#sometimes your family is the normal subsection

[torchship-rpg]

Dev Diary 8 - Identities: Terrans & Lunars

Happy International Moon Day! Torchship is set 200 years after Neil Armstrong first set foot on the moon, with history diverging when Alexei Leonov followed him a few days later, keeping the space race hot through moon bases, Mars, and beyond. A bit like For All Mankind, if everyone was a bit less of a complete drama queen.

In celebration of the incredibly cool feat of somehow putting boots on another world, we’re going to be focusing today’s Dev Diary on the two human Identities which descend directly from the event; the Terrans who went there and the Lunars who stayed.

Terrans

We touched on Terrans in Dev Diary 2, as an example for how even the most ‘standard’ of human identities still has a lot of interesting Traits to draw from. Still, Terrans are very much the ‘default’ human identity, being the most populous human group. They’re called Terrans because they got upset about everyone calling them Earthlings, and it had a nice symmetry with Lunars.

Even before we get into the specific sub-Identities, each Identity is divided into a bunch of subsections which dive into various details about the group; where they live, what the environment is like, and what specific biological or genetic details you might need to know. Any of these can come with Traits; the Biology one is where aliens get their signature features, and humans get the developmental and genetic distinctions that set them apart.

(As an aside, these Identity entries are big. They’re not just a couple of paragraphs, they’re thousands of words about history, culture, and biology. Sometimes I get distracted and go on for four paragraphs about the Zinovian biological and cultural concept of sex and gender. Sorry not sorry.)

For Terrans, our Biology section includes our first two Traits. As mentioned last time, 1g is unusually high for humanoid life in the setting; most other species evolved at around half to maybe three quarters of that, and the various spacers will have grown up under even less.

This means that Terrans are a great fit for the Heavyworlder trait, which is one of the Gravity traits. This gives you better tolerance for high Gs (important when you’ve got to work on your spacecraft while under thrust) in exchange for worse penalties in 0g. Compared to a spacer who could spacewalk before they could normal-walk, you’re going to come off clumsy in freefall. You also get a bonus to Physical Instrument, the cert used for basic physical strength and endurance, and do more damage in melee.

The other Terran biological Trait is Baseliner. An assumption underlying every biological Identity is that unless we say otherwise, there’s genetic engineering afoot, either ongoing or in the species' past. While some of this is awful Gattaca-style eugenics nonsense, for Torchship’s humanity this has mostly been just some tidying up. Evolution settles for a lot of ‘good-enough’ solutions, so with a little bit of targeted editing we can do stuff like prevent cells from hoarding molecules they’ll never use, or use a chemical that’s actually good at the job instead of one that the body just had lying around.

Baseliner is the Trait where we say otherwise. You pretty much can’t survive off Earth without some genetic engineering; turns out even a pretty small reduction in gravity long-term is going to be bad for your heart, nerves, muscles, bones… your everything, basically. But if you and your family have always lived on Earth, you could well have gone the last hundred years without genetic editing. 

The downside is that it costs more XP to upgrade Physical Instrument and you take extra consequences from different levels of gravity, but on the upside you have an extra ten minutes in low Oxygen before consequences start setting in, and you have a higher tolerance for drugs and poisons. You might not be peak human performance, but all those redundancies can come in handy.

Once we’re done with biology, we move into the sub-Identities, which are specific regions or subcultures. Right now Terrans only have two; rural and urban. (I’ve played around with some others but I haven’t been happy with anything yet, send in your suggestions!). Urban Terrans live in the dense, futuristic megacities that dot future Earth, in communal archeologies that are like self-contained villages. Theirs is a life of beautiful buildings, abundant greenery, a different kind of library for everything, and a joyous excess of monorails. It’s everything you could have wanted from Usborne’s Book of Future Cities (1979) come to life.

Urban Terrans get recommended the following Traits; Polyglot (to get across the cosmopolitan nature of the cities), Well-Connected (to show your closeness to the Star Union’s bureaucracy), Divergent (because urban Terrans are exactly the sort of people who do recreational genetic modifications), and Communal Spirit, a trait which boosts the effectiveness of working together. This is a common Trait for many Human identities; it’s pretty much the one that models prosocial production practices in action. 

The Rural Terran trait represents a much smaller proportion of the population. These are the mix of farmers, ecologists, and indigenous groups piecing the planet back together after a close brush with climate change. Outside of lithium, there’s not a lot of on-world mining anymore (space mining has made it uneconomical) so this is mostly agriculture. These communities are relatively isolated, bypassed by the high-speed trains connecting Earth’s cities; the saying goes that Mars is closer to the cities than the farms are.

Rural Terrans get these Traits suggested: Biome Specialist (representing a familiarity in whatever regional ecology you grew up in), Stiff Upper Lip (farm work tends to toughen you up), Natural Esper (a lot of psychics try to get away from the crowded cities), and Trusting, a trait that rewards you for helping others, but makes you more vulnerable to manipulation and makes it stressful to initiate violence.

Finally, at the end of each Identity is a section dedicated to how this group fits into Star Patrol, and how their presence can result in extra Traits through social interaction with other groups. Here, the privileged, ‘default’, often somewhat thoughtless Terrans are recommended the Imposing trait, which gives you some bonuses for being intimidating, but makes it a little harder to get people’s trust. It also does a decent job representing how Terrans are simply more heavily built than anyone else in the Sol system; when you’re comparing to tiny Martians and spindly Spacers, Terrans are collectively a bunch of Conans the Barbarian. 

You grew up somewhere where air is free and water falls from the sky, and people are understandably sometimes hesitant to correct your ignorance because you’re three times stronger than they are. Terrans often have some growing up to do as they realise how they come off to others.

Lunars

In Torchship’s world, there have been moon bases since the early 70s, and people have lived on the moon full-time since the early 2000s. The Soviet moon base program eventually withdrew due to budget problems, leaving the ever-increasing network of American bases the sole full-time real estate on the moon. In the 2040s, Armstrong City took one look at the unfolding disaster that was the collapse of American capitalism and seceded. Playing up its neutrality, it eventually became the de jure capital of the Solar Union and, now, the Star Union, though in actuality this is mostly symbolic.

This is because living on the moon is genuinely very difficult. The gravity is just 16% of what it is on Earth, it’s airless, and there’s no atmosphere to stop the radiation. When people started living there, its only selling point at all was being closer to Earth than Mars was.

Now that people do live there, though, in a vast underground city, there turns out to be a second advantage. The Moon is very rich in mineral resources and very poor in biospheres you might destroy by aggressively mining them, and it’s incredibly cheap to get things to lunar orbit. This has ended up making the moon the industrial powerhouse of the Star Union.

Lunars are living in the most extreme conditions of any of the human Identities, which is reflected in their Biology Traits. Like Spacers, they get Freefaller, a gravity trait that is in most ways an inverse of the Heavyworlder trait. They might not actually be living in freefall, but the gravity is so low it might not make a difference. The very low gravity also means they are recommended Medical Dependency; humans simply were not meant to grow up in these conditions. Even with genetic modifications, some ongoing medical treatment for bone density or nerve issues, arising from being seven feet tall and effectively 30 pounds, is to be expected. Finally, Lunars are recommended the Wireless Brain Uplink Trait, an extension of the implanted medical monitors which were once standard on US moon bases for long-term survival.

Lunars also only have two sub-identities. The first are the Mazedwellers, those who live in Armstrong City itself. Armstrong City is built out of the subterranean mines of Luna, using the thick crust of the planet to protect against solar radiation. This makes the city a twisting, sprawling web deep under the surface, where space is at an absolute premium even beyond what Spacers experience. To live in these conditions but still contribute your industrial might to the Union, your town doubles as a factory floor, converting back and forth every day.

This gives Lunars a distinct identity in their work ethic; while everyone else can be more content working at their own pace, on Luna the faster you get the job done the faster you get your living room back. Your recommended Traits are Claustrophile (giving you a bonus in a space suit but mild agoraphobia), Driven (representing this unusual work ethic), and Shifting Gears, a trait which lets you have two sets of Personality Impulses, in this case representing the strict work-life divide that is at the centre of Lunar culture.

The other Lunar sub-identity is being a Yardworker. The Lunar Yards are the reason that humanity won the big space war; turns out running a slower-than-light multiplanetary civilisation requires an absolutely ludicrous number of spacecraft, so Lunars built an absolutely enormous and ever-expanding space station to do that with, using a giant railgun to shoot raw materials up to it and commuting every day with short-hop shuttles. In the post-FTL era, the sheer scale of the Lunar Yards means humanity can produce an almost comedic surplus. During the war, Lunars couldn’t serve in Star Patrol (see the end of the dev diary for why), so people started living on the Yards to make as many rockets as possible instead as a way of contributing.

Being a Yardworker is a prestigious job for a Lunar, and also a competitive one. Work never slows down, six shifts twenty-four hours a day. For this reason, Yardworkers share the Driven and Claustrophile Traits with their Mazedweller counterparts, as they aren’t that divergent. They gain the Voidborn trait (which gives bonuses for making repairs, cheaper upgrades to the Cosmonaut cert, and stress when your rocket is experiencing shortages) and the Cultural Tool trait, which gives you a bonus 4d6-era item you can carry atop the normal inventory. For Lunars, that’s your Yarkworker’s Marker, the thick-nibbed, vacuum-writing pen workers carry to leave each other vital notes about problems that could potentially kill them and/or draw dicks on the spaceship. The Yardworker’s Marker and all the little notes that crews would find in their spacecraft developed a mythology, which is why now it’s as much a badge of honour as a practical tool.

Finally, the Lunars in Star Patrol section touches on an important consequence of Lunar biology; being a Lunar was for life up until shockingly recently. They couldn’t even survive something as tame as Martian gravity even a few decades ago, which meant they could never visit Earth and couldn’t serve in Solar Patrol because their hearts couldn’t take the acceleration. This only changed in the past few decades in the form of an intense, and often rather painful, two-year series of treatments and acclimation.

This comes with two suggested Traits. The first is Augment, the trait we use to represent attempts at genetic engineering that go above and beyond the normal evolutionary cleanup, which can represent some of the extreme intervention and above-average effects it might have had. The other is Stiff Upper Lip, as per Rural Terrans, representing the adjusted pain tolerances you’re going to develop after undergoing something like that.

As you can see, Trait overlap is pretty common in these things, and of course these are just suggested Traits. Despite all the differences, everyone is a lot alike in most ways.

[rainbowxocs]

TW: SEVERE CHILD ABUSE AND NEGLECT.

Remember: Daisy loves you!!

Name: Daisy, Daisy, Bell!

Alt Name: Ana Liddell.

Old Patient Number: Patient 101. :)

Username: @daisydaisyanswer FRIEND ME ON ROBLOX XD

Old Special Titles: Puppet.

Nicknames: Daisy Mayzie, Monster, Eve, Your Best Friend, Real Ana , False God, False Prophet, Bad Seed, Simulacra, Lost Soul, Doll, Apple, error: 1 14 1, My Lady, Lord Daisy, Queen Daisy, Princess Daisy, Our Star, Nobody, Scapegoat, Sacrificial Lamb, Black Sheep.

Age: 25!!

Pronouns: She/They!

Sexuality: Lesbian!

Gender: Glitchgender, Lostgender!

Species: Unstable Hybrid.

Hybrid Information: Nephilim 33%, Litch 33%, Simulacra 33%.

Disorders: CPTSD, BPD, Insomnia, Autism, Pathological Lying OCD, Chronically Online (Literally), Suicide Ideation, Night Terrors, Dissociative Amnesia, Maladaptive Daydreaming.

Physical Conditions: Chronic Pain, Migraines, Data Rot.

Religion: It’s kinda weird for a god to have a religion no? I am the religion. XD.

Job: I guess you could say I’m a game developer XD.

Lives in: Hmm depends.. Sometimes I’m in my original house.. sometimes Floor 1, Section 1. Floor 9, Section 3, Subsection 1. But Irl I live in Wisconsin XD.

Speaks: English, Fae, Demonic, Angelic, Morse Code, Ciphers, Wing Dings, Leet Speak.

Height: 5’8”

Race: White.

Spirit Level: Acceptance.

Powers: Reality Manipulation, Plant Magic, Teleportation, Technology Manipulation, Hypnosis, Creation Magic, Ice/Snow Magic, "Resetting", Glitching, General Video Game Logic, Generation Loss, Computer Viruses, Banishment, Super Hearing, Divination, Flying, Star/Galaxy Magic.

Weapons: Knives, Swords.

Alignment: Chaotic Neutral.

Text Color: Pink!!!!

Main Animal: Black Kiwi Bird, Raccoon.

Hobbies: Painting, Gardening, Sewing, Singing, Sculpting, Writing, Doll Creating, Playing Pretend, Video Games, Lost Media, Xylophone, Piano.

Diet: Can eat normal human food, but due to her condition has to eat.. unconventional… animals.. occasionally…

Favorite Drink: Almond Water, Bloxy Cola, BSODA, Sleepytime Tea, Witches Brew, Grimace Shake, Grape Juice, Apple Juice.

Favorite Meal: Musubi, Bacon Soup, Cheeseburger, Sour Dough Bread, Pepperoni Pizza.

Favorite Snacks: Potato Chips, Zesty Bars, Apples, Popcorn, Flintstones Vitamins, Communion Wafers.

Favorite Candy: Bubble Gum, Gummy Bears, Halloween Candy, Chocolate Coins, Peeps.

Favorite Dessert: Black Forest Cake, Butterscotch Cinnamon Pie, Turkish Delights, Chocolate & Strawberry Icecream, Apple Pie.

Favorite Flower: Daisies.

Scent: Old TV, Decaying Earth, Plastic, Strawberry Shortcake Dolls.

Handedness: Ambidextrous.

Blood Color: Glittery Pink, Sometimes Red, Sometimes Static.

Birthday: December 20th 1999! (I am a Sagittarius!!)

Theme:

Playlist:

Fun Fact: I LOVE YOU!!!

Special Interest: It’s y o u hehehe. :) I also like Roblox and the Internet, and Veggietales!!!

Comfort Objects: Dolly, Teddy, Ducky, Gloomy Bear, Freddy Plush, Imac G3, Fuggler, Flip Phone, IBook G3, Idog, Furby, Weighted Companion Cube, Balloon, Tamagotchi.

Stims: Does a lot of computer based stims. Like resetting herself, using her generation loss power, buffering. She also likes to control things with her powers, and play with her comfort objects, also has a collection of fidget spinners.

Soul: Wrinkled Pink Mushroom

Stimboard: LINK

Moodboard: LINK

Fashionboard: LINK

Models: LINK

Renders:

(This Render was created by Zack Sinner on Roblox!)

Her Minecraft Skin: [picture soon]

Family Tree!!!:

Camilla Liddell. (My mother… I don’t know how to feel about her..)

The Cultivator. (My… Dad…? It feels weird to call him that now… after everything that happened..)

Cosmo Bell (MY REAL DAD!!)

Radio (My Adoptive Dad!)

Ana ThoroughGood. (She’s, my twin I guess… If you could even call her that.)

Friends: You! :) and Mouse!

Crush!!!!!: Eyeris Cataract (I likkkeee her. Hehe~)

Pets: Mel! (Brown, Three Eyed Cat.)

Bread!!! (Pink Patterned Wobbledog with Two Heads and a Tail.)

Unihorsey (Purple Unicorn with a Rainbow Mane and Horn.)

John! (Green Frog.)

Brief Personality: Daisy is quite odd, She seems to act like a teenager from the early 2000s, and because of that a lot of her language is incomprehensible. She is quite possessive and controlling, she was so used to being in control of every little part of her world that now that she is in the real world she has no clue how to handle it. She is trying to be normal and likable so much that it’s almost to her detriment. However she is very sweet when her thoughts don’t consume her.

Brief Backstory:

If you were to ask Daisy what her past was like, you would only get bits and fragments. She would rather bury the past than to dwell on it too much. But, A long time ago, in a place far far away. A little girl named Ana was born. Ana was born out of wedlock to her mother Camilla and an unknown father to both Ana and Camilla.

The two of them lived in a small rural town, mostly made up with farms, a church, and a few mom and pop shops around. Ana however, didn’t know about all of that. Camilla hid her pregnancy from her family and friends, and ended up moving a little ways out of town to a cabin in the woods. This is where Ana grew up for the rest of her life.

Camilla, in order to hide the child and not cause herself to be ostracized by her community: locked Ana inside the house. Ana was not allowed to go outside or go to school or do much of anything. Ana spent most of her childhood trapped in her room, as going anywhere outside of her room almost always meant some sort of punishment from her mother.

Camilla was very neglectful, It’s a miracle that Ana survived as long as she did. Ana was barely fed, one of the only things she was allowed to eat was apples because her mother never noticed them missing. Ana did not have many possessions, her mother however occasionally did give her a gift or two.

Camilla taught Ana how to read using The Bible, Ana was actually very intelligent for her age, after Camilla taught her the basics she gave up on the whole thing, but Ana was able to read the Bible cover to cover. Ana devoured any information she could get her hands on, she slowly taught herself how to draw and how to write.

Her mother would buy her crayons and paper occasionally to keep her busy, and she would draw and write stories about far off lands and princesses and unicorns. She loved to create things. Camilla eventually bought her a few toys, a teddy bear and a doll, which also helped her create stories and such.

One day, Ana was wandering around the house, and saw her mother on the computer. Ana was fascinated with it, she watched her mother from a far, until Camilla picked her up and sat her on the lap while she surfed the web.

Ana loved that computer. She would beg her mom to search up random things and go on random websites. Camilla eventually gave up her old computer to Ana when she got her new one. This opened up a whole new world for Ana, she could play games like Roblox and Animal Jam, and she could google any question she wanted without annoying her mother.

When she was eight years old, she was completely obsessed with Roblox, she loved being able to talk to other kids and play fun games. She was able to teach herself how to type by her obsessive googling and talking to other people. She would take apart the few things she owned, like a music box to see how they worked. She was fascinated with making things.

She would make Roblox games, building houses and horror games for her online friends to play. She felt seen, for the first time in a long time. There were actual people who wanted to talk with her and play with her. She would play the game for hours and hours. It gave her an escape from everything. She could ignore the hunger, she could ignore the loneliness. She was in her own little world.

She created her own little character she named Daisy Bell. After the song. Daisy could do anything. Daisy could fly, Daisy could have a family, Daisy could go to school, Daisy was everything Ana couldn’t be. Ana was just a stupid little girl, she thought.

One week, when Ana was nine years old. She and her mother got into an argument. Which was normal. But something in her mother snapped. She told Ana that she was going away forever, she was going on a vacation and she couldn’t come. Because she was a mistake. She was the reason her life had been ruined. She wish she had never had Ana.

Camilla locked Ana in her room, and left her. That was the last time Camilla would see her daughter for a long while. Ana at first, thought she would come back. This had happened before when Camilla was angry with her, but she waited. And waited. And she ran out of food. She was starving. She tried playing on her computer to ignore it, and writing in her diary.

She began to hear a voice from outside her window, it was attempting to coax her out of her room. It promised her that she was safe, and that it was a friend. Eventually the hunger got to be too much. She tried breaking down the door, but she was too weak. But then she had an idea. She googled how to pick a lock, and was able to escape her room.

So, in her pajamas, she set out for into the snowy forest around her. She wandered for what felt like hours, she was so cold. She wandered and wandered until she came across a train, with a tall shadowy figure standing in front of it.

He comforted the child as she died of hypothermia. He told her that he could give her a world of her own. That he could make her a god, he could give her friends, family, anything she could ever want. As long as she ate the apple.

She of course, accepted. What a wonderful birthday present. She thought. A world of my own. She spent her tenth birthday with what she would now know as “The Cultivator”, her new best friend, and guardian.

The Cultivator taught Ana, now named Daisy. How to use her new powers. She was able to bend reality to her will, he told her that whatever she wanted would appear to her. He asked her what she wanted to make first. She made an apple. Which amused him.

He left her alone with a large empty void. And she began to create her own world.. except.. It didn’t go well at all. Missing textures. Everything fell apart when she built it. Even the premade stuff the cultivator had made for her fell apart in her hands. She collapsed into a pile of bricks. She felt so alone. What if the cultivator got rid of her?

Someone, however. Approached her. As if to answer her loneliness. She created an “NPC”, her name was Mouse. Mouse became Daisy’s best friend, Daisy finally had someone to talk to besides the cultivator and herself. Mouse told her stories about far off lands and adventures she had been on. Mouse told her that she goes where people needed her.

Mouse would disappear in and out of Daisy’s life. Sometimes she would be gone for a few minutes, a few months, a year. Daisy began to grow up, in her own way, slowly becoming a teenager. Mouse taught Daisy how to play the xylophone, and rediscover her love of Piano. Mouse also helped her with how to make her world as semirealistic as possible. She helped Daisy make a cat companion, and taught her how trees work.

[working on the rest, unfortunately you can’t draft an already posted reference lol]

[cantalooprat]

I Like Your Pheromones

What I Liked

is this the omegaverse of my dreams, the danmei omegaverse i've always wanted to read?

duan jiayan is such a dense dumbass lmao ok it's understandable considering he's always thought he was a beta but i lowkey just felt so much pity for the ml for chasing him akjdlds ok ok but i like how thoughtful he actually is. like abt his family situation and his mother's remarriage, and how he's prob lonely inside but in the end realizes that some things just can't be measured in give and take and just does his best with what he has. and how once he got confessed to by lu xingci, he really started to consider the things lu xingci has done for him and how if he accepts now, it could be misconstrued as him accepting lu xingci's feelings and he doesn't want to lead him on. anw he's a great guy.

lu xingci is also such a good alpha good god he's gentle, respectful, sweet, but also with that repressed feral possessiveness that every reader craves for when seeking omegaverse stories to read. he is such a henpecked husband tho. he might be the alpha but duan jiayan is the one holding the reins in their relationship. i also like how he banters with duan jiayan and makes him speechless nghhhh truly the one with the brains.

yo i am so glad shen chilie isn't a second male lead childhood friend who's destined to lose. for once! he's just a normal friend! with normal concerns! and once he sees that lu xingci is good alpha material, he immediately warms up to him and his friends! u go dude!

there's no real plot it's just a fluffy highschool romcom in an omegaverse setting. i smiled a lot reading it. it's so cute! it's really cute! 

at this rate i need an actual subsection for ost, but anw the audio drama ost is also rly good! they even made one of the songs that was playing in-universe into an ost!

speaking of said ost, the moment in the wn where lxc realized his feelings for djy while the song was playing is such an iconic moment for me, whenever the ost plays i just picture that scene in my mind when djy turns around and asks if he’s good looking and lxc is like en you’re the best looking while inwardly he’s finally admitted that he likes djy ahhhhhh

What I Disliked

reading abt duan jiayan sometimes is so... he's so naive and defenseless, like when he decided not to take an inhibitor during his heat on his bday and let lu xingci do whatever bc duan jiayan loves him a lot even though shen chilie painstakingly tells him it’s dangerous n that he needs to draw some lines. it's good he met someone good like lu xingci, or else he can easily be one of those bad end shou type of char if he gave his all to a scum gong…

duan jiayan’s family background could have been explored a little more, or the author could’ve leaned more towards how he could find a home with lu xingci i feel

Notes

fak me it’s another unfinished tl i have to do the tbbf cope and parallel-read mtl and the raw /crying

the quote below actually came from the in-universe song that was playing when lu xingci realized his feelings for duan jiayan it’s kind of… cheating… but it’s an actual quote… rly…

220516 edit: adlkjfslsdf I FINALLY FINISHED IT… I MTL-ED THE REST… finished the last 3 extra chapters today, hngggg even the extras r super cute /crying /crying when lxc wanted to get married but still didn’t mark djy bc djy’s underdeveloped glands caused him to be able to have only one alpha in this lifetime, and lxc rly wants him to be sure… /crying wuwuwuwuwu i love them xingyan forever i’m so glad they’re married and happy and they even have a cat my heart felt so full reading all the extras

i like it so much i’ll prob buy the wn the next time i top up jjwxc

Quotes

You're the most dazzling The spring breeze squeezing in between the pages of a book The summer sunset floating with the scent of flowers and grass The autumn moonlight stopping under the streetlight The winter fine snow hitting against the glass window After meeting you, the wind, flowers, snow, and moon all lost their radiance

“When you’re with him, you’ll feel like every day is a happy one.”

[faranae]

Do you think it's possible, on a weird inversion of what normally happens, to technically be part off the queer community, but not feel like one is at all? So, I'm pretty sure I'm demi ace, and I've been aware of it since I was pretty much a young child (without the proper terminology of course). And every pride month, I always feel more like an ally than a part of it. I'm not bothered by it! But it always takes me by surprise to be reminded that people consider me part of the community when I just don't quite feel I am. Not because anyone has made me feel like I'm not welcomed. But I feel there's something fundamental that is part of the queer experience I've just never lived myself. I've never felt broken, never felt unloved. My family knows, and while I still get the occasional comment on how I just haven't found the right person, it's quite honestly more just a minor annoyance than anything that might make me feel bad about myself. I don't naturally gravitate to LGBTQ+ spaces and I don't feel confident speaking about queer topics because it feels like it's not my place at all. My sexuality (or lack thereof) is such a small part of my life, that I feel I've dedicated more energy to fandom than I've ever to anything ace related. While it feels like being queer is such a huge part to so many people, to me it's just a fun fact about me. I see so many things that seem to be universally experienced by the community, even if it's just the need for the sense of belonging itself. Could it be that I get that feeling from another part of my life so I just don't crave it in this one aspect? And here it's not me asking to be told that I'm valid and that I belong or any sort of reassurance. I don't know. I don't particularly feel inclined to participate, and not because I feel any contempt or hesitance about it. It just doesn't feel it's for me. And I think that's ok! I don't know if there's any true objective of me sending this to you. I guess your post just got me thinking, haha!

I hope such a short response to such a long ask* is alright, but it really does just sound to me like you're comfortable where you're at in that respect. (Hell yeah!)

I know you don't need any reassurances per se, but this was great food for thought and I wanted to take a minute to say something (sort of) on a similar matter because I know a fair number of folks on here (of all ages) are still figuring stuff out on their own. The rest of this post is more just some extra, tangential thoughts.

-

Pride, at least in terms of the LGBTQA+ community, is... A lot more complicated than we give it credit for! Not just in what it is, but also how it feels.

It can feel to some like an obligation, a "union due" of sorts. To others, it's a philosophy and subsection of the human experience to be studied. To the oppressed or liberated it can represent a call to action. To the lonely, it's found-family and/or a sense of belonging. Others still just really love the excuse to party hard and make the bigots Big Mad.

To many of these people and those with similar perspectives, Pride is active: something to be pursued, preserved, or defended. 

On the other hand, it can be just another small passive aspect of our day-to-day lives. Make no mistake, this is definitely a massive privilege, but it's still not any less important than the experiences of anyone else just because it's not sourced in hardships and oppression or some other metric. 

(Personally, I love to see it. Whether you're a community elder or a Mil-Z, it's a privilege that ours and previous generations of queer folk have been fighting for you to have the right to experience.)

So yeah! Just because we're in one "family", doesn't mean we're obligated to ship out to every gathering, or hang the family crest over the threshold, or feel a swell of pride whenever it's acknowledged. Sometimes a Smith is just a Smith (or Kowalski, Chen, Andersson, Cruz, I was aiming for common surname placeholders but you get the point).

Though this is of course just my take on it!

Thanks for reaching out Nonny, it sounds sappy but I have such an appreciation for folks willing to share when their experiences differ from a perceived status quo. You may not have needed any encouragement or validation, but I hope you don't mind my using this as an opportunity to extend that gesture to others who may need to hear it.

As always, take care of yourselves and be kind. :)

*On another, completely unrelated note: How the hell is this ask so long? I thought the ask limit was 500 characters? What? What?? How??????

[purpleyin]

Why in 2020 am I still seeing complaints about Ir*s W*st being a barista. It’s season 6 now, she hasn’t been a barista for years - that was way back in S1 and it was only a temporary job during her finishing college. A perfectly normal job someone might take while also studying. It’s like they think once a barista, she will forever be defined as a barista. Selective memory much, she’s a reporter now, and has been for seasons even if she did have a bit of break in the middle.

And what in the hell is wrong with being a barista anyhow? Hi supposedly reasonable fan, I see your elitist BS and reject it, thanks. Do these people not realise that seeing others complain at how she’s a barista, as if they think that makes her unworthy of being on T*am Fl*sh, might make people who are barista’s feel bad? It’s a job that needs doing, someone has to. And a job does not have to define your life or your worth, sometimes jobs are just to pay the bills. People can have a whole lot more to offer the world and their family/friends than what they do as a dayjob.

Not to mention, being a barista has it’s own skills that are transferable and useful in other jobs and other parts of life - things like people skills and knowing how to handle crappy customers, multitasking and keeping ontop things during rush periods to keep orders flowing. Those are just the ones off the top of my head, there’s likely more I’ve not thought of. (No, I have not been a barista myself, but I’ve worked retail and I can imagine what it’s probably like.)

Of course then the criticism tends to move to ‘but she’s not a scientist’ instead, but I don’t tend to see people complaining about that much for say, HR, or Joe, who manage to have a place on the team that complements existing skills/talents. I’d argue the team needs people who aren’t scientists to have a better rounded view and different perspective. More skills on the team is a good thing. People are just acting like it’s a perfectly rational dislike of her being on the team, which is theoretically possible to have, and yet seeing people pass through several layers of poorly thought out ‘reasons,’ that feel like clasping at different excuses to fit their conclusion, tends to leave me feeling like they’re suspect.

Other characters in the fandom usually get a pass for not being perfectly written, but Ir*s they pick apart and it totally feels like looking for excuses to make things fit with an already formed bias against her. The people spewing this can’t see their bias even when it’s pointed out to them. And plenty assume that shared interests mean I must feel the same when I don’t. I’m torn between blocking this shit and trying, sometimes, to question it, to maybe educate people a bit, but I don’t know if that even will work when people are so stuck in a certain mindset.

I’m so sick of it and this is why I find it so hard to engage with some parts of the fandom. That’s often fellow SB shippers who feel the need to tie their love of the ship to the hate of her, but not exclusively that part of fandom. There’s at least a subsection of SB shippers who like Iris and/or WA too and mostly I just try to find them, but it’s still often hard to escape this crap online in hashtags, or surprise author’s notes that completely turn me off reading anything from that person.

(Starring her name above because I don’t want this to turn up in positive tags for her when it’s salt - though it’s not salt about her but about a section of fandom still being so ugh over her character daring to exist on the show. Honestly not entirely sure how to tag this other than salt and racism. Wondering if the best response is just to make an Iris fanwork out of spite each time I see them belittling her.)

[yourultraarchive]

Using Jisho to Translate Verbs, Adjectives, and Nouns for Names

So, there was definitely a lot going on in my “Creating a Name” guide, and after a couple of asks and private messages on creating names I realized that this part deserves its own more digestible post.

In one of the asks I got, I mentioned that this section of the names guide might have gotten lost in all the background context hubbub (it’s found in the first subsection in the “Types of Names” section; the following quote is edited for brevity):

A common thing I see in people naming OCs after verbs to give them that “name that matches the quirk” quality is that they [...] just use that verb as a name, with the verb ending and all [...]. Most verbs have a hiragana character at the end which changes depending on how the word is conjugated, but for a name it’s easy to just cut that part off and just use the singular kanji. When doing that, make sure to find an alternate reading or a name reading for the kanji by itself [...].

For people who don’t know how to read Japanese, this might be confusing or hard to do. So, the following is a step by step guide on how to use Jisho.org to properly translate an English word into a name worthy of an MHA character. (Unfortunately, this post does not account for punny names, just how to use jisho to make names. See the names guide for more on punny names, though.)

Disclaimer: This is just a guide for how to use jisho in the context of creating a name as referenced on this blog/in the names guide. This is not the recommended use of jisho, nor how you would normally create names for characters in other media/fandoms... though you can if you want to.

Note: I will not be defining words like kana or hiragana in this post. Please see the names guide or google for more info!

1. Translate your word. (And also, understand how Jisho works.)

If you have a lot of ideas, translate many words. Anything related to the character’s quirk or personality, whatever works.

Using the example from the names guide, here’s what jisho looks like when you look up “dragon”:

The anatomy of the above image is as follows:

Orange: the English word you’re looking up

Blue: the Japanese word relating to the English word you’re looking up (the image only shows one entry, but there will be multiple on the actual jisho site), with “furigana” above the kanji to show you how to read/say it

Keep in mind that this word may not actually mean what you think it means, hence the next bullet point of “green”...

Green: the definition of the Japanese word (blue), which usually has the English word you looked up (orange) somewhere in there, to give you a precise idea of what the word actually means, and may even give you multiple definitions if the word has more than one meaning

Note the small grey word at the top that says “Noun”! This tells you what kind of word the entry (blue) is, and this is going to be especially important when I get to talking about verbs and adjectives...

Red: the kanji which include the word you looked up (orange) in its translation, but keep in mind that kanji themselves have multiple definitions and may not just mean the one thing you were looking for

This section might actually be the most useful to you in making names, since you won’t get caught up in all the multiple definitions of actual words, but sometimes actual words are useful, so using just the kanji list to create a name is another starting point to go from rather than using the definitions/actual words as a starting point

Check the “More Kanji >” link toward the bottom of this list if you’d rather use a kanji as a starting point for your name rather than a word (for future reference, you can also skip directly to this list by looking up your word with the “#kanji” filter: “YourWordHere #kanji”)

Check the “Details >” link in the lower right corner of the box to see more info about the kanji, its readings (kunyomi, onyomi, and nanori/name readings), and some other words that may include this kanji somewhere in its beginning, middle, or end

Now, after you translate your word, there’s a couple ways this can go:

You probably started with a noun so you have your kanji to create a name with. Skip to STEP 3!

You decided to use the kanji list at the sidebar rather than using a word. Skip to STEP 3!

Your word was an adjective or verb, so there might be more work to do. Proceed to STEP 2!

2. Cut off the kana, extract the kanji.

So, say the word you looked up wasn’t as simple as a noun. There’s probably extra kana tacked on, which isn’t really the norm in a name. So you need to cut those off.

For quick reference like in my proverb names post, these are kana!

For an adjective that’s also a noun like “白 shiro” (white), there’s no extra kana, so you’re good. But some adjectives like “楽しい tanoshii” (fun/enjoyable) and “可愛い kawaii” (cute) have kana at the end, and the same goes for verbs like  “寝る neru” (to sleep), “泳ぐ oyogu” (to swim), and “死ぬ shinu” (to die). The occasional noun will have a kana too, like “眠り nemuri” (sleep), but the same rules apply--cut off the kana!

Extra information, feel free to skip this section:

Japanese usually have two types of adjectives, “i-adjectives” and “na-adjectives”, which you’ll see in the definitions section (green from before) in jisho. The “i-adjectives” are the ones that usually have extra kana.

There’s a sort of third type of adjective, “no-adjectives”, which are basically nouns that can be adjectives too. You don’t have to worry about any extra kana showing up with these, for the most part.

There are three types of verbs, “ru-verbs”, “u-verbs”, and “irregular verbs”, but jisho calls them different things like “Godan verbs”. There are other classifications like “Transitive” or “Intransitive” and other such things listed in jisho, but you don’t have to worry about them (they’re mostly for understanding usage/grammar, which isn’t what we’re focusing on here). In regards to the “ru” and “u” verbs, verbs are categorized by how they’re conjugated. In Japanese, the ending kana changes for tense, negative, potential, etc. which is why the kana is at the end of the kanji rather than part of the kanji itself.

Now once you have just the kanji, we can proceed with creating a name as outlined in the names guide. I’m gonna illustrate what the steps look like so you have a better idea what to do!

3. For a simple name, look up the kanji with the “#names” filter.

After you’ve got your kanji, copy it into the search bar and either type “#names” after it or manually click the filter button (green in the below image) and select the “Names” option (blue in the below image).

That will give you a whole list of names, with romaji included so you know how to read the kanji. It will also tell you whether it’s a male or female given name, a family name/surname, an unspecified name (usually for unisex given names, but sometimes those kinds of names also work as surnames), or the name of a place or known public figure (the latter-most two options you should ignore--naming a character after a place is unconventional, and you really probably shouldn’t be naming characters after real life people).

To narrow down your search so you don’t have to look through all the categories you don’t need, you can use these advanced search options by typing in these tags after adding the “#names” filter:

“#surname” for surnames

“#given” for given names, unisex or first names of any gender

“#fem” for feminine/female names

“#masc” for masculine/male names

“#unclass” for unclassified names (these can be any of the above)

So if you’re looking for names for a boy with a dragon quirk, for example, you could search “竜 #names #masc” or “竜 #names #given” or “竜 #names #unclass”.

EXTRA OPTION: Homophonous Names

In the “How to Create a Name for your OC” section of the names guide, one of the tips about creating a “name that sounds like another word” name is to take the pronunciation of the name that includes the kanji you want and using a name spelled with different kanji instead. It’s really easy to use the “#names” filter on jisho to do this!

Once you find a name you like, simply take the romaji spelling (green below), put it into the search bar (red below), and add the “#names” filter. This will show you a whole list of names that sound the same but are spelled differently (blue below)! You can pick the spelling you like, but be sure to check what it actually means with STEP 4!

Anyway, this step is pretty simple, but for a name that’s more than one kanji long, proceed to STEP 4. Otherwise, see more options in STEP 5.

4. Translate the name back to see the meanings of the other kanji in the name.

So say you found a name with more than one kanji that you like, including the one you were looking up in the first place. Great, now to see what the full name actually means!

Copy the kanji in the brackets of that name (green below--note that you shouldn’t be copying the kana directly to the left of it!) and put it back into the search bar (replace the text in the red below).

After that, either type “#kanji” directly after the name or manually click the filter button (green below) and select the “Kanji” option (blue below).

You’ll be taken to a page with lots of large text and technical info on it, but the most important bit is the definition of the kanji (green below). The image only shows the first kanji of the name, but if you scroll down you’ll see the others (one example in red below).

If that’s what you want your name to mean, great, you have a name! Otherwise, you can go back to the other steps and start over, until you find a name you like.

Proceed to STEP 5 if you want to manipulate the name some more to give it some uniqueness or possibly make a pun out of it.

5. Make a name out of a combination of kanji of your choice, or find alternate kanji readings.

So you have a kanji you like, but the options in the list of names in the “#names” filter don’t really fit your character: ie. you have a dragon quirk user but you don’t want to name them just “竜一 Ryuuichi” (one/first dragon) or “竜鼻 Tatsuhana” (dragon snout) or something.

One of the things you can do is just put together 2-3 kanji that don’t actually make a “real name” and come up with your own reading for them. For instance, “竜夜 Tatsuya” (dragon night) may be homophonous with a “real name”, but the spelling is unusual and if you look it up on jisho with the “#names” filter, nothing will come up.

It’s possible to make up names like the above example by combining the the different readings of the kanji. For example the 夜 can be read “yo”, “yoru”, or “ya”. To find the readings of a kanji, you can either look in the kanji list when you’re looking up a word, or you can check out the specific kanji details to find the kunyomi, onyomi, and nanori. (All the different areas to find kanji readings are in red in the images below. Nanori is called the “Japanese names” reading in the last image, but be aware that not every kanji will have nanori available.)

(The names guide outlines this a little too, as well as list other ways to find kunyomi, onyomi, nanori, etc. and their romaji readings, but I will not be getting into that here since I’m only focusing on jisho in this post.)

Of course you have to know how to read a little kana to figure out how to pronounce the kanji and its readings, but you can either reference the kana sheet above, google or wiki, or use google translate. The image below is going to be the only non-jisho image here I promise, but this part is important for people who don’t know how to read kana so I’m including it. (Be careful not to use the actual translation, in red below. The green and blue are the kunyomi and onyomi respectively, just to show you where in the romaji reading they are, as google translate doesn’t use line breaks in it. You can see why it’s not a good idea to use the red area since it tried to translate “rou” as an actual English word “low”--this also illustrates the importance of kanji, since all of those readings technically mean “dragon”!)

Once you have your kanji readings, you can combine them however you think sounds best. For example, 竜夜 (dragon night) can be any of these given or family names (this is not a complete list, and not all of them are necessarily homophonous with real names):

Tatsuyo

Iseya

Iseyoru

Ryuuya

Ryuuyo

Ryouya

Rouya

Rouyoru

Riuya

Riuyo

Riuyoru

You can also do this to names that aren’t made-up mashed-together kanji. For instance, take the real name “竜ケ江 Tatsugae”. With alternate readings, you can use “Isekemi” as a surname and still spell it the same as the traditional “Tatsugae”. This is useful to make a name look normal but change the pronunciation to be appropriate for a pun (my example is not a pun, however--I was just demonstrating how to do it). An example of this is Mina Ashido’s name, as the surname “芦戸” is normally pronounced “Ashito”.

Alternate readings are usually how puns are made, but I won’t get into that here. Check the names guide for more in-depth stuff on that, but the info from STEP 5 is particularly useful for the “name that matches the quirk” subsection of the “How to Create a Name for your OC” section.

Congrats, you made it to the end!

Welp, that’s all you need to know about using jisho to make a name! Please check out the “Creating a Name for your MHA Character” guide that this post was made to supplement. This post was just “how to use jisho”, the names guide will really get into the meat of how to create a name befitting of an MHA character.

If anything about this post was unclear or confusing, let me know and I’ll try to clarify. Hope this helps you name your character!

Go beyond and PLUS ULTRA!

[skvaderarts]

Apocrypha Chapter Twenty Four: Discretion

Masterlist can be found Here! Thanks!

Chapter Twenty Four: Discretion

Notes: I’ve just gotta say, I LOVE the comments that I got on the last chapter! Jokes on YOU, I’m crying too! I just use humor to mask my pain like Dante because it’s my only coping method! I’m worried about V, too and I wrote this shit! *Cry laughing*. Oh I’m so sorry, V. Please forgive me!

(-~-)

The coming storm built up momentum as it coated the forest below in a heavy layer of fog and rain. The air cooled down considerably as the minutes ticked by, night settling in earnest across the region and somehow making it even more difficult to see. As he neared the edge of the clearing to make a timely rondevu with the rest of the team, Griffon couldn’t help but shake his head at the insanity unfolding before him. If he strained the reaches of his subconscious, he could swear that he could still hear Nero and Vergil protesting V’s proposal, the plan seemingly unfathomable to them. 

While the concept was sound, the actual execution of the plan depended upon variables that none of them could control. While Nero was a bit more flexible in terms of ideas presented to him, Vergil couldn’t claim anything of the sort. Minimizing dependence on outside factors was quite literally a way of life for him, and the idea that the lives of either of his sons could fall into that category practically made his blood boil. But V’s counter-argument had been difficult to turn down, especially with the prospect of being rid of the cult forever on the table. It all came down to Vergil’s willingness to tolerate a plan that he despised, but he agreed to do so against his better judgement. At the end of the day, this was the best overall method of thinning out the ranks and being free of this threat for the foreseeable future.

At least Vergil still got to cut down his enemies…

Griffon landed with a firm thud, shaking rain droplets off of the tree as he came to a stop before the rest of the group. Being the only one who was experienced with a weapon who they could afford to spare, Nico had volunteered to get everyone out of town and onto the train. She had her own undisclosed plans as to how she intended to accomplish this that she wasn’t disclosing, but that was her primary objective overall. The last two days had been a refreshing change of pace, but there was no way in hell they were staying in town with the potential things had for going catastrophically wrong. While the young mechanic doubted that the city would end up under a pile of ash and rubble like Redgrave City had, she still thought that it was a good idea to round up Patty, Kyrie, and the children and skip town. And it was an idea that the rest of the team wholeheartedly supported. Having bystanders in the line of fire was never a good policy, especially when those bystanders were family.

They were in unfamiliar territory, and fixing that as quickly as possible was a solid idea. As soon as Lady and Trish had returned from escorting Patty and Nico to the relative safety of the hotel, they would return to help back up the rest of the team. But for the moment, Griffon had the stage, and his audience was what remained of Sparda’s descendants. Well, at least those of them that were present.

“Oh boy, I don’t like anything about this plan.” The vibrant blue bird said as he shook his head, totally unsure as to how the situation he currently found himself in was going to pan out,” I got out of there just in time. That cult made off with V right after I left. I heard them say something about taking him back to their base. It has to be that cave, right?”

Dante shrugged, totally unsure as to what was going on. All he knew was that Nero had bolted back into the clearing at top speed with Vergil behind him and that his older twin looked less than pleased about whatever had happened back there. He’d stepped away for a moment to figure out where they had disappeared to, casually mentioning that he was going to figure out where they’d gone. But when Nero had returned with more than a few cuts and bruises, and V hadn’t returned at all, Dante knew that something was terribly wrong. 

Vergil was clearly on edge, despite the fact that he was doing an excellent job of hiding it from everyone around him. Well, everyone but Dante. The younger of the two knew his older twin’s mannerisms far too well for that to sway him. But at the same time, he couldn’t help but agree with the wiley bird’s assessment of the situation they currently found themselves in. The youngest Son of Sparda had precisely no idea what had happened back there and the same amount of input in the plan, but he knew that he was a part of it and he’d take the opportunity to rip Vergil a new one about it after V was safe. 

As much as he’d like to tell his frigid twin off for not explaining things to him, a part of him was actually happy that he knew he could depend on him to help him, even without asking him first. Even if Dante would have preferred that they discuss things beforehand, he was relieved to know that Vergil finally trusted him to some measurable degree. He’d been on the fence about it for a long time.

“So what’s the plan then?” Dante asked, looking over his twin pistols idly. He wasn’t so much checking their condition as he was trying to find something to do to occupy his wandering mind.” I mean, there is a plan, right?”

Griffon shrugged, flapping his wings. He was honestly just as lost as Dante was. “Your guess is as good as mine. V didn’t explain the fine details to me. He just sort of does things sometimes and I just go along with them. All he had to say was that “everything was going according to plan”. Cryptic little brat.”

Both Dante and Nero were willing to agree with that statement. Sometimes V really did do things that made them consider that fact that he might be slightly unhinged. Vergil folded his arms, clearly unamused with the entire situation. Did they really have time for pleasantries and small talk considering the situation?

“I assume he sent you to lead us back?” Vergil said as he stepped towards the edge of the woods. He didn’t strictly need the rest of them to come with him. He’d found the cave once, and he’d find it again. He had to.” That part of the forest is thick with dark magic and, as such, is incredibly difficult to navigate. Having an aerial view would be advantageous.”

Griffon nodded and took off towards the sky, double checking the trajectory they needed to follow. Vergil addressing him wasn’t something he was used to, and he got the distinct impression that Vergil was only doing so to further his own goals. Luckily for both of them, they were on the same wavelength in that regard. Everyone present wanted nothing more than to help facilitate V’s safe return and take down the cult that had seemingly developed an unhealthy fascination with him since his return from the underworld. If Griffon could help in some way, then they were glad for it. But how long could the blue bird stay away from his master?

“Well, let’s get out of here then. We can talk on the way, right?” Nero said as he followed after Vergil. “Wasting time here talking when we don’t know what they have planned isn’t going to get us anywhere or help V.” 

Dante returned his guns to the holsters and nodded in conformation. Nero made a good point. Their limbs and mouths worked in tandem. Why not use them that way? V was skilled at adjusting to difficult situations, but if the cult had magic and demons at their disposal, who knew what they could be capable of. The longer they spoke, the more Dante got the feeling that he understood the premise of the plan. And the less he liked some of the finer details of it. Giving the cult exactly what they were looking for was a good way to gain access to their domain, but to what end? How did that benefit them? After all, there was no way that Vergil and Nero would've accidentally left him behind. As he entered the forest behind them, Dante took one last look at the peaceful clearing behind them. He had to agree with Griffon. This particular mission had “bad news” written all over it.

(-~-)

Panic worry and calm vigilance melded into one tense atmosphere as everyone packed their bags in a blind rush in anticipation for the trip home. While they were shaving off almost an entire day from their trip, no one had the time to worry themselves with such trivial concerts and they rolled their belongings into messy tubes and tossed them into their suitcases. They could do this again somewhere else at a later date, but they had to live that long first. 

Lady and Trish watched the door to the room with a level of professionalism born of the kind of experience that came with a lifetime of fighting the denizens of the underworld. Under no circumstances were they going to let anything harm their companions, human or otherwise. While it was true that they didn’t tangle with humans very often and normally stuck to the more overtly demonic cases, they had been forced to take up arms against less demonic foes in the past. The only thing worse than fighting a crafty demon was fighting one that was backed by an intelligent human.

Hopefully this subsect of the cult wasn’t very smart.

“Look, Love, all you need to do is make it to the train station and head back to town. I’ll be there to back you up as soon as you arrive.” Magnolia said firmly from the other end of the phone. There was no questioning the honesty and seriousness from which her statement had been spawned.” I protect my own, and those cultists are going to rue the day they threatened you sweet girls. Stay safe until then!”

Nico nodded in agreement, not considering the fact that the older woman couldn’t see her from this end of the phone. She still had Magnolia’s number in her pocket from the card she’d given Nero before they had departed back to Fortuna with V. The young mechanic wasn’t entirely sure if she was stepping out of line by asking for help, and she didn’t care. Anything that kept the people she cares about safe was a win in her book, and she trusted Magnolia. All she could hope for was that they would arrive back in town safely and that the botanist didn’t have to reopen any existing injuries to save them. Nico didn’t know if she could live with any untimely deaths on her conscience, especially when it was someone who had shown her nothing but kindness. That, and Magnolia was basically Vergil’s only friend. Getting her killed was bound to have negative consequences.

“Don’t work about it, Magnolia. We're gonna leave here as soon as I get off the phone with ya. The train ride is only a couple of hours. Seeya then!” Nico said, trying her best to sound confident and sure of herself. She wasn’t lying, but she did have her reservations. She could practically feel Magnolia’s concerned smile through the phone as she wished her a safe trip and hung up, leaving Nico holding the receiver with nothing but the sound of the dial tone to keep her company. All she could do now was hope for the best and do what she could to help everyone get out of there safe. The gunsmith sighed and turned to the rest of the group, pleased to find that they were all packed and ready to head out. All she could do now was hope that the cultists didn’t know who they were.

“Is everyone ready to go?” Trish asked, giving the room a once over. Lady unfolded her arms and reached down to grab her luggage bag. She shared a similar sentiment. The trip had been fun, but she was ready to get the hell out of there and back to a more familiar place. At least she would have an advantage to use against her opponents back in Dante’s stomping grounds.

Everyone nodded or vocalized in agreement, trying their best to hide their uncertainty. The children were too little to comprehend the danger they were in, and to a certain degree, they were glad for that. The last thing anyone wanted was for the children to have another thing to keep them up at night.

“Yea, were good. Let’s get outta here! The train is gonna be here in like twenty minutes!” Nico said as she helped grab the bags and herd the children towards the door. Someone was going to have to pick Carlo up to keep him from lagging behind or wandering off in the commotion. She just hoped it would be someone else. She didn’t have a hand to spare.

“Okay then! You head down towards the lobby. Trish will lead the way and I’ll cover your backs. Let’s get out of here before they find us.” Lady stood out of the way and allowed Trish to leave the room, followed closely by Kyrie, Patty, Nico, and the children. Moving with a group this large was going to be a challenge.” Paying repair fees to the hotel is not going to be the thing that finally sends me into bankruptcy. Let’s get out of here in one piece, okay?”

As soon as the room was empty, Lady closed the door behind them and bolted after the rest of the group. The only straightforward path in the entire place was the route down to the lobby. If they could make it down there and out of the building, all they had to do was go a handful of blocks up the street. Then they were home free. And she was going to make sure they got there in one piece. She’d never be able to face Nero again if something happened to Kyrie or the kids, and Dante would literally go to hell and back for Patty. She couldn’t let her family down.

(-~-)

“Why are there always so many people willing to jump at the opportunity to join some sort of sinister death cult?!” Nero said as he kicked one of the cultists in the chest, knocking them off the side of the cliff they were facing towards. They wouldn’t need to worry about that guy anymore. “Like, where do all these idiots keep coming from?! Is there a super villain lackey shop or something?!”

“Because it is the nature of humans to seek power beyond their current threshold, and they latch onto those that promise to deliver that to them.” Vergil said as he came to a stop, sheathing Yamato. Half a dozen cultists that he had taken off guard toppled over in a very upsetting way, clearly no longer a factor in the current battle. “All one must do to gain the trust of another is promise them something they do not currently possess that they seek to acquire, and many will see that as enough justification to commit unspeakable atrocities.”

Nero raised an eyebrow, giving Vergil a sideways look before turning to face Dante. “Care to translate, Dante? Your brother is speaking another language again!” 

The youngest Son of Sparda had just finished off his opponent’s summon and was pursuing them. The hooded man was spouting some indecipherable nonsense about something he didn’t care to understand and throwing everything between them at the red coat wearing devil hunter in an attempt to slow his approach. In a way, Dante pitied them. They seemed to be clearly out of their minds, the presence of so much demonic power and the toll of summoning so many demons with so little training had clearly robbed them of their humanity and their sentience. All that was left of them were the shells of what had once been people. But now they were twisted beyond recognition. Despite the fact that they were human, they were more akin to a demon than any pure blooded human should be. He’s seen powerful pure blood demons that could easily pass as more human than these poor husks pretending to be living beings. No. They were like worker ants, more akin to the Empusa than anything from the human world that wasn’t an insect ought to be. And he needed to find out who the leader of the hive was and give them a heavy dose of insect repellent.

Whoever was in charge of this cult needed to be stopped before any more lives were ruined.

“You think I know? I wasn’t really listening! Nothing Vergils says makes sense to me.” Dante said as he closed in on the cultist and finished him off quickly. No need to drag things out. His life had clearly been filled with enough suffering. No need to rub salt in his wounds.” Something about how it’s easy to deceive despirate people into doing stupid things for you, if I was going to make an educated guess. Why don’t you ask him?”

Vergil finished off the last of the demons, grabbing one of the cultists around the collar and slamming him into a nearby tree with enough force to shatter both him and the sturdy oak in two. They groaned and shook their head, clearly dazed.

“You're going to tell me where the rest of your ilk took him, or things will not end well for you.” Vergil said sternly, making eye contact with the young man in the hood.” My companions are patent. I am much less so. Do not test me.”

The younger man stared at him, clearly intimidated. “ B-but Agreus will kill me if he finds out I said anything! I can’t!”

”Yes, I’m quite sure he will. That is not my problem. You should’ve put more care into who you trusted in the first place.” Vergil gave him a sideways glance, allowing a hint of his demonic power to manifest in the form of his eyes flashing an eerie red for a moment.” But I am here now, and while he might kill you, I assure you that if any harm should come to my son, you will wish that was all I did. There are worse fates. Trust me.”

A visible look of horrified shock crossed the cultist as his blood ran ice cold. It was evident to anyone that could see him that he took Vergil’s threat to heart. With a sigh, he raised a shaky hand and pointed in the direction of the cave, barely hiding his worry. In that moment, he was more afraid of Vergil than he had been of anything in his entire short life. Not only was he sure that the Darkslayer could kill him, he knew that he wouldn’t hesitate to do so.

“Follow that p-path towards the interior of the cave. The part you can see here is only the mouth of a greater cavern that stretches several miles under the forest. At the end of the left fork is the cave you're looking for. You can’t miss it! They took him that way, I swear! Something about Master Agreus wanting to understand “what the dark lord saw in him”. I don’t think they plan to kill him, though. No. Master Agreus might be our leader, but he answers to a much higher power. A terrifying power. And that power is what is after that kid. We just do what they tell us to. I’m sorry, I didn’t know they would do something like this. I didn’t sign up to kidnap people! None of us did.”

Vergil yanked the younger man away from the tree and forced him in the direction of the woods before releasing him with a forceful shove. The younger man glanced at him for a moment, wrapped in confusion as the Darkslayer allowed Yamato’s blade to peak out of its scabbard. “Leave before I come to my senses.”

“Your… not going to kill me?” The older teen asked, clearly shocked by his decision. If he had been in Vergil’s place, he wasn’t sure what he would’ve done to the man who had helped kidnap his child.” What if I’m lying.”

“Then you're a fool and you should spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder for me. Now go before I bathe my blade in your blood and leave your corpse here for the wolves.” Vergil said, far beyond the limit of his patience. Was this foolish boy actually going to stand there and look a gift horse in the mouth? Humans were truly something else…

“T-thank you! I hope you find him.” The young man said as he took off running in the direction of the forest. Vergil doubted his ability to navigate in the vast darkness, but he’d made his way out there so there was no way of knowing. Regardless, he was no longer the eldest Son of Sparda’s problem. As the young man disappeared into the darkness, Vergil turned in the direction of the cave and his two companions, both of which seemed genuinely surprised at his decision. Vergil half groaned and passed them, heading into the cave. Dante and Nero shared a glance at one another before following him.

“So Vergil, why didn’t you…” Dante started, unsure of how to approach the topic in a way that wouldn’t reignite his twin’s barely contained blood lust. It seemed that his older brother possessed more restraint than he gave him credit for.

Vergil stopped for a moment, glancing over his shoulder at Nero. While his response was a result of Dante’s inquiry, his response was meant more for his youngest son than his twin brother. “... I don’t kill children, Dante. I see no need to elaborate further.”

With that, Vergil continued towards their objective. It had been entirely too long since they had heard from Griffon, and Vergil was admittedly concerned for what that might mean for his oldest child. Hindsight is twenty-twenty, and as such, Vergil loathed the fact that he had agreed to go along with this foolish plan. But he felt the need to allow Nero and V to prove that they were as capable as he believed them to be. After all, they were descendants of Sparda and they had worked together to bring him down in Redgrave City. Not just anyone was capable of doing something like that.

He just hoped they would all survive long enough to regret what they had done.

(-~-)

Oh, the last two three chapters have been a blast to write! This is the kind of melodramatic shit I live for! Thank you so much for reading this chapter and have an awesome day! I’m thrilled that you’ve all stuck around this long. Thanks for all the love!

[whetstonefires]

I have wandered into your tumblr and I want to know absolutely everything about your ideas for Earth 3 Impetus and Motion. EVERYTHING. Possibly the least relevant part of that is the family line, as Earth 3 often has really skewed versions of the characters. Would the first Johnny Quick even have a speedster grandson when he was killed and his blood used to power his successors?

Oh, cool ask! Thank you!

😄 I’m very happy to talk about this but I’m afraid you may be disappointed, because I’m Doing It Wrong. I’ve been working off and on on a bespoke Earth-3 for the past…several years. Production has slowed but not stopped. It’s up to over 300,000 words on AO3 at this point.

The issue that set me off was that tendency to skew; I didn’t like it. I found that, most of the times DC had built into Earth-3 before rebooting again, there were two countervailing currents leading writing decisions. On the one hand to make things As Wrong As Possible compared to the main timeline, and on the other to just make them…arbitrarily different.

Lois Lane is Superwoman, evil counterpart of Wonder Woman, for some reason, woop-de-do; this fits under both categories.

This process worked neither according to the ‘timeline that diverged into a Bad Timeline at some point in the distant past but somehow contains versions of the same people in the same place’ premise of the original Star Trek ‘Mirror, Mirror’ episode, nor does it work according to any direct cosmic principle of inversion, although some of the early versions claimed to.

(See: Mirror Christopher Columbus discovered Europe and then later Evil George Washington conquered England for the American Empire, what even guys. 😩)

Also Earth-3 so transparently existed almost every time it was reinvented as a place to get villains from, and to look bad in comparison to the main timeline, without any attention to making it work internally, which I thought was a damn waste of a cool concept. ‘A damn waste of a cool concept’ drives a lot of fanwork lol.

So for my world, I had the slightly conflicting goals of working as close to that amorphous thing ‘canon’ as possible, and of making the setting stand on its own, as a superhero setting, with internal causality and more or less the usual sort of hero-versus-villain logic. So I inverted the alignments of only superheroes and supervillains, and kept as much as possible of their backstories intact.

This means my stuff doesn’t map onto any canon Earth-3, especially not the one from Forever Evil because that came out after I’d already gotten all the big things pinned down. 😅 Some people get upset about this and come yell at me about how i.e. Owlman is Thomas Wayne Junior. But since I always saw that particular concept as a huge cop-out from looking at how few alterations it takes to turn Bruce Wayne into a spectacular villain, I was like ‘nuts to that’ from the start.

If you’re cool with my relationship with canon, on we go.

-&-

So, Impetus and Motion! I don’t remember what I said on that one post where I remember blathering about it, so forgive me if I repeat myself. ^^

Lineage is the same as canon, technically. I’ll go over it; if you don’t care just skip ahead to the next subsection. 😄

Mirror Barry Allen, the Dash, got his villain name for his signature kill technique of grabbing someone, hyperaccelerating them, and then letting go at the right moment that they get dashed against something immovable and go splat. He dashes people against things.

(His eventual sidekick, Blaze, got his for liking to make things combust by accelerating their molecules. The combination makes them sound like a pair of racehorses, which they did not intend and are very annoyed by when it’s pointed out.)

The Dash is pretty scary, especially because most of the ways he abuses his speed for profit are so low-key nobody even notices (i.e. screwing with the stock market) and he doesn’t need to be a supervillain. He just likes it.

His public villain profile is relatively low for the level of danger he poses, tho, because his town is infested with really dumb superheroes who beat him embarrassingly often, when he actually turns up to fight or is successfully ambushed. And with the occasional exception the scale of his crimes is fairly small compared to i.e. Ultraman.

Keeping him imprisoned is ridiculously difficult, tho. He can’t be completely depowered (because the Speed Force is external to him and all the power dampeners that are used assume they’re trying to shut off something generated internally) and he’s really smart, so it took years of battles to keep him long enough to transfer into a proper cell even, and longer to get an unblurred look at his face.

His secret identity survived so long that Barry Allen was there to comfort Iris West after she was targeted by the Dash on several occasions, and they were married by the time he got ultimately unmasked.

She left him after that and moved back to the future, which she was still from because that’s hilarious, but he eventually tracked her down and promised to reform if she’d take him back. This obviously fell apart eventually, but not until after the twins were born.

I haven’t mapped out the mirror Thawne line. I assume the Thawnes with healing powers who inadvertently adopted Barry’s twin were much nicer in this timeline but idk if he ever became Cobalt Blue or what. I hope he lived to old age. Apparently there have been multiple Cobalts Blue? Idk idc, Flash continuity what even are you.

Everyone thought Eobard Thawne was nuts, but he actually did go back in time and stop the Dash from destroying the world with nukes in a fit of rage, his historical analysis, method of giving himself speed powers, and time machine were all successful. He may additionally suffer from some degree of psychosis, but he wasn’t wrong. (His little brother still exists in this universe because good!Eobard wasn’t the type to manipulate time to erase inconvenient family members. He also doesn’t have the title Professor because he never got tenure, so he just goes by Zoom.)

-&-

Bart is still Don and Meloni’s kid. Frankly I don’t understand those two in the normal timeline, so it’s hard to construct their mirror versions in any depth or even decide whether they should get mirrored. (Probably not tbh.) But I don’t exactly need to, because the resulting Bart is very much the same and thus doesn’t really know them. He was still born with his weird speed glitch that caused him to be raised in a simulation, and eventually time-traveled to un-glitch him.

The difference is that he’s not a nice kid. He’s a two year old who looks twelve and has received all his socialization from reasonably good AI in a world that was not real. Where nothing had consequences. Where nobody was real.

He’s very frightening, is Impetus. Impetuous, wildly powerful, selfish–oddly sweet, occasionally, in the ‘gay and innocent and heartless’ way of Peter Pan, but probably even more likely than Peter to knife someone. He’s so delighted the first time he eats actual ice cream, as opposed to a simulated version, but the ice cream stand is now on fire.

Mirror Bart isn’t so much cruel or even un-empathetic as solipsistic. He’s arrested in the state of an intellectually advanced toddler playing, what’s that game called, the one where the objective seems to be getting in car chases a lot? When was the last time they made a new one, I feel like I haven’t heard it mentioned in ages, it’s a dead franchise isn’t it I’m old. Grand Theft Auto! That’s it. He doesn’t just not understand that danger is real, the way Impulse started out. People aren’t.

Impetus is easily bored and surrounded by NPCs. It gets ugly, sometimes.

He also time-travels a lot more frequently than normal Bart, because he doesn’t really get attached so he doesn’t try to maintain a normal life of any kind, so he pops up all over the timestream.

Jason Blood hated him personally long before Bart had any idea who he was; they have a villain rivalry plagued by causality issues and closed time loops that is alternately epic and stupid as fuck.

And then there’s Thad. Thad’s had a less awful time than he did in canon, I think–President Thawne is not technically a supervillain so he’s probably about the same as in the original timeline, but even assuming Meloni and Don are still out of the picture (probably it’s Barry’s fault in this dimension?) raising a kid as a ‘defense mechanism against a supervillain’ calls for less extreme brainwashing fuckery than raising one to hunt down a superhero.

So he probably behaved a bit more like a reasonable grandparent, simply because the context incentivized him to emphasize concepts like duty and loyalty more, and hatred less. He might even have been able to go public with Thad’s existence, depending on the spin he came up with. Among other factors.

But it was still a depressing, isolated, dehumanizing way to grow up, and it went on a long time, because as per canon Thad has the opposite problem from Bart in terms of how he passes through time. Motion is a 40-year-old man with a 12 year old’s body and approximate life experience.

Thad was already So Tired when he finally got out into the world on his own, and once he encountered Impetus he learned pretty quickly to both pity and fear him.

Even when Thad tries to avoid Bart and just have a life, Bart always crashes back into his existence again, and in the meantime he feels guilty. Because even if he could completely shake off having been raised to see countering Impetus as his whole reason for existence, he’d still feel a lot of personal responsibility to try, because he has the ability to stand up to him in a way almost no one else does, and he knows Bart’s out there resulting in casualties.

Due to all the time travel involved, even having just defeated Impetus doesn’t mean he’s not still out there at an accessible point in the timestream, needing to be stopped.

Impetus results in Motion the way Inertia resists Impulse. They’re very much locked into an action-and-reaction framework that does not even a little bit help with Thad’s clone identity issues.

Except for how the amount of time Thad spends saving people from Bart has slowly created a fairly large body of people over the course of history who know them as distinct entities, and like Thad a lot better. 

Good feels good. ^^ It’s not necessarily the case that this happens, obviously, but with their alignment swap they also ultimately exchanged who’s defined by isolation. It takes Bart a long, long time to even understand that he’s lonely.

[heardrpc-blog]

SECRETS MASTERLIST

i think we’re all tired of having our characters have the same dirty little secrets. so here are some realistic secrets you can use for your characters. i am putting an overall trigger and mature warning on this. they’re in the sections of: lighthearted, hardcore, family, involving others, criminal, embarrassing, sexual, romantic, and other..

scared your secret isn’t creative - change it up! it mentions drugs? change it to sex or alcohol. something mentions family? turn that into a romantic secret! the options are endless if you change details.

lighthearted: these secrets aren’t very harmful, but they’re still secrets. they’re for characters you can’t exactly imagine being bad human beings on the side.

hardcore: these are very hardcore secrets. these are your dirty, life ruining secrets. these could be the ones to get someone accost from their friend group and family.

family: these are family secrets, etc. these are the things nobody outside of the home is supposed to see. 

involving others: these are secrets you could request a character for or get another character involved with the secret. these are any group secrets, etc. THIS HAS SUBSECTIONS OF ROMANTIC & PLATONIC.

criminal: these are for those types that love to do illegal things. there definitely are illegal things in the hardcore and maybe some other sections, but this is where the real root of illegal activity is.

embarrassing: these are for the personal dirty little secrets. these are mostly harmless, but embarrassing. this is more for those who still have silly little habits rather than life ruining secrets.

sexual: this is anything involving sex, sexuality, kinks, and everything in between. this is definitely by far the most nsfw. 

other: this is anything that doesn’t fit into the above categories.

LIGHTHEARTED:

i cheated on every test i’ve ever taken.

i cry out of fear of going to hell every night.

i troll people online constantly. i have nothing better to do.

i never give my real name at any stores/starbucks/etc.

i tell people i donate all the time, but i ever have.

i cry whenever i have to leave my pets.

i inherited a lot of money, but haven’t told anyone.

i make fake ouija boards that move on their own.

i pretend not to speak english constantly to avoid being bothered.

i go to car shops constantly & take cars out on a test drive for fun.

i have to google how to do everything for my job.

i read peoples texts over their shoulder constantly.

i dropped out of college, and never told my parents.

anytime i do drugs i pretend its my first time doing them so people will pay attention to me

i work in IT & know everyone’s secrets because i can see what they do at work.

i lie to people about what i’m doing all the time so i seem more interesting.

i only do basic courtesy things when non-strangers are around (hold doors open, say thank you, etc)

i lie about my first kiss to make it seem more excited.

i pretend to be colorblind to seem more interesting.

i buy 2 movie tickets so the clerk won’t think i’m going alone.

i cry constantly over problems that aren’t even mine. i’m scared i’m too soft for life sometime.

i text people in the middle of the night & say its because i can’t sleep, but i’m really just scared they died

i can never “stop” in the middle of a fight and decide to talk later because i’m petrified of the person or myself dying in between now and then

i lie about voting because i’m scared i won’t know how to work the machine.

i run an anonymous tumblr blog about something i’d never tell anyone irl.

i pretend to like things all the time just because other people do. 

i got plastic surgery, but haven’t told anyone because i want them to think its natural

i’m starting to form religious beliefs, but i’m scared my atheist friends won’t approve.

i go to aa/na meetings to make friends. i don’t excessively drink or do drugs.

i go to a pet psychic whenever my pet is in a mood.

HARDCORE:

i know the killer in a murder, but i’m too scared to say.

i pretended to have a mental illness to fit in.

i forged my transcripts to get my current job.

i accidentally killed someone by not properly fixing their carbon monoxide detector like i said i would.

i tried to kill myself. i’m blackmailing my parents/ex-friend/ex-partner/other family & have been for two years.

i took the fall (or had someone take the fall) or a crime i/they didn’t commit.

i run an anonymous hate site/hate blog/gossip blog.

i ratted out a criminal so i wouldn’t get in trouble for the drugs they sold me.

i found a dead body when i was a kid, but didn’t know it till later in life.

i was the person to clean my dead friends things & found out he was addicted to drugs/a murderer/etc & never told anyone.

i knew someone was going to kill themselves, and didn’t stop them.

i paid someone to beat this girl/guy/person up because i hate them.

i falsely accused someone of assault.

i lie about everything all the time. everyone thinks i live a completely life then i do. i lie about my likes, interests, hobbies, and history. i don’t want to seem boring.

i gambled every cent of my savings away.

i tell people my family are very rich, elite people but they’re actually drug addicts.

while everyone else was going through normal teenage drinking rebellions - i was extremely violent.

i’m 200k in debt.

i break into hotel rooms to sleep some because i’m homeless. 

i have a mental illness, but completely lie about it to my friends and family. i’m seen as someone who is strong and capable, and i don’t want people to know i’m really not okay.

i pretend to be blind so people will give me their seat on the train.

i go to random peoples funerals constantly for the free food. if people ask - i make up some vague connection to them based on what i see around their funeral.

i tell people that my mom died from cancer. i just don’t talk to her anymore. i’m ashamed at how awful she is.

i found out one of my friends died. so the first thing i did was go to their house, into their room, and stole a bunch of their stuff. 

i pretend to be sick and hurt all the time to get the attention of those around me.

i started something as a prank, and its gotten out of control. i spray painted weird symbols on the road, and now everyone in town thinks it has something to do with the random murder on the other side of town.

i lie about being wealthy so i can hang out with rich people. i use buy resold fancy clothes online.

i stole money from a homeless person.

FAMILY: 

i pretend to have religious beliefs because i want my parents to love me.

i didn’t tell my parents i’m in recovery from drugs/alcoholism.

nobody talks about my relative that is special needs. we pretend they don’t exist.

i want my family dead.

i found photos of my parent(s)/sibling having sex and put them on the dinner table during Christmas for everyone to see.

i almost let my younger sibling get killed by setting them on a ledge of our balcony. i caught them moments before they fell. 

my parents had me drop off my sibling at a fire station. i’ve never heard from them again. i barely remember them.

my parent is a serial killer. i know. i haven’t told anyone.

my father committed a hit and run when i was in the car. this was ten years ago. i never told anyone.

my distant family is in a cult. i didn’t find out until a year ago when i pushed to ask more about my non-immediate family.

my dad/mom is gay. i caught them with someone of the same sex. my other parent has no idea.

my parents don’t know i’m gay/bisexual/a lesbian/pansexual/etc.

one of my parents is living with a double life. i found out about their other life, family, kids, etc. i haven’t told them i know, and haven’t contacted their other family.

my mom shot my dad. i pretend to not have seen her cleaning off the gun.

my uncle was accused of rape, and left the country. 

my grandfather didn’t die years after my grandmother. he died two minutes after he shot her, and then shot himself.

i saw my mom had a kink party. i ran out before she saw me.

my parents used to be drug dealers. i found out when my friends parents wouldn’t let their kids hang out with me....because their parents bought drugs from me.

my parents killed their animals growing up when they annoyed them.

i wish my family was less perfect. i feel bad when they talk and i can’t relate at all.

i constantly feel in debt to my mom. i was an awful child.

INVOLVING OTHERS:

i catfish people frequently.

i check my partners phone when they’re in the shower.

i made my best friend/partner hate me by acting awful because i knew they’d leave me first.

i will never love anyone as much as my first love. they’re second best.

i cheated on a past partner.

i’m cheating on my current partner.

i only hate my enemy because people expect me to now. 

i keep all major secrets from my partner so they don’t leave me.

i hate my partner. they’re a pain on my life, and drive me nuts constantly.

my best friend is a compulsive liar. i just ignore it because i love her so much.

i know my best friend runs a hate/gossip blog. as long as she doesn’t talk about me - i don’t care.

i only stay with my current partner because i don’t want to be on the dating market again.

i stopped dating with someone because they wouldn’t hold the door open for me.

you know how when talking about best friends you talk about which friend would help you bury a body? my best friend kept that secret.

i’m secretly unhappy with all of my friends success. i feel left behind.

i really dislike most of my friends. they’re all annoying. i just need people to talk to so i deal with them.

my partner buys so much useless shit then forgets about it. i sell it all online.

i have sex with my best friend.

i’m secretly in love with someone else.

i’m crushing on my best friend super hard. i don’t know how to tell them.

i love my straight best friend.

CRIMINAL:

i used a prostitute to lose my virginity.

i do drugs.

i hired a hit on someone i hate.

i steal non-necessity stuff constantly from stores despite being able to pay.

i committed a hit and run.

i hack for fun. i don’t do anything malicious. i just like finding out secrets.

i broke out of prison.

i steal from grocery stores all the time. i do the self checkout, click ‘cancel’, and walk out.

once my friend was speeding 80 in a 65. when i got pulled over - i forced myself to throw up so he’d think my friend driving was speeding because i was sick. we got out of the ticket.

when i was a kid i used to steal cars - drive around them for a bit, and then just dump them somewhere. they almost always got found.

i’ve stolen from every national park i can.

i used to rob graves.

i embezzled a few million dollars.

i’ve never paid property tax.

the only reason i have a “normal” job is to cover up my illegal job.

i’ve stolen from a church.

EMBARRASSING:

i go to a psychic for every decision, but don’t want to tell anyone about it.

i’m scared of the dark.

i spend all day on neopets/gaia online/etc.

i cried when club penguin shut down.

in my head i still pretend inanimate objects talk to me.

i still run up the stairs whenever i turn a light downstairs off.

i sleep with stuffed animals because i’m scared not to.

SEXUAL:

i run a very popular nsfw porn blog.

i’m addicted to masturbating/porn

i pretend to have sex all the time, but haven’t in a year.

i’ve participated in a glory hole multiple times.

i fuck people constantly for validation that i’m pretty/handsome/great.

i post nudes on reddit all the time so people will send me compliments.

my parents tried to hire a hooker for me when they found out i was asexual.

i go to kink parties semi-frequently for fun.

i’ve hooked up with more people than i can count.

i’ve only slept with one person, but i feel everyone it is more.

[cartoonloverstuff]

Are you still doing Sing Headcanons? How about some for: Meena and Ash, maybe they were high school friends. Meena's Family Meena's childhood and middle/high school life. Would Meena get along with Rosita's Piglets? What kind of things elephants do in real life do you see Meena's Family doing? Anything about Meena's dad? Do you see her being into anime? Is it too much, if it is, I'm sorry. So, think you can give headcanons about Those? Maybe the sequel will do more w/ them being animals.

Oooooh! So many wonderful Meena questions~💜 this gonna be loooong. Okay, lets do this!!:

Ash and Meena:-I don’t see them being very close in high school. I figure even if they did go to the same high school they’d fall into different crowds. Ash would still think she’s happy as Lance’s backup/girlfriend and hanging with a bunch of ‘edgy,’ judgy wannabes. Meanwhile, Meena would keep mostly to herself save one or two friends she made through church or had known as a child.-After the events of the movie, I think of the as getting pretty close. Ash socially adopts Meena and does stuff like order her coffee when the elephant is being shy and drag Meena out to parties and stuff.-Over time, Ash becomes fiercely protective of Meena. (Ash: “This is Meena. She’s small and adorable and must be protected at all cost!” Meena: “…I’m like 20 times your size.”)-On the flip side, Meena and her family do a lot for Ash while she adjusts to life without Lance. Ash doesn’t like being alone in the apartment for too long so she spends a lot of nights at Meena’s (which is cool, Meena’s family adores Ash, especially Meena’s mom) and Meena will also stays over-night at Ash’s a lot.-Ash has seems all of Meena’s baby pictures courtesy of Meena’s grandmother. Meena was not amused.-Meena sees Ash as her cool friend who has a ton of other cool friends and sometimes wonders why Ash spends so much time with her. And while it’s true Ash knows a lot of people in town, most of them are friends of a friend or just folks she knows. If any of them were to say they were moving, Ash might feel kinda sad. If Meena said she was moving, Ash would probably cry for an hour then threatened to super glue the elephant’s feet to the floor. (Ok, maybe that’s s bit extreme, but u get the idea)-Meena helps Ash with her music writing by reading/singing her stuff and suggesting lyrics or ideas for songs when the porcupine has writer’s block.Meena’s childhood/school life/family:-Meena was a pretty well mattered kid for the most part. But she would often get in trouble for things like getting into her mother’s nail (hoof?) polish and making a mess or getting into candy she wasn’t suppose to.-She always loved singing and would sing along to every Disney song for her family, but would become quiet and shy around strangers and hide behind her mother/grandparents.-Meena had a blanket that she carried around with her everywhere until she was 6. (She still has said blanket in her room.)-Meena was a pretty happy child until puberty hit and she started feeling really self conscious about her body and, to a lesser extent, things like her ability to make friends or seem cool. She started feeling like a fat loser. The reality that she was an elephant and could never look like the skinny animals in every movie/magazine/advertisement ever bothered her more and more as she went through middle and high school.-Meena’s family is the type that has a bunch of family traditions. Silly things like on someone’s birthday they make pancakes in the shapes of the numbers for the age. They’re also the kind of family that make like a million cookies during the winter holidays.Rosita’s piglets:-I would think Meena would be good with kids and probably have experience babysitting. She’s better with infants through. Although she is fond of the energetic piglets, they’re normal too much for her to handle on her own. Her and Ash make a good team for he piglets became Meena has the patience and Ash is more comfortable with raising her voice and telling them what to do. When Meena is with the piglets, she normal sits with a subsection of them that don’t feel like running around and reads stories to them.IRL elephants. Time for some fun facts about elephants!:-Elephant are very sensitive and caring. If a baby elephant cries, the whole family comes over to check on it and give comfort. Meena was spoiled with love and attention as a baby. (And honestly still is.)-Elephants have soft padding on their feet that let them walk in near silence, despite their size. Ash found this out on her first visit when Meena’s mother appeared behind and scared the daylights out of her.-Also learned that elephants purr like cats…do what you wish with this info.Meena’s father:-I heard something about a elephant in a police uniform in the photos in the background of Meena’s house, so I thinks that’s her father.-I have two headcanons I jump between, depending how angsty I’m feeling;1) He passed away when she was 12 from natural causes.2) He left her mother and Family when Meena was 8. He tried to get in touch with Meena a couple of times since, but she didn’t want to see him and her mother threatened to make it legal hell for the father. After Meena sings on TV, her father again tried to reach out to her, only to find Meena has changed her name to her mother’s maiden name and is an adult (legally) who still feel he walked out on her. Him coming back just gives Meena a panic attack.(I like the first one a bit better)Anime:-Meena owns a collection of adorable manga stashed in her room from when she was a bit younger. All cutesy stuff like lucky star (or the Sing universe equivalent) or adorably cheesy romances.-She never full on otaku but she had a weakness for cute romantic stories. -Will sometimes watch corny anime with Ash for kicks and giggles. —Ok @mrwyx! Sorry this took so long!! I have a lot of feelings for my sweet elephant baby, so this came out long. (I’m on mobile and don’t know how to make it 'read more’)As always, any and everyone is welcome to add stuff!

[rainbowxocs]

SPECIES INFO: Fae

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INFO: Fae are unique in that, despite their similar appearance to humans. They do not originate from humans. Fae come from the pure magic that comes from nature.

Fae are usually born from trees, flowers, corals, etc. and have a natural magic within them. They make fantastic spell casters and magicians.

ANATOMY: Fae are very tiny. Even in their human forms they tend to be shorter. They usually are around the size of bugs or a small bird depending on the type.

Most Fae have wings. Which usually either take the shape of a bug or are transparent and holographic.

Fae usually have pointed ears and markings on their skin. And are naturally a little bioluminescent and glittery. They also like to make clothes out of things like flowers and leaves.

Fae tend to be vegetarian but do have sharp teeth to defend from predators. Or just to bite people. They tend to eat sugary things like fruit, pastries, honey, wine, etc.

POWERS: Fae can usually fly.

All Fae can talk to animals and usually all of them have some sort of elemental ability like being able to control flowers or water.

Fae have some of the purest magical abilities that any creature can have. Due to their deep connection to nature. They are able to learn almost any type of magic on this earth.

Fae are natural shapeshifters and can shift into animal forms and human forms, and will sometimes take over other peoples form to prank them.

STRENGTHS: Fae are incredibly powerful. Having both a strong attachment to nature but also the Fae Rules. Fae are known to be tricksters who are able to trick humans into giving them things like their name or their soul. However they don’t do these things like for example demons do. They just do it for funsies.

WEAKNESSES: Fae are weak to certain types of plants like St Johns Wort and Four Leaf Clovers, Bells (due to the loud noise hurting their tiny ears), Iron and Silver also hurt Fae especially horseshoes. Salt also works against Fairies.

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SUBSECTIONS:

Fairy: One of the most common types of fae. A fairy has two forms. Their big/human form and their tiny normal form. Fairies in their normal form are about the size of a butterfly.

Fairies are known for their beautiful wings. Often having pretty patterns like butterflies or moths, or even dragon flies.

Fairies look the most like humans as well, however they have pointed ears and colorful markings on their skin.

Fairies are usually in charge of nature like activities in the feywild. Like growing flowers, painting butterfly wings and such. They are also the friendliest to interact with if you are a human. However make sure to mind the Fae rules even with them.

Changelings: Born without wings. Changelings usually take the place of a human baby or child when the Fae steal one. So the parents don’t get suspicious. They look almost exactly like humans except their aura is just.. a little off..

Humans who grow up in the feywild are also called changelings.

Pixie: Pixies are the smallest and most chaotic of the fae. They are about the size of a fly. And their entire mission is to just CAUSE CHAOS. They will steal your shoes. They will steal your left sock. They will steal the remote. They do not care all they want is chaos.

Elves: Elves are the biggest out of the Fae. They tend to be about the size of a bird. They do not have wings and have long pointy ears. Usually they are in charge of protecting the royal family or building things like houses and furniture. Since they are bigger they are also a bit stronger than most fae.

They also have a little bit of a bigger brain so they have two iq points in their favor.

Seelies: The ghosts of Fae. Also known as Will o The Wisps. These shiny glowing lights will lure people into the feywild. They have a sort of hypnotic quality to them. You can’t look away.

Mimic: Mimics are an interesting type of Fae. Have you ever been in an dungeon and see a bright shiny chest, but when you open it, it has teeth and tries to bite you? That’s a mimic.

Mimics aren’t always violent though. Some mimics just genuinely want to be what they are mimicking. And will do such a good job at it.

However other mimics are more violent in nature depending on who they are.

Some Mimics are able to speak but some only have limited range of words they can say.

Mimics can be a wide range of sizes, from human sized to even ladybug sized. They tend to have smaller wings than most Fae so they can hide better.

Dryads: Do you ever hear the trees whispering to you? That’s the dryads speaking to you. The trees in the feywild are very old and very wise, they are kind as long as you are kind to them.

Mushies: Little Fae shaped like mushrooms. These guys are the real keepers of the feywild. Hence why mushroom circles teleport you there. They have exactly 0 brain cells, they toddle about and are incredibly adorable. All the mushrooms are alive in the Feywild.

Plantlings: A general term used for the plant people of the feywild. Excluding Dryads and Mushies, Plantlings can be flowers, bushes, and any type of plant. They tend to have humanoid features with plant like bodies.

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EXAMPLES:

Ana Thoroughgood. (Mimic)

[dulcidyne]

[ME:A] Experiments in Diplomacy: Testing

There’s nothing in the Interspecies Diplomacy subsection of the Initiative handbook that covers sharing a tech lab with an angara who can kill her in her sleep. She knows, she’s read every page. Twice. //Jaal x Ryder // SFW // 2023 words // Pre-Voeld Spoilers // Ao3 Link Previous chapters: [1][2][3] Inertial dampeners kick in the moment the Tempest drops out of FTL on the fringe of the Nol system and a discordant metal warble shudders through the frigate, plucked from every bulkhead and bolt by invisible fingers of momentum. Se-ah stops talking. All it takes is one mechanical failure. One corroded mass effect field generator, one microscopic hull fracture, one warped bolt. And then, with no warning beyond the ominous groan of the hull, the ship would shear apart like tinfoil and spill all of them out to asphyxiate in a beautiful ocean of starlight.

It won’t happen. SAM once gave her the infinitesimal probability of spontaneous hull failure down to all 23 decimal places. There are backup systems for the backup systems, sensors and alarms and pre-flight scans that would catch any corrosion, fracture, and warp accumulated over time. In reality, it wouldn’t be one mechanical failure, but hundreds. But her heartbeat still picks up and her breath is coming faster and harder. Adrenaline builds up on her tongue, a tingling acidic zip. She grins.

“Alright ground team. Mission ready in the hour, we make planetfall in thirty,” she says and SAM transmits her voice to the ship-wide comm.

“Stop grinning, you maniac.” Liam elbows her in the side. His lopsided smile is straight of out Scott’s playbook of sibling affection and it’s both comforting and painful to see. Their personalities are a lot alike and she has to stop herself from indulging in too many comparisons--they aren’t fair to Liam or to Scott.

“Don’t worry, I’ll take good care of Maggie,” Liam says, misinterpreting her pained wince. The stroke he gives the tech bench is downright provocative and she slaps it away with a laugh.

“You taking care of Mags means you not touching her. I just finished fixing all her settings after the last time.”

“Yeah, yeah.You’re in an exclusive relationship with a machine, you do know that right?”

“I’m just giving Lexi interesting material for her next paper.”

Liam laughs and backs towards the door, still facing her when it opens up. “Keep telling yourself that. You’re the only one who believes it.”

Jaal steps inside behind him and Liam thumps him on the back as he walks past. “Hey Jaal. You stay safe down there too. Talev do shena.”

Stunned silence descends between the three of them. Jaal halts, momentarily taken aback, Se-ah bites back a breath and Liam’s gaze swings between the two of them, questioning until her laughter finally bursts out of her. She has to grip the edge of the tech bench, she’s laughing so hard.

“What? I just said good luck.” “That is not what you said,” she informs him between gasps, bringing a hand up to wipe a tear gathering at the corner of her eyes. Her grasp on Shelesh is feeble but she’s well beyond Liam and most of the crew. When it comes to languages, she’s a fast learner, having grown up in a household with a family member whose birth pre-dated infant translator implants. She also has the benefit of peppering their resident language expert with questions at every odd hour. And an AI that can inform her when he is pulling one over on her.

It’s no surprise when this revelation rolls off him, or when the grin darting up in the corner of his mouth has the air of begrudging admiration. The thing she loves best about Liam is that he’s not picky about which end of the joke he ends up on. He likes a laugh and doesn’t take ones at his expense too seriously ( not one of Scott’s fortes she reminds herself).

“Alright, alright. Jaal, I’ll be sure to pay that forward when you get back.”

Jaal doesn’t laugh, offer up a piece of deadpan wit, or turn around. Instead, his shoulders bunch up, drawn tight beneath the fluttering line of his rofjinn . He nods as if he hasn’t heard a word and makes his way to the desk where a new rifle mod is still open and in scattered pieces.

Se-ah and Liam exchange a glance and Liam soundlessly mouths the word ‘nerves’ before his mouth flattens into the facial equivalent of a shrug. She chews on her bottom lip in thought.

“I’ll let you finish your checks,” Liam says to her after a long pause. He throws in a good-natured wave on his way out the door. “ Talev do shena.”

It’s a valiant effort to lighten the mood back up again but it doesn’t work. Her adrenaline high is gone, leaving her with all the gut-churning, wobbly-kneed side effects. Se-ah bites down the last of her nutrient bar to get the sour taste off her tongue but her mouth is still too dry and it’s all she can do not to choke on the crumbling bits of artificially flavored ‘berry pie’ that taste a lot more like chemical cleaner than fruit filling.  

Hazarding a glance towards Jaal, she realizes there is nothing she can say to defuse the fraught emotion radiating up from him like a nimbus of dark energy. If Liam can’t get him to crack a smile, there’s no way she can, so for now she leaves him to finish piecing his mod together and picks back up on her own pre-mission rituals.

The new hardsuit gets five thorough scans with her omni-tool to map structural weak points in the ablative plating. Sometimes the fabricators make errors and she’s uneasy at the thought of going into the field with a brand-new suit but the alternative is braving -40 degrees C in her just her underlayer. All five come up normal, no chance a solitary shot to the center of her chest is going to shatter the whole plate in one go.

Because long-range scans indicate Voeld is a winter wonderland from Dante's 9th circle of hell, she triple checks the flexweave too--a single rupture will kill her suit’s thermoregulatory capacity and drain her power cells in minutes. The power cells themselves get their own scans plus a handful of functionality tests and she checks her shield mod housing and connections so many times she loses count.

Every scan, every test and the voice in her back of her head telling her that she’s not qualified, she’s just lucky , gets a little quieter. It won’t shut up completely, she knows that by now. But it gets easier to ignore it and pretend she’s the same person she was before her dad snapped his helmet on over her head--the Se-ah Ryder who chased her adrenaline high all the way down to solid ground with the knowledge that she’s got this (jet malfunction and all) ... and then hours later, asphyxiated in the thin atmosphere of Habitat 7, slipped into unconsciousness in 15 seconds flat, and died. Pretending to be a dead woman has its benefits.  Being able to choke down the raw, grasping panic that comes with standing on the universe’s invisible scales every waking moment and wondering how, how, how is she ever going to compensate for the monumental weight of Alec Ryder’s life is just the biggest one.

Se-ah takes a shaky breath and gusts out a distracted hum while she works. The ship rumbles again as the reverse thrusters kick in, slowing their acceleration to Voeld and breaking her out of the methodical trance her pre-mission ritual lulls her into.

Jaal is still in the corner but he’s finished with the rifle mod and now he’s turning something over and over in his hands. Silver flashes Morse code flickers between his massive fingers and before she knows it, she’s beside him and peering over his shoulder.

“What’s that?” Her question doesn’t break through his scrutiny but his hands pause and unfold to reveal a piece of metal with a forked end. She stares down at it blankly.

“Do you sew Ryder?” The question is a soft reverberation in the still air.

She shakes her head but he’s not looking at her, he’s still looking at the metal prong, so she adds,“No.”

“Ah. Well, this tool is what we call sahet. It allows you to unmake a stitch. But more often, we use the word for another purpose. When our loved ones die, when they are taken from us, this is the word we use. It...means to be removed. Unmade.”

Silver catches the light, throws it back in slow, hypnotizing arcs.

“The first thing Moshae Sjefa taught me was that there was a time when our word for death was sahet talesana, which means to unmake a stitch so that it can be sewn again. Creation through destruction. But talesana was stolen from us and it was stolen so long ago, few remember what was lost. The Moshae...finds her purpose in remembering not just who we’ve lost but what we’ve lost in the hope that someday we can begin anew. She safeguards talesana for all angara.”

His voice, the deep, rumbling glide that shapes every word with care and consideration, falters as if his admiration, love, and devotion for the Moshae and her purpose are rocks pinning it down. He struggles for a moment to speak despite their crushing bulk.

“We cannot lose her.” He looks up at her then, watery shadows of grief rippling in his blue vitriol eyes. The last time she saw eyes like that, mom’s illness was breaking over the horizon of the distant future to swallow up the present. It feels the same now as it did then: like she’s a clumsy intruder stumbling from the safety of the shallows without any idea how to navigate her way through deeper waters.  But instead of taking one faltering step back, this time she plants her feet against every panicked instinct to run and drops her hand to rest--tentative at first, then firm--on his left shoulder.

“Jaal.” Determination threads conviction through her voice. “I’ll do whatever it takes to help you find her and bring her back.”

Her promise gleams in the air between them like a string of platinum pearls. Weighty. Unbreakable. She doesn’t have her father’s genius or training or strength but flawed and fragile as she is, she’s not going to let that stop her. She’ll do everything to tip the scale back where it belongs. For Jaal. For the Moshae. For the colonists still in their cryopods waiting for a home. For everyone.

A massive palm presses down against her knuckles as his right  hand drops the tool and crosses up to envelop her own. Subtle pressure conveys a dizzying array of emotions too numerous and ephemeral to name. Fleeting, elusive impressions stipple like Braille over her knuckles. She had no idea--no clue that a touch could say so much and she wonders if she can pick up on the vocabulary of personal contact as well as she picks up on spoken languages. Right on the heels of that thought is the image of his bare skin beneath her fingertips and a not-at-all-unpleasant heat travels up from the base of her spine.

Unaware of the visual flashing through her mind, Jaal considers her sudden flush. The weight of his hand vanishes but before she can mourn the loss, the backs of his fingers brush hers. It’s more whisper than touch but she feels it like a burn.

“I've never met anyone like you, Se-ah Ryder.”

“Oh. Well.” Happiness expands in her lungs and a nervous laugh bubbles up despite her best efforts. She doesn’t quite know what to do with that look of his, the one she was so sure only hours ago, was the result of a morbid fascination for the strange and the hideous. Now she’s less sure. Much less. Uncertainty jabs an elbow into her stomach and she tries to cover for her inexplicable laugh with a joke and a smile that’s a cross between a wince and a grin.

“When you get the chance, you should swing by the Milky Way. There's millions just like me over there.”

Jaal’s chuckle booms out, far louder and far more amused than her lame attempt at a joke merited. “I doubt that very much.”

[manycoloureddays]

To The Moon and Back: a Ginny x Luna fic

Luna didn’t want to be tied down to one place, she wanted to explore and adventure, and Ginny understood that. Read it on ao3

for @moondustuniverse​ , because when you start med school you get a cheesy fluff fest to celebrate!

No one would ever suggest that Ginny Weasley was anything other than brave.

For one thing, she had a hand in saving the lives of most of the people who know her. For another, no one wanted to end up at the business end of her wand, or her rumoured-to-be-actually-lethal glare. But mostly no one wanted to suggest something that was so blatantly untrue.

Or so her brother told her consolingly when he bumped into her at the bar for the third time.

“Honestly Ginny. She’s one of your best friends, isn’t she?”

“Yes.”

“So finish your pint, I’ll buy you a new one, go over and talk to her.”

Ron clapped her on the shoulder and waved over the bar tender. Leaning over to order the drinks he was no longer blocking her view of the tables in the back corner that they had taken over. Harry was sitting almost in Hermione’s lap – because, of course, their response to the Daily Prophet article querying which of the three of them were in a relationship was to encourage as much confusion as possible. Seamus, Parvati, and Lavender were laughing at something Neville had said, Ginny could just see his proud grin before he ducked his head. And Dean and Padma were listening raptly to Luna. Her arms were swooping up and down, probably demonstrating something she had seen or done in the six months she had been away. The bracelets on her arms caught the light of the candle on the table. Ginny cannot hear them over the noise of the Friday night bustle at the pub, but she can imagine them gently clattering, adding musical accompaniment to the song of her words.

Ron turned back to face her just as Ginny realised she was beaming ridiculously at Luna. He snorted.

“Talk to her, Ginny. Merlin’s sake.” He passed her a drink and wandered back to the table, where he slung his arm around Hermione’s shoulder and kissed Harry’s cheek. Ginny rolled her eyes. She took comfort in the knowledge that they were still more ridiculous than her.

She took a big gulp, a deep breath, and pushed off the bar.

Ginny had not ignored Luna all night. She had said hello. They had hugged. And that had been the turning point. They had hugged, and Ginny had smelled that familiar first-bloom-of-jasmine-in-Spring smell she associated with home, and then she’d thought oh, and headed towards the bar. She was not drinking her sorrows either, no matter what Ron thought. She was thinking. Ruminating. Realising. Planning.

It wasn’t as though Ginny never wanted to be able to talk to Luna again. She loved talking to Luna. Luna was the first person to make her feel normal again after Tom Riddle. And then she was the first person Ginny wanted to be around when she clawed her way back out of grief, out of constant vigilance, and into some kind of normalcy. She was Ginny’s person. Not someone Ron knew first. Not someone her parents knew first. She was Ginny’s. She made everything seem possible.

It had been a while since she had seen any of her friends, let alone these friends. She had been busy training, and then playing in her first season with the Holyhead Harpies. Dean and Seamus had spent a month in Ireland with Seamus’ family. And from what Ginny had picked up from Ron, Harry, and Hermione at the Burrows’ Sunday night dinners, no one but Parvati had seen Padma for more than twenty minutes at a time since she had begun her PhD at the Muggle University she attended. They had all been busy, and as her mother insisted on telling her, sometimes people grew apart when they grew up. But Ginny didn’t want to grow apart, not from any of them, but especially not from Luna. She wanted to grow together. 

It was not something she had let herself think about too much after the war, although while Luna was away she had allowed her mind to wander in that general direction again. It would be nice to have someone to come home to, and someone to wait for. Luna didn’t want to be tied down to one place, she wanted to explore and adventure, and Ginny understood that. She was getting better at letting her toes skim along the grass now, but settling down, planting roots, was just not for her. No matter what her mother said about not counting her chickens, and changing her mind when she gets older.

Dean, catching her eye, nodded at her in greeting. She grinned back.

“Luna was just telling us about her time in Madagascar.” Padma squeezed Luna’s elbow, and tilted her head in the direction of the bar. 

“Can I get anyone else a drink?”

“I’m good,” Ginny held up her glass.

“I’d love a butterbeer, Padma.” Luna’s voice, soft and lilting and always on the verge of song, warmed Ginny. She hadn’t realised there was any part of her left cold, what with the jam packed pub and the alcohol, but she felt it in her cheeks and in the stutter-thump of her heart. “It wasn’t on my list of things I might miss, but I have been craving butterbeer ever since Indonesia.”

“I’ll come with you,” Dean offered.

He threw what Ginny supposed was a ‘significant’ look over his shoulder as they made their way through the crowd. Ginny needed better friends. Friends who don’t meddle when she very clearly has made her mind up thank you very much. She did not need help. She had this.

“So, what was on your list?” she asked, at the same time Luna said, “there’s something different about you.”

Ginny ducked her head; sure the Weasley blush was splashed across her cheeks. To her surprise, when she looked up, Luna was blushing too. She hadn’t looked away though; her gaze was steady, and Ginny felt herself begin to smile.

She took a step forward. Luna’s answering smile was bright and warm. The noise of the pub was no longer oppressive, has faded to a comforting buzz, cocooning the two of them. Ginny felt like her feet were back on solid ground for the first time in six months. It did not surprise her that solid ground with Luna Lovegood was just as exhilarating as flying. 

Ginny took another step, and Luna met her halfway. She lifted her hand up and traced a constellation she had often drawn with Ginny’s freckles.

“It wasn’t a list so much as it was one item with many subsections,” Luna whispered, so close now Ginny could feel the words on her skin. Only Luna could say subsections and make it sound romantic. Or maybe Hermione could. Ginny made a mental note to ask Ron if liking nerds might be a genetic trait, but that wasn’t important when Luna was threading her fingers through Ginny’s hair.

“I missed you too.”

“I know.”

Luna kissed her and she was flying.

[gizmodouniverse]

Civil RIghts

FAQ about racism

“Am I Racist?” Yes.

“WTF DUDE, I’M NOT RACIST, I I LOVE ALL PEOPLE!” Okay, okay, let me explain. When most people think of the term racist, they have images of this Hitler-mustache-twirling hateful redneck who believes the white race is superior over all others. Most racism is not deliberate and is usually very subtle. Most psychologists/sociologists refer to this as implicit bias.

“What is implicit bias” Let me go ahead and Tarentino it. Humans have evolved with a tribal mentality. Anybody who is different or outside of our tribe is scary. They might hurt us and they may have germs that are different from ours. Therefore, they might be dangerous.

Implicit bias are the subconscious feelings that we have toward people or cultures who are different from our own.

“Wtf are you talking about?” Subconscious feelings are feelings you often don’t even know are there. They may include anxiety, fear, or behavior that is less warm and welcoming than you would show to people of your own race and much less than of your own social circle.

“What does this mean for the real world.” When it comes to members of a different culture or race we may be less inclined to approach them or make friends with them. We may not be inclined to smile at them on the street. We may see them as more intimidating than we normally would someone of our own race, despite being of similar size or other physical qualities.

“Wait a minute, I have a few friends whom are of a different race than I, I can’t be racist.” Unfortunately, part of implicit bias is that we often see people whom are close to us as the exceptions rather than the norm. In some ways, our mind has brought them into our social group and assigned the qualifying relationships to them. Those relationships typically do not extend past that person.

“Okay, so how do I stop implicit bias?” Well, Alcoholics Anonymous put it best when they said “the first step is admitting you have a problem. As in, you consciously have to identify that those feelings exist and try to actively work against them and, honestly, they may never go away.

“So what does this have to do with police officers?” Well, police officers are humans too. Which means, implicit bias.

“So police officers are terrible people?” No, not at all. Police officers are flawed individuals who just want to go home to their families every night. Often times, their bias manifests itself by the fear and anxiety that they feel when dealing with members of a different race and may lead to being overly tough or strict.

Most police officers do not wake up in the morning with a plan to go kill some black people...

But...

this bias sticks out like a thumb when officers often do not connect with or understand some of the communities that they are given charge of.

“Why not?” A couple of reasons, really. These are just a theory of mine.... 1. Police are often of a different demographic than the communities that they are given charge of. 2. Police often do not give enough time and attention to be involved in the community as a member of the neighborhood. 3. Police training seems to lack enough focus on serving the community, de-escalation, and ensuring safety of it’s citizens and too much focus on military style tactics and weapon s training.

“But what about...” I would like to revisit the police on a separate FAQ.

“We’re all equal.” What do you mean.

“We should all be treated the same.” Yes.

“Well, how come black people get special treatment? Nobody ever talks about racism towards white people!”

White people are, essentially the ruling class. They essentially hold most government positions and most leadership positions and they have for 300 years. It is entirely normal for a subsection of people to hold a moderate amount of resentment for that.

“So? Black people can hold those positions, they’re holding themselves back. They must not be interested.”

Not entirely, the vast majority of black people have been stuck in poverty since the end of the Civil War.

“Yeah. Well, that was in 1865, that’s 150 years ago!”

Perhaps, but government policies have traditionally been very difficult on black Americans.

After the civil war, black Americans were set free from their masters and owned nothing. Many got their start as sharecroppers or “slavery by another name” which basically meant that they worked for their old masters and got a portion of the crop as payment but frequently owed their masters money for “renting the equipment.”

“See, they could have gotten started on their destiny and made something of themselves!”

In theory, but after the Union left the confederate states to their own devices, they got started with clamping down on black people’s right to vote through violence and intimidation. After former confederate leaders resumed their racist governments, they started enacting laws that were very difficult on the black communities. We know these laws as Jim Crowe

“Who is Jim Crowe?!” Jim Crowe wasn’t a person. They were a serious of laws that relegated black people to the status of second class citizen. They were denied the right to vote, own property, segregated into different facilities. They were not allowed to address white people directly or sometimes indirectly and were often required to display high levels of respect towards white people or suffer violence and intimidation. If they were lucky, the police threw them in jail for the crime.”

In fact many of these laws were enforced through street justice. Which means that white civilians just lynched them and no one cared.

If, somehow, a black person did get arrested. They were found guilty of whatever crime they committed. Juries were made up of white people because jury assignments were determined by voter rolls... so black people were disqualified.

“Wow, that’s all bad stuff, but that was a long time ago.”

Not really. Jim Crowe officially ended in 1965 with the passage of the Civil Rights amendment.

If you weren’t around, then you probably have a parent or grandparent that was.

“Okay, so they passed the civil rights thing, we’re all equal now and blacks have equal chance as whites do.”

Yes, but no. Wealth is often generational. Each generation strives to be just a little bit better than the last one.

Most people often inherent financial and social wealth from their parents and get a chance to build upon that.

Let me give you an example, we have heard about Henry Ford and the rise of the automobile.

“Yes, he was able to make cars available to the masses!” Yes, but when we say the masses we mostly mean white people. Remember, black people still mostly don’t have anything.

“Okay, so people can drive, big deal” This meant that people could move further from the city and live in the suburbs. New Deal provisions made it easy for a person to get a 30 year loan for houses out in the suburbs.

“See, Black people could have...” No, not at all. See black people often did not meet residency requirements of these neighborhoods (you had to be white) or the loan officer/bank was racist, or, quite simply, black people did not own collateral so they just couldn’t get a loan.

In time, these affordable housing projects in rural areas in the suburbs appreciated greatly.

“Appreciated?” They went up in value. That means white people could borrow against it, sell it, or leave it to their children. They often used that money to send themselves or their kids to college. The increase in value also meant they paid more in property taxes. Because of location and simply being white, they often had access to better jobs.

“What does property taxes have to do with anything?” In the United States, property tax tends to go towards schools. Higher property tax means better schools. In contrast, black people were stuck in the inner city. They mostly did not own their housing and the houses were worth much less which means much less funding for schools.

“What are they doing in the inner city?” We all know that “rough part of town” when I say that, we all have an image in our head of where that is and who lives there. That’s literally the area that black people live in because they are stuck there because of residency laws and lack of access to high paying jobs and education has historically made it difficult to leave so they tend to be stuck in poverty. They did not choose to move there so that their gangs could meet without using FaceTime.

“Why don’t they move?” Ever tried to move with no money? The job situation is improving somewhat as society progresses, but we are talking 150 years of struggle that we have to get through.

“Well, how come they get special attention. I mean, affirmative action and other social programs purposefully help black people. That’s reverse discrimination!” Those arguments only make sense if you’re assuming that Black and White people are similar economically. However, black people are very economically disadvantaged and those programs seek to help them catch up. I don’t understand this need to be jealous.

“How come they get BET?” Black people have a different cultural and entertainment interest than you do. Unless you want to watch “Tyler Perry presents” all day, in which case you can tune in to BET.

“But they have drug problems/kill each other/lazy/paternal abandonment” Yes, they often have issues related to poverty and insecurity. Many civil rights leaders do seek to address those concerns but you may not have heard of them because they’re not directed at you.

“Well, okay, but I don’t have white privilege.” Yes you do. Whites privilege is the implicit bias that you don’t have to deal with because you primarily deal with people whom are of similar culture and race to you. White people don’t often ask other white people who they are and where they’re going because they are seen as part of the in-group. Often, you literally look like everyone else around you and are barely noticed. Furthermore, Hitler-mustache-twirlers are a thing that you don’t have to worry about. Sometimes they are in powerful positions and disqualify people if their names sound foreign or black.

“So why don’t we get rid of those Hitler-wannabes?!” It’s complicated. Sometimes white people sympathize with them as members of the community. We don’t usually have individual racist interactions with people in our in-group so we may never know what level of racist people are until they start discussing how they are inspired by the text of Mein Kampf Racism is very deep in some societies and while some racism is explicit... sometimes you cannot convince people that something is racist because it’s difficult for someone who has never been a victim of explicit racism to understand how something is racist. Dog whistle tactics, by design, float over our heads.

“Dog whistles? Like those things you blow on that are only meant to be heard by dogs?” Yes, but for racism. Words have double or hidden meanings or are designed in such a way that you can say it and most people won’t understand what is being said except for the intended audience.

This was a powerful tactic used during the southern strategy.

Examples: New World Order - typically used to be anti-Semitic. Pest control in relation to Nazis - typically used by anti-semites and holocaust deniers. “States’ Rights”- was once a politically correct way to say “States’ rights to own slaves.”

“Whatever, why should I feel guilty for being white?!” Don’t. Nobody is responsible for the actions of their ancestors. We just need to push forward and try to help our fellow Americans instead of working against them.

“YEAH! White pride!” 🤦‍♂️. White is a race. American and European are cultures. American and White are so intertwined that simply saying white is like acknowledging American accomplishments without including the other races that made it happen.

“How comes you can say Black Pride, then?!” Black people lost their history prior to the civil war. Black pride is more of a rallying cry for the trials and tribulations that black people have had to endure over the years as a people.

“All Lives Matter!” Yes, but Black Lives Matter is an actual organized group who wants to address issues related to race and police brutality. All lives Matter is not a group. They do not organize marches or discuss solutions. It is literally just something that people throw out as a counter narrative to the group. If you would like, you can organize a ALM group and connect with BLM and practice political activism and work together to find solutions for the problems facing America, today.

“Is X racist?” Yes, minimally he/she has implicit racism. BUT If they are in a leadership position, they may also be racist in that they don’t identify with or try to identify with issues that face members of a different race and/or promote laws or ideologies that either directly or indirectly harm members of a specific race, sometimes based on ignorance, sometimes apathy, and sometimes racial identity.

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Is Texas An Alimony State?

Alimony In Texas

Texas is an alimony state but the courts tend to apply limiting criteria when determining alimony.  Alimony in Texas should not be confused with spousal support, which is support that is usually awarded during the divorce process.

Spousal Support Texas

Alimony is actually referred to as spousal maintenance and it lasts long-term, sometimes even after the divorce is finalized.

The reason why people sometimes wonder whether Texas is an alimony state is because it was the last state to enact a spousal maintenance statute in 1995.

Getting “Alimony” in Texas

Temporary Spousal Support in Texas

You don’t just automatically qualify for spousal support or alimony in Texas.  There are restrictions in place which make alimony hard to obtain. The reason for this is that in Texas, the statute was adopted to provide spousal maintenance as a temporary support for a spouse that cannot support themselves.  It is also for a spouse whose assets are not enough to meet reasonable expenses or needs.

In addition, under subsection 3, alimony is meant for spouses who gave up their jobs or education opportunities to maintain and care for the children and the marital home.  These spouses’ skills must also not be current during the time of divorce, which means they may not be able to transition into the workforce after divorce.

Requirements to Qualify for Alimony

 Generally you qualify for spousal maintenance in the following circumstances:

Your spouse is convicted of committing family violence against you or your child, during the divorce process or two years before the divorce action was filed

You and your spouse were married for at least 10 years, you are seeking support because you cannot provide for basic needs

You as the spouse seeking support is mentally or physically disabled which makes you unable to earn enough to provide basic needs

You are seeking support because you have custody of a child who requires special care and supervision because of physical and mental disability.  This must also be making it difficult for you to earn enough income to provide basic needs

To calculate the 10 year duration for alimony is add up the number of years from the date of marriage to the date when the divorce was finalized.

Time Limit and Amount of Alimony

In Texas, alimony is mostly limited to a maximum of 3 years.  The payments are made every month and the total monthly payment cannot exceed $2,500. The payments will be made for a time period the court considers enough for the spouse receiving payment to develop appropriate skills, or find appropriate employment. Appropriate employment in this case is employment that allows that spouse to provide the basic needs, or enough time to develop appropriate skills. The issue that normally arises in these cases is defining the minimum reasonable needs of the spouse receiving support.

Related Family Law Articles

Child Support

Child Custody

Temporary Restraining Orders

Co-Parenting Schedules

Same Sex Divorce

Mediated Divorce

Common-Law Marriage Alimony

If your marriage was established under a common-law process, alimony is available if you divorce.  Alimony can also be awarded if a marriage is found void because one spouse’s prior marriage was not dissolved.  In this case, the spouse that entered into the marriage without knowing that the other spouse had an existing marriage, may be awarded alimony even if the marriage is declared void.

source https://www.austindivorcelawyers.us/is-texas-an-alimony-state/

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