#i feel like I've improves substantially which is good

[noxious-fennec]

It's pomegranate season :)

A redraw of this piece from around a year ago

#hello guys...(: #i started school back in mid September! its hell #and my chronic pain is rly bad these days i can barely do anything #and my next break will be spent at the hospital #but love and light at least we're trucjing along and getting somewhere hopefully #this drawing isn't exactly the most finished the most effortful what have you but its all i can guve you #confession time: idk if i have it in me to keep drawing the guys #dont get me wrong still adore them. but i feel a little out of it #maybe this'll change the second i post this but whatever. #i had an amazing time being active in the fandom you guys are so sweet and you got me thru rough patches <3 #I'll still be around just even more inactive #anyway i hope you enjoy this!!! #i feel like I've improves substantially which is good #fennec. art #cwilbur #dsmp fanart #my art #thx to everyone that's loved my art yall hold a special place in my heart #alright bye bye xoxo #ps esteemed mutuals and lovely audience never hesitate talking to me i am always around and i love ppl I'm just socially anxious

[say-hi-intrepid-heroes]

my experience getting/having a septum piercing!

(detailed journal under the cut, overview at the top)

TLDR: my experience was good, but that's because i planned and dedicated time to it. if you're in a situation where you'd need to hide it, make sure you get the piercing at least a week before you would need to flip it under. anything less and it's going to hurt like hell (although it'll still hurt a lot after a week)

general tips: 1) clean it at least once a day for a while. stuff builds up, especially in winter. i'd honestly recommend not getting it right before winter like i did, cause cold metal is not great. 2) try not to mess with it during the day, but make sure to move it around when you clean it, otherwise the healing skin will stick to the jewelry. 3) get a color/style you can live with for a few months. 4) don't flip it back and forth too much. 5) don't blow your nose aggressively or you might pass out from the pain. 6) dont wear face makeup to get your piercing done. touching your nose is gonna hurt like hell afterwards, so removing makeup won't be fun. 7) don't get a septum piercing as your first piercing. i've had two piercings in each ear, so i've had experience with the pain. if you flinch on an ear piercing, it's not as big of a deal cause those are so fast, but this one is NOT. major flinching is really bad here.

i've put a detailed log with dates under the cut. tw for descriptions of blood (obviously) but nothing major.

also, if you have any specific follow up questions, feel free to message or send an ask! i can't necessarily give you a perfect answer, but i can tell you what worked for me :)

(disclaimer: i wrote these on the days they are marked. i have not deleted or added anything, these were my thoughts and experiences as they happened. this does not represent everyone's experience, just mine, and is meant to be used as a reference to anyone wanting more information about this experience)

day 0 (11/11)

- got it done at a tattoo shop, they used a new/sterile needle and disinfected the area or something with something that smelled like iodine. it wasn't as fast as an ear piercing but it was honestly less painful.

- lots of initial bleeding (normal for me and head wounds in general), they nicked the outside of one nostril but that's probably because of my nose shape, lots of eye watering (also normal for me)

- cleaning it sucked, used the stuff they gave me (neilmed piercing aftercare mist) and qtips. moving the piercing was the worst part (it was slightly off center so i had to move it a bit), hurt so bad. did not appear to bleed further, however.

- nose area around piercing (nostrils, tip of nose) is extremely tender. putting on moisturizer was painful. glad i was not wearing full face makeup that i would have had to take off

- still too scared to blow my nose. i have a congestion headache.

day 1 (11/12)

- itchy. so itchy.

- currently biggest challenge is cleaning it. the area is so fragile and hurts so bad if you mess up how cleaning is done.

- also, allergies suck. i can't blow my nose. why.

- no bleeding tho, and nothing concerning

day 2 (11/13)

- cleaning is better, but i did figure out i was doing it wrong so that might be why moving the actual jewelry hurt so much. (the piercing was a lot further forward than i thought it was, so i was kinda just cleaning the middle of my nose. i wasn't cleaning where the hole is, so the scab area was just dry when i tried to move it, which is so so bad)

- area around it is much much less tender. no sudden contact though still.

- moving the jewelry hurts like a bitch

day 7 (11/18)

- substantial improvement over the last few days. no longer hurts to move the jewelry or touch my nose. only hurts if excessive force (i.e. getting punched in the nose)

day 9 (11/20)

- flipped it under (to hide it) for the first time. had to look up youtube videos for people with my nose shape cause i was doing it wrong but other than that it was very smooth and painless.

- now i just feel like i need to sneeze, but no pain.

about three weeks post-piercing

- we've kinda leveled out. no more major pain, now i'm able to flip it under in an emergency (without a mirror, without prep, etc)

- i got super sick and had a runny nose and it did fine the whole time.

- highly recommend flipping it under if you're having to blow your nose a lot, otherwise it snags and snot gets caught in it and i don't like it

two months (mid january)

- it is extremely cold where i am (hanging at about 10-15 degrees Fahrenheit) and this is making my skin so so dry.

- basically the piercing wound has cracked open a bit. it hurts a lot. i'm now drinking lots of water and running a humidifier/diffuser, but there's only so much that can do.

three months (mid february)

- just took out the jewelry, cleaned, and replaced for the first time!! it went really smoothly, no pain, no blood, but i did go slowly.

- make sure not to do it over a sink or the pieces could get lost. also, for the horseshoe i have, the little ball is kinda tricky to get back in, but if you take your time it'll work.

- i'm at the point where i feel like it is substantially healed, barring a major snag or other injury. i'm probably going to change out the jewelry soon once i get a new piece, and im very excited for that!!

[end]

#not really sure how to tag this tbh #oh well it's fine #personal #septum piercing

[familyabolisher]

I'm very curious about any more in depth thoughts you have on It Came From The Closet! It's been on my radar and I'd been planning to check it out soon as my next read, and this is the first opinion I've seen on it that isn't part of what feels like marketing reviews almost. Is it the analysis of the horror movies and themes that feels off or the way the essays are written? I'm a huge horror fan and I've definitely seen a...few queer horror takes that felt either like reaches or just "off" to me, but it's always hard to put my finger on it

i’ve only read the first few essays so it’s entirely possible that the volume will improve from here on out (though i … haven’t gotten my hopes up), but my impression so far is that it’s a series of schlocky, surface-level analyses providing a veneer of pop talking points around “horror” and “queerness” over what are often frankly uninteresting personal essays. v little insight and v little desire to bring anything new to the table; frankly, v little interest in the films they purport to be writing on beyond shallow rhetorical vehicles for personal reflection. my patience for The Personal Essay is vvv low at the best of times, but like, i can appreciate a work from which i can glean some compelling insights and articulate a thoughtful response. and, god, none of these pieces have crossed that hurdle so far.

like, if it’s not a long string of appeals to buzzwords like “queerbaiting” and “bury your gays” or v poorly substantiated appeals to "subversion" then it's incorrectly defined “reparative reading” or one writer citing that stupid mary oliver soft animal of your body whatever line out of literally nowhere. it’s just not insightful or imaginative. at its worst it does just read like an annoying tumblr post circa 2017. carmen maria machado writes an essay on jennifer’s body as articulating something essential to her bisexuality such that efforts to talk about the way in which it marketed itself via appealing to the homophobic cultural currency of teen lesbian eroticism somehow constitutes “gatekeeping.” this is not compelling or original critical writing, people.

almost every essay seems to fall back on the same base claim: that what makes horror horrifying relies on a currency of alterity which discursively constructs the “other” and that queer people can & will identify with the “other”—the monster in the horror film—in order to make sense of themselves & overturn the hegemony that the film may well seek to affirm. cool, awesome—this is not new analysis. i would not expect this kind of thing to be churned out in a book published in 2022; we know this already. i worry that overleaning into this idea of a “reclamation” of sorts a) risks forfeiting the language we have available to us to actually talk about the sort of bigotry which can fuel these kinds of stories; how many people talk about le fanu’s carmilla as a stunning depiction of erotic lesbian vampires and lose sight of its having been a v homophobic, colonialist text in their doing so?; and b) neglects the tradition of horror within alterity; horror being made not out of a conservative ethos that we seek to critically remould into a kind of limp simulacrum of a “radical” one, but one born out of a desire to tell a story against heteronormative social imaginaries in the first place. it’s all well and good to identify with regan from the exorcist and cite your poor understanding of reparative readings (not a critical framework i subscribe to anyway, but like, at least get it right?) in doing so, but do we have to keep limiting our discourse to this back-and-forth about whether or not we can salvage obviously homophobic/misogynistic/ableist/racist stories forever? lol. i watched Hellraiser for the first time the other day and that was queer horror that could be met with on far more compelling terms than whatever all this is.

#ask

[chrisairgames]

A Year in Retrospect

The social media diaspora began a year ago, and I've been neglecting Tumblr. Trying to come back, slowly, so here's what I've been up to since November 2022.

Bio-Drones & Cryo-Clones

From November to February 1st, 2022, I worked on my Zine Month campaign, a Kickstarter for my first ttrpg zine, a Sleeper Crew Adventure for Mothership RPG called Bio-Drones & Cryo-Clones.

I was blown away by the immense show of support. The crowd-funding allowed me to pay for even more art, better and bigger maps, development and editing, and professional layout. I got to make the zine into the amazing package I'd dreamed up.

The zines were sent off to the fulfillment center last Friday! A ton of my ttrpg work time was spent on what's in these boxes, and it's pretty scary to see it go off into a truck. That does mean the zines will be available at retailers soon, though, which just feels nuts to me.

The Unseen City

I also wrote The Unseen City, the first 3pp setting and adventure for Cloud Empress, the ecological science fantasy RPG, the successful Mothership hack from Worlds by Watt.

I go into depth about how this 20pg zine turned evolved from the "Pamphlet Duet" I originally conceived in my most recent newsletter. A lot of struggles, gained some killer art from HodagRPG, and all for a game I'm really quite happy with. I do plan to return to writing more adventures for The Unseen City as well!

Mitosis, Escape from STAR Station

Last year, RV Games published my Mothership pamphlet series The Cerdo Cycle (that was my last Tumblr post!). Shortly after the campaign, Violet asked me to write a giant 8x16 inch pamphlet adventure for RV Games' upcoming in-universe Mothership board game, Mitosis.

I wrote Escape from STAR Station, a gonzo adventure about a Prison Break amidst two warring factions: Cyberviral Pirate Goons & STARS Staff Brainiacs. Both sides are infected by experiments with the Mitosis board game microorganisms. It's a crazy lil adventure with awesome art by Sigmacastell. You can pick up an abridged print-at-home version for free on my itch page, even.

5 Million Worlds RPG

For the One-Page Game Jam this past summer, I submitted a pocketzine Space Adventure hack of Mothership, called 5MW RPG: Avatar Basics.

In this little A4/US Letter space, I've designed two main pulls away from sci-fi horror to space adventure. The first are Push Tables. Similar to the end of act in a Star Trek episode, these tables push the conflict in new and unexpected directions.

The second is a switch from Stress into Limit. Limit is your PC's XP, used to improve Stats/Saves, build towards projects, etc. Notably, instead of a Panic Table, 5MW has two tables: a Break Down table (similar to Panic), and a Limit Break table (like in FF).

When characters are in the shit, and they have to roll a Limit Check, the players can decide whether to spend their XP and do some cool shit to overcome the circumstances, or accept the Break Down. Good ol' @christiansorrell even did a TikTok video discussing the game, if you wanna check that out.

I'm very excited to continue to pursue creating a player's handbook, 5MW RPG: Avatar Primer. If you download the game on itch, I'll keep y'all apprised of substantial updates. Next up is developing the chargen, and reconfiguring the pocketzine as an A6 booklet: 5MW RPG: Avatar Basics+.

Outer Rim Uprising

I was extremely honored to join 11 other designers to create pieces of the Outer Rim Uprising Megabundle, spearheaded by our intrepid leader, Iko of The Lost Bay Studio.

Several months of brainstorming and collaboration went into this 20+ piece bundle. I contributed two pieces for this bundle. The first is a 12pg adventure module Rusted to the Core. Androids aboard an aerostat station floating in a gas giant's clouds have gone on strike. Can the PCs resolve the issues before the Rust overtakes the station?

The second is the more "experimental" Bones on the Ground. Bones is a bifold adventure into an android museum-prison, paired with three diegetic fliers supporting the ARA, the Android Rights Association (or Android Rebel Alliance, depending on who you ask!). Pieces of the three flyers contain clues for PCs who join the ARA to better succeed when they begin their museum infiltration.

A Buncha Spaceship Deckplans

So I have ADHD, and experience bouts of summer mania. Spaceshiptember rolled around, and I thought, "Hey it'd be no problemo to write 30 deckplans and release them this month, while I'm also trying to print BioCryo, promote ORU, starting a newsletter, and finishing up The Unseen City." Totally sane decision, right?

Well, I got through half the month. And I sketched out a third week's worth of ships on paper too. One of those sketches caught Adam STATION's eye, even, and he asked me to join An Infinity of Ships to turn it into a micro-adventure!

As long as this quick-n-dirty zine remains unfinished, it'll be free on itch.io. Again, if you'd like, follow along and I'll send out dev updates when new pages are added!

the dying tides

Another Jam entry, this time for The Lost Bay Studio's system agnostic fantasy setting + coloring book, SKYREALMS.

I made the dying tides as a short, lightweight fantasy adventure to venture among wavebros and squidillies. The art is based on my 4 yo daughter's paintings. Since she loved coloring the SKYREALMS books so much, I figured it was a poetic homage to the kind and mysterious heart of this game.

An Interactive Terminal Network

Last but not least, I smashed my skull against Twine on and off for six months to create a unified Interactive Terminal Network for my Mothership adventure, Bio-Drones & Cryo Clones.

The terminal is absolutely free to play on itch.io. Though passwords that can be found in the zine lock off a few areas. That said, I'm sure many folk could dig out the passwords without the zine. I don't know how to do that stuff. The fact that I even MADE this thing is a miracle to me, hahaha.

Goal for 2023

Talk about this stuff as it's happening so I don't infodump on people like this, haha.

What I'm working on now:

Twisting Unseen

Untitled Liminal Horror adventure

Provisional sketches, for the artist/layout designer.

Also, if you made it this far, thanks.

-Chris Air

#indie ttrpg #mothership #mothership rpg #ttrpg #horror #spaceship #role playing games #tabletop #fantasy #liminal horror #science fantasy #nausicaa #nausicaä of the valley of the wind #rpg

[charmcoin]

i really do want this year to be the year i try to live less like a drowning rat in a bucket really and truly. my anxiety has been very bad as of late which has been A large part of any crazyposting i've been doing and honestly a lot of the issues i've been dealing with basically my entire life have sort of come to a head and i'm realizing that like if i want to have any real sort of chance at being happy in the future i need to make some very substantial changes to the way i live my life u know. which like is scary in and of itself and is a conscious choice i need to make like it's sooooo easy to just keep doing the things i've been doing but i need to grow+change if i want to improve even if it's scary right now. have made some posts about instant gratification and prioritizing present comfort over future happiness bla bla but i need to QUIT IT!!!!! because present me will become future me one day and don't i want to be happy when that happens....... constant fight trying to convince myself i deserve to be happy it doesn't always feel real but that's why on my good days it's my responsibility to take care of myself and make sure my bad days are as easy as possible. peace n love

#pers #post probably makes no sense i'm so absorbed in this video about kirby super star rn it took me like 10min to type this

[daydreamtofiction]

Hello! Firstly, I wanted to say just how much I adore your writing style. There's just something ever so beautiful about the way it flows. And speaking of flow... I wondered if had any tips for making a story flow better, I've so many ideas but I just can't seem to figure out how to put them all together in a coherent way. Thank you!

Firstly, thank you so much.

This is such a good question but it’s one I’m having a really hard time coming up with practical advice for! I’ll try my best, but I’m sorry in advance if this isn’t helpful.

As always, I like to start with the disclaimer that I’m 29, I’ve been writing since I was a child, went to university at 18 for an undergrad in creative writing and got my masters in creative writing at 23. I’ve also had another 6 years since graduating in which I’ve been incredibly privileged to be mentored and supported by some amazing people and organisations in the literary space. So I’ve got a lot of years worth of practice and development under my belt. I’m not saying anyone needs degrees or training or anything to become a good writer, because you don’t, I’m just trying to emphasise how time is truly the best aid for anyone looking to hone their craft. And there’s never a set formula you can follow when it comes to improving your writing.

Funnily enough, I enjoy creating fics so much on this platform because it allows me to be a little more lax with my writing. Some things I’ve published under this alias would never fly with an editor and would probably be torn apart in developmental feedback. I don’t edit and redraft as much as I do with my irl work, I’m not as economical with my words and I try not to overthink things too much. So first and foremost, I’d say go easy on yourself. You write your fics for you, and you write them for free! Fanfic readers, on a whole, consume works that range drastically in author skill level. And for the most part, they will still enjoy and appreciate a fic despite its flaws.

That being said, let me try and actually answer your question lol.

When you say ‘flow’, I’m not sure if you mean the narrative or the actual writing itself. So I’ll give separate advice for both.

The narrative

Some good ways to make a narrative flow better is to think about pace, character and storyline.

Think about a TV show, I’ll use Fleabag season 2 as an example since it’s fresh in my mind from my priest fic. The basic premise is Fleabag meets a priest, fancies him, they hook up, but in the end he chooses God. If that’s all the story was, the show would be an episode long. What makes it so much more compelling is all the little ‘side quests’ she takes, the exploration of herself and other relationships, the time they take to allow that tension to build, little scenes that have no bearing on the main plot but add meat onto the bones of the story.

This helps control the pace; makes it feel more substantial and gives the readers time to bond with your characters and become invested in the story. It also stops you and your readers becoming fatigued by the main plot. Think about your day; you got up, went to school/work/wherever, came home and went to bed. But that wasn’t the extent of your day. You also might have noticed some new freckles while washing your face that morning, had an interesting interaction with a shopkeeper while buying your lunch, you might have found yourself dwelling on something that happened years ago which affected your mood, it might have rained when you weren’t expecting it to. All those little things are what make the journey from A to B truly flow.

So don’t be scared to divert from the main storyline with extra scenes, or create secondary plots that run alongside the main narrative. Not only will it help with the pace, but it will also force you to create more well-rounded characters. A well-rounded character is another great way to make a story flow, because they feel more real and less like a device.

Having lots of ideas and no idea how to make them flow is a problem I think many writers have. My advice for that is to not attempt to squeeze everything into one story just because you’re overwhelmed with a plethora of ideas. I know it can be hard when you’ve thought of a great plot point or scene but you just can’t make it fit, or you can’t figure out where in the story all of your ideas should go. That’s why it’s good to create a rough outline of your story in advance (either mentally or written out), piece together where all of these ideas might go before you start to write your story.

You can keep a note of your ideas in a separate folder/journal/document, that way you won’t feel as compelled to fit everything in one fic, because you’ll have this great selection of ideas you didn’t use that can be utilised in other projects.

If you’re still struggling to make your ideas flow into one coherent narrative, then it could be a sign that the story you’re wanting to write isn’t a fully developed concept yet. It might be worth taking some time to read other books/fics you like, watch tv/films and take note of how they’re structured, even daydreaming about your ideas can be useful, as the more you play them out, the more you may begin to notice how your mind naturally puts them together.

The writing itself

Read 👏 your 👏 work 👏 aloud 👏. It’s easier to detect issues in the flow of your writing when you speak it out loud - if you trip over your sentences, then you can almost guarantee a reader will. Pay attention to where you naturally take pause, that’s usually indicative of a comma being required or a sentence running on too long.

Be mindful of your story reading like ‘and then they did this, then they did that, then they went here’. Not everyone writes in a flowery way, but it should still have texture, some light and shade. Similarly, make sure you’re not repeating yourself. Nothing interrupts the flow of a paragraph like seeing the same words or descriptions over and over again.

Also, I know I said I’m less economical with language here than I am in my real life work. But I still advise trying to lessen unnecessary words/sentences. Give readers credit that they can fill in blanks themselves. Do you need to tell them the character is holding the phone in their left hand specifically, or can you just say they’re holding their phone? Do you really need to describe a characters appearance top to bottom, or can you just pick out a few defining features? Do they need to be described at all? Could you take a sentence like ‘I walked over to the table and picked up the camera, then I turned around and took a picture of the flowers in the vase.’ And turn it into ‘I took the camera off the table and snapped a picture of the flowers.’ It’s only a small difference, but in terms of flow, the key is making it require as little effort as possible to absorb.

I also just realised you could be asking about dialogue, which is its own challenge entirely. But I did give this advice to another person asking how to make dialogue sound more natural.

I really hope this helps! Sorry I went on a bit lmao.

#writing advice #writing advice with daydreamtofiction

[druidgroves]

Edit 04/16/2024:

Putting all this here because I don't feel like making a whole post for this by itself & would rather have it somewhere that those who are actually looking for it can easily find it!

I've been hemming & hawwing about rewriting BLP for months now (if you've followed me through my bitching I commend you) & finally decided that in order for me to be truly proud & invested in what I was working on, I needed to refocus on a lot of things.

First, I haven't really written any new content for BLP in...months. I've just been trying to rework what I had and getting increasingly unhappy with it because I felt that since I had dedicated so much time to these ideas, they should be used. This lead me to realize that the entire fic needed reworking in small and major ways. I definitely see myself using a lot of what I've written here for the rewrite, just recontextualizing it and connecting it in more substantial ways to the major themes I want to hit on. Which was another issue.

I thought I had a major theme/throughline for the fic. I did not. Or rather, I did and it got very, very clumsy. Part of this comes from the fact that I did the bare minimum outlining because I was so excited to write & share what I was making. Things sort of started to get away from me & I was treating each chapter sort of as a one shot in itself so they were all sort of disconnected in a way that I was never happy with but felt too far into to do anything about. The clumsy handling of supposed major themes also came from what I identified as my main issue: I wasn't writing the fic I wanted to be writing.

In recent months I realized I was holding back. There were certain scenes, kinds of relationships, and graphic/violent themes I wanted to write about that I was scared about being received poorly despite the setting of Fallout being host to all sorts of dark & taboo things. Because of this I would shoot down my ideas as I was writing & subsequently became displeased with what I was making because I wasn't really getting to the crux of what I really wanted to write. Like ghosting around it in a way that coming back to the fic now, basically a whole year later, did not jive with me.

There's also the matter of Georgia developing a lot more in my head than what I was writing down. It's like every time I would strike out an old idea I could feel her over my shoulder in a "you're butchering me, you're butchering my character arc!" way lmfao. Writing BLP has taught me a lot about my own OC, which is kind of wild. This was Proto-Georgia. Pilot Georgia. First Draft Georgia.

Despite it all though, BLP has helped me a lot in terms of writing improvement! It's also helped me find lots of cool people in the fandom with amazing OCs and fics of their own. So for that, I probably won't delete this version of BLP for now, if only so it serves as a reminder of where I started!

I thank everyone who read, reblogged, commented, & kudos'd my fic. It truly means the world to me that literally anyone was interested in my silly little oc & my take on her silly little merc. Mwah <3 Off to the rewrite!

Fandom: Fallout 4 Ship: Female Sole Survivor/RJ MacCready Characters: Canon Divergent Sole Survivor, RJ MacCready, Preston Garvey, Piper Wright, Nick Valentine, Original Characters List of Triggers: Self-harm, unhealthy coping mechanisms, unhealthy/abusive relationships, mentions of child death, (to be updated as they appear)

Summary: Georgia Tate has always had a plan. She planned to be a teacher, eventually a wife, and perhaps a mother. In the 2070s, she has a pretty good idea of how her life should turn out. But after she's thrust into a future where her old world ideals don't make sense anymore, she's determined to make the best of it. She's willing to fight for a safer world for her missing son to live in, once she finds him. RJ MacCready has always known what life is like in the wasteland. He knew just what it was like to be a leader, a mercenary, a father. To be a leader, you had to be tough, to be a mercenary, you had to be quick, and to be a father, you had to be there. So when a woman walks into the Third Rail calling herself the new General of the Minutemen with more caps than sense, MacCready thinks he might actually be able to pull of the job that brought him to the Commonwealth in the first place. What neither of them are prepared for is the Commonwealth getting turned upside down with Georgia at the epicenter, much less for making sense of the feelings steadily growing between them. But even with Georgia's boundless optimism and MacCready's endless realism, best laid plans can often go awry...

Table of Contents

Chapter One: Maybe I'll Say Maybe (Rewritten 01/20/2024; original)

Chapter Two: Crawl Out Through the Fallout

Chapter Three: Hit the Road, Jack

Chapter Four: Accentuate the Positive

Chapter Five: Dear Hearts and Gentle People

Chapter Six: I've Got a Feeling I'm Falling

Chapter Seven: Dream a Little Dream of Me

Chapter Eight: Rhythm of the Rain

Chapter Nine: I Get Along Without You Very Well

Chapter Ten: So Much to Do and So Little Time

Chapter Eleven: Just In Time

Chapter Twelve: Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall

Chapter Thirteen: It's All in the Game

#blp table of contents

[atmymercy]

Feedback

In retrospect, I've recognized that for a considerable time, I diligently maintained an outward image that appeared unshakeable. However, since the year 2019, a significant transformation has unfolded within me. Now, it's as if tears come easily, and the tasks I once handled effortlessly have become intricate and challenging. There are moments of respite, but my inner landscape has undergone profound shifts, leaving me with an indescribable sense of emptiness.

I must note that since my birthday on September 2, which was nearly three weeks ago, there has been an improvement in my emotional state. Nevertheless, I remain engaged in an ongoing personal struggle.

When it comes to financial matters, I don't consider myself particularly adept at managing money. Paradoxically, though, people place trust in me with their finances, and I occasionally receive substantial sums from family members. Furthermore, I am slated to inherit my grandparents' house, which can be attributed to a stroke of luck with inheritances.

Thank you so much!

hello starzlight!

you sound like you have a good head on your shoulders and you're just fully learning the extent of your inner searching. like the epitome of the human experience! i love it! okay! obviously your significant transformation is yet to be over or why else would you still be feeling empty?

and i'm so glad you liked your reading, honey! and that is brought you to such a deep inner state of self-examination! nothing more beautiful than putting yourself under the scope and to see what can be found!

love & light!

-tea

#tea astrology feedback #starzlightzzz

[rjalker]

What would you do, if, like Quest, you were tricked, and your very Mind and Will stolen from your body?

The Stolen Mind, By M. L. Staley

From Astounding Stories of Super Science, January 1930

Almost 10,000 words long.

======

"What caused you to answer our advertisement?" Owen Quest felt the steel of the quick gray eyes that jabbed like gimlets across the office table.

"Why does any man apply for a job?" he bristled.

Keane Clason gave an impatient smile.

"Come!" he said. "I'm not trying to snare you. But there were unusual features to my ad, and they were put there to attract an unusual type of man. To judge your qualifications, I must know just why this proposition appeals to you."

"I can tell you that," nodded Quest, "but there's nothing unusual about it. In the first place, I knew that the Clason Research Corporation is the leading concern of its kind in the country. In the second place, this seemed to offer a way to obtain a substantial sum of money quickly."

"Good," said Clason. "And you feel that you have all the necessary qualifications?"

"Decidedly. I am 24 years old, athletic, and of an earnest and determined nature. Moreover, I have no family ties, and I'm willing to run any reasonable risk in order to improve the condition of my fellow men."

Clason smiled his approval.

"You say you need money. How much immediately?"

Quest was unprepared for the question.

"A thousand dollars," he ventured.

Without hesitation Clason counted out ten one-hundred-dollar notes from his wallet and laid them on the table.

"There's your advance fee. You're ready to go to work immediately, I hope?"

"Certainly," stammered Quest.

Stunned by the swiftness of the transaction, he sat staring at the money that lay untouched before him.

To accept it would be like signing an unread contract. But he had asked for it; to refuse it was impossible. Even to delay about picking it up might arouse Clason's suspicion. Already the latter had turned away and was opening the door of a steel cabinet. Quest had one second in which to reach a decision.... He crammed the currency into his pocket.

With delicate care Clason set two objects on the table. One looked to Quest like a miniature broadcasting tower or a mooring mast for lighter than air craft. The other was a circular vat of some black material, probably carbon. Within it a series of concentric tissues were suspended from metal rings, and in a trough outside ranged four stoppered flasks containing liquids of as many different colors.

"Look at these models carefully," said Clason. "They represent two of the most remarkable discoveries of all time. The one on your left is the most destructive weapon known to man. The other I consider the most constructive discovery in the history of science. It may even lead to an understanding of the nature of life, and of the future of the spirit after death.

"Both of these were developed by my brother Philip and me together—but we have disagreed about the use to which they shall be put.

"Philip"—the inventor dropped his voice to a whisper—"wants to sell the secret of the Death Projector—the tower, there—as an instrument of war. If I should permit him to do that, it might lead to the destruction of whole nations!"

"How?" demanded Quest "I've heard of a device called the Death Ray. Is this it?"

"No, no," said Clason contemptuously. "Even in a perfected state the Ray would be a child's toy compared to the Projector. This is based on our discovery that invisible light rays of a certain wave-length, if highly concentrated, destroy life—and our additional discovery that if these are synchronized with short radio waves the effect is absolutely devastating.

"We obtain the desired concentration of invisible light by using a tellurium current-filter under the influence of alternate flashes of red and blue light. The projector can literally blanket vast areas with death, up to a top range of at least five hundred miles.

"Just picture to yourself what this means! In a space of ten minutes two men can lay down a circle of destruction a thousand miles in diameter; or they can cut a swath five hundred miles long in any desired direction."

"Have you ever proved it?" demanded Quest skeptically.

"Yes, young man, we have," snapped Clason. "Right here in the laboratory—but on a minute scale, of course. However, there's no time to demonstrate now. The point is that my brother is determined to sell if he can obtain his price for the invention. He argues that instead of bringing disaster upon the world, this machine will forever discourage war by making it too terrible for any civilized nation to consider. In spite of my opposition he has opened negotiations with an ambitious Balkan power. He may actually close the sale at any moment!

"However," Clason drew a deep breath "you see this other device? Simple as it appears, it is the key to the whole situation. We can use it—you and I—to overcome Philip's will and prevent this unthinkable transaction. The two of us can do it. Alone I would be virtually helpless."

"Why not have the Projector confiscated or destroyed by our own Government?" suggested Quest. "That seems to me the only safe and sure way out of the difficulty."

"You simply do not understand," frowned Clason impatiently. "Philip is selling the plans and descriptions of the machine, not the machine itself. Even if this model and the larger test machine that we have built were destroyed—even if I were willing to have Philip sent to Leavenworth for life—he could still sell the Projector.

"But this other invention, our Osmotic Liberator, makes it possible for me to gain control of Philip and actually change his mind, through the medium of an agent. I have hired you to act as my Agent, Quest, because I can see that you are a young man of unusual character and vitality. And by way of reward I can promise you both money and a brilliant future."

The inventor poised in a tense attitude on the edge of his chair as though his body were charged with electricity. His eyes seemed to dart out emanations that set Quest's blood to tingling. Then for a moment the latter lost consciousness of his physical self. It was as though he had opened a door and found himself suddenly on the brink of a new and totally strange world. He dispelled this fancy by a quick effort of the will, for he knew that he had a delicate problem on his hands and that it must be solved within a very few minutes. However he proceeded, he must act without disloyalty to his Government, and at the same time without injustice to Keane Clason.

"Tell me," he said in a husky voice, "how do you intend to use me? I do not believe in Spiritualism. I would be a poor medium."

Clason gave a short laugh.

"You are not to be a medium in that sense at all. Spiritualism as practiced is just a blind sort of groping and hoping. Osmotic Liberation, on the other hand, is an exact and opposite physico-chemical science. Here—I will show you."

Into the outer cell of the Liberator he emptied the purple vial, and so on to the innermost, which he filled with a golden-green liquid like old Chartreuse.

"The separating membranes, you understand, are permeable by these complicated solutions. Each liquid has a different osmotic pressure and therefore should, under normal conditions, interchange with the others through the membranes until all pressures are equalized. I prevent such interchange, however, by maintaining an anti-electrolysis which retards ionization and thus builds up what might be called osmotic potential.

"Now if an Agent—yourself for instance—submerges himself in the central cell, at the same time maintaining a physical contact with his Control at the surface of the liquid, and if then the osmotic potential is suddenly released by throwing the electrolytic switch, the host of ions thus turned loose in the outer compartments make one grand rush for the center solution, which contains the cathode.

"Under these conditions your body becomes a sort of sixth cell, and your skin another membrane in the series. Properly speaking, however, you are not a part of the electrolytic circuit but are merely present in the action. Your body acts as a catalyser, hastening the chemical action without itself being affected in any way. Physically you undergo no change whatever; but in some strange way which is, like life, beyond analysis, your mind flows out into the solution, while your unaltered body remains at the bottom of the tank in a state of suspended animation.

"If no Control is present, all that is needed to return your mind into your body is a throw of the electrolytic switch back to negative, whereupon you emerge from the tank exactly as you entered it. But with your Control present and in contact with your submerged body, your mind, instead of remaining suspended in the solution, flows instantly into his body and resides there subject to his will.

"This can not be done, however, unless the wills of Control and Agent have first been brought into accord. To accomplish that, we clasp hands"—Quest grasped Clason's extended hand—"and look steadily into each other's eyes.

"Now, it is well known that the vibrations of an individual's will are as distinctive as the sworls of his finger-prints. What is not so well known is that the frequency of vibration in one person can be brought into accord with that in another.

"You consciously retract your will by concentrating your mind upon the thing which you know I wish to accomplish. Gradually while we continue in this position your vibrations speed up or slow down until they acquire exactly the same frequency as my own. We are then in accord, and when your mind is liberated in the tank it is in a state which admits absorption into my body. And it is subject to my will because you have purposely attuned it to my peculiar frequency. Immediately after the transfer there will be a brief conflict, due to the instinctive desire of your will to obtain the ascendancy. But of course mine will gain the upper hand at once, since both wills will be in my frequency."

Quest felt, rather than saw, a wall of alarm closing in on him. He tried to avert his eyes, to withdraw his hand from Clason's grasp. With a nostalgic pang in the pit of his stomach he suddenly realized that he could not do so. He had gone too far—farther than any man in his position had a right to go. Having deliberately weakened his will, it seemed now to have deserted him entirely. A prickling sensation coursed up his spine, his extended arm went numb, his hand trembled violently.

"Splendid!" said Clason, suddenly releasing both eye and hand. "Just as I foresaw, you will be able to attune yourself to my vibration-frequency with hardly an effort. Now please remain seated; I'll be back in a moment."

For a second after the door closed, Quest remained slumped in his chair. Then he was on his feet, shaking himself like a wet dog to free himself from the spell under which he had fallen. Something about Clason attracted and at the same time repelled him, fraying his nerves like an irritant drug and confusing his mind at the moment when he needed the full alertness of every faculty.

Invisible light—disembodied minds—will vibrations! Nothing there to get hold of. Were these things real or imaginary? Was Keane Clason a great inventor, or a madman? Would Philip prove to be a real or an imaginary scoundrel? Should he summon help, or go on alone?

Professional pride said: wait, don't be an alarmist! With his knuckles Quest tapped the table, half expecting it to melt under his fingers. The feeling and sound of the contact gave him a peculiar start. On the farther end of the table stood a letter-box—an invitation. From his pocket Quest snatched a slip of paper, and wrote:

6 stroke 4—9:45A—Hired. If no report in 48 hours, clamp down hard.

To address a stamped envelope and slip it in with the outgoing mail was the work of seconds. But he was none too quick. He had just dropped back into a lounging attitude when the door burst open and Clason flew into the room?

"We must act instantly," hissed the inventor. "Philip plans to close the transaction within a day."

In spite of himself, Quest jumped upright in his chair. Clason tapped him on the shoulder reassuringly.

"It's all right," he smiled, "I'm ready for him. We'll make our move this afternoon and beat him by eighteen hours.

"Let's see." He paused. "Oh! yes. I was about to explain to you that as soon as the will of the Agent enters the body of his Control, the latter can again transfer it into the body of still another person.

"Now you understand why I advertised for a man of exceptional character? As my Agent, I want you to enter the body of Philip, and your will must be strong enough to conquer his in the battle for mastery which will begin the instant you intrude into his body. You will still be under my control, but your will must be strong enough on its own merits to overcome his. I can direct you, but your strength must be your own. That's clear, isn't it?"

"I think so," said Quest slowly. "But what becomes of me after you have frustrated Philip's plot?"

"That's the easy part of the process," smiled Clason; "but naturally you feel some anxiety about it. I simply withdraw your will from Philip, return it to your own body, and pay you a reward of ten thousand dollars."

"You're sure you can?"

"Perfectly. I have merely to touch Philip's hand to recapture your will. Then I immerse myself in the tank with the switch at plus. The osmotic action will extract both wills momentarily from my body. But the presence of two bodies and two wills in the solution together forces a balance, and each will seeks out and enters its own body. Then you and I climb out of the tank exactly as we are this minute."

"If it weren't for my belief that anything is possible," Quest shook his head, "I'd say that your claims for this invention were ridiculous."

"And you couldn't be blamed," admitted Clason readily. "This toy of a model is hardly convincing. But come along with me and I'll show you how the Liberator looks in actual operation."

The office rug concealed a trap door which gave upon a spiral stair. Below, Clason unlocked another door and led the way through a narrow and tremendously long passage lighted at intervals by small electric bulbs. Presently another door yielded to the inventor's deft touch and closed behind them with a portentous chug. Here the darkness was so utter and intense that Quest imagined he could feel the weight of it on his shoulders. From the slope of the passageway and the muffled beat of machinery that had come to his ears on the way along, he guessed that he was below ground in some chamber at the rear of the factory.

He gave a low exclamation as Clason switched on the toplight. No wonder the darkness had seemed of almost supernatural quality! Even the hard white glare of the daylight arc was grisly. Its rays rebounded from the liquids of the great circular tank in a blinding dazzle of color, while the dull black walls and ceiling were so perfectly absorptive that beyond arm's length they became to all effects invisible. Even the ledge on which he stood—the shoulder of the vat—gave Quest the feeling that to move would be to step off into a bottomless pit.

But Clason took his attention at once, pointing here and there in his quick, nervous way to indicate how faithfully the Liberator had been reproduced from the model. In all respects the arrangements were the same, with the addition that here a long plank like a spring-board extended out from a wall-mount as far as the central compartment of the tank, and that from its end a narrow ladder hung down to the surface of the Chartreuse liquid. A double-throw switch fixed to the wall above the base of the plank was evidently the source of electrolytic control.

"When you throw the switch to plus," said Clason, pointing to the chalk-marked sign above, "you produce the violent electrolytic action needed to bring about a liberation. All the rest of the time it should be closed at minus, in order to maintain the anti-action which I explained to you.

"Now let's rehearse, so that when the time for the real performance arrives we can be sure of running it off without a hitch."

"All right, sir," nodded Quest, so dazed by the glittering light that he was hardly conscious of what he said.

"First," said Clason, running lightly up the steps to the plank, "you walk out to the end, like this, and start down the ladder. Then you lower yourself into the tank. The liquid is at body temperature; it's neither strongly acid nor caustic; it will cause you no injury or discomfort whatever.

"Meanwhile I keep in contact with your hand until the instant that you become submerged. Now your mind is in me, see?—ready for transfer into Philip, where it will act as my Agent. That's how simple it is! Come on up and we'll go through the motions."

Quest experienced a shiver as he mounted the bridge. Annoyed with himself, he shrugged the feeling off. There was no risk here. Moreover, it was a part of his daily work to take chances; he had done so a hundred times without hesitation. Now he moved all the more quickly, as if to belie the squeamishness that possessed him in spite of himself.

Swinging past Clason on the plank, he lowered himself without a pause to the bottom rung of the ladder, while the inventor, hanging head down, maintained contact with him.

"No need to stay here," he said in sudden irritation. "I understand perfectly what I am to do."

"I'm testing my own acrobatic ability," grunted Clason amiably. "Just a minute now."

He wriggled as if trying to adjust himself to a better balance, but in reality to mask the motion of his free hand with which he reached up and pressed a button in the side of the plank. Instantly the structure, pivoting downward on its wall-socket, plunged Quest to his waist in the osmotic solution.

"For God's sake get out of the way!" he shouted, trying to wrench his hand out of Clason's sinewy grip. "Let go, I tell you!"

But Clason clung like a leech, his teeth gritted under the strain. Again the plank lurched downward, and with a violent splash Quest vanished below the surface.

Quick as a cat, Clason scrambled up the ladder and back to the base of the plank, where he erased and interchanged the chalk-marked signs with which he had misled Quest. Then with a sinister twist of a smile he threw the switch to minus, and turned to watch as the plank slowly righted itself and the vacant ladder came clear of the liquid.

For some time he stood staring at the gleaming colored rings of his dissociation-vat like some witch over her cauldron, his lips working, his hands clasping and unclasping like the tentacles of some sub-sea monster. Then, as if the spell had suddenly broken, he turned on his heel and switched off the light. As he hastened down the passageway toward his office, the airlock sucked the door against its jamb with an ominous whistle.

In a twinkling, as Quest's shackled spirit writhed in its new housing, he knew that he was in bondage to a scoundrel. Formless and voiceless, he still fought madly for the freedom which the instinct of ten thousand generations made necessary to him.

At the same time he was furious at himself for having been tricked like an innocent schoolboy. The plank socket, the button which had tripped the supporting spring, the fake rehearsal, the tuning of his will to that of Clason—step by step the whole cunning scheme unfolded itself to him now.

But what could be the purpose behind this villainy? Only one answer seemed possible. Keane must be the one bent on selling the Death Projector, Philip the one who wished to frustrate the fiendish transaction! And Quest of the Secret Service—he was to be the tool to force the sale.

With the soundless scream of rage Quest's will hurled itself against Keane's. The two met like infuriated bulls, and for an instant too brief to be pictured as a lapse of time they poised immovable. But two wills can not exist on equal terms in a single body, and in this case the vibration of both was that of Clason. Quest had challenged the Master Will. He could do no more. It hurled him back, crushed him like foam, compressed him to the proportions of an atom in the background of his consciousness. So brief and unequal was the conflict that in the next breath Clason had all but forgotten the presence of the stolen will within him. When he was ready to use his Agent, that would be time enough to summon him!

Despite this suppression, Quest began to see dimly through strange eyes, and to hear vaguely with ears that were not his own. Feelers, tentacles, some intangible kind of conduits carried thought impulses to him from the Master Will. He received these impressions vividly, but those which he gave off in return were so weak, due to the subjection of his will, that Clason was entirely unconscious of any response. Quest was not enough of a scientist to be astonished at the ability of a disembodied mind to experience sense impressions in the body of another. He was only glad that the darkness and silence were growing less. Very, very slowly he was awakening to a new kind of consciousness—the consciousness of another person's Self. He hated and loathed that Self, yet it was better than the awful blankness that had gone before.

Suddenly, as light grew brighter and sound more clear and definite, a new element entered—the element of hope. At first it was feeble: its only suggestion was that sometime, somehow, he might escape this prison. But it was like water to a parched plant. It caused his will to expand, to extend its feelers, to press up a little more bravely against the crushing pile of the Master Will.

Now another surprise sprang upon him. He was moving! That is, Clason's body was moving in some kind of a conveyance, which was threading its way through crowded streets. Stores, buildings, buses, people—Quest remembered them all distantly as things he had known thousands of years ago. The driver turned his head, and his profile seemed vaguely familiar.

Now a rush of foreign thoughts drowned out his own. They were a sort of overflow from the mind of Clason. They thronged along the conduits that bound the two wills together, but only Quest was conscious of the movement.

Keane's mind was on his brother Philip: that much was particularly clear. And there was something about a telephone call. Yes, Keane had telephoned to the police, disguising his voice, refusing to divulge his name. He had said that a man by the name of Philip Clason was in trouble and had told them where to find him. Then the police had telephoned the factory, and Keane had pretended astonishment and alarm at the news. That's why he was here now—he was on the way to confer with the police. And he was chuckling—chuckling because he had fooled Quest and the police, and because now the hundred million dollars was almost in his grasp.

Cutting in close, the car turned a corner and drew up before one of a row of loft buildings in a section of the city which Quest failed to recognize. As Clason stepped to the sidewalk, Quest was more painfully aware than ever of his powerlessness to influence by so much as the twitch of a muscle the behavior of this hostile body in which he had permitted himself to be trapped. In his weakness he felt himself shrinking, contracting almost to nothingness under the careless pressure of the Master Will.

Clason glanced casually at his watch, and three men converged toward him from as many directions. There was nothing to distinguish them from anyone else in the street, but along the conduits it came to Quest that they were detectives and that they were there by appointment with Keane Clason.

"What floor?" asked the latter, with an excitement which Quest felt instantly was pure pretense. "Are you sure they haven't spirited him away?"

"Don't worry," replied the leader of the detectives. "The alley and roof are covered. We'll take care of the rest ourselves."

On tiptoe they climbed three long flights of stairs in the half-light. Clason held back as if in fear. He was a good actor, and Quest felt the shrinking and hesitation of his body as he crouched and slunk along in the wake of the detectives, pretending terror at what was about to happen, though he knew—and Quest knew he knew—that there would be no resistance up there—that Philip would be found alone exactly as he had been left by Keane's hired thugs.

On the top landing Burke, the leader, paused to count the doors from front to rear.

"This is it," he whispered to the bull-necked fellow just behind him.

The other nodded, and crouched back against the opposite wall while his companions placed themselves in position to cross-fire into the room the moment the door gave way.

Quest longed for the power to kick his hypocrite of a master as he still held back, cowering on the stairs, playing his fake to the limit. Then the door flew in with a splintering shriek under the charge of the human battering ram, and across it hurtled the other two detectives in a cloud of ancient dust.

"Here he is!" someone shouted.

"Phil! Phil!" Keane Clason's voice fairly quavered with sham emotion as he ran into the room and threw himself at a man tightly bound to an upholstered chair, which in turn was wedged in among other articles of stored furniture.

But Philip was too securely gagged to reply, and as Burke slashed the ropes from across his chest he dropped forward in a state of collapse. Stretched on a couch, he soon gave signs of response as a brisk massage began to restore the circulation to his cramped limbs. Suddenly he sat up and thrust his rescuers aside.

"What time is it?" he demanded with an air of alarm.

"One o'clock," replied Keane before anyone else could answer, patting his brother affectionately on the shoulder while within him Quest writhed with indignation. "By Jove! Phil, it's wonderful that we got to you in time. Really, how—you're not injured?"

"No," grunted Philip, "just lamed up. I'll be as fit as ever by to-morrow."

"If you feel equal to it," suggested Burke, "I wish you'd tell me briefly how you arrived here. Do you know the motive behind this affair? Did you recognize any of the body-snatchers?"

Philip frowned and shook his head.

"Yesterday noon," he said slowly, "I took the eight-passenger Airline Express to Cleveland on business. There were three other passengers in the cabin—two men and a woman. Right away I got out a correspondence file and was running over some letters. The next thing I knew I was approaching the ground in the strangest state of mind I ever experienced. My head was splitting, and everything looked unreal to me. Seemed as if I was coming down on some new planet."

"You mean the ship was gliding down to land?"

"No, no. I was dangling from a parachute.... By the way, where am I now?"

"In a Munson Avenue loft."

"In Chicago?"

Burke nodded.

"I guessed as much," frowned Philip. "You see, I came down in a field, and then before I could free myself from my trappings I was pounced on—trussed up and blindfolded—by a gang of men. I knew they had taken me a long distance by automobile, but I saw nothing more until they tore the blindfold from my eyes when they left me here."

"And they were all strangers to you?"

"Yes—those that I saw."

"Isn't this enough for just now, Burke?" interrupted Keane, and Quest received an impression of uneasiness that was not apparent in the inventor's tone. "After a good rest he's sure to recall things that escape him now."

"Just one minute," nodded the detective, turning back to Philip. "Can you think of no plausible reason for this attack? Is there no one who might possibly benefit by putting you temporarily out of the way?"

Philip gave a frightened start. Then he was on his feet, clutching at his brother's arm.

"Keane!" he pleaded, "Keane! What's happened? I know, I know! It's the Projector."

"Water!" roared Keane, and Quest felt the panic that coursed through him as he tried to drown out his brother. "Somebody bring water! He needs it!"

At the same time he snatched up Philip's hand in a grip of steel. Instantly the latter's wild eyes became calm, the flush passed from his relaxing face, and he slumped down weakly on the couch.

In that fleeting moment Quest surged into the body of Philip and confronted his will with a fierce and triumphant ardor. For now his will would have command of a body with which to fight his fiend of a Control.

With a sensation of contempt he met Philip's resistance and buffeted him ruthlessly backward, crushed down and compressed his feebly struggling will. And as Philip yielded, Quest felt his own will expanding to normal, taking possession of the borrowed body with hungry greed, and flashing from its faded eyes the spark of youth.

Burke stared in amazement at the kaleidoscopic rapidity of the changes in the rescued man's expression. Strange lights and shadows continued to flit across Philip's face as Quest's invasion of him proceeded, but with a diminishing frequency which soon assured Keane that his Agent was tightening his command.

The younger of Burke's aides stood fascinated, his mouth agape. The other spoke guardedly to his superior:

"Dope, eh!"

"Nah!" replied Burke, shrugging himself out of his trance. "Shock."

The actual duration of the conflict in Philip was something less than three seconds. It would have been more brief if Quest had exerted himself to the utmost. But his sensations as he first surged into this new habitat under Keane's propulsion were so weird and unearthly that for the moment he was lost in the wonder of the experience. For that short time, therefore, Philip was able to fight back against the onrush of the invading will.

In the next second Quest became conscious of the resistance. Urged on by his Control, he must push Philip back and quell him; but his sympathy for his opponent and his hatred of Keane roused him to sudden revolt. He wanted to disobey the Master Will, retreat, leave Philip in command of himself. But he could only go on, unwillingly thrusting back Philip's will despite the indescribable torment and confusion in his own. Then, with the feeling that he was ten times worse than the most inhuman ghoul, he took full possession of his borrowed body.

"I'll take him home now," said Keane composedly to Burke. "As you see, he needs a little extra sleep. Meanwhile, if you have any occasion to call me, I will be at the factory."

To the youthful mind of the Agent, used to the lightness of an athletic physique, the body in which it moved down the stairs to the limousine seemed strangely heavy and awkward.

"I'm badly done up, Keane," he said with Philip's lips as the car got under way.

"Bah!" snorted Keane, "you've had a scare, that's all. Go to bed when you get home and sleep till nine this evening. At ten a man named Dr. Nukharin will call for you. He will drive you to a garage, leave the car, and transfer to another one a few blocks away.

"Out near Marbleton you will find an airplane staked in an open field. Nukharin is a capable pilot. He will fly back southeast along the lakeshore to the meeting place. You should arrive about twelve-thirty. The test is set for one o'clock."

Quest listened in a state of abject rage. Lacking the power to resist his Control, he could only boil away in Philip's body like a wild creature hemmed in by bars of steel.

"Bring with you," continued Keane venomously, "the set of papers that you took from the safe in my office. Hold the other set in readiness to deliver to Nukharin to-morrow, after he has studied the results of the test and has notified Paris to release a hundred million dollars in cash for delivery at your Loop office at 3 p. m."

The murderous greed of the man maddened Quest. He tried to revolt, his will squirming like a physical thing, threshing the ether like a wounded shark in the sea. For a moment he felt that he was about to burst the bonds that his demon of a Control had woven around him. So violently did he resist that the immured and sporelike will of Philip forged up fitfully out of the blackness and joined his in the hopeless struggle. But along the attenuated conduits that still chained Quest to the Master Will Keane caught the impulse of the mutiny, and his eyes darted flame as he countered with a will-shock that paralyzed his unruly Agent.

"Listen! you whimpering dog," he snarled. "Think as I tell you—and nothing more! You are going to apologize to Dr. Nukharin for your previous unwillingness to sell the Projector. You are going to tell him that I am at fault—that I held out—but that you found a way to force my compliance. You understand?"

Quest could find no words. With Philip's head he nodded meekly. Just then the car stopped and the chauffeur threw open the door.

Dr. Nukharin flew high despite the masses of cumulus cloud which frequently reduced visibility to zero. He had merely to follow the rim of the lake to his destination, and an occasional glimpse of the water was sufficient to hold him on his course.

In the back seat hunched Philip, his body crumbling under the weight of Quest's despair. For hours the latter had gone on vaguely, hoping somehow to thwart this horrible transaction that was rushing the world to its doom, thinking he might grow strong enough to wrench himself free and so liberate Philip from the dominance of his conscienceless brother. Even though such a move should leave his own will forever separate from his body, he was ready and anxious to make the sacrifice.

Suddenly the crash of the motor ceased and Nukharin banked the ship up in a spiral glide. Quest had never been in the air before, and the long whirl down into the darkness on this devil's errand was to him as eery as a ride to perdition in a white-hot projectile.

His mind seemed to trail out in a great nebular helix behind the descending ship. He felt that he had suddenly crossed some cosmic meridian into a new plane of existence, where he was changed to a gas, yet continued capable of thought. But even here his obsession remained the same. Keane Clason—trickster, traitor, arch-criminal—must be destroyed!

"I'll get him!" vowed Quest in words that were no less real for being soundless. "I'll trail him to the end of space and bring him to account!"

Then wheels touched earth and the cold, bare facts of his destiny rushed in on him with redoubled force. He felt the nearness of his Control seconds before he perceived him through the eyes of Philip. With a sensation like a stab he realized that now he must speak, play his part, be any bloodless hypocrite that Keane Clason chose to make him. The silent order surged down the conduits promptly enough; he responded as an automaton obeys the pressure of a button.

"Well, Doctor," chuckled Philip with a cunning leer, "here's the magic tower, just as I promised you. We'll run it up in a jiffy. This test is going to be so vivid and conclusive that not even a hard-headed skeptic like you can raise a question."

"You misunderstand me," returned Nukharin in an injured tone. "So far as I am concerned this procedure is only a formality, but it is none the less necessary. Suppose that I should spend a hundred million of my government's money and the purchase prove worthless? You may guess that my folly would cost me dear."

Keane Clason was waiting on the platform of a giant truck, the motor of which was idling. All the apparatus was in readiness except that the three demountable sections of the tower had yet to be run up into position.

"One of the beauties of the D. P.," said Philip gleefully to the Doctor, while Keane smiled slyly to himself, "is that this pint-size dynamo provides all the current needed for the test. We pick the power for our radio right out of the air by means of a wave trap and mensurator invented by this bright little brother of mine," and he clapped Keane patronizingly on the back.

"Yes, ah—Dr. Nukharin," ventured Keane timidly, and at that moment Quest experienced the raging red hatred that causes men to murder. "Philip has promised me that you will employ this device only as a threat to hold the ambitions of the larger powers in check."

"Of course, of course!" replied the Doctor heartily. "But now let's have the test. Even at night I'm not too fond of these open-air performances."

The height of the tower as they ran the upper sections into place was forty feet. When all connections had been inspected, first by Keane, then by Philip, the former led Nukharin aloft.

As the climax of his plot approached, Keane's excitement bordered on a cataleptic state, hints of which came confusedly through the conduits to Quest. With a peculiar satisfaction he felt that Keane was suffering. The inventor's jaws became rigid, as though his blood had changed to liquid air and frozen him, and he had difficulty in controlling the movements of his arms.

Now he was afraid! Genuinely afraid, this time. Quest caught the impulse too clearly to doubt its meaning. This was no sham! Keane was doubting his own machine, fearing that in the crisis some element in the finely calculated mechanism might fail to operate, thus cheating him of the blood-money on which his heart was set. Then he was speaking, and even Nukharin noticed the tremor in his voice:

"These nine tubes, which look like a row of gun barrels, are molded from silicon paste. Each shoots a beam of invisible light and a radio dart of precisely the same wave length. The destructive effect depends chiefly upon this exactness of synchronization."

"A question occurs to me," said the Doctor: "will others be able to manipulate the machine as successfully as you can?"

"It's fool-proof," chattered Keane, almost losing control of his voice, "absolutely fool-proof. Surely you have scientists in your country who can follow written directions! Nothing more is necessary."

"Very well," shrugged Nukharin. "I only want to be sure that no unforeseen difficulties may arise in an emergency."

"See this range-setter?" continued Keane. "The thread on the vertical shaft enables us not only to limit the range by angling the beams into the ground, but it can also be disengaged and the Projector revolved in a flat circle for maximum ranges."

"And is there no danger of the machine going wrong—of destroying itself and us?" suggested Nukharin.

"None whatever, Doctor. There is no explosive force and no great electrical voltage involved. As long as we stand back of the muzzles we have nothing to fear.

"Now look. I have set the micrometer at three hundred yards, which will just about cover the stretch between ourselves and the lake. I will cut a swath for you—and every bush, every blade of grass, every insect in this swath will be withered to ash in the twinkling of an eye. The destruction will be absolute."

"Please proceed," said Nukharin grimly.

Keane pulled a lever in its slot, then pressed it down into its lock as his projection battery swung lakeward at the desired angle. Then with one hand poised on another lever, he pressed an electric button.

At the controls below, a bulb flashed on and off. The signal was superfluous, for already Quest had received his silent command from the Master Will. An icy dread fastened on him. He must obey the unspoken command; he had no will of his own with which to resist. The test would be a success; the Projector would be sold; the world would be turned into a shambles. And he, Owen Quest, would be the destroyer, the murderer, the weak fool who made this horror possible.

All this flashed through the Agent's mind in the fraction of a second that it took him to extend Philip's hand, close the switch of the dynamo, and snap on the alternating lights in the housing over the tellurium filter.

For an interminable five seconds he waited, in a ferment of revolt which the paralysis of his will made it impossible to put into action. Then again the command pulsed within him, the signal bulb flashed, and he reversed his motions of the moment before.

Cold sweat cascaded down Philip's face as Quest felt the ladder vibrating under descending feet. He longed for the power to hurl Keane Clason to the ground and turn the Projector upon him. But with an awful irony the Master Will forced him to his feet, and to speak in a tone that withered the manhood within him.

"Come," said Philip in a triumphant tone to Nukharin, "and I will show you that Clason inventions perform as well as they sound."

Flashlight in hand, he started toward the lake with Nukharin and his brother close behind him. Twenty paces, and the long meadow grass suddenly vanished from beneath their feet.

"See that!" whispered Philip excitedly, waving the light from side to side to show the forty-foot swath that stretched away before them. "Not a trace of life left, not a blade of grass—nothing but dust!"

The only response was a gurgling sound that issued from Nukharin's throat.

"Look!" Quest formed the word with Philip's lips under the urge of the Master Will. "Here was a tall bush. What do you see now? Just a teaspoonful of ash. When you examine the remains by daylight, you will find that even the root has disintegrated to a depth of two feet."

"Enough of this," croaked Nukharin in horror. "The deal is closed."

His face was convulsed with fear. Without another word he whirled about and fled toward his airplane. Philip gave a start as if to follow.

"Halt! you slob," growled Keane, whose composure had returned with the successful outcome of the test. "I have use for your company, even though you are as great a coward as our Slavic friend."

Coward! The epithet stung Quest like a flaming goad. One of the fine, intangible lines that bound him under the will of Keane Clason severed, and his own will exploded into action like a thunderbolt. With startling agility he whirled Philip about, the flashlight clubbed in his hand. But Keane was quicker still. A clip on the wrist sent the weapon flying. Then Philip reeled backward from a kick in the stomach, and his clutching hands beat the air as he sank unconscious in the dust.

With a violent tug, Quest lifted Philip's body to a sitting posture. The phone was ringing, and by the pull on the will-fibers he knew that Keane was at the other end of the wire. Philip's body was failing under the strain of the part it was forced to play, and the blow of the night before had further weakened it. Now he sat rocking his head painfully between his hands. But Quest lifted him to his feet by sheer will, and he staggered across the room.

"Hello!", he said in a hoarse voice.

"Get the hell out here to the factory!" rasped Keane, and the crash of the receiver emphasized the command.

It was one o'clock as Philip whirled his sedan into Olmstead Avenue. At three, reflected Quest as the car scorched over the pavements, he must be at the downtown office to deliver the papers and receive the money.

Then he was face to face with Keane, reeling dizzily at the hatred that blazed from the latter's accusing eyes.

"Double-crossed me, eh!" The voice was a low snarl, and as he spoke Keane thumped the extra outspread on his desk. "But you're not going to get away with it—neither of you!"

Dismay, hope, dread, wonder robbed Quest of the power to speak. But he whirled around behind the desk with such unexpected violence that Keane staggered back in alarm. Then he was devouring the screaming headlines of the newspaper. Three seconds, like a slow exposure, and every word of the Record's great scoop was etched upon his mind as if with caustic:

DOOM LAUNCH ADRIFT ON LAKE

Physician Baffled by Condition of Five Bodies Found in Craft

Blighted Area on Shore Said to Have Bearing on Tragedy

THAW HARBOR, IND., June 6.—Five Chicago sportsmen, most of them prominent in business and society, perished in the early hours this morning while returning in the launch of A. Gaston Andrews from a weekend camping party near Hook Spit on the Michigan shore.

The boat was towed into this port at daybreak by the Interlake Tug Mordecai after being found adrift less than a mile off shore. According to Captain Goff of the Mordecai the death craft carried no lights and he barely avoided running her down. The weather along the Indiana shore was perfect throughout the night and there is nothing to indicate that the launch was in trouble at any time. The bodies are unmarked, and this little community is agog with rumors ranging all the way from murder and suicide to the supernatural.

Dr. J. M. Addis of Thaw Harbor, the first physician to examine the bodies, says that they appear to have suffered some violent electro-chemical action the nature of which cannot be determined at the moment. This statement is considered significant in view of the reported discovery ashore of a large blighted area almost directly opposite the point where the launch was found. Joseph Sleichert, a farmer who lives in that vicinity, reports that this patch of ground extending back from the lakeshore was completely stripped of vegetation overnight. He ascribes the damage to some unknown insect pest. Others say that the condition of the ground indicates that it has been burned at incinerator temperatures. Nothing is left of the soil but a blue powder.

Philip faced his brother with eyes that were dull with agony.

"You have made me a murderer!" Quest forced out the words in painful gasps.

But Keane snapped back at him like a rabid dog.

"You did it—you did it yourself! You tampered with the Projector. You tried to spoil the test. You changed the range. You tried to kill me, and instead you killed these others. And you're going to pay—both of you. You hear me?—you're going to pay!"

His voice mounted the scale to a scream. It was a wail of unreasoning terror, of the dread of exposure, of the fear that he would fail to collect the fortune now so nearly in his grasp. The accident that had jarred his well-laid plans had unnerved him.

Frantically Quest strove to answer him, to explain his utter subjection, as Agent, to say that if he had possessed the will to oppose or trick him he would have turned him over to the police, or might even have killed him, at the very outset. But in his frenzy, Keane had so tightened his control that Quest was speechless. Now he tried to substitute gesture for words, but Philip was rooted to the spot like a statue; even his hands were immovable.

He might have remained in this state indefinitely had not Keane's fears withdrawn his mind from his immediate surroundings. Momentarily he forgot Quest, Philip—everything but himself and his predicament. And in the instant that his vigilance relaxed, Quest's enslaved will experienced a sudden lease of strength and hope. Independently of his Control, he found that he could move Philip's hand, could take a faltering step.

But now, what to do? How might he fan this feeble spark of volition to sufficient strength for decisive resistance? The idea came to him: if only he could place distance between himself and Keane, perhaps with one titanic effort he might launch himself against the Master Will, take him by surprise, crush him down, and reverse him to the status of Agent instead of Control.

With infinite effort Quest forced Philip's body step by step across the room. He must reach that window, get a signal of distress to someone in the street.

But Keane began to sense a mutiny. He followed. He crossed the floor with slinking, tigerish steps and snaking body. His wet lips writhed back over his teeth, and his contorted features wove the leer of the abyss. Now as his Control drew physically near, Quest felt his mite of strength ebbing fast. Slowly Keane reached up with his clawed fingers and grasped his Agent by the arm.

"Remember!" he hissed, "if these deaths are traced to us, you break down—you confess—you take the blame—you paint me lily white—you describe the cowardly means by which you moulded me to your will—you plead only for a quick trial and the full penalty of the law. You understand?"

Quest made no reply, but he understood all too well the hideous intention of his betrayer. What a fool he had been to imagine that Keane Clason would ever restore him to his body! Philip to the chair, Quest a homeless spirit wandering in space, and for the body at the bottom of the tank, the brief regrets of the Department!

A sudden rushing sound filled the air with a sense of action and alarm.

Two—three—four speeding automobiles swung in recklessly to the curb and shrieked to a standstill under smoking brakes. Men leaped out and deployed on the run to surround the factory. Keane darted to the door and twisted the key.

"Come on!" he spat at Philip as he snatched back the rug and threw open the trap door.

The command galvanized Quest to action. In two bounds he had Philip on the stairs. A heavy impact rattled the office door just as he dropped the trap into place over his head. Then, infected with Keane's panic, he was running down the passageway like mad.

Inside the tank chamber the brilliantly colored rings of liquid flashed back the rays of the arclight. Half crazed with anxiety, Keane danced on the black ledge like a monkey on a griddle. His face was ashen, drool ran from his twisted mouth, his eyes were two black pools of terror.

Again Quest experienced the peculiar sensation which came with the slackening of control. New hope sprang up in his agonized being as heavy blows boomed against the air-locked door. Great waves of fear poured along the conduits, betraying to the Agent the state of mind of his Control. Now what would Keane do? What could he do? Why, of all places, had he fled down into this blind burrow?

Thud, thud! Then came a series of sharp reports. Outside, they were trying to shoot away the deep-sunk disk hinges.

Still the door stood fast, but the fury of the assault on it whipped the faltering Keane to action. In a bound he was on the platform. With a lightning hand he threw the switch to plus, starting electrolytic action in the tank. Then he pressed a button concealed under the edge of the switch-mount and a panel slid silently aside in the wall, revealing a narrow outlet.

To Quest everything went a flaming red. He might have known that this fox would have something in reserve—a way of escape when danger threatened!

But his Control gave him no time for independent thought. He forced Quest to turn Philip's eyes up to his own. Without disconnecting that grip of his glittering eyes, Keane leaped back to the ledge. Quest felt the silent order:

"Get up on that plank! Dive into the tank! Get back into your own body, let Philip have his! Then come up—the two of you—and face the music. For I'll be gone, and your story will sound like the ravings of a maniac."

Quest took an obedient step toward the platform. But at the same instant a tremendous crash shivered the door. It seemed to unnerve Keane Clason. With a gasp he sank down upon the steps, his body doubled in pain, his hand clutching at his heart. Another crash followed, and he shuddered and cried out.

Instantly Quest felt an expansion of the will. Keane's sudden physical weakness had loosened his control. Philip's lips worked painfully as Quest forced him to pause, to disobey the command of the Master Will. In a spasm of will he fought to wrench himself free from the countless clinging tentacles of his Control. In great surges, Quest's reviving volition pounded against the walls of his borrowed body. Now he sought to force this sluggish body back to the wall, so that he might release the airlock and spring the door. But Philip seemed to ossify, every cord and muscle of his body frozen to stone by the conflict that raged within him.

Braced against the wall, Keane was rising slowly to his feet. His seizure was easing, and so he was able to exert a better pressure upon his rebellious Agent.

"Come!" he gasped, realizing that he lacked the strength to escape alone and must therefore change his plan. "Lift me—quick! Carry me out! Slide the panel back into place. We will escape together!"

The spoken command turned the balance against Quest. His will yielded to the master. At the same instant Philip's body relaxed like an object relieved of a great excess of electrical potential. Suddenly strong and supple, he lifted the trembling Keane and tossed him across his shoulder.

For a moment there had been a lull in the assault on the door. Now the battering resumed with a fury that jarred the whole chamber and sent ripples dancing across the varicolored liquids in the osmotic tank.

"Quick!" gasped Keane. "Move! I say. Carry me out."

But he was in a fainting condition. Crash after crash rocked the chamber, and with every blow Quest's will felt a stimulation that enabled him to stand off the commands of his Control. Then a wave of nausea swept over him and left him reeling. It seemed that Philip's blood had turned to boiling oil. A dazzling mist swallowed him up, and with a weird sense of inflation he felt full strength returning to his will.

A booming blow that bulged the door inward acted upon him like a stage player's cue. He leaped to the platform. The gurgling sound of remonstrance rattled from Keane's throat. But Quest paid no heed. Philip was walking the plank—away from the open panel—out over the tank.

Rapidly he dropped down the ladder to the bottom rung, snatched Keane's wrist in a gorillalike grip, and hurled him down into the vat.

Then Philip was clinging desperately to the ladder, his strength gone, his body shivering as if with ague.

"Go on up!" came a strange, impatient voice from below him. "For heaven's sake let me out of here!"

A downward glance, and with a shout of alarm Philip was scrambling up the ladder, for there was a head down there, and a pair of naked shoulders, and the face of a man he had never seen before. Hand over hand Quest followed. Philip had collapsed and lay prone on the plank. Quest lifted him to his feet and shook him anxiously.

"Philip!" he urged. "Philip! Can you walk?"

The tattoo on the battered door helped to revive the older man.

"Quick!" whispered Quest, kneading Philip's arms. "There's barely an hour left. Get to your office. Burn the papers. Refuse the money. Do you hear me?"

Philip nodded dazedly.

"Hurry!" puffed Quest, thrusting him through the opening that Keane had reserved for his own escape, and sliding the panel back into place.

Quest was himself now—young, strong, free. Instantly he threw the electrolytic switch to minus. For Keane had failed to emerge from the tank, and since he was submerged alone, he could not escape until electrolysis was halted.

Just as Quest leaped from the platform to release the airlock, the door burst in and three men with drawn guns rushed into the chamber.

The leader stopped with a startled oath and stood blinking his unbelieving eyes. Quest was poised like a statue, his naked body gleaming an unearthly white against the lusterless black of the wall.

"Quest," came from the three in chorus. Then a rush of questions: "What's the matter? What's happened to you? Where are the Clasons?"

Quest turned toward the platform, expecting to see Keane.

"Something's wrong!" he shouted. "Quick! Somebody get Philip. He's gone to his Loop office. Keane Clason's at the bottom of this tank. I'm not sure how this thing works, but Philip can get him out! I'm sure of it!"

Despite the confident predictions of both Quest and Philip Clason, osmotic association failed to restore Keane to life, and at last the coroner ordered the removal of the body. The autopsy revealed heart disease as the cause of his death.

For reasons best understood at Washington, the cause of the five launch deaths was withheld from the public. Quest's punishment for his part in the crime consisted of a promotion and a warm personal letter from the President of the United States.

#The Stolen Mind #M. L. STALEY #Scifi #science fiction #short stories #mind snatchers #Owen Quest #Keane Clason #Phillip Clason #public domain characters #public domain stories #public domain

[ilaiyayaya]

I Hate Twitter So Much

Ok so now Twitter is pretty much dead to me, soooo here I am, tbh I probably should've made another account here a long time ago, Tumblr has always fit my personal preferred use of social media far better than Twitter ever has. I used to have a Tumblr years ago but that was a very long time ago, and I deleted that account precisely because I was moving to Twitter, but now that place is a hellhole so I am returned. I didn't really use Twitter very much anyways so it wasn't really much of a loss, the only social media I've really used substantially in recent years is Discord, so I'm mostly just using this as an opportunity to spread out to more platforms again instead of staying within my small bubble that I've kept to for the last 3 years.

I spent over 2 years being a NEET, during which time I pretty much didn't talk to anyone outside of 2 close friends, I effectively went silent on all social platforms, and even in online games I played I started exclusively playing solo (which tbf, I do a lot of the time even when I'm not a shut-in, but like, the reasoning for why I was doing it was different). I only got out of this period of my life when I got a job at the beginning of this year which forced me to leave my house, even now after over half a year, while I'm doing a lot better I'd still consider myself to be recovering from that period of near complete isolation. Speaking anywhere online is extremely anxiety-inducing for me and often literally makes me want to vomit after saying even the most inconsequential things, and while I've been improving in that regard it's been an extremely slow process, and to me this blog is hopefully going to be a major stepping stone into going back to how I used to be.

Really, I'm just gonna be using this the same way that most people normally use social media, which really shouldn't be that weird or special, but it is for me. Also a lot of the layout of this blog right now is not final (believe it or not, Rune Factory 3 "My mother is telling me to get a good job but my heart is telling me marry rich" screenshot is not planned to be there forever I know it's very sad), I'll slowly figure out how I want it to look over time and change it accordingly. I've already prewritten a couple of blog posts for the next couple of days that way I have no excuse not to at least post something, but after those I'll probably write most of these just on a whim whenever I feel like it, about really anything I feel like talking about.

Now let's hope the formatting on this doesn't look shit on the actual page 🙏

Also I know tags exist, I refuse to use them for this post, if someone wants to find this one they gotta search hard for it, it's like a fun little scavenger hunt and the reward is Misaka_Spin.gif!!!

[seakicker]

after having talked with the appropriate parties involved, there is one thing i would like to address in further detail because it would not be fair to them if i had kept on acting like nothing had happened and that they were in they wrong because they weren't. i had failed to address this previously in the past posts i've made here nor did i address it on my old blog before i ultimately deactivated on may 4th. i'll put it below a cut for length:

there isn't any excuse for me not addressing it previously and so i'm sorry for sitting around and trying to block it out of my mind instead of swallowing my pride and facing it. this was something i had failed to address alongside my other posts addressing other things like the accidental deadnaming comparison. i was cowardly then for not addressing it and for not talking to them directly in the past since my deactivation, considering that i threw out something wildly untrue and pinned the blame on someone for something they didn't do. i made a promise to improve and better interact with others and i hope to stick to that, so hopefully this is a good first step for me.

please don't think this is my way of going "haha we talked so everything is good now<3 :)" because i don't feel that way. i wouldn't ever want anyone to think that me doing the bare minimum deserves praise. this was frankly overdue on my part and i appreciate them for taking the time to listen to me despite me dragging my feet and failing to address this in the past.

in early may, i had accused thena/fauna (username at the time was ayatonomy) and ró (username at the time was bassslut) of spreading and leaking my real life name to shittalk me. let me start by saying that this is not true and that neither of them did such a thing, and it was wrong of me to falsely accuse people of violating my privacy when they simply did not do that and i didn't have any proof to substantiate what i said wholly because it didn't happen in the first place.

for context, sometime in april i had accidentally connected my youtube account which, at the time, had my irl name on it instead of 'juju', to my discord profile while i was trying to connect my PSN and download a program that shows people what you're watching on youtube in the discord progress bar (the bar that says what game you're playing or what program you're running) and i was not aware that i had connected my youtube account. i've always been a little picky about my privacy and what i choose to share with other people online/what i choose to share here, and seeing that i had made a mistake and shared something i wouldn't have ever shared normally kinda sent me spiraling. at the time, ró had pointed out that i put my irl name on my discord profile (through the youtube link) and i was extremely embarrassed that i had done something like that without knowing. i want to also clarify that ró did not point it out in a mocking or teasing way, it was an honest "oh do you know that your name is on your profile?" so please don't think anyone was trying to make fun of me. they weren't, and i had reacted poorly in response because i was embarrassed that i was careless enough to make a stupid mistake like that. it had gone against the active efforts i took to protect myself and my privacy and the disconnect between my desire to keep myself safe and i felt humiliated, stupid, and embarrassed.

i had accused them of shittalking me using my real life name because someone else had mentioned that fauna was talking about me in her server by name. looking back, i think i should have absolutely realized that there was something fishy by the fact that there was never even a single screenshot provided to me with proof that they were talking about me with my irl name, or at all. the referenced incident was something that already happened months previously and my irl name was never used or shared. i had assumed that this was something new and raw because i was still caught up in my own humiliation about sharing my irl name on accident and, thus, i had jumped to conclusions instead of taking a minute to think and approach the situation properly. as a result, i accused the two of them of something wildly untrue and, after having talked with them, i realize this is long overdue and i apologize for that. i won't ignore the false slander i've tried to force on people anymore. i mentioned yesterday that i don't want to pretend like i haven't done anything wrong anymore and i promise to stand by that, i'll be better about coming to terms with what i've done wrong and how i can be better moving forward.

there were other things we discussed privately, some personal feelings and things moving forward, but i wanted to put this out in the open because i had made the original accusation out in the open too. i hear your criticisms and concerns about my haughty and dismissive behavior and i will remember them as i move forward. i won't dismiss other people's concerns because i'm too afraid to tackle them head on, i'll be a smarter and more mature person who can deal properly with criticism and what i've done wrong. i'll be the first to admit myself that i don't take criticism very well and i can be a defensive person, and i promise i'll be a better listener and think with a level head moving forward.

finally, i want to address some hate. not so much hate i have received, but hate the two of them have received since i first deactivated. if you have ever sent anyone hate, threats, insults, violence, or anything of the sort as your own personal way of trying to support me or take sides, stop. if that is your way of showing support for me, i don't want it. don't follow me and don't interact with me if your way of showing love for me and my work involves putting others down, sending triggering content and threats to others, or blaming other people for my own mistakes and mishaps. honestly, the third party asks demanding anything of anyone and harassing anyone need to just stop in general. i have been in contact with involved parties and will continue to be, so please stop trying to take matters into your own hands by sending self-harm/death/SA threats, fatphobic hate, "this is all your fault" blaming asks to others, and anything like that. if i'm learning to better accept responsibility myself, please help me by not going into other people's askboxes and blaming other people for things that are my fault.

thank you for reading and understanding. i'll keep working to be a better version of myself, and let's all try to have a good time here instead of putting down others and sending horrible asks to other people.

#seakicker speaks

[rattusn0rvegicus]

Orchid, mahonia, camellia :)

Orchid: what’s a song you consider to be perfect?

Uhhhhh idfk tbh. I'm gonna go with Hopes and Dreams from the Undertale soundtrack because I scrolled down one of my playlists and that's the first one I could find that spoke to me [shrug emoji]

Mahonia: what place, thing, activity inspires you most and how do you express yourself when it does?

I would say animated movies inspire me the most, tbh. I don't know why I don't watch more, nowadays - I just don't have the time I guess. But nothing gets me more emotional and inspired than a good animated movie - or even a kind of subpar one.

Hiking also inspires me, especially in the mountains and big hills. I just love being out in nature in all its glory.

Another thing is probably just... seeing other artists. Little animated shorts on YouTube. Webcomics. Drawings on Twitter and Tumblr and Instagram. I really appreciate seeing art and I think that's why I like the furry community so much - it's so art-centric.

As for how I express myself, idk, I usually just draw or (sometimes) paint? Occasionally I'll write, usually journal, but sometimes work on fic, and rarely, I'll make up a few lyrics and a partial tune for a song. I've never completed a song, though, except for one.

Camellia:  what were you like when you were younger? do you think you’ve changed a lot?

I mean, all I wanted to do as a kid was Die For The Lord (tm) To Prove My Worth To Him, and also live in the wilderness with wolves (lol), and also run away and maybe die or find a new identity. But I was also a lot less... inhibited? And would kind of just do and say whatever (like run around on all fours howling and/or biting a classmate). I was a REALLY anxious kid, too, just in like a constant unrelenting anxiety attack about the looming apocalypse/Tribulation/Hell/etc. I think I've chilled out a bit about that - I still feel like the world's ending (in a different, slower, less Biblical way) but I've like, somewhat made my peace with it now?

My mental health has improved substantially since high school and the first handful of years of my young adulthood. Things aren't exactly great right now, but I'm not actively suicidal or delusional for the first time in nearly a decade which is pretty amazing. I think I've changed a lot in that respect. I was a fucking miserable and utterly hopeless teenager and I'm still kind of healing from it. Like, I'm jealous of kids who got to get hospitalized for mental health reasons as teenagers, and that's with me fully knowing how fucked up and unhelpful the MH system is.

I just... wish I had had the privilege of being somewhere safe from myself instead of hiding everything I was going through from everyone I knew, even my best friends. I feel this weird wave of jealousy when I hear stories of people who got help and attention as teenagers. Sometimes I just desperately wish I could have had that, even though it's partially my fault for hiding it all.

I've gotten better about the hiding, but it's still so, so hard for me to share shit.

My views on pretty much everything have changed substantially, I mean, I was a conservative fundamentalist Christian for the better half of my life and now I'm... whatever the hell branch of leftist agnostic heathenry I am now.

Idk. I'm basically a totally different person now, aside from my love for animals and art. That's the only thing that hasn't changed, really.

#personal #ask meme #doctor-rot #WOW i made myself sad askdjfhkjdsg

[callgespenst]

I've mentioned it before but I've been playing a lot of Dance Dance Revolution lately. I started going to the local arcade to play once or twice a week in early May, and I've already noticed some pretty substantial improvement! I figure I'll start keeping track of notable progress here.

A brief recap of what I can recall of the last few months:

May: I had heard about the local DDR crew from one or two friends and finally gave in and checked it out. I did not do very well at all that first outing (my shoes weren't particularly good for it, I wasn't dressed for it either, and my accuracy was /wildly/ off on the arcade machines. I got a B full combo on one song with mostly Greats/Goods). But I met some of the lads and had fun and got myself an E-Amuse card, which I always thought would be harder to obtain.

After that, I immediately went to the store, bought myself some better dancing shoes and the largest water bottle I could find at Target. And at that point, I really had to keep going, sunk cost and everything.

Summer: It took a few sessions, but I adjusted myself to the arcade machine timing and started hitting a lot more accurately. Keeping to 8s and 9s. I'd alternate between going on half price Wednesdays, and Thursday evenings when my wife was at her Japanese classes.

Fall: Went to the big local tournament at a Round1 two hours away. Didn't compete, but I met some new people and still had a good time. I feel like the start of fall was when the group started going to Round1 more in general (there's one just about an hour west) because R1 locations got the A3 upgrade and D&Bs, did not, for reasons that would take too long to get into here.

Winter: Being a dedicated rhythm gamer, on one of the rhythm games designed to get you real sweaty, is truly awful when it's cold out. This is largely because arcades are not designed to be workout facilities. You gotta go in there in warm clothes, get changed in the arcade bathroom, go do your sets, and then leave a sweaty mess and drive all the way home to shower. The first instant when you walk outside into the cold air is a truly rejuvenating sensation, which is cancelled out by the next five minutes of perspiration frozen all over while you wait for the car to warm up. And it hasn't even been a particularly intense winter thus far.

Current Status: I've cleared five (5) songs at a 13 difficulty. No. 13 (Expert), Burnin' Heat 3-Option Mix (Expert), Xenon (Expert), Leading Cyber (Expert), and today I cleared Legend of MAXX (Difficult). None of these were particularly inspiring clears (that last one, I flubbed the whole last jump sequence, and just barely skirted through), but it's still leagues better than I was performing just a few months ago.

I also have five (5) charts I've cleared on AAA difficulty. Bloody Tears IIDX (Difficult, 6), Dazzlin' Darlin' Remix (Difficult, 8), Sparkle Dreams (Basic, 8, Sightread), Sterling Silver (Difficult, 10), and Zephyranthes (Basic, 7, Sightread). Those last two I just did for the first time today! And I got my best clear on Dazzlin' Darlin' yet (996k, only two greats).

Present Goals: The hope is to go to Japan at some point later this year. By that time, I want to get to a point where I can play at an arcade abroad and feel semi-competent about it. The plan is to get myself to a point where I can at least AA clear: Bitter Chocolate Striker (Expert, 14), Possession (Difficult, 14), and Eon Break (Difficult, 13, but at present, this song is only available on LIFE4, which adds a degree of challenge).

The Path Forward: My footwork has definitely improved substantially, when I started out I'd get awful pain in the arches of my feet, but I haven't really gotten that in a while. I don't think I want to go no-bar, but I might rely on the bar a little too much.

I think the most important improvement I can make at this stage is to work on my breathing. Once I really start going, I really run ragged. I used to be able to breathe properly while I exercised, I just have to relearn how to while I dance.

The other big one is definitely developing the ability to read faster stepcharts. Anything above 400, maybe 450 BPM is too much for me at present. Here I think the best way forward is to slowly amp up the modifier on songs I'm already familiar with. I'll need to be able to read at least 750 for the goals I have set.

That's the full recap so far! My next arcade trip is this coming Wednesday, but I probably won't post an update every time I go, just when I pull off something particularly noteworthy.

...also, writing this up was a great excuse to hang out on the couch for an hour and not move, because wow, I am so exhausted after that last session. My only regret is that I really want to get up and get a snack, but my legs are jelly and there's a cat snoozing next to me.

#gespenst dancelog

[arcticgraverobber]

I just finished: Super Mario Bros. Wonder!

Mario, like a lot of people, was one of the first proper games I played when I was little, originally on the Wii. That first platformer I played, New Super Mario Bros. Wii (which of course is now over a decade old, never call your thing 'new') defined what Mario as a sidescroller was for a long time. With Wonder, Nintendo wants to go into a new direction with the series, but I wouldn't say it's a severe of a change as some people are saying.

The star of the show is, unlike most of the Mario games, not a star - it's the wonder flowers, the main collectible in this game. All of the more traditional levels have one in them, which when found changes the gameplay in some way. These end up being very similar to how a lot of the kirby games work - standard gameplay for most of the level and a short but fut diversion nearer the end of the level. It also is a way to bring something from Mario Odyssey into 2D Mario, many of the effects of the wonder flowers change your player into various different things - such as a goomba, or a spike ball. Largely, I did enjoy this element of the game, but it wasn't the revelation that it seems to have been for some.

The main improvement I've found is simply in how the game feels, the controls are much tighter and more fluid - 2D Mario for a long time felt quite clunky to play compared to other contemporary platformers, but this is one of the smoothest I've played in a while.

As well as the controls, the structure and pace of the game has been improved substantially as well - in between the standard Mario levels are many short special levels - race levels, 'arena' levels, and there's even one type called 'break' levels - which is what they do, they server to break up the main gameplay to stop it from getting monotonous, which can happen with any game, no matter how good the core gameplay is, hours of it unbroken by anything will tire the player - and a Mario game's not going to break it up with Story. Generally this is a really nice thing to see from Nintendo, who i generally think of as being somewhat stubborn about keeping games as having a traditional 'difficulty curve', something that i generally think hurts a game, having them include sections that are purposefully meant to be simpler to ease up on the player for a while is a welcome surprise.

The game also features an interesting passive online mode, which many have likened to the ones in Fromsoft's games. When playing levels you can see the ghosts of other players playing simultaneously playing through the level. When someone dies, other players can revive them by moving through their ghost - or - they can be revived by 'standees' that players can put down to help others, and also communicate certain things such as hidden blocks. I found this made the game a little less lonely.

To be honest, the best praise I can give the game is I did actually take the time to 100% it - though this may be a point of criticism for some, as I do think it was easier to do than other games in the series - I don't think I would of managed otherwise. However I did use the online system, so I would recommend leaving that off if you want more of a challenge. Anyway, I also wouldn't have 100% the game if I didn't enjoy it - and certainly not devour it within a week of getting it like I ended up doing - so the game must be doing something right.

Oh also Daisy is in the game so 10/10

Significance: 1/3

Grade: A

#game reviews #games #reviews #videogames #platformer #platformers #nintendo #mario #mario wonder #super mario bros #super mario

[waspsinyouryard]

I’m curious how everyone’s year was so please tell me what you favourite ----- from this year was! Answer as many or as few as you want! (Feel free to send this to other people and change it if you want)

Favourite Movie/Show you watched: 

Favourite Album you listened to:

Favourite thing you learned: 

Favourite book/comic: 

Favourite project you completed: 

Best impulse purchase?

Funniest joke you heard?

Strangest building you went in?

New food you discovered?

Most memorable conversation?

Prettiest sunset?

Favourite new outfit?

What are you proud of this year?

Favourite Memory from this year: 

Anything you would change? 

Anything you’re looking forwards to in the new year?

~Gumi

I'm going to try and answer all of these but I can already tell that some of these are going to be difficult:

1. Favorite movie/show

I don't really watch movies out of my own volition and I'm like the one Tumblr user who doesn't watch TV shows (and my memory is bad, so I could also be forgetting something) so my options are very limited:

The FNAF movie (which was laughably terrible)

Stranger than Fiction (a 2006 movie that was just. not good. I didn't like it.)

Rio 2 (a kid sitting next to me for a substantial amount of time was watching it and I could hear the audio)

Out of those options I'd probably have to say the FNAF movie was my favorite because it was bad in a funny way and also recency bias.

2. Favorite Album

My music consumption is almost exclusively video game soundtracks and I haven't really found any games to love the soundtrack of recently anyways so

3. Favorite thing I've learned

I can't think of any one piece of knowledge that stands out as my favorite. I'm just happy to know things tbh

4. Favorite Book/Comic

I read quite a few books (mostly the Warriors series, near the beginning of the year) but my favorite probably still has to be Love and Limerence by Dorothy Tennov. I reread it this year so it counts.

5. Favorite project I completed

Probably this ridiculous 14k word Wings of Fire fanfiction where the world ends tbh. It's kinda very rough, but I had a blast making it.

6. Best impulse purchase

A greenish-blue Hawaiian shirt

7. Funniest joke

Unironically this

Leave the poor woman alone :(

8. Strangest building

Probably the church I took those photos in tbh. I get that it's not that strange overall but it was for me

9. Best new food

I can't think of any new food, but I did discover that French fries and (to an admittedly lesser degree) saltine crackers make surprisingly good additions to toppings and/or fillings.

10. Most memorable conversation

This one's memorable in a bad way.

Essentially, it was a conversation between myself and a friend about a Minecraft server we were on where said friend told me that I managed to piss off every single other member of the server. Of course I was a bit distraught about this, and I decided that I just wouldn't play on it anymore. Before that I was basically the most active member by far.

The reason I remember it so well is because I'm still so baffled about why what I did (kill the Ender Dragon on the first day of a new world (after rules regarding doing so were specifically abolished) and kill the Wither like a week later) enraged these people so much that they called for my friend to ban me (he didn't, btw).

11. Prettiest sunset

All of them. Unless I'm trying to go west and the sun is shining in my eyes.

12. Favorite new outfit

The Hawaiian shirt I mentioned previously.

13. Things I'm proud of

Here's a list, not in any sort of order:

Writing that fanfic I mentioned earlier

Figuring out Tumblr API stuff so I could improve @postsofbabel. And I guess it in general.

My progress on a new fanfic set in the Warriors world, where being sold to 1D is a major plot point.

Surviving, tbh

14. Favorite memory

uh

15. Anything I would change

I would change a lot about 2023, but I simply do not think I would have the ability enact a lot of these changes if I could go back through this year again.

16. Anything I'm looking forward to

World of Goo 2. Probably more that I can't think of at the moment but World of Goo is excellent

#ask

[casspurrjoybell-28]

Alpha's Temptation - Chapter 53 - Part 1

*Warning Adult Content*

After our big fight, things became so much better.

I felt like I was able to get off my chest all the things that had been weighing on me since our forceful separation by Theo.

I also learned the extent of an Alpha's protectiveness over their mate, which is insanely intense and now I know not to push his boundaries.

It was unfair of me to let Jay go unchecked for so long.

I told Daemon everything about what had happened at school.

How Trent targeted me and almost killed me.

There was no stopping his vengeance then.

He and Lucien had him expelled and put under house-arrest.

Daemon wanted to banish him from the pack altogether but the council thought it was too harsh of a punishment for someone so young.

That was BS, in my opinion.

Daemon seethed about it for days.

As for me, I've been working on my stability.

Daemon helps, of course, ensuring I take my medication every night and that I eat enough.

I hate feeling like a burden to be taken care of but Daemon assures me that he loves me every time, giving me endless affection that practically makes me melt into his arms.

I love him more than anything.

I've been trying to better myself in different ways, like exercise or reading and while I'm no where near completely okay and don't think I will be for a long time, I feel like for once I'm just fine as I am.

I haven't spoken to Jay.

My friends and I avoid him at all costs at school and since summer is fast approaching, I really don't think we'll have a reconciliation before then.

Not that I want one.

He crossed the line. I understand that now.

And I respect and care for Daemon too much to ever let something like that happen again.

Wren isn't really allowed to associate with him either after Tristan found out about how Jay got him pregnant and ditched him after their hookup.

Wren says that after he told his mate the whole story Tristan wanted to rip Jays head off.

So yeah... Jay's not exactly on best terms with two of the most feared Alphas in the pack.

Daemon has also tried to lay off his crazy possessiveness, even despite looking like he wanted to rip off the head of an Alpha that flirted with me at my work the other day, unaware my mate was sitting at a table just a few feet away.

But he's trying for me and I love him for that.

I also have been trying to shut people down more directly so my kindness isn't taken advantage of again.

Another good thing is I've finally gained some substantial weight.

Gone is the hollowness of my stomach and the sharp boniness of my limbs.

I've filled out my figure nicely and it drives Daemon wild when I flaunt it.

The other day I wore a tight pair of shorts and a cropped tank out on a date and teased him the entire time.

I got what I wanted eventually because the second we got home and he all but ripped the outfit off and fucked me right there in the entry way.

I wear whatever I want because Daemon can fight.

I know that all too well.

And yeah, everything is perfect.

Except... well, except for the fact that I can't shake the feeling that I'm being watched.

I try to ignore it.

I mean, paranoia is a symptom of PTSD, so it could just be that.

And I don't want to let my mental problems rule my life.

But... it's just so there. Like I can feel it.

I haven't told Daemon, not because I don't want to but because I want him to believe I'm getting better.

He's been so proud of me lately for taking care of myself and not letting the negative emotions take hold of me and I feel that if I bring this up all that progress will go down the drain.

He'll think I'm back to my crazy, fearful ways.

And it's probably nothing. It has to be.

Daemon and I are out on a hike, courtesy of my new quest for self improvement.

He doesn't really like hiking but the second I said that I'd just go alone while I'm in preheat he sprung into action, grumbling as he pulled his boots on.

If there's one thing he'll never risk, it's my safety.

My friends call him overprotective but I adore it.

He doesn't even let me sleep downstairs on the couch when I doze off watching T. V. always scooping me up and taking me up to the bed room.

When he told me that it's because if an intruder broke in somehow I would be the first one they'd get to my heart absolutely melted.

Overcome with how much I love him I squeeze his hand, look to my right where he walks beside me.

He glances over and I can't help but smile, stopping our trek to pull him down and stand on my tip toes so I can press a kiss to his cheek.

A pleased expression comes to his face.

"What was that for?"

I nuzzle into his side as he wraps an arm around me.

"Oh, nothing. I just love you."

His eyes soften in affection, kissing me back but on the lips this time.

"My pretty baby," he coos and I giggle as he attacks me with more kisses on my face.

Yep. We are totally the lovey-dovey couple that people hate.

Lylah always acts like she's going to barf when Daemon can't keep his hands off me when we're all hanging out.

I never tell him to stop, though.

"Am I really that pretty?" I ask up at him and he raises an eyebrow in question.

"Ever looked in a mirror?"

I flush, loving the way it makes me feel when he calls me pretty.

I'm really starting to believe it now and it's a nice change compared to previously thinking I was ugly and disgusting my whole life.

"You know I'm serious, right? You're the most beautiful Omega I've ever seen," he continues, his eyes darkening with how serious he is and at this point I think I'm as red as a tomato.

I look down, the smile on my face literally hurting my cheeks at this point.

"Oh my God," I breathe.

"You're as bad at taking my compliments as ever," he jokes, pulling me against his chest and I hide in it.

"I-It's just overwhelming for me."

"You're the one who asked."

"Well... that's because I like when you say it," I confess embarrassingly, curling my hands into the fabric of his shirt.

"You're adorable," he rumbles, kissing my head as he strokes my hair behind my ear.

We start walking again but it's not long before I have to pee.

Daemon crosses his arms.

"Just go. No one's here."

"You're here," I pout up at him.

"Baby, are you forgetting that I've eaten you out on my father's dining table? There's no reason to be so shy," he smirks as my face explodes with color and I glare at him, smacking his chest.

"Naughty Alpha," I scold before marching off behind a tree.

I spot a shadow in the corner of my vision the second I'm behind the tree and no sooner is a wrinkled hand grabbing my arm and pulling me towards a large figure.

"Daemon..." I scream in terror as an Alpha's one green eye bores into my own, my stomach tightening in fear.

I need to get away.

In seconds my mate is there, wrenching me away from the man and into his arms.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" he growls at him as his hold on me tightens in protectiveness.

I let out a shaky breath as I look back at the Alpha.

He looks dirty, like he hasn't had a proper bathe in ages.

His hair is gray and long, strings of it falling over the hard lines of his face.

A huge scar runs across the left side of his face, right over his the socket of where an eye used to be.

But he still has the other... And that eye.

That eye that, once I look at long enough, turns my world upside down.

That's my eyes.

"Ash," the man says in a broken, raspy voice.

I shake my head, a sob catching in my throat as I look at him, at the expression on his face.

"Ash Willow. That's your name, right?" he asks in a pleading voice, stepping towards us.

"No, you back the fuck up," Daemon threatens, his body tensing around me. "I don't know who you are but..."

"D-daddy?" I finally manage to choke out the words, feeling like I'll faint.

"Yes... It's me, it's daddy."

The man's face seems to light up, crinkling in a desperate smile as his eyes gloss over with unshed tears.

"How? I... I can't, how can this..."

I barely get a few words out before I start to feel lightheaded.

My knees buckle and I fall into Daemon who's quick to scoop me up into his arms.

I bury my face into his chest, hyperventilating until my world goes black.