#it’s a scientific term don’t look it up just trust me

[whatwouldmickeydo]

the sin on your lips

“He’s not sure if it’s the pleasant high he’s got going on or what but he finds himself saying “Looks kinda hot, actually. Think I could pull that off?””

———————————————————————

This was meant to be an entry for Kinktober hosted by @gallavichthings but time went sideways and wonky and well, now it's been two months and I've finally finished.

Hope you enjoy!

[awakenedsalamander]

So I’ve been wanting to write about this for a long time (my friends can probably attest to the fact I will talk about it unprompted) but I can’t find it way to do so concisely. Here’s my best try.

Is Mage: The Ascension (in its presentation of the Technocracy in specific) anti-science?

I don’t think so, not anymore. But I want to explain why. By the way, I have to imagine that this won’t be all that accessible if you don’t have much knowledge of Mage, but you’re free to stick around if you want to.

So, here’s the thing— the Technocratic Union is pretty much a stand-in for the advancement of the scientific method, “the Enlightenment,” all that. The whole point in the first edition of Ascension is that the Union is science, the science that dispelled notions of magic, and that this is a Bad Thing. They are oppressive, heartless, and cold. The villains, plain and simple.

In later editions, this gets softened, partly due to the notion of “Science is a conspiracy the elite uses to rule the world and keep you down” becoming less fun and more toxic as it gained more sincere believers, and partly because fans really liked the Technocracy.

I think the common read is that Ascension then took the direction of the Technocracy being anti-villains— the Union has noble goals, and many of its members are sincerely brave and compassionate, but ultimately it is too extreme, too callous. It has to be stopped.

This is, to be fair, an improvement over “science is evil,” but “science is too dangerous,” is still not great. And for a long time, this was my view on Mage: The Ascension. Fun ideas, maybe, but the core conflict of the game was just too reckless a portrayal of what seemed to me like a mirror of real-world conspiracist ideology.

And to some extent, I still think that. Especially in the early editions, this is a very fair critique. That said, the game still spoke to me as I looked into it, and for the longest time I wasn’t quite sure why. A piece of it was my own opening up to the notion of our subjective viewpoints affecting our reality— something that deserves its own rambling essay— but a related part of it was me realizing that there was something about the Technocracy that rung true to me, despite my misgivings. And I think I figured it out.

See, the Technocracy isn’t a stand-in for the scientific method, but for scientism.

If you’ve not heard the term, “scientism” is a controversial (we’ll get into why a bit later) pejorative term for the belief/perspective that science, as a body, composes essentially all useful and/or reliable knowledge about the world.

Notably, those who critique scientism rarely hold the view that scientific knowledge is bad or even inaccurate, just that it is an incomplete model of reality. This is not an anti-science position, but a skepticism towards the trust people place in its ability to solve every mystery. Vaccines, for example, are great! No one can reasonably dispute the benefits and efficacy of vaccination. When it comes to medicine, the scientific method has done incalculable good— the lives saved by vaccination alone are countless.

To be against scientism, then, is not to argue that medical science is a failure, or overrated— but to point out that there is more to life than being healthy. Everyone should be glad we have learned so much about treating illness and alleviating suffering. But what of having a sense of purpose? What about love and compassion and justice? What about satisfaction, having gone through a life worth living?

Again, none of that is to say that science or the scientific community is the problem. But if you take the Technocracy as an example of scientism gone to an extreme, one in which things like kindness and equity must be left behind in favor of only the virtue of material knowledge, I think Mage: The Ascension starts to really work.

(I originally intended to write a MUCH longer piece including references to the military-industrial complex, the rise of automation and AI, as well as the increasingly algorithmic nature of culture but this is so long already. And yet I worry I said essentially nothing. C’est la vie.)

[charaznablescanontoyota]

prompt bingo fill -- "notebook" takes place between eps 8 and 9

the casino discotheque is brilliant and startling, so loud that al can still feel the music reverberating in his ribs when he and audrey stumble out onto the third floor landing. his eyes water as they readjust to the light; audrey makes a low, annoyed noise next to him as hers presumably do the same.

“food,” al suggests. his brain is still buzzing a little from the tequila shots, but years of sneaking into the fields or up onto granny’s roof to drink with ed and winry have taught him enough about how to avoid a hangover the next morning. 

“food,” audrey agrees.

like with shadow earlier in the evening, al trusts her to steer him towards whatever is good to eat–they end up with hot pretzels wrapped in paper and frozen drinks that audrey calls slushies. the syrup in them tastes more chemical than fruit-flavored, but al can still feel his body welcoming the sudden onslaught of sugar.

“you’ve had pretzels before,” audrey quizzes him, as they find a table to sit at. it’s closer to the quieter lounge, the one with the small stage and the jazz band, and a safe distance from the throbbing bass of the discotheque.

“of course i’ve had pretzels,” al says, a little amused. “we have bakeries.”

“listen, i almost flunked world history, i don’t know shit about what was invented in the 1910s. you have soda, right?”

“we have pop. ed drinks it, i don’t like it very much.”

“is it, like, the kind with cocaine still in it?” audrey leans forwards, eyebrows arched.

“i don’t think so,” al says. he frowns. “your soda pop had cocaine in it?”

audrey hums, and doesn’t answer the question. “can you alchemy food instead of cooking it? if you have the ingredients?”

“uh–yes and no,” al says. he takes a bite of his pretzel and swallows it, considering how to explain in terms audrey won’t write off as scientific gibberish. “there are alchemical circles for food. but you have to understand all the exact measurements of ingredients in whatever you’re making, and there’s no room to improvise or taste it in the middle. so you’re better off just cooking, unless you’re trying to show off.”

the explanation reminds him of the small notebook in his breast pocket; al takes it out and flips it to the last entry, the oversized snacks from the arts and crafts car. underneath, he prints everything new he’s eaten since. small shorthand annotations and symbols go next to each one, nearly incomprehensible unless you know what you’re looking at.

“what’s that?” audrey asks.

“food diary,” al says, mid-stroke on the word slushie.

“you write down everything you eat?” there’s a tiny flicker of judgment in her eyes. “why?”

“when i didn’t have a body, i couldn’t eat,” he says succinctly. audrey knows about the soul-bond and the suit of armor, so there’s no point in dancing around it. “i couldn’t remember what a lot of foods tasted like, and nobody was good at describing them to me. so i made a list of things i wanted to eat when i got my body back, and then i wrote down what they all tasted like. and then i…kept going.”

“oh,” audrey says. she’s quiet for a moment, then, “but you’re not gonna lose your body a second time, right?”

“it’d be pretty hard to,” al says, smiling wryly. he draws a little circle next to slushie–he wants to figure out what it’s made of. what that chemical, imitation-fruit component breaks down to. “but i do it just in case. is that strange?”

“i think strange is fine.”

“me too.” al flips the notebook shut. he slides his small nub of a pencil back into its place in the wire binding, and tucks the whole thing back into his pocket. “you know–my number, the number it started at was 250. exactly the grams of salt in the human body.”

he doesn’t want to explain how he knows that; it feels like it would ruin the moment. audrey doesn’t ask. instead, she takes a long sip of her slushie, her lips twitching into a small smile.

“how’s your salt content now?” she asks. the inside of her mouth is bright blue from the faux-fruit syrup.

al turns his hand over to check his palm. “better.”

[lordisitmine]

TTNBD BLOG PART SIX

This blog covers chapters seven and eight of the story.

CHAPTER SEVEN – SUMMONING CIRCLES

Black Butler was one of my first fandoms. Not my first anime, by any means, but one of the first series of any kind that I consumed fan content for. I was new to the world of fanfiction back then, certainly not writing it yet. But some of the first fanfiction I read was Sebastian/Ciel.

The first fandom I wrote for was Supernatural. If you look at my works catalogue on AO3, you’ll see it’s the one I’ve written for the most as well. While it wasn’t my first fandom, I consider it my first in that it was the space in which I began to explore and hone my fanfiction writing abilities and specialties. I consider it my origin fandom, in a way. That series, its worldbuilding (or lack thereof) and its tropes make up the background from which I come.

So, when it comes to writing things about rituals and demons and other such things, I’m well-suited to the task. As I said in the last blog, I have an aversion to such things in reality, but in fiction, I’m old hat. I could say I researched ritualistic magic or the occult and took great pains to make it seem accurate to what may have been attempted in real life. But that would be a lie. When it comes to the ritual Lizzy and Sybil perform to summon Sebastian, I really just stitched together bits and pieces from stories I’ve read in the past, seen on TV or intuited from my own hypothetical actions were I in such a situation.

I have several 1899/1900 calendar pages on my wall in my writing space of the months in which the story takes place. It allows me to clearly and easily visualise the timeline of events and not lose track of them, all for the sake of maintaining proper continuity. I like to include references to actual events when appropriate. When Sybil mentions that the night of January 8th, 1900, is the first quarter moon, that’s true! I looked up the lunar charts for January 1900 and picked the soonest day when the moon was doing something definite so I could use it for the ritual. It’s amazing that the information about the phases of the moon from over a hundred years ago is available to us!

Sybil describes the balance of nature, how the sun and moon will be in the sky at the same time, and that will create harmony within the heavens. Lizzy refers to it as “a sort of homeostasis”. Homeostasis is a scientific term used in biology to describe the process by which a living organism maintains stability within itself while adjusting to varying external conditions. The term wasn’t coined until 1926 (I looked it up) but it’s a cool word and I wanted Lizzy to say something smart, because what’s the point of her going to medical school if she hasn’t become a bit of a nerd?

Also, it gives Sybil an excuse to mentally swoon. That, and the bit with the jam. I was trying to keep up the romantic tension and not let it get lost in the plot.

And then DRAT! They are interrupted by Simeon! He’s been out all night- doing what, we just don’t know. I won’t say it here but trust that in the final arc of the story, we’ll get more explanation about Simeon’s activities. Sybil is lying to her dad, thinking he wouldn’t approve of her frankly insane plan. And she’s right- he wouldn’t, but not for the reasons she thinks.

And now, it’s time for the BURNING BRIDES case! This is the case covered in the third episode of the second season of the Black Butler anime, entitled “Wench Butler”. A couple of readers have asked me how I came up with the case, and it reminded me how few people have watched the second season, or at least how few people remember it. I also have not watched it in many, many years, but I’ve taken so many pieces of it for this story.

In the episode, Ciel is assigned a new case by the Queen. There have been a few suspicious deaths- young women, all recently married, have been dying via spontaneous combustion- a truly horrific way to die, if you ask me. In her letter, the Queen mentions her “Spider”, and Ciel is intrigued, not knowing who this other investigator might be (it’s Alois).

Ciel and Sebastian eventually figure out that the victims all had their portraits taken by a pair of photographers- a married couple, the Turners. Margaret Turner, the wife, always wanted a passionate, romantic marriage, but hated her husband and her life and resented these women for their happiness and youth. So, she uses phosphorous powder, normally ignited to make the flash necessary for photography at the time to immolate her victims. When caught, she states that there was “a man with golden eyes” (Claude) who told her that the commission of these crimes would bring her happiness and that he would come to take her away from her sad life. She then commits suicide via the same method she used for the murders.

I kept most of this and just reworked some of the timing and conversations. There was a scene in the episode where Sebastian and Ciel run into Grell Sutcliff- I wanted so BADLY to have Grell appear again, I love her so much, but it was messing with the timing and tension, and it was just a whole extra scene to write, and I wanted to keep the story going. Also, trying to cram in every single character cameo I can think of would muddy the waters too much in my opinion. So, I left it out.

But I wanted to include the case itself. I always really liked the concept of it. And I specialise in re-working canon material. I’ve never been a huge AU person (i.e. high school AU, modern AU, coffee shop AU etc.)- I don’t write them (I think I wrote a Steve/Bucky coffee shop AU ONCE, for a request), and I don’t read them. Everything I write is within the canon of the series I’m writing for; I find that space much more rewarding to play in because there are rules you must stick to but still so many possibilities for what you can achieve and finding that balance is super satisfying. Things like soulmate AUs and stuff are my favourite though because again, they can exist within the boundaries of canon but make things so much more exciting in their own way.

Anyway, enough of my tangents. Back to the story. Ciel and Sebastian are investigating, being cute at a crime scene (what else is new) and they’re being watched. Ciel is not as good at being subtle as he thinks he is, so Claude was able to pick up his scent when Ciel was following him and Alois before- and they’ve decided to return the favour. But they’re also not as subtle as they think they are- cue a rooftop chase.

I like to think that Ciel is really fast. Like, I know Sebastian is fast- we see it all the time. But something about Ciel being slightly smaller makes me think that he might be able to move that much more quickly, though Sebastian will probably never admit it. I can’t wait for the later chapters of the story where Ciel begins to hone his skills. He hasn’t had a reason to properly learn how to move and fight- he and Sebastian have been living in peacetime, so to speak, since the end of TTEOE. But running fast doesn’t require a lot of practise, so Ciel catches Claude and Alois pretty easily.

Good God, Ciel remarked. Is that how I looked all those times you had to carry me?

No. You were far more distinguished.

Why do I get the impression you’re only saying that to spare my pride?

Sebastian looked facetiously wounded. You know I am incapable of telling a lie.

Ciel scoffed. I’ll believe it when I see it.

Just popping that in there to tell you once again how much I love writing banter for these two. It feels so correct, it practically writes itself, really.

I couldn’t decide whose POV this conversation should happen from, so I switched throughout. I try to be careful when I employ this technique- it can quickly make things a little soupy, for lack of a better term. But I wanted this exchange to have observations from both Alois and Claude. Alois is trying to be brave while internally pissing his pants, and Claude is falling into a quick and disgusting obsession with Ciel, which is also taken directly from season two of the anime.

I couldn’t resist having Ciel comment on Claude’s name. A Faustian demon having the last name Faustus is the most basic-bitch bullshit, and I would expect nothing less from Alois Trancy.

I loved writing Alois and Ciel’s exchange. They’re both such spitfires, stubborn and bitchy and uncooperative. The funniest part of the conversation to me is the fact that Sebastian and Claude are standing no more than six feet away, glaring daggers at each other and ready to throw down at a moment’s notice. I just imagine those wavy red lines radiating off of them like you see in an anime when a character is frustrated or angry.

If it wasn’t clear already, Claude is straight up lying when he says that Sebastian murdered Alois’s brother. This brings up another topic I wanted to discuss, which is the thing demons are always saying about how they don’t lie. I always just assumed that statement itself is a lie, and that’s the joke, right- lying when you say you don’t lie? Obviously if a demon’s master gives them an order to answer a question honestly, they would have to, but outside of orders, I think demons can just bullshit all they want. Especially demons like Claude, who are already disloyal to their masters and stretching the limits of their contract’s rules to the absolute limit In order to complete their own goals.

Claude telling Alois that Sebastian killed his brother is also straight out of the anime- he lies to Alois there too, so I don’t feel weird about doing it in this fic. Demons are creatures of treachery, after all, and will ultimately do what’s good for themselves in the end. The only question is, why would Claude lay they blame on Sebastian? What could he stand to gain? Questions, questions, questions…

As I said before, for a lot of this summoning ritual, I’m writing off the top of my head. The thing about salt is true, though- salt is a purifier/preservative, so it’s often considered to be symbolically protective. Pouring salt lines in doorways and windowsills will supposedly protect a household, as no evil can pass through the barrier. That’s a thing in Supernatural, but Supernatural didn’t make it up, is what I’m saying.

The way I imagine this ritual works is like: Lizzy focuses on Sebastian. Sybil reaches into her brain with her witchy powers, connects to the spirit network and just pulls really hard on the threads of the universe until Sebastian appears. That’s all pretty vague but I don’t really think the specific mechanics of the ritual matter all that much. It’s magic, don’t worry about it.

The rest of this chapter was one of the first things I wrote for this fic. Not the very first- The scene in chapter one with Lizzy at Ciel’s grave was first written in 2019 (!!), but the first draft of this chunk of chapter seven is hand-written (I handwrite a lot of my fic) and dated as May 2022. I hadn’t yet figured out what the circumstances were for Ciel and Sebastian even being in London, or why they’d been talking to Claude, but I knew I wanted them to be making out when Sebastian got yoinked. It’s just very funny to me. Someone commented that it’s good Sybil and Lizzy didn’t wait much longer to start the ritual, or Sebastian would have been buck-ass naked when he showed up, and that gave me a good laugh. I hadn’t thought of that.

I love Ciel making Sebastian jealous on purpose. They both like annoying each other, it’s an Olympic sport for them, but we all know that Ciel secretly (or not so secretly) loves how possessive Sebastian is. He loves being needed and wanted and owned and *screams* I love writing it. Makes my brain go brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

It was important to me that Sebastian show up in Sybil’s attic looking like an angry wet cat, only not wet. Frazzled maybe. He just got dissolved and pulled through space and then reassembled in a strange environment. You’d be frazzled too. I feel like I succeeded with my sketch.

Now that Ciel is a demon, it’s fun to have Sebastian be the one in danger because there’s actually more Ciel can do to save him- though his inability to really fight or anything is going to be a problem that needs rectifying (we’ll get there). He is, however, perfectly capable of smashing through a window and scaring the shit out of Lizzy and Sybil.

I knew from the very beginning that I HAD to have the moment Lizzy finding out Ciel is still alive be a cliffhanger at the end of a chapter. Nothing else would have done it justice. She was gagged. Gooped. Face? Cracked. Wig? Snatched.

CHAPTER EIGHT – A SOUL NO LONGER LIVING

Another Simeon flashback! I love writing these. I’m very fond of Simeon, much more than I thought I would be, considering he was basically only created to be a vehicle for exposition and plot continuance. We also get more insight into Ada, who I also love. I’m actually chipping away at a spin-off one-shot about their first few days together after making their contract it’s literally just porn but that’s beside the point. It’s quite a different dynamic than any other demon/master relationships that are seen in canon- but if there are many demons running around in the world, it would stand to reason that their contracts and relationships would be as diverse as they are.

In truth, I have ideas/intentions for a few spin-off one-shots of varying lengths for this universe. Don’t worry, I’m going to focus on finishing the main story first! But I’ve never been this excited to expand on a fic before. It’s a neat feeling, and I hope my readers will follow me along on the journey, even though I’m really just happy to write these ideas down for myself!

Ciel bursting into the room, dropping a “surprise, bitch” on Lizzy and then immediately ignoring her in favour of Sebastian is just very Him. I wanted this whole scene to be from Lizzy’s POV because again, I love that outsider shit, and she’s the one with the most new and overwhelming thoughts at this moment. As if it wasn’t enough that Ciel is alive, she suddenly sees him and Sebastian kissing- it’s a wonder her head didn’t explode! But that reveal was less surprising to her. Ciel and Sebastian were always… weirdly close, so she can’t claim to be too shocked.

He approached her, and she flinched. She never would have before- she would never have thought to be afraid of him- he would never have struck her. Now, though, she wasn’t so sure. There was some power, some darkness radiating from him that made the basest part of her shy away.

When I wrote this, I had fully forgotten the scene early in the anime when Ciel does totally reel back to slap Lizzy and Sebastian has to stop him. It’s a small thing, but I was kicking myself about it when I realised my mistake- nobody’s perfect, I guess.

“The eyepatch you wore,” Lizzy said, and then felt quite stupid. “It wasn’t from an injury, then.” Tears began to burn in her eyes, threatening to spill over. “That was a lie as well.”

Here, at this moment, we get Lizzy’s emotional hang-up for the rest of the arc- the fact that Ciel lied to her. For the record, I didn’t even expect her to care this much. She just would not let it go, even when I tried to write her letting it go. Sometimes characters and stories develop a mind of their own, and you have to follow their lead until it comes to its natural conclusion.

I know a lot of readers were annoyed by Lizzy’s unwillingness to just get with the program already and believe me- I was also annoyed! But I also felt that it was more accurate to her character, and I wasn’t going to sacrifice that for the sake of making readers a little less annoyed. Sometimes characters are gonna do stuff you don’t agree with. That can be interesting. And sometimes, the consequences of their stupidity or stubbornness can be all the more satisfying as a result!

Thankfully, before things could devolve into even more arguing, Simeon shows up and the boys quickly bounce. Sybil telling Simeon that it was a bird that broke the window is another pseudo-reference to the fact that Ciel, to me, is a phoenix. He’s the big bird lol.

Alois is of course enchanted by the idea of immortality- if anyone would be looking for a way to weasel out of having to give up their soul, it would be him. Claude, of course, has no intention of ever doing something like that. He’s anti-love and anti-fun in general, to be honest. What a buzzkill.

I’m not going to go too into detail about Hannah’s revelation about this weapon, as there are things about it that have yet to be revealed in the fic itself. I’ll leave that for later commentary blogs. Rest assured, this weapon is bad news.

In a comment on this chapter, someone pointed out that at the moment Alois and Claude are discussing mating bonds and such, Ciel and Sebastian are back at their hotel having emotional, life-affirming floor sex. The juxtaposition of those two images made me laugh. If this was a show, you could have a hard cut between Claude being like “Romance is dumb” BOOM Ciel and Sebastian fucking. It’s hilarious to me.

Anyway, this scene was so self-indulgent to me. Sometimes you just gotta write stupid mushy shit, okay? They’re so in love with each other *cries*

“How can you say such things?” he looked at Ciel mournfully. “How can it be that I’ve failed you so, that you believe these lies about yourself?” He reached up and pushed matted, wet strands of hair away from Ciel’s eyes. “You have proven time and time again to be my saviour and my solace. You are and always will be the very reason for my existence- the purpose for which I live and breathe- whether you are of any use to me or not.”

What’s that meme that’s like “Do you like soul mate AUs or do you just struggle with your self-worth and are obsessed with the idea that someone could love you no matter what”? It’s me. I have exposed myself.

I think Ciel likes pain, like, in a sex way- at some point, all the shit he went through must have crossed wires in his brain- but in this scene, it was more about his need to feel something, anything, to remind him that he and Sebastian were both alive, and real, and safe and together. And it affected him so deeply that his blue flames came back, even for a second!

I didn’t intend for Ciel’s powers to be a part of the story, but I realised early on that Ciel needed some kind of internal conflict to give him a character arc as well as the external conflict of solving murders etc. I’m excited to get into it properly in the final arc of the story.

Sebastian, a demon, reciting scripture will never not be amusing to me.

“And they shall take of the blood and strike it upon the two side posts and on the upper doorposts of the houses… for I will pass through the land of Egypt in the night, and I will smite all the firstborn, both man and beast.”

The passage he is quoting is from the Old Testament book of Exodus, paraphrasing verses from the twelfth chapter. It’s the command God gave to Moses for the Hebrew people, which led to what became the first Passover. The Hebrew people were in slavery in Egypt, and God sent the ten plagues of Egypt, and the final plague was that God passed over the land of Egypt, and every firstborn human and animal died, all in one night. This is what made Pharoah finally break down and let the Hebrews go.

The Hebrew people themselves were protected from the plague because they sacrificed a lamb and used its blood to mark their doors so God would know they were his people and not harm them when he passed over. Thus, the term “Passover”.

Sebastian, using his blood to mark the walls and keep them safe, found it a cheeky, fitting reference. And yet again, he STOLE something.

Cambion is indeed a term for a being who is half-demon, half-human. The term originates in European mythology and was originally used interchangeably with the word ‘changeling’, a mythological creature that replaced a human child, but later came to mean a demon-human hybrid. The most popular use of the term is the creature from Dungeons & Dragons, a humanoid creature with bat-like wings and horns and a devil’s tail.

Obviously, Sybil doesn’t have any of those physical attributes, but her demon heritage is what makes her capable of seeing the dead, as well as her intuitiveness and her ability to successfully perform rituals like the one that summoned Sebastian despite the fact that she’d never attempted anything like it before in her life. Witches in general are just humans with an affinity for the spiritual, but Sybil has heightened abilities that can only be attributed to her non-human genetics.

I ended this chapter on another sort-of cliffhanger- I hate writing normal endings to scenes, it always feels awkward, so I always end up doing this haha. I hope it doesn’t get too annoying or boring. Like right now, for instance, me not knowing how to end this blog post.

Okay, bye, see you all next time!

[puffpasstea]

I don’t know if you’ve done anything like this before, but I’d like to request a blurb about Matilda dealing with seasonal depression

Hi, lovely. Thank you for this! I've actually never written about this before, so here you go! I hope you like it. Please let me know what you think!! Sorry it's on the longer side.

--

A/N: Consider this the first Satellite extra :D A little glimpse of their new relationship.

Warnings: mentions of mental illness, including anxiety and depression. Please read with caution. If you struggle with, or relate to this, please be kind to yourself. I'm always here if you wanna chat. I'm literally writing this from bed instead of getting up and starting my day, so, trust me, I get it.

---

September has always signaled the beginnings a difficult time for me. Even though, as a bookish academic, it’s often filled with excitement and anticipation for the new semester, especially with my job at the library. Getting new books in, watching new students come by for orientation and discover the many wonders of our resources: archived materials, inter-library loan programs, journals, and rare books collections. Whenever work slowed down over the summer, I tended to struggle with my mental health. Without the structure of a predictable routine and a busy schedule to keep my mind occupied, and without the sense of purpose and connection to others that the job gave me, depressive episodes generally took over quickly. So, the fall semester was always a welcome reprieve by the time that it rolled around. But even that reprieve never lasted long enough. As soon as the months got colder, the sun set earlier, daylight savings hours crept in, I would find myself right back where I’d started. Feeling helpless against my own mind.

I have always known this about myself though I haven’t always understood it. Having grown up on the warmer side of the country, I was thrilled when I  finally got to go away to college. Not only because it meant I got to escape the life that has always held me back, but because I was finally going somewhere snow would actually fall. My first ever winter was exciting. In a historic blizzard that shut down the entire state, I was living my dreams. My Jane Austen course kept canceling classes cuz campus was shut down. I got to start a fireplace, curl up on the dusty couch that  I’d bought second hand when I moved out, and look out the window as inches of snow pilled out the driveway, coffee in one hand, and Austen’s Persuasion in another. For a socially-anxious introvert, that was the dream. Or so I thought. Unexpectedly, though, the novelty of it all soon wore off. And the depression set in. I’ve dreaded it ever since. 

Even when the sun was shining and everyone was out and about, it still took a lot of effort and energy out of me to actually try and live my life. So with below freezing temperatures, mostly gloomy clouds for months on end, depression followed me around even from the beginning of the day when I would wake up and the sun would still be down at fucking 7 am. When my first ever therapist used the term “Seasonal Affective Disorder,” I was both surprised and relieved. Surprised to learn that this was a scientific phenomenon that was proven to happen, and happened to others too, and relieved that I wasn’t just dead inside, incapable of experiencing joy. Even with my growing understanding of my mental health, though, deep down inside, I always held onto a naive idea that my self-inflicted isolation was partly to blame; that the reason I failed to get out of bed most days and brave the elements for five minutes of sunshine and a brisk walk that would "do me wonders" is because I had no one to do that with. No friend I enjoyed the company of enough to MAKE me want to go out, no partner to go out with. As any mental health professional would tell you, that’s not a healthy way of thinking. And I would soon find that out. 

Harry, on the other hand, LOVED winter. He has loved it ever since he was a kid, but, I think, his appreciation for this time of year grew exponentially as he got older and became a world-class rockstar. The holiday season was the only time of the year where he was forced to stop working. Even, or especially, when he was touring. His tour schedule was always jam-packed year round. If Harry was on tour, you best believe he was on tour for the majority of the year. Starting in the spring or summer, and going non-stop until the holidays. So, by the time that mid-November rolled around, he was always thinking about going back home to see friends and family, buying Christmas presents, disappearing from public life for a few weeks, getting to be a normal person again; decorating the tree with his mom and sister, making tea and watching holiday movies and eating his mom’s cooking while curled up under a pile of blankets in front of the tv in his mother's living room. It was a time he relished in and looked forward to every year. 

I supposed I should’ve expected our differences, even before we got together. But it was one thing to know that we had different experiences about this time of year, and another thing to experience it. 

“You wanna go shopping with me this week?” Harry climbed back into his now cold and empty spot in our bed, kissing my forehead and handing me a cup of coffee to subtly inform me that it was time to wake up. 

I groaned in acknowledgement, my fingers peering from under the covers to receive the warmth of the drink he’d brought me. This was it. This was my person. The person whose company I’d enjoy enough to put myself through the winter weather, right?

“I saw something at this boutique that I wanna get for Gemma. You know, for Christmas.” 

I took a sip of my coffee, avoiding his eager eyes, and mustering a small nod.

This is what I’ve always wanted. I can’t fuck this up now. “S-sure, Harry. I’d love to.” Forcing myself to look back at his expecting face, I willed myself to smile. 

“Great! Thanks! We can browse for you too, if you’d like.” Harry shuffled under the covers, throwing an arm around me and pulling me to his side. I didn’t have anyone to buy presents for. 

This whole thing was already wearing me down. I’d made a deliberate effort to change my attitude around this time of year. To will myself into becoming the sort of person who loved the changing of the seasons and celebrated every little thing. It seemed doable at first. September was fine. I enjoyed the back-to-school rush, especially with my new job as a college professor. It was an excuse for me to indulge in old habits: back to school shopping, new stationary, elaborate pen collections, pretty notebooks and highlighters. Plus, the first half of September is technically still summer. Even when the weather did start to change, it was changing from unbearably humid and warm, to tolerable and breezy. I could go for runs outside. I could walk down to the coffeeshop to get myself and Harry some coffee in morning. I found that I handled it okay. This sense of control gave me some hope that perhaps all needed was the motivation to do things differently.

By October, things felt a bit more challenging, but, determined to be the dutiful and supportive girlfriend, I participated in the pumpkin-spice-everything craze. Got Harry a pumpkin pie scented candle to take on tour with him, bought the Halloween decor, assisted in the Gucci meetings for Harryween, watched and took pictures of Harry carving pumpkins with his god-children. But all of that had soon burnt me out. Thanksgiving was in a week, and Harry was determined to celebrate with me and with his American friends, even though, I know for a fact that he has no sentimental tradition attached to this holiday; he couldn't possibly; England doesn’t even have thanksgiving! And we still had Christmas and new years to get through. I didn’t know if I could keep faking it much longer. 

Truthfully, I knew that if I told Harry, he’d be understanding and supportive. But I desperately wanted this to be the start of a new chapter of my life. Plus, I didn’t want him to be self-conscious about the things that he enjoyed just because I felt differently. Besides, our relationship was still new. I wanted to get to know his friends and spend time with the people who are important to him, even if it meant getting out of my comfort zone. Perhaps that's what I need to grow into a winter-wonderland-loving person. I just need to push through it all and come out on the other side a warm and fuzzy person.

“I don’t wanna push, but you still haven’t given me an answer.” Harry mumbled against the side of my head, his arm still around my shoulder. 

“I just said I’d go shopping with you, Harry.”

“Not about that! About thanksgiving.”

“Oh.” I dreaded this conversation.

“The Azoffs usually have this gigantic party. Catered, people from out of town, that sort of thing. But I know that’s not your scene. We don’t have to do that this year.”

“If you wanna go- I could-“

“Nah. Honestly, I’d rather just do something with the band.”

“Mitch is the only American.” I stated a bit too aggressively.

“Right. Mitch actually doesn’t care.” Harry giggled.  “But it’s an excuse to be together. Plus, what about you?”

Tell him. Tell him. Tell him. Now's your chance. Just tell him.

“W-what about me?” I set my mug down on the bedside table, growing uncomfortable under Harry’s gaze. 

“You’re American. Don’t you care? Come to think of it, you’ve never really told me anything about your holiday plans. Do you usually go back home, or?”

“I usually find every reason on the planet not to.”

It was true, I often worked on thanksgiving, to avoid having to go back to a place where I felt I didn’t belong and had no reason to be. And to avoid staying home in my cold and empty apartment. 

“Cuz, your family- oh-I’m sorry. I should’ve known - I-“

“Stop, Harry. It’s okay.” His concern was always sweet.

***

“Ready to go?” Harry peeked his head into the bathroom and watched me touch up my makeup. He stepped forward to help me buckle my necklace as he saw me struggle to put it on by myself. Kissing the side of my neck, he wrapped his arms around my waist and whispered in my ear, “I made us a dinner reservation at that French restaurant you like.” 

I saw from his reflection in the mirror that he'd picked up on me tensing up in his arms. 

“You made dinner plans?” I tilted my head upwards to look at him. “Without telling me?”

“This is me telling you now.” Harry’s arms withdrew. He stood up straighter, his presence now felt different, like he was towering over me. I felt suffocated.

“I didn’t know this was a dinner thing! I thought it was just a shopping thing. Now I have to-“

“Have to what, Matilda? Why does it matter what kind of ‘thing’ it is?" I detected a hint of mockery in his voice. Whether he meant it, or I was overthinking, I wasn't sure. "Did you have other plans for dinner? I can cancel the reservation. It’s no big deal. I just thought you might not wanna come home and cook after a long day of being out and about. I was trying to think ahead.”

“Long day? What on earth- I thought we were stepping out to go grab Gemma’s gift! Why would that take all day?” I turned around to face him. He looked baffled.

“Well, we are. But I’m not just buying Gemma a gift, am I? There’s other people I want to buy for. Plus, we haven’t been out, just the two of us, in ages. Figured we could make a day-“

“You make all these plans and you never consult me!”

I squeezed past Harry to exit the bathroom. 

“Where are you going?” He trailed after me, watching me go into the bedroom and begin to undress, kicking me shoes off and unzipping my dress. 

“What’re you doing now?”

"Changing."

"Why?" Harry shrugged.

“I’m not going.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. I’m not going. You go. Get a million gifts for a million people, eat French food, make a day of it. Go. Go on. Just leave me out of it.”

“I’m confused. Are you being serious, or is this a joke, cuz if it is, I don’t get it….”

“I’m not kidding, Harry. Go. Hurry or you’ll miss your reservation.”

***

Harry was gone all day. And it didn’t make sense that I was mad. I was the one who told him to go. But the truth is, I regretted it as soon as the words came out of my mouth. I hated that depression made me irritable. I scrolled my phone through tearful eyes to confirm: under “symptoms of depression,” alongside “loss of appetite” and “mood swings,” there it was, “irritability.”  I knew it. I’ve been living it first hand, for years. It just felt cruel and downright evil when it affected someone other than myself. It wasn’t Harry’s fault. He was being normal; doing normal people things. I’d snapped at him for no good reason. I wished he’d come home already. I wished I could go back in time and stop myself from being such a jerk to him. But the truth is, I have been feeling drained lately, and springing a whole day's worth of plans on me like this made me anxious. I didn't like that about myself. I didn't like that my default reaction to spontaneity was panic. I wished I could be the sort of person who didn't need an advanced warning and didn't need to mentally prepare herself for things before they happened. But this was the reality. I needed to plan things out to feel comfortable. And Harry was okay with not knowing.

I climbed into bed, turning my heated blanket up, and hiding under the covers. This was the only place I wanted to be today. I curled up and closed my eyes, letting tears fall as I felt my sense of failure fester in my heart. I wanted so badly to be the partner Harry wanted and deserved. I thought I'd managed to do a pretty good job of forcing myself into it. But, now, my act was faltering. There's no pretending after the fit I'd thrown over a fucking dinner reservation.

***

"Wake up, darlin'" Harry's hand shook me gently. "Matilda? you awake?"

my eyes fluttered, blinking away the sleep and looking up at Harry. It took me a second to adjust to the blurry light coming from the bedside lamp that Harry had turned on. When I did, I saw him standing over me, a seemingly infinite number of bags in his hand.

"Oh, you've been crying." Harry's eyes landed on the pile of tissues beside me and the tear stains on my pillow case.

I instantly turned to the other side of the bed, giving my back to him.

I heard the rustle of the bags as Harry set them down, and then felt a dip in the mattress as he sat down down next to me.

"Look at me, honey, please?" he placed a gentle hand on my shoulder urging me to turn around. "Wanna see your pretty eyes."

"sleepy eyes." I mumbled, unsure if he'd heard me.

"Teary eyes?" he countered.

I shook my head, still facing away from him.

"C'mon. You're a terrible liar."

"Don't wanna talk about it, Harry."

"Why not, my love?"

"Cuz I'll just start crying again."

"Aha! so, you admit you've been crying!"

Harry got up and rounded the bed, walking to the other side to look me in the eyes. He crawled onto the bed and squeezed under the sheets, his arms finding my waist and wasted no time in pulling me to him. His lips, locked against mine, felt cold, no doubt from the weather outside. The idea of him being out alone, all cuz I ruined our plans with my mental shit made the regret bubble back up to the surface, I broke down again, crying into Harry's lips, but he didn't budge.

"It's okay, it's okay." his hand traveled from my hips to my back, rubbing it soothingly.

"'M sorry I ruined everything." I squeezed closer, burying my face into his neck my tears staining his shirt, he smelled warm, comforting, his signature cologne clung to the fabric of his clothes.

"you didn't ruin anything, babe."

"yes I did!" I found it easier to speak when my face was hidden from his eyes. " You had this whole day planned for us and I ruined everything."

"S' okay, really. Is' not that important." His hands were still on my back, he squeezed me tighter and it brought me calm. "You didn't feel like goin' out tonight. I shoulda asked first. I'm sorry."

"You did! you did ask, Harry. And I said yes, but-" I felt another wave of tears spill from me.

"But what, honey? What happened? Did I do something? I-"

"No, Harry! It's me. I- I'm tired. All the time I'm tired."

"You work hard. I understand-" He whispered into my ear.

"No! you don't. I'm not tired cuz I've had a long week. I just-"

"Tell me."

"Depressed." Was all I could muster the courage to confess before I broke down again.

Harry's hands momentarily paused before resuming their circular movements across my back when he felt my tears on him again.

"I should've known. I'm so sorry, baby. I can be so insensitive sometimes. I'm sorry."

"I don't wanna be broken. I hate it. I'd do anything to feel normal just once."

"You're not broken-"

"Yes I am! That's why I hate this time of year, I fucking hate it!! It's not enough that I have nobody to celebrate or by presents for and my family isn't the sort of people I want to spend the holidays with, my own brain won't let me have a moment of personal joy, not even by myself!! Everyone loves the holidays, I-"

"You're okay."

"I want to change, Harry. I wanna be better. For you."

"Don't you dare!" Harry forced our bodies apart, enough to look down into my eyes. "don't ever change anything about yourself. Not for me or for anyone else. You're perfect. Just the way you are, do you understand?"

I swallowed, my throat itchy from crying.

"I said do you understand? I mean it!"

I nodded reluctantly.

"Good." Harry pulled me back into his chest, peppering the top of my head with kisses.

"But I wanna work on this. To try and do things differently. I want to." I whispered after a silent moment had passed.

"Fair enough, then. Let's start small. Maybe dip your toes in? with thanksgiving? Doesn't have to be a big thing. Just you and me and Sarah and Mitch. What do you think?"

"I think that's lovely." I smiled, kissing his neck and causing him to giggle. "Can Pauli come too?" I asked and waited for Harry's reply.

"S-sure. If it's not too many people for you."

I kissed his neck again.

"And Ny?"

"If- you want to."

Another kiss.

"And Elin? we can't not invite Elin..."

Harry was laughing now, his chest rising and falling moved me around and I placed another kiss to his neck.

"You sure you wanna do this?"

"Yeah, Harry. I think- with the band- I'll be okay. People I know."

"Thank you for doing this." He kissed my head once again, whispering praises into my ear.

"Sorry I ruined dinner."

Harry slowly wiggled out of my tight hug, rushing to the other side of the room and grabbing a couple of his bags. "You didn't." He said grinning widely and climbing back into bed.

I spotted the French restaurant logo on the containers he'd brought over.

"You got us takeout?"

"Hell yeah. Also don't look in those other bags. Bought your Christmas presents."

[warrioreowynofrohan]

Jurassic Park Daily - ‘Stegosaurus’ and ‘Control (V)’

Well now the chapter name looks like I want to paste something, ha.

It seems like it says something that the Jurassic Park staff couldn’t figure out why the stegosaur was sick for all this time, and then Ellie, an actual paleontologist, figures it out in about ten minutes.

It’s the “life finds a way” speech! Choss theory in general - Malcolm just saying - “this is complicated and unpredictable, so it won’t work” - feels too broad to qualify as scientific evidence to me, but I am so glad he brought up oxygen content, because that’s been bugging me since the earlier chapter that mentioned the air in the hatchery room was 33% oxygen, matching what they guessed to be the Jurassic atmosphere. Present-day oxygen content of air is 21%. These poor dinosaurs can’t breathe! But that’s not chaos theory, that’s a perfectly predictable problem.

I trust Grant to be able to identify a fragment of dinosaur eggshell and the general size of the animal it came from, but I do not believe he can identify a fragment that small as velociraptor specifically rather than a similar-sized animal (othnelia?). But it gets cleared up fast when they get the real numbers (Malcolm really is good at identifying the issues when he’s focusing on specifics rather than his theory) - statistically, if nothing else, it’s likely be a a raptor, because they’ve been breeding more than any other species.

This is the point where I really feel that Hammon’d determination to ignore problems has crossed the line from negligent into delusional. You have 29 raptors that you don’t know where they are. Muldoon knows how bad that is.

What I don’t get is how that could happen. The other species, sure. But all 8 original raptors are locked in a cage. The staff have video monitoring, and they can count to 8. Am I supposed to believe that the raptors are escaping from their cage every night and then all sneaking back in the next morning, like kids going to a party? (I want to say that’s way too intelligent for animals, but I think I did hear a story of an octopus doing that at an aquarium…though even so, that’s still one animal, not a group doing it in a coordinated way.) And even if they did, how could they raise young that way? The newly-hatched chicks would need round-the-clock care, which the raptors can’t give if they’re in a cage during the day.

Anyway, in the short/immediate term, 29 raptors loose in the park should be considered a crisis situation that warrants getting the guests back to the lodge immediately.

[fatefulfaerie]

Botanical

Linktober 2022 prompt #29/31

Word Count: 1,033

Incarnation: Age Of Calamity (post)

Trigger Warnings: None Applicable

“You summoned me?” Link asked, closing the door behind him.

Zelda’s study was clean, and nothing could have been more out of the ordinary. Link gaped at how much space was actually in here when all the books were on the shelf, all the otherwise lonely papers were filed away, and every guardian contraption was put away in a wooden crate.

“Please, sit down,” Zelda said formally as she gestured toward a chair she had set up, apparently for Link. It faced a chalkboard with a basic outline of a Hylian, accompanied by various arrows and writings he didn’t know the purpose of.

“Your Highness,” Link said as he sat down. “What is this?”

“I have a malady I wish to inform you of,” Zelda explained. “And this is the only way I know how to do it.”

Link narrowed his eyes and braced his hands against his thighs.

“Uhm,” Link breathed, hesitating. “It’s not…” He scrunched his face as if it were a bad word. “It’s not…private…is it? If it is, I don't need to know, really.” He held his hands up. “I’m just your knight attendant I don’t need to know about...” Link’s cheeks began to streak and his eyes widened for a second. “I really don’t need to know about that sort of stuff.”

Zelda had crossed her arms where she stood by the chalkboard.

“It’s something I want you to know,” Zelda said. “It has the potential to alter your job significantly.”

Link gestured wordlessly for her to begin, although he was silently nervous where he sat in the chair, elbows on his knees.

“All right,” Zelda began. “At about ten score, the Hylian body undergoes great alterations, a process that gradually hurtles us into the middle portions of our lifespan in ways that may seem awkward and unwanted.”

Link took a moment to parse through what she said, making sure that what he thought he heard was what she meant to say.

“Are you giving me a lecture on puberty?” Link asked, “We’re both nearing twenty, I think that ship has sailed for both of us.”

“I know,” Zelda said. “This is just the beginning of what I have to say, trust me.”

Link took a deep breath.

“Go on,” he said, half ready to walk out the door singing with his fingers in his ears as soon as Zelda started to talk about the female side of things. He heard it involved blood and Hylia was that something he did not want to know about. Goddesses, why was she talking about this?

“At a certain juncture it is instinct for this phenomenon to lead to species preservation through permanent replication, in more simple terms procreation through copulation, which is a bit extreme in this particular circumstance of course, but that is merely the scientific and even at times socially-obligatory source of the notion.”

“Internally, there are also factors,” Zelda continued, thinking Link was listening intently when really he was beyond understanding and just trying to figure out how she said that one sentence in one breath. “Namely rising dopamine levels from what we call the pituitary gland here.” She pointed a nicely-sanded stick at the middle of the head. “And the hypothalamus here. The actual process is abetted by the hippocampus, the medial insula, and the anterior cingulate, which are the centers for love, affection, and rewards. As far as intensity at the forefront of the phenomenon–”

“Hold on,” Link said, his hands out. Zelda turned her head back around. “You lost me at juncture.”

Zelda stammered, looking at the diagram and back to Link as if she didn’t know what to do.

“Okay,” he said. “This is about something you have, right?”

Zelda nodded.

“Well yes of course,” she assured him.

“Okay so,” he went on, circling with his hand as if to prompt her. “Try to put aside the science behind it. It doesn’t have to be so…botanical.”

“Botanical refers to plants,” Zelda said, the words coming out quickly as if they were just another breath. “And I’ve been working on this all week. This is the only way I know how to explain it.”

“Use simpler words,” Link said. “Stuff with less than ten letters if you can.”

Zelda twisted her lips as she thought for a moment.

“Magnets!” She exclaimed excitedly, her hands outstretched towards Link. “The magnetic field!”

Link dove his head into his hands.

“No?” Zelda asked.

“No,” Link replied, his voice muffled. He inhaled as he rose out of his hands so that they framed his face, in such a way that it looked like he was nursing a headache.

“Okay,” Link asked. “What is it you have? Just give me one or two words.”

Zelda didn’t say anything at first, pursing her lips.

“I need three,” she admitted.

Link gestured for her to continue.

“Feelings of attraction,” she said overly plainly, as if she had already said it twice before. Link furrowed his brow, almost taken aback.

“Wait,” Link said, looking up at Zelda. His mouth formed to make another ‘W’ sound and yet he froze. He pointed at himself and asked the question with his eyes, brow raised and heart leaping in anticipation.

“Of course it’s you, silly,” Zelda said playfully. “I wouldn’t be telling you otherwise.”

“Goddesses you made that so complicated,” Link said as he stood up. He approached her and touched her cheeks like she was the most precious thing in the world, stared at her like he’d never seen something more beautiful.

Link chuckled, happy, relieved. Zelda was stunned as she searched him, every bit of his stoicism melting away like the icy facade it was.

“I should tell you I have the exact same illness,” Link said. Zelda smiled and adorned a blush, so much love in her eyes that the artist depicting this moment would have replaced them with hearts.

“Really?” she asked flirtatiously. They swayed in place as they came closer and closer until their foreheads met and their noses brushed messy, invisible paintings on each other until lips were breathing, caressing, then grasping and clutching and inviting, tongues playing and Zelda’s back hitting the bookcase.

So much for a clean study.

[venacoeurva]

It’s the pinned post, READ IT PLEASE

Commissions can be found here: https://ko-fi.com/venacoeurva/commissions

Non-art posts will be tagged as “not art” and text posts are “vena vents”. Reblogs of my own posts are “Day reblog” blacklist these without quotations if you don’t want to see them.

I’m over 25, bi aro, and dude-esque, I use these w/ queer interchangeably.

Not all content is close to mature or suggestive but I would still prefer you to be 18+

I have anxiety issues and due to the nature of this website I will frequently delete posts. Posts that get too big freak me out, so don't be surprised when I turn off reblogs. I also have memory problems, including short term, bear with me.

I don’t know how to feel about gift art of my OCs quite yet. I’m protective of them given how “fandomized” orig stories/chars ended up. Please use common sense with other’s creations/characters and don't just do things with other peoples' characters/stories without their permission.

I block people into incest and adult/minor pairings, and any others I happen to be skeeved out by as I encounter em. Social media curation, baby

I BLOCK ACCOUNTS THAT LOOK LIKE BOTS.

I block h*rry p*tt*r accounts on sight, yes, even people who put it out there that they don’t like the author and only engage in the fandom.

My art’s not cleared for reposting (REPOSTING =/=REBLOGGING)/tracing/edits/RP/Commercial purposes without credit or permission. If you want to make merch for personal use, still PLEASE ASK ME FIRST if it’s more complex than just printing it on paper and sticking it to your wall. Consider it a “no” until asking me and getting a yes. Please understand how uncomfortable this can be for artists to just DO that without asking (and people have).

That's the main stuff, more info below

Other Rules:

I also block accounts dedicated to reposting (not reblogging) art unless the art is extremely well known, published, or very old.

I block accounts promoting or enabling AI (the current ~trendy~ interpretations of them, not the scientific simulation types)

If I mention a character not present in a post, I censor their name to avoid it ending up in results.

I have VERY limited social energy. Also please don’t just try to small talk.

Also if you try to joke with me and it's not obvious/a very well-known reference there is a chance it'll go completely over my head and I'll just stare at your reply/ask blankly and move on. If it comes off as you being a dick I'll just block you tbh (esp bc a lot of jokeyness on here is playful rudeness toward strangers)

Sometimes I'll block just off bad vibes

I’m critical of sites/companies/brands, including small ones if it warrants criticism, including A_/0/ 3

I’m not your therapist. I cannot stop you from committing suicide or suffering from other severe mental crises and I am not trained to. I will block trauma-dumpers for my own well-being.

l will block if you’re reblogging personal posts for no reason when I forget/can’t turn reblogs off or reblog spamming one of my posts a ton in a row, because reblogging one post a trillion times is just a thing people do now?

I don’t want to be mutuals with anyone under 18 (or 21, more realistically)

If you’re a minor reblogging/liking mature posts (which means you lied about your age to be able to view), I will block you. If you’re a minor leaving horny comments/tags on things, that’s also very uncomfortable and I will block you.

Also don’t ask me to be mutuals, if it happens it happens.

Just because you commissioned me it does not mean we're friends. That's a weird, unrealistic expectation and I'm a very closed off person.

I won’t share donation posts unless it’s vetted by others/via a trusted source.

I know sometimes my art ends up on Amazon, nothing I can do about that.

If you call yourself problematic/proship or call people puritans or fandom cops (or claim fandom critics is purity culture) a bit too unironically and seriously I’m just blocking, man, but frankly, if your main occupation is shipping discourse regardless of stance and you’re older than like 17-20 or beefing with actual children I’m also just blocking you (I have seen and had worse experience with people like the above though). There’s nuances and neither extreme sides of the argument like to work with those and you're too damn old to be making that your main hobby, let alone doing it at all.

[memestockpile]

cheers (1982-1993) feel free to change as needed.

you know, buddy, this is a bar. if you want to make polite conversation: take it outside.

men. they’re so stupid.

the soup was so hot it set off the sprinkler system. 

well, what else can i do around here that i’m great at?

are you on the sauce again?

hit the bricks, pal.

the cologne you always wear is totally without nuance.

if you can’t say it in front of me, don’t say it, at all.

a lady does not ask her chauffeur how much he stole from her dead husband. 

don’t toy with my emotions. 

i described you in terms which were positively glowing, which is the way i’d like to see you in hell. 

if you can’t say anything nice, say it about [name]. 

yeah, personally, i say good riddance.

i hate you with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns. 

never trust a man who can’t look you in the eye, never talk when you can listen, and never spend venture capital on a limited partnership without a detailed analytical fiduciary prospectus. 

you automatically spring to mind when i hear something stupid. 

it’s all cobwebby down there. 

she’s got ta-tas til monday afternoon at least.

go mate with a squid.

i don’t like the idea of somebody else plucking my pigeons.

shut up! we’re celebrating!

one murder does not a murderer make.

i succumb too easily to the pleasures of the flesh. 

you must be an idiot savant. 

do you make a drink for failures?

you know me, daddy cool. 

on behalf of intelligent women around the world, may i just say: phew!

life sucks. 

everything we strive for comes to nothing. 

don’t impose gender roles on me. 

face it: you’re a bunch of losers. 

if ignorance is bliss, this is eden. 

let me tell you something, [nickname]: when you’re eighty-seven, you’ll still be a hunk to me.

this would make a great bar story. 

you want to hear a scary story? i’ll tell you a scary story. my life, that’s a scary story. 

oh, how would you know you’re stupid?

you actually have to go with someone before you can get dumped.

i never heard you talk like this before.

oh, c’mon, honey.

oh, dear me, my worst fears are confirmed. 

let’s open up this discussion a little bit: what’s your name, son?

do you know the difference between you and a fat braying ass? the fat braying ass would. 

come on, man. don’t tell me you keep your money in your shoe.

why would she be carrying a dead rat in her purse?

i don’t want your money. besides, if i did, i could take it.

i got an attic you can hang upside-down in. 

oh, yuck! oh, i have to punish my tongue!

i’m scientifically handy.

boy, you guys really do think i just fell off the turnip truck.

your hormones have staged a coup d’etat on your brain.

oooh, a completely unprovoked personal attack. i like it!

you’re the most beautiful kid in the whole world. 

you squealed on me?

i’m a student, not just in an academic sense, but a student of life. 

where better than here to study life in all its many facets?

people meet in bars. they part. they rejoice. they suffer. they come here to be with their own kind.

you know, i think i’m falling in love with you.

i’d like to speak to the person in change of female dehumanization. 

i said that i wouldn’t call you stupid while we’re being intimate. 

i found holes in the pool table. 

[name] and i have decided we’re going to start messing around.

well, my dear friends, i want no part of it!

i certainly hope not. i’d like to think i was special.

if brains were money, you’d have to take out a loan for a cup of coffee. 

i’m tired of wasting my time and cleavage on him. 

we always get into so much trouble when we talk. let’s not. let’s just...do. 

a thirsty guy walks into a bar. you finish it. 

when the right dame comes along, you’ll know it.

if it’s true that a little knowledge is dangerous, you are a walking time bomb.

it’s a dog-eat-dog world, and i’m wearing milkbone underwear. 

if you ever open that gateway to hell you call a mouth in my direction again, i’ll snap off your extremities like dead branches and feed them to you at gunpoint.

what’s the point of winning if you can’t humiliate the other team?

after several hours of careful deliberation and weighing all of the consequences, i have decided to be playful.

i don’t know what a duvet is or what it’s supposed to cover!

he’s overcompensating for feelings of inadequacy with an ostentatious display of hormonal activity.

you know, darth vader cannot be luke skywalker’s father. they don’t have the same last name.

how would you like to take a flying leap off of a knuckle sandwich?

philly’s a dull town.

my brain must be full, now, ‘cause my hair hurts. 

thank you for the opportunity of knowing your dog. 

you’re a dink, a wimp, a thread, a loser.

your big drug companies don’t want you to find out about leeches. you know why? leeches are free.

go home and tell your mother you’re a flop.

you’re a magnificent pagan beast.

hey, c’mon, i’m smoking in any jacket.

i always meant to tell you that.

you did the right thing. you were noble.

bless the postal system and keep it from harm.

who is the biggest bigwig of them all?

i usually assume people are gay until i find out they’re not. sometimes we find out together.

bars don’t turn gay overnight.

yeah, that’s what they say: war is gross.

anybody with half a brain can see through his petty little scams and tricks.

it’s atrabilious, yet not a bit lugubrious. 

you’re dead meat on a stick. 

you don’t use a fork with soup!

perhaps on the isle of lesbos.

good news! i finally found a woman.

this country’s gone to heck in a handcart.

you should feel sorry for the flintstones.

you’re just gonna have to become a communist.

i think you should judge people for what they do, not for who they do.

it just seemed gauche.

my life is devoid of pleasure.

you think i don’t know what noodles mean in sexual lingo?

oh, step into the eighties. 

it moves me deeply to move you deeply.

now you’re saying that i’m redundant, that i repeat myself, that i say things over and over.

that’s the only line of shakespeare i ever understood. 

where is he? i’ll straighten him out.

anyone ever tell you you have a cute forehead?

i feel a cry coming on.

this is probably one of those things that we should just keep between the two of us, don’t you think?

you know, i like you, you’re a smart cookie.

i...feel...bad.

high praise from a man who thinks mashed potatoes are finger food.

you ever had a pot of chili fly by your face at the speed of light?

everything i do, everywhere i go, everything i see reminds me of her.

we don’t only eat cheese, we talk about eating cheese.

he wants to know if you boinked her, you dink.

whoever owns a honda, thanks for the lift.

i’m in far too fragile a condition. 

maybe i do tend to be a little uptight at times.

c’mon, if he was a great artist, what’s he doing alive, huh?

i’d hate to be the second member of my family buried alive by potatoes. 

just about time this old cowpoke moseyed off to the bathroom.

get your coat. we’re going dancing!

nothing’s ever obvious to me.

you know how i like to read between the lines. 

no guy touches my belly unless he’s paying for dinner.

thou lookest ridiculous. 

boy, am i exhausted.

tell you what, i bet you a dime i can drink that drink without touching the hat.

as sure as corn chiggers in august. 

i pictured you moving to a little home in the country with a rose garden out in the front and a nice little room in the back for me. 

that’s what comes from working with your hands. 

i, for one, am proud you licked it, [nickname]. 

mayday, mayday, mayday. 

i dreamed that i had insomnia all night.

forgive me for losing my academic demeanor for a few moments -- oh, yippee!

must have been hell.

for your information, my head is not flat.

oh, i’d gladly ask my parents. of course, they’re dead.

damn tropical drinks. 

you look like a large-mouth bass. 

farm boys love their halloween!

oh? couldn’t make summa? 

yes, i think we both know. 

i ever tell you about the first thanksgiving? yeah, it took place, uh, between the ancient egyptians and astronauts from a distant galaxy. 

hello, duckling. 

what could be more enjoyable than opening your heart with holiday cheer?

man, you punch a couple of guys out at a funeral, and everybody’s on your case.

i mean, i understand going out with two babes at one time.

i don’t want to talk. uh, i want to watch television. 

you haven’t lived until you seen bonanza dubbed into french canadian.

we’re gonna have to sober you up, sweetheart.

you’re just the guy i’ve been looking for. 

holy cow!

you like corn on the cob?

whew! you are so cranky when you’re naked.

don’t show fear. he smells fear.

just give me a whiskey, punk.

wait a minute, am i being hustled here?

well, there’s a shock, sex boy.

i find it also helps to listen to heavy doses of creedence clearwater revival. 

what do you want me to do? go back there, strip naked, and gyrate to funky cold medina?

you have absolutely nothing anyone could possibly envy or resent.

i mean, i worked all my life to get this mean. now you’re telling me i have to learn nice?

loneliness is a good thing to share with somebody. 

you’re a flimflam. 

i’m practicing my floating coin trick. 

here’s the ten bucks i’m gonna owe you in about five minutes.

i’ve always had a soft spot for you lunkheads.

[luverofralts]

Arkhelios University

“I still can’t believe that you’re here!” Roman exclaimed, wrapping his formerly dead husband in a tight embrace. After a few minutes had passed and Roman was still clinging on to him, Adrian gently pried himself free.

“I’m not quite sure what to make of it either,” he replied softly, clearly still staring in awe of their bland hospital room. “Things are a lot less...intense here. There’s a lot less pink, anyway.”

“And the doctors cleared you to leave? How? Your body is lying in a very expensive crypt. I saw you buried myself.”

Adrian smiled weakly, cringing internally about learning anything having to do with his death. It was a weird subject that he wasn’t sure if he wanted to continue to learn about.

“We did see the Grim Reaper,” he said with a dismissive shrug. “Between him and that strange man that kept talking to him, I have a feeling that there isn’t going to be a scientific answer to this situation.”

“Which is what brings me here.”

Both men spun around to see Evren Thorne, architect extraordinaire, waving at them.

“The witch council wants a report done on this resurrection,” he continued. “They want to make sure there is no threat or plot against the living and that ‘a hoard of zombies’ aren’t about to descend on us. It’s ridiculous, but it’s what I’ve been assigned.”

“Adrian’s not a threat,” Roman insisted, looking incredulously at the witch. “Who gave you that assignment? Claudia in Pleasantview? I’m on very good terms with your queen and I demand that you-”

“Wanda sent me,” Evren interrupted. “She’s worried about you more than anything. Theo too. Half of these questions I’m supposed to ask are about trust funds and house ownership, not magic. She’s your friend, right? She’s just using the witches as an excuse to meddle in your life.”

“Oh.”

Well, that was a different story then. Roman backed down, touched that his friend and aunt was looking out for him and the estate that he benefited from. He hadn’t thought about how the estate would be managed now that Adrian was no longer dead or about what he might be owed financially that the divorce would have settled had Adrian been alive. Was he still married to Adrian or was he still widowed and married to Abe?

“Some of these questions are about the duke though,” Evren said, relieved to see the challenge leave Roman’s eyes. “The witches are extremely interested in your body- I mean your resurrected body! What it’s made of! They want to make sure that you’re not a reaper in disguise or some kind of revenant. If you could help fill out this form with me, I can go back home and leave you two alone again. I keep telling them that I’m an architect, not some master warlock. I just want to start designing the witch council chambers.”

“Wanda’s building a witch council and a magical academy in Arkhelios,” Roman informed his ex-husband. “She’s got witches from all over relocating to Arkhelios.”

“Daddy!”

Theo burst in the room, determined to find his parents. He’d been told to stay with his grandmother until his parents returned home, but Theo didn’t feel like waiting that long. The hospital was only a few seconds away by teleportation after all.

Roman hugged Theo tightly, happy to see his son despite Theo’s inability to follow directions.

“Hey, buddy! You have a little sister, wanna see her?”

Roman reached into the incubator and retrieved his daughter. It was probably against hospital rules, but no one aside from Evren was around to complain. 

Theo stared at the infant in front of him and smiled at her. His sister didn’t shrink away from him even while he was in his dark form. After the initial excitement, Theo’s gaze traveled to his father, still unresponsive in bed.

“Is Dad dying?” he asked, tears welling up in his eyes. “I don’t want Dad to die.”

“So you’re from a different time and universe? That’s got to be hard to deal with. I was gone for a few years and just the trip to the hospital was unnerving.” Adrian smiled at Evren, happy to have found someone who at least sort of understood what he’d been through.

“It’s been a nightmare,” Evren confirmed. Adrian was a lot nicer than he’d expected and both attractive and rich as well. Roman had to have been insane to divorce a man like him. “Every time I feel even a little bit settled, something absolutely insane happens to throw me off again. At least the witches were nice enough to take me in. I’m not sure where else I would go if they hadn’t.”

“You could always come stay with me,” Adrian blurted out before he could doubt himself. “I have a huge estate and only my daughters to live in it. You’d have your own room and area of course, but it sounds like we’re both in a weird place in our lives. Maybe we could help each other.”

Evren nodded. The man was rich, attractive and his ex-husband was remarried with a new baby to distract him. Living anywhere that wasn’t with the snobby witches who were busy trying to establish their hierarchy would be amazing.

“I guess I can see what your place looks like and if it’ll work for me,” Evren replied, trying to hide the blush he felt spreading across his face. “I mean, I’m sure that the other witches will be happy if I stayed and kept an eye on you. Just in case you do start exhibiting zombie characteristics.”

“Of course.”

“You’re dad’s fine, he’s just sleeping,” Roman reassured his son. “I’m sure he’ll be awake soon. You can come sit and wait with me and your sister since apparently Grandma can’t keep you at home.”

“Adrian!”

The instant Theo’s focus changed from his unconscious father to the rest of the room, he could hardly contain his excitement.

“Hey, Theo. You remember me?” Adrian stood to greet his step son, only to have Theo fling himself into his arms just as tightly as Roman had earlier. “I missed you.”

“Adrienne talks about you a lot,” Theo confided. “Plus you had the best candy and let me have fun, unlike Daddy.”

“Hey!” Roman frowned, disliking the amused grin on Adrian’s face. Parenting was hard and sometimes Roman had to at least try to enforce the family rules even when it made him unpopular with the kids.

“Speaking of, I kinda figured that you’d be visiting before your dad came to pick you up. I snuck one of these out of the vending machine down the hall. These are still your favourite, right?”

Adrian held out a chocolate bar and Theo’s eyes grew wide with excitement. Those were still his favourite chocolate bars, not that his father let him eat that “garbage processed junk”. Theo immediately grabbed the chocolate and cradled it protectively. He stared at Roman, daring him to take his gift.

“You can have it,” Roman sighed. “I’m pretty sure that you saved a lot of people tonight with your gifts. A little bit of candy won’t hurt. But no more!”

[queenlucythevaliant]

🧬🦕

Is it cool if I get a little personal? Let me tell you about one of the coolest things I've ever gotten to do: two summers ago, I got to see the Archaeopteryx fossil at the Wyoming Dinosaur Center, which is also the only specimen on display in North America.

Trust me when I say that the stock clip art that I chose to obscure myself is 100% representative of the face I'm making here. If anything, the smile isn't big or goofy enough.

Here's a close-up and a diagram to show up-close what I'm actually looking at. Note the impressions of wing and tail plumage!

Diagram source

You've probably at least heard of Archaeopteryx: it's a transitional genus dating to the late Jurassic and the earliest example of what we could consider a "bird" which retains many ancestral "reptilian/dinosaur" characteristics.

Now, "bird" and "reptile" are kind of arbitrary words here because reptiles are a paraphyletic group. DNA tree-building models and sequence alignment evidence demonstrate that there's simply no way to define "reptiles" which does not also include birds; the definition of a "reptile" is a sauropsid that is not a bird. Thus, we know that all birds have a reptilian common ancestor because they arose as a branch within the sauropsid clade. Archaeopteryx is an ancient sauropsid with both avian and reptilian features; this is what we mean when we call it a transitional genus. 

But why did this transitional fossil make me smile so big that my cheeks went numb? There are several reasons, I think:

Despite its transitional characteristics, most scientists consider Archaeopteryx the first bird in the fossil record. It was also the first direct evidence that birds evolved from reptilians (the first Archaeopteryx specimen was discovered just three years after On the Origin of Species was published). Just on a basic, fundamental level, this genus is of immense scientific and historical importance and standing next to it felt like meeting a celebrity.

The particular specimen that I got to see was super cool! Unlike most Archaeopteryx fossils, which tend to be preserved on their sides, this one is preserved on its stomach with its head in three-quarter view. Thus, it's the only specimen in which the palate bones are clearly visible, and it's tetraradiate (as in non-avian theropods) rather than triradiate (as in other avians.) The palate is one of the most important features in terms of saying, "yeah, we consider this a modern bird."

Its feet are also really well-preserved! The specimen I saw clearly demonstrates that Archaeopteryx didn't have a reversed toe, but does have a hyperextendable second toe. This means that unlike modern birds, it probably had limited ability to perch; instead, it had tearing claws like a dinosaur. 

But even in contrast with other important transitional fossils - say, the Archeoceti of Wadi al Hitan in Egypt, which are amphibious ancestors of modern whales - Archaeopteryx is something special. There's a certain romance to the idea of the first bird: feathers that actually enable something like flight! (Like Buzz Lightyear, Archaeopteryxes' wings were probably used for "falling with style.") But still, there's beauty in Archeopteryx that we don’t see in other transitional fossils. In his poem "The Archeopteryx's Song," Edwin Morgan captures this glory far better than I ever could:

I am only half out of this rock of scales.

What good is armour when you want to fly?

My tail is like a stony pedestal

and not a rudder. If I sit back on it

I sniff winds, clouds, rains, fogs where

I'd be, where I'd be flying, be flying high.

Dinosaurs are spicks and

all I see when I look back

is tardy turdy bonehead swamps

whose scruples are dumb tons.

Damnable plates and plaques

can't even keep out ticks.

They think when they make the ground thunder

as they lumber for a horn-lock or a rut

that someone is afraid, that everyone is afraid,

but no one is afraid. The lords of creation

are in my mate's next egg's next egg's next egg,

stegosaur. It's feathers I need, more feathers

for the life to come. And these iron teeth

I want away, and a smooth beak

to cut the air. And these claws

on my wings, what use are they

except to drag me down, do you imagine

I am ever going to crawl again?

When I first left the crag

and flapped low and heavy over the ravine

I saw past present and future

like a dying tyrannosaur

and skimmed it with a hiss.

I will teach my sons and daughters to live

on mist and fire and fly to the stars.

And like, that’s it, right? Obviously no Archaeopteryx could possibly have any concept of bird or dinosaur. No fifteen million year-old creature could have dreamed eagles or pigeons or penguins. But God did. 

God knew from eternity that a creature called Archaeopteryx would exist. He knew that it would have a dinosaur’s sharp teeth and bony tail and yet wings and feathers to glide with. He alone could imagine a world in which creatures sharing a close relative with Archaeopteryx would have more feathers for the life to come; that the lords of the skies would be in the next egg’s next egg’s next egg.

He knew that Jesus would tell his disciples to look at birds when they were worried; that Gerard Manley Hopkins would write a poem dedicated “To Christ our Lord” in which he extolled “My heart in hiding/ Stirred for a bird, – the achieve of, the mastery of the thing!” God knew that the albatross, so like and yet unlike Archaeopteryx, would live its life on the wing, flying over oceans ten thousand miles at a time, and that Samuel Taylor Coleridge (a devout Christian) would write a poem in which an albatross was Christlike, and that C.S. Lewis would write a book in which an albatross was Jesus and whispered courage to a little girl in the dark. God knew that one day, in the summer of 2021, I would stand beside this fossilized evidence that Archaeopteryx really lived, staring and squinting to see all its features, grinning like an idiot and thinking, “Do you imagine I am ever going to crawl again?” 

[themrscevans]

Amateur Gynecologist

Just a little something I wrote based off a conversation with my gc (see attached photos)

Platonic!Josh x OC

Warnings: some language, scientific terms for female anatomy (is that even a warning?)

“That man couldn’t find my clit even if there were flashing lights pointing at it,” the movie echoed through the room. 

“God, I’m so glad I have you,” OC muttered, looking up at Jake, who chuckled. They were laying across the couch while Josh and his partner were cuddled up on the loveseat. 

“What do you mean?” Josh asked, moving his eyes away from the TV. 

“Before I met Jake, none of the guys I’d slept with could find my clit. They were some of the worst sexual experiences I’d ever had. Jake’s the first one I’ve never had to fake an orgasm with.” A smirk made its way onto Jake’s face, his chest filling with pride. 

“It can’t be that hard to find.”

“Oh, please. What would you know? You haven’t had sex with a chick since we were in high school,” Jake chuckled. Josh rolled his eyes, turning back to the movie as his partner placed a kiss on the top of his curly head. 

** 

OC turned the corner into the kitchen, seeing Josh looking very closely at something on his phone. She’d never seen him so focused on a piece of technology, so she moved closer, curious. What she saw made her laugh, causing Josh to jump and whirl around. “Jesus, you scared the hell out of me!” Josh exclaimed, quickly putting his phone away, his cheeks pink. 

“Looking at female anatomy, are we?” OC chuckled, moving toward the coffee maker. Josh’s cheeks turned a shade darker. “It’s okay if you don’t know where things are, Josh. It’s not like you’re needing the information for anything special.”

I know I don’t need to…I want to.”

“You really want to know about female anatomy?”

“Well…yeah. I mean, women have such complex bodies. The things you’re able to do. Hell, you guys can grow and carry an actual human inside of you. And then pushing it out? Women are amazing creatures.”

OC chuckled, “which is why we’ll end up taking over the world.”

“I just thought I’d do some looking, you know,” Josh shrugged. 

“Well, let’s see what you’re looking at.” Josh pulled out his phone again, showing OC the diagram. “This is the best you could find? This is the worst diagram ever. You need something more realistic.” Josh went back to Google, looking for something that fit OC’s standards. She shook her head at the images. “I mean, this one’s closer but it’s still not great,” she muttered, clicking on one. It had labels with explanations of each part underneath. OC glanced up at Josh’s face. “Do you trust me?”

Brows furrowing, he looked at her, “of course, I do. What kind of question is that?”

“Keep that page open and meet me upstairs in five minutes.” Before Josh could speak a word, OC had left the kitchen, going up to her and Jake’s room. Stripping her pants off, she sat cross-legged on the bed, waiting for Josh. He knocked on the door five minutes later as she had said. When he heard her call out, he slowly opened it, seeing her in her underwear. 

“OC, I’m not – I can’t,” Josh started but OC laughed. 

“We’re not going to have sex, Josh, calm down. You want to know female anatomy, you need to see female anatomy. And not that fake shit you’re finding on Google.��

“So you’re going to show me your…” Josh swallowed nervously. 

“If you’re comfortable with it.” He nodded slowly and OC sat back on the bed until she was resting against the pillows. OC slid off her underwear, beckoning Josh forward as she spread her legs. “Use that diagram we found and tell me what you see.” Josh moved until he was sitting on the bed in front of her spread legs, eyes moving from the diagram to the real thing.

“So these are the labia majora?” Josh asked, looking at the outer folds that covered the rest of it. 

Y/N nodded, “every woman is different. Some have smaller labia, and some have larger.”

Josh hesitated, cheeks turning pink as he glanced at OC shyly, “may I – can I – um…”

Knowing what he was trying to ask, OC nodded and Josh moved closer. He slowly reached a hand out, separating the outer lips so he could see what was underneath. “What else do you see?”

“Well, I know what this is,” Josh declared confidently, gently prodding around the vaginal opening. OC chuckled. “The diagram says the clitoris sits at the top of the vulva. Is that this?” Josh’s brows were furrowed in concentration as his finger moved higher, brushing against OC’s clit. The girl tensed. “Sorry,” Josh chuckled. 

“I think you may have found that faster than Jake,” OC joked. Josh continued to look between the diagram on his phone and OC’s body, figuring out where everything was, and what they did. The bedroom door suddenly opened, and they both looked over at Jake, who stood frozen in the doorway. 

“What the fuck is going on?”

“I’m teaching Josh about female anatomy,” OC declared. 

Josh smiled up at his brother like a kid in a candy shop, “I found the clitoris.”

[theshaddowedsnow]

Incorrect Quotes For my original charcters

Above is the generator I used, enjoy this chaos

-

Darius: Imagine if someone handed you a box full of all the things you lost throughout your life.

Silver: It would be nice to have my sense of purpose back...

Maria: Oh wow, my childhood innocence! Thank you for finding this.

Wolva: My will to live! I haven't seen this in years.

Will: I knew I lost that potential somewhere.

Gwen: Mental stability, my old friend!

Darius: Jesus, could you guys lighten up a little?

-

Wolvric: I found a note in one of my old word docs that said Note to self: Get revenge on Shino.

Wolvric: Except I couldn't remember what I was supposed to get revenge for.

Wolvric: But I trusted my own judgment, so I went with it.

Shino: Hmm... I don't know what you were supposed to get revenge for, either.

Wolvric: I can only assume you got what was coming to you. Not 100 percent sure, though.

Shino: Well, whatever I did, I guess I deserved it.

Wolvric: Let that possibly be a lesson to you.

-

Little John: Well you see, the explanation is perfectly simple and scientific. It was because shut up. Shut up is why.

-

Death: Thanks for not telling Robin what happened.

Ruhl, dumbfounded: I wouldn’t even know where to begin trying to explain this.

-

*Michaela and Ruhl looking at a locked gate into a park*

Michaela: Aw. :(

Ruhl: You know what they say.

Michaela: Please don’t-

Ruhl: BE GAY DO CRIME! *hops gate*

Michaela: Frick-

-

Darren: I’m telling you, my team is competent.

Anya, rushing in: Darren! Wallen tried to make pasta in the coffee pot and now it's broken!

-

Apollo: Hopefully Darren has learned a lesson about respecting other people's feelings.

Darren: Oh, shut up and die Apollo.

-

'Can I copy the homework?'

Felicia: I can help you with it!

Darren: Yeah, sure.

Anya: Bold of you to assume I did the homework.

Aubrey: lol nope.

Wallen: Wait, we had homework?!?!?!

Apollo: *Read 5:55pm*

-

Gwen: You have your weirdly sincere humility.

Will: I prefer the term "self-loathing", actually.

-

Sophia: What’s the dumbest thing you believed as a child?

Fele: That nap time was a punishment.

-

Scarlet: Why should I make my bed, when I'm just gonna unmake it to sleep in it anyways?

Axel: Why should I feed you if you're just gonna die anyways?

Scarlet:

Scarlet: I'll go make my bed-

-

Axel: I have very high standards, you know.

Lee: I can make spaghetti...

Axel: Oh no! You're meeting all my standards!

-

Ravena: Something’s off.

Kiara: Maybe you’ve finally developed human emotions and feel bad for hurting people.

Ravena: No, but that’s funny.

-

Wolva: Yesterday, I overheard Anastasia saying “Are you sure this is a good idea?” and Ruhl replying “Trust me,” and I have never moved from one room to another so quickly in my life.

-

Sophia: Look at the buns on that guy!

Shadia: *lying on the floor, covered in hamburger buns*

Maria: This is the comedy police! The joke's too funny!

Sophia: I'm not going back to jail!

-

Wolva: Why would you think any of this was a good idea?

Anastasia: Probably because I’m a dangerous sociopath with a long history of violence.

Wolva:

Anastasia: I don’t know how you keep forgetting this.

-

Lee: Bro-

Axel: No, no, hold up, rewind.

Axel: My tongue was down in your throat just a second ago and now you're calling me bro??

-

Cartel: Here is my wall of inspirational people.

Fele: Is that a picture of you?

Cartel: Yes, I am big enough to admit that I am often inspired by myself.

-

Maria: Hey, can I get a sip of that water?

Aria: It’s not water.

Maria: Vodka! I like your sty-

Aria: It’s vinegar.

Maria: …What?

Aria: It's vinegar, PUSSY.

-

Felicia: You either buckle down and do your work or you’ll end up at McDonalds.

Anya: We're going to McDonalds if I don't do my work?

Felicia: NO-

-

Shadius: I’m this close to falling in love with Kanna.

Marion: Your fingertips are touching.

Shadius: Exactly.

-

Kiara: *dies*

Lazerus: Timer starts now! When are they coming back? I say two months!

Lucien: Bullshit. One month.

Silver: Nah, half a month.

Maria, sobbing: WHAT ARE YOU DOING? KIARA JUST DIED!

Satanna, scratching chin in thought: One week.

-

Shino: We have a problem.

Electra: Let me guess, you caused it?

Medicia: Gimme a sec, I'm not drunk enough to listen to this yet.

Sophia: And it's another Tuesday, your point?

Scarlet: Would shooting you solve this problem? No? Then shut up.

Maria: If you mean the fire, that's our solution to last week's problem.

-

Scarlet: I dare you to kiss the next person who walks into this room.

Axel: Screw that, I’m not kissing any of you.

*Lee walks in*

Axel: Fine, I’ll do it. Rules are rules you know.

[cedenoarturo123]

Integrated Project

DEFINITION:

Story: A story or narrative is a connected series of events told through words (written or spoken), imagery (still and moving), body language, performance, music, or any other form of communication. You can tell a story about anything, and the events described can be real or imaginary.

Tales: It is a genre of narration with a fantastic or magical story taking place in a real or magical world in which both real and fictional characters can act . The author can raise moral, social, aesthetic problems of history and modernity.

Science fiction: Science fiction is a genre of speculative fiction that contains imagined elements that don’t exist in the real world. Science fiction spans a wide range of themes that often explore time travel, space travel, are set in the future, and deal with the consequences of technological and scientific advances

''"Preserving the Flow: A Water Conservation Crusade"'' My name is Arturo, I'm from Equator and it's December 22, 2064. I used to enjoy spending time with my friends and relatives until the massacre broke out. One day, I woke up as usual, ready to carry out my daily routine, but for my surprise there was no water. Not a drop in my house, or anywhere else in the world. The implications were clear; our ecosystems were collapsing, and life, as we knew it, was hanging on the brink of extinction. I couldn't accept this as humanity's inevitable destiny. Desperation led me to seek out some friends: Pablo, Pepe, and María. Together, we embarked on an arduous mission, working relentlessly for sixteen hours straight. Our goal: to construct a time machine that would transport us back to the year 2023, a time when water was still a plentiful and vital resource. We decided to name our project "AquaGenesis’’. We rounded up equipment and materials, relying on scientific knowledge and intuition. With limited access to water, we used every drop wisely, recycling and reusing as much as we could. The project was finally designed, but we started arguing about what we should do next.- So, guys… Time is running! What we should do know that the machine is done? I said. -''Just give up and accept our destiny Arturo, we’re tired and also thirsty'', said Pepe, in a sad way. -''Chill out Pepe don’t say that, with this machine we’ll be able to travel to the past in 2023 to sort out this big problem'', I said. -''You are right Arturo; however, how do we ensure that the machine works, and how do we convince people from 2023 that what we are saying is true if we’re clearly teens'', María added. -''Don’t worry Maria, when people can see us with a time machine they won’t have option, they’ll trust us. Just in case, get your phone out to take some pictures of the landscape'', said Pablo. -''Great Idea Pablo! Now, let’s team up to save our planet and figure out a solution'', I finally said.

For our surprise the machine took us directly to 2023, the first thing we did was drink up a lot of water. After that, we called everyone’s attention with our time machine, pictures and identity cards. Fortunately, All entities around the world heard us and they set up campaigns and projects in order to preserve water, when we traveled to our future, everything was fixed up and I kept enjoying to spend time with my friends and relatives.

APA 7TH EDITION REFERENCES:

-Story. (2018, November 3). Literary Terms. https://literaryterms.net/story/

-What is a literary tale: definition, examples. (n.d.). Unansea.com. Retrieved October 13, 2023, from https://en.unansea.com/what-is-a-literary-tale-definition-examples/

-(N.d.). Masterclass.com. Retrieved October 13, 2023, from https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-is-science-fiction-writing-definition-and-characteristics-of-science-fiction-literature

AI PICTURE RELATED TO THE STORY:

I ask AI in canva to create that picture for my presentation, I describe the image as I wanted in order to give the reader an idea of how the main characters look like.

30 SECONDS VIDEO:

[aizenat]

We do have longevity studies on veganism, there has been a scientific consensus on it for about ten years. Lots wrong with it but that it at the very least doesn’t have an adverse health impact isn’t debatable at this point.

I’m in a foul mood so I’m not really debating this. Veganism is not sustainable long term for everyone. It’s not environmental, it’s not realistic, and it’s at best a nice short term way to help heal certain ailments and issues related to diet. When you say long term, it’s at most 20ish years. Unless there is a study for ppl who have been vegan a MINIMUM 50+ years and it’s a huge study (aka, including thousands of ppl from different ethnic and racial and gender backgrounds over the course of those years), there is no set research on that.

Send me link if there is and I may look at it when I’m in a better mood but I doubt there is one. Also, controlling for ppl with other lifestyles and genetics (preexisting health issues, any other health issues that come up over the years, hormonal and metabolic changes, etc) is almost impossible, which is how I know such a study does not exist.

Also, part of what i was referencing wrt health impacts is also just how we get our nutrients. Supplements are highly unregulated, vague on effectiveness, and mostly unnecessary. On top of that, any scientist/doctor worth their salt would recommend you getting certain vitamins and minerals from the sources directly, not from supplements. Alternative forms of protein exist, but the minerals and vitamins we get from animals and animal products have to be replaced with third party vitamins to prevent insane health issues (one of the most common mistakes new vegans do is not get enough b vitamins that end up fucking them up; and you can’t only rely on getting b vitamins from quinoa). Anyone who tries to argue that it’s healthy and sustainable to have to be hyper vigilant about secondary supplements in order to have a healthy version of a diet that would be fine if you just ate some eggs and fish instead isn’t someone I trust for diet/health advice honestly.

Also, I would be interested in more studies that look into the impact of only getting certain vitamins and minerals from manufactured vitamins. Tbqh, arguments supporting veganism like this remind me of pro-ana tips I used to see back in the day saying to just take a multivitamin and biotin to stop your hair from falling out as you embark on a starvation diet.

And I’m not 100% against supplements. I take a multivitamin most days (when I remember), and as a Black person who lives a sedentary lifestyle, I have a diagnosed vitamin d deficiency. And vitamin d is notoriously hard to get from foods and the sun, so vitamin d supplementation is important for me. The multivitamin I plan to stop once I get my diet to a heathy point where I won’t need it, as it use it to cover the gaps in my current diet. But the vitamin d I’ll probably have to keep taking until a doctor tells me to stop. And on top of already needing to supplement, you want me to cut out eggs, which aside from the sun is the best source of natural vitamin d?

That’s what I’m talking about: the idea of replacing a meat product that provides me some of a vitamin I’m deficient in, both naturally as a Black person and lifestyle, for a pill has implications I don’t like nor care to get into.

I’m someone who spent the better half of a decade researching nutrition and vegan diets because I really wanted to go vegan and believed it was the “best diet.” But the more research I did, the more issues I saw. And even wrt my own (albeit, brief) stints at veganism, I’m very familiar on the topic. I’m not just talking out my fucking ass.

Also, again, veganism isn’t sustainable environmentally, with a lot of vegan foods necessary for a proper diet not being able to grow in certain environments. Especially given how the current worldwide heat waves and Russia’s war with Ukraine are going to cause major crop famines and issues over the next few years (and will likely start to hit this fall/winter), it’s not good long term environmentally as well. Not that cutting down the rainforests for cattle is the answer; our general disconnection from nature and the natural flows of the planet and earth are huge issues that dealing with is going to mean tearing down our capitalist society. And good luck convincing the average person of that.

A plant based diet with occasional meat options (and cheese, but that’s a personal preference lol) is much more healthier and sustainable to the average person than a vegan one. And more adjustable to accommodate others’ health needs and concerns. And you can try to fight me all you want on that but I’m not interested so take it to someone who cares to have that “debate.”

[punedrr]

The Thesis and the Doctorate

**A/N: Happy new year! (Oh dear.) Please accept this chapter and my apologies for taking so long. I just finished my first term of actual college and it was hectic there for a while, but I’m on winter break now and I finally have some downtime (and motivation) to write. This chapter is very exposition- and dialogue-heavy (one of my writing weak points) so if you have any helpful suggestions or critiques I’d love to hear them! As my first serious fanfic this is a learning experience for me.

I hope it doesn’t read like I’m flying by the seat of my pants because that’s exactly what I’m doing! My outline is no longer current nor has it been for the past three chapters. It’s also a little shorter than I wanted but I wasn’t quite sure where to end and I really just wanted to get it out there. Y’all have NO IDEA how awesome I feel reading your comments and seeing kudos. Please enjoy!**

Link to the story: The Thesis and the Doctorate

Chapter 9: Show and Tell

You hurry down the front steps of the library. Thankfully Powers and Trigger don’t seem to be chasing you. You weren’t sure how much legal power they’d have (assuming they’re actually F.B.I.) but your gamble seems to have paid off. You slide into your car and throw your bag in the back before pulling out into the road. You don’t care if you have to break down their door, you’re going to talk to the Pines. They need to hear about this and you have more than a few questions you need answers to.

In the quiet of the car the agents’ words come back to you. “They’re master manipulators.” “Stanford and Stanley Pines are involved in numerous criminal activities, including the creation of a so-called ‘doomsday device.’” “You can’t trust anything they say.” You shake your head. None of that’s true... Right? It can’t be. But despite yourself you can’t help but look back on the summer and wonder if maybe the Pines are hiding something.

Stan definitely has a colorful past, you’ve heard enough of his campfire stories to guess at what he might have been doing in the eighties, but he’s not a dangerous criminal. He likes historical dramas, fishing, and creative taxidermy. He used to run a tourist trap and sails around the world during the off season. What illegal activities could he possibly get up to? (Besides some light tax fraud.)

Ford, however, is more of a mystery. He never told you much about his past but you know he’s very well educated with doctorates in multiple scientific fields. Now that you think about it, you realize that Ford never talked about a career or family besides his brother. His only interests seem to be cryptozoology, DDMD, and whatever he’s building with McGucket. But there must be more to him. You recall the many scars you saw last time you were at the shack, how sometimes you’d catch him tapping out ‘trust no one’ in Morse code, how he never seemed to sleep. 

What if Mabel and Dipper are a part of this, too? The thought is chilling but before you can pursue it you’re coming up on the shack. 

You turn off the ignition and sit for a second, gathering your thoughts. The Pines aren’t dangerous, and they’re not criminals. The agents are lying. They have to be. You step out of the car. It’s not even noon yet. The idyllic surroundings are at odds with the serious events so far. You knock on the back door, shattering the quiet. You can hear floorboards creaking but no one comes to the door. 

“Ford? Stan?” You shout. “Dipper? Mabel? It’s me!” You knock again. “I know Ford’s pissed off at me over the statue but I said I’m sorry!”

Silence.

“We really need to discuss some things! I just got talked to by some guys at the library, they said they were F.B.I.? Agent Powers and-”

The door opens. 

“Will ya pipe down?” Stan grumbles. “Come inside already.” You follow him into the living room, where he points you to the card table. He’s still in his pajamas. “Pointdexter! Stop sulking and c’mere!” He shouts down the hallway, then sits down across from you. “The kids are at the arcade with Soos.” He explains. “And sorry about my brother. He’s been a real sourpuss ever since you showed him those pictures.”

You start to apologize again but Stan holds up a hand. “You said the F.B.I. was sniffing around?”

“Yeah, Agent Powers-”

“-and Agent Trigger. I might’ve met ‘em once or twice.”

Your eyes go wide, then narrow. “So what they said is true?”

“What did they say? I’ve done a lot of things.” Stan shrugs, nonplussed. 

“They said that you-” Ford walks in, looking everywhere except the table. “That both of you were dangerous criminals who are trying to build a ‘doomsday device.’ Apparently, they’ve been watching you for a while. They told me you’ve escaped arrest before.” At this, the brothers share a significant glance. What aren’t they saying?

“Look-” Stan starts, resting his hand on the table.

“No,” you cut him off. “You don’t get to dismiss this. I’m tired of not knowing what’s going on. First it was you-” your finger points accusingly at the Ford, “-acting all weird around me. And then I find the statue and you freak out. Which, by the way? It’s considered rude to slam a door in someone’s face. And then the F.B.I. shows up at the place I’m known to frequent, asking about my ‘perspective’ on the town and offering me money to sell you out.” 

Stan jerks back, brow furrowed in suspicion. “An offer which I firmly declined.” You shake your head. “Jesus, did you really think I’d say yes to them? I don’t even know what you’re doing yet!” You throw your hands up in exasperation. “Which brings me to my next point: what the hell have you two been doing to get the F.B.I. asking around?”

Ford looks at Stan and raises his eyebrows. Stan sighs. You cross your arms over your chest and wait them out.

Stan looks somewhere over your left shoulder and finally begins, “Kid, in the interest of mending fences I’ll give it to you straight. I’ve been involved in some pretty seedy stuff over the years, enough to get the F.B.I. interested. But-”

“What kind of ‘seedy stuff’?” You ask, catching his eye. “I need to know.”

Stan heaves another sigh and rolls his shoulders back as if reluctant. “All kinds, kid. Every type of fraud or traffic violation you could name. Smuggling, heists, crime rings, fighting rings. I stole my brother’s identity and faked my own death. Did I ever tell you I’m banned in 32 states? How’s that for seedy?” Stan cracks a smile, some of his old bravado resurfacing. 

“You stole your brother’s identity?!” You turn accusingly on Ford. “And where were you during all of this?” 

He won’t meet your eyes. “Traveling.”

“‘Traveling.’” You mock. You’re starting to feel like a parrot, but what they’re saying is ridiculous. “Traveling where? Did you know he was impersonating you at the time?”

“No.” Ford glances at Stan. “But he had his reasons.”

You clench your fists. “Will both of you stop being so goddamned cryptic?!” You shout. “I don’t know what you’re hiding, but I need answers!” You take a breath. “I come here at the start of this summer to study some trees. I get kidnapped by gnomes, find out magic is real, meet the Pines. I’d say I’m handling it all pretty well for an out-of-towner. But then the literal F.B.I. tracks me down and makes you guys out to be dangerous criminals, and tells me that they need my help to protect the world from whatever it is you’re building.

“Put yourself in my shoes for a minute. Imagine how I’m feeling. Now look at how I’m reacting. I’d say I’m entitled to a bit of a freak out at this point. I don’t want to believe what the agents told me; that’s why I told them to fuck off. You’re both my friends and it’s unthinkable to me that you’re a pair of evil masterminds. But you guys aren’t answering my questions and I know you’re hiding something. Probably something big based on your reactions. So could you please just tell me so that I know what to believe?” You plead. 

The twins share a look. Abruptly, Ford stands and folds his hands behind his back. “It’s a long, convoluted story. I’m not sure what you’ll think of us once you know it,” he warns. “But it might be easier if we show you.”

“Show me what?”

—---------------------------------------------------------------

You’re led to the gift shop vending machine. Stepping in front of you, Ford inputs a code on the keypad and you watch as the vending machine hinges open to reveal a dimly-lit passageway. You gasp in surprise but don’t say anything. You follow and hear Stan pull the vending machine back into place with an echoing clang!

You descend a steep stairway at the bottom of which is an elevator. Ford opens a panel on the wall next to it and inputs another code, this one a series of alchemical symbols. The elevator doors shudder and slide slowly open. 

“After you,” Ford says. 

The ride down is short and bumpy. Neither of the twins say anything until the doors slide open once again, opening directly into a cavernous space lit only by dozens of tiny blinking lights. 

“This is the bunker.” Ford says, reaching over to turn on the lights. These ones are brighter than those in the hallway and you can clearly see panels of switches and screens lining the walls, all of them either dark or filled with static.

You sneeze. The bunker is dusty, though not from disuse. Loose papers are scattered across any available surface and forgotten projects clutter the counters. “What- Why-” you start. You’re not sure where to start. It’s definitely interesting, but you can’t see what this place has to do with anything.

Ford stalks deeper into the space, flicking switches as he goes. You nearly walk into a periscope sticking down from the ceiling as you follow. He stops at a dark window and reaches over to press a button on the wall next to it. Suddenly the window brightens, casting Ford’s shadow tall behind him.

“Behold,” he sweeps out a six-fingered hand, bitterness in his voice. “The doomsday device.” Behind a thick pane of warped glass is a large room carved into the bedrock. It’s bigger than the bunker and extends high enough that the ceiling and back wall vanish into darkness. Taking up most of the space is the destroyed husk of a giant machine. Debris litters the floor around it. There are unfamiliar sigils carved into the face of it which emit a faint glow.

You turn to Ford. “You built this?” You search his face, unsure of what you’re looking for. 

“Yes.” He admits. “But I didn’t build it to destroy the world. Not consciously, at least. It was intended to be an interdimensional portal.”

Never once taking his eyes from the derelict machine, he tells you the story behind the construction of the portal. He starts at the beginning, back when he was a fresh-faced graduate of Backupsmore University with too much grant money and not enough sense. 

“One day I discovered cave paintings detailing an ancient ritual. The Native Americans who used to populate the valley had kept it secret for good reason, but I was young and too curious for my own good.” He laughs bitterly. “I didn’t think he was dangerous at first.” You can hear the self-deprecation in Ford’s voice.

“He tricked me into building this for him. Fiddleford was my assistant at the time but he was unaware of my inspiration. During our first trial run he was pulled through. I managed to get him back, but he...” Ford pauses and puts one hand on the glass. “Never fully regained his sanity.” Ford learned of Bill Cipher’s true plans soon after. Desperate for help, he called his by-then estranged brother.

“When Stanley arrived he didn’t want to take the journal like I told him to do. We fought. We were too close to the portal. I was trying to destroy it but-”

“I pushed him in.” Stan speaks up, startling you. Between the machine and Ford, you’d forgotten he was there.

“Stanley–”

“And I didn’t see my brother again for thirty years. That’s when I stole his identity. I needed a clean record and money to rebuild the portal, but I guess it turned out alright in the end.” Stan gets up to stand next to Ford at the window and picks up where his brother left off. He tells you about Lil’ Gideon, how he tormented Mabel and Dipper and eventually allowed Bill to cross into Gravity Falls. You learn about Weirdmageddon and about how the town came together to defeat Bill, how it all came down to Stan in the end. 

Both of the brothers are nearly hoarse by the end of their explanation. Stan soon excuses himself to go back upstairs. The quiet hum of the bunker is the only sound. What do you say to that kind of story? Your first feeling is relief, and then shame for doubting them. Anger follows, both at the Pines for not telling you sooner and at yourself for not figuring it out. 

You bump Ford with your shoulder, startling him into looking at you. From this angle his face is swathed in shadows. “Thank you. For telling me.” You say haltingly, not quite sure how to proceed. “And for showing me all of this. I know it must to be a lot for you. Hell, it’s a lot for me and I’m hearing about it secondhand.” You crack a smile. You don’t get one in return, but some of the tension seems to ebb from the room. “I can’t even imagine... Thirty years in the multiverse. What was that like?” You say the last part to yourself but Ford hears you and answers.

“Terrifying.” Shoulders up, hands in his pockets, facing forward again. Old trauma. “Surrounded by an ever-changing alien landscape, constantly either running for my life or hunting down Bill. Never sure if I would live to see the next day.” His voice is quiet, a razor’s edge of bad memories. He pauses and turns back to look at you. Behind the shadow flits the ghost of a smile.

“But sometimes,” he speaks softer now, and with a trace of wistfulness. “It was beautiful.”

—---------------------------------------------------------------

Back upstairs Mabel and Dipper are back and watching T.V. with Stan, who has mercifully decided to get dressed. (It was too serious to register at the time, but after your first meeting you had hoped never to see Stan in his pyjamas ever again.) Mabel is the first to notice you walk in, Ford on your heels. 

“Hi!” She chirps.

“Hey guys, how was the arcade?” You ask, taking a seat at the card table. A glance at the screen tells you they’re watching Ducktective reruns. From your previous visits you’ve learned that Mabel, Soos, and Stan all have a passion for it and that Dipper will put up with it only because his favorite paranormal show usually airs right after. You don’t think Ford even watches television.

“It was fun! Soos got a new high score on Ghost Maze, which I didn’t even think was possible,” Mabel recounts. “Grunkle Stan told us that you know about all the stuff that happened with Bill now. Which is great, because I hate keeping secrets!”

And what a secret to keep, you think. The mention of Bill brings up another question. “So... That statue I found in the woods- that was Bill?” 

You expect Ford to answer, but it’s Dipper that speaks up. “Yes.” His tone is serious, and suddenly you understand why he reacted the way he did when you showed him the picture. Like he’d seen a ghost, because he had. “But after I saw it I talked to Grunkle Ford and he says we don’t have any reason to worry.”

“That’s right, Dipper. It’s impossible for Bill to have survived. The statue is nothing but an empty shell. But just in case, I have plans to rig up a monitoring system so that we’ll know if anything changes.” 

The issue settled, you lean back and glance at the wall clock. It’s early afternoon. That means you were only down in the bunker for a little over an hour, but it feels like so much longer.

Truth be told, you still can’t believe that Stan and Ford told you everything. They had no reason to trust you, but they still let you in. You’re glad though. Over the summer you’ve grown close to this weird family and the weird town they live in, and now that you know about Bill it feels like you’ve grown impossibly closer. 

“What about the agents?” You ask suddenly. “I mean, I know now that they’re full of-” you remember just in time that the kids are in the room, “-it, but just because I’m not helping them doesn’t mean they’ll give up.”

Ford frowns and opens his mouth, but Mabel beats him to the punch. “We’ll kick their butts! We did it last time, didn’t we?”

“We did,” he confirms. 

“All I’m saying is, it’s probably best for everybody to watch their backs,” you say. “They didn’t tell me their plans, or if they even have one. But from the way they were talking they seemed pretty desperate.” You wonder if they’ll try to grab you again. You don’t have any weapons besides a small pocket knife, and it’s not like you’re trained in self-defense.

“Perhaps you should stay here for a bit,” Ford suggests, seeing the look on your face. “Just until we know the situation better.”

You stare at him. He flushes and looks down at the table. “Not that you can’t defend yourself, I’m sure you’re quite capable-”

“Sixer,” Stan cuts in. “Give the lady a chance to speak for herself.” 

“Right. Yes. Sorry.”

Stan pauses, but you’re silent. “Now,” Stan continues, “what my idiot brother means to say is: you’re welcome to stay here until this blows over, and all things considered, we could probably use the help. If you don’t feel like it though, I’d be happy to give you the family and friends discount on any weapons you may happen to find in the gift shop.” At this, Mabel reaches between the couch cushions and helpfully brandishes a grappling gun. 

“Thanks?”

“Don’t mention it,” Stan shrugs.

On one hand, you’re itching to get back to your cabin and think everything through. The last couple of days have been a lot. On the other hand, you would definitely feel safer at the Shack, even if that would be putting you closer to the action. You’d be in good company. Plus, it’s not like staying a night (or two, or three) is out of the ordinary for you anymore. 

In the end, the choice is easy.