#they’re making the invisible part of themselves and growing enormous

[corseque]

I want to grow an enormous amount of strawberries so badly it is causing me physical pain. I need a strawberry plant that I can endlessly clone into infinite strawberries right now as soon as possible

[five-rivers]

Triple Threat

Just realized I didn’t post this here.  This is based on @dalv-co-official‘s prompt.

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Three sets of screams echoed off the polished steel walls of the Fentonworks lab.

.

It was green, and they were filled with a horrible anxiety. Something bad had happened, or something bad might have happened, they couldn't tell which. Their mind was too stricken with pain, fear, and exhaustion to register anything but green and they were in danger.

Who? Who was in danger? They were important to them. They couldn't remember anything else. Couldn't think.

They moved and-

Contact. Relief. They could feel them, the others, and they were, well, they were hurt, but they were alive, and they were here. Together.

They relaxed. This was... not fine. Anything but fine, really. But it was manageable.

Unconsciousness draped back over them.

.

When they woke again, they knew themselves. Danny, Sam, Tucker. But the boundaries blurred. They were almost erased, and this was wrong, because they should be three, not one.

But it also felt right to be one. It was odd, and it made things difficult. Difficult to remember where they were, what they were, who they were.

Why they were.

Right. Why were they here? How had they gotten there? They knew, they knew that, but like this, their thoughts and feelings clashing against each other, it was beyond them. They couldn't even move effectively, always mistaking one hand for another. They had six of them, all together, and that was far too many.

They had to separate. At least for now, at least until they could get their feet under them.

They were fairly confident that this one was Danny. Yes. This one was Danny. He was Danny. Danny.

Danny sat up with a groan, feeling like he had just woken up from a dream. A dream where he'd been beaten to heck and back with a baseball bat that was on fire. His chest felt strange. Light and cold.

Why was everything green?

Then he remembered. The portal. The pain. The screaming. The screaming. The screaming.

Sam and Tucker had been with him. That thought forced him into a sitting position. Where were Sam and Tucker? What had happened to them?

Were they alive?

Danny had certainly thought that he was dying.

But, to his relief, he saw a Sam-shaped blur and a Tucker-shaped blur in the green mists, moving much like he was: gingerly. With little more than grunts, the three of them negotiated a position where they could support each other and stumble out of the portal.

That's when they saw each other, and things started to get really weird.

.

They sat in Danny's room and took their pulses.

"I think," said Sam, "that we can agree that we're alive."

"So, what was that?" asked Tucker. "That..." He flexed his hands and everyone understood he meant that other form, where they wore black jumpsuits and white gloves, where their hair was white and their eyes brilliant green. "Was it temporary? Just a side effect?"

"No," said Danny, putting a hand over his chest, just below his heart. The others mimicked the motion. "Don't you feel it? We're different now."

They all looked down.

"It could still be temporary?" said Tucker. "That could fade, too. I mean, we look like ourselves again."

"But you don't really believe that, do you?" asked Sam.

"No," admitted Tucker. "But it's still a possibility."

"Oh my gosh," moaned Danny, putting his head in his hands. "Mom and Dad... I can't be dead. I can't be a ghost. They're going to kill me... us," he added with more horror.

Sam and Tucker moved to either side of Danny, leaning into him.

"We'll deal with it together," said Sam. Whatever was inside them seemed to hum in agreement.

.

"Duck!" shouted Sam.

The words seemed to echo inside Danny's head, and he reflexively obeyed, barely missing the giant meat fist. Tucker took advantage of the opening, with a punch that did far more damage than it had any right to.

Things were... going. The poorly refrigerated meat dungeon beneath the school would probably need to be repaired, but, on the upside, the ghost wasn't hurting anyone.

Except for Danny, Sam, and Tucker.

But then, as these things happen, everything went wrong all at once. Sam and Tucker both lost hold of their ghost forms, as Danny had earlier, and they fell.

Danny decided that now was the time to be somewhere else. He grabbed them and they phased through the wall.

Then Danny... just... slowly...

.

"Danny! Thank goodness you're awake!" exclaimed Tucker. "You've been asleep for three days!"

"Uhuh," said Danny, glaring at his friend through sleep-crusted eyes. "You remember that we can tell when each other is lying now, right?"

"Ah, well, it was worth a shot."

.

"Do you sense anything?" asked Sam.

"No," said Danny, tensely. They were wandering around the school basements, looking for the ghost. It was lunchtime, so if she was going to show up at all, it would be now.

"Man, I wish I had a ghost sensing power," said Tucker. He'd been put in charge of the 'Fenton Thermos,' a device whose utility was currently questionable. Even if it had glowed some really weird colors when the three of them touched it.

"Me too," said Sam. "Then we could split up and find this vegetable-hating ghost faster."

"WHO SAID I HATE VEGETABLES!?"

.

Danny picked up on the second ring.

"Hi, Sam," he said.

There was a bit of a pause on the other line. "How did you know it was me? You don't have caller ID."

"Tucker's here and who else is going to call our house? Mr. Lancer? One of Jazz's 'patients?'"

"Tucker's there? Oh, good."

"Yeah," said Danny. Tucker had stopped by and immediately got roped into helping with Danny's chore of cleaning the garage. "What's up? I thought you had a thing with your parents today. They were making you go to a party or something?"

"I found out who was throwing it and decided I'd rather die again. Can you guys come over?"

"Yeah," said Danny, mentally bracing himself for another scolding from his parents. But that was future Danny's problem. "One problem. Where do you even live?" The three of them were psychically bonded, and Danny had still never seen her house.

"Right, right. Do you have a pen? My address is-"

.

"So, Sam lives in a castle," said Danny, staring up at the enormous 'house.'

"Wow," said Tucker. "I wonder if she has a swimming pool in there somewhere."

"Or a bowling alley," said Danny.

"What is your thing with bowling, anyway, dude?"

"I don't know. I just like it."

"Where did Sam say she was again?"

"Greenhouse. Back yard."

"Cool," said Tucker. He rubbed his hands together.

"Are you okay?" asked Danny. Tucker had been fidgeting all night.

"Yeah, just..." Tucker sighed. "Your parents' tech feels weird. I don't know. It's been bugging me all day. It's like, I kept wanting to put my hands into it," he said, briefly making the offending limbs intangible to demonstrate.

"Maybe it's part of your thing?" suggested Danny. "We'll have to look into that."

"Yeah. But, later," said Tucker. "Phase through the wall?"

"I don't want to talk to her parents."

"True," said Tucker.

Invisible and intangible, they walked into Sam's back yard. The greenhouse was easy to find. It was however, impossible to open the door, and Sam didn't answer when they knocked, so they phased in.

"Wow," said Danny. "This is..."

"Crowded," finished Tucker. "Sam? You in here? We're here!"

"Yeah!" said Sam. "I'm back by the oranges!"

They walked around tables that practically dripped with greenery, following the scent of citrus. Sam was sitting at the roots of a large tree, hugging her knees. On closer inspection, it appeared that the tree's roots had burst out of a ceramic pot before burrowing into the ground.

"Sam?" said Danny. "Did you, um, do this?" he asked.

Sam's eyes were wide and wild. "Maybe?" she said.

.

They stood over the smoking pile of technology that had once been Technus's battlesuit. It sparked. Faintly glowing moss grew from it.

"Okay," said Danny, twisting the lid tighter. "I think we need to go over our powers again."

.

"Danny can sense ghosts, is best at basic ghostly stuff, and is the fastest flier, agreed?" asked Tucker, typing on his PDA.

"Agreed," chorused the other two.

"Sam can make plants grow faster, but only if there's a bunch of ectoplasm around, and she's not good at, like, turning invisible and intangible."

"To be fair," said Danny, "none of us are very good at that."

"True," said Sam, "but you two are definitely better than I am. But I'm stronger, too," she added, flexing her arms.

"Yeah, yeah," said Tucker. "Then, there's me, and everyone knows I'm fabulous."

They groaned.

"Stop that, you're making me groan, too," complained Tucker. "Anyway, it looks like my thing is charging and draining electronics, which is pretty cool. I'll never have to plug Cynthia in again. My baby is one step closer to life."

"We're begging you," said Sam, "stop naming your PDAs."

"I will not," said Tucker.

"Fine. Then you can't use my bowling alley."

"I told you she might have a bowling alley."

.

"I've never wanted to kill somebody before," said Sam.

Danny shuddered, but he didn't say anything.

"But I wanted to kill him," she said. "I wanted to, so, so much, but I couldn't move. I couldn't do anything."

"But you did," said Danny, pressing against Sam's side and trying to project comforting thoughts. "You did do something. You broke free. Just like Tuck and I."

"Not soon enough," growled Sam, her eyes flashing.

"None of us broke free 'soon enough,'" said Tucker. He was playing with his glasses, turning the empty frames over in his hands again, and again, and again. "Do you really not remember, Danny?"

"No?" said Danny. "Not really. Just red, and when he made Sam jump off the train, and Jazz coming after us." He frowned. "Maybe a bit in the tent? On the high wire?"

"I guess those are the highlights," mumbled Tucker.

Danny bit his lip. "Well," he said, finally. "It doesn't sound like a loss, anyway."

"No," agreed Sam, "it isn't."

.

After Danny left to go home, Sam and Tucker stayed. "Freakshow is a dead man if we ever see him again," she said.

"After what he did to Danny?" Tucker scoffed. "You better believe it."

.

"I hate Spectra so much," said Sam. "Why is she so... so..." She waved her hands. "Why is she like this?"

"Why is it in an abandoned hospital?" moaned Tucker.

"Probably because you told her last time that hospitals were your deepest darkest fear," said Danny. "Why did you do that, anyway? We were pretty sure she was a ghost already."

"Have you seen what she looks like?"

.

Stars glimmered overhead. Danny laid flat on his back, watching them. Sam and Tucker were on either side of him.

"Can you believe," said Danny, "that one day we could put them out?"

"No," said Sam, immediately. "Because we're not going to."

"I didn't say, would," said Danny, his voice still soft. "I said, could. Those alternate realities... The ones where only one of us got powers... Where only I... Those were bad. Those were hard. I- I'm sorry."

"But we're together, here," said Tucker, soothingly, "and we're not going anywhere."

"I know," said Danny. "I'm sorry."

"What for?" asked the other two.

"That you had to half die so I didn't blow up the world."

"Come on, man, you didn't blow up the world," said Tucker. "Just, you know, a bunch of the stuff on the world."

Danny let out a hiccuping laugh.

"And I was just as bad," said Sam. "I mean, I like plants, but that was no good."

"You were under mind control," protested Danny.

"So were you," countered Sam, "by Plasmius. It won't happen. None of them will happen. As long as Tucker quits trying to make Skynet and doesn't get assimilated into SkulkTech or whatever the heck that was, it'll all be fine."

"We might have to break his PDAs to stop that."

"No, keep your cold hands away from my babies. I promise, no Skynet, no Skynet. I will leave the AI alone."

They fell back into silence.

"It's been a while since we've done this," said Danny. "Just hang out, I mean."

"Yeah," said Sam.

They inhaled, letting themselves feel each other. "It's nice," they said, together.

[theholycovenantrpg]

In the beginning was AZAZEL, a DEMON loyal to the cause of the DEMONS. She is said to be IMMORTAL and uses SHE/HER pronouns. In this New Testament she serves as THE MOON. Blessed be her name.

THE INDELIBLE MARK.

Once the inculpable ingénue of God’s holy servants, the angel Azazel fell from Heaven shortly after Lucifer, pulled down by some impossible enchantment as the underworld’s dusky circles danced below her. In Heaven, she had attracted the tender affection of her kind without ever needing to ask for it, and in Hell she was no different, drawing a new cohort of creatures around her like a shield. Azazel certainly draws the eye in the company of monsters and beasts, her gentle eyes and the faintly silver glow of her body marking her out, but the animals of the night find themselves mysterious fond of her. Even the worst beasts treat her with a sort of unsolvable gentleness—whether this is a mysterious gift from her creator or merely her nature, not even Azazel knows. She fulfils the role of Keeper of Hellhounds, monstrous animals which linger at her side obediently, and since the neutralisation of the Heretics she has also served as the Moon of the Holy Land, an honour bestowed upon her by the de facto leader of the Demons and her doting pseudo-brother, the Antichrist. She is the object of great desire and curiosity, though she keeps the world at arm’s length; nobody quite knows what hides behind her dove-like exterior. At the point of her fall, Azazel had her white feathers singed from her back, and these cauterised wings now stem from between her shoulders in the shape of mulberry smoke.

THE HISTORY.

How she came to be, Azazel barely recalls. Pulled from a cloud, some long-dead star, the shine of the moon which drank up the sun’s brilliance, or perhaps all three at once—it barely mattered. Only that she did. Where her counterparts were forged with purpose, Azazel seemed to have come into existence entirely by accident, betraying no real aptitude for anything in particular. Instead, she glowed. She glowed with a secrecy all those around her failed to unlock; not even herself, not even God. The Creator doted on her, heralding her as one of many of His great treasures, her sweet beauty and gentle demeanour transformed into His shining glory—He would have her do no more than merely sit there, ethereal. She would work for nothing. Azazel, after all, had not been crafted for labour; she had been made in the image of idolatry. The Angels called her the Dove of God, arranging their bodies around her like a divine shield. Perhaps that was why she slipped from their minds as easily as she did, left to uncover the shadowy corners of Heaven, if indeed there were any, alone. Though the light clung to Azazel, it bored her. Light cast itself on everything, and she was interested in the things the eye couldn’t see. She felt like your hands might go straight through her: it was a want from which she couldn’t right herself, a desire that spat itself out from her, following the scent of rot and decay and offal. So, when Hell worked to lure her, it didn’t have to exert itself much. Azazel worshipped its poisonous flowers, its rotting walls, the night. It didn’t need to teach her how to understand the darkness—she always had.

As she leapt from Heaven and draped Hell over her shoulders like a dark shawl, Azazel seemed to both change beyond recognition and remain precisely as she had always been. That was the magic of her. Curious and feeding herself on the shadows, she sank into Hell and felt its cleansing properties wash over her, like dipping into a moonless river. Azazel meandered down this murky nook and the next, slipping into some dark hole and emerging with its wicked secrets, and still the appearance of innocence stuck to her skin. It hardly mattered; Hell suited her. The darkness had sensed something in her up on her ephemeral cloud, called seductively out to her, and she had answered it. That was all. When Judas offered his hand in invitation as she looked down into Hell’s mouth, his mouth curling in recognition, she took it willingly. Azazel went further than he could ever have possibly imagined: she made ancient friends of the shadows, she had her feathery wings cauterised from her back, and all that remained of the heavenly creature she had once been was the ghost of her wings stirring behind her. The Demons yielded themselves to her, offering their wicked guidance—but she never needed it. As she planted her feet firmly in Hell’s soil and watched the twilight grow around them, Azazel purred like a primordial animal, called back to its feeding ground. After all, old things have old hungers, and who could point her to a thing older than the dark?

Azazel befriended all the monsters of the night: a coterie of beasts and hounds who, growling disbelievingly and baring their fangs at her glow, prowled around her before burying themselves obediently at her side. It was an odd sight to behold: this elegant, angelic-looking thing, surrounded by a sea of phantoms and ghouls. Nevertheless, they devotedly swore themselves in as her godless protectors, always anxious to return to her side and linger there. What could have caused it Azazel couldn’t possibly say: it couldn’t be that they felt she needed their chainmail, because when she stared into the beasts’ eyes, and when she watched them blink back at her, she knew they saw the horror in her. Azazel knew they detected the enormous malice she was capable of untying. It made her feel strangely understood. She became something of a marvel in Hell’s noxious halls: some desired her, some despised her, some couldn’t fathom ever coming to understand her—but, in the end, all fell at her feet. With the Antichrist by her side, who had seized something in her and sculpted her into the rotten sister he’d never had the pleasure of having, she made Hell her hearthstone: they misbehaved, wild as animals, and Azazel remained as elegant as she had always been. She leaned into Judas’ paternal-like wisdoms, who was, of course, king in all but name—and what did that make her? An heiress set to inherit his gospel. Hell’s own princess. Cherry-sweet and, in her centuries of existence, never denied anything, the darkness grew from her.

Pulled toward a land poised between the new and the old, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that Azazel took to the earth as easily as she did. Was she not the perfect parity between divinity and devils? In Heaven she had been half-starved, and in Hell she gorged herself on slices of the darkness, but the mortal world offered her something new to wrap her hands around. Greedy, she hoped to slip into a crepuscule throne of her own and, grown increasingly petulant over the invisible crown that had settled itself upon the Antichrist’s brow, he had granted her one—indulgent as ever. As she climbed to accept the role of the Moon, promising to represent her kind’s own interests in Sanctus Terra, Azazel’s beasts languished at her feet, her desire sated. If truth be told, she kept little interest in the politics of it all, but she delighted in the many eyes that fell upon her. As the Angels watched on, they supposed she looked little changed by her fall, while the Demons leered up at their wicked princess, knowing her for precisely what she was. Humankind seemed to see her through the crystals of a kaleidoscope: twisting left and right, up and down, seeming soft and dulcet where she was selfish and lotus-eating. They call her Sprite of Darkness as she passes, the Cherub of Hell, and Azazel luxuriates in their strange deference. At her fingers rests all she could possibly want: to have her curiosity sated, to pluck admirers from the crowds, to be blindly worshipped. Yet, she has always looked for more to chew on.

THE CONNECTIONS.

ABADDON, JUDAS & DAMIEN WARD: Dynasty. They’re like family, in a strange, twisted sort of way. They’re a family that has at once nothing and everything to do with each other: they share no blood except the stuff that they steep their hands in—they’re not kin, but still there is a kinship shared between them. There is no such thing as royalty amongst Demons—not now, but all of Infernum bows to them nonetheless. In Abaddon, Azazel finds a hesitant sort of mother, bound to Azazel by something more profound than mere history. She finds herself caught in the child’s web far more often than she cares to be. From Judas, Azazel collects his barrages of wisdom and adoration, gorging herself on slivers of his guidance and affectionate love. To her, he yields a part of himself that few are fortunate enough to witness. Though Azazel doesn’t share his interest in politics, nor his desire to crush the earth in his jaw, she certainly shares his appetite to hold the world in their palms. Damien, however, holds an unparalleled place in her heart; she loves him wickedly. He is a playmate, a co-conspirator, a confidant. He indulges her as much as he criticises her, and though they fight like monsters and argue like beasts, there is perhaps no-one she loves in the world more than her pseudo-brother. The four of them are an utterly indivisible unit—in Azazel’s mind, nothing can rend them apart.

CASSIEL: Rival. They are two creatures that God had carved from exactly the same things: beauty, enchantment, divine thrall. Perhaps it was only natural that they would each see the other as an enemy. Heaven had been filled with the sonorous ring of Cassiel’s heavenly laughter when Azazel had first ebbed down into Hell, for she was a creature who could only revel in the elimination of her most galling adversary. And yet, look how the mighty hath fallen. Not, of course, as Azazel had, slipping into the mouth of Hell, but crushed indifferently beneath the oppressive rule of those who easily eclipsed her. Azazel peers down from her bone-carved throne and can only virulently laugh at the way Cassiel is forced to scrap for a morsel of devotion, all while her many worshippers run their bare feet raw, setting off on pilgrimage, all to fall beneath her. She has always received precisely what she wants without ever having to first think of it, and when she feels the cold iron of Cassiel’s green gaze upon her, Azazel smiles something wicked. Let her dream of knocking the head from her shoulders, of her Hellhounds loosening from her bewitchment and turning their bloodied mouths back on her. Dreams haven’t served the invidious Cassiel for some time now.

JASPER RICHE: Intrigue. Because she has never had to ask for what she wants, Azazel has forgotten how to. He had never been particularly interesting to her in the beginning; his eyes were the same ravenous eyes lodged in the skulls of those who drank her in, and he was, after all, only mortal—but in withholding his reverence, when she can plainly see it delineated on his face, Jasper has drawn her interest. He mocks the way the people fall at her feet, as if she is the altar and they are its worshippers, and thus he has resolved to bridle his fascination—that, after all, would make it exactly the same as all the others. Jasper is mysterious in a way that she has found, in her many centuries of existence, mortals are never mysterious; though he cleverly compels her to tussle for his attention, Azazel finds herself drawn to him by something more than mere rebuffal. There’s something darker that lingers beneath, something powerful and ancient—at times, catching his gaze is like returning to the beginning of the ages. She wonders if that means something.

ORIAS: Companion. When she had first fallen into Hell, Orias had uniquely drawn her interest. Once, they had been nothing more than flesh and bone, but now they sat on a gut-carved throne above them all—almost all of them, at least. So used to being the object of affection, they are perhaps the only person that Azazel doesn’t mind sharing the spotlight with; they are, after all, hewn from the same cloth. In Hell, they kept her attention by plucking creations as beautiful as they were awful from mid-air, and on earth they surround the both of them with a gauzy veil, purging the things Azazel refuses to look at. In turn, she is utterly indulgent; she shows Orias true and genuine tenderness, and when the skies wheel into grey, they each find comfort in the other. They are her most intimate friend, her secret-keeper, her musketeer—for them, Azazel would ruin cities and whole worlds. What remains to be seen, however, is whether she’d be willing to crush her own kingdom. That is the ultimate test of their companionship.

Azazel is portrayed by Ravyanshi Mehta and was written by CAS. She is currently TAKEN by OPEN.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Adversarial interoperability: reviving an elegant weapon from a more civilized age to slay today's monopolies

Today, Apple is one of the largest, most profitable companies on Earth, but in the early 2000s, the company was

fighting for its life

.

Microsoft's Windows operating system was ascendant

, and Microsoft leveraged its dominance to ensure that every Windows user relied on its Microsoft Office suite (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, etc). Apple users—

a small minority of computer users

—who wanted to exchange documents with the much larger world of Windows users were dependent on Microsoft's Office for the Macintosh operating system (

which worked inconsistently with Windows Office documents

, with unexpected behaviors like corrupting documents so they were no longer readable, or partially/incorrectly displaying parts of exchanged documents). Alternatively, Apple users could ask Windows users to export their Office documents to an "interoperable" file format like Rich Text Format (for text), or Comma-Separated Values (for spreadsheets). These, too, were inconsistent and error-prone, interpreted in different ways by different programs on both Mac and Windows systems.

Apple could have begged Microsoft to improve its Macintosh offerings, or they could have begged the company to standardize its flagship products at a standards body like OASIS or ISO. But Microsoft had little motive to do such a thing: its Office products were a tremendous competitive advantage, and despite the fact that Apple was too small to be a real threat, Microsoft had a well-deserved reputation for going to enormous lengths to snuff out potential competitors, including both Macintosh computers and computers running the GNU/Linux operating system.

Apple did not rely on Microsoft's goodwill and generosity: instead, it relied on reverse-engineering. After its 2002 "Switch" ad campaign—which begged potential Apple customers to ignore the "myths" about how hard it was to integrate Macs into Windows workflows—it intensified work on its iWork productivity suite, which launched in 2005, incorporating a word-processor (Pages), a spreadsheet (Numbers) and a presentation program (Keynote). These were feature-rich applications in their own right, with many innovations that leapfrogged the incumbent Microsoft tools, but this superiority would still not have been sufficient to ensure the adoption of iWork, because the world's greatest spreadsheets are of no use if everyone you need to work with can't open them.

What made iWork a success—and helped re-launch Apple—was the fact that Pages could open and save most Word files; Numbers could open and save most Excel files; and Keynote could open and save most PowerPoint presentations. Apple did not attain this compatibility through Microsoft's cooperation: it attained it despite Microsoft's noncooperation. Apple didn't just make an "interoperable" product that worked with an existing product in the market: they made an adversarially interoperable product whose compatibility was wrested from the incumbent, through diligent reverse-engineering and reimplementation. What's more, Apple committed to maintaining that interoperability, even though Microsoft continued to update its products in ways that temporarily undermined the ability of Apple customers to exchange documents with Microsoft customers, paying engineers to unbreak everything that Microsoft's maneuvers broke. Apple's persistence paid off: over time, Microsoft's customers became dependent on compatibility with Apple customers, and they would complain if Microsoft changed its Office products in ways that broke their cross-platform workflow.

Since Pages' launch, document interoperability has stabilized, with multiple parties entering the market, including Google's cloud-based Docs offerings, and the free/open alternatives from LibreOffice. The convergence on this standard was not undertaken with the blessing of the dominant player: rather, it came about despite Microsoft's opposition. Docs are not just interoperable, they're adversarially interoperable: each has its own file format, but each can read Microsoft's file format.

The document wars are just one of many key junctures in which adversarial interoperability made a dominant player vulnerable to new entrants:

Hayes modems

Usenet's alt.* hierarchy

Supercard's compatibility with Hypercard

Search engines' web-crawlers

Servers of every kind, which routinely impersonate PCs, printers, and other devices

Scratch the surface of most Big Tech giants and you'll find an adversarial interoperability story: Facebook grew by making a tool that let its users stay in touch with MySpace users; Google products from search to Docs and beyond depend on adversarial interoperability layers; Amazon's cloud is full of virtual machines pretending to be discrete CPUs, impersonating real computers so well that the programs running within them have no idea that they're trapped in the Matrix.

Adversarial interoperability converts market dominance from an unassailable asset to a liability. Once Facebook could give new users the ability to stay in touch with MySpace friends, then every message those Facebook users sent back to MySpace—with a footer advertising Facebook's superiority—became a recruiting tool for more Facebook users. MySpace served Facebook as a reservoir of conveniently organized potential users that could be easily reached with a compelling pitch about why they should switch.

Today, Facebook is posting 30-54% annual year-on-year revenue growth and boasts 2.3 billion users, many of whom are deeply unhappy with the service, but who are stuck within its confines because their friends are there (and vice-versa).

A company making billions and growing by double-digits with 2.3 billion unhappy customers should be every investor's white whale, but instead, Facebook and its associated businesses are known as "the kill zone" in investment circles.

Facebook's advantage is in "network effects": the idea that Facebook increases in value with every user who joins it (because more users increase the likelihood that the person you're looking for is on Facebook). But adversarial interoperability could allow new market entrants to arrogate those network effects to themselves, by allowing their users to remain in contact with Facebook friends even after they've left Facebook.

This kind of adversarial interoperability goes beyond the sort of thing envisioned by "data portability," which usually refers to tools that allow users to make a one-off export of all their data, which they can take with them to rival services. Data portability is important, but it is no substitute for the ability to have ongoing access to a service that you're in the process of migrating away from.

Big Tech platforms leverage both their users' behavioral data and the ability to lock their users into "walled gardens" to drive incredible growth and profits. The customers for these systems are treated as though they have entered into a negotiated contract with the companies, trading privacy for service, or vendor lock-in for some kind of subsidy or convenience. And when Big Tech lobbies against privacy regulations and anti-walled-garden measures like Right to Repair legislation, they say that their customers negotiated a deal in which they surrendered their personal information to be plundered and sold, or their freedom to buy service and parts on the open market.

But it's obvious that no such negotiation has taken place. Your browser invisibly and silently hemorrhages your personal information as you move about the web; you paid for your phone or printer and should have the right to decide whose ink or apps go into them.

Adversarial interoperability is the consumer's bargaining chip in these coercive "negotiations." More than a quarter of Internet users have installed ad-blockers, making it the biggest consumer revolt in human history. These users are making counteroffers: the platforms say, "We want all of your data in exchange for this service," and their users say, "How about none?" Now we have a negotiation!

Or think of the iPhone owners who patronize independent service centers instead of using Apple's service: Apple's opening bid is "You only ever get your stuff fixed from us, at a price we set," and the owners of Apple devices say, "Hard pass." Now it's up to Apple to make a counteroffer. We'll know it's a fair one if iPhone owners decide to patronize Apple's service centers.

This is what a competitive market looks like. In the absence of competitive offerings from rival firms, consumers make counteroffers by other means.

There is good reason to want to see a reinvigorated approach to competition in America, but it's important to remember that competition is enabled or constrained not just by mergers and acquisitions. Companies can use a whole package of laws to attain and maintain dominance, to the detriment of the public interest.

Today, consumers and toolsmiths confront a thicket of laws and rules that stand between them and technological self-determination. To change that, we need to reform the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, , patent law, and other rules and laws. Adversarial interoperability is in the history of every tech giant that rules today, and if it was good enough for them in the past, it's good enough for the companies that will topple them in the future.

(Crossposted from EFF Deeplinks)

https://boingboing.net/2019/06/07/lightsabers-for-trustbusting.html

[twitchesandstitches]

Three Tides Turning

Odina was, perhaps against her preference, an expert on magical things of all kinds. Academic knowledge, with a lot of firsthand experience, and the joke was that she had approximate knowledge of pretty much any magical thing.

She was very surprised to have Toast, of all people, asking her advice; she was pretty certain the little robot hated her guts, and would in fact have been happy to SEE her guts spread all over the wall. It wasn’t personal, he simply hated every single human to ever exist. It was a democratic sort of loathing, an almost genteel hatred that ignored cred and origin and country and deeds, all in favor of resenting the great teeming mass of humanity and proclaiming them all equally guilty of being absolute bastards.

She’d never asked why he hated her species so much. She had her suspicions. The magic that powered him was fueled by his own hatred and anger, but the special kind that came from pain. Emotion magic had its own flavors, and he reeked of suffering, and in his impassioned rants she heard the echoes of absolute despair so painful the only sensible response was to make it into kindling. He had suffered, and given the reputation of humanity among its mechanical offspring, and the optic that had been torn out of his head, she could guess what KIND of suffering he had endured.

Even at his most sociable and miserably lonely, when he had no choice but to seek out company that might include humans, he tended to avoid her. So seeking her advice out was, well, a really big damn deal!

Toast hunched over on a small overturned table, a little red robot apparently designed for a quadrupedal stance. Here and now he looked a lot like a mechanical dinosaur, but one that was oddly cute. He was just so… small, and compact. His wiry tail lashed around, and his boxy head tilted around, his single remaining eye blinking as he twisted his head around to see her.

Both his arms articulated as he tried to explain himself. One arm was slender and ended in a kind of paw. The other was a massive taloned gauntlet, larger than he was, the obscene mass built around an elemental fire core that fueled his various powers. It made him a truly fearsome heavy hitter, but it also severely hobbled him, and only now did she appreciate just how awkward he moved with it; his claws alone were a painful sight, when all his other movements were fluid, if so jittery you could expect he was impatient to finish moving and making little gestures.

“It’s… it’s my friend,” he managed, and pointed, and some of the things he had been telling her clicked. Ah, she thought in the back of her head.

Looming behind them was a monstrously huge figure, apparently the size of a house, draped in a tent crudely worked into a rough cloak. Atop it was a feral head, snout poking out of a projecting head but still obscured by a massive set of puffy lips.

God, it was so big. No, she was so big. Femininity radiated from it, like the psychic tide you couldn’t help but hammer you with pleasant vibes and sudden surges of hormones, and the desire to… do things. Animal things, rutting and breeding and delighting in the most basest of pleasures...

Odina’s absorbing powers sucked away the worst of it, so that she was a whirlpool of negated essence right there. Her total lack of interest in sex of any kind also provided a defense. The great mother-monster noticed this somehow, and turned to see them. A massive pair of breasts, big enough for Odina to fit inside them, shifted behind the cloak, and were so large they dominated the heft of even this hulking frame.

An aberrant hand, or perhaps a paw, raised its two webbed fingers. Claws longer than Odina’s arm wiggled playfully at her. “Sup, hun,” she rumbled, her voice deep, resonant, like an echo of the primordial sea.

Odina waved back nonchalantly. “Hey, terrifying monster lady.”

The eldritch monster mother - Tiashar was her chosen name, according to Toast, who had made himself an expert on her - chuckled at that. It was hard to make out details with that big cloak she wore; Odina could make out a massive mane of hair, or perhaps feathers, growing down her neck and shoulders and expanding outwards into a huge floor-dragging cloud several times larger even than she was. Some bits of it had become little tentacles, or tongued mouths. There were eyes, many of them, beneath it, but were quite invisible behind the long bangs. She did see a hint of multiple floppy ears, tweaking vaguely in response to stimuli no mortal senses were capable of perceiving.

Most of the exposed body was deep black. The shade differed; upon her face and the smoother parts of her skin, it was the color of ancient tar. On the patches of scales, a blue-black like the deepest parts of the sea. The armored plates on her shoulders, forearms, or the enormous tube that was her tail? It seemed to be even darker than all that, oily and rich. And oh yes, there were patches of other colors here and there; the gills lining her neck and sides were the same magenta as her mane, her huge lips and various other parts were a brilliant green… and in fact green seemed to be a secondary color, as if to offset her other shades.

Pebbly scales, slabs of chitin, features of ten thousand different phylums all mashed together in a strangely ideal form with her, and she suspected that was the key to understanding her. So many things that didn’t seem to belong, but with her, they did.

Presently, she seemed content to now ignore Odina and laid down, cooing at the dirt. Apparently whispering to the bacteria.

“...I’m worried about her, “ Toast said, his smaller hand rubbing its claws against a single digit of his big hand, his normally grouchy expression winding up into something forlorn and distressed. “She’s being so… so weird lately!”

“Weird by what metric.” Odina indicated her vaguely. “This is the same lady who spent half a month living in an attic, eating our garbage cans and screaming at mega-possums.”

It was amazing how Toast instantly shifted into hostility; he flared up, flames exploding around him, and a fireball appeared in his hand. “You talkin’ shit about her!?” he snarled, embers flying from his mouth like spittle.

Odina let herself instinctively eat the magic he was throwing off, but if he noticed his flames dying, he didn’t notice. They just flared up again, and her butt expanded, shelf rising over her waist and her skirt creaking in protest at it slid up, her hips expanding sideways. ‘Do NOT push him,’, she reminded herself, he absolutely would try to kill her instantly if he felt even slightly irritated, regardless of needing her help or not.

It didn’t come easily to her to play nice, but she would do her best. “I’m not making fun. I’m just saying, she’s kinda weird. Like the rest of us?”

He grunted, depowering. The local magical quotient went down, though her backside scale remained embiggened. “Yeah, okay.”

“So what do you MEAN, she’s acting weird?”

“I don’t know. The other day, she’s all calm and serene, hanging around with the men and women that wanna be around her all the time. Y’know, she feeds ‘em, gives ‘em baths in her milk and stuff, sometimes they feed themselves to her and she pops ‘em out as monstery versions of their old selves, but mostly they just… adore her?” He shook his head. “I don’t know, its weird. It's like… she needs it?”

“Sounds like they’re worshiping her,” Odina said vaguely, an idea coming to mind.

“Seems legit.” he tweaked his fingers, popping them off and chewing on them anxiously. “Then the next few weeks, they do none of tat, they just hang out with her and we go exploring? Fighting monsters together? The other folks, they fuse together and stuff, its like its a big adventure party? And it's fine, but then, just a few nights ago, she got hungry. Really hungry.” he looked uncomfortable. “And horny. Like, even more than usual.”

“Sounds like a lot of effort,” Odina said, who regarded all things sexual as an alien endeavor way more trouble than it was worth.

“She just wanted nothing but sex, twenty-four/seven, for almost a solid week! With all of them! And then they let her gobble them up, and now…” he gestured at her. Odina noticed her belly was very ripe, round and projecting outwards. A gravid, super-pregnant belly, with both the offspring sired with them, and the cultist’s reborn souls. “She just did nothing but eat continuously, barely speaking a word. I tried to talk to her and she looked at me like… like she couldn’t remember how.”

He paused.

“She kissed me.” He hugged himself, looking faintly lost, like he couldn’t quite understand how anyone would want to do that to him. “She couldn’t talk anymore, but she was happy to see me.”

“She’s talking now.”

“Yeah, I mean, she’s back on her regular mindset, where she’s being a chill mom and stuff but… shit. She keeps going through these phases and! And! And I’m really freaked out, is something wrong with her, is she sick, is she going to go away and ascend or something!?”

He shook Odina by the neckline desperately. “I can’t deal with that, okay!? How do I help her!?”

She gently but firmly pushed his claws off. “Calm down, she’s okay. She’s just trying to balance herself out. It’s part of what she is, okay?”

Toast stared at her. “Part of… what she is? What, a chimera monster girl?”

“No. You… do know she’s something else altogether? One of those things that…” she gestured vaguely. “Come from Outside?”

He stared blankly.

“The far realms?”

His optic blinked, slowly. “Nuh uh.”

“The parts of the multiverse that exist outside the set that has anything at all to do with mortals or our understanding of reality?”

“I’m drawing a zero here.”

“...The mad things that were here before the gods?”

“Still nothing.”

“...Okay, she’s an eldritch abomination that decided to be like a mortal, okay!?”

He nodded. “Ohh, right. Like that. Got it.”

“...You really get it?”

“Honestly, no.” He shrugged. “Could not give a shit, to be honest.”

She sighed. “It’s like this. Creatures like her tend to develop certain traits in common, because they’re forming minds like ours, but they’re still working in a totally different way. They’re not exactly elder beasts, they’re a little bit like gods, but they’re something a bit in between. And SHE is learning her way around that. Every day, and sometimes backsliding or losing her sense of what she is.”

Toast seemed to understand that, at least. He nodded.

Odina sighed. “Right, okay. So, if she’s like the other sorts of things I’ve heard about, she’s basically formed a mental state made out of three different parts that influence her in different ways.”

“What does this have to do with her being weird?”

“Because these are giving her contradictory urges, and she has no impulse control! She IS her desires!” Odina snapped her fingers, producing a little magical sign that said ‘get it??’. “Firstly, what you probably think is her ‘regular self’ is really just the parts of her mind she’s forced to think like a mortal.” A troubling idea came to her. “Or… what she thinks mortals are like. But she’s so different that even that is just guessing games, and she’s forced her brain into patterns completely unnatural to her, and it's always shifting around and trying to become something else. Because change is what she DOES.”

Toast looked baffled.

Odina tried again. “Look at it like this. When she’s worked out some kind of balance between her natures here, this side of her is the one that probably wins out and makes a happy medium. She wants to please herself and please other people, in moderation; it comes off to us as weird and constantly hungry, but that’s just what happens when godly hungers get curbed. That’s still moderate, by HER standards. The kind of things she doesn’t really get, like abstract causes, and long term stuff; she’s able to deal with those things more easy. She’s able to think more like you can.”

“Okay, I get THAT, at least.” Toast scratched his metal ears sheepishly.

“Now, you probably noticed her gathering people to her. That’s just a function of what she is; she’s a sort of proto-god. Gods want to be worshiped and admired; she needs a cult, and it's her nature to build them. So that's the bit of her that’s the most divine coming out. Probably also why she goes off and fights monsters; she probably sees it as protecting her people.” She paused, thoughtfully. “Or maybe she’s just getting into the ‘guardian kaiju’ vibe. She does have the look.” Another pause. “And getting people to breed with her might also be a god thing; she’s probably compelled to do it, as a function of what she is.”

“And you said something about a beast, earlier?”

“Right, her third nature. That’s the part of her that’s… well, monstrous and ravenous. A beast, nothing but hunger and desire. Not that its bad or evil!” she said hurriedly, noticing Toast’s temper starting to rise on Tiashar’s behalf. “Just… she’s already impulsive, but that part of her is literally nothing but instant gratification and satiating herself! Like…the bit of her that wants to be pleasured and satisfied all the time, that wants to be constnatly gestating monsters and having sex whenever she’s not eating? And then eating them right afterwards, and turning their souls into MORE things to gestate so they can stay with her forever in new bodies. ITs the part of her that runs on instinct and animal hunger, forever.”

He nodded, in a dour sort of way. “Okay, I think I get it. So…” he tried to process it all. “She acts weird because she’s got a whole bunch of competing drives and urges, some of them at odds with each other, constantly changing how she thinks and feels?”

Odina shrugged. “Her actual feelings are probably pretty, uh, consistent. The way she responds to them and acts on them does change, depending on which way her brain is working. Like if she likes someone and she’s pure beast, she probably wants to just jump on them and rut until the sun goes down, and them nuzzle them for a full month. And when she goes full god, she wants to shower them with blessings and love. And if she balances it out and can think properly? Then she just wants a friend, or maybe a tiny spouse. As long as she can hold onto that scale.”

He looked uneasy. “God… and she has to live like that…?”

“I don’t think it bothers her,” Odina said, not sure if she was actually trying to reassure him, or herself. “It’s just the way she sees the world and prioritizes stuff changes. She probably doesn’t really notice her perspective shifting. It’s just part of what she is. The tide turns, because that’s what it does; same thing with her.”

Toast looked troubled. “But..”

“Most eldritch entities, the ones that are making an honest effort to really understand us, wind up something similar. Plenty of them strike up a balance. The trick is them holding onto it.”

Toast wiggled. “So… Mama Tiashar…?”

She noticed, but didn’t say anything about it, his use of the honorific.

A small slip of the tongue, but a big, big deal for someone so miserably spiteful and suspicious of the whole world.

“Nothing’s wrong with her,” Odina said. “Her nature is just to change to different extremes. Sometimes she’ll be wild and ravenous. Sometimes she’ll be weird and think like an old goddess. And sometimes, more often than not, she’ll be like a regular weird mortal thingy. Just depends on the way her tides are turning.”

He whimpered. “But I want her to be happy.”

Odina looked at him, with something she didn’t dare admit might be pity.

It was a hard thing, to find out what love was at this point in his life, and to be afraid to know it.

There was a heavy stomping noise nearby.

Tiashar had stood up and slowly approached. Her massive tail lashed around, her enormous thighs slapped together as she approached, and slowly she leaned down, her head looming over Toast’s body. Her mouth opened, and she whispered softly.

“Toast, buddy,” she said, the words sounding distant and carefully picked. “Something bothering you?”

He shivered, and suddenly hugged her lip. One arm too skinny not to just sink in and instantly vanish, the other a huge and awkward club that started to fall on its own weight. “I’m just worried about you,” he whimpered.

She giggled, and gave him a soft kiss, pulling him right off the ground. She stood up, to her full height, and with another smooching pop, deposited him neatly into her cleavage, where he immediately snuggled up. “Aww, you’re a sweetie, little buddy. Don’t you worry. Mama Tiashar has herself figured out.” She gave her gravid belly a hug. “Be chill, my little dude, and don’t beat yourself up over it.”

“Can’t,” he said shortly. “I just worry a lot about you…”

She chuckled. “I don’t worry about nothin’, and I’m totally chillaxed forever. Try it some time, sweetie. It’s fun.”

She nodded at Odina. “Later, short stuff.”

Odina waved vaguely at her, trying not to instantly butt-bloat up to the size of a building just from being in her presence. “Later.”

Tiashar skipped off, her gargantuan butt jiggling like literally all the gelatin there ever wars, her tail even smacking it possibly by accident, as she cooed gently to the still fretting Toast.

And Odina thought about the tides turning, and how they were fortunate to have wound up with an eldritch horror that seemed perpetually stuck on the ‘be a sweetheart’ side of things, regardless of her current flavor of impulses.

[mynumenorean-blog]

Physics and Philosophy: Depression is Like Gravity

When a star runs out of fuel and collapses under its own weight, it super-compresses into an infinitely small and dense point called a singularity. We never see this because this itty-bitty singularity has an enormous gravitational field around it that’s so powerful, not even light can escape it. In fact, the only things that have escaped are select radioactive waves that will, in theory, eventually cause the black hole itself to dissipate into nothingness.

In a way, this is also what happens to people with clinical depression. We collapse under the weight of our mental and emotional burdens. Our personalities, passions, and interests super-compress to the point to where even we can’t see them, surrounded by a near-impenetrable field of unwarranted, all-encompassing sadness and pain. The light given by family, friends, and other loved ones becomes all but invisible to us, and anything we send out from this abyss is just as harmful to ourselves as to others.

Unfortunately, we’re no closer to permanently fixing depression than we are to turning black holes back into stars. While there are some of us who respond well to conventional treatment, many of us find that regular therapy and medication just don’t cut it. To make matters worse, those who are lucky enough to not have this condition find it difficult to understand; some even deny that it’s anything that exercise, vitamins, and a deliberately chipper attitude can’t fix. Anyone with a shred of decency who’s kept up with modern science knows that labor pains are real, being gay isn’t a choice, and white people aren’t fundamentally better than any other kinds of people. Why, then, are we still taking backwards, outdated approaches to mental illnesses?

Modern physics tells us that so long as you steer clear of a black hole’s event horizon (the outer boundary, and the only part of it we can really observe), there’s still hope of not being pulled in by all that nasty gravity. However, the closer you are to it, the greater the speed at which you’d need to be travelling to elude the black hole’s gravitational pull. Similarly, most who suffer from Major Depressive Disorder can remember the event (or series of events) that lead to the onset of their condition. The pain, anger, and misery they inspired bind themselves to the center of a person’s consciousness, and anyone who approaches them afterwards is at risk of this malicious miasma interacting with their own day-to-day routine. Like gravity, it can reach out and touch anyone or anything in the sufferer’s life, twisting and distorting their perception of even the most cherished pieces of their lives until they no longer associate any feelings with them at all. While in its throes, some find that they must distance themselves from the sufferer to avoid being slowly consumed by their negativity.

To put things into perspective, a normal person has “gravity” that’s no stronger than that of Earth; just the right amount of pressure to ensure healthy growth. Clinical depression sufferers typically have an excess of the stress hormone cortisol, which causes certain areas of the brain to shrink and others to enlarge. An excess of gravity, on the other hand, would cause many parts of our bodies to be squashed down towards earth while causing blood pressure and production to increase. If it continues to grow, then eventually, it’s, “’Pop’ goes the human.” Much like gravity, too much cortisol can make a person “pop” both physically and mentally, as it’s been linked to weight gain, emotional outbursts, and suicidal behavior.

Even one’s sense of time is affected by both depression and gravity. The latter of the two literally curves the fabric of space time, causing it to flow more slowly than it would otherwise have done. The stronger the gravitational field, the more sluggishly time progresses. There is also a sense of timelessness in the minds of the depressed; one’s perception of time becomes altered and they often have difficulty keeping up with the pace of life. They’re stuck at the fixed points wherein their “gravity” increased, and forward progression can often move at as glacial a pace as George R. R. Martin’s writing (I love you, George, but two thirds of the Star Wars franchise were finished faster than it took you to not finish ASoIaF). They often feel that they’re standing still in a world that never stops moving, which exacerbates an already profound sense of alienation. The greater the depression, the more pronounced the sense of timelessness.

So, what’s one to do with all this information? How will knowing this change anything? Well, if we continue to draw parallels between MDD and the universe’s most abundant fundamental force, then we’ll realize that neither of these things are linear forces. Gravity can be understood as a curvature in space-time, whereas Major Depressive Disorder could be considered a “curvature” in the neural network. Both represent deviations from what is typically observed. There are very real physical differences between the typical human brain and one afflicted with MDD. Stop telling people with the disorder to “just get more exercise,” “go outside more,” “get over it,” or other such tripe. While time outdoors and physical activity are seldom bad ideas, they’re not a cure for the condition, so stop pretending they’ll fix depressed people. A better course of action would be simply to offer love and support; show them that you accept them as they are and will always be there to help them in whatever way you can.

Let’s also remember that gravity works in direct relation to the mass of celestial objects; the greater the mass, the stronger the gravitational pull. Some clinically depressed persons find that they can reduce their “mass” through regular therapy, while others must take prescription medications to chemically reduce it. Many require both. What most therapists will agree on, however, is that one of the most crucial factors in learning to cope with MDD is having a strong support system. Finding the right therapist can be nearly as challenging as finding the right medication; what works for one person may fail in spectacular fashion for another. Personally, I’m one for whom my circle of support was the only thing that truly helped me manage my MDD. Happiness became a conscious decision I had to make every day, and experience has taught me which of my coping mechanisms are the most beneficial for me. The love and understanding of those around me aid in keeping my “mass” as low as possible, and when it reaches a critical point, I can always reach out to them for help.

No matter what method a person uses to manage their depression, if it’s not harming the sufferer or others around them, no one else has a say in whether it’s the “right” approach or not. Yes, I understand that some medications have rather nasty reputations for the side effects they can produce. However, if a person feels that their meds are a bigger help than a hazard, then don’t try to cram essential oils up their noses, vitamins down their throats, or sunshine up their asses. You’re only adding to their mass.

Unfortunately, some psychiatrists do more harm than good by trying to find the quickest way to manage the symptoms. They treat their patients like lab rats, prescribing the most “promising” (aka expensive) new medications that haven’t been tested nearly long enough to observe any long-term damage they could eventually cause. When they observe an improvement, they pat themselves on the back and consider the job done. If the patient reports a different problem than the one with which they presented, they push another miracle pill onto the patient without considering the idea that the first pill might be causing the new problem. So-called medical “professionals” like this who play the doctor equivalent of “hit it and quit it” with patients are a large part of why the American medical system has become such a joke in the rest of the developed world. If all doctors were as interested in resolving their patients’ problems as they seem to be in throwing a pill at them, employing the “wait-and-see” method, and getting to charge them for follow-up visits, the WHO might not have given the US health care system the rank of 37th-best in the world in 2018.

Okay, that last bit was a rant, and it’s over now.

In conclusion, I hope this has been an insightful look into the minds of those who suffer from depression. If not, then I hope that those who have the disorder found it relatable. In any case, the more people understand the difference between “feeling blue” and actual depression, the faster the misconceptions about this condition can be replaced with compassion. One day, we may understand enough about MDD that we’ll be able to find a permanent solution. Until then, the 300 million people around the world who have this illness ask those who don’t to be patient with us… we’re doing the best we can against an enemy that modern medicine still doesn’t fully comprehend.

[xanth-the-wizard]

Random Town Encounters (1d100)

The complete list of my Town Encounters #1-5! Vote for the next set of Random Encounters HERE. (Image Credit: x)

[1] An enormous bear stumbles around town wearing human clothing. They’re attempting to order drinks at the local tavern, but so far they haven’t had much luck [2] You arrive early morning into a quiet little village. Unfortunately nobody is around to greet you because they have all been turned into candy [3] A festival is taking place in the center of town. They seem to be celebrating a historical figure that looks oddly similar to someone in the party [4] Dashing through the streets, a bandit has stolen a powerful magic artifact. Anyone they pass by are turned to stone. A hefty reward will be given to anyone who can catch them [5] Hm? In your back pocket there’s a piece of paper with directions to somewhere in town. If asked about the location, nobody seems to know where it is [6] While walking through the streets a child runs into the party at full speed, falling to the ground. They apologize profusely as they begin to collect their dropped goods. This includes a baby dragon [7] Rumor: The guards in this town are not human, they never sleep. Most people speculate they are from another realm [8] Enticing smells fill the air, there seems to be a cooking competition in town. And it looks like it’s not too late to sign up. Anybody know how to make a killer quiche? [9] Rumor: Beneath the city lies an ancient tunnel leading to a thief’s lost treasure. But everyone is too afraid to look for themselves. When prompted on what is down there, people dance around the question [10] Sentient vegetables rebel against the local chef. At first glance it seems to be a harmless prank, but anyone bit by the veggies begin morphing into vicious vegetables themselves [11] Magic is outlawed in this district of town. Anyone who casts any spell begins to glow [12] Little ducklings follow behind the party, quacking merrily. They are perfectly harmless but without their mother. Did somebody order 8 new beautiful children? [13] Ghosts have driven out the living from the town leaving behind a literal Ghost Town. The Ghosts are actually quite friendly, too friendly [14] Rumor: Grandma Crabapple, a sweet old lady who lives alone in her cottage up on the hill is actually a Doppelganger. Looks like we’re going to have to eat her famous cherry pie and get to the bottom of this mystery [15] The local tavern has been recently reconstructed, a group of rowdy adventurers burned it down a few months back. The locals don’t take kindly to any adventurers now [16] Every year in spring a nearby lake floods, threatening the village’s safety. But every year the cobblestone wall surrounding them keeps them safe. But this year, something goes horribly wrong. And it’s probably one of your player’s fault [17] Rumor: The local school is teaching children to summon demons and worship the devil [18] Rotten tomatoes fly as an Orc Bard attempts to perform in the streets for gold [19] A potion brewer has set up shop in town, they have an extra special brew that grants anyone who drinks it invisibility. But the effect happens randomly and without warning [20] Perched upon a crumbling building, a gargantuan bird watches the town silently. The villagers claim that wishing upon one of the bird’s feathers can grant a wish. Unfortunately the bird doesn’t shed very often and doesn’t like to be bothered [21] Rumor: The alcohol in the bar is watered down with a substitute that creates intense cravings for more alcohol [22] Transcending space and time, you cat appears. They are to scale with your figurines and demand your attention [23] Goblins have invaded! Oh, looks like they’re just selling baked goods at reasonable prices. You win this time Goblins… [24] The water wells have frozen over unexpectedly. A sentient ice elemental is passing through [25] You have entered into a town created with sand and dirt, there is a lone tower in the center. A wizard has created their own town by controlling local ants. The wizard smells really bad [26] A real life celebrity has a look-alike in your campaign, and they are the bartender at a small tavern with dreams of being famous [27] A Magic Shop is selling the most illegitimate looking magic items you’ve ever seen. But for some reason people are flooding to their stand and buying all of their merch. Do they not realize? [28] Rumor: In this small farming town, the Scarecrows are said to awaken at night looking to exchange bodies with anyone who loses to them at their game. The game is hopscotch [29] You’ve been handed a flyer for a local religious group. It seems they worship an Insect god. Surely they are up to no good! Oooh, look! They have a buffet! [30] A horse cart race is under way, are you in? [31] Out of the sewers, four turtles emerge. They have varying magical mutations. One can turn invisible, another has super speed, the remaining turtle’s powers are unknown. They are causing quite a ruckus in town [32] Rumor: Eerie whistling is heard by the graveyard every night. The townspeople believe it is a restless spirit [33]  Tap dancing frogs, followed by synchronized flying ravens appear. A local swamp witch is accomplishing her dream. She expects applause and tips, or else [34] A group of local teens are attempting to fundraise a dangerous project. They promise that it will revolutionize the world [35] Rumor: The leader of this town is actually a dozen frogs in a trenchcoat [36] You are given a free lotion sample at a stand. The lotion has strange side effects including but not limited to, sprouting wings [37] A villager appears to the party, they are an obvious caricature of your favorite video game character [38] Servants of a local noble rebel. They are protesting outside the castle [39] There is a college within the town that holds forgotten history. It’s a favorite among the world’s most powerful magicians. Surely you’ll meet someone interesting inside? [40] Many clues lead you to believe that there are witches hiding in the city. The truth is, the entire town is a coven, everyone is a witch. Can you trust this coven? [41] There is a flea-market in town with hundreds of vendors selling everything from valuable artisan goods to worthless junk. If you’re lucky you may find a neglected magic item for sale [42] A thieves guild takeover is currently underway and somehow you’ve managed to get involved [43] An earthquake ravages the city, within the rubble ancient prophetic texts are discovered [44] Rumor: Beneath the meat shop there is an illegal underground fighting ring. What will you do? Stop it from getting out of hand, make some bets, or sign up as a fighter yourself? [45] Riots in the streets spark as an unjust ruler is appointed into a position of great power [46] Taco Bell is real and Baja Blast is now canon [47] Rumor: An unknown infant Monster is roaming the streets. It is incredibly dangerous and there is a bounty for its capture. People believe it is a Basilisk [48] Twin scientists advertise around town for their Monster business. They buy and sell monster parts and some interesting Monster related goods [49] The town drunk happens to know a lot of interesting/important information but nobody seems to be listening [50] The world’s first train operates within this bustling city. While visiting a catastrophic event occurs involving a busted engine [51] Rumor: Pranksters have animated the children’s toys and stuffed animals at the local General Store causing some traumatic memories for the local kids. People believe the culprits are the store owners themselves. But how true is this claim? [52] Rumor: The abandoned castle on the hill is full of tremendous treasure and wealth. But so far nobody has discovered where it is hidden [53] Local crime lord strolls around town with their new love interest. Everyone is afraid of this criminal but do nothing to stop them from taking advantage of their town [54] An industrialized revolution is happening! Lots of unique goods and services are all over the city. But this massive urban development comes with a steep cost. Nature spirits are planning an attack on the city for invading their homeland [55] You are in a town blessed by nature. Colorful fauna is everywhere and on every building. It is a beautiful culmination of nature and society. They also grow rare and exotic crops [56] Yup. It finally happened. The most chaotic member of the party has a bounty. Good luck [57] This town is inhabited entirely by avian beings. They are friendly, but most places are inaccessible if you can’t fly [58] A local Barber is willing to give your party’s pet a cool new haircut. What’s that? They have no hair you say? No problem! Stylish wigs are also an option [59] “Welcome! Tonight is the big game! The Bardic and Wizarding colleges are going to face off! Be sure to buy your tickets now!” [60] Zelda-esque mini games are all over the place! Smash pots, hit some targets, win some rupees! [61] A town of sentient horses. An equestrian experience nobody will forget [62] Stone guardians have become animated and are rampaging through the town. First we must stop the guardians. Second we have to figure out who did this [63] Rumor: Buildings are falling apart as bricks and stones are disappearing randomly. Some believe the bricks are alive. It’s the curse of the Were-Bricks! [64] A special promotion for a local tavern is given to anyone who can catch and dispose of the rats from their basement. Problem is, these rats aren’t just simple street rats [65] Did somebody say, Shopping montage? A trendy fashion store has opened up, it’s the perfect to accessorize! Maybe some new outfits for the next campaign arc? [66] Just put your players in the town of Whiterun from Skyrim. Perfect [67] And while I’m talking Skyrim, instead of stealing Whiterun. Instead you should just quote the Skyrim NPC’s constantly. “Let me guess… someone stole your sweetroll.” [68] Rumor: A mad scientist has created life, but the being has escaped and stalks the dark alleyways [69] A bird delivers an important letter to a member of the party… That or it’s a 25% off coupon for a local Costume store [70] The circus is in town! But something’s not quite right. The attendants of the shows can never recall what happens during the performances but are always dying to go back [71] A knock off group of Fantasy Avengers appear and take credit for the party’s heroic deeds. They do this multiple times throughout the campaign. I’d suggest settling this debacle once and for all in battle! [72] “Welcome! Have you checked out our main attraction? It’s our pride and joy! People come from all over the world to catch a glimpse of this spectacle!” Examples: House made entirely out of food. A skyscraper that can reach space. A wishing well that supposedly grants one word wishes. A captivating glowing orb of pure hatred and hellfire [73] Rumor: During a full moon a store opens up for business selling strange artifacts. Rumors also suggest the owner of this business is the Devil himself [74] Giant Snail races are being hosted tonight, care to make a wager? [75] Rumor: The local fortune teller has been warning the village of some ominous futures. Surely this is just a ploy to snag some extra profit? [76] A carnival you say? Introduce a bunch of sleazy carnies to con your party into massive debt. A debt so large that it can only be repaid with even sleazier side quests [77] A FUN carnival you say? Let your players participate in some fun games to show off their strengths and clever skills (AKA cheating) [78] Local orphans take a liking to your party, they are very sweet [79] Roll initiative! A mugger has attacked- Oh! False alarm. It’s only a knife salesman [80] A bored god appears within the city demanding the town’s finest ales and to battle an honorable adversary [81] The local Odditorium* is an enticing tourist trap that is offering a questionable new promotion (Think, The Mystery Shack from Gravity Falls or Ripley’s Believe It or Not!) [82] The most unlikely individual offers the party an assassin job. Unfortunately, this job is wacky and requires dressing up like members of a circus [83] A blessing! Local flower shop gifts a player a lucky daffodil. Good fortune and prosperity is in their future [84] A curse! One of your players has been struck with a curse of familiarity. In every town you enter someone will swear they look just like someone else and mistake them for said person [85] Rumor: There’s a rumor going around about your party. A bad one. Nobody trusts you [86] It is migrating season for Unicorns and this town is in the middle of their migration path. Despite their beauty, these Unicorns are dangerous and untrusting [87] The entire town is riddled with traps and wires, be careful where you step [88] As your party travels through the town, one member of the party seems to be teleported to another realm. In reality they haven’t moved at all. Stranger things have happened I’m sure. It’s probably nothing (It’s definitely something) [89] Rumor: A man known as the Master of Riddles lives in town. He will reward anyone for solving his riddles. But the rewards are unlike anything anyone’s ever seen [90] Taxidermied animals rampage through the streets, a Necromancer is to blame [91] Your reoccurring “Big Bad Villain” just happens to be in town. They don’t immediately recognize the party and seem to be doing some pretty domestic stuff. Is this their hometown or is this just a pit stop in their travels? [92] This river settlement is quite large. They have just begun developing this area, most buildings are still being constructed. The tavern, inn and a few shops are open. Trouble looms in the distance as a large beast’s home is directly below [93] Local pants thieves begin messing with the party and it is hilarious [94] Rumor: Inside the oldest building in town there is an ancient door that is said to lead to the heavens. Nobody has ever been able to open the door, not even with magic. The key’s location is an unsolved mystery. Some say the key is buried somewhere nearby [95] Rumor: Local inventor claims to have created a machine that can fly and is willing to pay anyone to give it a test run [96] Dozens of missing person and lost item posters are all around the town (For an extra twist, one of the missing people is someone in the party) [97] In the center of town lies a guild of mice adventurers. They protect this town and make sure all outsiders are trustworthy [98] Take all the snacks and drinks you and your players brought to today’s session and create a boss fight out of it! It emerges from the earth with little to no warning [99] A group of teens run around the city role playing their favorite book characters. Unfortunately these characters are swashbuckling looters. Time to put these kids in time out [100] A traveling merchant sells odd wooden closets, drawers, and chests. When opened, these objects lead to portals between dimensions. Suddenly, one of the closets tip over and the doors swing open

[mikeo56]

Sue Tumblr

Earlier this week, the blogging platform Tumblr announced that it would be scrubbing itself of “adult content.” The move doesn’t just affect how people look at and exchange nude photos on a downtrodden platform—it portends a broad shift in how we experience intimacy and connection online, in how user-generated content is managed, and in how tech maintains its stranglehold on the digital commons.

The “adult content” Tumblr will be banning, the company wrote, “primarily includes photos, videos, or GIFs that show real-life human genitals or female-presenting nipples, and any content—including photos, videos, GIFs and illustrations—that depicts sex acts.” But what the company is really going after is a four-letter word strangely missing from its 538-word announcement: porn. Tumblr may be home to personal blogs, community forums, and foodie photo collections, but pornography makes up a huge part of its reputation. A friend of mine texted me that Tumblr ending porn is like “McDonald's ending hamburgers.”

Tumblr’s decision was partly motivated by a large child-porn problem. You can see why rather than pay for the expensive work of patrolling the age of people in porn, the company would simply want to overcorrect. But its adult content wasn’t strictly limited to porn. The site is—was—a haven for people who might not be able to connect sexually in other ways. As a reader who might be described as a member of the “cub” gay subculture wrote to me, “Porn and related content on Tumblr was the primary place I first saw more natural body types for guys.” Besides Tumblr, he said, there hasn’t always been “any place guys who are average to larger without growing six packs could admire themselves and other guys.”

Just as black Twitter gave voice and audience to black writers, Tumblr created the space for sexually nonnormative people to see and be seen in ways they weren’t elsewhere. There were Tumblrs for those who identify as bears, furries, HIV-positive, bisexual, disabled, and fat; for people into S&M, pegging, and group masturbation. Whatever your body type or fetish, there was probably a Tumblr community for you.

And this brings us to two problems that go well beyond Tumblr and the legal but still widely condemned sexual activities featured on it. The first is that Tumblr’s adult communities—like the platform writ large—are driven not just by amateur, user-generated uploads, but by the curation efforts of committed volunteers. Come December 17, when adult content is made private and un-shareable, these communities will effectively be shut down, their collectiveness made digitally homeless.

This is the end point of user-generated content on any social media platform: When people create content that has social benefit for them, it makes massive capital benefit for Silicon Valley and Wall Street. Yet the people who generate that wealth have no influence over the digital commons where it resides and no recourse if they’re evicted from it. The commons are, after all, privately owned—never really commons to begin with.

And here comes a second fact that the Tumblr fiasco exposes: how interwoven our intimate encounters, desires, and relationships (including, but not limited to, sexual matters) are with digital platforms. Consider how much of your personal and professional life experiences may be integrated with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Tinder. Now consider that these companies could swiftly and legitimately shut their platform down, and sell all of your images and words for a trillion dollars. And you’d get no money and have no legal recourse.

Why is this so broadly dangerous? Because it’s not easy to opt out of using digital platforms, which are becoming as important as physical roads for human interaction. Professional, commercial, and even the sexual interactions that literally determine life itself are mediated through these privately controlled communications networks. And as the power of these networks is consolidated, the people who’ve built them up but who are deemed a threat to maximum profit—even as collateral damage in a purge of illegal material—will be jettisoned.

For there is a “larger, disturbing trend,” as the New York Times Magazine writer Jenna Wortham put it, “indicative of troubling, invisible heteronormative morality clauses on the web that we are all likely [to] enable and/or are complicit in enabling.” In March, Craigslist closed its “adult personals” section in response to a pair of bills, the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act and the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act, that would hold platforms criminally responsible for any sex work facilitated through them. Facebook has also rolled out restrictive new community standards, which aim to “draw the line—when content facilitates, encourages or coordinates sexual encounters between adults,” dissuade people from discussing certain sexual preferences or positions and forbid “sexualized slang” or “sexualized language.”

Using social media intimately in our life hasn’t been all bad. Indeed, as a recent scientific article by Oliver Haimson on some 240 Tumblr gender “transition blogs” showed, social media can play “an important role in adding complexity to people’s experiences managing changing identities during life transitions.” In fact, “female-presenting nipples” will be allowed under Tumblr’s new adult-content ban if they are shown “in connection with breastfeeding, birth or after-birth moments, and health-related situations, such as post-mastectomy or gender confirmation surgery.” Tumblr will also allow “nudity related to political or newsworthy speech, and nudity found in art, such as sculptures and illustrations.”

But what counts as “female-presenting” or male-presenting, or as “political” or “art”? Just what counts as “health-related”? What expressions of gender are acceptable or unacceptable? These are profound and debatable questions. The Tumblr of the AIDS activist group ACT UP New York wrote that a post of clothed people wearing Silence equals death shirts had been flagged a while ago. Some LGBTQ Tumblr users have reported that content as queerly innocent in nature as a line drawing of two boys hugging is already being flagged. They’re afraid such content may be removed, which happens on other platforms often. In a blog post, Tumblr CEO Jeff D’Onofrio acknowledged that “filtering this type of content … is not simple at scale,” before concluding, “We won’t always get this right, especially in the beginning, but we are determined to make your experience a positive one.”

But the Tumblr adult-content purge reveals the enormous cultural authority, financial extraction, and what the philosopher Michel Foucault called “biopower” that tech companies wield over our lives. As intimate interactions are ever more mediated by tech giants, that power will only increase, and more and more of our humanity is bound to be mediated through content moderation. That moderation is subjective, culturally specific, and utterly political. And Silicon Valley doesn’t have a sterling track record of getting it right.

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

[lesetoilesfous]

For the whump prompts-the "another character spots their hands shaking" one with Caleb! (Dealer's choice for who notices, although I will admit a weakness for Fjord) Thank youuuuu!

Ahhhh you are very welcome (and I share the weakness for Fjord)

to the curious - this is from this whump fic bingo post!

Another characters spots their hands shaking, so they hide them

Warnings: PTSD, anxiety

It looks as if a dragon has been through here. The town has been levelled, and there isn’t much left beyond the jagged remnants of scorched walls and the lingering smell of burnt flesh. Caleb has already been sick once, and he doesn’t have much left inside him. He’s trying hard not to think about how true that is in more ways than one. He feels like a spectre, haunting the ruins of this place he’d never seen before, now a place he never would see, not as it was. A dull, tired, jaded part of him thinks that he should probably be grateful for the fact that he didn’t know this place already. He isn’t sure how much more loss he can take. Somehow, that doesn’t seem to matter much. Sure, he doesn’t know these people. He probably wouldn’t have cared about them if he did. But they’re dead, and they died horribly, and that fact doesn’t change because of the way he feels about it. 

Molly had grown strangely quiet almost as soon as they’d seen the smoke on the horizon, and now he picks through the blackened streets, murmuring quiet prayers to the dirt. Nott, too, is far more silent than usual. Her fingers twitch and grab at her clothes, pulling on loose threads until Caleb has Frumpkin move to sit on her shoulders with half a thought. Nott relaxes a little as soon as the cat settles on her narrow frame, but her eyes are still wide with a quiet kind of horror that speaks far louder than words. 

Jester is making no effort to hide her horror. Caleb thinks that she has probably seen more of the world’s underbelly than she lets on: that it’s likely her apparently relentless optimism is as much a conscious decision as it is a character trait. She had wept almost immediately, and then she’d walked away from the group a little and sat down in the grass and begun to pray. Caleb, and the rest of them, had thought it best to give her space, though he had no idea what a god like the Traveller could do in the face of such a calamity.

Beau had just walked away. From the anger and the grief snarling across her brow and around her mouth, Caleb expected that she planned to deal with her problems by punching something. He couldn’t exactly hold it against her. Molly is small in the distance now, half away across the ruined village. His tail whips and coils through the air as if batting away invisible instincts. It’s the only outward sign of his tension. 

Caleb has no idea what to do with himself. The few soldiers left over: the ones that they’d crept up on, the ones who had been boasting that this would remind any would-be rebels of their place in the empire, are long dead by now. Caleb himself had a hand in one of those deaths, and hard as he tries he can’t find it in himself to regret that fact. Their armour bounces the sunlight back up into the sky, and it’s strangely bright around the ruined remains of their bodies. Caleb thinks that he knows what armour like that feels like. He thinks that more than once he’d wondered whether that brass carapace would serve as his coffin. He thinks that he, too, had once imagined himself left for dead in the road. 

There are other things he could be thinking about, but he thinks that if he does that he’ll drown in them. Instead he looks around for Fjord. He sees him checking over the bodies of the guards, a deep frown casting shadow over his usually youthful features like a cliff over the sea. Caleb walks over to him quickly. Nott is sitting next to Jester, in the long grass, watching her intently. Her ears hang low, and Caleb knows her well enough by now to know that means she’s hurting. But he can’t hold her together as well, not right now. He feels as if he’s barely doing that for himself. 

“We should leave.” Years ago, Caleb might have cared about the way his accent grows thicker with the knot of emotions he is so carefully avoiding. Now, he just persists in the absence of a reply, “It will not do to linger here. The Empire…” Caleb takes a deep breath. “They will send more. We must go.”

Finally, Fjord looks up from the scrap of parchment he’d apparently pulled from one of the soldier’s pockets, slipping it into his cloak as he does so. His frown softens, a little, the wrinkles fading from his brow like creases under a hot iron. He looks up at Caleb - which in itself always feels a little strange, considering the several inches Fjord usually has on him - and his gaze stops somewhere around Caleb’s chest. Caleb looks down on instinct, less self conscious than he is curious. Fjord speaks whilst he’s frowning at his own tattered coat. “Your hands are shaking.”

Like a straw on a camel’s back, this breaks him. Caleb immediately tucks both of his hands deep into his pockets, clutching the bits of trash that he kept inside them and rolling them between his fingers. He hadn’t even noticed, but now that Fjord has mentioned it he can’t stop thinking about it. His fingers fumble buttons and beads and one precious silver coin. His skin is cold and damp with sweat and he feels like his insides are going to shake themselves apart. 

The village: what remains of it, looms up in the corner of his vision like some great shadow. He thinks he can hear screaming. Maybe he can. There are sparks in the air and they’re copper and bright and he thinks that nothing so terrible should look so beautiful. There’s the smell of burning flesh in his lungs, thickening, and it’s stinging with the acrid, heavy stench of smoke, and he can’t breathe, he can’t breathe, and if he doesn’t die by the fire then he’s going to suffocate and how inglorious, how stupid, how bitterly deserved. 

“-leb, Caleb, hey. Come back.” There are hands on his shoulders now and they’re shaking him, and Caleb thinks that someone has come back for him, and they shouldn’t have done that, they really shouldn’t, because this was his fault and now they’re going to die too and there’s nothing he can do because he has nothing left, there’s no magic, no matter how much he pulls at his own mind. There is nothing left to do but fall and die and he can at least be grateful for the fact that he will not have to live with this, because even as he’s dying he knows that getting through this would be so much worse than letting it win. 

The hands on his shoulders tighten, and then there’s a light sting across his cheek, and a warm hand touching the side of his face, and Caleb blinks and there’s a green face in front of him, and that’s strange - because there are no orcs here, none of the other races really, except the occasional wandering, miserable half-elf who rarely stayed long. But as his vision focuses he realises that this is most certainly an orc: or a half-orc, his features are a little gentler, his teeth too small to be full-blooded. He has wavy, short black hair, and his skin fades from blue to green like the sea on a hot day. He looks worried, and Caleb wonders why, briefly. The afterimages of sparks float by behind him like snowflakes. He can taste the smoke in his mouth, and he thinks they don’t have time for worry, they need to be running. 

Then Fjord slaps him again, gently, and Caleb’s hearing crashes back into his ears as if he’s just broken the surface of a shallow pool. “Hey, come on, calm down, it’s alright, I’m here. I’m here. Do you remember who I am?”

Caleb frowns, a little distracted. He feels drained, suddenly, as if he’s cast a powerful spell, and his knees are weak. “You’re Fjord.” His frown deepens, and there’s comfort in the familiarity of the expression. “What happened?”

The relief on Fjord’s face makes him look five years younger, less like a world-weary traveller and more like the wide-eyed sailor Caleb imagined him as being, once upon a time. It was hard to imagine Fjord, with all his tricks and careful ploys, as ever being anything like guileless. It was also an impossibly charming daydream. “You kind of…went away for a minute there. Are you sure you’re alright?” There’s a burr to Fjord’s accent, the same roll around the vowels Caleb had come to associate with Port Damali. It’s pleasant, and it distracts Caleb for a good ten seconds more before he remembers what had just happened. Whatever strings had been holding him upright snap, and he stumbles, barely catching himself and only managing not to fall with Fjord’s help.

Fjord is not as strong as Jester, Caleb has seen this first hand. But he’s strong enough to hold Caleb, and his hands easily envelop Caleb’s narrow shoulders, drawn thin through years of going hungry.  “Hey, woah, alright. Take it easy.” Fjord is still speaking with a strange kind of quiet, and Caleb lets himself be led away from the soldiers’ bodies with an enormous sense of relief. 

Fjord gently pushes him into sitting down, and rubs soft, slow circles on his back. Caleb thinks, a little distractedly, that if this had been anyone other than Nott he would have pushed them away. He wonders whether Fjord knows how much of his feelings even this simple intimacy gives away. As much as he’d like to pretend that Fjord would continue to be clueless, Caleb is not the kind of man who spares himself from hard truths. As his heart finds its way back to a resting pace, and his lungs slowly remember how to breathe, Caleb finds himself flushing with no small amount of shame, and he curls away from Fjord’s touch, ignoring the part of him that wants to linger. He does not deserve such things. Not any more. 

Fjord immediately draws back, because Fjord is not the kind of person who pushes his company onto anyone. Caleb’s breathing comes a little easier. He stares at the grass, and he tries not to think about the blackened husk of a village behind him, and he listens to the sound of distant birdsong. In his mind, he starts reciting spell components, falling into the repetitive rhythm of the list and letting it drown out all the other thoughts he needs to be avoiding. 

Fjord clears his throat, quietly. “So, uh…I don’t mean to pry but, you gave me a real scare just now.” He passes a hand up over his face and through his hair. “Do you mind telling me what that was about?”

He’s sitting a foot away from Caleb in the grass, and one of his hands is tugging at a handful of blades, rolling them between his fingers. His skin is several shades darker than the plants themselves, and it’s an oddly pleasing sort of contrast. Caleb focuses on that, because it’s a lot easier than eye contact. “I became…confused. That is all.” His voice is hoarse, though he’s not sure why. He doesn’t remember saying anything out loud. He hopes that he didn’t.

“Right, right.” Fjord sighs, and sits back, looking past Caleb and back towards the ruined the town. “It’s a terrible thing, what happened here.”

“Yes. It is.” Caleb says the words quietly, but he means them as much as anything he’s ever said. He thinks of the dead here, and he thinks about how in all likelihood, precious few will mourn them. He shuts his eyes, as if that will keep the world away.

“It doesn’t take a scholar to draw some kind of connection between this and your, ah, chequered history with flame. You want to talk about that?” Fjord’s tone is carefully neutral, but Caleb can feel the curiosity behind his words.

He shakes his head. “We do not have time to talk. We should leave. We are lucky they are not here already.” With that, he leans forward and pushes himself up from the damp earth, standing and looking back towards where Jester and Nott are still sitting in the tall grass. Molly has made his way back towards what had once served as the entrance to the town. He’s standing in front of a small stick in the earth. If Caleb had to guess, he’d say that he was praying. He doesn’t why any of them put stock in the gods, especially when confronted with things like this, but he can’t find it in himself to hold it against them, either. 

Fjord stands as well, and moves to step between Caleb and the road. He’s not really blocking his way: Caleb has miles of field to choose from. He pauses anyway, forcing himself to look up and into Fjord’s eyes. They’re a dark antique gold in the shadow. Caleb continues to wonder at the fool who had ever spread the opinion that half-orcs were somehow ugly by nature. He has never met anyone more beautiful. 

“I agree. But I’m worried about you, Caleb, and honestly I think I’m going to need you to give me something. Because if that happens in the middle of a battle then - ”

“It will not.” Caleb cuts him off as he tears his eyes away from him, walking past him and across the road towards Nott and Jester. Fjord makes a soft sound of frustration as he moves past him, lifting one hand to grab his arm and thinking better of it, letting him go. 

“Caleb, please. Just talk to me. You’re obviously hurting and this kind of stuff…It eats you alive. Trust me.” There’s something beyond mere sympathy in Fjord’s voice, and it’s enough to make Caleb pause. He half-turns back to him, and tries to ignore the smell in the air. Fjord is looking at him with kindness, and a kind of recognition that came only from experience. “You’ve got to talk about these things.”

Caleb takes a deep breath, and he looks back, up and towards the blackened village. The gutted timber frames of houses jut out against the wide blue sky like broken ribs. He curses himself for a coward. “I cannot talk about it. I am not…It is too much. I cannot do that. Not right now.” He swallows, and doesn’t miss the disappointment that crosses Fjord’s face, fast as lightning in storm. Mentally, he snares the mangy rabbit that is his courage and holds it tight as he continues. “My family lived in a place like this, once. Nobody ever mourns for the peasants. They think: oh, they are poor. They are replaceable.” His mouth twists with an old, familiar, bitter anger. He says his next words with certainty, in a tone that brooks no argument. “No-one is replaceable. This is a lie told by the rich. I…” Caleb falters, and in the time it takes him to stop and search for another sentence, Fjord takes his hand.

Caleb nearly jumps out of his skin, and as it is he stiffens like an unhappy cat. He thinks, perhaps, that he is most unhappy because this is not uncomfortable at all. Not even a little bit, not the way it usually is. Fjord’s hand is calloused as any labourer’s, and his skin is hot. Caleb looks up at him, still lost for words, a silent, helpless, bewildered question in his eyes. Fjord lifts a shoulder in half a shrug, and squeezes his fingers. Caleb doesn’t dare to believe that the faint shadow of darker green and blue across his cheeks is anything like a blush, but the stupid, shallow part of him that has yet to learn its lesson takes a mental snapshot anyway. 

“Your hands were shaking again. Thought you might be cold.” Fjord’s voice is gruff and low and still soft, and somehow, in that moment, Caleb manages to forget every careful reason that says he should pull away. So instead, he says nothing. Instead, he squeezes back.

“Thank you.” The words are quiet, quieter than before, and Caleb half expects Fjord not to hear them. By way of a response, Fjord’s grip on his hand loosens, just for a moment before he entwines their fingers, holding him tightly. 

“I know that you’re still learning to trust us. I know that, whatever this is, it’s a lot, and it’s not going to be easy for you to share it with us. But you can trust me. You don’t have to do this alone. Not any more.” There’s a certainty in Fjord’s voice that Caleb wants to cling to like the remnants of a wrecked ship floating on a stormy sea. He does, after that, often, in quiet moments when his nightmares find their way into his waking life. 

It is perhaps one of the things that hurts most when Fjord drops his accent and the lie he’s been telling them since the day they met. But Caleb doesn’t mention that. Instead, he tucks his hands into his pockets, in an effort to hide the way they’re shaking. Judging by the look on Fjord’s face, he’s fooling no one.

That makes two of them. 

[a-robin-among-thorns]

Too Old For Your Age

Part 1: Colors

Contains minor spoilers from the manga.

This is the first of the drabbles (although it ended up much longer than I would have thought) I have planned based on this post I made a while back. The tone and content ended up slightly different from that of the original post but I believe I’m mostly happy with how it came out. I can’t really make any promises on when the next one will come but I will try my best.  

Word Count: 2,871

“Did you have any fun at Ethan’s party?” Chise asked hopefully as she and Elias entered in the front door.

She was somewhat afraid of what his answer might be. Although they had obviously been present for the party, Ethan’s 11th birthday had provided a prime education opportunity for the human teacher and her oblivious pupil. Elias had in time and practice grown more aware of his own feelings of jealousy and how to act appropriately when they sprung, but he was still no master. He shrugged off his robe and glanced down at his party favor bag sporting a picture of a man in a blue and red costume. “I suppose so, although I can’t say I understood much of it.”

“That’s fine, there’s still a lot I didn’t understand either.” Chise said with a small shrug and a relieved smile. 

She made her way to the living room and was about to rest on the couch when she found Elias’ gaze was lingering on her with the clear indication of curiosity etched across his features. She cocked her head in questioning, “What is it?”

“Did you have a good time?” he asked bluntly. Chise frowned. “What makes you say that?”

“You seemed…stiff during most of the party.” Chise was almost surprised he had noticed, but quickly thought better of it. Elias deserved a little more credit than she was giving him. He was growing more perceptive by the day, steadily coming into an ability to read her at the very least and other humans on infrequent occasion.

She thought for a moment. “I think had a good time…” it was true…mostly. When her attention wasn’t focused on the glamoured mage awkwardly meandering around the Barklem Home Chise had enjoyed talking to Stella and meeting a few of Ethan’s younger friends. However, she still had felt…distant. She initially had chocked the feeling up to the difference in age, although that had never before caused any rift between her and the Barklem siblings. Yet when she saw the children engaged in games and stories of colorful characters and playful frivolities, she was almost frustrated at her inability to join along. “I guess…I still don’t really know how friends or children are supposed to enjoy themselves.”

Elias took his turn to cock his head. “Why do you suppose that is?”

That…was a good question. Why indeed?

“I’m not sure…I guess I just I never got a chance to do anything children normally do. Even before…even when I was with my family I couldn’t go to school or play outside.” Her early life in Japan had slowly begun to bleed into her memory over the years. As she remembered more and more she realized that strangely enough her happy memories had been buried alongside the dark ones. Perhaps that was because those few bright moments were only bright in comparison. Anyone in a normal situation would call her earliest days of hiding indoors alongside her mother until her father could ward off hungry assailants terrifying rather than comforting. Not to say there were no truly bright moments. Brief minutes between hiding and running had yielded tumbling over park toys with her father or cooking with her mother. But even so, those few lights were hardly an equal for the seemingly endless night up until a fateful trip across the hemisphere.

Her grip tightened on her own party favor. “I didn’t have much of a childhood when I really think about it.” Why did this cause her heart to sink so much now? 

Large gentle fingertips cupped her jaw tenderly urging her gaze upwards. “Did I upset you, Chise? I didn’t mean to pry into something you’d rather not think about.” He said with a hint of worry in his voice as he brushed his thumb across her cheek.

A wave of guilt washed over her. This outing was supposed to help Elias deal with his feelings of envy and here she was getting tangled up in her own. She placed her hand atop of his and made efforts to swallow the knot growing uncomfortably in her throat. It wouldn’t do for a teacher to lose composure in front of her student.

“You didn’t upset me, I just got a bit lost in thought.” Elias hummed in response clearly not convinced by her answer but respecting her desire not to divulge all at once.  

The humming continued as he released her jaw placing his hand on his chin in contemplation. “Thinking about it, I don’t suppose I had much of one either.” He said in a somewhat uncertain tone.

“Really? Even when you were traveling with Lindel?” Mention of Echoes brought a grumble out Elias.

“Although that time was formative, I wouldn’t call it a proper childhood. It was mostly spent navigating a very harsh land with more than a few unpleasant encounters.” The hand on his chin slowly dropped to his chest as his eyes fixed on a pattern on the wall. “I wonder…maybe that has something to do with why neither of us could understand much of the party. I believe we may have missed something important in those years.” Although his tone remained neutral a slight wistfulness played on the edge of Elias’ eyes making something in Chise’s chest ache.

Something important…what was it that the other children had that she didn’t that made her so envious? Or maybe it was something they didn’t have? They didn’t have to worry about ravenous other-creatures eagerly waiting to find out if they tasted sweet or bitter. And because of that, they could roam play yards free of invisible assailants.

“If I had to guess I’d say you missed the chance to have fun free of worry. That’s the nice thing about being a kid really. Responsibilities and expectations don’t exist or at least not as great as they do in adulthood. They get to do things for the sake of enjoying them no matter how insignificant they may seem.”

Elias glanced upward in thought, cogs turning in his skull. “Let’s do that then.”

Chise raised an eyebrow “Do what?” “Those ‘insignificant fun things’ children do, let’s do some of them.” “Really? Why?”

“You can teach me what a ‘childhood’ should feel like and you can get to experience some of the things you couldn’t in Japan.” He stated plainly making Chise feel a little sheepish.

“Are you sure? Some of it is definitely pretty silly and don’t we have orders due?”

“If it doesn’t bother you then I don’t mind silly and Silver Lady can take care of anything minor.” He hesitated briefly before adding. “Of course if you would rather not than we do not have to do anything.” Chise didn’t like the idea of dumping work onto Silver although certainly wouldn’t mind…However, Elias was rarely so insistent and eager.

She cracked a cautious smile. “Well, I guess I don’t see why not.” His head bobbed in a happy nod “Now then, how should we begin?”

“Oh! um…” Right…what did children do these days? What had she done, or wanted to do, as a child that Elias would enjoy? 

She fidgeted slightly causing the bag in her hands to crinkle. The party favors…She began to rummage lightly through its contents, a few plastic toys, a paper book and- Oh! This was an easy place to start.  She pulled out a small yellow cardboard box eyeing it slightly, “Why don’t we start with these? Could you grab some blank paper and meet me at the dining table?”  

In a few moments, they were sitting in their respective seats at the dining table, a small stack of cream white stationary and two small boxes of crayons sat in front of them. Chise reached for a box hesitating slightly. Would it be better to leave them in their box or to lay them all out on the table? Probably the table. Elias watched Chise’s motions patiently as she took one of the thin boxes and propped it open. He took the other box and followed her example.

“Have you seen crayons before?” She asked curiously. “Once maybe, although I don’t know what they’re for. They are a writing instrument, yes?” “They’re more of an instrument for drawing…”

She poured the crayons of her box into her hand and placed them on the table, Elias did the same. A faint waxy smell permeated the air. There were ten crayons in all, the boxes had both yielded the same colors; red, green, blue, yellow and black.

“So…there’s really not much to this,” she grabbed a black crayon and a piece of stationery, “you just take one and draw a picture.”

Elias stared at the crayons with a critical eye. “I can only take one?” His hand wavered over the red but retracted, frightened by the commitment of the decision. Chise giggled.

“You can use as many as you’d like, but it’s like a quill, it’s hard to use more than one at a time.”

Elias seemed to relax and picked up the red. “What should I draw?”

“Whatever you’d like, there aren’t any rules. Although you should probably take off your gloves, the crayon could leave a stain, maybe roll up your sleeves too.” Elias nodded and complied placing his gloves on the corner of the table. He picked up the red once again and ran his fingers over it pressing lightly to gauge its strength before positioning it like he would a quill pen. It was almost comically small in his enormous lavender hands. He tentatively placed his crayon against the stationary and slowly dragged it across the surface. “It’s…rougher than a quill.”

Chise smiled, with a creature as old as Elias there were very few new experiences. Watching him work through the kinks of a rare first try was oddly endearing. Until the crayon snapped.

He lifted the fractured halves to his face and sighed. “I’m sorry Chise…”

“It’s ok!” she reassured quickly leaning forward and grabbing his hand that lay on the table, “there’s another red you can use. Besides!” She grabbed the half still bearing a point and scribbled a circle on Elias’ paper. “It still can be used, it’s just a bit smaller.” She smiled at him before releasing his hand and handing him the spare red crayon. He took it cautiously before trying again, making sure to press lighter this time. After a few strokes, he started moving more confidently and eventually switched to the green crayon.

An odd sense of pride welled up in Chise as she watched him grow faster and more assured. She rested her elbow on the table propping her chin against her hand in thought trying to come up with something to draw herself. She glanced out the kitchen window where the early summer wooly bugs drifted through the air, baaing lazily. That seemed easy enough.

She dragged the black crayon lightly in curves creating a puffy cloud body followed by six black legs. The gentle action was calming. She couldn’t recall the last time she had drawn like this aside from little doodles in the margins of her notes.  

Hmm, what did their faces look like again? She peered up for the window but caught Elias staring at her intently. He didn’t meet her eyes but held his gaze for a moment before returning to his drawing.

That was…odd.

Deciding that if he didn’t want to explain she shouldn’t pry, she returned to her own drawing.

A comfortable silence settled over them occasionally accompanied by a shift of paper or changing colors. It wasn’t until she had finished coloring in the bug’s face and legs that the silence was broken by a groan from Elias.

“Is there a method for undoing mistakes?” She thought for a moment. “I don’t think so, at least not for crayons and paper.” “Hmm,” he held up his paper eyeing it with scrutiny, “I see.”

Flames bloomed from his fingers swallowing up the stationery in an instant with not a trace of ash left to prove it had ever existed. He took a new slip of paper and nonchalantly resumed drawing.

Chise huffed. “You know these don’t have to be perfect or anything.” “I would still rather start over.” Elias replied with a shrug. She sighed without exasperation and continued onto the bugs wings.

The silence returned as Chise finished her wooly bug. She placed it aside grabbing a new paper and briefly caught Elias staring at her again. She elected to ignore it since he seemed content enough and started drawing a salamander. After finishing rather quickly, during which Elias burned another sheet, Chise excused herself to the washroom briefly which Elias only distractedly acknowledged. When she returned Silver Lady was at the kitchen sink washing vegetables.

“Ack! Silver I’m sorry are we in-” the brownie raised a finger to her lips and smiled brightly before returning to her washing. A half smile found its way to Chise’s lips as she went to sit down before realizing her chair had been moved. It now sat on the side normally reserved for Elias alone who still sat quietly scribbling away.

She could have sworn she heard Silver chuckle.

Very aware of the fluttering in her chest, Chise grabbed a new sheet and sat next to her mage. Elias paused briefly to curl an arm around her shoulders leaning her to his side without a word. Well used to his heedless affections, Chise leaned her cheek against his side. As she did so, she caught a glimpse of his paper. Apparently, he had started over again as it currently only bore two empty black ovals. He gave her a quick side hug before releasing her and returning to the paper once more.

Her eyes lingered on his skull, quietly observing the shadows and contours from the dips and grooves in the bone.

Finally breaking away her gaze, she picked up a black crayon and set to work.

——

Peals of Silver’s bell finally brought the magi out of their concentration after the sun had sunk just below the horizon.

“Dinner time already?” Chise said as she stretched her back and arms.

“It seems to be.” Elias responded, “We should probably wash up before helping set the table.”

Nodding Chise made her way to the washroom. She returned shortly finding Ruth positioned at his seat and the table already clear of their little project.

“Uh, where are-?” Silver with plates in both hands gestured toward the fridge with a small hum.

Held in place by small magnets were their drawings; three by Chise and one by Elias. She Stepped closer to get a better look at the picture Elias had been so finicky about getting correct. Chise felt her cheeks burn.

It was only her head and shoulders but with red hair and green eyes, the drawing was unmistakably her. The drawing had her hair down on her shoulders, a thin line for a smile and wore her red sweater. He had even put in a little blue in the background for a sketchy sky. It wasn’t perfect; the eyes were slightly different sizes, the nose was off center and there were several places where the colors ran together. But either Elias was finally satisfied with the outcome or Silver Lady had seized it before flames could lick it up. Regardless, Chise was…touched it had been spared.

Warmth settled on her shoulder and side.

“I see we had the same idea.” He pointed to her final picture causing Chise’s blush to flare hotter. His skull had proven not as difficult as she would have previously thought, at least from the side, but she had run out of room for all but a little of his horns causing it to look a little funny. She wasn’t sure if proud was the right word for her feelings toward the drawing, there had to be at least three mistakes on her paper for every one on Elias’, but she certainly felt glad she had made it.

She grasped the hand placed on her shoulder giving it a small squeeze. “Your drawing looks very nice.”

He made a satisfied sound. “Thank you, yours does as well.”

“So what do you think of our first childhood activity?”

Elias shifted his head as he methodically analyzed his feelings over the past few hours. “I would say it was enjoyable in its simplicity. Although I did find myself wishing I had more colors to use.”

Chise smiled, “We can pick up a bigger pack next time we’re in town…if you’d ever like to do this again that is.” 

He hummed softly as his thumb circled her shoulder blade. “I think I’d like that very much.”

[kingofthewilderwest]

I was wondering if you could do a list or something of everything from the books that’s in the movies and tv show universe? Like every detail, character, plot or influence no matter how small or big?

Unfortunately I’m never going to be able to get it all, and it’s be quite the time-consuming project to try! However, thankfully the httyd book fandom is very good about picking up parallels, and I’ve previously made a list on this same topic! Here’s a semi-updated list about many of the movie and tv show parallels. Friends, feel free to tack on if you think of other parallels! It’s fun to see all the parallels that there really are!

Obviously... this is going to be resplendent in spoilers across both the books and DreamWorks franchise.

FIRST MOVIE

The first movie has the general plot structure of the first book and is clearly inspired from it. It is the story of a young boy who trains with other youths his age in the ways of his tribe. By completing training, he can do a rite of passage and demonstrate he is one of the tribe. However, he fails this rite of passage and is cast out of the tribe by his father. Then an enormous dragon threatens the village. Hiccup leads the other youths to defeat the dragon. Ultimately, his own dragon Toothless saves his life and guarantees victory before he gets eaten. Hiccup’s relationship with Toothless grows throughout this adventure.  

Berk is a small island with unpleasant weather. Especially, it’s cold.

Lots of the same characters - Hiccup, Toothless, Stoick, Gobber, Tuffnut, Snotlout, Alvin, and Fishlegs. Gobber remains the teacher of the students and Snotlout remains a bit of a cocky, self-important nagger against Hiccup. Stoick’s design with an enormous beard is consistent. We also have a dragon named Stormfly and a Monstrous Nightmare named Hookfang in the books!

Monstrous Nightmares are seen as a status symbol in Berk. The Monstrous Nightmare is considered the dragon for the chief and his family in the books. The Monstrous Nightmare is the dragon only the bravest kill in the first movie.

Astrid is inspired off of Camicazi. Both are bold, blonde female characters with great fighting abilities who are close to Hiccup and own a dragon named Stormfly.

Berk owns a dragon manual written by a renowned Viking. In the books, Professor Yobbish wrote “How to Train Your Dragon,” the ultimate guide for the Hairy Hooligans. The Hairy Hooligans revere this book as the means of how to control dragons. In the DreamWorks movies, Bork the Bold wrote the Dragon Manual, the book the Hairy Hooligans respect as the authority for how to control dragons.

Dragon species with the same names - Nadders, Monstrous Nightmares, Gronckles, Purple Death. The Gronckle’s design is also notably similar between book and film, and while the Monstrous Nightmare is larger in the movies, but you can see the similarities in appearance to the ones in the books.

Hiccup confronts the Red/Green Death. Book!Hiccup fights the Green Death to protect Berk. DW!Hiccup fights the Red Death to protect Berk as well. Hiccup nearly dies from this encounter and is saved by Toothless. In the books he’s swallowed by the Green Death and saved by Toothless coming in to save the day… in the movies Hiccup is caught by Toothless before plunging into an explosion and crashing to the ground.

Hiccup loses part of a lower limb. DW!Hiccup loses a leg. Book!Hiccup loses a toe in How to Steal a Dragon’s Sword.

Gothi the elder is the movie’s version of Old Wrinkly, a wise elderly member of the tribe with magical connections. It’s to note DreamWorks was originally going to have much more magic in the early drafts of HTTYD.

Spitelout takes the same role as Baggybum. He is the spiteful, nagging Viking close to Stoick’s side who seems to question the chief. He’s the father of Snotlout. Spitelout was originally planned on having a larger role in early HTTYD drafts… back when those drafts were closer to the books. We can see in the resulting movie and shows the threads of Spitelout’s resemblance to Baggybum (and Snotlout and Hiccup being cousins).

The phrase “kill on sight.” Not an intentional parallel, but in the first HTTYD movie Hiccup reads in the dragon manual that every dragon is, “Extremely dangerous. Kill on sight.” Book!Hiccup’s wanted poster also has the phrase “Kill him on sight.”

One of the statues in the HTTYD movies has a helmet similar to book!Hiccup’s. This helmet has one broken horn. Some fans have considered this a parallel to book!Hiccup’s broken-horned helmet.

Toothless is a rare, powerful, “special,” and feared species. The Night Fury is a dragon regarded and feared because no one has seen it and lived to tell the tale. The Seadragonus Giganticus Maximus is the greatest, most powerful, and most feared species of dragon in the books.

Fishlegs was originally going to ride the Hideous Zippleback. And in the books, Fishlegs’ dragon has three heads!

RIDERS OF BERK / DEFENDERS OF BERK

Hiccup owns a small, obnoxious green dragon. The Terrible Terrors were initially designed to be book!Toothless, back when DreamWorks planned on making the movie closer to the books. In DOB, Hiccup gets a small, green Terrible Terror named Sharpshot… who acts similarly to the small, obnoxious green dragon Toothless in the books.

Viking students learn how to train small dragons. “Best in Show” is a story where Hiccup and the other Dragon Riders attempt to train Terrible Terrors and show their skills. It’s similar to the rite of passage in the first book, where Hiccup and the other students in Berk must show how they have mastered training a small hunting dragon.

Hiccup collects ancient family treasure. Both book!Hiccup and DW!Hiccup follow a map and other clues to locate an ancient family treasure, a treasure that only someone like Hiccup specifically could find. In ROB “Portrait of Hiccup as a Young Buff Man,” Hiccup follows Hamish the Second’s treasure trail - something “only a hiccup” could do. In the books Hiccup the Third collects The King’s Things from Grimbeard the Ghastly - something only Grimbeard the Ghastly’s prophecied heir could do.

Basically… all of “Portait of Hiccup as a Buff Young Man” gives off book vibes. It shows Hiccup insecure about how his father regards him, showing that Stoick sometimes gets carried away with ideas of his son as a stronger, more “typical” Viking. We also learn that Hiccup has an ancestor in the past, Hamish the Second, who was a runt… just like Hiccup in the books learns about Hiccup the Second and Hiccup the First.

Snotlout and Hiccup constantly bicker… and part of the reason is because Snotlout is jealous of Hiccup’s status and achievements.  These two do not get along. Snotlout often acts rudely toward Hiccup. In “Defiant One” Snotlout shows he is jealous of Hiccup, just like Snotlout reveals to Hiccup in How to Betray a Dragon’s Hero that he’s fought Hiccup much due to jealousy. But, in the end, Snotlout and Hiccup make up when Snotlout does a bold, heroic action (compare “Cast Out Part 2″ with the end of the eleventh book).

Alvin the Treacherous. He’s a chief of the Outcasts who battles against Hiccup in both show and book series! The presence of Alvin the Treacherous and the Outcast Tribe is a clear inspiration from the books.

The Berserker Tribe. This is a tribe from both the books and shows.

Dagur versus Norbert. Dagur the Deranged and Norbert the Nutjob are both chiefs with deep intelligence but a wild sense of “crazy” unpredictability.

Fishlegs is a wannabe poet and musician. Fishlegs writes his own poetry and sings songs during Riders and Defenders of Berk. Fishlegs in the books wishes to be a bard and writes his own (terrible) poetry.

Dragons demonstrate similar abilities between book and show. For example, Changewings are dragons that can turn themselves perfectly invisible, like multiple species from the books can (ex: Stealth Dragon).

The eggs explode! In both books and DreamWorks franchise, dragons hatch through exploding eggs.

RACE TO THE EDGE

Hiccup’s name. Hiccup Haddock the Third is mentioned in the show… referring to the full name of the book’s protagonist, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third.

Fishlegs is believed to have allergies against dragons. Fishlegs has allergies to dragons in the books. DW!Fishlegs is suspected to be allergic to Meatlug in “Big Man on Berk.”

Snotlout mentions wanting to be chief. Snotlout makes several comments about how he is almost like the chief. It’s an interesting call-out to the book’s Snotface Snotlout, who spends most of the series trying so hard to become chief himself.

Snotlout tries to become leader. Snotlout is always trying to become the chief of Berk in the books. Snotlout tries to take over Hiccup’’s leadership and become the leader of the dragon riders in “Not Lout.”

Snotlout and Hiccup physically fight. Snotlout tries to fight and kill Hiccup in multiple books. In “The Zippleback Experience,” Snotlout is supposed to attack Hiccup to make Barf and Belch believe Hiccup’s life is in danger. The result is Hiccup punching Snotlout.

Snotlout death references. They’re everywhere. Snotlout making a comment, “What’s one little arrow going to do?” - when he gets shot by an arrow in the books. Snotlout flying to take a hit from an arrow/quarrel for Hiccup in the skies during “Not Lout.” Snotlout falling from his dragon into the ocean and believing he’s dead in “Snotlout’s Angels.”

Dagur’s false death goes down similar to Snotlout’s book death. Dagur becomes a protagonist after trying to kill Hiccup for eons. When he is finally accepted as an ally, he goes forth to tackle an enormous enemy in a sacrifice to protect Hiccup. He is downed from his dragon and plunges into ocean waters.

An enemy falls into a volcano, gets burnt, but survives. Alvin the Treacherous falls into a volcano at the end of “How to Twist a Dragon’s Tale” when he tries to take the Fire Stone from Hiccup. Viggo falls into a volcano at the end of “Shell Shocked Part 2″ when he tries to take the Dragon Eye. Both enemies come back to fight Hiccup another day.

An enemy infiltrates Berk to learn information by pretending to be a friendly, common worker. Alvin the Treacherous pretends to be Alvin the Poor-But-Honest Farmer. Trader Johann pretends to be a foppish ally to the Hairy Hooligans. But both are seeking a more sinister gain.

The brand of a slave. Hiccup is marked as a slave in the book series. In Race to the Edge, the dragon hunters almost brand Hiccup on the face with what would basically have been a mark of ownership.

Hiccup fights with a sword. Hiccup spars with Inferno during Race to the Edge, and of course he has epic battles with Endeavor throughout the book series.

Potatoes. There are lots of hidden potatoes in RTTE. Potatoes are quite important in the books, naturally, and this is a silly call-out to that!

A gladiator ring with dragons. In “Stryke Out,” dragons are forced to fight one another in the ring. In How to Speak Dragonese, Hiccup, Camicazi, and Fishlegs are part of a gladiator spectacle that involves dragons eating other dragons. 

Hiccup is pulled beneath sand by a dangerous dragon. Hiccup is pulled underground in How to Seize a Dragon’s Jewel by the Monster of the Amber Slavelands. Hiccup is pulled underground from a sandy beach in “Sandbusted.”

One of Hiccup’s closest companions will die unless a cure can be found from an impossible-to-find ingredient. There are marked similarities between the ideas of “Buffalord Soldier” and How to Cheat a Dragon’s Curse. In the books, Fishlegs is believed to be dying from the sting of a Venomous Vorpent. The cure involves finding a potato, a legendary vegetable that is not believed to exist by most people… and which is said to only be found in America by others. In the show, Astrid is becoming increasingly ill from the deadly Scourge of Odin. The cure requires the gang to find the Buffalord, a dragon believed to be extinct.

Hiccup and Fishlegs are best friends.

Hiccup gets kidnapped. This is the central plot of “Midnight Scrum.” Hiccup gets kidnapped as a child - mentioned in How to Fight a Dragon’s Fury - and he also has an unpleasant hostage situation with the Romans in How to Speak Dragonese.

More dragon species similarities. The Riproarer feels like the Cavern Crasher. The Grimoras feel somewhat like Nanodragons. The Snow Wraith feels a little bit like Sabre-Tooth Driver Dragons. Some fans feel like the Slitherwing looks somewhat like the dragon of the Slavemark.

Dragons hatching from volcanoes. The Eruptodon egg must be placed in a ceremonial location in the center of a volcano to hatch properly. The Fire Dragon also can only hatch from a volcano’s eruption.

Characters seeking out their fathers. Dagur and Heather search for clues of Oswald the Agreeable. Fishlegs spends the majority of the book series trying to find his family and home tribe. Both Dagur and Fishlegs receive disappointing news about their father’s status.

Vikings build inventions far beyond their time. Norbert the Nutjob creates a steamboat. Hiccup builds equipment that can take him to the bottom of the ocean.

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON 2

Eret’s brand versus the Slavemark.

Northern non-Viking tribes. The Northern Wanderers from the books could be compared to Eret’s people, the Sami.

Stoick jumps in front of a deadly shot to save Hiccup’s life. Stoick jumps in front of an arrow to try to save Hiccup’s life in How to Cheat a Dragon’s Curse, somewhat akin to how Stoick jumps in front of Toothless’ blast in How to Train Your Dragon 2.

Hiccup’s butt-kicking mothers neglecting parental duties through quests far from home… quests that their son ultimately fulfills. Valhallarama constantly quests away from Berk to find the King’s Things rather than spending time with her son. In the end, Hiccup collects the King’s Things. Valka leaves Berk entirely to protect dragons. She is not there to raise her son. In the end, Hiccup becomes the chief of Berk, the link between humans and dragons this world needs. In the end, both mothers realize that they have spent too little time with their son when he was growing up, and end up supporting him in his heroic endeavors.

Dragons that change color by mood. The Hobblegrunt changes its color depending on its mood, just like the Mood Dragon.

Sea dragons that breathe ice. The Doomfang is a giant Sea Dragon with a freezing breath. The Bewilderbeast is an enormous “ice spitter.”

Toothless shields Hiccup from an enormous dragon. In HTTYD 2, Toothless jumps in front of the Bewilderbeast’s ice blast and shields Hiccup last-second with his wing. In How to Fight a Dragon’s Fury, Toothless jumps in front of Furious to shield Hiccup. It’s to note that even the Bewilderbeast and Furious have parallels!

A chief sacrifices himself to save Hiccup… and Hiccup goes on to become leader. In How to Fight a Dragon’s Fury, Hiccup’s cousin Snotlout had become chief of the Hairy Hooligans before dying to save Hiccup. Hiccup’s father Stoick in the movies dies to save his son.

Villain!Valka versus Furious. The initial script for HTTYD 2 pitted Valka as an antagonist who believed that humans and dragons could not live together in harmony, so she attacked Berk and waged war against humans to free the dragon species. She commanded an enormous, behemoth Bewilderbeast in her fights - the King of all Dragons. Sound familiar? Furious is an enormous, behemoth dragon - the King of all Dragons - who wages war against humanity and attacks Berk because he believed that humans and dragons could not live together in harmony. Even the Valka that appears in our final HTTYD 2 bears similarities to Furious. She still does have the mentality humans and dragons cannot coexist in peace.

Drago and Drago’s Bewilderbeast versus Furious. Drago ultimately still has a lot of the same parallels to Furious that villain!Valka does. He commands an enormous dragon army against Berk with the King of all Dragons. Drago + his Bewilderbeast fill somewhat similar roles to Furious in the books. 

A potential three way war. The original plan of HTTYD 2 has some interesting set-ups that seem parallel to the final conflict in the books. In the books, there is a three-way war between dragon-friendly humans, dragon-hating humans, and human-hating dragons. In HTTYD 2, Valka was going to be pro-dragon and anti-human life Furious; Drago was going to be pro-human and anti-dragon like the Alvinsmen; and Hiccup was pro-human, pro-dragon like he is in the books. The reason I say potential three-way war is that it’s said Drago was going to be brought up, but not necessarily fleshed out or built upon in the original second movie drafts… the main battle scenes we see of the early storyboards are all seemingly between Berk and Valka.

The Red Rage versus the Bewilderbeast’s control. The dragon kings lead dragons in a mind-altered stated. The Red Rage causes dragons to angrily attack humans. Drago’s Bewilderbeast can control dragon minds - even to the point of dragons attacking their friends. Book!Toothless falls under the Red Rage briefly, and of course DW!Toothless is forced to shoot at Hiccup.

Berk is attacked and destroyed. Furious’ dragons blaze Berk down in fire. Drago, Furious’ equivalent, sends his Bewilderbeast to Berk. The village is wrecked by the dragon’s ice. 

Becoming a Hero the Hard Way. Both stories are about Hiccup becoming a Hero the Hard Way. Hiccup becomes a chief in HTTYD 2, while in the books, Hiccup becomes King of the Wilderwest. Both of them are initially unwilling to take up this leadership role, but ultimately fulfill it. And both Hiccups’ ideal is to create a world where humans and dragons live together in peace.

Hiccup is shown to be the one, unique individual who can fulfill the leadership role of his people. Hiccup is prophecied to be Grimbeard the Ghastly’s Heir in the books. Valka in the movies says, “You have the heart of a chief and the soul of a dragon. Only you can bring our worlds together.”

OTHER MATERIALS

Reference to Old Wrinkly. Old Wrinkly’s Cauldron is available for sale in School of Dragons.

Wartihog, Speedifist, and Clueless are residents of Berk. Several of Hiccup’s classmates from the books are NPCs in School of Dragons: Wartihog, Speedifist, and Clueless.

Dragon species. The Devilish Dervish and Windwalker are dragons available to hatch and ride in School of Dragons.

Hiccup’s far-traveled ancestor. In School of Dragons, Stoick is mentioned as having a great-grandfather who traveled far and wide. His great-grandfather in the books, Grimbeard the Ghastly, is someone who definitely sailed great distances. Furthermore, the family name is called the “Horrendous Haddocks.”

Rise of Berk introduces the Green Death.

The comic book “The Legend of Ragnarok” is about the Purple Death attacking Berk. Not only that, but Hiccup makes a reference to the dragon sleeping thousands of years under the sea. The Seadragonus Giganticus Maximus dragons (including the Purple Death) slept underneath the sea for thousands of years before coming to Berk’s shore in the first book.

The comic book “The Endless Night” introduces a female sorceress villain. Skuld doesn’t have much in common with Excellinor, but it is still to note this similarity.

How to Train Your Dragon 3 will be about the dragons disappearing, Hiccup making a choice that will affect humans and dragon’s future, and Hiccup actualizing as a leader. The books are of course about the dragons disappearing, Hiccup trying to unite humans and dragons, and Hiccup becoming King of the Wilderwest.

[a-tale-of-moons]

Chapter III: Patriots In the Night

I certainly never conceived I’d be saying this sentence; the undead is serving me soup.

There are rumors that in big cities, the extremely affluent exhume the bodies of those too poor to buy protection and fill them with enough living essence to do their bidding. Growing up in Willowbrook, I assumed I’d never have the means to confirm or deny such a heinous accusation.

In small towns, we let the dead lie. The closest we come to meddling with the affairs of the dead is our belief that occasionally the spirit of the deceased resurrects inside of a living vessel, like a beloved animal.

At first glance, they look almost alive. But, upon closer inspection, the skin is sallow with a plasticky film. Which I can only assume is some sort of preservation technique. The eyes are focused to such a fine degree that it is unnatural. Even their smiles seem painted on and disingenuous.

“They call them phantoms. The wealthier you are, the more phantoms you can afford,” Jacoby whispers to me while we’re sitting at the table. “They’re barely sentient. Just husks of once people with one-track minds, if that isn’t too generous a term. No emotions. No free thoughts. They can only take commands and follow them out. There’s no reasoning with them either. So, keep your distance.”

“Rich people are so…” I whisper back, baffled at the lengths those with money will go to flaunt said money to other people who also have money in their inane competitions. It sickens me to my stomach.

“Well, as of this moment, you are one of those “rich people.” Jacoby reminds me before he straightens up and turns to make conversation with Esper. Although I know he’s just trying to help keep our facade as strong as possible, I can’t help feeling chastised. He’s right, of course. I am one of these people. And if I act any other way, it means death for all of us. I have to start thinking more like a princess and less like a boyish orphan from the countryside.

Our audience with the king and queen isn’t for a couple more days. This week is purposed for the prince and I to get acquainted. We have an entire itinerary that includes things like walks in the royal gardens and private lunches. Also, there is a performance to be held at the end of the week in honor of my arrival where I’ll make my first public appearance as future crown princess. I want to be nervous, but I’ll have every evening until the performance to wallow in my anxiety; so, I choose to savor this moment of relative ease.

Besides the walking dead, the dining hall is beautifully decorated. Braeins sport their colors with pride, I’ve noticed. Blue and silver tapestry hang to the side of every window. Blue linen adorns the ornate, wooden tables. And adjacent to every window is a sparkling flag. Growing up in a tiny village where if you're not starving that means you're in someone's good graces, I can't imagine having so much pride in that. Love for the people, yes. And appreciation for the blessings, yes. But, pride in an invisible, unreachable country where the chosen lot live in luxury and the discarded others fend for themselves? When I know Ama is wasting away in her bed while these nobles stuff their faces with handfuls of privilege, it's impossible to find a place in my heart for patriotism.

I'll play the part of a spoon-fed princess for as long as I have to in order for us to get back to Ama, but I'll never consider myself to be truly apart of these greedy people's ranks. And that, I can take pride in.

During my quiet survey, I notice the prince taking glances at me. My first instinct is to tell him off before I remember where I am and who I’m supposed to be. Of course he’s curious. I’m his bride-to-be. I suppose I should be curious about him as well. He’s handsome; that much is obvious. And he seems to be amiable enough. Definitely not a nose in the air type of royal. I can appreciate that. But, I do have to consider that he’s mingling with “the princess”. If he knew I was just a poor orphan from one of the discarded villages he and his royal posse or whatever they’re called deem unfit to bother with, maybe it would have been a different introduction.

Throughout the dinner, I do my best to obey Jacoby’s instructions. Polite, and brief. Don’t say much more than I have to. So when the prince addresses me, asking me about our journey, I simply mention how hot it was. But, when I feel Jacoby stiffen beside me, I know I’ve already said the wrong thing in so few words. It takes me a couple of stalled beats, but the realization dawns on me. I’m a princess. Or, ...a thief playing the role of a princess. I should have been in my comfortable carriage, shielded from the sun, being fanned by my personal servants and drinking the chillest water that’s been fetched from the clearest of rivers. There is no reason for me to have felt any sort of temperature I found displeasurable. With the daintiest flick of my wrist, I should be able to have anything I desire. Moreover, I can dismiss anyone who doesn’t bend over backwards in pursuit of those desires, no matter how silly or trivial. And absolutely no one would dare accuse me of being unreasonable for it. The world is within my palm. I should want for nothing at all.

So, for me to complain about my journey being uncomfortable in the slightest is a dumb mistake I’ve made before the dessert has even hit the table. Elora may have been right. Should I have fought harder for my sister to take my place instead of letting my own ego get the better of me? Perhaps.

“Hot, huh?” The prince seems to mull over my words. And although irrational as it would be, I fear he’s going to see right through our facade at this very moment and throw us all in the dungeons to await our shared fate. However, his gentle grin doesn’t falter for even a second as he says, “It can get quite warm even inside of a carriage with this weather. Today, we’re cursing the heat. And soon enough, we'll be cursing the cold. Funny, no?”

“Quite,” I say, biting back the relief that pulses high in my throat.

This is only the first of the intimidating list of mistakes I make during the various courses.

The dinner passes in long pauses and heavy sighs. I couldn’t be worse at this if I tried. My hubris is going to be the death of us all. By the time the prince is bidding us goodnight and Jacoby is escorting me to my room for retirement, I have to hold in tears. Not the sniffle and whimper kind, either. It’s the tears that make me say a prayer because I’m afraid I’ll really just suffocate with my face in a pillow.

“Tomorrow will be better,” Jacoby says and pats my shoulder. I can hardly look him in the eyes. I’m so ashamed I may just curl in the tiniest ball I can manage and evaporate into the air. Not much harm I can do anyone as a particle floating through the universe.

“No one died. Stop looking like that.” Jacoby lowers himself on the enormous bed beside me.

“Not yet,” I say, finally looking at him with wet, itchy eyes.

Jacoby huffs. “The only one dying around here is me, of boredom! All the money he can wish for with the freedom to roam, much more than a princess has, and all the prince talks about are his horses and the gardens.”

“I’m serious.” I'm borderline shrieking. “I might get us caught and beheaded.”

“Delighted to make your acquaintance, Serious,” Jacoby says with a dumb smile. “I’m Reasonable. No one’s getting beheaded. It’s been a stressful few days. I’m not going to lie and say the hard part is over. Truthfully, it’s only just beginning. But, by tomorrow, the prince will have forgotten all about your tongue slips. So, be careful not to make anymore and we’ll all be just fine, yeah?”

Maybe that’s supposed to be comforting. All I hear is our fate is hanging suspended over a bottomless pit. Too many hacks at the frayed rope and we’ll be consumed. And I’m the one tasked to safeguard the rusty axe that does the aforementioned hacking in my sweaty, tremoring fingers. Ah...very reassuring.

“As relieving as it is to know our lives are basically in my hands, I think I’ll refrain from hearing the rest of this moving speech,” I say. “Wouldn’t want the well of wisdom to run dry. Because, whatever would we do then?”

“I can take a hint.” Jacoby gets up, straightening his robes lazily. “Try to get some sleep, alright? You’re having a picnic lunch with the prince tomorrow. Just before high noon, some ladies will come and help you get ready. And then after that, you’ll have lessons with various tutors.”

“Tutors?”

“Yes, tutors.” Jacoby confirms with a nod. “The princess is expected to be highly knowledgeable about most subjects. Mathematics, arts, science, and even a bit of politics. Not enough to rival your male counterparts. But, enough to sit in on discussions and make intellectual interjections.”

Groaning, I throw myself back on the bed. “Foraging in the blazing heat is easier than being a princess. You should have let Elora do it. She’s better at this stuff than I am. She’d probably even have fun. Meanwhile, this corset is making me sweat in places I didn’t know sweated until today. Plus, I’ve started to perfect breathing every two beats instead of one so it’s not digging into my spine constantly. As pitiful as it sounds, I’m actually kind of proud of myself.”

“Elora? In charge of sensitive information we need to save Ama’s life?” Jacoby deadpans. “If that sentence actually sits right with you, that corset is tighter than you’re letting on. Look, I need to squeeze information out of Esper, so I can get it back to you. I’ll come back later to say goodnight.”

After pressing a kiss to my forehead, Jacoby takes his leave. Soon after he’s gone, a group of women sweep in to undress me. I wonder where Elora is as the women pull my limbs this way and that. I actually miss her, smartass quips and all.

By the time they’re finished, I’m left alone in a flowy nightgown that looks too exquisite to be worn to bed. I gaze toward the window. It’s well into dusk. But, I’m not tired. Oddly enough, all throughout the day, especially at dinner, I could only think of when I would be able to sink into this colossal bed. Now that nothing is stopping me, I couldn’t be more disinterested in sleeping. I look to one of the huge flags hanging on the wall. I know now that the prince’s room is just on the other side of the wall that particular flag is hanging on. I wonder if he’s also getting ready for bed.

It only occured to me briefly before that I might have to hold his hand. Maybe kiss him. Pretend that I’m falling in love with this man I’m destined to betray. I’ll have to deceive him. Lie straight to his face without so much as twitching or blinking out of tune. If I continue to bumble along like tonight, we’ll all be drug into scrutiny. I can’t let that happen. I won’t let that happen.

Feeling strangely energetic, I slide my feet into a pair of slippers and venture out into the looming hall. It’s dimly lit. And empty in a sinister way. Maybe it’s meant to be that way. I only remember the dead-eyed phantoms when I hear something that sounds too much like feet scuffling. My heart thumps to an off-beat tune. Suddenly, I feel a chill that makes me shiver all the way to my curled toes. It’s as if my body senses it before my eyes have a chance to process.

At first, it looks like a regular servant, arms heavy with bundles of candles. But, it doesn’t take long for me to notice the way it barely shifts. It doesn’t take a moment to shiver from the cold. It doesn’t allow its eyes to roam around the empty hall. It’s so focused on its task that my throat goes cold and my chest tightens. The other end of the hall doesn’t lead out. This is a little hallway purposed solely to house the prince and princess’ rooms. And I’ve already roamed too far from my room to go back. The only way out is to scuttle around the phantom as it passes. And the thought of having to get so close to it when I’m completely and utterly alone makes me want to cry. It’s gaining on me and I have no way of escape. So, I hold my breath and brace myself to rush past it.

But, before it gets close enough, the prince’s door opens and before I have time to think I rush inside and press my back against the wall, panting lightly. I know I’m being stared at, but I can only laugh hysterically as the relief floods inside of me. I feel at ease and stupid all at once. Of course, the phantom doesn’t dive in behind me in hot pursuit. It shuffles past the open door and goes about its business of light maintenance. Buzzing like a jack rabbit, I remove myself from the wall and force myself to look at Nathaniel. I expect him to seem disturbed, or surprised at the very least. Instead, he looks almost as if he’s holding back a laugh of his own.

“They take some getting used to,” he says. “But, I promise they mean you no harm.”

Adrenaline is still pumping like molten lava through my veins, so I can barely manage a jerky nod. Nathaniel poses me a speculative expression before closing the door and crossing the rug to sit on the edge of his mammoth bed. I notice he’s still in his robes from dinner. He pats the space next to him. I hesitate for a moment, supposing I should feel scandalized. I’m in a nightgown and slippers, drowning in the belly of this man’s room. My soon-to-be husband, sure. But, still...a princess of quality breeding should know better than to mingle unattended with a man who isn’t yet her husband.

How fortunate that I’m of rather seedy breeding then.

I sit next to him.

It’s my first time being so close to any man who isn’t one of my brothers. And I would hardly call Jacoby or Pond men. More like men-like creatures who still think it’s funny to shove their saliva-drenched fingers down my ears. Nathaniel is a full grown man of twenty. He smells of vanilla and musk. I realize that my palms are uncomfortably moist.

“I always imagined I’d meet my wife on one of my courageous adventures. I’d probably save her from having her soul devoured by a demented necromancer. Then, we’d fall in love and I’d make her my queen,” Nathaniel says, voice low and hands clasped. Nostalgic. “On the eve of my seventeenth birthday, my father told me of a beautiful, accomplished princess from a small textile kingdom whom I was already betrothed. I was furious. I stomped around the castle for months, throwing tantrums like an overgrown child and detesting the very thought of you. Then, at some point, I stopped being angry. I realized you were thrust into this just as much as I was. I was born into a life of privilege and I’m arranged to be wed to a charming and intelligent young lady. Oh, poor me.”

I have no words. I always imagined royals to be selfish and narcissistic puppets, incapable of having thoughts that stretch further than their distaste for the buttered rolls at supper or the color of their bed linens. Being brought up in a poor village bordering a tiny kingdom where even the privileged few are just getting by themselves, it’s easy to believe the stories of the gluttonous aristocrats. It’s comfortable even, just to figure they don’t care enough about anyone else.

I look up, and notice he’s giving me that mysterious look again. His lips are smiling, but his eyes are heavily guarded, careful not to disclose his thoughts behind them.

“I grew up privileged as well,” I say tentatively. It’s not a total lie. I never went hungry or had to beg for necessities on the side of the road. Ama provided for us as well as she could and we were always content. “That being so, I understand I have certain obligations and responsibilities. I’m sure you’d prefer as much as I would for more of a choice in this. However, if this is the way it has to be, I’ll do my best to make this a pleasant arrangement. If you are willing to do the same?”

Nathaniel takes my hands in his and I startle a bit.

“I am more than willing.” His eyes are so penetrating I feel like the oxygen has been sucked from my body and I’m breathing on borrowed air that will eventually run out. “This is my future, our future, at stake. And it’s going to be bright. That, I can promise you.”

I can hardly do anything more than nod. My chest is tight, conflicted. Not only am I going to steal from this man who has shown nothing but kindness to me. I’m also stealing the actual princess’ place in his heart. And I can’t be sure if she’s alive or dead. I’m a monster.

“It’s getting late now, and I have some work to finish before I retire to bed. I have something I want to show you, though.” Nathaniel stands, still holding my hands, and I rise with him. He leads me over to one of the many flags displayed in his grandiose room. I’m confused for a moment. He can’t possibly want to show me the Braein flag. It’s in every room I’ve been in so far. Then, before I have a chance to ask he lifts one end of the flag to reveal a brass door handle.

“It’s a little passageway that connects our rooms,” he says. “I’ve had the dirt cleaned and the cobwebs cleared. You are free to lock the door on your end at any time, but mine will always be open for you. If you want someone to talk to, or just a place to hide from your ladies-in-waiting, you are welcome.”

“Thank you, Prince Nathaniel,” I say.

“Just Nathaniel.” He smiles.

“Why are you so perfect?” I sound incredulous, even to myself.

The prince makes another one of those expressions I’m so caught up in decoding that I just barely am able to process his actual words. “I’m nowhere near perfect. There are some unsavory details about myself I’m being very careful to keep from you. And I hope I can keep it that way. But, you, Princess? You truly are flawless.”

“You say that after I made an imbecile of myself at dinner?” I scoff and look away. “There is no need to flatter me with lies.”

With a finger under my chin, Nathaniel gently guides my face his way. “In an earnest attempt to impress my royal court and bring honor to your kingdom you exposed an emotion so human as anxiety. Can't quite consider that a fault. Actually it was rather endearing.”

I can only spare a moment to relish in the gentle warmth that spreads across my chest before it hits me. Something like light tugging just above the nape of my neck. Of all times, it chooses now.

The distinctive tingle in my scalp sets my face on fire. In an instant, I’m mortified.

“Princess, is something the matter?” Nathaniel’s voice sounds like an echo in the wind. I’m so ashamed I simply make a weak apology and excuse myself in a hurry so I can flee back to my room. I’m so aghast I don’t even spare any energy to be afraid as I whip past the phantom and dive inside of my room, pushing the door shut behind me and collapsing on my bed.

The tingle ensues and I’m so out of breath at this point that I take in large and labored gulps of oxygen, hoping something can cool the inferno raging through my ribcage.

Am I blooming?

[katrinawritesthings]

OT5; resume game; PG

listen... more d&d au

“When did you even get an antimagic spell?” Key asks. She sounds more impressed than anything by this point and Jonghyun snorts.

“Two levels ago, when you told me it was useless, remember?” he asks. Jinki doesn’t even have to look up to know that Key is blushing and Jonghyun is smirking.  “Also,” Jonghyun adds. “If this works, then I’m technically the one that beat him, and the rules that all of you fuckos set up say that that means that I get to decide what to do with him. So don’t hurt him.”

part 1

ao3

As the small group of adventurers advances further into the forest, the phoenix elf spots a clearing in the distance. She signals to the others and as one, they sneak quietly through the trees until they have a clear view. Set up in the loose grass and small boulders, a group of six humans lounge lazily around a fire, laughing and talking with smug pride. None are watching the trees and they have bags and boxes full of what appear to be the stolen artifacts from the city’s museum.

“I can get one between the eyes from here,” Yavè says, hand confident on the crossbow under her robe.

“We’re supposed to capture them alive,” The Double M-C growls. Their bear claws flex at their sides and Yavè sighs, crossing her arms.

“You’re right,” she mutters. “I can get one through the leg from here,” she offers instead.

“We can just… walk up and ask them to give the stuff back nicely.” Skell’s words are small, but louder than they have been, his growing confidence and experience showing in his actions. Yavè rolls her eyes, but Ace nods slowly.

“Let’s do that, but more… intimidating,” it says with a raised eyebrow and a little smirk in The Double M-C’s direction. The half-bear grins slowly back, lifting one big bear arm to point at the tree creature.

“I like that plan,” they say. “Come on.” They head off towards the clearing, leading the party with no stealth straight through the trees. They growl in the back of their throat and rustle the trees as they pass. Ace stomps its heavy oak legs extra hard against the ground, so the earth trembles slightly with each step. Yavè pulls off her hood and casts an illusion on herself, turning her already fiery colored hair into what looks like real flames and giving her eyes a deep red hue. In the clearing, the humans all startle and look around in a panic.

All at once, the party bursts through the trees. With an enormous, earsplitting roar, The Double M-C bares their claws and their fangs in a display of power that sends one human stumbling to the ground in fear.

“Draw your weapons and fight, theives!” they bellow, towering over the humans and snarling down at them. On their right, Ace thumps its huge wood club menacingly into its palm. On their right, Yavè draws a fire-tipped arrow and trains it expertly on the furthest human.

From the back, Skell scoots forward silently. Peeping his pink-haired head out from behind The Double M-C’s furry elbow, he waves gently and gives them a small smile.

“But, you don’t have to fight if you don’t want to,” he calls.

(“Jonghyun.” Minho hisses. Their hand is clenched around their dice, eyes closed as they take a deep, steadying breath. Jinki watches with the utmost amusement as they open their eyes and turn to face Jonghyun’s pout. “Will you please. For once. Let me do this.”

“What?” Jonghyun whines. “I’m not stopping you.”

“Yeah, but you kind of ruin the effect,” Taemin says. It shrugs lazily in its pillow pile. Key nods and Jonghyun grumbles at all of them, holding his pillow tightly under his chin.

“Minho, roll for intimidation with an advantage. Jonghyun, persuasion,” Jinki says, pausing their hundredth argument for just a moment. Both of them glance at him; Minho rolls two dice and Jonghyun grabs his.

“Twenty-four,” Minho says, and then, “I’m a big giant bear person,” they whine. “Like, half of my points are in intimidation. Let me intimidate people.”

“You can intimidate people,” Jonghyun huffs. He jiggles his die in his hand and tosses it into what he calls his lucky cup instead of the stimmy cup he’s been casually throwing them into the whole game. “I just want them to know that they don’t have to fight. They can just surrender. I’m helping.” He frowns at the outcome of his die and tips it back into his little tray. “Nine,” he tells Jinki. Jinki nods at both of them, picking up his own die to roll for the humans while Jonghyun and Minho keep up their bickering. They’re cute. As he rolls for each human, he snorts and smothers a grin in his hand at a particularly bad number.

“Okay, so,” he says, interrupting whatever point Minho was bringing up.)

Almost every human yells and stumbles back in terror. The sight of the half bear, half human, a monstrosity on their own, is enough to have them trembling in their boots. Two of them back up even more, turning around to flee, but their leader catches them by the elbows.

“Stay here and fight, you cowards,” they snap. They seem to not have been affected as much by the party’s entrance. They’re a seasoned veteran at this kind of thing and have seen worse, as evidenced by their firm stance. Their companions, however, have hands that shake as they reach for their weapons. One of them doesn’t even draw a weapon at all; with a glance at their leader, and a meaningful glance at Skell, they slowly slip sideways, slinking behind one of the larger boulders.

Skell’s eyes light up in delight and at his first opportunity, while the others are fighting, he jogs over there to meet them.

“Are you hurt at all?” he asks, holding out a worried hand to the shaking thief. “I can heal you,” he offers brightly.

(“Oh my fucking god,” Minho mutters.)

~

“You know, I’m sure you have more fairy in you than just your hair. Your smile is dazzling.”

“Yeah. And your sweet spirit is positively angelic.”

“We can’t thank you enough for convincing those hunters to leave our village alone.”

“Ooh.” Skell smiles wider, cheeks flushing as pink as faer hair, and nuzzles up to one of the many tall, handsome, suave boys speaking to fae at the bar. The village is celebrating their party’s victory over the attackers in the inn and fae’s having a lovely time surrounded by admirers. Fae draws invisible little lines on one man’s broad chest and looks up at him through faer lashes. “Tell me more about how pretty I am,” fae says.

At the other end of the bar, The Double M-C snorts, shakes their head, and returns to the story they were telling to the group of young children gathered around them. Yavè rolls her eyes and asks one of her own crowd of admirers to get her another drink. Ace sits moodily in the corner, arms crossed and frown directed towards the tallest of Skell’s babes. As they all go about their business, from the entrance, a--

(Jinki stops suddenly in his description when Taemin slips him a folded up note. He takes it, glances at Taemin’s little grumpy face, and reads it.

“I’ll give you five dollars if you make your hot self-insert bartender kick them out,” it says.)

~

“Okay, we’re just gonna barge in there, take out the bodyguards, kill the lord, get out, and--”

“What the fuck? No, we can’t kill him.”

“That’s what we’re supposed to do, we’re supposed to kill the asshole so the village can live in peace from his reign.”

“Okay, technically, maybe they want us to kill him, but they didn’t say we had to. We’re gonna tie him up and throw his ass in his own garbage jail.”

“Oh my god, this is going to take forever.”

“Well sorry I’m not a murderer--”

“It was your idea to take this fucking sidequest in the first place--”

“The people needed our help--”

“Lets just fucking get in there already oh my god--”

(“Hey, uh, real quick,” Jinki interrupts Jonghyun and Key’s hissed argument with the most amused hand between them. They frown at each other for another moment before turning to Jinki. “Are you two having this conversation, like, in the game?” he asks. He gestures at the little ambush setup they have on the table between them.

“Abso-fucking-lutely,” Key says. “Yavè is liking Skell less and less by the moment.”

“Of course,” Jonghyun says. “Skell thinks Yavè is being a big anus.”

“Ace wants to hurry up so it can eat,” Taemin mumbles.

“Yeah, and I feel like I’m like. Really worried, waiting at the inn for them to come back,” Minho adds. “Can y’all please hurry up and finish breaking the law?” They’re pouting really hard and Jinki chuckles softly.

“Okay, well,” he says, getting back to his point. “Since you two are arguing out loud, then, uh.”)

As the two’s bickering grows louder and more intense, the secret door behind the lord’s office is swung suddenly open. Three of his bodyguards, huge and intimidating, glare menacingly down at the party, swords drawn.

“Shit,” Yavè hisses.

“She was the one that wanted to kill you,” Skell says immediately, pointing at the elf.

(“I’m not taking you to the movies this weekend anymore,” Key hisses at Jonghyun.)

~

“I hate,” Ace growls as it sucks down one of its last healing potions. The magic of the drink bubbles and fizzes inside of it as it heals its wounds, but it doesn’t feel nearly as satisfying as they usually do. Ace peeps out from where it took cover behind the rocks to watch the other three try yet again to harm the warlock.

Yavè fires a perfectly aimed arrow from her crossbow, then casts her volley spell to duplicate it hundredfold. Every magic arrow rains down on the warlock with grim accuracy, but with a great acrobatic effort, they dodge and weave through the brunt of the attack. The ones that do strike him are taken easily, their magical force lessened and their damage partially healed by his many protective spells.

The Double M-C, freshly healed by Skell, hurls themselves again towards the wizard with a fierce roar. A reckless charge, they’re able to get closer to the warlock than anyone has yet so far, but still are blasted back by his powerful magic at the last moment. As they tumble back towards the rocks and pillars of the cave, their roar is one of defeat.

At the third round of repeated failures, Skell sneaks a peek out at the wizard from behind his own rock and huffs. “This is garbage,” he mutters.

(“Alright, listen, wait, Jinki,” Jonghyun says. Jinki turns to him with a hum of curiosity, trying not to grin too wide as his frustrated little pout. He shouldn’t be having this much fun with this, but the others are just having garbage rolls today and it’s way too funny. This really shouldn’t be that hard of a battle. Jonghyun reaches over to their little figures on the table and pokes the warlock gently.

“This fucko,” he says. “He’s like. Some scrawny old fuck that’s been living in a cave for too long, right?” he asks. Jinki snorts. That’s one way to put it.

“Basically, yeah,” he says, because it’s not like Jonghyun is wrong.

“He’s gonna be splattered all over the cave when I’m through with him,” Key mutters darkly. Jinki throws an amused smirk her way. Her patience ran out several turns ago.

“And, like,” Jonghyun says, ignoring her little comment. “He doesn’t have any actual weapons, right? Just his hands?”

“Yeah,” Jinki shrugs. “He had a staff but you all burned it, remember.”

“Mmhmm,” Jonghyun hums. He pouts at the little wizard figure, finds his own figure, counts the little spaces of distance between the two. “Okay,” he says. “So, I’m gonna-’’

“Wait, are you actually gonna attack him?” Minho asks. Their eyes are huge as they look at Jonghyun and Jinki honestly has to agree. What the fuck. Jonghyun curls up smaller under everyone’s disbelieving looks, but picks up his little figure anyway.

“It’s not like you guys are getting anywhere,” he mutters. “Jinki, I’m gonna cast an antimagic sphere on myself, run at him, like, full speed, and then just. Jump on his back.”

He hops his little figure across the table, struggles for a moment with balancing it on top of the wizard’s, and then just kind of sets it behind him. Jinki stares blankly at him. Holy shit. The other three are looking at Jonghyun in much the same way. Oblivious to their silence, Jonghyun fixes up the two figures on the board and then looks up at Jinki.

“What do I roll for that?” he asks.

“Um,” Jinki says. Uh. He doesn’t know. Constitution maybe?

“Are you serious?” Taemin asks. Jonghyun huffs at it with a little nod.

“Yeah?” he says. “All this fucko can do is magic. Just walk up to him and capture him gently while I’m blocking all of his spells and shit. I wanna get out of this cave.” He jiggles his die impatiently in his hand as Jinki flips through his guide book to figure out what attribute is best for this.

“When did you even get an antimagic spell?” Key asks. She sounds more impressed than anything by this point and Jonghyun snorts.

“Two levels ago, when you told me it was useless, remember?” he asks. Jinki doesn’t even have to look up to know that Key is blushing and Jonghyun is smirking.  “Also,” Jonghyun adds. “If this works, then I’m technically the one that beat him, and the rules that all of you fuckos set up say that that means that I get to decide what to do with him. So don’t hurt him.”

“That doesn’t--”

“They are the rules,” Minho sighs. Key huffs and crosses her arms in defeat.

“It won’t work anyway,” she grumbles. “Nothing has been working today.”

“Roll for dexterity,” Jinki mumbles, pointing vaguely in Jonghyun’s direction. He slowly closes his book as he finishes reading. Dexterity now, and then it’ll be constitution every turn to stay on. Yeah. Jonghyun tosses his die onto the table and when it settles, everyone kind of just stares blankly at the first twenty anyone besides the warlock has gotten all session.

“Plus four,” Jonghyun adds, pointing at the numbers on his character sheet.)

Skell takes a deep breath, casts an antimagic sphere on himself, sprints across the cave, jumps effortlessly onto the wizard’s back, and clings there.

(“Like a cute little koala,” Jonghyun adds, poking his figure with a grin.)

Skell clings to the wizard like a cute little koala.

~

“And I owe all of this to you, Skell. Sweet, sweet, lovely Skell.” Jo’s wicked smirk turns wider, more natural, more charming, a shadow of the old smile he used to give Skell before he turned into an asshole. Now it just feels like a mockery. He walks up to Skell and caresses his face, laughing softly when Skell jerks away. On the rocky mountainside cliff they’ve been backed up on, Skell stumbles, almost losing his balance, before Jo tuts and yanks him a single step away from the ledge.

“Don’t leave me yet, babe,” he chides. “You still have to watch me take the orb and harness its darkness to take over the world.” He backs up lazily towards the Darkness Shrine and holds his hands out, relaxed and confident and smug. “You should have listened to your little friends when they told you not to trust me,” he says.

(“Yeah. Jonghyun,” Minho says. Jonghyun rolls his eyes, squeezing his pillow close to his chest. Jinki props his chin in his hand lazily as he watches the other three glare at the soft little bub.

“Remember when I told you that your hot new boyfriend was just using you?” Key asks. Her voice is light and casual with just enough bite to get her point across.

“Remember that time a few days ago when he literally just suddenly screamed and grabbed his head and took, like, thirty points of psychic damage for no reason at all, and Jinki said that obviously the gods were displeased with him for something?” Taemin asks. It doesn’t do as good of a job at keeping the annoyance out of its voice.

“But no,” Minho says dramatically. “Jo’s great. He’s soooo romantic. He helped us fight sometimes. He just gets intense headaches every once in a while. Nothing’s wrong with Jo.” They lean really close to Jonghyun, trying to stare him down as he stares blandly at the table. “Do you think Jo’s gonna let us fall to our deaths, or will his charming gentleman’s heart grant us the mercy of killing us first?”

“Alright, can you, like, get out of my space, please?” Jonghyun asks. He’s perfectly calm and pleasant, flapping a gentle hand at Minho until they sit up straight with a huff. “It’s fine,” he says. The other three groan, probably because he sounds exactly the same as he has sounded for the past in-game week of them telling him that Jo was bad news. “It’s still fine,” he says. “It’s always been fine.”

“Explain to me how this is fine,” Taemin huffs. Jonghyun huffs lightly right back.

“I mean, if you would let me do my thing instead of whining at me, you would see,” he says.

“What thing,” Key scoffs.)

“Jo, honey,” Skell says sweetly. He takes several small, shuffling steps forward through the snow and the rope binding his feet, smile playful on his face. Jo pauses in his dramatic reaching for the orb, turning to look at him with a cocked brow.

“Stay back, cutiepie,” he says. “I would hate to have to kill you first.”

“Oh, I know, baby, but,” Skell pouts. “Can I have one last favor?” he asks. “Pretty please? For me?” He bats his eyelashes prettily and Jo laughs. He thinks it’s absurd that Skell still thinks that he actually ever cared. Still, the little pink haired human is absolutely adorable. One last request couldn’t hurt.

“Sure, kitten,” Jo shrugs. “What is your dying wish?” He hops off of the shrine with his arms crossed in front of him. Skell smiles, bites his lip, giggles cutely.

“Let us--”

(“Oh, wait, Jinki--he has more than fifty hit points, right?” Jonghyun asks quickly. Jinki cocks a brow, checks his notes, and shrugs innocently. Telling is cheating. Jonghyun huffs. “Come on, Jinki, you know I don’t want to accidentally kill him,” he pouts.

“How the fuck…?” Taemin mumbles. Jinki sighs and shrugs again, but this time with a little nod. He can’t say no to that face.

“Yeah, he has more than fifty,” he says. Jonghyun smiles bright and wiggles happily.

“Okay, anyway.”)

“Let us tie you up right now,” Skell says clearly.

(“Really? That’s your fucking plan?” Key hisses.

“Shh,” Jonghyun hisses back.)

Jo looks at Skell blankly for a moment, and the bursts into loud laughter. He holds his stomach, bends over, wipes a tear from his eye.

“Wow,” he says when he composes himself. “I thought you were going to ask for a final kiss or something.” He grins, steps forward, pecks Skell’s cheek, and backs up. “Not gonna happen, babe,” he grins. Skell just smiles pleasantly back as Jo turns back to the shrine.

Two steps up, Jo stops suddenly, stiffens, clutches his head, and screams, just like that time a few days ago. As soon as that happens, Skell pushes all of his concentration into another spell that hits Jo with force. Mid-scream, mid-horrible writhes of agony, Jo stops, frozen in place by the magic.

Skell turns quickly back around to his other three companions.

“Hurry up and get yourselves free, this freezing spell only lasts for a minute and I don’t know if a second one will work,” he says.

(“Holy shit,” Minho whispers.

“I told you it was fine,” Jonghyun grins.

“I thought you didn’t like to hurt people?” Key asks. She’s staring at the five damage dice Jonghyun rolled onto the board with wide eyes, and Taemin is giving Jonghyun the same look. Jonghyun shrugs, a sweet little smile on his face.

“I don’t like liars,” he says. His pleasant tone is betrayed by just a touch of a hard edge.

Jinki had known about Jonghyun’s secret curse plan the whole time, but it’s at that moment that he really remembers that chaotic good players play by their own rules just as much as the evil ones do.

“Holy shit,” Minho whispers again.)

[myfriendpokey]

mystery market

most of my imagination of game culture comes from memories of video rental stores (which rented games, too), with hundreds of different packets of various levels of opacity, blurred alluring pictures, unaccountable gaps (why was there always a copy of The Fly II but never of The Fly?), an enormous immediate level of variation coupled with a strange sense of equivalence, of anonymity. 500 videocassettes which each cost the same to rent / are packaged in the same format / come from the same store are all essentially the same videotape, regardless of what any particular one contains, or how good or bad it might be - everything united through the levelling effect of exchange value. it was a place of great mystery to me but it was also a kind of market, and consequently the way i thought about videogames was also kind of like a market.

this is obviously a framework with sharp, sometimes gross, limitations, even if i'm not sure how fully avoidable it is - i get the joke when small developers invent "companies" called Bob Corp or Susan Industries but it's also sort of close to home when considering just how mediated our images of these things are through the formats most amenable to business and capital. but that being said i don't think this means they're necessarily tainted right through from the start, having an alienated or aestheticised image of these things can help to identify tensions within them, particularly when compared to later and more accurate impressions. i think in retrospect the appeal of the video store to me was as a perverse image of egalitarianism, one of a community where membership would not be given on the basis of some particular quality (being good, being smart, being worthwhile) but in a structural sense which ignored the existence of such qualities altogether. the fact that all the individual cassettes seemed lost in their own worlds, that there was no communication between one video and the other, also had a specific appeal if you were shy or aloof - it was a community which didn't necessitate talking to anyone. and i wonder in general re. the famous affinity of white nerds with market capitalism if, on an emotional if not economic level, it's in part driven less by individualism than a sense of the community of commodities, one which opens indiscriminately to anyone willing to pay, heedless of all invisible hierarchies of social communication - while of course sidestepping the question of who is able to pay, and why, and allowing for the continued pleasant ressentiment towards other, supposedly more sectarian communities (i.e. ones excluding the speaker)  such as blacks, gays, women, etc. so the video-store-as-utopia image doesn't hold up, not just in the most obvious sense of where and who it existed for but even as an experience in itself - where unless you're 8 years old it almost immediately becomes obvious that the videos on display are far less heterogenuous than they initially appear, overwhelmingly the same recent-ish studio productions, the same aspirations and assumed set of references and emotional priorities, same genre signifiers and same functions, like one of those 999 game-in-one cartridges where 994 of the games are just variations of tetris. and in fact this experience is magnified even more enormously in any kind of "open" online market, such as steam or the app store or netflix, where the particular unease comes from the coupling of almost infinite choice with an uncanny lack of actual variation, like bad procedural generation, every possible combination of zombies and match-3 repeating endlessly into the horizon, in fact like a sort of negative image of our earlier videotape fantasy: where instead of individuality existing in a fixed structure we have the coexistence of an open structure with blandly oversimilar, repetitive elements. this might not be especially less "egalitarian" than our previous examples, "you can watch anything if you have money" not that much less limiting than "you can play anything as long as it's match-3" but i think it does highlight one of the felt contradictions of the system - in the discrepancy between the cultural fantasy image of endless "choice", sensation, multiplicity and the real economic factors which ensure such multiplicity will only ever be a fleeting dream before the increasingly uniform accumulation of capital.

i don't know what such contradictions are worth, although the enormous amounts of money and energy spent trying to fix or elide them suggest they're at least worth something - for example every essay or news report in a financial magazine taking the time to point out either that videogames are healthy in some neurological way or else focusing on the bright creative young things who are even now moving this horrible medium away from shooter games and collectibles and closer to dare we say it "art", the frequency of which have risen as the amount of money both made and invested in the format continues to grow. surely nothing this profitable can be ALL bad, surely there isn't a totally irreconcileable break between profit and human value. the question of whether videogames are art is political in the sense that it touches on one of those deep ideological articles of faith which provide legitimacy to economic or political order, like free trade equals freedom or capitalism being a natural fit with democracy, in this case the idea that commercial culture can never depart too dramatically from accepted parameters of merit and taste, which is typically a fantasy both sides are invested in maintaining even as the restless desire for more profits and more markets ensures the line is always only moving one way. in the same way that many proponents of truly free trade would (presumably) still feel some distaste at the prospect of selling heroin to teenagers even hardened conservatives can become a little sickly at the prospect that the future of the film industry consists of 44 years of spiderman reboots and pornography.

which brings us back to indie games, and to a certain awkward argument within them; namely, are these things meant to be replacing the existing industry or just supplementing it? with the consensus, by now, firmly with the latter. it's a little eerie to imagine "indie games" on their own, out of the contrast with some AAA counterpart - they immediately begin to seem more diffuse, if not distracted, stylish but also curiously listless outside of the deep mulch of practice games, physics toys, and abandoned projects that make up the majority of development practice. how much more sense they make as kind of a vitamin tablet, as transient and local infusions of colour, inventiveness and thought helping to smooth over cracks in an otherwise regimented genre landscape - and acting the same way in a moral capacity, where playing a short cute, weird, empathic or political game sort of clears your conscience about going back to play another 50 hours of destiny in the same way that jogging to work "earns" you a packet of crisps later on. which isn't necessarily to dismiss these games, which i think might require another 10 years to see clearly, to understand what "indie" meant to people growing up online or playing videogames - but i do think that lending themselves so readily to a place in this moral economy, acting as the human, creative supplement which makes videogames seem bearable, being the GOOD games, plays maybe more readily into the ideological survival of a dismal market consensus than maybe anyone involved would like to think.

does this mean moving away from things which are cute, weird, empathic or political in favor of some kind of bleak accelerationist impulse (everyone just make spiderman games now. no future), i don't think so. in a weird way i think part of the reason that image of the video store has stuck with me is as counterpoint to this equation of interesting or weird work with values of individuality, creativity, moral seriousness, all the other virtues that small developers are asked to provide in proportion to their gradually vanishing from the scorched earth of consumer culture. the alienated video store image, for reasons discussed above, is untenable as an actual proposal, but it's worth considering what that image, or that desire, represents: the difference between the dream image and the reality is that one is a market without competition, and this discrepency i think strikes at something real, the tendency of competition to extinguish that "variety" held up as the friendly, carnivalesque face of the market, the tendency of capital to eat away at those very features habitually portrayed as its most acceptable. when i think of the most appealling prospects offered by homebrew videogames i invariably think of those which assume from the start that competition is what's holding them back, like the glorious trainwrecks pirate karts or david kanaga's unionization proposal, both of which imply that true variety is only compatible with the equitable structures that they set out to create - which in other words argue for a basic fault in capitalism from the start and a need to move apart from it rather than that of finding aesthetic solutions for economic problems. i think at this point if there's anything i'd "like to see" it's just acknowledging how shitty the existing system for making and distributing these things is, and how few people it actually works for, and trying to move away from the idea that a few "cool folkz" making a living is good enough, broader structures, colder structures. both videogames and video stores are compromised by capital; the value of both is in their insufficiency, in the sense of promises not kept, of unfinished business.

[motherhen-bear]

Critical Role Relationship Week: Day 7 - Vex’ahlia & Jarett “Money Can’t Buy... Happiness?”

Jarett had long since considered himself to be a man of relatively simple tastes. He didn’t need much in the way of extravagancy to be comfortable – simple clothes, weapons in good condition, a steady paycheck, a roof over his head, a belly (or two) full of food, and enough alcohol to always get him to that sweet spot if not push him over the edge.

No, Jarett didn’t have much more than what he needed and he usually preferred it that way. Unfortunately, recent dragon attacks made it difficult to have even that much these days. After relocating to Whitestone, he’d taken it upon himself, with his now-former-but-not-really employers’ permission, to situate himself into the city guard for the time being – both out a desire to do good work, he knew he’d go mad if he didn’t have something to do, and out of necessity.

Like so many others, Jarett had escaped from Emon with just the clothes on his back, his weapons, and what few personal effects that could fit into a small burlap traveling sack. Now he found himself shacked up in the city barracks and while he had enough (bland) food to keep his belly mostly filled and enough work to keep his mind sharp, he’d be lying if he said his only two sets of clothing weren’t becoming a bit tattered.

It was nothing he couldn’t handle.

The Lady Cassandra was doing her best to accommodate not only the refugees, but her own people as well and Jarett was not about to bother her or anyone else for that matter. Resources were low enough as is.

Not only that, but with the constant threat of death from the sky or an army marching on them from the south, extended rest was no longer a luxury he could afford.

The more hours someone like him could put into keeping the castle secure, the recruits trained, and the more basic daily tasks attended to, the less the stronger and smarter of Vox Machina’s arcane allies would have to worry about, and be able to focus on the greater issue of shielding the city and ending the dragon threat once and for all.

Jarett could take care of himself.

Ultimately though, it seemed he could not avert every set of eagle eyes. On one of his breaks from training, during which he was doing his best to keep a newly sewn patch on his shirt from bursting free (he was more skilled with a sword than a needle and thread), he looked up to find Vex standing before him, hip cocked to one side, arms folded, and a very cross look on her lovely face.

“Jarett, dear,” she said in way of a greeting and Jarett suddenly felt very similar to how he had as a small child – his mother standing over him, scolding him for stealing the neighbor’s meat pies.

Doing his best to shake off the brief flashes of nostalgia and fear, he stood to greet his former employer. “Ah, Vex’ahlia. It is good to see you’ve returned. I trust your most recent venture into the unknown bore fruit?” Behind her, Jarett could spot her bear Trinket wandering around the training yard spooking recruits.

“Oh yes, it was lovely – near-death experiences and moments of idiocy for everyone. How are you, darling? You’re looking a little tired,” replied the half-elven ranger, without missing a beat or taking the bait and bringing his attention right back to her instead of on the enormous creature making his soldiers wet themselves.

Standing up straight and slapping on a winning smile of his own, Jarett shook his head. “I am simply doing my part, same as anyone should in times such as these. I may not be as equipped for hunting down weapons of power or constructing a magic barrier to keep us safe, but I do what I can.”

“Oh, no one’s debating that. You’ve proven yourself more than capable,” Vex said, her voice growing kinder, but still retaining that razor sharpness of cunning. “For example, you are extremely talented at avoiding my questions, so I’ll ask again: how are you, Jarett?”

His smile stayed in place, “I am well enough, truly. Grateful for a roof over my head, two square meals a day, and a place where my skills can be put to good use.”

Vex narrowed her eyes at him, gaze drifting down his person. He suddenly wished more than ever that he hadn’t decided to forgo the upper half of his armor for his break. His gear wasn’t of the highest quality, but he kept it in fairly good condition and more importantly it covered the admittedly tattered clothes that lay beneath. Worse then that, his traitorous stomach chose that exact moment to let out a clearly audible growl. He could practically feel his face flaming as Vex raised her head to look him in the eyes once more.

She seemed to think for a long moment and Jarett stood there, waiting to be lectured or teased or pitied, but instead the woman in front of him merely gave a thoughtful look before she began to speak.

“You know Jarett, the people here are very lucky to have such reliable guardsmen here to protect them. It’s clear their training is paying off. Look,” and she glanced back where three recruits were trying, quite admirably, to gently herd Trinket away from sniffing at the other recruits. It wasn’t doing much, but they hadn’t been eaten yet, so that was something.

“I don’t know many who are brave enough to stand up to Trinket, especially when he hasn’t eaten yet today,” her voice raised on that last part and Trinket let out a short growl that had the soldiers, looking even more nervous then before, beginning to back away from the bear. Jarett, who had seen Trinket furiously attack an invisible assailant in his defense in the past, was unworried and kept his attention on the bear’s mistress.

“Give them a week and they will be ready to face giants,” he bluffed.

“Grog will be pleased. He’s been looking for a new challenge. Dragons are becoming a bit predictable for him.”

“Ah, but I said giants Vex’ahlia, not half-giants.”

Vex laughed and Jarett felt pleased and hopeful that perhaps he’d be able to make it out of this with his dignity largely intact. That is, until she began rummaging through her satchel.

“Regardless, it’s always been my belief that outstanding service deserves just rewards,” and she pulled out a small, yet heavy bag from her satchel. Jarett could hear the clink of coin from inside and he stuck out his hand to push it away as she went to hand it to him.

“Thank you, but no. I appreciate your generosity, but there is no need. I am just doing my job.”

Vex raised one eyebrow, “Jobs typically entitle their workers to payment, darling.”

Jarett smirked at her. “That may be, but a “coin purse” of that size and amount would certainly go far above my monthly rate, even with the raises I am owed. Besides,” and he took a step back. “You need that far more than I do with what you are facing.”

Vex’ahlia was silent a moment, as though giving his reasoning serious thought, and then nodded. “You’re right, Jarett.”

The guardsman felt a rush of relief and a twinge of something else, before there was a sudden rush of movement and he found himself holding the heavy bag of coin in his hand.

“You’re right, Jarett,” Vex’ahlia said again with a cheeky grin on her face, but her eyes deadly serious. “We do need money for healing potions and resistances and all matter of bribes…” Now Jarett’s eyebrow raised and Vex’ahlia waved him off. “Don’t ask. Anyway, you’re kind to worry about us, but the tens of thousands of platinum we’ve happened upon in our recent fights should cover things for a while.”

She nodded her head towards the recruits, who Trinket had at last left in peace. “This gold however, is actually meant specifically to pay the soldiers for their service. You know, living and training expenses, equipment, hygiene, decent meals, bar tabs, and the like…” She gave him another look up and down. “New clothes.”

Jarett could feel his jaw hanging open, but couldn’t for the life of him find the strength to close it.

“So really, dear,” Vex continued. “I’m afraid to say this money isn’t just for you… No, no, that would be terribly inappropriate. It’s for you and the dozens of other hardworking individuals who I’m certain could use the odd comforts while they’re stuck here dong the work no one else can.” She looked him straight in the eye. “It would be selfish to deny them that, wouldn’t you agree?”

Finally closing his mouth so not to resemble a fish, Jarett stammered, “I-I suppose that’s true. Right. I will… distribute the funds accordingly and make sure everyone–” he flinched at the ranger’s glare.

“Everyone,” he emphasized, “get’s their fair share. Thank you.”

An enormous, satisfied smile bloomed on Vex’s face. “I’m pleased to hear it. I'm not often so generous, so such an occasion should be celebrated appropriately. Come along, Trinket!” she called as she turned to start walking away. “Let’s get back to the others!”

Jarett was left behind with a dumbstruck look on his face, holding a bag that must at least weigh… a lot. He watched until his former employer was out of sight, glanced over to the training yard where several soldiers were staring at him, and then weighed the bag carefully in his hand before a bright smile stretched across his own face.

There was a comfortable-looking dark-red jacket in a seamstress’s shop a few blocks from here that he’d been thinking would work very well against the mid-winter chill.

[ashcrking]

                CONFIDENT • AMBITIOUS • GENEROUS                          LOYAL • P A S S I O N A T E • creative

      PRETENTIOUS • DOMINEERING • STUBBORN                              V A I N • SELF CENTRED

Leo is THE LION, this well suited symbol represents Leo very well. They possess a K I N G D O M  ♔ which they protest and ( cherish ). The are high esteemed, honorable and very devoted to themselves in particular! The kingdom could be anything from work to home to a partner, whatever it is, you rule it. Leo is always { C E N T R E S T A G E } and full of flair, they enjoy basking in the SPOTLIGHT. A Leo always makes their presence known. Leo are full of energy that acts like a magnet for other people. Others are attracted to Leo's wit, charm, and what they have to say for they speak of things grand and very interesting. Leo will never settle for second best. They want only the best which can cause lavish EXCESSIVE SPENDING HABITS as they enjoy their life of luxury, which is all too easily justified by the grand and magnificent Leo! Public image is very important to Leo, with luxurious possessions and ways of life, this keeps the public image in high standing. They will do whatever it takes to protect their own reputation. Leos are very generous, kind and openhearted people. If a Leo is crossed, they will strike back with force but they are not one to hold a grudge, they easily forgive, forget and move on. Leos are always trying to make things right in the world, they have larger then life emotions and they need to feel like they have { accomplished } something at the end of the day. They REACT to situations with ACTION instead of sitting back and thinking about it, they are not impulsive however because they look at the future and consider consequences of their actions. 

THE SUN ( LEO ): “Instead of being the conceited, self-absorbed show-offs of reputation, they are usually very self-aware, self-conscious, and, yes, even humble.”

What is your character’s drive like and what fuels them? There’s an intense desire for freedom, for adventure and a life where he can thrive without being caged up in a palace with nothing but rules and regulations. Alex grew up tending towards rebellion because of the restriction of his lifestyle. Being in New Orleans is everything.. and though he is expected to do charity work, he actually rather enjoys it. 

What is most obvious about your character? He’s arrogant & confident as hell, though he has a likeable charm once you talk to him a little. He’ll walk into a room in a thousand dollar suit, screaming luxury and wealth with every step. There’s a suave sort of element to his demeanour, too. He’s cool, calm and collected and comfortable in his own skin. 

Who and what kind of people does your character surround themselves with? Alex loves to party.. so if people like to party, he’ll likely feel a sort of magnetism towards them, if that makes sense. People who like to have a good time. 

THE ASCENDING ( LEO ): “Leo rising people cannot help but be noticed. They radiate a special energy and magnetism that gets others' attention. Sometimes it's because they are loud people who pay a lot of attention to their personal appearance (especially their hair!); other times it's due to a regal manner that simply demands interest from others.”

In a public setting, would your character be easy to adapt or hesitant wherever they are? Easily adapt, I’d say. Though he’s never quite been in an environment where he’s technically invisible in terms of his identity, he’s quite enjoying the anonymity that comes with it. He effortlessly moulds into conversation and isn’t afraid to go out there and talk to a complete stranger. If we’re talking Monaco though, he can’t stand the public eye. It’s inevitable, he grew up in such an environment too.. but it’s taken it’s toll on him. That’s partially the reason he felt the need to publicly act out back home. He snapped and had enough.

Is your character an extrovert or an introvert? Very much an extrovert, in my opinion. 

What qualities do you think people first see in your character? They see his confidence, his easygoing charm, but also perhaps his arrogant need to be the best and do the best? He loves attention, so.. they’d probably either be very annoyed or intrigued by his confident manner. 

THE MOON ( SCOPRIO ): “Lunar Scorpios have exceptional "radar" that allows them to size up a situation--and a person--quickly and expertly. This ability to understand human motivation and nature can be too close for comfort for some, and enormously comforting for others.”

What moment does your character relive, either consciously or unconsciously? Perhaps positive childhood memories where, in limited windows of time or rare days of spending time with the family, he actually got to be around his parents 

How does your character (negatively or positively) adapt to life experience? He can adapt, I guess. He loves change and new experiences and new adventures.. but as for his life experience as a royal, he still struggles. It’s a love hate relationship. He loves his job and his position for some reasons, but for others he is completely rebellious. 

What facts would your characters conceal? His true feelings, or innermost desires. Or his art. 

THE VENUS ( CANCER ): “These people are sensitive in love, even if their Sun sign is the more playful and outgoing signs of Gemini or Leo. You may even say their egos are a little underdeveloped when it comes to love, but they have a lot to give in return: namely, security, comfort, and care.”

What kind of hobbies does your character have and why do they enjoy them? He is an artist; he enjoys drawing, painting and photography. He likes them ‘cause, growing up it was an escape for him for a while, something he could invest time into and express himself whilst putting on a royal mask to the rest of the world and his family. To him, his art is real. That’s why it’s very personal. 

What does your character find attractive, either in people or in their own possessions? Alex loves luxurious material items. He loves his clothes, his shoes, his watches, and his hair. He likes to look after himself, and is simultaneously attracted to those who always maintain upkeep physically (not to say he’s not attracted to those who don’t). He loves his cars, too.. he basks in his wealth and enjoys it, but there are other parts of him that give him depth. In a world where he was more mature, he’d probably seek for depth in his partner, akin to his own. Someone who sees life as more than just the mask. 

How does your character (negatively or positively) show their love or demonstrate their affection? Alex is very affectionate, whether he’s just met someone for a night or known them all his life. He’s a happy person, and likes to ensure those around him are having a good time. He wants to know he’s the reason for making another smile, in his own selfish way.

How does your character fall in love? Do they jump into relationships, or take slow, measured steps? Describe their behaviors and actions, if you’d like. Honestly, Alex claims he’s not one for relationships — and with his maturity levels, it’s probably best for right now. But I think he’s very sensitive deep down, and if he were to fall for someone, I’m sure he’d take it slow but jump in deep soon enough if he really felt for them. I think he’d fall rather easily. He may not seem like it, but he’s got a lot of baggage and family issues that impact him and shape him into who he is today. 

THE MARS ( TAURUS ): “These goal-oriented people are not known for their speed, but their staying power is tremendous. Generally calm and easygoing people, Mars in Taurus natives can have powerful tempers when they're overly provoked.”

What does your character want with every fiber of their being? Freedom to be who he is, nothing more, nothing less. Oh, and attention. He still likes that ;D

What will your characters do to get what they want? How far will they go? Alex appears pretty powerful, and he knows it. I guess you could say he is determined enough to get what he wants.. he was determined enough to get himself to New Orleans after a lifetime of trying. 

What makes your character see red? What makes their blood boil? Mistreatment of anyone he loves. Oh, and when tabloids speak terribly of those he cares about (not particularly himself). And when his father expects him at events without so much as a “how are you son?”, or a general conversation. 

On a symbolic level, what battles has your character lost and what wounds have they suffered? Fights with his father seem never-ending. The two have never really gotten along, and Alex harbours this great resentment towards him that he cannot iron out no matter how much he tries.