#have spacesuit will travel

[captain-athos]

I’m booked to be a gogo dancer tonight and like I’m not GOING to but I just think it would be so funny if I wore my blackbeard outfit for it I WON’T but I’ll be THINKING ABOUT IT

#the shift is til like 4am and honestly like it's the funniest regular gig that I have because like #I am not #a dancer #I do not own #gogo dancing outfits #I'm wearing a fucking disco spacesuit #one time I did the whole thing in a 70s plaid suit it looked like someone's dad time travelled and ended up on stage #like WHY do they keep having me back but also the money is really good so I'm not complaining #I'm just confused

[orteil42]

some undifferentiated thoughts about my Starfield playthrough as i have them. i am a game developer with a strong interest in procedural generation and i've enjoyed a bunch of other bethesda games so this might get pretty mean sorry

(this is a long one)

starfield dialogue is already exhausting me "oh you must've been living under a moon rock ;)" get it! because they're in space! this would've been too corny for the Jetsons

there's a kind of cheap dusting of space theme over everything. the food isn't salmon but alien salmon. it's not seaweed but alien seaweed. cooking alien stir-fry. come on

cannot get over how clumsily the theming is handled. books, board games, weapon names revolve heavily around space. these people have been living on alien planets for hundreds of years yet have this unending sense of novelty about it. the game takes itself completely seriously but feels like it's attempting to parody itself

people's EYEBALLS are CLIPPING THROUGH THEIR EYELIDS

a woman is speaking to me in french. her accent is about as believable as her haircut

these are some of the worst reflection maps i've ever seen

next to nothing is interactive. you can sit in chairs and sleep in beds and that is about it. can't even drink from people's toilets. disgraceful

game helpfully crashes 5 seconds after i decide i should get some sleep. very handy!

my character has not said a single thing since i started playing. not one peep. this is an unmitigated improvement over Fallout 4 i'm so glad honestly

the more i poke around the big city the more the NPC quips feel like something out of gen-1 pokemon. can't get enough of this coffee :) this city is where it's at :) spacesuits are comfy and easy to wear

very strange sense of altered reality from the quest dialogue too. has anyone at bethesda met a person before? i move on to some mission that has me scanning wildlife on a faraway planet hoping this will, somehow, feel less alien than human conversation

just as with No Man's Sky, every planet is uniformly dotted with equidistantly-placed points of interest that you slowly make your way to (no vehicles besides your jetpack) which always turn out to be some cave or building identical to those you've cleared before

unlike with No Man's Sky, the seamless exploration is faked and the biodiversity is nil. you do get an impressive amount of raw loading screens however

the prefab bases and power stations found everywhere on planets seem to have very sparse, very specific slots for spawning consumables, which results in encountering some giant industrial installation in the middle of nowhere with, i don't know, a loaf of whole-grain sandwich bread just casually sitting next to it all proper. there is no breathable atmosphere here. who is eating this

planetary traversal is a CHORE. i am saying this as someone who loved Death Stranding

heinous "hold to confirm" buttons sprinkled in various flow-breaking places throughout the interface

enemy AI is abominable. nobody is pathing their way to get my ass. "must've been the wind" taken to the next level. an infant playing peekaboo has more object permanence

hoisting yourself up on ledges when jumping is…nice

companions randomly nowhere to be found. persists through multiple fast-travels and loading screens until, just as randomly, they pop back up

storage space is now limited! unlike in Fallout 4 and virtually every other bethesda game, your containers now hold a finite item capacity. god forbid we let the player have fun

baffling inventory UI. i imagine there's a mod out there that completely overhauls it the way SkyUI did for Skyrim. this should not be needed! how are your UIs getting worse a decade later!

scanning the precious few species inhabiting some dusty planet; one of them is this arching red root i've already seen several times before. my job done in this biome, i travel (read: teleport with a loading screen) to the polar region to find some other species. the first one i catalogue is the exact same red root again but this time it's named "boreas root" todd howard is a genius

some alien horror comes at me full fangs out. i hop on a pebble. obscenely, i am safe

procedural terrain generation beyond dull, impossibly unimaginative. these people have not had one critical thought on what makes a procedural world interesting. beginning to feel validated in my belief that only i should be trusted with proc gen. along with perhaps tarn adams

jokes aside this is making me feel genuinely insane. there have been excellent procedural generation techniques that produce compelling explorable maps for decades now. bethesda absolutely has the budget and know-how to do miles better than this yet somehow they just…do not? the same way Pokemon has decided to just no longer bother with their mainline games despite being the highest-grossing media franchise in history? hello? what is for real going on

some of the most cynical breadcrumbing i've seen in years. approaching some random cave and this person in space gear, who in the vast immensity of the infinite cosmos just happens to be snapping pictures right here, tells me more-or-less verbatim "if you like this place, you should see this other place" [other random cave has been added to your map.]

i do not like how good this makes No Man's Sky's gameplay look. it depresses me how much i have to hand it to No Man's Sky for at least not fucking up this bad. please stop making me wish i was playing No Man's Sky instead this is grotesque

i think i've exhausted my interest and patience for this game at the moment. i'll get back to the main story at some point and try some other systems ie. crafting and base-building to see if there's any engagement to be found but so far, my god. my god

[ew-selfish-art]

DPxDC AU: Ellie was going to beat the shit out of this space cop if he was lying…she might just do it anyway but, like, fr she’ll throw down on Danny’s behalf.

Enter scene following a bad tandem clone + identity reveal where in Danny is captured and wounded, Ellie escaping just narrowly. She manages to get Sam and Tucker on her side and together the three of them save Danny. (Where was Jazz? Why couldn’t she find Jazz?)

Ellie has traveled all over the world, has seen its hospitality just as much as its hostility- besides Danny liked space right? Mostly, Ellie is panicking and, being unable to think of a place to take Danny while he’s bleeding out on her, she just goes… up. Out of the atmosphere and just beyond the satellites. It finally feels far enough away, tho she didn’t take them beyond the moon, she has limits to her paranoia thank you.

Imagine to her annoyance that apparently someone actually watches for biological materials leaving and re-entering the earth! Total Bullshit! She’s needed to make a number of trips back and forth to get Danny food and water and medical supplies- and she’s doing a damn good job of getting him stable. Too bad she hadn’t realized the ring guy following her sooner.

Turns out he’s “made a report” and “will find them justice” and “wants to help”. Yeah right. She throws down with him as best she can, and he clearly doesn’t want to hurt her so he keeps letting her get away with Danny in tow. Danny is sleeping through most of this but a few times he lets out a woop or a go get ‘em.

Eventually Hal calls the only person on the team with a single paternal bone in his body (even if it was only a single one most days). Pulling Batman into a spacesuit, into a ship and across the atmosphere shouldn’t have been that easy- though it was obvious how his agreement came immediately after Hal mentioned the wounded and entirely isolated twins he’d found.

#dcxdp #dpxdc #dc x dp #dp x dc #danny phantom #dc crossover #dp crossover #danielle #plz continue #I beg #by the time danny is recovered/comes to Ellie has fought all of his alien hero idols and he dies a second time #Ellie: if the green guy didn’t want to get punched he should’ve stayed in his own mind #Danny: el. that’s Martian man Hunter. el please say you didn’t #ellie regrets nothing and now Danny’s new coworkers all know where they stand #mixed results for bat adoption lmao #gl might even adopt tbh just to keep a better eye on her the guy seems chill #oh wait the male twin is over powered and has zero chill wait fuck batman give that one back

[natalieironside]

Alright, I got one. It's called the "I ought to jack off" test.

So I got this one bit of good advice from Have Spacesuit, Will Travel, which is probably Robert Heinlein's best book; it's a fun read wherein service does not guarantee citizenship and nobody has to become their own mom. When you find yourself bellyaching about how you "ought to" go and do this and that, you're suffering from a crisis of motivation, and the best thing to do is take a moment to examine what you're doing and why you're doing it so you can make sure it's actually what you want to be doing and not what someone else thinks you're supposed to be doing. You'll either have a new perspective to come up with a better, more effective plan, or you'll realize it wasn't so important after all.

Good advice. Obviously not applicable to a lot of situations, one of which is the avolition and executive dysfunction you get from mental illness. So! When everything in the world just feels like awful bullshit more or less equally, how am I supposed to differentiate "I don't want to do Task because it is in fact stupid and unnecessary" from "I very much do want to do Task but I can't because my brain is fried."

I think the answer is to examine how you feel about the Tasks that require little investment of effort or time for pure reward; fun things you want to do just for fun. Like jacking off for instance, or going to the park, or playing video games, or whatever.

If you can't muster up the wherewithal to fill out that application or go to that meeting or do the job, it's worth a moment of your time to examine if you really ought to and why; it's sure to be an illuminating exercise. If you can't muster up the wherewithal to turn on the TV and watch cartoons, that one's definitely depression.

[your-local-grubdog]

Pikmin 4: Heritage Theory

Warning for MAJOR Pikmin 4 spoilers, including: various end of day conversations, post-credit events, late game piklopedia and treasure hoard entries, and also the final boss.

As a sort of re-boot of the franchise, Pikmin 4 introduces a lot of new ideas to the series. Among them is the idea that the various alien species in the game are much more closely related than we first realized - and perhaps more connected to PNF-404 than we would have ever thought in the other three games. I wanted to go over the various texts in the game that touch on this idea and talk about them a little because, hoo boy, the IMPLICATIONS. I call it a theory in the title for a lack of better wording but it honestly just feels like a canon fact that's never directly stated. There's just that much evidence, much of which all but outright says what happened.

Apologies if the images are a little low quality, Tumblr crunched them up badly. I provide image descriptions so hopefully that makes up for it.

As this has many end game spoilers (which, final warning for those), I'm going to assume that anyone reading beyond this point knows the basics of the game's story, world, and characters. Thus I won't be explaining every last little thing.

Somewhat early on, Olimar makes the following observation in his Voyage Log:

[ALT ID: Olimar's Voyage Log, entry 60, "Lost Civilization": Some of the objects I call treasure seem to be more complex than they initially appear. It makes me wonder... who made these? And where are they? I don't sense their presence here at all, but I suppose they could be hiding in the shadows, secretly watching me. END ID]

This vaguely threatening entry does confirm that the characters, or at least Olimar, are aware that there was indeed a civilization on PNF-404 at some point. It should also be noted that the Japanese website includes notes from another character who is also aware of the ancient civilization, though the canonicity of it is debatable. I'll get back to that "they're in the shadows, watching" line in another post, as it presents its own can of worms. For now, what matters is that the characters are aware that this planet was once inhabited and Nintendo is drawing attention towards that.

Where this starts to get weird and interesting is with Olimar's Treasure Hoard entries on the Heroic Shield, Memory Fragment (Center Right), and Buddy Display. I can't show all of their text in just one screenshot and the pikipedia hasn't added every treasure note to the Pikmin 4 treasures as of writing, so I'll only be including the segments most related to this conversation.

[ALT ID 1: Treasure Hoard, Olimar's Notes, Heroic Shield (segment): That would mean these living beings must have looked something like us... I wonder who they were and what their faces looked like. Could they have been our ancestors who migrated through space to our planet long ago? (the treasure is a pin showing the helmet of a human-style spacesuit) END ID 1]

[ALT ID 2: Treasure Hoard, Olimar's Notes, Memory Fragment (Center Right) (segment): I'm amazed that such a similar species could exist in the far reaches of outer space. I've heard that organic components can travel through space on meteorites and comets. Could there be a connection between my planet and this one? (treasure is of a puzzle piece with part of a dog's face on it) END ID 2]

[ALT ID 3: Treasure Hoard, Olimar's Notes, Buddy Display (segment): I can't find any evidence of them in any of the existing creature databases. But there's something familiar about them. It's almost as if I've met them before... I guess I'll chalk it up to an ancient memory that's been imprinted on my genome. (treasure is a photograph of two earth dogs) END ID 3]

There is so much to unpack here alone. Olimar straight up theorizes that there may be a connection between PNF-404 and Hocotate, even going to far as to propose if maybe the people of PNF-404 (or at least the people who made the Heroic Shield) may be his ancient ancestors. He does also theorize that a meteorite may have carried "organic components", which is technically possible, but I'm not sure how that would occur in a way that carries said components from one non-destroyed planet to another and leading to creatures evolving in eerily similar ways. Honestly, I'll chalk that one up to an early theory of his, a red herring on Nintendo's part, and thus not something to think about too much. Especially sense, in the Buddy Display, he considers his ability to somewhat recognize Earth dogs as an "ancient memory... imprinted on my genome". While I'm not sure of the science behind such a claim, we also have to take this from a story telling perspective - which is that Nintendo is all but screaming "there is a connection here". Not just in relation to the aliens and the planets, but also in relation to the dogs.

Speaking of the dogs, Olimar's notes on the final boss of the game presents yet more evidence to a connection - this time focusing more on the connection between Earth dogs and space dogs.

[ALT ID 1: Piklopedia, Olimar's notes, Ancient Sirehound (segment): These results would indicate that 99.9 percent of the canine creature's DNA matches Oatchi's, and that the only difference between Oatchi and Moss may be the natural presence or absence of a leaf tail. END ID 1]

[ALT IDs 2 and 3, as one naturally leads into the other: Piklopedia, Olimar's notes, Ancient Sirehound (segment): If these two theories prove to be true, it would suggest the possibility that this ancient creature is a common ancestor to two canine species from vastly remote star systems. And that, perhaps, there are even more hidden secrets out there that could hint at a fascinating yet inconceivable truth the universe has yet to reveal... END IDs 2 AND 3]

I'm not sure what else to say here; the evidence speaks for itself. The Ancient Sirehound and Moss - both from PNF-404 - closely match the genetics of Oatchi, who is from an entirely different part of the universe. For the Sirehound to be genetically related to Oatchi, then members of the Sirehound's species would have had to leave PNF-404 and migrate to other planets. Their care takers - humans - would have had to go with them.

I also find it worth pointing out that the Sirehound's arena is filled with various human items, such as shoes and toys. It's honestly a little haunting to find them so deep in a dark cave, unused by humans for who knows how long. The ruined toys in particular really get to me. We don't know how old the Ancient Sirehound in particular is, but the idea that humans once hid in this cave from something or that their dog brought the items here for comfort is really depressing.

[ALT IDs: various hard-to-see images of the human items in question, including: pillows, pipes. gardening tools, a fork, adult sized shoes, baby sized shoes, various children's toys, and other objects I couldn't quite make out. All of them are either partly submerged in water or at the very edge of water, leaving them covered in mud. END IDs]

I think by now it's safe to say that, yes, humans left Earth with their dogs at some point in time. Yet there are still MORE pieces of evidence to suggest this idea, this time coming from Shepherd's family history. Because we really needed to be beat over the head with evidence, I suppose. All are presented in numerical order as shown in-game.

[ALT ID 1: Rescue Journal, Shepherd Family History, entry 1: Thanks to the technology that has come from space exploration, our lives have grown much easier and far safer, and on-planet rescue requests have decreased dramatically. But as migration into space continues to grow, our services continue to be needed. So I'm happy to announce we are extending our rescue services to the frontiers of space! Signed, Paniya Shepherd, 82nd Captain. END ID 1]

[ALT ID 2: Rescue Journal, Shepherd Family History, entry 2: We've done it at last! We have flown to space! Out in this great, limitless expanse, not a sound can be heard. And yet, I can still clearly hear the pounding of my own heartbeat. Space--how it overflows with possibilities! There can be no doubt. This is one giant leap forward for our kind. Signed, Ed Shepherd, 65th Captain. END ID 2]

[ALT ID 3: Rescue Journal, Shepherd Family History, entry 6: The Shepherd family has lived with dogs from the very beginning. We understand that if we love and respect these creatures as we do our own--if we pay attention and observe their behavior closely--then we can break down the walls between our species and truly understand one another. Signed, Kain Shepherd, 16th Captain. END ID 3]

[ALT ID 4: Rescue Journal, Shepherd Family History, entry 7: "Beyond the sky itself there lies a beautiful blue planet." Those words have been passed down from captain to captain, calling to each of us. I can't imagine what sort of place this blue planet might be, but it's said to be home to even more dogs and folks that we have here. One day, I hope to fly beyond the sky...and into space. Signed, Maris Shepherd, 7th Captain. END ID 4]

[ALT ID 5: Rescue Journal, Shepherd Family History, entry 8: Many years have passed since we first began to make this land our new home. Still, we need more time to complete our environmental adaptations. In the meantime, we must survive so that, one day, we can pass down this new history to our children, and pass down the ways we've learned to rescue and protect everyone. One day we will live here in peace. Signed, Mark Shepherd, 2nd Captain. END ID 5]

[ALT ID 6: Rescue Journal, Shepherd Family History, entry 9: The surface! We made it at last! Finally, we can begin making a fresh start here on this planet. Of course, it will take many long months and years before what we've built here will be anything like what we once had. But we won't be alone. Our beloved dogs will be by our side as we walk this long, difficult road. Signed, Aral Shepherd, 1st Captain. END ID 6]

There is so much here, all confirming that ancient Giyans (and Captain Shephard's direct ancestors) 1) migrated to this new planet in search of a "fresh start" and 2) proceeded to migrate to other parts of space many generations latter. It also hints that they know of a "blue planet" - a common nickname for Earth - which is home to more people and dogs. Most certainly, it is the planet they came from - making Giyans human, or at least an evolution of humanity, and perhaps all other alien races in Pikmin 4 (from Hocotations to Koppaites to Ohrians to Conohanins to anyone else from the twenty one named planets (excluding PNF-404) in the series) are also descendent from Giyans. It would explain why they all look so similar in game - though we can safely assume that Hocotations are at least descendent from Giyans based on Olimar's notes. Further more, the leafling cure requires cells from a non-leafified individual who is genetically similar to the individual in question. We're never told how Yonny gets these cells (and, given we're talking about Yonny, I'm too afraid to even ask) but the fact that the medicine works for anyone regardless of what their home planet is suggests that they are, in fact, more or less the same species.

How different the various aliens look from Humans is easily chalked up to evolution. We know minor changes in height could, theoretically, happen within just one or two generations spent on a planet with different gravity than Earth's. It would make sense that this would be exacerbated over many many more generations, especially if the gravity is much stronger. Which, to quote the Pikipedia, "According to Brittany, the gravity on Koppai is roughly ten times stronger than on PNF-404." Given their matching heights, it's probably safe to assume similar applies to the other planets, and thus over the generations the people shrunk. Again, the exact scientific validity of this is questionable, but given the semi-fantastical nature of Pikmin I believe we can suspend our disbelief enough to let this story work. We already have to do that for how the Pikmin as a species function, after all. As for oxygen becoming toxic in the 8th history entry Mark Shephard does state that "we need more time to complete our environmental adaptations". Be these natural or artificially induced (as he is only of the second generation), it is again safe to suspend our disbelief to say that humans just adapted to these new worlds. Besides, Koppaites at the very least retained (or possibly gained back?) the ability to tolerate at least low amounts of oxygen.

The real problems come in the time frame and the loss of history. It's never stated one way or the other if people are aware of their ultimate connections back to Giya, so I won't discuss that, but it is very obvious they have forgotten their connection to Earth/PNF-404. Furthermore, it's made clear that the Giyans lost the ability to travel through space by the 7th generation and only regained it by the 65th. If they had access to space flight, they would certainly have archives of their heritage - and they do indeed seem to have some idea of what it is, given how Earth has become a legend. Yet, the Shephard family history as far back as the migration to Giya was preserved - why not anything else? The inconsistencies and questions make this part of the tale hard for me to ignore, yet we have no answers. This is pure speculation, but if I had to provide an answer I think a solar flare hit Giya and destroyed their technology, making them start over. Perhaps these early Giyain-Humans were so reliant on technology at this point that there were no books or oral traditions to preserve this heritage lost when the tech was destroyed? Though, somehow, the Shephard family would have to be one of if not the exception to this. Again, the previous is pure speculation, but it's the best we can do for the time being.

There's also the question of when and how Earth dogs changed to look like the Sirehound, which would of had to happen before the migration to space given that Oatchi has the same body plan. And then why did Moss's species become so much smaller?

Still, even with all these plot holes, I think it's pretty damn clear that Nintendo intended for our favorite little aliens to be the evolutionary decedents of humans. How and if they'll use this plot point remains to be seen, but it does open up a whole bag of opportunities for the universe of Pikmin. One that, frankly, deserves to be explored.

#pikmin #pikmin 4 #pikmin theory #borb screams #THIS TOOK SO LONG TO MAKE AAAA #I am open to discussions and questions btw

[imagine-knowing-a-name]

Jeff the Space Shark

Summary: Through a series of chaotic events, Jeff meets Cosmo the space dog; they proceed to cause more chaos together.

Word Count: 2446 Pairing: Natasha Romanoff x Reader Warnings: None A/N: happy birthday to @sunsetscarlett :)) here's the Jeff and Cosmo fic as promised and I hope you like it!! and to everyone else, hope you enjoy the fic and let me know what you think! :)

Part of The Jeff Fictional Universe (you don’t need to read the others to understand)

Incessant buzzing of your watch drew you from the depths of sleep, forcing you to open your eyes and adjust to the darkness. Natasha stirred beside you. 

Tapping the watch screen bathed the room in a pale light; you had to flinch away while your eyes adjusted, but you were finally able to read the message.

In the dark, your arm jumped around until it hit something solid; the groan that followed indicated it was Natasha. 

"We have to get up," you mumbled, sleep still laced in your voice. You felt her shift beneath your hand, then the room lit up again, under the flow of Natasha's watch this time.

"I want a day off," she sighed, but then flicked the bedside light on regardless. The two of you prepared for work, because despite what either of you wanted, the world didn't wait, so you couldn't either.

"Is Yelena coming?"

"Couldn't see her on the list"

Natasha nodded. She shuffled in the wardrobe for your mission bags, while you let yourself into the room next door to nudge the sleeping shark. He shifted atop the covers, but ultimately stayed asleep. You nudged him again.

"Mrrrr," Jeff said with a yawn. His arms sleepily reached out and grabbed onto your departing hand, pulling you near.

Relenting, and apologetic for disturbing his sleep, you scooped him up with your other hand, grabbed his stuffed toy, and carried him to the car while he dozed on your shoulder.

Natasha was already waiting; your bag and hers were thrown into the boot, while Jeff's pre-packed travel kit lay on the back seats, beside his car seat. You set him down gently, using his plush shark to replace the comfort of your arm, then strapped him in safely. The car was set after that, and you began the quick journey to Yelena's house, dropping Jeff and his belongings off with many thanks and apologies to the blonde, before continuing on to the Compound.

Avengers in various states of wakefulness gathered around Fury in the conference room as the mission briefing was delivered. It would be a fight right from the offset, no retrieval or espionage, just a simple fight…in space.

"Do we need to bring lightsabers?" Tony scoffed, though you imagined he already has a stash ready for the occasion.

"Bring whatever you've got," Fury warned, "Carol's requested help for this one. Carol. I mean no offence but she could take any of you,"

"I'm a little offended by that,"

"Deal with it, Stark. If she needs help, you better bring all the fight you can. Understood?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good. The quinjet is already programmed; Hill will give you more information when you're up there. So get to it!"

At the man's orders, your team filtered out, spacesuits were handed out to those who needed them, then you strapped yourselves in. Natasha took the seat next to yours, the ones which had practically become your designated seats on this modified jet. She squeezed your hand with hers as the space launch began. You hoped Jeff would be okay.

Maria had given you more information while on the journey to space, yet Carol insisted on another mission briefing after you’d arrived on the spaceship. No matter how interesting her speech was, the whole team had still been roused from sleep and subjected to three briefs on the same topic; all she got in response were vacant eyes and scattered yawns.

That changed when the doors slammed open, everyone lost interest in Carol, in favour of turning to watch the newcomers waltz in. You recognised all the heroes, the ones who had chosen not to become Avengers, despite their capability for it, but most importantly, your eyes were drawn to the blonde leading the group.

"Yelena?!" Natasha exclaimed first.

The younger Widow turned her head toward Natasha and broke into a toothy smile, "сестра! I was invited too!"

"What did you do with Jeff?!"

Yelena jolted at her sister's unwelcome greeting, frowning slightly before she held her hands up with the goal of calming Natasha down.

Still without a word spoken, Yelena shrugged her backpack off her shoulder, unzipped it, then tipped it upside down, causing your favourite land shark to tumble out.

It was your turn to clamour now, while Natasha surged forward to check Jeff was okay. "You brought Jeff to SPACE??"

"Well what was I supposed to do with him?"

You looked beyond the shrugging assassin to see your own Black Widow on the floor smiling as Jeff cooed and ran circles around her, his tail wagging so hard it moved his back end with it. He was unaffected by the whole situation, something Yelena should be very grateful for.

"Not bring him to space?" You sighed. "What did you do with Fanny?"

"Oh, she is with my neighbour!"

"And you couldn't have done the same with Jeff?" The land shark scrambled over to you now, and your intimidating stance on Yelena was ruined by your need to crouch down and give Jeff the head scratches he was after. It was worth it; you knew Yelena wouldn't be the slightest bit scared of you no matter how you stood.

“Oh yes, let me think,” Yelena mused, “hello neighbour who does not know I am Avenger. As well as my dog, can you also watch this special, one-of-a-kind land shark?” She rolled her eyes. “You think that would be a good idea?”

Natasha got to her feet, ready to chastise her sister for her tone, when the doors burst open again, a new group of heroes entering the room.

"How many ships have they sent up here?" you muttered.

"And are we gonna have to sit through another briefing?" Tony asked.

"Who even are they?"

"The Guardians of the Galaxy have arrived!" came the announcement of the one who seemed to be the leader. 

"Ha! they brought a dog! see? I was not so silly bringing Jeff up here!"

"Cosmo is powerful member of team." The dog growled, for some reason in a strong Russian accent.

"Is that dog Russian?"

"Cosmo is from Soviet Union!" 

"Oh wow, it's like Yelena in dog form." Natasha laughed, but her comment went unheard by her sister, because she was already crouching in front of the Russian dog, littering her with questions including, but not limited to "how did you get here?" and "can I give you head scratches?"

Before you knew it, Jeff had approached the dog too and the rest of the Guardians were groaning at the lack of appreciation for the rest of the team.

Cosmo swung around to face Jeff, her stance changing to crouched legs, raised hackles, and a motionless tail. "Identify yourself, shark," she growled.

Jeff, meanwhile, dropped his back legs to sit on the floor, his tail sweeping the area around him while his tongue lolled out his mouth. "Mrrrr."

Cosmo paused. Her tail raised ever so slightly as she cocked her head to the side. "говорить по-русски?" (speak Russian?)

"Mrrrr."

You started blankly at the two. Jeff was speaking Russian; you know because you could translate it from land shark…but not from Russian back to English. Natasha and Yelena, however, expressed a different sentiment. They both looked in shock at your land shark, before turning to each other, then finally settling on you.

"You never said he spoke Russian?" Natasha questioned.

Your cheeks flushed at the thought of the confession you would now have to make. "He doesn't usually speak it," you said, your voice trailing into a murmur by the end, "he just…translates it."

"Jeff, Вы понимаете меня?" (do you understand me?)

"mrr"

"He says yes," you and Cosmo translated at the same time. He'd said it in Russian again, but you could translate that much at least.

"He's been helping me learn," you told Nat sheepishly, "you're more romantic in your native language, when you think I don't understand, and I'm about to marry into a Russian family so I didn't want to rely solely on Jeff to translate."

Natasha froze, her mind returning to the nights she'd spent in bed with you, while Jeff was curled asleep in the corner. She thought of all her sleepy ramblings to you in Russian and how Jeff would purr and you'd cuddle closer. She'd assumed it was a coincidence, and that Jeff was just sighing in his sleep. But now she knew, it was her turn to blush.

"Ah Natasha, Natasha, what have you been saying?" Yelena laughed in a fake scolding. Then the blonde left you to it, much preferring to talk with Jeff and Cosmo as they played.

"You could have asked me," your fiancée said softly, "I'd help you learn."

"I know you would, my love, but that's not the point of a secret, is it? Besides, your mother has been helping when I call her. And Yelena-"

"Yelena?!"

The younger Widow looked over again and shrugged at Natasha's open mouthed stare, accompanying it with a 'what can I say?' kind of smirk.

"It was supposed to be a surprise," you reasoned and she smiled at you, taking your hand in hers before the team were called to focus and actually do the mission you were there for.

"We still don't know what we're doing about Jeff," Natasha called out, "is the ship safe to leave him here on his own?"

Carol grimaced. Jeff would be safe on the ship, yes, but was the ship safe from Jeff? She knew what the land shark could do when left unattended, and she also knew what Goose tends to do when she's on missions.

Before she could express those concerns though, she was saved by Cosmo speaking up. "I will take care of shark. We have lots of people. Not all necessary."

Jeff purred lowly, completely unaware of the relieved sighs released by everyone in the room. 

"Good dog, Cosmo," the raccoon praised.

You paused, wondering how all the animals on their team spoke English, and whether they could teach Jeff, before you added your own advice, "give him plenty of food; he gets hungry quickly."

As if on cue, Jeff's stomach grumbled as you ran to join the others. "Be good, Jeff!"

The shuttles launched from the base and carried the heroes onto their battlefield, leaving Cosmo and Jeff in the great hall on their own.

"Mrrrr," Jeff whined

"да (yes), they will be back." 

"Mrrrr."

Cosmo watched on as the land shark drooped. His head bowed first, then his whole body slumped until his face rested on the floor, buried mournfully between his hands.

The space dog reached out and hovered a paw over Jeff, unsure how to comfort him through this sudden onset of sadness. But then she remembered your advice.

"We can go to kitchen?" Cosmo offered.

Jeff perked up instantly. Before the word 'kitchen' was even finished, the land shark was back on his feet, hopping around for Cosmo to lead the way.

Cosmo wagged her tail with the success, then tilted her nose in a 'follow me' motion. Dog and land shark snuck through the ship, until they burst a door open to find the treasure they both sought. The delicious aroma of various foods – along with hints of the previous cooked meal – hit both of them with force, thanks to their heightened senses of smell. 

Though they had met just moments before, the two animals knew instantly what they had to do. Working together was not a problem when food was on the line.

Jeff balanced on Cosmo's head for extra height, and used his flexible digits to pull the cupboards open.

"I take over now."

Jeff hopped off and watched with a salivating mouth as Cosmo used telekinesis to float snacks and meats from the high shelves down to the ground. Once the feast was laid, both animals nodded, showing appreciation to the other for successful teamwork, before diving straight into the food.

You returned from the mission exhausted; it had been a long fight, but a successful one in the end, with nobody coming back with anything worse than a few scrapes and bruises.

As the group emerged from the shuttle, chatter soon began to fill the previously silent hall and echoed around the station.

Natasha noticed it before you did.

"Why was it so silent?" The conversations stopped; the group kept their eyes on Natasha's outstretched arms, and listened for the scuffles and purrs that one might expect when a land shark and dog are left alone. They heard nothing.

"Jeff?" the Avengers called.

"Cosmo?" the Guardians followed.

There was no reply, so you soon went searching. The group raided and checked every room and corner of the ship until- 

"Found them!"

Steve's voice led you all towards him, beside the kitchen door. You should have guessed.

You weren't sure what to say when you saw inside. Jeff was curled up happily on the floor, a look of contentment on his sleeping face, while Cosmo slept beside him, using his body as a pillow to rest her head.

Your immediate reaction was to coo at the scene (and some of the others did) but your eyes were next drawn to the litter of wrappers and packets and gnawed bones that scattered the area around them.

"I don't think they left us a single post-mission snack."

"Your shark is a bad influence on our dog!"

"How do we know your dog isn't the bad influence?"

"Well, let's not kid ourselves here-"

A low growl interrupted the argument as Cosmo sprang to her feet, instantly ready to defend the ship, until she noticed who the 'intruders' were.

"Did you both eat all the food?"

Cosmo's mood sank the moment those words were spoken. Though she had been excited to see the group return, her ears soon folded back, and her head bowed to look at the ground, only occasionally flicking her eyes up to see you all.

"Is Cosmo bad dog?" she asked, her voice so full of sadness that nobody could find it in themselves to agree.

"No, you are хорошая собака (good dog), Cosmo." Yelena stepped in. "You took care of Jeff and kept him happy! That is what we asked."

Cosmo preened, her mood changed immediately by the praise. Since the others had yet to agree, the space dog designated Yelena as her safe spot, moving to sit between the Widow's legs and resting her head against Yelena's knee. She hummed again when Yelena started to scratch around her ears.

"You come visit me if you come to Earth, okay? You have home at my place any time."

"The whole team, or-?"

"Just the dog."

Jeff taglist: @unexpected-character​ @wolferine (if anyone else wants to be added to this list, just give me a message)

#natasha romanoff #natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanoff x y/n #natasha romanoff x you #natasha romanoff imagine #natasha romanoff fluff #black widow x reader #black widow #marvel #mcu #jeff the land shark #jeff the landshark #ikan writes #the JFU

[senkusphone]

Dr. Stone chapter 2D trivia post

Spoilers ahead !

Check out too, my trivia post for the previous chapter.

This changes everything, folks! however, we gotta start from the start.

Chrome's drawn this roadmap, and he seems to pretend to build yet another of his silly storehouse towers like he's done around the globe. Next stop, the moon.

This confused me for a while until it was pointed out to me that "EMU" stands for Extravehicular Mobility unit; which is what we normally call a spacesuit (and I call and EVA suit), and notably it doesn't look muck like these simple, yet decidedly comfy and cute looking jumpsuits.

The graphic depicted below actually shows two trips, if you follow the arrows along the lines, you can see the black ones show a trip from earth orbit to the moon, and the white ones show the return trip, landing in the middle of what loosely resembles the pacific ocean, east of Japan.

In other news, Suika joins the tradition of the space elevator, an idea that has been itching in the back of people's minds since the 1890's

The more detailed explanation of this is a bit more lenghty but I'll keep it simple, so buckle up.

The idea of a space elevator is that a weight with a cable tethering to earth, could keep it tense if the weight is moving too fast (so much so that if let loose it would escape into space, or at least a higher orbit).

This cable can support a vehicle going up along it, bringing any cargo within it to space, using much less energy and resources than a rocket.

How to make a cable that can support its own weight over such a huge distance is the main reason we haven't built one.

A problem that arises from this, is that if the weight doesn't match the rotation of the earth, the cable would get pulled around (eventually breaking or winding around the earth, pulling the weight down, as cartoony as that is), so we need it to hover over one spot.

Now we gotta talk about geostationary orbit, to make this easier.

So, when something is orbiting the earth, it needs to move really fast to combat gravity in such a way that the earth curves away from the object at the same rate it's falling towards it (spaceflight really is the art of falling to the ground and missing it, as the saying goes.)

The farther out you go, the weaker gravity's pull gets, and the slower the satellite needs to be in order to find this balance. Eventually it reaches the point where, if its flying around the equator, it will, at one point, match the speed of the ground spinning beneath, this is at 35786 km above.

Such a satellite appears still in the sky, which is very handy to, as a sidenote, aim a small TV dish at it, and just leave it in place, as you may have at home.

However one must notice that in a space elevator, the satellite (our weight) is not only pulled by gravity but also by the tension in the cable.

Since it's pulled in with a greater force, it falls faster than a normal satellite, and so it needs to also travel faster to avoid falling back to earth.

As a result, it also needs to be further away than a geostat satellite, so it needs to travel a longer way around the earth, and again find the balance of speed with rotation, staying still in one spot while keeping the cable taut.

This is why the weight is shown beyond geostationary orbit here. Yes, this was a long winded explanation for just that.

And after all that, here we all are, ignoring the fact that suddenly petrified hair is flexible.

Perhaps it's like glass fiber / glass wool, and it can be flexible when it's thin enough (yes, glass fiber is just glass but thin, if you weren't aware. Incidentally, most glass fiber is made by a process that works the same as a cotton candy machine... wait this was already shown in Dr. Stone, fu-).

This however doesn't explain how this flexibility hasn't been observed in statues before. Maybe her hair is special after all.

Also special is spider silk, although sometimes overhyped by the media. Spider silk has some outstanding mechanical properties, it's very durable, and it can take a lot of tension and deformation before breaking.

Ruri here makes a reference to her previously stated occupation after the main series. A lot of people took issue with the aftermath of the characters in general, myself included. Still mad at Kohaku joining the police, I'm pretending that didn't happen.

This might be an autism 100 take, but the wheels in this cart are backwards. The flanges should be on the inside, and the taper should be towards the outside.

This geometry helps railway wheels stay on the track, go around bends, and not have to constantly abuse the flanges to not fall off the rails.

The silk road... I really am just googling basic things for you, am I? It was an ancient trade route network joining asia with the middle east and europe. Silk was one of the most famous products traded through the network.

yeesh, I've been typing this for ages (tumblr logged me out while I was writing this post and lost like half of it), and I haven't even gotten to talk about induction motors yet.

A linear motor is just an electric motor that rather than making something spin, it pulls itself along some sort of guide rail. These are in use in some trains but they are not common, the infrastructure cost is much higher than a normal railway.

Why am I talking about trains again...

One way to make it work is by induction.

The tl:dr is that when a magnetic field is moving through a conductive object, it can effectively drag it with it to an extent.

The reason this happens is called Lenz's law; the variation of the magnetic field through the metal causes an electric current to flow through it.

This current, just like an electromagnet you may have put together in science class, produces it's own magnetic field that interacts with the one coming from outside, hence making the metal react, but only when the field is moving or otherwise changing.

A big advantage is that there needs to be no contact between the source of the field and the moving metal; this is used in all sorts of electric motors even in homes, you'll find them in fans, refrigerators and washing machines, etc.

The train/motor would have a magnetic field underneath with a north-south-north-south-... pattern, which flows towards the back like a river (made by a lot of electromagnets switching in coordination).

As the magnetic river flows backwards, the induced currents in the rail produce their own magnetic field in opposition, pushing the train forward.

How viable is it to use this on a thin cable that needs to pull itself up is another story, and I have my doubts. The electronics involved would be really complex, costly and perhaps even unwieldy, but at least the conductive cable can also be used to deliver power to the elevator with some tweaks.

The structure they begin constructing for the full size elevator is named after the 1979 novel "The fountains of Paradise" by Arthur C. Clarke, in which a space elevator is also constructed.

So, we've made it to this part. As far as I've seen this one panel has been the focus of like 50% of the discussion regarding this chapter.

We all see what he's doing whether we acknowledge it or not; Inagaki should know that you cannot build a relationship on just standing close and gazing with passion; believe me I checked, multiple times.

Wouldn't mind if he hadn't procrastinated on developing Senku's side, the girl has wanted her vegetables since day two (but not day one)

And now, things get really messy, as some mind boggling events lead Ryusui to ask "why, man?"

Look, I've already added 30 images to this post, and I imagine you have seen how this chapter ends, if you haven't, buddy what the heck are you doing here. Have some emoji, I'm not gonna make a second post about this.

🥨✨🦟 ⁉️👱🏼‍♂️🏴‍☠️ 👨‍🚀☠️??

You may be confused, you should.

But after a while I came to a conclusion that I feel is pretty solid, and you may have seen it in the post from earlier.

To summarize:

Ryusui noted that things were going suspiciously well for them, and the sudden disappearance of mosquitoes in the Kanto region ticked him off to something. He sent people to search and indeed found that mosquitos have been petrified within the region, and questions whyman about it, going as far as accusing them of pretending to be Byakuya from the future.

That's where we are left.

The medusa is fully capable of faking the signal they received from "Byakuya". The receiver only detected bursts of petrification beam presumed to be from the future and decoded them as morse code, and it was noted by Balb on discord that if you trace a circle with the center near Tokyo (where the lab keeping whyman is) and a radius reaching as far as Fuji, where they received the message, the circle covers the majority of the Kanto region as stated.

The bursts of petrification would have been invisible to humans, as only the affected species can see them.

So it is assumed that the mosquitos were petrified as a means for whyman to send the fake signal all the way to Fuji, depleting its diamond battery in the process.

However I believe it's also possible the mosquitos were zapped later to make work easier for the people building the space elevator as noted by Kaseki.

Several months if not more must have passed since the Byakuya message and whyman being caught (enough for Kohaku's hair to regrow), and it would be odd that no one would have noticed the lack of mosquitos, their petrified bodies, or the effect their absense would have in the ecosystem.

So why do any or all of this?

Well we know what whyman is largely motivated by, its survival and the spread of its kind across the universe.

So I think it's trying to accelerate human progress for that purpose, so we eventually get to the point where more medusas can be made, or who knows, maybe even succeed in warning the past ones with the time machine.

I also think it's likely this misunderstanding is gonna fizzle out once some dialog is made and Senku basically says yes to that goal too.

Will we get a triple twist and find that the Byakuya message was real after all, and the mosquitos were a separate event?

Will the sengen and kohasen crowds envelop the world in thermonuclear hellfire?

And will this be the true final end of Dr. Stone? hard to tell, but the answers may come next week.

Goodnight.

#dr. stone trivia #4D Science #dcst #Dr. Stone 2D #dr stone #dr. stone #drstone #dcst senku #byakuya ishigami #dr stone senku #senku dr stone #senku ishigami #dcst kohaku #dr stone kohaku #kohaku dr stone #dcst suika #dr stone suika #suika dr stone #dcst gen #dr stone gen #gen dr stone #dcst chrome #dr stone chrome #chrome dr stone #dcst kaseki #dr stone kaseki #kaseki dr stone #dcst ryusui #dr stone ryusui #ryusui dr stone

[vonryaned]

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐂𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐈𝐒𝐓

Pairing: 2012!Donatello x reader

Summary: Takes place during season four of TMNT 2012. Inspired by “The Scientist” by Coldplay. Gender neutral reader.

Warnings: mentions of death

Word count: 3.4K

A/N: writing this was very self-indulgent and also free inner child healing i hope u enjoy

You hadn’t made it to Fugitoid’s ship in time.

You were claimed by the black hole created at the hands of the Triceratons, swallowed with the rest of the planet. The turtles, April, and Casey were lucky enough to have been saved, but it had been devastating to lose you, to leave you. No one would be able to forget the look on your face as you stared up at the closing hatch with scared, helpless eyes. With the gravity askew and the force of the black hole growing stronger, you lost your footing and couldn’t reach the ship. But there was nothing that could be done.

They decided to fix everything in the name of all that had been lost. For your home, for Splinter, for you. They time traveled six months into the past in order to do so, to prevent the black hole generator from ever activating.

Space brought its fair share of lifestyle adjustments to make. The hardest one to get used to was your absence, and not everyone became accustomed to it. Some only became more and more aware of it.

Donnie hadn’t realized how much he missed you.

The loss hit him the hardest. You were one of his best friends, his lab partner, a comforting presence when he would work late into the night. A provider of coffee and energy drinks and sugary snacks. A keen observer of his technology, always eager to listen to his tangents, to appreciate his knowledge rather than dismiss it like the others did. He had gotten too comfortable with having you around to possibly part with you.

As the saying goes, you never know how much you appreciate something until it’s gone. He eyed the spare spacesuit in the armory that undoubtedly would have been for you. He thought of you on every space mission, taking mental notes of whenever you would have thrown in a witty remark if you were there. He often piped up to ask you a question while he was manning his station on the ship, only to remember and stop himself. He even found himself fretting less and less about his giddy crush on April.

He spent a notable amount of time immersed in the ship’s holographic simulations, sitting next to your silhouette on a New York City rooftop and retelling tales from the cosmos. He gave you mission updates. Sometimes he sat in silence, trying to convince himself that the projection had the same comforting presence you had.

And, of course, he pondered the logistics of the time travel that occurred. Because he went back in time, there is another past version of himself back on Earth with you. Overlooking your friendship, your presence. Probably still fussing about April.

The more he thought about it, the more he believed that perhaps there was a good reason for your warnings about his old crush. You told him it seemed like she wasn’t interested but didn’t want to reject him, and that he should invest his energy in someone that appreciates his efforts. And as the months passed, he put together the pieces. Unfortunately for both of you, though, it was not at the best time to do so.

He spent too much time worrying about what he lacked with April that he didn’t cherish what he had with you. He wouldn’t make the same mistake upon returning to Earth after saving it.

What he didn’t expect was to end up on Earth before the six months had completely passed.

It was an interdimensional dilemma that the turtles’ counterparts dragged them into. The other dimension’s Donnie had a portal ray that he used to transport them to the other dimension’s New York. From there, they fought the Krang and returned to your dimension’s New York. They obtained the weapon that Krang was planting in each reality, deciding it needed urgent analysis at the lab. They would finally return home to the lair after months of space travel.

And even though the situation was dire, the nostalgia that swept over the turtles nulled that fact for a minute or two. They stared with bittersweet eyes at their old television, the arcade machines, the box of a half-eaten pizza splayed out by the lounge area. They reunited with Splinter.

And it occurred to Donnie that he could finally see you again— you were probably in the lab that very moment. He desperately wanted to forget about the antimatter weapon in his clutches, to drop everything and just be with you. But the interdimensional turtles had sauntered into the lair, interrupting the reunion with Splinter, and he recognized that he couldn’t simply do that.

Donnie grabbed his counterpart and dragged him to the lab, handing off the weapon for him to begin the analysis. His counterpart had no issue making himself familiar with the lab equipment and got to work right away.

It didn’t take long for Donnie to spot you curled up on the beanbag chair with your T-Phone and earbuds in. He stopped in his tracks when he saw you. For the first time in months you were there, in the flesh before him, not merely a hologram, a mental projection. You soon noticed him staring and took out an earbud, offering a smile to greet him.

“Hey, Dee,” you said as you stood up to stretch. He hadn’t heard your voice in so long. “Thought you just went out for patrol?”

What surprised you was that he immediately enveloped you in a hug as you were still stretching. Caught off guard for sure, you slowly brought your arms down from above your head and returned the embrace. “Hey,” you said again, softly, patting his shell with a light chuckle. You pulled back to look at him, still remaining in his arms. “What’s up?”

You couldn’t exactly read his face. A myriad of emotions fought to prevail on his features. Among them, you could see relief, longing, fondness. Regret.

He seemed startled when he tried to explain himself, fumbling over his words. “Hey, yeah, uh… we found that weapon out on patrol and gotta diffuse it,” he explained, gesturing over his shoulder with his thumb. “I just— I missed you a lot.” More than you know.

You laughed a little. “It hasn’t been long, stupid. I remember saying bye to you, like, ten minutes ago.” But it had been months to him, and you had no way of knowing.

Out of curiosity, you glanced back at his desk where he motioned to earlier. Your eyes lit up with confusion upon seeing his counterpart. “That’s, uh… that’s new, isn’t it?” you assumed.

He shook his head. “Yeah. A lot’s been happening. Interdimensional trouble. Here, let’s go help him out.” He led you over to the desk where his counterpart was examining the device. Donnie grabbed some equipment and got to work alongside him.

“Hey, your dimension has a (Y/N), too?” his counterpart said, briefly looking up. He smiled to himself. “I was gonna take mine out for pizza later today. Better take care of this first, though.”

You couldn’t help but grin. Donnie couldn’t help but mentally beat himself up for being unable to do the same. There had been so many opportunities that he took for granted in his past. He promised himself that when the Earth was saved, it would be the first thing he’d do.

The analysis of the weapon —or rather, the bomb, as it turned out to be— brought distressing news. There were two identical bombs scattered somewhere across the dimensions, both rigged to go off in about fifteen minutes. Donnie quickly told his counterpart to inform the others while he made some adjustments to the portal ray, enabling them to track the bombs. It was admittedly a bit selfish on his part given the circumstances, as he was scouring for opportunities to seize a moment alone with you.

And this was it. He still worked swiftly on the task at hand, but his mind was swimming with everything he wanted to say. How could he possibly go about explaining the situation to you? Should he even try to explain it?

“Listen (Y/N), there’s… something I need to tell you,” he began. His nerves were starting to best him, so he kept his eyes trained on the various wires of the portal ray.

You nodded. “Shoot.”

“This is— I… This is gonna sound crazy, but would you believe me if I said I was from the future?”

“Well, I mean, you did just arrive here with some other Donatello from an alternate dimension, so… Anything’s possible, I guess?”

“Alright. Alright, that’s good to hear,” he said, relieved and encouraged by your open-mindedness. “Just… hear me out on this one, okay?” He paused for a moment, finally glancing up at you. “Almost six months ago, in an alternate timeline, the Earth was destroyed. My brothers, April, Casey and I were saved, but… you didn’t make it.”

Your eyes widened, but you remained silent.

“And, well, being in space for that long —without you— made me realize a few things, to say the least. As the saying goes, you never know how much you appreciate someone until they’re gone.” Despite him being so flustered, all his words were deliberate.

“I missed you. So much— that’s what I meant when I told you that earlier. Until now, I hadn’t seen you for months, or, as they say in space, for nextons. But I thought about you every day. I looked at the stars and saw you with them.”

Warmth crept up onto your face. “But— I thought that…” Your gaze wandered over to the picture of Donnie pushing April on a swingset, framed with hearts at the edges. Donnie cringed, deciding to swap out the picture as soon as he returned.

“It was never about April, (Y/N). It was always you. You’re my lab partner, after all.” He sent you a smile, still radiating so many emotions. Finished with his upgrades on the portal ray, he fastened the cover back on and powered it up. “I’m sorry for not acknowledging it earlier.”

“Only took Earth’s destruction for you to figure me out,” you grumbled, nudging his side before leaning into him. He hummed, pulling you closer, briefly resting his cheek on the top of your head. But the moment was short lived, as the remaining turtles returned to the lab to set forth with their mission.

“Alright Donnie, what do we do?” Leo asked, the rest of the group right behind him.

“I attuned the portal ray to locate the other Dimensionizers, and the next one…” Donnie booted up the device, firing it towards the empty space in the lab. A portal materialized to the alternate dimension’s New York, honing in on the Channel Six building there. “...is here.”

The team set off, but Donnie lingered. He stood before the portal with sad eyes, turning back for one last moment with you.

You smiled weakly and took a few steps toward him. “Such a shame for us to part.”

“I’ll be back, I promise,” he assured, resting his hands on your shoulders. “And the Earth will stay intact, and I’m not gonna lose you again.”

“Yeah, I’m counting on you for that one,” you said with a forced chuckle. Then your face fell. “You… should probably get going now. Don’t leave your brothers waiting. Me? I can wait a few more nextons for you.”

“I appreciate that. In my opinion, you’ve been waiting long enough already.” He approached you, his outstretched hand settling on your cheek. His eyes softened. “May I?”

A sheepish smile bloomed on your face. You leaned in to plant a kiss on his cheek, giving him an answer in its own right. “Yeah, of course.”

And it felt so right. Nothing more than a peck on the lips, but it was solicited, sweet, genuine. Not like a consolation prize, out of pity, like the handful he had received from April. This really meant something. The perfect parting gesture. A way of conveying his promises, of signifying a new beginning.

You let out a breathy sigh and a laugh when you pulled away. “Just a few more nextons, right?”

“Yeah. Trust me, it’ll be over quicker than you can say ‘time travel.’” He started off towards the portal. “Love you, (Y/N).” And then he was gone. The portal closed behind him.

And until his return, you would be left to ponder the short interaction from that night. It was strange to see him, a figment of the future, and then his past self, the one from your timeline. Still hopelessly fixated on the girl that eludes him. Funny how space travel will do that, you thought to yourself.

When Bishop brought news of the Kraang and the Triceratons, you could only assume the destruction would be coming. You did everything you could to help in the moment (with some strange, looming feeling of unknown déjà vu), but you were on constant lookout for the future turtles to drop in and help.

The weapon was on the verge of being detonated. You used what ninjutsu skills you could against the Triceraton soldiers, but they were much too strong for you to do any real damage.

But then, amongst the madness of the fight, you saw them.

The turtles from the future, clad in high tech space gear, rushed in to aid their past selves. You immediately locked eyes with Donnie, sharing a knowing grin from a distance. With a renewed fighting spirit, you leapt back into battle alongside him.

The past turtles seemed confused, but nonetheless helped them with the battle. And, luckily, the outcome this time around was different. Splinter caught sight of Shredder’s true intentions before they could come to fruition. Leo destroyed the timer on the black hole generator. Forced into a corner, the Triceratons beamed back to their ship to retreat, and Fugitoid reclaimed the black hole generator, sacrificing himself to destroy it and the Triceraton fleet.

The adrenaline was wearing off, and the turtles mourned the loss of their friend, Fugitoid. You looked around a final time, ensuring that everything was still intact. And then you approached Donnie again. “What a relief to still be on Earth right now,” you sighed.

Donnie wrapped an arm around you. “I’ll say. I wouldn’t want to see the past without you.”

“So, uh, what’s gonna happen with… them?” You motioned to the time clones: the past turtles, April, and Casey. The Aprils were having a friendly conversation on a park bench, and the Caseys were arguing about the Earth not being big enough for the both of them. You laughed at that.

A whirring in the sky caught your attention, and you looked up to see a duplicate of Fugitoid’s ship flying in to make a landing.

Donnie made a quick deduction. “Wait. If there are two sets of us in this universe, then there would be two Fugitoids, as well!”

The ship landed and the hatch opened, revealing the past Fugitoid. “Hello, my dear friends,” he greeted kindly. “My name is Professor Zayton Honeycutt. How would you like to go on a wondrous adventure?”

The past turtles all murmured in excitement, eager to partake.

“Space is awesome, guys, and if there's one guy in the universe you can trust, it's the Professor,” Leo assured.

“Thank you, Leonardo. Perhaps we'll all meet again in the future,” Fugitoid said, a smile in his robotic voice.

The past turtles bid a swift hug and farewell to Master Splinter before running aboard the ship, past April and Casey trailing close behind. Everyone else waved as the ship soon flew off.

“Don't eat the Vanarian muffins!” Mikey yelled after them.

“Well, I guess that solves that,” you chuckled, glancing up at Donnie.

“What, you’re telling me you don’t wanna go on a wondrous space adventure?” he teased in reply.

“Nah, I think I’ll pass. I’m content right here on Earth.” You leaned into his side, arm still securely around your shoulders. “With you.”

“Y’know, I’m willing to bet that, eventually, past me will be having the same regrets I had up there.”

You shrugged with a grin. “His loss.”

“There just isn’t enough (Y/N) to go around in the universe,” he joked. “Say, d’you wanna go get pizza? I’ve been waiting to ask ever since I last saw you.”

You glanced over at his tired family members, all planning on retreating to the lair and calling it a night. “Aren’t you exhausted? I mean, you did just save the world. After six months of space travel.”

“All things considered, not really. I’ve been looking forward to telling you all about the trip.”

As his family retired to the sewers after an exhausting battle, you and Donnie ventured out into the city in a fun little chase. It was playful but stealthy, slipping past one another with little shoves to the shoulder and quiet laughs. You picked up a pizza from Antonio’s with your favorite toppings before meeting Donnie at your spot on the rooftop. Between slices, he would retell his tales from the cosmos.

“Leo was totally geeking out at first. I mean, after watching Space Heroes for so long, it was practically his dream come true.”

You laughed a little, already imagining how thrilled he must have been. “Yeah, I bet he had lots of fun playing Captain Ryan out there.”

“And Raph has a pet alien turtle now. He’s a really fascinating creature, a Vorkathian Fire Turtle from a planet called Magdomar. And, don’t tell Raph I said this, but his soft spot for little Chompy is pretty obvious.”

“I’ll have to meet him next time I come visit.”

“And Mikey had a blast sampling all the space cuisine. At least when it wasn’t trying to eat him back. Oh—! And there was this one time we were dealing with a mischievous wish-granting creature and I accidentally made Casey smarter than me.”

“Casey? Smart? No way.” You couldn’t wipe your smile off your face no matter how hard you tried. He was a great storyteller, after all. “And what about you?”

“Well, other than missing you, it was a great learning experience. Fugitoid taught me a lot. Out in space, scientific knowledge is ages ahead of anything on Earth, so I had a lot to catch up on. And it definitely heightened my understanding of technology and astronomy in general, so I can take that back to the lab with me. Along with our new gear, which is pretty sweet.”

“Yeah, that’s great,” you said with a genuine sparkle in your eyes as you looked at him. Shortly after you took a bite of your pizza slice. “I’m just glad you’re back. Well— this version of you.”

“I’m sure it was weird for you to have to hang around my time duplicate. Especially knowing what the future brought. Kinda makes me cringe thinking about it, if I’m honest.”

“Nothing you haven’t already lived through. And yeah, it was strange, but I tried to act normal. I didn’t wanna mess with the time continuum if I could help it. At that point you were still hung up on April.”

“Ugh, please don’t remind me.” Donnie was grabbing another slice when the perfect idea struck him. “Hey, y’know that picture frame I have in the lab? The one with the hearts around it?”

You glanced at him, confused. The one showcasing the photo of April on the swingset. “Yeah…”

“I think it’s about time I replace the picture.” He took out his T-Phone with his free hand, swiftly opening the camera application. He held it with an outstretched arm.

Your heart leapt. Your picture together in that frame. “Hold on a sec,” you said, carefully moving the open pizza box so you could shift closer to him. You rested your head on his shoulder, holding up your half-eaten slice as you smiled the widest you had that night.

Donnie carefully put his arm around you, ensuring not to get grease on you while he presented his own pizza slice over your shoulder. He smiled as well, showing off his gap tooth.

Together, you captured the moment.

Donnie displayed it in his lab with pride. You couldn’t help but mirror the smiles in the picture whenever you saw it.

After waiting so many nextons, it was worth it.

#tmnt #tmnt 2012 #teenage mutant ninja turtles #teenage mutant ninja turtles 2012 #tmnt x reader #donatello #donnie #donnie x reader #donatello x reader #tmnt fanfiction #tmnt donatello #tmnt donnie #tmnt imagine #tmnt 2k12 #tmnt donnie x reader #madrcar writes

[ducktoonsfanart]

Della Duck with Casey Duck and their kids (Huey, Dewey, Louie and Phooey Duck) on the Moon in space suits - Ducktales 2017

After a long time, and at the request of my followers, I decided to dedicate myself to my topics again, so I will start with Ducktales in Space. Unfortunately, the Ducktales reboot didn't have a lot of space adventures, except for Della Duck's trip to the moon, her stay and return to Earth and the conflict with the Moonlanders, but I can still do it through drawings, and you can do it through your fanfictions if you want. Or maybe I will, if I have the chance.

For now I drew Della Duck, along with her partner named Alexander Casey Duck who is an OC by the way, the original character for my friend who I intended this drawing for. Together there are Della's children, Huey, Dewey and Louie, but I also added Phooey Duck and they are all together on the moon, in space, without Gyro's Oxy-chew invention, especially black liquorice, in their spacesuits. I drew in my own way, combining both styles, and specifically took a model of the space suit worn by Della for the rest of the crew. Yes, everyone wears clothes of their own color, with the boys wearing backwards baseball caps, since it is still a characteristic for them to wear caps. The planet Mars and a meteor can be seen behind them. I hope you like this drawing and this space travel idea.

Yes, this gift is for my friend @battlecry51, who designed this Casey Duck.

#my fanart #gift for my friend #ducktales #space #space travel #della duck #moon #huey dewey and louie #phooey duck #huey duck #dewey duck #louie duck #ducktales oc #ducktales 2017 #ducktales reboot #oc #original character #disney duckverse oc #disney ducks #disney duckverse #casey duck #ducktales in space #ducktales au #fanart #duckverse #spacesuits #space suit #moon walking #classic style #canon x oc

[sepdet]

Have you SEEN the original moon landing feed, especially the scary bit near the end?

Now stay with me. I grew up hearing about these few minutes from my parents (in fact I took the TV they watched it on to grad school; DS9 and Babylon5 worked well in b&w).

This is even crazier than it looks like.

My parents were both scientists, my grandmother a planetarium director, and my dad was just about to land his job at a rocket company that built 95 small rockets that were part of the UpGoer Saturn V. (Yeah. Just the small ones. Saturn V was a BEAST.)

So my parents had a fair idea how dangerous this was, how Neil going manual was a bad sign, and just how close he was to running empty and crashing. They knew the problem that every ounce of fuel you carry requires even more fuel to lift off, so the Eagle was built light, carrying no excess weight even in fuel (it had to lift off the Moon with no rocket, after all).

But they didn't learn until years later just how jury-rigged and bespoke Apollo technology was. Every vehicle and part was designed like a Mythbusters build: extremely customized for the procedures it had to accomplish, using parts and even technology invented for specific mission tasks.

rope memory, predecessor to modern silicon chips: 1s and 0s woven by women (of course) at a Massachusetts textile plant

At the time, computers were the size of rooms and very touchy. Apollo's computer memory was core rope memory, never used before or since, to save space. The read/write guidance computer, too, was woven: physical media could better survive the rigors of space travel. (I suspect even my parents don't know it also used some of the very first integrated circuits, soldered by hand under a microscope by Navajo women).

Spacesuits were (and still are) designed and hand-stitched by Playtex bramakers. The lunar rovers' wheels were titanium meshes woven with piano wire to let dust through, and even had a clever navigation system despite no GPS or magnetic north.

They couldn't test these rigs with computer modeling. They didn't know for sure what the moon's surface would be like, apart from basic parameters like low gravity and near vacuum and a temperature ranging from 250°F in the sun to -250° in the shade. And it was nearly impossible to test for or practice in those conditions on Earth.

And then there were the unknowns. A massive solar flare between Apollo 16 and 17 might have killed or sickened them too much to operate their ship.

While the spacesuit and to some extent the rover design carried on, a lot of these hacks were so unusual that they might as well be alien tech. (I'm sorry woven technology fell out of vogue for several decades.) That goes some way towards explaining why humans haven't left Earth orbit since I was two.

The other problem, of course, is expense. Tech for human space exploration requires as much R&D and testing as fighter planes, which have developed through a century of multiple countries' military budgets. Human space programs are lucky to last two presidents; the next president usually doesn't think giving glory to his predecessor is a good use of money.

So for 40 years, NASA has mostly worked with other countries on human spaceflight or built robot explorers that can be launched in 3-4 years before Congress or the president can axe the program. They're less likely to shut down a mission when 99.99% of the money's been spent, and all that's left to do is download data and uplink occasional instructions.

TL:DR; Congress and the White House keep flashing the equivalent of that computer error message, every time NASA gets ready to send humans into space again. Overload. Abort mission.

Unless, you know, American citizens start saying Go. Go. Go. Go. We have some pretty important priorities down here on Earth (which Amazon and Disney and oil companies should be footing the bill for, though they try not to), but I bet the military can cough up the cost of a few fighter jets.

#happy moon landing day #apollo 11 #space #Long post is long #I hope this is a good read despite fibromyalgia making my brain turn to fuzz #but this is so much cool stuff

[fullmoonfireball]

what is UPgamers i only JUST realized that the Pikmin 3 Secret File cutscenes use a different translation than the versions used in Pikmin 3 Deluxe for Olimar's Assignment

and all that because i wanted to grab a screenshot of Olimar mentioning the IT department in the Twilight River cutscene to be like "imagine working in IT for Hocotate Freight", only to make the discovery that line is remake-exclusive . so for future reference, here's a line-by-line comparison for both versions ig. dialogue below will be formatted like this:

AREA

"Wii U" // "Nintendo Switch"

GARDEN OF HOPE

"This is Olimar, captain of the SS Dolphin." // "This is Olimar, Captain of the S.S. Dolphin."

"This is the third time that I've set foot on this planet." // "I've been on this planet twice before already." (note: it's strange that they didn't fix this repeated mistake- this would actually be the fourth time, given that Pikmin 2 has two trips. i guess the miscounting is probably also in the japanese version(s), then.)

"Our company, Hocotate Freight, is up to its eyeballs in debt - courtesy of our beloved president." // "Hocotate Freight is drowning in debt. I'm not saying it's our company president's fault...because this is an official log."

"We've come here in search of treasure to help us repay that debt." // "We're here in search of treasure to pay off that debt."

[Louie cutaway]

"Needless to say, the local wildlife isn't exactly rolling out the red carpet for us…" // "But I know from experience that the local wildlife won't make this job easy."

TROPICAL WILDS

"This is Olimar, captain of the SS Dolphin." // "This is Olimar, captain of the S.S. Dolphin."

"This is my third visit to this planet. Hunting for treasure here never gets old!" // "I've been to this planet twice before already. I never tire of hunting for treasure here!"

"While searching this area, we stumbled across a key of some sort." // "I made an interesting find in this area: some sort of key-like object."

"I wonder if it unlocks a treasure chest?" // "I should hold on to it in case I find a treasure chest."

"Or could it be the key to..." // "Unless it's the key to something else?"

[Louie cutaway]

"…We'd better keep our wits about us." // "I'd better keep my eyes open."

"The crabs here are peckish, and we're on the menu." // "I wouldn't want to get between the crabs of this planet and their prey."

TWILIGHT RIVER

"This is Olimar, captain of the SS Dolphin." // "This is Olimar, captain of the S.S. Dolphin."

"This is my third visit to this planet. Hunting for treasure here never gets old!" // "I've been to this planet twice before already. I never tire of hunting for treasure here!"

"My explorations have taken me far and wide." // "I've travelled far and wide across this planet during my several trips here."

"Somewhere along the way, a number of my notes and memos went missing." // "But I'm only noticing now that several of my notes and log entries have gone missing."

"There must be some sort of bug in my file management software." // "It must be a leak with my file-management routines. I think I heard someone in IT talking about that once."

"Once we get back to Hocotate, I'll try to convince the president to invest in an upgrade…" // "Once I'm back on Hocotate, I'll try to convince the president we need an upgrade."

[Louie cutaway]

"Maybe he can upgrade Louie while he's at it." // "Maybe I can get an upgrade to my partner while I'm at it."

DISTANT TUNDRA

"This is Olimar, captain of the SS Dolphin." // "This is Olimar, captain of the S.S. Dolphin."

"This is my third visit to this planet. Hunting for treasure here never gets old!" // "I've been to this planet twice before already. I never tire of hunting for treasure here!"

"Unfortunately, I'm absolutely freezing, even with my spacesuit on." // "Unfortunately, even my advanced suit can't quite keep out the cold."

"It's doing a terrible job of keeping out the cold." // "I'm not surprised Hocotate Freight cut costs when it came to insulation. Brr!"

"It wouldn't surprise me if the president had plucked our spacesuits out of some budget mail-order catalogue." // "It wouldn't surprise me if everyone got the same standard-issue suit, no matter what kind of assignment they were on."

"Hocotate Freight's new venture has been an utter failure, and our earnings have suffered as a result." // "The company's new venture went down in flames, and it's dragged our yearly earnings down with it."

"Now it looks like we're cutting corners even on basic equipment like spacesuits." // "We don't have the money for decent space suits now. This one isn't even custom fitted."

[Louie cutaway]

"Shocking, to say the least." // "Without any insulation, I wouldn't want to put this suit up against any nasty shocks, either."

"I really should've held on to that Anti-Electrifier…" // "I really should've hung on to that Anti-Electrifier..."

FORMIDABLE OAK

"This is Olimar, captain of the SS Dolphin." // "This is Olimar, captain of the S.S. Dolphin."

"This is my third visit to the planet. Hunting for treasure here never gets old!" // "I've been to this planet twice before already. I never tire of hunting for treasure here!"

"While surveying this area, I came across something gold and shiny." // "Our survey has revealed a massive golden object in this region."

"It's got to be worth a fortune!" // "It'll be worth a fortune to the company!"

"My perpetually mute colleague Louie actually spoke up against coming here, for some reason…" // "My taciturn partner, Louie, didn't want to come here for reasons he refused to explain."

"Speaking of which… I haven't seen him around lately." // "Where did he get to, anyway? Well, it doesn't matter."

"Where's he disappeared to?" // "I'll just get this treasure myself and then it's back to Hocotate."

#Rambles Into The Void #Pikmin

[lenreli]

Day 3 - Affection

[AO3]

“How’re you feeling?” Hob asks, the sterile environment of the room after decontamination and decompression on the making Dream seem almost transparent when combined with the white of everything else. Humanity is going to space, and has yet to move on from sterile white for some things. Maybe Hob should look into paint to put some colour into it, since they do now own their own spaceship. 

“I miss when I could walk in zero-G without a spacesuit,” Dream mumbles, and Hob suddenly finds himself with Dream’s face hiding in his neck, as strong, not-Endless arms go around his waist. Hob hums, rubbing Dream’s arms as they walk into their spaceship, and Dream sighs, melting on top of him as they reach their bed. 

“Well, space travel’s only just starting, it’ll get more streamlined eventually,” Hob points out ― and they probably should get their ship off the dock, maybe going back towards Earth, though he also doesn’t want to move from underneath Dream’s humanoid form, and every day Hob still feels like pinching himself as he wakes up to Dream ― still alive, still there. Not Endless anymore, which Dream’s still working through, even hundreds of years later. 

“It better,” Dream says, voice muffled by Hob’s shirt, pale hands coming up to pat at Hob’s beard as Dream slithers up to kiss him.

“At least we got a cool ship now,” Hob breathes into the kiss, “though I’m thinking of a splash of paint for that white area―” Dream bites his chin and Hob giggles, pleasure soft and slow as they rut against each other gently, “alright, shutting up, got that.” 

“Talk about something else,” Dream orders, breath tickling his ear as Dream nips at it, a hand going down to Hob’s pants to grip his cock, making Hob gasp. 

“Like what? I’m up for ideas, Prince of Stories,” he whines, arching into Dream’s hand, and going to bite at Dream’s throat, and Dream shivers as he bites over fading marks.

“What can we do, now that we have this exorbitantly priced ship,” Dream mumbles, and considering words like exorbitant, far too lucid ― so Hob flips them over and grinds down on his partner until Dream starts moaning, hands now holding onto his arms. 

“One of the first things we’re definitely gonna do once we get out of here, is just fuck with all those stars around us,” Hob breathes, feeling Dream shiver and clutch him tighter, beard scraping down Dream’s throat and there’s a full-body shiver once more. “I’ve always like Jupiter, so maybe we can hang around Jupiter, and I can fuck you against the window. So many possibilities.”

Dream cries out, bucking into him as Hob takes one of Dream’s fingers, putting it in his mouth as Dream’s other hand caresses his face, blue eyes wet and filled with love and affection. “Always,” Dream whispers.

#dc #the sandman #dreamling #dreamling fanfic #dreamling smeptember #smeptember 2023 #dream x hob #hob x dream #hob x morpheus #writing #not sfw #today's vibes said sappiness and scifi #also retired dream

[moocowmoocow]

Femslash February 29 - White

Molly x Anastasia Belikova

In 1989, both the US and USSR celebrated the first men on the moon full of nationalism and dick swinging. Mars was years away and the moon was routine, but both nations needed the world to remember that they were the ones that held the fate of the world in their hands.

In 1990, the UN invited both Anastasia Belikova and Molly to Geneva to celebrate the anniversary of the first women to walk on the moon. It was a low key affair - no speeches, no heads of state. A medal ceremony and a reception afterwards.

Molly was still adapting to traveling to a new place for the first time since she lost her sight. She startled when she felt an unfamiliar hand on her arm. “Let’s get out of here,” a woman with a Russian accent said.

“Thought you’d never ask, Comrade Belikova,” Molly replied.

Anastasia took Molly’s arm and guided her to a bar a few blocks away. “You’re good at this,” Molly said as she settled into a chair.

“Americans aren’t the only ones who got caught in that solar flare,” Anastasia replied, as she sat next to Molly. “So, we’ve heard all the bullshit about us and the moon. What was it really like?”

Molly and Anastasia swapped stories about training and preparation and men who didn’t think they belonged in a space program.

“Then, because fucking Gagarin did it before he went into space, everyone had to do it. So I had to figure out how get my spacesuit off enough and squat down at the right angle to urinate on the tire of the bus that brought me.”

“Jesus. I’m glad I didn’t have to do that.”

“But that first step on the moon was worth it. To see all that white surrounded by the darkest black and then see the Earth just hanging there.”

“It was incredible. I can still see the white of the regolith.” Molly put her hands on Anastasia’s face. “Smile.”

Anastasia did. Molly traced her lips with her fingers. “Your damn smile. Everyone wanted me to smile like you did.”

Anastasia laughed. “After you went to the moon, everyone asked why I didn’t find ice like you did.”

“What happened to you after? I never heard about you again.”

“I worked in what you Americans call Mission Control. Got married, had children.”

“You never went to the moon again?”

“No. I miss it sometimes, though. Like an ache in my chest.”

“I know that feeling.” Molly placed her hand on Anastasia’s face again, her thumb tracing her cheekbone. She leaned into Molly’s touch. “Let’s get out of here.”

Anastasia nodded.

#molly cobb #anastasia belikova #for all mankind #FAMslash february #femslash february #i hope you've enjoyed these #as much as i have enjoyed writing them

[chernobog13]

MAJOR MATT MASON - MAN IN SPACE

Major Matt Mason, Mattel’s Man in Space.  This is an original 1966 release, as the straps on his space suit are blue.  All subsequent versions of the figures had black straps.

Mattel took full advantage of young Americans’ fascination with the space program by releasing the Major Matt Mason line of astronaut action figures in 1966.

Sgt. Storm on the Space Sled, a flying jet ski-like personal transport.

There were initially three color-coded 6-inch astronaut figures in the line: Major Matt Mason was in a white space suit, Sgt. Storm was in a red space suit, and Mason’s civilian scientist buddy, Doug Davis, wore a yellow suit.  In 1968 a fourth astronaut, African-American Jeff Long, made the scene in a blue spacesuit.

Long’s addition to the line was a bold move on Mattel’s part, as the astronaut program at NASA during that time was lily white.

Astronaut Jeff Long, who appeared nearly 20 years before Guion Bluford became the first black American to orbit Earth.

The figures were a rubber-like body over a thin wire armature - similar to the Gumby and Pokey toys - with molded plastic heads.  The wire armatures and pliable bodies made the figures extremely posable.

All four astronauts lived and worked on the Moon, which was pretty darn cool.  The coolest thing about the Major and his crew, though, was that - initially, at least - all their equipment was based on actual designs and prototypes developed for the space program.

Doug Davis, first civilian on the Moon.

And boy, was there a LOT of equipment and accessories: a flying Space Sled, a Cat Trac one-man tractor, a moon suit, a Space Crawler that used rotating “legs” instead of wheels, and a whole bunch more up to and included a  multi-storey Space Station play set (although it really was a Moon Base).

The Space Station play set in all its glory.

The Space Station was modular, and you could make it taller or shorter by adding or subtracting pieces of the red pylons.  The idea was for kids to have several Space Stations of varying heights, because Major Matt Mason had a ziipline accessory that enabled him to travel between them.

The Moon Crew in their color-coded spacesuits.

In fact, there were so many gadgets and accessories that, even with mid-1960s prices, I’m sure many parents would have had to take out a second mortgage in order to afford them all.

Doug Davis wearing a specialized back pack while riding his Space Sled.

Unfortunately for me, the only accessory I ever received was the rather prosaic Cat Trac.  It wasn’t as exciting as the Space Sled, or as zippy as the Jet Pack (there were a few different versions), or battery-powered like the Space Crawler.  Nevertheless, I used my imagination to make the most of it.

The Cat Trac: looked cool at first glance, but it was only a hollow piece of molded plastic.  Would’ve scored much higher on the coolness scale if the tracks at least moved.

The Moon Suit, based on an actual prototype developed by Grumman.

The Space Bubble was essentially a rickshaw on the Moon: One man did all the work while another just relaxed in the back.

The Space Crawler, the creme de la creme of the Major Matt Mason transport toys.  This guy crawled along at a pretty decent clip, and due to its “legs” it could cover some rugged terrain.

It wasn’t long, however, before someone at Mattel became bored with the relatively realistic theme of the Major Matt Mason line.  Their solution: introduce science fiction elements to make things more exciting.

Captain Lazer, mysterious alien friend to Major Matt Mason and crew.

The first was the introduction in 1967 of Captain Lazer, who was so different from the rest of the line that there is speculation that he was intended for another line of figures entirely, or acquired from a Japanese company (his helmet reminds me of the Toei tokusatsu hero Captain Ultra, which was airing in Japan at the time).

Captain Lazer was 12 - almost 13 - inches tall, towering over Mason and the other astronauts.  His body was made of hard plastic  The head rotated at the neck, the arms rotated at the shoulders, and the legs rotated at the hips, but that was the extent of his articulation.  He had battery powered glowing red eyes and chest plate, as well as the laser pistol that was attached permanently to his hand.  There were attachments that connected to the pistol to change its appearance.  All in all, he looks like a pulp magazine or Golden Age comic book version of a space hero.

Good guy alien Callisto.

Evil alien Scorpio.

Then there were the aliens Callisto and Scorpio.  These were both in scale with the astronaut figures, and came with various gimmicks and accessories.  Callisto, listed as Mason’s friend from Jupiter, had a rubber and wire armature body.   Scorpio was an evil alien had battery-powered glowing eyes.

A first edition version of the good Major.

The astronauts’ equipment became typical science fiction props, like the Firebolt Space Cannon, assorted hand-held weapons, the Super Power Set (think Ripley’s exosuit cargo loader from Aliens), and the Gamma Ray-Gard (a projectile firing toy).

Major Matt Mason even got his own Big Little Book.  This is the only surviving piece of my MMM collection.

I had a lot of fun with the few Major Matt Mason toys I had, as did everyone I knew who had some.  There were, unfortunately, two major problems with the figures that reduced their enjoyment and playability factors.

First, the wire armatures were extremely thin and broke within a matter of days. The wire would then stick out through the rubber body, poking you in the hand every time you picked the figure up.  Meanwhile, the limb the wire was attached to would flop around uselessly.

Second, the paint on the rubber bodies began to flake off almost immediately, exposing the black base.  I remember finding paint flecks all over my hands and clothes each time I played with the figures.  At a price in 1966 of around $2.37 (approximately $22.00 today), the figures weren’t inexpensive, and I know my folks couldn’t afford to replace them.

Sadly, just as America lost its interest in the space program due to severe problems at home (the Vietnam War, Watergate, the oil crisis, rampant inflation), so did kids lose interest in Major Matt Mason.  Mattel cancelled the line abruptly in 1972 and never looked back.

Nevertheless, the Major and his crew have remained favorites of that generation.  Tom Hanks has been trying to get a Major Matt Mason film made for years.

And the Major was a big hit with NASA.  He reportedly been to space as a crew member on several missions of the space shuttle, including Senator John Glenn’s shuttle mission in 1998.  Heck, I wouldn’t be surprised if you found him somewhere on the International Space Station.

#Major Matt Mason #Sgt. Storm #Doug Davis #Jeff Long #astronaut #Captain Lazer #Callisto #Scorpio #Mattel #action figures #toys

[danshive]

I said in an earlier post about Starfield that I did not want to use the ship.

By this, I did not mean that I acquired Starfield thinking “I’m buying this in spite of hating starships, and I never want to use them!”

I meant “I do not enjoy this map interface and the multiple steps / loading moments that amount to fast traveling to a single location.”

Maybe I’m doing something wrong, but here’s the interplanetary experience as I understand it:

1 - Go to where your ship is docked.

2 - Enter the ship.

3 - Select the option to leave the planet.

4 - Watch the leave the planet animation (in which you may well incinerate some random NPCs who are, for some reason, walking around right where you’re blasting your jets)

5 - Be in orbit. Point the ship where you want to go, assuming the visual can be made unobstructed, or enter the map menu.

6 - Select the location you want to go to, or the furthest you can make the grav jump.

7 - If not at your destination, repeat step 6.

8 - If at a populated planet, wait a moment to be scanned for contraband.

9 - Select where you actually want to go on the planet.

If it’s possible to skip any of these steps, and I’m just being foolish, please yell at me with clear instructions for my feeble brain to absorb.

To be fair, the contraband check is so you can play like a smuggler (everyone wants to be Han Solo), and there’s bound to be story moments that happen at any given step. I can appreciate why these steps exist.

That’s simply independent of whether I enjoy them most of the time.

I’m all for fun adventures in a spaceship. It’s just I don’t feel like that’s what I’m doing.

I feel like I’m doing fast travel with more steps.

I’m not trying to diminish the fun anyone else is having, but I do want to be clear that I’m not opposed to using a spaceship in the outer space RPG I bought that’s literally called “Starfield,” and has people in spacesuits on the box art.

I’m fine with using a spaceship. I just want the things I’m doing with the spaceship to be fun.

#starfield

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

NASA Selects Companies to Advance Moon Mobility for Artemis Missions

NASA

NASA has selected Intuitive Machines, Lunar Outpost, and Venturi Astrolab to advance capabilities for a lunar terrain vehicle (LTV) that Artemis astronauts will use to travel around the lunar surface, conducting scientific research during the agency’s Artemis campaign at the Moon and preparing for human missions to Mars.

The awards leverage NASA’s expertise in developing and operating rovers to build commercial capabilities that support scientific discovery and long-term human exploration on the Moon. NASA intends to begin using the LTV for crewed operations during Artemis V.

“We look forward to the development of the Artemis generation lunar exploration vehicle to help us advance what we learn at the Moon,” said Vanessa Wyche, director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. “This vehicle will greatly increase our astronauts’ ability to explore and conduct science on the lunar surface while also serving as a science platform between crewed missions.”

NASA will acquire the LTV as a service from industry. The indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity, milestone-based Lunar Terrain Vehicle Services contract with firm-fixed-price task orders has a combined maximum potential value of $4.6 billion for all awards. 

Each provider will begin with a feasibility task order, which will be a year-long special study to develop a system that meets NASA’s requirements through the preliminary design maturity project phase. The agency will issue a subsequent request for task order proposal to eligible provider(s) for a demonstration mission to continue developing the LTV, deliver it to the surface of the Moon, and validate its performance and safety ahead of Artemis V. NASA anticipates making an award to only one provider for the demonstration. NASA will issue additional task orders to provide unpressurized rover capabilities for the agency’s moonwalking and scientific exploration needs through 2039.

The LTV will be able to handle the extreme conditions at the Moon’s South Pole and will feature advanced technologies for power management, autonomous driving, and state of the art communications and navigation systems. Crews will use the LTV to explore, transport scientific equipment, and collect samples of the lunar surface, much farther than they could on foot, enabling increased science returns.

Between Artemis missions, when crews are not on the Moon, the LTV will operate remotely to support NASA’s scientific objectives as needed. Outside those times, the provider will have the ability to use their LTV for commercial lunar surface activities unrelated to NASA missions.

“We will use the LTV to travel to locations we might not otherwise be able to reach on foot, increasing our ability to explore and make new scientific discoveries,” said Jacob Bleacher, chief exploration scientist in the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “With the Artemis crewed missions, and during remote operations when there is not a crew on the surface, we are enabling science and discovery on the Moon year around.”

NASA provided technical requirements, capabilities, and safety standards needed for LTV development and operations, and the selected companies have agreed to meet the key agency requirements. The contract request for proposal required each provider to propose a solution to provide end-to-end services, including LTV development, delivery to the Moon, and execution of operations on the lunar surface.

Through Artemis, NASA will send astronauts – including the first woman, first person of color, and its first international partner astronaut – to explore the Moon for scientific discovery, technology evolution, economic benefits, and to build the foundation for crewed missions to Mars. Advanced rovers, along with the agency’s SLS (Space Launch System) rocket and Orion spacecraft, commercial human landing systems and next-generation spacesuits, and Gateway are NASA’s foundation for deep space exploration.

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