#other than taking months to fix something they claim is a glitch to the point where im like just delete it (bc it wont let me do it myself)

[lazyliars]

/rp

DreamXD actually slots very nicely into a working theory I've had for about two or so months now, mainly centering around one question:

What happened to Dream?

Namely, why did Dream change, when exactly did it happen, and was it solely an internal change, or was there an external force at play, specifically a preternatural one?

I think with DreamXD, we might finally have an answer.

Or at least some clues to follow. DreamXD presents a shift in every single paradigm the Dream SMP has had. Like, I think most of it is just being so utterly blind-sided by George Lore Real, but part of it is the massive ramifications of an Actual God* being present in the storyline.

((*On the other resident god of the server, Foolish:

DreamXD is different than Foolish, in that his characterization is so dramatically inhuman - Foolish talks and acts like a (somewhat eccentric) person, and his powers are, as far as we know, limited in comparison to the creative-mode godhood that DreamXD occupies. And whether that is because Foolish is not a "full" god (having been referred to as a demigod) or simply because he's spent so much time around humans, we don't know, but we do know that either way, DreamXD is NOT that.

DreamXD's voice is marked by glitches and dramatic shifts in tone, he seems to lack control over the different aspects of his personality, like the more "Dream" part vs. the darker one that threatens to eat peoples souls. The "normal" part even displays confusion when George references things that the "darker" part said, implying that it may not be fully aware of itself.

TLDR: Foolish acts more human than DreamXD, who has a very eldritch personality.))

To get right to the point:

The Dream we knew before November 16th, and the Dream we know now are not the same. Something changed, and it changed for the worse.

Consider: Dream was always antagonistic to the L'manbergians - he was always imperious to them, and he was responsible for starting a number of fights between his faction and theirs, just as many if not more than they were.

But, he was also not... evil. He'd pick fights with Tommy, the disc wars were still a thing, but the gravity of the spats they had weren't dire. They were fun. They were... actually a game. He wasn't like the way he is now. While in hindsight we can look at these events and detect a serious undertone knowing what's to come, at the time they were far from it.

There is an argument to be made that he had the same tendencies as now, just not expressed as loudly, and while I believe it's a valid argument, I disagree that it's proof of Dream always being the way he is now.

Sapnap, Badboyhalo, Sam. They all remember Dream as their friend - they remember someone who was, maybe a little aggressive and a lot competitive, but not cruel. Not needlessly murderous. Not someone who steals sentimental items and lines the walls of a disgusting museum to use against them.

Dream cut them out. Sapnap was totally blindsided. Bad doesn't seem to fully believe it. Sam blamed himself for not realizing and tried to take the weight of that crime on his own shoulders by becoming the Warden.

There's also the competing theory that what happened to Dream was purely psychological - either the circumstances slowly isolating him from his friends driving him to the do things he's done, or a desire for control that started early and continued to fester until it overshadowed everything else, or any combination of both.

And those theories are still valid, they could still be the case, but I haven't been able to shake the idea that there is something deeper at play. I can't overstate how the exile arc and everything after it have been so inhumane, so cruel, and... not exactly out of character in the sense that I could never see Dream doing them, but in the sense that I could never see him doing them for no reason.

And there really doesn't seem to be one. Dream says himself, it's like a game. He sees people as toys, puppets. And there just doesn't seem to be an inciting incident that could explain how he made the leap from semi-authoritarian leader who, despite being a warmonger, does love his friends, to heartless murderer who wants to reduce everyone he knows to dolls.

There's... ways, he could get there, but nothing that we've seen makes sense. There is a missing piece, something that must have happened from his POV that we didn't get to see because he doesn't stream.

And DreamXD could be it. This godly entity that claims that it is "a part of [Dream]" but that it isn't him entirely. That seems to share the lack of understanding of humanity that Dream has been displaying like when he asks if resurrecting Tommy was “cool.” But that still loves George. He still, despite apparently not having the same history as Dream, desperately wants to be George's friend.

If I had to pinpoint the moment Dream changed, it would be the day that he revealed that he switched sides, and was going to be fighting against Pogtopia. He was paid for this betrayal in the Revive Book.

I mark this as the turning point in my theory because it is the first time Dream mentions his affinity for chaos in the context of hurting others. However, we also know that this likely wasn't the day he actually made the decision to betray - as he revealed that there was a traitor among the Pogtopians, a fact that he likely would have learned before this.

Now, I mark George's lore stream as the introduction of DreamXD proper, and I want that on the record because it isn't technically his first appearance on the server.

Most people will remember him from Techno's stream, where he logged on to break the End Portal in a panic. I doubt the character was properly written into the lore at that time, but it fits neatly with the rest of what we know about him - a guardian of the server, and the keeper of it's rules. No contradictions.

What less people might know, is that DreamXD has made an even earlier appearance, and it's this one where things begin to get... interesting.

Around roughly October of 2020, Tubbo and Fundy did some improv'd streams centering around Demon Hunting, or rather, "Dreamon" Hunting, and it's during the first of these two streams that DreamXD makes an appearance.

The bare bones of it was - Tubbo is an experienced "Dreamon Hunter" and teaches Fundy his ways. They find Dream, and realize that he has a Dreamon inside of him, which is basically an evil version of him. They attempt to exorcise the Dreamon from Dream via various shenanigans, and eventually, they do a ceremony to free Dream. However, they apparently botch it, and unleash the Dreamon within. After more shenanigans, one attempt to fix it utilizing Fundy and Dream's wedding appears to work, but then DreamXD logs on, flys around at Tubbo and Fundy threateningly, and they end stream on the idea that there are probably more Dreamons to hunt.

Now. There's a lot to unpack here. I'm not gonna go into the nitty gritty details in this post, but I do recommend watching the Dreamon streams, as they have A LOT of details that, if this is getting incorporated into the main story line, could be important - especially the focus on duality, having TWO versions of Dream, which end up being potentially separated from each other.

(Also, they're just really funny streams. Tubbo and Fundy are at PEAK chaos and Dream plays along with their inane bit perfectly, it's just good content.)

At the time of the Dreamon streams airing, they were explicitly non-canon. IIRC Tubbo and Fundy referred to them as taking place In an “alternate universe,” which makes sense considering they would have been on opposite sides at the time (Manburg and Pogtopia.)

However.

And this is where I show you my wall of red string and newspaper clippings.

My singular piece of evidence for this comes from one line DreamXD drops. He simply says: “At least you're not hunting me.”

The Dreamon streams take place around early October. Dream reveals his betrayal of Pogtopia around November 6th-7th. The timeline of the Dreamon streams would line up perfectly with the idea that there was a catalyzing event that put Dream on the proverbial path to hell.

I do not believe that they intended the Dreamon arc to be anything other than a side story at the time, but considering that DreamXD himself was barely canon until now, I don't think it's out of the question that they took a look back at a fan-favorite minor arc, saw an opportunity to co-opt it into the current story line, and potentially fill in some holes regarding Dream's characterization all in one move.

On the question of whether this would be a GOOD storytelling move?

The Dreamon theories were prevalent during the exile arc, and I've got to say, I was never a huge fan. The detachment of Dream's actions from his intentions, and by extension his morality, never sat right with me. It feels cheap to make him a victim and say “a Dreamon did it!” in regards to all of the horrible things that he's done. It strips his agency and makes everything that happened less impactful in my opinion, and I stand by that reading.

BUT. With DreamXD introduced, I feel like it's necessary to look at this from all angles. And with the way DreamXD was characterized in George's stream, I don't think it necessarily ruins Dream's character to say that an external force was involved with his descent into evil.

Namely, the idea that whatever happened to Dream was not really a “possession” so much as a gradual loss of humanity, could be an interesting way to look at this. It implies that Dream was always capable of his actions, but grants us understanding as to why he would actually perform them, and why he might have become isolated enough from his friends that they would let this happen.

The Dream we know now could be an expression of his “worst self” brought to the surface by a Dreamon/DreamXD/other. It also begs the question of what would happen if that force were to leave him, and how it might cause yet another shift in character, especially if it were to be portrayed as less of a switch being flipped, and more of a withdrawal, with a gradual process of realizing how far gone he was.

To close this out, I've been stewing on the idea that Dream hasn't entirely been himself since the climax of the Exile Arc.

I think this theory holds water, but it's also not waterproof... there are plenty of holes, and a lot of that comes from the fact that Dream doesn't stream. We're left in the dark when deciphering his character, and what might appear to be the key, could just as easily be revealed as a red herring, or even nothing at all.

Regardless of the validity of the Dreamon theory, I think that DreamXD is one of the most interesting developments we've had on the SMP in a long time, if simply because his arrival coincides with fucking George Lore Real. God. I still don't know how to deal with that.

I always appreciate people adding to the discussion by the way! Feel free to reblog with additions if you like or leave them in the replies.

And if a single one of you comes to my blog on THIS. THE DAY OF MY DAUGHTER'S WEDDING. And calls ME a c!Dream Apologist to MY FACE..... I will be v sad.

[mobius-prime]

151. Sonic the Hedgehog #85

The Big Payback

Writer: Karl Bollers Pencils: Ron Lim Colors: Frank Gagliardo

So Eggman is quite peeved that Sonic stopped his plans to destroy Station Square via ancient water monster. However, he has a plan to get back at Sonic - and as with many of his previous plans, it involves a robotic duplicate of his archnemesis…

Sonic and the Freedom Fighters are in Station Square, which is in the midst of trying to clean up the mess left by the attack, being thanked and awarded by the mayor for saving their city. Suddenly, the ceremony is interrupted by the appearance of Silver Sonic II, which is significantly smaller in size than its original counterpart.

Sonic leads his robotic nemesis on a wild goose chase across the city to draw fire away from the innocents at the ceremony. Big snags Silver Sonic II's leg with his fishing rod, and Tails tries to attack it while it's stuck, but he gets knocked aside into Big as the mecha breaks free and continues its pursuit of its quarry. Sonic and it finally crash through a window into the ground level of a building that's been structurally compromised by the flood, something Silver Sonic II uses to its advantage.

The building falls on top of them both, and Eggman, watching from his base, cackles, knowing that Silver Sonic II is sturdy enough to survive such an impact. The Freedom Fighters desperately dig into the rubble only to find a hole in the ground beneath it, indicating that Sonic dug his way to safety through the ground. As he pops back out and continues to fight the robot, Nicole, Sally and Nate try to discern its potential weaknesses.

Damn, if Eggman somehow found an infinite power supply, why did he waste it on one measly little robot? You'd think he'd insert that into an Ultimate Annihilator Mk. II or something and get to work erasing existence. Sonic is shaken free from Silver Sonic II midair, and when Tails catches him, Silver Sonic II straight up jettisons his own foot into Tails' head as payback. Sonic becomes enraged at seeing his friend knocked out by the long-range kick, and this gives him enough strength to deal the final blow against his foe.

What indeed? Eggman certainly doesn't seem too fazed by Silver Sonic II's loss, as he installed a homing beacon in it for this very possibility, and intends to simply wait until the Freedom Fighters leave the city unattended and then waltz in to fix up his robot and get to conquerin'. However, the Freedom Fighters certainly don't seem too worried, leaving the city after saying goodbye to Big, who's heading back to the Mysterious Cat Country with Froggy in tow, and they hop in their aircraft only for it to immediately begin to careen out of control.

Sally orders Sonic and Tails to do some reconnaissance for signs of life nearby (why, I have no idea - they crashed like not even a mile from Station Square from the looks of it), and shoots Amy down when she tries to ask to go along. Nate, inspecting the damage, finds it to be the result of sabotage, and while he worries about who may have done it (the idea that it may have been, you know, Eggman, or the robot they were just fighting, doesn't seem to cross his mind), Eggman himself waltzes straight into the city like he didn't just try to murder everyone in it. Somehow he doesn't get immediately arrested on the street, and instead he finds his robot as planned - only Silver Sonic II is already repaired, and has been reprogrammed by Nate to serve as Station Square's loyal protector from now on! That's actually some damn good thinking on his part. Amusingly, Eggman races out with his former creation on his heels while shouting that "Payback is such a glitch!" which is maybe the closest this comic has come to actually swearing so far.

Home & Back

Writer: Karl Bollers Pencils/Colors: Diamond Rose Studios

The art in this issue is really bizarre, for some reason - it's credited in its entirety to "Diamond Rose Studios," without elaborating on who actually worked on what, and the art style, particularly the shading, is pretty noticeably different from the style of other artists for the comic. If anything, it comes across much more like amateur work you might find on DeviantArt rather than official art for a licensed video game comic. But hey, it's not bad art, so no real problem here. Oh, and Rotor's finally back! It's been so long since we've seen him… *checks back* twenty-four issues, in fact! We unfortunately find him now in a nasty predicament - his bathysphere is taking on water fast, and he's not having any success radioing for help. He thinks back on how his last few months have been - shortly after he left to find his family, he indeed found them safe and sound with the help of the Arctic Freedom Fighters.

This issue seems to take place just shortly after Eggman's return, because Rotor recounts how just recently his family all fell under the mind control spell again, once more trying to kill him and forcing him to run for his life in his bathysphere, which was then damaged, leaving him stranded in his current predicament. Honestly, I have to point out right now that the timeline of these early eras is aaaall over the place. Issues are constantly throwing out random amounts of time, claiming that X amount of months have passed between this event and that event, only to claim a different amount of time between similar events over here and there. I mean, I got the initial impression that Robotnik had only died a maximum of maybe five months before Eggman's arrival, and yet here Rotor is claiming it had been nearly a year? Then on top of that he apparently spent months hanging out with his family in the North Sea, easily making it over a year since Robotnik's death - and yet the timeline of StH#72 and beyond clearly indicates that mere days passed in between his leaving and Eggman's return, yet here he is, claiming to have spent months with his family unmarred by any negative circumstances. Even if you argue that maybe the mind control was a delayed effect and only started back up right around now during the Chaos fiasco, the early issues of this era seem to indicate that not more than a few weeks have passed between Eggman's arrival and the Sonic Adventure adaption - this is his first evil world domination plot since his return, after all. What I'm saying is that the amounts of time that various issues claim have passed between most of these key events just don't line up with each other at all, so you really have to take any character's claim of months or years between events with a gigantic grain of salt. I don't know why they didn't put more effort into maintaining a consistent "schedule" if you will of events, if only for consistency's sake, but then again this bothers me probably more than most, just because I have a strong need for narrative consistency in my own stories. It's just another one of those odd plot holes that we kind of have to ignore to get anywhere.

Rotor, having finished with his chronologically-impossible recounting of previous events, realizes that the water leaking into his bathysphere is coming entirely too close to a mass of live wires, and makes the decision to abandon ship, preferring to risk a long swim back to the surface.

Well, at least these friendly fellas have got his back. Hopefully we'll see more of him back with the main Freedom Fighter chapter soon, because having him head off to find his family honestly felt like an excuse to just get rid of him as a character for a while, and I resent that, because Rotor is a big chubby bro and we deserve to see more of him being a badass sweetheart.

[ladyvegeets]

Turn of Phrase

Written for @the-tesseract-wrinkling-time​ who once claimed she would read anything I wrote, including Vegeta reading from a dictionary (or something to that effect).

Her mind still turning over her work in the lab, Bulma walked down the corridor on the way to her room. It just so happened to be the same corridor past Vegeta’s room. He had been living at Capsule Corp for several months now, and still managed to be as enigmatic as ever. He hardly spoke to anyone and when he did, it wasn’t always the most pleasant of exchanges. He spent 99 percent of his time training, the rest of his time dedicated to eating and sleeping and being a general pain in the ass.

But hey, he hadn’t killed anyone yet (to her knowledge) so… Glass half full.

Consciously or not, her mind fell silent as she passed his door, her ears pricking up for any signs of life. What did mister short, dark, and criminally handsome do in his free time?

Her feet came to a stop. Was that a voice?

Was that his voice?

Was Vegeta talking to someone?

Was Vegeta entertaining someone?!

No… impossible. Vegeta only ever entertained a bad attitude. Who the hell did he know — and who knew him — that would come back to his room and at this hour of the night?

Curiosity ramped up to maximum, Bulma couldn’t help herself. She pressed her ear to the door and listened. If she was a betting girl, she’d put down her new bike that it was indeed Vegeta talking, albeit softly. Unusual in and of itself. He rarely spoke in such subdued tones. Unfortunately, she couldn’t make out what he was saying, or if anyone else was in there with him.

Well, there was no way in hell she was going to be able to sleep tonight until she got to the bottom of this.

She stood back and knocked on his door.

The talking immediately stopped. A few seconds later the door cracked open and a familiar scowl directed itself her way.

“What?”

He had barely cracked the door, the insufferable ass, but she still made a point of giving him a look-over from head to toe, taking in the casual white tank and black sweats, each stamped with a CC logo. The corner of her lip curled up. There was something oddly satisfying about seeing him branded in her family’s insignia. Like he was slowly being domesticated.

…Housebroken.

“Is there a reason you’re bothering me, or did you merely come to get an eyeful?” The sharp bite of his words reminded her of her purpose. Her eyes snapped back to his. They were narrowed, calculating, but guarded. For all his pomp and ego, he still considered her a threat. It was oddly flattering.

“Everything going alright with the gravity room?” she asked, deciding the best course of action was a more round-about approach. “You haven’t come demanding repairs or improvements in a couple of days, I was starting to worry you might be dead.”

His scowl intensified, his lip curling with disdain. “Don’t. Like anything you could make could kill me.”

She raised her chin. “Oh? Is that a challenge?”

His lips twitched, almost a smile. “It would be, if there was any challenge to be had.”

Oh, no he didn’t.

Wait, no, focus Bulma. He’s baiting you. You didn’t come here for a fight.

Choking back her pride for now — he would get his later — Bulma tried to steer the conversation back on track. “And your room?”

The ghost of his smile died, his posture tensing. “What about my room?”

“Everything agreeable? You’ve been here a while now but I don’t think I ever really checked in with you since you first started living here.”

He grimaced at her choice of words. He refused to acknowledge her house as his home. It was always your planet this, and your house that. The only time he invoked a ‘my’ was about his room or his food.

“It is tolerable,” he conceded. “Is that all?”

This wasn’t working. To hell with round-about. “Was that the tv I heard just now? Or the radio perhaps?”

“And why would I wish to inflict upon myself your Earth drivel?”

She would take that as a no. “It’s just, I thought I heard voices.”

Vegeta did the most peculiar thing. If she had blinked, she would have missed it. It lasted all of about 0.2 seconds, but in that time his mask fell away and the panic flashed across his face. Then just as quickly the glitch in the Matrix fixed itself and he was all cool-as-you-please cucumber with a hefty side of Saiyan beef.

“It was the radio,” he deadpanned.

Oh, that lying shit.

They stared at each other, both of them knowing he was busted but he refused to backdown from the lie.

Bulma cocked her hip, resting her hand there with confidence. “What station?”

“Whatever station drowns our your incessant screeching.” And with that he slammed the door shut on her face.

Bulma stared at the paneling with indignant fury before slamming her palm against it for good measure. “Fine! Keep your secrets, Vegeta, like I give a damn, but you don’t have to be a colossal dick about it! See if I give you the time of day again when you next break the gravity room!”

With a huff, she stomped back to her room and slammed the door shut behind her.

~xox~

Vegeta grimaced as he heard the the sharp bang of her door close. The woman was finally gone. Good riddance.

He scowled at his door for a moment longer, still irked by the whole confrontation. Like she had any right to be sticking her nose into his business. What did she expect, for him to throw open the door and invite her in and discuss the intricacies of what he did in his free time?

As if.

With an irritated huff, he made his way back to his desk and pulled open the draw. He dug out from hiding a small but dense book he had found in the Briefs’ library.

Little Book of Earth Idioms.

He started flipping through the pages.

Though he and the people of Earth shared a mutual language, there were still a lot of expressions the people here used — the damn woman especially —  that he was unfamiliar with. At best it was bothersome. At worst it was humiliating, leaving him adrift in a conversation with no alternative but to flounder and hope he found his way back to the point. Because like hell was he going to stop her and admit he didn’t understand everything she said. That would give her even more of an advantage over him than she already had, what with her putting him up and providing him with an occupation.

Some days he felt like he had traded one Frieza for another.

He might be another glorified pet, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to content himself with a Saibaman’s grasp of the local vernacular. Information was key to success, to power, to strength. He wasn’t about to let a few stupid turns of phrase keep him from achieving his goals: get the Legendary; beat the Androids; kill Kakarot; then… rule the universe, or something. He hadn’t quite gotten that far yet.

He reached the page he was looking for. He scrolled down the list with his index finger until he found the phrase and then carefully read it aloud. He found it helped to do so, to process the information faster especially as the Earth alphabet was still new to him.

“To ‘give the time of day’ is to respect someone enough to pay them attention. Conversely, to ‘not give someone the time of day’ is to dislike them so much as to ignore them.”

He let that sink in a moment. Then he scowled in the direction of the woman’s room and made a dismissive sound.

“See if I give you the time of day again, vulgar woman,” he grumbled under his breath before he snapped the book shut and shoved it back into hiding. He turned off his lights and got into bed, trying to push aside the woman’s threats of leaving him to his own devices — and the uneasy feeling it conjured — before he drifted off to sleep.

~xoXox~

[renegade-skywalker]

Out of the Abyss, Chapter 17

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2  / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6 / Chapter 7 / Chapter 8 / Chapter 9 / Chapter 10 / Chapter 11 / Chapter 12 / Chapter 13 / Chapter 14 / Chapter 15 / Chapter 16 / Chapter 17: A Bad Feeling

After years in exile, ex-Jedi General, Eden Valen (now going by Vale) continues to clean up after Revan and Malak’s mess of a war, only to find herself forever cursed with their unfinished business. As an ill-fated lead brings her to Tatooine, Eden finds that Revan’s mysterious plans go beyond the Republic, beyond the Outer Rim, and into the utter unknown. (A novelization of The Sith Lords and beyond)

Chapter Summary: The deep breath before the plunge... Vale attempts to interrogate the HK claiming to belong to her while Rell reports to Admiral Onasi  on the all-too quiet Harbinger as things continue to get stranger.

---

3951 BBY, Nespis VIII, Docking Bay Erebus

“I’ll do you a favor,” Mical breathed as they entered the now-dilapidated docking bay, “I won’t ask how you managed that.”

“Good,” Erebus replied, silencing the droid manning the garage and sending him up in sparks. With another wave of his hand, the loading ramp to his ship descended, and without a word, Mical rushed onto the ship and Erebus right after him.

“In there,” he directed towards the cargo bay once inside. “You’ll find a place for that thing, I’m sure.”

Erebus’ ship was outfitted for the transport of delicate goods, unsure what the Star Forge had use of for a ship like it but thankful he had found one, nonetheless. This ship had been his home for the past few years, and whether he was being chased by his Sith masters or no, he intended on keeping the thing, if he could. But first -

“Where to?” Erebus said from the controls, scrambling, knowing they hadn’t much time. “Where are you headed?”

“You’re being awfully generous,” Mical called ominously from the cargo bay, “How large of a sum do you expect when this is all over?”

“I’m not interested in money,” Erebus spat. “We need to get out of here, fast.”

A ship had blackened the sky upon their escape. Erebus first thought it was the debris from his escape plan clouding the city, but when the dust had cleared and the shadow remained, he afforded himself a glance upward to realize that Nihilus’ resurrected flagship, the Ravager , was in orbit overhead. Somehow, he knew Nihilus hadn’t been after him after what happened on Tatooine. Erebus wasn’t that important to him - only when he delivered a relic of note did Nihilus ever seem to care - but now that he had relics once belonging to Exar Kun, well, maybe now Nihilus might bother trying to find him. And seeing his ship on the same planet sure wouldn’t help.

“I need to get to my crew,” Mical said again, now entering the cockpit, looking over Erebus’ shoulder while he fussed at the navicomputer. “We need to plan a drop off.”

Erebus side-eyed Mical, almost glaring at him.

“As if we have time for that,” he muttered, “Where to? ”

Mical’s mouth opened, as if to answer, but a sharp thrum pierced the air, a shaft of light emerging from nothingness, instantly silencing them both. A flickering silver light cut through the cockpit, dividing Erebus and Mical from the viewscreen. A lightsaber.

“I’m getting tired of this,” Erebus uttered with disdain despite the genuine fear creeping over his bones as his eyes traveled the length of the silver beam to the hilt that created it, and the woman now appearing at its command beside him, close enough to feel her breath on his neck.

“Dantooine,” she said through a shuddered breath, “Plot a course for Dantooine.”

Erebus was about to retort with another witty rejoinder, as a defense mechanism if nothing else, but as the realization struck him his throat grew dry, the words suddenly stilled in his throat, stuck.

In his lapse of response, Mical sputtered to life, logging in the coordinates to Dantooine as if from memory, the navicomputer chiming pleasantly as he finalized their destination. Erebus remained fixed, watching the woman with rapt attention, realizing he knew her, realizing now just how old she’d grown and how much time had passed - her black hair now streaked with grey, her once lively amber eyes now dull, dark and angry. Even her lightsaber had changed, faded from a bright cyan to a pale silver in the din of his salvaged ship. Erebus had had one other Master before Atris, only one other instructor, briefly, before his reassignment as prospective Historian. As if any more pieces of his past needed resurrecting, as if he needed some reminder, some warning of the things to come.

“It’s good to see you again, Master Vash,” he croaked after a moment, his eyes never leaving hers.

“I wish I could say the same, Aiden.”

---

3951 BBY, The Harbinger, Outer Rim Vale

If Vale was good at anything anymore, it was repairing droids. Always had been, always would be. She was good enough that she made a living of it on Tatooine, when milking a living of any kind was near impossible. Good enough that she was often commissioned by Jedi Masters and Knights alike to fix any bugs in the protocol droids roaming the Academy grounds, wherever she happened to be studying. Good enough that Revan once asked her to repair her personal droid, as a joke, just to piss Alek off once. And now, she was repairing a droid that looked an awful lot like that one - an HK, its shining hull the same shape, its eyes set in the same half-malevolent glare - only it was a newer model, silver instead of bronze, and this one had claimed she was its Master.

Shit, don’t call me that Ede, Alek had muttered to her once he had unofficially become her instructor during the second leg of the war, indignant but somewhat amused when she had jokingly called him Master while sparring. We’re friends, right?

Friends. She almost snorted at the thought, with only the half-aware HK intelligence module to ridicule her for it. Asra had been a friend. Darek could have been one - and perhaps could still be a friend, once this was all over. So could Orex, so could Glitch. They reminded her of the people she’d served with alongside on Dxun, aside from the fact that Orex had actually been one of them . Her troops were the closest thing she’d had to a family since Aiden. Perhaps even more so. There’s something about the closeness of the end of the world and its impending immediacy that brings people together, keeps them on the same page… it had brought her and Alek together, at least that’s how she saw it, initially. Until it separated them once they’d become dangerously entwined, and utterly tore them apart.

After a few adjustments, the HK flickered to life, its eyes now aglow in the din of her appointed dormitory aboard the all-too-quiet Harbinger, suspiciously still since the salvage team returned from the frozen wreckage outside, still no news from Rell.

“Greeting: It is a pleasure to see you alive, Master, provided my receptors are not off-focus,” the disembodied head of the HK mumbled as it gurgled to life, its vocabulator no doubt still recovering from the jolt Zaalbar gave it back on Tatooine. “How may I be of assistance?”

“First thing’s first,” Vale began, placing the head on the generously spacious desk on the far side of the room. “I’m not your Master. And second, where the hell did you come from?”

“Pointed Recollection: Why, you purchased me, Master.”

Vale hung her head, already annoyed as she began pacing, thankful the HK wasn’t completely reassembled yet.

“I know that,” she replied, wracking her brain for the memory of the transaction, coming up just a bit too short for her liking, “It was two weeks ago, part of a large shipment if I’m remembering correctly.”

The HK remained silent, but it didn’t counter her claim.

She knew she was, in fact, correct. But it had been a week of busy orders, many customers looking to buy, to sell… only now a part of her realized this was all on purpose. If only she’d thought to bring her shop log along with her before the blast. She’d always made a point of keeping records, regardless of the transaction, and now with everything from the past few days weighing on her brain, her memory felt clouded, leaving her unnervingly unsure. And now she had nothing to weigh her memory against, she’d have to go on gut alone.

“I take it ownership occurred when the transaction was completed,” Vale stated, tentative, anxious to hear how the droid would phrase things. If HK models were known for anything, it was for their unique choice of words, which is why Revan had one specifically designed to kill on sight but only after cracking wise.

“Assertion: That is correct… Master .”

Vale let out a hollow laugh, unsure if the droid was being smart with her or if this one was naturally annoying. Protocols of any variety were the most challenging to crack, especially when ancient, but fascinating nonetheless. Their developed personalities could sometimes be traced to their wiring, a history of damages and repairs either written into their code or evident in the state of their plating if it hadn’t been completely replaced. But often there were missing pieces, ticks and traits that could only be explained as having been acquired over time, gleaned from experience and some sort of artificial evolution. But this HK model was new. She’d seen its innards, some of which were still strewn across her neatly-made bed on the other side of the room, and they were immaculate. Before the damage Zalbaar had done to the thing, it wasn’t likely this droid had seen action of any kind, at least nothing outside a factory…

She’d gotten lucky in the past month… more new droids than usual, which was something, since Vale had never actually seen any new droids in Anchorhead at all. A few were sold to her at the beginning of the month after a ship crashed out in the Dune Sea, likely spilling half of its contents across the sand like a bread trail to the city. Several scavengers had come in asking for more coin than they were worth, but Vale liked to think she could tell who needed the money more than the others. She still did business as routinely as usual, offering only the fairest price she could afford if she wanted to stay in business, if she wanted to eat that week, if she wanted to pay the cooling bills. But the other set of shiny new droids she recalled were sold by a young woman, a Zeltronian desperate to get off-world, willing to part with all of her belongings if it meant she could make it on the soonest shuttle. Whether she was a plant or one of the myriad of salvagers taking advantage of the crash was responsible for this planted HK, Vale was yet unsure, but she knew the answer was close somehow.

“So what kind of service can I expect from you, as your… Master?”

“Humble Explanation: As a premier-model HK-series protocol droid I am equipped to assist in a number of personal tasks, whether it be a question of translating binary sequences or nullifying any hostile targets.”

Vale only watched the disembodied HK head waiting for a reaction, though she knew she would receive none, before muttering, “Hm, thought as much.”

HK’s were clever in their ability to appear domestic when their true purpose was more akin to a personal bodyguard. But that got her thinking… did this mystery seller want her protected? Did they somehow know about the price to be placed on her head? As if they anticipated a swarm of mercs and bounty hunters to come and claim the sum?

“And as your Master,” she began, rounding on the desk again, placing both hands flat on its cool surface, leveling herself with droid’s line of vision, “I need you to tell me where you came from. Who sold you, and if not that, then who made you.”

“Unfortunate Confession: I cannot, Master. My memory begins and ends with you.”

Vale only smiled, though her expression soured.

“I doubt that,” she said, “You seemed to have a good idea of what you were doing, what was happening.”

Vale recalled those final moments in Anchorhead as painstakingly as she could, closing her eyes for only a moment and instantly placing herself there again. The HK had stirred once Asra had disappeared from the back of her shop, as the others made their first attempt at escaping ahead of her while Vale held the bounty hunters off, distracted them with the destruction of her store front, stalled only by the very HK before her.

“You knew there were people after me, after the price on my head. You knew where I kept my kriffing blaster rifle,” she could almost laugh, re-imagining the HK reach behind her to grab the gun, firing enough rounds to nullify the hostile targets that entered her shop with intention of killing or capturing her. “Explain that.”

“Impassioned Defense: Master, it is my job to keep you safe. I may have appeared deactivated, but my processor was on standby. Several interested parties visited your place of business in your absence. I merely kept tabs on them.”

“...Huh,” was all she managed. The droid was likely telling the truth, but she knew it wasn’t all of it. My memory begins and ends with you. Was that it’s way of telling her it had been programmed to follow her, somehow? To serve her? Or perhaps deliver her to someone else?

“If that’s so, then please report.”

She did her best to appear interested, neutral if anything. Protocol droids of any variety could detect some level of interest, though many failed to pick up on the nuance of human sarcasm.

“Recalled Observation: The day before your arrival, the shop was not empty, as it should have been in your absence, Master,” the droid began, as if aware that Vale was at rapt attention, “Several interested parties entered the establishment under the impression that they were not watched. A mercenary, a bounty hunter, and a man.”

“A… man?”

Vale could have questioned the HK’s suspiciously poetic rendering of a single scout from each interested party, as if there was any true distinction between a merc and a bounty hunter other than level of freelancing if anything, but doubted the droid would respond to any such suspicion.

“Affirmation: Yes, a man. Clothed in black. Facial structure similar to yours, Master. Likely from the Ploo Sector, Serroco System.”

“Interesting,” Vale countered, raising a hand to her chin in thought, “Did this man… do anything? Or take anything?”

Detailed Recollection: No, Master. Though he did… touch a great number of things. The counter, for one. The doorframe. Your tools. And the-”

“That’s enough, I get it,” she said, raising a hand to shut the HK up if it didn’t already get the hint. Vale had done as much as she’d meandered Aiden’s ship once she realized it was his, admiring his handwriting, his work, realizing that every surface smelled like him, spoke of him. Even if she could no longer feel the Force, the entire vessel thrummed with his energy, heavy with his presence even when he was not there. Perhaps her shop had felt the same to him, even if he had tried to kill her moments later, his teeth bared like a beast in thrall.

“No discernable affiliation for the… man , I take it?” she ventured, grimacing slightly as she said it, still uneasy to say his name, even if it meant nothing to the HK.

“Confident Assertion: Not that I could detect, Master.”

“But what of the others?” she countered, ready to be snarky again now that she reckoned the droid had nothing else to say about her brother, “A bounty hunter and a mercenary are easy to spot?”

The HK remained silent, its eyes’ lights blinking rapidly as if buffering, before it could respond.

“Master, I-”

“Miss Rissian?”

Vale’s head spun around to the console on the far wall by the door, the disembodied voice startling her before she realized what it was.

“Miss Rissian, if you have a moment.”

It was Captain Maris, his voice tense but urgent over the inter-ship communication console.

Vale swiftly shut the HK off, dislodging a wire at the back of its head, before sweeping across the room to the console, answering Captain Maris’ call immediately.

“Yes, Captain?”

“I didn’t mean to disturb you,” Captain Maris said as his face appeared on the screen, a wave of static rippling from top to bottom as his image rendered before settling, his pale face and fair hair set in a blue-white hue. “I just wanted to confirm that the ship will be resuming its scheduled arrival on Telos after a quick detour.” His expression soured for a moment before continuing, “We need to refuel, but we should be arriving on Citadel Station only a day later than originally expected.”

“That is… good news, Captain,” Vale responded, almost unsure of how her alias should be answering instead of herself. “Is there anything I need to-?’

“No worries,” he said, before she could finish voicing her thoughts, “You can remain in your quarters for the time being. Meals will be served as usual, if you need sustenance. The ship should be-”

The feed gave out just as the ship lurched, Vale’s senses akimbo as she regained her steadiness, “Captain? Captain, can you read me?”

A flash of memory - rain, static, interrupted calls as she commed her platoon, stationed at the temple on Dxun, their words drowned out by both the weather and something… else … something darker, something deeper than the rain-soaked mud that caked their boots and kept them from being quiet - and it was gone, just as fast as it had come. Vale blinked, and waited, hearing only static again for a moment before a voice cut through the white noise.

“- see to it, Miss Rissian. If you need anything just report to -”

The static sliced through his words again, filling the silence with even more uncertainty. As the comm went quiet, Vale could only glance out the window at the two ghost ships still hanging in the distance, stilled by time and something more mysterious, something darker.

“Sure thing,” she responded to no one, glancing at the console only to find it frozen, and back at the HK only to find it deactivated, just as she’d left it. Vale sighed, shoulders slumping, knowing she wouldn’t be sleeping for a good long while….

---

3951 BBY, The Harbinger, Outer Rim Rell

“You can confirm it? The ID? Everything?”

Rell had only ever met Admiral Onasi in person once, but even given her limited experience in the man’s presence she knew he was a man not often ruffled, unfazed by anything other than duty, driven by purpose. But now the man’s eyes were wide, almost manic, though he maintained an outer calm ever-present on his face as he questioned her now via holo. His image flickered in the space before her, a ghost in miniature on the console at her fingertips as her hands braced either side of the Harbinger’s monolithic conference table, replaying the mission in her mind over and over again, sure she had every detail down to the tee.

“I’m sure of it,” she affirmed. “The make and model, the carbon scoring you described, and then some. The layout is exactly the same, every nick and scratch accounted for interior-wise, though I can’t say the same about the hull.”

“And the navicomputer? Did you try to access it?”

Ithiris had taken the lead on that as well, searching every crevice of the starcraft, poking and prodding where she could. The ship had certainly been in recent use, despite some evidence otherwise, but the still-warm astromech proved that the ship had only been inactive for a day or two at most. The lack of life on both ships, not to mention the ... bodies … made Rell want to think these ships had been here for years, but the evidence just didn’t add up. And neither did the navicomputer. It had also been in recent use, since the only logged activity viewable was from a couple of days ago, coordinates to the exact spot where these two ships now hung in uncertain balance. But otherwise…

“Voice-locked,” Rell sighed, “Couldn’t crack that code no matter how hard I tried.”

And in fact, she had. It was part of her job description afterall…

Admiral Onasi nodded in understanding, though he looked none too happy at the news.

She shook her head, recounting her intrepid exploration of the Dynamic-class freighter, fearless until she came upon the body in the security room. It was one thing seeing the scarred body of the mangled man on the abandoned ship at first, but there was something about the lifeless body of the woman in the cloak, her face somehow unreadable though Rell could count her every feature, as if every detail was outlined as normally as any other face, but instantly forgettable - not because it was plain, but because it was… cloaked somehow, as if she were programmed to be forgotten upon trying to remember her. Rell shivered still, unsure if this detail was of any use to the Admiral, seeing as she was not the woman he was looking for.

“And the old woman,” Onasi said, as if his thoughts had touched on Rell’s, “She’s-?”

“Confirmed dead by several medics, sir. No ID on her either.”

Admiral Onasi seemed unconcerned with the woman’s identity, as if he may already have some idea of who she was, might have been, or knew of someone he could ask for further clarification. Someone far above her paygrade.

“What of the droids?”

“The…” Rell floundered, her memory malfunctioning as she processed the question. “The what?

“Droids,” he repeated, “What of the droids on board.”

Rell swallowed, resuming her usual professional calm as she laid out the ghost ship’s contents again, its layout, its every detail, as far as her recent recollection could tell her.

“Husks,” she answered after a moment, the image clearing once she got a hold of herself, “A disassembled HK unit was in the main hold, slumped up against the canteen, and a badly damaged astromech was found in the garage, still sparking enough to potentially cause a small fire.”

“Reparable?” Admiral Onasi asked so quickly, so swiftly, the inherent upturn to the question falling flat as he said the words.

“The HK unit is missing parts,but the astromech looks to be in better shape, given the circumstances. Nothing a mechanic can’t fix.”

“Good, good,” the Admiral mused, seemingly pleased as he absently stroked his beard, combing his fingers through it as if Rell were not there. She felt as if she were intruding on a private moment, wondering if the Admiral perhaps forgot this was a visual call and not purely an audible one. “Good.”

The last word he said with some finality, alluding to a potential end to this call, or perhaps a purpose. Rell wasn’t sure what her next objective was, let alone what was even going on.

“Make sure the ship and all contents are brought back to Telos, I’ll make sure my people are there to greet you and take it from there. The Exile as well.”

Rell nodded as she stood at attention, happy to hear some directive, suddenly more at ease despite how little any of this made sense to her.

“What about the other specimen, sir?” she asked, almost regretting it the moment she did.

“The specime-? Oh, you mean the body.”

“Well the bodies, plural, yes sir.”

“The bodies.”

Admiral Onasi wasn’t so much asking as he was repeating it, as if he almost didn’t believe it himself. Rell had no idea what any of this meant, let alone who the two bodies were once, but what had allowed for a once-violent standoff to end in apparent stalemate despite both vessels housing dead bodies… Not to mention that the Sith vessel was oddly empty, despite needing a fleet of a crew to operate. But from what she knew of what the Sith had been once, she ventured it may have not been too much of a stretch to assume the near-destroyed man they’d found had somehow held the ship together himself. She’d heard horror stories of what Darth Malak had done to deserters, to those that still followed Revan, even after she was defeated, even if they still followed his cause. She shuddered at the thought, hoping Admiral Onasi would continue before she had to step in again.

“We’ll take care of that as well,” he said finally, offering her a polite smile though none too pleasant, “I can take it from there. Just let us know when you expect to land.”

“Will do, Admiral,” she affirmed again, “We’re expected to in about-”

“Officer Amara,” a rap came at the door moments before it opened, Captain Maris stepping in before awaiting her response. “Admiral Onasi,” he nodded, his face grave before facing Rell again, apparently keen on having the Admiral listen in on what he was about to say, “It appears we may have a bit of a situation.”

“A situation?” Admiral Onasi asked, his holo-clone crossing its arms as he asked the question, doubt clouding his face even more clearly now.

“A few of our crew members have gone missing in the past twenty minutes,” Captain Maris announced in a hushed whisper, only loud enough for Rell to hear and the for the mic to pick up. “Either our communications have been tampered with or…”

“Or what, Captain?”

Maris turned to Admiral Onasi now, brows knit.

“I’d rather not consider it,” he said, voice hushed still, “I’m not a superstitious man, but-”

The lights cut out for a moment, Admiral Onasi’s flickering image the only light in the room as the ship seemed to sway slightly, the lights returning only to find Rell’s wide eyes on Captain Maris’ increasingly worried expression. Rell nodded slightly, as if confirming his fear, feeling the doubt she’d sensed on the freighter grow tenfold.

“I don’t like the sound of th-”

And with that, Admiral Onasi’s image disappeared entirely, the room plunged into sudden darkness, impenetrable black swallowing the windowless room whole.

“Captain-”

“Agent Am-”

Rell readied herself, hand at her holster before she truly realized what was happening, before her senses could catch up in real time as the lights slowly returned… and Captain Maris was nowhere to be found.

---

3951 BBY, The Harbinger, Outer Rim Vale

The caff had grown cold hours ago but Vale continued to sip it, suffering through its bitterness as she fought down the urge to explore the ship, to pay the mess hall a visit and maybe grab a snack… or a three course meal.

Vale was a woman of extremes when anxious. Either she could go hours without eating or down entire helpings of food without ever feeling full. The aching hunger or the temporary relief of eating continuously provided her with the same satisfied feeling that came with avoiding something, enough to push her worries to the back of her mind to instead focus on baser needs. But the caff wasn’t cutting it, at least not anymore, and if anything it was only making things worse. Captain Maris mentioned that meals would be served as usual, though she was sure the mess hall wouldn’t be devoid if snacks should she go looking for some…

She was about to sweep from the room before pausing at the mirror fixed to the wall, almost startled by the unfamiliar silhouette that met her peripheral vision. Still clad in her foreign garb, Vale suddenly felt strange, tugging at the clinging fabric as if it might strangle her if she didn’t change into something more… comfortable.

Sighing, she crossed to her bed, rummaging through what other items Mission had grabbed before sending her off on her rendezvous, though none of the team were too clear on what would happen next regardless of outfit choice. Inside her pack there was a set of sleeping clothes, it seemed, not quite suitable to wear during meetings but certainly better than what she was currently wearing. Slipping into a loose-cut mint-green shirt that exposed her midriff, adorned with gold -threaded sleeves that stopped just short of her elbows, along with a pair of deep burgundy loose pants that tapered at the ankle, she wondered why this wasn’t the original outfit of choice upon departing. Still unused to clothes that didn’t feel like a second skin, this new garb at least didn’t have a tendency to cling to her limbs in a way that reminded her of groping hands and unwelcome advances, instead giving her room to breathe.  

“Much better,” she said to no one, glancing at the disassembled HK in the corner before reaching the door… only a knock came rapping at it just before her palm hit the panel to open it.

“Miss... Rissian?”

Vale paused, startled.

“Miss Rissian, a word, please.”

The voice was garbled, quick, and Vale was already on edge, not on her usual game due to the lack of sleep and overcompensation of caff.

“Maker please,” the voice said again, though this time it sounded more like it was talking to themselves and not any perceived party, and it was with that that Vale decided to open the door.

Only to find no one there.

She paled, blood freezing in her veins.

Someone was here moments ago, and now the hall was empty, the lights uncharacteristically dimmed.

Maybe they’re refueling, Vale told herself, commanding the door to close again as she steadied her nerves. Or preparing to refuel. Saving energy until we arrive.

Glancing out the sorry excuse for a port window her room offered, Vale glanced at the grand expanse that was space, noting that it was empty. No planets, no stations, no way points in sight. They’d left the Sith vessel to hang in the middle of space for the rest of eternity while Vale noticed that the smaller cargo freighter was attached to the hull for transport, but they’d yet made hyperspace since then, drifting somewhat aimlessly until they’d made preparations for the jump… or so she’d assumed.

She needed to find Rell. Something wasn’t right.

Vale paused again, re-examining her pack and its contents, eyeing her weapons and her non-alias related clothing, considering foregoing the charade entirely. But something told her not to. At least… not yet. Something told her she’d be back here again, before all was said and done. Whatever that meant. Ever since she’d lost sight of the Force - stopped feeling it, channeling it - she’d had thoughts like these, just as sure but of unknown origin. A gut feeling, she ventured. Whatever it was, she trusted it, but something about the HK caught her eye.

“Rise and shine,” she cooed, re-enabling the intelligence module, “How do you feel about going for a little walk?”

“Surprised Statement: Master, my joints are aching for a stroll,” he garbled, eyes flickering before glowing at full capacity, “Except I cannot seem to feel my-”

“That’s because your heads not attached, dummy,” Vale quipped as she tucked a shock stick in her pocket - something these pants seemed wealthy in, to her pleasant surprise, both pant legs generous in the amount of hidden room they offered. “Now, I need to know I can trust you to follow me and follow orders. Are we clear?”

“Bemused Declaration: Master, that is my precise programming. Lead and I shall follow.”

Vale hinted a sense of sarcasm, only highlighted by the droid’s complete lack of emotion. All dorids lacked facial expression, though Vale always found the HK models to be particularly cold compared to others.

“Good, now try to stay quiet. Don’t say anything unless inquired and…” she wanted to say search for hostiles but knew better than to promise anything, lest the bastard get trigger-happy. Or maybe that was just Revan’s model… Vale tried not to dwell on it. “Don’t get yappy, alright?”

“Mild Indignation: Master, I would never.”

Yes, sarcasm, she sighed, keeping her mouth shut for her own benefit as well as the HK’s. Definitely sarcasm.

“Alright, let’s move out.”

It didn’t take her long to reattach the rest of the HK’s limbs’ together, mildly surprised that Zaalbar’s annoyed trashing hadn’t done more damage - not that she’d blame him.

Vale nodded at the HK, waiting until it slowly nodded its head in return before making for the door again, nervous as she touched her palm to the panel once more. Pressing firmly, realizing her skin was clammier than expected, the door slid open, a rush of tepid air meeting her expectant face as the hall opened up much as it had before. Oddly dark and oddly empty.

Earlier, there had been the dull ambient sounds of officers milling about, going about their duties, but now all Vale heard were the engines running, the halls quieter than they should be otherwise.

“Stay close,” Vale said, pulling a palm-sized holopad from her pocket, “But not… too close.”

The HK unit nodded and Vale loosed a breath, thankful this one was good at following directions. At least so far.

Glancing at the holopad, she tried to upload a map of the ship but found that the connection was fuzzy. Slapping the thing against the heel of her palm, the image jolted slightly before coming into focus. The light flickered, offering her a brief window to examine the layout of the floor she was on and the route to the bridge before the entire thing cut out, the light flickering and shuddering out of existence.

“Communications are more than just jammed,” she whispered, half to herself and half to the HK unit. Something or someone wasn’t just tampering with the systems on this ship but draining the power somehow, sapping it dry. “What the hell did they find on that thing?”

Goosebumps rose on her skin as she asked the question, as if giving the words open air made it seem more real, more mysterious and more… strange, a bad feeling creeping in and settling over her like a shroud, doubt and worry making itself right at home as she thought back to the objects hidden in her pack, the things they’d found on Tatooine and what had happened there...

The rest of the hall stretched on, lifeless, though lights promised some activity further down, where the hall branched out to other sections of the ship. Captain Maris hadn’t spoken with her that long ago, had he? How much had happened since then? And if this ship was anything like the ones Alek had commanded during the war, then there would be no shortage of officers going about their routine responsibilities, whether they were on active duty or not, preparing for battle or simply going through the motions, keeping the ship running…

Vale thought of a joke, something about taking up journaling once this was all over, but realized that the thinly veiled dark humor masquerading as humor at all would be lost on the droid, something better intended for Asra. She wondered what they’d all do next, if the hunt would lead them further down Revan’s rabbit hole along with her, or if they might find something more profitable, something worth pursuing, something that might allow them all to eke out a living without chasing ghosts.

Instead, she chuckled, at nothing and no one, knowing (or hoping) that the HK wouldn’t react and would allow her this small thing, this one human thing, despite the fear coiling inside her, ready to spring, ready to-

“General,” a voice cut through the dark, thick with the heat and loud with the rain from outside, “Where to?”

Eden looked ahead to only find more impenetrable darkness. Abandoning her eyes, she reached out with the Force to find the entire temple laid out before her like a starlit field, rooms illuminated like star maps, lifeforms glowing like distant planets catching the light as they continued in orbit. Behind her, her troops stilled, awaiting orders. Ahead there were beasts, creatures that had long since made these halls a home, allowed their darker energies to penetrate their simple minds and twist them… but something else lingered here. Someone… though no longer living. And something… hungry for what might be living beyond its walls.

“We go right,” Vale said in the present, the memory ringing clear as it overlayed her current consciousness like a kaleidoscope, inwardly joking again that this was something to journal about, something to remember. The memory was clear now, the temple on Dxun. Orex had been at her side, then. He may have even been the one to ask the question.

The HK remained silent at her side, playing along, quiet as promised. The hall ahead was barren as well, but there were echoes here, evidence of some not-so-distant activity. Vale glanced at the HK and nodded, as if in silent reminder that it follow along and stay silent as she took the lead again. She took a step forward.

As soon as she entered the next leg of the hall, the hair on the back of her neck prickled, her elbow grazing something solid even though she was at least a foot from the wall. Vale spun around, meeting the HK with a grimace.

“Please take a step back,” she whispered, “I said follow close by, but not right up my-”

She paused, straining her ears, her eyes, her senses, pushing them to the limit. The hair on her arms now stood up, her ear sensing something shuffling beside her, though she saw and felt nothing… but it was almost as if the space beside her sighed, as if the shadows shifted before settling, as if-

“Amused Query: Up your what, exactly, Master?”

“You know what I meant,” she hissed, turning back to the HK, annoyed, “Just… stay a step or two behind, is all.”

She didn’t like this. None of it. The hall shouldn’t have been this empty, nor this quiet, even though she swore she could sense something just on the edge of hearing, on the edge of feeling, on the edge of seeing…

It was as if she could feel the Force rippling around her, but was unable to tap into it, as if she were on the verge of channeling the Force but unable to find the right channel to tune into, forever her phantom limb.

“Confident Assertion: I can follow orders, Master,” the HK said quietly, its mechanical eyes providing little light to the dimly lit hall, “So long as you can lead the way.”

She took it as a challenge, sighing as she turned towards the hall and its closed doors again, wondering if any of them worked, wondering how she managed to inherit such a sarcastic droid at a time like this, figuring it was just her luck and she shouldn’t have been surprised in the slightest.

“Let me know if you sense anything,” she said over her shoulder as she ran her fingers over the shock stick still snug in her pocket, “Movements, voices… tell me if you pick up anything.”

“Pointed Observation: The hall is empty, Master,” it said, its voice level but sinister somehow, “However, there are movements up ahead, at the end of the hall and approaching the junction.”

Sure enough, up ahead was an intersection, a cross between four hallways converging into one. The end of the hall directly before them was completely dark, only the emergency lights outlining the dysfunctioning panel on the wall, thankfully leaving the blast door open for them to pass through.

“I’m not sure where he’s gone but since all the comms are down-” a voice said, starting off muffled but growing clearer as Vale inched onward, “I don’t know, but if we want to secure the-”

“We should just continue with the drill,” another voice cut in, urgent, “We’re still not sure what caused the- shit. ”

Two officers appeared in the junction ahead, the man on the left approaching the panel that likely controlled the entire intersection, before he noticed Vale’s silhouette further down the hall. He paused, hand on his holster, but he didn’t move beyond that, he only asked, “Identify yourself officer.”

Vale raised her hands slowly as if in friendly surrender, mustering up what she remembered of her cover story if asked anything beyond her name.

“Lan Rissian? I’m bound for Onderon, or at least Citadel Station. I was brought on board to-”

“Ah, right, the diplomat,” the other said, a Twi’lek she realized as his dark green lekku took shape, stepping out of the shadows and into the poorly lit junction beside his partner. “Are you alright?”

Vale took stock of herself, as if she weren’t already sure before being asked, though she glanced warily at the stretch of darkness that stood between her and the officers, as if she knew they were not quite alone, “I think so, yes.”

Both officers glanced at one another before eyeing the HK behind her with equally wary expressions, the shadow between both parties revealing nothing and no one, though Vale’s senses said otherwise.

“I didn’t pass this through customs,” she explained, as if being interrogated or brought to task, “He was disassembled when I brought him on board. It. Whatever,” she was nervous now, though unsure exactly as to why, “There’s a log of it, I just… felt safer going beyond my room if I wasn’t alone.”

Neither officer answered, but neither seemed to object or suspect her story. It had been true, after all…

“Have you heard from anyone at all?” the human asked, glancing at Vale now instead of the HK, though he still seemed a bit on edge because of it.

“No, not for a while anyway. Just a message from Captain Maris but that must have been an hour ago.”

He nodded, looking to his partner as they exchanged knowing glances.

“It’s not unusual for this sort of thing to happen out in the Outer Rim, as I’m sure you’re aware, Miss Rissian,” the Twi’lek said, crossing his arms and mulling it over, as if trying to convince himself just as much as he was her, “Independent systems are known to set up satellites in more remote parts of the Rim to jam systems, block communication and otherwise weave panic in passing ships, especially if they hail from the Republic. I’m sure we’ll be out of it in no time, especially since we’re nearing the waypoint now.”

The waypoint. They must have been really far out there, nearing the Unknown Regions if anything, a blackhole not far off if they were navigating this carefully.

“We’re telling everyone with a functioning door to meet in the med bay,” the human man continued, pointing a thumb over his shoulder, “All crew are required to update their vaccinations before re-entering Republic Space. Plus, with the systems malfunction we could do with the headcount. At least until we can get things up and running.”

Both soldiers sounded just as unconvinced as they looked. All she did was nod in response, taking the man’s advice about heading to the medbay, a maw of dread taking root in her stomach as she moved passed the two officers, grimacing in an attempt at ‘ thanks ’ before moving towards the only of the working doors in the junction.

The officers watched as walked on, as if waiting until she was out of view before speaking further or going about their business. She could feel the HK humming beside her, as if itching to speak.

“Just spit it out,” she said once they’d turned another corner, drawing closer to the medbay if her memory served her correctly.

“Pointed Observation: Master, I have a bad feeling about this.”

Vale could only roll her eyes and suck in a breath.

“I’m getting really tired of that phrase, y’know that?”

[crowned-ladybug]

Once Upon A Dream

Hey I’m back with my shitty titles

About three months and 10k words later here’s the fic I wrote out of that one dream I had once...kind of a self-indulgent pile of headcanons and feelings.

NOTE: I started writing this in the beggining of May and I didn’t want to keep changing it, so it ignores every piece of canon from after that. “Google gets an upgrade” is probably the first big thing I didn’t end up involving.

Please, if you don’t like this fic, or the ideas behind it, or the fact that it’s quite possibly very OOC, please just leave me alone about it. This story has become really, really important to me.

Special thanks to @lum1natrix for letting me submit the original dream to her (which ended up being ~2k words of this and the rest of me is trying to fix it), @sunkistjello for being genuinely interested in my headcanons and the story itself, and @bajszi-s-secret-life for letting me ramble on about my story ideas to her even if she probably can’t understand half of them

Word count: 9.7k words

Warnings: mentions of blood, injury and death, possible character death

Having a pocket dimension as your primary residence isn’t the worst thing in the world, really, even if it comes with a whole pack of rather...interesting roommates. It definitely has its charm, at least.

Said roommates are all interdimensional and, in certain cases demonic beings tied to living, breathing people’s life force, none quite like the other.

There’s Dark, demeanour and looks just like his name would suggest. He’s tall and wiry, his skin is pale as chalk and he’s always wearing a suit. Looking at him makes anyone feel dizzy, because he looks like a glitch dragged out from the deepest depths of an old VHS tape. He’s bossy, strict, and he denies ever having smiled in his existence. Some of the other beings are legitimately scared of him – or at least they’re really wary.

There’s Wilford, who’s the sickening mixture of cotton candy and murder compressed into a human shape. He wears a mysterious pink moustache, which gets its mysteriousness from no one knowing whether it’s dyed, fake or if it’s always just been pink since the dawn of time. He seems friendly from afar, smells like a candy store and talks weirdly. In a strange way, he could be called brave, or maybe he’s just too reckless for his own good – but either way he’s one of the only known beings to have teased Dark in the face and lived to tell the tale. He also seems to have an unhealthy obsession with trying to interview everybody and making it big on TV.

There’s Anti, the wild kid who might not be a kid, but he’s definitely wild. He’s like the lovechild of a computer glitch and a murder-happy demon, dangerous and unpredictable. Just like the person his life force is tied to, Sean, he’s loud and full of energy, trotting everywhere he goes, white noise sizzling in his path, excited at any chance to cause mayhem. He can be terrifying, but mostly he’s more of a friend to everyone else in the little pocket dimension. One day he decided he likes Dark and started following him around – and to everyone’s surprise, Dark, heartless, terrifying Dark, grew fond of him. Now the two of them are friends and definitely a force to be reckoned with.

There’s Google, who’s just like how you’d expect: punctual, emotionless and fast. His hands are always cold and he claims his heart is too, but everyone here has at least a little humanity stuck in them. He plans and does the logical thing and goes about everything the most optimal way, which sometimes only gains him glares from the group of ragtag hectic demon spawns he’s living with. For the most part he’s helpful and calm, but one time Anti tried to dump a bucket of water on him and he started swearing in every language available to his translate function – all at once.

There’s the Host, the observant one who knows more than anyone else around who has eyes to see. He’s a mystery in itself, with a bloodied blindfold he’s never seen without and a soft voice that always narrates what’s going on instead of speaking like everyone else, and so he sometimes stays silent and gestures instead of talking. He’s a pleasant company, as surprising as it is. He holds small talk, helps out where he can and sees others’ distress with sightless eyes. He sees what once was and what only will be, and somehow that has made him almost kind.

There’s Chase, who isn’t magical or mysterious or terrifying. He just wishes to have fun and for everyone to get along, and he dreams of his old life before it all crashed. He had lived thinking himself a human for long, building himself a human life because he forgot the one he had had before. Anti found him once things had gone bad and Chase was alone, and brought him back to their own little dimension. In a way, Chase is even more different than the rest of them. He just wants to play with his toy guns and look cool while doing so, and he sees friends in all the bloody-handed demons around him. Anti considers him a brother, and while Chase is grateful, he can’t help missing his other family.

There’s many others who come and go, some stay long and some only pass through, some good and some bad, some powerful and some...not so much. There’s too many of them to count.

In a strange way, they’re like a family.

The pocket dimension changes at its own will and today it’s nothing but a labyrinth of shadowy corridors with no windows, and rooms to match. There’s long desks and uncomfortable chairs in some of the rooms, but everything just looks the same. The air feels dry yet it seems foggy, for it’s grey and details get lost way before you’d expect them to. Everything is grey, just grey.

Chase doesn’t like it. It reminds him of bureaucracy, cold buildings and offices with strict people telling you to sign papers and thinking you’re nothing but a string of numbers and a handful of bills. His feet make almost no sound as he walks and he can’t tell what the floor’s made out of. He searches from room to room, hoping to stumble upon a coffee machine, but he gives up after the twentieth failed attempt.

He fixes his belt that has a loaded Nerf gun hanging from it and makes his way down the next corridor, hoping to at least run into a friend. Hell, at this point he would take Dr Iplier and his constant predictions of painful death, because wandering alone in such a creepy place is starting to make the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

He barely turns the corner when his luck comes into play and he hears a distorted cheer that changes pitch at least twice in the middle. Turning around with a genuine smile he finds Anti running towards him, glitching back a few steps every now and again. But aside from that, he’s barely messing with reality, no changes of hue or contrast surround him, and even the cut on his neck is closed up into a thin red line. He must be having an unusually great day.

Anti catches up to him and flings an arm around his shoulder, shouting as he greets his friend. Chase laughs and leans into him, grabbing the back of his shirt and cheering a half-mocking “Suh, dude!” with enthusiasm.

Anti laughs too and squeezes him around the shoulder, guiding him the opposite way. “Come on, man, I gotta show you something!”

Chase silently hopes it’s not a dead body.

They wobble down the corridor because they’re both yet to figure out how to walk properly while hanging onto each other like this. They run into corners a few times and trip on each other’s legs, but it makes their walk all that much more fun. Chase thinks about how much they must look like they’re drunk, but he doesn’t mind. Anti shoves him to the side and he shoves back and their heads knock together.

It flashes through Chase’s mind that Anti considers him a brother, and he finally decides that he likes that. He likes – loves – his glitchy, demonic, occasionally murderous brother.

“...and then he tells me, me, that he always keeps his files neat and organised!” Anti is fully immersed in the story he’s telling about his human host with much more emotion than necessary. He nudges Chase playfully as he continues. “Me, who’s slept in his computer like a dozen times at least!”

“...and is known to have eaten an equal amount of files,” Chase teases, and it earns him an exasperated groan.

“That was one time! And it was an accident!”

Chase laughs. “Alright, bro, alright.”

He would keep walking, but Anti suddenly forgets about his wounded pride and lets out a really choppy-sounding “whoop, whoop!”. Chase almost trips over his own legs when his friend grabs his arm and drags him into one of the rooms he almost passed.

“We’re here!” Anti exclaims, and as he waves his free arm around it displays the magenta of missing textures for a second. Chase is about to ask “Where?” when his eyes adjust enough that he doesn’t feel the need to.

Well, he’s still not sure where exactly they are, but it’s very much a here. The room is dark and pretty vast he assumes, as he can’t even seem to make out the walls. The only light source is a combination of multiple screens across the room, attached in a curved line and giving the impression of equipment at a spy hideout. Chase guesses there must be something displayed on the screens, but for now he can only see their unpleasantly bright light. He can make out a few silhouettes, and as his eyes adjust, enough details to recognise them as his friends and acquaintances, fellow beings he shares this pocket dimension with. Almost everyone who’s usually present is there. Chase’s heart swells – he’s found them, finally.

In front of the screens are a few chairs, and he can see Dark sitting in one of them, reading a book in the piercing light – though Chase can’t help but wonder if he even needs the light.

To his right are several more chairs and a few tables, one of which is covered in papers. Wilford is standing next to the desk, organising the papers, reading through them, making corrections with a pen that he then absent-mindedly tries to put back into his shirt pocket, failing a handful of times before succeeding. Finally he waves enthusiastically towards the other end of the room, pride shining in his eyes, and in response another being appears in Chase’s sight. Bim Trimmer, resident gameshow host who’s both somewhat human like Chase and kind of bonkers like Wilford makes his way over to the tables, and as he passes he flashes an award winning smile towards Chase and Anti as a greeting. Chase assumes him and Wilford must be discussing plans to try to make it big on TV – again.

On one of the spare chairs sits the Host. Google is standing nearby, silent and unmoving, his eyes shut, probably on energy saving mode. As the two newcomers watch, the Host reaches out to touch his arm and get his attention. Google comes to life immediately, the logo on his chest lighting up and his now open eyes flashing for a second before they focus on the blindfolded man next to him. He asks in a slightly robotic voice how he could be of help, and the Host responds in sign language.

It isn’t exactly an unusual sight. The Host isn’t the most thrilled about his constant narrating whenever he speaks, his inability to converse like anyone else. So, when he can’t take his own voice any longer, he goes silent and instead, he signs.

Google responds without hesitation, speaking because while he can sign too, the Host is still blind. The conversation continues and Chase stops staring, but he sees the grin spreading on the Host’s lips and the way his movements gain more momentum. He only recognises one sign (he’s started learning recently, but he’s only making slow progress), flat fingers against the lips, then moving outward as if blowing a kiss – thank you.

When he looks away, he sees Anti already beckoning him deeper into the room. He follows good-naturedly, curious as to what else is there to see. He thought finding the rest of the entities was the big thing to show, but apparently he was very wrong.

Anti leads him straight to the screens. As Dark notices them approaching, he stands, putting his book back on the chair he had previously occupied. Chase bites the inside of his cheek – Dark is intimidating, even if he isn’t particularly trying to be at the moment. He only relaxes when he sees that his gaze is fully fixed on Anti.

“Look, Chase!” Anti gestures at the screens. Being this close, Chase can make out what they’re displaying: a scene equally as grey as where they are, but this one is of thin streets veiled in fog, and there’s a figure walking along who looks like but a silhouette against the faded background.

As Anti’s fingers hover closer, tiny glitches start sparking to life on the screen and he withdraws his hand quickly, flashing Chase an almost apologetic smile.

“That’s Sean,” he announces without lingering. Chase would have never recognised his - their - human counterpart on his own, but he chooses to believe Anti. “We somehow managed to track him!”

Now that makes it sound like Sean is some elusive target, when in reality both Chase and Anti could easily find him in his world. But having a window to said world, solely focused on him as well, that is…impressive. Chase doesn’t know what to think.

“That’s…cool?” he shrugs meekly, but it is good enough for Anti, who turns back towards the screens and watches his host go harmlessly about his walk.

Chase allows him a few minutes of that, partly because it feels polite to do, partly because he still has to digest the situation…and partly because he feels like if he did anything slightly out of line, Dark would murder him (which would be quite impressive considering they’re both beings immortal as long as their current host is alive, so killing Chase would only be manageable by inadvertently killing Anti as well).

“So…” he starts after his thought process comes to a halt at “What do we do now?”.

Anti takes his time before answering. He grabs one of the nearby chairs, sits down, makes sure to arrange his legs comfortably and lean back before the clever gaze of his eyes finds Chase again.

“I feel like this would be the perfect opportunity to prank him a little,” he speaks with eloquence that is very unlike him. But his painted mask of seriousness crumbles just the next second, his signature grin taking over his lips. “Let’s scare the shit out of him!”

Chase swallows, hard. His eyes wander to look at Dark instead, because right now he feels like a much bigger threat. He’s leaning on the back of Anti’s chair, lazily eyeing Chase like some black cat that’s too smart for its own good. Except this cat has more than just tiny fangs to bite with and more cruelty than any feline. Chase feels like if he makes but a single wrong move, Dark will pounce and he will be nothing more than a memory.

Usually Chase feels glad that Anti has found friends amongst all these other beings, but right now he isn’t the happiest about one of those friends being a fiercely protective and sadistic demon.

He slowly looks back to Anti, who is waiting patiently for a response. Patiently. That’s quite unusual of him. Chase decides to thank their brotherly relationship for his luck.

“That’s...not a very nice thing to do,” he responds finally. He might be soft, but his heart is in the right place and he has probably the strongest sense of right and wrong out of everyone present. Right now that sense is telling him that scaring Sean, a harmless human on his way home on the foggy streets who has never done anything to hurt any of them wouldn’t be the nicest thing to do.

Dark blinks slowly, but he’s no cat and Chase knows not to take it as a sign of contentment. He’s still looking Chase up and down as if not knowing what to make of him in the current situation.

“Maybe,” Anti shrugs, and suddenly Chase gets the feeling that he might be getting some pleasure out of playing authority like this. Playing king is definitely not Anti’s style, but for now he seems to be enjoying just sitting back and watching Chase be uncertain with his words. “But it would be fun.”

“Eh, let’s just...have some fun that doesn’t hurt anybody, okay?” Chase tries with a half-hearted shrug, and he silently prays that he can somehow convince his demonic brother to lay off his idea. Even if they don’t end up giving Sean a heart attack, two guys materialising out of nowhere in the middle of a town street could possibly get some unwanted publicity with the humans. The last thing they should want is for Sean to get into trouble.

Anti is about to respond as he absently glances over to the glowing screens – and the words get lost in his throat. Instead, he’s jumping up, his chair falling back from the force and startling Dark enough to make him blend into the shadows for a moment. Chase flinches back from the sudden noise as the chair hits the ground.

Anti remains staring at the screen for another moment, his whole body tense and ready to spring, eyes turned pitch black and his fangs pulling at his lips. Chase follows his stare to the screen and his blood runs cold in his veins when he sees what got his friend so wound up.

The uneventful scene of Sean walking home in the fog has turned unsettling. Chase can no longer make out details and he can barely tell which way the street is going. There are dark figures, tall and sinister, getting closer and forming as if they’ve come to be from the fog itself. It’s impossible to tell what they are, but Chase doesn’t even think to because it doesn’t matter. They’re making their way towards Sean and they don’t seem friendly.

Before Chase could say a word or Dark could hold him down, Anti launches himself forward, right into the screens and through them. The image keeps glitching for a moment after he’s gone through, but once it clears out, Chase and Dark can see him standing beside Sean.

Anti can feel the rush of adrenaline in a way that feels almost a little too human, and he pulls strength from it on top of his already superhuman abilities. He glances to the side, giving a reassuring, friendly grin to a visibly shocked Sean. He doesn’t realise that maybe it’s not the easiest to muster “friendly” when his pupils are nothing but thin slits against red eyes and his fangs are long and sharp enough to put dragons to shame. He feels blood trickle down his neck, and knowing that his cut has opened up more with his rushing blood, he wipes at it absently.

He jumps into combat without a second thought, swinging his hand with his fingers curling into talons. For a moment he regrets not having his favourite knife on him, but it’s not like he’s helpless without it. He finishes one dark figure after the other without caring to look what they are and definitely without them even realising what’s coming for them. Why would he care, anyway? All he cares about for the moment is that these...these whatever they are had clearly had ill-intentions towards Sean, and Anti just won’t stand for that. He completely forgets the fact that just a few minutes ago he was planning to pull a possibly cruel prank on the man, because in his mind it would have been all in good fun. But these creatures, they weren’t here for fun. They were here to hurt his friend, and Anti would have to be dragged all the way to the Underworld and chained to the biggest poplar tree before he let that happen.

He only turns back towards Sean when he has torn off the last head he could see. The fog is thick and a monochrome grey again, and Anti can’t tell whether the figures had melted back into it or if it’s simply too dense to see through.

Sean still looks just as shocked as when Anti appeared beside him out of nothingness, but the tension in his eyes slowly starts to let up when he looks at him demonic friend. Anti looks really proud of himself. No, proud sounds like too plain a word to describe it. His eyes look almost human, and they sparkle with pride and some warm kind of joy Sean has never seen on him before. He wears a smile to match, a wide grin that’s soft and friendly and excited all at the same time.

No words are spoken, but Sean reads them from Anti’s face. I did it, you see? I did it, I defeated them, I protected you. I protected you! Just like a good friend, a real friend!

The fleeting thought crosses Anti’s mind that he hopes his friends on the other side are seeing this, seeing him being victorious and protecting his friend. He hopes Chase is grinning like a madman, maybe throwing his fists in the air because look at that, look at his bother – his brother! - kicking ass. He hopes Dark cracks a small smile, nods his head a little in the way that is like a whole speech of praise coming from him.

A smile spreads on Sean’s lips, and he’s about to laugh or walk up to Anti and pat him on the shoulder, maybe even hug him, thank him for what he’s done or ask what just happened, anything that’s just very nice and very human and very Sean. He never gets to do any of that.

Abruptly, Anti lurches forward, his eyes widening as his joyful expression melts into one of shock. Sean jumps forward to cross the distance between them, but there’s nothing he can do as Anti tumbles to the ground.

On the other side of the screen things seem frozen. Dark is the only one who moves, letting out a pained scream of his friend’s name that sounds almost more like the roar of a wounded beast, then he launches forward and through the screen, not entirely unlike how Anti had done so only a few minutes prior. Chase remains standing in the same spot, paralysed, feeling and looking like a terrified child.

Dark collapses to his knees next to Anti’s body. He couldn’t care less that the ground is wet and he’s probably ruining his expensive clothes. Sean hovers nearby, shocked and unsure of what to do, but Dark doesn’t spare him a single glance. His eyes are focused on the growing red stain in the middle of Anti’s chest. He presses his hand to it, clumsily trying to stop the bleeding as if he were a human and as if Anti were one as well, but the blood bubbles past his fingers and he feels helpless.

No one had heard the gunshot. No one can tell who even fired, there’s no one else around, no one they can see at least, and right now it’s not important either. For once, Dark is not hellbent on taking revenge, he’s instead clutching his friend’s body in his arms as if he could just keep him together and make him okay again if he just holds him tight enough.

He doesn’t know what snaps him out of his trance, but he suddenly stands, still clutching Anti’s limp body in his arms. He doesn’t look at him anymore, he just can’t. Poor guy’s eyes are rolled back into his head, his mouth is half open and he’s barely breathing. His hands are ashy black and Dark doesn’t want to question why, but aside from that and the cut on his neck, he looks almost human and all too vulnerable. But if Dark doesn’t look, maybe he can convince himself that Anti’s just asleep, he’s fallen asleep on him again, how annoying, right? He just fell asleep again and Dark is simply carrying him over to somewhere he can sleep without ruining his back, because Dark cares, even if he does so in secret.

He orders Sean to follow but doesn’t look his way to confirm he’s heard. He just takes a step forward, slipping through the fabric of this dimension and into another as if he was just walking through a curtain. Even he’s surprised he manages so easily when he’s so unfocused.

Dark never registers the small tug at the back of his coat as Sean grabs onto him the last second, allowing himself to be pulled along.

They arrive back in the dark room with the screens, and Sean immediately lets go of Dark. He steps to the side, looking around and still unable to shake his shock. He’s just hopped into another world, just like that.

Chase is still standing in the same spot, staring at Dark and Anti now, but no one knows if he actually sees them. He’s trembling slightly and his eyes are wide and empty, and Sean listens to his good heart when it tells him to comfort him. He walks over and wraps an arm around the poor guy’s shoulder, who almost collapses immediately. Sean bites his lip as he holds him up until Chase finds his balance again, and then they just stand there. Sean really wishes he knew what to say, how to help at least one person – being, whatever – in this room, but he just doesn’t. They’re both confused and terrified.

Wilford comes closer, casting curious glances at Anti’s limp form and waiting for an explanation with unhidden curiosity. He doesn’t seem concerned in the slightest, but then again maybe he doesn’t realise the weight of the situation yet. Google follows with a neutral expression, but his eyes are flashing wildly and Dark would know if he had the time to think about such things that he must already be searching for solutions to the current situation, trying to come up with anything that could help. The Host stays where he is and doesn’t come closer, which seems like a very Host thing to do. Sean briefly wonders if he already knows what Anti’s fate will be, or if he had already known before Anti decided to jump over into the human world. Bim is nowhere to be seen.

Dark’s eyes find Wilford’s, the only being’s who might be able to help. He might be missing a few marbles, but no one could ever deny that somehow, Wil knows a lot.

“He’s been shot,” informs Dark coldly.

Wilford nods to signal he understood and hums quietly, thinking. He doesn’t speak for long enough that Dark deems it too long, and when he tries to get closer, Dark’s immediate response is to clutch Anti closer to his chest, growling in the back of his throat.

Google doesn’t seem to see, probably too deep into searching for answers, so Sean deems himself the most competent being in the room after Dark and Wilford. It puts a bitter taste in his mouth, but his shoulders tense knowing that he might have to separate the aforementioned two before they get into a fight over Anti’s (possibly dead) body.

“Lemme see, will ya?” Wilford asks friendlily, and Dark glares daggers at him but loosens his hold on Anti nonetheless. “We shouldn’t need to worry,” he adds, staring at the wound on Anti’s chest. “He’s immortal here like the rest of us are, he’s probably gonna be fine.”

Dark’s teeth grown into fangs for a moment (no one’s seen him do that before, it’s normally Anti’s thing) as he snaps at Wilford. “Well, he’s supposed to be immortal out there too and it sure as Hell doesn’t feel like it now!”

Sean swallows hard and Chase looks at him expectantly. He has a feeling they’re both thinking the exact same thing. Anti’s only immortal as long as Sean is alive – but he’s alive, right? Fear stirs in his chest just when he’s thought there’s no way for him to be even more scared, and he’s definitely not a fan. But before he can voice his doubts, Wilford speaks again.

“Listen, my friend, Sean is doing just fine, probably more alive than ever from what I can tell,” as he says that, Sean lets out a silent sigh of relief in the background. “And as long as he’s fine, Anti should be too. Simple as that.”

Dark doesn’t respond. His eyes narrow, but instead of having a long stare-down with Wilford, he pushes past him without wasting another word. As he walks away, still clutching Anti in his arms, Wilford shouts after him.

“You can sulk all you want, Darky, but that won’t change the fact that I’m right!”

Sean doesn’t know what to think, but he’s pretty sure the pink man isn’t right. He silently grabs Chase’s sleeve (God, the guy is still shaking like a leaf) and drags him along as he follows Dark out of the room.

Once they’re outside and Sean sadly notes that the corridors are just as grey as the streets in his world are right now, he turns to Dark, not even intimidated by the fact that he’s a good head taller than him and, well, very dark looking. “What now?”

Dark takes a deep breath before responding. He looks at Anti, who’s out cold and still completely limp, but at least the red has stopped spreading on his chest and his neck wound has closed up again, too. He’s not sure if that’s a good sign.

“I don’t know,” he admits, and Sean can feel Chase sway beside him, though that could still be the effect of his panic. When Dark looks up, Sean thinks he can see helplessness in his eyes. “Do you think Mark could help?”

Mark – he’s another mere human, Dark’s human counterpart, and Wilford’s and Google’s and the Host’s and Bim’s, and Sean’s friend.

Sean lowers his gaze for a moment before answering. “I don’t think so,” he knows that’s not the answer Dark was hoping for. “No human could, I don’t think. Anti’s not human, we can’t just...bring him to a hospital,” and silently he adds, only to himself that maybe if Anti was human, he wouldn’t even be alive anymore.

“Dr. Iplier? Dr. Schneeplestein?” Chase asks hopefully, but Dark’s expression doesn’t light up like he hoped it would.

“They’re almost never around. I’m not sure if they’re even actual doctors, either. Maybe they would just do more harm than good.”

Sean wants to cut in that there’s not much worse than being shot in the back and bleeding out with no help, but he keeps his mouth shut. Even if he’s not feeling like himself at all at the moment, Dark is still a powerful demon and who knows what he’s capable of – especially in a dimension Sean is not familiar with.

So, he tries the next worst thing.

“But, he’s immortal, right? So what if-”

“Immortal means he can’t die unless you do or if severe your bond, not that he heals magically,” Dark cuts in bitterly, but without any anger. “In which case the best thing than can happen is he stays like this. In a coma, if you will,” he looks at Sean with something in his eyes that makes him seem human for a moment, and he draws his arms tighter around Anti’s frail frame. “Do you really think I’d want to do that to him?”

“No, of course not,” Sean sighs, and he can see Chase nod out of the corner of his eye. “Let’s just...figure something out. Quick.”

Dark starts walking down one of the corridors without another word, and Chase and Sean follow without a question. Chase catches up to Dark, looking at Anti the whole time with worry in his wide eyes. He wants so desperately to help. Anti is his family. But after a few steps, his shoulders shake, and he falls into step behind Dark again. Sean can’t bring himself to comment on the fresh tears running down Chase’s face.

Time feels strange and Sean can’t keep track of it well. It gives him a sliver of hope, that maybe Anti can hold on longer this way, but he isn’t sure how much he actually believes that, how much trust he is willing to put into the physics of a strange pocket dimension. He can’t tell how long they have been walking when they wind up in another room, almost as dark as the previous one.

There is a bed, a wardrobe and a few cabinets, and a single window with nothing but darkness on the other side. Sean makes a mental note to not go near it.

While Sean looks around, Dark walks over to the bed and lays Anti down carefully. Chase immediately crawls onto the mattress, sitting as close to Anti’s unmoving body as he possibly can. He lowers his head, staring at his brother and looking every bit as still as him.

“Why are we here?” Sean asks Dark after he averts his eyes from the heartwrenching scene. He’s scared for Anti, he really is, and he feels sorry for Chase, but he can’t let that take over him right now.

“We’re closer to the centre here,” Dark states as if expecting Sean to know what he means by that. He realises his mistake as he walks over to the wardrobe, so he explains. “The dimension has a centre, where its energy is more dense and powerful than towards the edges. The room where we arrived was near the edge. I’m hoping that maybe here Anti can...stay alive easier.”

“I see,” Sean says, staring at Dark’s back absently. He doesn’t question all the talk about Anti dying if he’s immortal, because no one knows enough about his kind, about these beings in general to be sure about anything. No one knows if they’re truly immortal or just very hard to kill, no one knows how fragile Anti is on his own or what it would take for the bond between him and Sean to shatter. No one wants to find out, either.

“Good. Go, be near him. He’s tied to you, maybe you being near will help,” Dark adds, digging into the wardrobe and visibly relieved that he doesn’t have to keep explaining something even he doesn’t fully understand.

Sean goes to sit down on the bed, his eyes travelling to the wound on Anti’s chest without meaning to. The room falls into silence.

...and silence is exactly what Sean doesn’t want. It allows his thoughts to gain his attention, and he doesn’t want to think right now. He barely knows what is happening or where he is, a literal interdimensional being tied to his soul (though he had come to accept that part a long time ago) is possibly dying right in front of him for protecting him from Lord knows what...When will he even get home? And how the Hell can he explain all of this to Signe? “Oh, yeah, sorry I’m late for dinner, I got dragged into another dimension trying to save Anti’s life.” Doesn’t sound likely.

He smooths his hand over the covers absent-mindedly, watching as the fabric creases under his fingers. Funny, he could have sworn it was black, but now it looks more like dark red. He doesn’t think much of it. Instead, he turns his head to stare at Dark’s back. Anything but his own thoughts, anything but dozens of unanswered questions that only lead in circles and make him anxious.

He’s thinking about how he’s glad that these beings, Dark and Anti and Chase and all the others, just look similar to their hosts and not exactly like them. He’s glad that when he looks at Dark, it’s Dark looking back at him, not Mark. Because Dark is tall, taller than Sean and definitely taller than Mark, he’s lean and his face is thin, and there’s no kindness in his eyes. And similarly, if you asked Sean he would say that Anti looks nothing like him either, because Anti’s a lot more angular and pointy looking, he’s thinner and his eyes can get so sharp their gaze could pierce skin.

“What do we do?” he asks quietly, not looking up from his hands as he bunches the sheets between his fingers.

Dark stands beside the bed, apparently having found nothing of use in the wardrobe. He watches Anti for a moment before speaking, a humourless chuckle in his voice. “You’re too human even for this strange world.”

“I don’t-” Sean’s voice drowns out when he follows Dark’s indifferent gaze down to his hand. He feels Chase’s silent stare, too. Suddenly he understands why the red sheets had seemed black at first.

“This place has been grey all day,” Chase says, his voice so fragile that Sean has trouble believing it’s actually him. “But it’s not, not around you.”

An idea strikes Sean, and without thinking he hovers his hand over Anti’s arm (his heart jumps when he sees his skin as a more lively colour and how the ashy tint of his clawed hands seems to fade), then places is on his chest. The blood under his hand is warm and wet, and he recoils immediately. Why did he do that?

As he draws his hand away, Anti lets out a tiny groan, and they all freeze in shock, watching if he’s waking up. But he goes still again just like that, like he’s never stirred in the first place.

Sean stares regretfully at his bloody hand. He doesn’t know if he’s done a good or a bad thing, and he also has no idea where to wipe all the blood off now.

“There should be towels in the wardrobe,” Dark says as if he’s reading Sean’s thoughts. He’s staring intently at Anti still, like he believes if he looked away, Anti would disappear.

There’s a whole shelf of towels, and Sean makes quick work of wiping the blood off his hand. He stares at the stained towel in disgust. That blood is the blood of a friend of his.

Before he could throw the towel away and reclaim his spot on the bed, he hears the door on the other side of the room open. From the corner of his eye he can see Dark self-consciously straighten his back, and he turns to see who the visitor is.

It’s Google. He’s wrapped up in his usual artificial glow, and the quiet ticking that imitates his breathing seems awfully loud in the silent room. He looks around with more emotion in his eyes than Sean thought an android could ever muster.

“Anything new?” Google asks. No one speaks, but he gets his answer as Dark turns away to keep staring at Anti instead, looking about as old as he must be – a couple thousand years, probably.

Eventually Sean makes his way back to the bed and sits again, and Google stands near Anti’s head. The minutes that pass seem like hours.

“Sean, you’re turning this world human around you...maybe you could turn him human, too,” Chase speaks hoarsely after a long bit of silence. “I’d rather have him be mortal than to keep him like this forever...” his voice rises near the end of his sentence, then he chokes up. He fails to notice Dark’s pointed stare.

“And risk him dying to his wound?” Dark retorts before Sean has a chance to speak, but there’s barely an edge to his voice. “Chase, even you should know better than that...”

And that’s when Chase breaks. Dark bites his tongue, eyes flashing with instant regret as if he’d just made a child cry, but it’s not his fault. Yet another thought of helplessness was just the final bit needed before Chase couldn’t hold himself together any longer.

The room goes still, and no one knows what to do, and Chase buries his face in his hands and he sobs and whimpers and shakes. He just feels so helpless. In that moment, he’s not a father of two, he’s not a demon who never unlocked his full potential, he’s not some mysterious being in a mysterious dimension. He’s just a normal guy, the most average of bros, who’s losing the only family he still has, and he cannot do anything to stop it. It’s heartbreaking.

Sean doesn’t know what to do with himself. He wants to help, so much, but there are no words of comfort in a situation like this. He can’t bring himself to lie that everything would be alright.

There’s a faint whirring coming from Google’s direction, almost drowned out by Chase’s crying. His eyes are flashing white and his body is rigid as he’s trying harder than ever to find solutions. It’s the only form of sympathy he has to offer.

Slowly, over time, Chase’s crying subsides. He keeps his hands in front of his face and his breaths come in little hiccups that make his shoulders quake, but he’s just a tiny bit calmer. Sean gives him a small smile even if he can’t see it.

In the meantime, Sean has taken to resting his hand on Anti’s arm. It doesn’t appear to have any effect at all aside from bringing back some colour, but that small detail is comforting just the tiniest bit. The black patches of skin are fully gone now, and Anti’s hands look like normal human hands again. Even his nails are trimmed nicely, and they aren’t painted black like they were the last time Sean had seen them, only a few days ago.

It’s a while before anything happens again. The door opens, and once more Dark and Sean are the only ones to react. They both watch as one person after the other files into the room.

The Host is first, looking downright dejected and guilty as if this was all his fault. He blames himself for not seeing what would happen to Anti. Next is Bim, following the Host closely, eyes red and cheeks puffy. It’s obvious that he’s been crying, and it looks like he still might. Lastly, there’s Wilford.

Sean doesn’t need to look to know that Dark isn’t happy. Wilford knows too, and he directs his words at Dark immediately after politely closing the door behind himself.

“Look, my friend,” Dark’s frown deepens a that word, but Wil doesn’t seem fazed. “I may be an a-hole, but even I don’t want him to die!”

After another moment of staring, Dark gives a small nod and turns back to the bed. He has more important issues to deal with right now than playing one-on-one turf wars with Wilford.

Wilford considers that good enough, and makes his way deeper into the room. Everyone gathers around Anti silently.

The Host, his shoulders slumped in defeat, raises his hand and signs towards Dark, Sean and Chase, moving his fist against his chest in a circle. Sorry. Then his frown deepens, and it takes him another moment before he speaks.

“The Host wishes, with all his heart, for Anti to wake up and be okay,” that’s all he can do. Wish. Hope. Because he can’t see.

Dark nods silently, and he’s grateful for those words even if he doesn’t show it. Sean mutters a tired “Me too, buddy”.

Bim finally gathers the courage to sit next to Chase, who still hasn’t recovered from his crying. He glances up curiously as he feels the mattress dip beside him, and he doesn’t pull away when Bim hugs him from the side and presses his head into his shoulder. Bim starts crying again, and soon the two of them, the most human ones out of the group, are weeping silently together. Sean doesn’t notice, but there’s tears rolling down his face, too.

Google still hasn’t moved, but he looks more and more hopeless as he just searches and searches...the internet knows nothing about saving demon lives.

Wilford places a hand on Dark’s shoulder, but he doesn’t look particularly offended when it gets shaken off immediately.

“Y’know, gotta admit,” he sighs, more quiet than he’s ever been. “I am kinda fond of this kid,” he decides he doesn’t want to risk an all-out war with Dark right now, so he doesn’t add the last thought – it’d be a shame if he didn’t make it.

Sean just can’t bear the silence anymore, the silence and those stray sentences that float away without anyone grasping them, and decides that if no one else is going to talk properly, then so be it, he will.

“He came out there to save me,” his throat feels tight, but he swallows and continues. “He saved me from...Lord knows what those things were, and he, he looked so happy in the end.”

Bim raises his head to listen properly, Chase wipes at his eyes, and Google’s whirring slowly stops as he finally gives up the search. They listen.

“He looked so happy with himself once he was done fighting. He just...looked at me and,” he smiles shakily. “he was proud of himself. He did the right thing! He helped me, he saved me...” he swallows again. “I think he really just...wanted to be a good friend, y’know?”

Chase nods along silently, and Dark lowers his head. The Host absent-mindedly signs “friend”.

“Is he...” Bim says, but he cuts himself off like he’s scared of his own voice. He takes a breath and tries again. “Is he going to stay like this forever now?”

“No.”

Everyone’s heads snap to look at Dark, and even Wilford looks genuinely surprised.

“Why?” Bim asks again, because if he’s the one who’s started this conversation, he has to be the one to carry it out. “How do you-”

“Because he’s my best friend,” Dark says, and he does so with so much certainty that no one dares pry after that.

Silence, again. Chase hiccups another sob and wipes at his face.

Then, Anti stirs.

Everyone goes still and just watches, because what if they just imagined that – or what if they didn’t, is it good or bad? Anti’s head rolls to the side and he frowns, and Sean’s fingers twitch with the need to grab him, shake him to wake him up and know if he’s okay. Chase reaches out tentatively, but the moment his hand would touch Anti’s arm Anti jerks and curls up on his side. As he tries to push himself up, his arms shake and he starts coughing, and still no one knows what to do.

Anti retches and keeps coughing, and then there’s blood splattering on the sheets. Chase panics, because that’s so much blood, too much, it’s pooling on the sheets and dripping on the floor and it terrifies him because that’s Anti’s blood. He reaches over, grabbing the back of Anti’s torn, bloody shirt, and he finally manages to pull him up to sit. The fabric rips further under his fingers and he doesn’t think he’ll ever forget the feel of dried blood against his skin.

There’s blood running down the sides of Anti’s mouth and dripping down his chin, and he coughs another one or two times after sitting up. His eyes are glassy and he doesn’t seem to recognise anyone around him.

He takes two deep breaths and shuts his eyes tight for a moment, and just for good measure, wipes the blood off his face and cleans his hand on the already ruined covers. Then he opens his eyes again quickly, too quickly, and looks down at his chest – and more importantly at his bloody shirt, black fabric soaked with dark crimson. He visibly freaks out and takes it off as fast as he can, ripping it even further. He tosses it to the other end of the bed in terror.

He has new scars. Star shaped ones, thin lines running into a single spot without leaving a dent, shiny and white. One on his back and a smaller one on his chest to match. Demons scar differently from humans, but it’s all too clear what left those.

Anti takes a few more shaky breaths, trying to calm down as if waking from a nightmare. He blinks rapidly a few times, shuts his eyes tight, then chokes a small sob. A few tears roll down his cheeks and he whimpers in the back of his throat. Then he wipes at his face again, opens his eyes. His gaze slowly focuses on Dark as he comes to his senses.

Everyone is silent and still. They don’t know what to make of the situation, what to do, what to say. Then…a chuckle. Shaky, weak, but undeniably alive.

“So...best friend, huh?” Anti’s lips draw into a small grin, not quite the usual one but getting there, because damn him if he’s not going to try and hide his pain and fear with humour.

Dark looks aside and shrugs. He doesn’t exactly know what else to do.

Anti lets out a little laugh. “I always knew you were sappy deep down, you old fart.”

He would probably say something else too, but before he knows it Dark is sitting on the bed and hugging him tight. Anti doesn’t know what to do for a moment, because Dark is not a hugging kinda guy and now he’s holding onto him like his life depends on it. Then he feels Dark gently knocking him upside the head without letting go.

“Shut up.”

Anti chuckles again, then he finally hugs Dark back as tight as he can, and he’s glad his nails aren’t sharp right now because they would be tearing holes into the perfect Armani suit. He tucks his face into Dark’s neck and smiles against his skin because Dark is his best friend.

When Dark sits back, he has an unusually soft expression on his face. Anti smiles at him, but then his eyes drift to the side and he sees Chase. Poor guy looks even more shaken than Anti, with eyes red and tears still running down his face.

Anti offers him a small smile, too. “Hey, bro.”

The next thing he knows, he’s on his back, Chase on top of him hugging the life out of him. He laughs, loud and joyful and very much alive, and he hugs his brother back. Chase is crying again, full on crying into Anti’s shoulder and his whole body shakes with it.

“I...I almost...almost lost you...” Chase stutters, and suddenly Anti feels really bad. “You idiot...No, don’t you...don’t you dare...say sorry.”

Anti stays silent and just holds onto him until he can sit up again. When he does, Anti’s sitting up as well, and he grins at Chase before taking the snapback that had somehow stayed on his head all this time. Chase lets him, and Anti looks really proud of himself with his brother’s favourite hat on his head.

It seems Anti’s only realising bit by bit how many people are present, because he looks absolutely delighted when he notices Sean sitting on the bed too. Sean smiles at him – everyone seems to be smiling now – and waves, saying a soft “hey”.

Anti wobbles over to him on his knees and pulls him into a hug, because he doesn’t care, he’s so happy and he wants to hug everyone now. Sean doesn’t object.

“Thank you for saving me back there,” Sean mutters, and Anti’s rarely heard him this serious.

“Anytime, man.”

Sean sighs and pats him on the back. “You’re my favourite dumbass demon.”

Anti pulls away laughing and he playfully punches Sean’s shoulder. He feels so happy to be alive, he thinks he’s going to burst.

Wilford seems to be resenting the fact that he’s not in focus, because he loudly claims that “this calls for a group hug”. Bim cheers loudly at that, and the Host smiles.

They all pile onto the bed, clumsy as it gets, and they all but suffocate Anti in one giant hug. For once Dark doesn’t mind physical contact, Bim fights the urge to cry again and Google smiles softly as he props his chin on the Host’s shoulder. And Anti’s in the middle, smile huge enough to reveal his fangs, just radiating joy. Things were scary, he’s pretty sure he almost died, but now everything feels better than ever. He’s just so happy.

After a while they all pull apart, but most of them remain sitting on the bed. Anti’s in the middle, grin wide and his hat knocked to the side. Dark comes back from the wardrobe with a towel in his hands and wraps it around Anti’s shoulders to make up for his ruined shirt for now before he sits down behind him. Anti thanks him and pulls the towel tight around his shoulders.

“So...what happened?” Anti asks. No one responds. “The last thing I remember is that I was fighting to protect Sean from those things, but after that it’s just...nothing.”

Everyone remains silent. The wounds are still fresh, thinking, let alone talking about the hours when they thought they would lose Anti would just hurt too much. Bim suddenly finds his cuffs very interesting. Chase shifts a little bit closer to Anti.

The other reason no one is speaking up is because they actually have no idea.

Google starts whirring, and everyone watches as it gets louder and louder until he slaps himself on the forehead. Anti and Sean are very amused by that ending.

“We’re all idiots,” Google says, and Dark is already opening his mouth because he’s not willing to accept that as fact. Google doesn’t pay him any mind and continues. “We already know that Anti gains his power from attention, and more importantly love, right? I think because we were all here, worrying about him, not wanting to lose him, loving him...that was enough to bring him back from the brink of death.”

A stunned silence settles between them. It makes so much sense. Anti sniffles a little, but everyone pretends not to notice, and Chase pulls him into a hug again to comfort them both.

Dark is the first one to speak. “Now, regardless of that,” he semi-seriously scolds Anti. “don’t you dare pull a stunt like that ever again.”

Anti agrees to try.

“The Host wishes to say that he could not be happier with the outcome,” the Host smiles, and Bim nods along enthusiastically.

“I think we can all agree on that, my friend,” adds Wilford. He earns a rare smile from Dark, but no one dares mention it.

They talk about nothings for a while, because no one wants to mention today’s events but being in each other’s company is comforting. At some point Chase gets his hat back and they get rid of the ruined covers to make sure no one sits in blood. Sean doesn’t mention it, but he notices the whole room seems to be gaining colour.

“Guys, I’m sorry, but...I think I should probably get going,” Sean says after a while. It earns him some disapproving whines. “I don’t know how late it is in my world, but if it really is late, I don’t want Signe to worry. Plus I do want to tell her about what happened to day, and man, I’m exhausted.”

No one really argues aside from Anti’s tentative “five more minutes?”. Sean only laughs and hugs him and Chase goodbye.

“I’ll escort you back,” Dark offers. Anti immediately bounces to get up, but Dark shoots him a glare. “You stay here and don’t get yourself into any more deadly situations.”

“But I’m-”

“Don’t say that you’re fine, I won’t believe you anyway,” and while Dark looks really strict saying that, there’s genuine worry in his eyes. That alone convinces Anti to stay put.

Sean bids goodbye to everyone and jokingly tells them to be good and stay out of trouble before he takes ahold of Dark’s arm and the two of them disappear into thin air.

It’s evening in the human world, and the sun is just setting. They appear near where Anti got shot and leave the scene as quickly as possible. Neither of them want to remember right now.

Dark walks Sean all the way to his house. It’s a bit of a walk and, naturally, Sean won’t stay silent during it.

“Best friend, huh?” he teases, but he’s genuinely curious.

“I might be a bitter old demon,” Dark says without looking his way. “but even I have a heart too.”

“...and Anti stole it?” there’s a small smile forming on his lips. He can’t help it.

“Yeah,” Dark chuckles in a way that makes Sean think “fond”. “that glitchy rascal. Plus,” he shrugs. “that Chase kid needs his brother.”

Sean finishes quietly like he’s able to read Dark’s thoughts. “...and we all need our friend.”

Dark nods. They agree on that.

Sean is long used to having these beings in his life – so is Signe, so is Mark, so are some of Mark’s friends. They came out of nowhere, no one really understands how or why, they’re strange, sometimes scary or funny or cunning or very, very human. Sean is glad he decided to make friends with them. After all, they had just waltzed into his life, first Anti, then all the rest of them, and he could do nothing about it other than make the best of it. He’s happy he did. They’re a strange gang of curiosities, an ever growing family of demons and entities, and damn would he miss them if one day they just up and disappeared. He really hopes that day will never come.

Street lights flicker on as they walk and Dark regards them with mild interest. He looks almost human in the evening light – or maybe it’s just his peaceful mood making him appear so, Sean isn’t exactly sure.

They arrive at Sean’s house in comfortable silence. He walks up to the door and Dark waits a few steps away before he turns back to say goodbye.

“Well,” Sean smiles lightly. “It was nice seeing you again, Dark.”

Dark nods his head with respect, and it’s clear that he’s bidding farewell to a friend. He disappears into thin air the moment Sean closes the door behind himself.

“You too, Sean.”

[fromthedeskofelizabeththird]

So this is the Bullshit

I don’t believe in call out posts. I think they’re unnecessary and usually create a tidal wave of drama over a misunderstanding or an issue that might have been resolved with a simple click of ‘unfollow’ or block’.

This is one of those instances where it is necessary. Where the actions of one person are genuinely harmful and quite likely malicious and it’s actually impossible to know the extent of everything they have done.

Before I proceed, I want to make it clear that I do not condone sending this person hateful asks-or, indeed, any- asks about their behaviour. If you wish to unfollow or block them-or not- then that is your business. But I did not make this post to encourage spiteful behaviour.

I want to thank everyone who contributed to this post, whether it was sending me data, good vibes, proofing or just cheering up my cranky butt at varying points between now and April. Without further ado:-

This is a callout post for user Vallanoble, for actions spanning back to February of this year.

Before I start, I need to point out a couple of things, this is a long ass story. It might take at least one session to get through all of the receipts, of which there are many.

Also: tumblr took a shit on the formatting and none of the links work now. Everything is ugly but I have a back up I’ll post when whatever weird glitch this is fixes itself.

SEVERE TRIGGER WARNINGS FOR THIS POST

Secondly, for much of April, before this story crossed over to tumblr, Vallan went by a nickname that was an amalgamation their general location on my statcounter and the fact they had sent weird anons as opposed to their actual name. Now that the story is being publicly connected to a singular individual, I’ve edited out all references to physical locations from my data and switched out the actual place in the document with the word ‘dipshit’. Yes, this took hours. Yes. I had a LOT of help. This is in the interest of protecting user privacy, however and not dishonesty.

First things first, Dipshit anon is an overly passionate Zen fan. They don’t interact much, so tbh I never really noticed them ?? But for sure they were following me around the time of this post 

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/155205738770/1-am-i-the-only-person-who-feels-like-zen-is

(which seems to be the first they reblogged from me) and I recall they had been for quite some time at the time of this one

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/156327734615/i-love-how-you-always-take-survivors-opinions-into

which they later alluded to in a post of their own.

It’s important to actually note several things happening at this point:-

Random overly enthusiastic Zen anon exhibit A // http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/156228295970/you-know-theres-something-that-annoys-me-like

Not so rando enthusiastic Zen anon // http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/156308585305/i-have-a-question-how-did-you-interpret-zens-bad

Zen anon the third // http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/156206700610/what-are-your-thoughts-on-the-conflict-between-zen

Zen’s creepy childhood brought up with the beginnings of resentment towards a Jumin post made only shortly before

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/156210280495/honestly-im-so-glad-youre-talking-about-how

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/155500851985/what-do-you-think-to-the-thoery-that-jumin-is-a

Tbh I’m a bit annoyed that tumblr removed their historical notes from posts so I can’t actually reference stuff properly >:[, but January was a very busy month in terms of Zen anons (a pretty recent thing, so I don’t think Dipshit had been following me for THAT long??) asking me about stuff while I posted Jumin fics and other Jumin meta, all while Dipshit anon liked the posts all of thirty seconds after I answered them, which basically led me to the conclusion they’d probably been the one asking in the first place.

In January, they talked to me about fanfiction

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/156305150630/vallanoble-replied-to-your-post-wait-why-dont

This is important. At the very least please take note of the tone

In January, they were also posting this, complaining about Jumin blogs shitting on their favourite character.

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/156356257463/something-ive-noticed-is-that-almost-all-the

(I took screens in case of deletion)

This post is fine on its own, but crucial context for what came later.

By this point, I had them tagged on Statcounter, though I didn’t know about these posts until February, when this debacle happened

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157102446080/i-looked-everywhere-my-desk-my-files-the

Tl;dr, in a conversation about how Jumin fans felt uncomfortable about a particular phone call, an anon came out of the blue to change the thread of conversation to Zen. Why is that familiar?!?

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157093746030/just-read-through-all-the-debating-about-jumin-and

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157097601850/the-breadcrumbs-call-is-outgoing-not-incoming

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157098711835/im-honestly-not-trying-to-be-so-salty-but-im

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157097035190/seven-does-make-passing-guilt-trippy-comments-in

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157112807900/to-clarify-it-was-annoying-that-the-discussion

Take note of this post and this one

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157112807900/to-clarify-it-was-annoying-that-the-discussion

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/157097417010/i-just-meant-during-the-conversation-about-sevens

Same day, take note of this

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/157117392193/lj-writes-shippers-my-ship-is-totally-not

(screenshot), 

plus this post from a short while earlier 

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/155827891443/what-really-irked-me-more-so-than-just-the-fact

(screenshot 1) 

(screenshot 2)

Same behaviours as before. Both resenting discussion of Jumin where relevant and blaming me personally for gross fandom behaviours I was not guilty of. I had statcounter data too (no longer unfortunately, as I have the free version), but anyway, I blocked the user and went on my merry way.

Note:- In case it is not clear, I was able to work out the identity of Dipshit and block them based on their historical activity, previous asks they had passed onto me (which in turn led to their tag on stats), stat counter data at the time of the debacle (data I don’t have anymore, but they remained tagged in April) and a cross reference of posts on their own blog.

Side note:- Here is Dipshit admitting to sending the anons (paragraph 4)

And again, (paragraph 2)

And again (paragraph 2)

And again

A n d   a g a i n

In any case. Check out these posts from March 

http://themystic-messenger.tumblr.com/post/158096675544/vallanoble-replied-to-your-post-me-i-dont

(screenshot)

, [x] 

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/158933352583/the-amount-of-hate-and-aggression-towards-people

 (screenshot)

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/158973582463/yall-rant-and-rave-about-how-rika-abused-v-and

 [x]

 (screenshot) 

and this one from April

http://themystic-messenger.tumblr.com/post/159234167469/i-rly-love-all-ur-posts-bc-i-agree-with-your

(screenshot here)

Once again, crucial context for what comes later.

Prior to JuminV week, I received this ask

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/159180924940/zenxv-and-zenxjumin

This question came off the back of this ask to Jun, which was liked by Dipshit anon.

https://xeraeus.tumblr.com/post/159177453126/what-i-was-asking-a-question

There is currently no evidence to tie the ask itself to Dipshit however, in light of what happened later, I am including that detail nonetheless.

On the first day of JuminV, this was posted

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159427686298/sees-zen-x-jumin-content-stop-that

 (screenshot here)

followed succinctly by this ask

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/159426686395/am-i-the-only-one-annoyed-about-the-popularity-of

I made the connection to Dipshit Anon after replying. Juminzen week, as far as we know, was not in the works until after JuminV week had already started. Therefore, it’s unlikely that first message is connected to it and it was sent for a different reason.

Note:- Here is Dipshit directly admitting to sending the JuminV ask Part one, part two

In any case, since I didn’t want to start ship drama, I dismissed them?? I blocked them by IP around this point.

After I responded two more responses came, citing a disability when reading and claiming to ship JuminV over Juminzen tl;dr because it was not fetishisation. I deleted both of these messages and blocked by ip. I would not have deleted them if I had already made the later connection.

I posted to twitter at this point, joking that it was the first day of JuminV and already I’d blocked the entirety of the University of Dipshit by IP.

I posted again a short while later after checking statcounter and making the connection.

Dipshit anon’s name or URL was not mentioned. The fact that they actually studied at the university was assumed, though not confirmed nor referenced by myself the tweets were later deleted and this is to the best of my recollection

Things went quiet, but then the mod of JuminZen week started liking my tweets about Dipshit anon (which in turn made me suspicious, as we did not know one another and did not talk until May). Strange asks started arriving to other bloggers in regards to JuminZen. My statcounter traffic started to spike with visits from the university of Dipshit.

In this period I made jokes about “Dipshit anon”, based on the fact that I had blocked them by ip more than once and they persisted in viewing my blog, leaving me to redirect their individual ip addresses to rick rolls, crash safari and more. In private I also complained about them, because their actions were making me uncomfortable.

They posted this on the 14th, which later made me suspicious

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159572324383/if-someone-makes-a-jumin-x-zen-week-i-will-boycott

(screenshot here)

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159700504123/wow-im-feeling-like-shit-i-want-to-die

This is what they posted on the 17th 

(screenshot here)

This is definitely about me, considering everything I’ve covered so far and this paragraph

were the same person who talked about listening to survivors expressing discomfort yet you shut me down just for not liking your fave. even when i phrased things nicely and came just to discuss things you immediately responded aggressively and accused me of trying to start drama. well im sorry that i saw you discussing similar topics and thought i could come and express my feelings to you but obviously you only care about specific instances of homophobia or problematic things that occur in the fandom if they have to do with bashing ur gross fave, jumin the ultimate misogynist han

The thing I didn’t understand was why it was framed as if friends were laughing, but

#dragzenweek

#dragzenweek was established as a joke (and regardless of opinions on the matter, it was not actually tagged with Zen’s name), but Alyx reported receiving genuinely hateful comments from fans of Zen and people who hated Jumin over it. One of them was Dipshit anon, which I pointed out at the time on twitter. Alyx posted a screenshot of a post from their notifs with Dipshit Anon’s URL blanked out and I was able to identify it. I personally feel from the manner the screenshot was edited, it would not be possible to identify the user without prior knowledge. (Please don’t take my word for this, however. Here is a screenshot)

I was in contact with other friends about Dipshit anon’s behaviour and the possibility they were connected to other current dramas (at that point, I was the only person to receive an anon in regards to JuminZen who knew where it came from) both in private and otherwise. I was concerned, but did not want to spread malicious, unwarranted gossip.

It’s important to reiterate that in any given public conversation about Dipshit Anon, they were only ever referenced as such and not as any individual tumblr user. Dipshit-originally- referred to the general location of their Ip and Anon referred to the fact they had sent an anonymous message.

I spoke to Alyx about this at the time expressing concerns that Dipshit anon thought I was perhaps connected, or at the very least somehow involved with dragzen week.

On the 19th/20th April, I made a private document, detailing everything I currently knew, with links, screenshots etc (the first draft of this document). I did not want to keep repeating the story and if I was actually going to suspect this person of behaving badly, I needed proof. This document could not be liked, reblogged etc and and was only circulated privately among friends who had been in conversation about Dipshit thus far. It was a presentation of the facts as I knew them and intended to inform, leaving everyone to come to their own judgement on the matter.

Remember that at this point, beyond sending asks to Alyx and their priors with me, we did not know for sure Dipshit was connected to other dramas and without statcounter data, there was no way to actually prove it.

On the 19th of April, Alyx posted this screenshot to twitter. 

At the time we joked about how this remark was actually unfair of both characters, as while it’s certainly true that Jumin can be quite mean to Zen, Zen is hardly kind to Jumin either. Neither the screenshot nor the subsequent thread were tagged JuminZen or Juzen. You would have had to have gone directly onto Alyx’s page to find it.

This coincides with the following twitter based traffic to my tumblr page.

Worth noting is that Alyx’s twitter is listed on their tumblr page, where they also received hateful messages about the week on the 20th of April,

 which once again coincides with twitter based traffic from Dipshit Anon. 

Considering Dipshit Anon complained on the 17th about me and my friends and then Alyx received a complaint about their hateful friends, I do not think it’s too much of a stretch to suggest a connection.

Also around the same point, off the back of sentiments from other people that someone was trying to perhaps stir bad feeling betweeen Juminzen and JuminV shippers, I commented that I knew of two potential problems in this regard, one of which was Dipshit anon who I knew for certain had sent me an ask that would have caused drama. I mentioned victim complex, by the way, as a comparison to the Juzen shippers sending asks badgering artists. I was rather suspicious that no matter how shady their behaviour, ultimately Dipshit anon would convince themselves they were doing the right thing and anyone who told them otherwise was being a bully or a homophobe, having seen such behaviour before- both from them and other fandom dramas.

Also worth noting is that my tweet was on my own personal twitter page, which is not listed anywhere and was written J*zen. It was not retweeted and no one commented on it. It would have been impossible to find without either going directly onto my page or searching Dipshit Anon.

Around the 20th, Vess confirms traffic from Dipshit anon coming through from Val’s blog. Vess continues to receive traffic from them over the next few days. This comes after a tweet expressing the belief that Dipshit anon is, in fact, more than one person. In response, I note that the messages I received (of which there were three) came from Dipshit anon, which I know for certain. I do not confirm or deny anyone else’s, however.

That same day, Gillian also questions if Dipshit Anon is making the rounds. However, I personally do not comment on that thread.

On the 21st of April, Dipshit anon posted hate directly to the Jumin Han tag because “they wanted Jumin stans to see it”

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159807410203/i-just-wanted-to-let-you-know-that-im-in-the-same

Screenshot is here

Note:- this gained a negative reaction on twitter as it broke established etiquette.

They later received an anon asking to stop sending messages.

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159834049063/look-im-not-here-to-convince-you-that-jumin-has

Screenshot is here

Note: I don’t know who sent this message. Up until this point, I had complained about them for stalking my blog, sending an ask that would have created a shit ton of drama and expressed my own concerns that they might have been doing the same to other people. None of us had mentioned sending asks about Jumin outside of that one post on the 19th, which related to askZen. This was not officially connected to Dipshit Anon at the time.

They later express righteous anger at the idea of “popular” Jumin and V stans blaming them for drama

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159834850458/apparently-someone-is-going-around-sending-angry

Screenshot is here

Note:- a quick search made it quite apparent that no ‘popular’ Jumin or V stans had referenced this blogger recently. However, this post comes shortly after dipshit anon was referenced as victim complex 101 on twitter (as dipshit anon). The connection was not made until later.

Dipshit anon claims to have been harassed, without mentioning names. 

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159836552898/leave-me-alone-i-honestly-dont-know-what-the

Could be true, considering the Jumin post, though is not tied to that and no asks are published. Feels victimized for content they post on their own blog. Also claims not to have sent anons and only have lurked in the Zen tag, which is, frankly, untrue.

Note the phrasing:  honestly how narcissistic do u have to be to think that one person who you had a disagreement with once is going around over 2 months later harassing every person who like jumin??? like???  <- this is about me

Link to Post - https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159836552898/leave-me-alone-i-honestly-dont-know-what-the

Screenshot

Note:- This message also comes off the back of me saying on twitter (not 100% seriously)  that I’m almost tempted to do a call out. Also note that this mostly came from the fact that they accused us of stalking and bullying on tumblr based on out of context comments from twitter.

Dipshit anon claims that people are spreading misinformation. 

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159838725443/honestly-i-dont-like-people-who-blame-things-on

At this point the only information being passed around is a private document containing links to legit sources that cannot be reblogged to avoid this exact thing. References being mocked, which … this blogger has not been referenced on tumblr. Has only been mocked for their efforts as Dipshit anon. Based on things they have actually done.

Screenshot is here

Dipshit anon refuses to give receipts on behaviour and references not wanting to start drama even though they spoke about boycotting an event only recently and tagged their hate that same day.

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159839414888/im-reading-ur-posts-abt-these-blogs-accusing-u-of

Screenshot is here

Dipshit anon tells another person that they have only made posts on their own blog irt Jumin, which is not true. They also say that their behaviour comes as a result of wanting their experiences as an abuse survivor to be considered. (Deleted! Screenshot available) Remember, they are not the only survivor here and they know this enough to try and use it in a vaguepost

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/156210280495/honestly-im-so-glad-youre-talking-about-how

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159700504123/wow-im-feeling-like-shit-i-want-to-die

Screenshot is here

this private post was only referenced on twitter. In replies to conversations, not all of which mentioned Dipshit anon. Usernames were not mentioned. It was not posted on tumblr. Enough said. It was at this point that everyone started to suspect they were actually watching people’s twitters.

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159839641293/whos-saying-its-you-whos-sending-the

Screenshot here

Demands information from the people supposedly sending them hate Deleted, I took a Screenshot

Posts this by way of a receipt (does not link actual users) Deleted, but I took a Screenshot

Note: You cannot just stumble across tweets !!! Also, the topic of conversation WAS Jumin. Dipshit got defensive after I refused to change the topic.

I would also speculate that this ask Alyx received on the 21st came from Dipshit anon, given these factors:

The timeline -  having asked Alyx and knowing that ask arrived somewhere between 5am and 3pm cst on the 21st of April, which places it on the busiest period of Dipshit anon’s posts that day. Between the Jumin hate and many other of their corresponding posts

the knowledge that Dipshit anon was watching our twitters

the data that proves they were watching both Vess’ blog and mine for certain

They arrived at Vess’ blog via referral from Val’s. With this in mind and the facts above, it’s not unlikely that during this period they actually lurked everyone’s blogs.

This ask arrived during a very difficult climate when Dipshit felt particularly angry and in their own words, was stressed and emotional.

Not only that, but they themselves were on the receipt of criticism for posting hate in tags on the 21st.

I did a search of their blog for mentions of Yoosung and Unknown and they have explicitly stated a dislike for the Yooran ship  (screenshot)

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159453918143/mysticmessengerspambot-gah-im-tired-of

This is speculation, but considering the evidence, I believe it is fair.

On the 22nd April, Dipshit Anon sends a message to Alyx (part2)(part 3)

They send a message to Serena shortly afterwards

Here is how the conversation goes:

S:  “I’m a bit confused about what it is you want me to tell you, honestly. I never thought that we were engaged in drama nor were we fighting, considering I’ve never spoken to you before.”

DA:  “No, I didn’t think so either. But apparently you and some others had a post listing things I’ve done and I was really confused?? There was accusations of me sending people who liked Jumin mean asks which I didn’t do? I just wanted to clear everything up and figure out where that was coming from.”

S:  “I don’t recall anyone saying that people were sending Jumin fans mean asks. Can you be more specific?”

DA: “Um, wasn’t that the entire point of what was going on though? There were tweets saying that I was sending harassment to people who like Jumin?Someone sent me a message telling me to stop sending asks to people who like Jumin which I didn’t do? And it seemed like it was from one of you guys. I could be wrong, though.”

S:  “Well, I didn’t send that message, and to my knowledge none of my friends have sent you anything.”

DA: “That was the bulk of my frustration. I saw some tweets assuming that I was sending anon asks to random people about Jumin which I didn’t do, and I was overwhelmed and upset at being told I was doing something that I didn’t.”

DA:  “Okay. Then what was all the hype about saying that I was harassing Jumin fans? And that there was a private post that apparently had a bunch of evidence that I did a bunch of things? I honestly was super confused on what everyone thought I did and that’s why I was upset.”

S: “Do you want to link me to a specific tweet claiming that you’re harassing Jumin fans, because I still do not recall anyone saying that.”

S:  Honestly, it’s really not my responsibility to entertain you, but I’m a bit tired of this and I have exams to study for so I’m going to anyway. First of all, my friends and I aren’t a hive mind. I don’t know what it is they’re saying about you at all times, and just because they say something it doesn’t mean that I personally agree with it.

Second of all, I was referencing this ask that you sent to Louise when I referred to sending asks trying to start shit:http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/159426686395/ … I’m not interested in debating whether or not that was actually your intention; it doesn’t really matter to me because that’s the effect it would’ve had when it landed in Louise’s inbox had she chosen to reply to you seriously. And I know that you were the one who sent that ask, because of this post that you made subsequently, so don’t bother:https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/159700504123/wow-im-feeling-like-shit-i-want-to-die … For some reason, you chose to pretend that her response was some sort of personal vendetta against you for disliking Jumin, even though her response has nothing to do with Jumin’s character at all and simply stated that she doesn’t want to partake in an argument that’ll cause friction with JuminZen fans. And then you did a whole lot of misconstruing by saying that she’s belittling you for your justified anger or not taking your experience as a survivor seriously, which is a very serious and untrue accusation to be making of a person who is also a survivor. Hence, my annoyance with you.

Thirdly, I posted my incredulity at the fact we’re the same age, because of your assertion that adults in the fandom are bullying you despite being an adult yourself, and despite the fact you aren’t being bullied. Getting blocked isn’t being bullied, it’s being ignored by someone who has no requirement to engage with you anyway. Fourth, it annoys me that you said you haven’t sent any asks about Jumin since months ago, when you just sent that JuminZen ask like two weeks ago, because that’s lying. This entire time you’ve remained anonymous in our discussions. We’ve literally been calling you “Dipshit anon”, and your url hasn’t been publicly revealed anywhere. None of this information is available to anyone except in our group of friends, since the post containing these and other links is private, and we’ve only been sending it through private messages to people we are friends with. The fact you decided to listen in on a conversation about things you really did and claim that having that conversation is bullying is your problem, not ours. Have a good night.

Screenshot of Dipshit Anon loading my blog one hour before I am referenced in this conversation

Before Dipshit Anon’s response, I learn that Vergil received a strange JuminZen ask and receive clarification that, while he did receive traffic from Dipshit (the location), the one in his askbox was Italian. Around this point we discuss potentially eliminating Dipshit from this particular inquiry, but also to keep an eye on them in case of future problems. I too received traffic from Italy recently.

Dipshit begins deleting posts off their blog around this point. (The final two on the list)

Vess confirms traffic from Dipshit anon

Dipshit Anon’s response 1,

  2

, 3

, 4

, 5

, 6

, 7

, 8

, 9

, 10

, 11

, 12

, 13

, 14

, 15

, 16

Some notes:-

In regards to point 8, this person is blocked from my blog for reasons I have already explored and it is manipulative, to say the least, to complain about my reaction to them when they had no business being in my inbox in the first place.

The phrasing of point 8 actually is very manipulative in general “oh well, she doesn’t care”. My emotional labor is not for their profit, nor consumption.

Speaking of manipulative, consider the point about age. Dipshit anon repeatedly refers to themselves as a child when they are nineteen, repeatedly complains about adult bloggers and grownups being condescending and in points 8 and 9 complains about an inherently present power dynamic that I should be aware of when speaking to younger bloggers, all while sending asks on anon. I cannot feasibly guess the age of anonymous asks.

I don’t actually remember saying anything about Zen and Seven fans on my twitter or tumblr. I also cannot find anything on my twitter about this. So. Um. Receipt?  

I believe that point 11 is true to an extent. I believe they probably found DragZen on the 17th and, from there, found Alyx’s tumblr. I also believe that from there they found Alyx’s twitter, which would give us something of a timeline so far. It certainly brings us to their angry post on the 17th, in any case.

It’s true that I identified them as Dipshit anon, but only after concluding that their URL was blanked out satisfactorily and only because Dipshit anon was the name I had been using from the beginning to identify the person that sent me a questionable ask and continue to load my blog afterwards.

The next part in 15 is just. Where do I begin? Even Dipshit is not sure whose anons I identified as theirs. As a matter of fact, I only identified Alyx’s. When Vess got statcounter, we compared data in the interest of accuracy (as I later did with Vergil), but none of this happened on my public twitter.

When Dipshit refers to Gillian receiving asks, I believe they are talking about this, which I did not confirm

Point 15/16 makes me really uncomfortable, for reasons I will come to at the end.

Here is them viewing my blog around about this time

S:  Okay, re: everything else now.

1. All right, if you didn’t consider that ask as being about Jumin then I’m fine with setting aside the idea that you lied about it. It was personally frustrating to me because I really don’t care what asks you sent about Jumin months ago, I was annoyed by the response to Louise’s way of handling the JuminZen asks from a couple of weeks ago. It’s pretty clear by now that you probably didn’t even have that JuminZen ask in mind the entire time all of this was happening, but that’s what I was thinking of in terms of everything else I posted. I have my thoughts on how the situation could’ve been handled differently by both you and me, but at this point I don’t think it matters anymore and in the interest of resolving things let’s call it a misunderstanding and move on. I already said I don’t really want to debate whether or not that ask would actually have started drama so I’m not going to.

2. I wasn’t aware of the timing of your post was after the DragZenWeek incident and not after the ask you sent Louise, but upon re-reading it makes a lot more sense in that context and I’m sorry for making assumptions. To ease your worries, Louise wasn’t stalking your blog. She has an app called StatCounter that allows her to see where people are accessing her blog from—that’s how she put together who it was that had sent her other messages prior to the JuminZen ask, and that’s how she was able to block your IP address. By the way, she also knows you’ve been bypassing her IP block to visit her blog these last few days.

I can understand why you were stressed, honestly. I disagree with the way you do a lot of things, but I’ll readily admit that I personally made a lot of assumptions that I didn’t have a real basis for making, and I’m sorry. I stand by my statement that no one claimed you were going around and harassing Jumin fans with asks, though.

To explain my own point of view, most of what was annoying *me* was that you were conflating responses to you with disliking you for liking Jumin. I can’t speak for anyone else, obviously, but I personally could not care less if you hate Jumin. Speaking for myself here, I’ve said multiple times that although Jumin is my favourite character, I’m completely sympathetic with the reasons people would have for hating him, and I’ve also said that I would never engage in a debate over him with someone who says Jumin reminds them of past abuse because that isn’t my place to speak. Most if not all of my friends have said the same or similar, and honestly, I don’t want friends that don’t have that attitude and when I dislike someone I make it pretty damn easy to tell. But you were accusing Louise of that, which I think is especially insensitive because Louise is also a survivor, and now you’re saying that you meant for all of that to apply to Alyx too—not that you need to know this, but Alyx heavily criticizes Jumin’s route for the exact reasons that you probably would. Again, it’s a very serious thing to accuse people of being abuse apologists, especially when you don’t know the situation.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m sincerely sorry that you were hurt by my words yesterday, especially because some of the claims I was making were unfounded. Gossip is something I generally try to avoid, and I think this entire situation was a good reminder as to why I do that. I still don’t think this falls under the definition of bullying, but I do empathize with your perspective and I’m sorry for my involvement.

I’ll go back and delete any posts about this that were made by me. Here are my recommendations for you:

1. I don’t know if you have the extension XKit, but it allows you to blacklist certain words so that posts containing them don’t show up when you’re browsing tumblr, and it allows you to block posts that you dislike/don’t want to see. It’s a good tool to help you stay safe while navigating the site, and I think you should probably put Jumin’s name into it since you’ve mentioned that you find him severely upsetting.

2. Use the “anti” tags when you want to discuss character hate/critique, or don’t tag at all. It’s totally within your rights to critique a character, and using the anti tag means that anyone who chooses to interact with your post is consenting to do so knowing what they’ll be getting into. When you tag a post, you’re basically giving people permission to engage if they want to, so if you want to have a critical discussion about a character with like-minded people or people who disagree but are interested in having a discussion, that’s your way to do it. If you only want to discuss with like-minded individuals, you can throw on an “#I’m not interested in debating this” tag so people who disagree know to stay away. There’s a reason none of the DragZenWeek posts were tagged with Zen’s name and this is that reason.

3. This goes for both of us, but if you’re seeing something happening out of context, don’t assume that you know what the context is. You didn’t know what it was I was talking about when I discussed asks you sent, I didn’t know what you were talking about when you made that post (and I also assumed it was you sending the other asks, double bad on me). I don’t think I’ve anything more to say on this subject. If you do, feel free. Thank you for taking the time to contact me in spite of your social anxiety—I understand that that was hard to do and I appreciate it.

Dipshit Anon:

Thank you for your reply. I appreciate you clearing things up. I usually tag my posts with anti-Jumin, but at that time I was still emotional and defensive about things I previously mentioned, so I thought that tagging it would send a one time message to people that like Jumin to not harass survivors that feel uncomfortable with him about it. That’s all I wanted. It was a bad move on my part and I’ve gone and fixed it and I’m sorry.

I forgot to clarify these things - I didn’t think Alyx was being insensitive towards me being an abuse survivor - I made an error when constructing that sentence and it made it seem like I was including them in that statement. I just was upset because I was under the impression that they thought I was pathetic and attention seeking for my deleted post on DragZenWeek.

I can’t remember what exactly happened that made me say that thing about Louise being insensitive to abuse survivors and not liking me because I didn’t like Jumin, but that wasn’t about the JuminZen ask I sent or the previous one for February. It was something to do with her statement about me being attention seeking and seeing some responses to other people’s asks who criticized Jumin or something. I honestly can’t remember, and looking back at the post I don’t know why I said that, and I’m sorry.

I feel like a lot of this was due to misunderstandings by me and a little on the others sides and I reacted defensively and angrily to situations when I didn’t know the entire story. That just led to more statements and miscommunication on both sides and it spiraled out of control. Nevertheless, I apologize wholeheartedly and I appreciate you giving me a polite and courteous reply. I’ve been dealing with some tough stuff in real life for the past few months, including a traumatic brain injury, that’s clouded my judgement and made me more volatile and sensitive to criticism or what I misunderstand as negativity directed at me. I know that doesn’t excuse anything, but I just wanted to clarify that I’m not usually like this, and I usually keep to myself. I’m digressing, but I sincerely do apologize. I appreciate your clarification and will definitely do the the things you recommended. If you could, it would be very much appreciated if you could pass along my apology sentiments to everyone else that was involved. You don’t have to, and I’m not expecting them to forgive or unblock me or anything, I just want them to know that I am sorry and I’m usually a reasonable and nice person when not under extenuating circumstances.

Thank you again and I wish you the best.

Also - clarification about why I didn’t have Jumin’s name blacklisted - I’m on mobile Tumblr a lot, because it’s just easier for me to use because of a lot of convoluted reasons related to my learning disabilities and mental illnesses. But I do have them blacklisted on my computer, and when I’m on mobile if I see a particularly terrible hate post about Zen or a post that is praising Jumin but uses examples of Zen and why he comes up short in comparison, I’ll block that person. I usually don’t really care and avoid that stuff, but I have encountered several blogs in particular (none of which belong to you or any of your friends) that express extreme animosity towards people who say Jumin makes them uncomfortable or reminds them of past abuse. That’s kind of where that ask response was coming from. I just wanted people not to bug others who don’t like him. But it was done in the wrong way and I’m sorry. Also, I was only checking Louise’s blog because I was paranoid that she was going to post things about me and I wouldn’t be able to see them. I’m not going to do that anymore and I’m sorry.

And those blogs I mentioned that attack abuse survivors make numerous posts saying stuff like “if you say jumin made you uncomfortable I don’t like you” or “people who are triggered by jumin are the worst” and etc. Again, it wasn’t you or any of your friends, but some of those people who do that were really insensitive. I’m sorry for tagging the post though and getting y'all dragged into it.

Notes:-

There is a difference between EXPLAINING your actions where relevant and EXCUSING them. And excusing them is very much what’s happening here, given this phrasing:  I’m usually a reasonable and nice person when not under extenuating circumstances.

Disability or stress or emotion is not an extenuating circumstance for accusations of abuse apologism and stalking, nor is it an extenuating circumstance for repeatedly insisting on engaging in conversation with someone who has blocked you. It’s not an extenuating circumstance for flat out lying in some cases and manipulating the facts in others. It’s not an extenuating circumstance for listening on a conversation you aren’t included in and choosing to accuse the people having the conversation of bullying instead of asking for context.

Secondly, Dipshit’s comment here:  I forgot to clarify these things - I didn’t think Alyx was being insensitive towards me being an abuse survivor - I made an error when constructing that sentence and it made it seem like I was including them in that statement. I just was upset because I was under the impression that they thought I was pathetic and attention seeking for my deleted post on DragZenWeek.

Given the timeline we have so far, their post on the 17th, Alyx’s asks around that period and the traffic on my blog, I think it’s more accurate to suggest that they WERE including them and are backtracking.

Also in regards to this:  I can’t remember what exactly happened that made me say that thing about Louise being insensitive to abuse survivors and not liking me because I didn’t like Jumin, but that wasn’t about the JuminZen ask I sent or the previous one for February. It was something to do with her statement about me being attention seeking and seeing some responses to other people’s asks who criticized Jumin or something. I honestly can’t remember, and looking back at the post I don’t know why I said that, and I’m sorry.

Once again, given our timeline, the fact that if I called them attention seeking at all it wasn’t until after the 19th in replies to other people and Alyx and I chatted about Jumin on twitter on the 19th, I feel it’s fair to conclude that this could be a legitimate memory blank, but it’s more likely to be backtracking.

It’s also very clearly backtracking irt:  but that wasn’t about the JuminZen ask I sent or the previous one for February, when both are explicitly referenced in the post itself.

I usually don’t really care and avoid that stuff, but I have encountered several blogs in particular (none of which belong to you or any of your friends) that express extreme animosity towards people who say Jumin makes them uncomfortable or reminds them of past abuse.

This is the second (?) time they’ve angrily drawn other people into a conversation about unrelated topics and they have made posts about boycotting events, they tagged their hate only recently etc. I think it is fair to conclude from all evidence so far that they do care and they don’t avoid that stuff.

I’m on mobile Tumblr a lot, because it’s just easier for me to use because of a lot of convoluted reasons related to my learning disabilities and mental illnesses

I went back to count and Dipshit anon mentions their illnesses, injuries and more on seven separate occasions and always in the context of gaining pity, thereby shifting the power dynamics of the conversation.

Dipshit Anon remains blocked as of April 2017

As of 22nd of April 2017, they continue to load pages of my blog, despite their own statement that they would not:

Also, I was only checking Louise’s blog because I was paranoid that she was going to post things about me and I wouldn’t be able to see them. I’m not going to do that anymore and I’m sorry.

Also worth noting is that this traffic came through a t.co reference, which is the shortened url format from twitter.

In response to this, I made my tweets private again and removed the link to my blog from my twitter bio.

As of May 8th 2017,  they continue to load pages of my blog.

I believe this occurred because of a reblog of this post.

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/160437244740/your-recent-reblog-made-me-realise-how-mistreated

As of the 10th of May, I receive traffic on a singular VxMC-centric fic from Dipshit (the location). This traffic recurs over several days right up until the 14th.

I do not usually receive traffic from Dipshit the location with this amount of frequency. I also knew that Dipshit the person had been browsing my blog. This put them on my radar.

On May 15th 2017, I learned of this ask on Void’s blog 

http://vo-dcc.tumblr.com/post/160686201606/i-saw-you-were-one-of-the-artists-for-the-zen

(screenshot).

At the time, I had my suspicions that Dipshit might be involved and a brief check on their posts that day reveals that Dipshit did intend to submit to the fanzine.

 (Link)

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/160685696123/zen-fanzine-project

At approximately 9am that morning, I receive traffic from them on statcounter.

The interesting thing about this is that at first I was not entirely sure why this traffic happened. I do not reference anything about this incident on my blog until approximately midday, when I reblog Void’s answer to a second ask. 

http://vo-dcc.tumblr.com/post/160688531186/the-creator-of-the-zen-fanzine-did-clarify-that

(Screenshot) (Here is the time stamp of when I actually reblogged it)

From 8.30am onwards, Void and I were talking privately about the situation, at which point (a little before this conversation) 

Void referenced typing out a long post, which likely became the one they later posted. (Having chatted to Void, they later confirmed that it was in fact, already posted by the time of that screen.) This creates something of a potential timeline of Dipshit seeing the post shortly after it was posted and following through to my blog shortly afterwards. (Note: I believe I was not the only one to receive this treatment, but I’ll get to that later)

In any case. I asked Void to check if they were blocked by Dipshit and it later transpired that they were. 

I encouraged Void to get Statcounter, we compared notes and here is a full compilation of all traffic 

  from  

Dipshit received within the first day of installation. (Pls note that the date is different because of time zones. I live in Britain and for me these times are in the evening of the 15th. US people would be even further back in the day)

Here is a screen of Dipshit later admitting to sending both asks covered so far to Void

Note that I said I was not the only person whose blog potentially received attention from Dipshit as a result of Void’s posts. I believe that Dipshit actually went through the blogs of several people who either commented or expressed support for Void over the course of those few hours spanning from when they first received an ask to the 9am response.

This would not only fall in line with current evidence at hand, but also their actions in April.

Exhibit a

, exhibit b

, and exhibit c

(link)

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/160688548033/lmao-i-just-found-out-that-this-gross-person-who

 (I’m coming back to this one later)

Also take note of this reblog by user setthestarsxonfire.

https://setthestarsxnfire.tumblr.com/post/160686536882/i-saw-you-were-one-of-the-artists-for-the-zen

 (Screenshot)

They made a post a short time afterwards, further going into their feelings on the matter

 (link)

https://setthestarsxnfire.tumblr.com/post/160687270552/please-guys-dont-go-hating-on-another-person

Afterwards, they received three asks (ask a,

  ask b

and c

) (link to a,

https://setthestarsxnfire.tumblr.com/post/160689487552/juzen-is-an-abusive-ship-its-unhealthy-and

  link to b

https://setthestarsxnfire.tumblr.com/post/160690376012/oh-my-gooooodddd-did-you-just-say-that-zen-needs

, link to c

https://setthestarsxnfire.tumblr.com/post/160691061357/i-only-replied-to-part-of-your-response-because)

When reviewing statcounter data, it’s clear that Dipshit reviews the #notes of posts and flits from one blog to another.

While this was happening, I was in conversation with user mariamagica, having seen them comment on Void’s post that they knew who was sending the anons. Considering that this was the same person who had liked my tweet about Dipshit Anon way back in April, I was curious to know what they knew and if we had any shared experiences.

It transpired that Dipshit was so well known to them and had caused them so much bother that they were able to reference them by name within a matter of seconds. They sent me this screenshot sent to the askbox of the Juminzen week blog.

Mariamagica had them blocked, but I encouraged them to get statcounter and here is their Dipshit traffic from the 15th.

A short time after this, Vess and Jun confirm that Dipshit followed them that same day.

Dipshit continues to lurk my blog.

Having gone over the events of the day, I made a post at 18:46 my time. This is a soft warning and a pre-emptive call out. Up until this point I had not said anything about Dipshit anon publicly on my tumblr, but I was running increasingly low on patience. I blocked them in February and kept the details to myself at the time, but they continued. In April, we resolved it peacefully but they continued. At this point they were on strike three.

In my post, I listed three examples of asks from Dipshit. 

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/160701054230/attn-mysme-fandom

These were all examples I could confidently attribute to Dipshit and as it gained so many reblogs, I gained 

  a

    lot of traffic  

  from Dipshit 

in that period.

This traffic extends to my personal blog

I received an ask 

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/160703102265/hi-im-not-looking-to-start-drama-and-am-here-on

(screenshot, including timestamp of receipt)

-Dipshit on my blog in that exact same time frame? Check

-Not my ask but trying to pull the high ground with me about it anyway? Check

-“Please consider the abuse victims!!1″ To a survivor? Check.

-Sending a really questionable anon in general? Check.

After my response saying that if I received any more messages I would reply with their URL, Serena got a message from Dipshit, complaining that I should apologise to their friend 

for blaming them for things Dipshit had done.

This earns the biggest of sighs and rolliest of eyes from me and there are hundreds of things I could say about it, such as the sheer unlikeliness of a random mysme blogger I have never heard of before (and incidentally never blocked) showing up to send me an ask with the precise same objections as Dipshit while Dipshit is on my blog, all while having no involvement with what Dipshit is doing. Even Dipshit acknowledged they were friends and went so far as to link their Zen centric blog.

They later post the following screens to their blog, which confirm that they sent these 

asks to Stars and encouraged another person to send more: 1

,2

,3

,4

Also. This is what a receipt for blocking looks like.

However, if a chat is what’s going these days, here’s a chat

between the mods of JuminZen week 

discussing whether or not to block 

Dipshit, drafting a response and discovering they were already blocked, 

as forwarded to me by mariamagica <3

I’m especially interested by the use of the word “demonise”. Demonise only makes sense in terms of me addressing Dipshit and publishing their URL, neither of which have anything to do with their friend…who up until that message was anonymous in this conversation.

User setthestarxonfire also receives two

https://setthestarsxnfire.tumblr.com/post/160705202992/hi-there-i-just-wanted-to-check-aside-from-any

https://setthestarsxnfire.tumblr.com/post/160706326042/thanks-for-your-kind-response-and-for-being-so

asks about this in much the same vein with identical phrasing. (screenshot one) (screenshot two)

You may recall I referenced user capitolscum. That is the personal of mmscum, who I was also in touch with at this time. Through the reblogs of my Attn:-Mysme fandom post, I became aware that they too had received strange anons.

As it happened, Scum had received three anonymous asks. One

, Two

and Three

(Links: One, Two and Three)

https://mmscum.tumblr.com/post/160542799049/you-should-read-jealous-wolf-by

https://mmscum.tumblr.com/post/160544142294/i-meant-what-isnt-his-its-a-little-odd-to-say

https://mmscum.tumblr.com/post/160556930029/anonhave-you-read-either-of-those-fics-if-you

This prompted the following essay:- 1,

2,

3,

4,

5,

6,

7,

8,

9,

10,

11,

12

Which corresponded with this review on AO3 (Please zoom)

This coincides with this ask 

and this response from Scum (part one and two)

It also prompted this chat (part one)(part two)

I’m including this chat for the sole reason that this is how Dipshit described it post call out

It’s unclear what exact fic Dipshit is referring to, though Scum believes the comment they’re referring to is this one, on a fic exploring Zen’s recovery as a survivor of a traumatic incident prior to the first chapter.

There’s also this post 

https://mmscum.tumblr.com/post/160144676634/i-love-my-followers-but-this-is-the-first-time

addressing negativity in fandom (screenshot here),

 to which Dipshit anon responded twice (one, two) 

(links)

http://mmscum.tumblr.com/tagged/vallanoble

I’m including this for the sheer ridiculousness of the fact that it happened two weeks ago and shows them discouraging their own behaviour.

Scum, post callout, received this review on the same fic

Considering both the linguistical patterns and the complaints both matched Dipshit, we did a bit of investigating and if this is a coincidence it’s a very unfortunate one.  

And now we arrive at the 16th of May.

Void gets notifications from Dipshit

and their reaction 

speaks for itself.

Remember this?

Void is 17. Younger than Dipshit and a minor.

I have 

multiple visits 

from 

Dipshit that day (Is it worth me even saying it at this point? Whatever)

Here is Mariamagica’s traffic for that day (All of the ones from the university are Dipshit)

17th of May, today!

Dipshit 

is active 

on my blog and Void’s 

(The one blacked out the most.)

Scum passes on their statcounter data to me and Dipshit is not only a visitor 

but recently went through the notes of this post

http://mmscum.tumblr.com/post/160736788924/mmscum-mmscum-i-love-my-followers-but-this-is

which somewhat ironically was partially inspired by their actions.

Considering this fact and the fact that they visit my blog in the wake of this reblog

http://fromthedeskofelizabeththird.tumblr.com/post/160765050395/fandom-commandments

(statcounter)

their subsequent blog post becomes slightly more interesting.

(Screenshot one)

 (Screenshot two)

 (link to post)

https://vallanoble.tumblr.com/post/160777864913/if-your-let-people-ship-what-they-want-uwu

It’s past midnight now and I’m about to go to bed. I have only one thing to say on this matter, however.

The adage that the internet is not your safe space is not a suggestion that it should not be safe. It means that the internet is not the safe place of any individual person. It belongs to all of us and there is going to be opinions, ships, characters etc you do not like personally. But it is NO ONE’s job to keep you safe but your own. It’s nobody else’s responsibility to write characters as you see them. It’s no one else’s job to keep the content you don’t like off your radar or create the content that you do. There’s no justification for treating real people badly over fictional things.

A few other notes post call out:-

Dipshit remains blocked. Here is a screenshot of a message they sent to me the day after I posted the call out (part one)

(part two)

from a new blog designed to collect receipts (this is not hyperbole: screen shot one

and two

). This blog has since been deleted.  

I am not a shipper of Juzen and so bad behaviour within the community is not something I would know of immediately or in much depth, however:

Dipshit considers an anti Juzen week to educate the homophobic women who ship it.

This is an interesting one, as it coincides with the appearance of the blog juzenisgross, which specifically posted excerpts from Why does he do that (a book about abusive relationships and domestic violence) in the juzen tags on the first day of juzen week.

This is a loose thread on its own. However. This is the time stamp of the first post on the blog.

This is Dipshit on my blog.

Once again, possibly coincidence, but incredibly unfortunate if so.

Here is Dipshit continuing to send lengthy messages to content creators 1,

2,

3,

4,

5,

6,

7 

along with her refusal to blacklist tags

[shouldering-space]

Listen, I’m just getting my theory on so I’m going to list all the junk I noticed in the bio inc video today...

I can’t put it together very well yet, so just some little things I noticed that could mean something, but maybe not.

 Anti claims to have been running the channel this entire time so we can infer that before Schneep came in, “Jack” was really just Anti acting. But why would he choose to “save” Jack? He could of played off killing him as a joke.

“Jack” ran off camera due to seeming sick. Was that because Schneep was taking control, a fight for control between Anti and the doctor, or was it actually Jack getting sick just like his character in the game?

 We’ve only really seen Schneep (i really cant spell his name im sorry) kill his patients before. In the description of Bio. Inc. Redemption #4 it even says that he is a “true doctor of death” so why is he suddenly saving Jack of all people. I mean sure he tried to save Peter (peetahhh) because it seemed like he genuinely liked him/his accounting skills, but in the same episode he refers to Jack (that last guy) as a sham and a travesty, but in the new episode he’s desperate to save Jack and calls him his friend many times.

In the beginning of the video Schneep puts his mask on saying that we “can’t see his beautiful face” but takes it off soon after and later removes his hat. He also complains about the heat, what’s making him so hot (bow chikka bow wow) is it Anti? Is he removing everything because Anti is taking back control?

 Schneep says that Jack is sometimes one person sometimes a completely different person, Anti is mostly known as the complete opposite to Jack. But the way it’s worded kind of makes it sound like Schneep wasn’t under the impression that he’d been talking to Anti. Maybe he never actually knew that Anti got control in October and was fooled just like we were. Or maybe he was talking to Jack and the “mood swings” were just the other egos showing through, but if that’s how it works then how would Schneep be able to talk to Jack at all? It’s an interesting line that I would love to examine more.

“I am a very smart doctor, as you all know. I saved Peter from the brink...” or “I am a very smart doctor. As you all know, I saved Peter from the brink...” The comma is pretty important to me because as far as we have seen Peter is dead. In the Dr. Septiceye Power Hour Schneep clearly lost Peter while operating and in bio inc #4 he said that Peter was “long dead and buried” Now with the comma in the second position shown it implies that we all were aware that Peter is not dead which a major theory I have could explain which is that I don’t think that was Schneep at all. The whole time it could have been Anti which could explain this particular line and how such an obvious mistake could be made, it feels very intentional as well. Showing the doctor failing would definitely give Anti the attention he needs which is why I really don’t think that was Schneep. I could really go more into this and bring in the glasses, the costume, the accent, the missed pronunciations, and other changes but i dont really want to flood this post TOO much.

“I saved my very good friend, Chase. Chase Brody. He went back, he saw his family. Did they take him back? We may never know.” This is another big flashing light line, First of all because we don’t know HOW Schneep saved him. Did he save him from the “suicide” he had at the end of the bro average video, from Jack’s play of bio inc #2, or from something else like an attack from Anti? If this is the doctor talking then should we infer that Chase is dead, like Peter and Schneep has just altered his memories? Is Chase’s family dead as well then? Also it’s important to point out that it’s his “very good friend” Chase just like his “friend” Jack, it’s pretty interesting to think when paired with point #5. And then if we consider that it ISN’T Schneep and it’s Anti then maybe we should assume that Chase is dead or “gone forever” because of the whole “we may never know” bit.

A big thing I noticed was all of the mispronounced words in the video. At first I thought it was just Jack having some trouble because there’s a bunch of weird medical terms, but then at 4:48 it got a bit weird. First of all the way he said “blood clots” was really strange, maybe that was just him trying to do the accent or maybe it was just a weird tongue slip, but it seemed kind of deliberate, it might have been to show the doctor getting infected by Anti as well. And then right after he VERY deliberately and clearly says that they needed to be treated with “antiCOLGATE” (anticoagulants) Now first of all it has Anti straight up in the name so it seems a bit weird that Jack would mess up the word so much, but then it gets weirder because later in the video he says the word correctly. That whole situation feels sketchy to me especially because I don’t know what it implies.Possibly that he only pronounces the word right later because Anti can and Anti is taking back control? He also says that the anticoagulants are the ONLY way to prescribe victory in the face of certain doom which can further imply that Schneep isn’t in this video.

Schneep claims that he is the only way to deal with things in your body that want to destroy you. So that one felt pretty obvious for why he is the first ego that we actually see Anti target, but it also implies that Chase did not turn evil as we previously thought because then Schneep would have “dealt” with him and not saved him wouldn’t he?

The whole I feel it in my own arm bit also implies that as Jack gets hurt Schneep gets hurt and that the game did actually kill Jack in the end. But it also implies that Schneep IS in the same body as the others, but it really confuses me how Jack had “mood swings” if Schneep was IN his head becoming friends with him, wouldn’t Schneep have caught on to what was happening, if so, why didn’t he act sooner to save Jack?

Listen, I’m not saying that the glitches after “I hear your heart, it beat for me. It beat for Schneep.” Were Anti saying it beats for him instead buttttt..... or maybe it was just Anti saying the heart beat was his but I like the first option.

“I will not have you die. Not again. I will not lose you.” So does this mean that Jack came back after Anti killed him last October? Was it a resuscitation kind of thing or maybe it’s impossible for an ego to die hence Chase’s possible survival. I do remember Jack mentioning somewhere that he thinks of Jack as an ego and that the real him is Seán.

“Tell me what to do” Why would Schneep think that Jack knows what to do? It could just be a tell me whats wrong and i’ll fix it kind of thing but maybe not.

“I need your help! Save him!” This was interesting to me because Schneep probably knows that we wouldn’t be able to help since the video wouldn’t be uploaded in real time so maybe he means that we still have time and need to save Jack before whatever goes on tomorrow.

Also it’s interesting that Schneep resisted the attempt Anti made to make him strangle himself whereas Jack succumbed to slitting his throat in the end, though Anti was pushing for like a whole month sooo.

The voice doubled at the line “I’m trying my best” made it sound like both Schneep and Anti were trying their hardest to complete opposite goals, I don’t really have a theory, I just thought that was a cool detail.

Anti saying they all follow him is weird too because if that was Schneep then he was clearly pretty against Anti and Jack also wasn’t very keen in October, maybe Anti is referring to someone other than the egos when he says that.

I don’t think we’ve seen Anti curse yet or at least in a way THAT emphasized which tells us that he is pretty pissed off at us and probably the egos against him too.

Also he referred to Schneep in the past tense (thought) so either Anti is confident that Schneep lost hope or more likely Schneep is dead/unavailable right now.

“That doctor thought he could save him but he was mine.” So was Anti mad because Schneep was messing with something he, in a sense, claimed?

“He was weak just like the rest of them.” Of the egos? Are they all down right now?

He calls us powerless but doesn’t he get power off of our attention? If we went away, wouldn’t Anti go away too?

Are we his puppets or the egos or...??

“There are no strings on me” there are a lot of things that line could mean but im also pretty tired and hopped up on some medicine so i don’t really have the motivation to go through a bunch of those theories.

Favorite boy.... Chase? Schneep? Jack? Seán? Anti? Jackieboy Man? Marvin? One of Jack’s friends? I don’t know about you guys but im pretty sure he means Jack. and i am excited even though i once again will be gone for a while and might see the video late.

Hope if anyone actually read all of this they enjoyed. I haven’t really read many other people’s theories so if any of these sound copied please tell me and I can delete it or credit them or whatever needs to happen. Happy Theorizing Friends.

[damionpoitier]

End Of Loop

About to post this on my Royalroad.com profile!

https://www.royalroad.com/profile/84786

I came to strapped to a chair. Another chair sat in front of me and their was a hole in the ground equidistant between them. A glance at my arm revealed my Quantum Permuter was active but in a weird stasis mode. I had spent uncountable years in ridiculous situations with this thing and I had never seen the code on the screen. A glance revealed my surrounding outside the structure were strangely familiar. I wasn’t sure (especially considering the amount of traveling I had been doing) but I felt like I should recognize them.

Then He walked into my field of Vision.

Slate.

We had never spoken, but since our first encounter he had been chasing me along the timelines. Interrupting my missions. Not allowing me to fix the past.

I hated him.

I had never felt such powerful enmity for a being I had so little meaningful contact with. With his containment suit I didn’t even know what he was. I was pretty certain he was one of Them.

A Kyrati.

The Kyrati were humanoid, and required the same basic conditions humans did for life. It’s ironic, towards the late 20th and early 21st century many stories compared Humanity to viruses. Our wanton destruction of our habitat, overworking of our natural systems, and rapid reproduction rates, irregardless of the reflexive effects, made this comparison troublingly on the nose. If that was a true comparison then the Kyrati were a Virulent Cancer, multiplying and destroying far more than our worse civilizations could ever have conceive of.

They arrived in 2035 after Dylam Enterprises had secured inter-dimensional trading rights with the phase they called 1xb12. Using the Banneker theorems they had successfully created a method of contacting, viewing, and traveling to alternate realities. 1xb12 seemed to have the best compatibility with what we needed, and could supply. So after years of negotiations the terms were set and the Quantum Permuter was utilized to open a doorway.

The greatest fears of the naysayers were almost immediately realized when it was revealed that the entirety of the presented data was falsified. 1xb12 was a seed world for the Kyrati Empire. It had been colonized Years ago and stripped of 90% of its life sustaining properties. What we had been looking at was a preserve and projections of the world before it had been stripped. The planet was currently much closer to Mars than earth.

As soon as the portal was open the Kyrati installed Phase Locks and their legions poured through. Our population was reduced by 70% inside of six months. That was 5.6 billion lives in half a year. Dylam Enterprises to those that still remembered it was an instant Pariah.

So the back up plan was enacted. Thing about the Quantum Permuter, it didn’t just allow for shifting between dimensions, but further investigation and modification could allow for movement along the time stream.

I was chosen to travel back in time and eliminate the conditions that allowed Dylam enterprises to obtain the technology and bring about the Catastrophe.

I had been traveling for untold years. I had committed acts of corporate espionage. I had committed acts of sabotage. I had committed acts of terrorism. I have killed. The things I had done were beyond rationalizing. I had become a monster to stop the monsters from coming. But above all the things I’d done… The thing I had become. I had failed. And this creature was the cause of it.

It walked in front of me and paused. It’s head cocked as it studied me. I sat their shaking with rage looking at the architect of my failures. It reached up to its neck and grabbed it’s helmet. A hissing sound was followed by a rush of steam and when it cleared what I saw was impossible. I looked into the eyes of Dr. Benjamin Banneker, creator of the Quantum Permuter. My mission parameters included potentially tracking and eliminating him but I was unable to find even a trace in my travels. I couldn’t rationalize what I saw. Why. How, could he be Slate.

“Why?” I whispered

He looked at me shook his head and let out a rueful chuckle.

“You really have no idea do you?”

He stared at me for a while. Then his expression hardened.

“I always knew the Permuter could potentially time slip, but I also knew the danger. Time is a stream, interrupting or altering the flow is always temporary. If you go back and change something to avoid an outcome you lock that outcome into place. The event becomes a constant because it Has to happen in order for the consequent event that is time travel to take place.”

“But there are alternate realities…”

“Yes, ones you will never fully experience because you have violated the time stream and Locked yourself Out of time into a loop. Had you Purmuted into a reality where the events that caused you to time shift never happened you could have theoretically stayed. The only way to even conceivably experience a permanent time alteration would be for you to double back on your first loop fix the problem, and convince the first you that he had to continue. You have shifted up and down the timeline so much that said outcome is now impossible.”

“Why, how… You could have told me this we could have..”

“By the time I locked onto your tachyon signature the greater damage was already irreparable. Haven’t you noticed that every time you shift the world you return to is Worse?”

“In some ways but I…”

“Have No clue what your actions have caused!”

He stared at me and in his eyes I saw a deeper pit of pain and rage than I though conceivable. Why couldn’t he understand? What could have happened that he looked with such vehemence towards me?

“It was pretty early on for you mission wise. You were not fully aware enough of the ramifications of your actions to realize, nor so far along in your path that you ceased to care. It was before you began searching for me. I assume your mission included potentially locating and sanctioning me?”

“But I didn’t, I never found a trace of you I couldn’t…”

“That’s because I blocked it. I thwarted your efforts before you even began them, you had already taken Everything from me before it even occurred to you to look for me. I wish you had found me before… I wish…”

He began pacing, galvanized by his emotions, containing himself from an outburst I could see would lead to my end.

“It was a normal day, as normal as days got after the occupation. I was moving my family to a new safe house. They were aware that my work was the foundation of their invasion and wanted me in custody to see what expansions they could coax out of me. I had my modified Permuter, it detected the vibrational differences of Them and their technology which also allowed me a heads up on potential encounters. You were in the area on one of your fools errands. Your tachyon signature and Permuter emissions interfered with my equipment. We never saw them coming.”

He stopped, locked in a memory I had no desire to share. With effort, he gathered himself and continued.

“They played nice at first, they provided for our basic needs in a shelter I knew to be far more comfortable than what was offered to most. At first they thought they had sold me on their propaganda. I smiled and played along with their claims of Manifest Destiny and Conquerers Preeminence. Till the day they realized I was stalling the process. Imagine if you will, what a race that was capable of wiping out 70% of a population without pause is capable of doing… To the child of a man that knowingly slowed their expansion.”

He stopped at this point, tears streaming down his face, still wracked by whatever horrors he had witnessed.

We sat in silence for some time. My imagination, that of a man who could not even remember the horrors I myself had perpetrated, travelled down uncanny valleys and left me paralyzed. I could not conceive of what this man had been through because of me and even more frightening what he had planned for me. Finally he turned.

“They didn’t give me much time before demanding I get back to work. Though I had been stalling on their goals. I had been aggressively pursuing my own. I was able to figure out your specific Permuters modifications, I could see the points of interference in my time stream and I could lock onto your tachyon stream. If I could stop you I could potentially reverse the causality that led to our capture. But first I had to escape my captors.

They were aware of your manipulations but their scientists had yet to replicate the equations that allowed travel along the stream. My Permuter had sophisticated quantum encryption layers. They had never even realized I had time stream alteration equations on my drive. For them I worked on expanding the Quantum Scryers vibrational wave margins. Based off my work they were marshaling for aggressive magnification of their empire. I built a null-time workshop and put it in a quasi permeable vibrational bubble, a pocket dimension if you will. I explained to them that the glitches in my workspace recordings were a result of my vibrational research. They took another of my children to insure I was being truthful. What they did…”

He paused again but briefly this time. Whatever their offenses, they had the exact opposite intended effect. His eyes met mine.

“I built this suit to reduce my agitation of the time stream. As it locked my physical form in temporal stasis , this is the first time I have removed it since I sealed it.”

He reached into a deceptively small opening on his backpack and pulled out a oblong cylinder with a point on one end and some type of tech box at the other end. He walked over to the seat opposite me and slid the cylinder into the hole. He sat down across from me. And though I saw no indication of how my restraints receded. He simply sat across from me looking at me. Waiting. The enormity of what I had just learned began to settle and I was at a loss.

“Do you recognize where we are? When we are?”

I looked around and with dawning horror realized why this place was so familiar. Across the street was the final operating lab of Dylam Ent. If my calculations were correct it was about to be destroyed in the explosion set off by my initial time jump. But why? Why here why now if he could not alter what I had done, what could his purpose be?

“This is an entropy spike. It took me many years and no small effort to create. Once I set it off the vibrational interference will cause your initial time jump to fail, the fallout waves will undo all the alterations we have created in the time stream… Well that is if my calculations are correct. My previous efforts at temporal repair all failed. Only the power generate by the initial causal rupture has a chance to effect a wave wide repair. And only with the presence of the original temporally displaced body. So, here we are. At the start of it all. And we can stop it. None of what we’ve done, what we felt we had to do to get here, will be.”

He paused and looked at me for a long beat.

“You can’t stop it this way. I doubt you even know how long you have been traveling or remember all that you have done. We activate this and the experiment fails. All the damage to the time line will be healed. We will never meet. My family, well I don’t know what will come, but I’m willing to face that over this.”

I looked at him, I looked across the street. I thought about the many times we had faced each other, his actions, our enmity.

“Why even tell me? I’m here you set the spike off and things go back to your normal, why bother to explain it.”

He stared at me with a combination of deep hatred and pity. Offering me no clue but his checked wrath.

“You need me to do something, you need me willing don’t you?”

He remained stoically silent.

“After all we have done, all of our encounters you expect me to believe you? To help you?”

I moved to stand but his hand quickly moved towards his wrist and I controlled my self.

“How do I even know this is real, that you, you are real? That you are who you say you are?”

He still gave me nothing, I studied him. I thought about everything. I shook my head.

“No, you are the reason I keep failing. You are the reason things are getting worse. I stop you here and I can still fix this, I can save everyone your family included. How can you not see this?”

He twitched, his face darkened as he realized my insolubility.

“I bear my soul to you, the cause of all my pain and you spit in my face?” He growled.

“You thing you are the only one who suffered loss?” I spit back. “You know what I have done, what I have become. I would sacrifice a million possible lives to save 5.6 billion actual ones. I am all that humanity has left!”

He stared at me. I saw the stillness come over him. The surrender.

“Then come stop me.”

He reached for the Spike, I lunged forward faster than humanly possible. All the shifting I had done had changed my relationship with time. I had my hand over the control panel of the spike before he could reach it. My other hand was around the handle of the knife I had rammed into his chest. His hand finally settled on mine and his body rocked back from the force of the attack.

I stared into his eyes. “All this time chasing me and you thought you could tell your little sob story and get me to give up on humanity?” I leaned in and grunted between gritted teeth. “Never.”

He coughed up blood, looked back at me and smiled. “I know.”

A automated feminine voice chimed out.

“Activation parameters accepted.”

And beneath our hands the Spike began to hum and glow.

As reality began to unravel he spoke his last words.

“I didn’t need you willing, I didn’t need you passive, I tried it myself and just created a feedback loop that reset back to the damaged timeline. I needed to balance my intentions towards the experiment on a quantum level, I needed you, and I needed you to fight.”

As I took in his words and his smile I could feel eternity pulling apart my existence and everything faded to nothing.

[flutteringphalanges]

A Heart of Razor Wire

Summary:  An alternate universe in which the X-Men infiltrate the mutant research center, Transigen, and rescue the children within. It is there that Logan is introduced to an infant identified only as X-23. This story follows the plot idea of how life would unfold if Logan raised Laura from infancy and the events that would follow suit. FFN and Ao3

                                     Chapter Three

SMACK!

Logan frowns around his mug of coffee as Laura, now what Hank had presumed to be eight or so months old, brings her chubby hands down on the pieces of dry cereal that had been designated as her breakfast. She smiles in delight, completely unaware of her father's displeasure as she relentlessly continues to crush the helpless circles of wheat.

SMACK! SMACK! SMACK!

"Cheerios go into your mouth, kid," he exhales, watching as his daughter slides her palms across the table of her high chair, knocking the crushed pieces onto the floor. "Not, well, everywhere else…" She laughs, giving him a wide, nearly toothless grin that makes it hard to keep a stern expression. "You're lucky you're damn cute and my kid, otherwise this wouldn't normally slide."

The infant lets out a loud, happy squeal that causes her father to wince at the volume. Despite having weeks to learn and adjust to her mannerisms, her shrieks, whether done so in delight or anguish, still bounced sharply against his eardrums. Logan breathes, brows knitting as he tries to ride out the ringing in his head. Laura, oblivious to her father's pain, babbles to herself before her attention turns to a solo piece of cereal that sticks to the side of her wrist that, without a moment's hesitation, finds itself promptly shoved into her mouth.

"Well, it's quite lovely to see that someone is gleeful and alert this Monday morning."

Logan turns to see Charles wheeling himself into the room, the man's ever present smile still gracing his aged features. He rolls up to where Laura sits cheerfully in her highchair, smiling even wider when she "graciously" drops a handful of her breakfast onto his lap. Shaking his head, her father steps forward and lifts the baby from the seat, the infant letting out sounds of discontent. It's only when she leans forward in Logan's arms, reaching towards the professor does she settle down after the telepath takes her-after, of course, scooping up the bits of cereal across his pants and laying them back on the highchair tray.

"Sometimes I think she likes you more than me," he comments, somewhat joking as Laura chews on her hand, leaving trails of drool down her chin. "She seems happier to see you at least."

"Now you and I both know that isn't true in the least bit," Charles replies, remaining rather neutral when the infant smears her wet hand across his shirt. "You're her father, you mean the most to her. It'll become more apparent as she grows older and is able to comprehend things."

As if in response, Laura begins to grow restless in Charles's arms, now choosing to reach for her parent instead. Logan gives a lopsided grin, taking his daughter back from the professor only to frown slightly when her drool covered fingers grip his nose before patting against his mouth. He sighs, shaking his head as he adjusts her in such a way where she can't assault him with her saliva. He meets the telepath's gaze when her hand wraps around his ear, wincing slightly as her tiny nails dig into his skin-he really needed to clip those.

"I should probably go change her diaper," he says, adjusting Laura in his arms. "And put her into some actual clothes rather than letting her stay in her pajamas. Not that she cares either way, but Jean and Storm have made a big deal multiple times about me needing to dress her right. And by right, they mean having her wear at least five different outfits a day. Seems like a waste of laundry to me, except when she has a poop explosion...which happens a lot."

"In that case," Charles smiles. "I'll leave you to your plans. If you need me, I'll be with Hank. He is helping me with a few adjustments to Cerebro." When Logan raises an eyebrow, he adds. "I've noticed a minute problem when searching for other mutants," he explains. "It's probably nothing, just a small glitch in the system. It's nothing, of course, Hank can't repair. It'll be back up to speed soon enough."

Momentarily, a feeling of discomfort comes over Logan. He is not sure what's brought it on, but he holds Laura closer to his chest. There was something about the professor's words that did not settle within him. But he's pulled from his thoughts when the infant begins to whine, struggling in his grasp. He exhales, shaking his head in a means of snapping himself out of it. He bounces Laura slightly in his arms, giving her a thin smile when their eyes lock.

"Sorry, Bubs," he mumbles, walking with her out of the kitchen. "Just have a lot on my mind. I think I'm going stir-crazy or something. Be glad you're still a baby and don't have to deal with this shit-crap."

Trying to quit his constant use of foul language for the sake of Laura hadn't been an easy challenge. Originally he hadn't seen it as such a big deal, with words of course being just that-words. But even Charles had gotten after him about his swearing, claiming it was not in his daughter's best interest. Again, he hadn't seen it as such a big deal, but listening and obeying the "suggestions" of the other adults had proven to be the only way to get them off his back.

As he carries Laura down one of the corridors, he finds it already bustling with students. Logan curses in his mind as the many children squeeze past him, none seeming to care enough to apologize or mutter an "excuse me" as they trample over his toes, some elbowing him in the side. He's forced to hold his daughter higher in an attempt to keep her from being jostled. Sometimes he forgot actually how many mutants made the mansion their home. Soon, he thinks to himself, Charles will have no choice but to renovate in order to accommodate the ever growing slew of students.

Luck finds him in the form of an open door that goes ignored by the swarms of children. Sucking in a breath, he weaves his way towards the entrance, managing to slip inside before he has the chance to be involved in a mutant pileup. Laura gurgles as he leans against the room's wall, closing his eyes for a few seconds to compose himself. It's when he finally opens them, allowing his gaze to take in the room itself does he realize that he isn't alone.

The room itself, which he recognizes as one of the few unofficial "adult mutant" lounges, holds a single bookshelf and a couch that faces a small television. The occupants on the sofa, Bobby Drake and Rogue, are completely focused on the screen before them, they stares unwavering. By their feet, Kitty Pryde sits cross-legged, her attention too captured by whatever program they are watching. The trio's eyes are so glued to the screen that when the older mutant clears his throat, they all jump.

"Christ," Bobby breathes, glaring at Logan. "Ever heard of knocking?"

"Ever heard of watching your tone," he grunts in response, walking over to the three younger mutants. "What are you watching anyway? Hope you are cool with waiting until lunch to eat, the locusts have probably consumed everything in the dining hall by now."

"I'm not hungry," replies Kitty, her voice lacking its usual spunk. "I just...I don't understand…"

Logan's brows knit together in an expression that is not brought on by the fact that Laura's yanking his ear, but rather by how ominous the phasing mutant was acting. He'd never seen Kitty upset like this. If anything, the only time he ever remembered her being the slightest bit displeased was when Kurt Wagner consumed her box of chocolate truffles which, of course, he argued wasn't his fault seeing as there was no name on it. And even then, she wasn't truly upset-most likely because he was feeling nice and went to get her a new box himself. The damn school had him softening up far too much for his liking.

"What're you talking about," he finally asks, breaking the silence. "Don't understand what?"

It's at that moment that Rogue speaks for the first time, turning to look at Logan. For a moment, he is taken aback with how drawn her expression is. She appears to be sick, or about to be at least. Concern floods over the older mutant as he absentmindedly, once again, shifts his child in his arms. Something was wrong and whatever it was had shivers crawling down Logan's spine.

"That," she whispers, pointing at the television.

For the first time since he entered the room, Logan's eyes fix on the screen. Without even the slightest chance to prepare, his line of vision is bombarded with images of what appears to be a small building, now adorned with ropes of yellow caution tape. Around its perimeter, the flashing blue and red lights from the countless cop cars and ambulances is almost too bright for him to focus on what was happening.

The images are quickly replaced by a live-feed that features a newscasters whose face is so expressionless, it's hard to determine if she feels sympathy or indifferent towards the situation. She stands in front of the area of the certain crime, fingers gripping her microphone tightly.

"Breaking news in Massachusetts that is being called a hate crime," she pauses, inhaling. "Here, late last night at the Second Street Bookstore in Charleston, Boston, a book signing event was held for the critically acclaimed author and mutant rights activist, Sandra Perkins, in honor of her new book, "The Mute in Mutation". According to reports, an armed gunman entered the building and opened fire on the occupants before turning the weapon on himself. Seven people, including Perkins and three mutants, were killed. Fifteen people were hospitalized, five with possibly life threatening injuries. As the investigation continues, we will keep you updated."

The cut to commercials seemingly comes out of nowhere, breaking Logan from his statue-like state. He blinks, letting out a long breath he hadn't realized he was holding. Tearing his gaze from the screen, he clearly sees the heavy blow the report had on the other three. Kitty's noticeably shaking, knees drawn up to her chin while Rogue turns into Bobby's chest making it difficult to see if she's crying. The only one who is completely at peace and oblivious is Laura, sucking on a piece of her father's shirt that her tiny fingers grasp onto.

Logan's mouth feels dry and his tongue heavy, and yet, he knows he should be the one to say something to break the uncomfortably long silence. But before he even has a chance, there's a click and over the intercom, Charles's voice sounds. On the surface, he's tone appears cheerful, so much so that if Logan didn't know the man so well, he wouldn't have been able to pick up the hidden strain that laces each word that passes through his lips.

"I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend so far. If all the teachers and other adults could convene in my office for an impromptu meeting, I would be most appreciative. Thank you all and continue to have a good day."

When the intercom shuts off, Logan feels a pit in his stomach. But he can identify why, no matter how hard he tries. He had been through wars and seen death more times than he was able to properly count. But after this, seeing a hate crime against mutants, while not unheard of, was causing his stomach to twists. He breathes through his nose, trying to clear his head. Of anyone, he could handle this. Handle anything.

Laura makes a sound from his arms, breaking him from this train of thought. He looks down at her. At her dark brown eyes. At the soft, mahogany hair that covers her head. To her tiny, drool covered lips that are formed into a large, happy smile.

And the pit grows bigger.

[printemps1996]

Risk and Resistance: Baudrillard, Badiou, and Being an Activist

(On May 25, 2016, one month before graduation march, I turned in the last paper I wrote as a college student. A product of several nights of beer and staying out at a nearby bar, this paper was the final requirement for Philo 170 or Philosophy of Man. Please don’t ask me why I, a Journalism major, took this course as an elective in my do-or-die final semester. The important thing is: I passed the goddamn course!)

Western astrology says that I am a Taurus. I was born on April 24, a date which falls under the sign of the Bull. Based upon the Cretan Bull, the mythical animal that fathered the Minotaur, people with such a sign are said to be the most headstrong, determined, strong-willed, and therefore, stubborn. Such traits, as astrology claims, are embodied by the said creature’s horns.

The validity of Western astrology, and any other horoscopic astrology for that matter, is subject of another discussion. It is with no doubt that astrology is largely pseudoscientific, and the newspaper columns and booklets that, using its framework, are devoted to offering a foresight of the days, months, or years to come in one’s life only work because they easily affirm one’s confirmation bias. However, it is this exact reason that makes reading one’s horoscope interesting, to say the least. While it may be a stretch to say so, astrology is just one of the innumerable ways we have created to make sense of our surroundings and our lives.

There is one tidbit of information about Taureans that struck a chord in me. It says, “Taureans are not fond of change. In fact, if change is imminent, they get very nervous and worried. They do not like anything new because anything new is unknown, and Taureans fear the unknown.” Apparently, the consensus among such horoscopes is that we Taureans actively resist change, and prefer comfort and familiarity over risk and adventure.

Not to say that I subscribe to astrology to the point of contending these words, I am alarmed and appalled that there is such a notion. After all, I for one am currently a part of a youth organization with national-democratic ideals and a socialist perspective, and the national-democratic movement in the Philippines has pushed for genuine social change and persisted for more than five decades, yet to waver in the face of every imperialist attack on the Filipino people. Coming from this, there spring questions in my mind as to how I approach change and how I see myself in the said movement. Am I really resistant to change? Do I really fear taking risks?

However, it is more apt to ask is if there is, indeed, such a thing as “resistance to change”. The field of philosophy, one that concerns appropriate aspects to address this problem, is at a point in time in which there is a re-invigorated interest in the human individual as a subject. After German continental philosopher Georg Hegel’s propositions on objective truth, or more particularly the lack thereof, we move towards an assessment of the subject’s knowledge of the Real, one of the three registers of the mind permeating every mental act and influencing us in unique ways (the other two being the Imaginary and the Symbolic). Philosophy now asks how – or whether at all – the subject approaches objective reality. As Slovenian psychoanalytic philosopher Slavoj Žižek quipped, “Why is there nothing rather than something?”

These questions can then be answered parallel to the simplistic and overarching adage, “Change is the only constant in this world.” Given its nature as both a lack and an impossibility, that which “resists symbolization and cannot be known by language, mathematics, or social rules”, how do we approach the Real as subjects? To contextualize the question, how do we see reality in relation to the movements for radical change all over the world? How do we see reality in light of the long-running national-democratic movement in the Philippines, or for the members of its allied organizations who are subjects themselves? What is reality for someone devoted to and engaged in the longest and most comprehensive resistance in the country? Having established the Real as a hole that is both fixed and impossible to reach, we shall ask then: why are we activists?

Philosophy and radical change

“Philosophy no longer knows whether it has a suitable place,” wrote Alain Badiou of the field in the twenty-first century. This is a bold declaration on the field’s apparent softness in relation to the other sciences. Badiou supports his view with a division of philosophy into sutures (political-scientific, artistic, amorous) to re-assess its relevance and its significance at present.

Dermot Moran in 2008 wrote that given the political cataclysms of the 20th century, “it seems rather strange that political philosophy did not really develop as a subject until the latter part of the century.” Moran here pertains to the great events of the past hundred years, from the two World Wars, the Cold War, and the powerful yet sporadic revolts and uprisings in the midst of these. On the other hand, Peter Laslett famously said in 1956 (as quoted in Moran 2008) that political philosophy is dead “for the moment, anyway”. Both aiming to address the relevance of political philosophy at present, the two scaffold the argument excellently worded by Matt Matravers (as quoted in Moran 2008), that political philosophy must now look at things using the lens of justice. Matravers believes that political philosophy will “turn away from theorizing about the precise nature of justice” as it underlines global issues, and that it will foster “the application of philosophical ideas to political practice [as] a matter of the particular, local, and historically informed”. With the apparent failure of the movements for radical change – that is, to put an end to capitalism as a social order – the questions of political philosophy are at the limelight again.

Given these insights, it is imperative of philosophy to engage in the movement of the sciences not only to interpret the world, but more importantly, in the spirit of Karl Marx’s works, “to change it”. Philosophy must now commit itself to not only understanding why injustices exist – a task rooting back to the Greek times – but more importantly, to address such injustices, to put an end to inequality, and to introduce a new order where inequality ceases to exist. The field of philosophy during Marx’s time generally adhered to his presentation of such an order, long-term and on a global scale, in the form of communism, one that is founded upon the liberation of the workforce. However, the philosophers of present time have contested the power and even the possibility of communism and a proletarian revolution – a goal that is shared in principle by the Philippine national-democratic movement – in light of the failure of the communist experiments around the world which were fascist and totalitarian in nature. These regimes imposed a new order with little consideration of the objective condition. Moreover, these revisionist regimes entrusted radical change to the institutions; this defeated the objective of communism to abolish the state, which it deems on the whole as an apparatus of oppression in itself. To make use of psychoanalytic concepts, they simply forced the subjective conditions to fill in the void.

One of the said philosophers, who has written about the intrinsic incapacity of a revolution to be birthed from the womb of the present order, is French cultural theorist Jean Baudrillard. Born in 1929, Baudrillard is best known to the public as the sociologist behind hyperreality, a term that encompasses his views on the commodity as the organizing principle of society. According to the University of Paris alumnus, we have lost contact with the “real”, and what remains is a fascination with its abolishment by models “more real than the real”. Hereafter, Baudrillard has adapted a neo-Marxist position, contending the German’s views on production in the context of postmodernity.

In spite of his materialist and Marxist roots, Baudrillard is unpopular among the likes of the national-democrats in the Philippines, because of his views that, for instance, the Left anywhere is only “keeping capitalism alive with its moral critiques and its quests for meaning” (Robinson 2012) which merely push capitalism to “panic” in the face of its own arbitrariness and to rectify its “temporary correctable glitches” – which, on the other hand, expose its unjustifiability.

Baudrillard’s postmodernity

While his fellow Situationists retained hopes for liberation, Baudrillard radicalized their analyses and argued that even the fundamental assumptions of Marx – needs, labor, production – are mere signs, or “ideological concepts created by the system itself to insinuate its survival”. He noted that “any attempt to talk about emancipation or alienation will be futile, because the system itself is no longer grounded upon a ‘great signified’, a presence, or the real – emancipated from what?” (Baudrillard as quoted in Mendoza 2010), closing in on his radicalness as an analyst.

With society having transformed our relations into one based on what can be shown and with signs and images having reduced reality into appearance, everything is reduced to sign and everything is reproduced by the system as a sign. This is the point in which Baudrillard’s writing veers away the furthest from classical Marxism, with him declaring the “end of production” and that “there is nothing more coming to be”. Returning to hyperreality, even the Real is a sign for Baudrillard, and we are left with models that are more real than what we have come to know as real. To put it simply, we cannot contain the Real in a regime of signs. It is impossible to represent.

In a sprawling series of essays for British left-wing weekly Ceasefire, Andrew Robinson posits a tripartite view of the works of Baudrillard. The French’s writings can be divided into the domains of symbolic exchange, of simulation, and of resistance. Robinson discusses Baudrillard’s views on symbolic exchange, how our alienated life today is suffering from its abolishment, and how capitalism’s reproducibility has invoked a new type of alienation – simulation.

Symbolic exchange “allows things to ‘mean’” as it establishes a relationship between signs and reality. In the midst of the regime of manufactured scarcity, we yearn for “our lost continuity and interconnectedness” as we simulate our reality through signs in a way that is “intense, ignorant of fashion, and disregarding of others’ demands for particular meanings” (Robinson 2012). Therefore, a regime based on equivalence brought about by reproduction instead of on symbolic exchange wards off ambivalence through the simulation of need, which in turn drives us to live a life of consumption and to derive our meaning from it. Capitalism functions on social exchange, “reducing everything to a regime based on value and the production of value”.

As he posited, in a postmodern society, “the need to speak, even if one has nothing to say, becomes more pressing when one has nothing to say, just as the will to live becomes more urgent when life has lost its meaning” (Baudrillard 2012). Words like these challenge the ranks of the national-democratic movement in the Philippines which have been an agent of resistance in the country for more than 50 years and whose socialist ideals have mobilized the larger, disenfranchised fraction of the population to advance their rights and interests as citizens of a democracy. It is in this light that Baudrillard contends the impossibility of a revolution. As a society, we have foregone symbolic exchange. It can be argued that even resistance is a sign, since the institutions in place in our present condition, in exchange for the struggle for liberation, only give us images to consume, in the form of slight, sporadic, short-term reforms. As Johnson writes:

Liberation is thus nullified, and re-encoded as a role and as narcissism. Concrete gains for liberation movements are side-effects of this immense strategic operation to disempower oppressed groups through their reduction to function or role. We are drip-fed little bits of democracy and progress to ensure the system’s survival.

Nevertheless, Baudrillard wrote of resistance by positing strategies of subversion through which he sees alienation being overcome or collapsing. However, what must be understood here is how these add up to the subject’s knowledge of the Real, especially in this condition that seemingly escapes approaching it through representation and replacing it with hyperreality.

The possibility of a revolution

Speaking of Baudrillard’s writings on resistance vis-à-vis his view of reality, Robinson (2008) says that the loss of reality “might explain why hope for liberation seems so hard to come by, and why revolutionary movements now seem to lack a clear vision of transformation”. For one, his view that consumption is a socially imposed duty is an attempt to address “why workers and other oppressed groups fall for capitalist ruses and remain attached to the system”. Seeing the postmodern condition as unable to provide “anything referential or emotionally meaningful”, Baudrillard believes that radical change cannot be possible at all if we make use of the same ideas and institutions, if we decide to return to production or fixed meanings, and if we keep working under the same framework or system. It is therefore a risk we take if we embark upon the struggle.

In spite of the challenges of a postmodern condition, movements of resistance like the national-democratic movement in the Philippines continue to persist. Although the movement fields and actively campaigns for senatorial candidates and party-lists during general elections, for instance, its socialist perspective altogether rejects and counters the continuity of the current social order. In his work “Towards a Marxist Theory of Oppression” (2005), David McNally insists:

Capitalism could not continue to exist unless the majority of working class people believed in the system; unless they thought that in some sense the present system was the best possible and that all talk of a new and free society was “unrealistic”. In order to keep its hold, capitalism is not only based on a system of economic and political domination; it also requires a system of ideological domination, a system through which workers can be made to believe bourgeois ideas.

Baudrillard’s words on resistance might be the French cultural theorist at his most benevolent towards activism. As a Marxist, what he shares is an acknowledgment of the necessity for liberation and therefore radical change; his point of departure lies in the means of the struggle for such. Alluding to the end of production, Baudrillard also believes that “every option available to resisters has already been encoded, given a meaning and a response. This makes the system seem impossible to fight” (Robinson 2008). Albeit a little pessimistic, he welcomes some sort of a revolution, still. Probably for Baudrillard, we are not that powerful to enforce a change in the objective order. What his pessimism might suggest is the need for a change in our subjectivity.

Sharing similar points, Badiou in The Rebirth of History (2012) says that the movements of resistance across the world must consider the impossible which is the Real, and how the subject ought to approach it. He writes, “The rebirth of History must also be a rebirth of the Idea.” Badiou, born in 1937 in French Morocco, actively posits the resurrection of the idea of communism in his works on truth, the being, the event, and the subject. As he says in lecture “On Optimism” (2012), “Freedom has nothing to do with the capacities of an ordinary body under the law of some language. Freedom is: active participation to the consequences of a new body, which is always beyond our own body.” For Badiou, a radical change can only be achieved “by forcing the Real and by displacing the empty place, so as to make the impossible possible”. It can be said, then, that communism is the Real of politics, given its nature as a complete overturn of the subjective orders that have persisted in the past millennia and as an order that seeks to fill the gaps present in these.

According to Slovenian poststructuralist scholar Alenka Zupančič, the Real signifies the incompleteness of reality. It is horrifying because it is impossible, in that it taunts the subject and asks the subject to overturn the convention of the symbolic order. Also, it “cannot be effaced and escaped by the subject”; there will always be figments of our world that we cannot understand. In this light, Badiou says that there must be “a forceful transformation of the Real into a consistent truth”. The incompleteness of reality must be acknowledged, though not to the point that we as subjects become passive or even surrender to the objective order confronting us. We must work towards changing our current subjectivity in such a way that the fear of the unknown only challenges us to push further and to understand and eventually resolve what is unjust in society. Here, the role of the subject in relation to the Real is thus underlined. For Zupančič’s fellow Slovenian Žižek, the subject is “what endeavors to fill in the gap within the order of being”.

Go not gently and rage with me

It is in this light that Badiou truly promotes the idea of communism. As he writes in The Rebirth of History (2007):

The rebirth of History must also be a rebirth of the Idea. The sole Idea capable of challenging the corrupt, lifeless version of ‘democracy’, which has become the banner of the legionaries of Capital, as well as the racial and national prophecies of a petty fascism given its opportunity locally by the crisis, is the idea of Communism, revisited and nourished by what the spirited diversity of these riots, however fragile, teaches us.

With the popular election of Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte as the head of state and government of the Philippines, the national-democratic movement is given a limelight. With the president-elect’s declaration of the social and economic reforms his administration is to offer, the progressive character of the movement is featured. Duterte, whose campaign strategy employed the creation of the Filipino people’s need for a brash, no-holds-barred figure to be at the helm of social transformation, has promised large-scale reforms.

In line with this, he has offered four seats in his Cabinet to “the Left”. Apart from this, he is known to have close ties with the leaders and prominent figures of the national-democratic movement. In his youth, Duterte was a member of the banned, underground, national-democratic mass organization Kabataang Makabayan (KM). The Davao region, too, is a known bailiwick of the movement. Jose Maria Sison, founder of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and a chief consultant of the national-democrats, was even promised a safe trip home and a warm welcome after having been exiled to the Netherlands for decades.

The euphoria surrounding Duterte’s rise in power is double-edged at best. While Duterte’s relatively anti-imperialist and progressive stance may truly work in favor of the Filipino people, there remains the fact that radical change must come from below instead of the institutions that benefit in its repression. We cannot deem the image of a Philippines under Duterte as an unknown, since it was a given from the start, with his positioning as the most “different” and “progressive” candidate, and even with his outing as a “socialist” and his promise of federalism for the country, he shall remain a figurehead of the current socio-political order. To quote Daniel Bensaïd in his essay “Thirty Years After: A Critical Introduction to the Marxism of Ernest Mandel” (2007):

Far from being a mechanical consequence of capitalist development, the rallying of the forces of resistance and subversion of the order established by capital is an incessant task recommenced in daily struggles, and whose results are never definitive.

In its struggle for genuine social change, the national-democratic movement must remain firm in its position of mounting a new, stable, and just social order instead of merely reforming and therefore reinstating the one currently in place. Moreover, it must be able to do this with the conscious knowledge that the objective order can never be perfect.  

Having said all these, I begin to reaffirm my position in the national-democratic movement. Firstly, there is no such thing as “resistance to change”, more so when one is engaged in a movement of resistance against the current social order. There is only that social order in place which, given its scope in every aspect of life, makes it impossible to overcome. It is this position that promulgates our surrender to the current condition. There is only a fear of change, so to speak, since the Real remains an unknown and it is too horrifying to even approach.

However, as Badiou says, “Do not give up on that part of yourself that you do not know.” When I am faced with having to make a big decision, I either decide on what is more comfortable or familiar, or resolve to go with the flow and let the waves carry me. This is not simply being a Taurus, as I would defend before, but a manifestation of a code that is imposed upon each one of us as we are born to a system which promotes reproducibility over creativity and signs and images over reality. The system teaches us to fear radicalness and to lose hope that there can be a better world different from or outside the one we are living in.

Activism in its sole legitimate form – militant and uncompromising – is a resounding call waged upon us to acknowledge our subjectivity and to assert our significance in relation to our objective reality. As Friedrich Engels’ dialectical materialism puts it, “The alteration of nature by men, not solely by nature as such, is the most essential basis of human thought.” Philosophy must now veer towards the subject as an agent of radical change and the Real as an impossibility that a subject must nevertheless acknowledge. To be Icarus creating his own pair of wings and flying close to the sun – that is the great risk of our time.

References Badiou, Alain, The Rebirth of History (New York: Verso, 2012). Baudrillard, Jean, The Ecstasy of Communication (Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2012). Bensaïd, Daniel, “Thirty Years After: A Critical Introduction to the Marxism of Ernest Mandel,” in International Viewpoint (2007). Diken, Bulent, Revolt, Revolution, Critique: The Paradox of Society (New York: Routledge, 2012). Johnston, Adrian, “The Quick and the Dead: Alain Badiou and the Split Speeds of Transformation,” in International Journal of Žižek Studies 1:2 (2007). McNally, David. “Towards a Marxist Theory of Oppression,” in Another World is Possible: Globalization and Anti-Capitalism (Winnipeg: ArbeiterRing Publishing, 2005) Moran, Dermot. The Routledge Companion to Twentieth Century Philosophy (New York: Routledge, 2008). Mendoza, Daryl Y., “Commodity, Sign, and Spectacle: Retracing Baudrillard’s Hyperreality,” in Kritike, 4:2 (December 2010). Robinson, Andrew, “Jean Baudrillard and Activism: A Critique,” in Ceasefire (February 7, 2013), <https://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/in-theory-baudrillard-14>. Robinson, Andrew, “Jean Baudrillard: From Production to Reproduction,” in Ceasefire (May 4, 2012), <https://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/in-theory-baudrillard-6>. Robinson, Andrew, “Jean Baudrillard: Marx and Alienation – Draft 2,” in Ceasefire (February 17, 2012), <https://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/in-theory-baudrillard-4>. Robinson, Andrew, “Jean Baudrillard: Symbolic Exchange,” in Ceasefire (February 17, 2012), <https://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/in-theory-baudrillard-1>. Robinson, Andrew, “Jean Baudrillard: The Rise of Capitalism & the Exclusion of Death,” in Ceasefire (March 30, 2012), <https://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/in-theory-baudrillard-2>.

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Pinterest Update April 2019 (Latest Pinterest Changes for Bloggers and Business)

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Pinterest Update April 2019 (Latest Pinterest Changes for Bloggers and Business)

  I think I know why you are on this page… A new Pinterest update 2019 just happened, some algorithm or interface changes seem to be occurring as we speak, and your traffic is either going down or up (lucky you if it’s the latter!).  I created this page because I got tired of replying over and over to similar questions I receive from my students about the latest Pinterest update (s).

I plan to update this page fairly frequently – as soon as something significant happens on Pinterest, you’ll be the first one to know about it from this post. So SAVE THIS PIN to your Pinterest Marketing board for later.

If you use Pinterest for marketing your products or you are a blogger and drive traffic from this platform, you probably know by now that algorithm updates and major interface changes happen on Pinterest so often that people are getting confused by what is the most recent or new update, what happened just a month ago.

I want to make your life easy! Here, on this page, Pinterest updates are presented in chronological order and also are explained as per what is an actual change, what is a rumor, and how you should react to these changes.

I’m going to also mention here some news related to the Pinterest-approved scheduler Tailwind and their new features as this might be directly related to your activity on Pinterest.

Pinterest October – November 2018 New Features Carousel Pins

All business accounts on Pinterest can now create Carousel Pins – this is a new type of pins which allows up to 5 different images published as a slider under the same pin URL.

These images can be linked to different page URLs on your website, they can also have different titles and descriptions!

Pinterest initially introduced Carousel pins as an additional tool for businesses to make their ads more attractive. However, right now you can create Carousel pins without starting an ad campaign.

Just go to your Pinterest account on a desktop and click on the “plus” button next to your profile name. From the drop-down, select Create Carousel.

There is a chance that as early adopters of the new pin format, we could gain some additional benefits. First, at the beginning, not many users will create these Carousel pins (they obviously take more time than the regular pins). Plus, Pinterest should probably give an additional initial boost to the new pins so that more content creators get interested in saving these Carousel pins.

Pinterest Update July 2018 (And Some Other Changes) Pinterest Glitch Blocked Many Legit Bloggers Domains on 7/24/2018

This day many bloggers and Pinterest marketers woke up to see their domains marked as spam on Pinterest. This very blog you are reading now was also blocked and you can’t imagine how I was worried about it – all my Pinterest traffic was gone for nearly 24 hours.

Want to know how I drive over 300,000 pageviews/mo to my blog from Pinterest? And how organic (free) Pinterest traffic allowed me to make $6000/mo with my blogs? Learn how I do it with a Free Pinterest Masterclass >>

Each and every pin on affected accounts was not leading users to the websites anymore – they were sending users to a broken page with a ruthless message:

As far as I was able to follow up the situation in multiple blogging communities on Facebook, the majority of the affected accounts were working fine within 24 hours since the issue was known about. Pinterest didn’t make any official statements, didn’t reply to anyone’s emails, just fixed the issue and pretended that nothing happened.

In case you ever get caught by a similar issue in the future, here are a few tips on how you can try to help your domain get unmarked as soon as possible. When you write an email to them, no matter how pissed you are by the situation, make sure you use respectful language because after all, the person reading your message, is just a person. You don’t know how that person who is not personally responsible for the algorithms on Pinterest, might feel about your message, and how this could influence his or her decision about your account.

Email creators-support @ pinterest.com – this address was shared by Pinterest on their conference for content creators. Visit the page https://help.pinterest.com/en/contact, select “Business Account” and then choose the option appropriate to your request. One more tip that might not be applicable to every situation, but I thought it’s worth mentioning this insider tip. You see, some companies have a privilege of talking to Pinterest reps directly and when a large-scale glitch is causing some trouble for bloggers or content creators, they do their best to help us. During the latest instances of mass accounts blocking, Tailwind (officially approved Pinterest scheduler), Mediavine and Adthrive (advertising network for bloggers) created lists of affected accounts in their FB communities and then sent lists to Pinterest to manually look into each blog.

Pinterest Analytics Glitches in July 2018

If you noticed that your Pinterest Analytics show nearly 0 views on some days in July 2018, that’s just a glitch and you can verify in your Google Analytics that you were getting traffic from Pinterest on those days normally.

Tailwind releasing SmartLoop tool 

Tailwind made an announcement about their long-awaited SmartLoop tool. They promised to roll it out on all accounts within 8-12 weeks.

If you are following Pinterest updates and changes closely, you probably noticed that 2018 is the year when Pinterest started really opening up a little more info to marketers, bloggers, content creators. Yes, Pinterest even organized the first-ever conference for content creators.

Out of all the information that was presented to the blogging community lately, not all “news” truly new or part of a Pinterest update. They just never spoke so openly about the ways you should promote your content on their platform.

However, a lot of stuff that was discussed during the conferences worked on Pinterest for years this way, and Pinterest just never spoke about it so openly.

On this page, I do my best to separate what Pinterest reps claim, what Pinterest Best practices dictate, from what actually works to drive traffic to your website. I’m also going to put away all the rumors based on some popular interpretations of Pinterest’s statements. 

I spend a lot of time (more than I wish I had to!) monitoring blogging communities on Facebook where people share their experience on Pinterest. I spend this much time doing it because among the numerous Facebook threads and comments sometimes I can see a pattern and it helps to figure out how Pinterest works for people in different niches, following different strategies. 

Also, I do it to save time for my students and to be able to provide the most recent and comprehensive information in my Pinterest SEO Traffic Secrets Course.

Pinterest disapproved BoardBooster scheduler

If you don’t know what BoardBooster was, then probably you can just skip this paragraph. Before you do it, just take one thing with you: from June 2018, Pinterest is not a place to mess around using any schedulers or tools which are not shown on their official Pinterest’s partners page.

Now, getting back to BoardBooster. It was one of the two most popular Pinterest schedulers for about 4 years and offered automation tools at an affordable price. Pinterest didn’t like that BoardBooster was operating without using Pinterest API. This was ok for a few years, but at some point, all big social media platforms crash upon unapproved apps or tools. Unfortunately, there was no way Pinterest would allow BoardBooster become an approved partner and the tool was closed for good.  

Several tools are shown on the Partner’s page but the leader is Tailwind. If you want to start using it efficiently and save yourself the time from learning it by trial and error, you could make a jump start with my very affordable video course dedicated to Tailwind.

Ongoing Pinterest Update – Algorithm 2018

Group Boards will be losing distribution power

This one is quite a fundamental statement made by two Pinterest reps in an interview for Pinterest scheduler Buffer (check the video below).

It’s so important because building powerful Pinterest account by reaching audiences of multiple group boards was the main strategy that has been working great for the last 2-3 years.

However, it seems like from now on, Pinterest will be working on reducing the distribution of pins saved to group boards.

Why Pinterest decided to do that? They said group boards became over time something different from what they were created for. Have you seen group boards with thousands of contributors? I bet you have because they are usually the ones that are too easy to be accepted to.

Now, 1000-4000 contributors (the max I’ve seen, but I’m sure there are even bigger group boards) and no pinning limits can’t end up in a good way. Spam eventually takes over these boards and the board is losing the focus on one topic.

As a consequence, even legit pinners on those boards get low engagement scores for their pins and a confusing keyword context based on all the spam saved to the board previously.

Pinterest reps explained that group boards should be only used for collaborations on “projects”.  For me, it means that group boards have to be as focused on one topic or keyword, as standard boards are. And shouldn’t involve large numbers of contributors.

What should you do now?

If you are still relatively new and don’t have many big group boards on your profile, you have two options. First, forget about group boards and work on your own boards. Second, if you still want to try to reach additional audiences with group boards, you might want to create or join only small group boards, very specifically targeted to a keyword or topic. If you already joined many large group boards, especially generic boards which allow people from all niches to pin, it’s time to evaluate how efficient these boards are for your account. Learn how I do it from this post.

2.     Build strong boards on your own account

Since Pinterest takes distribution away from the big group boards, I can tell that you naturally will redirect the majority of your efforts to building your own boards.

You might not even realize that, but a lot of established bloggers see their Pinterest traffic tanking for a while. Their accounts are packed with group boards they joined while their own boards are the minority.

If this is your case, time for a change has come. Did you notice that in their Best practices, Pinterest recommends creating at least 5 boards for each topic we cover in the blog or website? By doing this, you can target several keyword variations on each board.

3.   The “Most Relevant Boards First” Rule for a New Pin

To help your new pin succeed on Pinterest, you have to pin it to a relevant board first. Or several relevant boards. And they should be boards on your account. By saving the pin to a relevant board, you give this new image the right keyword context. By saving first to your own board, you help Pinterest boost your pin, because they claim to give priority to the pins saved by content creators.

4.     Tall pins pessimization

If you’ve been on Pinterest long enough, you probably have an idea that long pins get more engagement and space in the feeds, and in general are more successful. That’s why about 2 years ago Pinterest search results were jam-packed with infographics. Some marketing sites received a great traffic influx from Pinterest in those times.

I’m not too sad about it because I hated seeing those long pins using Pinterest on my phone. They used to occupy space or 3-7 normal sized pins and I didn’t find this fair.

Currently, Pinterest is cutting off the long pins at 2:4.2 ratio and in general, they recommend sticking to the 2:3 ratio in the future as longer pins will not only be cut but also pessimized by the Pinterest algorithm.

5.     Be a true Content Creator and save “Fresh” pins regularly

Several Pinterest reps talked a lot about the freshness of pins. Why would they touch on this subject?

Apparently, too many bloggers were repinning their own exactly the same pins too many times to multiple boards.

If you even upload the same exact image from the same exact post URL, Pinterest will recognize the image as an existent pin and in the majority of cases will immediately show you the summed up stats for that pin.

The conclusion is – you need to create a lot more new pins – new image, new text overlay, new colors – anything at all has been different on the image to be considered a new pin. They started saying content creators should save new pins weekly, but I lately hear voices saying we should do it daily. Who promised Pinterest marketing is going to get easier?

All platforms get more complicated algorithms over time as the competition between content creators promoting on these platforms grows. So if you are still on the fence about Pinterest traffic and think you can start later, I can’t recommend you highly enough to start working on your Pinterest account strategically NOW. The longer you wait, the harder it gets for a beginner.

I recently found an additional way to make your pins more “fresh” for Pinterest while saving new pin versions for your old posts.

When you just save new images directly from your web pages, Pinterest Rich Pins automatically attach to them your SEO titles and SEO descriptions (if you use Article Rich Pins). This mean, all your new pins from the same page are targeting exactly the same keywords.

Pinterest recommends you to create new pins and change keywords to give another perspective on your image and attract an additional audience. Changing pin description when you save a new pin does its positive job in this sense, but your SEO title and keywords in it remain the same.

So what’s the new solution?

When you save a new pin for an old post, don’t save the pin from your page. Instead, go to Pinterest Homepage and click on Create Pin in the right top corner:

Then you can upload the new image or if you saved it on the page, you can also retrieve the image from your site (insert the link to your page under the image upload). The most important part here is changing your Rich Pin’s title and description. Try to think of some new keywords you haven’t used in your SEO title for this post or page.

This way, you will overwrite the Rich Pins’s title that comes from your web page. The SEO description remains the same, but you can and should also use new keywords in the pin description (see the screenshot below):

6.     It’s Ok to have Multiple pins per page URL

Pinterest reps confirmed what was added to their Best Practices page – you can and you should create multiple pins per post to target different keywords or audiences in each pin version.

7.     Pinterest Analytics Work Faster

Pinterest used to have a 36-hour delay in stats shown for each specific pin. Lately, they show analytics on a pin basis almost in real time. Pinterest claims they have a 2-hour delay in reporting the data.

A side note here. The stats you are seeing on a pin basis are summed up counts for all repins, impressions and saves of all versions of this pin. Imagine a user B repinned your original pin to a bigger board and that repin got a lot more impressions and clicks. This means, your own pin will be showing a summed up stats from your pin and the repin of user B Stats.

Another note. When you look at the pin stats in a window like on a screenshot below don’t forget these are stats only for the last 30 days. It’s not all the repins/saves/impressions from the day the pin was initially saved.

8. Followers Quality over Quantity

Pinterest reps mentioned on a few events that the algorithm is showing your new pins first to your follower base. The algorithm evaluates the early engagement to see if your pin should be shown to bigger audiences.

This means that practices which involve mass following or purchasing followers are not helping you get traffic from your pin. In fact, they are doing the opposite. You get followers which are not going to engage with your pins. This gives negative signals to Pinterest about your content. This will limit your pins distribution.

They used the term “early engagement”, which is also well-known in regards to the Instagram algorithm. If your content gets good engagement soon after publication, chances are this content might get an additional boost from the platform’s algorithm.

To quote Sarah from Pinterest (the interview video above): “When you save a new Pin to Pinterest, it will be distributed it to your followers first. That’s the testing ground and it gets your content out much faster than Pinterest could ever do before. This is your most loyal audience – they love your content.”

Pinterest Changes 2018 – New Features and New Interface Easy Saving to Suggested Boards (for the Web, June 2018)

Like most Pinterest changes, this new feature is rolled to the user base step by step. So if you don’t see the same when you try to save a pin on your desktop, probably you will see it pretty soon.

The change makes saving pins it much easier. You don’t need to click on the Save button before choosing a board. Now Pinterest suggests a relevant board on your account and you can save the pin right on the same page.

Public Stats of Monthly Reach

Not everyone was happy with this one. Because a lot of established bloggers who started on Pinterest years ago were pretty happy with their high following numbers. Since they didn’t invest as much time and efforts in Pinterest anymore, the reach often decreased a lot over time. Now their low reach became public, and it doesn’t look so great when you have a sponsored post opportunity.

The reach number in your profile shows how many Pinterest users interacted with your Pins in the last 30 days. This number is rounded.

New Pinterest Profile Cover

You might have noticed on lots of Pinterest profiles a collection of the latest pins as a profile cover. You can customize which pins will appear there and choose one of the options to show:

All Recent Pins Recent Pins from a specific board, Recent Pins made from your site (includes pins saved by other users from your domain).

New Activity Tab

Activity tab is pretty cool – it shows you all the pins which were saved from your site. Not only saved by you (using Tailwind scheduler for example), but also by any other users. You can look at the most popular pins that get lots of saves from your site. Then make your conclusions about which pins or content works the best.

You have an option to keep this tab private if you wish.

Following Feed on Pinterest (March 2018)

I believe that by the time you are reading this post, this feature works on all Pinterest accounts. It’s the second mode of using Pinterest after the Smart Home feed – your “Following” feed.

It’s a feed of pins only from the people follow and these pins are shown in chronological order.

I also wrote a post earlier from which you can find out everything about Pinterest changes that happened in 2017 and earlier.

If you found this post useful, you might want to save THIS PIN below to your Pinterest Marketing board to check the post later when new updates are announced.

  The post Pinterest Update April 2019 (Latest Pinterest Changes for Bloggers and Business) appeared first on Anastasia Blogger: How to Start a Blog, Blogging Tips, Make Money Online, Work from Home.

Read more: anastasiablogger.com

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Watch the latest episode of our Fortnite talk show Squad Up to see Patrick Warburton perform about battle royale. One of the best things about building a MACHINE for Fortnite Visit this page exists to, instead of a great in-game show, people just really need 2 or more CPU cores. Results could sometimes get V-Bucks without their parents' knowledge, as their parents' character or debit cards are associated with the diversion account which they service to have fun. Although the issue isn't single to Fortnite, the issue with Fortnite has invited special interest because the game is so popular right now.

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You can earn V Bucks in Fortnite without shelling away money soon for them, although the solutions for slowly collecting the digital currency are cap and involve you buy Fortnite But the World. After got, one system is to plot in every day for small numbers of V Bucks from the servers. That claim is based on Fortnite (now renamed Fortnite But the World), a third-person cooperative, base-defense sport. In 2017, developer Epic Games accepted this view and rewrite this out right separate, free-to-play battle royale ready for COMPUTER, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

So that's everything you need to know before getting thrust into Fortnite and Fortnite Battle Royale. We'll appreciate people from the channels. In response , Epic party member darkveil” said, Sure!” The plan is already in place but it is theoretically a bit difficult,” according to the comment. Epic wants to give mini-BR” games in Creative where users will be able to configure the Hurricane, use the bus stop feature, and other issues on the main Fortnite battle royale island.

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Flamemaster”, a 10th grader, says they are, Annoying, obnoxious, toxic, and infuriating.” What has gone wrong? Of course, every competition retains its drawbacks, then I happen not looking to establish how Fortnite is a negative game, just show how many people who act that have destroyed what might have been a respected game. You will meet the e-mail alert when the charge of Fortnite - 10,000 (+3,500 Bonus) V-Bucks can stop.

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It is doubtful how much profit criminals were able to be through money laundering, though Sixgill gotten to Fortnite items made more than $250,000 on eBay in a 60 day period recently. A mini translation of Fortnite: Battle Royale will hopefully be accessible to participants soon via Creative Mode. Get V Bucks Free No Person Verify 2019 Hack Working Free V Bucks This Fortnite cheats will help in getting free v-bucks easily.

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First Drive: 2019 Volvo S60

When we were first invited to sample the new Volvo S60, we figured we’d have an easy job ahead of us; we could just cut and paste from our recent Volvo reviews. After all, the S60 (along with its wagon sibling, the V60) is the final model in Volvo’s product renewal, and it uses the same Scaled Product Architecture (SPA) platform, Drive-E engines, and tablet-like Sensus interface as the XC60 and 90-series vehicles. Though we were happy to hear the new S60 will be built in the U.S. at Volvo’s newly minted South Carolina plant, we weren’t expecting any surprises.

But surprise us Volvo did with its awkwardly named 2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered. This is the top-of-the-range sporting edition of the S60, with an upgraded suspension, brakes, and a version of Volvo’s T8 plug-in hybrid powertrain under the hood. While electrified performance cars aren’t new, this is one of the first examples clearly aimed at the masses. And aside from a few glitches, it’s pretty darn good.

That’s the good news. The bad news is you won’t be able to get one anytime soon. Volvo is offering just 20—yes, you read that right, two-zero—of the Polestar Engineering cars to the U.S. market for the 2019 model year. Rather than selling them, it offered them on its Care By Volvo subscription plan. As you can probably imagine, all 20 are already spoken for.

None of this makes us any less interested in the car, or any less enthralled by the driving experience. The S60 PE’s powertrain combines the supercharged-and-turbocharged version of Volvo’s 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine, which drives the front wheels, with an electric motor connected to the rear wheels. Total system power is 415 horsepower and 494 lb-ft of torque, up 15 hp and 22 lb-ft from Volvo’s base T8 setup. Other enhancements include Öhlins electronically-adjustable shocks and gold-colored Brembo brake calipers, with seat belts and tire valve stem caps colored to match.

The combination of the engine’s supercharger and the electric motor on the rear axle brings a new definition to right now power. Volvo claims a 0-60 time of 4.3 seconds, but there’s more to the story. Most modern-day turbocharged cars hesitate at least a little when you stomp the pedal from rest, but not the Polestar—it scoots with no delay. The T8 engine, which uses a supercharger to boost off-idle response, is quick enough on its own. Augmenting it with electricity seriously ups the grin factor and offers more confirmation that electrification can be a good thing from a performance perspective.

The snappy powertrain makes it easy to overlook the suspension, which is also worthy of note. Anyone who drove the previous-gen S60 Polestar will remember that it was a great-handling car with a punishing ride. The new Polestar Engineered S60 is a little tamer and a lot more livable. It’s not the grippiest car we’ve driven, but it zips through the curves with a satisfying rightness. The ride is firm, to be sure, but not putative, and it floats rather forgivingly over sharper bumps. And while we’ve already dealt with the powertrain, we must mention it again: Corner exit is a whole new kind of fun with the workload shared by an electric motor, which doesn’t get bogged down even if the transmission happens to be in the wrong gear.

What makes the S60 PE (sorry, Volvo, but we refuse to refer to such a great car by such a silly name) is that once you turn off Sport mode, it transforms itself into Mr. Green. The gas engine shuts off and the car favors electric power. The battery-only range is modest—21 miles—but that’s enough for the average one-way commute plus a quick run for lunch. The T8 charges with a standard 240-volt EV charger and drivers can charge from the engine or hold the battery charge for later use. Tired of imitating a Prius? Click back to Sport mode, the engine fires up, and the electric motor goes from helping you save fuel to helping you waste it.

Only one thing was seriously out of whack during our drive, however, and it had to do with the brakes. Like most hybrids, the S60 utilizes a mix of regenerative and friction braking, and the setup in the cars we drove seemed way off to us. Hit the brakes quickly and they grab hard, and when nearing a stop the braking effort increases with surprising rapidity. Smooth stops are nearly impossible as there’s no way of knowing when the sudden increase in braking power will come. We’re guessing there’s a problem with the transition from regen to friction braking as the car slows. Volvo says it is still refining the brakes, though it’s a little worrying that the cars have come this far along in the development process without solving the issue.

A couple of things are slightly less out-of-whack. The steering, while nicely weighted and responsive, could provide more feedback. And what’s up with the E-shifter’s behavior? The crystal handle is nice, but it requires a double-tap to move between the most commonly-used ranges (park, drive, and reverse), which is both frustrating and unnecessary—most electronic shifters allow you accomplish this in one motion. Call us pedantic if you like; we’ll see if you agree after driving a T8 and trying to figure out why the hell the car isn’t moving in its intended direction (answer: You want drive but you’ve only made it to neutral). We’d be much happier if Volvo fitted the ordinary P-R-N-D shifter it employs on its T5 and T6 models.

We should note that the crusher-bound pre-production S60s we drove had 20-inch wheels and Pirelli P Zero tires that will not make it to the U.S.; our S60 PEs will get 19-inch wheels with a yet-to-be-determined tire. Volvo thinks the 20s would be too rough for the moonscape pavement of Eastern cities, and given our experience with the previous-gen Polestar cars, its caution is probably warranted. We’ll save our final verdict for the fully baked production cars, which will mean waiting for the 2020 models. (Hopefully the brakes get sorted out by then.)

And what of the other S60 models? If you’ve spent any time in a new-generation Volvo, particularly the 90-series cars, we can do this quickly: There’s way more back seat room than the old short-wheelbase S60, the trunk is still a bit tight, and the T6 R-Design model drives—as you would expect—much like a scaled-down S90. Everything else we say will be a rehash, so if you’d like to slip away now, feel free. We highly recommend Jetrho Bovingdon’s article about scaring the daylights out of himself at the Nürburgring 24.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Volvo revolution, you’re in for a treat. No doubt you’ve picked up on the visual differences between the new S60 and the outgoing model; the two cars bear some similarity in silhouette, but the angles and creases on the new car are sharper, and we think the C-shaped taillights work better than they do on the bigger S90. This is a good-looking sedan, handsome and understated, and we think the design will age well.

But the real revolution takes place inside. Volvo has long aligned itself with Swedish minimalism, but the S60 (and its fellow new-generation Volvos) take this to a new level. Most secondary controls are accessed through a portrait-style touch-screen Volvo calls Sensus, with the number of buttons on the dash reduced to the minimum required by law. This makes the S60’s cabin a wonderfully uncluttered place, and Volvo has taken good advantage by fitting the S60 with top-notch materials and switchgear. Aside from some detail differences, particularly on the passenger’s side of the dash, the S60’s fascia is identical to other Volvos, and that’s fine with us—Volvo’s cabin design is totally unique, and we love it.

That said, familiarity with the Sensus system (something we are quickly gaining with our Four Seasons Volvo V90) can easily breed contempt. It’s easy to swipe around and find most of the functions, or to switch between a full-screen map and what’s playing on the stereo, but some bits of the interface need work—for example, you have to fill in a lot of information to perform a simple search for particular stores or other points-of-interest. Volvo hasn’t changed the interface much since the XC90 was introduced, though it says the S60’s version has a faster processor.

We drove our T6-powered Four Seasons V90 to the press preview, and our drive in the S60 T6 really did feel like déjà vu. Despite its smaller size, the S60 is not that much lighter than the 90-series cars, and acceleration from the 316-hp T6 engine felt comparable, as did steering and handling. What sets the S60 apart is its more sensible size. As much as we love the V90, it’s a land yacht, and the S60 is much easier to maneuver and park.

Volvo has set pricing at $36,795 (including destination) for the entry-level T5 Momentum, with T6 models starting at $41,295 and T8 plug-in hybrids at $55,395. T6 models are also available on Volvo’s all-inclusive subscription program, Care by Volvo, at $775 per month for the Momentum trim level and $850 per month for the R-Design. (In case you were wondering, the limited-run 2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered cars were priced at $1,100 per month.) Care by Volvo includes payments, insurance, and maintenance, and subscribers can change to a different Volvo after 12 months.

The S60 hits closer to the heart of the market than the bigger S90 sedan, and we predict it’s going to be a strong seller (or at least a strong subscription). We’re bummed to have to wait for the Polestar Engineered cars, but at least that’ll give Volvo time to fix the brakes—and maybe come up with a better name.

2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered Specifications

ON SALE Early 2019 PRICE $1,100/month via Care By Volvo subscription ENGINE 2.0L supercharged and turbocharged DOHC 16-valve I-4 plus electric motor(s)/415 hp, 494 lb-ft combined TRANSMISSION 8-speed automatic LAYOUT 4-door, 5-passenger, front-engine AWD sedan EPA MILEAGE N/A L x W x H 187.4 x 80.3 x 56.6 in WHEELBASE 113.1 in WEIGHT N/A 0-60 MPH 4.3 sec TOP SPEED 155 mph (est)

The post First Drive: 2019 Volvo S60 appeared first on Automobile Magazine.

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[jesusvasser]

First Drive: 2019 Volvo S60

When we were first invited to sample the new Volvo S60, we figured we’d have an easy job ahead of us; we could just cut and paste from our recent Volvo reviews. After all, the S60 (along with its wagon sibling, the V60) is the final model in Volvo’s product renewal, and it uses the same Scaled Product Architecture (SPA) platform, Drive-E engines, and tablet-like Sensus interface as the XC60 and 90-series vehicles. Though we were happy to hear the new S60 will be built in the U.S. at Volvo’s newly minted South Carolina plant, we weren’t expecting any surprises.

But surprise us Volvo did with its awkwardly named 2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered. This is the top-of-the-range sporting edition of the S60, with an upgraded suspension, brakes, and a version of Volvo’s T8 plug-in hybrid powertrain under the hood. While electrified performance cars aren’t new, this is one of the first examples clearly aimed at the masses. And aside from a few glitches, it’s pretty darn good.

That’s the good news. The bad news is you won’t be able to get one anytime soon. Volvo is offering just 20—yes, you read that right, two-zero—of the Polestar Engineering cars to the U.S. market for the 2019 model year. Rather than selling them, it offered them on its Care By Volvo subscription plan. As you can probably imagine, all 20 are already spoken for.

None of this makes us any less interested in the car, or any less enthralled by the driving experience. The S60 PE’s powertrain combines the supercharged-and-turbocharged version of Volvo’s 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine, which drives the front wheels, with an electric motor connected to the rear wheels. Total system power is 415 horsepower and 494 lb-ft of torque, up 15 hp and 22 lb-ft from Volvo’s base T8 setup. Other enhancements include Öhlins electronically-adjustable shocks and gold-colored Brembo brake calipers, with seat belts and tire valve stem caps colored to match.

The combination of the engine’s supercharger and the electric motor on the rear axle brings a new definition to right now power. Volvo claims a 0-60 time of 4.3 seconds, but there’s more to the story. Most modern-day turbocharged cars hesitate at least a little when you stomp the pedal from rest, but not the Polestar—it scoots with no delay. The T8 engine, which uses a supercharger to boost off-idle response, is quick enough on its own. Augmenting it with electricity seriously ups the grin factor and offers more confirmation that electrification can be a good thing from a performance perspective.

The snappy powertrain makes it easy to overlook the suspension, which is also worthy of note. Anyone who drove the previous-gen S60 Polestar will remember that it was a great-handling car with a punishing ride. The new Polestar Engineered S60 is a little tamer and a lot more livable. It’s not the grippiest car we’ve driven, but it zips through the curves with a satisfying rightness. The ride is firm, to be sure, but not putative, and it floats rather forgivingly over sharper bumps. And while we’ve already dealt with the powertrain, we must mention it again: Corner exit is a whole new kind of fun with the workload shared by an electric motor, which doesn’t get bogged down even if the transmission happens to be in the wrong gear.

What makes the S60 PE (sorry, Volvo, but we refuse to refer to such a great car by such a silly name) is that once you turn off Sport mode, it transforms itself into Mr. Green. The gas engine shuts off and the car favors electric power. The battery-only range is modest—21 miles—but that’s enough for the average one-way commute plus a quick run for lunch. The T8 charges with a standard 240-volt EV charger and drivers can charge from the engine or hold the battery charge for later use. Tired of imitating a Prius? Click back to Sport mode, the engine fires up, and the electric motor goes from helping you save fuel to helping you waste it.

Only one thing was seriously out of whack during our drive, however, and it had to do with the brakes. Like most hybrids, the S60 utilizes a mix of regenerative and friction braking, and the setup in the cars we drove seemed way off to us. Hit the brakes quickly and they grab hard, and when nearing a stop the braking effort increases with surprising rapidity. Smooth stops are nearly impossible as there’s no way of knowing when the sudden increase in braking power will come. We’re guessing there’s a problem with the transition from regen to friction braking as the car slows. Volvo says it is still refining the brakes, though it’s a little worrying that the cars have come this far along in the development process without solving the issue.

A couple of things are slightly less out-of-whack. The steering, while nicely weighted and responsive, could provide more feedback. And what’s up with the E-shifter’s behavior? The crystal handle is nice, but it requires a double-tap to move between the most commonly-used ranges (park, drive, and reverse), which is both frustrating and unnecessary—most electronic shifters allow you accomplish this in one motion. Call us pedantic if you like; we’ll see if you agree after driving a T8 and trying to figure out why the hell the car isn’t moving in its intended direction (answer: You want drive but you’ve only made it to neutral). We’d be much happier if Volvo fitted the ordinary P-R-N-D shifter it employs on its T5 and T6 models.

We should note that the crusher-bound pre-production S60s we drove had 20-inch wheels and Pirelli P Zero tires that will not make it to the U.S.; our S60 PEs will get 19-inch wheels with a yet-to-be-determined tire. Volvo thinks the 20s would be too rough for the moonscape pavement of Eastern cities, and given our experience with the previous-gen Polestar cars, its caution is probably warranted. We’ll save our final verdict for the fully baked production cars, which will mean waiting for the 2020 models. (Hopefully the brakes get sorted out by then.)

And what of the other S60 models? If you’ve spent any time in a new-generation Volvo, particularly the 90-series cars, we can do this quickly: There’s way more back seat room than the old short-wheelbase S60, the trunk is still a bit tight, and the T6 R-Design model drives—as you would expect—much like a scaled-down S90. Everything else we say will be a rehash, so if you’d like to slip away now, feel free. We highly recommend Jetrho Bovingdon’s article about scaring the daylights out of himself at the Nürburgring 24.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Volvo revolution, you’re in for a treat. No doubt you’ve picked up on the visual differences between the new S60 and the outgoing model; the two cars bear some similarity in silhouette, but the angles and creases on the new car are sharper, and we think the C-shaped taillights work better than they do on the bigger S90. This is a good-looking sedan, handsome and understated, and we think the design will age well.

But the real revolution takes place inside. Volvo has long aligned itself with Swedish minimalism, but the S60 (and its fellow new-generation Volvos) take this to a new level. Most secondary controls are accessed through a portrait-style touch-screen Volvo calls Sensus, with the number of buttons on the dash reduced to the minimum required by law. This makes the S60’s cabin a wonderfully uncluttered place, and Volvo has taken good advantage by fitting the S60 with top-notch materials and switchgear. Aside from some detail differences, particularly on the passenger’s side of the dash, the S60’s fascia is identical to other Volvos, and that’s fine with us—Volvo’s cabin design is totally unique, and we love it.

That said, familiarity with the Sensus system (something we are quickly gaining with our Four Seasons Volvo V90) can easily breed contempt. It’s easy to swipe around and find most of the functions, or to switch between a full-screen map and what’s playing on the stereo, but some bits of the interface need work—for example, you have to fill in a lot of information to perform a simple search for particular stores or other points-of-interest. Volvo hasn’t changed the interface much since the XC90 was introduced, though it says the S60’s version has a faster processor.

We drove our T6-powered Four Seasons V90 to the press preview, and our drive in the S60 T6 really did feel like déjà vu. Despite its smaller size, the S60 is not that much lighter than the 90-series cars, and acceleration from the 316-hp T6 engine felt comparable, as did steering and handling. What sets the S60 apart is its more sensible size. As much as we love the V90, it’s a land yacht, and the S60 is much easier to maneuver and park.

Volvo has set pricing at $36,795 (including destination) for the entry-level T5 Momentum, with T6 models starting at $41,295 and T8 plug-in hybrids at $55,395. T6 models are also available on Volvo’s all-inclusive subscription program, Care by Volvo, at $775 per month for the Momentum trim level and $850 per month for the R-Design. (In case you were wondering, the limited-run 2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered cars were priced at $1,100 per month.) Care by Volvo includes payments, insurance, and maintenance, and subscribers can change to a different Volvo after 12 months.

The S60 hits closer to the heart of the market than the bigger S90 sedan, and we predict it’s going to be a strong seller (or at least a strong subscription). We’re bummed to have to wait for the Polestar Engineered cars, but at least that’ll give Volvo time to fix the brakes—and maybe come up with a better name.

2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered Specifications

ON SALE Early 2019 PRICE $1,100/month via Care By Volvo subscription ENGINE 2.0L supercharged and turbocharged DOHC 16-valve I-4 plus electric motor(s)/415 hp, 494 lb-ft combined TRANSMISSION 8-speed automatic LAYOUT 4-door, 5-passenger, front-engine AWD sedan EPA MILEAGE N/A L x W x H 187.4 x 80.3 x 56.6 in WHEELBASE 113.1 in WEIGHT N/A 0-60 MPH 4.3 sec TOP SPEED 155 mph (est)

The post First Drive: 2019 Volvo S60 appeared first on Automobile Magazine.

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First Drive: 2019 Volvo S60

When we were first invited to sample the new Volvo S60, we figured we’d have an easy job ahead of us; we could just cut and paste from our recent Volvo reviews. After all, the S60 (along with its wagon sibling, the V60) is the final model in Volvo’s product renewal, and it uses the same Scaled Product Architecture (SPA) platform, Drive-E engines, and tablet-like Sensus interface as the XC60 and 90-series vehicles. Though we were happy to hear the new S60 will be built in the U.S. at Volvo’s newly minted South Carolina plant, we weren’t expecting any surprises.

But surprise us Volvo did with its awkwardly named 2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered. This is the top-of-the-range sporting edition of the S60, with an upgraded suspension, brakes, and a version of Volvo’s T8 plug-in hybrid powertrain under the hood. While electrified performance cars aren’t new, this is one of the first examples clearly aimed at the masses. And aside from a few glitches, it’s pretty darn good.

That’s the good news. The bad news is you won’t be able to get one anytime soon. Volvo is offering just 20—yes, you read that right, two-zero—of the Polestar Engineering cars to the U.S. market for the 2019 model year. Rather than selling them, it offered them on its Care By Volvo subscription plan. As you can probably imagine, all 20 are already spoken for.

None of this makes us any less interested in the car, or any less enthralled by the driving experience. The S60 PE’s powertrain combines the supercharged-and-turbocharged version of Volvo’s 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine, which drives the front wheels, with an electric motor connected to the rear wheels. Total system power is 415 horsepower and 494 lb-ft of torque, up 15 hp and 22 lb-ft from Volvo’s base T8 setup. Other enhancements include Öhlins electronically-adjustable shocks and gold-colored Brembo brake calipers, with seat belts and tire valve stem caps colored to match.

The combination of the engine’s supercharger and the electric motor on the rear axle brings a new definition to right now power. Volvo claims a 0-60 time of 4.3 seconds, but there’s more to the story. Most modern-day turbocharged cars hesitate at least a little when you stomp the pedal from rest, but not the Polestar—it scoots with no delay. The T8 engine, which uses a supercharger to boost off-idle response, is quick enough on its own. Augmenting it with electricity seriously ups the grin factor and offers more confirmation that electrification can be a good thing from a performance perspective.

The snappy powertrain makes it easy to overlook the suspension, which is also worthy of note. Anyone who drove the previous-gen S60 Polestar will remember that it was a great-handling car with a punishing ride. The new Polestar Engineered S60 is a little tamer and a lot more livable. It’s not the grippiest car we’ve driven, but it zips through the curves with a satisfying rightness. The ride is firm, to be sure, but not putative, and it floats rather forgivingly over sharper bumps. And while we’ve already dealt with the powertrain, we must mention it again: Corner exit is a whole new kind of fun with the workload shared by an electric motor, which doesn’t get bogged down even if the transmission happens to be in the wrong gear.

What makes the S60 PE (sorry, Volvo, but we refuse to refer to such a great car by such a silly name) is that once you turn off Sport mode, it transforms itself into Mr. Green. The gas engine shuts off and the car favors electric power. The battery-only range is modest—21 miles—but that’s enough for the average one-way commute plus a quick run for lunch. The T8 charges with a standard 240-volt EV charger and drivers can charge from the engine or hold the battery charge for later use. Tired of imitating a Prius? Click back to Sport mode, the engine fires up, and the electric motor goes from helping you save fuel to helping you waste it.

Only one thing was seriously out of whack during our drive, however, and it had to do with the brakes. Like most hybrids, the S60 utilizes a mix of regenerative and friction braking, and the setup in the cars we drove seemed way off to us. Hit the brakes quickly and they grab hard, and when nearing a stop the braking effort increases with surprising rapidity. Smooth stops are nearly impossible as there’s no way of knowing when the sudden increase in braking power will come. We’re guessing there’s a problem with the transition from regen to friction braking as the car slows. Volvo says it is still refining the brakes, though it’s a little worrying that the cars have come this far along in the development process without solving the issue.

A couple of things are slightly less out-of-whack. The steering, while nicely weighted and responsive, could provide more feedback. And what’s up with the E-shifter’s behavior? The crystal handle is nice, but it requires a double-tap to move between the most commonly-used ranges (park, drive, and reverse), which is both frustrating and unnecessary—most electronic shifters allow you accomplish this in one motion. Call us pedantic if you like; we’ll see if you agree after driving a T8 and trying to figure out why the hell the car isn’t moving in its intended direction (answer: You want drive but you’ve only made it to neutral). We’d be much happier if Volvo fitted the ordinary P-R-N-D shifter it employs on its T5 and T6 models.

We should note that the crusher-bound pre-production S60s we drove had 20-inch wheels and Pirelli P Zero tires that will not make it to the U.S.; our S60 PEs will get 19-inch wheels with a yet-to-be-determined tire. Volvo thinks the 20s would be too rough for the moonscape pavement of Eastern cities, and given our experience with the previous-gen Polestar cars, its caution is probably warranted. We’ll save our final verdict for the fully baked production cars, which will mean waiting for the 2020 models. (Hopefully the brakes get sorted out by then.)

And what of the other S60 models? If you’ve spent any time in a new-generation Volvo, particularly the 90-series cars, we can do this quickly: There’s way more back seat room than the old short-wheelbase S60, the trunk is still a bit tight, and the T6 R-Design model drives—as you would expect—much like a scaled-down S90. Everything else we say will be a rehash, so if you’d like to slip away now, feel free. We highly recommend Jetrho Bovingdon’s article about scaring the daylights out of himself at the Nürburgring 24.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Volvo revolution, you’re in for a treat. No doubt you’ve picked up on the visual differences between the new S60 and the outgoing model; the two cars bear some similarity in silhouette, but the angles and creases on the new car are sharper, and we think the C-shaped taillights work better than they do on the bigger S90. This is a good-looking sedan, handsome and understated, and we think the design will age well.

But the real revolution takes place inside. Volvo has long aligned itself with Swedish minimalism, but the S60 (and its fellow new-generation Volvos) take this to a new level. Most secondary controls are accessed through a portrait-style touch-screen Volvo calls Sensus, with the number of buttons on the dash reduced to the minimum required by law. This makes the S60’s cabin a wonderfully uncluttered place, and Volvo has taken good advantage by fitting the S60 with top-notch materials and switchgear. Aside from some detail differences, particularly on the passenger’s side of the dash, the S60’s fascia is identical to other Volvos, and that’s fine with us—Volvo’s cabin design is totally unique, and we love it.

That said, familiarity with the Sensus system (something we are quickly gaining with our Four Seasons Volvo V90) can easily breed contempt. It’s easy to swipe around and find most of the functions, or to switch between a full-screen map and what’s playing on the stereo, but some bits of the interface need work—for example, you have to fill in a lot of information to perform a simple search for particular stores or other points-of-interest. Volvo hasn’t changed the interface much since the XC90 was introduced, though it says the S60’s version has a faster processor.

We drove our T6-powered Four Seasons V90 to the press preview, and our drive in the S60 T6 really did feel like déjà vu. Despite its smaller size, the S60 is not that much lighter than the 90-series cars, and acceleration from the 316-hp T6 engine felt comparable, as did steering and handling. What sets the S60 apart is its more sensible size. As much as we love the V90, it’s a land yacht, and the S60 is much easier to maneuver and park.

Volvo has set pricing at $36,795 (including destination) for the entry-level T5 Momentum, with T6 models starting at $41,295 and T8 plug-in hybrids at $55,395. T6 models are also available on Volvo’s all-inclusive subscription program, Care by Volvo, at $775 per month for the Momentum trim level and $850 per month for the R-Design. (In case you were wondering, the limited-run 2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered cars were priced at $1,100 per month.) Care by Volvo includes payments, insurance, and maintenance, and subscribers can change to a different Volvo after 12 months.

The S60 hits closer to the heart of the market than the bigger S90 sedan, and we predict it’s going to be a strong seller (or at least a strong subscription). We’re bummed to have to wait for the Polestar Engineered cars, but at least that’ll give Volvo time to fix the brakes—and maybe come up with a better name.

2019 Volvo S60 Polestar Engineered Specifications

ON SALE Early 2019 PRICE $1,100/month via Care By Volvo subscription ENGINE 2.0L supercharged and turbocharged DOHC 16-valve I-4 plus electric motor(s)/415 hp, 494 lb-ft combined TRANSMISSION 8-speed automatic LAYOUT 4-door, 5-passenger, front-engine AWD sedan EPA MILEAGE N/A L x W x H 187.4 x 80.3 x 56.6 in WHEELBASE 113.1 in WEIGHT N/A 0-60 MPH 4.3 sec TOP SPEED 155 mph (est)

The post First Drive: 2019 Volvo S60 appeared first on Automobile Magazine.

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The Evil Of Video Game Microtransactions And Patches

Yep, this is the post that the Zelda Season Pass inspired me to finish. It’s like the one about pay-to-download games, which is similar, but not the exact kind of topic. Also, my posts about Microtransactions on Nintendo’s Miitomo and Konami’s bologna and talk about Cow Clicker. aren’t super detailed or anything. So it’s truly time I finish this one because it’s more important than ever. In fact, if there’s anything that I utterly detect about the game industry right now it’s this.

Let’s paint a picture. Let’s go back... back to the past... *holds flashlight in front of face* OoooOoOoOOOOoOooooooo... Gaming once did not have DLC. When you got a game, you got it as-is with no DLC, patches, etc... So companies had to put everything they wanted or could get in it in that one cart’s release and polish it to boot. So they could not release a game unless it was actually finished-finished. Occasionally devs will knock off a few bugs in revisions, but that just meant there were two or more versions of games (the first version, then tweaked copies) on the market and not a game with intended content another one didn’t have. However, the thing about it was that the first version was still perfectly playable. Ocarina Of Time on the N64 had three for instance if you want a notable example. Heck, Pokemon Red/Blue/Green/Yellow were some of the glitchiest games ever but they are well loved. It’s not glitches that make a game bad, it’s gameplay-hindering glitches and bad design that make a game bad.

This of course led to a lot of notable delays in the production of the best titles of their time. Games that were rushed out to meet a deadline such as games based on a movie being released or something were often sucky, buggy or even completely broken because it was less about the quality as it was trying to meet demand. So a game that was released bad, stayed bad with no fixes or whatnot. While the concept of not fixing up a bad game may seem archaic to many modern day gamers, there were still great games to be played. See, you’d think that there would be better quality games on the market now than there were back then because if you released a stinker, you could at least patch it to a semi-good quality. But that sure isn’t the case is it? In fact, it’s not unheard of for a patch to break a solid game, lol! In those cases they’re usually rectified by a simple rollback or re-issuing a fixed patch fast of course, but what I’m saying is that patches aren’t really making the overall gaming experiences you can have better than just releasing them in a good state to begin with. Unless the game is broke to begin with of course. But that brings me to my next point...

Both Microtransactions and patches have been quite the sneaky little moneymakers. What a lot of people aren’t realizing is that they are often paying a lot more for less. Which is astounding since game price has gone up in itself from $50 to $60 (Not all games of course, but I mean the general price of console games) AND in order to get all you could for a game, you have to pay for their online and downloadable extras. Some do online for free like Nintendo, but that of course is about to change not because they can’t do online for free of course since they have been for years, but likely because it’s just more profitable. So what game publishers are doing when they pull that is selling incomplete games at a full price (often just to release games as fast as possible for maximum profits) and charging you more to get them complete and/or playable through online. Some “retail” games are actually not even physical in that they only contain a game code or only a small part of a game so you have to download the rest to play it too. So what’s even the point of retail in those cases other than to sucker in people who don’t otherwise buy digital that just so happened to not read the box?... That trick won’t work forever. Mind you that there are still games made out there that are great on their own without downloadables, but the thing about it is that game companies know that these sorts of things are highly profitable because people are oblivious to how much more they’re spending overall. Even just $5 per game, if you got just 12 DLC packs, that’s $60 or the price of another whole game (again, it varies. :P). They aren’t only $5 either as DLC varies greatly in price. Online services alone are usually START at $10. PS4′s is at $9.99/month, but you of course get discounts at longer terms. :P

The patch thing also has a funny way of making more “versions” of games than ever before as well because there are games that people have never patched or did any microtransactions for, there are games people have fully patched and paid for all the DLC. Plus everything in between and every combination. So there can be an awkward division of sorts as well in that people rating a game better with a patch and someone not being able to get a patch for some reason (no net connectivity, online patch services canceled/shut down, etc...) that will end up creating forever bad games in the process because they put out junk and games not patched get shut out. There’s also the inevitable end of online patch support for a game to tangle with in the future. Meaning if people get a game that is no longer supported and it’s a stinker that could be patched into something better, they are stuck with the stinker unless they sell it to someone who is not in the know of the need for a patch or they locate or create some sort of fan-made hack-patch out there.

This also has a way of making it so that games are becoming less and less your’s. See, certain sections of the game industry hate stuff like the used game market and game sharing because they don’t get sales from after-market stuff. If a retail disc is just a key to get a game’s full download that you can only use once, you basically can’t resell or let someone borrow a game. The Xbox One back in development was going to be just like that until massive backlash hit them over it. As a matter of fact, that happens with a lot of publishers who try to pull that because people of course don’t like the idea of not owning what they buy, for good reason. So instead they got a bit... sneakier with it. Games that you buy digital for instance are locked to that system and if your system goes, so does the game, well, when they stop supporting it online. Think DLC/patches are any different? Think again.

I’ve seen people argue that the microtransactions are only to extend the life of a game engine and whatnot, but that’s what SEQUELS are for! Instead though a great increase in patches and paid downloadables on the very first day of release happened. Star Wars Battlefront was probably one of the most notorious examples of this in that the game was made to be small and to get everything you’ve gotta pay upwards of $100 total. Compare it to a fully complete game such as Ocarina Of Time and you can tell that there’s issues. Speaking of Battlefront... EA did it again with the next Battlefront, only FAR worse than before as you need to play 4,528 hours to unlock everything or $2,100 to “conveniently” speed things up ON TOP of the retail price of the game. That’s ludicrous! Then there was a whole debacle after that they they were going to fix it and semi-did, but this has happened with so many of their games in the past that you can basically see it as a cycle by now. They release a game > people point out how much of a ripoff it is > they “apologize” and “fix” it > they do it again with the next game. Why people even buy into it after all these years of them doing it I have no idea as it’s illogical. Maybe it’s like... an addiction or masochistic tendency. But they take advantage of that sickness like predators. Even a good chunk of those who aren’t addicted to it may not make much of it because it never seems like a lot to pay  few bucks for some DLC but when so many do it, it adds up for their profits gained on basically lies.

Talking addiction of course means it’s time to cover these bad boys: LOOT BOXES! They can be cleverly disguised as anything from Pinata Llamas to Trash Cans. But when I say “loot box”, I mean “you pay for something and you don’t know what you’ll get”. They have been largely equated to gambling which I couldn’t agree more with because it’s like rolling a slot machine’s wheels: The adrenaline of whether you win or lose is what is addicting but most of the time you will lose as the items you are going for in these monstrosities often only have less than a 1% chance of showing. So people who get addicted like with gambling addiction often open up hundreds and hundreds of these boxes to no avail. People who do this, even if it’s just over a bunch of DLC and whatnot, game publishers have called “whales”. Yes, they actually have a term for it. Not only that, but they also have a “science” to getting people to pay for such things. Behold! The hold grail of all things bad in the industry. The original video I linked to was removed, but you can still see it at 3:42-4:37 of this video, though you may want to watch it all anyway as it’s pretty good:

“Turning players into payers” huh?... They aren’t the only ones to do it either. Activision actually patented their own little scheme in 2015 (which amazingly they claim they never used) and you can bet that many others also have sneaky little plans of their own.

There are some extra tricks I haven’t went over yet that may still sucker people. Like remember the extra levels/stages/areas/gear/etc... that could have been added to a game before release by just delaying the game like they used to do? They could just put it on multiple discs/cards like they used to as it wasn’t uncommon for games to have 2 or more discs. But they don’t. Why? Well at this point you can guess there’s something extra sneaky about this one because the extra data doesn’t go on the disc, it goes on the game system’s hard drive or some other storage space. As the MBs add up, you need to buy more space. Who then gets in the market to sell more space? Game makers of course. While people can get stuff like external /hard drives and SD cards from other sources, you can bet that game publishers will partner up with someone that makes them (I have a Sandisk SD Card for my Wii with “Nintendo Wii” on it for instance. :P But for game data backup, not downloads.) or make em’ themselves.

Even if the DLC or online service is free, chances are it’s not entirely “free” anyway as you often have to see a bunch of advertisements to tempt you to spend money on other stuff. For instance, Call Of Duty WWII has a mission where you watch others open loot crates... But if you have the willpower and time to sit through that junk, it’s officially free I spose’. Again though for all of this they know not everyone can resist the temptation. It all keeps rolling back to tempting people in these ways really:

How badly do you want to fix your game?

How quick do you want to make progress?

How much more content do you want for the game?

How unique do you want your character to look?

How much do you want to play with others online?

How much do you want to play the same game as others?

How close do you want to be to your friends progress-wise?

etc... to make games cost far more than ever by having you pay for it.

But free online gaming even though companies clearly can do it and free DLC is not how the industry has shaped has it? Instead they have you pay for it with a grin basically saying “see you there because we know you won’t resist!”. The temptation thing ended up screwing everyone over, even people who resisted, because they are losing out on the content. All at virtually no extra development cost because it’s often already made and they just held it back.

Yes, I know some is genuinely made after a game if they feel there is more they can add, but it’s such a common “business model” that you just never know who is doing it. Though some slip up like Capcom, lol! But in any case, why not at the very least release extra stuff for free? Not make you pay for the online on top of the DLC. I mean logically they “should” be getting profits from online service sales to support further development of games as it was proven they are able to do online for free. If not, they are doing a pretty bad job.

I don’t see those unethical business practices changing any time soon either because they have been remarkably successful. It’s giving companies a lot of bad PR, but they don’t care as long as they get more money than ever. Which is a really sad state because it means that you no longer have to make a good game to profit off of it, you just have to make something that hooks people enough to get them to pay into it. Many indy devs are guilty of this too of course (especially the shovelware makers that put their crappy ((often copied)) games with paid DLC on every platform they can), so don’t think I’m ignoring them. I’m just using some of the most prominent examples here.

Now for some common rebuttals I hear:

-“But you don’t have to pay for it! It’s optional!” You also don’t have to pay for the game. Companies should be honored and humbled that you are interested in buying a game so they should offer you the full package, not a watered-down version of something and taking you for granted.

-”It’s only appearance DLC like clothing. It doesn’t affect the game!” Oh, but it does. Not having them is actually taking away a whole section of a game that people find fun: Character customization. Maybe it’s not gameplay-related, but it’s certainly something that people love to do and thus affects their experience. Games used to have stuff like that hidden in them as unlocks (See Bomberman 64 Custom Parts as an example), not as paid DLC.

-”They NEED to make more money because games nowadays are more costly to make!” How do you know? Games like Cave Story and An Untitled Story (6th from the bottom) are free and extremely well designed. But I’m also seeing a ton of asset-flipped games in that companies are basically re-using engines and whatnot. In any case, assuming they are pricier, then it should be in the initial cost of the COMPLETE game, NOT made up in DLC. You tell me that all of Battlefront 2′s content is worth $2,100 and I’ll call you a liar or blind because there’s no way they put that much work into it and there’s no way anyone should have to pay that much for a SINGLE game.

-“But there’s just so much content they didn’t have time to put it in at release so they offer you the service!” Yet they are able to magically churn out other games at the same time along with said DLC. Funny how that works right? Again talking EA as an example because they are just do good at providing them, they create a “new” sports game yearly (Madden, FIFA, NBA, PGA Tour, NHL, etc...) with the usual DLC, oftentimes of stuff that was in past installments of the game with the same engine.

-”They are companies, so of course they are trying to make money.” Nothing wrong with making money, it’s “how” you make it that’s the issue. When there’s a whole “business” model built around lies and deceit, I’d argue it starts to lean towards the scam side of things.

Your thoughts? Thanks for reading and have a good one!