’s how you play the game.

...

Skizz, entering electrical: Look at all these idiots in here. Endless: Hey! That’s not very nice.

...

Endless: I remember how to fix wiring. It’s not that hard. Can I do [shields] from here? I can. I did it. I figured it out. Etho: Good job. Endless: Thanks. Thanks, Etho! Etho: I never stopped believing in you. Endless: Your praise means everything to me, dad. *pause as Endless walks away* Endless: He’s not my dad.

...

Impulse: *reports a body* Impulse: Okay just hold on, I can do this. Ready? Skizz’s voice in a clip: DANG IIIIT! Impulse: Did you guys hear that? Evil: Yes. Brody: What is that? Impulse: That was the last thing I heard when I caught Skizz red-handedly killing Mrs Tango. *people laugh, then pause* Skizz: I don’t like you.

...

Impulse: Tango wanted to die so he could fix his overlay. Tango, dead: I DID NOT! YOU’RE A LIAR! Impulse: Someone did him a favour, I think. Tango, dead: >:(

...

Evil, in a monotone: I have wires to do. Skizz, snorting: World’s most bored electrician. Evil, slightly less monotone: More wires.

...

Astro: I also want you to know that I didn’t kill you, on purpose. Cuz it’s your birthday. But that was your one round of- Endless: Not my birthday. My birthday was- Astro: It was yesterday. Endless: -hours and hours ago. Astro: It’s still technically your birthday somewhere. Endless: I don’t think that’s how time works, but okay.

...

*last round, Endless spent a long time with Astro but didn’t kill him despite being imposter* Astro: Alright, Endless. This time, you can kill me. Astro and Endless: *laugh* Astro: Don’t throw me off like that. I thought you were all i- Endless: *kills Astro* *pause* Astro: ...thanks, Endless. Thanks. *laughs* Well, I can’t complain; I DID ask for it.

...

Skizz: Now if I die, you know it’s Etho (pronouncing it Eh-tho). Etho: Hey now.

...

Impulse: Oh whoops, I was muted that whole meeting. Tango: Aha! Exactly what a killer would say.

...

Astro, a ghost: Hey Evil, did you know that Impulse’s bone is not- not well right now? Evil: *snickers* Astro, a ghost: See I KNEW you could hear me, you imposter!

...

Pearl: Did you have a neutral role? Impulse: Yeah, I was jester. Pearl: Ahhh. Cheeky nugget.

...

Brody: Tango. Two people saw you leave the corpse of your wife. Tango: So what? Where is the corpse of my wife? Brody: Where is the corpse? Two people saw you, are you really gonna try that? Tango: I just passed you in the hallway! Nothing was there! Pearl: He’s gonna play dumb, it’s okay. Impulse: He’s still mad that she threw out his spices when they moved. Tango: IT’S THE OLD BAY, MAN! IT’S THE OLD BAY!

...

Endless: It was Tango in O2 with the lead pipe- No, that’s not- Different game.

...

Etho: I was with Brody and Astro but I’m… invisible, apparently. Astro: I- I said there was somebody else! I just wasn’t going to say something that I thought might make you seem suspicious. Etho: It’s been happening a lot and it’s a little weird, but okay.

...

*after the meeting* Astro: I’ll notice you next time, Etho. Etho: Okay, thank you. That’s all I want.

...

Skizz: It’s the purple guy! Endless: It can’t be the purple guy! Evil: It CAN be the purple guy. *votes are revealed, Endless is ejected* Endless: D’aww, you guys don’t even know how- that’s… stupid. *everyone laughs* Skizz, laughing: “Your Honour, this is very dumb”

...

*everyone skipped except Endless who voted for Impulse* Endless: I got your number, Impulse. *pause* Astro: What’s his number? Four? Eight? Nine? Six? Evil: Two. Endless, at the same time: Seven.

...

*Etho claims Tango killed Evil but can’t say how he knows for fear of assassination* Endless: So you saw it on admin and then came down to report it? Is that what that was? *pause* Etho: Exactly. *animation of Etho shooting himself plays* Etho: DANGIT!!!

...

Etho: Where we going, Tango? What we doing? Tango: I’m going to my grave is where I think I’m going.

...

Astro: Hey, Mrs T? Mrs Tango: Hi? Astro: I need you to do something really suspicious. Mrs Tango: Okay.

...

*after Impulse crashed out of the game but his body is reported* Skizz: That was the most epic kill yet. It happened IRL.

...

Tango: Dead, disconnected. It’s all the same thing. Pearl: For one, you get cut in half, but the other, you just go “poof”.

...

*Etho is suspected of being executioner against Brody* Tango: So Etho, you’re saying there’s two imposters alive. Who do you think is the second one? *pause* Etho: That, I don’t know just yet. Tango: An executioner wouldn’t need to know that though, right? Etho: Maybe Astro. *long pause* Astro: What?! Why have you gone from Brody to me all of a sudden?!

...

Brody: Astro, please don’t kill me. Astro: I would’ve killed you long ago. Brody: That’s not true. You love me. Astro: Not after you accused me of- Brody, chuckling: I haven’t accused you of anything. Astro: You accused me of breathing heavily earlier and I’m offended by it. Brody: You did, though. Astro: I can’t help that the air quality here is… dog crap. Brody: I know you well enough. I know you well enough to know when you’re, like, concentrating. Astro: Not my fault that I can’t breathe here right now.

...

Etho: [Brody] killed Impulse on the first round. It made [Impulse] crash. And then [Brody] reported the body. Next round, he killed another person and did another report. He’s a- He’s a self-reporting… Brody. *everyone laughs* Evil: This is the best you’ve got, Etho?

...

Evil: So here’s the question for everybody: do I tell Skizz what his minor tell is or do I keep it to myself? Skizz: You zip it! You got nothing! Tango: Keep it to yourself. That’s part of the fun; we can all learn each other’s tells. Astro: You mean like when somebody has heavy breathing when they kill somebody, Brody? Brody: Oh. Astro: I’m gonna have extra heavy breathing when I kill you. Extra… EXTRA… heavy breathing. Brody: ...I’ll remember that.

...

Skizz: I finally kill the banana and instantly I hear him be all “you crashed my game!” Astro: Wait, so when I said that if Impulse rage-quit it was Skizz, I was actually correct on that? Skizz: You were right, yeah. Impulse: Wow… Endless: Skizz was like “if you’re not gonna rage quit, I’m gonna rage quit for you!” Skizz: I killed you so hard your game crashed. That’s a KILL right there.

...

Brody: Yeah, I’ve been actually watching her teleport. Like “wait, did she come out of that vent??” No, she’s teleporting around. Tango: Hacks! Pearl: Speedies! Astro: The hacks are Australian ping.

...

Astro: Hey, Evil. Evil: Hi. Are you gonna kill me? Astro: Do you want me to or do you want me to let you live? Evil: I’d like to live, thank you.

...

Evil: *runs into electrical and finds only Pearl in there* Pearl, singing: Rudolph the red nosed reindeer, had a very shiny nose. Evil: I’m done with my tasks. Pearl: *kills Evil immediately* Astro, a ghost: *laughs* You got killed to Christmas music, Evil.

...

Astro, dead: Hey Evil, how did it feel to get Christmas carolled as you were being killed? Evil, dead: She took the happiest time of the year and destroyed me with it!

...

Pearl: I’m gonna go kill Etho. Shhh. Giant Skizz, in a deep voice: You do it. Rock and roll.

...

Mrs Tango: My cooldown was so long and nobody was alone. Astro: It’s okay, Mrs Tango. Your speedy laggy Australian friend was killing all the people. Pearl: I literally told Skizz I was gonna kill Etho and I did exactly just that.

...

Brody: I cleaned [Etho] out of a vent and I didn’t know you could even do that but here we are. Endless: That’s awesome! Brody: I mean- I knew it, I knew you were in there, Etho. Sucker.

...

Endless: I know of one person who didn’t do the kill. Skizz: Who? Endless, whispering: Me. I was downloading in weapons. Skizz: You’re not gonna vouch for yourself. That’s not how justice works. Endless: Oh. My bad.

...

*Astro and Endless win as imposters* Endless: What did you do, Pearl? What happened there? Did you try to sheriff Skizz? Pearl: Yeah, I wanted to take a stab. I was the sheriff. I thought it might’ve been Skizz. Astro: Ohh, YOU got the last kill, Pearl? Pearl: Yeeaaahh. That was me. Skizz: THAT’s how we died? Cuz Pearl sheriffed the wrong person? Endless: It gets better than that. Pearl asked me to move away so she didn’t accidentally sheriff me. ...

Impulse: We getting double killed in here? Brody: Hopefully.

...

Brody: I’m voting for Tango; he’s having too much fun. Evil: Tango’s not allowed to have fun, we know that. Tango: Shut that down, yeah.

...

Pearl: *votes for Brody* Brody: Pearl. Why do you hate me? Pearl: I just have reasons. Skizz, to Brody: Don’t tug at THAT thread. Brody: Would you like to tell people about those reasons? Pearl: Not particularly.

...

Brody: Mrs Tango, do you want me to put like a poster of me in your new office? Of just me looking at you? Mrs Tango: Uhhh… Evil: Only if you’re wearing the pink hat. Brody: ONLY the pink hat. That’s it. *pause* Evil: Okay, that… that got awkward.

...

Astro: So would you like to know a good story? It’s a fun story. Etho: I would love to hear a good story right now, Astro. Astro: The fun story is that Mrs Tango thought that the comms were out and she wouldn’t get revealed walking away from her archnemesis, The Endless’s body. Tango: Well then I’m not voting for her at all, even if she did kill him, cuz that’s good by me. Etho: Ohoo… Evil: WOW.

...

Astro: Mrs Tango, you basically won the round; you killed Endless, so… *everyone laughs* Etho: That’s all we can hope for in the world, right? Tango: You kill Endless, you pretty much win, right? That doesn’t matter. *pause* Etho: Love you, Endless.

...

*Brody and Mrs Tango win as imposters after Brody framed Evil* Skizz: Evil, I’m so sorry, dude! Evil: No you’re not. Brody: I’m not sorry. I needed that in my heart. I’m not sorry. I’m not sorry whatsoever.

...

Impulse: Come watch me scan! Wanna watch me scan? C’mon! Watch this! It’s gonna be the best. Come watch. Astro: No, because I know what you’re gonna say and I’m not gonna stand for it. Impulse, hopping on the scanner: I’m not gonna do it, I’m not gonna do it. But that was- that’s legit. You saw that? Astro: You’re a little to the left. Impulse: I’m not gonna say it. But you’re gonna kill me anyway, so I might as well say it. Astro: You need to go to the right. Impulse: Did you watch me scan? Astro: You’re a little- You were- Impulse: Watch me nae nae. Astro, laughing: -a little far to the left.

...

Astro: I was coming from lab. Somebody was nae-naeing over there. Impulse: *giggles* Astro: Won’t say who, but somebody was. Impulse: There’s only one person here who does that.

...

Astro: I’m gonna come back cuz I don’t trust you. Brody: *scoffs* Okay. Astro: You murdered me last time! Brody, deadpan: I wouldn’t do that to you. That doesn’t sound like something I would do. Astro: Right in front of Evil and everything. I couldn’t get through the door. Brody, deadpan: I wouldn’t do that to you.

...

Endless: Hey, I’ve gotta fix the- I’m rebooting the wifi, sorry if it goes down. For a few minutes. Or A minute. Or until I come back here and, uh, reinitialise it. Brody, walking away: Endless, do you ever just stop talking? Etho, laughing: Ouch. Endless, following Brody: Hey, Brody. Let’s hang out, SIR. Brody: *laughs* Endless: How’ve you been, Brody? How’s your evening going? Brody: I’m fine. I’m fine. Are you gonna kill me? Endless: Are you always a jackass? Brody: Usually, yes. Are you gonna kill me or what? Endless: No, I don’t- I can’t kill you. But next time. Next time.

...

Endless: I’m definitely going to take a break so that I’m the last one back, and that’ll teach them to leave me here to entertain you. Pearl: Okay. Enjoy your water consumption. Endless: That’s very sweet of you. I appreciate that. You enjoy whatever consumption you’re doing as well.

...

Skizz, being ejected: You can’t be mayor and imposter, can you? Tango and Endless: No. Skizz: Well, I’m all sorts of twisted. Tango: You’re all sorts of dead.

...

*after Mrs Tango assassinated engineer Etho* Mrs Tango: I super appreciate you calling Etho out for being the engineer. Etho: I didn’t appreciate it.

...

Astro: I can tell you one thing: Etho’s not the engineer this round. Etho: You don’t know that for sure. Astro: Oh I think I do.

...

Astro: Hey Impulse. Impulse: Yeah? Astro: I just scanned. You know what else I did? Impulse: *gasps delightedly* You didn’t! Astro: I… *pause* Astro: Nah, I’m not gonna say it.

...

Impulse: *reports Astro’s body* Impulse: So. Astro scanned. But he did not nae nae. Just saying. Endless: I don’t think that’s how the song goes. Impulse: So I came to give him a stern talking to. But his body was dead.

...

Skizz: I’m doing my tasks. Tango: Your task is to assassinate. Skizz: That’s right, baby. And I’m coming for you next. Tango: Mhm. Bring it.

...

Astro: I can vouch for Evil cuz he watched me scan, Impulse watched me nae nae, and-. Impulse: Oh no. You’re gonna die now.

...

Skizz: Impulse sampled the Skizz! *pause* Impulse: Ew.

...

Brody: I’m not sorry I voted for you, Endless. Endless: Well, I’m glad that Mrs Tango didn’t. Brody: It’s cuz she doesn’t want to hurt your feelings. I will hurt your feelings.

...

Endless: I knew I got that wrong. Dangit. Simon Says- I blew it- I screwed it on the last… Brody: ...what? Endless: I feel like this should be the last game. I just… Tango: Are you having a nervous breakdown? What’s going on? Endless: Yeah, a little bit.

...

Endless: I voted for you, Brody. Cuz I hate everything about you. Brody: Thank you, buddy. I’ll vote for you also.

...

Pearl: Who we voting for? Brody: Endless. Endless: Brody. Tango: Why are we voting for Endless? Or Brody? Endless: Because Brody’s a jerk.

...

Pearl: This is awkward, cuz Tango was trying to get me to kill him. Tango: Do NOT pin that on me, my fair lady! Pearl: No no no, I’m not. Etho: Ooooh this is spicy :D Pearl: I’m pinning this on Skizz. Skizz just decided to walk by- Tango: Oh, okay. I’m good with that.

...

Brody: Etho, c’mere. Come here. That’s the second time you’ve ruined my fun. Etho: Were you sheriff? Brody: No. Don’t Starve- I say that and you ruin my fun and then Christmas music and you kill me. I just- Why do you hate me? Etho: I- I was just backing up my partner, y’know? Brody: Look, if you don’t wanna play Don’t Starve, you just say “hey man, I’m not into it”. That’s fine. See, you just say that. Etho: I like Don’t Starve. Brody: Evidently not with me.

...

Endless: It’s Brody’s fault for sussing me on that one. Brody: It’s not my fault you’re dumb.

...

Impulse: Keys or you’re sus! Brody: Keys or you’re… Impulse. Endless: Hey, I’M Impulse.

...

Astro, dead: Hey. Your wife killed me. Tango, dead: Good. Evil and Mrs Jerkface.

[bandaigaeru]

comfort place - yang jeongin

→genre: friends to lovers →synopsis: comfort can manifest itself in many forms. some find it in the fantastical world of the arts. others find it in sports. but, for you, comfort is a person.  →word count: 6.5k →pairing: jeongin x gender neutral reader →warnings: drunk jeongin, mentions of puking

i. 

“Why are you doing that?” 

“Doing what?” 

“That,” your eyes go wide as you nod at his stature. He’s hunched over your trash can. Blue gloves shield his hands as he digs. 

“Oh. I think I lost my earring or something.” 

“And your first instinct was to search my trash can?” you quirk an eyebrow. Perhaps you should mention that this isn’t just any trash can, it’s your kitchen one. Full of discarded, burnt ramen and your roommate’s weird protein shakes that will clog your drain otherwise. 

He nods, as though this is the most normal first step to a lost earring. Yang Jeongin is many things, but being questionable is one of his strongest traits. 

You slip behind him to get to the fridge. Water bottles line the right half, more commonly known as your roommate’s side. You reach for one. 

“What are you doing on March twenty-fifth?” he asks, arms deep in your trashcan. He’s really going to endure this conversation without a single shred of his pride disappearing. 

You try not to look at him as you glance at the calendar. Two weeks away, the small square for that Saturday reads “NATIONALS” in large red letters. 

You hum to yourself. “Dog sitting.” 

“What?” he looks at you, eyes squinted in confusion, “Why?” 

“Danceracha’s going out of town for the dance contest. I told you this.” 

He exhales a deep, surrendering sigh as he straightens his back and plucks the gloves off. He shakes his hands in the cool air before starting for your sink. The calm stream of water trickles out. “Man. That sucks.” 

“Why?” you question. Your fingertips draw marks of condensation along the plastic. 

“I was gonna invite you to a party,” he mutters. A pout comes to his lips. For a moment, your heart drops. He looks the same as when you met him. All those years, long with memories but short in quantity, whizz past you. 

“Party?” you repeat. 

“Yeah,” he nudges the water stream off. 

Parties and Jeongin don’t mix well. History has proven this. 

“Whose party is it?” you start for the living room, knowing he’ll follow. 

“You don’t know him,” he says, his voice never once fading because, indeed, he’s on your tail. 

“Okay, but what’s his name?” 

“Chan. Actually,” he hesitates, “you might know him.” 

As you sink into the couch, chipped leather scratching your legs, you glance at him. His eyebrows are scrunched into his thinking stance. Then, his features light up once he finds the answer. “Do you remember sophomore year’s biology class?” 

You nod. 

“Remember when that senior came in to make fun of Mr. Lee?” 

Again, you nod. 

“His best friend is Chan. You probably saw them in our freshman yearbook for spirit week. They dressed up as Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum for Twins Day.” 

Your mouth forms into an acknowledging part. “Got it.” In fact, the recurring image instantly pops into your head. You can thank all the hours spent staring at it with stifled laughter for that. 

“So what’s the party for?” 

He shrugs, “Some college achievement shit.” 

“And you got invited?” you laugh. Jeongin barely made it out of high school. He took one harrowed glance at the local campus and nearly cried. You don’t blame him, though. That place is stressful. Even as a freshman you can say this. 

He rolls his eyes. “I’m cool, you know? I don’t need to be in academics for them to know that.” 

“Sure,” you nod. 

“I’m serious!” His lips quirk up in a defensive manner that sends a spark through your chest. 

Among other things, Jeongin is confusing. Questionable and confusing. These are the words you say when someone asks you what he’s like. Because seriously, why does he always do things so infuriating yet endearing? 

He runs a hand through his hair as he unlocks his phone. His thumb works quickly to swipe through a message log before he tilts the phone so you can see. “See?” 

The conversation in question is short, a maximum of four texts. The details blur as he snatches his phone back as quickly as he showed it. Again, infuriating. 

“Are you planning on going alone, then?” 

This question makes him freeze. He stares at the wall wielding a mounted TV, whose black screen reflects the image of him by your side, shoulder to shoulder. A small smile tilts his lips. “I guess. People want me there. So I’ll find my niche.” 

See? Endearing. 

You have no doubts that he can find a place to fit in. He did it in high school and he’ll proceed to do it in the future. That’s just how he is. Plus, maybe he can allow someone else to feel safe too. Like he did for you. 

ii.

High school is a demon with a comforting smile. When you’re forced to transition, they tell you it’s all fun. Sunshine and rainbows, if you will. What they don’t tell you is that luck will always make it so you don’t get any of your friends in your classes. And this, with your contradicting lunch shifts, will slowly force you out of the friend group you had stuck with since elementary school. 

Perpetual tears are stocked behind your eyes. Waiting for the perfect moment to fall because let’s be honest, any minor inconvenience could push you over the edge. Stress does that to you. 

In third period of your second week, your math teacher announces that she’s decided on her seating chart. She makes you line up against the walls as she grabs her reference sheet, lined with the images of desks, names scribbled atop them. “Jeongin,” she says, pointing to a desk in the front row. 

A boy a few feet away from you steps out from the crowd to claim his desk. He’s wearing an oversized maroon hoodie whose back is marked “Yang” in white letters. 

Your teacher stops at the seat next to him. She glances at you and your heart drops. “Y/N,” she points to a desk. 

Sitting up front is worse than the incessant plagues of high school drama. All eyes permanently burn into the back of your head, even when not a single soul acknowledges you. 

As you try to settle into your seat, back a little stiff from trying to shrink yourself into a tiny marble, the boy beside you leans over. “Hey, you okay?” 

For the first time, your eyes lock. His remind you of the innocence of childhood, that blank yet full gaze. You nearly melt, but instead, your back loosens. 

“Yeah. I just don’t like sitting in the front,” you chuckle awkwardly. 

He smiles. Not one of the pity ones, but a real toothy smile. “Aww. Me neither, I always feel like everyone’s watching me.” 

Finally, a person who gets it. 

“But I just have to trick myself into not caring,” he says, glancing at the whiteboard. Shadows of poorly erased marker line the corners. 

Abruptly, after his serene gaze, he jumps back to you. “Do you like coffee by any chance?” 

Despite the initial shock of the question, you say, “Yeah, I do.” 

As it turns out, his family owns this huge coffee shop right next to the bookstore you used to frequent. His mom was rather happy to see a new face. On that day, she accepted you as family. 

And math didn’t turn out to be so hard that year. 

iii.

The apartment grows quiet after Jeongin inevitably has to leave. Your roommate’s dog comes trotting out from his room. His nose is upturned, scouting for a soul to give him attention. 

“Come here, Kkami,” you pat the empty spot on the couch beside you. He runs the rest of the way. Instead of resting on the couch cushion, he prefers your lap. This pickiness he obtained from his owner. 

Hyunjin’s anything but a bad roommate. He does the dishes, sweeps when he finds a large puff of Kkami’s fur traveling your hardwood like a tumbleweed, even brings home coffee when you have a huge study night ahead of you. However, when it comes to you and Jeongin, your mutual hangouts on weekends, he has a very specific need. And that’s to be around you two as little as possible. 

He claims it’s because he can’t stand third-wheeling. Jeongin refuses to understand this concept. “If we’re not dating, it’s not third-wheeling?” he’d said, numerous times. 

Hyunjin won’t budge on the subject. 

The tune set as Jeongin’s ringtone, chosen by him, plagues the air. You reach for your phone, placing a protective hand on Kkami’s side to prevent him from falling. 

“Hello?”

“Problem: What would you do if your brother told you he got a girlfriend?” 

You squint at your reflection in the TV between scene transitions. It looks odd without him beside you. “Which brother?” 

“Guess which one would make me more dumbfounded. Hint, it’s not the older one.” 

“Your younger brother got someone before you?” you snicker. Jeongin holds his pride in his individuality. Losing to a younger brother with something like this is hilarious. 

“This isn’t funny! Should I be a serious big brother and talk to him or should I just seethe in silence?” 

“Neither. Leave him alone.” 

He does something akin to a whine. “But-”

You stick up a finger, though he can’t see you as you interrupt, “C’mon, Jeongin. He’s a teenager. Let him be.” 

Sometimes, it feels like he’s the outsider and you’re the true, reasonable sibling. 

He sighs. You imagine him pushing his hair out of his eyes and staring up at his ceiling. All lost in the possibilities that lay before him, since you and him both know he won’t listen to you. 

“Can I hang up now?” you ask, glancing at the front door. 

“Are you gonna abandon me for your significant other too?” 

You scoff as the front door opens. “You’re ridiculous.” 

Hyunjin steps into the apartment. His hair is damp with sweat and lays jagged in front of his eyes. You raise a hand to wave. 

“It’s a real question, though. You know whoever it is will be jealous of me.” Now, you know, he’s just prodding for a reaction. You can practically hear the smirk in his voice. 

“Yes, Jeongin. I would one hundred percent drop you for some person who offers emotional stimulation,” you monotonously chide. 

Hyunjin gives you a curious look as he passes. You would think he’d be used to this by now. 

“Okay but,” Jeongin’s voice grows low as he settles onto his bed, “would you really? Tell me you won’t.” 

“I won’t,” you press your back deeper into the couch. It’s not like you’ve had many romantic opportunities since meeting him. Jeongin, though also needy, is more interesting than anyone else you’ve met. He’s a shiny emerald among a sea of charcoal. 

“Good,” he says, and you can tell he’s smiling. The image of his little dimple indenting makes you mirror the sentiment. 

“Now can I hang up?” 

“Fine,” he sighs.

Through a laugh, you manage, “Goodnight. Love you.” 

“Love you too.” And then the line goes dead. 

iv.

“Are you sure you don’t like him?” must be a trendy replacement for ‘good morning.’ 

“Who?” you ask, rubbing your eye as you start for the cereal cabinet. 

“Jeongin. Who else?” Hyunjin says. He sits at the kitchen table. A plate of freshly heated blueberry waffles sits before him. 

Without turning to him, you say, “I’m sure.” 

It’s a reflex, really. 

He exhales in the most exaggerated way possible to grab your attention. His eyes are cold with the hunger for an answer. A real one. 

“I don’t like him,” you say slowly, allowing each word time to sink into the air. 

The thought has surely crossed your mind. It’d be unrealistic to say you’ve never pondered the great possibility of being in love with your best friend. But ultimately, you don’t think you are. Sure, you’d take a bullet for Jeongin. Just not in the ‘wow I’m madly in love with you’ kind of way. You tell yourself it’s in the ‘you’re going to do so much good for the world’ kind of way. 

“Fine,” Hyunjin admits, picking up one of his waffles and taking a caveman bite. 

Most of breakfast is quiet as you sit opposite him, staring into your bowl. Your milky reflection takes you off guard a few times. 

“You know,” Hyunjin says after a while, his voice raw and a little croaky. He has to bring a hand to cover his mouth as he clears his throat. “You should get him to stay with you while I’m away.” 

As you look back up at him, he adds defensively, “I’m not trying to play Cupid.”

You shrug, “He probably has other plans.” 

Yet when you text him a few hours later, he jumps on it. “It’ll be like a sleepover! Don’t you miss when we did those?” 

You did, but you don’t admit it. 

v.

The week of nationals arrives too quickly for your mind to process. One minute, you’re studying for an upcoming exam and the next there’s a knock on your bedroom door. It doesn’t wait for a sound before opening. 

“Hey, I’m leaving.” 

Hyunjin’s dressed in black sweatpants and a black hoodie, which covers his messy hair. Perfect for his night of sleeping on the bus. A duffel bag packed and puffy hangs off his shoulder. 

“Good luck,” you smile up at him. 

“Thanks. Don’t try sneaking into the venue with your rat like you did last year,” he returns the smile. 

“Hey, it wasn’t my idea,” you rush to defend yourself. 

He scoffs. “Yeah, right. You still played into it.” 

“And we got to support you as your lovely friends.” 

“You were the only people cheering during the contemporary dance,” he mumbles, stepping back into the hall. 

“To be fair, we couldn’t realize because we were so involved!” you shout to match the increasing distance. 

“Right!” he calls, a laugh shaking his words. 

Studying is now a failed mission. Every time you glance at the words printed on the textbook’s glossed pages, they just blur together until your mind drifts to Jeongin. When is he coming over? He said he’d be here by seven. It’s roughly a quarter past. He has a key, so it’s not like you have to be free when he gets here.

When you succumb and close the textbook, you hear shuffling in the living room. Shortly followed by Kkami’s familiar barking, which he only pursues when someone’s here. 

The feeling of a generously excited puppy fills you as you follow the source. 

“Hi,” you smile. 

Jeongin has treated himself to a coffee. He must have just worked a shift. 

“Hi,” he hands you the paper cup. 

“Oh, is this for me?” you take it. It’s hot against your palms. 

“Yeah. It’s hot chocolate. Thought you might want it.” 

He drops his backpack, likely stuffed with potential party outfits, by the couch. He stands and scans your face as you take the first sip of the drink. The sweetness takes over and makes you shiver, but the warmth minimizes the shiver to nothing. Surely enough, this is his mother’s hot chocolate. 

“Thank you,” you say, looking into his eyes. The living room light has speckled his eyes with stars.

“Of course.” 

A moment passes of just looking at each other. Not a single word. You’re not even sure if you’re remembering to breathe. 

It breaks when he glances at the TV. “Movie time?” 

Settling on the couch doesn’t take long. He sits close enough to you, resting his head on your shoulder. He’s done this for as long as you remember, but why does it feel so close all of a sudden? 

He chooses the movie. A tradition you’ve established ever since you accidentally chose a movie so repulsively awful you had to take a break from watching movies at all. The teasing was barely bearable. 

Even now, when someone says something similar to that movie, you shiver. 

“Are we feeling sci-fi?” he asks. 

You almost shrug until you remember where his head is. “I don’t care,” you say instead. 

He chooses a romance movie, his safe pick. 

And he falls asleep not even ten minutes in. 

Hyunjin’s question returns to you in neon lights. Certainly, this tight feeling in your chest couldn’t be akin to liking someone. When you like someone, there’s always a telltale sign. There’s a bright moment of realization. That’s never come for you. Even now, all you can do is question. Question. Question. Question. 

vi.

Jeongin’s party outfit is the most conspicuous thing ever. A light blue tee from middle school that has all his classmate’s signatures on the back. Black jeans with holes at the knees. You can’t tell if he’s going to a child’s party or not. 

He catches your tilted gaze, matched with the furrowed eyebrows, and huffs. “Would you rather I get puke on a good shirt?” 

You blink. “I’d rather you not puke on yourself.” 

A noise close to laughter bursts past his lips. “Ha. Funny. I won’t reach that point. I’m thinking people puking on me.” 

You nod. Jeongin’s a lightweight, from what you know. But hey, if it helps him sleep at night. 

He departs after a long phone call with Chan. He offers a little wave as he opens the door. “I’ll give you live updates.” 

“You don’t have to.” 

“But I will.” 

And indeed, he follows through. Selfies bombard your phone every three minutes. One is taken with Chan, but it’s so shaky and dark that they look like blobs with highlighted cheeks. 

These only make you more confused. Maybe Hyunjin was right. But you don’t want him to be. Nothing makes you feel more foolish than catching feelings for a friend who is just that. Friend. That painful, heartbreaking word. 

You open Hyunjin’s message log, prepared to reach out and ask if he can help you break down what you’re feeling, but his contact transitions to consuming your entire screen—perfect timing, he’s calling. 

“Hello?” 

“Guess what?” His voice is drowned out by external shouts. 

“What?” 

“We took second place!”

“Congrats,” you smile to yourself, leaning against the couch arm. 

“It’s all thanks to Felix’s freestyle. That surprise category threw us off, but he really came through,” he rambles. He tells you about all his points and each error, which ultimately seem mundane but apparently make a difference in his detail loving mind. 

“Anyway, I just wanted to call. See how you’re doing, you know.”

“I’m doing good,” you nod as though to convince yourself. 

“How’s Jeongin?” 

“At a party,” you say as your phone buzzes again. Another selfie. This time, he’s in a lonesome bathroom and posing in the mirror. A peace sign that surrounds his eye. That stupid dimple makes your heart jump. 

Hyunjin giggles at something on his end and says something not aimed at you. He quickly returns to his serious tone with, “How are you really feeling? Don’t bullshit me.” 

You stifle a laugh. Resting your head on the back of the couch, you glare at the ceiling, “Confused.” 

“About Jeongin?” 

He slips into a quieter place. You sigh. Why are your hands shaking all of a sudden? “Yeah.” 

“Well,” he starts, “I pushed you into thinking about it for a reason.” 

“He doesn’t like me like that.” 

“How do you know?” 

“Because friends don’t like friends like that.” 

“But you like him like that, so doesn’t that ruin your statement?” 

You sit in the silence for a minute. “I guess so.” 

His breath is amplified and you can hear each inhale and exhale. “You’ll probably just brush this off, but I think you have a shot.” 

You nod. “Sure. A shot at going to the moon maybe. A shot at Jeongin liking me? No way.” 

“Look, pessimism isn’t gonna get you anywhere. If you’re too much of a pussy to talk to him, I will. But not because I want to, because it’s terrible seeing you sulk,” he mutters. 

A round of applause for your roommate. 

“Just give me some time. I still don’t know if I like him,” you glance at the dog, who’s cuddled up on a pile of blankets. Why can’t your life be that simple? 

“Not trying to force you or anything, but I think you know the answer to that.” 

He’s probably right. It’s not like you can retaliate anyway. There’s a distant knock before he says, “Sorry. I gotta go. I’ll be home tomorrow.” 

The following silence is truly suffocating. 

vii.

That party changes everything. 

Jeongin stumbles home, each step a potential path to faceplanting. It’s this exact stumble that forces him to trip over a box. 

The noise draws you from sleep. Through squinted eyes, you stare at him as he tries to regain his balance. His arms are splayed out, searching for a stable support beam. 

“Jeongin?” you whisper, though you know it’s him. Who else would be drunkenly returning home at, you glance at your phone, three in the morning?

“Y/N,” he gasps. Your voice prompts him to follow it. 

As you stand, he finds his way through the narrow path between couch and coffee table. He throws his arms around you. 

“I missed you,” he mumbles, words meshing together. 

“I missed you too?” It’s only been six hours. 

He holds you at arms length, palms resting on your shoulders. “I love you,” he slurs, eyes drunkenly taking a long blink. 

“I love you too?” 

“No, like, I really love you. ‘The moon is beautiful’ type of stuff,” he nods. 

You’re not sure what he means by this. But it doesn’t matter if you try to question him, because he continues. 

“I think about the future a lot,” he says, hands falling to his sides before he falls onto the couch. “Nothing’s ever consistent. But you’re always there.” 

“That’s-” you begin. 

He wasn’t finished. “I think our wedding would be nice.” 

Now, he goes silent as you stand there in shock. He thinks about that? How often? 

The moment your lips part to ask these things, a light snore escapes his lips. You grab a blanket from your room, the Totoro one he loves, and you gently cover him. You lean over his face. His cheeks are a little swollen, as are his lips. You push his hair away from his eyes before going to your room. You’re careful not to make a noise as you shut the door. 

He’s gone by the time you wake up. For the first twenty-four hours, you shrug it off as a painful hangover he’s just sleeping through. 

Most hangovers don’t last a week, though. 

One time, sitting beneath a sky littered with stars, Jeongin released a deep breath. “Do you think we’ll ever stop being friends?” 

Jeongin’s not insecure about many things, as his philosophy is that if one person finds something unattractive, there’s a hoard who will think otherwise. But this topic is an exception. 

“Unless you do something unthinkably terrible, no,” you mumble. And you truly meant it. 

So, Jeongin: You haven’t done anything unthinkable.Why have you disappeared? 

Life without Jeongin has been incredibly boring. It’s prompted an imminent heartache. Attending class is a lame option considering your bed is so much more comfortable. You never knew missing someone could form a black hole in your body, consuming each grain of energy. 

Hyunjin’s the only reason you’re eating. Since he knows you’re not up for any meal, he brings you snacks and another bottle of water—to add to the mountain of empty bottles on your desk. 

“Do I need to go break his ankles?” Hyunjin asks one day, nearly a month after his tournament. 

You shrug. You know he’s joking, but laughter doesn’t seem to bubble up. It’s lost in the dark cave that is this confusing state. 

“I texted him today. No response yet,” Hyunjin adds. 

You nod. You got the same treatment, but you stopped trying a while ago. 

“Have you gone to the coffee shop? To see his mom or something?” 

You shake your head. “No point in it. He doesn’t tell her much. Plus I don’t want to pin her against him or anything.” 

Hyunjin sighs. He doesn’t know what else to say, or offer, or do to help you. Not that you’re a lost cause, but he’s starting to lose the ounce of hope he had. To him, you’re too good for this. Telling and convincing you of that is a difficult task. 

When he leaves you alone, you cry again. At this point, your eyes hurt when you aren’t crying. But hey, at least you’re sleeping nice. The desperate need to escape can do that to you. 

viii.

You tell Hyunjin your conclusion at dinner—something he’s finally tricked you into eating. “I think I love him.” 

He nods. “Yeah. Didn’t we already establish that?” 

You push the noodles around. “I didn’t want to admit it.” 

“Why?” 

Averted gaze set to the ramen, though his remains scalding. “I don’t know.”

He reaches across the table to regain your focus. He knows the noodles aren’t that interesting. “That’s okay. Look, we can go beat his ass if you want. Or we can hunt him down and hold him hostage-”

He stops when he sees the small hint of a smile turning your lips up. One of his own appears, and in his mind, he’s breaking into a congratulatory dance. The crack in the sadness is exposed, and it’s slowly breaking further. All that’s next is revealing the ravine of happiness. 

After dinner, you sit on the couch and decide to watch a movie. Unlike Jeongin, he gives you movie pick. It reminds you of the bitter taste that’s overcome your mouth since he up and left. 

Halfway through the movie, some shitty one Jeongin and you watched a few months ago, Kkami barks at the couch. He looks between you and the crack behind it as if to say, “Hello? Get my bone!” 

You glance at Hyunjin, who also waits for you to get up and retrieve the dog’s lost bone. Normally you take turns with this task, but he seems to have forgotten it’s been his turn for the last five times. 

With a muted sigh, you pull yourself off the couch. Hyunjin doesn’t even bother to pause the movie. Jeongin wouldn’t do that.  

You lower yourself to look into the dark tunnel. With a blind hand you swipe against the floor. A small object connects with the palm of your hand. You drag it out. A small metal earring glares back at you. You drop it in the pocket of your hoodie—which was a gift from Jeongin as you drifted into adulthood. You return to the bone search with a sting in your eyes. 

ix.

Happiness is a fragile object. 

At the same hour that Jeongin had said the unthinkable, your phone buzzes loudly against your side. Ultimately, this brings you back to the post-sleep daze as you trudge to answer it. Looking at the contact is the last of your concerns. 

“Hello?” Your voice is raw. A long gulp of water would be kindly appreciated. 

“Hey, Y/N, right?” This is a voice you’ve never heard before. You pull back to look at the contact and, unsurprisingly, there isn’t one. All that stares back is a string of numbers, unique to this person. 

“Yeah?” 

“Hi, sorry for the late call. I’m Chan-” you nearly hang up out of defensive instinct, but you let him finish. “I kind of need a favor right now.” 

“What kind of favor?” 

In the background, there’s a loud retching noise. “Um, so Jeongin, right?” Chan nervously laughs. 

“We’re not really-” you start. 

He interrupts, “I know. But he’s been talking about you nonstop. He’s really a wimp, you know. Actually, I guess I’m not really asking for a favor. I’m doing you a favor.” 

You know where he’s going with this. “I’m sorry, Chan, but I don’t think that’s a-”

“Hush,” he says before his voice distances. 

“Y/N? It’s Y/N?” the familiar, slurred voice asks. 

He wasn’t going to give you an option. Deep down, you’re kind of grateful for that. 

When Chan returns to the phone, he says, “I can send you the address. We’re on the first floor, so it shouldn’t be too bad. I would offer to come pick you up, but I’m babysitting.” At these final words, he laughs. 

You consider waking up Hyunjin to take you—he’s the one with the car—but you think against it when you realize it’s only a five minute walk. 

Despite the daytime weather that is clear sky and sun that hugs your skin, the nighttime 

version is a little less welcoming. Indeed the air is breezeless, but it’s a bitter cold. Grabbing a hoodie would have been smart, but alas. 

Chan opens the door with a smile. “Hi, come on in.” 

He points to a closed door, “Jeongin’s in there. He should be decent. Just a little pukey.” 

You follow his directions, while he starts for the couch. At least he’s allowing privacy, you think. You knock lightly on the door. After a long trial of waiting with no response, you slowly push the door open. 

His cheek is resting on the cold porcelain of the bathtub. Through dazed and squinted eyes, he looks at you. “Hi?” 

“Hey,” you say, stepping into his space for the first time in over a month. Despite the stain of puke on his shirt, you realize that he hasn’t changed much. What physical changes can someone go through in a month? Well. Everything. 

You appreciate your mind for allowing his appearance to never leave. Otherwise, you might have looked at him just now and been disgusted. Because it’s Jeongin, and because of this weird tugging feeling in your chest, you don’t. In its place, you look at him as though he holds the world’s most valuable object. 

He tries to sit up, nearly falls on his face, but manages. “Do you hate me?” 

“No. I don’t think so,” you squat next to him. The familiar weight of his head meets with your shoulder. 

“I shouldn’t say this,” he laughs. His mind is going a mile a minute, but his lips refuse to go at an accompanying speed. “I love you.” 

You stare at the top of his head. “I love you too.” 

“Really?” he lifts his head. He seems to search your eyes for the similar sparkle his hold. 

“Yeah,” you nod. You decide to save your cheesy comments until the morning. No point in wasting them if he won’t remember this when he wakes up. 

“Did you know that I,” he says, trying to lift himself to his feet. He leans a little too far on a foot, prompting you to rush and steady him. “thought you and Hyunjin were dating for the longest time.” He laughs again. 

You squint at him, “Is that why you disappeared?” 

A drunk smile finds his lips and his cheeks glow beneath the bathroom light. “Guilty.” 

“You’re stupid for thinking it’d ever be anyone but you,” you whisper, glancing anywhere but him. You could say this to the mirror too. Stupid for thinking it could be anyone but him. 

He’s ridiculous. Ridiculous enough to allow his smile to drop a little as he leans closer to your face. “I’m going to kiss you,” he whispers. 

You watch as he leans a little bit closer. Bit by bit. You even close your eyes at one point. At the last minute, when his breath begins to mingle with yours, he pulls away. “No. Let me brush my teeth first.” 

You watch in a stunned silence as he stumbles to the living room. “Do you have a spare toothbrush I could use?” he asks Chan. 

Chan responds quietly with, “Yeah, under the sink.” 

You beat Jeongin to it, offering him the packaged toothbrush. 

“Thanks, love,” he says. 

Questionable Jeongin who calls you pet names. You like it, though you’ll try your hardest not to admit it. That’d only feed into his questionable choices. 

Minty Jeongin has sobered up a little bit. Instead of kissing you immediately after rinsing his mouth, he stares. 

“What?” you prompt. 

“Nothing.” 

And then he leans in and kisses you. In all honesty, it’s exactly how you imagined kissing him. There’s no stereotypical sparks. It’s just Jeongin, whose lips happen to be on yours. That’s enough. Afterward, though, you acknowledge that Cloud 9 is beneath your feet. 

x.

Chan drives you and Jeongin back to your apartment after a difficult talk and one final puke. (The puker looks at you when he feels it coming and asks, “Can you hold my hair back?”)

As you’re helping Jeongin out of the car, Chan leans back in the driver seat and glares a strong eye at Jeonign, “Run away again and I will beat your ass.” 

Jeongin chuckles. “Right. Catch me first.” As he says this, he throws his arm over your shoulder for stability. Though, he’s sober enough to walk on his own now. The occasional stumble, sure, but he’s not in dire need of someone to guide him. 

You take it as his way of saying he plans on staying. 

However, when you make it into the apartment, you don’t bear right to the couch. 

Keeping him close will prevent him sneaking out and running away again. That’s a thing of the past, and you’ll make sure of it. 

He doesn’t even complain. 

“Don’t puke on me, please,” you whisper as you climb into bed. He follows shortly after. Arms naturally find your waist as he pulls you closer to him. 

He hums. “Wouldn’t dream of it.” 

Dreamless sleep takes over you, but the entire time you’re aware of his arms and his proximity. In a way, it’s better than dreaming. 

It’s even better when you wake up before him. His lips are a pretty shade of pink and for a moment you forget about his eventful night. You press a light kiss to his cheek. 

His eyes don’t open, nor does he stir. He’s in that beautiful, drunken sleep. You try not to laugh at the thought of his hangover to come. God, he’s going to be so whiny. 

You try to slip out of his arms, but the death grip only becomes tighter. He whines a little, mutters something like, “Don’t go.” 

After a few more minutes of just staring at the sleeping boy, boredom takes over. Yeah, staring is nice and all, whatever, but it reaches a certain intolerable point. Ten minutes is that point. 

You nudge him, “Jeongin, let go. I need to go to the bathroom.” 

“No,” he mutters, burying his face deeper into the pillow. 

“Jeongin.” 

“What?” 

“Let go.” 

His eyes finally open. They hold a small sense of surprise, which prompts you to tease, “What? Do you need a breakdown of what happened? Were you seriously that out of it?” 

“No. Well, a little,” he stumbles over the words. 

“What do you remember?” 

“Puking,” he winces as he laughs. There’s that signature headache. 

“You don’t remember kissing me?” 

Wide eyes stare back at you. His lip shakes as he tries to force words out. “What?” 

You laugh quietly. “Yeah. You did that.” 

“I’m sorry,” he sits up. His vacant arms feel cold. 

“No it’s okay. You only kissed me because I told you I loved you,” you sit up to match him. 

His head turns to look at you. Tufts of hair stick up in an oddly symmetrical way. “Really? Since when?” 

You nod. “Yeah. Time frame is unknown, but I think the feeling might have always been there. So you wasted a month of your life hiding.” 

He tips his head, “Hey now, I had a valid reason.” 

Your eyes squint at him. “It could have been avoided if you answered my texts. Or Hyunjin’s. Or if you checked your voicemail. Or-”

“Okay, I get it,” he nods, leaning in to shut you up. He presses a quick kiss to your lips. “I’m sorry.” He doesn’t say how weird it feels to kiss his best friend—but he’s incredibly excited to get used to it. 

“It’s fine. I think. My grades kind of tanked,” you comment, glancing at your desk. The tower of water bottles still stands. Somewhere buried beneath them are your abandoned papers. 

“Because of me?” his voice is soft, as are his eyes as he fights back the sting of tears. Of all his intentions, this wasn’t one of them. 

This look pains you. “Kinda. I thought I had lost my comfort place.” 

In order to disguise his tears, he pulls you into a tight hug. “I’m so sorry. I’ll be good to you. We can make latte art together at the shop and stargaze at stupid hours. Whatever you want.” 

You laugh into his shoulder. “Is that a promise?” 

He sniffles. “Yes. I love you. That’s the second promise.” 

xi.

Hyunjin’s reaction is lackluster. A forced gasp as he waves his hands in surprise. “Wow. I totally didn’t give Chan your number or anything,” he says. 

“Are you serious?” 

“Yeah. He called me trying to drop him,” he points at Jeongin, “on me.”

“And you didn’t want to get out of bed?” Jeongin asks, bringing his mug of freshly brewed coffee to his lips. 

“No,” Hyunjin sticks a finger up in defense. “Kkami wouldn’t let me move.” 

What he means is: Yes, I didn’t want to get up but allow me to use my dog as a ploy. 

You and Jeongin share a glance to confirm this thought. You burst out laughing. 

“Do not tell me you’ve developed a couple's telepathy already,” Hyunjin whines, throwing his head back as he begins to pace the kitchen. 

Jeongin begs your stare again. He wiggles his eyebrows to pseudo-communicate. 

“I’m going to retail therapy,” Hyunjin sighs, dragging his keys off the counter before starting for the door. 

A loud fit of laughter fills the air as the door shakes in its frame. 

“He’s so overdramatic,” Jeongin manages, wiping a stray tear away from his eye. 

You allow this time to watch him intently. All of his details flood over you with definitive clarity. His skin has gotten its first film of tan now that spring is in full swing. A change of season which you had missed out on together. It’s okay, he’ll take you to see the cherry blossoms next year. 

“Oh, I found your earring, by the way,” you say when he catches you staring. 

“Really? Where was it?” On instinct, he brings his hand up to his right ear. The lobes are not blinged, but it’s still worth checking. 

“Behind the couch.” 

He gapes at you. “How’d it get back there?” 

“How would I know?��� 

You allow a silence to lay upon you as his face twists to think. All at once, it lights up again, “Ah. It was probably when we had that wrestling match. I didn’t have the back on because my ear was itchy or something.” 

Interesting Jeongin. Questionable Jeongin. 

Yang Jeongin is many things. Home. Comfort. Love. Above all else, he’s a friend. Who you happen to kiss from time to time. 

[emiliaheartfeel]

Supergirl

Chapter 2: Forgotten (partly written)

AN: Nothing coordinates to Haikyuu actual timeline they would be older. And everything about Y/N gymnast career is made up, I don’t know too much about gymnastics.

You have just arrived back in your hometown after three months away in Tokyo. Gymnastics demanded you leave Hyogo to train at the best facility especially after the 2012 Olympic where you won three gold metals and you have to defend your title as the world best right now. You spent most of your time in gym, more the 8 hours a day, to perfect your routines. It meant you don’t have much of a social life outside of those that went to the gym and the few people you still talked to in Hyogo. You have been lonely, but that’s just how life is sometimes. Slowly you look around for some blonde hair and can’t find any. Waiting a few more awhile more you finally decide to text Atsumu.

You progressively get more and more nervous and angry as the time ticks by. Eventually you give up and start walking to the twin’s school seeing as it was closer to the trainer station then your home. Each step you take fuels your anger. Honestly you understand that Atsumu was just as passionate about volleyball as you were gymnastics, but you never have forgotten about any of your friends due to that passion. You see the gym come in to view and hasten your pace. At that moment you decide to be slightly cruel as you watch the boys practice from the door. You take out your phone once more and call Atsumu seeing him sit at the sidelines to let the backup setter practice with the starting lineup some. Watching as he grabs his phone, rolls his eyes and answer with a huff.

“This better be good”

“You’ve forgotten something”

“No I don’t believe so”

“Oh really”

“Ye I’m sure.”

“Think really hard Atsumu”

“Ugh, even if I did it probably isn’t important enough for you to call me in the middle of practice Y/N”

Both Osamu and Aran glance over at Atsumu with sympathy in their eyes. They both had tried to tell him earlier that he had to go get you but he had already locked into practice by then.

“Turn around jerk”

And so Atsumu does realization and horror appear on his previously annoyed face as his eyes catch yours. You hang up and walk to sit down on the other side of the court no longer looking at him. Your face remained neutral even though you were seething on the inside. Aran, Osamu and Kita all gave you some form of hesitant acknowledgment knowing how angry you must of been. Practice comes to a close after awhile and you head straight to Osamu. Forcing a smile you greet your long time friend while ignoring his twin.

“You mad”

“Extremely”

“Mad enough to forget ya mad at me”

“No not really. But nothing piss Atsumu off more then someone picking his twin over him”

You still smiling as you talk to the calmer twin. Osamu could see the slight edge to the grin that promised retribution and he really didn’t want to be on the other end of it. To try in get back in your good grace he would play along to whatever stunt you were about to pull. He, however, is not prepared for you to throw your arms around his neck pulling your self much too close for anyone who isn’t lovers and plant a kiss right next to his lips.

“Samu I missed you so much!”

Osamu watches his twin study them predatorily from a far as you continue to press yourself closer to him not that he minded that part. He minded that his team that had yet to meet you were now watching the scene unfold before them. Out of the corner of his eye, Osamu sees Suna whip out his phone as Atsumu marches over to them. You planning on Atsumu engaging you guys only smile to Osamu as his twin yanks you away from him.

“No, hi Tsum?”

“Hi Tsum”

The amount of venom dripping from those two words even made Kita flinch back. Atsumu only pouted more as you looked back at him unimpressed before turning back to Osamu with a (fake) lovesick smile. Osamu basically groan in his head plays along and brings you back to him. You quickly deciding to escalate this hop up and wrap your legs around his waist. He barely stumbles as he holds you tightly smugly looking at the blonde.

“You’re my favorite Samu. Always so nice, so happy we finally got together”

It’s almost like you stabbed both the twins with that. Whom your oblivious ass was unaware have been pinning after you since middle school. Neither made a rule because if either of them did it would ruin your friendship with both of them. So they locked up their feelings and just supported you and coped in their own ways. You turn just enough to watch Atsumu’s face turn red and him lunge. Being quick,agile and flexible you easily escape before you fall down with the twins. As Atsumu as about to start ripping into Osamu for asking you out Aran, knowing where all of this was going, covers your ears. You think it’s because Atsumu is screaming obscenities, but just before Atsumu can start talking Osamu gives him a hard wack.

“Dude shut up, n/n, is obviously fucking with you”

“Aw I was hoping to kill two birds with one stone”

Sometimes you were extremely bitter, and usually the twins are here for it, but not when it is directed at them. You send them both one last glare before helping them both up. Quickly you give Atsumu a short hug that he doesn’t even have time to reciprocate. Aran walks over and gives you a sympathetic pat on the head before he too got a hug.

“Who is this”

Suna asks putting his phone away raising an eyebrow. He gives you a quick glance over before looking at his teammates expectingly.

“Y/N Y/L/N, the twins childhood friend”

Aran explains gently and quietly. You now over your anger, mostly, give the newcomer a bright smile. The middle blocker furs his eyebrows.

“Why does that sound familiar”

“You see, Y/N here is an Olympic athlete who won three gold medals in 2012,”

Kita claims as he places a hand on your head shooting you a gentle smile that you easily return. Suna has the decency to look at you impressed and with a nod of acknowledgment he drops that. You, however, are now intrigued by the tall man and step towards him.

“And you are?”

“Suna Rintaro”

“Oh, you’re Suna”

“And?”

“Nothing, the twins talk about you sometimes”

“Weird, they never talk about you”

“We do too!”

“Don’t listen to him, Supergirl, we brag about our badass best friend all the time, or at least I do”

Cue Osamu hitting Atsumu upside the head. You laugh it off. Before Kita calls for the boys to change and leave. As everyone disappears into the bathroom Kita walks over to you with a bag.

“I assumed it was suppose to be a surprise to the twins”

You look into the bag to find his jersey and give him a gracious smile. Kita could always tell what was going on even though he hadn’t known you long. He knew it was more then Atsumu’s fan girls or Osamu’s teasing though Osamu’s teasing had something to do with it. He then too goes to change you put that bag in the duffle bag you had brought, so the twins wouldn’t know. Soon they show up no longer sweaty and in fresh clothes. Atsumu slings a arm around your should with such casualty that one might believe it had been done for years (it has been), but you not having any of it give him a tiny pinch. He quickly takes his arm back with a Yelp then glares at you. You merely tilt your head basically begging for him to retaliate so you could put him back in his place. He knows this so he says and does nothing. Osamu having had just watched this whole interaction takes your duffle bag from you.

“You coming over for dinner?”

“Nah really just want to go home and sleep”

You honestly didn’t mean it in a petty way to avoid them. You were tired from the traveling and it was late. Only when you see his face droop do you realize that’s how he took it.

“But maybe come over tomorrow and we could fix Saturday breakfast together”

You offer him a truce which he gladly takes. Neither of the twins like you being mad at them, but sometimes they forget you have feelings. You’re Supergirl to them, indestructible. They walk you to your apartment building and wave at you good night before they leave for their own home. Osamu lays in his bed thinking about the day events. He’s about to go to sleep when his phone goes off.

Masterlist

(A/N: I am sorry that your dialog is pink. I hate when people associate women with pink but it just how it worked out. Also sorry it this doesn’t make sense I wrote it on little sleep. ☺️)

@kaleidoscopekai

[kaissauce]

Undertale characters are already so cool and funky and although aus are cool and all it loses it's spark when people only focus on sans (he's a cool character i get it but so is literally all the other main characters). here's a bunch of stuff i wrote down about them characters because idk there's so much that can be explored with the base game instead of jumping to aus

sans: a character who very clearly just wants to vibe and no way shape or form wants to be in the spotlight or the main character. casually threatens the player to show that he's more than meets the eye but also does not want to fight but is capable of doing so. has weird powers and apparently pranking people across time and space is the norm for him (according to papyrus). absolute troll. likes astronomy and science stuff. his right eye glows light blue and yellow for a few frames in very specific moments during the fight (the beginning, when he slams you into the walls during the last attack but eventually it stops glowing even when he's still slamming the soul around, and when he teleports you to the middle when you try to go to the fight button when he's still awake.) has a key to a lab with a machine which could also belong to papyrus ( twitter post suggests two people tried to fix that machine the two people could either be sans and papyrus or sans and alphys) what's the machine for? most popular headcanon is time machine presumably connected to gaster

Papyrus: an enigma, literally nothing about his past is revealed. Has weird powers that he uses so casually. barely fazed by dying and continues to believe the human. he does not kill the human and will always end the battle once the human gets to 1 hp, flat out gives the choice for the human to skip the fight after a few tries. barely sleeps, has nightmares. hates hotland, indifferent to echo flowers, online friends with alphys, knows things that did not happen yet (mettaton having eyes, the phone turning into a jetpack). why does he never take off his gloves this detail is forgotten by so many people. CHECK in the genocide route his description is "Forgettable" that could mean multiple things and none of them are good. his stats change in other routes unlike other people who have stat changes that happen because of specific scenarios: undyne's stats are different during the hangout fight, asgore's stats lower after smelling toriel's pie. Has connections to the River person, Flowey, and the Annoying Dog (pretty peculiar people). Keeps secrets, like he's MUCH better at keeping secrets then Sans. also a troll but isn't as big of a troll as sans. appears to be naive and is much more mysterious than sans and also more subtle at being mysterious. presumably also can use gaster blasters

Asgore: the king of the underground with a tragic life and carries the hopes of his subjects and the guilt from all the people he's hurt. Shows signs of knowing about resets (talking after being killed the player tells him that he's killed them and he nods sadly in response). wait that'd be really sad if he could remember previous timelines because then he'd know that he dies in every outcome except for true pacifist. most definitely did not want to kill those children but had to for monsterkind, he probably wasn't even the one to kill most of the fallen children because their stuff is in places where they presumably died. Took a long time to get a new royal scentist after Gaster was lost to his creation. Tries to get back on good terms with Toriel. he's old as friiickkk. he's horrible at naming things i find that really funny that he mashed his name and toriel's name to get asriel. first person besides alphys to meet flowey, dude i will die with the headcanon that asgore named flowey. HIS TRIDENT CAN BREAK THE MERCY BUTTON MAYBE EVEN THE OTHER BUTTONS

Undyne: The captain of the royal guard. She's missing an eye with no canon explanation. She was trained by the king of the underground and looks up to Gerson aka "The Hammer of Justice". Met Alphys at the dump and watches anime with her. Intimidating at first but she can be a really goofy person or very threatening. Tried to get Papyrus into cooking instead of wanting to join the royal guard because she knows he's against killing and he'll probably die when facing a human even though she knows he's tough. Plays piano. cheats death, basically does the impossible it's no big deal

Alphys: The Royal scientist after Gaster. Created a body for Mettaton, lied and claimed she made a robot with a soul (which alphys never revealed to anyone, the player only finds this out by getting the mystery key and the lab entries in the true lab). Experimented with DT and human souls. Knows that souls can't be artificially created. Knows about alternate realities and probably also studied timeline shenanigans (maybe sans and alphys studied that stuff together, maybe even more than just timeline shenanigans since sans is hinted to bring dog food for the amalgamates). Created Flowey. LITERALLY MANIPULATES THE GAME CODE TO TROLL THE PLAYER

Mettaton: ok how often did he forget that he's supposed to be playing as a robot with an artificial soul. like come on he had to slip up at least once. does he continue with that facade on the surface???? like i thought alphys wanted to be honest and she just never said mettaton is just a ghost?? also need me more ghost family interactions that's always fun. ALSO HIS ENDING COME ONNN THERE'S SO MUCH POTENTIAL THERE WHY ISN'T THERE MORE FICS ON IT IN FACT THERE SHOULD BE MORE FICS ON THE NEUTRAL ENDINGS IN GENERAL like i've already read some fanfics that touch on his ending and they're SO COOL but also mEssed and sad

ok im getting sleepy and this post is getting long so this next one's gonna be short

Gaster: probably actually broke people's ps4s when they typed in his name because the code to simulate a crash on a computer actually crashes the game on the console and causes a fatal error. dude gaster what the heck