#i’m not really in the glitch art community but i do make glitch art and databend pictures and shit and

[devirexx]

idk if this is even a prevalent issue, but i just want to clarify none of my posts are ever made with any kind of AI. fuck that shit

#i know i post like once every five months but that will change eventually #ive never used ai to get my results and i never will. idk about anyone elses stance on it but #the whole art-theft thing being a big part of my opinion here but it just feels so lacking in integrity yknow? #i’m not really in the glitch art community but i do make glitch art and databend pictures and shit and #i would see SO many NFT posts and shit; people selling their NFTs or whatever and i did not support that at all #i havent really looked around the community in a while but if there were as many NFT peddlers as it seemed when it was still a popular fad #then no doubt some people are moving onto just using AI to generate shit and make it easier to create things #(essentially from other peoples creations that didnt use AI) #i know im not making Fine Designer High-Class Art here im just databending bl game screenshots #but i just noticed that like fucking every search on tumblr is littered with AI results now and its so disheartening to see #its so soulless. it sucks

[helluva-dump]

Yeah I think I am officially done with the Helluva boss critical community… for good.

Before you guys flip your shit and accuse me of being a Stan, let me explain.

So I deleted my tumblr app and decided just to refreshen my mind and focus on other things. (Like my art, my own possible indie project, ect ) and being away for a while… it kind of made me realize how much of the critical community was becoming too much for my mental health.

Originally, I joined because season 2 disappointed with season 2, didn’t like how Vivziepop retconned things like the pilot, the possible workplace allegations, and of course… the fandom being super toxic as hell work promoting toxic positivity.

But holy shit…. Somehow the critical community is even worse than the fandom.

Like I swear nobody talks about what’s wrong with this community. I’ve seen blogs have such an unhealthy hatred to Viv where they post nonstop about her… it’s insane. Like when making account names “wah I hate Vivziepop”

Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t think all critical blogs act like this. I do in fact still follows few, only thing is the ones I follow don’t constantly whine and bitch all the time and actually do critique. And these reblogs I follow just do AUs, rewrites, and redesigns which to me I will always see as harmless fun since that’s what I wanna do.

As for the other half of criticals…. Hell, these people legit get mad and share screenshots making fun of fans with different opinions. Like, bruh, didn’t you guys get angry at stans for doing that to y’all? You guys are literally doing the exact same thing. And no I’m not talking about sharing screenshots of toxic fans that attack former employees and make excuses for a questionable workplace…. But like they’ll just mock fans that didn’t do anything bad.

I’m all for critiquing a fandom and there are Stans that have such an unhealthy parasocial relationships with Viv… but somehow I see people acting the same with their unhealthy hate obsession. Literally going through her IG and bitching and moaning…

Seeing people making assumptions about her and Gooseworks with the glitch x as well as Tracy just shows me how unhealthy this hate is becoming.

Yes, Viv and Tracy had a bit of a heated thing on Twitter. However, I don’t think it’s fair to assume she’s this evil evil hellspawn that’s plotting to destory glitch x. “She’s kissing ass to goodeworks with her fake smile” dude she’s probably a fan of their works, you really don’t know that.

Also, while I’m aware of the allegations concerning Salem (who I hope really recovers and they did really make this episode the best IMO)… it’s probably not fair to assume all employees get treated the same way… the only people that seem to know what went down are Erin, Ken, Salem, and Ashley Nicolas. Do I think the workplace abuse is possible? Yes, it’s why I haven’t bought any merch.

BUT the reason why I don’t like to discuss things like this is because half of the other stuff seems like flimsy evidence besides Salem’s vents. And I think it’s a bit risky to spread such misinformation and make assumptions. (One blog I’ve seen had so many anons sharing rumors and just go along with them which to me is dangerous…)

Like when the new episode aired, unlike everyone else, I actually loved it. This recent episode was so great it’s what I wanna see more of for Helluva boss. But eh… I noticed some haters bitch for the sake of it. Now, some of the critiques aren’t too bad, I did notice some flaws and I understand the concerns for salem. But like other half it’s just bitching for the sake of it…

Also I heard rumors how the deranged stalker fan of Fizz is a parody of critical blogs… tbh I highly doubt that because that trope always existed in cartoons (like Aggrestuko had one too) but considering a good chunk of “criticals” have a hate boner for viv, can you blame some fans for thinking that?

I really don’t like how the critical community became the anti community. Because not every critical person is an anti, I don’t even wanna fuck with that shit and I don’t ever wanna resort to that.

Hell, they drove one critical blog I loved away… over a bad miscommunication.🙃 and that blog was right, you don’t wanna make friends with this community with how some toxic people are.

Also I’ve been drawing a lot of Hazbin hotel stuff for my Heaven AU and it reminded me why I enjoyed Vivziepop’s ideas and stories so much. It somehow was helping me take edge away from my mental health.

I think it’s possible to still be a fan without labeling yourself as a stan or anti. That’s why I made this blog for. I was so worn out by the toxic positivity of the fandom, so this is my comfort space. But now I need to cut the critical community away since it’s now full of toxic negativity.

And as I said, I do plan to make an indie cartoon series and I feel like being part of this critical community is NOT gonna make me professional on my end. That being said, I don’t like Viv as she said things that rubbed me the wrong way BUT I’m not gonna let that kill my joy for Hazbin hotel.(and Helluva boss to an extent) I do think she has good ideas and they CAN work but she does need more writers than animators to help her execute them.

That’s why I’m only a bit more excited for Hazbin hotel lately

Now I’m not angry at anyone who followed me. I just wanna make some boundaries, and that being said, I’m still gonna critique both shows. However, I’m just gonna tag these posts as HH/HB critiques than HH/HB critical for now on. I feel like that’s more professional and more genuine if you wanna share opinions on stuff.

Just wanna get this off my chest, it’s what I wanted to express for a while.

And if fans come across this blog, don’t be afraid to interact I won’t bite. Everyone has their different opinions. I only have an issue with Stans that promote toxic positivity and dismiss employees that were treated badly is all.

#helluva boss critical #helluva boss critique #hazbin hotel critical #hazbin hotel critique #for now on #I wanna restart fresh #and I don’t want antis and Stans to interact with me #you guys need to touch grass with your obsession with viv #it’s hella creepy

[sh4tt3rg1rl]

TAOCC IS AMAZING, and boy has it changed since I first showed up

Aka: Elsie gets really sentimental for once

I’m gonna be honest, this is not the community I expected to end up in on this site. I joined Tumblr about October 29th and expected to end up as maaaaaybe a minor artist. At best. At the time TADC was just “that glitch thing that was blowing up that I thought was pretty good” and I was much more into murder drones anyways.

…Holy crabs, looking back on that…I had no idea what I was gonna end up getting into lol

I randomly followed the @/ragatha1 ask blog at one point, kind of confused as to what an ask blog was but hey, why not? That’s how I found Soup’s gangle blog and boy did things go off the rails. I was…so confused, I showed up smack dab in the middle of the Tiger insanity with no idea who any of these characters or people were. At that point iirc, “TAOCC” wasn’t even the name for the whole thing yet. I made Easton and was like “okay I’ll just have this goofy guy who likes sandwiches, no angst here, maybe he’ll make some friends, I really hope everyone likes him!”

BOY WAS I IN FOR A SURPRISE

I joined my first ever magma at that point as well! And I vividly remember being really confused but just doodling my sona in the corner and then people were like

“Uhhhh who the frick is Elsewhere I like your art :D”

and I was like

“Um

you what”

and thus I joined magma…a lot. Lol. That’s how I got to know soup and you (Xeya) and a few others. I felt so…weirdly new. Like impostor syndrome was in full force. That feeling hasn’t…really ever gone away, tbh.

And since then I’ve figured myself out mostly with only a few embarrassments to my name. I’m really grateful for the people I’ve made friends with, especially Fei, Star, Soup, and Xeya, as well as Kumo and Candy mods. You guys have been lovely to me, and I don’t know how I ever came to deserve that. It’s been rough at times, and I had to/still have to figure out boundaries and how to be assertive basically from scratch. This website still hurts me sometimes, and I accept that I’m a bit odd in some respects. But overall, people have respected that here much more than they do in my actual life. People have respected me here more than they tend to in real life. Before this I could share my writing and art with one person. One. I would go stir-crazy because I would make art and writing and never get to show anyone, which meant I just…spent like an entire year not doing anything. It sucked. And now I will just,..make art and characters for the funsies, and not get scolded for it. I can write incredibly florid descriptions and scenes about stuff like a freaking TOWN’S DESCRIPTION, and people will like it and tell me I’m good at this. I honestly might consider becoming a writer now when I become an adult. I learned that I can be shamelessly self indulgent when writing and people will enjoy it lol. Thank you guys for dealing with that btw lol. I will just MAKE CHARACTERS FOR PEOPLE FOR THE FUNSIES, a willingness I thought I’d all but lost. Like, I saw a 3d printer in my chem class two days ago and went “hmmm yunno what I could give a character in TAOCC a 3d printer for a head and that’d be so cool! Yunno, maybe Xeya would like it if I made that for her.” AND HERE WE ARE I’M CURRENTLY MAKING YOU A CHARACTER WITH A 3D PRINTER FOR A HEAD.

Also, you guys have no idea how grateful I am that you go along with my giant overarching plotlines. Like, my first test of the idea was Dusk’s domain and Sun’s trip to see Northeast, and then I was confident enough that people would care that I made the entire Lull/dungeon thing. The dungeon has been my magnum opus of writing, I put more work into that than almost anything else I’ve ever written. And people actually…respected that. I’m terrible at writing fight scenes, and yet I carried a fight scene for multiple hours with like…20 characters! I DIDN’T THINK I COULD HAVE TWO CHARACTERS FIGHT AND MAKE IT WORK AT ALL! OH MY LANDS I HAVE ACTUAL SELF CONFIDENCE NOW!! AAAAAAAAA-

anyways, that aside lol

it’s been wonderful, really. I feel like the pros far outweigh the cons for me, and the cons for me can be mitigated anyways entirely on my side of things lol. I came to this site looking for a community of people who would appreciate me, stupid flaws, autism, anxiety, writing and all. And I think I got that. And I want to find more, I want to keep going beyond this little bubble, but I want to always come back to this little circle of people. I don’t care how many rps or writing messes I end up in, TAOCC is always going to have a special place in my heart, flaws and all. It’s helped me get through some serious mess in my life, and being excited to come home to whatever insanity these lil guys are up to today makes me happy like almost nothing else.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you.

Thank you for letting this odd moth in, I hope I’ve earned it.

HELL YEAH YOUVE EARNED IT!!!

You've been literally one of the kindest people I've met on the site. One of the most talented too! I've never seen someone write like you and. Honestly. Genuinely. I look up to you in quite a few aspects.

You're funny, kind, caring, skilled, and a great person overall. and im SO FUCKING GLAD YOURE MY FRIEND EEEEE HUGS SPINS YOUUUU

... (kicks feet) and I heard something about a 3d printer head oc youre making for me.... (teary eyed) (/pos) (me when people do things for me. i love yall. sm. love you elsie sm sM SM SM SM SM!!!)

#xeyasks #LOVE YOOUUUU #HUGS

[butterfliesonthewall]

Game Recommendation for Fellow HeR Nancy Drew fans!!

I know I can’t be the only fan of HeR Interactive’s Nancy Drew series searching for more games with adventure, mystery, and intrigue, right? So I figured: why not? I’ll just throw up a post talking about one of my Special Interest™ games that isn’t one of the Nancy Drews: The Last Express.

If you just want the quick TL;DR version, I would summarize it with: captivating artwork and animation, excellent score and sound design, intriguing mysteries and storylines, brilliant writing and character dialogue, superb acting, and literally the most in-depth real-time mechanic I've ever seen. If you purchase a copy, I would urge you to get the original version on GOG, not Steam’s “Gold Edition” of the game which fubbernucked the menu and has tons of audio glitches. Also: be sure to check the game’s ratings and content warnings beforehand, to make sure you’re a player of appropriate age. Enjoy, friends!

Back to the main post. So, just for a quick bit of backstory: I first got into the Nancy Drew series when I was around 8-years-old, thanks to the recommendation of a friend I had at the time, and I also somewhat got into more difficult puzzle games like those from the Myst series as I got older. Around 11 or 12, my parents brought out an old copy of The Last Express and said they figured at that point I was probably old enough to play it without being scarred for life by its more mature themes. So one night, I popped the first of three discs into my mom’s old Windows Vista (barf), and within mere seconds of the opening, it became one of my favorite games of. all. time. No, really: this game completely changed my understanding of exactly how good storytelling in games could actually be, if done right. I have seen so many games try (and fail) to do what The Last Express does seemingly effortlessly: blend together cinematic storytelling and gameplay in a smooth and balanced way.

(Trigger warning for the trailer!! Contains a few brief shots of blood and violence.)

Seriously, I don’t understand how underhyped this game is. Supposedly the company that released it, Broderbund, really screwed it over by giving it basically no advertising or exposure at all leading up to, and even following its release. My main theory is that this may be due to possibly believing it might not turn out profitable enough to make up for such expenses, since it’s a game that was highly experimental for its time and dabbles in rather niche and esoteric interests, making it a rather enigmatic piece even to this day. I guess the, “Why?” doesn’t really matter now, though.

Either way: I feel that truly did both the game itself and the gaming community as a whole a disservice, since I firmly believe that if this game had been successful, it could have changed the entire frontier of gaming for years to come, particularly in terms of storytelling and character writing. (This game also really makes you appreciate how much “small” details actually matter, BETHESDA / modern HeR.) A big part of the reason I'm writing this review is that I'm hoping at some point this game will get a second chance at glory with the help of the internet.

Now what’s so great about it? Well probably the very first thing you’ll notice about this game is its rather unique art style. The technique used was a blend of rotoscoping both still shots and filmed sequences of live actors and props against blue-screened sets, which were later filled in using digital 3D modelling.

I’ve heard some people describe the art in this game as “ugly,” and while I can agree that it is certainly dated by both modern rotoscoping and 3D modelling standards, personally I can’t say I agree that it’s “ugly” by any means. This was incredibly revolutionary for the time period the game came out in, and while not all of it looks flawless, the game still manages to achieve some truly visually stunning moments. Not to mention, seeing characters that appear so much like real people makes the game incredibly immersive, to the point that once, while waiting in the corridor for a specific time of day, a woman walked past me and excused herself, and I actually replied, out loud, to my computer, “Oh, sorry,” and it took me a solid minute after that to even realize what had just happened.

Don’t worry, though: if the visuals alone aren’t enough to grab you, more good things are on the way.

Another great thing about this game that you’ll notice straight-away is the score: this is hands-down one of the best soundtracks I’ve ever heard in a game. It sets up the tone and emotions for every moment perfectly, and can be quite chilling during the more dark scenes. The music in particular is one of the aspects that I think will appeal highly to fellow Nancy Drew fans, since it’s in a similar vein to many of the soundtracks in the ND series.

In fact, the all-around sound design for this game deserves praise. The sound effects used were all perfectly balanced and created a palpable ambience to the game, making you effectively feel like you’re really on the train. There’s also a very effective use of train sounds in general, particularly in regards to the sound of one braking hard. I swear, this chilling stinger that is heard each time you get a game over is permanently seared into my brain. (As heard in the trailer video, for those curious.)

So brushing away the game’s more “superficial” pros for a moment, what’s it even about? Well, the year is 1914, and you play as a doctor named Robert Cath, who has been wrongly accused of murder and is currently on the run from both the British and French police. Prior to the start of the game, Cath received a telegram from an old friend named Tyler Whitney, claiming he had come across something “exceptional” that required Cath’s assistance. Managing to hop aboard the Orient Express, Cath eventually discovers that Tyler has been murdered, finding him dead and bloody on the floor of his compartment. The rest of the game is a dive into the deepest secrets and personal lives of the other passengers while you, as Cath, adopt Tyler’s identity and attempt to figure out who killed him, why, and where his “exceptional” finding has disappeared to.

The story is a complex web of secrets, lies, puzzles, romance, political conspiracies, art, war, and bloodshed. To give away anything further would enter dangerously into spoiler territory. It’s best to go into the game as blind as possible so you can be totally swept up in its many twists and turns.

This game also has excellent writing, particularly in terms of character interaction and dialogue. Each character is uniquely written and memorable, making it very easy to want to engage with them and learn more about them.

I also have to give praise to the acting. Every single actor gives a stellar performance, even in the more “modest” roles. There’s not much more to be said there; it speaks for itself.

But by far the biggest selling point to the game, at least in my opinion, is its real-time mechanics. This is a game that can not only be played fairly non-linearly, but has a great deal of replayability as well since every character operates on their own schedule of events. The ability to rewind and, to a limited degree, fast-forward time in the menu allows you to explore multiple possibilities, as different events are taking place at the same time all over the train. Not only that, but the creators were quite thorough in making sure that players could explore every single possible decision, which resulted in a highly detailed script at nearly 800 pages long. I am not exaggerating the least bit when I say I have played this game to completion more than a dozen times, and have discovered something new I'd never seen before every time I've played it. Even to this day, I’m still learning things about this game I didn’t know before.

Much like the artwork, the real-time and time-rewinding mechanics were both revolutionary in the industry at the time of this game’s release. Jordan Mechner, the game’s designer, was the original creator of Prince of Persia, and implemented similar time mechanics in that series to those he would go on to use in the Last Express, albeit with a heavier emphasis on storytelling than action in the latter.

Two very important things to note before I wrap up this little review. First of all, while I do recommend this game to fellow Nancy Drew players, I'm recommending it specifically to older players. While I wouldn’t describe this game as particularly “edgy,” it does contain a fair amount of adult themes, such as: nudity, low-level (mostly implied) sexual content, smoking and drinking, a few mild profanities, onscreen violence and bloodshed, and some very grim deaths. It is not child-friendly, so be advised of that.

And secondly, be careful about where you purchase this game. GOG and Steam are the two main sites peddling it, but they’re both selling versions that are different enough to really impact your gameplay, depending on which one you choose. GOG’s version is completely faithful to the original and far less buggy, but Steam has what it calls, “Gold Edition,” and while it cleans up the UI a little and comes with a Hint System to assist players, (as well as the admittedly interesting addition of character screens, though I prefer the mystery and intrigue of not knowing the other passengers’ backgrounds, getting to learn them for myself as I play and explore) I can’t recommend it on the grounds that it’s super buggy, particularly with audio, and completely ruins the charm of the original menu screen. Obviously whichever you choose is your decision, but I would strongly advise purchasing The Last Express on GOG, rather than Steam.

So if this little review persuaded any of you to try it, please feel free to reply to this post, or reblog it and share your opinions and theories! I’d love to see what response my fellow members of the Clue Crew would have to it in particular!

#nancy drew #the last express #game recommendation #ND #HeR Interactive

[ixiraider]

Sorry for never ever being active I just honestly am not feeling Neopets anymore which is a tragedy because I grew up on that damn site. Next year should be my 20th anniversary, isn’t that insane? I don’t think I’d have ever grown out of it completely on my own, but the current state of the site is just entirely unusable for me. Flash dying and the broken ass conversion to the new layout was totally the final nail in the coffin. 99% of what made the site enjoyable to me is gone. No new events to speak of, customization is broken, no games and the few that are converted are super broken and clunky, a ton of dailies still not working, etc. Random little glitches that have literally never happened until the last few years, like my pets occasionally losing their outfits completely? I know some people have other things about the site they enjoy that they can still do, like pet trading or stocks or collecting, but I’m a simple guy and for me Neo was always a mindless little relaxant where I could play nostalgic games and dailies and slowly earn money to buy my pets nice things. That was kind of it. With the site so broken it has lost basically all appeal.

And with that said, I just really do not agree with the direction JumpStart/NetDragon has gone at all and I am partly not playing out of defiance or something lol. The NFTs are a joke and I can’t believe they are still engaging with metaverse BS -- I’m kinda appalled that so many people gave up criticizing this and have returned to playing like normal, NGL. It was only in July of this year that the official NFT ambassadors called anti-NFT Neopets players “worse than COVID.” Do people not realize that the Neopets Metaverse Instagram is up and active and there is currently a beta version of a crypto-based Neopets being referred to by the project devs as a “fully-upgraded Neopia”? Where the trailers reveal updated versions of games that are still unplayable either due to shoddy HTML5 conversion or no conversion at all, such as Turmac Roll and Meerca Chase? Alongside customization, NeoHome decoration, a fully animated BattleDome... basically everything broken on the main site, being given a full makeover on the crypto version? Like, I feel like I just am not going to stoop to “playing the shitty forgotten version of Neopets that has been sidelined over a crypto NFT money laundering scheme” lol. I can just go do something else with my free time.

Aside from that, it’s just one thing after another with poor communication, low effort art and events (when they happen at all), lack of transparency and weird vague surveys about features that absolutely nobody wants with a very clear bias suggesting that these things will happen whether Neopians vote against them or not. The third party/outsourced apps that are clearly made by groups with no knowledge of Neopets whatsoever before being paid to make a shitty Neopets clone of popular apps riddled with microtransactions, the poor quality nostalgia-bait merch while doing NOTHING to improve the actual site in any tangible way. I don’t blame TNT for the most part, I’ve said this before, I have a feeling their hands are pretty tied and they have mostly been stuck doing damage control as JumpStart refuses to give them the funding needed to make any major improvements and basically lets the site die off in favor of the metaverse version, but omfg, I’m not wasting my time or pride playing this shit anymore. Sorry.

[lowpolylobotomy]

hi there charly!!! i hope you're having a great day!! ready for some questions? how many different fan communities/fandoms have you been in? how active are you in them? what was/is your favorite one to be a part of? do you say you spend a lot of time in fandom spaces, or is it something that you do occasionally as an escape?

AUGHHFF FBHF

WELLG the first fandom soave i like actually engaged with and created for and talked to ppl in was DANGANRONPA. when i was THIRTEEN (1). anyone who meet glitch on danganronpa amino beteween 2017 and 2019 i am so sorry

thren i got into ever after high during the vorona cirus and wrote so many lesbians . i felt w little like i didnt rlly fit in w that crowd bc they love fluff and i love to be violently traumatised and murdered . creative differences i suppose i jus t think maybe apple white should drown painfully (bc i LOVE her gay ass).

and then me and the pal i stuck with from trhe danganronpa fandom (HI MIKE) got into undertale roleplay for a while (fun times)

and now i’m insane abt drag 👍 which is by far my favourite out of all of these. i cannot describe the passion i feel for thr art of drag hut i think ive rambled abt it af varying levels of coherency in thr oast

OH i also love really dumb reality shows but i don’t think i really consider myself In The Fandom for those unless you count my 50 year old mother as The Married At First Sight UK Fandom

b c i amincapable of going outside and talkign to people (this is not a ioke. serverr anxiety disordar) like all my human interaction comes from the fun ny ppl in ny phone i share interests w/ so yeah fandom spaces are pretty key for my like. existence as a person who makes contact with other people

i don’t do shit to do w undertale and danganronpa anymore, i will occaisonally peep in on the ever after hufh fandom and i’m still as insane abt drag as i ever was

#charly what the fuck are you talking about #thecollectionsof #I GE TTO SCREAM !!!

[lilkatzz-alt]

the following is a work of fiction based of a tweet that made me angry. cw // delusions , vent

I very rarely commission art anymore. I make all of my money by drawing for others, and it all goes to bills. But once, just this once, I had an opportunity. An artist I like with a cartoony style befitting of my character discounted their comms just enough that I could justify supporting them. After all, I can't really feel guilty about a luxury purchase if it's cheap and helps someone else, right?

Communications were smooth sailing; I gave them my ref and payment and they told me their turnaround time. They seemed really nice and even told me they liked my art ;w; (they didn't follow me back though but it's fine haha). It's getting pretty close to the deadline, so I'm really excited to see what they did with my character.

I'm just scrolling Twitter right now and... oh! Message badge! I kind of expect it to be a client, but it's them! The artist! My art must be ready!

"Had a blast working on this ^^ Thank you for commissioning me!"

The sentiment was followed by a link. I clicked it, and was met by my character. But....

Why is the mouth blacked out?

It almost looks like some sort of rendering error. I mean, it's FULL 000000 BLACK with no details. It's supposed to be open and happy, but it's just the silhouette of the expected expression.

My first thought is that I've slipped into an alternate reality, one where this is normal! Or maybe I actually asked for this? Did I ask for the mouth to be blacked out? No, I wouldn't do that... That's illogical. I don't feel so good.

"Hey!" I ask them, "Do you know what's going on with the mouth?"

The seconds seem to stretch on. I need an answer before my mind begins to act up.

Typing...

"I'm sorry? I don't know what you mean. Are you unsatisfied with the piece?"

That's. Not good. What. Why-

I look back at the piece.

The eyes are big and round, so bright and happy. The cheek fluff is big and had amazing highlights. Everything is clear and done with purpose. But the mouth... It's like someone cut it out with a lasso tool. If the artist didn't do it, then..... Then I must be going crazy.

I quickly navigate to my character's toyhouse page. Am I hallucinating? Will the other pieces have a problem too? No, they're all fine. My sweet summer child, staring back at me hundreds of times over, mostly renditions from years past. She's happy, and she's okay.

I quickly attempt to rationalize. This can't be a computer glitch; I don't know much about computers, but I know this. It can't be a hallucination; I don't actually experience those, I just fear that I do. So then....

Is the artist lying?

If this is a joke then it's not funny... my heart rate is elevated, it's practically psychological assault. I message them again.

"Here's what I'm seeing on my end. You don't know anything?" Attached is the same photo they sent me.

No response.

I start to hit the arms of my chair to keep myself busy while the anticipation eats me alive.

Suddenly, the worst possible outcome:

"You can no longer send messages to this person."

The tears start unprompted.

"nononononononono they're lying they did this they hurt me i DIDN'T EVEN GET MY ART. WHAT GIVES?"

My dog approaches me and lays her head on my leg. She knows when I'm in distress, but I'm not in any mood to be comforted. I ignore her and frantically swap to my alt account to check the artist's profile. And it looks like they've started causing quite a scene.

"I’m on my knees Begging y’all to PLS add an open mouth view on your ref sheets OTL Doesn’t have to be complex! Could even be a disembodied tongue and single tooth. PLEASE JUST PUT IT SOMEWHERE I hate having to guess the colors and most likely get it wrong 😖"

Wh- They didn't-

I check back in our DMs. I had given an older ref because it had fit the style better. On closer inspection, no tongue ref.

"Her tongue is just pink.... how hard would it have been to ask...."

I refresh.

"if you give me a mouth-less view ref sheet, I’m going to passive aggressively color any open mouths on commissions pure black. That’s it. And not even off black so u can see the lines. FULL 000000 BLACK. NO DETAILS Check ur refs :U"

P- PASSIVE AGGRESSIVELY?????

I'm in shock. They thought that not delivering the product I paid for, blocking me, and scaring the SHIT out of me was a form of PASSIVE aggression????? And they say "check ur refs" like this is some sort of PSA? Like we're supposed to want to LISTEN to them after being blatantly threatened with vandalized art? I'm furious. I'm furious and baffled, but at least I'm no longer scared.

At the end of the day, I'm just happy the artist told on themselves so that no one will commission them any time soon.

A refund sure would be nice though.

#short story #i don't know why i felt like i had to do this #it felt like it really happened to me even though it actually hasn't happened to anybody #they're just making empty threats #just in case they delete the tweet i linked: the artist is TheDragonElk

[color-ns]

Happy birthday undertale!

Man, the 5 anniversary for undertale is already here! I feels like it’s been forever since last year. I mean, can you believe I started this blog a year ago? I can’t at all.

So, last year I personally thanked all of my favorite undertale artists, blogs, and writers for being here and making my day every time they post. So, I’d like to do this again, but maybe less people, because I follow a lot more people now, I want to give a longer thank you to them, and if I’d list them all this will be too long.

Let’s get to it!

————————————————————

First I’d like to start with Toby fox, (@fwugradiation) the genius, creative guy, how did you even come up with this idea you amazing guy. You changed so many people’s life, personality, and social life, and to shorten, people. Thank you, we will all be forever grateful for everything you, temmie and the rest of the team did for us.

@absolutedream-undertaleart over the void was one of the very first things that  caught my eye in the undertale community, and I was so excited about your idea, I had to see if there is more like this. Thank you!

@alainaprana , you make the best comics, I always enjoy them! You and @little-noko always make me smile, because your friendship is so real and you’re supporting each other’s content all the time.

Also if speaking of @little-noko, I ADORE your comics and I get my most of my inspiration, dedication, and growth out of paper crayon. Thank you! My comic exist because of you!

@kuttiesstuff dude, you’re so fricking funny, I love everything about your comic! You make me laugh so hard all the time, whether you post you comic, or answer questions.

@unu-nunu-art I first saw your art in @ask-glitch-and-squid blog, and IMMEDIATELY fell in love! You. Are. So. GOOD. You comics, art, and characters are so inspiring, funny and beautiful! keep creating!

@zu-is-here man, I discovered your blog only recently, but mannnnn do you make me happy. your art is so cool, and your so polite and sweet, no wonder everyone on your blog sends you love so much. You’re incredible!

@lynxgriffin bruh, dude, I LOVE YOUR COMIC. I don’t know what else to tell ya. I mean the fact that I get so excited to see you updated your comic I want to jump in place is kind of obvious right? Wait no? Then let me tell ya. THANKS FOR EXISTING.

@metakazkz you make your comics so simple, easy to read, and I love the fact you upload not once a year. Your dedication is so inspiring, and I don’t really care what version of abysstale is it, I love it, and I love you and your content.

@bettinalevyisdetermined your voice is so lively, and every undertale comic you dub, I enjoy it to the core. You make frisk sound so cute! Thanks!

@onebizarrekai for every single thing you made for the community! Dreamswap, Isaac Beamer, grayscale and so much more. Do you even take breaks bro? You made so much, it’s  incredible.

@dryemiddi your comic is so unique! your art style, story, and especially the fact you did a comic with sans OUT of the story. not every person on the community can think of such, well, unthinkable idea! You can make a horrified or angry face, and it would accidentally scare me! X’D your expressions are so detailed, you can see you worked years to get to that level. Thank you! I really look up to you!

@hiimtryingtounderfell I first saw your comic from a comic dub. maybe I didn’t follow you until a few months ago, but from the very start I fell in love with your comic and art. I’ve been a fan for about 3 years. 3 years! and You’re still one of my favorites. <3

@xxtc-96xx you probable already got something like this today already, and I know you’re taking a break from undertale, but thank you. even if you decide to move on from undertale, I’ll still follow you. You make such good content, and I don’t care that you’re taking a break, because that’s ok. So, thank you for making such good art and sharing it with the world.

@xx-avj-xx you’re so funny, you make me laugh every other comic! not that many people come up with so many jokes for comics so frequently too. You draw incredible, and your style fits your humour so perfectly! You have so many characters and storys, i doesn’t matter whether someone’s new or been your fan for years, there is still to discover about you! Thank you for making a lust error that nobody asked you to make, Because nobody even thought about it.

@mramazingva without your sans voice what would the community be without you? A sad and voiceless place that’s what! You make every comic more alive then it was before you voiced it, and you work every week to make people happy. What can be more inspiring then that?

@tatatale bruh, your art is so beautiful! (If you don’t consider olivetale lol) insans interactions with every character is so fricking hilarious, and no matter how many comics people will make about him, (and i’m sure there will be) you’ll be the only one that can make him like how he really is. I can babble about all your other characters and your story all day, but I’m afraid that will be too long. Love your stuff!

@askfallenroyalty your writing always hits you in the face, and before you can even get up, you get knocked down again. You make every characters feeling as much as important as the other, and you don’t forget anything important in your story. You combined deltarune and undertale so perfectly, how can you not read this? You don’t try to make every update perfect, but that’s what so good about it.

@shattereddreamsau I was sad when you said the comic was going down, because I would wait for every update, make an alarm and read it patiently, and now that it’s over I don’t know what to do. But I respect your reasons, and I will not remember it by the fact that it’s over, but by the fact that it’s here, and I enjoyed every second of reading it.

And @slylock-syl, I saved you for last. Why? Because I love you the most! The first I saw of you was on a comic dub, three years ago, and started following you only 2 years later. wait, that’s a year ago! Yes, you were the first blog I followed on tumblr, and not only that, you made me download the app looking for more content! That’s because your comic is addictive, with beautiful art, full of action, with so much imagination, full of love, dedication, eye catcher, and has the best love story ever. Your reply to what I said last year made me want to jump in place, because I caught your attention even for just a moment. You probably don’t remember, but i do. So thank you, for everything you gave me without you knowing. For everything you made me feel even if you didn’t know. For making a comic that someone out there loves, until this day.

also a big thank you for my friend @amemi0 that is supporting me from afar, and my friend @cheese-and-peppers that let me use his birthday present, to the anniversary out of burnout. You are the best guys. Also, thank you 48 followers! actually I look at every blogs content that follows me. Some I even followed back!

To sum up this very very very long post, good night everyone and happy birthday undertale! Let us grow bigger and weirder!

#undertale #art #my art #artists on tumblr #undertale anniversary #frisk #undertale birthday #happy bithday undertale! #happy birthday #digital art

[zalrin]

Dream SMP x Detroit: Become Human AU

DSMP x DBH AU

Note: I was inspired to do this after watching Tubbo's play-through of Detroit: Become Human. At first, I was planning on posting art with descriptions, but I'm over flowing with ideas and not enough artistic talent to hurry along T-T I did post one piece of fanart, but it just wasn't enough so I have impulsively decided to post all my current ideas here on Tumblr and link it on Twitter (This is actually what got me to make a Tumblr in the first place XD)

Android and Human Pairs:

1. Philza & Wilbur

Philza, or Android Model PH-1L2A, is an advanced model of android that is designed to emulate human behavior, empathy, and responsibilities. He is programmed with human-like common sense, so much so that he is often mistaken for one. One of his most unique traits is his additional drone technology incorporation, allowing him to hover in the air and have limited flight capabilities within certain parameters. Some worry that he will eventually become a deviant, or is already one, due to his human-like qualities, but over the years on the force he has garnered vast amounts of trust to overlook most of his android-based discriminations. Unknown to most, Philza is actually married to a human, his ex-partner Kristin Watson, who retired after deciding to pursue a different career path. Kristin is the one that first named Philza and kept their relationship a secret for both the safety of their careers and livelihood. Wilbur Soot, a human, was once the Captain of the L'Manberg divison but was later pushed aside by his rival and competitor, J. Schlatt. Now transferred and demoted to lieutenant, Wilbur has shown no more desire for leadership and instead indulges in his once-suppressed eccentric tendencies. Although true to his duties, he now enjoys his job with less responsibilities and pressures, becoming more free-spirited under the guidance of his new partner/android.

2. Ranboo & Tubbo

Sadly, Tubbo is not an android, though he very much would like to be one. Ever since he was young, he envied the abilities of androids and always hoped for them to receive better treatment, albeit an unpopular opinion. In the past, Tubbo had his very own android, Tommy, who helped him in his tasks at a somewhat large bee farm. Due to his popularity and his work credentials, he eventually took over the company, but was dealt with many responsibilities and moral dilemmas. One revolved around Tommy. Caught doing something reckless and harmful (potentially arson), Tubbo was forced to give his android up for the betterment of his farm. However, shortly after letting go of Tommy, his company went under due to the rapid extinction of the bee population, and he was forced to find another job. Tubbo desperately wanted to reconcile with Tommy, deeply regretting his decisions, but he couldn't find even a trace of his android/friend. This prompted Tubbo to become a private investigator, to one day find Tommy, and was eventually paired with a new android, Ranboo. Ranboo, or Android Model RA-N800, is a highly advanced prototype that dabbles in the highly experimental field of teleportation. However, due to this dangerous function, Ranboo has issues with his memory drive and is easily susceptible to water damage.

3. DreamXD & George

DreamXD has no model number, as he was a private creation, designed in the image of his creator, Clay (aka. Dream), who went missing and is suspected to have been imprisoned. Most of his functions are unknown, even to himself, and his common sense is skewed because he was incomplete when his creator vanished. However, he has recently discovered that he has the ability to fly/hover with little-to-no limitations and can warp his voice at will, going beyond basic imitations. In addition, he has a storage compartment hidden on his body, allowing him to carry and hide items that go beyond normal storage units. Unlike most androids, DreamXD was made to have emotions, though the reasons behind it remain a mystery. He experiences things similar to a human and was designed to be a deviant. Most new abilities that he discovers are often presented during times of extreme emotional fluctuations, requiring him to have control over his emotions to then be in control of his abilities. DreamXD was pushed onto George after Clay was forced to run, entrusting his most prized creation to his once most trusted partner and friend. In the past, George and Clay were partners in the private creation of androids. However, the two had a falling out when Clay's ambitions became skewed from their original goals. Before Clay could spiral out of control, George decided to leave for both himself and his friend, throwing away his old city life and running away to a secluded area, away from urban society. Before the arrival of DreamXD, George lived a very peaceful, if not boring, life of gathering mushrooms and living off what nature provided. When he realized Clay was desperate for this favor, George could not let go of his feelings of loyalty and kinship to his old friend and agreed to let in DreamXD into his home.

3. Karl, Sapnap, & Quackity

Sapnap was also partners with Clay and George, but he left shortly before George. Creating his own independent business of consulting bigger companies on android management and programming, Sapnap was eventually introduced to Karl, an android helper provided by Mr. Beast Inc., and Quackity under the L'Manberg divison. Karl, or Android Model K-4RL, one of Jimmy Donaldson's (CEO of Mr. Beast Inc.) personal androids, primarily work under Mr. Beast Inc. but help out Sapnap and Quackity when there is time to spare. Before his partnership with the two, Karl was given an experimental update that would allow him to have access to vast amounts of past records and current data so that he could analyze the past and calculate accurate predictions of future events in real time. However, due to this Karl began to experiences glitches in his memory bank. At first, he ignored the signs, but then he realized that information/events that never happened to him (present time) flickered across his mind, often giving him a sense of deja-vu. He finally came to the conclusion that the "new memories" were actually past or future events brought on by the update and this data was too much for his system, slowly chipping away and corrupting his files. Scared of being abandoned, or worse (reset), Karl kept his glitch to himself, regardless of how much he had come to trust his two partners. Quackity was paired with Sapnap and Karl under direct orders from J. Schlatt, to investigate the problems in programming of deviants. Due to the rising issues of criminal androids, Schlatt was forced to send out his right-hand man to silence the disturbance before it had a chance to be known to the public and stir up chaos within the community.

PART 2

Note: I apologize if there are any misspellings or grammatical errors. It's currently 2am where I am and my eyes are getting too heavy for me to go back and re-read this post. If I remember to, I'll read over it later today, but for now I'm just going to post this and hope for the best. I really do hope you enjoyed it! If it garners enough attention, I'll try to write a fanfic of this, but I won't make any promises ^^

#dream smp #detroid become human #dream smp x detroit become human au #dsmp x dbh au #philza minecraft #philza #wilbur soot #wilbur #kristin minecraft #kristin #ranboo #tubbo #bee and boo #tommyinnit #tommy #dreamwastaken #dream #clay #dreamxd #georgenotfound #george #goggy #dreamnotfound #dnf #karl jacobs #karl #sapnap #quackity #androids #fanfic

[unluckyplanet]

Roleplay Search!

Looking for more 1x1 rps! A bit about me, I’m a minor, I’ve been rping for 5 or so years, my preferred platform is discord, I’m semi-lit and..... a tad awkward. As in pretty unskilled in the art of casual communication. Rp ideas under cut

Pokemon! I’m keep going back to my pokemon obsession and I have a couple of ideas - Literally just a pmd style thing. Maybe not the humans-turning into pokemon, but a pair of young pokemon becoming explorers and eventually taking down an ancient evil.  - Evil Team grunt x Undercover agent. Or just, platonic. It doesn’t have to be romance, I just really like enemies to friends stuff. One of the characters is a teen/young adult who joined an evil team, and gets paired up with another new recruit who is trying to take down the group from the inside. Could either be casual shennigans, or following the story (from the evil team’s perspective.)  - Ultra beast fusion rp! Lusamine finds out about Nihilego’s ability to fuse with humans, and thinks “gee, what if we could do this with other UBs or pokemon.” So she takes a bunch of kids, children of aether employees, interns or volunteers eager to help, and fuses them with ultra beasts. Those kids would be our characters and.... well, I don’t have any real plot ideas. If it’s interesting I’d love to brainstorm ideas tho

MHA rp idea. Our OCs are some aspiring heroes who’ve been hurt time and time again by hero society. So they become vigilantes, fighting villains while also trying to expose the corruption among the heroes

Magical Girl rp! Our characters are a pair or group of magical girls(or just magical people in general) connected to these flowers called Eternablooms. Slowly they find out that these flowers aren’t as nice as they thought and are actually parasitic and ultimately detrimental to their health

MLP, I love my little pony, and the worldbuilding and general themes of friendship. Also it gives me an excuse to draw ponies - A pair of unicorns are chosen to succeed the princesses (or at least train to do so) and a few days later the Princesses are suddenly snatched up by some evil force. And so begins their journey to find the elements of harmony and defeat (or redeem) whoever threw equestria into chaos.  - While traditional ‘magic’ is restricted to unicorns and a few other animals, it doesn’t stop normal ponies from trying. Like our characters! Two magic enthusiasts who are hornless, but willing to search for ways to master magic regardless.  - Newbie changeling ruler and newly ascended alicorn are forced to work together to face a bigger threat. Preferably, my oc would be the changeling since I already have one, but hey! I’m always looking for an excuse to make more mlp ocs

PJO, a group of demigods arrive at CHB and immediately get smacked in the face by a prophecy.... Do I have an actual idea for this propehcy? Unfortunately, no. I just want to use my demigod ocs

Homestuck, I read this stupid webcomic years ago, and it will never let me go.  - Flarping trolls? I don’t more to add onto this... just... flarping trolls.  - Cherub session! We each play a cherub who are entering a 2/4 player session together.  - Two player session, a pair of wannabe players with no friends willing to entertain them, end up playing an incredibly glitched session alone. The difficultly has been raised drastically, their prototyping has gone horribly wrong and ontop of that their medium just wasn’t built correctly. Humans or trolls work! Or both!

The Owl House, a couple of teen witches begin their slow descent into wild witchery. Probably more casual and school oriented?

And uh, I think that’s enough. Too much maybe. If any of these ideas are interesting send me a pm here or a friend request to Jupiter#7701 on discord!!

#discord roleplay #pkmn roleplay #pokemon rp #mlp rp #roleplay search #pjo rp #owl house rp #homestuck rp #magical girl roleplay

[hermitcraftheadcanons]

(Submitting these all together, rather than my original plan to post them bit by bit as parts, since the reaction/addition thing seemed like it was wigging out on me a little bit. Treat this as a reaction/addition, if you can. :P)

Okay, so as there's a cut off now, you're getting my ideas together in bulk, so apologies for that. Some might be a little patchy, as i've not had much time to think over it all. First, though, I want to tell you how fun reading Scattered has been. Only discovered it yesterday, but its been great. Even if you're closing it now, I hope you either open it again in future or do something of a similar vibe.

Anyway, first on the list of random ideas is something that pertains to the changes some of the Hermits have gone through. At first, and for a long time, it seems as if its just Hermits who were stuck in death loops or in a single place for a long time and were forced to adapt who took on these traits... but after over a year of being stuck in the glitched world, it becomes clear its happening to everyone - those with extreme circumstances just had it happen faster.

The first time this becomes apparent is with Stress.

She and False managed to escape from both their coral situation and the months spent travelling - both on their own and with Keralis and Cleo - without any alterations, but after several months back at spawn... Stress begins to feel the cold in a way that she hasn't since Xisuma helped to fix her ice glitch at the start of Season 7. She knows this feeling, and she doesn't like it, but its not exactly the same this time. It feels more malevolent and structured than her free flowing chill was... almost like the powers of an Iceologer. It makes it clear that these adaptations aren't just adaptations. People are just overall reverting to states more reminiscent of the non-player mobs. Death and environment are just catalysts that speed it along. Soon or later, this begins to happen to everyone, to one degree or another.

Changing tack a bit (as I said, putting all my ideas together, now :P), the time they spent together led to them basically being each others' best friend in the glitched world (not shipping, FYI. I appreciate that's not allowed). This experience has changed them, the most explicit shift that Stress' sword skills come along in leaps and bounds under False's guidance. Even long after they reach spawn, if either needs someone to watch their back, they go to the other before anyone else.

Switching tracks again to the outside, as that's something else I still find interesting, I imagine the whole "people not noticing the Hermits are missing at first because they're as the name suggests" thing is exacerbated by this occurring between seasons of MCC (though probably not the current break). A lot of the community gets their news at events like this, so its only really the people who know the Hermits well who notice within a month or so. By the time MCC starts up again, the Legates and a few others are already convening with the Noxcrew to try and figure out a way to find out what's going on, but the first time the wider community catches wind of something being up aside from a Hermit non-attendance is when Noxite pulls Dream aside before the 2nd MCC of the new season - along with any other admins they can get a hold of - for help with a problem. The Dream SMP group are nervous when the green man comes back from that chat seeming rather worried.

Another point to the wider MC universe. If this glitched world issue becomes known, there might be concern that it could spread, depending on what the identified cause ends up being. There could be talks of containing it, only to realize too late that because it snatched inactive Hermits from other servers, whatever it is is mostly likely already out there in the wild.

Seeing a couple of the Sci-crafters end up on the gltiched server of their own will, and you wondered why they'd want the Infinity Portal to send them there, perhaps it was part of a group effort. The groups aware of the rough details of the situation made the journey to the Season 6 world and made a base camp there. Lots of different players pooling their skills and strengths, working together to try and use the Infinity Portal to rescue the Hermits. Mango and Methodz were just the two who volunteered to travel through the glitched world and let the Hermits know that there's a plan to free them. They know there's an almost certain chance they'll be trapped, but between saving their friends, potentially setting up a proper means of communication to the outside, and stopping whatever this is from spreading to other servers, its a sacrifice they're willing to make.

And that's about all the major ideas I have, I think. Wish I had more, and I did have the small thought of the glitched world phenomenon basically being almost like a natural disaster with no surefire way of stopping its effects - the best the Hermits and anyone else can do is damage control, and even that's difficult - but I hadn't given that massive amounts of thought.

In the meantime, i'd like to repeat that I really hope you open this AU again in future given the amount of potential it has, even if that reopening ends up being more of a continuation, with everything before set in stone. For now, though, i'd just like to let you know that i'm attempting to go through the master-posts and other content to put together a visual infographic meant to chart each Hermit's actions and journey through this AU. There's every chance I won't finish it, but given you said you'd still take art after the close time, i'm not going to rush it.

Regardless, this has been great. Thanks for putting this thing together. :D

#false #keralis #stress #zombiecleo #submission #scattered au #Hermitcraft #mod shade #i love all of these ideas so much #also #infographic???? #!!!!!!! #it really does feel like it needs one doesn't it #some kind of colour coded diagram #that would be glorious my friend #good luck!!

[rabble-dabble]

Hi! I’d like to submit an OC for the trans/gay rights hoodies you’re doing but my ADHD brain needs more specific instructions on how to do that, if that’s not too much trouble?

Of course, I get it, it's no problem at all to explain!

Really, all I need from you is three things:

a picture of your OC

what your OC's name is

and what flag you'd like on the hoodie I draw on your OC (such as trans, pan, bi, aro, gay, etc).

The picture of your OC is one that needs to be a coloured one, basically kinda like a finished piece of them. You don't need to give me a full layout of their outfit or all of their details, really, because I'll only be drawing the top half of their body with the hoodie, but really anything helps so I can draw a coloured piece with the hoodie.

If you'd like to give a little detail (AS EXAMPLE: previous people have told me like, TV glitches on the eyes, or a glowsquid-influenced OC that had glowing hands and hair) you're welcome too! although I cannot guarantee I'll do them, and this isn't exactly a commission type thing, more just a thing for LGBT+ support, so I'm more focused on showing the support rather than making a full masterful piece of art.

Your OC name and flag you'd like on the hoodie is optional, although more customizable for showing the variety of support you'd like to show. Basically, if you wanna leave your OC nameless to me? I'll just @ you and say 'this person's OC!' and if you don't specify a flag, I'll just use the umbrella flag that symbolizes our community. Your flag doesn't have to be based on your OC's gender or sexuality, it can be based on yourself, or whatever you'd like it to be. If you request 1-2 flags, I'll try to do them, although no one's really done more than 1 flag so if anyone tries to request more than 2 at once, you'd probably have to submit more than one OC (which, at this moment, i'm perfectly fine with, although I may put other people with only one OC in more priority than your second OC).

and then, after that, all you have to do is ask/submit to me!

you just give me that reference of your OC, and go in the box saying "hi, my OC's name is [name] and the flag i'd like on the hoodie is [flag], thank you!" and then you're done! i get to work on drawing the hoodie, and you get a message a few hours later (may vary, depending on when you're sending it) that's @ you thanking you for your contribution of support and maybe a lil personal message in the tags from me. that's all! i hope this helped!

#answered #ask #i hope i really explained this specifically enough! i didn't wanna overload with info so I broke it up with some italics and bolding #essentially after the bulletpoints i explain what each bullet point means #hoped this really did help! dont worry about messing anything up #if i cant understand an intitial ask/submission I'll literally just ask by submitting that ask #speaking of which i have a submission to go correct LMAO #have a good day!

[spruceplank]

Here is Home

Impulse isn't anything special. He does his job in simple but effective ways just like the machines he builds. He can't do anything special. He isn't anything special. So he keeps working until he breaks. And when he breaks, it's not a simple fix. When he breaks, he breaks beyond repair.

Warnings for: Temporary character death, starvation, and overworking to death

Fic below read more and ao3 link in the replies! (8955 words)

Tango is like fire. He's warm and bright. Strength visible even when the embers smolder down under the weight of the world. A comfortable warmth and the crackle of burning logs of a fire in the winter. He should burn with every touch he gives but instead there's only warmth seeping through his fingertips like lava flowing down a mountain side at every passing touch.

Zedaph is like the wind. Soft and gentle summer breezes yet also fierce and howling storms. Ever changing and shifting through anything to reach his goals. Pushing anything and anyone forward with ease, his strength unwavering just as his faith. At his softest he eases calmness into weary souls and at his most energetic he's a whirlwind dragging the world with him.

Impulse isn't anything special. He can't provide strength through words alone. He can't do fancy tricks with his creations or build amazing things that make people stare in awe. His machines simply do their job just as he does. Working until soreness is so deep in his bones he would feel off without the constant background aching. He works and works to even measure up to being a fraction of what the others can be. Toiling away at perfect farms with exactly just the right amount of productivity to be simple but still effective. He builds farms as easily as he could build a crafting table at this point. The repetitive labor and click of redstone signals make him feel as if maybe he's doing something good enough to measure up to the others. Maybe this will be enough.

But it's never enough. Not when he looks at the desert he helped Bdubs and Tango to level out for Cub. Where there's now a massive pyramid full of mini games that only seems to grow by the day. Not when he enters the shopping district and sees grass where mycelium used to be. Where there's mini diamonds hanging from the trees and the diamond throne looming over him from town hall. Not when he sees the other's builds, with their massive scale and detailed nature.

He shifts his entire base one block and even though it takes hours and hours of work it feels like nothing compared to what he's seen the others make. He builds more and more farms so he doesn't have to think about that. He only works and works until he runs out of blocks. Then he gathers more resources then he'll ever reasonably need and works until those are gone too.

Tango and Zedaph come over and force him to sleep occasionally but he usually doesn't sleep long to begin with. There's too much work he has to do. Sometimes he doesn't even know what he's working on anymore. What's even the point? But he doesn't stop and think about it. He only works harder. He's nothing special, just like the machines he builds. He does his job in simple but effective ways. He works and works and works some more. His bed remains untouched and his food supply runs dangerously low but he doesn't pay any mind to those. He still has more work he needs to do. He always has work he needs to do.

He isn't anything special. He can't fly as if it's second nature like Grian can. He can't build castles on cliff tops that look as if they're paintings like Bdubs can. He can't tune note blocks so they play songs in a constant flow of melodies like Etho can. He can't craft art from blank sheets like Beef can. He can't make armor stands into scenes of life like Cleo can. He can't spin words and wisdom into poetry like Joe can. He can't wield a sword as easily as breathing like False and Wels can. He can't do anything special. So he keeps working.

He doesn't realize he isn't like his machines until it's too late. His machines aren't alive, they don't need to do anything other than work. He isn't like his machines at all. His machines run and could run forever if he needed them to. He had forgotten he can't do the same. He can break. And when he breaks, it's not a simple fix. When he breaks, he breaks beyond repair.

.

ImpulseSV died of starvation

TangoTek: Impulse buddy? You good?

Renthedog: Did you forget to grab more food when you grabbed more supplies or something dude?

FalseSymmetry: Should someone go check on him?

Iskall85: Probably should, it's not like any of us should starve to death.

StressMonster101: Iskall's right, there's never a shortage of food on this server why would he have died from starvation?

Zedaph: Impulse? You there?

iJevin: Would he have dropped his communicator before respawning?

Cubfan135: He would've respawned with it if that were the case.

Grian: Impulse? Can you tell us you're at least reading these?

GoodtimeswithScar: Who's the closest to his base?

.

Whisper from TangoTek: Imp? Buddy? You okay? You're kind of freakin me out with the silence act.

Whisper from Zedaph: Impy please respond you're worrying me.

.

XisumaVoid: I'll teleport over to him since he seems to not be answering give me a moment.

MumboJumbo: What are the odds he just has his communicator on silent?

Docm77: When you respawn it automatically shuts that off, it can't be on silent.

.

Teleport XisumaVoid to ImpulseSV

Teleport failed

Teleport ImpulseSV to XisumaVoid

Teleport failed

.

XisumaVoid: Whoever is near Impulse's base head there now I can't teleport

iJevin: On my way

Keralis: Shishwammy can't teleport?

XisumaVoid: Something in the code is glitched, but for the life of me I can't see anything wrong with it

iJevin: Uh X I need you here now

.

Teleport XisumaVoid to iJevin

.

TangoTek: X? Is Imp okay?

Zedaph: Jevin? What's going on?

iJevin: He isn't here

Bdouble0: I'm in the shopping district should I go look for him?

iJevin: No, his stuff is here, but he isn't

ZombieCleo: What does that mean?

XisumaVoid: It means he didn't respawn

__

There's nothing. He's aware of nothing and knows of nothing. He merely exists. He thinks he should be somewhere but he doesn't know where. He doesn't have the energy to figure it out. He should just go back to sleep. That's what he'd been doing right? That's what he should do. He should sleep. There isn't anything else he needs to do. He isn't anyone who needs to be anywhere. He can simply sleep.

"What in the… What are you doing here?"

There's a voice. It's familiar but different. Rougher, sadder, more tired than it should be. He thinks he knows the voice. But he doesn't know who. He doesn't have the energy to place the voice to a name. He doesn't even have a name.

"Hey, Hey…… Wake up…… Hey…….. Wake up……"

He can't wake up. There's no need for him to be awake. He doesn't need to wake up. There's no reason for him to keep going. He doesn't serve any purpose. He doesn't do anything necessary. He isn't anyone special.

"Dammit you're really going to make me take you back myself aren't you?"

He doesn't have anywhere he needs to be. He doesn't belong anywhere. He isn't anyone special.

"When X bans me again, I will find a way around it to come make your life miserable."

Someone grabs him. He didn't realize he was simply floating until now. There's something hard yet slightly warm beneath him. Arms under him that hold him up. He feels weightless as he did before. He doesn't have any reason to fight. He simply doesn't care enough to move.

"You're lucky my brother is too much of a derp to realize he needs to ban me again to keep me out of the new world."

Brother? He doesn't know anyone with a brother. Actually he doesn't know anyone at all. He doesn't know anyone or anything. He simply is and that's all there is to know. It's easiest this way. Simple yet effective.

"I don't know what you managed to do that's caused you to wind up like this but if I have to deal with my brother and your friends asking me thirty thousand questions you owe me another one on top of this for bringing you back."

His friends? What is a friend? Does he have those? And bring him back where? He's already where he needs to be. He doesn't need to do anything or be anyone. He is simply here. He can just sleep.

"You really are all perfect for each other huh? Just a bunch of derps. I'm taking your things for the headache dealing with the rest of your derp family is going to give me when I had no part in this."

His family? He didn't have a family. He was alone.

"Forget it, clearly your code is more messed up than even I thought it was finding you in the void."

His code? The void? Nothing made sense. The arms under him gripped him tighter against a hard surface. It should hurt shouldn't it? Yet it was familiar in a comforting way. He could hear a steady beat echoing in his mind. He should go back to sleep. The arms around him tightened but only silence answered him as he finally drifted away.

__

"Exy!" Zedaph calls delighted at the man's sudden appearance. His delight crumbles into fear as he notices the sleeping figure in Ex's arms.

Though he momentarily hesitates, Ex simply forces his nerves away with an eye roll and snaps at the blonde, "How many times have I told you not to call me that?"

"Ex, how, how are you here?" Xisuma stares at his brother in bewildered confusion. He had banned Ex hasn't he? But seeing his brother walk in with the very person he's been unable to find any trace of is a weight off his shoulders he didn't know was settling there.

"You didn't ban me from this world." Ex states as if it was that simple.

Tango ignores X's gaping, Zedaph's silent fear and pushes forward towards Ex. He glances at the still form of his best friend asleep and dead to the world before looking up at Ex. Tango's voice wavers between disbelief and hope as he asks, "How did you find him?"

"You said he wasn't where he should be so I looked in the place where things wind up when they don't know where else to go." Ex explains. He stands awkwardly in the doorway. Not quite moving forward into the room but not running away.

"You can read chat?" Xisuma questions.

"The place where things wind up when they don't know where else to go?" Zedaph asks right after. Both of them turn to look at each other before facing back to Ex with unreadable expressions.

"I can do all the things you can do Xisuma, don't tell me you've forgotten." Ex explains without actually answering. He sighs like it's enough to hide his feelings on the situation when he begrudgingly answers Zedaph, "Yes when things don't know where else to go they all end up in the same place."

"But you haven't done anything -" Xisuma starts but Ex is tired of this already.

"Because I don't want to do anything. I wouldn't even be here if I hadn't found one of your derpy friends lost in the void." Ex pushed back, voice raised over his brother’s. The two stare at each other as if having a silent conversation when Tango speaks up.

"The void? Why was Imp there?" Tango pushes looking between the two brothers.

"It's where things that have nowhere else to go wind up." Ex explains as if the answer is as simple as he puts it.

Zedaph stutters before anxiously speaking, "But he has a place, he has a home here. How did-"

"Ask him not me. I simply found him and brought him back." Ex states calmly over where Zedaph nervously trails off.

"Why though?" Xisuma questions like he's unsure if the person before him is actually Ex.

Ex rolls his eyes but answers his brother all the same, "Because he's just as much of a derp as you are and the void isn't a place for any human."

"But you were in the void." Zedaph counters, voice laced with worry.

"And I'm not human, don't lump me in with the rest of you derps." Ex complains.

Tango looks between the man in the entryway and his friend dead asleep to the world with worry, "Why didn't he respawn? Why won't he wake up?"

"His code's all glitched. Something went wrong somewhere. That or he didn't want to respawn." Ex answers Tango's questions though he faces Xisuma as he speaks.

"Can you fix the code?" Zedaph asks, voice hopeful.

Ex rolls his eyes at the blonde, "Not my job besides I don't have the right things I'd need to do it anyways. That's all on Xisuma."

Xisuma seems to relax for the first time since Ex appeared. He looks between his hermits and his brother who carries the sleeping form of another hermit gently yet protectively and makes his decision, "It would go loads faster if you stayed and helped me Ex."

"Like I said not my job." Ex pushes, eyes wary.

"Please help fix Impulse Exy." Zedaph pleads with hopeful eyes.

"I told you not to call me that!" Ex yells sharply but there's no threat behind his words.

"Just give it a rest Exy, it's not changing." Tango chimes in with a smile.

"You're both insufferable." Ex groans but doesn't move even as the other two surge forward to his side.

"And yet you still hang out with us." Zedaph comments cheerfully as he flutters to Ex's side and looks sadly at his friend who sleeps undisturbed by their conversation.

"Come on you three, let's move over towards the bed to work so we can let Impulse sleep while me and Ex work." Xisuma says, already walking the other way. Despite all of the hesitation before, Ex moves to follow without thinking.

"Wait, why are we coming there?" Tango questions looking between the two brothers confused.

"Because you two are going to tell me when and how you managed to get Ex to be your friend. I certainly don't remember this in the past." Xisuma informs his hermits with gentle warmth in his voice. He crosses the room without hesitation but rather new found confidence with the others not far behind.

"Wait why isn't Exy telling you?" Zedaph argues half heartedly. Fluttering along next to Ex with occasional glances at Impulse.

"He wouldn't tell me even if I threatened him." Xisuma says as if the answer is that simple. He stops on the other side of the bed they crossed the room towards, not paying attention to the others as the approach but rather pulling up screens of code at his fingertips.

With the same care he used carrying the man, Ex bends over to rest Impulse on the bed. At Xisuma's comment, Ex snorts, "What do you know, you can learn."

"Not even back five minutes and I already regret ever missing you." Xisuma fires back. His fingers dancing over holographic screens as numbers and letters blink in and out of sight.

"You missed me?" Ex asks warily, voice betraying him as it wavers. Vulnerable for a moment before it's gone again behind false bravado.

"Come on let's begin." Xisuma states, dodging the question. Fingers flick screens over the bed to his brother without hesitation.

"Just going to ignore the question? Rude, I can't believe I missed you too." Ex retorts, fingers already moving across the screens before he’s even finished talking.

"I didn't think you were capable of such." Xisuma fires back though there’s no heat to his words. There’s screens appearing and reappearing beneath his fingertips as he bickers with his brother. Occasionally he’ll swipe a few over to Ex who merely catches them with practiced ease.

Ex sighs, "You are just as insufferable as they are. Now are we fixing this or not?"

"Careful brother, someone might think you care." Xisuma comments, though his face is hidden by his helmet, it's easy to hear the smile in his voice.

"I hate all of you." Ex grumbles as he works.

"We love you too." Zedaph interjects smiling as he and Tango watch the scene in front of them with awe.

The two continue to work in the silence that comes to rest over the room. To Xisuma’s side another window pops up as Tango pulls out his communicator to update the others.

.

TangoTek: Good news Impulse will hopefully be okay

WelsKnight: Why does it feel like there’s a catch?

TangoTek: Well the bad news is I can’t say for certain yet

FalseSymmetry: But you guys found him?

TangoTek: Yeah he’s here

GoodtimeswithScar: How did you find him?

TangoTek: We didn’t, Ex did

Cubfan135: Ex? He’s here?

Zedaph: Yeah Exy’s here helping Xisuma

Iskall85: Exy? And you lived?

Renthedog: Only you Zedaph, only you

Docm77: X is okay with this?

Grian: Wait who’s Exy?

TangoTek: Exy or Ex is X’s brother

Joehills: Oh its brother now?

Bdouble0: But Impulse will be okay?

Zedaph: Hopefully!

Keralis: :D

Zedaph: :D

.

“If all of your hermits start calling me Exy I’m going to smite you all to the void.” Ex pipes up despite having not looked away from the screens in front of him.

“Your threats would hold a lot more weight if I couldn’t tell you were lying.” Xisuma points out, barely hiding his amusement.

Ex merely sighs deeper before grumbling, “Your ban would’ve been a lot more effective if you had kept me in the void rather than simply keeping me out of that world.”

For once Xisuma actually stops working. His fingers pause mid motion as the screens all slightly lower with his hands and he looks at Ex. He looks at his brother and carefully says, “That was never the reason for banning you and you know it.”

Ex however doesn’t stop working as he talks, “So you knew it was there.”

“Not until it was too late.” Xisuma slowly moves the screens back up and begins to work again. There’s a hesitation in his movements though and many unsaid things hang heavy in the air between the two brothers. Xisuma’s own regrets and sorrows smack dab in the middle as his voice nearly wavers.

“And when it mistook me for you?” Ex questions, still not looking up from where his fingers fly across screens.

Xisuma pauses again. He pauses and looks down at the ground, voice tight with remorse as he says, “I didn’t have any other solution.”

“You are the worst at dealing with your emotions, you know that?” Ex pushes several screens over to Xisuma but he pauses to look at his brother before going back to work for just a moment.

“You’re one to talk.” Xisuma fires back, fingers already zipping across the screens once more.

Ex pauses now. In a true mirror of his brother he looks anywhere but Xisuma before finally facing forward and questioning, “Did it ever-”

“Find? No, no it didn’t thankfully.” Xisuma cuts off with a short nod. Ex’s shoulders sag a little like he’s lost some of the tension he - no doubtly holds on his shoulders just as Xisuma does.

“Well at least that's one less thing to worry about.” Ex admits sounding almost relieved. The two work in silence for another minute or so longer until Ex stops suddenly with a whispered curse under his breath.

Xisuma’s eyes snap up to his brother, “Did you find what’s causing this?”

“Yes and you’re not going to like it.” Ex admits hesitantly, his fingers hovering over screens but not pushing them over.

“Let me see…” Xisuma trails off as he waves the screens over to himself, dismissing the others to the side. He reads whatever is on the screen quickly before sucking in a large breath and stuttering out, “...Oh my goodness me… how did you?”

“You got the same thing before you know.” Ex informs Xisuma like the knowledge they’re sharing is somehow dangerous.

“I did?” Xisuma questions.

Ex sighs, “Ages ago, but yes, you did.”

“But you fixed it, can you do it again?” Xisuma pushes, voice wavering slightly as he nearly pleads out right.

Ex shakes his head, “No I can’t, but you and your little hermits can.”

For the first time in several days, Xisuma breathes a sigh of relief, “Well I certainly don’t know enough about that to lead it well, you’ll just have to stay here and help me.”

Tango groans loudly. Interrupting whatever the two brothers would have continued to dance around with his dramatic gestures and loud accusations, “You two are the worst brothers ever! Can you not just say what you mean to one another and get it over with?! Or do you always have to speak in riddles around each other? Just tell him you want him to stay X!”

Xisuma recoils slightly at Tango’s accusations but attempts to stand his ground, "Tango you-"

Zedaph however is having none of it as well, "Exy would stay if you asked him to stay sincerely Xisuma. I know he missed you as much as you missed him."

They’re all interrupted when Ex barks out a laugh, "Your little hermits will never cease to amaze me with just how nosy they can be 'Suma."

"Well someone has to keep X from getting too lonely! We all know he'd never say anything on his own!" Tango grins widely at the brothers like he’s proud of this knowledge. As if it's something he will personally fix.

"Yeah! Just like you Exy!" Zedaph agrees with his own grin to the two brothers.

Ex glares at the two hermits and deadpan says, I'm going to smite you both."

Tango just laughs at that, "Cool, another threat of smiting for my tally board, now how do we fix Impulse?"

"We wake him up." Xisuma states.

"That's it? We just wake him up?" Zedaph asks in disbelief.

"It's not that simple." Ex pipes up looking pointedly at his brother.

Xisuma merely ignores Ex as he continues speaking to Tango and Zedaph, "He has to feel safe enough to wake up."

"Feel safe enough?" Tango questions slowly, sounding out each word as if they’re a foreign concept to him.

"But he is safe! This is his home!" Zedaph cries looking rapidly between the two brothers.

Ex merely nods down to where Impulse hasn’t moved, "And he has yet to even budge. It's not home enough for him."

"We have to help him feel safe." Xisuma informs his hermits, voice gentle yet unwavering as he says, "That's why I need your help."

Tango and Zedaph share a look before Tango turns back to the brothers with a wide grin, "Well what are we waiting for then? We have work to do, chop chop people!"

__

It's warm. A comfortable warmth like a fire in the dead of winter. There's the sound of half concealed laughter and hushed whispers swaying around him like a gentle breeze. He feels calm. He feels safe. He thinks of resting but something tells him he is needed awake. He's tired in a way he doesn't remember being tired before but if he's needed awake then he guesses he should wake up. How does he do that again?

There's movement at his side. Where is he again? He actually isn't sure this time. He doesn't remember the others insisting on a sleepover. Someone laughs nearby and it takes a moment but he manages to put a name to the laugh, that's Tango who's laughing.

"And he laughed at you? You sold the man some bones, accepted his sad payment of 12 bamboo, and he laughed at you?" Tango's voice is bright. Laughter caught between words as he speaks.

"Yeah he did, even showered himself with diamonds as I left. Mega annoying that hobbit was, glad to see him gone though his replacement isn't much better." Another voice loud and bright with laughter. He knows this voice as well but he can't think of a name for it. He remembers green and a solid presence. But a name escapes him. It bothers him that he can't seem to put a name to the voice.

"I do keep seeing it come up in chat, what even is hermit challenges?" A new voice asks and he knows this one too. Zedaph sits somewhere nearby, conversing with Tango and the other person.

There's a noise of uncertainty, "Your guess is as good as mine. I swear he just makes this stuff up on the spot."

"How does he say it again?" Someone asks but he doesn't hear well enough to know who.

"He-yer-metee-chall-eng-ges" The other person sounds out and he mentally yells at himself for not remembering who's voice that is.

"Hener-matey-chall-geng-ges?" Someone - Zedaph, attempts to a chorus of laughter.

"No, no start low and then go up" Someone encourages cheerfully.

"He-yer-metee chall-eng-ges?" The second attempt seems to work it as the others cheer.

"There you go!" Iskall exclaims loudly, hi-fiving whomever guessed right. Iskall, he knows Iskall, he knows these people. The other hermits. They're all trusted friends. This, wherever this is, as long as he's with the hermits, then that's home. This is his home. He is safe here.

As he blinks his eyes open, he feels like he hasn't seen light for years at the way it burns. Hissing he screws his eyes shut and groans at the sudden amount of pain he finds himself in. There’s the sounds of murmuring and shuffling as a hand comes to rest over his eyes, blocking out any light. A familiar voice not unlike one he remembers hearing before, speaks, “Easy there my friend give yourself some time to adjust.”

The voice is familiar but not quite the same as before; lighter and happier though still tired underneath. It's one of the voices he’d be able to recognize anywhere. His throat is sore but he still needs to be certain so he ignores the scratchy feeling in his throat and how horrible he sounds when he asks, “....X?”

“Yes, you gave us all quite the scare Impulse.” Xisuma informs him.

He can't remember what he did at all, “I… what happened?”

There's more shuffling and he thinks he hears a door but everything is already too loud as it is. He barely even gets his bearings well enough from a sudden spike of dizziness to hear someone say, “Well, we were hoping you could tell us that actually.”

“Zed?” He asks hesitantly. He can't be wrong about that being Zedaph's voice. He wouldn't forget one of his best friend's voices.

There's a relieved exhale before a warm voice speaks up as well, “Yeah and I’m here too buddy.”

“Tango? What’s, where am I?” He pushes verbally for answers as Xisuma still holds his hand over Impulse's eyes, not letting him even try to attempt sitting up.

“We’re at Bdubs’ little village.” Tango tells him. That makes sense, something about the air here felt familiar in a way. But he still has questions.

“Who else is here?” He questions as he tries to push against Xisuma who doesn't even move. He is so disoriented and confused. Why wouldn't anyone tell him more? Why did he have to push for answers? What happened?

“Everyone.” Xisuma tells him. Everyone is here? What happened? What weren't they telling him?

He's near panic when no one says anything else and he has to push for answers again, “Everyone? Why? What happened?”

“You died of starvation and I found you in the void.” A familiar voice states with no tone for doubt about the facts just shared. He stops struggling against Xisuma who holds him down merely by force of presence alone when he processes what he's heard. Actually for a moment, he nearly thinks it's Xisuma speaking but he knows it can't be. Aside from the clear change in tone and attitude, the voice sounds rougher, sadder, more tired than it should be.

“Wait… Exy?” He guesses though it's less of a guess and more of a reassurance he isn't completely delusional. Exy was here? What had happened that got Exy to show up? Wait he died of starvation? Wait Ex found him in the void?

Ex snorts and yep that's clearly Exy who hides his relief with annoyance, “If you wanted to thank me you wouldn’t use that terrible nickname anymore.”

He doesn't know how to process this information. He doesn't even know where to start, “I, how was I in the void?”

“Wait X,” Zedaph cuts in and Impulse can only assume he's the one who makes Xisuma let up. He is unsure what exactly he's slightly afraid of in the fact that X won't remove his hand from over Impulse's eyes but he is glad to be able to actually sit up, even if it's against a wall. Zedaph reaches out and grabs one of Impulse's hands, guiding it up to hold in front of him as something is pushed into his hold. Zedaph doesn't let go with the hand holding the outside of his own but uses his other now free hand to drag Impulse's other hand to help stabilize the glass bottle in his hold. He doesn't know what he's holding but Zedaph chuckles quietly and he feels himself relax a little at the familiarity. Warm hands pull away from his own as Zed speaks with soft reassurance, “Here Impy, drink this and eat something, you’ve been out for quite a while.”

“But-” He starts to argue though he's shot down immediately

“No buts mister!” Zed insists and Impulse knows if he doesn't listen with that tone he's not going to like it later.

Accepting his current fate of sitting in complete darkness and drinking some sort of potion (probably?), he still tries to get any answers he can, “Fine can someone at least tell me what's going on though? Why is everyone here? Why was I in the void?”

"We'll tell you after you drink that and eat something." Zed informs him with that same tone of voice that is very un-Zed like and concerning to hear.

"Can I at least get my sight back?" He tries, but it ends up sounding a lot more uncertain and afraid than he wanted it to.

"Impulse do you trust me?" Xisuma asks and that is unfair.

"Of course I trust you, I trust you with my life!" He insists not at all liking how this is playing out.

"Then trust me when I do this okay?" X continues and he does trust Xisuma with his life, that's not a lie but he can't help wanting to fight a little because there's something big that's happening or happened and no one is telling him anything! He wants to push and push but he loses all will to fight it anymore when he can hear X sigh in that same tired way he does when he thinks no one is around to hear and speaks in a quieter voice that's so unlike Xisuma he doesn't know what to do, "Please."

"Okay." He answers and that's really all he can do. Is answer and go along with it because he's downright terrified now. Did he kill someone? Did he hurt someone? Are they going to kick him out or Hermitcraft?

His mind's racing faster than his heart and he's sure his hands nearly grip the bottle in his hold so tight it'll shatter when there's a deep, aggravated sigh that can only come from Ex. There's a pause before he hears the floorboards creak and feels someone grab his hands and removes the bottle from them. There's a string of mumbled words he can't hear but knows that because it's Exy they're probably curses, when the bottle is shoved against his lips with a command, "Drink."

He really can't do anything but drink what he can now identify as a regen potion. He finally realizes just how awful he feels when it's effects start to kick in. Everything hurts. It hurts worse than any other pain he's known before and all the energy he thought he had falls away like sand beneath his feet by the time the bottles empty and he feels the potion take effect. He slumps backwards against what he previously thought to be the wall but now can tell is Xisuma's armor. His mind is still trying to go 3000 ticks per second but his body can't keep up and any panic he might've had fades into the background.

There's something warm and soft pushed at his hands again with another order he can't really refuse, "Eat."

Slowly he brings what he can tell, from touch and smell alone, is bread up to his face and eats. By the time he's handed several pieces and eaten them he feels exhausted. The hand on his eyes is long gone now, combing cold fingers through his hair instead and it feels nice. His eyes are long closed and would refuse to open even if he tried to do so. He is so tired. Maybe he should just sleep? He feels like he needs to ask the others something but it wouldn't feel so warm and safe if anything urgent was going on. Yeah, a little nap wouldn't hurt would it? He's out cold he even notices.

__

He actually sleeps this time. When he drifts in and out of awareness it's to shushing and soft reassurances he can go back to sleep. Sometimes the hand over his eyes is back and he's given something to drink or eat but for the most part he simply drifts in and out of various stages of awareness to the other hermits telling stories and talking.

"He's decided that instead of it being a proper punishment, it's now a problem I'm going to have to deal with and continues to make a mess in my base to store all these armor stands!" Someone, Cleo, complains with annoyance.

There’s a chuckle, from Cub, who then responds sounding smug, "Sounds like you might end up with a bit of a standoff there."

"I am going to turn your base into an underwater aquarium." Cleo threatens.

__

He fades back out of awareness. He wonders what the rest of the story is. He wonders if the others know he can hear them sometimes. He wonders if the others miss him.

He hears a laugh, that’s Mumbo’s laugh, and then he hears Mumbo ask, "How did you think to add mini mushrooms? What stroke of genius inspired you that much?"

"The mini mushrooms? Oh you mean the end rods and small block combo? They weren't really planned, I just happened to come up with it on the spot. They do look absolutely amazin' though I agree!" Scar says with excitement. He thinks he can hear Jellie purring but he isn’t sure.

“I- What? On the spot! Really?" Mumbo sputters in disbelief, sounding absolutely chuffed to bits as the man liked to say.

__

He wants to wake up. He wants to pay attention to these stories and conversations but even still, he's so tired. He can't even try to fight as sleep pulls him back under into nothingness.

There's a loud and exaggerated voice that only can belong to bdubs as he's telling a story, "So he gives me a bed, you know I love beds, and then later he asks me to sleep and of course I can't say no to that! Who would I even be?!"

"You didn't know about beds blowing up in the Nether?" Doc questions and he doesn't need to see to know Bdubs' annoyed reaction.

"NO! I DIDN'T! Why would it blow up? Of all things! Blow up? WHY!" Bdubs cries angrily only to be shushed by many people.

__

He wants to talk back. Wants to input his own thoughts and laughter into these exchanges. He misses the others. He hopes they miss him too. But, they all sound fine without him there. They all continue life as normal.

"So you like smooth jazz?" Etho asks.

Grian laughs and he can just imagine the look on the prankster's face when he answers, "If you can actually make note blocks sound like jazz music I'll let you put an automatic free glass sample under the entryway to the barge."

Etho chuckles quietly, "Now we're talking."

__

At some point he thinks they all seem to be enjoying themselves. They're all happy talking and chatting. They're all okay without him. He doesn't need to be here.

There's the slamming of a door against the wall that wakes him from his half asleep state with a startle. Loud footsteps echo as someone crosses the floor to yell, "Oh no you don't, not again!"

"Ex wait, he needs rest, don't-" Xisuma starts to interrupt but he misses what X says when Ex cuts over his brother's words.

Ex holds him up by his shirt and snarls, "Impulse if you even fucking dare think of leaving one more time I'm going to make you regret ever winding up like this in the first place!"

"Ex stop!" Xisuma orders but Ex turns his anger around on his brother.

With gritted teeth and a sharp edge, Ex pointedly tells Xisuma, "Stop me and you'll be following not long after him 'Suma. I will not stand here and watch it happen!"

Xisuma sputters, "But I-"

"Do me a favor and don't argue, we both know you'd be lying." Ex retorts.

"I…." X struggles to find the words to say as Ex simply huffs.

"That's what I thought." Ex says before he turns and grabs Impulse up by the shirt again and growls, "Impulse wake the fuck up or I'll flood Decked Out with lava."

"You wouldn't." He gasps, only half aware though his heart is racing.

"You know I would." Ex states as a fact and it's true, Impulse knows Ex would.

He struggles to find an answer as his mind can't seem to calm down from his abrupt awakening, "... Please don't, he's spent so long working on that."

"Always for others but never for yourselves. Why am I surrounded by fools?" Ex complains. He turns away, loosening his grip on Impulse as he yells over his shoulder, "Xisuma go get idiots one and three."

"Idiots one and three?" X questions.

"One, two," Ex says and Impulse can feel the finger Ex jabs at his chest on two before Ex finishes saying, "Three."

Xisuma sighs at Ex's nicknames before telling his brother, "Make sure he doesn't actually get up then."

"No I'll just let him up and about, of course I wouldn't! Now get!" Ex orders.

"Alright alright I'm going, goodness me." Xisuma's voice travels as he walks from the room, the door creaking slightly shut behind him but not closing all the way.

There's silence as Xisuma's light footsteps fade away before Ex turns back to Impulse, "So you figure out what happened to you yet?"

"I? What?" He asks, caught off guard by the question.

Ex helps him sit up right against the wall but doesn't let up the force behind his words, "You heard me."

He doesn't understand the question at all. He still can't see and now there's something noticeable over his eyes yet it feels more secure than a normal blindfold. Nothing about this is making any sense. Ex clears his throat and he rushes to at least answer with something, "No? Did I do something wrong? Why can't I see still?"

"Hardcoded blindfold, couldn't risk you hurting yourself trying to open your eyes." Ex explains quickly, sounding annoyed.

"Is this because I was in the void for a bit somehow?" He asks because he doesn't understand why Ex is so on edge suddenly. He doesn't know why he was dragged awake. He doesn't know what's even going on.

"A bit? You were there a week before I finally managed to find you." Ex informs him and he is immediately even more confused.

"A week? What-" He tries but Ex talks over him.

"Shut up and listen or I'll tell Xisuma I lied to him about what happened and you'll never find out the truth." Ex says on edge, words coming out as a hiss.

He gapes like a fish at where he assumes Ex before he connects enough of the situation to say, "Then start talking."

"It's called I.S. and I voided the original entry I dug up for 'Suma because I know he wouldn't be able to handle it so I lied to him about it. It's a glitch in the code of the world when an update comes through and invalidates part of a person's code, sending them to the void in a false ban." Ex explains so quickly that he fears he almost missed his inside as to what's going on.

"That's the lie?" He prompts, hopeful he didn't just miss his answers.

Ex groans but slows down his explanation to an understandable speed, "Yes, it's not an update glitch. It's an internally inflicted error glitch called Imposter Sequence. A player who meets a specific list of requirements and a certain percentage of difference in behavior is deemed by the internal protection of a whitelisted world as an imposter and banned from the world. Except due to how a whitelist works in the first place, it's a glitch. It's a glitch where someone who expresses extreme self doubt or self hatred who dies by working themselves to death through neglect to themselves winds up being soft banned from the world. You cannot return to the world or go to any other world. You do not respawn and you are not even aware of what's going on. You're lucky your admin happens to be a voidwalker or you would be dead by now."

None of that sounds real. It sounds way too extreme. Part of him admits to it being true but the other half still doesn't believe Ex. Not all the dots match up, "But you're the one who found me."

Ex curses under his breath before continuing his explanation, voice getting louder and louder, "Because my brother is just as much of an idiot as you are and has gotten himself in your exact situation before so I already knew what was going on. Furthermore, if you were in the void just a day longer before I found you, you would not have survived. The entry for Imposter Sequence in the admin code does not account for the admin being a voidwalker. The entry for Imposter Sequence ends by saying the player who is missing and believed to have become or been afflicted with Imposter Sequence is void banned. It's marked as a permadeath. Were you anyone else in the universe but a hermit who has two voidwalkers tied to their world you would be gone. You do not understand how close you were to being gone forever. You would've left everything and everyone behind. For what? For your own stupidity? You would have to be the biggest idiot in the universe to think that you weren't loved here, that you weren't wanted. You have one of the best possible lives and ways of living in this entire universe, do not throw that away as if it were nothing."

They wait in the silence. Only cut through by the sounds of their harsh breathing. His mind is racing and his head is spinning. Ex takes a few shaky breaths as he waits for Impulse to process what was just said. They're not alone anymore though as a sharp inhale echoes in the silence, "Ex…"

"Oh for fucks sake." Ex curses, rushed footsteps echo from across beyond room as Ex commands, "You two pull your heads out of your asses and make him believe, even a little, how wrong he was. I have a derp to find."

Ex leaves to go after Xisuma. Meaning he's now left alone with Tango and Zedaph who, based on X's reaction, have heard the whole explanation of what happened to him. He doesn't even know what to do other than wait for them to start yelling. Instead of yelling though, there's merely footfalls that come closer until they're at the side of the bed. He knows they won't hurt him but he's shaking because he's so afraid of what they'll think of him now. He screws his eyes shut tight and braces for something when there's a quiet whisper, “Imp…”

“You, you…” Zedaph starts to say. And he's so scared of whatever judgement he's about to face that his heart nearly jumps out of his chest when he's tackled backwards as Zed cries, “Absolute idiot! Impulse you big dummy!”

He barely manages to not smack his head unto the wall as Zedaph sobs into his shoulder, shaking like he's just as scared as Impulse is. “Oof, Zed, what-”

A hand on his shoulder makes him pause as Tango asks, “Imp, you don't really think that we don’t want you here do you?”

He feels like he's floating over the void after being blindsided by shulker bullets. He struggles to find the words to say, an explanation for his behavior, some sort of defense for his actions. But even to his own ears it all sounds like lies, “No of course not! We’re the hermits, we’re team zit, I just, I…”

“Tell us Impy, please, we’re a team remember. We face things together.” Zed pleads, his breath hitching as he hugs Impulse harder. He can feel the wet patch Zed’s tears have left on his shoulder and he feels horrible. He feels like the worst person in the universe because he made his friends worry and cry and suffer all for what? For his insecurity? He doesn't, he didn't think he deserved their support and friendship before all this. Now, now he finds it even hard to believe he deserves it.

“I just, I…” He struggles to say it. He can't admit this. Not to them, not to his two best friends. Two thirds of the whole they make, he can't do that to them. A part of his mind tells him that it's too late, that he's already done the damage and he thinks he's crying but he can't tell. He feels Zed hug him harder and Tango’s hand on his shoulder and he can't lie to them. He can't lie to these two. So he tells them the truth, “I just, I just don’t think I’m anything special that's all.”

He hears Zed’s breath hitch and can feel the way Tango seems to recoil as the hand on his shoulder grips tighter. Tango inhales sharply but he can't seem to find the words to say as he hesitates to say, " Impulse, buddy-"

He can't help but blurt out, "It sounds so stupid when I say it out loud but that's…"

That's why he's in this mess. Because he's nothing special. Because he's not like the others. Because he's not good enough. He's not good enough to be here. Not good enough to be a hermit. Not good enough to be their friend. Not good enough to be anything.

"Impulse what does the I in team zit stand for?" Tango asks suddenly.

"Me?" He hesitantly answers. Was it a trick question or something?

"Yeah, team zit can't exist without you. We'd just be ZT and that just sounds lame. You're irreplaceable to us. Not even just us but to hermitcraft as a whole." Tango says and he wants to believe it. He wants to believe it so badly.

"But…" But he doesn't believe it. He can't bring himself to believe it at all. He's not special. He's nothing special. Everyone else is so amazing and he's just, he's just here too.

The room is quiet and he prepares for the inevitable but it doesn't come. Zedaph lets go of him only to shuffle over to his side as Tango sits on the bed too. Both of them trap him in a side hug and he can't do anything but surrender his arms as the other two hug an arm each close to their chests. Both Zedaph and Tango take a hand into their own and hold it tight. He can't help the sharp inhale he takes as he's kept there in the moment by the hands holding his own.

It's Zedaph who starts talking first as he explains what happened after Impulse vanished, "There were set groups to explore different parts of the entire server all week. You died, never responded to chat, X couldn't teleport to you and then said you just hadn't respawned. We searched everywhere we could think of. Bdubs didn't even sleep until the third day when Etho more or less blocked him in and watched him so he couldn't escape. Ren and Grian didn't sleep at all and Xisuma had to teleport them back from tens of thousands of blocks away because they had gone so far X got a warning of how far away they were."

He's barely given time to process Zed’s words as Tango continues where Zedaph left off, "You're the one who's built so many innovations that so many of us use. The villager breeding system most of us use? You built it. The item filters most of us use? You built that? Your base itself is colossal and is full of so many different farms you had Doc and Mumbo looking like kids on Christmas when we all first got together to split into search parties. You can break bedrock without any fancy magic other than redstone and your own two hands. You owned the shop basically every hermit used in season six not to mention the gold farm. There are things you've contributed and things you've done no one else could do or has thought to do."

He feels overwhelmed. There's no way this is the truth but he can't even formulate why these two, his best friends, would ever lie to him as Zed keeps going, "The entire server stopped working for an entire week trying to find you. You vanishing had Xisuma more frazzled than either of us had ever seen and definitely more than the 1.14 update. Joe and Cleo had to knock X unconscious to get him to stop working. Cub and Iskall combed through the code for so long they started to talk in code too. We contacted other worlds and people and no one could find you."

“All of that, for me?” He wonders out loud in disbelief. Because he really can't believe it. Logically he knows they would have done that but emotionally he can't process that they would do that for him. They did that all for him.

Zedaph hums a noise of confirmation and says, “Had Exy not showed up when he did, Cub and Wels were set to go check the season six world so Grian and Doc could use the infinity portal or time machine to figure out what happened to you. No one was going to give up on you. So please don’t give up on yourself.”

He sits there struggling under the weight of their words. Under the actions of the others who had tried just about everything they could to get him back. He thinks he's going to be crushed under the realization of the impact his disappearance had on the others. But two hands squeeze his own in near perfect unison, and he barely manages to remember to breathe once more as all that weight vanishes. His face is wet from the tears he can't really even process as his own as everything comes back to him all at once. He chokes on all the things he wants to say, gasps for air like he's nearly drowned, and sobs out words he can only half understand himself, "I, I'm sorry. I, I didn't real- realize. Every, everyone suff- suffered because, because of me!"

"Oh Imp, buddy," Tango murmurs sadly. His friend inhales shakily before saying, "You don't have anything to apologize for."

"But, but I-" He tries to say but he can't speak through hiccuping breaths of air between his sobs.

"Impy you're not allowed to apologize for any of this. We're friends, we're family, any of us would do it again in a heartbeat no questions asked for you." Zedaph states so soundly he can't even begin to convince himself it's not true.

So he doesn't apologize. He merely sits between his two best friends and sobs his heart out. When he finally manages to stop crying there's a heaviness that comes over him as he thinks about how tired he is now. There's quiet whispers he doesn't have the energy to listen to as he's guided away from the wall to lay back down. He doesn't want to let go this time. Thankfully he doesn't have to as both his hands are squeezed hard and he's surrounded by warmth and the sounds of steady heartbeats. Here, he is safe.

There's a heavy blanket draped over them as hushed voices exchange words once more. Someone runs a hand through his hair and he feels himself relax even further into the bed. Here, he is loved.

In a flash of memories he can see so many scenes just like this one. Of being surrounded by his friends in comfortable quiet. He knows he can sleep safe and sound here. He knows he doesn't have to worry about anything right now. Here, is home.

#hermitcraft #hermitcraft fanfiction #hermitcraft season 7 #hermitcraft s7 #impulseSV #tangotek #zedaph #xisumavoid #evil xisuma #the rest of the hermits are more or less mentioned those are just the ones with a larger role #its all about the found family babey! #its also about that sweet sweet hurt/comfort dynamic #funfact i wrote this all mostly between the hours of 3 and 5 am over like a week #validate me please i crave acceptance of my creations by strangers on the internet #also a repost bc nev swore in the tags when he reblogged it from me and tumblr snapped it #smh gotta reply with my main smh smh

[roleplayfinder]

I’m 21+ looking for the same. Lit, third person, usually novella or multi-para as I enjoy quality and quantity. I don’t have limits but please tell me yours so I know. I love angst, darker themes etc. I’m OOC friendly and fairly regular with responses, so that’s another thing I am hoping we will match on.

Fandoms and Originals.

I have ideas for all of these but would love to develop them with you. I have left blurbs for some. BOLD IS MY PREFERRED CHARACTER.

White Collar

• Neal/Peter

Snowpiercer

• Grey/Gilliam

• Happy to bring Gilliam’s age down some but as Bong Joon-Ho himself said, the age gap here is very interesting and I’m continually fascinated by the loyalty Grey has. I would love to write these two finding love between the chaos on the train. I would also be happy to write them AU, whether a student/professor type story or maybe a different apocalyptic setting like zombies?

Glee

• Blaine/Sebastian

Loki

• Loki/Mobius

• Messing with the timeline slightly, what if Mobius was sent back to the moment of his abduction by the TVA? And in classic Loki style, what if he decided that the sane thing to do was stalk Mobius on Earth. I’m picturing Professor Mobius? I’m also definitely picturing single-dad Mobius because of how good he was with the kid at the church.

• Anyway. Loki figures he’ll watch for a few days. Check Mobius is happy. Flash forward to a week later and he’s getting a member of the faculty fired, framing himself as a substitute and introducing himself to Mobius at work.

• Office romance, re-falling in love, slow burn… all leading to angst when the TVA inevitably reappears and suddenly Loki and Mobius find themselves on the run (with a toddler). Perhaps they end up on Asgard? We can tweak the timeline all we want.

Star Wars

• Poe/Hux

• I’m just…. Love on opposite sides. Fascinating. I’m picturing Hux being a mole for longer (please no neutering him, bc I love him as he is) and Poe being his ‘handler’ of sorts. Meaning Leia sends Poe off to meet Hux on different planets so that he can receive intel to report back to the rebels. But in true enemies to friends to lovers, those report meetings become conversations become laughter become sharing lunches become sharing kisses.

• The ‘a-hole who can only stand one person’ trope for Hux is *chefs kiss*.

Orphan Black

• Ira/Art

• Ira/Felix

• Please either way I just need Ira to find a nice guy who helps him realise that he’s being hurt by Susan, even if it’s in a different way to how his brothers were hurt. Falling in love in chaos. Falling in love on a deadline (aka them thinking Ira will eventually glitch)

The Old Guard

• Joe/Nicky

• Open to anything here! Modern AU with Nicky running a coffee shop and Joe being the customer he falls in love with at first sight - but maybe there’s an abusive ex (Merrick?) in the picture and he is scared to let his guard down. Or an apocalypse AU, where they meet at the end of the world. Maybe they’re from different groups who don’t want to mix but they find themselves drawn to one another and begin sneaking out to meet with one another. Or just a good ol fashioned through the ages story.

Kingsman

• Eggsy/Harry

• Legend Crossover, with Eggsy’s twin Teddy causing problems? Apocalypse AU - maybe with Harry being from an affluent, gated community run by Arthur who refuses to let anyone new in. Eggsy from a scrappy, rundown group made up of the characters from the estate (Dean, Michelle etc). They could meet on a run and have to spend the night together trapped, negotiating a plan out and divvying up supplies. Perhaps the second meeting could also be a coincidence, but enough of one to make them feel the spark between them.

Stranger Things

• Steve/Billy

• Enemies with benefits, anyone? Post ‘bull**** party’ they hook up and Billy - in true Billy style - becomes obsessed with Harrington instantly. Steve is Steve. Inevitable roping in of Billy to the upside down.

Original

• Here’s the gist. MC is a long con artist working with a team he considers family. YC is the mark (OR someone associated with the mark, like a son/brother/enforcer) who is a mafioso, running a casino. The elder statesman (really the father of the group) of MC’s group of grifters was recently beaten to a pulp for trying to scam on the roulette wheel and now his family want revenge. They are going to steal every last penny from the casino. But it will take time to plan and lots of patience, so in true long-con style they put someone on the inside. Cue MC. He’s placed on the casino staff as a new bartender, meant to quietly keep an eye on things as well as familiarise himself with the guard schedules, cameras etc. Long story short, as time goes on he finds himself getting to know YC over the bar - serving him drinks and hearing stories. Love begins.

• Word bank: star-crossed lovers, deception, angst, sneaking around, betrayal, enemies to lovers, found family.

• Bonus points: age gap between MC (a younger, scrappy conman) and YC

• Bonus bonus points: someone eager to play side characters to build up the con artist family and play with friendships and angst there. I will also happily play family/friends/relationships for YC. We can build up an awesome cast.

I am open to email and discord but greatly prefer first contact on email. Please tell me a bit about yourself and what you’re looking for out of this as I won’t answer short ‘rp?’ emails! :)

Email: [email protected]

[email protected]

#twenty-one and over #white collar #white collar roleplay #white collar rp #snowpiercer #snowpiercer roleplay #snowpiercer rp #glee #glee roleplay #glee rp #loki #star wars #orphan black #the old guard #kingsman #stranger things

[zachsgamejournal]

COMPLETED: Wavetale

Another great game completed! I loved it, absolutely! Short and sweet with a lot of heart!

The game has its issues. Firstly, the graphics aren’t--wonderful. I think the design is excellent, but whatever weird color-filter they put on it just drove me nuts. I would have preferred not over-stylizing since the art design itself was excellent.

Secondly, weird glitches. Things like the character’s feet being 6 inches above a surface or 6 inches below. It didn’t affect the gameplay directly, but I immediately noticed this when I first started. I didn’t understand why. I feel like there were some corners cut to meet deadlines. I also saw issues with cutscenes. Sometimes the camera angles weren’t right.

Thirdly, some of the level design and design decisions weren’t as smooth as they could be. Gameplay is queen, and good gameplay overcomes poor graphics and, sometimes, even glitches. There’s time where the game was obviously trying to create a flow of movement but do to weird camera angle resets and other gameplay idiosyncrasies it’s easy to lose track of where to go, or make a “jump”.

BUT beyond a few obvious hiccups, the game is excellent. It’s made even more excellent by its story. The theme is loss. The grandmother and main character (Sigrid) lost Sigrid’s mother. They lost the world as they knew it, and lost many other things. Other characters also lament how the broken world used to be and what they’ve lost in the process. The game is fun, and pleasant, and mostly light--but there’s also a constant air of sadness that hints at real pain, even when you’re having fun.

There’s also the theme of prejudice, that I think is misplayed. The side I’m on turns out to be bad, as we polluted the world. And the bad people, which are perceived as saboteurs and terrorists, were trying to stop the bad things our sad was doing. In a pivotal scene where I felt the “truth” was going to come out, the game seemed to settle on neither side being right, and that it was a lack of communication that caused all the war, pain, and collapse of the world. But really, just like in Captain America: Civil War, there’s a right side and a wrong side here, and I feel the game didn’t quite deliver on that conclusion. It’s a small misstep in my mind that doesn’t ruin anything. Just makes it less perfect.

I thought they were going to reveal that the Mayor, who is apparently bad enough to be tied up by both sides at the end, had managed things to be in his favor, which accidentally rout destruction. See, my side--the Strandians?? Created the pollution machine and were hurting the other folks: the Whistlers. The Whistlers claimed to have sent many messages requesting the machine be turned off. When those requests were ignored, they tried to blow the thing up. This accidentally led to the creation of the pollution monster. I still don’t quite get what he is. I was hoping they would explain why the Whistlers were ignored. I thought maybe the Mayor had received the requests and selfishly hid them. So then both sides were fooled by a single Trum...selfish individual. But as far as I can tell, the game didn’t go there.

Still--everyone made up and we’re at piece.

Not sure what the black thing is or where the gloom comes from. But I can accept the gloom as metaphor for climate change and pollution, and the shadow mother just being an emotionally driven magic that guides the characters to success.

The kids liked this game and I liked this game. I love that it’s short enough to enjoy over an afternoon of dedicated play. I really wish more games were this length instead of filling in dozens of hours of bullshit ::cough:: Assassin’s Creed ::cough::. I look forward to playing this again some day!

#Zach's Game Journal #COMPLETED #Wavetale #Stadia #Video Games #Gaming

[fairytail-ship-obsessed]

To everyone denouncing ao3, and telling me to donate elsewhere.

One, it’s 230 in the morning and I’m goddamed tired, excuse my grammar and overall mood.

Two Consider: I can donate to ao3, AND other causes. Consider: if you're really so deadset on not using ao3, dont. Go onto the website, download their free source code, buy a webaddress, and run the code on your new site, and you can proceed to mod it however you'd like. don't be shocked when things don't go smoothly, and there are glitches and crashes you need to fix. In the meantime, I'm gonna stick with ao3, an organization that refuses to engage in censorship, and as a gay writer, that’s fucking IMPORTANT to me. Do yall remember when FF net would take down fics for queer ships? or that you'd start reading a fic only to get shocked by an un-tagged trigger, because the author couldn't properly tag it for fear of getting sued? That’s right. You don't. As great as purity culture might sound in hypothetical, the fact of the matter is that you don't know authors and readers, you're not in any position to judge them, and you're CERTAINLY not in any position to interrogate them on their life story and TRAUMA just to know whether or not they are "valid" in their writing. The fact of the matter is that heavy topics have ALWAYS been written about and addressed in writing, long-form and short story fiction especially. Stories have ALWAYS included the prejudices of their writers. But the fact of the matter is we're not burning the works of HP lovecraft or stephen king's It. And that’s because 1) censorship is NEVER a good thing, and 2) because critical reading is fucking important. We NEED to be able to read things that make us uncomfortable, and think about WHY they make us uncomfortable. To read a tragedy and understand WHY it’s a tragedy.

A 150k fic involving what you call "child porn" could actually be an intensely well-written piece about abuse survival and healing. It could take a very serious and emotional dive into the effects of such trauma on the mind, and how the healing process can be messy, and feel entirely hopeless at times. It could be a work very much worth reading. It’s also a work that "content bans" like you propose would prevent from ever being published. Either because the author is scared to publish it, or because the mods take it down, or because it gets mass-reported in bad faith by the community (don’t say it doesn't happen, cause it happens right here on tumblr, and used to happen CONSTANTLY on ff net). Censorship is dangerous because art, and writing IS art, is subjective, everyone is going to view something differently. and "Moral" lines get blurry, because a piece that might disturb you bad enough to click out of the fic, might have an ending that's cathartic to someone else, and is something they needed to read that day: someone going through what they went through, growing up, healing, and thriving. Maybe a way they can come to terms with their trauma, who knows. Certainly not you or me. The fact of the matter is that the line between a piece that addresses heavy topics, and a piece that just, IS a heavy topic, is uncomfortably fuzzy when we start talking about the "content" of a fic, and what the owners of a sponsored website are willing to allow to exist. A fic addressing racism in society could get taken down simply because it CONTAINS racism. And if that seems wrong to you, that's because it is. It's also what used to happen on sites like ff net, CONSTANTLY. Hell, one time I had a songfic taken down for "breech of copyright" and "sexual content" the content in question? Character A found out they were being cheated on by walking in on their bf with someone else. NOTHING graphic. Just Character A's shock and distress at the whole thing. Censorship is never clear-cut lines, and the literary world as a whole has agreed that allowing "problematic" content to exist is much better than the alternative of living in a sanitized world. There’s a reason we call the nazis evil for burning books, a REASON Fahrenheit 451 was written and read in classrooms to this day. A reason BANNING BOOKS is BAD. And listen, if you don't wanna take this from me, some random internet gay literature minor student, don’t. But I’m BEGGING you, go do some research on censorship in fiction, on books like Lolita and the color purple, step off the internet and look at the real issues facing literature, and subsequently, fanfic. and hell, listen to people who were THERE as fanfic evolved, and became more mainstream. They saw the horrors of censorship and advertisement-based websites firsthand. in fact, you can still see the horror of adds on wattpad and ff net. And one more thing, if you need an example of "bad censorship with good intentions", just look at highschool. Look at how many topics we were discouraged or flat out banned from addressing, even with the books in front of us: Ophelia's depression. lady McBeth’s guilt. Hamlets overt and violent disdain for his mother for her marrying her brother-in-law. Sapho, full stop. Achilles and Patroclus being gay. Teenage sexuality in YA novels (john green, but also authors like Michael grant on the Gone series, and Libba Bray in the Gemma Doyle trilogy). Anything LGBT or non-monogamous. Mental health beyond baseline depression. Was I alone in feeling frustrated by how much highschool censorship held back their literary discussion? Because I know for a fact I'm not. The fact of the matter is that the kind of censorship you see in american highschools is the EXACT same type that websites use to avoid getting sued, and stops the intellectual freedom of the artist/writer, AND prevents the start of important conversations. And not that I owe it to anyone on this website, but personally, fanfic has helped me work through a LOT, from my own trauma, to the fact that I'm not cis. A lot of that came from fics that would almost certainly get caught in the crossfire of content bans, and personally, I'm not willing to sacrifice that. So, go ahead and make your own website if you want to, I'm certainly not gonna stop you, but in the meantime, I'm gonna go tell paypal to confirm my 10$ donation, Finish reading His Dark Materials, then go finish the childhood abuse growing up/recovery found family fic I've been working on for months, because it helps me be hopeful, and because thanks to ao3, I CAN. Maybe I'll get some sleep, too.

Just, step off the internet for a few hours, and look at the issues surrounding censorship, and look at the legal issues fanworks have ALWAYS and CONTINUE to face. Once you’ve done that, then you can go make your own decisions.

#signed. A tired Lit student #ha. get it. lit student. like im lit #jk i've been sober for a while and im actually talking abt literature #ao3