#while I return to the weird alien content

[asheanon]

Also, a special thank you to everyone who came for Final Fantasy and stayed for the weird alien content. 😎👆👉

[heartburriedinvenice]

the end is undeniably near (and i keep running towards it) - steve h.

(steve harrington x hopper!reader)

a part of my phoebe challenge 🎞🪐💌🕯

based on the song "i know the end" by phoebe bridgers

in which you always wanted to escape hawkins, indiana, until you didn't anymore.

or

in which the billboard said "the end is near"

content warning post season 3 (SO SPOILERS), mild cursing (maybe), ANGST like the whole time, unhealthy coping, and hawkins being hawkins, reader is an implied theater kid (im sorry not sorry)

a / n i disappeared on y’all, I’m sorry!! you know life is getting weird when i randomly return to tumblr.  just dipping my toes back in the water of all this so i apologize if i am a little rusty. this is just a piece of a hopper!reader show rewrite that has been in the works for a while so if anyone likes it enough, lmk, I’d be be happy to start posting the whole thing,starting from season 1! any feedback would be awesome (and also requests cause I need inspo back). okay enjoy some angst!

No one ever got out of Hawkins, Indiana. Like the town was somehow enclosed within some heavy-duty bubble, only a few people ever got the nerves to squeeze through. Until you did, until you did the one thing you believed was impossible. You packed your bags, loaded up your car, and left hell. And you did it without a goodbye because the only way to do the impossible was without one. And deep down you knew you were a coward, even after fighting monsters and otherworldly creatures, you were a coward. You could not face what was left behind or allow yourself to acknowledge it.

And it ate away at you in a way you could have never imagined. Too busy pretending like it never crossed your mind, like Hawkins never existed in the first place. Still, it chipped at you piece by piece until the guilt of escaping Hawkins, Indiana finally caught up with you. Until one day that guilt would sneak up and trip you, sending you tumbling all the way back down a hill to only land right back at the gates of Hawkins, at its green sign, Welcome to Hawkins! That warm welcome, the warmest welcome, with its murders and second dimensions and its people. Those people. Those people who worked their way so deep into your heart before you could even realize it. So deep that leaving felt like removing deeply grown roots from a garden, so impossible, so hard to tell where they even stopped growing.  You weren’t sure entirely when they grew so deep, you don’t really remember at all how they got there. When you let them? Why did you let them? After everything, you should have known better. You shouldn’t have let them.

You were fifteen when you knew you could never live in Hawkins, Indiana your whole life. It never felt real, artificial, fake. Mass-produced nuclear families and white picket fence houses and stale dead-end jobs. 

And then Steve Harrington needed an extra art credit and found his way as the lead in Hawkins High’s production of Romeo and Juliet. When rehearsing turned into giving Steve girl advice and driving with him to drop off flowers. When running lines became swinging a bat of nails and finding an alien in a fridge. When the day before the play performance had turned into icing Steve's bruises on your couch as you ran lines back and forth because neither of you could sleep. When a whole group of middle schoolers sat in the front row and your dad sat center with a bouquet of flowers. They were your family. Your strange and messy family all pretending to be interested in the gibberish mess of Shakespeare on stage. Them watching with stifled laughs as Steve stumbled through lines, as the balcony scene turned into him and you having a staring contest trying to figure out whose lines were next. And though your director would have your heads later, the two of you sat giggling during intermission and had to hold the laughter again when your director asked why you didn’t have time to be memorized to perfection. Because you had all the time in the world, didn’t you?. 

Unbelievable as it was, you began to question what you at fifteen had promised you would do. Because you had found more than stale every day Hawkins. You had found their odd-balls who taught you to play Dungeons and Dragons in their basement, who reminded you so much of your sister. And you had found Steve Harrington, a pretty boy with a heart of gold, who risked his life for his Juliet that night at the mall. Who held you tight when it all got too much.

When you moved back to Hawkins, Indiana, after Sara, after your parents split, you were sure life would never be the same again. You needed a fresh start, to completely reconfigure your life and pretend none of what had happened had happened. That you never had a sister, that your dad hadn’t completely changed, burrowing himself under alcohol and late shifts. That your mom wasn’t actively trying to forget and build another life over the one that had been left abandoned in that New York apartment. You were so sure you would have to move on, cut it all out the minute you graduated from high school. You were sure you had to escape on your rickety old bike right out of town.

Then things happened and somehow you found yourself again, found your father again as you sat together for your first Christmas dinner in years. Celebrating the return of the young Will Byers and the return of something else, something more, something familiar and warm. It wasn’t perfect, far from it, but it was yours. You saw your father again for the first time in years that night, Christmas Eve, sitting on the porch as light snow fell and hit your heads, bundled in warm jackets, pretending the coffee you made was not mediocre at best. The police chief and his daughter, a messy duo. And that was perfect to you.

And then things happened again and again and again and finally everything just shattered.

And you left. You did what you had always hoped to do. But you didn’t feel the pride you had thought you would feel when you dreamed it at fifteen. You weren’t heading towards a new life, you were sitting in a stuffy apartment in the city. You were stuck again at what felt like the beginning. Unable to go with the Byers, you immediately made other plans, back at the apartment you had spent so many nights trying to forget. 

No one ever got out of Hawkins, Indiana. Like the town was somehow enclosed within some heavy-duty bubble, only a few people ever got the nerves to squeeze through. Until you did, until you did the one thing you believed was impossible. You packed your bags, loaded up your car, and left hell. And you did it without a goodbye because the only way to do the impossible was without one. And deep down you knew you were a coward, even after fighting monsters and otherworldly creatures, you were a coward. You could not face what was left behind or allow yourself to acknowledge it.

And it ate away at you in a way you could have never imagined or wanted to imagine. Too busy pretending like it never crossed your mind, like Hawkins never existed in the first place. Still, it chipped at you piece by piece until the guilt of escaping Hawkins, Indiana finally caught up with you. Until one day that guilt would sneak up and trip you, sending you tumbling all the way back down a hill to only land right back at the gates of Hawkins, at its green sign, Welcome to Hawkins! That warm welcome, the warmest welcome, with its murders and second dimensions and its people. Those people. Those people who worked their way so deep into your heart before you could even realize it. So deep that leaving felt like removing deeply grown roots from a garden, so impossible, so hard to tell where they even stopped growing.  You weren’t sure entirely when they grew so deep, you don’t really remember at all how they got there. When you let them? Why did you let them? After everything, you should have known better. You shouldn’t have let them.

You were fifteen when you knew you could never live in Hawkins, Indiana your whole life. It never felt real, artificial, fake. Mass-produced nuclear families and white picket fence houses and stale dead-end jobs. 

And then Steve Harrington needed an extra art credit and found his way as the lead in Hawkins High’s production of Romeo and Juliet. When rehearsing turned into giving Steve girl advice and driving with him to drop off flowers. When running lines became swinging a bat of nails and finding an alien in a fridge. Or jumping into a hole in the ground and lighting up never-ending tunnels of vines straight from those horror movies you used to watch with your sister. When the day before the play performance had turned into icing Steve's bruises on your couch as you ran lines back and forth because neither of you could sleep. When a whole group of middle schoolers sat in the front row and your dad sat center with a crumble bouquet of flowers. They were your family. Your strange and messy family all pretending to be interested in the gibberish mess of Shakespeare on stage. Them watching with stifled laughs as Steve stumbled through lines, as the balcony scene turned into him and you having a staring contest trying to figure out whose lines were next. And though your director would have your heads later, the two of you sat giggling during intermission and had to hold the laughter again when your director asked why you didn’t have time to be memorized to perfection. Because you had all the time in the world, didn’t you?. 

Unbelievable as it was, you began to question what you at fifteen had promised you would do. Because you had found more than stale every day Hawkins, you had found their odd-balls who taught you to play Dungeons and Dragons in their basement who reminded you so much of your sister. And you had found Steve Harrington, a pretty boy with a heart of gold, who risked his life for his Juliet that night at the mall, pulling you up when you twisted your ankle running up a flight of stairs and getting you out to paramedics when it was over. Icing your ankle and holding you when it all got too much. When you watched everyone exit the mall but the only real family you felt like you had left. When the police told you your fathers body couldn’t be found, buried under ash and grime in the mall fire. That he was the hero, that he saved your lives sacrificing himself. 

When you moved back to Hawkins, Indiana, after Sara, after your parents split, you were sure life would never be the same again. You needed a fresh start, to completely reconfigure your life and pretend none of what had happened had happened. That you never had a sister, that your dad hadn’t completely changed, burrowing himself under alcohol and late shifts. That your mom wasn’t actively trying to forget and build another life over the past one that had been left abandoned in that New York apartment, calling only for holidays and those important life events she was so sad she had to miss. You were so sure you would have to move on, cut it all out the minute you graduated from high school. You were sure you had to escape on your rickety old bike right out of town.

Then things happened and somehow you found yourself again, found your father again as you sat together for their first Christmas dinner in years. Celebrating the return of the young Will Byers and the return of something else, something more, something familiar and warm. It wasn’t perfect, far from it, but it was steps in a direction. You saw your father again for the first time in years that night, Christmas Eve, sitting on the porch as light snow fell and hit your heads, bundled in warm jackets, pretending the coffee you made was not mediocre at best. It wasn’t perfect, but it was something for the two of you. The police chief and his daughter, a messy duo. And that was perfect to you.

And then things happened again and again and again and finally everything just shattered.

And you left. You did what you had always hoped to do. But you didn’t feel the pride you had thought you would feel when you dreamed it at fifteen. You weren’t heading towards a new life, you were sitting in a stuffy apartment in the city. You were stuck again at what felt like the beginning. Unable to go with the Byers, you immediately made other plans, back at the apartment you had spent so many nights trying to forget. 

Spring of 1986, the New York apartment was driving you insane. You felt like you might start running up the walls if you didn’t get out soon. At least that would be ten times more interesting than sitting and watching your Step-Dad watch golf—a sport you didn't understand. Seeing how bored you were, he tried to explain it, but you didn't process a single word he was saying.

You didn’t want to have something with him, you didn’t want a thing you bonded over and you especially didn’t want that thing to be golf.

You debated moving, you debated being drastic and dying your hair to make your mom upset but what good would that do other than feed the part in yourself that no longer cared, no longer wanted to care. Everything you cared about had slipped from your grasp, had disappeared, no matter how tightly you clutched it was gone.

Fuck.

You stared at the wallpaper, one you knew your mom had probably gushed over at the store and chosen. And you glanced at the patterned carpet, and the family picture you were not in. And even though they all reassured you that you were family, deep down you knew you had uprooted their whole routine. You especially saw it in your moms eyes when she looked at you a little too long, a constant reminder of what she had lost all those years ago.  

You listened to the busy city traffic below the apartment and the sound of wailing sirens you had completely become ignorant of after you lived in Hawkins so long. You glanced at the kitchen, the sink with no dishes and a fridge actually filled with food that wasn’t leftover take-out, mediocre pasta you had cooked, or boxes of Eggos. And you looked at the man beside you, silent, watching golf. It was all so different.

Every day it remained that way, your mom got home from work late, your stepfather came home before you got back from school, and then Liam, your step brother would come home.

He made it all a little more bearable. The littlest but only because he reminded you of home. He reminded you of Dungeons and Dragons in Mike Wheeler's basement, and your found sister, and the party that always had you on your toes. But even you could not warm up to the boy because he would never be them. And it was unfair. It was cruel of you to make comparisons between Hawkins and New York, to allow that to shut out the only family you now had. But it was one habit you could not seem to break no matter how hard you tried.

Hawkins, Indiana was quiet, it was small. Hawkins, Indiana was both a breath of fresh air and a tightening grip that had you gasping, clawing for a second to breathe. New York was loud, so loud that the sounds of sirens and blaring car horns became only white noise in your head. It was big, not big in the welcoming and warming way. Not big in the feeling of catching sight of a friend in a crowded room. It was big in the way you could not point out a single person at school that you had seen more than once.  It was big in a way similar to that of being alone in the middle of a large party. It was so big that being alone in a quiet, dark, empty room would feel the same as walking amidst the large crowds on the street.

And New York didn’t have Steve Harrington. New York didn’t have crazy kids and weird aliens, New York didn’t have Robin Buckley or Nancy Wheeler or Jonathan Byers, New York didn’t have comforting hugs from Joyce, and New York didn’t have your dad and it never would again. The thought of it was enough to make you sick, nausea filling every inch of your body, barely able to swallow down the fact. But you would swallow it down like you always did, like you did everything else.

Your mom would always tell you you could talk to her if you needed to, that no matter how long you were a part she still cared about you. But you still remember the look on her face when you had turned up at the apartment after all those years. Finally back together face to face, the only words she was able to muster was, “you grew up”. 

You kept busy filling the days with nothing. On a good day Liam would show you some project he did in class that day, him seemingly the most unbothered by your move-in. And your stepdad, Bill, would ask you how school was to which you would reply fine. It was fine, it would always be just fine.

And you would stare at the phone on the wall in the kitchen. Dialing and hanging up and dialing and hanging up, hearing him pick up and then slamming the phone down, falling back into the chair at the kitchen table. Sometimes he would call back, you knew he caught on, you would just listen as the phone rang, head in your hands. You couldn’t face it, it was all too much and answering that call, hearing that voice would only throw it all back at you at once. It would knock you down and hold you there as you tried to gain control of the emotions you had locked up so tight once again. You felt sick to your stomach once again and the feeling spread, it spread all throughout your body, all the way to your fingertips and toes. For the first time in your life, you begged your body to just throw up, hoping the feelings would go along with it, until the pit in your stomach was completely washed away. 

It was this sinking feeling every time you heard the phone ring and as much as you wanted to convince yourself otherwise, you weren’t sure if you would ever pick up. Maybe you would just forget about it all. But it was hard when your mind was plagued with images of creatures you could only describe as otherworldly and when every time you looked at yourself in the mirror before a shower your eyes would draw focus to the deep cut scars that littered your body. You would never truly escape Hawkins, Indiana, it was impossible, and it would follow you around until you finally gave up and went back. But you refused to allow it to have that control, until you picked up the phone…by accident.

It was late, a Saturday evening of all things. Your mother was working late that weekend, your step dad was asleep on the couch, and your step brother had abandoned his books on the table and gone to bed. And the phone kept ringing and ringing and ringing, over and over in repeated increments. One call, two minutes passed, another call, three minutes had passed, and a third call with three minutes passing and on and on and on-

“Will you turn the damn thing off!” Yelled the man on the couch, whose deep sleeping was even disturbed by your past trying to creep back in. 

And it worried you, as you apologized and turned back to the phone, head aching from the noise. It worried you because every time before, the phone would ring one, maybe two times before the line went silent. But tonight, you had lost track of just how many times you had slammed the phone down to stop the ringing.

You looked up at the phone again, quiet for much too long, longer than before and RING. RING. RING.

The grunt of your step father filled the empty room and without a second thought, not wanting another lecture from your mom about not getting along with him, you reached for the phone line. Slowly placing it against your ear, you instantly pulled it back as a voice blasted through, louder than the ringing of the phone itself. “Goddammit! please pick up the phone-”

“Hey,” was all you said, it was faint and quiet in contrast, laced with guilt that had piled up from months of avoidance and pretending Hawkins didn’t exist. But it was loud enough to stop the yelling as murmurs and whispers filled the background of wherever your caller was calling from. 

Your Steve Harrington, your Romeo who deserved answers. After everything you had been through he deserved something from you that you had failed to deliver.

“Oh thank god, you don’t know how happy I am to hear your voice,” and what you expected to be anger was anything but, rather the clearest sound of overwhelming relief. Relief that all came crashing down the minute he spoke his next words. “You need to get back here, like... like-“

The sound of struggling came from their end of the phone and your heart rate sped up in a panic, only realizing how tightly you were holding the phone to your ear.

Dustin’s voice quickly came through the line, a complaining Steve evident in the back, “like right now, like ASAP, like as soon as possible.”

Dustin’s voice, his tone did nothing to loosen your grip on the phone, nothing to ease your panic and you almost slammed the phone down again. Back home, back in the familiar, back to memories of people that haunted your every thought. You wondered if they had called the Byers, your sister, you wondered if she was there too. 

“We can pay your bus ticket, but I can’t really explain like this and we just, we need your help,” Dustin practically cried. “We all need you. We can’t let anyone get hurt again.”

That was all you needed. Hawkins had a pull on you, a force you tried to ignore but eventually pulled you back anyways. Steve was back on the line soon after, you already scribbling a note to your mom, phone pressed against your ear by your shoulder. And when you heard his voice again your breath caught in your throat…it seemed to always do that with him.

“Steve, I-”

“You don’t have to say anything.”

“No, but, Steve I really, just…I don’t know where to start,” you tried to explain, losing any of the words you had planned to say while lying awake at night, staring at the ceiling. 

“You don’t have to,” he simply said. But you knew you would, you had too many words to speak. “Just show up, just be here. We need you, even if you don’t believe me. It’s getting crazy again.”

Hawkins would never not be.

“I will be,” you reassured, really reassured. “I will be, I promise.”

And if everyone in Hawkins knew something, you never broke a promise, never. You got close sometimes, sometimes it seemed like you would, but you always met your end of the bargain. You said you would be back in Hawkins, Indiana and you would be. Setting the phone down back on it's holder with a quiet click, you jumped from your chair in the kitchen, as the wood chair quietly screeched against the floor. Open and close, open and close, the drawers in the kitchen were opening and closing until you found a tape role, cutting away a piece. Grabbing your note off the counter, you secured the piece to it and stuck it against the fridge where it would be noticed by your mom.

She would know what it meant, you knew she knew all along, that New York hadn’t been your home in a long time. That Hawkins had grown into something much deeper than you could have ever anticipated. And even then, in that kitchen, in that busy city…you knew, the end was near

[kayharrisons]

Really fucked it up this time, didn't I my dear? [BJORN X FEM!READER] [18+ ONLY] [5 OF ?]

Tyler's plans start to come into motion, and a heart to heart ensues.

A/N: howdy folks!!! Apologies for the delays to updating!! But we're finally getting into the nitty gritty of the plot 👀👀 this is a Tyler heavy chapter bc his and reader's friendship is so sweet to me, and also plot purposes ehehe HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO SPIKE FEARN BTW WE LOVE YOU BBG 🎉🎉 that being said Bjorn ain't in this chapter AHAHAHA sorry guys

Series warnings: unplanned pregnancy, discussions of abortion, eventual childbirth, commitmentphobe Bjorn, possessive Bjorn, talks of morning sickness and other pregnancy symptoms, friends to fwb to something Worse, cheating mentions, nsfw content such as sex and eventual Alien type scenarios

Previous

He doesn't stay.

You knew in your heart that he wouldn't, but your heart still falls nonetheless.

You want to curse him out, yell at him for being a goddamn coward, for not facing the way your relationship with one another has unfolded, for being such a dick.

You don't.

Because you're just as much of a coward as he is.

You merely put the blanket you'd given him away, throw up for a good fifteen minutes, nibble at your breakfast rations, and then make your way to work.

The day mostly passes by in a quick haze, thank god. You're lost in your thoughts, lost in the rhymthic noise of your drill, of quiet chatter amongst your fellow miners, the parakeet singing further down the tunnel.

"Hey."

You look up, startled, meeting Tyler's kind eyes as he takes up the space next to you, you hadn't even noticed Stevens leaving earlier.

"...hi."

Tyler smiles at you, before fixing the bandana back over his mouth and nose and returning to work.

For a good while, you both drill in silence, intent on meeting your quotas for the day.

Your stomach is rolling a little, be it from nerves or pregnancy, you don't know. You haven't spoken properly to anyone in your group for a few weeks now, communication staying low as you TRIED to figure out what to do with the little being growing inside of you.

"Can you come over t'night?" Tyler asks you when there's a pause in your drilling, which gets you stammering.

"I- look it's uh-"

"You really are a shite liar," Tyler muses, smiling fondly at you, before shaking his head. "Look, I dunno what went on with you and Bjorn, why you're both acting all-"

"We're not acting like anything." You retort, petulant, your stomach swirling and swirling with nausea, your head light, Tyler levels you with a flat stare.

"Right. Exactly, that's why it's weird. You're best friends, for fucksakes." He sighs, shaking his head. "Look, just come over, alright? Nav and I we've... well, we might've found a way out of this shithole." He murmurs to your, voice damn near inaudible over the drilling around you.

You stare at him, wide eyed at the possibility, your fingers hovering by your abdomen.

A way out.

Your baby could be raised somewhere that wasn't fucking Jackson's Star.

"So you'll come ova?" Tyler asks, hopefully.

Your promptly puke your guts up.

\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

"I'm fine," you insist, weakly trying to slide off of the examination bed. Tyler tuts, pushing you back onto it and crossing his arms over his chest.

"You threw up and almost passed out. That's not like ya, love." Tyler frowns, getting that same pinch to his brow that he gets whenever Kay is out too late, or Bjorn doesn't answer his commlink, or when Navarro spends too long at work.

"It's just a blip-"

"My fucking arse it's a-"

"Sorry for the wait!" the nurse says cheerfully, scanning through her datapad. "So, you threw up and were lightheaded at work?"

"Yes," you retort, sourly. "But I'm fine, he just worries-"

"Oh! You must be dad, then!" The nurse beams cheerfully at him.

Fuck. FUCK.

You lose a few shades in colour from panic, from terror, because no one was supposed to fucking know yet you're not ready and what if Bjorn finds out from someone who isn't you and-

"Do I look old enough to be her dad?" Tyler asks, pointing a thumb at you, a touch of offence in his tone.

You burst into hysterical laughter.

Thank fucking god for Tyler Harrison.

\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

The Harrison trailer is thankfully empty when Tyler invites you over, sitting you down and making you tea, before sitting beside you, worry furrowing his brow and his eyes idly looking over you.

"Spose this is why you've been dodging the group for a bit?" he asks, leaning into the couch back as he takes a sip from his tea.

You exhale, nodding. The cup is hot in your hands, soothing. "Yeah. I... I just didn't know how to tell anybody, sorry. There were only so many reasons I could come up with for not drinking and stuff, I just... wasn't ready for anybody to know."

Tyler nods, painfully understanding, as he digests the information and sips at his tea.

"It's Bjorn's, innit?" he asks, glancing to your stomach, then up at your face. You damn near drop your tea, panic and shock in your eyes. Tyler rests a gentle hand on your shoulder. "Relax, love. I'm not gonna grill ya for answers you're not ready to give. But I'm right, ain't I? It's why you two have been so off lately-"

"He doesn't know." You inform him, quietly, staribg into your cup of tea. "I don't- I don't know how to tell him. The last few months with us have been... they've been rocky, Ty."

He nods, setting down his tea in favour of rubbing the back of his neck. One of his nervous ticks, you'd noticed. "Yeah, understatement there, love. Look, I dunno what went on between you both, it's your business, but you need to talk to him. It's his kid too-"

"A couple of thrusts and forgoing a condom makes a father not," you mutter, petulantly. Tyler shoots you a look. The one he gives Kay whenever she does something he disapproves of.

"I'd wanna know, if it were me. And I know my cousin, you know your best mate. Talk to him, please? Just promise me that much."

You sigh, but reluctantly nod your head all the same.

You were planning on talking to Bjorn, truly. You wanted him to know, wanted to talk about everything with him.

But, ugh, that meant talking to him.

[simpingforbots]

Little Alien part 4

Alright, you are now a pet to pink one – this is for sure now. Even if you were provided with all necessities for you to be alive and well – food, shelter, sanitary facilities, clothes – it seemed more like they got it just to keep you alive, panic buying things for the stray cat they just picked up of the streets. Though from where they bot it made you felt like something was of, and you were correct – the place did had a spot for you to rest, place to relief your self, excursive and a small box to store your clothes in, and every thing looked like it was made by one of those cheep landlords, that you knew to well about because your last apartment looked sort of the same, though you managed to scrape enough to make it feel like home, however in this situation you can’t do shit about it. What worried you the most is how pink one was constantly looking at you, knowing well what any reasonable parent would do the second they bring in a stray. And you feared what would come.

With one problames solved, Elita-One was left to deal with few other troubles. From what she learn from Swindle, while holding back as to not beat the living pit out of him, it become clear just how much effort it will take to take care of such small weak creature and right now she was staring at them with a bit of disgust. Apparently any organick life shed their body frequently and required a lot of sanitary care for it, like washing it every other day, to make sure it was safe for the little creature. Great, she will have to take care of it, though not right now as she did had a bit more work to do, time to time glansing to check what you were doing. You seemd to just relax, climbing on to small berth, covering them self with cloth and going in to recharge. It felt weird that she seemed to feel content to see little creature safe now, feeling pity brew inside her chest-plate again about them being left behind. Quickly shaking it off, she focused back on the pads, doing some more work before she left the room to get something that she will need.

After exploring your new cage, you felt exhaustion kick in – of course after being carried around all over the giant metal city, visiting doctor, shop and getting all the attention on a train ride, you just wanted to kick back on your new bed and get some rest, so seating on something that is actually soft for once in few days felt nice. Letting a yawn out, you curled on the soft bed, pulling thinnest blanket over your self and your head, hopping to dim light just a bit to let you sleep peacefully, closing your eyes and letting a sigh. You can feel you limbs becoming pleasantly heavy as exhaustion spilled though your body and you managed to fall asleep.

Returning to her quarters with every thing she needed, Elita-One was pleasantly surprised to see small one still resting, peacefully curled up on small berth that was propably more suitable for your little squishy body. Setting a small dish of water on table and a bottle of disinfectant along side a small rag, she walked over and leaned checking on you, making sure that you were still alive – even if she knew that you were, deep inside she worried for the small being, and right now she will have to wake them up to clean them up as Primus knows what you might have on your little skin - she is not ready to deal with any diseases that you might’ve brought. Opening the top lid of the cage, it made some noise, alerting you immideatly, jumping in your berth and scurrying in to the corner of the cage as soon as they saw her servo reaching for them.

“Stop fussing, I need to clean you Scraplet” she sighed heavily, reaching in with another servo, blocking any path that you might try to take. She is really not ready to play cat and mouse, even if it is inside the small cage, finally trapping them in a corner and quickly wrapping you in her digits. The small life from started wriggling and chirping loudly, but she really needed to do this. The small thing strated freaking out even more when she gently pulled the thin fabric of them, making sure as to not hurt them, their little peds kicking like crazy and little servos banging weekly in her digits, in fact she was not able to feel it that much, as of someone was tapping on them with something soft yet firm. After all the layers of clothes were off, she lowered them in to bowl of water, their body immideatly stifling and as soon as she let go, Scraplet tried to scramble out, it was a bit fun as the bowl was big for them and they did a strange motion, which fascinated her for a moment. It seemed like this life form is capable of floating on the surface, using their limbs to propel them self in liquid towards the edge and gripping on it. Alright, this is interesting, but now she really need to clean you off the grime you had on you. Grapping disinfectant, she squeezed a few drops on top of small thing, with Scraplet started chirping loudly and swatting their hands, trying to rub the cleaning mixture of them self, inevitably starting the process them self. Reaching in she rubbed the mixture in to the flexible soft skin, rubbing in the soapy substance in circular motion, all while little servos swatted at her. “Stop this” she mumbled out, tapping them slightly on the head, enough as a warning to stop wriggling. Moving up and down, she managed to clean the small one up completely and dipped in to the water to wash the soap off, lifting them up and settling them down to wipe of with a cloth they had prepared before hands and once they were dry, she gave them their small fabric back to wrap them self, letting a small chuckle at how quickly they did it, hiding their small squishy body behind fabric again. Pushing bowl to the side as to not accidently spill it, Elita one looked around for a small box she got at the same time as they were in Swindles little boutique shop, something she wanted to put on when they were clean.

You knew that it will happened, and you could do nothing about it, no matter how much fighting you did, you still got undressed again and dropped in to bowl of watter. Your first though was on to getting out, swimming to the side and getting some perch on the side of the dish you were lowered in to. The water was incredibly cold and you wanted to get the fuck out, able to fill your muscle tense up. As soon as your hands wrapped on edge, you felt a new cold sensation drop on your head, slowly flowing down like some slime, making you let out confused and fearfull gasp, trying to get it of your self. And then it started. Huge hands wrapped around again and strated rubbing the strange slime in to your skin, forming bubles that slipped in to water as the process continued. You did tried to fight again, but just got gently slapped on your head for fussing to much, so you just gave up, letting Mama-robot wash you. When it finally came to an end, you were washed off with same cold water, you swearing under breath and were pulled out, immideatly wrapped and rubbed with towel. The heat from friction spread through, making you sigh with relief, and when you were handed back your clothes, you were more than happy to put it on your body again, cold finally leaving your body. You sighed with relief, happy that the worst of things were behind, seating down and just taking a second to breath. Though you quickly jumped up when bot reached for you again, holding something in between two fingers, stopping you from going any where with other hand, wrapping strange contraption around your neck and it clicked loudly, biped and secured around your neck. The second you were free you strated tugging on it, letting out all kind of swears you could remember, fingers glididng along the grooves, trying to find something to dig in and free your self.

“What the fuck!!!” you yelled out, tossing your head up in fearfull expression “Hey! No! Get it off me! NO no no!” even if there was some distance between your neck and metal ring, you felt like suffocation, not licking the feeling of metal ring aorund your neck. You continued fighting it, until you just got tiered and slumped down on the ground, huffing and puffing while still holding on to the ring. You could not do anything about removing the strange collar, so you just give up, trying not to cry that now your entire being is just a pet. You knew it already, but just did not expected to be sealed with a fucking collar.

When she put on the collar on Scraplet, Elita did not expected such violent reaction. It looked like small being got possessed by something as they tugged on the collar, dropped on the ground, kicked, chirped loudly, doing every thing to get it off. It shocked her a lot, but to be honest it will be best of you because you are small and already proven to love hiding in small crevasses, so for your own safety she got the small tracer collar, just to keep tabs on you. Pluss it had a leash, even more procotion. And in case B-127 tries to take you to play with, which she sure will happen. When you calmed down enough, she had to do just a bit tinkering, to make sure collar was working, brining a small devise and letting it sink up with collar, checking that it was actually working and making sure it functioned alright. It did, so it might be even a good time to rest after very thign, and heating berth as well her self. Lifting Scraplet up and putting them in to their cage, Elita laid on her berth, letting her self recharge now a bit more peacefully. The very next day she took you out of the cage, as she was sure you were growing tiered of constantly being in a cage, a bit more confident that in case you managed to sneak away she at least she can track you, waking around with you on shoulder. You just kept stirring, looking aorund the place, letting chirps of curiosity. Passing by the archives, she managed to get a glance of Prime, stopping in her track and backing up, leaning in to see dark room filled with glowing pads laying all over the table in mess, that only Optimus can go through. Letting a sigh though her vents, pink robobt stepped though the doorway, closing the doors behind and queitly approached big red and blue robots, with his chest glowing bright at the demi-light room. Big bot seemd to be in deep though, resting his helm on the servo while scaning another tablet for any information, in hopes of finding answers just what Scraplet was and where they belonged.

“Prime” gently placing a servo on his shoulder, Elita-one brought Optimus back to reality, his head tipping up ad blue opticks focused on her with exhausted look “You need some rest... I managed to find some crumbs of information to keep them alive” she spoke softly, patting his shoulder. The little one chirped, leaning over, trying to get the eyes on the pads. Not wishing them to fall, she picked them up and settled on table, letting them roam around table, pushing on tablets and scaning them as well.

“That is some good news...i don’t seem to find anything about their kind specifically. I can see others, similar, yet not like them.... it’s good that you managed to find something that will keep them alive” he sighed heavily, reaching to pat small one, who dwindled in comparison to his servo, his digit so big, but still gentle, scratching their head. He scanned though a lot of information, but just can’t find any that was of your kind. Maybe you were still an undiscovered one and maybe he can get a privilege of naming them. This will be fun.

“You should get some rest... you are Prime now, remember. You have responsibilities and Quintessons are not exactly gone from our world. And there is still all the mess Sentinel left behind”

“yeah...” big bot sighed, dropping his head on table with a thump, scaring small one just a bit, She knew well why – it’s been not so long since their crazy adventure and them getting t-cogs, Pax becoming Prime, and it takes time for every one to adjust to a new world, to the world that they were supposed to have no thanks to false Prime. And even Optimus has trouble with transforming time to time, let alone his size, constantly banging on doorframes, stumbling over or getting stuck when ever he transformed. More times she would have to call him twice just to get his attention. “By any chance, do you have any name for them”

“I think Scraplet fits them well” reaching to scratch small one as well, Elita smiled

“Scraplet huh? It... kind of fits them”

Previous

[squishysoftmonsters]

Triggers : Sexual Content/Themes [Mature +18 Minors /Ageless DNI]

💚TD Master Post💚

💚Charming Attraction? 💚

Taking a chance with this alien,a ride with teacups that went with the rhythm of human intimacy was your first stop. Faint gurgles escaped the cups.

The name of the ride was scrawled in a language that was'nt exactly English. It was like a messed up type of Braille.

Alien : [chortles] The Humpycups?

You : [laughing] Humpywhat?

Alien : [chortles] Says here,calm monsters live in these cups and react with the warmth and heat scent of a rider. Each session with a creature can be pre set to your liking via the attendant. It also says commando is preferred but not recommended.

He nudged you with a smirk.

You : [chortles]Gross!You have to be naked in this amusement park? I can't.

He shrugged at you and removed his garnments while you pulled yours to where the fabric was the shape of your limbs.

Alien : I'm game for some tentacles to go down on me in one of those cups. Don't be shy.

You blushed at the size of the genital slit on your friend,innocent mind going to the dark side about his dong..the thickness and length it was,hoping he'd say yes to helping with internal decoration if you asked.

Attendant : Are you ready to interact with the cup creatures?

You : [blushing] Yes. But is it true that you have to go naked?

Attendant : If you'd like to tease the cup creatures,it's not required.

You : Phew..

Attendant : How long would you like to spend with them?

You : Uhh..I don't know maybe 5 minutes max.

Attendant : [chuckles] Alright.

Alien : [shrugs] Same.

Attendant : Please watch your step,and be safe.

Both : We will.

You heard the chittering sounds amongst the creatures as they listened to you both enter,carefully stepping into a cup and making yourself comfortable.

You : Hello there.

You stifled giggles as it started by tickling your parts with it's mushy tentacles. Aware of your heat,the creature wanted to toy with you some by slowly and surely doing away with your garnments,rubbing and grabbing.

A warm and fuzzy feeling washed over you as it sucked your tongue and licked your nipples

The cup monster grew engorged as it lubricated itself,giving stretches that made you see planets and begin drooling losing all sense of self. Your insides were being bullied by this tough creature,and you loved every moment!

It happily gaped you,squealing delightfully while holding the back of your neck,making little moans pushing against it's manic thrusts that squelched with every push. It squeaked more as your backside clenched down on the said tentacle.

Your eyes watered and glazed as the cup creature's tentacle numbed your throat,so you would'nt choke or gag as you sucked it awhile. To hear your orgasmic cries,it released your mouth,overjoyed with how you screamed and jizzed all over it.

In the other cup,you heard muffled groans from your friend as he was suspended and every orifice was plugged with a creamy tentacle of massive size. They both screamed in bliss after a monster orgasm between both parties.

After the ride was finished,you both stumbled out of your cups,bodies racked with pleasure from being pounded to the point of no return by nymphomaniac cups. The creatures were carefully washed afterward by the managers of the ride. They were angered,as they liked your scent and against being bathed.

You : [tired] That was fun.

Alien : [dazed] Who's the year and what's the President?

You : What? [chortles]

The attendants helped you both out of the ride. None of the aliens gave you weird looks or stares as walking around naked in the otherworldly Disneyland was pretty much normal. You held in a giggle as one of the games was called Lord of the Shlongs.

Alien : The idea is to use your assets to fling these clay discs,knocking down the targets. Well I think my john is mighty enough.

You : [laughs] Ewww.

Alien : I could do bicep curls with it if you want.

You : [chuckles] No.

The prizes were weird but adorable in their own way. Among them a plush human penis,balls and even a vagina. The newest prize was a giant hemipenis. Intimidated by the mini game,your chest and down below wasn't strong enough to throw anything.

Alien : No worries,I'll get you a prize.

You found yourself almost fainting at the strength and accuracy of your friend's dong as he took out several of the targets. After 20 targets,he claimed the Hemipenis plush,presenting it to you as a gift.

You both booked the night at a hotel after enjoying some of the sexual themed rides and mini games. Creature Endurance was one of them. You're tied down and triple penetrated by theme park owned and well cared for monsters of various dong sizes for several minutes.

You managed to handle a 12..but gave up at 13. After a shower,you lied in bed next to your friend,poking his leashed endowment which changed color with every poke.

You : Is that how you stay young?[giggles]

Alien : There's no such thing as oversexed and overstretched. So yes.

You straddled him and ran your fingers through his hair.

Alien : [chortles] It's about time. I dont have 4 eyes for nothing.

His mushy manhood wormed it's way into your booty hole.

You : [giggles] What are you doing?

Alien : It needs warming.

You began riding him.

You : [softly] What's your name anyway?

Alien : [huffs] Does it matter?

He kissed your forhead while squishing your buttcheeks with his hands,then kissed your lips. You giggled as his tongue went down your throat,but did'nt choke,as the saliva on his tongue relaxed the uvula,the muscle responsible for gag reflex.

As you kissed him,you continued giggling,the deeper he went into your backside.

Alien : You're still very tight.

You : I just sprang back into place I guess.

You liked the alien boy very much. His carefree attitude made it all the more better. He bit his lip.

Alien : Not if I loosen you up again.

You laughed,burying your face in his medium sized honkers. He spanked your booty as you began to bounce on his shlong.

Alien : [growls] You won't be the same once I'm done. I'm gonna stuff you and fill you with cream.

You were excited about what was next 💚

[pr-incey]

For a while—after being exposed to the antiship movement, because goodness knows I didn't care about this when I was younger—I wondered *why* fiction and reality were so different in my head. Why I could happily see things depicted in fiction that would make me sick to my stomach or upset me to tears just from thinking of it happening in real life. I couldn't come up with a reason for this for a while, which caused me distressed and made me worried that I might secretly be a terrible person after all.

But I've done some thinking and I've figured it out. Or, rather, I've returned to the mindset that came so easy to me in the past and probably did to a lot of people before the well was poisoned.

When I see a fictional character, I don't see a person. I don't see a person like *me*, anyway. I see a person within that piece of fiction's universe; a plane of existence that is wholly different from my own. Lines and colour, words on a page, virtual drawings being played sequentially at a speed that simulates movement. Sure, the written passage, 'He had eyes, ears and a mouth' is a representation of what *I* am, and what other people around me are, but it is fundamentally a plane of existence that is *alien* to me.

An alien is something that is decidedly not human. I feel empathy for other humans because I can relate to them. I have no desire to hurt them because I either know what it is like to be hurt in that way, or I can imagine what it would be like. I know the harm it would do to them, which illicits a reaction of disgust and apprehension in me. 'That's terrible,' I think, which simply kills any desire to cause any harm to a real person or do any disgusting actions.

This is why predators are such terrible people. They are fully aware of the harm their actions will cause and then go ahead with them anyway.

But with a fictional character, it's different in these ways:

1. First of all, we have to remember that they AREN'T human and so whatever I feel towards them cannot accurately mirror whatever I feel towards real flesh and blood individuals. They're projections of humanity from OTHER people in whatever medium they choose, but fictional characters are—and I cannot stress this enough—NOT HUMAN. If I pull off the head of a Barbie doll, does that mean I have the desire to behead someone in real life? Does it mean that I MUST have the urge to behead someone in real life, because a barbie doll is a 'representation' of a person? Your answer, I'm hoping, is no. Because Barbie is not human.

2. And because fictional characters are not human, I don't have empathy for them. Not REAL empathy, anyway, the type that stops the desire to cause harm. When I 'violate' a fictional character, it illicits at most only superficial disgust because I know that character will not live with the lasting consequences of my actions. They're a projection, a facsimile.

So that might bring you to another question, 'Even if they're not real, why would you WANT to do that to them, anyway?'

That I can't answer. The human brain is weird. Sometimes, people have dark urges. If a kid tosses their Barbie onto the ground and seems to take pleasure in it falling, can that accurately say they want to push a real person onto the ground? If someone seems to enjoy a violent video game like GTA where they can run people over and shoot them to their heart's content, is that a surefire way to know that they want to do those things to real people? I wouldn't say it is. Would you?

The final thing to remember is that it's not completely black and white. A serial killer might have been 'inspired' by a violent horror story, whereas the actual author of that story is a nice, well-adjusted individual. People with the desire to hurt actual humans might make do with projections, but it does not change the fact that they actually want to HARM people. The fiction didn't make them want to do that. They already did, and probably would have even if they didn't discover said fiction. And horrible people CAN make their own 'projections'.

Generally though I believe it is obvious when someone is just playing with dolls, and when someone is exhibiting an actual desire to hurt somebody.

[cellarspider]

5/30 The pseudohistory of Prometheus

(Previous) | (Index) | (Next)

⛬

We return to a movie I wish to send on a journey down the Kola Superdeep Borehole, Prometheus.

And my insanity truly begins in this segment. We are only 1/10th of the way through the movie so far. Content warnings for discussion of racism in pseudoscience and historical anthropology, Spider getting hung up on logistics and space nerd stuff, and pictures of Yuri Knorozov, the most sour-faced man to ever live.

The cast sits down for a briefing. This is a scene with an easily identifiable narrative function: providing exposition to the theater audience. The act of doing a briefing makes sense. It is the last thing here that will.

We are introduced to a hologram of Peter Weyland, the financier of the expedition. The name means all sorts of Lore to the series, but what’s intensely distracting is that we seem to have caught Weyland halfway through applying his zombie makeup.

Weyland is played by Guy Pierce. As of the filming of this movie, he was somewhere around 45 years old. Yes, they smothered this Australian in old man drag so that he could play this character. This is a baffling decision, that only gets slightly less baffling if you know the production history of the movie, which I did not at the time.

Guy Pierce was hired to play a younger Peter Weyland. There’s a promo video out there of him giving a fictional TED Talk in the not-to-distant future of next Sunday AD 2023, there were various plans for him to appear in the movie proper. None of those scenes are actually in the movie. They refused to double-cast the role for some reason. While the practical effects in the movie are generally excellent and it does make the tiniest smidge of sense that a hypercapitalist asshole would be portrayed as a literal rubber-faced movie monster, this, like many things in Prometheus, made the movie a very weird sit. One where I was increasingly less open to going along with the movie’s fiction. You are telling me that this is an actual human man. I am not buying it. He looks far less human than David, the only non-human there.

Speaking of David, Weyland calls him “the closest thing to a son I will ever have”, and then immediately says David is an inhuman lesser being, who does not appreciate the specialness of his existence because he does not have a soul.

Which is funny, because I think you can see David’s soul leaving his body at this exact moment.

Weyland then tries to mash in some existential weight to the movie: they might finally get an answer for “why are we here?” and all that jazz! He also tries to explain why naming a ship Prometheus is totally not like calling it Titanic II: Don’t think about the part of the myth where Prometheus is chained to a rock and has his ever-regenerating liver eaten by an eagle every day! Think about the bit where he brought fire to mankind! We’re gonna bring back that bit!

And then the archaeologists take over the briefing, and this, THIS, is the bit where they entirely lost me. My suspension of disbelief had already been strained by multiple oddities up to this point. My skepticism about these characters in particular was already a bit elevated by their implied invocation of the ancient astronauts concept.

Turns out, only Vickers, Shaw, and Holloway know why they’re here. 

Two years away from Earth. On a massively expensive expedition that intends to make first contact with an alien culture, the first alien culture that humankind has ever found evidence of. Nobody has been briefed up until this point.

This is lunacy.

Explanations have been figured out by fans since then: this is a passion project by Weyland, an annoyance to the rest of the corporate structure that nobody else believes in. The movie eventually intimates this, through Vickers. 

Fans have thus speculated that Weyland was just quarantined off to do his little alien hunt, with no logistical support that would make it actually functional. He believed a crazy theory put forward by Shaw and Holloway, and everyone else wasn’t actually best-of-the-best, they were just whoever would take a big paycheck to do fuck-all for nearly five years of sleeping their way to and from their destination.

I am willing to consider that this was intentional. The movie possibly tries to confirm this with Mr. “I’m here for the money” Fifield, but none of the other characters have enough characterization to determine if this is the general trend.

How could we make a story that more clearly spells this out? Maybe Millburn the biologist could encounter more of the crew talking about the payout from taking the job, or reveal that he himself has some project he needs money for. It would also chip away at the dearth of character-building dialog for most of the cast.

As a result of those deficiencies in characterization, a lot of my discussion of plot points is going to be focused around what they do, rather than why. …Except when it is about the why, at which point the main commentary will be “WHY.”

In any case: while it makes sense, I'm still not certain the film meant for this character motivation. Prometheus is just so loudly explicit with so many of its plot points that it doesn’t seem like this is the case. The movie certainly believes in the sincerity and correctness of the archaeologists, though.

Unfortunately, it also immediately tells me that they’re a couple of wingnuts. I’m not sure if it intends to, for reasons I’ll get into after I foam at the mouth for a little while.

They present a series of artifacts to the crew: Egyptian, Mayan, Akkadian, Sumerian, Hittite, Hawaiian, and their Scottish cave painting. All of them feature “men worshiping giant beings”, who are pointing to what stargazer nerds call an asterism: a pattern of stars. Shaw and Holloway believe that these are aliens that engineered humans into their current state. Shaw literally says “it’s what I choose to believe” as the entirety of their justification for this.

Again: I knew the movie wanted me to take this as truth, within its universe. That’s the implicit deal the movie has made with the audience, this is truth. You are supposed to be contemplating the "whys" of it all. But the movie had also smacked me in the brain so many times in the past five minutes, that I, like Millburn the Biologist, was ready to call bullshit.

I appreciate him for doing so, and it shows he could have been a smart character, but sadly, he is in Prometheus.

Because he is a fictional biologist and I am an actual biologist, I will expand on his argument, as I descend into ranting for the rest of the post.

Millburn objects on the basis of evolutionary history, which the movie only partially succeeds in papering over: the implication is that evolution on Earth was directed with the deterministic outcome of creating something like humans.

This opens up a whole new can of worms that the movie doesn’t get into–when exactly did this engineering start? When great apes evolved? When mammals did? Tetrapods? Skeletons? DNA itself? After all, we know the aliens, now dubbed Engineers by the archaeologists, have DNA. Did they seed all life on Earth? How did they evolve? Our last universal common ancestor is believed to have already been using DNA 3-4 billion years ago, evolving out of a likely RNA-based genetic standard. Hominins diverged from other apes around 15-25 million years ago. What sort of culture would undertake a project that required at least 15 million years on the extreme low end?

All excellent questions! The movie is not concerned with them. I am, and that is part of why this movie still lives in a special, awful place in my head.

This isn’t actually what made me become actively hostile toward the archaeologists, though. What managed that, well! It was their archaeology. Anybody who had an Ancient Egypt Phase in their childhood should be able to articulate multiple reasons why the academic community would’ve laughed these guys out of the building.

Bigness in ancient egyptian art does not indicate literal size. It indicates importance. In fact, the artifacts the movie uses exclusively come from artistic traditions which feature hierarchical or non-literal scale. Do the Engineers turn out to actually be eight feet tall? Yes! Am I still annoyed by this? ABSOLUTELY.

You know what else is a big problem? Many of the cultures they reference here had written language! A LOT of written language! They include Egyptian, Sumerian, Babylonian, and Mayan art in their evidence, all of which not only wrote a LOT of things down, but had a habit of annotating a lot of their art with labels to tell you what was going on! You can actually see some on the props they used in this scene!

Beyond that, they had very prescribed formal styles, where you can follow the action entirely through gestures, held objects, attendant symbols, and clothing! If all these cultures, as implied, had actual, direct contact with aliens, recorded in the art presented here, we would know what they were told.

Skipping ahead of the movie for a minute: the Engineers were apparently not telling humans “we’re here in these stars, come find us”, they were telling humans “settle the fuck down or this is where the hurt’s going to come from”. 

Here's the thing. Ancient peoples weren't stupid. They wouldn't just not talk about this. If giant aliens came down from the sky and gave them a stern talking-to that contradicted their religion, that would be a big deal. And these characters specifically say the Engineers are being "worshiped" in these images! They're apparently taking onboard what's being said!

It is certainly possible for information to be lost. Over long time scales, that's unfortunately the rule, rather than the exception. But again: half the artifacts have writing on them!

I chose to believe that Shaw and Holloway simply did not attempt to read any available translations of attendant texts, and they were thus cursed for their foolishness by the ghosts of Mayan Studies pioneer Yuri Knorozov and Egyptologist Jean-François Champollion, and the still-extant spirit of Assyriologist Irving Finkel.

Knorozov knows your sins against Mayan Studies. Knorozov is a vengeful god. Chapollion and Finkel are likewise very cross.

Two last things stood out to me in the theater. One of them was extremely petty but tied into some very serious issues with pseudoscience, and the other one was not.

Pettiness first: the asterism shown in the artifacts is a pattern of six stars. The movie wants you to believe that it is very spooky that the only asterism that precisely matches this pattern are six stars that are too faint to see with the naked eye. This is laughable, both because the asterism is so generic-looking that I can think of several very visible asterisms that are good matches for the pattern, but it also recapitulates a bunch of really fucking annoying stuff from pseudoscientific bullshit. 

First: Pseudoscience and pseudohistory likes to make a big deal out of the fact that every culture has stories about the stars. Why? 

The sky is very important to every culture’s mythology, because every culture can see the sky. Like, that’s literally it. People can see the sky. They tell stories about it. There’s not much to do at night except look at the sky, when even keeping a fire lit can be an expensive prospect. It is not even the least bit weird when multiple cultures–all of them in the northern hemisphere in this case!–have stories about the same stars.

Second: Cultures varied in their ability to faithfully reproduce celestial landmarks in art and align their architecture, and were not as exact as modern techniques can manage. Pseudoscience will claim that they are exact, when it fits their pre-existing theory, or fudge the difference if they want something to fit their claims.

(This is a photoshopped image, by the way.)

Were the stone age temples of Malta secretly aligned with a particular star that foretold the doom of Atlantis, precisely tracking its location through the sky over thousands of years of Earth’s axial wobbling? No! They were roughly aligned with the sun. Sunlight is important when you don’t have electric lights. Were the Great Pyramids of Giza laid out ten thousand years ago to match the layout of the stars in Orion’s Belt, according to the designs of a legendary lost race of highly advanced non-African people? Were they tapping into the Earth’s magnetic field to generate energy? No! They were aligned with the cardinal directions, and they got them a bit wrong! 

Hell, if we want to play at that game, I found a decent match for the asterism in Stellarium's Egyptian constellation set. Just flip this 90 degrees clockwise and you'll see I'm totally right. Aliens confirmed.

I know the movie is trying to tell me that all the asterisms in the art are precise matches for each other and are thus impossible to explain without intercultural contact (or aliens!!), but it is also showing me that they are not that precise. So, it’s just showing me stars. At least in some of them. Their little charcoal lad from the Isle of Skye may be throwing fruit at his audience.

In fact, there's a further, probably unintentional link to pseudohistorical claims in the artifacts presented: the Maya artifact shown does not actually depict a "giant figure" being worshiped, in fact, it shows one instantly recognizable, known figure in Classical Maya history: It is an altered version of the ornately carved coffin lid of Kʼinich Janaab Pakal I (24 March 603 - 29 August 683), with the top quarter of the carving replaced with a star pattern that looks nothing like the ones on the other artifacts.

The carving shows Pakal in the pose of an infant, entering into death and being reborn. It is packed full of so many symbolic elements that can be easily recognized by those more familiar with the Classical Maya than I am.

Conspiracy theorist Erich von Däniken thought that it showed Pakal rocketing away on a spaceship. Däniken proposed this because he didn't understand the cultural symbolism, but he had seen pictures of astronauts before.

And on that note, 2,400 words into this rant, we get to the actually bad shit. Unfortunately, it ties into the issue I had with the premise to begin with: the real-world context of pseudoscientific claims of ancient alien contact. Specifically, the racism.

We’re going to unspool this more near the end of the movie, because there was further behind the scenes I was not aware of when I first saw Prometheus, and it just compounds this stuff. 

So, when I went on my first tangent on how unpleasant ancient alien theories are, one thing I highlighted is that the further from Western Civilization you get, the more these theories presuppose that fellow humans are incapable of building great works or imagining interesting things. No, they had to be guided, and explicitly shown things that they copied down to the best of their limited capability.

The only european example of alien contact they show is from the Upper Paleolithic, 37,000 years ago. All the examples around the Mediterranean and Mesopotamia range from 5,500-3,700 years ago. The examples from the Classical Maya and Hawaiʻi are from 620 and 680 CE. 

During this period, Tang Dynasty merchants were creating the first paper money as the famous female emperor Wu Zetian was on her way to the throne. The Prophet Muhammad went to al-Aqsa mosque, and we’re only eight years before the birth of Charlemagne’s grandfather. We’re no longer talking ancient, it’s just old.

I want to emphasize that the movie is presenting these not as depictions of myths that have been passed down–though there are more problems with that I’ll get into shortly–these are implied to be contemporary depictions of events witnessed by the artists, who were quite possibly instructed by the Engineers to record a precise pattern of stars. An equivalency is being drawn between stone age Europe, bronze age Africa and the Middle East, and a couple of startlingly recent Mesoamerican and Polynesian cultures. 

But let’s be generous. Maybe these aren’t supposed to be contemporary accounts in these two outlier cases: the movie’s script will certainly indicate later that they have no idea what they’ve implied here. Perhaps these are story traditions that were handed down from the Olmecs and Melanesian precursors of the first to sail to Hawaiʻi. 

Unfortunately, this just recapitulates a different racist trope: that European and more “developed” civilizations invented so much cool and comfortable material culture and philosophy that they forgot the Mystical Religious Truths of the old ways, which were preserved only in Primitive Lands and among Uneducated Peoples, where they never found anything better to do with their time. Oh, if only we had heeded the warnings from those spiritually attuned non-white people!

(Look, I only remember Devil (2010), which has 50% on Rotten Tomatoes, because M Night Shyamalan wrote and produced it, and this was two years after The Happening came out, so I watched it out of morbid curiosity. It's not as unbelievably bad as The Happening, but as shown in the clip above, the spiritually attuned latino security guard Ramirez attributes toast landing jelly side down to Satan. That is an actual thing that happens in the movie. He is proven right.)

But let's be even more generous: someone probably realized that they'd focused near-exclusively on Middle Eastern cultures, and wanted to throw in a couple from elsewhere. Sitting here, having seen the movie in full, this is the most likely option: their inclusion creates a contradiction with a later scene, and was thus probably not checked for consistency. These cultures were thrown in as a bit of background flavor. I list this last, because in the theater, there was no way to know this at the time.

That answer's still not great. Still leaves us in the same position, where Europeans are pretty much given their own agency, while other cultures need to be led.

Oh, and to anyone else who’s made it this far and knows the production history of Prometheus: don’t worry! I know what Ridley Scott told that one interviewer, about a contact between a less-ancient European power and the Engineers. I’m saving that one. I like to save that one, because strategic deployment of that quote made some of my IRL friends scream.

Next time: the Prometheus descends to an alien world, and I descend further into madness. I am going to drag you all down with me.

(Pictured: Yuri Knorozov, and my present mood.)

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Citations for alt text ramblings:

https://www.almendron.com/artehistoria/arte/culturas/egyptian-art-in-age-of-the-pyramids/catalogue-fourth-dynasty/

[stationintern]

Drarry at Christmas! 🎄☃️

Thank you, @thehoneybeet + @lemonlimelea for tagging me! You know, I haven't really thought much about this before, but I can't wait to figure out how my variations of the boys spend Christmas! Lea's is here, and Honey's is here!

everybody knows to dance!

Luna and Ginny host an enormous Christmas, and Molly is a bit pissed that she's not hosting at the Burrow, until she accepts it and learns to relax as Luna takes the reins. Harry puts the finishing touches on a lawn chair he's made for them, before Draco drags him out of the shop. Lots of mulled wine, lots of cider. A healthy dose of alien-like dancing.

soft hands and glowing eyes

Fluffy spends the entire day trying to attack the Christmas tree. Harry threatens to withhold her presents while Draco makes excuses for her behavior, before making sure to sneak her a few extra treats.

author's note

Draco wakes up early to work on his manuscript without taking away from the day. It's an epilogue, of sorts, though he's not sure what it's about yet. They spend the day with their children- probing Luna about what she gets up to at university, and laughing until they're in tears when Scorpius gives Draco a bound copy of some very smutty fanfiction, involving the two main characters of his books. They feel a bit weird about it.

Better In The Dark (I'll Try Anything Once)

Draco and Hermione chat quietly in a corner about some recent developments in the WizTech world, her daughter asleep on his shoulder. Harry dozes on the couch with a glass of red he's been nursing for two hours at this point, content to watch them chatter on. The fire in the hearth bounces off of his hair, and when he catches Draco's eyes darting to him in a lust-filled panic, he's extraordinarily pleased.

Reverie

Scorpius finally returns home for school for a few weeks with a fun surprise for his fathers: a new girlfriend! Draco and Scorpius play piano side by side, while Harry talks shit about Jameson from work with Scorp's girl, who is genuinely very interested in the drama. All is right with the world.

__

This was so fun! I'm so glad I got to revisit these stories and roll them around in my brain again. I can't wait to get back to writing. Happy New Year!

[gayleviticus]

assorted thoughts on the two new doctor who episodes (spoilers below)

space babies

Weird concept but I think it worked. i dont think the token political allegory had a ton of depth but the stuff about stories is interesting enough i feel like i need to think abt it a little bit

my biggest issue is it feels like the doctor and ruby do a very jarring 180 on sparing the bogeyman at the end. like, i think in some ways it was predictable, but it happens so abruptly after they show zero concern for the bogeyman even knowing the truth of its origins I was super confused. like, i was just content to dismiss it as literally a pile of snot and not a living being.

ironically given the pro-choice vibes in the episode, this actually reminded me a little of kill the moon, where the episode doesn't spend any time actually fleshing out what the Bogeyman is, whether it has consciousness, its degree of sentience etc, the characters just decide killing is bad.

since this episode doesnt try to make a moral dilemma of it it feels less bad than kill the moon (altho I think unfair moral dilemma is a very deliberate choice on KtM's part to make you empathise w Clara aginst the Doctor) but I think it makes the 180 more baffling given the episode seems so uninterested in the Bogeyman as an actual being? if that makes sense?

the devil's chord

to be honest, while it was a fun watch at the time, this felt like an episode that ran out of ideas midway and the more I think about it the more I sour on it. at least scripting wise - i do think this was a very strong episode presentation wise!

Based on this and the Giggle I genuinely don't think RTD knows how to write godlike adversary; both these stories generally collapse into just 'godlike enemy hams it up and does goofy things while the doctor tries random stufff to save the day.' Like, as soon as Maestro turned up it felt as if the thread of narrative logic snapped and it just became a random events plot. And I felt the same with the Toymaker.

I think the issue is that these episodes overplay the power differential so much the Doctor doesn't have any kind of plan - but because these godlike entities like to toy w their victims it means neither the protagonist or antagonist are really driving the plot? i think the fact Maestro read as hammy rather than threatening also didn't help.

I also think these episodes don't set up clear enough rules. If you're going to have godlike aliens with gimmicks confronting the Doctor, the obvious appeal is that it's a story about manipulating the rules of the game to come out on top. It's like dealing with the Fey - or even Weeping Angels; the tension is in figuring out how to rules lawyer the godlike alien out of existence. But instead too much is made of the Doctor not knowing the rules and not attempting to discover the rules and it becomes boring. And if you take that aspect away what actually is the appeal of Doctor vs godlike alien?

They should have played devil went down to georgia during the music battle smh

The Beatles saving the day felt cheap, but it would have been incredibly cheap if they weren't real life people. Like can you imagine any other Doctor Who episode where one-off characters dismissed in the first 10 minutes save the day?

ngl while the ending song was fun and not lyrically terrible... it did feel like the lyrics were ironically the same kind of thing as the bad songs they were lampooning at the start of like, just perfunctorily rhyming random things together? idk. i guess it wasn't as pedestrian but i found it a bit funny

both

i feel like these episodes had a bit more of a return to a kind of procedural investigation format of Doctor Who - characters turn up to a new location and slowly have to piece together what's going on, the rules. which we also had previously in Wild Blue Yonder tbf, but i think it's interesting.

I like how there were moments where Ruby takes charge and says something a bit Doctorly - like when they enter the recording studio in devil's chord she says something like "Right, let's go!" and leads the way. It's a small touch but it just subtly chips away at the dynamic where the Doctor is always In Charge yknow?

Space Babies riffing on End of the World and Devil's Chord riffing on Pyramids of Mars for exposition scenes is perfectly justifiable (esp in the latter case given Pyramids of Mars is like 50 years old now), but I did definitely feel w those scenes that I'd seen it all before? Like, it's one thing to reuse a tropey scene because it's an efficient way of moving the story along, but I felt w both those scenes as soon as I knew what was going on I'd seen it all before. Nothing new. I could go to the toilet for a couple minutes

The magical realism is interesting (the handling of godlike beings aside) but i especially like the ideas of memories, songs hidden in Ruby's soul, and the snow appearing - that's very cool!

[longislandcharm]

TIMING: Early to Mid September, not long after the blue moon. LOCATION: The Wormhole PARTIES: @longislandcharm and @recoveringdreamer SUMMARY: A nice night out turns into a night of fear and suspicion when Winter starts to come to a conclusion about her new friend, Felix. CONTENT WARNINGS: Mentions of alcohol

She hadn’t been back to the wormhole much since her last stop in, Winter having been so busy that she didn’t have time for things like fun. Tonight was different though, tonight she was celebrating the end of a painful and eventful journey. Two of the nearly inedible drinks was enough to get her loosened up for the night, switching to water after so that she didn’t overdo it, and she was soon looking around the bar to see what could keep her entertained as her buzz took hold. 

The medium hadn’t been expecting to see a familiar face, her head tilting as she searched her mind for a name. Felix. That was it. They were the fidgety medium she’d met not long after getting to town. Lunch with them was the same as their initial meeting, Winter trying to ask more questions about what they could do as mediums before she gave up after getting nothing from them. Maybe now that she had some answers though she could be the one to share the knowledge if they wanted to know more about what they could do. Lil was a great teacher and while she didn’t have a ton of answers Winter knew more now than she had during her first encounter with Felix.

She grabbed her water, making her way over to their table and setting the glass down. She didn’t even bother asking if the seat was taken, Winter would have sat down anyway even if they were with a friend. Again, in this person’s presence, a weird feeling came over her. But she ignored it for the time being. “Long time no see, friend. Can I get you another drink?” 

This wasn’t the type of bar Felix would normally haunt. It was seedy, it was too close to work, it was full of a lot of different smells and sounds that the jaguar disliked. But they’d been so restless lately, unable to sit still at all. Going from constant fights and nonstop action to a whole lot of nothing while their injuries from the fight with Razor healed enough for them to return to the ring wasn’t doing their mental health a lot of favors.

So… they figured they’d try something new. The Wormhole wasn’t their usual kind of place, but maybe all those sounds and smells would tire the jaguar out a bit, make him quiet enough for Felix to catch up on sleep. Maybe a few drinks would help with that. 

Or… maybe it’d just stress them out more.

They spotted her from across the bar, recognized her immediately. Hard to forget a medium when you’d been taught to fear them all your life, after all. Immediately, Felix tensed. It wasn’t fair, of course. Winter had been perfectly friendly, and they’d even enjoyed lunch with her in spite of all the stress, but they couldn’t shake that old anxiety their father had planted in their head. They kind of just… hoped she wouldn’t notice them. But, of course, those hopes were dashed. She spotted him and made her way over, and Felix squirmed just a little in their seat. “Hey, Winter,” they greeted. “Um, nice to see you. I — I should probably limit myself to just the one drink, actually. I’m, uh… I don’t drink often.” There was no way he was getting drunk with a medium, no matter how nice she was.

“I can respect that.” She nodded to accentuate the words, knowing that’s why she cut herself off after two of her own. Even if she was feeling pretty good at the moment she never liked getting too far gone to be out of control and Winter just assumed that was the same for them. “I usually wouldn’t have more than one either but this…has been a rough couple of weeks.” And she’d needed something to make her feel like the world wasn’t spinning on without her. In fact, she was dangerously close to ordering another for herself but refrained since she was in the presence of someone else. She needed friends, not to alienate more people. 

Which was the reason she hadn’t brought up this weird feeling she got around Felix yet. It occurred to her that she never felt this around Lil who was the only other medium she’d met but both times she’d been around them there was an instinctual pull in her gut. Winter’s mind was begging her to ask what this was about but for once in her life she was trying to fight the questions threatening to spill from her lips. They probably wouldn’t know what she was talking about anyway, they didn’t seem to have many answers last time. 

Winter glanced over at Henry who was eyeing Felix curiously before she concentrated on the water in front of her instead. Her ghost seemed to realize that Winter was holding something back, something he’d never seen her do before, and it was clear he wanted to know why. “What have you been up to since our last encounter?” Generic. It was so generic but she couldn’t think of anything else. Normally she was so good at small talk too. “How was that blue moon for you?”

A rough couple of weeks. Felix could certainly relate to that. Their arm still ached beneath their sleeve, the wound stitched and tightly bandaged to avoid any kind of infection but still painful even with the time that had passed. The scar would be an impressive one; with a sizable chunk missing from the flesh, they doubted it would ever heal correctly. But the Grit Pit didn’t exactly offer a health insurance plan, and the healers they had on site would only do so much for the fighters. They had to save their energy, after all, had to ensure that they could help everyone. Felix got that. 

Still, they wondered what kind of ‘roughness’ Winter had been dealing with. It was so much easier to ask that question than it was to dwell on their own string of bad events, even if the medium still made him uneasy. “Uh, I hope you’re… okay,” they offered, a little uncertain. Were they friends? It seemed ludicrous to even ask, but it wasn’t as if Winter knew they were a balam. Given how little she seemed to understand about spirits, Felix was unsure she’d even know what a balam was. She was nice to them, though. That had to count for something.

She was glancing around, and Felix assumed that meant the ghost was here. They weren’t shifted enough to see it, didn’t dare try to change that in a bar full of people, especially not with Winter so close. She may not have noticed the slitted pupils that came with shifting his eyes enough to see ghosts out in the streets, but she’d probably pick up on it here. At her question, though, he quickly glanced away. “Work stuff,” they mumbled, arm burning. “Uh, it got — really busy. Around the full moon. It always does, but this was… I don’t know. Worse, I guess.”

She felt her lips lift up into a half-hearted smile with their words, her heart swelling just a smidgen. It wasn’t something that Winter would admit but she always appreciated when others showed their concern even if she didn’t want it at the time. It meant that despite her attitude and her brash comments they still somewhat cared and that…was nice. With her two drinks in her system, she was more willing to show that appreciation. 

“I am…now.” She paused, her mind going to the night of the full moon when she really didn’t know what was going to happen. Luckily, things had worked out and in hindsight she felt she had been a bit dramatic with it all but at the time she’d been certain that things had been bad. “Just…you know, abilities going haywire. It was weird. Still don’t know why.” Winter tapped the side of her glass, wondering if they had experienced the same thing she had. It had been almost a full week of the voices attacking her at all angles, not to mention the images flashing in her vision and she was still a little shaken from it all. “You didn’t have any issues?”

But maybe they had. The way that Felix had turned their gaze away, how careful they seemed with their words, it was something that sparked Winter’s interest as usual. She sat up a little, still ignoring that pull in her gut while she pushed forward with the conversation. “I’ve always heard the full moon could mess with people in weird ways but never really thought much of it…until coming here, anyway. I hope you don’t work at a hospital, I bet that place was hectic.” Fishing had always been one of her many talents when she wasn’t feeling too bold but tonight she wasn’t able to resist getting straight to the point. “What is it that you do? For work, I mean. Why was it so crazy?”

Was whatever had happened with the full moon affecting mediums as much as it had affected shifters? Felix had felt strange for days, the jaguar far more restless in their chest than it usually was. And they hadn’t understood it. The moon had never affected their shift before. It was something their family had taken pride in, something they figured other balam probably used as a bragging right as well. Werewolves were ruled by the moon, but balam were gods. The moon had no power over them, no hold. But it had, during the blue moon. Everything had been so loud, so bright, so strange. They wondered if their family, wherever they’d run off to, had felt it too.

Maybe it was… nice, knowing for a fact that other people had. That Felix wasn’t broken, somehow. Winter wasn’t a balam, but she’d still felt something strange with the second full moon of the month, and it made Felix feel a little less alone. So when they replied, they replied with honesty. “Yeah. Yeah, I definitely had issues. It was… weird. The moon’s never made me feel different before.” A risky confession, considering he had no idea whether or not the moon affected mediums and he was still pretending to be one, but it seemed safe enough. As far as Felix knew, the only ones really affected by the moon’s pull were the wolves.

But maybe they were wrong. Winter said she’d heard that the full moon messed with people, but Felix had never gotten such warnings. Their father had only ever talked about the moon in relation to werewolves, because their father had always had a problem with tunnel vision. Did mediums have similar effects? It was too late to take their words back now, in any case. Just like it was too late to avoid talking about his job, because of course she’d ask where he worked. Felix looked down at their lap, shrugging a shoulder. “Uh, I work at an MMA gym in Worm Row. We have fight nights and stuff. And like you said, the full moon always makes people crazy.” It was mostly true, at least. Just… a little misleading.

”So, you think it was the moon?“ Yea, she had mentioned it, but mostly in connection to the fun notion that the full moon made people do crazy things. It was something Winter had heard a lot while growing up, her own mother such a supporter of the notion. ”Be careful tonight, it's a full moon. You know people do stupid stuff around this time.“ The voice of Sharon Hall echoed in her mind and she smiled softly, the sudden ache of homesickness now pulling at her along with the weird feeling from before. ”The Blue moon, right? Someone was talking about it before but I didn't think it could...do what it did. It's starting to make sense though.” Maybe it was what caused such hell for her, and apparently others. The idea of it affecting her so much was a little scary though. “It's never done that to me either. Not even after the abilities really manifested themselves.”

She raised an eyebrow as Felix spoke of his job, the girl giving him an incredulous smile. They worked for the fight club? The one that the rando online tried to lure her to? “Wait, wait...the name, is that the uh..” She was reaching back to that conversation she'd had with the other person, not entirely confident when she spoke the name aloud. “ The Bit Pit? No, that's not right. Grit maybe?” That smile was still plastered on her face as she shook her head, Winter not sure what to think of this. “I never thought you would be a fighter. You give off more of the 'lover' vibe I guess...no offense. Some guy invited me to the fight on the night of the full moon but I was a little...too incapacitated to show up. I also thought it was a little sketchy but that's beside the point. Did I miss you fighting that night?“ 

If so, Winter would be highly disappointed. With Felix's docile demeanor it would have been very interesting to see them take someone on in a ring. She couldn't even imagine them having any sort of temperament for them to be able to do that. ”Maybe I can show up at the next one. You'll have to let me know when it is.“

“I don’t know. Maybe? I know a lot of people were acting weird.” They tried not to think about the fight with Razor, about how much more brutal it had been than most. Other fighters who’d been scheduled for the Blue Moon fights hadn’t gotten as lucky as Felix, who’d managed to walk away with only a chunk of flesh missing from their arm and a few other injuries to speak of. They heard that at least one fighter hadn’t made it out at all, with one of the Grit Pit’s staff members bragging that the payout from the match had been legendary. Felix tried not to read into it too much, tried not to put much thought to it at all. It was so much easier that way. “It was a Blue Moon, yeah. Um, they’re supposed to be really rare, so I guess they have… more of a kick to them. Or something. I don’t really know.” They felt some relief in knowing that they hadn’t misspoken, that the moon didn’t usually affect mediums any more than it did balam. They weren’t looking to blow their ‘cover,’ even if they were very bad at maintaining it.

She knew about the Grit Pit? Anxiety pulled at their gut again. If she had shown up at the Pit that night, she would have seen them fighting… but not like this. Felix only ever fought in a shifted state. Never fully shifted, granted, but never fully human, either. If she saw them like that, she’d know. And a medium knowing about them was one of the most terrifying things they could imagine. For the first time, they began to wonder about the audience at the Pit. Were there hunters in the stands, taking notes? Exorcists making plans? Their heart was pounding so intently that they nearly missed Winter’s next question. “Huh? Oh. Um, yeah. I — Yeah. I fight sometimes. Um, it’s not really — I wouldn’t, um, recommend going, though. It’s kind of intense. Not much fun, I think.”

They hoped it would be enough to dissuade her. Truth be told, Winter’s status as a medium wasn’t the only reason Felix didn’t want her in the stands. They didn’t want her thinking differently of them, either. They didn’t want her to see them the way they were in a fight, half feral and brutal. In spite of everything, in spite of their own fear, Felix liked Winter. They really did.

“It’s kind of scary knowing it can affect even us.” It made sense though. It was the week leading up to it when all of her problems started and the night of the actual full moon had been the worst for her. Now that it was over Winter had been slowly getting back to normal. Knowing something so out of her control could throw her so out of sync wasn’t the easiest pill to swallow and for a moment she was lost in thought about it, the medium swirling the water in her cup around. So many people had been acting out of sorts that week, it didn’t seem too out of the ordinary for her abilities to go haywire as well, right? 

Before she could dwell on it further, Felix was confirming his status at this fight club and her interest in the Blue Moon waned. She’d go back to it later, right now she couldn’t help her desire to know more about their career choices. “Not fun? Why do you do it then? I can’t imagine fighting for a living if I wasn’t passionate about it.” As often as Winter talked to them around town and online she was still very aware that she didn’t know Felix’s story. There could have been a million reasons for them to do what they did and she was always one to pry, especially when something felt off. The more she learned about them, the better her chances were of finding out why she got this nagging in her gut when they were around. 

A nagging that was suddenly getting worse. Out of the corner of her eye, Winter saw Henry sidle up to the table, done with whatever he’d been trying to get into, and it suddenly hit her that this feeling she got around Felix was the same one she always had around the ghost, or any ghost for that matter. She’d never noticed it before because Henry hadn’t been away from her side when Felix was around and, well, she’d been too wrapped up in her own problems to really put the pieces together. But with the two of them now in such close proximity to her it was obvious that they were both causing it to be stronger than usual. Eyes lifting back to Felix, Winter made sure to keep her expression neutral but she was doing her best to watch for anything weird going on. Why would Felix give her the same feeling that Henry did when they were most definitely not a ghost? 

“I mean, unless you always win or something. Are you that fighter that no one can touch?” It was best to keep them talking, not let on to what was going on in her mind. Winter didn’t want to spook them. But she did look at her phone for a second to text a question to someone who could help get the answers to the questions running through her mind.

“Yeah,” Felix agreed, and it didn’t feel like as much of a lie as the rest of the conversation because this was a thing they thought might be true for everyone. Werewolves understood that the moon had an effect on them. It was part of the deal when you were born or bitten, part of the package. But it wasn’t supposed to be that way for anyone else. Not for mediums, and not for balam, either. Having the rules change on you so suddenly was a scary thing, no matter what rules you were used to playing by. 

She asked about the Pit, about why they did something they hated, and part of Felix wanted to tell the truth. Part of Felix always wanted to tell the truth, wanted to scream from the rooftops just how exploitative the Grit Pit was so that no one else would ever fall under its spell. But that wasn’t something they could do. No matter how much they wanted to, no matter how much they wished it, there was that pesky clause in their contract that prevented them from hurting the Pit’s business. Felix could find ways around it, did find ways around it sometimes, but never without consequence. Never without pain. Best to save that sort of thing for people more likely to be taken advantage of; the Pit had little interest in humans, even humans who saw ghosts. “I just, uh… need the money,” they lied. “And I’m not really… good? At anything else.” That was… less of a lie, actually. Felix had so few marketable skills and no real education to speak of. Even without the contract tying them to the Pit, their options were always going to be limited.

Winter looked at something behind them, and it occurred to Felix that her ghost was probably here. They didn’t dare shift their eyes to confirm, too afraid that even the slightest change would be picked up on in such close proximity. It was good to know that the ghost was around, though; if Felix was going to keep pretending to be a medium to keep her from growing suspicious towards the truth, it was best to know when there was a ghost they were supposed to be seeing even if their eyes weren’t in the right state to catch it.

They shrugged, tapping their fingers against the bar. “I win most of the time.” Unless they were going against one of the real heavy hitters on an off night, Felix typically walked away victorious. It was why the Pit kept such a tight hold on them. They were an asset, Leo told them once; the kind no one in their right mind would let walk out the door. It wasn’t a good thing to be.

“I bet you’re better at some things than you realize.” Lying could be considered as one of those things but Winter was starting to wonder if she just sucked at reading people around here. It had been easy back home, back in LA, but for some reason she couldn’t quite get a read on a lot of them around here. Maybe it was because, like she’d noticed before, she was too wrapped up in her own thing to notice when someone was deceiving her. The irony was, Wicked’s Rest was where she needed the lie detection the most. 

Looking back on it, Felix wasn’t that great at covering things up. She’d thought that her aggressive approach had been what spooked them last time but now she wondered if maybe it was because they didn’t want to get caught up in their own story they were spinning to her. Nerves had taken over them, at one point they had looked like they were on the brink of a panic attack. Why were they so worked up when they spoke to her? 

Things were starting to click now. Winter had thought that maybe they were just weird in their own way but it was starting to seem like something else, especially now that she realized they gave her that same feeling a ghost did. “Most of the time is way better than never. I’d like to see one of your fights, when are you up next?”

Another glance at her phone gave her a confirmation of something she’d needed to ask them the question that was on the tip of her tongue. Winter took a sip of her drink before she gave them a serious look, no joking tone or her usual sarcasm in sight. “I have to ask you something and I don’t want you to think I’m…being dumb or whatever.” Nerves were being added to that now familiar pull in her stomach but she pushed on despite not knowing if they would even admit to this if it were true. “Are you…possessed or something?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Probably not.” They’d always struggled with new things. It took Felix months to perfect skills that took other people mere weeks to accomplish. Even the fighting, which they were good at, was probably more the jaguar than it was Felix. The spirit inside of them knew how to use his claws and his teeth on instinct, and some of that instinct bled through. But Felix, on their own? They’d never been very good at anything at all.

The idea of Winter coming to watch one of their fights made them anxious for a thousand different reasons, not the least of which being that it would be impossible to keep up the lie that they were another medium if she saw them in a fight. Mediums didn’t have claws, or cat eyes, or tails, or spots. Mediums didn’t fight in a way so animalistic that it scared people. Mediums didn’t rip their opponents to shreds. If she saw them in the ring, she’d know they were lying. Maybe she’d know enough to know what they were. Maybe she’d be so angry about the lie that she’d decide to do something about it.

A familiar panic rose up in their chest, and Felix shook his head quickly. “Oh, no, you — You wouldn’t want that. To come watch. It’s — I mean, the crowds are really rough, and it’s loud, and there are a lot of ghosts there who — Who died in a lot of bad ways, and it’s pretty overwhelming, is all. And, you know, the fights are really violent, and not much fun to watch unless you’re the kind of person who likes watching people get hurt, and I don’t think you’re that kind of person.” The words all tumbled out quickly, fumbling together with a nervous undertone.

Their heart was still pounding as she continued, palms sweating with anticipation. She needed to ask them something? That wasn’t good. That couldn’t be good. Felix shifted uncomfortably in their chair, eyes darting towards the door. When she spoke, it wasn’t something he wanted to hear. The answer was yes. Of course the answer was yes. Not in the way she meant it, but what was a balam if not a person born possessed? The spirit within him wasn’t a human one, wasn’t one that operated the way a human spirit would, but it was a spirit all the same. And someone like Winter, they’d been taught, might want to separate them from it because of that. Abruptly, Felix scrambled to their feet. “Actually, I — I forgot, I have plans! With a friend. Somewhere else! I should really get going, haha!”

“I think you should have more faith in yourself, Felix.” If she was anything, Winter was an advocate for self confidence. There was always something for people to be proud of in their lives, even something they might think is miniscule in comparison to what others could boast, and she wished that people could grasp onto those things and run with them. It’s what she’d had to do her whole life with the belittling her mother had always done to her whether Sharon was aware she was doing it or not. But it was a skill that had to be honed and all Winter could do was try to encourage everyone to work towards it. 

Besides, she was aware that she was making them nervous again, that much was obvious with how hard they were trying to dissuade her from the fights and the way their words stumbled over each other. Why did the mention of her going to see them in the ring cause so much anguish when they were the one winning most of the time? She was no stranger to violence these days and Winter was about to say as much but they jumped up from their chair before she could.

“Wait, Felix.” She hadn’t meant to scare them off but that’s exactly how they looked; terrified. She’d definitely hit a nerve there and it pretty much confirmed that something was going on with a spirit. But as Winter was continuing to learn the more time she spent in Wicked’s Rest, she knew nothing about the supernatural and how it worked. Did mediums get possessed often? Was it something that was allowed or was it frowned upon and that’s why they were afraid? She stood from her chair, not exactly blocking them from leaving but grabbing onto their forearm to get their attention. “Look, I promise, I’m not judging you or anything. I just-” She paused, trying to figure out how to explain this and not scare them anymore. “That feeling we get when a ghost is around, it intensifies every time you're near me and I got curious. Are you okay?”

“I think I have… the right amount of faith in myself,” Felix replied. They kept their tone light, like it was funny. Like they were joking rather than being honest. Other people deserved to have confidence, deserved to believe in themselves, but Felix? They didn’t feel they were much worth believing in. After all, what had they ever done but let people down? Their father, their siblings, even Leo had wound up disappointed after thinking Felix was something they weren’t. And weren’t they ensuring that Winter was set up for that same disappointment? This entire friendship was built on a lie that Felix had facilitated, this idea that they were the same as her, that she’d found someone who understood. They had exactly the right amount of faith in themself, and that amount was very little. They didn’t deserve anything more.

And now, every desperate word tumbling from their tongue was a frantic attempt to prevent Winter from discovering this. They didn’t want her at the Grit Pit, didn’t want the truth of their dishonesty laid bare for her to see. They were afraid of what she might do, sure — that old fear of exorcists and mediums was so ingrained in them now that it felt impossible to shake entirely — but they were afraid of what she might think, too. Of the disappointment that would come with the revelation. 

Winter stood with them, and Felix worried that their heart might burst with how frantically it was beating. She grabbed their arm and they stilled, turning to face her with wild eyes that they just barely managed to keep from flashing yellow as the jaguar sensed their desperation. “I…” They could be honest with her here if they wanted to. They could admit to the lie, they could tell her the truth and face whatever came with it. But that fear in their gut churned violently, and anything resembling the truth got stuck behind their teeth. “I’m okay,” they said quietly. “I promise, I’m okay. It’s not — It isn’t anything you need to worry about. I’m good, I swear.” 

It seemed very much like they had something they wanted to say to her, laying in wait underneath their surface ready to be released at any moment, but it seemed that Felix wasn’t ready yet. Truthfully, Winter didn’t know if she was either. What would she even do if she found out they were possessed? She could tell Lil, throw them to the exorcist and see what came of it, but…she didn’t want to if it meant they would get hurt in any way. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, Winter really was starting to care about Felix. They were a light in a town full of darkness, a light that she knew she needed in her life every now and then, and much like the other lights in this town she didn’t want to do anything to dim them.

So, she took their words for truth even with the voice in the back of her mind calling bullshit. It went against everything she stood for, and it took a lot for her to let it go, but she did. Slowly, the medium took her hand off their arm, now more conscious that she had been holding onto them, and took a step back. “Okay, I’ll trust you. But if you ever….you know…well, you know. I’m here.” 

After a deep breath, her composure was back. She put on a smile, made her way back to her seat, and gestured for them to join her once more. “You don’t have to go if you don’t want to. The seat is open.” But she wouldn’t blame them if they left. She had spooked them again, something she was very good at apparently, and Winter herself would have walked away annoyed. Her focus went to the drink sitting in front of her despite how empty it was, leaving Felix to make whatever decision was best for them.

She dropped their arm, she took a step back, and Felix hated themself a little for the relief that flooded them. Winter was their friend, wasn’t she? She’d given them no indication that she wanted to do anything more than help them. But… Sometimes, people thought they were helping and they weren’t. Sometimes, the most damage was done by someone who thought they were doing what was right. Felix knew that better than most.

Still, they offered her a smile. “I know,” they said, and they did. They knew that she was there for them. Maybe that was part of what scared them. If she got the idea in her head that the jaguar was a bad thing… They shook the thought away. No need to worry before there was something to worry about; for all Winter knew, Felix was just another medium who was a bit peculiar. They could keep pretending that.

They looked to the open seat, hesitating a moment before settling back into it. “Maybe just one more drink,” they agreed, offering her a small smile. There were worse ways to spend the evening.

[rpgsandbox]

The Best Selling Hit RPG from 1985 is Back!

This Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness Kickstarter campaign features a relaunch of the original TMNT role-playing game and sourcebooks, sought-after collector items that have enthralled generations since their release in 1985 as one of the first licensed TMNT products. 

They are returning to print as two, officially licensed, deluxe hardcover collections of the RPG and all sourcebooks. Each is completely remastered, includes rules clarifications, and is updated to full color. Bonus material includes an array of new artwork, never-before-seen behind-the-scenes info and art, remembrances, and tributes by renowned comic book and RPG creators Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird, Freddie E. Williams II, Sophie Campbell, Jim Lawson, Ciro Nieli, David Petersen, Steven Cummings, Ramon K. Perez, and many more.

From Kevin Eastman, TMNT Co-Creator

This is incredibly exciting! I am 1000% onboard to help bring this historic and original TMNT Role-Playing Game series back in a truly deluxe collector’s edition that will thrill original fans and open the door for new ones. 

I've made all my archives available for expanded behind-the-scenes content as well as a few top secret surprises you need to be part of. Stay tuned! 

What is the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness RPG?

CREATE YOUR MUTANT - Mutate your own hero (or anti-hero) from a wide variety of urban, rural, and wild animals from birds to exotic zoo animals. Train them up with a variety of skills, combat experience, weapons, cool gear, and even psychic powers!

EXPLORE - Shrouded in secrecy is a hidden world of mutants, robots, aliens, time travel, and even passages to other dimensions. While their existence is kept secret from the public, the deep lore of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - and other strangeness - awaits fans old and new to experience firsthand.

ADVENTURE - Visit the back alleys, sewers, and dark recesses of metropolises like New York City, or travel to faraway exotic dimensions. Get caught up in mayhem and foil plots to destroy the neighborhood, the world, or even stop an alien invasion. The choice is yours, and so are the weird friends and rewards that await. Each book contains easy-to-run adventure scenarios as well as plot hooks to keep your own story arc fresh for years.

DISCOVER - The familiar cast of the TMNT are joined by unique potential allies, enemies, and frenemies to add to the RPG lore. These characters, originally illustrated in 1985 by Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird, and others, have never appeared again in the TMNT comics, cartoons, movies, or video games. The Terror Bears, Caesar's Weasels, Doc Feral, and more will delight new and old readers and gamers alike with their memorable antics, crazy origins, and unique motivations. Learn their schemes and grand plans for the future of mutantkind and decide - will you help them or work against them?

Originally released in 1985, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness role-playing game books were created using typewriters, paste-up boards, and lots of handcrafted skill.

REMASTERED TEXT: Palladium Books' archives of these titles - the original boards sent to printers for printing - have been painstakingly scanned at high resolution, cleaned up visually, edited for typos, and updated with new content and rules clarifications.

ART UPGRADE: We are pleased to say that the high-resolution scans have the art looking sharper than ever and presented in glorious full color for the first time by top colorists like Michael Majestic, Jeremy Colwell, Luis Antonio Delgado, and more. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness looks more stunning than ever before!

FRESH CLEAN BOOK: When combined with advances in digital printing, modern digital layout software has also allowed us to refresh the look of the books while staying true to their classic presentation. Each book will have a back index and other tweaks to make the contents easy to navigate and enjoy.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles  & Other Strangeness Redux Edition

This 256 page full color reissue contains the following remastered with modern layout:

NEW Homage Cover Art by Freddie E. Williams II, with color by Michael Majestic.

The classic 1985 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness core RPG book. Now in full color.

The Turtles Go Hollywood adventure book. Now in full color.

The Truckin' Turtles adventure book. Now in full color.

Featuring 8 pages of original comics created for the RPG by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird. Now in full color.

Featuring 35 original mutant animal illustrations for the RPG by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird. Now in full color.

Featuring all-new rules for creating 5 new mutant animals (the Gecko, Great White Shark, Ring-Tailed Lemur, Penguin, and Alligator Snapping Turtle) with one or more illustrated by Sophie Campbell, plus a new "Feral" hand-to-hand combat style for mutants who grew up in the wild, and an equipment chapter updated with modern gear not available in 1985. 

The Redux Edition includes the classic rules clarified and updated to provide ease of play for fans old and new alike. 

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles  Transdimensional Adventures Redux Edition

This 256 page full color reissue contains the following remastered with modern layout:

NEW Homage Cover Art by Freddie E. Williams II, with color by Michael Majestic.

The fan favorite Transdimensional TMNT sourcebook with rules for creating humanoid mutant dinosaurs and prehistoric mammals like the saber-toothed tiger and mastodon. Plus fan-favorite easy to use time travel rules, magic, and more! Now in full color.

The TMNT Guide to the Universe sci-fi sourcebook and adventure supplement with weird aliens, high-tech gear, and rules for creating futuristic craft and piloting them in dogfights!  Now in full color.

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures the best selling TMNT RPG adventure book with memorable villains and dastardly plots. Now in full color.

Featuring 10 pages of original comics created for these sourcebooks by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird. Now in full color.

Featuring 33 original mutant animal illustrations created for these sourcebooks by Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird, and Jim Lawson. Now in full color.

BOTH BOOKS INCLUDE ADDED TRIBUTES AND MAKING-OF FEATURES

NEW full-page artwork by comic and RPG artists including Kevin Eastman, Jim Lawson, Freddie E. Williams II, Sophie Campbell, Ciro Nieli, Ben Bishop, David Petersen, Ramon K. Perez, Steven Cummings, and many more including RPG legend Larry Elmore!

NEW never-before-seen behind-the-scenes information and art, plus remembrances and tributes by renowned TMNT creatives including Kevin Eastman, Jim Lawson, Freddie E. Williams II, Ciro Nieli, Sophie Campbell, Kevin Siembieda, and others including writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber.

Kickstarter campaign ends: Wed, November 29 2023 4:59 AM UTC +00:00

Website: [Palladium Books] [facebook] [twitter] [instagram]

[lady-of-the-spirit]

☔ (for wip ask game)

☔Is there a fic concept you have that you'd like to just explain and share because you're not sure you'll ever write it? If so, what is it?

I have Several fics I'm not sure I'll ever write on rotation in my mind. But there's this Doctor Who fic idea I've had for ages now. And the premise is essentially that NONE of the Doctor's modern companions are human. or at least not like, human in the way the Doctor thinks they are. And the Doctor never realizes it until the companion actually tells them or they find out through other circumstances. (rest under the cut because I got very ranty.)

For instance, Rose is (obviously) a werewolf. She gets the werewolf gene from her dad, who was also a werewolf. She's had it drilled into her head by Jackie (understandably protective of her daughter) that she can't tell people, so she doesn't tell the Doctor. Rose starts to figure out how the werewolf and full moon thing works when she's in space and once she's got it all worked out, she figures out how to keep track of the days and keep herself hidden in the TARDIS or at home until it's over. The Bad Wolf symbols have even more meaning to her. Until, of course, the Tooth and Claw episode, where things go a little better because the werewolf alien has a real life werewolf to play with/fight.

Martha is an actual star - a star that fell to earth and gained human form, like in Stardust. She finds herself with a family on earth and since she has no idea how to get back to the sky, she's content - sort of - with making a life on earth. But there's still that yearning for home, for her sisters in the sky. When the Doctor - and she's heard his name, heard his song in the universe since time began - offers to take her through time and space, she agrees, figuring this will be the closest she can get to returning home. everything goes as normal, the Doctor doesn't know, until episode 42 - when she can hear the screams of her sister star, can speak to the host inside the human bodies without burning, and figures out what's happening much sooner than the Doctor does.

Donna was a normal human - in Ancient Britain, before the Romans invaded. At some point, she was in an accident - she got killed. And then came back to life, no longer able to age or die. Since then, well, her life's been a long, long series of events. A few generations ago, she had a son, who gave her a grandson she adores, who had a daughter, and no matter how critical her great-granddaughter is, she loves Sylvia as much as she loves Wilf, and she's willing to put on a charade of the annoying daughter to stick around them for a while longer. Of course she's heard of the Doctor, although she's never met him her other immortal friends have, but becoming besties with him and traveling to the stars was not expected. But traveling to the stars - she's felt like she's seen it all, but there's suddenly more to see? Sign her up! The Doctor thinks she's just weirdly passionate about obscure historical details and a little spacey on modern things, and things don't get revealed until the metacrisis - when instead of her brain exploding, it heals on its own, though it does take a little more time than normal because it's such a weird situation for her human body. The Doctor is freaking the fuck out the whole time.

Companions past 10's are when it gets a little more vague because I know less about it. Someone in the Donna/Doctor discord suggested Amy's a fae - the importance of names and all of that - and I like the idea. Rory is another immortal like Donna, although a little more timey-wimey. He gets killed like in canon, on his adventures with Amy and the Doctor. But he gets thrown into the vortex back to Roman times, and wakes up to find himself immortal. From there he's following mostly canon events, with some tweaks. He definitely meets Donna, and they're immortal besties. I don' t know at all about Clara or Bill, or 13's companions.

So yeah as you can see from the above 4 whole paragraphs of text I've thought about this plenty. I don't know what'll ever happen to it. But it's on my mind.

wip ask game!

[squishysoftmonsters]

Triggers : Sexual Content/Themes [Mature +18 Minors/Ageless DNI]

💚TD Master Post💚

💚Stranger as it can get! 💚

You were still asleep with the alien,in the spoon position,his rainbow penis still inside. Homesick,as traveling to another planet on your own is scary,but finding this cat boy was a blessing,in a weird way. You slowly awoke,trying not wake your friend.

Looking out the window while rubbing your eyes,the said creature producing this sound to signify morning on this planet,a rooster with bulging eyes. It's wake up sound was the combined screech of a chimpanzee and hooting owl.

You : [groggily] What the..

Alien : [yawning] Just a few more minutes..

You : That creepy chimpanzee owl is staring at me! Shoo!

However,the strange rooster continued to stare as you covered yourself,finally walking away once you tied the robe. Gently you roused your alien friend as he further curled into the quilt you both shared.

You : You have to wake. I don't know my way around here.

Alien : [groans] Okay.

He removed the covers and sat up,his john unsheathed now yellow and hard. Your eyes unknowingly drifting to it,feeling your face flush.

Alien : [groans]Yeah..Waking up hard is daily for me..

You chortled

You : [chortles]Put that thing away.

Alien : [dramatically] The cup monsters have sapped my penis powers..And only a kiss could restore it. Is there anyone willing?

He played dead and you laughed at him as he opened an eye to see if you'd budge. You knelt down,putting it against your face.

You : Just once.

You began massaging it.

Alien : I said a kiss! Wait!

Out of fear he tucked it back in.

You : [laughing] I knew I could make you put it away.

Alien : You see,the thing about my kind is when we nut..Its run over a full mayonaise bottle mess.

You : Can you show me?

You bit your lip and began tracing his genital slit and sticking your tongue inside to stimulate him,hoping he'd unsheath it again.

Alien : [nervously]Pretty sure there's a mini game or ride that lets us jizz for prizes. I mean,this IS Horny Disneyland. Anything is possible.

The Alien went to go shower,for another day of Otherworldly Disneyland's rides and attractions. He was whistling Dies Irae while showering,you leaning by the door enjoying how perfectly it came out from his lips.

You joined him in the shower of course.

Alien : [purrs]Look who came in to join me,someone very dirty. Come here. [growls]

His sudsy body against yours,he began to wash you from behind,massaging your body with the honey smelling soap while kissing your neck. A brief huff came from your lips his endowment slithering into you,gentle rocks following after,and a gasp feeling the tenderness of his fingers and hands over your chest.

The thought of "Im having sex with an oversized cat" stood fast in the walls of your mind,the deeper he went. Even though you barely knew him,you liked being with him

His purrs rippled through your neck as your bodies now mushed against the shower wall. You became crosseyed in between drooling and huffing once he picked up the pace on his rocks,tapping your insides perfectly,body trembling and shivering in delight.

Walking around naked was normal and getting hard rawed into the afterlife by intergalactic cats at any time was also normal. So you'd probably tell your parents you're moving out when you return to Earth.

Forget time to wake up for school. Time to wake and get pounded. Nothing like getting your holes pumped on the kitchen floor and running with extraterrestrial jizz in the morning. You moan,gasp and scream for more as the rocks became thrusts,thrusts making you weak,slowly falling onto the anti slip mat bent over..

Alien : [purring] Do you like it?

You : [breathlessly] Yes..

It was like the heavens opened up and the gods above came to take you away,feeling two other penises fit inside your waiting gape. Bent over doggy style,you didnt want this moment to end.

In the haze,your friend had two tails,these two tails deep inside,pleasuring you to the brink of no return. Feeling like a keg ready to blow at the climax of happiness,You cried aloud in orgasm,he behind yours. Through the vent you heard a woman doing just about the same. Apparently rubbing one out in the hotel bathrooms was normal here too. You panted and gasped,exhausted as bioluminescent jizz ran down your back.

Awhile after a good rest..A normal shower began. Both washed,teeth brushed,robed and ready for more of Twisted Disneyland's offers.

You : What was..[blushes]

Alien : Uh yeah..that. Let's leave that alone.

You : But..

Alien : [clears throat]

You : We should uh

The lady who had an intimate session walked past you and your friend. Both you and the Alien now outside..

Alien : There HAS to be a jizz for prizes ride.

You nudged your friend.

You : Is that pineapple the mini game?

Alien : That's not exactly a pineapple..With a name like The Mandingo Shake Shack I'm sure that's the mini game.

You both took quite a walk to the huge questionable pineapple structure. Your friend could'nt translate the instructions for you as he was laughing so hard.

You : [chortling] What's so funny?

Alien : [catching his breath] The instructions says,how big of a dick shake can you serve to these lucky men and women given 20 minutes?

You : [laughter] What?!

Alien : [laughing]This is the jizz game I was talking about earlier.

You felt yourself blush.

You : Oh my god... I can try..

You both went in,and the coordinator of the game was speaking..

Coordinator : The aim of this mini game is to simply serve your shake to our taste testers. They're snipped and tied,so no pregnancies.. You're rewarded based on how you taste.

The woman who had a moment was well endowed,and she blew a kiss at you. Several other competitors had joined.

And the contest began after you removed your robes. Your friend fainted after 10. The female competitor fell down after 13. Others fell after 6. You managed 8,but the last one missed the cup and slathered the testers. There were murmurs among the judges..

They were tasting.. The female alien got a 9.5. Your friend a 9,and were still debating on the taste of yours. You got a 10 as the best tasting.

You : Me? [blushes]

Coordinator : You're the winner! Now pick your prize.

The prizes were the weird animals that you saw upon entering the planet. You chose the three headed rattlesnake with 3 sets of eyes on each head while everyone clapped and cheered for you as you hugged your prize. You both washed up and put your robes back on.

You : [giggles] Weird but fun.

Alien : Whacking it off to fine judges..yes.

You giggled in the crook of his neck

Alien : You're gonna get some really out of the ordinary games and rides here..believe me.

You : What's the next ride?

You hid your face in your friend's neck,hearing orgasms and messy squelches.

You : [muffled]It has something to do with genitals doesnt it..

Alien : ..The Thumper. Dear god,they sure like stretching people out..The rules are,how long can you ride or hump one before you nut..

You started laughing.

You : [giggles] Excuse you??

Alien : [chortles] Look.

The ride was exactly that...So how long can one go?Without nutting?

How long can you exactly go?

[ghoulwithglasses]

Starting Fresh on Twitch – Again (A Rant, a Reflection, and a Reboot)

Well, against my better judgment, I’ve decided to start streaming on Twitch again. Yep, here we go — round two... or maybe more like round five at this point. But this time, it’s different. This time, I’m starting from scratch. A clean slate. A brand-new username, a new identity, and no baggage from the past.

Back in April, I had a falling out with one of my closest friends and most supportive followers — someone who had been part of nearly every stream, who was integral to the little community I had worked so hard to build. That fallout felt like a gut punch. Not just because of the personal sting, but because it forced me to confront something I had been trying to avoid for a while: things just weren’t working anymore. Not with Twitch. Not with my content. Not with my sense of fulfillment.

I walked away. From Twitch. From the half-dead Discord I’d tried to keep alive. From the screen name I’d used for almost four years. I was so deeply tired of that name. It carried weight — not the good kind. It reminded me of who I was when I started. And who I no longer wanted to be.

That account was born during a really dark chapter of my life. I started streaming back then as a distraction, a lifeline, something to look forward to. Somehow, I found a little community that welcomed me. They made me feel seen, even if I was just a voice behind a screen. Encouraged by that, I jumped into streaming. And for a while, it actually felt amazing. I was making something. Sharing my love for games. Building something real.

But over time, the momentum faded. The numbers stopped climbing. The chat got quieter. I took long breaks to recharge, hoping things would feel different when I returned. I came back refreshed and full of new ideas, only to be met with the same lack of engagement. I tried everything — rebrands, schedule changes, Discord revamps, themed events. It felt like I was throwing ideas into the void.

And so, I nuked it all. Left the Affiliate program. Deleted the account. Wiped the connected socials. Burned it all down.

I told myself I was done. That I had outgrown streaming, or that it had outgrown me. But over time, a feeling crept back in — something I hadn’t expected: I missed it. I missed hitting "Go Live." I missed sharing game moments with others. Hell, I even missed stressing about dropped frames and botched overlays.

So here I am, once again, standing at the edge of the stream (literally and figuratively). But this time, it’s different.

This new account wasn’t even supposed to be for streaming. It was just a placeholder. A quiet username with no expectations attached. But now? Now it’s my new beginning. And I’m coming into this with eyes wide open.

There’s no pre-existing community waiting for me. No built-in hype squad. Just me — and a small handful of friends who followed me into this new version of myself. That’s it. And that’s okay. Honestly, it’s kind of freeing.

This time, I’m doing everything on my terms.

No chasing trends. No trying to keep up with other streamers. No gifting subs just to keep someone’s attention. I’m not interested in playing the game of popularity anymore — I’m here to play actual games.

I’ll be setting firm boundaries. I’ll be taking things slow, building at a pace that feels sustainable. I’ll be consistent with my schedule and intentional with the games I choose to play. I’ll focus on creating a space that reflects who I am — a little weird, a little nerdy, full of aliens and game glitches and chaotic fun.

I know it won’t be easy. Building from the ground up never is. But I’m not expecting instant success. I’m not looking for viral clips or overnight fame. I just want something real.

So here are my first three goals for this rebooted Twitch journey:

Goal #1: Get Affiliate — start small, build the foundation

Goal #2: Reach 100 followers by October — a tangible milestone to work toward

Goal #3: Be consistent — show up, play games, keep promises to myself

More than anything, I want to enjoy this again. That’s the heart of it. Not numbers. Not clout. Just the love of gaming, of community, of connecting with people who might be out there feeling the same way I did when I first hit "Start Streaming" years ago.

If you’ve ever felt burnt out, disconnected, or like you had to walk away to find your way back — I see you. Here’s to fresh starts, to second (or fifth) chances, and to building something better, brick by brick.

If you'd like to check out my twitch and toss a me follow here's my link. Click here! Live on Mondays, Fridays, & Saturdays!

[cellarspider]

17/30 Inappropriate relations between hugger and face

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We return to the movie that is a menace to itself and society at large, Prometheus. 

Content warning for gore, death, orifice invasion, and, unsurprisingly,

Time to kill the sacrificial side characters! Well, at least, kill the ones that have names and distinct personalities, so that you are expected to feel somewhat bad for them. And I do. They didn’t do anything bad enough to deserve this movie.

I mean, they’re going to die because the movie turns them into morons to make this scene work, but hey. They’re still doing better than the guy who managed to insult his life partner’s father, faith, and infertility in the course of two minutes.

This part of the movie, in fact, leans fully into 80s-90s slasher tropes. The people who’re having sex are all going to have various bad things happen to them throughout the movie, with their severity and dignity depending on whether they display traits considered virtuous. But Fifield the geologist has committed the cardinal sin of hotboxing his suit’s air supply while they wait out the night in the creepy alien structure, so he shall be among the first to die. 

To make this work, they have decided to spend the night in the room right next to the decapitated alien body they refused to get near before. They do not seem to mind it now, nor do they find it worrying that the room on the other side of it is full of the black oil from the X-Files.

This is one of the other infamous scenes that everybody remembers about this movie. Millburn is not doing anything that a morally punitive slasher movie would declare worthy of death, but he is going to behave like a moron.

Remember I said ages ago that there was a cut scene where he apparently showed real reverence for the existence of non-humanoid, unintelligent alien life? That was meant to provide context for why he’d be so excited to see the world’s most genital-faced snake.

We, the audience, know that this is probably what’s become of some alien worms last seen being exposed to the Ominous Black Goo. Why didn’t it fully melt them like the Engineer at the start? Not explained! We, the audience weird enough to remember Prometheus twelve years after it came out, should also know that when a snake-like creature rears up, flares open a hood, and makes hissing noises, you should not try to get close to that critter. That is an angry critter, and it is going to do angry things to you.

Millburn is presented as the kind of herp-lover who finds a snakey critter cute, so he should know this too. He does not. That is impressively bad. The one impressively good thing about this scene is that the creature is largely a practical effect, save for in moments where it needs to move in ways a puppet can’t. At the same time, it’s unfortunately hard to tell that it’s real, due to its texture. This helps hide the transitions to CG, but it also leaves you less convinced that it’s there. Sometimes a more obvious puppet can still feel more threatening, because they are indisputably there.

Still, this scene is, despite the stupid context, effective at most of what it wants to do: creating a sudden, brutal spike of violence, with one small creature managing to act as an unstoppable force. Millburn’s arm is broken, Fifield is sprayed with acid blood as he tries to help and falls face-first into the black ooze, leaving Milburn to be killed by the creature as it breaks into his suit and crawls down his throat. It hits two of the usual beats of an Alien movie: acid blood, and overtones of sexual violation.

It made me feel squeamish, although that might have something to do with the fact that it has a weird parallel to a sci-fi comedy movie that had some unpleasant marketing back when I was a wee Spider: Evolution. Apparently, back in 2001, it was considered comedic to watch a giant mosquito crawl under the skin of a man’s thigh and imply that it bit him in the balls. Wee Spider did not agree with this assessment, and so now that’s burnt into my psyche.

The crew of the Prometheus is none the wiser, because nobody kept a watch on the two of them. The last interaction they had was Janek saying ‘hey, we detected movement in there with you, probably just a glitch tho, nbd’ before wandering off to have sex with Vickers.

I want to remind everyone that this is the movie that wants to deal with themes including but not limited to:

The creation and purpose of humanity

The ethical implications of creating human-level artificial intelligence

How religion intersects with science and crises of faith

Are we truly capable of grappling with any of the above

Genocide

This movie is an absolute mess. It is beautifully shot, and a competent shock-horror film when it feels like it, but that accounts for a fraction of its runtime, and basically none of the dialog.

It also fails at building tension for scenes like these, because it undercuts Alfred Hitchcock's principle of cinematic tension:

[Video description: An excerpt from a lecture by Alfred Hitchcock:]

"Four people are sitting around a table, talking about baseball, whatever you like. Five minutes of it, very dull. Suddenly, a bomb goes off. Blows the people to smithereens. What do the audience have? Ten seconds of shock. Now take the same scene, and tell the audience there's a bomb under that table, and will go off in five minutes. Well the whole emotion of the audience is totally different, because you've given them that information. That in five minutes time, that bomb will go off. Now the conversation about baseball becomes very vital. Because they're saying to you, "Don't be ridiculous, stop talking about baseball, there's a bomb under the table!" You've got the audience working. Now the only difference is--and I've been guilty of, in the picture Sabotage, of making this error, but I've never made it since--The bomb must never go off. Because if you do, you've worked that audience into a state, and then they'll get angry because you haven't provided them with any relief. That's almost a must. So a foot touches the bomb, somebody looks down, says "My god, there's a bomb." Out of the window, then it goes off, just in time."

[End description.]

Prometheus tells you, over and over again, that the characters are in danger. Why are they in danger? Because they deliberately put themselves there. It's like they're a bunch of ordinance disposal experts sitting around Hitchcock's table, one of them nudges the bomb with their foot, and they look down and say "Huh! That's neat. Hey, take a poke at this, guys!"

The last bit of Hitchcock's principle is moot in this type of horror film, because there are only some characters that are positioned as being worthy of real worry on the part of the audience, which Prometheus also undermines--but not entirely. We still have a ways to go before they take his advice on that, though.

Next time: 

Many posts ago, I responded to Holloway’s behavior with an invocation of Clue:

The tables shall soon turn!

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Citations for alt-text rambles

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/thats-a-penis 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tooms 

https://www.buzzfeed.com/adambvary/something-terrible-has-happened-here-the-crazy-story-of-how

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Do Aliens Exist? 4 Bold Proofs Of Aliens

A new proof of aliens: Do aliens exist? Since no alien life has been identified, this does not rule it out. Is there life beyond Earth?

The major key facts:-

No confirmed alien proof, but NASA actively searches for life beyond Earth.

Expanding knowledge of habitable environments beyond Earth and Mars.

4 potential “new proof of aliens” mentioned: Mars vegetation (dismissed), microbes in meteorites (inconclusive), Mars canals (illusion), and Viking Lander results (controversial).

A vast universe makes alien life possibilities intriguing.

Scientific exploration is the key to uncovering the truth.

Explanations — Do Aliens exist and a reference by NASA:-

Isthere new proof of Aliens? This is a fascinating subject that NASA has been attempting to comprehend, investigate, and answer for a long time. We have yet to discover life on another planet, nor have we seen any scientifically verified evidence of extraterrestrial life.

However, if we look beyond the huge things like elephants, whales, and redwood trees, and focus on the microscopic things, we’ve found microbial life almost everywhere on Earth.

Understanding of livable settings:-

Our understanding of livable settings continues to broaden. We’ve only just started looking beyond Earth. NASA has dispatched five spacecraft and four landing craft to the outermost layer of Mars. Furthermore, orbiters have been built with some incredible equipment to capture images of all the surfaces of the Red Planet. But we’ve only explored a small portion of Mars. And that’s just one of the promising places to seek life beyond our solar system.

Ice-covered worlds in the solar system’s outermost regions, such as Saturn’s Enceladus and Jupiter’s Europa, appear to have subterranean oceans that could support life. And that is only what our solar system contains. The more exoplanets discovered near other stars, the more scientists learn about the variety of settings that potentially support life. We can’t say for sure if there is new proof of Aliens or if they exist.

“The universe is a pretty big place.” “If it’s just us, it seems like a terrible waste of space.” (Carl Sagan)

A little reference to our last article:-

Previously, we explained the reason why to fear AI in “Expose AI Fear Demise.” Now, we plan to describe to you the possible variations of bizarre experiences and incidents. Our professional team is efficiently researching different strategies and approaches to boost your understanding capacities. We also honour your awareness of our content. That’s why we are fully ready to not only help you but to improve your mind with evolving insight. Let’s move on!

Are you searching for strange and mysterious content…?

Amuse yourself with a variety of mysterious, strange and wonder content on Rise TV’s impressive shows and sequences. Like Edge of Wonder, where we describe striking cases from our massive investigation collection.

Are you ready to unlock your brain to renewed opportunities? Do not skip the possibility of joining as a respected Gentlemen subscriber and undertaking this weird journey with us, achieving a tremendous beginning.

4 Bold Proofs Of Aliens:-

As far as we can recall, humans have questioned if they are alone in the world. However, in September 2013, a team of researchers stated that a cell fragment discovered during a balloon ride in the high atmosphere could be evidence of life from space. While people and conspiracy theorists frequently present new proofs of aliens’ visits, scientists have also claimed to have discovered evidence of extraterrestrial life. Here are the top five scientific proofs of aliens.

1- C. Clarke’s Bushes On Planet Mars

Sir Arthur C. Clarke made news in 2001 when he claimed that freshly returned photographs from NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor revealed the presence of trees and bushes on Mars. Most scientists dismissed the notion, but the writer maintained his view.

“I’m quite serious when I say have a really good look at these new Mars images.” “Something is moving and changing with the seasons which suggests, at least, vegetation.” Sir Arthur C. Clarke,

2- The Microbes In Meteorites

NASA scientist Richard Hoover issued a study claiming to have discovered fossil evidence of bacteria in carbon-based rocks from outer space. Hoover used scanning electron microscopes to examine meteorite slices and found filaments and formations that he described as resembling microscopic single-celled algae.

Some scientists were hesitant, partly because the article appeared in the doubtful Journal of Cosmology. Other researchers stated that the study was carefully done, but it was too early to judge if the claim was valid.

3- Mars Canal

The concept that a sophisticated network of canals crossed Mars was initially proposed in 1877 by Italian astronomers and later popularized by astronomer Percival Lowell. Lowell created complex sketches of what he believed to be canals based on observations collected at his observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.

The concept was reasonably popular until the early twentieth century when astronomical measurements were enhanced and higher-resolution imaging exposed the “canals” to be illusions of light and geologic structures.

4- Viking Lander Results

In 1976, NASA’s two Viking landers landed on Mars’ surface. The probes carried out a variety of biological investigations, including gathering samples of Martian soil for analysis of organic molecules (the building blocks of life) and biosignatures that might suggest the presence of microbes.

The landers found no evidence of organics, but the onboard Labeled Release experiment discovered a reactive agent in Mars’ surface material that produced more carbon dioxide. Gilbert Levin, the engineer who invented Labeled Release, determined that the behaviour was caused by living microbes found in Martian soil. However, the conclusion has yet to be embraced by the scientific community.

Concluding Thoughts:-

NASA has been exploring the possibility of alien life for years, but so far, there is no concrete evidence. While microbial life has been found on Earth, the search for extraterrestrial life continues, with Mars being a promising candidate for further exploration.

Scientists have claimed to have discovered evidence of extraterrestrial life, including a cell fragment found in the high atmosphere, challenging the age-old question of whether humans are alone in the world.

NASA scientist Richard Hoover’s study suggesting the discovery of fossilized bacteria in meteorite rocks from space has sparked debate among scientists.

Some question the credibility of the findings while others acknowledge the thoroughness of the research but emphasize the need for further investigation before confirming.

The Viking landers’ experiments on Mars in 1976 did not find evidence of organic molecules, but the Labeled Release experiment suggested the presence of living microbes in Martian soil, a conclusion that has not been widely accepted by scientists.