Hi everyone! At last, today's the day for me to release Strange and Wonderful, my ASGZC exophilia fanfiction anthology, aka a lot of one shots about at least two of the characters, and in every story someone gets to be a monster of some kind. We have both PG-13 and NC17 collections, so you can have whatever floats your both in terms of spiciness! The fics are all written by me, but with amazing cover art of Gemsom and @nagoo!
So without any further ado, here is
The Link
Also reminder that the whole thing is completely free! No money required at all!
And also, in case you want to know more before downloading, here is my FAQ page on the project.
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He glanced around the room, but it was the same as it had been when Simon looked two minutes ago.
Ryland had fallen asleep, slumped against his desk, arm down by his side, fingertips brushing the floor.
Simon was⌠trying to come to terms with everything.
Simon didnât know what to believe. Ryland said that mass couldnât disappear, but heâd never stared in the eye of the Light and the Blood Eel. He didnât know about the Light. No one did. Simon couldnât shake the feeling that he was supposed to die with that knowledge. Simon didnât understand it even, and the more time he spent in this odd space station, the further it seemed. Was any of that real? Had it all been one big hallucination caused by his body breaking down under the agroglobin? Was this all a hallucination? It didnât feel real. Sitting here in the dark, the universe spinning, spinning, spinning outside his window. The red was fading as they were pulled through Threeworldâs orbit, but Simonâs unease didnât lessen.
They were still too close to it. The star-eaters. They needed to flee, not study it. Why didnât anyone else see that? Some things werenât meant to be discovered. Some things werenât meant to be found.
Eyes up, Convict.
Simon gasped. Ava. Her voice rang through his mind as clear as day, as if she were right there in front of him, giving him his prison sentence. Her milky eye staring at him in judgment. His head snapped up, as if by some involuntary force, and locked onto Ryland, still slumped at his desk. It was dark, but Ryland was there, glowing a faint, hazy red. Immediately, something settled in him at seeing the man who saved his life. Ryland was here. Ava was not.
It's a trap.
âNo, itâs not,â Simon muttered, voice nearly whispering in the quiet darkness. It echoed the same thing as it had days ago, stubbornly insisting Simon was not safe here. He wanted so badly for this clean, kind station to be safe.
âSimon?â Adrian trilled. Simon couldnât bring himself to respond.
The voices seemed to think Ryland was setting a trap for him, but he couldnât be. He couldnât. Ryland wanted him to live. He liked having Simon around. He said that, out loud, to Simonâs face. Ryland needed Simon to live. He was useful. He had information. Information⌠that Simon wasnât sharing right now, but he would. He wouldnât stay quiet forever. He just needed to think. Â
You should consider yourself lucky. Avaâs voice echoed. Well, you are lucky.
Guilt sank into Simonâs spine. His left shoulder itched under the wraps. He was still alive while Ava was dead at the bottom of the ocean, melded with the Blood Eel or digesting in its stomach. He got to live while she went down to get him and didnât come back up.
It's still there.
âItâs not still there,â Simon hissed. There was no danger here. No blood ocean. The agroglobin was dead. âItâs dead, alright? Itâs dead. So just shut up and be dead, already.â
Look at me.
Ryland shifted, letting out a low moan in the dark, and Simonâs eyes snapped back to him. The scientistâs back shuddered, and Simonâs heart hammered in his chest as he watched a cough wrack up to his shoulders. He was slumped over, shivering, and then something red and thick spilled out of Ryland's mouth with a pained noise, splattering onto the floor.
Simonâs heart dropped to his toes. He was up in an instant, eyes wide with horror as his gaze locked onto the pool of glowing red at Rylandâs feet. This couldnât be happening. The blood couldnât have gotten Ryland. The scientist said it was IR light, but agroglobin ran hot, so Ryland could be vomiting blood. Just like the researchers, just like he had in the SM-13. What else could it possibly be? Simonâs chest shook with the beginnings of a terrified noise, stifled, as he slowly took a step forward. He wobbled with each step, trying to keep his balance, but he had to wake Ryland up, get the UV light, do something.
It's right behind you.
Simon flinched, his head turned back behind him despite himself. He only saw the spinning red of the planet they were orbiting. The planet infected with astrophage. Was it astrophage that Ryland was infected with? Eating something nearly as bright as the stars?
Itâs watching you.
He turned back to Ryland when he heard the telling sounds of him vomiting again, the splash of the liquid on the floor. The scientist let out a low moan of pain, not moving from where he was leaning against the desk. Chills pebbled over Simonâs skin as he took another step. He almost didnât want to see. Didnât want to approach, but he had to. Ryland saved his life, and now he was suffering for it.
You are the only one who can! Ava's voice started to shout, startling him in the eerie quiet. Simon flinched as Avaâs voice was overlaid with the whispering voice that had been taunting him for hours. They don't know the danger of this place. This isnât helping. We have to warn them-! I donât think thatâs possible. We can't die down here!
âShut up,â Simon growled to them, but they did not listen, incessant, insisting that he -survive, no matter what, do you understand me?! You can still redeem yourself.
âRyland?â Simon croaked, voice hoarse as he gripped the table and staggered forward. He distantly heard some musical notes, another grating voice, but what was another voice? Add it to the cacophony in his mind.
None can be allowed to see the light again! The voice roared, overlapped with Avaâs shout, You have to go now! What are you waiting for?!
âRyland!â Simon nearly pleaded as he pulled himself closer.
Simonâs hand closed around Rylandâs shoulder, and the man jolted under his touch.
Simon, please! Simon, please listen to me!
Ryland turned, and in the darkness, his eyes were hollow and gaunt, sunken in. Dark and gaping but red, red, red at the pupil. Blood leaked from his mouth in rivets of red. Simon flinched back, hand retreating as horror doused him.
This madness ends with you. It saw you, Simon. It will never let you go!
The last three babies spooked for some reason, and instead of rounding the corner to go back to their den, they went into our paint room, which was open. Alas, they were very very disinterested in leaving.
[video ID: an orange tabby cat lies next to a plasma ball.
Voice 1: "yeah?"
Voice 2: "[inaudible name] touch it"
hand reaches into frame and touches the plasma ball, causing lightning effect. Cat is visibly curious.
Hand pulls out of frame. Cat investigates and sniffs at plasma ball.
Voice 2: [giggles] "he's tapping his nose."
Cat sits up and, clearly mimicking the human's action, pokes and then places his paw on the plasma orb, creating a lightning effect which outlines his paw pads against the glass.
Voice 2: [suppressed laughter] "you can perfectly see the little beans!"
Cat removes paw from orb, sits back, and sniffs curiously in the air.
Voice 2: [through laughter] "oh my fucking god"
Voice 1: "that's the best thing I've ever seen."
Cat reaches to sniff off screen.
Voice 2: "oh now he's just going to eat my lamp." End video ID]
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one of the biggest issues for feminism and indeed society as a whole that i run into a lot is people don't realise just how weird and interesting snakes actually are. they're genuinely incredibly unique as vertebrates with many amazing adaptations to their lifestyle and body type and nobody knows!!!
the other legless lizards are fascinating in a different way because they mostly lack these adaptations to limblessness, but kind of just get along fine anyway
Miss Nebet, a spotted python (Antaresia maculosa) who will be serving as our live model for today.
many of these are probably well-known; others have surprised even other snake owners.
Snakes (suborder Serpentes) are lizards (belonging to order Squamata). Snakes are no longer thought to be a group outside of all other lizards; snakes are more closely related to iguanas than iguanas are to geckos, for example. The closest living relatives of snakes are Iguania (for example iguanas, chameleons, and dragons) and Anguimorpha (for example galliwasps, beaded lizards and monitors). Snakes are also relatively closely related to mosasaurs (such as the lovely Platecarpus pictured below), with some proposals suggesting mosasaurs are their closest squamate cousins. The various other legless lizards arise from all across Squamata, and aren't necessarily closely related to eachother or to snakes.
Snakes are almost entirely composed of "torso", with their ribcage extending down the majority (~90%) of their length and only a short neck and tail. The tail begins just after the is usually distinguishable by a slight narrowing and an end to the wide, flat ventral (belly) scales. By contrast, most other legless lizards have long tails making up a large portion of their overall length.
The green bar marks the approximate beginning of the tail, the diagram demonstrates the layout of belly and tail scales in two species. On her request, I have not included an image of Nebet's vent as it would be improper.
Snake ribs are jointed and manipulable, serving a role in movement, constriction and Their flat ventral (belly) scales are independently mobile, and can be raised in sections to create friction or flattened to glide across a surface. Both of these features are lacking in other legless lizards.
Miss Nebet's very cute pink ventral scales.
These unique features allow snakes to use four (conservatively; I have seen categorisations as high as eleven) separate methods of locomotion, combining these different methods in many ways to move across all sorts of surfaces. These methods include lateral undulation, in which the snake exerts muscles all across its body to push against the terrain in a typical serpentine motion, concertina, in which the snake pulls its body into bunches then extends in an accordion-like manner, rectilinear, in which the snake flexes muscles across its length while manipulating its ventral scales to drag itself in a straight line, and sidewinding, in which the snake 'throws' itself at an angle to traverse a slippery surface with little traction. Other legless lizards use simple undulation only, a more basic method of movement involving essentially wriggling in waves.
I have personally seen miss Nebet use all of these methods of locomotion except sidewinding.
Snakes do not 'unhinge' or dislocate their jaws when eating- rather, the lower jaw is split into two halves with a flexible attachment to the skull, allowing them to be independently 'walked' over prey. This allows them to swallow prey items much larger than the size of their head would suggest. Other legless lizards lack this bifurcated jaw, although they typically have very flexible skulls to allow them to swallow larger prey.
An Indian Rock Python (Python molurus) skull demonstrating the bifurcated jaw and Nebet demonstrating its utility in swallowing a mousey.
Snakes possess several unusual sensory organs depending on species. The first is their famous forked tongue. They flick their tongues to collect scents from the air then return it to a special cavity on the roof of their mouth (called the vomeronasal or Jacobson's organ) that allows them to detect chemical information. The fork in their tongue makes the sensing directional. They can also smell 'normally' through their nostrils.
The second of their unusual sensory organs is their heat pits, found in boas, pythons and pit vipers. These special rows of pits on (some) snakes' faces allow them to sense infrared thermal radiation. This adaptation, not found in any other lizard, has evolved independently multiple times across snake species.
Contrary to popular belief, snakes do possess ears and can hear sounds, although they lack visible external ears. They are also sensitive to groundborne vibrations through their jaw. Other legless lizards typically have visible, external ears.
Miss Nebet's forked tongue and heat pits (circled in pink). Scientifically speaking, these can also be referred to as 'charm points'.
These are just a few interesting things about snakes, the most beautiful and lovely vertebrates in the entire world. I haven't even talked about their teeth and fangs, the different kinds of specialised scales they can have, their venom or all sorts of other things. Please say thank you to miss Nebet for taking the time out of her day to have her photo taken for us, and please love and adore all serpents you meet!
I'm very very glad that my knee-jerk, gut-feeling, primal-instinct reaction to seeing a Default Influencer is embarrassment. I think this saves me from a lot of bullshit.
Some lip-filler lady on enough Ozempic to euthanize a horse: "The sad truth is an elite lifestyle takes money and discipline. Buy these brands on credit if you have to. Skip meals."
Me: "Oh. Oh I'm physically experiencing the effects of secondhand embarrassment. You live like this? This is your life? Your interiority? If I was anything like this I'd kill myself I think."
To be clear âď¸, absolutely not gender-exclusive. Some broccoli-haired shirtless 23-year-old man on enough trenbolone to euthanize a different horse starts talking about how to be a high-value male and I start thinking instantly about how I'd have 4,000 slugs use me as a jungle-gym before I'd want this man within cootie-contagion distance of me.
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Another character trope that I fucking love: When the characters end up in a situation that's unlike anything they've ever experienced as a group, and as a huge plot twist the one who's been useless this whole time turns out to be in their element right here. Like not only does the pathetic whiny comic relief who can't do anything know exactly what they need to do here, they're terrifyingly good at it.
Especially if it also turns out that they're famous or even feared for this skillset they have, in these circles the protagonists have never ventured in before. And there's a huge clash in the level of respect that they and these new people have for this mf in particular. Having conversations like
"Holy shit you know the Red Duke? Like the Red Duke? The man who can predict how a battle will end, two years before it happens, just by looking at the opposing armies' expense reports?"
"Uh, yeah? He's been in our party for like two years now."
"You've travelled together? What is he like?"
"Well, he screams like a little girl and he never checks his sleeping bag before getting in."
"...What do you mean by checking it? Why should he be checking his sleeping bag in the first place?"
"it would be so good if it was good" will haunt you but "it's extremely good, except for the one or two parts which are so bad it's genuinely kind of insulting" will straight up drive you insane
one has you making posts like "okay but if the author UNDERSTOOD the POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS of the story they were telling, and leaned into it, it would actually be a really interesting exploration of..."
the other has you pacing your bedroom at one in the morning going "why. why would you ever in a million years do it like that. genuinely what possible thought process was involved. was the writer possessed by a fucking ghost or something."
idk if i told the full story on here but i signed up for a research study where they were testing a new opioid, and it was supposed to be up to 5 injections increasing the dose to see what people could tolerate
i got the first dose and almost immediately fainted. they had to call in a whole medical team and it was a huge fucking deal
i was kicked out of the study and got a phone call later where they were supposed to tell me what the drug was, so i could avoid it in the future. they told me it was saline water. a placebo. i fainted from the placebo effect.
anyway, it's been a few months and i just got an email from the same department asking me to be a research participant in a new study: testing the effects of open-label placebo.
open label placebo is when the subjects and the researchers all know it's a placebo. they're testing the power of my mind. my power to imagine anything.
i like to think that they chose me for this specifically based on their past experience with me. "get the guy who fainted like a little bitch boy from saline water." anyway i just submitted all my info and i'm looking forward to getting started.
Controversial Truths About Ancient Egypt Masterpost
The pyramids were built by contemporary workers who received wages and were fed and taken care of during construction
The Dendera âlightbulbâ is a representation of the creation myth and has nothing to do with electricity
We didnât find âââcopper wiringâââ in the great pyramid either
Hatshepsut wasnât transgender
The gods didnât actually have animal heads
Hieroglyphs arenât mysteriously magical; theyâre just a language (seriously we have shopping lists and work rosters and even ancient erotica)
The ancient Egyptian ethnicity wasnât homogeneous
Noses (and ears, and arms) broke off statues and reliefs for a variety of reasons, none of which are âthere is a widespread archaeological conspiracy to hide the Egyptian ethnicityâ
The carvings at Abydos arenât modern machines but recarvings over old carvings. Sure they look like them but if you can read hieroglyphs and know that Ramesses II will even usurp the carvings of his own father just to be a little shit
âNo soot on the ceilings and walls of the Dendera temple!â is actually because of extensive restoration works and not because Egyptians were in on shit like Baghdad âbatteriesâ
While the Egyptians were fine-ass astronomers they didnât align any of their enormous and/or important buildings to modern star constellations, because constellations look very different now than they did ~5000 years agoÂ
The pyramid is the simplest, sturdiest shape with which to build and many different cultures discovered this in their own time. There were never any weird fish humans/aliens involved
While they had feline deities throughout their history, Egyptians didnât actually worship cats themselves. This was a later Greek/Ptolemaeic addition
It was not, in fact, practice to shave off eyebrows after cats died; Herodotus lied about that
Herodotus lied about a lot of things and many misconceptions about ancient Egypt can be traced back to his Greek ass
I canât believe I forgot my favourite Hill to Die On
Seth was not the god of âevilâ, and despite his chaos providing a foil to order, he wasnât completely villified until very late in Egyptian history, when he became associated with despised foreign enemies
Hats off to the few of you whoâre reblogging this with tags saying youâre going to check my claims later. You make me not entirely despair of this hellhole.
Here are some vetted Egyptological books/sources (that are by and large appropriate for a lay-audience) you can find most, if not all of the above:
Lehner, M., The Complete Pyramids
Wilkinson, R. H., The Complete Temples of Ancient Egypt
Hornung, E., The One and the Many: Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt
Dunand, F. & Zivie-Coche, C., Gods and Men in Egypt
Kemp, B., Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization
Bard, K., An Introduction to the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt
Stevenson Smith, W., The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt
Kitchen, K. A., The Life and Times of Ramesses II, King of Egypt
Sweeney, D., Sex and Gender (in Ancient Egypt)
McDowell, A. G., Village Life in Ancient Egypt:Â Laundry Lists and Love Songs
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rocky learning about last names is one of the most stressful days of grace's life on the way to erid.
it starts with them watching a movie, maybe the devil wears prada, and a little way through the movie rocky asks why miranda has two names. is it because she's more important?
grace, already anticipating a long conversation, says no, all humans have two names. everyone's just scared of miranda because her two names are really well known.
"grace have another name and not tell rocky?!" rocky asks, incensed. "what names mean, question? why two?"
"well," grace explains, "your first name is the name your parents give you at birth. usually people call you by your first name, especially if you're close. except in... some situations, i guess," he says, remembering stratt's vat. nobody had called him ryland there, but he still felt pretty close to all of them.
"and second name?" rocky prompts.
"right - last names correlate to your family. when you're born, you take your family name so that people know who you're related to. it also helps differentiate between two people with the same first name."
"so what grace last name, question?" rocky asks. grace blanches a little.
"uhh... grace is my last name, rock," he says, sheepishly.
"what?!" rocky yells. grace winces. "grace not tell rocky grace first name? grace not close with rocky? grace hate rocky?"
"no!" grace protests. "of course i don't hate you! don't say that!" maybe it's stupid, but grace does actually feel a little hurt by the insinuation.
"then why not tell rocky?!"
grace sighs. "i don't know, rock. i mean - when i met you i barely knew up from down, much less what my name meant to me. and i kept getting these memories and everyone kept calling me grace, and i just, i haven't been called ryland in so long it doesn't really feel like my name anymore."
rocky ruminates on this for a moment. then: "...ryland is grace first name, question?"
"yeah."
"rocky like grace better." grace deflates with relief. "yeah, me too, buddy."
"but," rocky says, "rocky want last name too now."
huh. okay, then.
"i guess i could figure that out," grace agrees. "we could give you movie rocky's last name? you wanna be rocky balboa?"
"mm, no," rocky says.
"okay, well we could go region based, i guess. where'd you grow up? i can make up something fitting, or i can look something up on my computer, i'm sure there's places on earth that are similar to places on erid -"
"no," rocky interrupts. "want grace."
"...huh?"
"rocky want grace last name."
grace is suddenly feeling very, very flushed. "you what??"
"last name is family name, question?"
"well, yeah, but -"
"and rocky grace family now. so rocky want grace family name!"
...well, when he says it like THAT, it's so much more innocent. grace... well, he agrees, because what else is he gonna say? that rocky should know that that that's as good as a marriage proposal?
no, that takes too much cultural context, and a longer conversation than he wants to have right now. easier to just let rocky have it. it's not like there'll be any consequences to bite him in the ass, right?
