#Life is a highway and sometimes people speed
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day 24. car sex. with. ningning.
1286 words.
tags.
kinktober ‘23, idol x male reader, car sex, Z O O M I N, deepthroating, semi-public sex, a bit of classic existential dread.
notes.
it is so fucking late i gotta go. speedily, leaf.
It’s at times like these that you want to treasure the most precious resource you have. The sun just sank down the horizon of Alpha-Earth, giving the sky this vibrant, electric aura, from the golden and pastel blue West to the indigo East. Hundreds of headlights leave long trails of yellowish white and rusty red all along the highway, almost as if the lines were already there, and the cars just following their predetermined paths. Your right foot pushes down, getting closer and closer to the asphalt. They can call you old-fashioned, but you love the growl of the rear combustion engine, the sound of rubber on tarmac. Time. They say it gets slower as you approach light speed, you’re far from it, but it’s almost like the clock’s hands move slower as the speedometer needle reaches new peaks. Nothing feels as close to God as this. The car takes a life of its own, and you wish you could simply close your eyes and, feel. The thrill you get when you’re on top of a tall building, and part of you wants to take a step. Those are also just passing moments, you think as you lift and return to cruise speed.
Ningning is beside you like she, sometimes is. Her hand falls on your pants-clad dick and starts rubbing like it does almost every single one of those times; the other times you’re already naked. Not the first time this happens in the car, even at high speed, so you simply turn auto-pilot on (they forced everyone to install it even on cars built before 2035) and let your head fall back in pleasure as she reaches inside your underwear to caress your bare length. Your right hand naturally goes to her almost naked back, needing to feel her skin under your finger pads.
She doesn’t dress to impress; sometimes she doesn’t dress at all. And the navy skintight rags she’s wearing today, well, those almost qualify as the latter. You’re in your usual attire, combat boots, cargo pants, the ones that tighten at the ankle, a close-fitting long sleeve shirt and a windbreaker. She needs your help to lower your pants and underwear, then goes back to stroking your cock, spitting on it for lubrication and reaching down to fondle your scrotum from time to time, causing you to moan up towards the roof of the car.
“Mmmh- Ning?”
“Huh?”
“Mind speeding the process up a little?”
Ningning likes to take her time, you learned that long ago. To make you look at her as she pulls the little lever on the side of your seat to move it backwards, positions herself between your legs, and stamps one long wet kiss on your tip. Or to observe people strolling at the night market, mothers buying their sons balloons, couples eating tanghulu (“You can tell if they’re good kissers just by looking at that” “Want to try with me?” “There’s a more hands-on way”; that was your first shared kiss, and it was more than just hands, on one another’s bodies after that). Right now her blue-tinted eyes are on yours, as her mouth surrounds more and more of your cock and she starts to feel her eyes watering and her lungs lacking air. She resists for almost fifty seconds this time - a good one, though not in her top five - drawing more than a groan from you before she has to back out and seek for oxygen.
“Are you okay?” She nods quickly, her hands cleaning up some of the drool that has accumulated on the sides of her mouth. “I need you right now, Ning.”
Ningning smiles and snorts lightly like she has you in the palm of her hand, and at the same time she has to concede this one to you. You stare at her open-mouthed as she somehow rids herself of her clothes, revealing her supple breasts and thick outer lips to you, and only thanks to your tinted windows not to any car around yours. She straddles your lap and wraps her arms around your neck to kiss you deeply while you grab onto one of her plump thighs with one hand and align your shaft with her already wet slit with the other. Her eyes are finally closed as she focuses on the feeling of your tip swiping up and down her vulva, brushing on her clit at every passage.
She’d been looking outside for almost all the trip, scrutinizing every detail of the gray and neon skyline of Nu-Seoul. Ningning has always had her own, unique wide-angle lens on the world. She has a little plant shelf right below her window in her apartment. It’s in one of those old, gray, samey buildings they were plopping one next to the other back when a growing world population wasn’t just a myth; the place is small and the plaster falling apart. One day she was sitting in front of the window, staring at the new little blossoms on the orchid, or at the bland, shiny neons on the skyscraper behind it, you couldn't really tell.
“Do you ever feel like the world is moving too fast for you?” She asked, sounding dispirited.
“I try to stay on pace”
“I feel… impotent. Like there’s nothing I can do, to change it”
“Do you think it’s on you to change it?”
“I think it’s on me to try.” She turns her gaze towards you, you let out a little sigh.
“When it’s just the two of us,” You sit beside her and wrap your arm around her back. “We can make what we want of our time. Make it speed up, slow down… It’s just ours. No one will ever take that away from us”
What you’re making of it now is pumping your dick in and out of her pussy while gripping onto her full asscheeks while she whimpers in your mouth at the sensation of her hole being stretched. She loves that feeling like she loves the feeling of wet grass on her feet when it’s raining, though meadows are but a distant memory in a city eaten by cement and desolation. Her soft, tight walls squeezing you in a humid embrace. You were wrong; this is what makes you feel like you’re touching the Infinite, reaching Eternity. Ningning moaning in bliss on your lips, on the crook of your neck, on the headrest of the driver’s seat. Her hands not finding rest, switching between your pecs, your jaw, your hips, and her own heat, digits circling at frenzied pace on her clit. You speed your thrusts up, time slows down. It’s a race ending in a photo finish; you can see the end, it’s close for both parties, but you never seem to reach it. Take a look at her pleasured state, savor the moment. Savor her tits as well, feast on them, then slap her ass once, twice. She wasn’t expecting it, her instinctive reaction is to drag her pelvis forwards towards you, giving you a different angle to attack. Exploit that to hit every crevice, every little patch you weren’t able to before, and as she contracts around you in one long, then multiple short and rhythmic flexes of her lower abdomen, each accompanied by a scream that fills the entire cockpit, you have your own release. Spill cups and cups of milky substance into her womb, every spurt coinciding with an upwards thrust and a small bite on her shoulder, as you continuously groan in complete bliss. Then it’s silence, a second, or an eternity, it doesn’t matter anymore, before she talks again.
“Back seat for round two? I want it from behind”
-
footnotes.
now i can’t unsee the asthma periods. you cursed me @erospandemos. gaspingly, leaf.
#kinktober#kinktober 2023#girl group smut#idol smut#female idol smut#kpop fanfic#kpop smut#idol x reader#idol x male reader#aespa#ningning#aespa ningning#aespa smut#ningning smut#aespa ningning smut
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BikeRide
May15th, 2004
tw;mentions of child abuse
before! › here! › after!
-just after the events of DoubleDate…-
Baji has drove down practically every road he knew existed. He loved his bike deeply, and made sure to take good care of it to keep it spotless and loud.
Driving down the road, he almost forgot he should be keeping a slower pace. It wasn’t like he was going fast, contrary to unanimous belief, Baji Mostly followed the law of the road. The only times he really said fuck the speed limit was during the night hours, when his bike roared its loudest, and the streets were at their clearest.
After being caught at a red light, Baji was careful pulling the breaks. “So, how is it? Need me to slow down?” He yelled over his shoulder.
“It’s fine! Just gatta get used to how loud it is!” You yelled back, giggling a little. He smirked. “Anywhere you’re lookin’ to go?” He asked.
A few seconds of deliberation, and you shook your head, smiling. “Surprise me.”
You could barely make out the road over his shoulder, your chin resting against his right back muscle. The street was going by in a way you’d never experienced. Neither of you did much talking. He was too focused on both driving, and how your arms would loosley remain looped around him even when you were leaning back a tad, the air whipping whatever hair peeking out from your helmet.
Being on a bike felt so exhilarating. It felt good. Emotional, you smiled, and rested your forehead against Baji’s back.
“You good?” He yelled out, slowing the motor just a bit so lesson the sound to hear you back.
But your reply wasn’t verbal. Instead, you hugged him from behind, and nodded your head, and he could tell what with your face rubbing against the back of his shirt.
Baji smiled.
“Hang tight, got ‘bout a half hour drive. You ready?” He asked, another red right, and a turn signal indicating he would be traveling Highway.
You grinned, doing your best to look at him, as he was looking back for you.
Through the helmet’s visor, you both caught each others stare, and each others heart skipped a beat. “Ready for anything.”
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯✦
28 Minutes later, and you noticed the ocean coming into view.
Guess he took your statement to surprise you pretty seriously. Because surprised you were, as you gasped with glee.
How cute.
Once he parked, you could see the sign for Rainbow Bridge. “Figure you haven’t been around this way.”
“I thought you said you were driving me around Shibuya.” you said back, the helmet popping off your head like a doll accessory.
“Eh, plans change.” He chuckled, and helped ease you off the bike. Walking down, you saw a few people line the sand, but no crowding.
“You like taiyaki?” Baji asked you. You rose an eyebrow. “Don’t think I know anyone who doesn’t, why?” You asked back.
“There’s a place on the way back Mikey likes. Thought I’d stop by to grab him some before the meet up tonight.”
You nodded. “I’d like that…” you said, looking out to the waves. He was right, somehow. You hadn’t seen the ocean in a really long time. You tried not to wander the thought, but somehow a churning in your chest wrinkled your eyebrows forward.
Baji noticed this. He stayed quiet for a while, but the feeling Chifuyu left him with made him think he should say something.
Chifuyu was making strides in learning things about you. Your interests and insecurities. Baji didn’t have the nerve to bring it up. He knew there was something there. Your parents, the way you divert attention and remove everyone from your life to avoid… something.
He wanted to know more about you.
“Did you used to come to the beach?” He asked.
You blinked. “Uh, not really.” you said softly, looking out deeper. “Maybe once or twice. Not often.”
You weren’t lying. He could tell. But there was still something there, circling around that head of yours.
Baji Keisuke wasn’t smart. He didn’t know what was the right thing to do sometimes, but he always stood by what he believed in. He had to reach.
“What’re you thinking about?”
he asked, plainly. You snapped your head over to him, eye brows still wrinkled in frustration.
His own gaze stayed out at sea, the quiet leaving room for the waves to help you think.
Slowly, you looked back to the sea too.
“Nothing particular.”
It was quiet once again. Baji couldn’t think of what to say.
He wasn’t sure how asking you up front about your issues would help, or backing you into a corner. You could very well shut him out then and there.
He had an idea of what you had going on. He glanced at you. You did not reciprocate.
Baji looked back out to sea.
“I have this friend,” he started. “Kazutora.”
“He was a insecure little brat who didn’t realize his friends were using him for his money. He only had money cause of his shitty dad. But Kazutora was a good kid. He stood up for his friends, shitty as they were to him.”
Baji looked down, a pinch of hurt making through the cracks. “We both… made a mistake.” He confessed. You looked over at Baji, whose hurt expression only stayed stagnant.
“We both fucked up. We bare the same sin. But he’s the one who swung the damn wrench.”
Baji clenched his fists tight.
“He couldn’t handle what he’d done. The shock of it all scared him shitless.” He looked down at your thoughtful expression. Probably trying to figure out why he was telling you this in the first place.
“His dad was… well, he was a shitty and harsh guy, t’say the least. Kazutora never told me much about him, I just saw some of the aftermath, at first.”
“But that night, I think I saw how bad his dad had fucked him up. The way he was talking, devoid of blame… to protect himself. Inside, he’s a fragile guy. Accepting the reality of what he did would have shattered him, yaknow..” he swallowed hard.
“So he… made up all kinds of shit in his head. Things that didn’t even make sense. And yaknow what?” Baji chuckled humorlessly. “I blame that son of a bitch sometimes. His dad.”
“I had a lot of time to think about it. I didn’t get the shit he was saying back then. But I get it a little better now.” He looked down at his feet. “Kazutora‘s family messed him up. And after he killed Shin… I think that’s why he’s became how he is.”
You looked up at Baji’s angry face, a little confused. “And… how is he now?” You asked.
Baji sighed deeply, running a hand through his hair. “Completely batshit delusional.”
“You don’t want the specifics,” you did. “But he isn’t in a good state of mind. Literally can’t accept responsibility. I think if he did, he’d… he’d probably hurt himself, like how he hurt Shin.”
Baji looked back at you, the story bringing each other’s vulnerability to the surface.
“But you remind me of him sometimes.”
You gapped at him in surprise, but didn’t say anything. He chuckled.
“Like I said, not a Bad way. “ he ruffled your hair.
“Can’t think of anything specific right now, but… you act like him sometimes, about your parents. The way you avoid talking about them..” turning his body so that he was facing toward you, looking serious and sentimental.
“I couldn’t protect Kazutora. Can’t go back in time, but I can at least do the shit I think is right now. Right?” He shook his head.
“You’re worried that eventually, something will happen, and change me into someone... else.” You said softly, straightening your posture and avoiding his set stare at you.
“You worry so much. It’s cute.” You chuckled, “but you don’t have worry about me. I’m very self-sufficient. And I’m smart, right? Nothing’s wrong-“ you tried to once again, deflect his topic. “I don’t think so.” He admitted, eyes still on yours.
“I just want you to be honest. I want to know more about you… and I can’t when you shut me out.”
You clinched unto yourself a little. As uncomfortable as the idea of opening up to someone felt… It was Baji. No one to feel scared around.
You let out a shaky smile. “It’s not important.” You said, almost sadly.
“Guess you wouldn’t mind if I asked, then hm?”
“Asked what?”
“What’s got you so shift eyed? I get that your dad’s strict, but there’s more to it. ‘Sup with your weird ass curfew? Your mom too?” He asked carefully.
“Dad…” you sighed, as though thinking about where to begin. “He…”
“He’s harsh. He works too hard at everything, and can’t handle anymore stress. He has a very strict routine, and expects nothing less of me. He proudly raised me, he reminds me often.”
“Mom’s always just been quiet and judgmental.” You rolled your eyes. “She doesn’t talk. I know what she expects of me. She doesn’t need to waste the effort.”
“They work off schedules, and I only see them both one night of the week. Dad refuses that I leave the house. And mom could literally not care less, long as I mind my respects.”
“It’s not bad.” You tried to divert, but the single tear that ran down your face gave you away.
“… you sure about that?” Baji asked softly. You knew he wasn’t trying to be pushy, but he knew more than you suspected.
The bruises from all the inconsiderate shoving or grab for attention. A back handed slap for a backhanded comment.
You couldn’t answer him. Not verbally.
Your face tore into a guilty expression. Yet you remained composed. Biting your bottom lip and trying to blink back the tears that the memories surfaced.
“This,” Baji said softly, and gently reached out, tapping his index and middle finger onto your covered wrist.
“Did he do that?”
You sighed, wrapping your other arm around to avoid his almost touch.
“It’s not important. I handle myself just fine. Once I’m old enough I’ll move out and it’ll be in the past.”
“Just cause you pretend it isn’t happening doesn’t mean that shit doesn’t affect you.”
“I’m not affected,” you tried diverting, but he was right, and it was becoming overwhelming.
“That why you’re crying?” He asked, making you hiss in betrayal.
“I don’t understand what you’re trying to do here Keisuke.” You roughed out.
“I want you to get angry,” he started, in an argumentative tone.
“Why? I’ve accepted that it’s just the way things are. How he will be until I get out.”
“Shouldn’t accept that shit.”
“Well too bad!” You yelled, heat eating up your neck. “I’m tired of crying about it! Getting upset about it only hurts, it’s easier to just ignore it.
“Nothing I do is ever good enough; There’s always something I did wrong, or somehow I should have known better!
“I’m tired of trying to get his approval, it doesn’t mean anything! He only cares about how I represent the family. All I’m good for is— I.. I’m just a waste of fucking space. I don’t care anymore.” You got out, frustrated. You went into hiding then, crouching into the fetal position, hiding your face in your knees.
“I don’t care anymore.” You said softly, small sobs racking you unwillingly.
Baji sat there quietly. He did it, he guessed. Made you mad. Made you cry. Shit. Maybe he didn’t know what he was doing.
“… it’s normal to care about these things, yaknow.” He comforted. “Holding that shit in all the time is going to back you into a corner. I feel like you’ve pushed past a few breaking points already, haven’t you?”
You sniffled, rubbing the unnecessary emotion from your face. “It doesn’t matte-” you tried biting back, really not in the mood for this conversation. But Baji was a persistent mother fucker.
“‘Does fucking matter,” Baji was losing his patience. Baji Keisuke was hot headed and brash, thoughtful, and stupid. “I don’t care how strong you think you are, I’m serious. This feeling’s gonna eat you alive. You’re the most capable person I know. You’re responsible and resourceful, always handling yourself even when nothing is going right. You are not a waste of space. I-“
Baji paused, chocked up.
“Don’t take that shit,”
He was getting tired of your avoiding gaze, latching his left hand out to pull your cheek to look his way.
Your eyes were wide and red, glassy with tears built up from his harsh words. “You don’t take shit from anyone anymore, got that?” Eyes glued to yours, he practically ordered this. “He ever hits you again, don’t take it. You might not be able to hit back, but I sure as hell can,��
You laughed, genuine amusement whipping your face clean for a few moments, before coming back to scene. Baji smiled at you. “You can always crash at my place if you don’t feel safe, got it?” He regained your attention when you tried to release his hold on your cheek and avoid his hot gaze.
Your cheeks burned with how bold he suddenly became.
“I-I can’t just run away from my problems, yaknow..” you huffed, but tried relaxing in his presence. He did make you feel safe, even if you didn’t know how to talk about this.
“Then fight back.” He smirked. “I’ll tell him off right now if y’want.”
“Tell him off?” You chuckled. “What would you even say?”
“Y/n ain’t you’re fucking stress relief, damn prick! Show some respect, ‘f you don’t want me to knock you a tooth loose! Scum! Asshole!!”
You laughed pretty hard at that. Baji’s exaggerated display of delinquent rebellion speech was just too cute. “I love when you talk like that, seriously!” You couldn’t stop laughing, his cute smile pairing at the angelic sound of your joy.
“There you are,” Baji felt himself lightening up from the harsh mood before, happy to see you smiling again. “There’s my girl.”
You stopped at this, eyes widening at his bold name. This surprised him even more. Immediately catching himself, he slaps his hand over his mouth, face drenched in Red. “Not what I meant! I meant! Wait! D-don’t get any weird ideas!” He lied, spinning and spinning in words and excuses.
“I meant! I-I meant, you look more like yourself, now…” he tried calming his palpitating heart. “You’ve been really gloomy this last week… it’s just nice seeing you smile again.”
Your heart caught in your throat, holding back fresh tears.
What do you mean gloomy? He wasn’t wrong, you were having difficulties managing everything coming up, and the added stress of school and family was only dragging you further. “Guess I’m not that good at hiding things, huh?” You chucked without humor.
“Don’t hide it anymore,” he said. As though that was the moment he was waiting for. “Come to me about it. About everything,” he paused. “Anything,” he looked back into your eyes. “I like the real you. I want to be there for you when you struggle. When you feel like crying, or screaming. Tell me about anything that ticks you off, the things you can’t stand.” He rambled on, pouring his heart out.
He couldn’t help how vulnerable he was, letting you see all the shameless feelings. “I’ll treat you to cake at the cafe when you get a high test score, ‘n tell that bitch Futaba to fuck off next time she tries pawning her cleaning duties to you again.”
“T-that’s enough,” you whined and Baji’s heartfeltness. “I get it, I’ll… try not to worry you so much.”
“Ah-!” He hacked, how gross. “Got it mixed up again, honestly. For someone so smart, you just don’t get it!” He ruffled your hair dramatically, thumping his forehead against yours gently. “I worry bout you cause I want to, you just gatta let me, first. Let me be someone who can help you, even if you don’t need it. Not everything’s gatta be on only your shoulders.”
The tension was heavy; the slip of a confession so close on his tongue. Yet even with his passion reaching new heights, he still found himself tongue tied in what he should say next.
“…Gee, you sure know how to cheer a girl up….” You chuckled to yourself, a genuine smile finally breaking through.
And even though there was still so much to say, Baji felt himself cave back inwards, that smile of yours being enough to satiate his yearning heart.
“Thank you…”
“Don’t thank me … “
“Still. Thank you.”
“… Anytime.”
#tokyo revengers#tokyo rev#tokyo revengers x reader#tokyo rev x y/n#Tokyo revengers comfort#Tokyo revengers fluff#Baji#Baji Keisuke#yandere#manga#baji x reader#Baji Keisuke x reader
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Lifting my self-imposed embargo because I'm weird and don't like posting on social media when I'm on vacation.
I'm at a point in my life where I can financially justify at least one international vacation a year and figured I'd finally cross off the Great White North from the bucket list. I'd never been and Andrew hadn't been back in a very long time despite having dual citizenship. Anyways, just got back, and a bullet-point breakdown of the highlights is after the cut:
I wish every international flight was under two hours; EWR to YQB was almost comically fast.
Had my first French conversation with the very nice lady at the car rental counter for about ten minutes. She complemented my pronunciation and grammar, and wished me luck on the trip. Every French interaction after this point was a linguistic battle for my life that I lost (Toutes les Québecois parlent trop vite pour moi).
We had some time to kill before the hotel check-in so we went to a mall in the suburbs just so we'd have a food court with some options. Turns out shopping malls are not only alive and well but fucking thriving in Canada. I haven't seen a mall that packed with people outside of December since the nineties.
Quebec City was very dense with old architecture which made it feel very European. It was also apparently built on a fucking cliff with streets at 60 degree inclines, which also felt very European.
Took a tour of the Quebec Parliament building (beautiful structure), and apparently they used to be bicameral, but voted to abolish their Senate in the 60's and they were the last Canadian province to do so. What a concept.
It's one thing to know on paper that Canada has about 1/8th of the population of the US, but I was not prepared for just how empty the countryside felt. For someone like me, living in the northeast my whole life, the idea that cities in close proximity to each other not having continuous stretches of suburbs and other smaller cities connecting them was completely foreign.
On the highways I kept thinking I was speeding because I'd look down at the dashboard and see the number "100", but 100 km/h is only like 62 mph, which is nothing.
Similarly, I kept getting sticker shock every time I spent money, and kept having to remind myself that $1 CAD was like $0.73 USD while we were there.
It was really cool to see that the complex for the 1976 Montreal Olympics is still maintained and actively used (we stumbled upon a skateboarding competition and I did not feel cool enough to be in that crowd). Sometimes you hear horror stories about Olympic villages bankrupting cities and falling into disuse afterwards, but that's definitely not the case here.
Montreal is apparently known for their local bagel culture, but their bagels have enormous holes in the middle of them, so you have less cross-sectional area for spreads and they don't really work for sandwiches. My faith in NJ/NY bagel superiority remains intact.
Every city we went to had dedicated bike lane infrastructure and young families with kids, but Montreal definitely had the most of both. Tons of parks, too. Simultaneously felt like a larger and smaller city than I was expecting.
Poutine is okay, but I wasn't prepared for the cheese to squeak when you bite into it. Very odd sensation.
The main Parliament building for the federal government in Ottawa (Centre Block) is stunning, but closed; apparently it's been under renovation since 2019 and isn't expected to be reopened until 2032! In the meantime, we took a tour of where the lower House of Commons is currently meeting. We learned that their electoral districts are routinely re-drafted by a non-partisan committee and that they occasionally add new seats to the legislature to account for changes in population. I had to seethe jealously in silence for the rest of the tour.
Also toured their Supreme Court building (way more Art Deco than I was expecting). We learned that there's currently a vacancy because a Justice recently retired because they're required to step down when they turn 75. I had to seethe jealously in silence for the rest of the tour.
Every single city had automatic/self-serve parking garages where you didn't have to interact with a human (which I was very thankful for), but in Ottawa they have this little jingle that the machine sings at you when you take your ticket, which I found very amusing.
On the drive to Toronto we took a quick detour into the Thousand Islands (yes, like the salad dressing) and visited Boldt Castle, which is technically in New York state. After seeing it in practice, the idea of living on your own private island is more appealing than ever.
Toronto feels like an exercise in what happens when a nation's largest city is allowed to grow without being hemmed in by ridiculous geography. As someone who grew up in NYC, this is another concept foreign to me. The GPS did get very tripped up navigating a particularly gnarly interchange however.
Toured the Ontario Legislative Assembly (yet another beautiful building). At this point we were really good at asking tour guides stuff like, "so if happens, do you guys have a plan?" To which they would reply, "well, no, but let's just hope that never happens!"
I now understand why the Great Lakes are effectively freshwater inland seas; you really cannot see the other shore, and Lake Ontario isn't even the biggest one!
YYC to EWR was under an hour. That's definitely going to spoil me for future trips going forward.
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dating harley quinn would include:
constant laughter. jokes that make no sense, have no punchline, yet still leave you both delirious from giggling so much. your sides hurt with her all the time.
harley is a roller coaster of the most beautiful variety. she’s beautiful and sweet, playful and brilliant. she brightens up every room she enters and you never let her forget it.
behind all the color, laughter, and smoke bombs hides a lot of insecurity and pain. the two of you don’t really talk about it, about him, but you know enough. instead of focusing on that, you can tell that she just wants to charge forward in life and leave it all behind her. while that may not be the healthiest of ways to cope, you can’t really fault her for it. nor can you complain about being dragged along with her on her wacky adventure.
greasy diner food, roller skates, and speeding along the highway blasting music to drown out the assholes that honk at you. there’s never a dull moment.
even in the safety of your own apartment harley brings a certain sense of vibrancy. curled up on your couch, unable to tell whose limbs are whose, she’ll babble on about anything and everything. you’ve learned all the dirty details of gotham’s underbelly thanks to her rambling. she even let it spill that harvey dent’s got a secret tattoo that the tabloids would just die to find out.
speaking of gotham’s underbelly, harley isn’t one to keep you out of it. she trusts you to handle your own. you’re dating her, aren’t ya? got to be some sort of bad ass to do that. even if you’re a civilian, there’s nowhere else she’d want you to be than with her. though that might mean having to teach you some tips and tricks to keep outta too much trouble.
who would’ve known that picking a lock was so hard? or that hot wiring your car while your girlfriend shoots glitter grenades at gotham pd would be so thrilling.
but for all the thrills and chills, harley also loves a romantic, chill night in. she loves to cuddle you, almost never letting your out of her arms even in public. she’ll kiss you, hug you, smack your ass, and she doesn’t give a damn who sees her do it!
anybody with a complaint about your relationship mysteriously ends up covered in pink paint and chicken feathers. or worse, if they keep pushing her. anyone who trash talks her baby is gonna get a face full of harley fuckin’ quinn, that’s for sure.
expect to be friends with lots of people you really never imagined being friends with. one day poison ivy will show up at your house with a small potted plant and warn you that if anything happens to it you die, the next black frickin’ canary shows up to ask if harley has stolen her tights again. harley collects people, her heart too big and vibrant for her not to be buddies with half of gotham (despite half of gotham wanting to shoot her, of course). some of these people, over time, become your people too. and it isn’t that uncommon for cassandra cain to be found snoring on your couch, for catwoman’s heels to be tossed in the corner of your kitchen while she digs through your fridge, or for the little old lady down the street to knock on your door with a freshly baked quiche.
bruce loves you, and i mean abso-frickin’-lutely adores you. the precious pup curls up around you every night when you head to bed, begs for treats every time you go to the kitchen, and never leaves your side when you leave the house without harley. heck, sometimes you cuddle the sweet boy more than you cuddle your own girlfriend. and she doesn’t even have the heart to be mad about it. (she’ll pout, though. you know she’ll pout.)
at the end of the day, treat harley quinn with kindness and respect and she’s gonna love you.
kiss her in the rain, bring her breakfast in bed, dance around in your underwear to the hairspray musical. understand that life is a blast and you gotta make the best out of it. kiss her pretty face all over, swing her around in your arms, blow raspberries on her skin. make her laugh, make her smile, and she’s yours.
she’s weird and makes no sense sometimes, and some of her antics raise your blood pressure to alarming levels. but there is no one else who’ll rock your world the way she can.
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spinning (for you)
There’s something magical about the open road at night.
They’re in the middle of nowhere, driving down a deserted highway in Steve’s Bimmer. It’s just them and the darkness and the endless Indiana summer air. Sometimes they drive under a street lamp and in the sudden puddle of light, Steve will be able to see Eddie's features. His big dark eyes and soft smile and the dimples in his cheeks. Steve is glad the road is empty and there are fields on either side because he can barely pay attention to the road when Eddie looks like this.
He can’t look away. Especially not when it feels like every glimpse could be his last.
He’s mourning a relationship that isn’t yet over, but Steve’s been here before. He knows what it looks like when someone is falling out of love. He knows the feeling of kisses that only he initiates. The taste of bitter blood in the back of his mouth.
He doesn’t think Eddie has realized it yet, that they’re racing towards the end. And Steve is nothing if not stubborn. He will hang onto this relationship by his fingertips until he’s bloody and bruised and he won’t let go until Eddie asks him to.
It took Nancy almost a year to give up on Steve. Steve wonders if Eddie will be able to last longer.
Probably not. They’re both too big for him, these beautiful, passionate people. Nancy with her sweet smile and her steady hands and her dreams of seeing her name in bylines in newspapers far, far away from Hawkins. Eddie, with his boundless energy and his quick fingers and his dreams of playing on stage for masses of adoring fans.
Steve was never going to be enough for either of them. He should just be happy to have gotten a bit of their time.
But he’s an inherently greedy thing. He wants forever and never more so than when he knows it’s out of reach.
There’s nothing certain in this life but death and taxes and Robin, and Steve loves her more than anything else but she’s part of him. She’s his Self, like his blood and his guts and his brain.
Steve can be lonely even with Robin there. Not lonely like a big, empty house. Lonely like the static of a record spinning after the music has already ended.
She didn’t choose him. They’re trauma-bonded soulmates and she can’t separate Steve from herself any more than he can separate her from himself.
Steve wants someone to want him, not just need him.
He’d thought, for a moment, that Eddie could be that person. He’d fallen hard and fast, the way he always does, and miraculously Eddie had felt the same. They’ve had months of lazy kisses and rough sex. Of Eddie reading books aloud with Steve’s head resting in his lap. Of Steve cooking breakfast and the two of them sharing it, bite by bite. Of slow-dancing in Steve’s living room and head-banging in Eddie’s trailer. Of holding each other close after nightmares and mouthing over sun-warmed skin in grassy fields.
Now, the late season heat feels heavier every day, one last gasp of summer before autumn sweeps it away, and Steve knows that when the cold comes it will find them already dead.
Steve’s memory hasn’t been the same since the series of concussions, but he’s trying so hard to pay attention to all these little moments, like if he presses them hard enough into his synapses he might be able to keep them.
Like right now, Eddie rolling the window down as they speed down the darkened roads. The wind lifts up Eddie’s curls, swirling them around so that Eddie is all flyaway hair and flashes of pale skin. He’s grinning, sticking a hand out the window to feel the air fly by, singing along to a new metal song that came out last week.
He already knows all the words.
“Ain’t it funny how it is? You never miss it ‘til it’s gone away,” Eddie sings.
That’s not true, Steve thinks. I miss you and you aren’t even gone yet.
Eddie launches into the chorus, which even Steve has heard enough times to know the words to. The hazards of dating a metalhead.
“Come on, Stevie!” Eddie says. “I know you know it!”
He grabs one of Steve’s hands off the wheel and starts moving it back and forth in a silly little dance. Steve knows better than to attempt headbanging while driving (and Eddie laughs at his headbanging anyway, says Steve is too careful not to mess up his hair) so he shimmies side to side in a way that doesn’t fit the metal music at all.
Eddie whoops like he doesn’t care.
As the second verse comes on, Eddie sings at the top of his lungs and Steve rolls all the windows down. The wind whips through the car and it feels like they’re sitting in the middle of a storm. It’s electric.
“Too much time on my hands! I got you on my mind!” Eddie sings. He’s lit up, completely in his element. Eddie feels larger than life sometimes and here, grinning as he sings into the abyss of the night sky, Steve could almost mistake him for a figment of his imagination. A pipe dream; too good to be true.
The chorus explodes from the speakers and Steve joins in on the singing.
“So-o-o, understand, don’t waste your time always searching for those wasted years!”
Eddie’s fingers are tight around Steve’s, rings digging into his skin, and Steve hopes they’ll leave a mark, something he can look at later. A little piece of proof that this was real, that Eddie Munson chose to hold his hand.
“Face up! Make your stand! And realize you’re living in the golden years!”
They’re dancing so hard the car is bouncing, Eddie’s hair flying everywhere, the wind whistling through the windows and the music roaring through the speakers. Steve’s blood is thrumming and in this moment, he feels so, so alive.
He isn’t sure sometimes, that all of this is real. Isn’t convinced that he wasn’t eaten by a demodog in a junkyard. That he didn’t die deep in a Russian base.
And even when he thinks he’s alive, he isn’t sure he’s real. Who the hell is Steve Harrington? A boy with a silver spoon in his mouth and parents he occasionally forgets exist? A guy who will practice keg stands in secret until he makes himself sick, all so he can volunteer to drink at a party and have everyone’s eyes on him? A devoted boyfriend who leaves notes in his girlfriend’s locker and kisses her in hallways, like he’s performing love for the masses, and doesn’t ever notice that she doesn’t love him back? An infallible hero, who can take hit after hit and always get back up?
Who is Steve when nobody is watching? Does he even exist?
In this moment, he feels like he does. He can feel Eddie’s skin and his own heartbeat and he thinks he likes whatever creature is sitting in the driver's seat, even if he’s not sure it’s Steve Harrington.
So understand
Don’t waste your time always searching for those wasted years
Face up, make your stand
And realize you’re living in the golden years
As the song ends, Eddie whoops, loud and long. Steve laughs, enamored, and Eddie presses a kiss to the back of Steve’s hand.
The next song to come on the station is Mötley Crüe and Eddie groans at the glam metal.
Steve takes advantage of Eddie’s disdain to flip the station. This is how they pass control back and forth, each getting to stay on their preferred station until a song they don’t like comes on. Then the other person gets to take control of the music.
Steve doesn’t particularly care what genre of music he listens to, so he usually gets more songs in a row. But metal songs last way longer than any other genre, so Steve and Eddie get about even time on each of their stations.
A few months ago, Steve had thought that was a sign from the universe that they fit together. That they were in balance.
A few months ago, Eddie tried to pretend to like glam metal so he could stay on his station and Steve didn’t know him well enough to call him on it. It was only once they’d been on Eddie’s station for two hours that Steve even thought to question it. In his defense, he was too busy watching Eddie headbang and sing and smile to pay attention to anything else.
Last week, Steve lied about liking a song because he wanted to stay on his station for longer and Eddie rolled his eyes, not like he thought Steve was being cute, but like he was genuinely annoyed.
Steve is always endearing until he isn’t, but he can never figure out why. He doesn’t think he changes his behavior — people just get bored or annoyed after a while.
There’s something in him that’s unlovable. He’s not sure if it’s so deep within him that it takes people a while to find it or if it’s something obvious and superficial that grows tiring after a while, grating from overexposure.
But Steve can feel the sands of time running low.
“Alright!” says the DJ on the radio. “Next up, we have a request. This is for Jimmy, from Angela. This is Thank You For The Music by ABBA.”
Eddie lets out a loud groan and dramatically curls up in the passenger seat, hiding his face in his hands.
Steve grins. For all that Eddie disdains pop radio, he has a fondness for ABBA. Steve has caught him many times bobbing his head along to the beat. Once, he even caught him singing Gimme Gimme Gimme, though Eddie maintains that when he does it, it’s out of gay rebellion and not appreciation for ABBA.
“Nope!” Steve says cheerily. “I’m not letting you get away with this!”
He pulls the car onto the shoulder of the road and gets out, leaving his door open as he rounds the car to Eddie’s side. Eddie feigns reluctance but he lets Steve drag him out of the passenger seat and to the front of the car. They’re standing in the beam of the headlights, the only spot of light in the empty road, and Steve pulls Eddie into his arms. Properly. Like they’re slow-dancing, the way they do in Steve’s living room the nights they’re soft with each other.
Those nights have been getting fewer and farther between and Steve wants one last dance. Here, outside the Hawkins town limits, in a place that’s both nowhere and anywhere. No expectations or history or promises to way them down. Nothing but the cicadas and the music filling the air.
Thank you for the music, the songs I’m singing
Thanks for all the joy they’re bringing
The song is a bit too upbeat for a slow dance, but Steve doesn’t let that deter him. He marches them back and forth, Eddie laughing as his feet get stepped on, and Steve feels a thrill at making him laugh.
He keeps them going through the verse, but he can see Eddie beginning to look around. Maybe it’s the woods or the darkness or the bad memories creeping in. It’s normal. It’s fine.
Except that Eddie is always getting distracted of late. Always looking away.
Steve feels like a performer, desperately trying to be the star of the show. Like a child, asking his parents to be proud.
Who can live without it? I ask in all honesty
What would life be
Steve spins out dramatically, throwing his arms wide, then twirls back into Eddie’s arms. Eddie fumbles to catch him, their feet getting tangled up, and when Eddie tips over, off-balance, Steve turns the motion into a dip.
They’re clumsy and unpracticed and he’s sure the dip looks terrible. But Eddie’s yelp of fear cuts off into a surprised bark and when he meets Steve’s eyes, he’s impressed.
Steve pulls Eddie upright again and they’re close together, breathing the same air, Eddie’s eyes huge, pupils tiny in the glow of the headlights.
“You’ve got moves, Harrington,” he says.
Steve smiles. Doesn’t say that a month ago Eddie would have called him Stevie.
“Only when I have someone worth using them on,” he says instead, and it’s the kind of flirty, glib comment that belongs at the beginning of a relationship. Not at the end of one.
It makes Eddie’s face fall a bit and Steve doesn’t know what he’s done wrong. He was only trying to get Eddie to smile.
He’s a disco ball; he’s a record. Spinning endlessly. Anything, anything as long as it will keep you looking.
He wishes he knew what Eddie wants so he could become it. But he thinks it’s already too late.
The bridge slows down and Eddie starts to take a step back, like the song is over. But Steve wants his perfect last dance.
He pulls Eddie in close. His arms wrapped all the way around Eddie’s torso, Eddie’s folded over his shoulder. He tucks his face against Eddie’s neck, against all that soft, dark hair. Eddie smells like cigarettes and motor oil and the 2-in-1 shampoo Steve scoffs at but secretly loves the smell of.
Eddie pulls him closer and they sway, side to side, way too slowly to match the music.
Without a song or a dance, what are we?
So I say thank you for the music
For giving it to me
As the last notes of the song ring out, Steve pulls Eddie into a kiss. It’s achingly slow, sweet but hungry. A desperate, tragic goodbye.
Eddie steps away first, giving Steve a strange look. He starts for the passenger side door and Steve can’t bear to see this end, so he blurts out “Let’s lie on the hood. We can stargaze.”
Eddie stops and turns and for a moment Steve hopes. But then he says, “Maybe another night, baby. I’m tired and it’s late. We should get going.”
You’re always going. I’m always watching you leave.
“Yeah,” Steve says. Swallows down the thickness is his voice. “Okay. Let’s go.”
He gets back into the car. Lets Eddie turns the radio down as he down a wide U-turn and points them back towards Hawkins.
He glances over at Eddie, who is staring out the window. Watching the scenery go by, maybe. Or lost in thought. Somewhere Steve can’t reach him.
Steve blinks furiously as he refocuses on the road, his throat tight. He wishes they were more than this. He wishes he were enough.
He would be a firework show if it would make Eddie smile. He would be Eddie’s favorite lover; his stalwart best friend; the world’s best actor. He would be Eddie’s favorite song.
But he can’t do any of that. All he can do is blink back the tears, put on a performance of a smile, and drive Eddie home.
~~~
I'm still editing this, so feel free to give feedback. It's meant to give mirrorball vibes, is that coming through?
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☆,
biker! ken hcs! (& car! guy ken cuz why not??)
biker ken
he rides a ninja 400.
before meeting you, he was for sure reckless. but after the two of you got involved with each other, he promised himself he’d be a lil more careful for you
everyone knows riding a motorcycle is dangerous as fuck, so he never wanted to have you worried
sometimes there’s night where he may go a lil too fast & ends up getting chased by police..
he texts you & tells you to have the garage open so he can just come in & have you close it immediately.. trust, you end up reprimanding him
he always takes you on rides when the sun is setting. idc, he tells you it reminds him of you
does wheelies just to scare you
one day you ask him to teach you how to ride & he says “last i checked, you’re already good at that”
you were left confused until it hit you.. “that is NOT what i meant!”
whenever he gets hit on, he mentions you with so much quickness
if a girl does happen to ask for his number, he gives them yours 😭😭😭 they don’t even know until they text you
if he ever gets injured, the first person he goes to is you, even if he feels that you can’t help. you’re his sense of comfort
like boy could lose a whole leg nd he’d prob call you first to let you know LMAO
his friends hate you bc they say you made him “soft” but you disagree completely!!!
you fear for your life half the time you're his backpack
he speeds through the smallest little cracks between vehicles on the freeway
he uses anything as a ramp & you hate it
when he's making sharp turns he touches the fucken ground with his hand "look how close we are!"
whenever you're in your car & he's on his bike, he always gaps you nd you think it's so mean. yet, he laughs every time
sometimes when he picks you up, he makes sure to make the most noise ever. that's mainly how you can tell he's arrived
i feel like his wardrobe is all black. the only color he has are the clothes you buy for him bc you tease him for being too emo
you also buy him a pikachu skin for his helmet as a joke, but he ends up loving it
he plays deftones on his rides, that or cigs after sex idc.. maybe even sign crushes motorist.. i feel like he's always in his feelings LMAO
whenever you guys are stopped next to a bus or a big semi truck, he always touches it
records pop vids & sends them to you..
car guy ken!
i honestly don't know what kind of car ken would drive..
it's between a supra mk4, nissan 350/370z, or maybe a 2013 bmw 3 :>
i mainly see him in a supra ngl
but whatever car ken drives, he puts WORK into.
you love being around whenever he's working on his cars tho, he'll be all dirty with oils nd shit but its so rawr
ken gets excited over new car parts too
one time you bought him a carbon fiber front bumper and he damn near cried over it
he put starry lights on the roof of the inside of his car to give you something pretty to look at
he lets you keep your little essentials in his glove department or his arm rest
you leave a scrunchie around his gear shift & glosses in his cup holder, plus lil makeup wipes in the lil side compartment on the door
i fear ken has road rage.. he hates slow drivers and flips people off so fucken often
not only that but this man never goes the speed limit???
his car is all blacked out.. so flying down dark highways with his headlights off is his fav thing to do
he hates when you opt out for driving your car.. especially when there's other cars being loud nd making noise. he feels left out, like a puppy taken from its owner
"baby, i wanna make noise too.." with the biggest pout you've ever seen.
one day he suggests that you guys save up for miatas so that your cars can make cute faces at each other & date. it was the sweetest idea ever
car guy ken handles all your car troubles. he's like your personal mechanic
he does donuts in empty parking lots
he did a burn out in your exes drive way & you didn't find out until said ex texted you fucken PISSED
"ken what the fuck??" "what.." "you know what!" "nuh uh."
takes you to car meets so he can teach you more about different cars & the mods you can add to them
can tell a car from the sound the engine is making..
lets you drive his car once & it was the scariest thing he'd ever done
"SLOW DOWN PLEASE"
"i'm going 70!??!"
"this is my baby, i don't want you to crash..."
whenever a car passes him, he takes it as a challenge & gaps them.
#anime#fanfic#manga#kaneki x reader#kaneki ken#headcannons#tokyo ghoul#fluff#tokyo ghoul re#kaneki#kaneki x you#xoti writes
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Anyone Anywhere Anytime
Turns out I still have some Gen Rex brainworms to expunge.
AO3
.
Anyone Anywhere Anytime
(Or, five times someone close to Rex became an EVO, plus one.)
.
The first rule of the war was that anyone could become an EVO. Anything, too, but making sure people knew it could happen to people was a higher priority than strict accuracy. It could happen to a stranger. It could happen to a celebrity. It could happen to a poor man. It could happen to a rich man. It could happen to the kid down the street. It could happen to your best friend. It could happen to your partner. It could happen to you.
Anyone.
No one was safe.
The second rule was that EVOs could show up anywhere. The Amazon Rainforest? Check. The Sahara Desert? Check. The middle of the ocean? Check. Antarctica? Check. The middle of Mexico City? Check. Kyiv? Check. Highway during rush hour? Check. The middle of a corporate office? Check. High security military facilities? Check. Wherever there was life, there were EVOS.
Anywhere.
Nowhere was safe.
The third rule was that EVOs could be created at any time. Sometimes you’d get a warning, a split second before the day’s unluckiest person, pet, or petri dish got an unwanted upgrade courtesy of the pervasive nanite plague. Day or night, dusk or dawn, it didn’t matter. Asleep in bed, on top of the world, down in the dumps, stressed, relaxed, whatever. No one knew what the trigger was. There might not even be a trigger. So it paid to always stay on your toes. Always vigilant.
Anytime.
No time was safe.
Anyone could become an EVO, anywhere, at any time.
.
#1: Six
.
Rex was not a fan of baseline hand-to-hand lessons. Like, okay, it was cool to be able to do some of this stuff, but, honestly, whenever he got into a fight, he’d be using his builds, so it felt sort of… unnecessary. Especially compared to more practical practice.
Six raised an eyebrow so that it arched above the top edge of his sunglasses. “Are you going to tell that to Van Kleiss when he manages to drain your nanites again?” he asked.
“Uh, no. I don’t really chat with Van Kleiss when I’m fighting him.”
A second eyebrow joined the first.
“Okay, okay, but that’s banter. That’s different. We’re not, like, actually talking.”
“I see,” said Six, before aiming a punch directly at Rex’s face.
“Ack!” said Rex, barely dodging it. It was definitely a ‘training speed’ punch, telegraphed way more than Six usually would. “Six! I wasn’t ready!” A common complaint of Rex’s during training.
“Someone who attacks you while your nanites are offline won’t wait until you’re ready, either.” An equally common response from Six. It was a whole song and dance. Routine, really. Their own form of banter.
Rex knew Six loved it. Probably. Possibly? Okay, it was sometimes hard to figure out if Six loved anything, or even if he liked anything, but one time Rex held off on the banter and Six walked him down to Holiday’s lab for a full body checkup, so that was something, right?
Anyway, they continued lightly sparring for a few minutes before Six put him into a serious hold. “Alright,” he said, “today, we’re going to work on breaking–”
Six went silent, his body stiffening and going still.
“Uh,” said Rex, “Six? You okay?” He reached up behind him, or tried to– Six’s hold was still solid and really did its job of making sure Rex couldn’t grab or hit Six. “Is this supposed to be some kind of ‘figure it out on your own’ thing? What’s going on?”
He didn’t get a response from Six. He did, however, get a response from his nanites.
{alert: t102-INITIAL activation of b6066-ZETA detected in range. query: action.}
“Oh, crap,” said Rex, flailing. b6066-ZETA was the batch number for the primary population of nanites in Six– A fact he’d thought hilarious when he’d first managed to find out. He didn’t know what t102-INITIAL meant, but then, he’d never been in close physical contact with someone who was going EVO.
{alert: t103-CASCADE activation of b6066-ZETA detected in range. query: action.}
{command: abort activation.} Rex sent back.
{error:} said the nanites, because of course Rex would miss step one under these circumstances, {not connected. alert: t103-CASCADE activation of b6066-ZETA and b5534-ALEP detected in range. alert: t102-INITIAL activation of b6002-THETA detected in range. query: action.}
Rex didn’t need direct skin-to-skin contact with an EVO to be able to cure it. He did, after all, wear gloves, and he could work through an EVO’s clothing, if necessary.
But he did have to make a connection, he did have to send his nanotechnology into the target, at last at first, to take over and deactivate the other nanites. And he hadn't done that yet. Normally invisible dermal nanite colonies lit up and moved as Rex forced them into action.
{command: abort activation.}
{processing…}
"Okay, okay," said Rex, more than half his attention on minding the connection. "It's processing. Not everything is instant, right?"
{processing…}
“Just… just hang in there, okay? Six?”
{processing…}
Rex didn’t know what he’d do if Six was incurable. Six was… He was the first person Rex had really met. The first person whose name he knew. The person who’d been with him the whole time, who had protected him in the ruins of Mexico City, and later from people like Dr. Fell. He was the one who taught Rex to survive, who was still teaching him how to survive.
Rex didn’t know what he’d do, if he lost Six.
{alert: command aborted by secadmin-SIX. query: action.}
“What?” gasped Rex, affronted. “Admin? Since when is Six an admin? Who decided that?”
{admin_history: priadmin-REX (priloc: b4739-BETA, locus: hsapiens1-REX) designated user-SIX (priloc: b6066–ZETA, locus: hsapiens2036606606-SIX) secadmin on–}
Six spasmed and pushed Rex away, practically throwing him across the room and breaking the connection Rex had to the nanites in Six. Rex rolled, ironically making use of some of the first things Six had ever taught him, and bounced back to his feet just in time to watch as Six’s nanites took over.
Limbs and fingers lengthened. Skin went shiny, green and scaled. Six made a terrible, terrible sound.
“I-It’s going to be okay,” said Rex. Because it had to be. This was just… this had to be because it was in the middle of an activation, not because Six was incurable. Once it ran its course, and Rex was able to make contact again, it would be fine. Six would be fine. And then Rex could sit down and figure out what priadmin, secadmin, and locus meant, as well as why his nanites decided to be so talkative today.
{help_info: topadmin, priadmin, secadmin, and user are the four access levels designated on standard nanOS.}
The last three fingers on each of Six’s hands lengthened further, and fused together, forming long swords not unlike his magna blades. A long tail grew from the base of his spine, stabilizing his center of gravity.
“Also, please don’t go crazy, because I really, really don’t want to fight you like this.”
{help_info: a locus is an integrated biomechanical entity formed of all nanites within or controlled by a biological organism and that biological organism. individual loci are designated by–}
Rex dodged out of the way as one of those swords came down at him. Great! Six was crazy. This was bad, bad, bad, bad.
He called up his nanites into his smack hands and deflected the next blow, pushing forward even as he winced against the sound it made. Six flipped over his hand, or tried to. He got clear of Rex, yes, but he fumbled both the flip itself, and the landing. Rex had never seen Six fumble anything before.
Except footballs and basketballs. But Rex was pretty sure that was on purpose.
(A magna blade through a ball was a clear message, after all.)
But it made sense that Six would fumble now. Nanites themselves could only control so much, after all, and still relied on their hosts’ brains for a lot of things. Six wasn’t used to his new body plan. So, fumbling.
Rex lunged for Six again, this time managing to grab his tail, but Six stabbed one of his swords right through one of the tendon-like cables that controlled the grip of his smack hands, and his hand flew open, letting Six escape, bounce off one of the walls, and hit Rex’s back, just over the shoulders. Rex hit the ground again, but not for long. His boogie pack pushed Six off before he could do any damage, and man that was close.
Six skirted Rex’s counterattack, and almost managed to get Rex in the same hold he’d been in just minutes ago, but that was fine. Contact was contact. Rex was not going to be picky. Not today.
{alert: contact made with locus-hsapiens2036606606-SIX. query: action.}
{command: shutdown. command: extract activated nanites.}
{processing…}
"Come on, Six, let me do this, please."
{processing…}
"Because I don't know what I'd do without you."
{processing…}
"Also, your sword fingers are getting way closer to my face than I thought they would and it's really freaking me out!"
{waiting… alert: command accepted, extraction initiated.}
Rex sighed in relief as he felt Six’s frame change behind him and the extra weight of Six’s extracted activated nanites settled inside him. Six’s grip on him loosened, and Six himself tilted back until they were lying flat on the floor.
“Six?” said Rex.
“Yes, Rex?”
“Just checking.” What, exactly, he was checking went unsaid. “Just don’t do that to me again, okay?”
Six patted Rex’s shoulder and made no promises either way.
.
.
.
#2: Caesar
.
"It isn't that simple," said Caesar, glaring up at the over-bright and too-high screen. If he didn’t already hate White for how he was treating his little brother (“It doesn’t matter how many dubious long-lost relatives crawl out of the woodwork, he isn’t leaving Providence.”) he might hate him for how he’d arranged things so that he’d be able to, quite literally, look down on everyone.
“Explain,” ordered White.
“I shouldn’t have to,” said Caesar, eyes flicking briefly to the doctor who’d joined them just a moment ago. Dr. Holiday, he thought her name was. “I know I’m not the only scientist from the project who survived the nanite event.” Rylander, Meechum, and Van Kleiss, at least, had to still be around. “You should already know the answers to these questions. Is this some sort of test?”
“Humor us,” said Dr. Holiday, clicking a pen and resting the tip against a notepad. “You might have a unique perspective on the question, especially in regards to Rex.”
Caesar sighed roughly. In regards to Rex. Yes. Yes, he supposed he did, but he’d really rather spend this time in a lab, trying to get the last kinks out of Rex’s programming before… before.
But these people wouldn’t let him do that until he gave them what they wanted.
“Fine,” he said, blinking back a touch of dizziness. A side effect of near light speed trave? “There are several roadblocks to the goal of ‘curing everyone.’ The first is that not all nanites are the same. By the time the nanite event happened, there were hundreds of different sub-projects. The nanite project as a whole had hundreds of the best scientists money could buy, and it ran for over a decade. There was even a major programming fork in the early days, so there’s the possibility that there are two different operating systems at play, in addition to different models of nanite with different programs. Some of those programs were meant to run on humans. Most of them weren’t. Some of them weren’t meant to interface with biological entities at all. And the more recent batches were designed with limited self-programming capability, so that they could interface better with individual hosts. There is no one size fits all solution. Even if you’re talking about Rex, his nanites just aren’t going to be able to communicate with all other nanites.”
“What about the Omega nanite?” asked Dr. Holiday. “Isn’t that supposed to be a master control?”
“Eh, well, there are master controls and then there are master controls. In theory, he can use it to talk to all the other nanites, in practice–”
“What about kill codes? Emergency stops?” asked White, leaning forward.
“That’s the second problem. There might have been emergency shutdown codes, or emergency self-destruct codes, but only a few people ever had access to them. Top admins. We wanted to put these things into people. ¿Lo entiendes? We didn’t want just anyone to be able to mess with them. Which loops back to the other part. Even with a master control, if it’s changing someone’s body, it needs user permission.”
White scoffed. “Yeah, and you’ve really done a stellar job with that.”
Caesar made a face but didn’t dispute the point. Things had gone very wrong. “I think that might be the main stumbling block for Rex. That wasn’t implemented yet in everything, but if it was tagged as complete and for humans, there’s that limit there. Also, if the onboard AI has any integration troubles, getting permission would also be problematic. No communication, no permission.”
“Wait– Onboard AI?” Dr. Holiday asked, looking interested.
“Later, Holiday,” said White. “What are the other problems?”
“Frankly? Admin levels and programming tools. It’s my understanding that most of the original project equipment was lost in the event, and if you had anyone with top admin permissions, this would be a very different conversation.”
“What is your admin level?” asked Holiday.
“I have primary admin permissions,” said Caesar, “with a few special permissions on the computer in my lab.” He jerked his head in its general direction. “But most of my access - my primary location - was from my computer in Abysus. I don’t know if I can replicate that from a secondary. And there’s not a chance I’d be recognized if I ‘went EVO.’ I don’t have a registered locus in the system. Although, I suppose Rex might be able to promote me to secadmin if… but that’s behind a partition… he was ten! Of course we put it behind a partition…” We being Caesar and his parents. His parents who were…
“Great. Whatever. I’ll leave the technobabble to the nerds. Salazar. Don’t forget. I’m watching you.” The screen flicked out.
Holiday stepped forward. “Let me show you to your lab space,” she said. “I think we do have a lot to talk about.”
“Actually, if it’s all the same to you… From my perspective, my day started with the nanite event, the death of my parents, and time travel. I’d like to take a moment to… catch up with current events.”
“Oh,” said Holiday, softly. “I hadn’t– Of course. But you should still know where the labs are.”
Caesar managed a weak smile. While it was true he was unsettled by recent-to-him events, he was mostly saying this to get Holiday out of his hair. She was probably expecting him to break down, now, but Caesar had never been much of one for emotional affect… Although he’d been expecting something more from the deaths of his parents… His principal emotions at the moment were continuing hatred for White Knight and… worry for Rex.
This was not a good environment for him, he was sure. It already wasn’t a good environment for Caesar, and he’d been here, what, five hours? And Caesar wasn’t being used as a hostage, a weapon, or an experiment.
Yet. There was always tomorrow.
They walked down a series of impersonal hallways. There were more signs of life here than near White Knight’s ‘meeting room,’ but it was still quiet, which Caesar was grateful for. He was developing an unusually sharp headache.
“Communal labs,” said Holiday, opening a door to reveal another hallway, this one inhabited by a pair of scientists trying to get an optics table through a doorway. “You haven’t been assigned work space yet, but the intake paperwork should be ready by tomorrow.”
“This can’t be all of your labs.”
“No,” said Holiday. “Of course not. But this is what you’ve been cleared to access, so far. You’ll also be assigned a small private lab, for sensitive work, and you will have limited access to some of the spaces we have for Rex.”
“To study Rex, you mean.”
Holiday shut the door and continued to walk down the hallway. “I don’t like it either,” she said. “But things could be… worse.”
“How so?”
Holiday hesitated. “I’m not in charge of all the scientists here,” she said, finally, “and before I was in my current position, I was treated like a glorified intern. My predecessor…” She seemed to make a decision. “He tried to kill Rex. There are still too many people who think like him. But outside of Providence, it’s worse. EVOs, even the human-passing ones, legally aren’t human and can be killed with no legal repercussions.”
“You can’t be serious,” said Caesar. Even if everything was as bad as she and White said, human-based EVOs should be treated like people with a disease, not dangerous animals.
“I wish I wasn’t,” said Holiday. “Rex has been…” She pressed her lips together in a firm line as she input a key code for the next door. “He’s been assaulted, more than once. He wasn’t seriously injured, his nanites let him shrug off most things, but it’s not… You can’t live freely in a world that doesn’t consider you human.” She swallowed and then waved a hand at the room. “This is the principle programming and sim lab.”
“Ah,” said Caesar, taking note of technology that, at least on the surface, was decidedly behind what was in his pod lab.
“Next stop, general quarters.”
They didn’t talk again until they reached a much narrower hallway with a lot more traffic.
“Shift change,” explained Holiday. She stopped in front of one of the doors. “This is your room. You should be able to use your ID card to open it.”
The room was, in fact, a small studio apartment. Not huge, but fully furnished with a small kitchen and full bathroom. There was a desk with a computer set up on one side, next to a fake window.
“The computer should let you access the public internet, but you’ll have to wait for credentials to access Providence’s databases. That should still let you catch up with current events.”
“Right,” said Caesar. “Thank you, Dr. Holiday.”
“Oh, one more thing.” Holiday reached into her pocket and pulled out an old model clamshell phone. “In this line of work, you get used to carrying a few burners. It has Rex’s number already on it.” She handed it to him.
“Thank you,” said Caesar, almost dropping it as he took it, unclear on what, exactly, she wanted him to do with it.
“Just… be careful, Caesar.” She turned away and walked back down the hallway.
Caesar let out a puff of air. She could at least call him Dr. Salazar… Although that would have him looking over his shoulder for his father… and might be a little strange considering what appeared to be her relationship with his brother.
Life was, as always, unfairly complicated.
He shook his head and went into the room, closing and locking the door behind him. Although, considering that the locks were electronic, he suspected that anyone with ‘clearance’ could get in. He looked at the computer and sighed. Best to get started.
He sat down and shook a slight tremor - probably caused by lack of sleep and adrenaline - out of his hands. Time to see what the nanites had been doing over the past six years.
.
There was… a lot.
A horrifying lot.
Although, to be fair, most of the horror on Caesar’s part came from watching his little brother fight what looked like giant monsters. Although, that was also somewhat impressive, because their parents absolutely had not programmed Rex’s nanites with giant swords, saws, guns, or VTOL equipment, which indicated that the self programming abilities of Rex’s nanites were far more versatile than intended… or they’d figured out how to ‘steal’ programming from other nanites, he wasn’t sure yet. In any case, the emergent behavior were fascinating, and–
Caesar hissed as his hand spasmed. That wasn’t normal. Had he strained something earlier, or…
It occurred to him, then, that after so long, most people with a propensity for ‘going EVO’ already had, with the rate of new incidents currently being relatively low compared to what had happened right after the event. But for Caesar, the event had only just happened.
He swallowed and clicked through to a website discussing the symptoms of ‘nanite infection.’
Much of it he had already been aware of, including positives like the elimination of several common diseases, reduced rates of infection, faster healing for minor injuries… Those were the things nanites were supposed to do, after all. Negative side effects other than ‘going EVO’ were surprisingly few and far between, other than nasty interactions with strong magnetic fields.
He scrolled down.
… most cases nanite activation is spontaneous, with no prior warning or indicators. However, some individuals report precursor symptoms. Research is ongoing, and it is currently unclear if these reports are reliable, and, if reliable, if they are caused by nanite activation. Some demographics, notably hispanic males under the age of thirty and East Asian women between the ages of twenty-five and forty, report these precursor symptoms at a higher rate…
Of course. Those demographics lined up nicely with the original test subjects. The nanites had been adjusted based on their data, so it made sense that sufficiently similar people would interact with the nanites differently than the general population.
Caesar also fit those demographics.
He scrolled further.
… commonly reported precursor symptoms include headaches, dizziness, excessive sweating, muscle spasms, unusual muscle soreness, tremors, sore throat, sore eyes, unusual hunger or thirst, difficulty focusing, transient aphasia, nausea, seizures, general malaise and anxiety, feelings of doom…
Caesar was very much not experiencing all of those symptoms. However…
He licked his lips and glanced at the phone Holiday had given him. Surely, it wouldn’t hurt. He picked up the phone and dialed the only saved number.
“Aló, habla Rex! What’s up, Doc?”
Was that the sound of Mario Kart in the background? Did Rex cope with terrifying experiences like his body producing a machine that trapped him in a tiny airless bubble by playing Mario Kart? Whatever, not important.
“Ah, actually, Rex, this is Caesar.”
The sound of the game stopped and there was a rustling sound. “Uh,” said Rex, “hi… bro? What’s, uh. How are– How are things?”
“It’s,” said Caesar, no longer sure what to say. He could have worked himself up over nothing, and Rex… with his amnesia, he was probably expecting Caesar to give him some kind of full-life rundown, which Caesar wasn’t sure he’d ever really be up for. He swallowed. “I was wondering if you would like to…” What was Rex even allowed to do, here? He wasn’t sure.
“Sneak out together?” asked Rex, brightly. Caesar could almost envision a wagging puppy dog tail.
“Yes, that,” said Caesar, forcing a smile. He’d read that facial expressions made enough of difference to the average voice that people could tell whether or not you were smiling over the phone. He inhaled to continue, maybe to elaborate on what, exactly, they could sneak out to do, but the bottom of his stomach fell away and he–
.
Caesar inhaled sharply as a white tile ceiling came into focus, along with a face. He blinked a few times. “Doctor… Holiday?”
“Yes,” she said. “How do you feel, Caesar?”
“I–” How did he feel? “Fine.”
The familiar-unfamiliar face of his not-so-little-anymore brother leaned into his field of view. A few rapidly dimming lines of light lay scattered over his skin and clothing. “You’ve still got all your memories and stuff, right?”
“I… think so,” said Caesar, levering himself into a sitting position and looking around the room, which wasn’t any different from how it had been when he first walked in. “What happened? I had called you, and then…”
“You went EVO,” said Rex, nervously, picking at the seams on his gloves.
“Ah,” said Caesar, who hadn’t considered what it would be like for Rex to hear that over the phone. “I was under the impression that something like that would result in more collateral damage.”
“Oh, yeah, because of the stuff on the news?” Rex shook his head, the last of the nanite-lights going out as he did so. “Nah, man, the news only shows the violent ones, or the flashy, powerful ones. A lot of EVOs don’t do much of anything unless you mess with them. You were pretty chill.”
“Right,” said Caesar, because what else could he say to that? “I’m glad I was… chill. I suppose I’m due for a medical checkup?”
“Standard procedure,” said Holiday. “You, too, Rex.”
“Aw, man, do I have to? I was actually beating Bobo this time.”
“Caesar’s nanites might be different from what you’re used to, due to his proximity to the event,” said Holiday.
“She’s right,” said Caesar. He might as well get some good will from backing her up on this. And, besides, it might be a little easier to talk to his little brother if they were both… getting medical scans… and…
Okay, that was a terrible idea, actually. But it wasn’t as if Caesar had any better ones.
“Ugh, fine,” said Rex, crossing his arms. The intonation was almost exactly the same as the last time their mother made him go to the doctor before his accident.
Caesar smiled, and this time it was almost genuine.
.
.
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#3: Bobo
.
The emergency lights blared overhead as armed Providence agents streamed into the room. The monkey rolled on the floor, laughing, as the probably-a-teenager-but-only-probably threw anything he could grab at him.
“I can’t believe you fell for that!” howled Bobo.
“I can’t believe you did that!” countered Rex, whose eyes were suspiciously glassy. “I was really worried!”
“I’m already an EVO, kid! Can’t EVO me twice!”
Six sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. It had only been two months since he’d found Rex in the rubble of Mexico City, and every day was another massive headache. One that could only be rivaled by the headache he got wondering what would have happened to Rex if he hadn’t intervened.
“Shut it down,” he said. “False alarm.”
“You thought I was going EVO! Ha! That’s one for the books!”
“You suck so much!”
Yeah. This was going to be a long day.
.
.
.
#4: Holiday
.
Beverly was getting her last exit check up before she was released from Providence’s care when it happened. She was watching Rebecca type something on her computer, something about slight anemia, her face visible only in profile, when she saw it. Color, curling up out of the collar of her sister’s lab coat, vibrant and striking against the overwhelming white and pale gray of the room.
For a moment, she thought it might just be the shirt Rebecca was wearing underneath the coat, but then it moved, it spread, feathering out over the curve of her jaw and her cheek, dyeing her eye with stripes of bright gold and adding points to her ears. The color - no, the fur - crept out from the ends of her sleeves, covering the backs of her hands and fingers.
Beverly couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t– She couldn’t– This couldn’t be happening. Not to Rebecca. Not her sister. Not when Beverly had just realized she’d missed years of her life as an insane spider-monster.
Not when Beverly was the only one here, with no way to protect herself.
But Rebecca kept typing away at the computer, only looking away when one of the machines began to beep at her.
“Bev, are you feeling okay? Your heart rate just spiked.”
“I’m–” gasped Beverly. “Becca, you– Your skin!”
Rebecca blinked her (too large, too bright) eyes at Beverly, then looked down at her hands. “Oh!” she said, then fell silent for a long minute. “Oh. That’s– Huh.” She turned her hands over. “That’s… Huh.”
“What do I–” said Beverly. “I don’t–” Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. “What do I do?”
“Just, uh,” said Rebecca, sounding stunned and bemused. “This hasn’t happened before, obviously.” She paused. “There’s a procedure.” She reached for the phone on her desk, slowly. “I never thought I’d have to use it to report myself, and maybe that’s a little hubristic of me…”
“Why?” asked Beverly, still shaken.
Rebecca glanced at Beverly. “I didn’t think I’d retain my intelligence.” The subtext was clear. She didn’t think that she would keep hers, because Beverly didn’t. She pressed a button on the phone. “Hello? This is Dr. Rebecca Holiday in examination room three-thirteen. I’m reporting an EVO– No, you don’t need– It’s me. Yes, that’s correct. I have gone EVO. Yes. I appear to be, yes. I understand the procedure. I will stand by, thank you.” She put the phone down with a click. “Alright, they should be here soon… Bev. Beverly. Are you alright?”
“Why are you asking me that?” asked Beverly, twisting her hands together. “You’re the one who– who–”
“Well,” said Rebecca, examining her nails, which looked longer than usual, “I seem to be. Fine. Mostly. I’m… unlikely to lose my job over this. Variagation isn’t progressive, generally speaking. Assuming this is already complete, and that’s likely, I won’t get any worse. I’m just, ah. Processing.”
“Processing,” repeated Beverly. “Becca, what if you aren’t– What if you’re not curable?” Rex was great and all, but Beverly hadn’t been curable.
“Then I’d have to deal with that,” said Rebecca, who was still way too calm for the situation. “There’s already precedent for EVOs working with Providence. I’ll be fine. Promise.” She smiled. “Ow.”
“What? What is it?” asked Beverly, not moving from the examination table.
“Change to my tooth structure… Still don’t know why so many EVOs are adapted to be more combative…” She fell to muttering about random science stuff, which was typical Rebecca, but still.
The door slammed open and Rex slid in, followed shortly thereafter by Six (who Rebecca was maybe sort of dating - it was really unclear), and a dozen Providence agents. Who had guns. Guns that were being pointed at Rebecca.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Come on, guys, it’s like you don’t work with multiple totally awesome EVOs every day,” said Rex, walking between the agents and Rebecca with ease, Six following him after pointedly pushing down one of the agents’ guns. “So, uh, how’re you doing, Doc?”
“Fine,” said Rebecca. “Just a bit… surprised.”
“Uh huh,” said Rex. “Want me to, uh. Work my magic?” He held up his hands and waved them back and forth slightly. A thin blue line flashed across one of his palms, as if his nanites were eager to be used.
“Actually, if it’s all the same to everyone,” said Rebecca, “I think I’d like to run some tests on myself, first. We have limited data on early nanite behavior in EVOs who retain their intelligence. Limited data on EVOs who retain their intelligence all around, actually.”
“And what are we?” asked Bobo, shouldering his way past the agents. “Chopped liver?”
“You,” said Rebecca, “are a different case altogether. And you know it.”
“Ah, so Rex is chopped liver. Got it.”
“Hey!”
“Rex is one data point. It’s always good to have more.”
“Absolutely,” said Rex. “So… does that mean you’re going to come join me in the training salle? See if you’ve got any special abilities? Maybe take a shot at some of the guys in the Petting Zoo?”
Six pushed up his glasses. “If you intend on staying like this for any period of time, it would be tactically sound to assess your combat abilities.”
Rebecca smiled again, and her teeth really were sharp. Heck.
“Alright, alright, but I’ll need to do my tests first, in my main lab… Beverly, I’m really sorry, but I think it might be better to reschedule the rest of your checkup. We’ve. We’ve both had a scare.”
“Yeah,” said Beverly, who still felt like a strong breeze might blow her over. “I think. Yeah.”
“Okay. Six, could you…?”
Six looked like he wanted to object. “Yeah, I’ll see her out.”
“Thanks,” said Rebecca. She and Rex left, followed by the other agents.
Beverly hadn’t moved at all.
“Come on,” said Six. “Let’s go.”
“R-right,” Beverly said, sliding off the examination table. Her legs almost buckled, but she managed to stay upright, and a few breaths made her feel a lot better. Which meant that it was time for deflection. She looked up at Six. “If you’re just going along with this because you’re one of those guys with a catgirl obsession, I’m going to kill you.” She didn’t know how. Six was, like, a ninja. But she’d figure it out.
“Noted.”
.
.
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#5: Noah
.
“You would be wise to consider delaying your celebration for the moment, Rex. You’re about to have your hands quite full.”
Rex crossed his arms, smirking, because it was hard to take him seriously when he’d just been taken out by Noah driving a forklift. Heh. Forklift certification, Van Kleiss’s true weakness. “Oh, really, and how do you figure that?”
But Van Kleiss just smirked again and lunged forward, his arm longer than it should have been. He made contact with Noah’s chest, and the nanites activated all at once in a flash of yellow-orange light.
Oh, jeez, of course Noah would be a big one. And not particularly bright. Crap.
.
Why were Providence agents so trigger-happy, darn it? Rex was right there.
.
At least he was closer to the destructive end of the spectrum than the violent end, but would it kill him to stop running around and give Rex an easier time?
.
Sometimes, Rex really hated how his biometrics worked. And also Van Kleiss. He really hated Van Kleiss.
Which was why hitting the guy with a train was so satisfying.
.
Watching EVO Noah almost rip the guy’s arm off was even more satisfying. Maybe Van Kleiss’s real secret weakness was just blond teenagers or something. What a loser.
.
“Oh my gosh,” said Noah, watching the TV through his fingers. “I did that? I did that?”
“Yep,” said Rex, tossing back some popcorn.
“That’s so cool. Wish I could actually remember, though…”
“Eh,” said Rex. “I like you better this way, anyway.”
.
.
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+1: Rex
.
(He could hear his parents arguing. He couldn’t tell what they were arguing about. He couldn’t open his eyes, or move, or even think all that much. It was like when he woke up early in the morning, but was actually still asleep, still dozing, but deeper. Darker, somehow.)
(Something was very wrong.)
(There were more people talking than just his parents. Caesar, of course. Of course his brother was there. But so were other people. Scientists. Their names slipped from Rex’s mind even as he thought of them, but they were there.)
(Why were they there?)
(It was suddenly very important to him that he wake up. Vital. Something was going to happen. He needed to be awake.)
(Why couldn’t he wake up?)
(The voices in the other room fell silent one by one, until it was only his father talking, his tone grim, his cadence steady. Then he, too, fell silent.)
(Had something bad already happened? Rex didn’t remember.)
(He… didn’t remember.)
((He didn’t want to remember))
(The door opened. Footsteps came near, two sets of them, his mother and his father.)
“Rex, we’re so sorry, but this is the only way.”
“Don’t worry, it’ll work, and then this will all just be a memory.”
(There was, very briefly, the sensation of something cold in his veins.)
{system integration initiated.}
{processing…}
{processing…}
{processing…}
{update: b4739-BETA integration achieved. hosttype hsapiens detected.}
{update: locus designated hsapiens1-REX (user-REX) systemwide.}
{alert: locus-hasapiens1-REX healthstat abnormal. processing healthstat report to topadmin.}
{alert: beginning t88-INITIAL activation of b4739-BETA.}
{processing…}
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To help explain personality/chaos levels/Vibes for each of the Links, here’s how I imagine all of them would drive if cars existed (loosely ranked from best to worst, it’s not a hard set scale):
Twilight: Literally perfect, has never hit the curb before in his life, always uses his turn signal, never speeds, has never been pulled over. Driving with him feels SAFE and he makes sure everyone is comfortable and ready to go BEFORE he starts the car. He will tell everyone off for being too loud and tell them he needs to focus on the road, and he also checks the traffic maps before he goes anywhere so he knows the best route to take because he gets anxious sitting in heavy traffic. Most likely to have a minivan to drive ‘the kids’ around in, and also a pickup truck for work
Calamity: Perfect driver, both hands on the wheel always. The car ride is dead silent because he’s mute and also refuses to put on music, plus he’s not that talkative anyway, so it’s up to whoever’s in the car to talk if they want to. Would probably drive a small black SUV
Past: The kind of person who you cannot read whether or not they’re a good driver just based on vibes, but are surprisingly good. Sometimes stops are a bit rough and maybe they’ve hit the curb once or twice, but has never been given a ticket. Would have an older car that they’ve taken good care of, like an early 2000s Toyota Corolla
Mask: He’s a good driver, he’s just so stressed he has a death grip on the wheel and if people don’t let him over on the highway or he can’t merge over on surface streets he will burst into frustrated tears. Has to have the music turned up loud enough so that Hylia can also hear it, but without it he’ll be too much of a nervous wreck to drive. Would drive an SUV, he couldn’t handle anything bigger (he’d get too stressed out)
Sky: His kindness and music taste makes up for the fact that in a fifteen minute drive, you gripped the handle and feared for your life once. He asks if people are buckled up before he starts the car because one time he braked so hard Mask’s face bounced off the dash and he still feels bad about it. Would drive a smaller car and it’s definitely bright red
Minish: Inexperienced, and sometimes forgets to put on his turn signal. Has ran a red light once or twice. He’s 15 so he wouldn’t have his own car, he’d probably use Twilight’s or Wars’s
Warriors: He has never been in a crash that was his fault, which no one believes because getting in the car with this man feels like tempting the reaper. The kinda guy to hit a pot hole that leaves the car making a brand new sound and just go “OOPSIES!!!” but he cries himself to sleep over it. He either screams along to his playlists or he tells you the hottest gossip you’ve ever heard. Usually has an iced coffee in one hand and waves it around when he talks. Would have a Ford Escape, but like a 2013 Ford Escape specifically. He also checks the traffic maps before he leaves because he likes to he efficient and will leave very early for whatever event he’s going to
Tune: He’s never been the direct cause of a crash and that’s what’s important. He calls his car “ol’ girl” in the most respectful loving manner, and treats the car better than anything else in his life. That being said, he is a truly awful driver and would have a little old sports car
Hyrule: Struggles to stay in the lanes because he gets distracted by landmarks. Past has had to grab the wheel and steady it on more than one occasion. HAS hit another vehicle because he stopped too late. He’s also run several red lights because he thought he could make it
Tears: Better at off road driving than on road driving. You need to take a car up the side of a mountain? Tears is your guy. Otherwise don’t get behind the wheel with them, EVER.
#linked through the centuries#lttc#lttc past#lttc warriors#lttc mask#lttc tears#lttc tune#lttc sky#lttc minish#lttc twilight#lttc hyrule#lttc calamity#jes talks#links meet au
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Was I even going that fast?
summer friday afternoon, you seventeen, you speeding past me on the right, you promise of the rest of the summer ahead. summer friday afternoon and you, little black car, spoiled and custom-spoilered and spoiling for the fight against inertia. summer friday and I’m older, so I could be your mother (I couldn’t), or I could be your mom’s weird friend (better), so I can drive my own sedate sedan steadily and let you overtake me in a rush of choices.
It’s all I’ve got, man.
and I can watch you (not you but what you’d call you, where you’d place yourself in this story) hit wet sand and gravel at a little too fast and then you’re spinning down the off-ramp and you’re not getting to the highway with your tire at that angle and your back end hovering over the ditch and you facing the wrong way while a transport comes. (and we, you’re not the only one here, we get you off the road.)
My fucking car, it’s all I have.
I could be your mom’s weird friend, and you know it when you tell me that four weeks ago this little black car with its freshly bent axle and its scraped-bare front bumper was in impound and it wasn’t your fault. you need me to know this: it wasn’t your fault. it was only that you were on the highway, and someone else was, and sometimes you are seventeen and your blood tries to sing its way out of your body and life is blinding bright and richer than you’d imagined and risk is a plastic and moldable concept. you spoke like you’d been hunted.
when the deer run switchbacks through these old hills, can you call that stunt-braking?
I’ve got nothing left
oh kid even my evening’s just started; you’ve got days and days, years, whole eras. you’ve got your mom’s number in your phone. you’ve got this nice couple with a dog looking at your tire. you've got a tow-truck coming. no one is laughing at you too much. you’ve still got this car (maybe don’t drive it yet).
here: you’ve got a bottle of water and someone to remind you to breathe.
here, you’re connected all together in your selfness.
here, you’ve got the horrible gorgeous long future scraped out in front of you, rubber in reverse.
(you have, almost certainly, decades. you will drive recklessly again. i hope you don’t kill anyone, but people — generally — will die, and you’ll mourn them. you’ll love them, and so you’ll pay the grief-price of it that we all do. you’ll succeed and then you’ll fail, again and again. sometimes the success will feel as inevitable as making your turn. some failure will come from an impossible direction.
you’ll sit on your kitchen floor some nights and sob to yourself that you’ve got nothing left. you’ll be wrong then, wrong again.
you will have summer friday afternoons, and rainy tuesdays in november. you will, eventually (i hope, i hope) laugh about this. you’ll move out of your parents’ house and live in a place where people walk to meet their friends. maybe you’ll have a favourite place to meet them. maybe you’ll take a little more time: you have it. you have so much more.)
I’ve got nothing left. oh sweetheart, oh fool. come around me to the right again; let me, sinister, instigating, chase you off the side of this road into the next.
#words what i wrote#writing#this was a timed exercise - gotta go fast in honour of the poor kid who irl was unharmed but deeply embarrassed#and is of course just a starting point for these half-truths#prose poem#or possibly#cnf?#or just a regular degular#blog post#like it's 2007 over here
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Hello! Good luck on your driving exam and your uni :D I want to request something, but no need to rush okay, take your time ^^ sooo my request is.... shigaraki, miruko, and hawks (oh and it's only if you're alright with three characters ofc!) headcanons! welllll so... i'm this type of person who sings when i'm doing something, whether it's doing chores, playing games, or working on my homeworks. i also sing to my cat and act as if i'm a disney character ksskjsjs. Anddd yeah if it's okay i want to request hcs with this type of s/o who sings in their daily life as if they're a disney/musical character ksksks i hope my request makes sense!! Thank you so much, I hope you're doing great!
|| WITH A S/O THAT LIKES TO SING ||
Awww this is so sweet! Anyway, sorry for the long wait, I'm usually faster with requests but yeah. Uni. I'll probs be a bit slower with requests now, but I hope you'll keep liking my lil headcanons!
Pairings: Shigaraki × reader • Miruko × reader • Hawks × reader
Shigaraki looked at you weird when he noticed you dancing around your house, watering your plants and singing to them.
You stopped when your eyes met his, and raised a brow as to ask him if everything was alright.
"Plants can't hear you," he said.
"But you can." You smiled.
He scoffed and shoved his hands in the pockets of his sweatshirt. Of course he could hear you. How could you be so relaxed around a deadly villain was still a mystery to him.
"I...'msorry. Didn't wanna bother." You lowered your head, thinking how annoying you must have sounded to him.
"No!" Tomura lifted his hand, as to reach you as you turned around to silently complete your chore. "I like it. Kinda. It's just... unusual."
People were always so stiff around him, yet here you were singing and dancing with a watering can in your hands. For unusual that it was, he had found himself listening to your songs, muttering along to your favorite ones when you weren't listening.
He took a step, half turning on himself in a cranky emulation of your dance, before tripping on his own feet and falling to the ground. You failed to keep in your laugh, as he groaned and moved his hair to the side to look up at you.
"I like it. Please, don't stop singing."
He makes sure you never doubt how much he enjoys hearing your voice again. However, I don't think he'd try to dance with you again soon, he'd be too embarrassed.
Rumi, on the other hand, isn't one to join you or shower you in compliments, although she totally doesn't mind listening to you sing
She'd be the type to have voice notes of you singing that she listens to when she's having a rough day, without ever mentioning it to you. She fears it would cringe you too much.
But I mean, it's so relaxing to listen to you singing as you cook dinner, whenever she can get to stay for dinner and forger her responsibilities for a while.
If you're really really lucky you might hear her humming along to your favorite songs, but it's almost impossible to hear her sing out loud.
Yep, she's kinda self conscious bc her voice is more on the contralto side so she can't really hit those high "princess notes" you nonchalantly sing in. I feel like she'd be one to shrug off your reassurance on how pretty her voice really is, but it could actually have a deep impact on how she perceives herself.
The only way to get her to sing a bit is to blast loud ass music in the car and let her drive down a highway at top speed.
Those are the only times she sings more than you, mostly because you're busy gripping your seat
"Rumi babe, couldn't you slow do-"
"Hah! Like hell! Dis song is fire!"
He loves loves loves hearing you sing, and showers you with compliments.
"Mmmh babe your voice is so pretty."
"You sing so well, it's like a lullaby."
Also calls you "My little Songbird" and it melts your heart every time.
Sometimes youre doing your homework in your room while he's busy outside or in another room when you start singing, and after a few seconds some red feathers start twirling around you as he wants to hear you better.
He's loves pretending to be in a musical with you, and will totally duet you if you ask him to. He still prefers to listen to your voice than to his own of course, but there's something so intimate to him in hearing your voices harmonizing over the lyrics.
Wanna dance in the living room, hand in hand like that scene in The Beauty & The Beast? Asking him may sound a little corny, but he's already smiling like a lovestruck idiot simply at the idea of doing it.
Again, there are feathers everywhere as he doesn't want to lose the tune of your voice if the music is too loud.
Also because romantic mood, and it's like dancing in a rain of red rose petals.
He will fall asleep if you sing to him, like hum to him softly while combing his hair with a hand and it's a matter of seconds before he's sleeping soundly.
masterlist
taglist: @ok-what-now-huh @liberace2 @whiteusagi @help-idk-what-my-life-is @comehome2myheart @peachysuguru @iam-mentally-unstable
tell me if you want to be added!
#mha headcanons#bnha headcanons#mha shigaraki#shigaraki x reader#shigaraki tomura#shigaraki headcanons#miruko headcanons#rumi usagiyama#bnha miruko#miruko x reader#bnha hawks#hawks headcanons#keigo takami x reader#keigo takami#takami keigo#mha hawks#hawks x reader
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I don’t know why, but whenever I go to the grocery store, people keep giving me money. They just walk right up to me in the parking lot and fork over a couple bucks. Sometimes they act like I should be embarrassed to take it, or whisper something like “you poor dear” as they pass the change and bills into my hands. Occasionally, an angry husband makes me swear that I won’t spend it on drugs. No problem, sir, it’s just going into this shitty Plymouth behind me. Drugs are nothing compared to the thrill of finally getting the horn to work.
Sure, I don’t dress particularly well, either. Grease-stained t-shirts promoting a long-past motorcycle derby from a distant city. Whatever free hat NAPA handed out most recently, also stained with grease and/or shoplifted undercoat. That’s no reason for people to be giving me charity, not when there’s truly deserving people. Admittedly, those people are driving Camrys that were made in this century, and probably don’t have to walk home nearly as often as I do.
Perhaps I’ve gotten off-track a little bit with my life. I should be projecting a lot more confidence in my dirtbag existence. Despite what the nice social workers say, there’s really no law against cornering people at the grocery store and talking to them about six-barrel carbs and mostly-junkyardable Jeep cam position sensors. Then they’d know that they are dealing with someone who Chose to be a complete asshole, rather than a person who is so beaten down by society that they operate a 1970s Mopar product unwillingly.
Trust me: if you knew how much work and expense this thing took to keep running, you’d be throwing eggs instead of pennies. Any sucker can finance a badly-running Highlander from a buy-here-pay-here lot off of Crackhead Street and then go to their three grinding retail/service jobs, but in order to avoid falling out on the highway at one-half road speed, I need to invest the approximate salary and skillset of one highly-trained mechanical engineer. Maybe send some of that charity money to Chrysler, so they can build a better car for me to ruin in fifty years from now.
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Autism/ Neurodivergent Tips! Autism Journal Entry
On an everyday basis I have 1 backpack and 2 fanny packs I wear on my body.
I wear fanny packs for trinkets, money, writing notes, eye drops, pocket magnifying glass, forging pocket knife, tweezers, lighters, chapstick, a mask, hand sanitizer spray, extra marker, bobby pins, and peppermint oil.
In my backpack I carry books, headphones/earplugs, stationary pencil bag, stim puzzles/toys, extra makeup, THC gummies, cards, matches, AirPods, cigarettes, binoculars, sticky notes, and a portable pee funnel, Advil, Tums, and Dramamine
But I also carry a single backpack in the car for emergencies; stuck in traffic, shit my pants, need to change clothes. The contents of my bag are baby wipes, a pair of socks, a pair of underwear, a bandana, pants, a shirt, a hand fan, Clorox wipes, and a make up bag with; athletic tape, bandaids, vapor rub, tiger balm, and CBD oil. Also I carry my charger sometimes.
I also have applesauce and small pringles cans for homeless people and for myself.
I NEVER go without these 2 bags and 2 fanny packs EVER
Recently, I was stuck in the car due to a flat tire. I hadn’t showered all day, I had been to literally 6 different spots and I spent a total of 7 hours in the car, alone, driving. I had too many interactions with people over the past few days and that day with no spoons left in me. I had a meltdown when we pulled to the apartment because the apartment keys were left at the last spot we were (which was 15 minutes back) I was livid and scream cried. I sat in the back of the car and tried to calm myself down, we were almost back to the apartment, then we got a flat tire. It popped and it scared the fucking life out of my already high-stress-alerted body and I had another full blown meltdown. I was screaming and inconsolable and frankly losing my fucking mind. I was thrashing my body and screaming with hot tears running down my face, pulling my hair all while on the shoulder of the highway with cars and semis speeding past at 70 mph shaking the car.
If it wasn’t for the bags I always keep on me I wouldn’t have made it out the way I did. After I had calmed down just enough I sat with my headache. I took an advil down with some applesauce, I peed using my portable pee funnel into my reusable pint water bottle, I wiped myself everywhere using baby wipes, I changed out of my sweaty underwear and socks, and changed out of my clothes completely. I put my headphones on and turned on some brown noise. I stuffed my clothes in a plastic bag from the car. I opened a book and looked at some pictures. I put eye drops in and put on my coat. After about an hour I was fine enough to go outside and help my partner with the flat tire.
If you are neurodivergent or are Autistic please please please take my tips and carry a change of clothes, baby wipes, and things you might ever need with you. Accommodate for yourself. You never know when you will actually need it. This isn’t to scare you, you can’t prevent life from happening but you can help yourself.
#actually autistic#self diagnosed autisic#autism#autisic traits#autistic feels#autism in women#late diagnosed autistic#autistic adult#autism in girls#neurodivergent#self diagnosers#undiagnosed autism#actuallyautistic#self diagnosis#autistic experiences#autistic spectrum#autistic#executive dysfunction#adhd#actually adhd#autistic tips#survival tips#overstimulation#meltdowns#meltdown#autistic meltdown#audhd#actually audhd#neurodiversity#neurodivergent tips
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This summer, a Vancouver car mechanic named Max got a perplexing ping on his phone: Betty White was in Ukraine and needed his help. This was surprising because she had died on a Canadian highway back in January.
When Max last saw Betty White, his nickname for his Tesla Model Y Performance, they were both in rough shape after getting sideswiped on the highway. Max’s rotator cuff was torn in several places. The small SUV had bounced off multiple concrete barriers at high speed and was bashed in on all four corners, its wheels ripped to pieces. Coolant appeared to be leaking into the battery chamber. From his own work on EVs in the garage, Max knew that Betty was done for. “No auto shop would put a repair person at risk with that kind of damage,” says Max, whose last name isn’t being used out of doxing concerns. A damaged EV battery can become dangerous due to the risk of shocks, fire, and toxic fumes. His insurer agreed, and Betty was written off and sent to a salvage yard.
Months after he had last seen the car, Max’s Tesla app was now telling him that Betty needed a software update. It showed the car with an extra 200 kilometers on the odometer, fully charged, and parked in Uman, a town in Ukraine’s Cherkasy Oblast, midway between Kyiv and the front line with Russia’s invasion force. Minutes after that first ping, the app showed the car in service mode, suggesting Betty was undergoing repairs. “I thought it must be a mistake,” Max says.
There was no mistake. WIRED tracked Betty down to a Ukrainian auto auction website, looking good as new, maybe even better, with newly tinted windows and rearview mirrors wrapped in black. Betty 2.0 was being sold by “Mikhailo,” who wrote that the car had suffered “a small blow” in Canada and been repaired with original Tesla parts. The price, $55,000, was roughly the same as a new Model Y Performance costs in the US.
Betty White’s intercontinental resurrection was impressive but not unusual. For a long time, cars written off in North America have found their way to Eastern European repair shops willing to take on damage that US and Canadian mechanics won’t touch. In 2021, the most recent data available, Ukraine was a top-three destination for used US passenger vehicles sent overseas, close behind Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates. And Ukraine’s wreck importers and repairers are particularly known for their ingenuity. Some have made fixing EVs written off across the Atlantic into a specialty, helping to drive a surge in the number of electric vehicles on the country’s roads, even as the war with Russia rages.
Though few automakers sell new EVs in Ukraine, the share of newly registered vehicles that are fully electric, 9 percent, is about the same as in the US and nearly double that of neighboring Poland and the Czech Republic. Most of Ukraine’s refurbished EVs come from North America, and many arrive with major damage.
There’s a ready supply of crashed North American EVs in part because electrics are becoming more common, and also because in recent years, relatively new EVs with low mileage have been written off at a higher rate than their gas-powered equivalents, according to data from insurers. US and Canadian repair shops and insurers see them as more dangerous and difficult to fix. Scrapyards find it hard to make money from their parts and instead ship them abroad.
Ivan Malakhovsky is not afraid to work on cases like Betty White. His five-year-old repair business in Dnipro, in eastern Ukraine, fixes about 100 Teslas a month, roughly a fifth of them from overseas, and employs a staff that varies between six to 10 people. He’s currently away from home, serving with the Armed Forces of Ukraine, but he manages his workers, and sometimes makes software-mediated repairs, remotely. “We have problems in our lives and can fix them, whether a battery or a full-scale invasion,” says Malakhovsky. “Electric cars, electric car batteries—it’s no problem.”
An electric vehicle battery is made up of thousands of individual cells, which store and release energy. Sometimes, Malakhovsky says, he and his coworkers will break up large EV batteries damaged beyond repair and repurpose the cells to power electric scooters or even drones for the war effort. He says the vast majority of Teslas on Ukrainian roads were once involved in wrecks in North America.
The war has even boosted Ukraine’s EV resurrection business at times, by driving up gas prices and making electrics more attractive to drivers. Ukraine has a public charging network of some 11,000 chargers, according to Volodymyr Ivanov, the head of communications at Nissan Motor Ukraine—that’s more than the state of New York, and double the number in neighboring Poland. Since 2018, Ukraine’s government has removed most taxes and customs duties on used EV imports. In the US, electric vehicles tend to be expensive, and the average EV driver is still a high-income male homeowner. North American wrecks, Ukraine’s EV incentives, and its relatively low electricity prices have created a different picture.
“There is a joke here that all poor people are driving electric cars, and all the rich people are driving petrol cars,” says Malakhovsky. “Tesla is a common-people, popular car because it’s very cheap in maintenance.”
That’s a relatively recent development, says Hans Eric Melin, head of Circular Energy Storage, a UK-based consultancy that tracks the international flows of used EVs and batteries. He began watching the Ukraine market in particular a few years ago, after he noticed more ads for Nissan Leafs on auction sites listed in Ukrainian than in English. At the time, the Leaf, a pioneer among EVs, was essentially the only one that had been around long enough to develop a healthy used market. Over time, Ukraine’s electric fleet grew to encompass the full range of EVs sold around the world, including Teslas, as more cars hit the roads and aged or got into crashes.
Melin had suspected Ukraine’s EV boom would end with the war. “I was completely wrong,” he says. By this summer, Ukraine’s EV fleet had doubled since July 2021, to 64,312, according to data compiled by the Automotive Market Research Institute, a Ukrainian research and advocacy group.
Roman Tyschenko, a 25-year-old IT worker who lives in Kyiv, decided last September that he was sick of his Jeep’s $400-a-month gas bill. Friends had purchased used, damaged electric cars on an online auction website called Copart, a US-based public auto reseller with 200 locations around the world. He logged on and spent $24,000 on a gray 2021 Tesla Model Y that had taken a solid blow to its passenger side in Dallas, Texas. Its bumper was almost fully detached; its hood was tented; some of its airbags had deployed.
That Texan Model Y was likely declared totaled by an insurer. From there, it probably moved to a salvage auction in the US, where licensed exporters, salvage shops, and repairers tried to figure out how much value they could squeeze out of the wreck. The winner, or perhaps the insurer itself, listed the car on Copart, which made it available to anyone around the world who wanted a smashed-up Tesla and was willing to pay for shipping.
If Tyschenko hadn’t brought the Texan Tesla to Ukraine himself, it had a good chance of being shipped there anyway by someone who professionally flips cars to countries like Ukraine. These exporters look for wrecks potentially worth more than their scrap value, but little enough that an expensive US repair and resale wouldn’t make sense. Some ship vehicles directly to Ukrainian repairers and pay for the fix, while others import damaged cars and relist them for sale to Ukrainian buyers who can figure it out for themselves.
It takes a damaged North American car between one and five months to reach a nearby port. Before the war, wrecked cars headed to Ukraine’s Port of Odessa on the Black Sea. Since Russia invaded in 2022, they come through Klaipėda in Lithuania on the Baltic Sea, or Koper in Slovenia on the Adriatic, and are brought to Ukraine by truck. A shop like Malakhovsky’s can fix a Tesla in somewhere between one week and one year, depending on the damage.
Tyschenko arranged for his Model Y to be shipped to a local repair shop in Kyiv, where it arrived in February 2023, five months after he hit the Buy button online. The technician sent him videos of the EV’s ongoing revamp every few weeks, and Tyschenko stopped by to visit a handful of times. By May, he had paid the technician some $25,000 for his work and was driving the Model Y around Kyiv.
Two months later, the battery died and Tyschenko spent another $4,000 to replace it—a demonstration of the risks of electric vehicle rescues. Still, he’s happy with how things worked out, and now pays just $10 to $100 a month to refuel his car, depending on whether he charges at home or at public stations.
Finding parts to repair Teslas and other EVs can be a challenge. On Facebook and Telegram, groups like “Renault Zoe Club Ukraine” host thousands of EV owners who barter with each other for spare parts. Oleksandr Perepelitsa, a 25-year-old electric vehicle repairer in Kyiv, says that when he first began his work three years ago, he and his business partners would buy two wrecked Teslas from overseas to create a single working vehicle to sell to local Ukranians. “Even that was profitable for us,” he says. Now, business connections can send Tesla parts from the US or Europe, or repairers buy cheaper Chinese reproductions.
The success of Ukraine’s EV resurrection industry is the flip side of the failure of insurers and manufacturers in North America to figure out what to do when a shiny new EV becomes roadkill.
US insurers are more willing to write off vehicles of all kinds that in the past may have been fixed. New vehicle repairs have gotten more expensive, in part due to vehicles getting more complex and computerized, as well as a shortage of vehicle technicians. In the past decade, the damaged cars up for auction “are better and less damaged,” Copart CEO Jeff Liaw told investors on an earnings call this year.
Industry-wide data is hard to come by, but numerous sources suggest that EVs are more likely to be written off than gas-powered cars, and can be declared unfixable after even minor crashes. A Reuters analysis this year found that a “large portion” of damaged EVs sold for scrap were low-mileage, nearly-new vehicles. While one in 10 new cars sold in the US and Canada this year are forecasted to be electric, the infrastructure and expertise needed to assess and fix damaged EVs can be patchy. “In an ideal world, electric vehicles are as easy to repair as internal combustion engine vehicles,” says Mark Fry, research manager at Thatcham Research, which crunches auto market data for insurers and other clients. It recently found British EVs get written off at disproportionately high rates.
The main reason EV repairs are so tricky comes down to a lack of agreement on how to handle EV batteries after a crash. Worldwide, there is no industry standard for measuring battery health. Vehicle manufacturers sometimes refuse to sanction battery repairs because of liability concerns. “If you repair the battery, what's it going to be like after another two, three years and another 50,000 miles?” Fry says. It’s easier to let nearly new vehicles be declared dead than to find out.
The North American scrap industry is also somewhat leery of EVs, says Megan Slattery, a researcher at UC Davis who studies what happens to damaged EV batteries. Scrap businesses generally make money by taking cars apart to extract the most valuable widgets to resell. But dismantling a battery takes dedicated workers, equipment, and—most important of all—space, due to the fire risks of storing lithium-ion cells. Many mom-and-pop dismantlers don’t have any of that.
Plus, EVs tend to have simpler drivetrains, with more plastic and large, prefabricated body components that can’t be easily pulled apart. In some electric vehicles, the battery is built directly into the car’s structure, making it especially difficult to dismantle or repair. All of that means that exporters looking to sell to eager buyers abroad have less competition when bidding on totaled cars.
In the US, there’s increasing pressure to keep broken EVs from heading overseas. Regulators are concerned about safety, hoping to better track broken batteries through shipping channels as fears rise of fires sparked by used EVs, including on cargo ships. Another is to avoid dumping e-waste on countries without the means to recycle or repurpose, and instead keep the valuable minerals inside batteries local. Battery recycling startups have received vast amounts of private and public investment—both in Western Europe and the US, with funds from the Inflation Reduction Act—with a promise to help shore up raw material supply chains. But so far, they have received only a trickle of used batteries.
Policies that wind up choking off the export of EV wrecks would in some ways be a shame, Slattery says. More stringent European Union export rules for used cars and EV batteries in particular are one reason why the supply of Teslas to Eastern Europe is so dependent on North American wrecks. Without them, the electric revolution would be much less advanced in places like Ukraine, where US and Canadian write-offs have helped support the emergence of charger networks, trained repair specialists, and a wide familiarity and acceptance that electric propulsion is not just green but also practical.
In North America, there's a widespread belief that “people don't want electric vehicles and that it's just laws and regulations that push us to buy them,” says Melin, the used EV analyst. “There are other markets that want to have electrics.” It’s a testament to a system that is working, Melin adds, that used EVs end up in places like Ukraine, where new models are difficult to come by.
For Max in Vancouver, Betty White’s reappearance overseas did cause some headaches. The car was still logged into his Google, Netflix, and Spotify accounts, potentially allowing the new owners to access his personal data. When he asked Tesla support, he was advised to change his passwords, Max says. (Tesla did not respond to WIRED’s questions.)
But looking back on the crash, and now driving a new Model Y—named Black Betty—Max says his old car’s resurrection is the best possible outcome. “I’m happy to see that Betty White has lived to see another day,” he says.
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Disclaimer before I tell this story: I like to drive fast, I know the dimensions of my vehicle, I know what gap I can fit into, I commit to my choices when I'm in care and control of my vehicle. Second-guessing yourself will get you killed, so decide quickly, and then make your move. Fast and accurate, people.
Couple of weeks ago, I was driving to the city from home. Home is a small town, and the city's the city. Lotsa traffic. I regularly get frustrated with people in the city who don't use their signals, or who try to change lanes into the side of me, or who run lights, etc. But the drive in is nice at that hour of the morning, usually! It's county roads and then the highway and usually I'm leaving early enough that I miss most of the traffic.
So, I'm past halfway, and I'm in a little group of cars and we're stretched out doing like, I dunno, a buck fifteen (speed limit is 80km/h, roads were dry, sun is rising, no one is following too close), and behind me, on my left, I see this pick up truck.
He probably did eight of us, hauled in two cars ahead of me, and then popped out again to do three more, and then two more, and then i lost him over the crest of the hill. If we were doing a buck fifteen, he had to have been pushing a buck thirty going by me. Where's a cop when you fuckin' need one, right?
So, I'm like whatever, he'll get his someday. Firm believer in the balancing hand of the universe, me.
We come up to this lone traffic light, which is usually green, but today, someone must've been coming up from the other county road, and that's chill, it's green again, but we're slowing waaaaay down because at the head of the line is a full grain truck. He's getting himself going and shifting through his many gears to do it, and it takes a while! It's fine, I know he'll get up to speed and I know we're coming up to a town where the speed limit drops to 60km/h halfway up a hill and then 40km/h through the centre of town, so I am not minding that we're taking our time.
This little Chevy SUV roars past me on the left, and he's making stupid passing decisions. The pickup truck earlier wasn't making the best choices, but he wasn't passing going up a blind hill or nipping in and out without a signal which is making everyone in our little column nervy, which means brake lights and people bunching up, and I'm like, okay, well, this is getting dangerous, so I'm backing off and off and leaving a bunch of space between me and the SUV in front of me, you know, just in case we gotta stop suddenly 'cause the idiot has caused a wreck further up.
At this point, I'm really starting to wonder why I haven't seen a single fuckin' cop this whole trip. There's usually at least one, and sometimes also a ghost car doing a speed trap, but there's been nada today.
We get to where the speed limit drops, and the grain truck turns into the feed mill, as I figured he would, and then traffic slows to a fuckin' crawl. Sure, it's 40km/h on the other side of the lights, but like, it should still be moving. So I'm like, what has happened? Is there a farm implement? A horse and buggy? (I do this entire drive through Mennonite country after all).
Then, I notice debris on the road. Bits of car. And I'm thinking oh no.
And then, I see it.
On my right, pulled over to the side, out of traffic, I spy the little Chevy SUV. His driver's side rear quarter panel is mangled, his tire's gone. The guy's out of the car gabbing on his phone so he's clearly fine. And THEN, on my left, on the shoulder, as we all crawl through town, in front of the private school that is the reason for this speed limit, is the pickup truck from before!
His right passenger front quarter panel is scraped to shit, his front bumper is hanging off. He's standing in front of his truck, hands on his hips, looking very put out by his circumstances.
I have never in my life seen karma applied with such a precision edge. No other vehicles were involved. Just the two idiots who were in such a fuckin' hurry they were probably playing leap frog chicken in a school zone. Truly, a thrilling conclusion to that drive.
#that post i just reblogged about people on their phones reminded me of this#cannot confirm or deny whether either of these idiots were on their phones#but i would bet cash money they were#things jess says
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Ah... I feel a bit strange doing this. Might just stay in the drafts forever. We'll see. But my hands itch to do it every single time I listen to the song so... So here's a lyric analysis of "Star Treatment" and how... it might?... be? A song... About... Miles Kane?? Maybe??? 🫣 (no executions please. I'm really not trying to push this narrative. These things just kind of jumped out at me & I felt an urge to write it down somewhere. And perhaps see if anyone agrees? Comments encouraged! If anyone ever stumbles upon this silly thing)
This will get long... Cause that's who I am. And also it references other songs.
Disclaimer 1: I did see someone attempt this on reddit. It was a bit out there though... And maybe ironic? I do share a thought or two with them though.
Disclaimer 2, an Important one: this does rely on an implication that there was something more between the two sometime around/ between 2015-2017ish? I don't want to put any labels and try to stay away from any too specific guesses. But well, I suppose I do kind of personally believe there was something there. If you're not a fan of theories about private lives of real people... I'm sorry. This one's not for you. I really do try to do it as respectfully as possible though. At the end of the day - it's just a theory. And not a mean one. I understand it's all just something that fits together in my head and may be very far from any truth.
Disclaimer 3: I know this album is a concept album centered around characters. But I'm analyzing the second, potential autobiogrophical hidden layer beneath the obvious first meaning
Okay, let us have a whack at it now:
I just wanted to be one of The Strokes
Now look at the mess you made me make
Hitchhiking with a monogrammed suitcase
Miles away from any half-useful imaginary highway
This one is very on the nose. But quite literally sneaking in his name in the lyrics -- maybe? we know Alex loves playing with many meanings/hidden messages & double entendres.
+ the being away from any half-useful imaginary highway makes me think of when he spoke about the fact that he couldn't write any more love-related matarial after EYCTE. And someone encouraged him to just go a different route. That's how TBHC was born. But also implies some trouble in the love-related ascpects of his life around the time. Could've just been trouble around Taylor - who he broke up with soon after the album's release. There's theories about how that happened [current girlfriend invloved] - but maybe there was even more confusion & heartbreak in the mix (ending a tour with someone with whom the lovey-dovey jokes may have gone a bit too far/serious?)
I'm a big name in deep space, ask your mates
But golden boy's in bad shape
this is just implying any sort of broken-heartedness.
I found out the hard way that
Here ain't no place for dolls like you and me
Everybody's on a barge
Floating down the endless stream of great TV
1984, 2019
dolls = puppets. And how the industry / society isn't a good place for relationships like this. (People wouldn't understand the type of bond they share?)
Maybe I was a little too wild in the '70s
Rocket-ship grease down the cracks of my knuckles
Karate bandana, warp speed chic
Hair down to there, impressive moustache
Miles and Alex have spoken many times about how their first album was heavily 60s inspired - Scott Walker, The Beatles, 60s Morricone.
What may be less obvious and spoken about is how EYCTE was sort of meant to take their work into the 70s. He spoke about it in an interview when asked about the album cover. It's a 1969 photo of Tina Turner - which Alex commented on by saying: "The idea was to move the artwork on from the ’60s feel of the first Last Shadow Puppets album artwork, so here is Tina on the very cusp of the 1970s"
(They also chose to sing covers like Moonage Daydream and Is This What You Wanted during that tour. Both 70s songs from artists that defined the era).
So this could be him reflecting on the EYCTE era and how things may have gotten a bit too far during the time. Going in to deep, crossing some boundries and definitions?
Love came in a bottle with a twist-off cap
Let's all have a swig and do a hot lap
alcohol? pills? alcohol & or drugs clouding some judgement/helping loosen up and causing the crossing of certain [friendship] boundries?
So who you gonna call?
The Martini Police
Baby, that isn't how they look tonight, oh no
It took the light forever to get to your eyes
It's not a particularly meaningful line in terms of this narrative - but I wanted to talk about it because I find it so beautiful but also so fuck*ng sad. Like - one of he saddest lines I've read. It just hit me in the heart straight away when I heard it. I feel like my personal interpretation is dead wrong. But still choose to see it that way. I also know of the story of how it's inspired by Alex's dad telling him about how we see the light of the stars the way it was in the past bc of how long it takes to reach us. The way I hear this line though is: seeing the bottomless sadness in the eyes of someone who had their heart broken. Someone whose eyes used to be full of happiness - and now it takes forever for any touch of happiness to show up in their gaze.
Now a possible interpratation for a second meaning to this whole section could be: calling the martini police = grabbing a drink to help with hearbreak, when there's no other solutions left.
Miles has sang in his breakup album Coup de Grace about how he drowned the sadness after hearbreak in alcohol and pills. Mixing stuff together like a mad scientist etc.
(Also if you ever saw the interview he did with [the one and only] Martin on his CDG album... Oof... Yeah. There was no light in that man's eyes. Even Martin saw that pain and commented on it. It's a tough one to watch)
I just wanted to be one of those ghosts
You thought that you could forget
And then I haunt you via the rear view mirror
On a long drive from the back seat
This is one of these sections that hits me the most.
Cause to me it can be seens as: Alex being aware of how much pain he caused - all he could wish is that he was just another lover whom the hearbroken person [Miles?] could forget.
But alas - he still haunts him.
Here it gets interesting (or batshit crazy. Cause I might be).
Beacause the use of "ghost" just absolutely sends me to Miles' song "Shavambacu" - where he describes the eyes/thoughts of an ex lover still being focused on him after the breakup (this song though could have a whole seperate post of it's own)
While "haunting via a rear view mirror" made me jump up and recall lyrics from Miles' song "Dont let it get you down".
I saw your reflection, in
The backseat of a Chevrolet from
Hollywood to East LA
NOW - don't shout at me. I know timelines are important. Because Shavambacu and Star Treatment came out around a similar time period. But Shavambacu came out a little bit later.
While DLIGYD came out completely after all of hits - this year.
So first off - I'm considering the fact that Miles and Alex are clearly still friends and in contact. So could have shown each other songs earlier.
But more plausible theory: if these songs are perhaps maybe inspired by one another - they clearly are gonna recall events and/or inside lingo and jokes they both used.
Possible situation: post Miles-Alex hearbreak Miles stumbled upon Alex going somewhere in a car. They spotted each other.
this also makes me recall the whole:
Swear I saw you smile
You try to hide it well
3:15 on the wrong side Columbia Street
line from "Killing the Joke". Which many think references the area that Alex lives in.
They lived a few minutes away from each other around 2016-2017. So would obviously run into one another often. Even if they were going through something and taking a break/trying not to.
But it's alright, 'cause you love me
And you recognise that it ain't how it should be
Your eyes are heavy and the weather's getting ugly
This one is also way to sad if you place it in a relationshippy context. There's a few ways I see it:
1) it's alright - no matter what happens, because A. knows M. loves him and will understand why things ended like they did. It shouldn't be this way - but it has to be, because there's things standing in the way. He believes he'll understand despite the grief.
2) dramatic, sad version - the "it ain't how it should be" actually references the "love me part". So M. should understand that things ended because they shouldn't love each other this way. It's just now how it should be and A. believes M. recognises that.
So pull over, I know the place
Don't you know an apparition is a cheap date?
What exactly is it you've been drinking these days?
once again referencing bumping into each other randomly? And going with it - going some place; talking. Maybe about how Miles' is doing, the heartbreak, how he deals with it - the alcohol (once again - just referencing what he himself sang about in lyrics on his breakup album)
Jukebox in the corner, "Long Hot Summer"
They've got a film up on the wall and it's dark enough to dance
"Long Hot Summer" - by The Style Council is actually a song Alex cited to be one of the main references/inspirations used when working on the EYCTE album. So is definitely a nostalgic/meaninful song between the two.
They go to a place after bumping into one another - there's a jukebox with a nostalgic song. They can dance together - because it's an incognito, dark place.
What do you mean you've never seen Blade Runner?
Now the Blade Runner line is so clearly Taylor Bagley (the woman is a huge, huge fan of it, apparently) it did have me stumped for a while.
But then - maybe it's a clarifying line? Like - if this were about Taylor he would definitely not say that to her. It's obvious she's seen it a million times. Maybe this is here to sort of clarify this?
Oh, maybe I was a little too wild in the '70s
Back down to earth with a lounge singer shimmer
Elevator down to my make-believe residency
From the honeymoon suite
Two shows a day, four nights a week
Easy money
70s again - EYCTE era
But after the tour ended it was time to go back to earth, back to being non-TLSP Alex. Running away from reality into writing music - writing about a make-believe residency (Tranquility Base)
Time to leave the honeymoon era = the tour and shows TLSP had together.
(also AM may be easy money? Their reputation [very well deserved] makes it so that it's easy - bc anything they come out with will be bought)
So who you gonna call?
The Martini Police
So who you gonna call?
The Martini Police
Oh, baby, that isn't how they look tonight
It took the light absolutely forever to get to your eyes
...
And as we gaze skyward, ain't it dark early?It's the star treatment
Yeah, and as we gaze skyward, ain't it dark early?
It's the star treatment
It's the star treatment
The star treatment
a sad ending. It got dark. A bit too early. It's sad that it all ended.
But that's how it has to be - in show buisness, in the industry. They're well known people and it could hurt their careers - also it would just get out easily, so there's no room for self-discovery and just trying it out. That's the star treatment. (This is also a theme I am seeing in Mr. Schwartz lyrics. But that's for another time)
Am I crazy? Probably!
Is this just accidental elaborate fan fiction? Maybe!
But still...I don't know. Song theories are fun. I get that morally it's a gray / or maybe even red area - talking out loud, publicly about theories invloving specific names and relationships. But like... Sue me! Let's call it a guilty pleasure.
If anyone ever reads through this wall of text... Hi! Thanks and sorry. And please share some thoughts!
(Eh. May just delete this soon anyway)
Peace and love
#artic monkeys song theory#arctic monkeys lyric analysis#star treatment lyric analysis#arctic monkeys#tranquility base hotel and casino#alex turner miles kane#everything that you've come to expect#the last shadow puppets#miles kane and alex turner#alex turner and miles kane#song analysis#i may be batshit crazy i'm sorry#but it's harmless#milex#?#i suppose#my posts
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Heyy, can you wrote a Oikawa x male reader who does extremely reckless/dangerous stuff (like drinking till he passes out, speeding on highways, taking random drugs people give him at raves and clubs) because He just has no self preservation or self care and he doesnt care about what happens to him or whether he lives or not. And Oikawa is worried/mad at the reader because He's scared for The readers safety and the reader is trying to tell Oikawa that he will be fine but Oikawa refuses to listen. Sorry if this is super specific but I'm going through at lot rn and this kinda describes it
oikawa tooru x m!reader
a/n: hey! most certainly. i hope that you're ok and please don't hesitate to reach out if you need someone. i know life kinda suck balls but it's good to have someone and if i can do anything for you, please don't hesitate at all to reach out to me! my inbox is always open 🖤 also i hope this story helps a little
tw: mentions of alcohol and drugs
you have always been on the wild side, as others would say. you were reckless with life and you didn't cared whether you lived or die.
from passing out drunk and accepting drugs from strangers in clubs, to speeding on highways, sometimes half sober, you didn't cared if you ended up dead in the ditch.
as much as you wanted to do all those reckless things, there was always someone nagging at you. that someone being your boyfriend, oikawa tooru.
props to him for being so patient despite you doing all the shit you do. he had always told you how worried he was when you're out and how you always shrugged him off by saying you'll be fine.
i guess even the most patient person has his limits.
his last straw was when you almost got into an accident when you sped home from a party, after taking god knows what drugs that stranger gave you at the club.
"y/n, did you drive home like this"
you just stumbled into the house and nodded ever so slightly.
he quickly pulled you to the couch and sat you down.
"you can't keep doing this. i'm always worried the moment you leave the house, not knowing if you're going to make it home alive. not know if i'm going to get a call saying that my boyfriend is dead. please y/n, you can't keep doing this."
you suddenly sobered up from whatever drug you were on as you watched your boyfriend cry.
oikawa was never one to cry. he was always the stronger one in the relationship, always the one trying to hold things together when you're out, living your life so recklessly, not caring about your life or safety. and while doing so, you forgot that you had someone worrying and caring for you waiting back at home.
"i just need you to know that i don't care what it takes for you to live properly and not recklessly. i know that you don't care what happens to you but i do. i care so much for your safety and for you and i'm so scared to lose you."
he was so vulnerable.
"i'm sorry"
that was all you could mutter out.
"i love you so much. please, try to live better for me, if you don't wish to live better for yourself"
he hugged you so tightly, it felt like your lungs were about to collapsed.
but i guess if you can't live for yourself, the very least you could do is to live for him.
#haikyuu hcs#haikyuu x reader#haikyuu x y/n#haikyuu au#haikyuu headcanons#haikyuu scenarios#oikawa tooru#oikawa toru x reader#oikawa toru x you#oikawa x you#oikawa x reader#oikawa x y/n#oikawa x male reader
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