#when i win

[toastdragon01]

wanted to draw pen today C:

[katkm53]

CHOTINER: Recently, RISE has been the subject of public scrutiny due to its connection with IPL 64 semifinalist Aracely Sosa. Would you be able to shed some light on her involvement with your clinic?

MOTHER: There is no involvement. Aracely Sosa is not a member of RISE.

CHOTINER: During the group stage of the tournament, she was seen wearing a pendant in the shape of the RISE logo. It's visible on camera.

MOTHER: Cely interned at our clinic when it first opened two years ago. Clearly, she must have found her time with us quite rewarding. But competing at the professional level necessitates both a schedule and a mentality generally incompatible with the services we offer. She has not returned to us since that spring.

CHOTINER: But you were aware that a former member of RISE was competing at IPL 64?

MOTHER: I do not concern myself with the IPL.

CHOTINER: Yet it concerns itself with you. Gladion Mohn, Sosa's opponent in the quarterfinals, was the one who sparked this discussion in the first place. What of his involvement with you?

MOTHER: There is no involvement. That boy has never stepped foot in our facilities.

CHOTINER: So you're suggesting that two of this year's Top 8 have independently formed strong contrasting opinions on RISE from afar?

MOTHER: [Enough of these inane questions. I am not one to be brought to heel by the blithely sneering contempt of the uncomprehending. They are but children; children are all that is left. They will never know what it means to evolve. To RISE.]

CHOTINER: Okay.

[nightpool]

got any thoughts on when i win the world ends now that its over?

got distracted and lost my SECOND attempt at answering this ask bc the tumblr mobile app STILL doesn't save ask drafts. hate this stupid app.

anyway, really enjoyed the ending. wasn't as blown away by it as I was by, e.g. Fargo's ending but I definitely think an understated approach worked better for the thematics of the story. wish i had more time in Cely's world though. need a million words about toril and cely's idyllic domestic bliss. need a different million words about the secret underground wars the IPL gets up to.

on that note, it reminded me a lot of Consider Phlebas. Which isn't any surprise, given the subject matter. and Player of Games! Banks has his hands all over this fanfic, doesn't he. kind of surprised I never noticed the connection before, but this is exactly the kind of ending a Culture novel would have.

really sad we never really got to figure out what's going on in Red's head of his. maybe i should go back over the story with a fine-tooth comb and see if I can figure out what that means. but it does feel more realistic that way—sometimes there's just always a bigger fish. If I had one complaint, i guess its that the world felt a little small for the stakes we were supposedly playing in. like, it's realistic to the small circles of top level esports but feels a little weird for the amount of Geopolitical Weight that we're told hangs on pokebattling. but I guess that's intentional like, the world *should* feel hollow for the thematics to work. there's an argument to be made that the whole thing could have been set at Kanto regional finals or whatever and left open a larger world.... idk. I'm still really curious about Lachlan's demographics arguments.... does it just boil down to something mundane like "money & proximity to the imperial core brings talent and training"?

The story works best for me, I guess, as an argument against Narrativization. Everybody in the story has their own little Narratives, their own little storylines they're selling or ways to make sense of what the world means. Cely committed suicide because she didn't have a narrative, she found one, but it ended up dropping out from underneath her. Mean reversion. Eventually, for everybody in the story, reality intrudes. So it doesn't really matter whether Cely's powers sent Toril or not—it's not part of her narrative anymore. she's learned to move beyond it in order to live—just living day to day without having to Narrativize her life to the same exent. Or at least the story wants us to think so!

[theothin]

Aracely's winsome smile never faded. She never stooped for the microphone, but always waited for Fiorella to lift it to her lips. "Go ahead, doubt me. I can already hear Bill Masaki saying I played sloppy. Hii-i Bill!" Her fingers wiggled as she waved. "I hope to see real juicy comments online tonight too. You guys at home better be dropping your hottest takes. I'll be so disappointed if you've gone quiet already!"

doesn't matter if they hate you if they all say your name

[mzcain27]

I’m gonna start fighting billionaires, if I win I get their money

[nightpool]

The next genre Bavitz should tackle has to be worm fic, right? that's the logical progression here?

[theothin]

Lynette's arm suddenly detached from the rest of her and fell splattering to the ground. Lynette fell back howling, rolling in the snow, clutching her stump with the other arm, eyes shut tight in pain.

huh, same thing that happened to toril

also occurs to me to wonder if lynette is another character who got her name from berwick saga. the timeline fits

[theothin]

He hit his target, bounced back, and landed with aplomb. Under the sky's black gyre he extended his arms. Zapdos remained where it was, unmoving. But the holoscreen showed its health at 0. A voice in the communicator intoned: "Our biometric indicators deem Zapdos no longer fit to fight without serious risk of permanent harm. It is considered fainted for the purposes of this battle." Cely laughed. How could their biometric indicators possibly read this creature nobody ever knew? But Red accepted the conclusion. He held out a Poké Ball and pulled Zapdos into it with a beam of light.

"fine, you can field your damn god, but we're capping it at 1% of its actual endurance capability"