Chess Getting A Huge Update I See

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: Gen

Fandom: Dimension 20 (Web Series)

Relationships: The Bad Kids & Riz Gukgak, Riz Gukgak & Sklonda Gukgak

Characters: Riz Gukgak, Fabian Aramais Seacaster, Figueroth Faeth, Kristen Applebees, Gorgug Thistlespring, Adaine Abernant, Sklonda Gukgak

Additional Tags: Depression, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Overworking, Sleep Deprivation, Caffeine Addiction, Texting, Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Sleepovers, this is a vent fic in the sense that i had one (1) coherent emotional impulse today and then had a ten minute panic attack over it, Campaign 01: Fantasy High (Dimension 20), Post-Campaign 01 Season 02: Fantasy High Sophomore Year (Dimension 20), Self-Worth Issues, [slaps roof of riz gukgak] this bad boy can fit so much projection

Summary:

"and when i'm lying in my bed / i think about life and i think about death / and neither one particularly appeals to me / and if the day came when i felt a natural emotion / i'd get such a shock i'd probably lie / in the middle of the street and die" - the smiths, nowhere fast Riz Gukgak keeps himself busy enough that he doesn't have time for nuisances like emotions or stress. His heavy schedule sits like a weight on his shoulders, holding down depression and anxiety that threaten to bubble up at any moment. But slowly, imperceptibly slowly, and yet somehow all at once, he begins to fracture under the pressure.

word count: 2050

girl who loves her friends so much but is so bad and awful at messaging them back for some reason even though she really really wants to talk to them

Gorgug has tusks and Riz has fangs and they are such creatures and they are. Friends. Gorgug growls and Riz hisses and they actually both do some variation of a chirp or chitter and Gorgug's rage is a frenzy and Riz's bloodlust is a fury and it is. Good. They are not human and they do not have to be.

Also Riz claws and tail. Also you know how dogs and I think other canines but idk I'm not a mammal guy start drooling/foaming at the mouth because of overexertion or stress or anxiety? Gorgug when he's raging. This is less because he's half orc and more because he's specifically a berserker* and that subclass goes crazy. Frenzy, mindless rage, okay bitch we're snarling and drooling and animal and taking a level of exhaustion afterwards. Love that.

Solace is fantasy racist sometimes and I think they both separately had some trouble accepting themselves and their less palatable features and I probably rambled about that in a long post I can't remember rn but they do now and they are so good and I adore them.

*"For some barbarians, rage is a means to an end – that end being violence. The Path of the Berserker is a path of untrammeled fury, slick with blood. As you enter the berserker's rage, you thrill in the chaos of battle, heedless of your own health or well-being." - The Player's Handbook

A lesson that we can’t afford not to be taught.

holy fucking shit people simulated the 302 neurons in a worm’s brain with software, put it in a Lego robot and it behaves like a worm

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/weve-put-worms-mind-lego-robot-body-180953399/?no-ist

maybe gonna make this a oneshot, maybe just gonna let it drift away into silly headcanon land, but have a middle-of-the-scene snippet of Tim monologuing at Bruce in the middle of the kitchen floor after school:

Number 16 for Alfred plz

Short, contemporary set fic. Alfred wakes from a nightmare and Matt knows what to say. On ao3 here. From prompt 16. “Are you afraid to fall asleep because you think you’re gonna have a nightmare?”

21st Century, Ottawa.

Mathew's bedroom was still and dark when he woke, and he stared at the dim glow filtering through the blinds. The light of the streetlamps was tinted blue in the storm, and he wondered why he'd woken. Kuma was still dead asleep on his memory foam sheepskin bed just next to the vent. If there'd been any intrusion in his space, he'd have been up, hackles raised and howling. Oh. He had to piss. Fuck, he must still be drunk. Groaning and cursing himself for not taking a pit stop when he and Alfred had finally put the beers and video game controllers down to go to sleep, he finally peeled himself out of bed. The room was cold, and peeling off the duvet made his thoughts switch languages and wish for a quick death in French.

Shaking the drama off, he shoved his feet into his indoor boots and shuffled down the hall, rubbing at his eyes and letting the. Business completed, he was turning off the water and drying his hands when he thought he heard something. He stumbled, still groggy, down the hall, away from the bedroom. Again, Kuma didn't howl or join him.

The TV, mounted above the fireplace, was on and thew an eerie cast over the living room as Matt approached, poking his head in. There was Alfred, hunched over.

"The fuck are you doing up?" Matt asked, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Alfred glanced up, expression inscrutable.

"I couldn't sleep," He said, sounding wrecked, like he'd been throwing up or crying.

"You good?" Matt asked, frowning.

"Fine."

"Fucken liar," Matt replied. Alfred's gaze flashed up, the hint of Cherenkov radiation flashing in anger.

"Don't give me that face, o mighty superpower." Matt laughed, rubbing a hand down his face, incredulous. "Christ. You know, I'd normally be happy to do the usual song and dance where you deny everything until I hit a nerve. And then you can have your semi-annual mental breakdown on my couch, but it's 3 in the fucken morning. So get your ass up, turn off the TV, put your butt in a chair in the kitchen and spill your guts while I make us hot chocolate, and then we can go the fuck back to sleep. Okay?"

Whatever it was that made Alfred their kind's weird undying version of superman seemed to drain from him, and his shoulders slumped. It was like watching someone drain the water from a nuclear reactor and shut it down.

"Yeah, all right."

In the kitchen, Alfred sat at the old kitchen table. Matt raided the cabinets and dumped milk, cream, and chocolate into a pot, breathing in a bit of the soothing steam as it warmed.

"You going to start talking?"

"I'm organizing my thoughts," Alfred said as he stared at the kitchen table, tracing the grain of a knot Matt had sanded smooth himself with two fingers. He glared at the wood. "Or I'm trying too."

"Okay. Take your time. This will take a minute." Matt's heart ached, and he opened another cabinet. There was vanilla extract there, but glancing at his brother and full of something softer, he selected one of the vanilla beans he had purchased on his last trip to Mexico and scraped it clean. In it went with the chilli and clove and cinnamon to simmer away.

"Doing okay?" Matt asked. Alfred's hand had gone still on the table, balling into a fist.

"Yeah," Alfred said.

Deciding his brother needed more time, Matt took down a bowl and whipped the living hell out of the rest of the cream until his arm shook. It was always a process. His brother's emotions were structured with the strongest joy on earth on a delicate pedestal of half-processed memories. He stirred the hot chocolate, and now melted together and velvety, it clung to the sides of the pot.

"Okay," Alfred said at last. "Okay, fuck."

He quickly poured two terracotta mugs, scooped on the hand-churned whipped cream and even dusted them with more cinnamon. He sat across the table from Alfred, shaking his left hand out. It was sore from all the whisking now.

"Damn, Matt. You were busier than a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest. That's amazing."

"Have to do something while you brood," Matt replied, pulling his hoodie sleeves back down. "Now, what's the fucken problem?"

"I had a nightmare," Alfred said plainly. Well, that'd been easier than usual.

"The 'showing up to the Armed Forces Committee with no pants' nightmare or the 'I got hung for witchcraft and dad presented the head of the fuck who sentenced me on a silver platter' nightmare."

"Neither," Alfred said, scrubbing a hand through his hair. He sighed and took another long drink.

"Alfred," Matt said. "Talk."

"I'm trying," He whispered. "It feels like if I say it, it'll come true."

"That's bullshit," Matt replied. "Out with it."

Alfred sighed. "You're a piss ass when you don't sleep, you know that, right?"

"I'm going to be puking chilis and tequila when I wake up. I'm allowed to be cranky." He countered. "Saint Bibiana can't do shit about it. Now, what was this nightmare?"

"I dreamt I woke up, and the world ended while I slept," Alfred said. "Russians yeet some ICBM at me, I tossed some back, the world burned."

"You've had that nightmare since the Russians dropped their first bomb."

"Yup," Alfred said. "But usually, in the dream, I cross from New York into Quebec, and you're there. A little crispier than usual, but there and mostly okay. This time..."

Matt stared at Alfred over his mug.

"This time, what?"

"This time... nothing. No survivors. No glowing zombies, no gas-masked raiders, nothing." He paused, and Matt was silent.

"No you either," Alfred said, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes and leaning into the table. "Just ash."

"Alfred," Matt said gently, softly. His brother didn't look up. "Alfred, look at me."

Watery blue eyes appeared from behind his hands. Alfred sniffed, and Matt gave him a sympathetic look. "I'm not going to die,"

"I'm stronger than you," Alfred said. "I'm stronger than everyone. If anyone would survive and be alone, it'd be me."

"So you're afraid that if you go to sleep, you'll have another nightmare about this?"

"I'm scared that if I fall asleep, I'll wake up alone." Alfred scrubbed his hair and looked on the verge of tears again. "Just me on planet earth."

"Alfred, you didn't die on me. I won't die on you, much less the entire planet."

"When the hell would I have died?"

"Does the American Civil War ring a bell?" Matt replied. "You were dead for four days after Gettysburg. But you lived."

"No one was firing nukes at Gettysburg."

"No one is firing nukes now," Matthew said. "If you're okay, I'm okay."

"Can you just... can you promise me you won't die?" Alfred said. Sometimes there was something so childlike about his mind. "Just promise you won't leave me here by myself."

"Cross my heart and hope to live, bud." Matt made the motion of the cross over his heart. He smiled. "Happy?"

Alfred nodded. "Swear to god, though, I will fucking kill you if you die before me."

"Hard same." Matt returned. "I'll set your ass on fire and make DC look like a bathroom candle if you leave me here alone."

Alfred took another sip of hot cholate and shook his head. "You're a firebug, you know that, right?"

"Well yeah, I had to settle for pyromaniac since my big brother is the one with the nuclear hellfire in his back pocket." Matt knuckled his chest and swallowed bile. "But I might be getting there. Holy shit, this is giving me heartburn."

"It's not even spicy." Alfred laughed.

"You know damn well chilli powder, and I don't get along." Matt exhaled, trying to get rid of the taste of bile in his mouth.

"Why'd you make it if you knew it'd give you heartburn?"

"I'm not the one who needed cheering up," Matt shrugged. "Hang on a second. I need antacids."

"Jesus Christ, gringo."

"Hey," Matt flung open the drawer he kept various bottles of over-the-counter pills and tablets and popped something he'd hoped would help. "That's tabernaco to you, Tex-Mex."

Alfred snorted. "Did Mari start calling you that before or after you vomited Salsa Verde all over her nice floor?"

"I put in that floor for her," Matt said. "And it was before if you must know."

"You've got too much slav in you."

"Eh," Matt countered, sitting back down, this time with a glass of water. He shoved his still-hot mug at his brother, and Alfred took it to finish it off. "Katya hasn't pegged me in a while, actually."

Alfred snorted hot chocolate so hard he choked. "Ew, dude, gross."

Matt smacked him on the shoulder. "Finish that up, and you can come huddle for warmth like we're fucken four,"

"Fucking heat-seeking missile,"

"Goddamn right."

WHITE PEOPLE REBLOG THIS ONE:

when you are in public with your black friend/friends DO NOT make jokes, or loud jokes about crime. do not yell at people when you are walking down the street, do not make jokes about robbing or stealing. YOU might be able to make those jokes by yourself, but when you are in presence of a black person, the effects can be DIRE.  

Just because one of your chicken eggs hatched a fire breathing dragon people think you’re evil. But you’re still just a regular farmer trying to make a living while dealing with an overprotective dragon, heroes that want to kill you and fanatics who want to worship you as the new Demon Lord.