#bone-dry is fun for me also . fun fact the desert it's in used to be a salt water lake

[aliensmoothie]

I WPULD. LOVW TO KNOW SO MUCHABOUT BALONEY . i think the fact that he's in the bg3 universe is amusing to me . i hope hes been getting up to shenanigans . i love that he outdrank some guy

HE HAS IN FACT BEEN UP TO TONS OF SHENANIGANS . him and ast*rion are on slightly less thin ice than usual which maybe doesnt bode well for baloney's moral compass atm but he is pleased to be getting more info abt the man at any rate . he gave shadowheart a flower and it reminded me of the flower scene from tftb and i cried a little . i dont think baloney has romantic feelings toward shadowheart . but it was cute nonetheless HER LITTLE ' HA JUST KIDDING ' AFTER SAYING IT WAS POISONOUS WAS SO CUTE . i was pretty neutral on beloved shart at first but now i belove her alot . he has still not stopped travelling with wyll they are besties forever to me . baloney is like wyll's pet decrepit old man who has mostly good intentions and is only sometimes overly violent .ALSO FUN FACT HE HAS OUTDRANK PEOPLE BEFORE HE DID IT IN A DND CAMPAIGN I PUT HIM IN . he ALMOST outdrank the whole party . but the ( i think ) warlock just barely beat him .

also . coughs . let me go dig up the summary i wrote about his backstory . grins completely insane .

ok . smiles . SO . Bloney is from a town called bone-dry ( which also has it's own whole lore google doc but thats another story ) which in short is a small town surrounded by it's own graveyard in the middle of a salt desert . he is the middle child of . like 13 ? i dont have the number written down anywhere but i think that is right . anyways he's somewhere in the middle . he has always been just a very strange child . standoffish and always smiling at inappropriate times and not very good at talking with people , and spends most of his time reading whatever reading material passes through the town through trade , and then cataloguing all of it . HE ALSO catalogues any stories he can get out of the travelers who pass through ., and anything the people in town tell him . that said . he is standoffish and people in town are just kind of made Uncomfortable by him . so this effort does not ever bear much fruit for him . can youtell i am projecting my autism experiences onto him BAD . one day when he is a fairly young adult , his eldest brother dies under somewhat mysterious circumstances . on that same day , baloney finds himself lost out in the desert , and almost dies too . all he remembers is wandering , trying to find his way back home for hours and hours , and as the sun beats down at him he collapses and goes unconcious . he wakes up to a raven pecking at his head , and when he wakes up it starts to fly away , but stops and lands a few feet away and looks back at him . and when he follows it , it leads him back to town . from then on , he does not remember how he ended up wandering through the desert , and he does not remember that his eldest brother is dead . they never find his body , and with nothing to bury they just erect a gravestone in their vast graveyard with nothing underneath it . this whole experience combined with baloney's newfound memory issues give him a . warped view of death . where he never fully believes someone is dead , just missing , sick , or is generally in some kind of denial about it . ( BG3 BALONEY I THINK THIS GOES ANOTHER WAY WHERE HE BECOMES SORT OF OBSESSED WITH DEATH . though i dont know much about the durge stuff yet SO we'll see . we are talking about canon baloney for the most part here anyways though . if the durge stuff doesnt spell completely otherwise there should be some overlap still smile ) ALSO since that day , a small number of ravens have been appearing in town , which tend to folow baloney . or maybe the other way around . at any rate , baloney find that the ravens are most interested when he tells them tales of the dead ( or in his mind the sick or the missing ), which starts when he talks to them about his eldest brother . over the years he spends nearly all his time combing through the town's graveyard , and telling whatever stories he knows at the dead . he gets *really good* at piecing together stories of these people's lives from what limited information he can get from the rest of town . and without him knowing , the raven following him and listening to his stories were a weak manifestation of the raven queen , who was over time building him up to be her cleric . after many years he notices the ravens have started flying away from the town and not returning . at this point he is familiar enough with the ravens that their message is clear : he needs to leave town and seek out more knowledge of the dead . his one wish being to figure out how to heal these " sick " people , to talk to them and find their stories from the source . all of that building up to him being a death domain cleric LARGELY FOCUSED on necromancy . smile . also i have been playing with the idea that he is the one who killed his oldest brother . my only roadblock being that im not sure Why he would have done it . alas . it is a neat concept !

#¿ #I ENJOY HIS BACKSTORY i was sad i couldnt make him his exact class in bg3 but oh well 💔 #bone-dry is fun for me also . fun fact the desert it's in used to be a salt water lake #ive never ironed out the fine details of it but in my mind it was all pretty quickly evaporated by ..some kind of magical cataclysm #again ive never ironed out the details . but bone-dry was established when the lake was still there it was built In the lake #okay sorry there is like a whole google doc of stuff about that town . baloney is so important to me i think about him very often . #my ocs #baloney watertower #hesitated posting this i feel SO CRINGE sharing my oc lore . but im going to make myself do it anyways . im SO POWERFUL

[grem-archive]

OK SO

how do the specific rock and soil types around a certain dig site contribute to the way that a bone fosillizes if it does at all, such as would it fossilised better in clay rich moist soil, often the ones found at the bottom of a bog for example, or a more silt and sand based soil found in airod climate or on the sea floor.

and if you dont mind me asking what is your favourite crystal formation structure, its for a thing

So, brave adventurer, what you're seeking is a little something called 'taphonomy'. To put it poetically, taphonomy is the study of how an organism goes from the biosphere to the lithosphere; in simpler terms - how one goes from living to stone. The study of fossilization, in even more basic terms. Primarily associated with paleontology, taphonomy is actually useful for archaeology as well. I've had it lovingly told to me by professors and mentors that taphonomy in our context is the study of how long a material/artifact stays in the archaeological record. We are interested in what happens between deposition and lithification just as much as we are interested in the fossil itself.

There are many factors that affect a bone's preservation process, but if we're talking just soil, there is a very basic rule of thumb: Organic materials such as bone, shell, and wood are going to preserve best in anaerobic environments. This means an abundant presence to a lack of oxygen. This rule actually goes for a few other material types, too, but I digress. Other conditions that are advantageous for good preservation are climatic extremes: extremely dry (deserts - think of natural mummification in desert environs) and extremely wet (the bottoms of bogs and seabeds). In the latter, an anaerobic environment coupled with an extremely wet environment is excellent, such as the poorly-draining setting of a raised bog. Ex: The Osterby Man (Osterby, Germany) and the Elling Woman (Silkeborg, Denmark), two separate bog bodies well-known for the presence of their hair and pieces of their clothing/burial shroud.

We also look at the acidity or alkaline nature of the soil. So it is not necessarily if the soil has more clay or sand, but the humidity, acidity, and exposure to oxidation. Bone and glass do very poorly in acidic soils, but other organic materials thrive in it. There are many confounding variables such as the material type itself. All material types preserve differently in different soil conditions. You have to use a lot of context clues and careful observation.

And fun fact, a single soil type and composition might not even be consistent across the entirety of a site. I've worked in two units barely 15 meters from one another, and their soil colors were entirely different, their composition highly variable, and the artifacts in differing states of preservation. Archaeology is all about being flexible!

>> P.S. While I'm not sure if I have a favorite crystal system, I do adore minerals with an acicular crystal habit!

#callsign gremlin checking in #moooom! gremlin is archaeologyposting to her fandom blog!

[timelesslords]

I’ve Got This Fever

Read on AO3

In which Annabeth catches the flu, and domestic fluff ensues 

Annabeth woke up in pain. 

This wasn’t exactly an unusual occurrence. Being a demigod, Annabeth was no stranger to pain. She’d had broken bones, burns, cuts, stab wounds…. you name an injury, Annabeth Chase had probably experienced it. 

But this was a different kind of hurt, a hurt Annabeth hadn’t felt in a long time. Her head was pounding. Her mouth was drier than the Sahara desert. Her muscles ached, and even the soft sheets and pajamas she was wearing felt like knives on her skin. Despite being under a mountain of covers, she was shivering, bitterly cold.

There was no doubt about it. Annabeth was sick. 

Annabeth never got sick.

She groaned, sitting up. That turned out to be a bad idea as a wave of nausea rolled over her, and she lowered herself back onto her pillows, falling the last half of the distance. She felt Percy shift beside her, woken from her movement. 

“Hey,” he said, the smile fading quickly from his face as he saw her own expression, which was probably nothing short of miserable. “What’s wrong?” 

“I feel like crap.”

She surprised even herself with how horrible her voice sounded, raspy and dry. Percy frowned, reaching out and touching her forehead. He normally ran hot, but now his fingers felt cool against her skin, almost painfully so.

“You’re burning up.” he said, frown deepening. 

“I’m freezing.” Annabeth croaked. As if to prove her point, she shivered involuntarily.

“That’s the fever talking.” Percy said grimly, “Hold on.”

He climbed out of bed. His warmth left with him, and Annabeth was left just that much colder, trembling under the covers. Percy couldn’t have been gone more than two minutes, but it felt like an eternity. 

When he returned he was holding a thermometer and a glass of water. 

“Temperature first. The water might mess with the reading.” He said, apologetic. She wanted to hate him for that because she was so thirsty she thought she might die, but she knew he was right. 

Annabeth sat up slowly. Thankfully this time she just felt a little dizzy and not nauseous. The thermometer was cold and uncomfortable under her tongue, but Percy kept a steadying hand on her back, rubbing small circles into her shoulder with his thumb. With her oversensitive skin it almost hurt, but she leaned into the contact anyways. 

When the thermometer beeped, Percy traded it for the glass of water. Annabeth nearly downed the entire glass in one gulp. 

“A hundred and one.” he announced, flipping the display so she could see. The number was lit up in red, signaling that she did, in fact, have a fever. 

“I can’t be sick. I have class.” Annabeth said. Her voice was a little improved by the water, but she still sounded kind of terrible.

“Just email your professors and tell them you can’t make it.” Percy said, as if this were the easiest thing in the world. 

For him it probably was. He did his best with school, but he also wasn’t opposed to ditching class every once in a while and blaming it on a fabricated stomach bug, something Annabeth found absolutely abhorrent. She hadn’t missed one class in her entire college career, and she wasn’t about to start now. 

“It’s fine. I’ll just take some tylenol and I’ll be good to go.” Annabeth said. Percy gave her an exasperated look. 

“Beth. You probably have the flu, you can’t go to class like this.” 

“It’s just a little fever.” Annabeth protested. Really, she was already starting to feel better. It was just waking up that had been the hard part, and some ibuprofen would knock her headache and high temperature right out. Percy didn’t look so convinced, but what did he know.

“If you say so.” Percy said, crossing his arms over his chest. Annabeth looked at him suspiciously.

“You’re not going to fight me on this?” she asked. Percy just gave a shrug, though his expression was a stubborn one.

“Nope. You can go right ahead.” Percy said, gesturing his hand off the bed. There was no way he should be giving up this easily, but if he wasn’t going to argue with her, Annabeth wasn’t going to be the one to start it. 

She swung her legs carefully over the edge of the bed, glancing again at Percy. He gave her a go ahead look, so she did. The second she tried to put weight on her feet, her vision blacked out and her knees buckled. She would have fallen flat on her face if Percy hadn’t been waiting there to catch her. Her headache immediately doubled in intensity, and Annabeth groaned.

“Still wanna go to class?” Percy asked. He at least had the decency to sound sorry for her, even though making fun of her would have been just as deserved. 

“That was mean.” Annabeth complained. Percy lowered her back into bed, gently pushing her shoulder so she would lie down again. Annabeth didn’t need so much convincing this time. 

“It was the fastest way.” Percy said apologetically, brushing some hair out of her eyes “You would have fought me on it all day, otherwise.” 

Annabeth sighed, but didn’t deny it. She probably would have been unbearable. She probably still was going to be unbearable.

“How am I sick? I never get sick. I’ve never had the flu in my life.” Annabeth said. She glanced upwards at Percy, who was looking very much like he was trying to not say something. 

“What?” she asked. 

“Nothing.” he said quickly, but Annabeth knew his expressions better than her own, and she knew when he was holding back. 

“You’re thinking something.” Annabeth said accusingly. A smile cracked through his holding-back face.

“Should I not be?” he asked. 

“You know what I mean.” Annabeth grumbled. 

“Okay. I mean, I’m sure your immune system is very high-quality. I mean, it's yours, how could it not be?” 

“Stop trying to butter me up.” Annabeth said, but she couldn't keep a smile all the way off her face. 

“Who said I was buttering you up? I was complimenting your robust immune response” Percy said innocently, still grinning.

“Now you’re trying to distract me, but it won’t work.”

This was a complete lie. If he tried a little harder, it probably would work, and he knew it as well as she did. He caved anyways, which meant he probably did actually want to tell her what he was thinking. 

“Okay, fine.” Percy said, “I was just going to say, you spent most of your winters at camp, which is totally isolated from the outside world, which means you haven’t really had a real flu season since you were like seven.” 

“I went to boarding school.” Annabeth reminded him.

“Yeah, and you spent winter breaks at camp, or at your dad’s.” 

He neglected to mention that she had spent one such break kidnapped by Luke and forced to carry the weight of the sky, which would have proved his point further, but Percy was not so ruthless during little discussions like these that he needed to bring up every last piece of evidence. Annabeth envied that restraint sometimes. 

“Are you trying to tell me that my immune system probably actually sucks because it hasn’t been exposed to anything real since I was eight?” Annabeth asked. Percy bit his bottom lip.

“You said it, not me.” he said, with an apologetic shrug. Annabeth groaned again, rolling onto her stomach and shoving her face in her pillow. The sudden movement did nothing to relieve her headache; in fact it started pounding away with renewed vigor. 

“But I got my flu shot and everything.” Annabeth complained, “I wash my hands all the time.” 

“If you hadn’t gotten your shot you’d be feeling twice as bad right now, believe me.” Percy said. Between his ADHD-induced forgetfulness and his living in the city during flu season, Annabeth was inclined to trust him on that one. 

“What do I do?” she asked, turning her face halfway off the pillow so she could look at him again. The sympathetic look he was giving her did not make her optimistic for his answer.

“Drink a lot of water and wait for it to pass.” 

“That’s it?” Annabeth asked in disbelief. 

“And keep an eye on your temperature.” Percy amended, “If it goes over a hundred and three I’m taking you to the ER.” 

“Modern medicine is a sham.” Annabeth said. That elicited a laugh from him, at least.

“Go back to sleep. You can send your emails later.” he said, brushing a few stray curls behind her ear. 

“I don’t know if I can.” Annabeth said, and it wasn’t even a lie or her being stubborn. She was still freezing somehow, shivering even though she was under blankets again. 

In response, Percy crawled back under the covers, wrapping his arms around her. She snuggled into his chest, stealing his warmth, even though she knew she shouldn’t.

“You have class.” Annabeth protested. She felt his laugh, a sturdy vibration in his chest, more than she heard it.

“Not anymore. I’m probably just as contagious as you at this point.” 

Annabeth tried again.

“I’m going to get you sick.” 

“Maybe.” Percy said, not sounding particularly bothered by it either way. 

“But…” Annabeth trailed off. She didn’t want him to leave, but it also didn’t feel fair to keep him here, knowing she was probably condemning him to the same misery she was feeling now.

“Don’t worry about me.” Percy said, reading her thoughts, “I used to ride the subway everyday, I think I’ve had every strain of the flu known to man. And if you think I’m just going to leave you here shivering, you’re crazy.”  

“I guess I’ll allow it.” Annabeth mumbled, scooting a little closer to him. The shakes were finally starting to dissipate, driven off by Percy’s warmth. 

“Oh, you’ll allow it?” he asked. She could hear the smile in his voice, even if she couldn’t see it. 

“For now.” Annabeth said, though she had absolutely no intention of changing her mind, and he knew it better than she did. 

“Go back to sleep, Wise Girl.” Percy said, kissing the top of her head. 

“Fine.” she said, too tired to think of a good retort. “Seaweed Brain.” she added sleepily, for good measure. She felt him laugh again. 

It took a while, but eventually she managed to drift off to sleep again, curled up against his chest. 

#i had a shitty day at work so have some tooth-rotting fluff #percabeth #percabeth fic #percabeth fanfic #percabeth fluff #percabeth angst #pjo #pjo fic #pjo fanfic #pjo one shot #percabeth oneshot #Percy Jackson #Percy Jackson fanfic #percy x annabeth

[ppersonna]

thunder - ksj | m

your voice was the soundtrack of my summer. do you know you're unlike any other? you'll always be my thunder. - thunder, boys like girls

↳ summary- you allow your best friend Jin to take you backpacking once per year.  apparently, this year’s outing would be the wettest yet.

↳ rating- explicit/18+/nsfw

↳ pairing- kim seokjin x reader

↳ word count- 6k

↳ genre- fluff, tiny angst, smut, comedy

↳ warnings- penetrative sex, unprotected sex, fingering, dirty talk, light dom!jin, light sub!reader, fucking in tents haha ha ha ha, cum play, cum eating, possessive dirty talk

↳ a/n- wow hello! its been so long since i uploaded a fic i almost forgot how to do it! i would like to give you a fic that i’ve had in my storage since march, and one i’m excited to finally finish. i’d be nowhere without @taetaewonderland​ @xjoonchildx​ @ladyartemesia​ for hyping me up to post it in the first place.  thank u to @shadowsremedy​ for being my fav beta ily ily ily. enjoy my babes! pls feel free to message me!

 “Kim Seokjin, if you got us lost, I’m going to murder you,” you seethed as your pulled your booted foot out of a slick puddle of mud. 

“I didn’t get us lost, dear. The map is wrong,” he replied coolly as he twisted the crumpled map from portrait to landscape, and back again. “I’m an excellent navigator, but when the tools I have are faulty…”. 

You grumbled, stopping your walk to sit on a fallen log. You sighed audibly at your best friend, still maneuvering in the small clearing in the forest, trying to match the map to where you were. You chanced a look at the sky as you sought to catch your breath and sate your anger. Dark, heavy clouds were forming, the kind that didn’t just indicate a sprinkle but a torrential downpour. 

“Shit, Jin. It’s going to storm soon,” you warned.  

He stopped his map seeking and glanced at the sky, frown buried deep in his face. 

Instantly, as if it never changed, he returned to his bright and cheery demeanor. 

“Well! Looks like we should work faster to make it back to camp, huh?” 

Seokjin would be excited for an unexpected kink in your plans. The boy was obsessed with “roughing it”. You agreed to one weekend with minimal hiking. Camping, in your opinion, was meant to be spent drunk around a fire eating s’mores and telling scary stories, not walking for miles through nothing but trees, mud, and probably bears.

Camping had never been your favorite hobby, and you allowed Seokjin to take you off trail backpacking once per year. The man looked forward to it, planned it several months in advance, and counted down the days until he stuffed you in his Jeep down a deserted forest highway to the campsite. 

Only, Jin never took the “minimal hiking” thing too seriously. 

“It’s an easy hike,” he had promised you that morning as you set up camp. “More of a stroll than anything.” 

You kicked at the dirt beneath you now, upset you had listened to the dark-haired man’s empty promises. 

“How about we just go back the way we came from?” You suggested as you stood up and brushed the dirt off your backside from the log. 

“Nonsense,” he sniffed. “I’ve got it right here. We can take this trail,” he gestured at a clearing through the trees, “for about a mile, turn left at the open valley, and we’ll be back at camp two miles after that!”  He proclaimed his findings as if it were so easy, so obvious. 

“Great, three miles of hiking. After we’ve already done four, at least.”

“Yes, my ever-positive sunshine, you should be happy I found us a shortcut.” He patted your head and smiled at you as he adjusted your backpack strap that was sliding off your shoulders. He lingered, eyes on you and your lips for just a fraction too long, before he turned and began leading you through the forest. 

Your heart was racing, unrelated to the elevation or the hike. 

You gave in so easily to Jin not because he was your best friend since childhood, but also because he was the man you were hopelessly in love with. 

You’d been smitten with the older boy since your senior year of high school, when he jokingly asked you to prom and you realized you wanted Seokjin courting you to be a regular occurrence. 

You stayed by his side through it all, all girlfriends and breakups. It hurt to watch him with another, but maintaining his friendship was more important than anything else and you weren’t about to lose him to a crush that you could easily just avoid. 

Seokjin was attached to your hip, a fact your friends never let you live down. They were relentless in encouraging you two to be alone, and for you to admit your feelings to him. They told you they were sure he would reciprocate it.  

Unbeknownst to them, you had admitted it. 

You and Jin once got messy drunk on the floor of your apartment, where you slithered up into his lap and whispered your secret devotion to your best friend. Seokjin merely laughed and kissed your nose. You were so embarrassed and rejected you never brought it up again. Best to leave it be, rather than bring a 15 year friendship to a screeching halt. 

So—you valiantly stood by him as his best friend and confidante. You were there when he excitedly told you about his new girlfriend, or when he called you crying over their breakup. Your heart twinged at both; you wanted to be the reason for his excitement and the balm to his wounded heart. 

You allowed Seokjin to take you on all his wild adventures. Like now—traipsing through the forest with no direction in sight, because you would have done nearly anything for the boy.

A crack of thunder shook you from your thoughts and you jumped at the sudden sound. 

“Ah, so cute,” he smiled at you, “still afraid of thunder?”

You blushed and pouted. “It just surprised me, is all.”

He smirked as if to say he didn’t believe you and nodded. “We should get a move on, don’t want to get caught in the rain.” 

You shivered at the thought. It was already cool in the forest; the trees providing enough coverage it locked out any sun, if there had been any. You quickly moved in step behind your best friend. It only took a few minutes of silence before the telltale pitter patter of droplets on leaves began. A fat raindrop landed on your forehead. 

“Fuck,” you groaned. “It’s starting.”  

“I know,” Jin suddenly looked worried, his confident demeanor cracking. He looked back at you and tightened the straps on his backpack. 

“Let’s run?”

You were powerless to deny any request from him. Plus, you didn’t really feel like getting drenched. 

You adjusted your own backpack and took off, running through the quickly dampening forest beside Seokjin. 

The rain came in a downpour. It hit you hard, blurring your vision. Seokjin slipped his hand into yours, not wanting to lose you in the storm. You pushed your legs in time with his, jumping around fell logs and rocks and skipping large puddles. 

You were drenched as Seokjin pulled you into a makeshift canopy of rocks, a momentary pause from the storm to catch your breath. Your hair was soaking wet, as if freshly showered. Seokjin’s hair stuck to his face, and you smiled as he looked at you with concern. It only took a moment until you were both bursting with laughter, finding humor at the moment. 

It was something you loved about Seokjin. He always knew how to make you laugh in times it seemed impossible. 

“This sucks,” you spoke through your joyful laughter.  He nodded in agreement. 

“I think we’re almost back. We need to turn soon, and then we’ve got about two more miles. You ready?”

You agreed and pushed back the slick hair in your eyes, before doing the same for him. His eyes sparkled. You didn’t know what it meant. 

In an instant, you were running again. The backpack bounced against your back and rain pounded your body. The things you did for Kim Seokjin. You were whipped, and you knew it. 

The trail seemed like it went on forever. You both became so tired of running that you slowed and trudged slowly through mud as rain pelted you, accepting your fate of soaking to the bone. You were sure you had never been this drenched in your life.  Your clothes were stuck to your body and dripping down into your shoes and socks. Your teeth chattered in the breeze—it felt as if the wind whipped right through you.  The sky rumbled again, as if warning you to hurry lest it dump more rain on you.

Seokjin was always the caring companion. He rubbed your shoulders and arms to warm them up and promised a roaring fire. You hated how much it made your heart burst.

You were very much looking forward to your one-man tent, stocked with a sleeping bag and blankets. You could strip down and dry off and slip into the warmth of your own personal nest. 

Seokjin waxed poetic about his own spacious tent—a lofty family sized one, and how he made sure he brought his sleeping bag along with 8 thick blankets, and how he couldn’t wait to snuggle down into his own.  Seokjin was the picture of preparedness. He even kept a locking box full of snacks in his tent because the boy was a foodie and couldn’t survive without the treats. It came in handy. 

“What would you do if we were stuck out here forever?” You posed to your best friend, curious about his response and desperate to pass the time as you hiked. 

“Well,” he thought aloud. “I’d miss the guys. But I’d be happy to be stuck out here with you.”  

Your cheeks flushed. 

“You wouldn’t miss, ah—what’s her name? Miya?” 

Seokjin shrugged. “She’s fun. She’s not you, though.”

You couldn’t help but grumble internally. She was good enough to date, and you weren’t. She was different in some respect. 

“Are things not going well with her?” You asked, secretly hoping they weren’t.

“It’s fine. She’s nice and all,” he sighed.  “Just, there’s no spark there, you know?”  

You knew all too well. Any man you tried to date paled compared to your best friend, and the fireworks behind your every heartbeat when you were near him.

“What about you?” He was peering into your eyes and into what felt like your soul. “You and Jungkook sure seem cozy.” His tone sounded annoyed, sarcastic even.

You couldn’t help but bark a laugh. 

“Oh god, no,” you shook your soggy head.  “Not my type. We’re good friends and that’s it. Plus, I’m sure he’s into Jimin.”

Seokjin shrugged again. “You sit on his lap and cuddle up to him all the time…”

“Are you jealous?” You smirked, nudging the man.  Please, god, please be jealous.

“N-No!” He was sharp. “I’m not.”

Ouch.

You remained silent, eyes downcast at your muddy boots as you walked alongside the man.

“Sorry,” he mumbled after a beat of silence. 

“Don’t worry about it, Seokjin. I got it—loud and clear.”

Seokjin looked hurt, a wave of dissatisfaction crossing his features. He wanted to say something, mouth opening to continue his apology. You ignored it wholly. He knew your feelings. There was no way he couldn’t remember that night. You pushed ahead of the man, walking in front of him to avoid his pained gaze and likely hurried apology.  

The light of day was leaving. Everything around you was steadily getting darker, and the rain showed no sign of giving up. You silently begged to be back to the safety of your camp soon, lest you become walking mountain lion bait.

“There’s camp!” Seokjin finally pointed and ran through the rain ahead of you.

“Oh thank fuck,” you sighed, feeling as if it lifted a weight from your shoulders. You couldn’t wait to strip out of your soaking clothes and slither into your blankets.

“Oh shit,” Seokjin whispered, stopping where he stood.  You followed his gaze, concerned about what stopped the boy so quickly.   

Your tent was ripped open, the insides of it exposed to the wind and rain. Everything you owned was soaking wet. You had set it up in a clearing with not too many trees above it, and it appeared the lack of protection against the wind and rain tore the poor fabric to shreds.

A worn-out and distraught sob left your lips.

“No!”  

You ran to the tent and nearly cried. Fortunately, beyond just being soaking wet and useless for the night, everything was intact. There was only no warmth to be had. No warm clothes to change into. Nothing.  

“What the fuck am I going to do?!” 

Seokjin placed a hand on your shoulder.  

“You can share with me?” He sounded hopeful. “We can hang your clothes to dry and when the storm passes, we can build a fire and let your tent air out.  But you should probably sleep in my tent tonight.” 

You bit your lip. You had slept with Seokjin in more beds than you could count, always being forced to share a bed as the designated ‘best friends who don’t care’.  And it was never easy for you. You always woke up with the delicious scent of his cologne and shampoo, and your body curled around his. His hardness would always be pressed up against you, and it took all you had not to wrap your mouth around it to wake him up.

“Yeah, thanks Seokjin,” you breathed. “I’m fucking freezing. And I’m tired. I just want to get some sleep.”

Seokjin slipped his backpack off and pulled yours off your frame. He hung them from a sturdy branch, protected by layers of trees overhead, to let them dry.  

“I have some towels in my tent, go on in. You can get dry and hand me your wet clothes to hang. Then you can get in the blankets and I’ll make us something to eat.”

You blushed. Seokjin hadn’t seen you fully naked, ever; at least not since you were toddlers.

Slipping into his blankets while stark nude would be a dream. It was something you fantasized about more than you’d care to admit. But, in the current conditions, being naked and clammy in the blankets next to your best friend who didn’t return any feelings for you sounded more like an awkward moment waiting to happen.

If Seokjin noticed anything, he didn’t show it. He acted as if making you strip in his tent was a normal thing, nothing out of the ordinary. 

“I’ll wait out here,” he nodded dutifully. 

You slipped out of your muddy boots and socks, and into his tent. It was nice and spacious, and the blankets looked incredibly enticing. It was kind of Seokjin to let you stay with him, even kinder that he would remain soaking wet to make you something to eat. Your body felt so worn out and drained, and you were sure he did too. 

You peeled the wet clothing off of you, every bit, before sticking your head out the door and handing him the clothes.  

“Don’t worry about food, okay? You should get dry too.”  

He wrinkled his forehead. 

“You sure?” 

You bit your lip and nodded. 

“I’m sure. Plus, we have your snacks.”

“Ah, good thinking,” he shot his finger guns at you. “I’ll be there in a minute, then. Hand me a towel and I’ll get undressed out here.”

You shyly handed him a towel, now very aware that you and Seokjin would be in the same tent—naked. The thought thrilled you as much as it scared you. 

It didn’t take long to burrow yourself into his freshly made bed roll, sliding into the neat layers. Seokjin was nearly military in his routine and order.  Everything was always tucked, pressed, and laid down perfectly. 

Your body wracked with shivers and chills—the blankets and sleeping bag were cold from the ambient air outside. You folded yourself together in a fetal position to maintain some warmth. It felt good to lie down on the soft bed mat, but the blankets were doing nothing to provide warmth. 

The sound of the zipper opening the front door flap of the tent made you shake harder. You could feel the wind blow through the opening now. The sound of the storm was loud, and you were grateful for the heavy tarp covering Seokjin’s tent. It provided some respite from the wind and kept all water off the tent. At least Seokjin had been smart in his setup. You ignored the man’s suggestions to set up better, and you were fully regretting it now.

Seokjin had the towel wrapped around his waist and stepped about the tent easily. He dabbed at his upper body with a smaller towel from his suitcase and rubbed his hair dry. The normally perfectly coiffed head was now static-y and sticking up wildly. It would have made you laugh if you weren’t so cold. 

Seokjin moved around you and slid into the blankets, leaving a large space between you, before he threw the towel around his waist onto the floor. He was naked now; you noted internally. You both were. A shiver ran down your spine, unrelated to the relentless chill.

It was silent. All you could hear was the beating of the rain on the tarp and your teeth chattering as you shivered. 

Seokjin stole a look at you, finally, and noticed your position, holding yourself to build warmth. 

“Shit, are you okay?” He asked. 

“I’m j-j-just col-l-ld,” you whispered. “And t-t-tired.”

Seokjin didn’t reply, but you heard the scratching sound of a moving sleeping bag and rustling of blankets and suddenly felt a very warm, very naked body pressed against you. It was blissful, and you moaned out loud at the feel of him spooning you. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. You didn’t know what for, and couldn’t bring yourself to reply. 

You burrowed yourself down into his warmth and felt his arms wrap around you, securing you against him. He radiated heat. He felt like heaven. Your eyes closed—he had you feeling like you had stepped into a delicious sauna.

Seokjin’s muscular arms hadn’t moved an inch since they wrapped around you, but now his hands slowly rubbed at your torso, warming you everywhere his hand dragged. It felt electrifying and your body relaxed easily under his delicate fingertips. 

It started out innocent, rubbing along your stomach and side to warm you further. But his hand began straying north, reaching the crest of your breasts. Your breath hitched as he rubbed over the cold swells. Your nipples were hard from the chill and pebbled even further with the touch of his hands. It made a gasp stick in your throat.

His lips touched your neck, lightly. They were warm too. It seemed his entire body was twenty degrees warmer than your own, and every touch felt like a raging flame. His hands continued rubbing along your breasts as he laved and sucked.

 at the column of your throat.  

As instantly as it began, Seokjin stopped. His hands hovered above your breasts. 

He pressed kisses to your neck and face. “We should sleep, babe,” he sighed.  

You wanted to protest, to push him further, to take care of what he started, but you couldn’t find the energy. Seokjin’s warmth matched with the comfort of his bedroll, and the soothing rise and fall of his breath was lulling you into sleep. Even though it was still early evening, the hike and the run back to safety took it all out of you.  

Seokjin’s arms felt like safety. He secured them around you, slipping just underneath your breasts where his thumb could trace alongside the bottom as you easily succumbed to sleep.

It was still dark when you woke.  

The rain was still coming down, light this time. It sounded relaxing, soothing. Seokjin was still spooning you, sleeping soundly behind you. You twisted in his grasp to gaze at him. 

His hair was dry now, sticking out randomly about his pillow. You were sure if he saw it he’d panic, normally so precise with his looks. He looked so peaceful when he was asleep, none of his chaotic energy and dramatic charisma. 

You loved every facet of Seokjin. You loved the flamboyance, the sensitivity, the deep compassion for his friends.  

You turned around, as gently and quietly as you could, and pressed a hand to his cheek—rubbing at the warm and soft flesh. He sighed softly in his sleep, moving against his pillow. An eye cracked open, and he stared at you. 

“Why are you awake?” He whispered, his voice gentle. “It’s still dark.” 

He was confused, and the look that graced his features was adorable. You wanted to photograph it and frame it, make it the lock screen of your phone. 

You shook your head. 

“Don’t know.”

Seokjin’s hand rubbed at your shoulder, then up to your face. He tucked your hair behind your ear and smiled at you. 

“You look so cute in the moonlight.”

You closed your eyes, letting his compliment wash over you. You couldn’t find the words to reply. You let him continue caressing your cheek, feeling as if you were living a fantasy where Seokjin touched you like a lover. 

You were so close to him, chest pressing against his own. Something about the quiet storm, the dark tent, had you disregarding any embarrassment you should have felt pressing your naked tits to the man's chest, but the spell of the forest had you pressing closer. Your lips were inches apart, and you could feel his breath on your lips. 

The feel of Seokjin’s lips pressing against yours was light, but felt as if all the fireworks in the world exploded behind your eyes and within your belly. It started sweet, gentle. You kissed him like you always wanted to, full of unrequited love and unwavering desire. Your arms slithered around his neck, pulling him even closer against you.  

The kiss turned deeper, mouths opening to allow the passage of tongues. He sought into your mouth, caressing yours with his own, pouring what felt like his very spirit into you. His hand left your back and slid up your sides to press against your breast. 

“Seokjin,” you murmured, feeling your brain swirl headily. “Feels good.”

He didn’t reply, only kept kissing at your neck and pinching gently at your hardened nipples. It made you cry out, gaping at the slight pain.

“If you want me to stop, tell me.” 

His words were gentle. His hands stilled, stopping all ministrations against you.

Your breath was hard and shaky, matching the erratic beat of your heart in your ribcage. Your unrequited crush of years was now roaming your body, touching you as a lover rather than a friend.

“Please, don’t stop.”

He was on you again, now bloodthirsty for any part of your skin to touch. He tugged at your nipples, suckled up your neck to kiss and lick at the shell of your ears.  You pressed against him, gasping at the feel of his now stiff cock. He circled his hips, relishing in the feel of you against him. You wondered how he would feel inside you. He was thick and long—it would be a stretch, and a most delicious and welcome one.

He pressed you back against the pillow, hovering over your body as he kissed down your neck and sucked at the pressure points there. A pleasured sigh passed through your open lips, reveling in the feel of him on your skin. It was something you dreamed about often. It felt unreal to finally have it. 

You were on display for him, and his eyes raked over you as if you were a Dalí in the Louvre. His hands slid up to cup your breasts, and you tilted your head back to moan. You didn’t care at all about how you looked, how this might be awkward in the next few hours. You cared only about feeling Seokjin within you, getting him off, succumbing to your own pleasure wrought by his hands and his cock.

“Fuck, babe,” he sighed. “Wanted this for a while.”

“Me too,” you gasped as he slid a finger down to your core, circling faintly over your slick folds.

“Have you?”

“Seokjin, I’ve been in love with you since high school.”

Seokjin closed his eyes and smiled, breathing through his nose in contentment.

“You weren’t just saying that when you were drunk then.”

You shook your head, and Seokjin opened his eyes to peer at you.

“No, Seokjin,” you whispered needily, his finger still so torturously close to your clit. “I meant it.”

He leaned down with a smile and planted gentle kisses on your cheeks, adoring and gentle.  

“I’ve been in love with you too. I thought you were just drunk. I never acted on it because I didn’t want to get my heart broken.”

He pulled up and allowed his free hand to cup your cheek.

“I’m going to fuck you now, okay?” He asked. “Like, really fucking hard. You good with that?”

You couldn’t help but laugh. A deep, hearty chuckle passed between both of you, enamored with each other and the situation of being naked and intertwined together, the warmth of your matched confessions surrounding you.  

“Fuck me, please,” you begged.

And Seokjin would be loath to deny you.

His teasing finger finally slid into your core, fucking into you with ease from your slick walls.  You gasped at the welcome intrusion, eyes fluttering closed as he began a slight pace and watched the way you fell apart.

“So pretty,” he whispered. “So fucking pretty.”

He slipped another finger in, scissoring them open as he worked at you.  Your legs trembled, and it made the older man smirk.  

“Look at you,” he praised. “So easily turned into a *gushing* puddle for me.”

You nodded pathetically, back arching as he added yet another finger and pressed at the spot inside you that had your mind spinning and thoughts erasing.

“Oh—God, Jin!”

As much as Jin wanted to see you get off around his fingers, he was desperate for more. You were finally all his—something he’s wanted since he could remember. All he’s wanted was for you to be his.

He pulled his fingers from inside you and smiled as they came out slicked up with your own essence.  He ensured you made eye contact with him, then popped them into his mouth one-by-one, to suck them clean.

It made your mouth nearly fall to the floor as you watched him suck his fingers clean of you. Your body trembled with a need you hadn’t felt before. It was stronger than anything you’d felt before. It was unadulterated desire for Seokjin.

“Mm,” he sighed happily as he pulled the final digit from his mouth. “Delicious, as I thought.”

“Oh, my god,” you gaped. “Jin…,”

The man merely shook his head and smiled, crowding you down and hovering over your lips.

“You’re mine now, you got that?” 

His eyes tracked yours, watching your every movement. It took you a moment to swallow your nerves, to regain any ounce of confidence.

“I’ve always been yours, Seokjin.”

He held you down, watching you with a gleam of wonder in his eye, before surging forward and planting his lips onto yours. His tongue dove in instantly, seeking solace in the warmth of your mouth. Allowing him passage was easy, almost natural. Jin’s tongue swirled around your own as your arms slithered around his neck to bring him closer. Kissing Jin felt like everything you’d imagine it would be, and yet like nothing you could have even dreamed.

Jin didn’t just kiss you—he consumed you. He lapped his tongue into your mouth like he couldn’t get close enough to you. His chest pressed against your body and he groaned into your mouth at the feeling of your perky breasts pushing into his own broad chest.

“Baby,” he whispered as he pulled away. 

It sounded like a dream—the pet name fell from Jin’s lips so easily, as if it were always meant to be spoken to you.

“You’ve always been the one I wanted,” he breathed as he pressed his lips down your neck. “Always the girl I wanted and could never have.”

“Jin,” you gasped as your fingers carded through his hair. “Jin, you’ve always had me.”

He lifted his head and peered deep into your eyes again, so deep it felt like he was glimpsing into your soul.

“I only want you. No one else.”

It knocked you breathless, and it took a moment for you to refill your lungs before nodding.  

“I’m all yours.”

There was acknowledgement in both your admissions. An understanding that there was no more separation of you, and of Jin. That after tonight, it would be a partnership, and the beginnings of something more, something you’ve only dreamt of with the older man.

“Mine,” he whispered, before pressing his lips back to yours.

The kiss was sweet, nearly cloyingly sweet, as his hands cupped your face. He kissed you with every intention, every desperate plea he’s held in his heart for you.

Jin’s length pressed against you—his hips rutting minutely as he kissed you.

“Jin,” you gasped as you pulled away from his lip locked embrace. “Please, I need you.”

Jin’s charming smile spread across his lips, blooming your heart along with it.

“As you wish,” he whispered as he pressed in for another soft kiss..

Instantly, Jin flipped around and switched positions, guiding you to sit atop his hips while he settled down into the mess of blankets and pillows.

“What?” He asked as he noticed your confusion at the sudden mood change, a smirk rising on his puffy lips. “You think I’m gonna let you lay back and make me do all the work?”

There he was, your Seokjin. Never able to keep a comment to himself, regardless of the situation—always working to make you laugh. It made your heart sing.

His hands slid to grip at your hips while you lifted yourself up to hover over his hardened length, lining up the tip to just graze the wetness there.

“You see what you do to me?” You asked with a coy smile. “You see how badly I want you?”

Jin bit his lip, mesmerized by the way your cunt slicked up the head of his cock, desperate to spear into you but holding back.

“Fuck—,” he breathed. “P-Prove it.”

A smirk crossed your features before you took the plunge and allowed his length to slip inside you as you sank to his hips.  The intrusion was welcome, and you gaped at the sensation of him plunging deep.

“Oh, my God!” Jin gasped as you had taken him to the hilt.  His eyes bulged for a moment before they closed in bliss.  “You feel so fucking good.”

You didn’t need to speak. The feeling of Jin’s thick length inside of you was more than enough agreement.  He felt so thick, so long, prodding at the spot inside you that had you weak and stretching you wide to make you gasp at the sizzle of pain.  After a moment of adjusting to his size, you let your hands fall to his chest as you began to slowly rise and fall and set a pace on his cock.

“Oh, fuck, baby,” he whined—eyes wide open and watching you bounce on him. “Shit, this is where you belong.”

You eagerly pinched at your nipples as your pace quickened, nodding at Jin’s encouraging words. Your mouth felt dry, and you felt unable to even vocalize your pleasure beyond your loud sighs and moans.

“Jin,” you breathed.

He nodded, assisting your pace by gripping your hips.  He tugged you down, face to face, to rest on his chest while your hips kept their quick speed of enveloping his cock in your tight heat.  He let a hand cup the side of your face, the other moving to grip your ass.

“You’re all fucking mine,” he grunted as he thrusted his cock up into you, matching the rhythm of your rise and fall. “Gonna make you feel so fucking good every day, baby.”

You nodded quickly, heartbeat rising as you quickened each pound.  Jin’s lips pressed to yours again, this time messier, hotter.  He licked into your mouth, desperate for any more of you he could consume.

“Fuck, you drive me fucking crazy,” he said, cock still thrusting deep inside you. “Let me fuck you from behind?”

You didn’t bother replying, simply removing yourself from his body and assuming the position on your hands and knees.  Jin scrambled to line up behind you, hand pumping his slick cock as he marveled at the sight of you presented for him.

“Take me, please,” you whispered, turning your head to peer at him with a desperate smile. “Fuck me until I can’t see straight.”

Jin hissed an expletive, before lining himself up in your sodden folds and plunging in without a second thought.  Your eyes widened at the new angle, gasping as you felt it hit different areas inside of you that had you squeaking with each hard thrust of his cock.

Jin’s hands gripped your ass, your hips, anywhere he could leave his brutal fingerprints.

“God, you take my cock like a fucking queen,” he gasped as the sound of skin slapping echoed around the tent. “Look at your pussy, so fucking wet for me.”

He marveled at the way his cock plunged deep inside you, then came out covered in your creamy slick.

“You gonna cum for me, baby? You gonna let me claim this pussy with my cum?”

The pleasure was overwhelming—it felt like every nerve ending was lit on fire, and you were a burning fuse about to detonate into a thousand brilliant explosions.  Each thrust of Jin’s thickness had you crying for more, moans echoing off the trees outside.  You were suddenly thankful you were in the middle of nowhere, allowing you to be loud and needy.

Jin reveled in your desperate sighs and the way your body pushed back against his to match his pace.  He knew his end was coming, knew it was going to be short-lived from the start. He’s wanted your body for as long as he could remember, and wanted you in his life as his lover, his girlfriend, more than just what he had been relegated to for so long.  

“Mm, baby, you look so good on your knees for me, fuck,” he gasped as his speed increased. “I can’t wait to make you cum on my cock every fucking day, love. This is my pussy now.”

Jin’s possession of your body made you see stars, vision blurring as your cunt tightened its grip around his cock.  Jin gasped at the grip and his hips stuttered.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he groaned. “I feel you, baby, fuck. Cum for me, angel. Let me feel this tiny little cunt milk me.”

The coil inside you was tightening, pulling tight and making you gasp and scream at the oncoming rush.  Jin’s pounding was relentless, making your entire body shake with the anticipation.  

Your hand dipped to circle at your clit, the ultimate piece to your end. 

The coil snapped, and your cunt pulsated wildly around his cock, vice-grip tight.  It felt as if you had been catapulted off into space, vision blurring and all sound indiscernible from the blood rushing in your ears.

Jin’s climax quickly overtook him at the feeling of your delicious heat gripping at his cock.  With just a few strokes inside you, his cock pulsed hot stripes of cum within you and painted your channel.  Something primal in Seokjin loved that he was within you now, a piece of him deposited inside. 

He allowed a few moments to pass to catch his breath, before slowly easing his spent cock from your dripping walls.  He groaned as he watched a bit of his seed drip out, and he was careful to collect it on his fingers.

“Come here,” he whispered as he pressed his chest to your back and lifted you upright, sitting on your knees.  He presented his fingers to your lips, dripping with your combined slick, and wrapped his free arm around your stomach.

Obediently, you opened your mouth and allowed the man to swirl his cum-coated digits in your mouth. It made your stomach erupt in butterflies, the taste of you and the man you’ve only dreamt about for years now on your tongue.

A crack of thunder shook you from your silent reverie, and Jin removed his fingers from his mouth before wrapping both arms around you and tugging you down to lie face to face on the mused sleeping bags.

“Now, aren’t you glad we did this?” He asked with a chuckle and a kiss to your nose.

You wrinkled your brow and smiled coyly.

“I would have enjoyed it more if you hadn’t gotten us lost.”

Jin pouted and huffed.

“I didn’t get us lost,” he sniffed with indignation. “The map was wrong.”

#bts smut #kim seokjin #seokjin smut #seokjin x reader #ficswithluv #kim seokjin smut #jin smut #bts fan fic #bts imagines #bts fic #bangtanarmynet

[homerforsure]

Whumptober No. 15

delirium / fever dreams / bees

Also partly inspired by a fun fact prompt that I received AGES ago from @oatflatwhite who told me something frankly horrifying about ants. (I’m not responding directly to that ask because you deserve something nice so I’m gonna do something nice with the other prompt you sent <3)

***

Day One:

Everything hurts. But Buck knows this is the most energy and mental capacity that he’s going to have until this thing is over and he can’t afford to waste any time. Screaming as he does, Buck tries to pluck the stone and debris out of his right arm where he’s split wrist to elbow before slathering it in antibiotic ointment and wrapping it up in gauze. There’s no bone showing, but the cut is almost too deep for the Neosporin to be a good idea. Buck would prefer to wash it out with water except that he doesn’t have any.

Landing on his backpack probably saved his life, but Buck can’t help but be devastated that his hydration pack popped like a water balloon when he landed on it. He has a life straw and water purification tablets, but neither of those is of any use without a water source and the next one is six miles up the trail. A trail he’s not even on anymore, he reminds himself, looking up, up, up at the blue sky and the canyon rim that he tumbled from, hitting every ledge on the way down. 

Of course his phone is signal-less. He’d known it would be as soon as he got more than half a mile away from the Jeep. There’s a circled map on the front seat with his route and a matching one at home with Eddie and that might be comforting except that it’s going to be at least 36 hours before anyone notices that he’s not where he’s supposed to be. 

Buck tries not to think about that part.

Day Two:

It took some doing with only one good arm and one good leg (nothing broken, but his right elbow and his left leg from ankle to hip are bruised nearly black; the left ankle is already the size of a softball and Buck doesn’t dare take his boot off to inspect it), but Buck managed to make a lean-to with his striped blanket. He has one end of it secured on a rock with his backpack and the other end precariously pinned with his trekking poles to the canyon floor. Eddie gave him the hardest time about his plans to cowboy camp on this trip, but Buck doesn’t think he could have gotten a tent assembled anyway.  

Of course when he wakes up in the morning, the blanket is gone and he’s staring up at a ruthless sun that’s already started cooking his pale skin. Still half asleep, Buck leans on his right arm to push himself up and a scream rips through his dry throat as the pain burns like fire through all the nerves of his forearm. He tells himself he’s allowed to whimper all he wants as long as he doesn’t stop. He can bitch and moan and cry, but he has to find out where his blanket, his only protection from the desert sun, has blown away to and he has to bring it back.

He also has to force down the melted pack of peanut MMs from his backpack and the orange he was supposed to have for dessert last night. He has a bag of granola too, but it crumbles like sawdust in his dry mouth and while Buck knows it isn’t actually going to make him more dehydrated, he gives himself a pass on eating it for now. 

It’s only for today. Eddie won’t hesitate to pull the trigger on calling search and rescue when Buck doesn’t check in by three. Buck just has to hold on for today.

Day Three:

He feels, simultaneously, like the body in the Operation board game and the person holding the tweezers. Every movement Buck makes seems to provoke a loud, emphatic error response. Screaming instead of buzzing. When the sun went down last night, he screamed for what felt like an hour, yelling for help that was nowhere around and apparently not coming. What he got for planning a hike on a Tuesday. The last names in the trailhead book before his own had departed on Saturday and on such a little known trail, Buck didn’t expect any to follow him until Friday. 

Tomorrow? 

He doesn’t like that it takes him a minute to remember what day it is.

He doesn’t like the angry red lines radiating from the cut on his arm. Buck manages to change the gauze, but he doesn’t have enough left to do it again. The skin and exposed muscle beneath is obviously infected, but apart from another layer of the useless Neosporin, there’s nothing he can do. 

After he loses the feeling in his left toes, he kicks his boots off to find that the swelling is as bad as he’d feared. No longer sure that it’s not broken, Buck doesn’t dare to put any weight on it at all and he hobbles around his right, leaning hard on one of the trekking poles, as he chases down the blanket again.

When he makes it back to his rock, panting, dizzy, and not sweating nearly as much as he’d like, Buck gives up on the idea of a shelter and just wraps the blanket around his sunburned shoulders. 

Day 4: 

He’s such a fucking moron. He’s wasted all of this time and he should have tried to climb out of the canyon when he had a chance instead of sitting around waiting. “Hug a tree” was advice for toddlers like “don’t talk to strangers.” Adults were supposed to rescue themselves. Buck should have been able to rescue himself. 

As the sun rises, he paces along the canyon wall, looking for any sign of footholds or paths. He screams until it feels like his throat is bleeding and his racing heart pounds in his head. When he tries to swallow the granola, it comes back up in a mushed mass of oat and stomach acid. His piss is burnt orange and he tries and fails to catch it in his hands anyway, desperate for a drink. Fucking Bear Grylls would have climbed out of the canyon. 

He has the blanket with him and he pulls it over his head to protect his shoulders and the back of his neck, but the sun sneaks in anyway. Blisters pop up on Buck’s collarbone and on his forehead and when he sits down to cry, his eyes are too dry for tears. He can’t stand up afterward and he crawls on his hands and knees back to his rock.

The battery on his phone is dying so even though Buck is sure is going to live--he has to live-- he drafts a few text messages. To Maddie. To Eddie.  I love you I love you I love you I love you. I’m trying so hard. I love you I love you I love you.

Day ???:

Eddie had been worried about the mountain lions. Buck laughed at him as he rolled up his sleeping pad, telling Eddie that a tent wasn’t the protection against a mountain lion that he thought it was. Buck’s main concern right now are the ants. They seem like they’re swarming everywhere. Big golden ants with mandibles like the jaws of life. They didn’t have ants like that in Pennsylvania. 

Buck brushes at them furiously as they crawl all over his arms and legs. They don’t bite but the incessant march of their feet itches. Buck claws at the gauze on his arm, scratching and scratching and the previously white cotton is stained with blood and dirt and it’s on fire. When he pulls at the bandage, something gummy holds tightly to it and Buck decides to leave it alone if only to keep the ants out of it. 

Some of them look as big as scorpions. Eddie had been worried about scorpions too. Eddie worries a lot. He wanted Buck to bring an inReach but they’re expensive and by the time he brought it up, Buck didn’t have a chance to order one anyway. 

You should have listened to me, Eddie says, leaning against the rock as Buck lays beneath it. 

“I know,” Buck answers. “I’m sorry.” 

Don’t be sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I’m just scared, Buck. I don’t know where you are.

“I don’t know where I am either.” That’s a new thought and it’s scary. Buck is next to the rock and he’s in a red canyon under a burning sun and there are ants crawling all over him and he doesn’t remember how he got there. 

I’m looking for you.

A dry sob echoes in the canyon.

You’re holding on for me, right? Stay in the shade. Wear your blanket.

“It’s hot.” Too hot. His skin is burning from the inside and the outside and every part of it is red and warm and itchy and Buck’s not sweating anymore. An ant bites his arm and he smacks it hard, forgetting about the wound beneath. He wonders if the ants are crawling there on purpose.

People used to use ants as stitches. They’d let them bite right into the edges of the wound and then pull their bodies away. Buck doesn’t know why the ants held on after they died. He doesn’t know who thought to try that and why bandages weren’t enough. He imagines what it would feel like. The hundreds of ants he’d need in his arm. Inside for the muscle and outside for the skin. Imagines their mandibles sinking into him. Imagines the pain of it. Imagines what would happen if one of the inside ants wasn’t decapitated properly and it was let loose and crawling inside his arm and it carved deep tunnels in there and laid eggs.

“Don’t let them put ants in my arm, Eddie.” 

I won’t, Buck.

“Don’t let them do it. I don’t want them to bite me, Eddie. Eddie.” 

What if they’re in there already? Buck starts unraveling the gauze ignoring the howl of pain up his arm and the black spots dancing in front of his eyes as he forces himself to sit up. The gauze rips away from his skin and the wound below is white and yellow with pus and there aren’t any ants in the world big enough to close the cut. 

The gauze is a tangled mess and he can’t put it back on so Buck wraps his arm in the blanket and squeezes tight to keep the ants out. He can’t hear Eddie anymore. He can just hear the ants. Marching. Marching. They’re climbing down the canyon walls. They’re coming for him. Buck shivers and shakes and waits for them. He has to survive. He has to. He has to. 

#whumptober2021 #no.15 #delirium #911 #fic #911 fic #WIP #or I guess the abridged version of something that will eventually be a WIP

[burnedbyshoto]

the marriage contract

chapter one: [begin this journey.]

— Just because your soulmate is Bakugou Katsuki doesn’t mean that he’s the one meant for you; in fact, he’s your worst enemy. With trouble brewing across the way, and with no one able to complete this job except you and Bakugou, there’s nothing you can do except go along with the mission. But wait, what?! You’re supposed to be married?!

pairing: pro hero!bakugou katsuki x pro hero fem!reader

chapter warnings: cursing

word count: 4,093

a/n: in this enemies to lovers story, only you get to decide whether you remain enemies, or if you succeed in becoming lovers. the choice to make is at the end of the story, good luck :D also, background on your quirk (sorry, I had to give you a quirk in order for this to work the way i see fit.) I won’t lie, im really nervous about all this... hopefully this is fun and won’t come and bite me in the ass.

Quirk: Water Sprout - using water from your body, you are able to extract and then use the water (that comes from your body or has come in direct contact with your fingertips) freely. Drawbacks include constant dehydration, dizziness, headaches.

bolded choice is the answer. ~ {masterlist}

[Begin this journey.]     [Turn back now.]

relationship status: enemies.

“You’re fucking with me, right?”

Cosmic and gods, there was nothing in this world that proved these existed.

Nothing.

Nothing in this world could show the nonbeliever that there was an outside force in the world that made people suspect that there were otherworldly ties. Not the appearance of quirks, which was proven to be a genetic mutation as part of humans' evolution, and even the sudden and ancient appearance of The Contract did anything to solidify this - well, at least to some.

Quirks were easy to understand.

Powers, drawbacks, uniqueness.

Oh, it was something that was still so new to the world that people enjoyed it so, but for The Contract, oh how that was different.

The Contract was what was the name of the world wide know phenomenon more known merely as soulmates. Everyone had a fated one, and you would know who they were because every once in a while, a simple choice would appear before you.

A this or that situation.

You would pick one of the options, and somewhere out in the world, there was a person who, despite their own free will, would succumb to your choice. It was as simple as choosing to make someone double knot or single knot their shoes, or sometimes as hard as pulling the plug on a stranger, you had no idea existed. But it had been generations since it had first appeared, and people had grown to accept the inevitable. Which, in turn, brought out new problems.

Soulmates, while fundamentally and theoretically excellent and good, seemed to shock people by the work that needed to be put into them to succeed. Two souls that were perfect for each other didn’t guarantee two people were perfect for one another. The blind, false, true love these people bragged and teetered on was ridiculous and often led to horrible breaks within soulmate bonds. People did not understand that soulmates - just as any other relationship - needed time to fester and grow. It wasn’t an over the counter remedy, it was two people trying to find similarities other than the gods and the cosmics wanting this.

It was rather rough, to say the least.

Most people didn’t mind the growth, waiting for their soulmate to become the person meant for them. Others, well, you were the perfect example of it.

Your entire life, you had thought your soulmate was an asshole, well, scratch that, he IS an asshole. Every chance he got, he would always pick the worst of the two options. He chose for you to reject pursuers in your school days, to trip your siblings, to yell at your parents when you were upset. He picked for you to get up early in middle school and train, to study for tests right when you were about to go out with friends. He was obviously picking the worst things for you (not that you were any better), and so by the bitter age of fifteen when you were put into Shiketsu High School, you were glad to pledge to be someone who wouldn’t accept the soulmate shit for anything.

If he was your soulmate, so be it, but he would never be your lover.

Things in high school and your last year of middle school went reasonably well, the choices the two of you had to make were simple enough. The worst one you remember seeing late one night at the beginning of summer break during your last year of middle school, two options illuminating before you.

[Accept his offer.]     [Decline his offer.]

There was no context for your choice.

But there had been a pit in your stomach, something telling you to chose the bottom one, and you did. Nothing consequential came from that, and you forgot about it with time.

High school went on with usual choices; both of you continue to choose the lesser of two options from what you could tell. The worst thing was rejecting your senior who had asked you out on a date (something he had told you to keep a secret from the school officials), and you had really wanted to go on a date with him… but nonetheless, you survived. Fresh out of high school with your official Hero License under your belt, you had been accepted into Rising Agency, a very new agency founded by a class older than you over at Yuuei - Class 1-A.

The prominent faces being hero Deku, Ground Zero, and Shouto.

Somehow you had passed the interview selection and had been accepted, and your first day went horribly. On account of your quirk, Water Sprout, you had woken up with a mouth drier than a desert, and like you always did, you grabbed your liter bottle and went to chug.

Only two options popped before your eyes the moment you moved the water to your parched mouth.

[Spill the water.]     [Safely drink the water.]

You had tried your hardest to get your lip to the opening, but you knew better. During the time The Contract appeared, time literally froze. Your soulmate was given up to fifteen seconds to choose the answer before the first choice was automatically selected. You had tried to suppress the scream at the back of your throat when the cold, cold water came splashing down on your chest. Spraying all over your bed.

The scream you made when you were soaked to the bone no doubt made your soulmate smile wherever he was.

So you were glad when his options appeared before you a few minutes later.

[Break the sink faucet.]      [Turn off the water.]

With a sniff, you held no remorse when your hand jammed out and hit the option he deserved.

You had arrived at the agency's front door within the next hour, your most formal business clothes were worn fresh and sharp. Your hand held your case with your hero costume and nerves at your stomach. This was it, you had thought, your hands sweating profusely, your mouth so dry you felt faint, and with a quick chug of your water, you entered the facility.

The agency smelled like Pine-Sol and sweets, and you found the front desk immediately but were off-put by a man who was already there. His back hunched over, arms crossed, and placed onto the counter as he seemed to be arguing with the receptionist.

Nearer and nearer you drew, and the more you began to recognize just who the man was: Ground Zero.

Calm down, calm down, calm down.

Your heart hammered viciously in your chest as you were finally in earshot of the conversation - it seemed that he was fighting over his new time slots for his routine patrols. But you were no stranger to his… vivacious temperament, and instead of addressing him first, you figured it was in the best interest to simply ask the receptionist what your first steps should be.

But as you opened up your mouth, your internal monologue of what to say blaring on repeat so that you wouldn’t mess up, the world froze, and you panicked.

[Ace the introduction.]      [Fumble the introduction.]

The world was still for five seconds, but never did you ever once experience someone moving within The Contract. So, when Ground Zero’s hand moved and punched in an option that was mirrored right in front of your mouth, you immediately felt the blood in your cheeks from seeing him recoil back to your heart faster than you could blink.

“Hi, I’m Hero, and I’m new? I’m looking for the y/l/n room?”

Horror struck through you immediately at the realization.

Ground Zero was yours...?

He was your…?!

You saw red.

“Hah? What kind of introduction was -- WHAT THE FUCK?!”

Your fist throbbed pathetically still curled near his face, and Ground Zero’s blazing, burning red gaze matched the blood pouring from his busted nose as you panted like a corned animal.

“YOU MADE ME WET MY BED, ASSHOLE!”

So went your first interaction with your soulmate.

Your fist connecting and shattering his nose. Three of his friends holding him back, and three trying to escort you away quickly. It was indeed one for the books.

But that was three years ago, and at the age of twenty-one, you could still not handle the sight, or the presence of your soulmate, and vice versa. The both of you were like oil and water, conflicting and fighting whenever left together for too long, unable to get along. He was not meant for you, and you were not meant for him - it was evident like night and day.

Right decisions were made, however, once knowing who the other one was. The both of you taking track of each other’s patrol schedules to make sure good choices were made at that time, just in case, but as soon as the other was off, payback was a bitch. The entire agency had learned that both of you were soulmates the same day the both of you found out, and there were actual looks of sorrow given to you from his friends?!

Not to mention that his nickname for you was bedwetter now, something that both infuriated and embarrassed you to this day.

Both of you were separated at all times, never once having to work together, that is, until today. A time where we find ourselves back in the beginning.

“You’re fucking with me, right?”

A part of you wanted to roll your eyes at Bakugou’s quip, but in all consideration, you agreed with him ultimately.

“Unfortunately, I’m not,” Yaoyorozu sighed, her mouth pinched and her hands passing both you and Bakugou a small stack of documents for you to read over. You took your file after placing your water bottle down and opened it immediately as Yaoyorozu continued to speak. “Kane, Bryan is an American man who has recently been on Japan’s watchlist. He is highly dangerous, evasive, and a hard man to pin anything on… all we know is that innocent people are going missing when they enter his land, and undercover heroes end up in the sea with no memories, or worse, dead.”

That took you by surprise, and your stomach twisted at that thought.

Heroes have turned up dead?

“I don’t doubt the seriousness that this Kane man brings, but no offense, Creati, why does it have to be a mission for Ground Zero and I?” you asked, your eyes flittering from the blurred photo of the man on your page onto the slightly frowning commandeer of this agency. “We aren’t exactly… a good fighting duo? If what I think you’re asking is correct, why not send in Deku and Ground Zero? They have the best duo track record, I’m sure that they’ll be able to apprehend this man better and faster than we can.”

Yaoyorozu sighed, her teeth tugging at her bottom lip while her fingers drummed on the table, obviously not comfortable telling the full explanation.

“Well, to be honest, he stays on a remote island nearby, and it’s very exclusive.”

You owlishly blinked at Yaoyorozu, who straightened in her chair, a new air of confidence flowing through her that made you almost ask if a choice had been made for her.

“Kane owns a private island that is known for its resort, and to enter the resort, there must be two truths to this,” her eyes were holding yours for a moment, they were deep, so dark that for a second you felt fear tickle at the back of your spine before she turned her attention over to Bakugou. “One: those who may enter must be in a romantic relationship.”

What?

“Two: they must be soulmates.”

“WHAT?!”

You blinked, your head snapping over at Bakugou, who had yelled the same words as you did, obviously not impressed with what they were now enforcing. Oh god, this was not what you were thinking at all!

“Why the hell does it have to check off those two boxes? I’m not going somewhere obviously dangerous and in the middle of nowhere with bed wetter!” Bakugou growled, his feet planted onto the floor as he had his upper lip pulled into a sour face of sorts. “I’ll do it with literally anyone else, ponytail!”

“Unfortunately, that’s not an option,” she sighed, her hand pushing through her bangs with a sad shake of her head. She looked tired, and her exhaustive eyes rose to meet yours, and his, and her voice was weak and oh so pleading. “There is some way they can tell if you’re soulmates, and those we sent out who weren’t already soulmates never made it in. You two are quite literally our only option, without the two of you, we don’t stand a chance.”

“So, can we act as estranged lovers then?” you questioned, your stomach twisting in the thought of having to display any sort of romantic displays with the man sitting right next to you. “We can be a couple trying to work on our relationship?”

Yayorozu gulped.

“W-We actually made profiles for the two of you…”

“And?” came Bakugou’s near whisper.

“Y-You’ll be acting as a, well, a newly married couple. This is your honeymoon… I know you two don’t have a good history, and your on field teamwork has never been tried, but I’m pleading to you two now, please consider. You have until tomorrow to tell me if you accept.”

If there had been a choice that appeared for Bakugou to make you slam your head through the desk, you would have thanked him for choosing it.

[Carry all the bags]     [Take only his bags.]

“Thank you!” you chirped with no pity for the situation you had just placed him in, the glint of a sneer flashing across Bakugou’s face was fierce as he took the bags of luggage the two of you had been given from your agency. This was it, it was starting.

The weight of what was to come of this was now starting to hit heavily, the importance of the diamond ring on your finger - a symbol of the fake marriage contract between you and Bakugou felt like a ton. There was no hiding the discomfort the both of you held when you had to act in love, your hand itching to leave his clammy, abnormally warm hands, and you never realized how he mumbled under his breath until you were forced to sit next to him on the private plane. But as you were given two days to prepare for this mission, it didn’t hit you what was happening until you unloaded from the plane.

From the initial observation of the island, you immediately recognized just why the owner was so elusive and able to keep his agenda hidden. The island's natural barriers were bright as day, the rocky mountains seemed entirely inhabitable, and the entire resort was located where the mountains met the beach. Tropics and natural waterholes existed in those parts before slowly blending into the white sand beaches with water so blue and clean that you genuinely wished you would be having a good time.

You hated having to remind yourself that you were here for the sake of a mission and not to simply lay out, well, it was easy to forget that until Bakugou was beside you, and you fought the instinctive reaction to scowl at him. In fact, with your gaze falling onto the blond-haired hero, you didn’t notice the small woman appearing from nowhere, a bright smile on her face and white linen clothes on

“Welcome to Hibani Island!” she chirped, her eyes closing in well-practiced greetings, she spoke with an accent, and with her appearance, you assumed she was American. “My name is Jane, and I’m here to welcome you to our wonderful island! May I please have your names and the choice you had upon arrival?”

Your greeting smile disappeared at that point, your head tilting in confusion, “I’m sorry, our choice?”

“Mhm!” Jane nodded enthusiastically, the same bright smile plastered on her face. “Our wonderful island works in mysterious ways! As you both know, our beautiful resort is only for those who are soulmates; after all, we would never wish to poison her beautiful nature with impure love! Upon entry, with the help of the island, I am able to procure a choice for you and your soulmate to make! Since I posed the question to you,” her glazed over eyes focused on you, “I would appreciate it if your partner answered!”

There was a silence, and it couldn’t have lasted any more than a few seconds in all reality. But in that still, you could feel the hair on the back of your neck stand straight up, there was obviously something entirely wrong here.

“A choice about who would carry the luggage in,” Bakugou calmly, smoothly answered, his voice somehow not picking up on any suspicion. “Be -- Y/n chose that I would carry them all.”

The way your name passed his lips made your spine stiffen, it felt weird, unnatural, fake.

Well, this entire thing is fake, you reminded yourself, grateful that Jane was at the moment impressed by Bakugou’s correct statement.

“Well, wonderful! I’m so glad that our island can greet two beautiful soulmates today! Your names? So that I may check you both in?”

“Nakamura Katsuki and Y/n.”

“Amazing! Let’s get you to the main lobby, and they’ll set you two love birds up!”

Thankfully, Jane was a woman who didn’t mind talking to herself the entire way over to the resort’s main lobby, she spoke wonders of how the hot springs were especially “magically” at night, and promised that a trip during that time would lead to “the best of fantasies.” The resort itself was oddly busy. Couples were everywhere, each in their own world, yet all orbiting around one another, never once mixing.

The white sundress you wore suddenly felt too simple, especially with the stupid designer wear most people were wearing.

Jane escorted you to the front desk, and with one last overenthusiastic smile, she disappeared.

“Check us in, Joo Dee just about made me fucking lose it,” Bakugou grumbled, his patience hanging on a much thinner thread than yours apparently.

“Glad to know it takes only one super smiley person to ruin your day,” you couldn’t help but snip, the rolling of your eyes only stopped when the front desk clerk began to walk over, a bright smile on his face, and his hand waving in greeting.

You opened your mouth, ready to begin talking when his welcome rang clearly in your ears, but just as it happened all those years ago, the world froze.

[Ace the introduction.]     [Fumble the introduction.]

The prideful, arrogant smirk on his face seemed to burn into your back as he stared from behind you.

“Hi, I would like it.”

Your voice gave out, and with burning cheeks, you and the front desk clerk stared at each other, the awkward silence biting into your throat. The clerks’ smile, breaking slightly in his second-hand embarrassment and wonder as to why you stopped talking, but despite wanting to continue speaking your voice refused to work again.

Bakugou Katsuki was an asshole.

“Are you here to check in?” he asked, his eyes searching yours in hopes that was what you were here for.

With a burning face, you nodded, and the check-in proceeded.

The clerk, who introduced himself as Ryan Locke, quickly checked you and Bakugou into your rooms. He pulled out a simple paper map and circled the small house - yes, small house - that the two of you would be residing in. Just as the package the two of you purchased, both of you would be here in two months, and the entire time everything would be included. Name it, and it would be brought to the room, well, house. You nodded, trying to take everything he was throwing at you in, not at all relying on Bakugou, who was standing by the window staring at the other guests with a frown on his face.

PDA was not something either one of you were comfortable with.

“Well, that’s it from me! Should you need any assistance, please do not hesitate to call!” Ryan smiles, the crinkles by his eyes creasing, even more, washing you over with ease despite the tension in your body. You heard Bakugou approach the two of you, and with him beside you, Ryan seemed to remember something as he rubbed the back of his neck. “And, there is a couples event tonight, should you and your husband want to join! Most couples do, and by the look of it, it may help re-spark things?”

A sour rancid taste crawled at the back of your throat as you awkwardly laughed, your fronts were weaker then you thought, and shook your head, “Oh no! That’s no issue! We’re actually here on our honeymoon,” your fingers pressed to your chest, your eyes trailing to where Bakugou was standing in hopes that it somehow looked romantic. Pet names were a thing, right? But what to call him? “Uh, K-Kacchan is actually super shy with PDA!”

You froze when the only nickname you’ve ever heard used toward Bakugou fumble clumsily from your tongue.

Kacchan?!

KACCHAN?!

WERE YOU SUDDENLY DEKU?!

“Oh! Yes, I understand now!” Ryan laughed, waving off his mistake, the apples of his cheeks dusting in what you could only pray to be embarrassment. “Well, if you want to help your Kacchan here express his love for you without care of the world, tonight’s session is the place to be!”

He turned and walked away with a final smile, most likely retreating to the ringing phone in the back room.

“I swear to god, do not ever call me that shitty nickname ever again, or else I’ll explode your ass,” Bakugou hissed, his hand grabbing you by the elbow as he had you in close.

“I’ll call you whatever I damn please!” you hissed back, ripping your elbow out of his hold.

You watched as his upper lip twitched, and he moved to go grab your luggage, something The Contract still held over him. You stood with the papers that Ryan had given to you, the stack of itineraries and options of what the both of you two could do while at your stay taking far more room in your arm then you thought was acceptable. Your concentration on your fake husband - as you kept vehemently reminding yourself - broke when the door opened and in walked a woman who was alone, and headphones on her ears. You offered her a smile when eye contact was made but did nothing more.

Bakugou leaned down, his hands lifting up the luggage, most definitely annoyed with rolling the large suitcases. But with the woman’s course and the way that Bakugou’s back was towards her, having not noticed her entry at all, you could see that they were going to collide. Essential items were in that suitcase, and you had no idea if they could break if Bakugou managed to drop them after crashing with her. But again, it would be payback for the embarrassing first encounter with Ryan!

But before you could make up your mind on what to do, the world froze.

[Crash into her.]     [Avoid her.]

⋄⋆⊹⋄⋆⋄⋆⊹⋄⋆⋄⋆⊹⋄⋆

(make sure to vote for the choice to be chosen!)  poll closes august 30 8am pst

#bakugou x reader #bakugou katsuki x reader #bnha #bnha x reader #mha x reader

[manychocolatefactories]

CatCF Milk Chocolate: Part 1, the kids

About this version: Milk Chocolate was inspired originally by a mix of the book, the vibes of the 1971 movie and the Tim Burton movie aesthetic. A bit more goofier and whimsical than the other versions. In term of era, I thought of it as a mix of 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.

In this version seven Golden Tickets are spread throughout the world, and each time one is found the same female reporter (her character is a reference to the musical) goes to interview the children. Another recurring joke is that while the hunt is going on for the Tickets, there are all sorts of ridiculous debates on television such as: do the Golden Tickets really exist, or is this just a hoax ? Do the Golden Tickets give cancer? Can animals go on a tour like humans? What happens if a Golden Ticket winner dies before the tour? Are the Golden Tickets linked to the rise of youht delinquence? Are the Golden Tickets a proof of Wonka's alleagiance to the obscure sect of the Golden Bird?

  First Winner: Augustus Gloop

(Based on Augustus Gloop)

This Augustus was actually based on an idea Stained-by-the-sea allowed me to "borrow" a bit. Stained noted that Augustus always made him thought of this section from the movie "North", about Buck and the Texan parents. If you don't know what I am talking about, I'll leave links down there. And this is such a perfect matc I had to dig a bit down there.

This Augustus is basically a mix of all the archetypes associated with Texas and Nevada. But more precisely, he is basically "Buck" from North - a boy whose family (and his own mindset) embody the motto "bigger is better".

The Gloop family always thought that they should be "the biggest and the bests" and that "bigger is better". Ironically, the Gloop parents themselves are regular-sized people, but they clearly enforced this mentality on their son. Augustus is a big boy. Literally. He is tall, he is thick, he is fat, he is very, very big. He is probably one of the tallest, and definitively the largest boy on the tour (in fact, he once or twice gets stuck in the doors of Wonka factory). He eats ten meals per day, and we are not talking of regular sized meals. We are talking piles of ribs, kilos of potatoes, entire chickens... His parents also prepared for him a "big" and "best" future - paying the local sportive teams to claim he is a sports champion despite Augustus never setting a foot on a sports field, arranging his marriage with the local beauty queen of the state he lives in, already preparing the three different houses he will live with his fifteen kids... As a result, Augustus isn't just big and fat physically, he also has a massive and bloated ego. He thinks that he is the best at everything, and that he should have absolutely everything he wants.

The Gloops themselves are actually the masters of the state they live in, so to speak. They are the wealthiest and most influential industrials of the area: they built highways, casinos, hotels, private villas, they are cow-farmers, owing a lot of slaughterhouses, and also dig for oil and gold. They want their business to be the "biggest there ever was" and all they do is exaggerately big: their villas are enormous, their hotels are everywhere, their farms hosts several thousands cows, their mines are among the deepest in the world...

Trouble is that, due to their expansion and consumption of everything, they are a threat to the landscape and the environment - destroying forests to build their roads and buildings, drying out the lands to feed their farms... in fact, part of the reason why their state looks like the most desertic parts of Texas and Nevada is due to their actions.

Think... Buck from North. Think Art Land from Mar Attack. Think an evil (and obese) version of Clay Bailey from "Xiaolin Showdown". In fact, if I remember well in one episode Clay turns into a sumo for one of the Showdowns... this would probably be Augustus' appearance in this version: sumo Clay Bailey. (Edit: Yes, I checked out, it is episode 23 of the series).

 Second Winner: Clarence Crump

(Based on: Clarence Crump)

Clarence didn't had any kind of personnality in the original drafts outside of a desire to prove he was right. As a result, I decided to have a lot of fun and create my own character.

The idea of vanity has already been touched several times with the other brats, but I wanted to give it its own character and kid. I also wanted to create a polar opposite of Augustus, denouncing the fact that being skinny can be just as bad as being fat when in excess. As a result, Clarence Crump is here a boy obsessed about being thin, and proud of being too skinny for his own good.

Mr. Crump is a pseudo-health guru that keeps writing phony and very dangerous diet books, the kind that will advice you to stop eating altogether to lose weight. As for Mrs. Crump, she is a beauty pageant champion (local and regional, and while she acts as if she was some national beauty champion, she always failed at nationals). From their union was born a child who inherited their vanity, pride and obsession with "health"

Black haired, very pale, very thin, very slender, to the point his bones show, Clarence delights in being skinny, and works as a teenager model promoting the "thin-fashion". He is also the embodiment of fat-shaming, never missing an occasion to insult fat people (in fact he often calls Augustus a big fat cow). He uses however the excuse of health for that (a trick his parents taught him) - promoting extreme thinness by talking about health and fat-shaming people in the name of health allows one to be much more horrible than normally accepted.

A good proof of how Clarence actually is just very vain and obsessed with being thin, and not at all defending health - Clarence condemns sports for being unhealthy, because according to him "muscles are unhealthy because they don't make you look beautiful, they make you look ugly".

He always wears short and black sleeveless tank-tops, the point being that he needs to show as much as his body to the world as possible, to be a "living example". He even wears his black short and tank-top during the tour (despite it being winte - the only thing he wears on top of his clothes to not get cold is a skunk fur coat).

  Third  Winner: Miranda Grope

(Based on: Miranda Grope)

This character was based on Dahl's own character of "Miranda Grope" from early drafts of the story, the horrible and atrocious girl allowed to do "whatever she wants".

In my version, the Grope parents are hippie-like people, the father having a very long beard and being covered in fleas, while the mother is covered in flowers and oss (plants that grew over her), and both always wearing rose-tinted glasses. They are the kind of parents that refuse authority and orders, seeing these (and social norms as a whole) as a "dictatorship". They prefer to trust their daughter to find her own way in the world, believing that experience is the best teacher in life. The result? They lazily raised her by telling her they would never forbid her anything and that she could do anything she wanted.

Miranda is a devilish little girl who does only what she wants, and becomes extremely violent when prevented from doing something. Or when people say something she doesn't want to hear. Or just when people she dislikes are near her. She shouts, the screams, she insult, she kicks, she hit, she throw enormous and terrifying tantrums. She has a very wide range of insults, and a truly evil mind : most of the things she wants to do are borderline crimes. It seems for her only chaos and destruction is "fun", a true little punk.

Miranda has a disastrous haircut because she cuts her hair herself, and she is always wearing the same clothes that she rarely washes): a white shirt, a blue sweater with long sleeves, and a plaid tiles skirt. An outfit that looks strikingly like a school uniform - but it is pure irony, because Miranda hates more than anything in the world school. She doesn't go to school, and the only time she went near one was to try to burn it down. (Her appearance is in fact based on Lauren Child's illustrations for Miranda, if you are wondering).

  Fourth Winner: Veruca Salt

(Based on: Veruca Salt)

For this Veruca, I wanted to do something slightly different... here, Veruca doesn't want everything just because she is a spoiled rich brat. She is still one, but she is also the product of post-WW2 consumerism.

This Veruca was born surrounded by advertisements, logos, slogans and product placements. On television, in the streets, in shops, in journals, at the radio... She grew up with them and was influenced, brainwashed by them. As a result, she is obsessed with obtaining everything that was advertised, and she herelf looks like a walking billboard since she is covered in big, flashy logo and keeps reciting different brands' slogans and mottos. As soon as she sees something she saw publicity of before, she needs to obtain it at once. She is a true zombie, only hearing the call of the shopping mall and of the television advertisements.

One idea I had was that the Salt parents actually worked for (or where at the head of) a wealthy advertisement company, known to produce, design and create all kinds of famous publicities and slogans - and that they used their daughter as a guinea pig for their tests, and delighted in Veruca being so addicted to consumerism. In fact, they may have named her Veruca because at the moment of her birth they were working on advertisements for an anti-wart product, so that's all they had in mind.

  Fifth winner:  Herpes Trout

(Based on: Mike Teavee)

I went with this version of Mikee Teavee with the focus on "violence" already present in the original work, but also heavily used in the opera (and touched a bit in the 2005 movie).

This Herpes Trout is the embodiment of the fear of kids becoming violent upon watching television and playing video games (his only two passions in life). He has a true fascination with guns and firearms - US soldiers shooting aliens, gangs shooting each other, cowboys shooting at bandits, it's all he ever plays and watches. Herpes worships violence, and is absolutely obsessed with war (here I am thinking of all the wars present from the 60s to the 80s, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Glasgow Ice Cream Wars...). War propaganda and the fight being glorifyed heavily influenced him - as a result his biggest dream is to go at war in some foreign country to kill everyone there and come home a hero.

Herpes comes from a family of rednecks and hillbillies from the deep country. They are not poor however, they are wealthy enough to have television and several video games, but they are uneducated people full of stereotypes, discrimination and hate. They named their son Herpes because they ignored what it meant but just thought of it as an "intelligent" name. Herpes has everal brothers and sisters, and all have a disease name.

Herpes himself is a big and strong kid, who followed body-buildings process a la Charles Atlas and military training, becoming impressively muscular. However, he retained a soft, childish and chubby "baby face", which kind of ruins the effect of this massive, muscular, almost adult body. Always dressed in a military outfit, he carries everywhere with him guns and firearms, the question being: are they real? Or are they not?

  Sixth Winner: Violet Glockenberry

(Based on Violet Beauregarde)

I wanted with this version to take back the idea of a competitive and "sportive" girl obsessed with contesting and winning - introduced in the Tim Burton movie.

This Violet is a tall, muscular and strong girl. She won numerous sportive competitions, but this doesn't make her just arrogant and prideful like in the Tim Burton version. In my version she is also very aggressive and violent (a bit like in the original novel). She is a nasty and rude bully easily prone to anger (in fact, if she keeps chewing gum it is mostly to calm her down sot hat she doesn't punch everyone around). Her parents originally pushed her towards competitions to manage her anger issues, but sports only gave her more strength and destructive power. In fact, they became terrified of her, while she considers them losers here to serve her - she basically thinks of herself as self-made, literaly.

  Seventh Winner: Charlie Bucket

(Based on: Charlie Bucket)

For this Charlie, I wanted to go with a Charlie similar to the original illustrations of the character: blond hair, blue eyes, a white boy...

Basically, he is the original Charlie. Very sweet, very innocent, a gentle kid, the best of the group.

However I changed slightly his background. Charlie in this version is not the grandson of four grandparents, but rather the big brother of four younger siblings - and his family here struggles with trying to feed five children (and a total of seven mouths) despite having very humble and low-paid jobs. I think Charlie has taken the role of a parentive figure for the siblings, but at the same time him spending so much time with young children helped him keep in touch with his "childish" side.

#charlie and the chocolate factory #catcf #milk chocolate #retelling #charlie bucket #violet beauregarde #mike teavee #augustus gloop #veruca salt #miranda grope #clarence crump

[majingojira]

Brief Review of Every Dinosaur/Prehistoric Documentary/Educational Short I’ve ever seen (1923-1996).

And thanks to a certain project, I’ve seen a LOT! 

Evolution (1923) - This is the oldest of the bunch, a silent film.  Mostly it uses modern animals to represent ancient forms, with a few statues and brief animated bits to fill things out. The only real highlight?  Seeing where some of the “film real” segment from Gigantis the Fire Monster comes from! 

Monsters from the Past (1923) - A short documentary with original stop motion (this was pre-The Lost World, so that’s to be expected).  Triceratops, Tyrannosaurus, and Brontosaurus are the key creatures. Included as an extra on the second DVD release of The Lost World. 

Prehistoric Animals (1938) - Reuses footage from The Lost World (1925) for its prehistoric segments. This will not be the last time it happens. 

Prehistoric Times: The World Before Man (1952) - This thing is so quintessentially 1950s, it’s highly riff-able.  It uses a mix of paintings, sculptures and some live animals to represent prehistoric life.  

A World Is Born (1955) - Ya know what Fantasia needed?  Overbearing Narration! That’s it.  That’s what this documentary is.  I saw this thing rebroadcast in the 90s on the Disney Channel, believe it or not. 

The Animal World (1956) - Ray Harryhausen.  Willis O’Brian. Their stop motion segment is the ONLY notable part of this documentary.  This is also the only part that has seen some release in modern times, as a bonus feature on the DVD of The Black Scorpion.  

Prehistoric Animals of the Tar Pits (1956) - Black and white, but also quintessentially 50s and riff-able.  Aside from the bones, it shows some wooden models to represent the animals. 

Journey into Time (1960) - Fantasia this is not, but it TRIES to be.  Lord it tries.  Or, rather, there’s a Fantasia-adjacent thing elsewhere which does the same thing.  Has some unique choices for animals to represent, including showing Permian forms like Scutusaurus and Inostrancevia. 

Dem Dry Bones: Archaeology, Paleontology, Identification, and Preservation (1966) - This was a lucky find, it was on Youtube for half a second.  And not worth digging out, really.  Stuffy, dry, and mildly condescending.  It was still interesting looking at the dinosaur hall of the Smithsonian back in the 1950s. 

Dinosaurs - The Terrible Lizard (1970) - The stop motion here is pretty neat, if slow and plodding, it’s refreshing after all this crap. The puppets for many of these would later be re-used for The Land of the Lost.  Including Grumpy, Alice, and Spot. 

NOVA: The Hot-Blooded Dinosaurs (1977) - Robert Bakker’s first appearance in a documentary.  HE HAS SUCH LONG HAIR!  Not bad, a little dry, with National Geographic titles.  It reminds me of 1990s documentaries, just so show how long it’s taken for various ideas to filter down.  Currently, it’s available on Archive.org. 

Dinosaurs: A First Film (1978) - The art style for this half-animated 70s abomination makes identifying various prehistoric animals almost impossible.  Almost painful to sit through. Stops with the Dinosaurs. 

Dinosaurs: The Age of the Terrible Lizards (1978) - Similar to the above, but available from Rifftrax, so much more watchable.  Also, it’s actually animated!

Dinosaur (1980) - Wil Vinton Claymation with Dinosaurs.  A few edits of this exist, the latter works a bit better, but the original is interesting to track down. Most of the edits are audio only, so you aren’t missing anything.  The dinosaur sin this are top notch for color and design.  They even have Corythosaurus and Tyrannosaurus not dragging their tails! 

Cosmos (1980) - the animated segment covering Evolution is still wonderful if only for the narration from Carl Sagan. 

The Age of Mammals (1981) - A follow up of sorts to Dinosaurs: The Age of Reptiles.  Decent stop motion if a little slow.  Decent variety for the time. 

64,000,000 Years Ago (1981) - A solid stop motion short film.  Still worth checking out for stop motion fans.  Available on Youtube legally! 

Dinosaurs: Fun, Facts, and Fantasy (1981) - Nostalgic for some, but aimed at a rather young audience.  Some interesting stop motion bits in here too... if awkward in that way British stop motion can be outside Aardman Studios. 

Reading Rainbow “Digging up Dinosaurs” (1983) - Definitely nostalgic for me.  Besides, it’s Reading Rainbow!  And opens with a clip from One Million Years B.C.!  What’s not to love?

Prehistoric Beast (1984) - One of the best stop motion shorts on this list.  Included because it INSPIRED a documentary from it.  Phil Tippett firing on all cylinders.  Well worth watching.  And he uploaded it on Youtube himself! 

Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs (1985), More Dinosaurs (1985), Son of Dinosaur (1988),  Prehistoric World (1993) - Gary Owens and Eric Boardman have a series of documentaries on dinosaurs and prehistoric life.  The presenters are what really make these work. Colorful, fun, and yes, silly, these still hold a nostalgic gleam for people like me.  The last one has Dougal Dixon talk about his After Man speculations.  Fun times. 

Dinosaur! (1985) - Hosted by Christopher Reeve, this is one of the best documentaries of its time.  Reeves loved dinosaurs and was happy to work on this project with Phil Tippet behind the animation.  Covers a lot in its hour long format, and well worth watching.  Do you know how good this special was?  When Reeve died in 2004, the Discovery Channel (or similar station) re-aired this thing as a tribute.  It holds up that well! 

Tell Me Why: Pre-Historic Animals, Reptiles and Amphibians (1986) - This is something I had when I was a little kid.  Dry, straight forward, a “Video Babysitter” at it’s best. It consists of a narrator while looking at pictures of the Invicta Dinosaur Toys that were also on the poster. 

Dinosaurs! A Fun-Filled Trip Back in Time (1987) - Wil Vinton’s Dinosaurs! tied with a short setup/framing device with the kid from the Wonder Years involving a low-animation music video (this was the MTV age) and a guide through art from various dinosaur books from the 1950s through the 1980s.  Rather meh, but Wil Vinton is why we are here.  This was the only way to get Wil Vinton’s short back in the day, and is the version of the short shown in Museums like The Academy of Natural Sciences.  

Digging Dinosaurs (PBS-WHYY) (1988) - Something I managed to record of TV back in the day, though not much of it, about the uncovering and preparation of Avaceratops. Bone Dry. 

Maia: A Dinosaur Grows Up (1988) - A VHS version of the picture book, with narration and the whole spiel.  Actually not to bad for what it is, but it is what it is.  The art for that book is rather wonderful. 

Lost Worlds, Vanished Lives (1988) - David.  Attenburrough. Need I say more?  Not one of his best, but still wonderful. Hard to track down.  

Dinosaurs (1989) - From the Smithsonian Institute, one of the video followups sold in various museums (I have one from the Royal Tyrell, but haven’t been able to track it down).  Not great, but I’ve seen worse. 

Infinite Voyage: The Great Dinosaur Hunt (1989) - A rather dry documentary, but one I find extremely relaxing and calming.  Very nostalgic for me.  But still dry. 

Vestie Video Sitter: Dinosaurs (1989) - This is for babies. It hurt to watch. 

In November, 1990, Jurassic Park (novel) was released, and thus began the great shift. 

In Search of the Dragon: The Great Dinosaur Hunt of the Century (1991) - a.k.a. The Dinosaur Project, The Great Dinosaur Hunt, The Hunt for China’s Dinosaurs.  Edited into a 1 hour NOVA special from a nearly two hour documentary, all about the joint Canadian/Chinese Gobi Desert Expedition in the 1980s that gave us Mamenchisaurus among many other species.  With another stop in the Arctic for good measure.  Some good stop motion and pencil animation for Troodon round this one out. 

A&E’s Dinosuar! (1991) - There’s so many things named “Dinosaur” that I have to specify.  Hosted by Walter Cronkite, this is rather dry, but still entertaining documentary series has some nightmare-fuel puppet-work.  The ‘sad’ music gets caught in my head sometimes when I think about it.  It is 4 episodes long.  “The Tale of a Tooth”, “The Tale of a Bone”, “The Tale of an Egg”, and “The Tale of a Feather”

T. Rex: Exposed (1991) - a Nova Documentary on T. Rex.  Not too bad overall, focusing on the Wrankle Rex unearthing. Parts of it are available on Youtube, but not all of it.  

The Case of the Flying Dinosaur (1991) - the third in the “NOVA” 91 trilogy, this covers the bird-dinosaur connection as it was still contentious at the time. 

PBS’ The Dinosaurs! (1992) - A gold standard for documentaries on dinosaurs. The hand drawn animation with colored pencil style still hold up today. The narrator has a bit of an accent and pronounces “Dinosaur” oddly, but that is the only complaint I can really give. It has 4 episodes: “The Monsters Emerge”, “Flesh on the Bones”, “The Nature of the Beast”, “Death of the Dinosaurs.”

Muttaburrasaurus: Life in Gondwana (1993) - A half-hour short about dinosuars and mesozoic life in Australia. Solid stop motion animation. Australian Accents makes it fun to listen too.

NOVA: The Real Jurassic Park (1993) - Jeff Goldblum narrates this bit of scientists going on about “But what if we really did it?” Quite fun, lotta fun details the movies and even the books didn’t get into. My favorite bit had Robert Bakker talking to a game keeper at the Rockefeller Refuge in a Louisiana Cypress Swamp about what could happen if they kept a few dinosaur there (Edmontosaurus, Triceratops, and T. Rex).  Namely, he talks about housing ‘about a thousand” Edmontosaurs on the 86K acre facility, with 2 or 3 mated pairs of Rexes.  It’s fun getting numbers like that. 

Bill Nye the Science Guy “Dinosaurs” (1993) - BILL! BILL! BILL! BILL! BILL!  Not a bad kids entry for documentaries. Available from Netflix. 

Paleoworld (1994-1997) - Running originally for 4 years, and being revamps once along the way, this rather dry, “Zoom in on paleoart” style of documentary was a good holdover for bigger things, and covered some pretty niche topics.  Much of the later version has been uploaded to youtube. 

Dinosaur Digs: A Fossil Finders Tour (1994), Dinosaurs: Next Exit (1994) - These films hurt me.  They hurt me so much.  I’ve seen some painful things, but these are hour long tour advertisements for road trips with annoyingly earworms.  Available on youtube, but I ain’t linking anything! 

Eyewitness: Dinosaur (1994) - Not a bad documentary, but I still hold a grudge on it for replacing Wil Vinton’s work at my local museum! Still, it is narrated by Martin Sheen. The clip selection is wide and varied, but we’re still getting The Lost World (1925) footage. 

Planet of Life (1995) - This documentary series is rather dry, but boasts some interesting coverage of topics.  Though some of it’s conclusions regarding dinosaurs are... not great.  Still, the episode “Ancient Oceans” is a favorite of mine. 

Once Upon Australia (1995) - The bests stop motion documentary on Australia’s prehistory. Has some humor to is, and Australian fauna that it does cover is solid.  Though finding out how one of the animals is spelled, ( Ngapakaldia) drove me nuts for literally decades. 

Dinosaurs: Myths and Reality (1995) - Like a little more polished episode of Paleoworld, with a lighter-voiced narration, this covers common myths about dinosaurs. Overall, a Meh.  But it has a LOT of movie clips. Which makes sense given it was funded by the Disney Channel! 

The Ultimate Guide: T. Rex (1995) - The Ultimate Guide series of docs were overall rather solid, as was the Tyrannosaurus one.  Stop Motion animation along with puppets and some minor CG help round out the normal talking heads and skeleton mounts.  Along with a solid narrator, it has a real mood to it.  

The Magic School Bus “The Busasaurus” (1995) - The original Magic School Bus was a solid series, and their episode on Dinosaurs bucks trends even the reboot didn’t cover.  The core thrust here wasn’t just dinosaur information, but the idea that Dinosaurs were not Monsters, but animals.  And they conveyed it in a unique way.  

I may do more of these mini-reviews, but there are a LOT of documentaries post The Lost World: Jurassic Park that don’t have as much easy access.  Like, I’ve seen them, but digging out links/citing places to watch them is a lot harder. 

#Dinosaurs #Documentaries #Documentary #Review #Dinosaur #Prehistoric

[daggerzine]

Sunday Runners.....the Corvair interview.

The music of Corvair fell into my hands recently thanks to Heather Larimer, who makes up one half of the band. The Portland duo, comprised of Larimer and her husband Brian Naubert (and drummer Eric Eagle for the recordings) haven’t been around for too long but being together a lot the past year or so gave them plenty of time to work on songs. I was a big fan of Larimer’s previous band, Eux Autres, and wondered if they were still around (see the first question) so was anxious to hear Corvair. I really liked what I heard. A healthy dose of all things 1970’s, 80’s and 90’s and not quite new wave, note quite indie rock but 100% deluxe. The S/T record, which was released in February, was a co-release between their own label and WIAIWYA label in the UK.  Read on and find out the history of the band, where they’ve been and where they’re headed. Oh and make sure you listen to their music.

 Heather and Brian and Brian and Heather 

Tell us about the end of Eux Autres. Why did that band end?

It actually has not officially ended. While Sun is Sunk was coming out, we left SF because it felt like that city as we knew it was dying—all the artists we knew were moving out, and I moved back to Portland and Nick to LA. Then I had a baby and then Nick had a baby and then soon we each had another baby. With 4 little kids among us, it became really hard to fly back and forth to work on new material. We tried it for a couple years and then one day we calculated that at our pace, the record we were making would take 5 years. So we just kind of gave each other permission to prioritize other projects. Nick is working on some songs I truly love right now. They’re a real gut punch.

 …and about the beginning of Corvair. How/when did the band form?

We had known each other for many years and then we got married three-ish years ago and suddenly neither of us had other musical projects going on. So we kind of shrugged and said, what if we worked together? We would sing in the car or while cooking or whatever so we knew our voices sounded great together. Then it was just a matter of figuring out what sort of project it would be. We went into the studio with a session drummer (Eric Eagle) in late 2019 and then a few months later, the pandemic suddenly gave as a LOT of time to make progress on the tracks. So the creative center of the record was defined in a weird apocalyptic bubble. But it was helpful to have that break with reality as we knew it, because we’ve both made a lot of records, and I suppose that could have somehow blunted our ambition or our edges. But we just hit the “fuck it” button and gave ourselves over to it completely. We were very nervous to mix, because no one else in the world had heard it, and we thought it was great, but we also could have been in a shared hallucination. Really, we’d be the last to know.

 The debut....

Who came up with the name? I have always loved those cars.

Brian’s mom drove a Corvair with a hole in the floor. They would drive it on the special outings to the beach, the weekend adventures. So it was a very romantic car, and the name is just very nice to say. It makes you feel good. Both of us had been in bands with names that were a nightmare to tell someone  in a crowded club, or really anywhere (Eux Autres and Ruston Mire). You’d have to repeat it 3 times, then explain it, and then they just kind of shrug with pity. We vowed to have a band name anyone could understand the first time.

 Did the WIAIWYA label approach you about releasing the record (or co-releasing it)?

John had approached Eux Autres right after our second record and so we did an EP (Strangled Days) with him and then we were on his label ever since. Late last summer, I posted a picture of Brian and I holding the CD Master on my Instagram and John said, what the hell is this? And then I emailed him the record and he wrote right back: “It’s RAD Heather!” I’m not sure if he was making fun of me by saying “rad”--probably, actually. I think I used to say it a lot. But he immediately wanted to put out the record. Nick and I had some really great times in the UK and Europe thanks to John and he has a very devoted audience, so Corvair felt it was a great fit for us.

 Is the Pink Room your own studio?

Yes, it is literally a room in our house that is pink. Brian has been making records at home for most of his life, since he was about 14. And despite having done fancier stuff like making studio demos for Columbia several times and recording with Peter Buck in a nice place, he really prefers to work at home because he likes to spend a ton of time on overdubs—they’re not even really “overdubs,” more like a second wave of writing for him. And I had found being in the studio very stressful in the past because I’m not a technically proficient musician and that makes me self-conscious. So I was grateful to be in the privacy of my own home, in my soft pants.

 Single from last year

Did the songs on the album come fairly easily or did you feel like you labored over them?

The initial writing of them came very easily and fast. Brian did a couple of 30 day writing challenges where he wrote several songs a day. But then once we laid down the basic tracks, we spent a ton of time building them and experimenting with them. We actually recorded probably twice as many parts as we ended up using. And half of what we did in the mix was kill things. In fact, we cut five totally finished songs from the record. 

 Tell us about making those videos? Were you freezing?

Consistently very very cold, yes. Ironically, the one in the snow (Green Mean Time) was the warmest because we were properly dressed. But the ocean ones were just brutal. Especially Sunday Runner. The video was Brian’s idea, he had a very specific vision and made it sound all easy: OK, just go down to the beach and dance for 90 seconds. And I was like, huh?!? And then I kept falling down and got absolutely soaked to the bone. When we finished shooting, I couldn’t feel my hands or feet and he was steering me down the beach with his coat wrapped around me and these little kids were staring horrified, like, Mom what’s wrong with that lady?

 Prior to the pandemic had you played out live much? Done any tours?

We have never ever played live as Corvair. Which is just wild. We will likely be recording this next album before we even have a line-up for performing. But we are very excited to play together. Likely this fall. Hopefully John will bring us to England soon so we will have a great excuse to get it together.

 What are your top 10 desert island discs?

 Brian:

David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust

David Bowie - Low

Nada Surf - Let Go

Brian Eno - Another Green World

Pink Floyd - Dark Side of The Moon (yeah I know, but I don’t care)

 Heather:

GBV  - Alien Lanes

Kinks  - Village Green

Elliott Smith - Either/Or

Radiohead - Kid A

Ruston Mire - Steady Jobs and Flying Cars

  Who are some of your favorite current bands, local otherwise?

HL: I’m interested in the Dry Cleaning juggernaut. And I really dig Deep Sea Diver, Cloud Nothings, Courtney Barnett, Big Thief/Lenker. And then, I’m also very ready to embrace a new angry band whose music makes you think your stereo is broken when you play it--I’m taking suggestions.

 BN: Alt J, Elbow, Doves, Metric, Foals, Snail Mail

 What’s next for the band?

HL: We are recording this summer and trying to put some sort of live outfit together ASAP. Trying to stay out of the ocean for a while. 

 Closing comments? Words of wisdom? Final thoughts?

Thank you so much for having us! 

 www.corvair.bandcamp.com

[princessnyria]

( alia bhatt, cis female, she/her ) — here ye, here ye, behold the princess of sunspear, nyria martell. the twenty-four year old is known for being adventurous but has the tendency to be calculating too, which should be expected of the storm of sunspear. ( slender daggers peaking out of the fanned out hem of a vibrant dress, the relishing relief of the first drops of rain after a drought, a quirked brow that goes unnoticed by an enemy who’s already been beaten, the taste of freedom on tongue as you ride towards the setting sun on a sand steed )

BASICS.

full  name:  nyria nymerios martell. title:  princess of dorne. kingdom: dorne. unique title / moniker:  the storm of sunspear. gender:  cis  female. age:  twenty  four. sexuality:  bisexual. abilities:  elemental - rhoynish water magic.

FAMILY.

parents:  prince luras martell  and princess natari martell. siblings: queen dyana targaeryn née martell ( older sister ), prince dariss martell ( older brother ), princess valeria martell née staunton ( sister-in-law ). spouse:  none. children:  none.

FAST FACTS.

she’s definitely a charmer & knows how to turn it on when she wants to.

she adores her sand steed, named cress, takes better care of it than herself.

known for wearing colorful dornish gowns.

she’s vexingly defiant & believes when it comes to those close to her, it’s usually best to practice honesty to the point of bluntness because secrets among people you’re near to can get you killed

while she’s by no means a warrior, her parents did teach her to protect herself so she can hold her own & her father specifically shared with her his love of spears as a weapon

ABOUT.

they say the drought bore down on dorne as one of the longest they’d ever had to weather. that is, until the water broke on her mother’s womb and she was born– her birth was accompanied by a bold storm that rose above sunspear and moved throughout the nation, ending the drought and saving the land from further despair. the baby was named nyria, a shortened derivative of nymeria, an homage to their first princess and the woman who commanded ten thousand ships.

they called her the storm of sunspear and the smallfolk sang praises of an oblivious infant nyria for weeks. they claimed the skies broke with her birth, claimed she was born just to save them from scarcity, that she was glory made flesh - they claimed her for greatness. she became a legend just by being born and she’s never known how to stand in front of a shadow cast so big by happenstance.

she always adored her parents. their weathered eyes winking with vigor and passion when they smiled on her with preciousness, she couldn’t help but be in awe of them both. her mother grew her love of horses and held wisdom and bite in one body. and nyria loved her father especially, always following him around and tugging at his shirt. he loved her in kind, putting a spear in her hand when she was scarcely old enough to grip it all the way and even allowing her to sit beside his throne or on his lap when he was working - it was one of the rare times she could sit still. watching him fight and rule, she thought him the bravest man in all the world.

her valorous nature and adventurous spirit lead her into mischief, even when she was young. her older siblings were twins so nyria was determined to make her own fun, often wandering off. her mother would capture her attention with stories at night and nyria drank them up, relishing in the tales of intrigue and daring, memorizing many by heart.

she lost her parents too young, only being about 12; each year she grows older her remembrance of them grows more and more into absence. she’s managed to fill the emptiness inside with rage. she had always been an excitable girl, and had never much cared for the world outside her beloved dorne. but with her parents taken from her, convinced it was by the targaryen’s, her anger grew. and swelled even higher when she heard her eldest sister had been sold off like some steed to the targaryen’s in the name of “peace” - peace with a destructive empire with maddening rulers ruled by their own madness and greed.

with the death of her parents came the worry for her, the guards being greater and the eyes cutting sharper in her direction. but the way she was treated was not all that changed; nyria changed too. her carefree-nature melted into something more focused. she had to be smarter, like her siblings. she would not wear her emotions across her face like she used to. she would learn to hold her tongue around certain people until she was ready to bite. though she is not great at it, she has grown better through the years, much more calculating. her mind has always been interested in unique military strategies, and she applied that nature with relation to those who were her enemies - and many became her enemy in her mind’s eye with the death of her parents. she no longer knew who she could trust.

now she wears daggers under her dresses, concealed so well that the only time you can truly tell she’s unarmed is when she’s disrobed. now she is learning what it means to find freedom, if not for herself then at least for her people.

as the only eligible child of house martell left for betrothal, her hand was looked upon as advantageous. dorne is different, is allowed certain privileges that other lands are not, dorne is strong and the title of prince, even if it is not a ruling one, is alluring enough that many houses, great and otherwise, attempted to form an alliance through marriage with dorne. but they should’ve looked past her hand and to the anger in her eyes. while many came to vie for her hand, promising plenty to the prince, they did not have what it took to walk among vipers - and a young nyria proved it, placing serpents in their beds, at the feet of their steeds, and sometimes into their minds with doubt-causing whispers. she scared them off and her family was not stupid - they knew what she was doing. but her brother has not seen fit to marry her off yet.

nyria likes her hand unheld and free of a husband. in an attempt at rebellion, in the hopes of keeping her sovereignty longer, she bedded her first love in early adolescence. taking pleasure in her own, she continued her flirtatious trend. and who could resist such a girl, whose tongue can tame vipers when she sees fit but who tears through a room like a hurricane. she beds men and women in kind, though she considers her weakness to be skillful women with an air of danger about them.

it was a few years ago when she got lost traveling. an argument leading her to ride off alone, desperate to get away from the overbearing principles of responsibility. a sand storm found her lost on her own in the desert for days. the heat bore down and the water grew scarce and her anger and frustrating grew, swirling around her and on the second day, half delirious, she laid next to a dry stream as her emotions boiled over. she could scarcely remember the words she whispered to herself as water began to flow back into the stream. she had barely the strength to wet her face and her tongue before she passed out. she was found the next day unconscious next to a free-flowing stream that none could remember being there.

when she awoke back home, she at first tried to convince herself it was a hallucination but she could not ignore the hum in her bones, the difference in…something…or perhaps it had always been there, and she’d never known or chosen to ignore it. she  could not resist the tug towards the library and ancient scrolls on water magic, learning about the rhoynish practice of it. she was particularly interested in how it was able to stop dragons…

now she feels the power crackling inside of her. she cannot do much because she has not managed control. even small acts like attempting to water a plant bring on a flooding of a fountain near her instead. she has told scarcely anyone about it, unsure what to make of it. it kills her to admit it, but she may need help, if she ever wants to make this power useful.

the sadness never goes away, the suffocating pressure of everyone she has lost sitting stiflingly in her chest. she wishes she could be as open as she once was when she was younger but the walls are there now. she questions her capability to love when she already carries so many people in her heart: her parents, her siblings, her people, her land. or when suitors have always said love and marriage and meant power and ownership and control. sometimes she thinks the burning anger inside of her is what is keeping her alive, though she questions if you can live off of fury.

she is leashed chaos, driven by love, emboldened by belief, and made all the more complicated with growing power - not just in the magical sense but also in the way she’s learned to conduct herself politically. her tongue still strikes like a serpent but she waits for it to coil more carefully now.

she is incredibly loyal, loving, and protective of her family, particularly her siblings. growing up, they were all she had. her heart is with dorne and her people. she’s heard the flippant, remarks by those in the other kingdoms about the dornish and their culture and in truth, the talk, and many of them, disgust her. she finds their succession laws foolish, much of their culture barbaric, and their food bland. she is quick to remind everyone that dorne was never conquered by the targaryens, that even fire and blood cannot make the sun bow to it, that in truth, the legacy of the targaryen conquest in dorne is one of failure; dorne only joined the seven kingdoms through marriage. and though it was on dornish terms, nyria’s always thought it a mistake. what do the other kingdoms know of dorne?

WANTED PLOTS & CONNECTIONS.

you can find my post of wanted connections here! please feel free to message me to plot. i prefer tumblr but can do discord as well though i’m not well-versed. and/or like this and i’ll hit you up. 

#loyal:intro #hi i'm diane! #asldfajsdl that is all #sorry this is kinda long

[jeaneybean]

@raptorsquadblue

Here yo update on the Vera

We’ll go back to when she had the baby, which was back in the in world equivalant of November. I had a chart to roll on for how she’d act when she saw the baby, and when I rolled it was the awful ‘She loves him, but is terrified she’ll ruin him’ so the poor baby, who still doesn’t have a proper name, gets a bit neglected from mommy as she pulls into herself and tries to push him on everyone else. Havilah eventually gets some awful backstory when he tries to get her to hold the baby because it needs her and learns her dad threw her down a flight of stairs at one point and broke her arm. She doesn’t deal well with early motherhood, even less so when Bip detect thoughts on the baby to read his baby thoughts and he’s wanting her heartbeat because that’s the sound he’s heard his entire life.

Vera’s still struggling a month later when she gets a letter from home, from her father, disowning her. This is the first thing to really get her mind clear from how rageful she is. She lets Havilah read the letter (and he rips off the name portion, as does Amy to the prop Sam gave me) before going off to write a letter of her own back to him. She tells him that he can’t disown her, basically, and that ‘I have the echoes of your adoring parenting etched into my bones’ and ‘There is no power on this earth, not arcane nor divine, that can change that I’m your daughter’. and at this point is all on the ‘okay let’s go back to langly and beat the shit out of my dad’ route.

However it’s heavy winter in the country they’re in, and they get snowed in. No one is happy about this. Bip hibernates. Havliah’s like ‘aaaaaa’ Oz is like ‘why is the snow sticking around’ Vera is like ‘oh dear sweet redeemer NO’ and eventually talks her way into a werewolf run with her and bear to get out of the castle walls.

Once the weather’s good the caravan packs up and finishes our last business in the country (killin vampires) before getting out of dodge. WE have some more usual adventures and Vera crams the new law book her husband sent her (not at all looking at the law named for her family that lays out in writing laws against child abuse. Her twin brother had always been braver than she is, after all). They have some adventures with hags and meet another adventuring party, and they roll up to the grand town of Dragonport which is the biggest city in the world.

We have like a two month tournement arc, with a sidequest of a group of investors wanna meet with us and have us talk to the queen for them. They’re trying to get a postal service started. Turns out, they’re a group of Brass dragons that realized (unbeknownst to us) that they can get that sweet sweet goss from letters (that they magically re-seal after reading) AND people pay them to deliver. The party goes before high court and argues before the child queen and her advisors and the dragon post is started. Meanwhile the group fights in a tournement honoring the gods Mayana and Shepard. Havilah’s appendix ruptures and the enitre group is like a what is an appendex aaaah.

Jasna wins the tourney, and we also gain a new party member named Desert Glass, she’s a half blue dragon (and the entire party was INSTANTLY horny on main when she came out. Magnolia’s player is back and playing a different character.) and we head on ship to Langly. We have to make a pit stop in Spea, because despite paying insurance and having a contract, we’re attacked by Spea pirates. (It’s like. A government job.) We go to Spea, meet Oz’s mom, go to Oz’s college and yell at his headmaster, and we get on a boat and go to Langly. Vera’s baby Mishka says his first word, which is fuck. Vera: Oh right these learn to talk.

On the way to Langly we’re again attacked, this time by a plesiosaur from Dinosaur island that’s being followed by Sahaugin. There was a notable moment where Vera called over and asked these Sahaguin if they worked for Spea (because a lot do, in tandem with the pirates) and they were like FUCK SPEA GIVE US THE (thing that was riding on the plesiosaur). I beleive I narrowed my eyes and Taylor started snorting, because Vera does not like to be told what to do.

Oz turne his familiar Veli into an 11 headed hydra and sent her down to murder sahaguain. This was terrifying and amazing and it deserves it’s own damn paragraph.

A day before we land in Langly, Bip bips off to mainland and finds Vera’s husband and is basically like ‘hey getinto this bag of holding I’ll take you to your wife’ and Vera’s beautiufl idiot husband is like ‘oh okay’ and climbs in and wakes Vera up the next morning. 

When they land Mishti takes them around on tour, but eventually the baby (Mishka, as Vera’s been calling him. Her little teddy bear) starts fussing and Vera puts him into Bear’s saddle bag because baby is comofted by bear. Of course, Bear has never been to this city before and gets lost. With the baby. So they have to start tracking the baby down and go to the watch headquarters- which is in Vera’s house that she grew up in. (Grandmama, who controls all the deeds in the family, evicted Vera’s father and gave the building to the watch) So Vera’s gotta go up the stairs and greet Allahandra, a paladin in her order and the former queen, and get her dam baby back. THe baby swears at Allahandra delightedly. Vera is beyond mortified.

The next day Vera gets a summons from Grandmama asking her and her friends over for tea. Vera’s like ‘hey guys, here’s a rule: have fun where you can because no one has fun with Grandmama.’ Beofre they leave Oz stops MIshti and asks him if there’s any new developments that the family could use against Vera. Msithi admits a big one: Vera’s brother was also disowned. However, he’s ran away to join the Von Rothrine family. Y’know. The vampires we’ve been fighting in MOntesylvania. Vera reacts appropriately bad.

 When they go in to Vera Medvedeva the first’s tea room she has cakes and treats set out for everyone. They’re customized. Treats from vera’s favorate bakery, she makes traveler’s coffee when she sits down for Havilah, there’s citrus cakes from Spea for Oz, Mamoul and date candies for Desert Glass, sugary treats for Bip. Grandmama comes in and throws her weight around when she can, drops that Desert Glass is apparently a princess from the country of Dasadan, but she seems mostly interested in creeping out Havliah and Oz and also telling everyone about Vera’s past. Poor Girl. She wasn’t allowed to have friends, you know. Her father insisted. And did you know she couldn’t read until she was eight? I had to step in and get her a tutor. Vera SMASHES a sense motive and is like ‘We’re not killing dad for you, Grandmama’. Grandmama, for her part, seems amused by everyone.

They head out, Vera getting the butler to call her father down to talk to her. He’s still big like she remembers, and he tries to blame her for her brother being taken by vampires. (SHe brought this on the family. IF she hadn’t used their name it never would’ve come. they had to offer him up like a lamb to slaughter) and vera has a good moment where she’s basically like: stop blaming me for all of your problems, you’re a grown ass man and I know if you had a chance to grab any power you’d let them drain you dry.

It’s good she has that one moment, because that’s the last one she has for a while.

She gets the party together and is basically like: I wanna get my dad legally. I want to catch him breaking the law, I want him tried, and for once I want the lawt o work for me. So Bip and Oz start a mini crime gang (Because vera also is like ‘I have otaths i cannot crime) and Bip sets the house attached to Grandmama’s on fire because he’d followed Sieger in there through a hidden passage. Meanwhile, having a perfect alabi across town is Vera drinking in the watch’s favored bar. OUr entire party had a perfect alabai.

Vera gets a few more mental blows to go with the ‘my twin brother is going to be a vampire and when I scried on him he looked happy for the first time in years’ one she’s got going in the form of actually going to church and thinking the new pope hates her as well as a second tea with Grandmama. Meanwhile, Bip steals letters from the post box to find out Sieger’s been in contact with Anton Bellek, a vampire from Durmond that tried to get the party to work with him. Also: The first person Vera introduced herself to as Vera Medvedeva, because she didn’t want to use her marrie dname. Her father hadn’t been lying: she did bring the vampires to his door. Though, he’s been working with them. And he plans on leaving the city soon.

So the group takes this all to Vera, who takes the ‘you did in fact lead the undead to your family’s door and now your brother is going to be a shell of who he used to be’ B A D. She makes a decision that she refuses to let him leave the city  and get out into the world. She’ll feel responsible for everything else she does. If she falls, she falls.

The party: but you said specifically you didn’t wanan do that though.

So Vera leaves to go find her mentor, who’s over the moon because the pope, after meeting with Vera, approved him getting funding for his pet project inspired by Vera, which is a research division to help questing paladins. Vera’s like ‘I’ll unpack ths later’ and drags him into a room to ask him if he’s ever fallen. He had, twice. He tells her about both and she asks the question: Was it worth it. Hesitantly, he says it was, and all but begs her to be careful. She promises him everything will be okay.

Meanwhile, the party comes up with the only plan they can: The easiest thing they can get him to jail for is assault. Desert GLass had asked Vera if she’d be fine being bait earlier and she’d said yes, so the plan is to send Vera to talk to him and get him to punch her. They break apart like ‘go team’ and go to find Vera and Havilah, who’d pulled her into a talk where vera is like ‘I am totally cool with murder’ and he’s like ‘please let us help you not fall’.

SO back over to the family house and Vera’s like HEY HEAD BUTLER LET’S GO TALK TO MY DAD and gets let into his room where she basically acts like she owns the place. They argue, Vera being a vicious as she can, and eventually he grabs her by the arm and pulls her to her feet and throws her a bit, and when she refuses to retaliate he lunges. Before Havilah can get into the door he manages to do like 20 points of damage to her, all his unarmed strikes do a good ammount (and he beat all of her grapple checks, and one of hers was a 28. Curious) Havliah knocks him into unconciousness with one head crack into the floor (also curious) and they call the guard.

Oz points out something to desert glass because he feels terrible: their grand plan was sending an abused woman back alone to incite the man who abused her. This marks the point where vera stops sleeping, btw.

Bip has a horrifying encounter with sieger when he goes to fuck with him in jail where Siger snatches him out of the air twice and pulls him against the cold iron bars purpousley to hurt him.

Allahandra comes by the next day and poses the idea of Vera going to get her older brother Genya to testify and Ver’s like ‘yeah I should do that’ and the party goes up there. Vera is very, very not interested in talking to Genya and doesn’t look to him, and the party notes both of their very defensive posture. Vera stays behind in the wagon while the rest of the party goes intside, but with some force from the party Genya goes out to give Vera dinner and to offer her to come inside.

Vera finally lets loose on him, which is basically like “I lost Volya, Genny. I lost my brother”. And Genya asks her if she thinks the law will actually kill their dad, and she laughs and tells him that if it doesn’t she will. She comes int he house when he offers again, though her postiure is very defensive and she doesn’t really interact. She also doesn’t sleep that night.

The party heads back to Langly and as soon as they get back to the caravan, everyone but Vera (who at this point has a -6 to all her rolls from being exhausted) hear the news: Vera’s Grandmama was found dead that morning. Oz and havilah take her to her husband for him to break the news. Anya tells Genya, who’s basically like ‘good riddance, if they iill dad too this’ll be a great week’.

Vera does not take the news well. She walks off to the first room with a lock she can find and breaks down sobbing. Grandmama’s a terrible person, she’s a legitimate monster, but Vera still loved her.

Through some magical intervention she’s forced to sleep that night and wakes up and goes to church grumbinglyly, getting her prayers out ofr the first time in like three or four days so she’ll actually have magic and her bear. This is also the point where her 12th level that she put into Dragon Rider pops in, because she gets her dragon. He’s red. He’s pretty much instantly attacked by mercinaries. His name means Smart Ash. Vera loves him already.

More stuff happened, and Vera’s still in a horrible god awful mood, and as she’s gonnat ell the dragon she’s still 50-50 on if she just burns the rest of the Medvedevs down at the funeral because the only ones she cared about are daed. But we’ll see!

[smithereensbymaisie]

There was once a demon named Émond

A brief warning: This is an entirely fictional piece that is based on a dream of mine, but it does mention child trafficking and child labour, so please proceed with care. Your well-being is the most important. This is also written in the heat of the moment, so the subjects that this touches on may be poorly-researched or misinformed. If that’s the case, please kindly let me know. It’s uncertain whether this will have a follow-up, and although I will try my best, there’s no promises. Lastly, English is not my first language. With all that said, I hope you enjoy this weird dream of mine.

---------------------------------

There was once a demon boy. Well, not exactly “boy”, since demons’ age, sex, and gender just did not work that way, but he liked being a young boy, so why not? Wayward was the word that he deeply identified with, and it did not help that he also disapproved of certain rules and values of the demon world. After too many times refusing to perform his duty of being an “upright and devoting member of the community”, The Council of Demonic Society put limitations on his magic before casting him to earth as a punishment. The demon would not be able to return until he successfully tempted seven kings into wrongdoings.

He had no intention whatsoever to complete the task.

On earth, still in the form of a young boy, he decided to simply live on the street and went by the name Émond. His magic, though limited, was still more than enough to suffice, so his new life mainly consisted of magicking whatever food and drink he needed if he was feeling lazy, and stealing if he was feeling particularly bored or adventurous. He could no longer make money out of thin air, though, so that was a shame. He then decided that he would feel adventurous most of the time, which was terrible news for shop owners in the area.

That way of living lasted for about as long as the lifespan of a dragonfly. Wandering the land of the living without any permanent shelters, money or full power, Émond found himself being snatched from the street and sold to some kind of twisted organisation located in a desert faraway. All the manual labour was young boys who had to stay in tents. There were also adult supervisors who lived in brick houses nearby. The children were chained together at the wrists in groups of seven when they worked and forced to dress in uniforms at all times, which consisted of too big a shirt and a pair of baggy trousers that looked like they had been vomited out by an entity that solely produced eye-achingly bright red-colored clothes. There were about five groups of seven red-clothed children. Usually, they had to work in the desert under the sun, digging sand for wood, animal or human bones, and if they were in luck, scattering pieces of jewellery; in general, anything that was not sand and could potentially be sold for money. On special occasions, the boys were given the job to act like “feral cheerleaders” in a spectator sport taking place on a dune near where they put up their tents. The so-called sport apparently included gruesome murders performed by men on horses. They were told to scream, clap and jump manically whenever someone was killed or badly injured to “set the atmosphere”, metal chains clinking and air thick with the pungent smell of fresh blood.

Naturally, Émond did not get on well at first. He was made fun of by adults and children from other groups, as well as having to endure snickers from his own for his rather chubby body and long mop of curly hair, although he did not give a monkey’s about that. He liked this body. What truly annoyed Émond was the fact that he was expected to take commands from these ridiculous, violent, crude supervisors, whom he ignored out of spite most of the time, and just as often, they got furious and took that anger out on the children in his group. Whenever that happened, the demon would use the little power he was allowed to his advantage. He created a strong and urgent urge to fall asleep and planted it inside the minds of red-faced supervisors. Being in the thrall of demonic magic, they had to crawl back into their bed and slumber for the next hour; he then wiped their memory of his unruly behaviour, which oftentimes resulted in a dopey and silly facial expression when they finally woke up from the unnatural sleep.

Very quickly, other boys in the group started to pick up on the pattern and confronted the demon on one late afternoon.

“How did you do that?”, one child named Asher asked him when they had finished the work for the day. The supervisors had taken off their chains and retired to their brick shelters. Their tent had been put up properly for the freezing forthcoming night, and sunbaked wood and dry grass had been provided for each tent for fire.

“Do what?”

“Stop the adults from hitting us, obviously”, another small child, Neil, he recalled, turned to him, squinting his hazel eyes.

The demon soon found himself the object of curious and suspicious gazes from six little humans. Well, he thought to himself, they are going to stay with me for quite some time anyway, I may as well get on with it.

He told them everything, from the fact that he was not as human as it seemed and there was an entire world full of his kind to the event of his punishment and his life before being taken here. Émond also told them that his magic abilities had certain limits, and that yes, he could make the supervisors forget about his scornful attitudes and behaviour, but no, he could not do the same for memories concerning other people, the boys included. As that was the case, the demon could not wipe away the existence of six children from the minds of several supervisors and help them escape. Also, they were in the middle of a desert, it was not a very good idea to venture out without sufficient resources, knowledge of their current location or a map for direction. Émond had expected the boys to get terrified, accuse him of lying, or laugh in his face and consider him insane, but that assumption was quickly proved wrong. Apparently, the demon had not been very subtle with his magic, and as it was, he found himself surrounded by six fearless, inquisitive little creatures.

“Do you have horns?”, a boy named Alex, twelve years old with wide brown eyes and short hair of indiscernible color, asked him. “I heard that demons have horns.”

“Well, I can have horns if I wish to,'' came his answer, “but those things are just terribly inconvenient, are they not?”

“You can change how you look? That’s wicked awesome!”, exclaimed another child, Alfie, who was sitting cross legged next to Alex. The other children just looked at Émond with even more wonder evident on their faces.

“I wholeheartedly agree with you, child.”

“Wait, so are you really a boy, then? And how old are you, exactly?”, asked a fifteen-year-old named Victor, which made him the oldest of the six.

“No, I’m not really a boy, I’m a demon. We don’t normally categorize our kind into boys and girls, or anything like that, really. There are certain types that run The Council, but that place is full of stiff demons that know no fun, so let's not count that. Most of us just exist or don't. And it’s rude to ask people of their age.” Then, after a beat of silence: “Also, I don’t remember. It’s been a while since I last checked a calendar.”

“What about magic? Can you do magic now? I want to see it!”

The children looked at him excitedly. Happy to entertain, and also starting to feel a bit cold, Émond magicked a burning fire next to their tent. It crackled cheerfully and smelt sweeter than any scents the children had ever smelt before.

The last remnant of sunlight was starting to fade on the horizon. The group of seven shifted closer to the fire, basking themselves in the warmth, hoping that the biting cold of the desert night would not seep into their bones.

“Do demons have parents?”

That question took the demon by surprise. He contemplated for a while before settling on an answer: “You know what, I’m not sure. The first memory I have is waking up alone on the floor of a dimly-lit room with only one door. The knowledge of my power and who I was just…magicked itself there, I suppose. I then opened the door and found an entire world of demons on the other side.”

“Oh”

“Right, it did get a little overwhelming.”

“I have a mother,” said Little Henri, aged eight, after a while, “She’s still waiting for me to come back, I’m sure. I just hope she doesn't cry so much anymore.”

And so, the conversation turned to the life stories of each child. Henri was the youngest in the group. He loved visiting the park with his mother when she came home from work. The ducks in the park’s pond, in his opinion, had been the most interesting citizens he had ever encountered, aside from his mother, of course, and a source of endless entertainment. Alex and Alfie were of the same age. They were orphans and had lived together on the same street before being kidnapped. The A-Duo, or TAD for short, was how they had called themselves back in the glorious olden days of mischief. Mind you, they were still TAD and still full of shenanigans, but artfulness was now their main focus to avoid the beating from supervisors, whom they called “visors” because “really, it’s impossible there is anything super about them”. Émond found it funny. Neil and Asher were brothers, aged ten and fourteen respectively. While Neil was an energetic little boy and was often found conversing amicably with The A-Duo, Asher was rather reserved and quiet. They had lived in a loving family, although both knew that “sufficient” could hardly be used to describe their home. Neil had been snatched from a vacant playground on a humid summer afternoon. Asher had witnessed the incident and rushed to his little brother without thinking, which had resulted in him being rendered unconscious with a bat in the head. They had both been dragged away from view in an instant. Asher had woken up with a mild concussion to find Neil hugging him tightly, sleeping, cheeks still streaked with tears. The pair had travelled with a dealer for about a week before being sold to this place. The oldest among the children was Victor, who sported a perpetual grim face. He was reluctant to talk about his family, but the little information he provided was telling enough: he had been sold by the hand of his own kin. The pain of that memory seemed to etch on his brow, cling to the downward corners of his mouth and the dimmed color blue of his eyes. Sensing the unease, Asher steered the conversation away from Victor, asking Alex and Alfie about their latest mischief.

“Well, since you insist,” said Alfie before the duo plunged into every detail concerning The Sandy Bums Operation with obvious pride. Victor looked at Asher gratefully.

By the end of the conversation, Henri and Neil had been fast asleep. Alex and Alfie were struggling to keep their eyes open and failing spectacularly. Victor ushered the two inside the tent, meeting with little protest, and followed them with Henri in his arms, while Asher gently scoped up his little brother. For a moment, the gentle crackling of the fire was the only sound that dared to disrupt the quiet night.

“Why haven't you escaped on your own?” A hushed voice broke the silence. Asher seated himself beside Émond, hazel eyes fixed on his profile. “You know, you have magic and all that, and I reckon you also have better endurance than us humans. So why?”

Chuckling lightly, the demon turned to look at him: “Why do you ask? Do you want to get rid of me that much?”

“Not really,” Asher shrugged, letting out a sigh, “just curious.”

They fell into a comfortable silence. The flickering fire threw long shapeless shadows on the ground, unfailingly scented the surrounding air with its enticing aroma.

“It doesn't sit right with me, whatever that may mean coming from a demon,” Émond said after a while, still resolutely staring at the fire. “Leaving the children here when I walk free and wreak havoc to the world, knowing that I might have been able to aid their escape in some way, doesn't sound very fair, does it? It's bad for business, anyway, that not everyone is given the same chance to do evil.”

A smile grazed Asher’s lips. It was a small, fleeting thing, but in this harsh and unforgiving place, it was more precious than gold. “You know, I think I get why those stiff demons rejected you. You are terrible at being a demon.”

“Wow, thanks so much for that”, said Émond, feigning outrage.

“You would make a pretty decent lad, though, if you were a human being”, Asher carried on, unfazed.

That threw the demon into a lapse of silence. He looked in bewilderment at the child beside him, dirty face and matted blond hair. Then, softly, as if he feared the image of that boy might shatter before his eyes: “But I'm not, aren't I?”

“No, you aren't,” the boy gently shook his head, “but I choose to see you as such anyway.”

They sat in silence for some time before pulling the sweet air into his lungs, Asher patted Émond on the shoulders and stood up, stretching and yawning: “I don’t know about you, but I’m knackered. Going inside now. You coming?”

“The night sky is too beautiful”, Émond replied simply.

“Alright. Goodnight, then.”

“Goodnight.”

There was a soft rustle of fabric, and then, once again, Émond found himself embraced by the chilly stillness of the desert night. The sky was indeed beautiful. He might as well admire the stars while he could.

#my writing #write #writing #in english #story #my weird dreams #There was once a demon named Émond

[tes-trash-blog]

OCAngstAndFluffWeek2019

Day 4: Hand Holding

Title:  Just Assassin Gals Being Assassin Pals

OCs: Amayn Moorfield, Caslin Split-Tongue

They were in and out of Hammerfell in just two days. As much as Amayn loved the slow and steady approach she and Babette took with their targets, sometimes what she needed was a fast-paced, high-stakes, heart-pounding assassination, and the Listener was just the woman for those jobs. Caslin was good at killing, very good in fact, but she liked to have fun on her missions.

Sometimes “fun” meant dressing up as a belly dancer and murdering an Alik’r commander at his own retirement party, and so the two assassins spent a full night running for their lives as the remaining warriors tried to chase them down. The sun was rising when they finally crossed into the sparse woods of Craglorn, and in Caslin disappeared into the trees. Amayn was about to object when two invisible arms grabbed her from behind and pulled her into the trees’ protection. 

“Hold your breath,” Caslin whispered. Amayn held her nose and mouth, keeping the sweet air in her lungs as she watched the warriors search for them. Through the speckled shade she saw the warriors were still in their dress armor, scimitars out and ready for blood. They circled around the two assassins, close enough to touch but never finding them; Wood Elves were known to disappear in the jungles of Valenwood, but Caslin could vanish in any decently sized wood. They swore and shouted revenge before returning to the sands. Caslin giggled and let the trees release them when the warriors were out of sight.

The first breath of open air was always bland, but Amayn still couldn’t figure out how or why. Hiding within the trees with the Bosmer also made her just a little light headed, but that was probably due to the magic. Bretons were supposed to have a resistance to magic, too.

--

“How do you do it?” Amayn asked over a late lunch, just as Caslin took a large bite from her barely cooked elk. The Elf looked about awkwardly, deciding what to do. “Oh, finish first!”

“Do what?” Caslin finally said after swallowing the last bit. “Eat my meat rare?”

“No-- Well, yes, that too, but..” Amayn stopped, realizing she didn’t really know what she was asking in the first place. “You know what, yeah. Isn’t it cold in the center?”

“It is, but I like it like that. It’s got more flavor that way I think. Everything else just tastes.. I dunno. Dry. Say, do you have any water left in your canteen?”

“Yeah, here you are.” Amayn tossed her stolen bladder over. She swiped it from one of the laden horses as they were being chased out, and was lucky enough to grab a full one. It was enchanted to keep the contents inside cool even under a desert sun.

“You think they’ll really come back for us?”

“I don’t think so, no. I’ve had maybe one or two folks try and take revenge, but it didn’t work out for them.” That was Amayn’s biggest strength. Not even her fellow footpads knew she was a Dark Sister until after the whole Mercer affair. Only Delvin knew.

She wondered how they were doing. Last she saw of any of them, she threw both Eyes of the Falmer and the Skeleton Key on the cistern floor and let them all have it. She couldn’t remember everything she said, she was just so angry and it all fell out of her. Vipir didn’t try and cut her off with some snide remark about how ugly anger looked on a woman, Vex didn’t roll her eyes and walk off, Brynolf didn’t even try to talk her down. Not even Delvin did anything, and somehow that hurt the worst.

“Hey, you okay?”

Amayn blinked and found Caslin was staring at her with a worried face.

“Oh.. Oh, yeah. I’m just.. Thinking.”

“About the Guild?”

“Yeah,” Amayn sighed. “About the Guild.” She circled her thumb in her palm. “I mean, this is nothing compared to what happened with us, to you..”

“Hm..” Caslin’s mouth curled into a small and studious frown. “I dunno. Astrid’s heart was in the right place, I think. And Lucien tells me that wasn’t the first time the Dark Brotherhood’s been nearly wiped out. Probably won’t even be the last, I bet. But as for Astrid.. I guess I just feel sorry for her.”

“Yeah.. Me too.” They sat together in silence. Caslin fiddled with her bone necklace, tracing the notches on direwolf fang. There was one notch for every confirmed kill, and hers had at least two dozen. She had them arranged in a neat zigzag along the tooth, spiraling slowly downward to the tip. Amayn wondered what would happen when she finally reached the bottom.

“But you know what? We’re still together in spite of it all. You, me, Cicero and Babette, and Nazir’s been incredibly helpful… You got that look on your face again, what’s up?”

And just like that, Amayn remembered what she was going to ask.

“I just remembered what it was.”

“Hmm?”

“How are able to stay so.. Optimistic? What’s your secret?” Amayn felt the words bubble up in her throat, and as always, she couldn’t stop it. “I mean, I’m still mad about the Guild, and what they did wasn’t anywhere near as bad as our matron trying to kill you, and even then you’re not mad, or maybe a little, but you just let it go so easily, and.. And..” 

Caslin had taken Amayn’s hands into her own. She held them gently, lightly, as the trees did. Her heart was racing, but there was no chase. Her head felt light, but there was no magic at work, and the air was sweet, almost as sweet as Caslin’s smile.

“Oh, Amayn,” she said. “How can I hold a grudge against Astrid when she introduced me to you?”

#OCAngstAndFluffWeek2019 #hand holding #i'm bad at fluff okay #this is as soft as i get #oc: amayn #and making her debut is #oc: caslin #*in comic sans* writing is my passion #fanfic

[rosedavid]

andi bonds with tj over motorbikes and she then helps him get together with cyrus

This is so long overdue! I’m so sorry!

Send me prompts 

Outside, the air is hotand dry. Heat wafts across the landscape, causing a visible ripple effect. Inthe driver’s seat, Andi squints as she makes her way along the dirt road, handsclutching at the steering wheel. Beside her, Buffy is resting her feet on topof the dash, basking in the cool air blowing from the vents. Meanwhile, in theback, Cyrus is spread out horizontally, one arm hanging over the edge of theseats as he presses cheek into the cool leather.  

“Are we almost there?”Cyrus groans. “We’ve been driving for forever!”

“It’s only been likethirty minutes,” Buffy reminds him.

“Exactly!”

Andi rolls her eyes ather friends’ bickering. “Don’t worry, Cyrus, we’ll be there soon.”

“You said that 30 minutesago!”

Earlier that afternoon,Andi excitedly texted the group chat about a surprise she had for them. Cyrus,of course, expected something predictable such as lunch at the Spoon or a dayat the museum; however, Andi obviously had another idea in mind. She assuredthem it would be fun, but Cyrus had yet to experience it.

“Trust me, it will beworth it,” Andi assures him with a smirk.

True to Andi’s word, theyarrive only a few minutes later. She parks her truck close to a prodigiousboulder. When they all hop out, everyone immediately feels the intense, overwhelmingheat. The sun sits at its peak in the sky as it scorches the earth. Cyrusstarts uselessly fanning himself.

“This is worse than thecar! I’m dying from the heat,” Cyrus whines. “Is this the surprise? Sufferingin the middle of the desert during the hottest part of summer?”

“No! Of course not,” Andisighs, walking to the bed of her truck. Buffy and Cyrus share a confused glancebefore following behind her.

They watch as Andi opensthe back of the truck and unlatches her tarp in the back. Cyrus peers overcuriously, watching as she pulls the tarp off with a flourish. It’s revealed tobe Andi’s bike and gear, which Cyrus honestly almost forgot about. Despite thebig reveal, he’s still confused as to what exactly they were doing, as Andiknew that Cyrus would never get on that deathtrap, and Buffy wasn’t interestedin bike riding either.

“So, I’ve been practicingriding a lot more recently,” Andi begins, “and I came across this group here intown that also does motocross for fun! I decided to join, and now, once everyother week, we get together and practice! Sometimes, they even do races, andthis is my first one I’m participating in so I thought you both could comewatch!”

Cyrus is immediatelyrelieved that he doesn’t have to ride Andi’s bike. After all, the only type ofbike he can handle is foot pedals.

Buffy smiles, “That’sgreat! I’m glad you found another hobby. We’d love to see you race.”

“Of course,” Cyrusagrees, “Anything to support you, even if it feels like I’m slowly melting outhere. So, where is everyone else?”

Andi heaves her bike andgear out of her truck, then motions for them to follow her. They walk behindthe group of boulders where numerous other cars are parked and a bunch of peoplesit on their bikes, all decked out in helmets and gear. A few others sitagainst the largest boulder, hiding out in the shade to watch the action.

“Hey, Mack! Took you longenough. You ready to lose?” A male voice taunts from beneath a helmet.

“As if,” She grins as shegets ready to go. First, though, she turns back to Cyrus and Buffy. “You twocan go sit with the others and cheer me on.”

Cyrus eagerly hurries tothe slight amount of shade provided by the rock, Buffy following. He feelsextremely out of place as he looks around at all the bikers. After all, Buffyis at least a sporty person, but Cyrus doesn’t have an athletic bone in hisbody. He’s thankful that Buffy at least is there to keep him company.

As more bikes start,Cyrus continues to flinch at the loud noises, trying his best not to cover his ears.He watches as Andi lines her bike up to the other four bikers. She looks smallcompared to all the others, but Cyrus knows better than anyone to neverunderestimate Andi Mack.

Someone raises a flaghigh into the air before quickly bringing it down, officially starting therace. Cyrus watches with rapt attention as Andi and the others kick off andstart biking around the homemade racetrack. They soon enter the first turn, kickingup dust with their tires. For a few seconds, Cyrus can’t see anything, and heworries that Andi may have crashed. Then, he sees her fly out of the dust inthe front of the pack, neck in neck with the biker she was talking to earlier.

Cheers fly out of the crowd,despite it only being a few people, and Cyrus can’t help but join in to cheeron his friend. Buffy rolls her eyes at him but soon finds herself caught up inthe moment as well. The race is so intense that it makes Cyrus’s heart poundand hands shake. The intensity of the heat doesn’t help, either. His eyes stingfrom the dryness and dirt being kicked up. Still, he finds himself having morefun than he thought he would.

“She’s so good!” Cyruspractically shouts over the noise of the bikes.

Buffy nods, “I know,right?!”

Although the other bikersare putting up a valiant effort, Andi and the other boy are clearly the starsof the race. The boy edges closer to Andi, barely taking over the lead as theygo around another corner. Cyrus can’t even imagine being out there. He’d be waytoo overwhelmed. In fact, he’s overwhelmed just watching them.

“Go Andi!” He shouts intandem with Buffy.

The bikers approach thefinal corner. The boy still has the lead over Andi. As they head into the turn,though, Andi maneuvers her bike tightly around the corner right beside him, soclose that Cyrus thinks they might crash into each other. Thankfully neither ofthem crash, and Andi straightens back out only to have a substantial lead. It’sthe final straightaway, and she urges her bike faster. The boy is close behindher, but not close enough. Andi finishes first. Cyrus and Buffy cheer and clap wildlyfor her.

She rides up to them andparks her bike before removing her helmet, a wide smiling gracing her face.They all high five each other and laugh together at Andi’s helmet hair.

“I can’t believe you hidthis from us for so long,” Buffy mentions, “You were amazing out there!”

Andi’s face is red, bothfrom the heat and the compliment. “Thanks, but I’m really not that good. And I’m sorry I hid it from you both, I was justnervous.”

“You are that good.” Cyrus replies, “And it’s okay, we’re just glad wegot to cheer you in your first race!”

They pull each other intoa group hug, ignoring for a moment how hot and sweaty they all are. The soundof another bike breaks them apart. It’s Andi’s main competitor who rides up tothem. She smiles when she sees him, smacking his shoulder lightly as he getsoff his bike.

“Told you I’d win,” Shelaughs.

He groans, “Yeah, yeah, beginner’sluck. I’ll beat you next time, for sure Mack.”

The boy reaches to takeoff his helmet, and Cyrus gasps quietly when he does. The boy underneath thehelmet is undeniably gorgeous. Much like Andi, his hair sticks up everywhere.It’s blonde and soft looking and Cyrus just wants to run his hands through it. Hisgrin is infectious, and it makes Cyrus’s knees feel weak and throat close. Theboy’s green eyes shine in the sunlight, and Cyrus can just barely make out afew freckles dotting his nose.

“Aren’t you going tointroduce me?” he says with a smirk, breaking the moment of silence. Cyruswants to melt into his shoes.

Andi rolls her eyes. “Thisis TJ. He’s kind of okay when he’s not being a jerk. TJ, this is Buffy and Cyrus.”

Cyrus notices her lingeringon his name, but quickly moves on as he and TJ make eye contact. He tries notto do anything too embarrassing under TJ’s gaze. He ends up tapping his fingersagainst his thigh and biting his lip nervously. TJ smiles at him.

“Don’t listen to her,” Hesays, gaze still focused mainly on Cyrus. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Another voice calls out somethingthat Cyrus doesn’t really hear, and he sees Andi wave a hand before dragging aconfused Buffy with her down to the other biker. Cyrus immediately feelsawkward, lacing his hands together and dragging his eyes down to his feet.

“So, Cyrus,” TJ begins, “Everridden a bike before?”

“I’ve ridden a bicycle numeroustimes, but I can hardly handle that let alone one of these bikes,” He rambles,unable to stop himself from spewing out words.

“I’m sure you could do it.”

Cyrus blushes, shakinghis head. “No way. I don’t have an athletic bone in my body! I almost failed P.E.”

TJ giggles, and it makesCyrus swoon. He risks a glance up at the biker, who is smiling fondly at him. “You’readorable.”

Cyrus tries to form acoherent sentence in response. “I—you, what?”

“Do you want to hang outsometime?”

“You’d want to hang outwith me?” Cyrus asks in disbelief.

“Yeah, why not?”

“Because I’m me and you’re…you,”He trails off, motioning between the two of them. “I’m not interesting. I don’tlike normal stuff that boys should enjoy like sports. Instead I like dinosaursand musicals and screenwriting.”

TJ steps closer. “Hey,you don’t have to be interested in sports. I think that stuff all sounds cool.”

Cyrus finds himselfinching forward slightly. “Really?”

“Yeah,” TJ breathes out quietly.Then, he pulls a phone out of his pocket and hands it to Cyrus, who staresblankly for bit. No one has ever really wanted Cyrus’s number let alone askedfor it so directly. His fingers fumble over the letters as he types in his nameand number before gently handing it back. As he does this, his fingers justbarely brush TJ’s own, sending shivers throughout Cyrus’s body.

TJ types out a quickmessage on his phone, smiling as Cyrus’s own phone goes off. Cyrus opens histexts.

(***)-***-****: It’s TJ (:(: (:

Cyrus sputters at theexcess amount of smiley faces. He looks up at TJ with a smile before texting back,feeling a sudden boost of confidence

Cyrus: Three smileyfaces? You sure know how to make a guy feel special.

TJ bursts out laughing. “Ihave to go, but text me later?”

Too flustered to speak,he nods.

He likes motocross a lot more than he thought he would. 

#tyrus fanfic #tyrus #andi mack #cyrus goodman #tj kippen #fanfiction

[esseastri]

Megan Reads Oathbringer (part 8)

AAAAANND WE’RE BACK!

Hello, fronds, apologies for the brief hiatus, but I had to pause the reading/liveblogging because I was busy finishing my novel. YEP, I FINISHED WRITING MY BOOK, WHOOO! And then it was December, and there was Christmas, and traveling, and retail job at Christmas, and Star Wars, and what little time I had to myself I spent chilling because I was exhausted, but ANYWAY, I’M BACK, FRONDS, LET’S GET ON WITH THIS.

Part 8 encompasses pages 557-666 (previous parts) 

whooooops where did I leave off, OKAY INTERLUDES

Why...why are we doing anything near Aimia? Listen: Axies the Collector is cool, but two-thousand-cremlings-in-a-trench-coat was waaayyy too far over the horror line for me. I do not want more of this.

So...there’s a third storm? But this one is stationary and around Aimia?

MORE REASON NOT TO GO THERE

Whoa, that sure is a side effect of Soulcasting... #yikes

Or is it not soulcasting? Is it something Radiant?

Oh fuck. Fine. This is fine. You know, the previous Stormlight books didn’t have this much body horror in them.

Ahh, shit, wasn’t there an Oathgate on Akinah? I don’t want a direct line to  two-thousand-cremlings-in-a-trench-coat.

“the creatures that accompanied the spren” So...like......their Cognitive shadows? the versions of them still in the Cognitive Realm even as bits of them manifest visibly in the physical? Or...something else?

I’m sorry, did they just...die?

What the

What even is Aimia, really?

Mmmkay, actually, I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know the secret of Aimia, I am not interested in being EATEN by two-thousand-cremlings-in-a-trench-coat.

Genuis!Taravangian is an asshole. I’m not surprised, I’m just. Stating a fact.

!!!! Are his secretary and the Dustbringer a thing? Are they together? Get it, girls!

I still don’t trust the Dustbringer.

Aslo “the most likely to accept their cause” Why? Is the “cause” like...destroying the world? I don’t remember if we know the Diagram’s endgoals.

...There’s a danger line for the “too smart” end of the sliding scale? Smart.

Also his name is Vargo? Vargo Taravangian? hehehehehe

IT’S NOT ABOUT DESERVE.

I think I hate him.

Dumb question: if Taravangian wants to take over Alethkar--presumably so he can take over the world--then aren’t he and Dalinar working toward the same goal? They both want a unified Roshar. So why kill Dalinar instead of working with him? The logical solution is to work with him, since he’s more charismatic and has a higher chance of actually succeeding, and then kill him off after he’s succeeded in laying the groundwork, and take over from there?

Not that I’m encouraging this, I’m just saying: Taravangian needs to sort out his priorities.

“kill those children” seriously, fuck this asshole, what a douchecanoe.

Also Renarin the wild card HECK YES.

The farming question can be easily answered: Progression.

Not all the Radiants’ powers were battle powers.

“the part of the world that mattered” OH FUCK YOU. That’s not how it works. It’s not about deserve. It’s about having the ability to help, which gives you the responsibility to help. If you can, then you should. No exceptions. No “matters”. Everyone matters. Everything matters. Everyone deserves to be saved.

Except maybe Kylo Ren, but that’s a different story.

Buddy. Odium already made a deal. He wants out of it now. Also he’s not a spren or a god, so why should your pathetic rules hold him?

Oh. Duh. Somehow I didn’t connect Listeners and gemhearts? But of course they do. How else would they bind spren? They infuse their hearts.

Oooohhhhh snap, they done got possessed.

Aw, Venli...things not going your way anymore?

Idk, I should feel bad for her, but I don’t? She brought this on herself. And on her friends. And on her sister, who is still dead. This is her fault.

“The listener gods were not completely sane.” I mean, idk what you expected.

Though, neither are our gods, so I guess we can’t talk.

Seriously, what did Alethkar do to them?

Oh. Wait. Where was Jezrien from? King of the Heralds, right? Prooobably his idea to make the OAthpact? His fault they were bound? That’s probably what Alethkar did to them...

Oooh, the new epigraphs are from the library at Urithiru! Heck ye, Radiant archives!

Though Taln and the Stonewards need to take a chill pill on the self-sacrificing front, apparently.

(Eks would be a Stoneward, pass it on)

Wait, no, hold on--the whole of part three with no Moash pov? But I’m WORRIED about MY BOY.

I’m unnecessarily suspicious of literally every guard that’s not Bridge Four. But particularly of this Rial guy. What is he, Bridge Thirteen? I don’t trust him. At all. He’s too...glib? with Dalinar to be a proper bridgeman. Around other bridgemen, fine, but with Dalinar? I don’t trust it.

I’m with Navani. “The greasy man is...unfitting.”

ooohh, Dalinar...... he “reminds him of friends from the old days.” Tho, bud, how many of those died, betrayed you, or left to become ardents?

Dalinar should know by now to just...not trust people implicitly. Always question.

I really, genuinely can’t imagine how awkward Kaladin and Shallan’s excursion to Theylan City was. Didn’t they fly? Shallan was probably all SCIENCE!! about it and Kaladin was definitely grumpy “let me fly in peace” boy. Nerds.

Sorry, hold on--you’re counting on Kaladin “Impulsive” Stormblessed and Adolin “Disaster Bi” Kholin to make sure Elhokar doesn’t do anything stupid? That’s like asking two kittens to babysit the new puppy.

“I can’t afford to lose you.” AAaaahhh

omg, no, don’t give Kaladin land. What will he do with it? Turn it into the Land of Misfit Bridgecrews?

Five times...so what’s it been, 50 days? Not even? That’s so little time!!

“Or is someone else receiving [the prayers] instead?” ...Isn’t that just the most chilling thought.

There has to be an explanation beyond “The Heralds are nuts” for Shalash to be erasing herself from visual records.

I’m sorry, rockbuds blossom? and have fragrance? Stop and smell the rockbuds?

“I am a diplomat.” Yeah, and I’m a rockbud.

How is Taravangian such a good actor? Or is he really this emotional on days when he’s not a raging asshole of a genius?

Aw yis, non-hereditary monarchy! I love!

“Does it involve punching someone?” It’s Dalinar, so, what do you think?

“Stone-sinew, Herald of Soldiers.” But...Taln’s focus is bone? Ishar is sinew?

I suppose “Stone-bone, Herald of Soldiers” would be a little too ridiculous-sounding...

brb, changing my url to “stone-bone-herald-of-soldiers”

“It was as if Odium had a grudge against this one in particular.” SAD ABOUT TALN FOREVER: THE MEGAN STORY

I s2g Dalinar is the most Extra son of a bitch in all of Roshar.

HOw do I prove I’m not trying to take over your country? I know! I’ll let you stab me through the chest! This is the BEST IDEA.

oooooooo Tension, maybe?

TENSION!! THIS SHIT IS SO COOL OMG

Also his special power--resonance? right?--is listening and that’s delightful. Or...I’m guessing that’s what it is.

Heck ye, Renarin!

“Strength and passion, the Vorin way.” In other words...Honor and Odium....hmm

So it’s Kaladin, Elhokar, Shallan, Adolin, Skar, Drehey, and...who? Some other bridgemen? It’s gonna be a fun roadtrip, tbh.

Buddy, Shallan ignoring her problems IS a problem! Don’t support this impulse! Don’t encourage this!

omg of COURSE Adolin hates flying. Nerd.

“No wisecracks about missing boots?” No, because that wasn’t funny.

“First assess the area for danger, get the lay of the land. Then gawk.” I LOVE MY SON SO MUCH, WHAT A TRAVEL NERD, BUT ALSO #SAME BRO

...we knew that Elhokar had a kid, but every time I’m reminded of it, I get really weirded out. He’s not old enough to be a dad.

PLease meet up with Moash. Please. I’m dying. My crops are failing. My skin is dry. Help me.

the advantage of living through Bridge Four is that you can sleep well anywhere? Well, I mean. I GUESS That’s an advantage. Sort of.

OH of COURSE it’s an Unmade. We do have eight more of those to encounter and deal with.

Whose is this though? Kaladin’s? Or are Elhokar or Adolin finally going to manifest?

(This is assuming that my theory about there being one Unmade for each order of Radiants to defeat is sound.)

Elhokar is trying so hard to be good.

Also Shallan is mean to Kaladin again, news at nine. *rolls eyes*

So, it’s going to be Kaladin’s Unmade then.

Elhokar, you know that the more you tell yourself you’re going to fail, the more likely you will? Stop it. Have confidence.

“Adolin made you want to laugh with him.” Yeah, he doesn’t punch down.

Also, the Kadolin is REAL, and I’m living.

Kaladin really is too good for this world.

I’m sorry, the fancy lighteyes’ gated villas have guards to keep the refugees off their perfectly manicured lawns? Fuck that. Fuck them.

“I needed someone I’d trust with my life, or more. So I brought us to my tailor.” THIS CHILD IS A DISASTER AND I LOVE HIM

Oh snap! we’ve made it halfway through the book!

“Even his voice was adorable.” HONESTLY, people who don’t ship Shadolin: how? It’s so pure and good and supportive and wonderful!

How did Aesudan know the parshmen were voidbringers? And why did she order them killed only to desert the city?

I suppose fabrials do trap and use spren, right? So it makes sense that the yellowgold...voidspren? would be offended by that sort of...I guess, spren enslavement? Sort of? But why are they so concentrated here? Which Unmade is it and what does it do other than corrupt other spren? and influence people.

How To Corrupt Spren and Influence People, a new bestseller by Odium, found in stores near you!

“I am the only one here who has confronted one of the Unmade directly.” Yeah, you, the Kholin bros, and most of Bridge Four who protected you while you did your thing. But sure.

Kaladin, when will you stop seeing your brands as part of yourself and let yourself heal?

Aw, I’m proud of her, admitted Veil is--oh. “They are both equally fake.” Hon, no... please. Talk to someone about this.

Aharietiam, or as I like to call it, “that other stupidly long and impossible-to-pronunce “A”-word.”

Sorry, but the fact that Shallan takes pleasure in pissing Kaladin off-- “he glared at you in the most satisfying of ways” --is really....gross. Uncomfortable. I’m not here for it.

Like, yeah, teasing is fine, but like... if it strays over from teasing into Actively Pushing Someone’s Buttons Just to Make Them Angry, then it’s BAD, okay? It’s really bad. I can say from experience: it’s very bad.

Well, I mean, that explains why no one’s come back from the palace.

“As a connoisseur of things that have killed me...” honestly. what are we up to now? Poison bread. Shipwreck and drowning. Run through with a sword. Dear god, child, you need to be more careful.

Kaladin making bad puns and smiling is giving me life though. Petition for more.

So, the Skybreakers and the Windrunners did not get along? Justice vs. Honor, I suppose...not unexpected. Especially is one is corrupted.

Isn’t Ishar...Bondsmiths? Herald of Luck? Are you sure?

“He is now as mad as the rest. More, perhaps.” Yeah, I got that vibe from Edgedancer.

Shit. Of course he set himself up as a god-king.

(He and the Lord-Ruler should make t-shirts.)

Dangit, Ishar founded the Oathpact, so bang goes that theory about Jezrien and Alethkar and the listeners.

“The Stormfather hated to be misquoted.” Pppfffft.

HECK YE, Bridge Four got a sword!!

Also omg Navani invented alarm clocks. Bless her.

She packed him lunch! BLESS THESE ADORABLE NERDS. God, they are ridiculous.

Dalinar hitching a ride to Azir with Jasnah and her just going, “Byyyeeeeee” and leaving him alone is HILARIOUS to me.

I wonder if the color of the gemstones in the epigraphs correspond to the radiant orders. Like, if the Windruners recorded in sapphire, and the Lightweavers recorded in garnet, etc.

Okay, I went back and checked, and that seems legit. I’m going to guess that’s been #confirmed by people who finished this book earlier than me, but listen.

“covered by a magnificent bronze dome” Lift voice: “boobies” Me: snrk

SPIRITUAL ADHESION!? WTF THIS IS SO COOL

OMG, he brought them an essay, that’s magnificent. Especially because they all had to write essays to apply to be king. Or.. Prime? WHATEVER THAT’S HILARIOUS AND I LOVE AZIR SO MUCH

hello, I love Jasnah, this is news to no one, but girl wrote an essay in rhythmic meter and *melts*

...the Azish parshmen negotiating for pay is...very Azish of them. And the Alethi parshmen gathering for war is very Alethi. And the Theylan parshmen sailing off into the sunset is very Theylan of them.

HA, Dalinar just said the same thing in the next paragraph, go me.

LIFT ATE HIS LUNCH, I LOVE HER, HELLO BBY I’VE MISSED YOU

“The crazy spren who lives in the forest.” 1. I love Lift a lot. 2. uuhhh...we know the Heralds are crazy, and I assumed Odium was crazy, but Cultivation, too?? Is ANYONE here sane anymore?

oh wow they agreed.

didn’t...see that coming. Not with so much book left.

OOOHHH SNAP HE REMEMBERS. HERE WE GO HERE WE GO AAHHHH

Every time I’m reminded that Adolin is only, like, 24yo, I have to tell myself that I was about that old when WoR came out and he’s not actually a child.

Anyway, 12yo Adolin is a gift. “Neat!” this kiddo aahhh

“It was gratifying to see how much one could accomplish in both politics and trade by liberally murdering the other fellow’s soldiers.” PUNK!DALINAR NEEDS TO LOOK AT HIS LIFE AND HIS CHOICES AND RECONSIDER HIS WORD CHOICE AT THE VERY LEAST

hugs are un-Alethi. this is why they have so many issues. they are emotionally constipated from lack of hugs.

“The other son” fuck you, punk!Dalinar

also “she’d never be a great scribe” yeah, that’s ‘cause she’s left-handed, you Vorin jerks

haaaa, he has a point. That even if he and Gavilar know that he wouldn’t ever betray Gavilar for the throne, Gavilar’s advisors aren’t stupid and will find reasons for Dalinar to be...elsewhere.

“Storms, I don’t deserve her, do I?” NO YOU FREAKING DON’T

tbh, I’m not even sure present-day Dalinar deserves her. Like, he’s better now, but he’s still... a soldier. He’s still a strategist. And Evi deserves a soft, gentle person who loves her.

Evi deserves the world, tbh, and I’m Upset because she’s going to die and I’m going to be Sad.

#op #Megan reads OB #Oathbringer spoilers #Stormlight Archive #Oathbringer #Brandon Sanderson #I'm back y'all #hopefully I will finish this book by New Year's...we'll see if I manage it but that's the goal #thanks for your patience everyone!

[acradaunt]

Wanted to gab about Monster Hunter World for a while. It's probably going to be really rambly and sound overly negative, but hey. I tend to be like that. Super negative. It's easier to pinpoint and hammer on a weakness than a strong point.

I guess let's start at the very, very beginning. While it doesn't bother me even slightly, the concept of Capcom pouring all this money and focus onto Monster Hunter, but then not even remotely trying any sort of lip-syncing for the very first cutscene was... jarring. I don't really get complaints about it being too hand-holdy, though. You're fighting Jagras by the third quest and maybe an hour and ten minutes, compared to like three for Jaggi/Jaggi/Maccao in the previous games. Yeah, that first hour is like 105% cutscenes and scripted as heck, but that's them trying to be 'cinematic'. It's not great, but it's better than kicking you back and forth between town and the plains level for ten missions of gather honey/bones/ore/Aptonoth. NPCs tend to feel kind of like completely worthless human beings, but that's just a global videogame issue. Of course nobody else could actually show up and fight something. I guess not showing up at all is better than the Huntsman/Field Leader/Ace Cadet getting bodied time and again.

While yeah, no loading zones are nice, and most of maps are absolutely stellar (though Forest has that confounding middle floors region and Coral Highlands has waaay too many huge pointless regions), I think weapon and quality of life changes are what matters the most. While I think I prefer Gen's (Guild style for both) SnS (World's feels a touch too spammy, and the backleap suuuucks now; Gen's SnS required some finesse) and Greatsword (in spite of the fact that MHWorld's GS is designed around my 'stay in there' playstyle and not running away like everyone else does), almost every other weapon feels at its best. I've found love for Dual Blades, Gunlance, Bowguns, the Bow itself, and even slightly the Katana in this one. Still hate Insect Glaive, but at least they fixed the bugs. I like the LBG and Dual Blades enough to break them into regular usage. Hammer is just so pure and powerful that it kinda makes the Greatsword's damage feel woefully inept. Lance is amazing with guard being worth a damn and being more mobile than ever. Switch Axe makes actual use of both switching and axing. All shields are good. Blocking Nergigante's dive with a SnS shield like it's no huge deal is glorious and refreshing, because that would NEVER have flown before.

Seeing the weapon tree is great, even if what's on the tree is a bit barren. Like, really, I'm not even gonna whine about the boring weapon designs; why are old designs like the Rathian Switch Axe and Dual Blades missing? Poor things don't even GET poison without Awakening. Lots of weapons have huge holes without Awakening. The clear winner is armour skills. It's just so simple and intuitive, it's honestly baffling they didn't do this ages ago. My only quibbles are that you might possibly get TOO many skills now. You're packing more goods than an endgame G-Rank character in 4U. Also, sometimes some Alpha pieces feel exceptionally dumb. Like, is anyone ever going to take the version with, like, freaking Entomologist on it over a free socket? I do think I'd have preferred seeing more Set Skills to scale things down slightly so you had to get a few subpar pieces to get a better, prominent skill, but hey. Set Skills only needing typically 3 makes them a lot more palatable to me.

I might be in the minority here, but I like the switching of decorations and charms. Getting that one good charm completely changed your armour sets, and the 5000 others you got until then were wholly worthless. With decorations, you can equip multiple at a time, sometimes nearly a dozen. You can actually get lots of use out of 'okay' ones. The weekly gold tickets for free gems is really fair. And kinda necessary for upgrading charms. A couple skills really stand out, which I guess isn't anything new. Health Boost went from wholly worthless to the single best skill, allowing for 200 HP, Fire Res stops fire's constant burn damage and near global usage (especially with Bazel and Rathalos' interruptions), and Stun Res is more useful than ever, with Stun taking thrice as long to recover from. I'm sure the 'metagame' is still herp derp handicraft and crit boost or whatever, but I prefer not dying. Ever. I can run all that stuff handily and still get a pricier skill like Elemental Crit or some serious Guard points and not look like complete clownshoes, so that's always a huge plus. Oh, however. Female armour design is at its all-time low. One of the plusses of switching primary genders every game is that I dodged that bullet. Course, in Gen, I knew going in that I wanted Tigrex for Hearing and Eating, so I could use the name Amber quite fittingly. Two armour styles helps sometimes, but. Just. Stop. Making. Everything. Be metal thighhighs and have random-ass patches of bare skin.

A lot of the new monsters are mostly just rehashes. Which is... reasonable, really. There's only so many moves and so many ways to do stuff. Legiana is a less threatening ice Rathalos. Anjanath is a more aggressive, less burly Deviljho. Even Paolumu is Kecha Wacha with a few low-grade Kush attacks. Bazelgeuse  certainly stands out among the crowd, because his moves are wholly unique, and he's actually a threatening party-crasher, unlike Deviljho. The fact he's mostly about area of effect makes him incredibly dangerous (and/or helpful) when you're preoccupied, but when the focus is on him, he crumples surprisingly easily. I think most people have a love/hate relationship with him and the 3-monsters in the field. It does spice things up, but it also sometimes turns into an absolute fustercluck.

What's less thrilling is the near universal amount presence of fire. It's one thing that ALL the old guys are fire (minus Diablos, Kushala, and Kirin), but the fact that several of the new monsters (Anjanath, Bazelgeuse, Xeno'jiiva) are fire too is just pouring gasoline on the, well, fire. Kirin, Paolumu, and Vaal Hazak are the only three weak to it, I think, while each weapon gets two-four trees for fire. The free DLC doesn't change matters, with both Lunastra and maybe Alatreon doing fire too. I don't actually remember if Alatreon can light you up. For the other elements, Thunder and Ice get two (plus Oroshi, later). Water has just Jyuratodus and nobody even does Dragonblight. This means if you want elemental weapons, you'll be killing a shitton of Jyuratodus, Tobi-Kodachi, and Legiana. It also makes Fire Res probably the second best general-purpose skill, but I've already been there.

One thing I really did like is how HR just opened up pretty completely. It was fun seeing if you could immediately tackle Rathain or whoever to get some solid HR armour right away. The only shortcoming was the sad, sad excuse at 'oh no, monsters are invading other envir-- Anjie and Pukei are the in desert. That's it. It would've been a nice change of pace to see different guys different places, not to mention it could better use certain otherwise barren rooms and cause 'party chambers' to sometimes be more or less dangerous. Because I've never once fought Dodogama without in the main crystal room without it being a four-way. Lavasioth won't go there, but the three others are mighty fond of the room, too. On this thought, why the hell doesn't Nergigante show in the desert? They had his AI working there for the beta, and you first find traces of him in the swamp. :|

Investigations, Expeditions, and Bounties are all nice enough ideas, but I really think it would've worked better if they reworked how they functioned. Expeditions are kinda... pointless? Other than stupid gather-y bullshit like the ultra-rare endemic life and tempered tracks only show up there. Bounties are an alright way to guide your hand to specific quests, but it's flow breaking early on, and once you don't need armour spheres, you can just forget all about it. Investigations giving bonus rewards with stricter demands is genuinely nice, although there's always the issue of running a quest dry before you have enough Jyuratodus Fins or whatever. I'd more prefer these be like sliders that you can play with to set it to be as hard and rewarding as you can handle, but hey. I'll take it any day over 4U's Guild Quests.

It's kinda a half-baked idea, but I could sort of see a revision of these ideas into one bigger thing. Like, you'd choose a set of three or so investigations at once (like bounties), and when you go to a viable locale, those goals slot themselves in. If it's 30 minutes for Rathian and 50 for Barroth, she'll leave at 30 minutes and Barroth will stay for 50. Or once room opens and Diablos shows, Diablos' timer starts. I'm not sure how death would work. Take ten minutes away? It's not perfect, but it would flow a lot better than having to reload the same map twice every ten minutes when something dies.

Tempereds are just the stupidest attempt at harder monsters yet. Frenzy wasn't great either, as they gave nothing better compared to their normal counterpart, but at least there was a mechanic beyond 'hits harder'. And I seriously think half the G-Rank monsters don't have non-frenzied quests, so it's not much of an option. Hyper was never explained at all, but its heads above the other two. Specific stronger attacks with weaker weak points. Further, with Hypers, you still needed to fight the appropriate monster to get their parts (with some more variety for semi-generic parts like Hyper Horns). With Tempereds, your goal isn't to get parts, but horrifically rare drops, so there's no reason to do anybody but the easiest guy of that tier. You gain nothing more from fighting Radobaan versus Jagras. While I can live with never getting those amazing decorations, streamstones and augmenting are just awful to be linked to luck. Yeah, it's post-postgame, but that junk alone makes me feel I'd rather see a new game that refines World's new ideas rather than it get a G-Rank expansion. Generations was content to have the end be the end, not involving any roulette crap. ...Double Cross might've done some wacky random-luck bullshit. I don't know, come to think of it.

I feel like I had other, nicer, things to say, but this is already waay too damn long and sounds bit too bitter, so I think I'll just stop. Oh yeah, and needing a subscription to play online sucks, so I haven't even attempted to enter or use an SOS out of curiosity. But from what I hear about it only having two scales, one for one player, and one for four, is really stupid. It reeaallly favours single player, which, hey, is working for me, but might've missed the point of the series. See? I can't even end this without sounding negative. :|

#Monster Hunter World