You Are A Villain Famous For “killing” Heroes. In Reality, Heroes Come To You To Fake Their Deaths.

MST3K: The Phantom Planet

There’s this one scene in the book, that didn’t make it into the movie and it’s a huge shame, because it’s a fanservice straight from the author:

After that they stopped pleading. Then they took off their clothes and bathed in the river, which was shallow and clear and stony at the ford. When they had dried in the sun, which was now strong and warm, they were refreshed, if still sore and a little hungry.

- The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien

So I tried to at least make a pic of it. I’m sorry, I suck at colours, composition, perspective and having more than two characters on a pic. u__u

And if I ever mention anything even vaguely resembling something along the lines of “I want to make a huge, multi-character and colourful pic with full background!”, feel free to kick me in the head.

When the sorcerer found the dragon, it was attacking a grape.

This was only possible because the dragon was not much larger than a grape itself, but she still had to do a double take to be sure the object it was fighting with such animosity was in fact inanimate.

She crouched so that her eyes were level with the top of the table and squinted at it. The dragon sank its tiny fangs into the grape’s skin and gave a great tug, succeeding only in throwing it and the grape into a backwards tumble. The tiny green reptile rolled to a stop with its whole body wrapped around the grape and shook its head ferociously, managing to pull its teeth out but also launching the grape across the table. It gave a mighty roar of anger (about as loud as a human clearing their throat) and stalked after it, tail swishing dangerously.

“Do you need help?” she offered.

The dragon froze mid-prowl and whipped its head around to look at her, looking so offended she almost apologized for asking.

“I mean, I could peel it for you, if that’s the problem.” She wasn’t sure it was getting the message. One could never tell how much human language these little creatures picked up by hanging around the magic labs. Some understood only such essentials as “scat!” or “oh fuck, that sure did just explode”, while others could hold entire conversations — if they deigned to interact.

This one looked like it was deciding whether she was worthy. Finally, it sniffed daintily and flicked its tail, scales clacking together. “Little monster is my prey, and you can’t have it. Found it first. Will devour it!”

“Oh, sure,” she agreed. “But you know it’s a grape, right?”

This was the wrong thing to say. It glared at her and then bounded away to the other end of the table, where it slithered up to the grape and pounced on it.

Grape and dragon promptly rolled off the edge of the table.

The sorcerer quickly went around to that side, alarmed that it would be stepped on. The labs were bustling with shoppers stopping by to watch demonstrations this time of day, and a small dragon wouldn’t be easily visible on the blue and green tiled floor.

“Horrible! Dirty!” The tiny dragon was screeching at the top of its lungs, holding onto its prey for dear life. It would have been hard to hear anyway, with all the noise of the labs, but with the sorcerer’s diminished hearing it took several seconds to locate the screaming creature.

She scanned the pattern of the tiles for it and sighed. “Oh, hold on, we mopped this morning.” She cupped her hands around it and deposited it into her skirt pocket, an indignity the dragon endured only with more screaming.

“An outrage! Put me down!”

“Shh,” she advised. Lab workers were strongly discouraged from bringing creatures into the back rooms, which was where she was heading, picking her way through the crowded front lab.

“Fuck pockets!” her pocket responded.

“Oh, you can curse. Wonderful.”

The dragon seemed to take this as an actual compliment. “Am multitalented. Can also compose poetry.”

“Really? Can I hear some?”

“No. For dragon ears only.” It sounded viciously pleased to hold this over her head. The bulge in her pocket rearranged itself, and she thought it might be trying to gnaw on the grape.

She felt herself smiling even as she tried to squash her mouth into a straight line. She liked this little bad-tempered thing, even though its spiky feet were digging into her thigh.

In the much quieter kitchen of the back rooms behind the lab, she transferred the wriggling, scaly handful from her pocket to the table. The dragon hissed out a few more insults as it got up and straightened itself out, but its jaw fell open when it finally took in its surroundings. She’d set it down next to the fruit bowl.

“There you go. Food mountain.”

The dragon’s shock didn’t last long. Abandoning the grape, it scraped and scrabbled its way up the side of the bowl and from there onto an apple, its claws leaving tiny puncture marks as it hiked to the top of the arrangement. “Food mountain!” It repeated, its gleeful crowing much clearer and almost sing-song without having to compete with the noise of the crowd.

She watched it turn in a circle, surveying the feast. “But… cannot eat it all,” it observed after a while, crestfallen. “Human-sized. Big shame.”

“Don’t you have nest-mates who can help you with it?” she asked. She had assumed not, from the way it had apparently been foraging for food on its own, but she needed to be sure she’d found a loner.

“No nest. No mates. No nest-mates. You’re rude.” It flopped down ungracefully, wings spread out flat on the apple like it was trying to hug the entire much-larger fruit.

She gave it a moment to be dramatic, and then offered it the grape, minus the peel. “You seem to have a good grasp on human-speak.”

It grabbed the grape without so much as a thank you. “Yes. Have composed poetry in both Dragonese and Humanese. Not for humans to hear, though.” Bragging cheered it up a little.

“You mentioned. I can’t hear very well, anyway.” She pulled up a stool and sat down. “Actually, I’ve been looking for a helper.”

“An assistant,” it said, apparently showing off its Humanese. “An attendant. An aid.”

She watched it bury its snout in the grape, juice dribbling down onto the apple it sat on. “Yes. A hearing aid. How would you feel about having a job?”

It smiled craftily. “Would feel positively, if job comes with chocolate chips.”

“It could,” she said, grinning. She had some friends who employed bird-sized dragons as messengers, but this was the first time she’d heard of one negotiating its salary for itself. “It certainly could. What’s your name?”

“Peep,” said Peep. “It is self-explanatory.”

“Don’t worry, I got it.”

Peep expressed its doubt that humans ever got anything, but she thought the tiny, prickly creature might be warming up to her.

we found love (1/1, 19811 words) Relationship: Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield Rating: Teen Tags: Modern AU, Mafia AU of sorts, Romance, Fluff, Angst with a Happy Ending Summary: In which Bilbo meets Thorin and life takes unexpected turns. —- Hey, if y’all enjoy this fic at all, please reblog this so more people can too!

41 \o/   Hooray for old farts!

Is it “A Matter of Convenience”?

http://archiveofourown.org/works/656793

Erik manages the small store his late parents left behind and his days bleed together in a tiresome monotony until he touches the hand of loyal customer Charles Xavier. They tip-toe around each other as they struggle with mutant rights and the resurgence of gang violence in the neighborhood.

Help finding fanfic? Erik owns a shop and Charles comes in to buy ramen and a bottle of water every week, paying with exact change. The get off on the wrong foot cause Erik doesn’t know Charles is a mutant at first. Also they were in a bad part of the city I think? And Charles has a T tattooed on his neck and I believe was in Uni.

I’ve seen a lot of posts commenting on how there is no fake Star Trek fan or Trekkie, and how which series or movies you like do not determine if you can call yourself a Trek fan. They’re right, it doesn’t matter which Star Trek you like.

However, if you are the sort of Trekkie that comments on a photo of Sulu with homophobic and racist remarks, or the sort of Trekkie that makes violent threats in the general chat on Star Trek Online, or the type that writes an angry homophobic letter to an author of a licensed Star Trek book or even the type who comments on a photo of Captain Janeway with gendered slurs… You are no “real” Trekkie. Be it racism, misogyny, sexism, homophobia, transphobia or ableism, if those are the sort of values you espouse, your interests in Star Trek are superficial at best. You have missed the core values of Star Trek, from the IDIC to Starfleet’s credo. When Star Trek came on the air it instilled hope of a better future, so why are you so eager to drag us into the past?

boston gothic

- there is no grid system in boston. every street is a circle. you miss your turn and try to double back, but the asphalt is giving way to cobblestone. you can hear muskets just ahead.

- boston common always closes at 9pm. it locks from the inside.

- you walk out of mike’s pastry in the north end and the streets are deserted. there’s a rumbling beneath your feet. it smells like molasses.

- every time you crane your head to peek down the dark subway tunnel for the train, you can see two bright pinpricks of light in the distance. they’ve been there for 30 years, watching. you look away and try not to breathe.

- they’re always trying to fill the pot holes and the cracks in the sidewalks. it’s from the ice, they say. come morning, the holes always return. bigger. deeper.

- the next train will arrive in 5 minutes. days have passed; winter is setting in. the next train will arrive in 5 minutes.

- you arrive at logan airport and it’s empty. the intercom crackles, “this is the final boarding call.” no flight is specified. it’s time to go.

- the red line train pulls up, empty. you get on and it comes to a sudden halt in the tunnel. the lights go off. you hear the muffled sounds of ‘sweet caroline’ in the distance. it’s getting closer.

- the citgo sign looms above the brownstones. no matter how far you walk, it is always there. 

- you hear rustling. it’s just the turkeys, you say. you hear screams echo in harvard square. it’s just the turkeys.

The Special Ingredients…of Earth!

With its blue skies, puffy white clouds, warm beaches and abundant life, planet Earth is a pretty special place. A quick survey of the solar system reveals nothing else like it. But how special is Earth, really?

One way to find out is to look for other worlds like ours elsewhere in the galaxy. Astronomers using our Kepler Space Telescope and other observatories have been doing just that! 

In recent years they’ve been finding other planets increasingly similar to Earth, but still none that appear as hospitable as our home world. For those researchers, the search goes on.

Another group of researchers have taken on an entirely different approach. Instead of looking for Earth-like planets, they’ve been looking for Earth-like ingredients. Consider the following:

Our planet is rich in elements such as carbon, oxygen, iron, magnesium, silicon and sulfur…the stuff of rocks, air, oceans and life. Are these elements widespread elsewhere in the universe? 

To find out, a team of astronomers led by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), with our participation, used Suzaku. This Japanese X-ray satellite was used to survey a cluster of galaxies located in the direction of the constellation Virgo.

The Virgo cluster is a massive swarm of more than 2,000 galaxies, many similar in appearance to our own Milky Way, located about 54 million light years away. The space between the member galaxies is filled with a diffuse gas, so hot that it glows in X-rays. Instruments onboard Suzaku were able to look at that gas and determine which elements it’s made of.

Reporting their findings in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, they reported findings of iron, magnesium, silicon and sulfur throughout the Virgo galaxy cluster. The elemental ratios are constant throughout the entire volume of the cluster, and roughly consistent with the composition of the sun and most of the stars in our own galaxy.

When the Universe was born in the Big Bang 13.8 billon years ago, elements heavier than carbon were rare. These elements are present today, mainly because of supernova explosions. 

Massive stars cook elements such as, carbon, oxygen, iron, magnesium, silicon and sulfur in their hot cores and then spew them far and wide when the stars explode.

According to the observations of Suzaku, the ingredients for making sun-like stars and Earth-like planets have been scattered far and wide by these explosions. Indeed, they appear to be widespread in the cosmos. The elements so important to life on Earth are available on average and in similar relative proportions throughout the bulk of the universe. In other words, the chemical requirements for life are common.

Earth is still special, but according to Suzaku, there might be other special places too. Suzaku recently completed its highly successful mission.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

I spend lots of time at Dank Millet.  I only wish I got off at Queer Parrots.

Anagram map of the MBTA