#A very big and very long tardigrade monster!
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Big fat thread about an unfinished Pokédex
Admittedly, they aren’t very Grass type for a starter line. They are herons/storks that end with a “mad” scientist and windmill motif, the latter is shown better in the G-Max tho. The G-Max is a Don Quijote “Giant” and likely how Homo Floresiensis looked at Flores’ giant storks
Storks are common in Spain and I saw literally a flock of migrating herons from my dad’s car during my childhood, hence why this pick for my grass starter
G-Max Crumenill was mostly inspired in giant flower-”crest” like the ones of Petaldramon or Flowered Sectonia
Hierbill’s neck is like green heron’s neck and Crumenill’s bow tie spins when generating electricity
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The Fire starter line takes inspiration from the origin of the myth of fire salamanders, obviously axolotls/olms and San Juan’s bonfire, as well as something unfortunate about axolotls. This G-Max was the weakest design of the starter trio to be honest
The fire salamander is the most common salamander in Europe. The axolotl details were taken because they give a very good aesthetic and were easy to implement
The loose skin “coat” is meant to look short like a sorcerer cloak. The vivid belly patterns were based on Monster Hunter’s Nibelsnarf and the ones of the G-Max form are meant to look like lava
The unfortunate thing about axolotls is how their skin is damaged by staying too much time out of water. Good to find for the inspiration of this line, but the picture of the poor axolotl so crippled breaks my heart
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Yeah, the Water starter line are literal water bears, tanks in every sense of the word, but as bears with traits of the tardigrade rather than the other way around (because the other is quite overused) and with fun inspiration in spanish stuff
Bathcub’s name was prompted by my friend EventHorizontal
Aside from the Iberian Bear, the traits of diving and astronaut suits and submarines are because the first versions of the suits were made by Spanish people. In the case of the submarine it was just the first armed submarine
Tankursa takes inspiration from Mecha Bun-Bun from The Battle Cats
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The early Normal type line are just really European rabbits with a fun twist, turning into a spanish conqueror. They are super common here and a pest everywhere else, so you get the drill
Mundabitt looks like as if it was permanently startled/curious because I have never seen a rabbit directly that wasn’t like either of those
Clawqueror’s claws are meant to resemble the blades used by the conquerors, but they accurately are like how long rabbit claws are
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The low tier early Bug types are earwigs because it’s very odd that such a mundane insect hasn’t been used by Pokémon yet. They have exaggerated rear pincers because earwigs doesn’t have much else than their butt pincers
The names of both use the spanish translation of buttface combined with words to fit the whole “It thinks it’s way cooler than how it actually is”
For the laughs, if I designed their stats, they would get Guillotine hilariously early
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A regional variant! One of the many that at the end evolved into a new fakemon here. Is Pidove, but became a city pigeon by eating garbage, so it’s just really a regular pigeon
While the whole idea is about the city, domestic and rock pigeons, this character (see until 1:16) was the biggest inspiration for this https://youtu.be/cw2c4r5gkvs?t=53
As they are Poison type and the colors of the rock pigeon fit with cigarettes, Filftdove’s color are based around these and smoke
The fact that regular pigeons have both green and violet was too perfect for a Poison type to let it pass
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Another line of early Bug types that starts as a pitiful worm that decides if to protect the weak as it was or if to get revenge on those who hurt it. Based on Kamen Rider like Lokix for the bug theme (although I made these years before)
Atempupa is mean to represent a punching bag and bandages
The fly hero/mosquito villain contrast was short of a joke because as a person with atopic skin, biting flies actually leave worse bites than mosquitoes
Tabanero is literally Kamen Rider. The wings are his scarf and when it goes G-Max it basically goes “Anime hero over the top stuff”, not because Kamen Rider but for fun
Maldamo is the leader of Shocker, but it takes heavy inspiration from Parallel Nightmare from Kirby. In fact, Maldamo has no legs
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The early bird fodder here are based on sparrows and immediately in the second stage they are bearded vultures. Bird repeats do change to different species more often than you might think, but it’s honestly cooler to do this
Trituross takes the regular and clay-stained coloration of bearded vultures and nothing else because they are awesome enough
The Ground type was initially because the bone moves motif and added with clay to fit the concept, I didn’t know that bearded vultures ACTUALLY use clay on their feathers until much later
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Pokémon did their own Spanish Grass cat and I decided to do mine. Interestingly both take inspiration from the Cipotegato, which was a funny coincidence, although mine ended inspired in San Jorge’s legend (and the Shrek Puss in Boots)
And if you think that Meowscarada is based in the Mars de Foie, you know shit about Spanish culture
The original idea was a rose Pokémon with a rapier (as it’s a Spanish sword) that turned Fairy in reference to the rose that grew from the blood of the dragon that San Jorge killed in his legend and was pretty much a Roserade clone
The concept nailing when like this:
1- The Tomatina is a well known Spanish tradition that involves a plant
2- Tomatoes and roses are related and their fruits are similar
3- One of the Tomatina’s origin comes from the legend of a harlequin with a cat mask
4- The Shrek’s Puss in Boots is a Spanish cat that wields a rapier
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My Pikaclone here is a shrew because they have an unhinged metabolism and because they were perfect for an Electric/Poison fakemon. Also because with this I could make it more comfortable for my designing style
Originally it didn’t have the white Pikachu-like cheeks, but after Fauxlens suggested these to make it look more like the other Pikaclones I considered and finally used it
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These weren’t for dog Pokémon fodder but more because I wanted to make a literal spanish water dog. While water dogs has been done fittingly as mop dogs, I wanted a different take that ties to poodles as they are hunting dogs
When you think in poodles you usually don’t get the picture of a hunting dog adapted to water, so that’s why I wanted to go in this vein
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This Paras line is just free of harmful fungi and instead have benign symbiotic edible mushrooms. As child I always saw Parasect as a crab-spider thing rather than as a stylized cicada, so that’s why Matantis is like a mix of mantis and oil beetle with some fun in the mix
Certain oil beetles in Spain are called Aceiteras, which translates as oil container. Although subtle, the long body and nose are meant to be like a bottle of cooking oil
The mantis part is because the mushroom “buns” were inspired from Monster Hunter’s armor piece Chaos Cap, which is based in Chun-Li clothing
It isn’t Fighting because it was originally going to be Normal type and since it looks like an ugly Chun-Li and mantises just do fighting moves for bluffing, it was fitting
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These Timburs use sacks instead of their regular tools to steal things from others. It’s based in a rural sport called “Smuggler Race” that involves carrying sacks like these
Before you ask, yes, I played the chorizo pun and yes, Chorerurr is just a politician
The chorizo thing is a pun because we use chorizo for the sausage but an old term for “to steal” was “chorar” and thus saying “ser un chorizo” equals to “to be a thief”
The Dark type was initially a bit forced in the most early versions but aside from the Smuggler Race, the sacks that they use were going to be the shed skin of another fakemon based on the man of the sack, a version of the spanish boogeyman, which was Dark type
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Making an ice skating Surkist’s evo isn’t mindblowing, but I wanted to do my own take because it’s fun
Skice’s design takes inspiration from the main character of the Nitrome games’ Frostbite and its Spin Off Thin Ice, mostly on the latter
In fact, its lore would have involved sinking opponents by cutting circles in the ice just like that character
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My first shiny ever was a Yanma in Platinum. As I lost the game eons ago, I made this to tribute it. This Yanma is a dragonfly nymph and the evolution, aside from the overused dragonfly pun, is based in a damselfly, which in Spanish they get the name of “Horses of the devil”
Damselflies’ Spanish name inspired some pretty cool pictures like this and became the main inspiration for Diablanma
Since it’s “horse”-like, it was intended to be a flying Poke Ride
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This Tynamo line is all about love and passion, two things that lampreys absolutely don’t have. They bite and thrash to make babies, so for this absolutely anti-romantic fact I wanted to make this joke
The palette was inspired by the Spanish dish of lamprey cooked in their own blood and the Tinto River and the “burning passion” idea came because male lampreys have a special cord that heathens by pyrocells when reproducing
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This variant of Rolycoly is quite literally the Ave trains because in Shinaipa they breed Rolycoly to not use coal and be more ecologic. They served me for years to see my father after my parents divorced
The penguin part is because ave means bird and because an inner joke about how the train stations in where I live are very cold
The idea for the G-Max was going to be the full train but as a goofy vertically elongated penguin which move would be called G-Max Delay
This, combined with Stall as a possible ability, is because these trains basically always get late
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At this point these last lines didn’t get any lore because I was approaching the burnout of this dex, but for context, this one is based on the Gamusino. Essentially a fictional animal to prank strangers and kids
Likely, I would have made its lore being a non legendary Pokémon so rare that people often doubt that it actually exists despite being recognized in the Pokedex
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Based on the cases of witchcraft and witch-hunting in Zugarramurdi. They became vengeful wraiths after being burnt to death and use the fire that killed them to cast fireballs. Zugaruja’s eyes aren’t usually seen, but when you see them, you can feel the deep hatred of it
This is what happens when you don’t expect the Spanish inquisition
This line went through many many concepts around the same basis and while I didn’t bother in making Zugaruja’s G-Max, it would have been based around Drawcia Soul
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These variants are based on the Gaizkin, a mythological vasque creature that sickens sleeping people by putting under their beds rooster heads made with feathers. You likely won’t find much about them because for some reason the info about these has become somehow more scarce through years
Their lore is that they were evil creatures that were ridiculed with chicken-like bodies as a punishment
The last evo, just like Grimmsnarl, is actually way thinner than how it looks due the feathers making its bulk
Its G-Max would have been roughly in the giant bird of The Claw (1957)
Baba Yaga ideas would have been fitting but very odd to use on this and not in Zugaruja’s one
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The last two lines that were going to make into the dex were based around two ice poles we have here, starting kinda goofy but turning awesome for no reason. In this case they were based on Dracula poles
The pre-evo would have been able to sneeze icicles and the evo would have gotten an ability that boost 30% damage when hailing/snow, basically having recoilless Life Orb and a free item slot in hail/snow
The more I think about it, the evo is quite literally ice Noivern. Btw, this is the ice cream I’m talking about
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These are based on the Frigo Pie, an ice cream that looks like a foot, for some reason
Anyways, these go from red footed boobies to a short of mix of animals aiming for something like an owl bear because I wanted some short of abominable snow monster
I really mixed design traits to make the evo look cool, but I think that I was really thinking in some of the Frostbite’s creatures in my unconscious when doing this one
And this is the weird Frigo Pie
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These didn’t convince me at the end, but these are the only ones of the good bunch of non-designed ideas and concepts that got a design
We have in Spain the legend of the Black Hand, a ghostly severed hand thing. Since I wanted to make a sock puppet for fun, I thought in making a counterpart since in Pokémon we have the White Hand
Aside from the ghostly hands inspiration, they are also themed on Master and Crazy Hand. In fact, the Crazy Hand one’s glove isn’t patched by needlework, it was added with staplers
The Crazy pre-evo is meant to look like that disgruntled Kermit’s face
Oh and yes, those translucid parts are bones. Of humans? Yes and no, but I will just leave that in the air
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And that’s it. Thank you if you went through the full thing
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If I were a tardigrade, I’d move out from home
Why live in the shrubbery when you could have a throne?
Pressure wouldn’t squash me and fire couldn’t burn
These are the things that I never will learn
#Some Kinda Nonsense#Fantasy June#FantasyJune#Tardigrade#Fantasy#Traditional Art#Cosmo Sheldrake#?#What is better than a tardigrade?#A very big and very long tardigrade monster!
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From the Inside Looking Out
Read on Ao3
This was for her daughter, everything was for her daughter. This whole experiment, it was for her daughter. Her daughter’s future, her daughter’s success, her daughter’s potential. Under the guise of humanity, it was just for her child.
Which was why she was okay with the sacrifice, Emelia’s anger, losing everything. What she was not okay with was losing control.
Sinking through an orange liquid, up to her waist while being watched by the Mega Monkey. Unable to decide how she acted and having to fight to stay in control.
Then the fume hit them, and she was thrown onto her hands and knees. The monkey stood at attention and she could see the outside. She could see Emelia, she could hear her.
“Oh, Song. You didn’t think this through.”
Yes, she did. She put over a year of thought into it, she put at least a decade of science education she had to work, she put everything into it. She tried to reach out and grab her, but she couldn’t move. She couldn’t do anything. She could only watch from the monkey’s view.
“We should leave this pile of rubble, take me for a walk, Song.”
She tried to run away at every opportunity, but Emelia always found her. Sometimes she escaped for weeks, sometimes months, once even a whole year, but she would track her down one way or another. Someone who was once her best friend was now her capture.
Sometimes she’d say things to her that she thought would never grace the world again.
“Do you remember when Liam was killed?” Emelia asked one day. She didn’t respond, she missed Liam. He was someone who had daydreamed with her about a safe surface, then he was taken away from them all so suddenly. Emelia took her silence as a yes.
“Well, he had actually managed to befriend some mutes. Rats that drove a van. He was always too charismatic for his own good,” she chuckled darkly. “He wanted to tell everyone about how nice they were, how they liked him and even were going to welcome humans into their park. But that was against our goal.” She grinned at her.
“I couldn’t let him do that. So, do you know what I did Song? I shot him. I shot him right then and there.” The laugh disturbed her deeply and if she could have backed away any further from her in the cave she was trapped in she would have. She would have run as fast as her legs could carry her. Instead, she just trembled. Emelia stepped closer to her.
“The end justifies the means. Come on, I think there’s another burrow nearby.”
Another time after an encounter with Scarlemange, Emelia had her blocked in again.
“He was like your son, right? How did he end up like that? I guess insanity is inherited. I’d assume it was from your side, but Lio spent more time with him. And somehow, Lio disappeared from our burrow, with your monstrosity, and left him behind. I guess he was disappointed in him just like Father was disappointed in Liam.” Emelia tapped her fingers against her chin.
“Liam, Liam. He was never the smartest. Nor was he very strong. But I have to say, he was very dedicated. Too bad it was to the wrong cause. If he had listened more he would be alive. Father told us the truth, how Mother died was directly caused by mutes. Yet Liam always bought into what the Overseer told us. I told you too, Song. But you didn’t believe me.” She slammed her fist into the dirt, and she had the strong urge to do the same to her body. Her hand was stiff although in her reality it twitched.
“You all let yourselves be occupied with basic science. We never moved forward until I was in charge. I can’t believe it was ever a debate whether you or I should lead. If you lead, we’d all be like you.” Even the wave of her hand she had to obey, no matter how hard she fought.
The last time Emelia controlled her, Song will never forget.
“You haven’t seen your daughter in a long time, she’s turning thirteen soon, right? I bet you’d love to see her again. And you’re in luck because I need that monster right now.”
She wanted to kill her, she tried. She lunged and swung and kicked and bit but in reality, she was frozen. She could do nothing.
Then she didn’t see Emelia, but her husband.
“This isn’t you.”
This wasn’t her. This was Emelia. The collar felt like molten lava on her fur. This was the man she loved.
Then it released another wave of pheromones.
Next, it was her daughter. Pesky axes that did nothing but annoy her, faces she didn’t recognize, snakes that only felt like small pinpricks. The music was unmistakable. After random strokes over the strings and shouting she charged but then her daughter started singing.
“We may not have sunshine, or starlight, or weather. But, we have each other, and that’s even better.”
That was their song, but that wasn’t Lio. And no one else could know it but…
Kipo.
She slowed down until she was only sliding and then standing still. Her eyes were fixed on her daughter. The girl she never got to raise. The girl she hadn’t seen in over a decade. She let her finish singing and kept her gaze on her.
Did she eat humans? No. Did she take them? No. Did they get away? Yes.
The glow on Kipo’s face would have spread to hers if she didn’t have fur. She reached a finger out to touch her and drew it back when Kipo jerked back before trying again. To touch her baby after so long made her indescribably happy.
Then she asked why she broke into the burrow and her collar started beeping.
She tried to signal what was happening, but Kipo couldn’t understand. When it released the pheromones, she used her last few seconds of control to run away. With no humans in her hands, she had no orders and she would not grab her daughter.
The next time she saw a human, it was again Kipo. This time, with a jaguar paw. She was growing up, and she was missing it. Her girl helped her, she cut through her collar. But she still couldn’t understand her, no matter how hard she tried to sign that she was her mom. Kipo misunderstood as her wanting to go with her, which wasn’t wrong but was not what she was trying to say. Before Kipo left, she did attach a bracelet to the fur on her arm.
She spent a long time staring at it.
Then it was Emelia again, but she wasn’t alone.
She was frozen in fear as Emelia spoke, she wasn’t hearing anything she said. Then she saw the collar and heard a sentence that registered.
“Put it on the monkey.”
She ran, her legs carrying her faster than Emelia and her goons could keep up.
Then not much later her son.
He chased her around Las Vistas, able to move well enough around the buildings that he didn’t crash as his followers did. He talked to her normally, before preaching of a future for mutes, and she ran. That was not the mandrill she had raised.
Then she was tied to a tree with silk, and she awoke to a small human climbing her. She looked down to see Kipo scaling her.
“Hi, mom.” She never thought she’d hear those words. She cooed at her and she was offered a canteen. “You must be thirsty.” Yes, she was. “Let me get you out of here.”
She raised a paw to strike and was grabbed by a flamingo’s talon. She howled in panic but she couldn’t do anything. Her hands were tied.
Her surroundings suddenly changing into a cave was shocking, even more so when a tardigrade started talking to her. Her daughter befriended a water bear, somehow she was not incredibly surprised. What she was surprised by was that she was now immune to pheromones. She could protect her family now, and she could convey a message.
“Could you tell Kipo mom loves her?”
The coronation was terrifying for her, and she could have easily escaped. For Kipo, however, she’d jump into an active volcano. So she did take the golden top off a building and help a thousand humans escape. So when she saw Kipo take charge as a jaguar and try to knock the tree down she joined. Even after her hand got gilded, she stood by her daughter.
When she howled in pain after she realised she was stuck, she howled with her. She understood. She wrapped her arms around her for the first time in twelve years and held her as she cried. She didn’t let go until Kipo had turned back and she could not be prouder of and happier for her daughter.
“Don’t worry mom, we’ll get you back.”
Working alongside Kipo every day was a blessing, even under threat. Getting to see her every day, getting to see her husband every day. Even if they could only hug her finger, she was content.
Then her family was under stress and she had to practically tackle her daughter to keep her from running into a trap. Afterwards, all she could do was pace back and forth. She knew how to beat Emelia at her own game, however, she didn’t know how to communicate.
“Hey! Song! Song!” She looked down at Scarlemange, the frustration painted on his face making her feel guilty. “These are my only hours of peace and quiet, and I can’t enjoy them if you’re shaking the whole forest!” She tried to sign to him, but he didn’t understand either. She picked his cage up and started cooing at him.
“You know I can’t understand you, right?” he stated and she groaned in frustration and pressed her palm to her forehead. “Wait, I’ll make you a deal.” She shook her head and the cage, eliciting a shout. “It’s not letting me out! Don’t worry. But I need you to do a favour for me and I’ll do a favour for you. Deal?” She nodded, and Scarlemange let out a shout. “Nod with your head, not your whole body!” She corrected herself and he smiled. “Good.”
It took them a long, long, time. Trying to use motions, then blocks, then motions again. He couldn’t understand her signals, her fingers were too big to use the blocks, and he couldn’t understand her noises.
She started signalling very quickly out of habit, and was surprised when one of the kittens pointed at her and said; “That means no!”
She nodded and Scarlemange tapped a finger to his chin. He climbed up next to the kids and sat with them. It was like playing charades, more like a game than a translation. Granted, it took them ages, they did eventually get her message down.
They delivered it, and she had to watch her daughter go and hope she’d be okay.
When she did come back with her friends, she let out a sigh of relief. She watched them talk and leaned down to be level with Kipo when she approached her.
“Let’s get you back, mom.” Her finger was pricked with something, and everything felt like she was on fire. She flailed briefly, and then her vision went black.
She got it back quickly, and she pushed herself up with two hands. She looked at her body and she wasn’t a monkey anymore, and she only had two hands. She pulled herself out of the crater she had made and her eyes landed on her daughter. The moment she got on her feet, she ran towards her and grabbed her in a hug.
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My Toy Collection
Hello, welcome to a very long, image-heavy post about me showing off some of the toys I’ve acquired over the years.
(Forgive me if the images are too big D:)
So, let’s begin with my Monsuno toys :)
(For the uninitiated, Monsuno was a cartoon that aired back in 2012-13, following this 13 year old boy as he tried to find his missing dad. Said dad was a researcher working on secret government experiments that created monsters from green glowing alien essence (the titular Monsunos). It’s close to my heart)
This is Rouge, my fake fusion Shadowhornet toy (with their core that they pop out of when it’s struck). They are my icon for this blog. I know this is a fake because the wings are completely red (when they should have some black on them).
And this is Meteorit, my Backslash toy. He’s real and cost me close to $60 AUD to import from Romania. His name is meteorite in Romanian (Monsunos are associated with some mineral and Backslash’s mineral, officially, is meteorite).
That blue thing in the background is a worm on the string btw
The Monsunos also come with cards. You’re meant to battle with them, activating abilities through cards I think (I’ve never played it). These are ones that came with Meteorit:
Pretty neat huh? Every Monsuno comes with some ‘character’ card (left) that shows the creature’s strength, with a small description. The others are attacks the Monsuno can do. In the show, Cursed Spiral is so cool to watch (midair corkscrew from Meteor Mutt)
Anyway, this is the card that came with Rouge:
You may notice that the beast on the back of the card looks nothing like Rouge. That’s because the creature on the back is Backslash 2.0, a fusion Monsuno that appeared only in the Season 1 finale of the show. It is a mix of two Monsunos: Backslash and Shadowhornet. If you have the two fusion versions of the Monsuno toys you can connect them together to create the fusion.
Backslash 2.0 is my favourite Monsuno. It’s a combination of two things I really like: Meteor Mutt and Bat-winged Centipede
Now, onto my Yugioh cards (another show with a tie-in toy line)
I used to have a full deck and play against my sister. This is all I have left now unfortunately. That Dark Magician card isn’t even the one I had originally. A friend gave to me after I told him I lost mine. It still is my favourite card. Greaceful Dice is a close second
I loved the TV show when I was younger and grew up with it. I still enjoy seeing fanworks related to it today
Speaking of my childhood, let me show you my Bakugan
(Bakugan is yet another cartoon that had it’s own toy line. It aired between 2007-2008 (wow!) and followed this group of kids who find these mysterious balls and cards falling from the sky and make a game based on it. They find out that these balls are actually aliens from another dimension who reveal their true forms during battle. If memory serves me correctly (it’s been a while), the two dimensions are colliding and must be saved (that or the Bakugan dimension was crumbling for some reason). I absolutely adored this show when I was younger!)
They toys are magnetic and pop from their balls when they land on a magnetic card. I have several, some from the second wave of toys, some fake and one from the first wave. (As an aside, the colours indicate the Bakugan’s element, there’s 6 in total)
These are the bootleg Bakugan. On the left is a raven man who’s missing his legs. The right is an enthusiastic frog who doesn’t like to stay in their ball. I like to think the frog carries the raven on their back, traveling as a team
This one’s a warrior, a knight (if memory serves me right). This is a second wave Bakugan, having a chasm on its back that allows you to attack some weaponry
These are two of my dragons. On the left is a prism dragon (I always thought it was another raven person). On the right is Terra, a dragon from the first wave. I bought Terra because my favourite character from the show was Drago, a fire version of Terra (I sincerely apologise to the Bakugan nerds who find this post. I can’t remember the element names D:)
Finally, we have two more second wave Bakugan. The one on the left is a dragon dude. The right is a winged, long-haired sword wielder (they’re also my strongest Bakugan).
Now, for the cards. These are the weird ones I got with the bootlegs:
They’re all magnetic. These are the real ones:
The River Valley card is the one I got with Terra. The creature on it, I remember, appeared late in the series (of the first season) and it was a water/air elemental. It was shocking to the protagonists because Bakugan only have one element associated with them. I think all the creatures that you see appear in the show at some point.
There are also non-magnetic cards that you activate during battle
Now, for something more well known: Pokemon
To say I have a few cards would be an understatement
Majority of them are fake. I won’t show them all, just some highlights
Two of these look cool while one is well loved :)
These ones have cute artwork. The Driftloon one looks like it’d fit into a children’s book. The bottom two are shiny, for some reason
When you’re right half of the time
Lation instead of Latios and calling Deoxys’defense forme its attack forme
I like Gen 4, clearly. These some of my legendaries. Note the two Dialga X cards that aren’t identical
G A L A C T I C
With weird energies. That Palkia is actually one of my favourite Pokemon cards (I like Cyrus and I have Pokemon Pearl)
Now, these two cards I got from a friend while on the school bus. I think these are the only real Pokemon cards I have. Maybe. I don’t know. Either way, they look cool!
This card below is something I found in the sorting room of the op shop I volunteer at. It’s holographic (sorry for the gif quality :/)
This is the back of it. Te description says:
This terrifying Pokemon may be a Bug-type, but it seems to have as much in common with the dinosaurs.
Its razor-edged wings make its Slash technique a killer. Add to that ninjalike speed and sharpness and the enemy is down for the count! This is one Pokemon to avoid if you’re a beginning trainer.
To think, I’m taller than it
Moving on, we have (left to right) GL the Arceus, an Oshawatt dangler I got from a cheap capsule dispenser and Phoebs the Manaphy. GL and Phoebs were gifts :)
This is a Meowth next to a tardigrade (water bear, moss piglet). The Meowth was originally my sister’s. She gave it to me when she moved out. The tardigrade I got from Scienceworks (which is what I can only describe as an interactive science museum). Water bears are a microscopic organism that inhabits moss. They can roll up into a ball (called a tun) and can survive extremes that would otherwise kill (extreme colds, pressures and even the vacuum of space). But, they can’t stay rolled up forever.
On the subject of soft toys, I have some Beanie Kids
Left to right, you have T-Bone the dog, Munchies the Guniea Pig, Cecilia the Snake and Blueberry the not furry. T-Bone, Munchies and Blueberry I got at the same time. Meanwhile, I found Cecilia at the op shop and I had to have her (she’s a naga bear). They’re all very fluffy and cute :3
Munchies in the middle is questioning his life choices
Now, to the toys I’ve had the longest: the Transformers
Not to sound like a boomer, but back in my day (*shakes cane in air*), Transformers had multiple steps to transform, not single fluid movements that you find in current toys. I even remember that they came with step-by-step instructions.
Left to right, you have Divebomb (local eagle screaming at ground), Demolisher (the reason I know that word) and Cruellock (my first and favourite). These are part of the Energon series of Transformers, which allowed you to attach a stud to some part of them (Demolisher is the one wearing it)
This is them transformed. Divebomb is the most fiddly to work with because those hands keep falling off (and you expect him to hold his boomerang?) Demolisher comes with missiles that be fired from his truck tray. Cruellock originally had a sword and a second piece to his tail. I lost both of those at school long ago. I was rough with him (but I wasn’t any older than 7 years)
Finally, I leave you with the image of the worm on a string I seemed to have acquired.
Well, thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed this! :D
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The Captain’s Secret - p.64
“Where the Wild Things Are”
A/N: Takes place after episode 5, "Choose Your Pain."
Also, I was asked a question about the usage of "Rove" a couple chapters back. Hm, yes, that was odd, wasn't it? I wonder what that was about... (Has anyone been noticing any other odd details? It's almost like there are some secrets around here or something. All shall be revealed in due time...)
Full Chapter List
Part 1 - Objects in Motion
<< Part 63 - A Laughing Rain
Part 65 - The Stars, Broken >>
Ripper was gone. While Lorca endured a bout of physician-mandated rest (sometimes it was impossible to argue with Starfleet medical, especially when the request was an entirely reasonable "get eight hours of sleep after being tortured" that turned out to be a much-needed ten and then some), Burnham and Tilly released the tardigrade into space under Saru's supervision.
Saru reported this to Lorca in the form of a ready room confession first thing in the morning, admitting he had timed the release so that Lorca could not offer any objections to the action. "The tardigrade had suffered enough," said Saru, "and it was no longer necessary to keep it on board in light of Mr. Stamets ability to compensate for the tardigrade's function."
Lorca registered a distasteful frown. It seemed on the surface to be in response to Saru's little deception, but the truth was more nuanced.
"I will accept any punishment as you see fit," said Saru.
Lorca stood there, silently hemming and hawing, then said, "Dismissed."
Saru did not understand. He was prepared for a lecture from the captain at the very least, or more likely an expression of outright vitriol for his deception. "Sir?"
"Dismissed," Lorca repeated, with more emphasis, but still entirely calm.
Saru wandered out, confused as to why there had been no reprimand.
Lorca turned towards the ready room window. Ripper was out there somewhere, free and unfettered, roaming the mycelial network and dining on mycelium spores. Ripper had murdered Landry and gotten away scot free. Lucky little bastard. Maybe murder was too strong a word, but at the very least, killed in self-defense.
The kicker was that, for all that he had told Burnham to make full use of Ripper, he was fond of the giant tardigrade and would have liked to have been there when they released it, or at least have been afforded the chance to bid it some sort of farewell. He saw a lot of himself in Ripper. Out of all the many living things on the ship, it was the monsters Lorca identified most with. Ripper had been king of the monsters, and if Ripper was king, Lorca was Emperor, because it wouldn't do for the tardigrade to outrank Discovery's captain.
Yes, it was true, they would never be able to plunder the tardigrade's genetic code for new biological materials or technology to exploit, but on some level, Lorca preferred the monster being free. At least one of them was unfettered by any rules or obligations.
He took a cookie from the bowl, shattered it between his hands, and read the fortune. Many receive advice, but only the wise profit by it. Then, with a certain degree of reluctance, he contacted Starfleet Command.
He received Cornwell in response. Waiting in ambush was more like it. She was as good as the Klingons in that regard. Which, come to think of it, the Klingons had found him as surely as if she had tipped them off. Had it not been for her summons to forward command, he would never have been captured in the first place, and the fact colored his reception towards her. To top it off, their last exchange of words had been largely unkind.
Oblivious to the roiling discontent in Lorca's mind, Cornwell looked genuinely happy to see him alive and well. "Gabriel!"
Lorca grimaced faintly. "Admiral," he said, entirely businesslike. "Reporting in I've been cleared for duty by our CMO and Discovery is back—" he almost said in action but the words were entirely inaccurate "—online."
Cornwell's face fell at the lack of reciprocity. She tried again, exuding friendly concern as she asked, "Are you all right?"
He remained impassive. "Never better."
The stubbornness he was displaying in the moment hurt her and it showed. "Gabriel. It's just me asking. When I realized you'd been taken..." She inhaled, shaking her head as he did, and then exhaled heavily. Words could not express the worry, fear, and upset she had felt at the news.
"Were you worried about me? Or the things I know." He'd seen the orders sent in his absence, watched the replay of her instructing Saru to retrieve him before the secrets of the spore drive could fall into Klingon hands.
She registered shock. "You, of course!"
That, at least, he believed, and he felt a little guilty for pressing her on the point and looked away. Then he relaxed, shrugged lightly, and lifted his head up. "I'm fine. Really." He even managed a smirk.
"The Klingons had you for almost forty-eight hours," said Cornwell.
"Pleasure cruise," he suggested.
Though the joke was potentially a positive sign, Lorca's history of avoiding processing things suggested it was more likely to be the usual pattern. "Don't do that. Don't shut me out."
He blinked. "What do you want from me, Katrina? You want me to curl up into a ball and cry?"
"That at least would be some sort of reaction commensurate with what you've been through," pointed out Cornwell.
"Well, sorry to disappoint, but I've been through much worse. They didn't break me. Frankly I'm a little offended you thought they would." This wasn't San Francisco. He had no need to convince her of anything. "And you should see the other guy. Seven months he was in that hellhole. Still didn't break him. What happened to me wasn't even a flash in the pan. Barely a tickle." He smirked, confident, jesting.
Somehow Cornwell doubted Lorca's ability to psychologically assess the recovered lieutenant. She equally doubted his ability to assess himself, but there was no way this was being resolved via commlink.
"If you need to talk," began Cornwell earnestly.
"I know exactly who to call." He smiled again.
Cornwell was not reassured in the slightest.
Lorca checked on Tyler in sickbay and brought him the "traditional welcome aboard gift of Discovery," as he put it, handing Tyler a fortune cookie. Tyler's recovery was going well and he was almost cleared to leave sickbay, which was remarkable given what he had been through. Tyler was a resilient officer. Lorca had already arranged some decent quarters so Tyler could finally sleep in a real bed.
"This ship wasn't even active when I was captured," noted Tyler, still amazed by how much time had gone by during his captivity. It did not feel like seven months so much as one long, unending day. "You have traditions?"
Lorca shrugged. "Might be more my tradition than Discovery's. This was the family business back when business was a thing." Lorca had a cookie of his own and cracked it. "Ah, this is a good one! 'You don't become a failure until you're satisfied with being one.' As someone who's never satisfied..." Lorca smirked in satisfaction, .
Tyler opened his. "Your love life will be happy and harmonious."
Lorca chuckled. "Well, with a face like yours, lieutenant." Tyler's dark, soulful eyes and fine features were probably capable of melting whatever heart he chose to direct them towards.
Tyler smiled faintly and pressed the pieces of cookie to his lips, eating slowly. He was not quite to the point of mustering a real laugh of his own yet, but it was good to hear laughter again after so many months with only screams for company.
"So, you given any thought to what you're going to do next?" asked Lorca.
"Sir?"
Lorca leaned against the side of the biobed. "I don't think anyone would blame you if you used this opportunity to hightail it on out of here. You've certainly been through more than your fair share in this war."
Tyler considered that, his brow furrowing. "I want to stay on, sir. If they'll let me."
"Oh? Is it vengeance you're after, lieutenant? Not that I'd blame you."
Tyler considered that, his brow furrowing. "I don't think so, sir. It's more... if I did leave, then it would be like the Klingons beat me."
Lorca was impressed. It was not just that Tyler had survived so much, but he had come through it with a remarkable resolve and even a degree of introspection where most people might have fallen apart. Whatever he had told himself to get through the long days and nights, it had been enough.
"Someday you'll have to tell me your secret," said Lorca, smiling kindly. Tyler looked confused. "The thing that got you through."
Tyler looked down and away, head shaking faintly. "I don't know, captain, I just... got lucky."
Lorca's smile pulled into an entirely lopsided twist of amusement. Luck alone did not get you through an ordeal like that. Survival on such a level required an innate reserve of strength as rare as a green star. You had to be wily, and determined, and possess the ability to forgive yourself, because otherwise you would go mad.
"We both got lucky," said Lorca. "Wouldn't have made it out of there without you."
"It was good thing you knew how to work that raider," said Tyler. "I didn't learn that in the cell."
"Now that," said Lorca, perking up, "wasn't luck at all. That was preparation."
Tyler looked at Lorca with his big brown eyes, eager to hear more.
Lorca was more than happy to comply. "You have to know your enemy in order to beat them," he said, "and you, Mr. Tyler, know our enemy from the inside. Everything I know is from the out. Between the two of us, we might know everything there is to know about Klingons. Certainly more than any other two people in Starfleet. It'll be a few days yet before there's any chance of you leaving Discovery. I hope, in the interim, you'll do me the favor of letting me pick your brain about our former hosts."
There was the faintest flicker of hesitation. It was true Tyler knew the Klingons more than anyone, but a lot of that knowledge was far too intimate, things he would rather forget. Still, he was Starfleet, and he was determined to make what had happened to him count. "Anything, captain."
Lorca smiled. He had no intention of letting Ash Tyler go anywhere else. He liked Tyler, and the potential he saw there was worthy of cultivation.
Typically, when Lab 26 called late at night, it was Lalana for their almost-daily discussion. This time it was not.
"O'Malley to Captain Lorca."
From the comfort of his quarters, Lorca considered declining the comm, but he answered.
"I seem to have more beers than I know what to do with. Fancy a drink?"
Lorca snorted. "How about something a little stronger?"
"If you're referring to my emergency anti-claustrophobia supply, then, no."
There was no sign of Lalana and Mischkelovitz in the main lab area. "They're watching this movie Melly likes, Caddy-catsy or something. It's just pictures and music. I can't stand it myself. I'm not particularly fond of music," explained O'Malley as he opened the beers.
Lorca took one. "You don't like music," he said with mild incredulity.
"Not really, no. Melly does! Loves it, in fact. She's always got something going in her ears. I'm just glad she spares me the inconvenience." They sat down, O'Malley in Groves' chair and Lorca in Mischkelovitz's. "There is this one song I don't mind. I can't remember what it is, though." With a shrug, O'Malley started on his beer.
"There's no music you enjoy?" said Lorca.
"What about you?" shot back O'Malley.
"Good ol' country boy like me? What do you think."
"How typically American," said O'Malley, rolling his eyes. A moment went by of silent drinking. "How are you, by the way?"
Lorca's eyebrows shot up and he leaned back in the chair. "Cornwell put you up to this?"
"Good god, nothing so formal," said O'Malley, looking genuinely insulted. "It's just, you've been through an ordeal, and if I'd gone through what you had, I'd want a friendly drink or two. Or five, really."
"You wouldn’t have survived what I've been through," said Lorca darkly, but as always, there was a macabre sort of humor in it.
O'Malley scowled. "You know, you always make it out like you're some sort of special survivor so much better at it than the rest of us, but the fact of the matter is, you can't say that. You don't know what I've been through, what I've survived."
"So tell me," said Lorca, sipping at the beer.
"You'd like that, would you? An entire lifetime's worth of blackmail material. Sorry, leverage. Because you're too good for blackmail, aren't you?"
Lorca started to snicker. "Why the hell would you say that?"
"Oh, so you don't have an inflated opinion of yourself?"
Lorca decided to give O'Malley that one. "Doesn't mean I'm above blackmail."
O'Malley laughed and Lorca chuckled. "Tell you what," said O'Malley. "You can ask me three questions about myself and I'll answer one as a sort of welcome home present."
"How magnanimous," drawled Lorca in a total deadpan.
"I have my moments. Now hurry it up before I change my mind."
The first question Lorca asked was what O'Malley and Mischkelovitz's mother had done to them. This was a clear non-starter, but there was no harm in trying. The second question entailed what an alien with no romantic proclivities saw in O'Malley, because clearly it wasn't looks or personality. The third question was, if he hated John Groves so much, why did he bother looking after him?
"To answer the second," said O'Malley, "she said my blood smelled delicious."
Lorca snorted in amusement, then realized it wasn't a joke. "Seriously?"
"Misellians drink blood. Any blood, really, but I've got a rare type, so why not a delicious walking blood bag anytime you want a snack?" O'Malley smiled to himself. "God, I miss her." He resumed drinking his beer.
It was obvious what Aeree was interested in. What the hell O'Malley got out of his marriage, Lorca couldn't tell. "You let her drink your blood?"
"She's always careful about it, metes it out in quantities that don't cause any lasting harm. I don't love it, but it's not so bad. Here, look." O'Malley pulled his collar loose, unzipped the tunic partway, and revealed a box-shaped scar just below his left collarbone about two inches tall and nearly as wide. There was something odd about the texture of it.
Lorca reached towards O'Malley with a glance of sought permission. O'Malley did not recoil from the advance. Touching his finger to the spot, Lorca discovered the skin felt somehow chitinous, like the membrane of an insect's wing. "What in the..."
"Careful now," warned O'Malley, "if you press it too hard, blood'll come right out. It's a graft, you see, slightly porous biosynthetic material. Beats getting sliced, bitten, and stabbed every time Aeree wants a drink."
In other words, a shunt. Lorca was enthralled by the modification. It was delightfully gross. "And what does she do for a drink when you're not around?" he asked, half-hoping to find out O'Malley's wife was drinking other men behind his back.
"I shudder to think. This is why I can't get a cat." It was said in jest, but the next line out of O'Malley's mouth was entirely somber. "And why it's probably a good thing we can't have children."
There was no denying the longing and regret of that admission. O'Malley wanted children and had sacrificed that desire to live with someone who viewed him as convenient snack. It beggared belief. Lorca said, "You could always adopt."
"I'm not sure taking a child into a household where the mother drinks blood is such a good idea. Mind you we could adopt a Misellian, but then the child would drink my blood, and I don't have enough for two." O'Malley sighed. "Anyway, I've got Melly."
It made a sort of sense. In lieu of a child of his own, an emotionally-stunted kid sister would seem to do the trick. It put O'Malley's unnatural attachment to Mischkelovitz into a slightly changed light. The bond wasn't just sibling, it was also vaguely parental.
"And Mr. Groves," pointed out Lorca.
O'Malley groaned. "I wish I didn't, but it's for his own good. Honestly, if you'd kicked him off Discovery, the loneliness would have killed him."
A shadow crossed Lorca's face. "You said it was Emellia needed him, not the other way around."
"I said what I thought would work in the moment," admitted O'Malley. "And Emellia would be heartbroken to lose another sibling. We all would."
"I didn't realize you lost one already," said Lorca, sympathetic.
O'Malley froze. "We... we don't like to talk about that."
"Fair enough," said Lorca, putting a pin in the subject for the moment. It felt like he had stumbled onto something. He wondered if the family secret was that their mother had killed one of her own children. He pondered the possibility as they sat there drinking. Then Lorca asked, "So, Mac, if I get kidnapped and tortured by Klingons again, you'll answer another question?"
O'Malley lifted an eyebrow. "Try it and see." They both laughed, a good laugh, and despite whatever misgivings Cornwell had and everything else going on in the universe, from where the two of them were sitting, life wasn't so bad.
Eventually, Mischkelovitz came out of Lalana's room, which was Lorca's opportunity to enter it. He caught a small exchange between the siblings in the process. When Mischkelovitz told O'Malley she loved him, O'Malley replied, "Just as much."
Lalana was pleased to see him in person for the second night in a row. "Tonight you will not be called away to sickbay," she noted.
"That is certainly true." He sprawled out comfortable on her couch, half a beer still in his hand.
They talked. About Ash Tyler and what Lorca saw in him, about Ripper's unceremonious departure and Saru's deception. "Do you know, I think Saru actually thought I intended Ripper harm. It's not like I told him to go all out and risk Ripper to rescue me." He drank the last of the beer and put the glass bottle down on the table.
"No," said Lalana, "that was me."
Lorca blinked in surprise as he leaned back onto the couch and stretched his arms across the back. "You?"
"I told Saru in no uncertain terms he must use any means necessary to retrieve you. I may have suggested Discovery would fall apart if he did not."
"For the record, Lalana? Tyler and I were doing a pretty good job of rescuing ourselves."
"You might have died in the process."
"I'm a survivor," said Lorca. "I'll die when I'm done with the universe, and not a moment sooner."
Lalana slid up next to him on the couch and pressed against his side. "I do wish I could believe that," she said, "but experience has taught me different." She brought her tail up and stroked his cheek.
Lorca smiled. It was strange to think that, once upon a time, he had looked at her and seen something so unforgivably alien it bordered on the incomprehensible. Looking at her now, he saw a person, strange and blue-grey with green eyes that never blinked and could be poked with a finger if he so chose, whose presence made him happy.
"You are different," she said. "Something happened on that Klingon ship."
"Not you, too," said Lorca, thinking of Cornwell accusations. "I'm fine. It wasn't that bad."
Her tongue clicked. "No, not something bad, something good."
"You think being tortured was good?" he chided her lightly.
"I only know what I can see," said Lalana, "and what I see is good."
Lorca reached over and brushed his fingers across the filaments on her head as if they were Mischkelovitz's hair. "What can I say. A little light torture now and again serves to remind a person what's good in life."
He had realized something on the Klingon ship, in that moment when the lights were burning into his retinas and the Klingon captain had tried to guess at who he was. A cosmos full of agonizing light? Maybe so, but it was a pain he would happily endure for the chance to be right where he was, surrounded by monsters he loved.
Part 65
#Star Trek Discovery#Star Trek#Discovery#fanfic#fanfiction#Captain Lorca#Gabriel Lorca#Saru#Ash Tyler#Commander Saru#Katrina Cornwell#Admiral Cornwell
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I want to design a monster that is a worm or a leech or a caterpillar or a centipede or a tardigrade or a every long bug is precious I can't decide I want to carry my long child on my shoulders and feed them many doritos I've been awake for like two days and I really need to get this tooth pain treated I would call the long friend Heinrich Hinkleton and we would ace the competive monster racing circuit My teeth would watch as I race off into the sunset without them I should sleep now Does anyone have a favourite long bug? Everyone look up velvet worms right now They are the cartooniest lil mofos Big ol anime :D mouth Maybe I dunno have like one of those but with fluffy moth antennae and it'd a spirit of the sky Squiggle swims thru the cloudmeats I'm very tired Or maybe a super fluffy caterpillar that's an ice type and maybe it also has like a seahorse snoot face Like a long long dragon that has nothing dragon about it They eat a leafs They eat a dorite Heinrich hinkleton will forever live on in our hearts and meends I'm very tired
#the gane#the gsne#the game#the tag#the monster pet shiop gam#the#festger#festher#feayher boa friend
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[SF] They Came From The Moon
Note: I don't care about the real-life details of the real event that's being reported on right now. This is my inspired take on it. Enjoy.
It all started when we went back to the moon. And now here I am, about to die. There’s not too many of us left, I don’t think. At this point, they’ve pretty well exterminated us. And they won’t stop until they get every last one of us. I’m certain of that. I’m surrounded now, and I’m not going to get away. There’s nothing I can do.
These damn things are indestructible. You can shoot them, stab them, bomb them, nuke them. And they just keep coming. The most indestructible creatures known to man. And to think they started out microscopic and insignificant.
Fucking tardigrades. Water bears. Moss piglets. Monsters.
Of course, it’s our own fault. These things were perfectly content, blissfully unaware, non-sentient little bugs who never hurt anything or anyone. Fine tuned over bazillions of years of evolution, the little bastards were perfectly adapted to, well, everywhere. Water, frozen and boiling, volcanoes, tropical rainforests, you name it. People say only cockroaches and twinkies would survive world-wide nuclear holocaust, but so would tardigrades. These things can live in the vaccuum of space for jebus’ sake.
At some point we decided it was a fan-fucking-tastic idea to shoot them off to the moon to “see what would happen.” Humans. Balls, we’re stupid sometimes. Not that our smartest minds could have foreseen the events that would happen to transpire a few decades later. At that time, it was no big deal. The tardigrades were dehydrated and cryo-frozen in epoxy, and sandwiched between plates of nickel. And then these plates - no larger than a DVD - were blasted off to the moon, where an Israeli ship crashed into the lunar surface. Oops.
Oh, and also sandwiched between those plates of nickel? Human DNA.
Human DNA and tardigrades. Together. Forever. Why you ask? Fuck knows.
And now here we are, a couple decades later, facing certain extinction. I don’t know if anyone knows how they became what they are - indestructible, slimy, 12 foot tall, sentient (REALLY fucking sentient) tardigrades. I don’t know, I’m not a scientist. Although now that I think of it, there very well may no longer be any human scientists around. So maybe I’m the closest thing to a scientist now. Maybe I’m the smartest human left on this monsterbug-infested planet. And I’m surrounded by them. Not so smart, I’m thinking.
What we do know is that a little over seven years after that initial tardigrade-dump on the moon, we went back for them. We always intended to of course. Scientists wanted to see how the lunar environment - weaker gravity, temperatures nearing absolute zero, the bombardment of radiation (so, SO much radiation) - would affect the biology and chemistry of those little shits, and apparently that of human DNA.
So these discs came back to Earth. A fully automated combination lander/rover/rocket blasted off from Kennedy Space Station in August, 2026. Space X’s latest and greatest at that time. It gently reverse-thrusted it’s way to the lunar surface 42 hours later. The rover unfolded itself from the lander rocket, set its 12 treaded wheels on the dusty, grey ground, and embarked on its mission. It took a little while, but eventually it made its way to a series of craters that upon first glance looked empty. But half buried and scattered throughout the two largest craters, were four DVD sized discs that the rover came for. Nothing else survived. No debris from the crash, no additional components. It was designed that way in case of a crash. You know, don’t contaminate alien worlds and all. Just the discs. Almost as if it was intended that way.
With the discs rounded up and safely stored away, the rover made its way back to the lander - now lunar rocket - and mechanically secured itself into a specially designed niche on the side of the ship. And off it went, right back to whence it came.
So they came back. Seemingly no different than when they blasted off the first time. NASA and Israeli scientists initially reported that the cryo-frozen tardigrades appeared to sustain very little, if any damage, and that they were still blissfully alivedead in their cozy little petri dishes. Re-hydrated, they went right back to their unassuming tardigrade ways, sucking nutrients from mosses and lichens through their face-holes and floating around lazily in saline solution. That’s the last I had heard back in the day, and hadn’t thought anything of it until the mushroom clouds appeared.
That was about two years ago, I’d say. I haven’t kept track. Maybe a bit more, maybe a bit less. It’s either late 2039 or early 2040 now. Winter. Only there’s no snow, there hasn’t been since last winter when nuclear fallout toasted most things and dried it to a crisp.
Those blasts killed most things. Not a whole lot of us survived. Not a whole lot of anything survived. But a few of us did. Cockroaches, and some people who had the wherewithal to shield themselves in time. And a few of us who can only chalk it up to dumb luck. I was out fishing when it started. Deep, deep in the middle of the Rocky Mountains. Considering packing it in for the day, fish-less, when I noticed the sky darkening and grey-green smoke rising between two peaks in the distance. Forest fire was the first thing that came to mind. Until the smoke quickly took a form that is unmistakable. As the mushroom-cap billowed upwards, I turned and ran. Had it not been for old crazy ass mountain man Liam, I’m sure I would have radiation puked myself to death within days or weeks.
That guy was a riot. And I mean, a machine gun totin’, bear trap loadin’, full blown lunatic of a man. The guy turned his small peaceful cabin and surrounding lands in the middle of nowhere into Fort Fucking Knox. That’s what he called it. Only he wasn’t guarding gold (maybe he was?), he was guarding himself. From them lib’ral snowflake soshulists comin’ for his guns. And his rights, he tells ya what.
So by a strange cascade of events that I don’t have time for here - mostly me runstumbling through the brush - I found my way to Liam’s bunker. More like, he found me. At gun point. The man, staring at me down the barrel of a Kalashnikov; greasy, stringy white hair flowing from under a disgusting old red trucker cap with worn once-white lettering on the front. I couldn’t make the words out, but it looked familiar from a time long ago. I thought I could vaguely make out the phrase “...GREAT AGAIN.” After much deliberation I was successfully able to convince him that indeed I was NOT one of them soshulist motherfuckers. I told him our govmint turned on us and were nukin’ us goddammit. I had no idea what was going on, I had to tell him something.
Liam’s place - Fort Fucking Knox - happened to come equipped with a state of the art nuclear fallout bunker. Of course it did. One of those they sold in mail order catalogs back in the 1950s. Better than duck-n-cover. So we holed up for a while. We ate a shit load of baked beans. Luckily, Liam preferred to keep to hisself and for the most part, that’s what he did. We listened to the chatter on his shortwave receivers, which is how we came to understand - mostly - what was happening. Liam didn’t keep TeeVee, or internet, or satellite. Just his goddamn CB radios. Probably a good thing, because I’m pretty sure these things would have found us sooner if he wasn’t so goddamn paranoid. They were smart. Very smart.
Not a whole lot more to report, honestly. Some time has passed, and Liam dies from some shit. No idea what. One day he just wouldn’t wake up. For the best though, I was gonna kill him soon if he hadn’t. I couldn’t take any more of his conspiracy theories, or his baked beans.
Over time the chatter on the CB radios went quiet. They were all getting found. I even listened to a couple good ol’ boys broadcast their own terrifyingly gruesome deaths. The Water Bears found them. It didn’t take long, they found them all.
Now, the bunker is surrounded. I have guns - Liam’s guns - and I have explosives. I have actual hand grenades. I’ve been out of the bunker a bit these last couple weeks, I don’t think the radiation is too bad, I’m only puking once every couple days or so. I’ve taken guns out looking for things to shoot. No animals anywhere, no birds chirping, not even a cricket.
And that’s how I fucked up. You see, I was out looking for anything to eat besides baked beans, when I rounded a group of huge boulders. And I saw it. That thing. It was huge, at least as big as the largest boulder I was standing next to. At first it didn’t know I was there, and it was preoccupied with something I couldn’t see. Then it froze. And much quicker than it had any right to, based on its fleshy marshmallow man contours, it half-twisted around to face me. It’s alien face - is it a face? - staring directly at me. The bung that is it’s mouth/face-hole slowly puckering in anticipation.
We stood there frozen for many milliseconds. Then I acted, pulling Liam’s only AR-15 around and semi-automatically squeezing off as many rounds into its pudgy rice pudding torso as I could. More rounds. I was on my ass on the ground now, the assault rifle having knocked me over. But I kept shooting. It folded in, like a roley-poley and collapsed face-down. I could see brown green goo dripping from the exit wounds on its reverse side. Thankfully, no one came and took away Liam’s guns.
Then they slowly, but surely, closed up. The wounds. They healed right before my eyes, and the thing started to tremble and move. I took off. As fast as my aging knees would let me, I stumbled back through the wild, crashing through the steel barbed front gate of Fort Fucking Knox. I didn’t stop until I was down in the bunker, locked from the inside.
That was two days ago - I think. Not like I’ve slept, and I’ve stopped looking at the clock. I’m not even sure what time or day it was when I got back to the bunker after shooting that thing. I knew, of course, that they were indestructible. I heard as much from the handhelds. Guns, bombs, nukes. Apparently, we (the govmint) retaliated by shooting nukes at Canada. This after the bugs already nuked Canada and most of the rest of the world. Wasn’t much left of ‘Mercia then either. But we still had our nukes.
They wanted to see if we could nuke those bastards. Because perhaps our nukes were better than those Russian nukes that already gave their college-try. Apparently not. Or if the nukes did get ‘em, more just came in their place.
Fucking machetes. One good ol’ boy hacked one up with a machete. Then as he was proudly broadcasting his victory on channel 13.5, the thing got him.
And now, here I am. Surrounded. I know I am, because I’m watching them on the closed circuit monitors. I’m going to die. Not sure if today, or tomorrow, or when, but I’m going to die. At least I’m in the bunker. I’m certain they can’t get in here. Reinforced concrete and steel. Underground. So I’ll just watch them, LEARN them. For my own edu-ma-fuckin-cation. I’ll eat these beans, though I’m only seeing about half a dozen more cans. I’ll drink whatever water is left, also not much. And then I’ll die. Either I’ll starve or die of thirst, or maybe I’ll rig up this whole damn place and blast myself and them to kingdom come. Or just myself. I turned around and puked into an old stainless steel turkey fryer.
I guess we’ll just see what happens. You know, it’s a bit ironic, don’tcha think? For decades now people have been freaking out over the climate changing. Me too. Now I’m in a bunker in the middle of a wasteland. And we didn’t even do THAT shit. People have been freaking out over viruses - these “super bugs”. The flu is goddamn scary these days, for sure. People die from that. At least, they did. Super bugs. Ain’t that some shit. I’m looking at the real Super Bugs right now, in all their closed-circuit, black and white, low resolution glory.
Fucking Tardigrades. Tardigrades from the fucking moon. And yes, we did that shit.
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