#yes i have spent hours researching this just to try to find relevance somewhere where there might never have been relevance | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

wisteria-lodge · 3 years

Text

lion primary + slightly burnt lion secondary (badger secondary model) (bird secondary model)

i hope you’re having an amazing day!! here’s my SHC dilemma:

i know my primary is lion, and it feels a little exploded, at that, but at least i know what’s up. but im still extremely confused about my secondary. i tried looking through other submissions, but i didn’t really find anything i vibed with 100%, but then again i have adhd and im really struggling going through all that text, it just kinda blurs together at some point

so, my secondary. taking the test, i always get burnt, often with a vague hint towards bird. at first i immediately adopted that and decided i was a burnt bird, but the more i go the less that feels right to me and i think it might be some sort of model.

Yeah. “doesn’t feel right.” Definitely see the Lion in your sorting.

working by elimination, im pretty certain im not a snake secondary. that ish doesn’t even sound real to me, i know there are people like this because i know a couple, but it’s just so weird to me that some people are just able to improvise so effectively, and seemingly change themselves like that, and they?? enjoy it?? it does sound dope, like i admire it, but wtf.

Lion secondaries can get very *does not compute* when trying to get their head around Snake secondaries. I’m considering Lion for you.

i do act differently in different situations or with different people, but i don’t think i have “personas” as much as degrees of awkwardness

I see the burnt secondary. You’re definitely talking yourself down here. But the way you talk about “degrees of awkwardness” does make me think about the way Lion secondaries “change faces” by modulating intensity.

depending on how much my anxiety is acting up, and the more anxious i am, the more i act like a doormat and revert to the proper manners i was taught, but like… that’s not me, and it’s not done on purpose, i don’t enjoy it.

Looks like somebody’s got an unhealthy Badger secondary model.

it feels gross not to be able to act like myself, whatever the hell that is.

And you didn’t vibe with the Lion descriptions? This is the first time I’m reading though this and… very interested to get to the part where you talk about why you think you’re not a Lion.

im also convinced im not a bagder - my mother is, and there are a lot of those in my community, so i was raised thinking that was the best way to be, an ideal to work towards, but it’s just not comfortable for me, i don’t wanna do it.

Yeah, this would that unhealthy Badger secondary model you were talking about. ^

i don’t even think i *can* do it. i mean, “showing up and doing the work” is pretty hard with adhd, and not even the most efficient way of getting stuff done (at least for me), and thinking of the group and what i can do in that group is annoying. also i get that asking for help is important sometimes but it still feels like that’s just admitting i can’t figure out how to do it myself, which, yikes (don’t come at me i know it’s unhealthy)

Hey, breathe. It’s okay. Nobody is going to make you be a Badger secondary. Clearly you’ve spent enough time struggling under the weight of a model that doesn’t suit you, and now you’re pushing back against everything Badger extra hard.

id rather find a group im a good fit for instead of molding myself to please others.

See, that’s an exaggerated, caricatured way of conceptualizing how a Badger secondary works… but I’m not surprised that you think about it that way.

whatever i do, it needs to come from me.

… you’ve got a very loud Lion secondary.

anyway im somewhere between lion and bird, and at first i thought i was a bird because i do in fact fricking love learning everything i can, i wouldn’t naturally call it “collecting”, i’m just doing whatever’s interesting in the moment

You mean you learn by improvising? :) Like a Lion? :)

but sure, why not - i like collecting languages, knowledge about different cultures, books, music, space, countries, medicine, anything and everything, and i sometimes spend hours researching random stuff that im never actually gonna use “just in case im stranded in the wilderness and need to make soap” you feel? but it’s not actually because i think it might be useful (though i do get random bouts of anxiety over not knowing how to do certain stuff “in case” even though the probability id need them is infinitesimal).

Loving knowledge does not make you a Bird secondary. I’m hearing you talk about about a thing you do for fun, and - this is key - a thing you use as a mechanism to cope with anxiety. ADHD can sometimes make you feel very scattered, going too fast, and your Bird is giving you [the illusion of] control. And I’m not going to knock that. The illusion of control is important.

i just like knowing things and being able to use those things to do stuff. i wanna be “that guy” you can come to with the most obscure problem and they’d have some way of dealing with it. doesn’t that sound pretty bird?

Okay. Here’s the deal. You like Bird secondaries. You think they’re cool, and badass. Maybe you’d like to be one. But I’m still not at all convinced you are. I haven’t heard you use it to solve problems.

but i can’t actually do that stuff. i think i used to, when i was a teenager? but depression and undiagnosed adhd kinda kicked my ass, among a few other things, and now i don’t really have the brain power for it and i feel like im not actually able to learn things as well, or to even think straight.

Wow. That is some burnt secondary talk. I can’t do things.

(I promise you, people with ADHD have absurd brain power, and can learn things crazy well, although not in the same way as neurotypicals. You are right about not thinking straight, which I am interpreting as “in a straight line.” ADHD people think in webs and corkscrews and I love it.)

or if i did, i can’t learn as *many* things as i need to feel accomplished? which idk what you think but it kinda just sounds like burnt bird to me.

Feeling like the secondary you have isn’t good enough can be a Burnt thing... but feeling like you need to manifest a specific secondary *more* (which is what this feels like) is usually a sign of a model.

but here’s the thing. all of those sound real nice. and cool. and a good way of doing things, maybe even the “right” way, even though i know that’s subjective. but lion just feels more comfy, and idk if that’s because im a burnt bird modeling lion or if it’s smth else.

… you mean… like being… a Lion?

cause the “collecting skills and knowledge to solve problems” thing sounds cool, but it’s actually more just the first part that i vibe with? the part where i get to learn stuff! but when actually solving problems, i don’t usually think too long, i just vibe. i see where my instinct is taking me and i apply reason *after* that, or like, as a secondary, support thing. im not a dumbass either, im good at puzzles and logic problems, i can totally think things through and use my skills! but that’s not really how i approach problem-solving. i just jump into the situation and see what part of it is closest and start there, or what’s convenient, or what just feels right or nicer or whatever.

This is a perfect description of a Lion secondary with a supportive Bird model. Like a LOT of neurodivergent people (hi!) you built yourself some scaffolding using the Bird toolbox.

and on one hand it could be that im not confident in my skillset enough to do things the bird way, but on the other hand, thinking back to my childhood and teenage years, when i had better executive skills and i wasn’t as completely scatterbrained as i am I now (i was, but not as bad in some ways), i still did this? like, all of my major life decisions where made on the spot based on instinct and nothing else

I’m definitely seeing the Lion primary come though as well.

whenever i have a problem of the interpersonal sort i just face it and talk to the person and don’t bother hiding or sugarcoating things even if it means hurting that person because i don’t want to lie or come off as something i’m not, when i need to work on a project i don’t bother planning, i just jump in and a strategy forms in an organic way as i go, you know what i mean? isn’t that what this “charging” business means?

Yes.

anyway i have no idea which one is a model and which one is actually mine. i love learning things but i don’t care about actually using them. i mean i like it, of course, but it’s whatever. planning is tedious and it kinda gives me validation because im meant to be “smart” and i guess planning is what smart people do, but it’s annoying and nothing ever goes exactly to plan anyway so you just have to pause and plan again or whatever, and that’s just so boring and frustrating??

I get that you like Bird secondaries, and I get that the picture of “smart person” in your head looks like a Bird secondary but just like… come on…

why not just do the damn thing?? and then what you have to do will be obvious anyway?? and sure, if you planned ahead, maybe you’d already know what you need to do and you’d have prepared it and you’d do it better, but who’s got the time for that?? i can’t use my brain like that! i need to live the thing before it actually feels real enough for me to think about solving it.

I have never read anything more Lion secondary in my entire goddamn life.

i hope this actually made sense and i gave enough relevant information, my head kinda feels jumbled right now. i mean it makes sense to me but i don’t know how this reads from an outside perspective. maybe i should have planned this like an essay or whatever lmao

thanks a lot for answering these & running this blog!!! it’s dope and you give really good insights and you’re just a super cool person!

<3 <3 <3

#LION SECONDARY #badger secondary model #bird secondary model #lion primary #sortme #sortinghatchats #wisteria sorts #submission

27 notes · View notes

kaen-ace-of-diamonds · 3 years

Text

Walking Space Heater

Word Count: 2700+ (oneshot)

[AO3]

Genre: Fluff/Hurt/Comfort

Characters: Cinder Fall, Neopolitan, Emerald Sustrai, Mercury Black

Pairing: Cinder Fall/Neopolitan

Summary: Written (late) for Day 4 of @spice-cream-week 2021, “There Was Only One Bed.”

With the heat of both her Semblance and the Maiden powers, Cinder's body is much warmer than the average person's. So long as she's still by her side, Neo intends to take full advantage of that.

~0~

This is definitely a step down from the Haven dorms. Neo’s thumbs moved lightning-fast over the keyboard of her Scroll. Don’t they have ANY concept of personal space here?

She could say something about Roman’s excessive use of emojis. But looking at his messages, she could hear his laughter clearly in her head, and she had no problem with that.

wtm? you got stuck with a shitty roommate? I’ll come and get her for you idgaf

That elicited the breathy noises that were the closest Neo got to laughter. Truthfully, she probably wouldn’t have minded sharing a room much in and of itself. It might even have been fun to mess with Emerald and Mercury in their own space.

But no, she’d ended up with the only one that made the hair on the back of her neck stand up.

Cinder Fall was calm, collected, and incredibly competent. Neo didn’t necessarily dislike her. She thought that they got along fairly well, in fact. But that didn’t mean that she trusted her.

Roman was content to stay in the dark about what exactly her ultimate design was beyond Beacon’s destruction, having already accepted the fact that they would be overwhelmed by it. It still gnawed at Neo, though. Thus far her only clues had been the couple private calls that Cinder had taken, and the way Haven’s headmaster cringed like a kicked puppy whenever he caught sight of her.

Sure, the man was jumpy enough in general, but Cinder — or, more accurately, whatever force had moved Cinder to the Academies — made him cower. Even Neo’s most devilish smile couldn’t do that.

She’s...not bad. She definitely likes me more than she likes you.

Now, did that really require five laughing emojis after I can live with that lol?

And

Neo’s thumb hovered over the screen. For the first time in several minutes, she glanced up from where she was curled up tightly on the covers of her bed.

Cinder was perfectly at ease on her own bed, leaning back against a stack of pillows with her Scroll open in front of her face. Still rifling through the records of all the Academy students, no doubt. Casting her great and bloody show, for which every little thing had to be perfect. It wasn’t enough that she was sending Emerald and Mercury out to run recon and collect as many relevant details about their players as possible. No, she had to study up herself for hours on end.

Neo was willing to play her own part, but it all seemed very boring to her. Certainly her interim leader could use a break. She returned her attention for one moment more to her Scroll:

I think she would be fun to play with.

Ignoring the several question marks sent in reply, Neo pocketed her Scroll and slipped off her bed. Moving soundlessly was one of the first skills she had ever had to master, and she still considered it her most important.

Cinder was still too engrossed in her research to notice as she crept across the carpet and climbed onto the other bed. Or maybe she just didn’t care enough to acknowledge her. She certainly didn’t look surprised when Neo’s head poked through the hole between her arms and her Scroll.

“Oh,” she said, smirking, in a tone that she might use with a stray cat that had come up to her in the street. “Hello there. Looking for some entertainment?”

Neo gave her her best strawberry-ice-cream smile, and scooted closer. From the meager rations of physical contact she meted out to Emerald, she wasn’t sure how much Cinder liked being touched, so she proceeded with care, little by little. It seemed to be acceptable: she stayed very still, but allowed Neo to settle down on her chest, resting her head against her shoulder.

“Or are you just lonely?”

Neo hummed thoughtfully, letting herself relax: not all the way, but just enough. This was nicer than she had expected, she had to admit. Cinder was dressed like she had been in the first round of the Vytal Festival: sleeveless jacket, long pants, and sarashi. Neo’s cheek rested mostly on bare skin, and though of course she had seen Cinder’s Semblance before (as well as the flames that didn’t quite seem to fit with it), it was much warmer than she had thought it would feel. Softer, too, with the scents of wood smoke and spicy perfume clinging to it.

“Well?”

Neo rolled lazily over onto her back, looking up at Cinder’s Scroll to see what she had been so busy scrutinizing. Hm. Several pictures of that Mistrali girl from the cereal commercials, accompanied by a passage about her Semblance which had been highlighted in a few places. There was one more tab open with an acronym on it, but that was it.

Nothing that could tell Neo anything about their situation that she hadn’t already guessed at. And what was more, absolutely nothing that could be more interesting to her temporary partner than her.

Clearly, Cinder could use a lesson on how to properly spend an evening. Dastardly planning, which seemed to be her only form of recreation, just wasn’t going to cut it.

So Neo helpfully reached up, laid her hands over Cinder’s, and pushed the Scroll shut for her. She put her pointer finger to the outside of her nose; her new teammates might not be picking up Valerian Sign Language particularly well, but she hoped the long, exaggerated twist away from her face coupled with a dramatic sigh got the message across equally well: Cinder, I am bored to tears.

Cinder tilted her head, puzzled but smiling. She slipped her Scroll into her pocket and wrapped an arm around Neo’s waist.

“Well, in that case, I’d be happy to give you some attention.”

Neo made as pleased a sound as she could muster up, and snuggled up to Cinder, as close as she could get. It might have been dark and cool outside, but she felt as if she were napping on a sunbeam. Rolling over to lay her head on Cinder’s chest, she could imagine that there was a powerfully burning fire inside it in place of a beating heart, whose heat was palpable, just beneath the skin.

She tried to look more sweetly smug than actually impressed, but gods, she had never felt anything like this.

Cinder held her tightly in both arms now, fingertips scratching lightly between her shoulder blades, and Neo nearly purred. Years of pulling back bowstrings had turned those arms wiry and oh so strong. All at once, she completely understood why Emerald was always trying to earn one of these rare hugs.

And speaking of which...

Neo wasn’t sure how long she spent in the lap of luxury, only that she felt like she might actually fall asleep in it, as toasty warm as it was. Cinder had switched from rubbing her back to stroking and playing with her hair, which, in her experience with other people, was a welcome first. But she was jolted back to full awareness when their dorm room door slammed angrily open.

Blinking, Neo lifted her head. She caught the lingering scents of jungle juice and sweat incoming, before she saw Emerald stalking inside, barely hanging onto her last scrap of patience. Mercury stumbled in after her, wearing a huge grin and mirrored shades that Neo was fairly certain did not belong to him.

Cinder smirked. “I was wondering when you two would be back. How did it go?”

Emerald forced a halfway convincing smile for her leader. “It was...interesting. Though not quite as informative as I was h—”

The smile froze on her face when she turned to look directly at Cinder, and saw Neo lounging in her lap like a spoiled cat.

Neo smirked, and signed, Party fun? With the reputation Vytal Festival house parties had, hopefully Emerald had gotten some attention as well.

“Oh, it was great!” Mercury shrugged off his jacket and pitched it into his and Emerald’s room, littering their carpet with brownie crumbs. “We saw a lot of everybody, didn’t we, Emmy?”

While Emerald tried to take a cue from Cinder and set him on fire with her eyes, Cinder herself just closed her Scroll with a soft laugh.

“Well, you can tell us all about it in the morning. We should all get some rest now.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You got it, boss...”

Neo watched them slink into their room, where muffled bickering started up as soon as the door closed, but did not move until she felt a gentle pat on her thigh.

“You too, dear. Go on.”

Though she made a show of huffing about it, Neo got up off Cinder’s bed and went back across the room.

Her own bed felt cold and uninviting now. Catching up on the several missed texts from Roman (including but not limited to what do you mean by that lmao, hey Neo dont leave me out of the loop :), Neo tf are you doing to her O_o, NEO) did make her smile, but as she drifted off to sleep, she couldn’t help but wish that she didn’t have to return to being alone just yet.

~0~

This was not at all the solution to that problem that she had envisioned, but Neo knew very well how to deal with whatever life threw at her.

She had never been to Atlas, and while she had to roll her eyes at its decadence, she couldn’t say she hated the place. Cinder, on the other hand, never answered outright when Neo tried to ask if she had ever been here before, but every bitter hiss from her about Atlas elites that had not been asked for gave her a general idea. It had taken them a while to find a vacant apartment to squat in, especially considering that there was an entire chunk of the city that Cinder refused to even go near.

But now here they were, and it was empty around them and quiet outside. The blackout curtains shielded them from the city lights. In pitch darkness the two of them were curled up together in the place’s one bed.

Cinder had initially balked at the idea of sharing it, insisting that Neo take an extra blanket and find somewhere else to curl up. So barky with her orders these days, and so on edge, too. Neo was beginning to wonder how she had ever thought of this woman as calm and collected.

In any case, she didn’t see what her once-again partner’s problem was. She had invited Neo into her bed with her before, hadn’t she? Maybe not to sleep, but still. And she was far from squeamish; she wouldn’t make a fuss about the scarring and empty eye socket on full display. As such, she ignored the demand, and simply undressed, got under the covers, and gestured for Cinder to join her.

After some indignant spluttering, Cinder threw up her hands and stormed into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her. She didn’t come out until Neo had turned the lights off and laid there long enough that she might reasonably have fallen asleep. Even then, she slipped in quietly, gingerly, and stuck close to the edge of the bed.

Now, that just would not do. Atlas was much too cold for that kind of nonsense.

Neo rolled over under the blankets, feeling just as bold as last time, but exercising even more care, Cinder being so volatile lately. She went out of her way to be heard, so it wouldn’t startle Cinder to be touched. She knew her bedmate was awake: though she lay very still, her breathing was nowhere near relaxed enough for her to be asleep.

Cinder didn’t jump when she felt Neo wrap her arms around her waist, but she did go still as a statue.

“Neo,” she growled, low in her throat, “what are you doing? I’m not in the mood for—”

Neo nuzzled her bare shoulder in a way she hoped was reassuring, as she pressed up against her back. Fortunately for her, Cinder’s new arm was tightly bandaged up for the night, so she didn’t have to risk touching the awful thing. Only human skin, just as fiery warm as before. Even the wood smoke smell remained.

As had happened so often since the Fall of Beacon, Neo caught herself writing a text to Roman in her head, wryly telling him that he was right, she shouldn’t have thought so hard about where Cinder’s flames came from, because she would never in a million years have hit on the right answer.

She gave her head a shake, and resisted the urge to glance back at the bowler hat perched neatly on a bedpost. If she started thinking too hard about that, she would never get to sleep either. There would be time, when the sun came up, to consider some more whether the woman in her arms was the key to her revenge, or its target all along.

Right now, the darkness was peaceful and the blankets thick and soft around them, and the heat of their bodies grew more soporific every moment. Comfort was a rarity in both of their lives. They ought to savor it whenever it came their way.

Cinder let out a long, exasperated huff, clearly not sharing the opinion.

“Couldn’t you just hug a pillow?” she grumbled. But there was no bite in her voice.

Neo smiled against her skin, entwining her legs with Cinder’s. Now, she would have said, were her hands not occupied, where would be the fun in that?

“...Fine. Just don’t think you’re going to make this a regular thing.”

Oh, she absolutely was, so long as they were staying in the coldest part of the world and she was in the company of a walking space heater.

As such, Neo ignored the question and snuggled closer. She was trying her best to communicate “calm down and go to sleep” through body language alone, so to feel Cinder slowly but surely relaxing in her arms, eventually going limp, was deeply gratifying. Almost fascinating.

From nights spent in the Beacon dorm room and Mistrali inns, Neo already knew that Cinder talked in her sleep. Most of what she said was sluggish and toneless as well as nonsensical, but sometimes it was a series of fierce snaps or pained moans. It came as no surprise to Neo that when, just as she was starting to doze off herself, she was woken back up by her partner’s twitching and yelping.

“No...don’t take...I’m...!”

Neo sighed drowsily, and tightened her embrace, humming as soothingly as she could. Her inability to speak never really bothered her, but there were times like this when it didn’t exactly help her, either. At least she could keep Cinder from thrashing around and hurting one of them: if that arm decided to act up while its host was in distress, she had zero faith in the bandages to hold those claws back.

It’s okay, she thought, hoping that somehow it would get across, just relax, you’re all right...

Nightmares never lasted forever. Neo had woken with her stomach still in free fall from enough dreams of plummeting wildly through a Grimm-infested sky to know that. Still, she hoped that her attempts at calming had helped this one pass quickly. Cinder’s mumbling devolved into moans, then to frantic whimpers, then finally to something close to the restful breathing that Neo had almost fallen asleep to before.

Neo took a deep breath of her own. She was too tired to smile, but leaned in to press a kiss to the back of Cinder’s neck, the ends of her short hair tickling her nose. To her surprise, she felt a burn scar here, too: thin and faded, but winding around her neck like garrote wire. Somehow she didn't think that Ruby had done this. But she certainly wasn't going to ask who had. They weren't going to discuss any part of this in the morning.

So she kissed her neck once more, soft and just a bit more sincere, before closing her eyes again.

Good night.

#spicecreamweek2021 #cinder fall #neo politan #rwby neo #spice cream #RWBY #rwby8 #kaen's fics

45 notes · View notes

ankewehner · 4 years

Text

Livetweet of accidentally getting into fairyland...

Best twitter thread ever?

https://twitter.com/NeolithicSheep/status/1330548523721515013 Shepherd: Oh hey Ursula, do you have the number for those people who take out invasive plants still?

Ursula: Probably somewhere, yeah. They said they didn’t usually work on such small properties, though, and I don’t know if I’ve got an infestation worth their time.

Shepherd: Ok but what if I say "kudzu" to you, can we throw enough money at them to make it worth their time.

Ursula: If you say “kudzu” to me, I will panic, scream, and come running to Dogskull with a flamethrower.

Shepherd: Ok well I suggest driving but maybe pack up the flamethrower. Ursula: OH MY GOD YOU FOUND KUDZU OH GOD WHERE IS IT ARE YOU SURE IT ISN’T JUST WILD GRAPE

Shepherd: YES I KNOW WHAT WILD GRAPE LOOKS LIKE THANK YOU anyway I was walking Beamer this morning after the deer ate breakfast and the white deer was walking down toward the back of the property, you know that low tucked away part? And I thought, well, we'll just trail after her at a polite distance and if I'm lucky I'll find some of her fur caught on a bush! Wouldn't that be great! So we kept going past the big ass fucking oak trees that make, like, that weird arch? And there's kudzu.

Ursula: What big oak trees?! There’s no big oak trees back there! It’s all pine!

Shepherd: Yeah you know, the two really big motherfuckers that look like English oak. They're like, way the fuck back there.

Ursula: There are no English oak on Dogskull. Are you sure you weren’t trespassing on the Freemason’s property?

Shepherd: No they're closer to the front I think? Who's next door to them? Also I thought Dog Skull was 7 acres? Because I should be off it and hitting the road by now.

Ursula: Next door to them is the people with the trailer on its side. Do you see any trailers lying on their sides?

Shepherd: A lot of oak trees, a little bit of kudzu, zero trailers in any orientation. Some birds and squirrels. Oh hey Beamer found a nice pond.

Ursula: Okay, this is important. Do the oak trees still have leaves on them?

Shepherd: Yeah but so does the one up front. Oh wait. These are, uh, still green. Like summer green.

Ursula: Right. Okay. This could be a problem. Give me a couple minutes, we have to take trash to the dump and then I’ll look some stuff up. Meanwhile, DON’T EAT ANYTHING.

Shepherd: You mean in case it's poisonous, right? Like THEORETICALLY if I didn't see this tweet until just now and HYPOTHETICALLY I found an apple tree and ate an apple, that would be fine?

Ursula: ...that would not be fine.

Shepherd: Beamer didn't want any, which was weird I thought.

Ursula: INDUCE VOMITING! INDUCE VOMITING!

Shepherd: He didn't eat anything! I'm not going to gag my dog for not eating an apple!

Ursula: Not the dog! Induce vomiting in yourself! Every chunk of that apple needs to come out before you digest it!

Shepherd: FINE. I have puked it up. It was a really good apple, too.

Ursula: Oh thank god. Whew. Okay. The alternative was that you were gonna need a cold iron enema and I wasn’t sure how to do that on short notice.

Shepherd: Oh hey fun fact, "cold iron" is just, like, iron. It's not a special kind or anything!

Ursula: Do you have any on you right now? Beamer’s collar or tags or anything?

Shepherd: Collar hardware is all aluminum these days, otherwise it rusts. Let me pat down my pockets. Syringe of dewormer? Is that helpful?

Shepherd: Anyway I don't want to alarm you but uh. I can't find the trail I followed? So you and Kevin will need to go over tonight and give the boys [i.e. oxen] a hay bale and the goats and sheep two.

Ursula: No! I am scared of cows! We have to get you out of there! Look, I have a bunch of Llewelyn books from my teenage pagan days. I’m sure Scott Cunningham or Silver Ravenwolf covered this somewhere.

Shepherd: Scott Cunningham seems like a really drastic measure just because you're afraid of some cows. But sooner or later I'm going to run out of cigarettes so sure, why not. Oh!! The boys' bow pins are in my pocket, I was going to sand them today and oil them! They're very definitely iron!

Ursula: That’s good! That’s very good! If anyone tries to talk to you, keep hold of those! Now let’s see...do you consider yourself a “solitary practitioner?”

Shepherd: Ursula I'm an ornamental hermit, you don't get much more solitary. Also so far the only person who tried to talk to me was a frog.

Ursula: ...what did the frog say?

Shepherd: "SMOKING KILLS." I tossed it back in the pond.

Ursula: *rubs forehead*

Shepherd: Fucking frogs are all alike, I'm telling you.

Ursula: I really wish these authors had spent less time on “why Wicca isn’t Satanism” and more time on “what to do when you’ve strayed into the fae realms.” I mean, I understand it was the political climate of the time...

Shepherd: I feel like nobody really covers that last one anymore. You have 4 hours until the cows want dinner.

Ursula: Silver Ravenwolf suggests making your magical working space more inviting with stencils? These books spend a surprising amount of time on interior decorating as a vital part of ritual magick. I never noticed that when I was fifteen.

Shepherd: Yeah me neither honestly. It's remarkably unhelpful when you're stuck in faerie and your collie is getting bored. Shepherd: So you want me to... Build a magical working space and stencil it?

Ursula: I can’t actually see how that would help matters. Maybe I should check the Foxfire books instead.

Shepherd: I... Don't remember them having anything relevant, but I might be wrong?

Ursula: They have everything. Ooh, this one is about how to scald the bristles off a hog!

Shepherd: A) I already know how to do that and B) I do not have a hog, sufficient firewood, or a hog scrubbing brush here. FOCUS, URSULA. FOCUS.

Ursula: Sorry, the ADHD meds haven’t kicked in yet today...uh...let’s see...avoid whippoorwills, if you see any?

Shepherd: I do that already, otherwise they steal your toenails.

Ursula: If you harvest apples, leave one on the tree or it attracts the Devil.

Shepherd: You told me not to eat the apples! Am I allowed to eat the apples now??

Ursula: No! These are hypothetical apples! NO EATING! I tried to look up deer in the Foxfire books and there’s a story about somebody’s grandpa wrestling a buck in a mill dam and drowning it, but I don’t see the relevance here. I mean, Grandpa does sound like a badass, though.

Shepherd: I feel like I shouldn't wrestle deer here. What if I try telling Beamer to find his sheep?

Ursula: Well, research has hit a small snag. I tried googling for the foxfire books and kudzu, in case there was something about fae kudzu portals, right? But it turns out your Twitter is the third hit. Shep, we may BE the experts.

Shepherd: Uh oh. OK. In that case, you and Kevin go over to Dog Skull. Hitch up Cole and Cannon and take them back to the oak trees. Put a logging chain around one and yell real loud "LET SHEPHERD OUT OR WE START PULLING"

Ursula: Oh hell no! I read tree law Reddit! I know how this ends! Do you want us to get sued by Freemasons?!

Shepherd: I DON'T THINK THE FREEMASONS ARE THE PROBLEM HERE, URSULA

Ursula: I DON’T TRUST THEM WITH THEIR LITTLE LEVELS AND SHEEPSKINS AND WEIRDLY OCULAR PYRAMIDS Also if you see a pyramid with an eye on it, don’t eat it’s either.

Ursula: Okay. Never mind the Freemasons. I wrote a book about this once, I think. White animals, scary fae, random magic deer. It was set in Finland, so you may need to fashion some umlauts, though.

Shepherd: I've got my chore knife, I can carve so many umlauts. Do I just put them in trees until I get back?

Ursula: First of all, are you wearing pants?

Shepherd: YES I'M WEARING PANTS YOU WEIRDO

Ursula: t’s a legitimate question! I mean, I’m not wearing pants.

Now Shep, this is very important. You have to take off your pants.

Also your shoes, your hoodie, and probably Beamer’s collar.

Shepherd: Ursula. Why are we getting naked.

Ursula: To break the misdirection spell! Put your clothes on backwards!

And possibly inside out? Shit, there’s a bunch of different sources. I don’t know if they have to be inside out, but definitely backwards.

Uh...let’s see...hmm, backwards definitely. Inside out might be for leshy. Leshies? Leshys? What’s the plural form, do you think?

If you happen to see any giggling green hairy dudes, ask them what the plural form of their name is. That’s gonna bug me.

Shepherd: Beamer's collar doesn't have a backwards! I'll turn it inside out. And my clothes backwards and inside out, got it.

Shepherd: There's just, like, frogs. And squirrels. I can hear music though! There might be a dance party, I could go ask about green hairy dudes?

Ursula: STAY AWAY FROM THE MUSIC unless it’s the Freemasons I guess

Shepherd: No it's more folk music. The Freemasons play, like, Michael Jackson.

ANYWAY clothes are backwards and inside out. Beamer's collar is backwards and just to be thorough I tied the rope end of his leash to his collar instead of using the clip, so his leash is backwards too. He's pulling me away from the pond!

Ursula: Tell him to go find his sheep!

Shepherd: I have so instructed him! Hopefully there's not, like, the faerie equivalent of really good sheep here. Hey do you want me to grab you an apple

Ursula: No, they don’t come true from seed, but if you can cut me a decent slightly whippy twig with a few leaves, I might be able to root that sucker.

Shepherd: ...you want me to pause a collie on a mission while I test the whippiness of twigs??

I HEAR MOOING. I SEE PINE TREES.

Ursula: GO TOWARD THE MOOING

Shepherd: THERE'S THE OLD RUSTED OUT METAL THING! I'm back! On uh the opposite side of the property from the one I left from.

Also there's a goddamned chorus frog calling.

Ursula: Yeah, they do that.

Ursula: THANK GOD THE KUDZU IS ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PORTAL

...oh, and you’re back, that’s good too. Very pleased.

Shepherd: Anyway you don't have to feed the boys. Unless you want to?

Ursula: There is no situation where I will WANT to feed your giant-ass death bovines.

Also, what have we learned about following the white doe into the woods?

Shepherd: She knows where the really good apples are?

Also my boys are tiny!!

Ursula: ...I’m gonna go take a nap.

#Ursula Vernon #NeolithicSheep #Faerie

37 notes · View notes

libermachinae · 3 years

Text

Fault Lines Under the Living Room

Part I: Listen - Chapter 1: A Commotion, Eager and Anxious (Previous)

Also available on AO3! Summary: Arcee arrives on the Lost Light just as someone else is getting ready to leave. Chapter Word Count: 3010

---

“Hey, you’ve reached Captain Rodimus’ personal hailing frequency. If you’re calling to complain again about mandatory hab sweeps, please refer to recent events involving briefcases and the hereafter outlawed opening of. If you have news involving foolish, ridiculous, or nonsensical obstacles in our quest, input 1 to be transferred directly to Megatron’s personal comm line. If you have a complaint regarding sign placement, grammatically incorrect maintenance manuals, or that weird temperature difference between floors 7 and 8, input 2 for Ultra Magnus. If you’re lonely and want someone to talk to, input 3 for automatic directions to Swerve’s. Input 4 to be connected with me, provided I’m—”

Beep.

“Rodimus?”

“Blaster! Great timing, we just got back from Fortuna. Don’t talk too long, though, Magnus just handed me my prep for the hearing and these datapads are engraved with his personal insignia.”

“Sure, Rodimus. I’ve got incoming transmission from an unknown caller, not laying down any codes I’m familiar with. Tried pressing for details, but all they’re letting slip is they want to talk to you. Want me to patch them through?”

“Hm. On the one hand, unknown caller with mysterious intentions almost always means trouble, right?”

“We’ve ended up in some axel grease for it in the past, yeah.”

“And the reason we set down on Scarvix was to avoid creating more problems while we deal with the fallout from the last batch.”

“I thought it was to give the crew a day off?”

“And that’s why you’re our morale guy. Ratchet would probably tell me to ignore it, right?”

“I guess.”

“You don’t think he would?”

“Not really sure how the CMO’s opinion is relevant.”

Because Ratchet’s vote was the only one he knew.

“Yeah, never mind,” Rodimus said with a shrug, almost losing his balance in the process. “Ultra Magnus would say the same thing, anyway, and he’s counting on me to get to the hearing on time. He cares so much , he ‘summarized’ Brainstorm’s alleged code infringements himself.” He shifted the armload of datapads. The topmost pad was hanging off the edge, preparing for freefall, but trying to tilt it back to safety risked upsetting the rest of the pile.

“Nice of him,” Blaster said.

“Yep, super nice. He went to so much trouble. Really dug into the details, researched historical precedents, looked at the case from every angle. He probably buried his essay on the origins of Decepticon as an adjective somewhere in here.” The datapad tilted and dropped. Rodimus shifted his weight to one leg and kicked with the other, bouncing the pad off his knee and catching it with his teeth. “You know ‘at? Hure, ‘ut the comm hrough. ‘robably just a co’arketer, anyay.”

“Yes, sir.”

The familiar click and beat of a line being transferred. Rodimus deposited the datapad on top of his stack and started walking again, forgoing his office in favor of a detour to the middle decks. The view there was more impressive, the angle revealing the organic landscape that stretched between the Lost Light and Fortuna, a popular interstellar rest stop with enough mechanical business to make it worth the daytrip. Chomskians were their patrons of choice, but a hand over the faction insignia and most folks would let it slide. Walking the length of the Lost Light revealed a subtly changing view as the gleam of the mechanoid hub altered the silhouette of the city, and Rodimus busied himself tracking the shuttles, jets, and personal aircraft traveling in and out, letting it distract him until his comm came back.

“Am I speaking to Captain Rodimus?” an unfamiliar voice asked. Cybertronian, definitely, but otherwise unknown.

Cool .

“Yep, captain of the Lost Light and quester for the Knights of Cybertron,” he said. “What’s up?”

“This is Autobot Arcee, requesting permission to dock in the Lost Light’s shuttle bay.”

“Arcee?” Rodimus went through the list of all the Autobots he knew, ignoring the space where Arcee’s origin should have been. Some folks, MTOs especially, didn’t like to broadcast that information, and it wasn’t strictly necessary for a personal database search. Regardless, “Sorry, Arcee, I’m not remembering you. Who did you serve under?”

“New recruit. Was working with Prowl for a bit, now Optimus Prime. We’ve met.”

He had to hold himself back from shutting down the call. The datapads wobbled and he quickly righted himself.

“We have?” People who worked for Prowl were strategic about when they released that information. If she really was a new recruit, it was possible no one had explained to her yet that, ultimately, everything led back to him. It was the only justification he could find for staying on the line and not telling Ultra Magnus to initiate an immediate sweep for unauthorized listening devices.

“Well, no. But I crashed a shuttle for you. Into Galvatron.”

“You did?” And just like that he had forgotten Prowl entirely.

“I did. Me and a few others. It didn’t do much, but you and Optimus managed to take care of Vector Sigma anyway, so, bygones.”

Why couldn’t he remember this? It sounded awesome .

“Totally,” Rodimus said, feeling a swell of pride as he remembered the moment Optimus had set aside his doubts and trusted Rodimus’ word on the Matrix. Up until that point, his chosen name had felt ill-fitting, like the myriad of function tests that preceded a new harvest’s official classification. Or, in his darker moments, like the Primes of old, who claimed the Matrix’s blessing despite no legitimate connection to it. Optimus had put his faith in Rodimus, though, in his connection to the Matrix, and that faith had been rewarded , not punished . For once, his destiny hadn’t been priced in spilled energon.

Not that they hadn’t seen any.

“So you decided to get the brand and make it permanent?” he asked, pulling himself back to the present.

“Yes.”

“Then yeah, come aboard. ‘The more the merrier,’ as Megatron would never say. When do you estimate your arrival?”

“I’ve just breached atmosphere, should be there in an hour.”

“Perfect. I’ll send instructions along to open the shuttle bay doors and will be there to meet you.” He passed the news to Megatron and Ultra Magnus and was unsurprised when only the latter acknowledged the alert, as well as a bunch of forms that seemed incredibly tedious and not worth the bandwidth. Maybe once the hearing was over, he could sit down with his co-captain and remind him of the responsibilities he had agreed to as part of his deal. That would be a proper, leader-like thing to do.

Or he could let Megatron continue to wallow in whatever new misery he had concocted for himself. It certainly made his shifts easier.

He and Arcee exchanged farewells and his comm powered down, leaving Rodimus to strategize. Arcee’s arrival meant he did not have enough time to get back to his office, read through all of Magnus’ files, and make it to the shuttle bay, especially with all the effort it would take to even work himself up to unlocking the datapads. Better to make a good impression on their new guest and bump out the least pressing task. He could do his reading once Arcee was settled.

Walking around weighed down by the burden of knowledge was a drag, though, so he stuck to the part of the plan that involved getting rid of the datapads. He spent the remaining walk to his office (longer now after he had inadvertently walked in the opposite direction while on the comm) thinking about what he could do with the surprise free time. Maybe take a quick lap around the lower decks or make his first official visit to “Visages”. Something fun, carefree, and just barely skirting regulations; something normal , to start the work of convincing everyone, again, that things were going to be fine.

~*~

Ratchet was not stalling.

There was a chance he was overpreparing, but better that than the opposite. The galaxy was a big place, and if he was even slightly accurate in his guess of how far Drift would wander in his search for redemption, he would be touching corners of it even the war had never brought him to. So, an abundance of fuel was necessary, at least enough to last two bots a month plus about half that for the journey outward. Then medical supplies: wiremesh bandages, nanite gel, intravenous lines, sparkstarters, sorted boxes of nuts and screws, antiviral uploads, rust repellant, strut stabilizers, soldering wires… The shuttle was turning out better equipped than some of the mobile surgeries he had worked from during the war; even some hospitals had been dangerously low on materials he now found in abundance. For the first time, he had the resources to make sure nothing and no one would be lost to shortage, and he intended to take advantage of that new luxury.

Following that, the next logical step had been to make the rest of the shuttle comfortable as well. Two Morphy berths with recharge docks. A media library of music and movies to pass the time (the former Cyclonus’ recommendations, the latter, Swerve’s). A few selections from his private engex stash. A box of data blockers he had buried deep among the medical supplies and would claim were standard for any med kit if interrogated.

He nudged the box of Hex pieces against the wall with his foot. Was it alright there was nowhere to sit beside the naviconsole and the berths? He had though Drift would appreciate the economy of a smaller shuttle, but with the cargo loaded the atmosphere was shifting from cozy to cramped. Would Drift feel claustrophobic, reminded of squatters’ dens and Decepticon outposts? Drift was also a high-energy bot, who would probably itch for a chance to spin his wheels from time to time. Were the fuel reserves large enough to accommodate multiple planet stops?

Ratchet’s knuckle had worked its way between his teeth before he realized what he was doing. Dropping his hand, he forced himself to turn around and exit the small spacecraft. He was committed. Out of anyone on board, Drift had done the most to earn this home. If no one else was going to step up and do the right thing by returning it to him, Ratchet would resign to do it himself.

He heard a commotion, eager and anxious, as he stepped out into the shuttle bay. The hangar doors were opening, sunlight slipping through the growing crack, and several parked crafts were being taxied out of the way. Not wanting to get cut off by wandering shuttles, he hurried to the pedestrian entrance, where most of the voices were coming from: a small crowd, loiterers looking for the new source of intrigue. Whirl and Tailgate were among them, providing running commentary as the unwieldly ships skirted just shy of scraping each other’s paint off, so it was no surprise to find Cyclonus standing further off.

Perfect. Though Ratchet and Cyclonus were not on bad terms, neither had ever tried to expand their relationship past the occasional long-suffering glance. If it had been one of the bots who had his spark twisting every time he bumped into them in the hallways, Ratchet would have worried about giving his plan away, but he doubted Cyclonus cared whether the something-like-guilt was visible.

“Cyclonus,” he greeted.

“Ratchet.” The older of the two offered a polite nod, though his gaze returned to the door.

“What’s going on? Somebody forget something in Fortuna?” Ratchet kept his voice light, curiosity without investment. A change in routine could mean nothing, but by now everyone knew it could also be the start of something weird, dangerous, or a combination of the two. Either way, it would end up among Swerve’s stand-up material.

“New arrival,” Cyclonus said. “Arcee of the Darklands: a tested warrior with a spark that rivaled Galvatron’s.”

Might as well have called herself Foreboding of Doom and saved his declarative archives the search. Ratchet wondered if he should move his departure up.

“Is she here? Did I miss it?”

Rodimus’ panicked shouts preceded his stumble into the hangar. Ratchet greeted him with a pointed look, which he shouldered by simply not noticing it while his gaze darted around the room.

“Not yet, Rodimus,” Hoist announced over the loudspeaker. “We’re just getting the last shuttles cleared for landing.”

“Oh, thank Primus,” Rodimus said, tilting his head back as his fans released a cloud of warm air. “Fantastic.”

“You look like you gunned it to get here,” Ratchet said, waving away the smell of an overheated engine.

“No, that would be speeding, which is definitely against spacetime law,” Rodimus said, straightening to flash Ratchet a deeply unappreciated grin. “I ran. I told Arcee I would be here to meet her, and it would make for a pretty bad impression of the ship if the captain failed to live up to his promise.”

“Don’t you have a hearing to be getting ready for?” Ratchet asked, the question slipping past his censors. Slag. That was not the note he wanted to leave on. The stress of his impending departure was getting to him more than he had realized.

Rodimus shrugged, unaffected.

“Magnus gave me all the materials, just need to read them. Won’t take long.”

That stirred something in Ratchet’s spark.

“Good to know our justice system is under such attentive care.”

“Perhaps this is a conversation that would be better saved for when we are not moments from new introductions,” Cyclonus interjected, his deep bass distracting enough to halt those emotional processes of Ratchet’s that started to loop out of control whenever Rodimus opened his mouth. He set his vocalizer to standby, not trusting it to wait for his command, and wondered whether it would be better to get out sooner. Before his own smart mouth made his worries a reality.

The appearance of the approaching shuttle did not ease his concerns. Starting as a speck above the horizon, all optics were on it as it approached, a little blob of a spacecraft dangling over the city of Fortuna. Big, for a single occupant. Ratchet hoped he was wrong, but he noticed something further odd as it came nearer.

Whirl took care of that loose thread of optimism.

“It’s purple,” he said, with a coy look at Cyclonus, who ignored it with enviable steadiness.

“It’s a Decepticon vessel.” Ratchet had seen enough in his time. After the fall of Tyger Pax, Autobot regulations had outlawed all colors between navy and magenta for ships, and he could think of no other species brazen enough to steer a spacecraft directly into civilian airspace. “Rodimus?”

“Blaster confirmed Arcee’s ident after our call,” Rodimus said. “Bit of a garish choice for a ride, but it’s her.” He had maneuvered himself to the front of the group, standing at the front like he was putting himself on display for an honored guest.

“That is rich, coming from you.”

“Thanks, Ratch,” Rodimus said, casting over his shoulder a wink and a grin before he turned back to face the oncoming ship. Ratchet’s frown deepened and he ignored the way the gesture reminded him of Drift.

He never knew what the bot had seen in Rodimus. Short-sighted, selfish, and with an ego that could have powered the ship if he could have been bothered to contribute that much, Rodimus’ ability to perform feats no one else would attempt meant he was also prone to making mistakes they neither could have imagined. For all the time Ratchet had spent on the Lost Light , he still had no idea the limits of chaos Rodimus was capable of summoning to it, so he let triage and combat protocols idle in the background while they waited.

It was not a nice landing. The thrusters were still burning several hundred feet out, so they all heard the roar of wind buffeting ailerons as the shuttle struggled to slow itself down. It was only by the combined effects of the Lost Light ’s buffeting shield and the shuttle’s reverse engines that they did not suffer a catastrophic collision, and even then, the shuttle bounced as it finally touched down, coming within feet of kissing Huffer’s personal speeder. Ratchet still did not remember to vent as it struggled through taxiing, twice having to reattempt a maneuver as the combined efforts of Hoist, Rodimus, and a group of volunteers guided it to its designated space. Only when the engines finally shut down did Ratchet hear the collective sigh of multiple hydraulics systems releasing their tension.

“Guess Darkland warriors don’t need to know how to drive,” Ratchet muttered. He thought he heard Cyclonus huff, which was enough to get a chuckle out of him.

That was it, though, because in the next moment Rodimus was rushing to the lowering hatch, his spoiler flicking behind him like an insect wing. Ratchet caught a glimpse of a labyrinthine cargo hold before Arcee stepped forward, filling the space, and descended rapidly. He tensed, ready for something else to come charging out from behind her, but besides a look passed between her and Cyclonus nothing immediately hostile revealed itself.

“Welcome to the Lost Light,” Rodimus said, standing aside to let Arcee descend. The hatch raised as soon as she was standing on the Lost Light’s floor, blocking Ratchet’s view again.

“Yes, thank you.” Her tone was clipped, not the melodic veil of sophistication Ratchet had come to associate with Cyclonus, and she scanned the assembled bots with a look of blatant suspicion. Ratchet could relate to that, if nothing else.

He glanced at the purple ship once more while Rodimus led Arcee in the direction of the rec rooms while the rest of the crowd dispersed. Ratchet himself would never believe in anything as a sign or omen, but the sight of the purple plating made old welds ache, and he found his resolve. He would go get a drink. He would attend the hearing. And then, goodbyes or no, he was leaving that night.

#maccadam #transformers #rodimus #ratchet #my writing #longfic #fault lines #im posting this so late 😂#life happens yknow

17 notes · View notes

ieattaperecorders · 3 years

Text

Something’s Different About You Lately - Chapter 9: A Disappearance

Several employees become preoccupied with personal projects. The archive has a minor infestation.

Read on Ao3

Martin leaned against the break room counter, phone to his ear. As before, the call went directly to voice mail.

"Don't know what I expected," he muttered to himself. He'd called twice already that morning, third time wasn't going to be the charm.

The sound of the kettle came nearby, and he paused to pour water into two mugs. As the tea steeped, he brought his phone up to stare at the familiar number. Pushed down a tiny, anxious compulsion to just call again, as if that would accomplish anything. The phone was either on silent or powered down, either way he wasn't getting through.

Sasha always had her phone on her. She always had it charged. Martin had never known her to go more than a few hours without responding to texts or missed calls. Really, he had no idea how she kept on top of it.

Maybe she'd caught the flu and was sleeping all day, too tired to call in or charge her phone? Or maybe she'd lost her phone. It happens. You couldn't assume someone was missing just because they'd skipped a couple days of work, could you? One and a half days, really, since it was barely past noon. And the weekend, of course, no one had seen her then. But that was the weekend.

Reassurances like these might have sat easier with him if it weren't for the time Jon had vanished into a set of supernatural corridors. As was, things were beginning to feel uncomfortably familiar.

He opened his text history with Tim, knowing as he did there'd be nothing to see.

Martin: are you at the institute ?

Tim: nah nowhere near

Tim: doing some field work

Martin: oh :/ are you coming in at all today?

Tim: probably not. dw i texted jon, he knows

Tim: tell him not to worry, just doing some recon

Martin: maybe you should call and tell him yourself? he seems pretty upset

Tim: it's cool. i 'm gonna have my phone off so i won't see texts for a while :) ttyl

Martin: I really, really think you should call Jon and talk to him

Martin: seriously. Things are getting weird here

That exchange had happened that morning, and there'd been no word from Tim since then. Martin didn't like this feeling. Half of him thought he was worrying over nothing, while the other half suspected that he wasn't worrying enough. And the only other person in the archive wasn't likely to provide a model of stability anytime soon.

He remembered what it had been like during the two weeks Jon had disappeared. The first days had been marked by a passive confusion, with the three of them going about things normally, occasionally looking up and asking has he still not come in? Did you see him at all? Should somebody call him? Idle concern that grew into anxiety as more time passed.

After four days of it, Martin went to Elias to ask whether Jon had called in, if he knew where he was. Elias had said something vague about field research. Said that it was open ended, and no he didn't know when Jon would be back. Added with a smirk that he was taking a "hands off" approach with him. When Martin pressed for more, expressed worry that he wasn't answering his phone, Elias had given him a knowing smile that made him feel like he was naked in public. He'd suggested Martin might be letting his own "personal preoccupations" color things, and reminded him that repeated phone calls can make one look rather desperate for someone's attention. Martin had shuffled off, face burning, and not brought it up again.

Elias's explanation and lack of concern had kept them all complacent for too long. But Martin shouldn't have been complacent. He should have known better. No, that wasn't even it – he did know better. Deep down he'd known something was wrong, because he'd spent so much of those weeks worrying.

Worrying, and thinking about those days he'd spent trapped in his flat, slowly accepting that no help was coming, that the outside world had shrugged at his absence and moved on. He remembered worrying what would happen to his mother when the payments for her care stopped coming. And thinking that the others at work might not even learn he was dead unless his landlord gave a statement about the rotting, buzzing, hole-shot thing he'd find when he finally came to evict him.

Sitting with his back to the wall, cold, tired and halfway to delirium, Martin had hoped that they'd feel guilty when he did.

It had been some consolation to learn Jane had been using his phone, that there was a reason nobody had looked. Nursing resentment, he'd thought to himself that ‘stomach problems' had been a weak excuse. But then, an even weaker excuse alongside a snide comment about how obvious Martin was had been all it took to stop him asking questions, so how much worse was he? He'd known something was wrong, but instead of doing anything he'd kept his head down, and worried, and hoped it would work out.

Tea finished, he brought the mugs out to the bullpen. Jon was already there, bent over Sasha's desk -- he'd emptied the contents of her drawers all around him and was sifting through them, brow furrowed. He looked up as Martin entered.

"Anything?" he asked, expectantly.

"Still no answer . . . should you really be going through her things like that?"

"Yes, it's fine." Jon waved a hand and turned back to the papers he'd been looking at.

The question had been rhetorical, not an opportunity for Jon to give himself permission to keep rifling. Martin decided to let it go.

"She didn't tell you what she was working on, did she?" Jon asked. "Anything that could give you a clue where she'd be headed?"

"Not really," a twinge somewhere, because since when did anyone tell him anything? "I mean, she's been looking up statements for some research she's doing, but she's secretive about what it is. I think has something to do with Gertrude? She's been talking about her a lot, anyway."

"That isn't much help . . . there's too many directions it could lead. And that's just the ones that I know about . . . ."

"Sorry . . . I wish I knew more." Maybe it was the anxiety already swirling in Martin's stomach that made Jon's tone cut through him the way it did. It was hard to say.

"It's something. A starting point, at least." Jon sighed, shoving some papers haphazardly into a drawer. Assuming Sasha wasn't eaten alive by some nightmare creature, she was definitely going to notice when she got back. He pulled a notebook from his pocket and began scribbling in it. "I'll try making a list of relevant statements, maybe we can check whether she accessed them recently."

Martin stepped a little closer to peek at what he was writing: 0081912, 9522002 (would she recognize the voice?) 0141010, 0063011, 0090202 (anything involving A. or L.F.) The moment he realized Martin was watching, Jon frowned, flipped the notebook closed and stuck it back into his pocket.

"What about Tim? Have you been able to reach him at all? I think he's flat-out ignoring me at this point."

"No. His phone rings, but he doesn't answer. Last we talked he just – well, see for yourself."

He displayed the last text conversation. Jon's eyes scattered over the words, then he grabbed the phone from Martin's hand and began typing a reply. Martin barely had time to sputter a hey! before it was handed back to him: Sasha is missing. Call immediately. -J

Terse, but he supposed it might get Tim's attention. Martin looked up to see Jon pacing back towards Sasha's desk, shaking his head.

" ‘Recon . . .' there are only a few places that could mean, and all of them are bad," he muttered. "I'm going to have to go after him, aren't I? I'm going to have to – but there's only one way that can end for me and I can't – not yet, not while Sasha's still gone. . . "

Martin frowned. "When was the last time you slept?"

"Last night." There was a note of triumph in Jon's voice, an unspoken so there. "The same as you, presumably."

"Okay. How much sleep did you actually get, though?"

"I don't know. Not much. Doesn't matter . . . can't sleep anyway." His voice dropped in register and he muttered, "spiders" like it was the name of his mortal enemy. Martin considered mentioning something about how they'd at least keep more harmful pests out of his home, but thought better of it.

"Okay, then. . . suppose I'll file that away with all the other weird, cryptic things you keep saying." At that, Jon gave him an aching look that made him instantly regret saying anything.

"I'm sorry, Martin. I am trying to be more forthcoming. I t's just – well, it's difficult . A nd I'm afraid it's already making things worse . . . ."

"Look . . . you don't have to tell me everything, okay?" Martin said. "Just let me help. If you think you know where Tim's vanished off to, tell me. I can check in on him if you can't. Really, I'd rather be doing that than sitting here doing nothing--"

The rest was cut off by Martin's yelp of surprise, as Jon closed the distance between them, grabbing him tightly by the shoulders.

"No! Don't you dare. Not you too," Jon's voice began to crack. "Please . . . if I can't even keep you safe . . . ."

His eyes were wide, and he was holding Martin very, very closely. As Martin tried to think of what to say to that, tried even to remember how words worked, his phone rang and startled them both. Jon's grip on him loosened and he pulled away to check it – it was Tim.

"Put it on speaker," Jon said. He did, and Tim's voice came out before Martin had the chance to say hello.

"Martin. What's going on?"

"I see now you're suddenly available," Jon's voice dripped with disdain.

"Don't. Not now," Tim said warningly. "Just tell me what's happening with Sasha."

Martin held a hand up before Jon could interrupt him again. "We don't know exactly. She didn't come in today, or yesterday. We'd actually been wondering if she was with you."

"I take it from your call she isn't," Jon said. "Did she tell you anything about where she was going?"

"No. I didn't even know she was going anywhere. Have you called her?"

"Of course--"

"--We tried," Martin cut Jon off, his tone forcefully calm. "We've been trying to reach her for a while, actually, but she isn't answering calls or texts."

There was a pause on the line as Tim quietly cursed. Then Jon's hand was on Martin's wrist, pulling him – no, pulling the phone in his hand – closer.

"Look, just . . . come back to the institute," the argumentative tint to his voice was gone, now he was all but pleading. "We can work this out together. Just – just come back."

There was a pause, then Tim's voice again.

". . . I'll be there in a few hours."

He hung up without ceremony. Jon released his hold on Martin and slumped into a chair.

"Well, that's one crisis dealt with," he exhaled. "Or postponed."

There was nothing like relief in Jon's voice, only a low, tired dread. Martin looked at him, taking in the bruises under his eyes, the unsteady tremor to his hands. He looked . . . harried. Like he'd been running for days and might drop dead from exhaustion before whatever was after him even caught up.

Martin found himself badly wanting to reach for him, to brush away whatever dark thoughts were settling in. He wanted to take a blanket and wrap him up warm, to sit next to him as he'd done for Martin in the storage closet, until he felt safe enough to close his eyes and rest.

"Jon . . ." he said softly. "You're not well."

A hollow, humorless laugh. "Not really, no."

Sasha was missing, monsters were real, and Jon was keeping secrets that were tearing him apart from inside out. Martin didn't know how anything he might say could stand against any of that. But he still wanted to say something. He pulled up a chair and sat down.

"You don't have to take everything on, you know. We're in this together, right? That's what you just told Tim. So let me help you," Martin said, something weak and pleading in his voice. "Tell me what you need."

An indecipherable look passed over Jon's face. Martin wanted to take his hand but had enough sense not to try, instead placing his own hand palm-down on the desk beside them. To his surprise, Jon reached forward to grasp it. For a moment something fluttered in Martin, but he nudged the feeling carefully aside. This wasn't about his embarrassing, childish crush. Jon was scared and exhausted, and he needed a friend. Martin turned his palm and gripped back. If he could give Jon any little bit of comfort, he was going to, and he was not going to be weird about it.

"What I need . . . ." Jon swallowed and shook his head. "What I need is to know where Sasha is, and – I need Tim to not be doing something suicidally dangerous." He looked up at Martin, then back to their joined hands, placing a second palm over them both. "I need you all to be all right. It's all I have . . . ."

"Okay . . . okay. Well." Martin took a breath, in and out. "We'll do what we can to find Sasha. And Tim is on his way back for now," he said softly. "And for what it's worth, you know, I – I'm here."

". . . I know." Jon gave him a weak smile, and shook his head again. "Whatever else happens, I . . ."

He trailed off, looking down at their hands. His thumb moved back and forth, absently brushing little arcs over Martin's knuckles. He was quiet for a long while.

"I don't know," he finally said. "Just be safe. Please. If . . . if I lost you, Martin, I don't even know . . . ."

Jon kept his grip on Martin and yes, he was definitely stroking his hand now. Martin's heart began to pound. He might have kept it together, but then Jon's fingertips trailed up the curve of his wrist and his breath hitched – quiet, but Jon heard it. He looked up abruptly, seeming to realize himself, and dropped Martin's hand as if it was on fire.

"God, I – I'm sorry, I didn't –"

The pained look returned to Jon's face as he pushed away from the desk. Several responses crowded Martin's brain at once. It's okay, you don't have to stop, and please don't look so sad, and I'M GAY IN CASE THAT WAS SOMEHOW UNCLEAR, I MENTION THIS NOW FOR NO REASON. But instead of saying anything he stared, dumbfounded, as Jon got to his feet.

"I have to go," he said, hurrying back towards his office. Martin heard the door slam followed by the click of the lock, and he was left sitting speechless next to two cold cups of tea.

* * *

Back to the door, Jon pressed his face into his crossed arms, swallowing back the noises that refused to stop coming out of him. He wasn't crying, the fact was that he was far too tired for tears, but kept his mouth covered all the same. He'd done enough to confuse Martin already without him hearing Jon sob through the door.

Stupid, stupid. Careless. It was falling apart so quickly. He couldn't imagine what else he'd have managed to destroy if he'd stayed in that room a moment longer.

Every step he took seemed to be a mistake, every option leading to disaster. Keep his secrets to himself and Sasha runs off to die looking for answers. Let out a little truth and Tim throws himself to the Circus. Be the Archivist, let the Beholding in and he would repeat the cycle as Jonah's tool. But stay human, and if he wasn't killed by something lurking in the shadows he'd be spun into the hands of the Spider.

Assuming he wasn't there already. He'd danced his way to the apocalypse once, all the while thinking he was trying to prevent it. How could he be sure every action he took now wasn't part of the Spider's plan?

He'd had a dream some nights ago. Martin had been in his flat, curled up with him on the couch – there had been no confession, no revelation of feelings, they were simply together once more, and it was wonderful. Until Martin tried to get up. Jon felt a tug as he moved – first gentle, then more insistent. Martin's expression went from one of contentment to confusion, to sudden distress. He was trying to pull away, but somehow his arms were still wrapped around Jon. With as much force as he could muster, Martin yanked back hard, and his arm finally moved to reveal thick, white webbing between them, binding their flesh together.

Horror washed over him as Martin began struggling in earnest, and Jon felt every tug and snap, the desperate writhing of hopelessly trapped prey. Jon wanted to say something – to comfort him, to scream with him, to beg for his forgiveness – but a thousand legs were stirring inside him. He felt the press of movement in his throat, and put all his effort into keeping his mouth closed. Not certain how long he'd last, but entirely sure of what would swarm from him the minute he let it open.

He very nearly found himself missing the Watcher's nightmares when he woke. At least he'd never worried that they might be prophetic.

Jon's fingers tangled themselves into in his hair, and he felt something crawl over his hand. He jumped, shaking his arm free, and a palm-sized spider fell onto the floor. Revulsion crawled through him – he grabbed a loose folder, ready to smash it. But the moment he raised his arm he saw something move in the corner of his eye. He looked around and suddenly they were everywhere.

Hundreds, thousands . . . more? He didn't know how many, it didn't matter how many, it was too many. Too many spiders, his brain screamed. Tiny, skittering things crept out from behind boxes and between files, from under the baseboards and over the ceiling. They crawled from every direction in the room – above him, around him, everywhere, EVERYWHERE.

Panic gripped him. He froze. So did the spiders. For a tense moment, they all stayed like that – Jon too terrified to move, eyes darting from one part of the room to another. He was surrounded. There was a clean circle a few feet around him, and beyond that, the swarm. Waiting. Unmoving. Why were they just sitting there?

Experimentally, he lifted the folder in his hand, ready to bring it down. The swarm crept closer. He stilled, and they stopped. They didn't withdraw, but they didn't advance either. It seemed that they weren't going to touch him . . . unless he made a move to kill one of them.

What the hell was this ? Some new way to toy with him? Was he being trained like a dog, now? The Web didn't like his habit of killing spiders, so it was sending a message – quit swatting at us, or – or what? They'd kill him? Not if they intended to use him, they wouldn't . . . but then, they wouldn't need to. He'd seen the sort of things they do to people – victims left hollow but alive, helpless to stop as their bodies are jerked along on invisible strings.

He shuddered, withdrawing his hand, and he swore he could feel the pleasured satisfaction running through them as he did what he was told. It made his stomach twist.

He couldn't just obey them like this, could he? But if he defied them and they swarmed, wouldn't they have him then as well? Was it reverse psychology, did they want him to attack and give them an excuse? Or was that what they wanted him to think, so he'd fall in line? Maybe he was damned either way, maybe it was only a question of how his free will would be stripped from him.

To hell with it, then – if nothing mattered, he could still spit in the puppeteer's face. He raised the folder in his hand.

Then he stopped.

Something dawned on him. Not the sudden rush of Knowing he'd felt from the Beholding, this was more akin to the moment he'd understood what the Distortion was, his own mind putting together the pieces of something he'd been struggling with. He forced himself to ignore the swarm and focus on the lone spider he'd shaken from his hair. The one that had made sure he'd noticed it, that still hadn't scuttled away. It was waiting for him. All of them were. The last pieces fell into place.

"It has to be a choice," he whispered.

The spider regarded him, silent. Slowly, he lowered his hand, wary of any sudden movement that could break the stillness holding it all back. He never took his gaze off the palm-sized spider on the floor.

"It has to be a choice. But it doesn't have to be a fair choice." he continued, face twisting into a hateful grin. "Doesn't have to be a choice you understand the consequences of, or even one you know you're making. It can be made under the threat of death or heat of panic, as long as it's done."

"That's what's been haunting me this whole time, isn't it?" His voice was bitter. "You have to make a choice , Jon. You chose to pursue knowledge, Jon . All of this has been because of your choices Jon. That's where you creep in."

Jon knew the small, eight-legged fear in front of him. It had been with him a long time, its legs tickling the back of his mind whenever he agonized over the all things he might have done differently. And how much more had he been thinking of those things since he came back? Since what he might have done differently had become an immediate reality, no longer hypothetical? How many hours had he spent dwelling over all the possible outcomes, the consequences he could never predict? How many times had he been paralyzed by the thought that each new action would make things worse?

If there was no hope – if there was truly nothing he could do, no way to keep the world from ending . . . well, that would be a nightmare of its own. But if the world could be saved, then Jon could fail to save it, could destroy them all again.

That horror of choice, that fear of responsibility. He'd brought it back with him.

The spider scuttled forward. Decades-deep arachnophobia rose in Jon at the skittering motion, but he resisted the urge to swat at it. Stiffly, he pressed himself into the door as the thing began to crawl up his leg. Every muscle in him wanted to jerk away, to get rid of it, destroy it. He resisted the urge. Carefully, he reached down and scooped it up, cupping it between his hands. Its legs tickled his palms and his skin crawled, but his own fear screaming at him to to crush and kill it solidified the certainty that he shouldn't.

"So you come to me when I'm at my worst," he said, "at my lowest and most self-destructive, and you set up this little tableau. Make me feel powerless, toyed with, so that I lash out. And as I do so, I think – to hell with it, let them have me ."

And they would have him then. They'd swarm, slip in through his eyes, ears, and nostrils, crawl through him as he screamed and wept and writhed. Then they'd tuck themselves away inside him, where they could spin their webs, lay their brood, and turn him to their purposes.

He'd be theirs. Freed from all responsibility, a helpless, innocent puppet.

Not a fair choice, but enough of one.

". . . That part of me that wanted you to be the reason I hurt people, that in my worse moments wished the Eye would overtake me, take the fear and the shame and make me a monster that didn't care. It called to you, didn't it? I'm sure it's calling to you still," he said softly. "But that isn't me. A part of me, maybe, but not all of me. And I've been fighting it too long to give in now."

Bending forward, he opened his palms and shook the little fear onto the floor, glaring at it with every ounce of hatred he had in him.

"I don't know if I can fight you forever, any of you. Maybe it's foolish to think anyone can. But I'm not going to give myself to you that way," he growled. "I'm. Not. Yours."

The lights flickered as he spoke those final words, and for a moment he felt an overwhelming sense of vertigo. When he managed to focus again, the spider was gone. As were all the others – he looked in every direction, but they were nowhere to be seen. Left . . . or crawled back into hiding, he didn't know which.

Jon sat there, wondering what exactly he'd just done. It felt as though a decision had been made. But he didn't have much time to think about it before the sounds of shouting came from down the hall.

"Jon!?" Martin's voice, strained and panicked. "Jon! Sasha's come back, and she's hurt!"

#tma fanfic #tma time travel au #time travel au #canon typical giving jon a bad day #*slips this in before thursday morning*

18 notes · View notes

bewareofchris · 5 years

Text

Public Relations 7/??

R atm | Alec Hardy/Dr. Bill Masters | Broadchurch, Masters of Sex | Strong language, eventual sexual situations

“The fact that Alec Hardy was not currently, had not ever, and did not want to date the American sex research did not seem very important at all to the town of Broadchurch. They did what they had always done with a little bit of juicy gossip: they made a spectacle of it.”

<<prev

After an afternoon of wandering, searching through the town for any indication of the headquarters of the Broadchurch Echo, Bill had simply given up and headed back for the hotel. He’d been all set to put the odd, stupid day behind him when the Broadchurch Echo seemed to find him. That was, it was directly across the street from his hotel, as conveniently placed as you please. It was so easy to find that he’d spent a few hours not finding it out of the stubborn feeling that if he asked anyone for direction he’d only fuel whatever rumors and half-thoughts they were already developing about him.

And not just him. Him and Alec Hardy.

Bill’s reputation had suffered enough bruising that it almost couldn’t get any worse. He certainly never needed help in damaging it further; he was perfectly capable of coming up with new heights of stupidity on his own. But, it didn’t seem very fair to let his mistakes drag another man down with him.

The doors to the newspaper headquarters were open to the breeze, the young woman behind the counter looked at him like she expected to recognize him, and didn’t, and only at the last moment remembered to say, “good afternoon,” and “can I help you?”

“I’d like to speak to whoever’s in charge,” Bill said. He remembered hearing the name Ellie and Maggie but he couldn’t be sure which one of them was relevant to the newspaper. Bill had a manner of speaking that made everyone uncomfortable; Betty said it was like being sent to the principal, or standing in front of a judge in your underwear. No matter what Bill was saying, he said it with severity and people were always put off by it.

The woman here looked sideways and then back at him, “uh, can I tell her what it concerns?”

“Yes, I was accosted during my lunch by Olly Stevens, he says he works here and I’d like an explanation.”

The woman couldn’t muster even the faintest sense of surprise at those words. She smiled an apology that she didn’t say and motioned over to a small seating area at the front. “I’ll go and find her,” she said.

Bill was not going to sit on display in the front window of the newspaper. He stayed at the counter, looking down at what passed for headlines in the town. He’d expected some manner of excitement over fish, or an expose on a disliked neighbor. He wasn’t ready to be confronted with the story of a child’s murder. He hadn’t expected to read anything disparaging about DI Alec Hardy, but he was three-fourths through an article when a polite cough interrupted him.

“I’m Maggie Radcliffe, the editor.” She extended her hand in greeting and Bill set the paper back on the counter. “Please, take a copy.”

“Yes, thank you,” Bill said as he shook her hand. He folded the paper over and tucked it under his arm. “Is there somewhere less in the public view where we can talk? I’m sure you understand that I don’t really want advertise this visit.”

“Sure,” Maggie led the way through the building to her cramped, dusty office. It smelled like newsprint and ink, and age. There was a rickety chair to sit on and a door that very nearly closed. She turned her attention to him solely, “Olly interrupted your lunch?” she prompted.

“That’s putting it mildly.” Bill set the paper in his lap and cleared his throat, “I’m vacationing here. I’ve had the feeling since I arrived that I’ve somehow become a spectacle. And today, while I was trying to enjoy my dinner, one of your reporters interrupts me to ask if I plan to move my sex study here and what my relationship to Alec Hardy is.”

Maggie was annoyed, but there was no knowing which part was annoying to her. “I’m very sorry about that,” she said. But no indication if she was sorry that he was offended or sorry that it had happened. “I’ll talk to him. He gets over-excited, forgets what is and isn’t acceptable. I’ll send him over to make an apology. You’re staying at the hotel across the street?”

“Yes,” Bill said. He cleared his throat before he could be shuttled out the door, “The thing is,” interrupted what Maggie seemed to think was a complete conversation, “what I’m most interested in knowing is why people seem to think there is a relationship between Alec Hardy and I, and exactly what sort of relationship they think it is.”

Maggie had the face of a woman who had seen more than any person ought to have seen. She had the body of someone who had done her share of interrupting lunches and hunting down sources. Life had given her plenty to write about, and it had left plenty of marks along the way. And here she sighed and leaned back into her chair. “To be very blunt, the feeling is that you’re having an affair with DI Hardy.”

“Why?” Bill asked.

“You were travelling together, you were with him in the hospital, you’re staying at the same hotel. I heard he was yelling at Ellie about--”

“Who is Ellie?” Bill asked.

“Ellie Miller? She works with him. I wouldn’t say she’s his partner, but since she’s the only one that will voluntarily work with him, she might as well be considered a partner.”

Ellie was the woman that had come to collect Hardy from the hospital, the one that had been so amused to hear Bill’s first name. Bill rubbed his forehead with his fingers and tried to figure out what could be done now. It didn’t matter that the evidence was stupid, or that he hadn’t been travelling with Hardy. This thing the town had created required no facts to be sustainable, because it was built on Hardy’s unpleasant face.

It was almost like a bad joke.

“Well,” he said, “thank you.” He got up and waited for Maggie to pull the door open. She pointed him toward the front and had the decency to say sorry as he left.

Hardy wanted a drink more than anything he’d ever wanted in the whole of his life. He just wanted to drown the stupidity of his sorrows in liquor until the world faded around him. He hadn’t even been the sort of man that indulged in that manner of escapism.

No, Hardy had always been the same. He’d always been driven by the here, and the now, and the terrible notion that every person on this forsaken planet was alone. He’d been waiting for something to prove him wrong, he’d been willing to hear arguments to disprove him but life had taught him that there were no grand gestures. There was no sense in this world, and there was no hope in it ever making sense.

Justice was the idea he’d subscribed to. The law was the rule he’d decided to follow.

And now he was a skinny shitface of a man, dragging his body back to the hotel he called home. Becca was there with a smile, and the distant sound of a bar full of patrons hoping to learn something new and juicy about the rumor spreading through Broadchurch.

Hardy had every intention of leaving it alone. There was nothing to gain by protesting. If anything, it would just convince them all they were right and the last thing he wanted was anyone knowing his opinion on the matter. (What did the truth matter really?) But his feet brought him to a halt, and then back, and he was standing in front of Becca with a sour frown and the desperate need for a drink. “Is it really that exciting?” he asked.

“What?” Becca asked.

“The idea of me fucking someone,” he said. Because that’s who he was right now, he was a coarse, foul-mouthed man on a ledge. He had nothing to lose and no reason to be polite when there was an audience gagging for tidbits to add to their circumstantial collection. He didn’t stay for her sputtering denial, “good night,” was how he left her.

The stairs mocked him, and the hallway seemed to grow longer-and-longer the more steps he took. He’d been hoping for a drink, but he was praying he made it into his room before his legs gave out. His heart was getting worse, but he just needed a few more days to close this case. He was so near to the end of it now.

“You really are an idiot,” was the sound of his fictional American lover, and the feel of his arm sliding around Hardy’s back. He was pulled straight upright without realizing he’d listed to the side. “Which one’s your room.”

“No,” Hardy said.

“We could go to mine,” Bill offered.

“No,” Hardy said with more force. He tried to pull away and Bill’s grip tightened around his ribs. “Haven’t you heard?”

“Oh, I’ve heard,” Bill said. “Which one’s your room?”

Hardy couldn’t save a man that didn’t want saving. He directed them to the door and leaned against the wall while Bill opened it for him. They stumbled in together, two grown men trying to fit through the same doorway. He collapsed on the bed and Bill shut the door behind him. He stood there for a moment, observing the bad idea he’d involved himself in. “I’m not gay,” Hardy said, like it mattered. “Not typically.”

Bill snorted, he pulled a stethoscope out of his back pocket. “Open your shirt,” he said.

“You just had that?” Hardy asked. He shrugged his coat and his suit jacket off, and pulled at his tie. He took a break with it half-loosened and let his head hang back. His body was singing, just thrumming, and his head was starting to ache. The pills were in his pocket but the moment might pass.

Bill was pulling his tie free, as if he regularly undressed strangers. (And he might, what with being a sex researcher and all, who knew?) He fumbled at the buttons but managed to get enough of them open that he could get the bell of the stethoscope flat to his chest. “Just breathe normally,” he said.

“What sort of doctor are you?”

“Shh.”

“What sort of doctor studies sex?”

“I’m an obstetrician, now could you please be quiet, I’m trying to listen to your heart.” And if he determined it was bad enough he was going to force Hardy into a hospital again, no doubt. All doctors were like that, admonishing and lecturing and prodding at him about how he was going to die. As if he he didn’t know, as if they had told him some news he’d been too stupid to notice himself.

Hardy was quiet until Bill leaned back away from him. “Obstetrician, that’s a baby doctor?”

“It’s women’s reproductive system, pregnancy and birth doctor. Once the baby is born, they are generally looked after by a pediatrician or a neonatologist.” He hooked the stethoscope around his neck and stood there with an expression that wanted to be severe but settled for annoyed. “You have to start taking care of yourself.”

“How’d you find out?” Hardy asked.

“About us?” Bill asked. He looked around for somewhere to sit and found a chair that he could pull close enough they weren’t shouting across the room at one another. “A reporter named Olly Stevens interrupted my lunch to ask me what my intentions in Broadchurch were. He seemed to think they included you.”

Hardy turned on the bed so he could lean against the headboard. “Sorry,” he said.

“Worse things have been said about me.”

Well, at least they had that in common. Hardy nodded and looked toward the door, “am I going to live?”

“You should make it through the night, I wouldn’t feel comfortable giving you an idea beyond that.”

“I’m really tired,” Hardy said.

For a minute, Bill looked as if he wanted to start yelling. It was a storm of things parading through his deceptively pleasant face and none of them made it to his mouth. He only smiled, polite and indifferent, and stood up again. “I’ll leave you my number. Call me if you start getting symptoms, and call for an ambulance. I’d hate them to think I killed you.”

Hardy snorted at that. “I can see the headline, worst cop in the world killed by American’s cock.” He took the slip of paper that Bill offered him and nodded his thanks.

“My secretary would frame the paper that printed it, hang it in the lobby of my practice.” He lingered a moment to be sure that Hardy wasn’t going to keel over and then let himself out. The quiet he left behind was almost companionable. Good natured, at least. It was nice to know that the only person likely to be damaged by the nonsense rumors found them as stupid as Hardy did.

He gave up sitting up, and staying awake, and the idea that he should change his clothes. His bed was warm and ready for him, and he was very ready for it.

next >>

@marvelmisha, @it-is-ineffable, @may-darling, @quakerlasss (it wouldn’t let me tag you), @e3105eb, @bigleosis, @jiffry6969

#illogical husbands #broadchurch #masters of sex #grouchy bastards in love #public relations: the fic

48 notes · View notes

honeylikewords · 5 years

Note

Pining crushing Miggy?? Cause I love some pining.

OH I WAS LITERALLY JUST TEXTING MY FRIEND ABOUT HOW I LOVE PINING! I hope this sates the pining urge a little!

(there aren’t many good Miggy gifs, so this will have to do as the image header for now!)

It all started months ago when Miguel had been asked to sit down with a journalist who wanted to report about the work Miguel, his lab, and his company were doing.

Miguel was initially unhappy about it-- he very rarely enjoyed talking to the press, since they were so prying, always looking for some splashy story instead of the truth-- but decided that, of his team, he was probably the best equipped to be the spokesperson for the lab. After all, he was the lead researcher and the one with the best ‘stage presence’, so to speak, so he resigned himself to the meeting.

The journalist assigned to the report called Miguel to establish things, and Miguel had taken the first call with an air of frustration and haughty defiance. He had intended to embarrass her intellectually to the point where she’d drop the story and leave him well enough alone, but was soon met with the reality that his haughtiness would be no deterrent to her.

Through all his performative intelligence, the journalist seemed to keep up, understanding what he was saying and how he was saying it, all while maintaining a shockingly chipper attitude, speaking in such a manner and cadence that Miguel could practically hear her smile through the phone. And even though she was sunny in a way Miguel had not prepared himself for, she was no less intelligent: she asked thoughtful questions and made Miguel take pause to answer her, and when he tried to use some highfalutin scientific gargon specifically to throw her off, she was somehow able to keep up and stay right on his tail.

He was, against his wishes, relatively impressed.

The second call also found Miguel attempting to project his attitude of intellectual and academic posturing, but within minutes he had relented and just spoken with her like a normal man, even laughing at a few of her jokes and popping in some of his own. This second call lasted upwards of an hour as Miguel talked about the work he’d done at university regarding this particular kind of genetic research and how his thesis work had carried over from his PhD to this specific experiment, and he found himself pleased when she asked salient questions about the experiment’s relevance in years prior as opposed to currently. And pleased when she asked about the band he’d been in while in college.

By the third call, Miguel had recognized her number and answered with a smile.

A few more phone calls came in here and there, varying in length, but always increasing in warmth and familiarity. By the time of the last phone call before the meeting was scheduled, Miguel had come to regard the journalist quite amicably, and with even something of affection in the back of his mind.

In the last call before the meeting, they confirmed a few final things; the cafe they’d meet at, the time, the day, and a few basic talking points that Miguel could come prepared for. She mentioned that this would, of course, just be the first face-to-face, seeing as how she’d also have to do a tour of the labs and maybe a secondary interview about some other questions she might have after the lab tour, and Miguel felt his heart sing to think of being able to talk to her more, then felt himself shut the feeling down and push it far, far away from the forefront of his thoughts. Before she hung up, she made a final confirmation, asking him if the day and time and location were all okay for the meeting. When he said yes, she made a light, airy laugh of pleasure on her end and said “alright, it’s a date!” before hanging up.

Miguel didn’t want to admit to himself how much he liked her saying that.

When the day of the first interview rolled around, Miguel was both ready and completely unprepared. He dressed himself in a nice button-up with a vest (foregoing a tie, assuming that it would make him look like a stuffy prude instead of the young, handsome man he wanted her to see him as (why did he want her to see him as that?, he panicked to himself)) and some slacks, along with his good leather shoes; he even spent a few extra minutes in the mirror fixing his hair and making sure he was clean-shaven (but leaving just enough stubble for the image of ruggedness) before heading out the door and down to the cafe.

Miguel picked a seat at a small table that could only accommodate two chairs, and made sure that it was a window seat so that she’d be able to see him before she even entered the cafe. He sat patiently, but an air of anxiety surrounded him, making him shift in his seat and readjust the position of his legs time and again.

He waited for all of five minutes before she came in with a big, warm smile, rushing over to his table with her hand extended for a shake. Miguel, despite himself, found that he was more than a little charmed as she beamed at him and introduced herself.

“You must be Doctor O’Hara,” she said enthusiastically, shaking his hand with a firm, slightly feverish bounce. “Oh, it’s so great to finally get to sit down with you!”

“L-likewise,” Miguel replied, finding himself stuttering.

He balked for a moment; he never stuttered. Miguel was not a stutterer. Nor an easily flustered man. So why was he seeming to trip over himself as he rushed to the table to pull her chair out for her, to ask if she wanted anything from the cafe, to say it’d be his treat? Oh, this doesn’t sound like me at all, he thought, panicking a little.

But nevertheless, she seemed unfazed by his out of character slip, and declined his offer for a drink-- which, for some reason, made his heart sink-- instead flipping open a notepad and placing a pen on it, and taking out a recording device and setting it up between them on the table. Her hand hovered over the button as she turned to meet his eye with a cordial, friendly smile, one that sent Miguel’s stomach clenching.

“Do you mind if I record this? It’ll help me later with exact quotes.”

“Yeah, no, that’s fine, you can send me a copy of the recordings too--”

“I was planning on that, yeah! And I’ll have you proof-read the article in case I get anything wrong in it, you know, factually.”

Miguel nodded in agreement, folding his hands on the table before realizing that posture looked too tense and leaning himself back a little, trying to seem more relaxed. It didn’t work; he felt surprisingly nervous, as if something was pulling down his stomach, like a steel weight attached to the bottom of a balloon.

She seemed to pick up on this, looking at him squarely in the eyes. Miguel tensed as she did, because it made him confront looking at her face-to-face, and made him confront the fact that she was, in fact, very, very pretty; pretty in a human and humble kind of way, without theatrics or facsimile. And she had beautiful eyes, the kind that made Miguel feel like he was being seen for the very first time.

He looked down at his hands.

“Hey,” she said gently, putting her hand out and touching his wrist, making Miguel’s hairs stand on end, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just had a little too much coffee this morning, got the jitters.”

Miguel gave a fake, hollow laugh, and she frowned at him.

“You know, it’s perfectly normal to be nervous before an interview, so we don’t have to do this today if you don’t want to--”

“NO!,” Miguel interrupted, his voice coming out louder and more desperate than he’d originally intended. “I mean... no, I want to do this. I want to talk to you. I’m fine, really, I’m just getting in my own head about it.”

“Well, alright, Doctor O’Hara--”

“Miguel. You can call me Miguel.”

“...But that first time on the phone, you told me to only ever call you Doctor O’Hara?”

Miguel cringed to remember the way he’d forcefully insisted on being called Doctor O’Hara as if it was a badge of honor. It was when he’d still been trying to embarrass her out of bothering him, and remembering how he’d behaved, the rudeness with which he’d conducted himself... it made him want to shrivel into a ball and die on the spot.

“I know. I was being stuck-up, then, being a bit of an ass.” Miguel gave her an apologetic half-smile, trying to broach the gap he’d carved himself. “I’m really sorry, so you, uh, you can just call me Miguel. Or Miggy-- my friends call me Miggy.”

At that, she smiled so genuinely that Miguel could swear he felt his heart grow a full size larger. She seemed to feel more confident about his readiness for the interview, and seemed less estranged by the ‘Doctor O’Hara’ posturing of before. Calmly, she nodded and clicked the recorder on, tapping her pen on the pad with her smile still living on her lips.

“Alright, Miguel, let’s start at the beginning.”

The interview went on for nearly three hours straight. The initial hour was all very professional, with her asking topical questions about genetic research; what it is in layman’s terms, what kinds of experiments they were doing, ethical implications, medical applications, agricultural applications, social applications, et cetera. But the remaining two hours slowly devolved into, well, more of a coffee shop date.

Miguel started asking her questions: questions about where she’d studied journalism, what stories she liked to report on, her journalist icons, what her favorite news story of the last month was, how she liked to take her coffee, did she have any pets, what was her childhood like? When she answered, she’d ask him “and you?”, and somewhere along the way, both of them forgot the recorder was even running. Her pad and pen lay to the side, having been abandoned after a few hasty notes scribbled about the FDA testing and approval system.

By hour three, Miguel had ordered them both drinks and a small plate of baked goods to share, and as he was answering a question about his experience on the “extreme parkour and stunt bike team” he’d formed in college, he idly reached his hand out to pluck a miniature scone from the plate. As he reached, he felt a brush of skin on warm skin, and he pulled his hand back, an electric surge rippling through him.

“O-oh,” he stammered, realizing he’d touched her hand. “Sorry--”

“No need,” she beamed, picking up the scone and holding it out to him. “Take it.”

“You can have it, really--”

“Mm, no, you can. I don’t like the fruit scones, anyway, I was reaching for that little cream puff over there.”

As he was about to pick it up and offer it to her, however, her phone began to ring. She glanced at it then made a soft gasp, dropping the scone back on the plate.

“Oh, oh my goodness, I didn’t even realize--”

“What is it?”

“Miguel, I’m so sorry, but I have to go; I was supposed to be back at the office half an hour ago for a staff meeting! I’m sorry, we’ll have to do a second interview later, but for right now, I need to go...”

She stood up abruptly and began scrambling to collect her jacket, purse, and equipment, and Miguel stood to assist her. His heart felt low and flat in his chest as he realized she’d be leaving, but he scolded himself internally: he should have known better. This was a purely professional affair, one solely about his work and about hers. He shouldn’t have imagined anything more, anything between the lines.

But then he felt her put her hand on his bicep and squeeze, tugging him back down to earth. He met her gaze and saw her sheepish, apologetic smile as she rubbed his upper arm soothingly, her brows bent and her posture diminutive, seeking forgiveness.

“I really am so sorry to cut our time short, Miggy,” she said as kindly as she could, giving his arm a quick pulse. “But I’ll see you again soon, right? Maybe next time I could swing by your office, or we could meet over dinner--”

“Dinner sounds good,” Miguel butted in, spirits rising. “I know this really good restaurant, Italian, nice and quiet. We wouldn’t get bothered.”

“Okay, great! Great! So just call me in, let’s say, an hour? I should be done with the meeting then... yeah, call me in an hour and we can set up when we’ll do that dinner interview, alright? I’ll see you soon.”

With that, she gave him a last, final squeeze and headed for the door, turning before she left to give him a parting wave goodbye, which he returned in a fuzzy, dreamlike haze. He watched her leave, turning to watch as she walked past the window and off into the streets of Nueva York. His head felt light and his body heavy, somehow simultaneously depressed and elated.

He slipped back into his seat with a strangely heavy sigh and checked his watch; four in the afternoon. He’d call at five, maybe five-fifteen so he wouldn’t seem so cloyingly desperate (but he was, he reminded himself, he was cloyingly desperate). But he’d call, and he’d tell her about the restaurant, and he’d tell her about a great time to meet her, and about how good the food was there. That’s what he’d do, and hopefully, she’d like it, too.

His belly flutters with excitement to think of it and he puts his hands to his lips to cover his infectious smile (and to, hopefully, prevent people from staring at his fangs). Miguel almost wants to laugh with giddiness, as if he’s a schoolboy again, and at the same time, he wants to cry with embarrassment. He’s a muddled up mix of emotions, and he hasn’t felt this... this much in so long.

And that’s how it all started.

Now, months later, she’s still working on the story, hoping to make it a multi-installment piece. She comes into the office, sometimes to talk with Miguel’s lab partners, sometimes to check on the stages of experiments that are taking place, sometimes to get photographs for the pieces, but every time she’s there, he stops her for a chat, asks if she’d like a coffee. Sometimes she has time to spare, sometimes she’s on a crunch. But every time he sees her, that spark, that flutter, that mix of emotion rises in Miguel and he just can’t keep himself away from her.

He waits with bated breath for a glance, a smile, a wave, just even the barest acknowledgment that he’s there and she can see him. When she turns those beautiful eyes on him, he feels a thousand myriad emotions and his face warms, his smile unintentionally slipping out to greet her. He can’t resist hovering near her, staying in the office late when she’s there, hoping every time that his phone rings that it’ll be her.

Sometimes when they talk, or walk near each other, they’ll brush against one another and Miguel will feel that surge of energy, his heart hammering an unforgettable rhythm against his chest. Sometimes his fingers will meet hers as they reach to open the door at the same time, or she’ll hand him documents to sign and he’ll semi-accidentally place his hand over hers and feel, for a fraction of a second, what it would be like to hold her hand.

Every now and then, when they talk face to face, Miguel will find his eyes wandering down towards her mouth, and he’ll end up watching her lips form words so elegantly, their smooth, plush softness calling out to him. He’s more than once felt the urge to just put his hands under her chin and kiss her, kiss her like there are no rules of reporting conduct, no barriers between them. But he never does; he can’t, for his sake and, more importantly, for hers.

Of course, he won’t act on these feelings, however strong they may be: the two of them are entangled in a professional praxis, hovering near each other but kept neatly divided by the walls of their work, separated by their respective responsibilities to their professionalism and to their professions. He’s promised himself that once the final installment of her work on his research and company is out, he’ll tell her how he feels, since, by then, it will no longer interfere with their work, but... for now, all he can do is look at her from a measured distance and dream of what it must be like to be loved by a woman that wonderful.

He wonders if she dreams about him, too.

#long post #messages #anonymous #miguel o'hara #honestly i might've liked to go longer because you can't have a good pine without a strong setup but! i hope this does for now

18 notes · View notes

mbcorvo-author · 5 years

Text

11/11/11 Tag Game

Thank you @dotr-rose-love for tagging me!

Rules: answer 11 questions, write your own 11, tag 11 people

1. Did you have alternate ideas for a wip that eventually didn’t make it in the story or were exchanged with a better scene or sth? If yes, tell us one or a few that you left out (could be just a character too, or a name) I think that for every wip I have a lot of alternates ideas that got shoved into the trashbin or didn't even got added into the story because they didn't fit. The most evident example is my Sci-Fi wip. It's the one that has changed the most during its long years of being a work in progress. From an idea of story for an rpg was reworked to became a novel, then that plot has changed to remove everything that was connected to other's work (since it started as setting for an rpg, I took some races and planets from sci-fi movies and such), then changed again to fit a better idea, and changed again to be then shoved in the corner after hitting a MajorPlotHoleTM that made the story go down the drain. In all these years and reworks only the characters kept to be all the same, maybe I changed partially them to fit the new idea but they still were the original ones.

2. Do you have a specific audience in mind for your wip? I have to admit that I don't have a specific audience in mind for Beyond the Veil, even if the story could fall into "new adult" genre since most of the characters age from 20 years up. But for what I'm thinking for the story, it will fit every one that love fantasy stories (or specifically urban fantasy ones) and that are searching something "lighter" than the dark-ish/gothic/gloomy ones I'm often seeing in bookshop shelves. While for a wip that I have in the backburner I think that it would be better for a grown-up audience since it (at least in my ideas) will be more on the horror side of mythpunk with biblical figures like devils, angels and whatnot.

3. Is it important to you that your wip has a moral or a message? I think that it could be nice if a novel has a moral or a message for the readers. I'm not good with morals and messages...like, I know I'd love to put some of them in my story but I'm not sure if I'll be able to mix them well in the story so everyone could find them. But for Beyond the Veil I'm trying hard to plan everything to give the message that everything will be better and...welp not saying anything else because it could be spoiler!

4. What kinds of relationships do you like writing the most (romantic, platonic, familial, etc)? I love writing friendships. The healty kind of friendships where each friend really care about the other. I was in a lot of unhealty friendships in which I gave everything and I got nothing except being laughed at when I wasn't there...so writing friends that are really caring about each other makes me feel good. In my stories you won't find only that kind of friendship, though. Life isn't always peaches and cream, so in my stories I try to reflect it.

5. What kind of research have you done for your wip? what have you learned? I love learning, so I love doing researches even when I find myself a couple of hours later learning about something not relevant for any wip. For my sci-fi I ended up collecting a bunch of scientific magazines, but this maybe it's not really relevant because I was always a science nerd and there always been some scientific-oriented stuff at home, but sometimes getting something new could help remaining up to date with new discoveries and such. For Beyond the Veil I'm mostly bounching back and forth from Wikipedia to some websites found while googling, but going into the next town library hoping to find something about local/Italian folklore I found a couple of books that are transcriptions of trials of witches and similar. For the horror-ish wip in the backburner I weirdly have to do less research...either because when I was a teen I tried to write an horror and got weird stares when I asked the librarian if they had something about torture and then left renting a book about black masses...and then proceeded to do some research online, I think that I still have a pdf copy of the "Bible of Satan" by LaVey somewhere in my laptop...and also because in the last years I did some research while playing in a homebrew urban fantasy rpg set in the Purgatory. I learnt...quite a lot of stuff I think? Maybe not the useful kind of stuff, but stuff that I could use in my works and that could be interesting or weird random notions that I could tell to someone.

6. If your wip became very successful, would you want to make a movie adaptation? why or why not? I think I already answered this in another version of the tag game, so I'm going to copy-paste it because heck yes.

"Gosh, yes! But I’d like to have a big part in realizing them choosing how to adapt the story, who to cast and so on, like Neil Gaiman with the Good Omens series and such. Also, screenwriting is one of my dream jobs."

7. Did you have any alternate title ideas for your wip? if so, what are they? The sci-fi, in its many reworks, has never changed its title: Otherverse. Maybe for some time had some variants like "Chronicles from the Otherverse" but usually I ended up keeping the original title. Beyond the Veil actually is a placeholder title, but looks like it could become the actual title since I never found anything else that I liked as title. Maybe when (and if) I'll complete it I'll know if I want to keep this or change it. The horror in the backburner has a title. And now I'm struggling to find a good plot that could fit the title (sorry, I'm not telling it since I never "officially" announced this new wip since as for now it's only a pinterest board and a mix of ideas in my head) or changing it and making it a chapter title.

8. What has been the hardest part about writing your wip so far? The plot. As I said in the past, for Beyond the Veil I came up first with the characters, then the generic setting and an even more generic plot for them. Now I'm facing some difficulties to make everything connect correctly and, most importantly, interesting. The plot was also a big part of the failure of my sci-fi, so I'm afraid that Beyond the Veil could face the same fate.

9. Do you prefer writing action or description? Description. I re-read one of my old writings, one that was an actual attempt to write something original and not fanfiction, and the chapters where full of detailed descriptions because I remebered that I was trying to put on paper the picture I had in my head. But, as a reader, I'm not really fond of too leghty descriptions so I'm always keeping myself in check to not over-describe stuff and - at least - describe stuff only when it's necessary and for how much is necessary to know. I feel that I'm not really good at writing action, but after years of text-based rpgs where in some you had to nail the action description correctly to have more probabilty of good results during quests, I think that now I have at least the basics for them.

10. What do you want your readers to come away with after reading your story? Uhhh...I think that this question could be linked to the previous one about the moral and message in the wip since my answer for that one could also answer this one...

11. What’s your favorite part about your wip? what makes you excited to write it? The characters. I love writing and seeing them interact with each other and seeing how they evolve during the story. You already know that I'm fond in particular of Luciel the Genie, but this is because they are a rework of the character I played for years in the rpg I previously talked, but I'm fond of all the characters I create. There are also some scenes in my mind that I can't wait to write...but the most important thing, apart from characters, is that Beyond the Veil is a wip that I started after years of writer's block and time spent (or wasted) on the sci-fi that never worked.

The heatwave today has gotten me and my brain is a bit fried by the heat, so the questions will remain the same and...I'm not tagging anyone. If you see this and want to do it, feel free to do so and tag me so I can read it! :D

#11/11/11 tag game #tag game #writing tag game #about corvo #mgcorvo-author #beyondtheveil wip #corvo answers #inthepitsofhell wip #otherverse wip

0 notes

edenfalling · 7 years

Text

[Fic] “An Unexpected Meeting” - Enchanted Forest Chronicles

wistfulmemory said: I would love to claim the "picnic" prompt with Cimorene, Morwen, and Kazul having to deal with unexpected ambassadors.

Note: So that took way too long to write... *sigh* Also, if you find yourself curious about Thelistra and Andovan, you can read their earlier adventures (and the tale of how Morwen met Kazul) in The Affairs of Dragons, a story I wrote for Femgenficathon back in 2008. (3,525 words)

--------------------------------------------- An Unexpected Meeting ---------------------------------------------

One Monday morning two months after Kazul's coronation (and all the chaos leading up to it), Cimorene woke up completely and utterly out of patience for wrangling her new responsibilities. She was fed up with all of them: organizing the royal caverns, handling knights and princesses, talking excitable dragons down from rash ideas, translating and transcribing Kazul's responses to foreign correspondence into something slightly more diplomatic, and every other petty yet vitally important thing she'd shouldered so Kazul would only be somewhat overwhelmed rather than utterly inundated.

Eventually she hoped to get the dragons' old bureaucracy -- sadly neglected by their two previous kings -- back into working order, but for now she, Roxim, and Marchak were shouldering the same amount of work that her father had spread among three score advisors and staff, and Cimorene needed a break or else she might go crazy.

"We are taking a day off and inviting Morwen over for a picnic," she said as she cleared away the breakfast dishes.

"Not that I object to company or the chance of Morwen's cider," Kazul said in response to this pronouncement, "but why a picnic? And if you're set on a picnic, why here? Morwen's garden seems like less work for the same result." She idly picked her silver teeth with a wishbone left over from her meal.

Cimorene looked up from wiping the table and said, "A picnic because neither of us has been outside for more than five minutes at a time in the past three weeks -- possibly longer, but I only started keeping track then. Here in the Mountains of Morning because you're not a private citizen anymore. If you travel to the Enchanted Forest, we'll have to explain to the King why foreign royalty is visiting his country without visiting him, and I don't want to deal with diplomatic headaches on our day off."

"Fair enough," Kazul agreed. "But when will we have time? I need to call a council meeting tomorrow so everyone can shout about the latest border incursion from the Frost Giants; once they wind down, we might be able to start thinking of a practical response. The ambassador from Kaltenmark should arrive on Wednesday, which means we'll need to work up a formal dinner. On Thursday I have to meet with the delegation from Otterton about student research trips into the Caves of Fire and Night and Kalkiz wants to ask you about--"

"Tomorrow," Cimorene interrupted firmly. "Marchak can sit at a table and listen to people yell just as well as you can. Roxim is perfectly capable of organizing a formal dinner. And the longer we wait, the more chance of something unexpected happening that really does need your attention. Let's not give trouble more time than it needs to sneak up on us."

"You realize you've just invited trouble to show up as another picnic guest," Kazul pointed out.

Cimorene blinked, then thumped the heel of her palm against her forehead. "Bother. You're right. I blame overwork and lack of sleep; normally I'd have caught that before the words got anywhere near my tongue. But I'm sure we'll manage. After all, what could possibly be enough of a problem that you, Morwen, and I together couldn't... and I'm going to cut myself off before I gild and engrave the invitation as well."

Kazul laughed smokily and went off to inform the relevant people about their plans.

Cimorene finished cleaning the kitchen, opened the royal caves for Kazul's public audience hours, and went back to bed for an obviously much-needed nap.

-----

Tuesday dawned bright and clear, which had Cimorene casting suspicious glances at the sky all morning, wondering when narrative irony would whip up a drenching autumn thunderstorm. But the sky seemed determined to remain bright and clear, and eventually Cimorene resigned herself to the thought that whatever trouble she'd invited would take a less convenient form.

Weather was only weather, after all. People could get complicated.

She spent the morning preparing sandwiches and finger foods in both human- and dragon-sized portions (plus some cat treats, since at least some of Morwen's familiars were bound to tag along). Meanwhile Kazul indulged in a rather melodramatic novel about a long-lost princess and a poor woodcutter's son that she'd been putting off since her coronation, occasionally reading a passage aloud for Cimorene's amusement.

When Morwen walked into the royal caverns at precisely half past noon, trailing a trio of cats, she caught them in the middle of laughing at a particularly improbable declaration of eternal love. "Do I want to know?" she asked, raising one eyebrow above the rim of her glasses.

"Possibly, but it would take at least fifteen minutes to explain the context," Cimorene said. "Hello, Murgatroyd, Miss Eliza, Aunt Ophelia." The cats mrowled in greeting, and Miss Eliza deigned to twine briefly around Cimorene's right ankle. Murgatroyd simply leapt from a chair to the kitchen table to Kazul's shoulder, where he promptly began washing behind his ears. Aunt Ophelia remained on the table, tail twitching, and attempted to look uninterested in the contents of the human-sized picnic basket.

"Some other time, then," Morwen said. She clapped her hands, calling the cats' attention back to herself. "I've brought two gallons of cider, and I presume you have appropriately sized mugs somewhere in the room. Shall we head outside so we have half a chance of finishing our meal before the inevitable disaster finds us?"

Cimorene blinked as she fetched three mugs (one much larger than the others) and a bowl from her cupboards. "You think there's bound to be trouble, too?"

"I think two months isn't nearly enough time to set a reliable routine for a new job, particularly not for a job as big as Kazul's," Morwen said. "And on that note, I trust you're both setting up a system of delegation instead of trying to do everything yourselves."

"It's taking longer than I'd hoped to weed through Tokoz's staff and install some people with a bit more initiative," Kazul said as she slipped a bookmark into her novel. "But yes, we're working on that. I haven't developed any sudden love for politics, and I insist on carving out enough free time to attend my grandchild's hatching next spring."

"Another grandchild? Are your son and his partners having a third, or has your daughter finally found someone she's willing to reproduce with?" Morwen said, in tones of great interest. At her feet, Miss Eliza added an inquisitive chirp.

"Now you've done it; we won't hear about anything else all day," Cimorene said wryly. "Let's head out. You two can gossip while we walk."

"Don't be insulting. Dragons don't gossip about our families. We boast about them," Kazul said. She edged slightly closer to the table and added, "Anyone who wants a ride should climb on now. I won't stop to let you up later."

Miss Eliza and Aunt Ophelia joined Murgatroyd on her shoulders, and the small party headed out into the midday sunshine.

-----

Twenty minutes (and a temporary break from Kazul's bragging as her description of her son's cave renovations detoured into a discussion of Morwen's recent difficulties with finding a construction company willing to build extensions in magically indeterminate spaces), they stopped at the edge of Cimorene's chosen picnic ground: a short, narrow valley filled with wildflowers and a small pond at the base of a slow, rock-seep spring. It was a lovely location, which wasn't at all unusual in this portion of the Mountains of Morning.

What was unusual was that this particular location was currently occupied, and not by dragons.

At the far end of the valley, two humans were shaking out an impractically gorgeous embroidered blanket over the grass and remnants of late summer flowers. The man was lanky, ginger, and wore a mail shirt; a sword in a slightly shabby scabbard hung from his belt and he had a shield slung across his back. The woman also wore a mail shirt (which clashed a bit with her full lavender silk skirts) and had her blonde hair cropped short about her ears, but instead of a sword, the only thing hanging from her belt was... an embroidery bag? Surely not. But it did look exactly like a larger version of the fabric bags Cimorene's own mother and sisters used. (She'd never much liked embroidery herself, and had happily 'forgotten' enough bags that even her mother had given up making her carry one.)

Morwen peered thoughtfully across the valley. Then she wiped her glasses with a handkerchief pulled from her left sleeve and peered some more. Finally she said, "Kazul, you have better eyesight than I do. Am I imagining things, or is that Thelistra and Andovan?"

Kazul stopped her attempts to shoo the cats off her shoulders and craned her neck around. A startled hiss of smoke escaped from between her teeth. "You're not imagining things. That's definitely Thelistra and Andovan. What on earth are they doing back in the Mountains of Morning?"

"Before we speculate on that, can someone tell me who Thelistra and Andovan are?" Cimorene said. "A pair of adventurers?"

"No, my last princess and her knight," Kazul said in a distracted tone.

Cimorene blinked. "Oh. Really?" The two didn't look much like any princesses and knights she'd seen in Linderwall or among the dragons: Andovan was far too lightly armored and Thelistra wasn't nearly delicate and frothy enough. Even aside from that, once a knight rescued a princess, the traditional procedure was for them to return home, claim the promised reward from the princess's family, and settle down to manage their new lands, not go blithely picnicking in lands claimed by the same dragons they'd previously had trouble with.

"Yes. They moved to Kaltenmark about five years before you left Linderwall, and I didn't expect to ever see them back here," Kazul said. "We parted on awkward terms."

"'Awkward,' in this case, means that there was a mix-up involving a magically disguised artifact that a previous king of the dragons had given Thelistra's grandmother. I helped them untangle the mess," Morwen added.

Cimorene thought this explanation raised more questions than it answered. However, the two strangers had caught sight of them and were waving their arms in greeting, so she shelved her curiosity for later. "Well, they seem to have noticed us. We should go say hello and ask why they've returned."

"Yes, let's," Morwen agreed, and hurried downward toward Thelistra and Andovan, calling hello as she went. Kazul caught up within three strides, cats still clinging to her shoulders.

Cimorene followed at a slower pace, willing to give the others time to get reacquainted. She could always get their own picnic set up while she waited for a good time to introduce herself. Lugging a filled basket didn't seem like a lot of work at first, but by this point she'd be glad to set it down.

-----

When she reached the far end of the small valley, Andovan was trying to coax the cats off Kazul, to mixed success at best. Meanwhile Thelistra had slung her embroidered blanket back over her shoulder and was so engrossed in conversation with Morwen that neither of them noticed Cimorene's approach.

"--municipal sorceress of Elsburg for three years now," Thelistra said in a voice that chimed like a choir of tiny bells. "It turns out I'm happier doing magic professionally and sewing as a hobby than the other way around."

"I know how that goes. I enjoy cross-breeding magical flowers, but I don't think I'd want to do it on order," Morwen said. "Are you still self-taught or did you find a mentor?"

"Kaltenmark's a bit short on magicians right now, unfortunately, so no mentor." The bells that wreathed Thelistra's voice shifted briefly into Phrygian mode, then brightened to Mixolydian as she continued. "I do write to my father's court sorcerer for advice now and then, and of course I inherited a very good (though slightly outdated) library from my predecessors."

"Which I've been organizing," Andovan added over his shoulder, in an improbably cheerful tone.

(Cimorene, busy shaking out a picnic blanket and shooing Aunt Ophelia away from the basket, thought of the state of Kazul's library when she'd first encountered it, and bit back a remark on Thelistra's good fortune in marrying someone who understood filing systems. Judging by the meows drifting down from Kazul's shoulders, at least one of the cats shared her opinion.)

"Which my darling Andovan has been organizing, as part of his duties as municipal clerk," Thelistra agreed. "We've been researching fairy blessings most recently, since I'd like to get rid of mine. Ethereal chimes aren't really appropriate for anyone except damsels in distress."

Morwen nodded sympathetically. "Remind me to introduce you to one of my old classmates from Stokey's Academy. She had a similar problem, and while each blessing needs its own personalized counterspell, you might find her research helpful."

"Oh, thank you!" Thelistra said, beaming. "I've been looking at Sternberg's theorems of sympathy and antipathy as applied to intangible concepts, and I thought that maybe if--"

But before she and Morwen could dive into a full-on discussion of magical theory (which Cimorene would not have minded, even if she tended to have trouble following the more technical jargon; it would have made just as nice a change from royal responsibilities as Morwen's home improvement woes), Kazul interrupted.

"That sounds fascinating, and I'd even be willing to lend you some of my own books that touch on fairy magic, but right now I need to know why you're back in the Mountains of Morning. You're not a private citizen anymore, Thelistra, and as Cimorene reminded me yesterday, government representatives can't walk unannounced into other countries without starting diplomatic incidents."

"Cimorene?" Thelistra said.

"That would be me," Cimorene said. She rose from setting out napkins and sketched a brief curtsey in her plain cotton skirts. "Cimorene of Linderwall, Kazul's current princess."

"Drat, I got distracted and forgot introductions again," Thelistra said. "Please accept my apologies. I'm Thelistra, lately of Veritand, Kazul's former princess, and this is my husband Sir Andovan Marginalis, lately of Raxwel." She made a curtsey of her own, more graceful than Cimorene's even though the embroidery bag and blanket ought to have affected her balance.

"Pleased to meet you, and please forgive me for not bowing," Andovan said, as he attempted to juggle Murgatroyd and Miss Eliza, who seemed to be arguing over who got to perch on which of his shoulders. "I hope you and Kazul are doing well together. If you're not, I can send word around the hedge-knights' network and have some of them write to you, to see if you get along well enough to help them arrange a rescue."

Cimorene blinked. "Arrange a rescue?"

"Of course! It would be terribly rude to barge in and carry someone away from their home and friends unless the person agreed to that beforehand," Andovan said, still sounding improbably cheerful. "Besides, the comparative natural advantages of humans and dragons are such that, without a fair bit of jiggery-pokery, the dragon almost always wins. It's much easier to set up favorable circumstances if you have an ally on the inside."

"Exactly," Kazul agreed. "It's against the rules to interfere in honorable combat, but there aren't any prohibitions on getting magical aid beforehand. Hedge-knights notice that loophole a lot more often than knights from noble families."

Cimorene blinked again. "Clearly I should have spent more time talking to hedge-knights and less to the princes my parents dangled me and my sisters in front of."

"Oh, princes," Thelistra said, and made a terrible face. "I had one of them try to rescue me every day for nearly a month even after I told him I'd rather be turned into a toad than marry him. I finally convinced him that I couldn't leave Kazul's service for another seven years without dishonoring my family, which was ridiculous but fit his silly misinterpretations of chivalry. I think he went off and got himself killed fighting a sphinx down in Serethryn because he was too proud to buy the standard riddle guidebook."

"It's astonishing how many people can't follow simple advice, assuming they think to ask for help in the first place," Morwen put in.

Thelistra smiled, a bit ruefully. "Yes, well, I have gotten better, especially now that I tend to be the person giving advice. But in any case, Andovan was much more respectful, and didn't have any trouble asking me for some magical assistance in battle." The smile she turned on him was practically soppy with love; he returned the expression with a similar level of sentiment.

At this point, Cimorene had a realization which she later compared to knocking herself silly on a low-hanging tree branch, but without the accompanying pain: namely, the stone prince and Alianora weren't as much of a statistical anomaly she'd assumed. Thelistra had also found a man who respected her, and who was both intelligent and sensible enough that he didn't make Cimorene want to tear her hair out after less than five minutes of interaction. Happy endings didn't have to be a stark choice between accepting or rejecting every last piece of the traditional roles Cimorene had run off to the Mountains of Morning to escape. It was possible to pick and choose. There were other people out in the world also picking and choosing, and presumably some of them would want whatever set of options she eventually settled on.

Unfortunately, this wasn't a convenient time for revelations, so she tucked it away as best she could (along with her curiosity about exactly how Thelistra and Kazul had parted ways) and said, "I'm quite happy where I am for now, but I'll keep your offer in mind if I ever want to move on to other things. Anyway, we've gotten off-topic. Like Kazul said, what brings you to the Mountains of Morning? I didn't think we were having any problems with Kaltenmark."

"You're not, unless one of the younger dragons has done something improbably stupid since we left Elsburg," Thelistra said. "But I suspect you are having problems with the Frost Giants."

"They have been testing our northern border more these past few years," Kazul admitted. "Several of us tried to get Tokoz to take measures, but he never got around to it. I assume they're causing similar problems for Kaltenmark, since we're expecting an ambassador tomorrow, but I don't see what that has to do with your visit."

"Well, you see," said Andovan (now with Miss Eliza on his left shoulder and Murgatroyd balanced precariously on top of his head), "when my darling Thelistra was appointed municipal sorceress, we had to meet with the Assembly of Notables for her official investment and then there was a party afterwards. When the Law-Speaker got onto the subject of dragons, I made the mistake--"

"We both made the mistake," Thelistra corrected.

"--of mentioning that we knew you personally, so naturally when your coronation was announced, the Assembly jumped at the chance to add a personal touch to a request to turn the current non-interference treaty into a formal alliance, and then knock sense into the Frost Giants before they do serious damage to either of our countries," Andovan continued.

"In other words, we're the ambassadors you're expecting. We arrived a day sooner than we planned, so we thought we'd take a little time for a picnic lunch before getting down to business," Thelistra concluded. She looked down at the blanket and dishes Cimorene had spread over the grass and added, "It looks like you had the same idea. Do you mind if Andovan and I join you? I can access our enchanted pantry in Elsburg through my bag, so food won't be a problem."

"So long as you don't talk about politics, that sounds fine," Cimorene said. "Unless Kazul objects?"

Kazul smiled, showing all her silver teeth. "Not at all! I was just getting ready to tell Morwen all about my third grandchild, and I never turn down a willing audience -- especially not if the audience brings lunch."

"A third! You only had one when I left," Thelistra said. "Two eggs in under ten years is awfully fast. Tell me all the details."

Cimorene, who had heard all the details a dozen times over, deftly plucked the embroidered blanket from Thelistra's shoulder and shook it out over the grass beside her own plainer and more practical picnic cloth. After a moment, Andovan grabbed the far corners and helped her pull the fabric flat, while Morwen began pulling cider bottles and mugs out of her sleeves. The cats prowled around, staring hungrily at the picnic basket and Thelistra's embroidery bag with its promised link to additional food (though considering how woefully underequipped Thelistra had left Kazul's kitchen, Cimorene had to hope her enchanted pantry did most of its own cooking).

Kazul would move on to other topics eventually. In the meantime, Cimorene intended to eat lunch, enjoy the sunshine, and relax in the knowledge that even the inevitable complication hadn't managed to spoil her well-earned day of rest.

---------------------------------------------

End of Fic

---------------------------------------------

Victory is mine! \o/

#liz writes stuff #mini ficlet prompt meme #enchanted forest chronicles #cimorene #kazul #morwen #cotton candy bingo #in conversation with the internet

6 notes · View notes

mrsblf-blog1 · 6 years

Text

The Hell of Infertility

It’s taken me a long time to write about this. I’ve journalled snippets here and there, have recorded countless clips in moments of utter despair. I’ve sent many audio notes to friends and family too. I’ve filmed videos of myself in tears, in cycles of anxiety and insomnia and on days where I could feel the sun. And now I’m using the nearly two years of documentation to help me write our story.

I swing from wanting to talk openly about our fertility issues and to wanting to keep our journey to ourselves. It’s not only my story to tell and my husband is a private man. But the thing is that now, nearly two years in, there is a creeping feeling that I should keep this all to myself, that it would be the ladylike and dignified thing to do and also that no-one wants to hear about it anymore. I know these thoughts are my insecurities in overdrive but they’re front and centre nonetheless.

Even though it’s our choice to pursue science, it feels like we’re intermittently standing in a line-up waiting for emotional assault rifles to pummel us over and over again. And men and women can handle things so differently that it’s takes a great deal of courage and work to stay strong and united as a couple. We’ve been together nearly five years and married for over one and we have had our fair share of struggle. When we’re on the same page we’re a formidable team but, like most couples, when we spend too much time in our own corners digging our heels in or licking wounds, we flounder and have to wade our way back.

No-one can prepare you for the first round of fertility test results. The shock and weight of the results sat heavy as the wheels spun trying to make sense of it all. How could this be? No, surely not us? What do you mean we’re “infertile and that natural conception is highly unlikely?” You read and hear about all these stories and all this damn science but you never ever think you’ll be sitting in those rooms year in and year out hoping to conceive. And there is nothing that could prepare me for the physical, mental and emotional assault of the fertility drugs.

To kick it all of was the endometriosis surgery which, to date, has been the most physically painful procedure from which I have ever had to recover. The trapped air in my diaphragm sent sharp stabbing pains to my back and shoulder blades which was not only excruciating but made it hard to breathe. And two weeks later, once I had recovered, doctors told us that it was the best time to start the hormone treatment as my uterus was the “cleanest” it was ever going to be. So we did. Like lambs to the slaughter we walked in with so much naivety, innocence and hope with daily mantras of “this is definitely going to work”.

And then it didn’t. Our little embryos didn’t even make it to the halfway mark and just like that it was all over. The hope, the expectation, the financial investment. All of it gone in an instant.

Our doctors sent us away to regroup. We cried, we raged, we battled. We spent and still do spend countless hours seeing homeopaths, acupuncturists, reflexologists, nutritionists and researching every organic and growth-stimulating supplement available. And when we saw improvement we threw ourselves into the Artificial Reproduction Treatment (ART) cycle again. We got further this time. Over 20 eggs out of me with two fertilized embryos making it all the way to growth day five which means we had two to implant. I needed a month to recover from the hormones before we could take the next step of embryo implantation so I had four weeks to rid myself of the artificial medication and mentally prepare for the drug protocol that comes with the transfer process.

But then came the large and painful ovarian cysts which I had never had before but grew as a direct result of the artificial hormones. They gave me fevers and had me throwing up. Hot on the heels of that was a doctor deciding my appendix needed to be whipped out which was followed by abdominal adhesions which brought my digestive system to its knees. For weeks I was swollen and so sore but there was nothing to do except painful physio treatments to try and get the adhesions to break so they were no longer wrapped around my colon. I sank to a level of exhaustion I never thought possible.

Riddled with anesthetics, pain killers, hormones, antibiotics and physical pain, I fell apart. I went into a dark hole of depression and stayed there for about three months. I didn’t want to see anyone, I lashed out at pregnant friends and I raged, cried and battled all over again as tempting thoughts of death crept closer and closer. I had never felt so alone in my entire life. Of course I wasn’t alone, I am fortunate enough to have an army of support but they aren’t there when you’re still wide awake and pacing your house at 2am shedding your billionth tear. And they aren’t there when you imagine the lives growing inside the bellies of your friends which results in shuddering, shaking and bitter resentment that you can taste. My dark thoughts made me feel like a despicable human and they just compounded the already dominant voice in my head telling me that perhaps I don’t deserve to be a mother.

It was during this time that my husband whisked me off on our honeymoon. I had my endometriosis surgery a month after our wedding so we finally got to pack our bikinis and board shorts and head off to some sunshine. This trip brought me back to life and my comeback was on a super hero level. On landing back home I was ready, excited and incredibly positive that our embryo transfer would take and that soon I would be pregnant.

But it didn’t. I bled out on day three. I still kept up with the estrogen, progesterone and cortisone for the prescribed 12 days but I knew it had failed. On that third day, I felt all hope drain out of me and even though our doctor said we still had a shot, that many women bleed heavily, I knew it was over and it was confirmed on the day of our test. My husband and I went numb but we actually felt quite strong. We made plans, we had a few laughs, we went out for lunch...it all felt insanely normal.

The grief descended on me that night and by the following morning I couldn’t move. Despair and rage pulsated on a level so deep that I shuddered and shivered most of the day. And the next. And for the next few weeks. I had moments of reprieve where I felt blissfully numb but for the most part there was engulfing pain and frantic anger.

Why us? Why me? This world is so unfair? Why is it so easy for all of our friends and not us? Why do we have to go through this too?

I battled through all of it and felt so guilty at the same time. You have a roof over your head. You have a family who love and support you. You’re not a Syrian refugee fleeing for your life. And although that is all true, it’s taken me a long time to accept that my pain is relevant and I have every right to feel it.

And so here I sit, two and a half months later wondering if I can go through it all again. My husband and doctor want me to because I do have this “amazing” reserve of eggs and even though they’re 40 years old, “it only takes one”. I am obviously terrified of another failure as I’m not sure how many times I can bounce back and I once again find myself without hope or any faith that this going to happen for us. I feel defeated and depleted. And yes, I am aware of how fortunate we are that this science exists and that it is something we can afford but that does not take away the brutal emotional experience of it the process.

And I’m scared of the drugs. I don’t handle them well and am over-stimulated by all of them. It’s actually the embryo transfer drugs that stop me dead in my tracks. The combination of the estrogen, progesterone and the cortisone is a really bad cocktail for me. The hormones make me feel like a different species and the progesterone coupled with the cortisone puts my digestive system into a coma. It’s PMS ten times over with an inflamed, sore and sluggish stomach to go with it.

A real treat for me was when people asked me how I was feeling and if I responded honestly they would retort “well get used to it because that’s what pregnancy is like”. Thank you for making me feel ungrateful and that I should be handling this better. I could write a novel on all the very stupid, reckless and thoughtless things people unintentionally say but I’ll save that for another post.

The above is long enough for you to get a glimpse into my life as a woman who is struggling to conceive. And honestly, from the depths of my heart and soul, to be a Mom is always something I have wanted. There was never any doubt in my mind although now I wish there was.

A few days ago a good friend asked me how I felt. How I really and truly felt. My response: “I feel like a Mother without a child”.

I realise that sounds odd because I haven’t had a child but I feel like I’m lost, or that I have lost something, and I am wandering around looking for it with rising feelings of panic and hopelessness. I know I have to dig deep and find some faith and hope somewhere but I’ve learned that you can’t fake it. As much as I want to rush to the end of this faithless funk, this reactive depression, I just can’t. I can only do it at my own pace. I can’t force the healing as I know with absolute clarity that on this infertility journey there has to be genuine and total readiness before I can throw myself into it all again.

#infertility #icsitreatment #icsi #fertility #fertility treatment

0 notes

datingadviceonreddit · 7 years

Link

First post on Reddit. Figured I'd try and make it a good one. This is going to be pretty long, so stay with me. I'll try and not bore you to death. No promises though. You've been warned.IntroTo give you, the readers, an idea of my background and where I'm coming from. Also human beings are inherently curious, right? :PSo I'm 35, a college student (an even longer story haha), single and never been in a what you folks call an LTR. Or hooked up (I'll get to that later). At this point I'm sure a lot of people are wonder wtf is wrong with this guy. Did I get hit with the ugly stick? Do I have a hunched back?Resemble Emperor Palpatine after playing with too many matches as a child? ....Afaik, nothing. Actually got a lot of positive comments from a multitude of people, although that's always subjective. I workout around 6x a week so keep myself in a good, physical condition. I'm not a big guy, but athletic sure. I still play football (soccer), love to read, play music, speak 5 languages, into computers, science, gaming and NOT socially awkward. Bit of a mix I guess. I can talk to people no problem, even women. Had to learn that whilst working at a Laser Tag center in my late teens/early adulthood (best job ever). There just has to be a connection and until recently, never had that. They say that life works in mysterious ways. Uhuh.So, with that out of the way, I've been lurking for a long, long time and reading each post and all the topics in a lot of relevant forums in the aftermath of my recent connection (Dating, Dating_Advice, Relationships, AskMen, Toughlove, Redpill etc...). There are some great stories on here, but a lot of depressing ones too. A modern phenomenon seems to be Ghosting. The majority of people would rather have honesty, as hurtful as that is, it's infinitely better than wondering wtf and being left in the dark. It would also enable people to grow and move on. At least those capable of some intelligence. Life after all, is an ever-continuous learning experience. On the flip side of this, some people cannot handle the truth (as seen on the NceGuy subreddit).History of my 'dating'I'm not totally clueless you know, so here goes:Primary school:Chased a girl for a while and at one point got a "Would you be my boyfriend Yes/No Tick box thing'. Just don't tell anyone (haha). Later on at one point I did tell people, so I fucked it up. Still a fond memory.Temporary primary school (just moved country, 12yrs old,.finished primary school back home, but new country, new language.....had to wait for new school year to go to an International school)There was this girl that I found immensely attractive. I went to the shops and bought a single, red rose. Placed it on her desk during break time. Yes everyone knew who it was from and no, she didn't reciprocate. Was a nice gesture though.High school:I guess around 14-15 at this time. On a school trip abroad this one girl caught my eye. Couldn't stop thinking about her. Back at school I did my research and found out in which class she was in (each class had a classbook, with records of students and to keep attendance) and left her a note. If I recall correctly, I even smooth talked her address from a school administrator and sent her a bouqet of flowers. Not bad for that age, right? Things did escalate from there and during a lunch break there she was, with her friends, all started giggling when I walked outside. I approached and started talking and it went from there. Since this was the 90s we spent hours talking on the home phone and even came to my place. One memory of that was when I rode her home (bikes) and we stayed at the halfway point for hours just talking and being playful (my mom called the police on me wondering where I was, because I didn't do shit like that, just my siser). It never escalated to kissing though, as much as I wanted to. One thing that stuck in my mind was she had a history of being abused, so with that in your head you want to proceed carefully. I wasn't stupid. Inexperienced sure. How do you deal with something like that? I suppose that's one of life's regrets. What if? What could have been?High school 2Different school, just going up in the system. So there's this really really cute girl and just happens to be best friends with one of my female classmates. At one point a friend of mine started dating this classmate and I got them to put in some good words for me (Networking people, this shit is legit). So, we started hanging out, doing stuff. After school, at the park etc. Lots of kissing (wasn't me escalating, trust me). Anyhow at one point as you do at school, you invite people over for a small party/gathering. My parents are divorced, mom lived elsewhere and dad was away most of the time (work). So the house is mine. I'm 18 at this point so it's all fine. Soaking rain, met the group outside, came in etc and this girl is all wet and needed a change of clothes so she put on a tracksuit of mine. Everyone had been drinking so all good. Kindof. So we're getting hot and heavy on the couch (the group is still sitting around the table haha....no shame :P) and at one point I put my hands down her pants.....but.....BUT.....this goes on in my head "oh wait because she's been drinking I must not take advantage of her" so I didn't. She then leads me to my bedroom and we start making out on the bed, but because I was a dumb motherfucker back then I didn't escalate it (so we wen't back downstairs again). The signs were obvious, but inexperience on my part and being too 'nice' and 'gentlemanly' about it....le sigh.This was my one and only chance so far (cry) to get laid. The relationship lasted about....3-4 weeks? In retrospect I learned a lot and the fact that there are different women out there with different wants and needs. The irony of that is how different my life might have been. Maybe somewhere in a parallell universe I wasn't that dumb...And thus ends my 'dating' history, as short as it was, for the next two decades. It's odd I suppose. In the years I followed before going back to college I was working in the entertainment industry. Bars, clubs etc. Working behind the bar was really really awesome. Not just working well with your colleagues and having fun (still hard work), but interacting with the customers. Unfortunately I was never, and still not, a 'player'. I'm just me. So no 'barman hooked up with...' stories etc. No panties being thrown in my direction for free drinks...So basically that was my life. Eventually moved to an IT/logistics job, still played football, still went to the gym, still played computer games, still did my music. Then at one point I decided fuck it, and went back to college.Fast forward to nowSo I'm at the end stage of my Bachelors and it's Koningsnacht here in NL. My smartphone is tucked away in my drawer and I use Whatsapp via Bluestacks on the PC. Just easier that way. Some of my football mates are in town at the Irish Pub and I go down to meet them. I get there and they are gone. Shit. No smartphone, no way to contact them, and ofc didn't put their numbers in my flipphone. Derp. I get pissed off and go back home, figured fuck it, just as well, don't want to drink and get drunk anyhow. I did fire up my PC again and find out where they were. At this point I'm debating, because usually when I go back bad things happens (drink too much, massive hangover) but #YOLO, right? So back I go.The night was great, went to a few bars (four of us) and had a blast. I did NOT go out expecting to meet anyone. The last place we went to was a club open till 4am. Ordered some interesting mixes and had fun........and there she was. Ironically a mate of my mine was talking to the pair and I overheard where they were from and English being spoken, so I went in and took over the conversation (sorry mate). I connected with this girl from the start. Started talking about music and we had a passion for similar stuff. We moved to the side and talked all night and exchanged numbers there and then. When the place had to close I helped her get her coat and walked her home (was a fair walk, 30min easy). Her friend also had a guy with her but was busy doing her own thing. That night we ended up talking till 7am. She made some great tea with some moonshine which was at least 60%++ and just enjoyed each others company I guess. It only ended when her friend was tired and wanted to go to sleep, haha. So bade our farewells....we both went outside and she was worried for me about the rain, but being a footballer it was only a slight drizzle and it was fine. Was nice of her though. Didn't kiss her ( I wanted to, trust me), but the whole 3 kisses on the cheek thing and rode off into the sunrise...Texted her the next day and set up a date. Went on around 4 dates after that and they all went really well. We talked a lot and had fun. You just know something is right when you can communicate without any pressure. No nonsense, just getting to know each other. There wasn't non stop texting, but she'd text me ask me how my weekend was etc. After a night out that she had originally planned with her friends ( I was welcomed to come along, didn't pressure her, but she said "Well if they have issues with it (me coming along) then they aren't my friends anymore" So that was a positive reaction. She ended up coming an hour later, cause they were drinking at home first :P but we ended up again talking non stop and her friends backed off and eventually buggered off elsewhere...... At the end of that (3rd date) I walked her to her bike and made my move, slowly, slowly and we kissed. There's no feeling like that connection. Electric. And we made plans to see each other again on Sunday (this was Friday).On that date I met her where she parks her bike, kissed her and we went through town holding hands (I initiated). Took her to various places, walk through the park etc. At other points where we weren't holding hands or couldn't, she'd grab mine, so that was a good sign I thought. Things were looking up. Again ended with me taking her home, kissing. She did warn me that the following week she'd be busy (exam coming up, internship). Fair play, I'm a student myself so I know how that works. Not a problem. She'd let me know when she'd have time. People have their own lives too.Next day (Monday). Evening, around 10pm, I was already in bed, smartphone on the table....yes I had finally found a use for it.....and there's this thunderstorm going. Always enjoyed a good storm, great for getting to sleep. I get a text.....from her........saying how she enjoys thunderstorms etc (as Gibbs would say, there's no such thing as coincidence) and we flirt. I replied along the lines of how I enjoy them as well and "There's only one thing missing wink"But. Tuesday. This is where shit gets (Un)real.Because she has this exam coming up, I get it in my head to drop off a box of chocolates where she lives (as fate would have it, 10s away from where I play football....) so she has something nice to snack on whilst she's studying. I do the same behind my PC. Now, the day before she had mentioned chocolates so that's how it popped into my head. These weren't bonbons, nor anything even romantic I thought. Just a box of Jaffa Cakes that my grandma had brought over when she visted. You cannot buy them here in NL and these were my only box (goddamnit). I wrote a note to it attesting to the fac tthat these were to help her study and that her friend could have some too if she behaved. So a friendly, cheeky note, right?Tuesday evening came about. Nothing. No word. I mean, I knew it was a risk leaving the bag hanging on the door. I dropped them off on my way to the gym after all. So I asked her. She didn't get them. Shit. Someone must have stolen them. Motherf*****s. Probably some punk ass kid. Anyhow I wrote a text as such....about an hour or two later I got a somewhat scathing message back "You shouldn't have bothered cuz I won't have time for you this week etc etc etc" Woah. WTF? I knew from that moment that something was up, but she did warn me she'd be busy. I was Alright, you warned me, gl with the exam, let me know when you have time" and didn't contact her again.Few days later she contacted me thanking me for the chocolates and that another house guest had brought the bag in, but that the following week she'd be busy too with her final internship report and had already planned a weekend away with her BFF (female). Again I fired off an ok, have fun, let me know"8 days passed, no word. This is where I learned from Reddit about Ghosting. I thought shit, I'm being ghosted. No idea why. The chocolates? Really? Fuck man everyone loves chocolates, right? ShitAt the point it's feeling like a huge kick in the balls. Like someone just dropped a thermonuclear device on my ass. However, instead of pussying around I decided enough was enough. I'm taking control of my life once and for all. I've always been athletic, but started going hard at the gym. Everyday. Sometimes twice a day. Got my place sorted out, cleaned it from top to bottom. Every nook and cranny. Threw out all my old shit I didn't need anymore (still had computer mags from 1996+) and old electronics. Everything went. Everything was spotless.I even bought two new books. Modern Romance by Aziz Anshari (funny as fuck, highly recommend) and The Game (recommended by a friend). This last book is really weird though.However. 8 days came around and I did the hardest thing I've ever done in a long time. I removed her from my contacts. Broke my heart, but had to be done. Didn't really sleep that night. Very early morning I was still awake and thinking. Fuck it, fuck the rules. Who imposed these bullshit rules anyhow? I'll break them (Thanks Arnold) I'll send a final message. And being the sometimes-too-smart IT geek I am....figured her phone number might still be located in my flipphone. So switched simcards and lo and behold, there it was. Back on the smartphone I fired off a long message. Basically came down to how I enjoyed the time we spent together, regardless of the outcome. Wished her well and didn't expect any response.At the end of the day I got a response. She apologised and said she'd chickened out, how the chocolates scared her off and wasn't sure where this was heading.However, I was a great guy and she enjoyed the company. She needed time and wasn't ready for a commitment. I responded again thanked her for being brave in sending the msg and honest (well she could have kept her mouth shut, so have to give her credit). All we ever want is honesty, as much as it might suck. I did say my intentions were honourable but respected her decision. Wished her well and left with if she ever wanted to talk or grab a drink she knew where to find me.So that ends that chapter.In retrospect, the red flag during our dates was that she mentioned her ex a few times (pothead, he dumped her apparantly, didn't ask why). I should have carefully poked and prodded and found out when the relationship ended I suppose. I guess it was recent and/or other things were at play still. She had basically come to this country with him and I'll assume they were together for a while and had plans. Just a guess on my part.The days that followed were extremely hard. At times I didn't want to get out of bed. My gym time sucked balls. Couldn't concentrate, couldn't finish my routines. Gah. Then you know it's bad. Basically you just want things to end or just be swallowed up. I did a lot of ranting and raving at my mates online and they listened, had advice, as hard as it was. So appreciate all the shit I put them through (they know who they are). As Freddy put it: The Show Must Go On.It didn't end there. Oh no. Being the total dumbass I am I left her number in my phone. Two weeks after the fact I was somewhat back to normal (not really, but relatively speaking). Was going to go to the pub with a friend but he cancelled at the last minute. I figured fuck it. I'm 35, good looking, fuck sitting at home wallowing in misery I'll go out and have fun. Talk to people. This I did, up to a point. I ended up at the same place I met her. At first it was fine, busier than normal, good music, lots of good looking women around. I did contemplate at one point going up to speak to some but was in a good place at that point and just enjoyed the surroundings.ButThe alcohol started kicking in. I realised that I really didn't want to speak to anyone else and just had one person on my mind (fuck...you know where this is going). I bust out the phone and fired off a long message. In my defense, I still had some things left to say and like Rocky in Rocky Balboa (6) I had to get it out of my system. She actually responded right away (this was after midnight) and she was glad I understood, but she was confused and needed to be alone for a while etc. I responded to that (how I thought she shouldn't think that, she is a beautfful, intelligent and fun person to be with) yadeyadah. I did mean every word. I don't bullshit.In the morning I did apologise for being an annoying, dumb fuck and wouldn't bother her again and wished her well on her vacation.So there you have it Reddit. My story. If you've read all of this then fuck me you deserve a cookie. At the very least a strong drink probably.So to all of you posting how you are 18, 25 or whatever age and still haven't been laid. Trust me, things could be worse. You could be me, hahahaha. (I had my shot at 18 :P) But there's no right age either. And don't force it. I've thought plenty of times about casual hookups, or even paid services. But that's not me and never will be. Yes I've also tried online dating, but never clicked with me. I just have to keep moving forward with my own life. It's not easy though. No human being should ever be alone and as you get older, it sucks even more. You just have to keep at it.Worst part of this story is, I still think about her. Everyday. As much as I try and get her out of my frikking system, I'll be lying on a bench doing flys, or pullups on the bar and she'll pop into my head. You know how annoying that shit is? Even trying to follow The Rock's advice "FOCUS!" doesn't help. But what can a guy do ? (get laid? Thanks Reddit, very funny).On the positive side, I'm even more motivated at the gym than ever before and I stopped caring about computer games. Once I realised that I thought the End Times are truly here. Some things are more important in pursuing though. And talking is good. Don't keep shit bottled up inside, even if you have to make a Reddit post. via /r/dating_advice

#dating #dating advice #reddit

0 notes

caqrecords · 7 years

Photo

A CONVERSATION WITH RENOWED ARTIST: KOSSI AGUESSY

AUGUST 2015

I had the great pleasure of interviewing Mr. Kossi Aguessy. It was much to my surprise to hear of his untimely passing. To honor the legacy of Kossi, here is a re-share of our interview.

Hello, Mr. Aguessy, thank you for having this interview, I am a big supporter of your work.

Good Day to you,

It is a true pleasure spending this moment with you and share a parcel of life.

First thing first, thank you for supporting.

How is your day going today?

I love that question, I wish I had it every morning.

My day, as usual, hectic, full of solutions to find, challenges to tackle, questions and answers, some accurate, some others less, but beyond all, my day is enlighten – a miracle I am thankful for and work for copy and the past to tomorrow.

At what instant did you know that designing would play a major role in your life?

The right question should be: at what time I did know art would play a major role in my life.

Because design is just a part of what I do. I am first of all a visual artist, who happened to have certain capacities as an engineer. This melange led me to design, that I do consider a medium, as sculpture or painting, although it has it own specific constraints.

I never really chose to be an artist. I have the feeling, and this feeling had been lasting from the very instant I started to have a conscience of what I am.

But let’s get back to your question: I can exactly replace that instant in history. Because the role design played in my life had been a decision;

In 2002/ 2003 I was mainly focused on painting, yet had been working on solution-based designs, for the sake of research. The first edited works I have had then were a couple of perfume flasks I’ve been hired for designing.

My decision of making design the core of my production for the next decade came from there.

It was part of a cold blood plan and paradox, a reaction to my environment.

The fact is, back in the days, despite the fact one of these early works became a serial award winner, I was constantly told in the Parisian creative sphere I should give up on design because “African descents are not really trustable when it comes to industry”. The claim was clear to me. Because I was African, I wasn’t capable of conceptualizing highly valuable and accurate items.

Funny thing is, unfortunately not for me, the same sphere trying to convince me of my “natural incapacity of intellectual sharpness” was the same one hiring me for half a dime to create objects they’ll never give me credits for, objects and concepts they’ll simply make theirs. Being told that there is no valuable dark skinned person in design as justification to these behaviors from another era was no justification to me. I couldn’t just go “well yes if these are your rules…” I just couldn’t.

I had two choices: accept the perpetual rules of this shameless slavery, or settle my own private ones. From this very moment, I knew I had to invest the design field.

I’ve chosen the second option because the first one was simply unacceptable to me.

And I’ve made two promises to myself: the first one, to splendidly ignore what others were doing in the design field and settle a competition with only one person, myself. The second one, to reach excellence whatever I work on.

This is what I did for a decade, and although every little step was a nightmare because you literally feel you are not welcomed on a field you are not supposed to explore, if history has to be repeated, I will be doing it again.

I did want to settle a precedent, abolish these undercover rules I – as millions of human beings as myself – never validated. Somewhere, I did, and it is maybe one of the sole achievements I am proud of. Yet, I am far from being a fool and I know the war is not over.

Who are some artists that have inspired your craft?

My answer will be simple: none. For I’m not inspired by artists, especially in the visual arts field. I mean, what would be the point of being inspired by someone’s work while there is a whole world around and within us to get soul food from?

I am inspired by Nature, Human included, the infinite universe we are part of inspires me, in fact, I am amazed by life and its various facets. The living is another source of inspiration. History thrills my mind. Philosophy, mathematics, sociology: these are sources I drink from. I can spend hours watching a leaf in a forest. You have more chances of finding me reading a book, focused on one archaeological doc than trying to find inspiration from another artist work. It is not an attitude, just a fact.

Yet, there are people I do admire as persons. The first name coming up my mind is Leonardo Da Vinci. He was, and forever will be a game changer and simply one of the greatest minds this planet gave birth to, and these minds shape what we commonly call Culture, our most precious asset.

Do you tell your life experiences through your artwork and designs? If so may we have examples of some pieces that are relevant to your life?

My work IS a reflection of my life, every single one of my artworks or designs tells a part of it, from personal life experiences to more global concerns, they are shortcuts to my life.

Painting my Leo De Medio Rubi (“Leo from the bush”) series was literally like writing a biography, each painting representing a period of my life, my interactions with my environment as well as with my fellow human beings, things and stories I couldn’t or chose to not speak up till then.

Working on the Newbian collection, was a way to express my concerns about the place given to contemporary African design artifacts, and beyond the very concept of evolution when it comes to Africa, arts, and design.

My I-Dolls sculptures question spirituality today, something which is naturally part of us, and yet turns out to be considered as a dirty word nowadays.

These sculptures are my personal Elements-turned-Idols. The Sun, the Earth etc…I do believe we should step back to the essential, realize where we do come from, what we are part of, have a conscience beyond material for defining a brighter way to future.

Beyond these specific cases, everything I do is about settling a new reality, either it is about providing a solution through design or expressing feeling and thoughts with art pieces. This reality is simple: we are not our history; we are what we make of it. We do have one life and it deserves to be enlightened.

It is about digging love, hope, and life out of whatever our history had been.

It is about shaping today and tomorrow with our own rules and tools and shaping it in a splendid manner.

Being that Africa is the motherland and the source of all, how has it impacted or shaped your perspective?

You know, I usually define myself as a Nubian, a word that means a lot to me.

It means first that I am African, with a capital A, and second that I am global.

I am African because this continent is my motherland, this continent had fed mentally and shaped the person I am. Yet, I am certainly the “sort” of African the western fantasies had shaped through centuries. If you are looking for some victim to project some paternalist schemes on, I must confess I’m not that kind. If you are looking for a speech made by complaints and call for help, you won’t find it with me either. And I do believe there are millions sharing my mindset.

I come from a continent with the biggest potential on earth, one incredible energy, a youthful population, and incredible resources, but yet I’ve been constantly shown through medias and our common education in the west, images reflecting nothing of this reality. Images and information, which subconsciously build a map of this continent in our imaginary, a sort of fancy fantasy of the African, incapable of getting through, incapable of building the present, and at best forced to claim a brilliant History for justifying a call for respect.

What Africa thought me as a child is the following:

A conscience of that brilliant History, the conscience I do not need anyone assistance for building my present and future despite the lack of material assets, that I do not need anyone’s fantasies for defining what and who I am.

Africa thought me how to be fearless, to accept the fact I was a human being among human beings, with a role to play and a message to carry, my native land thought me how to overcome obstacles and how to find the light within my own self for enlightening darkness when it comes.

And last but not least, Africa impacted my very notion of pride. As an African and afro-descent son, I have been thought I can’t be proud of my origins, this will be compensatory to the shame these origins are in the eyes of the one broadcasting our “natural inferiority”. This continent thought me to be proud of my or our achievements, our values, the place we make for ourselves in mankind and our capacities as women and men to design and pave new roads while we are denied the right to use other’s and to pave them better than our fellow’s.

That is what I call a Newbian: having this conscience of where I do come from and what it means to me and those of my kind, yet knowing I am part of a bigger and global scheme called mankind, then work and address it.

What’s a day in the life of Kossi Aguessy like?

This is the part everyone gets bored and very disappointed. Good lord, why on earth did you ask this question? Can’t we just let the effortless, fancy life of mine’s fantasy last forever?

Well, well, well, my days are pretty simply manufactured: I wake up early, around 4 AM, whatever the moment I went to bed, I usually take advantage of this peaceful moment for having what I name My Orange Vibe Music instant, generally one hour spent assembling and listening to my dolly track list, then I reply to my emails and messages, then I’m out for a running or a boxing session before hitting the studio and start my daily work, which varies from design process, technological researches to pure artistry moment like sculpting or painting. These are moments I spend usually on my own, with the less external disturbance possible, generally with my iPod as a sole companion.

My meetings are generally settled between 12 and 2 pm, and as I’m not a long meeting person, they generally last about half an hour for each topic, if longer, I cut them off and leave – if we can’t find a solution to a problem during the first 30 mins of a meeting, means to me either we did not work enough on the subject, or we are incapable of dealing with it: needless in both case wasting time in arguments. Then I go back to conception or handiworks depending on the current works.

I do work pretty late, usually finish around 11/ 12 pm unless I do have some extra work.

Sometimes I have a break for cooking which is a pleasure of mine, a vegan cuisine I must precise, or reading or watching a doc or hanging out with friends.

See, I told you it is a very boring routine when you remove the travels, the events, the exhibitions, the launchings and the media’s parts.

When people read about you, they will find that you’re a very well-rounded, cultured and accomplished man, but do you feel there are some barriers you haven’t reached or shattered as a black man?

Now that is a question I do thank you for.

In fact, when people read about me, they are confronted to the finality of a permanent struggle, the result of a still live happening and a social experiment I’ve settled a decade ago.

If that question had been asked only a year ago I would have skipped it, because I’ve given myself a precise duration time for completing that experiment and delivery its result. 2005 – 2015.

It’s history now, and a block of a history:

In 2005 somebody in the arts/design world explained to me why there shouldn’t be an African descent person in the design field: “They” were not used to or not meant for industry, which unlike painting necessities a high level of mathematical projection. Well, my answer was “what about me?”. “You should consider another path”

Instead of considering another path, I’ve gone through listing one by one all the reasons and justifications provided for supporting such a splendid theory.

1 As a Black person, I seemed do be lacking intelligence for claiming design, yet according to my interlocutors IQ test, I was rated beyond Albert Einstein.

2 As a Black people, I could not understand the matters of solution providing, yet according to queries from the same interlocutors, I was asked constantly this service for products ending up with other persons, who happened to be leucoderms, signature on.

3 As a black person, I could not have access to one academic education, as every, absolutely every attempt I’ve made back in the days was unfortunate.

You know it when you send 2 files, one with your real name, and another with an Anglo-Saxon or a French one, and when you have a thrilling wowed response to the last one and no reply at all to the first.

4 As a black person, I could not fit in, as “the system does not trust Africans” or “Our brand does not do ethnic, nothing personal”.

5 As a black person, as everyone knows, I was looked with suspicion, my intentions were questioned. It couldn’t be only for the sack of evolution and arts, I should have had some undercover goals.

I’ve listed all of these and many more and responded one by one to them, because for the sake of the 25 millions years of evolution bringing us to the instant we are, we cannot just sit our asses down and let some people decide of our path and destiny in the name of a so-called supremacy they do everything but reflecting.

I’ve decided then to settled this experimentation, and believe me or not Michael Jackson inspired me.

I mean, this fellow had to go through whitening and “Europeanization” for been recognized for the real value of his talent. We won’t talk about it and we won’t break the taboo because it is disturbing, so we are constantly serving the most improbable reason for explaining the metamorphosis. Or when we do bring the subject out, we discuss the evil of him doing so instead of asking the right question: WHY? Why would a human being be forced to go intentionally through such a painful journey?

Maybe because it seemed clear to him, as it is to me that without this he would have been forever a “black entertainer” according to our male-heterosexual-European-centered-misogynic shaped society.

This is where we stand, I’ve seen my mother doing the same, for been even lighter than she was original because lighter is better. I see everyday women and men of my kind covering their hair with chemicals and being convinced this is a plain personal choice, and not one inducted response to their environment.

I did the same, not physically, that was out of the question, but symbolically, and for the time being I’ve decided, as a way of showing up the vertiginous stupidity of that system.

Was I too African? I’ve brought up my Brazilian mother. And then of a sudden, I became acceptable, because of Brazil. Although no one said it clearly, Brazil means mixed, and mixed means having a certain percentage of white blood, which can justify the fact you are good.

The reality is, yes I do have Brazilian blood but from my grand grandmother.

I even have German blood from my father side. But this Brazilian grandmother had no impact on my mother, and despite the fact my grandmother’s name is Chaold, she couldn’t feel and be less African than she was.

From the very moment I’ve started purposely that experiment, I could literally see. To fight the barriers my origins brought, I’ve responded with being raised up in New York, and of a sudden, people became less concerned by the fact I was too intelligent, or too talented for being an African. I was a western product, their honor was safe; I could be part of their game. I’ve met very few people in the west, these past years I felt like exposing what I was really doing to because the majority embraces this hypocrite and damageable rules, which serve their interests. And those who dare question it one bit, either they’re colored or not, are called names.

I recall Thibaut Perrin-Faivre, now vice CEO of Burberry London telling me 7 years ago: “ you are probably one of the most brilliant creative minds of this century”. Not that I needed his validation for being aware of my own possibilities and work them out, but it was one of the rarest moment I had a Caucasian from the creative field clearly putting words on a fact without directing the focus on my origins, color or whatever else their fantasies are.

The fact is, I’ve been raised in Africa, which I left as a teenager, sent in exile for the simple reason I’ve told my parents I felt more attracted to men than women, a fact that was unacceptable for the social brightness of my family.

The barriers were steel made and still are, on a field, which we may consider as progressive and open. I’ve understood one thing in my journey; this primitive racism in disguise is the reflection of our society globally and has nothing to do with color but everything to do with power. When you fear to loose the power you hold, for centuries, especially when you perfectly know that your possible challenger is, in fact, better than you are, you play bluff and you work on them psyche for convincing them you are almighty, so they won’t even think of challenging you.

The problem with me is that I never even consider this almighty, I never believed in a race, the silliest concept since the earth was flat, I consider not challenging myself first and my environment second, because if I may recall this is the fundamental principle of evolution.

I am even inclined to consider anyone’s supremacy, but please, let’s be serious, not because they’ll explain to me they are, deprive me of tools and possibility for being part of their game, but in playing a fair manner, and winning with dignity and honour. Unless it is done, I will have a vicious pleasure demonstrating to these fellows real supremacy does not know colours or origins but cares only about capacities and hard work.

And this 10 years experimentation was exactly about that, sending that message to everyone, we do not have to refer to what had been settled without our consent, we are not what anyone decides but us, and without feeling obliged to justify who and what we are, we have the right to bring up the best of us and to work it out with excellence without finding excuses in our History.

I’ve been through child abuses, rejection and leaving in the streets because of my sexual orientation and the shame it was for my family, I’ve to face the suspicious, shameless look of racism and barriers because of my origins and colour, yet there is one thing I know, I am no victim, I chose and design my path, I am thankful for the gift I had, I work and will work beyond strength to bring it up to the summit because this is where it belongs, there are no unreachable barriers, there are only our desire of being the change we want to see around us.

What kind of music do you like to listen to? Can you name a few artists playing in your iTunes right now?

Oh boy, that is a tricky one, as I change my playlist every morning:

Ok, for today I’m dealing with Amel Larrieux’s latest album , Ice Cream Everyday, a gem, Anoushka Shankar’s duet with Karsh Kale, Bella Bellow, probably one of the greatest singers Africa had know, Smell the D.A.I.S.Y from De La Soul, Franck Ocean, Lokua Kanza, a Congolese artist I love, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Bsement Jaxx, The Dandy Warhols, Diane Birch, Prince, Jill Scott, Nik West, Asgeir, Asa, Jay Z, Beirut, Jhene Aiko, Labrinth, Puccini, Rachmaninov and Stromae, with a pinch of Timbaland.

What advice would you give to young people aspiring to be in your career field?

Do you mind if I quote and reshape UB40?

“The great flood of tears that we’ve cried For our brothers and sisters who’ve died Over four hundred years has washed away our fears And strengthened our pride, now we turn back the tide

We will no longer hear your command We will seize the control from your hand We will fan the flame of our anger and pain

We will fight for the right to be us

And we will build our own society And we will sing, we will sing We will sing our own song »

Whatever the obstacles, always recall these words, sing your own song, and sing it splendidly, more than your right, it is a duty, for tomorrow’s sake.

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

Anywhere, everywhere, I’ll be content, as long as a river runs through it.

Thank you for your time Mr. Aguessy!

Most Welcome and thank you for wasting yours with me.

originally posted and removed from on TucMag.com

http://bit.ly/2qNtxmf

#KOSSI AGUESSY #KOSSI AGUESSY 2017 #KOSSI AGUESSY death #KOSSI AGUESSY interview

0 notes