#2450 b.c. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

basketonthedoorstepofthefbi · 2 months

Text

Shaking (Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader)

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

Summary: You have an anxiety attack in a public setting, but luckily, the doctor is there to help you through it.

Word Count: 2450

Warnings: Anxiety attack, mild cursing, mostly just ANGST and then comforting FLUFF

A/N: Wanted to write Spence comforting the reader during a panic attack. Fanfiction is better than therapy, right? At least, it’s cheaper! Also not my GIF

——

“You don’t want to just order it online?” Spencer asked as you walked beside him down the sidewalk. His longer legs would typically mean that he’d be several steps ahead of you, but he always slowed his pace so you wouldn’t have to strain to keep up with him. He also walked on the outside of the path because, let’s face it, he was a gentleman.

You shook your head. “No, I want the whole experience,” you said excitedly as you walked, your face lighting up in anticipation. You were on your way towards a local bookstore, where the third book in your favorite series was being released today. The bookstore was going to be packed, but you were so excited to be one of the first ones in the door, to get your hands on a physical copy. “I don’t ever do things like this, but it’ll be something I think about every time I look at the book sitting on my shelf.”

Spencer nodded, lifting his hand, his thumb and forefinger in an O-shape as he spoke. “Ah, the age-old concept of symbolic treasures. One of the main reasons why souvenirs are such a prevalent part of going on vacation. Did you know the tradition dates back to Ancient Egypt?”

You shook your head as you continued to walk with him. Your boyfriend carried on without fault. “As far back as 2200 B.C, Egyptian Prince Harkhuf traveled to what is now known as Sudan and returned with all sorts of objects to present to his father, the pharaoh,” Spencer explained. His words spat out quickly, compulsively, as though they had to exit his encyclopedic brain. “He brought back items such as incense, ivory, even the skins of leopards to show off to his father.”

“I had no idea,” you told Spencer as you neared the bookstore, smiling sideways at him. You loved it when he spouted off facts like that, like he had to get the information out or else he’d explode. He had confessed to you more than once before that most people found it weird or off-putting or even annoying, but not you. Rather, you loved learning new things. Whatever information he had to share with you was always relevant in one way or another, and it was just one of the reasons why you loved spending time with him - he made you a more knowledgeable, well-rounded person.

Before either of you could say much else, you’d reached the back of the line of the bookstore. You checked the time on your phone. The store would open in about fifteen minutes. The line stretched down at least a full block, from what you could see. Lots of people dressed like characters from the books, shuffling their feet in excited anticipation.

There were at least a hundred people in the line, and after a minute or two, a couple dozen more had filed in behind where you stood. You pursed your lips for a moment, scanning the crowd until your eyes met Spencer’s.

“What’s wrong?” He asked, inclining his head to the side.

You shook your head. “Nothing,” you said. “Just… lot of people.”

Spencer nodded understandingly, then reached down to take your hand. Your fingers twined with his and he squeezed his palm against yours. “I’m right here,” he reminded you. You didn’t love crowds. They always made you feel anxious, perhaps even a little claustrophobic. You and Spencer had gone to a fairly crowded French film festival a few months ago and there hadn’t been an organized line to enter; rather, it had been a cluster of people, all pressed together. And you had felt like you couldn’t breathe. Spencer’d had to pull you to a seat off to the side so you could catch your breath, and you’d missed getting a seat up front like you’d been hoping for.

Right now, you were okay, though. There were people in front of you and behind you, but they weren’t flush against you like they had been waiting for the film festival to open. And Spencer was holding your hand, and you were outside, with the cool, spring morning breeze hitting your face. It was fine. You were going to be fine. You inhaled deeply and exhaled, then nodded your head, feeling the anxiety dissipate. “I’m good,” you told Spencer, looking up at him.

Spencer nodded. He squeezed your hand once again before letting go, only so he could wrap his arm around your shoulders and tug you so you leaned against his chest. He kissed the top of your hair. “It’s going to be just fine,” he promised you, and you just smiled to yourself.

About ten minutes later, the store opened. You only knew that because the line started moving, and more quickly than you thought. You squealed in delight and matched the pace of the people in front of you, Spencer by your side with an amused grin on his face. He loved books just as much as you did, if not more, but this outing was definitely just for you. He’d read the other preceding books in this series (literally just because you asked him to and it took him an hour, tops), but he wasn’t a total geek for it like you were.

You finally made it inside the bookstore, a small business, a local place. You’d been inside several times before, but you hadn’t realized just how small the building actually was until you stepped in now. It was two stories, but everyone was tightly packed, with the people and the bookshelves crowding around you as you made it fully inside the store. There was even a line to go up to the second floor, like a queue at an amusement park.

There was little to no breathing room. Everyone was talking as they waited their turn to grab a copy of the new book, and the sound seemed to bounce off the walls and the ceiling and smack you right in the ear. The air felt thick despite the front door and handful of windows being opened, allowing the cool spring breeze to ruffle the pages of the paperbacks on display.

But it wasn’t refreshing. Rather, it was another stimulant that caused the neurons in your brain to fire even faster. You felt your palms get slick. You felt your heart start to pound, and your knees wobble as you shuffled forward in the line. What were you even waiting in line for? You momentarily forgot, blinking a few times before looking up at the man beside you. Spencer was engrossed in looking around the bookstore, the corners of his mouth quirking upward as he seemed to find something amusing. But when his eyes came full circle back to you, they were immediately filled with concern. “Y/N?” He asked softly, placing a hand on your shoulder.

You couldn’t even hear him. The sound of his voice just bounced off your brain, like you were trapped inside of cellophane. All you could think was trapped. I’m trapped. No way out. Stuck. Caged. Can’t breathe. Can’t breathe.

You felt your breathing go heavy, and your eyes fill up with tears. Your cheeks were red, bright red, judging from how hot you suddenly felt. “Leave,” you managed to choke out, your voice coming out from your throat. It felt like your throat was lined with thorns, like the words you wanted to say kept getting caught.

Spencer nodded. “Leave? Yeah. Yeah, baby, we can leave,” Spencer grabbed your hand, tugging you along behind him as he murmured “excuse me, pardon me,” to the other patrons, to get through the crowd. Moving against the crowd was so much worse than standing still. All those eyes on you, seeing your red face and the anxious tears trickling down your cheeks. It was so embarrassing, freaking out like this is such a public space. Everyone thinks I’m a freak, you thought. Your anxiety became not about the crowd, but about your anxiety, about how you were being perceived. Your breathing picked up, quickened, and by the time Spencer led you out into the morning sun, you were fully hyperventilating.

The thoughts in your head were racing at the speed of light. You hated feeling nervous like this, but moreover, you hated that Spencer had to take care of you because of it. You felt like you had ruined the day because your head wasn’t on straight, because you couldn’t stand in a crowd of people and hear the cacophony of voices and tamp down your panic.

Spencer led you down the block, about twenty feet from the store, away from the crowd, and your breath was still coming out staccato, unstable as you looked down at your shaking hands. You were crying and hyperventilating and the whole world felt like it was spinning. Spencer kept his hold on your hand and stood in front of you, squeezing his palm against yours. His eyes, those light brown irises with little flecks of green, stared into yours. “Hey, Y/N,” he said, bending his knees so his face was level with yours. “Breathe with me, okay?”

You shook your head, your eyes clamping shut. You were so mad at yourself in that moment. You didn’t want to have Spencer take care of you, to have to drag you out of a bookstore because you were having a panic attack. “Baby, you’re trembling,” you heard Spencer’s voice laced with concern. “Look at me. We’ll get through this together.”

You opened your eyes slowly, and that’s when you realized your entire body was shaking. You looked into Spencer’s eyes and he released your hand so he could cup your face. His fingers anchored under your jaw, his thumbs rested on your cheeks, and his eyes were wide, full of worry, but his voice managed to stay soothing and calm. “Follow my breath, Y/N. Do what I’m doing, okay? In for four, hold for four, out for four.”

He inhaled for 4 seconds, and you tried to follow his lead, but you just couldn’t control your lungs. “It’s okay,” he assured you as your brows furrowed, presenting frustration. “C’mon, try again.” He inhaled for 4 seconds, and you managed to match him this time. “Hold for four,” you held your breath while Spencer counted. “And out for four,” you exhaled deeply. “Good, okay, let’s do it again.”

Spencer guided your breath for a few minutes, until you finally felt like you could do it on your own. And when you finally felt yourself coming down from the rush of panic that had sent you into fight-or-flight, you wiped at your wet eyes. “I’m sorry,” you croaked, and Spencer just shook his head.

“No,” he insisted, taking your hand and placing it on his heart. You could feel it beating through his long-sleeved t-shirt. “No, you don’t have to be sorry.” You rubbed your hand against his chest, finding it comforting as you hung your head. “Baby, look at me,” he requested, and you met his eyes.

“Please don’t ever apologize for having an anxiety attack, okay? For one thing, it’s not your fault. You can’t control the chemicals and waves in your brain and how your body reacts to situations,” Spencer began, his hand on top of yours that rested on his chest. You nodded, using the heel of your free hand to wipe away your tears. The crying was over, you were fairly certain, but god, did this suck. “You also should never feel ashamed for having a panic attack, Y/N. It happened, and we’re working through it. It’s a lot like boiling a pot of water, isn’t it?”

You let out a garbled sounding laugh and your brows furrowed. “How so?” You stammered out.

“Well, you set the pot of water on the stove, right?” Spencer began, and you nodded. “And then when it starts to bubble, that’s your anxiety. Some sort of external stimulant - the stove, or, in your case, the overwhelming feeling of being in a crowd - is causing the water to bubble. And when the external stimulant increases in intensity, so too does your anxiety. And sometimes, yeah, the pot boils over.” Spencer shrugged like it was no big deal. “But then you just turn the stove off, grab a dishtowel, and clean up the mess. Problem solved.”

You cracked a half-hearted smile. “So in this metaphor, you’re a dishtowel?” You asked, curling your fingers around the fabric of his shirt.

“Technically, I think it’s a simile, but yes,” Spencer grinned as he looked in your eyes.

“But the book,” you sighed, looking back at the bookstore, which was still filtering people in and out slowly. The patrons leaving the store clutched their new copies of the book in their hands, grinning and taking pictures with their phones, laughing with their friends excitedly.

“Do you want to get back in line and try again?” Spencer asked, and you bit your cheek pensively.

“I don’t think so,” you said softly, defeatedly.

“That’s okay,” Spencer said. You loved that he wasn’t coddling you, he was just feeling it out, seeing what you were up for. “Do you want to get brunch somewhere and come back? Maybe the line will have died down by then?”

You nodded, your lips curling into a small smile. “Yeah,” you agreed. You realized your hand was still over his heart, rubbing at his chest. Your movement halted and you retracted your hand, but before your arm could fall completely at your side, Spencer scooped your hand up and kissed the back of your palm. “What if we come back and they’ve sold out of the book, though?” You asked as Spencer walked with you in the direction of one of your favorite brunch places, just a short walk from the bookstore.

“There are twenty-two independent bookstores in the D.C. metropolitan area alone,” Spencer rattled off. “If this one doesn’t have it, we’ll drive around until we find one that does.”

“What article did you read that told you how many bookstores were in D.C?” You asked. You often liked to challenge him by asking him to cite his sources.

“No article. I did a search on Google Maps last night,” Spencer explained.

“What, because you knew I’d freak out when we walked into this one?” You asked him.

Spencer shook his head. “No, just wanted to have a contingency plan in case our first stop sold out before we got there.”

“Always thinking ahead, huh, Boy Wonder?”

“Damn straight.” A smirk formed across Spencer’s lips.

You shook your head. “You’re the best dishtowel a girl could ask for.”

#spencer reid x fem!reader #criminal minds #spencer reid #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x y/n #basketonthedoorstepofthefbi #criminal minds spencer reid #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid x you #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fanfics #spencer reid angst #spencer reid fluff

488 notes · View notes

definitelynotamhafan · 8 months

Text

Shadows of the Sun (Fear pt.1)

Egypt 2450 B.C.

The sand-filled wind whipped across your face as your eyes settled on the burning sun. Or what was…. Left of it. Your grip on your whip tightened. A black shadow loomed over the sun. Today was the day, the day you got revenge.

The sky was a blood red, turning the sand a dark smoky color. No clouds were in the sky. Just the heat, which left a sour pang on your forked tongue. The only thing lighting up this hellish landscape, was the thin ringlet which tried its best to escape the shadow of the moon.

The wind blew through your hair, whispering sweet revengeful sins to your ears. Sweat was glistening down your spine. You weren’t tired, despite the fact that you had traveled the world in the past century like death would come for you if you didn’t. You were panting, but you weren’t exhausted at all. On the contrary. A feeling of calm was swirling in your soul. You were home. After all this time. And the Eclipse came with you.

Your hound, Ankh, let out a huff.

“Let’s go pay a visit, shall we?” You asked, patting his side.

You jumped on his back, no saddle needed. Your whip cracked in the air, bringing shadows on the sand. The whip hit the sand, raising a cloud of dust, and creating a path of darkness wherever your hound stepped.

You sped through the dunes, your eyes twinkling with a dark red. You knew what was coming. And you weren’t going to stop it.

Temple of the Gods

Ra sat on her throne, her eyes glued to the omen before her. An Eclipse? What did it mean? In the middle of the harvest moon, nonetheless. Was it…? No. It simply couldn’t be. Or…. Could it?

Bastet was biting on her thumb nervously, trying to figure out a way to bring moisture back. It was like the rivers had all ran out of water. The drought was already a problem, and now, with no sun to light the already dying crops?!

Osiris, the disgusting green pea-looking bastard, was somehow concerned as well. Not even a century ago, he allowed one of the most dangerous gods and creatures of chaos to escape. Now, there was a possibility they returned, and he still hadn’t faced a punishment.

Horus, who had been one of the few to see your face, was looking at the sky in shock. His mind was blank. No thoughts. No words to be said. Nothing.

Tefnut’s brows were knitted together, and Geb’s hand rested on her shoulder. Something was off.

The air was thick with tension. Almost as if you would be breathing shards of glass, cutting through your lungs and choking you with every breath.

Isis was looking at Ra, expectantly. Just what was going on through the Sun goddess’s mind?! What did this omen mean? Was Ra weakened by the moon? What was going on?

Maat cleared her throat. “May the congregation begin!” She paused a little. “As you all know…. Not even a century ago, the feared Amheh escaped the confines of the underworld. They wreaked havoc all over Egypt, and the sacred lands. Any objections so far?” She asked, looking around the courtroom.

The gods kept silent.

“Then we continue.” Maat spoke again. “Amheh, god of darkness and shadows, is also accused of leaving us in a time of need-“

God, Maat’s words couldn’t be more boring at this point. Ra could swear she already felt part of her brain die. Just get on with it, Maat, what’s taking you so long?

Suddenly the gates of the temple swung open.

You, your hair blowing in the wind, whip in hand and hound by your side, eyed the gods in the temple, who were looking at you in a mix of confusion, fear, and awe.

“So… What did I miss?” You asked, raising an eyebrow, a smirk playing at your lips.

(YAYYYY IM BACK! Thank you so much to those who asked me to make a sequel- honestly I didn’t think I had it in me to continue, but I hope you’re happy with the result! I plan on continuing this with at least 2-3 more parts, and I’ll post as quickly as I can. Any ideas on what to center them on, or what to add are more than welcome!)

#egyptian gods #ennead manhwa #ennead mojito #ennead seth #fanfic #fanfiction #x reader #seth ennead

74 notes · View notes

yes-lana · 3 years

Text

An Old Kingdom limestone statue of a scribe named Kai, from his tomb at Saqqara, ca. 2450 B.C. (The Louvre)

The most outstanding feature of the statue is that retain their lifelike inlaid eyes of crystal which stunned the Egyptian workmen who first opened the tomb and saw them staring out. In the torch light of the dark tomb they looked alive. The workmen fled in terror.

The rock crystal used for the eyes was a blue-violate color.

These early lenses appear fully formed about 2600-2575 BC at Meidum in the famous statues of Rahotep and his wife Nofret and reappear sporadically in small statuary throughout the Fourth and Fifth Dynasties. The peak of development of these lenses was reached circa 2475 BC. The last Old Kingdom example being that of Mitri. Another Fifth Dynasty statue, that of the funerary Priest Kaemked, had eye structures where the rock crystal lenses were replaced with obsidian, a dark volcanic glass. In the Sixth Dynasty, there are no known examples of these eye structures. These elegant lenses/eyes then reappeared in a single example in the First Intermediate period, the statue of King Hor found at Saqqara, circa 1750 BC.

Note the intensity of the blue eyes.

The composition of these eyes is a lens of polished rock crystal (either alpha silica or fused silica, formerly known as crystalline quartz and fused quartz which had a convex front surface and a near hemispherical concave ground pupil surface in a flat iris plane (normally covered with resin) at the rear of the lens. The white of the eye (the sclera) was carved/ground in white limestone, cloudy or translucent quartz, or marble, some of the latter contained impurities which simulate the conjunctive capillaries of the eye. These are set into the statue in copper (early forms) or bronze (late form) structures which simulate painted eyelids. they are said to sweep back to form a retina-like surface. Resins sometimes partially or fully obscure the pupillary aperture. This type of eye structure is known as a form of “schematic eye”. The structures of these eyes indicate at a minimum a very advanced understanding of the anatomy of the eye for that time.

Source: The lecture based on research Dr. Enoch undertook at the Louvre on the famous seated scribe statue (E-3023) and a “reserve eye” from Saqqara (E-3009) from their collections along with other observations made on pieces found at the Louvre and the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

3 notes · View notes

arthistoryfeed · 4 years

Photo

Bearded Bull’s Head. Date- 2600–2450 B.C. Culture-Near Eastern, Mesopotamian, Sumerian Period-Early Dynastic III period (2600–2450 B.C.) Medium: copper with lapis lazuli and shell inlay. https://www.instagram.com/p/CEpTgbelC-I/?igshid=nndkuo8njjfk

62 notes · View notes

madamlaydebug · 5 years

Text

TELLING TIME IN ANCIENT KEMET:

A hallmark of almost every known culture is some system to track the passing of time. It is thought that, like most agricultural societies, the ancient Egyptians originally organized their calendar according to the cycles of the moon and the agricultural seasons (30.4.2). Most scholars agree that the Egyptian day began at dawn, before the rising of the sun, rather than sunrise. The daily cycle was divided into twenty-four hours: twelve hours of the day and twelve hours of the night, the latter apparently reckoned based on the movement of groups of stars (“decans”) across the night sky. Beginning in the New Kingdom (ca. 1500 B.C.), there is evidence that sundials, shadow clocks (12.181.307), and water clocks (17.194.2341) were used to measure the passing of the hours. There is no evidence that the Egyptians tracked minutes or seconds, although there are general terms for time segments shorter than an hour. The month was organized into three weeks of ten days each, with the start of the lunar month marked by the disappearance of the waning moon.

By at least the middle of the Old Kingdom (ca. 2450 B.C.), and quite possibly several centuries earlier, the Egyptians had developed a “civil” calendar composed of twelve months of thirty days each (360 days), divided into three seasons—Inundation (Akhet), Emergence (Peret), and Harvest (Shemu)—of four months each, with five epagomenal days (days outside the regular months) added at the end of the year. Official dates were expressed according to this system, as a specific day within a specific month of a season (e.g., Day 15, Month 3 of the Inundation Season). At least as early as the Middle Kingdom (ca. 2030–1650 B.C.), the months had alternative names (22.3.522) that seem to echo some sort of lunar reckoning.

It is likely that New Year’s Day (30.8.214) originally was associated with the heliacal rising of the brightest star in the night sky, Sopdet (also known by its Greek name of Sothis or Latin name of Sirius). In Egypt, this star reemerged after a seventy-day sojourn beneath the horizon at about the same time as the first signs of the annual Nile flood that brought the life-giving waters down from the highlands of Ethiopia. The correlation between Sopdet and the New Year is based in part on an ancient text (from ca. 2500 B.C.) that reads: “It is Sopdet, your daughter whom you love, in this her name as Year”; an inscription from the New Kingdom that mentions the rising of Isis-Sopdet on the morning of New Year’s Day (ca. 1250 B.C.); and a reference to Isis-Sopdet from the much later temple at Dendera (late first millennium B.C.), which says specifically that the years are “reckoned from her shining forth.”

Since a true astronomical year has 365.25+ days, the Egyptian civil calendar fell back by a quarter day or so each year. This meant that the rising of Sopdet/Sothis and the seasons of this calendar did not correspond to the actual agricultural seasons for much of Egyptian history. Scholars have attempted to use this disconnect, especially between the actual Sothic rise and New Year’s Day in the civil calendar, which correspond only once every 1,460 years, to calculate when the civil system was first established, but no agreement on this point has yet been reached.

Lunar-based month names, the importance of the heliacal rising of Sothis, the fact that some Egyptian festivals were scheduled according to the lunar cycle rather than tied to specific days in the civil calendar, and some double dates, have led scholars to posit an early luni-stellar calendar that would have operated alongside the civil calendar. This presumably would have been corrected regularly (perhaps by adding a thirteenth month or an extra epagomenal day every several years) to stay in step with the actual astronomical year (66.99.73).

Although the exact format changes over time, years were for the most part counted according to the reign of a specific ruler (10.176.42; 09.184.183). In Dynasty 1 (ca. 3100 B.C.), each civil year within a reign was identified by important events such as the founding of a temple or the installation of a cult statue, a practice that lasted well into the Old Kingdom (ca. 2649–2130 B.C.). It is also during Dynasty 1 that the germ of a system to number the years by reign appears, in a record of “the first occasion of the Djet (“eternity”)-festival,” probably referring to the first time this festival had been celebrated during the reign of King Djer. By late Dynasty 2 (ca. 2900 B.C.), regnal years were being labeled according to the apparently biennial census of the country’s mineral, animal, and/or agricultural assets. This soon seems to have become the key event by which years were counted: through to the end of the Old Kingdom (ca. 2130 B.C.), years can be named as either renpet zep N (Year of the Nth Counting) or renpet em-khat zep N (Year after the Nth Counting). Scholars long assumed that these counts were always biennial, and that minimum reign lengths for Old Kingdom monarchs could be estimated by doubling the highest attested census. However, recent scholarship has begun to question this construct and to suggest alternatives such as biennial counts that gradually became annual; counts carried out as needed to raise funds for government projects; or counts carried out in years during which a thirteenth month was added to the theoretical luni-solar calendar. It seems likely that annual counts became the rule by Dynasty 6 (ca. 2323–2150 B.C.), but overall, this question remains open.

At some point, most likely during the First Intermediate Period (ca. 2130–2030 B.C.), years began to be numbered according to each king’s tenure on the throne. During the Middle Kingdom (ca. 2030–1650 B.C.), these years were counted from one New Year’s Day to the next; the period of time between the new king’s coronation and Day 1 of Month 1 may have been counted as his Year 1, but alternatively may have been left to his predecessor. In the New Kingdom (ca. 1550–1070 B.C.), the regnal count began when the new king took the throne, and years were calculated from one anniversary of the coronation to the next (50.6) all according to the civil calendar. It is likely that the same system pertained during the Third Intermediate Period (ca. 1070–664 B.C.). During the Late Period (ca. 664–332 B.C.), the second option outlined as a possibility for the Middle Kingdom was in use: the king’s Year 1 was counted from coronation to New Year’s Day, and his Year 2 began with the new year, so that a Year 1 could last anywhere from a week to almost a year.

Also extremely important in the ancient Egyptian conception of the world was their larger attitude toward time. Inscriptions refer to two kinds of eternity. Linear time, or djet, associated with the funerary god Osiris (56.16.2), had a beginning and would have an end, albeit in the infinitely far future. Neheh, cyclical time, was tied to the passage of the sun through the sky during the day and the Netherworld during the night (O.C.81). Ideally, an Egyptian who had lived according to the precepts of maat by supporting and maintaining the proper order of a just cosmos, and who had been accorded a proper burial, would live forever (djet) and ever (neheh).

13 notes · View notes