#the aftermath is terrible

[pate-geo-enthusiast]

Note to self: If your egg cracks when you put it into the pan to boil, dont be lazy

[theartintrying]

the other day my friend said "jayce in a double breasted suit" and my mind immediately went to a kingsman au

so here's some fun quick sketches for that

[tanadrin]

Although human civilization on Qefre is a couple of thousand years old, it has developed along idiosyncratic lines due to the existence of a planet-wide teleporter network left behind by the long-departed terraformers. These teleporters are essentially stone rings a couple of meters across that can instantaneously exchange everything in a spherical bubble inside them with a similar bubble inside another teleporter (usually including a flat stone platform that provides a convenient surface to stand on). Although their capacity is limited--you can move a lot more people and certainly far more goods by train or ship than you can by teleporter, even if those conveyances go a lot slower--they allow far-flung cities to cheaply stay in close communication with one another.

The basic political unit of Qefre is not the state but the rashun, a kind of ritual-political association tasked with managing the eruni, the logistics management system that controls access to recovered ancient technology. The terraformers seemed to use the eruni as a kind of basic permissions system to distribute and manage responsibility for the planet-wide terraforming infrastructure and its supporting technology; the powerful nature of the eruni and the need to use them responsibly meant that the planet's human inhabitants quickly developed sophisticated social systems for protecting them against misuse, which inevitably became entangled with questions of political power and competing interests between social groups. Rashun became landholding organizations early in Qefre's history, and soon supplanted most early proto-states in regions of extensive human settlement.

In the modern era, rashun club together with local governments and private political associations into "circles" which undertake most low-level administrative functions; these small-scale circles are in turn grouped into larger planet-wide circles, of which there are about fifty; and these larger-scale circles in turn are grouped into ten loose associations, which collaborate to manage affairs of regional or global interest. Since circles can hold territory basically anywhere within the region of human settlement, there has in practice been a strong pressure toward institutionalizing various forms of collaborative and representative government at all levels in order to prevent an absolutely sclerotic degree of political deadlock strangling economic growth.

Not that this hasn't been an issue in the past; indeed, much of Qefre's history has been an endless series of petty local wars, some rising to the scale of planet-wide affrays, with the fragmented structure of territorial control only serving to increase the amount of chaos when violence did break out. Eventually the largest cities, including all the teleporter-networked ones, got so sick of this state of affairs that they ganged up to completely expel the rashun from their immediate territories, and implemented a "power-sharing" agreement that was really an early form of representative democracy, which came to have a profound influence on the internal administration of the rashun themselves.

When the Western Territories were opened up by the discovery of the teleporter at Ar-Amal, the independent cities and the rashun hammered out a set of agreements to prevent a destabilizing series of landgrabs in the surrounding region; but now that the Territories have a large native-born population, many have begun to grumble that they are simply living under a kind of shared fiefdom, quite different from the actual self-government that the cities in the east--or, indeed, the subjects of the modern, collaborative rashun--enjoy. There is a growing local home rule movement, which envisions something quite different from the governments of the east for itself: exclusive territorial sovereignty, with no role at all for the Delegations in its internal affairs. Opponents argue that this is preposterous: that not even the haughtiest of the eastern cities could get away with demanding complete political autarky. To which the Territorialist answer is that all the eastern cities are equals in political affairs, and their political affairs (and political interests) are irrevocably bound up with their neighbors, in a way that is very different from the subordinated and exploited Western Territories. It seems to be an intractable conflict, where neither side is willing to entertain any notion of compromise, nor is it clear what such a compromise would entail. How it will resolve ultimately is anyone's guess.

[sweetestflow3rs]

tw for me rambling, also body horror & death

i like to think about what if noel didn’t ‘run away’ and decided to stay and keep going as riley… i think that’s probably one of two of noel’s worst timelines LAUGHSS

like not worse for noel mind you. she thinks she’s thriving ( delusional ). just worse for the pc on how stress & trauma-inducing it is.

the idea of an li / npc who seems so confident and sweet, the exact standards you’d expect a school’s star athlete to be: kind, helpful, warm. though, a bit untouchable because she always seems so busy with track practice and tutoring students, AND working part time as a front desk staffer at the hospital.

the only method of bonding with riley more being the tutoring, only being able to join the program if the pc has high grades. which, bc it’s DOL of course, the very first student to tutor leads to a combat encounter that the pc can choose to tell riley or not. which if they do, riley acts accordingly by calling out the student in front of everyone before throwing them out ( surprising strength for a girl that short )

and then everything after that…. is ENTIRELY dependent on if the pc has high awareness & if they visit the school at night.

which to not irritate people on the length of my rambles, putting it below here:

visiting the school at night, entering the library: the pc runs into the same student that harassed from the tutoring program there, sitting at one of the tables. it makes the pc antsy at first, but then the student speaks, saying they are only here to catch up on studying. since the pc DID get them kicked out for snitching.

a low awareness pc seeing the student not doing anything else. they notice a shadow of a coat over their seat but think nothing else of it and leave.

BUT A HIGH AWARENESS PC… sees something else that makes them freeze in their spot. through the faint shadows and lighting of the moon, they can see… fingers…. opening & closing the mouth. like a sock puppet. the shadow behind the student looking more another person that the PC SWEAR you can see peering at you in the crouched position.

your silence is deafening.

a loud, squelching sound of the hand removing itself from an opening of the student’s head that soon falls to the floor to reveal the crouched figure being riley herself. and of course, she’s not happy, she WAS banking on the pc not noticing. in fact, she’s wondering what the pc is even doing in the school this late at night!!!

the pc having the option to either help riley, or run. and like… turning to you all, the audience, we ALL know how riley is the star athlete, especially the track team. trying to outrun her is impossible, it’s a literal game over ( death ) for the pc.

BUT choosing to help riley get rid of the body and evidence will finally unlock riley as a love interest. her special stat being well, her hysteria. the pc now having the new option of reporting harassers to riley, who will HAPPILY get rid of them for the pc, at the cost of her hysteria rising. but the reward of combat encounters becoming fewer.

you may ask: hysteria regarding what?

well, the corruption of this town SILLY! riley who is becoming more wrapped up in her delusion that everything in this town is corrupt and awful ( she’s right about that ) and the only way to solve it is to get rid of everyone ( slow your horses ) (( and yes, even other fellow orphans. even the ‘good’ people in this town )) and that she and the pc is the only righteous thing in this town. riley at max hysteria taking too many victims to her list. the slightest fault someone makes in front of her could make them a target. ( god forbid someone says a lewd comment about someone’s body in front of her )

though, be careful of having her love too low when hysteria is high. being TOO submissive in combat encounters and taking enjoyment of the abuse the town dishes out can lower it! because then she’ll think the pc is now corrupt and ruined. and she might do something about that!! ( she’s going to kill the pc, she can’t trust them anymore. game over )

and raising her lust seems almost impossible. helping her crimes only raises it by 1-2%. but if the pc ever decided to take charge in the crime, if they have the sadist trait, it grants a 10% boost of lust from riley.

and why not add another level of fun freak by having that riley almost seemingly prefers to only engage in sex with the pc IMMEDIATELY after they just commit a murder? like what’s not hotter than just killing someone you hate in the most brutal fashion imaginable, to then fuck in front of their corpse ( or almost corpse, they might still be bleeding out ), covered in blood??? like thats amor to riley

[transingthoseformers]

Fuck. Now I'm thinking about toxic overtarn in a decepticon victory au context. Oh no. Ohhhh noooo.

[evebestthinker]

[...] And so, the woman dies. The woman dies so the man can be sad about it. The woman dies so the man can suffer. She dies to give him a destiny. Dies so he can fall to the dark side. Dies so he can lament her death. As he stands there, brimming with grief, brimming with life, the woman lies there in silence. The woman dies for him. We watch it happen. We read about it happening. We come to know it well. - Aoko Matsuda

[lucy-marigold]

Every time I log onto the MC server to sit down and grind gear for the war, I end making more elaborate towers that SOME PEOPLE didn't think would look good. This is why I'm starting a revolution. For the towers. @dragonmine-24 better not figure out how to make airplanes for their husband.

[thehecklingmouse]

Kaveh having terrible back pain so alhaitham makes him soup to comfort him

[impossible-rat-babies]

didnt expect to sit here and be like. rielle......................and kiet................ ;----;

[the-ghost-king]

I'm terrible pjo gay rep because I fucking love the Cupid scene and won't shut up about it. I think it's an excellently done outing scene and it saved my life. Sorry you didn't like it because it scared you and I'm sorry that we live in a world where queer kids have to feel that way but as someone who has repeatedly been put in the position nico was in that scene I need you to know that the way Cupid was obviously painted in a villainous light and the way Jason reacted 100% gave me the strength to carry on at multiple points in my own life when I was in really terrible situations as a kid facing people like Cupid. It was a triggering scene for many I'm sure and I don't mean to minimize that, but that scene literally changed my world view in so many ways and helped constantly remind me that there were people like Jason who would be there for me if I could live long enough to find them. It's fine to criticize it or question it, but sometimes you also need to take a step back and ask "is this scene for me or is it for someone else" it may not have been what you needed but it was 100% what I needed and I'm so greatful that I read that scene when I was young and all that the memory of that scene carried for me and gave me.

[camels-pen]

relief

[calronhunt]

when the, when the, when the, when the siblings who were really close completely fall apart.

[emmynemm]

Having fun CANCELLED I have a 100 degree fever in the middle of SUMMER

[clown-guitar]

extremely messed up that covid can have long term mental side effects they don’t tell you about actually

[paigemathews]

Frankly, I'm hoping that this well be an unnecessary statement, but there are asks I was responding to prior and haven't posted yet that make me want to make this disclaimer preemptively. (Most people are perfectly lovely, but fandom can be... a hellscape, and I'd rather make this clear in advance.)

As much as I am critical of Cole as a character (and kinda a hatergirl), none of that is ever about Julian McMahon. First of all, character ≠ actor. Second of all, I think that he was a great actor. (Besides Charmed, I always loved his portrayal in the Fantastic Four films as Dr. Doom.) Especially as Cole, because he really did bring a lot of depth and nuance and skill to that role. (Frankly, all of my issues with Cole can be traced straight back to the writing choices, not any of JMM's acting.) And I genuinely did find his character to be fascinating and interesting, even if not in the same way as a lot of Cole's specific fans.

[saints-who-never-existed]

"Seconds in command are a fascinating, if somewhat doleful, bunch: their labour is often as great, or greater, than those under whom they serve, and their character is less often blemished by egoism and hubris. After all, if it had been, they'd never have lasted very long in such a nearly commanding position. Sometimes, however, when the firsts are fallen, the story of the seconds takes on a grim and strange fascination: we yearn to see how they will perform when the mantle of responsibility is fitted to their shoulders."

Russell Potter reviewing Smith's 'Captain Francis Crozier: Last Man Standing?'