#and like that might sound like it's a formality. like they didn't legalize it but everyone basically acted like it was legal

[copperbadge]

Hi Sam, how did you come to the conclusion you should be tested for neurodivergence? I've been reading a lot of Temple Grandin (Visual Thinking is fantastic) and see so much of myself in her books. But, I, too, am, let's just say well into adulthood, and I don't know if my life would change that much with a diagnosis. The only thing I can think of doing with a diagnosis is telling my siblings and childhood bullies that they picked on someone who had a reason for being "weird." But it doesn't change anything. Beyond the medication, did you find any solace? Thank you for sharing your journey.

I was just thinking I should do a post about this....

I don't recall the specifics and have never been able to find the post again, but sometime prior to 2019 I made a joke about having a short attention span, and someone said something like "Oh, did you finally get a diagnosis?" and I said haha no, I don't have ADHD, and a bunch of readers went, "Uh, you very clearly do." Some of them added that they thought I knew and was just being discreet about it. (As if I have ever been discreet about anything in my life.)

So I figured, okay, probably there's some level of neurodivergence there, given that my mother and siblings all have various diagnoses, and my father was clearly autistic. (Knowing what we know now about how ADHD can mask as other mental illnesses, there's a strong chance this comes from my maternal grandmother, who was the person in the family I was most like when she was alive.) I tried a couple of times to get evaluated and always had either slow or nonexistent responses from the clinics I reached out to, so I stopped trying. I had a ton of coping mechanisms in place and was in a good spot in my life, so I thought honestly, what would it change?

But by the end of 2021, while I was still in a pretty good financial place, and my career was doing well, I could tell that if things kept up as they were I was going to tank my job purely through being unable to get through a day doing productive work the way I used to.

I thought, well, if this is ADHD and it's getting worse because the whole fucking world is on fire, I have two options: I can assume I have it and just do the reading and figure shit out on my own, or I can get evaluated, get professional advice, and possibly get medicated. That seemed like the best return on investment, so that's what I worked on. My goal was primarily medication, because I didn't see myself being able to change much else about my situation on my own. And, truthfully, medication has been the biggest change -- I actually have an essay about that queued for the anniversary of my starting Adderall. But while it hasn't been a massive life-altering world-shattering change, all of this was worth it purely for the medication.

Uh, momentary sidebar in my memoir: there are downsides to having a diagnosed disability -- discrimination, legal barriers to certain things like holding government jobs or adopting, etc. Those have to be weighed when you're considering evaluation. If you think you may have autism, there's not necessarily an advantage to having a formal diagnosis unless you need accommodations; if you think you may have ADHD, the huge advantage is access to medication, which doesn't exist for autism as far as I'm aware. So your particular flavor of neurodivergence might dictate whether you get a diagnosis, or whether you just start operating on the assumption you have it. Both are valid, I think, it really depends on what's going on in your life and what you want to change.

Anyway, I have been doing other research, reading journal articles and pop psychology and talking to people, and that's been good, but even if I had none of that, the medication has been so helpful in getting me back on an even keel and then making life even better.

This sounds kind of weird to say but I'm not generally someone who needs a lot of solace. There is some relief in knowing that at least some of my fuckups in life weren't something I could have prevented by simply having more strength of character or working harder, and that's nice, but it's something I could have had without a formal diagnosis -- just like you could simply tell your siblings and bullies you have a diagnosis. (Being real, I doubt they'd care; bullies gonna bully whether you had a reason to be weird or not, and none of that would have been your fault regardless of your neurology. But it's all very situational, as I'm sure you know.) I wasn't badly bullied as a kid and there's nobody really to...tell, in the sense you're thinking of. But I didn't get into it for emotional solace; I got into it to fix a life that was, albeit extremely slowly, starting to fall apart. So if you're someone, as most people are, who derives emotional satisfaction or catharsis from having the diagnosis, I think it probably would be pretty helpful. But even if you aren't, like me, if you can get medication or accomodations, I think it's worth it.

#sam has adhd

[j0ekw]

Hey did anyone else (particularly ppl who have been to uni) have a bad experience reading Loveless? Not even that its a bad book or anything, I just had a rly hard time with it (I've stopped reading it like halfway)

(B4 reading do be aware that this is quite personal and is more about my experience than the book itself, if ur just looking for discussion on the book specifically then this proly isn't up ur alley)

Like obviously the main character struggling with their sexuality and the consequences that has on the ppl around them is going to be especially sore if that struggle is relatable (which is a bridge I don't want to cross rn). But, as a Uni Student also in the UK, I found the setting weirdly upsetting.

Now its a different uni to mine, the characters are doing different courses to me and come from different backgrounds, but like I can't help but feel a sense of betrayal. In the book, sure there's conflict but the MC, who's just started in first year, is going to uni with ppl they know, they're getting to know ppl there quickly, they're going to cafe's and societies etc. Where I left it off, they were at this prom thing in fancy clothes with a ton of events coming to ahead, and there was a major conflict coming to ahead in the middle of a bouncy castle fight. Its a scene with bad consequences, but like the whole time I can't help but think about how amazing the event sounds, and how cool everyone looks.

My first year was spent being ill, tired all the time from work and the ppl in accommodation, being uncomfortable around most ppl and then, being afraid of some bullshit fine from the uni for keeping the kitchen clean that I felt I was the only one taking seriously (I don't even know if they were legally able to enforce it) and of course, with 2020 rolling around, covid. And sure, things have gotten a bit better since then, it took a few years but I found a good community, better housemates and a better job. And there were good bits in first year. However, reading that book, I couldn't help but think; has my experience been so bad that I can't even fathom what a good uni experience is meant to be? Because the book sounds fake, and maybe there are some exaggerated bits to make it more exciting, but even though I find a lot in common with the MC, it feels like they're in a world a million miles away from my own. Every cafe experience is tainted with regret bc I could've gotten the food cheaper, every society social felt like "go to pub" so god forbid you can't or don't want to drink, I don't think I've even been to a formal event. And even now, as a person helping to run a society, I can't even make that much better because the uni aren't helping! I didn't even start thinking about sexuality till I took a year out working full time, because that was probably the most stable situation I've been in since what feels like forever, and had the headspace to start thinking about that stuff.

And the book itself was published in 2020, its contemporary! I can't even blame the decline of this country due to the ghouls running it on why my experience is so different (altho maybe Alice is writing from her own experience which would be before my own).

I just feel like I've taken years off my life to make this uni thing work, and reading a world where money is a non-issue, fun events are going on, and the MC is around ppl they've known for ages, makes me envious.

I'm realising that this is rly personal and a non-issue in the grand scheme of things, I might just be feeling sorry for myself. I do still need to finish it tbh, maybe I was in a bad frame of mind at the time.

#loveless #alice oseman #uk #university

[the-heaminator]

I should legally not be allowed to like writing these oh my God.

Chapter 9 of But MUUM

The fighting in the rice isle of tesco had me dying because my parents, aunts uncleseveryone does it and it almost always goes like this.

Hmm that's warm, what is that, light, fucking light fuck off.

This was the thought process of England as he stole the remnants of the blanket not already on him to cover his eyes against the light of morning.

The Gilbert next to him, in his sleep was muttering what sounded like military commands, something his brothers had confirmed and recorded, was a thing he did too, but upon the stealing of the blanket he, very pathetically if I may add, whined "Get your cold fucking feet off me you God forsaken fucking frost gremlin and give me the damn blanket."

Gilbert grabbed the blanket back and put it on himself because it was all of 2 degrees outside the blanket and he would rather not freeze to death today.

In his quarter lucid state, Arthur thought.

He had the blanket, which means he will be warm, which means if I snuggle I will be warm.

Flawless logic you've got there mate, flawless logic, so he snuggled, very, very close. Gilbert wasn't exactly the most muscular dude, not anymore at least, and most considered him a little scrawny and under fed, but it seemed pretty soft to sleepy Arthur, so he snuggled in nice and deep.

Gilbert also got the nice addition of having a nice little heat pack attached to his chest, snoring quietly, but those fucking feet.

He really needs socks his feet are so fucking cold.

In this sleepy state, neither really realised that either was snuggling the other, sleep tends to make you forget stuff, I can say first hand.

But when Matthew, another insomniac in a family of them, found them, both usually being people that woke pretty early, if they slept at all, still asleep at about 9 in the morning, he could not resist snapping a photo of it because d a m n.

But everyone was awake now, an oddity for sure, and they were hungry, the groceries from yesterday had almost been depleted and they ate what they could from the bare cupboards and the sad looking pantry.

Beans on toast was what they all ate, but as previously mentioned, everyone here ate much more than a normal human would do so, mainly due to them being nations, and also  because people like Alfred were constantly hungry, they were just built a bit different.

So he woke the two sleepy bastards, with great difficulty I might add, Gilbert woke up easily enough and gave him a look that very clearly said "We don't talk about this if you want to have your kidneys inside you and not outside you."

While the rare times England actually slept, he slept hard, and waking him up was a difficult task, both managed to do it, and when he realised that that "thing" he had been cuddling to all night was Gilbert, he also gave Matt a look that said "Shut up or I will show you why both the devil and I wear red."

And Gilbert a look that said "We will discuss this later."

This was only managed to be conveyed through looks because the Germanics as a whole had gotten very good at non verbal communication, because whatever communication was actually achieved, was usually incredibly filtered and a bit too formal.

"Dad wake up theres no more food again."

"How? Didn't we just get food yesterday?"

"Yea but we have 14 people now and we eat enough for at least 20."

When they both decided to get their asses downstairs, they were greeted by the customary chaos that comes with having 14 people in one house, Peter was hanging upside down on the sofa with Wy, for some unfathomable reason, and it appeared they were having some sort of competition, lots of smack talk was involved. Very creative smack talk too.

"Your teeth are wonkier than a buck toothed snake you little British cunt."

"You can't talk your a mosquitoes shits sisters mothers father in laws dentures!"

To avoid further confusion we shall stop elaborating from there, but I assume you get the picture clearly enough.

Scotland was fully awake this time, Wales was not, and looked very happy to murder North who kept pestering him about something, Ireland was manning the toaster with the bravery that only comes about when you've exploded 3 toasters in the last year, Jack was sleepy and hungry, the same applies for Matt, Eleanor, Raj and Alfred.

The rest were just hungry.

"Ah look who decided ta join us, had a nice little cuddle did ya?"

That, that was remarkably blunt even by Scotland standards, really by any standards, and so naturally at least someone had to start laughing, well the someones, Peter had fallen off the sofa due to laughing, much to a triumphant Wendy's teasing, Matt after reading the text from Brighid was not expecting to need to get two of his family members laid already, Scotland wasn't laughing but he had that shit eating grin that only younger brothers could have.

Raj looked vaguely concerned because the toaster had started to smoke as Brighid laughed at her brothers misfortune, like she didn't have the exact same fucking problem.

Wales, quite often being in possession of The Braincell™️ decided to ignore all of that and said "We ran out of food, or we would have let you two sleep a bit longer, who knows when is the next time we'll be able to get him to sleep for more than 4 hours."

Swiftly removing the plug from the smoking toaster, not really wanting to clean up the mess caused by a toaster explosion, India continued "Apparently we forgot that 14 people eat a lot, and some people here eat like cows, and I don't think you've been grocery shopping for at least 2 months, so yes we do need to go to get our groceries."

Dismissively the resident Arthur said "Sure, sure, we'll go."

Mentioning to make tea, for only an absolute psychopath can wake up properly without tea, to find that there was no more tea, it having all been imbibed by far too many people.

"For fucks sake how many cups of tea did you shits drink so far?"

Mentally tallying the number, India came up with "10 at the very least, though probably more knowing the crowd."

Grumbling, people said he had tea for blood, it wasn't exactly that bad, Turkey did, but a deprivation of tea in the morning is never a good thing if you wish to keep your spleen inside your body, especially because he knew for a fact that he had at least 15 teabags left, who the fuck would do this to him? Well he could think of 13 people in this house from the top of his head so maybe it wasn't the most surprising.

A little more pissed than he was 5 minutes ago, Arthur rallied up the fam and asked who wanted to go with him to the big Tesco's in town, nobody but Prussia volunteered, for some reason (cough cough gay) and India wanted to come along mainly because he said he couldn't trust either of their taste buds, both having been destroyed long ago, and he was going to be one of the few that cooked so he knew what they needed.

"Aren't you going to eat anything?"

The question was aimed at England and Prussia who had both already worn their coats and shoes to go shopping.

"No."

And that was that, no one questioned it and they left the house, and loaded themselves into England's crusty old car, England driving, India called dibs on the front seat, leaving Gilbert to choose between the three back seats, one looked like it had a bloodstain on it, and the other looked like somebody both shat and vomited on it, so go chose the middle seat and hoped to hell that England was a careful driver because the seatbelt didn't work.

Turns out that for all the shit he did, England really was a careful driver, albeit a vocal and bad mouthed one, cussing the one guy who was on the wrong side in a roundabout so profusely that Gilbert could feel his ears shrivel up from the blasphemy, getting into the local big Tesco with old english cuss words ringing in his head.

They had to take one of those big trellises because they knew they were to be buying a lot of food, and England, being the stingy cunt he tended to be, took as much yellow sticker stuff as he could, that was not perishable at least, he did not want salmonella again, who can blame him.

Checking the very long list on his phone, India first fucked off to get vegetables, England had a load of oranges and lemons but you can't really eat those as a meal, so enter in a lot of chillies, garlic, onion and coriander, peppers, a fuck tonne of tomatoes, and mushrooms, grumbling all the time about how expensive they were.

Prussia went off to obtain the meat he needed, which was 6 chickens, (Arthur knew a butcher who would get him discounted lamb)

"How the fuck am I meant to get 6 chickens and not look suspicious!" Whisper yelled Gilbert.

"You're always suspicious you dumbass now go get the fucking chicken."

"Why me?"

"Because I need to get other things!"

Gilbert huffed like a small child and stormed off, and India looking over from the vegetable isle was wondering when the two would get their act together, because this was humourous in its stupidity.

England went to go get the canned goods (ie baked beans, tuna, tomatoes) and the sweet stuff, a lot of biscuits, ginger ones and Bourbon ones seemed to be the most he took, finally meeting the other two in the international foods isle.

Ah rice, a staple food of a lot of countries, a 10 kilo pack ranged from 15 to 25 pounds, and was of varying qualities ranging from burnt rubber to utter divine bits of carbohydrate.

And once again being the stingy cunt he is, Arthur wanted to get the 15 pound packet because "Its not like half of us can taste it anyways!"

I mean he had a point there but he really was fucking blunt about it, India did not want to buy the rubbery  shit because he wanted to make biryiani and you need basmati rice otherwise it's all crusty and he did know that most of everyone had either non functional taste buds or they were a but malfunctional, but the texture was something they could all feel.

"Yes but the texture is so bheanskiankh" (directly translates to cows eye but means shit)

"Its just fine?"

Gilbert interjected before anything else could happen "How about we compromise. India what is the best rice for whatever you're planning to make."

"Pakistani basmati."

England pointed at the price tag which was quite a lot to be fair, 24 pounds.

"And I understand that you want the cheapest option, ja?"

It was the Laila rice, or the Tesco basic rice, 15 quid both of them, well technically 14.99 but it was close enough.

"Right so is there any basmati (he butchered the pronunciation) that is cheaper than 25 pounds?"

Searching the aisle, one was located, it was the normal basmati rice for 21 pounds, and with a lot of glaring from the two parties, and Gilbert questioning his life decisions once again, they went to thee checkout, pushing the very heavy trolley.

It amassed to nearly 300 pounds.

Lots of grumbling later, and grocery tetris, they all managed to fit into the car as well as all thee stuff they dragged along with them, prussia smooshed in between rice and bags of vegetables.

Finally getting home as it was nearly dark, Gilbert was hungry Arthur was not, so after unloading said groceries, he raided them, making off with some beans and and chicken slices to consume at once in his room.

Once he remembered where that was first.

Ah fuck it England's room will do just fine, so he indeed did consume, Den found him there and berated him like only a truly concerned homie can, and dragged him down to the living room.

Today was halfway decent weather, which meant that everyone who wasn't used to cold temperature was still inside being all cosy in a blanket someone had rummaged from somewhere that was not full of holes, while Matt, Matthias, Peter, Alfred and the British isles siblings were outside doing something that was being observed from the inside, and said thing was not exactly describable, Alasdair seemed to be sticking knives into a tree and having Peter climb it.

Jack and Wendy were no where to be seen.

#The heam writes #These can be read as standalone to be fair #Arthur is snuggly guy #Pruk

[prettyboysdontlookatexplosions]

hm it did occur to me today that possibly witnessing a whole bunch of nightmare discourse around the already nightmarish spectacle of a man using the legal system to continue to ruin the life of the woman who dared to leave him and call him what he was might be activating certain things for me, a person whose parents' divorce trial took five fucking years

#new york state didn't legalize no fault divorce till like 2010 #is a fun fact i think about every now and then for normal reasons #and like that might sound like it's a formality. like they didn't legalize it but everyone basically acted like it was legal #but no my mom's divorce suit got thrown out by westchester family court in like 1993 & she had to try again in manhattan #but yeah 20 years later we've definitely worked all of the patriarchy out of the system #in fact nowadays it's soooooo tragically biased in favor of women #won't anyone think of the poor men being forced at gunpoint to initiate costly and traumatic legal proceedings #that are virtually guaranteed to have no consequence except continuing to make their main character syndrome their ex-wife's problem #a ny way #i am doing fine and honestly in a weird silver lining way it's kind of nice to be like #'oh i guess i gotta process this' #at a phase of my life where i'm like pretty good at processing things #like. we woulda gotten there eventually i think. #but. u kno. can't spell processing without process

[dance-of-deduction]

#3: Learning the Law in Meiji Japan

Spoiler warning: None!

TGAA appears to be set in a fictionalized 1900-1901, and at this point, studying law wasn’t as prestigious as you or I might imagine. This is in part because Japan’s nationwide legal system only crystallized about halfway through the Meiji Era, so there wasn’t a domestic legal system to study for quite a while. Read on to find out about what university would have looked like for law students like Kazuma!

🌸 Reblogs appreciated! 🌸

In 1871, the Ministry of Justice established Japan’s first institution dedicated to legal education. This wasn't a full-on university that anyone could apply to; rather, it was a training program for its own employees. Japan needed to develop a new legal system and train people in said system almost simultaneously, so the first priority was making sure members of the ministry were well-versed in international and domestic law. These student-employees received scholarships and were required to continue working in the Ministry of Justice for a fixed number of years. In other words, Japan's first law school graduates didn't immediately go on to become lawyers, prosecutors, and judges - most went into the civil service or administration. Before Japan developed its own legal codes in the 1880s, students were trained in French law. 

Established in 1877, Tokyo Imperial University included Faculties of Law, Science, Medicine, and Letters. Aspiring students had to have 10-15 combined years of elementary, middle, and high school education. That might sound like nothing compared to today’s law school requirements, but keep in mind that widespread compulsory education simply wasn’t a thing yet. By the 1860s, about 40-50% of Japanese boys, and 15% of girls, had received any kind of education outside the home. 

Japan wasn't alone in this. Other than Germany, which had already established compulsory education, other major European nations had similar rates of education. Education had become more widespread in the Tokugawa Era, which preceded the Meiji, but a commoner’s education was limited to practical skills: reading, writing, arithmetic, abacus use, and maybe calligraphy. Extensive formal education was a privilege only the wealthy got to enjoy, so we can assume that the Asougis, Naruhodous, and Mikotobas are fairly well-off. This is reflected in-game when Kazuma mentions that his and Ryunosuke’s student numbers are still in the triple digits, making them some of the earliest students in their university's brief history. 

Private universities also existed at the time, but since Yumei is an imperial university, I'll focus on Tokyo Imperial University as a model. Tokyo Imperial University's Faculty of Law taught exclusively French and Anglo-American law until 1890. By that point, Japan had its own constitution, civil and criminal codes, and a Court Organization Law, so legal educators turned to focus on the new, domestic legal system. Studying criminal law wasn't as intense as civil, administrative, or foreign law, which were more rigorous and required more examinations. Meiji Japan focused more on its civil codes because it already had a long history of bureaucracy. Initially, it borrowed from French (and then German) legal codes, but there was a pressing need to build and grow a uniquely Japanese set of institutions; Japan knew it could not rely on imitation forever. So while criminal law makes for a more exciting game, it was less of a priority when it came to nation-building.

Although the fields of study had diversified, the ever-present Westernization of the era still had an effect on education. As mentioned above, foreign law was the focus of study for the first decade of Japanese law schools. At Tokyo Imperial University, law courses were taught in English, and students in the department were required to write their theses in English until 1882, after which they were permitted to write in Japanese or Chinese. Classes weren't taught in Japanese until 1883.

Kazuma and Ryunosuke wouldn’t have been allowed to practice law while in school, but by Meiji standards, they actually aren’t all that lacking in credentials. At the time, aspiring lawyers didn’t need practical experience or any post-graduate training. If one wanted to become a judge, lawyer, or prosecutor, the only qualification needed was a two-part bar exam. What's more, Tokyo Imperial University graduates did not need to take the exam at all - they could go from the Faculty of Law to the the judiciary right after graduation.

(Oh Ryu, your lack of court experience is a feature, not a bug!)

Even though university students were generally privileged, neither the government nor society viewed law school as an especially glamorous thing. In the early days of Meiji, establishing a centralized, codified legal system was a top priority so that Japan could assert itself as a modern nation. Once that was squared away, the government focused on expanding the economy and the empire, encouraging university graduates to go into careers that would serve those goals instead. 

And as it turned out, most law students had no intention of joining the judiciary, anyway. Law was simply an undergraduate major like any other, viewed as a general area of study rather than a highly specialized one. It was also the choice for some students who didn’t know what else to major in. Government jobs were some of the most sought-after positions among law students, because high-ranking bureaucratic work was both stable and prestigious. High-ranking civil servants enjoyed more pay, prestige, and power than judges and prosecutors. And as for defense attorneys…oh boy. Defending the accused was a pretty darn disreputable job for a pretty long time!

But more on that in a future post. For now, have my thanks for reading! Questions? Comments? Feedback? Just want to say hey? Send me an ask me any time!

Sources

Sources and Further Reading

Legal Education and the Reproduction of the Elite in Japan

Turbulence Ahead: The Future of Law Schools in Japan

History of Education in Japan

#apologies if you watched me delete + repost 17 times #please please please tell me if something doesn't make sense in this one! #i will go back and re-investigate if that's the case #this one was a doozy but i will Strive #the great ace attorney #tgaa #dai gyakuten saiban #dgs #ace attorney #tgaa meta #japan

[yurtletheturtlehenderson]

COSMIC - S1:E3; Chapter Three, Holly, Jolly - [Pt. 3]

A Will Byers x Male!Reader Series

𝘞𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘱 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥, 𝘠/𝘯, 𝘔𝘪𝘬𝘦, 𝘋𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘯, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘓𝘶𝘤𝘢𝘴 𝘴𝘦𝘵 𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘤𝘩 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘞𝘪𝘭𝘭. 𝘈 𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘧𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺 𝘪𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘰𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘲𝘶𝘢𝘳𝘳𝘺 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘳.

|| 𝟑𝐫𝐝 𝐏𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐏𝐎𝐕 ||

Hopper pulls up to the library, thankful to get a spot up front. He steps out of the vehicle and makes his way inside, Powell behind him.

Hopper takes off his hat as he enters the building, making sure to send a big smile to the librarian.

"Hey, Marissa. How you doin'?"

The disapproving look on Marissa's face never left as she spoke.

"You have a lot of nerve showing up here."

"What?"

"You could have at least called, said, 'Marissa! Hey, it's not gonna work out. Sorry, I wasted your time. I'm a dick.'"

Powell was unsure of what to do; he looked from Marissa to Hopper, waiting.

Hopper only stares ahead for a moment, unsure of what to say. Finally, with a subtle smirk, he mutters,

"Yep."

She looks to him, shaking her head expectantly. He seemed at a loss for words again as he shook his head.

"I'm sorry. Uh... Maybe we could go out again next week?" He offers, hoping for the best. She slowly turns her head to Powell and gives him a 'is he for real?' look. In turn, Powell slowly looks over to Hopper awkwardly. Hopper, already knowing he chose his words poorly, visibly cringed, and was eager to change the subject.

"Newspapers? You guys got newspapers around here?"

Marissa had shown them over to the filing cabinet and started pulling out drawers, naming the selections.

"We have the New York Times, the Post, all the big ones. Organized by year and topic. You can find the corresponding microfiche in the reading room." She briefly gestures behind her.

"Okay, we're looking for anything on the Hawkins National Laboratory."

"Well, shouldn't you be looking for that missing kid?"

"Yeah." He states as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "We are."

She nods her head, suspicious.

"Uh, so, why don't you start with the Times, and we'll check out the Post."

Marissa scoffs and looks behind her to Powell, unsure if he's serious. She turns back to Hopper and lets out a soft 'hmph!' before strutting away. Powell steps forward and lowers his voice in a questioning tone.

"The librarian?"

Hopper shrugs wildly before diving into the drawers of files.

The two men had gathered a handful of files and set to work in the other room. Each at their own microfiche, reading every column.

Hopper scanned another column that caught his attention.

'ALLEGED EXPERIMENTS, ABUSE' by T. Bridges.

"Terry Ives' legal case against embattled research scientist Dr. Martin Brenner suffered another setback today when the district attorney's office formally refused to press criminal charges against Brenner, his fellow researchers, assistants, or the project's sponsors, citing lack of evidence. Local law enforcement executed a search..."

Next column.

'MKULTRA EXPOSED' by T. Bridges

"The trust of the American people has been shaken to its core as a special inquiry into a covert CIA operation, code-named MK ULTRA, has exposed the extensive details about that which has been haunting the nation for the past decade. Six subjects have come forward..."

This particular column was accompanied by a negative of seven people. Five of which were slightly disheveled, in hospital gowns. A man in a turtleneck and blazer stood obediently in the back. A man in a fancy suit and tie, holding a clipboard stood front and center. A man with whom Hopper guessed to be Brenner.

Next slide.

'DR. MARTIN BRENNER NAMED IN LAWSUIT' by A. Ward - Staff Writer

"Senior researcher Doctor Martin Brenner and seven other staff researchers have been named in a new lawsuit filed today on behalf of former federal research study participant, Terry Ives. Dr. Brenner's attorney in conjunction with the Department of Energy has asked the circuit court to seal the details of the lawsuit until the attorney general's office can determine that no federal..."

Hopper found himself more engrossed and confused as he read.

"...her newborn daughter for scientific research. Following an investigation, the district attorney has already declined to press criminal kidnapping charges against the research facility and staff, citing lack of evidence. Dr. Brenner's attorney called Ms. Ives' allegations baseless and tragic, citing Dr. Brenner's excellent reputation, his twenty recent peer-reviewed scientific papers..."

The next slide was a short column with another accompanying photo. Although the picture was small and blurry, it wasn't hard to see the grief-stricken features on the young woman.

TERRY IVES SUING - 'They took my daughter' by Benjamin Buck

"After the district attorney's office declined to press criminal charges citing lack of evidence, local resident Terry Ives is not giving up her search for justice for herself and her daughter, and this morning filed a lawsuit against research scientist Dr. Martin Brenner and his staff.

Ms. Ives' suit seeks unspecified damages against Dr. Brenner and his facility, alleging physical abuse, sleep deprivation, malnourishment, and multiple allegations of kidnapping; both attempted and successful..."

Hopper sighed, trying his best to swallow all of this new information.

'What the hell has been happening in this damn town?'

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

Three. One. Five. The numbers on the strange new bracelet read three one five.

Thankfully, El was able to find her way back outside by the large telephone pole where Mike told her to meet them. But El was still nervous. She just hoped no one had spotted her.

El couldn't find it in her ability to stay still. She couldn't stop pacing and she was subconsciously shaking out her hands, her nerves shot.

'What if someone saw her?'

She eagerly checked the bracelet, muttering aloud to herself.

"Three-one-five. Three-one-five. Three-one-five..." her voice turned soft as her confidence wavered. The only thing that was able to take her attention away from the bracelet was the familiar sound of meowing next to her.

Shocked, she looked over to see a scrawny orange cat staring at her from the other side of the fence. It began to meow again and panic and guilt crashed over her as once again another terrible memory resurfaced.

- 𝗙𝗟𝗔𝗦𝗛𝗕𝗔𝗖𝗞 -

The white cat in the cage before Eleven let out a terrible hiss at her. Her head began to shake as she strained her ability. The combination of the cat growling and hissing and the frantic beeping of the machines was enough to push her even further.

She didn't want to. She never wanted to hurt this poor creature. But she knew that if she didn't, she would have to face the consequences. She would have to go back there. The cat gave out another deep growl and Eleven tried to the best of her ability not to cry. Not to break.

The cat began snarling, and it quickly turned to whimpers of pain. Eleven was freely crying now as she looked between the frightened cat and Papa. She gave one final look at the cat before yanking the wires off her head in defeat.

No. She couldn't.

She wouldn't.

She looked at Papa defeated. She shook her head in defiance, though her sobbing gave away her true feelings. He only stared at her in disapproval.

"No! No!" She struggled and kicked. She fought back with all her might while Papa stood at the end of the hallway. Doing nothing.

"Papa! Papa! Papa! Papa! Papa!" She screamed her throat raw as the men dragged her away, yet as always Papa only watched it happen.

"No!" Her shrieks grew more violent as she neared the room.

She couldn't go back in there.

She couldn't.

The men tossed her inside and began closing the door.

She wouldn't.

Eleven stood to her feet and before they could close the steel door, she threw it open in a fit of rage, her attention quickly shifting to one of the men doing this her. In the very next instant, his back was thrown into the ceramic just behind him. His limp body slipped to the floor, leaving a large hole in the tile.

The second man spared a second to look before turning to her to try and restrain her.

Before he could even step foot in the room, he was dead on the floor, his neck snapped. All with the flick of her head.

Overwhelmed with exhaustion, she collapsed against the wall, her nose and ears bleeding.

Papa appeared. He took one look at the cracked wall, to the collapsed man, and then at Eleven. Yet she couldn't move. She was completely drained, all she could do was stare at him. He slowly stepped towards her, staring at her.

She looked up at him in fear of what would happen next, and what did was not something she could have anticipated. He slowly reached his hands out, cupping her face. Sobs wracked her body, and he stared at her in awe.

"Incredible."

He reached down, hooking an arm under her legs, th arried her like an infant. He carried her out of the room and down the hallway, staring at her sobbing form as if he hadn't been the one to cause it.

- 𝗘𝗡𝗗 𝗢𝗙 𝗙𝗟𝗔𝗦𝗛𝗕𝗔𝗖𝗞 -

"El!"

El turned her head to see Mike, Y/n, Lucas and Dustin. They were walking their bikes across the muddy grass in her direction.

Mike looked to her concerned as he, as well as the others, turned their bikes around.

"You okay?"

Relieved to see her friends, she nodded her head.

Mike gave the seat of his bike a few pats.

"Hop on. We only have a few hours."

Hesitantly, she walked forward. But she complied nonetheless and got on Mike's bike, and the five of them peddled off.

|| 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫'𝐬 𝐏𝐎𝐕 ||

The five us were walking our bikes through the woods. Dustin and Lucas were in the back, while Mike and El were just a few steps in front of me. El was looking around as she walked and suddenly I felt her eyes on me. I suddenly became very self-conscious of my cut.

I got it to stop bleeding eventually, but I don't know how I will ever explain this to Mom. She worries so easily. And, I don't think I have ever had a cut this big but I'll survive. My thoughts are cut short when I become very aware of the fact that El had fallen back next to me and was now looking at me with concern.

"Why did they hurt you?" Her voice came out very soft but was laced with concern.

"Huh?" I asked surprised.

El extended her arm out and pointed to my chin. I looked down, upset with how things went today.

"Oh, that. I uh, well... I was tripped. By this mouth breather, Troy."

Her face scrunched up in confusion.

"'Mouth breather?'"

"Yeah. You know, a dumb person,"

I suddenly grew quiet, and El noticed.

"Y/n, are you okay?"

I paused. "Yeah. Yeah, it'll be ok." I said.

I knew what she meant but I didn't think it was noteworthy to bring up how I was feeling.

"Y/n." I turn to look at her and she is giving me a knowing look. "Friends tell the truth."

I began to fight tears that were stinging my eyes, but I wouldn't let them fall.

"I just... I just miss him. Will, I mean. And the things Troy was saying..." I began feeling myself get worked up again at the mere thought of it. "They were awful. Truly awful, and I just... I'm tired. And worried. And I just want to find my friend."

There was suddenly a somber silence over the group that was quickly broken by El's soothing tone.

"Y/n," she said sternly, pulling my eyes to her. There was a soft demand behind her eyes, willing my gaurd down. "I understand."

I looked at her, a grateful smile on my features and my voice came out in a weak whisper.

"Thank you, El."

She gave me a warm smile in return. It very much resembled the one I gave her the first night we met. It was at this moment I knew. I had just found myself a very unique and powerful friendship; one that stood out from my friendship with the party.

El and I have a lot more in common than I thought.

#you'll float queue #stranger things #will byers x reader #reader insert #will byers #dustin henderson #mike wheeler #lucas sinclair #cosmic #y/n henderson #stranger things x reader #x male reader #x m!reader

[greyeyedmonster-18]

(i had more of this prompt inside. per usual; part 2; rebel with a single cause ((seducing the new boy)) and the new kid)

"What were you doing down there anyway? Unless you were also trying to ruin my sheet music and Mulciber beat you to it." They were walking painfully slow down the hall to respective next classes that Sirius was already over 10 minutes late for. He figured if he was already going to have to sit for a lecture from his parents when he got home about the state of his bookbag, and his clothes, and probably something regarding to his piano practice that was never quite enough in their eyes, he might as well be late. And he might as well be late because he was spending time with the first person who had bothered talking to him since arriving.

And this person happened to be a sight for sore eyes. This person also happened to have a gap between his lower teeth and freckles across his nose and cheeks that resembled different countries that were decidedly, delightfully distractive.

"Oh, no, definitely that. I'm just not much of an athlete, couldn't run fast enough."

"Funny."

"I smoke in the bathrooms down there. No one passes through especially during lunch unless they're being good students in the practice rooms," Remus teased with a wry smile and Sirius look down a little just so he could get a fucking grip.

Remus could think he was practicing and being a good student. Remus didn't need to know he didn't have any friends. Though, that part wasn't exactly leaps and bounds away from having bullies.

"Like, cigarettes?"

"Sure, let's go with that."

Sirius looked at him with wide eyes, "This is a school," he hissed in a whisper. Sirius wasn't a stickler for the rules...not...entirely. Maybe. But marijuana was a different story.

Remus gasped, "It is? Here I thought I was in a local pub for my studies." Sirius rolled his eyes, trying to wave off an obvious blush at how uncool that probably sounded. "Relax. It helps me focus."

"That's not possible."

"And you know this because...?"

"Well...I don't actually know know, but I've..heard through...you know, places."

"Places." Remus nodded an eyebrow-raising.

"And people."

"People?!"

Sirius couldn't help but crack a smile, "You know what? Shut it. Leave me to fend for myself next time. Take your," Sirius lowered his voice, "marijuana and--"

Remus laughed loudly, "Weed."

"Huh?"

"You don't need to call it by its formal legal name. Weed is fine," he explained to Sirius and Sirius scowled a little, not used to being poked fun at in this way; the way his little brother poked fun at him for folding his socks. Much less by a boy who had fucking freckles and stupid long fingers. Usually, Sirius was the one who made the comments and started the flirting and the whole incident had knocked Sirius's world off-kilter. Maybe the bottle had addled his brain. "Oh...you're very cute."

"Flattery will get you absolutely nowhere."

"Mmm....okay, sure." Remus shrugged as they reached a point in the halls that sectioned off, "This is me," Remus inclined his head towards the direction of a doorway. Sirius could hear faint sounds of strings.

"...Cello?"

"Goodbye." Remus grinned cheekily, unphased at how obviously ridiculous the joke was, as he turned over his shoulder to walk through the doors.

Sirius made a mental note of long legs and a tight arse.

Sirius made a second mental note to look at the school map and find out where the bathrooms were in the piano hall.

The third one was for an excellent excuse to tell his professor (and his parents) when he strolled into English a half-hour late, smelling like cranberry juice but smiling like an idiot.

#wolfstar #sirius black #remus lupin #anonny prompt #day 2 #30 days of fluff #drug mention

[tumbleweed-palmer]

might I request Victoria going to prom and Jimmy having a rough time with his girl growing up, and reader comforts him?

Jimmy felt terrible to admit it but he felt his heart sink despite the excitement of the familiar voice on the other end of his cell phone call.

He was thankful that it hadn’t been a facetime call as he was sure his sixteen year old daughter would not take the clearly sour look on his face well. She sounded so delighted he didn't want to crush her excitement.

He leaned back against the unoccupied Autopsy table, his head feeling light and his knees feeling wobbly as he listened to Victoria prattle on about the amazing dress she’d spotted at the mall. He tried to focus on the words pink, sequins, and tulle. His brain spun, he suddenly feeling so overwhelmed.

He felt his throat grow tight as Victoria finally stopped obsessing over the dress she fast to speak her words flying from her mouth quickly; she clearly overexcited. “So do you think Y/N will have the time this weekend to go to the mall? She said as soon as I found the dress to let her know. Prom is literally next month so I have to get a dress soon.”

He felt his throat grow all the tighter as he responded only half joking. “What, you don’t want your dear old dad to go watch you try on dresses again?”

Victoria let out an overdramatic groan, she fast to reply. “No offense, Dad, but the last time I let you come with me to buy a formal gown you kept picking out dresses that looked like something Nana would wear.”

Jimmy let out a small huff wanting to point out that the dresses he’d chosen had been perfectly appropriate for an eighth grade formal. He kept his lips sealed though knowing he didn’t want to go down that road with his daughter.

He was proud to say that sixteen year old Victoria Elizabeth Palmer was not afraid to speak her mind, even when that meant occasionally stomping on her father’s spirits.

Dr. James Palmer had raised his daughter to be a confident and outspoken young lady who was never afraid to say how she felt and fight for what she wanted. She was always so quick to want to do the right thing. He’d raised her to be an intelligent and driven young lady who was equally compassionate and kind.

As proud as he was of his daughter’s outspoken ways, Jimmy could admit occasionally he missed the days where her vocabulary had been limited to the words Dada, Momma, Doggie, Yay, and No.

He felt his heart sink as Victoria spoke totally unaware that she was kicking her dad while he was down. “I tried calling Y/N so I could ask her myself, but she must have her phone silenced because I couldn’t get ahold of her. So, I thought I’d call you since you may see her before I do.”

Jimmy scowled a little voice in the back of his head pointing out that he wasn’t even Victoria’s first choice of who to call. He was just the messenger for her to pass along a request to her stepmother.

“I think she’s been busy settling in the new intern up in Legal. I’m sure she’ll call you back when she sees the missed call.” He responded keeping the bitter tone from his voice.

He took a deep breath reminding himself that it wasn’t anything personal. She was a teenage girl. When it came to things like shopping she much preferred to ask the maternal figure in her life. There were just some things she didn’t want to go to her father for.

Victoria was fast to speak up again. “You guys aren’t working late again right? I really don’t want Nana to be in charge of dinner. She always takes us to Olive Garden because Henry and Harper will at least eat spaghetti and it’s better than eating at McDonalds.  I can’t eat Olive Garden again Dad. I can only do never-ending breadsticks so many times.”

Jimmy smirked slightly at the overdramatics. He was sure he’d never get over how his daughter took everything as being so serious; even her four year old half siblings' limited palette when it came to dinner requests.

“I can’t promise I won’t have to work late, but I don’t think Y/N has any cases to prepare for court that are currently demanding late nights. So, I think you’re in the clear. Knowing Y/N you guys will wind up eating Chinese takeout if I have to work late.” Jimmy reassured her already knowing his wife’s go to dinner option if he had a late night with an unexpected case.

“I hope so, I’d rather do Sesame chicken again than another unlimited soup and salad night with Nana. I'm serious Dad, I can't keep trying to smile through another night of chicken parmigiana so I don't hurt Nana's feelings.” Victoria insisted, not putting away the dramatics for even a moment.

She was fast to speak up again, her voice tired. “Anyway my lunch hour is almost over. So, I gotta go.”

Jimmy resisted the urge to scold her for even using her cell phone at school but he kept his lips sealed barely having a chance to say a goodbye before the call ended.

He shoved his cellphone back into the pocket of his scrub pants, his stomach churning and his throat still feeling so tight.

He hated this.

He didn’t have long to stew in his own personal pity party because the doors to Autopsy slid open the very person his daughter and he had just gotten finished discussing entering the room.

She didn’t look up from the form she was holding her voice revealing how exhausted and annoyed she was. “Jimmy, I need you to sign this court order again stating that NCIS and you as Chief Medical Examiner are requesting exhumation on Petty Officer Lewis Jones’ body so I can file it with the courts and get the ball rolling. The intern forgot a few forms when I sent him down with this earlier. Agent Torres has already called me twice asking if the forms are ready to go to the courts yet. Apparently McGee and Agent Knight are growing antsy thinking that Jones’ widow is going to leave the country before you have a chance to do an autopsy on her first late husband’s body and compare it to her current late husband’s body.”

She looked up as she finished her statement, a frown crossing her features at the obvious distress written all over her husband’s face.

She felt her heart sink her brain automatically jumping to all the worst possible conclusions. “What’s wrong? Is everything okay? You look like you’re about to cry. Is it the kids? I saw Victoria called earlier but I haven’t had a chance to see if she left me a voicemail.”

Jimmy let out a small sigh hating that he was so transparent. “Victoria thinks she found, in her words, the perfect prom dress. She wants you to go with her this weekend so she can try it on. I think the money my mom gave her for a prom dress is burning a hole in her pocket.”

Y/N couldn’t stop the small smile from crossing her lips despite the current dampened mood her husband seemed to be in.

She had come into Jimmy and Victoria Palmer’s lives when Victoria was eight years old.

It hadn’t been the most traditional meeting.

Jimmy Palmer had still been struggling with the death of his late wife, Victoria’s mother, Breena.

He’d thought that he was really ready to move on. He’d even tried going out on a couple of dates, but it had all felt so wrong. He’d felt like he was doing something wrong. He’d been unable to stop talking about Breena on these dates.

It was obvious to Jimmy Palmer that he was still struggling. His therapist had suggested that he attend a grief share group. She’d recommended one in Jimmy’s area. She’d insisted to him that it would be healthy for him to talk to others who may be experiencing the same thing he was going through.

So, he’d started going to the grief share meetings.

That was where he’d met Y/N Y/L/N. She was a widow and much like Jimmy, her spouse had died quite suddenly and she’d never felt as though she truly had a chance to say goodbye.

Her husband had been in the military and had been stationed overseas. They hadn’t been married for very long but they’d been high school sweethearts who had reconnected in their thirties.He’d been living separately from her on a base in South Korea, given her father  had been ill and it wouldn’t feel right for Y/N to leave her as her mother was deceased and she had been her father’s only child.

Y/N’s husband had died in an automobile accident while in South Korea. She'd admitted that she'd been prepared to possibly lose him due to the danger that went along with his military service, but she'd not been prepared for something like a car crash to kill him. It had been so unexpected and she’d struggled to deal with the loss.

Jimmy and she had connected on that feeling of sudden loss.

They’d had a lot in common as far as their failed attempts at dating again. Jimmy had felt really connected to Y/N when she’d spoken of her failed attempts at moving on.

She’d had a hard time dating people and had felt that they didn’t understand that she still loved her husband despite the fact that he was deceased. She felt that people acted as though she was moving too slowly through her grief. She resented that people had time with their spouses and they didn't even appreciate it. She had admitted she was struggling to adjust to the thought of life without her husband. Those words had resonated with Jimmy as he’d occasionally felt the same way.

He’d listened his heart aching as she recalled one date she’d had where the guy kept referring to her late husband as her ex, and she’d wound up chewing the guy out stating that her late husband and she had still been married, so he was no ex.

They had only spoken at grief share and had only spoken about their loss and their experiences surrounding that loss.

There hadn’t been romantic feelings at first. At first they’d just felt connected over loss and grief. It felt good knowing someone else was having the same thoughts and experiences.

They hadn’t expected to meet outside of grief share meetings.

They certainly hadn’t expected to meet the way they had.

Kasie had been the connecting force behind them meeting outside of grief share.

Kasie and Jimmy had a Sunday morning brunch routine at least twice a month.

Kasie had requested the chance to bring a new friend she’d made, who worked at NCIS in the legal department, to one of these Sunday morning brunches.

Jimmy had never been expecting Y/N to be that new friend.

Things had been awkward at first especially given they’d had to confess to Kasie how they already knew one another.

Overall, though Y/N had been a nice addition to the Sunday morning brunches.

They’d formed a friendship, finally finding things to discuss outside of their grief.

They’d crossed the line into romance slowly. It had been a year of friendship before Jimmy had made a first move.

He’d been terrified when his lips had met hers for the first time. It had been New Years Eve and Kasie had invited them for a night on the town.

His mom had taken Victoria out of town to visit Jimmy’s sister. So he’d taken a chance to have a grown up night out with friends.

He’d wanted to blame it on the champagne but he’d only had one glass.

It had been painfully awkward he spewing apologies after the kiss but much to his surprise Y/N had remarked that as far as first kisses had gone with guys, he wasn’t that awkward.

They’d taken things slow from there. They’d dated slowly for a few years taking their time knowing that they were both a little skittish at times given their situation.

They’d managed to come to an understanding that them liking one another and even loving one another didn’t erase the love they had for their late spouses. They would never stop loving their late spouses, but they were fine with this. They both understood that the heart was big enough for loving more than one person.

He’d been hesitant to introduce Y/N to Victoria. He’d feared that his daughter would see Y/N as an intruder on their family. He’d been afraid she’d meet Y/N and would interpret her place in their lives as a cheap attempt at trying to replace her mother.

He knew Y/N was hesitant as well. She didn’t want Victoria to view her as some evil stepmother figure looking to erase Breena Palmer's memory from their lives.

Much to their relief Victoria had seemed to take Y/N’s introduction into their lives well.

They’d made sure to have plenty of talks with Victoria about their relationship, wanting to make sure the child understood that Jimmy loving Y/N didn’t mean that he loved Breena any less. Y/N had been quick to reassure Victoria that she was only looking to be a friend to Victoria and that she never wanted to take Breena's place. She’d been fast to reassure Victoria that she loved Victoria's father and she understood Victoria was number one in her father’s life.

It had gone well. Y/N had been able to form a bond with Victoria. They’d become close. They would spend Saturdays together doing all the things Jimmy couldn’t quite do with his daughter or his daughter didn’t want him to do; such as shopping for clothing and getting their nails done.

Y/N had been the one who had backed up Victoria when she’d requested a new wardrobe in middle school, whining that when her father took her shopping for school clothes she wound up with overalls. She'd been the one who'd gently made Jimmy realize that his daughter was growing up.

She had also been the one who Victoria had come to with the more embarrassing parts about growing up knowing Y/N could be spoken to about things that were just too mortifying to discuss with Jimmy such as boys and periods and mean girls at school.

Y/N had managed to fill a maternal role in Victoria’s life, always sure to make an effort to ensure that Breena’s role as Victoria’s mother was not erased.

Y/N always made a point to stress to Jimmy that she understood that Breena’s memory needed to be a part of Victoria’s life in any way possible. If that meant watching old home movies and looking at photo albums and talking to Victoria about Breena, then Y/N was happy to let Jimmy and Victoria bond and remember Breena.

Y/N had been able to connect with Victoria as Y/N had lost her mother when she was around Victoria’s age. Discussing this had helped cement the bond between Victoria and she.

When Jimmy had proposed to Y/N, Victoria had been very involved in the process and when Y/N had said yes she’d made sure that Victoria was involved with the wedding. She’d insisted that this wasn’t just her wedding. The wedding wasn’t just about Jimmy and her joining their lives together. It was about Jimmy, her, and Victoria joining their lives together.

Y/N had so easily loved and accepted Victoria and the role Victoria had allowed her to take in her life.

Y/N had always assumed she was infertile. She’d had difficulty conceiving with her late husband. Her doctors had seemed to believe that it just wasn’t possible for her to conceive and carry a baby to full term.

So, Y/N had approached being there for Victoria as a chance to be a maternal figure. Victoria might not be biologically hers but she was happy to have a chance to be there for her even if she knew that Breena would always be Victoria’s mother. She had always made a point of stressing that she didn't want to fill Breena's role as mom, but she was happy to at least be a maternal figure of sorts while respecting Breena's place in Victoria's life.

She'd been able to at least feel as though Victoria allowed her to be maternal towards her. She'd embraced the role Victoria had allowed her to take.

It turned out though that Y/N wasn’t as infertile as her doctors had believed.

Jimmy and she’d only been married a few months when she got pregnant. It had been a huge shock given her belief that it just wasn’t possible.

She'd been terrified given that she knew Jimmy and she weren't exactly young. He was well into his forties getting so close to hitting fifty and she had just turned forty.

She knew it was a risky pregnancy given her age. She'd been elated though by the news as had Jimmy.

It had been a bigger shock when she was not only pregnant but pregnant with twins.

It hadn’t been an easy pregnancy. She’d been on bedrest and had been terrified the entire time.

Thankfully the pregnancy had not upset Victoria but had seemed to make the bond Y/N had formed with her deeper.

Victoria had been barely twelve when Y/N had gotten pregnant and Victoria had admitted to being disgusted as she remarked that she knew where babies came from.

She’d been excited to be an older sister though. When Henry and Harper had been born Victoria had clearly been proud. Though there was an age gap between she and her siblings she still clearly loved them.

Jimmy would have never believed back when his therapist had brought up grief share that he’d be setting himself up to meet someone who would change his life in such a profound way.

He was thankful for Y/N and Y/N had insisted she was just as thankful for Jimmy and Victoria.

Y/N stepped forward placing a hand on her husband’s upper arm, her voice soft. “Why is a prom dress making you sad?”

Jimmy let out a small chuckle, his voice weepy, he feeling pathetic to admit it. “She’s sixteen.”

Y/N gave him a crooked grin knowing that humor was usually the best way to pull Jimmy from his funk. “I know, I am the one who searched high and low for the perfect ice cream cake for her sweet sixteen and made sure that Tori’s friends werent full of shit when they asked if they could go to the movies alone and promised me that there would be no wandering off with sixteen year old boys.”

He groaned at the mention of sixteen year old boys.

He spoke not even wanting to consider his daughter being anywhere near a teenage boy. “This is her Junior prom. Next year she’ll have her Senior prom…then she will graduate from high school…and then she will leave the nest. I’m not ready.”

Y/N gave him a soft smile rubbing his upper arm soothingly. “She’s not going to stray far from the nest. She’s going to be going to a mortuary school here in the area. She most likely won’t even move out of our house for the first year or so.”

Jimmy sighed his heart having to lift a bit at the mention of his daughter’s career ambitions.

She wanted to follow in her mother’s footsteps and become an embalmer.

She already had ambitions to apply to the same mortuary school her mother had attended.

Jimmy couldn’t be prouder. He’d known that Victoria had a lot of questions about her mother growing up. Breena’s career had been something they’d discussed.

At first, Victoria had chosen to go into the same field as her mother as a way to feel connected to her. It was clear though that she did have a passion for it.

Jimmy knew for a fact his daughter had the mind for it. She was intelligent and driven. He had no doubt that Breena would be proud.

He let out a shaky sigh as he spoke up. “It doesn’t mean I have to like her growing up. The world is such an ugly gross place. I have tried so hard to teach her to be optimistic and to find the good in the world. I’ve tried so hard to protect her. I thought I’d have more time to protect her. It’s moving too fast. It feels like she was just a sassy seven year old in overalls yesterday.”

“And now she’s a sassy sixteen year old who would scream if you handed her a pair of overalls.” Y/N joked knowing how her step daughter cringed when Jimmy brought out the photo album containing photos of what Victoria insisted were the worst outfit choices.

Jimmy had heard the exact words “Daddy, overalls and a sequined scrunchie, Seriously a giant bow and rainbow leggings! Am I seriously wearing light up sneakers? Why do we have matching reindeer sweaters in this photo? Even when Y/N joined the family she didn't stop you from dressing me like this till I was like thirteen. Did you just hate me when you went shopping for back to school clothing!”

Jimmy usually found he had to gently remind his daughter that the outfits she’d worn had been in style for kids her age. Y/N usually had to point out that Victoria wouldn’t complain if she saw her father’s and her stepmother’s photos from when they themselves were that age.

Y/N spoke up knowing just the words to say. “It’s just a prom dress sweetheart. She’s not leaving the nest just yet.”

She paused, continuing to stroke his arm as she spoke again. “If she was that grown up she wouldn’t want dad cuddles after she’s had a bad day.”

Jimmy felt the smile cross his lips knowing for a fact that though Victoria was sixteen years old she still wanted to sit on the sofa and have Jimmy snuggle with her if she’d had an awful day. She still sought out her father’s comfort.

Y/N was fast to speak up yet again. “Don’t tell her I said she’s not that grown up. She’s been trying to convince me to use my feminine wiles to sweet talk you into letting her babysit the next time we have a date night. I do think she has a point. I think she’s grown past the Great Mac and Cheese Fire.”

Jimmy groaned remembering the first time he’d left Victoria home alone a couple of years ago without supervision. The girl had accidentally started a small kitchen fire trying to make macaroni and cheese. Luckily the fire had been contained and she’d been smart enough to call the fire department. Jimmy had decided then though that perhaps his daughter just wasn’t ready to be left without Jimmy’s mother watching over her just yet.

Y/N pressed a kiss to his cheek. “I know it’s hard, but I also know you’re so proud of her. You have done a great job raising an intelligent young lady who is going to be just fine when she does leave the nest.”

She leaned up, pressing another kiss to his cheek. “She’s a tough kid. I don’t think you have to worry about sending her out into the world. I think she’s going to make it just fine out in the big gross world. I know that if she ever feels like it’s too much she’s perfectly aware that she has an amazing dad who she can come to anytime she needs him.”

He felt a small smile cross his lips at the words he fast to respond. “You say that as though you didn’t have a part in raising her. I know she’ll come to you if she needs you too.”

She pressed her lips to his, the kiss brief, before she pulled back and spoke again. “It’s just a prom dress, Jimmy. Don’t get into your head too much about it. Enjoy the moments we have with her. You said it’s moving fast and that’s all more a reason to enjoy the moments,”

He nodded his head, a small laugh leaving him. “I know you’re right. Do you think she’ll be upset if I want to buy her a corsage? I don’t want to embarrass her…I mean she doesn’t have a date and she might feel weird if I buy her one. I know she’s going with her friends, but…I would like to buy her one.”

“I think she’d love that. I’ll let you know which shade of pink dress we go with. I’ll even do you one better and send you a photo of her in it via text message.” Y/N remarked, pressing a soft kiss to his lips.

He frowned, the words spilling from him. “How do you know it’ll be pink”

“She’s a girl obsessed, babe. She’s been talking about a pink dress for weeks.” Y/N remarked he letting out a soft laugh realizing she was right.

He held her against him, soaking up her words. She was right; time might be moving too fast, but he just had to make an effort to enjoy the moments while they were happening.

He’d drive himself crazy if all he could focus on was the moments slipping away.

Y/N spoke again making his stomach drop. “Just remember this talk in about twelve years when Henry and Harper are ready to go to prom.”

“Oh God, How old will I be then? I’m getting so old.” He groaned, sinking down against her working a laugh from her.

“No, if you’re old then I am too.” She remarked another groan leaving him.

She stroked his back, he closing his eyes, soaking up the feeling.

Somehow he had a feeling getting old wouldn’t be so bad.

He let out a soft sigh soaking in the fact that Victoria Palmer was growing up. Even if she was growing up so fast, he had a feeling she’d never stop needing her dad.

His babies might grow up, but Y/N was right. His kids might leave the nest, but they’d never be afraid to visit the nest if they needed him.

#Jimmy Palmer #Jimmy PalmerxReader #Jimmy Palmer X Reader #Victoria Palmer

[calciumcryptid]

I Have Elected to Ignore Midnight's Death

Polarmare's First Day

It was the first year Kenta would be teaching at U.A. A longtime friend of hers requested to take up the open teaching position, and who was Polarmare going to deny a change of scenery?

Besides, her sister lived in Japan and was elated to know that the Fuyuhito sisters were getting back together so that was the housing situation solved in under five minutes.

U.A. paid good as well which was good for a single mother like Kenta. She adored Seko with all her heart from the first time they met in Japan two years ago when she saved him from prison. Sure the paperwork was a bitch, but Seko loved the opportunity to meet so many different heroes.

So they packed their bags, and headed off to Japan where she was reunited with her sister.

The day after they arrived she made sure her paperwork was sorted by the Hero Safety Commission, then made sure to pick up Seko for her tour at UA.

There she met Nezu, who seemed just as crazy has he had been over the phone and her fellow coworkers.

She took an instant liking to Powerloader and Snipe as they bonded over creating weapons. Vlad King and Ectoplasm seemed chill too, and it was nice to see other dedicated teachers.

Midnight was cheering about another woman on the staff, though seemed to deflate when Kenta snipped her sexual flirting at the bud.

Present Mic was loud, but reminded Kenta of a friend in America so the familiarity was nice.

It was interesting meeting All Might after seeing his last stand on the news, but Kenta hoped they would be able to get along even if he seemed like a bumbling mess half of the time.

Recovery Girl was alright, a bit jaded but it was hard to find a hero so old who wasn't.

Aizawa seemed like someone she needed to keep her eye on, his knee jerk reaction upon learning she was an international hero was hostility while he worked under the impression she was a spotlight hero.

With a swing of her axe, and a clarification of the fact she was a Neighborhood Hero who worked mostly under Rescue and Underground terms, he simmered down real quick.

The General Ed teachers seemed chill, and Kenta hoped she would be able to grab some drinks with them after a long day of work.

Seko loved every one of the them, and was excited by the prospect of their quirks though Kenta made sure to cover his eyes and ears whenever Midnight was in the room.

After final arrangements with Nezu, she was given the dates of the entrance exams. The Fuyuhito family left in good spirits.

The day of the Management Entrance Exam came around, and Kenta came in her formal hero uniform. She took a seat beside Snipe and Powerloader, and was introduced as Polarmare.

Polarmare watched as potential students came in to present one by one, and she made notes. At the end of the day after helping the potential support students present Polarmare was happy with her picks.

It wasn't over though as she spent a while in her new office she looked at each students history, made a few calls, and at the end picked out a good sixty for the first years.

Sixty may seem extreme, but there were many parts of management and business so they wouldn't all be in one class.

She went home to tend to her son, and went to see the sights with her family.

The day of the hero entrance exams arrived, and Polarmare took a seat in the viewing room. She studied the motions of the potential students, their interactions, and was pleasantly surprised to see Nezu took her suggestion of making Rescue Points public and hiding a new type of points known as Cooperation Points.

The big scale robot had been toned down a bit, and at the end Polarmare had a few qualms but didn't have any outward complaints.

Eventually, the first day of the school year came around and Polarmare did her introductory presentation. She explained each branch of management and business, the schedules, and sent them on a tour with Snipe of the business building.

While that occured, she had a meeting with the votes on representatives and outlined what she expected of each of them. She was pleasantly surprised to find them ready to meet the challenge, and was off once again.

She let the students spend the first week exploring the changes she made, and getting used the renovated building. She didn't see the need to challenge them too much considering they were in a new environment.

At the end of the day, Polarmare made her way to the Conference Room and took her place. The first thing she noticed was a lack of Gen Ed teachers present, which concerned her.

Snipe and Powerloader seemed surprised to see her there, and it was Snipe who leaned over.

"The Management teacher usually doesn't come to these meetings as they center primarily around the hero course."

Polarmare took in the words before responding, "Business and Management is a huge part of heroics so I believe I should be present for any meetings regarding the Hero Course."

Snipe nodded, and straightened back up.

After a couple more looks, the rest of the teachers settled down to prepare the meeting.

Nezu got up on his little podium, and smiled. "Welcome to the first hero course meeting of the year. Since we have a new teacher with us this year, I would love to hear her thoughts on how she plans on interacting with the hero course."

"First, may I record the meeting?" Polarmare asked. "I work better if I have audio to listen to afterwards."

A few of the teachers gave each other looks, but Nezu nodded.

Polarmare tapped her recorder before she stood up. "I plan on calling the second year students to the business building to discuss their media presence. With permission from you and their gaurdians, I want to make sure they have profiles set up on Hero Watch. It would be good for them to interact with other heroes, and it will open internship and work study opportunities for them."

Nezu hummed, "Permission granted, you may start as soon as you can."

"Once I get their gaurdains approval," Polarmare resaid with a firm stare. "I shall send out the email tonight, and set up conferences if needed."

Polarmare noticed some of the teachers looking at her in confusion, but she made her notes.

The rest of the teachers went around, and Polarmare made her notes. Admittedly more on their body language then what they have to say.

The last person to talk was Aizawa. He stood up and gathered a couple of papers.

"All of the expulsion forms have been filled out." Aizawa passed them around towards Nezu.

Polarmare slammed down her hand before they could be passed the final length. She turned them over to look through them.

"Polarmare, may I ask what you are doing?" Aizawa asked through gritted teeth.

"You know Eraserhead, this seems quite light for expulsion papers. I see a distinct lack of reference to any evidence or record of you meeting with the student to discuss the expulsion."

"What are you talking about?" Aizawa asked.

"According to the Student Rights, the student should be made aware of their expulsion with any evidence before they are expelled." Polarmare looked over to Aizawa, "I assume this is the first time Nezu has seen these, so I also assume he has been expelling students based on your word without a meeting or evidence."

Aizawa stared Polarmare down, "U.A. does not work on the regular rules schools are legally allowed to abide by."

Polarmare shifted the papers in her hand, "Actually, Student Rights apply to all schools. If this is the case, and you have been expelling like this, it is a miracle you haven't been sued."

"Nezu handles the lawsuits," Snipe said.

"Ah, that explains that. Let me clarify, it is a miracle that someone who outranks you hasn't caught on and sued you." Polarmare adjusted her posture, "Now what is your reasoning?"

"The students show a lack of potential," Aizawa stated matter of factly.

Polarmare raised an eyebrow, and waved her hand. "And?"

"What more is there to say?"

Polarmare sighed deeply. "Tell me Eraserhead, how do you measure a concept as abstract as 'Potential'."

"A series of trials," Aizawa stated.

"Yeah, I saw those trials being performed. I noticed that they are all physical. Are you saying you are measuring potential on how physically experienced your students are?"

Midnight giggled.

Polarmare shot a glare before turning back to Aizawa, "I am going to look through these students and read out loud their quirks."

"This is uneccesary-"

"Marinette, this quirk allows the user to control those with human intelligence or faux human intelligence like robots as though they are simply puppets. Hmm, I don't see how this could apply to something like a grip test or ball throw. Though this could be a way to give heroes confidence or maybe even to control villains. This student sounds like a great Underground or Neighborhood Hero if they so desired.

"That is only-"

"Oh! Gnaw. This one is interesting. This quirk gives the user sharp appendages as long as they are made out of keratin on some level. Can't think of how this would help a sit-up, but imagine there was a super strong net that could be useful. This student sounds like an amazing Rescue Hero if they so desired."

"Two-"

"Slowdown, a quirk that allows the user to slow down anything that is moving. That is amazing on its own, and if they know how to dismantle robots in the time allowed they have to be some sort of mechanical genius! They could go down any hero path they wanted and he so successful. A shame I can't think of how this would help on any trials unless they were sabotaging others. Were they sabotaging others?"

"No," Aizawa said.

"This is a bad trend Eraserhead," Polarmare warned. "Of course if you insist on wanting to expell them, then why don't you allow me work out some private study transfers. I know what, like five? Ten? Twenty? Probably like something hundred pros who are on the waiting list that would love to work with some of these quirks."

Aizawa glared at her.

"Then again why is there such a focus on their quirks? Oh! I know, it is because you don't care how they act if Mineta and Bakugou is anything to go by." Polarmare said. "Don't think I've noticed the large amount of tapes and complaints filled out regarding them."

Polarmare looked up at Aizawa, "I'm just saying there is some good evidence here to create a good quirk discrimination and abuse of power case. Unfortunately for you, I happen to be friends with a lot of lawyers and reporters who don't exactly love UA and would love to get their hands on this information."

"Nezu!" Aizawa shouted.

Nezu who was blankly smiling throughout the whole exchange looked at Aizawa. "What? She has a point, and we can not take another hit like this to our reputation. Polarmare you have permission to disband the expulsions."

"Thank you."

"Oh shit," Present Mic muttered but it was audible due to the complete silence of the room."

"With that, I believe this meeting shall be adjourned. I employ you all to spend some times to reevaluate your students."

Polarmare collected her notes, and looked over the expulsion sheets. She wasn't lying before, she was sure she could find some good mentors for these students depending on what they want to do. She'll have to add those meetings to her calendar. Maybe Seko had some ideas, and her sister would probably snatch up one of th-

Something ling and grey wrapped around her mid section, and she didn't have to turn around to know who it was.

"Eraserhead, what do I owe the pleasure?" She turned her head to see his eyes aflame with red.

"I have been managing my class like this for years, and I do not appreciate you coming in here and dictating what I can and can not do."

"I do not dictate it, the law does." Polarmare sighed as she looked at his eyes. "Cancelling my quirk is useless considering it isn't and offensive quirk," She pointed out.

Aizawa let his capture scarf wrap back around his neck as he blinked. He stared at her with narrowed eyes.

"Bakugou is a perfectly fine student, and I do not see why you brought him up-"

"The boy has a record of telling people to die, I don't care if it is his thing it fucks with your head. Not to mention the physical assault and berating he does, because unlike you I read the complaints."

"The complaints are useless, I judge my students without any prior knowledge."

Polarmare raised an eyebrow, "Does that include background checks because I thought UA prided themselves on those."

Aizawa gritted his teeth.

"If that is all, I need to get home to my family."

#polarmare #bnha writing #bnha fanfic #bnha ocs #bnha business course ocs #bnha management course ocs #aizawa is nezus favorite #aizawa critical #aizawa negative

[bichlordstories]

17: Turning Point

You were going to kill Todoroki when you find him.

Fucking running off and making you follow after him... what the hell does he think he's doing?

Just 30 minutes ago, you, Endeavour, and Todoroki were on patrol when the attacks began. There was screaming left and right, filling the air along with inhuman sounds that belonged to these mutant beasts with brains showing.

Fires and explosions went off and there were pro heroes dealing with these abominations that seemed unkillable

Endeavour was the first to react and quickly burned the thing to a crisp and you were quick to follow his lead.

Once activating your quirk, you punched one of the monsters to the ground and started beating it up, tearing it's limbs off.

The thing slowly regenerated, which brought you frustration.

You bit into it's brain out of rage and pulled its chunks out as it screamed at you.

"Blood God. Move."

You recognized the voice as Endeavour's and slowly got up. You hesitantly looked at the writhing beast beneath you before moving out of the way for Endeavour to burn it.

"You did quite the number on it." He said before fire left his fist.

The man let out a grunt as he roasted the thing alive before turning to you.

"I need you to go after my son and make sure he doesn't get into trouble. Is that understood." He said and proceeded to tell you where to find him.

You grew confused and infuriated when you realized that Todoroki was gone.

What the fuck is he doing? There are villains to fight here!

You had a moment of clarity and spat the brain bits out of your mouth.

"Yes sir."

Before he could respond, another monster came into view and tackled the man. Endeavour shot fire into its face, making it lose its control over the situation.

And thus here you were, trying to find the stupid bicolored brat.

You nearly passed an alleyway before a noise and a flash of yellow and orange caught your eye.

There he was, fighting a deranged looking ninja and... and the greenette brat. For some reason, when the man licked his blade, Todoroki fell to the ground, laying on the ground.

Just as the man was about to strike the bicolored moron, you leapt into action, quite literally.

Your body rammed the man, making him tumble back and rip up his clothes from the pavement. He was caught in a daze before shaking it off and searching for who was responsible.

"...All Might?" The man said breathlessly before narrowing his eyes.

"...no... you're not All Might."

You ignored this as your brain was registering who this man was. You knew he was familiar, no one can forget someone with his ugly mug. You heard of his ideas and his rants about society a few times before. Everyone has.

You especially heard of what he did to a pro hero by the name of Ingenium.

"So... you're the hero killer: Stain."

The crazed man slowly stood up held his sword out, pointing at you.

"You... you're the fake that nearly killed the bicolored one." He spat.

You simply ignored this and looked past him to see Deku, Iida, and a man in a Native American themed costume. Midoriya locked eyes with you and immediately yelled to you in desperation.

"Don't let him lick your blood, His quirk will paralyze you!"

Stain shifted in front of you to block your view from the greenette, which you were thankful for.

"So you've come to save your fake hero friends..." he said.

"They're not my friends." You stated.

"Hm... doesn't really matter anyways..." he said before shooting forward.

He was fast, you wouldn't lie, but you were also quick on your feet.

You ducked down really low and grabbed his feet, which took him by surprise, and pulled them out from under him.

You didn't hesitate to drag him and spin around the ground before making him go airborne for a quick second and having him make impact with the wall. Hard.

He should have passed out. Should have. But he didn't.

This infuriated you more as you quickly went to grab his face, only for him to lift his sword up just as quickly.

He left a shallow cut on your shoulder, to which you quickly grabbed the blade and pulled it away from him. You weren't about to leave the blade with him since it caught a bit of your blood.

You backed away from the slightly dazed man, who slowly walked towards you.

"You dare... take my blade... you damn fake."

"You dare take my blood, you murderer." You said back to him in a mocking tone, holding his blade in your now bloodied hand.

The man smirked, narrowing his eyes at you as he started walking forward.

"Heh... you're skillful and intelligent... I'll give you that."

He lifted his bloody hand up and licked it, which confused you for a moment before you fell limp.

The sword that you once held clattered to the ground along with your body. Stain approached you slowly like a predator ready to strike.

"...it's a shame your quirk makes you bleed out naturally."

He picked up the blade and pulled out another before standing over you.

"Any last words, fake?" Stain said while placing his two blades on both sides of your neck.

"...of all the things..."

The man's nasty smile fell and he cocked his head to the left in confusion.

"What was that?"

"Of all the things to go after... you chose fakes that still did their jobs of saving lives...? You... you could have used your skills... your fighting experience to kill pedophiles... rapists... human traffickers..." you glared daggers into the now expressionless man's eyes.

"You could have taken the hero's jobs and still make a god damn statement about how unreliable fakes are... but instead you chose to target corrupt politicians, people with shitty fucking opinions over... over actual murderers." You spat out a bit of your blood as your quirk was still activated.

"There are people you could have saved that the frauds failed to do, but instead you go after a bunch of stupid kids who wear their hearts on their sleeves, one of which had his older brother sent to the damn hospital because of you." Your voice cracked as you grew both fearful and angry each second.

This man was going to kill you, you realized. He was going to kill you, and you wouldn't be able to do anything about it.

Everyone else was paralyzed including you.

Oh god.

You were going to die.

You never even got to save anyone and become a hero.

Fresh blood and tears trailed down your cheeks more and more, staining your (h/c) hair.

The man still stared down at you with no emotions on his face. His smile was long gone, replaced with a slight frown.

Just then, a flash of green knocked the man away from you, which caused one of the blades to leave a shallow cut into your neck.

You couldn't move your head, only your eyes and mouth, but you knew who it was.

The greenette held up against the man while the rest of you laid there paralyzed.

Soon, the ingenium kid, Iida, got back control over his body and joined the battle.

You were paralyzed both physically and mentally.

You almost died. You were about to be decapitated.

You were still in danger, after all, he isn't in cuffs yet.

But you were staring your death in the eyes.

In all of your 16 years of life, you had never been faced with something as severe as your own death.

You seen death before, you do visit the hospital and you have gotten to meet patients with terminal Illnesses.

But never have you battled your own death.

Is this what helplessness is like?

You didn't like it.

Not one bit...

You stayed laying there until someone came to pick you up.

"...No..." you croaked out, not realizing that it was the ingenium kid.

"(L/n)-san, I'm here to help." Iida said while giving you up into a piggyback ride.

"...Stain." You said, growing weaker as your quirk slowly deactivated itself.

"We took care of him..."

You could have sworn you saw tears collect in the kid's eyes.

"You all did..."

You couldn't hold onto consciousness any longer and slipped into darkness.

You woke up to the smells and sounds of a hospital, finding odd comfort in the familiar environment.

A formal voice was talking in the background followed by a woof. You didn't open your eyes but instead listened to what he was saying.

It took you a couple minutes to realize that he was talking about the legality that was the battle against Stain. A whole bunch of junk about how todoroki, Iida, and the greenette brat should be punished for initiating a fight against the villain.

"...they're the only one who was given permission by a pro hero to help keep you out of trouble and did what they were told."

It was obvious he was referring to you.

After chewing them out more in a professional way, the mutt finally told them that they have an option to pretend it was Endeavour who took out the hero killer and avoid punishment.

Although reluctant, they were forced to agree.

The police chief muttered his thanks to the kids and then left.

"...is he gone yet?" You said out loud, wincing at your dry throat and the scratchiness in your voice.

Your eyes were closed the entire time, so you didn't see the dog-headed man leave.

You heard a bit of gasping near you and some shuffling.

"You're awake!"

That annoying voice. That damn annoying voice you hate so much is talking to you.

There was a moment of silence, which made the three boys believe they were just hearing things before you spoke.

"...I believe I should give credit where credit is due..."

While you refused to open your eyes while saying this, you could still hear everything around you.

"You saved my life... Deku... and I... appreciate this second chance at life and shall cherish it..."

You could feel the shock radiating off the greenette. Tch. So obvious.

"...but don't think that for a second that I'll be picking daisies with you. I still fucking hate your guts." You said.

"Eh? How is that being appreciative???" Iida asked in a bewildered tone.

You didn't answer, which made the blue haired gentleman start making chopping motions with his broken arm before yelping when it let out a crack and pop.

"Iida!"

~~~~~~

Old habits die hard, aye? Iida couldn't help but try to scold Mc, which didn't work out for him since he just made his arm worse.

Looks like Mc is slowly gonna respect Izuku... until they find out about All Might being their secret dad.

And when they learn that Midoriya knew before them.

#bnha x reader #bnha x gender neutral reader #bnha x y/n #bnha fanfiction #blood sport

[dukeofriven]

HOW TO SOLVE BREXIT (HEAR ME OUT)

My solution to Brexit is that, effective immediately, I should be invited to be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. It’s been 96 years since a Canadian last served in that position - the wonderfully named Bonar Law, of whom not enough is ever said - so although I don’t think I could thrust my way into British politics with quite his length and breadth of talent, not the stately girth of his political acumen, I still think I could do the job fairly well - at the very least I will bend over backwards to stop Britian from being screwed by Brexit. The criteria have not changed since Bonar Law’s time: I just need to be able to command the confidence of the House of Commons. This is trivial, really: I am very commanding, and since nobody in the House seems to have any confidence in one-another, it cannot be well argued that I - a total stranger - command any less confidence than anyone else. I meet this sole criterium just as much as the current incumbent, undoubtedly more so. Since I do not have to be an MP, or a Lord, or be a British citizen, or even be in Britain (Her Majesty can Skype me, hmu on the DM, ma’am), there is no legal impediment to me taking the job. If it sweetens the deal, I have been to Britain more than once, like bits of it very much, think roast chicken crisps are divine, can quote an awful lot of Monty Python, enjoy cricket immensely, and once happily consumed deep fried Haggis - which will make me winsome enough to win-over the SNP and put to bed all this independence nonsense (you might think you want it, but when you go to watch your favourite BBC series and realize that iPlayer no longer works in your country you’ll regret everything and curse the heavens for your short-sighted folly.) As for Brexit, my solution is this: I will telephone President Juncker (and party-line in M. Macron so he doesn’t get all snotty) and have an amiable chat about this and that - how are you enjoying being EU President, do you like the curtains in your office - really stretch out time until he get impatience and goes  “What about Brexit?” and I’ll say What about whatnow? And he’ll say. “Brexit.” And I’ll say Cereal, usually - Shreddies with brown sugar for the last week - hey whatever happened to Freddie and Eddie? And he’ll say “Not Breakfast - Brexit!” Brag sit? And what that when it’s a home, then? ”BREX! IT!” I don’t - remind me? “Britain’s departure from the EU!”

I don’t think we’re planning to leave, Mr. President. Seems like an odd sort of idea. Exit the EU? And miss out on cheap flights to Monaco, home to the historic Iron Man 2? Nonsense. Somebody would have said something. “You are leaving!” he will cry - hopping mad, I am sure. (Unconscionably rude of me, I know. Under normal circumstances I would never behave in a manner so unbecoming of a gentleman. but needs must: as your new Prime Minister it would be my duty.) Er... “You are leaving! You triggered article fifty.” ... oh. Oh bugger. Devil’s fardles and ambergris - this is all very embarrassing. Yes, right - they did mention it to me, and they blushed the whole time, and this has been the most MORTIFYING thing you could imagine, but the burden has fallen to me, and I can’t shirk it. Alright, Mr. President: I am afraid there has been... well... something of a cock-up. A truly monumental cockup, but everyone over here has been so super shamefaced about it they couldn’t bring themselves to say anything - hoping it would just sort of be forgotten, go away on its own - but it never did, and now they’ve had to bring me in - a colonial and everything - because nobody here could bring themselves to come clean, its all supremely awkward. Gods, alright, here goes. I am afraid, Mr. President, that all this “Brag Sit” kerfuffle is the most terrible misunderstanding. A mis-hearing, in fact. They... gosh this is hard... they... they... sod it: They didn’t trigger Article Fifty, Mr. President. They triggered ... sigh... they triggered Article Schwifty. ... ... ... ... ... “what?” It was 2017, Mr. President. It was 2017 and Rick and Morty was terribly popular - the third season was all set to start that Monday and, well, the country just got so excited it rather lost its head and did something big and dramatic to show its fandom colours. It took a bit for anyone to notice that the rest of the EU seemed to have misheard them - Britons tend to be a bit neglectful of things on the continent. Also everyone was super cross that there was that two month hiatus after the episode came out and that had everyone distracted - not to mention that whole Szechuan Sauce thing. Anyways, Mr. President, by the time anyone realized the mistake cultural opinion on Rick and Morty had begun to sour and the United Kingdom found itself unwilling to admit that it had been that excited to watch it - they’d already had a fandom fall-out with something called “Briscuit” the year before and nobody wanted to stir-up old drama. Somebody suggested that they pretend Schfifty Five had been a popular retro-meme that month, but nobody thought they could make it sound convincing.  So, as has become very obvious by now: after two years of going through the motions, the country is tired of being oppressed by cringe culture. They have made me their Prime Minister in order for me to tell you that although they no longer enjoy the show, there was a time that it meant something to them, but even so they’re very sorry that their intense display of fandom was so insensitive and hurtful. And they’re equally apologetic they didn't try to fix their mistake sooner. On behalf of the United Kingdom, Mr. President, and speaking as Prime Minister, I formally apologize for Rick and Morty and the harm it caused our union. “Uh...” he will say - speechless, utterly speechless. As a way of recompense, I’d like to convene an emergency of meeting of the EU council to discuss extending the reach of BBC iPlayer Europe-wide. “Mr. Prime Minister I - I cannot simply overlook two years of-” Did I mention Mary Berry has a new cooking show already available for streaming? “Two years of .... er... years of... of the United Kingdom not bringing roast chicken crisps to EU council meetings.” Heavens! What barbarians my predecessors were - there’ll be a lorry stuffed with Walkers in the Chunnel  in twenty minutes. if you’ll excuse me, Mr. President, I’ll make the call right away. Toodle-pip. And that, ladies and gents and honourable non-binaries, if how I will swiftly and efficiently get rid of Brexit. Your Majesty, my Skype is open: I await your DM for my contact info.

#brexit #britain #uk #article fifty #article 50 #eu #european union #rick and morty #schfifty five #get schwifty #HRM Queen Elizabeth II #prime minister #mary berry #bbc #iplayer #shreddies #freddie and eddie #WHO DISAPPEARED! #what happened to them? #Where did they go? #monty python #cricket #Jean-Claude Juncker #Emmanuel Macron #chunnel #walkers crisps #roast chicken #canada #parliament #bonar law

[dontreadthistrashgarbage]

Pt. 6

Guerin got a call at her desk halfway through a project she was working on for HEET. Groaning at the interruption since she knew it would take a while to get her focus back, she took a moment to exhale before answering. "This is Go Guerin."

"Guerin it's Han Jisoo. I need you to come to my office right now."

"Yes, I'm on my way." She said cheerfully before hanging up. Leaving her hand on the phone she stared at it for a moment. "I'm getting fired." She said outloud. Her entire life any time a higher up had asked to see her in their office she immediately assumed the worst. Her stomach churned as she tried to calm herself down, then she stood up, stuck her cell phone in her pocket and left to see the CEO of her company.

She knocked gently on the door and peered in to see Jisoo, who looked up and gestured her in. The room also had a PR manager, the company lawyer and HR. [Yeah this is either about the case or I'm being fired.] She stepped inside and bowed, greeting everyone politely.

"You're not being fired." Jisoo, the CEO quipped.

"Oh thank god." Guerin exhaled, her hand going to her heart as tension left her body.

"I've known you for a long time Guerin. Things have been rough lately and we're working on it. You're an excellent worker and overall an asset to our company, and you're a very good friend." Jisoo said, smiling, though Guerin caught the strain on her face and the serious expression everyone else wore.

"Thank you, I love my job and I want to do well at it. I like this company and how it is run." Guerin bowed with gratitude before sitting down as Jisoo gestured. She looked curiously around.

"All that being said, just like we were worried about you've been targeted again by rumors." Jisoo frowned. Guerin's heart sank, she had just started getting back to her normal mood. What happened now?

The PR manager, Jaemyun showed a printed out article from dispatch, "This was published online about fifteen minutes ago." She informed Guerin, who leaned forward curiously. Her mouth dropped open as she read the headline and stayed open the rest of the article.

"WOW OF A.C.E CAUGHT ON A DATE WITH CONTROVERSIAL FOREIGNER MANAGER OF HEET"

The article was punctuated by a picture of Seyoon and Guerin sitting in the cab, smiling, and another of Guerin getting out and leaning over to say goodbye.

"As you are aware, if you are dating a celebrity we need to know so we can react appropriately." Mina, the lawyer, spoke up.

"Yes of course I know! Which is why you haven't heard anything. We're not dating! We're friends! A bunch of us went out for karaoke and drinks last night and Seyoon rode with me to make sure I got home safely after drinking." She felt embarrassed admitting she had gotten drunk the night before in a professional setting, but she knew in this instance complete honesty was important.

"I figured it was something like that." Jisoo sighed and rubbed her temples. "We've contacted Beat Interactive. They're on their way with Seyoon now so we can talk about how to best handle this. Let's relocate to the conference room."

Guerin's phone was vibrating like crazy while she waited with everyone for Seyoon and his company to come. Charlie and HEET had gotten wind of the scandal as well as some other acquaintances. She only responded to The first two with assurances that she was okay and everything was getting straightened out now before putting her phone on silent and putting it back into her pocket.

It didn't take long for Seyoon, Minseok, Beat Interactives own legal and PR team as well as the CEO Kim Hyeim herself to come in. Everyone stood and bowed, greeting each other appropriately before settling in to discussions.

"Go Guerin has already informed us that they were not on a date." Jaemyun started.

"Kim Seyoon confirmed that, he said they met with a group and he made sure she got home safe as a friend." Started the other PR manager.

Seyoon tilted his head slightly and raised his hand, "Excuse me, but that's not exactly what I said."

For a moment everyone looked at him before Hyeim finally spoke up, "Is there something you want to clarify further?"

"Ah... yes. I said we did meet with a group of friends and it wasn't a date, and that I did excort her home. But it wasn't as a friend." He seemed to have finished talking despite everyone staring at him in need of more information. A few people glanced at Guerin but she was just as lost and put her hands up defensively, unable to withhold an awkward laugh.

"Kim Seyoon, please excuse us but could you explain what you mean by that." Jisoo requested in a polite but stressed voice.

"I like Guerin." He said simply, looking at Jisoo, before his eyes went to Guerin who stared back at him in shock, hands over her mouth, "I've been meeting her as a friend but also with the intention of developing a relationship eventually."

Guerin let out another awkward laugh through her fingers, eyes wide as she ran her hands through her hair in shock before stopping at her neck. Blinking rapidly she tried to center her thoughts.

"I'm guessing this is news to you." Mina stated with a sigh.

"Yea- yes. This is not what I expected." Guerin corrected her formality, sitting up and trying to look professional again.

"I'm sorry, I didn't want it to come out this way." Seyoon said, still watching Guerin's reaction with his unreadable expression. He finally broke his stare and glanced around making it clear the apology was also intended for the rest of the people in the meeting.

"That complicates things." Jisoo frowned and looked at Hyeim, "What is your company policy on dating?" Everyone got filled in on the rules, Seyoon looking back to Guerin who was now chewing her lip thoughtfully. He smiled at her again and she couldn't help sending a smaller smile back to him.

"Go Guerin." Jaemyun brought her back to reality, "If you two are dating we'll need to-" she stopped talking to see Seyoon had raised his hand to politely interrupt again.

"I'm sorry, but we aren't dating. Guerin has only just heard of my intentions and she has not responded." Seyoon smiled as though unaware of the tension. Hyeim put her face in her hands and Jisoo coughed as they both tried to hide what might have been a chuckle.

"I see." Jaemyun nodded slowly, "Go Guerin, are you planning on responding to Kim Seyoon soon or should we write a statement without one?"

"I'm- I'm so sorry." Guerin looked around at everyone, "I've just been taken by surprise. I don't know what to say. And the talk I need to have is... a private one with Kim Seyoon." She finished the sentence hyper aware of how inappropriate it sounded, but relied on the others to understand.

"Why don't we get started on the first part while you two talk? There's some other details we need to address as well regarding Guerin's current legal issues." The Beat Interactive lawyer said. Guerin started as though he had slapped her in the face. Of course that would be a problem now, the case hadn't been resolved so her reputation was controversial and could affect all of A.C.E. Recovering she stood and bowed, then followed Seyoon out.

He turned to her just outside the door but she moved past him, grabbing his sleeve and leading him to a smaller unoccupied meeting room. Closing the door she let out an exhale and leaned against it, eyes shut for a moment as she recuperated. Blinking her eyes open she met Seyoon's gaze and couldn't help but laugh, shoving him slightly.

"What the hell Seyoon?!"

"I was gonna talk to you tonight but, it seemed like a bad idea to hide that." He shrugged.

"I mean yeah, can you imagine if they said we were just friends for that to change in what a week? A month? That would have sucked." Guerin agreed.

"So, if it would have changed," he took a step toward her, taking her words literally, "Does that mean they have?"

"I- I mean." She stammered then put her hand on his chest to stop his approach. "You're distracting me!" Guerin complained. His smile grew, narrowing his eyes mischeviously.

"So you find me distracting?" He wiggled his eyebrows and bit his lip bit didnt advance any closer.

"Yeah of course!" She couldn't hide it, "You're too damn sweet and cute and weird and handsome. You're fun and you keep me on my toes but you also are so genuinely supportive and kind, aaaaaaahhh." She groaned covering her face with her hands again. He reached for her wrists and took her hands in his, holding them both between them. She sighed hopelessly at him.

"You said you acted without thinking last night. I thought you meant that it was a mistake."

"Ah... I meant that I wasn't thinking because I just wanted to be in contact with you." He swung her hands in his lightly as though showing her what he meant, "But I didnt want to say it over text."

"I was actually disappointed." She admitted with a laugh.

"Does that mean you like me too?" He wiggled his shoulders at her and made her chuckle. Guerin peered into his eyes pensively, her heart beating rapidly.

"... yeah. I do. Of course I do."

He pulled her toward him, wrapping her arms around himself before hugging her tightly back. She stepped into it willingly, as she rested her chin on his shoulder and his body against hers, in her arms, it felt surreal. She had idly wondered what embracing him would feel like and now it was happening. But reality brought her back to her senses. Remembering the biggest obstacle, she reluctantly pulled away from him. He was still grinning but it faded slightly at her expression of regret.

"Seyoonie, even if I like you I don't know that we should date..." she started.

He tilted his head inquiringly, waiting for her to continue, "Your lawyer mentioned my case... I have a really bad reputation right now. It's already risky enough when an idol dates but... someone like me? A foreigner with rumors of attacking a fan? How would that affect A.C.E? Your whole career?" She trailed off again, not knowing what to say next.

Seyoon looked pensive and nodded slowly before speaking, "I love being a singer. It's my dream and I don't want to lose that."

"I know, and no one is worth giving that up for!" She agreed quickly.

"We know you're innocent. That's going to be revealed soon." He nodded along with his own reasoning, "And I'm going to get married someday. So I might as well begin with someone I like."

Guerin laughed loudly at his self satisfied expression with his simple logic, "You're too cute, it's killing me."

"Noonaaaa don't die yet." He poked his own cheek as he pouted, "We haven't even kissed yet."

"You little." She failed to look stern and tapped his lips lightly with her hand. He responded by wiggling closer to her. Getting swept up she chose to meet his challenge, moving forward she pecked him suddenly on the lips, then ducked away.

"Hey, wait I wasnt ready!" He called out surprised and reached out to grab her. She spun his arm and turned him so she was facing him and he was up against the wall as she smirked at him in his surprise before he licked his lips and gave a naughty smile.

"Okay, so get ready again." She moved her hands to his torso and leaned in again, eyes fluttering closed. He leaned in the rest of the way to kiss her lingering for a few seconds before they both begrudgingly separated.

"So... we should find out what our bosses have to say. About us..." she felt disheveled suddenly, straightening her clothes and running her hands through her hair. He watched her with a smile before taking her hand again.

"First, you have to tell me." He said.

"Tell you what?" She asked.

"You have to tell me you like me."

"I already did! And then I showed you." She winked then laughed in embarrassment.

"No, you only agreed with me." He glanced up, "and then you showed me." He nodded and looked back at her, "But I want to hear the words."

"Youuuu..." she trailed off, her heart unable to handle this giant baby.

"Noona. Go Guerin! I like you. Do you like me?" He said earnestly.

"Hmmmm..." she teased him, but couldnt Deny him for long, "Seyoonie. I like you." She stated.

"Perfect, now theres no question." He beamed, "you should give me a piggyback ride back to the conference room."

"Absolutely not. Any other time I'm game but we have enough trouble right now." She laughed at his feigned disappointment and snuck him a kiss on the cheek, "have that to keep you happy until after work today." She left for the door and he trotted along after her once he recovered.

The rest of the meeting was a lot of talking, phone calls, more talking, a lot of stress all punctuated by Guerin and Seyoon sneaking glances at each other and trying to not look too pleased due to the stress levels of everyone else involved. Ultimately it was decided that Beat Interactive would announce that while the two were not dating at the time the photos had been taken, they had begun dating recently and hadn't had a chance to confirm before the article was released. In the meantime, PWER, the company Guerin worked for, had gotten clearance from the police department for some details of the case while the police department worked on their own statement since the investigation had been concluded. No one was convinced that it was an ideal scenario but they hoped with everything coming together it could minimize this particular PR nightmare.

"I never should have let you meet them." Minseok complained to Guerin as they trailed out.

"I didn't start this!" Guerin responded defensively, "Besides its not my fault I'm irresistible."

Minseok groaned as Seyoon smiled and held Guerins sleeve for a moment. She glanced at him and slowed a step as he pulled gently backwards.

"Can we still meet after my practice tonight?" He asked quietly so others around wouldn't hear.

"I don't see why not, I was planning to anyway." Guerin said.

He looked around to see if the hallway was clear before sneaking a kiss to her cheek, then speeding past her to catch up with Minseok, his dangerous smile back in place.

"Guerin?" Jisoo looked back suddenly from ahead of everyone, "Will you meet me in my office after I see our guests out?" She asked.

Guerin nodded and when it was appropriate ducked away to Jisoo's office, certain she was getting fired as per her usual anxieties, but also logically knew it wouldnt be likely at this point.

While waiting for Jisoo she pulled out her phone to catch up on her blown up messages.

Han Jisoo returned before Guerin could text HEET through Woojin's phone. The two went into the CEO's office and as soon as the door closed, Jisoo spun on her friend and began smacking her in the arm repeatedly.

"Hey, you're my boss now you're not allowed to do that!" Guerin said in English, laughing and cringing away but otherwise letting it happen.

"You are such a problem sometimes aaah!" Jisoo responded with a final smack, also in english. "And this is how I'm supposed to find out one of my best friends is dating?? And an idol no less!"

"To be fair, I also just found out the same way which is, arguably, worse." Guerin rubbed her eyebrow subconsciously. "None of this even feels real."

"Well it is and now it's my mess to help clean up." Jisoo crossed her arms. Guerin looked at the ground guiltily causing Jisoo to sigh, uncross her arms and hug her friend, "I know it's not your fault. It's just an unfortunate pain in the ass."

"Guerin laughed and hugged Jisoo back, picking her up for a moment, "It's so cute when you swear in English!"

"Hey. Boss. Remember?" Jisoo protested disingenuously.

"It's payback for hitting me."

Jisoo tsked and changed the subject, "Mina is going to come here to talk you through how we're handling the court case since you'll need to testify. But first I wanted to make sure you're okay."

"I honestly havent processed most of today yet so I'm not sure. I was starting to be okay again and I think right now I'm okay too?" Jisoo nodded, knowing her friend had more to add and waited, "I was also wondering... how does this affect me working with HEET again...?"

Jisoo looked serious, "As of right now you not being manager is only temporary. We do need to see how things shake out but nothing has changed. Hopefully with the resolution of this case things will work out."

Guerin nodded in understanding. Jisoo had been friends with Guerin before she had even moved to South Korea as they had met in the states where Jisoo attended school and done internships at record companies around the world to broaden her knowledge of the industry. It helped her family was very well off and able to help her start her own company once she had returned. At that time Guerin was nearing the end of teaching English when Jisoo offered her a job. Guerin would forever be grateful for her friend and knew she had her best interests at heart.

"Jisoo, thanks for sticking with me. I'll fo my best." She said in Korean, it just seemed more genuine.

Jisoo was spared a heart warming response as Mina arrived.

The men of A.C.E were called into a meeting once Hyeim and Seyoon returned from their meeting with PWER. The four other members had an inkling of what it would be about given they too had seen the Dispatch article. Jun had texted Charlie who hadn't had much more information than he did at the time. Once everyone was seated, papers with the statement were passed out but Kim Hyeim talked before they could read it.

"On those papers your holding we have written a statement concerning Kim Seyoon and Go Guerin dating. We've agreed to let PWER and the police handle the statements regarding Go Guerin's legal case. Hopefully with her proven innocence and releasing of actual footage of what happened we won't get much extra blowback to an already risky announcement. Also you should know that as of this afternoon Go Guerin and Kim Seyoon have expressed an interest in dating and going forward they would like to be up front and honest about it."

The expressions on everyone's face changed wildly as she spoke, except for Seyoon who maintained his normal unreadable face, watching her despite the others looking around at each other.

"Wait." Chan started, "So it's TRUE?"

"It wasn't last night but apparently it is now." Kim Hyeim said with a crooked smile.

"Since when did you-?" Jun sputtered and stopped, "So...." the king of reactions lived up to his name as every thought raced through his brain.

"Good for you Wow!" Byeongkwan fist bumped his hyung.

"It's not how I expected you to go for it but it works." Donghun said, patting his friend on the shoulder.

"I didn't even know you felt that way about her?" Chan added, still shocked but smiling along, "Wait, what does that mean for-" he started and the boys swung their gaze to Jun.

Hyeim watched this curiously, "Park Junhee is there something wrong?"

"I wanted to tell you today but..." he trailed off for a moment, "Ah... I also confessed to a woman last night and she might be my girlfriend soon."

Kim Hyeim was frozen, then rested her face in her hands for a moment before looking up to Minseok who appeared just as shocked as she was, "Maybe we should rescind the idea that they can date." She said dryly.

"I'm so sorry I didn't know this was happening. I thought they were friends I didn't think they were their type!" Minseok said in a rush.

"What does that mean?" Jun asked with a hint of aggression as he and Seyoon snapped their faces toward their manager.

"I just meant they're foreigners and I just, i thought you each had a different type and with them being older and Guerin is a lot... they're really good people I'm sorry I'm just shocked." Minseok tried to explain.

Hyeim interrupted, sensing an argument and not wanting to deal with that on top of everything else. "Minseok will chat with me later." She shot him a look, also displeased with his judgment toward women and he bowed his head at the visual scolding, "What we need to figure out now is how we're going to handle the second announcement. I'll get someone from PR to meet with me, Park Junhee and his girlfriend. Until then we'll go through with what we planned for Kim Seyoon since with that article we do not have the luxury of time to discuss things."

She looked at all the boys, "I expect this to have an impact on the fanbase. We've just wrapped up promoting but maybe we can work on a special project for Choice to communicate with them. Think it over and let's start something soon."

The meeting was dismissed and Minseok hung back to talk to Hyeim as the boys meandered back to their practice room.

Guerin waited outside the door to the dance room as HEET wrapped up their practice inside. When their dance instructor left Guerin put a finger to her lips and winked so as not to give away the surprise. She was holding bags of fried chicken and iced coffee for the boys. The dance instructor smiled back and moved on without a word. Peaking around the corner she snuck in while the boys were straightening up or sitting on the ground catching their breath.

"Special delivery!" Guerin announced loudly, holding up the bags of goods. Byoungjin, Minhwan and Seungbin all startled at her sudden appearance, but once all five saw her they hopped up and ran over. Gabriel relieved her of her bags with Minhwan as Seungbin hugged her, Byoungjin held back with Tobio for his turn. Once they had all gotten their hugs in (Guerin had to guilt trip Gabriel and interrupt him setting up for the meal) they settled down to eat with Woojin.

"Woojin told me when your lesson ended and I asked him to let me bring you all food." Guerin explained, handing Seungbin and Gabriel next to her some extra chicken, "Are you boys being nice to him?" They all nodded through bulging cheeks.

"They've been working very hard." Woojin added with a small smile. He seemed the quiet accommodating type so Guerin was happy to hear the boys had seemed to accept him.

"I'm glad." She beamed at HEET as they dug in. "I don't know if you guys have heard anything but I wanted to stop by because I have some news."

"Are you gonna be our manager again!?" Gabriel called out through a full mouth.

"No, dummy. It's probably about the dispatch article." Tobio retorted and he shoved Gabriel away as he leaned into his Japanese teammate smacking his mouth annoyingly loud.

"Tobio is right. It's about the article." Guerin interrupted their bickering.

"Were you really on a date with Wow-hyung?" Minhwan asked, stunned.

"Well, no. We all met as a group of friends and he was making sure I got home safe." Despite telling the truth Guerin felt guilty so she moved on quickly, "But this afternoon after the article came out... while we were discussing how to address it... Seyoonie did confess."

The boys erupted, even shy Woojin reacted with surprise while Seungbin had leapt up, "I KNEW IT! NOONA I KNEW IT WHEN I SAW YOU AFTER THE ZOO!"

Gabriel was downright crowing in excitement as Byoungjin sat in shocked silence and Minhwan clapped excitedly. Only Tobio kept his head enough to ask "But what did you say?"

The boys all quieted again at his question. Guerin felt her face get warm as she responded, "Well he's my boyfriend now." The boys all erupted again, alternating between shocked and happy. Guerin waited for them to calm down before speaking again.

"I double checked with Han Jisoo and she said it so far hasn't meant I can't come back as your manager. But we still need to wait to clear the court case and we will need to see how the public reacts to the statement that we are now in a relationship."

Minhwan frowned, "So if a bunch of people decide to hate you, you won't be our manager?"

Guerin paused, "If it means you aren't safe. And we don't want to hurt your image." The boys looked crushed, "Your debut was strong, and you've all trained so long and so hard for this. I won't let something like my personal life ruin your futures." She added firmly.

"Noona..." Seungbin snuggled up to her and she put her arm around him, "They can't hate you right?"

Guerin wanted to comfort them, looking at all five faces of HEET- even empathetic Woojin seemed sad - but she wouldn't mislead them, "It's unlikely it'll come to that. We'll just wait and see and keep working hard okay? All of us."

Gabriel sulked, "Seungbin-ah was right. Seyoon-hyung was going to steal you from us."

"I understand that's how it looks, but I promise that wasn't the intention. Please don't hold it against him." She squeezed Seungbin and looked at all of them, "I love you all dearly and even if I'm not your manager I'm still working for PWER and we can see each other often like we have been. But my goal is to come back as your manager okay? I haven't forgotten you." The boys nodded quietly.

"Come on, let's finish eating." She encouraged them, changing the subject, "You also need to show me your new dance so far, I heard it's very challenging!"

Before long the seven of them had settled back into cheerful chatter about what HEET was working on next.

[cookinguptales]

Things are starting to get out of hand with these accusations. What is this The Crucible? When I was a kid I had an uncle who was accused by a lady who didn't know he was closeted. It was fucked up and ruined his life even when we proved his innocence. That's why even if I hate the person being accused I won't side with the anyone unless there is evidence. Whatever happened to Innocent Until Proven Guilty? I'm just saying, accusations don't automatically mean guilty and shit's out of control.

Ah yes, The Crucible. A play about the Salem Witch Trials, a late addition to a series of injustices perpetuated against women who were often predated on much stronger men who knew that their word carried more weight in the community.*

Yeah. That was a great analogy, dumbass.

I considered just deleting this ask because it is, again, really fucking stupid. But you know what? The past few weeks have been fucking torturous for me because, as I have mentioned many times lately, I am a survivor of CSA. And I think maybe you don’t really understand what that’s like. If you do, you certainly don’t seem to care.

Here’s some of the many, many reasons why what you said has me literally shaking I’m so angry:

The most modern and accurate statistics for false rape reports show that the number is literally no higher than any other type of crime, yet rape is the only one that ends up getting its victims regularly accused of lying. I wonder why that might be!

Even the women who do make accusations and have hard proof (up to and including video, confessions, rape kits, etc.) rarely get justice in court. Rapists very rarely pay for their crimes, and if they serve any time at all, it’s minimal. (Statistics estimate that 994 out of 1000 rapists walk free.) Judges regularly reduce sentences because, y’know, children were ~asking for it~. Most men who face rape accusations (and keep in mind, statistics show most of them fucking did it) suffer zero real consequences. So guess what? Lives aren’t ruined by rape accusations; they’re ruined by rapists.

The false rape statistics that do exist often contain misleading information; in other words, the number of “false” reports include women who withdraw their statements for any reason (including intimidation, cops advising them there’s not enough evidence to push forward, etc.) and women who were raped but were wrong about who raped them. So yeah, the number’s even fucking smaller than it sounds, and those misleading statistics often use the very painful experiences of real rape survivors to bolster dumbass statements like the one you just made. So way to help revictimize survivors. Asshole.

Almost every single one of these accusations thus far have been backed up by many other people who were victimized by the same person. And literally none of the people who have been victimized have benefited in any way from making these accusations (they never fucking do); one of the women who made an accusation about Weinstein was even driven from her home country, but you don’t seem to care about that shit being “out of control”.

In many industries, Hollywood included, rape, sexual harassment, and sexual assault are so prevalent that it’s considered a goddamn hazard of the trade. Women are kept quiet through the exact kind of societal, legal, and just downright fucking shady means that have been reported on extensively the past few weeks. The only thing that will ever change this is brave women (and men!) coming forward with their experiences. Silencing them only serves to help the rapists keep this terrible, disgusting system going. You wanting to silence them helps keep this terrible, disgusting system going.

One of the things that’s been most triggering to me the past few weeks is stupid-ass statements like this. I never made a formal accusation against my abuser for a lot of reasons, and one of them was because I was publicly victim-blamed, harassed, and questioned about my experiences. I still have nightmares and panic attacks over a decade later, and I’d say probably half of them are due to the way that I was treated by ~viewers like you~. Like wow, talk about lives being ruined. You have no idea. No fucking idea.

So in short, go fuck yourself.

Sending the message you did to a woman who’s a CSA survivor was cruel. Like even if you’re just fucking stupid, it was cruel. You are a cruel person. I hope the words I’ve written make you feel sick to your stomach just like yours did to me. I don’t want you following me. I don’t want you reading my fic. None of the words I write, other than these ones born of anger, are for you. I don’t want you anywhere near me.

Go the hell away, anon. You’re a jerk.

#I have links to back up all of this but if you're seriously going to make me look them up than I hate you even more #Now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to fucking Disney World #*I’ve studied historical witch trials extensively so I know the gender dynamic can be more complicated than this #But lbr this was usually the case #Trigger warning #Tw: rape #tw: csa

[bountyofbeads]

🚨🚨BREAKING NEWS ALERT 🚨 🚨

Ukraine to review investigation of company tied to Hunter Biden

By Kim Hjelmgaard | Published October 4, 2019, 9:16 AM EDT | USA TODAY | Posted October 4, 2019 9:30 AM ET |

KIEV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s top legal official said Friday that his office would review at least 15 high-profile past investigations including a probe into the owner of a natural-gas company linked to former Vice President Joe Biden’s son.

Ruslan Ryaboshapka, Ukraine’s general prosecutor, said during a press conference, that the review is part of a wider audit of cases that were closed or dismissed by his predecessors.

He said the decision to review the cases was not specifically related to the time Hunter Biden spent on the board of Burisma, Ukraine’s largest private natural-gas firm, or allegations from the Trump administration that Joe Biden improperly applied pressure on Ukraine to have an investigation into Burisma halted.

The allegations from President Donald Trump and his lawyer Rudolph Giuliani have played a key role in the impeachment inquiry into Trump by Democratic lawmakers.

Ukraine’s previous general prosecutor, Yuriy Lutsenko, closed a money-laundering and tax-irregularity probe into Burisma’s owner, Mykola Zlochevsky, in 2016. The case did not focus on Hunter Biden. There is also no evidence that Joe Biden acted improperly in applying pressure on Ukraine to dismiss Lutsenko’s predecessor, Viktor Shokin. Shokin was widely and publicly viewed by international organizations such as the European Union and International Monetary Fund, and anti-corruption investigators in Ukraine, as an impediment to reforming the country’s culture of graft.

Ryaboshapka said the audit has been planned since he took office one month ago. Friday’s press conference was his first public one since taking up the role.

Vitali Kasko, Ryaboshapha’s deputy, told USA TODAY after the news conference that an affidavit by Shokin highlighted in recent days by Giuliani’s office that claims he was fired in 2016 because he was leading a “wide-ranging corruption investigation” into Burisma had no merit.

“Shokin is not a reliable figure,” he said.

Intelligence watchdog to testify about 'credible' whistleblower complaint before key House committee

Bart Jansen   | Published October 4, 2019 8:30 AM ET | USA TODAY | Posted October 4, 2019 9:30 AM ET |

WASHINGTON – The inspector general who received the whistleblower’s complaint at the heart of the impeachment investigation of President Donald Trump and who found it credible will testify privately Friday before the House Intelligence Committee.

Michael Atkinson, the inspector general for the intelligence community, received the whistleblower complaint Aug. 12 that focused on Trump’s call urging Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to discredit a political rival, former Vice President Joe Biden.

As House Democrats worked to corroborate the complaint, Trump told reporters Thursday that both Ukraine and China should investigate Biden.

"Well, I would think if they were honest about it, they'd start a major investigation into the Bidens. It's a very simple answer,” Trump said of Ukraine President Zelensky. “And by the way, likewise, China should start an investigation into the Bidens because what happened in China is just about as bad as what happened with Ukraine.”

Biden, a leading candidate for the Democratic nomination for president in 2020, has forcefully denied wrongdoing with his son, Hunter Biden, who worked on the board of an energy company in Ukraine. Kate Bedingfield, the communications director for Biden’s campaign, called Trump’s statement “a grotesque choice of lies over truth and self over country.”

Atkinson spent two weeks reviewing the whistleblower's complaint that alleged Trump “used the power of his office” to solicit foreign help for the 2020 election and then restricted access to records of the call. Atkinson found that the complaint appeared credible Aug. 26, after a preliminary review.

But the acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, prevented him from passing along the complaint to Congress within seven days, as is typically required for national-security whistleblower complaints. Maguire consulted with the White House and Justice Department in opting for the delay, he told the intelligence panel Sept. 26, the day after a summary of the call was released and the complaint was provided to the committee.

Maguire said he thought the complaint might be protected by executive privilege, despite being a conversation with a foreign leader. The Justice Department ruled that the complaint didn’t qualify as an “urgent concern” about "a serious or flagrant problem" requiring notification of Congress because the target – Trump – isn’t a member of the intelligence community.

Atkinson respectfully disagreed with that decision, saying in a letter Sept. 17 that the allegations related to “one of the most significant and important” of Maguire’s responsibilities to the American people. Atkinson warned lawmakers that withholding the information could lead to “a significant problem and deficiency” relating to Maguire’s intelligence programs.

Trump released a memo summarizing the call and Maguire provided the complaint to the House and Senate intelligence committees on Sept. 25. Lawmakers on those panels now want to hear from the whistleblower.

Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., has characterized the call as sounding like a mafia shakedown, seeking the favor of an investigation of Biden in exchange for the release of military aid. He called Maguire’s decision to consult with the White House “bewildering” during the Sept. 26 hearing. And Schiff said Wednesday that lawmakers will have questions for Atkinson because they didn't have the complaint when they last met with him.

“We certainly intend to ask (Atkinson) about the efforts that were made to corroborate that complaint, which we now know the inspector general found both credible and urgent," Schiff said.

But the top Republican on the panel, Rep. Devin Nunes of California, said the whistleblower had arguable political motivation for the complaint and said Democrats were using it as ammunition in political warfare.

Trump has called the whistleblower "very inaccurate" and Schiff "a lowlife."

"He should resign from office in disgrace and frankly they should look at him for treason," Trump said of Schiff Wednesday while meeting with the president of Finland.

Six House committees have been pursuing wide-ranging investigations of Trump since Democrats regained control of the chamber in January. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., announced a formal impeachment inquiry Sept. 24 based on reports about Trump’s Ukraine call.

The inspector general's meeting comes amid a flurry of subpoenas for documents and depositions with State Department officials and associates of Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who met with Ukraine officials to urge an investigation of Biden.

#breaking news #trump scandals #trumpism #trump administration #president donald trump #president trump #news today trump #trump #trump crime family #trump corruption #trump crime syndicate #trump cult #trump china #joe biden #us politics #politics #u.s. presidential elections #u.s. department of justice #u.s. news #u.s. constitution #u.s. politics #impeach trump #impeach45 #impeachment inquiry now #impeachthemf #impeachtrump #ukraine #ukrainegate