#and yet there’s no writers block for RANCHERS | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

neverchecking · 9 months

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Not so Scary

Okay, okay, I know I'm starving y'all. I'm sorry for that, but writer's block is choking me between it's thighs rn. BUT, i do have this to offer.

It's more Aaliyah x Ceres stuff. Sorry not sorry. This time our guest star is Twilight (sage is still there. that bastard)

For those who don't know, Ceres belongs to @angry-trashcan, my lovely wife whom I love so much <33

Smut so MDNI! !8+

Smut CW: Foursomes, there is some scissoring in the beggining bc girls being girls :), Aaliyah and Sage get a little mean at the end but that's okay bc Twilight and Ceres are into it <3 Also, you'll see where the new blog name came from <3 (Bailey and I thought of it when shit-balling --it's like spit-balling but pure crack instead--and i just love it sm). This ones breeches 5.2K words, but it's not all smut there is a fluff portion before hand <33

There were a few things that confused her about the current Sage of Spirits.

None were truly consequential things, mindless thoughts that had no real merit in the real world (Why did she wake at the first peaks of dawn if only to sit in front of a window with her legs crossed as she mumbled under her breath? Why did she choose to eat with chopsticks as opposed to the normal cutlery everyone else chose? Why did she put both socks on before her shoes? That was the wrong order. It was sock, shoe, sock shoe-), but one thing in particular perplexed the brunette.

Why did Aaliyah showcase this false bravado of a blood-lusting warrior when the way she cradled her cheeks was nothing but soft and loving?

Why did the Sheikah insist on hiding behind stone walls? Why did she completely shut down and refuse to acknowledge anything when any part of it was brought up? What had happened to her that had shattered her soul in such a way she refused to let herself be vulnerable again?

They had been in Sage’s Hyrule for a few weeks at this point and it was evident the Sheikah had made her impact. With gentle hums and smooth words, dressed in a silky tilt, she had wound a few of the others around her finger, keeping them coiled there like a viper.

And yet, it was as if she didn’t care. She paid them no more mind than that of the villagers around her. In fact, if it wasn’t pertaining to herself or Sage, it seemed Aaliyah had zero lost love on it.

Even right now, she was laying in the front yard, one leg crossed over the bent counterpart as her arms laid folded under her head. Her eyes were closed but the rhythm of her breathing remained controlled. Never falling into the soft and even pattern that most had when they succumb to sleep. No, she was simply resting her eyes. Sunbathing like a cat would any other lazy afternoon.

It was an odd sight, seeing the woman so…eased. Vulnerable wasn’t the word to use because Ceres would bet money that, should any threatening presence wander nearby, the Sheikah would waste no time in neutralizing it. Eased however seemed to fit.Quelled maybe.

She shook her head, standing after a second with a fleeting touch to Twilight’s shoulder. He glanced back, catching her eyes for a fleeting second before letting her go with a nod. It was still in earshot and even the rancher was still weary around the sage in the yard based on her battle prowess alone.

True to her earlier predictions, Aaliyah’s ears twitched the second she stepped foot onto the grass, alerting the other to her location immediately. Still, she did not move. She remained in her spot until Ceres had settled beside her, politely folding her legs and holding her hands in her lap. Eyes that shined like sapphires darted from the Sheikah’s face up to the sky, noting the lack of clouds, before repeating the process. Somewhere along the line, Aaliyah snorted, rolling her shoulders before settling once more.

“Keep staring at me like that and I’ll start getting ideas, doll.”

“I like ideas.”

“Oh, I am well aware.” Even if her eyes remained closed, Ceres knew the other was well aware of every interaction going on around her. “What’s turning in your pretty little head there, my love?”

“You.” Came the automated reply before Ceres was trying to correct herself. It wasn’t fast enough as Aaliyah chuckled from her place on the ground, something just as harmonious as it was rare.

“Glad to know I’m always on your mind, even when I’m not around.” Her tone seemed happy, which was a plus. Even if it made Ceres' cheeks turn red and her ears lower. “No, I mean not that I don’t think of you- but I just-”

“Breath.” There was a sudden hand on her own. She hadn’t even heard Aaliyah sit up, but there she was, eyes open and soft and focused on her. Goddess, Aaliyah had gorgeous eyes. It was kind of unfair. “Take a breath,” Aaliyah’s chest gave an exaggerated inhale in demonstration. Ceres followed. “And release.” The air fell out of her lungs in a sweeping exhale, to which the brunette followed. “There you go, my sweet girl. Now, tell me what’s going on up there.”

Aaliyah was so steady and smooth and confident that Ceres nearly wanted to kiss her then and there. In every torrent of a storm, whether it be her’s or Sage’s, or even a personal issue she was facing, she remained consistent. Like a pillar of conviction that instilled trust without her even trying.

“You-...You let the others believe you're so…scary, but you’re not. You’ve proven to me that you’re not. So, I guess my question is, why let them believe that?” Ceres spilled out, without so much as a second thought. It seemed to take the other aback for a second, her own ears rising and falling for a moment as she stuttered over an answer.

Then she huffed, eyes darting over for a second. One of the farm dogs from up the road had trotted over, eagerly stuffing its snout into Aaliyah’s face, lapping at her cheeks and rubbing their noses together. The Sheikah returned the action, ruffling the dog’s ears with both of her hands as the dog’s tail wagged. Her mouth opened then closed before opening again. The dog lapped at her cheek again, paws pushing at her shoulders in an attempt to pin her beneath them. Aaliyah gently pushed them off, cradling them close to her chest as she finally let out a sigh. “Scary, to me, is safe. It’s territory that I’m familiar with. It’s easier for people to be scared of me and to stay away than it is for them to be close and to get hurt. With you- It’s…hard. Hard because I know that in letting you in, I open myself to the chance of you getting hurt, knowing there was something I probably could’ve done. But it’s just as easy showing you that I’m not all jagged edges and shattered parts because I know that even when I’m not there, you have some, admittedly, talented men protecting you when I can’t. I don’t care much for what they think, but I do care about you. If they think I’m scary, but see that you’re okay with me, they know that I am just as capable of protecting you as they are. If not, more so.” She spoke with hearty conviction and a gaze that said everything she couldn’t quite put into words. It was something that had obviously been running amuck in her own head for quite some time, long before Ceres had prodded for it, and something that she obviously had thought a lot about.

Aaliyah had been at her most vulnerable with Ceres. She’d fallen asleep next to the woman, ate next to her, they’ve even had sex. Quite a few times, and Aaliyah had trusted her not to drop the piece of her that the Sheikah had offered.

Ceres swallowed harshly. The dog barked. Aaliyah huffed at it through her nose before pushing the paws off and letting the dog run back to where it once came from, watching with a fond grin. Animals were always a comfort to her since they were something she understood (From how Wild explained it, nature talked in ways he could understand without needing to understand any form of speech. If Sage and him were alike as they said, and Aaliyah followed in Sage’s footsteps, they were something she was familiar with. Something that shaped and carved her out of a blank canvas and then continued to grow alongside her.), but when the grin remained as Aaliyah’s attention turned to Ceres, she realized something. Aaliyah had come to understand her too, all while giving Ceres the ability to learn about her. What made her tick, what had her brows furrow, what made her lips turn into that adorable little pout. All of it. Aaliyah laid it out for her to memorize, even if it ate at her to do so.

Ceres realized Aaliyah had let herself love, if only to a certain degree. It was still something. And that something was all she needed to affirm that she wasn’t scary. She was scared and traumatized and tired.

Ceres lept into Aaliyah’s lap at the reminder, pushing forward all the growing affection she had for the woman into a searing kiss. The Sheikah stumbled a bit at the sudden action, one hand raising as the other shot back to catch them both. Her lips remained frozen for a second before Aaliyah was raising her free hand to cup the brunette’s cheeks, letting a smile gently curve on her face.

That was a good sign, right?

Ceres returned the grin, giggling a big into the other’s growing smirk before using her body weight to pin the other beneath her. Their lips never separated, even as chuckles bubbled between them before fizzling out into a mix of teeth clicking against teeth and tongues swiping against each other in a fight for dominance.

Ceres pulled back before a winner could be decided, a line of spit connecting her to the Sheikah beneath her. Said Sheikah panted for a second before licking her lips, snapping the line of spit.

“What did I say about giving me ideas, Doll?”

<><><><>

“Great Din’s tits-” Aaliyah couldn’t even stop the curse before it dropped out of her lips, hands squeezing the calf in her grasp in a pure, desperate attempt at holding control. Ceres, her wonderful, gorgeous Ceres, was beneath her, cheeks red and flush as tears began pearling down the apples of them. How she wished to wipe them away, to kiss away any woe the other was facing, but she was a bit preoccupied.

She was too occupied watching the other’s tits bounce up and down, over and over, keeping time with Aaliyah herself. Too busy watching how the blush on her cheeks did not stop at said cheeks but flowed down her body in a feverish haze. Too busy marking up once pristine skin in a reminder to any and all that she had her hands on Ceres first. She was the one making the brunette cry out, hands clawing at Aaliyah’s own thigh in an attempt to hang on as her head fell back into the pillows beneath her. She was the one with Ceres' leg thrown over her shoulder, grinding against her pussy in a slick back and forth. Their clits would brush up against each other with every thrust forward, coating the other’s pussy lips in a nice sheen of their cum before Aaliyah was drawing back, repeating the process. Over and over again, the Sheikah picked up a rhythm, feeling that coil in her stomach tighten. There were so many things she wanted to do to this woman, just so little time. And it seemed somewhere along the line, Aaliyah had seemed to piss off a god somewhere somehow (probably Hylia with her daily cursings out of her name) and picked up a curse where they could never really have an entire evening to themselves. It seemed no matter what she had tried to throw Sage off her tail, for just a little while, he had made it a game to come back as soon as possible just to catch her in the act. He looked her in the eyes (late at night after their rendezvous with his shadows and the aforementioned female) and admitted, with that suave smirk and hands firmly on her hips, that he had found it so endearingly entertaining that she thought she could slip anything past him. That it was, in fact, just a game to him. To let her wander, let her hands and eyes roam on places that weren’t his own body, only to reign her back in, tightening her leash. It amused him to no end.

Goddess, she hated the smug ass smirk. Wanted to wipe it off his stupid face.

Mentally, a timer was counting down in her head. A number of variables were running amuck as she took Ceres apart beneath her, thinking over every little thing that would either slow the man down or cut her time. Of course, there was a chance that none of it mattered because the man was inherently unpredictable in every way and no amount of planning could ever truly be used against him.

So she was going to enjoy this time while she had it.

“You look so good under me, doll.” Aaliyah purred, feeling the way Ceres bucked up into her, meeting her thrust for thrust. “Fuck me, you’re too good for me. Makes me wanna be all domestic and shit. Put the fattest rock on your finger. Call you my little wife.”

Nails dug harsher into her thigh at the remark as a moan cried out, high and pretty, sung just perfectly for the Sheikah’s ears. “Oh you like that? Like the thought of being my little wife? Cooking and cleaning for me? Goddess be damned-” Aaliyah hissed as her hips kept rocking forward, head falling as her pace picked up. “Gonna cum all over my pretty wife. Bet she’d like that, huh? Love for me to just cream all over her pussy?”

Ceres’ head fell against the pillow beneath her, back arching up into her as she came with a loud cry. Her thighs twitched and quivered as the nails moved from Aaliyah’s thighs to her back, painting thin red lines along her spine and against her scars.

“That’s it, my beautiful girl, coming apart just for me-” Aaliyah groaned, turning from rapid thrusts to long, drawn out strokes that drew out the other’s orgasm. “Fuck, you make it so hard to not lose my ever loving mind-”

“I know the feeling.”

Goddesses and all their followers be damned. “Do you have the innate need to stick your nose where it doesn’t belong?” Aaliyah snapped, lip raising in a snarl even if she remained focused on her task at hand. “You're like a dog with a bone.”

Sage clicked his tongue from wherever he remained behind them. “Tch, tch. You still have that bratty attitude. What is it gonna take for you to smarten up?” The sharp claws of Rauru’s hand pricked right under her jaw as her head snapped up, Sage quickly moving into her space. “Especially when there’s company.”

“Who’d you rope into your schemes this time?” She spat, hips slowing to little more than a leisurely roll. “The old man? Maybe the smith? He’d be a fun toy.” The hand tightened until she stopped her hips entirely, throwing her head back against the male’s shoulders. Ceres whimpered underneath her, overstimulation making her entire body jolt as Aaliyah halted. In a silent apology, the Sheikah gently ran a hand up and down the thigh still in her grasp.

Her eyes strained to look behind her. A grin upturned her features as she rolled her head to look at Sage once more.

“Isn’t this fun.”

Twilight knew that was the second he bit off more than he could chew. It was when Sage, ever confident, easily moved. He moved the white-ette, Aaliyah if he remembered correctly, keeping her close with a hand around her throat before glancing back.

“I did you a favor. She can get a bit mean when you try to take away her toys.” He huffed, moving the other female back enough that when he suddenly, and quite forcefully for that matter, pinned her right next to Ceres. The piercings in her nipples caught the light, and the brunette’s eyes, as she went down, her hands snapping up to catch herself even if her cheek was still smushed into the mattress.

Twilight almost worried for the other, ears flinching at the harsh smack that rang out. It didn’t seem to even startle Ceres, who looked up at him. “Hi, Twilight. Come to join the party?”

“Look at you, darling.” He breathed out, quickly moving closer to the woman, who smiled up at him in nothing but pure bliss and post-coital haze. “Did she treat ya well?”

“Oh, she always treats me so well.” Ceres giggled, head lolling to the side. Another smack rang out. Ceres nor Twilight paid it any mind this time. “Gonna let me treat you just as good, darling?”

She giggled. “You always treat me so well, too, Twilight. You all do.” Her hands brought up to cup his cheeks, bringing him down to seal their lips in a searing kiss. “Now, be a good boy and do it again.”

<><><><>

Sweat sheened off of bodies as the smell of sex permeated in the air. It was heavy and sweltering and holy shit was it almost overbearing. The sound of skin on skin echoed in repetitive claps, whines and whimpers leaking out. Aaliyah never raised from her place where Sage had pinned her, taking the abuse he hurled her way. Her ass stung and the pace he upkept was something brutal and harsh and had her rocking her throbbing clit against the edge of the bed over and over again. It wasn’t enough to get rid of that burn of understimulated edging that she had been left with since the boys had left her disgustingly hung and dry (Well, not quite dry).

“Please-” She cried out, eyes darting to look over at Ceres. She was on her back, legs thrown over the cowboy’s shoulders as he kept a much smoother, softer rhythm. It kept the brunette singing her lovely song and making those delicious faces.

Aaliyah turned her face back into the mattress, groaning into it heavily before raising her head and arching her back, pushing herself up. “Let me cum. Let me cum-” She huffed, groaning once more when Sage yanked her head back by her hair. The action was harsh and made her neck snap back in the direction he wanted.

“So demanding. First you beg for my fingers, then for my cock, and now you want to cum?” He snipped into her ear. “Sounds a little selfish to me, snowdrop.”

“Please-” Aaliyah gasped out, hips jutting against the mattress once more. It was an achingly soft brush against her clit, nothing to push her over the edge-- and she was sure Sage knew that.

“You can say please all you want, my love, not gonna make me think about it any faster.” He smirked, sharp teeth snapping on her ear and pulling it back just a bit. She cried out at the action, eyes landing on Ceres. The woman was already watching her, one of her hands interlocked with Twilights while the other was laid on the bed beside her. The hand reached for the Sheikah, brushing against her cheek. The hold on her hair loosened and Ceres took the chance to pull her forward, making their foreheads rest together.

The act was not entirely foreign, she and Sage had done it when emotions ran high after an adrenaline boosted round and they needed to remind the other that they were still there, still alive. But it was still terrifyingly intimate.

It burned where their skin touched, but it was a nice burn.

Ceres gasped out suddenly, making Aaliyah’s eyes shoot open only for her eyes to catch Twilight’s free hand rubbing harsh circles into the other’s clit. It made the other woman jolt and shudder, Aaliyah’s hands coming up to gently pin her shoulders. From behind her, Sage delivered another smack to her ass, probably watching it ripple before lowering himself. His chest laid on her back, arms coming to wrap around her midsection.

Aaliyah swallowed at the action, raising her head (To avoid giving poor Ceres a concussion) and gently cupping Ceres’ free hand in her own. A breath was sucked in in preparation before she was throwing her head back onto his shoulder. Sage kissed her shoulder before biting into the soft flesh, hips suddenly rocking forward much faster. A cry burst out of her lips at the action, body all but curling in on itself as Ceres watched, Twilight picking up his own pace.

Cries from the both of them rang out before Twilight was stilling, cock buried deep in Ceres, who cried and shook as her own back arched up into him. Like a chain reaction, Aaliyah fell apart at the sight, her own head falling forward as her thighs quivered and shook, Sage’s name falling from her lips as his hips stilled against hers. She remained still and obedient as he filled her full of cum, even as it slipped past his throbbing cock and dripped down her thighs. He unlatched from her shoulder, licking at the bite mark before pulling away from her back. “There’s my good girl. Done with your fit?”

Aaliyah swallowed, but nodded.

“Good. Now, on your back. You’re about to get a lot more friendly with our local cowboy.”

<><><><>

Ceres feared for a second that Sage would go on hard on her as he did with Aaliyah, but she should’ve known better. The relationship between the two of them was something far more trusting than anything Sage had branched out to her just yet. Something that allowed that level of pure unfiltered trust between two individuals was something that wasn’t just earned, but had to be forged and built out of shattered pieces and broken parts.

So she should’ve known that Sage would’ve handled her with nothing but care. His touches were far more delicate and far softer as he moved her onto her knees, kneeling behind her on the bed and gently steadying her when she swayed. He hushed her whines with gentle coos and softer whispers, both him and Ceres watching as Twilight and Aaliyah nervously navigated new territory.

With Cal and Wild, she was familiar with them in the sense that Sage was them at one point, so she knew how to handle them. But Twilight was a whole new ball game. They were entirely foreign to each other. The only bits they had to go off of was what was just witnessed now.

Which was so little of such a bigger picture. Because while Twilight had seen her take it rough, he was a soft lover at heart. He never wanted to hurt his romantic partner, but it seemed that was what the Sheikah liked. It wasn’t something he was inherently comfortable with with a new partner, but he didn’t want to disappoint her. Similar in the sense that all Aaliyah had seen of the cowboy was that he was a giver. He never once failed to take into account Ceres’ pleasure and Aaliyah felt that if anyone touched her clit at the moment she’d explode, buzzing on pure hormones and adrenaline. It wouldn’t feel good to her should he go about pleasing her in the same way he did with Ceres.

Luckily for both of them, Sage had the uncanny ability to be in control, even from halfway across the room.

He hummed gently, massaging Ceres’ hips as she melted into him. “She won’t break, ranch hand. You can move her. She’ll go. No more brat left in her to fight ya anymore.”

Twilight’s eyes shot over to the blond, who nodded once in encouragement before he even dared to touch the Sheikah. She was bent over the bed, one leg thrown lazily onto the bed, but it seemed that was as far as her effort went. Her shoulders shuddered with every breath she took, an assortment of claw marks (Probably from Ceres’) flexing along her spine. Her hips were bruising already and her ass was a warm red, hot to the touch when Twilight ran a hand along one of the cheeks. He stepped closer, her entire form freezing at the action, gently moving his hands to run the course along her hips.

“Ya’ alright with me handling ya, darling?” He gently whispered, waiting for her acknowledgement before doing anything. Her eyes watching him through her curtain of hair, yellow and blazing like a wild animal’s, before she nodded slowly. He nodded back, moving her hips to slot better against hers before picking her up by her thigh, moving it to rest on the bed as well. She groaned at the action, but did as instructed, even sitting up to lay against his chest in the same manner Ceres was with Sage. Her head lolled back against Twilight’s shoulder as a mindless babble left her lips.

“There ya go. See, she’s tough around the edges, but she’s just a big softie underneath it all.” Sage gently chided, knocking Ceres’ thighs apart just enough for him to slip between them, entering her with a low groan. Ceres’ whined at the action, hands flying back to lace into his hair. A low noise left his throat at the action, gently thrusting up into her.

Twilight watched the action, eyes darting to the woman on his chest. Her own chest was heaving, breasts moving with every breath as her piercings gleamed. Without thinking about it, he reached up to toy with them, twisting them just the slightest. The Sheikah keened out a noise much more akin to quiet scream then anything as her back arched, knees spreading apart on the bedspread.

“There ya go, sweetheart.” He hummed, lining himself up between her legs. The head of his cock prodded her entrance, a cooled dollop of the other’s cum making his spine shiver before he was pushing in.

She tensed again for a second before relaxing, looking over to note his facial features. He watched her as well before she was burrowing into his neck. “Prove your worth my time, cowboy.” She suddenly hissed, making his cock jolt as his hips suddenly snapped forward. Across from them Ceres watched carefully, moving in time with Sage along with his every thrust.

They kept a steady rhythm, rocking back and forth, over and over again as Sage pressed small butterfly kisses along her neck and collarbone. “There ya go, good girl. You're always so good for us.” He praised gently, moving his hands to her hips, helping her keep time with him. “Always taking every one of us so well. You deserve a treat don’t you think?”

“Would love a treat,” She panted, head falling back as a croon left her mouth. “Gonna let me cum?”

“Not yet,” Sage growled, rolling his hips up and into her. “Why don’t you help out with snow drop over there?”

“Help me with what?” Aaliyah huffed, a furrow of her brows wrinkling her forehead as her and Twilight picked up their own rhythm. “The mutt can listen well enough. Seems he likes a little bit of name calling though.” She smirked, something devious and almost a little cruel at the edges. “Like every common whore does.”

Twilight gasped at the name, wrapping his arms around the Sheikah’s torso with one hand toying with one of her tit’s and it’s piercing with the other seemed to hold on for dear life.

Ceres swallowed. Lucky bastard. Maybe she wanted to be called names too.

Sage hummed from behind her, gently pushing her forward just a bit. When she fell onto Aaliyah’s chest, the other smirking down at her, she realized that no matter what position they were in, they still had wordless communication. That they were so rough with each other for the sole reason that sometimes they needed to be. Sometimes they just needed to duke out that power imbalance, lest it eat them alive.

And now they had both her and Twilight at their mercy.

What a delicious thought.

“Seems someone else isn’t too against the thoughts, huh?” Sage purred, his own hands moving across her body. One hand echoed Twilight’s, playing with one of her tits while the other toyed with her clit. Overstimulation was already buzzing in her nerves before this was turning it into a steady inferno. “You wanna be called a whore? Our little whore? Want us to treat you like nothing more than a toy for us to use?” He teased, the circles he was drawing on her clit speeding up and growing smaller, more concentrated.

Across from them, Aaliyah picked up a steady pace herself, one hand cupping over Twilight’s, helping him juggle the mound of flesh in his grasp as the other pulled at his hair. “Twilight, you dirty slut, you need to tell me these things. Bad dog.” She clicked her tongue.

It was almost amusing how fast the tables had turned between them.

“Shit- I’m gonna- Gonna cum-” Ceres panted, wrapping her arms into the curve of Aaliyah’s back. The white-ette let it happen, removing the hand from the one around her tit to Ceres’ cheek, cupping it with such sincerity that she was in no way prepared for when she pinched her chin in her grasp, tugging her up to lock their lips together. The kiss was a searing clash of teeth and tongues, something that had the brunette staggering for balance for a second as a pure rush of pleasure shot through her gut. It lit up her nerves and made her cry out into Aaliyah’s mouth as Sage continued pounding into her. That didn’t stop his mouth however. “Atta girl, cumming all over my cock. Bet you love giving all control over huh? Love letting your pretty little brain go empty? Nothing but a mindless sleeve for me to use once Aaliyah’s had her fill? Once Twilight’s all done with you?”

“Goddess, yes-” Ceres cried out the moment Aaliyah gave her space, quivering on her chest as she unthread the hand in Twilight’s hair, moving it to his hips to help him maintain a good rhythm. Twilight looked close to tears as he burrowed into the junction of her shoulder and neck, hips rocking wildly against her.

“You’re such a good little whore for me. Nothing but a brainless little boy for me to use, hm?” Aaliyah purred, catching Sage’s eye for a second. Something dangerous and unsaid flickered in the irises, warning her that while she held a bit of control over Twilight, she still answered to him in the end. She smirked his way, nodding once before turning back to Twilight. “Gonna cum in me like a teenager? Bust your load? Maybe cry just a little? I’d love to see your pathetic little tears, Twilight. Hear you cry as you cum-”

Something akin to a yell broke free of his lips as his eyes shut tight, hips stilling against Aaliyah’s before giving a couple more harsh thrusts. The suddenness of it all made the white-ette crumple, a burst of clear slick leaking out around Twilight’s cock and down her thighs as she cried out, shuddering once more. “Shit- Fucking good boy-” She groaned out, nails pricking whatever they had grappled onto.

Somewhere behind Ceres, she could feel Sage suddenly withdraw, pinning her against Aaliyah’s chest as he hurriedly tugged his shaft, cursing under his breath before streaks painted the brunette’s back, a little even reaching the white-ette’s cheek and making her wince in distaste.

Twilight remained where he was, clinging to the Sheikah as he came down from his high, with Ceres on her chest while Sage watched over the panting trio. He grinned at his other half, who raised an eyebrow.

“So much for saving a horse and riding a cowboy, huh?”

He only laughed at the pillow thrown his way.

#I LOVE THEM SM-#just girls being girls #Ceres is bailey's #Aaliyah's is mine <33 #cindersins #they are more then friends and it is not so secret anymore #lu sage #lu twilight #twilight is joining the party #but he's a little scared #thats okay bc he cries a little #as a treat #still wish that was me #</3 wish it was me

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johaerys-writes · 11 months

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Do you have anymore patrochilles fanfics planned?

I don't think there's any time when I don't have at least 10 patrochilles fics rotating in my brain like rotisserie chickens lmao but to answer your question:

you're a walking disaster and yet-- is the fic that is currently rotting my brain and that I'm planning to invest the most writing time in. Baby Achilles and Pat growing up in a tiny rural town and slowly realising that their (very intense and exclusive) friendship might be more than friendship has become my obsession.

I really want to return to High-Flying Birds and hopefully finish it this year, I've had major writer's block with it but I think I'm ready to start working on it again soon.

After these two, pretty much anything goes!! I have plans for a Western/Cowboy AU (wealthy rancher's son Achilles falls hopelessly in love with sexy ranchhand Patroclus who returns every season-- but who has a dark secret 😳), as well as for a cracky modern AU where Achilles and Pat work in the same firm (new employee Pat has a crush on his extremely hot yet ruthless team leader-- until he discovers that said team leader has an OF account 😳 and strips online for $$ 😳😳 so Patroclus does the obvious thing of spending all his hard earned cash on him under a false name LMAO until Achilles clocks him 😏)

But of course, I always expect to be struck by a random idea that will take me off course at any moment. And those are usually the best!

#patrochilles #jo answers #now if only my brain would let me actually sit down and write all those things LOL that would be neat 😐

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the-scarecrow-of-aus · 1 year

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#dnd #D&D #ttrpg

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bokettochild · 3 years

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Hi! I really like the fics you write, and for the requests I was thinking some Wild and Legend bonding? I’m a big angst fan, but fluff always makes me happy :)

Okay, so, this was partially inspired by this, but also this.

I'm not really sorry, this has been brewing since the last update and I finally wrote it. That and I broke my writers bloc and figured out how to write Legend again!

Suffer 🙂

Sunset Comforts

Twilight was dead.

That was the thought flashing through his mind as he called the younger heroes to order. The worry that stung in his heart as Hyrule and Four charged towards the enemy that had downed their friend with ease.

A gleaming axe had struck the wolf form of their brother mid spring, and the pained and breathless whimper of the canine mixing with the wet squelch of the blade pulling free echoed in his mind.

Legend’s stomach rolled, the need to turn to the side and be sick growing as the battle continued on around him.

He didn’t know how he took command, simply let his emotions fall to the back burner, pressing down the need to vomit along with memories of a dark sewer, a gleaming blade, a wizard's cackle and wet and wheezing breaths. He focused his gaze on the enemy and called out orders, forcing the hero’s spirit to take the reins while a young hero fell to the background, eyes wide and full of tears as sobs built up in a throat that words had not poured from in years.

Blades sang a death dirge as monsters had fallen; enemies laid low by the weapons of the heroes still standing. There were no words to the song as an eerie silence hung over the field, only the sounds of battle and the occasional cry filling air that felt thick and muddled as they fought. And when at last the final monster had fallen from Wild’s blade, and the shadow had long since faded back away from where it had come, leaving the heroes bloody and breathless, Time and Wild had sprung to the rancher’s side.

Legend stood to the side, hands gripping his blade, ignoring the blood that trailed over his clothes and skin, eyes wide as they’d watched Time firmly press Warriors’ scarf to the gaping wound in -the now hylian- Twilight’s chest.

White and red clashed beneath blackening green, and Legend’s stomach revolted again at the sight, one hand pressing to his lips as he’d been forced to turn away, the sight to much for him. Bloods stench was heavy on the air, death and destruction smelling of gaping wounds and foul flesh, and it made his stomach roll. There was no task he could complete as he stood to the side and allowed the others to fuss and heal, and the mere smell of the blood on his hands made him wince back nausea.

He was covered in the stuff, it coated his body and overwhelmed his senses, and as the other’s fussed over far more pressing matters than blood; a wound, gaping and black with shining bones exposed to the air and torn flesh and-

Legend keeled over, heaving and wheezing for breath as the contents of his stomach found a new home in the carcass of a slain bokoblin.

The camp that night was plagued by the eerie heaviness in the air that had lain over the battle-field.

Warriors leaned back against Sky’s side, hands shaking from having laid the final stitches, eyes bleary as the Skyloftian gently pressed a potion to the captain’s lips. Not far from the two, Hyrule’s glimmering hands worked over Twilight’s chest weakly, shoulders drooping and hands shaking until Four had gently pulled him away with his one good hand, the other wrapped and hung in a sling from his neck as he gently ushered the traveler towards his bed roll to sleep.

Time, to no one’s surprise, sat at Twilight’s side, the ranchers hand clasped tightly in his own as worry creased already heavy brows, a single eye dark in the fading light as a song, bitter and almost tearful rings through the air. There are no words, but Warriors’ voice, heavy and weary, joins in, and though Twilight’s body lies still and the rancher hasn’t opened his eyes, there’s a flicker of his lids as his breath evens slightly, the faintest of hums sounding wet and broken from blood-stained lips.

Legend turns his gaze away.

None of the others had seen his shameful reaction earlier, and as much as he wants to be of aid, he knows that the blood that coats the bandages wrapped around Twilight’s chest and spatters over his clothing will only made him ill again, which will be in no ways helpful.

Violet eyes drift over leaves and stone before coming to rest on the form of the Champion, curled around himself at the furthest edges of the camp, fingers digging into his arms as his eyes remain fixed on his mentor. The vet blinks in surprise as his gaze trails from Twilight’s broken form to the huddled form of the man’s protégé, hiding on the edges of the camp and making no moves to approach him.

Does Wild have trouble with the blood too?

A closer look reveals that the champion’s face is red, eyes puffy and tear tracks rolling down his face, but the gaze on the champion’s face is hard, and Legend finds himself shaking off shivers from the intensity of cornflower hues as they stare across the camp, resolute and dark.

He’s useless to the healers, and the sight of Twilight’s blood streaked across all the surfaces around camp, red and wet and warm and full of life that should be staying inside him and not bleeding out because he needs to live, he needs to live, he needs to stay alive! Link can’t live without him he can’t it’s just not possible please-

The vet forces himself to breathe, shaking his head and blinking back his own tears as he moved towards his fallen friend’s protégé. He can’t offer any help to the others, but at the very least he can knock Wild out of his own head.

Twilight would want that.

As feet pick across the camp, bare because he can’t stand the ooze that coats his boots, he wonders when he began to wonder what the rancher would want or do.

Wild’s fingers are digging into his arms, blood springing up beneath his nails as they grip tighter, and Legend has to fight the urge to flinch away at the sight. It’s shameful, his aversion. He’s a hero and he’s killed more enemies than he’s seen seasons. Yet, he still flinches back at pooling red, and the droplets that roll down the champion’s arms to drip onto the ground are enough to make his stomach lurch again.

“Quit it.” He scolds, positioning himself in the way of the kid’s line of sight, blocking off the sight of the rancher as cornflower blue flicks up towards him.

His stomach rolls again at the ethereal glare that’s cast his way, eyes too old and a soul too shattered for the young body they’re set in. Still, he’s fought a corrupted goddess, he can meet the gaze of the champion, but it’s hard, and he hates it, but he forces himself regardless. Violet and blue clash, trails of gold set in each as both boys glare at each other, both disapproving in their own way before Legend shakes his head, reaches down and pulls the champion’s hands free of his arms. “None of that now. You don’t need more scars, kid.”

Wild’s eyes blink slowly, but there’s no recognition in them, and Legend finds panic flooding through hm as he realizes that Wild may or may not even be fully aware at the moment.

Great Seven, what would Twilight do?

Wild is stiff as a board and silent as death itself as Legend kneels before him, the kid’s gaze unmoving as he glares over Legend’s head, right between his ears, to where Twilight lays in his mentor’s hold. Pain leeches into the silent cold of ethereal blue, and something inside the vet shatters, his chest burning lightly at the pain and hopelessness that crosses over the kids face for a brief second before it returns to stony coldness.

Ah.

“It’s not your fault.” He breathes, crossing his legs underneath himself as he gazes up at eyes that won’t meet his own. “Wild! You can’t blame yourself; you hear me?” His own gaze hardens as he focused on the kid. “Twilight chose to chase the Shadow. It was his choice-” Glowing blue turns to him with a ferocity that nearly steals his breath, but Legend presses forwards, golden tinging at his own irises as his voice rumbles low and firm, blessedly free of its usual squeaks and breaks. “Twilight chose to fight. I’m not saying this is his fault, but it isn’t yours either.”

The champion’s gaze is stony and silent.

“You had no way of stopping this.” Legend repeats, hand clasping the kid’s arms just below the shoulders and gaze heavy as it meets the flickering blue before him. “You were on the other side of the battlefield, your arrows would have only made things worse and you had no way, on Din’s green earth, to reach him before the shadow struck.”

Wild’s eyes flicker up to Twilight’s broken form again, but the vet catches the kids face in his hands, eyes firm and glimmering slightly in faded light of the sunset. “Do you understand?”

“I failed.” The kid croaks out, broken and stiff and every word labored as if it is a weight that holds down the kid’s tongue. Each weight falls hard and heavy on Legend’s shoulders, pain dancing through his chest at the broken soul that cracks through the stone gaze. “I couldn’t save him.”

“No one could.” Legend presses, voice catching in his throat.

“I should have.”

The words are simple, but they bear a weight that nearly fells the veteran hero right then and there, and he watches in horror as tears pool behind Wild’s eyes as they turn to gaze at the dirt at his feet.

“I’m supposed to be the Hylia forsaken Hero.” The kid curses softly. “And I can’t even save my best friend.”

“You can’t save everyone.” He murmurs in reply, his own gaze struggling to stay on the kid before him and to not follow it to the ground.

Red hair and a bubbling laugh ring in his memory alongside a booming laugh that is weakened by blood that trails from an open wound, hidden in the sewers below the castle. Hands that held his own, laughter that rang with his and voices that carried joy and wonder on tehri lips as they filled his heart and breathed life into his soul.

Both of them are gone. He couldn’t save them. He’ll never have another chance to try.

“But Twilight is still alive. He’s still breathing and...” A wet laugh stutters up in his chest, broken and wrong, but impossible to hold back. “He’s still trying to sing on key.”

Wild’s eyes freeze the breath in his throat, hard and shattered and angry as they bore into him. “Twilight is still alive because Warriors and Time saved him.” The kid hisses. “He’s alive because everyone else banded together and staved off the monsters. He’s alive because you all are heroes enough, that while I was pulling my sorry ass off the top of a wall, you were all down there protecting him!”

The kid’s voice rises and those behind them turn to stare, but Legend isn’t cowed. He’s heard many a worse speech from his own shattered soul ringing in his mind again and again over the years. The kid’s broken voice and aching soul aren’t enough to bring him to tears and reassurance.

Twilight might treat the kid with care and grace that one would a wounded child, which Wild needs. But the kid also needs the sense slapped into him, and Legend’s very good at that.

“You all protect everyone!” Tears spill down the kid’s cheeks as he glares at Legend. “All I ever can do is sit by while everyone else struggles, and I can’t even offer help!”

“Wild-”

“My whole world died while I was sleeping!” Wild’s voice breaks, blue eyes sparking with lights that aren’t natural or Hylian.

“And I killed mine!” Legend shoots back, gaze and voice both dark as he meets the kid’s stare. “You’re not the only one of us to have ever failed!”

The champion blinks at him in shock, and Legend takes the moment to catch his breath, eyes blinking open again to meet the kid’s. “I destroyed a whole world. People, places, families and homes. Just blotted them out of existence.” His voice is firm but tears prick at his eyes as he glares down the taller hero. “You aren’t the only one who messed up.

“What matters though, is that when you were given a second chance, you took it. You stood to your feet, after being killed in battle you came back. And you walked right up to Ganon and drop-kicked his ass back into whatever hell it came from.” Violet and gold swirl in the vet’s gaze as it bores into Wild’s, the kid’s expression fading just left of wonder as he stares back. “You are still living your second chance. You are going to make new mistakes. You are going to get hurt. Other people are going to get hurt. What matters is that you don’t spend all your time crying over what you aren’t, and instead use it to become what you can be.”

The vet’s gaze softens. “You’re a good kid, Wild. And a great hero. Don’t ruin that by worrying about the past. You don’t live there, so you don’t belong there. Get your ass in gear and start worrying about the now.”

Wild opens his mouth to protest but is cut off by Legend. “And I don’t mean fussing about a battle that’s already lost. I mean by getting over there and hugging the stuffing out of your grand-mentor or whatever the shit Time is to you, because the guy is on the verge of tears and none of the rest of us can help.” The vet cracks a weak and strained smile. “Twilight’s strong. He’ll pull through. Don’t make me have to explain that you’re depressed because you can’t accept what he sees in you.”

He’s not fast enough to pull away before Wild’s arms are wrapping around him in a tearful hug, sniffles and sobs escaping the kid as he whispers thanks into Legend’s blood matted hair, and Legend can’t even bring himself to pull away. Instead, he gently rubs the kids back, grumbling back fondly until Wild pulls away, rubbing at his eyes and nose he offers Legend a wobbly smile, before standing and making his way back into the center of the camp.

Time’s face when Wild comes over and wraps his arms around the man is priceless, the tune on his lips fading out as the man folds Wild into his arms with a quiet sob, and Legend fights back a twitch of his lips as the two hold tight to each other.

Night falls as the others fade off into sleep.

Legend had finally pulled himself back into the camp once the lights had dimmed enough that the blood across their faces and clothes could be mistaken for dirt and shadow, and while the others cling to each other in their sleep, his eyes are fixed on the rancher.

Twilight’s breaths are sharp and strained, chest stuttering and stopping agonizingly often as the night continues on. Each time it stutters, Legend has to hold his hand above the rancher’s mouth and nose, waiting for warm air to caress his palm. Each time it comes late, panic blossoms inside of him, and Legend has to hold his own breath as he waits for it to eventually puff out again.

Time sleeps not far off, Wild’s curled in his arms where the two had dozed off after their nerve-wracking evening, and Sky is settled not far from them, Hyrule pressed to one side and Wind to the other, and Four lying across the lot of them while they sleep.

Warriors sits at the edge of the camp, hands working over the blades of his brothers, cleaning away blood and dirt and sweat with practiced movements as his gaze flickers from the forest to the fallen hero, concern in the royal blue gaze as it turns every so often to Legend.

He knows the captain wants to tell him to sleep, wants to tell him to rest, but seeing as the man himself doesn’t seem able to do it either, neither presses the other to sleep. Grim understanding flashes across the camp when their eyes chance to meet, and Warrior’s turns his attention back to Legend’s sword where it lays across his lap, hands working over it while its owner sits beside Twilight.

He doesn’t know when he’s taken Twilight’s hand in his own. Doesn’t know when his fingers start trailing over worn scars and calluses, taking comfort in the warmth that they find there as he holds it close to his chest, breaths deep and stuttering as his eyes flicker over Twilight’s pale face.

“You better be okay.” He whispers, voice breaking slightly as tear prick at his eyes. “I told the kid you will be, but it you make that a lie I’ll-” A sob breaks the silence, one that Warrior’s politely ignores as Legend drops his gaze, clinging to the still hand. “You’ve got to make it through this, Twi. Please! Please!”

Scarred and calloused fingers twitch softly, clasping Legend’s own weakly as another sob shatters the silence.

#linked universe #linkeduniverse #fluffics #lu wild #lu twilight #lu legend #lu time #lu warriors #hurt/comfort #i'm not sorry #linked universe fic requests #angst #wild angst #legend angst

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lildevyl · 3 years

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Pick Me Up Playlist

@jellymadebutler I know you said you’re not feeling your best so here’s a “Pick Me up Playlist” for ya or for anyone needs it!

(Markiplier)

Try Not To Laugh Challenge: This is actually backwards! It goes from 23-1 but it’s still a nice Playlist to watch!

Markiplier Makes: This is the whole Playlist of the infamous Markiplier Makes Videos! It’s really funny!

Among Us: Among Us is a new game that’s out there on Steam. You’re either a Crewmate going trying to do tasks to keep the ship going until you reach your destination or the you’re the Imposter! What happens when you get a bunch of YouTubers together for a classic Whodunnit? Chaos and hilarity in sue!

Minecraft: I’m not big into Minecraft but it is very funny seeing Mark and Sean play this and see what they come up with!

I Am Bread: This is a rage game just letting you know ahead of time! But it is funny seeing Mark rage out of the game! But like I said this is a rage game so there is some yelling/screaming in it!

Getting Over It: This another rage game! It is quite funny but like I said it is a Rage Game so there is screaming and yelling involved!

Pogo Stuck: This is a somewhat kind of rage game! It first starts out with Bob, Wade, and Mark playing it. But then Mark starts playing it by himself and yes there is some yelling and screaming in the videos so fair warning!

Uno: This is quite a hilarious game series! It’s Mark and his friends playing the online game of Uno!

Monopoly: This a goo game series and is quite hilarious! It’s Mark, Bob and Wade and there is one where Lixian joins! It really funny and think you might enjoy it!

(JackSepticeye)

Undertale: The best way to start you off with JackSepticeye is one of his most famous series of all time, Undertale! Undertale is about a human that falls in the Monster World and go about it learning the Monster World while trying to get home! It’s a text based game and Jack does the voices for the characters!

Deltarune: The Sequel to Undertale! Or that’s what everyone seems to be calling it! I haven’t had the chance to watch the series but I’ve heard it’s really good!

Slime Rancher: Literally you are a Rancher raising all kinds of different slimes! It’s really cute and funny!

Cuphead: This is a very old school cartoon like style game. There is some violence in it but it’s mild and no more then what actual cartoons, like Tom and Jerry and the Animatics.

Bendy and the Inc Machine: This is a horror game but it’s not the scary! There are some jump scares but it’s more like FNAF kind of jump scare. So, it will be scare ya but not that much. It’s like a cartoon horror game. Again some violence in the game but it’s mild. This also kinda of spawn the idea of the JSE Fan Made Ego Shawn Flynn! Jack has a cameo in the game!

Animal Crossing: Nice little story driven game that Jack plays on his switch. It’s very cute and it’s a nice little game to series to watch!

Spiderman: Jack finally gets to play as his all time favorite Super Hero from his childhood! Spiderman!

Spiderman Miles Morales: The next gen starts now! With the new Spiderman! This game is based of the movie Spiderman into the Spider verse and I can’t wait to watch it and watch this series of Jack’s!

Spyro 3: Remake: This is a cute series of the game Spyro 3 redone for the PS3! It’s super cute and a lot of fun! I think you might enjoy this one!

Minecraft: Like I said, I’m not into Minecraft but this is a nice and cute series that Jack has! Filled with a lot of Adventure and some scary events!

Meme Time!: A cute series that Jack started where he goes on his Subreddit and looks at some of our Memes that we did!

Luigi’s Mason 3: I can’t make a playlist for someone to watch and not include this! This is so cute and wholesome! It’s all from Luigi’s point of view and how he’s going to try and stop the Ghost King and save his brother and friends!

Among Us: I have to include Jack’s! This is so funny with Jack and his friends! I think you might enjoy this!

(CrankGamePlays)

Pokémon: I haven’t watched this series yet, but I’ve heard great things about it!

Papers Please: This is very hilarious! I’ve seen a couple of episodes and I think you might like it!

Animal Crossing: I did enjoy watching Ethan play this! It’s really funny and wholesome and I think you might enjoy it!

Slime Rancher: I have to include this! I watched this when I was feeling a little down during Quarantine. It’s really funny!

(DolphinTreasureArt)

This a YouTuber that I found when I went browsing for Markiplier and JackSepticeye fan-made games! DolphinTreasureArt plays fan-made games and indie games on her channel. Along with some Cosplays and Artwork that she has done. Some of her Fanart has gotten in a couple of fan games!

Septiscape: First off, this series is near and dear to my heart! This is the first ever series that watched back in 2k18 when I first found Erin’s Channel! This helped me get over my writers block and led to me to writing my first fanfic that I wrote in over a year! This one is an older version but I still love it!

Jack finds himself trapped in his own mind, the Mindscape and is trying to find his way home! Along the way he finds out the Egos that he created are more then just Egos! But at the same time, some sort of Corruption and happening with Jack’s mind and many of the Ego’s Worlds is collapsing!

Septiscape: Livestream #HopeFromHome: This is the livestream of the updated version of the game! It’s about 8 hours long but you can skip some parts, especially since some of the fights can be a bit repetive but I wanted to include this one!

Soulscape: I can’t put in Septiscape and not give you the sequel as well! This is the well awaited sequel to Septiscape! After the adventures of the first game, the Egos go and try to enjoy a nice little R&R only for someone to stalking Anti and trying to take his soul pieces back! Join Anti and the Egos as they try to figure out what it going on and help save Anti before it’s too late! And there is really cool plot twist!

Hearts and Heroes: This is another one that is near and dear to my heart! I will also link Mark’s playthrough as well! Hearts and Heroes and about you the fans of Markiplier and the journey that the fans go through trying to help save people from the Monsters the haunt their dreams and to help save Mark from his worst Nightmare. Markiplier’s Playthrough here.

Septiclands: A JackSepticeye Fan Game: This is very funny series that DolphinTreasureArt has done! It’s silly and goofy and it has a very weird plot but it’s absolutely one of my favorites! It’s also on her longest series as well!

The Boss: A JackSepticeye Fan Game: Just like Heats and Heroes is near and dear to me heart so is this game! I’ll leave a link to Jack’s Playthrough as well! This is near and dear to my heart b/c it’s the first JackSepticeye Fan Game that I came across. It was on Jack’s Channel that first saw it and then I watched Erin’s. This is nice little RPG Game, but it’s about Jack being sucked into his computer and has to try and find his way home! On the way he finds out that there is two subscribers that lost in his computer and there is a major twist at the end!

The Boss Is Nothing: His Side of the Story: I don’t want to give away what happens in the Boss! So, this the other side of the story of The Boss! In the Boss, Jack comes across someone he never thought he would, so now we’re getting his side of the story and why did what he did to Jack!

Glitch in the System: Chapter 1: This is a very special game! It’s the sequel to The Boss! The developers over at Sarcastic Pasta Games is working hard to get chapter two out! Chapter one is really good and you get see Erin do some Cosplay along with some voice acting for the characters/Egos!

Septic Storm: This is a cute little fan game that’s a bit old, but it’s a very cute RPG Game! Join, Jack, Mark and Felix as they battle Billy to end this battle once and for all! Only to find out that Billy isn’t the one that truly is behind this, but someone else entirely!

CrankGamePlays Fan Game: The Crank Chronicles: This is a RPG Fan Game of one Ethan Nester CrankGamePlays! Ethan has find himself in a distant land thanks to the help of a powerful Sorceress! But an evil threatens the land! With help of his two best friends Mark and Tyler, Ethan goes on a quest to help save this land and find his way home! I don’t if the developer ever did the sequel to the this game or not but it’s not a bad game!

#markiplier #jacksepticeye #crankgameplays #dolphintreasureart #jellymadebutter #here's a nice list of playthroughs for ya!#i hope you feel better #and my inbox is always open if you need and/or want talk!

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agent-yolk-writes · 3 years

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Year in Writing - 2020

Well...I really don’t know where to start. One year ago today I was pretty optimistic that I’d get a lot more done and even get at least one person on my Patreon, but (gestures to 2020 in general) shit happens I guess.

Somehow in this messy year I graduated college and managed to get a PT job while the world. In between all that, I somehow had the time and energy to write. So, like last time, here’s a summary of what I can remember writing in 2020 as the final hours dwindle down to zero.

Okay, where to begin?

I guess we can go with zines since that can be dealt and done with. I moderated a lot this year, and will probably do some more modding next year once the pre-order period for the ones I’m currently on have passed. I contributed less than I mod since I’m guaranteed to be rejected every time. It sucks that there’s hardly any zines that even include writing in the first place. The perks of being a mod that, if writing is available, you can bypass the application process. That’s what happened with the Slime Rancher OC Zine and my piece Trials of a Rookie Rancher which features my OC from Summer Essay, Riida. It was a financial flop, but atleast it was a charity zine anyways.

I’ve applied to another charity zine about Pokemon called Helping Hand, which I forgot to apply as a mod to. I got accepted as a pinch hitter and, surprisingly, I was called to action as someone had to drop. As of writing this, it’s still in the production phase so I can’t tell you much. I meant to post a preview of it, but the formatting of which the mods wanted the writers to post scares me. I’ll probably post it on ao3 when I get the go ahead.

I only updated Friends Like You and Us with only one chapter back in May, but lately I’ve made excellent progress on the next chapter since action and fighting isn’t really my forte and yet here I am, getting sucked into fandoms that are action-oriented. I think watching ITSV again before it got pulled from Netflix helped.

Of course, it can’t be a year unless I write an FGO fic. In fact, I somehow managed to write two! Part one of a two-shot, and a crossover one-shot! The two-shot is Night SURFING which is a continuation/sequel of my Asterios fic called Ebb and Flow of the Sea back in 2018. I have to give a special shoutout to my friend Pallan Minerva, author of Saga of Shirou’s Summons and irl friend, who enabled me to write more cute shit for the minotaur. The only reason why it’s not completed yet is, surprise surprise, the second part has an action/fight scene and as you probably know by now, I’m not very good at writing those. Especially since it involves two huge monsters...which is ironic considering I’m a big fan of tokusatsu.It’ll figure itself out one day.

The other FGO fic is Udon for the Drifting Warrior, which is a crossover fic with Isekai Shokudou or Restaurant in Another World. It came to me during one of those days during the pandemic where I couldn’t sleep because I couldn’t go outside and do shit. In a sleep deprived haze, I decided to pick up Shokudou again, got hungry in the process, and thought “This would be the perfect setting for Musashi.”. Few months prior, I told Pallan that I wanted to do something with Musashi since she’s my waifu and he suggested an udon date. Well, I got the udon part down at least. I haven’t finished the anime yet, but I have bought the first book of the light novel. I’m hoping to at least do a Shokudou crossover with Dorohedoro but other than that? Who knows.

And finally, I have fallen in and out of fandoms throughout 2020...and there’s one that I’ve fallen hard for. It’s Obey Me, the latest addition to the Shall We Date? otome mobile game franchise. I think I tried another SWD game years ago but never got into it because reasons. But Obey Me definitely hits all my buttons...which is just hot demon guys plus the obligatory human and angel. I wrote A Sleep-In Demonstration for funsies when I was planning out like at least two longer-form stories. Satan and Belphie aren’t my top faves if you would believe it. It’s Lucifer and Diavolo bc of course it would be

That...seems to be it on my end. While my quantity is less than desirable, I can only hope I improved in quality. My job can be pretty draining, and I know I don’t want to do it long term, so I hope juggling to find a better opportunity alongside writing fics will be easy for me in 2021.

I hope I can update Summer Essay too in the new year. I’ve done tremendous progress for the latest chapter and I would like to think it’s almost done. The mental block that’s preventing me from finishing this fic already is going to catch these hands when I find it. I hope I can gush about it in next year’s YiW as well.

And that’s it for real. Thank you so much for reading this. If you’ve been sticking around for some time, I thank you for your patience and support. We may not talk, and only one person drops something in my inbox once in a blue moon. It gets very lonely on this blog, but I know you people are out there. Knowing that you’re reading my fic as well as liking and reblogging it so other people can see it works just fine. Thank you, and I hope the new year treats you kindly.

See you in 2021!

#agent yolk talks #my writing #man i wrote a lot for this despite not writing a lot of fics this year

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mrgrant9559-blog · 5 years

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Safe Keeping: Prologue

A/N: Ayo, whats gucci? Yup, I’m back with a brand new fic! This one is Tony paired, which is a character I honestly thought I’d never write for, and yet here we are! Funny how things work, huh. I should include that Reader can fly and shoot basically energy blasts from his hands. So, pretty much Captain Marvel but not really Captain Marvel, ya know. Anyways, I’m hoping to be better with this fic than I am with Witch Way Is Right, as far as continuity goes. Btw, WWIR is still continuing!! It’s just I’ve been told by mutiple fic writers that in order to get rid of writer’s block, I should write something else. Hope you guys enjoy this one!!

Subject: Tony Stark x Male!Reader

Prompt: @trampledcactusboy - I am humbly requesting a something parter Tony one shot when you have the time too :) (like 2,3,4 however many parts you choose) I hope it can be in civil war time period so Tony's in that kind of mindset/feel and maybe reader can be a shield agent or hero who helped cap & friends escape but really agrees with Tony so he gets protective over him? if not you do you cuz you can never go wrong <3

Tags: @avengersohyeah @uselessace @writeyouin @trampledcactusboy @thegreatficmaster

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You’d been with the Avengers for as long as you could remember. You’ve shared laughs, drinks, food, and a couple of moments along the way. So, you couldn’t believe your eyes when you realized what had become of you guys at this point. If someone would’ve told you 3 years ago that your team, THE Avengers, would split into two disagreeing sections over a stupid Sokovian accord, you would’ve taken a shit on their shoes and laughed in their face.

But now, it was almost like you were living a nightmare. No scratch that, you WERE living a nightmare. The same extraordinary people who you could call your brothers and sisters, were literally at each other’s throats.

You see Steve fighting a man dressed in red and blue spandex. And it looks like Steve is losing? You fly at Steve and swoop him up to the roof of the airport building and drop him off, landing in front of him to give the star spangled jolly rancher an ear full.

“What the hell are guys doing?!” You ask angrily.

“It’s long story, Y/N. And I really don’t have time for this.” He replies.

“We’re supposed to be a team, Steve. Almost like family.” I add. “So, imagine how I feel when I’m informed by SHIELD agents that not only are you and half of this so called family commiting treason, but you’re also protecting the man who killed King T’Chaka in cold blood!”

“I know it sounds crazy, but you’ve gotta believe me, kid. Buck is innocent. He’s being framed.”

“He tried to kill you and Fury just a year ago! If he’s willing to kill his best friend, brother in arms, then how am I supposed to believe that he wouldn’t to do the same to the now former king of Wakanda” I interject.

“That wasn’t him! You know as well as I do that he was under HYDRA’s control for years! He’s been trying to escape his past ever since and he’s been doing a great job so far!”

“Listen, I know Bucky is an innocent man, but what if the Winter Soldier comes out again. He’s a threat to others and himself!” I argue.

Steve sighs, realizing that what you’re saying is sorta true. “What if I can prove to you that Bucky didn’t kill anyone including the Wakanda’s king and that he’s innocent?”

“I don’t know Bucky well, but I do know he’s NOT innocent.” I say causing him to look down at his feet in disappointment. “However, if you have proof that he didn’t kill the king, then I’ll be willing to give him a second chance.” Steve looks up at me with a smile and nods in agreement. “Ok then, what do you need me to do?”

“Can you help us get to the quinjet? Take care of whoever gets in our way without causing permanent damage?” He asks.

“I can try.” You say before flying into the battle zone, making sure Steve and Bucky had a clear opening to the quinjet. You had to admit, these new people that Tony found were tough as nails. Definitely wasn’t their first time in a fight, but luckily, you were no rookie youself.

————————————

“Rhodes!!” You hear Tony yell in his suit while flying over to Rhodey’s aid. Rhodey was shot down by Vision, who was aiming for Sam. You tried to fly as fast as you could to catch him, following Tony and Sam in suit, but he had already hit the ground.

The sound. The sound his body had made when it made impact was haunting to say the least. Tony landed down next to Rhodey’s side and took off his helmet to examine the damage. He was unconscious with a bloody nose, which usually means that the person is either dead or damn near. Tony tells FRIDAY to read his vital organs. Thankfully, she replies by saying that there’s a heartbeat and that EMT are on their way.

Finally, Sam swoops in. “I’m sorry”, is all he could really say at the moment, even though he wasn’t entirely at fault. Tony didn’t care though as he raised his hand at Sam and blasted him, knocking him unconscious as well.

“Tony, you didn’t have to do that! It wasn’t his fault!” You say.

He moves his arm in you direction, his repulsors ready to fire. “Shut the hell up, Y/L/N! You’re just as in the wrong as him! I saw you helping Steve and Bucky back there. You’re supposed to be on MY side. You’re supposed to be MY friend!” He yells at you in anger, feeling betrayed and mostly hurt.

Your eyelids start to build up tears, as you find pain in what you’re about to say next. “Last I checked, we’re ALL supposed to be friends.” The look on Tony’s face tells you he was taken back by your words. “Look around you, Tones. Look at what’s become of us. We’re supposed to fight the enemy, not each other, and you know Bucky had nothing to do with the death of King T’Chaka.” Tony starts to lower his arm, which has now powered down.

Realization washes over him as he sees medics take Rhodey away on a stretcher in critical condition and the rest of Cap’s team get detained. The Wakandan Prince disappeared probably gone off to find Steve and Bucky. Tony knows Bucky couldn’t of been the one doing all these terrible things, at least not on purpose.

You and Tony finally arrive at a high max security prison in the middle of the ocean, where they were keeping the rest of Cap’s team for God knows how long. Tony walks over to each cell to talk to them about what they’ve done and how foolish they were being. Clint mostly, who retorted with his own words going back and forth with him. Tony then sees a new guy and wonders who he even is which punt a dent in the poor guy’s ego. He then walks over to Sam and asks if he’s been fed at all.

Sam just replies with snark, “Oh, so you’re good cop now?”

Regardless of what happened, Tony still cares for everyone and wants to make sure they’re at least being treated right. “I’m just the guy who need to know where Steve went.” He replies.

Sam tell hims that the only way he’s gonna get info outta him is if he goes full benny hanna on his ass. Tony starts messing with his watch, shutting off all coms in the prison system.

Tony tells Sam this, and he reveals to him everything he knows about where they could’ve gone. Tony rushes out of the cell block, with you following in suit. “Did you find out where they went?” You ask, following him to his private helicopter.

“Yup.”

“Great, I’m coming with you...”

“No, you’re not.” Tony retorts, spinning on his heel to face you.

“But I-“

“No, you don’t.” He interjects before you can finish your sentence. “What I need you to do is to stay here with the general and make sure he doesn’t send any of his people to follow me. I already told him I’m going back to the compound, but he might still suspect something.”

“Just, make sure you come back as friends. Last thing I wanna see is The Avengers break up over some dumbass accords.”

“I promise, we’ll all being sitting in front of a campfire singing Kum Ba Yah, and eating s’mores.” And with that, he enters the helicopter, on his way to help Cap and Buck find Zemo, so we could all be a team again.

Or at least thats how I hoped this day would end.

________________________

I’m so sorry for taking so long people! I’m a busy guy, but I knew I needed to out something out for you guys so here it is. This was pretty much my way of adding Reader into the movie without changing much. Also, I’m thinking of upload my fics to Wattspad. Should I do that?? I don’t know, but I hope you guys like this new fic!

#marvel #x male!reader #avengers #avengers x male!reader #peter parker #male!reader #marvel x male!reader #tony stark #bucky barnes #steve rogers #male reader inserts #iron man #Tony Stark x Male!Reader #civil war #Captain America Civil War #cacw

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amaritage · 5 years

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Those Who Wander (Repost)

Theme - Equals: I want to stand beside you, not behind you. Rating - G Warnings - None :D Notes - Reader’s gender is not defined as this story is designed to be applied to anyone.

The first thing someone usually said about you was that you knew how to handle yourself. Which was entirely true as you were the type of person who had wanted to not only to be able to protect yourself but also those too weak to fight for themselves. Due to this normally when you found yourself in some sort of trouble or had sought out the trouble yourself, you where left to deal with it on your own. You had, by now, become used to this and now found yourself in a strange and even interesting situation.

You had been riding your horse through the plains of Hyrule with no real destination in mind when a group of Moblins had rushed out of a small grove of trees straight at you. A single Moblin was annoying a group of them could get tedious and even dangerous under the right circumstances. They caused your horse to rear up in surprise and you jumped out of the saddle to deal with them before they could surround you. You were up to your elbows in Moblins when you heard the sound of a galloping horse.

Since you figured whoever it was would just take advantage of you distracting the Moblins to ride pass you ignored it. That is until the horse ran past you and the blond haired young man riding it took a swipe at one of the Moblins as he rode past. You could not help but stare in surprise as he reigned his horse and jumped out of the saddle fully intending to help you. You continued to stare at him until a Moblin tried to detach your head from your shoulders with the rusty blade it was carrying.

With a yell, you refocused on the ensuing battle and blocked the Moblins attack with your short sword while you dispatched it with your other sword. With the help of the stranger, the two of you were able to make quick work of the Moblins a task that would have taken three times as long on your own. As you cleaned your weapons, something that was like second nature to you now, you glanced around to make sure they were no more. Then you turned your focus on your new ally a smile on your face. “Thank you for the help!”

The young man seemed a bit more surprised then you had been by his sudden appearance probably because he had not realized that you could actually hold your own. Most people found out and about on the plains where traveling merchants, farmers, ranchers, the rare sheep herder, or people just trying to get from point A to B. While some of them could at least defend themselves, very few of them could stand against a group of Moblins. Still, as far as you were concerned, his help was more than welcome as he not only saved you time but helped keep you from being injured. Like you, he was wearing light armor though he seemed to favor a sword and shield as his weapons.

He recovered from his surprise quickly enough and returned your smile with one of his own that seemed so natural for him. “I am glad that I was able to help,” he told you and you nodded. Then he glanced at your horse, who had not wandered far once it realized the Moblins were ignoring it, which was as sturdy as the one he rode. Yet you noticed that while yours was burdened with various travel gear his was not. He then turned his attention back to you and asked, “Where are you headed, if you do not mind me asking?” He was not trying to be rude you noticed he was just genuinely curious.

You walked over to your horse to retrieve its reigns. “I do not mind you asking. Honestly, I do not know where I am going yet,” you answered him truthfully. You had nothing to hide. When you turned to him you noticed that his smile had been replaced with a troubled expression. “Why?” you asked him as you pet your horse on its nose. “Is something wrong?”

“Ah,” he started as he seemed to become a bit nervous as if he was unsure of what to say, “It's just that things have become… Dangerous.” To you it seemed dangerous was not quite the word he wanted to say yet he must not have had a better explanation for what he meant.

You blinked and had to wonder just what he had wanted to say and what he meant by dangerous. Hyrule had never been a safe country to travel through. One could be attacked by Moblins at any time and traveling by night could be downright deadly. Yet, now that you thought about it, you realized that the number of Moblins recently had increased. It was also rare for them to have rushed you like they had when you had not stepped foot into their territory. Also, the number of people you had seen traveling had decreased lately, but until now you really had not been paying all that much attention to it. What else could you have missed?

“Is there someplace in particular that I should perhaps avoid?” you asked him as you watched him retrieve his horse’s reigns as she had begun to wander off to graze. He leads her back over to you while he clearly thought over your question carefully. It seemed to you he was becoming a bit more guarded and if you had to guess it was not a natural thing for him to do. He seemed more of the type to be open and forthcoming. As you waited for his answer you continued to pet your horse’s nose.

“It would be best to avoid Castle Town,” he finally said after a few moments of silence as he looks downward. You could not help it when your eyes widened a bit. Castle Town was obviously the very heart of Hyrule with its vasts markets and various services it offered. It was commonplace for most travelers to stop at the city to take advantage of what it had to offer. Not one for crowds or narrow streets you actually preferred the much quieter and more open Kakariko Village where the villagers were friendlier to travelers than most in the city. You would have no qualms following his advice.

“Alright then,” you told him and he lifted his head to look at you. “I will make sure to avoid Castle Town if I happen to find myself in the area,” you said much to his immense relief. For someone, you had just met he seemed to be overly concerned for your safety. It was clear that he had a big heart if nothing else.

“Good,” he said as his smile made a reappearance. He then glanced around the field. “I am sorry to leave so soon but I have to go now,” he stated as he climbed up into the mare’s saddle.

“Wait!” you called before he could urge the mare onward and he looked at you. “What is your name?”

“Link and yours?”

“I’m _____.”

“It was nice to meet you, _____,” he told you a bright smile on his face. Then he urged his mare into a full gallop continuing in the direction he must have been going before he had come to your aid. You watched him go until you could no longer see him than continued on your way as well. Maybe if you were lucky you would run into him again sometime on your travels.

A/N - I really enjoy reading Reader x Character stories practically ones that feature Link as he is the type of character that can be written so many different ways depending on how the writer pictures him. However, most of the stories I have read always have him playing the Hero while the Reader is protected by him. I wanted a story where the Reader could stand by Link’s side and not be a burden for him (If anyone knows a story like this feel free to let me know!). So I wrote one XP. There will probably be more to this later, but for now, this is it.

#loz #loz link #Link x Reader #fan fiction #short story #writing #author: Nicole Cluver

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taylornye · 4 years

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Set in Stone Courthouse proof of county's grit

When one thinks of Hopkins County, the mind no doubt jumps to the Hopkins County courthouse. Completed in pink granite and red sandstone, the five-story Romanesque revival structure by James Reily Gordon towers over the surrounding landscape. On Aug. 22, the historical landmark will celebrate its 125th anniversary of completion as a proud testament to the enduring spirit of its county folk.

EARLY YEARS

The Hopkins County courthouse is actually the fourth such county courthouse to stand in Hopkins, according to historical documentation. The Tarrant townsite, founded in 1846, was the first county seat due to its rich soils from silt runoff. The early white settlers didn’t have much money to erect permanent buildings, so it took five years to raise enough money to build a courthouse, and they had to sell off cattle to add to the courthouse fund.

The first Tarrant courthouse was a single-story clapboard building. The town later built a brick replacement with two stories and a chimney at each end, which was a “great source of pride,” according to Hopkins County historian Jeff Campbell. The courthouse also had its own well and a picket fence, and housed all court proceedings and county business. However, starting in 1868 the county was placed under military rule, as refusal to free slaves, violence against free blacks and guerrilla opposition to the reconstruction era meant the Union sent an army detachment to the county’s larger city, Sulphur Springs.

For a brief period of time, county business was hosted out of a hotel in downtown Sulphur Springs, although historians cannot determine which of the city’s two hotels housed Union soldiers.

On Sept. 29, 1868, plans for a stockade to house the Union soldiers were commissioned. Constructed of a split log fence, they rented a lot. It is now marked across from Sulphur Springs City Hall’s back parking lot and bounded Atkins, Mulberry, North Davis and Connally streets. This is where Hopkins County held its court functions until July 1, 1870.

Following tensions between Union soldiers and county slave owners in 1868, and a fire set to a hotel at which the soldiers were staying, Union soldiers packed up and left in 1870, to the “absolute fury,” of Tarrant citizens, according to Hopkins County historian June Tuck. Records were then moved from the Tarrant courthouse to Sulphur Springs. In 1871, an official act of the 12th legislative session of the State of Texas appointed Sulphur Springs the county seat of Hopkins County. Not long after, the sheriff ordered the abandoned Tarrant courthouse up for sale, and it was dismantled board by board and brick by brick.

After being without a courthouse during the Union occupation, the citizens of Hopkins County were determined to have a functional legal system and a county government building to call home. A two-story wooden courthouse sat adjacent to the current courthouse building, where the pergola of the Hopkins County Veterans Memorial now provides onlookers with shade.

The first Sulphur Springs courthouse did not stand for long before a fire ravaged the building Feb. 11, 1894. The building was a total loss, with nothing left but the steel vault doors that guarded the county clerk’s office.

“They had a fire lit under them—quite literally,” said former county commissioner Pct. I turned FEMA grant writer Beth Wiesenbaker.

FROM THE ASHES

In April 1894 the commissioners court passed a resolution providing for the construction of a new courthouse for a price tag of $53,000. Calculating for inflation, that cost would now be approximately $1.7 million. The now-famous landmark took shape over the course of the next 16 months, although the cost rose to approximately $75,000, or $2.2 million in today’s dollars.

“You just can’t believe how quickly they did it,” Wiesenbaker said. “It took us 33 months to refurbish it and $5 million. We weren’t even building it from the ground up.”

The funds for the courthouse came from the early use of what we now call bond elections, and many East and Central Texas locations were locked in an arms race to build bigger and more beautiful courthouses, Wiesenbaker said. James Riely Gordon was a popular architect throughout Texas for his courthouse designs and had provided plans for Ellis County in Waxahachie, McLennan County in Waco, San Antonio in Bexar and as close as Canton in Van Zandt County. Yet Hopkins County, with the spirit of exceptionalism that has pervaded the collective mindset, asked Gordon to vary his stock design.

A hallmark of the Romanesque revival architecture is its cross-shape building. Found across the cathedrals of Europe built in the 6th to 11th centuries, the symmetry pays homage to Christ on the cross while providing thoroughfares for which cross-breezes can easily move. To further help with temperature retention, the building materials are often stone, and the walls are of massive thickness. They also feature arcades, which are arches supported on rows of columns. Columns can have Corinthian or Baroque relief. The tower is one of the most important features of Romanesque revival architecture, and ornate facades are also featured prominently.

“These grand courthouses made a statement about a commitment to the law,” said Gordon biographer Chris Meister. “This sense of permanence for an established community that valued the rule of law attracted immigrants to Texas.”

By bringing in the Romanesque style, it gave communities a sense that the courthouses “had been there forever,” Meister noted.

The Hopkins County courthouse showcases all these aspects typical of the Romanesque revival architectural style, but with a few unique additions. Although the typical structure of the building is oriented East-West or North-South, the Hopkins County Courthouse is turned on an angle, and its entrances are from an angle, rather than on the four corners of the building. According to Wiesenbaker, this is because the land donated for its construction was small and located at the corner of the square rather than its center. A typical city square has its courthouse dead center. But again, Hopkins County is rare.

“It does make it confusing for first time visitors which door they should enter,” Hopkins County Judge Robert Newsom joked.

The center of the courthouse also features not one, but two “double helix” staircases that stretch from the basement to the tower. The dizzying focal point, ordered from a Sears-Roebuck catalogue, is now where the county keeps a three-story Christmas tree during the holiday season. No other courthouse in Texas features more than one central staircase, Wiesenbaker said.

The tower is an interesting departure not only from Romanesque architecture, but also from most other municipal structures. For one thing, as a clock tower, it contains no clock. This was by design, according to Newsom.

“They [county commissioners] voted not to have a clock, because if you got up with the sunrise and went to bed when it was dark, then you were doing all right,” Newsom said.

Newsom joked it was “pretty good advice, even to this day.”

However, Hopkins County historian and mayor John Sellers heard a different story.

“The old story was that the people in the rural areas said that the people in the city would just sit and watch the clock all day,” Sellers told the News-Telegram in 2019.

With the plans settled, the over 200-pound blocks were shipped in from elsewhere in Texas. The pink granite came from Burnett, and the red sandstone came from Pecos. Each block was carefully carved into shape where it was mined and inscribed on the back with an identifying number. After making the trip to Hopkins County, it was hoisted into place by a winch system and a Hopkins County hero named Pete the donkey, according to lore. The local builders knew where to assemble the blocks by their numbers, Wiesenbaker said.

“They literally built the courthouse by the number,” she marveled.

By Aug. 22, 1895, the new courthouse was ready to open for official business and accept all visitors.

GRAND DAYS & DISREPAIR

The Hopkins County courthouse was the center of life for local residents throughout the 20th century. Ranchers and cattlemen gathered in the commissioners court to hear county business, and the floors were concrete just as they are now, given that country folk often track in mud on their boots. For the tobacco chewers there was a spittoon placed conveniently in most every room, as documents for furniture orders illuminated that more than 130 spit vessels adorned the courthouse. The courtroom on the second floor hosted a wide variety of jury trials, speaking events and lecture series.

“It was the place you wanted to be to know what was going on in your community,” Wiesenbaker said. “There was no television!”

According to Newsom, the lower-level seating of the second floor courtroom was not segregated. Any man, white black or Hispanic could occupy the bench floor seating for a trial or lecture. It was rather women who were relegated to the balcony step seats.

“It was just like the sale barn seating up there,” Newsom said. “Of course, back in those days the ladies had the large bustles so they had to have room big enough to spread out.”

The courthouse also lacked other markers of segregation, according to those who restored it. There was no signage for segregated drinking fountains, only signage asking patrons not to spit in the apparatus.

A main feature of the criminal justice system was the jail building and Sheriff ’s quarters attached to the courthouse. In fact, a rickety catwalk was still present to the second floor courtroom when Newsom began to serve as a jailer during the early 1980s.

"We used to bring prisoners all the way across from the jail, and that was nearly 40 years ago,” Newsom remembered.

In fact, Newsom said, those looking from the outside can still see the small door they used, suspended in midair, its threshold a slightly different pink granite than the surrounding stone.

The Sheriff lived at the courthouse until 1949, former Hopkins County constable Roger “Tex” Maynard told the News-Telegram. W.E. “Bud” Melton held the prisoners at the Sheriff ’s office while his wife cooked their meals, according to 1942 editions of the News-Telegram. Today, Hopkins County’s incarcerated eat much differently, as they grow and prepare much of their own food at the Trustie farm.

Tex was the last law enforcement officer to take residence at the court, where he stayed over the fall of 1965 as a new recruit to the Department of Public Safety as a highway patrol trooper in order to save his money to move his family up from Howe and give them a good Christmas. He bunked on a cot in the drafty third floor jury room, which now sometimes hosts budget work sessions or fire chiefs meetings.

Although the courthouse was a beloved part of Hopkins County life, wear and tear began to show. As vehicles became the primary mode of transportation, the city removed the watering trough it kept in the square for horses. For some reason, this led the basement of the courthouse to flood every time it rained, Newsom remembered.

As the basement flooding got worse, the county would attempt quick fixes, Newsom said. As the Sheriff was formerly in charge of courthouse maintenance, an easy way to stop the flooding—at least temporarily—was just to add another layer of cement to the existing floor and proceed with county business until the next flood.

“I’d go down there and bump my head just about every time,” Newsom recalled.

The second floor courtroom, once a beloved gallery for gatherings, had its windows boarded up to minimize street noise from oversized trucks as they rumbled by on State Highway 154. Through cracks forming in the window casings, birds got in and left feathers and droppings all over the balcony seating. And for acoustics and to reduce heating costs, paneling was installed to drop the ceiling to make the room half its height. The county began to use the balcony to store excess junk, Wiesenbaker remembered forlornly.

“When I got here in 1997, we were bulging at the seams,” Wisenbaker, who served on the commissioner’s court at that time, said. “All the county and district offices were housed in the courthouse, and it carried all the administrators and judicial offices.”

GROWING PAINS

As it was constructed in 1895, the building had no provisions for modern electrical wiring. Newsom described the cobbled-together electrical work as “just bare wire, hanging in midair.”

Heating and cooling could not reach all parts of the building. The third floor was sweltering hot, and all of those who worked in the bottom floor offices kept space heaters, although they constantly worried about floods short-circuiting their electronics, Newsom said.

“Honestly, it was all a bit dangerous,” Newsom mused.

The building was also non-compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

“I do remember having to carry wheelchair users all the way up the stairs to court,” Newsom said. “Their wheelchair had to be folded up and carried up separately. At least I didn’t drop anyone.”

One day, Wiesenbaker and the other county employees had enough. They approached former County Judge Joe Minter and told him the courthouse needed fixing up.

“At the time, everything was painted this awful, awful pink color. The county must have bought it by the truckload,” Wiesenbaker said. “Judge Minter said, ‘Well, we can see if we have some more of that pink paint around.’”

But Wiesenbaker and the other county employees emphatically told him no. Along with treasurer Betty Moore Bassham, county auditor Suzanne Bauer and maintenance supervisor Tony Goodson, they promised Minter they wouldn’t make a mess, picked up paint scrapers and took to a corner. Under layers of pink, green and beige paint they uncovered a treasure: curly heart pine, as rare as it is beautiful.

The discovery spurred inspiration in the court to rehabilitate the historic building, especially given the electrical fire that took the Hill County courthouse in 1993. Early articles on the process from the News-Telegram showed that planning meetings in the summer of the year 2000 were drawing crowds of citizens upwards of 50, and the commissioners thought they could raise approximately $600,000 by themselves. However, the committee, chaired by judges Minter and Cletis Millsap, were hopeful they could be part of the inaugural class of a state grant program, which could provide them with up to $3.2 million from the state and allow them to raise $1.7 million in bonds for a total of $5 million for the project.

Minter, Millsap, H.W. Calvin Prince, Mary Bonham and countless others toiled away at the grant process. However, they would not concede a measure that would have gained them two points on the grant criteria, according to Wiesenbaker. The state would have ranked Hopkins County’s application more highly if it had ceded control of the building to the state historical society to maintain the space as a museum. But Minter and Millsap had no intentions of doing so, Wiesenbaker noted.

“It is to stay a living, breathing courthouse,” she said. “We weren’t going to give that up. And Judge Minter, when they asked him, he said… ‘I’m going to take that letter and fold it into an itty bitty paper airplane and fly it out my window.’”

The state continues to ask for the rights to the building, and each subsequent court has denied the request, Newsom stated.

“I love it here. I don’t want to move,” Newsom said. “ It’s the history of it that is breathtaking.”

In the end, it seemed the court need not have worried their tough stance on keeping the courthouse in Hopkins County hands would prevent them from getting the grant funding.

“One day we were in court, and George W. Bush just walked in,” Newsom remembered. “He shook everyone’s hand, and I mean everyone. I got down off the bench, all the jurors, everything. He was governor at the time and wanted to see this project get off the ground. That’s when it seemed like things really got going for us.”

GLORY RESTORED

By June 2001, courthouse construction was underway, according to the Hopkins County Echo.

Over the next 33 months, the courthouse underwent major changes. Crews chiseled away layer after layer of concrete in the basement, and installed a complex French drain system as well as six sump pumps. Now the basement no longer floods, and there are offices there.

All the wood in the building has been restored to its original glory. There were only minimal places where the original wood was missing, but the historical restoration crew was able to raise curly pine timbers sunken in riverbeds across East Texas during log drives of the 1800s.

The second floor courtroom is once again a brilliant gathering place, which has hosted the symphony orchestra, children's choirs and political forums just as it used to. All electric work is safe and tucked away, and the court surrendered 5,000 square feet of space for an ADA compliant elevator.

The furniture that now sits in the offices of the judge, county commissioners and meeting rooms was specialty-ordered from the Chicago company that originally made the furniture in 1895, with a great grandson now at the helm. The one exception is the second floor courtroom, which has Amish-made curved benches, as the religious group were the only ones with the tools to make the benches curve.

“To me, this is the history of Hopkins County,” Wiesenbaker said. “It’s not that we don’t want nice things, but we want durability.”

The Hopkins County Courthouse draws visitors from Texas and around the world who take time to marvel at the architecture inside and out. If Newsom has a free moment, he tries to take them on a tour.

“Court after court has owned and maintained it like they would their home,” Newsom said. “I give thanks to God every day I get to work here.”

Pictured: The exterior of the Hopkins County Courthouse

Pictured: The second floor courtroom, which now houses the 62nd District presided over by Judge Clay Harrison, was once a gathering place for all measure of county life, including lectures, concerts and trials.

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bebelonian · 6 years

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keep on writing!

I’ve been writing for about ten years, and these are some things I've discovered and would like to share with you about motivation and perseverance. I've seen a lot of writers give up because they feel like they “can’t do it” or aren’t good enough, but the truth is that they ARE. They just get discouraged. So I'm here to tell you how to avoid this nastiness. :)

First of all, do not compare yourself to ANYONE. I know it’s tempting. I know you’re constantly seeing someone with more likes, faster updates, more fans, etc. than you, and I know it’s hard to ignore sometimes. But the truth is that every single writer works at a different pace. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. Don’t try to make yourself work or write exactly like someone else, because it will most likely make your writing more forced and less effective.

If your works don’t get as many likes/notes/kudos/comments/etc. as you would like, don’t get discouraged! There’s a huge chance that you are simply not on the right platform for that particular piece of writing. A story about a cutesy first meeting in a coffee shop vs. a story about a rancher in 1900′s Virginia would get wildly different reactions from the same audience. Both stories might be amazing, and the one about Virginia might even be better quality writing, but chances are that if you’re posting in a space where young adults go to read fanfiction, the coffee shop will win every time.

And even if you’re writing a “coffee shop” story and you’re STILL not getting notes, don’t let it ruin your day! By no means does the amount of likes you get on a work determine how good it is. There is an audience out there that will LOVE your story. You just have to find them!

Have writer’s block that you just can’t shake? We’ve all been there. When I'm stuck on a scene or section of my writing, I like to skip to a different scene that holds more excitement for me. Even if it’s not going to be used until the very end, if you have inspiration to write it before it’s needed, go for it! If that doesn’t work, and if the block persists, you may have to scrap the story altogether. If writing becomes more of a chore than a reward, it’s time to say goodbye to that project, at least for a while.

BUT never delete your writing!! Even if you think it’s the worst thing you have ever typed, do not get rid of it. I have so many unfinished projects that I got disheartened about and just deleted, but I regretted it later when I wanted to revisit those ideas. Even if you think you’ll never want to write it again, it might be helpful to use as something to look back on later and decide where you went wrong/what made you abandon that story so you can avoid the same mistakes in future writing.

Don’t ever give up!! I know it’s hard to follow through on a project, especially if you’re like me and don’t share with anyone (which means no feedback, helpful or otherwise), but keep plowing on! finishing the first draft is next to impossible, I know (the eight unfinished ones in my documents are screaming), but it gets SO MUCH EASIER from there! Editing is the “fun” part after you put in all that hard work, and it’s so worth it at the end.

Everyone can learn how to write well. Are some people born with some gene where words always come easily to them and they hardly have to work at it? Maybe. But the truth is that if you want to write, you can. And if you want to write well, you can learn how. No one is stopping you from reaching your full potential but yourself! There are a million people who would be willing to give tips or edit your writing for you if you aren’t confident in it or would like some help. (If you’re ever in need of this person, I will do it. Just ask!)

If you’re not comfortable sharing your work with anyone quite yet, I have some resources that might help. Hemingway Editor is a great tool that tells you how easy your story is to read, when you’re overusing adverbs or passive voice, and if you have any words that can be simplified. If you’re looking for an editor that’s a little more in-depth, Slick Write is similar to Hemingway, but it has a few more features and digs a little deeper into your story. WordCounter tells you how many words you’ve written, and it has a feature that reads your writing back to you, which I find incredibly helpful to find out where it sounds choppy or unnatural. Last but not least, the OneLook Reverse Dictionary allows you to type in words, phrases, or sentences, and it will bring up a list of words related to what you type in. It’s like a really specific thesaurus that helps if you just can’t think of the word you want, and it works great if you’re looking for something to replace an adverb (for example, if you type “ran quickly” it might suggest “sprinted”).

Write about what you love. Sometimes, especially in fanfiction writing, there will be pressure to write in certain genres. And I won’t lie, people who read fanfiction generally have certain “types” of stories that they like to read (angsty, modern, romance or the “coffee shop” fics I mentioned earlier are popular favorites). But if that’s not your thing and you want to write something else entirely--GO FOR IT! I’m writing a fic set in 1920s Chicago right now because it’s what I love writing. DO YOUR THING.

Set aside time each day to write. Writing is just like a sport or pretty much anything else: practice makes perfect. Stephen King and J.K. Rowling weren’t born great writers, and their works look nothing like their first drafts. If you want a great story, work on it whenever you can to make it stronger. It’s worth it--I promise. It doesn’t matter what you write, but even if you have writer’s block, write something. It will help.

And last but certainly not least: I believe in you. No matter what you’re writing, whether you’ve been writing for three months or twenty years, whether you’ve published six novels or have nothing but saved documents, you can do this. I have complete faith that with dedication, hard work, and love of your work, you can write anything. I hope this wasn’t a huge waste of your time, and feel free to leave me a message if this was helpful or if you think I missed anything. GO GET ‘EM! <3

#writing #writing tips #writing inspiration #inspiration #writing resources #fanfiction #writing fanfiction #writing tools #writing advice #hemingway editor #slick write #wordcounter #onelook #keep writing #writer's block

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dailyfeartwdgifs · 7 years

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Den Of Geek: Fear The Walking Dead delivers a strong episode that gives The Walking Dead a serious run for its money...

Well, it was only a matter of time before the ranch fell, but did anyone expect it to happen quite in this fashion, or so soon before the end of the season? Still, Jeremiah Otto’s legacy doesn’t go out with a whimper—resulting in one of the strongest episodes of the season, if not the entire show itself. A couple of minor points bog things down here or there, but overall, This Land Is Your Land vaults Fear The Walking Dead onto the same level as The Walking Dead. And a lot of the credit for this goes not only to writer Suzanne Heathcote (who also penned this season’s excellent Burning In Water, Drowning In Flame), or to first-time Fear director Meera Menon, but to Alycia Debnam-Carey as well. Especially Debnam-Carey, whose performance in This Land... gives us an Alicia that is bold but not fearless, brave but vulnerable, elated yet in mourning. Debnam-Carey is always solid, but this hour of television is truly transformative.

While the survivors may have found refuge in the pantry, their very salvation is also the means of their own demise. Thanks to a blocked vent, the bunker has about two hours of oxygen left. This conflict alone is enough to drive the entire hour—but Fear doubles down on the drama by revealing that some of the survivors have been bitten. So not only is This Land... a race against suffocation, Alicia and company must contend with potential zombies in their midst.

Most of the scenes in the bunker are shot very tight and very close, with a shallow depth of field. Menon and director of photography Scott Peck choose what we see and when we see it. The resulting shifts in focus are intimate, to the point of claustrophobia. There's no escaping any of this, for those in the pantry or us at home—we're in this together.

This tight framing has its real payoff in a quiet character moment between Alicia and fellow rancher Christine, played with lived-in hope and weariness by Linda Gehringer. The two enjoy an unexpected heart-to-heart chat, remembering better, bygone times filled with the sorts of simple pleasures that are so easily taken for granted.

Debnam-Carey is strong throughout the hour, but she’s at her best as she recalls a funny childhood moment with Nick. The camera wisely lingers on her face, allowing us to see the humour and sadness warring behind her large, expressive eyes. This is the happiest we’ve ever seen Alicia. She’s at her most vulnerable, too, letting her guard down long enough to let some light into her burdened heart.

Troy, on the other hand, is enjoying himself a little too much, taking glee in the bloody chaos and carnage. Surrounded by the dead, he's suddenly euphoric, a kid in a candy store. I’ve often heard the argument that TWD’s Daryl only came into his own after (and because of) the apocalypse. The same could be said of Carol, too. But Daryl and Carol don’t delight in killing zombies the way Troy does. He’s a Lost Boy in this way, a product of an unstable childhood and an isolated upbringing. Nick is a lot like Troy in this regard, bringing a specific kind of street smarts to the table but still liable to making terrible decisions that get people killed.

Alicia is the flip side of this, thinking before she acts. Her choices weigh heavily on her. We know her actions in the bunker will stay with her to the very end. Killing zombies is one thing, but killing the living—even in the name of the greater good—has killed something vital in Alicia that she will likely never get back. In this respect, Alicia is a leader. “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown,” after all.

The worst part of this sacrifice, however, is that it’s in vain. The bitten are put down, but nearly everyone in the bunker suffocates to death, unleashing a new kind of close-quarters terror. Alicia can barely stand, let alone fend off the newly turned. Unlike the end of Brother’s Keeper, I had no doubt that Alicia would survive the episode. What was more surprising to me was how Madison, Strand, and Walker rode in like the cavalry to save the day. (Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever been happier to see Madison.)

While one could argue that this is too contrived a resolution, I think Fearhas earned this moment of true salvation. Because in the end, Alicia knows the truth, that no place is safe, that safety is an illusion. That no place is worth killing or dying for. So it makes sense that she's striking off by herself. Alicia is more alone than ever now, but she’s at least able to live and die on her own terms.

If you read my review of Brother's Keeper, you know I suggested it might have been a stronger episode had Fear killed Alicia, Ofelia, and Crazy Dog off as the zombie hordes closed in. Not killing the three of them in that moment felt like Fear was pulling a punch. But, that being said, had I chosen that particular end for that adventure, the events of This Land would never have transpired. And I’ll admit it: I’m glad (and relieved) Alicia's survived to see another day.

#ftwd #fear the walking dead #season 3 #spoilers #article #review #den of geek #news #aheartfulloflexa #camila

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newstfionline · 6 years

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The federal government’s boldest land grab in a generation

By T. Christian Miller, ProPublica, and Kiah Collier and Julián Aguilar, Texas Tribune. December 14, 2017

BROWNSVILLE, TEXAS--The land agents started working the border between Texas and Mexico in the spring of 2007. Sometimes they were representatives from the Army Corps of Engineers. Other times they were officers from the U.S. Border Patrol, uniformed in green, guns tucked into side holsters. They visited tumbledown mobile homes and suburban houses with golf course views. They surveyed farms fecund with sugar cane, cotton and sorghum growing by the mud-brown Rio Grande. They delivered their blunt news to ranchers and farmers, sheet metal workers and university professors, auto mechanics and wealthy developers.

The federal government was going to build a fence to keep out drug smugglers and immigrants crossing into the United States illegally, they told property owners. The structure was going to cut straight across their land. The government would make a fair offer to buy property, the agents explained. That was the law. But if the owners didn’t want to sell, the next step was federal court. U.S. attorneys would file a lawsuit to seize it. One way or the other, the government would get the land. That, too, was the law.

The visits launched the most aggressive seizure of private land by the federal government in decades. In less than a year, the Department of Homeland Security filed more than 360 eminent domain lawsuits against property owners, involving thousands of acres of land in the border states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

Most of the seized land ran along the Rio Grande, which forms the border between Texas and Mexico. All told, the agency paid $18.2 million to accumulate a ribbon of land occupying almost half the length of the 120 miles of the Rio Grande Valley in southernmost Texas.

Years before President Donald Trump promised to build his wall, Homeland Security erected an 18-foot-high fence here in a botched land grab that serves as a warning for the future.

An investigation by ProPublica and the Texas Tribune shows that Homeland Security cut unfair real estate deals, secretly waived legal safeguards for property owners, and ultimately abused the government’s extraordinary power to take land from private citizens.

The major findings:

Homeland Security circumvented laws designed to help landowners receive fair compensation. The agency did not conduct formal appraisals of targeted parcels. Instead, it issued low-ball offers based on substandard estimates of property values.

Larger, wealthier property owners who could afford lawyers negotiated deals that, on average, tripled the opening bids from Homeland Security. Smaller and poorer landholders took whatever the government offered--or wrung out small increases in settlements. The government conceded publicly that landowners without lawyers might wind up shortchanged, but did little to protect their interests.

The Justice Department bungled hundreds of condemnation cases. The agency took property without knowing the identity of the actual owners. It condemned land without researching facts as basic as property lines. Landholders spent tens of thousands of dollars to defend themselves from the government’s mistakes.

The government had to redo settlements with landowners after it realized it had failed to account for the valuable water rights associated with the properties, an oversight that added months to the compensation process.

On occasion, Homeland Security paid people for property they did not actually own. The agency did not attempt to recover the misdirected taxpayer funds, instead paying for land a second time once it determined the correct owners.

Nearly a decade later, scores of landowners remain tangled in lawsuits. The government has already taken their land and built the border fence. But it has not resolved claims for its value.

The errors and disparities played out family by family, block by block, county by county, up and down the length of the border fence.

The Loop family spent more than $100,000 to defend their farmland from repeated government mistakes about the size, shape and value of their property. The government built a fence across Robert De Los Santos’ family land but almost a decade later has yet to reach a settlement for it. Ranch hand Roberto Pedraza was accidentally paid $20,500 for land he did not even own.

Retired teacher Juan Cavazos was offered $21,500 for a two-acre slice of his land. He settled for that, figuring he couldn’t afford to hire a lawyer.

Rollins M. Koppel, a local attorney and banker, did not make the same mistake. A high-priced Texas law firm negotiated his offer from $233,000 to almost $5 million--the highest settlement in the Rio Grande Valley.

“We got screwed,” said Cavazos, 74.

Greg Giddens led the fence building project at Homeland Security. Now retired, Giddens said his team faced pressure from both U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which wanted the fence built quickly to benefit law enforcement, and from Congress, which set a deadline to complete the structure.

“Everybody wanted to do this right. But it was clear that the mission was to get this done,” Giddens said.

The fence was born in the middle of a fierce national debate on immigration reform. In 2006, Rep. Peter King, a New York Republican, introduced a plan to build hundreds of miles of a physical barrier along the southern border. Although controversial, the proposal won bipartisan support. Then Sen. Jeff Sessions, the Alabama Republican, led the fight for its passage. Yea votes came from Democratic Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

On Oct. 26, 2006, President Bush signed the Secure Fence Act. President Obama oversaw the fence’s construction. All told, Homeland Security built 654 miles of fence--just short of the 700 mile goal set by Congress--at a cost of $2.4 billion.

Now Trump has promised to finish the job with a much larger wall--nearly twice the height of the current fence, made of concrete, and occupying much of the remaining 1,300 miles of southern border unguarded by a physical barrier. His administration has declared its intent to take more land to build the wall in the central Rio Grande Valley, where much of the property remains in private hands.

For Trump to succeed, the federal government will have to file more eminent domain lawsuits using the same law that resulted in uneven payments the last time. Many of the players who oversaw construction of the fence are now working on making Trump’s wall a reality.

Mauricio Vidaurri’s voice catches when he envisions a wall running across his family farm south of Laredo on the banks of the Rio Grande.

A rancher, Vidaurri strongly supports better border protection. Border crossers constantly trespass on his land, and drug couriers have broken into a home on the ranch.

But a wall would almost certainly split the ranch that has been in his family since the 1700s. If Homeland Security wants to build a wall, Vidaurri knows he will be almost helpless to stop it.

“That’s a battle that we can’t win,” he said.

“EMINENT DOMAIN” PROBABLY EXISTS as a phrase in the consciousness of most Americans in some way or another. Maybe you heard it when the government was building a highway, or clearing a route for gas pipelines.

The sovereign power to seize land--and the need to protect property owners from its abuse--dates to the beginning of modern democracy.

In 1215, the Magna Carta limited royal power--including curtailing the sovereign’s ability to take property from his nobles. “No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions,” it read. A man’s castle was his home, and not even a king could take it without due process. The language survives unaltered in modern British law.

More than five centuries later, America’s earliest lawmakers enshrined private property rights in the U.S. Constitution. The Fifth Amendment required that the government provide “just compensation” if it took property through eminent domain--the English rendering of a Latin phrase meaning “supreme lordship.” If the government was going to appropriate property, it had to pay for it, fairly and fully.

Over the decades, eminent domain transformed the American landscape. The U.S. Interstate Highway System and some national parks, NASA’s Cape Canaveral and the U.S. Supreme Court building itself--none would have been possible without federal land condemnation. During World War II, the Justice Department boasted of being the largest real estate broker in the nation. The federal government acquired more than 20 million acres of land to build bases and other military sites--an area the size of South Carolina.

At the same time, the potential for abuse inspired deep-seated fear. An early Supreme Court justice described eminent domain as a “despotic power.” Property owners--from gigantic timber companies to people evicted from their homes--have fought bitterly to stop the government from taking their land, or to ensure a fair market price.

Politically, an unusual coalition of the right and the left has resisted the use of eminent domain.

Progressives have argued that disadvantaged groups feel the pain of condemnation more than most. In the 1950s and 1960s, officials deployed eminent domain to bulldoze mostly minority, mostly poor inner-city neighborhoods in the name of urban renewal. Government planners called it “blight removal.” Writer James Baldwin had another term: “It means negro removal,” he said after a meeting with U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy in 1963. “And the federal government is an accomplice to this fact.”

On the right, conservatives have warned of the so-called “grasping hand” of bureaucratic attacks on private property rights. That concern rose to national prominence in 2005, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against private property owners in the landmark case Kelo v. City of New London.

The Connecticut city condemned the homes of Susette Kelo and her neighbors to turn the land over to a private developer. The developer planned to build a hotel, housing, and office space to complement a new research center by Pfizer Corp., the pharmaceutical giant. The city determined the new development would generate jobs and tax revenue.

In a 5-4 decision, the court decided that taking land from one set of private property owners to give to another private entity was permissible as a “public use.” Kelo’s small pink house was relocated and her neighborhood was bulldozed, but nothing was ever built.

The ruling united ideological enemies. Ralph Nader blasted it. So did Rush Limbaugh. A few property rights activists were so angry they sought to condemn the New Hampshire home of Justice David Souter and replace it with the “Lost Liberty Hotel.”

One of the few high-profile supporters of the ruling was Donald Trump, then a New York developer. “I happen to agree with it 100 percent,” he said. His opinion was informed by experience. In the 1990s, he lost an eminent domain battle when a local agency failed in its bid to tear down an elderly woman’s home in Atlantic City to make room for a limousine parking lot for Trump’s casino.

Trump’s enthusiasm for taking land endures. During a February 2016 presidential debate, Trump described it as almost like winning the lottery. “When eminent domain is used on somebody’s property, that person gets a fortune,” he told the audience. “They get at least fair market value, and if they are smart, they’ll get two or three times the value of their property.”

In response to the Kelo decision, 45 states, including Texas, passed new laws to improve landholder protections. Some states banned private-to-private takings. Others required “supercompensation”--payments at greater than the fair market value. Those reforms built on others passed over the years. California pays out up to $5,000 for property owners to hire their own appraisers. Texas provides special commissions to review land seizures before the start of costly legal proceedings. Utah created an independent ombudsman to help landowners navigate the process.

But the furor to fix eminent domain abuse bypassed one important entity: the federal government. After Kelo, President Bush issued an executive order requiring agencies to better monitor land seizures. Congress passed no meaningful legislation.

And so, by the time the land agents had finished knocking on doors in the Rio Grande Valley at the end of 2007, the property owners faced a federal government armed with powerful legal tools, many created decades earlier for a very different purpose than building a border fence.

#Texas #US-Mexico border wall #eminent doman #federal land seizures

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bubba532to · 7 years

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Title: Fate Mountain: Complete Series (Small Town Bear Shifter Romance) Author: Scarlett Grove The Rescue Bears series The Bear Patrol series The Timber Bear Ranch series Bonus Books Lion's Halloween Baby Cowboy Bear's Christmas Surprise Beauty and the Bad Bearlionaire Release Date: #AlreadyReleased Reviewer: Ingrid Stephanie Jordan Genre: #PRN #BearShifter 18 Books at 5stars each = #90Stars My Rating: #5Stars☆☆☆☆☆ •••••••••••••• OMG can you believe this 3 Full Series even 3 Holiday Stories. Eighteen Books in one package. We hit GOLD. Ms. Scarlett has everything in these mind blowing books - Adventure, Survival, Fear, Betrayal, Suspense, Action Packed, Loyalty, Hate, Love, so much Drama, Revenge, Sacrifice, Ex-Navy SEALS Breath taking Cops and Detectives Shifter Cowboys and Ranchers ALL TIED UP IN ONE PACKAGE Wowzer! •••••••••••• Rescue Bears Chief Bear #1 Levi Blackthorn is Chief Bear and a shifter, a regular hottie who owns the Fate Mountain Lodge. Corey is his computer expert developed a Dating App that he said was 100% solid. Levi is tired of being alone so he thought why not try the dating app maybe he'll find his fated mate, looking through a lot of the curvy women that are human he didn't see anything but then all of a sudden there was his 100%, he couldn't believe his eyes. Juliet Fernandez loved her position being a graphic designer but she hated her boss, he picked on her constantly. But when she reported him his boss said to sucked it up or find a new job. Saying there's a hundred Julie's waiting to work. So needless to say she grinned a bared it. Juliet just wanted to be loved, has she found it? •••••••••••• Title: WILD BEAR #2 Chief Bear aka: Levi didn't really want to hire him because Shane's couldn’t control his Bear and you never knew when he would take over there were humans at Fate Mountain Lodge. Shane decided to prove that the Match Dating App wouldn't work because he had a secret..... He already knew his fated mate. Lily Mason is a human, working as a waitress in a greasy spoon diner. She moved back to Fate Mountain, so her 5 year old hybrid shifter son, Theo so he would grow up around shifters. After years of knowing Theo's dad, there first and only night together, she woke up alone, he was gone and never came back. Lily was heart broken especially since he told her she was his fated mate. •••••••••••• Title: Big Bear #3 Poppy Robins is an accountant/book keeper working for a Russian import-exports company through the year she felt like something was going on but she really wasn't sure plus she couldn't prove it, so she believed her boss, an let it go. Poppy needed to go out she was lonely, never going anywhere it was just her and Malcolm, her parrot. When she saw the app called Mate.com. While signing up Poppy over heard her boss talking she knew she had to leave, grabbing her purse, keys her boss's son grabs her than threatens her. Poppy went home and decided was time to leave so she packed and got Malcolm. Beep Beep her phone rang Mate.com found her 100% mate !!! Angus Grant aka Big Bear is a Grizzly Bear on top of he's a famous wood furniture maker and also part of the Rescue Bears his life was full with all his Ex Navy Seals that was the rescue crew for the Fate Mountain Lodge in the Fate Mountains. All he was missing is that he hadn't found his mate. •••••••••••• Title: Brew Bear #4 Drew Bock owned The Fate Mountain Brewery, making his own brew, loving every minute of it. Brew Bear also was part of the Rescue Bears Team. Lately though he felt like a lost crazy Bear, nothing is sacred anymore. Quinn Jacobs works for PR executive in Portland. Not only was she very talented she was very successful, but then she went to her friend's wedding and something happened one night, everything changed her life. The pull was unbearable she had to have, she begged and she got marked. •••••••••••• Title: Ski Bear #5 Zach Rayner is a Polar Bear Ski Instructor who grew up in San Diego happy, great attitude and surfed, skiing,just a happy go lucky kid loving life. He was in the X - Games when war broke out than enlisted was a Navy Seal. Zach turned out to be quite a ladies man too. A Bear with many talents. To bad he's been waiting a year and still no match from Match.com. Maisie Green came from Paris after she became an award-winning pastry chef she decided it was time to go home to be with her mother and to open a bakery on main street in the Fate Mountain Village. Everything was great but her mom was right she needed a boyfriend. •••••••••••• Title: Geek Bear #6 As a computer programmer Whiz Kids, Corey Bright invented the app that would find his Rescue Team there fated mate. Mate.com which was a shifter/ human dating site, yep it worked for his buddies, it seemed to work very well that it just added to his billions but than he could care less about money and he wasn't interested in finding his fated mate. Little did he know that the Rescuer Bears had other plans for him. Will they succeed? Willow Rhine is the ghostwriter for the famous romance author, Sandra Collins. Willow didn’t want all the signings and press chattings, she just wanted to write, which for some reason she has writers block better yet somehow someone found her out and now she has a stalker who loves to send threatening messages. Now for once what seems like a long time since anything went right she a match. Yep they found her Fated Mate at Fate Mountain. •••••••••••• Bear Patrols # 1-5 Title: Commander Bear #1 Rollo Morris is the head sheriff who decided to do what the other Bears did use Corey Bright's application to find his mate. Low and behold he finds his mate , who happens to be Corey Bright's sister and she's as messed up as Corey was. Well it didn't matter Rollo was not going to be distracted, he found his mate and he was keeping her no matter what was happening. She was his and no FBI or Mob Pin was taking her from him. Zoe Bright is a Jaguar Shifter that was forced to be a jewel thief, plus she is the sister of the Rescue Bear Corey the inventor of the Mate App. Being forced to do a job close to her brother was a God send in a way because Zoe learned she was interested in woodworking and loved Fate Mountain not to mention her application in the Mate App found her 100% Mate. She knew it was all short lived, soon she had to take the stolen jewels to the boss. Can she leave her brother? Fate Mountain? Her Mate? •••••••••••• Title: Detective Bear Book #2 Gauge Stockwell is a Polor Bear Shifter where he worked in the police station as a detective. Investing many leads for the epidemic going around that killing people especially shifters. Everthing seems to be just out of reach. Who ever was making the drug "crystal" had to be caught, putting them away for life. Then he has a break thru on the net with Stonewall666 to boot, going undercover was the only way he would catch them. Now his cell is pinging for what, No way after applying two years ago to Mate.Com when he is going deep cover they find his mate. What does he do now? Lola Lockheart has been high on Fate Mountain, hours upon hours back packing up away from civilization. A whole year of loneliness with no one to talk to , to laugh, to have fun going against her stepbrother and his anti-shifter gang would be death. Lola lived in a tent with no fires or heat, being forced to cut crystal in a cold cave of Fate Mountain, far underground away from everyone. Lola just knew she was going to die here, with no one to cherish her. •••••••••••• Title: Cadet Bear #3 Rosa Reyes is so tired she works in Los Angeles as Administrative Assistant when coming home one day 2 weeks ago to find that her sister was not at home never made it home from school. Going to the police department to file a missing-person they said to her they didn't feel this was a missing persons, they felt that her teenage sister ran away from home but she knew that she didn't run away from home, she knew her sister would never do that. Rosa would never give up so she decided to investigate on her own, and that's why she was driving up the coast, realizing there was a lot of kidnappings just like her sister. Rosa was tired and running out of money but she just knew she was close. Bored and looking for something else to do since she couldn't fall asleep she did an application for match. com and guess what hundred percent baby she got a hundred percent! Heath Reynolds is quite a Bear Shifter, he left High School to take care of his sick mother and the when she past the war happened. So when it was all said and done, he went back to high school at the Institude and then he went into law enforcement, now he's on Fate Mountain in the Bear Patrol. Buying his house all thats left is a mate. Patiently waiting on Match.Com for a year now he was flabbergasted to get a bing from his phone saying he got a 100% yep life was good. •••••••••••• Title: Tech Bear Book #4 Damien Fellows is a Bear Shifter aka: Tech Bear working for Fate Mountain Police Depart. His favorite past time has been playing Dragon Lands for the last seven years as Tech Bear Paladin. He can never get enough of this game especially since he always played and chatted with Elf Rogue. Some day he would get his the nerve to asked her out, after all they've known each other for so long. He has tried to find his mate for years now on Mated.com there was nothing, why not meet Elf Rogue. Raven Lucas is a is a techie & a coder, has been since High School so money is good for her plus she can work from anywhere. Raven was five years old her mother told her no matter what I'll always be back for you. She disappeared and Raven went into the system, everyone told her, her mother abandoned her but she knew better her mother gave her love, she mother promised her she'd always be back. She started looking, for years now, finally she got a break, her mother was last seen at Fate Mountain Lodge. •••••••••••• Title: Deputy Bear Book #5 Harper Brown is grieving, her grandfather who she has became close too the last two years, past away. Harper went every weekend to visit her grandfather in the nursing home since they both still lived in Portland. Than the floor fell out from under her, first the will was read her grandfather gave her the summer fishing cabin, that was quite a surprise. She than went home only to find her boyfriend in bed with her girlfriend shocked she screamed, packed her things up and left. Harper had no choice but to quit her job and go to the fishing cabin. At almost Christmas the cabin was freezing with the small electric heater in the bedroom the rest of the cabin was heated by the fireplace, it was going to be a long winter. She decided to sign up at Mate. com and there it was 100% match. Deputy Knox Carter of the Fate Mountain Bear Patrol has finally found his mate, only to maybe lose her. His Alpha, Boss, Best Friend, Rollo demanded he stay away from her. Is that possible? Can a mated couple before the bite stay away from each other? And why was his boss so determined to keep them apart? •••••••••••• Timber Bear Ranch Complete Title: Boss Bear #1 Sylvia Becker is a tax auditor, she was given a new assignment what already looked cut and dry this ranch probably owes millions for years of back taxes. At twenty eight years old, Sylvia was tired of her mother's blind dates she arranges for her. They all are big failures, so sitting at the Brewery at Fate Mountain she thought why not join Mate.com. Sure enough her 100% popped up, he was so beautiful, wait can a man be beautiful? Hunk, Striking, Handsome Adonis she ever seen. Leland James Kincaid is a Grizzly Bear Shifter, he hasn't been back to Timber Bear Ranch on Fate Mountain in seven years. So coming back was hard when his dad had a heart attack and died. Then as if it wasn't hard enough Leland found out he inherited 50% of the ranch plus the title of Alpha of the Kincaid family. His brother's Jessie is the baby, Buck is the second oldest, Cyrus was the third born he hasn't been home as long as Leland, living a day away if the bear would run up on the mountain. Leland doesn’t understand how his father could let the shape of the ranch go down while years of bills piled up. They were in trouble and he just got home. •••••••••••• Title: Saw Bear #2 Maria Reyes she's human and studies botany at the Bright Institute for shifters Her sister ad mate lives on Fate Mountain too, but Maria always feels alone in her sisters shadow. It seems that if anything can go wrong it happens to her. Maria was attacked and bitten, she ran far to a cave in the woods her lioness was feral plus very crazy. Maria was trying to survive as much as possible but her lion took over anytime and it could be days before she was herself again. Her mate want to protect her, she wants him to leave. Maybe he should end her now? Buck Kincaid is a Grizzly Bear Shifter who works on the family owned Timber on Fate Mountain. Seven years ago he applied on an app for mates but nothing until today. He's so excited he texted her but then she said something happened and she can't be his mate. Going on with life all though him and his Bear were miserable, than accidentally Buck runs into a shifter clawing up trees, when he gets close enough he smelled his mate, to late he was attacked. Can he help his mate? Does he have to destroy a feral shifter even if it's his mate? •••••••••••• Title: Mountain Bear #3 Daisy Danes is a rich spoiled brat or is she? Her stepdad gives her anything she want but love and an education. One day he tells her to pack a bag she is finally going to be worth something. He sold her for crystal, what's bad is he's sold her to the Updike's the Hyenas Shifters that were nothing but criminals. She knew the Updike brother's were not her fated mate so she applied to Match .com and found her 100% but it was to late. Cyrus Kincaid is a Grizzly Bear Shifter who it was very in tune with his bear. His bear could talk to the forest in his human side was getting close to doing the same thing. He loved his life on Fate Mountain he'd been here for so many years since the war, but there was one thing missing his mate. He wanted to share everything, so Jessie his brother put him on Match. com. but nothing has happened yet. Then there was a knock at his door. Who would have thought that the Mountain Bear would find on Fate Mountain? •••••••••••• Title: Mechanic Bear #4 Dana Myers is Fox Shifter who basically is a slave to the Updike brothers who were Hyenas that live the life of crime. Since Dana's Clan sold her for the money they owed the Updike Brothers she has been making plans to try to escape. Working for two years for them with no pay, Dana has scavenged everything she could on the floor anywhere she found money here and there and kept it all and now it was her time her time to escape. Of course Dana has no luck, the car she steals breaks down, she finds her fated mate now when she's running and as if that's not enough she has a surprise in the trunk. Jessie Kincaid is a Grizzly Shifter who is the Mechanic Bear. To get his sister-in-law's off his back he went ahead and signed up with mate.com and of course they found his match, a hundred percent no less, she was gorgeous. He couldn't place her but he knows her but from somewhere? Who would of thought his fated mate needed a tow •••••••••••• Title: Lion’s Halloween Baby Geneva Zales is a White Hedge Witch she goes on day by day doing everything that she has always done in life. Except there isn't that thrill that it use to be. After losing her mother a year ago she has not bounced back yet. Plus her Coven wanted her to take over her mother’s position as matriarch. Being a white hedge witch Geneva didn't feel she was educated or powerful enough to be the matriarch of the Coven. But tonight on All Hallows Eve she will asked and than know the answers. Rowan Tark is a Lion Shifter he has been riding around aimlessly on his Harley motorcycle for the last six months after leaving the military. Not knowing what he wanted in life or where he was going. Than one night almost loosing his life he knew what he wanted. He heard good things for shifter at Fate Mountain •••••••••••• Cowboy Bear's Christmas Surprise Mia Royce was running for her life, she had to get away, get away fast there was no way she was going to let these men do what they wanted to do to her. So she drove and drove ending up at Fate Mountain. Her car was climbing on the freeway, the roads were getting worse all of a sudden a big tree came at her, and she blacked out. Connor Milton is a Bear Shifter and a Rancher. It was hard work for one person but at the end of the day it was rewarding. He has been hoping for years now to find his mate and no one has turned up. The way Connor saw it was either he found his fated mate or it was nothing at all. Who knew his Fated Mate would crash right into his tree. I almost forgot to ask, Do you like Gingerbread Cookies? •••••••••••• Title: Beauty and the Bad Bearlionair Matilda Swank was in such a mess two years ago she left her mom's to live with her boyfriend Tim his whole family had a business, meat packing so she work there with him. He spends all her money going to the bars, picking up women, she finally had enough. Problem was since he spent all her money she's has to live with her mom plus working in her cleaning business. She decided to see if she could get a 100% at Mate. com. Being attracted to an grumpy esentric billionaire was the pit and his house was so dirty too. James Hill is a Military Grizzly Bear Shifter who sold his business after coming back from serving his country. The Great War ended and many shifters were damaged, broken. His Bear is one of them, he's out of control and breaks out when ever he wants to hunt, this is a problem among humans so James bought a mansion on Fate Mountain. It was perfect no one was around him except his cleaning maids who all quit because he was a pig and growly grumpy bear. But James was very lonely maybe he could not be so crazy for a Mate? He went to the site one maid told him about, Mate.com than called Fate Mountain Cleaning to get another maid, his mansion was like there was a pig here instead of a bear. Could his broken Bear be good? •••••••••••• A copy of this book was provided to me with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book and my comments here are my honest opinion.

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