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littlemisspascal · 2 months

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Fast Cars and Lightning Bolts Part 4

Pairing: Din x Female Reader

Word Count: 3200+

Rating: T

Summary: It’s kind of ridiculous, really, the way everything else fades away the longer you stare at Din. The gaudy banners in all capital fonts seem to blur and the colorful bouquets of balloons lose their vibrance. The Din Djarin Effect, you used to call it, a comforting distraction to indulge in when the rest of the world felt too close, too much all at once.

Author Note: 2 years later I'm sure 99% of people have lost any care about this series, but it felt nice returning to this fic after so long away. Hope someone out there enjoys this 😊 All likes, comments, and reblogs super appreciated 💗

Warnings: Helmetless Din, dialogue heavy, racing au, heavily inspired by Ford v Ferrari, language, worldbuilding, No physical characteristics of Reader described except for having hair + a heart condition (I’m not a doctor, all medical details are fictional)

Series Masterlist

Mos Espa is hotter than you remember.

Or maybe it’s how different the city looks—flourishing businesses, smiling faces, and cleaner streets (literally and figuratively, not one piece of trash or shady character in sight)—that’s making it hard for your memories to sync with your reality.

There’s a bustling crowd of hundreds at the Fett Motor Company Headquarters by the time you arrive. You almost forgot how overwhelming being in the midst of large groups of people can be, all clamoring for a handshake or autograph. Like feral dogs fighting over the same piece of meat, pulling and tugging until they get their portion of the prize.

Today’s a significant one for Fett Motor Company. Not only are they announcing their partnership with you and subsequent entry into the world of auto racing, they’re also celebrating the launch of their newest model. Dozens of reporters and photographers from every major HoloNet site have come, drawn to the promise of a spectacle and juicy bits of gossip to spin a story out of.

Attending events like this has always been the part of fame you liked the least. Too chaotic and invasive for your tastes. Makes your heartbeat start to climb until it’s in your ears, an incessant reminder of your retreat from the spotlight.

There are a plethora of people in every direction you look. Do they notice your trembling hands? The bottle of pills in your jacket pocket? Can they tell you’re in over your head?

So many people. So many pairs of eyes.

And then, just when you think you’ll be swallowed whole, there’s Peli blasting her way through the crowd with waving arms and shrill exclamations, providing you a path to freedom. The rush of absolute relief nearly has you sinking to the floor, but she’s quick to latch onto your wrist, towing you to sanctuary in a quieter room away from access of the general public.

“Thanks, Peli,” you say, letting out a shaky breath as the tension digging into your spine starts to loosen.

“Don’t mention it, LB,” she shrugs, then nods at something off to the side. “I figured it’d go smoother if I saved your hide instead of tin can man. He looks like a biter—and not in the sexy way.”

“What?” Sometimes your engineer makes no damn sense. You look at where she’d gestured, first noticing Ahsoka (the young Togrutan mechanic had practically stubbornly glared you into letting her come along) talking animatedly to—

Your eyes widen.

“He…” you trail off, mouth abruptly dry. “He actually came?”

“Well, yeah,” Peli replies, looking back and forth with furrowed eyebrows. “You invited him, didn’t you? He told me he wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Funny. Last thing he said to you, back in that diner one week ago, standing up from the table with an expression devoid of the previous softness, was, “I’m nobody’s puppet, not even yours. Find someone else.”

It’s kind of ridiculous, really, the way everything else fades away the longer you stare at Din. The gaudy banners in all capital fonts seem to blur and the colorful bouquets of balloons lose their vibrance. The Din Djarin Effect, you used to call it, a comforting distraction to indulge in when the rest of the world felt too close, too much all at once.

You give yourself a tiny shake, forcing yourself to blink. Today’s too important for your career to lose focus.

Walking up to the pair, you greet Ahsoka first with a friendly nudge of your elbow against her arm. Blue eyes widen in surprise before she beams at you, utterly oblivious to the straightening of Din’s posture you catch out of the corner of your gaze.

“Lightning, you made it!” Ahsoka’s one of your youngest employees, full of big emotions and just a tad bit impulsive at times, but Peli swears she’s got one of the brightest minds for vehicular engineering the woman’s ever come across in all her years. And that’s the exact kind of talent you want to surround yourself with these days.

“Welcome to the madhouse,” Din remarks dryly, and you hate the instant locking of your eyes with his, the sensation of a loss of control of your own self. You hate the reminder that for all the things time and distance have changed, there still remain some constants entirely uninfluenced by either.

Still. Better to have loved and lost than to have continued down the road you and your ex-boyfriend had been on, pretending things were fine when they were anything but. And having him here in Mos Espa, looking at you, speaking to you, that’s more than you had dared to hope for one week ago, parting ways in the diner; definitely more than five years ago, breaking up in the middle of your living room.

You smile at him, unable to stop yourself. Another one of those pesky constants you can’t shake. “I’m glad you came,” you tell him genuinely. Then, a hint of teasing, “Forgot how nice you look all dolled up.”

He has ditched his usual oil-stained clothes for his clan armor, Mandalorian beskar pristinely forged by his mentor to fit his exact measurements. The rare metal glints dangerously in the afternoon sunshine streaming through the skylights, a far contrast from the soft and silky fabrics of the expensive suits other men have chosen for the occasion. It’s purposeful, this look, there isn’t a doubt in your mind. You can already imagine the numerous photos of champagne and fancy ties and plastic smiles online, and there Din will be, stubbornly resisting to blend in.

Honestly though? You would’ve been upset if he’d tried.

His lips curl at the corner. “You don’t look half bad yourself, mesh’la.”

Maker. You’re tiptoeing the line of dangerous territory, feeling hot all over in a way that has nothing to do with the temperature. And judging from that look in Din’s eyes, a daring sort of regard, the bastard knows it.

“Have you seen the new Fett Firespray?” Ahsoka asks, her voice startling you out of your staring contest. Embarrassing, how easily you’d forgotten she was standing right next to you.

“It’s uglier than a shaved bantha’s ass,” Din remarks, so utterly deadpan it takes an incredible amount of self-discipline not to bark out a laugh.

Ahsoka huffs, the kind of sound kids make when they think an adult has said something stupid. Maker, she really is young, isn’t she? “It wasn’t that bad. All those customization options for the interior were pretty cool.”

The unimpressed scowl twisting Din’s mouth tells you exactly what he thinks about the options. Pretty cool definitely isn’t his opinion on the matter. No, you’d bet it’s on the complete other end of the spectrum. Which means that’s where your opinion can also be found.

Ahsoka may be the brightest of her generation, but Din is Din. When it comes to cars, there’s no one’s judgment you trust more. Another constant that’ll stretch the length of your combined lifetimes.

Fennec Shand and Peli approach at your side, putting an end to your conversation with Din before you’re ready for it. Your fists clench against the nervous energy pulsing in tandem with your heartbeat, then immediately slacken upon registering the unknown Duros accompanying them, red eyes peering at you with scrutiny.

“I’d like you all to meet the senior vice president of Fett Motor, Cad Bane.” Fennec introduces with a respectful dip of her chin, hands clasped behind her back. Her hair is styled in another long braid with intricately woven orange ties holding every strand in place. “Bane, this is Lightning Bolt.”

Rather than shake your outstretched hand, Bane merely tips his wide-brimmed hat in acknowledgement. His crimson stare never lessens in its intensity, as sharp as the pointy teeth peeking from his lipless mouth when he speaks.

“Afternoon, little lady. You look…rather ordinary outside of a race car,” he says, and that’s enough for you to determine three things. One: his voice is as deep and gravelly as the depths of a bottomless chasm. Two: he’s a master at intimidation. And three: he’ll mercilessly squish you beneath the heel of his boot the second you let your guard down.

You absolutely cannot show weakness in front of him.

“Ah, well, despite what the tabloids might say, I’ve always been just a regular, ordinary mortal girl.” You force your mouth up into a small grin, tacking on a rueful little laugh you learned over the years will smooth the spikes of even the prickliest of bastards. Hard to tell if it works on Bane, his features so stoic they might as well be carved out of stone. “I brought along one of my best mechanics, Ahsoka Tano. And this is my–”

You cut yourself off, triggered by the inaccuracy. The acknowledgement that Din isn’t your anything anymore. Once upon a time you were so close you might as well have been the same person. Tangled up in each other’s souls. Indistinguishable. LightningandDin. But the way Din’s looking at you, guarded in a way you aren’t used to seeing, well. Not everything can remain a constant after five years.

Surprisingly, though, Din saves you from having to make up a label on the spot. “We’ve met.”

The curtness of his delivery throws you off. Your eyebrows furrow, flicking a quick glance between the two men, sensing a frosty tension that wasn’t there mere seconds ago.

“Yes,” Bane says, something in the drawl of the word you can’t determine. But it definitely isn’t pleasant. “We have.”

Curiosity and wariness fizzle uncomfortably in your stomach. Here and now isn’t the time or place to ask questions. Too many eyes. Too many cameras.

The whole thing feels very…sharp. One wrong move and someone will wind up scarred forever. The jackrabbiting beat of your heart doesn’t offer any comfort to the situation either.

A hand lightly grasping your elbow is almost enough to have you biting through your bottom lip. Jerking your head to your side, you meet Fennec’s even gaze. A calm port in this brewing storm.

“Walk with me?” It’s phrased as a request, but you and the woman both know it isn’t one. “There are a few details I need to discuss with you.”

You nod, and follow after Fennec with your head bowed, focusing on the taps of her boots against the stone floor. She leads you to another private room, a small nook empty except for a pair of Gamorrean security guards standing near a door which opens up to the courtyard swarming with people waiting for the big news to be announced. You suck in a breath, feeling like for the first time since you arrived your lungs stretch to their fullest capacity.

“So, what is it?” you ask. “What details do we need to talk about?”

Fennec leans back against the wall. “Before you go give your speech, I need to make sure we’re on the same page regarding our future partnership and procedure going forward.”

You try your best, but you can’t stop the incredulous arching of your eyebrow. “Are you checking that I read the fine print of the contract?”

And something interesting happens then. Fennec’s jaw quirks, the faintest, most miniscule display of unease. “Well, it’s just–”

“Page 3 paragraph 2 explicitly states that responsibility for the day to day practical affairs of the Fett race team is handled by me,” you cut in, pointing your index finger at your chest. The bottle of pills in your pocket rattles with the movement, drawing Fennec’s eyes there for a split second before your sharp glare has them recentering on your face once more.

“That’s correct,” she agrees. There’s a carefulness to her voice you’ve heard before many times in your own tone. Used when the topic of conversation is a potentially explosive one that could result in tempers flying. “Day to day stuff, that’s your job. But in regard to broader decisions that may or may not affect the wider company…” Her tongue runs over her lower lip, buying a pause to plan her next words, before she eventually comes out with, “There’s going to have to be some give and take with the gotra.”

“The gotra,” you repeat, audibly clumsy and unfamiliar coming out of your mouth.

“Senior creatives, Lightning.” Her expression is back to annoyingly neutral. “Just so everybody involved is comfortable.”

“Well, color me confused, Fennec.” You draw yourself up to full height, arms crossing over your chest. You might not be as intimidating as Cad Bane, but no one survives long in the racing world without a bit of iron in their spine and fire in their stare. “Because up until this exact moment, I was comfortable.”

“Look out there,” Fennec says, gesturing with a tilt of her head towards the courtyard, an MC standing on stage addressing the crowd. The same one you’ll be giving a speech to only a handful of minutes from now. “What do you see?”

Your eyes drift over each of the figures. There’s an air about them, sensed even from where you stand, suggesting they’ve never changed a tire in their lives, let alone picked up a hydrospanner. They’re pencil pushers, not grease monkeys.

“You know what I see?” Fennec asks rhetorically when you say nothing, pointing a nail painted onyx black at the door. “A machine. Thousands of parts moving hopefully in harmony because it’s my job to make it so. And it’s my job to guide you through it.” The nail’s aimed at you now. You swallow, your mouth dry. “I am here to help you, Lightning Bolt. But we have to trust each other.”

A crack splits open your chest, aching and inflamed, upon the realization that Din was right. Controlling people is their specialty. You press your lips together into a thin line, knowing the assurance Fennec wants but you’re reluctant to give it. Trusting others has never been easy for you. It’s something that must be fairly earned, not handed out carelessly. That’s how you spare yourself unnecessary pain.

The presenter’s wrapping up his opening welcome, you can hear the applause like distant thunder. You pull out your pill bottle, mechanically opening it and popping two into your mouth, all too aware of Fennec watching the entire process. The meds taste like ash on your tongue, scraping the tender inside of your throat, but they’ll serve their purpose of keeping you numb onstage.

Tucking the bottle back away, you start to turn for the door. “Excuse me, Fennec.”

“Lightning,” she holds up a hand, reaching for your shoulder then quickly backtracking, awkwardly hovering in front of you. “Do not go on that stage if you don’t trust me.”

You stare her down. “I said, excuse me.”

Hearing the firmness in your tone, Fennec sighs, her shoulders slumping marginally. She yields and moves out of your way.

The walk up to the stage, the shaking of hands and greetings along the way–none of it truly registers. You’re just going through the motions. Like you’re on autopilot. Like…like someone else is pulling the strings.

“Hello everyone,” you say into the microphone, voice steady and emotions tightly wound in the depths of your chest. You introduce yourself with a bright, picture perfect smile. “Most of you probably know me better as Lightning Bolt though. And like my cars, I’ll make this fast.”

The crowd ripples with laughter, softening the edges of your smile into a slightly more genuine one. Sometimes there’s no reaction, just blank stares or, worse, eye rolls. Speeches have about a fifty-fifty risk of making you feel like you’re flying high or that you’ve just struck concrete face first. You never quite know what to expect until after your first attempt of cracking the ice.

This time, you’re soaring.

“I was just a youngling when my mother told me the luckiest souls are those who know what they want to do. Because they’ll never work a day in their lives.” The crowd shifts a little and you catch a glimpse of Fennec and Bane standing together with other authoritative-looking figures, including a massive black-furred Wookiee–the gotra you were warned about, you assume. It’s the man further behind them though, beskar gleaming like there’s a spotlight trained directly on him, that has your heart leaping. “But I’ve come to learn there’s a precious few in the galaxy who find something that they have to do with their lives. An obsession they can’t shake. Pushing them to their farthest corners.”

You’re hyper-aware of the hundreds of eyes on you–of Din’s eyes on you, sunlight turning the dark brown into liquid gold smoldering in a forge–and you rapidly try to organize your thoughts as memorized words spill from your lips because time is running out and you have to make a decision.

Why is it, whenever you find yourself faced with making one of the hardest choices of your life, Din can be found at the bleeding center? Why do they always involve him?

“I’m one of ‘em.” You remind yourself to take a breath, that you have to breathe even as it feels like your insides are being crushed. “And I know one man who feels exactly the same.”

Din hasn’t blinked, staring at you like he always does in your dreams, and just like in those dreams all you want is to reach out and touch him.

“His name…”

He’s your weakness. Always has been, always will be.

“His name is Boba Fett.”

Time seems to stand still, captured in ice, chilling you to the bone, and Din’s eyes have widened, you can see it from here, see how he can’t believe what you’ve just said.

And you–you taste the name like poison. You’ve never even met the Daimyo, unable to cut out a hole in his schedule big enough for a face to face conversation with you. He didn’t even come out of his palace to make an appearance at his own damn car launch. You can’t pull your words out of the air though, can’t erase them from anyone’s minds because the ice shatters with roaring applause.

You might smile, your lips are numb so it’s hard to tell. You want to say: Forgive me, love. Forgive me for surrendering to them. Maybe you would if not for the threat of the gotra hanging above your head like a knife.

Some things must be hidden behind closed doors. And sometimes…sometimes you must put your career first above all else.

Averting your gaze back to Fennec, you nod at her as you pitch your voice over the cheers. “And together, we’ll make history. We’re going to build and race the fastest car the BEC’s ever seen. I personally guarantee it.”

You step back from the podium and wave both hands, pretending it’s excitement twisting your guts into knots. You might’ve fallen for it, if not for the last second guilty glance at the back of the crowd, stomach dropping at the lack of familiar brown eyes and beskar.

Funny, how quickly soaring can switch to plummeting when one flies too close to the sun.

And all you can do now is brace for the inevitable impact, hoping you made the right choice.

#din djarin x reader #din djarin x you #din djarin fanfiction #my fic #pedrostories

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rjzimmerman · 1 month

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youtube

Watch Senator Kennedy from Louisiana make an ass of himself as he questions one of the witnesses before the congressional heating described in the Grist story below.

Excerpt from this story from Grist:

A congressional hearing on the fossil fuel industry’s “evolving efforts to avoid accountability for climate change” turned into a spectacle on Wednesday morning as lawmakers in Washington, D.C., grilled a panel of experts on wide-ranging — and often irrelevant — topics. The thousands of internal oil company documents released before the hearing, however, contained some bombshell findings.

One of the biggest revelations is that BP executives understood that natural gas, which the company promoted as a “bridge” or “destination” fuel to a cleaner future as coal declined, was incompatible with the goals of the Paris Agreement signed in 2015. “[O]nce built, gas locks in future emissions above a level consistent with 2 degrees,” at least without widespread carbon capture technology, according to a comment on a draft outline for a speech by BP’s CEO in 2017.

“This is the first evidence I’ve seen of them acknowledging internally, at the highest levels, that they know this — natural gas is a climate disaster — and yet, they still promote it,” said Richard Wiles, president of the Center for Climate Integrity, an environmental advocacy organization.

At Wednesday’s hearing, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democrat from Rhode Island, invited expert witnesses to talk about the industry’s attempts to shape media coverage and academic research and allegations that they misled the public through deceptive advertising. But Republican lawmakers went off-script, asking questions about boreal forest fires and alleging that reducing fossil fuel production would result in Americans “having to sell blood in order to pay their electricity bill.” At one point, Senator John Kennedy from Louisiana read a list of old Twitter posts in an attempt to discredit Geoffrey Supran, a climate researcher who testified at the event, apparently without realizing that the posts were not written by Supran, although he did retweet one of them.

The hearing was the outcome of a three-year congressional investigation that sought to uncover new information about fossil fuel companies’ history of spreading disinformation about climate change. The first hearing, in October 2021, focused on an early chapter of that history, the 1970s, and drew testimony from executives of BP, Chevron, Exxon Mobil, and Shell, as well as two industry lobbying groups — the American Petroleum Institute and the Chamber of Commerce.

Now, lawmakers have turned their attention to recent history. Ahead of the hearing, they released some 4,500 subpoenaed documents dating back to 2015 that show how oil companies’ internal discussions about the Paris Agreement, methane emissions, and investigations into their own climate denial have diverged from their public statements. The new evidence, summarized in a 60-page report, could be critical for lawsuits alleging that oil companies lied to the public about climate change, since they provide evidence of ongoing deception.

#fossil fuel industry #fossil fuel executives #natural gas #climate change #Youtube

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qqueenofhades · 8 months

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Lol McCarthy asking Democrats to PuT away partiSansHIp FOR the gOOD OF The CoUnTRy

What a dipshit. Too bad there’s so much at stake. The Democrats should take him to the cleaners.

What a sad, sad little man. Turns out when you can't control the crazies in your caucus, which is basically all your caucus, you're left with this humiliating spectacle of just how bad you are at your job and vainly trying to shift the blame to anyone except KevKev the FailMan. Womp womp.

#anonymous #ask #politics for ts #'put away partisanship for the good of the country' lololololololololol #i am shocked the irony didn't cause a small localized black hole to open up directly beneath his feet

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kopw · 9 months

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my brain is not really working because it's like almost midnight here but i'm (once again) thinking about how kenny molded his cleaner image around 80s action film machismo in particular. which, while being about abs and guns and explosions, is also about... the spectacle of the impenetrable male body as an object of desire for other men, phallic imagery, and overblown sadomasochism. like i know his thought process behind the look was most likely "man i love the terminator movies wouldn't it be cool if i also wore a leather jacket" but it still carries some fascinating implications. wrestling and archetypal action films already have so much in common but still. this angle has a lot more substance to it than the final fantasy references in his presentation for example. at least i think so

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velvet-vox · 27 days

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INDOCTRINATION F####NG SUCKS

AND WHY IT HARMS ART TOO.

The title is self-explanatory yet it cannot overstate the massive damage and impact that culture, society, and any other type of long term influence has on the human mindset and its artistic output.

You may be thinking, what is this post talking about? Well let me explain.

You see, the thing about me is that I tend to enjoy more complex stories with complicated characters and dynamics, but not in just the political, real world type of way like Arcane politics, I am towards the type of stories that allow for good characters to remain good and for the status quo to change in a substantial way; for antagonists to be complicated while not having them all be morally grey but showing that even the more seemingly black and white ones are not just pure evil atrocities and are still worthy of a shot at redemption; to not have said redemption be served on a silver platter but not just permanently locking people out of society just because they required said society to invest too much time and effort in helping them become the best version of themselves, because unfortunately, despite the opposite being also true, we are not born equally and some people are going to struggle more than others due to things outside of their control like their personality type and lack of mental fortification.

I want balance in storytelling! Not just gore or wholesome, not just morally grey or black and white, not just big spectacles and pause moments, but all of those combined in ways that force me to reflect on the media I consume and the way I consume it, to dig further in the limits of artistic expression and the classification of art as a whole.....

And indoctrination just ruins all of that, period.

We all, from a young age, are conditioned to uphold certain standards and to not challenge said standards in fear of being cast out by the people around us and the world we live in.

Art, as a medium, should be used to counteract the rigid lines of thinking that we're asked to uphold, but unfortunately, even if just subconsciously, the harmful, more strict lessons that we learn growing up still make their way into our works because of the mass consumption of simplicity we endured in our childhood.

From a very young age we are taught simple, clear cut definitions of right and wrong, and then we are subsequently told to simplify all of our real world problems into easily computable boxes so that we can be more efficient at our job, from moral decision making down to choosing what to eat for dinner; the adults tell us that it's ok to ask questions when in reality we're often punished or ignored for asking them and we all grow to internalise a passive acceptance of the status quo because that's what the status quo taught us to do in the first place.

I wanted to write this post because I was getting angry at myself for screwing up my own ideas due to my pathological need to divide right and wrong into easily checkable boxes and thus creating issues of the "these two ideas cannot interact or mix with each other anymore because of the way I segregated them" kind. I am always afraid of punishing my villains too much and not punishing my heroes enough and it's very hard for me to find that balanced middle ground that all works of art should strive to achieve; and then I realised: the problem has less to do with me and more on the unfortunate mindset that I internalised in my youth that keeps popping back up slowing down my output for thought provoking stories.

Admittedly, this is a larger issue that (contrary to what our collective nurture has drilled into our heads) cannot be easily resolved and probably requires a vocal discussion of some kind since typing can be extremely tiring and doesn't have the same engagement value of a dialogue, I'm very sorry if you found this post amateurish or you think I haven't conveyed my ideas well enough, I hope someone with a cleaner picture can show me what I got wrong and would like to share their opinions with me.

#indoctrination #carceral thinking #redemption #art analysis #black and white #nurture #storytelling #a complaint #villain #hero #politics #arcane #murder drones #wakfu #just because

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dlancecleaningspray · 2 years

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This pen spray is an ideal gift for family and friends.

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#Alcohol Based Lens cleaning spray #Lens cleaner for spectacle #Chashma saaf karne wala spray

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visidantav · 2 years

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#Different types of sunglasses for men #best spectacle cleaner

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lamortwrites · 2 months

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WIP Wednesday

tagged by @mightymizora, thank you!! it hasn't been wednesday for a little while, oops, but then again when do I ever get these up by midnight? tagging anyone who sees this and would like to share!

Enver hears the rising chatter of excitement drifting up towards him from his citizens gathered on the lower tiers to watch the culmination of the hunt. He can hardly admonish them -- after all, is he not doing the same thing, looking down on the spectacle far above their heads? He hears the groan of metal as Baldur's Gate's great jaws slowly pull apart, feels the tension in the vibrations beneath his feet as the winch attached to the harpoon begins to slowly wind the line back in.

Waterdeep stumbles for the last time as the clock strikes seven behind him. He cannot help but lick his lips as the many tiered structure loses its balance and begins to tip over, as the distance between their two cities narrows further at the close of the hunt. Baldur's Gate slows beneath him in an attempt not to overshoot or collide with her prey, but even as the many glittering, gleaming tiers of Waterdeep crash into the hard ground that dirties her delicate skin even further she is still trying to crawl away from them, pushing furrows into the earth as she drags her wounded body further through the compacted dirt.

He does so love it when they struggle.

But there is nothing she can do, now -- her fight is only for show as Baldur's Gate looms over her, leans down to sink her teeth into decorative skin too delicate to ever hope to protect her from jagged metal jaws too used to ripping into far sturdier cities than she. Enver opens his own mouth, brings his teeth together in an imitation of the bite several storeys below him. He wonders, not for the first time, what a city tastes like, whether Waterdeep has a different flavour to the others they have eaten, whether she would taste like metal and oil and smoke or whether she would be cleaner, sweeter, a refreshing palate cleanser after such a heavy diet as Baldur's Gate has subsisted on for some time now.

#still haven't decided if I like this or not but it's the best I have available rn o7 #wip wednesday #ty for the tag! <3

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transmutationisms · 1 year

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any thoughts on doderick macht frei and kendall saying lukas is v european? / new lukas fascism takes?

well i think that line is really a continuation of the way characters on this show will use accusations of fascism or authoritarianism whenever it's rhetorically useful to them. they're not really engaging with the substance of what they're saying, and every single character is fascistic, so when they hurl those accusations at each other it's really just a game of spectacle and pr (which is itself fascistic, if we accept benjamin's argument that the aestheticisation and spectacularisation of politics is a feature of fascism).

like, matsson is not engaging with ideas about antisemitism in any deeper way; he's using the holocaust and the genocide of jewish people as a rhetorical point. which directly echoes kendall calling roman and shiv "nazi lovers" last season, or shiv calling mencken and ravenhead fascists, or roman calling logan "kim jong pop" and "a human saudi arabia" or like a million other things. the thing is, when characters on this show call each other fascistic they're usually right in some way but not in the way they meant it, and they're not committing to any real moral stance.

to the extent that matsson means his tweet as anything deeper than a rhetorical blunt instrument, we could say that he evokes auschwitz specifically as a way of contrasting the nazi regime, which is remembered in the mainstream american historical memory as being self-evidently repugnant, with his own nicer, cleaner, more modernised fascistic tendencies (nasdaq master race). the living+ presentation is supposed to make it look like the sort of techno-utopian fantasy someone like matsson would like, and he's instead trying to suggest that it bears more resemblance to a concentration camp. for someone like matsson, you can be racist and nationalist and ground your sense of superiority on eugenic reasoning about how beautiful and ideal your muscular white male body is, but as long as you don't aesthetically signal nazism in some way you're good to go because you're doing, like, scandinavian utopianism, which is For Sure not fascistic in any way. so matsson is basically just trying to turn the rules of this game against kendall and living+.

i will hand it to the writers though that "he's very european" is a highly underrated kendall stupid line imo. like essentially what kendall wants the investor audience to believe is that matsson just has some, like, incomprehensible foreign sense of humour and/or simply fails to understand the gravity of comparing waystar, a good liberty-defending american corporation, to the nazi party. and of course, because this entire world (business) and city (la) run on spectacle and hot air, the audience basically eats it and the presentation more or less succeeds.

#tripping the light fantastic

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zirawrites · 1 year

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Y'know that one Ranbo scene where he *firmly grasps* this one dudes windpipe and rips it out? How would the Nuka-World faction heads react to Sole ripping the F*** out of Colter's throat in an incredibly brutal fashion?

I wrote this entire reaction not reading NUKA WOLRD FACTION HEADS. I’ve admittedly not played Nuka World since it came out, so I wouldn’t be able to write them anyways. So enjoy Sole’s companions reacting. Oopsy.

Cait: “Fuckn’ brutal, Sole!” Cait took a step backwards, forcing herself not to look away from Colter’s body. “I mean, it serves the raidin’ bastard right. But ya didn’t need to make a spectacle of yourself.”

Codsworth: Codsworth shivered, his mechanical body rattling against the screws that held him together. He had seen Sole fight ferals with their bare hands. Snack on human corpses. Threaten settlers into submission. But this was new. And oddly personal. “He won’t be spouting off any nonsense now,” Codsworth noted. “Shame. I quite liked his accent.”

Curie: Curie let out an uncharacteristically girly shriek. “Sole! Disgusting!” She shielded her eyes from the carnage. “That violence was completely unnecessary.”

Danse: Danse thought Colter was raider scum. He was a slaver and a bully and a menace to the Commonwealth. But did Sole have to act so savage? It would send a message to the factions, alright. Yet it wasn’t the one he wanted traced back to the Brotherhood. “I think we’ve done enough damage here, soldier.” Danse flinched before mustering the courage to place a hand on Sole’s shoulder. “Lets leave this godforsaken theme park before someone recognizes the Brotherhood symbols on our power armor.”

Deacon: Deacon couldn’t say he hadn’t been as merciless on raiders when his old gang killed Barbara. But this violence was unlike his partner. He worried something had snapped in Sole’s psyche, and the pieces might not fit together like they used to when he swept them up. “Well that’s one way to win a fight.” Deacon shoved his hands in his pockets. He didn’t even have a joke for this. “Remind me not to have a lover’s quarrel with you, boss.”

Hancock: The ghoul whistled lowly. First Sole shot Finn and now they ripped out Colter’s throat. He was impressed by their brutality. Finally, someone who got things done in the Commonwealth. “Can’t say I’d have done the same, but I like your style.” Then he handed them a can of jet. They desperately needed to learn how to relax.

MacCready: “Oh shit!” MacCready pawed desperately at his face. “I think some of it got in my eye!” He was one for long-ranged, clean kills. Sole completely freaked him out.

Preston: “What the hell was that?!” Preston’s neck and cheeks flushed red. “We want to clean up the Commonwealth, but we’re not savages.” He pointed to Colter’s mutilated body. “That isn’t the future, Sole. Or at least, it’s not one I want to be part of.”

Piper: Piper nearly jumped out of her coat. Sole’s hands were covered in Colter’s blood, and it took everything in her not to fall to her knees. “Did you just... grab his throat out?” She gagged. “Oh gosh, I think I’m gonna be sick.”

Nick: “Great. Just great.” Nick wiped at the wet blood on his coat. “Because the Commonwealth is full of dry-cleaners.” He was actually furious at Sole’s savagery, but he doubted even his harshest scolding could get through to them.

X6-88: “Fuck.” X6 took a respectful step backwards to avoid Colter’s blood from pooling at his feet. And there was a lot of blood. “I didn’t see that coming. I bet neither did he.”

#fallout 4 #fallout 4 reactions #nick valentine #piper wright #fallout deacon #maccready #preston garvey #paladin danse #fallout cait #fallout curie #codsworth #hancock #x6 88

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esperanzagalaxy · 2 years

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RQG requests #3, tumblr’s not letting me tag them, but spiraling-solarsystem-of-sadness very politely asked for barnes and carter, giving me the chance to finally settle my designs for them! which came with great timing, because there were some other requests that included them and i didn’t want to go guessing each time. so here’s my process for designing them!

i already had some images on my mind based on the vibes they’ve given me since the first time i listened (early barnes especially), so polishing them was really fun. i’d wanted to Just Doodle for a long time and this was very nice and helpful. i love sharing sketches, and coloring them digitally makes for something really pleasing to share. carter evidently was much harder to nail down, the slippery fuck, but we got there. enjoy the B-team in all their glory!!

ballpoint pen and fine brush pen on yellow paper, with digital colors.

ID under the cut, it’s a long one!

[ID: a series of three pages of sketches of barnes and carter. they're drawn traditionally and colored digitally over cream paper. the first two pages are filled with tests and exploratory doodles done with ballpoint pen, while the third has drawings with their more adjusted designs, in fineliner. the first page has unfinished attempts for barnes's face at the top left section. to the right of those is a doodle of season 1 barnes, shaded with light gray: he has a coat with a high collar, epaulettes and some military insignias, and uneven, straight black hair that goes to about his neck at the longest. there's quick lines signifying rain around him, and a hasty thought bubble that reads "llueve sobre la ciudad". in the center-left, is a cleaner sketch of that design. his coat is colored dark blue in the outside and red on the inside, with golden accents, his skin is pale brown, and his hair is the same black, uneven cut. he has a long face, a rounded jaw, a long, straight nose and narrowed brown eyes, as well as a faint three o' clock shadow. he looks tired. there is an almost identical, line only version of that portrait right next to it. a list to the right of that portrait reads, "-long face -long nose -narrow eyes, high up -thicker eyebrows -ok enough lips -clean shaven -big ol' coat". below it is written, "oh yeah that's him babey (dover)". to the center right, filling up the space, is a sketchy height comparison between cel, barnes and carter, with cel being the tallest, barnes a little shorter, and carter somewhat shorter than barnes in turn. they're silhouette only, standing neutrally. below barnes' reads, "lean but not lanky, he just looks kinda built when compared to cel". below carter's reads "¿?". the bottom third of the first page is all carter. on the let are line-only attempts at his face, with disheveled short hair, a thin, crooked nose and a mustache. he's smiling in both of them. around the first one there's the notes "weasely man" and "but less einstein...". next to the second one, where he's smirking and looking to the side, it says, "that but less yassified?" and "glasses maybe?". a third attempt below those is shaded in light gray and has similar features, but has his hands clasped together and big, pleading eyes, and he's saying "no stealing?". last in the page, on the bottom right corner, is one last headshot of carter, shaded with light brown. he has the same disheveled hair but wavier and swept to one side messily. he's wearing a hat and small, rounded spectacles. he's rolling his eyes and saying, "it's the cops again...". the list below him reads, "-droopy eyes maybe? -thin nose yes -those ears -face shape? -rounded eyebrows". the second page is mostly carter. the first drawing, on the top left, is a shaded copy of a photo of real life howard carter. he has an oval-shaped face, drooping cheeks, small eyes, a big, rounded nose, short-cropped black hair and a mustache. he's wearing a hat and a suit, and doesn't look anything like the design attempts. next to the study are the notes, "me cago que tiene los ojos de manuel", and "can't believe that this is howard 'THE CUUURSE!!' carter". occupying the right side are doodles of late 1800s-early 1900s explorer's gear, and one is of carter shrugging, with the clothes colored light tan. a note next to the figure says, "some scrawny bitch?". to the center-left and below it are two portraits of an adjusted carter design. the upper one is for his cairo aspect, and is similar to the photo copy, but with a smug face, a short, pointy black mustache, the thin nose, and black hair slicked to one side. he's wearing the exploring gear. the notes beside him say "sorry i'm keeping the other nose" and "oh yeah there he is". below that portrait is supposed to be a s4 portrait for comparison, the messy hair and a hand holding up a dagger are visible, but the face has been covered up with a cartoony snarling face. there's a speech bubble that says "this one came out ugly", and a note below that reads "omg i can't get the hair it's not einstein". on the remaining space, there's two full body sketches of carter and barnes's outfits, plus another portrait of barnes below. the outfit sketches are faceless and only the clothes are colored. carter stands cockily with a hand to his hip and the other going to pick something from his belt. his outfit consists of a big, medium-length brown coat, a red vest, a light yellow button-up, a bowtie, dark gray trousers, and knee-high brown boots. he also has a belt diagonally across his chest and one around his hip from which smoke bombs and sheathed daggers hang, as well as a big backpack, atop of which is visible a bedroll and a hat. the notes to the left of him say "big chonky jacket sasha would cringe at", "oh yeah there he iiiis" and "post time skip". barnes's sketch has him standing heroic but neutral, with a hand on the handle of his sheathed sword, and looking away. he has his long, heavy blue coat, a shorter red jacket underneath, a white billowy shirt open down to the navel, black trousers, and lightly heeled knee-high brown boots. in the portrait below, also colored, he's wearing that same outfit and has the face previously designed, but with a bit of stubble and long hair, as well as his hat. he's looking off to the side, leaning slightly forward, hair whipping in the wind. the third and final page has three drawings in total, in a "before and after" sort of comparison. on the upper half are two drawings simulating photos, side by side. the one on the left is barnes's, in his season 1 design. it's a bust where his head is hanging down slightly, his shoulders seem drooping and he looks tired. carter's, on the right, is as if he'd been caught red-handed, mid-lock picking. he's looking to the viewer over his right shoulder, tools in hand, with wide eyes, cartoony pursed lips and a bead of sweat around his cheekbone. he's in his season 3 design, explorer gear with brown hair swept to the side. both photos are colored in a faded, more brownish palette. below, is a more carefully drawn and colored picture of carter and barnes fist-bumping in their season 4 designs, from the waist up. carter is to the left, smiling at the viewer, with his left hand to his hip. the only new thing to his design is that his short hair is greying instead of brown, and it has a broad white streak by the middle. barnes is fist-bumping him back, on the right, smirking lightly at the viewer. there are cartoony sparkles around them and also around them reads, in blocky pink letters, "B-team glow-up". end ID]

#rqg #rusty quill gaming #commander james barnes #rqg carter #rqg howard carter #rqg barnes #mixed media #doodle #fanart #2022 #the great swarm of rqg requests 2k22

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