#it does feel like youre in a simulation prison which it's supposed to but that atmosphere bums me out </3

[hoppinkiss]

i have swept and vacuumed and I AM GOING TO GRILL ME A CHEESE

maybe after I eat I'll play some sa.ints r.ow 4 to see matt,,,,

[redjaybathood]

No, seriously tho. Webtoon continues to be good. It nicely balances focus between all three characters. Biz is given as much depth if not more than in the first 25 issues of RHATO Rebirth. Jason isn't OP here, and allowed to have flaws and fail because of those flaws, not just because. Artemis having her own issues with her image and the way she's supposed to take, to find. And, you know, it's nice to see her being sapphic not ignored even as she does have romance relationship with Jason.

Of course, Batman fans won't like it. Go read WFA or, you know, Batman comics if you want him to be always right and good. He's unfair here. He does fucked up shit. League is basically... No better than Outlaws. Even if they're supposed to be. And that is okay, them being foils for Outlaws, the "you know, people everyone always compares you to, people you are expected to style yourself after... They don't have all the answers. They're not infallible. Be true to yourself, your values, your goals". And I don't think it's a bad message to send to the teens. Who are, more than likely, intended audience.

So the story is simple, touching, has art that makes you constantly scroll down - amazing, not only the details, or how concepts are utilized visually, but the dynamic of movement. You feel characters moving on page.

Yeah, Jason is not the perfect version that you may wish to have. Neither is Artemis. Nor is Bizarro, although I have never seen the outrage on his behalf, but whatever.

But honestly? It's not a bug, it's a feature. Outlaws are supposed to be fuckups. They're supposed to be not perfect. But they're still good at their core, they still heroes who have empathy, desire to help. They're hurting - Bizarro, for example, the most issues person on Earth. When his player broke, my heart broke. Then Jason killed Luthor and figured out they're in a stimulation - fuck you, Bruce, this is just unnecessary cruel; he's literally punishing Outlaws for what Jason did in a stimulation? Instead of giving them the chance you jiggled before their noses? - and my heart broke for them again.

Yeah, maybe killing a President of the United States is not a clear-cut solution to that particular problem. But Justice League's solution is to do exactly nothing, if we're talking about rich and powerful egomaniacs, and over police if we talk about non-violent offenses like stealing (for no nefarious purpose) and... Helping to conduct magic rituals, I guess. And sure, the ritual was dangerous, but in the end, Eurya wasn't. She helped to stop it, in the simulation. And I don't know. Chances of Medusa getting help while she and her sister both are in the space prison are much less than if Eurya just safely turned her, like all her victims, from stone back to normal. And then they could figure something out from there. At least, the potential for that was there, you know? Not so much if you behind some plexiglass or whatever it is.

Off with Luthor, my point is. And I hope Outlaws will be able to help the other three (Mirror Master, Eurya and Medusa) after they deal with bounties on their heads. Which - a nice thing to expose your son to, Bruce.

[lafiametta]

Is there any theory about the show that you dislike? Personally, I don't like the idea that Daniel is part of the simulation and doesn't exist. I found him so charming in how desperate and how much of a mess he was that I would love to have him in the later seasons (same for Elliot!). Now, one theory I have is that the show would jump from past (1899) to future (2099) to present (1999?), such as to follow the meaning that Cerberus the three-headed dog is meant to represent. Would also explain the vintage TV displays we see in Henry's "office" and the one where Ciaran sent Maura his welcome message being vintage.

And for curiosity's sake, are there common tropes about shipping that you dislike? I hate emotionally constipated couples that never talk about their feelings openly. It just creates the most ridiculous of dramas, and I'm too old to sit through that! And because of that, here's a question: how do Olek and Ling Yi open up about their feelings? Both in the modern and the 1899 the New York AUs!

There aren't any theories that I dislike per se, although, yeah, the one where Daniel is actually dead didn't seem to make much sense to me. (I wonder if some of the theorizing was based a little too much on whether people shipped Maura with Daniel or Eyk, and if certain characters were evil or dead, it meant that a particular ship would win out. I mean, whatever... ship what you like, and you can just as easily ignore the bits of canon you don't care for.) But almost all the theories about the show were so interesting — Were the characters on a long space voyage, with the simulation as a way to keep their brains occupied? Were they prisoners being transported, with the simulation as their punishment? Was Henry Singleton just an AI within the simulation or was he "real"? Was Ciaran ever an actual person or was he an AI gone rogue? — and it seemed very foolish to discount any of them when we didn't really have enough to prove any of them true or false. (I'm using the past tense, but I really hope that we all continue to post meta and analysis, offering more theories about the simulation and the spaceship "reality'" at the end.) And seriously, I like your idea a lot — it would make sense that there would be a middle stage between the historical past of 1899 and the spaceship future of 2099. If the whole thing is actually happening in a present-day 1999 (with some of the 70s and 80s-era furniture now only looking a little dated), it would add a whole new dimension to things and make them more familiar to our own experiences. (And, yes, the three-headed Cerberus! Such awesome symbolism, which also meshes well with the three points of the earth sign triangle!)

As for common tropes in shipping, like you, I'm generally not a fan of miscommunication as a vehicle for drama. (Like people overhearing things they're not supposed to hear, and then acting out based on it, without telling the other person what they overheard or giving them a chance to clear it up.) And while I'm such a fan of domestic fluff, I don't like surprise pregnancies, especially if they're used just to introduce more drama. Ironically, given that they're such a big part of 1899, I'm also not a big fan of love triangles. (But maybe it explains why I started shipping the one couple who aren't part of a triangle!)

I think that in the both the modern AU and the 1899 New York AU, Ling Yi tends to be the more emotionally expressive one. She definitely says what she thinks and even when she doesn't say it, most of the time it's clear how she's feeling. (In the 1899 New York AU, Olek does have to do a bit more to pick up on things, just because she can't verbalize it to him as easily. But even in the show, they seemed to understand each other fairly well, even when conversing simultaneously in two different languages, so it's not as difficult for him as it might seem.) Olek is more reserved and finds it harder to fully express how he feels, although he finds it much easier to do so in a physical than a verbal way. There are definitely times, though, when Ling Yi has to drag things out of him and get him to use his words! But ultimately he feels things really deeply (still waters run deep!), so part of their growth together as a couple is Olek learning how to become more open and expressive.

[prototypelq]

Outer Wilds and the DLC

S P O I L E R S

B E L O W

_________________________________________

I can't say that Strangers' story resonated more with me than the Nomai's.

Nomai story rips your heart apart when you read the loss they've suffered, all the trials and errors and complications of their experiments, you read as they have an ethical dispute about the Sun Station, you read about their kindness towards each other and to future Hearthians. You learn their tragedy because the ATP could not be powered and seemed to be a lot cause, and I can only hope their end was peaceful when the Interloper came into the solar system.

Strangers' story is supposed to be an inverted (or maybe alternate?) events as compared to Nomai, but it actually feels like it consists of two polar opposites.

The first half is domestic, comfortable and quite homy. You see inviting wooden interior, nice chairs all around, a cinema gathering space, something like wine glasses all around. Pretty much every room has paintings mostly consisting of family portraits (with wives, husbands and children together!) or domestic life (playing a board game together, having a discussion over a table, something like crew member portraits too) and the temples all have a nice and peaceful atmosphere because of the lanterns and paintings.

Even the dream has Lots of homy/comfort qualities, if you consider that Strangers probably are half-noctural and dark is not unseteling to them. Despite being able to see in the dark (or not being bothered by dark) all of their trails are marked with candles which are lit when the area is used. Woodlands is literally a cabin near the river with a fireplace inside, and where they play music. Canyon has a cinema room with a (once?) huge library of slides, there is a dining hall, something like a rock garden, and a stage for musical concerts. Cove is a little village around a lake, sadly can't say much more here.

Strangers themselves should be fluffy with their feathers and all.

The music while traveling the raft is otherworldy sweet and sounds kike something angelic, or from a fairytale.

All of this is just sweet and domestic and very nice.

And, instead, what do we feel the entire playtime? Dread, wrongness and feeling of being not just unwelcome, but preyed upon. The wooden and metal floors always make sure your footsteps are loud, and they usually are the only sounds you will hear. Dark unsettling you is one thing, but mechanisms that activate only in the dark (ESPECIALLY when they take an already quite creepy portrait and change it To Actually Angry At You and also lock the door you are in) are entirely another matter.

(I let slide (ha) pretty much all the creepy expressions in the reels because that's just it - they are expressions and we are unused to seeing them. Just like when the Prisoner yawns when you meet him for the first time and you get a heart attack because of that. 'Creepy smiles' in the reels seem to me like they could be making hissing sounds, which are a way of expressing aggression for birds)

I do believe that this rift was intentional, and this is a story about regrets, coupled with fear and anger transform peaceful people into something twisted and horrible.

However

The one thing that breaks this story for me is the Strangers themselves.

Why do you consider Kaepora (I believe that's his name in the game files, it's the Prisoner) a friend? Well, because he talks (in whatever capacity he can) with you, and you share your experiences with each other.

Why does No Other Stranger attempt to do just that? They go straight to breaking your spine. No one else saw a weird four-eyed small blue creature without feathers and thought 'Oh wow, what is it?", every Stranger in the game except the Prisoner immediately goes 'KILL IT WITH FIRE'.

That's not how you tell a compelling story.

Is there any reason all of them try to kill you (Strangers don't know you're alive outside the simulation, so it can be considered literal killing of the Hearthian)? Maybe Prisoner somehow knows about you and doesn't try to end your existence on sight?

No. No, Strangers do not know you are actually alive and they don't seriously harm you, they just expel you from the dream. No, Kaepora (Prisoner) has no reason to act deviantly, as compared to entirety of his "living" species.

This is not how you tell a compelling story. The issue here is not that they are hostile towards you, but that they have no reason to, and none of them tried to communicate the issue that they have with you entering the dream.

How could you improve the story and resolve the issue:

I believe that the story of EotE could be improved if the Hearthian could connect with the Strangers.

What if the Strangers were actually curious about what the Hearthian is and how they got into the dream, but would turn suspicious and hostile if you try to find your way into the Archives. Granted, they can't speak much, and maybe not everyone would be friendly enough to offer your their projection staff, but that's Still Better Than Breaking Your Spine.

Maybe you could sneak around some more (have you seen the Canyon? It has TONS of rooms, there should be hundreds of Strangers there!) you can find some Strangers who were afraid of the Eye, but though that what they did to Kaepora was too harsh of a punishment, and he did not deserve that fate.

Maybe the patrolling owls (like, 4-5 out of 10 or so? in each temple) are extremists who believe the Hearthian is someone sent by the Eye (not entirely false?) of a horrible glitch that endangers them.

What if your motivation for meeting the Prisoner was based on a feeling to right a wrong and tell him that his actions were not in vain and Nomai succeeded because he has shown them the way? For all we know Kaepora could have lived all those centuries believing he had seriously endangered, and possibly, destroyed his own people by letting the Eye emit it's signal once again.

The tragedy of Strangers does not change if you add a little bit of peaceful interaction with them - you will experience and see the consequences of regrets, fear and anger that twisted nice deer-owl people into something terrifying and hostile, and you would be able to feel empathy for them, yet go against their wishes and pursue the truth, and only then will they have a reason to turn on you.

The story of the Nomai felt emotional and personal because you had lot of individual Nomai you could feel empathetic to. As it stands, there is only one Stranger you can briefly connect to, there is no reason why others don't try to, and you can feel sadness for their overall story, which is powerful, but not as powerful as if you had a cast of individual strangers with their own desires and fears which, in a sad turn events orchestrated their tragedy.

[heliads]

One to Another

When Bucky Barnes arrives at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters, he wasn’t expecting to meet an agent who had a similar past to him. However, their shared experience of being held by HYDRA will bring them together.

masterlist

Bucky surveys the room, his sharp gaze sweeping from corner to corner of the S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters at the Avengers Tower. Agents are scattered about, conversing in hushed tones or doing their best to pretend they’re working on critical tasks whilst secretly checking out the two Avengers by the door. A motley crew, but S.H.I.E.L.D.’s been helpful in tracking down HYDRA, so Bucky bites his tongue instead of lashing out at them.

Next to him stands Steve Rogers, Bucky’s childhood friend turned overly patriotic brother-in-arms. Steve can’t help a grin at Bucky’s surly expression. “Okay, I know most of them seem a little young or easily distracted, but they’re not as incompetent as they look.” Bucky grumbles under his breath. “They had better not, or they’ll have wasted all of their funding on new recruits for nothing.” Bucky’s eye catches on a solitary figure in the back, poised against a wall. She seems to be the only one here who actually might know what they’re doing.

Bucky jerks his chin at the silent woman in the back. “Who’s she?” Steve sighs. “That’s Agent Y/N L/N. Best in her year, and probably all the other years, by far. Trouble is, her high standing caught HYDRA’s attention, and she got captured and tortured by them for a long time about a month or so back. Hasn’t really rejoined the rest of these chatterboxes since.”

Steve lets his words sink in for a moment, then, not wanting to linger on the unpleasant topic, claps his hands together. “Right, well, we have an interrogation to get through. HYDRA Agent Donovan is waiting for us in the holding block a few doors down. Oh, and L/N’s going to be joining us for the interrogation. She wants to see if he knows anything about the thugs who captured her.” Bucky nods once and the two men walk to the holding cell, joined by a silent Y/N, who falls in step next to them when they pass by her.

The holding cell itself is desolately empty, save for a chair with a man chained to it. There are strong restraints holding him in place, and the man himself looks as greasy and unkempt as a classic movie villain. Beside Bucky, Y/N’s gaze becomes steely the second she sees the HYDRA agent, evidently recognizing him. 

Steve pulls out a manila file folder and starts addressing the man, occasionally checking the notes in the folder as necessary. “Robert Donovan, we know you worked for HYDRA for many years. Tell us everything about the October incident.” The man just laughs, showing his teeth. “You think I’m going to talk to you? I don’t waste my time with nationalist toy soldiers.” 

The man suddenly stares at Y/N, a grin sliding over his face when he sees her. “Well, look who it is! If it isn’t Miss Y/N L/N.” He leans forward as Y/N remains silent. “You know, we got to host you a while back. Wasn’t that funny, that we had you there for months and months and nobody ever-” 

The man is cut off as Y/N briskly pulls a gun from her hip and fires it once at his chest. The man slumps forward, and then does not move again. Y/N looks up at Steve and Bucky, taking in their incredulous stares. “It’s just a tranquilizer. He’ll wake up again, unfortunately.” With that, she strides impassively out of the holding cell.

Bucky moves to follow her, but Steve steps in front of him. “You don’t want to go there, Buck. She’ll want some space.” Bucky shakes his head. “I’ve been there before, a prisoner of HYDRA. I know how it feels, and I know that the last thing she wants is to be alone right after having to face the memories of what they did to her.” Steve gives Bucky one last questioning look, then steps aside and lets him pass.

Y/N is standing out on a balcony, staring out into the New York skyline. She doesn’t move when Bucky comes to stand next to her, just starts to speak quietly. “I’m surprised you came after me. Most of them want to avoid me. They’re too scared that if they start a conversation, they’ll have to face what they did to me.”

Bucky glances at her, then looks back at the view before them. “It was like that for me too, when I first became an Avenger. I don’t think I’ll ever truly be an Avenger, no one really trusts me enough for that. When I first started working with the others, it was like people wanted to make sure I was alright but maintain enough of a distance that they could leave without too much damage.”

Y/N sighs. “I thought I was fine. I thought I had a firm enough handle on things, but the second he started talking it was like I was back in the center of HYDRA control once more.” Bucky nods slowly. “One ex-HYDRA prisoner to another? It never goes away. You’ll always see signs of what happened, and you’ll always remember. The only thing you can do about it is try and move on, or take steps to make sure it never happens again.”

Y/N leans forward, folding her hands around the cold metal of the balcony railing. “I was afraid that was true.” She turns to look at Bucky for the first time. “You don’t really know the full story of what happened to me, do you?” At Bucky’s shaken head, she nods. “I’m not sure how many people really do.” She clears her throat once, and begins to speak.

“Everyone says that my capture was an accident, brought on by a squad of enemy agents storming my house or something. It’s not true-I was betrayed by my own fellow agents. I was working late at S.H.I.E.L.D. one night, and about a dozen of my coworkers were there. They were all people I’d known for a long time, and trusted with my life. The second there weren’t any witnesses, they swarmed me and knocked me out with some kind of chloroform. I took out a lot of them, but there were just too many and I wasn’t expecting an attack from my friends.”

“When I woke up, I was in a HYDRA facility. I was questioned and tortured for S.H.I.E.L.D. secrets for months. They placed a ransom for my safe return at the beginning of my stay, but no one ever responded to it. They knew I was there, and they knew they could get me back, but no one at S.H.I.E.L.D. thought it was worth their time. It’s a dangerous thing, to know their secrets, and I suppose S.H.I.E.L.D. thought it would be cleaner to just have HYDRA kill me rather than bring me out of there.”

“Eventually, S.H.I.E.L.D. broke into the building to rescue another of their agents, and happened to find me along the way. I hadn’t told a single one of their secrets, and had protected S.H.I.E.L.D. until the end. I wish I could say the same for them. Ever since I got out, I haven’t let myself get close to anyone here. I was captured by my friends, and I just keep thinking that it could happen again. Any one of these people in the room could be seconds away from bringing me back to HYDRA.”

She finishes talking, and Bucky stands there in silence for a moment. “Why did you go back to S.H.I.E.L.D.? You knew they didn’t protect you.” Y/N lets out a bitter laugh. “There is no retiring from S.H.I.E.L.D. Especially not after this. The only way you leave is with a bullet in your skull, either by your enemies or your higher-ups.”

Bucky lets out a low whistle. “You’re not alone, you know. We just met, but I want you to know you’ve got an ally if you want one. I don’t care how long it takes you to trust me, just know that I’m here.” Y/N lets a slight smile cross her face. “I think I already do trust you. Not even my closest friends know what happened, and here I am telling you, a man I met about ten minutes ago.” The two of them smile, and talk for a little longer before Steve calls them back into the interrogation room.

Later that night, Bucky is trapped in another nightmare. He keeps seeing the same scenes over and over again- the doctor, speaking to him when Bucky woke up for the first time with a metal arm. Being brainwashed. The last moments of consciousness before the ice froze his world into nothingness. Then, that feeling of losing all control and having to watch as he killed innocents, his own body slaughtering countless people all while he screamed silently from the darkest corners of his own mind.

When Bucky wakes up in a cold sweat, blankets thrown back around him, he still can’t tell if he’s in the nightmare or not. His heart is pounding, a pulsing drum that won’t stop echoing in his ears. Dazedly, he gets up, pulling on a light jacket and stumbling down the hallway.

He can’t go back to bed, too afraid of what he’ll see when he closes his eyes, and so Bucky slowly makes his way into the central living room of the Avengers Tower. He stares around him at the darkened room, which should be so familiar yet feels like he’s never seen it before.

“Come stand by the window.”

Bucky’s head flies up at the sound of the voice, but he forces himself to relax as he recognizes the shadowy figure standing at the far side of the room. It’s Y/N. Just Y/N. It’s fine.

Bucky walks slowly over to her, looking out at the city, which is busy even at these hours of the night. Y/N’s eyes flicker over him understandingly. “It’s better if you can see the city. It’s better if you can see where you are.” Bucky glances at her, confused. “What?” His voice sounds scratchy and exhausted, but Y/N just gestures back out the window before them.

“For the nightmares. When you wake up and you can’t tell what’s real and what’s not. When you look out the window, you can see the whole world before you. That’s how you know it’s not made up by HYDRA. No matter how detailed their simulations are, they can’t make up this specific view, or every car and person in this city. If you can see the world, and it looks right, you know you’re back in real life.”

Bucky lets her words wash over him in a comforting wave. She’s right. “Thank you.” He mumbles, and she leans her head against him. “Hey, one brainwashed soldier to another. We have to stick together, right?” Bucky lets out a hoarse laugh. “Who else do we have?”

He’s not sure how long they stay like that, his arm wrapped loosely around her and her head lolling against his side, but he does know that he clings to her like she’s the only thing in the world he can depend on.

[sp00kworm]

Rogue Feelings

Pairing: Hellboy x Male Reader

Warnings: Extremely Adult Content below the cut. 

A/N: This was a commission piece for @sleepy--bat​ who kindly allowed me to post this! I hope you all enjoy something a little...well very much adult haha. 

---

---

“Have you seen Red?” You walked into the library with a huff, looking over at Alice as she turned another page of her book, studying, seemingly ignoring you, “Alice?”

Alice jumped in her seat, looking up from the book on the table with wide eyes as she finally looked at you, “Huh?” She snapped the book closed.

“I said, have you seen Red?” You asked again, resting against the doorway as you tried to get a look at what she was reading.

She was quick to hide the book from your prying eyes, “I haven’t seen him since yesterday.” She tucked the book under her hands and folded them over the title with a smile before sliding it into her lap and tucking her ponytail of dreadlocks back behind her shoulder.

“Oh, you haven’t?” You asked with a scowl, “Well Ben said you were the last one to see him.” You scoffed, “So I guess I’ll go back to Ben and tell him he’s a liar.” With a kick of your boot on the floor, you turned to go back and annoy the shifter again.

Alice sighed, and threw her head back with a groan, “Fine!” She grumbled before reaching for the book in her lap and tossing it on the table.

 ‘Demon Anatomy and the Cycles of Devils’

 “Alice what the fuck?” You asked as you sat at the table, “What does this have to do with where Hellboy is?”

The medium pushed her fingers together underneath her chin and smirked, “Well if you look at the pages that I bookmarked it might make a lot more sense.”

With a suspicious look you opened the book, “Alice there’s a lot of diagrams of penises here and not a lot of explanations.” You fumbled through the pages, half curious and half distraught at the amount of demon anatomy being thrust into your brain.

Alice stopped your flipping with a finger and tapped the chapter title with a laugh, “This one, love.” She teased as you looked down at the words.

‘Mating Cycles’

“You better be messing with me right now, Alice.” With an open mouth you looked up at the medium. You regretted looking.

A smirk was plastered on her face as she reached for the hot tea on the table. She took a sip, still smirking at you over the top of the mug, “Why would I joke about this?”.

“I don’t know, but its usually to mess with me or Ben.” You scolded as you glanced over the parts about binding a mate to themselves. An interesting read without the current woman in the room.

 Alice rolled her eyes, “Ben will tell you the same thing.” She rapped her fingers across the table before tilting her head, “Speak of the devil and he shall appear.”

Ben scowled at her as he entered, “The devil will be less inclined to kick your arse.” He snarled, the scars on his face twisting before he walked over to Alice, and placed his hands on the back of her chair with a growl, “You were supposed to be in simulation training forty-five minutes ago, Alice.”

“Cry me a river, cat-boy.” She spat back as she stood and flexed her fingers, fingering her knuckle dusters as she stood, spinning them teasingly at the soldier, “I’ll kick your arse for fun then come back and finish my cuppa.”

Ben scowled at her before looking at the book in your hands, “Perhaps you should be more inconspicuous about yours and Hellboy’s…activities?” He let out a laugh as you hid the book underneath your arms, “That or go and help the poor fucker. He’s a dick normally, but he was unbearable yesterday.” The were-jaguar grumbled as he pulled Alice from the room, “Sort him out.”

The two of them disappeared through the library doors once again and you let out a deep sigh as you looked back at the pages underneath your arms.

“He’s locked in his room!” Alice screamed from the corridor before Ben growled once more and steered her away to the training room, leaving you alone with your thoughts once more.

 Hellboy’s room was entirely reinforced alloy steel. Inches thick and rather unbreakable. It was like a vault, sealed tight to stop him breaking out or someone getting in. A prison was what he usually called it. You had to agree most of the time. It was like a super reinforced cell made just for him. However, usually it didn’t stop him from punching his way out of it for a night on the town. You banged a fist against the door and waited for a reply. Nothing. Silence.

“Red! I know you’re in there. I asked Jacob in security to check the cameras!” You shouted as you stood in the hallway, tapping your foot against the steel flooring as you waited for the demon to open his door.

You heard a thud and an annoyed groan, “Piss off!” Hellboy shouted from inside.

“Don’t you tell me to leave, Red! I’ve had enough of you as it is! Open this door right now or I swear to God I’ll get someone to unlock it for me!” You threatened as you knocked again, persistent in your hounding of the demon locked in his room.

You jumped as a bang sounded from the door, “Will you listen to me for once!?” Hellboy snarled from behind it, his voice muffled by the metal, “I ain’t feelin’ good and I don’t want you on the receiving end of this one!”

 He sounded tense, like he was struggling to control his temper.

“Alice and Ben are worried about you…I am too.” You pressed a hand to the door, “Ben said you were more of a dick than usual.” You joked as you listened to what was going on behind the door.

Hellboy was silent for a moment before he replied, “Well Ben is an asshole.” He grunted, “Maybe if you like Ben so much you should go bother him.”

“Now you’re being a brat you oversized tomato!” You thumped at the door again, “You know full well I only have eyes for you.”

“Well maybe you shouldn’t!” He declared before stomping back into his room, his loud footsteps disappearing in the direction of his bed.

“You great oaf.” You hissed before opening, unlocking your phone, and ringing the security room. Jacob picked up, “Yes?”

“Open his door for me.”

“You know that’s not…”

“Open. It.”

“Yes, Sir.”

 The great locks churned open, clunking before the great vault door swung open to reveal a trashed room inside. You stepped inside with a confused look and closed the door behind you with a slam.

“Red, I’m coming in whether you like it or not!” You announced as you stepped into his small lounge room. There was a lack of grinding noises, but the bathroom light was on and his sander still plugged into the wall. There was rubbish all over the floor of the lounge, mostly made up of smashed pieces of the table. You stepped over a cushion impaled with a table leg and moved to turn off the bathroom light. A great sigh came from behind Hellboy’s bedroom door, and you headed towards the large doorway, carefully picking your way back through the rubbish once more.

“Hellboy?” You asked, softly, gentle as you reached his door.

“Why can’t you just listen to me…” He grumbled from behind the door, “Always ignoring me…”

You opened the door, “I want to help…” Your mouth dropped open as you looked at the demon laid back across his bed, cheeks flushed almost purple as he rubbed at his head and tried to adjust his legs. He was half dressed, his bottom half covered in slack, soft, black jogging bottoms. There was a moment of silence between the two of you as you gazed at the picture before you. Your gaze lowered to the strained fabric over Hellboy’s crotch.

 “Well this is awkward.” Hellboy grunted as he sat back against his headboard, legs spread to stop his own large thighs from pressing against his genitals, “But since when do you listen to me, huh?”

“This is what all this drama was for? Because you’re in season or whatever?” You asked softly.

“Don’t say it like that.” Hellboy grumbled, “Makes me sound like some sort of animal. Which I’m not!” He snapped, his pointed tail swishing irritably by the side of his bed. His stone fist clenched rhythmically as his orange eyes looked up your body, raking over the tight uniform of the BRPD, which you had been forced to wear since arriving. Hellboy’s assistant. Most people called you his wrangler. The boy-toy. Hellboy tended to get handsy then, usually meaning one or more people ended up in the infirmary with broken noses.

“You’re being…” You stopped when he rolled over onto his side, hooves scrunched up, knees bent as he hid his face from you, his tail swishing grumpily, “Such a meathead, HB.”

The demon peered over his shoulder, hair spilling over his shoulder as he rolled himself back to face you, “Not the worst thing I’ve ever been called.”

 You stepped into the room as Hellboy’s orange eyes looked you up and down, admiring the tight shirt over you as you snapped the lock on his door. His red tail perked up with interest, debauched ideas streaming through his mind as he watched you walk towards the bed.

“You could have told me…” You whispered, reaching a hand towards his chest.

Hellboy felt his chest flutter underneath your warm hand and he reached for it with a low rumble, clutching the fingers with his human hand, keeping your touch on his skin, “Its not entirely normal, babe.” He rumbled as your fingers threaded through the fur down his stomach. He caught your hand before it could reach the waistband of his joggers.

“But its part of you, Red, and I love every part of you.” You promised as you let him just hold your hand. He placed your palm against his cheek and smiled as your fingers rubbed against his sideburns. You threaded your fingers into his facial hair as you moved to sit by him on the bed, perched on the edge.

Hellboy shuffled back from you, recoiling, his right-hand grazing against your wrist, but not holding you, just pushing your hands back, “This ain’t a good idea.” His tail snapped like a whip against the bedding, “You could get hurt. It was bad enough last year in Mexico. I thought I was gonna…”

“Kill somebody?” You offered with a half-smile. You pressed your hands against his stone palm and rubbed at it softly, trying to sooth the worry coiling in every muscle of the demon.

 Hellboy rumbled again as your finger wandered over the stone of his arm, stroking the swirling patterns over the hellish coloured rock. You passed the top of the rock, just below his elbow and connected with his skin, gently circling the red skin, feeling the tension in his bicep as his breathing fluttered.

“Stop that.” Hellboy whispered, “You don’t know how hard this already is, sweets.” He plucked away your touch again and levelled his orange gaze at you, “I don’t wanna hurt you.” He insisted, “And I’ve never…I’ve never rode this thing out with another person! I don’t know what I’m capable of or…” He shouted until your finger pressed over his lips.

“Are you done worrying now?” You asked as you flopped yourself against his chest, feeling the burning heat of him through your uniform, “Because I know that you won’t do anything to hurt me.” You insisted as Hellboy wrapped his arms around you tight, pressing you against his front, your head resting on his pectorals.

“You ain’t listening to me is my problem.” He grumbled as his tail reached to coil around your waist, the end poking against your skin. The demon held you possessively, “But…I’m.” He groaned in exasperation, “Fine. You can have your way then.” He relented, sagging back against the cushions, throwing his stone arm up into the pile as you grinned down at him.

 “You might want to get undressed before we start.”  Hellboy purred underneath you, the words whispered, dark and deliciously, against your cheek. You shuddered against him as his hand moved down your back, following the curve of your back before he squeezed at the flesh of your backside.

“You want me out of my clothes that badly, Red?” You teased as the demon underneath you rumbled, enjoying your attention as you laid your hands on his chest again and rubbed at the hair on his chest, fingers teasing over his nipples, watching his red skin go flush with a myriad of purple tinted red. It was a puce colour, a red mixed with purple, almost brown. Puce suggested it was a foul look for him. It was anything but. The bright flush on his cheeks and chest was endearing. The embarrassment suited him. You pushed against Hellboy’s chest, leaning back, slotting your hips against his own as you settled yourself back comfortably before you stood up from him, swinging your leg over his hips, escaping his grabbing hands.

“I wanna rip you out of it all.” He growled, watching as you kicked your shoes and socks off. You pulled your jacket off with a smirk and then tugged your shirt off, revealing your skin to his hungry orange eyes. He didn’t move from the bed, sprawled back, fiddling with the elastic of his waistband as you unbuckled your belt and slid it free from the trouser loops. Your bottoms followed as you shimmied them off your legs and kicked them into the pile with the rest of your clothing.

 “Somehow those briefs look hotter than they ever have.” Hellboy groaned as he pushed his jogging bottoms down, revealing his hard cock and thick thighs.

You laughed at the desperation in his tone, “They’re no different than usual.” With a hum you followed him in pulling at the elastic from around your hips, giving the demon a peak at your crotch before you tugged them back into place and placed your hands on the edge of his bed, leaning over, peering at him as he touched himself.

“Are you really just going to stand there?” He huffed at your smile, “I wouldn’t mind a bit of help.” He all but purred as your hand squeezed at his left arm’s bicep, admiring the squash of the muscle underneath your fingertips.

“I might just pull up a chair.” You whispered hotly, teasingly, before you reached for his bottoms and eased the soft fabric down his thighs, watching Hellboy flinch as your fingers grazed his skin.

“If you pull up a chair, I think I might drag you out of it.” He promised as he tugged his hooves from the clothing and fisted his dick again, squeezing the base of his erection with a shuddering breath.

“I know you would, Red.” You chuckled as you sat on his thighs.

 Hellboy grumbled at your underwear, a stone finger slipping under the elastic of your pants before he grazed the rough texture over the curve of your ass, “Take these off.” He grunted as his hips thrust upwards, jarring you against his thighs, his red cock bobbing, even though it was still enclosed in his fist, “Please.” Hellboy whispered as you knelt on your knees and tugged the fabric down, awkwardly wiggling upwards to get your legs out of the holes. Hellboy took your underwear in his hand and grinned smugly as he pressed the crotch of it to his nose before tucking them under his pillow for safe keeping.

“You’re gross.” You were cut short and whined as his fingers clutched at the meat of your ass again, human and stone, grinding into the flesh as he dragged you up his legs, meeting your hips in a rough, jarring slide.

“You love it, baby boy.” Hellboy rumbled as he pressed his lips against your neck, grinding his nose into the flesh between your neck and shoulders, inhaling deeply against your skin. You shuddered at the name. Hellboy gave you a hot kiss as you melted against his chest, his facial hair rubbing against your skin as you wrapped your arms tightly around his neck, opening your mouth to his advances. Your tongues met in a wet exchange before he domineered the kiss, demanding rights to explore your mouth. Happily, you complied to his control, one hand easing down his chest, kneading at his chest, squashing the large pectorals as you continued to kiss.

 You pulled away for air far too quickly for your own liking, the desperation to breathe making you whine at the demon.

Hellboy grinned up at you, looking at your flushed face and swollen lips. He leaned up to bite at the skin and tugged on your bottom lip with another growl, “One nickname and you’re already ruined. What happened to all that bravado, baby boy?” He purred darkly as the fingers of his stone hand gripped your ass tightly, leaving grazes on your skin as his human hand reached to stroke your cock, “I think its my turn to wind you up…” He hummed against your neck before watching your own fingers wrap around his cock, both hands squeezing rhythmically around his shaft. It was too large for both to cover completely, the end weeping in his desperation to fuck something other than his own hand.

“Fuck I can’t…” He moaned as your hands trailed up and then down in a featherlight touch, “I’ve been fucking my own hand since yesterday to the idea of this. The idea of fucking you has…” Hellboy’s orange eyes burned as you squeezed the tip of his cock. Fangs snarled at you as you pulled away, red lips peeled backwards in a harsh display before his pointed ears shifted up and down, “Fuck!” He cursed as his cock twitched in his own lap, clear precum clinging to the hair down his stomach.

 “Hellboy…Do you have lube?” You asked, half delirious as he commandeered your lips again, exchanging spit once more before he gathered himself.

The demon heaved a deep breath with another snarl before his stone hand slammed at his nightstand, “Shit!” He cursed before he held you up with the stone hand and searched with his other in the mess of items from the drawer. After a moment, he sat back in the cushions, and held up a bottle of lubricant with his thumb and finger. He was quick to snatch your wrists with the stone hand, gripping them in front of you tightly as he spread his own thighs, spreading your legs wide, opening your cheeks to the fingers of his other hand. They sought your entrance, already slick with the lubricant, a moment later. You never even heard him open the top of the bottle.

“You ready, baby boy?” He asked, eyes full of lust but serious and in the moment.

You nodded and relaxed over his legs as a finger massaged at the tight ring of muscle, gentle as he eased his way inside, one finger at a time. One long finger stretched you open, and you clenched around the thick finger, breathing as evenly as you could manage. You squeezed at his stone fingers your mouth open as you let out a breathy moan. A second finger breached you a few moments later, pumping just as gently as the first, easing you open a little more. The third was a surprise and you gave a great moan as Hellboy popped it inside.

“You sure about this?” He asked again.

You gave another shuddering moan, “If you don’t shut up and…”

“Got it baby.” He teased as he grazed a bundle of nerves inside of you.

 Hellboy’s finger’s slid free, leaving you feeling empty.

“Hellboy.” You whined as you were pulled forwards, your dick grazing against his own. You thrust your hips against his own and opened your mouth to receive another messy kiss as he growled, fangs bruising your lips. He turned the fangs against your neck and purred in delight at the blood and bruises welling under your skin. A dexterous tail slid around your waist, holding you up as Hellboy poured lube over his cock, fisting his dick as he quickly spread the lubricant over himself.

“Shh, baby.” He rumbled as he slid his cock between your buttocks. The head grazed your entrance before he slid home, slowly easing you down on his demonic sized dick. The lubricant eased the way dramatically and your thighs smacked with a wet slap as you paused over the root of his dick, already feeling a little too full. He snarled underneath you and held your hips steady before he eased his own hips up the last few inches, impaling you fully on his cock. Your moan made his ears twitch and the demon smirked as you sat there in his lap, stuffed full, wet eyed and asking for him to move. He did after a moment, hips snapping upwards as his stone hand gripped your waist and dragged you up and down, impaling you repeatedly on his dick. Words seemed to escape the two of you and you whined for another kiss as he started a snapping, heavy rhythm, in and out of you.

 “Hellboy…” You moaned as you pulled away from his heavy, addictive kisses, “I want you to come inside me.”

Hellboy growled, his head pressed to your chest, pointed tongue licking at your nipples as he ground his sanded horn stumps into your muscles, “Fuck yeah.” He cursed as his cock twitched inside of you, “I don’t…I don’t know how much…” You kissed him before he could finish and gripped his long hair as his hips stuttered and so did your own. His hand sought your cock between your legs, stroking you as you took him to the root, moaning into his mouth as your cum splattered against his stomach. Hellboy let out a growl, then a moan, before he pushed your hips down further, fingers gripping your ass as his cock twitched and fired a heavy load of cum straight inside of you.

“Fuck…” He cursed again as his orange eyes went lidded, another shot of semen pouring inside of you as you felt your entrance go tight.

“Shit!” You reached for his cock and moaned as the feeling of a sharp barb tugged inside of you, “Is…Is that a barb?” You whined as Hellboy’s hips moved, another drip of cum searing inside of you before he managed to realise what had happened. A few soft barbs and an inflated knot at the base of his cock held the two of you together.

“Oh shit!” He cursed as you shuddered in his lap, “Baby, I swear, I did not know that would happen.” He appeared sheepish once more, his face flushed with a familiar purple tinted red as he held you tight against his front, stroking your face gently, trying to soothe you.

 The demon beneath you peered down in shock as you started to laugh, “Uh? Babe? You okay?” He asked as he tilted your chin upwards.

You whined softly as you moved your hips but settled against his plush chest happily, tracing your fingers through his hair, “I have no idea you had a knot…” You trailed off as he shuddered, “Looks like we’re stuck for a while in any case, but before I…” You yawned, “Before I fall asleep. I love you, Hellboy and nothing like this, nothing about you, could ever put me off or send me running, because you’re perfect just the way you are.” You kissed his chin and settled down, watching his eyes go wide before he sniffed, cringing, and hiding a tear as he returned your kiss.

“You’re too good for me.” He grumbled into your hair, “I love you too.”

You smiled against his skin and kissed at his blush.

[jbeshir]

Confusion Around Newcomb’s Problem: Theories of Counterfactuals

So the big reason I’ve been sitting this discourse out is that my take on the discourse has been that it seemed to be to be mostly people with different theories of counterfactuals talking past each other, with no one having read any of the papers that explain what a theory of counterfactuals is.

My main suggestion on all of this is to read one or more of the papers discussing various decision theories, what differs in them, and the different questions they ask to make their decisions. Towards Idealised Decision Theory is a relatively short (13 pages without the citations) one which I think deconfuses things considerably. But I’m going to give explaining a go! I might make errors here, since I’ve not checked this off anyone else.

Very roughly: The disagreement is over how you resolve that as a deterministic/by-hypothesis-perfectly-predictable entity, reasoning conditional on yourself performing any action other than the one you are, in fact, going to do, suffers from problems with contradiction. You need a theory of counterfactuals- a method for constructing hypothetical worlds where you take each action in order to choose between them- to decide where you introduce that potential contradiction at.

Causal Decision Theory’s theory of counterfactuals works by blackboxing (in a somewhat underdefined way) the physical system that is you, and for every action, holding everything not causally downstream of that physical system constant while updating everything casually downstream of it.

It, more or less, answers the question of “If a hand of God reached into the universe at this point and changed my behaviour in a way that ignored causality, what behaviour would I like them to give me?”, and accordingly is big on two-boxing, accepting awful deals in (one-shot) Ultimatum Games against a counterparty who could perfectly predict what they’d accept, paying out in the Counterfactual Blackmail Problem, and defecting on perfect copies of itself in one-shot prisoners’ dilemmas.

Evidential Decision Theory’s theory of counterfactuals works by, for every action, supposing that you observe yourself to perform each action and holding nothing constant.

It more or less answers the question of “If I could see myself take any action, which one would make my expectation for the world highest?”. This sounds a lot like “I choose the action that leads me to expect to win/get the million dollars”, but it’s also big on paying out in XOR blackmail (”If you receive this message, I the superhonest and great predictor predict EITHER that all your investments lose all their value before you can sell them XOR that you will send me $1,000 in the next 24 hours″) and does other weird things.

Updateless Decision Theory’s proposed theory of counterfactuals works by blackboxing (in a somewhat underdefined way) the abstract computation that is your decision making process given all its current parameters, and for every action, holding everything not causally downstream of that computation constant while updating everything causally downstream of it.

It more or less answers the question of “If a hand of God reached into the universe and changed the output of the decision-computation that I’m doing now everywhere it’s instantiated, what would I like them to change it to?”. This is much like CDT, except that it treats the behaviour of all perfect copies, simulations, and sufficiently good predictors (in its “somewhat undefined way”) as also causally downstream of your decision. There’s proof-based (suppose that UDT(observation) = action, what I can prove from this is downstream) and graphical (more CDT looking) conceptions of this.

(There’s also Functional Decision Theory, which I’ve not read about yet, and Timeless Decision Theory, which as far as I can tell is in effect just an earlier name for graphical UDT.)

Which of these appeals to you most probably depends on your position on other things. Of these I lean to UDT personally; CDT and EDT are both reflectively inconsistent, in that if you had them you’d wish you could immediately self modify/make binding precommitments to behave differently under a wide range of circumstances, and there’s circumstances that seemingly adaptive human intuitions differ from both. I would like to one-box and get my million, but also not pay XOR blackmail. UDT as I read it is very heavy on determinism; the rebuttal in that mindset to “you can’t change the past” is essentially “you can’t change the future either”, it views you as not changing but determining the behaviour of anything that is, ever has, or ever will evaluate you with sufficient fidelity, which might either put you off or feel like a way to resolve decision-making with your views on determinism, depending. But there’s a lot of handwaving you need to take on faith that there’s a tidy version in there somewhere.

Mostly though in terms of talking about what choice is better than another in Newcomb’s, it comes down to different ideas of what action selection is doing under determinism/in the presence of extremely good predictors, and how their counterfactuals are being constructed. If you’re answering “which action leads me to expect a world where I get money” and someone else is asking “which action would I like a causality-breaking agent to make me do” then that’s going to go around in circles until that’s properly noticed and addressed.

[fanfalc-616]

The Rights Of A Nindroid

Chapter Twenty-One

(Previous Chapter Here)

I was gonna post this tomorrow because it’s late right now, but... I don’t know I just have no impulse control and I’m posting it now lol

Unfortunately, even with the development of the Falcon, things aren’t much better.

See, Cryptor can’t let Kyle or any one know that he has access to the Falcon, so he has to just… keep on doing what he’s been doing. Following orders, being a pawn.

Still, he does have the relief of being able to easily talk to Zane and sometimes Sentry when in the sanctuary of the lockers. That makes things at least somewhat more manageable.

But that doesn’t make this damn illusion of a maze any easier.

He’s clearly not supposed to know that it’s a simulation, but with the help of Zane’s Falcon, it’s ridiculously easy to tell that it is.

"Come on General, you can do it! You say you're smart, right? Prove it!" Kyle’s voice echoes through a speaker- or an illusion of one.

Cryptor grinds his teeth, fighting to prevent his emotions from showing. “I’ll try, Master.” He gets out, still trying to concentrate. You can solve a maze by sticking to the right wall… he thinks he saw that somewhere.

He spends a few more minutes trying to figure out where he is before sighing, shaking his head. Did they purposefully make this to frustrate him?

Knowing them, they probably did.

Groaning quietly, he starts to go back to solving the damn puzzle.

Then he pauses. What if he climbs the walls? If he gets above it, he could easily see where he’s supposed to go.

Granted, he’s probably not supposed to do that, but no one explicitly said he couldn’t, and it’s worth a shot.

So he turns to the wall and starts fumbling for a grip, trying to see if he can haul himself up.

Once again, Kyle’s annoying voice shows up. "Wouldn't try that if I were you-"

It takes everything Cryptor has to avoid snapping at him. Can this brat just-

A sudden electric shock from the wall sends him tumbling downwards, and he lands shakily, barely managing to keep his footing.

"Told you."

Pure rage is building up inside of him, but Cryptor forces it down, trying to keep a hold of himself. He can’t act up. He has to behave. Even if Sentry isn’t at stake anymore, his way of contacting him might be discovered.

He takes a deep breath as he steadies his footing. “You did, Master. I should have listened.”

Cryptor fucking hates his life. How did he even get into this?

Right. Pythor was legally his owner and the government accepted Cryptor as a bribe so that the damn snake could avoid prison.

Which was illegal, but no one really cared.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Kyle questions.

Cryptor tenses at the words. Is he supposed to actually answer that? What the hell should he say?

“No thanks.”

Why. Why is he like this. What the fuck is wrong with him today? Or in general, really. He’s definitely got some issues.

Gee, maybe if he thinks real hard, he can come up with a reason why.

"Please reconsider?" He’s asking a question, but his tone implies that he’s not going to be taking no for an answer.

“What do my thoughts matter to you? You don’t-“ Cryptor cuts himself off. “I- I’m lesser, right? What I think and feel doesn’t matter.

The words are bile in his mouth. This really is how he lives now, huh? Just… lesser. Forced to be whatever they want him to be.

… eh, life could be worse.

He could be Zane and be in a relationship with a bunch of idiots.

Kyle sounds slightly annoyed. "Doesn't matter if the thoughts aren't interesting. I wanna know, so tell me."

“Well my main thought here is how much I want to beat your face in, but I’m guessing that-“

He freezes, sudden realization hitting him as he processes what he was saying.

“Wait-“

"Alright." Kyle’s voice is calm, but there’s a darkness behind it, something that’s showing that he’s barely holding back some kind of angry response.

“I- I didn’t mean to say that, I- I’m sorry, I-“ Cryptor fumbles to find words, but Kyle doesn’t want for him to bullshit his way through an excuse.

"Nice try." Kyle’s voice is tight with annoyance, that rage still hidden behind it. "Too late, though."

Why does Cryptor keep doing this to himself? Really, he should know better by now.

“... I’m going to go out on a limb here and say I’m in trouble.”

"Look at that, you are smart after all." Kyle’s voice is passive aggressive now; every time he speaks more and more of his emotion is bleeding through.

Cryptor curses quietly. “Don’t suppose I can talk my way out of it?”

"Because that worked so well five minutes ago, didn't it?" Yeah, Kyle’s definitely pissed off.

Wonderful.

“I- I’m gonna go back to solving the maze now.”

Cryptor hates the fear in his voice, he hates how controlled he is by this damn brat, but he is, and there’s nothing he can do about it, nothing but be a pawn in whatever game he’s playing.

At this point, the goal of the game seems to be to fuck up the pawns as much as possible.

So he goes back to the maze, silently debating the pros and cons of what would happen if he flipped off a camera.

He decides against it. He’s already in enough trouble.

Cryptor doesn’t say another word as he carefully does his best to solve the maze- and while it takes hours and hours and actually the entire day- he manages to make it out.

He looks over at a camera. “I’m not going to get to go back to my locker, am I?”

Even though it’s technically a question, there’s no doubt behind his words. He knows full well that he’s in trouble- and a lot of it, at that.

"Don't ask questions you know the answer to. Saves a lot of time." Kyle sounds almost indifferent now, but Cryptor knows that he’s still going to get hurt- badly.

He forces a nod. “Yes, Master.” He agrees, waiting for the guards to drag him off to the room that he actually never left.

The damn sensory manipulation is really getting on his nerves.

When the illusion is lifted and he’s able to see how he’s chained down again, Cryptor doesn’t bother trying to look up and make eye contact with Kyle.

He’s in enough trouble as it is.

"I'm not really in the mood to joke with you right now, so I'll make it quick." Cryptor isn’t looking at him, but he can hear the annoyance and frustration in his voice.

Biting back a snarky remark, Cryptor nods, breathing out softly. The sooner this is over, the sooner he can go back to the locker.

Before he gets the chance to blink, Kyle is suddenly in his face, grabbing him by the chin and forcing Cryptor to look him in the eyes.

"I'm starting to have enough of you.” He snarls lowly. “I'm the only reason you're not in pieces right now. Martha isn't at all fond of your… Personality. And I might just end up agreeing with her."

Cryptor feels himself tense up at the words, shock and near terror overtaking him as he processes them.

He’s not sure what to say- is he even supposed to say anything? Should he apologize? Stay silent? What the hell is he supposed to do here?

After a moment, he opts to remain silent, wishing he actually had his face plate so that he could close his eyes and not have to keep looking into the malice filled blue ones that stare into him.

"I'm getting tired of this. So I'm saying it one. Last. Time. Don't talk back to me like we're friends. I can accept the snarky remarks, but you were out of line. Way out. Either you correct your behaviour yourself or we have ways to make you. There won't be a next time. Nod if you got that."

Cryptor tries to ignore his terror as he mutely gives a shaky nod. He…

He doesn’t want to die.

When Kyle lets go and steps back, Cryptor drops his gaze to the floor, his whole body trembling in the sheer terror flooding through him. He knows the blond well enough to realize that he’ll follow through on the threat.

He’s unchained and is taken from the room, but they don’t have to drag him- Cryptor doesn’t resist.

But as they reach the doorway, Kyle’s voice calls out after him.

"I will break you,” he promises darkly, words dripping with venom.

"And you're going to thank me for it."

Cryptor feels his terror increase tenfold as he tries to make sense of the words. Before he can even begin to understand the true meaning behind the threat, he’s taken away, back to his locker.

The door is closed, but his mind is still racing, fear is still rushing through in every single wire and gear he has, and he feels almost nauseous- if it’s even possible for a nindroid to feel something so human.

(“Cryptor? Are you okay?”) Zane’s voice questions, but Cryptor can’t think of a response, he can barely even hear his own thoughts.

(“Please, just… leave me alone.”) He sounds pitiful, weak, pathetic. Just as worthless as he’s been told he is.

(“Cry, you can talk to me. I can hel-“)

Cryptor sucks in a deep breath. (“No, I can’t. I wish I- it’s not…”) He doesn’t have the words for the emotions tormenting him, he doesn’t have the words to describe the twisted feeling in his guts, he doesn’t know how to explain the sheer helplessness that’s overtaking him.

(“Stop talking, Original.”)

(“You weren’t given permission to speak.”)

[laurelleghuleh]

OCAF | Ch. 3 “Heart, tell them what you came for”

Warnings: read the masterlist first

Songs: “Tell Them” by James Blake, "Forever & Ever More" - Nothing But Thieves, "Bad Man" - Esterly, Austin Jenckens

LEVI'S POV

"You shouldn't be here. Do you miss prison so much?" I asked her.

"I'm doing anything wrong. Please, get lost..." she paused and then slightly turned her head, just to say "captain".

Captain. I repeated the sound of her voice articulating that word a couple of times more. Captain. Captain.

"Tch. I don't care. You should be in your room, sleeping"

"I can't" She confessed.

Well, apparently, I wasn't the only one not able to catch some sleep.

"Again. I. Don't. Care. Go back to your room"

She stayed silent, ignoring me and still staring at the sky.

"Oi. Are you deaf? I said. Back. To your room. Don't make me repeat myself or I'll push you down the building"

She suddenly turned her head over her shoulder, staring at me intensely. If looks could kill, I'd be dead right now. And yet, on second thought, her eyes were pretty reddish. Glassy. Close to tears. Was she crying before I caught her?

Too distracted by my own thoughts, I didn't notice she had slowly gotten up and pretty close to me. "You are all talk, captain, and no trousers, you know? Always threatening me with death and yet here I am. Still very much alive. Living and breathing"

Her tone ignited something almost animalistic inside of me. Something wicked. And at that moment, I totally lost it. Who she thinks she's talking to?

I fiercely grabbed her collar, brought her to the very edge of the roof, almost shoving her out of it.  One of her feet slightly whipped out of the corner, but her face remained stoic. Stony-faced. She grabbed my wrist to steady herself like she was trying to provoke me, fight me, but still stayed almost unmoved.

Looking me dead in the eyes, she was waiting for the death sentence from her executioner. Not a single word. Not a single whine. Isn't she afraid of me? Isn't she even afraid of dying?This must be a bluff. And yet, she never flinched.

Enough. I decided to let her go, throwing her to the ground. "Back to your room" I said once again.

"Captain?" she mumbled while I was already closing the roof's door behind my back.

Again. Captain. Captain. I turned back.

"Captain, before you go... I wanted to say... I-I'm sorry"

"Ok. Got it. Now, back to your room"

"No" She declared standing up, right in front of me "N-not for this. Well, also, but I wanted to say that I'm sorry... for Farlan...and Isabel... I've never stopped thinking about it. You know, about your reaction. They were close to you, weren't they? I'm so sorry... I was ordered to-"

"Don't" I interrupted her "Don't be sorry. It wasn't your fault. You couldn't know and that was your mission, right?" and then we stared at each other for what seemed a very long time.

I was looking for something else to say or some way to say nothing at all, but a little voice inside me told me to speak. To talk to her about it. But why? So, I soundly sighed and opened my mouth.

"Yes" I declared "We were close. Friends, you could say. More like a family, actually" She immediately tensed.

"I told you, don't be sorry... I don't need your pity" I spat as she was lightly shaking. What is the matter now? Why does she even care? Criminals don't care.

"I am. I am sorry" she replied straight away.

"You know, I'm pretty familiar with the underground. It challenges you in any way humanly possible until you can't bear it anymore, until you are capable of the most horrifying things, just to survive. Swim or you'll drown, right?"

She flinched a little and then said "So, I was right. You are the guy from the underground"

"Yeah... to be honest, our stories are pretty similar" I confessed.

"I don't think so, captain"

And then again, my childish curiosity spoke for me: "So tell me about it, cadet"

"There isn't much to say... You already know pretty much everything. Just a regular thug from the underground. Before that, to quote one of your comrades, a slut. A poor orphan making a living by working in a whorehouse. Oh, and I once was a survey corps' prisoner. The rest is history"

I couldn't find the right word to say. She really was a prostitute. And Oruo had the audacity to provoke her like that. I felt so upset. He was a great soldier but... a loutish most of the time. I was still speechless. If only she knew that also my mother used to work as a pr-...

"Well, captain, I've bothered you long enough now. So, I-"

"Forget about it" I suddenly spat "Whatever happened back then forget about it. Let your past die and most importantly, don't have any regret"

"Like you did?"

"Yes, and like you should. Be a better person. Do something good. Make new friends"

"I'm tryin-"

"No, you are not. I saw you today. I observed you. You barely speak to your mates. They are your comp-"

"I know you stared at me the whole time, captain" She teased me looking up at me. Was I staring at her? Was it that obvious? I thought.

"Shut up. That's my job, cadet. I have to survey you and your fellows"

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, captain"

"Tch. Be more sociable. Full stop. Now, back to your room..."

"Look who's talking..."

"Cadet. I warn you: you're playing with fire"

"I'm just saying that I did everything I was supposed to do today. I ate. I trained. I didn't try any "funny business" as you said, so-"

"That's not enough. You have to trust them and they have to trust you. Some of them will join the Survey Corps. Some of them we'll be in our squad, so you need to trust them. The next expedition will take place soon, so be more sociable. End of discussion"

"Ok, I wasn't sociable, buuuut I observed them if that counts for anything"

"Tch. Let's hear. Enlighten me, cadet. Share with me some of your wisdom"

She frowned her forehead, upset by my little tease, and then she started "Some of them are already both talented and motivated, like that Mikasa. Then we have a bunch of "I don't know why I'm here" beefy guys. Similarly, a bunch of "I want to be here but I don't know if I should", you know, the motivated but poorly skilled type. Still, I admire their spirit, like that Armin. He seems a nice person. And lastly, the ones who give me chills. Like that blondie, Annie. Her eyes looked almost dead... Even though she was the only one truly challenging me during the combat, she mumbled some nonsense, like that she wants to survive, she won't join the survey corps. And yet, she was one of the strongest in the group. Weirdo. Oh, and talking about weirdos, let's not forget our Jean. He hit on me three times. Three. Only during the training. And then once again soon after it ended"

"So, you can be very talkative when you want to, Daphne" And also, she had quite a good intuition. She could really read people. Wait... Did I just call her by her name?

"I-I was just trying to give you my point of view, captain..." Is she blushing? "I need some more time to trust them" She continued "I'm not good at socializing, let alone trusting people. I'll do better next time"

Yeah...I know what you're talking about...Trusting people ain't my thing either.

"Try. And now, go and try to sleep" I ordered "Tomorrow it'll be quite a busy day. Erwin just informed me there'll be Eren's sentence. Have you heard of him?"

"I heard Mikasa and that short blondie talking about him. They seemed pretty worried about him. So, is it true that he can shift?"

"Yeah, he's the guy. Tomorrow the Supreme Commander will determine which division will look after him... well, survey him. He's fundamental for our mission. We can't afford to lose him. So-"

"Yeah, I know. Back. To my room." She sighed almost mimicking me. I stared at her dead in the eyes. She enjoyed teasing me way too much for my liking.

"Good night, captain"

I nodded, unable to respond, while my head was still focused on that captain.

DAPHNE'S POV

I think I'll never get used to the sky.

I've dreamed about that so many times and yet I couldn't still find my peace. It felt like I couldn't allow myself to feel at ease, let alone content to even that view.

I had no choice, and actually, their offer had given me a little more time to think again about my plan. I would have wait and then, when the right opportunity would have come, I'd run away.

Maybe during the next expedition...What a coward, I thought immediately. I couldn't not only accomplish my mission but also I was no use to their cause. What a coward. Maybe I should have helped them, for a while, and then escape.

I was so conflicted, confused.

That night changed everything for me. When that thing, the titan, attacked me nothing else mattered. Any worry I had ever had in my life couldn't compare. Its expression haunted my thoughts throughout the day as I was trying to plot my way out of that place.

I needed to go back to the underground again, I couldn't let things that way. Wait for me... Wait for me, Abi...

As her face appeared between the shining dots of the wild blue yonder, a single tear dropped down along my cheek to my jaw. "Crying won't fix anything, you coward. Stop it" a voice in my head told me.

And that's when I sensed him. Someone. No, Levi was watching me, and soon after I said something to get his attention. He was just surveying me, yeah sure, but still, his presence didn't bother me that much, quite the opposite.

Scratch that, not only the titan, also the captain and his revelation about being the guy from the underground haunted me all day and for the rest of that night too.

Fortunately, the night didn't last that long, and "a busy day" awaited me.

First thing in the morning I headed to the cafeteria where a quite enthusiastic Hange was already bothering an unfazed Levi.

"Good moooorning, little early bird!" she shouted at me, while Levi only nodded in my direction, simulating a greeting.

"Why so early, darling?" Hange asked.

"The captain had informed me just yesterday that today we would have had a lot on our plate, so I wanted to be ready as soon as possible..." I replied.

Sincerely, I didn't want to be in their way. The faster I would have gained their trust, the faster I'd had a chance to run away.

Moreover, Levi seemed rather pleased with my answer. Did I catch him hiding a little smile in his cup?

"That's great! Since she's already here you two should accompany commander Erwin to the court, I'll go get the kid. I'm so thrilled to finally meet hiiim! See you there!!" and so she left.

Again, I was left alone with the captain. He took another sip and then extended one of his arms to a table behind him. "Here, eat something, so we can arrive at the court before the crowd" said Levi, not daring to even look at me.

"Good morning to you too, captain... and thanks anyway" I didn't make him repeat it and I did as he said. But here he was again, bossing me around while being nice.

He had prepared a cup of tea and some slices of bread with jam. Did he prepare it? For me? Is he just acting like a hunter feeding his prey right before killing it, or is he actually a caring person?

My little and silent breakfast was soon over, so we headed to the stable to get a couple of horses. Levi seemed to have his own and then he grabbed another horse for me: "Take care of it. Horses are pretty smart animals" he said while brushing his horse's mane "They have a great memory and they can understand human emotions. They'll read you right away...They are known to be able to smell fear, you know? So, remember what I said to you yesterday: forget about the past and be present. Moreover, don't be afraid. Whatever you're going to see today, trust me, trust us"

I nodded, swallowing soundly. I somehow did trust them. I trusted him.

"You're such a good little liar, aren't you, Dafne? You trust him, you trust them but they shouldn't trust you. You don't deserve being here, you don't deserve being a soldier" said again that voice.

However, we made it to the court and met Erwin right in front of it. I saw both of them chatting about something and before I could catch any clue the assembly had already started. The room was packed with people: soldiers from all the ranks, regular people, and even a priest.

"Get here, next to me" said Levi catching me by surprise "Be a good girl and stay quiet until the very end" When will he stop bossing me around?I want to punch him so bad.

"Now, look there. Right in front of you. See, that's the gendarmerie, our opponent. A bunch of chickenshit... If they win Eren's custody, they'll kill him straight away. And they still dare to call themselves soldiers" he explained.

I listen to him carefully as I scanned them one by one. Then Levi pinched my hand "Here he comes".

As soon as Eren got inside the room the air got heavier. The gendarmerie was pretty agitated, they made a big fuss while arguing with a mad priest. On the contrary, Erwin confronted them and without losing his cool he proved his point. He was in charge.

But still, everybody seemed to be afraid of Eren: what if he couldn't control himself? What if he was a bluff? What if-

While the whole commission was arguing, Eren was kicked right in his face. LEVI. What the fuck is he doing??? He kicked him again, and again, and again. Even harder than before. He was ruthless. What the-

But I soon realized what he was doing. He was trying to prove he was in charge, that he had Eren under his power. He was the only one who could have stopped him if necessary. Fair enough, but isn't he even a little afraid of that kid? Levi is still a mystery.

Soon after, Mikasa tried to scream and suddenly stood up. So, I moved closer and stopped her "Wait, Mikasa. Wait and see. Trust me" I told her.

It was a setup, I knew it.

When Levi was satisfied with his job, Erwin started to speak again. He explained once again how indispensable was Eren's power to their mission and proposed to assign the boy to the only one who could have surveyed him: captain Levi. The supreme commander accepted. They won Eren's custody.

Soon after the end of the assembly, Hange, Erwin, Levi and I escorted Eren back to the HQ and tried to help him with his bruises. Hange had carried some medicine with her, but Eren was so in pain. Levi had been far from gentle with him.

That's when I remembered an unguent Martha used to hand me whenever I encountered a difficult customer. I once was beaten up pretty bad and I still remember Martha's words "Here, take this. You know, sometimes this type of thing happens around here. Get used to it, babygirl"

Yeah sure, like it was totally normal.

However, I tried my best to replicate the recipe pretty fast with some ingredients brought there by Hange.

"What are you doing, cadet?" immediately said Levi, standing behind me and observing what I was doing.

"What does it look like to you, captain? I'm trying to help him out" I confronted him.

We stared at each other. None of us dared to look away.

"Oh, c'mon Levi, cut her some slack" said Hange.

I glared at him once again and then got back to my recipe. Soon after I was finished and I handed the unguent to Eren.

Half-kneeling down in front of him I said "It should help speed up the process. Or at least it'll help endure the pain. It contains aloe" I smiled at him, trying to cheer him up a little.

"T-thank you s-so much, it feels really nice" He stuttered.

"You're welcome, kid. You did well today" I said as I playfully rubbed his head. He giggled.

"Wooo, it's true! It does feel nice. Where did you learn that, girl? I want the recipe now" Hange said enthusiastically as she was applying a little of my unguent on her arm. "This girl continues to amaze me, I'm glad you two captured her" she laughed and then she turned to face both Levi and Erwin. And so I did too.

The captain eyed me. Unfazed. A penny for your thoughts, Levi?

However, I chuckled a little. Hange's fervor was quite contagious, I must admit.

Suddenly something else caught my attention: Eren's bruises started to fade away. What the fuck?! "I think I saw something even more amazing, Hange. Look at his skin..." I said pointing to him "I don't think that was my unguent" What kind of witchcraft is this?

"No, darling, that's the titans' power. But still... how fascinating..." said Hange, drooling. Another weirdo. Well, another nice weirdo.

However, that's what Levi was talking about before. "Don't be afraid. Whatever you're going to see today, trust me, trust us" he said. I turned around to watch his reaction and he instantly glared at me. A hint of a smile appeared on my face. I wanted him to know I wasn't afraid.

The more I spent time with them the more I could see what they were about.

Soon after, Hange escorted Eren back to his dorm, while Erwin, Levi and I headed down the hallway in the opposite direction.

Before he left, Erwin said "We made it. Another step further" and then he approached me "You did well today too. Thanks for handling Mikasa, she could have gotten herself into trouble without you"

"Don't mention it, commander. She was just blinded by her feelings. She was clearly worried about Eren's fate, I totally get it" I replied.

"Sure, but you demonstrated a lot of self-control and discipline today. Well done, cadet"

"I'm just good at reading people and situations, but thanks commander" I tried to minimize my actions. "Look at yourself: behaving, obeying, being a good girl... what have you become, Daphne?" that voice inside my head echoed once again.

The commander discharged us, so Levi and I headed to our respective rooms.

"Are you happy now?" Levi suddenly asked me when we were almost at my door.

"Excuse me, captain?"

"Now I'll be on Eren's ass. I won't have time to survey you" he said, getting close to me. Way too close "Consider yourself lucky, cadet" he continued.

"If you ever miss my ass, captain, you can make an appointment. I'll definitely keep myself free for you" I teased him, preparing myself for the worst.

His jaw tensed as he scanned my face. He inhaled soundly, never looking away from me. He looked like a wild animal, a predator. His eyes were running furiously all over my face, restless.

"Calm down, captain. I was just messing with you..." I hissed, almost feeling my own breath coming back to my face. He was way too close.

"I've already warned you. Smartmouth, drop it already" he whispered "Just because you behaved today, it doesn't mean I'm buying it. I'll still keep an eye on you"

"Oh, my dear captain, I know you'll do" I teased him.

My fault. I brought it on myself. He gripped my jaw with just his hand and so my head banged on the door. He stared at me furiously but a small grin painted on my face. You don't know who you're fucking with, Levi.

He groaned and let go of me. His expression suddenly changed: did he regret acting out of rage?

"C'mon captain, it's time to go to sleep, right?" I whispered massaging my chin and trying to make eye-contact with him.

Levi suddenly grabbed my hand and took it away from my face. With his left one he cupped my cheek, so he started stroking my jaw with his thumb. I stared at him trying to keep my heart from jumping out of my ribcage.

His thumb softly traveled back and forth on my jaw, while the other fingers stayed solid on the back of my neck. What was that all of a sudden? And the expression on his face...He seemed sorry. Then his eyes traveled from my chin to my eyes, looking for something. He sighed soundly and moved his attention back to my jaw.

He eyed me once again and then left me there, without saying a word.

Once in my room, another sleepless night awaited me, and yet another day came. I really was a lucky bastard.

However, when the daylight hit my window I got up, showered and then headed to the cafeteria where again a silent Levi was waiting for me. Sitting next to him was Eren, quietly eating. On my usual seating position, there were a cup and a plate. Again, Levi had prepared that for me.

I noticed the plate was stuffed with biscuits, slices of bread and some fruits. Was he making amends for yesterday? I smiled at him, but he stayed silent.

While I was still focused on the food, he shyly scanned my face, looking for some evidence of our last encounter. I saw him out of the corner of my eyes so I kindly asked "Is everything alright, captain?" but he just gave me a dirty look.

Once he was finished with his tea he started to speak "Today we'll move out of the HQ. We will travel a little and get to an old castle, which is actually the old HQ. There we will hide you, Eren, so that freak can continue her experiments on you in peace. Hurry up and meet me at the stable" and so he left.

I rolled my eyes, so Eren laughed a little. He was clearly afraid of the captain. How can I blame him?

"Scary, isn't he?" said Eren when Levi left the cafeteria.

"He is all barks and no bite, trust me. However, I guess he is just trying to be a good captain... in his own way, but I think I get it" I admitted.

"I heard he went hard on you too, right? You are the criminal from the underground... Oh, I'm sorry, it didn't come out that well... "

"No, don't worry. You're right, I am the criminal from the underground. And yes, he wasn't that gentle with me either" I said.

"But you don't seem frightened around him, how do you do that??" I really didn't know what to say... Maybe it was because if Levi wanted me dead, I would have already been worm food.

I didn't know for how long it would have lasted, but to be honest, judging from his last behaviors Levi seemed as conflicted as I was. Luckily for me.

After we finished our breakfast, we headed out and started our little trip along with the Special Operations Squad, also known as Squad Levi: that creep Oruo, Eld, Gunther and Petra. The elite squad of the Survey Corps, hand-picked by the almighty Captain Levi.

Once there, we all reunited in front of the gate.

"Oh God, this place is a mess. Look at all that weed!" exclaimed Gunther.

Indeed, it was a mess. A huge castle, for sure, but it rather looked like a dump now.

"In which case we have a problem, don't we?" said Levi, coming from our backs "Best get a broom and get to work".

Is he for real? A question mark appeared on my face and Petra immediately caught it.

"Oh, that was just the calm before the storm, now you'll see what captain Levi is really all about" she giggled as she took me by the arm, escorting me inside the building.

[ashdoesfandomarchieved]

Hey!! Could you write something shippy about Boimler and Mariner? What if Boimler regularly spent time in the holodeck acting out certain scenarios and situations with Mariner? 👀

A/N: This was way angstier than I meant it to be. And way less sexier. I apologize in advance.

ao3

She glares at him, mouth pressed into a thin line. “What happened to having each other’s backs? I put my ass on the line for you. Repeatedly.”

He winces. This conversation is not going how he’d planned. “Mariner, I-”

Mariner clenches her fists and straightens. “No, you don’t get to say anything after what you pulled. Fuck you.”

The image freezes and Boimler resets the simulation.

What seems like years ago, he remembers lecturing Tendi overusing the Holodecks for fun. The details are fuzzy. It was before the “GUYS I MADE US INTO A MOVIE'' incident with Mariner, but after that weirdass thing with Rutherford and his rogue program. He thinks she and Mariner had been using it to watch Ransom in an array of—what he now admits-hysterical situations—but can’t be sure.

She and Mariner have gotten up to so much shit, he can’t keep track.

He doesn’t know why he’s remembering it now. It was a random conversation that happened a long time ago—a few months after Tendi was assigned to the Cerritos? –so there’s no reason why he should be thinking about it right now.

Liar, a smug voice intones in his head. It sounds vaguely like Mariner. Boimler aggressively shoves it down.

This isn’t for fun, he anxiously tells the voice in his head. The voice is quiet. It does nothing to soothe the turning of his stomach.

It’s been three months since Boimler requested a transfer back to the Cerritos. Three months since he’d run into Rutherford and Tendi on shore leave and the three of them got swept up into a ridiculous, interplanetary civil war that took three different starship crews to settle out. Three months since he’d almost died more times than he can count on all his fingers and toes, three months since he thought Tendi had died, miles away from her home, on a world which would never remember her name, three months since Mariner swept in and fixed everything.

It’s been three months.

Not that he’s counting.

Somewhere between being in a remote alien prison with Tendi and hiking for a month in a perpetually dark wilderness with Rutherford, Boimler had come to the belated conclusion that his career didn’t take precedence over his friends.

(Also, if he’s being completely honest, he missed the chaos of being a lower deck ensign. Not that he still doesn’t want to be in the upper ranks. Just not without his dumb, dumb friends.)

After it was all over—and he’d realized that Tendi was alive—he put in his transfer request, surprising all his peers.

“This just isn’t a good fit for me,” was his official statement.

Captain Riker gave him a bland look. “You worked with Beckett, didn’t you.” His voice was flat, but his eyes were amused.

“Is it that obvious?”

“She rubs off on people. Don’t let her give you a hard time,” he added, signing off on the request. “It was nice working with you, Boimler. If you ever need anything, let me know.”

And so here he is, a newly minted ensign again, on the lower decks of the Cerritos.

(Captain Freeman is thrilled. “All operations have been down by 18% since you left. Good to have you back, Boimler.”)

Tendi and Rutherford seem hyped to have him back-Tendi especially, who’s been a little clingy with everyone since her near-death experience-but are acting uncharacteristically nervous around him. This isn’t a surprise. The tension between him and Mariner when she’d shown up on Roxadt II was insane and was only getting worse with every day. It’s been six weeks since he’d transferred, and she’s found a reason to be in a different room for all six of them.

Hence the simulations.

That makes absolutely no fucking sense, the Mariner-esque voice in his head sneers. Just talk to her you fucking wimp.

Boimler ignores it.

“Scenario A-187,” the clinical voice of the simulation intones. The simulation restarts.

It goes exactly the same way 186 other scenarios had gone. He corners Mariner. She stays quiet. He apologizes. She explodes.

Mariner’s anger had always burnt red hot. He’d first experienced it when an ensign got a little frisky with Tendi after she’d repeatedly told him no. Mariner’s fury at the situation felt justified. Vindicated. The ensign had been demoted so hard, Boimler was certain they’d seen the last of him for like. Well, forever.  At the time he’d been astonished that she’d managed to pull it off, but after finding out about her familial connection to the Captain, it made sense.

He’d seen a glimpse of that anger a few more times—when Captain Freeman had forced her to go to therapy, after Rutherford had been captured by rogue Klingons, that one-time Ransom tried to promote her.  But never toward Boimler.

Oh, she’d get irritated with him.  “Loosen up, Boimler, it’s not that bad.”

“Look, the worst that’ll happen is that we get a note to file-stop yelling!”

“Dude if you don’t chill the fuck out I might actually throw you out of an airlock.”

Standard Mariner reactions, right? Yeah, she’d been pretty pissed when he took the promotion (his voicemail had been blowing up for the first 48 hours after he transferred), but it had died down fairly quickly so he had logically assumed that she had gotten over it.

He assumed wrong. If her icing him out was to be taken into account. So here he was, six weeks in, desperate and stressed from his friend’s apparent dismissal. The obvious solution, his sleep deprived brain decided, was to simulate a conversation with her using his high-tech program on the holodeck.

This may have not been the best idea. But he’s calculated the probability of anything going wrong and it’s under 3%, so he’s almost guaranteed success.

(So, of course, it blows up in his face, in true Boimler fashion.)

“Okay, I have a pretty high threshold for weird, but this might take the cake,” a voice slowly says.

Boimler startles. Whirls around. Shuts down the simulation. “Ohhh shit-”

“Yeah shit,” Mariner says, stalking into the room. “What the hell, dude?”

“This isn’t what it looks like!” Boimler sputters out, panicked. The simulation is shut down, leaving them in the empty holodeck room, but the echoes of Holo-Mariner’s rage still resonate between them. Actual Mariner is staring at him, face somewhere between completely shocked and furious.

“Did you use your dumbass hyper realistic program to simulate a situation with me so that you could cheat later?”

“I mean, kinda?”

“Then it’s exactly what it looks like!” Mariner slaps a palm over her eyes.

“Well what was I supposed to do?”

“I don’t know—maybe talk to me like a person? Not use your creepy, hyper realistic simulations to roleplay it?” She drops her hand and glares up at him.  

Boimler rolls his eyes. “You literally created a simulation to kill the entire crew because your mom made you go to therapy.”

“Yeah and it fucking worked.”

“Then why are you yelling at me?!”

“I’m not!”  she shrieks. “I’m very calmly telling you to fucking talk to me next time!”

“There’s not going to be a next time!”

Mariner stops, mouth open. “What?”

“Look, I get it. I fucked up and you apparently don’t do second chances! I was trying to make things right but clearly it isn’t working. I’ll stay out of your way now.”

Instead of pacifying her, this seems to make Mariner even more furious. “You fucking asshole. what am I supposed to say to that?” she shouts, stomping up to him.

He groans in exasperation. “Apparently nothing, considering you don’t want to talk to me!”

Her hands grab his collar, pulling him down to eye level with her. “I literally just said to talk to me next time!”

“And how was I supposed to do that if you’re avoiding me?”

“You’re the one who fucked off in the Titan to god-knows-where,” Mariner grits out.

So they’re actually doing this. Boimler swallows hard. Takes a breath. Tries to quell the anxiety welling in his gut. “I’m sorry.”

“Right after you said you didn’t care about rank or shit,” she adds, twisting the knife.

“Yeah. It was really shitty of me.”

“And then you ghosted me for like six months.”

Boimler winced. “Yeah—I. Yeah.”

Mariner’s iron grip on his shirt loosens, but she doesn’t let go completely. “That was really shitty of you.”

Not sure what to say, beyond apologizing again, Boimler gives a jerky nod.

“You came back.” She stares at him, eyes unfathomable. “The Titan wasn’t everything you dreamed it would be.”

It’s not a question.

Boimler still has an answer, though. “It was.”

She stiffens. He pushes forward, intent on getting this out while he still has her attention. “It was everything I wanted in a career. I was doing what I wanted, everyone took me seriously. Our missions came straight from the Admiralty and they treated us like we weren’t a joke. I loved it.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Because I care more about my friends then I do about people taking me seriously.”

Mariner freezes and then lets out a strangled laugh. “Now I think you’re the simulation. Who are you and what have you done with Boimler?” She pokes at his cheek.

He grins. And then falters. “For what it’s worth—and I know it’s not worth much—but. I am sorry. I wasn’t a very good friend.”

“Yeah you weren’t.” She lets go of her grip on his shirt completely and draws back. “You said you were my best friend and then you left. For Riker.”

“That makes me sound like the love interest in a cheesy drama. And like I’m hooking up with Riker.”

“I said what I said.”

Boimler laughs. It feels real for the first time in a long while. “Are we good?”

“No.” Mariner smiles. “I’m going to give you so much shit and you’re gonna grovel for like months and then I’m going to tell my mom that you used to holodeck to simulate certain situations with me.”

“If you do that I’m transferring back,” Boimler tells her. “Your mom finally likes me; I don’t need her ejecting me out of an airlock.”

“She wouldn’t do that.” Mariner waves him off.

“She totally would.”

“Yeah, she totally would,” she agrees. Grabs his arm and begins dragging him out of the holodeck. “So maybe I won’t tell her. I am telling Tendi though and she’s gonna give you so much shit considering you reemed her out over misusing the holodeck.”

Boimler makes a face. “I’ll probably let her too. I’m such a hypocrite.”

“You are, but it’s super weird to hear you be honest about it. Stop being all apologetic, it’s weird.”

They’ve reached the corridor. Mariner steers them in the direction of the bar. “Only if you promise to deck me if I ever make a dumb decision like that again,” he says, giving in and allowing himself to be manhandled. It’s the least he owes her.

“Deal. And the next time you use your weird, hyper realistic simulator—which doesn’t even fucking work by the way, I’m not that much of a bitch—you gotta promise you’ll use it for sexy reason only.”

“Sexy reasons only,” Boimler deadpans. “You know they log everything we do down there.”

Mariner wiggles her eyebrows up and down. “I know.”

“You’re disgusting.”

“And you’re uptight, but you’re the one who was playing with simulations of me.”

“That sounds way worse than it actually is,” he cringes.

“No, it doesn’t. I would take some sexy action over your sad, sad trauma simulations any day. Next time I catch you, you’d better be having fun with it.”

“Mariner, what the fuck—”

They dissolve into good natured bickering. She says something lewd and he rolls his eyes and elbows her and she squawks in protest and threatens to get him thrown in the brig. It’s normal, but it’s also not. There’s something new in the air between them that wasn’t there before. Tension, but not negative. It’s charged with. Something else.

Boimler doesn’t examine it too closely. Better to let it work itself out naturally. After all, he has all the time in the world now.

[dream-wreck]

Count On You

Surprise! “Count On Me” has an unintended part 2.

Chapter 2 Title: Count On You Rating: G Word Count: 1,668 Description: When the office door closes, Neil can be alone in his own world. That's not always a good thing.

…..

Of all things, Neil missed spaghetti the most. Jarred red sauce, fifty-cent pasta, pre-grated parmesan (if he was feeling especially bougie). Nothing could beat it. He didn’t miss the reflux, but he’d deck his esophageal halls with ulcers if it meant eating a real meal, a heaping bowl of comfort food that would leave him full and sluggish and knock Insomnia flat on its back.

Neil ran his thumb over a medicine-purple protein bar wrapper, smoothing out the perforated ends between the flesh of his thumb and index finger. The yellow POWER BAR logo rippled and glimmered under his office lights like a cheap trick.

Clearly, the graphic designers had no idea that their chosen font and colors made the meal replacement look like a cartoon villain’s mind-controlling sugar bar. This one was supposed to taste vaguely reminiscent of peanut butter, which he’d discovered was easier to stomach than the artificial vanilla flavor that stuck to his tongue for hours after the fact.

He tore the wrapping down the middle. The sickly brown bar revealed itself, shedding its tacky cape.

He took a vengeful bite out of the bar, feeling as triumphant as he possibly could while chewing something that tasted like cardboard soaked in old peanut oil. Just last week, these weren’t so bad. He could stomach them and they had tasted pretty decent.

I was thinking of you the entire time, he’d eventually say to a heaping bowl of angel hair pasta and marinara.

Eventually. One day, soon. When all this was over, Neil could quit skipping meals and popping pain pills like tic tacs and Mentos.

The single bite of bar began to disintegrate in his mouth the same way a bad piece of gum chewed too long turns into a compound of sand and slime. Neil choked the mixture down and lunged for his water bottle. Empty. He turned to the mini fridge and pulled out an ice cold energy drink that had been sitting on standby, untouched, for months.

“Don’t tell Eva,” Neil said, snapping the tab open in the vacant room. The drink went down cold and sweet, washing the gritty paste from his tongue. He’d regret the caffeine in an hour or two, but for now, the familiar bubbles were worth whatever he had coming later.

A lot of things had become worth it recently. He banished the pitiful excuse for a protein bar to the bottom drawer, sitting down in his desk chair, staring at the paperwork that so desperately needed filing. A fib, of course. He’d never filed paperwork on time in his life. Lying to Eva....Neil had yet to discern if that was worth keeping any secret.

What secret? In the end, what could be worth keeping from her? That Neil Watts was mortal? Extraordinary, but mortal. Extraordinarily mortal.

He thought of Eva sitting outside the men’s room while he retched, stretching to keep pace with him in the hall, reminding him about the simple things. There is so much said in reminding someone to take care of themselves in the little ways, to drink water, to take time. Neil wished he were a better listener, that his pride would crumble for a day or two, long enough for him to set good habits and be honest -- with himself, with Eva, with everyone.

Fluorescent humming grated his ears, burned his eyes. He felt new sickness swelling. He shut his eyes to the room’s blue white.

He’d worry a lot less if Eva would just let it drop. She cared too much, that was her problem. She was usually good at hiding it. At work, of course, surrounded all day by dying people and their repressed traumas, you need to find a way to push through it all without completely breaking down, balancing visible empathy with healthy detachment.

Crying in front of the clients doesn’t get the job done, and it certainly doesn’t look good on evaluations.

Their particular line of work called for expert compartmentalization. Eva had mastered concealing a naturally compassionate disposition behind cold professionalism, efficiency, and control. It was never just another day at the office for her, even if she’d sometimes seem unfeeling when the chips were down.

Neil knew her too well. She always wanted to help. She was a problem solver, always trained on an objective, never one to dwell, to stutter-step, to second guess. She never let things lie. Why should a problem go unsolved?

He used to hold that against her, that she couldn’t let things be, that she could get a little control-crazy when things shifted from their right places into wrong places, drifting away from order like moons out of orbit. But she wasn’t the one who had to cheat on her entrance exams. And between the two of them, she seemed to have her life under control.

Neil Watts had looked to Eva Rosalene for a lifetime of answers. He could count on her for anything. She always came in clutch (he’d been watching a lot of Esports streams lately, picking up on the lingo during his late night nausea fits).

It wasn’t a question of whether or not Eva cared about him. It was a question of, if Neil truly believed in Eva Rosalene, why on God’s green earth had he not told her a lick of truth about what was really going on? He dove down for a good answer, or even a scrap of a convoluted selfish reasoning, but resurfaced empty.

In his coat pocket, a little blue bottle pressed against Neil’s thigh. He crossed his arms, but he only grew more aware of the light pressure resting there. It annoyed him, more than anything, like feeling a strand of hair brush along your skin, but just when you think you’ve swiped it away, there it is again, brushing just light enough to frustrate, to aggravate, to piss you off. Neil bounced his knee, trying to shake the coat off his leg, but the bump beneath the white cloth just moused its way back and forth, prodding.

He should do that paperwork. Listen to music or something to pass the time.

His stomach roiled. Neil slipped a hand into his pocket. He closed his fist around the smooth bottle, ran his thumb over the cap, catching his thumbnail along the ridges there. Comforting, he thought. The action really did calm his nerves.

Eva was across the hall. Fifteen steps away. A knock away. A conversation away.

Neil didn’t bother to set a stopwatch so he never knew how long he sat there, his thumb running back and forth over the ridges in the lid while his mind wandered, imagining the many ways that conversation could go, the look on Eva’s face, the disappointment. Daydream Neil started crying, but Real Neil didn’t think that was very dignified, so he started from the beginning, approaching Dr. Eva Rosalene in her office. Figuring she’d probably be busy, he reset to the cafeteria. A nice talk over lunch. When Eva burst into tears and people from the surrounding tables looked their way, Neil chose the park, even though they weren’t in the habit of going to the park together and never had been. But it was quiet, undisturbed. A gorgeous day in this self-revising simulation. He guided Eva to a bench. They sat down. Eva told him to take his time, that she knew something was wrong, that she was glad Neil could finally talk to her. Yes, he was ready. It would be amazing to finally say it out loud. To someone else. To confide. To confess….

He opened his eyes to the harsh light.

Confess? What was that word doing, flitting about in his stream of consciousness?

An email notification pinged on his desktop. He moved to open it with a click. It read:

If you’re up for it, they’re showing Inception and the Cowboy Bebop movie tonight. It’s the weirdest double feature ever so I have to go, it’s the law.

Popcorn’s light on the stomach, right? Let me know, my treat. --Eva

Perfect. He could talk to her then. Simple, easy as that. All that melodramatic daydreaming over nothing. He could talk to her then. Besides: free food.

Neil’s stomach suddenly felt very, very empty. His usual nausea felt like he was too full and ready to burst.

But it suddenly felt as if something small inside were eating away at everything, the lining and the tissue and the bile, hungrily consuming out of a gluttonous jealousy that which consumes. And when there would be nothing left, that small something would eat the air and the Nothing until an impossible vacuum remained. And Neil would also remain, nothing more than a container to conceal a parasitic anomaly, cursed never to be filled again.

His hand closed around the little blue bottle. The pills inside stirred, knocking against the walls of their plastic prison.

The emptiness in his stomach slowly spread into his hips and ribs, knees and neck, his head and the space behind his eyes, until his whole body felt hollow and the hollow spaces felt sore.

This moment was nearly one of those moments that change everything. Very important, nearly pivotal, but not to be realized, lacking the crucial self-awareness that would have sent things this way and that, particularly along different this-es and better thats. The manner in which a single rock falls prevents or triggers a landslide.

Neil drew the bottle from his pocket, poured two little white pills into his palm, tossed them back. They scraped down the dry walls of his throat, as though clawing for a foothold, before eventually settling in the cavern of his stomach, and almost instantaneously, the pain began to dwindle.

Neil didn’t stop to consider the impossibility of this. If he had, it would have made all the difference. But he didn’t, so it did not, and things seemed to remain relatively the same, the distant sound of tumbling rocks drowned by electric humming.

--------

Chapter 2 end notes: Ended up somewhere unexpected, as writing usually does. My fingers like to run without me sometimes. Pleasant surprises though! Thank you for supporting "Count On Me"! You all are the best :)

Wubnjeft

...

I've been reading a lot of science fiction lately.

[thegoldenreport]

MIND BENT

Pretending to be someone else is easy, especially when you’ve been doing it your whole life. Amber-Eye 098 is an top tier imitation artist from the Southern Moon district, who has almost twelve years of experience under her belt in deceiving the general public for fun.

She recently sat down with Golden Report executives to share one such experience - how she managed to infiltrate Jatty’s Candy Cave and impersonate the titular owner, while remaining undetected for three months.

If the name of “Jatty’s Candy Cave” doesn’t ring a bell for you or stir up a primordial urge to vomit, we highly recommend an appointment with your local re-education services to rectify the issue. But in the mean time, we’ll ask you a very simple question, what’s really in their candy?

Or to put it in a different way...

Are you meant to be seeing the buzzing, glitching, oozing shadow that stands in the corner of your room at all times?

…

AE098: Whenever I approach a new character, I choose to look first at their environment. Their people. You can tell a lot about how a person is supposed to act just by looking at their people.

Jatty’s Candy Cave, for example, is housed in a very elaborate sewer system underneath the inner city of West Logos. Jatty doesn’t voluntarily share this information, but somehow makes sure her customers spread it like the plague. She wants to be known far and wide, yet continues to stay hidden. Chosen isolation perhaps as a method of retaining control? A walking contradiction nonetheless.

Sending several camera flies into the underground system confirmed she didn’t work alone. A personal assistant named Rael followed her every beck and call. Visuals showed him to be a funny little man who changed his aesthetic and vocal inflection on the daily. Though tended to favor anything revolving around a space or astronaut theme. It was a good thing I wasn’t stealing his identity.

Jatty, on the other hand, donned an a-line purple skirt, skin tight black turtle neck, dark green combat boots (which just so happened to be the same shade as her nefarious chemical ingredient, zeroX), and a pair of velvet back gloves that extended her fingers into claws.

Unlike Rael, she wore this suit on the regular and showed no signs of switching it up. Which of course made things ridiculously convenient for my costumes associate. She does such a sublime job at matching garments down to the very fabric and shade. I had nothing but confidence in her work.

I remember spending long evenings in her sewing shop, top floor of the special ops building. Trying on the boots and pacing around the floor. Feeling out the walk of, shall we say...a potential murderer? An ill advised chemistry enthusiast? Mad science extraordinaire? I wouldn’t know for sure until I became her.

Everything is a performance. Everyone has a good side. Everyone loves to act for the camera that isn’t even there. You may be wondering why we even go through the trouble of full body espionage if we already send in a hundred camera flies to wire tap the place. To that I say again, everything is a performance. The name of the game is not just tearing down the curtain, but walking backstage. The one place a camera refuses to go.

Further audiovisual input revealed her voice to be low and musky, like she constantly had to be clearing her throat (of her own toxins, perhaps?). We had vocal modifier pills that could mimic this effect. And her walk was always brisk in comparison to the slower moving factory workers. She was a being in motion, a blur that could not stop for more than a few moments at a time. And it wasn’t just an urgency to it, but a nervousness, a real fear. I was excited to discover more.

In the days leading up to my deployment, special operatives performed what we like to call a body snatch. Methodically extracted in such a way that Jatty would not even think to deny leaving with us. We offered an opportunity, intentionally vague, but sweet enough to seal the deal. Or that’s how it started.

In reality, we slipped a sleeping agent into her water glass, while discussing terms in the late hours of the evening. I’m not entirely sure where they took her, but by that point, I was ready.

MEETINGS

This is the word I would use to describe my first month in character. I remember the night I slipped into her office chair, torn faux leather at a cherry red mahogany desk. I remember the stickiness of said office chair. I remember pouring through her journals, her agenda books, her middle school science books. She was a being on the move, constantly meeting with someone. But for what?

One such meeting that stook out to me was with a blue deer handler, and only in my second week of deployment. I had read about this particular blue deer. And the sweet nectarine like flavor of it’s blood. Our conversation was brief, speaking about his latest harvest for the factory. He had come across a surplus, could give more this month than before. I was immediately suspicious. Could this blood contain the hallucinogenic properties I had heard about?

Unfortunately, the answer was no. Can confirm. I tried it myself.

It was however the main component of almost all their candy’s flavor profile. But I couldn’t have cared less about the flavor.

CHEMICALS

My second month felt the most comfortable. No one had yet raised a suspicious eye towards me, save for a few factory workers who I quickly disposed of, as per my training. I had gotten used to the endless walking. Learning to digest informative material while on the go. Like all those mad scribbles in her middle school science textbook. Keeping all conversations either short or long depending on what the situation called for.

I had internalized every type of candy we made in the Cave. The pipes hissed. The air smelled like swamp water. The work room was a mental prison of blood, sweat, and flickering lights. It was here that I learned the ingredients. That I tasted the fruit for the first time. Although I was pretty good at pretending I had done it many times.

She must have built up a tolerance to the drugs they use if she does this on the regular.

The candy I tried was called Vox. A lime green sucker that slowly turns into goo as it melts in your mouth. The color is deceptive. One might expect it to taste like an apple or even a lime. It tasted like salted butter.

This particular candy among many others contained a key ingredient known as zeroX: an opaque, thick, dark green almost black liquid at room temperature. Meant to be highly addictive. Meant to simulate an adrenaline rush. Meant to make the whole body shiver. The eyes dilate. The palms sweat. You feel like an imposter in your own skin. You believe that the voices on the radio are talking directly to you. The paranoia crawls deep into your brain, filling the space behind your eyes.

But you don’t hallucinate.

Can confirm, as I locked myself in the chief office and rode out it’s side effects on the wave of a panic attack.

SECRETS

In the middle of month 3, we received a mysterious package from a tall man in a black trench coat. My assistant Rael brought it to me at my desk, during one of the few times I had felt comfortable sitting down. He seemed to know exactly what it was. And assumed I also knew.

It was a black box, no seams or openings, no buttons or lights or switches. The only thing of note was a silver etching of an eye marked out with an X. It was a symbol that made me shudder. I had seen it all over the textbook. I had seen it plastered on every police car and above every government building. It’s a symbol you should all know. That was the first secret.

Our own leaders were in on it. Turning a blind eye.

That was the beginning of the crack in my facade. That little pause. That miniscule choke before my answer. I noticed a glimmer of something in Rael’s eyes. Confusion. Doubt. Suspicion. Patrons not trained in this artform might miss a cue like that, but I knew I had to begin my extraction.

A week later, I exposed my taste to zeroC. One of two chemicals they used as zeroX was designated for hard candy and zeroC for soft. Only five percent of their production contained soft candy. They don’t talk about zeroC. They mix it under tables or in dark corners of the room where the light doesn’t touch them. Which leads to the second secret.

The black box was zeroC, ground up like powder to be mixed with the syrup.

I had been reading about this less popular ingredient written upside down between the lines of Jatty’s incredibly weathered textbook. Similar to the effects of LSD or DMT, but extremely more potent and infinitely more long lasting. Made with the same blood of that fantastical blue deer.

I was fearing the inevitable. My weekly tasting of the newest batch. I could not fake it. All the workers lined up to stare at me at I sat before their production table and consumed their poison. There are some things you simply cannot fake before that many eyes.

I felt the sweet juice explode in my mouth as the candy’s skin broke between my teeth. I swallowed with all the confidence of returning to my office to take a shot of my emergency counteractive medicine.

I immediately started to cry. A side effect I was not expecting. The emotion swallowed me as they all stared. Some perplexed. Some, dare I say, satisfied? I stumbled through the hallways. Rael chasing after me with a clipboard. I didn’t turn to look at him. Escaped to my office, shut the door, and locked it. Which brings me to the third and final secret.

I had been fooling no one. They knew.

Sitting behind the cherry stained mahogany desk was the real Jatty, holding the shattered remains of the syringe, which contained my antidote. Ice blue eyes magnified by the chemicals coursing through my body. Her glare pierced through my skull. I don’t know if she escaped, if I was set up, or if my extraction was on short notice. My supervisors have neglected to tell me.

But as I was there with knees buckled and tunnel vision, I saw the black shadow of a hand appear on her shoulder and she whispered.

Don’t forget this. You people have no control.

I blacked out after that. My supervisors came to collect me after some time. I felt their arms wrapped around me as they dragged me out, slipping in and out of consciousness. Unable to process the shocking and also very strange things I was hearing.

Something about not keeping the deal. Something about craving orange juice. Another thing about an early return. And another thing about wombats in space.

I was in recovery for three weeks afterwards while our physicians on hand constructed an antidote. The hallucinations have stopped, but the paranoia is still palpable. They offered me a mind wipe pill, asked me if I wanted to forget.

I told them it was impossible.

[poplinn]

I do think that the new outbreak of toxic people drumming up their toxic groups in this fandom is hurting people. They think theyre doing something right but all they're doing is making mentally ill and/or young fans too scared to enjoy or create in fear of being harassed.

Hi anon! first of all i want to apologise for responding so late. I have a lot to say about your ask and just wanted a clear head before i decided  to respond. i want to start  off by saying you are absolutely right.

Before i continue i am going to put a read-more because, well, i have a LOT to say about this, so, mini-rant ahead under the read-more…

These people are doing more harm than good.

I understand if you want to make a small list with content warnings, for a fandom, that is completely fine! But using such a list to start bullying, harassing, threatening and in general, witch-hunting people is not okay. Many great and talented people have been driven away from the fandom by that tiny toxic group(or the cucks, as i like to call them for easy sakes). Content creators are even scared to post their content too now, both of these things are a huge shame. It’s terrible. Sites like tumblr are supposed to be for sharing your content without limitations. [well, until the nsfw ban, but you get what i mean..]

I happen to be in contact with some people on the blocklist, and let me tell you, they are truly amazing and wonderful people. 

Yeah sometimes people make content you may not agree with, but that doesn’t mean you have start attacking people for it. Do you know how easy it is to click the unfollow or block button? But apparently some people are so stupid they prefer to screech instead of click one single button. 

But for example, I dislike a certain popular hc for medic. I dislike the Jewish medic hc. I’m a Jewish man myself, but I don’t like seeing Jewish medic for multiple reasons, none of which are out of antisemitic nature. What do I see when I see Jewish medic? I mind my own fucking business. The person who posted that wanted to create that, fine by me. I don’t agree with it, and I don’t have to. I’m not going to make a dumb expose list for everyone who ever said anything about medic being Jewish. I mind my fucking business like a normal, mature person. 

And there was/is a huge discussion about drawing or writing tf2 non-con…yeah, rape isn’t good. Every sane person knows that. Writing or drawing rape does not mean you’re a rapist (unless it’s an autobiography of course, then I’d like you to take a trip to prison). But, some people, including myself, write or draw non-con as a coping mechanism. I use confrontation to cope. I have a few triggers, and by confronting myself with said triggers I’m slowly getting over said triggers.

If I write or draw about these triggers or rape, I feel like I’m relieving my feelings about what happened to me. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, and i’m not the only person who does it like that. 

Yeah, I get people don’t always want to see that. That’s why tags exist, that’s why people use those tags for content and trigger warnings. That’s why you block those tags if you don’t want to see it.  It’s that simple

Also, some of them make the claim that fiction is reality. I disagree, fiction is not reality. Yes, fiction can impact reality, but it isn’t one and the same. If you can’t distinguish fiction from reality then, well, you’re either not ready for fiction or not old/stable enough to be able to tell the two apart. Besides, if fiction really IS reality then so many movies and books would have been banned, or the writers of those must have been in jail by now, right? Writing a book about a fictional serial killer does not mean the writer is planning to or already has commit murder. Take Tf2 fan-fiction writers for example. They write about dudes slaughtering each other on a daily basis, but some of them wouldn’t even DARE to hit a fly in real life. 

People who commit crimes because of a fictional piece were already going to do so to begin with. No sane human sees a crime that occurs in fiction and thinks to do the same. Those who do commit crimes because of a fictional piece were already planning to do so to begin with, and were probably not a completely hundred percent stable person.

And about the discussion of miss p being a lesbian, yeah I get that Jay said she’s gay and that, and if she really was a Canon lesbian, it’d be weird to ship her with men. However, those cucks do also make soldier a homosexual despite him having a (gorgeous) wife? Isn’t that kind of hypocritical? Anyways, Jay most likely was joking about miss p being gay, he’s known to be a jokey person like that. I feel like the way he did it was just saying “oh yeah btw she’s gay”. To me it feels vague. In the same sense that jk Rowling suddenly says everyone is gay in Harry Potter. Yeah, I hc her as a funky lil lesbian too, but i don’t go off on a tangent when someone sees her as bi, because the way she was “confirmed” as a lesbian, was vague and uncertain, and most likely a dumb joke that split the fandom in half.    

Anyways, most of the cucks I ran into are underage, and aren’t even allowed on this site, which can explain their irrational behaviour, and refusing to listen to anyone who slightly disagrees with them, but lemme tell y'all something, minding your own fucking business would have prevented this entire blocklist ordeal.

Besides, YOU are in control of what you see on the Internet. Don’t like a certain type of content? BLOCK IT! or just, STOP LOOKING AT IT! it’s not that hard!

You are responsible for your own experience on the Internet. Not ready for that? Then close your phone/laptop and go outside. Content creators are not responsible for what you do online, these creators don’t know you, don’t expect them to fucking take care of you, they’re not your parents. Avoiding certain content does NOT mean you have to start policing others on what to post. You have no right to tell artist what they can and cannot post. Again, you may criticise or dislike it, that’s fine, but actively demanding censorship or threatening the creator makes you look like an incompetent asshole. 

And if you disagree with something, it’s better to start with calming yourself down and contacting the OP in a respectful and mature manner. Maybe talk to them, broaden your horizon, broaden their horizon. Can’t agree eventually? That’s fine, it’s normal. Simply block the tag or the creator themselves and boom! You’re done, and didn’t harm anyone in the fandom and probably learned something, and OP probably too! If something isn’t tagged you can always, nicely, reach out to OP and ask them to tag. Most of the time they will. And if they don’t, just unfollow or block them if they continue posting a certain something that triggers you. Making a blocklist is one of the most immature things you could do. You bully and harass people to the point where some feel unsafe, and some even suicidal, in a fandom about a dumb fucking hat Simulator. Is that really what you want?? A fandom is supposed to be a safe and fun place for everyone who likes a certain something. By being toxic, and harassing others to the point where they don’t even feel safe(not only those who are young or mentally ill) in a what was supposed to be a safe place for them, you’re actively harming that safe place, and frankly, you don’t deserve to be in the fandom. 

Also, I’ve seen a lot of these cucks say they actually hate tf2 as a game, and really, if you hate the game so much why are you still here in the fandom? And ruining it for the rest for us?

If you do feel unsafe, follow steps I mentioned above. Talk to people, block tags, block people, and mind your own business without policing others in what they can and cannot do. Unfortunately, the creators who do feel unsafe because of the toxic group cannot talk them, because the moment someone even slightly disagrees with them, or tries to respectfully discuss why they’re being “cancelled” the cucks start screeching like full-blown autists.

You’re not the law enforcement, you are (most likely) a minor who isn’t even allowed on tumblr in the first place, and who has no idea how the internet, or fandom spaces in specific, even work.

Fucking hell I miss 2014 Tf2 fandom sometimes. 

~~

I hope this ramble makes sense, and again I’m sorry for making this so long.

And I’m sorry for posting drama again, I don”t like it either, and i usually have a lot of patience, but after a few years of this shit, i have come to reach my boiling point, and i just snapped, I’m sorry.

I sometimes refer to the cucks as you, idk why, but just now that isn’t referring to you anon.

Hopefully this will be the last of drama/discourse for now.

Thank you for reading, have a good day. 

-pop 

[thespacenico]

99 klance

“don’t look at me like that.”

。·:*:·ﾟ★,。·:*:·ﾟ☆

It always starts out the same way.

The mission is simple—get in, get the intel, get out. The security is relatively lax, nothing that Pidge can’t handle, and the place is run almost entirely by sentries, which aren’t exactly the sharpest tools in the shed. This might as well be a practice simulation.

Only, everything takes an unexpected turn when they discover a prison cell that effectively turns their simple covert operation into a rescue mission.

Which would have been fine. The team has certainly managed themselves in tougher situations. If they’ve learned anything, it’s how to be quick on their feet. Adapt.

But of course, Keith just has to play the hero.

Because everyone else is ushering the rescued prisoners onto their Lions, and Keith—Keith is watching, waiting to make sure that they’re all secured and nothing is out of place before—

“I’m going back for the intel,” he announces, the second that everything is in order and the team is gathered near him. “Everyone else, I’ll rendezvous with you back on Arus.”

The implications make Lance’s blood go ice cold, and yet they make his blood boil because—Keith is leaving again.

And then he has the audacity to turn to Lance and say, face close to expressionless: “Lance, you’re in charge. Lead the team to safety.”

Lance’s ears are practically ringing as everyone begins returning to their respective Lions, everything happening in slow motion around him and his direct line of vision, where Keith is already turning away—

“Wh—hey, wait—” He suddenly finds himself two steps forward, without remembering ever even taking them. “Keith, where are you going?”

Keith stops only long enough to spare a passing glance over his shoulder. “I just said I’m going back for the intel. I’ll catch up soon, just—”

Lance doesn’t quite know what exactly comes over him. “No.”

A tense pause, and then Keith is turning to fully face him, eyes darkened and expression stormy underneath his furrowed brow. “No?”

“Don’t look at me like that,” Lance snaps, tightening his grip on his helmet held close to his side. “It’s one thing to infiltrate this base with an entire team of people, but with just one of us—”

“I can handle it,” Keith says slowly. Warningly. It leaves a bitter taste in Lance’s mouth.

“You really want to take that chance?”

“Lance.” Keith’s voice changes. It’s hardened, but that only serves to make it clear that there’s something hiding there under the surface. “I’m asking you to stay here.”

“And my answer is no,” Lance insists, with as much finality as he can muster. “I’m coming with you.”

Keith’s gaze flickers, and something that looks almost like—worry, maybe, or concern—flashes briefly across his face, gone as quick as it had come. “No, you’re not.”

“It’s not a request, Keith.”

Keith presses his lips together. “I need you here to lead the team—”

“Shiro can lead the team,” Lance scowls. “He’s plenty capable, something of which you’re perfectly aware.”

Something of which Keith chooses to ignore anyway. “I’m not asking you again.”

“Fine by me.”

Keith’s eyes are burning, with what Lance can’t place. “Lance, I don’t have time to argue with you about this. Just—keep them safe, alright?”

“And what about you?” Lance shoots back.

But Keith is turning away again, evidently finished with this conversation, but Lance—Lance is not finished. And before he can stop himself, he’s reaching forward and grabbing Keith’s wrist on its backward swing. “Keith.”

Keith freezes mid-step, and turns slowly to look down at where Lance’s fingers are curled around him. And when he finally drags his gaze up to Lance’s face, Lance has to force himself not to physically melt from its searing intensity, all deep violet hues and flecks of blue like starlight in a swirling nebula.

Lance loosens his grip, but he doesn’t let go. He takes a deep breath to keep himself steady.

“I’m not watching you walk away again.”

That does it, for whatever reason that Lance doesn’t exactly have time to think about right now. Finds the crack in Keith’s defenses and wedges itself in further and further and forces the gap wider and wider until it all comes crumbling down and all that’s left is—Keith.

Not the flunked out Garrison fighter pilot, not the half-Galra, not the BOM member, not the black paladin, not even the red paladin—just, Keith.

Because his shoulders deflate, and he relaxes in Lance’s hold, and his eyes soften almost imperceptibly but undeniably and it takes all of Lance’s strength not to collapse at the sight of it. When he speaks again, his voice is low, rough, deep and vibrating in Lance’s chest, full of the same unnamed something that’s been making its home in Lance’s heart for a long time coming.

“I’ll come back, Lance. You don’t need to worry about me.”

Lance lets out a breath. “Keith, we’re a team. It’s literally my job to worry about you.” Keith glances down again at where Lance won’t let go of him. “We’re supposed to have each other’s backs,” Lance adds quickly, all in one rush of a breath, not even bothering to try to hide the desperation in his voice anymore. “You have my back, I have yours. That’s how it’s supposed to work, right?”

Keith lifts his gaze again, and licks his lips and opens his mouth as if to respond, but nothing comes out.

“Right?” Lance repeats firmly.

A pause. Lance wonders why Keith hasn’t made him let go yet. Their eyes meet—really meet—and he’s struck again by the fiery determination in Keith’s eyes that always seems to make his throat go dry.

“Right,” Keith echoes finally, quietly, just for them to hear.

Lance’s heart sighs with relief. He slowly releases his hold on Keith’s wrist but doesn’t go far. “So?” he prompts.

Keith seems to study him for another moment, and then he leans slightly to the side to signal Shiro, who’s waiting patiently from the ramp of the Black Lion. He nods in acknowledgment, and smiles, the way he does when he’s proud, and then disappears into the cockpit.

Lance shoves his helmet over his head and feels the familiar rush of adrenaline as his rifle materializes perfectly in his grasp. “What’s the plan, team leader?”

“Partner,” Keith amends, and warmth blooms in Lance’s chest and shoots through his body from head to toe as Keith’s sword materializes in his own hand and he smirks that signature Keith—not paladin of Voltron—smirk.

“Let’s go.”

[kcwcommentary]

VLD7x05 – “The Ruins”

7x05 – “The Ruins”

With the Paladin roster finalized as Keith in Black, Lance in Red, and Allura in Blue, and Shiro in nothing, and with the death of Zarkon, the title sequence for this show is antiquated. It now functions at the start of every episode as a reminder of what the show used to be. The opening title sequence for a show should always be a statement about what the show is, but this sequence is so far from what the show has become. The title sequence not matching the current content of the show highlights how the show has lost its sense of direction.

I like the first shot of this episode in that the nebula is pretty, the smallness of the Lions creates some of a sense of immensity for space. I don’t like the white trails behind the Lions though. They’re not shown to be moving through anything, so what’s creating the white trails behind them?

Hunk’s sleeping, and Keith yells, “Everybody up!”

Pidge is dreaming about getting “only [a] 99 on the test.” I guess some people – I’ll say Mitch Iverson, since he wrote this episode – think grade anxiety is funny. Grade anxiety comes from a lack of parental support. A kid thinks they have to earn the absolute highest grades possible to be able to keep their parent(s) from criticizing them, emotionally abandoning them, or even at the most extreme physically abusing them. Pidge has always had endless support from her family, so having her demonstrate having grade anxiety reveals this show sees intelligence as a caricature. The creators of this show, or at least the writer of this episode, included grade anxiety without having even a basic understanding of what it is. They just thought it’s funny how some clearly intelligent people are scared of not getting perfect grades. They’re mocking people with grade anxiety, not revealing character with Pidge.

Lance and Allura want to sleep some more. Romelle’s sideways on her bed, foot on the wall, head hanging off the side: her posture made me genuinely laugh.

Everyone except for Keith and Krolia have been sleeping. Keith says, “We can’t let this long journey make us soft or dull our skills.” It’s obnoxious for this show to have Keith equate the need for sleep with weakness. They have all been through really stressful events, it makes sense that they need to rest and recover.

Shiro speaks (what? he’s still a character on this show?). “Keith’s right. Routine is what got me through being Zarkon’s prisoner and being in the infinite void of the Black Lion.” What!? Having a routine can be very useful, but neither of Shiro’s citations are instances in which he created a routine for himself. Shiro was a prisoner. Prisoners don’t manage their time, those who imprison them do. If he had a routine while imprisoned, while having to literally fight for his survival, then it was because the routine was imposed on him by the Galra. As for being in the Black Lion’s psychic space, what exactly was that routine? Literally, what actions is he supposed to have done while disembodied and existing in endlessness? This line written for Shiro is ridiculous.

Keith won’t even give the other Paladins a chance to wake up, he’s already calling or them to conduct battle simulations. Krolia has programmed a new one. I still don’t feel that she’s earned the prominence this show is giving her character. She presents the challenge. “You’re on a planet with double gravity—” what does that even mean? double what? double Earth’s gravity? “—dense volcanic fog, and eight [some kind of] raptors are attacking. What do you do?” Keith thinks that “this is a good one.”

What’s the mission objective that’s supposed to be at the center of this simulation? They’re on a planet and local lifeforms are attacking. Okay, why are they on the planet? If the challenge is solely to survive the creatures, then just leave the planet.

One of the raptors latches onto the Yellow Lion, and Krolia yells, “A [whatever kind of] raptor just melted your face off, Hunk!” Krolia has not earned the position of integration into the group that she’s being written to have. It makes her presumptuous. I guess the personalities being demonstrated in this scene are supposed to make Krolia and Keith look like badass personality types, but it doesn’t work for me.

Krolia says, “Now it’s eight-on-four,” and Hunk quietly replies, “That’s fine by me. I’m eating.” If you’ve read much of my commentaries, you’ll know that I usually have a big problem with how this show writes Hunk and food, but I like his response here. I don’t blame him one bit. Hunk, you go get yourself some food.

The planet weirdly shoots like twenty-foot wide columns of lava hundreds of feet up into the air. It looks silly to me. Keith orders everyone to “split up to thin their numbers.” For a story that’s supposed to be about the development of a team, these guys don’t really work as a team often. If you’re being attacked, you have greater safety and defense as a group. That’s why a lot of animals have herds or flocks or schools. Separating from one another makes the group weaker. This is not good leadership or tactics. Keith gets hit by an energy blast from one of the raptors. What is with this show having so many animals that can emit weapons blasts?

For a place that has “thick volcanic fog,” as Krolia said and Pidge now repeats, they all can see really well. Does this show know what the word “fog” means? Pidge says that the raptors “must use some form of thermal vision to see us.” Again, this environment has been depicted as having high visibility, not any kind of fog, so the raptors could see just like the Paladins can. But also, if they use “thermal vision” on this volcanic planet, then the raptors would have a hard time seeing. Unless this show is making up something else with its use of the term “thermal vision,” what is being referenced is the ability to see into the infrared spectrum of light. Things that are warm radiate light in the infrared portion of the spectrum. If we humans could see infrared light, every time we looked at another person, they would be glowing. I like the idea of the show presenting creatures that see more of the spectrum that humans can, but what Pidge says here doesn’t make sense. She’s presenting the idea of the raptors having “thermal vision,” as their natural ability to see, that it’s somehow supposed to be an adaptation to living in “volcanic fog.” But if the raptors see infrared, then the heat of the “volcanic fog” would inhibit that vision. And the heat of the lava on the ground would be blinding. This show really cannot do science.

Lance says, “Maybe I can lure them away with my heat-rays.” Have the raptors been distracted by the large, hot plumes of lava that jet up off the surface? No? Then they wouldn’t care about Red’s fire cannon either. But Lance blasts some rock with his fire cannon, and the raptors fly off to check it out. It’s senseless, and thus contrived.

Allura, Lance, and Pidge all get taken out simultaneously by a lava plume. Krolia chastises them for having “focused too much on the raptors and forgot about the volcano.” I still don’t like Krolia. She says, “I programmed the simulator to be unbeatable. I wanted to see how long you survived.” In other words, Krolia wasn’t trying to help them with training whatsoever. This wasn’t designed for them to learn anything, not new skills, not something about their character, nothing. Krolia was just being a troll. She and Keith woke up people who needed rest in order to mess with them.

Hunk is making burritos. He packages six of them, ties them around the space wolf, who teleports them to the others. Krolia and Keith each get one. The wolf gives Alura, Romelle and Coran each one. Then suddenly, the wolf’s bundle has more than what Hunk put in it. Pidge takes two, one for her and one for Shiro. That leaves one for Lance. I guess this counts as an animation error? Hunk only put six in the bundle, but there are eight given out. Team Voltron kind of discuss the wolf, nothing that explains the wolf’s narrative importance or reason for being included in the show or anything, but his name. Hunk suggests “Cosmo.” Keith objects to the name, “I figure when he’s ready, he’ll tell me his name.” Does Keith actually think the wolf is going to talk? Keith lived with this wolf for two years while in the quantum abyss, and he hasn’t named him yet? Who has a pet for two years and doesn’t name them?

Lance likes the way the burritos taste but doesn’t want to know what’s in them, saying, “I just want to eat it and pretend that it’s my meemaw’s home cooking.” Lance is supposed to be Cuban. Why is he calling his grandmother “meemaw?” The best I can tell, Meemaw is a southern United States thing, and I’ve seen one suggestion that it’s derived from French through Cajun culture. Why is a Cuban guy using Cajun or southern United States slang for his grandmother? As a Cuban guy, wouldn’t Lance call his grandmother Abuela?

Pidge picks up a signal that she only identifies as, “a signal!” Allura reacts with, “How did you get a signal?” Unless the Lions’ communication systems are broken or the rest of the inhabitants of the universe, including all the Galra, ceased to exist, the Lions should be getting more than a few signals. Getting any particular one they’re looking for is different, but the idea that it’s such a surprise for them to have picked up any signal at all is absurd. What is the signal? A television show from Bii-Boh-Bi’s planet. Bii-Boh-Bi is not and never has been funny, can the show please stop using him and his species? Please!? Team Voltron watching the show goes on for far too long.

There is what Pidge thinks is some interference in the signal, but Krolia – because of course it’s Krolia because why have the main characters have any importance in this show when you can instead give the importance and time to a side character like Krolia – can tell that it’s not interference. She has Pidge “amplify that signal.” She then listens to it with her eyes closed. Pidge says that it’s “just deep space interference.” Krolia says that that is “just what it’s supposed to sound like. Listen to the sounds in between the pulses. There’s a unique pattern.” Only after Krolia says this does the sound design for the show actually start including a specific beep to correspond with what Krolia is identifying. That beep did not exist in the sound until after she says so. That seems like bad sound design to me; the beep should have been there the whole time.

Krolia says, “Before the Blades were unified, we would use this crude way of communicating with each other.” Uh, when were the Blades not unified? Is this some undetailed period of the Blades’ history that the show hasn’t ever presented? Why am I expecting this show to have anything be deeper than the shallow instantaneous and fleeting use of anything just because it suits the individual moment of its usage? “Not many Blades know this code,” she says. “It must be a senior member.” I guess that means that she’s also supposed to be a senior member?

She says it’s a distress signal. They trace the signal to a specific area, which Hunk says is “a pretty severe detour from Earth.” So severe that it lasts only this one episode. So, yeah, not severe at all. Dialog like Hunk’s has no meaning, no impact on the story. It’s not like diverting to check out this signal will make them late to Earth and something bad will happen while they’re on this detour. The bad thing that’s happened to Earth has already happened because of the time jump (I’m still significantly annoyed by the time jump’s plot hole).

Cut to the Lions arriving at the planet where the signal’s coming from. That was such a big detour that it happened instantly. The planet is one of the most ludicrous planets this show has done. Like, it’s bad even for this show. It’s maybe the size of an asteroid, but it’s jagged and has weird holes and slopes. This show doesn’t even try, does it? Pidge says there are signs of a former civilization, but no signs of life. There are broken buildings. Team Voltron walks around – remember how the space wolf was injured and that’s why he supposedly couldn’t help Coran two episodes ago, well that’s resolved with no resolution.

Krolia says, “The signs are all around us. There was a massacre here.” This episode is really giving Krolia a disproportionately large amount of the script. It’s just so frustrating for a side character to be given so much screen-time, but main characters, like Shiro are nearly non-existent.

Allura says, “Some of this damage looks like it’s from magic.” What does that even mean? What are the characteristics of building damage that indicate it comes from magic? Ultimately, this line from Allura is leading. The show knows that the villain of the episode is one of Haggar’s Druids, so it has Allura make this comment to foreshadow that. Allura saying this right now though feels totally forced and manufactured.

Krolia says that some of the “strike patterns,” scratches in the rock, “look Mamoran.” If this signal is supposed to be a Mamoran signal, then is it a surprise that they might have gotten into a fight here? I know this episode thinks it’s setting up some mystery, but it doesn’t feel mysterious.

The space wolf growls and runs off and tackles someone to the ground. Keith yells at the guy, asking, “Who are you? Who’s broadcasting the signal?” Why does Keith assume this guy knows anything about the signal? Oh yeah, because characters make whatever assumptions the writers need them to, rather than behaving in a way that’s actually natural.

The guy says that he’s the one who’s broadcasting it, and Keith replies, “Impossible! You’re not Blade of Marmora!” What is Keith basing that on? Keith doesn’t know every Blade in the universe. If he’s basing it solely on the clothing the guy is wearing, then that’s senseless. Keith’s a member of the Blades, but he’s not wearing a Blade uniform currently. Krolia’s a Blade, but she’s not wearing a Blade uniform right now either. Why would Keith assume this guy couldn’t be a Blade? Again, it’s the writer leading the story, rather than the story unfolding in a natural way. The writer knows that this isn’t a Blade, so I guess it’s supposed to be foreshadowing. It gives the writing an unnatural, jerky development.

They let him up, and he takes them to his campfire. Romelle calls the location of what looks like someone struggling to survive “disgusting.” Good to know that her experience hasn’t changed her pampered, privileged mindset. At least she gets called out on her insult. She tries to cover, but it’s obnoxious. “‘Disgusting’ is Altean for lovely. You don’t speak Altean, do you?” She could have been written to recognize her privilege and apologize for her insult, but no. I don’t like Krolia, and I don’t like Romelle either. Ugh.

Pidge confirms the signal is from here. The masked guy reveals he knows they’re the Paladins of Voltron. Shiro asks him what happened here. The masked guy, with an ominous voice, says, “Bloodshed happened here. Death happened here.” I actually kind of like this line and how he sounds saying it. It actually has some creepiness to it. He identifies himself as Macidus and says that this is his home planet and that he’s the only one left alive here.

Krolia finds a not-really concealed set of blades from Blades of Marmora. She immediately turns her gun on him. He says he has them arranged as they are “in honor of their sacrifice. They died trying to protect the universe.” Knowing that he’s eventually revealed to be a Druid, he’s not exactly lying in saying that, the Blades were trying to protect the universe from people like him.

Macidus tells them how this all started when Voltron disappeared. He says that the “power vacuum that ensued destabilized much of the universe.” That again makes Voltron’s turn against Lotor look totally short-sighted. The problem I have with this is that, while this does reveal consequences to the Paladins’ actions, I never get a sense of them actually taking responsibility for those consequences.

Allura asks, “what happened to Haggar, the witch,” and Macidus says, “no one knows, but her Druids continued her work.” What work is that? This is a big part of my dislike of Haggar: Whatever she does off-screen that’s supposed to be so villainous is almost never shown. What her goals are for these actions are not revealed. We know that Honerva was obsessed with quintessence, and that drove her to poisoning herself. We know she would create Robeasts to attack Voltron, but that was mostly in support of Zarkon and his dictatorship. We know she used the komar (are we to assume there was ever only one komar?) to extract quintessence from the life on planets, but we only ever see that done once. We know she had a particular interest in Shiro – “You could have been our greatest weapon,” she said to him in 1x13 “The Black Paladin – but we have no idea why she was interested in him or what she was planning in thinking of him as a weapon. Are we supposed to think that she was just accumulating miscellaneous weapons? It’s not like Voltron had reemerged at the point she had started thinking of Shiro as a weapon, so with the Galra dominating the universe, what were the Galra lacking that meant they needed more weapons? We know she oversaw the clone program, but there was never anything that suggested the Druids were involved with that; instead, it seemed more like that was a secret side project she had. And we never are given an explanation as to why she was having so many Shiro clones produced.

So, Voltron has been missing for three years. Haggar hasn’t been seen in that time either. Given season eight, we’re supposed to understand that during these three years, she found Lotor’s colony hidden in the quantum abyss, establishing a relationship with the Alteans there, hyping them up into a vengeful fury against Voltron for killing Lotor, and using whatever powers she gained from killing the White Lion in Oriande searches through all the other realities to find one that she thinks of as being perfect? I guess I’ll get to all that when I get to those episodes, but the topic of who’s the show’s antagonist is a topic relevant to now. Once we get to Earth and dealing with the invasion and occupation there, Sendak becomes the primary antagonist. But Sendak has always only been a secondary antagonist. That’s one of the many weaknesses of the story in season seven. The villains are shallow. Ezor and Zethrid were villains for two episodes because they wanted power. Sendak wants to conquer and dominate. Haggar is off-screen, at best, only slightly coming into play with the Altean-controlled mecha at the end of season. There is no character motivation grounding the antagonism of the conflict of the season. That’s not to say the show has ever been all that great at having compelling villains because it hasn’t, but at least in the first two seasons Zarkon and Haggar worked as foils for Shiro and Allura. There was a character connection there. And as much as I hate that they played the Lotor’s-secretly-been-a-villain-all-along absurdity for seasons three through six, at least he was emotionally connected to Allura. But here in season seven, anyone that can be identified as the antagonist could be easily replaced by any other character and things are really still the same. Consider this season’s story, but instead of Sendak, it’s another Galra like Ranveig or Gnov from back in season five. The story doesn’t change whatsoever. Sendak behaves the same as every other villainous Galra.

Macidus says that Haggar’s final order to the Druids was to destroy the Blades of Marmora. Another problem with this is we don’t know anything about the Druids. Who are they? Why are they Druids? How are they Druids? They all use magic, so do they come by that magic on their own, and in demonstrating magic are recruited by Haggar into the Druids? Or does Haggar teach them magic after they join the Druids? Part of me kind of likes the Druids because they’re differentiated from regular Galra, but I find them frustrating because they don’t feel like characters. They’re masks and magic, and that’s it.

Pidge says, “After Lotor took over the throne, almost every Mamoran agent was exposed.” They were? This supposedly-multiple-millennia old covert organization failed to maintain their cover because Lotor became Emperor? This is a huge deal that’s never come up before. Did the Blades suddenly become incompetent when Lotor became Emperor? I could understand maybe Kolivan became exposed because he was broadcasting his face all over the universe when communicating with the Voltron Coalition, but every other Blade took explicit measures to conceal their identities. How were they exposed? This does not make sense.

Macidus says that “all Blades were called from their assignments and sent to this base. Kolivan knew they were being hunted and wanted to make a stand against them.” Are we to assume that the Druids were just so good at magic that the Blades’ covert methods were no protection? The Blades could conceal their existence for thousands of years, but now for no reason they couldn’t? Maybe this is the problem with all this story being told through exposition. None of the logistics of this have been thought through by the creative team.

Macidus continues, “When they arrived here, my people helped them fortify their base.” So, Kolivan wanted a base for the Blades to be able to defend against Druid attacks, and he chose an inhabited planet? I know Macidus is spinning a tale here, but thinking of it logistically, this planet has been established as having once had a civilization on it. Unfortunately, this means that once again this show reduces the concept of a civilization to a few hundred people and one city – they did it with Arus, they did it with the mermaids, they did it with Taujeerians, it also feels like they did it with the Olkari. The population of planets in this show are unbelievably too low.

“The Druids […] arrived without warning.” How were there no monitoring systems for this planet or from the Blades? Throughout human history, we monitor the borders of our respective territories, but not here.

The conflict was supposedly a long one. Casidus refers to it as “a long battle of attrition.” I guess. “Casualties on both sides were enormous.” There have only ever been a handful of Druids in this show. So, these enormous casualties had to have just been regular Galra. This show has had the Paladins blow up a lot of Galra, so this “both sides” crap feels manipulative. But then, Macidus is being manipulative, but his ruse should be such that he doesn’t care about the Druid+Galra side. Is this supposed to be another hint that Macidus is not who he’s pretending to be? The Druids have never been shown to care about Galra death before; like with Haggar, the Galra have always seemed as nothing more than pawns for them to use. I can’t believe that Macidus now cares about the Galra who died under his command.

“My people were the first to try to escape,” and they’re shown running through the city streets. I thought this was supposed to have been a war of attrition? That would require the Blades and this planet’s people to have hunkered down in a strong defensive situation. That’s antithetical to escaping. Macidus says he stayed behind with Kolivan, who “led those of us who remained to battle the last of the Druids, but for each one we were able to take down, nearly a hundred Blades would fall.” Again, there have only been a handful of Druids in this show. Allura, Kolivan, and Antok – just the three of them – were able to kill two Druids while also fighting Haggar in 2x13 “Blackout.” So, the Druids are more powerful now without Haggar than they were when they literally fought alongside her? I know that Macidus is spinning a tale, but is any of what he’s saying supposed to be considered accurate? And if it’s not, if this is all a total lie, then this episode is giving way too damn much time to his telling this tale. You don’t write a character to tell a tale like this unless most, if not all, of it is true. This conflict between the Druids and the Blades feels totally disproportionate to what we’ve seen of both Druid and Blade in the past.

Krolia can apparently “recognize every one of these blades.” She’s got a really good memory then. “I trained many of them myself.” This makes her character feel even more over-important than she’s felt already. Kolivan’s blade momentarily glows. I thought a blade only glowed for its owner. I guess the way the blades function for the Blades of Marmora is another instance of the show’s magic system never being defined. Krolia concludes that Kolivan must be still alive, and Macidus, with the cliché voice of an 80s villain, says, “Just barely.”

Surprise everyone! Isn’t everyone surprised? Macidus has tricked you all!

“Your hand is looking much better,” Macidus says to Keith, referencing way back to 1x12 “Collection and Extraction,” when Keith’s hand was injured fighting the Druid and was healed when quintessence accidentally splashed on it. That happened so long ago that it feels, not like a long-range plan for the story, but like someone in the writing staff went back and rewatched the first season and realized they never really explained that moment in that episode.

“You’ve been using that signal to draw Blades in,” Keith says. Thank you for stating the obvious, Keith. The Druid cackles like an empty, cliché villain. He teleports away, and in his place a grenade falls to the ground. Krolia yells, “No!” in slow motion as it explodes. It’s silly. The space wolf teleports to Keith and teleports him away from the explosion. The explosion creates a pink bubble of energy, and everyone is stopped inside it. I guess it’s some kind of time-stop bomb?

Keith, the wolf, and the Druid are in some tunnels. Keith and the wolf initially just walk off to the side, but then are suddenly underneath the platform the Druid is walking on. I guess the Druid is just assuming that his bomb took out everyone? Despite the thin, wooden walkway he’s clomping across, the Druid stops because he hears something somehow over his loud footsteps. I guess maybe he magically sensed something since magic is whatever the writers want it to be at any given moment in this show. A canister rolls out of nowhere, and the Druid zaps it with purple lightning and walks away. Keith turns around, and boom, the Druid is behind him and stabs down through the platform. His aim with the stab is not even remotely accurate though. I guess he’s supposed to have teleported to behind Keith after having walked away. It feels more like a fake gotcha moment.

The space wolf teleports Keith away. The Druid follows. Keith slashes at the Druid’s mask, and it breaks and falls away, revealing the Druid’s face. He doesn’t look Galra to me. He has no nose and circular ears. I don’t know if he and/or the Druids are supposed to be Galra or what. He screams and attacks. Keith fights using his Marmoran blade rather than his bayard. It makes me think of how Keith gets two weapons while Shiro gets none.

A ball of energy starts to glow in Allura’s hand, and then that quick piece of a scene cuts back to Keith. The Druid keeps teleporting after Keith, Keith and the wolf run and teleport. By happenstance, Keith and the wolf end up in a room where Kolivan is suspended by ropes from the ceiling.

The Druid arrives, and complains, “Our high priestess Haggar has forsaken us because of your treachery. But after I kill you and the other Paladins, Haggar will allow me to return.” Because the show does not show us her “forsak[ing]” the Druids, this is mostly just confusing. We’re not told or shown any specifics of what happened. Did Haggar tell the Druids off? Did she just disappear? Both could be considered her having “forsaken” them, but they’re still very different. Macidus seems to connect, I guess, the Paladins’ killing Lotor to Haggar’s leaving. I guess Haggar’s supposed to have blamed Voltron for it, but we’ve never seen anything to show what Haggar knows about Lotor’s death. The last we saw of Haggar was in 6x05 “The Black Paladins” when Lotor told her off, Axca tried to shoot her, and Haggar teleported away. Is it supposed to be that Haggar irrationally blames the Paladins for the emotional rift she created when she abused Lotor? If Haggar has forsaken the Druids, if they haven’t seen her for years, then how does Macidus think he’ll be able to present his having killed the Paladins to her? I imagine the show would just say, he’s a villain, he’s not thinking clearly, thus nothing has to make sense within the narrative. That’s just lazy writing.

The Keith-wolf-Macidus teleport battle resumes. Allura’s ball of energy glows blue, the air swirls around them, and then poof. The sphere of pink energy disappears and Allura is left glowing pink. I guess she’s supposed to have absorbed the time-stop energy? Allura asks Pidge to “lock on to Keith’s location,” and conveniently, he’s “right directly below us.” Allura slams her hand into the ground, which cracks underneath her. She blasts through to the chamber Keith is in. I guess the blast vaporized all the rock because there’s almost no debris. The other Paladins join Allura in jumping down into the chamber. They fight Macidus, and he knocks them around too easily. Again, I think back to Allura, Kolivan, and Antok killing two Druids while those Druids fought alongside Haggar, and that makes Macidus seem overpowered. He teleports behind Allura and zaps her unconscious.

Macidus looks at Keith and teleports away. Keith then closes his eyes, somehow sees flashes of where Macidus is (if he’s invisible) or will be (if he finishes a teleport to wherever he’s going to appear). Keith throws his blade at where Macidus appears, hitting him. What is this power? Since when does Keith have magic sensing powers?

Macidus has a couple of blue lightning sparks and then he glows and explodes. The other Druids we’ve seen killed didn’t explode like this, so what’s causing this other than inconsistent writing and production?

They get Kolivan down. He’s injured, but alive and will recover. We find out now that Keith gave Kolivan the coordinates of the Altean colony. Why this hasn’t been brought up before now, I don’t know. Kolivan says he “sent a team. There was nothing there, just an empty facility.” Keith would have had to have given Kolivan the coordinates sometime between the end of 6x02 “Razor’s Edge” and the beginning of 6x04 “The Colony” because he was too busy with fighting the clone and Lotor after “The Colony.” Did Kolivan sit on the information until sometime after Voltron was under the effects of the time skip during the battle with Lotor (again, ignoring the plot hole that Coran, Krolia, Romelle, and the clone would have experienced the three years that passed outside the rift since the Castle Ship never went in)? When did Haggar collect the Alteans from the colony?

I know throughout the entirety of this episode’s commentary, I’ve put a lot of work into trying to understand the logistics of events that are only halfway referenced, at best, and take place entirely off-screen. I have probably put more work into understanding this than the creative team did in writing it. I really doubt that any of them cared if any of this really made sense or not. Keith got to have a supposedly exciting fight alongside his magic space wolf, that’s all that mattered to them, really.

Kolivan says that he has to “find the others. The universe needs us now more than ever.” So, did any of the battle that Macidus described in his tale even happen? Or did he only capture Kolivan and lure other Blades to this location one-by-one to kill them? The show is not clear about what has actually happened.

Krolia declares she’ll join Kolivan to help rebuild the Blades of Marmora. At least she won’t be here to take up so much of the story for a while. She goes to Keith and says, “I’m sorry to have to say goodbye to you for a second time.” Yeah, remember when she revealed herself as his mother back in 5x05 “Bloodlines” when she couldn’t control herself in the moment and said, “I left you once. I’ll never leave you again,” remember that? Yeah, that overwhelming amount of emotion that got to her in that moment no longer exists. She’s going to leave Keith. I don’t mind her leaving (beyond my being tired of her character) because they’re both adults and they’re both fighters in a huge conflict. But her leaving here makes her previous proclamation that she would “never leave [him] again” lose meaning. It takes away whatever emotion that part of the story had. It makes her declaration hollow. Once again, this show has flipped a switch narratively, and things are just different now just because. Keith gives her his Marmoran blade, and they hug. “Thanks for everything you taught me, Mom,” Keith says. Of course, we have no idea what any of these supposed things she taught him are since almost all of their relationship has happened off-screen.

“Keith, it’s time to get going,” Shiro says. Oh? Shiro’s still in this show? Of course, the show would have it be Shiro to be the one to interrupt Keith and his mother’s moment. And why are the Paladins so eager to leave right this very minute? I know they want to get to Earth, but they’re all still in the decompression phase of this conflict with Macidus. This separation feels forced.

Krolia and Keith tell each other they love each other then cut to the Lions flying away from the planet.

I like the premise of this episode. I like bringing the Druids back into the story, but that’s mostly because the show has never treated the Druids like characters and I’ve always wanted to learn more about them. While we get a Druid as an actual character in this episode, because of his lying, we have no idea what he says is true and what he says is a lie. We still don’t have any sense of the actual organizational relationship between Haggar and the Druids.

This episode having Macidus be the specific Druid that Keith fought in “Collection and Extraction,” while kind of cool to have a reference back to that early in the show, it reminds me about Keith’s hand seemingly being healed by the quintessence. If quintessence, and not Allura’s generated quintessence, but the refined quintessence ripped from living creatures can heal wounds, then how is quintessence a substance that poisons people so that they lose control of themselves? So, unfortunately, this episode just leaves me with more questions than it answered.

While I spent a lot of time trying to understand the logistics of off-screen events, and I don’t think much of it makes sense, and I know that a lot of my questions have no answers because the show’s creative team never thought to have answers for them, this episode is still way better than the past three.

[blog-shakirali-blog]

Sniper games for pc

Sniper games are about perking at the top of a building and punching holes through bad guys from a mile away with the help of a high-caliber rifle. Whether it’s a challenge to compensate for a bullet drop or the simple joy of seeing a group of enemies descend into panic as you pick up the helpless goons one by one – the PC Games Repacks pop into moments like these.

Sadly, there are not many games that focus solely on making the player feel like the ultimate ghost warrior, but there are a large number of sniper games with realistic sniping mechanics and sniper missions to keep your itchy finger going. Trigger. Our sniper game list offers everything from military simulations to more laid back experiences where you can make a strange mistake or even dig a sniper rifle completely.

We repeatedly return to our lists to ensure that they are as up-to-date as possible, so you can be assured that in the list below we are no less than a classic sniper game on PC.

1.GHOST RECON BREAKPOINT

Release Date October 4, 2019

Publisher Ubisoft

Genre/Tactical Shooter 3rd Person Shooter Game Open World

The latest Ghost Recon from Ubisoft was supposed to have a lot of sniper action. Ghost Recon introduces the Breakpoint Sharpshooter class, along with a bunch of sniping perches to complement your loadout. It is built around Ghost Recon Breakpoint class sniping and includes class benefits such as ‘breathing while doing’ and ‘bonuses’ using sniper rifles and DMRs. Ghost Recon Breakpoint’s best weapons are highly accurate and fun to use snipers like TAC50, HTI, and Scorpio – found from loot drops, boxes, and blueprints across the imaginary island of Auro.

The breakpoint also introduces quick loot that adds extra perks to your guns, such as improving accuracy or maneuverability. You are able to upgrade your sniper rifle using Ghost Recon Breakpoint Gunsmith and spend old gun parts to improve your favorite sniper. If you are planning to tackle this open-world best single-player games pc, sniper rifles are our recommended choice.

2.ARMA 3

Release Date September 12, 2013

Publisher Bohemia Interactive

Genre/Tactical Shooter Open-World

There is no point in Arma 3 being a sniper. It is a battle simulator and as such it prides itself on annoying realism – you have to use a rangefinder, zero your scope, and freeze your breath ahead of every long-range shot. You have to engage with extreme caution, when you are aware of your situation, when you are acting as a ghost behind enemy lines, you will be killed very quickly.

Arma 3 is so realistic, in fact, that some snipers pair up with a spotter who handles all the totals for them and reveals new targets. Unlike many sniper games, Arma 3 snaps a cooperative experience. Better still, Arma 3 has loads of updates and expansions, so it’s never too late to fall in love with this military simulator.

3. SNIPER ELITE 4

Release Date February 14, 2017

Publisher Rebellion

Genre/ shooter, Stealth game, 3rd-person shooter

The shooting of Nazis is never complete. Sniper Elite 4 continues the series’ gradual transformation from linear stitcher to sniper’s dream sandbox game, marking the occasion with Italy’s fascist switch. The sniper game chop is intact, so expect a realistic bullet drop and there’s plenty of scopes until you manage to slow down your heart rate.

Sniper Elite 4 also features the franchise’s Gore Pies de Restasance: X-ray Kill Cam. Now, in addition to being able to take out a Nazi’s testicle from a mile away, you can see internal damage caused by stabbing an enemy in the back or splattering flying out of a nearby explosion. And what sniper games really are, if not waving your crosshairs to a bad guy’s head, pulling the trigger, and then looking up at his skull as morbid curiosity.

But it is the sniper Elite 4’s sandbox level that is the biggest improvement over its predecessors. Each one is alive and full of possibilities – be it a side-quest, a glimpse of a possible environmental kill, or a sniper nest waiting to be uncovered and used. As we found when writing our Sniper Elite 4 PC Review, each level is sought to be maintained again and again, and this means more sniper game talent for your buck.

At the top, Sniper Elite 4 also received more single-player content in the form of Destastorm, a DLC mini-campaign in which you sneak into a naval base. The campaign released add-ons to chapters after the game’s launch, along with free multiplayer modes and maps. Sniper Elite 4 has a lot more to do as sniper games go on.

4. SQUAD

Release Date December 15, 2015

Publisher Offworld Industries

Genre/ Tactical shooter

While the squad does not have the role of a sniper, there is a mark sheet class – and if you don’t think there is a difference between the two, the squad probably isn’t for you. The squad’s gameplay is all about teamwork, and as such, there is no room for lone wolf roles such as snipers. A shooter’s job, on the other hand, is to go anywhere with the fire team, giving the team its effective access to reacting to long-range fire and generally attacking and defending.

Related Survival Games For PC

Communication and teamplay are also essential for future snipers. Hitting more than 500 meters will give little success, but a higher-magnification scope and better-stopping power ensure that the tracer always has the upper hand in long-range skirmishes. The way it should be in a sniper game For PC

5. INSURGENCY SANDSTORM

Release Date December 12, 2018

Publisher Focus Home Interactive

Genre/ Tactical shooter

The original insurgency offered a genuine albeit clunky modern best FPS pc games with some solid sneezing mechanics. Insurgency: Sandstorm overhauls everything for graphics and animations, sound design and weapon models, and the result is a multiplayer shooter that sounds as authentic as Arma’s, especially when it comes to it’s powerful, one-hit-kill-snipers is. There is not much in bullet drop or travel time as most maps are very small, but weapon models are impressively detailed and have small details such as magnification effects when you are immersed in the role of the trail.

As much as insurgency: Sandstorm’s best zombie games pc focuses on large-scale attacks, playing a sniper in this FPS, which is about cutting flanking routes and catching lines of sight, so taking a spot and a Expect it to stick to the match. Most multiplayer shooters move too fast to make a sniper’s nest worth catching, but in Rebellion: Sandstorm it is necessary.

6. BATTLEFIELD 5

Release Date November 9, 2018

Publisher Criterion Software

Genre/first-person shooter battle royale game

Battlefield games are always baked for snipers, with bullet drops, travel time, and large-scale multiplayer maps ensuring that the range is well-crafted for long-range assassins. Battlefield 5 does not add a huge amount to the equation, but the selection of historical sniper rifles at your disposal is one of the best in the pc games for the free genre.

Whether you prefer to lay low in a hay knot, punching holes through a helmet with a carabiner 98 Kurz, or fancy carrying on vehicles with a Boyz anti-tank rifle. In addition, the new Battle Royal mode, Firestorm, let’s now put your sniper skills into the biggest Battlefield map in the final test against over 60 players. Best Horror pc games

7. CALL OF DUTY MODERN WARFARE REMASTERED

Release Date November 4, 2016

Publisher Activision, Activision Blizzard

Genre/ First-person shooter Game

Quickscoping and no scooping may not be as likely in modern warfare as they were in the original game, but the remastered version of the game is still home to the best pair of sniper missions in gaming: All Gilded Up and One Shot, One Kill.

These heavily scripted missions lead the player through the ghost town of Chernobyl on a mission to assassinate a Russian ultrasooologist-cum-arms dealer. The atmosphere is rhythmic, the narrative attractiveness surrounding it, and the pace irresistible – these missions ignited a passion for sniper games in all who played them. As we found in our Modern Warfare Remastered Review, the game is more than a flashy HD makeover, it is a complete remake of the old game.

8. HITMAN 2

Release Date November 13, 2018

Publisher Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment

Genre/Action Adventure 3rd Person Stealth Game open world

Hitman adds more to what we love in the acclaimed sequel to Hitman 2 – silent and brutally shot opportunities.

Scope aficionados will enjoy a game mode within Hitman Sniper Assassin, Hitman 2 that can be played solo or multiplayer. You only have the job of navigating a level equipped with your sniper rifle, and the mission becomes a puzzle that you will have to figure out how to solve using stealth, position and time. A headshot is not enough for landing – you have to hide the bodies and cover the evidence to pass the level.

New Levels and The Prison ‘and u Huntu Port’ for Hitman Sniper Assassin were recently released with the latest hit 2Alc

9. OPERATION FLASHPOINT: DRAGON RISING

Release Date October 6, 2009

Publisher Codemasters

Genre/ Tactical shooter, Military simulation

Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising has a lot of load-outs to choose from, but when you’re working in a sandbox, only a sniper rifle in about 200 square kilometers makes sense. Especially when you can command a squad of AI soldiers to clean all the rooms and do the dirty work for you, leaving you free to pick up utensils from the miscreants in the safety of a grassy knot far and wide. best strategy games for pc

So far away, in fact, that it is possible to kill enemies more than 1,000 meters from you. There are some substantial bullet-drops to take into account, but a few things warmed up the cocktails such as picking up an entire enemy squad without them ever finding out where you are. What else is there for sniper games? Of course, because Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising is a battle simulator, you will have plenty of opportunities to make the helicopter fall out of the sky with a single shot.

10. COUNTER-STRIKE GLOBAL OFFENSIVE

Release Date

Release Date August 21, 2012

Publisher Valve Corporation

Genre/ First-person shooter

The best sniper games are not about taking that one entire shot. In the hyper-competitive space of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive a Perfect Shot is not enough (even if you know the best places to throw CS: Smoke Grenade). You have to take thousands of perfect shots with each other to split each one, and there will be no margin for error. Forget Ghillie Suits, CS: Only care about muscle memory and accuracy – nothing less will do.

With this in mind, you can look for the CS: GO console command to access the game’s practice mode before going into the killing areas of the multiplayer. Pokemon pc Games

We also have CS: Gaming, thanks to the best and most famous sniper rifle in AWP. Why so much love for a gun? With each shot that plays with an adorable sound, it is also the only gun in the game capable of killing an enemy with one shot to the torso. This Quake’s railgun is distilled in a realistic form, and in the hands of a supporter, it is destructive.

CS: GO is one of the most played games on Steam and its ultra-competitive nature makes it one of the best multiplayer games on PC. Playing online against highly skilled players will make you an eagle-eyed sharpshooter in no time.

11. SNIPER GHOST WARRIOR CONTRACTS Upcoming Game

Release Date

Release Date November 22, 2019

Publisher CI Games

Genre/  Action-Adventure Stealth PC Game

the best fighter games on pc The latest release in the Sniper Ghost Warrior series, Contracts, will take you to five different locations in the deepest Siberia, each with an ‘IP sniping sandbox’ full of objectives and tasks. Designing a new dynamic reticule system, which manages the variables present in rendering the correct headshot, promises to enhance the tactical sniping experience to contract gadgets. upcoming games pc

Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts will also have a multiplayer mode and is scheduled to release on November 22.