Somehow wound up mostly blogging about sci-fi and fantasy and writing bullshit, with the occasional "this I gotta see" and "don't do that, you will die". Also this is my "cool stuff" pile, no sideblogs, no sorting, abandon all hope you who enter here. Art on banner is "Sphinx's Day Off" by Sandara (https://www.deviantart.com/sandara/art/sphinx-s-day-off-179426159). Art on avatar is "Lost Track" by Aron Wiesenfeld (https://aron-wiesenfeld.squarespace.com/2018).
The Nameless Fanfic (5/6 stories written, 6th in draft): Masterpost
The Nameless Fanfic is a series of crossover fanfics for Time to Orbit: Unknown and The Murderbot Diaries. I post the rough drafts here as I write them, then edit them and post them on AO3. As of right now, I have stories 1 through 5 up on AO3, and I am working on the beginning of the last big story in this cycle. There are also standalone short stories from OC and other canon characters' perspectives, and a planned standalone that's between a short and a full-size novella.
The series begins post-canon for TTOU and just after Fugitive Telemetry for TMBD, but spoiler-wise it's extremely heavy spoilers for the end of TTOU (of the "you should probably read the original first" variety), and light spoilers for Fugitive Telemetry for TMBD. As of the story 3 time skip, we've entered post-canon territory for TMBD as well, with extremely heavy spoilers for NE and SC.
Most of the rough drafts for these stories can be found by going down The Nameless Fanfic tag, but as this has already grown... Unwieldy, below the cut you will find AO3 links and blurbs. Enjoy!
Story 1: Connection Test Start (AO3 link)
SecUnit has told Senior Indah it is open to further work, but only if the work is really weird. So when a research transport from an unfamiliar non-corporate political entity called Trellin arrives at Preservation Station and starts throwing strange errors within seconds of contact, SecUnit is tasked with figuring out what the hell is wrong with that ship. (A lot. A lot is wrong with that ship. One, it’s not ART. Two, it’s kind of an asshole anyway. Three, it has feelings. And morals. And that last one might be the worst.)
Story 2: Formless and Vanquished We Shall Travel (AO3 link)
One Public Universal Friend runs a corporate blockade with a shuttle full of refugees, fully expecting to die in the process. Instead, it wakes up on an unfamiliar ship, with a bot pilot that informs the Friend that it is well aware of the Friends' existence and has helped it escape pursuit. In the Corporate Rim era, the Friends have been forced into becoming an underground operation, and they have few allies. Stranded, disoriented, and hounded by a corporation in possession of an anti-terrorism mandate, the Friend must deal with its situation and not sink its entire organization in the process.
Direct continuation of Connection Test Start.
Story 3: The Worst Movie Night (AO3 link)
The alien remnant contamination did far more damage to Perihelion's wormhole drive than anyone had initially realized, and the PSUMNT researchers are at a loss with how to solve the problem. But SecUnit and its Preservation humans have seen “super fast organic wormhole drives” before. With the reluctant permission of Perihelion's crew, a distress call is sent to Trellin, and three scientist teams, two sentient research transports, and one SecUnit convene to figure out how (and whether) ART can get its wings back.
Set after System Collapse.
Author's note: the main thing that you need to know about this story is that I started writing what I thought would be the NE analogue in this cycle, and it turned out to be SC: ART Edition instead. So expect a marked tone shift in comparison to the previous two stories, leaning towards introspection and existentialism. Also, altered states of consciousness.
Story 4: Roots and Branches (AO3 link)
Being responsible for the security of two separate groups of humans is hard enough when SecUnit knows and likes the ships they are travelling on. But once its humans arrive at the incredibly normal space station in orbit of Trellin, SecUnit finds their potential new allies to be much more difficult to deal with than most hostiles. To do its job, it must navigate local privacy customs, dead and/or naked humans, experimental biomes full of planetary fauna and, worst of all, the helpful local HubSystem, which happens to be a) very friendly, b) totally useless at security, c) really fucking creepy. Can SecUnit keep its humans safe and not be driven absolutely beeshit by argumentative social scientists, HubSystem or human, along the way? It’s about to find out.
Direct continuation of The Worst Movie Night.
Story 5: Digging in the Dirt (AO3 link)
Following the events of Connection Test Start, one doctor from Preservation Alliance decides to make things right and sets out for the Corporation Rim, hoping to unearth and eventually bring to justice a certain humanitarian-cum-terrorist organisation. Utterly unprepared for the reality of the Rim, the good doctor finds far more horrors than they ever bargained for—but also many more friends than they expected. Nobody is what they seem to be, and now Dr. Mrinal must decide what to do with what they have discovered and live with their choice.
Direct continuation of Connection Test Start and Roots and Branches.
Short stories, collected as Voices From the Pegasus Constellation (AO3 link)
A collection of short stories portraying some of the events of The Nameless Fanfic from the perspectives of Trellians (and other members of Starwind Accord). Character tags updated as stories get published.
Note that these short stories are placed in different points of the main continuity and are best read one at a time! Links to the relevant stories are given chronologically in the main storyline.
Right now, this includes:
Chosen Burdens (Captain Reed) - after s2ch5, "Verdict"
ship's haunted (Navigator Brisote) - a view of s3ch4-5
Cultural Significance (Senior Engineer Haze) - between s3 and s4
what's in a name (Senior Computer Technician Iceblink) - after s5ch18, "Preparation"
Losing Starlight (Dandelion) - during s5ch24, "Beeshit".
Massacre (Blaze) - during s4ch30, "Preparations"
Medicine From Your Hands (Aspen) - after s4ch41, "Puppetry"
As Above, So Below (Ruby) - technically set between chapters 44 and 45, but probably a good post-epilogue read
Axiom (Ghostwheel) - set between chapters 44 and 45 of Roots and Branches, best read after Digging in the Dirt chapter 7, Monster.
There is also an equivalent collection from the points of view of various TMBD characters, Voices from Preservation Alliance and PSUMNT (AO3 link).
Little Miracles (Ratthi) - set during s4ch13, "Visage", but best read after s4ch31, "Chief". Note that this contains mild Aspen/Ratthi smut (because they are nerds).
People Worth Knowing (Mensah) - the events of Connection Test Start from Dr. Mensah's perspective. Functionally a prequel to s6.
There are more short stories in the tag, but they're not quite edited yet and also a little bit ahead of the currently posted storyline. I will update them as I go!
If you're the sort of person who likes comparing text versions, some old chapters are up on the nameless fanfic: deprecated tag.
I also occasionally post music, pictures, reference materials, etc on the nameless fanfic: supplemental tag. This is mostly for my own convenience, but if you're the sort of person that enjoys finding new music or something that way - enjoy!
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Adjusted value of Bees. Now that was a special one… because every item in the game had a minimum value, and a beehive was a container for bees, which each had a minimum value… which meant the moment one of your dwarves picked up a beehive, your entire fortress’ net worth skyrocketed… a value used in determining how powerful the foes that visit and try to murder you are.
Actually I lied it’s the one where after a major update werewolves and vampires started climbing the nearest tree and refusing to come down. It turned out that he’d given evil creatures the ability to sense each other, but forgotten to set a maximum range on it, so werewolves were aware Hell was underground and trying to flee by climbing
Ogoh-Ogoh ᬳᭀᬕᭀᬄᬳᭀᬕᭀᬄ handmade statue from Bali made of bamboo and paper, paraded through Bali, Indonesia, on the eve of the Balinese Hindu New Year (Nyepi) to represent and banish evil spirits (Bhuta Kala) and negative human traits before the day of silence
It’s kinda funny to me that both Indo-European linguistics and cuneiform studies have a niche and unrelated (German) term Gunierung. In Indo-European linguistics, the term was apparently introduced by Franz Bopp to refer to the formation of what is now called full ablaut grade. He takes the word from Sanskrit guṇa “virtue”, used already in this way by the ancient Indian grammarian Pāṇini in his Aṣṭādhyāyī. The earliest usage of the term in German (spelled gunirung) I can find is in Bopp's Vergleichende Grammatik (1833).
The usage of Gunierung in cuneiform studies is younger and seems to go back to Friedrich Delitzsch's Die Entstehung des ältesten Schriftsystems (1897). Here, Gunierung means the addition, usually of three or four horizontal wedges to one cuneiform sign to create a new one. Delitzsch took the word from Akkadian gunû, itself borrowed from a Sumerian word (perhaps gun₃(-na) “speckled”, cf. Yushu Gong 2000, Die Namen der Keilschriftzeichen: 31–32) used already by ancient Mesopotamian scholars to refer to that very process.
Thus, in both cases, modern researchers adopted and continue to use a term coined by native ones. That the two words are today identical is of course of no significance, but still rather neat.
(Louis Havet, “Mémoire sur le système primitif de voyelles”, 1879, reproduced in Cahiers Ferdinand de Saussure 32, 1976: 115.)
“The same word guna went down in history; it seemed so indispensable that the German scholars felt they had to create derivations: gunieren, to affect with guna, gunierung, the act of affecting with guna. Even in some books written in French, one occasionally encounters the noun gounation and the verb je goune, tu gounes, il goune. Without gouner, it seems, and without displaying that it gounait, the science of language could not live. That is how, a hundred years ago, chemists phlogistiquaient, déphlogistiquaient, and rephlogistiquaient.”
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Don't get me wrong, I've been waiting for a good dramatic moment where I get to give the scions a death fakeout. Alisaie is yelling for me to come back. Alphinaud and Urianger are working overtime to heal me. Y'shtola angrily pacing. G'raha having flashbacks, wondering how he could possibly handle my death a second time. Thancred not only afraid for me, but the thought that no one would be able to tell Ryne what happened. Wish I got to sit in it a little longer.
However.
All of them. All of them acting like they did not just disintegrate themselves literally eight hours ago, who are YOU PEOPLE to call ME reckless? Y'shtola, THIS IS THE THIRD TIME YOU HAVE VAPORIZED YOUR BODY. Alphinaud, Alisaie, WHAT WOULD I HAVE TOLD YOUR PARENTS?? G'raha, I love you, please quietly have your crisis in the corner and do not make me remind you of every time you've tried to sacrifice yourself to save me. No, Urianger, this talk's not actually for you, you showed a lot of growth there and I'm proud of you.
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[id. A twitter post by @/Bennieeexyz
Jury duty letter came addressed to my cat.
Not a mistake. "Felix Martinez" - that's his full name according to his vet records.
My last name. His first name. Somehow he's a registered voter now.
Called the county clerk.
Me: My cat got summoned for jury duty.
Clerk: Is the name correct on the summons?
Me: Yes, but he's a cat.
Clerk: Is Felix Martinez a legal resident of this county?
Me: He's a legal cat.
Clerk: Sir, if the name matches our records, he needs to appear or file an exemption.
Me: He can't file anything. He has paws.
Clerk: You can file on his behalf.
Me: Under what exemption? There's no box for "is a cat."
Clerk: (pause) Check "unable to serve due to medical reasons."
Me: What's the medical reason?
Clerk: He's a cat.
Me: That's not a medical condition.
Clerk: It is if it prevents him from serving.
Sent in the form. Got rejected two weeks later.
"Insufficient documentation. Please provide medical professional's statement."
Took the letter to my vet.
Me: I need you to write that my cat can't do jury duty.
Vet: Why is your cat summoned for jury duty?
Me: Excellent question. No good answer.
Vet: This is the weirdest request I've gotten.
Me: Can you just write that he's medically unfit to serve?
Vet: On what grounds?
Me: He's a cat.
Vet: (started typing) "Patient is unable to serve due to species-related limitations including inability to speak, read, or comprehend legal proceedings."
Me: Perfect.
Sent it in. Got another rejection.
"Summons is mandatory. Failure to appear will result in contempt of court."
My roommate thought this was hilarious.
Roommate: Felix is going to jail.
Me: This is serious.
Roommate: Bring him to court. See what happens.
Decided that was actually the only option left.
Day of jury duty, put Felix in his carrier. Brought the entire paper trail of rejection letters.
Checked in at the courthouse.
Clerk: Name?
Me: Felix Martinez.
Clerk: (looked at the cat carrier) Is that Felix?
Me: Yes.
Clerk: (long stare) He's a cat.
Me: I've been saying that for six weeks.
Clerk: Why didn't you file an exemption?
Me: I filed three. All rejected.
Showed her the letters. She read through them, expression shifting from confusion to disbelief.
Clerk: Someone rejected the veterinary documentation?
Me: Twice.
Clerk: (called her supervisor over) You need to see this.
Supervisor read everything. Looked at Felix. Looked at me.
Supervisor: How did a cat get registered to vote?
Me: You tell me.
Supervisor: This is a data error.
Me: Took you six weeks to figure that out.
They dismissed Felix immediately. Apologized for the inconvenience.
Supervisor: We'll remove him from the voter registry.
Me: Appreciate it.
Supervisor: (pause) Out of curiosity, how would he have voted?
Me: Probably whatever party supports universal treats.
Got a formal apology letter a week later and a voter registration card.
For me this time. Apparently I wasn't registered, but my cat was.
Roommate: Felix committed voter fraud.
Me: Felix committed nothing. He's innocent.
Roommate: That's what they all say.
Felix is sleeping on the jury summons now.
Fitting end to his legal career.
end id]
Working an office job will truly make you have the wildest enemies, bc why is my nemesis rn a woman I’ve never met and who exclusively haunts me by sending diabolical emails, and also a specific guy who left my company before I even worked here and made the system so fuckass that it ruined procedures for like a year
Yesterday my nemesis (woman I’ve never met and whose face I’ve never seen) sent my office an email so rude, basically saying we had fucked up every project she ever ordered from us, one of the worst emails I’ve ever read in my life.
And it pissed me off so badly that I spent the ENTIRE WORK DAY today compiling evidence from every project my team has ever done for her, pulling past emails she’d sent us, putting together an entire case proving that she had been the problem all along. That she got projects mixed up, that she’d made requests that were nonsensical, literally everything you could possibly imagine. Screenshots of emails, reports we’d submitted, EVERYTHING.
This woman in particular has been terrorizing my team for years, her name is almost a slur in my office, I had simply had ENOUGH of her.
I put all of this evidence together and sent it to all of my bosses at 4:30pm. Then I took a long break to eat a sweet treat and drink some tea.
After my break, my bosses all called in an emergency meeting with me and they said they read my report and fucking loved it. And I sat on a teams call with my boss’ boss as she wrote my nemesis the scathing email I had always fantasized about sending, using the evidence I’d compiled, and hit send.
It was the most satisfying workday I’ve had since I got hired.
It is So Boring in the mattress store for kids. It’s basically hell for children because there’s fuckall to do for them.
A couple I was helping earlier had two little ones, three and six, who were behaving in a rather saintly fashion for the average bored kid I see. I tried to engage them with remotes and things while their parents talked.
Eventually they were restless enough that I pulled out notepads and asked if they wanted to draw. The three year old quickly lost interest and I went over to ask her favorite animal. She told me “elephant” so to delight and amaze her I started drawing an elephant. Usually kids are into it.
When I was done she pronounced, “It looks like a giraffe.”
I staggered back melodramatically but actually laughing hysterically and said, “There goes my art degree!”
The parents laughed and said kids were harsh critics. When they checked out they saw my elephant doodle on the desk and both did a double take like, “Woah, that’s a really good elephant!”
“Yeah, I actually did go to art school, but it’s okay. My niece wasn’t very impressed with my drawings at that age either.”
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Bashir's work establishing a dental service on DS9 is surely one of the great unsung achievements of the post-Occupation period, and the work he does is adopted throughout Bajor during the reconstruction. It's not like you'd be able go to the dentist easily towards the end of the Occupation, nor train as a dentist either. He trains up a couple of his team so that he doesn't get overwhelmed just dealing with everyone's teeth.
But naturally there's a fair amount of resistance to having anyone poke around inside your gob, or wave a needle at you, given Cardassian practices in this regard. Poor old Kira has to step up and set an example, having first had to put up with Bashir pinning her down at every available opportunity to explain the importance of dental care. She works out her frustration by ordering every single member of the Bajoran militia stationed on DS9 to get themselves down to Bashir's House of Dental Horrors. But it works, and the civilians start to follow.
None of the Ferengi take Bashir up on the doctor's kind offer to extend the station dental service to them, and, indeed, consider it something of an insult.
As for the rest of the station crew - no problem there except, naturally, with O'Brien. Eventually Molly persuades him. "You can come along with me and we can both be scared together. But Uncle Julian won't hurt us, Daddy. You'll see. Also you get a sticker and if you're extra brave you get a lolly."
@hartlins i would like it to be known that these plot bunnies are not ”random” and i actually work really really hard on them. for this one, for example, i went outside and saw a dentist’s office,
