#I have spent months of planning and research on this project before I even wrote a single word of the first chapter down

[foundress0fnothing]

Chapter 2 of "more thicker than forget" is here, featuring an awkward reunion, a lot of academic worldbuilding, and a tentative truce between our favs.

I thought this fic would be a two-shot, but as I got further into the story, I realized that some of the scenes I had planned needed more time/deserved their own chapters, so the expected chapter count is now 5 as Eris and Azriel re-meet each other after 5 years apart. This chapter is relatively short, but the next ones should allow our two more time to interact and come to terms with each other. I don't have an upload schedule for the other 3 parts yet, but expect them soon--I'm starting a new writing project sometime in July and want to have this story finished before I move on.

Read here on AO3, or continue below the cut.

5 Years Later—Eris

Late August

Eris checked the time on his office computer, sighed, and leaned back in his chair, closing his eyes briefly. He only had a few moments alone before he had to pull himself together to greet the visiting scholar Prythian was hosting for the semester.

Or—to be more accurate—the visiting scholar he was hosting for the semester.

Thankfully this would be the last time he’d ever have to do something like this—in two months, he would finally, finally have tenure, not just be on a tenure track, and he could slow down—could stop working so hard to have a new publication every other month, could stop worrying so much about what students wrote on their course evaluations, could stop having to volunteer for every little thing the department needed, all to prove that he was—how did they put it?—“an asset to both the department and the university at large” and worthy of tenure.

Helping visiting scholars like the one coming that day was one of the volunteering responsibilities that he had taken on. The weeks or months spent playing host were typically monetarily and intellectually thankless time sucks, but they at least earned him a fair amount of good will—the senior scholars in the department were more than willing to pawn off the visiting researchers and the responsibility of making them comfortable to an underling whenever possible. And it’s not like the work was particularly hard at this point: Eris took them out for drinks, made polite small talk about whatever their niche research was, helped get them set up in their office and hotel, and was on-call to answer any question about university bureaucracy that might come up during their time on campus. Easy, distant, and—typically—quite dull.

At least this final scholar actually promised to be interesting. Eris couldn’t remember the man’s name—the department had certainly told him when he agreed to help him settle in, and he was sure there was an email buried somewhere in his inbox that would have the man’s CV and relevant publication information—but he remembered enough for their meeting today. 

He was another modernist, albeit an independent scholar, working on an accessible reading guide to Finnegans Wake (a pointless task, Eris thought, not that anyone had asked him—no one tried to read the book except for the most dedicated Joyce scholars, and even then, it was more of a curiosity than a work of serious literary merit. It was just too strange—he first read the book one summer as an undergrad and felt drunk for a week after). Apparently, the project was in its final stages, and since Prythian housed the largest collection of Joyce’s letters and drafts, the scholar had requested a visiting position to have access to the archive. He and Eris would be co-teaching an undergrad survey class on Joyce as well, thus necessitating their meeting today—who would lecture when, what they would ask the students to read versus what the students would actually read, how harshly they wanted to grade essays—all the usual logistical nonsense that came with teaching a class. 

At the sound of a soft knock on his office door, Eris snapped his eyes open and shrugged his blazer back on, the tweed slightly itchy at the back of his neck where the jacket rose over the collar of his shirt. As settled as could hope to be, Eris called out, “Come in.”

“Dr. Vanserra!” Thesan Aubade, the department chair, greeted him as he opened the door and stepped into the cramped space. The office was clean, and as elegantly outfitted as an 8 by 8 cell could hope to be, but Eris was victim to the occupational hazard that befell anyone making a living off of their words: every spare foot of space was devoted to books, each wall lined with overflowing shelves that intruded into the already too-small room. There was room for his desk and a single chair for students coming in for office hours, but not much else. “I come bearing your charge for the semester, Dr. Azriel Moreno.”

Eris took a moment to study the man who followed Thesan into the room. He looked vaguely familiar, tall and broad and with an unfairly beautiful face framed by rounded tortoiseshell glasses, wearing a white oxford tucked into black jeans with a black blazer over top. Eris had probably seen him on the conference circuit at some point over the last few years, but at this point, the names and faces of the minor scholars who attended those blurred together. Deciding that it wasn't anything worth worrying about, he smiled and said, “It’s good to meet you, Dr. Moreno. I look forward to working with you this semester.”

The man held Eris’ gaze for a beat too long, not offering a greeting in return, his hazel eyes boring into Eris’ own before he slowly raised a brow as if in challenge. 

Before Eris could start to make sense of the man’s expression and the odd hostility it conveyed, Thesan cut in. “Facilities couldn’t find him a space in the building with the construction in the east wing, but I assured Dr. Moreno that you would be more than happy to share your office space for the semester.”

Eris blinked at Thesan, who had the gall to meet his confused expression with only a bland smile. “Is that so?” Eris said slowly, biting his tongue before he said anything ruder. Because god, it was just like Thesan to spring this on him here, in front of the scholar, rather than giving him time to argue or plan or figure out literally any better solution than cramming two people into the same small working space.

Moreno, however, simply smiled at Thesan. “I’m sure Dr. Vanserra and I can make it work. Who knows?” He said, cutting his eyes over at Eris again. “Perhaps we’ll find we enjoy such close quarters.”

Eris almost rolled his eyes at that bullshit, ingratiating answer, which would have wrecked the image of careful control he had cultivated over the last five years of dealing with departmental politics. Thesan, though, pleased that he wouldn’t have to do any mollifying, clapped his hands and started moving toward the door. “Well, that’s excellent. I’ll leave you to it, then. Can’t wait to hear what you plan for the Joyce class.”

There was a beat of silence in the wake of his departure as Eris stared after Thesan’s retreating form, silently seething as he imagined the intrusion that Moreno’s presence would present to his routine: a person in his space and in his business, for whom he’d be expected to give up his desk and his peace of mind whenever the other man decided he needed it, nevermind how snowed under Eris was with trying to keep up with teaching responsibilities and research and preparations for his tenure review. 

And that wasn’t even taking into account that the man himself was apparently going to be insufferable—oddly standoffish with colleagues like Eris, irritatingly sycophantic with higher-ups like Thesan. Any enthusiasm he might have felt about working with Moreno this semester was rapidly draining away.

Still, he had a job to do, but Eris was not about to tackle the rest of the day sober. “There’s a bar a few blocks away that the undergrads haven’t discovered yet. Why don’t we do this over a drink?”

Eris saw something flash briefly over Moreno’s face—again, that strange, brief hesitation—before he said simply, “Lead the way.”

A few minutes later, they had settled into a booth with their drinks, both men slightly sweaty from the walk to the bar through Prythian’s late summer humidity. Their conversation on the walk over had been stilted: Eris made some innocuous comment about the weather and Moreno agreed brusquely that, yes, it was quite hot; Eris asked after the general details of Moreno’s travel to Prythian and Moreno informed him that it was “fine;” Eris asked after the details of his research project and Moreno told him that it was “almost finished.” And that was it. 

Perhaps the man was just awkward, Eris mused as Moreno raised his pint glass to his lips to take a sip while staring at the street outside of the bar, just someone who never mastered the politicking and the small talk and the conversations that came with academia. It would explain why he wasn’t at a university, at any rate. 

Even so, he didn’t relish the thought of spending any more time with him here than he had to—sharing an office and a class with Moreno all semester would be enough of a headache and, if the walk over was any indication, this meeting would be much the same, with Eris carrying the discussion about semester logistics while the other man grunted agreement instead of offering real answers and insights like an actual person. He sighed internally— only two more months until tenure . 

Pulling out his laptop, he said, “So. The Joyce class. I figured we’d alternate lectures rather than splitting them, and I’ve made a tentative weekly lecture and reading breakdown. What’s your email? I’ll send this to you to review.” 

Turning back to Eris, Moreno looked at him blankly for a moment, apparently not quite ready to jump into the work of the meeting, and Eris resisted the urge to sigh and scold him like he was a distracted undergrad broodily gazing out of a window.

“Of course,” Moreno said, shaking himself slightly and pulling out his phone. “Email is [email protected].” 

As Eris typed in the email, he noticed that Moreno began to roll up the sleeves of this shirt, the sunlight streaming into the bar having made even the indoor space uncomfortably warm. 

And then—fuck .

Because the man had tattoos across his forearms, intricately swirled and somehow elegant in their brutality, and Eris had only seen tattoos like those once before—years ago, at another bar, in what felt like another lifetime—and he realized why the man had seemed so familiar back in his— their —office.

Eris dragged his eyes away from the man’s arms only to find Moreno studying him. With a smirk, Moreno asked, “It was the tattoos then?”

Eris felt his mouth go dry as he remembered the last time he was with this man, was with Azriel Moreno. He was high on his job offer and cool and articulate and utterly in control. But now? Now, he could only rasp out, “They made an impression.”

Moreno barked a mirthless laugh at that. “I suppose they did.”

Silence stretched between the two men after that for a few beats as Eris, caught wrong-footed, scrambled for something to say to salvage the meeting, hoping desperately that Moreno wasn’t petty enough to say something to Thesan about the disaster this was becoming.

To Eris’ surprise, however, Moreno was the one to break the tension. “Look, Vanserra, I’m here to continue my research and finish my book and teach this class. Nothing more. I haven’t been with a university in five years, and I just want this to be simple and professional and uncomplicated.”

Eris hoped his relief didn’t show too clearly on his face. “I think we can manage that.”

“Good.” With that, Moreno turned his attention back to his phone, pulling up the email from Eris and skimming through the document. “I have some thoughts.”

#azris #azris fanfiction #academia au #five years later #one bed trope? NAH one desk trope

[thecraftyfoxthewriterscorner]

Improving Your Writing Habits When Time Is the Limit

A few tips for getting some writing in when you don’t have a lot of time.

Hi Story Crafters,

This is a little late, but happy 2024! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season, and spent some time relaxing and recharging the writing part of their brain.

I’d like to start off by thanking all of my current subscribers for their continued support of this newsletter—I couldn’t publish these posts without you! Please bear with me as I get back into the habit of sending out this newsletter more frequently and consistently.

As a way to get back into the swing of things (me with the newsletter, and maybe you, with your writing), this post will be a remix of a couple of my earliest posts:

5 Tips for Developing a Daily Writing Habit

Developing a Daily Writing Habit Recap: Taking a Break

Now for the remix:

I’ve found the tips below (a few of which may sound familiar) helpful with improving my own writing habits over the past few weeks. Hopefully, you find a couple of them useful too!

✨Try to write every day.

Try to write every day, even if it’s just 1 sentence or even just a fragment of one. Sometimes the hardest part of writing is just starting. As long as you have something written on the page, you can build on it; and it might feel easier to do so as the days go by!

✨Write ugly—or, you know, have fun!

Don’t worry too much about connecting sentences or even ideas together. Don’t worry if they’re in chronological order, if there are repetitive words, etc. Some days getting words on the page will feel like pulling teeth; on others, you’ll feel like everything is falling in place, and the writing will be fun. In any case, just set the goal of getting your thoughts and ideas down—or if you’re feeling up to it, a whole scene!

✨Try to have 1-2 days a week where you can sit down and write.

Try to have 1-2 days where you can sit down with the ideas, sentences, and/or fragments you wrote over the course of the week and try to connect them. This might take the form of writing a paragraph, a scene, or even an entire chapter. The goal is to weave everything into a cohesive story. Often I end up writing more and writing longer than planned, so I try to set aside a big chunk of time.

✨Try to read what you previously wrote before you start writing again.

Reading what you last wrote (which, hopefully, was the day before) can help rev up the writing part of your brain, making you excited to keep on writing and/or giving you ideas on how to keep writing. They’re pretty much the same thing, honestly. Try not to edit too much when you use this technique, unless doing so will help you continue writing the current narrative.

✨Find inspiration wherever possible.

This could mean watching movies or TV shows that are the same genre as your writing project, or share similar characters, plot devices, or other story elements. This might mean researching certain topics like historical events, investigative techniques, first aid techniques, fight scenes, etc. And it might also mean finding techniques you’d like to use in your own writing, like comedic dialogue, tragic narratives, certain plot twists etc.—though in this case, you’ll want to find examples of books that use those techniques effectively, so you can analyze how the authors pulled off those techniques.

That’s all I’ve got for now! I’ve also got some news for this spring…

❇️ Upcoming Event: #RevPit 2024

If you’ve got a finished manuscript and are planning to pursue traditional publishing, consider submitting your manuscript to this year’s #RevPit! Manuscripts of all genres, audiences, and lengths are welcome. I’ll be participating as a #RevPit editor this year alongside several other fantastic editors.

In the months leading up to #RevPit there will be events where you can meet the editors and even submit your query package for brief feedback (You can check out the most recent #10Queries event here.)

Check out the event schedule below:

Twitter/X: https://x.com/reviseresub/status/1747255382320533918?s=46&t=jIkStnxyKeaXgs-crC42IA

Please remember that all #RevPit events have been moved to Reddit! You can find the #RevPit event Reddit post here.

Until next time!

Best,

Leah

Visit the Crafty Fox Editing Services

Connect with me on social media!

Substack Post: https://thecraftyfoxwriterscorner.substack.com/p/improving-your-writing-habits-when

Interested in learning more about me, and the kind of energy I’ll bring to a writer-editor relationship? If you're a writer, consider subscribing to my free Substack newsletter (you can check out the archives, too). You'll get a free writing resource on relationship mapping, and a special offer when you subscribe!

You can also check out the archives.

Are you searching for an editor to work with on a completed (or soon-to-be-completed) manuscript? Get in touch! I’d love to hear about your project(s). I’m looking to work with authors of:

Fantasy

Dark Fantasy

Science Fiction

Horror

Send me an email!

#Writers #Writing #Writing Tips #Writing Advice #Improving Your Writing Habits When Time Is the Limit

[ewebie]

2022: An Author’s Review

I've gotten in the habit (over the past 9 years) of posting an author's review of what I've done on AO3. Since I started my Patreon, I've been posting it here and sharing across Tumblr and Twitter. I think it's good to take stock, be honest about what was possible and look and what I want for the next year. So here it is:

2022... I must say that I had higher hopes for you. It was a busy and productive year, but I did spend a lot of my time healing from the past 2 years and dragging myself, kicking and screaming, into a healthier place.

I was forced to take time out of work for my own mental health in 2021, and kept a lighter schedule going into 2022. It was very very needed. And 2022 from a society perspective was not what I had hoped for. Hubs and I made a (temporary -- one year only) move back across the Atlantic, and I learned a whole new job (clinical adjacent... research).

Even with all the chaos of a move and work and... *gestures at everything* I did manage to accomplish a few things.Summary of writing in 2022:

I set out with the goal of posting something every month, and I succeeded through August. I settled down after that to really plow through some of my WIPs and get ready for a big push in Jan '23.

In January '22, I spent some dedicated time torturing giving Paia everything she's ever wanted. And kicked off a series of works of Papa Lestrade (and his 3 kids). Series became When You're Fast Asleep, the first one written called Deep Inhale.

February brought two more installments to When You're Fast Asleep: Foundational and Counter Riposte. Also very much targeting Paia. Because if I cannot lob fully completed fic attacks back at her for all the rabid plot-bunnies she sneaks into my DMs, then what's the point of our friendship?

For March, I broadened my attack to hit Moth as well as Paia... An indulgent little praisekink AU that hit up a few important interests, called Praise Worthy. And I finished the NYE fic I was working on that specifically used receipts from Moth and Paia that's just suit worship and proud indulgence: Silver and Gold. I also got Jinxed by V in the MRC and added a chapter to Safety First (my Kiss Kiss Bang Bang shorts collection) called G is for Grooming... because toilet plungers???

Though I technically finished posting in May, the April fic was another When You're Fast Asleep called How Your Heart, and I absolutely adore it (and attacked myself with it). And while that was posting, I was working away on the May-Mystrade (Maystrade challenge).

So that brings us to May - when things started to get really busy as I prepped to move, and the Mystrade is Crime collection, to which I submitted Bait and Switch (since KKBB and Sometimes I Feel... were already in existence and I wanted to go full evil).

June and July were mental... packed up 16years of life on one side of the Atlantic, moved to the other, got COVID, got better, and made my way to a State that I'd never lived in before, started a new job in a new environment, dealt with family health issues, celebrated a major birthday. A lot of stress... not a lot of writing.

August I put up Where To Draw the Line, because sometimes I cannot control myself.

September, I fell off the wagon. Not that I've not been writing, I've been writing continuously. But I went all in on some of my WIPs and committed to finishing Hayloft, which is due to start posting on Fridays in Jan...

Overall, I published shy of 50k words (though, I wrote just over 80k... there are some big WIPs in the works) with 16k hits and I now have 360 user subscriptions and 6000 bookmarks. It was a solid effort and I've spent the year only writing Mystrade -- though... I've expanded my reading ships (I'm looking at you Moth).

Plan for 2023: Starting in Jan, I'll be posting The Hayloft (aka "The Farm AU"). One chapter a week... until done... Which... will be midyear. There’s a few bigger projects that I’ve back-burnered or have been plodding along with, including "the sad one" and "the Pretty Woman one" and some complex, multichapter things. Trello has been excellent this year to keep my bunnies sorted and in some sort of order.

Working titles of a few:

Lesser Things

Used Books

The Marshmallow Experiment

Huff and Hush

The Time Has Come

Attack the Cheese Block

Of Legwork and Dogs Bodies

Make Yourself

I hope to keep adding shorts to Safety First and Badges and 'Brellas. And I have 2 birthday pieces that I'm working on, and hope to get out in Feb/March. I'm not going to aim for monthly new works, since Hayloft is going to take a lot of attention, but I do hope to publish more words than 2022.

Many thanks to everyone who has beta'd works for me through the year (this year was mostly Paia -- many times for her many many sins). Thank you to the Asylum (nee Jail) - you're all gremlins and I-A-Door-You! Thank you to the MRC for being just... whatever it is you are. And the OGC - because intercontinental chat groups are their own, special nonsense!

I want to thank everyone that has left kudos and comments and reblogs and likes. Anyone who has dropped me a message or a thought and has generally enjoyed or encouraged my writing this past year. ILY all!!

#2022-2023 #author's review #annual review #On writing #writing milestone

[sciencespies]

China Launches Astronauts to Tiangong Space Station: Video and Updates

https://sciencespies.com/space/china-launches-astronauts-to-tiangong-space-station-video-and-updates/

China Launches Astronauts to Tiangong Space Station: Video and Updates

After decades of military secrecy, Chinese officials opened their desert rocket launch center to a handful of visitors and called for international cooperation in space.

Tall as a 20-story building, a rocket carrying the Shenzhou 15 mission roared into the night sky of the Gobi Desert on Tuesday, carrying three astronauts toward a rendezvous with China’s just-completed space station.

The rocket launch was a split-screen event for China, the latest in a long series of technological achievements for the country, even as many of its citizens have been angrily lashing out in the streets against stringent pandemic controls.

The air shook as the huge white rocket leaped into a starry, bitterly cold night sky shortly before the setting of a waxing crescent moon. Less than nine hours later, the three astronauts aboard Shenzhou 15 docked with the space station and greeted the crew of three who were already there and had completed construction of the orbital outpost this autumn.

That made the expedition to the new space station a milestone for China’s rapidly advancing space program. The Tiangong outpost will now be continuously occupied, like the International Space Station. That is another marker laid down by China in its race to catch up with the United States and surpass it as the dominant power in space.

With a sustained presence in low-Earth orbit aboard Tiangong, Chinese space officials are preparing to put astronauts on the moon, which NASA also intends to revisit before the end of the decade as part of its Artemis program.

“It will not take a long time; we can achieve the goal of manned moon landing,” Zhou Jianping, chief designer of China’s crewed space program, said in an interview at the launch center. China has been developing a lunar lander, he added, without giving a date when it might be used.

The launch of Shenzhou 15 comes less than two weeks after NASA finally launched its Artemis I mission following many delays. That flight has put its uncrewed Orion capsule into orbit around the moon.

At the same time, Beijing has engaged in a charm offensive since the Group of 20 summit in Bali earlier this month, wooing European nations and developing countries in particular. That includes space exploration. China’s leader, Xi Jinping, emphasized that point in a letter on Nov. 21 to a United Nations symposium.

“China is willing to work with other countries to strengthen exchanges and cooperation, jointly explore the mysteries of the universe, make peaceful use of outer space, and promote space technology to better benefit the people of all countries in the world,” Mr. Xi wrote.

Zhou Jianping, the chief designer of the China Manned Space Program, said on Monday that the country had spent money on its space program efficiently.Li You/The New York Times

A worker on Monday in front of the launch tower where the Shenzhou 15 rocket was being prepared for the launch on Tuesday. The Jiuquan site is a military base long involved in China’s ballistic missile programs.Keith Bradsher/The New York Times

While European nations are working with the United States on the Artemis missions and the International Space Station, they so far have not expressed much interest in Tiangong. Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action said in a written reply to questions that Germany had no bilateral projects with China for its space station.

And while Germany and Italy each sent an astronaut four years ago to China’s Shandong Province for training to fly aboard a Shenzhou rocket, neither country has announced plans to send astronauts on a Chinese rocket. Some European researchers are involved in scientific experiments that will be carried to Tiangong, however, including a proposed high-energy cosmic radiation detector. Researchers from India, Peru, Mexico and Saudi Arabia have also received research opportunities on the Chinese space station through a United Nations program.

Officials in Europe have been wary of closer cooperation in space at a time of rising frictions over China’s human rights record and military buildup. They have asked China to share highly detailed information about its space operations, partly to ensure the safety of astronauts. But China’s space program has grown out of the country’s military, like the early American space program decades ago, and has been wary of extensive sharing.

That military connection was on display at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the desert. Camouflaged vehicles were visible in and around the base, and some signage referred not to Shenzhou civilian space rockets but to Dongfeng, the ballistic missiles used in China’s nuclear weapon arsenal.

Visitors approaching the launch center received a succession of short, automated warning messages on their mobile phones, starting about 50 miles away. The warnings stated that they had entered a military management zone where photography was strictly prohibited and violators of national security would be executed.

The first of these messages, in Chinese, provided a mobile phone number for reporting any sightings of foreigners or of suspicious activity, and concluded with a warning: “Those stealing secrets will surely be caught, and will be decapitated once caught! Everyone catch enemy spies, and make great contributions by seizing them!”

Ji Qiming, assistant director general of the China Manned Space Engineering Office, said at a news conference on Monday ahead of the Shenzhou 15 launch that China was preserving the heritage of the “two bombs one satellite” vision articulated by Mao. That program aimed to create an atomic bomb, an intercontinental ballistic missile to carry the bomb and a satellite from which to view the world below.

The Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China on Monday, where the Shenzhou 15 rocket was being prepared for a launch scheduled for Tuesday.Li You/The New York Times

Astronauts live and train before launch inside this fancifully decorated area at the Jiuquan site.Keith Bradsher/The New York Times

On Tuesday, foreign journalists were given uncommon access to the launch center, which began construction in 1958 and is usually out of bounds even for Chinese citizens.

Two journalists for The New York Times and a photographer from Kyodo News of Japan were allowed to attend the launch, as were a small group of journalists from mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau. Visitors from Beijing and other cities were required to spend a week first in quarantine at a village hotel about 50 miles away, and to pass daily PCR tests. Foreign journalists paid for their travel, accommodation and quarantine.

The quarantine was part of elaborate precautions to prevent the Covid-19 virus from reaching the space center again. An outbreak last year briefly interrupted work at the site.

The base is 150 miles into the Gobi Desert from the nearest city, Jiayuguan in northern Gansu Province. On the highway from the city, an older China was still visible as a farmer’s small herd of Bactrian camels loped along, their double humps shaggy with dark-brown fur as winter approaches.

The region around the launch center has some of the world’s tallest stationary sand dunes, rising to a height of over 1,000 feet. Flat, gray gravel surrounds the base itself, which is home to an architectural mélange.

An immense vertical assembly building for rockets and modern administrative high-rises stand at the front of the base. Behind them are considerably older, low-rise brick buildings with prominent Communist Party insignia, and then rows of three-story apartment buildings with peeling white paint. The astronaut living and training quarters used before launches have been built in a fanciful Art Deco style with a curious resemblance to Tomorrowland at Disneyland.

The newer buildings at the site signal how fast China has been catching up with the West in space. Charles Bolden, who led NASA during the Obama administration, said that China’s ample budgets and long-term planning had given it an advantage over the United States, where Congress has been divided on space expenditures.

China, he said, moved as fast as “anybody would do if they had unlimited resources and didn’t have to go back” repeatedly to politicians for approval of expenditures.

Astronauts waved to the crowd while a brass band played on Tuesday.Keith Bradsher/The New York Times

Huang Weifen, chief designer of the astronaut system for the China Manned Space Program, said on Monday that fresh fruits and vegetables would be sent to the Tiangong space station.Li You/The New York Times

Mr. Zhou of the crewed space agency said that China had spent money efficiently on its space program, and that its space station had cost not much more than $8 billion. Pay and the cost of living are low for the large community of rocket scientists living and working mostly in isolation at Jiuquan launch center, with even their internet communications with the rest of China restricted for national security reasons.

By contrast, NASA will spend $3 billion just this year on the International Space Station, which has cost more than $100 billion to build and maintain over the course of its life.

Three men were aboard the Shenzhou 15 when it lifted off: Fei Junlong, Deng Qingming and Zhang Lu. China has sent women into orbit on previous trips, but chose its oldest and most experienced team of astronauts to get the just-completed space station up and running in the next six months.

The trio stood at attention when introduced at a news conference, and delivered crisp military salutes. Mr. Fei, the spaceflight commander, first went into space in 2005 and is 57 years old.

“I am very proud and excited to be able to go to space again for my country,” he said.

Huang Weifen, chief designer of astronaut systems, said in an interview that China had added resistance exercise equipment and a broader menu for recent spaceflights, even including fresh fruits and vegetables.

Herbal treatments based on traditional Chinese medicine are carried aboard the space station and also used for medicated baths given to astronauts after their return to Earth, in an attempt to limit medical harm from prolonged stays in space, she added.

Mr. Zhou Jianping said that experiments to be done by the crew would involve using an extremely accurate atomic clock for gravity research and deploying a space telescope for ultraviolet studies of distant reaches of the universe.

“China’s aerospace industry is developing rapidly,” he said. “China is already a major aerospace power.”

Li You contributed research from Jiuquan.

#Space

#Space

[bisexual-horror-fan]

Gotta love it when you post a new chapter and less than 24 hours after that you get a comment telling you to, "plz update"

How about, no. And furthermore, how about, I'm not rushing this story, it's massively important to me. And to finish off, how about you're GONNA fuckin' wait and you're GONNA fuckin' like it.

#I am not about to rush this shit #I have spent months of planning and research on this project before I even wrote a single word of the first chapter down #I am gonna update it when I fucking feel like it #And you rushing me DOESN'T make me wanna push out shit before it is ready #Literally less than a DAY and you are begging for an update #Shut up dude fucks sake #I am not a machine #I got shit to do #BHF vents #BHF rants #Respect me and my time PLEASE #TTHISTOW

[1kook]

ZOOM CALL

⇢ meeting two

jeon jungkook x (f) reader

⇢ series masterlist

summary: Most notably, there’s one group project waiting for you, which leads you to Friday. Sitting at your desk, bright and early, absolutely dreading being assigned to your group. genre: fluff, slice of life, smut (tags tba) warnings: ITS A SLOW BURN OKAY...., sweetheart jk, campus crush jk, college crushes, social distancing, zoom -_-, jk owns a keroppi plush, oc thirsts over his hot bod, jk’s sweet attempts at flirting </3 he’s just 2 cute for his own good ratings: e for everyone <3 wc: 3.7k

notes: this took long bc i wrote one version but it was SO LAME u guys r lucky my friend and editor ( @kigurumu​ 🖤 ) stopped me from posting it. so then i had to reorganize my thoughts n b like girl. the ppl are waiting. get it together. anyway here’s zoom jk 😎

Being grouped with Jeon Jungkook (he/him) for your first class on the first day of your first Zoom semester truly sets the standard.

By no means do your other classes suck; they’re quite enjoyable, more relevant to your area of study. They’re familiar which makes them comfortable, your Zoom meetings filled with faces you’ve seen time and time again the last four years. The material interests you, so you definitely don’t have anything against them or your classmates. 

That being said, no one is prepared for the awkwardness that comes with each and every Zoom meeting. You never thought you’d be embarrassed to turn your mic on— to speak in a class filled with your peers. And the meetings are all like that, filled with uncomfortable silences and endless black screens. 

You wish there was a Jeon Jungkook (he/him) in every class. 

Jungkook’s just got this bubbly aura to him, this magnetic presence that staples itself into the back of your mind with each passing day. No one fills a Zoom call like he does, making every person laugh and smile like him. 

Wednesday rolls around and you find yourself a little disheartened when you don’t get sorted into the same randomized group as him again. Disappointment melts into annoyance when you find out how incompetent your other classmates are, refusing to speak in the small group or just completely clocking out all together. A lot of them didn’t do the reading— the one you stayed up all night doing —and your first partnered assignment of the semester finds you doing it all by yourself. Muted mics, black windows, complete radio silence; you hated it all. 

You find yourself weirdly longing for Jeon Jungkook’s presence, even if he’s only there to talk about some movie he saw last night. No one is as much of a chatterbox as him, can’t even hold a candle to the way he draws everyone in with his mindless conversations. At least he speaks during Breakout Rooms, you think bitterly. 

Anyway, the first week of classes ends and your brain is a frenzied mess. There’s schedules to memorize, professors to impress, assignments to plan out. There’s definitely no time to sit around and fantasize about the curly haired cutie in one of your general classes. The weekend is spent trying to organize your planner, filling in due dates and exam days ahead of time. It’s your last semester and you’re dead set on making it your best one yet. There’s a lot of written work this time around, analyses and research papers that need to be organized. The road ahead is manageable, but you’ll have to work hard to keep it that way for the next five months. 

Most notably, there’s one group project waiting for you, which leads you to Friday. Sitting at your desk, bright and early, absolutely dreading being assigned to your group.

Jungkook is early this time, not like on Monday where he’d been one of the last to filter in, and he’s looking as chirpy as ever. Donning this horrendously hot pink shirt, completely unlike the neutral tones he’d worn during your last two meetings and that decorate his room, and the cutest pair of circle glasses sitting on his nose. He says his regularly scheduled ‘good morning’ to you all and receives a collective response from the rest of the class that not even your professor got. 

Speaking of the professor, you’ve been giving him the stink eye this whole time. Not that he can tell, given the fact he’s probably miles away in his own home while you angrily glare at him through your webcam. It’s this old guy who’s decided to sort you all into semester long groups for the class, which is the absolute worst. These types of groups always go the same way: you make a group chat promising to study together, those plans fall through, and then everyone just leeches off of each other for homework answers. And in most cases, it’s you handing over your homework answers because no one else ever bothers to do anything. Sadly, it’s a routine you’ve had to suffer through many times in your academic career. 

The thought makes you sick. Having to spend another semester being labeled as the bossy, nerdy dictator of the group? Not exactly how you wanted to spend the last few months of college, but there’s nothing you can do. Maybe this time around you’ll just let it be, won’t fight it (and by it, you mean your lazy classmates when they inevitably try to guilt trip you for homework) and simply let it run its course. 

“I’m going to put you guys into Breakout Rooms with your new groups!” your professor claps excitedly, and then you and the rest of your classmates are forced to watch him lean too close to the camera as he begins clicking around to find the preset groups he’s assigned the class. “Remember, guys, this is it for the rest of the semester. So if something isn’t right, let me know by the end of today.” 

Man, this was going to suck, you groan. The syllabus had said that the purpose of these groups was to keep you all connected with your classmates during these trying times, to give you the same opportunities in-person learning would. Frankly, you’re not too worried about making friends with everyone in this large class. Most of them are younger than you anyway, save for Jeon Jungkook (he/him) and a handful of others who are apparently in your year. Befriending lowerclassmen only to have to bid them adieu in a few months seems awfully sad, a little too heartbreaking. You really just want to get a good grade in this class, collect the last of your credits, and put this whole college experience behind you. 

Your thoughts are wrapped up by the pop-up message that appears on screen. 

The host is inviting you to join a Breakout Room: Group 12

You sigh, contemplate dropping this class for all of two seconds, before dutifully accepting the request. Worse comes to worst, you make up some lie to tell your professor that you’re allergic to group work and hope it works. (It won’t.) 

You sit through the mandatory loading screen for a few seconds before being abruptly dumped into your new room, Group 12, or so the message had said. There’s no one else here yet, which isn’t really a surprise. A lot of your classmates are probably like you, scowling at the pop up message every time your professor sends you into small groups before accepting the request. So you chill by yourself, eyes tracing over your own mirrored image. The notes on last night’s reading are neatly laid out before you, your copy of the book off to the side. 

Another beat and then, much to your surprise, Jeon Jungkook (he/him) is appearing in your room. “Oh,” he says, round eyes magnified by the thick lens of his glasses, the glare of the computer’s glow casting a funny shape across the lens that momentarily robs you of his pretty eyes. His pretty pink lips stretch into a smile, upper lip thinning out a bit when he flashes you those perfect teeth. “Hi, __,” he greets politely, bubbly. 

It’s embarrassing how much his presence affects you, your back going ramrod straight in a terrible attempt to compose yourself. “Hi, Jungkook,” you manage to get out, fingers nervously reaching for something, anything, to ground yourself. They land on a pencil. 

Jungkook doesn’t seem even the slightest bit aware of the commotion he causes within you. “I was really nervous for these groups,” he begins rambling right away, lips pushing down into an exaggerated frown as he shivers at the memory. “But I’m glad I got placed with someone hardworking like you!”

Despite how sweet he sounds, you’re not entirely sure if he’s buttering you up just to take advantage of your ‘hardworking’ attitude later down the road or if he’s genuinely being polite. The little information you know about Jungkook wants you to believe it is the latter; he’s very kind, sweet and nice in a way that makes everyone he speaks to feel warm. Still, for all you know this could be some elaborate ruse of his to make you trust him now and then convince you to do all the work for the rest of the semester. 

Tentatively, you ask, “and how would you know that?” You try your best to keep your usual snappiness out of your voice, pose it simply out of curiosity. But everything you say or do feels like a stark contrast to Jungkook and his bubbliness. 

His head tilts cutely to the side, imploring brown eyes looking at you for one hard second. And then, “I read your forum analysis from Wednesday,” he admits, breaking into a smile. Shy and tiny, bashfully looking down at his desk. “I thought your perspective on the piece was really interesting,” he says, lips pursing together as if he’s suddenly too embarrassed to admit such things to you. 

Stunned, all you can manage is one slow nod. “Thank you,” you eventually choke out, trying to ward the heat away from your cheeks as Jungkook sheepishly nods back, cute smile still on his face. 

“Oh, please,” he chuckles, raising his hand to rub at the back of his neck. “Don’t thank me!” 

It is in this exact moment that you are suddenly made aware of two things. 

One: despite his collection of soft sweaters and t-shirts, his bouncy curls and sweet smile, Jeon Jungkook’s body is neither as cute nor as soft as any of his belongings. In fact, Jeon Jungkook’s body is all hard planes and prominent veins. Arms beefy, biceps that bulge beneath the fabric of the short sleeve t-shirt he’s donned today. His shoulders fill out the material nicely, making him look broad and huge, but that’s not even the worst part, because—

—two: Jeon Jungkook is covered in ink. Dark streaks and swirls paint his forearms, curling around his elbow. Every inch of his pale skin is littered with tiny designs. They dance along the back of his hands, over his knuckles, and end at an unidentifiable point beneath the sleeve of his t-shirt. When he tugs at the neckline of his shirt in an effort to readjust it, you hope your eyes are deceiving you and that isn’t a hint of ink by his collarbone. 

Your normal composure seems to slip away at the mere thought. 

It’s Jungkook’s voice that brings you back, a soft timbre that asks, “aren’t we supposed to have someone else in our group?” You flinch as if you’ve been caught ogling him, never mind the fact he’s started mindlessly shuffling some papers around on his desk, not the slightest bit concerned with you. 

“Oh— um, yes. I think,” you stammer, feeling like some creep for ogling your very cute, very sweet classmate. The memory of his inky skin nearly sends a shiver down your spine as you navigate back to the class syllabus. “We’re supposed to have at least three people,” you read off, glancing at the boy on your screen who frowns at the news. 

“Do you think they dropped?” Given it was still only the first week of school, probably. There had been a fewer number of people in the call when it started, you remembered. Jungkook sighs, this rather light sound that ends in a hum. “Well, we can always wait a few minutes just in case.”

So you wait, nervously bouncing your leg up and down. It’s not awkward, or at least, not as awkward as it would be with anyone else. The other week you had silently sat with another classmate in a one-on-one discussion and hadn’t uttered a word for five minutes. It wasn’t because you didn’t care about the class, but because said classmate had been tapping away on their phone the entire time and hadn’t even responded to your simple greeting. That was awkward. 

With Jungkook it’s more weird than awkward. You can tell the silence makes him uncomfortable because he keeps doing these tiny inhales like he’s about to speak, followed by a little head shake where he seemingly stops himself from saying anything at all. He wants to talk, very badly it seems, but holds back for some odd reason. 

He’s scribbling on some sheet of paper, leaning forward to give you a view of the top of his head. From this angle, his shirt hangs forward and a silver necklace falls out from beneath the neckline, thuds against the table. And then your suspicions are nearly confirmed, and oh god, is that a chest piece—

You quickly look away. 

Robbed of his handsome face and feeling like you’ll die if you look at his body any longer, you settle for your newly acquired favorite pastime: inspecting your classmates’ rooms over Zoom. Yes, you’ll admit it is incredibly nosy, but what else can you do? You can only look at your professor for so long until you inevitably grow bored, attention drifting off to your classmates tiny windows. And with no professor in sight, just gorgeous Jeon Jungkook, you quickly begin your examination of his bedroom. 

Jungkook’s room is pretty much the same as you remember it, rather neat and plain. There’s not a lot going on in terms of decoration, which is a little surprising to say the least. Over the course of the week, you’ve watched your classmates’ dormitories and bedrooms gradually change, decorations and tapestries decorating the walls, mountains of pillows added to their beds. It’s only natural that everyone has an innate need to show off who they are now more than ever, and you thought Jungkook would be the same. 

Apparently not. 

Aside from the guitar you had spotted on Monday, his little dorm room remains unchanged. Blank walls, grayscale sheets. The same perfectly fluffed pillows and then—

A tiny Keroppi plush smack dab in the middle of his bed. 

It’s adorable but a little out of place amongst Jungkook’s rather masculine decorations (or lack thereof). A tiny green doll sitting by his pillows, cute striped shirt and ridiculously dopey smile. 

Leaning forward, you unmute yourself and conversationally say, “I love your Keroppi.” 

At the sudden sound of your voice, Jungkook abruptly straightens up, glasses practically at the very tip of his nose. Eyes wide, it takes him a second to process your words before jerkily whipping around to stare at the aforementioned item. “Oh,” he jumps, slowly looking at his screen again, lips pulled into a tight line. “Um… it’s not mi—“

“It’s adorable,” you add, propping your chin in your palm, absolutely endeared with the rosy color that paints his cheeks, fades down the column of his neck. 

He squirms, hurriedly pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. He looks like he’ll deny it again, nervously nibbling at his lower lip, before eventually he settles with a sigh. “I won it from a crane machine,” he confesses with a sheepish huff of laughter, rolling backwards to the edge of his bed to snatch it from its spot. 

(Of course he manspreads as he sits, dark jeans hugging his thighs as he rolls back your way. His arm looks so strong, covered in all that ink, you nearly drool.)

“It’s cute, isn’t it?” he says, abandoning his embarrassment as he shakes the little figure around, makes it look like it’s dancing for you. “My mom said it looks like me.”

At that, you laugh. Loud and boisterous because you were definitely not expecting Jungkook to say that, such an odd but weirdly fitting comparison that has you looking at the doll in his hands with renewed interest. And through the pixelated screen, you can see the similarities: Jungkook does have the same smile as Keroppi. 

“Your mom was right,” you agree, wiping a faux tear from the corner of your eye. “Very cute.” 

Jungkook’s got this big goofy smile on, shaking his head in disbelief that you would ever dare agree with his mom. Like he’s genuinely enjoying himself, you think, oddly proud to have evoked that reaction from him. Granted, Jungkook always looks like he’s pretty happy during class, but it feels nice knowing that you were (confirmed) the reason why.  

A little caught up with the bumbling feeling in your chest, you’re not expecting his next words. “Does that mean I’m cute?” he asks, still with that same dopey smile on his face. 

It’s a bold statement you wouldn’t have expected from him, someone who seems content being the world’s friend, but apparently Jeon Jungkook also craves compliments. 

Slowly, you nod. “...yes,” you say, trying to keep the tumultuous emotions inside of you at bay while you grant him this one compliment. Outwardly, you give him what you hope is an obviously feigned look of disbelief, managing to lace it with a little amusement as you shake your head at his inquiry. On the inside, your mind and heart are a thundering racetrack, the roar of the engines and the screams of the crowd enough to momentarily make you lose your senses. “Very cute,” you repeat, hoping he can’t hear the same pounding of your heartbeat in your throat and in your ears as you do. “Like a little frog.” 

Jungkook graces your robotic response with the most boyish laugh, head tossed back as one loud cackle (because, really, there is no other way to describe the sound that tears itself from his throat) escapes him, curls bouncing back from the movement. “Cute like a frog,” he wheezes, seemingly to himself as he shakes his head with a grin, scooting closer to the camera again. “That’s a new one.” 

“You set yourself up for it,” you defend, busying yourself with the papers spread out in front of you before Jungkook can distract you any further. “Anyway!” you announce, neatly lining the papers up. “Our group.”

Jungkook does his best to wipe the glee off his face, but even as he reaches around for his things, it’s still there. “Right,” he agrees, “we have to, um—“ a huff of laughter “—group contract! Or, well, partner project.”

Briefly, you consider calling in your professor to inform him of your missing partner. He had said to let him know by the end of today if something was wrong. But, honestly, you didn’t see a problem with your group the way it was now. While you can only hope he’ll turn out to be as dedicated to his work as you, as it stands now, there weren’t any major red flags surrounding Jungkook’s character. 

Besides, you didn’t mind being with him for the rest of the semester. 

You nod, forcing yourself to ignore the glimmer in his eyes when he looks at you through the screen. “I think it’s safe to say it’ll just be the two of us, which I don’t mind,” you say, glancing at the time on the corner of your screen to see five minutes have passed since you agreed to wait. “Do you?”

On screen, Jungkook profusely shakes his head, curls bouncing all over the place. “Nope,” he hums. “I don’t mind at all,” he reassures you, resting his chin in his palm as he regards you, and then sweetly adds, “it’ll be nice with just us, __.”

Right. 

You gulp, heart fluttering at the dreaminess he exudes through your screen, the soft strand of hair that falls over his forehead, tickles his brow bone when he flashes you another smile.  He was so handsome. Before you say anything silly, you quickly attempt to move on. “But it does make us more of a duo than a group.” 

Jungkook looks away from his screen for the first time in what feels like forever and you finally let your heart rest for a second. “A duo,” he murmurs, shuffling through his papers. “Like Mickey and Minnie?” 

You nearly choke on your spit, coughing to hide the surprise from his rather cute suggestion. He’s not even looking at you, doesn’t even realize the absolute shock he’s thrown you in by comparing the two of you to one of the most famous couples— that’s what they are, a goddamn couple, not a duo! the words mean two completely different things! —in the world. Instead, Jungkook is humming the theme song to Drake & Josh. 

This man was dangerous for your heart. 

After having felt all the emotions in the world in the span of ten seconds, you eventually gather the courage to say, “sure,” and quickly try to move the conversation along. “We just need to, um, make some ground rules and responsibilities for us to follow.” 

Jungkook nods, finally glancing up again, but not at you. He’s glaring at some point behind his computer, brows furrowed together as he begins brainstorming on his own. You try to, really, but his lips pout adorably when he’s deep in thought, and they’re just so pink and look so soft and would feel like—

“Well, we should probably exchange numbers first,” Jungkook says, interrupting your spiraling thoughts with a new topic to spiral over. He tilts his head to the side, brown eyes focused on you. 

“Yes, of course,” you stammer, fumbling for your phone as Jungkook lets out a soft yay at your acceptance of his request. Quickly, he recites his number and you type it in with trembling hands into the number pad, giving him a quick call so he can have your number as well. 

You save him right away, just his name followed by the class you share with him. Not like you know any other Jeon Jungkooks, and if you did, you doubt anyone could ever leave such an impact like this Jeon Jungkook. 

“__, look,” Jungkook calls, that same excitement lacing his already lovely voice, and you raise your head up at the screen again. He’s waving his phone over his camera, so you don’t get to see his face when he says, “It’s a little mouse emoji and a pink bow— just like Minnie!”

Dangerous for your heart and, most likely, the death of you this semester.

Copyright © 2021, 1kook on tumblr. absolutely NO reposts allowed.

#networkbangtan #bangtanhq #jungkook fic #jungkook smut #jeon jungkook fic #jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook x reader #bts smut #bts fic #jjk smut #jeon jungkook smut #jjk♡ #mine

[felassan]

DA4 Lead Producer Scylla Costa’s BIG Festival talk, “Challenges of Dragon Age production during the pandemic”, can currently be rewatched on YouTube here starting roughly at timestamp 8:57:02 after a lil presenter blurb/intro. It’s 1 hour long. When it was streamed live, there was an English translation ‘voiceover’. There isn’t in this vid, however I want to post the link for Portuguese speakers, and also it’s neat for everyone to be able to see all the slides he presented with for themselves in context.

I don’t know if an English-language version will get put up so I’m sharing the notes I took during the talk below, in case anyone’s interested and because I might as well since I wrote them. The rest of this post is under a cut due to length.

Edit: Found a place to re-watch the English version of the talk

(Quick note: I didn’t note down everything, mostly things that caught my interest, so this isn’t exhaustive, and when I was watching I was real tired, so pls bear that in mind and don’t take these notes as bullet-proof 100% accurate gospel or direct quotes. If you watched it and think I’ve written down something wrong/misunderstood, let me know and I’ll fix. Also if you’re a Portuguese speaker and I’ve gotten something incorrect or missed something important etc, again just let me know.) **

** Edit: I’ve now gone through my notes while watching the talk again. I’ve filled in some of the gaps (although they still don’t cover everything said) and so forth, and now I’m no longer worried about there being possible errors in this post.

-----

For some context, this slide contained the breakdown of the talk’s structure. Bear in mind there are other slides present in the talk than the ones I’ve posted here, I didn’t include caps of all of them, just ones which were of note to me.

In the talk, chief Producer Scylla goes over challenges of DA4 production during the pandemic. He discusses the adaptations - necessary skills and learning from remote work - and he ponders on the future of teamwork.

After the launch of ME3 he became a producer, all his MMO and other experience helped a lot. He was on DAI for 3 years and MEA for 9 months, then Anthem. Today, on DA4, Scylla and another Lead Producer were the heads of the whole project, and there is his boss is the Executive Producer Christian Dailey. 

^ the usual AAA game development cycle (brief introduction)

AAA games are games that are launched for several platforms simultaneously. 

In BioWare’s case, the pre-production phase of the game development cycle can have from 5 - 30 people, and up to almost 60 people when they’re just about to go through the gate to production. 

In the pre-production phase, they go through the game’s concepts and prototypes and start developing systems. They seek the game’s concept and focus, and its key features. They do lots of market research. In the case of BioWare, all their games are strong in narrative, so they have lots of tools related to game narratives and supporting the development of a narrative (cinematic design, dialogue system etc) that get focused on in this phase. Other parts of the team such as writers and cinematic design need these systems to do their own roles. 

In BioWare’s case, the pre-production phase through to launch can take 4 - 6 years, but it does depend on the size of the team during development.

With regards to Dragon Age 4, they were coming close to the time when they would shift from pre-production to the production stage when the pandemic hit.

During the production phase is when the development of content and features takes place, with the systems mostly already existing from the pre-production phase. A few new systems may be developed in this phase. In the production phase is when things start escalating, and the team really starts growing, to like 2- or 3-fold the prior pre-production phase size. 

(DA4 is currently in the production phase.)

In the alpha phase, features have to be fully implemented and systems all have to be running / working. All the game features should already be in the game by now. They test from pre-production onwards, but this phase is when they run heavy technical tests with lots of players trying to play at the same time. In the beta phase, the idea is that you should now have full content and that now you’re balancing it and running more and lots of different tests with players before launch. There are final tweaks and then the final launch, when in the weeks prior to launch, all the different business units and areas e.g. marketing team, technology team, publishing team, get together once a day and all of the game’s issues are reported and brought to the table to be prioritized. Then they decide the next steps re: these issues (this is known as ‘the war room’).

After the launch there are usually patches like day zero patches and other patches, this being standard industry practise. The last stage is the new content stage where there are DLCs and a game with more content.

On March 12th 2020, the team gathered to review the DA4 story in the new office. Everyone was very excited. (They had spent over 10 years in their last building and had noticed that with the team growing they needed more space. In August 2019 they found the new studio in the city center.)

Anyway that evening, they got an email from the CEO which contained instructions and said that due to the pandemic, they should from now all start working remotely. They had known that this happening was a possibility so they had been planning on how to have all the devs working from home, but initially less than 50% of the devs were able to work from home successfully/efficiently due to various issues e.g. you need a VPN to be able to log in remotely to do your job normally, varying home office setups. The day after this, the office was basically deserted, except for Scylla, the IT infrastructure people and one or two odd devs.

Scylla was part of the team that was working on allowing the devs to work from home. They first started looking at the short-term changes they needed to make to allow this.

“First, take care of our developers”. 

When the pandemic first hit, their and Scylla’s [as Lead Producer] first priority was to look after the devs. Many of them are parents (schools and day-cares were shut, children were studying from home), others have relatives living with them, others have other personal circumstances which of course need to be taken into account when it comes to assessing what needs to be taken into consideration for this new scenario. So, they looked at each dev on a case-by-case basis in order to evaluate, speaking to each one and asking them what they could do to support them.

One of the first changes/adaptations they could implement was flexible working hours and flexibility around deadlines. Generally speaking the devs got a lot of support, EA was really good and really supported the devs especially in the first months of the pandemic (and they are still supporting them). Initially not all devs had suitable office spaces at home, some were working from the living room from laptops or at the kitchen table. The whole covid situation basically just happened over night and nobody was really ready to deal with that change. So their first step was to enable their devs to work remotely. As a producer, Scylla’s main task is to communicate with the team such as via a number of daily meetings. He doesn’t depend so much on powerful hardware.

“Enable developers to work remotely”.

This slide shows some of a BioWare audio team. Different teams have varying and specific needs in order to do their jobs and therefore in order to do them remotely. For example, the audio team need good-quality speakers and amplifiers, while the lighting and art teams need other specific equipment such as tablets and large screens. So there was a lot of work they had to do to go through each dev to understand their individual needs and what needed to be done for them. ‘Could they download the builds? Did they have the right performance [tech-wise]? Could they submit their changelists, their codes to the server?’

Some devs needed a more powerful internet connection as it would take 6-8 hours to download a build (some devs live rurally). Some needed a lot of cable, as they were working far away from their routers (sometimes up to 50m). As time went by things got better and better. 

The chair devs work from is also important; a kitchen able chair etc is not suitable to sit in for long-term desk work, possibly leading to health issues like back ache and blood circulation problems in the legs.

Every 3 months they had money given to help devs buy new mice, keyboards, monitors - anything they needed really in order for their office setting at home to be improved. For a while, because lots of people [generally, in society] were needing and buying them, it was quite hard to buy things like webcams and microphones.

On mid- and long-term changes:

In terms of DA, we have to look at this from 2 perspectives, the change in the personal and the professional environments. 

As a consequence of working from home, people tend to be less active during the day (even in an office, you go between meeting rooms, up and down stairs etc). Physical activity supports life quality and therefore work quality. Scylla noticed that he began to feel listless and such, and found that he needed to change his routine that he had initially developed when he started working from home, for example; having a normal start time (as in, have a semblance of structure in your day as if you were still working in the office site), get dressed at the normal time, not having meetings over lunch etc. This wasn’t just him, lots of other devs encountered this and had this experience too. Devs which adapted faster had better productivity and became more productive faster.

Scylla bought a stand-up desk which he can raise up and down, and at meetings he would be delivering a talk while standing or even while walking on a treadmill. Other devs also got stand-up desks. He tracked his body’s data on a Fitbit. These sorts of things helped improve physical and mental wellbeing. Other devs did similar things, like starting going out for jogs or began practising yoga. Essentially, everyone needed to make changes to their daily routine in comparison to what they had been doing prior to the pandemic. 

The pandemic has been a thing for over a year now. In their location, every couple of weeks a new restriction is put into place or a rule is changed, and every two weeks there’s a new thing that you can and can’t do. Scylla also started moving around his property. He worked on his desk, fixed it up and painted - taking up a new hobby. Other devs picked up new hobbies too. These are good ways to be active and also to be somewhere else, i.e. to break up the working day and not be spending it all in one home office-type location. Scylla found that when he made these sorts of changes to his routine to improve his lifestyle, the data output by his Fitbit as indicators of his health/wellbeing etc improved, e.g. number of steps taken in a day, heartbeats per minute while at rest. As stated many of the other devs went through a similar process.

On the professional side of things:

They had to improve remote delivery of builds. Accessing things from home as a dev requires a VPN. They need to download a build every day and then upload it to the server after making their changes to the game. They had to work with infrastructure and research other tech, such as streaming tech to allow remote console access, in order to better facilitate this process. For remote access, they also had to work on adapting communications channels.

“Adapting channels of communication.”

In this slide, the team are working on the storyboards. Before you can implement motion capture & performance capture, you have to ‘run the storyboards’ like this. These are small illustrating drawings which reflect the drafts and are meant to quickly reflect the intention of the scenes that are to be built. Before the pandemic, the team would go to meeting rooms like this, sit down, talk and interact in person. After the pandemic, the question became ‘How do you do this over Zoom?’ You can, but it’s not quite the same; it’s harder to see peoples’ expressions, some people are embarrassed speaking over Zoom etc. Therefore they had to adapt their communications systems, and unlearn the ways in which they developed before in order to relearn and learn new ways of communicating.

Slack was a tool that they adopted on this front. Communications channels can be confusing on Slack, so there was a need to develop structure. For example, how quickly should someone reply (as a recommended convention for the purposes of work)? They had to define the process/procedures for the channels so it was clear for the team as a whole how it would all flow (this is important especially if you have a team with say 30 people or as a whole hundreds of people). Before the pandemic, they had stand-up meetings where they’d go around in a circle every morning and talk about their activities - what they’re going to be working on, any roadblocks they had encountered etc. The question arose ‘How do you replace these?’ They ended up doing Slack messages at a certain time of day and updating their statuses with some details on what they’re working on and color-coding (green - fine, yellow - need help, red - busy/blocked out).

Another issue that they faced was unforeseen - the number of meetings that devs were having really shot through the roof. When there wasn’t a good structure of communications channels, any conversation would become a meeting. Everybody began scheduling meetings left and right, and at the end of the day they would have little time left in which to actually work on their to-do lists. Hence, they had to work with the team to really analyze and be very pragmatic. ‘Which meetings needed to happen? Which didn’t? Is a specific meeting really necessary? Which meetings should be recurring? What can be done over Slack?’ This guideline had to be given to the team to help, and it improved things a lot. The number of meetings decreased a lot and they got more effective. For example, by making sure to set an agenda for meetings beforehand, and by having meeting notes (then a dev who didn’t really need to be at a meeting could skip attending and just quickly review the notes output after instead). They also decreased the standard length of meeting times from the default Outlook blocks of 1 hour and 30 mins to 55 mins and 25 mins respectively. This 5 minute change gave devs time for things like bio breaks (also 4 hours in a row at a computer in a home office with one meeting after another just isn’t good for a person).

“Adapting p-cap and mocap”.

On content:

From a content point of view, the most difficult thing in terms of the pandemic was adapting p-cap and mocap (performance capture and motion capture). They hire actors and it’s a large studio. The pandemic meant big limits to what they could and couldn’t do. The actors had to be masked and 5 meters apart in distance (although it doesn’t look like it in some of these shots due to angles). Also there could be no other person around in the studio - only the actors. The directors instead would ‘patch’ in remotely on big screens (you can see this in the second photo in the top right). 

Before the pandemic, they felt that they wouldn’t be able to do p-cap or mocap properly remotely, as the directors would usually stand right next to actors giving guidance on their performance. The techs would also usually be near. But they adapted! The keyword is adapting, changing process. It’s harder and it’s different, but it is possible, and people start rethinking what is possible. What was said to be impossible before now is possible.

P-cap differs to mocap in that it also captures voice and facial expressions.

On the future of work after covid:

There will probably be more working from home and more flexibility for workers e.g. being able to work say 3 out of 5 days from home. It does depend on what a dev’s specific job is however. For example, the audio engineers require lots of specialist equipment and said equipment is of higher quality and quantity in the office. So, depending on role, devs might be working more often or less often from home.

Another development is that lots of devs are moving house. In lockdown etc people started reassessing what’s most important in life. Some are moving further away from the studio to get a cheaper rent or for example couples who both needed an office space to work from home from but their current place only had one area. Others are moving closer to nature for a better quality of life, and still others have other different reasons for doing so. Over 10 devs that he knows in fact have recently moved, including Scylla himself.

The pandemic changed certain skills being used by people on a daily basis. Scylla used as an example of this one of his soft skills, being able to tell from looking/interacting in-person with someone if they are stressed out. Obviously it’s less easy to tell if someone is stressed out when you’re remote, so you adapt different ways of checking in with people in the new situation. To continue carrying out his role as Lead Producer, he began checking in with his team pro-actively on the new comms channels and asking how they were doing.

Also, now that companies are more open to working remotely, there is going to be increased competition for hiring devs. They saw both sides of this coin at BioWare. They were able to hire devs from many places that they couldn’t hire from before e.g. Montreal, Vancouver, the US, as there’s less need for devs to relocate to Edmonton or Austin. This opens up opportunities to hire really intelligent and skilled people that they would not have had access to before.

Question and answer segment:

The pre-production phase has been concluded. They’re in the production phase.

They are not giving out a lot of details yet but Scylla is really excited as a big fan of the whole series. He thinks that with DA4, they will have the opportunity/possibility to launch the best story out of all DA games. He feels that the characters they’re making are amazing. He’s dying to say more but can’t. 

When you work from home you need to keep your team as productive as possible. During the pandemic, when people started working from home, they noticed that some people became more productive and some people became less productive. They were analyzing it on a case-by-case basis so as not to make assumptions. They were interested in seeing what they could do to help. At the beginning of the pandemic, they were looking at the devs as people and seeing what they needed.

Production of DA4 still needed to continue during the pandemic because they want to be able to launch the game.

This slide shows a writer. Writing is an example of a role which is more able to work from home easily.

Their productivity did go down in the first month of the pandemic. After adaptations, some people then became more productive than they were before (this was role and personal situation-dependent, examples of this being artists and coders who were able to art and code at home without being interrupted, thereby being able to produce more). Covid has affected productivity in general, but this is part of our new reality. They have adapted and adjusted some deadlines. They have enough data (Scylla LOVES data) now to understand how long it will take them/how long they’ll need to launch the game. They have always had historical data for this purpose, but they’re doing more of this sort of thing now to ensure that they are doing things at the right time.

Remote hiring opens up the door to more talent joining, so if someone has talent geography will hold them back less. Some companies though may choose not to hire people from other countries due to labor issues, cumbersome legal aspects, time zones. But even in such cases there are activities for example that can be carried out while the rest of the team is asleep such as testing or working on the build, or there are cases where those companies still will want to hire a specifically/highly talented person even in spite of the potential legal aspects and so on.

On mental health: People were affected. There is the mental, physical and social impacts of the pandemic situation on people. EA supported them during the pandemic in terms of their mental wellbeing, there are specific companies (services offered, speaking to a therapist) that they can contact if they need something or help. EA had always been good at supporting them with this sort of thing but this has improved further during the pandemic. Another change was that they could/can take a couple of days off if they needed/need to because of the pandemic e.g. to take care of children, who were obviously not at school at the time. As a producer he had to be very mindful of all of this. How much they were monitoring peoples’ wellbeing really went up during the pandemic.

A question that was asked - in terms of DA4′s storybeats, is there anything in there that they decided to change due to the pandemic as it wouldn’t be sensitive or appropriate to include anymore, for example a plague plotline or something? Scylla’s answer is that DA and ME are games in which they try to have narratives that are relatable, which include things which people will identify with, so that players understand what characters are going through etc. Nothing in DA4′s plotline/storybeats has been changed (in the frame of this question, relating to the pandemic), as it didn’t have anything in it that could be specifically or a directly connected to a pandemic-type situation or anything. Of course the DA story has Blights and the Taint, but these are different & fantastical things and existed long before the pandemic situation. So this wasn’t the case with DA4 and there was no need to change anything, but this has happened to other games where they decided to change a storyline due to a strong correlation with something in the real world.

There were then concluding/closing remarks. The message he wants to send is that a crisis will always spark opportunities. Look at a crisis and try to see how you can grow.

-----

[☕ found this post interesting or useful? my ko-fi is here if you feel inclined. thank you 🙏]

#dragon age 4 #the dread wolf rises #da4 #dragon age #bioware #video games #covid mention #long post #longpost #wanted to write these up properly and post them yesterday but wasn't able to #mass effect #anthem

[hunxi-guilai]

CQL Companion Album Annotated Translation Project: an introduction

Over the course of this year and my time spent in this fandom, I’ve spent a lot more time thinking about translation as a practice, translation as a service, translation as a literary form, and translation as an intensely personal journey for diasporic individuals. As a result, I feel the need to preface these translations for the CQL companion album with a lot of background and disclaimers before I start throwing things on the internet.

Also because I am... incapable of doing anything without getting on a soapbox about it first:

Back in June, I wrote a heartfelt tumblr post about why I had no plans for translating the CQL companion album line-by-line. Naturally, six months later, I decided to eat my words for a variety of reasons we don’t need to get into at this particular moment. I bring up that post, however, because the central concerns I highlighted in there about taking on this kind of translation project still remain:

…for me, songs in Chinese are stupid hard to translate. A lot of this is because the lyrics are gorgeous, descriptive, and heavily referential…

Said lyric ambiguity causes me no end of headache, because then I have to decide – do I remain faithful to the semantic truth of the lyrics, or do I fudge things a bit to best convey what I consider to be the atmosphere or emotional context the lyric is trying to get at? How closely should I try to adhere to line length and rhythm? And if I decide to take liberties with the translation, how can I justify that to the people who will inevitably come after me for inaccuracy, and how much ink will I need to spill trying to defend my choices?

All of these concerns still remain: I am going to make interpretive decisions in translation that folks may disagree with. I am going to take liberties with the semantic accuracy of lines to better convey what I think the lyrics are trying to get at. I am going to miss references due to my own limited knowledge of the literature and language. I am also, very likely, going to get things flat-out wrong. 

Such are the dangers. Such is the adventure.

To mitigate these errors (hopefully) and justify my choices in translation, I’ve been annotating both the lyrics and my work as I go along. In fact, that was one of the main reasons why I dragged my feet on taking on a project of this size--I knew that there was absolutely no way I was going to work on these translations and not annotate my work. At the same time, I was keenly aware that opening the door to an annotated translation project like this would mean (in addition to however many hours spent translating) sinking even more time into researching and contextualizing literary references in the lyrics, teasing out the particular connotations of imagery and phrasing, justifying choices made in translation.

I’m calling (and tagging) this project “PL translations”—the PL stands for “poetic license” as I, in pursuit of some nebulous quality of “elegance” or “emotion,” step away from pure semantic fidelity to the original text. For the most part, I will try to annotate the places where I do so, but if someone decides to come screaming into my inbox about “inaccurate translations,” I’m just going to point at the poetic license of it all and call it a day.

I’d also like to emphasize that the source texts are incredibly complex on both a linguistic level and compositional level. Not to trot out the tired excuse of “it’s like translating poetry!” but this time, it really is. At least dialogue in CQL strives to be understandable and, y’know, something someone would actually say out loud. But in these songs? No such consideration for us poor translators. Horribly convoluted poetic line structures and obscure references are in.

Some logistics, if anyone is, uh, still reading this:

I am planning to post this series initially on tumblr, and eventually edit/migrate them to AO3 for long-term archival. I’ll be tagging these posts with “PL translations,” and make (oh no) another masterlist for these posts once I hit a critical volume!

tentative post schedule of one song every two days? I’m just over halfway done with translating the entire album, so I’ve got a little buffer room just in case

I pulled all of the lyrics + production information for these songs off of baidu baike, and have not researched possible alternate lyrics. This is not intended to be an official translation or comprehensively-researched project in any capacity!

#PL translations

[capricornwriter5]

You are the one - Chapter 4

Pairing: Bang Chan x female OC; Lee Know x female OC

Genre: au (high shool, college), love triangle, fluff, angst, smut, from friends to lovers. Warning: soft drugs

Words: 3k

Summary: Bang Chan and Jasmine have been best friends for as long as they can remember. With little time to finish high school, they both begin to develop romantic feelings. However, family situations and communication issues force them to move away. Once in college, they decide to try to regain the friendship they had. As Bang Chan sees the opportunity to finally be with the girl he has always loved, his friend Lee Know, who had been studying in England, returns home and the connection he develops with Jasmine is undeniable. Can the chemistry and attraction with Lee Know outweigh a tender first love and memories of years of friendship between Bang Chan and Jasmine?

Disclaimer: I named the character Jasmine (Minnie for Chan 🥰) because I love that name. Besides, it’s easier if we want to see Chan saying cute names (it’s better than just Y/N, I think) but you can totally picture yourselves in the story, that’s the idea. <3

Chapter 4 - The Confession

The following weeks the guys focused on recovering the points that Bang Chan had lost. Jasmine spent hours working on the artistic project and researching for some assignments while Chan used all his mental and physical strength to be part of training and competencies of the sports clubs, apart from arriving home to continue with the projects in which Jasmine couldn't help him at all. For that reason, the boy forgot the conversation he had heard.

A couple of months passed and Jasmine and Chan were so busy that they fell asleep on their desks more than once. They hadn't even had time to do things between them as before, the most was studying together and, rarely, they went to eat something with Changbin and Han.

"Minnie, you haven't eaten anything all day." Chan said one Saturday that they had locked up themselves in the library since very early.

"I'll eat something soon; I almost finish something." Jasmine did not pay much attention, making Chan closed the computer very softly. In seconds she would start to claim him, but her best friend did not let her and started to put everything away. "What are you doing? We have a lot to do".

"I know, and I really appreciate you are helping me, but you need to eat."

Bang Chan went out of the library with Jasmine and invited her to eat in her favorite place. Later, he convinced her to go to the cinema, since it was necessary for them to get distracted. He had to promise her that they would continue studying in the night for Jasmine to accept his proposal. When they were inside the movie theater, the girl relaxed a lot and forgot all her responsibilities.

"If you want to sleep, I won't tease you." Jasmine turned to tell him she wouldn't but, to her surprise, Chan gave her a kiss on her forehead. Until that moment, the boy had done that very few times, so her cheeks turned very red. "You've worked a lot, rest, Minnie." He got her closer to his chest and she immediately snuggled in Chan's strong arms.

Chan's hands went over Jasmine's arms and back all the movie, even when he knew that she had fallen asleep, he continued stroking her. The boy really appreciated all the help that Jasmine gave him, but they had three months of barely sleeping and demanding themselves more than any other teenager, so he begged her that they stopped only for that day and took advantage of that night to be with her parents or rest a little bit. In the end, Jasmine accepted because her mom wrote to her to tell her that his father wouldn't sleep at home, since an emergency had happened.

While Jasmine spent the night in her house with her mom, Chan had planned to see Changbin and Han.

"Finally, we get to see you. Where's Jaz?" Han asked sitting on the terrace of Chan's house to drink something together.

"She's in her house. I asked her to rest, but when she realizes that I saw you and she was not invited, she's going to get upset. I don't know at which moment you became so close."

"We like her more than you, if you want us to be honest."

"I don't blame you, Minnie is wonderful." Chan was smiling like an idiot, so Han ended up spitting out some of his beer in Changbin's shirt.

"You idiot! It was new! So disgusting, I have your saliva everywhere".

Changbin did so much drama that Chan ended up going upstairs to his room with his friends to look for a clean t-shirt. It was the first time that they entered the boy's room. More than getting surprised because of the size of the room, both of them were mouth-opened when they saw a whole collection of small sculptures related to the First and Second World War. They saw from weapons to small buildings perfectly made.

"Wow, you have money, dude! See all this whole collection. This is worth more than my house." Han couldn't take his eyes off a replica from a helmet.

"I didn't buy them, Minnie made them all." Chan answered while opening his closet.

"Are you telling me that your room is full of Jasmine's gifts, that your closet is full of her clothes, and that even then you are only friends? You two should get married now, you have a better relationship than my parents."

"Well, actually, I have been thinking that maybe... well, you know...."

The guys looked at each other and try to repress a smile when they saw Chan scratching his neck and making visual contact with neither of them.

"No, we don't know, talk clearly," Han replied.

"Well, you know, I could invite Jaz to do something different but..."

"Are you trying to say that you want to ask her out? Because if so, we want to listen to it clearly." Changbin had crossed his arms and waited with a smile that his friend admitted it.

"IwanttoaskMinnieout." He admitted talking very fast, but both of them understood perfectly.

While Han screamed in the loudest and most high-pitched way possible because of the excitement, Changbin had hugged his friend almost trying to strangle him. They started to ask a lot of questions, they wanted to know where he planned to go with her, what he would tell her, how he would ask her, and Chan didn't have an answer for any of the questions, hardly he had admitted it, now he had to think about how to do it.

****

A few days after talking with his friends, Chan and Jasmine were in the girl's house. That day, since the moment Bang Chan woke up, he swore to himself that he would ask her out. He had bought tickets for a concert of Jasmine's favorite group, but the more time passed, the most nervous he got and he focused all this attention on the art project that they had in front of them. Chan explained to his friend a design that he had made for an art class and now Jasmine would help him with the next step, which was depicting it using different materials. However, no matter how hard she tried to understand him, nothing made sense. The drawing had some mistakes and Bang Chan had erased it so many times that the sheet of paper was almost torn up.

"Would you mind if I try to fix it?" Jasmine asked taking softly the sheet of paper before her best friend destroyed it. "I already know how you draw and how you design, I can do it. I only need that you lend me the other pencil." Jasmine took his backpack to take the pencils that he used to design. However, she immediately saw the tickets and even screamed a little, which made him jump. "Bang Chan! How do you have tickets? You told me you looked for them and there weren't any! Who are you going with?" Jaz was so offended that she was pushing him. "You are a traitor!"

Jasmine never called him by his Korean name, she really never did it. Since they were kids, she had always called him Chris. No one else called him that way, not even his parents. The few times that she had done it was because she had gotten angry at him, so listening to her calling him like that made him very nervous. When he saw the girl had the tickets in her hands, Chan cursed everything inside him. He wanted to give them to her in another way; he had been thinking about it all day, but he hadn't been able to do it.

"Minnie, wait!" Chan said taking her hands for her to let him explain the situation.

"Are you going with a girl and you didn't tell me because of that?"

"No! Of course not!"

"I'm going to finish this project and I'll go to sleep, I don't want to talk with you. Go to your stupid date and have fun." She said putting on her earphones.

Jasmine saw with the corner of her eye that Bang Chan had stood up to take his backpack; it couldn't be true that the boy was going to leave like that. Without wanting to see how he left, she turned up the volume a lot, in that way she wouldn't even hear when he left. With her eyes focused on the materials, Jasmine saw how a box with her favorite chocolates was slipped little by little until Chan's hand was in front of her eyes. Chan watched her waiting for her to open the box, and when she did it, she found a note written by her best friend.

"Can I ask you out on a date?"

Jasmine removed her earphones and after turning around, Bang Chan was in front of her. He was trying to do his best to talk and hold her gaze while fighting his shame and fear that he would reject him.

"Minnie... I... I..."

"Chris, it's okay." She said cupping his face and with a beautiful smile, Jaz approached until her lips touched his forehead, just with that, she made Chan feel more secure. "Tell me"

"I do want to go with a girl, and no, I hadn't told you. But just because you're the girl I want to go with and I wanted to ask you differently, but I couldn't think of anything, Minnie, you're too special, nothing was enough."

Jasmine felt her heart pound, but not because of the nervousness, but because of the excitement of being able to have a chance with her best friend. "Chris, do you really want us to go on a date?"

"I would like nothing more."

"But... but I don't understand. You told the guys at Chloe's party that nothing would ever happen between us, you told me that too."

"I was scared, I didn't know how you were going to react when I told you..."

"When you tell me what?" She asked closing her eyes and making the tip of her nose touch his.

"That I'm crazy about you, Minnie."

"It's the same thing I've been trying to tell you all this time."

Very carefully Chan tucked a lock of Jasmine's hair behind her ear, and showing a smile that can only be shown to the first love, he kissed her for the first time. Until that moment Chan realized all the time that he had wanted to kiss her, but even in his dreams he did not imagine feeling that way, what Jasmine was showing him with her lips was more than he could understand, at least not being so young. Neither of them had a clue that what they had was something that any other couple older than them would wish they had. Jasmine and Chan had loved each other since they were children, their feelings were pure and honest. The kiss started off very innocent, their lips barely brushing, but as soon as Chan felt Jasmine's hands pulling him closer, he did the same. Jasmine's caresses were slowly melting Chan's heart, who didn't need more than that first kiss to know that there would be no one else who could love him like her. Chan didn't suspect that with that kiss he would forever be Jasmine's. Just as Jasmine did not know what her kiss was causing in Chan's heart, the boy did not even think that those first caresses would be enough for his best friend to lose her mind for him. The kiss lasted a long time and when they separated, there was no trace of discomfort in either of them, it was as if all that time they had been waiting for that to happen.

"So, can I take this as a yes?" Chan asked making her laugh as she nodded.

Naturally, the young couple put aside all the artistic project, and taking the chocolates that Chan had given Jasmine, they sat comfortably in the armchairs in the living room. They both knew that things would change between them because of the kiss and the confession; however, they were not uncomfortable, what they felt was a great deal of curiosity. Fortunately, confidence was something Bang Chan and Jasmine had to spare, which allowed them to be able to talk about just about anything.

"So... you like me?" Chan asked raising his eyebrows in funny ways and stealing a chocolate from his friend.

"Did you really never suspect it?"

"You've always been very loving, Minnie, there were days when I didn't know if I was imagining things. Also, what was I supposed to say to you: hello, do you like me, or am I imagining it?" Of course that comment made them laugh even more.

"Well, for your information, you also gave me very confusing signals."

"I told you in front of your dad that you are the most beautiful girl of all. I practically begged you to kiss me during that game. Was that not clear enough?"

"Well, it was clear until I heard you talking to the boys. Also... the bottle game... Chloe stole that kiss from me." Jasmine got close enough to brush Chan's lips with her index finger.

"We can go back to that night." Using all his willpower, Chan moved away from her to grab a bottle of water that was nearby.

Offering her his hand, he helped her up from the couch so that she sat on the floor in front of him, in exactly the same position as when they had been playing. He imitated Changbin by making strange sounds at the same time insisting that he turn the bottle. Jasmine couldn't stop laughing, not only because Chan perfectly imitated their friend, but also because when he turned the bottle and it pointed at the two of them, he covered his mouth with his hands and said what he had thought that night.

"Am I really going to be able to kiss the most beautiful girl of all?"

"Is that what you thought?"

"That, and I couldn't wait to do it."

"Well... the bottle is pointing at us and this time there is no one to interrupt us."

Jasmine called him with her hand and without thinking twice, Chan approached, brought his right hand to the girl's neck, and with his left hand, he took her by the waist to bring her closer and be able to kiss her as he had wanted.

The following days, when they saw each other at school, they smirked at each other, the two had agreed that they would not say anything to avoid being the focus of the entire school again. Han and Changbin did not know anything, they had not seen how Chan winked at his best friend when the four of them studied together, much less had they noticed the times that the couple had gotten up to, according to them, look for a book on the library shelves, but it really was for kissing.

The night of the concert, while Jasmine was in her bedroom getting ready, Chan helped the girl's mother with a cake she was baking for her husband, who had been locked in the office all afternoon working.

"Darling, leave it to me, you're going to burn yourself." Said the lady trying to get the tray out of the oven but Chan insisted that he could do it.

"It's too hot and hasn't worked well for a while, Minnie and I tried to cook something recently and ended up burning it."

"How many times have you burned with this oven for the same thing, honey? Your hand is full of scars for not listening to me". She said sounding exactly like his mother.

Even though Chan tried to do everything very carefully, he totally lost his concentration when he heard Jasmine's voice calling him to leave. As soon as he heard her, his gaze looked at Jaz; however, he also forgot what he was doing and ended up touching the edge of his hand on the oven.

"Chris!" Jasmine said when she saw that, again, he had burned.

"I told you!" The girl's mom took it immediately to check it out. "Chan, you're going to have another scar!"

"What's going on here?" Jasmine's dad had just entered the kitchen when he found his wife and daughter looking for cream. "It can't be... don't tell me Chan got burned again."

"It's nothing, it doesn't even hurt." Bang Chan replied very embarrassed.

Seeing the burn, the man put his hand on the boy's shoulder and brought him to his side. "Come with me, boy, the medicine is in my office."

The office was so full of things that it was almost impossible to walk. Besides numerous books, he had tons of Jasmine's drawings, as well as sculptures and other works of art. Not to mention the huge amount of memories and photos he had of his wife. "Sorry, you know this place is uninhabitable, sit down while I get the medicine for you."

"Sir, it's not necessary, I'm serious."

"Sit down, Chan." He ordered kindly but sounding so firm, that the boy immediately obeyed.

Chan took a seat in front of the computer, he didn't really mean to look at what the man was working on, but he looked up for a moment, just a moment, and saw the photograph of a woman next to a chat. She was beautiful, younger than Jasmine's mother, and what struck Chan the most was seeing that in the photograph she was wearing the coat that Jasmine had given her father for his birthday, it was impossible for him not to recognize it, they had bought it together. However, Chan could not look at the photograph for long or see the woman's name in the conversation because the man spoke to him. "I found it!"

That second clue that something was going on was even more evident than the conversation Chan overheard; however, he kept repeating that it had to be a mistake, there had to be an explanation.

"Ok, done, but that's going to leave you a scar. Does it hurt?"

"No sir, I'm fine." He replied barely audible, his mind was lost in that picture.

"Chris, are you ok?" Jasmine had entered her father's office, just as her father saw her, he sneakily walked to the computer and closed it, leaving Chan perplexed.

"Yes... Minnie, let's go, we'll be late." He said desperate to get her out of there. He was capable of doing anything before letting her see that picture. "Thank you very much sir, we'll be back early." He said trying to smile and quickly leaving the house, Chan needed to clear his mind and stop doubting about the man who was almost his father, his girl's hero.

*****

Once outside the house, Chan helped Jaz to put on her coat, but the girl stopped looking at his hand. "Are you really fine? You have to be more careful, Chris."

"How could I be careful when you look like this?" He asked caressing her cheek and then kissing her tenderly. "It's our first date, could we ignore that I got burned and made a fool of myself in front of your parents? Please"

From the second floor, Jasmine's father saw his daughter stand on tiptoe to hug Chan. The man smiled, knowing that Bang Chan adored her, but he was taken by surprise by the kiss Jasmine gave to Bang Chan on his lips. Little by little, he saw them walking away holding hands and smiling, anyone could tell how excited they were.

That concert was something neither Bang Chan nor Jasmine could ever forget. They danced, sang, had fun, and kissed the entire time they were together. They had been listening to the music of that group since they were kids, but that night everything was different. Chan hugged her from behind while his chin rested on her shoulders so he could whisper the most tender words to his girl. The kisses on Jaz's cheeks didn't stop, especially since Chan knew how much she liked them. Without having spent a long time together as a couple, he already knew how to show his girl how much he loved her.

Anyone who had seen them interact before dating would have realized the incredible connection they had. If as friends they were already the envy of any couple, now that they were dating, there were not enough words to describe their relationship.

To be continued… 🐺

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#stray kids #stray kids imagines #stray kids fanfic #stray kids scenarios #bang chan #bang chan fanfic #bang chan scenarios #bang chan fluff #stray kids bang chan #skz chan #changbin #han jisung

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Fists and a Smart mouth

Pairing: Namjoon x female reader 

Summary: When a rich cowboy moves into town you can't stand him, more so when he attempts to make some drastic changes but with a secret of your own he soon finds out that you'll protect your town and your privacy by any means necessary.

Genre: Idiots to lovers / Enemies to lovers / Angst / Smut / Wild west au / Cowboy au / One shot

Rating: 18+ (NSFW)

Warnings: Abusive ex / Mentions of stabbing (not detailed description) / Guns / Talk of scars / Shooting (not described) / Oral (f receiving) / Sex / Minor character death

Word count: 8100

Project: Bts writers collective secret santa 2020

A/N: This is for my Secret Santa @joontopia​ I was not planning it to be anything like this but it took on a mind of it’s own as I wrote, so my apologies. It’s not the fluffiest thing I’ve written but I really, really hope you enjoy this. If you have an issue with any of the warnings, message me and I will try and edit it for you. It was really lovely getting to know you through asks and trolling your page for clues and info about yourself. Enjoy ❤

Thank you to @moccahobi​ for beta reading this and @birbdae​ also, your comments helped me a lot, it’s much appreciated. And thank you to @wheresmymoniat​ for being a general angel and reading along the way, with your endless encouragement when I’m unsure of my writing.

Two months since Namjoon moved to town.

"Have you heard?" one of your usual patrons, Hoseok, asked, leaning discreetly across the bar.

You look over with a questioning eyebrow. "Heard what?" you reply, half listening and half keeping an eye on Taehyung over on the piano. After one too many beers, you wanted to make sure he wasn't about to put a fist through the keys, with his wild playing; giving the room a personal concert.

"Namjoon's planning on building a mall." he whispers, glancing around suspiciously.

The empty glass you're drying slams against the counter as you turn and face him. 

"How do you know this?" you ask, voice low and uneven with anger.

"I heard him talking to Seokjin about it, he wants his help with planning."

Seokjin, the local and resident builder, he's also the best builder in the state. You knew him well enough to know that he wouldn't want to help with something like that. He wouldn't want to change this town...but maybe for the right price? We all know Namjoon has money, the way he flashes it around like a Hollywood star meant it was not a secret and he didn't want it to be. Even so, you highly doubt Seokjin would accept such an offer.

Doubt starts creeping in, an ugly voice whispering in the back of your mind.

"Hey, Jimin! Can you take over for me?" you call over to him. 

He nods, joining you behind the bar instantly, as you grab your brown fringe-jacket and head out to Seokjin's ranch. You had to know if there was substance to this and not just rumours whispered between the townsfolk.

As your truck raced along the dirt roads, the sound of the roaring engine doing nothing to calm your mind, with flashing images, slicing their way behind your eyes like projector slides. Big corporate buildings, a shopping mall, more city folk, modernisation...not that you were against it. You just didn't want it here. That's what drew you to this place in the beginning a few years ago, that's why you stayed and built a life for yourself, that's why a lot of people stay here, for the vintage, small town life.

You fling your door open before your truck had even come to a stop and you waltzed straight up to Seokjin's front door. Your knuckles making loud contact as they rapped furiously against it.

He opens it with a frown, his face softening when he sees it's you but quickly his expression turns weary from the tense expression you hold.

"What's-"

"Are you helping Namjoon build a mall?" you demand, in no mood to be messed around.

His jaw tenses and he nods for you to come inside.

Storming into his living room too infuriated  to sit, you stand and face him, arms folded, waiting for his response and dreading his answer.

"He did approach me about it but I said no. Did you really think I'd say anything but?" He shook his head at you, disappointment obvious on his face and immediate guilt rising inside you in response.

Your shoulders relax as you let out a breath you didn't realise you'd been holding. "I had to check before I assumed anything."

You slump down on the sofa, leaning your head back and staring up at his slacked ceiling. "Why is he doing this?"

He lets out a laugh as he joins you on the couch. "Now, you know the answer to that. Money. It's all he cares about. He saw an opportunity for something and he's taking it. End of."

You rub your eyes, trying to ease the tension created from your anger pounding inside your head, desperate to escape like some caged, wild animal. "If I went to see him with my gun, do you think it would change his mind?"

He laughs again. "I don't think he'd change his mind even if you shot him, sweetheart." A groan rumbles inside you, the idea of him being so stubborn, makes your fist want to connect with his jaw. "That's not deterring me from doing it."

"If he's going to do it, there's not much we can do." he shrugs and puts his feet up on his wooden coffee table, the wood dipping slightly on impact.

Fury lights your insides anew. You stand, striding across the room, "Like hell there isn't." you say, as you storm out and head off ready for a confrontation with the person you hate the most in this entire town.

You expect your wrath to have died down somewhat on your ride over but, to your pleasant surprise, it hasn't.

You come to a halt outside his ranch, looking over his land and the new building he spent ages preparing to become a hotel...an empty one at that.

After hammering on his door so hard the hinges rattled, he strangely and calmly invites you inside his house.

"You really should see someone about your anger issues. It's not healthy for one person to harbour so much...rage." he says, in such a condescending manner you clench your jaw to stop yourself from lashing out. You'd only be proving him right. 

Something about him got to you, you two have clashed since the moment he arrived in this town, and he knew exactly how to play it too.

"The only issue I have, Namjoon, is you."

He sighs. "I would very much like you on board with this. I don't want to have you fighting the inevitable."

"The inevitable." you gasp with angered amusement, "as long as I'm living in this town, this is anything but inevitable."

"Why do you hate this idea so much?" he asks perplexed, with simultaneous interest and bemusement.

"Someone like you would not understand." You fold your arms in an attempt to hold in the pointless angry words you feel boiling inside.

He shrugs. "I would like to try. Humour me."

You let out an exasperated sigh, tired of the anger, tired of being so closed off but you had no choice but to be exactly that. "Some people have come here to enjoy the small town life." you reply simply, not having the trust in him or yourself to say more.

"And maybe some people have come here to escape something?" 

You freeze, heart stopping before pounding so violently against your ribcage, you're sure it's echo fills the room.

He watches you carefully, searching your eyes and all you can do is stare back.

"You know, I did some research after our first encounter…"

You swallow, trying to ease the choking sensation in your throat.

"...I'm usually good at finding any useful information about people…"

He walks slowly around his kitchen island to you. You couldn't move even if you wanted to, your feet frozen to the spot but wanting to run, fighting for you to run.

"...But you...I couldn't find a single thing about you."

Your eyes connect with his as he towers above you, searching for your own answers, needing to find out what he knows.

"Don't you find that odd?" he asks.

Your mind races inside your frozen stature. You could not tell a man like Namjoon anything. You could not trust him. He will ruin this life you've made and turn it upside down.

"Well, I found it very odd. It's like you don't even exist...so that got me intrigued and asking some questions."

Your stomach drops as small beads of sweat break out across your forehead, the sudden heat under your flannel shirt almost unbearable.

"And do you know what I found out?" he taps his chin, drawing out the tension purposefully and making you want to headbutt the smug look off his face.

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. No one knows a personal thing about you."

The relief you feel inside makes you want to collapse to your knees and thank gods you don’t believe in.

"That is, if they're being honest. I know you like to protect your own in communities like this. But it definitely has me wondering…?"

He waits for a response this time.

"What?" your voice comes out a raspy whisper, his words leaving the taste of ash in your dry mouth.

"What are you hiding?"

You steel yourself, remembering just how pathetic of a man he is and let's face it, you've dealt with much scarier things than him. "Even if I was hiding something, I'd certainly never tell the likes of you."

You turn and head towards his door, when you hear his voice again. 

"I'm not stupid enough to believe we'll be friends, you know but I would like us to at least be civil."

You let out a bitter laugh. "You can keep dreaming, pretty boy." You storm out, slamming his door hard enough for the glass to rattle in it’s wooden frame.

Three and a half months since Namjoon moved to town.

He's wasted, completely inebriated. You watch from behind the bar, getting ready to close, as he fumbles for the keys to his truck.

He came quietly into the bar this afternoon, face like thunder, ordering drink, after drink, after drink, no other words spoken. Most unusual for the chatty Kathy he is.

You've never seen him so drunk - so vulnerable. You wonder if perhaps something has happened. But, honestly, do you really care?

The keys slam to the floor and he goes head first into the driver's side door as he bends to retrieve them, face down in the dirt.

You shouldn't let him drive home. Definitely not.

Quickly shrugging on your jacket and grabbing your keys, locking the bar doors behind you as you rush over to him.

"Hey, big guy, come on, let's get you up." you throw his arm around your shoulders and use all your strength to get him on his feet and on balance. 

"I don't...need...your help." he mumbles, leaning into you, almost ready to pass out.

You open his truck door and shove him in, sliding him over as you climb in beside him. He doesn't notice as you pry the keys from his weak grip and start the engine.

Driving to his ranch would be a mistake; the pretentious layout of it would mean you would have to walk him much further than you think you actually could. Not without dropping him a few times, although that's not a bad idea.

You sigh as you drive down the winding dirt road that led to your land. The idea of having this man in your house would usually have infuriated you. But after seeing the sadness that clouded his eyes this morning you...felt for him.

You once told him he must have a miserable existence, being surrounded by money and not love. You wince at the memory. You were no different, except you weren't surrounded by either, how miserable does that make you?

As you pull up to your ranch, you look over to him, passed out, face squashed against the glass of the window. You wonder what secrets he must have, what sadness he's known, what dreams he’s had. How does someone get to be the way he is? 

There are surely a few people who would ask that very question about you. Only, you had a reason...have a reason. One you will never be free from. You push the thoughts away, back down into the pit they're buried into. No time to dwell in self pity. You're in this position through no fault but you're own, you bought it on yourself and now you have to live with those choices. 

You practically carry him the few steps to the front door and over to the sofa. He stumbles and almost trips over your rug but you hoist him up, almost injuring yourself in the process. You practically throw him onto the couch, where he tries to hold himself up but fails and collapses into the pillow you shove under him.

"I wish…" he starts, slurring every word. "I wish I was more like you." 

"No, you don't." You reply into the thick silence that envelopes you in a inescapable cage.

His eyelids close and immediately a roar of snoring fills the room, vibrating not only your eardrums but you're sure the walls too.

You lift his legs and lay them flush with his body, his limbs are so long they hang off over the armrest.

Taking one last look at him and wondering exactly what he meant by that, before heading upstairs to bed.

Why would anyone want to be like you?

The day after you let Namjoon sleep on your couch.

You had taken longer than necessary in the shower this morning, pottered around upstairs, procrastinating, which is something you rarely do and all to avoid the man you'd left slumped unconscious on your couch.

You listen for any signs of movement down stairs and when you hear none, part of you hopes he's gone. That he woke up early and drove home, no awkward encounter, no questions, just peace.

You should be so lucky.

As you descend your wooden stairs, you hear the rattle of snoring and roll your eyes.

He lay on his stomach, face squashed on its side with limbs splayed out and hands sagged against your rug.

How were you going to get rid of him?

You prepare a few things in the kitchen before taking some pain killers and a glass of water over. 

You nudge him tentatively with your foot. Nothing. Nudging him again, harder this time, but still nothing.

"Hey." You call harshly into the heavy silence. Nothing.

Inspiration strikes, as your hand lashes out, flicking the glass forward and sending water cascading over him.

He jumps up with a gasp, bolt upright, shock contorting his face.

You bite back a laugh at the sight of his drenched form.

His eyes widen when he focuses on you and then dart around wildly searching for answers.

"I drove you home last night as you could hardly stand but you passed out so I brought you here." You explain in a blasé manner. 

Holding out the pills, he takes them mechanically. 

"I'll just refill your water for you." You skip off with a smirk. His wet hair clinging to his forehead, little water droplets dripping off the end of his nose. The sight deeply satisfying, in more ways than one. As much as you would never admit it, he looked good wet.

He swallows the pills and greedily downs the water you return with. Gasping for air, he finally meets your gaze. "We didn't…" he stumbles on his words and you laugh loudly.

"Trust me, you were in no condition for anything physical last night."

A hint of a smile plays around his mouth but he tries to fight it. "That doesn't sound like you're completely repulsed by the idea?" One of his eyebrows pulls up into a challenging arch.

"Ha! If you were the last man on earth and the human race was left depending on us to continue, only then would I possibly consider it."

A shy smile and a dimple creating an endearing crevice in his cheek. "Well that's not a complete no, so I'll take that."

You shake your head, amused, if not a little perplexed by him.

He sighs, wiping down his damp jeans. "Well, I suppose I better get out of your hair." He stands, seeming slightly unsteady and visibly in pain as he clutches his head. 

"Why don't you stay for breakfast, have some coffee then I'll drive you back to your place in the truck?"

He stares at you with his mouth popped open in a little 'o', the same expression you imagine looking at yourself with. Where in the fuck did that come from? Have you forgotten who he is? 

"If that's ok with you, that would be great...unless you're planning to poison me?" There's humour in his remark but a sincere worry too.

You chuckle as you head over to the stove, switching it on and cracking some eggs into the heated frying pan, the sizzle filling the silence. "I can assure you, I'm more of a 'violence is the answer' type person, in case that wasn't obvious already."

You smile to yourself at the memory of the very first day you met. 

He'd backed his truck into yours, denting the hood and completely knocking off the bumper before driving home. You had greeted him in his living room, not bothering to knock, just letting yourself in, backing him into a corner and threatening him with a wrench. The image of his wide eyed, frozen form brought you a fresh wave of satisfaction as he handed you a wad of cash and uttered frantic apologies. 

"Hmm, so I recall." He replies, brows furrow in thought as he takes a seat at your table, clearly his mind travelling to the same place yours is. You'd gotten off entirely on the wrong foot, and if you were honest, still continued to.

"How do you like your eggs?" 

He smirks. "I'm assuming, 'with a kiss' is pushing it."

You shoot him a glare, even though you feel amusement tug at your lips.

He holds his hands up. "Fair enough, as they come will be fine."

Once breakfast is done, you drive him home, smiling and laughing more than you thought possible with him, you realise he's actually quite humorous when he's not torturing you by his existence. 

You stand awkwardly by his truck waiting for him to say words that are clearly trying to escape from his mouth but he seems to be having trouble forming.

"Thank you...for last night...and this morning. You've been surprisingly kind, even if I really don't deserve it." He looks at his feet while clutching his hat tightly, looking utterly innocent and fragile, suddenly seeming like a much younger man standing in front of you. 

"Don't mention it. It won't happen again, don't worry." You smile playfully as you knock on his truck and leave, feeling his eyes watching you as you saunter off down the dirt road to work.

"I'm sorry, did I just hear that right?" Seokjin asks, his voice shrill, shock making his eyes bulge comically at you. "'He's not that bad' since when, please tell me!? A few days ago you thought he was the devil in disguise." 

You laugh at his reaction and poke him playfully on the chest. "Hey, listen, all I'm saying is we only show people what we want others to see, doesn't mean it's always real."

He thinks for a moment, eyes sparkling with amusement. "So what you're saying is, he acts like Mr big shot money bags but he isn't?" He gives you a quizzical look and checks your temperature with the back of his hand.

You laugh again and shove his hand away. "Yes, I am fine and yes in a way. Sure, he has money and he shows off but maybe he acts like that to hide something else. Maybe he thinks that's what people expect of him, maybe he's scared of something."

Seokjin's windshield wiper laugh shrieks in your ears. "Ok, now I've heard it all. Firstly, there’s nothing deep about this man, other than his cash flow and secondly, you think he's scared? The man is an arrogant moron, end of." 

"Everyone's scared of something, it's not that far fetched."

He leans in to you slightly. "That is a lie. You, my friend, are scared of nothing." He gets up from his bar stool, placing his hat on his head and downing the last of his drink. "The day I see you scared is the day the world ends. There's not a problem you can't get out of with your fists or your smart mouth." He laughs as he leaves the bar.

The irony is, there is one problem that would get infinitely worse with your fists and your smart mouth. Something that would have you terrified beyond imagination. Something you plan to hide from for the rest of your existence.

Five months since Namjoon moved to town.

You are back at his door, although this time you stand on the doorstep and pound angrily to be let in.

When he opens it, he looks hesitant. "You don't usually knock, just barging in is more you style rig-?"

"Why was there a man taking photos of me today?" The words leave your mouth in a furious rush, the need to be out and to hear another dreaded deal he's made. To prove yourself right about the type of man he is.

"What? You mean the photographer?"

You take a shaky breath to calm yourself. "That's usually what they do isn't it? Take photos?" You say between gritted teeth.

He frowns. "Well, yes, I don't understand why you're upset? I listened to you and told you I'm not building the mall, I've hired someone to take pictures of the town as it is, just to get business for my Hotel, and you're still upset with me!? Jesus, I can't win." He runs a frustrated hand through his swept back hair, forehead exposed - it suits him best that way. 

You melt slightly under his accusing stare and suddenly you feel embarrassed by your reaction, it's not all anger, it's fear clenching your heart in its iron grasp. You want to scream, to run from it but you can't, it follows you. It followed you here and to the town you were in before. It will follow you wherever you are. You know this, you've accepted it and this is why you can't afford to get attached to someone, not romantically. It would cause too much heartache on both sides, when you'd eventually have to leave again.

"No, I'm not upset about that." You sigh and rub a hand across your eyes, exhaustion and exasperation weighing you down like a ton of bricks. "I just….I can't have my picture taken. Do what you want, but please, I'm begging you, do not put me in them." You stare at him with desperation, flitting from one eye to the other. 

"Ok, ok." He says quickly, putting an arm on yours to reassure you. The touch soothes you for a moment and takes you by surprise. 

"I'll make sure they delete the ones of you, ok? You have my word."

You see the honesty radiate from him and you relax. You're on the verge of tears with relief and happiness, the fear deflating as you stand here.

"Thank you!" You plead.

There's a moment of silence between you and you're not quite sure why you're still standing here.

"You know, if there's anything you ever want to tell me or talk about, you can trust me. I know I've not been great but I'll always be here if you need someone to lean on." 

An odd warmth spreads through your chest, until you feel it's ready to burst. You can't help the smile that stretches across your lips.

"I know you can bear the brunt but sometimes it's nice to not have to." He adds, eyes wide and welcoming, enticing you with his earnest expression and the dimple that appears from his sideways smile.

You grab him by the collar and pull him to you, lips crashing against his with ferocious hunger. You feel him freeze against you before he returns it with feverish hands running down your back and cupping you under the buttocks, lifting your legs beneath you.

You wrap them tightly around his waist as he leads you quickly inside, kicking the door shut behind him.

He doesn't make it up the stairs, the plush living room rug against your back a suitable substitute for his bedroom. 

Your mouths dance, tongues interlacing all the while his hands are everywhere all at once, the heat from them setting your veins alight with fiery lust.

Your hands find his hair and your fingers run through his silky locks, using them to pull him even closer to you.

He moans into your mouth, the sound enticing you further.

"I want you so bad." he says in a breathless whisper.

You hook your leg over his and push him, flipping him on his back, straddling him.

You pull your button up off over your head and he groans when he discovers you aren't wearing a bra. His hands slide quickly up your waist to fondle your breasts, plunging his teeth into his generous bottom lip before he sits up and sucks a nipple into his mouth. A hiss escapes you as pleasure shoots straight to your core and has you grinding against his denim clad erection. 

He cups the side of your face and brings you back down to his mouth, your lips meeting once again in a hot, fervent kiss.

His lips find their way to your ear. "Stand up." 

There was no authority in his voice, just a soft pleading, one you could not resist. As you rise, his fingers were already undoing your jean buttons then pulling them down around your ankles and helping you step out of them. 

On his knees looking up at you with heavy lids, as he places a faint kiss against your clothed sex. The sight of it heavenly, you couldn't help but admire his beauty, the sheer amount of it having escaped your notice before.

He slips a finger under your panties and pulls them aside, lips instantly on you, hot and wet, causing your head to snap back with explicit language echoing past your lips.  

He chuckles against you, the vibration making you gasp as his tongue delves to your most sensitive parts, a venture no previous man has been. The sensation; mind blowing and you find yourself grinding against him. The relentless pace of his tongue against your swollen bud has you crying out, hands gripped into his hair as you come undone against his mouth. His arm snakes around your waist, supporting your trembling frame as your moans of ecstasy repeatedly fill the silence of the room.

As the spasms of pleasure subside, you're vaguely aware of Namjoon removing his trousers, his hand still in contact with your skin, as you drift back down from your euphoric cloud. 

You mount him before he's finished pulling his pants from his ankles, his hands find your buttocks and guide you onto him. You lower yourself, sliding him into you.

He lays back, a look of pure adoration as he watches you wind your hips round, back and forth and up and down, until he's a writhing, moaning mess underneath you. His lips constantly find your skin, leaving moist trails, cold from the air, all over you.

Your bodies crashing against each other as you eagerly chase your end. 

Feeling yourself tightening around him, coiled like a spring ready to bound into a new realm of elation.

"That's it baby, let go." He says softly, clinging onto your hips to keep you moving.

Your orgasm explodes, more intense than before, completely taking over you as you contract around him. He joins you, filling you with his warm seed, cradling you in his arms as you both ride out your spasms of bliss. 

When your mind has returned to your body, you slump onto the rug, your bare bodies beside each other, as he turns towards your back his fingers skate over the large scar on your back. You go rigid for a moment, preparing yourself for his questions, attempting to scramble up a lie in your mind. His lips find the puckered pink skin and place a chaste kiss on it. His questions don't come, instead he wraps you in his arms and holds you close enough you can feel his pounding heart against you.

No words are exchanged. There isn't anything to be said but you feel everything and more in that moment.

Two weeks since you had sex with Namjoon.

"Very nice. You've really captured the beauty of the town in these." you smile at him and lay a gentle hand on his knee. Something he chooses not to ignore, placing his hand over yours while he continues clicking through the various pictures on his hotel website.

"Yea, the photographer did a really good job." he looks over to you, with a raised eyebrow. "So you approve of these?" 

"Of course." you say, standing and grabbing your jacket draped across the stairway banister. 

"That's a first." he teases, a smirk playing across his full lips, calling out to you as usual.

You drape your arms around his shoulders and place a slow kiss on his neck, the moan you entice from him has your lips smiling against his skin.

"Stay." he says quietly.

"I can't, I have to work." It's regretful but true. "Besides, I've been holed up in here for nearly two weeks. Time for a change of scenery."

He pouts as he takes your hand, pulling it towards his chest. "There's nothing wrong with the scenery here...especially when you're upstairs...in my bed...naked."

His eyes hold burning heat, pupils blown with longing and it sends throbbing lust right between your legs.

"How about, you think about me naked and in your bed...until I finish work, then I'll make up for all that torture." you reply, winking at him before your lips meet in a passionate, fiery kiss. 

No one has ever kissed you like Namjoon. No one has given you this feeling...one you can't quite describe. For the first time in years, you feel completely yourself and...happy. Your chest swells when you look at him and you find it odd how someone you could hardly stand, now has such an effect on you.

"This evening is going to drag." he rolls his eyes. "I'll pick you up after work."

Your insides grin. Part of you wanted to keep him your dirty little secret and the other part wanted everyone to see you together.

You nod and plant one more kiss against his mouth, as you tear your body and your eyes away from him. 

That’s when you see it.

Your face. On his screen. Bold as a summer's day.

Your stomach drops, turning into a lump of concrete inside you, weighing you down. Rage alights in you but betrayal counters it, racing through your veins in your shaking limbs and spilling out of your eyes in hot tears.

Namjoon follows your eye line and freezes. Neither of you move. 

All you can do is stare at the smiling, care free photo of you, behind the bar. And all you can think of is, how many people have possibly seen this? Who has and what now? 

He turns back to you, eyes wide and encased with a frown, a pleading hand outstretched towards you, as you realise you're backing up and heading to his front door.

"I didn't know." he says quietly.

 "You promised me that I wouldn't be in any of them!" you yell, skin hot and your stomach churning. "I can't believe I let you fool me. I genuinely thought you were telling me the truth. How could you do this to me?" 

Something flickers across his face but it's gone before you realise what it is, as he takes another step towards you. "I didn't do this!"

Your heart pounds in your ears, every part of you throbbing with treachery. 

He drops his hand, sensing it's useless. 

"Clearly your word means as little as I do to you." you close the distance between you, a finger pointing in his face. "If I ever see you in my bar, so help me, I'll make you unable to ride your horse for a very long time."

He opens his mouth to speak. 

"I beg you, give me one reason." you spit, venom encasing every word. You storm out, feeling sick to your stomach. This is the man that you've been having the most amazing, passionate sex with for the last two weeks. You've been inseparable, opened yourself up to him in every way. Laid yourself bare and vulnerable for him.

You wanted to scrub yourself down, feeling like you've gone past enemy lines and turned against your own. He was a risk, you'd known that but had still let yourself get caught up in him. Believed in his lies. In him. You left him in the middle of the room, staring after you, getting in your truck and driving. After calling Jimin to cover you, you head to the next town, where you can be alone and drink until you forget.

Three months since Namjoon betrayed you. 

You've been a wreck. For three months you've been constantly looking over your shoulder, sick to your stomach. Your emergency bag packed and hidden in your truck, should you need to flee. Your life shoved in that small leather bag. You didn't have much, that was clear to you but it seemed sadder than ever to have your most important things in one tiny holder. No one that would care when you were gone. Maybe Seokjin, but he'd forget about you eventually, any friends you make always do.

Namjoon had not been back into the bar, not while you were working anyway, you're not sure he'd have the guts. You had seen him fleetingly on a few occasions, his hopeful glances towards you rebuked by your impassive, stony face. 

At some point Seokjin informed you, your photo had been removed from the website, Namjoon clearly trying to make amends for his deception - unsuccessful and useless attempts. You do not bend or yield to someone who has stabbed you in the back, you learnt that the hard way a long time ago...quite literally too.

You shrug into your jacket, noticing how much roomier it had become recently. Eating has not been high on the priority list when your stomach churns with anxiety and trepidation. You turn off the lights and head to the door of the bar, keys in hand.

A squeak from the hinges sounds into the silence, you look to see the doors wobbling slightly, the breeze catching it. 

Suddenly, the hairs on the back of your neck are on end, goose bumps leave a bumpy trail across your skin. You're just being paranoid. No one's here. It’s just the wind. 

Your feet move quickly to the doors, imagining you can hear following footsteps. Just as you reach your exit, a swift, sharp pull on your hair sends you slamming into the wooden boards.

A weight on top of you, pinning you down and unable to fight. A hand across your mouth to stop you from screaming and making it difficult to breathe.

His scent. It encases you, trapping you in another time and freezing you in those moments, those memories. The abusive days, the violent temper, the possessiveness, the cuts and bruises, the stabbing. Staring death in the face had been the final moment to give you the confidence to run, to escape but forever looking over your shoulder, forever living in fear.

Terror has taken over your body, not even trying to fight at this point.

"Did you miss me?" his sickly voice whispers in your ear.

Inside you're screaming, begging and pleading but nothing comes out into the silence, just the sound of his harsh, excited breathing.

"I knew I'd find you, knew it wouldn't be long until someone led me to you." 

You could feel your limbs shaking wildly underneath him.

"You knew I'd find you didn't you? You led me here with that photo, I knew you missed me, baby." he kisses your forehead, your skin crawling beneath his lips. 

"I'm going to take my hand away now, you're not going to scream, are you? You're going to be a good girl, aren't you?"

His words twist your insides in the most repulsive way as you nod your head.

His hand comes away, freeing your face and you gasp, desperately filling your lungs with air. 

"It's so good to see your face, baby." 

Your eyes, now adjusted to the dark, could make out his teeth, his lips pulled into a sinister smile.

"Will you at least let me sit up, Yoongi?" you ask, sounding much braver than you feel.

"You're not going to do anything stupid." he orders.

"No." your face is deadpan because it has to be, a slither of anything he deems untoward would make matters much worse for you.

Even as your brain frantically tries to find you a way out, any idea hitting an immediate dead-end, your face remains impassive.

He releases your wrists above your head and slowly climbs off of you, still crouched and ready to pounce should you run. 

You had to be smart about this if you were going to get away, you had to think. THINK! 

"You've been very bad, haven't you? Running from me like that. And I know you like playing games but I've not appreciated this hide and seek exchange between us. Four years I've been searching. That's a long time, baby." his menacing tone has you on edge, wondering just what he is going to do.

"You left me to die." you reply, recalling that night with a chill creeping up your spine. A knife in the back and for what, having said a few too many words to the corner shop owner, like 'how are you?'

You wonder what type of weapon he has on him tonight and you push the thought away.

He stares at you shocked, as if attempted murder is so far fetched from what he's capable of. 

"Who do you think called the ambulance? I would never let you die, I would never let you leave me."

Lies. You knew a passer-by had rung the ambulance, had stayed with you until they came and had waited to hear your prognosis at the hospital. You even met them a few weeks later, when they brought you flowers. But for now he had to think you believed him.

"Is that what they told you?" he leaned in stroking your face and you had to swallow the recoil that your body reacted with.

"Is that why you've been running from me? Oh baby, you should have said and we could have had this all straightened out, wouldn't we, hm?" 

He grips your chin, keeping it aimed directly at him, his fingers just forceful enough to leave bruises.

He watches your mouth, licking his lips. He wants to kiss you and you're preparing yourself for it.

"How many other men have been on these lips? How many have been inside them?" he sneers pushing his thumb, harshly inside your mouth, the taste bitter on your tongue. The Yoongi you know, well and truly here.

"No one."

"Don't lie to me." he squeezes your jaw, pain blazing underneath his fingertips  causing a whimper to escape your lips.

The satisfied look in his eyes has bile rising in your throat.

"I'm not lying. You think I'd want another man anywhere near me." 

He smiles, clearly not catching the bite in your words.

"If I find out different, there's going to be problems." he sing songs. "You understand?"

You nod and he releases your chin, harshly discarding you like a useless piece of meat.

He stands and offers a hand out to help you up. You want to spit at it and slap it out of your face but you shiver at the reaction that would bring.

You take it and he pulls you up, harsher than was necessary but you ignore it. He's on you, stalking towards you, backing you against the hard, wooden panels of the wall behind.

Your heart pounds violently, the sound all you can hear, you can hear your breathing spike as does his. He's excited, but you're trying to survive. 

He closes the small amount of distance between you, his body pressed firmly against yours. One hand grabs your waist, pinning you harshly in place, the other travels to your throat. He keeps it there pressed lightly against your windpipe, not doing any damage but enough to show you the threat that's there. You swallow involuntarily. 

The wind picks up outside and you hear the door wobbling, your attention back on it. How can you get to it? 

You can hit him with something, but it would have to be hard enough to take him down and give you enough of a chance to run. Every thought seemed risky.

"Are you going to be a good girl and come with me willingly?" he raises an eyebrow at you.

"Yoongi, I can't just pick up and leave."

He adds a pressure to throat, fear rising up in you hot and fast.

You put your palms up. "I'm not saying no. I'm saying, I have a job here, people know me. If I get up and leave without a word, they'll think something awful's happened and that'll create problems for us."

He watches you for a moment, eyes thin and suspicious, you can practically see the cogs turning in his mind. "What do you suggest then?" Before you can even open your mouth, he adds. "I'm not leaving you." 

"Why don't you stay here with me for a little while?" you can feel the sweat on the back of your neck, the idea of him being with you any longer than he has been already filling you with absolute horror.

"Then we can announce that I'm moving back with you."

"How can I trust you, after the way you've behaved?" his face is millimetres from yours suddenly, the tips of his noses touching. 

"W-what do you want me to do to prove it to you?" you stammer, losing your composure momentarily.

"Kiss me. Like you used to." he smirks, knowing that towards the end of your relationship, touching him in any way had repulsed you, you hadn't kept that a secret.

You take a breath to steel yourself, if this is what you had to do…

Namjoon's shadowed face captures your attention as it appears just behind Yoongi's head and directly in your line of sight, holding - what looks like - a metal crowbar in the air. He nods to you.

The relief you feel cascades around your body, washing waves of solace through you, your skin tingling as your adrenaline spikes even higher. Everything seems much more hopeful in this moment and you've never been so happy to see Kim Namjoon. 

Your eyes flash back to Yoongi, you could not lose it now, otherwise it's another person to be endangered by him.

You grab either side of his face, tilting your head, he closes his eyes as he prepares for your lips to touch his. He moans from anticipation, the sound bringing a fresh wave of nausea over you.

You meet Namjoon's eyes once more, watch him raise the crow bar higher, preparing to swing…

You push Yoongi's face as hard away from you as fast as you can muster and duck. Your eyes squeeze shut as you hear his gasp and then the noise of the metal connecting with his skull. 

"Run! Go now!" 

You do. Your legs charging forward before you even have a chance to process Namjoon's words to you. You push through the double doors, the cool night air hitting your skin and giving you added power to your legs. You race along the dirt path, hearing the ruckus ensue in the bar. You stop. Namjoon's face bloodied and bruised flashes in front of your eyes. An image you can't escape.

You couldn't leave him to deal with this man alone. You had to face your past. Face him, like you would face anyone else threating your life, or your town, or your friends. You yank out your phone and dial Seokjin's number.

"Do you know what time it is?" his voice thick with sleep sounds on the line.

'Jin, I need you to call the sheriff and come down to the bar! I'm in trouble. Bring your gun!" you hang up not giving him a chance to respond as you race back to Namjoon. 

You throw open the doors and see the two men throwing punches in and out of tight holds as they roll around on the floor. 

How could you get to Yoongi without hurting Namjoon?

You stand hesitating in the doorway.

But watching Yoongi take control and pin him down before connecting punch after punch, the sickening sound of flesh hitting flesh, something inside you snaps. 

You charge at him, bringing your foot up to connect with his face, the impact sending him flying backwards. By the sound, you're pretty sure you've broken his nose.

You crouch down to Namjoon as he sits up, wiping his bloody mouth on the sleeve of his plaid shirt.

"You ok?" you ask, eyes wide as they skim over his face, assessing him.

"What are you doing here!?" he exclaims, desperate eyes pleading with you to leave. "I told you to get out of here!"

You want to say so many things in that moment, looking at him and realising; he's got a good heart, even if it is a little misguided at times. Looking at him and realising all the unspoken feelings between you. From the moment you met him, he's been a disaster and every time he tried to be nice and make an effort you violently pushed him away to protect yourself. But you couldn't do it anymore. You cupped his purple marked face in your hand,  wishing you could erase these marks, left because of you.

He leans into your hand, just for a moment before his attention is behind you. Grabbing your waist and pinning you to the floor before spinning on top of you, shielding you from the skull cracking snap of the gunshot. The deafening sound echoing in your ears, as pain sneaks through the hole in your left arm, the one underneath Namjoon's weighted, limp body.

Six months since the shooting, Christmas day.

Your first Christmas without the thought of Yoongi hanging over your head like a dark cloud, the kind that gives you headaches and makes your mind feel heavy and slow.

Seokjin had gotten there with Sheriff Jungkook just after the first shot rang out. 

You don't remember everything but you do remember hearing the second shot clap like thunder around you, a split second of light illuminating the thick darkness, followed by the sound of a body hitting the ground. 

That was it, he was gone, no more looking over your shoulder, no more running and no more fear following you with every decision. The demise of Yoongi. You are free.

You feel lighter as you open the oven and baste the turkey once again.

"When is dinner going to be ready?" Seokjin whines from the sofa.

"Oh, have a little patience." you scold him.

You are more than grateful to have him with you at this time of year, seeing as neither of you have any family here, it's worked out nicely. 

"I see Jimin is doing well after taking over Namjoon's Hotel." he remarks.

You nod. "Yep, business is going well for him. I'm glad. I will miss him at the pub though." 

"What about Namjoon's house?"

Your hand stills, stopping stirring the vegetables bubbling away in the pan and a hard swallow slides down your throat. "What about it?"

"Is it going on the market?"

You glance over and notice him watching you from the corner of his eye.

"I'm not sure, it's not been discussed." 

He nods carefully.

Footsteps down your stairs have your head turning towards them. The sight of him, bare chested, hair swept back effortlessly almost takes your breath away.

"We can discuss it now, if you like?" Namjoon teases you and places a kiss on the side of your head. "Seeing as you keep ignoring my question."

Seokjin sits bolt upright. "What's this? What question?"

You laugh. "Not that question!"

The disappointment across Jin's face is obvious.

"I keep asking her to sell this place and move in with me but I haven't had an answer yet." Namjoon watches you, an arrogant look on his face as he turns towards your guest.

The wrinkled, pink scar on his back greets your view, a perfect circle from where the bullet entered. He was lucky. You'd almost lost him before you even had him, before you realised how much you wanted, needed him. 

You go toward him, wrapping your arms around his stomach. You go on tip-toes to kiss his scar. You match. Two scars in exactly the same place caused by the same person. In a sick way that connected you forever and the thought brought you comfort somehow. 

Namjoon had saved your life, endangering his in the process. Now it's you who would protect him from anything. 

"Yes." you say quietly against his back.

He turns, wrapping you in his arms.

"What?"

You look up at his bewildered face. "Yes, I'll move in with you."

His face blooms into the most beautiful smile, making your insides flutter. He brings his lips crashing down against yours, a kiss that takes your breath away and makes you giddy.

This is the true start to your life, after existing for many years you're now truly living, with the sound of Seokjin's cheers and hollas in the background.

#bwcssy2 #bangtanarmynet #thebtswritersclub #ficswithluv #btswriterscollective #btsbookclub #bangtanedu #bts fanfiction #bts fanfics #bts fanfic #bts namjoon #bts kim namjoon #kim namjoon #namjoon #namjoon fanfic #kim namjoon fanfiction #kim namjoon fanfic #namjoon fanfiction #enemies to lovers #idiots to lovers #cowboy au #wild west au #cowboy namjoon #bts angst #bts smut #namjoon smut #namjoon angst #cowboy aesthetic #bts kim namjoon fanfiction #bts namjoon fanfic

[chromalogue]

Alive.  Healthy.  Chugging along.  Still rubbish at communicating.  

*

I spent the holiday season making approximately 20 different kinds of cookies.  It was supposed to be more but I ran out of time and spoons.  Some of them, like salted double chocolate cookies and plum slice (which turned out to be a. crabapple slice and b. wildly popular to the point where I didn’t get any) were very successful, and some, like rye flour wreaths and poppyseed sablés, were a bewildering waste of time.  But I do have nice pictures of everything.  And way too late for me to make anything to order, a couple of people got in touch asking for baking and goodies, and it was nice to have something to give them.

*

Highlights from last year’s books include Jordan Ifueko’s Raybearer, Aminatta Forna’s Happiness, and Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent.  

Right now, among other things, I am reading and very much enjoying Paul Féval’s 1867 novel La Ville-Vampire.  It is Ann Radcliffe RPF with all sorts of wry observations about the exotic and ever-so-slightly-wrongheaded character of the English people (you know, the way English gothic novels wrote about the rest of Europe), and it is a delight.

*

A few months into the pandemic, I got in touch with one of my best friends from Toronto, because she really needed to watch The Witcher.  Since then, we get together on a phone call every Thursday or Friday and watch stuff.  I turn off sound and put on subtitles, and hear her audio through the phone, so if it’s not perfectly synced it’s okay.  We’ve also been through She-Ra, Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, The Dragon Prince, Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, Adventure Zone: Hootenanny, a surprisingly good high school production of Phantom of the Opera, and we’re just starting Raising Dion.  

Will and I loved the heck out of Lupin.  

And the Roku Channel has Hunter, which I loved as a tween.  I’ve been watching it for the nostalgia and because it’s a kind of show I don’t even think they make anymore, i.e. a show I can have on while doing something else and not worry about what I’m missing.  But JEEZ.  Every terrible (both narratively and morally) cop show trope you see being mocked, picked apart, critiqued, or lampooned?  It’s here, and it’s so darned earnest, and it explains so darned much.  Poke it a little and Reaganomics dribbles out (trickles down?).

Some enterprising soul also put the whole of Jul i Blodfjell (Christmas on Blood Mountain) on YouTube, and my soul sang.  I’d heard bits and seen the odd clip, so I was keen to watch.  Fellow North Americans, this is a genre I never even knew existed, even though I’d seen a previous example from Ylvis: the Julekalender.  There’s an episode every day of December, until the 24th.  And this is a slasher murder mystery comedy Julekalender.  The episodes were about twelve minutes long, and when I was trying to decompress after a whole gruelling night of Christmas cookies, and just needed to sit down long enough to shove some bread and cheese in my mouth and chug a smoothie before going to bed, these were just the thing.

*

We’ve heard, not necessarily that vitamin D makes COVID better but that vitamin D deficiency makes it worse, so I asked Will if he wanted me to get him some, and he said sure.

“Do you want the grownup kind or the fun kind?” I asked, because I had been sharing my vitamin D gummies with him and he seemed to like them.

“The grownup kind,” he said, in a tone that suggested it was a silly question.

So I got him some of the flavourless kind you’re supposed to swallow.  And when I brought it to him he was like, “Oh...  I thought they’d be gummy.”

*

The community group is not feeling super great.  The new chair has been micromanaging.  After the second e-mail that left me so furious I couldn’t sleep, I replied to the effect of, “When you coach me on how to do work I did professionally for years, I feel like you’re sending the message that I’m not a good fit for this organization.  I don’t disagree, but we can’t afford to lose members, so let me serve my term to the best of my abilities and I’ll be out of your hair.”  

He apologized, said he definitely valued my skills, and told me that he was changing our procedures so that those skills would no longer be needed.  When I said I’d like to see how the committee felt about changing those procedures, he brought it to a meeting, let two people speak in favour, and then was like, “Welp, everyone agrees with me, it’s a done deal!”  No vote or anything.  Just a decree.

THEN he got in touch to ask me if I would do THE SAME THING I’VE BEEN DOING ALL ALONG, THAT HE JUST HUMILIATED AND BULLIED ME OUT OF, but ONLY FOR HIM.  

Virtually everyone who knows what happened thinks I should resign, and maybe I should.  But we had been working for three years when this dude came on, and he does not get to own this project, and his bad behaviour does not get to take it down.  And I mean, he’s been pretty consistent in underestimating me and minimizing my work, so he probably forgets that some of my previous experience comes from workplaces a lot more toxic than this one.  I’m equipped to deal, and now that he’s flipped the bully switch, there are a bunch of friendly small-town softening behaviours that I’d adopted for meetings here, that I feel empowered to discontinue.

*

When I mentioned offhand to my dad that last Valentine’s Day Will and I had gone out for dinner, and this year it seemed unlikely, so I was gonna have to think of something, my dad said, “You two like mussels, right?  Why don’t you invite him over here and we’ll have mussels?  Your mom will eat some.”

So yeah.  This Valentine’s Day we’re planning a super romantic dinner with my parents.  

*

At 159 800 words on the new thing.  Now all I need to do is research Viking legal codes.  Good times!

#long post #stuff I've been meaning to write for ages #I miss you folks

[tinydooms]

Original Short Story: written in early 2016 while I was minding the doors at Handel and Hendrix in London (in my glamorous past life). Content Warnings: demons, assault, demonic sexual assault, murder.

The Death of Andromeda Ashton

Now darling, you know that there is a big empty house on this property, away up past the formal gardens; you can just see it from your window when the leaves are down from the trees. Ashton Manor is its name, so called because my ancestor, Joseph Ashton, built it centuries ago, when Queen Anne ruled this isle. A solid English manor house, with wings stuck on it during the reign of the Georges, built of grey stone and with hundreds of windows peering down at us like so many curious eyes. It is the country seat of the Ashton family and has been for almost three hundred years. But we do not live there. Not anymore.

I can see impatience in your face. I know all this, is what you’re thinking. Patience, dear one, for I am going to tell you why.

They were great collectors, the old Ashtons were, and as the years went on they filled the Hall with all manner of treasures, ancient books and paintings and sculptures from far off lands where strange gods were worshipped and men look nothing like you’d believe. Every generation of Ashtons contributed to the Collection, until one day, one of them brought home something monstrous.

The house is empty now, its windows stare unseeing; its treasures are locked up and guarded by an aging caretaker. All know that it is abandoned, most of its treasures still inside, though some were safely moved to London around the time Queen Victoria died. But never, in eighty years, has anyone broken in to steal anything. There are too many stories about the place. You’ve heard some of them, of course. The crying that can be heard in the east wing. The singing heard on stormy nights. The dark figure that prowls the corridors and the woods by the park, thinning the packs of rabbits that live there. The woman sinking into the lake. Yes, I can see by your eyes that you know of what I am speaking.

Her name is Andromeda Ashton. She lived here many years ago, when the house was an open and happy place. She was the darling petted baby daughter of older parents, born when her elder siblings were almost grown and had thought their parents were passed the age of engendering children. Her eldest sibling, Henry, was already well into his first year at Cambridge, her sisters away at school. The closest brother in age was Edward, seven years older than she, a quiet and thoughtful boy.

Now, because she was the baby, and in no small part because she was a beautiful, intelligent little thing, Andromeda was given license to behave in ways that were most unusual for a girl of her class in that time. She had a governess and a tutor, learned Greek and Latin from childhood, and could always be found prowling the family Collection or reading books by great explorers and renowned antiquarians. By the time she was eighteen, Andromeda was widely considered to be one of the brightest Ashtons for a generation. What a shame, people said, that she was not a boy and could then use that pretty head of hers. What a shame such remarkable intelligence was all for naught.

They need not have feared, for Andromeda had plans for making her mark upon the world, in the form of her family’s Collection. She may not be allowed to attend Cambridge like her brothers or study theology like Edward, but she was allowed and encouraged to contribute something to the Collection. And it would be more than just her portrait, which showed a slim, wind-pale girl with dark hair and eyes, gazing at the painter with a fiery intensity. No, Andromeda had not spent her life reading the tales of antiquarians for nothing.

Now dearie, you know that there are many stories of ghosts and legends in these parts. The hills are as dotted with stories as they are with sheep. On the eve of her nineteenth year, Andromeda began to collect them. With her father’s blessing and the help of her former governess, a project was begun: to compile the county’s folktales. It was no small task. For months, Andromeda could be seen riding from farm to farm, speaking to laborers and landowners alike, and writing down their stories. The Crone of Tetley. The Wailing Well of St. Edmund’s. The Fenbury Witch. She recorded them all, never realizing that she herself would one day become such a whispered story.

“I don’t know how you sleep at night, after hearing these tales,” her mother said once.

Andromeda smiled. “They are not true, Mother! They’re silly superstitions that came about because people in the past had no learning. People tell stories to ascribe meaning to what they do not understand, that’s all. There’s no truth to them.”

This, my dear, was Andromeda’s firm belief: that superstition had given way to science, and that all the ghostly tales of the past, while amusing and interesting, had a rational explanation. It was to be her undoing.

Now, as is sometimes the case with amateur antiquarians, Andromeda began to be curious as to the truth behind these stories. There was one in particular that caught her fancy, and that was of the Chalice of Tilbury St. Bartholomew. What’s that? The what? I knew you would ask; it’s certainly not talked about anymore. Not since-no, I’m getting ahead of myself.

The story goes like this: centuries before, at the time the plague first appeared in England, there was an alchemist who thought he could escape the illness by coming to the countryside. And where did he come? Why here, of course. Tilbury St. Bartholomew, though in those days the name was rather different. It was whispered that this gentleman-I use that term lightly, for he was no such thing-continued his strange experiments in his cottage, and that he not only practiced alchemy, but the dark arts as well. You’re skeptical, I see. So was Andromeda. What were considered the dark arts then is known as science now, of course. But for all that, the villagers were afraid of him. It was said that he conjured devils, and that one such devil was contained in a silver cup he kept with him in his bedroom, ready to do his master’s bidding. Village maidens dreamed of a dark shape coming into their beds at night, bending over them and stroking their hair. The alchemist leered at them in church on Sundays, leading to speculation that his demon was kept for the hunting of women. Unease and unrest grew in the village, yet the alchemist continued his work unmolested.

But when the plague finally came to Tilbury St. Bartholomew-for no part of the country was left untouched-the villagers said it was the judgments of God upon them for allowing an evil sorcerer to live unhampered in their midst. The alchemist was dragged from his home and burned at the stake. The village maidens breathed sighs of relief, for though the plague raged about them, the dark creature came to their chambers no more. The alchemist’s cottage was burned, too, and the silver chalice was lost. No one knew what became of it.

Andromeda, though, had her suspicions. She was a learned young lady, and figured that there had to be some record somewhere of a necromancer and his effects. I don’t know what sort of research she did, but one summer evening, when her brother Edward was visiting from his Cambridge seminary, she asked him to ride out with her. No one knows where they went, but when they came back, Andromeda looked quite pleased, and shortly thereafter presented an ancient silver goblet to the family.

Why did she want it, you ask? Why, if such demonic stories were attached to the thing, would a young lady wish to bring such an object into her home? Come, child, haven’t you been listening? Andromeda was not a believer in such things as demons. She was an active and intelligent young lady, and it rankled that she could not use her brains to their fullest capacity. A book was all very well and good, you see, but a treasure such as this cup was a real asset to the Collection, and it gave her a measure of fame, besides. She wrote the card for it herself. Silver chalice, English, circa 1330. What a find! Everyone in the family and many people outside of it admired the discovery.

All of this is common knowledge. You can find Andromeda’s book in any bookshop in the county, and the local historians will tell you about the silver goblet. They will also tell you that the goblet has been lost under strange circumstances, and when pressed for an answer, they will sigh and tell you it was a great tragedy. For you see, darling, very few people know exactly what happened to the Ashton family in the months following Andromeda’s discovery.

Most of what I know comes from Edward’s personal diaries, and they are to be treated with much caution. He lost his mind that year, you know. But I think he was saner than anyone knew.

Nothing went right for the Ashtons after Andromeda’s discovery. First Mrs. Ashton, who had never been strong after the birth of her daughter, succumbed to illness, soon followed by Mr. Ashton, so that Henry, the eldest son, living in London, found himself head of the family. That was in September. Then there began to be problems with the livestock. Horses went mad, sheep began to die for seemingly no reason, and the gamekeepers reported outrageous amounts of dead rabbits and birds in the woods. The servants began to complain that tricks were being played upon them, for it seemed as though they were being pinched and grabbed at by unseen hands. Edward recorded in the days that followed his mother’s funeral, was the sense of being watched when you knew you were alone, of a cold breath at the back of your neck, the creak of a chair that only creaked when sat in. There was a presence in the house, he said, and everyone knew it. But no one spoke of it.

Andromeda was not spared. Alone in her room at night, as she lay in bed, she felt the gentle caress of fingers across her cheek, in her hair, running over her body, cold as a breath of winter air. She told herself that she only imagined the icy kisses on the back of her neck, on her shoulders and breastbone. They were the products of a fevered mind, surely, imaginations brought about by grief at the death of her parents. She ignored the caresses. What’s that, darling? She must have been very brave? Yes, or very foolish.

By late November, the events had become too real to ignore. When serving tea to visitors, Andromeda would feel whispery fingers on her thighs, and moments later her stockings would loosen as her garters untied themselves. Something tugged her hair as she brushed it, or grasped her hand as she reached for a pen. At night, the sensation of someone cuddling close to her became unbearable, until she jumped for a light, gasping. And then she would hear it: a soft, cold laugh.

At last, after one such night, Andromeda swallowed her pride and told Edward what was happening. He was a priest, or nearly so; of course he would help her.

“It has only been since we brought home my goblet that this has happened,” she told him as they walked through the portrait gallery. “But artefacts cannot truly contain demons. Can they?”

Edward rubbed his hand through his hair, eyes straying to Andromeda’s portrait, swinging in its frame against the far wall. “We cannot know what devilry a sorcerer can conjure when he goes against God. I fear we made a mistake in unearthing that cup, Meda.”

“What must we do?”

“We must put it back where it was. As soon as possible.”

They agreed that Edward would write to one of his teachers, Reverent Dr. Padgett, to come assist them in exorcising the demon. The letter was duly dispatched. The reply came by telegram the next morning: Dr. Padgett would arrive that evening on the six-thirty train. They would commence their business immediately.

That afternoon, Andromeda asked the servants to leave the house for the night. She found them eager to do so. None of them liked to say how relieved they were to be away from the house and its unseen occupant. At half past six, the head footman was dispatched to the station to collect Dr. Padgett. In the back of the carriage was his own trunk, for he had no intention of remaining alone with the family in the house once he had safely delivered the doctor. It was a cold, windy evening, and later he said that his master and mistress could not have picked a worse night to be alone in that house.

All of this is fact; you can find the records in the village police archives, if you’ve a mind to. But what I’m about to tell you know, darling, are the words of a madman. You see, the only two people who know what happened in that house are Andromeda and Edward, and the latter was in no fit state to speak coherently of what happened for some months afterwards. Besides, his tale was dismissed by doctors and magistrates alike as being too unbelievable to come from a sound mind.

What Edward said was this: believing that Padgett would soon arrive, he and Andromeda set about making preparations for the exorcism. The house was empty, but the air around them seemed heavy, oppressive. As there were no servants to light the lamps, they sat in near-darkness. Their black mourning clothes must have made the scene even darker. Once or twice, Edward felt as though something touched the back of his neck, but there was no one there but Andromeda, sitting on the sofa by the window, peering out into the windy dusk.

“Perhaps we should bring the cup here,” she said, at last. “Perhaps Dr. Padgett will be willing to go out with us immediately.”

“Certainly,” said Edward. “Shall I go for it?”

“No.” Andromeda stood, smoothing her black skirts. Edward says that her hands were shaking. “I feel certain it has to be me.”

Though neither of them said it, the fact hung in the air that Andromeda was the one to have meddled in what she should not. Still, Edward, being a kind soul, rose from his seat and put her arm through his.

“We will go together. Come now, little sister, chin up. Everything will be all right.”

The silver cup was in one of the many rooms that housed the Collection, deep in the bowels of the cold house. I’ll show it to you one day, if you like, through the window. Night was falling fast as they walked through the halls, the strong wind driving dark clouds before it as it screamed around the manor. The lamp in Edward’s hand flickered in the draught, and his diary says that it was with some relief that they gained the Collection rooms. Leaving Andromeda by the door, Edward moved across the room to light the lamps, thinking to bring some cheer to the evening, if cheer were at all possible.

It was as he was lighting the lamps that Edward heard the screams. He ran to the door to see Andromeda lying in the corridor, beating at something unseen with both hands. He ran to assist her and all at once found himself picked up and flung back into the room he had come from. Undaunted, he picked himself up and made to run to his sister, only to again be thrown down by the unseen creature. It must have been terrible, fighting such a force while Andromeda’s shrieks echoed through the halls. Edward says that she twisted this way and that as though grappling with something. He made for her a third time--and this time, Andromeda was thrown down on the floor, gasping, and the thing, the monster, the demon, grabbed Edward by the neck and dragged him back into the Collection room. He was sure it would kill him. But it did not. A moment of white hot pain, and Edward found himself pinned to the floor with an arrow through the leg. Where the dart came from, he did not know. He could not move. Apparently satisfied that the young priest would prove no further nuisance, the thing returned to Andromeda. Helpless, crying with pain and horror, Edward heard his sister’s screams renew, growing more and more awful until they were drowned by a low, terrible laugh. Then there came the sound of a body dragging, and Andromeda’s shrieks faded as she was carried away.

Dr. Padgett, arriving an hour later, found Edward, alive but in a terrible state. Having asked his driver to wait at the door, Padgett was able to send for a medical doctor, and a search was made for Andromeda. It did not take them long to find her, for though the wind continued to buffet the county, there was no rain. You know where they found her, of course, my dear, for you can see her there still, some nights. She was in the lake, just under the water, her dark hair a loose cloud around her, her heavy black frock covered in hundreds of tiny gashes, her shoes and stockings gone. Her eyes were closed, her skin bleached of color in the green water. She was quite dead.

For months afterwards Edward screamed in the night, howling that the monster had come for him. Certainly in the mornings he was covered in scratches that had not been there the day before. A team of doctors agreed that his mind had been shattered by his sister’s murder, for they did not believe that anything but a mortal man could have done such a vicious thing to the Ashton children. The best thing for him, they told Henry, was to retire to the coast in the care of a nurse. And so Edward never returned to Ashton Hall.

And the cup that had started the horror? Dr. Padgett conducted a search for it, but it was nowhere to be seen, though Edward swore it was in the room when they were attacked. No one knows what became of it. Perhaps it had gone, and the demon with it. I see the doubt in your eyes, dearest, and I have to agree with you.

Ever after, the servants whispered that there was something still haunting the rooms and corridors of the hall, and the gardeners swore they saw Andromeda slipping out of the lake on icy winter nights. Henry’s family certainly never felt comfortable in the Hall, and so it was shut up. And so it has remained for these eighty years, and who knows if we will ever return to live in it? But one thing I know for certain: on nights when the wind blows and the moon is dark, shapes can be seen moving in the windows of the Hall. And out in the lake, a dark-haired Victorian lady floats just underneath the water. Watching. Waiting.

#original fiction #my writing

[tinyshe]

Story at-a-glance

In October 2019, mere months before the pandemic was announced, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation co-hosted Event 201, in collaboration with the World Economic Forum and Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, funded by billionaire technocrat Michael Bloomberg. This tabletop exercise simulated the global response to a fictional coronavirus pandemic

Amid predictions that 65 million people were dying, mass lockdowns and quarantines were implemented around the world, and alternative viewpoints were suppressed through censorship under the guise of fighting “disinformation”

Event 201 confirms that even if the virus itself wasn’t preplanned, the unprecedented and draconian response to it was

The goal of this pandemic is to usher in the Great Reset, a strategy developed and promoted by the World Economic Forum. Previously referred to as the New World Order, this “reset” of the global economy and society as a whole has been carefully planned for decades

A key component of this agenda is the transfer of global wealth and assets into the hands of the wealthy

source  please go to source for video

In this video, Ronnie  Cummins, founder and  director of the Organic Consumers Association, and I discuss “The Truth About COVID-19 —  Exposing the Great Reset, Lockdowns, Vaccine Passports and the New Normal,”  which we co-wrote.

The book was released  yesterday. If you preordered, thank you! If you didn’t, you can now pick it up  without delay.

Thanks for  all your support with the book. This is going to be an overwhelming best  seller, and likely No. 1 in the U.S. We preordered 50,000 copies, but Amazon  told us a few weeks ago that they needed 100,000 copies, which only happens a  few times a year for any new book. The orders were placed weeks ago, but this  pandemic has massively disrupted the printing industry so it is taking far  longer to print books than it used to.

For that  reason, your books will be delivered just a bit later than anticipated. However, if you are like me and only read  Kindle books, you can get the book now! The good news is that at least 50,000  of you will get the book next week and start to understand the deep web of   deception you have been led into. I deeply  appreciate all your support on this book and the project to educate the masses  about the truth about COVID-19.

As mentioned by Cummins, the COVID-19 pandemic surprised a lot of people, but  in researching this book, we learned that vaccine companies and their investors  had been anticipating a scenario like this for a very long time.

Event 201 — A Prescient Foreshadowing

Interestingly enough, in October 2019, mere months before  the pandemic was announced, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation co-hosted Event 201, in collaboration with the  World Economic Forum and Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, funded by  billionaire technocrat Michael Bloomberg. This tabletop exercise simulated the  global response to a fictional coronavirus pandemic.

Amid predictions that 65 million people were dying, mass  lock downs and quarantines were implemented around the world, and  alternative viewpoints were suppressed through censorship under the guise of   fighting “disinformation.” They even discussed the possibility of incarcerating  people who question the pandemic narrative.

The need for radical  censorship was perhaps one of the most striking foreshadowing in  that exercise. In my view, Event 201, as a whole, confirms that even if the  virus itself wasn’t preplanned, the unprecedented and draconian response to it  certainly was, and Gates is a key figure in this scheme.

He may not be the mastermind, and  he’s certainly not the only person involved, but he appears to be one of the  front men for the technocratic elite who are using this pandemic to further  their own agenda, which is nothing short of world domination through  subjugation of the people.

Science and Facts Tossed by the Wayside

Many of the containment measures  employed during this pandemic have never been used before, ever. Among them are  the shutting down of businesses and forcing people to self-isolate at home for  weeks and months on end — around the whole world! It’s quite unbelievable, and   few would have thought it possible.

Clearly, it would not have been  possible were it not for having spent long periods of time grooming the right  people, infiltrating the right organizations and government agencies,  influencing politicians and granting nongovernmental bodies global influence.

The goal of this pandemic is to usher in the Great Reset, a strategy  developed and promoted by the World Economic Forum. Previously referred to as  the New World Order, this “reset” of the global economy and society as a whole  has been carefully planned for decades.

We’ve also never quarantined  healthy people before. Usually, you isolate the sick and contagious. This is  standard practice. But you don’t isolate non-sick people. This is a brand-new  idea that has never been tried before and has no scientific basis whatsoever.

They were able to do all of this  because the World  Health Organization is the de  facto ruler when it comes to global pandemics. What they say is what member  nations will follow. And who’s the primary funder of the WHO? Not any nation,  but Gates. He has, by the way, been involved with the WHO for over a decade, so  this is not something he or anyone else dreamed up over some weekend event.

The End Goal Is to Usher in the Great Reset

As we describe in the book, the goal of this pandemic is to usher in the Great  Reset, a strategy developed and promoted by the World Economic  Forum. Previously referred to as the New World Order, this “reset” of the   global economy and society as a whole has been carefully planned for decades.

A key component of this agenda is  the transfer of global wealth and assets into the hands of the wealthy. According to a September 2020 economic  impact report1 by Yelp, 163,735 U.S. businesses had closed their doors as of August 31, 2020,  and of those, 60% — a total of 97,966 businesses — were permanent closures.2

Meanwhile, between March 18, 2020, and April 12, 2021, the   collective wealth of American billionaires increased by $1.62 trillion — 55% —  from $2.95 trillion to $4.56 trillion. One-third of the total wealth gains by  billionaires since 1990 occurred in the last 13 months!3

As noted by Frank Clemente, executive director of Americans  for Tax Fairness, “Never before has America seen such an accumulation of wealth in so few hands.”4 The primary benefactors of the pandemic  measures include the finance and tech industries and the pharmaceutical and  military-intelligence sectors.5

Vaccine Passport Is Your Ticket to Tyranny

As you’d expect, vaccine companies  have been able to exploit this pandemic, in large part due to the heavy  censoring of any and all preventive and early treatments. Without that  censoring, I don’t believe as many people would be lining up to get these  shots, seeing how they are experimental gene therapies miscategorized as  vaccines.

None of the COVID-19 vaccines  currently on the market has been licensed. They are all being used under  emergency use authorization, and a condition for an EUA is that there are no  other effective treatments available. This, I believe, is the real reason why  effective prevention and alternative treatments were so heavily suppressed.   They, quite simply, would have rendered the vaccine moot.

In the book, we also detail how  inaccurate tests, used inappropriately, created the illusion of a highly  infectious pandemic and served as the basis for the fearmongering spewed by the  media. In reality, the vast majority of “cases” actually weren’t. They were  false positives and/or people being counted multiple times because they kept being retested, and instead of counting people, they were counting tests.

Fatality statistics were also  grossly inflated by suddenly changing how death certificates are filled out and  marking any person who died having had a positive PCR test within the last  month, or who was simply suspected of being positive, as a COVID-19 death. Even  the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention admitted that 94% of   COVID-19 deaths were people who died with the virus, not from it. The real  cause of death was another underlying, often long-term chronic condition.

All of these statistics were  artificially manipulated to make it appear we are in a sufficiently deadly and  horrible situation to warrant vaccine passports, without which you won’t be  allowed to participate in certain social activities or travel.

The irony is that the COVID-19  vaccines are not designed to prevent infection or spread of the virus, so being  vaccinated won’t do a thing for public health. At best, it may protect the  vaccinated individual from having a more serious case of COVID-19 if or when they  do get infected. They encourage everyone to get vaccinated in order to ensure   we reach herd immunity, yet these “vaccines” aren’t designed to provide immunity!  

Since vaccination won’t prevent viral spread, the vaccine passport will fulfill  but one purpose, and that is to usher in a digital surveillance mechanism that  can then be expanded to encompass many other areas of life, including financial  data. So, the vaccine certificate is not a passport to freedom. It’s your  ticket to tyranny.

How to Take Control of Your Health

I believe your best bet, moving  forward, is to address your foundational health, starting with your metabolic  flexibility. You want to be metabolically flexible. What does that mean? It means  that your body can seamlessly transition between burning fat and burning carbohydrates  as its primary fuel. This is important, because when your body can do this, it  means you are not insulin resistant.

When you’re insulin resistant,  you’re more likely to have complications such as immune insensitivity, obesity,  high blood pressure and distorted cholesterol patterns. Your risk for severe   COVID-19 will also be dramatically increased. Thankfully, many of these issues can be simply  reversed for no cost with time-restricted  eating.

Secondly, you need to have enough  vitamin D. For optimal health, you’ll want your vitamin D level, which you must  measure using a simple blood test, to be between 60 ng/mL and 80 ng/mL (100  nmol/L and 150 nmol/L).

My peer reviewed published study6 on the “Evidence Regarding Vitamin D and Risk of COVID-19 and  Its Severity”  is available for free on the journal’s website. In the book, we go into more specific details about these  strategies, and many others.

Freedom of Speech Is Officially Dead

“The Truth About COVID-19” will become all the more important to own and share in  days to come, as I was recently forced to permanently remove all articles on  vitamins D, C and zinc, as well as most articles on COVID-19, from my website.  This book will now be a primary source of such information.

Over  the past year, I’ve been researching and writing as much as I can to help you  take control of your health, as fearmongering  media and corrupt politicians have destroyed lives and livelihoods  to establish global control of the world’s population, using the COVID-19   pandemic as their justification.

Through  these progressively increasing stringent measures, I have refused to succumb to  these relentless attacks. I have been willing to defend myself in the  court of law, as I’ve had everything reviewed by some of the best attorneys in  the country.

Unfortunately,  threats recently became very personal and intensified to the point I could no  longer preserve much of the information and research I’ve provided to you thus  far. These threats are not legal in nature, and I have limited ability to  defend myself against them.

Politicians  in January 2021 managed to pass the COVID-19 Consumer Protection Act of the  2021 Consolidated Appropriations Act.7 This piece of legislation was hidden in a 2,100-page bill8 that now provides the government with enormous legal authority to prosecute  anyone for “crime” of disagreeing with the official narrative that the vaccine  is the ONLY approved approach to treat or prevent COVID-19. Here  is the relevant portion of this Act:

This Act makes it unlawful under Section 5 of the Federal Trade  Commission Act for any person, partnership, or corporation to engage in a  deceptive act or practice in or affecting commerce associated with the  treatment, cure, prevention, mitigation, or diagnosis of COVID-19 or a  government benefit related to COVID-19.

Remember,  Hitler and Mussolini came to power LEGALLY, because they subverted the legal  structures of their country. Folks, you are now seeing the same kind of  subversion happening in real time in the U.S. It is obvious that this is the  first assault, designed to remove your personal freedom and liberty. This law  essentially abolishes the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution with respect  to ANY dialog on COVID-19.

[thinking-in-symbols]

Quinquennial Life Assessment

So, it’s been a few years.  When I was 19 I posted a sort of “roadmap” for the evolution of my life on this blog.  Today I thought I’d revisit that.  I want to take a look back and see what progress I’ve made, and then in a separate post I want to turn to the future, think about how my vision for it has changed, and consider how I can reincorporate these goals into that vision.

This is the list of things I wanted to get done in varying time frames.  I’ve crossed off the things I’ve done to get a sense of my progress:

1 year:

At 19, my hopes were to accomplish the following things by age 20:

- Joined, and consistently participated in, at least 2 campus organizations that suit my interests, at least 1 of which should be competitive in nature - well, I joined the ISO and KVRX, my college radio station!  Neither of those were competitive, but in retrospect I don’t really care about that :-)

- Made concrete plans to study abroad - Nope, unfortunately I never did this.  I’m not quite sure I regret that, all things considered - I traded that experience for other things.  I did make plans to spend a few months abroad of my own accord, and I would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for that meddling global pandemic.  But as it stands I haven’t done this.

- Learned C++ and python to proficiency - Hm.  “Proficient” is a relative term.  But I think I have a tendency to downplay my skills, so in the interest of counteracting that I’m going to count myself as “proficient” in these languages.  I think that’s fair.

- Gone on at least a several day road trip with at least 1 friend - I’ve gone on several trips with @meeshbug​, my very lovely girlfriend and best friend in the world :-)

- Decided on a concentration beyond the extremely vague umbrella of “computer science” - Unfortunately as far as my education is concerned I never really did this.  If anything my interests have *broadened* rather than becoming more focused.  More on this later...

- Made meaningful, ongoing contributions to an open-source project - You know what?  I’ve published the source of everything I’ve ever made, and I’ve gotten to the point where I can make stuff that’s not trivial.  So I’m giving myself credit for this one.

- Learned to cook enough meals to eat in most days and not get sick of my own food - I wish.  I’ve learned to cook a fair amount of stuff but I still get way too depressed and lethargic to apply that consistently.  Whether I consider myself to have achieved this honestly depends on the month.

- Learned to keep my living area clean - I’m much better at this than I was at 19, but at 19 I could barely clear a path to walk across my room.  So there’s more work to do.  More on these last two later.

- Gotten a pet - Meesh and I have a dog named Courage (after the dog of cowardly fame) and a cat named Jax!

2 years:

- Independently written a piece of software to completion and deployed it publicly - I’ve always pretty bad at actually seeing projects through to completion, but I do have a few full, independent projects under my belt at this point.  I’ve built a simple game engine, a pathtracer, plugins for games I like, and some other stuff.

- purchased and begun regularly using some basic amateur radio equipment - Ah man.  I got my license but I still haven’t gotten any equipment.  I guess I have to get on that...

- purchased and begun experimenting with some basic music recording equipment - This one I’ve done, but I haven’t done as much experimenting as I’d like.

- hosted a party - I did this for my 21st birthday and it’s one of my favorite memories!  Honestly this was probably the last time I had all my really close friends in one place.  I’m actually getting kind of emotional about that.

- done some kind of hallucinogen - I have now done this.  I definitely did get something out of it, albeit not what I expected.  This is something I actually only did pretty recently and it’s still having a pretty profound effect.  Maybe I’ll write a separate post about this.

- Gone camping with friends - Despite my best efforts, this hasn’t happened yet.  Pretty fucked up.

3 years:

- learned to play another instrument besides the piano (guitar?) - I don’t feel comfortable crossing this one off quite yet, but I went ahead and bought myself some guitar equipment and have been messing around with it lately :-) I think I’m going to have to bite the bullet and pay for lessons if I’m serious about this, which I am.

- Written and recorded a song - Damn, I can’t believe it’s been 5 years and I haven’t even done this.

- Met a group of people I can play music with - nope

- Owned a leather jacket.  I can’t believe I’ve still never even owned a leather jacket - I’ve done this and wore it frankly too much.  Kinda cringe.

- Worked as a professional software developer - Yep!  Worked as a software developer for a retail company for a couple years.  I’m actually not working as a software developer right now, though; I’m working in a sort of adjacent position.  More on this later.

- Participated in research related to my field - That’s pretty ambitious.  Not sure I’ll ever do this, unfortunately.  But we’ll see.

- Been to a film festival - Oh shit, I totally forgot about having written this.  That’s a cool idea.  I should do this, it’s not like it’s hard (well, at least in principle.  I guess covid kind of changes the situation).

- Gotten a dog - Courage is one of those, I think, although he might also be part rat.

- collected 50 records - Lol, my dumb ass really thought I was going to buy $1,000 worth of records on college money.  No, I haven’t done this, but I’m on my way there.

- Purchased a desktop computer - Well, my dad gave me his old desktop.  That’s not really a purchase but I think it counts.

5 years:

- Begun accepting freelance development gigs - haven’t gotten here yet and I’m not totally sure this is a direction I want to go in my career.  Freelancing has its own stressors as I’ve come to learn from others.  No career path is sunshine and roses and I’m trying to internalize this fact.

- Participated in a student film - Nope.  I don’t even know why I wrote this down to be honest.

- Gotten laid by solving a 5x5 Rubik’s Cube in front of a girl because surely that’s gonna have to work on someone eventually, otherwise I wasted a lot of time - These are getting weird.  Surely I didn’t really expect this to happen, right?  Well, either way I now have a long-term girlfriend, so I don’t - wait, Meesh has seen me solve a Rubik’s cube and she saw it before we started dating.  So actually I’m going to give myself credit for it.  I’m the one who makes the rules here.

- Fleshed out my political opinions - Yes, I now know everything about politics and can answer 100% of questions on political issues.  Just kidding.  But I know where I stand.

- Participated in a protest or some other kind of political event - Done!  Went to a few protests as part of the ISO, participated in lots of their events, and attended some protests with friends as well.

- Studied abroad - Nope :-/

- Learned a language other than Spanish - I took a semester of French!  But I don’t quite want to give myself credit for this one because I really would like to learn a different language to something resembling fluency.

- Run a marathon - Lmao.  I am in much worse shape now than I was when I wrote this post, and even at that time I could probably do like 7 miles if I really pushed myself.  How sad.

- Gone hiking outside of texas - This is weird because I’d literally already done this when I wrote this post.  But I’ve done it more since then, so hey!

- Been out of the country with a friend - This I had also already done.  I guess the point is to have done it without “adult supervision” or whatever.  I haven’t done this since writing this list so I guess I have to leave it uncrossed.

10 years:

- Lived with a girl for an extended period of time - Meesh 🥰

- Spent at least 6 months living on the road in an RV, preferably with a dog and a girl - God, I am so close to being able to do this.  I don’t want it to be an RV anymore - those things are expensive.  But a van?  Still pricey, but doable, especially if I’m willing to sacrifice some comfort.  This has actually been front-of-mind for a while.  I’ll let you know when I get the balls to pull the trigger.

- Started making Real Money - Well, yep, I have gotten to that point.  I do have other thoughts on this, though.  Money is weird, man.

- Lived in a long-term living space outside of Texas (i.e. not including RV time) - How long is long-term?  Three months?  If so, I’ve done this by living in Boston with Meesh for a few months after she went there for law school.  However, I anticipate staying there much longer in the near future, so I’ll wait on this crossing this one off.

- Written a book about something, idk - Not yet.  I’m halfway to the deadline on this one and I have some ideas, but ideas aren’t worth all that much, especially to me, who rarely sees them through.  We’ll see where this goes.  It’s not exactly a priority and historically I struggle to get even my priorities done.  It might make more sense to replace this with recording a concept or narrative album, for which I also have ideas that I happen to take more seriously.

- Learned to solve a 6x6 Rubik’s Cube - nope

- Gotten laid by solving a 6x6 Rubik’s Cube - nope

- Lived in an apartment where I pay all the rent - Yes!  :-))) We love independence

- Earned an advanced degree (this one’s iffy) - This hasn’t happened, and whether it will ever happen is something I’ve been thinking a lot about.  I sort of decided half-way through college that I would be totally burned out on school by the time I graduated.  But in retrospect it takes way less time to burn out on work than it does to burn out on school, and grad degrees are a different kind of thing.  So it’s worth revisiting.’

- Given a best man speech (Sam, this means you have to get married within the next 10 years.  Good luck out there.) - Holy shit, Sam, you maniac, you actually did it!  Sam got married back in 2019 and I gave his best man speech! It’s another one of my favorite memories :-) 

- Gone on a cruise with someone I’m dating - Hmm, not yet.  I’ve gone on cool trips, but none on a boat.  Maybe that’s something to aim for after the pandemic passes :-)

Retrospective:

1yr: Completed: 5/9

More than half isn’t bad!  I’m not gonna worry too much about whether I got these things done within their assigned “time-frame”.  I’m a procrastinator in my heart and I don’t see any reason to put that kind of pressure on myself.  The point is, they got done.  That’s enough for me.

The things I did best in in this category were academic things, and things to do with relationships.  I’m proud of the academic achievements, I really feel like doing them has increased my belief in myself and my sense that I’m good at the thing I’ve spent the last four years studying.  And of course, I am so happy to be in a loving, fulfilling relationship that brings so many good things into my life.  I almost feel like the things I accomplished sort of fell into my lap - of course I’m gonna do programming stuff as a programming student, and getting pets / going on road trips are things I did as a result of my relationship with Meesh.  I don’t say that to downplay the accomplishments, but I do think it’s worth noting.

The things I haven’t done are more to do with personal development, which is disappointing.  I would like to be able to say, 5 years down the road, that I’ve done the personal development I expected to do in just a single year, but maybe that’s a lot to expect.  These are problems I’ve dealt with my whole life.  I think what this means is that I can’t expect everything to fall into my lap.  Those things are going to take real concerted effort to change.  I’m not quite sure how to go about that, though.

2yrs: Completed: 4/6

Two-thirds!  Even better!

Lots of these are one-time accomplishments, not so much long-term commitments to personal development.  The good news is, I did them, and I think those resulted in some development in their own right :-)

Again, though, the things I didn’t do so well are the things that require long-term, concerted effort.  For instance, while I crossed off the one about experimenting with music, it’s really only the initial investment that I’ve really done at this point.  It remains to be seen whether I’ll be able to follow through on the commitment to actually experiment and learn.

3yrs: Completed: 4/10

This category also follows the same pattern I’ve noticed with the last two.  The other thing I’m noticing is that so, so much of my effort over the past few years has been going towards developing a very particular skill: programming / computer science.  Music and art are so important to me, but I’ve done very little real development in those areas.  I mean, I’ve done some.  But not as much as I would have hoped for half a decade.

5yrs: Completed: 4/10

This is getting a little more fun because less of my goals have to do explicitly with my degree.  I’m starting to think beyond college, which is good, because the stage of life I’m in right now requires me to start thinking about the kind of life I want to build now that I’m done with school.  Also, I’m at the deadline for this one right now!  So this is a particularly interesting category because it really shows where I thought I’d be by this time.

The goals I accomplished in this timeframe are, again, mostly things I’ve done through my relationship, but politics also feature pretty prominently on this part of the list.  I spent a lot of time reading and researching political issues during college and really did look for ways to participate.  I honestly made politics a pretty big part of my identity over the last 5 years, and I think it will stay that way forever, but I’ve gotten to the point where I think I need to devote less of my mental energy to knowing more.  I know what I need to know.  It’s time to think about other things.

10yrs: Completed: 4/11 (and counting!)

There’s some career stuff in this section that I’ve been able to do, which is good news.  I’ve always been scared about entering the working world.  All things told, it’s gone more smoothly than it could have.  But I also have lots of lingering doubts about what I want to do in the long term.  So one of the most pressing goals I should aim for is to resolve those doubts.

Ultimately, I have a lot of time left, and I’m not even done with this time frame, so I’m not gonna spend much time dissecting the things I haven’t done.  What I’ll do instead is say that while I didn’t do everything on this list, I feel proud of the things I have accomplished.  I said when I first wrote this list that it’s sometimes hard for me to feel that my life is moving in any particular direction, and I’m still feeling like that five years later, to be honest.  But looking back on these things has helped me see that I actually am making progress in my life.  Not in all the ways I want to, but that’s OK.  There’s still time.

In the next couple days I want to come back to this and reorganize this list into an updated set of goals, for the same time frames.  Maybe that will help me think through exactly what it is I want out of the next five-ten years, with the benefit of having analyzed the things that I did and didn’t do well over the previous five.

[t100ficrecsblog]

an interview with @osleyakomwonkru (she/her) what are you working on right now? Several things! I’m the queen of many WIPs (let’s not even talk about the ones that are languishing in the limbo of old fandoms). But my priorities right now are my own Season 7  and the promptfills that I’m doing for Bellarke Writers for BLM (but not for Bellarke). I started working on my Season 7 fic last summer as soon as 6x13 aired because I couldn’t wait nine months to find out what happened to Octavia, I needed to answer that myself. So I spent months writing and planning and researching and compiling lore so that I could answer that question myself. Started posting it episode by episode at the beginning of 2020. Then pandemic got in the way of me finishing it before the official season 7 started airing, so right now the first 9 episodes are up, and the last 7 will be up after the official season 7 is finished. So if you want a season 7 that has a bit less planet hopping, more Bellamy, more TALKING and characters taking the time to sort through issues rather than the season 7 we’ve been having, then please check it out! what’s something you’d like to write one day? I’d like to actually finish and publish the myriad of original works I have in a state of perpetual incompleteness. I’ve been writing stories ever since I could hold a crayon, and I’ve never stopped. But the past decade I’ve been focused on a lot of fanfic. what is the fanwork you’re most proud of? Well, I love all of my word-babies, and I’m super proud of my S7 fic as mentioned above, but outside of that series, the fic that holds a special place in my heart is “fly away to heal my broken spirit (there might be peace on the other side)”, which is an Octavia-centric character study written between seasons 5 and 6, whereupon landing on the new planet, Octavia takes off on her own and takes the time she needs to heal from the pain of her past. why did you first start writing fic? Well, the reasons why I first started writing fic are perhaps different than what they are now. I started writing fic when I was a child, when I didn’t even know it was something other people did, let alone something people shared with one another (this was back in the Days of Yore before the Internet, so while now I know fanfic was going on at that time, it wasn’t easily accessible). The longest fic I’ve ever written was when I was a preteen, and it was 943 pages, handwritten, and it was a self-insert RPF where I became best friends with Alanis Morissette. Back then, I wrote fic because I wanted more stories, more adventures with the characters I loved, and in the case of that self-insert, I wanted to be a part of those adventures. But now I write fic for different reasons. Now I write mostly because I want to address the parts that canon leaves out. The parts that aren’t “exciting” for a TV audience, because they’re not full of flashy explosions and fights and whatnot, but that I want to see because they’re a vital part of the character journeys - the talking, the healing, the things that should be addressed so it makes sense to go from A to B in the storyline but tend to be swept under the rug. I’m in a fandom for the characters, so I want to see them and their thoughts and feelings addressed properly and not just get shuttled from one Plot to the next. So as this applies in this fandom, that mostly revolves around letting characters take the time to talk to each other, to sort out their issues, stuff like that. Because after everything they’ve been through, they need this! what frustrates you most about fic writing? Too many ideas. I have so much I want to write, but I also don’t want to abandon projects so it hurts to have to put ideas on the backburner. Also - middles. I often know how I want a story to start and how I want it to end, but the part in the middle is always a bit fuzzier. Middles are hard. what are your top five songs right now? Lunatica - Heart of a Lion (perfect Octavia song!) Icon for Hire - Supposed to Be (also a good Octavia song) Beth Crowley - Don’t Think Just Run (ditto) Really Slow Motion - Unbroken (same) Miley Cyrus - Mother’s Daughter (Hope’s theme song) what are your inspirations? Music is a lot of my inspiration. I have an entire Octavia playlist, and Spotify is really good at recommending more songs to go on it. Spotify has the only useful Internet algorithm. Also, just those moments in canon where you go WTF and you’re like… I need to fix this. Or, “there has to be more than just this”. A lot of scenes demand more than what we saw on screen, so I’m here to provide.

what first attracted you to Octavia? what attracts you now? I started watching t100 between seasons 4 and 5. The specific reason why I started watching was Chai Hansen (Ilian), because he’d just been cast on Shadowhunters, and he was hot, so I went looking to see where else he’d appeared and happened upon this show. So I watched some of his scenes on YouTube, and was intrigued by this chick (Octavia) he was with. Then the next scene I saw was Octavia winning the Conclave in 4x10 and making her speech of unity, and I was sold. I was all “I need to know who this girl is and how she got here”. 

So I went back to the beginning, and yes, she was the one. I have A Type when it comes to fandom favourites, and she fits it to a T - the misunderstood badass with a tragic past and a dark side. Octavia Blake, Regina Mills, Magnus Bane, Eliot Spencer, James “Sawyer” Ford, Juliet Burke, they all fit that same archetype. 

 I just love Octavia so much, because she’s been through so much and she’s still standing and she’s grown and changed and evolved and it’s all been beautiful. Even the dark parts. Especially the dark parts. Because without them she wouldn’t be who she is now. I hate it when people say she’s “back to her old self” now. No. No she’s not. She’s a stronger, wiser and more mature version of herself, and she wouldn’t be that without her darkness or without her healing. I could go on more, but for that you can just go to my blog and read all of my meta. BESIDES Octavia, what character or pairing do you like best on t100? Uhhh… well, Octavia’s kind of my brand. So everything does kind of revolve around her. But I also adore Echo, Diyoza (sob!) and Hope, and I’m so glad that canon Hope is like the Hope I wrote in my S7 fic - fearless, reckless, committed to her family and questioning what makes otherwise sensible women willing to die for Bellamy Blake. I ship Niytavia, and a fair amount of my Niytavia fic is written from Niylah’s point of view rather than Octavia’s. I’ve also written some bunker-era Mackson as best friends to Niytavia, but Miller being a jerk in season 6 has kind of soured that ship for me. But after 7x10 I’m hopeful that he’ll pull his head out of his ass so that I can like that ship again, because Jackson is still all kinds of lovely. 

But if we REALLY need to depart from the Octavia sphere, then Murphy’s my man. I don’t have a horse in the race as to which ship he’s a part of, because I can low-key ship him with just about everybody (even Octavia).

why did you decide to start writing for bellarkefic-for-blm? Because I wanted to do something to contribute to the BLM movement, but since I live in a tiny northeastern European country and have no money, going to protests or making donations myself isn’t something I can do. But I can write words so other people donate money, so here I am! 

what’s your writing process like? I don’t have a set process. Sometimes a story just FLOWS and I’ll get it done in a few hours. Sometimes it involves a lot of throwing stuff at the wall and hoping it sticks and days and weeks of contemplation and starting to write and hoping it’ll come together at the end. Same applies regardless of what I’m writing, be it my own idea or someone else’s. what are some things you’d like to recommend? My partner in crime in plotting my S7 epic, who I’ll message at 3 in the morning looking to brainstorm ideas, @easilydistractedbyfanfic . You want Murven? They’ve got you covered. Also, tacos, cheesy pasta, and sushi. Because food is delicious and I’d like to be in a country where I can get tacos again, so if you’re in a position to be able to eat tacos, eat tacos. They’re not available everywhere in the world. You can find @osleyakomwonkru here on Tumblr, or you can find her on AO3 here. If you’d like to request a fic written by her, you can do so via @bellarkefic-for-blm.

#bellarkefic4blm #octavia blake #illian #the 100 #the 100 fanfiction #bellarkefics for blm interview

[100gayicons]

“I had to overcome the name Rock.”

I’ve been working on a personal project regarding “old” Hollywood stars who were gay. Of course, the most famous was Rock Hudson (but there are plenty more). For a gay man of his generation (born 1925) you simply didn’t come out of the closet, whether you were a movie star or just a regular Joe. But by becoming a major movie star in the 1950s, it put pressure on maintaining his secret even more.

Born Roy Scherer, Hudson grew up in Illinois. He joined the Navy in 1944 after graduating from High School. His discharge was in 1946 and he eventually made his way to Hollywood. There he soon came under the wing of talent agent Henry Willson. Willson was famous for the many handsome men he helped to make stars. But first he changed their names to something masculine and rugged. Even then there were rumors in Hollywood that his client repaid him beyond the usual 10% to agents.

Hudson’s first role (uncredited) was in Flighting Squadron” (1948). There is a a legend that Rock himself repeated, that he had only one line but it took 38 takes to get something usable.

After being signed to Universal, he went through it’s talent development program (acting classes, etc.). By 1952 he became a leading man. I imagine that as his fame grew, the stress of keeping his secret grew geometrically.

In 1955 a scandal magazine threatens to expose Hudson. Henry Willson wasn’t about to lose the biggest star in his stable. So he negotiated a deal with the magazine dirt - he gave them dirt on 2 other actors with his agency in exchange for tossing the Hudson story.

Who were the other stars? First western star Rory Calhoun (Francis McCown) who was had spent time in jail for robbing a jewelry store, stealing a car, and escape. Calhoun has a bad boy image that the article actually worked in his favor.

The other client to be thrown under the bus was Tab Hunter (Arthur Kelm). He had been arrested for attending an “all-male pajama party” in 1950. He wasn’t a “star” yet so there was little impact. But Hunter was gay and it must have put more pressure on him to keep his own secret. (Later Hunter would date actor Tony Perkins and dancer Rudolph Nureyev.)

After this close call, Willson insisted that the bachelor Hudson get married. What Woman would agree your a sham marriage? Willson’s secretary Phyllis Gates. Two years the couple divorced and Hudson had an ex-wife in his past to help quell more rumors. (In 1987, after Hudson died of AIDS, she wrote a book where she claimed she never knew Hudson was gay.)

As Hudson’s movie career faded in the 1960s, he found new success in TV shows like “McMilan & Wife” (1971-1977). But those rumors had a way of persisting...

As the story goes, a group of Gay men in Huntington Beach had an annual party. Their 1971 invitation joked “witness the marriage of Rock Hudson and Jim Nabors". The punchline being Hudson would take Nabor’s TV character name and become “Rock Pyle”. Somehow this joke became an urban legend and was spread as rumor.

I even heard about the story as a high school student at the time. It was so weird. Rock Hudson gay? Jim Nabors gay too?!? I didn’t get it.

Well the joke was on Hudson and Nabors. The two men barely knew each other. But from that point they made sure they never appeared in public together.

You see, Jim Nabors, the most famous marine in the USA as “Gomer Pyle” was also gay. Ironically around the time the rumor was circulating, Nabors met Stan Cadwallader, a fireman in Hawaii. The two became lovers and got married in 2013 when it was legal to do so. They were together for 42 years.

Hudson continued acting and in 1984/1985 appeared in a recurring role on the night time soap opera “Dynasty”. But Hudson has been diagnosed as having AIDS in 1984 and his appearance and faulty performance created new rumors. His character was written out of the show sooner than planned (killed off-screen). Shortly after, Hudson appeared at a press conference for his former screen partner Doris Day, to announce her new daytime show. It alarmed his fan. Hudson looked gaunt and at times was incoherent.

Within days Hudson flew to Paris to treat his “liver cancer”. His publicist at first denied he had AIDS but a week later he confirmed it. Hudson never officially announced he was gay, but the AIDS diagnosis pretty much said it for him. By October 1985 Hollywood Movie Star Rock Hudson died at home at the age of 59.

Because AIDS until then was just a “GAY” disease, Actress Morgan Fairchild said, “Rock Hudson's death gave AIDS a face."

Commedian Joan Rivers said, “Two years ago, when I hosted a benefit for AIDS, I couldn't get one major star to turn out. ... Rock's admission is a horrendous way to bring AIDS to the attention of the American public.”

Even though Hudson had been friends with President Ronald Reagan and Nancy, Reagan still avoided even mentioning the term AIDS. A couple of years earlier the White House press secretary joked about the subject and expressed no concern. And shortly before Hudson died, Reagan was proposing cuts in Federal Funding on AIDS research.

Photo key:

Top row: Young Rock, with Henry Willson, with his wife.

Second Row: Rory Calhoun, Tab Hunter & Tony Perkins, Jim “Gomer” Nabors

3rd Row: McMillan & Wife, with the Reagan’s, with Doris Day a few months before he died.

#100 gay icons #rock hudson #in the closet #movie star #tab hunter #sham marriage #rory calhoun #jim nabors #aids #ronald reagan #doris day #henry willson