Feb 2017 Archive, part b

Hi,

Even though I'm a newbie, I started working on a set of agents for the PPC.
While I'm probably not going use these three characters when I finally start writting, I want to know how they can be improved.
Therefore, would anyone be willing to beta the character descriptions?

SECRET MESSAGE 10

Before I confuse everyone, my new account in Discord is now Gensokyian-Dreamer, and my Agent has not changed, so it should be easy to find me.

Anyway, much thanks for the invite, Desdendelle.

Here's an invite.

In case you want to make the Control Prompt a canonical interlude:

"… if you want," Apecian began. "… but comfy enough." Michael walked further into the room, turning to get the best view of it.
A new protagonist (Michael) should get a new paragraph, especially when it's not just one move he does before Apecian continues speaking, and this is one of your longest paragraphs anyway.

It was as Apecian had said, though he had neglected to mention a few thing,...
Should be "things" (plural).

HG

Your agents have been awesome in Rudi's, you really deserve this!

What? I even brought a stamp.



...Fine, I'll do this the proper way.

Do I know you? Oh yeah. I seen you in Discord, like, all the time. I've bounced ideas off you (I trust you enough to be a story adviser; does this mean I trust you with your own? Heck yes.), I've RPed with your characters. I got to watch them develop as you readied for Permission. I like 'em. You got plans to rein in their more OP sides. Gold star.

Can you write? You got betas. Good show. I've seen your unedited RP posts and you know how to do SPaG there, too. And your prompts and bios look solid; there were a few punctuation errors, but nothing major aside from using carrot brackets to show your characters thinking. They're not Andalites; use italics instead, for thoughts and for the Flowers. Flowers don't use quotations for their speech. Make sure to italicize those continua, too. :) Basically, SPaG is mostly good, and nothing that a beta or two can't catch.

As for storytelling, I think you're good. The control prompt was a bit lacking in funny, but it was engaging nonetheless, and it was a nice showing of how your agents met.

The second prompt was better; I laughed when Apecian fell in the Floating Hyacinth's tank.

And the fic to spork: I took one look and NOPEd out. I think we're done here.

*takes out sword and taps your shoulders* It is my duty and honor to announce Sir Granz, Knight of Plort!,

If it helps, I think it's good as granted. Ticks all the marks, and it's entertaining. Nicely done.

Good bloody luck, mate.
Get permission or not, know that I still reckon you're a bloody good writer, at the end of it. Plenty of us do, in fact! Least, in the Discord, where all that RP stuff is.

Good luck, Granz! Good luck.

Also, tell him I said thanks for running Pathfinder even in those poor conditions. Seriously, that was very cool of him.

... Happy Birthday!

That actually looks really good. I'd definitely eat that, despite the monolithicness (autocorrect hates me now).

One small bite is enough to fill the stomach of a grown Boarder. Hence why I ate four of them.

(It actually looks quite interesting, as desserts go.)

But I also have a huge sweet tooth.

Somehow, I don't know how that works.

The sort of thing to give you sugar poisoning.
What you clearly need is tea: Earl Grey. Hot.
Nothing like a good cuppa tea, y'see.

Seriously, pure sweet chocolate death. I definitely agree on how fast they fill up. The one I had was pretty small, and way too filling. It's just so rich and wonderful.

I love how the top looks like it's just cookie, and then, beneath, there is this dark, hidden chocolate secret, deviously pretending to be your normal sweet treat.

...maybe I'm thinking about this too much.

And this is coming from a chocoholic, too.

But look at this and tell me it's not beautiful.

I would undoubtedly be killed by a brookie. That stuff looks murderous.
If you dropped one off a building, it'd probably go through the core of the planet and come out the other side!

As all the best desserts should be. They look tasty!

Also, hi! I, uh, don't think I commented on your intro post. So hi! Have an urple ocarina and complimentary wilver earmuffs! Also also, what Overwatch heros do you play? I usually do Lucio or Mercy. Pharah if I'm feeling lucky.

-Alleb

Basically, it's only Harry Potter because the character gets brought in. Everything about the canon, from the magic system to established magical creatures to the timeline, is thrown out the window in the name of smut.

Please have a black-hole chocolate cake. All of it, as an apologise for being late.

Oh, well. Happy birthday! Yet again, you have defied the Fates and cheated Thanatos. Your reward is cake. Delicious cake.

I look forward to getting to know you better as I spend more time on the Board!

...Earth orbits around the Sun, yes, but on a grander scale, the Sun orbits the galactic core and our galaxy is part of a local cluster of galaxies which are interacting via gravity. Earth never sweeps the same sectors of space because our entire solar system is also moving.

But that's besides the point. Happy 2π around the Sun day!

Since you've made it all real vague, I've decided to collect all the facts and study all the data and I have come to the conclusion that, not only is it not your birthday, you, in fact, never were born, having instead sprouted from a tree like a lemon.

My gift upon you is: a pack of fish and chips to be squeezed onto! Because you're a lemon!

Happy regular February the 12th!

Have a box. It is rumored to contain a gift, which people say is a sugar bowl. Believe what you will, but keep it secret, keep it safe.

--Key isn't even sure what she's referencing at this point

Congratulations on being supremely confusing and ambiguous. Have some cake!

Blows GIANT NOISEMAKER CANNON! Hope I didn't blow your ear drums out! Congratulations on growing a year older through perfectly natural processes!

Okay, okay, this is awesome. Really awesome. This needs to happen.

That was WICKED! You should definitely make more trailers.

What, in your opinion, does Lina Holling look like?

hS

It would be great to do some of our setting's shorter missions or interludes, though I know it would get time consuming.

I'd, uh . . . I'd love to be in on voice acting, if there are any parts needed in the future? I'm a baritone.

—doctorlit never heard back from Ekyl after his initial voice auditions, now glomps on to hS's project

I'd be happy to contribute more if the project does continue. (I'll try to improve my sound quality, too. Couldn't help but notice the difference there. >.< )

I hope Miss Cam likes it. *crosses fingers*

~Neshomeh

*screams in excitement, then likes the video* The animation and voice acting was great! Good job!

Sounds like a very fun time for all!

We should get Roger Ebert's site to review it!

Now, I'e got a stupid question. Is it possible to voluntary apply to an OFU? I mean, even good/decent authors could want to improve. And why the Suethors should be the only ones visiting these worlds, eh?

I'm looking forward to watching more of this if/when it exists, and I think the trailer was well done. I don't really have any more substantive comments. Now shut up and take my money!

I will keep you updated on her reaction.

I like how this turned out. I mean, I really liked it. To the point where I have a suggestion:

OFUM Podcast.

The thing is here!

Please will there be more of the thing? :3

So, I haven't ever 'officially' beta'd something, just looked stuff over for friends, but I do have a lot of X-men knowledge. I'm definitely willing to look over it if you want me.

Hi,

Even though I'm still a newbie, I've made a set of agents.
While it will be quite awhile before I can actually write something for the PPC, I want to see how I can improve.
So, would anyone be willing to beta them for me?

Note:
There are a total of three agents with around 200 words each. No prompts yet.

PS: Silenthunder, I hope you don't mind me gluing this to your post.

SECRET MESSAGE 11

Did I spot a Lady and the Tramp reference in there?

HG

The beginning was a little confusing since italics don't show up well in the font. Then you use italics for the thoughts after the flashbacks.

How sweet that now Ix has to deal with angsting over Charlotte's choice instead of angsting over the immortality.

Did Ix not take her potion so that she could fight the were tooth to tooth?

So I'll settle for a music to go with the scene.

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone, loners as couples. Still, don't let only one day define your love lfe.

Hardric, trying to forget Persona 5 was supposed to be released today to steal all the hearts.

One of the best things about this is how clearly everyone's emotions come through. Specifically, you do a good job of showing me the inside of Ix's head (which is not a very nice place) without it being overblown. The second half, where Ix realizes the truth, is very moving and heartwarming, and it looks like things'll be looking up for the two of them.

In other words, going off the text, Ix is will on her way to getting all the love and hugs she desperately needs.

. . . I think they bear repeating here.

(Her fanfic gives the voice a name, but I think everyone who's read it knew who it was. )

We all knew Ix had no reason to worry. It's a place that's relatable, and it grates the heartstrings.

Which is why the fic's end is such a relief, and a heartwarming success.

All in all, a piece of Valentine's Day fluff I'm quite fond of, even if it did leave me in need of a cardiologist after all that grating and warming.

...I'd be happy to join in. Unfortuitously, the Hallmark Holiday has already come and gone, and good riddance to it, as far as my realself is concerned.

If this has yet to happen, however, I'd be interested in tossing in my prototype Agents - Calliope, who is definitely going to exist in some form or another; Lu, who is in question, and probably would not attend without vicious prodding from her original partner (who happens to be being named next); and Steele, who is the one most likely to attend such a thing and is probably better suited to being a Bad Slasher than a Floater.

AKA Apollo is in. As is Kaatah, mainly because a Quarian speed dating will be interesting.

Unfortunately Kelly and Theo won't be in attendance. Kelly because she's not interested in that sort of thing, and Theo because he's staying faithful to his girlfriend who is from a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...

I have many old and mature and busy things to do.

Bollocks to all that.

Finch and Bingle are in!
Lou and Duane (who arguably comprise only one person) are/is in!
Maz and Yocherry aren't in because, bloody hell, there's no way I could handle six (or five?) people at once, who do you think I am? An octopus?
If I was an octopus who was able to write six/five people at once, I probably wouldn't be partaking in Singles Awareness Day, let me tell you.

You have been invited.

I'm far too busy this week and the next with phone screens and interviews, and I also have to help field a construction estimating workshop in Indiana the weekend after this one. Besides, even if I was interested I don't think any of my agents would be - more than half of them are already "taken", as it were, and I have some SUPER TOP SECRET PLANS for the ones that aren't which would preclude any relationships to speak of.

About the one agent whom I could see participating is Falchion, which is painfully ironic because I myself am horrible at dating (the two instances where my family tried to pair me up with someone else have not worked out well, and I don't know the first thing about how to form romantic relationships in general). I have yet to see any currently active female avian agents, though, so I kinda doubt he'd be interested either unless or until one comes along. ^^;

Of course, neither of them know that the other is also attending, for macimum shenanigan potential.

How long will this RP go?

Agents Alleb, Jesse, Michael, and Mia will be in attendance. I'm going to have a knight and a cowboy speed dating. I love the PPC.

-Alleb

... make it official. I will happily dropkick Michael and Apecian into this RP. Now, pardon me while I scuttle off to giggle madly and create nonsensical reasons for them to be there.

The Host looked on at the revelry as the last few grains of sand fell into the bottom of the hourglass, rotating it without needing to examine the display.

He made a few adjustments to his mental list, and seemed to grow still for a moment. Another signal went out, and had the agents been watching, they would have noticed their cards grow a little longer as the name of the person they had just met with appeared at the top.

As the agents shifted, new tables became apparent, as if they had always been there. Interestingly, there was just enough additional room to seat the newcomers.

Regardless of whether the guests were paying attention or not, they would feel something from their placecard as another set of instructions appeared below the names of their current dates, guiding them to their next partners, who are as follows: Harris and Apecian; Chris and Shamrock; Mia and Kei; Lou and Naergondir; Randa and Kaatah; Cat and Lu; Finch and Thorn; Alleb and Steele; Miguel and C; Michael Tanner and Michael Green; Jesse and the Mysterious Host; Ami and Sonia; and Bingle and Apollo.

The newcomers would find their names elegantly written on namecards at their appropriate tables, and the attached directions were enough for those already in attendance to find their respective partners, even if they had never encountered one another before.

As the evening moved onward, the Mysterious Host smiled at Jesse, beckoning him toward the open seat across from him.

((First things first: This is not the end of the first round. This is me attempting to open up the door for our later arrivals, and giving people a bit more to do every day. I was thinking that each conversation should have about ten posts for player, but that is not a hard and fast rule. Secondly, please post your agents interactions for this round as replies to this post, to keep this thread from becoming impossible to navigate. Finally, these pairings are, ultimately, random. I rolled dice, I did not decide who anybody would be seeing. Thank you. That is all.))

The voice was deep and rich, with a slight accent to its masculine tones. It carried across the room, but did not disturb the conversation, and a tall figure could be seen rising from his chair to raise his glass once more in greeting.

He took a few steps to his left, and was then standing by the door, as if he had always been there. He offered cat a warm arm clad in black and escorted her to a small, comfortable, and, above all, convenient chair, just near the door and outside the ring.

"I'm glad you could make it," he said. "I was worried you all would not be joining us." His grin was just visible in the shadows.

"I believe the couples have just finished talking. I think the new round will be beginning shortly."

He felt ill at ease, despite Gurnirel's encouragement. He was an Elf of the First Age, one who had seen the light of Laurelin and Telperion in the days before the sun and moon. He had fought in too many bloody wars. His name he had chosen for himself: Man of Lament. It had seemed only too fitting.

And here he was, entering a room full of...'speed daters'.

"You need not find love here," Gurnirel had pointed out the day before. "We are both aware that tragedy follows the pairing of one of the Eldar with a mortal, and there are few of us in Headquarters."

"Then what reason could I possibly have to attend?" Naergondir had asked her.

His sworn sister had smiled. "You might find friendship there, Meldaner. On that, the Valar have so far smiled."

He could not argue with that, even with the Doom of Mandos ringing in his ears (To evil end shall all things turn that they begin well...), and so he had consented to attend.

He had dressed well, as one did for first impressions. His robes were long and blue, in overlapping layers and varying shades. His hair had even more small braids than usual, and bore a shimmering array of tiny gems at the clasps. He bore no weapons save a short dagger at his waist under the outermost robe, and that only in case of unexpected trouble. He had learned not to underestimate any place's capacity for unexpected trouble.

Unfortunately, he had no idea where he was meant to go, and so he stood just inside the doorway and looked around for direction.

"C. Forwards. Now." The first speaker was a decidedly feminine individual in frame, but somewhat less so in manner. Even before she'd opened her mouth, her eyepatch advertised to any who glanced at her face that this woman hadn't had a cushy life, and the set of her features advertised that she was not wanting to convert to such a life. In contrast to her eyepatch, and her somewhat battered-looking horns (if one cared to look at them), she was dressed in a fine red gown, exposing a pair of armored arms but hiding almost everything else.

"Relax, Lu, she's not one for attention." The creature at the back of the group spoke in a fair voice, but... well, she was very much not human. Her torso and face were, yes - though they were quite a bit higher than the average human female's was - and they were rather pretty for human features, at that. Below her torso, though... well. Cervitaurs weren't exactly common in HQ, but this girl had managed to get her hands on the mods to make it happen. Clearly, she held her human and deer halves to quite different standards; she had worn a stunning blue blouse to cover her human half, and though she technically wore a skirt below it, it primarily served to complete the outfit as opposed to covering anything.

"Steele, thank you for defending me. Lu, I will move as soon as I decide where I would like to go. Besides, standing in doorways makes for a nice picture, if you ask me!" The final girl - or the first, if you were going by who was where in the cluster, as this was the one actually in the doorway - was most certainly the most 'ordinary' of the three. Light skin, brown hair, and completely human. She hadn't worn anything particularly fine, either - a darkly-colored top and a somewhat more lightly-colored skirt, which was nicer than any of her usual attire, but looked extraordinarily ordinary amongst the finery of the room.

Shamrock Alsike came running through the door, tripping over her floor-length emerald green evening gown. A large, bushy squirrel tail poked out of the back of her skirt, and her hair had been done up in elegant braids that fell to her waist. She righted herself and looked around, skin darkening with a blush when she realized most of the tables' occupants were already, well, occupied.

"Shamrock, relax," Randa said, coming in behind her. She pushed her glasses up her nose and looked around, smoothing down her knee-length, sky blue skirt. "I guess we'll take a table and wait for the host to tell us to switch."

"Aw man!" Shamrock wrinkled her nose. "I gotta date you?"

"I feel your pain," Randa said dryly, and sat down at the nearest empty table.

Or, well, some of them did. Others had a bit of difficulty finding theirs. This wouldn't do. They couldn't enjoy themselves if they spent the night wandering about aimlessly. He reached out and tapped on one of the armrests of his chair. Immediately, the cards in the Agents' hands fizzed a bit. Were they to turn them over, they would find instructions guiding them to their first partner of the night. It had been arranged as follows: Harris was to see Lou, Sonia was to see Michael Green, Jesse was to see Ami, Mia was to see Apollo, Chris was to see Kaatah, and Alleb was to see Bingle. He smiled and sipped his glass once more. This should keep things interesting.

((Note: The RP is not closed. Feel free to join if you want, and even if nobody takes you up on it, just mark your agent's entrance, and we can work you in on the next round.))

He had done his best to clean up— three showers and a full bottle of shampoo and body wash still hadn't been enough to remove all of the smell of dragon drool from his person— and he was seriously starting to wonder if anyone was going to come to his table. He had found his place and sat down all right, but aside from that nothing seemed to be happening.

Typical.

He sighed and scanned the menu for the umpteenth time before rolling his eyes and tossing the card back onto his plate. Boring, boring bo– wait. Was that Sonia?

He craned his head to get a better view. It was her! And she was wearing that beautiful long red dress and her silky, wavy brown hair was down and cascading over her shoulders and...

Harris caught himself staring and tore his eyes off of her. He kept on forgetting that he had no chance with her— best to stay in his metaphorical lane. He picked up his menu again and scanned it again.

Sonia rose an eyebrow as she watched Harris bury his face back into the menu again. She had been quite surprised to see him here— the Pegasus Knight was convinced that he had been planning to stay in the RC for tonight and binge-watch RWBY. She felt the urge to go over to his table and talk to him— he was always a surprisingly good conversationalist and quite funny— but remained seated at her table. Harris did as Harris does—sure, she was placed with him to make sure he didn't get into too much trouble, but she didn't need to shadow him at all times.

Even if he was charming and actually quite handsome and...

Sonia caught herself staring and tore his eyes off him. One of his best qualities was how forward he was— and she was convinced that if he had any feelings for her, he'd have said something by now. She picked up her menu and listlessly read through it.

And Apollo really hoped that this event wouldn't become a basis for, or an actual, one. Still it was an opportunity to get out of the RC and try and get to know others who he could become friends, or even more with. He hadn't really had much of a chance to do that back in his home continuum, mostly because of his real occupation and the savviness that most of the inhabitants of the continuum had, he'd known several people who'd lost loved ones due to other people's schemes.

Still, it was a new chance, and so Apollo had decided to dress as well as he could, or at least as well as he could without alerting the attention of Kelly, who would otherwise tease him for going for a long time. And so he was dressed in some semi-formal black chinos and a simple black t-shirt, his normal boots being the only pair of shoes he owned, even if they did make him look more casual than smart.

Beside him, Kaatah shifted nervously as the two walked towards the room where this event was meant to take place, Kaatah had expressed interest in it to Apollo when they'd met up to talk at Rudi's one day in the last week, the inhabitants of RC 9.81 and 1692 often met up as Kaatah had worked with Apollo and Kelly before she'd been assigned to Theo and DOGA. Now that the day of the event had come, Kaatah was nervous, even beneath her normal Colussus suit of armour that she always wore (although Apollo could tell that it'd been cleaned up somewhat), and Apollo could tell.

"Don't worry, you'll be fine, we already went through what speed dating is, right?" He said, hoping it'd calm her down, at least a little bit,

"I know." Kaatah replied, her voice really on edge, "I just don't know what I'm going to do if a Geth or another AI sits down next to me, I kinda wish I hadn't asked Theo to lock all of my normal combat functions on my Omni Tool now."

"You'll be fine" Apollo reassured her. "Besides, if things get really bad, I still have a knife in my boot, and you can borrow that."

Kaatah nodded, noticing they had reached the mahogany door. "Keelah, what is you say? Break a leg?"

Apollo smiled in reply, "Something like that."

With that, he opened the door, gesturing for the Quarian to walk inside before following himself. Noticing Kaatah heading off for her table he scanned the room, looking to see if someone there interested him.

((For reference to appearances etc. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KV3Dx10WJFrUNjqeOvHVeRsrTTUQrjykDFLVtNV3cjw/edit?usp=sharing ))

'You look absolutely brilliant, Finch!' Bingle said, patting the upper chassis of his absolutely brilliant-looking friend. 'Oh, you'll be like Alexander the Great out there, Finch! The most famous conqueror of hearts of all time, you know.'

An actuator unfolded from Finch's side and fiddled with the bow tie attached to his front, below his ocular, where a neck would be on a being that used necks. 'Alexander the Great-s the most famous world-conqueror, Bingle. Not hearts, the world.'

Bingle shrugged. The suit wasn't designed to shrug. The suit probably wasn't designed to go on Bingle. It looked like it had been stretched and pulled and slapped onto Bingle's body before it could reform into its own shape. 'Surely, Finch, the world would involve the hearts of charming young women?'

'Bingle, don-t do this to me. Don-t bloody do this to me. Not now.' his ocular flicked here, flicked there. It fell on a lit candle, it fell on a very flammable looking tablecloth. It fell on various other people, all of whom did not look as silly as Finch. He was painted black, all the way up, all the way down. His display chamber had been emptied. A bottle of wine had been placed inside to fit the mood. Finch had to keep himself from yelping every time he heard it clink or slosh.

'Finch, you look fantastic. Like kangaroo, the second most famous conqueror of hearts of all time!'

'Kangaroos are Australian marsupials, Bingle. They don-t bloody conquer anything except for grassy fields.'

'Historical bias, Finch. Historical bias...'

Lou stepped in, shuffling by the old, rather stretched-looking man and his hovering vending machine friend. Duane didn't step in, because Lou was holding him under an arm. Lou hadn't looked so fancy in years. She still wore her hoodie, still wore her pajama pants. But, for once, she was wearing proper shoes. Black ones. Shiny. And a waistcoat, too, which would have probably looked even more fancy if it wasn't over her hoodie. Duane wasn't wearing anything, because Duane was an igneous, volcanic rock of felsic composition. Geologists liked to call him 'rhyolite.' Lou called him 'Duane.' If you asked Lou what Duane would have called himself, it would have been 'The only worthwhile entity within this horrid mess we call Headquarters.'

'Gosh, Duane. Maybe you're not overdressed,' Lou said, leaning into the rock. 'Look at them all, Duane. That woman looks like an umbrella!' Lou wished she was an umbrella. People loved umbrellas. Lou knew she did, anyhow.

Agent Alleb was certainly uncomfortable. If she wasn't touching her hair--as if it were in some special configuration and not falling to her shoulders like normal--she was fidgeting with her dress, or wringing her hands, or biting her lip. However, even if she had been still as a statue, it would have been easy to see that she was uncomfortable, because her paper-white face was nearly covered in an embarrassed flush.

"Really, Sir Jesse," she said, tugging at the shoulder of her gown as they walked, "are you sure this is... fashionable?"

"Yep!" Jesse answered. He practically skipped through the Generic Halls, looking dapper in a black three-piece suit and starched white undershirt. She found the cut of his jacket odd; its front edge ended at his waist while the back went nearly to his knees in two long tails. He'd tamed his mop of golden hair and hidden it beneath a brimmed cylindrical hat--a "top hat" he'd called it--and had even shaved. He grinned at her, eyes twinkling. Alleb managed to smile back, though she was still tugging at her gown.

Well, Alleb thought, biting her lip and peering down the corridor, that's rather easy for him to say. He does not look ridiculous. She looked down at her own clothing, and felt the knots in her stomach tighten. The color was alright--a deep blue--but some madman had designed the shoulders to not be on her shoulders. She kept trying to tug them up; she was sure the whole thing would fall at any moment. Not to mention the fact that the cut revealed two stab wounds and the edge of a long cut on her shoulder, all long healed, but red and ugly nonetheless. And, as if that weren't bad enough, she had a train dragging along behind her, rustling over the Generic Floor and making a nuisance of itself.

Alleb sighed. At least she'd resisted the shopkeeper's attempt to stuff her into one of those "corset" things. She wouldn't have breathed for fear of breaking the laces.

"Hey, I think this is it," Jesse said, stopping in front of a wooden door. His grin returned. He opened the door and swept his top hat off in a bow, ushering her in. "After you, Lady Alleb," he said, his grin never faltering.

Alleb raised an eyebrow and bowed in return. "My thanks," she said, "Sir Jesse." She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and marched into the dimly-lit room. It was going to be an interesting night.

Michael Green was tired of a lot of things. He was tired of missions, he was tired of Sues twisting the canon, he was tired of the unrelenting grey of the Generic Hallways. More than anything, though, he was tired of his partner.

They both stopped outside of the mahogany door. Michael was in a slightly-rumpled suit, and had traded in his white ceramic coffee mug for a sleek black travel cup. Mia was in her customary leather jacket, black tank top, and black ripped jeans, her ever-present black sunglasses... present. Michael suppressed a sigh (he had a lot of experience doing that). She might have been original in her method of expressing rage at life in general. She might have opted for an orange jumper, indicating her lack of respect for society's rules of fashion. She might have chosen a red hat, symbolizing her anger for the world. She might have worn a pair of green pants, showing off her disgust for everyone.

But, no, she'd chosen black, as if it hadn't been done a thousand times before. Michael suppressed another sigh. This was going to be interesting.

"Why're we here, Greenie?" Mia growled. Well, she tried to growl. Her voice was too high and feminine for growling, but he had to give it to her, she really did try. "Wouldn't counting loose threads in your suit be a better waste of time for both of us?"

Probably, he thought. "We're here so one or both of us can get married and move into another RC," he reminded her. "Then you won't have to deal with me, and I won't have to deal with you." He took a sip of coffee, blinking tiredly at the mahogany door. Why weren't they going in? "Oh," he said, reaching for the handle. Mia scoffed as he opened it, brushing past him into a darkened room. Michael took another fortifying gulp before following her. He hoped she was wrong about this being a waste of time; he really wanted a different RC.

A girlfriend would be nice too, he supposed.

((Alleb and Jesse are in standard 1870s formal wear, as Jesse is from that time period and Alleb unwisely let him shop for her. I couldn't resist stuffing Alleb into the stuff; she's a muscle-bound warrior woman in a sleeveless, shoulder-less dress, from a time period that loved slim waists and the like. Poor girl. I thought about giving her a corset, but she's built like a slightly-feminine bull, so I didn't think that would go well.

Here are links for Alleb, Jesse, Michael, and Mia's wiki pages, in case anyone wants visual reference.

Thanks for putting this soiree on Aegis Mysterious Host!

-Alleb))

Chris was wearing a clearly rented but still nice black suit. He didn't have a tie, but he did have a yellow violet corsage pinned to the jacket.

"I can't believe they had something for a pony," said Ami. She had a simple pastel-purple dress and a blue ribbon holding her mane out of her face. They'd offered fancy horseshoes, too, but she declined.

Miguel, meanwhile, had simply dug out the suit he'd wanted to use for a Bond costume the previous year. "It's a shame Violet didn't want to come. I really love that pheasant dress from last year."

"Yeah, me too." Ami looked around for the table with her name. "Remind me again what the signal for 'Let's go home' is?"

"One of us finding the other and saying it," Chris deadpanned. "Ami, we're not undercover agents or going into a risky neighborhood, we don't need a safeword."

"I'm ready to split up if you two are," Miguel commented.

Chris nodded. "All right. Have fun, guys!"

Miguel wandered off towards the back, and Ami headed for the left wing. For his part, Chris found his table relatively quickly.

Both were in formal wear, although Apecian's was more an approximation of such adapted from his usual outfit, the most notable changes being that his shirt had long sleeves and he was wearing a vest in a deeper shade of red than his eyes. Michael, on the other hand, was wearing a traditional tuxedo, with a green neck tie tied in a knot whose name Apecian couldn't remember. Apecian grinned at his partner, who had seemed to relax a bit after seeing the modicum of privacy afforded by the low lighting.

"Alright, you ready?" he asked. His clothes may have been more formal, but his speech most definitely wasn't.

"I believe so, yes," Michael replied quietly. Apecian had been around him long enough to pick up that he was nervous, and scoffed.

"Come on, you'll do just fine," he said. "Go on, find your table." Michael hesitated, but then nodded.

"Good luck," he said, and went in search of his name. Apecian waved to his partner, then started walking around the tables. He managed to find his name rather quickly, and he considered taking a peak at his first date's name. He grinned at the thought of this as a date, and decided against it. No need to ruin the surprise. He slid into his seat, and waited for the other to arrive.

Huzzah! I've been looking forward to this one. Kudos to the both of you for finishing it. o7

So, this mission was well-done. The agent interactions were interesting, we got to see some of Zeb's assertive side again, and it gave a good sense of the badness of the fic while keeping an appropriate level of quoting. I also liked the fact that they were disguised as cats (since students wouldn't work) and that there were appropriate logistical difficulties (I'm now imagining two cats dragging a large-for-them bag around Hogwarts, and it looks funny in my head.)

I would complain that there wasn't much snarking in this mission (it was mainly agent interaction and "ow my brain"). However, the fic was bad enough (but had good enough SPaG) that it was probably hard to get many gags in (there were, however, funny bits, like the line about the spell to conjure clothes, the blanket thing in general, and the "squelch" thing). Additionally, Dawn pointed out this problem in universe (right at the end), so you obviously knew this was a drawback to this mission and made it clear it wasn't your fault.

Despite that small issue (which again, I can't really blame you for), the mission was readable and kept me reading all the way through. (Near the middle, I was reading mainly because I wanted to see the fic die, which means you did a good job of putting across how infuriating this thing must have been.)

So that's my review.

Below find my notes (in mostly chronological order) on my reactions to the mission. I'm including them in the hopes they might be insightful.

- Poor Zeb. Poor Dawn. They don't seem to be in good places.

- I was almost expecting the alarm not to go off when they said what they were planning on, but I guess it happened because I expected it not to happen.

- Given the description, I'm not sure i wanted to look either

- ... as cats? How're they going to take the changes? Dawn seems unusually comfortable with this, but context is telling me that she's done this sort of thing before.

- Dawn called it. Ew.

- Ok, so there are logistical difficulties involved. I shouldn't have doubted the authors. Maybe Zeb and Dawn should have gone in for bigger cats.

- I sure hope that their expectations don't match (on-screen) reality.

- Zeb (around the common room flailing bit) seems to be taking on the senior agent role a bit (or trying to). (I don't actually remember the relative seniority between the two of them, so I thought I'd mention my impressions)

- Going off of the discussion leading up to the "house meeting", I take back the previous comment. Zeb and Dawn are about even

- Zeb being worried about Dawn pulling a Rina. Poor guy, and entirely expected. That scene carried a good sense of everyone's emotions.

- Zeb, get yourself some sex ed. You need it. (and obligatory yay intertextuality!)

- "Just don't think about it." I'm trying, but it's not working!

- Man, this fic is painful just from the summaries and excerpts. How did y'all actually get through it enough to mission it?

- Heh. Alex has a bet going on Zeb's CAD failures. Also, that poor machine...

- Is Dawn going to snap? Is Zeb going to ... phew, it's not happening

- Now, I'm reviewing the mission, not rehashing it, but "They went there." is an accurate summary of my thoughts about this.

- I take it cats have less dexterity than Luxrays?

- "unable to think of anything else, including a spell that would conjure clothing". Heh.

- Impersonating Aurors was a good strategy for dealing with the rest of them. And I like the idea of the exorcism going faster once the replacement is dead

- Zeb probably thinks Dawn needs some sex ed.

- Dawn, don't worry. I wouldn't look at the floor either. (I liked that line)

- We don't usually see canon reasserting itself, IIRC, and it's good to see it here

- Zeb and Dawn trying to help each other out at the same tine near the end was nice. Also, Dawn called out my one complaint-shaped thing.

Congratulations for making it that far into a fic that squicky! And may that fic rest in pieces, the one sided monogamy requirement was especially insulting. The rainbow halos were also bad.

I'm still not certain what the heck you two sporked, but... wow.

As for the mission, Zeb and Dawn are always fun to watch and this mission developed both of them nicely. One thing I noticed for SPaG was a double comma in the charge list on page 20. Great work on picking quotes from the fic!

I have a decent quantity of Fire Emblem badfic, all of which is NSFW and NSFB:

Never Too Young: The pairing is Orochi/Kaden!Kana in a BDSM context. Kana is stated to be 10 in the fic and has furry traits, so it's pedophilia. Seriously, be careful.

Meant To Be: Pairing is M!Corrin(Kamui)/Takumi, which, while possible in canon, is sibling incest. It also features cis male pregnancy, beige prose, and is filled with technical errors.

Dragon Heat: Another M!Corrin/Takumi fic, this one involving Corrin's dragon form. Corrin also has two of a certain bit of anatomy, eash of which is stated to be larger than an archer's arm. Takumi is also highly fetishized trans male. HerrWozzeck might be doing a spork of this one, however.

I also have two fics I would prefer to handle myself, once I get permission. They are both NSFW and NSFB:

A Pair Of Dragons: This is a Nowi/Nah fic, which means it's mother/daughter incest between two characters who appear underage. I intend for this to be my first mission.

Futanari Goddess: It's F!Robin/Every female character from both Awakening and Fates, except they've ALL been turned into heavily fetishized trans characters. That includes characters who are underage, related to Robin, or otherwise should not be paired with Robin. On top of that, there's frequent terrible anatomy, including proportions that really shouldn't be possible and vary wildly throughout the fic without any discernible explanation. The "plot" is complete nonsense, Robin and Corrin have both been turned into utterly uncanonical deities, and there is not a single character whose canon self could be on the same continent as their portrayal in this fic. This fic is extremely awful, and has personally offended me, so I would prefer to take it out myself.

Please have a pot of black-hole coffee, and my welcome.

Hi,

Hope you enjoy it here.
Take this invisibility pen.
When you click it, you become invisible... or maybe it becomes invisible.
Enjoy!

SECRET MESSAGE 12

I'd be willing to wager three orange gel pens (of subtly different shades you never will properly be able to distinguish) on this claim of insanity.

Given that bets aren't actually welcome gifts, have a floating jellyfish. It's friendly, I think.

Harry Potter has some really awesome fic around, some of the best, but it also has some of the worst (or the worst, depending on you ask) as well. But when you can find the good stories (which isn't that hard) they're incredible. I just love the whole series, and the fandom too.

Have one of my own shed feathers and a complimentary kit of Spikes!

We've got our own crazy corner of the internet around here, so feel free to step in!

Have a free key lime pie from my stash, and also have some crazy 20th Century music: https://youtu.be/H6qoqlvtN4E

For we have been bestowed upon with a KoopaGirl. But no normal KoopaGirl, no average KoopaGirl.
A Kool one.

Truly, Zeus has blest us upon this day!
I welcome thee, KoolKoopaGirl, with this gift: a minifridge.

So you can conserve your Koolness, even in really small spaces where a normal fridge wouldn't fit.

Welcome!

It feels like just five or six days ago that I was new to the community myself! Wait. Wait, hang on. It HAS been five or six days. Wow.

Well, whatever. That's not important, is it? What's important is you! Hi! Welcome! From what I've seen of the PPCers in aggregate so far, it looks like your strangeness will be in good and equally strange company.

Am I in any position to give newbies gifts, being a newbie myself? Whatever. I have to get rid of these darn things somehow. I bestow unto thee a pack of 75 paperclips. These don't come in any eye-searing Suvian colors. However, if you put your ear up to one, you can hear faint power metal emitting from it. It's definitely an experience. Try not to headbang too enthusiastically in public.

What other fandoms are you involved in, and how much do you write (fanfiction or original fiction) on average? I'm just curious. :)

I look forward to getting to know you better!

Hello, friend! Welcome to our organization! As someone dear said to me when I first joined, "Come in, sit down, rest your weary legs... no, not over there, that's where we keep the poisonous spiders."

And a lot of other stuff. Sitting down is dangerous, it seems.

But here! Something with which to defend yourself! Assuming you can use them properly, that is.

The gift in question: a full set of dice. The pattern is your own to choose; the shapes are all your favourites - d4, d6, 2d10 (for probabilities), d12, and the ever-important d20. Use them well.

Please have this bit of Bach and your standard-issue hamster.

Wow, first glomp ever... Huh... Okay, feels kinda nice.

Anyway, welcome! Make yourself comfortable and... have this box o' Cocoa Puffs!



Somebody lovely will probably provide you with a Discord link later!

I wish I had proper concrit for you on why it's wonderful, but I'm afraid I was just killing time before bed, and my brain is not at its best. But, I laughed, and I enjoyed the characters and the action, and that's pretty much that. {= )

I did notice a misplaced comma, though, at the end of the ‘And then I hit her’ before Maz says 'Is she nice?' It should be a period.

Also, the quotes around Alleb's speech “I think we ought to fight one another" ought to be single-quotes to match the rest of the story. I'm pretty sure all the rest are quotes within quotes, but you might want to double-check to make sure.

~Neshomeh

I like the tension created by the non-linear setup, the different ways Alleb, Yocherry and the not so omniscient narrator tell the story, their respective partners different reactions, the vivid fighting scenes and gentlepersonly conversations …

In the end, we didn't get the full story from any point of view. But that's not a bad thing, it just tickles the imagination.

There's actually nothing I didn't like, except this:
He glanced at it his arm
and
He couldn’t even even shift

HG

Instead of just squealing at Larfen in private chat. But really, this is super funny, and made my day, and all that stuff. I don't have anything critical to say (although I may have simply used up my supply of concrit explaining to a vole I found in the Pit thereof why it's probably a Bad Idea to write a story about a seven-year old Harry Potter being "rescued" by an unnaturally beautiful woman who is the personification of Death and trained by demons to fight Voldemort)(I'm an idealist, okay? Suethors can be saved!).

Anyway, good work and I hope to see more from you both!

--Key

So, I liked it. The story was funny, the meta-humor was silly without seeming overdone, and the interlude helped me get a better sense of the characters of everyone involved. The plot made sense even with the rather non-linear layout of scenes, so you don't need to worry about that.

However, one apparent typo: "‘Hey, uh, dude,’ She said." (shouldn't that be lowercase?).

Also, not a typo, but it took me two tries to figure out "... was not on that list [paragraph break] She was. [paragraph break]", since the paragraph break there sort of threw me off and made it non-obvious what that sentence was referring to.

Other than than, good stuff. I'm looking forward to more work from Larfleb (or is it Alfen?) in the future. (Are you the first geographically distributed superentity that posts on the Board? I think you might be.)

Okay, this I have to see. I can imagine it as sort of like a detective show, except with Alan Rickman trying to find and contain the Sue, and having to keep his knowledge of them secret from the rest of the staff.

The concept reeks of both awesome and win. Please do it. Please!

then several more Occlumenses... Occlumensi?... Occlumensees?... would be able to block their mind from the Suefluence... Dumbledore, Voldemort, Slughorn, Grindelwald, etc.

And yet we still have Voldemort's daughters, Dumbledore's nieces and of course, the crown jewel of Snape corruption - Little Miss Mary!

That being said, it sounds not that bad. I'd give it a read.

...when posting something I didn't cowrite, I've generally opted for Livejournal. That's now Dreamwidth, though I haven't yet had the opportunity to put that into practice--the most recent thing I posted was, of course, a cowrite.

~Zing

I don't want to bother with another account for stuff, and GDocs gives you a nice way to work on stuff together with other people.

NB: It's Permission with a capital P — it's a very specific permission to do certain things.

First, though a description of the badfic is certainly not out of line, posting excessive detail about something designed only to cross as many bits of respect/humanity as possible is really quite unnecessary. The broad strokes would be just fine for something like this.

Second, the whole thing about the PPC is that it runs on Rule of Funny. (Okay, not exactly, but still.) Fics like this are out there, yes, and they're bad, yes, but I think the main reason this is unmissionable is that it's so egregiously bad, in so many ways, it would be difficult to make it . . . funny. Even C*l*br**n was tough to do while maintaining any humor, because, well, rape isn't funny. The Holocaust isn't funny. "Hermaphrodites" aren't funny – just ask my students. (Seriously, they NEVER laugh at my jokes.) Despite what Stone and Parker tell you, AIDS isn't funny either.

So this fic, I think, would be out of reach for a mission, just because I have a very hard time seeing how anyone could make it more than 20% more entertaining than the fic itself.

Obviously this is just my opinion, so if you disagree, I'd actually be really interested in seeing someone explain why or how they would manage it. Because dang, if you could actually make something this tediously hateful funny? That's quite impressive.

This thing just violated several of my favourite universes, my own sensibilities, my personal politics, my brain, my eyes and my sanity. I request permission to take this fic when I get permission, if only to restore the balance of grimdark and British pessimism.

Here, have the bit of music I'm currently listening to.

It was based on one Vocaloid song I really liked, Kagome Kagome, and it was supposed to be a horror piece. It just turned out like laughable garbage though. A cliche storm, with a dumb ending.
I deleted it, didn't make any copies, and haven't seen it since, so I think it's safe to say that it's been wiped from the world lol.

A good deal of those are nowhere on the Internet, either, which is probably for the best. The first one I remember writing (which now lurks somewhere in the depths of my external hard drive) was a Neopets one about a Kougra archaeologist going to Mystery Island and (eventually) waking up the local volcano god, Potgatkerchi. (Can't believe I still remember how to spell that.) This was inspired by some flavor text on the collectible cards that I thought sounded cool. The only details I remember are that a rainbow Pteri (not a Sue; those actually exist in Neopets) and a green Minci were involved somehow and the obligatory newscast-full-of-foreshadowing was a blatant ripoff of the one from the beginning of Sorcerer's Stone.

Looking back, this probably would've also taken several cues from the Indiana Jones movies if I'd seen them at that age.

To take examples from my own work, I've used the following for Sue body disposal: a dragon reserve in Romania (Harry Potter); a Dalek ship, about to be destroyed by Bad Wolf (Doctor Who); the Veil (Harry Potter); the Crucible's energy core (Doctor Who); and the Darkness of the Book of Darkness, moments before it was Arc-en-ciel'd (Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's).

*Fights through the pile of dust on top of him.*

Oh. Right. New person. Hello! Greetings, welcome, salutations, and a whole host of other welcoming comments. Welcome to the PPC, hope you survive the experience.

Have..... um.... an old tea bag and a bag of dust. You never know when it may come in handy.

Congratulations on joining the PPC! Have a Mary-Sue Lego figure.

Welcome aBoard! Everything I wanted to say has been said, I think, so, have these voidkittens! Basically just holes in spacetime that acts like kittens. Be careful with them, I got them from someone else and they'd probably be mad at me if they got hurt. Though I don't know how this could exactly happen.

I see you already reached out to the community at the Discord. Good job with the social initiative!

So, I took a look at your DeviantArt, and I like what I've seen so far. It might not be much, but it's shows promise. Nothing that can't get better with practice.(And you had legitimate art classes I'm so jelly)
How often do you draw or practice? Do you have a routine or practice pointers? I hope you don't mind, I'm just curious.

Have a complimentary jar of kimchi, a portion of my infinite paper and an ultra fine point sharpie!

I hope you enjoy your stay!

I'm a newbie myself, but I'm not one to not welcome others!

Here's a milkshake and some Bleepolate. Trust me, you're gonna need it!

Please ave this bag of black-hole chocolate and my welcome.

Have a bag of spicy Poffins. If you can handle them, they'll make you *cool.* Probably.

As you've probably guessed by now, I'm also into the Pokémon games! I still haven't gotten around to finishing Sun, and I'm really kicking myself for it. Sigh. I was raised on Gen IV, and sometime around Gen VI, I tried getting into competitive battling. It didn't work out. Oh, well. I can always EV train my little buddies and then never use them. :'^)

It's great to have another JoJo fan around! I'm still recovering from a condition I call Vento Aureo Fatigue; the arc was just so boring to me that I never mustered the strength to read Stone Ocean. I'm not asking for any spoilers here, but is Part 6 any good? (yes, I know about MiH)

Hello,

I hope you have a wonderful time here.
Here's a poison/steel Pokemon pen.
Just be careful of ground types.
Enjoy!

My boi, SquidBoi!
Welcome, my boi, to the PPC, my boi SquidBoi! My boi!

My gift upon you, SquidBoi, my boi, is a kettle. My boil.

You can punch me if you want, for that. I feel like it would be justice.

Also, you draw things? Oooooh! Larfen like pretty drawings. Who're you on Deviantart (I assume you put your drawings there, considering the 'art' part of the website name.)?
Assuming you're fine with that and such. I mean, I assume you are, but, y'know. Better safe than sorry and such.

Anyhow, welcome, SquidBoy, my boi!

*high-fives* Welcome to the club! I have a Tumblr too; follow me at astraygenius. Mostly I reblog stuff that catches my eye or post pictures of my New Leaf town, though all my missions are on there if you dig through the tags.

What's nosleep for?

Anyway, your newbie gift is...an Inkay and a Rugby Shirt from Splatoon! The shirt comes with Damage Up as its main ability and two subs of Run Speed Up, while the Inkay is just there to look cute. Enjoy! :D

Have one of my own shed feathers and a complimentary kit of Spikes!

Have two cents! You'll want to put them into a discussion at some point.

You've answered the usual question about fandoms, so I don't have to ask you it. I can give you a Discord invite so you can join us over there as well.

First, as a customary newbie gift, I grant you 128 coffee cherries.

Also, what is your favorite generation? I'm personally divided between fourth and fifth, but I can definitely see any of them.

Hello, and welcome aBoard! For your newbie gift, take this plate of freshly-made SPaGhetti!

Definitely do go ahead and finish reading TOS—it and the Constitution are pretty much the only must-reads around here.

We also have a Discord channel if you wanna drop by and say hi! Hope you like it here!

Olderbies used TekTek dollmaker, but nowadays it's between RinmaguGames's Mega Anime Avatar Creator, or a sandbox mode from recolor.me

Poor Alex. Very nicely paced, too. I loved the delivery of the ruby, and that short, buoyant conversation.

There was one thing that surprised me (which might just be me being behind on PPC reading): Sue-made gems are high-quality? I always got the impression that everything or nearly everything Sues created was shoddily built out of warped reality and plotholes, and most everything would collapse upon exposure to a Reality Room (except for a few useless but shiny trinkets kept as trophies, which category I suppose the Hummingbird would fall under, but I don't imagine the repurposed ruby would be more useful than an un-Sue-contaminated one. Especially given how little Suethors generally know about what makes an ideal gem). I mean, imagine if agents could wield Sue technology! Given how overpowered most of it is, it would be a strain for them to keep from becoming Sues themselves.

I also want to say that I really liked how petlike Zeke acted. He reminded me of my cat, but not to such a degree that you'd written a cat rather than a fire lizard. I'm wondering: do you have animals? Do you model him after one of them?

--Key

If Alex were a Pokemon, I'd be asking if he wanted some Burn Heal after that.

BTW, I think you a word here: and clucked his tongue Zeke.

Or, Aegis vomits out his thoughts in a significantly less-than-orderly fashion, as per usual.

I liked it, actually. Makes me wonder what's put a bee up Farilan's [redacted] this time, but then it could just be her being her.

I appreciate seeing Olivine give Alex a kick in the pants, especially since it worked out so terribly for him. I hope we see more from the newest technician.

The moonstone reference was a nice touch, by the way.

Shame things didn't work out with Katie. I guess their love is just doomed . . .

I'm currently working my way through the Ahriman series of 40k novels, as well as The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan and Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing in America, a collection of his letters from '68 to '76.

I've been wanting to read his Dream Cycle for a while, and earlier today I finished the Cats of Ulthar. I'm planning on starting a book of short stories called the King in Yellow tomorrow. The first few stories focus on this play that supposedly drives people mad, so that seems pretty interesting.

Right now though, I'm reading through page after page on TV Tropes. Hopefully soon I'll be finished!

Feb issue of Nylon mag , re - reading the HON series ( yeah , I know ....... ) and online I've been re - reading like crazy , hottopicgirl's badfics , Hermione's Talent ( 1 & 2 ) and Karaoke Night . Those are the main ones but there are MANY assorted other things . I'm quite a reader . 8D

Okay I'll be more serious now. Besides a relatively small pile of Dragon Age fanfiction, I'm also reading 'The Lost Stars: Imperfect Sword' by Jack Campbell, whose books (both under Jack Campbell and John G Hemry) I would thoroughly recommend to any Sci-Fi fan.

The one thing I would say is that his writing style is quite different to most other people's I've read is that he doesn't actually describe the physical characteristics of his main characters, we've gone through eleven books now in 'The Lost Fleet' and 'The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier' and we still don't have a full description of the main character, John Geary. But then again, it's hardly felt like things like that are needed. The final thing I will say is that all the battles that occur in his books, especially the space battles feel so realistic, Campbell manages to plot out each and every battle in 4 dimensions and just makes each and every one of them work, he does it almost too well at times because I know I've had to actually close the book and stop and work out exactly each battle is playing out.

If the title of the series starts as 'The Lost' (or, from May onward 'The Genesis) then they all take part in the same universe and I'd recommend reading through 'The Lost Fleet' before reading 'The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier' or 'The Lost Stars', 'Stark's War' is probably the least futuristic of all the books Campbell has written and the majority of it takes place on the Moon, whilst 'JAG in Space' is a lot more about the day to day running of a spaceship mixed in with some really interesting legal drama.

*ahem* I think I may have got a little distracted, oh well.

Storme Hawk

There is the cruising through Whateley Academy, MLP fanfics, many other fanfics actally, fantasy series, webcomics, mangas... Kinda busy, and I'm not accouting for work, games, TV series...

The PPC message board, I wouldn't be able to post otherwise......

Oh, you mean other stuff. Right. Yes. I have a pile beside my bed that I'm working my way through, A Dance with Dragons I'm about half way through. Below that I've got Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John Le Carre with a bookmark in Chapter Two. Then below that is The Citizen of the World by Oliver Goldsmith.

Finished Kraken, by China Mieville a week back. It was quite good - very sort of bizarre look on urban fantasy. I'll admit, it deflates a bit towards the end - the bizarreness sort of wears off slowly, and it just kind of turns into a more generic urban fantasy. A good one, mind you, with really interesting ideas on magic and reality and such, but it's a bit disappointing considering the start. Made me expect a bit much, perhaps.
It also has the first positive portrayal of a cultist character I've ever seen! One've the main characters, part of a cult that worships squids and such. He's entirely faithful with his beliefs, and yet is still shown as a totally reasonable, relateable person!
I'll appreciate him for as long as possible, considering he's also most likely the last positive portrayal of a cultist character I'll see, too.

I also recently got The Gone-Away World, by Nick Harkaway. It's a bit of a mess, as genres go, but it can be generally summarised as an absurdly comedic post-apocalypse kind of thing. Which is probably very inaccurate, anyhow.
I've not even got halfway, but, I mean, it's surprised me, it really has. For all the surreal humour satirising this and that and bureaucracy and such, it's actually quite genuinely sweet at times. I note this in particular, because these kinds of stories with these kinds of humour usually sway in a more bitter, distant direction, y'know? And it's damn bloody funny as bollocks, too.

Aaaand, just today, in fact, relating to a school project thing I've got, one've my teachers lent me a copy of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. The script. Book. Scriptbook. Dunno what that's called.
Only actually read a few pages into it, on account of having just gotten it, but it's bloody funny as hell, too. The very opening joke is so well delivered, and escalates perfectly. Brilliant stuff!
P'raps I should stop being a filthy plebian animal and actually watch the play but, er. Pssssh.

As anyone in the lounge or on the wiki already knows, I just finished Watership Down by Richard Adams recently. It was rather better than I was expecting. I've never seen the movie, but I didn't find the violence to be too overwrought in the text. Then again, I am a zookeeper, and am used to seeing animal violence regularly, so not sure if that would bother other folks. Either way, I found the characterization of the individual rabbits and their collective culture to a very believable representation of how a prey species might behave, which importantly helped keep the story from feeling dated, despite its age. It was a fairly quick read, too, so I definitely recommend it to anyone who can stomach tooth-and-nail rabbit battles.

I'm still in the middle of Bryce Courtenay's The Power of One. I'm not very far yet, but I had to watch the movie version for Senior Synthesis back in high school, so I already know most of the major points. It's a long, sprawling story about a little British boy growing up in South Africa right at the start of World War II, his experience shaped by dealing with nationalism-based hatred from the Nazi-sympathetic Boers (local white people) while also observing how native black people are treated by both. It's a good theme, obviously, but I have to warn for not just vulgar language, but extremely frequent use of the k-word. I also don't know if any sex scenes are coming up later, since I'm only up to Peekay being eleven years old. (I don't recall any from the movie, but the movie cut stuff from the book, and I may just have forgotten any that were.)

—doctorlit is aiming for a biography on Saint Ignatius next; he likes to mix things up with a teeny dose of non-fiction, ever-so-rarely

Specifically, I just brought home and began reading five books, while I was already in the middle of Lord of the Rings (I swear I'll finish it eventually), three essays on Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse (for school), a giant essay on Euripides' Medea (school again), Fun Home by Alison Bechdel (for school and fun; I love it, and rereading Crooked Kingdom (the sequel to Six of Crows. I like it, okay?).

The library haul:
-Making Money, by Terry Prachett. I've been excited to read Prachett, because a bunch of my friends like him, but. . . this is bad; I'll probably put it down. It's about banking. Not in a good way. I'm choosing to assume his writing is hit-or-miss?
-Siege and Storm, by Leigh Bardugo. This is also bad. I'm reading it because it's part of the series Leigh Bardugo wrote before Six of Crows and set in the same world. I want to write fanfic set in this world, and the wiki isn't well-maintained, so: melodramatic romance with a limp, uninteresting protagonist, here I come.
-Graceling, by Kristin Cashore. Haven't gotten far enough to judge yet. Haven't gotten far enough to know what it's about yet. It's been recommended to me constantly since seventh grade; it's about time I gave it a chance.
-Flight, by Sherman Alexie. This is so excellent.
-Black Butler, volume 22. Before you judge me, remember that the manga and anime are different, and I can't stand the anime.

Plus a couple of fanfic (a Six of Crows modern AU and some of Miss Cam's old LOTR slash), sundry webcomics, and PPC stuff as it's published (of course).

That's it for active reading; there's some other stuff I dip into now and again, though.

--Key has a problem. She's working on it but this week is not her week.

Novel: Fall of Giants by Ken Follett, which came recommended to me by several people. It's not my usual fare, since it's historical fiction about the start of World War I, but it's very good. All the characters are interesting, even when they're not being particularly nice, and you get to sympathize with multiple points of view from people of various nationalities. Also, this may or may not be a selling point for you, but a surprising amount of nookie takes place. I think it's fun—it's kinda detailed, but not TOO detailed, and real people fall in love and/or have sex, so it fits in with Follett's meticulous character-writing—but nobody told me about it ahead of time, and I think it should probably be mentioned.

Fanfic: "Saving the Dragonborn" by SaxyGirl - Skyrim - Farkas/F!Dragonborn. A light, fluffy, fun series of (mis)adventures with my favorite character and a perfectly tolerable, nay, likeable OC. Raelynn is clueless, hapless, and a little bit hopeless, but her heart's in the right place, and she's funny. ^_^ The SPaG isn't perfect and the characterization of both parties is a little inconsistent, IMO (exacerbated somewhat by the episodes being told out of chronological order), but I had fun reading the whole thing and I'll go back for more if the author updates.

(Out of curiosity, fellow Dovahkiin: Got a favorite twin? Farkas or Vilkas, and why?)

~Neshomeh has been on a serious Skyrim bender lately.

Alright, I'm reading Tale of Two Cities because I have to, but I'd guess that's not really relevant. On my own time, I'm splitting my time between the webcomic Freefall, and the anime Fate/Stay Night, which for some reason I am watching after Fate/Zero.

I'm late to this but Happy B-Day !

Yeah, adulthood is overated... But not this black-hole chocolate cake! With red berries as a bonus.

I know I'm a day late, but I hope it was a really good day for you!

And wow... I'm at least two years older than you are! O_o Life is full of surprises, I guess. XD

Happy birthday. Take it from someone who's been there, there's plenty more milestones to hit still. You just have to keep making new ones.

Have a copy of 2014's PPC missions as that's about the last time I logged in!

There's no going back. Wrinkles, aching backs, grey hair, a fondness for soap operas.
You are now, officially, as decreed by my incredibly ignorant sixteen-year-old eyes, old.

Congratulations! Happy old day, you old coot, you!
My gift is: four walking sticks! For all four limbs!

Huzzah!

Obviously, the only way to celebrate this happy event is to drink yourself under a table and hope it doesn't kill you. Yes. That is totally a thing you should do, and is not a stupid plan at all. But, in case you choose not to do this totally safe and sane thing, you can go ahead and take my best wishes for your next year of life, and some free internet ice cream.

I do not remember if you play Civilization or not, but in honor of you reaching legal drinking age, here is a French drinking song (which happens to be France's theme in Civilization VI): the tourdion Quand je bois du vin clairet ("When I drink Clairet wine").

HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
MAY ALL YOUR WISHES COME TRUE
HOPE NOBODY MAKES YOU BLUE
AND YOUR CAKE DOESN'T EXPLODE IN GOO!

*blows noisemakers*

Thank you for all your well-wishes; I'll reply individually later. I'm on a family trip right now and I'm staying in a hostel where the wifi is spotty at best (whinch is why you may have seen me briefly appear in Discord but not reply to any messages, why I've been neglecting the RP, etc). Lucky the Board is so simple; it's the only thing I've been able to get to load so far. I'm returning home today and should be able to reply properly to all the stuff I know I've been sent at some point in the next 12 hours.

--Key thanks you for your patience

And a toast of black-hole coffee for you.

*Toasts with coffee*
If my first year is as successful as yours, I'll consider myself ridiculously lucky.
Also, "yammered the yak"?

Congratumalations on your Boardiversary. If there happens to be any real alcohol flying around somewhere feel free to toss it towards my corner somewhere.

And then I made that all-caps joke, and then you returned that all-caps joke, and I realised then, at that exact moment, something truly beautiful had been created. Something irreplacable. Something untouchable. Something truly unique.
A really stupid joke about all-caps.
But also friendship! That, too! That was also created!

Yeah, mate, what a bloody day that was! Good thing you stuck around for longer than a week, Key, because you're bloody cool as hell, and I think you're bloody cool as hell, and you get my signature 'cool as hell' thumbs up sign.
And then you worked as a really bloody good beta (and the first beta I ever got!), and then you taught me how to beta things, and a million other things. And then I got permission and I do genuinely owe a massive portion of that to bloody you, because of all that, and a bunch of other stuff I've probably forgotten because I'm kind of dumb. Anyhow, there's a lot of things I owe to you, mate, and if you're assembling a team to rob the world's most well-defended bank, or something, I'm in there. Whether I ultimately want to be or not.

*toasts with REAL beer because Larfen is cool and edgetacular and he has a katana* To another year! To getting those Permission prompts written, releasing undoubtedly brilliant agents who will single-handedly fix everything that my dumb ones ruin, and a great spin-off and a whole bloody lot more!

Bloody stroke of luck it was, on my part, to somehow bumble into befriending a person as all-around brilliant and all-around lovely to talk to and all-around jolly fantastic as you, Senpai.