Hi, I'm Onyx, mid 30s, She/They, a disabled trans writer, miniature painter, and table top game enjoyer. none of my creative work will be on this webbed site due to fears of AI mining. Go to onuaryder.monster if you want to sample my work. :3
if you told diogenes the cynic about being trans he'd be like "lol that's a sick troll you're epic" and you'd be like "diogenes no i'm serious" and he'd be like "lol that's even better lmao those guys are so mad about it" and then he'd start going by new original neopronouns every single day specifically to piss off the whole symposium
I just had an idea for a really dumb comedy sketch where a transphobe starts ranting about what really makes a women a woman, and diogenes returns each time with a different cis woman or outwardly femme intersex person that doesn't meet the criteria saying "behold, a man!"
"a woman has XX chromosomes"
*Diogenes with an androgen insensitive XY cis woman*: behold, a man!
"Nono, a woman can bear children!"
*Diogenes with someone who has medical complications associated with pregnancy*: "behold, a man!"
"nono, a woman produces the large gamete"
*Diogenes with a postmenopausal cis woman* "behold, a man!"
Some said no one was left who could remember how the world had fallen under darkness, but that wasn't quite true.
“Can anybody hear me?”
It was true that the older generation, the generation that had witnessed the City's rise to greatness and subsequent fall, was dying off before its time. Many had perished in violence, cut down by the robots for daring to speak their dissatisfaction with Dr. Wily's totalitarian rule. But even those who supported the Good Doctor's rise to power weren't exempt from an early grave, nor were those that didn't care about all that political stuff and just wanted to live simple lives and keep their heads down. Some died quietly, years of laboring in the robot factories and breathing the thick polluted air taking their toll. Some were imprisoned or put to death for even minor offenses. Others were simply caught in the crossfire as Dr. Wily's elite soldiers, the robot masters, enforced peace and control, and, most importantly of all, safety.
“If you can hear me sending out this message, please, help me.”
Some of those still surviving passed down the story of a hero who had fought the robot masters, but who fell in battle when no one would stand at his side. For years, these tall tales were assumed to be nothing more, and it seemed the hero would pass into legend and slowly be forgotten.
“They have me surrounded. I'm holed up in the apartment building next to the old donut shop on 44th street, in West District 78. They-- They've killed my commanding officer and the rest of my regiment. I'm the only one left.”
Then another hero rose. The Man in Blue. The Blue Bomber. The Mega Man.
“I've fought them off as long as I can.”
Once again, humanity cried out for a hero to save them. Once again, they would not fight alongside him.
“Please, somebody, anybody. I need reinforcements.”
The Man in Blue did not fall in battle, but turned his back on the City, walking into the Wastelands to the west. The robot masters, along with the lesser machines they controlled, marched on the crowd, slaughtering thousands.
“I can hear the Sniper JOEs marching through the building. Breaking down doors and making their way upstairs, taking their sweet time. And– and there's a robot master. I saw it down on the street, just watching, just… waiting. I– I don't know if it saw me, but I think they know where I am. Please...”
The Man in Blue was never seen again.
“I can hear them getting close. This is my last message. Please, if anyone can hear me. Send help.”
Five years after the Mega Man's disappearance, the younger generation began to take up arms. To fight back. To pull the City out of the clutches of the robot masters and their ruler. All in hopes that, someday, the Man in Blue would see they were finally ready to stand. And in hopes that, maybe, someday, he would return.
“This is codename Bass, Chamethrawer Squadron, signing out.”
The resistance soldier known as Bass, a young man dressed in gray and denim, stared at his handheld radio for a minute. “Well, crap. Still no answer. What was I expecting?” It was worth a try, but he’d known all along that reinforcements weren't coming. All he could do was hang on to his trusty chamethrawer-- a combination chainsaw-flamethrower, one of the anti-robot weapons of the human resistance-- and await the inevitable. His chamethrawer, his last remaining ally, was painted purple and neon yellow, with a treble clef roughly engraved on the side. Carefully, he peered out the dilapidated room's lone window once again. “What– two?” he gasped before pulling away from the window and pressing his back against the wall. “Two of 'em? Two robot masters?!”
The robot masters controlled the lesser robots, like the JOE units that were now looking for Bass. Unlike the mass-produced JOE-unit footsoldiers, which could carry out simple directives like patrol this city block or capture this target or search this dilapidated building for any remaining survivors, the robot masters were intelligent and capable of higher reasoning. Of plotting, planning, and strategizing. They were combatants, too; they were Wily’s elite enforcers, stronger than perhaps a hundred of the mass-produced lesser machines they commanded, each one specializing in a different type of combat. Some were fast and agile, some were slow and sturdy; some were the size of an average human, some had been built as tall as ten feet; some used conventional weaponry, some were armed with fire or electricity or other such tools of destruction. None of them really needed their weapons to defeat a lone human, and each could easily kill with their bare hands. These deadly machines had patrolled the City for decades, far longer than Bass had been alive.
Before sending his plea for help, Bass had seen the shorter of the two robot masters, the one wearing the heavy, dark blue cloak despite the early summer season. The cold one. The cloak’s hood hid the robot’s face from view, but Bass knew it; everyone had seen the robot masters’ faces plastered on propaganda posters throughout the City. This one, unit DRN-005, Ice Man, had a visage like a mechanical skull, with deep-set, unblinking, round spotlights for eyes. No nose or mouth, only a series of slits that emitted fog in a constant stream like an exhaust pipe, rather than in rhythm like a breath. Now, on a second glance, Base had seen the other one, the taller and slimmer one clothed in black leather and blood red. The fast one. Unit DWN-012, Quick Man, wore a crimson helmet with a dark visor and a gold, boomerang-shaped ornament on the front, but Bass knew underneath that helmet was a closer approximation to a human. The kind of flexible, emoting face that was common among the newer models, the kind of face that was meant to be familiar and approachable, but, with its shining blue-white eyes and slightly imperfect animation, was a more mocking imitation of humanity than the other robot’s glaring metal skull.
Two robot masters. Fighting off just one of them would be nigh impossible, and there were two. Even escaping the two of them and the JOE units they commanded would be nothing short of a miracle.
With a hard swallow, Bass thought it over. Two robot masters, sure. Two impossible opponents that he couldn’t possibly hope to fight off. But they were still outside on the street. Just standing there, waiting. They weren’t inside the building. The only robots inside the building with him were the JOE units, and he’d fought those before. If his chamethrawer had enough fuel, and if he could make his way out without getting overrun, and if the JOE units didn’t immediately summon their masters to come join the fray– then maybe, just maybe, he might get his miracle after all.
Bass pressed his ear to the door, listening. Quiet. Just a minute before, he knew he'd heard the JOE units marching his way, but now, he heard nothing but his own heavy breath. His tongue darted over his dry lips, tasting the bitter, nervous sweat just above them. He’d been sure they knew exactly where he was, but maybe he was wrong, and they had moved on to another floor. Maybe this moment of quiet was his opportunity to escape. After wiping the sweat from his palm, he unlocked the door, turning the knob slowly and silently, then barely cracked the door and peered into the hallway.
Empty.
Bass released his breath in a slow exhale.
With the crash of a shattering window behind him, all hope for a miracle faded. Bass spun around, panting. It was the fast one, the quickdraw. Its reputation preceded it, yet Bass stared dumbfounded at the robot that seemed to move faster than the speed of thought. Quick Man had just flung itself through the window, the glittering shards of glass barely hitting the floor before the machine had sprung to its feet and drawn a weapon. And now, with his mind catching up to what he’d just seen, Bass found himself staring down the barrel of a revolver in Quick Man’s gloved hand. The helmet and dark visor hid most of the robot’s face, but an opening on the front left visible a self-confident smirk.
No miracle, no escape, and no point in staring with mouth agape. Bass put on his fiercest scowl and, without taking his eyes off the robot, fumbled around for the chamethrawer’s start cord with shaking hands.
In a soft, breathy voice that carried neither softness nor breath, Quick Man said, “Good evening, Mr. Bass.”
“It's not Bass like the fish, rust-nuts,” he growled, tugging at the cord. “It's Bass like a bass guitar.”
With a chuckle and a shrug, Quick Man said, “I don't care. Put the weapon down, Mr. Bass. You're going to have to come with me.”
“Huh--” Bass paused for just a second. He was being apprehended? He… could still get out of this alive? No, no way, he thought. Surely being taken alive, for forced labor, interrogation and torture, robot combat testing, or who knows what else, would be worse than dying here. “No way. I'm not going anywhere with you, you– you bucket of bolts.”
“Ooh, clever insult, I've certainly never heard that one before,” Quick Man said with a mocking, lilting tone. “Listen, Mr. Bass, my objective is to bring you in as alive and undamaged as possible. So why don't you make this easy on both of us? Just put down the weapon and come along quietly. It's not like there's anyone left here to see you surrender, so you can quit pretending to be a big brave boy and leave with both your 'honor' and your body intact.”
Bass swallowed hard, squinting away tears in his eyes. There really was no one left. He didn’t know why they’d left him alive, but everyone else was dead. With a snarl, he pulled the cord one more time, and the chamethrawer finally roared to life. “Go to hell, you chunk of scrap! If I'm going down, I'm taking you with me!”
The cocky expression fell from Quick Man's face as the chamethrawer's flame flared, heating the spinning chain to red-hot. Bass swung the weapon above his head with a cry of rage. But before he could bring it down, the door behind him burst open, and searing, blistering cold tore through his arms. Screaming in pain and shock, Bass stumbled and collapsed, his head slamming into a nearby wall. His weapon’s chain snapped in the cold, leaving the chamethrawer useless and frozen to his hands. As Bass slid to the floor, Quick Man glared at the attacker, lips pursed in tightly contained fury.
Withdrawing an outstretched hand back into his heavy blue cloak, Ice Man simply said, “You're welcome.”
Quick scoffed. “For what?! I had the situation under control!”
“That's not how it looked to me.” Unlike Quick’s, Ice Man’s voice sounded very synthetic, and as cold as the fog that poured from his face.
“My gun was on him!” In frustration, Quick tore his helmet off and flung it to the ground, revealing slicked-back red hair and a grimace on his almost-human face. He stomped over to Ice Man and thrust a pointed finger toward him. “I had him. If you had just given me another minute, I could have taken him in with minimal damage. Now look at him! Look at what you've done to his hands!”
“He's alive, so the objective is complete,” Ice Man said, turning toward the door. “Make yourself useful and restrain him. I'll send some JOE units for the retrieval.”
Between the dizziness and pain and the sound of his own blood rushing in his ears, Bass barely heard any of their exchange. He hardly reacted with more than a cough when Quick Man, in annoyance, kicked him in the gut. As the robot restrained his hands with zip-tie cuffs, he thought, I can’t feel them, just before the world faded to black.
Just gonna copy over propaganda from the Mari poll, don't mind me. Facts about Spanks Sinatra:
-Calls himself a lesbian himbo but is in fact his crew's sole braincell/fourth wheel; any time he's not around to keep the car on the road, they invariably go careening off a cliff and more often than not need him to come to the rescue. Of course this doesn't mean he still doesn't act often without thinking of the consequences for himself:
-Is a bounty hunter who refuses to carry a gun, calling them "loud and impersonal". He solves problems with fists and fists alone. This includes attempting to punch out a plant:
-As a mechanic of SEE YOU, SPACE COWBOY... (the game), every character has an inciting debt they need to pay off or a regret they need to atone for to complete their character arc. For the others this manifests as things like owing a debt to the mob, seeking to clear their name for a crime they were unjustly accused of, or needing to pay back school loans. Spanks' debt is to himself, in that he needs to find a way to learn to care about anything and restore his life from being nothing but a howling emotionless void. Which he ultimately does... by adopting a cat. Who he liberates from working as the receptionist for an evil interplanetary megacorporation:
This fixes all of his problems, except that now he owes a debt for the staggering amount of money he spends on cat food and toys.
For those who aren't aware, there was a historic one-day metal festival in Birmingham this past weekend. The birthplace of Heavy Metal. It was the farewell show for Ozzy Osbourne, because he has Parkinson's and doesn't seem like he'll be around long. Hell, he was barely able to perform nine songs across two sets, from what it's done to him, and he stood for 0% of the show.
He's been out of commission for six years. I've already seen people joking about how "this is his last show until the next one" like.... C'mon. That's just heartless at this point.
An entire genre of music exists because of him and his bands. If not for Ozzy's work in Black Sabbath with Tony Iommi's guitar innovations, the genre simply would not exist as it is today.
They started as a blues band. Then Tony quit his factory job to play in the band full time, and on his very last shift... A machinery accident cut off the tips of two of his fingers on his fretting hand. But he was so determined to keep playing, that he made himself prosthetics out of bottle caps, used extra thin strings, and tuned down his guitar, which all combined with Ozzy's wailing vocals to create the sound of heavy metal.
Heavy Metal legends turned out to this festival to play 3-5 songs each, everyone including a cover of an Ozzy or Sabbath song, in honor of the man.
Launching crowdfunding to get these bad boys made up as pure metal die-cast pins. The dark areas will be recessed, creating a stylish, classy design.
Sigil for a mysterious cryptid rescue agency! If you want to help the Department of Supernatural Conservation, and get a nifty pin in the process, send $15 to this ko-fi https://bsky.app/profile/hellbreakfast.bsky.social/post/3limzazxwtc2l with a note saying what it's for, and the best way to get in touch with you.
I will be making a public trello to track backers, for full transparency, and updating everyone on their orders.
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