#whatever remains redux

[anotherwellkeptsecret]

Whatever Remains: 532

Previous - Next - Beginning

Read more comics on my website! Support this comic on Patreon, where you can read ahead!

#my art #whatever remains #whatever remains redux #sherlock #sherlock holmes #johnlock #action #adventure #romance #noir #comic #pastiche

[winterwump]

🤍Taejin x Jihan Couple Headcanons: Part 1🤍

Author’s Note: 🚨THIS IS A MLM PAIRING, AND IF YOU DONT LIKE MLM SHIPS, KEEP IT PUSHING🚨 AND THERE ARE SPOILERS FOR A FEW PLOTPOINTS This is the Redux of the previous Headcanon list I made for these two. My lovely moot @kawaiiwitchalpaca requested this so here it is. AU2: Okay so the timeline for this part is windows of time that we don't see Jihan working at the hospital so keep that in mind!

ENJOY 🤍

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that these two had an immediate attraction to each other. Like it was an instantaneous kind of connection, though I think that Jihan would pass it off as a normal amount of tension one would have when meeting someone who they know is shady.

Jihan is oblivious because he, rightfully, has the mission at the forefront of his mind. But Taejin is laying it on thick ass hell, like painfully thick.

Throughout their “shifts” as “first responders”, Taejin is an ever-present figure, looming over Jihan, stealing glances and making short quips about Jihan’s performance. Jihan tries to remain oblivious to these quips but, there are only so many times one could hear a sexual innuendo and not react. And react he does, though he [Jihan] tries his hardest to cover by turning his face away from the taller man. To Taejin, this is the most fun he’s had in a while at “work” (I guess beating innocent ppl gets boring after a while lolol). ‘It is too easy making the new guy flustered’, Taejin would note to himself internally after making a rather on-the-nose *pass* at Jihan, much to the other man’s dismay(excitement) 

Prior to this interaction, Jihan has been psyching himself up to ask the other man about his intention, and because Jihan’s not a bitch, he made a scene during their break to drag Taejin away from the group that surrounded him. This little stunt earned the two of them stares of pure confusion from one half of the group, and blatant amusement from the other half. Once they were properly secluded, Jihan spat it out, as leveled as he could possibly be, before Taejin got a word in:

“What is your deal with me? What are you…like that?”

“Like what?”, Taejin inquired, his voice trailing off with a mischievous drawl.

“Don’t play dumb”, Jihan huffed- he was failing at keeping his voice calm. It was hard to maintain his phony Seoul accent when tensions were high, and God they were high what with them being so close together behind the row of ambulances. 

“Why do you keep..hitting on me?”

There was an obviously fake laugh given in response, “You’re just now realizing that I’ve been flirting? God, you really are oblivious!”

The instant Jihan heard the taller man laugh, Jihan’s eyes looked onto Taejin’s smug expression, he[Jihan] sucked in air harshly before speaking: “I knew you were flirting for a while, I’m new here but I’m not dumb.”

Maintaining his placid amusement in the face of Jihan’s obvious exasperation, Taejin decided to make the other man wait for a response - even if momentarily. Just to fuck with him, Taejin retrieved both a cigarette and a lighter and lit the stick with languid movements, watching Jihan’s now narrowed eyes as he[Taejin] to a drag. 

“So what now? You got me. What are we going to do about this situation?”

“We?!-”, Jihan started before cutting himself off abruptly. He had to calm himself down if he wanted this to work.

In the days prior to this confrontation, Jihan had come to the conclusion that he could be involved with Taejin if that meant getting close to his goal of revenge. After running his plan by Daniel, and getting a weary go-ahead, Jihan knew what the goal was. There was no way that he would let himself lose sight of why he was in the 1st Affiliate.

“We can do something about this, actually. We can be whatever you want us to be, just keep it between us”, Jihan finally replied sounding a semi-believable level of calm. Witnessing Taejin’s instantaneous expression change lit a tiny spark within Jihan, it made him[Jihan] a bit vindicated. Taejin was cute when shaken up:

“Oh? Really now? Whatever I want us to be? Well thank you for giving me the reigns.”

Yeaaaa, this is gonna be split into two parts. This, of course, is the first part! Think of this as set up to the actual relationship headcanons that are in part two. Hope y’all like this. BYE🤍!!!

#wumpuswrites #lookism #fandom #lookism headcanons #webtoon lookism #lookism manhwa #lookism fanart #lookism taejin cheon #taejin cheon #Taejin cheon lookism #lookism kwak jihan #kwak jihan #jihan cheon #lookism shipping #Lookism couples #lookism mlm #lookism daniel #daniel park #lookism webtoon #manwha #korean comic #korean webtoon #korean webcomic #korean webnovel

[probablyasocialecologist]

While there is a putative difference between Jeremy Hunt and Rachel Reeves, with the latter saying she would borrow to spend on capital investment, Labour’s commitment to reducing the national debt as a percentage of GDP over a parliament (like the Tories) means any difference is negligible. By extension, this means there is no real difference between the two main parties on the role of the state. Forget Bidenism redux, the strategy for whatever remains of British social democracy is to hope growth will magically return and that distributional conflicts will evaporate. Under conditions of low to no growth (which has now been normal in British politics for 15 years), we essentially have a one-party state which supports austerity and certainly doesn’t believe in Keynesianism. Any points of difference now consist in how Labour and the Tories would spend the proceeds of growth.   Emblematic here is Labour’s green prosperity fund. Initially, the party had committed to spending £28bn a year, every year, as part of a massive program of green investment. Now, however, the aim is to instead “ramp up” spending so it hits £28bn in the final year of Labour’s first term.  Remember that for Labour, just like the Tories, national debt needs to fall as a percentage of GDP after five years. In other words, resources available to the fund will have to come almost entirely from economic growth. And the basis of such growth that will fund a government programme which is, comparatively speaking, arguably bigger than Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act? Reforms to planning regulations. Does anyone seriously think that some new Barrett Estates on the green belt, however welcome, will generate £28bn in extra tax receipts by 2029? Even the most plucky Foxtons estate agent would struggle to sell that. Already the bare minimum for Starmer as a remotely progressive PM look implausible – forget about a programme of social home construction or interventions to reduce child poverty, let alone massive state-led investment in green energy.

#labour party #keir starmer #uk politics #austerity

[veliseraptor]

it's 150 words meme time. fewer options this time because I'd really really like to finish something in the near sometime.

the rules: send me up to three numbers from the list below and I'll write 150 words in the project(s) of your choice. go forth and go wild

1. Our lives together, Xue Yang said, and an awful feeling rose in him, anger and something more sour that he didn’t want to name as jealousy. He remembered that glimpse, hearing Xingchen’s laugh, Xue Yang taunting him, Xingchen’s glorious smile turned unknowing on a monstrous murderer. The boiling hatred he’d felt; the fury and the determination that he must save Xingchen from whatever dreadful fate Xue Yang had planned, and Xingchen would never need to know the nature of the beast he’d allowed into his life.

Xue Yang said our lives together and it made him think of three years about which he knew nothing. 

He realized that for all Xue Yang’s vicious words, he had never spoken in any detail of that time. There was his mention of a garden, his assertion that Xingchen had been happy, and that one brief goading allusion to a relationship that he didn’t want to acknowledge. Other than that…nothing. It would, he thought, be an easy weapon for Xue Yang to use against him, to rub Song Lan’s face in the knowledge of their – friendship, however false it had been. 

And yet there was silence there. 

That’s not yours, Xue Yang said, like memories were something he could hoard, possess, like a stolen sword or – or a piece of candy. 

Aren’t they? The thought came to him quietly. Didn’t your memories sustain you, for those years wandering, searching… (Walking Far From Home)

2. Vegas jerked his head. “Forget it. It’s fine.” 

It wasn’t, obviously it wasn’t, but Pete wanted it to be and was seriously tempted to just let it drop. It seemed like that would probably be dangerous, though. Vegas probably wouldn’t actually let it drop, just chew on it in his own head for days on end and be in a bad mood the whole time. Only he had no idea what he was supposed to say. 

He inched closer to Vegas. “It’s not your fault either,” Pete said. “You could just as easily say I should’ve been paying closer attention.”

Vegas’s jaw tightened. “You’re not–” 

“Your bodyguard, I know,” Pete said, though he had his own thoughts on that that weren’t quite the same as Vegas’s. “But I still look out for you. Same as you do for me,” he added. 

Vegas’s expression remained stubbornly unhappy. “I can’t afford to be careless,” he said tightly. “And you shouldn’t have to always be on the alert.” Pete bit his tongue before he said but that’s what I do, that’s what I’m for. Vegas wouldn’t like it even if Pete knew he was right. (Drift)

3. “Does he have any friends?” 

“A-Qing!” Xiao Xingchen said sharply. “That’s unkind. Of course he does. I’ve - well, I’ve seen them, at least. He doesn’t think we’d get along.” Xiao Xingchen had mentioned something about wanting to meet Xue Yang’s other friends and he’d laughed. Yeah, no, he’d said, like it was funny. They’d eat you alive. 

He’d also said friends is kind of a loose term, anyway, they’re all bitches. Half the time I don’t like half of them and the other half half of them don’t like me, but he didn’t think a-Qing needed to hear that part, and he wasn’t sure Xue Yang hadn’t been joking, either. 

“Or,” a-Qing said, “he doesn’t want you to know the kind of people he hangs around with when he’s not with you.”

“You always say I don’t have enough friends,” Xiao Xingchen said, “but now that I’ve found one you don’t like him. And you still haven’t said why.”

“Friends, yeah, not a whole-ass red flag of a boyfriend,” a-Qing said. (Redux)

4. Did Chan suspect him of being a traitor? If he did it was weird that he hadn’t said anything, hadn’t brought Pete in for more questioning. He was still technically off duty, not medically cleared yet, but it wasn’t like Chan to leave a potential security threat loose.

Weird to think of himself in those terms. Pete knew he was loyal, knew he was where he was supposed to be, knew he would fight and die for the main family without hesitation. Wasn’t that what he’d gone in prepared to do? He hadn’t given anything up (Vegas had never asked). There was still something deep in his core that whispered that he was a traitor, that he’d betrayed the main family, that he couldn’t trust his own loyalty.

He could’ve run and he’d chosen to go back. He’d given Vegas pieces of himself nobody else had, he’d pulled him in and smashed their mouths together, offered himself up and he was still there, or at least part of him was, still with Vegas, still Vegas’s and he had a feeling he wouldn’t get it back. Which was – which was fine, he didn’t want or need that part of himself, he was better off without it, whatever it was that had made him do what he’d done. (jiggety-jig)

5. “So what’d you want to talk to me about away from sensitive daoshi ears, Wei-qianbei?”

“A lot of things,” Wei Wuxian said. He pulled out Chenqing and started twirling it around his fingers; Xue Yang took a moment eyeing it to decide if it was a threat or just a fidgety gesture. “One thing I’m really curious about is – how the fuck did you convince Song Lan not to kill you? Xiao-shishu I know you had the advantage he didn’t know who you were until he’d already got attached.” 

Xue Yang didn’t like the sound of that. Like he was some kind of stray dog who’d wandered into Xiao Xingchen’s house. Even if it was pretty much true.

“But that couldn’t’ve been the case with Song Lan. You blinded him, killed his entire temple. Whatever you said, it must’ve been pretty persuasive.”

“I’m just irresistibly charming,” Xue Yang said. Wei Wuxian laughed, and Xue Yang grinned. “Maybe I seduced him. You don’t know.”

“You’re certainly shameless,” Wei Wuxian said. “And you don’t like answering questions.”“I don’t like answering boring questions,” Xue Yang corrected him. “If you had more interesting ones maybe I would.” (demonic cultivator team up)

6. The door opened. “Vegas?” said Pete, sounding a little anxious. Vegas pulled his gaze off Porsche.

“In here,” he said. “We’ve got company.”

Pete slunk into the room; that was the word for it even if his posture was perfect and he was smiling. His eyes moved fast back and forth between Vegas and Porsche. “I know,” he said. “I saw the car. And the guards.” Vegas could see him trying to read the situation, assessing threat levels, though Vegas wasn’t sure whose. How dangerous he was to Porsche or the other way around? 

“Hey, Pete,” Porsche said, smiling warmly. “How’re you doing?” 

“Good,” Pete said, his smile making Vegas itch. “I’m good. Uh – I didn’t know you were coming over.” (post canon vegaspete long(er) fic)

7. *Zichen,* Xingchen had said, gazing at the fire. He was sitting too close to it; he was often cold now, as though his body remembered the chill of death and couldn’t hold the warmth of life. *Can I ask you something?* 

Dread materialized in Song Lan’s stomach, but there was nothing he could deny Xingchen anymore. *Anything.* 

Xingchen took a shallow breath and held it for a few moments too long. *Xue Yang,* he said. *Do you know…where he is?* 

Song Lan hesitated. The reluctance to speak the truth returned in force. Lie, it urged. It would be a relief, surely, for Xingchen to know that he couldn’t do any more harm. It could provide some sort of closure, help him move on. But there was a nagging memory at the back of his mind that heard Xingchen’s laugh, saw him sitting side-by-side with the man Song Lan had hated more than anyone in the world. The friend he’d killed to save.

He deserves to know, he thought wearily, and so he said, *he is dead.* (Life After Death)

8. It was Pete he thought of. Everything he’d done to Pete. Every way he’d hurt him, and Pete said it was fine, Pete said he didn’t care, it didn’t matter now, but Pete didn’t know how much he mattered so he wasn’t exactly a trustworthy judge. Vegas knew how somebody else – anybody else – would see it, looking at them from the outside, and mostly he didn’t care because Pete’s opinion was the only one that mattered but if he thought about it– 

What goes around, he thought in English, and laughed a little. Him dying here wouldn’t make anything better. Might make some peoples’ lives a little easier, but it wasn’t like it would fix anything that he’d already done. But maybe it wouldn’t make anything worse, either.

Don’t you dare walk away, Vegas, Pete said. Vegas, look at me.

His eyes slipped closed again and this time he didn’t try to open them again. Pete was going to be so upset. His bodyguard friends who hated Vegas had better take care of him. Better than Vegas had. (All's Fair)

#fic excerpt #150 words meme

[dull-c]

last night was a biggie, rewatch-wise! i got through tkk movies part 2 & 3 and the first three episodes of ck. assorted mixed-up thoughts underneath the cut w/ varying degrees of coherency

psa: the below thoughts contain occasional subjective opinions from my dumb brain and those opinions should be given the respect they deserve (which is none) 

tkk2: -honestly a solid sequel and i didn’t have a lot of thoughts on this one, because fr i was mainly chinhands-ing at everything kumiko did, and trying to work out the physics of chozen’s boobs. but look, here’s a couple i remember: -daniel really declared his love for miyagi at the airport gate like it was a proper romcom, he said that man’s my dad now and i’m his son sorry college bet

-ok no but really, they love/d each other so much and it makes me unhinged!!! that scene with them on the beach made me cry and cry

-was that bd wong?? -very nice of sato to say to miyagi ‘i will give you three days to mourn before i kill you, out of respect to the man whose still-warm corpse we are currently kneeling alongside’. ok thanks man -arrrrrrms -i got a little distracted at one point thinking about what johnny was doing during the events of the movie and if his neck still twinged sometimes and then i got even more distracted thinking about how i read somewhere once that one of the options floated for the third movie was bringing back johnny and then i got really, really distracted thinking about how good that coulda been, but then decided that i didn’t want it because if that had happened there might not have been a cobra kai, a terrible show that i am in love with speaking of the third movie……………

tkk3: -wheeeeeeeeeew boy. i have not rewatched this one since i was a child and i gotta say, i’m with ralph on this

-kudos to TIG tho for chewing the absolute life out of the scenery and providing some comedic respite from the racial slurs and whatever else was going on with this movie.

-(the randee cameo was nice too) -something that did strike me – the daniel in this one really felt a lot like ck daniel. i mean, they all do at various times (ck okinawa daniel feels like tkk okinawa daniel and etc), but there was something timely about the daniel in this one that really felt like oh. you know? the self-recrimination, the scattershot anger, the rambling and flailing and loss of control. i think because i hadn’t seen it again since looooong before watching ck, it really gave his actions in s4 a little more clarity for me. of course he’s clinging to miyagi do, of course he is. of course the random outbursts of anger are coming back. of course he’s terrified of terry winning and wanting to stop him at all costs. of course he’s going to spiral of course. it wasn’t like i *didn’t* get it before but it made it hit a little harder you know? and i am very scared about s5 and i need to protect this pretend man

aaaaaand we are onto ck!! already!! so much for moderation! (sidenote: daniel-enjoyers, i highly recommend going straight from watching tkk movies to watching ck. it is a Trip to see how very little his mannerisms have changed over the years. he really is that bouncy little guy!!! he just got old. which i mean, that’s exactly the case, it is the same guy playing the same guy, and of course he is still him, but it is still delightful to observe somehow. it made my heart do things)

anyway, thoughts on ck s101 -jlawz looks good with a beard but it probably smells so bad  :( -also i always forget his first audible sentence is “great, more immigrants” and i think it’s because i repress it on purpose. -in the same vein. if i ever have to hear anyone talk about laura lawrence’s vag again i will walk into the sea -baby brace-face miguel is a sweet little angel. i know he and johnny are like miyagi and daniel redux but it’s cute how they’re kinda the mirror of them, rather than the copy. miyagi saves daniel, miguel saves johnny. johnny and daniel remain ridiculous no matter what; the true constant of the saga -not to say that driving away from a scene of an accident is a good thing to do but i would also drive away from drunk jlawz while he was having his little flashbacks breakdown too so.....??

-god the kids are all such wee babies in s1. mute lil eli! teeny nihilist demetri! adorable babby aisha with the science puns we hardly knew ye! (the show only cutting her, out of all the kids, gives sus vibes, but gonna save that rant for another time)

-both funny and deeply sad that while johnny spent all these years building daniel up in his head as the root of all the bad things that ever happened to him, daniel just assumed they were on really great terms (“friends and family discount” please i’m sick). he rly took ‘you’re alright larusso’ to heart while you know, johnny walked away and got almost killed and it felt like daniel’s win and by extension daniel took everything from him. i mean, that’s not even subtext right? it’s not that i don’t get it. but i do feel a little hurt on daniel’s behalf because he’s being so immediately, instinctively kind to him. maybe there’s a hint of smugness about the win and unintentional condescension in the mix but he really does spend the majority of the whole several minute interaction giving johnny free stuff and telling him how pretty he still is and just visibly beaming at him and i’m [sticks entire fist in mouth and screams] - jlawz deciding in that moment to start his own karate dojo is such a move. whatcha tryna do babe? tryna get back to the good old days where you kept putting your hands on that lil guy?? and you had each other’s angry undivided attention???? okay then!!

ck s102 -guys the little daniel montage at the start pls. i am unironically obsessed with daniel fistbumping his employees and making brekkie for his kids and drinking lil espressos with his wife. lookit him living his best life, i bet he smells amazing -well anyway those last moments of happiness and a normal blood pressure level for him were nice i think -i’m glad after s1 things got a bit less edgelord-y. i don’t know how to explain what i mean by that but ig the constant /don’t be a pussy/ and jokes about allergies and fat people and kids these days like it was kinda tiresome?? a bit?? to me?? ymmv but i’m glad they eased up on that shit. or at least made it more about johnny’s ignorance, so it wasn’t quite so… punchy-downy? ya know what i mean? if not, understandable.  -how many bathing suits does daniel have anyway? -the casting choices are very good all round but i personally think robby/tanner in partic is genius, because he gives such strong generic ‘80s teen heartthrob vibes. like when i first watched the show all i could see when i looked at him was jonathon brandis. accidental nostalgia boy, amazing -oh god the dinner with kyler. delete delete delete. if I don’t acknowledge it it didn’t happen!! -”i’m right here man”. i have never seen two angry grown men wanna kiss each other so bad in my life

ck s103 ok it was almost 2am by the time i watched this ep and i wrote just one thought in notes app, and frankly, i agree with my one 2am thought:

#claire rewatches the 35 year slow burn

[favoniuscodex]

REDUX : 8k event - genshin + magic AUs

intro : welcome to redux, my 8k follower celebration! yes, i know i posted about an 8k follower event before, but since i couldn't think of ideas, i'm deciding to go with something even cooler and better to write about as i redo the event. hitting a follower milestone is a magical thing (i do sound corny, don't i?), so this event is centered around four different magical AUs.

how it works : send an ask with ONE character you like from the available character list below and pick ONE au from the list below. i will write you a romantic reader insert based off the character you chose & the au you chose! <3

characters available : albedo, ayaka, beidou, childe, diluc, gorou, itto, kaeya, kazuha, kokomi, mona, ningguang, rosaria, shenhe, thoma, xiao, yoimiya, zhongli, dainsleif, scaramouche, pantalone, dottore

rules :

for male characters, requests will be gn!reader. for female characters, requests will be f!reader. no exceptions.

be polite in your request or it will not be completed.

my responses to some requests may be super short while others will be super long. there is not a unified format in how i may respond, it's just whatever inspires me the most. thank you for understanding! <3

if i get over 20 requests, not every request will be completed.

please be following me if you request. i would like to think that you would want to see the end result LOL

introducing the universes :

WORLD ONE - teyvat university - magic + university au

welcome to one of teyvat's most exclusive universities: teyvat university for the magically gifted. for those with mythical heritage and magical prowess, this is the top university to study magical arts and myths. an eclectic cast of characters attend, ranging from sirens who enchant choir audiences to half minotaurs who bring home the national wrestling trophy every year. as a student, you are familiar with your peers, but which will be the one to be your perfect college romance to occupy your time between thaumaturgical thermodynamics and enchanting ethics?

WORLD TWO - blessed crown - magic + royalty au

within the seven kingdoms of teyvat, human and non-human generally live in harmony. the study of magic has been cultivated for generations, and, with it, several subcultures have arisen. yet, when it comes to the royal palaces themselves, all divisions are cast aside to ensure the benefit of those within each nation. retainers and royals all live within the palace grounds, determined to lay their claim to power that resides within. in some tales within this world, you may be a royal yourself, pining after a visiting scholar mage who catches your eye. yet, in other stories, you may be the citizen hoping that the royal looks your way. no matter how your story unfolds within the magical seven kingdoms, one thing remains the same: the web of magic that unites all living creatures.

WORLD THREE - arcana automated - magic + cyberpunk au

modern times have long since come and go, giving way to a sprawling hellscape of crime-addled city streets and grandoise skyscrapers that pierce the sky with haughty spires. in this world, the magic of the old meets technology of the new. it isn't uncommon to see augmented individuals who use magic to aid in prosthetic upgrades, pushing their bodies past limits not formerly known. in teyvat, those with visions are blessed with technological output to an unforeseen degree. you are just another citizen, yet every single person within this country's urban environments are anything but ordinary. this cyberpunk au involves stories of you meeting or knowing various individuals and how both of your roles fit into this hyper-futuristic version of the teyvat we all know.

WORLD FOUR - gods amidst men - magic + modern mythology au

inspired by my series that i have yet to fully write, mythos, this au treats you as a mortal who uncovers a secret of teyvatan history: the gods believed to be dead are still alive. this essentially works as the same world as mythos, but stories for this event will not be canon to the mythos series. instead, they will use the same premise for characters as above and, for characters that aren't listed, invent new domains for these additional characters to rule over. if you aren't familiar with mythos, the premise is simple: you are an average mortal who begins to receive dreams that prophesize the world's demise. in your attempt to figure out what they mean, you begin to realize that the dreams are clues and pathways to the ancient gods that will help you stop the oncoming apocalypse. and, in typical fashion, they all fall in love with you in their own ways. oh, the woes of being the protagonist. stories with this event may not necessarily feature the mythos protagonists, but will feature the modern god version of whichever genshin character falling in love with you, in one way or another. who knows? you might get a coffee shop au with the god of the dead if you play your cards right.

#genshin impact x reader #axia.events #events.redux

[reina-royale]

Who's Number One: Bonnie, or Kim? (Redux)

FOREWORD: THIS IS NOT A POLL! DO NOT ACTUALLY REPLY WITH YOUR OPINION ON WHO’S NUMBER ONE!

So, when "Number One" first came out, of course we're all rooting for Kim to remain captain. But, now, I don't think Kim really deserved it.

Kim’s skills, especially in cheerleading, should not be doubted. But is Kim really the best fit for captain?

Let’s discuss:

Kim has been doing cheerleading since seventh grade, but Bonnie not only has been doing it longer, but has already been Cheer Captain before.

(In "A Sitch in Time" she was the one assigning routines to the girls trying out, implying that, even if she wasn't the captain, she was at least some kind of authority in the squad.)

Over the course of one week, Bonnie organized a fundraiser, raised money for new uniforms, and wrote and choreographed a new cheer. Kim did nothing other than expecting Bonnie to just fail on her own.

The one time Kim's mentioned as doing any of that, it ended up with all the cheerleaders in a pile after Kim's dismount from the pyramid, as Kim crashed into all of them during her dance. Given that they were all standing around, it's possible that they couldn't follow Kim's routine very well. ("Mind Games")

In "Queen Bebe" Kim was supposed to write a new routine for the squad, but was unable to do so because of all her other obligations.

In "The Full Monkey" Kim showed up to practice tired and missed her cue, causing Bonnie to trip and fall. Luckily, Bonnie was uninjured. However, we get an interesting quote from Bonnie in this episode:

Bonnie: Looks like Miss Perfect's going to leave us hanging. So typ.

This implies that this is not the first time Kim's had trouble keeping her commitment to the squad.

Obviously, it kind of sucks that Kim's so busy saving the world that she has a hard time doing things like cheerleading, but she can be a cheerleader without being the captain.

And the squad deserves to have someone in charge who can actually do the job. Whatever the reason is for Kim being unable to do it, it's not fair to keep letting the squad down again and again. Bonnie was definitely a better fit for captain.

(As much as Bonnie hates Kim, she's not going to kick Kim off the squad just because. She let Kim join in "A Sitch in Time" because of her skill, even though she didn't want to, so she wouldn't kick Kim off unless it would be better for the squad that way.)

And it's really surprising that we're supposed to assume Bonnie quit being captain.

Bonnie's not lazy. At all. She's shown to have been taking dance lessons for a long time, got good grades in school, put a lot of work into becoming captain, was (most likely) captain before, and, most importantly, the whole reason she challenged Kim for the captain spot in the first place was because Kim couldn't do the work.

And Kim didn't even try to prove she should still be captain. She did nothing to deserve it, not even sell a chocolate bar. She just expected Bonnie to fail on her own.

So, even if Bonnie was going to give up the job of captain, she wouldn't give it back to Kim. Anyone other than Kim would be better in Bonnie's eyes.

I get that, as the main character, we’re supposed to root for Kim, but in this particular episode, the only reason to root for Kim is because she’s the main character, not because she actually deserved it.

And that's not fair to the viewers or the characters.

#kim possible #meta #bonnie rockwaller

[birbfeeder2artisticboogaloo]

Birb!!!! Once again, I'm so sorry BUT YOUR LASTS GoT POSTS GAVE ME A BLAST!!!!

don't be sorry!! it's ok!!! i am so glad i can make u laugh!! MY SILLY JOKES HAVE FINALLY FOUND A PURPOSE ;A; sooo who do we have here....??? >:3c

1 - OH!! the lil girl!! mcdaughterburner's daughter!! u'll NEVER guess what happens to HER ;A; i referred to her as 'NOOO BABY NO!! ;A;' bc that's what i was saying in every scene she was in ;A; I KNEW THEY WOULD TAKE HER FROM ME ;A; didn't expect the fire tho, that was hard to listen to ;A;

2- ZOMBIE JOE'S BROTHER!!! aka uncle failson!!! he lost a fight with a fire poker or something, it was very sad 😔 i can't actually remember what happened to him tho?? i just,,,,lost track of him at some point?? so im going to assume he ended up at ned stark's castle where the remaining cast re-enacted the film 'dead snow' (2009 norwegian film about nazi zombies). if he WAS there he should have volunteered his services as a ladder for lydia mormon, the child warrior who somehow managed to be better and braver than any adult (except for BFF of course!! who could surpass SHE?? ;A;)

3- IT'S NOT-SAMWISE!!! he is almost a samwise gamgee!! but not quite!!! it's ok tho, nobody could ever REALLY compare to THE samwise gamgee. this lesser samwise is good enough!!! i liked how willing samwise was to adopt a random baby whose mother he met exactly ONCE, that was quite sweet of him. hope everything works out for him and jill or whatever and junior. good lot them 😌 (note: during the earlier seasons, i wanted him and redux jesus (then simply called ned stark's bastard) to MAYBE run away from snow gaol and kiss each other. but in the end samwise met jill and they seem very happy together!! pity about egret. maybe redux jesus should kiss that viking man instead. tormod ruadh or whatever. idk that's a viking name, right?? :P)

4- OH THIS GUY. ok i know. I KNOW WHO HE IS. i saw him in a film JUST THE OTHER DAY. it was a john wick film!! my mam LOVES the john wick films, she's in love with keanu reeves. uhhhh. his name is. it's. ok i don't actually KNOW his name but. BUT IN GOT, he played the role of MCDICK-IN-A-BOX!!! i called him mcdick-in-a-box bc, well, uh, u know 😳 am very glad captain ginger was able to rescue him from that snivelling lil shit, wannabe dexter. that clown was. extremely unpleasant. more unpleasant than any other character. not a fan of wannabe dexter. he took himself too seriously!! we get it, ur a serial murderer, cool story bro!! just MURDER then. don't be such a bitch about it. ur mad bc no one will kiss u (willingly), every day is a bad hair day, ur doggos won't talk to u if u don't feed them human flesh,,,, WE GET IT. he's what my father would call a 'langer' 🙄

poor mcdick-in-a-box. even when he's the photo u sent, i spend more time talking about somebody else. sadly typical for poor mcdick-in-a-box, smh 😔

hee hee, thank u for indulging my silliness 😄 i always appreciate the chance to make my dumb jokes 😊 hope i gave u a laugh or two! hope ur day or night goes well 💚💚💚

#birb still says #aaaaaa thank u all for indulging me ;A; #i will be spoilt SPOILT I SAY from all the indulgence lmao 🤣🤣 #@prommethium #bullying game of thrones characters for sport #that sweet lil girl deserved better #she was such a nice child ;A; she just wanted to play with her lil toy ;A;

[anotherwellkeptsecret]

Whatever Remains: 530

Previous - Next - Beginning

Read more comics on my website! Support this comic on Patreon, where you can read ahead!

#my art #whatever remains #whatever remains redux #sherlock #sherlock holmes #johnlock #action #adventure #romance #noir #comic #pastiche

[itservicesprovider]

Part I – Introduction to Progressive Web Apps using React.js

Progressive Web Apps leverage new technologies to provide consumers with the best of mobile sites and native apps. They're dependable, quick, and entertaining. They come from a safe source and load irrespective of network conditions.

There's a lot going on in the realm of Progressive Web Apps (PWAs), and you might be wondering how they work with existing designs that use frameworks like React and JS module bundlers like Webpack. Is it necessary to completely rebuild a PWA? What web performance metrics should you monitor? In this series of essays, I'll describe my experience converting Reactjs web development projects into Progressive Web Apps (PWAs). We'll also discuss why delivering only what customers need for a route and removing all additional scripts are smart ideas for high performance.

Lighthouse

Let us start with a PWA checklist. We'll be utilising Lighthouse for this, which is a tool for inspecting your app for PWA features and ensuring that your app meets a reasonable benchmark for web performance under mimicked mobile settings. Lighthouse is available as a Chrome extension (which I prefer) and a CLI, both of which display a report that looks something like this:

Audits at the highest levels Lighthouse effectively executes a combination of contemporary online best practises that have been tuned for a mobile world:

The network connection is safe.

The user may be asked to Add to Homescreen.

The installed web app will start with a personalised splash screen.

The app can load when there is no internet connection or when the connection is unstable.

The page load time is quick, and the design is mobile-friendly.

The site is gradually being improved.

The address bar matches the brand colours.

Lighthouse has a getting started tutorial, and it also supports remote debugging. Very nice.

Whatever libraries you have in your stack, I want to underline that everything on the above list is doable today with a little effort. However, there are certain restrictions.

We all know how sluggish the mobile web is.

The web has progressed from a platform focused on documents to a first-rate application platform. Simultaneously, the majority of our computing has shifted away from powerful desktop workstations with fast, consistent network connections and toward comparatively weak mobile devices with connections that are frequently sluggish, flaky, or both. This is especially true in areas of the world where the next billion people are gaining access to the internet. To enable quicker mobile web:

We must all transition to testing on real mobile devices with genuine network connections (e.g Regular 3G in DevTools). Chrome:/inspect and WebPageTest (video) can help you. Touch events, viewport emulation, and a throttled network connection are all included in Lighthouse's simulation of a Nexus 5X. (150ms latency, 1.6Mbps throughput).

If the JS libraries you're utilising weren't designed with mobile in mind, you could be fighting a losing battle when it comes to being interactive. We'd like to be interactive in under 5 seconds on a typical device, therefore we'll need more of that amount for app code.

However, many libraries are attempting to improve in this area and may need to if they are to remain viable for performance on physical devices. Just have a peek at Preact's A+ performance with real-world devices.

Examples of open-source React Progressive Web Apps

If you're looking for non-trivial examples of PWAs developed using React and optimised with Lighthouse, check out: ReactHN, a HackerNews client with server-side rendering and offline support, or iFixit, a React-based hardware repair guide that leverages Redux for state management.

Let's go over what we need to do to complete each item on the Lighthouse report, with React.js-specific recommendations sprinkled throughout the series.

The network connection is safe.

HTTPS tooling and advice

HTTPS protects against criminal actors meddling with communications between your app and the browser your users are using, and you may have heard that Google is working to shame unencrypted sites. Powerful new web platform APIs, such as Service Worker, require secure origins via HTTPS, but the good news is that with services like LetsEncrypt providing free SSL certificates and low-cost options like Cloudflare enabling end-to-end traffic encryption for all, getting this setup has never been easier.

I normally deploy my personal projects to Google App Engine, which enables providing SSL traffic through an appspot.com domain if you provide the'secure' option to your app.yaml file. I use Node on App Engine for my React projects that require Node.js support for Universal Rendering. HTTPS is now supported by Github Pages.

You may check issues with security certificates and mixed content errors using the Chrome DevTools Security panel.

Here are some more security suggestions for your website:

Upgrade insecure requests ("HTTP" connections) to "HTTPS" when needed, redirecting users. Consider Content Security Policy and upgrade-insecure-requests.

Change any references to "http://" to "https://." If you use third-party scripts or material, talk to them about making their resources HTTPS as well.

When serving websites, use HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) headers. It's a directive that compels browsers to only communicate with your site via HTTPS.

For additional information, I recommend viewing Deploying HTTPS: The Green Lock and Beyond and Mythbusting HTTPS: Busting Security Urban Legends.

The user may be asked to Add to Homescreen.

The next step is to personalise your app's "add to homescreen" experience (favicons, application name displayed, orientation and more). This is accomplished by including a Web Application Manifest. Customizing cross-browser (and OS) favicons is generally the most time-consuming part of this process, although sites like realfavicongenerator.net take a lot of the sting out of it.

There has been significant debate about the "minimum" number of favicons required for a site to simply operate in most locales. Lighthouse has suggested shipping a 192px icon for your homescreen and a 512px icon for your splashscreen. Personally, I like the output of realfavicongenerator because, despite involving more metatags, I prefer the certainty that all of my bases are covered.

Some websites may wish to ship a platform-specific favicon. For more information on this issue, I recommend reading Designing a Progressive Web App symbol.

You also have access to app installer banners with a Web App manifest setup, offering you a means to directly urge visitors to install your PWA if they find themselves engaging with it frequently. It's also feasible to delay the prompt until a user interacts with your programme in a helpful way. Flipkart discovered that the ideal place to display the alert was on their order confirmation page.

The Chrome DevTools Application Panel allows you to check your Web App Manifest by going to Application > Manifest:

The layout is mobile-friendly.

Apps designed for many devices should include a meta-viewport in the document's head>. This may sound apparent, but I've seen many Reactnative apps where this has been overlooked. Fortunately, create-react-app includes a proper meta-viewport by default, and Lighthouse will warn you if it is missing:

<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">

Although we place a strong emphasis on improving the mobile web experience in Progressive Web Apps development, this does not mean that desktop should be overlooked. As illustrated by Housing.com, a well-crafted PWA may function across a variety of viewport widths, browsers, and devices.

We'll look at page-load speed using React and Webpack in Part 2 of this series. We'll look at code splitting, route-based chunking, and the PRPL pattern to get to interactivity faster.

[whatever-remains-comic]

Whatever Remains: 292 - 299

Previous - Next

#whatever remains #whatever remains redux #sherlock #sherlock holmes #johnlock #action #adventure #romance #noir #comic #pastiche

[apocalypse-friend]

Whatever Remains is going to be the death of me

#whatever remains #whatever remains redux #anotherwellkeptsecret #sherlock holmes #johnlock

[inspiteallthedanger]

So from your India answer I took it to mean you don’t think Paul and John were sexual with each other. Are you in the John was in love and Paul wasn’t camp?

Well, there's the trillion pound question. Answer under the cut to save you all the pain of going over it again unless you want to.

FWIW I changed my mind while writing this out. Like. WTF.

The real answer is that I swing wildly depending on the day and my mood and if I've just read something unhinged that one of them said.

What don't I think happened?

That John was pining after an oblivious Paul who couldn't/wouldn't love him back in the same way. I mean, I can see this interpretation for sure. But that seems to rely on Paul either being a total, utter moron or an arsehole who kept John on the line for creative reasons. But he was way too confused by John and the breakup for me to buy that. That man believed he got dumped and then told he in fact dumped his soulmate accidentally.

I don't tend to believe they were ever having a secret affair that they had to stop for whatever reason. That would have required them talking about what was happening and challenged (especially Paul's) concepts of their own sexuality. I also think how John and Paul approached the topic of each other and sexuality would be very different if they were consciously in a romantic and sexual relationship.

Sadly for everyone, me included, I can work my way around into giving a pretty convincing way either of these two are still possible. I just don't think that's what happened. But you'll need to send a new ask about that. Ha.

That we're imaging the whole thing and they were just very close pals in a band that had a bad falling out over money and creative control of The Beatles.

What's that leave?

Everything else. Lol.

Firstly, they loved each other. It often wasn't healthy. It often wasn't pretty, but boy was it strong. Neither of them ever got over the other. Not only in a "I'll always miss him but I'm alright way" but in a, "I will never stop wanting him back in my life, no matter how often and terribly I got hurt." I'm sorry, I don't believe that's because they enjoyed writing songs together just a normal amount. One obvious thing it could mean is something went unresolved (maybe the didn't fuck, but should have). Or, more likely imo, they couldn't reconcile what they were to one another, which made it impossible to move on from.

I think sex for them was not like it is for us normies. Not just because the sheer amount and variety of it they were having. Although, please don't underestimate how that impacts a person's view of whether sexual contact 'means' anything. I also mean it from a cultural perspective. The idea of sexuality was so vastly different that for them to think what they were doing was 'queer' would have meant it fell under pretty specific parameters which I think they could have easily avoided (by having sex with and dating/being married to women).

So, yeah, they fucked basically. But in such a way that Paul could still think they didn't. What's that mean? That's probably going to remain between Paul and his guitar. To be fair, it could even include penetration, but I somehow doubt it. Fooling around is more likely. Perhaps some blowjobs here and there. You know, high jinx, pals being bros.

There's a distinct possibility that they were somewhat consciously aware of some of the above. There's so much weirdness going on that it would just explain why it was happening. For example, Paul ricocheting between Jane and John in terms of shows of commitment. John and India. The Yoko and Linda parallels. Paris and Paris redux. Brain. I just don't think they knew how/would have had the skills to talk about it. I would love to know what exactly was expressed in Key West and what the fall out of that was.

The stakes were too high. This meant that they had to get on and couldn’t risk falling out because the Beatles rested on them writing songs and therefore getting on. They didn't want to lose face in front of the person they respected most in the world by being the first to ask for more. There was too much in the way for them to communicate and risk trying to ‘give it a go’ (whatever that meant to either of them) but that, in the end, ripped them apart.

#mclennon #beth rambles #lennon mccartney #this is an essay #and I know most people have already said all they care to on this #but other thoughts always welcome

[veliseraptor]

mmkay been struggling with feeling like my writing tanks are empty but sometimes this helps. if nothing else maybe it’ll help me fuckin’...finish something, eh

so it’s a 150 words meme! send me up to 3 numbers from the following list and I’ll write 150 words in that project. twelve fics and some stuff in here is even not yi city centric if you can believe it

1. “I’m gonna be gone,” Xue Yang said, “for a little while.” 

He was sprawled across Xiao Xingchen’s lap, shirt rucked up in a decidedly distracting way. What he said, though, jarred Xiao Xingchen’s thoughts away from thinking about that kissable strip of skin, and not very pleasantly. 

“What?” 

Xue Yang’s nose wrinkled. “I have to go out of town. Work stuff. This one client, stupid rich…he wants to meet me in person, apparently. He’s got some big job and…” He shrugged one shoulder. Xiao Xingchen’s stomach squirmed. 

“Is that…unusual?” 

“Yeah, sort of,” Xue Yang said. “I mean, I’ve done shit for this guy before, but I guess he didn’t care about the personal factor or whatever it is. Or maybe it’s something illegal and he doesn’t want a digital trail.” Xiao Xingchen’s eyes widened and Xue Yang laughed. “You’re so easy. It’s fine, Xingchen. I promise if he tries to lock me in his sex dungeon I’ll run for the hills.” (Redux)

2. You summoned the other corpses. 

“Just one isn’t very threatening,” Xue Yang said. “All weak, and I didn’t tell them to kill anyone–” 

You lied. You said there were no puppets left. 

“There weren’t,” Xue Yang said. “I made new ones.” 

It’s disrespectful, Song Lan snapped, frustrated. You’re desecrating the remains of innocent people–

“Yeah, yeah, it’s an abomination, if you’re looking for an excuse to finish what you started then stop talking and just fucking do it,” Xue Yang snarled, his muscles bunching tighter. “I could do anything and you’d find something wrong with it even when it’s helping you–” 

You aren’t helping me. Just yourself.

Xue Yang’s mouth set. To Song Lan’s surprise he didn’t immediately snap back, eyes suddenly gone flat black. “Yeah,” he said after a couple moments, his voice darker and uglier. “Right. So are you going to kill me or just keep telling me everything I did wrong this time?” (Walking Far From Home)

3. “Accept Christ,” Lymond said, “and my deformities shall disappear. Deny him, and I am cast out of the body public. Is that it?” 

Gabriel knelt, beginning to remove the dressings. “You cast out yourself,” he said mildly. “If you refer to your convalescence…I am given to understand it is exhaustion and overwork that brought on your collapse. You drive yourself hard, my dear.” 

“I do what I must,” said Lymond. “Should I let my opponent set the pace, instead?” 

“Your opponent,” Gabriel said, setting the soiled bandages aside. Lymond made no move to pull away, head turned just slightly to retain view of him as he examined the wound, livid and angry. “Your metaphors are all of war.” He paused, leveling a clear gaze at Lymond. “Is it any surprise there should be casualties, when such is your approach?” 

“You made it so,” Lymond said, suddenly blunt. Gabriel’s expression changed not at all. (et ipsi sunt jacula)

4. He slid his fingers into my hair then and pulled my head back until my neck hurt and then said, “do you know what I am going to do to you now, darling?”

I swallowed and shook my head. 

“It is an old piece of magic,” Malkar said, and his voice was like velvet, but velvet with a knife under it or something, and I’d’ve sworn I could feel it all the way down in my bones. “It is called the obligation d’sang. Do you know what that means?”

I shook my head again. 

“It is also known as the binding-by-blood,” Malkar said, still in that voice, and he let me go and stood up. “You are my student now, Felix. Do you know what that makes me?” 

“My master,” I whispered.

“Yes,” he said, and I could hear him smiling. Then he let go of my hair and moved away. I lay still and took shallow breaths and shivered, my heart pounding in my stomach.

Malkar knelt straddling me and I arched up against him without thinking but he shoved me back down, pinning me flat. “Hold still, darling,” he said. “This is delicate work. Don’t make me start over.” 

Then he cut into me, and I put together that binding-by-blood meant mine, and all at once remembered a hundred horrible stories about blood-witches like Vey Coruscant. “Wait,” I said, but he ignored me, and then the magic took hold and I couldn’t say anything at all. (Pygmalion)

5. After a moment Xue Yang added, “what if you could bring them back? Like Wei-qianbei did with his Ghost General. Did you ever think about trying?” 

“No,” Jiang Yanli said. “Never.”

Xue Yang made a sort of ‘huh’ noise. “Would you want to?” 

“It wouldn’t work,” was, awfully, the first thing Jiang Yanli said. “A-Cheng and Zixuan both had Soul-Calming Ceremonies.” And a-Xian…there had been, she knew, official attempts to summon his ghost in order to destroy it for good, with no result. “And…it would be wrong, besides.” 

Xue Yang made a dismissive sort of noise. “Right, wrong, what does it matter?” he said. “It’s not like it makes a difference. It’s not like people are going around rewarding the righteous and punishing the wicked. So why not do what you want if you can get away with it?” 

“It’s not what I want,” Jiang Yanli said, even if it wasn’t entirely true. Of course a part of her wanted it. Of course a part of her wished…

But she knew it wouldn’t be the same.

“Huh,” Xue Yang said. “Well, if you ever change your mind…I’d be up for trying again.” With that, apparently ignorant of how it made Jiag Yanli’s stomach jump and twist, Xue Yang rolled up to his feet and stretched. “Okay,” he said. “I should probably go, I guess. But I’ll see you later, right?” and just like that, he was gone.

She dreamed about it that night. Dreamed that she stood at Lotus Pier, looking out at the water, and she could feel her brothers at her sides – a-Xian on the left and a-Cheng on the right. But she didn’t want to turn her head and look. A-Xian took her hand with skeletal fingers, bone worn smooth. 

Welcome home, shijie, he said, in a voice like a terrible cold wind. But she wasn’t afraid. (this world is gonna break your heart)

6. “Does Wei Wuxian know?” Jin Ling asked quietly after a couple moments of silence. Jiang Cheng set the letter aside.

“About this specifically? No. I imagine he’s well aware of the fact that he still has enemies.” 

“Maybe,” Jin Ling said slowly, “you should mention it to him?”

Jiang Cheng managed to keep himself from giving his nephew an incredulous stare, not sure whether to start with that would require us speaking to each other or you want me to make the first thing I say to Wei Wuxian after eight months of silence to be ‘someone is writing me letters to convince me to kill you’? and not really inclined to say either aloud. Even less inclined to try to express how it felt to wonder, with an unpleasant twist, if Wei Wuxian would take it as a warning or a threat.  (through thistles and thorns)

7. “Where?” He asked the Seeker wearily. There was no point in refusing her; Seekers got what they wanted, and Cullen suspected this woman more than most. 

“The Gallows,” she said, turning toward the door, clearly with the expectation that he would follow. Cullen stood, and did. 

“Did I get your name?” He asked as they walked into the street. 

“Cassandra Pentaghast,” she said, her eyes straight ahead. Cullen couldn’t help turning to stare at her. 

“The Dragonslayer?” 

Oddly, she didn’t seem pleased. “I have been called that, yes.” 

He couldn’t decide if it was a good sign or a bad one that the Seekers had sent the Dragonslayer herself to talk to him. Considering the trend of his life so far, probably a bad one. But that was rank self-pity, and he shouldn’t indulge in it. (Salvage)

8. “I don’t usually do this,” Xiao Xingchen said breathlessly. Xue Yang pushed his hips up, squeezing the tops of his thighs where he was straddling him.

“Do what,” he said. “Go home with strange boys you meet in bars?” 

He meant it as a joke, but Xiao Xingchen looked serious when he nodded. “Not really,” he said. “But you’re…” He reached out, fingers brushing Xue Yang’s cheek with sudden and startling gentleness. “There’s something about you.”

Xue Yang stared at him, knocked off kilter by how fast Xiao Xingchen had veered off script. (spin me right round)

9. “Hello, Chengmei,” he said, calm and even. It was always better to at least act calm, dealing with Xue Yang. He treated fear like a wolf scenting blood. “How are you feeling?” 

Xue Yang let out a series of huffs that might have been laughter. “What’s it look like,” he said. “Should’ve…should’ve killed me better the first time, a-Yao. Wouldn’t be causing you trouble now then.” 

“As necessary as it was at the time, I’m not unhappy to see you’re alive,” Jin Guangyao said, which brought back the expression of consternation. He knelt down and held out one hand. “Let me feel your pulse. Do you know what’s happening?” 

“Yeah,” said Xue Yang, after a pause in which Jin Guangyao thought he was considering lying. There was sweat beading visibly on his forehead, his expression tight with pain. Jin Guangyao had seen him shake off open, bleeding wounds as insignificant. Either that had always been pretense or what he was feeling now was worse. 

“If you tell me, I will be better able to help you,” Jin Guangyao said, when Xue Yang didn’t elaborate. “As it is…” 

“I’m fine,” Xue Yang interrupted. “I’m fine, everything’s fine, I didn’t mean to – I wasn’t supposed to–” Of all things, he glared over at Song Zichen.

“Of course,” Jin Guangyao said soothingly. “I know. When did Song Zichen-daozhang die?” 

Xue Yang’s expression did something strange again, somehow furtive and miserable at once. “A while. Doesn’t matter.” 

It very clearly did matter, but Jin Guangyao wasn’t going to push. Not on that, anyway. “Did you kill him?” 

“No,” Xue Yang said. “I mean. Sort of. I would’ve. But I didn’t. Not exactly.”

That clarified exactly nothing and raised a great many more questions. (these are our times (the end times))

10. There were the things about Jinlintai that Xue Yang expected to appreciate (good food, warm bed, consistent supply of sweets), and the annoying things that he might’ve predicted if he’d thought about them (the people, mostly). 

Then there was the shit that came as a surprise, like the performances that got put on sometimes. Plays of stories he sometimes knew and sometimes didn’t, some better and some worse and some just stupid as all fuck. 

“Was that supposed to be Liu Qiuyue?” Xue Yang asked Jin Guangyao, who paused, pulling his brush away from the letter he was writing, and looked at him. Xue Yang waved a hand. “Last night. The story. That’s what it was, right?” 

“I believe so,” Jin Guangyao said after another moment, setting the brush down. Xue Yang smothered a smile of triumph at the indication that he had his attention. “Why do you ask?” 

“Cause it was different than the version I’d heard,” Xue Yang said. “The story I knew she wasted away cause she wouldn’t eat after Prince what’s-his-name turned her down. But this one had her…” He wrinkled his nose. “Puking petals, or something. Unless that was supposed to be symbolic.” (xuexiao hanahaki au)

11. “I,” Anders said, “was thinking about the Hanged Man. I’d pay a lot of money right now for their piss-flavored beer. And that soup–”

Fenris raised his eyebrows. “The one with the chunks of unidentified meat in it?”

“Yeah, that one,” Anders said with a bit of a laugh. “I heard Merrill ask what was in it once and the barkeeper wouldn’t say. Hawke said one time she found a rat skull in her bowl but I’m pretty sure she was making it up.” 

An unwilling smile tugged at the corner of Fenris’s mouth. “Better than anything you’d find in Darktown.”

“Oh, well,” Anders said. “At least there they’d just give you the whole rat on a skewer. You knew what you were getting into.” 

Fenris’s laugh startled him. Anders grinned, looking pleased with himself, as wet and bedraggled as he was. It had been a while since the last time he’d laughed, Fenris realized. Probably since he’d left Hawke. 

That killed his laughter and he looked away from that grin, suddenly annoyed by its smugness. (the best all lack conviction)

12. The next morning Song Lan wasn’t certain he hadn’t dreamed the whole thing. But he wasn’t certain he hadn’t, either. It shouldn’t be possible - he’d been deliberately thorough disposing of Xue Yang’s corpse, and made heavy use of suppression arrays. There had been a part of him that thought let him lie like a dead dog in the street for his body to be desecrated as he did to so many but almost immediately he’d been ashamed, and the pragmatic part of him knew it was too great a risk. 

And some dim part of him, too, looked at Xue Yang’s empty eyes fixed on a piece of candy in one limp hand and felt a miserable sort of pity. Bitter and unwanted, but it lingered nonetheless. 

But the memory was so very clear. Xue Yang’s voice, precisely as he remembered it. The black feeling that had been plaguing him lately.

If anyone could somehow cling to the world of the living in spite of everything that said it should be impossible, it would be Xue Yang. (the poison in your bones)

#i almost put mcu fic on this but i'm not quite there yet #150 words meme #fic excerpt #so yeah. hit me

[delimeful]

how easy you are to need (redux) (1)

the first chapter of my HEYATN rewrite! find the original here!

warnings: panic attacks, fear, hypervigilance, paranoia, mentions of freezing/starving

-

The first sign of the humans had been the smoke.

The scent had caught Virgil’s attention from the moment he woke, the light grey plumes curling over the tips of the trees in the distance. There’d been no recent storm to strike a flame, which meant that human hands had crafted it.

It wasn’t the first time. His forest was wide and sprawling, and it was near enough to a few well-worn traveling paths that humans thought it a fair place to set up camp for a night or two. The otherworldly aura of the forest itself tended to dissuade any longer stays.

(Eerie howling in the night also tended to do the trick.)

Virgil still had to check it out, of course, both as his home’s protector and to soothe his own agitation at the sight. It didn’t matter that they were almost always peaceful travelers, the presence of humans put him on edge every time.

And if the sensation of being watched drove the intruders away quicker? All the better.

He headed down the hillside, winding his way through the edges of his normal patrol route as he went. Nothing was amiss there, the wildlife scampering away at the sight of him, the natural magic of the area still abundant and thriving.

The source of the smoke was closer than he’d anticipated, though. It was rare that any were bold enough to camp any further than the edges of his territory, and yet here he was in the middle of the forest, the smell rapidly growing stronger.

He slowed, close enough now that the smoketrail was hidden by the long branches overhead. This was a familiar spot, there was a clearing up ahead, and—

Virgil stopped dead at the edge of the trees, staring at the abandoned cabin that had sat quietly in this clearing since he’d first stumbled into his forest.

There was smoke rising from the chimney.

He could smell the humans now, tracks and scent trails to and from the apparently formerly abandoned cabin. They must have trekked through a good quarter of his territory to get here, and he’d slept through the intrusion like an idiot. He paced back and forth agitatedly, circling around the clearing and remaining carefully out of sight as he did.

He’d been in that cabin before. How could he not have? Alone in these woods, there wasn’t much to do for fun except explore. Once he’d gotten past his initial skittishness, he’d been determined to investigate every inch of the dusty old place.

And then he’d realized it was a former den for hunters. He’d spent weeks on the other side of the woods, slowly working his way through the panic that had risen up in him at the simple thought: what if they return?

Even so, as time passed, he’d only grown more sure that the place was well and truly harmless. Nobody had been in there for years prior to Virgil’s arrival in the woods. Whatever use its hunters might have had for it, it had clearly been long abandoned and left to rot.

Of course, now there was smoke in the chimney, and the windows had been carefully pushed open, and there was a horse, grazing mildly.

Virgil took a deep breath, pausing his pacing to try and calm his racing heart. He couldn’t jump to conclusions.

Just because it was an old hunters’ den didn’t mean the new occupants were hunters. It might have been a simple act of opportunity, like a vole taking up an abandoned burrow.

The back door swung open, and Virgil went still, watching as a human donned in red strode over to the horse, patting its snout and murmuring softly to it. He offered it a handful of some sort of grain, which it seemed to enjoy, and then made his way to the center of the clearing and drew a sword from the sheathe at his hip.

Even from here, Virgil felt his skin prickle at the way the blade sang, radiating protective magics as the human moved through blocks and attacks against an invisible enemy. It had to be pure silver, and likely warded as thoroughly as possible against creatures like him. One didn’t simply obtain a weapon like that without knowing what it was, what it was meant for.

He backed away slowly, fading into the underbrush, until he was absolutely certain that he was free from the human— the hunter’s range of sight.

Then, mind full of white noise, he turned and bolted.

—-

He lost a day and a half to the blinding panic, cycling between fear-anger-exhaustion-terror until he’d finally burnt all the emotions out and collapsed.

It was an awful decision. He’d kept as far as possible from the cabin, even in his haze, and now he had no idea what the humans had done in his absence. If they knew he was there— if they’d set up traps— it would only take one slip and everything would be over.

No, if he was going to get rid of them, he needed to be as prepared as they no doubt were.

He spent sleepless nights scouring the forest, searching for any traces of them-- searching for their patrol routes, their traps, the damage to the forest they left in their wake.

But there was none. Not even a faded scent trail to suggest they’d ever been through at all. It seemed they were sticking close to the cabin.

For the first time, Virgil wondered if they’d really come for him. He hadn’t been seen by humans in years, often sticking to the shadows to scare off travelers that had overextended their stays. It was possible that they didn’t even know a shifter lived in the forest, let alone a werewolf. He couldn’t bet on it, but it was possible.

Whether he wanted to find out what they were doing here or just know what human tricks he’d be facing, he had to return to the cabin. He spent less time sleeping so that he could continue patrolling through his woods and also keep a wary eye on the humans when they roused.

The hunter was the easiest to spy on. He spent most of his time outdoors, running through a series of daily tasks that ranged from caring for the horse to gathering firewood to hauling water from the well. He practiced drills with that sword less frequently than Virgil would have expected, but when he did, he moved with the well-balanced motions and sure strikes of someone who knew their way around a weapon.

The other two were more difficult to get a read on. They didn’t seem like hunters in physique or manner, and they spent significantly more time indoors.

One had hands that carried the sharp, chemical smell of ink, and only made regular excursions from the house to mess with a plot of upturned land he’d had the hunter help him fence in. It was a garden, Virgil was fairly sure, though it looked nothing like the ones he’d planted, all careful rows and even spacing.

The other spent most of his time indoors, though he was anything but stagnant. Where the hunter focused on heavy labor and maintaining the exterior of the home, this one seemed to focus his attention on the interior care. Virgil often caught glimpses of him opening windows to air out dusty old linen or set sweet-smelling baked items along the sill.

Most interesting of all were the ways the three of them intersected.

The baker would bring simple food and drink to the scholar when he spent longer than usual wrist-deep in the dirt, and sneak the horse treats while the hunter wasn’t looking, completely unrepentant whenever he was caught.

The scholar would sit and watch the hunter run through drills, occasionally calling out an imaginary attack for him to counter, or share quiet conversation with the baker as dusk fell and the lantern bugs began to emerge.

Even the hunter was gentle, presenting freshly-plucked berries to the baker with a dramatic bow and excited smile, or crouching in the garden to listen as the scholar excitedly explained how well the new sprouts were doing.

It wasn’t like anything he’d ever seen from humans before.

He eventually decided they couldn’t know he was there; any hunter worth their salt would know that encroaching on a pack’s territory was tantamount to declaring war. The other two didn’t even seem to be combatants. If Virgil was anything other than an undersized, scrappy outlier, he could have killed all three of them at any point.

He probably still could, now that he knew when they slept and was well familiar with the ins and outs of that cabin. Unless they’d set up new defenses, or sealed off the secret passages, or randomly deviated from their normal sleeping schedule. Unless, unless, unless.

The forest had been as uneasy as him at first, but surprisingly enough, these new residents worked hard to avoid wreaking the casual destruction humans were known for. They didn’t clear swaths of land of all life or hunt the new season’s young.

As the days passed, they continued to just… exist there, long enough that deer passed through the clearing with barely the flick of an ear at the voices from inside the house.

Over time, the forest’s reluctance turned to ambivalence, and then to amusement at Virgil’s expense. He was the only one who seemed to be taking the threat seriously anymore, much to his annoyance. Sure, they hadn’t done anything yet, but the key word there was ‘yet’.

It was well into the moon’s cycle that his patience in watching the human’s was rewarded with witnessing a change in their routine. As dusk fell, the three of them left the clearing entirely, trekking into the woods with careful steps. Virgil followed at a safe distance, feeling suspicious about their uncharacteristic silence.

The hunter led the way with a glowing lantern, wary but with no sword at his hip. The baker walked behind him, carrying a wrapped, slightly bulky package in his arms, and the scholar brought up the rear with a lantern of his own. Every so often, the scholar would pause and then murmur directions.

It took Virgil an embarrassingly long time to realize they were following a leyline, and sure enough, once they reached an intersection point, they stopped and set up a brightly colored cloth, a few wooden dishes, and bound, dried herbs from the garden.

An offering, the forest seemed to croon around him, pleased with the cuts of meat and burnt herbs. Virgil couldn’t hear what the scholar said, the words quiet and slow, but with the forest present in the back of his mind, he got the general idea.

Reciprocity. Giving for what they had taken, a declaration of their intent.

The forest accepted the claim as it had accepted his offer years ago, the sound of it in the buzzing of the insects and the breeze rustling the leaves. The humans returned home, as much residents of these woods as Virgil was, now.

---

Between the forest’s new fondness and their own persistent harmlessness, Virgil couldn’t justify getting rid of the humans.

So instead, he stayed well away from them, only venturing out of his corner of the forest to supervise the offering trips they made into the heart of the woods on every half-moon, both waxing and waning. If the humans noticed either the forest's fond touch in the brush of its greenery against them or the weight of his narrow-eyed gaze upon them, they didn't show it.

The season shifted slowly, and then all at once. The forest grew quiet again, its greenery fading away as it and many of its inhabitants dropped into snowsleep. Virgil wished his own winter could pass so simply.

The humans’ arrival had dragged his attention away from his usual preparations, and he had enough difficulties hunting alone without adding new complications to the mix. As it stood, he had barely any body fat to speak of, and even his winter coat felt pitiful against the cutting winds and heavy snow.

Whenever he wasn’t hunting, he was curled up in his cave, wishing for the warmth of a pack to surround him. He usually ran warm, enough that even the night’s chill didn’t bother him, but it was a different story in this weather. Shifting wasn’t an option either— His human form could barely withstand minutes in the cold, let alone hours.

Looking back, he wasn’t sure whether he’d drifted towards the cabin on purpose or simply subconsciously followed the smell of smoke. The result had been the same either way.

The house had looked unbearably warm against the bleak landscape, and Virgil had spent ages arguing with himself before slinking towards the abode, unable to bear another sleepless night having any scrap of heat leached away. Honestly, he’d been half-surprised to wake up this morning.

He slunk around the edges of the building, his heart pounding at the muffled voices inside. They had no reason to believe a werewolf resided here. He was small enough to resemble a normal wolf if they caught him. He might simply be earning himself a quicker death, put down like a simple wild animal, but he felt too numb to care.

The cabin’s foundation was solid, but Virgil had spent a fair amount of time exploring the human den as a pup, telling himself he was conquering his fear. It was certainly a hunter’s hideout; he’d found a staggering number of secret passages and hidey-holes built into it for easy escape. With a little prying, they could also be used for easy entrance.

The boarded up entrance to the crawl space was just where he remembered it, faded defensive runes carved into the wood. The enchantments were long defunct, the boards old and rotted, and he’d wriggled through the crawl space enough as a kid to know that there were no lingering traps in wait.

He braced himself, and then shifted with low cracks of bone and flesh. This close to the full moon, it ached like sore muscles, but not as bad as the cold stung at his now-human body. Gritting his teeth, he quickly dug his nails into the wood, able to pry the planks free even with half-frozen fingers. Task done, he shifted back as quick as he could and waited for an agonizing moment, listening for any signs that he’d been heard.

Nothing. The distant voices carried on without a pause.

He hesitated again, but in mere seconds, meager warmth began trickling out from the opening, baiting him more effectively than any supernatural lure. He ducked his head and crawled into the passage, which was more cramped than he’d recalled but still manageable. Step by silent step, he crept through the crawl space, letting the growing heat sink into him until the biting cold was barely more than a memory.

He hadn’t realized just how far under the cabin he’d ventured until a voice rang out directly above him, the actual words lost in the rush of panic he felt, crouched and vulnerable with a human was only meters away.

He wasn’t sure how long he spent like that, tremors vibrating through him as old memories came rushing back. It was small things that brought him back; the smell of ink, the crackling of a hearth, shared laughter. He’d had none of those, back then, but they were here now. He was here now.

The humans continued to chatter casually, none of them aware that there was a beast lying in wait just under the floorboards. They didn’t know he was there. He was safely hidden away.

Slowly, inch by inch, Virgil relaxed, head tucked against his paws, adjusting bit by bit until even the creaks of the humans moving about over his head didn’t register as a threat.

Finally warm, he dropped into sleep between one exhale and the next.

#sanders sides #sanders sides fic #werewolf au #ts virgil #ts roman #ts patton #ts logan #heyatnr #heyatn rewrite #how easy you are to need redux #my writing #writing #im sorry this is so late i got caught up with work #this part is pretty close to the original so im sure its familiar #but i hope you all enjoy anyhow!