#two of them you have to break through a ton of spiderwebs to find it

[aroace-polyshow]

do you guys ever think about this dialogue in black space 2

#mono’s stuff #omori spoilers #minus the mom asking where the violin is part #i remember finding those boxes and feeling so horrified #do you ever think about how surpressed these moments are #they’re deep in black space 2 #two of them you have to break through a ton of spiderwebs to find it #after you click on it once it’s gone #do you ever think about that #how guiltu sunny feels #how deep these parts were repressed #idk #is this anythibg

[therainroguefanfiction]

Chance Encounters (P) Encounter 1: First Meeting

Table of Contents & Information

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"Boss."

You glanced over your shoulder as Jin approached you. "What's up, Jin?"

He closed the distance between you, the wind whipping around your bodies as the two of you stood on the roof of a twenty-story building, most of the floors abandoned and forgotten. With his hands behind his back, he offered you a worried expression. "While I was out patrolling, I heard whispers that a P8 brat has kidnapped a young man. I wasn't able to confirm this, but I do believe it's Junji again."

You sighed in annoyance, turning your gaze back to the shopping district below. "Why am I not surprised? Did you happen to find a location?"

"No, but there are two known hideouts that he's used in the past."

"I'm sensing a 'but' here."

Jin shifted his weight from one foot to the other, looking at you with an unsure expression. "He knows that we know about these locations. Surely he wouldn't be dumb enough to return there."

The corners of your lips twitched up into a smirk as you turned to look at him. "Human beings seek out familiar places in times of stress. Humans are also idiots."

"I suppose so..."

"One is the abandoned warehouse near the border to Nameless City, yeah? What's the other?"

"An abandoned clothing store just inside the White Rascal's territory."

Your nose wrinkled at the thought of those fucks in white. "Not that I'm being biased or anything, but there's no fucking way I'm going to Rascal territory. I'll take the warehouse."

Jin chuckled. "Then I'll secure the clothing store."

With a nod, you stepped off the ledge, enjoying the feeling of the cool air against your skin as you fell toward the alleyway below. Your boots hit the concrete, creating spiderweb-like cracks from the impact and kicking up dust around you. A wave of pressure shot through your leg and you gave it a shake to rid yourself of the feeling before stuffing your hands into your pockets and heading in the direction of the warehouse down by the docks.

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You tugged on the large doors of the warehouse, hearing a chain rattle from the other side. With a grunt of annoyance, you tightly gripped either side of the double doors before beginning to pull them apart. The chains resisted before finally snapping, the doors flying open to reveal the darkness inside. The only light came from tall windows on either side of the room, but it was enough. You stepped inside, eyes narrowed at Junji who was standing near the back of the room, eyes wide in surprise.

You held up your hand in greeting. "Yo."

"'Yo'?" he repeated incredulously, his voice taking on a higher pitch than normal. "You break down my door and all you can say is 'yo'?! You really have ZERO manners, Y/N!"

You hummed. "Better than breaking down the door and then breaking your voice without a word, yeah?"

He scoffed, putting his hand on his hip. "You always talk such a big game. Hmph! I bet you're all talk. I'm gettin' a ton of money for this boy, ya know, enough where I can finally leave this god-forsaken town! I won't let you ruin that."

You glanced to the right side of the room where he had motioned with his hand. A red-haired boy was on his knees, his wrists tightly bound around a thick pipe that connected to the ceiling. A bandana had been wrapped around his mouth to keep him silent. His dark eyes met yours, surprisingly calm despite his current situation. You suddenly felt Junji's power spike as he rushed at you.

He held his right arm above his head, engulfed in a brown glow as he focused his power there. The earth shook beneath your feet and you just barely managed to dodge the sharp rock column that shot out from the ground. With a huff of annoyance, you flexed your fingers before balling them into a tight fist, focusing your power on it. A red glow swirled around your arm as you thrust your first forward, clocking him in the face before his own fist could reach you. Junji cried out in pain, his body flying back and crashing into the back wall, the stone fracturing beneath him. As he slipped into unconsciousness, the rock pillar started to shake before finally shattering into a million pieces.

"You're still annoying as hell, man," you complained, turning your hand over and flexing your fingers again. The skin around your knuckles was bright red and had a dusting of blood on them, but you honestly didn't know if it was his or your own. Your gaze slid to the boy and you paused.

His eyes were wide and shaking as he tried to process what he had just seen.

'Hm, must be his first time seeing a P8 brat use their powers. I wonder if I should pay for his therapy...' You held your hands up in surrender, slowly approaching him as if he were a frightened animal you were trying to befriend. "I'm not gonna hurt you, man," you told him softly as you kneeled in front of him, tugging the bandana from his mouth. The ropes around his wrists were thick, but they were no match for your flames. It was easy to burn them, but you had to be careful not to hurt the boy in the process. When he pulled his hands away, you noticed just how red his skin was. You grabbed his forearm, bringing his wrist closer so you could inspect the damage. They were nearly raw and you knew it had to hurt.

You clicked your tongue in annoyance, but before you could ask if he was okay, you felt the aura of a P8 brat quickly approaching. "Shit." Your grip on his arm tightened and you forced him to his feet before shoving him back behind a stack of thick wooden crates. You covered his mouth as you pushed him flat against the crate, bringing your finger to your lips to indicate that he should be silent. He nodded as best he could.

Three pairs of footsteps echoed through the warehouse and you kneeled down to peer through the crack between two of the crates. When you realized who had just arrived, you cursed under your breath. It was Big Helga, a P8 brat with one hell of an annoying power. You wanted to avoid that confrontation at all costs.

The heavyset woman scanned the warehouse, her voice shrill and annoyed. "Where is that fool? I was promised a cute young man to add to my collection!"

You knew it was dark, but could she really not see his unconscious body stuck in the wall at the back of the room?

"Where is my cute young man?!"

With each word, her power shot up and you quickly stood up, your hands covering the boy's ears. She suckled in a large breath before a scream tore from her lips, shattering the windows and causing the walls of the warehouse to shake. You ground your teeth together in pain, feeling as if your eardrums were trying to evacuate your head. Even with you covering his ears, the sound still hurt and his hands shot up to cover your own, trying to find more relief.

Several painful minutes passed before she finally shut her trap, huffing loudly before turning on her heel and stomping out of the warehouse, her two goons hot on her heel. You waited a few more minutes until her aura disappeared completely and you released a groan, shaking your head. "Ah, what an annoying ass power! Fuck her power."

The boy frowned. "You're bleeding..."

Lifting your hand to your ear, you could feel blood on your fingertips. Your ears were ringing and pulsing painfully. "Let's just go before anyone else decides to show up, yeah?" You took a hold of his shoulder and started pushing him toward the side door at the back of the warehouse. The two of you walked in silence as you put distance between yourself and the warehouse, your fingers tapping away at the phone to arrange for someone to come and pick up Junji. Once you were confident that you had put enough distance between you for him to be safe, you spared him one final glance before ducking between two buildings just as he started to speak, but his words died on the breeze.

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You shuffled into the diner feeling annoyed, in pain, and pretty damn tired. Most of the Hoodlum Squad was nowhere in sight aside from Chiharu who sat at the table in the center, Yamato who was stuffing his face at the far, and Hikaru who was practicing pool at the back. You slinked over to the bar, practically falling onto the stool before letting your upper body crumble onto the surface.

Naomi frowned as she pulled a bottle of soda from the fridge, pouring it into a glass of ice. "What's wrong?"

"You look like this," Yamato commented before shoveling more rice into his mouth.

You lifted your body just enough to take a large gulp of the soda, enjoying the burn in your throat before sprawling out on the cold surface again. "I need a vacation."

Chiharu put his hand on your shoulder, settling himself on the empty stool between you and Yamato. "Rough day at work?" he wondered with worry in his voice, fingers lightly brushing next to your ear. "There's dried blood..."

"Really?" Yamato replied with surprise, his brows raised and spoon suspended in mid-air. "You must be losing your touch if people are making you bleed."

"I'm not immortal, ya know," you muttered tiredly, folding your arms beneath your head.

Naomi grabbed the bottle of painkillers she kept on hand before setting them beside you with her usual 'disapproving-mom-stare' that she had perfected after years of dealing with Yamato and Cobra. You thanked her softly, palming a few pills before tossing them into your mouth and washing them down with the rest of the soda. As the three of them talked, you thought back to the red-headed boy and the strength that had been in his gaze, even when he was scared. Who even was he? If he was a resident of Hoodlum territory, you would have remembered seeing him. Not everyone around here walks around with red hair and they certainly didn't have eyes like his.

"Y/N-san?" Chiharu called softly, not wanting to interrupt the heated argument Naomi and Yamato were currently having. His fingers tugged at the hem of your shirt, his eyes filled with worry.

You smiled, reaching up to ruffle his hair. "I'm fine, Chi, just tired." And then you stood up, tugging your wallet from your pants and tossing a few bills on the counter. "I'm going home and going to sleep for like a week. Farewell, peasants."

"Who're you calling a peasant, huh?" Yamato huffed, glaring at your back as you headed for the door, but you ignored him. "Oi!"

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Next

#high & low #high low #high and low #rude boys #rude boys p #chance encounters

[theatriscribe]

Guide to Getting Lost

I know I ignored this blog for a very long while, but uuuuuh have some Taz! I will hopefully write some more fic for this fandom in the next couple weeks, but I unfortunately can’t make any promises.

(Edit: Also on AO3!!)

Aubrey just wanted to have a nice picnic with her girlfriend. 2410 words. Aubrey/Dani.

Aubrey was making an actual plan for once, so you absolutely knew she was being serious.

That didn’t mean Duck sounded all that pleased when she called him at 11:30 at night, saying “So Duck, hypothetically, if someone wanted to take their partner out for a picnic-“

“They should hypothetically do that when it’s not the literal middle of the night, Aubrey,” Duck said.

“Technically it’s half an hour before midnight! But seriously Duck,” Aubrey said, “can you call me back tomorrow? I’m sorry I called so late, but I was worried I might forget it-”

“Say no more, say no more,” said Duck. “I get it, Aubrey, believe me. But can I call you back tomorrow? We’re doing Chosen Brunch with Indrid, and it’s like. you know how you feel when you bring your boyfriend back and all your cousins start making fun of him?”

“…Did that happen when you brought Indrid home?” Aubrey asked.

“Haven’t done that yet, but this is basically the same thing, so… I’d like that not to happen, and it’s probably more likely to happen if I show up sleep-deprived,” Duck said.

Aubrey tapped her fingers against the wall. “I know I’m guilty of this too, Duck, but… y’know that things won’t always turn out the way you worry they will, right?”

“ ‘Noted, Aubrey.” Duck yawned. “Pick this up around noon?”

“Sure!!” Aubrey said. Besides, this gave her more time to try and plan out what she wanted to make for the picnic. Only problem was, she hadn’t really been cooking for herself for a while. But she probably would be fine, and besides, Dani deserved better than microwavable veggie nuggets.

And on an unrelated note, why didn’t they have dinosaur-shaped veggie nuggets? There had to be a market for white moms giving the “healthier” option to their kids. And didn’t she, a vegetarian, deserve to have her food be dinosaur-shaped on occasion?

They probably sold dinosaur cookie cutters somewhere around. If she could figure out how to make veggie nuggets, she could very easily make some herself. Veggie nuggets had to be easier than the normal meat chicken nuggets. After all, it wasn’t like you had to process the meat yourself. They’d probably be made out of seitan or something.

And then it was 1:30 in the morning and Aubrey took a break from reading veggie chicken nugget recipes and recoiling from the nearly textual whiteness of the food bloggers to realize still hadn’t showered, so she went to go do that and halfway back to her room, whispered “shit” as she realized she hadn’t. actually… picked food to make for Dani.

Clearly the internet wasn’t helping. Okay, what did her parents usually bring on picnics when she was younger? She remembered a bucket of fried chicken at one point. That wouldn’t work now, obviously. Neither she nor Dani ate chicken… but there were vegetarian versions. There was hope.

Okay, entree settled. What else did people eat on picnics? Probably about the same things people brought to a barbecue. Potato salad, corn on the cob… corn on the cob was probably not too easy to pack in a picnic basket, but if she cut the corn off the cob and put it in a little Tupperware container, it might be easier. But was it worth it to bring a ton of barbecue food to a little secluded wooded alcove? Maybe she’d just have to have a barbecue date with Dani on another time. There was no way that Ned, Duck, and the other residents of Amnesty Lodge weren’t going to crash it immediately, but she wouldn’t have a barbecue date any other way to be perfectly honest.

But that still didn’t answer the question of what exactly she was supposed to pack for Dani. So at 2:30 AM she finally decided on the classics: grilled cheese, a thermos of tomato soup, and chocolate chip cookies.

At ten AM, she woke up and her fingers were halfway to dialing Duck’s number before remembering he was at chosen brunch probably, and immediately went back to scrolling through food blogs to find recipes for homemade tomato soup. She picked three that looked promising, and started the process of making one later around one o’clock when Duck finally called her back and told her various places he’d taken people when he was younger.

Aubrey tried the three different recipes for tomato soup through the next week, before finally deciding that they all tasted pretty good and choosing the first one she’d happened to click on. As a result, she didn’t have time to make any kind of chocolate chip cookie research beyond the lid of the oatmeal canister, but that was a project for another time.

“You’re excited,” Dani said, as Aubrey came practically bounding up to her.

“We’re going on a picnic!” Aubrey said, holding out the picnic basket.

Dani just smiled in response, a tiny flash of her fangs, and Aubrey was pretty proof-positive this was what happiness felt like.

Of course, they then proceeded into the forest and everything immediately fell apart.

Her first warning sign should’ve been that Duck had given her a hand-drawn map, rather than a trail map. He’d walked the path where they were supposed to go with her, too, but she hadn’t exactly been walking these trails for the past twenty years.

They’d ended up just following the trail they were on for a while.

Which was fine, for the time being. For not being the nature-y one of the relationship, Aubrey kept noticing cool things, like a little patch of soft moss on the side of a tree, or a dew-covered spiderweb. Of course, that meant she wasn’t paying a very large amount of attention to the map.

As they came to the third tree that looked suspiciously similar to the one they’d passed a while ago, Aubrey finally admitted, “I don’t know where we’re going.”

The two of them walked in silence for a minute. Aubrey noticed that a little fern was starting to crumple in on itself, and took a second to pluck off a dead leaf, and silently hoped it might get better.

Then Dani realized, “I think I might know the place you were thinking of,” and found the place in the next twenty minutes while Aubrey had been leading them in circles for the better part of an hour.

Aubrey, even though she could feel herself starting to sweat through her t-shirt, resolved to try not to be a jerk and just sit down and enjoy the picnic with Dani.

And then it started raining.

“Are you kidding me,” was the first thing out of Aubrey’s mouth as the few raindrops she felt fall on her head quickly turn to a torrential downpour.

“Sorry, Aubrey,” Dani said, smiling to her apologetically. “But at least we found it for next time,” she said, holding out her flannel in an attempt to shelter Aubrey from the rain.

Aubrey sighed. Her soggy hair was beginning to hang in her face. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I just… I wanted to enjoy a nice nature walk with you and be a cool girlfriend, and all I managed to do was fuck it up. Again,” she said. She wrapped an arm protectively over the picnic basket in the vain hope that maybe the sandwiches wouldn’t get soggy.

“Well,” Dani said, “one of the best ways to grow moss is in the rain. So we might still have a nature opportunity after all.”

As they wandered back down the path to duck under a little alcove they’d found between two big rocks, Aubrey sighed. “I know you’re not upset with me, and I appreciate it,” she said quietly. “And I’m not asking you to be upset with me, like… by any stretch of the imagination, but… I just wanted to do something nice for you. I just feel like you’re the one who plans most of our outings, you’re the one who asked me out, and… you’re so put together and I’m not,” Aubrey finished. “I wanted to be the responsible one for once, and all I gave you was a long, sweaty walk and soggy sandwiches, and-“

Aubrey looked away, not wanting to meet Dani’s eyes. As she looked out at the woods they’d just been wandering through, Aubrey noticed the fern they’d passed earlier was spreading out it’s leaves a little.

“That fern’s starting to perk up,” Aubrey said. She’d forgotten what point she’d been trying to make. The “almost about to cry” she’d been feeling ever since it started raining was no longer an “almost”.

She felt Dani’s hands on either side of her face.

“Aubrey, you know why I love you, right?” Dani asked.

Aubrey wanted to say something, but staring into Dani’s eyes, dark brown with flecks of gold, whatever thoughts she’d formed were quickly forgotten.

“I’m not sure you do,” Dani said, rubbing her thumb over Aubrey’s lips. “I love you, Aubrey, because you care so much. I love you because you notice little things, and because you want to do so much at every moment, and I’m not going to pretend it’s hard to follow you sometimes, because frankly it is. It feels like I’m running after a force of nature. But I love how you care so much about everything, and I don’t think that’s all part of your ADHD. But I know that’s what you’re scared about, right now. And I love you,” she said, pressing a kiss to Aubrey’s lips, “so much,” another kiss, “and I think that part of you is beautiful.”

Well, if Aubrey was having trouble forming words before, it was even harder with her brain short-circuited. Awfully rude of Dani, that, if she was being perfectly honest.

So Aubrey just responded by kissing Dani back, and feeling the sensation of Dani’s old flannel under her hands, even of both of them were drenched at this point, and god, she didn’t know why Dani thought Aubrey was somehow good enough for her but she was never going to stop trying to be everything Dani thought she was.

After a moment, Aubrey broke the kiss because she’d remembered to ask what kind of fern that was, to which Dani responded that she wasn’t certain but she’d look it up when she got home, and almost kissed Aubrey again before Aubrey thudded her ankle on the picnic basket and remembered it all of a sudden.

“We should probably at least eat the soup before it gets cold,” she said, and Dani pressed one last kiss to her cheekbone before nodding.

So then Aubrey opened the thermos (thankfully the soup was still warm), and poured the soup out into the cup, and smiled at Dani’s look of surprise at the steam coming off of it.

“It’s really warm,” she said, taking a sip and promptly sticking her (presumably burnt) tongue out.

“Now who’s the impatient one?” Aubrey said, tucking a strand of hair behind Dani’s ear. “Doesn’t Mama have a thermos?”

Dani looked lost in thought for a moment. “If I’m being honest, I assumed that was just another Earth thing where people act like something is warm and it really isn’t. Like radiators,” she mentioned.

“…Dani, radiators are warm. They literally produce heat,” Aubrey said.

“What? Nobody ever told me these things!” Dani said. “It doesn’t exactly come up when most of our appliances are powered by magic!”

Aubrey laughed as she started explaining how a thermos cup worked, at least from what she remembered her dad telling her when she was about fourteen and asked him. She paid attention to Dani’s smile the whole time she spoke.

As they talked, Aubrey got out the Tupperware she’d kept the sandwiches in. “I can’t believe I had a mental breakdown over soggy sandwiches for nothing,” she mentioned in between explaining thermoses. The two of them ate the sandwiches down to the crusts, then dipped the crusts in the now-cooling tomato soup.

Dani talked a little more about fire magic, how there were specific people to enchant things like ovens and most people only knew enough magic to just turn the oven on, and sometimes not even that. As Dani continued, they passed the remainder of the thermos between them. Aubrey knew it shouldn’t send sparks down her fingertips every time she remembered that drinking from the same cup as Dani was basically a kiss, given that she’d just been making out with Dani not an hour prior, but she just couldn’t help it.

As she picked up the basket and prepared to get up and head home, she noticed Dani was looking up. “The sun’s almost setting,” she said. “The stars will be out soon.”

“That’s true,” Aubrey said, taking Dani’s hand and squeezing it.

“We have a blanket,” Dani said, “and I don’t think it’s supposed to rain anymore. We could sleep out under the stars.

“What, no sleeping bags? No carefully planned snacks?” Aubrey asked.

Dani smiled back at Aubrey. “Well, someone inspired me to be more spontaneous,” she said.

Aubrey kissed her again. “You definitely still owe me trail mix, though,” she said.

Dani walked back over, and the two of them spread the blanket out and laid down on it, looking up at the sky and watching it fade from blue into black. Eventually, the stars began to come out and Dani rolled over to rest her head on Aubrey’s tummy. Aubrey ran her fingers through Dani’s hair and sighed. One of the rare few times she didn’t feel insecure about the width of her waist was when people were using her as a pillow.

“Do you have constellations in Sylvain?” Aubrey asked Dani, as her fingers caught a snarl in Dani’s hair.

“We have some, yeah,” Dani said. “Most of them were based off of creation myths, like the twins who fell into the heart of the quell, or the one about the wolf-woman.”

“I don’t think I’ve heard those before,” Aubrey said, and for the next hour or so, Dani told Aubrey about stories she’d heard growing up. In return, Aubrey told her as many Greek myths as she could remember, which wasn’t a huge amount, because it didn’t really matter, because a little while later, Dani was asleep.

As Aubrey folded the blanket over her and her girlfriend, she resolved that they would have to take a camping trip at some point.

#The Adventure Zone #Taz amnesty #Dani taz #Aubrey Little #Danbrey

[angstmatsuscenarios]

how about...? Jyushi, Todo and Oso get trapped under rubble after an earthquake

Hope you like this, sorry for the delay!

Warning for natural disasters and language under the cut:

It seemed like it happened in the blink of an eye.

One minute Osomatsu was minding his own business, reading his manga in the living room with the knowledge that his two youngest siblings—the only other people at home—were upstairs.

And the next…catastrophe.

It started with a mild tremor that Osomatsu tried to pass off as nothing—they’d had smaller earthquakes before.

But before he knew it the ground was shaking violently, pitching the house back and forth so harshly that pictures flew off the walls and shelves toppled over, crashing to the floor and scattering books in every direction. Glass broke, wood splintered, and in his panicked state Osomatsu had no idea where it was all coming from.

He bolted to his feet, realizing it was a stupid thing to do in the midst of what might have been the worst earthquake Akatsuka Ward has ever seen, eyes wide in alarm as they darted around the room. Cracks formed in the walls, splitting them, and he could see cracks in the ceiling spreading rapidly as well.

Was the house collapsing???

Jyushi and Totty, Osomatsu thought frantically, attempting to run toward the stairs. I need to get them…we need to get out!

Every step felt futile as he struggled to reach the doorway of the living room. The ground shook so tremendously that it knocked him off balance, and he crashed face-first to the floor with a heavy thud.

“Fuck!” he hissed as he tried to pull himself up again, only to be bowled over again.

“Osomatsu!!”

“Osomatsu-Nisan!!”

The frantic shouts of his little brothers bellowing from upstairs lit a fire under him, and he scrambled back to his feet and rushed toward the staircase. He clung to the banister, staying rooted to the bottom of the stairs. There was no way he could climb up them.

“Guys!” he shouted above the horrendous cacophony of noise that surrounded them. “Are you okay?”

Todomatsu appeared at the top of the stairs, as well as Jyushimatsu, clinging to each other with terrified expressions. Todomatsu had tears rolling down his cheeks.

“Don’t move!” Osomatsu ordered. “It’s too dangerous, stay there!”

Todomatsu gave a frightened whimper as he nodded, and Jyushimatsu clutched his little brother more tightly.

It felt like the earthquake lasted for hours, when really it was probably only a couple of minutes. When it ground to a halt at last, the house fell eerily silent. The calm after the storm, or so it seemed.

As soon as it seemed safe Todomatsu tore himself away from Jyushimatsu and barreled down the stairs, practically throwing himself at Osomatsu in a fierce hug. He sobbed uncontrollably, clinging to Osomatsu like he’d never let go.

“It’s okay…it’s okay.” Osomatsu tried to sound soothing despite his own shaking voice as he hugged Todomatsu back. “You’re safe…”

Jyushimatsu bolted down the stairs too, wrapping his arms tightly around his brothers. For a moment all seemed still.

And then they heard an ear-splitting crash.

Todomatsu gasped, gripping Osomatsu. “What was that?”

“It…it came from the kitchen!” Jyushimatsu stated.

“Let me go look.” Osomatsu swallowed hard as he removed himself from the hug and stepped carefully toward the kitchen.

A massive chunk of the ceiling had fallen, blocking the doorway and covering the entire room with a layer of dust and broken plaster. Osomatsu gaped, horrified.

Before he could react an identical crash could be heard from the front of the house, and Todomatsu let out a high-pitched scream. Osomatsu’s stomach lurched as he rushed back.

“Oh shit…”

The ceiling was caving in here, too—a huge chunk had fallen and now blocked the front door, too. The house was collapsing around them.

“What do we do?!” Todomatsu fretted hysterically. “We need to get out, but we’re trapped!”

“The house is breaking!” Jyushimatsu lamented fearfully. “The exits are all blocked!”

“I need to think…I need to think…” But before Osomatsu could concoct a plan the ominous sound of splintering wood split the air again, almost deafeningly. Cracks spiderwebbed their way across the ceiling and down the walls.

“Oso!” Todomatsu wailed, and Jyushimatsu started bawling.

Osomatsu’s heart skipped so many beats he had no idea how he didn’t go into cardiac arrest. They needed to escape, now. How though?!

Suddenly Osomatsu heard that now too familiar cracking noise above them. His gaze darted up to find the roof buckling—right over his brothers!

“Look out!” he screamed, lunging forward. In one shockingly swift motion he’d jumped and pushed his younger brothers out of the way, just in time.

The ceiling snapped above, and as Osomatsu gaped in horror tons of heavy plaster and wood started hurtling toward him. He could only hear his brothers’ frightened screams before—

Everything went black.

Osomatsu sat bolt upright, gasping for air, his eyes searching the room frantically. Jyushi, Totty, where are you?! Fear coursed through him like icy water rushing through his veins.

It took several seconds to realize he was in his room, and that it was the middle of the night. All around him his brothers were asleep. Osomatsu sagged with relief when he spotted Todomatsu and Jyushimatsu among them, safe and sound.

Osomatsu gulped, heart still pounding. It was a dream…just an awful dream. It’s fine, everything’s fine, your house is still standing and your brothers are okay…

But his heart refused to slow down.

Osomatsu sighed, flopping heavily back against his pillow. It had been a nightmare…one of the worst ones he’d had in awhile where he hadn’t been able to save his brothers the way he’d wished. He had these dreams frequently, about not being able to be the best big brother they deserved and letting them down. Or, in cases like this, saving them only to have something bad happen to him.

And then where did that leave everyone?

I swear to you, he thought, that if anything ever happens to one of you I’ll save you—even if it risks my life. I’m sorry, guys…I hope you don’t think I’m a shitty brother. I’m trying…

This internal rambling lasted only a couple of minutes before exhaustion claimed him again, and he drifted into a troubled, though fortunately dreamless, sleep.

#osomatsu san #osomatsu san angst #osomatsu #jyushimatsu #todomatu #earthquakes #natural disaster #nightmares #tw nightmares

[chubigans]

My First GDC: 2018

It has become something of a yearly ritual where I get an email from Mike Dailly over at YoYo Games asking if I’m going to GDC, and I respond with my reason of why I’m not going. I’m in the middle of game development, I’m in the middle of something, literally anything that was going on right at that moment was enough for me to skip another year of GDC. Maybe next year, maybe in two years, who knows.

This year was different, in that I didn’t really have any particular reason not to go. My game was fully released, I was in a good place as far as patches go, I had money in the bank. This was the year. I had to commit. I knew if I didn’t go this year, I would never go.

It’s not that I didn’t want to go, it just became easier to say no. That came hand in hand with a lot of things in my life, I think. At that moment, I had reached a breaking point. I was tired of letting myself be the only reason I wasn’t going to do something.

Yes, I responded, I am absolutely pretty sure I’m going this year, maybe, and I’ll let you know at the end of January for sure, or maybe early February.

I’m not particularly out going, though I’ve been making hard strides to do so over the last few years. The hard part of going to a convention, I would soon realize, is that I didn’t have a team to bring along with me. It has mostly just been me and freelancers over the last few years. Someday I’ll change that and open my own studio. I had hoped GDC was going to be helpful in showing me that path.

One of the first talks I attended, Failing to Fail: The Spiderweb Software Way, seemed a great place to start. I had somehow misread it and assumed it was talking about the Spiderweb Solitaire game on the Xbox 360 that I really enjoyed playing. Looking it up now, there’s not even a game that exists that is called “Spiderweb Solitaire” nor can I find anything like remotely resembles the game in my head so I am at a complete loss as to why I thought any of this.

“A lot of you probably don’t know me or any of these games” Jeff Vogel said as his array of titles was displayed on the projector, most of which were hardcore RPG games. That’s a weird path to a Solitaire game, I wonder how that happened? It was a fantastic talk, with lots of humor and self-depreciation. He commanded the room easily, which was completely full, many of whom who knew exactly who Jeff Vogel was, unlike me apparently. It didn’t matter, as by the end of the session, I was a fan. It was a great start to my GDC week.

On Tuesday I had a chance to go to the Humble party, as well as the NoClip documentary that was showing later that night with a live Q&A with Danny O’Dwyer. The doc seemed like a natural place to be- I really enjoyed NoClip’s docs, I wanted to meet Danny, and the social interactivity would be low. Perfect.

Outside on the street, I was frantically looking for the entrance to the screening room. The entire center is a maze of doors, stairs, exits and entrances, and by the time I had found it I had wasted twenty minutes. As I walked up to the door, someone exited. “Session is full.” I couldn’t believe it.

I stormed back to my hotel room, mad that I missed it, angry at myself for being so stupid in not finding the entrance fast enough. There was still the Humble party, something that I likely wouldn’t have gone to if I had been able to go to the screening. I felt that all-too familiar feeling of having myself be the one reason not to go somewhere. In a sense, maybe I was going to the screening so I didn’t have to be left with this decision of not going somewhere because I was too afraid to do so. What was I scared of, really? No one knew who I was, and if it’s not something I liked, I could leave easily. I grabbed my coat, opened the Lyft app, and somehow found myself on the way to a party.

“Yo welcome to the Folsom Street Foundry we got a ton of pizza so be sure to head to the back and grab some slices!”

As I shifted through the crowds I became acutely aware of how I looked: head darting back and forth, aimlessly wandering through people, not really with any purpose or direction. Immediately I looked to see if anyone was doing the same thing, and there were. I went up to introduce myself to them.

There is a certain relief when the first thing I tell someone is that I don’t normally do these things and I’m a bit nervous and they respond in the same way. If you don’t go to parties, you don’t go and meet people who also don’t go. It was only at GDC where you felt like you were surrounded by equally nervous people who were in the same position as I was: doing something out of their element. I talked to one person, then three, then five and ten. It got easier and easier.

“Hey we just got another batch of pizza delivered everyone, so come grab a slice or three because we have way too much pizza! Seriously let’s all go to town on this pizza, don’t be shy!”

What I found to be the easiest thing in the world to enjoy were videogames, which were stationed all around the hall. The power of videogames can always bring a group of people together, and I found myself having a great time with several people who had never played a game of Gang Beasts/Duck Game/Nidhogg and other games on the multiplayer circuit. I did a high five with someone when we beat a Cuphead boss, explained the dynamics of Duck Game to three other people who I easily steamrolled over but kept it close to make it exciting, and lost miserably in Gang Beasts, one of the few games that seems to level the skill level even if you’ve played it for years. None of these experiences were particularly new to me, but the added dynamic of strangers in a new city playing and having a fun time was a warm comfort blanket in a cold city.

“Last Call is going to be at 11:30 everyone, and please be sure to grab a few slices of pizza because we still have plenty! Let’s all enjoy some pizza!”

I did another round of aimless walking and found a random sofa with two people sitting in it, one of whom looked like Rami Ismail. Is that him? That totally looks like him! I quickly grabbed my phone, pulled up his twitter profile, and compared a photo of him. I am 75% sure its him. 85%. Did more photo searches. 95%.

He got up, and I asked, hey are you Rami? Keep in mind that whatever the correct way to pronounce Rami I did the opposite of, that I am 100% sure and I will never look it up to find out otherwise.

“Yes I am!”

“Hey, my name is David Galindo! I made Cook, Serve, Delicious!”

“What?”

“COOK SERVE DELICIOUS!” (I would typically tell people who I am immediately because it was an easy way to remind myself that I wasn’t some kind of fraud/phony and that I actually deserved to be there, a nice side bonus of impostor syndrome).

“Oh yeah!”

“I loved Luftrausers!” (I love Luftrausers).  

“Thanks!”

“This is my first GDC!”

Someone came up behind Rami and wanted to introduce him to a friend of his. My time was up, but I was happy. I did it. I started to walk away.

“Wait wait!” Rami told them. He turned back to me and gathered his thoughts for a quick second. “What are your goals for GDC?”

My goals? I literally had no other goals that night but to talk to someone, let alone talk to an industry star. I found myself answering, “to learn,” which is just about the most generic stupid thing you could hear anyone say.

What surprised me the most is that Rami didn’t want to brush me aside, he wanted to make sure we finished our conversation before talking with someone else. That meant so much to me. I got a firsthand account on why Rami is so loved in the industry.

“Look I’m going to be real with you all: we ordered way too much pizza. Please, please take some, we have to throw it all away after tonight. Please! We have so much pizza! Please!!”

The next night, around the time Rami was getting his GDC Ambassador Award in front of a massive audience, I was inside the screening room for the last film in the festival, called Insert Coin. I was determined not to miss this one and showed up about an hour early in the rain. I struck up a conversation with some people in line, which had the added benefit of being in a mostly empty lobby. In a city where a quiet space was about medium yelling to the person next to you, the silence filled the room. I never appreciated a quiet conversation more.

As we ushered into the theater, I saw a crowd of people come into the theater. Oh my gosh, I told the person in front of me, do you know who that is? It’s Ed Boon!

She didn’t respond immediately. “The creator of Mortal Kombat!” I followed up. “Oh, yeah, of course!”

The documentary was not finished, and we only saw three segments with some temporary audio mixes, but it was immensely entertaining. Setting up the rise of Midway in the coin-op arcade glory days, the film talked mostly about Mortal Kombat and NBA JAM in the segments we saw, with some of the familiar beats (Mortal Kombat: corrupting today’s youth?) and some truly astonishing revelations I had no idea about (NBA JAM made one billion dollars in revenue…in quarters.)

The lights went up and questions were asked to some of the Midway people in attendance. I was somewhat unfamiliar with the history of NBA JAM, which was the main focus, and I missed out on that golden era of arcade gaming. But I was determined to ask a question…something, anything. I quickly put together some ideas in my head.

“Ok, a question in the back?”

Something to do with the rise of arcade violence? No, that was covered already. What about other NBA games? I didn’t know enough to reference anything. I wanted to ask a question, but finding an actual good question was harder than I thought.

“Ok how about you?”

Maybe Mortal Kombat? What about its competitors? Think of some…Eternal Champions, Primal Rage, yes, those games make me feel like I know what I’m talking about. Ok, I can do this!

“And time for one last question…yes?”

“Yes, how did y’all feel at the time about competitors nipping at your heels with cookie cutter games like Eternal Champions and Primal Rage?” (Nice, I nailed it.)

“Hah, actually we have a Primal Rage dev here today!” He points to a man in the front row, who immediately looks behind him to see who asked that question.

There are so many more stories I have to share, like the moment where, upon finding out that PixelJunk Monsters 2 was announced, I made a dash to the Chunsoft booth which turned out to be a conference room, slid some money under the door and tweeted about it, and by the end of the day ended up getting a hands on private demo by none other than Dylan Cuthbert himself (due to the tweet, not the money). I am confident that I was the biggest PJM fan in attendance, and if they didn’t know it then, they knew it when I was asking a ton of inside ballpark questions as the demo was played.

Another story is being able to meet some people for the first time and tell them how much they changed my life. Meeting up with friends that I only knew online but finally met that week. Meeting new people, but not enough new people, something I’m already working out in my head for next year. Feeling a renewed sense of purpose, of loving game development. Experiences I’ve never had before. Moments I’ll never forget. Moments just for me.

For that one week, game developers took over the city. That’s what it truly felt like, with our badges flopping around all over downtown. You could not be in the downtown area without passing by a fellow convention-goer.

As the conference ended and I left one last party that Friday night, I made a quick detour to Super Duper Burger to grab a shake. I walked back down to my hotel one block away, and I saw many people walking but no one was wearing a badge anymore. No one was left from the conference, no one was walking to any sessions, there were no other events or parties to attend, and I suddenly felt very alone, back to how it always has been. Maybe I should change that.

[illumynare]

Red vs Blue Fic: I’ll Tell You My Sins and You Can Sharpen Your Knife (2/4)

Summary: Locus understands why Kimball would want to keep him alive long enough to testify at Hargrove’s trial.

He doesn’t understand why the Reds and Blues would volunteer to protect him.

Parings: None. Warnings: Canon-typical language, tons of drippy angst.

Notes: Also available on AO3!

Yes, this is now a three-chapter story. BECAUSE LOCUS ANGST IS SO MUCH FUN.

Huge thanks to @littlefists for letting me use her pancakes headcanon!

In the days that follow, Locus finds a strange sort of peace.

It's like when he walked away from the Communications Temple. He was wrapped in the same sort of hazy numbness that came with bleeding out. After so long fighting the idea that he was a monster, it was a relief to finally accept it. To know there was nothing he could do to redeem himself.

It's like that now. It's the same lesson: he's a monster, a weapon, a suit of armor and a gun. He can't be anything else.

At least now he's going to be wielded by somebody better than Felix.

#

The Reds and Blues seem to understand they have broken him. Because the way they treat him changes.

It starts the morning after his nightmare. After Agent Washington releases him, Locus slinks back to his room, ashamed of his outburst. He wonders if he'll be told to sleep outside the base, where he can't disturb them. It would only be fair.

But at 7:02 AM, Caboose pounds on his door. When Locus staggers, bleary-eyed, to open it, Caboose grabs him by the arm and says, "IT IS TIME FOR BREAKFAST."

Too dazed to protest, Locus lets himself be dragged into the kitchen, where Tucker is making pancakes and Agent Carolina is frying bacon. Agent Washington is staring at the coffee pot as it bubbles, while Simmons carefully chops a pineapple into perfect squares, and Grif steals pieces.

Locus knows that the two teams have breakfast together regularly. He's never dared intrude before. But now Caboose shoves him into a chair, Tucker sets a plate of pancakes in front of him, and Agent Washington wordlessly pours a giant puddle of maple syrup onto the pancakes.

"Aw, man, did you have to ruin them?" Tucker grumbles.

"They're better that way," says Agent Washington.

"Who wants to share some whipped cream?" Donut calls from the pantry, and Simmons shrieks, "Donut! NO!"

Locus doesn't see the scuffle that ensues. He's eating the pancakes slowly, bite by bite. They're soft and fluffy, tangy with buttermilk and sweet with syrup. He hasn't had pancakes like this—or generous puddles of syrup like this—since before the army, before he was Locus, before—

Everything.

Later that day, Tucker—for the first time—demands to spar with him.

"Lemme see if you know how to do anything with that sword," he says. "Bow-chicka-bow-wow."

Locus stares at him, not sure what the final exclamation means.

"Ugh, you're so boring," says Tucker, and with a flick of his wrist, the glowing blade shimmers into being. "Let's do this."

Tucker is better than Locus expected. This is not saying much, and Locus soon disarms him. What's really a surprise, though, is that though Tucker whines and grumbles, he doesn't give up. He listens while Locus demonstrates the techniques he learned from the Sangheili who trained him, the movements he worked out for himself while trying to defend that colony of refugees.

Tucker listens, and he tries, and Locus is surprised at how quickly he learns.

"Heh, I guess you're not too bad at this," says Tucker, when they finally stop for a break.

Again, Locus stares at him. Because there's no malice in the words, no backhanded reminder that Tucker is better, more whole—

as Felix would have reminded him, always DID remind him

—even though it's true. Locus may be better at fighting with the sword, may have learned from the Sangheili how to wield it, but Tucker is the one who deserves it.

Tucker is the one who became a hero, and Locus is ashamed that while he was on his quest, he had started to think that he could be one too.

The strange kindness doesn't stop there. The next day, Donut reproaches him about his pores and demands to give him a facial. The thought of letting anyone touch his face like that make Locus feel sick, but he has no more right to refuse anything.

"Very well," he says.

Donut's fingers are surprisingly strong and gentle as he exfoliates Locus's face and then rubs lotion into it, thumbs pressing against his cheekbones as he works the youth-enhancing, spot-removing seaweed gel into Locus's skin.

"The first rule of facial scars is that you always moisturize," says Donut, and Locus—holding himself tense and still in the chair through sheer willpower—feels a strange fluttering in his chest.

Nobody has ever talked about his scar this way before: as it was normal. As if he hadn't ever been tied down and screaming while an Elite cut the pattern of his helmet into his face, as if he hadn't woken up after being rescued and known that he was—

broken, a weapon, a suit of armor and a gun

—forever marked by the war.

Donut is marked too. Locus hasn't asked what caused the spiderweb scar on his face, the drooping eyelid and ragged ear, but he'd guess it was a close encounter with a grenade.

Marked, but not broken.

The pressure on his face is no longer so alarming. Locus shuts his eyes, and doesn't protest when Donut finishes with his face and immediately moves to massaging his shoulders. The contact is strange and frightening and more than he deserves, but it's also comforting. Locus relaxes, and for once he doesn't think of Felix as he hums in contentment, as Donut laughs and says, "See, I knew my fingers could get you moaning."

And then, the next day.

The next day, Locus is sitting alone on the couch in the rec room when Agent Washington walks in.

At once, Locus gets up to leave. Ever since arriving, he's tried to avoid him; he knows his presence can't be welcome to the man he stalked and nearly killed. The cautious glances that Agent Washington gave him proved it.

"Uh, don't go," says Agent Washington, and Locus freezes.

It's the first direct order he's been given.

He sits back down. He feels the couch shift as Agent Washington sits down beside him, but he doesn't dare look up at him and meet his eyes.

He can't stop remembering the way he whimpered and shook like a frightened animal. The soothing pressure of Agent Washington's hands on his shoulders, and he hates the impulse that made him leave his room without armor this morning. He doesn't want anyone to see his face right now.

"So, uh." Agent Washington shifts awkwardly. "You sleeping okay?"

"Acceptably," says Locus, wishing he could flee the room.

He'd had another nightmare the night before, but it was just the normal kind: blood and the faces of his victims. He didn't scream when he woke, and he went back to sleep eventually.

There's another pause. Then he hears movement, and he tenses reflexively—

Agent Washington's hand presses against the back of his neck.

For a second, Locus can't breathe. This doesn't make sense. The pressure is too warm, too gentle, too kind. It's not necessary. He wasn't screaming, he doesn't need comfort—and he certainly doesn't deserve it.

But Agent Washington doesn't move his hand.

Locus reminds himself: this isn't real. Of course he doesn't deserve to be treated kindly. But none of the kindnesses shown him over the last few days have been real.

The Reds and Blues are better than Felix, are going to use him for better purposes, but they are still going to use him.

That's the only thing you can do with a weapon.

The thought should be a comfort. It certainly makes Locus feel less confused; it calms the panic that made him want to flee, and his shoulders finally relax.

But there's still a sick feeling at the pit of his stomach. Because this firm, relentless kindness that is not quite kindness—it's very familiar.

In the days after he killed the alien, his CO started calling him Locus. The whole team followed suit, calling him nothing but Locus, hey Locus, and the nickname hurt—but less each time he heard it, and sometimes there was a camaraderie that wasn't there before, as the other soldiers slapped his shoulders and compared kill-counts. They loathed his cowardice in wanting to spare the alien, but he had proved himself one of them when he killed it.

After he and Felix split from Siris—after they took their first mercenary contract—after they accepted Hargrove's offer—all those times, Felix was different with Locus. Not kind. But he rolled his eyes less, used the word broken less. He was more inclined to brush up against Locus, lean against Locus, heave a sigh and put a hand on his shoulder. Because Locus had proved himself. Had obeyed. Had chosen Felix.

It's like that now.

Locus chose the Reds and Blues, he obeyed them, and so they are rewarding him.

Those are the rules for taming a wild animal: a lure and then a reward for every act of obedience.

Some part of him still wishes that he could have been more. Could have been human. But Locus knows he has to live with his choices.

He closes his eyes and promises himself that when they give him orders, he will be ready.

#

But a week passes, and there are no orders.

None that really mean anything. Carolina says, "Spar with me," and he walks away with several bruises and an even greater respect for her. Caboose says, "I made you cookies," and Locus dutifully chokes down the charred lumps until Agent Washington storms into the kitchen and tells him to stop. Tucker says, "Hey, check these new photos," and Locus sits for an hour, wearily agreeing that every one of Tucker's children is "fucking awesome."

They don't need Locus for such trivialities. They must mean to use him for another purpose. And now their kindness is starting to make Locus feel an overwhelming dread.

Because they can't possibly be rewarding him any longer. He's definitely done nothing to earn this treatment. They can't be just waiting to use him after the trial. They have to know that once he's given testimony, he'll most likely be executed.

They must be preparing him. They must be trying to ensure that he is loyal enough, dependent enough, to do whatever they ask.

And what might they be planning to ask if they think he needs this much preparation?

One night, as he cleans Red Team's guns, Sarge grins at him and says, "Say, you ever think about how easy it would be to accidentally fire one of those at Grif while you're cleaning it?"

Locus freezes. Because there could be no accident: he's always careful to unload the guns before he cleans them. So what Sarge is suggesting, is maybe ordering—

hey I'm orange just like your last partner

—and he can't do this, Locus thinks numbly, he promised himself he would be obedient but Grif was the first and maybe only one of them to trust him, he can't do this.

He can't refuse either. He can't make himself say the words, question the order. He can't do anything.

For a few endless moments, Locus just stares at Sarge and thinks, no, no, please no.

Then Grif yells from the other room, "I HEARD THAT," and ambles in with a six-pack of beer, looking completely unconcerned.

"Hey, you want one?" he asks, holding out a can.

And Locus finally remembers that when he was pretending to work for the Federal Army, he'd heard Sarge say many times that he was going to shoot Grif as soon as he got him back, and he hoped those terrorist bastards didn't manage to kill him first.

It was a joke, Locus realizes, and the relief is so overwhelming that it takes him several moments to realize that Grif is still holding the can of beer in his face.

It was a joke. But there will come a command that isn't.

That evening, Locus can't sleep. He keeps remembering all the people he killed, and it was easy then to pull the trigger, swing the knife, but now the memories make his hands shake.

A long time ago, he thought that killing made him one of "the good guys." Then he thought it made him a soldier. Now he knows that it makes him a monster.

Locus will kill for the Reds and Blues. He knows this. He doesn't have it in him to refuse them. And he owes it to them, surely, to at least be a useful monster.

He still doesn't want to.

He wishes they would tell him what he's going to do, exactly what kind of monster he'll have to be. The wait is tearing his mind apart. He's never felt dread like this before—

Except he has, when Hargrove started hinting about a "delicate political situation." There was a moment, before Hargrove completely explained what their contract entailed, when Locus felt a sudden surge of dread. He'd already done all kinds of mercenary work, killed many people who didn't really deserve it, but there were still some lines he hadn't crossed.

Deep down, Locus had realized that Hargrove was going to ask him to cross those final lines. But he'd looked to Felix for reassurance, and Felix had nudged him and grinned and then said to Hargrove, "Yeah, we're interested."

Locus had snuffed out that last flicker of his conscience quickly enough. But it had been real. And it was the same dread he's feeling now: the fear of what will I become?

He presses his palms over his eyes.

It's not like that. The Reds and Blues are different, better, and whatever they ask him to do—even if it's horrible—will be right.

But he knows exactly what Felix would say if he were here:

It's exactly like that, partner. Everybody's got an agenda. And everybody needs a weapon. Good thing you've got that freaky obsession with orders, huh?

"I'm trying to do the right thing," Locus mutters.

Yeah, funny how for you the right thing is always doing what somebody says.

It's true. Locus can't deny it.

But back on Chorus, Agent Washington told Locus he was a monster. Whatever he's planning to make Locus do now, it has to be better somehow than the orders Hargrove gave him.

Locus clings to that thought through the following week, even as sleep becomes rare and he starts flinching whenever anyone says his name.He's tries to hide it, but the Reds and Blues notice anyway.

That has to be why they're suddenly always around him, always talking to him, always touching him. They see that he's afraid to follow orders, and they're trying to make sure of him. It's driving him mad, and just when he thinks he can't stand it anymore, Agent Carolina drags him away from the others, to the little hill outside their base.

"Take some time alone," she says. "You probably need it."

She turns her back on him, moving to guard his position. Locus stares at the back of her helmet and thinks that she's found a way to make even isolation a kindness. And he's grateful.

That evening there's another movie night, and this time Locus sits on the couch, Caboose on one side of him, Grif on the other. Locus sits rigidly between them, not eating the popcorn, not even trying to watch the screen.

He tells himself, again and again, that these people are not Hargrove. They are not Felix. He has to trust in them.

That has to be enough.

But it turns out all his fear was pointless. When he draws his sword and kills people a few days later, it's not because anyone gave him a direct order.

It's because Charon finally finds them.

#rvb #rvb fic #samuel ortez #rvb locus #locus #red vs blue #my fic: i'll tell you my sins #my fic

[reveriesforyou]

Wuthering Heights and Billie Holiday

Hi sweet beans!💘 this is a soft and fluffy Tom imagine about him wanting to show the reader how much she means to him! I wrote this based on a request sent in by my bby, L🌸 L, I hope that this cures at least a little bit of your melancholy! I love you with my whole heart, my dear☁️ Wuthering Heights and Billie Holiday The night before had been wondrous. Each time their fingertips graced the other’s skin, it was as if they were being molded even closer together. Tom was at a loss, he could barely believe how much larger his heart had grown since he’d met her. Everyday that Tom spent with her, the feeling of his heart expanding in a fashion similar to the Grinch’s after he’d observed the celebration of Christmas when he’d stolen all the Who’s presents would overwhelm him. Tom was so positively filled to the brim with love that it was dripping off of his frame. Tom looked down at her sleeping form, all curled into his chest, and he was absolutely spellbound. Her skin looked luminous and soft, and Tom could feel her chest gently moving up and down each time she took a breath. Long lashes laid against her cheeks, and glancing down at her lips, Tom’s own mouth began to feel exceedingly lonely. He longed to press them against the rosiness of her mouth, but declared that after the night they’d had, she’d be needing to rest. He moved swiftly out of the bed, as to not wake his sleeping girlfriend. Tom slipped on the pair of his sweats that resided in her drawers, and pulled on his shirt from last evening. Walking into her kitchen, he scrawled out a messy note telling her to go back to sleep because he’d be home with breakfast and coffee soon. Creeping back into her bedroom, Tom laid the note down on his side of the mattress and adoringly smoothed her hair back to place a tender kiss to her forehead. “I’ll be back soon, my love.” Tom murmured, pulling her blanket a bit higher to tuck her in. He grabbed her car keys and headed out to the florist a few streets down from her apartment. As Tom drove, he chuckled when he recalled their conversation a few nights before. His girlfriend had gone out with her friends and had drank a bit too much wine, and when she came back to him, she was completely wasted. One of her friends had called him, asking if he’d be able to come and pick her up because there was absolutely no way that any of them were alright to drive themselves. Tom obviously agreed and when he’d gone to get her, she flung herself into his arms, pressing wild kisses onto any spot of bare skin on his body that she could find. Her arms were like vines, constricting Tom with all the love she had to offer. When he’d finally gotten her outside and into the car, Tom did his best to buckle her in when she poked him softly on his cheek and leaned in once again for a hug. “You know,” she slurred, “I think you’re the love of my life and I wish on stars every day that I’m yours.” In the morning, it was clear to him that she’d been too intoxicated to call to mind her statement, but it had been on Tom’s mind ever since. He knew that she was the love of his life as well, and he was confused as to why she wasn’t aware that he felt the same. Tom decided that as soon as he woke up, it would be his mission to make her realize that he felt the same. Tom was out and about for about an hour before he returned home to her. In his arms, he cradled a massive vase of flowers, two coffees, and a box of baked goods and a bag of bagels. There was never a time when he’d been more envious of Peter Parker’s sticky spiderwebs to help him carry goods. When Tom made his way back to her room, he discovered that she was still blissfully snoozing. Sliding out of his sweats and yanking off his T-shirt, Tom burrowed back underneath her bedspread, eager to hold her in his arms again. Maneuvering her as slightly as he could, Tom could tell that she wasn’t going to stir. She was passed out, and Tom laughed. He supposed that their previous activities really had tuckered her out. The night before, the couple had ventured out to a quaint, French bistro that she had spotted one day on her drive home from school. She’d mentioned that she thought it looked sweet, and Tom knew of her growing fascination with France, so he thought it would be fun to take her there on date night. When they got there, the place was even better than she could’ve hoped for. Twinkly lights in the dimly lit cafe, along with soft, french tunes drifting in through carefully hidden speakers, and flowers littered room. Tom had to admit, the place was pretty dreamy. Beyond the place being dreamy, she was radiating beauty that night. Her hair had been softly curled and she’d taken the time to carefully apply a red lipstick that went perfectly with her red dress, and the heels she wore made her legs appear endless. She smelled as if she’d rolled around in the field of daisies and when she smiled at Tom, she looked so pure and happy, that Tom would give her anything in the whole, wide world because he knew that she deserved it. Passion and romance drifted throughout the bistro, and as soon as they’d gotten home, Tom had nearly torn her scarlet dress off, he was so keen to dive between the smooth skin of her thighs. After nearly five orgasms, they were finally too sleepy to continue. They’d kissed each other delicately on the mouth before she had picked up her copy of Anne Sexton’s collected poems. She read to him until her eyelids fluttered shut and the book dropped to the floor. After another half an hour in the morning, Tom awoke to a changed position. He was laying on his back and his girl sat atop him, smiling down at him. “Good morning sleepyhead,” she greeted, leaning in to kiss him good morning. “Oh, I see how it is,” Tom smirked, gripping her thighs and tossing her onto her back so that he could press tons of kisses to her exposed skin. “You get to sleep in, but not me?” She wiggled around beneath him, giggling as Tom softly bit into the skin of her collarbone, “Exactly.” She halted her movements and glided her hands into a lock behind Tom’s head, “thank you for getting breakfast.” “Course, darling.” Tom moved off of her and offered her a hand, “to the kitchen,” he said, once she took his hand. Truthfully, Tom wouldn’t have minded sharing the meal in her bed, he really just wanted to show her the bouquet of flowers that he’d purchased for her earlier in the day. When they reached the kitchen, her eyes widened and she immediately jumped into his arms. Tom stumbled for a moment, her reaction taking him by surprise, but nonetheless, Tom spun her around the room. “Thank you, Tom! I love them so, so, so much.” She kissed him quickly before moving to examine the flowers more thoroughly, “I don’t know how you can stand to be so thoughtful and wonderful all of the time, Tom. Doesn’t it get exhausting being you?” She teased. Tom wandered around her kitchen, doing his best to get closer to her ever-moving figure, “I just really love you,” he said, once he’d finally caught her and snared her with his arms around her waist, “you’re the love of my life, and who am I if I don’t show it?” She turned to face him, dragging her bottom lip between her teeth, “You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on.” Tom took her face between his palms and moved his mouth to hover over her own. “Wuthering Heights?” He pondered. Moving her head up to meet his lips, “No, Pride and Prejudice,” she uttered before bridging the gap between them. “I love the looks of you, the lure of you. The sweet of you, the pure of you. The eyes, the arms, the mouth of you. The east, west, north, and south of you.” Tom breathed as soon as they broke apart. “Billie Holiday,” she smiled, moving to her head to kiss the palm of Tom’s hand. “Dance with me,” Tom ordered, breaking away from her to fiddle withhis phone to put Billie Holiday’s ‘All of You’ on. “Everything will be cold by then,” She started, reaching for her coffee, a hot blush spreading across her cheeks. “I don’t give a damn about the coffee, love. And besides, it’s probably already cold.” Tom said, taking ahold of her waist. “Tom,” the girl whined, “I don’t know how to dance, it’s embarrassing.” Tom shushed her with a kiss, “Just hold onto me, yeah? I’ll show you how.” With that, he guided her arms into their proper place and he piloted their slow dance across her kitchen. As Billie Holiday’s voice coaxed her into relaxation, her eyes shut and she laid her head to rest on Tom’s shoulder. “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” She whispered into Tom’s chest. He raised a quizzical brow at her, “Wuthering Heights?” Tom questioned. Standing up on her tiptoes, she nodded and brushed her lips against his, “uh huh,” she agreed as they swayed together, knowing that there was no place in which they’d rather be.

#tom holland imagine #tom holland fluff #tom holland fanfiction #tom holland #tom holland oneshot #tom holland x you #tom holland x reader #tom holland smut #peter parker fluff #peter parker imagine #peter parker fanfiction #peter parker #peter parker oneshot #peter parker x you #peter parker x reader #peter parker smut #spiderman imagine #spider man #spider man homecoming

[snails4martianrights-blog]

Thailand

^ The late King Bhumibol, whose passing has spawned an odd competition between every kind of establishment as to who can create the largest and goldest shrine to him

So I went to Thailand a couple weeks ago. Thailand is a fun little place in Asia, and it’s got that dirty and wild side that people know about, as well as a lot more. The citizens seem a little tired of tourists, but most of them are still nice. They’ve got Buddhist monks, they’ve got clothes cheaper than dirt, they’ve got bars and parties, they’ve got wild dogs and buffalo-looking creatures wandering around.  The taxis and most other businesses seem to take the law as a vague suggestion, and haggling is definitely accepted. You could live in Thailand for ten years on $25, 000 (and decently well). Just because of the slow, leisurely pace of this trip, instead of telling this chronologically, I’ll break this up into areas of interest.

Tuk-Tuk Drivers

A Tuk-tuk is an open taxi, and mostly they seem to operate outside of the law, not that anyone seems to care. Pretty much it looks like someone affixed a small sitting area to the back of a motorcycle and started zooming around, picking up passengers for dirt cheap. It’s a super fun way to get around, and you haven’t really experienced the best of Thailand unless you take one somewhere.

ONE SERIOUS WARNING: Beware taxis, tuk-tuk drivers, and mostly anyone else who speaks really good English and offers to take you to where you want only after you go to his friend’s tailor shop, or bar, or whatever else. Some people here will attempt to trick you into going really far distances and basically extorting you into paying a bunch of money or buying stuff you don’t want or else you’re stranded. I had one douche tell me how much he wanted me to pay in the middle of a tuk-tuk ride, and when I refused because it was a ridiculous sum, he told me I had to pay twice as much and wouldn’t let me get out. He drove wildly into oncoming traffic multiple times, and refused to let me and my friend out. Don’t let suspiciously overly friendly people take advantage. Also, tuk-tuk rides have no set price, so you should give them what you think is fair. This being said, don’t let this turn you off to tuk-tuk rides. Weaving through oncoming traffic while trying to hold on to a plastic woven spiderweb, trying to escape the madman who is also in control of your fate at top speed is part of the experience.

The Streets of Bangkok

Bangkok is so hot that people wake up at around 11 and start opening their stores and restaurants for business around noon.  Don’t expect to get anything done if you’re any early riser. The streets in Bangkok have all manner of crazy food and cheap clothes. There are a bunch of people sitting in piles upon piles of cheap wholesale goods, bare feet, just chilling. Some of the side streets have cramped mall-like areas that you can barely walk through because people have so much random stuff to sell. And they pretty much just unload it from a truck on the sidewalk and sit on it all day unless someone wants to buy it.

^ A covered area we walked past with a ton of Buddhas

^ Random street with a waterway going through the area. They have a lot of water cutting through populated areas.

^ Pretty sure this is a spirit house, and as I understand it, these are for tricking evil spirits into think that this is the real house so they won’t enter.

^ Another spirit house, I think, or maybe some kind of shrine?

^ MOAR SPIRIT HOUSES (possibly for sale?)

^Buddhist temple

^ Close up of those cool ass windows

Toilets

Toilets are super weird in Thailand, but maybe that’s just in the city areas. I don’t know, but I do know that many of the ones I encountered said things in multiple languages like “Do not flush toilet paper! Throw it away! This is for the environment.” Often, the toilet paper would be located outside the stall. They also seem to do this thing where they have a full shower head inside the toilet stall. I am not sure what to make of that.

Songkran Water Festival

This was seriously the best time.

^ Street full of people shooting each other with water guns (there’s more of them than it looks like)

I had been eager to come here during this particular time of year because apparently what had started as a demure celebration of sprinkling small amount of water on people’s heads had slowly evolved.  It gets to be about 110 degrees by noon on a normal basis, so someone had the great idea to turn this several-day holiday into a national water gun fight.

By the time my friend and I walked down a random side street and were finally ambushed, my friend just looked at the ground in somber acceptance. Four joyful dudes poured a bucket of water on us and then wiped baby powder on our faces- marking us. *horror movie sound effects*

(I, meanwhile, had totally forgotten what was happening so I screamed when water was poured over me. It was awesome.)

After a few days, our hostel had towels on every floor and every person we came in contact with was perpetually soaked. One day, as I was flaunting some bright red underwear beneath my saturated pants, my travel buddy became vengeful. “That’s it,” quoth he, “Tomorrow we buy super soakers.”

Notes about this: If you intend to go during this time of year, bring MANY changes of socks. The participants will also shoot you if you are on a motorcycle or tuk-tuk. It’s SUPERFUN for the first two days but then you might find yourself wishing you had more socks, and sprinting past kindergarteners with tiny bowls of water who pour it ONLY on your feet which would be one thing you’ve been trying to keep dry the whole time. You will also be unprepared at some point and get soaked by an entire street of cheering folks. Some will pour entire buckets of ice cold water on you- or more disturbingly, they will pour very warm water on you. People also do drive-bys from truck beds.

Pattaya

^ The people of Pattaya are also participating in Songkran

We only spent one day here, but I immediately understood why this is a tourist area. There are a lot of water sports like jet skiing, some sort of parachute-gliding over the water, boats. They have bars and parties galore, nice country lanes, nice and very cheap houses mostly owned by expats, cool Buddhist temples, laser tag, elephant rides, crocodile farms, the “Floating Market,” and more. The only down side is that everything is way more expensive here than in Bangkok. I’d recommend a vacation here if one were planning to go to Thailand for a short visit.

^ The Beach in Pattaya

^ Water sports are available on the beach of Pattaya

Aquarium

So there we were, waiting to get into the aquarium in the basement of a mall in Bangkok,  when a lady approached us and asked if we wanted to skip the line. It sounded weird, but it turns out there is a deal where you pay a lot more money and you can not only skip the line, but go inside the fish tank.

 They took us into an area where you can see over the top of the tank and gave us wet suits to put on. Then they lowered this weird helmet onto us that was basically a reverse fish bowl. We got to walk in the tank with sharks and stuff, but we were also part of the entertainment, it would seem. Everyone outside the tank was watching us and taking pictures, so I got to find out how awkward it is to be a celebrity for four minutes. Just smile and wave, boys. 

^ Above the tank, waiting to go in

^ Getting in the tank

^People were behind us watching us watch sharks from behind the glass

^ Us becoming aware that we had an audience

Thai Massages

If you like being in massive amounts of pain, these massages are for you. Thai massages are famous, and I’m sure they do a lot of good for a person’s body, but wow. They get in there deep, and you won’t like it. If you need some serious attention, they’ll give you that. Even a simple pedicure or foot massage will probably hurt quite a bit the first time you go. And probably a few time after that as well. I didn’t really like them because of how painful they were, but personal preference I guess. Mr. Superman (I’ll talk about him later) from our hostel seemed to think they were part of the true Thai experience. I do not have any pictures of my agony. 

Food

Thai food is damn good. The noodles, the smoothies, Tom Yam soup, Pad Thai, you’ve got to try it all. Tom Yam is a spicy lemongrass and shrimp type deal, and you need to try it. I always loved that soup, but it’s even better from actual Thailand. The smoothies are great and come in huge variety, and are usually freshly made right then and there. I loved the coconut ones close to the hostel, but I also tried one from a small café that involved dates and papayas. 

There is one food that reigns above all the others: The Durian. This fruit is very smooth in texture, and when exposed to air, at first smells faintly of mild onion, and then over time develops the odor of a ripe fermented gym sock. It is banned from most stores and establishments. It is inexplicably popular and looks like this;

^ The spikes are there to warn you.

Obviously I was super excited to see one and hold it. The lady selling them was amused and a man standing behind me in the uncropped picture looked thoroughly disgusted. This fruit divides a nation.

Animals

In addition to these soon-to-be mentioned creatures, I also saw a water buffalo looking thing that I don’t know what it was, and also a bunch of wild dogs. If someone could tell me what the water buffalo thing is, I would be grateful. 

Anyways, first we went to a zoo in Bangkok and saw a nearly not fenced in enclosure with a super low concrete wall housing some bears. Naturally we went to go see the bears. He is bathing in this small pond like a hot tub for bears, and you can only see his head. He was pretty close to us but then some douche thought he was into celebrating Songkran and started shooting him with water. He moved. :(

We also went to a tiger park in Pattaya where they raise baby tigers by hand and treat them almost like cats. Large, dangerous cats. You can go inside the cage and pet them, but you can only do what the keepers tell you. 

^ Us petting a “small size” tiger

^ “Small size” tigers playing in their pool

^ Lil baby guy that they kept bottle feeding

I also got to ride an elephant and that was cool.

^ This was fun and we got rings made of elephant hair that are super tough and feel like plastic. I wish I’d asked for the elephant’s name, though. 

Hostel

The place we stayed was a hostel, which was interesting because we got to see a bunch of interesting other travelers, including this one super weird dude that I called Mr. Superman who spoke enough English to give us some recommendations and walked around naked a lot and had some crazy outfits for his raves that he went to. He wore a superman outfit at one point and coated his hair in blue dye and sparkles, hence the nickname. This place was called “Boxpackers Hostel” and it was clean, had a good hang out area, and they served breakfast. I’d say hostels are good for meeting strange people, or if you really want to save money because they are not expensive. Some people say they are dangerous or weird but I think it depends on which one. 

[ghozt1ng-blog]

Mysteries of the Q Files

Chapter 8: Tracking

The autumn air was nice and crisp as Naomi walked along the dirt road where Samantha had been kidnapped. She wouldn’t admit it to Trick, but she was getting a sense that there was something off with the town. It felt so much better to be out here in the woods than in town. It did not make a ton of sense to her, because she had always considered herself more of an urbanite. However, unlike Trick she didn’t think it was due to people acting and looking like they might still be in the 80s, or some hellish version of the 90s. No, there was an odd feeling in town, like something was trying to crawl under her skin.

Naomi set aside those confusing thoughts, they wouldn’t help her with her current task. She was going to try and find out just where the lichen had come from and where it went after taking Samantha. It helped considerably that the FBI agents had been willing to bring her along after she had lent to them her considerable brain and deduction skills. At the school she and Agents Miles and Conturbatio had looked at the remnants of the girl’s bathroom where Carly had been kidnapped. The smell of burnt hair was long gone, and Naomi figured it was a smell that followed the wolf around wherever it went. The wall had not been torn open so much as collapsed and pulled down. That was an odd thing to realize. Furthermore, the wolf had dropped from the nearby school theater to land next to the bathroom.

She had discovered this by paying attention to the noticeable indents of wolf paws in the cement. The beast probably weighed a ton by the looks of how it smashed the cement down hard enough that cracks sprang from the imprints like spiderwebs. From what Naomi could figure from how the rubble lay about, spray patterns of rocks, and the paw prints, the lichen had jumped down from the theater, pulled down the wall, snatched up Carly and then leaped back into the air. Agent Miles had said that the theory might be plausible, but Conturbatio acted on it immediately. He went up himself to the theater’s roof and inspected for paw prints. He found plenty of what looked like claw marks and another set of paw prints.

“So our perpetrator is someone who can transform at will,” he had told them afterwards. “And they most likely used the theater as both and entry and exit point. This might confirm your suspicions of the animal being a lichen, Naomi.”

She had beamed with pride at that comment, albeit more internally than where the agents could see. No use in showing what you were really thinking to others. It made you a terrible analyst, and in Naomi’s experience most people couldn’t interpret emotions very well either. That’s what made Trick a fun anomaly to be around.  

“How could this lichen though know that Carly was indeed there? If Carly was even its target at all,” Agent Miles asked.

“Trick said that we had to find a bathroom with the best wifi access,” Naomi remembered. “He asked me based on the map I had which place would get the best reception. Just going off of wall width and stationing of most practical wifi receivers, this was the only place in a reasonable distance from her class.”

“That was what lead you here,” Miles asked with a sense of confusion.

“Brilliant,” Conturbatio breathed. Naomi felt like his nickname of the Sphinx was fitting him more and more. “This requires an intimate knowledge of the victims, their surroundings, and more. I think Trick is right that whoever did this was close to these girls.”

By the time he had returned from the roof, it was confirmed that Carly was indeed the girl who was missing. The agents looked a little concerned at that. Naomi did not feel so much concerned as elated. She and Trick were actually hot on the trail! At least… They were starting out on the right foot. She knew that with some more data she could put them right where they needed to be. That brought them to the scene of the first kidnapping.

Though the paw prints were a little more worn than what Naomi would have liked, there was a lot to tell from them. The officers who had escorted the two agents and Naomi to the site of the party pointed out the bush where Ashley and Alex said they first saw the monster. Behind it were the prints and Naomi’s confirmation of the creature’s awesome jumping ability.

“Look here,” she said, gesturing to the indents in the earth to the two agents. “There is a very slight skid mark, but there nonetheless. That compounded with the fact that the dirt is built up a little more on the paws’ left side. Finally, the indents are just as deep, if not deeper than those we found at the school. The lichen jumped to get behind this bush. And it jumped from somewhere among those trees.”

“I know that we’re trying to be correct with our terminology and everything, but can’t we just say wolf? I keep thinking we’re talking about a kind of moss,” Agent Miles complained.

“The lichen was able to jump up to the roof of the school’s theater,” Naomi continued as though Miles hadn’t interrupted. “Which is probably near four stories high. If these prints are anything to go off of, and the distance of those trees there, the lichen probably launched itself from the middle of the tiny grove.”

Agent Sphinx motioned to one officer and told him to go searching and then he said, “That is fascinating, and might help us eventually uncover the wolf’s identity. However, our most pressing matter should be finding out what happened to those two girls. Naomi, where do you think the wolf went? The police couldn’t figure it out.”

The remaining officer, who looked more like he should be a mall cop than someone out working a beat, harrumphed at Conturbatio’s statement and made to walk off.

“Officer, I’m going to have to talk to you after a second, so don’t go,” Naomi told him. The man gave her a startled look and tried to edge away, but the Sphinx called him back. “Now when I follow what remains of the tracks, it’s a good thing that the lichen is so heavy that its tracks are not too damaged by the blunderings of the local police. They stepped everywhere. Also their dogs… But here, there’s a scraping and it looks like the lichen flew off from here, and northward.”

“Erm… We needed to give the dogs a chance to pick up the scent,” the man mumbled apologetically.

Naomi ignored him for the most part. “Judging by the distance and that the lichen is marked by the smell of burning hair, it makes sense that the dogs would have a had a hard time following the it. Is there a stream or any kind of water over that way?”

“Well… eh, there is a streamlet that breaks into three,” the officer admitted. “The hounds did pick up something, but we also think that the water might have covered the tracks. Honestly, we thought that the whole story was too farfetched. I still think it is… But the bathroom… The school....”

“The unbelievable can be hard to accept when it comes knocking on our front door,” the Sphinx said. “But just because we have a hard time grasping it does not in any way undermine its reality. No, here I think we have something concrete to go off of: The beast is very strong and it plans its attacks. This means that it might be even more dangerous than just some ravenous beast. It shows real intelligence, which I think we can also take some comfort in.”

“How’s that,” the officer barked.

“Because there is a greater chance that the girls might still be alive,” Conturbatio insisted. “Otherwise, it would have just killed them messily on the spot like any kind of wild animal. But we need greater vigilance if we are going to catch it.”

“I’ll make sure that we get pictures of everything around here and take some samples,” Miles said. “I’ll send what we get back to HQ for testing and analysis, see if they agree with Ms. Naomi here.”

“I think that’ll be  a complete waste of time,” Naomi answered.

“A waste or not, that is the procedure for proper investigations, and we won’t be allowed to continue this one if we break protocol,” Miles sniffed.

“She’s right,” the Sphinx said, getting out a camera. “Let’s go and see if we can find any other tracks.”

As they walked through the woods Naomi asked the policeman, “Sir, can you tell me when the school was built?”

“Why would you want to know that?”

“I think it might be helpful to the case.”

“Fat chance of that,” the man almost sneered. “Look miss, I don’t think you should be out here. This is highly irregular after all. This whole case makes my skin crawl and I still think it’s somewhat hoaxy.”

“Please answer her,” the Sphinx said as he snapped some shots. “I find her to be a great asset to this case. Her observations are refreshing and she might be onto something, even if you can’t see it yet.”

The officer now looked thoroughly disgruntled but he finally said, “The school was built in the early 60s, height of the Cold War and everything. It was small and quickly became outdated. In ‘87 it was given an overhaul and finally completed in ‘92. That’s how we got the new theater and everything. Especially the gym. Damn fine gym, that one.”

“Was there anything peculiar to the original design,” Naomi asked.

“Not really,” the man mused. “Except that since it was built at the height of the Cold War it was supposed to weather most of a nuclear blast. Ha! That’s before people smartened up and realized that a nuke doesn’t take no prisoners!”

“Doesn’t take any prisoners,” Naomi muttered. “Well, that might explain a few things.”

“You’re a really odd girl, you know that?” The policeman said with a sideways glance.

Once Conturbatio and Miles had taken all of their pictures and they had located extra paw prints in the woods, they were off towards the town again. The officers stayed behind to chase for more prints leaving the house. Both men looked disturbed at the notion, but dutifully went out in the woods. Naomi lounged in the back of the car as the Sphinx drove.

Miles suddenly asked a question. “Naomi, why did you decide to come along on this case? I understand that Patrick is a troublemaker and felt bored or needed to prove something, but what about you? You are a good student, you don’t cause regular problems, so why start now?”

Naomi thought about it for a moment and then replied, “Why do you want to know?”

“Just so I can better understand all of this. Understand that all of this goes against protocol and by all rights any other agent would have you locked up for interference.”

“So why haven’t you?” Naomi fired back.

Agent Miles groaned, but the Sphinx answered, “I wanted to see what you had to contribute. I know that both you and Patrick are problem solvers in your own ways, and that you wouldn’t come here just because. I had a hunch, and it paid off.”

“I haven’t done anything because as you just heard it from the horse’s mouth, he thinks your antics are cute,” Agent Miles pouted.

Naomi chuckled a little and then fell silent. After a few more minutes she answered the question.

“Trick said that I needed an adventure. I had him try to convince me that this could be one, and he did an adequate job. And so, on my own hunch, I came with him. I want to put my knowledge and skills to the test in an impossible situation.”

“And you’re sure it’s not because you like Trick,” Miles suggested.

Naomi gave her a flat stare through the rearview mirror.

I am so sorry for the late posting!!!

#mysteries of the q files #q files #SORRY I'M A DAY LATE #AAAAAAAh #my stories #My writing

[readbookywooks]

In Latitude 47 degrees 24' and Longitude 17 degrees 28'

IN THE AFTERMATH of this storm, we were thrown back to the east. Away went any hope of escaping to the landing places of New York or the St. Lawrence. In despair, poor Ned went into seclusion like Captain Nemo. Conseil and I no longer left each other. As I said, the Nautilus veered to the east. To be more accurate, I should have said to the northeast. Sometimes on the surface of the waves, sometimes beneath them, the ship wandered for days amid these mists so feared by navigators. These are caused chiefly by melting ice, which keeps the air extremely damp. How many ships have perished in these waterways as they tried to get directions from the hazy lights on the coast! How many casualties have been caused by these opaque mists! How many collisions have occurred with these reefs, where the breaking surf is covered by the noise of the wind! How many vessels have rammed each other, despite their running lights, despite the warnings given by their bosun's pipes and alarm bells! So the floor of this sea had the appearance of a battlefield where every ship defeated by the ocean still lay, some already old and encrusted, others newer and reflecting our beacon light on their ironwork and copper undersides. Among these vessels, how many went down with all hands, with their crews and hosts of immigrants, at these trouble spots so prominent in the statistics: Cape Race, St. Paul Island, the Strait of Belle Isle, the St. Lawrence estuary! And in only a few years, how many victims have been furnished to the obituary notices by the Royal Mail, Inman, and Montreal lines; by vessels named the Solway, the Isis, the Paramatta, the Hungarian, the Canadian, the Anglo-Saxon, the Humboldt, and the United States, all run aground; by the Arctic and the Lyonnais, sunk in collisions; by the President, the Pacific, and the City of Glasgow, lost for reasons unknown; in the midst of their gloomy rubble, the Nautilus navigated as if passing the dead in review! By May 15 we were off the southern tip of the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. These banks are the result of marine sedimentation, an extensive accumulation of organic waste brought either from the equator by the Gulf Stream's current, or from the North Pole by the countercurrent of cold water that skirts the American coast. Here, too, erratically drifting chunks collect from the ice breakup. Here a huge boneyard forms from fish, mollusks, and zoophytes dying over it by the billions. The sea is of no great depth at the Grand Banks. A few hundred fathoms at best. But to the south there is a deep, suddenly occurring depression, a 3,000-meter pit. Here the Gulf Stream widens. Its waters come to full bloom. It loses its speed and temperature, but it turns into a sea. Among the fish that the Nautilus startled on its way, I'll mention a one-meter lumpfish, blackish on top with orange on the belly and rare among its brethren in that it practices monogamy, a good-sized eelpout, a type of emerald moray whose flavor is excellent, wolffish with big eyes in a head somewhat resembling a canine's, viviparous blennies whose eggs hatch inside their bodies like those of snakes, bloated gobio (or black gudgeon) measuring two decimeters, grenadiers with long tails and gleaming with a silvery glow, speedy fish venturing far from their High Arctic seas. Our nets also hauled in a bold, daring, vigorous, and muscular fish armed with prickles on its head and stings on its fins, a real scorpion measuring two to three meters, the ruthless enemy of cod, blennies, and salmon; it was the bullhead of the northerly seas, a fish with red fins and a brown body covered with nodules. The Nautilus's fishermen had some trouble getting a grip on this animal, which, thanks to the formation of its gill covers, can protect its respiratory organs from any parching contact with the air and can live out of water for a good while. And I'll mention - for the record - some little banded blennies that follow ships into the northernmost seas, sharp-snouted carp exclusive to the north Atlantic, scorpionfish, and lastly the gadoid family, chiefly the cod species, which I detected in their waters of choice over these inexhaustible Grand Banks. Because Newfoundland is simply an underwater peak, you could call these cod mountain fish. While the Nautilus was clearing a path through their tight ranks, Conseil couldn't refrain from making this comment: "Mercy, look at these cod!" he said. "Why, I thought cod were flat, like dab or sole!" "Innocent boy!" I exclaimed. "Cod are flat only at the grocery store, where they're cut open and spread out on display. But in the water they're like mullet, spindle-shaped and perfectly built for speed." "I can easily believe master," Conseil replied. "But what crowds of them! What swarms!" "Bah! My friend, there'd be many more without their enemies, scorpionfish and human beings! Do you know how many eggs have been counted in a single female?" "I'll go all out," Conseil replied. "500,000." "11,000,000, my friend." "11,000,000! I refuse to accept that until I count them myself." "So count them, Conseil. But it would be less work to believe me. Besides, Frenchmen, Englishmen, Americans, Danes, and Norwegians catch these cod by the thousands. They're eaten in prodigious quantities, and without the astonishing fertility of these fish, the seas would soon be depopulated of them. Accordingly, in England and America alone, 5,000 ships manned by 75,000 seamen go after cod. Each ship brings back an average catch of 4,400 fish, making 22,000,000. Off the coast of Norway, the total is the same." "Fine," Conseil replied, "I'll take master's word for it. I won't count them." "Count what?" "Those 11,000,000 eggs. But I'll make one comment." "What's that?" "If all their eggs hatched, just four codfish could feed England, America, and Norway." As we skimmed the depths of the Grand Banks, I could see perfectly those long fishing lines, each armed with 200 hooks, that every boat dangled by the dozens. The lower end of each line dragged the bottom by means of a small grappling iron, and at the surface it was secured to the buoy-rope of a cork float. The Nautilus had to maneuver shrewdly in the midst of this underwater spiderweb. But the ship didn't stay long in these heavily traveled waterways. It went up to about latitude 42 degrees. This brought it abreast of St. John's in Newfoundland and Heart's Content, where the Atlantic Cable reaches its end point. Instead of continuing north, the Nautilus took an easterly heading, as if to go along this plateau on which the telegraph cable rests, where multiple soundings have given the contours of the terrain with the utmost accuracy. It was on May 17, about 500 miles from Heart's Content and 2,800 meters down, that I spotted this cable lying on the seafloor. Conseil, whom I hadn't alerted, mistook it at first for a gigantic sea snake and was gearing up to classify it in his best manner. But I enlightened the fine lad and let him down gently by giving him various details on the laying of this cable. The first cable was put down during the years 1857-1858; but after transmitting about 400 telegrams, it went dead. In 1863 engineers built a new cable that measured 3,400 kilometers, weighed 4,500 metric tons, and was shipped aboard the Great Eastern. This attempt also failed. Now then, on May 25 while submerged to a depth of 3,836 meters, the Nautilus lay in precisely the locality where this second cable suffered the rupture that ruined the undertaking. It happened 638 miles from the coast of Ireland. At around two o'clock in the afternoon, all contact with Europe broke off. The electricians on board decided to cut the cable before fishing it up, and by eleven o'clock that evening they had retrieved the damaged part. They repaired the joint and its splice; then the cable was resubmerged. But a few days later it snapped again and couldn't be recovered from the ocean depths. These Americans refused to give up. The daring Cyrus Field, who had risked his whole fortune to promote this undertaking, called for a new bond issue. It sold out immediately. Another cable was put down under better conditions. Its sheaves of conducting wire were insulated within a gutta-percha covering, which was protected by a padding of textile material enclosed in a metal sheath. The Great Eastern put back to sea on July 13, 1866. The operation proceeded apace. Yet there was one hitch. As they gradually unrolled this third cable, the electricians observed on several occasions that someone had recently driven nails into it, trying to damage its core. Captain Anderson, his officers, and the engineers put their heads together, then posted a warning that if the culprit were detected, he would be thrown overboard without a trial. After that, these villainous attempts were not repeated. By July 23 the Great Eastern was lying no farther than 800 kilometers from Newfoundland when it received telegraphed news from Ireland of an armistice signed between Prussia and Austria after the Battle of Sadova. Through the mists on the 27th, it sighted the port of Heart's Content. The undertaking had ended happily, and in its first dispatch, young America addressed old Europe with these wise words so rarely understood: "Glory to God in the highest, and peace on earth to men of good will." I didn't expect to find this electric cable in mint condition, as it looked on leaving its place of manufacture. The long snake was covered with seashell rubble and bristling with foraminifera; a crust of caked gravel protected it from any mollusks that might bore into it. It rested serenely, sheltered from the sea's motions, under a pressure favorable to the transmission of that electric spark that goes from America to Europe in 32/100 of a second. This cable will no doubt last indefinitely because, as observers note, its gutta-percha casing is improved by a stay in salt water. Besides, on this well-chosen plateau, the cable never lies at depths that could cause a break. The Nautilus followed it to its lowest reaches, located 4,431 meters down, and even there it rested without any stress or strain. Then we returned to the locality where the 1863 accident had taken place. There the ocean floor formed a valley 120 kilometers wide, into which you could fit Mt. Blanc without its summit poking above the surface of the waves. This valley is closed off to the east by a sheer wall 2,000 meters high. We arrived there on May 28, and the Nautilus lay no farther than 150 kilometers from Ireland. Would Captain Nemo head up north and beach us on the British Isles? No. Much to my surprise, he went back down south and returned to European seas. As we swung around the Emerald Isle, I spotted Cape Clear for an instant, plus the lighthouse on Fastnet Rock that guides all those thousands of ships setting out from Glasgow or Liverpool. An important question then popped into my head. Would the Nautilus dare to tackle the English Channel? Ned Land (who promptly reappeared after we hugged shore) never stopped questioning me. What could I answer him? Captain Nemo remained invisible. After giving the Canadian a glimpse of American shores, was he about to show me the coast of France? But the Nautilus kept gravitating southward. On May 30, in sight of Land's End, it passed between the lowermost tip of England and the Scilly Islands, which it left behind to starboard. If it was going to enter the English Channel, it clearly needed to head east. It did not. All day long on May 31, the Nautilus swept around the sea in a series of circles that had me deeply puzzled. It seemed to be searching for a locality that it had some trouble finding. At noon Captain Nemo himself came to take our bearings. He didn't address a word to me. He looked gloomier than ever. What was filling him with such sadness? Was it our proximity to these European shores? Was he reliving his memories of that country he had left behind? If so, what did he feel? Remorse or regret? For a good while these thoughts occupied my mind, and I had a hunch that fate would soon give away the captain's secrets. The next day, June 1, the Nautilus kept to the same tack. It was obviously trying to locate some precise spot in the ocean. Just as on the day before, Captain Nemo came to take the altitude of the sun. The sea was smooth, the skies clear. Eight miles to the east, a big steamship was visible on the horizon line. No flag was flapping from the gaff of its fore-and-aft sail, and I couldn't tell its nationality. A few minutes before the sun passed its zenith, Captain Nemo raised his sextant and took his sights with the utmost precision. The absolute calm of the waves facilitated this operation. The Nautilus lay motionless, neither rolling nor pitching. I was on the platform just then. After determining our position, the captain pronounced only these words: "It's right here!" He went down the hatch. Had he seen that vessel change course and seemingly head toward us? I'm unable to say. I returned to the lounge. The hatch closed, and I heard water hissing in the ballast tanks. The Nautilus began to sink on a vertical line, because its propeller was in check and no longer furnished any forward motion. Some minutes later it stopped at a depth of 833 meters and came to rest on the seafloor. The ceiling lights in the lounge then went out, the panels opened, and through the windows I saw, for a half-mile radius, the sea brightly lit by the beacon's rays. I looked to port and saw nothing but the immenseness of these tranquil waters. To starboard, a prominent bulge on the sea bottom caught my attention. You would have thought it was some ruin enshrouded in a crust of whitened seashells, as if under a mantle of snow. Carefully examining this mass, I could identify the swollen outlines of a ship shorn of its masts, which must have sunk bow first. This casualty certainly dated from some far-off time. To be so caked with the limestone of these waters, this wreckage must have spent many a year on the ocean floor. What ship was this? Why had the Nautilus come to visit its grave? Was it something other than a maritime accident that had dragged this craft under the waters? I wasn't sure what to think, but next to me I heard Captain Nemo's voice slowly say: "Originally this ship was christened the Marseillais. It carried seventy-four cannons and was launched in 1762. On August 13, 1778, commanded by La Poype-Vertrieux, it fought valiantly against the Preston. On July 4, 1779, as a member of the squadron under Admiral d'Estaing, it assisted in the capture of the island of Grenada. On September 5, 1781, under the Count de Grasse, it took part in the Battle of Chesapeake Bay. In 1794 the new Republic of France changed the name of this ship. On April 16 of that same year, it joined the squadron at Brest under Rear Admiral Villaret de Joyeuse, who was entrusted with escorting a convoy of wheat coming from America under the command of Admiral Van Stabel. In this second year of the French Revolutionary Calendar, on the 11th and 12th days in the Month of Pasture, this squadron fought an encounter with English vessels. Sir, today is June 1, 1868, or the 13th day in the Month of Pasture. Seventy-four years ago to the day, at this very spot in latitude 47 degrees 24' and longitude 17 degrees 28', this ship sank after a heroic battle; its three masts gone, water in its hold, a third of its crew out of action, it preferred to go to the bottom with its 356 seamen rather than surrender; and with its flag nailed up on the afterdeck, it disappeared beneath the waves to shouts of 'Long live the Republic!'" "This is the Avenger!" I exclaimed. "Yes, sir! The Avenger! A splendid name!" Captain Nemo murmured, crossing his arms.

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