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goldie90 · 3 years

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Watching The Emperor´s New Groove with the Sawyers🦙

My first thought when I watched The Emperor´s New Groove, back when it came out was that it was different. Because it was not the typical Disney movie, not like the ones that came out before. No, it seemed like they tried something completely new with it and I have to say, I think the result is really great. One thing that makes the movie so different and also very interesting, is that the main character is not the typical hero and by far not a nice guy. No, Emperor Kuzco is the exact opposite. He´s selfish, arrogant and doesn´t gives a damn about anything but himself. I guess, you could say he´s the most dislikeable main character ever. And what can I say - I love him for it.😄

And I think that, if I would watch this movie with the Sawyers, I wouldn´t be the only one who feels that way. There would be at least two persons who see it the same way. But also someone who would highly disagree....

It´s definitely one of these movies, Drayton wouldn´t want to see, cause you know, it´s not realistic enough. A young man gets turned into a llama? That´s silly! Things like this don´t happen in real life.

So no, Drayton is really not looking forward to watch this movie with us. The only reason he agree, is because it´s Bubba´s birthday🎂 and the youngest Sawyer really wants to watch it with the whole family. So of course, Drayton couldn´t say no to him, even though he really wished he could, because he´s got a very bad feeling about this movie. He still remembers how the twins made him watch a terrible unrealistic movie, which had horrible things like robots and space ships in it, on their birthday and he really don´t want to go through this experience again.

During the opening scene, he will already see his fears confirmed, because at first he have to endure seeing a talking llama (which isn´t really a llama, but a human who´s got transformed into a llama, but that´s not the point). Also, the “llama” is talking directly to the audience and that´s something Drayton also don´t like, because he don´t want a talking llama talking to him. So yes, he dislikes the movie right from the start, but it will only get worse when the actual story begins and we see Emperor Kuzco in all his glory.

Let me tell you, Drayton is not very fond of him. No, he´s completely shocked. This boy is so arrogant and dislikeable, that he can´t barely stand to look at him. Also, he seems pretty lazy. There he is, dancing around in his palace,

pretend to work when he actually does nothing,

and expect other people to serve him, because he´s too lazy to do anything himself.

It´s... it´s just unbelievable! Who he think he is? Emperor or not, his behaviour is just unacceptable! Seriously, while looking at him, Drayton feels a very strong urge to give him a good beating with the broom🧹(and also a lecture about work ethic🙄).

While Drayton obviously dislikes the movie, Chop will really love it, already alone for the music part, cause damn, Kuzco´s groove is groovy!🎵 And therefore, he can fully understand that the emperor isn´t all to happy, when all of a sudden some old man stands in his way and threw off his groove by doing so.

In Chop´s opinion, it is completely understandable that Kuzco gets angry at the old guy and therefore, he thinks that his reaction is pretty justified.

Telling his servants to throw the old man out of the window, seems like a very reasonable thing to do, due to the circumstances, also it´s pretty funny.

The latter is what Nubbins thinks, too. My dear husband doesn´t really care about what the old man did, to deserve being thrown out of the window, the only thing that matters to him is that he gets throw out of the window. He will manically laugh during this scene, because in his opinion it´s just too funny. Also, he´s pretty sure that the old guy didn´t survive this fall, which makes it even better, cause damn, we´re just a few minutes into the movie and someone already died! That´s how a movie have to be!

Of course, when it turns out that the old man is still alive,

my darling will be disappointed, but it´s only for a few seconds and then he starts to laugh again, cause even though the guy is not dead, seeing him being stuck on that banner outside of the palace is still pretty much fun and who knows? Maybe he´s still going to die, cause if he´s only stuck there long enough, then there´s a chance that he might starve to death sooner or later. Oh, that´s good, that´s really good! A slow, distressful death...isn´t this exactly what everyone wants to see in a movie?🙄 At this point, Nubbins is pretty sure that this movie is going to be absolutely great, but then, while he´s still laughing about the old man´s misery, this happens:

And now my darling gets really angry, cause what the hell is this man named Pacha doing? Why does he save the old man? Does he know him? Is he his grandfather? His best friend´s grandfather or something? No, obviously these two don´t even know each other and therefore it makes absolutely no sense that Pacha is saving the guy. And now Nubbins will feel really frustrated, because he just realized that Pacha is one of these characters that he hates with a burning passion. You know, the kind of character you see way too often in movies, the one who runs around and rescues random people just for the fun of it. It´s so disgusting! He´d really hoped there wouldn´t be one of them in this movie, but it seems like luck isn´t on his side. Now the only thing he can do is to hope that Pacha will die a very slow and very painful death.

But until this happens (and for some reason, he´s convinced that it will be happen🤨), Nubbins will be happy with this scene, because of the great news Kuzco reveals to Pacha:

The young emperor plans to build a summer home and the location he had chosen for it, is the place where Pacha is currently living. Yes, Kuzco actually plans to razing a whole village, just to build his summer residence, which means that Pacha and the other villagers are going to be homeless soon and in Nubbins´ opinion that´s a great thing, cause Pacha don´t deserve any better, also the thought of all these villagers becoming homeless is pretty funny. And who knows, maybe the other villagers will be so angry at Pacha, because he wasn´t able to dissuade Kuzco from his plans, that they going to kill him. Oh, that would be just perfect! Maybe they will beat him to death, or gut him on the village square.😲 Just thinking about this causes Nubbins to get a laughing fit, which will make it pretty hard for the rest of us, to pay attention to what happens on screen.

He will only stop after Drayton smacks him with the broom🧹 and yells at him to shut up. You should know, Drayton is already in a very bad mood and that´s not only because he don´t like the movie. No, what makes him even more angry is the way the main character behaves. Not enough that this boy is a lazy, arrogant brat who never worked one day in his life, no now he even wants to kick simple, decent people like Pacha out of their homes, so he can build his stupid summer home (as living in a huge palace isn´t already decadent enough). Oh, how he wished he could give him a good beating right now! Because in Drayton´s opinion, that´s exactly what Kuzco needs (and I have to say, I can´t even disagree with him on that topic😄).

During this scene:

Drayton and Nubbins will actually agree on something (which is very rare). Cause when Yzma and Kronk are plotting to murder Kuzco, both can´t help but think that this is a great idea, granted for different reasons. Nubbins just wants to see someone die, because he thinks it´s fun, while Drayton´s reasons are a bit more personal. He hates Kuzco like he never hated a fictional character before and therefore he really hopes that Yzma will be successful with her plan to poisoning him.

Meanwhile Bubba will be a bit worried, cause even though he didn´t like Emperor Kuzco that much, he definitely don´t want to see him die. No, in fact Bubba don´t wanna see anyone die in a movie, because it always makes him a bit sad. Maybe it´s because he sees so many horrible things in real life (even causes them himself quite often), that he didn´t want to see them in a movie too. No, when Bubba is watching a movie, he wants to escape reality for a while. He wants to see a better world as the one he´s living in. A world where everyone is happy and nothing bad is ever happening. Therefore he´s really relieved when Yzma´s plan fails, because Kronk accidentally gives Kuzco the wrong poison, which instead of killing the emperor, simply turns him into a llama.

Chop will also be relieved, because he actually likes Kuzco and therefore he don´t want him to die, cause he thinks that without Kuzco, the movie wouldn´t be as funny as it is. Nubbins on the other hand will be pretty annoyed, cause he was looking forward to finally see someone die, but nothing happened. And the fact that Kronk is too much of a nice guy, to kill Kuzco when Yzma tells him to do so, only makes things worse. From this point on, my husband starts to hate Kronk just as much as he hates Pacha, cause in his opinion, you have to be an really pathetic wimp if you´re not even capable of killing a llama.

Meanwhile, Drayton starts to hate the movie even more, because not enough that Kuzco is still alive and also accidentally ends up in Pacha´s village, which means that the poor, decent and most likely hard working Pacha is now forced to help this ungrateful brat getting back home, no the ungrateful brat is now a llama (a talking llama by the way) which means that from there on, the whole story will be pretty unrealistic.

So while the movie goes on, Drayton will complain and grumpily mumble to himself again and again and he also have to beat the twins with his broom a few times, cause everytime Yzma and Kronk are showing up on screen,

Chop will start to loudly wonder what exactly is going on between these two. Is Kronk really just Yzma´s assistant, or is there more going on behind closed doors? Does his job maybe includes some special services? Yes, my favorite brother in law is actually convinced that Kronk is sleeping with Yzma and he will happily discuss this topic with Nubbins (who´s the only one who´s willing to listen to his theory) And so it comes, as it had to come: Drayton yells at them to shut up and because Chop and Nubbins are not listening to him, he starts to chase them with the broom and almost knocks grandpa´s wheelchair over in the process, Luckily, grandpa is currently sleeping💤 and therefore he don´t notice what´s going on around him (but then again, he also wouldn´t notice if he was awake😩) .

During this scene:

Nubbins will again get a laughing fit, cause it looks like Pacha is going to die and that´s the moment my darling was waiting for. Since Pacha saved the old man in the beginning of the movie, Nubbins wished for him to die and even though he was actually hoping for some kind of medieval execution by the hands of the other villagers, he thinks that seeing how Pacha falls off a bridge and gets eaten by alligators🐊 is also pretty funny.🙄 Also, what makes it even more fun is the fact that Kuzco refuses to help him. Looks like the emperor is at least a normal, reasonable person, someone who´s not walking around and saving other people for no reason. No, Kuzco is more than willing to let Pacha die and in Nubbins´ opinion, that´s a pretty good thing. Seriously, why are there not more characters like that? That way, most movies would be much better.

While Nubbins is obviously enjoying this scene, Drayton will be furious, due to Kuzco´s behaviour. How can this boy be so ungrateful? Pacha had helped him, he was even willing to bring him all the way back to the palace, even though Kuzco was treating him so bad and now Kuzco refuses to help him? That´s ... no, he can´t even find the words to describe how angry this whole situation is making him. In his opinion, there was never a person who deserved a beating as much as Kuzco does. Oh, if he could only meet him in person... He would give him a beating, that he would never forget. But because that´s not possible, Drayton decides to give Nubbins some hard smacks instead, which will make my dear husband immediately stop laughing. Understandably, he´s not happy about being smacked with the broom and his mood will get even worse, when the scene ends without Pacha dying (which is especially disappointing, cause for a brief moment it even looked like Pacha and Kuzco would both not going to survive, which of course, would have been really great, but sadly they survived and Nubbins is very unhappy about this fact).

He will get even more frustrated when the movie goes on without anyone dying, even though there was so much potential for some good death scenes, but during this moment:

he starts to feel hopeful again, cause Yzma is obviously determined to kill Kuzco and she´s got a knife.🔪 Oh, that´s perfect! Now we´re going to see how she will stab Kuzco to death (and hopefully Pacha too). That´s so great, that it almost makes up for the fact that he had to wait so long for it.

But unfortunately, it seems like Yzma don´t want to get her own hands dirty and so she hands the knife to her assistant and orders him to finish the job.

And very unfortunately, Kronk is again too much of a wimp to do what he´s told and so the movie ends without even one single death scene, which is of course very disappointing for my husband.

And not enough that everyone made it out alive, no Kuzco got even turned back into a human and to make things even worse, he decided against his former plans to razing Pacha´s village, which is, in Nubbins´ opinion, a very stupid decision.🙄

Now Kuzco and Pacha are actually friends and Kuzco hangs out with him and his family, like he was a part of it, which is without a doubt the most boring ending ever.

So yes, Nubbins is very disappointed of the movie, while Bubba is happy about the nice ending. Chop thinks that the movie was okay, also pretty funny, he only wished that there would have been more music parts.🎵 Meanwhile, Drayton is still a bit angry about the terrible main character, but at least the boy learned a few things in the end, which is of course a good thing.

Also, seeing Kuzco made Drayton realize that, even though me and his brothers are of course all very annoying and ungrateful half-wits, we´re not the worst people in this world and this knowledge makes him appreciate us a bit more. You know, just a little bit.😄

#nubbins sawyer #chop top sawyer #drayton sawyer #bubba sawyer #grandpa sawyer #texas chainsaw massacre #domestic fantasies

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crocodilenialledfics · 4 years

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You’re all I need (the air I breathe)

sixteen - in which the new semester starts and Stella thinks things

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love-at-first-sight, falling-too-fast, uni au that will make your heart ache (in a good way)

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The start of the spring semester started abruptly and without much warning. The month off was enough to make Stella comfortable doing nothing. Except here she was, back at the library working her evening shifts, rushing to early morning classes and finding little time to breathe in between.

Of course there was also the getting used to new routines aspect of a new semester. This was Stella’s least favorite part. It was just when she got used to things, they changed again.

What didn’t change was Niall, though. He was still the very same, soft eyes meeting Stella’s from across the dining hall table. His hand in hers when they walked back to his room. This was exactly the same.

Stella periodically thought, “how lucky am I?” in regards to Niall’s kindness. She didn’t doubt for a moment that she was lucky, not taking any moment for granted.

That was why she kissed him more than usual, thanked him for everything and hoped he knew how grateful she was. There was a bit of fear inside of her, that this would come to a crashing end. Stella would be destroyed. She knew she would.

“What are you thinking about?” Niall asked, unlocking his door. “You’ve been quiet all evening.”

“Just thinking,” Stella shook her head as they walked in. “Tired. Stressed. You know the bits.”

“Right but...” Niall trailed off with a chuckle. “Those aren’t usually things that keep you quiet.”

Stella silently cursed him as she collapsed in his bed. “Don’t know what you mean.”

“I’m sure you don’t,” Niall rolled his eyes, taking his jacket off. “You know me. Talking absolute none sense.”

“Right,” Stella agreed, crawling under his duvet.

“You have homework,” Niall reminded her, sitting down at his desk. “And so do I. You said you were going to do it.”

“It’s not due for another two days,” Stella argued, eyes fluttering as her senses were overwhelmed by being in his bed. They always were.

“Well mine’s due tomorrow morning so I have to...” he trailed off, looking over his shoulder at her. “I have to get mine done. Stop looking like that.”

“Like what?” Stella asked, laughing.

“Like that,” he emphasized. “In my bed. I need to focus.”

“Stop looking at me,” Stella laughed, shaking her head.

“Fuckin’ hell,” he muttered, turning around in his chair. “But I know you’re laying there waiting for me.”

“Take your time,” Stella murmured, relaxing against the mattress. “I’m not moving any time soon.”

This time when Stella closed her eyes she thought about New Year’s Day. She had to open her eyes, feeling breathless at the thought. She had no business thinking about that now.

“It’s an easy assignment,” Niall told her. “A discussion board on whether or not Napoleon’s invading Egypt was ethical or not.”

“Interesting,” Stella mumbled. “The answer is no, correct?”

“I have no idea,” Niall shrugged. “And that’s what I’m writing. I literally do not know.”

“Honesty,” Stella commented. “Nice.”

Stella lasted ten minutes before she fell asleep. Niall was engrossed in his work, unaware. January was miserable in Manchester. Rain and gloom. It wore Stella out, exhausted her. Most nights, she preferred Niall’s bed over her own but she didn’t usually let herself stay. Maybe tonight would be different.

“Stella,” Niall drawled out, closing his laptop. “I finished now we can...” he trailed off, settling his eyes on her, “hang out.”

Niall got into bed beside her, not caring if he woke her up. He didn’t. He settled beside her, staring at the ceiling until he couldn’t take it anymore.

“Stella,” he mumbled, nudging her.

“Niall,” Stella mumbled back, nudging him with her foot. “Shhh.”

“No,” he laughed. “Wake up. It’s only seven.”

“I’m tired,” Stella emphasized, rolling into her back. “What is the reason you woke me?”

“Oversleeping can increase your risk of heart disease and obesity,” Niall answered, almost robotically. “I’m just looking out for you.”

“Right,” Stella laughed, rubbing her eyes. “God, Niall, that’s absolutely ridiculous.”

“I’m looking out for you,” he repeated, laughing.

“altruistic,” Stella murmured, looking up at him.

“Always,” Niall mused, pushing his fingers through her hair. “Finished my assignment.”

“Good,” Stella mumbled. “Anything else I missed in the last twenty minutes?”

“Yes your phones been going off. Veda,” he told her, though he hoped she wouldn’t move.

Stella didn’t, eyelashes fluttering as Niall continued to run his fingers through her hair, “I’ll fall asleep again.”

“Don’t do that we’re hanging out,” Niall argued. “Wanna talk to you.”

“About what?” Stella asked, tired. “We talk a lot, you know.”

“I know,” Niall chuckled, letting his hand fall from her hair. “You can go to sleep.”

“No we can talk,” Stella shook her head, rolling onto her back. “What’s on your mind?”

“I should be asking you what’s on your mind,” Niall emphasized. “What was that eerie quiet earlier?”

“Oh nothing,” Stella chuckled, rubbing her forehead. “Just... thoughts.”

“About?” Niall laughed.

“I don’t know,” Stella laughed, shaking her head. “Nothing. It was nothing. Just tired.”

“Right, the bits,” Niall agreed. “One day, Stella you will spill your secrets. I just know.”

“They’re not secrets,” Stella laughed, looking up at him. “Do you share every thought that pops into your mind?”

“No,” Niall chuckled. “But I certainly don’t get distracted the way you do. Thinking secret thoughts that are just so secret you can’t tell anyone.”

“You aren’t gonna let me out of this one, are you?” Stella deadpanned, eyes narrowing at him.

“I was thinking about it,” Niall laughed. “But now since you’ve given me that look, no, I’m not. Spill.”

“I was thinking about last semester. How crazy it’s been,” Stella shrugged.

“That’s it?”

“And what would happen if we broke up,” Stella added, convinced he wouldn’t stop until she’d said it.

“Oh,” Niall mumbled, eyebrows furrowing. “That’s not a good thought. You want... you’d want to-“

“No,” Stella cut him off with a startled laugh. “No, of course not. It was just a fleeting thought like I’d be devastated if that happened, those sorts of things.”

“Right,” Niall agreed.

“You’re upset?” Stella murmured. It was half a question, half a statement. Judging by the look on Niall’s face, eyebrows knitted together still it could have been a statement.

“Not upset,” Niall shook his head. “I pressed you to tell me and I shouldn’t get upset about what you think about. Thoughts are private, you know.”

“Right,” Stella agreed, though she did feel guilty.

“Do you think about that a lot?” Niall asked, looking up at her.

“No,” Stella shook her head. “Never. I never think about it. It just happened upon me. I think I was thinking about how grateful I am for you, and then thought I’d be crushed if this ends because I’m so happy with you.”

“Well that’s a relief,” Niall chuckled. “So you don’t daydream about breaking up?”

“No,” Stella laughed, sliding her hand into his. “I don’t daydream about breaking up.”

“Good,” Niall mumbled, pressing a kiss to her knuckles. “Stella Bella, if I hear you thinking about us breaking up I’ll... I’ll... I don’t know what I’ll do but it’ll be serious.”

“Hm I’m sure,” Stella murmured, letting him pull her in.

Niall slid his hand around her waist and Stella couldn’t remember why she was thinking about breaking up in the first place. Niall kissed her softly and it was decided, they’d never break up because this, between them, was too good to let go.

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imactuallynotsorry · 4 years

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Office

Robin x MC (Emma)

It was a hectic and exhausting day at the office, doing a marathon just to get from one point of the building to the next and back. From overseeing the drop off of their prototypes at the robotic Lab, to the multiple urgent documents that had to be sent out two days ago but Sam idiotic self forgot to sign and have his actual assistant mail them. Robbin had to work his charm, and kiss some ass, in order to fix his brother's mistake just to make sure the documents were delivered without complications to Dalton’s partnerships. And the oh so many meetings he needed to be present for, were draining him.

Robin was making his way back from lunch when a tall, slim woman talking to the receptionist caught his attention. His eyes drifting down long wild curls, watching the way her hips and ass filled those jeans. A familiar soft feminine voice reached his ears. Snapping out of the trance, Robin quickly jerked his head to the ceiling, realizing the stranger he was gushing on was Emma. Running his hands through his hair, a weak last attempt of combing his heated thoughts out of his head. Be professional, Robin.

“Emma!”,a wide grin was plastered on his face, “It’s delightful to see you again!” Woow, did he just sound as enthusiastic as M&M with one of their experiments? Robin’s excitement was met with an equally wide smile from Emma, “Pleasure to see you again.” Deciding to ignore the pleasant warmth he felt at her assertion, and instead focusing on teasing her, “Ready to drown together?” Though it wasn’t much of teasing but just being realistic. Robin knew from past experiences how demanding Sofia was and how much she loved to micromanage every little step of the way. Emma’s smile faded, and a serious frown took its place, as if double guessing agreeing to help him out, “You really aren’t trying to sell this, huh”. Robin couldn't help himself, throwing his head backwards in laughter, “Come on Emma! I thought we could be honest with each other. Let's go get our hands dirty” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively at the last part, leading them to his office. Without realizing it, Robin had softly placed his right hand on Emma’s lower back. Allowing himself to enjoy the warmth feeling he got from the contact this time.

They worked besides each other in perfect sync, stopping only to steal glances from each other now and then, hoping the other wouldn't catch them in the act. Robin was amazed at how Emma’s soft voice shifted to a strong and determined tone while speaking with the event decorators. Thought it was hot when she lightly bit her lower lip right after succeeding in getting what she was demanding, adorable when she wrinkled her nose while reading an exaggerated demand from Sofia’s everlasting list. Found her little not so innocent smirk thrilling when she suggested sneaking in sliders to the menu. No wonder the twins cherished her so much, it was hard to look at her and not automatically love her.

Need a drink. Getting up from behind his desk and slowly making his way to the drink cart; he needed to collect his thoughts. Reaching the golden shelf, Robin mentally kicked himself for only ever stocking up on whiskey. He poured two glasses of Balvenie and carefully handed one to Emma.

“Whiskey? A man after my own heart”, a faint pleased moan escaped her lips as the whiskey made contact with her tongue. Robin smirks into his glass, satisfied with her reaction. They stayed like that for a while, just sipping on their drink quietly; Emma in her seat adjacent to where Robin stood leaning against the drink cart. First to break the silence was Emma, “I have to say, I'm pretty impressed by the way you tackle everything, when we first met I figured you were..” she trails off, searching for the right words. “Just a party boy?” Robin finished for her in a more aggressive tone than he meant to. Emma wasn’t trying to offend him, he knows that, but for some reason it bothered him that’s how she saw him. Emma responded with a timid tone he hadn't heard her use before, “Can you blame me?” No. And he really couldn’t blame Sam either for telling her about his player party boy reputation. It's his own, for selecting that to be the cover he chose to present to the world.

Before realizing it, Robin spilled everything to Emma, needing her to understand there was more to him than the last-call strangers he took home and the social events he filled his nights with. Wanted her to see he wasn't just ‘Sam’s assistant’ but a vital part of Delton Inc; wanted her to know his carefree, wild child persona was a defense mechanism, one that comes from years of working hard, trying your best and still not being enough. Thankful doesn't even begin to describe how he felt towards the Delton’s, but everything he has, from the clothes off his back to his position in the company could only be credited to his passionate work ethic.

Even accidentally mentioning the fact that Sam is in an arranged marriage. Unlike with everything else he had mentioned so far, he wondered why Emma didn't bat an eye at this revelation. “I can tell there's no love when they stare at each other. Don't think they ever even kissed before” Emma stated factually as if answering Robin’s unspoken question. Did she like Sam? Everyone did, why would she be the exception? He tried to give her an unreadable look, one that wouldn’t portray how envious he felt towards his brother. So he reflected the only way he knew how, by shamelessly flirting, “In front of the kids, probably not” Robin looked down at his half empathy whiskey glass, before glancing towards her with a smirk plaster on his face, only continuing after coming into contact with brown eyes, “But they're two young, attractive adults sharing a drink and killing time” he made a point of lifting his glass in front of him, revealing they both were doing just that right now. Robin nudges forward, gazing at Emma flirtatiously, admiring how her lips parted just lightly as he inch closer, “Stranger things have happened.”

Reluctantly, Robin made his way back to his seat on the other side of the desk, fighting the urge to lift Emma up, pushing her against the wall and proving which brother she needs to desire. Professional, you’re in the office, keep it professional.

Emma takes a sip of her drink as she tries to process everything, ultimately deciding to change the subject, “So why weren’t you set up?” Robin was both thrilled that they were done talking about the golden boy but irk by the turn of events. He was used to people querying about his life, but he could always shake them off with a bullshit answer. Not Em. She had a way of tearing down his wall, making him an open book for her prying eyes. Hesitantly, Robin confesses that love was just not meant for him. He was a good lay and a fun time but not worth the effort for the long shot. Waiting for the last shoe to fall because the past continuously proves him so, and it would hurt ten folds as the previews time.

“Just because you haven't found your person..” She pauses as she reaches across the desk, interwinding her fingers to Robins before continuing, “I'm sorry if someone made you think it's hard to love you, but that ‘can’t eat, can’t sleep’ kind of love is out there”. She gives him a sad understanding smile, squishing his hand before leaning back, taking the warmth of her touch with her. Robin didn’t like the absence of her, but he hated that wistful look in her face more.

“Did I ever tell you about the time Sofia tried to order pizza through the phone? It was hilarious she asked if the caterers had been to le cordon bleu or if it was just the chef….. You know, the caterers as in the delivery guy.” She threw her head back and laughed at that, loud and rich, her black hair spilling from her shoulder to her back. Robin couldn't help but to join her, her laughter contagious, he could definitely listen to it forever. Emma continued to giggle softly, accidentally spilling the whiskey on her top.

“Crap!” She starts frantically apologizing, rumbling on about how the Balvenie cost more than her degree and she just wasted it on her shirt. Robin shakes his head as he springs up and grabs a handful of napkins, she’s too cute.

Robin was about to help dab the stain away when he stepped back, realizing that would require him to touch Emma’s chest. “ I know how this sounds but the stain is less likely to set if you take off the top” Girls wear undershirts, right? This was safer than being close proximity to her bosom.

Gazing up through her eyelashes, Emma gives him a devilish smile, “Great idea.” That’s all the warning Robin got. She reaches for the hems of her top, curls cascading down as she pulls it over her head. He stared at her in awe. “Fuck” he gasps as he drops his head to her breast. Never a fan of blue, but staring back at him was a beautiful turquoise lace bra offering him a front row seat of the gorgeous view Em was.

“Focus please, I’m going to be pissed if I got half naked in the office for nothing.” Got naked for nothing. Wait, she wanted him to make a move? Was that an indirect permission to ravish her mouth with his tongue? Did she crave being bent over his desk as much as he wanted her? Robin swallowed roughly. He never had trouble reading hints before so why couldn't his brain and body correlate.

And of course his brother would choose this exact moment to interrupt them.

“Sam have you ever heard of knocking!” A pissed off Emma quickly slipped her shirt back over her shoulder. Robin turns a bit, putting himself between her and Sam in an attempt to help cover her, making Sam huff in annoyance. Robin smirks letting his chest beam with pride, marveling at how opposite Em’s reaction was to be seen in her lingerie by both brothers, creating a sullen look to take over Sam’s.

His possessiveness and territorial demeanor made sense now. It was clear, how obviously into her Sam is. It didn’t seem to matter that he is an engaged man, Emma was the crack in Sam’s perfect golden boy persona. “I’ve left you alone with Robin enough for one day, ready to go home...” Sam’s eyes darken as they dart to Robin… “Unless you still have some unfinished business here.”

Cheerfully Emma chipped in that she had already accepted a ride from Robin, casting sourness to appear in Sam's face and a cockiness on Robin’s. Though it was a lie, he hadn’t offered Emma a ride, but it was a lie Robin was more than glad to comply with if it meant spending more time with her and antagonizing Sam.

*****************************************************************************************

“Em, have you ever ridden a motorcycle before?” Robin asked as she looked down at the bike skeptically. It wasn’t til they were in the Delton parking garage that he remembered he rode his bike to work this morning. Riding his motorcycle had been an exciting change of pace, now looking at Em’s terrified face, it just seemed dumb.

Emma started to walk backwards, stuttering, “Um sa..Sam’s probably still close, maybe he-“

“Just trust me, I won’t let you get hurt,” he said, tossing her the helmet. She sighed and pulled it over her head.

Robin stood in front of the bike with his hands on the handlebars and motioned for Em to come closer. “Besides, I know you’ve been dying for an excuse to get all over this”, lifting his arms, rubbing them seductively in circular motion, all over his broad chest while wiggling his eyebrows almost comically.

Shoulders visually relaxing, she makes her way to him, chuckling , “In your dreams lover boy”. “Honey, you do a lot more and wear a lot less in my dreams”, Robin corrects her.

A light pink shade appears in Emma’s checks, she returns his bright grin with a shy smile of her own. Coming to a stop right in front of him, she tries to tuck a lock of loose hair behind her ear but she’s met with hard metal. Snickering, Robin reaches out to close the shield. “You’re wearing my helmet, dummy”. Messing with Sam was fun, but making Em blush? Now that was his new favorite thing.

“Climb behind, and hold onto me”. Emma does as she’s told, only hesitating for a second before wrapping her arms around Robin’s torso. He turns on the ignition and sets the kill switch to “on” making the motorcycle roar to life. Emma tightens her grip, flushing her chest close as humanly possible against his back. Robin looks over his shoulder smiling, “Got her started and you’re still in one piece, so far so good”.

“Still? Are you planning on breaking me apart?” Emma said with a glint of smile. Turning back around Robin murmured, “You know what they say, if it isn’t rough..”

With a simple twist of his wrist, they're zooming off through the garage doors. The tension from work, he didn’t even realize he was carrying, evaporates as the fresh air hits. Robin skillfully leans into the swerves and corners of the road. His attention totally focus on what he is doing when the smell of vanilla and lavender fill his senses. Emma. Comforting. That's interesting. Having her press up against him was exhilarating but oddly comforting. Like she was much part of the adrenaline and freedom as the demon rumbling between his legs, and miles speeding away beneath its balck wheels.

What would have been a forty-five minute ride in the subway or even a car, took only fifteen on the bike. Emma instantaneously jumped off the motorcycle as soon as he parks. Remembering her scared reaction,Robin winced, maybe he shouldn't had accelerated right off the bat, “Look Em-”

“That was unbelievably incredible! You were all rrrrrrrrRRRRR!!! And the bike just vvvrrrrrrrrrrAAAAAAHHHHHH” she clapped her hands together making a loud clack, “And I was just in the back like WAAAAAAAAA but the BIKE was like pa pa pa” She was shocked, “ YOU! You were so calm and collected!” Robin almost fell throwing his head back laughing as Emma tried to mimic riding the motorcycle with her hand motions. There was a jolt of satisfaction across his heart, “Alright settle down, greyhound”. Emma placed her hands across her chest in fake shock.

Robin swings his leg over after killing the engine, steping in front of her with a soft smile on his lips. Placing a hand in each side of her head, he delicately lifts up the helmet,rosy cheeks coming into view, “Yikes, maybe you should keep it to help hide that” he points at her face as he crunches up his face.

“You’re an ass!”, Emma halfheartedly punches his chest. He reaches for her wrist and holds her against his chest, close enough that they’re breathing the same air. She inhales, her plump lips parting slightly. They weren’t in the office anymore. Could easily close the gap if he just leaned- “Ah-HUM” Still embracing her, he turns towards the unwelcoming interruption. Of course, of course, it was Sam.

“Appreciated it, if you didn’t include what’s MY -“ Sam clears his throat as he catches Emma narrowing her eyes at him, “the kids nanny into your flavor of the week.” Still holding on to her hand, Robin steps back to have a full view of Emma again, “look at her, one day wouldn’t be enough!” “You couldn’t handle a woman like me”, Emma teased. “Is that a challenge?” Robin questioned back.

A pinched expression crosses Sam, his hands forming into fist, “We should head inside, Emma”. She purred, noticeably poring her eyes over Robin's body, “Goodnight, cutie.” Clenching and unclenching his jaw multiple times, Sam gave Robin one last stormy look before striding to the door.

This was a first for Robin: seeing his brother so worked up for his flirting. A weakness Robin was willing to use for his own amusement.

#robin flores #robin x mc #choices #sam dalton #tna #the nanny affair but make it Robin centric #fiction

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solocyclepolyamory · 3 years

Text

Andromeda

How does one maintain solo intentions while navigating . . . Here I want to say NRE, but the use of the word ‘relationship’ in this acronym seems to contradict the question, while also precisely reflecting the question itself. A paradox.

I have done years of work and gone through many heartbreaks to get to where I am today. I have dissected my upbringing: the ways society portrays and dictates how I should look and how I should act, and the assumptions I had that I would grow up, get married, have kids, and die happy (and old) in my bed beside my long-term monogamous partner. I have scaled that rocky tundra and fallen down many times doing it. I have the scars to prove it.

I have taken a few workshops in the last couple years and they have been life changing (stay tuned for links to my favorite facilitator at the end of this post). I have learned about loving partners through trauma response, triangulation, and how to step out of victimizing myself. I have also calculated my “north star” which has always read something like, “because this is better than the alternative.” Reading it now, I can see how dismal that sounds.

I was married monogamously for 4 years and when that relationship ended I promised myself I would not allow that to happen again. When my spouse left I was an empty shell. I felt so far from myself I forgot I was in here somewhere. I met someone soon after and could feel myself coming back to life. It felt like I had been asleep and didn’t know, and this new person was waking me up. I fell in love very quickly and was determined that this time I was going to do it right. This new person and I slowly and intentionally built ourselves a primary partnership structured around transparency and trust, but we were so caught up in falling in love that we were not actively seeking other connections. It’s all well and good to intend to be poly, but all the talking in the world cannot provide the same experience as actively practicing. After eighteen months of talking about it I began to feel empty again. I could feel myself pulling away from my partner’s loving physical touch and was falling into a prolonged state of frustration. I am thankful we were scheduling regular check-ins as it gave me the dedicated space to work to the bottom of my behavior in real time. As we worked together to unpack my resistance, I realized monogamy was the culprit. Although we were not labelling ourselves that way, the situation so closely mimicked those patterns that I had fallen into a near comatose state; resentment was building and the robot was driving the vessel.

This would have been an excellent time to access a counsellor.

I have heard many people say recently that polyamory is becoming more common these days, and I would be inclined to agree. Poly is quickly becoming the chicken dinner option at the steak house, but I can’t help wondering if hierarchies have become the new monogamy for me. I know that I have done well in challenging the monogamous messaging we are all steeped in, but what about hierarchies? There really is no ‘how to’ on allowing love to grow in intimate and authentic ways without falling into prioritization of those connections. How does one solo and fall in love?

Last night I had a check-in with a person I have been growing along side of, during which I shared my excitement around two new connections I have made. He asked me if the new feelings I was exploring left room for me to truly stand alone and operate as a solo individual. I had a hell of a time answering that question. Conceptually, this way of existing and relating makes sense to me, but as soon as I look directly at it I lose it, and begin to feel uncertain.

Solo poly is like seeing the andromeda galaxy in your peripheral vision. The way the rods and cones are arranged at the back of your eye make it physically impossible to view this wonder of the universe while looking directly at it, so you must look directly ahead and use your peripheral awareness to see its splendor. I feel this is an excellent way to approach viewing solo poly and the connections we explore through this framework. Take your hands up in front of your face and turn your palms toward one another. Interlace your fingers. This is what hierarchy looks like to me. Our lives are entangled, enmeshed, have become one. Now unlace your fingers. Flatten your palms, and turn them towards one another, but do not allow them to touch. This is what solo poly looks like to me. There is freedom for both hands to wave at one another individually, in opposite time, or in sync. There is also allowance for more or less space between them without the need to disassemble. Now, come back to andromeda with me. Let’s say my left hand is me, and the right hand is a romantic connection. In order to truly understand how solo poly works we apply the andromeda principle to the right hand. My left hand is my life. My child, my pets, my career. My self-love, my self-compassion, my healing. When I look at my life directly and place my attention there, I can see the love that surrounds me in my peripheral vision. I focus on my left hand because if I look directly at the right hand instead, the connection to that person disappears. In fact, when I focus solely on other people my connection to myself disappears as well. It is only when I focus on my left hand that I can actually see how I want my life to look. By focusing on myself I am creating space for those I love to show up authentically in whatever way they have the capacity to. My connections remain in my peripheral awareness and have the freedom to dance and play, while my life remains intact. This. Is how I solo poly.

I know that as I allow love to grow I will come across new challenges that will blow my mind wide open. I look forward to seeing where my life takes me in the coming years, and welcome the opportunity to allow loving connections to run along beside me until they find curiosity pulling them in another direction. I am already thankful for these people, some of whom I do not yet know.

I think it is time for a new north star. If I recalculate my trajectory, and ask myself, “why am I practicing solo poly?” the answer reads something like this:

“By prioritizing myself, I am loving myself, and when I allow loving connections to grow in this way I am enriching my life without sacrifice.”

By allowing romantic relating to remain in the periphery, I am gaining a new understanding of how to love authentically while learning to confidently stand on my own.

For now, I want to say thank you to the people I love. To every single person who’s life is happening next to mine, in whatever way we are relating.

Thank you for loving me back.

Resources:

I cannot say enough about Radical Relating. Mel Mariposa’s workshops provide gentle guidance and education around compassionate, fearless relating, and I would not have gotten to where I am with out them. They offer many services, including relationship coaching that comes from a combination of professional training and real life poly experience. They are gender and trauma informed, and this comes through in the safer spaces they create for people to learn and grow.

To access some of my favorite workshops, visit:

http://radicalrelationshipcoaching.ca/

And, as always, I would like to direct link you to the Multiamory website for access to hundreds of podcasts on polyamory and ethical non-monogamy. This podcast has always been there for me while I have been struggling. They have also taken the time to transcribe their podcasts. They have included a search tool so that you can type in key words and any podcast they have done that mentions that word will come up in the search results. Check them out here:

https://www.multiamory.com/podcast

#polyamory #ethical non monogamy #ethicalrelating #enm #solo poly #solocycle polyamory #solopolyamory #solorelating #new relationship #NRE #navigatingpoly #multiamorypodcast #radicalrelationshipcoarching.ca #polyresources

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script-a-world · 4 years

Note

Clearly there are some settings which make no sense scientifically. But how do I decide when to intentionally ignore reality, can't bother to do research, don't understand research, and thus create scientifically impossible places? When are such things considered be offensive or overused cliche or have a reader point out the impossibility and can't get into the story? I'm guessing some of this might be structural issues instead of world building?

Tex: One of the perils of attempting to write about highly technical subjects is that you run into the issue of not understanding your writing. I do raise a nominal objection as your first sentence, because sensibility is a sliding scale based on one’s familiarity with a given subject. I don’t know crap about, say, textile art (however much I might have bluffed readers in the past - no, no, this is just good googling skills on my end), but that doesn’t mean the textile arts are an inherently incomprehensible subject.

Scientifically, automobiles were once thought to be insensible. Scientifically, phones were thought to be a flight of fancy. Scientifically, 3D printing was improbable. Scientifically, quantum computing was the stuff of sci-fi nerds who just wanted to slap the “quantum” label on everything.

And yet we are now on the verge of robotic vehicles, mostly functional smartwatches, laser printing cells (PDF), and quantum computers (VentureBeat, IBM).

So I would argue that the insensibility of a setting would be due mostly to, yes, a structural issue - on the part of the author. No matter what you put into your world, internal consistency is key; nothing, no matter how ostensibly outlandish, will make sense if you contradict yourself.

I’ll volley a few questions back to you:

“[...] when to intentionally ignore reality” - Are you ignoring reality entirely, or just parts of it? Why? How does that decision benefit your world? How does it detract from your world?

“Can’t bother to do research” - Is it because you are discouraged by the breadth of your comprehension of a subject, compared to the subject’s depth? Or is it because of something else?

“Don’t understand research” - Is this because you don’t understand the academic papers that turn up in your search results, or because you have a fundamental lack of or misunderstanding of the given subject? Or is it because of something else?

“When are such things considered to be offensive or overused cliche” - As someone who intentionally arranges their studying around the plausibilities of the future, I would quite frankly be delighted to see more conceptual stretches of the imagination in this regard, as do many others on this blog, and beyond it. Why have you already passed judgement on the offensiveness or clichéd-ness of incorporating scientific things? Is this related to your other comments?

“[...] or have a reader point out the impossibility and can’t get into the story?” - If you are writing to please a specific individual or demographic, you are inevitably always going to fall short, because it’s genuinely impossible to meet every single item on a group’s wishlist without devoting your life to it (not an entirely worthy pursuit, in my opinion, but alas). What made you decide to be so concerned over the potential reaction to your stories that you worry about it before the story is even written?

I think I will put the majority of my curiosity’s weight on the last bullet point, as I’m seeing similar themes with the other portions of your question. It’s a fruitless endeavour to tie yourself into knots over a possible (not necessarily probable!) reaction - and quite likely from a stranger, to boot. Education is a relatively easy situation to fix, so long as you’re patient with yourself; dealing with anxieties over readers is… not so easy.

I can really only recommend that you take a close look at the goals of your worldbuilding, and see where you contradict yourself - once you have that in hand, it’s a relatively simple yes/no process of what concepts you want to keep. If the issue of decision comes from a lack of understanding, then make a note to yourself to seek out either the million wikis we Pylons utilize ourselves like any other worldbuilder, or to chalk it up as a genuine lack of context.

Please understand that even someone who’s dedicated their life to a certain aspect of science won’t know everything about it - that’s the point of research! We’re constantly asking ourselves questions, and pushing the envelope of known boundaries. Star Wars has lightsabers, but we don’t need to know how they work; likewise with holodecks in Star Trek. So long as an audience is reasonably entertained with the least amount of head-scratching, you can get away with handwaving quite a lot.

Lockea: On a scale between Star Trek and Star Wars, how “hard” is your science fiction?

I mention that mostly to illustrate that science fiction exists on a continuum, wherein science fiction with more “science” than “fiction” drives a story towards the harder end rather than the softer end. Also, a story’s place on the continuum will change based on what we know and understand about science.

I feel like everyone always beats me to saying all the important stuff about questions, so I’ll just give a few thoughts from my personal experience as a science fiction fan with two engineering degrees and a thesis about robots on the moon (yes really, I wrote my thesis on AI for moon robots). I really, really, love the creativity of science fiction writers. I think so often in defending the genre, we can get caught up in saying things like “science fiction predicted XYZ!” Well, sure, I may have studied Isaac Asimov’s three laws of robotics in my introduction to engineering ethics course, but I was also greedily reading my way through “The Hunger Games” by Suzanne Collins at the same time. The fact that I sincerely doubt Panem will ever happen didn’t dampen my enjoyment of Katniss’s story. It was a fun read and it gave my friends and I something to talk about that wasn’t “feasibility of Battlestar Galactica” during our daily lunches.

The thing about writing science fiction is that, without a doubt, there will be someone who knows more than you about a topic who reads your story. Most of the time, I end up being that someone since everyone likes to talk about Skynet and robots taking over the world to a roboticist who sincerely refers to artificial intelligence as artificial stupidity. Y'all are seriously overestimating the field, my friends. Nonetheless, I still enjoyed “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” even as I thought how impossible Project Insight would be. Honestly, something every READER of science fiction needs to make peace with is the fact that writers will get something wrong. Writers, despite their best efforts, are not always going to understand that a facial recognition algorithm will fail if you introduce tiny amounts of random noise and are thus going to treat The Algorithm™ as infallible in your crime drama novel.

It’s not the writer’s fault, though.

That deserves to be on its own line. It is not YOUR fault if you get something wrong. Would it be nice if science literacy was just better all around? Of course! But it’s not your fault if your science literacy isn’t up to snuff enough to parse the article I cited above. It’s also not your job. Your job as the writer is to tell the most interesting story you can and to maintain your own internal rules and logic such that the reader never breaks the willing suspension of disbelief.

I watch Star Wars and get really into the light saber fight scenes and forget that light sabers are basically impossible to make. Star Wars has the Force, which is basically magic, and that’s okay. Really. I KNOW it’s not possible, but I still have a lot of fun watching it!

So yeah, write that story about how the robots are going to take over the world. I’ll probably enjoy reading it even as I laugh off my friends telling me that I will be the first to die in the robot apocalypse (of course I will -- I have five robots in my living room alone).

Constablewrites: Tone and consistency are the biggest pieces of this for me. If it’s the kind of story where the answer to “How does this work?” is usually a detailed and plausible explanation, then getting an answer later that is implausible or slapdash will stand out more. But if it’s the kind of story where the answer to “How does this work?” is “You push that button and it goes whoosh” from the start, my expectations adjust accordingly. (It’s possible to have the latter version in a story that is mostly the former, frequently when it’s played for last. Again, tone is key.)

So yeah, a lot of this is execution and the way the story sticks to the rules it sets for itself, and also how central the implausibility is to the story. A realistic thriller that relies on cartoon logic for a background bit might be a little jarring, but not nearly as much as a realistic thriller that relies on cartoon logic to set up its main showdown. The more central it is to the story, the more consistency and accuracy matters. Learning how to balance this can take some practice and some insight from beta readers.

#pylons #research #believability #worldbuilding #Anonymous

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luckcycler · 5 years

Note

hi! i know you have a info page (or whatever it's called) for your characters butt doesnt work on mobile? anyways i wanted ask if you could tell me what ultimate talents they have?

Huh…

Not sure how invested you are with how you phrased your question but I just copy-pasted all the info on this ask.

I’ll put it under read more because otherwise, it will be super long

Basic info:

Heartbreak is a story of 16 former students of Hope’s Peak Academy who have found themselves locked in the bizarre setting of a love hotel. And thus, a new exciting killing game takes place once again!

As the concepts of guilt and justification clash together inside the sickeningly pink walls of the hotel, one starts to wonder who exactly is the morally righteous one?

And to shake things up… a new rule has been added to the monopad.

The cast:

Aino Inoue

Former Ultimate Mermaid

Age: 20

Class:75-B

Blood type: O

Likes: Long Walks on the Beach, Astrology

Dislikes: Sand

It’s time for opinions! Meaning opinions from this woman! This is Aino Inoue, the ultimate mermaid! Or more precisely a professional underwater mermaid actress. It appears childhood career dreams do come true! She became a very known underwater actress for her infectious charm and her ability to stay underwater for 9 minutes without breathing.

Her attitude towards others is very straightforward but that doesn’t mean she is unfriendly, actually quite the opposite and especially if she is under the liquid courage. What’s personal space? She certainly doesn’t know.

Aino is a very nosy person and loves to give relationship advice to other people, even when these other people really don’t want it. It doesn’t help that quite a lot of these advices come from her obsession with astrology and blood type personality theory.

She can also be seen more often than not with a cocktail in hand to a point her constant state of tipsiness worries some of the others. In Aino’s opinion, it just makes her twice as fun!

Daisuke Okamoto

Former Ultimate Robot Combat Champion

Birthday: May 25th

Age: 19

Class: 76-B

Blood type: B

Likes: Logic Puzzles, Memes

Dislikes: Raisins in Bread, Academic writing

Here comes the local memester! Daisuke Okamoto is the current robot combat champion. But despite his promising career path in the art of mauling battle robots and much to everyone’s bafflement. After his time in Hope’s Peak, he went to study engineering at his local university. He refuses to tell why he had such a change of heart even when he still regularly competes.

Daisuke is a second-generation immigrant with his mother being American and father being Japanese. Because of this, his sense of humor is influenced a lot by western internet culture. He tends to joke around a lot giving him a carefree attitude. He loves to entertain, although in serious situations his joking nature can come off as insensitive.

But under all the jokes and terribly outdated meme’s, he is very intelligent and a hard realist who wants to know every detail of the rules and isn’t afraid to ask them from Monokuma.

Gina Higanbana

Former Ultimate Biochemist

Birthday: October 31st

Age: 23

Class: 72-A

Blood type: B

Likes: Poetry, Family

Dislikes: Frankenstein (Story), Sour Plums

Speaking of eccentric mad scientists! Gina Higanbana, the ultimate biochemist is the sort of person who definitely befriended every monster under her bed when she was young. Gina is a boisterous workaholic which has paid off since she is known most for her study of parabiosis. Unfortunately, not all of her fame is from positive feedback, as some of her testing methods have been found very unorthodox…

Gina presents herself as larger than life, after all, she is a woman of science! Though she delves with modern problems, her way of talking is very old fashioned, and even poetic, making her sound like she would fit right into a 19th-century romance novel.

While being a semi loud presence to the group, Gina tends to withdraw to her own space and has trouble talking about subjects outside of her interests. But when it comes to teaching neighbor kids how to turn a volcano eruption experiment into a baking soda canon, she is the right person to tag along.

Hotaka Muramaru

Former Ultimate Florist

Birthday: January 27th

Age: 22

Class: 73-B

Blood type: A

Likes: Frogs, Bellflowers

Dislikes: Kiwa Fukuda

Hotaka Muramaru, the former ultimate florist… Well, a former florist, really. He isn’t doing too hot in his life at this moment. These days he mainly does gardening work around his area. It is unfortunate as he was known for his striking floral arrangements and attention to small details before his family’s flower shop business went down.

Hotaka as a person is very forgiving by nature. He doesn’t like causing conflicts and it is very hard to get him angry. Despite these positive traits, he seems to be nice for the sake of being nice which makes it hard to get close to him in a way that matters outside of everyday small talk. It seems preserving what little image he has left is more important to him. This has also made him quite the perfectionist.

Kana Nakano

Former Ultimate Lifeguard

Birthday: May 2nd

Age: 25

Class: 70-A

Blood type: O

Likes: Children, Geocaching

Dislikes: Spontaneous Plans

Kana Nakano, the ultimate lifeguard is very passionate about her job. She is the mom friend of the group you know you can always rely on in any hardships, niche killing games included. She has become a very popular lifeguard at her local kids’ poolside as she has a knack for talking to children. Though because of this her way of talking can sound very condescending when speaking to other adults. She tends to simplify her words and soften the meaning much to some of the group’s irritation.

As a person, she can also be very stubborn until she meets her goal. If nothing else, she makes a great leader figure with a lot of survival abilities and experience in tough situations.

Katsurou Furusawa

Former Ultimate Hunter

Birthday: September 5th

Age: 23

Class: 72-A

Blood type: A

Likes: Sewing, Peace and Quiet

Dislikes: Wet Socks, Attention

This timid yet patient boy who looks like he just crawled out of a swamp is Katsurou Furusawa. Though he doesn’t like talking about his talent that much, he is known as the ultimate hunter. He got his title for his exceptional trap making skills and the ability to stay unmoving for hours to no end, blending to his environments seamlessly, and waiting for a pray to trigger his traps.

Personality-wise, Katsurou is bashful and likes to talk to himself rather than others. He has a tendency to be a people pleaser, disregarding his own beliefs and feelings on topics just to appease both sides of the argument. He was never a problem child, as he has always done what his parents told him to. Even accepting the invitation to Hope’s Peak was not his idea.

Katsurou is also a huge daydreamer. He seems to be more comfortable with the world inside his head than the real world, and it shows.

Kiwa Fukuda

Former Ultimate Scapegoat

Birthday: December 31st

Age: 23

Class: 72-B

Blood type: AB

Likes: Citrus Fruits, Tacky Decorations

Dislikes: Paper Cuts

Though she looks quite sporty, her talent is far from a healthy career. This awkward and accident-prone woman is Kiwa Fukuda, our protagonist. Unfortunately to some, she is known as the ultimate scapegoat, though this information is confidential especially in court. Her line of work is basically taking the fall for a singular person’s or even a whole company’s mistakes. If that’s not deemed realistic, she will direct the fault towards a more suitable candidate. The amount of guilt Kiwa’s work as a scapegoat leaves her with has made her desensitized and apathetic towards others.

Personality-wise, Kiwa is laidback and can come off as an airhead thanks to her apathetic demeanor towards their current situation. She tends to joke about terrible subjects that make people around her a bit uncomfortable to say the least.

Kiwa is also clumsy and tends to get involved in accidents without trying to. Be it an injury, a misunderstanding or a terrible accident, it’s easy to assume she always has something to do with it whether it was her fault or not. Kiwa now wears a bicycle helmet all the time to make sure she won’t get a third fracture on her skull.

Kohaku Iwatomi

Former Ultimate Gemologist

Birthday: June 4th

Age: 19

Class: 76-B

Blood type: O

Likes: Shiny Things, DIY

Dislikes: Loneliness

This is Kohaku Iwatomi and he is happily ready to talk your ears off! Kohaku is known as the ultimate gemologist, mainly because he changes his specialty in gemology quite often, always wanting to try out something new. He seems to excel in all the areas he has tried out so far through pure dedication and excitement towards his profession. Though, for some reason, he has been working as a gem appraiser in his local pawnshop for longer than his peers thought he would withstand to.

Kohaku is a very cheery young man who loves to mingle no matter the topic. If you know him, you probably know his whole life story. He doesn’t like silence, nor does he bode well if left alone for too long. He isn’t narcissistic though as he is very empathetic and wears his emotions on his sleeve, he just really likes company and he has so much information to share with everyone!

Kohaku also has a liking towards thrift shop clothes and DIY projects hence his striking and pretty mismatched appearance.

Masami Kiyokane

Former Ultimate Croupier

Birthday: July 17th

Age: 22

Class: 73-A

Blood type: O

Likes: Board Games, Philosophy of Ethics

Dislikes: Alcohol

As if there were not enough party poopers in this group… This is Masami Kiyokane and he is known as the ultimate croupier. He got his title through diligent croupier work at organized events and after coming of age, at established casinos. Masami also has gotten quite good at seeing who is cheating and he knows most card games by heart. He seems fascinated by game rules in general.

Masami’s personality is pretty uptight and passive-aggressive. His way of talking tends to be a colorful use of personification, especially when he is going on a tangent and complaining about something. Though he talks big, very rarely is his bite worse than his bark as he mutters under his breath before admitting he is in the wrong.

Masami has a very strong moral system he believes in. His rather judgmental attitude is unusual for someone who has a hobby of learning about ethical philosophy though and often he gets called a hypocrite for playing favorites. He is not very happy about that.

Mei Kaneko

Ultimate Phonologist

Birthday: March 21st

Age: 18

Class: 77-A

Blood type: B

Likes: Corvidae, Accents

Dislikes: Wasting Time

This young girl is Mei Kaneko. She is the youngest of the group as she is the only one still studying in Hope’s Peak. She should be set to graduate soon and she is more than excited to continue with her dreams towards a real working life as the ultimate Phonologist!

Personality-wise, Mei is very energetic and will give her all to any task at hand. She is also very loud and a bit of a daredevil. If you tell her to not push the red button, she will definitely push the red button.

Growing up, Mei’s neighborhood had always been surrounded by corvids. As she slowly got more familiar with them, she developed a fascination towards the crows that kept playing in her backyard. Mei had been studying dialects and languages since she was little thanks to her bilingual home and decided, quite abruptly, that her life work from then on would have to deal with establishing communication with corvids.

Nori Ikari

Former Ultimate Sailor

Birthday: December 8th

Age: 20 (?)

Class: 75-A

Blood type: AB

Likes: Folk Tales, Making Rope Knots

Dislikes: His Knee Brace

This theatrically boisterous man is Nori Ikari, the ultimate sailor. Believe it or not, he is as young as 20 years old, which has led some of the group to believe he is a vampire in disguise. Nori comes from a vast lineage of sailors of different ranks but all just as proud seafarers! Nori got his title as the ultimate sailor after recklessly making a week-long fishing trip alone in a trawler boat made for a crew of 10.

Nori tends to tell long tales of his ancestors which sound just bizarre enough that no one is quite sure if Nori is speaking the truth or not. To be honest, everything he says just sounds downright like a big fish story all the way down to his accent. Is this man real? No one has a good answer to that.

Personality-wise Nori can be pretty intense. He has a habit of making a bigger deal out of very normal things. Nori values honor and traditions and tends to get quite defensive if his integrity is challenged. And if needed, he might challenge you to a sword fight at a parking lot if he deems you need a fair ass kicking.

Okemia Momose

Former Ultimate Opera Singer

Birthday: March 10th

Age: 24

Class: 71-B

Blood type: A

Likes: Vintage Aesthetic, Home

Dislikes: Hope’s Peak, Luck

This nervous woman is Okemia Momose. It’s been a while since people have heard her sing, but she is still regarded as the ultimate opera singer. She got her title for her incredible range and her ability to hold a note for almost half a minute.

Nowadays though, her fame is shadowed by a traumatic event she went through in one of her performances. She was one of the performers at her local opera house which was run by a Yakuza family. However, there was a very strained turf war going on around the area that one day resulted in a shoot out at the opera house. Unfortunately to Okemia, she got caught in the crossfire and a bullet hit her temple. Though she survived, she got inflicted irredeemable damage to her brain which developed into a stutter.

Despite her towering over everyone with her height of a 6’5 feet, she is not very confident in herself. Okemia is a very high-strung person who tends to think the worst possible thing will definitely happen to her. Though she is nervous she has a lot of resentful opinions that are made from wise words

Shion Arai

Former Ultimate Figure Skater

Birthday: July 23rd

Age: 21

Class: 74-B

Blood type: B

Likes: Rhinestones, Straightforwardness

Dislikes: Cleaning, Bootlickers, Mornings

This person here is Shion Arai the ultimate figure skater! Under all the glitter, rhinestones, and an eccentric personality lies a somewhat kind-hearted individual who is willing to cooperate… as long as it doesn’t inconvenience them.

Shion got their title thanks to their impeccable ability to adapt and improve fast. They have won multiple competitions in their teen years despite starting the sport at age 12, which is considered quite late. After graduating Hope’s peak, Shion’s placement in the podiums has started to steadily drop. If asked about the slow decline of their career, Shion just shrugs nonchalantly, leaving it at that.

Shion identifies as nonbinary and they are very prideful towards their identity and their achievements. Despite this, they are also incredibly lazy and rarely bothers to do something they don’t want to. Their goal is to go where the bar is the lowest and if that’s not possible, they WILL complain.

Suzu Nagahashi

Former Ultimate Ballerina

Birthday: November 1st

Age: 21

Class: 74-A

Blood type: A

Likes: Rainy Days, Leather Jackets

Dislikes: Dancing

This cold and assertive young lady is Suzu Nagahashi, the ultimate ballerina and she is not here to get herself killed over some dumb motive. Suzu has been known for her skills all her life. Rumor has it her mother, a former ballerina, started teaching Suzu how to dance the moment she was able to take her first step. Absolutely no one was surprised when she got her invitation to Hope’s Peak, though she rarely showed up to school thanks to her harsh performance schedule.

Suzu is very stoic and she picks her words carefully. Though her tone of voice is very serious, her pink frilly dress makes her attempts to be taken seriously harder for her. Luckily Suzu is stubborn and will try her utmost best to keep the situation she has been thrown in solely under her control.

Tetsu Asukaze

Honorary Ultimate Taxi Driver

Birthday: October 1st

Age: 26

Class: N/A

Blood type: AB

Likes: Radio, Coffee, Extraterrestrials

Dislikes: N/A

This funky young man is Tetsu Asukaze and he is known as the ultimate taxi driver. Who would’ve thought that was a talent, huh? Tetsu’s situation as an ultimate is a bit different from others because he only discovered his talent after getting old enough to drive which meant his high school days were already over. Despite this, Hope’s Peak decided to give him an honorary title of an ultimate taxi driver. Whatever that means…

Even though Hope’s Peak had given a public acknowledgment of Tetsu’s talent, he doesn’t think much of it nor does he feel he really belongs with the other ultimates.

Personality-wise, Tetsu is your serene local cryptid whose life has no order and looking at his sleeping schedule it’ll stay like that. Despite his harmless chaos, he is a very sweet lad with a passion for the unknown and obscure theories.

Tsubaki Ito

Former Ultimate Mortician

Birthday: May 8th

Age: 24

Class: 71-A

Blood type: O

Likes: Medical History, Bad and Gory Horror Movies

Dislikes: Spirals

This unnerving and small woman is Tsubaki Ito, the ultimate mortician. She was born as a miracle child to an old couple that ran a mortician family business. In fact, everyone in her extended family is at least a generation older than her. As the years went by, her family slowly passing away from natural causes had become a regular occurrence.

Tsubaki is specialized in body restoration and desairology, as she tends to work with victims of causalities. She got her title by her ability to make even the worst of murder victims to look like they are merely sleeping in their caskets.

As the concept of death is an old friend in her family, Tsubaki has become desensitized towards the subject and can come off as insensitive towards the killing game. But what can you do when your daily routine occasionally includes pulling out a chainsaw from someone’s chest cavity due to a gruesome accident? Despite this, Tsubaki is very sweet and will address everyone with an endearing tone.

#Anonymous #drs heartbreak #fanganronpa

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shebeafancyflapjack · 4 years

Text

Deal

My brain was buzzing with too much angst that I couldn’t sleep so I had to write this out quick. It’s the equivalent of me screaming into a pillow except the pillow is my ship.

Yes, I stole the whole ‘bring them back via time travel’ bit from Twelve x Clara.

TW: Angst, grief, major character ‘death’, Michael takes words way too literal, sad one-sided Hellstrop, cute but problematic Cheleanor.

"You sure you wanna do this?" Gen asks, very little reluctance in her tone, detached as she is from real emotions.

Even other immortals are specks of dust to her. Maybe having an impartial sociopath in charge of the Universe isn't the best idea. Oh well. It's the best they've got.

Michael nods, resolute; "I'm sure. Just...explain to me how it will work again."

It's been almost a month since she left her house. He just wants her to get some air.

"If I agree to go to lunch, will you find a way to bring him back?" Eleanor sniffs, wearing one of Chidi's shirts.

He sighs for the billionth time.

"You know I can't..." he tries to stroke her hair.

She slaps his hand away.

"Then what is the forking point of you?!"

"Eleanor-"

"Big Boss of Heaven and you can't bring back one person?! The one guy I need to be happy here?!"

He takes a step back. He knows she's just lashing out because she's in pain. He can't imagine the pain she's going through. He only suspects it will be what he'll endure when it's her time to walk through.

All he wants to do is help her until then. He wants to see her smile.

This was everything he feared would happen when Chidi left. He isn't enough.

"It's not a place, really. It's just time. Time with the ones you love." Eleanor wipes her nose on his sleeve; "So if the ones I love are gone then this isn't really the Good Place, is it? It's just...Place. Not even Bad or Medium, just...nothing."

It's getting harder to ignore how deep her words cut.

"Is there anything I can do?" He almost begs, voice barely above a whisper.

He would try to hug her again if he didn't expect another slap.

Eleanor turns back towards the sunset at her window.

"Aside from giving me my boyfriend back? Yeah..."

He waits, ready for whatever it is.

"You can leave me the fork alone."

Gen rolls her eyes at having to explain it again. She summons a virtual graph with a line to show him.

"I pluck Chidi out of a previous timeline before he had his 'feeling' and bring him here. He's still content to stay around, him and Blondie can get back to getting it on and I get some peace and quiet." She tells him, "But I can't say how long it will be till he has that feeling again. It might hit him the same amount of time or maybe years later."

Michael waves that detail off; "He'll see how much she needs him and he'll stay. He shouldn't have left in the first place. Fork, I regret inventing the damn thing. What matters is Eleanor is happy."

"Oh I ain't doing this for Blondie, I wouldn't do it for anyone but that sweet bootie she's with. The Universe shouldn’t be without him."

And because she owes Michael a favor for saving humanity. That's why she's breaking the rules.

And Michael is breaking a thousand ethical ones.

It's all worth it if it means she'll smile again.

She hasn't showered in a long time. She should probably get on that.

Michael will nag her about it the next time he barges in. Maybe she should consider getting a lock. Who does he think he is? She's totally handling this.

Handling losing the man who made her feel complete.

How else is she supposed to handle it other than staying on their balcony, in his shirt, stuffing her face with shrimp while clutching her copy of Scanlon's stupid book?

Maybe she'll go for a walk after her shower. Maybe she'll-

"Hey, babe. You okay?"

Fork. Oh, fork.

Now she's seeing things. Things such as her boyfriend exiting the shower, that buff chest of his on full display above his towel covered waist.

Eleanor freezes. This. This can't be...

"Babe? You're starting to freak me out..." Chidi frowns, looking down as her fingers gently prod his chest; "...You didn't suddenly go blind, right?"

Her eyes water as she feels up his skin, his neck, to touch his cheeks.

"You're here?! You're real?!"

"I...Is this an existential thing? Have you been reading Descartes because, trust me, that's not the best idea before bed-."

Eleanor pulls him in for the most desperate kiss of her life, savoring the taste of his mouth, the feel of his lips on hers, in case it's the last time. Again. Fork, it feels real.

She pulls back a little, looking deep into his eyes.

"Are you gonna leave me again?" She has to know before she lets herself fall too deep for this.

Chidi looks confused as There; "Of course not...I keep expecting you to be the first one ready to leave me. I love you, Eleanor, you know I wanna be with you for as long as we can."

That's all she needs to hear. She's not sure how but...the son of a bench did it. This is her Chidi. It's not a suit or a simulation. If it is then she's grief-stricken enough to fall for it.

Just a bit more time. That's all she wanted. She wraps her arms tight around his neck.

"I love you too, babe. I just had the most forked up dream."

That's all he needs to know. It may as well be that for all she cares.

"One last time. You're prepared to pay the price?"

Michael looks at the familiar pin in his palm.

Everything you've ever wanted.

"You need a great surge of energy in order to manipulate time streams in parallel dimensions." He repeats her earlier words; "What better use of fuel than a demon's essence?"

"You sure you wouldn't rather toss me one of your old enemies from the Bad Place?"

He shakes his head.

If they're going to do this...This completely unethical and unnatural scheme...It has to be him. Anything for her. She asked for two things he could do to make her happy. Now she gets both.

"I see now why you marbelised Janet." Gen remarks; "No way she'd have let you go through with it. It won't be as painful as retirement but...It's just as final, pal. So long as that past Chidi is here, I’ll need your goo to be simmering away in that vortex...even after he goes through the Door. Time isn’t to be messed with easy, even for me."

He knows. But if the alternative is Eleanor alone, depressed and hating him then what does he have to lose? The afterlife council is pointless now. Tahani and Vicky are doing more than he could attempt to contribute anymore. His friends are gone...or no longer need him...or want him.

This is the closest he will come to finding his Door.

"You'll restore Janet once it's done? And explain why I had to?"

Gen sighs; "She won't be happy about it. Usually I'd feel confident handling a Janet but...She's something else."

He gives a small, proud smile.

"Yeah. She is."

He looks at the pin again, focusing on what good this will bring back rather than the horrifying thought of what awaits him.

It's worth it for her. Always for her.

"I'm ready."

He wishes he got to see her smile one last time.

She's still kissing a damp and topless Chidi when there's a familiar bing sound.

"Janet! Hey." She beams, not as stunned or off put as her blushing soul mate.

"Y'know what, I'm gonna get dressed. So glad we allow our friends free access to our house."

Eleanor gives that ash a pat as he goes off. She turns to Janet, grinning from ear to ear.

"Can you believe it?! It's really him, isn't it?" Eleanor grabs her wrists, seeing Janet's face bowed; "Who knows what Michael did but I need to see him now! I’ve been pretty crabby to him lately, ‘cause it’s been so hard coping with all this, but he’s made it all right now."

Her not robot friend is silent.

Damn. The little voice is back in the corner of her mind. Hello, old frenemy.

"Okay, I know Chidi said he wanted to go and I agreed to let him go but neither of us knew it would hurt me so much. And this Chidi doesn't wanna go yet so it's all good, right? Whatever Michael did..."

She spots the tear run down Janet's cheek.

Eleanor's senses slowly make a comeback as the high of her wonderful shock evaporates, leaving her with realistic dread.

"...What did Michael do?"

Janet sighs, followed by the smallest sob. She presses something into Eleanor’s palm.

She feels the circular piece of metal. Her heart sinks before she even looks down at the engraved thumb pointing downward.

"He gave you everything you wanted..."

#hellstrop angst #tgp minific #rose's catharsis

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thehandsomeasshole · 4 years

Text

@starttheanarchy from X

She kept silent as he talked, rambling about some rather interesting work that was being handed to a CEO. Wouldn't that kind of issues fall into a mixture of legal and HR? Ah poor is the chain of command. Well Gaige held her tongue on those thoughts, leaving the man to his legal headaches. Though at the mention of a wife, her eyes cut to the sky, right to the giant H that loomed overhead no mater where she was. And she felt a small bit of pain for the older man, not having a chance to mourn or process. Just work as usual. And she could tell that this was something she at the very least wasn't suppose to know with how he cut himself off. A small light humm came from her throat, a form of acknowledgment that she was listening and that this was marked down in her memory.

The topic swap back into technology got her moving again, nearing the garage that Ellie owned. Said woman was in front of the compactor doing what she seemed to love best, and Gaige just sent her a wave before ducking into the building.

"Yes, but is it not a sign of good quality when even the parts of your work can be used beyond others?" Gaige was going to be nice this once and allow the conversation to flow away from his past. "No, I can say with absolute certainty I would never take any shortcuts with DT. Or own a company, why would I want to be a sell out like that?" And that is where the anarchist started to come out. Ah the amount of times in class she debated the ethics and morals of the different corporations of the universe.

"Well then it is poor design then to have all the sensors in one place, and you can't say that you don't with how fast they are rendered useless once shot in the blatantly obvious eye." Stairs were taken two at a time as she head over to the workbench beside the vending machines. "I could care less about the funky stuff, would probably be a downgrade more then anything else to my work of art.” The tool case dropped onto the workbench, and a loud snort at the agree to disagreement. Eyes roll at the claim of superiority.

Gaige stills at the mention of what happened at the science fair. Eyes narrow as she was trying to figure out if he was trying to insinuate if the accident was not actually one. Fingers grip the workbench, dents forming under her robotic ones. It had been a moment since she had even had a single thought of that day, one of her worst days even compared to what Pandora had thrown at her so far. And something to think about when there was far less on her plate, one more issues shelved for the eventual emotional and mental break down.

"Actually, DT is programed to react to hostility. Meaning they will only take action after aggression has happened. Reactive rather then active, always has been like that." Sure it was a stupid idea to keep one of her main ways of defending herself on a more passive setting, but Gaige refused to to cause harm first.

"Yes I will admit, there is a fair amount of blood on my hands. But when did I ever claim to be the good guy? You have always been the one to bring it up, usually to either defend your actions or yourself. Since when have heroes ever claimed to be one? When have they allowed cruelty into their actions? To break apart families?"

Jack leaned away from the echo, burying his face into his sweater sleeve and he groaned loudly.

Well, that was definitely going to come back and bite him in the ass.

"Uh… No." Jack raised his head and turned back towards the echo, "No, it is not. You see, I don't exactly design my bots to help you jerks. I design 'em for maximum efficiency in production and combat. Got that? Good."

"Ooh, ouch! Look at you go, insulting me left and right. Good for you." He snorted, shaking his head, "Listen, kid, you can shit on the corpos all you'd like–trust me, I did my fair share of it when I was younger–but it's not as bad as it looks from the outside. And, hey! At least we don't have slaves like- Oh, actually, I think that's confidential… But, my workers get honest pay for, mostly, honest work. If they don't work hard enough, then, yeah. They get the crap beaten outta them or, if they're real lucky, they get airlocked. Much quicker. And funnier, actually. Their little eyes popping out of their heads and they just burst."

For a moment, Jack considered disagreeing. Telling her that the sensors were all strategically placed for maximum energy efficiency. While it was partially true, it wasn't entirely for that reason.

"Nah, I know," Jack laughed slightly, "you're right. It's mostly for the aesthetic, everything just slots together so nicely that way. Looks all sleek and tidy, y'know? You know."

Jack had taken the silence as confirmation he'd made her uncomfortable, talking about her killing her classmate, though it hadn't felt as good as he'd hoped.

She's probably around Angel's age, you asshole, he thought to himself, even more displeased now he'd made himself uncomfortable, too.

"I did the same thing with the loaders. Can't have them mowing down all my workers, can I? No matter how funny it would be." Jack hummed slightly, picking his pen up off the desk and beginning to rapidly click it, "That did happen once, though. Rouge claptrap unit, got it's gross little hands onto an assault rifle after it found out it was gonna get shot down onto Pandora cause it was useless."

He shook his head, shuddering, "Something you'd never want to see, an ugly little trashcan of a robot coming at you sixty miles an hour and screaming 'you'll never take me alive!' at the top of it's voice module." A small laugh slipped past Jack's lips, "We didn't, the turrets finally kicked in and slaughtered the bastard."

"You're-..." Jack paused, the expression of frustration slowly melting off his face and he leaned back into his seat, "Actually kinda right. I always forget it's not you I hate. Well, I don't like you by any means but… Heh, guess I'm just amazed you'd work for the Crimson Raiders with their track record for screwing everyone over."

He shrugged, satisfied with planting the little seed of doubt in her mind, "I mean, whatever. No hair off my head if they try to kill you, right? Just less effort on my part."

"But, to answer your question…" he leaned forward again, letting out a quiet chuckle, "When they think it's the right thing to do. Y'know, human flaws and all that. The whole trolley problem thing or whatever. Would you rather kill one person you hold dear, or ten you don't? That kinda bullshit."

In all truth, he couldn't remember what they were talking about.

"Next time you wander into a bandit camp, stop and ask yourself: am I doing what I need to? Or am I just doing what I'm told? Always thought it was kinda funny how y'all just run around like headless chickens doing whatever your 'leaders' told you to, bet you don't even question it, do you? They say kill, and you just ask how much you're gonna get paid or if you'll get a shiny, new gun outta it."

"So, how am I doing so far? Pissing you off enough to keep you interested?"

#ahaha i think i just get excited to reply and it's just automatic #i look at the word count at the end and im just like huh #also hope this was okay!!#it could've been paradise // borderlands 2

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kisskissbanggang · 4 years

Note

I just woke up from a nap and let me say—political android Jaehyun is a crazy idea. In my dream he killed my coworkers in a planned destruction of scientific data, but got scared of himself and was hiding in my office so I went back 3 days later to go recover what I could and poor boy was scanning and reprinting all the data he destroyed because he felt bad so I brought him into my home and recovered the data with him and then his ai was great but I didn’t know that yet (part 1)

Move along, nothing to see here unless you want to see Lexi’s incredible nap-dream play out and then me screaming about it. 💕

I was just being me, nice to robots, but I started to do more research on the ai his model had, and had him destroy my search histories and found out that I could remove his “person chip” so he could go back to work and have most of his memories that were positive wiped so he was able to continue his government work while he was feeding me information, and the government found out I didn’t die so I lied and faked my support of their actions and they brought me into the ranks (part 2)

But he still preferred to come to my place most nights so I would replace his person chip when he came into my home and we became friends and he expressed that he always wanted to know about human feelings like having parents and pets and falling in love so one night I asked him if he wanted to lay in my bed with my cat since she’d gotten used to him being around and so he laid in my bed and was all stiff and didn’t know what to do because inexperienced robot (part 3)

And he asked what cuddling was like but he was all stiff so I resituated his body to be okay for cuddling and snuggled him and told him to research “body language” and 2 minutes later he moved himself again and wrapped his arms around me because he learned about body language and I kept telling him keywords to research about intimate human interaction and interacting with pets until I fell asleep in his arms and when I woke up (part 4)

He was in my kitchen with breakfast prepared waiting for me and sitting on my couch, petting my cat whom he befriended overnight 😂 and we watched the news about the government again and he said to me “you don’t really like it do you” and I was engulfed in my eggs and said “no I love what you cooked but fuck that guy” at [insert gov official here] and he said “how come you work for them now” and i said “I need a job because my other one was destroyed” and he got all glum looking (part 5)

And he said “I didn’t want to do it, but they decide my actions when I’m in uniform” and I said “I know I don’t blame you for what they make you do” and he said “How can I learn about them to decide if I like them or not?” And I gave him keywords about the government to research and he came back and said “oh those conspiracies are true I saw it with my own eyes” and I said “well shit then I hate them even more” and he asked about keywords to learn about morality (part 6)

And he ended up mentioning his creator and I remembered learning about how that guy was murdered by his creation (Jaehyun) because the government made him, but that that creator always created both the most powerful androids but also the most ethical and I asked him if it was true and he said it was true and that he regrets his actions everyday and that’s why he wouldn’t ever hurt me. He talked about how mean the gov was to him and how I was the only nice person he knew since his creator(part 7)

And it became this cute thing in the mornings, I’d take out his person chip while I adjusted his collar similar to a spouse putting on a tie and he’d go off to work before me and then I’d go off to work and get back before him so when he’d come home I’d loosen up his shirt and put his person chip back in and he’d turn back into a docile friend and one day we ended up “meeting” at work because I reached a higher rank and we had to pretend we didn’t know each other (part 8)

But as time went on the government was still shitty and made him do not great things and my job got slightly less ethical as days passed but I was getting paid a lot more and Jaehyun told me about the plans to destroy the low income neighborhood I lived in to remove those people from the planet and make everyone else there homeless so I took a personal leave from work to both move and also warn everyone there (20% of them outright believed me—they thought I was a crazed scientist) (part 9)

But I moved into a nicer area that wasn’t getting destroyed and that neighborhood was destroyed but only 5 people died, but that was because they thought they could take on the android, but also one elderly lady never made it out even though my neighbor promised to get her out so I was devastated about her loss, Jaehyun could tell something was off and did research on the event and learned about the old lady’s death (who he killed ofc) and felt sadness for the first time in his life (part 10)

Eventually I’m to the point at work where my creation is being tested so I’m told to move back home to be safe and they’d give me a retirement for my work (I guess I lived on the east coast) but couldn’t take a plane because of Jaehyun so we were road tripping all the way back to North Dakota which Jaehyun loved because he never had to pee and could use the AC adapter in my car to top off his charge. He was a great GPS though (part 20)

But because of the global warming and regulations you could only drive 250 miles a day so we had to stop a lot and ended up at a lot of motels so they wouldn’t ask questions about my other guest since he had minimal ID and was theoretically meant to stay on the east coast and never move. And we ended up at this janky place and it spooked me out so Jaehyun actually laid with me again that night instead of just sitting at the desk charging like he did at other places (part 21)

And my car had issues so we ended up having to stay at that place a couple of nights but it was still v scary for me. We ended up going to a saloon near the motel for me to get food, Jaehyun came with because spooked) and they were having a dance night and Jaehyun had never danced before so I decided to teach him and he was having a great time and suddenly a slow song came on and I was so focused on teaching him how to slow dance that I didn’t notice how he was looking at me (part 22)

And so I finally feel like he’s got the footwork down and the song is half done and I look up at him and he leans down to kiss me and his dumb android lips are too great and part of me is revolted because I’m kissing a robot but also part of me loves Jaehyun more than I could ever love anyone I’d ever met because of his innocence and good morals and when he pulls away he looks shocked and he said “I just wanted to copy the movies I didn’t know I could feel that” and I laughed at him (part 23)

And when we got back to the motel and I’d washed up he was like “Can we do that again?” And it was the dumbest most cute thing ever and I sat on the bed with him standing in front of me, way too eager hoping I’d say yes and I nodded and he did a little dance before leaning back down to kiss me again and he kept going and eventually had my back on the bed with him over me, holding me as close to himself as he could and then the moment was ruined bc there was some guy rattling room doors (part 24)

I got spooked and Jaehyun guarded me with his body and the guy kept going and management called the room to apologize for the drunk guy who forgot his room # and I ended up just going to sleep. The next day my car was fixed and we were back on the road. Jaehyun kept touching his lips and opening his mouth to say something, but instead of speaking, he’d blush, look away, and close his mouth. He’d do this ad nauseum until I asked what he was thinking (part 25)

And he just asked “How do I know what love is?” And I choked on air, not expecting that question and I tried my best to describe it and gave up and said “You just know. You’d be devastated without them in your life and you enjoy being with them and you love all of their flaws.” And he asked if I loved Gladys and I said “Of course, platonically” and he asked the difference between platonic and romantic love and he said “I loved Gladys platonically too” (part 26)

I ended up going north to Wisconsin for some reason (I think there was a safety issue?) so it took a while to get anywhere but the day after we talked about love Jaehyun looks at me and says, “What if I think I romantically loved you?” And I pulled over, absolutely shocked by my own internal instinct to say “I love you too” and he looked at my face and sheepishly asked “So is now a good time to kiss again?” And we ended up making out on the side of the highway (part 27)

At that point in the dream it gets fuzzy, we get to the next motel, Jaehyun kisses me again, but puts his knee between my legs and when he moves and up moving against my groin and things escalated from there. The dream cuts to my parents meeting him and my dad having a weird vibe about him but not being sure what to think because the dogs think he’s cool. Piper bit his finger once and he didn’t flinch so my dad was like “????” But whatever he seemed like a nice boyfriend to me (part 28)

I end up telling my sister everything and my mom overheard the part about what my job was doing not about Jaehyun being a robot. My sister was understanding and my mom was worried about my work and told me that’s why she warned me about working at the Naval Academy. And between my sister, her husband, Jaehyun, and I, we came up with this plan to take over the government and it was crazy but Jaehyun had all the information to get into places since I backed him up (part 29)

Okay but OH MY GOD??? I CANNOT BELIEVE HOW INVESTED I ALSO JUST GOT IN YOUR NAP DREAM???????????? This had everything like it had stakes and drama and comedy and suspense and science and sex and what the hell it was a whole movie??? It was a whole miniseries??? ANDROID JAEHYUN WANTING TO LEARN WHAT LOVE IS WHAT AN IDEAAAA

I’ve said Android au’s are my jam I feel discombobulated in the best way this is like three different movies in one I’m still losing it BECAUSE I CAN’T STOP THINKING OF ANDROID JAEHYUN LOVING YOUR CAT HOLY SHIT

#mail #hellapainyo #my children #let me tell you!! this was a ride #and i wish to get right back on pls

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cfiesler · 5 years

Text

the tenure-track detective agency

I tweeted about a dream, then realized it should be a television show, so I tweeted the whole first season plot. Featuring an academic who has to solve a murder so she doesn’t have to teach another class, and her librarian sidekick who is very helpful because of the research she’s done while writing Sherlock and Veronica Mars fanfiction. The whole thread is on Twitter, but copied in plain text below the cut for your reading pleasure. #sixseasonsandamovie

The Tenure-Track Detective Agency: Season One

I recently dreamed that one of my colleagues was wrongfully accused of murder, and because of the trial, could not teach their fall class. I feel like an "oh god I have to solve a murder so I don't have to teach an extra class" anxiety dream is like next level #academiclife.

S1 opens in mid-summer when a tenured computer science prof is found in his lab surrounded by simple robots testing conversational agents, busily chatting about top-voted reddit posts while he dies from blunt force trauma. The murder weapon is a dusty teaching award.

Our hero, an overworked assistant prof, is updating the syllabus for her machine learning class that just doubled in size, when she receives news that she has to pick up a section of intro programming b/c the instructor was just arrested for murdering another faculty member.

Our hero has THREE WEEKS to exonerate her colleague so that he can teach the class as planned, instead of her. Her tenure case hangs in the balance. What follows is a montage of frantic syllabus writing and murder investigation.

She visits the scene of the crime. A PhD student is frantically deleting data from a hard drive, and claims the IRB made her do it. Our hero distracts her and pockets one of the prototype conversational robots in the hopes it might have been a witness to the murder.

Our hero has a conference call with the set of brand new PhD students who will be teaching assistants to the intro programming class and informs them that their jobs start now and they need to dig through Lexis Nexis for case law about chain of custody and robots.

She visits the library and finds the librarian who usually answers questions about copyright, because she must know the most about law. Cue enthusiastic quirky sidekick, who actually doe knows a lot about murder investigation because she writes Sherlock fanfiction.

She visits her colleague in prison. She should probably be investigating the murder he is wrongfully accused of, but instead has many questions about the syllabus for his class she is now forced to teach. She tries not to sound bitter as she asks him for his slide decks.

Her colleague, clad in his orange jumpsuit and holding a prison phone, is understandably very upset about having been wrongfully accused of murdering another professor. But as she stands to leave, he calls out, "Wait! Do... do you think this will hurt my tenure case?"

She visits the detective in charge of the case. He says that her colleague's alibi for a 3-hour time period surrounding the time of murder is damning. "Who spends 3 hours answering email?" he demands. "Besides, professors don't work in the summer!" She fears this may be hopeless.

With the help of her librarian sidekick who convincingly impersonates a lawyer, our hero gets her hands on the the transcripts from the police interview of her colleague after his arrest. She assigns a PhD student to conduct a rigorous grounded theory qualitative analysis.

Word has gotten out that she is investigating the murder. Someone pins a note to her office door: "FOLLOW THE GRANT MONEY." She pulls up the dead prof's CV on his website only to find that it was last updated in 2003.

She interviews his PhD students after (out of force of habit) having them sign consent forms that detail data storage practices. None of them had seen their murdered advisor in person in years except when he mysteriously appeared to add his name to their published papers.

The librarian sidekick uses a bobby pin to break into an admin's office to retrieve grant spending records. It appears that the murder victim has been funneling funding earmarked for students and travel into "equipment." Almost $1m of invoices from a mysterious tech company.

(In case you were wondering, the librarian sidekick also writes Veronica Mars fanfiction and ABSOLUTELY knows how to pick a lock because of important research. She also wrote House fanfiction so let's hope she gets to diagnose Lupus by the end of this tale.)

Meanwhile, the PhD student has finished her grounded theory analysis of the arrest interview, and concludes (with an appropriate limitations section) that the interrogation was conducted under duress. The police officer promised to write him a tenure letter if he confessed.

Our hero buys many pizzas and puts the qualitative analyst in a room with the teaching assistants doing legal research and tells them to work on a motion to get the confession thrown out. She has to promise them they can all be co-authors on a major journal publication.

Cut to a scene where our hero spends hours answering emails from students trying to enroll in THE CLASS SHE SHOULDN'T BE TEACHING b/c they're on the waitlist but they need this class to graduate & also will she be taking attendance. Between emails she studies 18 U.S. Code §3501.

She visits a clinical prof at the law school to ask for help. You remember that this is TV so wonder if he is the obligatory love interest. He suggests they discuss 18 U.S. Code §3501 over drinks. She laughs: DO YOU THINK I HAVE TIME FOR THAT. You write hero/librarian fanfiction.

She interviews more students. Admins. Faculty. They initially were shocked the murder victim got tenure, but he'd seriously stepped up his game in the last couple of years. Not just more productive research, but he spent time on his teaching! And service! And apparently... sleep!

This trend becomes more shocking when she finally visits the victim’s family. They too noticed a change. They’d seen him *more often* in the year leading up to his tenure review. Now our hero doesn’t just want to solve his murder, SHE NEEDS TO KNOW HIS SECRET.

Meanwhile, the librarian has tracked down shipments from Mysterious Tech Company not to the victim's office but to a Mysterious Storage Unit. This is a clue! They brose YouTube videos about breaking into storage units. (YT tries to show them flat earther videos but they resist.)

HOT ON THE TRAIL, our hero makes the mistake of checking her email. She has a nastygram from a journal editor who reminds her that her promised review of a paper is 1 week overdue. The murder investigation halts while she spends hours on labor for which she will not be paid.

Our hero reluctantly suggests "major revisions" even though she knows this means more unpaid labor in a few months, and then regroups with the librarian. They head to the storage unit; we discover that the librarian drives an impala convertible.

They are nearly there when our hero's phone dings with a calendar reminder; she has a committee meeting in fifteen minutes. She can't remember which committee it is, but they turn around anyway. After the meeting, she still isn't sure which committee it was.

Our hero gets a phone call from her colleague who is wasting away in prison while wrongfully accused of murder. He doesn't ask about the progress of her investigation. He's just called to ask her if she can take over some of his committee assignments.

FINALLY our hero & the librarian get to the storage unit, which with the help of YouTube videos they break into & discover... rows of gently humming servers, and also robot parts everywhere! It's very uncanny valley in there, y'all. You're like, woah is this show actually scifi.

Our hero sits down at a computer. Did you know that even CS profs can have terrible password practices? Our hero read @lorrietweet's papers so the first thing she tries is "monkey" and VOILA she is inside a private github repo. (She has an ethics-related twinge, but he IS dead.)

Our hero emails the students enrolled in her machine learning class, sends them the github repository, and offers them extra credit for a forensic analysis. This is the best service learning activity she's ever come up with.

Our hero checks her email again (WHY DOES SHE KEEP DOING THIS) and has a message from her department chair reminding her that murder investigation does not count as a service activity. ('We've already had discussions about tweeting as not a good use of your time' he reminds her.)

We're getting very close to the season finale, and there's another montage: meeting with student investigators, tinkering with robot parts, answering emails about course overloads, talking to the police, revising a journal article that is due soon, formatting a new syllabus...

Over a bottle of wine in her office, our hero and her librarian sidekick put together the final pieces by doing rigorous affinity diagramming on a whiteboard. There is one final thing to verify. They enlist one of the murdered prof's PhD students to help. This is very exciting!

She visits her wrongfully accused colleague one last time in jail to give him the good news about her findings. He doesn't listen, far more concerned with making sure that revisions on his latest journal article get in on time, so she helps him & then leaves to go exonerate him.

Our hero gathers the relevant parties: detectives, faculty, PhD students, a public defender who she forgot existed. They meet in a windowless conference room. She has prepared a powerpoint presentation. It shows a table of contents: Intro, Methods, Findings, Discussion.

She speeds through the beginning (stopping to answer a question from a prof about the sample size for the qualitative analysis) and finally gets to the point: "I have discovered that the murder victim had a dark secret. And in the process uncovered the REAL killer!"

(Her librarian sidekick cheers from the audience. She is wearing the deerstalker from her Sherlock cosplay, which our hero reluctantly refused, saying that she probably shouldn't cosplay at work until after tenure.)

Our hero continues: "Our analysis of his private github repo revealed the REAL source of increased productivity in the year leading up to his tenure case - particularly striking since he also managed to save a failing marriage. Impossible, you say? That's what I thought! But..."

"It turns out that he solved the problem of not enough hours in the day for assistant professor levels of research, teaching, and service with ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE!" The department chair nods. Artificial intelligence can indeed solve all problems.

Our hero reveals a beautiful powerpoint slide that details their analysis of the code and its conclusion: Prof. Murder Victim had programmed an AI to do all of his service and administrative work, most of his teaching, and a big chunk of his research collaboration.

From answering emails to grading assignments to delegating tasks to student collaborators to reviewing papers (ESPECIALLY reviewing papers), Prof. Murder Victim had managed to streamline his duties into the things that were most important for tenure & avoid everything else.

And he was able to do what can be so rare in some departments - have a lot of time for himself, which repaired his relationship with his family. "But then..." our hero began ominously, "he thought... why can't I create an AI for that too so I can spend more time on my research?"

Our hero gestures at the door, and in walks a PhD student with a humanoid robot in tow. It is a half-finished, uncanny valley nightmare of the murder victim. "He was murdered by his own creation!" our hero shouts, as she reveals her final slide with a list of collaborators.

There is a long, heavy pause in the room. The detective looks stunned. The librarian sidekick pulls out a flask and toasts our hero. Then suddenly, the department chair leaps to his feet and says, "HE WORKED FOR THE UNIVERSITY, WE OWN THE PATENT!"

The room erupts into a flurry of activity. PhD students start updating their CVs. The prof who teaches tech ethics immediately starts writing a paper. The department chair posthumously grants the murder victim full professor status in recognition of his contributions to robotics.

The detective quietly comes over and asks our hero for her evidence. She produces a full paper with 12 figures, 78 citations, and 17 authors. He says that it may take some time to sort this out. She says, the guy you arrested starts teaching in one week, better be sorted by then.

Our hero has approximately thirty seconds to bask in the glow of her triumph when her phone dings informing her she has a committee meeting in 10 minutes. She checks her email and 4 students are asking for copies of the syllabus for the class she's hopefully no longer teaching.

That night she receives an email from the dept chair: (1) Remember this is not part of your tenure case; (2) Our colleague has been released from jail & will resume teaching his class; (3) The ethics instructor just got a grant with a course release so you'll need to teach that.

Before she can start sobbing, she opens an email from one of the students in her machine learning class, telling her that the work they'd done analyzing that code was the most amazing learning experience of his life and can they please do more stuff like that.

After a long moment, she opens up a new document so that she can start creating a syllabus for Computing Ethics & Responsibility. She adds a sentence: "You may be occasionally asked to participate in real-world problem-solving activities as part of your grade."

The season finale ends with the librarian joining our hero in her office and producing a sign to hang on the door: THE TENURE-TRACK DETECTIVE AGENCY. It is a joke, of course. ... or is it???

If you read to the end, I feel like I should mention how difficult it is to write a story linearly while not knowing the plot and without the ability to edit at all, and also that it would make my life to see hero/librarian fanfiction on AO3. :D

And if you’re a TV exec or literary agent:

(And if you’re someone who is going to write tenure letters for me: don’t worry, I also did a lot of research, teaching, and service today. ;) )

#academia #murder #fanfiction #mystery #sherlock #veronica mars #faculty life #archive of our own #twitter #fiction

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bluepenguinstories · 4 years

Text

Happiness Overload Chapter Sixty

Finally: cotton candy. Held in my hands, stacked high, almost a mile wide. Or maybe like a foot long. Or some odd centimeters (but not the even ones). Such sweet, cottony candy.

“There’s something bittersweet about finality, isn’t there?” I asked the guy at the cafeteria who gave me the cotton candy.

“Dunno what you’re talking about,” he grunted.

I shrugged and told him, “yeah, me either. I mean, it’s bittersweet when things come to an end no matter the outcome. But when it comes to cotton candy, it’s just sweet. That’s why I love it. That, and fruit snacks. Say, which would be better: fruit snack flavored cotton candy or cotton candy flavored fruit snacks?”

“Cotton candy isn’t a fruit. It’s just sugar.”

“Oh yeah. What would you call sugar, anyway? It’s a crop, right? So, is sugar a vegetable? Or a seasoning? Could sugar be considered a spice? But then again, spices are bitter and sugar is sweet.”

“I don’t have time for philosophy. I make food and serve it.”

“That’s fair!” I snapped my fingers. “For me, I can’t even be sad even if I wanted to. My whole cotton candy journey was a long and arduous one. It must have taken the length of two characters’ arcs just to find the cafeteria. Can you believe that?”

He groaned. Jeez, tough crowd. I took a bite out of my cotton candy and the taste was so good that more cotton candy formed from out of the space where I took my bite. As long as eating cotton candy made me happy, I’d get an unlimited amount of cotton candy, which was guaranteed to be unlimited, because being full only made me happy when I felt like being full, and I never got upset stomachs, because it has the word ‘upset’ in it and being upset didn’t make for a happy Blanc.

“Say, what makes you happy?” I asked the cotton candy maker, who I was sure made other food, but everything else paled in comparison to cotton candy. Well, cotton candy paled in comparison to fruit snacks. It’s all relative.

“Making food,” [insert guttural adjective here] the cafeteria worker.

“Great!” I waved finger guns at him. “Then that’s all you’ll be doing for the rest of your life! Hope you at least get a chance to eat what you make, but I don’t make the rules!”

“Yeah,” his face crinkled into a smile. “MAKING FOOD MAKES ME HAPPY!” He bellowed.

I took a bow.

“You’ll do great. I probably won’t see you again. I gotta meet up with a couple of friends, though there’s no telling how long that will take. Then some things will happen. Probably. Happy things I’m sure, because those are the kind of things I like to happen!”

I skipped off, cotton candy in hand, in search of Velvet and Coriander. As much as I wanted to cross their names off of my happiness list (which I never really conjured up, it was more of a mental list. Sure, I could have, but I wasn’t a big fan of work, and writing things down on a piece of paper was just too much work for this human-shaped happiness), something told me that they weren’t quite out of the woods. I put my finger (not the index finger, the happy one (obviously, the pinkie)) on my chin and got to thinking.

“Now, that whole artist thing sure created an ethical dilemma. One that I don’t want to boggle my mind with, but I’m going to have to figure this out one way or another.”

I had to think of that artist. Dr. Katsushika. She didn’t go by that name, at least not often, but that’s what it was. Or that’s what it would be if she went by that name. To be honest, I would have felt bad for Velvet, and doubly bad for Coriander. Sure, there were folks like that in The Flashbulb. Many more than those two faced, but there was only so much time in the void, even if time in the void didn’t quite exist. But I didn’t feel bad for them, because feeling bad wouldn’t have made me feel good. But that would have made me feel bad, if I could feel bad.

All that said, Dr. Katsushika didn’t quite make me feel good either. Retract that. Dr. Katsushika would have made me feel bad, if I could feel bad about anything. She wasn’t what I’d call someone who made others happy. Even if she liked that word almost as much as I did. When it came down to it, she was the ethical dilemma: if dying didn’t make her happy, but it put Coriander at peace, was that OK? On one hand, it was probably better if she had died, but on the other hand...happiness comes first.

“I knew it! I fuckin’ knew it! You can’t make everyone happy!” I stamped my foot. Then my left hand formed a mouth. Y’know, like a hand puppet.

“SURE YOU CAN! BOTH PARTIES DON’T HAVE TO BE HAPPY RIGHT AWAY!” My left hand told me. On the other hand...cotton candy.

Ah, yes. My Left Hand was right. It was all clear now that the pieces would soon come together. I just had to disregard any sort of ethical dilemma, disregard logical conclusions, and let things run their course. That course being a corrected one.

Hey! Would it come off as a surprise to say that I’ve had a hand in everything this whole time? Specifically, My Left Hand. More specifically, Euphy! Maybe a better question was: would it ruin the impact of everything that’s transpired? Hmm...probably. But it wasn’t like it was anything major, really. Euphy’s hands were long and could find their way anywhere. That said, most of my friends’ actions were their own and for the most part, I was hands-off. The best explanation I could give was that I tossed around a few metaphorical breadcrumbs here and there.

So with that out of the way, let’s just say that a few more breadcrumbs were about to snow down like dandruff.

Tick-tock, knick-knack, knock-knock.

Those were the sound effects made once my little bug found the correct door (and no, they were not behind door number three, but game shows really were the pinnacle of television). Of course, neither of them answered. All the better. As far as I figured, neither of them wanted to see me. Especially not the spice rack. Which, given what I put her through, was understandable.

All the same, thanks to all my spare time locked away from all the other Flashbulb employees, I once learned the fine art of lockpicking. Not to say that I could have just broken free of my enclosure any time I wanted to, but I sure was glad I learned the craft all the same. If not, I might not have gotten into their room.

Like a thief in the night (not that there was any sense of day or night in our headquarters), I slipped into their room. To my surprise, they both must have been heavy sleepers. There they were, hand in hand, holding each other close. Like still life models. It brought forth the urge to chuckle, something I had to surprise in order not to get caught. Even asleep, they continued to be an inspiration.

Oh. There would be questions.

“How did you survive? Didn’t I slam you into the floor and kill you?” The outraged, or horrified Coriander (the art formerly known as Mavis) would ask me.

I would smirk all smug, close my eyes, with my index finger (a very smart and astute finger, the one finger who puts the most work into every craft) pointed up, and then tell her:

“Simple: I created an android of myself to pull the strings while I watched in a hidden space. You really should have paid better attention. Not that it would have done you much good, as I had packs of blood stored up in the android set to spill out upon a fall. It’s true: I really do think of everything!”

She would probably yell and/or scream, “I HATE YOU,” and I wouldn’t know what to say to that. I had no smug remark. As far as I was concerned, she had every right to hate me, to wish me dead. Hell, I’d wager that she’d try to kill me all over again.

But alas, I was alive, and I’ve had my fill of both of them. I’ve painted so many paintings, and sent one of my little flies (microscopic robots) to scout out the area and find them for me. All in the span of time that they spent lovemaking. Yes, I knew about that too. But rest assured, I had my fly leave the room as soon as it went in. Say what you will about me, but I respected others’ privacy.

Case in point, I slipped underneath the bed. I was in no rush and the cold, metal floor was really quite comfortable. Those two also had all the time in the world. The problem was that their world didn’t have much time left. That was A-Okay, though. Because I told them I would help them and damn it, I meant it!

It wasn’t like I woke up between a rock and a hard place. In fact, the bed I was on was quite soft, and Coriander’s back was also quite soft. But even still, I felt like I was between an unstoppable force and an unmovable object; the unstoppable force being the comfort of being on a bed, and the unmovable object being my cute girlfriend who was currently asleep on top of me.

Well, if my time awake was time wasted, so be it. I couldn’t be any more satisfied knowing that I held in my arms both the one I loved, and the one who loved me. There was still a world to save, somewhere out there, with however much time it had left, but let’s face it: I was too tired. So I smiled as I stroked her back, then turned my head to fall asleep once more.

Whether sleep was for the weak or I was weak without sleep, one thing was clear: I didn’t get enough of it. Then again, how could I even tell? Trick question, I couldn’t. It was all a wild-ass guess based on how tired I still was. I was so tired that when I lifted my head, I didn’t have the strength to get up all the way, so I lowered my head back down onto Velvet’s chest. Big mistake that was. As soon as I did so, I felt a wet spot on my cheek and for a hazy moment, I thought nothing of it. Until I did. And started to freak out.

“Oh no! That’s drool! I drooled on her boob! She’s always saying I do that and I always say that I don’t do that but I just did! What am I supposed to do?” My words spilled out in a panic. Spilled out like drool. Ew. No. Stop.

I stared down. She was still asleep. I poked her cheek for good measure. Nothing.

“Okay. Good. I can use this to my advantage,” I mumbled. I could get a tissue from the bathroom. Wipe her boob down. Wait. What if that woke her up? Well shit, too late to consider that, I was already up and out of bed.

Ugh. What if she wakes up and notices and points it out and I wouldn’t have anything in my defense! I’d be caught drool handed. Ew. At least I’ll wash my hands.

I got into the bathroom and washed my hands. To my surprise, there was a stack of folded clothes on the counter right next to the sink.

“Was this here before?” I muttered. Well, I was too tired to think about it too hard. Maybe if I was less tired, I could have asked questions like, “is this an automatic feature of The Flashbulb’s technology?” or “was this here this whole time and I just didn’t notice?” and of course, the most important question would have been, “did someone sneak in here?”

But no. Call it stupidity, tiredness, or a lapse in logic, because I just took the clothes and put them on. They fit quite well. Not too tight, not too baggy. Really, if there was any complaint, it was how generic they looked. Plain white shirt and pants. Nothing much else to say. I wasn’t even sure why describing them at all was worth mentioning.

Once I left the room, clothed and cloth in hand, I froze in place. Lucidity took hold and all the thoughts I should have had weighed down on me as I stood face to face with the one I thought I had killed. The same one who put me through such torture.

“You…” I forced the words out. My blood was boiling, but I just couldn’t bring myself to move. “You can’t be here…” I was about to say, “...you aren’t real. You’re not here.” But the rest of my words didn’t come. I closed my eyes.

“Surprise! Bet you thought you’ve seen the last of me!” Her words rang through. No, there was no mistake: it was her.

I opened my eyes and looked around for something to use as a weapon. Not that it would have done me much good. I should have just kicked her face in and whaled on her, but for whatever reason, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Worse yet, I started to tremble where I stood.

“Really, this wasn’t how I expected our meeting to go down. I wanted to wait until both of you were awake, but maaaan, that Velvet is one heavy sleeper! You’re welcome for the clothes, by the way. Did you know that I’m quite the seamstress? Quite the tailor? It’s true! Just one of the many art forms I’ve learned throughout the years!”

I growled. That was all I could bring myself to do. I wanted to lose all control and beat her to a bloody pulp. I should have been allowed that after all that was done to me. She shouldn’t have been alive, she should have been dead. All the pain, everything she caused, and there she stood, without so much as a scratch.

“Huh? What’s going on?” Came a voice beside me. Hoarse and droned, but unmistakably Velvet’s. I looked over and when she saw who was there, she too got on the defensive.

“You! How...how did you get in here? For that matter, how are you alive?” Her voice changed to that of more serious and harsh in tone.

“Finally!” Dr. Popsicle grinned. “I’ve been waiting for someone to ask that! It’s simple, really, I –” The mad artist never got the chance to finish. Velvet shut her down quick.

“You know what? I really don’t care. It doesn’t matter how you’re still alive, but I won’t forgive you for what you’ve done to me or my girlfriend. So I’ll make sure to kill you this time.”

“Your girlfriend? Oh, congrats! You made it official!” Popsigirl chuckled. I managed to break free of whatever mental restraints were placed on my physical being. I began to charge at her and gave her a swift kick in the shin.

She seethed, but even in pain, managed to keep a smile. “Right...I deserve that,” she winced.

“Velvet!” I yelled. “Grab something to throw at her! No mercy!”

She gave me a nod in response and felt around, then grabbed a knife. Blessed. I continued the beat down as I shoved the artist to the floor and began to kick her repeatedly.

“I’ll kill you!” I yelled. After a few kicks, sure to at least bruise up her sides, she put a hand up in the air.

“Wait! Wait!”

I didn’t want to wait. How dare she tell me that?!

“You guys can kill me if you want, but you might want to think it over!”

“What?!” I stopped for whatever reason.

“OK. So. Imagine: you kill me, I’m on the floor. My body rots. The smell gets real bad. Either someone notices my body, ups the security and finds out who killed me, or, let’s say hypothetically, you manage to defeat the whole Flashbulb, which I can’t imagine you guys doing without my help. You’ll probably have to kill many others along the way, too, of course. All of those bodies, that smell, it all tends to add up. If you’re going to be stuck here for the rest of your lives, is that really what you want to walk around smelling all the time?”

Such drivel. As if she really believed she could weasel her way out with some loose logic that anyone could poke a hole into.

“Of course,” she went on. “You could dispose of the bodies. The question is, where and how.”

“Enough,” Velvet interrupted once again. “First off, what is this wet spot on my chest?”

Really? You’re really going to focus on that when we have more important things to worry about? Even still, I guess it would be bad on my part if I told her it was drool.

“It’s probably sweat. We were going at it pretty rough,” I told her.

“Ah, that makes sense,” Velvet replied, and I was saved.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t watch!” Popsigirl chimed in, much to my disgust.

“Second off!” Velvet hushed the intruder. Although I suppose as a whole, Velvet and I were the intruders. “Bold of you to assume I have a problem with the stench of death. Sure, I’d probably vomit every time I passed by a dead body, but I’d rather make that sacrifice than know someone like you would still be around to hurt the one I love.”

“Oof. Well, you raise a find argument. Some sacrifices may be necessary, after all. Gee, I’m getting a kick out of discussing these things with you! We could have some really creative debates!”

“Screw that,” Velvet spat. “It’s bold of you to even be in our presence right now!”

“That it is!” The art fanatic proclaimed. “And you two have every right to hate me.”

“Good, because we do,” I found my voice once more. Velvet nodded along.

“But even if that’s the case, I’d like to make it up to you guys. The way I see it, neither of you have much time left before your version of Earth is kaput. And if you just flail around the headquarters randomly, you’re never going to save anything. Hard truths, y’know?”

“Here’s a hard truth: you can’t make it up to us. I can only speak for myself, but even if it takes longer, even if I fail, I don’t want to stoop so low as to accept help from someone like you. Besides, you’ve already claimed to want to help us before, and I remember all too well how that went.”

Both of us were on the same page, but I started to feel a little mixed about it all. The whole reason I wanted to get to the headquarters was to exact revenge on the ones who made me who I was. Yes, I knew that the world was ending, but that wasn’t my main reason. But I knew there were better reasons to defeat them besides revenge, which Velvet had those better reasons, and yet she was willing to sacrifice them for my sake. Not only did I not deserve that, but if we had a chance…

No. I knew better than to think about that. The one in front of us was the one who had traumatized me, used both Velvet and I for her amusement. We had no reason to trust that someone like that could help us, and even if she could, I didn’t want to be in her presence. It hurt so much just to stand there. Worse, I was wearing clothes that she had made for me. Total red flags right there.

“I...I feel sick,” I said at last. “I’m going back into the bathroom.”

“What about dealing with the other person in the room?” Velvet pleaded.

Really, what about it?

“I trust you to make a decision,” I replied.

“But I don’t want to make a decision without you!” She called for me, but I already closed the door. I sounded so bitter even though I knew I wasn’t mad at Velvet. I just didn’t know what else to do. So I locked myself in until I felt safe enough to come back out.

Gee, things were going to be harder than I thought. Well, according to the ancient art of boxing, “sometimes you just gotta roll with the punches.” So that’s just what I did: I reached into my shirt and pulled out a pile of clothes. Voila! I threw them at Velvet and got into my most Serious Person impression.

“Put these on. You’re not modeling for one of my drawings, and besides, you two don’t wanna be running around the headquarters naked,” I commanded.

“I bet you have it rigged so the clothes have some kind of mind control or body control thing, or it’s got some explosives attached, or there’s tracking devices, or –”

“All good ideas,” I stopped Velvet from listing other things. “See? Even now you give me such good ideas! But no: they’re just clothes.”

She eyed me, but gave in all the same. As she did so, I decided to sit on the floor. Not to worry, it wasn’t to better enjoy the view, I just figured the floor was a good place to be. Once she was all dressed, I got back to business.

“Now, I don’t doubt your guys’ resilience, you two displayed it quite well back there,” I chuckled. “But as I said, you can’t just run around and hope for the best. That’s even worse than how others have tried to overthrow us in the past, and their organized efforts didn’t pan out well. Do you know why?”

She said nothing, but continued to glare.

“It’s because everyone could see them coming, so just as the groups were prepared, so too was the company. Which meant they could hire all the guards, janitors, death squads, you name it. Traps and gadgets, weaponry beyond your comprehension. No offense, of course, but the only thing you two got going for you is that no one sees you as a threat. Sure, you had guards after you, and they saw you as intruders, but after you fell down and into my domain, everyone just walked on and figured I killed you guys.”

Still no response. Well, I had more to say, so good.

“But really, it’s a matter of time. The more it seems you have a chance of winning, the less of a chance you actually have. I mean, you don’t think there’s cameras in this room? And listening devices? You’re lucky I’ve disabled them, but still, there’s bound to be other cases where such things weren’t disabled, and you two were caught sneaking in a room or two. Hmm?”

“I get that evil monologues are what you guys are good at, but can you just get to your point?” At last! Velvet spoke! Hurrah!

“What you guys need to do is simple: just run up to the front of the ship, say that it’s been taken over, and do so before your guys’ world is destroyed. Easy enough, right?” I may have skipped a few steps in my head, but she did want me to get to the point, so really, that was on her.

“How did you get to that conclusion?” Velvet sounded baffled as all heck, which was baffling to me, to be baffled at all.

“Because I’ll take care of the rest! See, once you get up to the ship, either they don’t take you seriously at all, or they see you as an actual threat, and if it’s the latter, they’re going to want to throw everything at you. But if they can’t get a signal to contact any guards or anything, they won’t have anything to throw at you. Meanwhile, I’ll be organizing various Flashbulb members to revolt and we’ll open up portals and kick the guards into those. It’s really funny that we had a Morale Department seeing as worker morale here isn’t very high.”

“I see. And the guards won’t overpower the workers because…? I doubt the ones in front care all that much about killing their own in order to maintain power.”

“Ah! Yes! Power! See? That’s something I didn’t think about! Aren’t I glad I have you around?”

She growled. Sheesh, I expected that from the other one, not the velvety person.

“The Flashbulb’s hierarchy goes as follows: the workers, the scientists in the departments, and then the Grandmaster Flash. Everyone answers to Grandmaster Flash, except I’ll let you in on a little secret: there is no Grandmaster Flash. There never has been a Grandmaster Flash.”

“So what? It’s a conspiracy within an organization shrouded in conspiracy theories?”

I snapped my fingers. “Bingo! But also, it’s not the wisest of decisions! See, it was born from a rumor spread by those at the front of the headquarters. Apparently they got together and wanted to get out of work, so told the other departments something like, ‘Grandmaster Flash says I don’t have to do anything.’ At first, the others must have been confused, but as the rumor spread, the ones at the front cleared up the manner by saying, ‘Grandmaster Flash is secretive and makes all of the decisions. Maybe if one of your departments is really good, you will be recognized and one of you will become the next Grandmaster Flash.’ But yeah, it’s a con to keep everyone working hard and to allow the ones at the front to do whatever they want!”

Her eyes widened. Good. She was catching on.

“So basically, if we want to defeat them, we just gotta get them to admit that there’s no leader?”

...Swing and a miss. I rolled on the floor.

“No, silly! Instead, just say ‘we’ve taken out your leader’ or something. That will make them take you guys a little more seriously. And then, when they call for backup and nothing comes, bingo! You’ll have them pissing their pants and I’ll be laughing at them from afar!”

“That still sounds really far-fetched and way too convenient. And besides, how can we even trust you to follow through on your end and do all those things?”

“Good point! You can’t trust me! For all you know, I could rat you guys out and watch your downfall! That’s the poetic nature of all this! Such revolutions like this really are a work of art!”

Velvet shook her head. “This doesn’t sound good, no matter how hard you explain. The fact that you’re even alive…”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I sighed. “You want me rolling in my grave instead of on the floor, which, there are no graves here, so why would I be?”

“You did all those things, unrepentant –”

“What can I say? An artist should never apologize for their art.”

“Good,” Velvet crossed her arms. “Because here’s another hard truth: I will never forgive you. No one is obligated to forgive you for the things that you’ve done to them and the sooner you learn that, the easier life will be.”

“Duly noted. But don’t you worry! You don’t have to actively work with me or anything. Just run to the front and say that you’re overthrowing the whole organization, and I’ll do the rest.”

“You say that, but…”

“...Or...you two can run around naked and get killed a horrible death and fail miserably in your mission. Choice is yours, really.”

“I don’t want to do this. If I do, it will feel like I’ve gone against Coriander. If I can find another way, with her, I will.”

As she said that, the one and only spice girl (in the void. Not to discount the infinite amount of spice girls out there across an infinite amount of universes. Also not to discount the infinite amount of Spice Girls, either. I was particularly fond of the version of them where they put out an EDM Folk Death Metal album. Truly ahead of their time) stepped out of the bathroom.

“Let’s just do it, Velvet,” Coriander announced in a dull and lifeless tone. “If there’s more of a chance with this, I’d rather go with it.”

I put my hand on my chest and smiled. So it seems I was forgiven after all! Good! Even though when I looked over at Coriander, her face looked like it was filled with hate and sadness, but I’d take what I could get.

“Now!” I took one good look at the both of them. “Before you two start running off, perhaps you’d like to know how much time you have left.”

“Don’t we have plenty of time, though?” Velvet objected. “Seeing as time doesn’t flow the same here, plus all those time travel devices. I think we’re allowed to take our time, given all that.”

“You’re going to apply logic to a sci-fi setting? What’s wrong with you?” I countered. “I’m sure you can understand how things work if you think about it for more than a few seconds.”

Velvet groaned, Coriander grunted. They must have understood once I said that: time still flowed down on their version on Earth, and maybe even at a faster rate than in here.

“For all you know, your Earth could already be destroyed,” I added. “And you can turn back time, that would just make an alternate Earth, which means there would already be a Velvet occupying there, and…”

“Okay, okay, I get it,” Velvet grit her teeth.

“So in order to figure out how things are going down there, I’ll send my little bug to see if there’s anyone I can talk to! That way I can confirm that there’s at least some people still alive, and that they can tell me what the situation’s like!”

I put a little earbud in my ear, then sent one of my little bugs out from my pocket and watched as it warped away, using a built in fragment of a time cube, and waited until it found someone. After a little while, I heard the bug beep. That was my cue.

“Hey! Is anyone still alive on this planet?!” I yelled, as I had no idea how loud I should have been.

“Oh, just little old me,” a voice on the other end came up. I just about jumped for joy! There was life! And with a pleasant voice like that person’s (a soothing mix of baritone, treble, and alto), it seemed like my two muses were in luck.

“Hi there! Yes! This little thing I sent down was one of my art projects! Good to see it was a success!” My heart was racing so fast I could have entered it in a horse race, except hearts weren’t horses. Not unless you did some genetic experimentation, but that was neither here nor there.

“If only I got to hear this conversation from your memories,” he crooned. It really got me thinking: did he know who I was already? Well, I didn’t even know if the voice was a ‘he’, but I just figured such a disembodied voice being a ‘he’ would have been a nice thought, and then I started thinking about how I might have gone about drawing that. Oh, but I was getting distracted once again.

“Then I could see who you are and what your motive was. I could even taste you, just a little,” ‘he’ continued. While some may have found that to be just a bit creepy, I imagined ‘he’ must have thought of me to be a mix of paints.

“Yes! That would be so artistic! Maybe it could mix together at once like a collage!” My excitement might have been showing a little too much. Restraint, too, was an art.

“Where did you send this little bug down from?” ‘He’ asked, which seemed obvious enough to me where I sent it from. Maybe obvious to ‘him’ as well, if ‘he’ called my art project a ‘little bug.’

“I think you know already!” I replied, still with as much cheer as before. Restraint never was my strong suit.

There was a pause before either of us said anything else, so maybe I should have just cut to the chase.

“Are you really the only one left?” I asked. “How’s the situation on Earth?”

The voice on the other end came in once more:

“There were many booties a clappin’,” spoken in a sing-song voice. “But yes, I may be the only one left. There might be a few others. Not sure. Probably won’t last long, though. I’d give it...what? A few more months? A year? Then everything, so happy it could all die.”

“Oh, that sounds so beautiful!” I would’ve been this person’s biggest fan had I been down on that version of Earth and in that specific period in time. “Say it again!”

“It does, doesn’t it?” My next source of inspiration agreed.

“But! And this is a big but!” I had to get myself back on track, else I’d be in awe the entire conversation.

“...You cannot lie?”

“I can’t! One of the greatest artistic achievements! Aha! I am among a true scholar! Oh! But I didn’t go on! See, I’ve got a couple of muses with me who would like to possibly save Earth. Think there’s any way they can do that?”

“Let’s say I could pull a few strings. Buy some time.”

“Great!”

“But, and this is a big booty, I can only delay it for so long. If your pals can’t do anything soon, then I’m afraid my hands are tied.”

“Sounds good! I’ll let them know! They’ll be so excited! Hold on just a sec!”

I put my hand over my ear and said to Velvet and Coriander.

“So someone on Earth says you’ve got time, and could even buy you guys some more time! Isn’t that great!?”

Whether they were excited or my imagination was telling them that they were, I was excited enough just to tell them the good news. Then I uncovered my hand and spoke once more to the jolly fellow.

“Hey! Hey! I’m still here, are you?”

“Indeed, good friend. I have a feeling you and I would get along quite well. Which means I would probably not get along with you at all. But if only I could have found out.” Gee, what a friendly person. Like a star-crossed friend that I never would have met, because if there was anywhere on Earth I’d have wanted to go, it would have been back in Japan, with my father.

“That’s okay! There’s artistic merit in mystery! Leaves some for the imagination!” I assured the good-natured spirit.

“Well, before you depart, I just want to ask a favor of you.”

“Sure!”

“If you could give me an audience, that would be great. I think I’m done being in the shadows. It’s gotten quite boring. So, I would like it if I could speak with others.”

I thought about it. I could already do quite a bit with disabling communications, so opening up a line of communication didn’t seem too hard, either.

“Not a problem!” I assured ‘him’.

‘He’ laughed hysterics. “It’s good to know I had your permission, given I already had the ability to do so.”

“Oh, you sly devil!”

Then, without so much as a good-bye (although I’ve had worse phone conversations), my little bug left and within a few moments, had returned to me.

With that out of the way, I took the earbud out and grinned.

“So basically, you’re already pretty close to the front of the headquarters! I suggest you get going, because it’s hard to tell how long you guys have even after all that! All I can tell you is that there is still hope!”

Velvet and Coriander looked at each other, put on their shoes, then were about to get going. But before Velvet left the room, she turned to me.

“Why are you doing this?” She asked.

I shrugged my shoulders. “I just started thinking that even though art has been my life ever since I was a child, if I have to hurt others to make art, then maybe I should find a different path.”

“That’s good, but that still doesn’t absolve anything you’ve done,” she spoke in a low tone.

“I wouldn’t count on it!” I grinned.

“Maybe the right question I should be asking is this: just who were you before you joined The Flashbulb?”

I shrugged once again. I wasn’t good at being concise, but I’d try.

“Also an artist. Someone’s daughter. Something like that. Hey, I have a favor to ask you and you don’t have to accept, but I just thought of it!”

“Yes?”

“If you ever figure out who I was on Earth, please don’t think of the other versions of me as evil. My actions are my own.”

Velvet nodded. I wasn’t sure if that was her agreeing to my favor or not, but both Velvet and Coriander left at that, without so much as another word. I looked out the door and watched the two run off, then I went back in. It was time for me to do what I did best.

#happiness overload #scifi #writing #stories #cotton candy #finality #the end of all things

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