#and some of you haven't read the book

[lokilickedme]

The gigantic male glanced across at me and tilted his head.  I knew him, or knew of him to be more painfully precise, but Kaine knew him far better and the nasty history between the pair of them was absolutely something I wanted to see acknowledged before sides were chosen.  The Strada were infamous for making their minds up at the last second and allegiances meant jack shit to them.

This was a famous one.

“Baltho.”

The huge black wings shimmied for a second, the way a bird who’s just had a dust bath gives its wings a shake to throw off the last of the dirt.  Someone coughed.

“Kaine, you fucker.”

- The Magnussen Ultimatum (Book Two of The Othersider Wars - The Carmichael Addendum sequel), starting soon at Ao3 (after The Carmichael Addendum finishes uploading)

.

#that time Baltho joined the battle for funsies #and nearly took out the entire team because Aiden's ramba tried to imprint on him #I love it when my characters jump from one story to another just because they want to #Baltho aren't you supposed to be in prison right now? #and where is Keene? #oh yeah you did that face thing again and Keene is in your cell wondering how you managed to do it again #Here And There X The Carmichael Addendum crossover #THE MAGNUSSEN UNTIMATUM #no spoilers because TCA isn't finished uploading at ao3 yet #and some of you haven't read the book #so this is all I'll say about the sequel for now #Baltho faceclaim - Tom Hiddleston #Kaine faceclaim - David Gandy #Fausto - Jason Momoa #Aiden - also Hiddleston lol #Original Stories

[stairset]

I do feel like the way Kyoshi was written in the Avatar reboot was lowkey influenced by the fandom's perception of her. Cause like in the original show she's really just portrayed as a pragmatist who's willing to kill if necessary. Like Aang is conflicted about killing the Fire Lord and she's like "well if I were in your position I'd do it but that's just me. Good luck." And then people started making memes where she's like a murderous psychopath who thinks extreme violence is always the solution. And it was funny at first cause it was just exaggerating for comedy but now everyone thinks she was actually like that in the show when she really wasn't. And then in the remake her introductory scene is her angrily yelling at this 12 year old that he needs to stop being a little pussy and be a ruthless warrior or whatever and the only explanation I can think of is that someone in the writer's room maybe looked at a few too many of those memes.

#she had an awesome fight scene though so there's that #disclaimer i own both the kyoshi books but haven't actually read them yet #so this is just going off how she was written in the original show #i'm working my way through all my books that i haven't read yet so i'll get to the avatar novels soon #but i gotta get through a couple more star wars books first lol #but yeah you know those spider-verse memes #where they take the scene where jefferson says ''spider-man why did you create that guy'' #and they replace it with some funny dark shit like ''spider-man kill him and his family'' or ''spider-man fuck this guy's ass'' #that's basically what people seem to think kyoshi is like #avatar the last airbender #avatar kyoshi #shut up tristan

[hedgehog-moss]

In other news, this week a French publisher on his way to the London Book Fair was arrested by British counter-terrorist police to be questioned about his participation in protests in France.

A French publisher has been arrested on terror charges in London after being questioned by UK police about participating in anti-government protests in France.

Moret arrived at St Pancras [...] with his colleague Stella Magliani-Belkacem, the editorial director at the Paris-based publishing house, to be confronted by the two officers. [...] He was questioned for six hours and then arrested for alleged obstruction in refusing to disclose the passcodes to his phone and computer. [...] He was transferred to a police station in Islington, north London, where he remained in custody on Tuesday. He was later released on bail.

Éditions la Fabrique is known for publishing radical left authors. Moret also represents the French science fiction novelist Alain Damasio and had arranged more than 40 appointments at the London book fair. [...]

[Quoting publishing house’s press release] “The police officers claimed that Ernest had participated in demonstrations in France as a justification for this act – a quite remarkably inappropriate statement for a British police officer to make, and which seems to clearly indicate complicity between French and British authorities on this matter.” [...] “There’s been an increasingly repressive approach by the French government to the demonstrations, both in terms of police violence, but also in terms of a security clampdown.”

(Guardian link - BBC link) (article in French)

The publishing house (here’s their latest statement in French) and the publisher’s lawyer mention that the British police asked him “Do you support Emmanuel Macron? Did you attend protests against the pension reform?” and he was also asked to name the authors with anti-government views that his employer has published. They add, “Asking the representative of a publishing house, in the framework of counter-terrorism, about the opinions of his authors, is pushing even further the logic of political censorship and repression of dissenting thought. In a context of social protests and authoritarian escalation on the part of the French government, this aspect [of the questioning] is chilling.”

Being an accomplice to thoughtcrime by publishing dissident authors gets you treated like an international terrorist now... The publisher’s lawyer suggests that French authorities asked the UK to help them get their hands on the publisher’s contacts in the radical left sphere. But on the face of it, we’ve got: Exercise your right to protest your government in France -> get arrested by counter-terrorist UK police in London. That’s literally the reason he was given for being greeted by police at the train station...

#frpol #i bought a couple of books from la fabrique this morning... win-win i actually meant to read them and didn't know they were #published by them #in slightly better news @french people if you haven't seen some video excerpts of macron meeting alsatians today it's worth checking out #people telling him how corrupt his gov is; someone saying ''you're going to fall; mark my words'' and someone else #''we don't want your reform you arsehole'' and people chanting 'macron resign' as he walks away looking a bit pissed... #and naturally protests were banned in the cities he visited today and cops had cleared the area of actual protesters #before macron arrived so the people he met were actually the less angry people

[uhbasicallyjustmilex]

quotes from alex turner's favourite authors that make me want to put my face through a wall:

"although i have never been an actor in the strict sense of the word, i have nevertheless, in real life, always carried about with me a small folding theatre" - vladimir nabokov, despair

"there is a terrible emptiness in me, an indifference that hurts," - albert camus

"there is no trap so deadly as the trap you set for yourself" - raymond chandler

"at eight, he had once told his mother that he wanted to paint air" - vladimir nabokov

"no man ever understands quite his own artful dodges to escape from the grim shadow of self-knowledge" - joseph conrad

"everything i've ever let go of has claw marks on it" - david foster wallace

"we're all lonely for something we don't know we're lonely for. how else to explain the curious feeling that goes around feeling like missing somebody we've never even met?" - david foster wallace

"i turn over a new leaf every day, but the blots show through" - keith waterhouse

"the truth will set you free. but not until it's finished with you" - david foster wallace

"curiosity is insubordination in its purest form" - vladimir nabokov

"i'm me and nobody else; and whatever people think i am or say i am, that's what i'm not, because they don't know a bloody thing about me" - alan sillitoe

"we live as we dream; alone” - joseph conrad

"i liked, as i like still, to make words look self-conscious and foolish, to bind them by mock marriage of a pun, to turn them inside out, to come upon them unwares" - vladimir nabokov, despair

"whatever you get paid attention to for is never what you think is most important about yourself" - david foster wallace

"i continued to stir my tea long after it had done all it could with the milk” - vladimir nabokov, despair

"i remained too much inside my head and ended up losing my mind" - edgar allan poe

"all the information i have about myself is from forged documents" - vladimir nabokov, despair

"how odd i can have all this inside me and to you its just words" - david foster wallace

"you will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. you will never live if you're looking for the meaning of life" - albert camus

#all of these are from books/authors alex has explicitly mentioned being a fan of #god i wish he talked more about what he reads because i find the books and authors people are drawn to fascinating #it's such an insight into someone's psyche #then again maybe that's why he doesn't talk about it a lot - the books you love are quite a personal thing #but yeah #having read a few things i just thought i'd compile a little selection of quotes from his favourite books/authors that #idk - stuck out to me as being very alex #and it's safe to safe i have well and truly destroyed my own heart in the process #i also now absolutely have to read despair by vladimir nabokov #it's one of his that i haven't read but i had a little flick through it and oh my god i can totally see why alex is so into it #this list was almost entirely just quotes from that book #there are SO MANY that are just painfully alex #(in my mind anyway) #anyway #enough rambling from me #i might have to do a part two of this at some point #alex turner #arctic monkeys #lulu posts

[fromtheseventhhell]

"It's normal for siblings to fight" Okay well it's not normal to be extremely classist and look down on your sister for being non-conforming. Or to go to the woman who ordered the death of your pet to tell her about your father's plans, when he specifically warned you against doing so, because you want to marry the boy you saw attack your sister and her friend (contributing partially to said father's death and your sister being unable to escape on the ship he chartered). Or to think of your sibling as unsatisfactory in comparison to another when you believe her to be dead. I notice that none of the "Sansa and Arya are going to reunite and instantly have no issues" crowd ever acknowledge any of this, which makes it seem like they don't actually believe what they say about their relationship being normal and easily reconciled. People wanting them to have no issues simply because they're siblings is another example of how fandom likes to flatten complex characters and relationships. They get reduced to being bickering siblings when their conflict runs deeper than that. If the author is telling you that they have "deep issues" to work out [X], I don't understand being so adamant about ignoring said issues. I also get the sense it's about ignoring the capacity for a certain character to be flawed, but that isn't going to change the fact that her "slip of the tongue" is very likely to be revealed and a source of further conflict 🤷🏾‍♀️

#arya stark #sansa stark #house stark #asoiaf #also if it's so normal for siblings to fight then why are you guys losing your minds over us theorizing they won't get along?? #the amount of condescending /that's just how siblings act/ takes I see 🙄 #sorry I guess? that we read the book and don't just delete parts of the story because we find it convenient? #it's not even like takes about them being enemies is widespread the most I see is that they aren't instantly bffs when they reunite 😭 #some people theorize they'll never be close but guess what? that's a completely fair and valid assumption based on their relationship! #personally I think they'll have a sweet reunion before the issues they have inevitably surface again because while they've been through #a lot they haven't fundamentally changed as people or the values they hold #and I think that's going to be very interesting to read about! #I can't figure out why people always take the most boring bland route for how things will play out #mostly because people seem to be unable to swallow the concept that Sansa is a flawed character who isn't perfectly sweet all the time #and the fact that their conflict is instigated by Sansa's classism #which is funny cause in the grand scheme of things her being mean to Arya is such a mild thing that opens the door to a ton of growth #never seen anybody but stansas equating her being a bully to her sister to her being evil/a villain #all we do is point out that it exists in the story...people in this fandom have no concept of nuance I stg 😭 #anyways they're both complex characters and their conflict is interesting and I hope we get to see how it plays out #cause it's definitely going to be better then that trash d&d came up with 🙏🏾

[bluebirdcurse]

It's so awkward how they have a cannibalism control group...every day Coach lives is another day they kind of didn't need to eat Jackie. They're drawing lots for their next meal while he's out hiking.

#i read a book on the donner party where the author does some caloric math and is like they really jumped the gun on cannibalism #god i'd love a reading list from the yellowjackets writers. you know the research phase was bananas #yellowjackets #they haven't even gone thru all the belts! they're just starting to hallucinate! #they know javi was eating something out there but dealing with him is a whole Thing let's jump straight to murder

[jenna-louise-jamie]

disclosure: this includes books 1-11. reblog for a bigger sample size & throw your hat in the ring to guess what alex hasn't done if you've never seen or watched alex rider !

#i saw the other poll that was similar to this one and it was so funny i wanted to make another one bc I LOVE POLLS #some of these are phrased weirdly i apologize tumblr would only let me have so many words #and i kept getting tripped up on grammar for some reason lmao #but oh well #if you haven't seen or read alex rider please also vote!!!! #reblog for a bigger sample size #alex rider #alex rider books #alex rider series #tumblr polls #my polls #polls #anthony horowitz

[commandercoriandersalamander]

two dudes... sitting in a hot tub stone wolf... souls mingled into one complete being but they're not gay

#fitz and the fool #lmao theyre so gay #has robin hobb recanted yet? she literally wrote this ending #with a callback to the 'no limits on that love' line #did she think that was a heterosexual conclusion to these nine books #i know people on tumblr like to call queer headcanons 'literally canon' and then when you consume the media its like #they talked twice and made eye contact and one of them wears a stylish coat #and so if you haven't read the books but have seen the fandom you might think 'oh so some subtext?' #'theyre friends who have an emotional connection which could feed shippers?' #no #this is textually canon across both their character arcs and the larger themes of the series #reinforced through repeated narrative symmetry and also the fact that they have kissed and confessed their love multiple times #robin hobb is FASCINATING to me like imagine someone writing a story about a guy with 'hair the color of autumn leaves abd foxes' #and then getting mad when people interpret him as anything other than a blond #bestie you WROTE THIS

[wikiangela]

tease tidbit tuesday💀

tagged by @alliaskisthepossibilityoflove @daffi-990 @fortheloveofbuddie @disasterbuckdiaz @hoodie-buck 💖

hi! so, yesterday I randomly opened the doc with the buddie death cast au - which is a fic I started writing last summer on vacation and never got back to it but then made progress lol it's gonna be MCD, which i know is not everyone's thing so feel free to ignore this 🤣 it's basically buddie in the universe of the "they both die at the end"/"the first to die at the end" books so it's gonna be sad, sorry lol (I never even read mcd, idk why i'm writing this but this idea just wants to be written i guess haha) gotta put this weird mood I've been in lately to good use and finally write this 🤣 not sure if I'm happy with this snippet, but it all needs editing, the first two snippets were written on my phone and haven't been edited yet lol

I posted two snippets so far, gonna link them both snippet 1 | snippet 2

___

“Is all of this clear, Eddie?” she asks in the end.

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” he says shortly. He should've just hung up immediately. Or cancel this stupid subscription after Shannon died. Sometimes he wonders if maybe people who get the calls and coincidentally get into accidents, for example, just give up and refuse to fight because they think it’s their time. Not like Shannon could do much, her injuries were too severe when they got there, but the point stands. Maybe they get more reckless, thinking it doesn’t matter anyway. 

There’s a short pause on the line, but then Jane speaks up again, her tone softer, more sympathy seeping through.

“I know it’s not easy to accept, if you’d like some help with that, on out website you can find therapists and grief counselors specializing in-”

“Listen.” Eddie interrupts. He’s spent enough time in therapy. He’s not doing it on his supposedly last day. “I know it’s all bullshit. I don’t care. You said what you had to say, I listened, for whatever reason.” he rolls his eyes. He really should’ve hung up, or not answered at all. “Is this conversation over yet?” he asks and is met with another moment of silence. She’s probably wondering what everyone else always is: why is he even spending money on this if he doesn’t believe. He has an answer ready to go, but that’s not what she asks.

“Can I ask you a question?” she says quieter, whispering, probably not allowed to go too much off-script. 

“Sure, why not.” he shrugs. He’s wide awake now, anyway, he’s not in a hurry. Not like he’s dying anytime soon.

“If it was your last day, how would you spend it? You don’t have to answer, just think about it.” she adds quickly, her tone much softer and gentler now. Eddie’s mind immediately supplies a picture of Christopher and Buck, just a casual hang-out, like usual, maybe going to the movies, or the aquarium, or the planetarium, something fun for his kid. And later a gathering with the rest of their family, maybe a barbecue at Bobby and Athena’s, with Maddie and Chim, and Hen and Karen, all their kids, just everyone having fun together. Yeah, that’d be a perfect day. “There’s no harm in spending today just like this, if possible. Just in case.” Jane adds, still whispering. He doesn’t tell her that’s more or less his plan, anyway, for the evening after his 12-hour shift. During which nothing will happen to him, because Death-Cast doesn’t know shit. “Well, lastly, Eddie,” Jane’s voice is back at normal-volume, tone strictly professional but sympathetic, as she recites the end of her script, “on behalf of everyone here at Death-Cast, we’re so sorry to lose you. Live this day to the fullest.”

Eddie hangs up without a word.

___

no pressure tags: @elvensorceress @gaydiaz @diazass @thebravebitch @silentxxsoul @shortsighted-owl @eddiebabygirldiaz @arthursdent @911onabc @housewifebuck @rogerzsteven @watchyourbuck @underwater-ninja-13 @eowon @loserdiaz @evanbegins @ladydorian05 @wildlife4life @nmcggg @diazpatcher @lover-of-mine @king-buckley @monsterrae1 @thewolvesof1998 @puppyboybuckley @weewootruck @buckaroosheart @spagheddiediaz @steadfastsaturnsrings @exhuastedpigeon @jesuisici33 @theotherbuckley @rainbow-nerdss @malewifediaz @giddyupbuck @diazsdimples @jeeyuns @epicbuddieficrecs @pirrusstuff @honestlydarkprincess @hippolotamus @spotsandsocks

#tease tidbit tuesday #death cast buddie au #buddie wip #buddie fic #buddie #wikiangela writes #my writing #fic snippet #my wips #angst #buddie angst #mcd #i don't know how yet but eddie will die in this one bc apparently ive been in the mood to break my own heart lmao #i wanted to say maybe i'd share smth happier tomorrow but i don't think i have any happy wips im actively working on rn??? #there are happy wips in general but im not really in the mood/inspired for those rn #ran out of happy when i finished the natalia fic i guess lol #who even am i lmao what's with all the angst and sad im usually all about fluff 🤣 #(gonna share some more of alive shannon tomorrow!) #btw if you haven't read the books and have questions hmu but also i'll try to make everything clear in the fic lol #but also SO recommend the books they're so good and so sad and I think about them like at least once a week (the prequel wrecked me)

[lamentable-comedy]

John Updike, "Afterword", Gertrude and Claudius (2000)

Okay. Okay, yeah, I'm fine. Mmhm. I'm fine. This is fine. "Hamlet pulls them all into death. Coolcoolcoolcoolcoolcool. Cool. I am,,,,,

Fine.

#gertrude and claudius #john updike why did you do this to me #it's tragedy enjoyer hours lads #seriously though if you haven't read this book i highly recommend it #it makes some cool choices wrt to different names for the characters #also it understands hamlet (the guy) on a level that few other adaptations do #my guy billy shakes #hamlet

[asteroulik]

I had this au idea where some guardians have to go through this sort of 'rebirth' after death to formally become a guardian, growing up into their role until they 'stop aging' per se. North didn't really have anyone when he went through it and ends up adopting jack when he comes back to life--cue antics.

#rotg #rise of the guardians #jack frost #nicholas st. north #sanderson mansnoozie #toothiana #pitch black #kozmotis pitchiner #You are not immune to the found family #Anyway really sorry if this doesn't correlate with lore of the books bc I haven't read them. By 'some' I meant maybe the more human charas #cuz I'm not sure if age is a problem for pookas yk #rotg rebirth au #asteroulik art

[xnervouscircus]

captive prince antis are so adorably ludicrous because their argument essentially comes down to believing that after seeing the man that killed his brother and sent his life down some deeply traumatic and almost lethal paths, laurent should've just been like:

good to see you again, brother-killer, so sorry about the rough journey here, almost as rough as my life has been since losing my best friend and protector, haha! but no worries, sure you actually, genuinely, thoroughly ruined my life, but revenge would be immoral so i'm just going to send you on home #forgiveness #healing #growth #risingabove #aneyeforaneyemakestheworldblind

#not advocating for people to read the books if they're put off by the CWs #it's heavy shit!! if i hadn't gone into the books blind i might very well have not ever read them!! #but Context Is Everything and some of y'all either never read the books or you sorely lack reading comprehension #haven't seen capri anti gibberish recently but am rereading the books and just had to laugh again at their absurdity #captive prince #michele.txt

[pa-pa-plasma]

people who have not read Alex Rider

editing to say answer in the tags (obvious spoiler art)

#Alex Rider #i haven't read the newest one so if That happens colour me surprised #SPOILERS BELOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! #all of these happened in this exact order EXCEPT the last one. i chose one insane thing he did from each book up to Nightshade #not including Secret Weapon & Russian Roulette #Alex has never officially gotten a girlfriend. one of his love interests actually became his sister too so probably not gonna happen #& also every time he has a chance to check out a girl or flirt he chooses a guy instead. kinda gay if you ask me #i chose ''got a girlfriend'' not only because it's funny but because it's so normal that i hoped it would be like reverse psychology #& it looks like it worked on some people lol

[eldritchamy]

A question for Uneiverse (to give you an excuse to talk about it, only if you wanna. Since I also just really hearing about it). What's a detail about it that you really enjoy but haven't gotten a chance to use anywhere story related or otherwise just don't get to play with much (silly or serious)

This ask has been sitting in my inbox for over 5 months.

It's time.

And so, we begin with a question of my own.

What IS time?

We're off the map now. Come with me. Take my hand as we walk through the valley of the shadow of time. We're going to uncharted waters, and I'm going to put the fear of god into you. I'm going to make you ask yourself (and me) Amy, how the fuck does you brain WORK like that?

Let me tell you about time and fate, and about what it means to "predict" the future.

And you will begin to understand the scale of what lives within me, eternally gnawing at the inside of my skull, begging for release.

If I asked you to conceptualize time, what would you say? Is it the neat and rigid tick-tick-ticking of regular intervals on the clock? Is is the fluid, indivisible space between?

Is is all just an illusion conceived by the animal brain to account for the changing shape of the universe as one dimension passes through another, which our three-dimensional eyes are too flat to see all at once, and our souls have concocted for us a comforting lie, that we may pretend to know the universe in its whole, by knowing it piece by infinitesimal, grinding piece, seeing the pan-dimensional amalgam of existence as an endless, continuous sequence of cross-sections in a number of dimensions our meat-circuitry can pretend to process?

Time is shadows.

Imagine, if you will, a sphere.

You hold it up against the light. Suspend it in the air, perhaps, for simplicity's sake. And the sphere casts a shadow.

Is the shadow still a sphere?

Far more importantly, is it even a circle?

At even the tiniest fraction of an angle, the sphere casts a shadow that no longer perfectly represents a cross section of the sphere. It has ceased to perfectly capture the nature of the object that cast the shadow, even accounting for the wrong number of dimensions. It's skewed. You can never unskew it. The distortion is irreversible.

And the floor isn't flat.

The sphere casts a shadow at an angle at a surface that ranges in distance and direction from the object casting the shadow. Is the shadow still an oval? Has it become a shape you can't name?

But the shadow isn't cast upon a floor, even an uneven one.

What shape is the shadow of a sphere cast at an angle upon a field of grass blowing in the wind? By now there's no pretending you know the answer. And even if you could snapshot a single instant of a single shape, the very next instant that shape would change in the breeze as the grass shifts.

The world is not a field of grass upon the ground. The world is endless variation of leaves upon trees, forests upon mountains, birds in the sky, hunting for the bugs that crawl on the branches of the trees. Massive floating pools of water churning in the low atmosphere as humans decide whether that one looks like a mouse or a sheep. So many humans walking, their clothes flowing behind them as they talk, eat, buy goods, shed tiny particles of skin and hair into the wind, their breath adding chaos to that same wind and a hundred miles away a leaf turns slightly more to the left than if that human had said nothing.

What is the shadow of a sphere cast upon that world? Twisted by its unfathomable complexity of shapes and movement?

And now, to make things worse, imagine if that shadow were a tangible thing that you could pick up. That could cast its own shadow not on the floor but up against the wall.

And all of that is if the shadow is cast by a perfect sphere.

Imagine you are a being that can see the shape of time. Could you look at the echo of a shadow of a shadow of a reflection in a fun house mirror, and recreate what it once was?

Could you look at a crooked set of lines upon the wall and know the meaning of cause and consequence? Could you predict what consequences of which actions would lead to favorable outcomes when realization dawns on you that

𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖘𝖕𝖍𝖊𝖗𝖊 𝖍𝖆𝖘 𝖙𝖊𝖊𝖙𝖍, 𝖆𝖓𝖉 𝖎𝖙 𝖎𝖘 𝖘𝖔. 𝖛𝖊𝖗𝖞. 𝖍𝖚𝖓𝖌𝖗𝖞.

Time is an ocean of possibility. Each possibility has consequences. Each consequence a sea of new possibilities. How can you hope to understand the shadow of a shadow of a shadow, and not only know what's coming, but how to stop it?

Nothing is fated. But I said something important that bears repeating. Time is an OCEAN. We'll come back to that.

Time MOVES, at least the way we perceive it. I don't like the phrase "everything happens for a reason." I prefer something of my own creation: for every effect, a cause. To achieve a desired effect - a desired outcome - you must change the circumstances of cause that lead to that effect. But there are limits to your influence.

The time to change the course of a river is when the river is still small. The longer that river runs its course, the deeper it shapes and erodes the ground around it. The larger and faster a river the harder it is to redirect it. It will go where it's going, and there's nothing you can do about it. There is an element of momentum that must be accounted for. An element of inevitability.

The path of one person's life, one set of choices available to them in one specific context, may feel perhaps like the current of a river, when you look back on it. But if different changes were made during its formation, it could have taken a completely different path. Ended in a completely different place. And influenced the formation of completely different paths in the future as a result.

But I'll say it again, and you'll know its significance now: time is an OCEAN. It is not a river, but an IMMENSE network of currents with no clearly defined borders, flowing with or against or around each other in an unimaginably complex churning of possibility and consequence and cause and effect. A shift in one current may brush up against another. The second current may shift with it, or crash violently into it, or ignore it entirely.

For every effect, a cause. But for every CAUSE, many POSSIBLE effects.

So time becomes a series of choices beyond number. Each choice leading to fathomless changes in the flow. As the earth turns, some currents flow inevitably in certain directions. If not here, then somewhere else. SOME CHANGES ARE INESCAPABLE.

The universe must be dynamic. If nothing changed, the universe would not need to exist at all. Change is the point. Variance is the point. Choice is the point. The universe exists to know itself, and it knows itself through change.

There is an endless sea of currents flowing in various ways with, beside, against, around each other. Some directions of flow are strongly influenced by the shape of the seafloor and the rotation of the earth. There are changes in the world that are virtually guaranteed to exist, whether because the nature of the universe has made them inevitable, or because changes long past have created the currents that are now too old and too deep to change.

Picture a river again. What happens when you throw a stick into it? The stick is swept up in the current and carried along the river.

Throw in more sticks. Same thing, right? You can make small changes without affecting the overall outcome. Within one large shadow of a sphere, the details of a hundred blades of grass whose shadows are lost within the larger shape.

Anchor a large stick to the riverbed so it can't get swept away. Now, it's just one stick. The water will flow around it. There are small ripples. Tiny changes in the river, micro-currents that will affect a localized area. But on the whole? The river still flows. You changed something. But you didn't change the course of the river.

Add stick after stick after stick until the river is obstructed completely, and the current is forced to change shape.

Which stick built the dam?

Which straw should the camel's back blame?

Back to the ocean. Can you dam the sea? Can you build that dam one stick at a time, by throwing sticks into separate currents, hoping the currents bring them where they need to be in time?

There are patterns borne out from the endless flow of possibility as the ocean of time churns. With all those ancient currents running together, what difference does the wake of a boat make on the shape of the waves? How many breaches from how many whales would it take to turn a current south instead of north?

What if you could make a bigger change? What if an avalanche altered the shape of the seafloor, so the rotation of the earth forces new waters to resist the old currents? So the inevitability of the dynamic universe drags forth a new set of possibilities?

There are a LOT of currents. They've been turning for a long, long time, ebbing and flowing with a billion tides and ten thousand quintillion waves. Choices can make new currents. BIG choices, with a lot of consequences, may even change existing ones.

But the ocean still has a geography to it. There are places where water is forced through the gaps between landmasses, or forced into the shallows, or freed to dive into the black beyond a continental shelf. There are places where, no matter how many changes you make, many currents are still guaranteed to meet.

There are fixed points in time.

What if one of those points is a whirlpool, threatening to swallow everything drawn into the place those currents meet?

What about a whirlpool on the scale of worlds and gods?

How do you keep from drowning?

How do you give yourself the best chance, not of AVOIDING the whirlpool of inevitability, but of entering it at the farthest possible edge, where the right momentum, the right decisions made in the moment you are caught in its gravity, may carry you through to the other side, so you still remain when time marches on?

Is it better to see things coming at all? Or is the ability to see time, to speak a language of the universe that no one else can speak, one of the greatest cosmic horrors you can imagine?

Imagine the burden of time on those who can see it.

Imagine the WEIGHT of being able to see those currents. Of knowing which threads of fate to pull. Of knowing which ripples to make, which waves to break, which currents to shift. Of knowing.

Imagine the complexity of figuring out WHICH changes to make. And the great leviathan of guilt left on your shoulders when the decisions you made - even in pursuit of the best possible outcome - bring harm to the ones you love most, the ones you're most desperate to protect.

Even if you're right.

Even if you played 17-dimensional chess with the wizard-addled corpse of god and knew, with certainty, that if a single problem you had a hand in creating had been resolved more neatly by even minutes, the sticks would not have fallen into place within the dam, and the entirety of creation could have been swallowed piece by piece by the horror you were trying to stop.

Imagine the horror. Imagine the responsibility. Imagine the unending, agonizing pain of the burden of Knowing.

Because what time is, most of all, is a nightmare.

And there's no waking up.

#Uneiverse #worldbuilding #a sufficiently clever person who has meticulously read all of my Uneiverse posts #MIGHT be able to make some pretty reasonable guesses about the plot of the first book by now #is it likely? nah #is it possible to get a CLEAR idea of how any part of this will go? oh not a chance in hell #no matter what shape of shadow you can see .... remember there are blades of grass #is this the most horrifying answer I've ever given? #please scream your incoherent cosmically garbled thoughts into my inbox so I can enjoy your mental breakdowns #I feed on the knowledge that I have changed you on a neurological level #and yes this is the shit I have to live with inside my brain at all times #I mean is that fucked up or what #I haven't even scratched the surface of what god is

[iamwaytoointostartrek]

Star trek book/show covers always have art of the complete opposite spectrum and I love it cause you could get

Absolutely gorgeous art

Or you could get

Half of somebody's face (bonus points if they're transparent)

#(I haven't read these books) #but if you did #toss me some input bc I have a suspicious feeling the worse the cover the better the book #star trek #star trek ds9 #ds9 #deep space nine #deep space 9 #star trek tos #tng #star trek the next generation #quark #garak #julian bashir #jadzia dax #benjamin sisko #kira nerys #odo #books #star trek voyager #star trek next gen #the next generation #tos

[aster-draws]

Who’s the hardest character to write and why?

And who’s the easiest?

(I’m totally not asking this because I like reading you explaining things, noooooo)

You are in luck because I love explaining things.

I don't think I really have difficulty writing any one character- I don't like staying in one POV for entire works, that's definitely more of a struggle for me than any one character. Generally if I'm having problems with a character then it's not the place for them? If that makes sense. Like I love Duke to Death but trying to fit him into Wanted was Not It. And that's for writing in their head or for writing them from someone else's. If it sucks hit da bricks, essentially.

Technically, though (as in, regarding a technical aspect) Damian was the most difficult in Wanted because I started off giving him a very strong and distinct voice, and when I went back to his POV in later chapters, I had to edit a lot to maintain consistency.

As far as Better Halves, though, I don't think I'm running into any issues with either of them- i won't be moving to any POVs other than Tim or Danny for the whole work. Tim is Very Easy for me to write. I am him. He is me. in that we have a lot of similar tendencies and flaws. But it's easy for me to find a balance- i don't stay in Tim's head forever, because I just ask myself- who's POV in this scene has The Most potential for. Like. a reaction from my audience. (eg. Angst, Humor, giggling and kicking feet, ect.) and then I just do that.

And OUTSIDE of Fanfiction, the Most technically difficult character I write is one of my OCs, CARMI, who is a brain in a jar operating an android body. I have to make a lot of decisions about her narration based on Neuroscience and our understanding of consciousness, and how learning and the way we interact with our environment affects the way we perceive the world around us. I'm gonna be so fr I still don't know if I can pull this shit off. I'm gonna TRY because it'll be sick as hell if I can do it right. But it's very hard and my brain hurts thinking about it

#You don't understand the amount of books about neuroscience i've been reading recently and I was a neuroscience major #I literally was a research assistant on so many neural imaging studies and I still feel like I'm drowning when I'm reading some of this stu #its so complicated and its so interesting but i need to make a decision and stick with it but that decision is predicated on sm research #anyways soft launch of Blood Brain Barrier! The scifi horror novella that i'm terrified of trying to start! It is. So. Intimidating. #and I write 100k+ fanfiction for fun. So. hopefully that can indicate the scale of how scared I am of this thing. #Also dear weirdo I do see your ask about freakshow i haven't really watched DP properly in Years so let me do that and get back to you. #answered #weirdohasleft #better halves (and other such falsehoods) #wanted: dead and alive