#psychopathic the videos volume 2

[mindofsmoothie]

My Black Friday order from the Psychopathic Vault arrived today. Definitely happy to have my own copy of Violent J's Behind The Paint.

#icp #behind the paint #insane clown posse #psychopathic records #psychopathic vault #psychopathic the videos volume 2 #charges of indictment #the dayton family #juggalo #juggalette #whoop whoop

[derschwarzeengel]

Getting real tired and very annoyed of seeing Negative Legend's videos on Loveless (anime and manga) in the tag by people who have never actually watched the anime/read the manga and proudly identify as Antis (or have "Proshippers/NSFW blogs DNI" in their description; same fucking thing at this point).

Again, way to miss the whole fucking point of this story and demonize people who are in the fandom and genuinely like/love Loveless. People in the fandom on Twitter were Not Happy with his anime video, corrected him/them multiple times, and each time he/they doubled down with trolling responses.

With both videos, Negative Legend doesn't even try to understand why this series was so popular to begin with, why it's so important to the fandom, and/or the themes within.

Yes, Soubi and Ritsuka's relationship is very complicated and fucked up. Yes, Seimei is a sexual predator and is in all likelihood a psychopath/sociopath. Yes, Ritsuka's mother is extremely abusive towards her youngest son. Yes, Soubi is a child sexual abuse victim later paired in an emotionally abusive relationship with Seimei when Seimei was 14 and Soubi 17.

This is all intentional on part of the mangaka. Loveless is a story about abuse, about trauma, how words hurt a person's psyche more than physical injuries, and (through Ritsuka and Soubi) how to break free from an abusive relationship and grow as a person. It is repeatedly noted in-universe that Ritsuka and Soubi's relationship is not normal.

Yun Kouga has outright said that while there are a lot of BL themes in Loveless, she doesn't consider the series to be BL in and of itself and the focus is more on relationships and how they affect people within them.

Being a josei manga, the target audience in Japan is adult women. It was never meant to be targeted for a teenage audience, but North American publishers saw the cat ears and tails aesthetic for virgins in this universe + the BL-ish themes and the fact Ritsuka is in the sixth grade and marketed it for older teens.

For a lot of North American fans who first picked up this series in the early/mid-2000s as young teens when it was first being published by TokyoPop? This was baby's first exposure to BL and queer themes in media in general. (Same with Black Butler.)

The other thing that annoys me so fucking much about these videos and has earned Negative Legend my contempt, is this:

Who exactly is Negative Legend trying to warn with these videos about how Problematic and Messed Up and BadWrongTM Loveless is?

The manga has been running since 2002, and the most recent volume came out in the mid-2010s. Since then, the manga has been on hiatus.

Loveless is long out of print in US bookstores; if you want a physical copy, you have to order it online.

The anime first aired and completed in Spring 2005, covering the first four volumes of the manga and creating an ending out of whole cloth.

Negative Legend fully admits that they weren't around when this series was popular.

Fansites that were around in the early 2000s dedicated to this manga and the anime, given the nature of the Internet, are probably long since shut down with how long the manga has been running and the increasing corporatization of the World Wide Web.

If you were in middle school/high school when Loveless first came out, by now you are well into your thirties/forties.

Back to Soubi/Ritsuka/Seimei/Nisei for a moment:

Soubi being overly affectionate with Ritsuka in the first few volumes is twofold: 1) he was ordered to do so by Seimei, Ritsuka's older brother, when he knew nothing about Ritsuka other than he was Seimei's little brother and would inherit him when Seimei was killed; 2) all Soubi has ever known ever since he was six years old is abuse in some form or another, and he was raped by his mentor/father-figure when he was ten years old. All while being brutally trained to submit wholly to whoever is his Sacrifice. Soubi has never known what it is to be in a healthy relationship, and so he visibly does not know how to react whenever Ritsuka treats him like an actual human being.

From what we see of him in volume 5 onward, Seimei is all but stated to have some form of antisocial personality disorder, and he is obsessed with earning Ritsuka's love. Nothing matters more to him than his little brother; everyone else are pawns and toys for him to use and discard. (He also has powers that other Sacrifices do not seem to have, but that is neither here nor there.)

Ritsuka, the 12-year-old protagonist, has been abused by his mother since before Seimei faked his death and the abuse became even worse after Ritsuka developed selective amnesia at the age of 10 over the trauma of losing Seimei. He was also subject to increasing molestation by Seimei, who was more of a parental figure to him than their father and definitely more so than their mother. Yes, he attends therapy weekly, but this is only so his mother can have her "Ritsuka" back. Enter Soubi and his introduction to the Fighter/Sacrifice world and taking on yet another identity as Loveless. He's incredibly tsundere toward Soubi, whom he doesn't want to continually rely on, yet at the same time doesn't really have a choice. It doesn't matter that there might or might not be a destined Fighter for him out there; Soubi is his Fighter, Loveless's Fighter, and as patchwork as their bond is, it's better than the corrupted bond Soubi shares with Seimei.

And Seimei takes advantage of the fact Soubi was his Fighter and they still share the same name to force Soubi to help him, to make him (in a way) betray Ritsuka against Soubi's will. Soubi breaks down first when he realizes Seimei is alive, to the point Ritsuka realizes something is deeply wrong here, and then again after Seimei and Nisei's attack on Seven Voices. He's basically catatonic after Seimei essentially mind-rapes him and forces him to act against his and Ritsuka's wills to help Seimei (his abuser) escape.

Gods forbid dark, fucked-up shit happens in a dark story about abuse and relationships and how words mean things and affect people.

I don't really know what else to say here other than media literacy is dead, antitubers stop coming up with dogshit takes challenge, and not censoring the names of Loveless fans on social media knowing people who watch your videos will harass people who actually like this manga/anime and want to talk about it?

Not fucking cool. Fuck off. And fuck you and the high horse you rode in on.

#outofcrossbows ( OOC. ) #Loveless manga

[perryhedge]

japanese update dec 2022

I tend to just vomit up walls of text on Discord about this stuff, especially since it doesn't really go anywhere usually and I just need to talk it out and set some things in order, but every once in a while I remember I have this Tumblr. i mostly use it for talking about anime and manga I guess, but there's no reason why it has to be that.

So, after two months of basically taking it easy in a sense and not tracking any of my study, I'm now getting kind of sick of that. I like having goals, seeing my progress in hours, and generally watching Number Go Up. It was nice to take a break, especially since I've been essentially tracking religiously since May 2020 or so, but I think that break is over and I'm ready to take things seriously again.

I know from my experience with French that maintenance of a language (at least for input skills, not output) becomes much easier the higher your level. I can still watch a French Youtube video (even sometimes at 1.25x speed every once in a while like I do in English -- I have recently been told I am a psychopath for doing this, but I know people do it for audiobooks and such), or read a book, even though I stopped immersing every day starting in March. I do want to get back into it again, with a book club reading L'elegance du herisson. Anyway, so basically my goal with Japanese is to kind of go at it seriously for a shorter period of time before tapering off, rather than being more casually immersed in it over a longer period of time. It just helps with my motivation. I tend to binge things and respond well to goal-oriented stuff.

So, because I'm a maniac, I basically went in to my old spreadsheet (stopped at Sep 30) and cross-checked with Learn Natively and Anilist to fill in an approximation of how much anime and manga I read. No idea about Youtube, but it's a good enough estimate. Apparently I've crossed 2 million characters, and 800 hours total (including study and immersion).

So where to go from here. Well I already decided this month I would focus on reducing my backlog, since I started like 10 different shows, and some of them are quite long. I also decided I would finish Pandora Hearts, which is a long-ish manga. I read the first volume last night, I liked it well enough but I don't know if I'm totally sold just yet, or at least not sold enough to binge it like I've done with some manga. I read half of Chainsaw Man in one day. I might push my way through it still, though.

So yeah, next year I want to be a little bit more intentional about working hard to improve my Japanese ability. I think just a bit of extra effort will be worth it for me. I don't think what I currently do is unsustainable -- I put in about a half an hour into study (kanji and vocab SRS), then just watch and read what I want to, and I'm still improving since I have so much more to learn. But I learned this with French, too. I was improving way more when I was actively challenging myself, and spending at least some time doing things that took a little bit of effort. Not so much that I wasn't having fun at all, but just that extra bit of effort was really good.

So in terms of my listening ability. I think I'll just stick with anime, honestly, for the time being. I do need stronger listening ability eventually, and for that I plan to go into movies or other scripted live-action content. But at the moment I still don't even really understand easier unscripted content like streams 100%, let alone most anime, because of my vocab limits. It's good to train general listening ability at the same time as vocab, but I think it might honestly burn me out unnecessarily to have to deal with films right now. I am not interested in dramas, they seem mostly to be in genres I don't find interesting, and it wouldn't be something I would normally watch. So for the moment, listening will not be my focus any more than it already is. I'm not setting any strict goals, but maybe I'll set an easy weekly minimum just to ensure I'm getting some listening practice as I put in the hours to improve my vocab and grammar through reading.

The lack of middle-level content that I find compelling is kind of an issue I have with my reading as well. Obviously, difficult ranges widely in a medium or even a genre. But generally, I'd expect manga to be pretty much the easiest thing you can read, followed by light novels and then finally novels. Within novels you can probably make a similar distinction to what we have in the anglosphere, between genre fiction and literary fiction. Not a perfect distinction, but again, talking in generalities. So if I wasn't such a stubborn person I'd try to work my way up from manga (which is 100% of what I read now, and I'm getting kind of okay at it at least with furigana) to light novels, the next easiest thing. But here's the thing. I really, really, do not like light novels. I find them boring and irritating. And I really do want to emphasize that I am being stubborn here. I'm sure I could find stuff that is at least enjoyable. But, I just want to jump directly to literature. I don't even think I particularly would care for genre fiction written for adults (if such a distinction exists and if that is even much of a genre different from light novels, which seem more like what we'd call YA).

So here's my dilemma. I said I would put more effort into doing things that aren't necessarily what I love to do, in the name of improving. But I don't think I can overcome the intermediate plateau by suitably "leveling up" to intermediate level difficulty content (as opposed to the easier stuff I immerse with now, kids' anime and shoujo/shounen manga) since I just don't find it interesting. I'm not even in the intermediate plateau yet but of course since I'm incredibly neurotic I'm already worrying about this.

So here's my solution. Next year, or whenever I finish Pandora hearts, I'm going to set a very minimal goal of pushing myself 30 minutes a day with actually challenging content. I might work up through difficulty levels on Natively, and just force myself through a couple of light novels if I feel in the mood to do so. Or, I might just dive into literature and push through it. I've looked into literary prizes which might be a good start for contemporary literature, which I'd imagine is easier than classical stuff or even older stuff for kids (I tried reading Night on the Galactic Railroad once, by the way -- way too hard at the time). I also follow a French Youtuber who reads a lot of Asian literature and might be a good place to look for recommendations. A few days ago I looked at the Japanese Wikipedia pages and skimmed some synopses, and I found some that actually sounded interesting and like something I would actually read, moreso than pretty much any light novel I've found. And I could actually understand these synopses, sometimes. So I think that's where I'll go next.

So in conclusion, I won't be changing anything drastically this year most likely. I'm still kind of focusing on life stuff, too. But starting the end of this year or perhaps 2023, I'll try to seriously improve my reading ability, and as a result I imagine I'll be bumping up my SRS to something like 10 vocab cards a day.

800 hours is nothing to sneeze at. I feel like I've made a lot of progress. But it's still the beginning. I want to seriously get to a level where pretty much any normal anime/manga (which is most of what I expect to be using Japanese for) is comprehensible at like a 99% vocab coverage level. That'll take some effort, but it's doable. It just requires me to either keep at this the way I am for years (like...3+ years maybe, just a wild estimate), or really put in the work to always be immersing with harder and harder material and look things up more often like I did with French (in which case I might be at least at a N1 level at the two year mark). I feel ready to commit to the latter, at least where I'm at now.

Really, I truly believe that after a certain point (which I'm past) language learning is all about how many hours of immersion you get. At least, for me. I can do some skill building here and there, maybe brush up on grammar but there's a limit to how effective that can be. Every time I look into that stuff I'm disappointed at how shallow the pool of language in learner resources is compared to what I care about, which is the pool of language that people use to communicate -- and that includes slang, in-jokes, memes, cultural background, history, and tons of other stuff that comes up naturally in natural communication but rarely in artificial communication. So, in terms of hours, where do I want to be in a month? In a year? Well, I'm not going to count the SRS time because that's not a goal -- it's not like I'm willing to put in any more or less than 30 minutes a day, so it makes no sense to make goals around it. Right now, I have ~575 hours of immersion (just an estimate). I can probably get that to around 650 by the end of the year. So I think around 1500 hours (about 140 minutes a day) or even 1750 hours (3 hours a day) are not too unreasonable goals for 2023. And maybe if I'm still feeling up to it, I'll continue to commit seriously in 2024. But at this point, there's no point in theorycrafting so far ahead.

#japanese

[inthisroomofsilence]

Another round of Pauley Perrette’s bullshit

All tweets from July 21st 2020!

So, Pauley read an article about the abuse by a show runner on a different CBS show. Pauley mentions that she knew of this guy’s abuse for a long time but did nothing even though some of her closest friends works on that show. Pauley remained silent about it UNTIL someone else fought the guy. And then she has the gall to expect rewards for knowing of this show runner’s behavior and doing nothing. 

She remained silent over actual abuse but screams and shouts over alleged abuse in form of physical and psychological abuse. 

2018: in secret DMs to fans she called Harmon a psychopath, bully & narcisst 

2019: she openly accuses Harmon of physical assaults, punching & shoving her around, bodychecking her

2020: Add to that she also now claims Harmon is a misogynist, homophobe and racist

So far, she could NOT prove her allegations. Not a single one. So, the question is what more could she accuse Harmon off next year? There’s a pattern. With every year she adds more accusations towards him.

Despite: Knowing that Harmon is friends with people of color and gay couples in real life. Despite having shown support towards a former make-up artist from NCIS when she was fighting breast cancer. He collected donations, doubled it and brought it to her in person. Someone else made that public, not Harmon.

Let’s move on: She is seeking symphathy by bringing her dead mother into this. Her mother died when Pauley was a child, not an adult trying to make a career in Hollywood.

Also, she claimed that she hadn’t paid attention to the abuse happening since day one. So, she really isn’t the humanitarian she wants the world to believe she is when she willingly and happily ignores bullying and so on as long she gets lots of money and publicity.

And another thing: This is the woman who cheered her now ex-boyfriend Thomas Arklie on when he called a straight man a “faggot”. So much for supporting the LGBTQ campaign.

Now, several fans with accounts on Twitter, Tumblr and even Instagram have made it public that a great bunch of crew members has reached out to them with proof of Pauley’s wrong doings and bad behavior on set. She was caught on camera verbally and from what I understand, also physically attacking members of the crew and cast. Does that sound like the cast and crew are supporting her? Secretly or not? Personally, I haven’t seen videos or photos but I’ve been chatting with one member of the crew who’s very happy to be rid of the “entitled, selfish liar”. It speaks volumes about how people that spend working with her for over 10 years view her behavior. I have heard stories of how she refused to work with certain guest stars, how she threw tantrums when she didn’t get her wishes. I could go on. I don’t need to see any videos. I’ve seen enough of her lies, accusations and the damage those caused to the individuals she has targeted in the past.

Let’s not forget: Harmon and Cote de Pablo were both being trashed by her in public. The private DMs about her thoughts of Cote had been released. Part of me hopes that someone soon will leak the other DMs she wrote to fans talking badly of Sasha Alexander, Lauren Holly, Jennifer Esposito, Maria Bello, Emily Wickersham and Diona Reasonover. Or the ones of her rather digusting thoughts of David McCallum, Michael Weatherly, Sean Murray, Brian Dietzen, Rocky Carroll, Duane Henry and Wilmer Valderrama and even Donald Bellisario.

You see, she has trashed all of them, in private or in public. Pauley Perrette thinks everyone should believe her. Everyone questioning her, seriously very contradicting, accusations is called a “troll” or “hater”. 

But why should we believe her words and not doubt them? Because she is white? Because she is a woman? Because she is a white woman? That’s right. We are not to demand any sort of proof for her allegations, past, present and future. She won’t stop now. Or at some point. For as long as she has those brainless and mindless fans believing every single one of her sob or hero stories, she won’t stop. More is to come.

And the absolute nerve of her to state that she had to use her own money to pay for lawyers is astonishing. It really is. All over the world people fear losing their jobs because of the pandemic, people are struggling to survive in every aspect of their daily lives: monetary and healthwise. For someone with millions of $$$ in her account, she comes across as a whiny and uncaring bitch.

And it doesn’t matter if her entitlement and need to make everything about herself take away the spotlight and attention from REAL abuse and tragedies as long as it brings her the attention she craves.

Last but not least, she is once again throwing shade at the entire cast and crew of NCIS whilst claiming she wants to protect them. Weird, isn’t it? And then she has to drag people into this that weren’t around, that only know one side of the story. Attention seeking behavior right in front of our eyes.

And never ever forget that she was/is close friends with Les Moonves and has Harvey Weinstein’s fixers on her payroll. Remember that she had no problem to throw Eliza Dushku under the bus because Pauley, at least for the public pretends to, like the guy.

And in a different recent tweet of hers she claimed herself to have been a model since the age of 2... well, didn’t she always say that she never intended to become famous? That she kind of accidently stumbled into acting? Which one is it? Like, she hates all food and that humans need it to live and in the next week food is yummy and she only hates some foods, not all.

So, I will say it loudy: I stand with every single man she has accused in the past. I stand with every single woman she has accused in the past. I stand with the cast and crew of NCIS who had to deal with her bad behavior for 15 years because she had the ear of Moonves.

#Pauley Perrette #NCIS #NCIS Cast #Mark Harmon #Cote de Pablo

[serpenttailedangel]

!!!

This just crossed my mind.

I’ve complained multiple times now about how the anime left out the detail of the other three heroes thinking they’re effectively immortal, after having expressed multiple times that I was really looking forward to seeing that argument in the anime, but there is a major detail I overlooked.

So the basic order of events as referenced in-story during this argument is that the three stooges lose to Glass but Naofumi is able to hold her off. They get hospitalized, wake up just fine, figure it was a “scripted event” that wasn’t actually winable and that they didn’t die after losing is evidence of that. Then they all try to murder Naofumi when they think he abducted Melty (a moment the anime also heavily shafted). Then they fight the pope and basically lose again, only for Naofumi to pull through, and decide this was a second scripted event where loss was pre-determined and look they woke up in the hospital again without dying so they must be right. (It’s only after Naofumi handles the entire fight with L’Arc as well that they acknowledge that maybe it’s a stretch to have three scripted losses in a row but they still don’t want to think they’ve fallen short in any way--with that meeting hopefully having been moved to the start of season 2 but for now having also been something the anime cut.)

And in the ensuing argument with Naofumi over this fact, when Naofumi calls them on how they all still tried to, y’know, kill him while thinking heroes were unkillable, and Ren and Motoyasu have semi-decent answers while Itsuki is a blatant psychopath. But Ren sort of just... went with the flow even though it didn’t make sense to him while Motoyasu and Itsuki’s answers suggest that they didn’t think of Naofumi as a fellow hero and thus not someone with their perceived immortality. The whole conversation gives the impression that they see their little posse as stock video game heroes, but Naofumi as a particularly annoying NPC.

But there’s one thing missing from that entire chain of events.

Between the fight for Melty and the pope fight, Motoyasu tried to kill Naofumi a second time believing that he’d killed Ren and Itsuki. If he thought Ren and Itsuki had protagonist immunity, then Naofumi shouldn’t have been able to kill them regardless of whatever skills he did or didn’t have.

Motoyasu spends the first six volumes of the LN and the entire first season of the anime thinking that Ren and Itsuki are basically NPCs.

#the rising of the shield hero #tate no yuusha no nariagari

[gingermcl]

Weaponization of music

Did you know that the standard music frequency is 440 hz and this is an unnatural frequency? A 440 hertz frequency disrupts the mind and the body. 432 Hz resonates with 8 Hz, same as the Schumann resonance, the documented fundamental electromagnetic “beat” of Earth. 432 Hz simply feels better.

Research shows music tuned to a 432 hertz frequency is easier to listen to, is brighter, clearer, and contains more dynamic range. Music with this tuning does not need be played at high volumes, thus reducing the risk of hearing damage. However by the 1950s the worldwide music was tuned to 440 hertz instead of 432 hertz.

If musical performances were going to sound the same all over the world, standardization was required. Having a universally accepted tone is why a piano in Toronto sounds exactly the same as a piano in China. There is nothing wrong with standardization, it is the choice of 440 Hz that was strategically calculated to disrupt the psyche of humanity as a whole.

In 1885, the Music Commission of the Italian Government declared that all instruments and orchestras should use a tuning fork that vibrated at 440 Hz, which was different from the original standard of 435 Hz and the competing 432 Hz used in France.

In 1917, the American Federation of Musicians endorsed the Italians, followed by a further push for 440 Hz in the 1940s by Nazi Germans.

In 1953, a worldwide agreement was signed. Signatories declared that middle “A” on the piano be forevermore tuned to exactly 440 Hz. This frequency became the standard ISO-16 reference for tuning all musical instruments based on the chromatic scale, the one most often used for music in the West. All the other notes are tuned in standard mathematical ratios leading to and from 440 Hz.

432 Hz is said to be mathematically consistent with the patterns of the universe. Studies reveal that 432hz tuning unifies the properties of light, time, space, matter, gravity and magnetism with biology, the DNA code, and consciousness. When atoms and DNA start to resonate in harmony with the spiraling pattern of nature, our sense of connection with nature is magnified. The number 432 is reflected in ratios of the Sun, Earth, and the moon as well as in the precession of the equinoxes, the Great Pyramid of Egypt, Stonehenge, and many other sacred sites.

So what’s the big deal? It’s just a difference of 8 Hz. It’s actually quite a nefarious plan. The recent discoveries of vibratory or oscillatory nature of the universe that happened recently show that this contemporary international pitch standard may actually generate an unhealthy effect or anti-social behavior in the consciousness of humans.

There is also a theory which says that the change from 432 Hz to 440 Hz was dictated by Nazi propaganda minister, named Joseph Goebbels. He used it in order to make people think and feel a certain manner, as well as to make them a prisoner of a certain consciousness. 440 Hz is an unnatural standard tuning frequency, is removed from the symmetry of sacred vibrations, and has declared war on the subconscious mind of Western Man.

The powers that be are successfully lowering the vibrations of not only the younger generations but of all of us. Such destructive frequencies turn thoughts towards disruption, disharmony, and disunity. 440 Hz also stimulates our brain – the controlling organ of our body - into a disharmonious resonance, which ultimately creates disease and war in the world. All disease is a disruption in frequency. Atoms are made of waves and vibrations. Therefore everything is sound. A disruptive or unhealthy frequency can cause big problems in a world made of sound waves!!

Both vibration and frequency hold a critically important yet hidden power to affect us, our lives, health, society; our whole world. The science of Cymatics, the study of visible sound and vibration, proves that frequency and vibration are the master keys and the organizational foundation for the creation of all matter and life on planet Earth.

When the sound waves move through a physical medium, such as sand, air, water, etc.; the frequency of the waves has a direct effect upon the structures that are created by the sound waves as they pass through that particular medium. The same will happen with cells in the human body.

Frequency isn’t the only way music affects our civilization. Music lyrics are known to cast spells on the masses. Modern society may not treat music as a magical thing now, but once music was considered to be one of the highest forms of magic. If we look back to ancient times, drums and other instruments were used to celebrate holy-days, invoke trance-like states, or announce the start of a battle. The people in ancient times who sang, danced, and made music were once thought of as spiritually-gifted individuals.

Music magick is still alive and well in modern times. We might not see it in the mainstream music industry, but it’s there if we dig a little deeper. First – think of the way music makes you feel. Music is known to rouse energy and stimulate emotions. Given that energy is what magic is all about, music is a fantastic tool for spellcasting!

A spell is defined as

1- A form of words used as a magical charm or incantation.

2- A state of enchantment caused by a magic spell.

3- An ability to control or influence people as the one had magical power over them.

The intention of any song could very easily be spell casting and the masses would have no idea. The term MC stands for Master of Ceremonies. Concerts are ceremonies. Ceremonies are where ritual magic is done. Are you seeing what is happening here? The masses are being placed under spells and casting negative spells on themselves via their favorite music all the time! They’re also generating energy for these celebrities satanic ritual abuse ceremonies! I’m not saying that you don’t need to listen to music but I am saying you must be very mindful of what you do consume in every way. That includes what material you let into your consciousness. There are apps in every App Store one can download that will switch your music to 432 Hz. I advise everyone to do this. Increase demand could mean more and better apps that convert music to the proper frequency.

One simple song can invoke feelings of joy, sorrow, laughter; essentially every emotion under the sun. One song can whisk us away to a past moment in our lives, good and bad. Music can be used in mental and physical therapy to aid in healing the body, mind, and soul. One can use the emotions felt through music and its unique, fluid energy in magic. Intention can and does make music witchcraft.

Witches can help improve or focus their magic by incorporating music into spells and rituals. Lyrics aren't the only consideration. Beats, measure, instruments, etc. can also be used in music magic.

Music is also used on the people as a form of mind control. Mind control techniques have been noted throughout history dating as far back as Ancient Egypt. Mind control did not enter the realm of modern science until the 1930’s when a physician by the name of Josef Mengele brought it into full practice within Nazi concentration camps. The majority of Mengele’s research within mind control remains classified to this day, however some has slowly come to the surface including the recognition of it being the basis for the covert CIA research program MK Ultra.

Joseph Mengele sounds like a psychopath by all accounts and his mind control programs are nothing short of inhumane. The number of crimes committed against humanity by those in power is too many to count. All celebrities are forced to undergo MK Ultra programming to some degree. This programming breaks down the human spirit and can create alter egos. It is done in order to brainwash these people into doing anything their masters and “fame” requires. Several celebrities have begun speaking out about the torture and programming they endured at the hands of the Hollywood and music industries.

Symbolism is used heavily in mind control programming. The all-seeing eye, demons, and baphomet are just a few of the reoccurring themes that love appearing in entertainment; often in completely unrelated ways to the content. These themes can be noted throughout music videos, movies, and TV shows. The existence of this symbology is one thing I feel can be stated as fact. The symbology is clearly there. Watch see any of the following music videos and then tell me the symbology and themes are a mere coincidence or are directly related to the songs content:

* Lil Wayne – Love Me (Explicit) ft. Drake, Future

* Ke$ha – Die Young

* Lady Gaga – Alejandro

* Katy Perry – Wide Awake

* Britney Spears – Hold It Against Me

If you truly feel that the symbols were fitting and not purposely placed, I will respect that opinion. However I encourage you to search for a breakdown of the above listed videos in order to make sure you are made aware of symbology and themes. There may be some you missed or may not be aware of. It’s also worth noting that these 5 videos are not the only videos out there, they are simply a handful of the hundreds (if not thousands) of music videos that feature these symbols to some degree.

Assuming that these symbols/themes do recur, the question becomes why? Is it a level of programming that they are attempting to inflict on us the viewers? Could it be to desensitize us to their existence and placement throughout society? Or could it simply be artistic coincidence? The answer to these questions lie within. Let this article be a starting point for your own research and findings on all of the aspects of 440 Hz, music magick, and Monarch mind control programming (MK Ultra.) There is a lot of information and well-formulated opinions out there, many worth considering.

Once you have done your research, see what resonates with you as true and don’t be afraid to stand by it even if it isn’t in-line with popular opinion. No matter which side of the spectrum you stand on having an awareness towards this subject is important, and that’s why I felt inspired to write this article.

[shutupandshipit]

Magic in the Blood - Ch.3

Summary: “You used magic on me,” Neil said, mildly accusing. He opened his eyes, staring into the glowing honey gold of Andrew’s eyes.

“Don’t I always?”

Instead of answering, Neil asked, “Yes or no?” because his hands were aching to run along Andrew’s skin, up his toned thighs, to tug him down over him. …..

Or where everything is the same, but magic exists. The school year is over, there’s no more practices until mid-summer and for the first time, Neil can spend his time the way he wants. Without suppressants muddling his system and Andrew sober, they’ve got magical and logistical issues to work through.

And then there’s the new Foxes when they show which is a whole other magical nightmare of itself.

Pairing: Andreil

Rating: T

Previous <- Chapter 2

Chapter 4 -> Next

Chapter 3: Taconic State Park, New York Part 1

Neil:

“Where are we going?” Andrew asked, reaching for the radio and adjusting the volume so Neil wouldn't have to shout over the music.

Neil and Andrew hadn't made any plans before they'd left Fox Tower that afternoon, leaving Kevin, Nicky and Aaron to their empty rooms waiting to be picked up by Abby. The Upperclassmen had been smart enough to book it out of the dorms as soon as they had the chance, and they'd followed their leads. They left without saying anything to the others, simply throwing their belongings into the Maserati and leaving. They didn't need to be back for another two weeks when Aaron's trial started, and Andrew's protection was no longer needed with Riko dead.

Even now, hours later, Neil's phone was still vibrating insistently with Nicky's texts. 'Where did you guys go?' 'Where are you going?' 'You can't ignore me forever'. 'Whatever. Have fun, nerds <3'. 'Don't do anything I wouldn't do :P'.

Reaching into the door side pocket, he finally turned off his phone. He'd talk to Nicky later. Maybe.

“We're going camping,” Neil said simply, rummaging through the glove compartment for the map of the East Coast and brochure he'd picked up. He'd made the decision when they'd stopped just after the house in Columbia, talking to the woman at the register and then Matt about places in New York. He turned the brochure towards Andrew.

Andrew glanced at the picture and quickly away, changing lanes before looking back. “Where is that and why there?”

“New York. Matt's mom wanted to meet us, so this is going to be two birds with one stone.” He shoved the map and brochure back in the glove compartment. “Don't make that face. Matt all but begged me. This will be a road trip. The place is called Taconic State Park. It looks cool, and there's not going to be a lot of people there so we'll be able to let our magic do what it needs to. Also, it says there's a waterfall. Matt pretty much made it a requirement for us to go.”

“And when did you start listening to what Matt says?” Andrew asked, schooling his face from the mild look of disgust back to his usual blankness. “You don't know how to lay low, do you? This is exactly how you got caught last time.”

“I got caught because some murderous psychopath outed me,” Neil corrected, rolling his eyes.

Andrew cut him a sidelong look. “No, you got caught because you decided to mouth off to a murderous psychopath and make him look incompetent multiple times who then decided to out you.”

“I would never,” he said, mock seriously.

“I have video evidence.”

“Lies.”

Banter with Andrew was easy, the easiest part about being with Andrew if he were to be honest. Unlike when they were intimate and they're magics intertwined as if fighting, they tangled and settled between them in a comfortable jumble instead. When they bantered, they didn't need to worry about how their magic was interacting, if their magical union would become toxic or burn out in their emotions or knock out a cell tower.

“I wouldn't lie to you.” There was a lilt of mirth to Andrew's voice, but underneath, there was also the tang of seriousness.

Sobering, Neil smiled over at him and held out his hand. “I know that.”

Glancing over, Andrew took Neil's hand without comment, threading their fingers together as lightning sparked between their palms.

Neil was unreasonably happy as he tried to school his expression. “We're going to have to stop for water and food.”

“Oh, so you weren't planning on hunting and scavenging for food? What's the point of camping then? Do you have any of this planned out at all?”

“Some of it that I've figured out since the gas station.” Neil shrugged. “Mostly, I'm hoping for us to get lost and dies out in the woods. It'd make what's left of my father's syndicate happy.”

“They'll have to try harder than that if they think I'll let you die by accident.”

Andrew:

Before knowing where they were going anywhere in particular, the first stop the pair had made had been at the house in Columbia. Perhaps due to some feral instinct, Neil had spent the time collecting blankets and other useful items for life on the run, shoving them into the trunk without much thought.

Andrew left him to his hording, disappearing into the how to collect the few pre-made sachets he had and jars of honey and animal blood he had in his closet. He'd shoved them into a small bag he had, packing sweaters and shirts around the fragile glass. They'd met back down at the car, climbing in without discussion.

They stopped again nearly eight hours later at a twenty-four hour all sale store and bought a small tent, sleeping bags, chairs and enough non-perishables and water to last them several days. When they climbed back into the car, Neil behind the wheel, it was nearly midnight.

They'd been up for more than eighteen hours, and they sat in exhausted silence for several long moments. The want to finally get to where they were going and the need for sleep hung unspoken between them.

“I'm tired,” Neil finally admitted, “And even if we get there, I don't think the registration office will be open.”

Andrew hummed, but didn't say anything, his eyes itchy with fatigue. While the silent need to finish the drive sat heavy in his chest, he also knew there was no need to continue on. They were on summer break. There was no reason to rush anywhere.

Of course, there were spells they could cast to combat exhaustion and caffeine just a drive-thru away, but neither of them had the energy or ingredients for a spell, and caffeine did strange things to their magic when they were so tired. Caffeine made their magic unreliable and uncooperative, made it more like to explode at inopportune times.

“Hotel,” Andrew decided.

“Thank god,” Neil whispered.

They found a cheap motel ten minutes up the road, and fell into the queen sized bed as soon as the door was locked and bolted behind them. Neil toed off his shoes while face down in a pillow, groaning all the while, before curling into the smallest ball possible against Andrew's back. He pressed his forehead to the space between Andrew's shoulder blades and fell asleep. Within a moment, his breath had evened out and his magic filtered through the air.

Andrew lay there for longer, listening to Neil's breathing. Rain began to patter softly against the roof. His magic reacted to Neil's sleep accordingly, snaking out gently from his body to wrap protectively around Neil and cocooning them in a bubble of protection. The sachet in his pocket warmed, adding strength to the walls he so easily built.

He slipped into sleep with the warmth of his own magic and the sounds of Neil and his rain surrounding him.

…..

Andrew woke in the early morning to Neil rolling away from him and pushing into the bathroom. He turned onto his back to stare at the ceiling and listen to Neil puke his guts out. The shower roared to life before Andrew followed him into the bathroom.

“You can come in,” Neil said as the door opened, “I didn't mean to wake you up.”

Closing and locking the door behind him, Andrew pulled off his clothes one piece at a time. He hesitated with his briefs before slipping them off. Normally, he wouldn't get naked even with Neil, but it was early in the morning and he could feel the lag in Neil's magic. He was craving skin to skin contact, and he had to wonder if Nicky was behind that. It wouldn't be the first time he'd cast on Andrew, on accident and just to see if it would work if he did, but it would be the first time Andrew hadn't felt the spell hit.

“Magic in the area?” he asked even though he knew that wasn't the answer, stepping under the spray where Neil stood with his head bowed.

Neil's breath came quickly, and he swallowed harshly. His voice was thick as if he were trying not to vomit again as he said, “Someone tried to cast on me. Tasted like tracking. God, I feel nauseous.”

Andrew's protection magic had at least done its job, but he thought they'd managed this part of someone casting on Neil. His spells must have been fading. “Yes or no?” he asked, sliding his fingers together to prep his magic.

“I don't want you to take this. It feels... wrong. Different than usual.”

Andrew stood a hair's breadth away, waiting as Neil leaned forward with a hand on the wall and wretched. “They're probably using someone stronger or a different spell.”

Bile splattered against the tub floor. Neil nearly whined as he said, “They're trying again. Where did they get so much of my hair?”

“Probably Fox Tower. Or the court. They might be using your blood.”

He heaved again. “Fuck 'em.”

“Neil-”

“Yes. It's a yes.”

Andrew pressed his parted lips to the back of Neil's bowed neck, licking at the knob at the top of his spin and biting down. Acrid smoke filled his mouth as he inhaled Neil's tainted magic, and exhaled clean magic back into him. Without the help of his conduits and herbs, the process took longer than normal, hurt more, tasted worse. While he worked, he drew invisible sigils across Neil's back, pressing them into his skin with just the warmth of his palm before moving on.

When he finally pulled back, a bruise was forming on the back of Neil's neck in the arc of his teeth and the vaguest impressions of his sigils lightened Neil's skin. “This is temporary. I need to refresh your spells.” His mouth tasted like ash, and he spit at the floor several times.

Neil turned to face him, looking tired and rung out. His magic barely flickered in the air around him, grey and dull. “I can take care of myself. You don't-”

“I'm going to anyway,” Andrew cut in before he could finish his sentence. The last time he'd fully revoked his protective spells on Neil, he'd gotten kidnapped almost immediately by his father's people and come back looking like someone had used him as an ashtray. He wasn't about to let that happen again.

“I'd kiss you if I hadn't just puked.”

“Brush your teeth while I get my bag, and we'll talk about it.” Andrew shut off the water and stepped out of the shower, wrapping a towel around his waist and heading to get his bag.

Neil followed more slowly after him, towels wrapped tightly around his waist and shoulders, to rummage through his bag. He stood at the sink, scrubbing roughly at his teeth and tongue.

Andrew watched him closely from the bathroom as he sat on the edge of the bath and set out his supplies. He pulled out the small mortar and pestle that Nicky had jokingly gifted him after learning who his deities were, but he used it more than he liked to admit. He used it quite often actually.

Small, but heavy, the set was carved from black stone intermixed with glaringly white fossils. The inside was stained rust brown from constant use, and he only considered it for a moment before tapping in dried mint, rosemary, sunflower and salt. Over the herbs, he poured a small splatter of the blood that had been enchanted to remain fresh before grinding it all together into a fine paste.

He'd been told over and over throughout the years that he practiced his magic wrong, but the first thing he'd learned once Higgins had found him was that his magic was highly subject to his own thoughts and whims. For him, it helped to include as object that was close to him and something that reminded him of the subject of his magic.

When Higgins still mattered -because he had at one point no matter how Andrew felt about him now- he'd taught Andrew that magic was personal, that there was no right or wrong way to do it. Where Exy was structure and rigid, witchcraft was loose and up for interpretation. Due to his lack of control though, Higgins had suggest a deity to follow, Apollo to be exact.

Andrew had scoffed. What use would he have had for a god that wasn't there to help anyway? What use did he have for magic that didn't work anyway? The only person he could rely on was himself, and he wasn't going to put his time and energy towards an absent god.

Only once he was in Juvie and had met Aaron with all his bruises and down turned eyes that he considered the possibility. Deities, whether that be God from a magicless religion or a God(dess) from a pagan religion, were supposed to focus the worshiper's magic and make it easier to manipulate into the needed shape. A deity wasn't a requirement for practicing, but Andrew had needed to focus if he was going to help his brother.

Andrew studied under Apollo for months before realizing he was in dire need of feminine energy in his craft.

Sekhmet found him sitting on the curb outside a convenience store in the form of a black cat with piecing golden eyes and an emerald collar. The cat had rubbed her head along his arm and back before taking a seat next to him. She's dropped a piece of paper in his lap, looking please. The paper had been from a textbook, an image of Sekhmet staring up at him.

Mistress of Dread.

Lady of Slaughter.

He'd looked over at the cat, scratching behind her ear. “Thanks.”

With a blink, she'd gotten up and disappeared over the hood of a car.

“Andrew?”

Blinking back to himself, Andrew scooted over and said, “Sit. Back to me.”

Neil sat as he was instructed, dropping the top towel and shivering as the cool air pressed against his skin. Overhead, there was the weak patter of rain beginning again, softer than earlier that night.

“Sit still,” Andrew warned before dipping his fingers into the blood mixture. He retraced the sigils he'd already written. Track blocker. Hex dispeller. Barrier. The blood glowed gently after her pressed each sigil into Neil's skin.

Neil trembled. “You're warm.”

“Good. Turn. Now the front.” Andrew placed a general protection sigil in each of Neil's four corners to ask the elements for their protection, and over his heart, he drew his oldest sigil. The first sigil he'd written that worked.

When he pressed his hand over the blood, electricity jumped between their skin. Neil gasped quietly. “What was that one?”

“Just something extra.” He was still mildly skeptical about the gods, but he'd silently talked to Apollo and Sekhmet while he'd been drawing. The burst of energy between their bodies told Andrew that someone had heard.

Andrew ran his fingers down the bridge of Neil's nose, smirking as he scrunched it up. When he prompted Neil, he dipped his clean fingers in the blood mixture to do the same to Andrew.

Standing, Andrew said simply, “Shower.”

Neil climbed into the shower, and Andrew followed behind him, leaving his tools to clean up later. He dragged Neil into a kiss as the water burst back to life.

Neil:

The shower lasted longer than either of them probably meant it to, turning from washing the blood from their skin to moans and gasps, hands in hair and lips on necks. The water ran cold before they clambered back out, Neil feeling like himself again and Andrew's magic jumping from his skin in energetic spurts compared to the person. It was nearly eight when they check out of their room.

“Off to the campsite then?” Neil asked, sliding into the driver's seat and turning over the engine in one easy motion. He grabbed the map from the glove compartment as Andrew smoked outside the car door, but instead of opening it, he licked his thumb and pressed it to the front where his fingerprint remained and glowed. “At least we won't get lost now.”

“You'll find a way,” Andrew hummed, stubbing out his cigarette and sliding into the passenger seat. “Do you still feel the spell?”

Neil shook his head, twisting around in his seat to back out of the spot. “No. All I can feel is this sigil.” Turning forward, he pressed his fingers over his heart.

He didn't see Andrew look over at him, but he smiled when he growled, “Stop making that face.”

“I'm not making a face.”

“You are, and I hate it.”

Neil pursed his lips. “You know, every time you say you hate something about me, it makes me think that you actually like it.”

“Bold faced lie.”

“You said you wouldn't lie to me.”

Andrew shrugged. “I wasn't the one who said it.”

Neil hummed along with the frequency of his own magic. “Do you want coffee before we leave town?”

“I want a chocolate croissant and java chip frappuccino,” Andrew said.

“You had those yesterday.”

“And?”

Neil started laughing.

#all for the game #the foxhole court #aftg #andrew minyard #neil josten #Andreil #my writing #magic user au #witch au #my idiots holding each other up

[kob131]

https://izetarion.tumblr.com/post/189410998186/theres-two-versions-of-adam-taurus?is_liked_post=1

Monty!Adam: Created by Monty Oum, a minority. Focused on the Faunus, while wanting to get back at the humans for their mistreatment of his kind, a man of revolution who was focused on the safety of his people - seen as how he was strong-armed into working with Cinder Fall after getting her maiden powers, wasn’t so psychopathic that he would turn on his own kind and kill humans out of sheer glee (seen with Cinder and her lot, as he gave them a chance to leave), prioritizes the cause over a cat girl, who was his student - sharing a “student-mentor” relationship as established by the show’s creator as well as said cat girl (“Forget it! It’s time I headed back to Mistral!”), has a legitimate reason to hate humans - especially those affiliated with the Schnee Dust Company, very charismatic, somewhat of a fallen mentor figure given the way the catgirl described him, his cause steadily consuming him (“I had someone I care for, who changed…”), is one of the most popular male characters in the series in the first half of RWBY - despite having little screentime, has an aesthetically-pleasing look to him, compared to DMC!Vergil and Jetstream Sam - two of the most iconic video game characters, in terms of looks and fighting style, Adam Taurus fans signs his adoption papers so that Miles and Kerry would never touch him. People use this version in their fanfics and RPs, turning him into a redeemable person while still keeping his morally grey aspects. Tauradonna is more mutual than lovey-dovey.

Okay so let’s break this down and show this is bullshit.

“Focused on the Fanaus-”

He is never shown to actually help any Fanaus and all White Fang activity, ESPECIALLY in Volumes 1 and 2, revolves around fucking over human. In fact, considering Tuskon, the fact that Vale does not have discrimination against Fanaus and V1 E1 openly says a peaceful protest of Fanaus was interrupted by the WF (” In other news, this Saturday's Faunus Civil Rights protest turned dark when members of the White Fang disrupted the ceremony. The once peaceful organization has now disrupted...”): Adam has acted AGAINST the Fanaus since LITERALLY the first episode.

“A man of revolution who was focused on the safety of his people-”

Which is why, in an EARLIER episode than the one you cite (Volume 2 Episode 12 meaning MONTY was in charge here as we know since he was cited with putting in the Raven scene in the SAME EPISODE against Miles and Kerry’s wishes): Adam gave no shits about his men DYING when he openly said he’d convince them to work with Cinder without so much as a glare at her. BTW, Adam specifically cited Cinder being HUMAN for the reason why he didn’t want to kill his men (’I won’t sacrifice my men for a human cause’). If the human part wasn’t the reason why he wasn’t agreeing with Cinder, why would his dialogue not be ‘I won’t sacrifice my men, no matter what.”?

“ wasn’t so psychopathic that he would turn on his own kind and kill humans out of sheer glee (seen with Cinder and her lot, as he gave them a chance to leave)-”

Nuh uh, in the same Volume Adam out right STABS Blake and says he wants to destroy everything she loves, in the previous Volume he didn’t care about his men dying and said nothing about trying to DESTROY VALE killing THOUSANDS if not MILLIONS of people (including FANAUS) and at the VERY beginning, he tried to blow up a train car full of people who hadn’t even raised a finger against him even though, as Blake shows, he could have detached the train.

“ prioritizes the cause over a cat girl, who was his student - sharing a “student-mentor” relationship as established by the show’s creator as well as said cat girl (“Forget it! It’s time I headed back to Mistral!”),”

Except that, again. Adam STABS Blake and outright shows malice towards her in the SAME VOLUME, Arkos shows mentorship and romance are NOT exclusive and even THAT line is delivered with Adam looking furious clearly showing he’s hung up about Blake.

“ has a legitimate reason to hate humans - especially those affiliated with the Schnee Dust Company-”

Not really, especially since Adam was shown to be selfish in previous Volumes so why would he care about other people? In fact, the ‘fuckboi’ Adam you’ll bitch about later has the reason to hate humans, especially those with the SDC. This version, since he’s apparently completely seperate, is just racist.

“very charismatic”

Never shown OR said. Just projecting.

“ somewhat of a fallen mentor figure given the way the catgirl described him,”

Notice how here they don’t actually say WHAT the description is despite KNOWING about quotes? That’s because there’s nothing actually said in the show that is ambiguously about a mentorship.

“ his cause steadily consuming him (“I had someone I care for, who changed…”)”

Doesn’t prove anything AND it coinsides with ‘fuckboi’ Adam.

“ is one of the most popular male characters in the series in the first half of RWBY - despite having little screentime,”

So is Kirito, wanna guess what V1-2 Adam and Kirito have in common? They don’t have defined personality and their popularity came from people projecting onto them.

“ has an aesthetically-pleasing look to him, compared to DMC!Vergil and Jetstream Sam - two of the most iconic video game characters, in terms of looks and fighting style”

Both of which are incredibly common in anime.

“ Adam Taurus fans signs his adoption papers so that Miles and Kerry would never touch him”

Too bad according to you, they weren’t the ones who ruined Adam. No no, your issues, as I have shown, existed with MONTY. So you better start smack talking him... what’s that, if you did that you couldn’t profit off his name and his fanboys would rip you to shreds? Maybe you shouldn’t be a disingenuous fuck.

‘ People use this version in their fanfics and RPs,’

And people turn Jaune into a generic self insert and Ruby into an edgy angsty psuedo anti hero- that means nothing.

“ turning him into a redeemable person while still keeping his morally grey aspects.”

So basically making him a generic anti villian instead of a tragic case of someone not being able to get over their past tramua.

“ Tauradonna is more mutual than lovey-dovey.”

And it’s more ‘abusive’ than mutual.

Fuckboi!Adam: Created by Miles and Kerry, two amateurish white guys noted for writing sub-par comedy segments and part of the upper echelons of Rooster Teeth. Born out of the criticism of “show, don’t tell aspect” of the show - barely having any visible evidence of Faunus racism, born out of the two admitting they couldn’t write a racism sub-plot - despite having the money and resources to do so, established as an abuser by CRWBY and demonized heavily by them and the fanbase despite little evidence of such prior to because of catgirl’s various descriptions of him pointing towards someone “dear” (“More of a mentor, actually…”),  “hElLo, My LoVe!” “tHe bElLaDoNnAs HaVe CaUsEd Me NoThInG bUt GrIeF!”, “sO i JuSt wAsN’t GoOd EnOuGh FoR yOu.”, A fedora wearing crazed nazi ex-boyfriend, DMC-Reboot!Vergil but with the edgelord turned to 11, “Tauradonna? More like Tauradon’t!”, How many zippers does your dumbass outfit need? lol, Why did your voice crack?, Even his own VA hate him, Is an incel-ass bitch, Gaston apparently, Lol he’s attempting the birdbox challenge, That stupid ass face reveal did nothing as the damage was done, The fandom - primarily BMBLB, and CRWBY sing of his death (“Ding-dong the bitch is dead!”) - with the BMBLB fandom using his death as major evidence of their ship becoming canon. Also, his death caused such dissonance in the fandom that shit hit the fan in all kinds of ways, not to mention his death started the slow deterioration of RT - embodying the spite element that Blake attributed him, probably because he was pissed at CRWBY to the point where his hatred manifested as a curse - causing their various injustices against their employees to come out and be heavily criticized as a result (No, seriously, RT is visibly crumbling shortly after his demise).

“ Created by Miles and Kerry-”

And yet will somehow completely overlap with the Volumes Monty had the most control over.

“ two amateurish white guys”

Miles is part Mexician.

“ noted for writing sub-par comedy segments”

While Monty is noted for never writing whatsoever so i guess that means you think Miles and Kerry are better.

“ Born out of the criticism of “show, don’t tell aspect” of the show - barely having any visible evidence of Faunus racism, born out of the two admitting they couldn’t write a racism sub-plot - despite having the money and resources to do so,”

The criticism being located SOLELY in Volumes 1 and 2 Aka MONTY.

“ established as an abuser by CRWBY and demonized heavily by them and the fanbase despite little evidence of such prior to because of catgirl’s various descriptions of him pointing towards someone “dear” (“More of a mentor, actually…”)’“

You know...despite the fact that every single aspect of Adam’s character has been shown WITH MONTY, as I showed above.

“ “hElLo, My LoVe!” “

Located in Volume 3, which you cite as a Volume where ‘Monty!’ Adam existed.

“ “tHe bElLaDoNnAs HaVe CaUsEd Me NoThInG bUt GrIeF!” “

Huh, if you spelled “Belladonna” as “Miles and Kerry”, that sounds an awful lot like you...oh

“ “sO i JuSt wAsN’t GoOd EnOuGh FoR yOu.” “

They scream as Rooster Teeth ignores them.

“ A fedora wearing crazed nazi ex-boyfriend”

Never actually shown wearing a fedora or ever showing any personbality traits associated with it...but then again, you know what they say about mirrors...

Also at least it’s better than ‘blank edgy emo teen’ he was in Volume 3 which you loved apparently.

“ DMC-Reboot!Vergil but with the edgelord turned to 11″

Uh oh, Op’s brain rotted so he can’t actually make arguments....oh wait, he was always like that.

“ “Tauradonna? More like Tauradon’t!” “

So basically ‘wah wah wah. my otp is not canon’.

“ How many zippers does your dumbass outfit need?”

Dunno, why is wearing a tux as a freedom fighter and sticks out like a sore thumb?

“ Why did your voice crack?”

Why did he sound fourteen in Volume 3?

“ Even his own VA hate him,”

Ever since Volume 3 which you cite as “Monty!Adam”

“ Is an incel-ass bitch, Gaston apparently”

Or you know, a Beats who never grew up and never became a better person. But who needs insight?

“ Lol he’s attempting the birdbox challenge”

*insert Family Guy skit here*

“ hat stupid ass face reveal did nothing as the damage was done”

They say as most of the fandom did a 180 on how they view his character and gave him more justification for his actions than “Monty” Adam ever had.

“ he fandom - primarily BMBLB, and CRWBY sing of his death (“Ding-dong the bitch is dead!”)”

Which considering he was meant to be hated is a GOOD thing.

“ with the BMBLB fandom using his death as major evidence of their ship becoming canon”

Basically ‘wah wah wah make MY otp canon”

“ Also, his death caused such dissonance in the fandom that shit hit the fan in all kinds of ways”

all kinds being two ways: accepting it and throwing a fit because you didn’t get your way. Also inadvertently justifying wasps being assholes because they did the same thing during Volumes 4 and 5.

“ t to mention his death started the slow deterioration of RT - embodying the spite element that Blake attributed him, probably because he was pissed at CRWBY to the point where his hatred manifested as a curse - causing their various injustices against their employees to come out and be heavily criticized as a result (No, seriously, RT is visibly crumbling shortly after his demise).”

And said curse infected many of his fans where they all became monsters after his death like say, using the suffering of others AND THE DEAD *cough* MONTY *cough* all over a fictional character that didn’t even exist because as I have shown Adam is completely consistent with his characterization from the Black Trailer to his death. Something I am certain OP knows deep down because half way through this point they completely abandon any attempt at actually proving what they are saying to instead spout a bunch of memes in a vain attempt to appeal to people’s confirmation bias because they can’t actually make an argument to prove Adam had changed AT ALL, especially since their obsessive behavior, attempt at creating an abusive/parasitic relationship with RT and their own childishness has all but prove Adam is in no way unrealistic as they act like him except with NO justification whatsoever.

But sure, scream loud enough and people will think you’re right. That hasn’t BACKFIRED before.

[monster-mum]

A Count Down to Death

Recently I have been feeling my age. At thirty-five I’m hardly over the hill, but I am not feeling particularly spritely. It amazes me how in my mind I still feel eighteen, yet the pain in my back and hip are a sharp, consistent, nagging reminder that I am not. The ridiculous thing is I am in much better shape now than I was at eighteen, but man do I miss the days of being able to eat whatever I wanted and not feel, or see the repercussions of that decision. Now all I need do is be in the vicinity of a cheeseburger and then BAM my bum is rivalling that of a Kardashian’s. I find myself looking around at my friends and thinking about how old they are, and if they’re feeling their age, for one reason or another I think they are. Most of my friends have young monsters in their houses though, so I am thinking that this has something to do with how old and tired we all are. I guarantee that a parent asked how they are will respond either verbally or mentally with “tired.” Maybe that is why I am feeling old and it has nothing to do with me being five years shy of my fortieth birthday.

 I have a really bad way of thinking about age, I think about time left before I likely die, as opposed to how little time I have had here. I can honestly tell you, it is not a very optimistic point of view. I do not recommend it. So, you can imagine the bittersweet experience I have every birthday. I love presents, but hate counting down to my ultimate demise. Cheerful aren’t I.

 Nothing reminds you better of your old, aging self more than that of playing with a child. Oh yes, they pretend innocence and ignorance but they are mocking us with their youth and young, energetic bodies as they run circles around you in Tesco while shouting about something bizarre. For example;

 Myself, Steven, Lyla and Lachlan are in the kitchen. I am making the boys their lunch and Lyla has informed me that she is making her own, cue chaos and mess. Me and Steven are talking when he tricks me into saying the same word as him, he then Jinxes me. I cannot speak until he says my name three times.

 Lyla laughs manically at the fact I am temporarily mute, Steven smirks then takes pity on me.

 Steven: “Mummy, Mummy aaaaaaaand Muuuummmmmmmmy.”

 Me: “Thanks Steven. You do know that Mummy isn’t my actual name though don’t you?”

 Steven nods.

 Lyla: “MUMMY!!”

 Lyla does not believe in talking at a normal volume. Everything must be shouted from about five to ten centimetres away from a person’s face. No matter what.

 Me: “Yes Lyla?”

 Lyla: “Mummy! Your real name is Nicola Whittington! Not Mummy! So, you cannot talk!” She then begins to laugh manically while waving a knife around.

 That might sound alarming to some but I’m 40% sure that Lyla wouldn’t stab me in the kitchen. I have it on good authority, from Lyla herself, that if she were going to kill me she would stab me in the eye while I was sleeping.

 Lyla is all about the warm feels and sweetness.

 Lyla: “And Daddy’s name is Chris Whittington!”

 Me: “That’s right. Daddy is Christopher but at work some people call him Dick for short.” I hope I do not have to explain why a Whittington’s nickname is Dick.

 And this is where the bizarre chaotic behaviour begins.

 It starts with Lyla shout singing “Chris Dick Whittington.” She then introduces a kind of dance that is only seen at the end of a wedding reception. There’s usually that one guy who is drunk and doing some kind of headbanging, Tigger bouncing rock dance, while a very drunk woman, with her shoes in her hand, is swaying and rolling her head around. Combine these two people and you’ll have some clue as to what Lyla’s dance was.

 Steven then joins in by turning his Dad’s name into a rap where he says “yeah, uh, yeah” at every break in Lyla’s performance.

 This is what children are like. Weird, funny, energetic little creatures.

 I actually managed to video part of this performance, which carried on to a great finale, where Steven pointed at Lyla who did some kind of kick jump with a spatula in her hand.

 Very strange beings, they must get it from Chris. He is definitely the one who dances around the kitchen singing into spatula’s, (cough cough.)

 The energy and shout singing are one of the many ways in which children mock us with their youth. They are also just downright mean.

 Me and Lyla are watching Tangled. If you’ve read one of my previous blogs you’ll know this is a favourite of Lyla’s, you will also be familiar with the story. An older woman kindly protects, nurtures and cares for a young woman called Rapunzel, for eighteen years. The only payment she asks in return is to be allowed to sit and brush Rapunzel’s ridiculously long hair and sing a sweet song to her, which also happens to give the older woman a make-over rivalling anything you saw on The Swann. Thus, helping her to look a few years younger. Then Rapunzel runs away with a man, whom she had never met until he broke into her home. She then sets off with him and later horrifically murders the poor older woman. It’s a very cruel story of betrayal.

 Anyway, Lyla likes it.

 Me: “How old do you think that lady is Lyla?” Pointing at the older woman in the film.

 Lyla: “Thirty-six.”

 Hmmm…

 Me: “Oh, okay. I must look very young then Lyla. How old do you think I am?”

 To be fair, I can now see where I went wrong here. I should never have asked this question.

 Lyla: “One hundred and eleventity four.”

 Sigh.

 Me: “So the older lady there looks thirty-six and I, who is thirty-five, looks one hundred and fourteen?”

 Lyla: Smiles coyly and feigns innocence “Yep” she then cuddles into me.

 I am pretty sure this is some kind of psychological abuse. Telling me I look old, not just old but I look older than the oldest person in the world, but then being affectionate? No wonder I count down to death, I am living some kind of psychological thriller.

 I once asked a friend of mine who works in the Mental Health sector to access Lyla for psychopathy. Lyla was five. He informed me that Lyla was not a psychopath and she is a normal child. I told him that when she has grown up and has gone on a killing spree I will be at his door reminding him of this conversation.

 So, what have we learnt from this blog today.

 1)    Children are not innocent in their mocking of our age-related aches and pains.

2)    Children are weird.

3)    DO NOT MESS WITH LYLA!!

#mummyblogger #mummylife #children #monsters #aginggracefully #reality #mylife #this is my life #parentingblogger #parentblogger #parentblog #mycrazylife #lifewithchildren #my family #getting older

[arkus-rhapsode]

Rhapsode Reacts: RWBY Volume 3

Hey guys, Rhapsode here. So I’ve been on the record numerous times saying I haven’t watched the internet series RWBY. I haven’t. However, I have a rather close mutual @remnantoforario who tells me about most of the series and characters. Seriously, I basically have experienced the plot through osmosis. Now me and remnant work on a lot of fanfiction stuff and general discussions of video games and manga. And highly suggest anyone who wants a more in depth look at RWBY to please check him out. He’s great.

Now due to the fact he has basically told me the series up this point, its kinda been a bit frustrating when I forget something and ask him to reiterate. So I decided to knuckle down and watch some of the series.

I helped remnant get a non RWBY fan opinion, by basically live-blogging him in our PMs. And I thought I had some level of humorous reactions and Remnant had some witty observations to my reactions.

Anyway, if you didn’t catch it the first time, I must repeat, I’m not coming at this from the perspective of a fan. I have very little emotional or personal enjoyment going in the series up to this point. If I say something that offends you as a fan, I’m sorry in advance.

With that out of the way, let’s dive in:

Oh that’s a sweet scene of Ruby at her mother’s grave.

Why would you start Team RWBY’s preliminary fight in the middle of it?

the Vytal Festival feels like it should be reversed: you should start with 1, then go to 2, then for your finals, 4. Or just do a solid 4 v 4 all tournament

Remnantoforario: I dont know what the purpose of the tournament is, or why anyone would want to participate. There is no prize 

Me: Bragging rights I guess. But the whole point of the festival is to celebrate peace. Lets celebrate piece with a bunch of kids beating each other up .

Ruby has a line of "we did it?" like she was surprised. Was that a concern? 

Like I understand the festival has been built up since the second volume, but there's a reason most good tournament arcs ease you into the first round. Its to reaffirm character motivation and actually show you what a fight would look like 

  I do appreciate some of the “show don't tell” moments like the one girl using a heat crystal in her skate board to free her teammate

But usually even if the first round is jobbers, they're at least presented as a threat. I never really got that. The tide seemed more and Rwby's favor, but I can't tell if that was always the case because we started in the middle of the fight

the pacing just feels like you can't handle the story, so it wants to get to the fight scenes to keep your attention 

Emerald is actually really funny, holy shit 

“How can they be so happy?” And “It’s the heiress and the bimbo” 

Still Weiss and Yang, better savor this duo while I can 

Neo’s gothic Lolita is cute. Though I feel like their match should’ve gotten a focus 

Like I mean not an episode but if they started with the instant eliminations of 1v1, I could easily see this cool intro of Rwby has met Emerald, Mercury, and Cinder, but then is shocked at who this fourth member even is 

OK I feel like the scene with Rwby and JNPR should’ve happened before the first round.  Given Nora’s rant would actually tie to Ruby’s whole “we won?” Surprise

“Cinder: Even if you know how the story ends that doesn’t make it any less fun to watch.” I’d agree with you if you know the story wasn’t Rwby. And it’s not really that fun to watch a bunch of fighting with no weight.

OK team JNPR vs team BRNZ is actually a much better introduction to the tournament than Rwby vs Abrn

We actually see how the field is chosen and we actually get some genuine strategy and coordination. And before all this we actually get some motivation about how the characters feel going into this battle

Me: OK why are these not the protagonists and why was this not episode one?

Remnantoforario: questions for the writers 

I got admit I’m not very much of a fan of melee weapons that also turn into guns and just kind of makes the purpose of melee fighters and ranged fighters pointless 

Logically it makes sense that if you’re making a weapon you do want it to have multiple functionality but at the same time it kind of makes a lot of that fighting less fun 

I mean what do you want to see more a team complete each other or just one person who can just do everything with the right weapon?

  Ehh OK the team meeting joke is running a tad too long

Okay, that was what I was mentioning before... Just cut out Nora with missiles. I feels more like a give and take as well as more unique to have that moment with her slamming on the ground 

“Crow Bar.” Oh you go to the corner for that pun.

OK that joke with Weiss and telling Indigo to beat up Neptune was timed and delivered really bad 

Also port makes a point that Sun is from Vacuo. Wouldn’t it be interesting if the leader or any membr of Indigo actually did know Sun from Vacuo?

I say that because no member of team Indigo has said anything, and it would at least add something unique to this fight

OK I have to bring up the weird use of western cartoon comedy

Neptune running up the mountain it’s super speed is kind of funny but this is also a fight I’m supposed to take seriously 

Nora and Ruby kind of get away with it given their powers but Neptune just ran up a mountain like it was nothing

What is the tone here?

Sage went out like a bitch 

you know if you wanted to eliminate someone to make me feel for this team being in trouble why didn’t you just eliminate Neptune? 

OK scarlet’s scene actually really works 

That nut joke didn’t. Again, tone? 

Me: Why would you sacrifice the two characters we don’t know anything about just to do Neptunes stupid joke?

Remnant: COMEDY 

OK this fight was bad 

Me: I get the idea indigo was a bunch of jobbers so you decided to play the comedy angle. OK, well then tone down the serious rock music, turn down the cartoon physics

Remnant: For reference. That was a post Monty fight 

I agree with Qrow, that was a mess

okay introduction to Winter is pretty good. Shame we don't really get that "Novice victory" vibe from their fight. Maybe if it last for more than 8 minutes and didn't start from the middle... 

okay see, I don't mid Winter and Qrow having a fight in the middle of the square as it helps serve as an introduction to the characters and flexes their strength

though Im also starting to notice something else that bugs me in the fights, no banter or introspection or comments

its just fight moves 

like there's times that's god, DBZ did it tons of times when its just Goku making "Hiyah" noises but there was still a bit of time to get in a line that both broke up the action and highlighted how two characters felt or through thought was able to give us a peek into their head

watching rwby fights makes me think, "This be better as a video game" 

so... does no woman in this world wear a bra? 

 Ironwood: “If you were one of my men, I'd have you shot!”

Okay, that can't be legal

Ironwood is kinda becoming my favorite character 

He's a flawed human being, and the narrative shows that, but it also shows he has a point 

Okay, yeah I see what you mean, all this Fall stuff is happening in the background which is nice, but there's no real plot with the tournament 

Okay Mercury and Emerald vs Coco and Yatsuhashi is actually really good 

not much character, but its actually more intimidating seeing how strong these two are. Wish the music had a bit more ambiance 

Okay, that's an interesting plot point. Qrow explaining how beating one high profile criminal hasn't stopped crime. And the fact there is zero crime is concerning and relating it back to Ironwood

Wow, its almost when you just slow down and lt characters breath and talk to each other and have them be characters without shoving in a fight scene, its pretty good

Why is team Cardin fighting a non faunus team? Feels like a waste of characters 

disappointing that Ciel doesn't know Penny is a robot

mainly because the way its queued up with Ciel seemed like she was only spending time with Penny because ordered and her attention to the schedule makes it seem like she is a soldier just having to play dress up for the robot to make it comfortable 

Me: Wow Weiss's heels...  Never noticed them. I just thought they were boots

Remnant: Nope heels 

Also Neon and Flynt actually have a pretty good intro 

We know what Atlas is like seeing Winter and Ironwood, so Neon and Flynt make an interesting and immediate contrast

And it feels like there is something riding on our opponents side given Flynts history with the Schnee. Which makes him stand out from the other jobbers

And Neon's intentionally irritating personality actually is more character displayed by any other opponent character

I actually really like the OST in the fight too. This might be my favorite action scene 

Flynt actually has a really cool semblance too 

oh wow, some actual dread with Weiss getting eliminated 

Imma let you get away with that Hulk reference Port

I like how Yang beat Flynt, but if I was gonna beat Neon, I'd have Yang punch the ground and through her off balance 

Haha Ironwood doesn't have a heart, I get it, he's tin man 

least they didn't go with Ozpin saying Qrow doesn't have a brain 

Me: So... If Pyrrha is all these things, why aren't we following her team?

So abridged version of the four seasons story Four random chicks find a guy camped out in his house, be nice to him and he gives them super powers. If I were a kid being told that, I’d demand another story 

Pyrrha: like a semblance?

Oz: Like magic!

Me: Like a semblance

Qrow is right, this selection is stupid 

You’re keeping a woman in your basement in cryogenic suspension. Oz you and Rhea need to share notes 

Oh god... Adam. You can’t act

Adam seems already psychopathic Or maybe that’s just his acting

So this is the famous Yang punching Mercury... It works I guess

Actually getting a chance to see some Jaune and Pyrrha moments in v3 and it’s good 

Me: Velvet is British? Huh... never predicted that 

Remnant: Australian 

How can Ruby notice Emerald all the way across the arena? Actually wait she’s the only one not in a black uniform 

Why did they leave Mercury behind where anyone could find him? 

And Penny is dead and I do not care at this point

Cinder’s little speech is the first time I’m actually feeling like I’m getting a villain motivation out of her 

She talks about how Oz and the headmasters are just men capable of making mistakes But she’s someone who would embrace and all powerful godly being. Though that seems and odds with the presumed motive that she’s working with Salem to potentially kill the brother gods

Okay, Blake and Weiss have a pretty good scene when all hell was breaking loose 

Ruby versus the big ass bird was actually pretty cool and the scene of everyone’s lockers being what puts it down is really clever 

Oh really cool scene of Port and Oobleck. Hey the fall is turning out pretty decent

Ironwood killing the wolf was pretty good 

Roman is a breath of fresh air as a villain. And it’s namely his acting 

You know I feel like you could let the more tertiary characters fight the robots while Weiss and Blake fight WF 

OK I repeat this is just become a video game. Giant dragon that spawns mini monsters in a destroyed town 

The spectacle fighting actually really works when your opponents are mindless and faceless brutes

You have Adam in a school full of terrified people, why aren’t you showing his nuance by showing he won’t hurt Faunus staff and is giving them an out? 

Velvet’s scene be cool if it was powers she was mimicking. Looking at a lot of weapons really doesn’t do much for me.

That said, this could work if she ended up copying the mech and fighting against it

Okay I feel like Weiss finally being able to summon something should’ve been done with a lot more gravitas

And Sun proceeds to be the best male character 

Neo is fucking beast. Y’know what, let her be final boss

Now I just have this image of Neo flying through the air with a sign reading “I’m Mary Poppins, Y’all”

Wow, Roman went out like a bitch 

Like zero build up just dead. And his replacement is Adam... There is no justice 

Ironwood: someone has done the unthinkable and taken control of my machines!

Watts: What? Like it’s hard? 

Blake and Yang holding hands on the ground after Yang lost an arm. Yeah that’s pretty shippy 

Also, I feel like the animation really limits a lot of the characters expressions. Like the time Ruby spent dwelling on her sister being mutilated is well timed. But usually a lot of the emotional devastation comes down to the expression.

a lot of faces seem stiff in transition expressions. Or they have this doll like quality 

The most expressive person seems to be Emerald 

Pyrrha and Jaune’s kiss is actually really tender 

Me: Okay how the hell is Cinder’s dress still managing to cover her loins? 

Remnant: maiden magic.

And Pyrrha died 

Are you done with the whole line of do you believe in destiny was fine Personally I would’ve also accepted the Ted Kord response, Rot in Hell.

Ruby went super saiyan 

Tai being the first person Ruby sees is nice 

Yang’s bitterness works here. Though given how I wasn’t feeling too much of the sisterly bond between the two, it’s probably not as hard hitting as they wanted 

Salem’s introduction isn’t bad 

so after watching V3. my final opinion is meh 

Strikes me as they wanted to the fall, and the tournament was just a lot of window dressing. Because the stuff with the Fall is the best part, but everything else has felt dull and fillery.

Maybe I’ll do this for the next season of a series I binge. But till next time, take care.

[ongshat]

  For a comprehensive list of most of my print work (not including magazine articles) see this list on Goodreads.

All my works dedicated to the memory of my dearly departed friends: The members of The Formless Ocean Group – Nina Graboi, Elizabeth Gips, Paddy Long, Betsy Herbert, and Robert Anton Wilson. Also to my departed friends: Dave, DW Cooper, Dr. Hyatt (Alan) and humdog.

PAST WORK

Beats In Time: A Literary Generation’s Legacy (Chapter 12 is my interview with Diane DiPrima) also to be included in Conversations with Diane di Prima to be published by the University Press of Mississippi, in 2021/22.

Transmedia: Who Invited the Lobsters Anyway?

Legend-Tripping Online: Supernatural Folklore and the Search for Ong’s Hat by Michael Kinsell – While clearly this is a book about my transmedia project it also includes a lot of things that I wrote as examples, so I include it here. Metamodernism, anyone?

Rebels and Devils: The Psychology of Liberation edited by Christopher S. Hyatt, Ph.D. introduced by S. Jason Black foreword by Nicholas Tharcher contributions by William S. Burroughs Joseph C. Lisiewski, Ph.D. Timothy Leary Ph.D., Robert Anton Wilson, Austin Osman Spare, Genesis P-Orridge, Aleister Crowley, Joseph Matheny, Peter J. Carroll, Israel Regardie, Jack Parsons, Phil Hine, Osho, and many others

Black Book Omega: CIRQUE APOKLYPSIS by Christopher S. Hyatt, Ph.D. Joseph Matheny, Nick Pell, Calvin Iwema, Wes Unruh, Antero Alli (more info here)

Contributor YouTube: An Insider’s Guide to Climbing the Charts (more info here)

Introduction to The Art of Memetics Aside: When I posted about this book on Greylodge, Seth Godin references the post as a good example of “How to write like a blogger“ This made me happy. 😉

Contributor/Editor:This is Not a Game: A Guide to Alternate Reality Gaming with Dave Szulborski (Excerpt here )I edited and contributed to : “This Is Not a Game” which was included in the annual Tween market report that went to marketing executives worldwide in the toy, gaming and youth market industries. Also, I appeared as myself/in character, in person,  in the “Catching the Wish” ARG by Dave.

Third Realm (The Yellow King) Written and executed by me, produced in conjunction with Foolish People http://www.argn.com/2009/10/puzzles_for_the_apocalyps

4P2 My first foray into the True Crime arena. Formula:  Just put up a single, spooky web page, that purports to be a recruitment drive for an organization whose actual existence is speculative at best and at worst is fiction presented as fact or paranoid, hysterical hand-waving in the interest of selling books and you will get all kinds of reactions. In all fairness, I think the theories mentioned read as good fantasy crime fiction and this was a conceptual attempt at that very thing. Apparently, it succeeded. The unnerving side of this was the equal amount of applications I received asking to join (Really? Join a group of underground serial killers? Really?) or outright death threats by people who really believe in such things.   (Someone summed it up pretty well in this article from The Fenris Wolf)

  the-fenriswolf-iss-no-4-pp-87-116 PDF Excerpt

El Centro & OMEGA This was a ARG/Transmedia style story with occult/horror/conspiracy elements, started in 2004 and ended in 2006. It utilized Web, print (booklet), radio, phone trees, theater and news wire services. [A version of the doughnut shop scene from this story was used in Amsterdam production of Terra: Extremitas by Foolish People.] This project was done in collaboration my late friend Dave Szulborski. There’s a LOOOOOONG story about this project. So long in fact that it will take up at least three chapters in an future book.

Contributor: What Would Bill Hicks Say with Ben Mack, Amelia the Great and Soft Skull Press (along with Jeff Danziger and Martyn Turner; writers Neal Pollack, Robert Newman, and A.L. Kennedy; and Thom Yorke of Radiohead and others…)

Contributor: 2004-2005 Exquisite Language project for the 2004 ELfest and collected in the Spring 2005 issue of of 2 Gyrlz Quarterly. NOW AVAILABLE AT POWELLS.COM

Introduction, afterward and editing for Poker Without Cards– First Edition. I orchestrated the first release campaign for this book, with the main character becoming “real”on the Internet for a while. After the first few months I turned it over to the author. (statement regarding this work here)

GALT’S ARK: The Black Symphony, First and Second Movements Produced by Cthulhu The Players: Joseph Matheny, Christopher S. Hyatt, Ph.D., Father Daniel Suders & Nicholas Tharcher Illustrated by S. Jason Black, Jonathan Sellers, Weirdpixie & MobiusFrame

�� THE BLACK BOOK Volume III, Part I

THE BLACK BOOK Volume III, Part II

(The Black Books are considered the workbooks for The Psychopath’s Bible, which I wrote an infamous jacket blurb for.)

The Incunabula: Ong’s Hat Project [ Reviews | Interviews, etc. | Wikipedia | History] This was a ARG/Transmedia style story started in 1988 and ended in 2001. It utilized zines, BBS, early Internet, Web, CD ROM, CD Audio, DVD, print (book, graphic novel and magazine), radio, phone trees, fax, and news wire services. I gained and leveraged exposure in both the mainstream and alternative media to distribute over 2 million copies of CD ROM, ebook and print versions of the story combined. Story elements from Ong’s Hat were also included in the EA Game, Majestic which unfortunately ended prematurely due to 9/11. It was the subject of a full 4 hour show on Coast to Coast AM, been the subject of an article on the Weekly World News and been covered on many radio shows world wide, books, newspapers, magazines, etc. Links to media here.

Description: “…a bizarre Internet phenomenon: an “immersive” online experience—part mystery, part game, part who knows what—known as both the Incunabula Papers and Ong’s Hat. The Incunabula Papers/Ong’s Hat was, or is, a “many-threaded, open-ended interactive narrative” that ”weds an alternate history of chaos science and consciousness studies to conspiracy theories, parallel dimensions, and claims that computer-mediated environments can serve as magical tools…. the documents provoked a widespread “immersive legend-trip” in the late 1990s. Via Web forums, participants investigated the documents—manifestos—which spun up descriptions of brilliant but suppressed discoveries relating to paths that certain scientists had forged into alternate realities. Soon, those haunted dimensions existed in the minds and fantasies of Ong’s Hat’s many participants. That was evident as they responded to the original postings by uploading their own—all manner of reflections and artifacts: personal anecdotes, audio recordings, and videos—to augment what became “a really immersive world, and it was vast”. – The Chronicle of Higher Education—-

“Ong’s Hat was more of an experiment in transmedia storytelling than what we would now consider to be an ARG but its DNA – the concept of telling a story across various platforms and new media- is evident in every alternate reality game that came after.” – Games Magazine 2013

Though Ong’s Hat may not have set out to be an ARG, the methods by which the author interacted with participants and used different platforms to build and spread its legend has been reflected in later games. –Know Your Meme

The Incunabula Papers are arguably the first immersive online legend complex that introduced readers to a host of content, including what religious historian Robert Ellwood has called the “alternative reality tradition. – Legend-Tripping Online: Supernatural Folklore and the Search for Ong’s Hat

As a companion piece to understanding some of the history of the transmedia work that centered around Ong”s Hat you may also want to read Legend-Tripping Online: Supernatural Folklore and the Search for Ong’s Hat,  reviewed here.

The Incunabula Papers CDROM was recently included in the BNF (Bibliothèque nationale de France) digital art collection.

Game Over? (currently re-vamping this for re-release)…but if you just HAVE to have it now, someone is selling one for $900 over here. 😛

What Really Happened at Ong’s Hat?

The Incunabula Papers (CD ROM) Free ebook versions here

Incunabula: The Graphic Novel Free ebook version here

Why DVD? (B and N Digital Bestseller)

A booklet published in April-99

Over 100,000 in circulation to date

Available from booksellers nationwide in October reprinted by:

DVD Creation Magazine

Videography Magazine

(printed copy sent out with each issue – July,1999)

Video Systems magazine

and many others

Convergence 2000 (B and N Digital Bestseller) Free ebook version here

Covert Culture Sourcebook

Earth Dance 2000 (Video and DVD)

The Millennium Whole Earth Catalog 

Transmedia Litany (with Genesis P’Orridge)

Thee psychick bible

esoterrorist (publisher)

My idea for an Exquisite Corpse jacket blurb using faxes. (WSB missed inclusion by a day). Used on Esoterrist

Banishing Ritual (cover) with Illusion of Safety (audio here)

The Last Book

Also contributed a few articles to Bob and Arlen Wilson’s Trajectories.

A write up I did about my old friend Rob Brezsny for disinfo.com

Interview that I did with with Beat poet and author Diane DiPrima

Nina Graboi Interview, bOING bOING, Number 8 (written under my nom de plume: Michael Kelly)

I’ve contributed articles to AlwaysOn and Adotas. I’ve contributed book, music, and movie reviews to Gnosis and Magical Blend in the past as well as the old Boing-Boing print magazine and Fringeware Review. Note, in the interest of full disclosure, I’d sometimes contribute more than one article or review to a single publication and to avoid the appearance of saturation, I’d use the pen name: Michael Kelly for some of the articles.

Writing For a comprehensive list of most of my print work (not including magazine articles) see this list on Goodreads…

[emperorlotorr]

You sent this to the wrong blog buddy, this one is for anime/animated series/video games etc.

actual answer:

When was this even sent, what post are you even talking about. Like…what?

I’ll try to answer this even though it’s not really…a question?

We don’t know what Monty planned him to be and that’s that. i can tell you guys Adam was never supposed to be what he is now and you can tell me he was but we just don’t know and we never will. I’ve pretty much given up on this whole “what adam was meant to be in the beginning” at this point, I’m just thinking that he had a cool fighting style and I wished they’d done something more with his character and established motives.

Your point is: Adam never cared about the passengers in the black trailer so that’s why Monty always planned for Adam to be an abuser/killer of his own people/psychopath? Adam was never meant to be a protagonist or a particular good guy and him having questionable morals is established in the trailer so i’ll give you that but I still don’t understand what you’re trying to say.

Maybe I’ll just give you my opinion based on what i’ve been posting: I believe with the introduction and the info we got in the black trailer, volume 1 and 2 and the songs Adam’s character was established as a leader of the White Fang, who had an unclear relationship with Blake, who was ruthless, ambitious and willling to kill for his cause. They added another aspect of his character later on: his abusive (alledgedly romantic) relationship with Blake and his obsession with her. It’s this last part that feels out of place and i feel like he would’ve done better if they had either never established him as anything else but an abusive piece of shit, with no morals, no true belief in his goals or anything to him but his obsession with Blake OR a misguided leader of a faction with questionable morals as a result of the racism he encounters. I also believe that it was possible to give Adam both of these aspects and still have a believable character if they’d balanced him out better. Eg. Fleshed out the faunus subplot better, not give him over the top lines, established him as both form the beginning.

#asks #answered #don't send these to lokirevenger pls thank you #adam taurus #i haven't been in this fandom for months where did this come from #rwby #rwde #roosterteeth #RWBY volume 6 #rwby v6

[hunterguyveriv]

Where is Desty Nova? POSSIBLE ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL SPOILER theory?

So watching some reaction and docu-videos on the upcoming Alita: Battle Angel and some of them are possible new fans (depending on how the movie does) and some of them who are fans from the beginning, and some of the fans have been wondering where is Desty Nova is for the movie. 

For those who are new because of the upcoming movie, Desty Nova is essentially the opposite of the caring Doc Ido and the biggest thorn in Alita’s side in the manga. If memory serves me right he psychologically broke Ido over the truth of Tiphares. Even played psychological mind games with Alita’s consciousness, and made Cyborg duplicates of Alita to fight her. This is the extent of what I know of Desty Nova because I only read up to Last Order volume 2. But just know he is a thorn in her side and a complete psychopath willing to dissect & experiment on himself (and others), torture others physically & psychologically, and from my understanding on a whim kill whoever he wanted while having a good old laugh about it... basically a Mad-Scientist but with Joker’s state of mind. But anyway, fans are wondering where Nova is. I think he is going to be in the movie or at least referenced. See the pending soundtrack has this for a possible track:

So at least Nova is referenced. But I did a little looking at the cast and there is one person whose character isn’t even listed that screams… SCREAMS Desty Nova. And that is Jackie Earle Haley. As I have stated the character he is playing isn’t listed on either Fandango or IMDB but also he looks EXACTLY like that flan eating psychopath to me.

Now, this isn’t meant to be a solid beyond any shadow of a doubt post, but I am writing this because I strongly think Jackie Earle Haley is the nemesis we love to hate in the series. Hopefully, 39 more days will tell. 

Well, these are just my thoughts on Jackie Earle Haley’s potential role, and the soundtrack listing (which is subject to change) Do you, my fellow Battle Angel fans share the same thoughts?

#battle angel alita #alitabattleangel #alita #desty nova #possible Alita: Battle Angel spoiler

[knightofbalance-13]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suFTBHoLGco

Unicorn of War, I’ve gone on record to say you’re probably the second best RWBY critic on YouTube.

Unforunately, videos like these show that’s more a reflection on how low the bar is in that community than any real indicator of quality. No offense to you but, I think you need to consider certain factors before making videos like these.

Okay so his number five pick is...Raven Branwen. The reason why he choose Raven is because the writing makes Raven out to be a petulant child whose a bad guy when she’s suppose to be a morally complex grey character.

... Issue here is that what she just said is only half right and even then, it’s intended. Raven is suppose to come across as a petulant child to contrast Yang’s maturity as a person as well as the reasoning behind why someone like Raven would do the things she does. As for being morally grey: the issue here is that Raven is morally grey in that she acts for her own selfish goals that contribute to either side. If you were expecting Raven to be this super complex character morals wise from Volume 4: She willingly left her family to join a tribe of bandits that is so horrible that Qrow (her twin) hates them. Not to mention the mass murder. It was clear she was never gonna be on the lighter side of the moral spectrum.

Also he says part of this is due to how Ozpin isn’t called out for being nefarious (I personally doubt that but moving on). Bit thing is: that should contribute to OZPIN’S character, not RAVEN’S. This just comes across as kind of narrow minded in how he views characters and that just leaves a bad feeling in my stomach.

His fourth pick is Leonard Lionheart. He says this is because...um...

Okay first he gives the opinion that Leo’s defection to Salem wasn’t explored enough and wasn’t given enough details. But ironically, he doesn’t really give any details here to really sell that as a reason.

Another is that he’s a headmaster of an Academy in a racist kingdom and says they could have explored his implications but that’s only speculation and if we judge things based on how many opportunities are missed, we’d never have a good character or show.

The third is that he’s a poor representation of the theme of choice in Volume 5...which doesn’t make sense since this is never directly commented on, it isn’t really prevelant and, considering how greenhorn Miles and Kerry are, I doubt they would have a theme of choice and NOT have the target relic be the relic of choice (Haven’s is the relic of knowledge). He also cites another reviewer as a source which...yeah, even if I like the reviewer, you use your OWN words.

So we have three reasons that don't really contribute to anything let alone each other so I have no idea what the central reason why Unicorn choose Leo for this part other than “I don’t like him.” There’s nothing to really judge or discuss here, not even any suggestions on a better way to do this or improvements. I feel even more numb than he does towards Leo.

Third is Blake Belladonna and he admits that Blake was great in Volume 5....which is it’s own bag of worms. Look, there can be different incarnations of the same character but this is from things like spin offs, reboots and non canon material: NOT between seasons of a show. If this ws Blake from a spin off then this statement was fine...but the fact that he uses original Blake despite complimenting her most recent incarnation is like hating Jaune for his actions in Volume 1 but praising him in Volume 5: it’s really conflicted and weird.

Not that his reasonings are the best. He says that Blake is switching between wanting to be left alone to participating in Team RWBY;s antics...while using footage from Volume 1. Not even really Black and White, like Emerald Forest and Badge And Burden. Issue here is that these are two very different situations. Before, Blake didn’t know people like Ruby and Yang and had no reason to try and get along. Now, she’s a member of their team for four years and has gotten to know them a bit better: it makes sense that she’d get along with them better here. The other reason why he puts her here is because since the Volume doesn’t focus on her self hatred, her leaving her team left a bad taste in people’s mouths. This only works if you don’t consider Blake’s martyr complex and her previous actions. This is like expecting to know why Goku fights every single person he does when the reasoning is obvious.

The only thing I liked here was him addressing her relationship with Adam and how it wasn’t explored. But I only liked it because I understood where he was coming from, not because I even agreed with him on an objective level. The relationship doesn’t look explored because you have to view Blake’s character through the lens of an abuse victim AFTER Volume 3 and RWBY...isn’t the most rewatchable show. Oh and he ends by saying she has gotten much better in Volume 5, which is just confusing me on this list even further since he could put someone else (like Ozpin since he has issues with the writing surrounding Ozpin) here and made it more relevant.

Second to last is Adam Taurus. He’s here because...Raven. He’s here for one of the same reasons as Raven: he was something in Volume 3 but now he’s a petulant child. And again, this fails because that’s the point of Adam: he’s a psychopathic manchild. He’s Raven ramped up to 25. He says that Adam is a joke now because he tries to be an edgelord but in one episode he has one of the cringest lines possible (”Hello my Darling) but in the next he singlehandedly cuts off Yang’s arm without so much as a blink. Unicorn tries to justify this by saying his forces were defeated, he tried blowing up everyone in a fit and was defeated by a backhand. But again, this is AFTER he was shown to be fully willing to destroy YET another Hunstmen academy and do god knows what to Blake. This doesn’t work as a good reasoning. 

His last reasoning is that his character keeps bouncing back and forth between wanting justice for his people (which is incorrect, he wants supremacy) and wanting to get back at Blake...ignoring how there is an underlying connection here of “I was wrong ergo I’m going to do terrible things to get back at people” AKA SPITE. The show literally handed this to the viewer on a silver platter, I can’t excuse this mistake. It’s isn’t being torn apart or attacked: they’re the same goal, just targeted at different people.

Dishonorable mentions:

Corsec And Fennec: makes some sense but the compliant of ‘their manipulative side isn’t shown’ doesn’t hold up, rather it should be ;their manipulative side isn’t shown enough.’ Also they should have replaced Blake since, you know, they are disliked throughout their ENTIRE incarnation.

Vernal: Is said to be on here because nothing is really done with her aside from being a red herring. Again, not really enough to justify being on this list over another choice like Ozpin.

Ruby Rose: “She’s the exact same character as she was in Volume 1 and the attempts at character development are just...so shallow.”

... I have discussed this so much that at this point, I’m not even gonna dignify this with a response.

And Number 1 is Cinder Fall. And it’s all the same arguments so I’ll just give the bullet points version:

1. She has no backstory: I’ve pointed to villians like the Joker as a counterpoint to this. You don’t need a backstory for a good villain.

2. She fought Jaune instead of Ruby: ironic considering the clip he used to illustrate his point is PRECISELY why this doesn’t work. Jaune attacked first.

3. She was stupid in her volume 5 plan: Look, I could explain why this makes sense since she’s a sadist and wants to kill people. But you can’t have this reason and Number 2 together. The second is all about how she didn’t kill Ruby when doing so would be stupid but then you decry her for NOT being stupid. Choose one, these reasons are knife fighting to the death here, that’s how badly they work together.

4. She doesn’t interact directly with the characters directly to have a real presence against them: ... Fire Lord Ozai. Same supposed issue, didn’t stop him.

He brings up the idea of ‘good idea, flawed execution’ at the end and while I would normally agree with this:

This is like someone calling a guy ‘flithy’ when they themselves look like they just swam through a river of sewage. AKA I can’t focus on the second party because the actions of the first has drawn attention to their own issues.

Unicorn of War: I have no idea what you were trying to accomplish here. Was this suppose to be a list about characters you personally don’t like? Then why did you keep bring up the public perception of characters? If this si suppose to be an attempt at an objective look at the characters: then why do you keep bring up personal issues and personal points? 

I have no idea what I’m suppose to take away from this. You make some good points here and there and unlike people like Muffin Man Dan or FMF: I didn’t have to wade through absolute bile to get to them. But your execution and your reasoning is so all over the place that I can’t take anything away from this. I’m just left a confused mess by the end of this because I don’t even know how I’m suppose to judge this. Like-Dude, sit down, take a breath and decide whether you want to look at things from your own personal experience and feelings like MurderOfBirds or try to look at things objectively, trying to distance yourself from personal bias like...okay, there’s no RWBY Youtuber equivalent there. But you get my point.

As I have said in the past: You can make good points. It’s just when you delve into the points is when things get confusing. If not for common mistakes (like saying that the Volumes of RWBY post 3 are rushed when they take about as much time to make as Volume 2 did), then for confused execution like what you did here.

#rwby #unicorn of war #Thomas vaccuo

[nerdwaifuu]

So here’s a little short story with two of my OCs, Jasper “Virus” Julien and my newer OC Jason. I’ll probably start posting an oneshot/shortstory once a week to get me back into writing. Anyhoo, enjoy this little story about my two OCs.

White snowflakes danced in the city air while people walked on the sidewalks trying to cram in last minute winter sights before winter break was over. Although the snow fell heavily that day, everyone knew there was work and school the next day. Today was that last day to have total free time. Jasper Julien, along with every other citizen, didn't want it to end.

It was New Years, a day to celebrate the passing of the previous year and the beginning of the next. Walking through the congested city, Jasper couldn't be ever more grateful to have the past year disappear behind him. He was leaving everything behind; his old nickname Virus, his revenge against his brother, his hatred toward his creator, and every mistake he make in the past 2 years of following a total psychopath to take over Ninjago which will be a story for another time.

As he watched each delicate snowflake land on the ground, in his raven hair, and onto the passing civilians and families, Jasper could help but study each little flake. He never was one for snow, since all he could connect it to was his brother, who is the ice ninja, and awful blizzards and snow storms; however, his mind was like a child's when he saw the snowflakes gently make their way to the ground, forming small clumps of snow. All he could think was how beautiful it was, and all he do was just look up at the gray winter sky with a smile, allowing them to land on his pale, white face. There was an urge to just stick out his tongue like he has seen young children and people in movies do, but he kept himself from doing it; he can wait until he gets home. To an actual home. To an actual home where he can finally live a normal life that he has been yearning for since Julien built and destroyed him years ago. To an actual home  where a young boy is waiting for his new father figure to bring home whatever surprise he promised to get while he was out running errands in the city.

With that in his mind, Jasper picked up his pace and squeezed through the crowd to get to the outskirts of the city. In his hand, Jasper held tightly to 2 large brown plastic bags, full of items he thought his new son would enjoy. The thought of how excited his son would be to see what he got filled his robotic mind. That moment would soon arrive since Jasper finally escaped the crowds and quickly made his way to the outskirts of the city. Mainly filled with small shops and businesses, there were still places to live that Jasper found to be more homey than apartments. Reaching the wooden front door of his home, he could hear someone blasting music inside. Shaking his head and quietly chuckling, Jasper unlocked the door and stealthily went inside and to the kitchen; he set the bag on the counter and took off his coat before he went to see where the music was coming from. Following the sound of music by The Fold to the living room, Jasper found a child sitting on the couch, staring at the black screen of the tv. He made his way to the speaker and slowly turned down the volume of the music where it could barely be heard, yet the child remained in his trance.

“Jason? Jaaaasonnn?” The child blinked his eyes open and closed and looked down at the floor. “You should probably turn the music down a notch next time. Don’t want the neighbors to complain,” Jasper told the child softly. “I-I’m sorry,” Jason apologized with a whisper, and his brown eyes remained glued to the floor. The urge to just run up and hug Jason ran through Jasper every time Jason said he was sorry for any small little thing, but he knew Jason was uneasy when it came to physical contact. “It’s fine kiddo, don’t worry about it,” Jasper softly said with a smile as he sat down on the couch next to Jason, yet he left a small amount of space between them to allow the kid some personal space. Feeling the weight of the android on the couch, Jason’s eyes left the floor and met with Jasper’s red eyes. The two sat in silence while the music quietly continued to play.

“So... I brought home a bunch of surprises... I know it’s basically a week after Christmas, but I put them in the kitchen, so I guess you can go open them,” Jasper told Jason. With a shy smile, Jason nodded, got up, and waited for Jasper to get up before going to the kitchen. Quickly, Jason walked to the kitchen and went up to the two large bags.

“I can open these, right?” He asked; Jasper nodded and gingerly pushed one toward Jason, indicating that he should open that one first. Hesitantly, Jason sat in one of the tall stools, carefully sits on his shins to give his some extra height, and starts grabbing out the contents of the first bag. Each thing he grabbed was a disc or dvd case of some sort; it was either a movie that he should’ve seen in his childhood, such as Shrek, Shrek 2, and a bunch of Disney movies for example, or a fun video game, such as Super Smash Bros and the Legend of Zelda games for example that went with the Nintendo Switch that he got for Christmas. His eyes lit up as bright as a star and his jaw dropped with each case he grabbed out of the bag. In total, he got about 5 video games and 10 movies. At the bottom of the bag, there was a a small package. Within the small package, there was some bluetooth earphones waiting to be used. Immediately, Jason ripped open the package and put the earbuds into his ears despite not having a device near him.

“H-how... what... why...” Jason was basically speechless at this point; his eyes went from one case to the other and to the earbuds. It felt like last year’s Christmas all over again.

“Since you never really had a proper childhood with that as- butthole as a father... thought I would try to fill in the gaps now.”

Before anything else could happen or anyone else could say anything, Jason hopped off the stool and ran to Jasper to give him a hug. Realizing what he was doing, the 7 year old dropped his arms to his sides and backed away from Jasper. “S-sorry,” Jason quietly apologized again. “It’s fine,” Jasper told him, lightly running his hand through Jason’s feathery, dark brown hair. Flinching slightly, Jason said, “Thanks for all the gifts,” and ran back to the stool to empty the other bag. Looking inside, all he could see was a couple of medium-sized paint cans and paint brushes, so Jason gave his new father a look of confusion.

“Oh, I was thinking made sometime this month we could do some painting in your room to decorate. I just got the primary colors for now; later on I can pick up specific colors you want,” Jasper explained to Jason.

“Thanks, that sounds like fun, Dad.” Jasper’s smile felt like it couldn’t get any bigger or wider. This was the first time Jason has called him Dad. It was always just “Virus” or “Jasper” for the past few months, but now Jasper’s robotic heart felt like it was going to explode from joy. This was his true goal in life. It wasn’t to kill his “replacement” and make his father regret everything he has done. It wasn’t to stand beside a man who wanted his help to take over the city and ruin everyone’s lives. It was to live a normal life with a family; whether it was with a spouse and many kids or just one adopted child, this was the life Jasper always wanted.

“So, Son...” Jason couldn’t help but smile a bit when Jasper called him son. “Do you want to watch something before you get to bed?” Nodding his head, Jason grabbed the first DVD case he could his hands on and gave it to Jasper to put in before Jason hurried to the living room. Looking at the case, Jasper saw he had chosen Shrek. “Good choice... I guess,” Jasper grabbed out the DVD, went into the living room, put it in, and turned on the TV.

“By the way, thank you so much for everything, Dad. This has been the best winter break ever,” Jason said with a big smile which was the third smile Jasper has seen from him ever since he has met him years ago. “Anytime,” Jasper smiles back, pressing play on the remote to start the movie.

#ninjago oc #oc

[tired-college-student-writing]

What do you mean real?

Summary- Ethan really thought the craziest thing he’d ever experience was having his idol turned friend invite him to move cross country for YouTube. Unfortunately, that was only the tip of the iceberg.

Part 1

part 2

Ethan tossed his set of keys on the kitchen counter as he entered Mark’s house. He listened to the house only to find it silent, which was odd since Mark and Chica were suppose to be home. Right as he was going to call out for the older man, a yellow and pink form appeared in the doorway. He raised an eyebrow before shrugging.

“We doing an ego video today then?” 

Mark grinned behind his pink mustache, lips spread so far it must be painful.

“Not sure yet, blueberry. Still working out some of the… Details,” 

The slurred drawl made Ethan snort before turning towards the fridge.

“Okay cool,” He said, rummaging through the fridge for last night leftover Chinese food, “We can go over ideas if you want, just let me heat some of this up. Tyler texted a bit ago saying he was leaving his doctor’s appointment so he should be here-” He stopped talking as he heard the back door open. Weird no one else was supposed to be here…

“Who’s an adorable baby girl~” 

Ethan’s blood ran cold as he heard Mark coo at Chica from down the hall, “You are, oh yes you are Chica-bica.”

 Ethan’s eyes were locked with the man across the island from him.

“Yo Ethan, you here yet?”  Mark called out, “I wanted to run some of these ideas past you before Tyler gets here,”

“We’re in the Kitchen Mr. Mark-le-plier!” Wilford answered. Ethan heard Mark swear and feet pounding on the floor before he saw him appear in the doorway from the corner of his eye. Chica shot past him towards the brightly dressed man who fell to the floor with an excited squeal.

“Oh, Miss. Chica, you’re looking lovely as always,” was laughed out as Chica licked his face. It wasn’t until a large hand gripped Ethan’s forearm did he look away from the man on the floor up to an almost identical looking face. Mark placed himself between the laughing man and Ethan before turning back to the blue-haired man.

“Are you okay?” Mark asked glancing over his pale friend, “He didn’t hurt you did he?”

“Please tell me this is some weird dream,” 

Mark let out a hollow laugh,“I wish,”

“Secret twin brother?” 

Mark raised an eyebrow, “I’m sorry, have you met my family? There’s no way I could hide a twin,”

“I’m in some weird ass coma dream?” 

Mark sputtered at that last one, eyes wide not knowing what to say for a couple of seconds before he threw up his hands.

“Why the hell would you be in a coma?!” He screeched indignantly as the… being behind him laughed.

“I don’t know,” Ethan replied back at equal volume, “Maybe I accidentally forgot to ask in a new place used peanut oil or some shit!” Mark paled as Wilford fell silent, Ethan hardly noticed until a flash of pink light appeared behind and a hand squeezed his shoulder. He whipped around coming face to face with a stoic-looking Wilford, a heavy scent of candy apples hitting the blue-haired man full force. The look on his face was enough to send a shiver down Ethan’s spine, even without him thinking about how only a second before Wilford had been across the room.

“Now, Now Ethan, my boy,” His voice was slow as if talking to a child, “ Markaham doesn’t like to think about friends playing that kind of jokes on him,”

“What kind of jokes?” Ethan couldn’t help but ask, mind trying in vain to restart.

“Pretending to be dead and leaving him, of course!” Wilford said. Ethan opened his mouth to ask what he’s talking about when Mark broke in.

“We’ve been over this Wilford. When people die in this plane, they stay dead,” Wilford frowned.

“That’s not very fun!”

“It's not supposed to be!”

“Well, I guess those jokes aren’t much fun in the first place,”

“Not everything is a joke Wil!” 

Ethan squeaked, stumbling out from between the two snapping men. Mark stopped, throwing a glare at Wilford before he turned back to the younger man.

“How about we move this to the living room?”

 Ethan felt his head nod as Mark ushered him onto the coach. Wilford followed rocking back and forth on his heels across the room. Mark sighed, wincing a bit before leaning against the arm of the couch. He gestured at the pink haired man.

“Ethan met my oldest ego. Wilford Warfstache, manic reporter, possible psychopath, and an all-around pain in my ass.”

 Wilford swept into a deep and dramatic bow.

“A pleasure to finally meet you in the flesh, Blueberry,” Wilford proclaimed, smile wider then looked possible. Ethan’s eyes flicked between the two men letting the silence overtake the room.

“This,” He finally broke the uncomfortable silence after several long minutes, eyes settling on Mark’s serious face, “This is actually real. HE’s real?!” 

Wilford laughed heartily, “He got it together quicker than most!”

Ethan stiffened as the… ego gestured wildly with his gun. That thing was plastic, right? It had been when he had messed with it at the office last week, but no he wasn’t so sure. 

Mark simply rolled his eyes at the man he had just described as a maniac waving a gun around.“Shut up Wil. We were going introduce him to you guys soon,” 

Wilford pouted crossing his arms.

“It’s been a month!” He whined, “I’m not the only one getting bored you know,”

“It has not, it’s hardly been three weeks!” 

Ethan broke in, not able to hold his tongue any longer, “How the actual FUCK!” 

Mark chuckled slightly, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Long story,” He said, “The basics are Wil here is a figment of me brought to life by the fans and their belief in him-”

“The official term is Tulpa,” Wilford said, breaking in a proud smile on his face, “A being brought to life by a mental power. Oh, you should have seen Mark’s face the first time I made an appearance! He thought he was going crazy for over a month before I decided to appear when he was with Wade and Bobert, they all had a conniption!” Mark growled, glaring at the other man.

“Yes, because having a psycho with my exact face pop out of fucking nowhere is totally normal,”

“It is to you,”

“Well, it is now! You don’t leave me the hell alone!” 

Ethan couldn’t help, but feel slightly amused as the pair started squabbling, Mark’s voice slipping into an exasperated fondness as Wilford’s smile faded from manic to content.

“This isn’t what I expected to come back to.” 

The pair stopped mid-sentence, eyes flashing over to the door, not moving back from each other’s faces. Ethan glanced up to see Tyler standing in the entryway, arms crossed over his chest.

“Ah, the man of unusual size has returned!” Wilford greeted, wiggling his fingers at him.

“Wilford, let me guess, you decided to ignore Mark’s order to let us break this to Ethan gently because you were bored?”

“Got it in one, Chap!”

“And you two,” He continued, “Got distracted by your lover’s quarrel to actually explain what’s happening?” Ethan let out a startled laugh at the sputtering pair that sprung apart, disgust growing on both their faces.

“Gross, Tyler!” Mark whined, nose wrinkled, “He’s literally me… if I was a pink obsessed serial killer,”

“Hey now,” Wilford said, “I’ve never killed any cereal.”

“Enough,” Tyler’s voice cut over the impending argument, “Ethan needs an explanation,”

“They told me some stuff, like him being here because the fans want him to be real and stuff, and how he made Mark think he was going crazy before freaking out Bob and Wade,” 

Tyler snorted, “Better than my introduction to them. I almost got stabbed when I met Mark’s superpowered imaginary friends,”

Ethan’s eyes widen.

“Them? Friends? As in plural? Are all the fucking egos alive?” Ethan ranked his brain trying to make a list of all the characters Mark created over the years, but there were too many. Mark cut back in.

“Only the most well known and loved ones~” 

A pink cloud appeared on Ethan’s lap fading to reveal a grinning Wilford, the smell of candy apples renewing. He seems to ignore the fact that Ethan looks ready to bolt as the ego continued.

“Oh yes, it’s me, my partner in crime Bimbo, the good old Doctor, Mr. Roboto, Hosty bosty, The rodent monarch, The sexy scary school girl and of course, Darkipoo.”

 Ethan’s minds whirls trying to figure out which characters Wilford is talking about. His mouth works quicker than his mind as a question slipped out.

“Why the fuck does it smell like a carnival threw up?” 

Wilford looked sat up scandalized as Mark double over, clutching his gut as he laughed, Tyler giggling helplessly next to them. Wilford huffs as he leaves Ethan’s lap, mumbling to himself as he paces the room.

“Of all the things for you to be worried about at this given moment” Mark finally gasps out, “You’re asking about how his pink cloud smells like fair food?” Ethan blushed, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Excuse me for trying to ignore the fact that half the egos he listed off are killers… I think at least? I mean you implied stuff in the videos, but didn’t always come out and say they were serial killers,”

“Nah,” Tyler laughed, “I’m pretty sure at least half of them would kill people if given the chance,”

“I made it so they don’t” Mark piped in raising his hands in defense, “ They just have to work out their murderous desires in other ways,”

“That’s very reassuring,” 

Mark shrugged helplessly, a weariness settling on his face.

“You learn to live with what you can get when your psyche literally shatters into a million pieces and becomes new personas any time you want to make a joke.”

Ethan winced, only for Mark to wave it off.

“Oh don’t get so put off, I’ve made my peace with whatever curse is placed on YouTube that makes egos come life.” 

Before Ethan could respond, the front door banged open, and a mechanical whirl was heard walking towards them.

“Oh looks like my escort has finally arrived,” Wilford said, waving his fingers slightly as another Mark look-alike appeared in the doorway. With his shaggy hair, simple blue shirt and glow G shining on his chest it was easy for Ethan to conjure his name up.

“Hey Google,” Tyler greeted, as Mark just sighed as Google tilted his head.

“Gr-Greetings Tyler,” His voice skipped slightly over the words.

“Let me guess,” Mark started, “Wil left right before a meeting and Dark is throwing a fit?” The android nodded, advancing on the pinkette.

“Dark is-is not impr-pressed with Wilford’s disappear-ance,” he explained, “I have been sent to retrieve-retrieve him,” 

Wilford pouts.

“Alllllllright,” He sighs, “I just need to do one more thing before we leave,” Google’s eye seems to twitch before he nods.

“Hurry u-up then.” 

Wilford smirks before diving onto the couch, wrapping his arms around Ethan’s waist, placing his knife against his neck.

“Isn’t my new friend adorable googs~” He sings, the others freezing around him. Google’s blue eyes flashed over the scene.

“I was under the impre-resssion you wished-wished not to tell Eth-Ethan of our ex-ex-existence yet,” Google said blandly, ignoring Ethan’s pleading eyes. Mark refused to tear his eyes off of the pair but replied.

“I didn’t Wil had other ideas though,” Tyler made a move forward only for Wilford to tighten the knife more.

“Ah Ah,” He laughs at Tyler, “No need to be hasty-” 

Ethan rammed his head back against Wilford’s nose, twisting from his grip, grabbing the knife from his hands as he sprang up from the couch. Without a second thought, he ran behind the others, pinning himself to the wall behind them. Mark and Tyler simply stared at the small boy, back to Wilford that was clutching his nose in pain.

“Is-Is your t-t-test complete yet?” 

They all turned to google who had his arms crossed across his chest. Wilford pulled his hands away from his face, smiling widely despite the blood dripping down his face.

“Yup, Yup!” He skipped over to Google, snapping his fingers. Ethan yelped as the knife in his hand vanished and reappeared in the pink psycho’s.

“What the fuck Wilford?!” Mark demanded. Google raised an eyebrow at him.

“It’s tra-tradition to see if the introduc-tions in-to the Office include a death threat,” He said, “We thought you-you were aw-aware of this. It’s to in-sure they can handle the more-ore unstable sides of the egos. If not then-then the saner of the egos-Egos work to pro-protect th-em until they-they learn to defend them-selves.”

Ethan’s eyes widen, before glancing at the stunned men in front of him.

“You handled yourself nicely, we shouldn’t have to worry about you too much tomorrow,” Wilford said, “Tootles~” 

In a flash of pink the egos vanished, leaving the three men alone. Mark removed his glasses, rubbing his face with a groan.

“We’re taking a day off today,” He said, collapsing on the recliner, “ We’re gonna need all our energy for when they demand all us at the Office tomorrow.”

“I’ll text Kat,” Tyler said, “I’m sure she’ll bring some Indian food,”

“Amy will probably grab ice cream when I tell her why we’re having a light work day today,” Mark mumbled pulling his phone out. Ethan nodded silently taking a deep breath before walking out of the room.

“Where you going?” Tyler called after him. He glanced back as he climbed the stairs.

“Borrowing Mark’s laptop” He said, “If we’re not recording today I should get some editing done,”

“Yeah, no,” He heard Mark call before the man seemingly appeared behind him, swinging him onto his shoulder and started to carry him back down the stairs. Ethan yelped in shock, pounding on Mark’s back lightly.

“What the hell dude! Put me down,” He complained.

“Not happening,” He laughed, tossing him on the couch.

“You are on strict relax mode today,” Tyler said, as Mark went over the tv and started fiddling with one of the game systems.

“I’m fine and we have to do something,” He whined, trying to get up.

“Kathryn and I will do some editing and post a video or two for both of our channels. You’re giving your brain a rest from the mind fucking it just experienced,” Mark commented, shoving him back down, before handing him a Wii controller. A quick glance at the screen revealed Mario Kart 8 was cued up and ready to go. He sighed settling back.

“You guys aren’t giving me a choice are you?” Mark laughed ruffling his hair.

“We’ll let you pick what cup were competing for,” Ethan’s lips quirked up against his will as he entered Grand Prix mode. He slowly relaxed as his friends plopped down next to him, the fears of tomorrow being drowned out by colorful graphics and playful shoving.

#markiplier #crankgamplays #tyler scheid #welcome to the office! #Wilford Warfstache #Google