#i saw saturn shes pretty but like. eh.

[asswiper]

how the hell do amateur astronomers map asteroids n shit. i can barely find the moon in my telescope

#i saw saturn shes pretty but like. eh. #my eyes are NOT GOOD my telescope is a COMPLEX MACHINE the moving parts KEEP MOVING and the sky? the entire sky? never stops moving either #standing in one place trying to focus on a single dot of light is entirely impossible #my knees hurt my back hurts im sure something bit me #i rubbed catnip all over myself to stop the mosquitos #the people mapping asteroids for fun are absolute maniacs #here track this relatively tiny non-luminous thing across the night sky we wont pay you either #my eyes are exhausted and a raccoon growled near me #my celestron has a SCOPE. uou would think it would be helpful. its not. #its cool tho. i dont know what magicery it uses but the laser pointer is always at the same point in the sky no matter where you look at it #unfortunately tho the on switch is a turn dial. the way to readjust it is also a turn dial. u see the problem here #so ur in the fuckin dark being eaten alive by bugs the counterweight mechanic is confusing at best and everything sucks #i love astronomy but the whole manual telescope thing aint for me #just give me datasets to analyze ill do that in search of extraterrestrial goldmines #me? and my eyes? no telescope on earth can accommodate for visual snow and astigmatism #god who thought it was a good idea to give the blind person a telescope as a gift #anyways. how does the mm system work for the lense pieces i feel like things got smaller on the 15mm than the 9mm

[cptn-m]

One Piece chapter 1103 review

Back for the year of the dragon! I'd completely forgotten the zodiac colour spread was coming until I saw it. Franky absolutely wins this one with the hair and the decals on his shoulders. The axolotl-y looking dragon on Nami's top is also pretty cute.

This was perfect note for returning from the flashback to the present. It puts a bow on the last few emotional beats of the previous sequence. Bonney is emotionally and physically disarmed by what she's seen, becoming the child we now know her to be for a cooldown chat with Vegapunk, presumably after he was rescued from York. The sapphire necklace she gets for her birthday resembles other sun symbols used previously in the manga, such as Alabasta's flag, the middle of Kuma's church's crucifix and on the Kozuki crest. I'm guessing we'll see more and more of this imagery as the series builds up to its finale.

And we cut from this moment of wholesome vulnerability between a little girl and a guardian figure, to a much more heartbreaking kind as Bonney, even acting the grown-up again, is helpless in Saturn's clutches. It's so frustrating to imagine how she must feel, especially having learned everything we just saw, and not even being able to get a single effective hit in. It's personal for her. She has every reason to be able to find that last reserve of strength for the shonen emotional powerup, but it's just too much. But it's a very One Piece thing to leverage that kind of infuriating feeling of impotency. Unless you're Luffy (and even then) you're going to end up in this position, having to ask for help, at some point in your life. There's no shame in needing to call for help in this series.

The following exchange follows up two nit picks from the flashback sequence, once again exposing the risks of doing a week by week critique without seeing the full story. I actually really like the logic behind the Distorted Futures - wrapping it up in a child's logic and having it get limited by a more mature view of reality is a really fun view of the ability and would have been cool to see further explored. It can only be overpowered in the hands of someone drastically underpowered. The idea that the power as a whole was the result of an experiment is… eh, it doesn't actually add much in tangible terms, just ties off the loose end of no one knowing how Bonney got the fruit. And makes Saturn seem like more of a bastard in hindsight, not that he needed it. It's weird that he implies the Sapphire Scale was a side-effect of his work though. The doctors were talking about it like it was a rare but known-of disorder. Or does that just speak to the number of people Saturn has tried this one then released?

But also, the symbolic value of the bad guys literally creating a disease that makes people unable to walk in the freedom-representing sun is pretty good, so maybe we let this one slide.

And I also like that we're learning something about alternative Devil Fruit applications in the arc. I still haven't forgotten Oda's promise that Vegapunk would explain how inanimate objects could be made to eat Devil Fruits when he appeared in the story (from I think a Water Seven-era SBS) and I'm still waiting on that explanation. Come on, just a little more in that direction.

All evidence suggests it was Borsalino that fed Luffy, which is a fascinating, fascinating move for the character after so long putting his job before his feelings. Was it Saturn's cruelty that finally inspired a small act of rebellion, or was it just that this was the only opportunity he saw to strike back with some plausible deniability?

Kuma's rampage is the perfect climax to the chapter and just what the story needed after returning to the present. I would liked to have seen more of the battle damage from his encounter with Sakazuki sticking, but that's a small complaint in the grand scheme of things. From seeing the guy take more and more pain as the Marines try to gun him down, to Saturn's firing squad exploding, to the last second save of Bonney, this is a brilliant sequence. And despite his silence, we get a bit of evidence of what's happening to Kuma. This isn't some secret program or protocol put in his system by Vegapunk, Kuma truly has pushed through the mind wipe and is able to act on an extent of his own emotions and willpower. He has his Haki, and he has his anger. While I still think this battle ends in tragedy, I'm thrilled to see that punch land and see what happens next.

This is the start of a good year. Promises of Egghead's climax, the conclusion of Kuma's gripping narrative and a whole new (likely Elbaf) arc in the next 12 months makes me very excited to be on board for the ride.

My Wordpress.

#One Piece #OP1103 #Manga review #One Piece spoilers #bartholomew kuma #Monkey D Luffy

[rigmarolling]

Historical Holiday Traditions We Really Need To Bring Back

Here comes Santa Claus, and also a bunch of annual holiday Things we do to ensure he commits a truly boggling act of breaking and entering and leaves goods underneath the large plant in the living room.

Because I’ve always got a hankerin’ for the days of yore, here are some historical holiday traditions we really need to bring back:

1. Everything that happened on Saturnalia

Saturnalia was the ancient Roman winter festival held on December 25th--which is why we celebrate Christmas on that day and not on the day historians speculate Jesus was actually born, which was probably in the spring. 

Saturnalia was bonkers. As the name suggests, it celebrated the god Saturn, who represented wealth and liberty and generally having a great time.

Above: Their party is way cooler than yours could ever hope to be.

During Saturnalia, masters would serve their slaves, because it was the one day during the year when everybody agreed that freedom for all is great, actually, let’s just do that. Everyone wore a coned hat called the pilleus to denote that they were all bros and equal, and also to disguise the fact that they hadn’t brushed their hair after partying hard all week, probably.

Gambling was allowed on Saturnalia, so all of Rome basically turned into ancient Vegas, complete with Caesar’s Palace, except with the actual Caesar and his palace because he was, you know. Alive. 

The most famous part (besides getting drunk off your rocker) was gift-giving--usually gag gifts. Historians have records of people giving each other some truly impressive white elephant gifts for Saturnalia, including: a parrot, balls, toothpicks, a pig, one single sausage, spoons, and deliberately awful books of poetry. 

Above: Me, except all the time.

Partygoers also crowned a King of Saturnalia, which was a predecessor to the King of Fools popular in medieval festivals. The king was basically the head idiot who delivered absurd commands to everyone there, like, “Sing naked!” or “run around screaming for an hour,” or “slap your butt cheeks real hard in front of your crush; DO IT, Brutus.”

Oh, wait. Everyone was already doing all that. Hell yes.

(Quick clarification: early celebrations of Saturnalia did feature human sacrifice, so let’s just leave that bit out and instead wear the pointy hats and sing naked, okay? Io Saturnalia, everybody.)

2. Leaving out treats for Sleipnir in the hopes of avoiding Odin’s complete disregard for your property

The whole “leave out cookies and milk for Santa” thing comes from a much older tradition of trying to appease old guys with white beards. In Norse mythology, Odin, who was sort of the head god but preferred to be on a perpetual road trip instead, took an annual nighttime ride through the winter sky called the Wild Hunt. 

Above: The holidays, now with 300% more heavy metal.

Variations of the Wild Hunt story exist in a bunch of European folklore--in Odin’s case, he usually brought along a bunch of supernatural buddies, like spirits and other gods and Valkyries and ghost dogs, who, the Vikings said, you could hear howling and barking as the group approached (GOOD DOGGOS).

That was the thing, though; you never actually saw Odin’s hunt--you only heard it. And hearing it did not spark the same sense of childish glee you felt when you thought you heard Santa’s sleigh bells approaching as a kid--instead, the Vikings said, you should be afraid. Be VERY afraid.

Because Odin could be kind of a dick.

Odin was also known as the Allfather, and like any father, he hated asking for directions. GPS who? I’m the Allfather, I’m riding the same way I always ride.

And that was pretty much it: “I took this road last year and I’m taking it again this year.”

“But,” someone would pipe up from the back, “there are houses on the road now--we’re gonna run right into them. We could just take a different path; there’s actually a detour off the--”

“Nope,” Odin would say. “They know the rules. My road, my hunt, my rules. We’re going this way.”

So if you were unlucky enough to have built your house along one of Odin’s favorite road trip sky-ways, he wouldn’t just plow right past you.

He would burn your entire house down--and your family along with it.

Kids playing in the yard? Torch ‘em; they should have known better. Grandma knitting while she waits for her gingerbread Einherjar to finish baking? Sucks to be her; my road, my rules, my beard, I’m the Allfather, bitch.

Above: Santa, but so much worse.

To be fair to Odin, he could be a cool guy sometimes. He just turned into any dad when he was on a road trip and wanted to MAKE GOOD TIME, DAMN IT, I AM NOT STOPPING; YOU SHOULD HAVE PEED BEFORE WE LEFT.

To ensure they didn’t incur Odin’s road trip wrath, the Vikings had a few ways of smoothing things over with Dad.

They would leave Odin offerings on the road, like pieces of steel (??? okay ???) or bread for his dogs, or food for his giant, eight-legged horse, Sleipnir, because the only true way to a man’s heart is through his pet. 

People would generally leave veggies and oats and other horse-y things out for Sleipnir, whose eight legs made him the fastest flying horse in the world and also made him the only horse to ever win Asgard’s coveted tap dancing championship. 

(Side note: EIGHT legs...EIGHT tiny reindeer...eh? Eh? See how we got here? Thanks, nightmare horse!)

Above: An excellent prancer AND dancer. 

And if Odin was feeling particularly charitable and not in the mood for horrific acts of arson, children would also leave their shoes out for him--it was said that he’d put gifts in your boots to ring in a happy new year.

If all that didn’t work and the Vikings heard the hunt approaching, they would resort to throwing themselves on the ground and covering their heads while the massive party sped above them like a giant Halloween rager. 

So this holiday season, leave your boots out for Odin and some carrots out for his giant spider horse or you and your entire family will die in a fiery inferno, the end.

3. Yule Logs

Speaking of Scandinavia, another Northern European winter solstice tradition was the yule log. Today, if you google “yule log,” something like this will pop up:

...which isn’t an actual log, but is instead log-shaped food that you shove into your mouth along with 500 other cakes at the same time because it’s CHRISTMAS, and I’m having ME TIME; so WHAT if I ate the whole jar of Nutella by myself, alone, in the dark at 3 am?

But that log cake is actually inspired by actual logs of yore that Celtic, Germanic, and Scandinavian peoples decorated with fragrant plants like holly, ivy, pinecones, and other Stuff That Smells Nice before tossing the log into the fire.

This served a few purposes: 

It smelled nice, and Bath and Body Works scented candles hadn’t been invented yet.

It had religious and/or spiritual significance as a way to mark the winter solstice.

It was a symbolic way of ringing in the new year and kicking out the old.

Common belief held that the ashes of a yule log could ward off lightning strikes and bad energy.

Winter cold. Fire warm.

Everybody loves to watch things burn. (See: Odin.)

The yule log cakes we eat today got their start in 19th century Paris, when bakers thought it was a cute idea to resurrect an ancient pagan tradition in the form of a delicious dessert, and boy, howdy, were they right.

In any case, I’m 100% down with eating a chocolate yule log while burning an actual yule log in my backyard because everybody loves to watch things burn; winter cold, fire warm; and hnnnngggg pine tree smell hnnnnggg.

(Quick note:  The word “yule” is  the name of a traditional pagan winter festival, still celebrated culturally or religiously in modern pagan practice. It’s also another name for Odin. He had a bunch of other names, one of the most well-known being jólfaðr, which is Old Norse for “Yule father.” If you would like to royally piss him off, or if you are Loki, feel free to call him “Yule Daddy.”)

4. Upside down Christmas trees

I just found out that apparently, upside down Christmas trees are a hot new trend with HGTV types this year, so I guess this is one historical trend we did bring back, meaning it doesn’t really belong on this list, but I’m gonna talk about it, anyway.

Side note: Oh, my god, that BANNISTER. I NEED.

Historians aren’t actually sure where the inverted Christmas tree thing came from, but we know people were bringing home trees and then hanging them upside down in the living room as early as the 7th century. We have a couple theories as to why people turned trees on their heads:

Logistically, it’s way easier to hang a giant pine tree from your rafters upside down by its trunk and roots. You just hoist that baby up there, wind some rope around the rafter and the trunk, and boom. Start decorating.

A Christian tradition says that one day in the 7th century, a Benedictine monk named Saint Boniface stumbled across a group of pagans worshipping an oak tree. So, instead of minding his own damn business, he cut the tree down and replaced it with a fir tree. While the pagans were like, “Dude, what the hell?” Boniface used the triangular shape of the fir tree to explain the concept of the holy trinity to the pagans. Some versions have him planting it right-side up, others having him displaying a fir tree upside down. Either way, it’s still a triangle that’s a solid but ultimately very rude way of explaining God. Word’s still out on whether anyone was converted or just rightly pissed off that this random guy strolled into their place of worship, chopped down their sacred tree, and plopped HIS tree down instead. Please do not do that this holiday season.

Eastern Europeans lay claim to the upside-down tree phenomenon with a tradition called podłazniczek in Poland--people hung the tree from the ceiling and decorated it with fruits and nuts and seeds and ribbons and other festive doodads. 

(God, who lives in these houses? Look at that. That’s like a swanky version of Gaston’s hunting lodge. Where do I get one? Which enchanted castle do I have to stumble into to chill out in a Christmas living room like that?)

Today, at least in the West, upside-down trees are making a comeback because...I don’t know. Chip and Joanna Gaines said so. 

Some folks say it’s a surefire way to keep your cats from clawing their way through the tree and then puking up fir needles for weeks afterward, which checks out for me.

5. Incredibly weird Victorian Christmas cards

So back in the 19th century, the Christmas card industry was really getting fired up. Victorians loved their mail, let me tell you. They loved sending it. They loved getting it. They loved writing it. They loved opening it. They loved those sexy wax seals you use to keep all that sweet, sweet mail inside that sizzling envelope. (Those things are incredibly sexy. Have you ever made a wax seal? Oh, man, it’s hot.)

The problem, though, was that while the Victorians arguably helped standardize many of the holiday traditions we know and love today (Christmas trees, caroling, Dickens everything, spending too much money, etc.) back in 1800-whenever, a lot of that Christmas symbolism was, um...still under construction. No one had really agreed on which visual holiday cues worked and which...didn’t.

Meaning everyone just kind of made up their own holiday symbols. Which resulted in monstrous aberrations like this card:

What the hell is that? A beet? Is that a beet? Or a turnip? Why is it...oh, God, why does it have a man’s head? Why does the man beet have insect claws? 

What is it that he’s holding? A cookie? Cardboard? A terra cotta planter?

And then there’s this one:

“A Merry Christmas to you,” it says, while depicting a brutal frog murder/mugging. 

What are you trying to tell me? Are you threatening me with this card? Is that it? Is this a threat? How the hell am I supposed to interpret this? “Merry Christmas, hide your money or you’re dead, you stupid bitch.”

Also, why is the dead frog naked? Did the other frog steal his clothes after the murder? WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH THIS?

Victorian holiday cards also doubled as early absurdist Internet memes, apparently, because how else do I explain this?

Is this some sort of tiny animal Santa? A mouse riding a lobster? Like, the mouse, I get. Mice are fine. Disney built an empire on a mouse. And look, he’s got a little list of things he’s presumably going to bring you: Peace, joy, health, happiness. (In French. Oh, wait, is that that Patton Oswalt rat?)

But a LOBSTER? What’s with the lobster? It’s basically a sea scorpion. Why in the name of all that is good and holy would you saddle up a LOBSTER? I hate it. I hate it so, so much. Just scurrying around the floor with more legs than are strictly necessary, smelling like the seafood section of Smith’s, snapping its giant claws.

This whole card is a health inspector’s worst nightmare. It really is.

I gotta say, though, I am a fan of this one:

Presumably, that polar bear is going in for a hug because nothing stamps out a polar bear’s innate desire to rip your face from your skull than candy canes and Coke and Christmas spirit.

This next one is actually fantastic, but for all the wrong reasons:

I know everyone overuses “same” these days but geez, LOOK at that kid. I can HEAR it. SAME.

If you’ve ever been in a shopping mall stuffed with kids, nothing sums it up better than this card. This is like the perverse version of those Anne Geddes portraits that were everywhere in the late 90s. “Make wee Jacob sit in the tea pot; everyone will--Jacob, STOP, look at Mommy; I said LOOK. AT. MOMMY--everyone will love it.”

Actually, you know what? Every other Christmas card is cancelled. This is the only card we will be using from now on. This is it. 

Wait, no. We can also use this one:

Merry Christmas. Here’s a fuckin’...just a dead fuckin’ bird.

#victorian #listory #christmas #holidays #mythtory #norse mythology #odin

[does-this-look-logicality-to-you]

words: 1952 universe: human au characters: Logan, Patton, a bunch of random original characters pairings: romantic logicality (it’s not the main focus though) warnings: brief mention of suffocation, language, otherwise none i can think of a/n: i owe this idea to my good friend lilia, aka @croftersjam15 on pinterest. a huge thank you to her for the idea, and i hope y’all enjoy.

Logan stood at the door. Just ring the doorbell. It isn’t hard, just reach out and touch it. Why aren’t I moving? It’s so simple! Logan, you pathetic idiot, why can’t you do this one simple thing?

“Lo? You okay?” Logan was shaken out of his thoughts by the sound of Patton’s concerned voice and the feeling of his hand on the other’s shoulder.

“Hm? Oh, I’m fine.”

Patton gave him a doubtful look. “You don’t look fine.”

“Just… nervous.

He looked up at him, sympathy and worry flooding his expression. “Oh no, why?”

“It’s nothing to worry about,” Logan reassured him.

Patton frowned. “Yes, it is. Is it about meeting my family?”

Logan hesitated, then nodded slowly. “I’m sorry, I know it’s all I’ve been worrying about all day, but—”

“Logan,” he interrupted gently. “You don’t need to apologize for feeling things, remember? It’s normal to be a little anxious about things like this.”

He sighed. “You’re right.”

“I know I am. Now, do you want me to ring the doorbell?”

“Please do.”

Patton gave his boyfriend a reassuring smile, and Logan felt his muscles relax a little as he rang the bell. Almost immediately, the door swung open. Both of them immediately recognized the woman on the other side.

“Mama!” Patton swept her into a bear hug, and Logan couldn’t help but smile fondly as he watched.

“Hi, Pattycake!” She peppered his face in kisses, making him giggle, before pulling back and looking at Logan with a smile that shared an almost perfect likeness with Patton’s. “And Logan! It’s so wonderful to see you again. Come in, come in!”

Logan stepped inside, doing his best to mask his nerves. “Hello, Mrs. Morris. It’s nice to see you too.”

“You know you can just call me Miranda.”

Great. He hadn’t been here for a minute and he’d already made a mistake. “Right. I’m sorry, Miranda.”

“Oh, it’s no problem at all. Come on, let’s go see everyone else.” She started toward the kitchen. Patton took Logan’s hand and gave it a gentle, reassuring squeeze before the two went after her.

There weren’t many people there yet, as far as Logan could see. There was a small group of adults in the kitchen, but that was about it. Logan recognized one of them as Simon Morris, Patton’s father. “There he is! Hey, Patty!” Simon greeted him. Patton hurried over and hugged his father tightly. Not even thirty seconds had gone by when Simon caught sight of Logan and let go of his son. “And what do you know, Logan’s here!” He held his arms out. Logan felt his stomach flip, but he came over and hugged Simon anyway. The older man’s grip was tight, nearly suffocating Logan, but he managed to hold on until Simon finally let him go. “I should introduce you to the rest of the family, eh? That’s Miranda’s brother Rick, and his husband Carlos.” He pointed to them as he said their names. Rick looked somewhat like his nephew, while Carlos was shorter and had more sharp and angular features. Nevertheless, both of them looked friendly enough. Logan recalled that Patton was very close to them both, and considered them to be secondary parental figures.

“It’s nice to meet you.” Logan held his hand out to shake one of theirs, but was pulled into another hug by Rick.

“You must be Logan! Patty’s told us all about you!”

“He has?” Logan’s voice was choked by the tightness of the hug.

“Oh, absolutely!” Carlos piped in. “We ask about you every time we talk to ‘im, and he always has so much to say!”

Logan couldn’t keep a small smile from crossing his face. “Oh. Well, I’ve heard quite a lot about the two of you as well.” Rick looked pleased, before realizing that he was still squeezing Logan. He released his grip.

“Sorry ‘bout that, I got excited.”

“It’s alright.” He stepped away, allowing Patton to hug his uncles. Once they released him, he looked around.

“Where’s everyone else?”

“They’re not here,” Miranda replied. “Looks like you guys were pretty early.”

“So are you,” he pointed out.

“Oh, we’ve been here for hours helping with preparations.”

“Is there anything we can do to help?”

“Nope! Everything’s good to go.”

“If you change your mind, let us know.” Patton went back to his boyfriend, slipping Logan’s hand into his own.

Just then, the doorbell rang.

“Ooh, our first guests!” Miranda exclaimed enthusiastically. “Pat, could you let them in?”

“Of course? Lo, you wanna come with?”

Logan hesitated for a moment. Did he want to come with him? He certainly didn’t want to attempt to make small talk with a group of adults he barely knew, and this was a good way to avoid that. “Sure. It was nice to meet you, Rick, Carlos. And it’s nice to see you again, Simon and Miranda.” The four of them smiled at him, before he and Patton went to the front door. Patton turned the handle and had barely pulled the door back an inch before a horde of small children exploded inside and immediately swarmed Patton, hugging him and climbing on him.

“Uncle Pat! Uncle Pat!”

“Hi, Uncle Pat!”

“I missed you, Uncle Pat!”

“Pick me up, Uncle Pat!”

“Look, Uncle Pat! I lost my tooth!”

“Well I lost two teeth!”

“Do you like my new dress, Uncle Pat?”

“Uncle Pat, do you remember me? I was five when I last saw you, but now I’m six!”

“Uncle Pat, guess what? We got a puppy!”

“Are you gonna take us to get ice cream again, Uncle Pat?”

“Uncle Pat! Lookit my new plushie!”

“Yours is ugly! Lookit mine, Uncle Pat!”

Logan was beginning to regret not staying with the other adults, feeling his anxiety come rushing back. He knew there would be children, but he hadn’t imagined this many of them.

“Hi, everyone!” Patton giggled. “I missed you guys too!”

One of the older ones turned to look at Logan. “Who’s that, Uncle Pat?”

All at once, twelve pairs of eyes locked on him, the previous excited energy disappearing abruptly from all of them, and a jolt of fear travelled up his spine. He had never been very good at socializing with children, especially of the younger variety like these ones were.

“He’s my boyfriend!” Patton told them cheerfully, either completely missing Logan’s panicked expression or ignoring it. “Everyone, this is Logan.”

“He’s tall,” one of them remarked.

“Taller than you, even,” added another.

“Isn’t he the guy on the news in the morning?”

Logan’s stomach twisted. He had been hoping to not be recognized for his work. He didn’t do what he did for the public exposure.

“That’s right, Max!” Patton replied, looking impressed. “He does the weather!”

“Why?” Max asked, tilting his head. “Isn’t that boring?”

“Max!” one of the older boys scolded. “You don’t say that to someone!”

“No, it’s alright.” Logan forced his voice to be even and calm. “I do it because I’m interested in what happens in the sky.”

“Like space?” a little girl asked him, her eyes wide.

Logan couldn’t help but smile. “Especially space. I’ve always found it fascinating.”

“I think it’s fas-i-cating too!” she squealed.

“Fascinating,” Logan corrected. “But you like space?”

She nodded eagerly. “What’s your favorite planet?” she wanted to know.

“Pluto.”

“Like Mickey’s dog?” one of them asked.

At that, one of the children started barking like a dog. The others joined in, and Logan gave Patton a puzzled glance. He just shrugged.

“No, not the dog,” Logan tried to say, but the barking drowned him out. Lucky for him, the little girl who had shown interest in space before heard him.

“Hey!” she yelled, and all of the others went silent again. “I wanna hear what Uncle Lo’s saying!”

Uncle Lo? Logan couldn’t tell if those words made him feel uncomfortable or touched.

“As I was saying,” Logan continued. “Pluto is the farthest planet from the sun. It’s so far away, in fact, that many scientists don’t consider it a planet. But I haven’t given up on it yet.”

What do I say now? Shit, shit shit, I don’t know what to say? Uh… why don’t I ask her about her favorite planet? That’s a good idea. Do that.

“What’s your favorite planet?” he asked.

“I like Jupiter,” she told him. “It’s the biggest.”

“That’s right. Did you know it’s made of gas?”

“Woah, really?”

“That’s right. It’s what we call a gas giant.”

“Is it the only one?”

Logan shook his head. “No, it’s not. Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune are all gas giants.” He ignored the chorus of giggles when he said the word “Uranus”. He’d laughed at that when he was younger, too. “And did you know that Jupiter has rings, just like Saturn? It isn’t as famous for them, but they are there.”

As Logan rattled off facts, the children listened intently, as if he was telling the most engaging story they had ever heard. Some occasionally asked questions or made comments, which Logan didn’t hesitate to answer. Maybe this won’t be so bad.

~~~

“And those stars over there make up Scorpius, the scorpion. Some myths say that Artemis sent it to kill Orion after he boasted that he could kill all the animals, and Zeus put it in the sky when it won the battle. Others say that Apollo, Artemis’s brother, sent it after Orion when he said he was a better hunter than Artemis. Zeus put them both in the sky.”

Logan was lying in the backyard, all twelve children surrounding him.

“I bet I could beat it if I tried,” Max mumbled.

“You could not,” murmured Heidi, Max’s older sister. “It’s way bigger than you. It’d totally crush you.”

Logan glanced around them, a soft smile spreading across his face when he saw most of them were asleep. It wasn��t very late for him, but it was for many of them.

“Hi, guys.” Logan looked up to see Patton standing above them, grinning.

Max’s energy returned, and he leapt to his feet. “Uncle Pat! Guess what? Uncle Lo taught us all about the stars!”

“Oh yeah?” Patton looked at his boyfriend with an adoring expression.

“Yeah! He told us all about Ursula Major and Aquarium and Scorpiss!”

“What?”

“Ursa Major, Aquarius, and Scorpius,” Logan explained. “And many more.”

“Ohh. That’s so cool!”

“Mhm! Is he gonna be here next time?”

“Maybe. Did you like hanging out with him?”

“Yeah!”

Patton smiled warmly at them. “I’m so glad. Uncle Lo and I have to go now, okay?”

“Do you have to?” Max looked up at his uncle with wide puppy-dog eyes.

“Sorry, buddy. It’s getting late.”

“Awww.” He pouted.

“I promise, we’ll come visit you, ‘kay?”

“Okay.” Logan stood, and Max hugged his leg. “‘Bye, Uncle Lo.”

“Goodbye, Max.” He patted his head.

Patton leaned down and kissed his nephew’s cheek, then took Logan’s hand. Max reluctantly let go of his leg and plopped down on the grass, watching them walk inside.

“‘Bye, Logan!” said Miranda, who was in the living room. “It was nice seeing you!”

“It was nice seeing you too.” He gave her a polite wave, before he and Patton went out the front door and to their car. Patton got in the driver’s seat, while Logan got into the passenger’s.

“Sorry I left you,” Logan told him.

“No, no, I didn’t mind at all! It was cute! You looked like you were having a lot of fun.”

“I was,” he admitted. “I hadn’t expected to.”

“I know you didn’t.” Patton leaned over to kiss his cheek before starting the engine. “But I’m happy you had a good time.”

#sanders sides #logan sanders #patton sanders #ts patton #ts logan #logicality #romantic logicality #language #language tw #tw language #tw: language #fic #fanfic #fanfiction #writing

[popculturebuffet]

The Legion of Super Heroes Reviews: The Legion of Substitute Heroes or Unsung Heroes

Happy 29th Birthday to Me! Yes it’s my birthday which means it’s time for reflection, griping about getting older and cake. And after an exausting weekend of grappling with a growth, i’m not going to go into anymore detail, I can finally, relax celebrate and get back to reviewing. And since i’ts my big day, that means I decided to dedicate today’s reviews to things that mean a hell of a lot to me and in one way or another shaped me as a person. A self indulgant way to reflect on my past, look to the future and show y’all some stuff I really like. So with that out of the way let’s talk about the Legion of Super Heroes.. and their oddball sub team I love dearly. 

This is also my first chance to talk about DC Comics on my blog. I’m honestly shocked that in the year i’ve been reviewing stuff regularly, the other half of the big two superhero comic publishers hasn’t come up. While I do tend to lean towards marvel, in part because Marvel is simply better at collecting their stuff and putting it on sale more often, it’s still the home of some of my faviorite properties: Justice League International, The Green Lanterns (Minus Hal), Teen Titans, Wonder Woman, Oracle, Batgirl (All of them, particularly Steph and Cass), Young Justice, Supergirl, my personal boy The Martian Manhunter.. the list dosen’t go on by much but it indeed goes on. I”ve been reading dc comics since I was in middle school, and I haven’t stopped since and don’t intend to stop now and maybe in the next year I can get around to tackling some of their awesome cartoons and comics more eh? But yeah among these titans, including the actual titans, are the Legion, one of the most unique and awesome super team concepts in my humble opinon and , even for DC, one of the teams with the most tangled up histories. 

First created in the Silver Age by writer Otto Binder and Artist Al Plastino, The Legion of Superheroes is DC”s first successful teen superhero team, predating the titans by a few years, though I dearly love both wildly diffrent teams. The Legion is defined by their high concept: A thousand years into the future, three super teens from diffrent worlds who happened to be on the same ship with billionare RJ Brande, saved Brande from some goons hired by his crooked buisness partner. 

And exposed him. Inspirired by their courage, heart and skill, Brande latter called the three together to form them into a super team, one inspiried by the legends of teen hero Superboy. 

No not Conner though it was nice to get to show off my poster of him. While he was part of the second continuities legion, we’ll get to that, he’s not the superboy we’re looking for. He is damn great though and it’s good to have you back bud. 

Not Jon either, though I do miss this kid’s pre-bendis version and he was the inspiration.. for another version of the legion. (SIGH). Try. AGAIN IMAGE SEARCH. 

...... 

No not the cool bad boy turned troubled good boy, not the child who was inexpciably aged up by that bald smeghead, and not the great idea turned into a editiorial mouthpiece. I”m talking about THIS superboy. 

This is where the name came from: From the silver age till crisis on infinite earths, Clark Kent was active as a kid in smallville, and thus was Superboy, superman when he was a boy. He dealt with similar stories just with Lana replacing Lois, and Luthor as a ginger teenager. And it was these deeds as a teen hero on his own, one of the first honestly, that inspiried the legion and brande and forged the team. 

And it was naturally a super boy story where they were first introduced as the legion’s founders went back to recruit Superboy after putting him through some trials, and were intended as just one of many silver age one off concepts.. but caught on with the readers so much they were brought back, and had their ranks expanded and eventually not only added supergirl, yes the one your thinking of this time, to their ranks, and yes sometimes she and superboy were in the same place at the same time, Clark willingly had founding member and telepath Saturn Girl put a mental block in his head for any info he’s not supposed to know yet so it’s cool . But yeah not only that but they eventually became their own feature in Adventure Comics, where Superboy’s stories were published, but overtook him in popularity with time.  Over time a number of distinct aspects were established: The roster eventually got as large as 20 plus legionarres, almost all from diffrent worlds, and they eventually set up bilaws. Some are silly and dated such as “Legionarres marrying means they retire” which was eventually done away with in the 70′s, but others were simple logic: each member must have a unique power, no using weapons and such which rather than be super power snobbery is so said tech dosen’t fail and the legion later fully allowed Karate Kid, a martial artist, to join, no killing.. just common sense stuff that adds to it. And one of those is the centerpiece to today’s story, which we’ll get to in a moment.  Obviously given they’ve been around since 1958, there is a LOT more to the Legion’s history I will dig into at a later date: The short version is that Crisis on Infinite Earths, Dc’s first big reboot, fucked the team up badly by retconning superboy out of existance and dc editorial made it worse by shooting down EVERY solution the team came up with to fix the issue. So eventually things got so messy they nuked the whole thing during the event Zero Hour and rebooted fresh with Mark Waid taking the helm and updating the concept for the 90′s and being a more lighthearted, if still not without weight, comic in the sea of 90′s edge. Waid would reboot the team again due to sagging sales, a far weaker reason this time, with a more rebllion slant, the original team would be reinstated, and then ended for a while before recently being rebooted by Brian Micheal Bendis... who sadly is long past his creative prime from books like Ultimate Spider-man and alias and is instead stewing in his own toilet dinner these days and thus it’s not pretty.. well okay art wise i’ts VERY pretty, it’s just story wise it sucks dirty ass in thunder storms. There was also an awesome cartoon that sadly lasted only two seasons that I will DEFINTELY be digging into, especially since unlike x-men evolution, it’s not you know 50 some episodes and me biting off way more than I can chew but a slim 26 that still has fans to this day. I”ll get into ALL OF THIS, some ohter time hopefullly and I mostly outlined it since some of you might be familiar with another version or “Sigh” the reboot and this helps clear things up.  So yeah with all that out of the way we’re going back to the silver age and the first story I ever read of hte team, how I met them with “The Legion of Substitute Heroes” and a later subs story I genuinely love. I first read this story in one dc’s old expensive archives collections I got from the library. Oh how I miss the library. Your probably wondering who the legion of susbstite heroes are.. but since the first story covers that we can jump right in after the break!

So we open with a teen in a parka uniform disembarking from a spaceship from another planet, which a passerby notes is just like the airplanes people used to ride from country to country. 

But we meet our hero, Polar Boy, whose in a winter themed outfit and has come to try out. This is the tradition I was saving for now: The Legion Tryouts. Like a club or sports team would, but I like it because it makes sense: The Legion NEEDS to be as big as it is because while their headquartered on earth, their mission scope is anywhere in the united planets which spans GALAXIES. They could be called on any time and need their full force or need to have severa l members on a smaller mission and frequently having members away on a mission was cleverly used to reduce the cast to whoever was needed for the story. 

So it only makes sense to frequently look for new membbers to help strengthen their ranks... but given their teens and are recurting teens they need to be careful and need a logical way to reduce crowd flow. I mean you saw how many people used to line up for american idol before that died a justified death, people will do anything to be famous and they need to weed out those whose powers and skill just aren’t up to snuff yet, or those who are just dicks as, unsuprisingly, several stories have been built on assholes who applied and were rejected turning evil and attacking.. even though the Legion wasn’t even paticuarlly harsh. They also are more than fair as applicants CAN try again or if they prove themselves in other ways can be let in, as Bouncing Boy, my favoirite legionarre, was intially rejected for his power of .. well...

Yeah.. on paper inflating like a ball and bouncing around is kind of silly. In practice he can ricochet off enemies, walls, and obstacles and is fairly durable in that state. It’s why I don’t really brook mocking the guys power: yes it’s goofy.. but say that again when he hands you his ass. It’s the same with matter eater lad who yes is an actual character: While being able to eat anything is gloriously goofy.. it means he can chew through ANY substance and digest ANYTHING. Hell in the cartoon episode intorducing the subs they used both of these guys to great efffect: Bouncing Boy, who in the cartoon had to try out multiple times in his backstory, encouraged the future subs while Matter Eater Lad got in by EATING A FUCKING BOMB. He also had shades which I dind’t know he was missing but now I do. My point is the process is fair and well thought out and leads to some really fun scenes. 

But yeah joining the legion is naturally Polar Boy’s dream, as he walks down the avenue of heroes, basically a series of statues honoring the legion and hopes all his hard work paid off. We then cut to the auditions, where he apparently waited all night. What I like about this story is that unusually for the silver age legion where it was mostly a sea of powers attached to a bunch of cardboard, really the dc silver age in a nutshell and why marvel broke out so much for having more dynamic and realistic characters, Polar Boy has more of a personality. It’s not MUCH but he’s a dedicated, hard working kid who just wants to join his heroes and seems really in awe of htem, a feeling we can all relate to. We’ve all had people we’ve looked up to, admired, and we’ve all had groups we wanted to join as kids, teens or what have you. And of course.. we all know what it’s like to be rejected by someone or something you badly wanted to be a part of.  And that’s what happens to poor polar boy, who comes from a world with an intense sun thus his people developed super cold powers.. but he can’t control them well so while their impressive, they also freeze the legion. HIs powers are good... but due to their strength and radius he’s also a liablility. They give him an consolation anti-gravity belt.. they had these before eventually compressing them into the much cooler flight rings.. which I still desperatly want one of. I have the flash’s costume ring and a green lantern corps ring, but still no legion ring. 

Naturally this devistates the poor boy and he wonders around dispondent till nightfall, convinced he’ll never be one of them. He soon meets Night Girl, a fellow reject with super strength given to her by her dad’s formula.. but only in darkness as she’s from a world without sunlight. She also faces a “hopeless future” but it’s then Polar Boy’s true strength reveals itself: he decides screw giving up on their dream and if they can’t be in the legion they’ll start their own Legion. 

Though not to compete but to serve as a subtistute, in case the legion is ever incapacitated. So Night Girl gathers the other rejects the next morning. Cleverly one of them, Chlorophyll Kid was seen with Night Girl herslef at the tryouts behind Polar Boy. We soon learn about them and each of their origins: Stone Boy can turn himself into an immobile stone statue, as his world has half a year long nights and thus his people hybernate, Fire Lad who can spit hot fire literally and set anything combustable on fire and Chlorphyll Kid who can make plants grow rapidly. Each were rejected for resonable powers: Stone Boys powers too static, Fire Lad’s is too dangerous and Chorlpyl Kids toos pecific. But upon seeing all of this Polar Boy says they STILL have fantastic powers and still can help people and the legion. 

Thus the Legion of Substittue Heroes is born. And I love them as much as the originals. As a bit of a misfit myself I relate to these guys: They have strange specific powers, got rejected by the big team.. while that trope is nothing new at the time it was unique and even now it’s a nice and inspiring message. Instead of giving up they form their OWN team to do what htey can anyway. They might not be the best like the legion but they can still help and still do what’s right even if not on their scale. It’s a great concept and really makes them endearing. Again I have a thing for the underdogs but I still really like these guys. It’s why it annoys me they got kind of spat on with time: While I love Keith Giffen and Paul Levitz run on the legion, and feel it’s the best of that contnuinty it’s not without fault and the two basically spent a full issue mocking the team and split polar boy off from them before making their own subs with only ONE of the originals. It just felt.. disrspectful. And so far no continuity has used them again until the recent bendis run, which has them announced for the Future Slate special. It took BENDIS, who dosen’t get how to use the team properly and is up his own ass, to bring them back in a new continuity and I find that obnoxious. The subs are a great concept and deserve to be honored as such and as such are one of my favorite superhero teams. 

But their careers don’t start well as they doubt themslves, except for Polar Boy who boisters them along, and constnatly just end up going to missions the legion already has covered and when the legion go to fight some robot ships, they refuse the subs help.. which is fair though, as Brainy puts it they can’t risk putting untrained volunteers in harms way. Their about to just quit, in a really sad moment.. when CK, because I can’t spell cholophill and hate having to use spell check notices some odd seeds spread about.. and when he grows one a horrifying tree man shows up. They struggle with it till the setting son finishes it’s job, meaning Night Girl is at full power and whollops it and the subs spend the night destroying the seeds.  They  find out the next day the seeds came from the same planet as the robot ships, meaning the ships are a distraction for whoevers doing this and since they can’t just call earth, as the full force of the legion is needed with the robots and all it’d do is cause a panic, it’s down to them. Night Girl however is scared.. and I like that. It shows that while their regaining their confidence.. it’s sitll risky. Their a bunch of barely trained fanboys, and girl, going up against an alien invasion, with it down to them. They CAN save the world but it’s alright to be entirely terrified when your thrust into it this fast. 

They make their way to the planet, having built a ship earlier and lie low, finding out what’s going on: The plant men are fully intellegent, and grow themselves..though how they know to attack and go to the bathrom and what not out of the seed I don’t know but I assume it’s a genetic thing or they might be some form of hive mind. point is the seed plan is to grow troops all over the world via rockets for an invasion, and it’s a brilliant concept for one too. Aliens who simply GROW the troops right into battle, born with the knowledge to do so, and right where they can ambush them. It’s down to our heroes and Stone Boy, whose been the most pesemistic, valiantly dives in to provide a distraction so they can destroy the factory and the seeds. Turns out he is useful as the most the treeple have is a space lead pipe.. yes really. I love the silver age. But they’ll bring ray guns soon, so Stone BOy knows it’s a suicide mission and now our heroes have a timer. But luckily.. our heroes are stronger than they think. Night Girl punches a way in till Night passes, while Polar Boy and Flame Lad use their powers in concert to make an opneing.. but with time running out Polar Boy finishes things by having CK grow all the seeds now they have acess.. thus exploding the planets population, destroying several cities from the number of bodies, and thu discourguing the treeple from trying again. Stone boy is able to flee with the rest of our heroes and the day is saved. 

The heroes opt not to tell the public, as to take away glory for the Legion. It’s a noble gesture.. they do DESERVE credit, but they choose not to take it, preferring to let the legion get theres for stil lsaving the world from the robots. They stand firm, now confident they may someday make it to the big leagues.And it’s this that really makes me love them: Thier not the strongest or best, but they try anyway for the reasons a hero should: to help people, and not for the glory. THey remain unsung heroes and are fine with that.  Eventually the Legion WOULD find out about them, but naturally instead of being dickheads about it, fully accepted them, even offering them some contests for membership, but that’s a story for another day. THey’d remain stalwart allies and valuable backup in crisis situations for years to come until the bollocks outlined above. But they’d never leave my heart and thanks to them.. the legion never left either. 

Final Thoughts:  While I do love the story for it’s personal signifigance to me, It’s stilll a really good story for the time. A bit stilted as was the style, but still good, well paced and with an endaring cast of underdogs who prove themselves in the end. It’s something diffrent from the usual clean cut ahead in life wasps these stories usually followed at the time. While the team’s still all white and all that, their outcasts and misfits who just want to help and have trouble beliving in themselves. Their a good standard to live up to.. and a good inspiration for me and my constnatly self hating self doutbing self. And I hope you enjoyed htem too.  If you’d like to comission your own review, just dm me. It’s 5 bucks for individual issues. Later days. 

#the legion of super heroes #the legion of substitute heroes #polar boy #fire lad #night girl #chorophyil kid #stone boy #silver age #comics #comics reviews #birthday

[w-k-smith]

Once again, tumblr has hidden the version of this post that has links. (Clearly, weird fan fic where ghosts eat candy bars is just *too radical* for this website.) This story is also available on AO3, under the username w_k_smith.

Chapter Two is here of “Don’t Go to the Netherworld!”

In this chapter, Beetlejuice and Lydia make their way through Saturn, but are waylaid by Zagnuts, a boy band, and all the obstacles the desert otherworld has to offer.

Chapter One: “It’s a Wonderful Afterlife” (6/19/20) Chapter Two: “Worm Welcome” (07/03/20) Chapter Three: “Ghost to Ghost” (upcoming) Chapter Four: “To Beetle or not to Beetle?” (upcoming)

Warning:  This story contains depictions of, references to, and discussion of  topics like suicide, untimely death, abuse, and body horror - you know,  like the musical does (though this probably has more). Know your  boundaries, and stay safe.

New chapter under keep reading!

“I don’t understand,” Lydia said, as they crossed from the midnight  of the administrative area, toward the hot afternoon of Saturn, through  the twilight in between. “What’s Saturn? Are we going to the  planet…somehow?”

“Nope. Totally unrelated, and don’t ask me who  named it. Saturn is the part of the Netherworld that acts as a trap for  ghosts who get out of line, like if you try to leave the house you’re  haunting, or jump the line in processing like someone I could mention.  Going through processing would only take a couple steps, but Saturn is  an anti-shortcut from the feverish nightmares of M.C. Escher. It’s a  giant desert, and it’s full of sandworms. Those are snake monsters that  eat ghosts. Foreshadowing?” he muttered to himself.

“This is so weird,” Lydia muttered. “I love it.”

She didn’t seem like she was being sarcastic. Maybe hanging around her wasn’t going to be too terrible.

Unfortunately, he saw trouble ahead.

“Keep your head down,” he whispered to Lydia. “Look dead. Deader than that. And don’t sneeze! Dead people never sneeze!”

“What?”

“Hello, Beetlejuice,”  said five tenor voices in unison. A cluster of expressionless young  white men was drifting through the shadows toward him and Lydia. The  boys had died in their late teens and very early twenties, long enough  ago that two of them sported frosted tips. They were dressed just  differently enough to be distinguishable from one another, in dated  pants and t-shirts with no personality.

“Hey, Boy Inferno,” he grunted.

“What are you doing out here?” they asked. They all floated six inches off the ground, in a formation reminiscent of migrating ducks.

He rolled his eyes. “Just running an errand for Juno. Miss Argentina find that living intruder yet?”

“Not that we’ve heard. Who’s your friend?”

“New  hire. Juno wants her on border patrol. Her name’s Lydia, and she’s  boring. Kids these days, you know, they think eyeliner and TikTok counts  as personality. But them’s the rules: if you add to the work, you have  to help out.”

“Do you want to hear the introduction song, Lydia?”

Geez, they didn’t back off easy. “Save that for people who’ve committed genocide or worse.”

“We were talking to Lydia.”

At his elbow, Lydia scratched the end of her nose. Boy Inferno caught the gesture, and as one, cocked their heads.

“What did you die of…?” they asked her.

“Um,  I don’t want to talk about it,” Lydia said, which was the wrong thing.  All newlydeads ever wanted to do was blather on about how they’d bitten  it.

“OK, you got me!” He stepped between Lydia and the boys. “This  isn’t an approved mission to Saturn. We were actually trying to, ah,  hide out from Juno for a while. She is in a mood today, I tell ya. Just  impossible. She wants me to take a statement from all the recently  deceased who were in line when the alarm went off, and then pinch each  of them really, really hard to see if they still have nerve endings. I’d  rather swallow my own toenails. Remember that time Juno made me swallow  my own toenails? You were there for that, weren’t you? So be a  hive-minded pal and help me stay on the DL. This one already threatened to tattle if I didn’t show her my good hiding spot.” He jerked his head at Lydia.

Boy Inferno blinked.

“Alright, then,” they said, and each voice sounded suspicious. But they drifted back toward the administrative area.

Lydia stared as they went. “Who are those guys?”

“Boy  Inferno is a dead boy band. They didn’t have enough brains or  personality to be individuals when they were a living boy band, and when  their tour bus crashed, the situation got worse.”

“Yikes. And speaking of yikes, what were you saying about sandworms? Are they going to eat us?”

He  waggled one hand back and forth, and started walking. “Eh. It’s  probably OK. You’re alive, so they’ll leave you alone. I’m half-ghost,  half-demon, which confuses them more than anything. We’ll be fine if we  don’t run into a sandworm that’s pissed off or starving.” They were  crossing into Saturn proper. The terrain changed from dark gravel to  rolling sand dunes dotted with twisted rock formations. Wooden doors  hovered here and there, from three feet off the ground to 20 stories  high. There was the light and warmth of a yellow sun, but if you turned  in every direction, you would never see a sun or any other stars in the  royal blue sky.

“Huh. Now I kind of want to meet a sandworm...” Lydia said, looking around like one was going to pop out from behind a dune.

“Yup. That’s definitely foreshadowing.”

“So…what’s it like? Being half-demon? How does that, um, happen?”

He  waved his hands to turn them into sock puppets – one red and bearing a  vague resemblance to Juno, the other a grey blob and as good a  representation as he’d ever had of his father. “Hello, children!” he  said in a screechy voice. “Let’s talk about the occult birds and bees.  When a demon woman tolerates a living human male very much…”

She shoved him. “I know that, gross! I’m ace, but not completely ignorant. I just wondered if you were ever alive.”

He  put his hands back to normal. “Uh-huh. I was alive. Looooong time ago,  though. Long enough that we didn’t pay much attention to what year it  was, and only bathed twice a lifetime, and drank beer instead of water.  Hm. Or maybe that was all just me. Anyway, Juno only had me to see what  would happen if you mixed demon magic with ghost abilities. Turns out,  you get yours truly. She hated the result, and I never got any little  siblings to chase around. But it’s fine with the just the two of us; my  mom has this sweet thing she says to me every day: ‘I wish you had never  been born.’ I think it’s a Swedish pet name.”

“How did you die?” Lydia asked.

“I asked a bunch of annoying questions that weren’t any of my business and someone stabbed me.”

“Ha ha,” she deadpanned. “How far is it, anyway?” she asked, shading her eyes. “I don’t see anything…”

“Distance doesn’t really work like that here, and we could move way, way faster if we were both dead. But it’s pretty damn far.”

She sighed.

*

He  had to give Lydia Deetz this: she was a trooper. She was wearing a  dress, and boots that were very much not made for walking, but she kept  moving, eyes forward, not a single complaint. When her stomach growled  like an angry guard dog, she held her head high and acted like she  didn’t notice.

“OK, time for a break!” he said.

“No!” she said. “We have to keep going.”

“If  you keep going like this, you’re going to collapse, and then you’ll  die, and a sandworm will eat you, and that’s my whole day gone. Sit  down.”

“I don’t need to.”

She was going to give him grey  hairs, she really was. He shook one hand like he was shooing a fly, and  she stumbled backwards until she sat on the closest rock.

Lydia’s eyes bugged. “What am I – what are you –?”

“You’ve never been possessed before?”

She stood back up. He waved his hand again, and she sat.

“No, keep it up,” he said. “This is fun.”

He flicked his fingers, and her expression brightened.

“Beetlejuice, you’re my role model!” she said, in a tone much more chipper than any that had ever come out of her mouth, he was sure. He released her.

Lydia’s face soured like old milk mixed with lemon juice, and she made the fingers-down-the-throat gesture. “I’ll sit for five minutes. Don’t do that again.”

“I  always knew I’d make a great babysitter!” He settled on the other side  of the rock. He folded his hands over his stomach, figuring he’d take a  nap if she stayed quiet.

She didn’t. “My mom would love all this,”  Lydia said. “Her favorite holiday was Halloween. We’d make our own  haunted houses in the garage – but in the summer, when no one in the  neighborhood was expecting it. She liked the weird stuff in the world.  Or – she likes the weird stuff in the world. She doesn’t just avoid it, like most people do. Like my dad does. I think she’ll like you, even.”

He  wanted to make a face at the idea of a well-adjusted person liking him  (though it was a nice feeling, deep in his black heart), but Lydia  couldn’t see him, so it would be wasted effort.

She was quiet for a while, and he thought he was free to drift off to sleep.

“Um…do you have any food?” she asked.

He reached into his jacket and pulled out a handful of Zagnuts. He tossed the kid two. “Here ya go.”

“Why so many Zagnuts?” Lydia asked. “They’re good, but I didn’t think people ate these anymore.”

“It’s the only candy in the vending machines in the Netherworld.”

“Really? Why?”

“Because everything around here is at a baseline of low-grade crappiness. Haven’t you noticed?”

“Are  you really supposed to spend eternity here when you die?” she asked, in  a muffled way that told him she’d bitten off half a candy bar at once.  “It seems like it should either be a whole lot better or a whole lot  worse.”

“You aren’t supposed to spend eternity here; that’s the  point,” he said. He popped a Zagnut into his mouth, and swallowed it  wrapper and all. “You have to move on, eventually.”

“To what?”

“Do I look like a priest? Or a philosopher? Or a TV psychic?”

“The  last one, a little. A bad one. The kind who gets tricked by reporters  to help contact their dead kid, but it turns out the kid is really alive  and just in the next booth over in the Denny’s.”

“Touché. The  point is, nobody around here knows. You hang around the administrative  area until you’re ready to go into the miserable nothingness of the  Abyss, and then you swirl around in the Abyss until…I dunno, something  else happens. Maybe you just stay in the Abyss forever. I don’t plan on  finding out anytime soon.”

“Is that where my mom is?”

“Yup.  If she didn’t come running when you first came through the door, she’s  definitely gone through security. Don’t worry, though. You poke your  head into the Abyss and shout her name a few times, and she’ll come  right out.”

He lied easily. He always had.

“I’m just  surprised she hasn’t tried to contact us,” Lydia said. “I guess she must  be confused, because we moved and everything. My dad dragged me out to  Connecticut, away from New York and all our friends and family, to work  on this stupid gated community project he has in mind. And he took my  annoying life coach with us. She’s friendly and positive,  and keeps trying to make me fill out a star chart. I don’t know why he  thinks she’s helping me. It’s not like there aren’t actual therapists in  Connecticut. I don’t get it.”

He chewed another Zagnut for a  beat, waiting to see if she was making a joke. Then he broke the news.  “Your dad is boinking the life coach.”

“What?!” she said. She whirled around the rock to sit right next to him. “How can you know that?”

“Um, because I’m an adult with a brain.” He grabbed the top of his head and lifted his skull to show his grey matter.

“He isn’t…Dad’s not…” She slumped. “He’s totally sleeping with her.”

“Totally,” he agreed.

“How could he do that? Mom’s only been dead a few months. Well…when he sees Mom – if he just talks to her again – he’ll understand what an ass he’s been.”

“Uh-huh,” he said, non-committedly.

“How much farther do we have?” she asked.

“Long enough to aaaaaaalmost make you give up and collapse in despair.”

She groaned.

For  a second, he thought her groan was superhumanly long and loud, and he  prepared to be impressed. Then he noticed the ground was shaking.

“Looks like it’s our unlucky day!” he said. “Run!”

They  both got to their feet, and made it about five steps before the sand  exploded to their left. A sandworm rose from the earth, its  black-and-white stripes blurring into grey. At the peak of its jump, its  inner head came out of its mouth, eyes glaring, jaw snapping.

It dove back down toward them.

He  dodged one way, and Lydia dodged the other. The spray of sand blocked  out everything, and when it all cleared, the sandworm had risen from the  ground again, undulating in and out of the dunes. Lydia stood in place,  looking all around. But it was hard to know where to run when you were  being attacked by a sandworm.

The sandworm’s chomping heads came out of the ground an arm’s length from Lydia. She yelled, and punched it in the closest eye.

The  heads hissed and thrashed, knocking Lydia down. The sandworm dove down,  and the sand around them whirled and roiled, until he felt like he was  standing in boiling dirt.

When the sandworm rose again, it  accidentally scooped up Lydia. She showed a little more survival  instinct than she had before, and clung to the sandworm’s back.

“Knock it off!”  he heard her say. She nudged the sandworm with her left boot, and the  sandworm turned to the right. But it had had enough of its passenger,  and whipped its body to throw Lydia like a beanbag.

She shrieked as she fell through the air. He stretched his legs, about 20 feet, and caught her.

As  he dragged her back to the ground, he braced himself for another attack  by the sandworm. Maybe if he transformed into something big and scary,  showed some lionfish spines or extra limbs, the worm would leave them  alone. Getting swallowed would be no good. Not only did he usually try  to avoid getting eaten, but sandworms’ digested prey just wound up back in processing…after a wait of at least a decade or so.

The  sandworm jumped over their heads, dove into the ground, and kept going.  Its writhing body upset every dune it plowed through, but it didn’t  double back.

He wasn’t going to look a gift worm in the mouth.

“And don’t come back!” he yelled. “G’on, git! Git!”

Lydia jumped out of his arms. “That was awesome! I thought I was going to die, but it was awesome.”

He  was more tired than he’d been in a while. He was tired like Juno had  been screaming at him for hours. Also, there was a lot of sand in his  shoes. “You did OK But why the hell did you try to punch it in the  face?”

She didn’t look ashamed in the slightest. “I thought it  would be like avoiding a shark attack. That’s what the Discovery guy  said during Shark Week: punch the shark hard in the eye so it leaves you alone.”

“Since when has punching something made it leave you alone?” he asked. “That has never worked when I’ve tried it with people.”

“Because then the shark – or the sandworm – thinks you’re too much of a threat and it ignores you. I made it go away, didn’t I?’

“I  seriously doubt you’re what made it leave, Karate Kid. If a sandworm  had its multiple hearts set on eating us, it would take more than your  mechanical bull riding skills to dissuade it. I don’t know – I’m not so  sure it was all that interested in us.”

“If it wasn’t going for us, why did it come over here?”

“I said I don’t know! I’m not a sandworm scientist.”

“Your hair is changing color,” she said, pointing at his head.

“Can you blame me? I’m pretty pissed off right now.”

She brightened. “It changes color with your mood?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I touch it?”

He  grunted, and tilted his head. She patted some strands on the right side  of his head, which were dark green at the tips, but probably working  their way to red. The cocoon the caterpillar had made behind his ear  popped open, and a death’s-head hawkmoth shot into the air and planted  itself on Lydia’s nose.

“Augh!” she yelped, and fell right on her ass. He doubled over laughing while she tried to get back up with dignity.

“You’ve taken things too far this time, Beetlejuice!”

Once, just once, he’d like to go 48 hours without hearing those words shouted at him.

He turned to see Miss Argentina stomping up a sand dune, clipboard in hand, sash askew, which meant she was really really really upset.

“What have I done this time?” he asked, resigned.

“What have you done this  time?” Miss Argentina pointed at Lydia. “Let’s start with child  endangerment! And the fact that your disappearance has about given Juno  apoplexy.”

“Ah, she loves me.”

“No! She just knows  that if she hasn’t heard from you in twelve hours, it means you’re up to  something! And that means the rest of us suffer! I’m just glad she gave  me clearance to go to Saturn to look for your sorry, sagging ass, so at  least I was able shoo a sandworm away from some newlydeads. I have a  sneaking suspicion you bear some responsibility for that, too?”

“OK,  that is both not fair and completely true,” he said. “And I’ll have you  know I’m doing a good deed. I’m guiding this one around the  Netherworld.” He jerked his head at Lydia.

“And why, in the name of all that is sacred, would you consider that a good idea?”

“Um…”  He faltered. He may have been able to fudge a few details with Lydia,  but Miss Argentina had been around long enough to know how the Abyss  worked.

“Newlydeads…” Lydia said. “That must have been what attracted the sandworm. It wasn’t coming for us after all.”

“Why  did you drag newlydeads with you?” he asked, happy to change the  subject. “What, did you need help shouting at me? Anger backup singers?”

“Of  course not.” Miss Argentina frowned. “But – that’s a good idea.” She  clicked her pen, and scribbled on her clipboard. “I am actually writing  that down. If Boy Inferno is free…”

“Excuse me!” came a woman’s voice from the bottom on the dune. “I’m so sorry – could you wait just a minute?”

“It’s very hard to walk on sand!” came a sexy, nasal male voice from the same direction.

“These  newlydeads have a problem, you see,” said Miss Argentina, her voice  icy. But something was wrong – she wasn’t looking at him. Her gaze was  fixed on Lydia. “Apparently, a living person used their Handbook without  permission.”

Lydia became interested in the horizon. “Huh. That’s weird.”

Miss Argentina jabbed a finger in Lydia’s face. “Oh, don’t even try that on me, living girl. I am not in the mood today.”

“Whoof! We made it.” The newlydead couple crested the dune…and he was smitten.

The  woman was white, a pretty blonde, in a green wrap dress and  suburban-mom-at-the-nice-grocery-store boots. Her companion was a  beautiful Desi man, with light brown skin and a lock of black hair  hanging over his forehead that he immediately wanted to run his fingers through.

“Oooooh…” he said. “Hello, sexy…”

Lydia looked at him with a scientific expression. “Which one?”

“The  Trader Joe’s guardian angels over here. Not that Miss A isn’t pretty  easy on the eyes herself, but she’s a friend of Ellen, know what I mean?  A patron of U-Haul. An adopter of shelter cats. Wrong tree, is what I’m  saying. But she loves me platonically.”

“She doesn’t,” Miss Argentina said.

The couple pushed past him and bent over Lydia.

“Oh, thank goodness!” the woman said.

“Lydia!” said the man. “I’m so glad we found you. We were worried sick!”

“Adam, Barbara?” Lydia said. “What…what are you doing here? You weren’t supposed to go to the Netherworld.”

#beetlejuice #beetlejuice fanfiction #beetlejuice the musical #lydia deetz #fan fiction

[tobiasdrake]

Power Rangers Turbo E21 – The Wheel of Fate

Recap

We open with Elgar and a couple Piranhatrons carrying a chest full of treasure onto Divatox’s bridge. As part of her plan to declare victory and loot the planet, she’s been sending her forces to collect treasure from the sunken wrecks of the ocean. Inside one such chest, Divatox makes an exciting find.

So if I’m reading this correctly, you go right while leaving Earth and head out past Jupiter. Thread the needle through Europa and then approach Saturn. Look to your right and BOOM! Honda dealership.

Divatox explains to Elgar that the star chart reveals the locations for the Lightning Cruiser and the Storm Blaster, the most powerful vehicles in the universe. Divatox likey, Divatox want. She brings the pirate Dreadfeather up to the bridge in order to brief him on the job.

In this episode, the surprising origins of ace pilot Falco Lombardi!

Falco flies out to the Omega Quadrant to find the two vehicles, but space is humongous and he’s literally tooling around with a jetpack scanning asteroids by hand. It’s not exactly going well. He takes a break and sits his dumb ass down on an asteroid, and by pure luck it happens to be the correct rock. The Lightning Cruiser and the Storm Blaster erupt from the asteroid and rocket straight for Earth.

The cars land in Angel Grove because it’s the Weird Alien Shit capitol of the world. Also, despite clearly having been black on the map, the Storm Blaster is actually blue.

At long last, the secret origin of the Turbozords has been revealed. Zordon read a Wikipedia article about ancient super-vehicles of immeasurable power. He considered trying to track down their locations but then decided, “Eh, fuck it. They’re just cars.” So he had the Rangers build knock-offs with whatever spare parts they could find lying around Billy’s old engineering lab.

The pirates try to claim the cars, but are violently rejected. Storm Blaster drives over Dreadfeather’s foot while Lightning Cruiser ejects Elgar from its driver’s seat.

T.J. and Justin notice the brightly colored meteor strikes and head out that way to investigate. The cars nearly run the Rangers down, but stop just short of a bloody mess. T.J. and Justin take a moment to inspect these mysterious new vehicles.

“You think these are what we saw in the sky?” Justin asks.

T.J. considers. Actual dialogue, “Could be but I haven’t seen anything like this.”

“Yes, you have,” Justin says. “They look just like our Turbozords, except very slightly different.”

“What’s a Turbozord?”

Justin blinks. “…the cars we drive to form the Megazord.”

T.J.’s jaw drops. “The Megazord is made of cars?! I thought it was just a cool giant robot! Why didn’t you tell me we were assigned cars?!”

Thinking back, Justin says, “You know, that’s fair. Maybe we shouldn’t have used the stock footage in place of training you guys. That’s on me.”

Suddenly the pirates appear to reclaim the cars. “Oh, hey, you found my cars!” Elgar declares. But the vehicles back away from the pirates in fear and T.J. figures out pretty quickly what’s up.

Justin plays defense, chasing Piranhatrons away from Storm Blaster, while T.J. charges right in and starts swinging on Elgar. While T.J.’s distracted, Dreadfeather conjures up a net and drops it directly on top of Storm Blaster and Justin.

“T.J., help!” Justin screams. “A drug dealer has caught me in his net! Those D.A.R.E. specials were right all along!”

Elgar opens his mouth to argue but then remembers that the pirates did, in fact, start dealing drugs the other day.

Deciding that one out of two isn’t bad, Elgar and Dreadfeather warp Justin and Storm Blaster away before vanishing themselves. T.J. calls Alpha to report Justin’s disappearance, but Lightning Cruiser pops its door open and runs T.J. down.

“What the fuck, man?!” T.J. declares. “Are you trying to help or kill me?!” Lightning Cruiser jets forward a bit and then stops. “Hey! Don’t you drive away while I’m talking to you!” The car bolts at a slow enough pace that T.J. can still chase it down on foot, then slams on the brakes to force him to slam straight into the back of the vehicle.

After flashing its lights to laugh at T.J. for a few seconds, Lightning Cruiser opens its door and allows him to have a seat. As soon as he’s in, the car takes off and careens around the road, then dumps him out. After a bit of finagling, T.J. manages to get himself back inside the car.

Let’s all take a minute to appreciate T.J.’s confidence here. This asshole thinks that if Lightning Cruiser decides to slam on the accelerator, his meaty torso is somehow going to block it.

Meanwhile, Lt. Stone manages to get Bulk and Skull some new jobs at a construction site. They’ll be standing in the road directing traffic with STOP and SLOW signs.

Five seconds after they’re given the jobs, Lightning Cruiser streaks down the road towards the site. Bulk and Skull desperately raise SLOW signs but to no avail. T.J. finally gives up on getting Lightning Cruiser to stop and instead opts to crank the gas and go from Murder Speed to Massacre Speed. This is a terrible idea.

The car careens straight for Bulk and Skull, then fires off into the air and converts to a jet; Bulk and Skull are knocked into wet cement in the process.

“Holy shit, do our other cars do this?! Could I have been flying a jet car to school and back?!”

At that moment, the Power Chamber calls T.J. Kat comes on the mic. “Hey, Justin’s dropped off the face of the—are you in a plane?!”

“Uh, flying car,” T.J. says. “How did you—”

“We can see you on the Viewing Globe! Where did you get a flying car?! Do we all have flying cars?! Did nobody tell me about the flying cars?!”

“I think it might be an alien,” T.J. says. “There’s a blip here that looks like it might be around the Warehouse District. Try that.”

Alpha scans the Warehouse District more thoroughly and still finds nothing. To be specific, he finds one warehouse in particular with a great deal of nothing. It has a vacuous absence of an interior. “They’re jamming us right there,” he concludes.

Carlos, Ashley, and Kim shift into Turbo and head to the warehouse to meet T.J. They arrive first because teleporting is faster than flying cars and find the mysterious jammed warehouse guarded by highly visible Piranhatrons. They bait the Piranhatrons around to a side door and quickly take them out before heading inside.

“Too bad you’re headed for the scrap heap!” Dreadfeather says, actual dialogue. He brandishes a sledgehammer menacingly.

“Whoa, hold up!” Elgar says. “I think Auntie D wanted us to capture the cars, not smash them?” He considers for a moment. “On the other hand, that looks like fun!” Without further ado, he draws his cutlass and slashes Storm Blaster right across its hood.

“Oh, what the hell. I’m her favorite nephew! Worst she can do to me is string me up by my… you know what, let’s not think about that, there’s fun to be had!”

Justin manages to slip free of the Piranhatron holding him and ram into Elgar. Elgar slashes at him in retaliation, but Justin catches the blade in his chains, using Elgar’s own strength to break them. With his arms now free, Justin shifts into Turbo.

“Okay, you’re sure this is how we use this thing?” Carlos asks, standing over the Turbo R.A.M. The Rangers have successfully managed to mount it up into artillery mode.

Ashley admits, “I’m not even sure it’s pointed the right direction. The old team didn’t leave much workflow documentation.”

“What about those stacks of papers you were so excited about?” Cassie asks.

“Yeah, I’ve been through those. They’re great! Very thorough. None of it applicable to our jobs. I have no idea what a Zeo Cannon is! Instead, we have this, and as far as I can tell, this thing just crawled right out of somebody’s ass one day. So let’s pull the trigger and hope for the best.”

The Rangers fire up the Turbo R.A.M. and blast the warehouse door. The Turbo R.A.M. is, indeed, pointed the right way. Unfortunately, it doesn’t even scratch the warehouse.

“Was it on a low power setting?” Cassie asks. But she’s met with silence. The only person who’d actually know is currently inside that building.

“Fuck it,” Carlos declares. He calls T.J. “Hey, does the flying car have guns on it? Because that’s going to probably be a better idea than figuring out the arcane sorcery needed to make this stupid thing work.”

“Don’t worry,” T.J. tells him. “I think I’ve just about figured out the arcane sorcery needed to make this stupid thing work, so I’m on my way.”

Inside the warehouse, Justin spots the Lightning Cruiser headed straight for the building. Storm Blaster snares Justin with ropes and yanks him inside its cabin, then fires a tow cable straight up into the sky. The cable links with Lightning Cruiser, who slams on its jets and rips Storm Blaster free of the chains.

“I have no idea what’s happening but goddamn if it isn’t the coolest fucking thing I’ve ever done!” T.J., summarizing the experience of being a Power Ranger in a nutshell.

Just after the cars have escaped, an outraged Divatox warps up to the warehouse. Elgar jerks his thumb at Dreadfeather. “He did it.”

“OH COME THE FUCK ON,” Dreadfeather exclaims. “You sent me to pick up cars. That was the job. You said nothing about having to fight Autobots from planet Cybertron! This is not my fault.”

Divatox considers. “You know what? I agree. I sent you out there with poor intel. But good news! Now you can make this right because I’ve brought you a Decepticon.”

“So I’m supposed to go head to head against, and I quote, the most powerful vehicles in the universe using a junkyard reject from a monster truck rally. Is it too late to accept responsibility and walk the plank?”

Dreadfeather is extremely reluctant to go with this plan, so Elgar hops in the driver seat. Dreadfeather reluctantly climbs into the car and the pirates take off in pursuit of the alien cars. They briefly swing by to knock Bulk and Skull into the wet cement again, then track down the cars.

Justin and T.J. pull into an empty parking lot to call their success in to the Power Chamber. Lightning Cruiser and Storm Blaster thank the Rangers for helping them by adopting the Turbo Ranger symbol, officially declaring themselves to be T.J. and Justin’s cars respectively.

Elgar pulls into the lot to confront the Rangers. Dreadfeather takes the opportunity to flee from Elgar’s driving, instead jumping into Lightning Cruiser. Piranhatrons blitz towards Justin on their motorcycles; he responds by being in a huge fucking Jeep, which barely even notices as their bikes slam straight into it.

T.J. climbs up out of the Lightning Cruiser to have a high-speed punch-up with Dreadfeather.

Exactly the kind of shit that every episode of Car Rangers should be like.

T.J. forcibly ejects Dreadfeather from the vehicle, but he takes to the skies with his Space Jetpack and draws his gun. With bullets pelting Lightning Cruiser from both Dreadfeather and the Piranhatron bikers, T.J. calls for backup.

“On our way,” Ashley tells him.

She, Cassie, and Carlos teleport directly in front of Elgar. Elgar, however, is still driving a fucking car and he plows right on through them.

It’s okay, though. Carlos has a plan. “Time to change drivers,” he announces, actual dialogue. Then he leaps dramatically into the air, diving for the car! And lands on his face on the pavement, five feet away! Elgar’s car recedes into the distance and he throws up one hand to flip the Rangers off.

“Okay, I’m not going to tell you how to do your job,” Cassie says. “But we have teleporters.”

“Right,” Carlos says. “Okay. Take two.” He teleports straight into Elgar’s backseat, then reaches his arm around to choke Elgar out.

The last two biker Piranhatrons speed towards Cassie and Ashley. But they have guns. So they draw their guns and shoot the Piranhatrons. It seems like the obvious thing to do.

These guys brought motorcycles to a gunfight. Motorcycles! You know what a motorcycle is good for in a gunfight? It’s good for bringing your face much more quickly into the bullet.

T.J. converts Lightning Cruiser into its Jet Mode. Justin snatches Dreadfeather with the tow cable to hold him in one place. Then T.J. swoops in with guns blazing.

“Okay, let’s fire… shit, how many guns does this thing have? Is it all guns? We’ll say it’s all guns. Fire all guns.”

Before Dreadfeather knows what hit him, he’s chewed up by Lightning Cruiser’s unholy fury.

Meanwhile, Elgar manages to get Carlos out of his car by slamming the brakes. Carlos flips over Elgar’s shoulder, rolls across the hood, and hits the dirt.

“You weren’t wearing a seatbelt?!” Elgar exclaims mockingly. “What kind of an example are you setting for the kids at home?!”

“Not a great one, you’re right,” Carlos admits, picking himself up out of the dirt. “They probably shouldn’t play with guns either.” Carlos draws his Turbo Pistol and empties his clip into Elgar’s car. His shots tear up the hood, smash off the mirrors, burst the tires, and then finally ignite the fuel system prompting the car to violently explode. Elgar scrambles to escape.

With the pirates soundly defeated, the Rangers welcome their new sentient cars into the Turbo Ranger arsenal. Elgar finds out exactly what Divatox could do to him, Bulk and Skull get fired from their construction jobs, and the Rangers take their new vehicles out for a joyride. The end.

Dragon Score: 8/10

Y’know, it’s kind of funny how completely random the introduction of Lightning Cruiser and Storm Blaster was. Divatox wasn’t trying to find the map to them at the beginning; she was just looting, and was pleasantly surprised to discover said map.

The total lack of information we were given about what these cars are supposed to be was kinda surprising. They’re intelligent space cars programmed to come straight to Earth the moment their asteroid is discovered, with a map on the planet to help people find them. I was kinda expecting some sort of lore dump like we got with the Zeo Crystal or Gold Power Staff but nope. Once again, Turbo’s total lack of fucks towards actually explaining its Ranger elements is on display. All we got is “Most powerful vehicles in the universe.”

But that’s okay. Nobody comes to Power Rangers for the lore. The important thing is that we have these two brand new super-vehicles, which look suspiciously similar to the old super-vehicles except these ones are intelligent! And they got to have a legitimately awesome vehicular carnage sequence, which is all too rare in Turbo.

I have one major problem and one minor nitpick with this episode. The nitpick is a moment when Justin refers to his vehicle as Star Blaster. It’s moments like these that remind you just how little actual care or attention went into making this show. It’s not the first time an actor has misstated the name of a Ranger Thing and the crew kept that take in, and I’m sure it won’t be the last.

But the actual problem I have with the episode is T.J.’s experience with trying to break in the Lightning Cruiser. It’s a very weird scene. Does the car want T.J. to come with it or not? It lets him get inside, then immediately tries to shake him off. When it does shake him off, he has to chase it down and forcibly climb in.

Lightning Cruiser doesn’t take advantage of any opportunity to actually lose T.J., but still makes getting inside as difficult as possible. It’s a very confusing bit of filler action.

But apart from that, this episode was a hit.

Best Ranger: T.J. Johnson, Red Ranger

Okay, this was a really close one. Justin very nearly took this when he broke himself free of the pirates. However, it didn’t ultimately amount to much and it was actually Storm Blaster acting of its own volition that got him out of there.

So instead I’m giving this to T.J. for that really cool vehicular combat sequence with Dreadfeather. T.J. wins Best Ranger for giving us that little taste of what every episode of Turbo rightfully should be like.

Worst Ranger: Ashley Hammond, Yellow Ranger

Ashley teleported the team directly in front of a vehicle in motion. Good job, Ash. I know I could pin this on Carlos or Cassie but she was the one who answered T.J.’s call, so I’m blaming her.

#power rangers #power rangers turbo #dragon review power rangers

[novarasalas]

Second Look Review: Battle Scars

Hey, guys...remember me? I make Voltron fan content and stuff. That is, when I’m not working an insane amount and end up too tired to think.

So...yeah.

I’ve been working on this one in my down time. It’s a bit shorter than usual, but I’ve still got a few thoughts on the whole thing.

-

Wide Open Spaces

They don’t tend to speak about it in depth, and the science is always simplified (almost too much), but one thing I’ve always appreciated about this show is that they acknowledge how far away everything is in space.

Pidge: Also, this celestial quadrant is 230,000 light years in diameter.

I, being me, did some research.

I’d like to know how they’re calculating these “celestial quadrants”, because our milky way galaxy is 100,000 light years across. The Andromeda Galaxy is 110,000 light years across.

Are they really searching an area the size of two, average sized galaxies?** In that case, they’d be lucky if they found anything at all. And as it happens, they’re having that particular kind of trouble here.

Once again, I say: space is huge and scary.

**The largest galaxy that we’ve detected so far is IC 1101, a supergiant elliptical galaxy that spans 2 million light years at its widest point.

- -

Forgotten in the Chaos

Raise your hand if you had a bad feeling about Olkarion this season.

Yeah….same.

I’ll be honest, I’ve had a bad feeling about Olkarion’s fate since the last battle there in S5.

I’m still a bit confused about the apparent lack of communication here. Had they contacted Olkarion at some point before the Atlas set out? You’d think so, as they’re arguably Voltron’s greatest ally.

I suppose that they may have been in contact before Volton split from the Atlas, and that this is a very new  development.

But why haven’t the Olkari alerted them to the situation? Have they actually gone into hiding?

That’s the feeling I get now that I’ve looked at things again.

We have to remember that the first time we meet the Olkari, they’ve been enslaved by the Empire and forced to make the cubes. And here, we end up seeing that the Robeast absconds with those same cubes. I can easily see them, at least for the time being, disappearing from the galactic stage until they feel safe again.

Shiro: How many years have you lived like this?

Ryner: Many decafeebs.

It hasn’t been that long since they had been freed from years long occupation. And now this thing comes and takes the weapons that they were forced to build. I can assume that at this point, they’re hiding not just to protect themselves, but everyone else. They have a unique kind of power. In the wrong hands, it’s devastating.

Removing themselves from view removes the possibility of others using the Olkari people for their own gain.

- - -

Girls, Girls, Girls

I’m never going to shut up about this, ok?

This episode gave us some great Allura and Pidge moments. I just wish we’d gotten more throughout the series.

Of all the paladins, other than Shiro and Hunk, they’ve interacted the least on screen. I wish it had been under better circumstances...but eh.

But this was the episode that I started realizing that this last season was going to be female driven.

This episode has the aforementioned Pidge and Allura interactions, but also:

The two girls Pidge sees playing, and:

Ryner, who I’m going to imagine is their grandmother.

The first episode of this season featured some great female interactions of all kinds. The big bad is Honerva, and her most notable cohorts are also women.

It’s something that means a lot to me. Even now, you don’t see many shows with a number of diverse female characters. And even though this series had to get a running start at it, I still appreciate what they’ve given us in this case.

Who run (and destroy) the world?

- - - -

The Lessons Learned

“The old must give way to the new.”

That’s a good lesson to learn. Nothing lasts forever, no matter how much you might want it to.

Personally, I have difficulty letting go. Objects and people...if I lose them, it causes major anxiety. Learning to accept change and loss is an ongoing process for me, as I’m sure it is for a lot of people.

So, what Hunk says here:

Hunk: If you think about it, this isn’t really the end of Olkarion. Weblums eating dead planets is just the first step in a process that leads to the growth of new stars, planets, and galaxies.

...not only is it the truth of things, it’s an idea that can help quash those bad feelings that come with change and loss.

It’s healing, in a way.

So when I saw these faces:

...I figured that maybe something significant was to come.

Looking back...well…

In Keith’s case, maybe he’s remembering their first trip to Olkarion. He was still reeling from the realization that he was most likely half Galra and had a few things to say about acceptance and sameness.

Pidge: I guess it’s like Ryner said. We’re all made up of the same cosmic dust.

Keith: So, that means we’re all related. This ship, those stars, the Olkari. Even the Galra.

So when I see that contemplative look on his face, I can easily imagine that he’s remembering this moment, and how he had may have felt at ease with himself for the first time since his revelation.

Allura, on the other hand…

At this point, I was convinced that the end was going to see her finding happiness with a new family. Between this episode (that look!), and “Launch Date”, I took it as a given.

After all, old gives way to the new.

As far as loss goes, losing not only you’re family, but the entirety of your people is more than I can even imagine. The amount of loneliness and pain she must’ve been feeling this whole time is sure to have weighed her down.

I was so, very hopeful that the end of all this would see her happy and surrounded by the people who loved her.

We all know that didn’t happen.

In fact, I’m now lost on the meaning of this lesson within the plot.

No old gave way to new. The old came back. The old just kinda...hecked off back into space.

Where was the new? What’s my take away from this?

I’ve been working on this piece for a month. I’ve rolled these thoughts over in my head, trying to tumble them into smooth stones of reason.

And I got nothing.

...I mean, it’s still a good lesson, but….

- - - - -

A few good things, cause I promised.

One, this move is fire!

It’s speed up because Tumblr’s gif limit is still shiat, but that’s Allura and her lion working together.

They never really did the whole “remote-piloting” thing again, but they’ve learned to do things like this, and I think it’s pretty cool.

Second is something not so much related to this show, but within the theme of the episode.

There was always something I would try to remember when I was feeling particularly down on myself. And there’s a post going around on here saying the same thing, and I was absolutely thrilled to see it.

The idea is this:

A supergiant star can burn for billions of years. Eventually, though, it will begin to run out of fuel, and within its core, it’ll fuse heavier and heavier elements, until eventually, it begins fusing iron.

This is how a star dies.

If the star goes supernova, all of the elements contained within will be blasted out into space to eventually become new things. Maybe the hydrogen will help form a new star. Maybe the helium will help create a new gas giant, like Saturn.

And the iron?

That iron is in your blood.

So if you’re feeling small, maybe a little worthless, remember: a part of you once killed a star. What could be more bad ass than that?

------

In summary:

This episode featured a lot of loss, as well as a lot of hope.

In the end, I’m not sure what it did for the overall story, though. Unless I’m forgetting something that happens later on that acts as a call back to this “old is new” concept, I’m just kinda eh on the whole thing.

Next up: 

Wish you weren’t so fuckin’ awkward, bud.

#voltron #voltron legendary defender #vld #keith kogane #vld keith #allura #pidge #hunk vld #second look review #long post #olkarion

[insarations]

these are actually hella fucking cute y’all

1: when you have cereal, do you have more milk than cereal or more cereal than milk? more cereal

2: do you like the feeling of cold air on your cheeks on a wintery day? oh yes :) but gotta  get me some hot chocolate or blanket

3: what random objects do you use to bookmark your books? usually just a scrap of paper or whatevers close

4: how do you take your coffee/tea? i put soy milk and sugar in my coffee....just sugar in tea

5: are you self-conscious of your smile? ya :/ well at least if my mouth is open...I have terrible teeth

6: do you keep plants? no

7: do you name your plants? noo lol

8: what artistic medium do you use to express your feelings? painting/drawing/crafting..sometimes writing or poetry

9: do you like singing/humming to yourself? very much

10: do you sleep on your back, side, or stomach? usually side, sometimes back

11: what's an inner joke you have with your friends? too many to name

12: what's your favorite planet? hmm...never thought about it strangely. saturn for looks. but mars cause idk..it holds the most possibility

13: what's something that made you smile today? my cats

14: if you were to live with your best friend in an old flat in a big city, what would it look like? uhhh....idk

15: go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is! A day on Venus is actually longer than a year on Venus... wrap your head around that ;)

16: what's your favorite pasta dish? ooooh all of them lol but probably lasagna... ooh or alfredo

17: what color do you really want to dye your hair? just darker...dark brown or black

18: tell us about something dumb/funny you did that has since gone down in history between you and your friends and is always brought up when i made us play hide n seek in a hotel room and i hid behind a curtain. or when i peed on my friends foot cause she got stung by a jellyfish XD

19: do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw/ in it? I used to :/ I dont' really anymore..probably should

20: what's your favorite eye color? um idk really it depends on the person..I usually like brown or blue. not that green isn't nice but again depends on the person lol

21: talk about your favorite bag, the one that's been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces. ugh I really don't use bags or purses or anything like that much. currently my black vans drawstring

22: are you a morning person? nah, never will be. i'm used to getting up early but still hate it

23: what's your favorite thing to do on lazy days where you have 0 obligations? SLEEP

24: is there someone out there you would trust with every single one of your secrets? yes..a few people

25: what's the weirdest place you've ever broken into? umm i dont think ive broken into anywhere

26: what are the shoes you've had for forever and wear with every single outfit? i got rid of all my own shoes but the ones ive had a while i wear the most are my black slipon vans

27: what's your favorite bubblegum flavor? mint

28: sunrise or sunset? sunset

29: what's something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing? only she could do it, cant even explain lol

30: think of it: have you ever been truly scared? more than a few times

31: what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks. I LOVE SOCKS lol absolutely not all white socks. I like fun patterned socks..especially my vans no shows... sometimes sleep with them on

32: tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3AM when you were with friends. oh gosh dont let me start

33: what's your fave pastry? uggghh too many. recently something amazing I tried... lobster tails from carlos bakery. but really..any pastry lol

34: tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what does it look like? do you still keep it? lots of them. the main one I can think of is a small little grungy horse named Wickee lol...got him at this amusement park called Wickee Watchee... idk where he is atm :/

35: do you like stationary and pretty pens and so on? do you use them often? ooooooh yesssss...from time to time

36: which band's sound would fit your mood right now? 21 pilots

37: do you like keeping your room messy or clean? I mean I like it clean.... but it's messy most the time anyways lol

38: tell us about your pet peeves! ugh so many. the #1 thing probably is when I'm walking like in a store and someone just stops right in front of me..like i'm tryna get somewhere please move haha but otherwise I just had selfish spoiled people and attitudes and people who think they're better than everyone else

39: what color do you wear the most? black and gray

40: think of a piece of jewelry you own: what's it's story? does it have any meaning to you? um honestly I don't have any jewelry besides my liprings. There is this necklace that was my grandmas but I don't really wear it anymore

41: what's the last book you remember really, really loving? It's called Pawn by Robin Roseau

42: do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it! Starbucks. it's amazing. it's life. that is all.

43: who was the last person you gazed at the stars with? this girl

44: when was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything? um hmm on and off lately and I think i'm getting there again...but probably really completely like...last spring

45: do you trust your instincts a lot? as much and often as I can

46: tell us the worst pun you can think of. oh you don't want me to do that

47: what food do you think should be banned from the universe? donald trump. oh food. hahahahah omg. i thought it said thing. hahahaha. i cant even answer now.

48: what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today? roaches. yes still same. I HATE THEM

49: do you like buying CDs and records? what was the last one you bought? eh neither like or dislike..rarely ever buy cds never records. But I did recently buy the Gwen Stefani Christmas album ;)

50: what's an odd thing you collect? nothing really odd. oh well.... unique boxes. I guess thats strange lol

51: think of a person. what song do you associate with them? so many songs.

52: what are your favorite memes of the year so far? uh hmm.. probably the spongebob mocking one lol

53: have you ever watched the rocky horror picture show? heathers? beetlejuice? pulp fiction? what do you think of them? honestly..dont kill me...no

54: who's the last person you saw with a true look of sadness on their face? myself XD

55: what's the most dramatic thing you've ever done to prove a point? gotten out of the car and walked a mile home XD

56: what are some things you find endearing in people? just being genuine and truthful and sweet and trying to be funny even if you're not really

57: go listen to bohemian rhapsody. how did it make you feel? did you dramatically reenact the lyrics? BEAUTIFUL. I didnt actually listen but I did in my head. BEAUTIFUL SONG

58: who's the wine mom and who's the vodka aunt in your group of friends? why? uhhhh..... dont really have a group of friends XD

59: what's your favorite myth? hmm too much thinking

60: do you like poetry? what are some of your faves? depends, most the time...the Footprints poem

61: what's the stupidest gift you've ever given? the stupidest one you've ever received? given um...idk I used to get a buncha stuff from the dollar store for my fam every year lol received? a rock from my ex bf -_-

62: do you drink juice in the morning? which kind? nah not really a juice person

63: are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organized or kinda leave them be? yes organized

64: what color is the sky where you are right now? black

65: is there anyone you haven't seen in a long time who you'd love to hang out with? yesss....

66: what would your ideal flower crown look like? uhhh eh..not for me

67: how do gloomy days where the sky is dark and the world is misty make you feel? either calm or sad or sleepy or a combo

68: what's winter like where you live? it's florida. not usually cold. this week is as cold as it gets...low is like 38 but usually it doesnt even get there

69: what are your favorite board games? clue, monopoly is alright too

70: have you ever used a ouija board? no

71: what's your favorite kind of tea? not huge on tea but I like mint, or something fruity like berry or lemon or peach

72: are you a person who needs to note everything down or else you'll forget it? with certain things

73: what are some of your worst habits? leaving drinks or bottles half finished out or like letting my room get messy

74: describe a good friend of yours without using their name or gendered pronouns. funny. sarcastic. sometimes an asshole. good time. gorgeous. fun.

75: tell us about your pets! They're two cats, sister, Lamb and Rue...they're 2 and 1/2 years old..and sweet and mischevious and fluffy and soft and cuteeee  and I love them more than anything

76: is there anything you should be doing right now but aren't? not really

77: pink or yellow lemonade? dont really like lemonade much but they dont make much a difference to me

78: are you in the minion hateclub or fanclub? fanclub :)

79: what's one of the cutest things someone has ever done for you? wrote a song for me

80: what color are your bedroom walls? did you choose that color? if so, why? white..nah I didnt choose

81: describe one of your friend's eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of. honestly my minds going black lol im tired

82: are/were you good in school? yes for the most part..had my moments but overall good

83: what's some of your favorite album art? so many I could name. coldplays is always really colorful and abstracty. and imagine dragons.

84: are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones? already have two. want a lot more..too much to name and i dont even know still what all i want

85: do you read comics? what are your faves? nah

86: do you like concept albums? which ones? YAS. many. but first came to mind, Skillets Rise

87: what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives? Silver Linings Playbook. Paper Towns. Shrek. All the disney movies. Avatar. Wizard of Oz. many more

88: are there any artistic movements you particularly enjoy? all of them haha... pop art, impressionism, renaissance..just all of it all special in they're own way

89: are you close to your parents? eh idk i cant explain..neither close nor distant. like we live together and talk alot but not really the close relationship as some do..im very different from them

90: talk about your one of you favorite cities. Knoxville. the city I went to college in... interesting place with lots to do..best of both worlds. beautiful mountains and hills and views. but also the downtown areas are cool..lots of fun stuff

91: where do you plan on traveling this year? going to savannah ga for my bday. not sure where else yet but i'm sure there will be other places. i'd really like to go to phoenix..boston..new orleans..california..portland ugh so many places

92: are you a person who drowns their pasta in cheese or a person who barely sprinkles a pinch? CHEESE AF

93: what's the hairstyle you wear the most? just up in a bun which is boring but its too messy and long to put up with lol

94: who was the last person you know to have a birthday? my dad

95: what are your plans for this weekend? nothing really so far. probably will go to lunch or something with my friend

96: do you install your computer updates really quickly or do you procrastinate on them a lot? procrastinate

97: myer briggs type, zodiac sign, and hogwarts house? myer briggs- INFJ (advocate) sign- aquarius house- ravenclaw

98: when's the last time you went hiking? did you enjoy it? legitimately...like 3 years ago...hated it...too much walking and pain XD

99: list some songs that resonate to your soul whenever you hear them. ugh sooooooooooo many. pretty much any song by skillet or gwen stefani/no doubt recently..dusk till dawn by sia, new rules by dua lipa... also songs by ben howard..lots of indie stuff

100: if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why? 5 into the future... i've already lived my past, and i've made a lot of progress...wanna jump to even more progress hopefully

#survey #survey questions #random survey #cute questions #many questions #random questions

[classhattery]

Personal Space - Interstellar Sarcasm (Prologue)

---------------  This is a little something I’ve been cooking up over the past year or so. I would’ve posted this teaser/prologue earlier but I only recently got comfortable enough with the main story arc  to warrant posting it here. I hope you all enjoy, and if anyone wants to follow it, I’ll be posting occasional updates under the #PersonalSpaceStory and #ClasshatCompositions tags. Extra special shout-out to my editor and reviewer, @risualto for helping this pile of words resemble a plot. <3 Happy Reading! --------------- 

Prologue

    “Thrusters?”     “Online.”     “Vectoring ports?”     “Online.”     “Weapons?”     “Secured and stowed.”      …I always enjoyed pre-flight checklists. Even if it involved meticulously re-reviewing the same list of things I had gone over personally the night before, it felt satisfying to know my ship was working well. The list also gave me a second or two of silent repose in an otherwise hectic morning.     “Navigation and guidance?”     “Online.”     “Cortex Reactor?”     “Optimal to within 3 percent.”      I ran my hand along the sleek edges of the leading wing of my ship, feeling the light vibrations that the dual fusion reactor steadily put out. Even in the dim light of the hangar, the Federation Class 5A Interceptor’s jet black polished angles shimmered like the facets of a gem – brilliant, yet exact. Even after a year in the Tactical Fleet, spaceflight was still amazing to me, no matter how commonplace it had become in my life.

    ”Life support?”

    “Functioning.”

    “Databases and communications?”

    “Online.” 

     …Cosmic awe or not, I had today’s agenda in my hand, and daydreaming was better-suited for times where I wasn’t at the controls of a multi-million-dollar spacecraft.     “Launch Clearance Code is 4578-D.”     “Open hatch 1 for boarding and prepare all systems for immediate departure.”     “I’m afraid I can’t do that, Dave,” the ship’s loudspeaker blared.

   When scientists finally perfected computerized artificial intelligence, they realized that each one they created had a unique personality. In the same way that all humans are different, so were all the AI’s that they created. Now, when Cadets graduate from academy, they choose their ship, and along with it, the embedded nav console’s artificial personality. When I chose my ship based off the personality trait “impressionable” listed on the registry for a new 5A, AEPRIS was there, waiting there for me on (in?) deck. AEPRIS’ full textbook name is “Artificial Evolving Personality, Relations, and Intelligence System” however, unlike others, she preferred to go by “PRI”. If she wasn’t integrated into the dashboard of my ship, you wouldn’t be able to tell that she was a computer.    Have you ever watched one of those adventure movies where the protagonist chooses a companion or animal out of many just like it? There’s normally some sappy bonding and cheesy music to accompany it, and it leaves you feeling like your sense of reality was just sugar coated and deep fried by a guy named Roy Disney. That was craft selection day for me, except you replace protagonist with pilot, and companion, bonding, and music with four weeks of teaching a computer how avoid sarcastic retorts in intense situations.    The thing about “impressionable” AI’s, though, is that they learn fast. It took no longer than three days of exposure to…me…before PRI was about as bad as I was when it came to inherent sarcasm. You’d think that two innately sassy individuals with an affinity for space would get along just swimmingly, and you’d be right. Regardless, PRI and I had our moments. -----    While PRI’s reference was a good dose of humor for an otherwise dreary morning, I was on a schedule. “We do have a mission today, you know. You can pretend to kill me later, HAL.” I shouted, rapping loudly on the hatch.

   Over my coms link I came a reply. “What do you mean pretend?” she chuckled. “I’m just looking out for you, for all we know there could be deadly space out there, and you could die from it.”

   “PRI, we’re at war and I still think I’m in greater danger of dying from old age out here if you don’t open the door!” After what sounded like a stifled electronic laugh, the hatch swished downwards, and the interior lights flickered on.

   “Welcome back, Captain Killjoy,” she snickered.

   “Always a pleasure, Lieutenant Lithium.”

   I climbed up and inside. If the outside of my ship looked sleek, the interior made you feel like a true starship captain. Arrays of holographic blue displays and arrays of buttons flickered to life and the HUD on my headset synchronized with the PRI’s onboard computer. The 5A was an Interceptor class Starfighter, meaning it was about the size of a small single-story home, yet weighed over 15,000 tons due to the reinforced hull, shielding, and increased weapon capacity. Regardless (literally) of mass, space didn’t seem to care about weight, so the 5A was still nimble on its feet and absolutely gorgeous throughout. I sank into the command chair and plugged in my data logger.

   “Ready PRI?” I inquired to my co-pilot.

   “As I’ll ever be, Captain.”

   I contacted the orbital platform’s traffic control tower.

   “5A Interceptor NVA-7S, registry M. Davidson, cleared for launch tunnel egress. Fly safe, Captain.”

   As soon as the massive titanium gate started to lumber sideways, the hangar lights cut out and the artificial gravity shut off. As the air escaped the room, all the sounds of the hangar faded. All I heard was myself, my ship, and the silence of space.

   “Vectoring to align with tunnel.”

   The 5A nosed up until the glimmer of the stars in space came into view through the cockpit glass and reflected off the mirrored facets of my ship. I unlocked the throttle and the status lights on the displays surrounding me turned green in reply.  I looked over the familiarity of my hangar one last time and edged the throttle smoothly forward. The warp bubble formed as the 5A slipped quietly into the darkness towards Saturn.

Chapter 1: Ringleader    The flight to Saturn only took about 80 minutes, and that’s going sub-warp at light speed. About 45 minutes into my flight, the radio crackled to life, and I was greeted by today’s impromptu alarm clock.

   “DAVIDSON!” roared a vaguely familiar steel-cut voice.

   “Yes Sir!” I snapped to attention, even though I was millions of kilometers away and half asleep.

   “Glad to see you’re awake, Matt!” the admiral chuckled.

   I recognized the voice as Admiral Baker. He was a close friend of my father back when the Antero-Solaris war began. He was the one who introduced me to the Federation’s Tactical Fleet when I was young, before my father shipped off.

   “It’s been a while, Admiral.”

   “I’ll be dammed, it really has,” he replied, nearly putting emotion into his words. “You finished reading all of your father’s old science journals yet?”

   An image flashed through my mind of the six boxes of Popular Science magazines and NASA Tech Briefs (print materials from the 20th and 21st centuries) that got passed down as an heirloom through my family. “Not even close,” I replied, feigning despondence. “So, what brings you onto my screen today? You don’t normally give assignments to the Tac Fleet.”

“I saw you coming out this way and just had to drop in. I even have a special assignment for you.”

“Special assignment?”

“And a good one at that! I saw you were en-route to Neptune via Saturn, and though I’d spice up your day job for once.” The Admiral then held up a portfolio, which materialized into my hands instantaneously. “Our long-range satellites picked up some anomalies in the rings of Saturn, and we can’t rule out the possibility of ACF activity this close to earth, so we need a scouting party to check it out.”

“ACF? In our solar system?” I suddenly felt less amazed about the folio that had just appeared in my lap.

   The Andromedan Confederation, or ACF, was the first militarized foreign entity that mankind encountered and had long been the bane of our existence. The Antero-Solaris war stemmed from this first encounter, but never really went anywhere, as the Andromedans had technology that rivaled ours. In the decades since then, the conflict devolved into more of a cold war, with neither side really fighting with the other unless somebody got too close for comfort.

   “I know the space commies really aren’t your cup of tea,” he remarked, “but the location takes you through the rings of Saturn, which I know you’ll love. Besides, our analytics team thinks that it’s probably malfunctioning sensor equipment. We just need a physical verification to confirm our guesses.”

   He had me there. With the strict scheduling of my flights I never really got to explore places I wanted to go that often. “Sounds quite fascinating,” I answered, trying to hide my enthusiasm. “I’ll take up your offer.”

   “Good man!” shouted Baker. “Oh, and before I go, how’s PRI?”

   “Oh, the little virus is holding up just fine.”

  “VIRUS?!?” boomed a faux-irritated voice from within the ship. Immediately, I lost control of the stick and the fighter started banking erratically, jarring me in my seat.

   “I-M-M-M    JU-US-US-T    KID-D-D-ING!” I tried to sputter out while being tossed about like a bad salad.

   PRI’s voice returned to normal almost immediately, and with it so did the ship. “I know!” she said gleefully.

   “And what about our dear friend Matt, eh PRI?” Baker inquired.

   "My space prisoner is holding up just fine,” chirped PRI.

   “Glad to see you two are getting along well,” Baker said, stifling a laugh. “Regardless, duty calls. Dismissed, Captain.”

   “That’s Captain Killjoy to you.” PRI interjected, as the comm-link clicked off. -----    Radio silence greeted me for the rest of my flight. Even PRI remained quiet for most of the trip, only speaking up when I asked for status reports.

   “What’re our sensors picking up?”

   “According to sensors, our biggest enemy in the solar system is currently ice and rocks.”

   Ice and rocks. I hoped Saturn was as pretty as it was in the books, because it was still a dreadfully uneventful flight thus far. For the next 10 minutes, I fixated on the pastel orange speck slowly growing bigger in front of me.

   “Approaching Saturn. Dropping out of light factor.”

   As we decelerated, I banked slowly, wrapping around the planet in a wide loop. The scanner worked below 0.15c, so I completed my orbit and drifted to a halt at the extent of one of Saturn’s dust rings.

   “PRI, what do you see?” I asked.

   “Ones and Zeroes, mostly,” she teased.

   “I mean through the sensor array,” I spoke, trying to conceal the fact that I wanted to laugh.

   “The orbital sensor array seems to be working. I’m picking up some dust. Rocks. Moderately bigger rocks. Some ice, maybe? Oh, and there’s also this big planet thing here, if you’re looking for one. Can’t miss it.”

   “PRI…”

   “There are no signs of malfunctioning technology or intelligent life anywhere nearby. On an unrelated note, here’s the ship self-scan you totally asked for.”

   “That scan defines you just as much as it does me, you over-engineered calculator.”

  “And where would you be without your calculator?” she taunted playfully.

   “Probably mauled to death by all the deadly ice and rocks around us,” I laughed.

   PRI’s mic channel opened to respond with a quip, but was suddenly cut short by an incoming emergency hailing frequency request on my screen. I hit accept and a very harried looking Admiral Baker appeared on the console.

   “Admiral! You look terrible, what happened to-”

   “Davidson!” he interrupted, in an abrupt and alarming tone.

   I recognized that tone of voice. In my seven years of training I heard that voice only one other time: When the Andromedans attacked my father’s regiment.

   “Sir, what’s wrong?” I replied nervously.

   “Matthew, you need to get out of there right away,” he warned. His frequency was weak, and barely audible through the static. “You…kzzzt…planet…bzzzz…array…krzsst…ACF…”

   “I’m departing asap, sir. My reactor needs to safely recharge” I replied.

   The static cleared for a moment.

   “Davidson listen to me, drop the protocol and get the fuck out of there now!”

   The admiral opened his mouth to speak again, but the signal was drowned out by an incoming message transmitted across nearly every open frequency. Immediately, alarms rang out from my ship. I clearly recognized the metallic lisp of an ACF translated transmission.

  “UNIDENTIFIED SOLARIS CRAFT” the radio hissed. “YOU ARE TRESSPASSING IN THE LOCAL AIRSPACE OF A CONFEDERATION VESSEL. VACATE THE PREMISIS AT ONCE, WE WILL NOT WARN YOU AGAIN.”

   A distortion appeared in the middle of the dust ring in front of me, rising higher. Slowly, a Confederation Capital ship materialized out hiding beneath the thick dust, blotting out the distant sun.

   “PRI, redirect all power to thrusters and shields, now. Get us out of here.” The Capital ship was over a hundred times my size, and locked on to my Interceptor. I was out of time.

   “IDENTIFY YOURSELF OR BE DESTROYED.” blared my headset.

   “Sir I can’t hail them; the dust cloud is scrambling the message.”

   “Then we’re leaving posthaste. Light Factor, now!”

   “Our vectoring ports are clogged with dust, we cannot aim!” PRI shrieked frantically.

   “TIYE DLRW UA AWLKWS!” seethed the Andromedans in their native tongue.

   I felt the distortion created by their gravity well cannons charging up. I had a matter of seconds before I became a permanent part of history. I was out of options.

   In every cockpit, in every ship, regardless of size, there exists an orange button that no pilot ever hopes he has to press: Manual Warp Override. In a frantic dash I spun around and hit the button. The glowing switch clicked down and locked.

   “OVERRIDE PROTOCOL ACTIVATED” repeated PRI, robotically.

   5A lurched forward as the first gravitational round exploded behind me. As the interceptor accelerated to warp 10 in a fraction of a second, I was stretched between the expanding gravity well behind me and the compression of space-time before me. The sudden change in G forces slammed me into the back of the cabin. As the stars bent backwards around 5A, the warp bubble formed, and I blacked out. The gentle hum of the Cortex Reactor was the last thing I heard as darkness enveloped me.

Chapter 2: A Rude Awakening    I awoke to the sound of nothingness, floating in a black void. My ship, PRI, and all of space was nowhere to be found. “Hello?!” I shouted frantically, but nothing came out. The deafening silence was as black as the void that surrounded me. As I contemplated the meaning of death, a light appeared before me, and grew brighter. As white light blinded my vision I came to my senses, and could hear again.

   “Be safe, dear,” a solemn yet familiar voice cooed.

   As my eyes adjusted, I recognized the blurry outlines my mother and father, standing at the threshold of our front door at the base on Mars. My father was accompanied by two men in uniform, holding papers. It had been ages since I saw my father’s face, and I tried to call out to him.

   “Dad will be back soon, Matthew, don’t worry,” my mother assured me, still choked up.

   I tried to scream, but all I could do was cry. I was not in control here. My actions were on autopilot and I watched onwards like I was living through a replay of the past. Suddenly it hit me. The papers, the teary goodbyes –this was the day he shipped out to fight the ACF, and the last time I saw his face. The cruelty of the situation tore at me and I wanted to break out and run to him. Younger me had feelings to deal with too, and instead ran to the couch, crying and burying us both in it. As I felt the emotional dam crack within me, I felt the reassuring hand of my mother hugging me as the world faded to black again.

-----

   I slowly awoke, and knew this time I was alive, as everything started hurting immediately. As I slowly got up, PRI, who was silent up until now, must’ve noticed my movement and shouted to me.

   “Matt! Oh, thank god you’re alive!” she exclaimed, as if I just rose from the dead.

   Something was oddly comforting about the sincerity coming from my electronic partner, but that warm feeling didn’t last for long.

   “We can share details in a minute, disable the override, we’re still at warp!”

   I immediately looked out the window and realized that my ship was still at warp 10, as space distorted around the cockpit glass. The hum of the reactor was no longer quiet, and was now an alarming roar that shook the back of the cabin. I crawled to the orange button and twisted to unlock it. Instantaneously, the ship slowed to a halt as the stars stretched back into shape. As I caught my breath, PRI spoke again.

   “2 days.”

“…What did you say?”

   “2 days. You were out for two days,” she explained, somberly.

   As the reality of what those two days meant sunk in, my heart dropped. At light speed, I would only be 48 light-hours away from earth. At warp 10, which was about 1.6 billion times that, I could be lightyears away from the edge of our solar system.  I needed more information.

   “What did you do after I blacked out?” I asked, perplexed. I decided against sharing my story from my vision with PRI, she had enough to process without my compromised emotional state messing with things.

   “After you collapsed, I sat and waited. That button is a manual override, meaning I was powerless to do anything to stop it. I just sat there and waited, recording data the whole time.”

   I felt a twinge of guilt, realizing that I left my co-pilot stranded helpless for such a long time.

   “At least I’m alive now, right?” I half-joked, trying to lighten the grim atmosphere.

   “Just don’t die again, okay?” she said, worriedly. “Please, Matt. I don’t want to be stranded out here alone.”

   “I promise I won’t,” I assured her.

   …It took me a second to process the emotions coming from PRI. Engineers really nailed the self-aware aspect of AEPRIS, and it showed. It used to be cliché, for someone to grow attached to a machine, but among pilots it was a real thing. You spent more time with your AI then you did with your own family, so sentiment was something we all dealt with, so the sudden grimness that came over me shook me so.

   “What data were you able to record?” I asked, trying to steer the conversation positively.

  “It took about 8 hours at warp 10 to leave the range of the fleet’s beacons, so I have our exit vector from the local cluster. Past that, I only know the time frame that we were at warp for, which was 53 hours, 27 minutes, and 32 seconds. That’s onboard computer time, not observational time.”

   It took me a minute to do the displacement calculation, but PRI beat me to it.

   “It’s roughly 567 Trillion kilometers from Earth. Or about 5 light years,” she tabulated.

   Normally 5 light years is cosmic pocket change in terms of faster-than-light travel, but I gulped at the thought of what running the core for 48 hours did to the ship. Prolonged usage of the Cortex Reactor can shatter the crystalline structure of the power cores, and two days is way over the operational limit.

   “How does our core look?” I wondered.

   “Output is severely limited. When we pulled out of warp, the immediate cooling stress fractured it. Warp functionality is offline, and we’re limited to impulse and emergency power.”

   “Shit,” I thought. Either we had to find a replacement crystal, or I’d die of starvation long before then.

   “Okay PRI, can we still do a scan of the surrounding area?”

   “Our relay dish is still working, I can try.”

   As PRI ticked away I tried to do an inventory of what we had left in terms of supplies. I had the Federation standard issue survival pack, and water. At least I wouldn’t die thirsty. The cockpit toolbox contained a set of basic implements: a hammer, adjustable wrench, and fusion welder; nothing of special interest.

   As I finished my inventory, a critical alarm lit the ship’s interior.

   “Oxygen Levels Critical,” reported PRI.

   “…Oxygen. I need that,” I bitterly thought. “Where’s the leak, PRI?”

   ”I can’t find it. You’ll be dropping below critical O2 percentage in 30 seconds.”

   Federation code always ensures that there’s an emergency respirator on the bridge of every ship in the fleet. Mine was in an emergency cabinet underneath the console. I reached for it, only to be met with resistance from the door.

   “PRI, the cabinet’s locked.”

   “The manual says to ‘Break Glass to Open’ so I’d do that if I were you.”

   “PRI the door is made of metal.”

   “No, I think you literally have to say ’Break Glass’ to open it.”

   “Wait, what?” I stammered.

   “Just say it before you suffocate!”

   “Break Glass!” I commanded the ship. Instantaneously, the metal cover of the panel disintegrated off the door and fell into a pile of fine dust on the floor. I knew that Command was trying to automate everything, but this was a bit of a stretch, even by my standards. I could picture the Aerospace Engineer who designed the door out there laughing his ass off at his own handiwork. I hastily affixed the respirator to the front of my helmet. Even with that, I had about 30 minutes of emergency oxygen to work with, and that was a generous estimation considering my current heartrate. “What’s our course of action? Did your scan find anything?” I asked.

   PRI struck me with an unusually worried response. “There’s a registered Class M planet with enough oxygen content for your respirator to sort it out. However, it’s about a million kilometers from here.”

   That was good enough for me. However, the distance meant that I had to jump to at least a fraction of light to arrive before I ran out of oxygen. It wasn’t optimal, but I was running out of lucky breaks to use.

   “Set a course for it, speed factor 0.20c.”

   “I hope we hold up, Matt,” PRI wavered as she inched the throttle forward.

   The ship lurched into motion again, and accelerated to speed in an instant.

   Seconds later, I arrived at the outer cusp of the atmosphere.

   “Okay, full stop.”

   Before I had a second to evaluate the situation, a crack appeared and ran across the length of the cockpit glass. My emergency supply of lucky breaks apparently just ran out.

   “Hold on to something, now!” PRI shouted.

   I clamped down on the chair right as the windscreen shattered, sucking shards of glass out of the cockpit – along with all my oxygen. The bag of emergency tools whizzed by me and I caught it by the strap before it was swallowed by the void of space.

   “Impulse engines failing! System reserve power depleted! Core offline!” The ship started to fall, and I felt the “space elevator dropping” feeling in my gut.

   “We’re getting trapped by the planet’s gravity, and we’re falling without impulse,” PRI emphasized.

   The 5A was by no means an atmospheric vehicle. Reentry wasn’t something pilots normally had to do, and I was unsure if the ship would stay together. Without a windshield, I wouldn’t be able to monitor my own progress downward and the cockpit would be exposed to the effects of reentry.

   “Trajectory unstable. We’re entering the upper atmosphere.”

   The tip of the ship began to heat up, and I felt the air begin to push on my suit. I pulled up, aligned the belly of the craft perpendicular to the direction of travel, and dove into the back of the cabin, shutting the door. Hopefully PRI would be able to take us down gently. I could begin to hear sounds of the atmosphere interacting with my ship as we rocketed through the lower layers of the sky.

--------------- Personal Space Copyright 2018 Daniel S. [Classhattery] DBA Commonwealth Technology Solutions ---------------

#personalspacestory #classhatcompositions #I had so much fun writing this #I hope y'all like it #there will be more to come #long post #writing post #space stuff

[trackingthislamp]

Partners In Crime

Pairing: Peter x OC

Summary: Peter puts himself in trouble for defending his classmate in class from transphobic teacher. They both get detention, and some churros.

Word count: 1.3k

A/N: This is a trans boy Peter x non-binary OC story. Not particularly romantic but just some casual fluff. The OC goes by ze/hir pronoun :)

“Y’know you didn’t have you drag yourself into this.”

Peter withdraws his sight from the small television on the desk, slowly turning to his classmate on the left, who isn’t paying attention at Captain’s speech about responsibility at all. He blinks his drowsy eyes, struggling to support himself up.

“Uh,” he shrugs, “s’not a big deal. I mean- it is a big deal though. The way Mr. Crawson talked to you was simply awful. Anyone who saw that situation would speak out for you.”

“Not everyone.” Hir voice fades a bit, but the smile on hir face widens. “There were a full class of people, but here’s only you and me.”

Peter grins back, but looking away as he immediately feels silly. “Sometimes people just, well, need some more courage… I guess? Like, it was very badass of you… ‘gender isn’t real and you’re free to suck my ass!’ you really snapped him there.” He recollects, doing a cutting throat gesture.

“Ah-ha! You should look at his face!” Ze burst into laughter, then quickly hides it with a few coughs when ze spots Mrs. Lambert raising her eyebrow. “You’re not bad yourself. ‘Gender is as fake as that toupee on your bald top.’ Shots fired, Parker.”

“Ha, call me Peter though.” Peter straightens his spine, doodling absently on his notebook. “I just realized we never properly talked to each other before? S’kinda crazy. You’re—uh…M-M…”

“Mneme. M-N-E-M-E. Nee-mee.” Ze writes down the letters on the corner of the desk, “Or you can call me Jupiter XL, I won’t mind. Sounds like a code name.”

The topic of Captain’s speech has changed to about respecting the elders. But neither of them are listening. “Woah, it’s a moon of Jupiter?” Peter whispers with excitement, “I only remember Io and Europa—sorry that I sound dumb. There are like, uh, 60 of them?”

“69.” Mneme winks, “I discovered the name from Greek Mythology—the ancient Muse of Memory. I love it. Better than my dead one.”

“That’s dope. I love names with stories” Peter coos, starting to doodle the solar system. Mneme extends one hand to draw a Saturn that is twice bigger than Peter’s Sun. “So, what about your story then?” ze says, coloring the planets with glitter pens.

Peter’s hand stops, hesitates, “uhh…” his pencil hovers above the Earth, “I’m not really a guy with a lot of stories.”

“Oh c’mon, Pete, you got the most amazing internship that makes every kid in the school wish they were you.” Mneme throws the eraser at his direction, “You’ve probably had after tea with Tony Stark, just right by the window of his office, you talk about schools and he calls you son.”

“Actually he calls me under—ugh, actually I don’t see him often. The CEOs don’t come down from their office to talk to the interns, y’know—”

“But you’re friends with Spider-Man aren’t you?” Mneme interrupts with an excited tone, “The hero of Queens and the Star of Midtown? I saw it on the news, the accident in the monument. You were there too, weren’t you? I keep imagining what if I was there, in the broken elevator, ready for my death, thinking ‘bout what if they misgender me on the newspaper… then suddenly this tight-suited fella appears and save the day! That’s like the most dramatic plot twist ever. I’d probably be so excited that even give him a kiss—if he’s comfortable with that, o’course.”

An awkward smile appears on Peter’s face, but Mneme is too concentrating on drawing a Spider-Man mask to notice. “Well… yeah, yeah he’s really a cool guy.” Peter mumbles, rubbing his eyes, “I think… I just think it’s cool that he uses his power to… you know… like… save the little guys, and do good things. It’s-it’s really nice I think.”

“Yeah? A brave guy with a big heart. I love that guy.”

“Haha,” Peter lets out a dry laughter in a weird pitch, “he wasn’t really that brave though…he was actually pretty scared when he was on the top of the monument. Uh, I mean, he told me so...”

“Bravery doesn’t equal to being fearless.” Mneme takes a break from the drawing, tilting hir head. “The real courage is that despite your fear, you still choose to face it because you know you’re doing the right thing.”

Peter beams a shallow smile, “Woah, you should sign that on my yearbook.”

“Definitely will!” Mneme chuckles and points at television with hir pen. They aren’t even quite sure what Captain is on about now. “Look at that guy. I dunno everything about his story, but m’sure he got his reasons to choose his own path. I don’t think he’s a criminal. At least I don’t believe so.”

“Yeah.” Peter nods, and swallows the ‘except he kinda beat me the hell up’ down to his stomach. “I wish I could be like that because… I feel like m’just scared and can’t even tell what exactly is the ‘right’ thing to do.” He leans backward to the chair, staring at Captain’s smiley face. “A few months ago, I tried to impress Mr. Stark with my hard work. I thought as long as I put enough effort in it, he’d see my ability eventually… But all I did instead was mess everything up. And I even lost my internship temporarily… luckily he decided to give me a second chance. Yet still… it makes me wonder if I’m really ready for the bigger challenge.”

The confession is followed by a moment of silence that makes his stomach strains. But then he hears Mneme’s voice again. “Pete, you’re only 15. And sometimes you just gotta allow yourself to make mistakes. You really think Stark or Captain America don’t make mistakes like yours?”

“I understand that. But it still feel pretty much…defeating when it happens.” Peter sighs, “I don’t know, I feel like m’kinda eager to get approved. Maybe that’s where it goes wrong.”

“Eh-eh, you gotta stop right there, baby boy. There’s nothing wrong with expecting approval from others.” Mneme pouts and wiggles one finger, “You just have to remember that no matter how people see you, you’re still valid. Alright? Anyone who disagree owes you 5 billion, and they better turn on their locations.”

That finally makes Peter laugh. He presses his fist against his lips to cease the giggles, “You’re such a gem, Jupiter.”

“Jupiter XL, get my code name right, Spidey XX.”

“Spidey XX? Seriously?”

“Why not? M’sure your wall-climbing friend will appreciate that.” Mneme throws hir hands up, “Picture this: you’re sitting in the Avenger’s headquarter, giving orders to your crime-fighting partner. ‘Wall-Climber, this is Spidey XX, there are 10 bad guys on the east side of the building, you copy that?’ ‘Spidey XX, this is Wall-Climber. 10 bad guys, east side, got it. Over.’ ”

“That’s literally not gonna happen!” Peter’s cheeks redden, “Because I—”

“Kids! You’re here for punishment, not for parties!”

Mrs. Lambert’s holler almost makes them jump from the chairs. Neither of them notice that she has been standing by their desks for a while. “Apparently this is too easy for you kids and y’all haven’t really learned from your lesson yet. That only means—” she starts writing rapidly on her clipboard as the two kids exchange looks with each other, “—one more week of detention. Don’t give me that look! And think about what you’ve done wrong. Now finish your assignments and I don’t wanna hear any noise again!”

As soon as she turns around, Peter quickly glances at his partner in crime, who’s sticking hir tongue out behind hir notebook.

“Pssss,” Peter whispers, taking a peek at Mrs. Lambert’s direction, “Have you tried the best sandwich in New York? Delmar’s sandwich? We should totally get some later.”

“Hell yeah, Spidey XX.” Mneme gives him a peace sign, then narrows hir eyes. “What were you gonna say earlier? Right after you said, ‘it’s not gonna happen’.”

But Peter only replies with an innocent smile, “It’s classified, Jupiter XL.”

Ending note: Thank you so much for reading! This is my first Peter fic, I hope you enjoy this small piece I attempt. Also apologies if there is any possible mistake since I clearly haven’t beta’d the fic yet haha. If you have any idea, I’ll really love to hear from you :) Xx

#peter parker #peter parker imagine #peter parker fic #peter parker x oc #trans!peter parker #xanthe writes

[r0rorowurboat]

All of them!

200: My crush’s name is: n/a lmao199: I was born in: naples, fl198: I am really: gay?? idk197: My cellphone company is: t mobile196: My eye color is: green/blue/gray/idk man195: My shoe size is: 7 1/2 8 sometimes194: My ring size is: um i think that was 7 too but i dont remember193: My height is: 5′4″192: I am allergic to:pineapples and penicillin191: My 1st car was: a v old red saturn190: My 1st job was: a waitress189: Last book you read: um i think it was uhhhhhh shit uhhhh god fuck it was the warrior cats book but!!! it was bc i was stuck at my sister house with nothing but bibles or that series to read188: My bed is: an air mattress atm187: My pet: is perfect and i love her her name is luna and shes a little black cat who loves cuddles and kisses186: My best friend:is wonderful and i love him185: My favorite shampoo is: uhm. error i hardly ever use shampoo bc i have v dry curly hair and it makes it horrible184: Xbox or ps3: pc boi183: Piggy banks are: cure182: In my pockets: they dont make pockets in womens fashion wtf are you on. but uh. usually my phone, wallet, and keys181: On my calendar: i.. dont.. have one. 180: Marriage is: alright i guess. tax benefits179: Spongebob can: do that annoying laugh 178: My mom: tries v hard177: The last three songs I bought were? *squints* i think... it was keshas new album?176: Last YouTube video watched: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQuR8LVKhUE175: How many cousins do you have? 2174: Do you have any siblings? yes i have 3 older sisters173: Are your parents divorced? yeup172: Are you taller than your mom? nope171: Do you play an instrument? not anymore but i used to play clarinet170: What did you do yesterday? uhm spent the day at home as usual[ I Believe In ]169: Love at first sight: nah man168: Luck: to an extent i guess?167: Fate: i dont think so. 166: Yourself: sometimes165: Aliens: yes164: Heaven: nah163: Hell: nah162: God: nah161: Horoscopes: yes160: Soul mates: nah159: Ghosts: hmmm probably158: Gay Marriage: yes!157: War: no156: Orbs: orbs?? what are those?? like in ghost hunter shows? bc if so then no155: Magic: hm. what type? i think theres stuff we dont know about but idk if id call it magic. I think certain things have more power than we give credit. idk its hard to explain.[ This or That ]154: Hugs or Kisses: hugs153: Drunk or High: drunk152: Phone or Online: online151: Red heads or Black haired: redheadsredheadsredheads150: Blondes or Brunettes: hmmmm blondes i guess?149: Hot or cold: cold148: Summer or winter: winter147: Autumn or Spring: autumn146: Chocolate or vanilla: chocolate145: Night or Day: night144: Oranges or Apples: hmmm oranges143: Curly or Straight hair: curly 142: McDonalds or Burger King: mcdonalds141: White Chocolate or Milk Chocolate: milk chocolate140: Mac or PC: pc139: Flip flops or high heals: usually sneakers tbh but uhhh i own more heels then flip flops138: Ugly and rich OR sweet and poor: hm i mean i guess sweet and poor? im already poor so137: Coke or Pepsi: i dont drink soda, water. or coffee136: Hillary or Obama: obama135: Burried or cremated: cremated134: Singing or Dancing: singing133: Coach or Chanel: um. walmart? 132: Kat McPhee or Taylor Hicks: who or who?131: Small town or Big city: hm idk. probably city? 130: Wal-Mart or Target: target129: Ben Stiller or Adam Sandler: neither pls128: Manicure or Pedicure: hmmm manicure probs.127: East Coast or West Coast: i live on the east coast but idk west coast is home to a lot of friends so hmmmm126: Your Birthday or Christmas: its like a week apart there isnt much difference125: Chocolate or Flowers: chocolate124: Disney or Six Flags: disney123: Yankees or Red Sox: i dont sports[ Here’s What I Think About ]122: War: icky121: George Bush: memes?120: Gay Marriage: im gay119: The presidential election: my vote didnt matter!118: Abortion: its your body your choice117: MySpace: never had one116: Reality TV: i mean, its fake? entertaining tho115: Parents: eh. 114: Back stabbers: icky113: Ebay: cheap stuff112: Facebook: only for family tbh111: Work: pays the bills110: My Neighbors: dont know them109: Gas Prices: expensive108: Designer Clothes: overpriced107: College: wish i could afford it!106: Sports: nah105: My family: haha104: The future: haha[ Last time I ]103: Hugged someone: my grandma a few days ago102: Last time you ate: pizza a few hours ago101: Saw someone I haven’t seen in awhile: moving day seeing my extended family again100: Cried in front of someone: the other night with my mom or uhhh in call with kina today actually99: Went to a movie theater: wow uh pretty long time ago i dont actually remember98: Took a vacation: haha idk man97: Swam in a pool: wow uh idk96: Changed a diaper: hm last time i was with the twins. not sure how long its been. maybe 2 or 3 months?95: Got my nails done: when did my sister get married? years ago idk94: Went to a wedding: ^^93: Broke a bone: never have92: Got a peircing: about a year ago91: Broke the law: heh uh 90: Texted: a few hours ago[ MISC ]89: Who makes you laugh the most: probably kina or riley rn88: Something I will really miss when I leave home is: my mom tbh. the kids. wyatt. 87: The last movie I saw: the orphan86: The thing that I’m looking forward to the most: hm idk getting a job i guess85: The thing im not looking forward to: getting a job lmao84: People call me: by my name. but i have nicknames now!! Ray, rachi, babe, ray baby... its very nice and makes me feel warm and fuzzy and loved83: The most difficult thing to do is: hmmm clean? be honest about things that are bothering me? idk82: I have gotten a speeding ticket: never81: My zodiac sign is: capricorn sun aquarius moon80: The first person i talked to today was: the gc i think?79: First time you had a crush: i was v young and they had freckles and red hair and i died78: The one person who i can’t hide things from: um i try not to hide things in general! but someone who will call me out recently is raiken and archie lmao77: Last time someone said something you were thinking: riley lmao tho i beat her to it 

76: Right now I am talking to: riley75: What are you going to do when you grow up: i am grown up technically. uh. hopefully be an animator74: I have/will get a job: as a cashier probably73: Tomorrow: i have a job interview and then im gonna get coffee72: Today: was a long day71: Next Summer: hmmm idk70: Next Weekend: IDK GOD69: I have these pets: a cat!! who i love!!! and already gushed about but shes laying on my lap and purring rn and its so soothing68: The worst sound in the world: scratching against those uhhhh holographic things???? god i hate it67: The person that makes me cry the most is: hmnn my dad haha66: People that make you happy: my friends!!! Kina, Ali, Archie, Riley, Leo, Raiken, Mimi...... all of them good pals the squad my faves i love them65: Last time I cried: today rip64: My friends are: GOOD AND AMAZING I LOVE THEM63: My computer is: big! and i like it62: My School: none61: My Car: ded from the hurricane rip me60: I lose all respect for people who: are shitty? idk. 59: The movie I cried at was: hmmmm idk movies dont usually make me cry58: Your hair color is: uhm it was really dark blue but as the color has faded it kind of looks black/brown now57: TV shows you watch: a lot of them56: Favorite web site: uh i guess tumblr55: Your dream vacation: not being here!! probably just going around visiting everyone and hanging out having a good time54: The worst pain I was ever in was: tearing a ligament in my knee it hurt a lot53: How do you like your steak cooked: medium 52: My room is: messy51: My favorite celebrity is: ummm idk50: Where would you like to be: home tbh49: Do you want children: idk48: Ever been in love: ye47: Who’s your best friend: hhhhhhhhhhhh raiken46: More guy friends or girl friends: girls and nb babes45: One thing that makes you feel great is: just hanging out with people tbh44: One person that you wish you could see right now: i guess that would be my mom haha43: Do you have a 5 year plan: i did once. idk what happened to it haha i guess things never really go according to plan and it just hurts more to make one. just set goals, not plans.42: Have you made a list of things to do before you die: i did once but i dont think i have the same values as i did when i made that41: Have you pre-named your children: i used to but idk if i want kids anymore40: Last person I got mad at: ummmm hmm 39: I would like to move to: hmm somewhere with 4 seasons not just summer and less hot summer38: I wish I was a professional: artist[ My Favorites ]37: Candy: kit-kats36: Vehicle: um idk small ones i guess35: President: obama? idk34: State visited: ooohhh michigan33: Cellphone provider: ive only ever had the one so idk32: Athlete: uh31: Actor: uh30: Actress: uh29: Singer: hmmmmmmmm rn i would have to say Bea Miller but check back with me in a week28: Band: The Silent Comedy27: Clothing store: hmmmm cotton on has really comfy clothes26: Grocery store: target or publix25: TV show: rn? bnha24: Movie: hhhhhh um idk uhhhhh moulin rouge i guess? it used to be my fav but idk anymore23: Website: tumblr22: Animal: elephants21: Theme park: epcot20: Holiday: halloween19: Sport to watch: none18: Sport to play: none17: Magazine: none16: Book: hmmmmm A Monster Calls15: Day of the week: none14: Beach: hh13: Concert attended: never been12: Thing to cook: uh i guess eggs11: Food: sushi10: Restaurant: its a really good sushi place with bubble tea and thai donuts that i dont remember the name of9: Radio station: hhh idk8: Yankee candle scent: idk7: Perfume: i dont really like perfume it gives me headaches6: Flower: ooooh gardenia5: Color: blue/green teal4: Talk show host: john oliver3: Comedian: hh2: Dog breed: hmmm husky? also labradors and uhhh all dogs tbh ohhh pitbulls and rottweilers i love dogs good yes1: Did you answer all these truthfully? ye mostly

[unbeast]

Cute Tags

I was tagged by @cafedetude​, keep em comin, these are fun xx

1: when you have cereal, do you have more milk than cereal or more cereal than milk? more cereal; use just enough milk for the cereal to soak up

2: do you like the feeling of cold air on your cheeks on a wintery day? no!

3: what random objects do you use to bookmark your books? usually receipts, sometimes postcards/birthday cards in envelopes

4: how do you take your coffee/tea? tea: only if I’m sick and just with honey coffee: I just like iced capps

5: are you self-conscious of your smile? sometimes, if I overthink it. The left side around my mouth isn’t as mobile so it looks stiff and awkward, and also there are these two veins or something on either side of my face that move towards my eyes when I smile and it looks very disturbing

6: do you keep plants? oh shit I forgot I have one, haven’t watered that thing in about 3 weeks

7: do you name your plants? no, sorry “that thing”

8: what artistic medium do you use to express your feelings? drama

9: do you like singing/humming to yourself? I don’t like to sing because it hurts my ears when I do, but I like to dramatically deliver song lyrics. Humming usually leads to me getting too riled up so I often steer clear of that

10: do you sleep on your back, side, or stomach? side!

11: what’s an inner joke you have with your friends? The first one that comes to mind is “Sarahhhh” aka the reenactment of Max not knowing what to do when his kayak is sinking

12: what’s your favorite planet? venus, baby

13: what’s something that made you smile today? a scene in the final episode of Stranger Things 2 that I can’t mention now because it’s still too soon

14: if you were to live with your best friend in an old flat in a big city, what would it look like? semi-bohemian, cozy, clean

15: go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is! “Saturn is the only planet in the solar system that would float on water”

16: what’s your favorite pasta dish? homemade lasagna

17: what color do you really want to dye your hair? blue

18: tell us about something dumb/funny you did that has since gone down in history between you and your friends and is always brought up. the time I gifted tampons with christmas jokes attached to the strings 

19: do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw/ in it? Yes, there’s your classic recap, poems, dumb questions, favorites lists, to-read/watch lists, semi-collages

20: what’s your favorite eye color?  “The kind of green that doesn't make a big deal about itself” which has... ugh okay for years now, this description of Sam’s eyes from Perks, it just. You know what eyes he’s talking about 

21: talk about your favorite bag, the one that’s been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces. my topshop bag. It’s the first thing I purchased from topshop, and it ignited my addiction to the brand

22: are you a morning person? yes, metaphysically(?) (lol) I like doing things in the morning because time seems slower and I feel more productive and energized. Waking up’s the challenge tho

23: what’s your favorite thing to do on lazy days where you have 0 obligations? swingset

24: is there someone out there you would trust with every single one of your secrets? no

25: what’s the weirdest place you’ve ever broken into? is this a common thing people do??

26: what are the shoes you’ve had for forever and wear with every single outfit? ehhhh I’m not too fond of any one of my shoes right now but grade 10 through 11 I was overly attached to one pair of indoor soccer shoes that I used as everyday sneakers

27: what’s your favorite bubblegum flavor? bubblegum

28: sunrise or sunset? sunrise

29: what’s something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing? their laugh!! Makes me so happy, can’t help but laugh along

30: think of it: have you ever been truly scared? proximity to wasps, walking across a valley on a rusty pipe with low guardrails

31: what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks. love socks!! I have to sleep with socks because I get cold at night and if my skin is exposed, I get sick. I like comfortable, just-below-ankle-length athletic socks, would like to invest in some that I could wear my vans with w/o the socks showing because otherwise, socks makes my calves look bulbous when I wear skirts/dresses/shorts

32: tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3AM when you were with friends. we had a really deep talk and sappy declarations of friendship

33: what’s your fave pastry? AHH! STAHHP, I could’ve dropped my ______

34: tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what does it look like? do you still keep it? Lami! A sweet little lamb I got from the dollar store when I first moved to Canada, very precious and dear to me. Carried her to school until grade four because I was scared there’d be a fire at my house and she’d die. I still keep her, of course!!

35: do you like stationary and pretty pens and so on? do you use them often? yes, love stationary n pens! But never buy because, money. :/

36: which band’s sound would fit your mood right now? tame impala

37: do you like keeping your room messy or clean? it’s so, so messy. I hate it! I like things clean but I just never have time to sort through it and it piles up and :( I’m disgusting

38: tell us about your pet peeves! when, in the winter, you have a scarf wrapped around your neck and then the wind keeps blowing it behind your shoulder so it’s softly choking you 

39: what color do you wear the most? black 

40: think of a piece of jewelry you own: what’s it’s story? does it have any meaning to you? I have a troy bolton necklace that I believe Joyce got me for my birthday in, I want to say grade four or five. It’s perfect

41: what’s the last book you remember really, really loving? Ender’s Game

42: do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it! Tim Hortons near the mall, makes the best hashbrowns and the iced capps are perfect balance of coffee and milk and ice, just A+

43: who was the last person you gazed at the stars with? my roommate, on our walk home

44: when was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything? on the skytrain, moments before I looked through an open apartment window and saw a naked girl flopping down onto a mattress, followed by a nude man jumping ontop of her like a flying squirrel. The illusion was shattered (yes, this actually happened and it was a lot to process)

45: do you trust your instincts a lot? no !!!! never ever ever

46: tell us the worst pun you can think of. I was wondering why the baseball kept coming closer and closer, and then it hit me!

47: what food do you think should be banned from the universe? This spinach dish my mum makes with an egg on top? It’s slimy, and it’s a no from me

48: what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today? I was scared of fish up until age 5 I believe, my grandma used to cut out paper fishies and flush them down the toilet to try and help me get over that fear. Now its probably... oof I can’t think of any atm but there’s soooo many

49: do you like buying CDs and records? what was the last one you bought? yes, I most recently purchased an After Laughter cd and cassette, I’m stoked

50: what’s an odd thing you collect? journals that I never use

51: think of a person. what song do you associate with them? I associate the twinkling at the beginning of Fleetwood Mac’s “Everywhere” with Shalla

52: what are your favorite memes of the year so far? homeboy can like... get it, me talking about myself vs me talking about ______, there’s LOTS but I just can’t remember :’(

53: have you ever watched the rocky horror picture show? heathers? beetlejuice? pulp fiction? what do you think of them? I’ve seen all! 

RHPS: I’m “eh” towards the movie itself but the atmosphere of seeing it in a theatre is the best fucking experience!!! This weekend I went to a shadowcast for Halloween second year in a row, thinking of making it annual :)

Heathers: can quote it start to finish as though it were a favorite song, love this movie

beetlejuice: it’s good, Winona Ryder is such a gem, and the scene with the banana boat song is cinematic gold

pulp fiction: it’s good, not a favorite but I can appreciate it

54: who’s the last person you saw with a true look of sadness on their face? can’t think of anyone rn

55: what’s the most dramatic thing you’ve ever done to prove a point? everything I do is dramatic, every point I’ve made has been made dramatically 

56: what are some things you find endearing in people? genuine, genuine, genuine

57: go listen to bohemian rhapsody. how did it make you feel? did you dramatically reenact the lyrics? made me feel loosey goosey, and yes 

58: who’s the wine mom and who’s the vodka aunt in your group of friends? why? hi yes this is vodka aunt speaking, I like vodka. Wine mom is no one because wine tastes horrible 

59: what’s your favorite myth? I’ve never looked into myths, but Medusa just sounds like a riot

60: do you like poetry? what are some of your faves? yes, poetry is nice, but it’s rare I find ones I really am a fan of

I like listening to T.S. Elliot read his four quartets and "Pins and Needles" by Dua Saleh

61: what’s the stupidest gift you’ve ever given? the stupidest one you’ve ever received? given: a tween magazine that I decorated with obscene language that ended up being secret-santaed to my theatre director. Received? Probably a shirt with a picture of a random blonde girl saying “nevermind” from my mom (sorry mom)

62: do you drink juice in the morning? which kind? if I need refreshing wake up call, I’ll drink OJ

63: are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organized or kinda leave them be? My bookshelf is organized by favorites, idc about my music

64: what color is the sky where you are right now? midnight blue at 10 pm

65: is there anyone you haven’t seen in a long time who you’d love to hang out with? lotssss

66: what would your ideal flower crown look like? any collection of flowers that are all white, or a collection of colors that are moody and vampy

67: how do gloomy days where the sky is dark and the world is misty make you feel?  heavy, like I’m walking in water

68: what’s winter like where you live? hopefully no snow this year or ever

69: what are your favorite board games? Translated, it’s called “get angry, man” but essentially it’s Sorry

70: have you ever used a ouija board? no

71: what’s your favorite kind of tea? I haaaaate teaaaaa but chamomile if I HAVE to drink some when I’m sick

72: are you a person who needs to note everything down or else you’ll forget it? yes

73: what are some of your worst habits? ripping the skin off around my nails, biting my nails

74: describe a good friend of yours without using their name or gendered pronouns. genuine

75: tell us about your pets! I HAVE A BIRD NAMED CHARLIE AND HE IS TOO COOL FOR ME 

76: is there anything you should be doing right now but aren’t? a cog psy assignment 

77: pink or yellow lemonade? pink, aesthetically; yellow flavourfully(?)

78: are you in the minion hateclub or fanclub? If I don’t ever see an unironic facebook minion meme ever again, I can tolerate them

79: what’s one of the cutest things someone has ever done for you? can’t remember :( lots of cute things done by lots of cute people but I have a horrible memory

80: what color are your bedroom walls? did you choose that color? if so, why? grey, no

81: describe one of your friend’s eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of. you know the blue in Blue from Blue’s Clues’ fur, well that

82: are/were you good in school? I was, now I’m not 

83: what’s some of your favorite album art? ahhhh can’t think of any. I’m sure I will literally 2 seconds after I post this

84: are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones? no, I’m too indecicive and I can’t commit

85: do you read comics? what are your faves? I don’t, used to read archie digests though

86: do you like concept albums? which ones? yeah, as a concept (AHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHA)

87: what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives? Bad Genius, Moonlight, Donnie Darko, The Matrix, What We Do In The Shadows

88: are there any artistic movements you particularly enjoy? idk anything about art

89: are you close to your parents? not that close but i love em

90: talk about your one of you favorite cities. Vancouver, love everything

91: where do you plan on traveling this year? hopefully my family and I can vacation this year, it’s been a while

92: are you a person who drowns their pasta in cheese or a person who barely sprinkles a pinch? drownnn

93: what’s the hairstyle you wear the most? just down

94: who was the last person you know to have a birthday? @millport​

95: what are your plans for this weekend? this past HALLOWEEKEND I went to a frat party, saw a shadowcast of rocky horror, and spent time with good friends :) Next weekend sucks, I’m studying. 

96: do you install your computer updates really quickly or do you procrastinate on them a lot? procrastinate

97: myer briggs type, zodiac sign, and hogwarts house? 

INFJ

Libra

Slytherin 

98: when’s the last time you went hiking? did you enjoy it? would have been a long time ago, summer after grade 9. The hike was for five days and I was super sick, so I couldn’t realy heal properly. Plus, my period just started so everything felt shit. But overall I loved it lmao

99: list some songs that resonate to your soul whenever you hear them. semi charmed life! Not because my soul is like “ooh, meth” but it’s just a perfect song

100: if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why? past, so I could have the power to completely change my present

I tag @kabul1998 and anyone who is up for some tag-answering

[courage-a-word-of-justice]

My Roommate is a Cat 7 - 8 | Shield Hero 7 - 8 | Egao no Daika 8 - 9 | Morose Mononokean 8 - 9 | Mob Psycho 8 | Spec Ops Asuka 7 - 8

I can’t believe I forgot to check whether I had all the tags on my posts...I was missing Mononokean tags all along...

My Roommate is a Cat 7

Hiroto is such a meddler…

Hmm…this reminds me of a quote I have on a bookmark. “Picking 5 favourite books is like picking the 5 body parts you’d most like not to lose.” – Neil Gaiman

Tenshindon. I think the subs previously had it as “tenshidon”, so with tenshi meaning “angel” I was wondering what sort of rice warranted the name “angel rice”…

They say that pets are like their owners, but Haru really is a cat that’s like Subaru if I ever saw one! Hahaha!

Shield Hero 7

This stuff about the Spear Hero…we’ve heard about it before…hmm…(pieces all fall together)

This is sliding into demi-human harem territory…hmm…(disapproving)

Spec Ops Asuka 7

The sign on the maid café door says something along the lines of “Closed for Today”, not “Closed for Party”!

Wakkanai.

I like Tamara already. She says good quotes and has a cool catchphrase!

Mononokean 8

Fuzzy eating cotton candy is too cute~!

Ashiya’s black thug jacket says something like “no equal in heaven nor earth” (first 4 kanji), while Abeno’s says “good at fighting” (last 4 kanji)…but part of Abeno’s is covered by his hand and likewise Ashiya’s is covered by the frame, so I can’t tell you what the entire jackets say.

Fuzzy at the top of the slide is also cute. Just give me any shot of Fuzzy that isn’t CGI and I’ll be sold!

Why do watermelons in anime have black seeds only??? Plus, why does this one have so many of them???

Mob Psycho II 8

Dosei means Saturn (the planet). No wonder the shirt image’s planet has rings.

I-Is this the first time CR has added lyrics to the theme song???

The calligraphy on the wall behind Mob says “starry sky”.

Just jog instead of sitting. That’ll get you all fit!

Relationship advice, eh? I was bang on with my OWLS post, yay!

“He’s got the stamina of a snail.” – For some reason, I find that statement relatable…is that a good thing???

Is it just me, or are Mob’s shoes on the wrong feet?

As much as I never really grokked the first season, hence its rating on my anime list being in the 80s (as of right now, it’s an 86 but it used to be 85), my heart really sunk when Sho pulled the “burn your parents and brother in a fire” card. There’s a reason this is topping my charts this season, y’know. (Interestingly, if fangirlling is indicative of grokking the show, I grokked Magic-kyun Renaissance, currently sitting at a 76. It lost due to the simplicity of its plot…and the fact I may have overreacted to Ume voicing a character I could get behind.)

Ooh, it seems the narrator of this next-ep preview is dissing people who illegally downloaded the episode! Now that’s nasty!

Egao no Daika 8

…hmm, why do I get the feeling the Empire will intercept the data Izana is sending? (But on an unrelated note, I really like Izana’s hair…LOL, that’s just me being shallow.)

Hmm? Izana is French??? That’s the biggest surprise in the entire show, right up there with Joshua dying.

My Roommate is a Cat 8

How did Hiroto deal with unsocial Subaru, come to think of it…?

As someone who did want to be an author at one point, I went at my dream a completely different way – I went to the library a tonne, I wrote a tonne and I illustrated my own books whenever possible (but only ever made one copy of each book, because illustrating is hard). I never really owned that many books until I started up a collection of my own (because I was always sharing with other people).

Also, if Subaru did a degree…what degree did Subaru do??? I wanna know!

Also…I really like that shirt Subaru’s wearing in the flashback, The one with the black collar, sleeves and button section.

Did Subaru forget to eat again? *sigh* Subaru, what are we ever going to do with you??? (LOL)

Oh? Post-credits segment…keep watching!

LOL, that was a great post-credits segment!

Spec-Ops Asuka 8

Oh…goody. It’s thug!Kyubey (Giess). (sounds kind of sad)

Magical yandere, much????

Careful with Mia, you molester (Francine)!

For some reason, “Texas Girl” and “Russian” as nicknames makes me crack up.

Sata andagi. I think I first heard of these in Mahou Shoujo Ore.

Chisato seems to be the parallel to Kurumi.

Shield Hero 8

“I’m not warm, you know.” – Oh ho ho! Naofumi really knows how to tease a girl, eh?

Morose Mononokean 9

I find it interesting Ashiya’s mother’s name has a tree radical in it.

Strangely, CR didn’t sub a line but lip reading says it’s “Sumimasen” or “Shitsureishimasu”.

Poor Fuzzy…getting energy zapped from that youkai must be harsh…

Is Sakae Ashiya’s dad???

Mononokean does Mob Psycho’s shtick…but because I don’t find it touching or hilarious, it’s worse than the other show.

Who dis woman??? Update: That’s Ashiya’s sister.

Headbutt her! Headbutt he-awwwwwwww…why the facepalm? (disappointed)

Has Abeno always had spots on the left side of his face???

Sorry for interrupting with my opinions on gender, but why does Hanae have to be blue and his sister pink???

Egao no Daika 9

For some reason, I don’t feel like Izana died last episode. Unlike Joshua, who I could get over pretty easily because he was a Shonen Hero (TM), Izana we got to know more...to the point where it almost felt like this opening was a fakeout of sorts.

This is so obviously discussing nuclear power, y’know??? The fact they come from Verde (Green, the cliched colour of nuclear power and the colour of the environment) makes it even more obvous.

I read somewhere that Stella could be the child of Layla…hmm…

Oh dear…this death…Harold’s death…was quite the sucker punch to the feels, huh?

#simulcast commentary #my roommate is a cat #doukyonin wa hiza tokidoki atama no ue #mob psycho 100 #Mob Psycho 100 II #Egao no Daika #the price of smiles #Mahou Shoujo Tokushusen Asuka #Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka #fukigen na mononokean #the morose mononokean #Fukigen na Mononokean Tsuzuki #tate no yuusha no nariagari #the rising of the shield hero #Chesarka watches MP100 #Chesarka watches Tate no Yuusha no Nariagari #Chesarka watches Egao no Daika #Chesarka watches Doukyonin wa Hiza Tokidoki Atama no Ue. #Chesarka watches MGSOA #Chesarka watches Fukigen na Mononokean

[w-k-smith]

Chapter Two is here of “Don’t Go to the Netherworld!”

In this chapter, Beetlejuice and Lydia make their way through Saturn, but are waylaid by Zagnuts, a boy band, and all the obstacles the desert otherworld has to offer.

Chapter One: “It’s a Wonderful Afterlife” (6/19/20) Chapter Two: “Worm Welcome” (07/03/20) Chapter Three: “Ghost to Ghost” (upcoming) Chapter Four: “To Beetle or not to Beetle?” (upcoming)

Warning:  This story contains depictions of, references to, and discussion of  topics like suicide, untimely death, abuse, and body horror - you know,  like the musical does (though this probably has more). Know your  boundaries, and stay safe.

New chapter under keep reading!

“I don’t understand,” Lydia said, as they crossed from the midnight of the administrative area, toward the hot afternoon of Saturn, through the twilight in between. “What’s Saturn? Are we going to the planet…somehow?”

“Nope. Totally unrelated, and don’t ask me who named it. Saturn is the part of the Netherworld that acts as a trap for ghosts who get out of line, like if you try to leave the house you’re haunting, or jump the line in processing like someone I could mention. Going through processing would only take a couple steps, but Saturn is an anti-shortcut from the feverish nightmares of M.C. Escher. It’s a giant desert, and it’s full of sandworms. Those are snake monsters that eat ghosts. Foreshadowing?” he muttered to himself.

“This is so weird,” Lydia muttered. “I love it.”

She didn’t seem like she was being sarcastic. Maybe hanging around her wasn’t going to be too terrible.

Unfortunately, he saw trouble ahead.

“Keep your head down,” he whispered to Lydia. “Look dead. Deader than that. And don’t sneeze! Dead people never sneeze!”

“What?”

“Hello, Beetlejuice,” said five tenor voices in unison. A cluster of expressionless young white men was drifting through the shadows toward him and Lydia. The boys had died in their late teens and very early twenties, long enough ago that two of them sported frosted tips. They were dressed just differently enough to be distinguishable from one another, in dated pants and t-shirts with no personality.

“Hey, Boy Inferno,” he grunted.

“What are you doing out here?” they asked. They all floated six inches off the ground, in a formation reminiscent of migrating ducks.

He rolled his eyes. “Just running an errand for Juno. Miss Argentina find that living intruder yet?”

“Not that we’ve heard. Who’s your friend?”

“New hire. Juno wants her on border patrol. Her name’s Lydia, and she’s boring. Kids these days, you know, they think eyeliner and TikTok counts as personality. But them’s the rules: if you add to the work, you have to help out.”

“Do you want to hear the introduction song, Lydia?”

Geez, they didn’t back off easy. “Save that for people who’ve committed genocide or worse.”

“We were talking to Lydia.”

At his elbow, Lydia scratched the end of her nose. Boy Inferno caught the gesture, and as one, cocked their heads.

“What did you die of…?” they asked her.

“Um, I don’t want to talk about it,” Lydia said, which was the wrong thing. All newlydeads ever wanted to do was blather on about how they’d bitten it.

“OK, you got me!” He stepped between Lydia and the boys. “This isn’t an approved mission to Saturn. We were actually trying to, ah, hide out from Juno for a while. She is in a mood today, I tell ya. Just impossible. She wants me to take a statement from all the recently deceased who were in line when the alarm went off, and then pinch each of them really, really hard to see if they still have nerve endings. I’d rather swallow my own toenails. Remember that time Juno made me swallow my own toenails? You were there for that, weren’t you? So be a hive-minded pal and help me stay on the DL. This one already threatened to tattle if I didn’t show her my good hiding spot.” He jerked his head at Lydia.

Boy Inferno blinked.

“Alright, then,” they said, and each voice sounded suspicious. But they drifted back toward the administrative area.

Lydia stared as they went. “Who are those guys?”

“Boy Inferno is a dead boy band. They didn’t have enough brains or personality to be individuals when they were a living boy band, and when their tour bus crashed, the situation got worse.”

“Yikes. And speaking of yikes, what were you saying about sandworms? Are they going to eat us?”

He waggled one hand back and forth, and started walking. “Eh. It’s probably OK. You’re alive, so they’ll leave you alone. I’m half-ghost, half-demon, which confuses them more than anything. We’ll be fine if we don’t run into a sandworm that’s pissed off or starving.” They were crossing into Saturn proper. The terrain changed from dark gravel to rolling sand dunes dotted with twisted rock formations. Wooden doors hovered here and there, from three feet off the ground to 20 stories high. There was the light and warmth of a yellow sun, but if you turned in every direction, you would never see a sun or any other stars in the royal blue sky.

“Huh. Now I kind of want to meet a sandworm...” Lydia said, looking around like one was going to pop out from behind a dune.

“Yup. That’s definitely foreshadowing.”

“So…what’s it like? Being half-demon? How does that, um, happen?”

He waved his hands to turn them into sock puppets – one red and bearing a vague resemblance to Juno, the other a grey blob and as good a representation as he’d ever had of his father. “Hello, children!” he said in a screechy voice. “Let’s talk about the occult birds and bees. When a demon woman tolerates a living human male very much…”

She shoved him. “I know that, gross! I’m ace, but not completely ignorant. I just wondered if you were ever alive.”

He put his hands back to normal. “Uh-huh. I was alive. Looooong time ago, though. Long enough that we didn’t pay much attention to what year it was, and only bathed twice a lifetime, and drank beer instead of water. Hm. Or maybe that was all just me. Anyway, Juno only had me to see what would happen if you mixed demon magic with ghost abilities. Turns out, you get yours truly. She hated the result, and I never got any little siblings to chase around. But it’s fine with the just the two of us; my mom has this sweet thing she says to me every day: ‘I wish you had never been born.’ I think it’s a Swedish pet name.”

“How did you die?” Lydia asked.

“I asked a bunch of annoying questions that weren’t any of my business and someone stabbed me.”

“Ha ha,” she deadpanned. “How far is it, anyway?” she asked, shading her eyes. “I don’t see anything…”

“Distance doesn’t really work like that here, and we could move way, way faster if we were both dead. But it’s pretty damn far.”

She sighed.

*

He had to give Lydia Deetz this: she was a trooper. She was wearing a dress, and boots that were very much not made for walking, but she kept moving, eyes forward, not a single complaint. When her stomach growled like an angry guard dog, she held her head high and acted like she didn’t notice.

“OK, time for a break!” he said.

“No!” she said. “We have to keep going.”

“If you keep going like this, you’re going to collapse, and then you’ll die, and a sandworm will eat you, and that’s my whole day gone. Sit down.”

“I don’t need to.”

She was going to give him grey hairs, she really was. He shook one hand like he was shooing a fly, and she stumbled backwards until she sat on the closest rock.

Lydia’s eyes bugged. “What am I – what are you –?”

“You’ve never been possessed before?”

She stood back up. He waved his hand again, and she sat.

“No, keep it up,” he said. “This is fun.”

He flicked his fingers, and her expression brightened.

“Beetlejuice, you’re my role model!” she said, in a tone much more chipper than any that had ever come out of her mouth, he was sure. He released her.

Lydia’s face soured like old milk mixed with lemon juice, and she made the fingers-down-the-throat gesture. “I’ll sit for five minutes. Don’t do that again.”

“I always knew I’d make a great babysitter!” He settled on the other side of the rock. He folded his hands over his stomach, figuring he’d take a nap if she stayed quiet.

She didn’t. “My mom would love all this,” Lydia said. “Her favorite holiday was Halloween. We’d make our own haunted houses in the garage – but in the summer, when no one in the neighborhood was expecting it. She liked the weird stuff in the world. Or – she likes the weird stuff in the world. She doesn’t just avoid it, like most people do. Like my dad does. I think she’ll like you, even.”

He wanted to make a face at the idea of a well-adjusted person liking him (though it was a nice feeling, deep in his black heart), but Lydia couldn’t see him, so it would be wasted effort.

She was quiet for a while, and he thought he was free to drift off to sleep.

“Um…do you have any food?” she asked.

He reached into his jacket and pulled out a handful of Zagnuts. He tossed the kid two. “Here ya go.”

“Why so many Zagnuts?” Lydia asked. “They’re good, but I didn’t think people ate these anymore.”

“It’s the only candy in the vending machines in the Netherworld.”

“Really? Why?”

“Because everything around here is at a baseline of low-grade crappiness. Haven’t you noticed?”

“Are you really supposed to spend eternity here when you die?” she asked, in a muffled way that told him she’d bitten off half a candy bar at once. “It seems like it should either be a whole lot better or a whole lot worse.”

“You aren’t supposed to spend eternity here; that’s the point,” he said. He popped a Zagnut into his mouth, and swallowed it wrapper and all. “You have to move on, eventually.”

“To what?”

“Do I look like a priest? Or a philosopher? Or a TV psychic?”

“The last one, a little. A bad one. The kind who gets tricked by reporters to help contact their dead kid, but it turns out the kid is really alive and just in the next booth over in the Denny’s.”

“Touché. The point is, nobody around here knows. You hang around the administrative area until you’re ready to go into the miserable nothingness of the Abyss, and then you swirl around in the Abyss until…I dunno, something else happens. Maybe you just stay in the Abyss forever. I don’t plan on finding out anytime soon.”

“Is that where my mom is?”

“Yup. If she didn’t come running when you first came through the door, she’s definitely gone through security. Don’t worry, though. You poke your head into the Abyss and shout her name a few times, and she’ll come right out.”

He lied easily. He always had.

“I’m just surprised she hasn’t tried to contact us,” Lydia said. “I guess she must be confused, because we moved and everything. My dad dragged me out to Connecticut, away from New York and all our friends and family, to work on this stupid gated community project he has in mind. And he took my annoying life coach with us. She’s friendly and positive, and keeps trying to make me fill out a star chart. I don’t know why he thinks she’s helping me. It’s not like there aren’t actual therapists in Connecticut. I don’t get it.”

He chewed another Zagnut for a beat, waiting to see if she was making a joke. Then he broke the news. “Your dad is boinking the life coach.”

“What?!” she said. She whirled around the rock to sit right next to him. “How can you know that?”

“Um, because I’m an adult with a brain.” He grabbed the top of his head and lifted his skull to show his grey matter.

“He isn’t…Dad’s not…” She slumped. “He’s totally sleeping with her.”

“Totally,” he agreed.

“How could he do that? Mom’s only been dead a few months. Well…when he sees Mom – if he just talks to her again – he’ll understand what an ass he’s been.”

“Uh-huh,” he said, non-committedly.

“How much farther do we have?” she asked.

“Long enough to aaaaaaalmost make you give up and collapse in despair.”

She groaned.

For a second, he thought her groan was superhumanly long and loud, and he prepared to be impressed. Then he noticed the ground was shaking.

“Looks like it’s our unlucky day!” he said. “Run!”

They both got to their feet, and made it about five steps before the sand exploded to their left. A sandworm rose from the earth, its black-and-white stripes blurring into grey. At the peak of its jump, its inner head came out of its mouth, eyes glaring, jaw snapping.

It dove back down toward them.

He dodged one way, and Lydia dodged the other. The spray of sand blocked out everything, and when it all cleared, the sandworm had risen from the ground again, undulating in and out of the dunes. Lydia stood in place, looking all around. But it was hard to know where to run when you were being attacked by a sandworm.

The sandworm’s chomping heads came out of the ground an arm’s length from Lydia. She yelled, and punched it in the closest eye.

The heads hissed and thrashed, knocking Lydia down. The sandworm dove down, and the sand around them whirled and roiled, until he felt like he was standing in boiling dirt.

When the sandworm rose again, it accidentally scooped up Lydia. She showed a little more survival instinct than she had before, and clung to the sandworm’s back.

“Knock it off!” he heard her say. She nudged the sandworm with her left boot, and the sandworm turned to the right. But it had had enough of its passenger, and whipped its body to throw Lydia like a beanbag.

She shrieked as she fell through the air. He stretched his legs, about 20 feet, and caught her.

As he dragged her back to the ground, he braced himself for another attack by the sandworm. Maybe if he transformed into something big and scary, showed some lionfish spines or extra limbs, the worm would leave them alone. Getting swallowed would be no good. Not only did he usually try to avoid getting eaten, but sandworms’ digested prey just wound up back in processing…after a wait of at least a decade or so.

The sandworm jumped over their heads, dove into the ground, and kept going. Its writhing body upset every dune it plowed through, but it didn’t double back.

He wasn’t going to look a gift worm in the mouth.

“And don’t come back!” he yelled. “G’on, git! Git!”

Lydia jumped out of his arms. “That was awesome! I thought I was going to die, but it was awesome.”

He was more tired than he’d been in a while. He was tired like Juno had been screaming at him for hours. Also, there was a lot of sand in his shoes. “You did OK But why the hell did you try to punch it in the face?”

She didn’t look ashamed in the slightest. “I thought it would be like avoiding a shark attack. That’s what the Discovery guy said during Shark Week: punch the shark hard in the eye so it leaves you alone.”

“Since when has punching something made it leave you alone?” he asked. “That has never worked when I’ve tried it with people.”

“Because then the shark – or the sandworm – thinks you’re too much of a threat and it ignores you. I made it go away, didn’t I?’

“I seriously doubt you’re what made it leave, Karate Kid. If a sandworm had its multiple hearts set on eating us, it would take more than your mechanical bull riding skills to dissuade it. I don’t know – I’m not so sure it was all that interested in us.”

“If it wasn’t going for us, why did it come over here?”

“I said I don’t know! I’m not a sandworm scientist.”

“Your hair is changing color,” she said, pointing at his head.

“Can you blame me? I’m pretty pissed off right now.”

She brightened. “It changes color with your mood?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I touch it?”

He grunted, and tilted his head. She patted some strands on the right side of his head, which were dark green at the tips, but probably working their way to red. The cocoon the caterpillar had made behind his ear popped open, and a death’s-head hawkmoth shot into the air and planted itself on Lydia’s nose.

“Augh!” she yelped, and fell right on her ass. He doubled over laughing while she tried to get back up with dignity.

“You’ve taken things too far this time, Beetlejuice!”

Once, just once, he’d like to go 48 hours without hearing those words shouted at him.

He turned to see Miss Argentina stomping up a sand dune, clipboard in hand, sash askew, which meant she was really really really upset.

“What have I done this time?” he asked, resigned.

“What have you done this time?” Miss Argentina pointed at Lydia. “Let’s start with child endangerment! And the fact that your disappearance has about given Juno apoplexy.”

“Ah, she loves me.”

“No! She just knows that if she hasn’t heard from you in twelve hours, it means you’re up to something! And that means the rest of us suffer! I’m just glad she gave me clearance to go to Saturn to look for your sorry, sagging ass, so at least I was able shoo a sandworm away from some newlydeads. I have a sneaking suspicion you bear some responsibility for that, too?”

“OK, that is both not fair and completely true,” he said. “And I’ll have you know I’m doing a good deed. I’m guiding this one around the Netherworld.” He jerked his head at Lydia.

“And why, in the name of all that is sacred, would you consider that a good idea?”

“Um…” He faltered. He may have been able to fudge a few details with Lydia, but Miss Argentina had been around long enough to know how the Abyss worked.

“Newlydeads…” Lydia said. “That must have been what attracted the sandworm. It wasn’t coming for us after all.”

“Why did you drag newlydeads with you?” he asked, happy to change the subject. “What, did you need help shouting at me? Anger backup singers?”

“Of course not.” Miss Argentina frowned. “But – that’s a good idea.” She clicked her pen, and scribbled on her clipboard. “I am actually writing that down. If Boy Inferno is free…”

“Excuse me!” came a woman’s voice from the bottom on the dune. “I’m so sorry – could you wait just a minute?”

“It’s very hard to walk on sand!” came a sexy, nasal male voice from the same direction.

“These newlydeads have a problem, you see,” said Miss Argentina, her voice icy. But something was wrong – she wasn’t looking at him. Her gaze was fixed on Lydia. “Apparently, a living person used their Handbook without permission.”

Lydia became interested in the horizon. “Huh. That’s weird.”

Miss Argentina jabbed a finger in Lydia’s face. “Oh, don’t even try that on me, living girl. I am not in the mood today.”

“Whoof! We made it.” The newlydead couple crested the dune…and he was smitten.

The woman was white, a pretty blonde, in a green wrap dress and suburban-mom-at-the-nice-grocery-store boots. Her companion was a beautiful Desi man, with light brown skin and a lock of black hair hanging over his forehead that he immediately wanted to run his fingers through.

“Oooooh…” he said. “Hello, sexy…”

Lydia looked at him with a scientific expression. “Which one?”

“The Trader Joe’s guardian angels over here. Not that Miss A isn’t pretty easy on the eyes herself, but she’s a friend of Ellen, know what I mean? A patron of U-Haul. An adopter of shelter cats. Wrong tree, is what I’m saying. But she loves me platonically.”

“She doesn’t,” Miss Argentina said.

The couple pushed past him and bent over Lydia.

“Oh, thank goodness!” the woman said.

“Lydia!” said the man. “I’m so glad we found you. We were worried sick!”

“Adam, Barbara?” Lydia said. “What…what are you doing here? You weren’t supposed to go to the Netherworld.”

#beetlejuice #beetlejuice fanfiction #beetlejuice the musical #fan fiction

[sarazanmai]

Thoughts on the “Sailor Moon Crystal” English dub. Season two episode six.

what’s your name? who’s your daddy? is he rich? is he rich like me?

they could have at least let his cape be purple since the manga describes it as a sunset like lavender (I have my copy of this volume at my side so I’m not running upstairs like a jackass)

I can only imagine he wears all white this time for the sake of being different

“haven’t you figured it out?” Endymion is like “wow my younger self was stupid”

I just realized Chibi-Usa doesn’t actually have a last name, but it should be Chiba unless he took her name

and there’s the bomb that everyone saw coming, nobody is gonna go into this being surprised because Crystal has approached this with the mentality that we already read the manga

maybe back in the day this was surprising, but nobody’s gonna be fooled now

“how....” Venus apparently can’t visualize these two having sex

“queen? me?” well you wanted to be a princess, but why stop there?

I love the fact that Endymion loves his wife so much that his bedtime stories to their child are about how much of a BAMF she is

hell the final page of the manga is basically Mamoru going “omg! Usako! I love you and your beautiful face!!! you’re a star, you’re THE star!!!”

but given how time travel works does this mean stories of Chibi-Moon were just omitted? eh time travel in this series is bullshit

Diana finally spoke and she is voiced by Debi Derryberry (that name though) and get this, like seriously sit your ass down, she voiced Jimmy Neutron

yeah

I like how Diana’s all “lawl yeah I’m your kid!” when her parents have not actually hooked up in canon yet

like surprise!

“we were wrong” Robbie is putting on this action movie voice for this line, like he’s reciting narration for a post apocalyptic movie trailer

awesome more computers for kitties to paw at

like I know time travel is nonsense here, but King Endymion should already know this because he’s already experienced it

at least Naoko remembered time paradoxes are a thing, that’s one thing Toriyama neglected to touch upon when he did his time travel story (seriously future Trunks interacts with his baby self like its no big deal...I guess that’s what happens when you accidentally create an alternate timeline...)

“talking to my younger self like this, I confess it does feel a little strange” no! really!?

deep down Mamoru is thinking “at least I stay hot”

friendly reminder Pluto’s existence is pretty shitty, between her and Saturn I don’t know who’s is more miserable

also now feels like a good time to remind people there was once a crack theory that Pluto and King Endymion were the same person

I’m not kidding

and here we have Mamoru and Usagi acting like divorced parents

I feel like people probably think Usagi’s being irrational, but while all the Chibi-Usa stuff is going on three of her best friends are in the hands of an enemy and she just had a massive bomb thrown in her lap and honestly I never had a problem with her outburst for these reasons

my girl is stressed

so Mamoru doesn’t close his shades when he sleeps apparently

the music that plays as Chibi-Usa walks through the palace is so nice

eugh, here we cut to Prince Demande and his holo Serenity (that HE made mind you, he made this thing)

really Esmeraude you could have anyone why are you pining over a guy who jerks off to a hologram of a woman who will never love him?

thankfully Rubeus is there to troll them

“code extra, operation relax” sounds dirty

I always imagined her arms being black with green reflects when I’d look at this

Mamoru is so good at pep talks that even his future self can pep talk himself

so for a brief moment it sounded like Matthew flubbed his line and called her “Esmerald”, but I think I was just mishearing things

I appreciate the clear contempt he shows when he says “Tuxedo Mask”

“there they are, those fierce determined eyes, the ones that stared back at me that fateful day” I will not miss you when you die

IT LOOKS LIKE A VAGINA, NAOKO WHY?

tune in next time where Prince Demande makes me puke blood

#angelina watches smc