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kyleknight · 4 months

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How to Make Friends: A Guide By Joe Hills with A Variable Success Rate

This is heavily inspired by Maple's Red vs Blue/Hermitcraft AU, which has utterly captivated me. If you're unfamiliar with Red vs Blue, it's a space opera series loosely set in the world of Halo, about a collection of dumb idiot troopers who get into hijinks and shenanigans. Maple's AU sort of follows RvB canon, but it also sort of doesn't. So I'm playing loose with it and just writing whatever's funny.

wordcount: 4563 warnings: violence, character death, discussions of war brief summary: Joe Hills arrives at Blue base, meets his teammates Bdubs and Scar, and befriends a tank. And perhaps a small incident happens. ao3 link

* . °•★|•°∵ ∵°•|☆•° . *

There’s no way to properly begin a story that involves many, many people with many, many different life experiences. Initiating events can only really be fully understood and realized in hindsight, with the subsequent actions and consequences to give the proper context required. And even then, background information is required. Who are these people, what are the circumstances they come from? Why is there a war, and why does it have to involve so many people who just want to live their lives in peace?

But Joe thinks that his slight mishap on the first week at this outpost is perhaps a good place to start.

He doesn’t have a whole lot of company on the cramped ship that flies him at a faster-than-light speed across the universe out to the base. The ship itself is on routine autopilot, giving the impression that the mysterious and distant “Command” can’t be bothered to spend the human resources to assign the ship a pilot. But they sure can waste a whole lot of resources on energy and fuel shipping one person all the way out to a little planet that Joe has never even heard of.

The planet itself is simply identified by a string of letters and numbers, which seems like a shame. It’s probably a perfectly nice place— shame it’s the setting for at least a part of this war. (Not that it seems like any planet in this part of the universe is untouched by the war.)

Joe tries to get a good look at the planet as the ship approaches, but the most he can see is a rather large expanse of what could be badlands and perhaps prairie or savannah. Not a whole lot of green. It’s hard to tell from space, and the window shutters close as they get closer to the planet.

Once the ship lands, the doors open, and Joe is finally able to leave, he’s greeted by a pair of people in blue-colored armor, similar to Joe’s. The shorter of the two is a light cobalt while the taller is something between teal and aquamarine. Only the aqua one has his helmet off, and he smiles sunnily at Joe. He has a friendly looking face, but Joe thinks he should take some time to make any conclusions about his character.

“Well, hello there,” the aqua guy says. “You’re the new recruit?”

“I suppose so,” Joe says. He would call his attendance the result of involuntary conscription, but that’s not necessarily something he needs to burden his new acquaintances with. “It’s nice to meet you. My name is Joe Hills. I’m from Nashville, Tennessee.”

“What— you’re all the way from Earth?” the cobalt guy says. “No way. I thought it wasn’t suitable for life anymore.”

“Well, to my knowledge, I was still alive when I left, but I can’t say anything about what may have transpired for the other inhabitants afterwards,” Joe says.

“That’s amazing,” the aqua guy says. “You can call me Scar, by the way. That’s Bdubs. Welcome to Blue base!”

“Blue base,” Joe repeats, a little quietly. That offers a surface-level explanation for the ocean-blue armor he was given after a sparse three weeks of “training” during which he actively did his best to underperform at everything in the hopes of being discharged. No good, since at the end of the three weeks, he was handed this armor and promptly shoved into a waiting ship with only a clipped explanation that he was being deployed to a place called “Blood Gulch.”

Jokingly, Joe says, “Is there a Red base too?”

“Yeah, the Reds are at the other end of the canyon,” Scar says, nodding his head to his right. His voice drops to a whisper. “They’re kind of silly, but don’t get too close to them, cause they’re seriously trigger-happy.” His voice lifts again. “But that shouldn’t matter, because Command said they were sending us a tank! And I can see it right there!”

Without any more preamble, he dashes past Joe, past the crates of equipment and supplies that have already been unloaded by the gently whirring mechanical arms of the ship, and straight up to the main thing that had been taking up the majority of the space on the transport ship.

A tank.

Joe had kind of hoped that it wouldn’t be getting off at the same stop as him.

“Hey— Scar— you’re not getting in that thing first—” Bdubs shouts, chasing after Scar.

But as the two of them start scuffling to determine who will get to the tank first, there’s a mechanized activation sound from the tank.

Joe tilts his head. That’s odd. It never did that on the whole way here. Could it be solar-powered?

“Hello,” comes a surprisingly soft masculine British-sounding voice. “Thank you for activating the N808-V Main Battle Tank. You may call me Oli. Please standby as I run diagnostics.”

Oh, the tank has a name. And a voice. That’s kind of nice. Joe wishes it could have been active on the way here. It would have been pleasant to have someone else to talk to.

Bdubs groans. “Of course we can’t just use it right away. Hey, tank, can you skip the diagnostics and start working right away instead?”

“Rescheduling diagnostics,” Oli says.

“Hey, wait, diagrostics might be important,” Scar says. “Oli, you can keep doing your diabolics.”

“Restarting diagnostics,” Oli says.

“Stop that!” Bdubs snaps. “I want to drive that tank right NOW and blow something up!”

“Well, so do I, but it’d be safer to cab-ilirate it first,” Scar says. “Joe thinks so too, right?”

Joe pauses to consider his answer, and in that moment, Oli speaks up again.

“Initiating restart mode. Please standby. This may take a few minutes.”

Bdubs throws his hands in the air. “I swear, if you guys have ruined it already…”

“He’s a brand new tank, just give him some time,” Joe says, walking closer to the tank as the large war machine hums at a quieter volume. Joe recognizes that he is making a rather presumptuous assumption here— he should ask Oli what his preferences are when he reboots himself. “We should probably just let him do his thing first.”

“In the meantime,” Scar says, turning his attention back to Joe. “We can show you around the base!”

“Sure,” Joe says. He glances at the walls of the canyon, stretching high on either side. The sedimentary layers are quite pretty, and he hopes he’ll get some time to check out the stratigraphy a little later. Just because he’s stuck out here for the foreseeable future doesn’t mean he has to dislike the actual landscape. While there might not be a lot of green life, there’s certainly got to be arid-adapted life instead. Could be interesting.

That is, if the skirmishes haven’t destroyed it or chased it all away.

The base isn’t terribly big. Scar shows him to a room that apparently used to belong to a man named Cub, who was their commanding officer until he died not too long ago. Not from fighting, Scar assures him, just an unfortunate accident. The space is nice and roomy, although it would be a lot more mentally soothing if it had a window. However, Joe can imagine there are a few reasons why that wouldn’t be recommended in this situation. The dust, for one.

There’s also a general common area, an armory, a kitchen, a large storage room, and a bathroom. Conspicuously, there is no dedicated place for medical treatment, nor are there any sort of recreational facilities. And, as Joe walks through the base, listening to Scar’s long-winded and elaborate explanations, there doesn’t seem to be anyone besides the three of them stationed here.

Joe is not sure whether to be glad or worried about that. The fact that the base only seems to be big enough for maybe a maximum of six people is certainly an indicator that… maybe this just isn’t a very important outpost.

Maybe Joe actually succeeded in his efforts to make himself a completely useless soldier, in a way.

After the tour, Scar and Joe work together to move some of the supplies into the base, starting with the food supplies, as Scar seems eager to see if they got “anything good.” Bdubs is noticeably absent from the kitchen stocking, as well as lunch, and Scar tells him it’s not a big deal. The three of them gather again after lunch to move the rest of the supplies into the base, which takes a few hours.

The sun is starting to sink below the horizon as the three of them approach Oli once again. The tank has restarted himself by now, if the lights are any indicator.

“Hey, Oli?” Joe says. “How’s it going?”

“Diagnostics check at thirty one percent,” Oli reports. “Estimated time of completion: six hours, twenty minutes.”

“Oh, yeah, SURE,” Bdubs gripes. “So we won’t even be able to use it until tomorrow.”

Joe glances back in the direction that Scar had pointed in earlier. “Do you think it’s alright to leave him out here all night?”

Scar shrugs. “He’s a tank, I’m sure he can protect himself.”

“I am equipped with 700 millimeter steel-alloy armor, as well as an AI-directed recognition system,” Oli reports. “As for offensive capabilities, I have a 50 millimeter wide plasma turret. I can also run people over with my big heavy treads.”

Bdubs seems startled. Scar leans forwards, clearly delighted.

Joe meanwhile, is intrigued. “You’re an AI?” he asks. “They put AIs in tanks?”

“While I do not possess the capabilities of a smart AI, I am certainly capable of keeping myself in working order,” Oli says. “Starting by making sure my systems are fully functional, so if you’ll excuse me, I still have another seven hours of diagnostics to run.”

“I thought you said it was six hours,” Bdubs says.

“I think I’ll take my time, actually,” Oli says, actually sounding huffy about it. “Don’t you have something better to do than bother me?”

Oh, he has a personality. Joe likes him. He’s pretty sure he likes Scar and Bdubs too, but he really likes Oli.

They unanimously decide to leave Oli for the evening. Once again, Bdubs doesn’t join Scar and Joe for dinner, but he joins them in the common area as they’re winding down and getting ready for bed. There isn’t much in the way of leisure opportunities, but there are some books, board games, a deck of playing cards, a few thousand-piece puzzles, and a pile of sketchbooks that both Bdubs and Scar spend a considerable amount of time drawing in as the evening progresses.

Joe has guessed by now that whatever threat the “Reds” pose, it’s certainly not enough that they need someone standing guard all night. That’s just fine by Joe. He takes the deck of cards and plays solitaire while occasionally looking at the very nice drawing that Bdubs is making in his book.

The next morning, Joe heads over to Oli first thing, even before breakfast. His internal clock isn’t aligned with this planet’s day cycle yet, so the sun isn’t even up when he steps outside. But he can’t sleep any longer, and he’d like to take a bit of a morning walk and hopefully strike up a conversation with Oli.

The tank is still humming that steady sound.

“Good morning, Oli! Hey, I don’t want to assume anything about you or your identity,” Joe starts off. “We’re both new here, and I want to make sure you feel that your boundaries are properly respected.”

“Well, that’s very kind of you,” Oli says. “I am just a tank though, so I’m not sure how you could be misidentifying that. I’ve never been anything else, to my knowledge.”

“Would you want to be something else?” Joe asks.

“Hm,” Oli says. “That’s something to think about. I’m quite fine as a tank, I think, but I suppose I wouldn’t turn down the opportunity to become, say, a helicarrier or something else that could fly.”

“I can see the appeal in that,” Joe says. “Flying does give you certain extra freedoms.”

“What about you?” Oli says. “Would you want to be something else? A tank perhaps?”

“Since I asked the question to you, I guess it would be rude of me not to have an answer,” Joe says. “Let me think… There are a lot of things it would be interesting to be. I don’t think I would limit myself to just living things either. I’d like to be something that wouldn’t be caught up in a space war. Or something that could stop it.”

“Oh, now that’s a heavy topic,” Oli says.

“Is it weird hearing that, as a tank?” Joe asks.

“Hm. I don’t know. Just because I was made for war doesn’t mean I’ve participated in it yet,” Oli says. “My fundamental processes are all designed for combat and typically being an unstoppable force of violence. But you’ve put me in a quandary here.”

“Sorry about that.”

“No need to apologize. It’s all about considering your identity, as you said,” Oli says cheerfully. “I do think I’d at least like to try out my components while I continue to think that over. Not against anyone, of course.”

“How would you try them out?” Joe asks. He looks around again at their surroundings, barely lit in the pre-dawn. The canyon isn’t small, but he doesn’t think there’s a whole lot of space that could be used for whatever tests Oli might want to run next.

“Well, I suppose I could just run the tutorial program,” Oli says. “That probably won’t hurt, and it’ll give us a more practical idea of how it feels to be a battle tank.”

“Mind if I join you for that?” Joe says. “Like I said, we’re both new, so this could give us both an opportunity to get to know each other a little better. I could tell you a little about where I’m from after you’re done with the tutorial.”

“That sounds lovely,” Oli says. “Of course you can join me! Just climb into the seat right there and I’ll activate the program.”

It starts out very nice, all things considered. Unfortunately, it’s already very warm, even this early in the day, and the radiant heat from Oli’s mechanisms only adds to the temperature. Joe finds himself regretting putting on his full armor, but he still hasn’t seen those “Reds” yet, and he doesn’t want to take any chances just in case there are potentially dangerous arid-adapted animals lurking around in the dusty canyon.

The tutorial program starts out with driving. The number of pedals and buttons is alarming, but Oli assures him that Joe will get the hang of it eventually. So he tries to follow the prompts. Forwards, backwards, turn right, turn left, rotate in place. It’s a lot more complicated than driving a car, and obviously has the potential for creating a lot more hazards.

It’s at this point that things start to go a little wrong.

Oli insists that Joe continue to drive straight, shifting to different speed settings. They’re driving deeper into the canyon, further in the direction that Scar had said the “Reds” are based. And in the distance, Joe catches sight of another structure— nearly identical to the Blue base. He doesn’t get much of a chance to examine it, because then Oli gets stuck on a large boulder and it takes Joe a while to get him unstuck.

“Now that you’ve mastered driving, we can move on to some of the safety features,” Oli says brightly.

“I wouldn’t say I’ve mastered driving a tank yet,” Joe says. “You’re an AI, though, wouldn’t you be able to drive yourself?”

“Oh, sure I can,” Oli says. “But this is standard for training uncertified recruits. Actually— were you certified in tank operations?”

“I don’t think I gave them the opportunity to certify me in anything,” Joe confesses. “I was trying to get them to kick me out, and it didn’t really work.”

“Sorry to hear that,” Oli says. “Now, the first safety feature you’ll be learning is the anti-locking brakes.”

“That’s sensible enough,” Joe says.

The sun is starting to come up, which paints the canyon in a rather beautiful light. Oranges, yellows, and stunning shades of rich sandy tan come alight as the day begins. Joe does take notice of quite a few shrubs and stocky trees, doggedly surviving even in these conditions. Oli takes care to avoid hitting any of them, which is nice as well.

He thinks he might see some movement down at what he’s assuming is the Red base, but every time he tries to look, Oli turns in a different direction.

“The driver visibility isn’t the best, I’ve come to notice,” Joe says as Oli finishes his explanation of the child-safety-locking rear passenger door.

“Well, I can’t do much about that,” Oli says.

“Can you see what’s going on?” Joe says. “I thought I saw something going on at the other end of the canyon. Not the place where we came from.”

“Oh, well I’ve seen a guy in orange armor and a guy in maroon armor driving an armored jeep towards us,” Oli says. “But I think I shook them off when we drove around that big rock formation a few minutes ago.”

Joe twists around in the seat, but he can barely see anything besides what’s directly in front of him. “Do you think those are the Reds?”

“Could be,” Oli says. “Do you want to engage in battle?”

“No, there’s no reason for that,” Joe says quickly. “It’s only my first full day here, I don’t want to hurt anybody.”

“Oh,” Oli sounds disappointed. “Weapons were next on the tutorial program, but if you want, we can skip it. I can respect that, for you, my friend.”

“Thank you,” Joe says.

And it’s at this point that things start to go a little more badly. As Oli delves into an explanation about the more interesting parts of his mechanical engineering design, Joe hears something he’d rather hoped he wouldn’t hear so soon. Gunfire. Automatic gunfire. It’s nearby, but after a moment he determines that the shooting probably isn’t directed towards him and Oli.

“What’s that coming from?” Oli says.

“You’d probably know better than me,” Joe says. “I can’t see anything.”

“Could be from those guys we saw earlier,” Oli says. “Think they’re doing target practice?”

The sound hasn’t ceased at all. “Well, anything could be possible,” Joe says, even though he’s not feeling especially positive about it.

“Should we go to see what’s going on?” Oli says.

“If you want to,” Joe says. If it looks dangerous or scary, he will certainly suggest that they reschedule the tutorial for another day, but Oli sounds like he wants to check it out. Joe supposes that he can’t fault a tank for wanting to at least check out what might be a battle. It would be his intended ideal form of stimulation.

But Joe will do his very best to abstain from participating. Maybe he can attempt to talk things out.

They soon catch sight of a bulky armored jeep parked somewhere in the middle of the canyon. A person in orange armor is in the driver’s seat, while a person in maroon armor is standing on the back, directing a large automatic cannon to shoot endlessly at an already-battered rock formation sticking out of the ground. As Joe and Oli get a little closer, Joe gasps when he sees two blue-armored people standing huddled behind the rocks.

“That’s Scar and Bdubs!” he says. “When did they get out here?”

“Looks like a battle,” Oli says. He sounds a little too eager. “Shall I eliminate the threat?”

Joe winces. “I don’t think we’d need to perpetuate the violence,” he says. Scar and Bdubs are both visibly standing, so they should still be alright. Probably. “Maybe we can just fire a few times to scare them off. You’re a tank, after all, and they only have a jeep.”

“I’ll light up the array that has all of my weapons capabilities,” Oli says.

Joe looks down at the rows of illuminated buttons. “Which one is the least lethal?”

“I’d reckon all of them are pretty lethal,” Oli admits. “It’s what I was made for, after all. You can always aim just to the side of their jeep so you don’t hurt them. Or if you’re feeling good about your aim, you can take out their cannon.”

“How do you aim?” Joe says, keeping his hands very far away from the buttons for now, even though Oli is continuing on with his advance.

“That’s in the tutorial!” Oli says cheerfully.

“But we didn’t finish the tutorial!” Joe says.

The people in the jeep have definitely noticed them now. They’ve stopped shooting at the rock and seem to be arguing with each other. The maroon one has abandoned the cannon for the time being.

“They’ve stopped,” Oli says, sounding disappointed. “Can I still shoot at them, Joe?”

“I can’t actually stop you from doing things,” Joe says. “You’re an AI and you have a certain level of autonomy despite being an unwilling participant in a war.”

“Well, sure you can stop me, there’s a manual override,” Oli says.

“What? Where is that?”

“That’s the last segment of the tutorial.”

“That’s not exactly helpful,” Joe says. He examines the buttons and levers in front of him, very aware that he’s running out of time. Oli had mentioned an energy shield earlier, but Joe didn’t really pay attention to how strong or durable it is, and he doesn’t want to test it out like this.

There is a rather prominent joystick, so Joe experimentally moves that. Oli’s big turret moves.

“Okay, that’s a start,” Joe says. He squints through the curved metal bars covering the hatch. “Huh. I can’t really tell what I’m pointing at. Oli, I’m not about to hit anyone, am I?”

“Only one way to find out,” Oli says.

Perhaps. But Joe figures that if he pushes the joystick all the way to one direction, he’s more likely to hit one of the canyon walls than he is to hit a person. He does that, giving it a few seconds to be more sure that Oli’s turret is far pointed away from actual people.

“Okay,” Joe says, looking at the buttons once more. “Now… if I was designing a tank, where would I put the button for the least damaging attack? Oli, you don’t have any idea which one of these will fire the weakest beam?”

“Well, no. I could activate the tutorial mode again,” Oli offers.

“We don’t have time for that,” Joe says. The maroon guy has jumped back up onto the back of the jeep and is now pointing the turret at them. They really don’t have time for this. Joe pushes the first button.

“Firing main cannon,” Oli reports happily. The tank shudders with almighty force as an intense beam of energy blasts out of the turret. It hits the canyon wall, making an instant crater and causing chunks of rock to fall noisily onto the ground.

The orange and maroon people are definitely spooked, but they haven’t run away yet. Joe carefully makes a small adjustment to the joystick and fires again.

Another crater, slightly closer to the people but still a safe distance away. Better, but the orange and maroon guys still haven’t left. Meanwhile, Joe notices that Bdubs has left the cover of the rock and is waving at him. He hopes he’s going to be careful.

Another adjustment, but Joe unintentionally makes a small mistake. He doesn’t think he can really be blamed for it. This is a high stress situation and he’s very ill-equipped to be operating this kind of machinery, even with Oli’s questionable help.

Either he presses a different button by mistake, or there’s some kind of trigger activated after pressing that particular button three times. Joe has no way of knowing for sure.

“Initiating auto-fire mode,” Oli says. “Acquiring targets.”

“Oli, no!” Joe says. “We don’t want to hurt anyone!” He looks at the buttons, thinking desperately about which button or switch might be able to turn it off.

The one relief is that the orange and maroon guys have jumped out of the jeep and are running back towards what Joe guessed earlier is the Red base. When Oli auto-locks onto the jeep and fires several shots in succession to blow it to smithereens, there’s luckily nobody there.

But then, Oli says, “Acquiring new target.”

His turret adjusts. And in the span of a few seconds, Joe watches as, one moment, Bdubs is standing beside the rock, waving at him. And then in the next moment, there’s a small crater and a smoking pile of cobalt armor.

“Oh no,” Joe says.

“Oops,” Oli says. “Deactivating auto-fire mode.”

Good thing too, because Scar emerges from behind the rock and crouches down next to Bdubs. Joe opens the grated hatch of the tank and climbs out shakily.

“Scar,” he calls out as he drops to the ground and runs towards his teammates. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean it!”

Scar pulls off his helmet as Joe approaches. He doesn’t look angry, though, he just looks shocked.

“Is he still alive?” Joe asks, panting with exertion as soon as he’s close enough.

“Huh?” Scar says. “Oh, no, he’s definitely dead. He just said he hated all of us and died right away. Hey, do you think that’s a curse?”

“I don’t know… maybe?” Joe says. He kneels down next to Bdubs and examines the smoking debris. There’s no blood, which seems a bit odd, but maybe it got vaporized in the blast. “Gosh. I’m sorry, I don’t know any first aid. Um. Not that I think it would help at this point.”

“Well, that’s alright,” Scar says. He leans back with a sigh. “Do you know how to do last rites and all that? Bdubs was the one who handled that when Cub died a few weeks ago.”

“Uh, I’ve never done it before, but I guess I could give it a try,” Joe says. He wonders idly if they’re still in shock and that’s why there hasn’t really been an outburst of emotion over this. He just killed Bdubs, and Scar doesn’t seem to be badly affected by this.

“By the way,” Scar says. “Why didn’t you say you knew how to drive a tank?”

“I don’t,” Joe says. “Oli was teaching me.”

“Oh,” Scar says. “Huh. When we didn’t find you this morning, we went out to look. Ran into Joel and Jimmy— those two Reds— and they started trying to kill us, cause that’s usually what they do.” He laughs.

“I’m sorry I got Bdubs killed,” Joe says, looking back at the corpse of the man he only knew for half a day.

Scar shrugs. “It happens. No point in holding it against you. We can request a two week period of mourning, though, and Command might send us some condolence gifts. Last time we got fresh fruit and the milkshake machine.”

Joe gives Scar a questioning look. “You don’t seem too upset by this,” he says.

Scar just smiles. “Oh, you’ll see soon enough.”

#maple's rvb/hc au #mani playing with words

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gogogoats · 1 year

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Pirate!Gunther AU

As promised for Aura on the JatD discord.

The sloppy summary of my pirate!Gunther AU that I would like to write someday but probably never will.

TW: slavery

Gunther is tasked with escorting one of his father’s ships on a long (6+ month) voyage. Theodore/the King agree to it because it will be a character-building experience for Gunther and the kingdom owes Magnus lots of money soo. Gunther isn’t really keen but he knows he has no choice and no one cares so he just has to suck it up. All he knows is that they are picking up a highly valuable cargo and he must guard it until it is delivered, then the ship can return home. Jane and the others are just like ‘well it’s only six months/it’s an adventure!’ and aren’t reality worried.

So Gunther sets off, eventually gets his sea legs and stops feeling sick constantly and starts to enjoy the taste of freedom. This is a new ship with an entirely new crew, none of the familiar faces Gunther has come to know over the years, and they mostly leave him alone.

A few months after his departure, word arrives at Kippernium that the ship and all hands have been lost at sea. Jane wants to organise a search party but Magnus is strangely refusing to help, saying there’s nothing to be done, and the King doesn’t have the resources. She flies out to sea on Dragon to search a few times but with no information on what direction to go and her responsibilities doubled at the castle without Gunther she ultimately has to give up.

Many years pass and Jane, now a knight, is on night-time guard duty at the gate when a stranger approaches. She can tell from his walk that he’s a sea-farer, and he says his ship is in port and leaving early morning but he had hoped to see the castle and dragon he once heard about from a boy lost at sea.

Of course Jane thinks of Gunther and immediately starts questioning the stranger, who tells her that might have been the name of the boy he knew briefly, but he was taken by pirates and is long dead. The stranger asks about Gunther and his father, and Jane tells him that Magnus died of ill health several years ago. A new merchant family live in his house now, and with no heir left the kingdom took possession of his properties and was freed of their debts. They tried to continue his trading business, but his ships were often targeted by pirates and the fleet greatly reduced. The stranger is quiet. Jane wants to know more about what happened to Gunther but he is reticent and sticks to the shadows. Eventually he agrees to tell her a story if she doesn’t ask any more questions. Jane agrees.

The ship Gunther was on was enroute to pick up slaves, Magnus’ new money-making scheme. He wanted Gunther to act as guard because he was loyal to his father and Magnus didn’t want his new venture to be widely known. The slaves were loaded into the hold one night while Gunther slept, and the ship was back out to sea before he realised. He was upset and disgusted of course but the crew of the ship ignored him and wouldn’t turn around. Ultimately Gunther decided that if he was to guard the cargo then he would do just that, and protect them from the ship’s crew and make sure they were being fed enough. This didn’t make him popular with the crew and the slaves didn’t trust him, but he spent most of his time in the hold with them, trying to bridge the language barrier. He wasn’t allowed to let them out of their cages and the hold grew increasingly pungent, but he couldn’t go enjoy fresh air and freedom on deck while captive humans suffered below. Of course this all took a toll on his health, so when the ship was attacked by pirates one night there wasn’t much he could do about it.

The ship and the cargo were taken and the crew put to death. Gunther was knocked out and woke up chained in the scullery of the pirate ship. He was put to work as a kitchen hand/deck hand, and it was days before he began to piece together what was going on. Half of the pirate crew remained on board the merchant ship with the slaves who were now freed to move around the ship. The pirates were mostly freed slaves themselves, from all different countries, races and languages. While they were always looking for merchant vessels to plunder, they would take the time to free any slaves they found and offer them two choices, join the pirates or be left at the nearest safe harbour. The pirates always killed slaver crews, and Gunther was only left alive because some of the slaves spoke in his favour, and the pirates needed a new cabin boy. He wasn’t treated kindly by the pirates who had little sympathy for the son of a slave trader and his already failing health was made worse by hard labour.

The stranger told Jane he was a freed slave who met Gunther briefly on his journey to safe harbour, and Gunther told him stories about the distant kingdom with a gentle King and a dragon that was tamed by a girl with wild red hair. “They will be searching for me,” Gunther would tell the stranger. He died before the man left the ship, his body thrown to the sea, his existence erased.

The stranger prepares to leave, his story told, and Jane becomes upset, wanting to know his name.

“No questions,” he reminds her. “The boy you knew is gone. Tell your king to run dragon flags on his ships and they will be left alone.”

He leaves, and Jane must remain at the gate. She heads to the port as soon as her shift ends, but the ship is long gone.

Out at sea, the stranger has removed his cloak and hood, and gives orders as the captain of the ship. They take down the merchant flags and run up their pirate blacks. His first mate asks after his night ashore. “The merchant is dead,” says the captain. “His line is done. They will do no more harm.”

The captain is called all number of things by the people he robs and the people he helps. By his crew he is simply called ‘captain’. Once, in his distant past, he was called Gunther, but that name died with the boy who wore it, when another pirate captain learned he was educated in language, reading, numbers and combat and had been kind to slaves. He gave the ailing boy a chance, which grew into a different kind of apprenticeship than the one the boy had known. A new life, an atonement, call it what you will. His old identity was shed and he became ‘the boy’ who one day eventually became ‘captain’.

A vast shadow passes over the ship. A giant green dragon, and a fire-haired knight on its back. The captain looks up as his crew yell and clamour. His black hair waves like a banner in the wind and his grey eyes meet the dragon riders’ green ones. They share a moment before she touches the dragon’s neck and they turn, rising as they go, back towards the mountains of their home.

The captain watches them go.

#IDK why I always descend into melodrama with these things #jane and the dragon #jatd #au

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sasukesun · 10 months

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You know, I don't know which part is more annoying when it comes to ships, if those who defend the canon or those who defend the fanon and then allege queerbating or that they were robbed, the first one are annoying because they don't stop harassing those who enjoy the fanon but the latter tend to lock themselves in a bubble where they believe that it's really the author's fault and that he guides them along a path to repent not give them anything later, examples of this we have zutara, narusaku, etc (within the typical "we were stolen") and within queerbating there are examples but many times that word is so worn out because the fandom's own imagination believes that couples will happen that never even had a chance, some will say that sns is queerbating but for me not because I would never have been hope that the ship became canon and at most one could expect an open ending without ships (which wasn't possible because they still wanted to exploit the story with the new generation), this also happens in the fandom of bnha, black clover, Kimetsu no yaiba (here I don't know who is more desperate if the lgbt or the dudebros with their canon ships without real development), even jjk with itadori and fushiguro. It's like each party creates a version, they believe it's the absolute truth and then they complain when it doesn't turn out as they expect and they criticize the author.

i actually think narusasu is the opposite of queerbaiting. there’s a huge difference between giving meaningless hints to instigate the audience and develop a relationship while not being allowed to give it the real name to it due to homophobia. queerbaiting is a marketing resource, naruto and sasuke’s relationship isn’t used to sell the story… actually a lot of dudebros, which are the main audience of naruto, hate and complain about the gayness. the name itself indicates that it’s used as bait, as a hint… naruto and sasuke’s relationship is the most developed in the series, they don’t have mere moments that are used as shipping bait… you know which pairings have? ss/nh/nrsk, and they are all one sided still. that moment during war in which sasuke doesn’t let sakura fall is a shipping bait, especially when you consider that kishimoto already knew about boruto and yet made no effort to give important moments or develop ss (actually he made sasuke say he had no reasons to love sakura a few chapters later, which is negative development). naruto holding hinata’s hand is a shipping bait, kishimoto said neji died as a cupid, but it’s impressive how the moment is still not romantic from naruto’s side and naruto still ignores hinata until the end of the manga lol, it’s a shipping bait because kishimoto knew he had to pair naruto and hinata together for the sake of boruto. same about naruto telling minato that sakura was his girlfriend during war, but when he’s really talking about important things in their farewell, he changes the subject. can’t even say that sk has shipping baits because no one cares about that pairing lol i don’t even think sasuke saving her could count as shipping bait when it’s so clear that there isn’t anything emotional about it. but all those pairings consist of those moments that make the shippers go crazy, yet they have no meaningful interactions or development. i made this joke a while ago but i wouldn’t say that’s far from the truth lol.

again, those shippers that claim they were robbed just got too instigated by the shipping baits, but there isn’t really good development. would say zk has some development, since they were enemies in the beginning and all, but it’s really not like the shippers claim as well, that zuko truly understands katara and that it would be a better choice because [reads smudged writing] aang is an abuser and just like ozai… (what fr). idk about black clover and i know little about kny but i don’t think the others you’ve mentioned have queerbaiting either, they just have developed male friendships that shippers that have at least one mlm pairing for every media they interact with go crazy over it.

#ask #anonymous

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lafcadiosadventures · 2 years

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I (bravely) challenged myself and translated Pétrus Borel's Obelisk of Luxor manifesto.

disclaimer: this text is above my grasp of the social context Borel is critiquing, so I'm sure there are things that went over my head and therefore not accurately translated. (the parts I didn't get are marked so, reader beware) Also, although the core of the first part of the manifesto is anti imperial and anti colonialist, that doesn't mean Borel doesn't indulge in some orientalist tropes. There is also some classism thrown in into the mix. Nevertheless, I think it's definitely worth reading, for that first part, and as an angry plea to value the then neglected Gothic architecture, so here it goes:

french original text here

THE LUXOR OBELISK, 1836, Pétrus Borel.

Was it not enough to destroy or allow the destruction in Paris as in all of France, of the monuments bequeathed by our ancestors? Was it not enough to permit the demolition of Saint-Côme and Saint-Damien church and the chapel of the collége de Cluny? Was it not enough to permit the establishment of a bad place(*1) at Saint-Benoît, to have promised to the hammer the collége de Moutaigu, to have sighed after the demolition of the Vincennes Sainte-Chapelle, to have made little gardens (jardinets) and canals of the majestic composition of Le Nôtre, and have the Tuilleries patched up? Was it not then enough, having shamefully let loose Bagatelle, and to make of the château de Saint-Germain, in the name of reigning Liberty, a dungeon? Was it not enough to tear down Saint-Leu-Taverny manor, and have its blood stained stones sold to anybody who wanted them?

Wasn’t it enough with all these assaults? Was it still necesary for the devastation to spread its ravages up to the shores of the Nile?

Humanity’s duty is to oppose with all the resources of its genius, to the anihilation of its works; to counterbalance, delay, suspend the operations of nature, who doesn’t know to create new beings but at the expense of those that preceeded them. The law of men is conservation; the law of time is destruction. Man and time must then be locked in a constant struggle. Unfortunately, the first one often sacrifices its mision to help the other with his, and like him, he is armed with a scyhthe and a sword. Once set in this road, Man becomes more dreadful than Time; because the latter’s deteriorations are slow, nothing presses him, he has eternity before him.

Let not the Vandals and ignorance be accused of destruction: Vandals did not make war on monuments, ignorance is respectful. It is in the name of Science and Progress that most of these crimes are commited. It’s science, and not ever ignorance who says: “- This is gothic, therefore it’s barbaric, crush it down!” --It’s science who travels the universe, pickaxe or axe in hand; who goes spoiling Thebes of its imposing ruins which after so many centuries were admired by voyagers, making their souls soar and enlarging spirits by meditation. It’s science who goes ravaging the Thebes necropolis, demolishing the hypogei, making sepulchres collapse, blowing out the dust on the tombs; it is science who would not stop its profanations until she has leveled the desert’s sands to the cradle of primordial civilizations.

It is science who has pillaged Athens as it pillages it each day of its magnificent débris; who tears away its bas-reliefs and its metopes; who strips its statues; who packs up and dispatches its columns and its portals en route to the land of business, for England, where they will be devoured by the extravagant groves of some newly wealthy refiner.

It is science who will not delay to strip India of its monuments of Mughal glory, who won’t hesistate to rip off the Taj-Mahal mausoleum, Akbar Palace, the Mouti-Mutjid, the pearl of mosques; it is science who lets the mausoleums in Akbar and Ulla-Madoula waste away, to hastily authorize their demolition and ship them to Europe.

My God! What an obsession with taking and shipping off! Couldn’t you instead let each latitude, each area have it’s glory and ornaments? Couldn’t you contemplate anything on a distant shore, without coveting and wanting to substract it?

I would not be surprised if someone told me one day that the English had taken down the Moon and stored it in the Tower of London Museum.

You think you have given much radiance to your nation, to have so intensely embellished it, when you have actually buried under the Thames sludge, or the muck of the Seine, the work of two or three thousand years, the masterpieces of fifteen or twenty civilizations; when you have piled up in your crossroads and your shops, Romans over Etruscans, Egyptians over Hindus, Italians on top of Arabs, Greeks over Mexicans?

Each thing has no value other than in its own land, on its natal soil, under its sky. There is a correlation, an intimate harmony between monuments and the countries that erected them, there is no way to intervene with impunity.

The Pyramid needs blue skyes, a smooth floor, the monotonous horizontality of the desert; it needs the caravan passing at its feet; the cries of a nomad ethiopian population, or loneliness and the howling of chackals.

The granite Sphynx needs the lenghty avenues of the Pharaos Temples; she demands them, or the strange hordes killing each other at their shadow. Or the silent ruins of the Karnac.

Obelisks need the temple pillars, the solar cult, the idolatry of the multitudes, or the desert.

These monuments that pour such great amounts of sublime poetry on the arid sands of the Sahara, that proclaim the grandeur, the might, the genius of races past, are dragged to the bosom of our cities and become as drab, mute, and stupid as them.

How great would a Sphynx look in a gap between a cobbler shop and a tavern! Such a wonderful effect the profile of an obelisk would give to an hôtel garni, between a guardhouse and a tea shop!

Alas! All these arguments non withstanding and many more, France leans in the monument trafficking business, and does it without quarter. Recently and in a notorious, scandalous fashion, she has imported a monolith, uprooted from the ruins of Luxor. Poor France!... how happy she is now that she posseses an obelisk! What glory! May you rejoice long time, my fatherland! A child who shakes its rattle forgets its troubles: may this granite rattle numb your pain and pour balm in your sores!

But if, like a child, you have a need for toys, often too like him, you don’t know what to do with what you desire, once you posses it.

In order to find a use for it, during three years, no wait, what am I saying? During four full years, rhetoricians and reasoners have striven: even men from our senate, who have raised this high question on their petite chambre.

And during these for years, by roads and paths, by mounts and valleys, we haven’t seen nothing but obelisk hunters, wandering, torch in hand, to find not a man but to find or perch themselves on this coquetish emblem of the solar rays. This one here wants it to be placed on the Louvre courtyard; that one over there, right in the middle of the Invalides esplanade; this one there, at Montmatre, between two moulins; him over there, on the Pont-Neuf terrace, in stead of that insipid Henri IV. In fact, what does a Herni IV even mean? Nothing is more spiritual than an obelisk! The majority inclines in favour of the place of the so called Concorde; without doubt, because there, the obelisk will provide the advantage of cutting up the four façades into eight(*2).

In order to satisfy everyone, to manage the goat and the cabbage(*3), The State, who wants to rob nobody of its hope, consequently orders to have them erected everywhere; and with that purpose, it is said the state has emitted lettres de marque to a company of sapeurs charged with capturing and embargoing all the obelisks they can get their hands on. We must conclude that this enterprise is founded on a wealth excedent in order to have reserves and prevent any lacking of this provision so necessary to the People, and that a market is opened for the sale of those in excedent, to stock up the provinces. --Every fortnight their taxes will be displayed along those of the bread.

I seek to joke; but my jest truns into a grimace, my laugh is hollow; my heart is too heavy with moral pain; and whose wouldn’t be, when imagining the stupid misemployment of money destined to the protection of the Arts; of the mess made at this very moment in the château de Versailles; imagining the considerable sums spent on the coupling and uncoupling of stones; imagining that the Louvre is still unfinished, that we deny him a mason while during more than three months, we make more than eight hundred arabs occupied with just digging up trenches in a soft slope, made from the pedestal of this Egyptian men-hir up to the pier; when imagining this false and disordered love some men have for antique rubble, and of the disdain professed solemnly about our own antique junk, which should be so glorious for us, which we should be so protective of!

Wretches! While you squander the treasury on your conquests of green or pink Sphynxes, while you reattach becquets or empeignes to mutilated bacchuses and hermeses, our cathedrals fall to ruin, our Castles are dismantled, Royaumont abbey, the most admirable edifice erected by the generosity of Louis IX, who erected so many admirable ones, lies there, semi destroyed and devastated by a laundry.

All your boisterous display of affection for Art and Antiquity is nothing but an impudent parade. If you really had a sensitivity for the good and the beautiful, wouldn’t you put away the Raphaellos, the Rembrandts or the Andrea del Sartes you offer in your galleries? Would you allow these collected masterpieces to be dispersed and preyed upon by foreigners? Your feelings are feigned and false. Your heart has never beaten under the vaults of a temple; you never quivered at the sight of a Murillo or a Corregio; you have never understood Puget; you ignore who Jean Bullant, Jean Joconde or Philibert Delorme are; you are nothing but pedants at the shore of the Seine, and you pretend to be poets on the coasts of the Nile. Shame on you!...

Those who do not understand Saint-Vandrille, Blois, Chambord, Gaillon, Royaumont, Brou; cannot understand Thebes. Just like the One who traded, when there were yet nothing more than clovers in his crown (???), Jean Goujon’s Diane of Poitiers in exchange for an Ajax by Dupaty, how can He ever understand an obelisk?

You do not profess the religion of the Ancients; you don’t even practice that of Art or Country, all you want is to simulate what you can’t feel; you want the appereance of a protector, play-act Maecenas, affecting solicitude, and to showcase your imposted solicitude you become extravagant; you seek to astound vulgarity with your eccentricities. Little it matters to you that your underlings demolish by hits of paper bundles the most magnificent vitraux, you do not concern yourselves with such petty matters, where you would remain obscure: you need sensational acts. You must attract the eyes of the masses, and squeeze out their admiration. You know full well it is not wisdom and beauty what stuns and amazes, and you need to stun, and to achieve that you need wonders.

No one will turn their heads to look at a superb arab stallion, the most beautiful creature of God, the most beautiful being; but when we present a giraffe, that ridiculous animal, the multitude will briskly rise and run en masse to see it pass, its entrance would be a triumph! What do we care about a work by Michelangelo? Who will stop and take a detour to look at it? But with an obelisk the multitude will stampede around it. An obelisk is a stone giraffe: your obelisk will be a success!

About a hundred fools will go “Oh!!!” when percieving it for the first time. A hundred or so grocers from the suburbs will come after selling their groceries, they’ll stop with their mouth gaping, and ask what is this machine ornamented with ducks and zig-zags: and we could answer in french: it’s a stone spike; emphatically we will say in greek: this is an obelisk monolith (what a wonderful thing Greek to pump up platitudes, to obscure what was clear!) "Zounds!" these brave people answered, "before that I thought it was a fire pump stack!"

But all jokes aside, what is it that you find beautiful in an obelisk? As art, as an accomplishment, as an invention, as a silhouette, as an effect, it’s an ugly and empty monument. Do you want to give a fabourable impression on the egyptians and their genius? Why then did you pick from among their works, a milestone? Because, you know as well as I do, or better than I since you are wise, that an obelisk was not a monument, but a milestone placed in front of temples or palaces to there inscribe the names and surnames of the founders, the enlargers, the restorators of these palaces or temples.

Do you want to prove to what point the Egyptians were skilled in their transportation and mounting of such enormous blocks? Good God! The skills of the Egyptian are not up to debate, we know perfectly well they were very adroit.

Or do you want to prove to us that you are stronger than them, and that you can, like they did, build without effort heavy masses. Good God! Who is discussing your skill! We already know perfectly well you are as skilled as the Egyptians. We know your steam machine would make the obelisk dance if it didn’t have teeth(*4).

The Romans, who didn’t know better than to pillage and imitate, transported to Italy about twenty obelisks: we are like we have seen, in our way to ship an innumerable amount. It’s al very well to imitate August and Constance; that gives us a less trivial appereance. Sixtus-Quintus(*5) had Caligula’s obelisk streightened; but how can you streighten an obelisk when you don’t have any? The task is simple: we search for them. Méhémed-Ali is very friendly, he gives to anyone who asks. Furthermore, you have only one so far, and Rome at this very moment, posseses almost half a quarter pound(*6) of them, you’re way behind.

Are you obstinately willing to complete the half quarterpound? Are you seriously that fond of obelisks (on my part, I cannot hide it from you, I am unlucky enough to prefer the infinitely long Strasbourg needle to the two hundred aunes of monolith)? Follow my advice, have your own oblesik made yourselves. Who is stopping you? One would have to have a very insulting opinion on our artisans to think them incapable of such a task. Go to Provence, in the Fréjus diocesis, where the poryphyre abounds; go at the Esterel and in Roquebrune. In the way from Roquebrune to Muy, you will find a mountain containing masses more than sixty feet tall, with a considerable width. You could there chisel, like the Romans used to do, columns similar to those brought from High-Egypt; you could make there a profusion of obelisks; and certainly, obelisks made of French porphyre, crafted by french artists, which would worth as much as those granite obelisks form Egypt.

“Whoa! Whoa there you ass!/hold your horses!” will the savants cry at this evil proposition; “Imbecile!” They will call me, “Obelisks have no intrinsec value!; their worth is the memories stored in their bosom, the memories they overflow with.” Dream then you idiot, that the Luxor obelisk remembers Ramses or Rhamases III (monsieur Marle has not yet fixed the orthography of this name; for now there is only an orthography for improper nouns) Rhamases III, fifteenth king of the eighteenth dynasty! What? You were not expecting a memory of Ramses or Rhamases, the same selon les uns, tout autre selon les autres, que Sésostris, que le grand Sésostris ! ---Cruel, unfeeling, how are you not disolving into tears to the memory of Ramses III, fifteenth king of the eighteenth dynasty! How does your heart not beat furiously at its mere name, here, written on the stomach of these eight kynocephalus monkeys(*7)!...

Alas! Messieurs, I beg pardon; but I cannot sympathize with you in this point. My heart is not that wide yet, or as elastic as to extend so far its loves and affections. Your Ramses or Rhamases III, fifteenth king of the eighteenth dynasty, was doubtles a really great man (we must never speak ill of those who are gone); but on my side, sincerely, he and his great milestone are no big deal.

Don’t think that France is anymore crazy over your Pharao than me messieurs, or that she has ever thought to erect him an altar; and you can be certain that it will not be the remembrance of your Rhamases III, fifteenth king of the eighteenth dynasty, who will come and attack them when they lay eyes on the milestone, located on a spot still fuming with the blood of Louis XVI.

*1 mauvais lieu: in the XIXth century, a maison de débauche, or a brothel -> (thanks @sainteverge !!) the allusion though, is still obscure to both of us

*2 no idea

*3 ménager la chèvre et le chou: idiomatic expression meaning to satisfy opposing parties at the same time.

*4 no idea either

*5 a Pope.

*6 demi-quarteron. Again, pretty sure this is bad translating

*7 a baboon.

#any imput/suggestions are welcome #text post #long post #fixed the footnotes to make the asterix thing easier to read

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fnrrfygmschnish · 1 year

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Apparently one of the directors of the Mario movie came out and said that the reason why blocks float is that they’re made using a magical mineral that’s mined in the Mushroom Kingdom, which gives anything crafted from it floating properties. There doesn’t seem to be an “official” name for it (unsurprisingly) but they mentioned that they’ve been calling it “floatanium” because the name sounds funny.

Thinking about it... yeah, that actually works!

I think I’m going to adopt this as my explanation for the floaty blocks (I didn’t have one before) if I ever write/draw/etc. anything Mario related at some point in the future.

Unlike many of the weird random theories people come up with to try to explain game-mechanicsy things that most likely were never intended to have an explanation, this idea actually works with what we see of the games.

Donut blocks that fall if you stand on them -- well, they’re made with less of this material than other blocks (they’ve even got a hole in the middle, hence “donut” in the name.) So they can float themselves just fine, but their floaty magic is not strong enough to support someone’s weight, and if you stand on one for more than a couple seconds it burns through the floaty magic and the block falls.

Other blocks are made of enough floaty-stuff that they can stay up for a very long time even with additional weight added on top; maybe they eventually fall if they’re left floating for years (leading to some ?-blocks lying on the ground in various games), but it probably takes a while.

Blocks that float, but appear to be wooden... maybe somebody in the Mushroom Kingdom just likes the woodgrain pattern and painted/carved blocks to look that way? Or they are made of actual wood, but with pins/rods of floaty stuff distributed throughout, like how concrete has metal rebar inside for added support.

Bowser’s airships. They usually are depicted as barely having any propulsion mechanisms, especially for something their size -- just a few jets and propellers scattered here and there. And they float in midair and need to drop anchor to stay in the same place for long, a lot like sailing ships. So what if a lot of the metal parts of these airships are made from floaty-material in metallic form? That way they don’t need any means of propulsion powerful enough to “lift off,” and the few little jets and propellers would be mostly for added speed or changes in direction.

Other parts of the same world seem to have a lot less floating blocks than the Mushroom Kingdom itself -- the setting of the Wario Land games does have them (but then, it might be part of the Mushroom Kingdom or at least located nearby, since the plot of one of them involved a giant gold statue of Peach), but the WarioWare games seem to be set in a city with more real-world style construction materials, and you don’t really see floating blocks in the Donkey Kong Country games either. Though there are floating barrels... which could be because the metal bands around them are made of floaty-stuff. There seemed to be a lot less floating blocks in Yoshi’s Island than in the main Mario series, too. Everything points toward this material being more abundant in the Mushroom Kingdom than in other places.

And if the Mushroom Kingdom is the only place you can find reliable mines for the stuff... well, no wonder so many villains want to conquer the place! People always fight over major resources -- gold, spices, copper, oil, and so on are all good real-world examples, and none of those have obvious magical powers. Maybe Bowser’s Koopa Kingdom used to have a fair amount but he’s already mined it out and used it to build his airship fleet. And of course Smithy the “fill the world with weapons and have non-stop war” guy would want exclusive access to a magical ore he could potentially craft all kinds of weird floating weapons with.

#mario #super mario bros.#why blocks float #floatanium #might've been said as a joke in an interview but hey if it works...

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wolfjawswriter · 11 months

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so I just watched the live action lil mermaid (don't ask me about it or I will go on a rant) SO prepare yallselves for the lil mermaid lco au none of yall asked for!

and yes this Tumblr post is all the au u will get, I wish I had the motivation to write a whole fic however I haven't had any ficwriting motivation in a while and I still wanna get this out there

because I like to change things up in aus based on existing ip for the sake of living it up, this is the story of Anthony Lockwood, a young merman, prince of the sea, who is obsessed with humans - he finds them to be such fascinating creatures, just like his parents did before him, but he and all the rest of Atlantica are forbidden of interacting with humans by his older sister, Queen of the oceans Jessica Lockwood, after the former king and queen were killed by fishermen

this doesn't stop Lockwood from collecting human stuff that falls from ships or that he finds in shipwrecks, wondering about human life and wishing he could learn all about it for his parents’ sake, to get the knowledge they so readily died for

this drives him to interact with a passing ship where he spies a bunch of humans celebrating, becoming entranced by one such female human among the crew

this human is Lucy Carlyle, youngest daughter of the queen of a pathetically small and insignificant Caribbean island. A lifetime of being ignored as the seventh in line for her family’s puny title led her to find friendships with the common folk of her island, most of which work as fishermen. Today is her birthday and she’s chosen to celebrate in one of the many boats she usually works in with her peers, dancing and drinking until a terrible storm rocks the sea into a frenzy. Lightning strikes a fire on the boat, forcing everyone to evacuate to the lifeboats.

unable to see the young woman drowned, Lockwood takes the princess and follows the boats back to the island, laying her down in the sand. Seeing as she’s terribly wounded and cold sick, he uses his Siren song, an ability legendarily used by sirens and mermaids to beckon fishermen to the sea so they drown, to heal her, making sure she’s found before he leaves

after this event Jessica could tell something was changed about her brother - his sharp nature suddenly dulled with daydreaming, and wonders if his stubborn attitude has finally been met with the stinging needle of love. She’s sorely disappointed to find it so, not with a fellow oceanid, but a human girl. In a desperate attempt to keep her brother safe, she destroys the secret collection of human junk his treasured

betrayed and hurt, Lockwood’s approached by a strange kelpie. She claims to have been an old friend of his parents who wishes nothing more than to aid her old friend’s beloved son in his our of need. A striking siren by the name of Marissa, she promises him to make his wish come true with magic almost as powerful as his sister’s - she can make him a human.

blinded by the possibility of seeing the girl his so infatuated by, Lockwood readily signs Marissa’s impossible contract; trading his Siren song/voice for legs, vowing to procure a true love’s kiss from the princess before the third sunset. he manages to swim back towards the island he took her to, and is quickly found by the townspeople, assuming he’d been shipwrecked from a trading ship, those pass a lot by the isle on their routes

since her rescue, princess Lucy had been all but obsessed with finding the mysterious man who saved her. It was nothing short of expected that she’d want to thank them, but the longer time passed since, the more seemed to go deeper than that to her friends. A growing desperation drove her to ask her family’s limited resources to search for him again and again, all throughout the island and the neighboring ones - Siren’s songs do have addictive qualities, probably the reason they were used in legend to compel fishermen to jump off their boats when they heard it

on one day she's about to search for the mystery man, she finds the townspeople helping a castaway who’d just washed up shore. Awash with empathy, she offers him a stay at her family’s modest manor, hoping that a comfortable bed, a safe roof and warm food might shake off the horrors he lived enough to restore his voice

despite her mind still being desperate to find the man who saved her, Lucy can't help but be taken by the castaway, mute though he is, and how he seems to be intrigued by everything around him - unable to express a single thought yet so clearly filled with ideas and emotions and desires - its endearing. she allows herself to be pulled away from her quest yet a second day in favor of showing him the small island, introducing him to her friends and watching him discover the world like it was new

by the end of the day she finds herself exploring the few inhabited areas of the isle where flora thrives the most with him, enjoying a quiet row boat jaunt. somehow she felt at peace there, just listening to the singing of crickets and the water rippling under them with a man who’s name she didn’t even know but whom it felt like she knew better than anyone else. there was something about him that gave her a strange feeling, one she’d never known - despite all the things they saw that day, his eyes always returned to her, his attention always came back to her. even now, faced with the beauty of a perfect night, he seemed to have eyes only for her. He spoke without words, a language that seemed to be made only for her and that she longed to understand

even the row boat getting tipped couldn’t ruin the night for her as she led him back to the manor, soaking wet and laughing, wishing him a good night. it wasn't much later that night that, while watching the sea out from her window, she’d hear the same melodiously masculine voice that spoke to her on the day she was rescued, and the Siren song’s hold on her would be revived once more into a frenzied bliss, finally finding the man

the next morning Lockwood wakes up to the manor’s loud preparations for a party, hearing the few servants around talk about the youngest princess having finally found the man who’d rescued her and her desire to wed him immediately. Despite the unfortunate interruption they’d suffered last night, Lockwood couldn’t have been more happy that he’d managed make her see the truth - he had saved her! he loved her! he wanted to be with her in this magnificent island of hers forever!

he searched for her to express his delight, only to find her and her family discussing the wedding, another man’s arm around her.

maybe he misread the signs. maybe he should have been more forward, however he could have done it without his voice, but he’d lost. he’d lost her. she’d fallen for another man, and he’d have to return to the ocean

idk who the fuck is the seagull, i didnt think that part bUT WHOEVER IT IS TELLS HIM ABOUT THE WITCH OR WTHEVER

lockwood hurries back to the Carlyle’s manor, intent on stopping the wedding. Just before the third sunset he manages to tear the necklace off the guy’s neck, releasing his Siren song

the spell of the Siren song breaks and lucy finally recognizes lockwood, not just as the guy who saved her, but the guy shes really in love with, and she runs forth to embrace him-

the sun sets and lockwood doubles over in pain. he looks down to see his legs tear off his clothes, transforming back into a single long tail. the guy transforms back into Marissa, the sea witch, who quickly makes her way back to the sea, dragging lockwood back with her

big fight happens, i dont particularly care about this part, all u need to know is yes lucy stabs marissa with a sunken boat, that bitch basically becomes fried fish

jessica sees how affected her brother is having to leave that human girl behind and decides to give him his human legs back so he can live with her

#wolfs disney scribbles #wolf shitposts #lockwood & co #lockwood and co #lockwood and co netflix #lockwood and co tv show #lockwood and co fanfiction #anthony lockwood #lucy carlyle #lockwood spoilers #I mean not really lnco spoilers but yes cause this is derived from the books canon so watch out #I feel like lockwoods the only one dumb enough to trust a sea witch that's why his the lil mermaid here Lucys wouldn't fall for that #its literally the movie but locklyle #i wrote this at like 1 am #this has been sitting in my notes for like a month still i wrote this after watching the movie

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nonbinarycthulu · 11 months

Text

Ziva Lockeheart Character Bio

Name: Ziva Elizabeth Fig-Lockeheart-Morganach

House: Slytherin

Age: 15

Blood Status: Pureblood

Nationality: Israeli-Europeon

Patronus: Dog

Favorite Class: History of Magic

Least Favorite: Flying and Defense Against the Dark Arts

Abilities: “Ancient Magic”, Animagus

Wand: An Ebony wood carved wand with a Phoenix Feather core that is approximately about 11 1/2 inches long. The handle is shiny with a stylish groove pattern that has a marbled base at the end of it.

🐍

Personality: Ziva has many traits that would have put her in Hufflepuff if not for her wit, resourcefulness and determination. She’s a nervous wreck most of the time and struggles with overthinking, while it may be one of her biggest flaws, has come in handy more than once. Ziva is a kindhearted individual with a strong sense of justice. Being a late bloomer, she is fascinated by all sorts of magic and wants to master it all as quickly as possible, sometimes forgetting about patience.

She struggles with communication and can come across as awkward, even blunt or rude, unaware of how her tone may be heard. Not only this, but she tends to be salty and is annoyed easily. She holds small grudges, even if she doesn’t know the person that well. Her ability to read the emotions of others, unless put out not so subtly, is also rather weak. However, she makes up for it in empathy and trying to help others in anyway she can.

She also curses, like, a lot.

To put it simply: she can be an asshole without realizing it(spoilers, she’s got the ‘tism)

Appearance: I suck at describing people. Just look.

🐍

Ruth Lockeheart(Mother, Alive)

Esther Lockeheart(Grandmother, Deceased)

Miriam Fig-Lockeheart(Great aunt, Deceased)

Noel Morganach-Lockeheart(Father, Alive)

Eleazar Fig(Great uncle, Alive)

Unknown Grandfather(Grandfather on Father’s side, Deceased)

Ancestors(Deceased)

Isidora Morganach(Ancestor, Deceased)

Unkown Ancestor(Deceased, Isidora’s lover)

Natsai Onai(Best Friend, Possible Love Interest, Alive)

Imelda Reyes(Best Friend, Alive)

Poppy Sweeting(Best Friend, Alive)

Amit Thakkar(Best Friend, Alive)

Garreth Weasly(Best Friend, Alive)

Sebastian Sallow(Complicated, Alive)

Ominis Gaunt(Best Friend,Possible Love Interest, Alive)

🐍

Some fun facts!!

- Ziva is autistic and struggles with sensory issues, mainly touch and clothing. She wears gloves almost all the time to prevent sensory overload and is known to cover her ears often. Due to the time period and not much known about autism, she does struggle to find proper help. The teachers are very accommodating for the most part and always make sure she’s comfortable(especially Weasly, Garlick and Rowen).

-She’s got a Roman nose

-Going back to that, she uses her wand as a fidget. She likes feeling the bumps on it.

- She ADORES cats. She has pet every cat in Hogwarts more than once and made a vow to pet any cat she sees, first time seeing them or not.

- Speaking of; her scar is from the result of a cat that didn’t want to be picked up.

- She throws up when anxious. The first time she fought spiders with Sebastian she puked for at least five minutes. He definitely did not let her live it down.

- VERY judgmental, even over the smallest of details.

- She’s not related to Gildroy. I wasn’t even thinking about him during her creation, and his surname came up because I thought it sounded pretty. It’s spelled differently anyway so shhhh

- Really likes spicy food.

- Knows what sex is, but refuses to accept that’s how babies are made lmao

- Her boggart is a dragon. Seeing a man get eaten alive is literally nightmare fuel(fun fact, it’s based off an oddly specific fear I have. I can’t watch movies with people getting eaten alive). Poppy helped her get over this fear.

- She has thick 2c hair that is impossible to hold in a bun or ponytail without the band snapping.

-She’s very shippable. I honestly ship her with most of the fifth years, mainly Natty and Ominis. The rest are just alternate universe pairs.

🐍

Before I finish, I want to mention that she is apart of an AU within the canon timeline where certain events played out differently. Minor changes are her not being such a perfect person, like:

- Getting hit in the face with the book when ‘Accio’-ing for the first time, as well as losing the match to Natty.

- Getting thrown off the table and across the room by Sebastian. I couldn’t care less about Crossed Wands and wanted Ziva to suck at fighting for a while lol

- HATED flying. She also got smacked in the face with the broom Ron Weasly style while trying to summon it. She declined Everett’s offer. She also puked once she landed and a first year laughed at her.

- She’s definitely more of the laughing stock after the first few days.

#hogwarts legacy #sebastian sallow #ominis gaunt #oc #natsai onai #imelda reyes #hogwarts legacy mc #slytherin #harry potter hogwarts game

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zeb-z · 2 years

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So your Star Wars au, what plot lines have you got, it could be from any of the smp, give me everything you had planned out in term of plot at least.

Alright, so the main plot lines I have fleshed out revolve around dsmp as I’ve had the most time to plan those? Under the keep reading I do have more Hermitcraft plot as well though pfjsjfjfj

Tommy is a Jedi initiate who almost doesn’t become a padawan, a story similar to Obi-Wan’s - he’s assigned to the AgriCorps once he’s past the age of mentorship. No master wants him, he’s far too emotionally charged, angry, has feelings he doesn’t understand how to properly deal with - many think he’s a ticking time bomb.

Sam comes back to the temple from an extended mission, and runs into Tommy just before he’s meant to get on the ship to his assignment, and sees a troubled kid with so much potential who just needs a little guidance but is refused out of fear from the order - he looks at Tommy and sees himself. So he names him as his padawan right then and there, and the rest is history.

Tubbo is Tommys best friend, they grew up together from crèche to initiates in the same clan, until Eret asked Tubbo to be his padawan learner. Tommy gets his assignment to AgriCorps, and Tubbo is who he goes to straight away - Tubbo comforts him and makes a grand plan of running away together and becoming the greatest space pirates to have ever plundered the galaxy. It’s a fun thought, but Tubbo entirely means it - he’s got a bag packed and ready so he can stow away on Tommys ship, and surely the two of them could figure it out from there.

Wilbur is a senator from some planet that’s barely in the mid rim, famous for being the leader of the revolution that toppled the previous monarchy of the planet. He’s a smooth talker and knows how to make a speech, and can be absolutely infuriating to work with, but he’s not a bad guy. He does his senatorial work, he volunteers his planets resources when he can, he works on establishing a proper infrastructure for refugees - especially and specifically for those who were previously slaves. When the clone wars comes around, he’s one of the loudest in the senate about bills for clones rights as sentient rights.

He’s got an ego and a temper, but he’s not an idiot. The political climate is pretty much the same as it is in Star Wars canon - a republic succumbing to corruption, greed, and malicious workings from the few in charge who siphon more power until they have total control. He’s never liked Emperor Dream, he’s never been a fan of the republic as a system, but he isn’t pushed to work outside of the laws to fix things until the death of the Jedi and the birth of the Empire.

He’s started a revolution before, led a rebellion from the ground up - he can certainly do it again.

Now the real plot, the big I have drafts for chapters of this fic plot, starts after order 66. Tommy thinks everyone is dead and he’s barely survived, only to find out Tubbo is alive through the force, but hurt and in need of rescue. Wilbur starts sparks of the rebellion in the heart of the Senate, doing what he can with subtlety and spreading the fire to what people he can. Eret, who was the one who betrayed the Jedi Order, realizes what they’ve done and leaves, coming to terms with the effects of their betrayal and doing what they can to fix it.

Dream is the Emperor, and is having a grand time consolidating his power and controlling the galaxy. Quackity runs Las Nevadas (of course) someplace in the outer rim, taking in Sapnap and Karl (who are both jedi) and acting as best as he can as a neutral ground.

Technoblade is a Mandalorian, specifically a True Mandalorian, comparable in Star Wars canon to Jaster Mereel in terms of Mandalorian beliefs. One of the only survivors from Galidraan, he joins Death Watch and seeks bounties to make a living, and comes to his own realizations about Death Watch maybe a little too late.

Ranboo? He’s just a nobody, from nowhere, who helps Tommy and Tubbo when they crash near his home on some backwater planet after Tommy rescues Tubbo. He helps them fix their ship and in return he joins them, finally stepping off solid ground and seeing the stars for the first time. He’s somehow the most force sensitive bastard ever, of all time, and just doesn’t realize it.

(Dream does. Dream also has an eye on Tommy as a surviving jedi padawan with a checkered history - either way, he’s looking for an apprentice of his own)

Philza and Sneeg are partners in crime, whatever that crime may be. Hitmen, mercenaries, smugglers, whatever hat the job calls for they wear it. Their ship isn’t anything impressive, but Phil’s talent as a pilot more than makes up for it - Sneeg’s skill on the turrets picks up whatever slack is left from there. It’s not too long before they join the rebellion themselves - they may not have hearts of gold, but working under Empire conditions is just not worth it, and hey, maybe they can find a little more help with their own troubles with the Pyke’s.

Niki and Jack are Jedi as well, Niki with an excellent connection to the living force, while Jack has connection to the Cosmic force. By all rights he should be dead, shot fatally during order 66 and dragged away by Niki - but he’s not, and his connection to the force has been fractured ever since. Niki as well has trouble seeing the light, during what feels like the end of all things.

All the OG L’Manberg crew were close before, including Wilbur. Jack worked mostly in the senate, with a bit of an interest in politics, but mostly used as an overqualified bodyguard for senatorial escorts. He worked most often with Senator Soot. Niki is close to Jack, Eret is close to Niki, and the rest of the connections are obvious from there.

Of course there’s a teary reunion, years down the road somewhere in a rebellion base. A day where even the general can take it easy, where the rebels can drink and dance and have a moment of hope and joy and love, making everything worth it.

Along the lines of order 66, and onto some hermitcraft folks, Etho is a mechanic on Coruscant when it all goes down. He’s in the wrong place at the wrong time, or maybe in the right, and helps save some Jedi.

Now far before order 66, even a while before Sam meets Tommy, Grian is taken in by the jedi order. He’s an amnesiac with far too much skill with the force to be turned away, not that it was easy for the council to decide. Scar fights tooth and nail for that decision to be made, having been the one to rescue Grian.

Grians memories come back fractured, cracked, through confusing dreams and visions of things he should recognize. He was involved in a mysterious and ominous force cult, the Watchers, who were obsessed with the omniscient powers the force could bring. Seeing what is, what has been, what will be, and always hungry for more.

He’s often struck with visions, sometimes helpful, sometimes not, often debilitating until he can unlearn the way the watchers taught him to seek them out rather than building shields to avoid constant connection to the force. Until then, he has to piece together his visions to figure out just what he used to be, and how to stop what they’re planning next.

This leads him and Scar to quite the adventure, along with Ren - a spacer who will take anyone anywhere if they’ve got the credits. He used to be a king on his home planet, until his kingdom was overthrown and he had to flee. Now he’s constantly on the move, making money where he can, and learning that there’s more to the galaxy then both nobility and war.

Xisuma is a senatorial aid for some Senator in the republic - for who, what planet, is inconsequential. What does matter is what he overhears one day, whispers of a nefarious plot that he clearly was never meant to witness. Plans on getting Senator Dream elected Chancellor, murmurs of dissent and planets wanting to secede, political plots that he’s far over his head in dealing with.

Cub and Mumbo are top scientists, well renowned and respected in the republic, with top level clearance for all the latest projects. They work on prototype weapons and defenses especially, while their colleague Zedaph works more on the biology side of things. He’s taken on to a top secret project, picked back up by Chancellor Dream when he takes office, and really cannot talk about it - and Cub and Mumbo grow very concerned at their own work, and the way Zedaph seems to disappear.

Doc has long since quit his scientific work for the republic, instead using his technical know how to find work in the outer rim, making money for taking odd jobs offered by questionable people and then doing what he can for the less fortunate. He’s less than pleased when he starts getting tracked down by the republic to work for them again, personally asked for by the chancellor. Whatever nonsense they want him for, he’s certain it’s some level of unethical, and wants no part of it.

There’s of course more, but these are the most major plot involved characters as of now. Pix has another large chunk of plot that I’m currently fleshing out as well. They all survive order 66, they all play some sort of role afterwards.

The main story’s theme is quite a few different things. A lot of discussion of what the jedi order should have been as opposed to what they were. About emotional regulation and feeling your feelings instead of blocking it all away. A lot of politics and commentary on it, a lot about fascism and how it rises. How to live with grief and to continue even after it feels like the end of everything. How hope is always there so long as there is life, and what that means for different people.

If not happy endings, then hopeful endings. And found family of course.

#this is. still just barebones hfjsjfjejr sos #if you want more specifics on anyone don’t hesitate to ask! for literally any mcyt #combining hyperfix with special interest means I will write easily over 100k for just part of this #thank you for the ask anon!!!!!#star wars au #sw #mcyt #dsmp #last life #hermitcraft #evo smp #i won’t tag empires because there’s barely mention of them. but they’re in this au #anon ask #z speaks

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checkxmaster · 1 year

Text

About the Muse: Chad Kaplan

[Bio and other information below the cut!]

Type of Character & Fandom/Source Material: Canon character from the movie Resident Evil (2002). Will become canon-divergent in verses

Full name: Chad Kaplan

FC: Martin Crewes as Kaplan in Resident Evil (2002)

Race: Human

Age: Verse-dependent; Late 20s during RE, Late 30s by RE: Retribution

Sexual/Romantic Orientation: Heteroromantic/Heterosexual

Occupation: Umbrella paramilitary commando; UST (Umbrella Sanitation Team) member; computer technician; technology specialist; programming expert; electrical engineer

Family & Home Life: Chad is an only child of two doting parents he sees on a regular basis (or used to, before the world went to hell). He has a gregarious wife, Iris, whom he met when he relocated to Raccoon City to become employed by the Umbrella Corporation. Before that, he lived in Washington D.C., working for the FBI (all headcanons, heh). He and Iris have a good relationship. He respects and loves her very much and she encourages him whenever his confidence level is not where it should be. She thinks he’s just adorable, haha. Iris loves children and is an elementary schoolteacher in addition to having worked extensively with physically disabled children. In addition to have a degree in public education, she is also a registered nurse. (Note: I can remove Iris from his background easily enough, or in many verses she might have died in some of the initial outbreaks, if there is a potential for shipping.)

Potentially Triggering Material in Threads: Anything you’d find in a zombie apocalypse movie plus medical stuff, heh. So... death, blood, violence, gore, body horror, needles, medical procedures and equipment, surgery, monsters and mutated creatures, mind control, and mental health issues such as anxiety and panic attacks.

General Personality: Despite being an indispensable member of the team, having formal training, and being cleared by Umbrella to be in the field, Chad is a nervous soldier who often doubts his skills and second-guesses himself. He is much more at home at a desk in front of a computer screen than he is on a battlefield. At heart, he is a quiet, sometimes mousy, but morally centered man. He may not seem very brave - and may argue himself that he’s not - but when the shit hits the fan, he’s very much able to push himself through the most harrowing of situations, especially when the lives of team members are at stake. His biggest problem in the field is being emotionally affected by the injuries and deaths of others, especially if he believes they might be his fault. This can very easily cloud his judgement or cause him to freeze into inaction because he’s overwhelmed by emotion.

Negative Personality Traits: Kaplan is very insecure and unsure of himself. He doubts and second-guesses himself often, and there really isn’t a reason for it. He’s fully capable of doing his job, but when challenged, put under pressure, or nervous, he starts to doubt that he can, and then he makes foolish mistakes. So it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy fueled by his anxiety and insecurity. He’s very hardon himself and is very susceptible to patterns of guilt, regret, and survivor’s guilt. He can also be kindof a doormat, very often letting people take advantage of him or working himself to the bone when others don’t feel obligated to.

Positive Personality Traits: Although when pressure first starts to hit, he gets easily flustered and doubts himself, when things really get bad Chad had an amazing ability to push past his fear, anxiety, and insecurity through sheer force of will. It takes a lot for him to get angry or to get his back up about something, but once he’s pushed to that point, he becomes more assertive and highly productive. He’s loyal, empathetic, resourceful, selfless, helpful, and can be brave in his own way. He’s also just... a sweet, genuine, and nice guy in general. He’s never manipulative and doesn’t take advantage of people.

Background:

Chad Kaplan is, first and foremost, a technical specialist whose expertise lies in electrical engineering, computer hardware and software, cyber security, coding languages, hacking, audiovisual utilities, digital mapping, and surveillance systems. Before being scouted by the Umbrella Corporation, Chad worked for the FBI as a computer technician in cyber security. He was not a field agent, however, despite receiving weapons training at Quantico. It was not until he joined Umbrella that he became a trained commando in addition to a tech specialist.

Once he did, he was placed on one of Umbrella’s Sanitation teams as their computer technician and technology expert. His teammates included: Rain Ocampo (marksman), J.D. Salinas (marksman; security agent), Olga Danilova (medic; security agent), Vance Drew (commando), Alfonso Warner (security agent), and James Shade, a.k.a. “One“ (team commander; security officer).

Although he is currently stationed at the Hive and works and trains within it along with the rest of his team and others, Chad was the only member of his team to live outside it, in the suburbs of Raccoon City However, due to the demanding nature of his job, he frequently stays overnight in the Hive if he’s pulling long nights and has his own dorm room on the employee housing floor just in case.

What does the URL of this blog mean? (Because people have asked XD)

“Check Master,” was a nickname that Chad’s friends and fellow trainees gave him at Quantico when he was training for the FBI. They bestowed it upon him because every time he accomplished something he was proud of, he’d say “checkmate,” as in the chess term. Nowhere did he say it more than when he had gotten really difficult code written and working or when he had managed to crack a hacking puzzle. To this day, whenever he hacks into something and feels like he accomplished something, he still says it. So his friends started calling him “Check Master,” partly because of that habit, partly out of affection for him, and partly because he can be a pretty mousy guy but the nickname implies a large amount of confidence in addition to ability. So it’s a playful teasing sort of thing that just... stuck.

Potential Starter Ideas:

It’s probably easier to just view my rp verses post to get some ideas on when/where you’d like to fit your muse in, or we could chat if we’d be melding two fandoms together in a crossover.

Likely, the most versatile verses for Chad are going to be ones that take place before the first movie (before the Hive and Raccoon City Incidents), during RE: Apocalypse (the RC Incident), or later in the series for things set during RE: Retribution or RE: The Final Chapter. But again if we’re doing a crossover and melding two fandoms together, or we’re bringing in the games or the Welcome to Raccoon City movie, we can certainly chat to iron out a starting point and plot ideas.

We can always take Chad completely out of his canon zombie apocalypse world and plop him into your muse’s world/setting too.

Fun facts:

Chad has a pet cat named Oreo (x,x,x,x). Although he lives off-site, sometimes he brings him to work in the Hive in his dorm room if he has a lot of coding to do and knows he’ll be at a computer for days. Oreo is exceptionally intelligent for a cat. He passes the “mirror test” (x,x) for a high level of self-awareness and sometimes seems to understand what people say to him. He also has a habit of standing up and walking around on only two legs, which some find creepy and others find hilarious. Oreo constantly interrupts Chad’s computer work at home, often laying across the keyboard or his arms while he is trying to type.

Oreo wasn’t just named because he is a black and white cat. He’s also named after Chad’s favorite cookie. Chad loves oreos so much, and is one of those rare people who can eat whole sleeves of them on a semi-regular basis and never seem to gain weight.

Chad really loves to play video games. He always wanted to design and code his own, but never got around to it.

He likes to play around with broken and dead machines (computers, cell phones, tablets, etc.) and rewire them to do what he wants. Seeing if he can frankenstein devices or change their functions to suit his needs is a hobby of his.

Chad is a huge Star Wars and Star Trek fan, but he prefers the older movies and show to the newer ones.

#{out of code} ᵒᵒᶜ #about the muse

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herethereverywhere · 1 year

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who’s your favorite npc you’ve designed :0 (- @/albatrio)

i have been WAITING for this one :D

if my players are seeing this before they block the tag (#when the dust settles do NOT click on the tag in the post) BLOCK IT NOW AND DO NOT PROCEED. please i want you to experience the surprise :(

are they gone?

ok, here’s a list :)

1. Cordia Hyre

Cordia is my ultimate babygirl. She has committed several war crimes as an individual who’s high in rank in the rebellion. She’s also one of the most powerful magic wielders of the entire campaign - one of her unofficial titles is Planemover, as she (with the help of her husband, a member of the Order of Glass) convinced the Feywild to give the cause a bit of the plane to hide away on as they gathered resources and recuperated.

She’s…a very complicated character. The majority of the decisions she makes are made genuinely from a place of love, but she does make some objectively fucked up decisions.

One of my players, Luna, gave me the opportunity to write a large part of his character, specifically her backstory. Perle doesn’t know this, and neither does Luna, but Perle is an incredibly significant individual in the context of the rebellion. He’s is Cordia and Aedium’s kid, and Cordia’s decision to modify his memory to make him not remember his community is one that effects the entire rebel body.

It’s also a decision that effects Perle - I was actually just speaking to Luna about how the cracks that are starting to show through with that spell are effecting his ability to trust himself. I’m…deeply intrigued by what will happen when that spell inevitably gets dispelled, or goes down, and how Luna will play that as Perle. Because I know what Cordia’s thought process was, but she never asked her son what his desires were before she executed that act.

2. Metis Kore Hey so you know how I was heavily sympathizing with a war criminal above? Yeah, here’s her foil that I despise but love from like, a character perspective. Metis is...genuinely one of the worst people I’ve ever written. She’s the mother of one of my other PCs, AK, who she experimented on to the point of his death, and then subsequently revived him. She’s a litch at the moment because I needed her to be somewhat present in the story, but wanted to honor my player, who when I inquired about the Kore family, said that they thought that AK might have killed Metis while he was escaping. Right now she’s the individual who funds the actual criminals (I specify because the Firelights are technically criminals in the eyes of the law, but are actually trying to help their community) of Zuan who have been slowly, but steadily, abducting Zuan children for Metis’s experiments with Hextech. She’s essentially trying to create immortal humanoids and, um...let’s just say that from the TW list I’ve had to put together for AK’s arc, has thus far had no success. 3. Zeus & Romulus Aere More members of the Kore family, what a surprise! Candle, as much as AK is the character I find myself having to think of ways to balance more and more on a mechanic level, has created so many fantastic opportunities for me to introduce aspects of the world that I don’t think my players would have sought out on their own. One of these is the members of the Kore family that are missing - Zeus, and Romulus. Romulus is AK’s older brother. When he is reunited with Zeus on the Dominum, a pirate ship that his father captain, he’s not incredibly friendly towards him. All that Romulus knows is that his father left by his own violation, and cause a domino effect that lead to Romulus being forced to flee Piltover too. Zeus...does genuinely try, from the time he recognizes Romulus again, to have a relationship with him, but he wasn’t there to witness what Metis put Romulus and AK through - he doesn’t know that Romulus is being reactive to not be retraumatized. They do eventually get to a good place with one another. Romulus’s last name is taken from one of Zeus’s close friends, and quartermaster, who is the person on the ship who mentors him, and is generally someone he leans on in the healing process. I’m excited for this reunion too, because Romulus does think about AK a lot, to the point that the only picture that remains of him pre-transition is in the locket he carries.

4. Silco Yeah. She’s alive and she’s transfem. My game, my rules, and I say that Silco is a transfem Paladin who kicks ass. She’s presumed dead right now but I do have a player who suspects she’s alive because of a...very good perception roll. For Silco I’m excited from a storytellling perspective, and a mechanic one! Her oath is one I’m working on homebrewing myself because I like to make my life harder. That and her relationship with Vander & how their respective oaths effect that relationship should be fun. An honorable mention goes to the Firelights, who I’m sort of glad AK traumadumped on because now they have a reason to have a relationship with my players! The Firelights are really the only organization other than the Academy that I’ve worked on extensively, and they’re just fun :)

#when the dust settles #<- spoiler tag for my players #long post #cause this one...got away from me fast #i think these are all of my faves? aside from jol who's just #she's fun to play #theres worldbuilding things im proud of too but i will wait for another ask to ramble about those LOL #so yeah #this is what it's like to play dnd with me

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