#it would be very odd to keep us out of the loop on the whole why mike can say ily now and how he got there thing if we were supposed to be

[gayofthefae]

"How will they convince people of Mike's feelings" my guy literally all they have to do is have them have a normal conversation then linger looking at each other for just a little too long afterwards.

[elaboration but you can stop here if you should be asleep right now. Yes, you. I caught you. Go to bed.]

It's platonic to look at your friends, and even look at them when they aren't looking, but it is notoriously not platonic for a TV show to SHOW us.

That is literally ALL they did in season 4 with Will btw and you believe him. He literally just looked at Mike. He said a couple of coded things but I would argue still quite deniable until that talk in the junkyard got more specific. The bulk of the weight being pulled was - not even lingering looks, just lingering ON looks. Lingering the shot.

In the sweetest way - and including myself - audiences are dumb. We don't need much, really. Boy look at boy too long when he not looking equal romance. Telling love stories actually is not complicated AT ALL.

[keyboardsmashess]

The Siren, or The Heart of the Matter

Chapter Seventeen: The Phone Call, or Hey Look, Ma, I Made It

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x OFC

Warnings: language, eventual smut, fluff, angst, canon-typical violence MINORS DNI. A/N: Plot twist - injured me is a writing machine! Hope you all enjoy this chapter :)

Summary: Cleo and the rest of the Avengers decompress after the fight.

Chapter Directory

By the time Nat, Clint, and Steve return to the Tower, the library incident is all over the news. While nobody had gotten hurt, even one Avenger fighting in such a public place draws a lot of attention, and there had been two plus a newbie. Not to mention the damage done to some very old and very expensive books.

It hadn’t exactly been an inconspicuous location when we’d moved the fight through the ceiling of the library and onto the roof, so much of what happened was visible from the street. The news is showing a rotating cycle of shaky cell-phone footage: my stone tornado, the hit to Tony’s arc reactor and subsequent dive into the sidewalk, the masked man grabbing and immobilizing me with his currents of electricity, both of us tumbling down the sloped roof and stopping against an invisible wall, and his body freezing unnaturally as I sing inaudibly above him. 

Fortunately, my moment with Bucky happened out of sight - I don’t think I’d survive the embarrassment if the whole world could watch me melting into a puddle at his feet. Especially since I’m certain that, any minute now, he’ll go back to pretending I don’t exist.

When the returning Avengers find us, we’ve changed into sweatpants and are enjoying a truly superhuman amount of pizza in the common room while the TV plays, muted, in the background.

Clint grabs a slice of pizza and throws himself down on the couch next to me without a word. I raise my eyebrows at him, but he just chews noisily in my face, mouth open and smacking. I may be an only child, but this is sort of what I always imagined having a brother would be like. I shove him affectionately.

Steve takes a slice to the empty chair next to Bucky, and Nat perches on the arm of the couch. “So,” she starts. “Looks like you found a way to stay busy without us.”

Tony smirks. “Can’t let you have all the fun.”

She turns to me, an eyebrow raised. “How are you holding up?”

I smile gratefully. “I’m fine, honestly. A bit tired from using so much energy, but that’s it.”

“I already knew you’d be fine after the fight - I’m the one who trained you.” She nods wryly at the TV. “I mean how are you holding up now that everyone knows your name?”

I pale as I turn back to the screen. The familiar loop of cellphone footage has been replaced with a close-up still from one of the clips of me standing on the roof, hair out of its ponytail and whipping in the wind, face scratched from roof debris, supersuit in full view. I spare myself a brief moment of pleasure at how badass I look before turning my attention to the other picture. Oh gods. They have my student ID photo from Culver. The news ticker reads: Cleo Blake - newest Avenger?

I groan and cover my face with my hands. “Couldn’t they have found a better picture of me?”

Bruce squints up at my ID photo - it had been taken on the second day back at campus, but I had already spent an all-nighter at the library in my eagerness to start work on my dissertation. My eyes are unnaturally wide thanks to the several shots of espresso I’d had to keep going through the night, and my hair is wild - frizzy and curlier than normal and sticking up in odd directions. There’s a very large coffee stain on the front of my cardigan, and my sundress is wrinkled as hell. And, through it all, I’m grinning widely - almost manically - in my excitement to be back at Culver.

“I don’t know,” Bruce says. “I think you look… fine.”

Nat pats my arm sympathetically and I throw the remote at Bruce with a groan. He catches it and points it at the TV, unmuting the anchor mid-sentence.

“ - stopped the fire completely, using only her hands according to an eyewitness account. An unnamed source close to the Avengers calls her The Siren, likely due to the power we see on display here.” They replay the clip of me freezing The Philosopher with Siren Song, though the words are still inaudible. “As you can see in footage obtained exclusively by our news team, The Siren appears to subdue the masked man using only her voice. While the audio remains unavailable, the visual impact is undeniable. The Avengers have yet to comment on their newest member, but if her performance at the Stephen A. Schwarzman building is any indication of what's to come, we haven't seen the last of her. We'll continue to bring you updates as they become available.”

I look at Tony, eyes wide. “Who could’ve talked to the press?” I ask, panicked at the thought of someone in the Tower breaking the stringent privacy policy.

Tony smirks. “I did.” At my flabbergasted expression, he continues. “If you don’t give ‘em a name, they’ll give you one themselves, and it might not be as catchy as Iron Man. It’s the oldest trick in the book - you give them a piece of information you want out there without having to release it yourself, and they claim it’s from an ‘unnamed source.’”

I sigh. “Well, at least I won’t have to talk to them now.”

Tony bursts into laughter, slapping his knee dramatically. “Lite Brite, you are hilarious. Do you really think you’re going to be under less scrutiny now? You made the cover of a magazine just for going outside with Barnes. Now they’ve got your full name and your alter ego.”

I groan and shove my face into a pillow. 

Nat gently pulls it away. “Come on, it’s not so bad. If I can go from being a ghost to being on every news station in the country, you’ll manage.”

I hold her gaze. “Yes, but you are beautiful and graceful and very cool, not an embarrassing feral creature who should be kept hidden in the darkest corner of a library lest she terrify the children,” I say, gesturing at the photo that’s reappeared on screen. I try to keep a serious face, but this is all too insane - too unreal - and I find myself releasing a hysterical little giggle. 

Nat’s subsequent laugh is infectious, and soon we’re all busting up at the photo on TV. 

“What - what are you on in this picture?” Clint asks through peals of laughter.

Tony grabs the remote from Bruce, pausing the footage and zooming in on my crazy eyes. “Yeah, you look high as hell.”

“I’d been up all night in the library! I was on like sixteen shots of caffeine to stay awake.” I feign outrage. 

To my shock, Bucky joins in with a chuckle. “That doesn’t explain the hair.”

I throw my pillow at him, and even though I know he could catch it if he wanted to, it smacks the side of his face. “I may or may not have fallen asleep on the floor by the mythology stacks, leading to an unfortunate static electricity situation,” I say, crossing my arms with a small smile.

His eyes crinkle when he laughs, and as our gazes meet I find myself transported back to the moment on the roof. Heat pools in my stomach, my palms start to sweat, and I find myself wondering what the hell this man is doing to me.

I’m jarred out of the moment, though, by the sharp ring of my cell phone. “Oh god,” I groan. “My mother is calling me.”

Tony grimaces at my tone. “Good luck with that, kid.”

Steve’s smile is clearly meant to be comforting. “She’s probably just calling to check on you, or tell you she’s proud of you.” I resist the urge to tell him he’s an idiot and instead just smile grimly, standing up and moving toward the door to the terrace. 

I don’t go outside, but I hug the wall of windows in an effort to gain a little privacy. I suppose I could go back to my room, but honestly I don’t want to be completely alone with this woman, even over the phone.

I reluctantly answer. “Hey, mom.”

“Cleo Sophia Blake, do you care to explain why Susan Smithfield just called to congratulate me on having a superhuman daughter?” Her voice is deceptively calm, but I know her well enough to know what’s brewing.

“I don’t know, mother, probably because she’s a nosy bitch?”

Her voice lowers, betraying her anger. “That obviously isn’t what I meant. I had no idea what she was talking about, which of course delighted Susan, and I was absolutely humiliated.”

“Look, I was going to tell you before anything happened - I swear - but I ended up in the field sooner than I expected. It all happened so fast, and most of the team was away, so they needed me, and -”

She cuts me off. “Tell me, Cleo - how exactly does one move from a research position to becoming a superhero?” The disdain is evident in her voice as she speaks, as if ‘superhero’ is a dirty word.

Fuck. I grimace but try to keep my voice bright. “Oh, right. About that. I - well, I never really had a research job. Something weird happened to me at Culver, and they sort of… recruited me, I guess you could say. I didn’t want you to freak out, so -”

“So you lied to me?”

My stepfather pipes in then, and I have to stop myself from plucking at a few threads to crush the phone in my hand. “Listen, kiddo, your mom and I are just worried about you. The last time you started lying to us -”

Politeness be damned, I interrupt him. “This is completely different, Robert. I’m sorry for lying, but the situation was complicated and I wasn’t going to talk to you about it before I understood exactly what was happening. I’m fine, I’m employed, and I don’t know if you’ve watched the news lately, but I just helped save five innocent people and a bunch of books.”

There’s a stunned silence on the other end of the phone - I’ve never spoken to Robert this way before, and I wonder if he’s realizing who - what - I am now, and what that might mean for him.

“Well,” he says, voice strangled with what I suspect to be restrained rage. “We’re certainly glad for that, kiddo. Who wouldn’t be proud to be the parent of an Avenger? Right, Sophia?”

My mother stammers for a moment, her frequent pauses letting me know just how upset she is. “I - I suppose you’re right, it is… impressive.” I roll my eyes. “But does this mean you’ll be doing… fighting… often?” Again, her tone makes it sound like she’s saying a dirty word.

I sigh and rub my eyes. “That’s sort of the whole shebang, mom.”

“Well, I don’t know how I feel about that. It would be one thing if it wasn’t so… public, but as it is, it’s just… distasteful.”

“Distasteful?” I ask, eyebrows knitting together.

 “Knowing everyone will be seeing my daughter wearing that skintight little number, engaging in physical violence alongside a group of men…”

I squeeze my eyes shut, clenching a fist as she trails off. I take a few deep breaths, let myself pause for a moment as I try to keep calm, but I know I’m still about to say something that will get me in deep shit. “Well I’m very sorry to be such a fucking stain on the family, mother, but -”

I hear someone clear their throat and open my eyes to see Steve. The rest of the team is watching intently from the sitting area, clearly having listened to the entire conversation.

“Put it on speaker,” Steve whispers. I raise my eyebrows, alarmed, but he smiles. “Trust me.” 

And I do trust him, simple as that, so I put the phone on speaker right as Robert is raising his voice. “Young lady, if I ever hear you use that kind of language with your mother again -”

Steve leans toward the phone and cuts him off. “Excuse me sir, ma’am. I don’t mean to interrupt your conversation, but my name is Steve Rogers and I just wanted to tell you how excited we are to have your daughter joining the team. You should be very proud - she’s incredibly bright and dedicated.”

I feel like I might pass out, and all I can do is grab Steve’s hand and squeeze it hard, hoping it conveys the depths of my gratitude. 

There’s a long stretch of silence on the other end of the phone before Robert speaks again, voice shaking. “C-captain America?”

Steve chuckles winningly. “Well, I have been known to  answer to that, but you’re part of the extended Avengers family now, so I have to insist you call me Steve.” Robert makes a strangled little sound as Steve laughs again. “It’s not like you’re going to start calling your daughter ‘The Siren,’ right?”

I can hear my mom mutter The Siren under her breath with distaste, but Robert speaks over her. “Yes sir, of course, sir. Thank you very much, sir.”

Steve winks at me. “I should be thanking you! You raised quite the fighter here - we’re very lucky to have her.”

I wonder, for a moment, if Steve doesn’t possess some sort of mind-reading abilities, because he’s just selected the exact words that will infuriate my mother and stepfather the most, and he’s spoken them in such a way that they will have no choice but to bite their tongues.

Robert clears his throat. “Yes, well, we did our best, I suppose. Cleo, it sounds like you’re busy with… work, so we’ll let you go now. Capt- er, Steve, thank you so much, sir, for speaking with us.”

“Anytime,” Steve says. 

I sigh, shoulders slumping in relief. “Yep, busy Avenger, that’s me. Talk to you guys later.” I hang up the phone. “Hopefully much, much later,” I mutter once the call is disconnected.

I look up. “I don’t even know how to thank you, Steve.”

He shakes his head firmly. “Don’t mention it - we’re a team, it’s what we do. We have each other’s backs.”

I look at the rest of the team - my team - lounging casually, eating pizza, and watching TV together. 

“I, uh, I’m going to go take a shower. I think I still have some roof dust on me.”

Nat nods with understanding. “We’ll be out here when you’re ready to come back.”

I smile gratefully and head for the door, but I pause. “Stark?”

He turns his head and leans over the back of the couch. “Present.”

“Don’t forget my helmet.” 

Bruce smacks him on the shoulder. “I told you, Tony, but do you ever listen to me? Of course not.”

Tony turns to his friend, expression faux-offended. “Well excuse me for not being an expert on glasses. We can't all -”

I interrupt him. “My com fell out, too, you know.”

“Not helping, kid!”

I chuckle and head to my room, wondering if this is what it feels like to have a family.

******

For all the changes he’s undergone recently, Bucky knows he’ll never escape the skills he learned as The Winter Soldier. For better or worse, he will carry them with him for the rest of his life. Sometimes, he hates this - hates knowing he can be the perfect weapon if the situation calls for it. Other moments, he has to admit it comes in handy. And, as he listens in on the other side of Cleo’s phone call with his precision hearing, he’s of the opinion that this is one of those handy moments. 

“Her parents are real pieces of work,” he mumbles to Steve, who just shrugs. Bucky shakes his head. Why is she letting them speak to her like this? The Cleo he knows would never let someone get away with what her parents are doing.

He clenches his jaw as he hears her mother refer to the Siren suit as a ‘skintight little number,’ the implication in the mention of fighting alongside men making his blood boil.

He nudges Steve. “Do something.”

Steve furrows his brows. “What? What can I do?”

Bucky shakes his head. “I don’t know, play the Captain America card, say some charming shit about how lucky we are to have her on the team - just help her, man.”

Steve shoots him a strange look but gets up anyway. Bucky grabs his sleeve to stop him with one last idea. “Wait, tell them they raised a fighter,” Bucky says with a small but feral grin. “Cleo’ll love that.”

Steve nods, still looking curiously at his friend, and heads over - just in time to interrupt Cleo as she starts to say something that will probably make the situation worse. 

Still, it makes Bucky smile. Finally, he thinks. There’s my girl.

[briebysabs]

Vnc OP 1 - Sora to Utsuro

We are here again! I’ll be taking the time to talk of VnC’s first opening and breaking down the lyrics. Specifically in regards to what I will refer to as the dream loop theory. If you don’t know what I mean by that, the base summary is that the VnC universe is a story. Noé is the narrator, the character, the archiver and the creator. Noé is writing the memoires to manifest his memories. Let’s call it a memory world. He does this either to escape his regret-filled reality or to save Vanitas. However, when he “loops”, he doesn’t remember why he’s there so everything plays out the way it was written in the memoires.

Then Noé will live on, write the memoires again, and the cycle continues. And because he’s done this countless times, the memoirs gradually stray away from the original story. I’ll elaborate further when talking about OP 1. Right about now!

This was the main translation I could find for the full song (not including English covers but I could reach the same conclusions for those as well) If anyone has other translations for the whole thing, I’d love to see it. https://youtu.be/G_bJwB1YePw?si=xPVlV3_Fd57S-Bo1

/You’re pondering the simple things, pretty much human emotions and love/

/I hope one day you’ll understand/

/Too many wounds have left you patched together, a miserable sight/

/That doesn’t even know the definition of alive/

It is confirmed that this opening is from Noe’s POV. But keep in mind for the rest of this thread, it’s future Noé speaking. There are two main readings for the song; for the most part it’s Noé talking to or about Vanitas. And then there’s Noé talking to himself. This part has both interpretations.

Noé to Vanitas: Vanitas does struggle to understand his emotions throughout the story, that includes love. Vanitas is a broken individual, has too many wounds/trauma Noé cannot ignore and for a long time, was fueled by getting his “revenge”. Thus he’s forgotten what it means to live. You can also read into “doesn’t know the definition of alive” in a meta sense, from the beginning of the story he’s already dead.

And the very name ‘Vanitas’ is surrounded with the imagery of death, futility and mortality. So yes, Vanitas as a concept doesn’t know what ‘alive’ is.

Noé to himself: Noé as well is trying to figure out human emotions. This is a case study of a human after all. The memoirs follow Noe’s journey in understanding Vanitas’ thinking. And we’ve had Noé blatantly ask Vanitas what love means. But we can read this as Noé , sort of telling his past self that one day he will understand and feel this pain. Take note of “many wounds have left you patched together”. As I said, he could be talking about how “fragile” Vanitas is but what if this is about himself?

/No need to say “just the two of us” or anything/

/I have a feeling we can understand each other/

/And that’s fine for now/

This is calling to the Catacombs Arc, where Vanitas repeats Noe’s line of being able to do anything together. Interesting enough, it’s that arc where we see a bit of Vanitas’ backstory and it ends with the two sitting against each other. An understanding has been reached. Of course we all know that’s what VnC is about but of course he adds the ‘for now’ because what would this show be without its looming doom.

/I love this world and the light only you give me/

/Makes the world I see through these fractured eyes/

/Look gleaming and bright/

It’s these verses that made me want to spend more time on this. First of all, ‘I love this world’, a little weird right? I can only hope this translation is the most accurate but we’re saying ‘this’ instead of ‘the world’. Makes it sound like “I like this one. I prefer this one.” And ‘the light only you give me’ is very odd if we’re saying this is from Noe’s POV. Emphasis on ONLY.

Another reason why I believe it’s future Noé singing because why would present Noé say Vanitas is the only light he has? Vanitas is the only thing keeping him from falling apart. Vanitas being the sole reason Noé loves the world…doesn’t line up with the Noé we’re seeing now. Now it could be Vanitas is a “special” light. But that kinda raises more alarms because Vanitas is very admired in this song guys. And present Noé I feel wouldn’t be so sure in proclaiming this. The world being seen through fractured eyes could be multiple things. We know Noé sustained an injury on his left eye when Teacher bought him.

This could feed into a theory that has been speculated over the years that Noe’s vision was permanently altered and he sees things from that eye differently. Of course, it could refer to future Noe’s perception of life being broken due to the events of the series. Thus why Vanitas is the one thing that makes it gleaming and bright. You could then ask “But Vanitas is gone in the future so how is that possible?” In comes my theory. It’s interesting how Noé is often associated with light, the sun etc. but here we see him give those characteristics to Vanitas’ presence.

/There’s no such thing as a sure thing/

/But you can see me can’t you?/

Things get a little fuzzy here. Obviously, nothing is sure, nothing lasts forever. This period of happiness will pass. But “you can see me”. Assuming this world is a memory, this could be Noé being elated from seeing Vanitas. That his plan has worked. But you can also interpret this, I forgot who pointed it out but ty whoever you are, that this is the one moment Vanitas interjects in the song. Essentially saying, “you can see me, so this is not real.” As if trying to wake Noé up. And if you look at the OP itself, for most of it Vanitas is following or lagging behind Noé like a ghost. There’s even a part where Noé is looking at a drawing of a view instead a real one, Vanitas is yelling at him, trying to get his attention and Noé ignores him completely. Not to mention the OP starts and ends with Noé sleeping, Vanitas nor his belongings ever in the room almost as if it was all a dream hmmm.

You can see this also as Noé acknowledging the world he has created is only temporary. Noé knows this isn’t real, isn’t a sure thing. But then Vanitas comes in to be like “you can see me, can’t you. So is it that bad?”

/I’m pondering the simple things, pretty much emptiness and frigidity/

/One by one lies have increased/

/Playing with a simple puppet/

/My rusted head is shaking/

We’ve contrasted “human emotions and love” with “emptiness and frigidity” here. Frigid here means the bitter cold, stiff, lacking in warmth. The opposite of what Noé says this world gives him so safe guess, he’s talking about the reality he is escaping. Where Vanitas is dead as well as a lot of his friends. The lies have built upon each other, adding to my theory where the numerous times Noé has done this has created layers upon layers of worlds. And each one has more inaccuracies than the last. This is his story, a play, he is the writer and the puppeteer of everyone’s roles. When they appear, what they say and do is decided by what Noé writes in the memoires. But by all the loops he’s made himself a puppet too. His head being rusted could hint at many, many years passing since everything happened. What’s even more interesting is remember, Vanitas is the one usually associated with cold and emptiness. So why is Noé assigning those things to his thoughts? It really shows how future Noé has come to view Vanitas vs himself. Because ignoring any theories or whatever for a second, future Noé is clearly burdened with regrets and hate towards himself.

/Your laughing was reflected by a daydream/

/Without knowing yet we just want to laugh/

/Throw away the answer, whatever you want is fine for now/

We circle back to the dream thing again. What is a daydream? It’s something you fantasize about when you are bored or in need of a distraction. A reflection looks and behaves exactly like you, copies your movements, but is it real? We all know mirrors and reflections play a major role in the story. Whether having mirrors or frames in official art or volume covers. Characters reflecting each other like Vanitas/Astolfo, Domi/Louis, Ruthven/Noé etc. I think the “throw away the answer” is interesting, it could be Noé again knowing what the “right” thing to do is but is desperate to see Vanitas laugh. Feels very much like a “oh forget about all that, what do you wanna do?” Noé putting other people before himself and being selfless to a fault.

/I love this world that lacks everything/

/If the mechanical echoes/

/Everything seems to be laughable/

/I can’t be proud of it/

/But isn’t the burning dream beautiful/

Why would you love a hollow world? This is Noé saying this. How can a world lack everything if it’s meant to be real? Unless it isn’t. Unless it lacks what you truly desire even if you claim to love it regardless. Echoes fall into the same vein as reflections I brought up previously. ‘Mechanical’ implies it’s a machine, tying back to it being empty and hollow. Lacking realness. And it’s funny, Noé says he’s not proud of it. His world, his creation if you will. That it’s laughable even but then goes on to call it beautiful. Think about that for a minute. The dream is burning because Vanitas will always die no matter what Noé does. Everything will go up in flames, it’s only temporary but guess what? To Noé, this fleeting period of happiness is far better than whatever he has left when he wakes up.

/When the sky and the void meet look back because the dreams will come later/

/When the sky and the void meet look back be still in bloom/

/When the sky and the void meet born and die repeatedly/

/The future and lies break and laugh/

We’ll stop here because the song then goes back to the first chorus “I love this world and the light you give me” stuff. This part of the OP I would say is the most vague, you can read this a lot of ways. However you want to interpret it, there is a clear loop going on. We can see “sky and void” as metaphors for Vanitas and Noé. Personally I’d say Noé is the void because of that official art that has Vanitas with a clear sky in the background and Noé is sinking into the darkness. Similar to when he drinks someone’s blood and sees their memories.

But while Vanitas has a few purple butterflies, Noé is given that distinct glowing blue butterfly. Vanitas is Noe’s light. We talk about that art for hours but that's for another day. Plus given how Noé talks in this song, it’s safe to say he sees himself as the void. And once they meet the dreams will come later, to be born and die repeatedly. Meeting could be their actual meeting from chapter one and the cycle/memory world begins from there. It could be wherever fuck they were when Noé failed to grab Vanitas’ hand. The future and lies….what lies? Who my dear readers would be lying to us :000. But eventually that mountain of lies will come tumbling down.

And, no theory just pure delulu I’ve always headcanoned that when Vanitas dies Noé is going to break out laughing. So if that happens the op spoiled it.

[chimachapterbooks]

In the Lair of Lavertus

“I can't sleep," said Cragger.

Laval rolled over on his sleep mat and peered at the Crocodile through half-closed eyes. "Do what you always do. Count swamp sheep."

"Tried that," said Cragger. "I also tried singing Crocodile lullabies to myself."

"Crocodiles have lullabies?" Laval asked.

"Sure," said Cragger. "They're mostly about what we're going to eat the next day."

"That sounds.. relaxing, I guess," said Laval. "So why can't you sleep?"

"I don't think I like this place," answered Cragger. "Or maybe I just don't trust our host."

Laval, Cragger, and their friends were on a quest to free the Legend Beasts and restore the flow of CHI from Mount Cavora. On their journey through the mysterious Outlands they had encountered Lavertus, a very odd Lion who lived in a fortress he called his "Lair." He had offered the team to stay there and use it as a base, as long as they didn't go wandering around after dark.

Cragger got to his feet. "I'm going to take a look around. I think this Lion is up to something."

"None of us should go wandering," Laval warned. “Lavertus told us it isn't safe, and that, at least, I believe…”

"I know, I know, Lions love following rules," Cragger said, heading for the door. "Well, Crocs make their own." Laval went after him. "And we all remember what happened because of that. Sometimes, I think you break rules just for the sake of breaking them. Fine—if you're going, l'm going with you."

"Why?" Cragger asked.

"To make sure you don't mess things up ... again," said Laval.

"Come on, we're on the same side now. You can trust me." Cragger flashed a toothy grin before turning away.

"I used to," muttered Laval, following after him.

——————

It was easy to see that Lavertus's home was designed to make sure any stranger would rapidly get lost inside.

Hallways looped around on themselves, doors led to solid walls, and staircases that went up somehow managed to leave you on a lower floor.

"Ive never seen anything like this," whispered Cragger.

"I wish I wasn't seeing it now," answered Laval. "What do you expect to find, anyway?"

"I don't know," said Cragger. "Nobody builds a house like this unless they have something to hide."

"Or they had the directions upside down," Laval said, shaking his head.

The two moved on. After another half hour of searching, they came upon a corridor lined with doorways on both sides. One by one, they opened the doors.

"Closet. Closet. Closet," said Laval.

"Staircase!" cried Cragger.

Laval rushed over to see what the Crocodile had found.

But when he got there, Cragger was standing at an open door looking into another closet.

"Where are the stairs?" asked Laval.

"They were here a second ago," said Cragger, shutting the door. "Then they weren't."

"Hmmm. Try opening the door again," said Laval.

Cragger opened the door a second time. When he did, the staircase was back. “That’s weird,” said the Crocodile. "Let's go see what's down there."

"Got any breadcrumbs?" asked Laval.

"Huh?" snapped Cragger.

"To leave a trail to find our way back," said Laval. "What happens if the stairs disappear again when were halfway down?"

"Good question," said Cragger. After a short pause, he added, "You go first."

"Right," said Laval. "Because turning my back on you is my favorite thing to do. ... Not."

The pair stumbled down the staircase side by side. At the bottom, they found an iron door. To their surprise, it was unlocked.

"He must not have thought anyone would find this spot," said Laval.

"Or maybe he wanted whoever did find it to be able to get in, because he knew they wouldn't get back out again," answered Cragger. "You go first."

"Wait a second!" said Laval, turning around to face the Crocodile. "This whole thing was your idea! Why do I have to keep going first?"

"Um, because you're such a fierce fighter and you can handle whatever comes at us?"

Laval glared at Cragger. "Yeah, I'm fierce," he said.

"You might want to remember that if you have any tricks planned. Anyway, I'll go first, because we're supposed to be friends... and that's what friends do."

The Lion pushed the door open, even as Cragger said, “Tricks? Me?"

"Yes, you. Just because we're on the same side again doesn't mean—"

Laval stopped short and his eyes grew wide. He and Cragger had stumbled upon the biggest workshop either had ever seen. It was packed with strange devices, big and small. Some were incredibly complicated and others were extremely simple. At a glance, the only things Laval recognized were Speedor wheels and other parts of a Speedor bike.

"Incredible," said Laval. "Eris would love this!"

"If Lavertus made all this, he must be some kind of inventor," said Cragger. "But he didn't tell us. Why keep that a secret?"

"I don't know," answered Laval. "But look at this stuff. Some of it looks like weapons. It could be dangerous. We'd better tell the others."

Just as Laval was speaking, the floor shifted underneath them. The Lion and Croc were knocked off their feet.

"Whoa!" said Laval. "What was that?"

"Laval, look!" cried Cragger, pointing at the iron door.

"The stairs are gone!"

Cragger was right. The doorway leading to the stairs now led to a solid wall.

"We're trapped!" Laval realized.

"No, we're not," Cragger said, racing into the heart of the workshop. "There has to be something in here that can get us out."

"Cragger, don't!" Laval cried.

But it was too late. Cragger had bumped into one of Lavertus's inventions: a big metal cannon. It immediately shot out a tangle of ropes that wrapped around him.

Cragger toppled backward, falling into a stone chair.

The arms of the chair closed tight on either side of the Crocodile and held him fast.

"Hang on," shouted Laval. "I'll get you out."

But as he raced toward Cragger, the floor rumbled again. A small catapult on top of a tall shelf went off, launching a little rock at the head of a life-size Gorilla statue. The statue sprang to life, plodding forward and knocking into more inventions as it went. Soon, the air was filled with arrows, jets of flame, and bursts of water.

"Great job," called Cragger. "If we weren't doomed before, now we really are."

"Just ... stay there!" yelled Laval. "I'm coming!"

"Where do you think I'm going to go?" Cragger struggled against the ropes. "This thing makes one of Gorzan's hugs look like a bunny cuddle."

Laval was about to reply when, suddenly, he heard a loud groan behind him. He turned just in time to see the loud groan behind him. He turned just in time to see the Gorilla statue tipping forward! Laval tried to spring out of the way, but he wasn't fast enough. The statue toppled on top of him.

"Oof!" the Lion exclaimed. The heavy statue pinned him to the ground.

"Laval! Are you okay?" Cragger called.

"Yeah, I think so," Laval said. "But I'm ... LOOK OUT!"

Laval's eyes grew wide as a flame cannon went off beside Cragger. In an instant, the Croc was surrounded by flames!

"CRAGGER!" Laval cried.

For a moment, Laval couldn't see anything but embers and smoke. Then, he heard coughing. When the smoke cleared, Cragger was sputtering and waving his arms.

Instead of hurting the Croc, the flames had burned right through the ropes tying him up. He was free!

"Talk about luck." Laval exhaled. "Are you hurt?"

"Just a little singed," said Cragger. "You?"

Laval squirmed under the statue. "Been better. Could use a little help here."

Cragger moved toward Laval. But as he did, the floor shook again. The whole room turned, and the stairs by the doorway reappeared. All Cragger had to do was make a run for it and he would be free! But the room could shift any minute and they would disappear again.

Cragger met Laval's gaze for a split second. Then he turned and ran.

"Cragger?" Laval's heart sank. The Crocodile wouldn't really leave him there?

Would he?

Suddenly, Cragger swerved and jumped over a marching group of Skunk mechs. He snatched a wrench from one of the mech's hands and skidded to a stop right beside Laval.

"Quick!" he said, using the wrench for leverage against the statue. "We'll push together-hurry!"

Together, the two managed to pry the Gorilla statue off of Laval. Cragger helped him to his feet. "Let's get out of here!" he shouted.

Running faster than they ever had before, they shot through the room and made it out the door just as the floor was starting to turn again.

Together, they clambered back up the stairs. When they got to the top, the Lion and Croc leaned heavily against the wall, gasping for breath.

"Thanks," Laval said finally. "For a second there, I wasn't sure you were going to come back for me."

Cragger shrugged and gave a big Crocodile grin.

"We're friends, right? That's what friends do."

Laval smiled and clapped Cragger on the back. "It sure is."

[ghosts-and-blue-sweaters]

3, 4, 5, 22, 23, 28, 29, 36, 40, 44, 48

Do you like smoothies?

Yes, although I’m very picky about them. Generally if it has bananas or strawberries I’ll like it, but when it gets into other fruits I’m very cautious. Which is… odd to me? Because I don’t think there’s a single fruit that I dislike. For some reason when it’s in smoothie form I am far more particular!

What do you wear when you have to dress nicely?

Sometimes a dress, sometimes I’ll put on a pretty sweater, sometimes I’ll wear one of my long skirts :) There’s not a set Fancy Outfit that I own; it’s mostly down to why/where I have to wear a fancy outfit, and what I feel like wearing in the moment.

How do you like your eggs?

Scrambled, although I don’t like eggs very much at all 😭 I’ll pretty much only eat them with syrup or (sometimes) cheese.

Iced or hot drinks?

Probably hot! I don’t like it when the ice melts and my drink gets all watery :(

Which songs do you like to sing in the shower?

Whichever songs I’m currently looping/listening to a lot! I think during my last shower it was Rise by Trip Lee (but only the singing part because I don’t know the rap part yet). Glue Myself Shut by Noah Kahan also I think!

Can you swim very well? Do you like swimming?

YES swimming is one of my favorite things ever! I wouldn’t consider myself the greatest swimmer though, as I mostly dog-paddle XD But seriously take me to a Sea or a Pool and I will be there for hours.

Did you play with Legos as a kid? What was your favorite set?

Not much, no! My younger siblings both played with legos all the time, but I definitely preferred my stuffed animals.

When I did play with legos, I would like, never build my own creations; I would only ever follow the instructions Exactly. I remember there was this one specific house I would build. It may have been the only thing I really built with legos, actually. We had a little instruction manual for it and I would flip through it, build the house accurately and precisely, and promptly take the house apart or leave afterward!

What’s an arcade or table game (air hockey, ping pong, etc) that you’re really good at?

Drawing a blank here to be honest. I was never much of a games person so I genuinely don’t think I’m good at anything apart from Mario Kart Wii, Abalone, and Uno (none of which are arcade or table games) XD

What’s your favorite kind of tree?

CHERRY BLOSSOM!!!!!!!! CHERRY BLOSSOM!!! My favorite tree in the whole wide world. Red maples are also very special though <3

What do you do with spare change?

Keep it in my wallet until it becomes like Heavy because of all the coins I’ve got. I’d like to use them more but I usually don’t due to a combination of me forgetting I have coins, or being too embarrassed to count them out at a register.

Do you have a favorite plate or bowl?

At the moment we do not own anything plate-or-bowl-wise that is particularly unique or has particularly great textures 😔 BUT my favorite plates are these ones, which we used to have but then my mom got rid of them <—upset about this

[frozenjokes]

typical convex kill and eat each other fic

ao3 link

LOOP 8

It was Scar’s claws that hit the cool floor this time, adrenaline and rage carrying him lunging forward to the left door. He tore through the hall, caution falling to the wayside in his fury, but luckily there was no fire, no anvils. He skipped the tripwires, and either got lucky avoiding pressure plates, or stepped too light, too fast. When he burst into the storage room, Cub was nowhere to be seen. What a surprise.

“Where is he.” Scar hissed to where Cleo was still laying in bed. Is that where she and Cub started out when the loop reset? Lucky, weren’t they.

Cleo turned their head to face him, slow, unhurried, and infuriating. “Only two ways to go, and you came through one of the doors.”

Right. Well. Scar probably could have figured that out himself. He turned around, but Cleo wasn’t done.

“Wait a minute, Cub asked me to tell you something- he didn’t think he’d get the chance, you’re a very shoot first ask questions later kinda guy.” Scar growled impatiently, but Cleo waved him off, “I have no skin in this game. He just doesn’t want to be killed instantly. He gave me a dumb script, but I’m doing him a favor by not saying it. Cub is so lame.”

“So what if I kill him instantly or not?”

Cleo sighed harshly, “Who knows. He likes to run. I don’t care what you do, but if you wanted to finish me while the two of you goof around, that would be appreciated.”

“He won’t be happy once I’m through with him.”

“I believe you. I also don’t care. If you aren’t going to shoot me, I guess I’ll enjoy my nap. Goodbye.” Cleo made a spectacle of yawning, closing their eyes, and turning away. Scar huffed, but did as she wished, twice to make sure. It felt odd, shooting someone as an act of mercy or- whether or not this was mercy could be debated, Scar didn’t think this would take more than ten minutes, but regardless, it was time to move on. Scar huffed, taking off his helmet. It would only get in the way.

He was more careful entering the hallway to the control room, but making it though, Cub was still nowhere to be seen. Was he hiding? Scar doubted it, Cub was a big guy, and neither he nor Cleo seemed to be very flexible. A human trait, maybe, but regardless, there didn’t seem like there were many places to hide. Cleo said Cub liked to run, hadn’t she? Fine. Let him.

Scar entered the third and final hall, only for Cub to be at the other end.

“Hello, Scar. I’m not dead yet, so I’m going to go ahead and assume you and Cleo talked?”

“Cleo has nothing to do with the state of your sorry life.” Scar started forward, slow, methodical, and Cub did not move.

“Will it hurt?” he asked, not sounding particularly concerned with the question, and continuing on before Scar could answer, “Honestly, I can not believe that whole thing with the snare worked. I mean, I was confident I could get you to chase me, get you angry enough not to pay attention to what was in front of your face, but I did get lucky. It was a pretty narrow window for you to get your head stuck. I was worried the wire wouldn’t be strong enough either- I mean, you did break it. Just too little too late.”

Scar did not humor him. If Cub wanted to keep talking, let him talk. Scar could probably leap a third of the length of the hall if he really pushed himself, and once Cub was in his claws, there would be no more speaking.

“Would you like to know what I’m going to do to you Scar?”

Scar did not answer.

“I’ve got this little statuette that I nicked from the control room, and there’s a panel a couple feet from my door that triggers a machine gun to fire from your end to mine. I’ll probably get out safe, but you probably won’t. If you do, I’m pretty sure I can get you with something in the next hall. I don’t know, I haven’t been there yet. It’s more likely I kill both of us by accident though.”

Scar narrowed his eyes. He was not far enough through the hall to be able to run safely to the other end, or even jump. “Go ahead and throw it then.

Cub considered him thoughtfully, “I guess I probably should, shouldn’t I?” Cub took the statuette from his pocket, spun it once in his hand, then tossed it. Just as quickly, Scar’s gun was drawn, the collision from his bullet splitting the thing in two, both halves bouncing in opposite directions and cracking apart on the floor, while the bullet clattered back towards Scar. He sheathed his gun. Across the hall he now had two safe spaces, possibly three if the bullet impact to the floor had enough force to trigger a pressure plate, but Scar wasn’t certain. Just as he was preparing to leap, ready to clear the room in two bounds, Cub spoke.

“It’s a good thing I took two.”

Scar jumped at the same time Cub threw his second statuette, his first instinct to catch it, keep it from hitting the floor, but the sudden change shifted his trajectory. Splaying his body, he had enough reach to snatch the item from the air, but with only one forepaw, he landed awkwardly, his back half nearly flipping over the front until his midhand shot forward to steady himself, hitting the exact spot the statuette had meant to land. Scar heard something click behind him. He lunged, adrenaline coursing through his powerful hind legs and driving him toward the exit where Cub was now escaping. He heard the gunshots, but felt nothing but Cub’s pant leg in his grip, both of their momentums throwing them through the doorway and rolling across the floor until the steel door slammed shut, and nothing else could be heard.

Scar pulled himself up over Cub with a triumphant snarl, heat roaring through his veins at the sight of Cub smattered in blood, quite a lot of blood, had Cub been so slow that he’d been shot multiple times?

Scar wound back an arm to tear through his assailant, and found himself unable. Something was wrong. He tasted blood. He saw blood, but spilling from his own chest. He looked at Cub. Cub stared back. Scar could not read him, nor did he expect Cub’s hands to find the leaking wounds in his side, dig his fingers in, and tear Scar off of him. Scar’s scream was strangled, almost gurgled, he hardly recognized he was the one making it until he was writhing on the cool ground.

He did not recognize that Cub had found one of the guns at his hip. “See you soon.”

LOOP 9

Scar did not catch himself before hitting the ground, but he was no less furious. He kept his head enough to be cautious, but maybe it should not have been a surprise that Cub was not in his bed. Cleo was already dead. Huh.

Cub was not in the control room, nor Scar’s room, nor any of the hallways- was he just running in circles? What was the point? What was Cub going to do if Scar turned around, or waited in the same place? Well- Scar was thinking about it, but if he was going to wait, he would much rather do it in the safe room. Scar maneuvered through the hall, more confident now that he’d been here before, and pushed through the door.

Cub was not here. Cub wasn’t, but something else was.

A.. it almost didn’t feel accurate to describe the thing as a robot, a steel pole coming up from a plate with four wheels, the head of some kind of animal stuck to the top, mechanical and wholly fake looking. It looked a little like a cat, but with a longer snout and floppy ears, and it turned to face Scar when he entered the room. Sunglasses were perched on the snout as if the hidden eyes would disguise the lack of personhood behind them. Adding to the absurdity, a paper crown was taped to the top of its head.

“Halt, heathen!” The mechanical mouth fell open; did the humans really not have enough budget left to make a functioning robot? “You are in the presence of your king! Ren the king, master of puzzles and ruler of hints, fixer of bloated economies, and beloved across all the lands. Kneel below your king or face the consequences!” The robot chugged into gear, scooting forward toward Scar. It was so unstable, Scar was certain it would fall over when it stopped in front of him. Indeed, it wobbled, but did not fall.

“Heathen! Kneel at the feet of your king! Pledge your allegiance or be hailed a traitor to the crown!”

Scar blinked, staring. He walked away. The robot chugged after him.

“Traitor! Traitor! Blasphemous traitor to the tiny crown of the dog! Suffer the consequences, fool! Suffer!” The robot continued to berate him, but between the general jank and the stuffy mic quality, Scar had written it off as some kind of practical joke, at least until he heard the click of an ignition, and out of the corner of his eye, a spark.

Scar had no time to react before he was engulfed in flame. Maybe he could have been okay with his helmet on, but a face full of fire did not serve his eyes and nose well, his dry fur catching as he screeched, unable to do much but stumble back and shield his already burning face. All he knew was heat and fire as he grappled for a gun, but even shooting blindly, the onslaught continued mercilessly.

“Traitor! Traitor! How dare you heathen, attack your king!”

Scar was knocked off his feet by two gunshots slamming through his chest, rolling instinctively into a protective ball, as small as he could make himself. The fire had ceased after the gunshots, but you could have tricked Scar, the whole of him burned and blistered. He couldn’t see. He couldn’t breathe.

Vaguely, Scar was aware of another presence entering the room. He heard footsteps, but knew little else.

“My liege,” came Cub’s gruff voice, and the robot must have turned, Scar heard the chugging whirs of the janky machine.

“Good citizen! Have you need for your hint?”

“No, not yet. Your generosity is boundless, king.”

“Right you are!” the robot stopped whirring, apparently pleased. Cub began to move again, and Scar curled up tighter against his approach.

“Meet the king, have you? Yeah, he’s a bit of a p-a-i-n in the a-s-s, but he can’t spell, so you’re good as long as you’re careful. Ren is our hint system; we get one a week, but because he’s a-n-n-o-y-i-n-g, we don’t turn him on unless we really have to. If you don’t roleplay with him he gets upset, but I guess you wouldn’t have known that. Anyway, I think I’ll count this as a win for me. 3-0, oof, it’s not looking good for you. Unless we count the other times you killed me.. let’s see here.. one and two were pretty clean. You got me again in the hallway, that’s three. You did shoot me through the door that one time, but it wasn’t fatal, so Cleo finished me. Other than that.. nope, we’re even! 3-3, yeah, that’s a little better. Here, I’m not trying to drag things out.”

Cub pulled at something on Scar’s belt and said nothing more.

LOOP 10

Scar was hot. Everything was too warm, too everywhere, and he spent some time laying face down on the cool floor, desperate to be consumed by it. Suffering from the last life did not carry over to the next, at least that’s what Scar thought was the case, but maybe this was in his head, his brain reacting late to his body’s trauma. He could see, but he didn’t think he’d be able to. His eyes still burned.

He didn’t want to be set on fire anymore. Suddenly he felt utterly apathetic. He didn’t want to be here anymore. He didn’t want to move.

So he didn’t.

…

Cub never arrived. That was odd. Maybe he’d decided to wait? Maybe he guessed Scar might wait, might jump out at him, and had hidden himself away somewhere else. How would he know, though? Were there cameras? If there were cameras anywhere, Scar assumed they’d be in the control room. Slowly, he got to his feet, curiosity drawing him toward the right door. When he pulled it open, he was not expecting to see Cub curled up on the ground.

“Ah- Hey there.. I’m just. Just resting.”

Scar narrowed his eyes, suspicious until he saw a small trail of blood from the other side of the hall to the middle, where Cub had apparently decided to take his nap. It was difficult to see exactly, but two bolts were sticking out of his back.

“It’s a nasty one. In the control room,” Cub breathed shakily when Scar didn’t speak, “Suit of armor. With a crossbow. I was just trying to figure out what would set it off, you know? It uh- I figured it out. Course I stayed out of line of fire but uh- there were two. Two crossbows. I’m very. Dizzy. Might have been poisoned, haha. It happens..”

Scar frowned. “Guess that makes 3-4, huh?”

Cub jolted, eyes focusing where they’d started to dull. “What- no. No, absolutely not. You did not set that trap. You didn’t shoot me with that crossbow. You had nothing to do with this.”

“If I shoot you right now, I’d say I do.”

“But- no! You wouldn’t have got me if I hadn’t been poisoned. I’m already dead. Finishing me off hardly counts as a point toward you.” Scar laughed, he couldn’t help himself. Is this really what Cub cared about? He was upset, he was actually upset about this! Crazy!

“You didn’t set me on fire. That robot is what killed me last time, not you.” Scar smirked as Cub gaped, showing more emotion now than Scar had ever seen over the entire duration of his stay.

“I set that up! I knew you wouldn’t know what to do!” Cub was mad, he was so mad! Scar couldn’t have been happier.

“Sure, but you only finished me off.” Scar shrugged, “I was already dead.”

“I set you up!” Cub seethed, goodness gracious this was incredible. Scar wondered if Cub had even considered the fact that Scar was messing with him. Probably not, since even as Cub was trying to sit up, his arms were shaking horribly and his whole body swayed to the beat of his dizziness. “I set you up,” he hissed, but the sound was more breathy than anything, “You had nothing to do with my- with- with the crossbows.”

“But if I shot you right now, then I would!”

“No! No!”

“Tsk tsk, I don’t think that’s true Cubby, I don’t think that’s true. If you want your point for the robot kill, then I get a point for this.” Scar laughed, leaning against the wall while he shook his head. Something clicked. Both his wall and the wall across from him smashed into each other, leaving him crumpled on the floor like a squashed bug.

“You- You stupid motherfucker!” Cub might have laughed, he might have continued on, but either way, Scar wouldn’t have remembered.

LOOP 11

Waking up was a disorienting feeling to say the least. His first thought wasn’t exactly coherent, but certainly one of surprise, and his second thought fell more along the lines of ouch after hitting the floor.

Scar really didn’t know how he died. Had Cub done it somehow? Cub couldn’t even sit up straight, surely not. Well.. as disconcerting as that was, Scar was quite a bit more motivated to find him now.

He went to the safe room, as was his preference now. It didn’t matter if he wanted to backtrack or wait to catch Cub off guard, there was value in a place like that, where nothing else would get in his way. Honestly, if Scar was going to do as he wished with that bastard, the room with no traps was likely the only place he’d get that chance. Cub was too willing to play with his life in order to take Scar’s, he had too much experience navigating the halls.

Scar couldn’t say he was expecting to see Cub in the safe room, still in bed, almost cozy looking. Scar growled, looking for the robot, but didn’t see it. Cub followed his gaze around the room.

“Ren’s not on. He’s over there, tucked in the corner. Any other concerns?” Scar frowned, glancing at Cleo.

She was dead. Well. He couldn’t say he was surprised.

“Yeah,” Cub mumbled, not without amusement, “No interest in us, which is fair, fair. It is nice to wake up and know time has passed without you. Maybe a bit more disruptive to wake up this many times, but they don’t know what has gone on without them. We each get a gun, so the first thing I do is end it quickly. They don’t even open their eyes.”

Scar didn’t see a gun, but that didn’t mean Cub didn’t have it. Something told him Cub wouldn’t use it on Scar anyway. Slowly, he began to stalk forward.

“Yeah, this is a bit of a freebie for you. Go on, relax. Take that suit off if you like, get comfortable. It just occurred to me you might not understand the rules, right? Well, there are no rules really, not besides my own self imposed ones, but I don’t expect you to follow those. This is about intention, Scar. Points.”

Scar narrowed his eyes. It would be more satisfying to rip Cub apart without the gloves. He’d mentioned being eaten alive before, hadn’t he? Scar couldn’t do that with a helmet on. Scar began the process of removing his suit. He was in no hurry. Cub had nowhere to run.

“I think you were confused last time. To me, the final blow isn’t what necessitates a kill, not exactly. It can, sure, but when I kill you after you’ve been caught in a trap, it’s not because I’m claiming a point. Unless I’m working with a more intricate trap, which I don’t have the time to set up with you chasing me, I’m not trying to prolong your suffering. I could wait for you to bleed out or succumb to your burns, but I take no joy from that.”

“So if I killed you last time, I would have gotten a point.” Scar turned away so Cub wouldn’t see his smirk.

“I- No. That is the opposite of what I am saying.”

“But I would have shot you, killing you.”

“I was already dying from an unrelated trap. One you had nothing to do with. If you had intended for me to get shot by a poisoned crossbow bolt, then sure, you would get a point, but you didn’t, you weren’t even around when I got shot. There’s no way you would have made it there before me, and even then, you couldn’t have done anything. I killed myself last time. Just like you killed yourself with the trap in the wall.”

“Oh, is that what happened?”

“You hit a trigger and the walls crushed you between them, yes. If I had shot your twitching body, would you consider that my point?”

Scar shook his head, like this was a preposterous notion. “Of course not. I killed myself by activating the trap. I don’t even remember it.”

“Exactly! Then you understand!”

“Well, but it’s different if I shot you before I accidentally killed myself. I would have gotten a point then.”

Cub sat up so jerkily in bed that the sheets flew off him. “Wh- No! Why? Tell me why. How in the world is that different?”

“I mean, sure, you were pretty close to dead, but you weren’t really dead. If I had shot you then, I would have killed you. Therefore, my point. Honestly, we may as well consider this 3-4. In a couple minutes it’ll be 3-5, wow, I’ll be crushing you then.”

Cub balled fists into his hair, distress real and utterly delicious. “That’s- No, no, we are not ‘just considering it 3-4,’ you didn’t even shoot me! You leaned against the wall like a fucking idiot and got crushed! Even if you shot me it wouldn’t- no!”

By now, Scar had long since stripped himself of his space suit, doing everything in his power to keep from laughing in Cub’s face. “Shhh, no more talking now.” Scar did not actually expect Cub to quiet, but when he turned wearing his crooked smirk, Cub was silent, staring, looking like he had zero intention of continuing on. Good.

Scar growled lowly as he approached Cub, who seemed to have zero intention of trying to get away. A little disappointing maybe, but this would be nice to do on the cushioned surface. Just because Scar was murdering someone, didn’t mean he had to do it on the hard ground.

“Are you comfortable, Cub?” Scar snickered as he crawled onto the bed, “Maybe this isn’t a terrible place to be, not now. How will you feel when I take you apart?”

“You- What?” Cub drew into himself slightly, and Scar pounced on him with a snarl, taking hold of his arms and legs and trapping Cub beneath him. How unfortunate it was for humans to have so few limbs. For them, at least. For Scar, he found this to be very satisfying. Cub took a sharp breath when Scar let his claws dig into Cub’s wrists and thighs.

“Will you scream for me? You seem the more stoic type, I’m afraid I’ll have to work for it.”

“I mean- I- I’ll do whatever you like.”

That confused Scar a little- he faltered slightly, he wasn’t- that was an odd thing to say, surely, but maybe something had bugged with the translation. These things were never perfect. Scar huffed out of a lack of anything else to say, drawing his claws down Cub’s arm to his heart, pressing to feel its erratic beat. He was certainly afraid, whimpering quietly. Scar took a lot more pleasure out of basking in the anticipatory terror than he did typically, and maybe that was because he had been forced to fight for this, he earned it. Cub wouldn’t look at him, and maybe he couldn’t, not beyond a passing glance. Scar reveled in it. He didn’t see humans terribly often, and when he did, he rarely took the time to appreciate their terror. Not many peoples had such unprotected skin, so splotchy and red.

Scar tore through the collar of Cub’s shirt, ripping the fabric for better access. As satisfying as it would be to tear through Cub’s throat, Scar preferred he live a bit longer than that. Cub pushed at Scar’s arm with his own, but Scar adjusted to hold him still with his midarm, wasting no more time before bending over and tearing through Cub’s pectoral with his teeth. All food at home was food to be savored. You were lucky to eat, lucky to live, and even as a kid when Scar had priority in rations, he was still so skinny, even more so than he was now. Everyone was skinny back home. Their soil had gone to waste, crop yields too few to feed their livestock, so their animals were skinny too, just as sick as the people who salivated over their still breathing bodies.

It was silly, almost unfair, the position of his world. Technology to rival the most advanced worlds, abundances of resources that would make galaxies beyond his sick with jealousy. His people had the means to do such great things, and they had, for thousands and thousands of years they had, but..

They couldn’t eat. There was simply not enough food on their planet to feed them all. They had to look elsewhere, to the sky.

Scar wondered often about leaving. Taking the whole population, finding somewhere new, somewhere there might be hope for the next generations of his people. He didn’t know why they didn’t. Was it stubbornness? Was it even possible? Maybe he was too stupid to understand it. He used to be told that often, he was too stupid to understand most things. It was probably true.

They’d thought he was going to die. His peers, his teachers, his parents. He was always so sickly, prone to injury, he spent so much of his life in a wheelchair or on crutches. They were waiting for him to die because he was a waste of food, but only the kids were brave enough to say it to his face. Our parents are starving, their narrowed eyes would say when out loud they would tell him he wasn’t worth it. Scar knew it, because his parents were starving too. He knew they were scared, because the people they looked up to were so skinny, everyone was so, so skinny, and the sick kid was taking the meals that would save their parents.

Scar was afraid, every day he was afraid that they were going to eat him. That they would not wait for him to die to cannibalize him, because they were so hungry, and his sick, stupid, useless existence was killing the people they loved.

So he enlisted. He wouldn’t take no for an answer, he wouldn’t accept his sickness or his age as an excuse to send him away, he was going to fight, he was going to be useful, and if he would die, then he would die something, and when he was consumed, there would be no malice. Scar did not worry about it anymore. He had more than proven himself, even if he would not be missed. He’d fed them, mothers, brothers, daughters, and he’d done a good job of it, and they would love him when it was finally his turn.

So he enjoyed it. He made sure to enjoy it, Cub, because while Scar was here, stuck for up to three years, he would be eating well, and they would not.

It was not about Cub, not anymore. When Cub stilled, Scar did not notice. For the first time, he ate his fill.

It was weird, afterwards. It was quiet. Very, very quiet. Scar didn’t.. he didn’t really know what to do. He was full, a different kind of pain, new and more uncomfortable than he’d bargained for. He wasn’t sure if he could do anything besides fall asleep. He was really tired actually, maybe that had something to do with the loop. He did spend a lot of time sleeping, usually. Scar didn’t love the quiet, he was used to the bustling of others as he dozed, but he didn’t think he’d be able to stay awake if he tried.

He curled up, right on the end of the bed. He would not be awake for much longer.

…

It was still quiet when Scar woke up. Lacking. He disliked it heavily, and without the shield of his anger, he felt more unsafe than he had since he’d first arrived. He didn’t want to leave this room. He supposed he didn’t have to. Still, he wished Cleo was here.

He felt dirty. That was the blood, decidedly. He.. wasn’t sure how he would wash his clothes here. Well. It wasn’t like it was cold or anything, and he had nothing to hide. He stripped, then decided he’d actually quite like to have the bed for himself, to he stripped it as well, not that the blood hadn’t soaked through the sheets, but whatever. Better than nothing. Actually! Scar flipped the mattress over, utterly pleased with his own brilliant ingenuity. Wait a minute-

Scar poked his head over to Cleo’s bed, also bloody but far less so, and stole the blankets from it, snickering as he went. Perfect. Purrrfect.

Then he spent a couple hours really cleaning himself up. He was a bit of a mess in the first place, and he supposed he would always start that way after each loop, but ah well. That didn’t mean he had to sit in discomfort now. After that, he went to sleep. He woke up to the familiar feeling of hunger, and while Cub’s corpse was far less appetizing than it was fresh, well, Scar was not about to waste it. He’d eaten far worse without getting sick. If he got sick, he’d stop. He made less of a mess of himself this time (the floor was a different matter) so he did not spend nearly as much time grooming, and afterwards went right back to sleep.

When he woke up, he was bored. Hm. What did Cub and Cleo do when they were bored? Well, Cub plotted murders, Scar knew that. What about Cleo? He’d seen them drawing once, he thought. Cub and Cleo talked as well, he’d seen them doing that before.

What did they do when everyone else was dead?

They didn’t.. did they..?

Surely not.

Who was Scar kidding, they absolutely killed themselves. They didn’t value their lives at all, not when they came right back. And that- well, it made a little sense he supposed, but he didn’t feel good about it. The thought disturbed him deeply, killing himself. That felt like crossing a threshold you didn’t just come back from, and Scar- well, everyone thought about ending it every once and awhile, but this was far too real. No, he didn’t think he could do that.

He went back to sleep. When he woke up, he was hungry, so he continued eating Cub, groomed himself, and was a little more bored than he was tired, but slept anyway. Scar was sufficiently restless when he woke up.

He would take a walk. He would take a little walk until he ended up back here. That would be fine. Stupidly, Scar found himself afraid to venture through the hallways. Apparently with no one else around, he lost his nerve. But he went, regardless.

He did not die. He didn’t even trigger any traps. He was still restless.

Scar went again, faster. He made multiple loops, challenging himself to beat his time, treating this like a training exercise. He remembered Cleo mentioned a stopwatch of some sort, and tore through the drawers of the control room looking for it. At the back of his mind, he prayed his carelessness would end him. It did not. He found the stopwatch.

That was fun for a while. He timed himself, he was fast, he got to know the route very well. He could cross one of the hallways in five long bounds, was an expert of ripping the doors open and pouncing inside, knew every route by heart, and still pushed himself further. He did this for days, not that he had the wherewithal to keep track. He couldn’t read human clocks, and didn’t try very hard in the first place. He wouldn’t have known what to look for in the first place. The numbers meant nothing to him. Regardless, time certainly passed. He began to eat Cleo as well, with some hesitance. Shame would not allow him to waste the meal.

He got lonely. With a jolt, he remembered he was allowed to call home. The realization was followed by the paralyzing fear he’d have to speak to Grian. It was days more before his loneliness overtook his fear. When he got to the control room though, his papers were gone. Of course they’d be gone, they’d probably disappeared when the loop reset, but they had the instructions he needed to call home, and the language barrier kept him from just figuring it out, though, maybe the language barrier didn’t even matter. He was probably too dumb to figure out the interface on one of his own ships. Mumbo stuck with him for a reason. Scar was only good for one thing.

He started pressing buttons. In all honesty, he was certain this would kill him, but he never managed to do anything. Some buttons pulled up completely different screens, showed different images, different information, but none of it meant anything to him. He didn’t realize how desperate he was to talk to someone until nothing worked. Until every press of every button led him to the same unintelligible nonsense. Until it became clear that he was entirely stripped of the option for any companionship at all.

Frustration tugged sobs from his chest. It was so quiet here. He wanted to go home.

He slept for a long time. He was starting to feel sick, and he didn’t know if it was the meat, the sadness, or his poor immune system rearing its ugly head. He did hear that sometimes when two different peoples are together for too long, they can get each other quite sick. Exchanging of foreign germs, or whatever. Maybe that was happening here.

Scar did end up getting quite sick. He stopped eating Cleo, and perhaps a little late, dragged her body and the remains of Cub to his starting room, leaving them there. For the rest of the week he was a zombie. It was a shame food and water was so accessible, or he might’ve died. When he dreamed, it was only his mother. She would lean over his beside, furiously grooming his forehead, and Scar would lean into her touch, into the fleeting feeling, too phantom to be real. He fell out of bed once or twice chasing her. Often, he’d just lay on the floor. It was cool, and he was burning with fever.

He was bored. He was so bored. Bored and sick, bored and hungry, bored and lonely, always bored. He wondered about the puzzle, but had no idea how to start it. If there were instructions, they were in the human language. He grew frustrated he had survived so long. He was tired of racing himself through the halls, beating his own time. He didn’t want to do it anymore. He wanted something more exciting, something deadlier.

First, it was discovering what everything did. The walls were less predictable so Scar didn’t touch them, but it was easy enough to activate the pressure plates from afar, and with a long enough tube, the tripwires went easily as well. He found usually the tripwire traps opened a slot in the floor, death pits, water, spikes, the like. The pressure plates typically activated traps in the walls, gunfire, normal fire, arrows and crossbow bolts. There were also various sensors, but if a sensor was invisible it usually gave you more time to get out of the way, for example, something heavy falling from the ceiling after a short beep, to eventually be pulled back up again. Some traps only triggered once, but most of them activated multiple times. Scar actually broke a pit trap by opening it several times in quick succession; it never closed back up, so he was left with quite the precarious jump. Fine by him.

From this came his new challenges. Get through a room while activating a trap. Activate a pressure plate, a tripwire, or both. He ran the same hallway so many times that one of the guns ran out of ammo. The empty clicks were terrifying at first, something new was happening, something unplanned, but his hesitation had not killed him then.

Still, the gun running out of ammunition was terrifying in itself. This place was not infinite. Things broke. Traps did not last forever. What would he do when every resource was expended? The terror of it kept him wide awake. Loneliness was a beast, but one he’d tackled his entire life. Boredom.. That was a monster he didn’t know how to fight.

To his great fortune, he never found out.

It was an accident, truly and wholly. There were all sorts of debris on the hallway floors from traps triggered over and over, messes Scar never bothered to clean up. He’d thought about it, but why ruin the extra hazard?

Something long and sharp had dug directly into the ball of his foot, an item that would likely pierce through his boots if he’d been wearing them, and he’d tripped, catching on a tripwire that sent him plunging into a vat of dark water. He did not drown, though he did not know entirely what happened either. It was painful, but surprise and adrenaline quelled the worst of it beyond whatever stuck his foot, which he did remember.

Something was biting him. Somethings. There were ‘somethings’ in the water. These thoughts would not follow him into the next loop.

LOOP 12

Cleo did not sit up, not bothering to do so until whatever Cub and Scar were engaged in was finished. Once again, she heard Cub shoot up in bed, but beyond that there was no more shuffling, an oddity when he was usually out of here in seconds.

“Cleo. I have no idea what just happened.”

Cleo perked up, looking over to where Cub’s bed was parallel from hers, “Oh? Did he get you?”

“Well, yes, but only because I let him. He was misunderstanding the rules, I had to set him straight.”

“Yeah, I bet you did.. Sarcasm, by the way.” Cleo snickered at Cub’s delayed affronted reaction. He shook his head, dismissing her.

“I was being nice. He couldn’t hold a candle to me after I killed him three times, so I let him count the times from before the game, right? I was being nice. He got confused, so I was being nice when I threw him a bone, but I think he’s being obtuse on purpose. Regardless. He was going to take his freebie, and that’s fine, I don’t care. Let him do what he wants, whatever. But then he started being weird about it.”

“Weird how.”

“Like. Sensual.”

“Sensual? You misunderstood. He was pissed.”

“I know he was pissed! I have given him quite a few reasons to be but I- I don’t know! I was teasing him a little bit- not even, I just wanted to talk to him long enough to get my point across. I told him to relax, take that bulky spacesuit off, right? I think he did. I think he very much did.”

“Unless he stripped and said ‘Hello Cub I would very much like to fuck you now,’ I am refusing to believe this is true.”

“Listen to me!”

“I’m listening, I’m listening.”

“He crawled on my bed like he was horny about it-“ Cub started, and Cleo couldn’t help but interrupt him with a harsh cackle, but Cub persisted, “I swear he did! I swear it, you weren’t there, you can’t judge me! You did not see the way he was looking at me. He told me he was going to take me apart, Cleo. He was holding me by my damn wrists and thighs! He tore my fucking shirt open.”

“I feel like you can’t apply human euphemisms to aliens, Cub.”

“He was horny about it.”

“Are you sure you weren’t just horny about it?”

Cub turned away staunchly, “I can neither confirm or deny being horny about it. This is irrelevant actually.”

“Right.”

“He told me he wanted me to be vocal!”

Cleo scoffed, “Did he really say that?”

“Yes!” Before Cub could defend himself further, the churn of the heavy door snapped both his and Cleo’s attention to Scar, head low and ears slightly drooped, though Cleo didn’t wait for him to attack Cub before shooting him several times through the chest and abdomen. Scar gaped from his place on the floor where the impacts had driven him, perhaps looking for an answer. Cleo shrugged.

“Girl talk. You’re not invited.”

“What constitutes a girl?” Cub asked, similarly unphased.

“Not Scar.”

“Wow. There’s a lot of girls out there,” Cub mumbled, which Cleo ignored until Scar’s head drooped, lifeless.

“Tell me what happened from the beginning.”

“I thought you didn’t believe me,” Cub huffed, but Cleo knew just as well as he did that he was dying to share in great detail. New gossip is a hot commodity when you’re the only two people around.

“I don’t,” they answered simply. “Tell me everything.”

[bakawitch]

Aaaah au where Atem goes to the Afterlife and tkb is also there but—plot twist—he's a baby! Or well, Kul Elna massacre aged. The point is that tkb is a young child. Atem is hella confused, but the gods explain to him that in order to keep Zorc's Darkness out of the afterlife, they could only allow tkb to enter in a state in which he has never been tainted by it. A.k.a. the babyyy state. The whole thing is also very confusing for poor baby Thief because he's back in the body in which he couldn't do anything to stop the tragedy that happened to this village, the memory and emotions—the fear, disgust, anger—are just as fresh on that horrible night and he feels so exposed and vulnerable, and to top it all off, he still has his regular Thief King/Yami B memories in an odd distorted way.

Not knowing what else to do, Atem manages to wrangle a very disoriented baby Thief on his back and takes him into the palace where he reunites with his court and manages to keep baby Thief safe from the kinda violent intentioned Priests. Him and Thief baby stay in the palace for a while and while Atem catches up with his other friends, Mana volunteers to entertain the baby because she kinda fondly remembers him from her time as a Ring holder.

Moving on, Atem kinda gets on with Set, has trouble connecting with Mahaad, and discovers that his father was and is a complete and utter ego maniac asshole. His mother is nowhere to be seen, and everyone just keeps telling him that her heart didn't balance on the scales. He is extremely saddened and disappointed with the afterlife because everything sucks and the only people he feels he can truly talk to is a conflicted child version of his nemesis and an extremely out of the loop magician apprentice.

So Atem eventually finds out from a guilty afterlife resident that his mother did actually make it into the afterlife, and she only disappeared awhile ago. On the other hand, he also learns that his father only appeared in the afterlife a little while before Atem did. Atem kinda logics out that his father entered the afterlife at the same time when his Shadow RPG version guided the spirits of Kul Elna to the afterlife so he deduces that there is a very high chance that baby Thief's family might also be here. He shares this with Mana and Thief, who immediately wants to leave and find Kul Elna, and to his surprise, Atem agrees to take him. Mana covers for the two of them while they sneak out, and they go on a long journey to find Kul Elna!

Baby Thief and Atem end up growing closer together during the journey, and Thief also manages to rediscover Diabound! They eventually arrive at Kul Elna, where everyone is very distrustful of Atem, but after baby Thief gets reunited with his parents, they agree to help Atem reunite with his mother as well. So everyone from Kul Elna marches up to the palace and a big giant Ka battle happens! Baby Thief and Atem manage to get to the old dungeons where all the Priest Akhnadin tortures were going on and they find Atem's mum, trapped inside a ginormous splodge of Darkness. Atem puts two and two together and him and baby Thief confront his father in a way extremely reminiscent of how tkb first confronted him. Atem and baby Thief team up and whoop Akhenaten's ass while the other Priests just kinda surrender, and it gets revealed that Atem's dad used the coverage of Kul Elna's (more or less) innocent souls to pass through without any detection because he himself has also been tainted with Zorc's darkness. He hid the queen away because he knew she would immediately be able to tell and he eventually overpowers Atem.

At the last minute, baby Thief jumps infront of Atem with Diabound to block an attack and as he delivers his own corny "family you choose is everything" speech and recognises Atem as his brother, Atem's and his hearts meet and Atem's extra energy overcharges Diabound who takes out Akhenaten in a single hit. Queen gets saved and reunited with Atem, Kul Elna's relationship is kind of okay with the palace now, and Atem and baby Thief are still found family!

So yeah, friendship wins again, much to baby Thief's utter mortification. The end! :]

[theresattrpgforthat]

would you happen to know any rpgs explicitly about the Great Chain of Being?

Theme: The Great Chain of Being

Hello friend, I don’t think I know of anything that’s explicitly about the Great Chain of Being, although I think I have a few ideas for games that might flirt with either a Christian hierarchy or the concept of ascension. Nothing here's an exact match, but maybe there's still something that catches your interest?

If you are a follower of this blog and you know of a game for this, please add it in the comments or reblogs!

Hellwhalers, by Brewist Tabletop.

HELLWHALERS is an original TTRPG of both nautical and Christian-religious horror. Play as damned whalers, sailing hell's oceans to hunt a monstrous leviathan whale in a bid for redemption of your immortal souls. 

Whalers will earn souls through roleplay, challenges, and gambling, eventually collecting enough to pulse the Hellwhale's disembodied heart, a blackened, grisly organ kept locked away by the captain. To pulse the heart is to summon the monster you seek: the dreaded Hellwhale. Slaying this titan of Hell's waters is said to earn you a place back in God's graces.

Gambling plays a central role in the gameplay loop, creating a procedurally generated series of events each day. Gambling takes place on a Sic-Bo board, a game played with three six-sided dice.

This is a game of ascension to some extent, in that you are fighting to ascend from Hell. You choose from six base playbooks, and you’ll have to track your resources to make sure you have enough to keep you hale while out at sea.

Trash Mob, by mothermultiverse. After an untimely death, you reincarnated as something weak and potentially hated- but you don't have to stay that way! In a video game like world, your skills can grow simply by use, and while initial survival in the world may be harsh and difficult, it is only a prelude to a grand adventure that only you (and potentially your friends) can manage!

Trash Mob! was made to be Solo RPG ready, but also allow for some epic, GMless team up action or classic Narrated play. In the basic edition of Trash Mob, there are 16 playable Mobs, 4 basic zone setups, a series of charts to help you explore the world, and over 50 different skills you can gain as your monster grinds in their quest to survive, thrive, overcome the odds, regain some measure of their humanity, and become an overpowered anime protagonist that can shape the world with their actions!

While Trash Mob may not look like it from the cover, this entire game is about becoming a more and more powerful monster! You start as something weak and small, like a zombie or a chicken, but as you make your way through this magical world, you’ll find yourself levelling up, all the way until you become the most powerful thing in the dungeon!

And You Shall Shatter Temples, by Anna Landin.

Sing songs with the words they could not take from you. Raise the banner woven from the flags you stole back from them. Arm yourself with the swords you forged from their discarded bones.

And You Shall Shatter Temples is a game about rising up against an overwhelming power that is trying to crush you. All you have is what you carry with you, and those who rise up by your side. Together, you can turn the tide. Together, you can dethrone a god.

This game is more about fighting a god than anything else, but I think the very act could be part of the whole process of climbing the ranks. You don’t dethroned God all at once; you have to claim symbols of their power before you can topple them completely.

You Might Also Be Interested In…

My Destroy God Recommendation Post.

[limerental]

ficletvember 2024 - day 16

isengrim/dijsktra

Isengrim receives word of the unfortunate events following Radovid's assassination.

The letter takes some weeks to reach Isengrim as letters sent into the forest always do. It's a rare thing to hold a physical sheaf of parchment in his hand, most couriers choosing to memorize and destroy any implicating messages.

He cracks the seal and endures a waft of perfume, scowling at the tidy scrawl that greets him. The little irritant does prove useful occasionally. Sigi prefers the poet over other informants for whatever baffling reasons, but Isengrim never likes to see that script. At least this time it's not in verse.

He reads and then rereads. The candlelight flickers, burning low. The war's meant fresh wax is harder to come by, candlemakers selling direct to Nilfgaard or Redania to light their late night war room meetings. Funny how light itself has become a dwindling rarity, reserved for powerful men while the rest sink into darkness.

Isengrim reads the letter again. Regret to inform you swims in a loop of Elder script. 

Dandelion's Elder has always been a strange mix of archaic grammar-- the sort learned from old songs-- and informal speech patterns-- the sort that look odd written out. Sometimes his letters require some creative interpretation to parse his meaning. Maybe that's what's happened this time. A simple translation error.

Isengrims notes that his hands are shaking as he pulls out a very different letter he keeps tucked against his breast. This one is well-worn from frequent reading, the creases close to separating. He flattens it on the table over the other and reads the words he has memorized. He knows that written word is fleeting, that the letter will age and decay before long, water-logged and rubbed thin by the heat of his body.

Sigi's Elder script is clumsy, his grasp of grammar highly rudimentary, his vocabulary lacking. The bulk of the letter is matter of fact and unembellished.

Events going ahead, the letter reads. Won't see you before. The house is cold without you. Hurry back, beloved.

There's not much more than that, a handful of coded details and reminders, scraps of news from Novigrad. Isengrim's eyes burn as he reads the letter once more, though his weeping soon steals his vision and he must rely on memory alone.

Hurry back, beloved.

When he masters himself as the candle sputters, he examines Dandelion's letter a last time and can find no flaw of interpretation.

The man known as Sigi Reuven is dead, killed in an altercation with Temerian partisans in the midst of a successful plot to assassinate the king of Redania. 

He's died before, thinks Isengrim. He remembers the looming stranger he sat with talking for hours that night before the fire in the Elskerdeg Pass. He recalls knowing exactly who he shared a log with, the master spy of a hostile nation, and deciding that that life was gone, that man was dead, and this one living one was interesting.

Travel in lands freshly deemed Nilfgaardian proves tedious. It matters little to Isengrim who holds power in the North, trading one tyrant for the next. He knows there will be no real place for him in any empire, even if by some miracle his people rise up and take back what is theirs.

Sigi had discussed his ridiculous plans at length, how the North would be better governed by a council of worldly experts rather than inbred monarchs. Elected by him, of course. He didn't seek to be crowned king, but if need be, he'd rule with an iron fist.

Warm in their bed, Isengrim had laughed, voice dry with mockery as he asked what role he'd be made to serve in Sigi’s future Redanian ministry. 

“Prince Consort?” he'd asked, lips brushing his lover's ear. “A curiosity to sit at your arm? Relic of the last Aen Seidhe.”

“Chancellor's bedwarmer,” Sigi had said and rolled them into a fresh bout of love-making.

The whole debacle had sounded to Isengrim like a foolish venture. Never to come to pass.

As he slips like a shadow past the Nilfgaardian checkpoint into Novigrad, he imagines a parade in arrival of his honor. The crowds parting, trumpets sounding, and Sigi larger than life on a waiting dais, chain of office heavy at his breast, hand reaching down to take his own as they had that first night.

He does not wholly believe it until he scales the balcony, steals through his usual second story window, and finds the townhouse vacant and hushed. 

He stands in the darkened kitchens, cloak dripping muck from the streets onto the bare floor. He has never known the great stone hearth to go wholly cold.

The once well-stocked pantry is barren. The furniture has been hauled away. No books to the ceiling in the office. All personal effects gone.

He does not climb the stairs to see if the oversized mattress on its opulent bed frame remains or if someone has found some way to remove it as well. It was the first luxury Sigi had splurged on in their return North. Had to be hoisted to the top floor by a questionable pulley system, ropes straining, crewmen swearing below.

The thought of seeing the bed wide and barren when the nights spent in it had been the warmest of his life is an ache nearly too sharp to bear.

He flees the townhouse and seeks out Dandelion. 

The poet is no trouble to track, interrupted in the midst of a lively performance that happens nightly at his gaudy inherited establishment. Isengrim remains as a hooded figure in the farthest corner booth long after the performance ends, and eventually, Dandelion staggers to meet the intriguing visitor.

He sobers when Isengrim's scarred face catches the light.

“Faoiltiarna,” he says. “From the bottom of my heart, I am so very–”

“Spare me your courtesies. They're as cliched as your songs.”

The fool presses on anyhow.

“I know how it feels when it's fresh. The emptiness. Wondering if something could have been done to change it, could have been different. I wish things could have been different.”

“Nothing could have changed the bastard's mind,” says Isengrim. He knows his voice would break on his name and avoids it. “I don't need platitudes. I only need to know what happened.”

“Well, it's quite a long story really. May I buy you a drink? Though I own the whole place and the drinks so–”

“You misunderstand,” says Isengrim, voice raw and dangerous. “I need you to tell me who killed him. So that I may kill them.”

“Ah.” Dandelion wilts. “I was afraid you'd say that. I fear my tongue is tethered by the bindings of fraternal loyalty. I cannot tell you.”

Which is answer enough.

“So the Witcher chose to involve himself after all,” isengrim hums thoughtfully. “Foolish of him.”

He doesn't fancy his chances against Geralt of Rivia. He knows Sigi doomed himself, made his own fatal choices. But he wants to make the absence of his beloved feel in the world. He wants the loss to have meant something to someone beyond him.

“Geralt's long gone. You'll never catch up to him,” says Dandelion hurriedly. “Besides, he only acted for the Temerians’ sake. Dijkstra was the fool to think that he would simply stand by as–”

“And where are these Temerians? I'd love to pay them a friendly visit. Don't tell me your fratenal bonds protect them as well.”

Dandelion relents.

Within a week's time, Isengrim finds himself in a Nilfgaardian encampment on the border of the vassal state of Temeria, waiting for Vernon Roche, freshly-installed member of the Temerian Regency Council, to return to his humble quarters for the evening.

Instead, a ghost materializes before him.

Some mirror of his past self, a tall, scarred elf dressed in Nilfgaardian black. Only the missing Vrihedd emblem at his breast and gold-threaded eye patch marks the difference.

“I told him you'd come for him,” says Iorveth, the sound of his familiar nasal voice sending Isengrim's heart rate climbing. “I hardly believed it myself when I found  those letters in his study, but as intolerable as Sigismund Dijkstra was, he didn't seem the sort to forge himself love letters.”

His lover spoken about in past tense by a comrade who should be long dead is fiercely disorienting. Isengrim fears he may be sick on the ornamented rug or worse that he will weep as he has most nights until the hitch of his lungs aches worse than his hollow belly.

“Is the Witcher dead?” asks Iorveth.

“When I track him down, he will be.” Isengrim can't quite muster up the energy to sound convincing.

 Iorveth looks older, which is all that tells Isengrim that he isn't a trick of his worn-thin mind. If anything, he wishes he would conjure Sigi when he finally lost all sense, even if as an illusion he could hear his voice again.

There's nothing to be done but sit together in the Nilfgaardian tent and light up a pipe. 

“I suppose you're going to tell me not to kill him,” he says, voice warped by a pull of smoke.

“Who? Vernon?” Iorveth waves a hand. “Be my guest. Mind you, I've been trying to kill him for the better part of a decade. He bites back.”

He's not certain what happens now. Sigi's briefer lifespan had ever existed as an inevitable but distant hurdle. Something to be grappled with after a good decade or more. Before having to cope with his loss, Isengrim had expected to deal with the drudgery typical of aging humanity. Senility, frailty, a body failing one organ and joint at a time.

He had prepared himself to watch his lover's slow decline, to see him shrink and go pale and eventually stutter out. But he'd always imagined holding Sigi's aged hand to the last breath, skin as thin as paper, breath unsteady, and wry wit still sharp.

Iorveth takes the pipe and inhales so deeply Isengrim imagines smoke trailing from his ears. He thinks what happens next is that he may join Iorveth in whatever venture he sees fit.

In another life, they had settled shoulder to shoulder dressed in black on the eve of a battle that would decide everything. Isengrim hadn't known then the difference between something worth dying and living for. 

He knows now, maybe. A part of him wishes he didn't.

[beanyboobee]

Random theories of mine:

1. What were the Archvisites?

2. Teachers out here scheming

3. How does vanitas die?

What were Archvisties to vampire society? I keep wondering that because I find it so curious how so very few people actually know what they are, and the only ones we have seen who know right away are count orlock, chloe and Ruthvan, all high ups in vampire society, while those of lower status, aka count Orlocks servents, Jean Jacqes, didn't know until they were told.

Surely if Archivistes were well known their massacre would still be remembered as it wasn't that long ago [if we go by Noes age] but yet the servent of Orlocks who does know what an Archvisite is, refers to the massacre as happening 'long ago'

Concidering how long some vampires live, isnt it odd for them to refer to something not even 20 years old as a long time ago ?

We also know Archvisites are differant to regular vampires, as Dominique claimed vanitas wanted to use noe for his unique abilities, (abilities not just ability to see memories), how it (presumably) took longer for chloes potion to kick on for him

Not to mwntion- SPOILER FOR THE LATEST CHAPTER CHAPTER 61

how Noe is already starting to recall what Ruthvan did to him, which shouldn't be possiable if Ruthvan is more powerful than him.

Moving into another theory that I mentioned before but I keep finding more and more proof for,

I think EVERYTHING since the beginning has been planned by teacher, everything, not just the small things. From him just os happening to find noe at an auction, as far as we know the teacher didn't have any others in the mansion so he just so happend to go to a human auction and find the last remaining archvisite? As we know noe added that the vampires who kidnapped hom mistook him for a human?

It was almost as if Noe was the main peice of the story the teacher wanted to see play out. Not to mention in Domiques first appearance she says this-

Who told her where Noe was? Realistically how would anyone know that Noe was with count Orlock? Unless count orlock told someone and it got passed on? But the only person who knew noe was in Paris was the teacher.

The teacher sending a letter to count orlock with Noes full name and asking him to help Noe with anything he needs is also weirdly suspicious because there was no need to give out Noes full name unless he knew the effect it would have.

I am also of the mindset that everything happening is a timeloop, of this situation has played out time and time again, from the conversation lady Archvisitie and the teacher have in Chapter [ 58]

That his excitement at Noe coming with him, "Yes I am having fun because you came with me" implying Noe had a choice not to come, and as we know Teacher loves throwing around the word "choice" an awful lott.

If it is true abiut this being a time loop or some sort of time shenanigans, Noe could be the slightly differant thing Lady Archvisite and Teacher discussed in chapter [58 and 59 ]

One small "choice" can change the entire direction of a story after all.

Also final theory, Vanitas Dies by Noe not grabbing his hand when crossing the portal, I'm still of the mind the story will end with Atlus crumbling. And Vanitas will be trapped in the middle world because Noe didn't grab his hand. Why? Simple, I like to think this scene is foreshadowing

Noe keeps moving between saying- he killed vanitas by his own hand, and, he regrets not grabbing his hand that day, the death of vanitas won't be this big and major gruesome thing like we are led to beleive but rather him being stuck in a void, as it would also explain vanitas saying this during his 'death'

As we know Noe is an unreliable narrator, he blames himself for alott of things that happend, and tends to overexagerate how much of a part he played in the tragedy, as we can see during the whole Louis situation, he holds alott of regret and blames himself for it to the point even years later Domi has to remind him it wasn't his fault, so by him saying he killed Vanitas by his own two hands, it could be something as simple as him- being unable to catch vanitas in time. Or hesitating before holding onto him because Vanitas might of been the to let go.

There was enough of time between Vanitas dying and Noe somehow being the cause of it, for Vanitas to give him the reassurance that he won't die that he just won't be apart of this world,

It could of been said in a similar fashion to how Jean jauqes forced Noe to drink his blood so someone would remember hom and chloe, because if we think about it in that sense. He could of meant he won't die because Now will always be around to remember.

Making Vanitas a figure similar to the shapeless one or lady archvisite; who mainly seem to operate and live in the between world.

[erisluna35ocblog]

The Story Behind Shizuke and Fashion

I am a sucker for clothes telling a story so my OCs end up changing clothes a lot across my MLB au. Most only have subtle changes like Blair's palette favoring more orange as time goes by or Natalia changes her hair style a lot after getting dumped until she settles on a ponytail... But it's Shizuke who actually has the most drastic shifts as a whole.

Punk Goth Era

Here's something I've been flipflopping over but... What if Shizuke had a punk goth era? Shizuke, the glasses guy who's always dressed like a prep and is the poster child for the Asian nerd stereotype (except not really he ain't book smart enough for that)? He used to wear matching outfits with his delinquent friend Fiona. Their friendship isn't actually that odd.

This isn't just for the fun gap moe contrast or because I really liked dressing reverse!Shizuke as this edgy looking guy in a leather jacket post-quitting the Supreme. I think it can strengthen Shizuke's character and how much he keeps changing to adapt and to be what he feels he needs to be. I happen to like it when clothes can convey something about a character.

It also highlights his dynamic with Fiona. She is his first real friend since he moved to Helios. The one who chases out the bullies, his protector, the toughest person Shizuke knew. The one who didn't turn their back on him when he needed help.

Over the years though, what used to be reassuring became kind of a point of insecurity for Shizuke. He's the wuss hiding under her wing. He doesn't want to depend on her forever. He wants to get stronger. That's why he took up Judo. That's also why he tried to dress like a punk - dress like Fiona.

Fiona was the one who supported him in his efforts, went with him through every martial arts club til he found his niche, and even helped him pick out clothes to look more intimidating. He even knows how to do makeup and paint nails. It has her written all over it.

Preppy Nerd

His main outfit and the one most people are familiar with, in and out universe. The thing that made him switch to nerd clothes is because one day, his parents could no longer afford to keep him in his school. It was one of those highly reputable ones full of scholarship kids and rich kids who bought their way in. As I've said, Shizuke isn't very book smart, so the only way in was for his parents to pay tuition. They only went for it thinking they weren't gonna stay for more than three years in Helios City, might as well get their kid into a good prestigious school that'll look great on his records even with his B-C average. Anyway stuff happened, his parents decided they're gonna have to go back home to Japan and Shizuke can continue his studies there.

Keagan wasn't having it so he pulled strings to get him into his mayor father's scholarship program - who was only willing to do so because despite his academic records not passing his requirements, Shizuke's his son's more responsible friend who at least messages him to reassure him they're safe and where they are whenever his son decides to sneak out, so Mr. Aurelio would rather Shizuke sticks around.

Shizuke is once again on the receiving end of help from his friends. Feeling like he might taint Keagan and his family's reputation for this special treatment, he changes one again. He has to at least look like he earned his way in so he replaced his punk goth clothes with something more "appropriate". The red tie and maroon pants he wears aren't just a reference to Ladybug, they were first a reference to Keagan and his family's signature color, red - which funny enough, loops back to Ladybug cause they're like, showing nationalist pride in their red hued island city made from a ginormous Lucky Charm.

This is made worse by the time Scorched Origins rolls in. He is Ladybug now. And Keagan was the first akuma who was and still is deeply affected by the event. All that red, it's no longer just about the Aurelio's scholarship, it's about his duty to Keagan and the rest of the city. He has to be at his best as he fills the large shoes Ladybug wore. He has to seem more put together, more mature, not a thread out of place and not a wrinkle to be seen. His outfit gets more uptight the worse he feels this.

Dressing for Others

The nerd outfit ties into Keagan the way his old punk clothes ties to Fiona.

There were whispers of envy that came with this though.

“Take off your rose-tinted glasses and see past that ‘nice guy’ façade, Blair! I’m telling you, that guy’s nothing but a social climber who uses everyone around him then dumps them once they’ve stopped being useful!”

“Just look at the people he surrounds himself with! He’s clearly using them for his own gain!”

“Keagan got him a recommendation into the scholarship program. Perks of being the friend of the mayor’s son, didn’t have to fight tooth and nail for a spot here like the rest of us,” Natalia growled, jealousy rolling off her in waves.

“Fiona, the little monster, has gotten into a lot of fights with a lot of other delinquents over the years and has never lost. With her by his side, no one would dare bully him.”

Here's some quotes from Natalia from the Bully Hunter episode as she summarizes Shizuke's rep from the side of the school that doesn't like him or are distant from him. She even nails the thing that bothers Shizuke the most about their friendship:

“But what do they get out of him? Nothing! He’s not even there for them when they need him the most!”

Shizuke's motivation across the main story goes all the way back to his friends helping him out and wanting to pay them back. It's why when asked at point blank on his debut on what motivates him, he searched around the crowd and looked at his friends whole saying he wants everyone to be safe. He wants them to be safe.

It's for them he goes through with being Ladybug even though he feels he is unworthy of it. It's only as Ladybug he's strong enough to be the one protecting them just as they had always protected him.

And just like his nerdy getup and his former punk phase, he wears the Ladybug suit for someone else.

When Will He Dress for Himself?

It'll be the day he can fully accept himself for himself.

The final style for him should still have little elements of both styles but is over all a lot less strict with sticking to a specific style. He's finally wearing the Ladybug earrings on his ears. The main piece is a varsity jacket, a symbol of his greatest achievement in his civilian life where he finally earns his own scholarship through the Judo club by getting into their competitive team.

The first step though is to truly understand he is good enough.

[betweenlands]

reblogged all the positivity from yesterday so i can Make My Own Post TM about the epidemic of "this should've been a miniseries" -- because pacing-wise, tone-wise, plot-wise, Ocean should never have been three hours long. it's one of Legs's longest non-compilation videos and it is also full of a lot of... not much happening besides the same core gameplay loop.

that'd be fine if i was looking for podcast/"second monitor" content that i could put on in the background while i do something else, but 100DMV is an ARG. there is no reason to make a video this long for a series that is, secretly or not, part of a running plotline. the two are at odds with each other. an ARG needs to be something you want to give your full attention to, make sure you aren't missing anything, pick apart and rewatch multiple times to analyze strange details. a three-hour video is directly hostile to that and a timesink for no reason.

i don't have a problem with longer videos -- there's a reason i cite hbomberguy as my usual exception to the Three Hour Balk Point -- but with Legundo's stuff, i'm increasingly finding it just doesn't have the same substance to hold together its own runtime. i mean, Ocean is longer than:

Sculk Apocalypse (kind of on the long side and could be shorter, but generally uses that runtime to keep a strong sense of tension and fighting to survive. has a very strong hook, multiple "time limits," and a clearly defined endgoal from the start.)

Undercover (a video with Legs actively trying to pretend he's not playing on the server he's playing on, consisting of secret community interaction, cool builds, the potential for a lot of lore drops, and a clearly defined time limit/endgoal from the start.)

Nights (the S1 finale of 100DMV, containing a whole bunch of separate mods to tinker with that hadn't previously been seen before, a good deal of lore, uses its runtime to keep a strong sense of tension and fighting to survive)

the Zombie Apocalypse scenario (full of interpersonal tactics and tension, contained a lot of person-to-person interaction and discussion, had a clearly defined time limit/endgoal from the start)

Dimensional Doors (the video that got me into 100DMV! full of strong plot beats, had variety but began cutting stuff when the dungeon pockets got too repetitive, contained a good deal of lore. also had the bonus of namechecking a mod i knew, recognized, and enjoyed that then made up a good deal of the playthrough's runtime)

the entirety of Deceit Season One, including the wrap-up episode (I DON'T NEED TO TELL YOU HOW INSANE DECEIT MAKES ME. JUST. HUH???)

and then there's the one i suspect started it all, the Game of Thrones scenario.

the GoT scenario is long. it clocks in at a little under 3 hours. but the difference between GoT and a lot of the other long videos is that it uses every single second of its runtime. there is a clearly defined endgoal and a time limit for that endgoal. there are a lot of different mods that play off each other and are used in interesting ways for interesting tactics (as well as smart use of vanilla mechanics). it has clearly defined sections for people that don't want to binge-watch all at once (including one that is pointed out to the viewer in-video as a good time to take a breather). it has, and this is critical, multiple running subplots owing to the fact that there are somewhere in the neighborhood of 50+ players on the server, most of whom are working for one team or another.

GoT works because of interaction between other players. a singleplayer quest for the Iron Throne would not feel nearly as tense or engaging -- but because there's a great deal of interpersonal politics, planning, and battle tactics, it keeps up the variety and nicely flows between downtime, negotiations, and battles. and, because there are multiple players in the conflict, something is always happening offscreen. the world of GoT isn't static, and doesn't only change when Legundo Specifically does something. it is always changing, all the time, when even a single person is logged in, and it means that there is no possible way to get stuck in one gameplay loop for too long because someone is always going to either finish that loop or throw a curveball into it from completely offscreen.

i've made my peace with Haunted Winter being so long, even though it probably should've been a four-part miniseries with one episode per each season. it still has those clearly defined "season" segments, has multiple mods that are being used in different ways at different times, and contains both a known time-limit and interesting editing that keeps up a decently strong sense of tension. it's also the S2 finale of 100DMV, so i can understand how it'd run a little long.

but, and i cannot stress this enough, there is no good reason Ocean -- which consists almost exclusively of a core "loot ships, return to current base, build/mine, loot ships" gameplay loop with no real variation until the mod in the thumbnail really comes into play on day 74 -- should be three hours long. there's no good reason for it to be longer than GoT, than Sculk Apocalypse, than Deceit S1. in the time it takes to watch Ocean, i could rewatch most of Deceit S2. if i set the Ocean video to loop and walked away, i could go rewatch every single Dominion episode that Legundo has ever uploaded and come back in time to find the Ocean video only partway through its third loop.

i really hope this doesn't keep happening. 100DMV used to be something i could recommend without caveats, at the most go "it's got some slightly clickbaity intros, and it might start a little slow, but it picks up quickly and stays really good." now i'm in a situation where the second season runs incredibly long and i genuinely don't know if i'd tell people to get into it anymore -- because right now, at the pace the story is progressing, with the length of videos being put out, it just is not worth the time investment.

i like 100DMV. i like 100DMV a lot. i mean, i'm writing a multichapter fanfiction about it, of course i like it. but if i hadn't gotten into it when i did, with an hour-and-a-half long video about Dimensional Doors, i would be seeing 2-3 hour long videos in my recommended, shrug and go "nah," and then go watch something else.

and this frustrates me. i know 100DMV can be good. i know 100 Days videos can be tightly edited, engaging, interesting fiction with a lot of strong plot hooks despite having a fairly repetitive gameplay loop. i know there's got to be a way to fix this, but i can't do that. all i can do is point out how it comes across to a specific subsection of the audience and hope that it doesn't just come across as needless bashing on something kind of popular.

because it's not. i say all this because i love storytelling in MCYT videos -- it's why i've been here for so long. i say all this because i don't want it to become a lost art for more and more people because long videos do better in Youtube's algorithm.

[timberwind]

here's a feature that the more advanced digital radio cloaks could have (besides improved range, encryption, multi-channel support, and custom connection graphs with tuned delays and stuff) a loss of signal script. the user could set up custom loss of signal scripts for their individual members and then in the event of an unexpected disconnect it could help keep the singleton calm and keep them from behaving unsafely. an extremely simple one that just plays back or loops prerecorded mindsound would probably be a lot better than nothing. a particularly clever tine might set up a repeating mantra of instructions with gaps between for responses from the singleton that are intended to be replayed later (so the recording behaves like drum memory does in some early computer architectures). more advanced ones could set up the singleton with the virtual computer interface tine as a sort of odd duo. if you go to advanced it might end up being like *connection dropped, emulating all other members* and then the pack has to do a git merge when the singleton regains connection (probably the emulated members stick around as log file like things that can be interacted with but tend not to chime in of their own accord without something important to say). there's a certain tipping point in technology where the interesting stories can happen and i think it's usually right around the development of new capabilities. (although, imagine a multiplanetary choir in the mid beyond linked by ultrawave - their navy could be frighteningly competent for the depth, especially if they found good solutions to the routing problem of distributed computation)

Oh I love this! There's room here for some really good characterization - a lost tine in the Beyond dealing with a partially-emulated sense of self, an old pack maintaining a "thought cabinet" of emulated past members and passing it on to offspring... I definitely agree also about crossing technological tipping points and all the rapid change that can cause being being a really fun story topic - a tine-human expedition from the top of the Slow Zone into the Beyond in a flotilla of ramscoop ships, or a first colony Out There... these could be good story hooks for some fic I think.

(Brief fill-in for those who haven't read the books: tines are a species where each "individual" is the gestalt of a pack of three to eight sort of wolflike creatures, each critter's on-its-own-nonsentient thought combining into a conscious whole by a kind of distributed ultrasound 'telepathy'. A choir is what happens when lots more tines than can form a discrete individual pack live together - they form a shifting and disorganized morass of thought that is... sort of alien to both discrete packs and humans.)

I have found myself thinking about how intelligent choirs in the beyond would act too... I suppose you can imagine lots of different ways it could go. I like to think you could get some kind of prosperous coexistence, possibly even with packs sometimes choosing to temporarily dissolve themselves into choirs as a sabbatical, or to assist with some great task, and coming back with new insights (and sometimes coming back very much changed by the experience). Sort of a little bit like the Pattern Jugglers from Revelation Space, maybe. Perhaps, if what Johanna says in Children of the Sky about the way the choir on the raft conceptualizes things continues to hold true, sentient choirs shoot off into modes of consciousness that are undoubtedly sentient but also still weird to us - like the Powers in miniature.

Of course, a fun sort of horror take on it would be a sort of hard-takeoff choir coming into existence accidentally, like a version of the Blight just for tines. The last remaining individual pack on a first expedition to the far Beyond/low Transcend, cowering in a corridor on a hab orbiting a cold red star... feeling the call, no, the demand of its reconstituted peers, the overwhelmingly more powerful consequence of a sudden relaxation on limits on just how complex and distributed a mind can be...

Also I would really like to chat in realtime about tine worldbuilding with you sometime, anon! My direct messages are always open if you'd like to drop in. No pressure if not, of course.

[anachronistic-falsehood]

cellbit dsmp.... could be a saving grace or a living nightmare depending on when he joined

like early l'manberg? saving grace. He's got the paranoia that cWilbur had yet to earn, I genuinely think there's a good chance he would have been able to spot Eret going turncoat. And it wouldn't have hurt to have a guy who could actually fight in this faction (cccellbit's pvp abilities aren't that noteable but qcellbit is a renowned killer so we can pretend). Maybe things would have turned out differently. Maybe the Final Control Room would spare some lives, leaving Wilbur or Fundy or Tommy or Tubbo with one extra

But if he joined during elections era? More complicated. Just looking at how he was during the QSMP elections, I think he might have been a SWAG supporter? Non-zero chance that he would have been cQuackity's vice president, which is funny to me. Also, based on how he tried to handle the Federation I think that when/if Schlatt won he would stay in L'Manburg and try to spy, leading to a Manburgian cabinet like

Tubbo 🤝 Fundy 🤝 Cellbit: I Sure Hope They Don't Realize I'm The Only Spy Here

If he joined when Pogtopia v. Manburg was already in full swing, I think he would have gone for Pogtopia. cWilbur spends the whole time thinking he's an assassin hired to kill him and is just waiting for that knife to the neck. Never happens, though. He's on board with the Kill Schlatt cause, if not Wilbur being in charge- not personal, but he wouldn't want himself to be in charge either, and he has objections to Wilbur on similar grounds. Which probably makes things just that bit more stressful and worse, in the long run

For the life of me I can't figure out how he'd feel about the Butcher Army stuff

Would have supported cQ eating Schlatt's heart 100%. In general I think he and cQuackity would vibe, no matter where he appears on the timeline. If he joined before November 16th he'd understand the weight of Q eating Schlatt's heart and be tactful about it, but if he joined after he'd be like. A fellow enjoyer of cannibalism! What are the odds! And just assume that they had a shared hobby, not knowing that was a one-time thing

Could have quite the time getting possessed by The Egg

There's no way that he has a good reaction to the prison torture stuff, no matter what happens. Actually really interested about what he'd think of it, being on the one hand someone who suffered in the prison system, and on the other hand considering how he reacted to BBH capturing Ron. Non-zero chance he could get onboard and involved. Just depends on when he joins and how much he knows about the guy

I think Las Nevadas would unsettle him and if he joined as late as s3 I think he wouldn't go for any of the factions. Might put that paranormal research to use and go against The Egg

And also if he'd been there during ho16 he would have gotten a folding chair or something to put on that pressure plate. Bam. No Ranboos were harmed in this pyschocompetitive rivalry

OH this is an older ask but i am rotating it in my mind on loop rn. i am THINKING about this. ik i talked about cellbit being around for lmanberg but i like to imagine he would have joined around the time ranboo and puffy did, right after nov 16. he never knew wilbur as he was and met ghostbur a handful of times, which would make him meeting revivebur later on sooo much more interesting. he would be so standoffish with this guy. like oh you're the guy i keep getting compared to. nice to finally met you. so i heard you blew yourself the fuck up and destroyed your country and made your father kill you. what was that about huh. and wilbur would HATE him he would detest this man. you know how when two people are so similar but just different enough that they clash horribly??? that's them. they go about things the same way but have very different things that they want to do so they disagree on everything and are equally stubborn about it. they would drive everyone around them INSANE.

and if we're keeping cellbit's backstory the same as q!cellbit's then he's already got a history with bbh, so he might be tempted to join the badlands. he would LOVE the egg arc omggg he would go crazy for that shit. he would be obsessed. since cc!cellbit wanted to be a villain when he joined the qsmp (and got distracted by Gay Roleplay) i think he would love to act the part of an egg infected villain :3 i like to think the egg would be able to sense his bloodlust and try to manipulate him into helping it. and i think he would for a bit!! whether he's actually infected or just pretending so he can gather information and betray them later, idk, but he'd certainly play a part in the eggpire somehow, that's for sure. he'd fit right in with them :3

HOWEVER i do think that after the red banquet, or even during it, he would denounce or betray the eggpire (which would be insane, imagine hannah betraying the pro-omlette team and then cellbit immediately going HA YOU THOUGHT!! and betraying the eggpire, the plot twist would be crazy) and i think he would join the syndicate right after. he'd be sooo good in the syndicate i am so serious. cellbit himself is kinda friends with ranboo and they click so well so i think they would have a great time roleplaying together!!! imagine him escaping to the end with the rest of the syndicate +kristin AAAAAA syndicate cellbit...... save me syndicate cellbit

and i would LOVE to hear the insane homoerotic way wilbur would write him into hitting on 16. you KNOW cellbit would be involved in las nevadas/the burger van arc somehow. we'd have a three way homoerotic psychocompetetive rivalry going on. idk what he would even do to get involved but you just know he would involve himself somehow. i think quackity and wilbur would fight over him a little bit and cellbit would be a little shit and tell them he'd join the country/faction of whichever of them could give him the best offer in terms of riches or weapons or other benefits or whatever and then he'd leave them to fight. he loves stirring shit up <3 but i think he would get involved because he'd be friends with ranboo and wants to make sure they're doing okay. the syndicate sticks together!!!! i do think he'd ultimately get more involved with las nevadas as cquackity's vice bc i think cq would offer him a chance to torture cdream in prison and cellbit would be like. absolutely vibrating with excitement. he would accept immediately. when cq is tired he sends cellbit in his place and cdream DREADS those days, bc at least quackity is methodical and clean with his torture. cellbit just goes absolutely ham and gets very close to killing him multiple times. oh cellbit would have such a blast beating the shit out of dream <3

[intrepidacious]

time after time: reread edition [1]

series summary: After what starts out as a fairly normal mission, you find yourself stuck in a time loop. Which would already be bad enough in itself if it didn’t also mean having to watch Bucky die over and over again.

pairing: bucky barnes x f!reader

word count: 6.0k

chapter warnings: canon-typical violence, accidentally starting a time loop, banter, pretty angsty to start us off with ngl, reminder to read the fic premise. please note that my blog is rated 18+. minors dni. ageless/empty blogs will be blocked without warning.

read the full chapter here | series masterlist | reread masterlist

wouldn't you know it, it's friday already!! this is a reread of already published chapters, so if you're new to this story, i would highly suggest not starting here and reading the actual story first. please be aware that by clicking the read more you're gonna see spoilers for chapter one 💚

how it started

welcome to the reread. i'm pretty sure this is the part of the post i'll only do once, but we'll see how it goes.

i swear to god, i only wanted to write a fun little time loop fic. it was never supposed to be this huge thing; it just kept growing. it's two years later now and i'm still writing—granted, that's after taking several long breaks because this story gives me headaches like no other, but still. i've never poured this much love into one story, i think.

and we can all blame russian doll for it.

turn back the clock – tl;dr

we start with a mission. sam, bucky and the reader, soon-to-be nicknamed twelve, are checking up on a secret lab. against all odds, bucky gets killed right before the fight seems to be won. twelve uses her time powers to prevent this from happening, loses consciousness and wakes up in her bed earlier that day. she goes through the entire day again, thinking her reset worked as intended, only for bucky to die in a different situation during the same mission and her waking up in her bed again.

behind the loop

welcome to my first running commentary on my own story. you’re gonna be sick of me really soon.

depending on how new you are to this story, you might not know that the chapter titles are all taken from movies. sadly i haven't seen most of them but the ones i have seen do feature a little in one way or another. more about that when we get to that point, though. the title cards for this story were also so fun to make because i just recoloured the actual movie posters!!

i’m gonna be honest with you, i keep forgetting that this first flashback exists. but i lowkey love it?? i like how it sets the tone for the angst that’s stitched into the very fabric of this story while simultaneously being juxtaposed with the first actual, very blunt introduction of our main cast.

the start of that mission was one of the first things i ever wrote for this fic, but the whole transition from the upstairs lab to downstairs and the actual fight scene were the last parts before posting.

“Do you think I’d pass up the opportunity to hear the two of you scream in terror when the vampire puppets creep up on you?” “Gotta disappoint you, cap,” you grin and wait for him to check the map. “I only scream when there’s good reason.” “I don’t wanna interrupt,” Bucky interrupts over the intercom, “but they’re heading your way now, so get a move on.”

writing banter is one of my all-time favourite activities. i also already knew at this point that i was gonna write a lot of it over and over again, and so i needed to vary the interjections in order to not bore everyone to bits. i like to think it worked out, but you tell me.

my beloved nightmare flashmob was such a fun antagonist to include. they will be named in the next chapter but if there are comic readers among you, i feel like i have to apologise because i definitely haven’t read enough of them to properly do these guys justice. they did seem like a logical step up from the version of the flag smasher(s) we encountered in tfatws, though. plus, there’s just enough of them to be a realistic threat to three very capable superheroes.

And then his eyes glaze over. You scream.

i’m so evil lmao

You wake up with a start to the sun in your face and FRIDAY blasting The All-American Rejects at full volume.

spoiler alert, you’ll encounter that sentence a couple of times. and i still love it. fun fact, i genuinely set my playlist to shuffle to decide on the song that was going to play to wake her up, and this was the one i landed on. and i couldn’t have come up with a better choice. honestly, look at the lyrics and tell me i’m wrong. i love how things work out sometimes.

originally, the decision to set the story on july 4th was very practical because i needed my available settings to be limited. this isn’t punxsutawney, pennsylvania in the middle of a snowstorm, this is new york city after the blip. i wanted our characters to have at least somewhat limited options what to do during their ever-repeating day. (on a sidenote, do you think we’ll ever see avengers compound again in the mcu? how long are they going to rebuild that thing? anyway.)

“Feels a little … déjà-vu-y.” “I know the type,” Sam says. “Wanna talk about it?” You do. But the time stuff is your problem to deal with, and so you shake your head.

isn’t it great to have a full ensemble of characters who absolutely will not talk about their feelings to each other? (derogatory) is it more interesting from a narrative point of view? … i suppose.

i love twelve’s rings though. are they entirely useless for the duration of this loop? maybe. but i love that she has them to physically show her how stuck she is <3 other things that i love: bucky calling sam bud. it just makes sense.

A surge of emptiness goes through you, unlike anything you’ve ever felt before. Time seems to still for just the blink of an eye as Bucky’s head is thrown forwards.

and there we have it. ✨dread.✨ this is such an evil way to end a chapter, wow. i had fun, though. was it fun for you?

how it's going

well, actually. i've been writing chapter seven as well as a secret bonus chapter this week, and i've made reasonable progress on both which i'm quite proud of. i really hope i can report that i got started on chapter eight this time next week, but we'll see. i think the worst of my writer's block is gone, at least. and all it took was a little self-indulgence and an external deadline. who'd have thunk.

if you made it to this point of my rambles, thank you. lmk how i can keep these interesting for you to read, and if you have any questions about the story, you know where to find me!! also: please please please consider leaving a comment or a reblog on the actual chapter. it would mean the world 💚

[echolaliaplayer]

Long winding rant about bullshit under the cut, I warned you

what part of trans Tumblr am I even in. Every day I keep finding new [animal]girl[body part]s so I don't think it's that part of trans Tumblr. I refuse to post with any kind of seriousness so it probably isn't the theory girls as much as I appreciate them. I don't really hornypost much anymore although I'd like to change that. I guess it's largely up to how others see me. Why am I here?

I don't think I have the follower count to be clouted on here and frankly that seems hollow compared to the fun I had in just finding people (or people's accounts, as one such account pointed out to me) I could befriend or associate with to some degree. It's fun (? - wrong word but there's an enjoyability to it that makes it repeatable) to just care a little bit though I lack the proximity or resources for anything more than words with those people, so I get it might not be for everyone. I guess it's all I have in place of exchange of small trinkets with people met along travels I also don't have (although I do plan to exchange parcels or digital files with some of you and I'm looking forward to it). I'm worried there might be a critical mass at some point where I simply don't have time to meet new people because I have to keep up with old mutuals and balance real life friends and what not. If we're mutuals and you're reading this far and I haven't contacted you it's certainly nothing personal, you're recognisable to me most likely I just haven't had time/courage I probably think you're really cool.

So that also leads me to the question of my current Tumblr use pattern. This stuff is mental cigarettes for me. I'm on here hourly at least if I'm not completely preoccupied by, like, sleep, driving, sex, showering, random activities that require my full attention. Eating alone or shitting are not sacred frankly. Not sure that's very good for my cognitive health or just like. Life experience. How I relate to people IRL. That's had issues long before this account so it isn't the sole culprit but it's something to keep in mind. It reinforces a tendency for easy stimulation that I think can thwart conversational ability; it turns the other party's words into one-sided consumption with little consideration for reply (although my job does this as well, it's the whole point of it) and frames how you approach responses in a way that is less about a meaningful reply and more about. Idk. Generating something someone undefined approves of - no that's wrong. I just no longer feel in the moment in a lot of conversations, absorbed to a degree by time with another. I desperately want that back. This isn't really about Tumblr at all is it. This is about the very short loop that my brain goes through that prevents me from acquiescence to a moment. Nothing feels lived. It hasn't in a long time and I'm only getting flickers of it with HRT. Clearly dysphoria hasn't been my only problem for a long time but how would I know? My hormones haven't been right and

It's such a tough loop to even approach. Probing it mentally causes nausea. I was acutely aware of it the last time I was on psychedelics and I spent the whole time feeling ill. During it I could occasionally lose myself in something and then I would be dragged out by physically disgusting feelings in my gut and just anxiousness about it. But I notice "seed thoughts" for it now. I feel it before anything physical. It's odd. The thought is leaving my head now and I'm tipsy after day drinking. Where was I? "Love you all, talk soon", I think. Seems nice to end this on that.