Where Do These Livers Keep Coming From???

taumoeba (obviously)

instructions on how to use taumoeba (obviously)

50+ hrs of unedited footage of Grace fucking up a bunch of stuff in the ship

so much info about Eridian language

1700+ hrs of unedited footage of Grace and Rocky fucking up a bunch of shit in the ship

Cannot emphasize how much info on the eridian sentence structure there is here

a weirdass knit sweater pattern that takes people weeks to realize is for Rocky

literally hundreds of pages of Grace just describing Eridian linguistic history which like honestly isn't even his field why should we even listen to this guy- (hes the only one to ever fucking met an intelligent alien Dave. we'll take him at his word)

Why the Goldilocks Zone is for Idiots Part 2: Biological Diversity all across the Petrova Line (subtitled "We haven't found them yet BUT THAT DOESNT MEAN THEY DONT FUDHING EXIST-")

what are essentially just those reaction videos "Alien watches Legally Blonde for the first time" "Alien gives thoughts on movie Cats (2019)" "You'll never believe what this Alien thinks of the movie Fantastic Mr. Fox"

Grace's modified cardigan charts because someone was asking for them on his Ravelry and he never actually got around to posting them

(people have already fully recreated this cardigan just months after his launch. but they appreciate it)

very respective, kind eulogies for everyone who died in this mission (Grace AND Rocky's crew)

a lace shawl pattern inspired by the petrova line with a beaded fringe. knitters everywhere weep in despair because those instructions are gOD AWFUL, the man had 0 (zero) test knitters AND THERES NO PICTURES FUCK

Rocky make Grace cringe compilation statement

the issue I was running into with researching this a few weeks ago is that almost all of the scholarly writing on the content of people's forced-sex fantasies focuses solely on women's fantasies and starts with the research question of "why would women enjoy imagining such a horrible misogynistic thing?" despite surveys often showing that men have force-fantasies (where they are the one being forced) at very comparable rates to women. my hypothesis for a bit was "either men's fantasies are exactly the same as women's or they're completely different in [x] way," which was disproven interestingly when I did finally find something about men's force-fantasies: in content they are almost exactly the same as women's fantasies but the emotional motivations are often different in [y] way, which I hadn't expected. and [y] also super applies to my buddy ryland, perhaps even more than my original [x] hypothesis.

And you know, that “King Bradley” name is a strong contender for most ridiculous in-your-face naming but that’s not actually the worst of Bradley’s name. What’s worse is that he’s “Fuhrer President King Bradley”, because he’s literally got three titles in his name that all mean “Ruler” literally three of them but even that is not the worst part about Fuhrer President King Bradley’s name.

You see the worst part about this name is that he goes by “Fuhrer”. You know, the German word for “Leader”, pronounced “fyur-ur”, same as “Furor”.

You know, Furor

Or,

you know,

in other words

And so:

i’m talking video feed, microphone, and remote access to the care robot.

stratt watched the ISS crew assist yao and ilyukhina and a sedated grace prepare for their induced coma. she heard ilyukhina make a joke about waking up the most well rested she’s ever been in her life. she watched yao shake hands with the crew captain and thank them for their help. she watched the fate of humanity drift off to sleep, watched as the ISS crew wrote “good luck!” on the sleep pods, watched the hail mary detach from the ISS.

stratt checked the feeds almost obsessively. she would pull up the cameras and tap into the microphone, even though she saw no movement and heard no sound. she scrolled through health reports that she couldn’t understand. it became part of her routine. despite all her bravado, all her efforts to remain distant and detached, these people had become her friends.

and she had betrayed them all, in some way. grace most of all, yes, she had forced him on a mission he didn’t want to go on, had signed his life away to the stars for the sake of a dying star and a suffering planet, but she had also betrayed yao and ilyukhina, sending them on a mission without knowing that grace had said no. a lie of omission, but a lie nonetheless.

once the ship had cleared the requisite distance from the ISS and any satellites, the astrophage engines kicked on. the speed increased and with it the distance, which eventually led to delays in communication with the ship. the reports began to slow, delayed by a few hours, then days, then weeks. the video feed became glitchy before going dark. the mic feedback was nothing but static.

the hail mary became a ghost — something that was there but could not be seen or reached.

but perhaps most haunting of all was the last report ground control was able to receive:

STATUS

YAO - DECEASED

ILYUKHINA - DECEASED

UPDATE! They found the original photo!

I trust them with the world, not with my life though, I’d be very afraid actually