#yes there was a 20th anniversary showing near me

[deadlypen1]

Pretty sure there were people behind me smoking weed at my Oldboy showing.

That's not a movie to smoke weed to.

#oldboy #park chan wook #korean cinema #yes there was a 20th anniversary showing near me #already knowing what the plot twists were didn't make it any less hard to watch

[reversemoon255]

5th Review - Hirogaru Sky! Precure

I have said, many a time, that I think there is no bad season of Precure, and I stand by that. However, something has to be on the bottom, and, unfortunately, I think that’s this season. It doesn’t help that, along with this season, I was also watching Otoha ‘23 and Yes! 5, which were both better seasons of the show, IMO. That being said, there’s still quite a bit to like about this season.

The Characters:  I really enjoy that Sora actually wants to be a hero. While Precure is by nature about heroes, the nature of being a hero is usually an underplayed element, so having this small change ends up meaning a lot, especially in something like the 20th anniversary season. And when Sora got to star in an episode, they were often some of my favorites, with the baseball episode in particular being a highlight. Also, having the ace be blue is pretty cool.

However, when the focus wasn’t on Sora, she was the most background character of any Precure ace, period. She often felt like a second or third stringer, being very one note when anyone else was in the spotlight. There were even some episodes near the end where the focus switched half-way through and it was actually jarring how her character shifted. It doesn’t help that she only had strong relationships with Mashiro and Elle, meaning she had less people to develop her character off of. She did have the most associated side-characters, but all of them were from Skyland, and as we barely spent any time there, those side characters don’t amount to much in the end.

Mashiro was a very strong character, having the most developed relationships, with Sora, Elle, Ageha, and the villain Batamon. She also had the strongest individual plot with the most notable development and episodes devoted to it, and a good chunk of the final few episodes were devoted to her winning over Batamon. She often felt like more of a main character than Sora did, as her connections to more characters let her play bigger roles in others’ stories.

There aren't a lot of negatives when it comes to Mashiro, though if I had to complain about anything, it’s that for such a developed character, she has the most boring concept of this team. Sora’s an other-worlder and a hero, Tsubasa’s the first male Precure along with being a bird, Ahega is our first adult main-cast Precure, and Elle is an actual baby. Compared to everyone else, the fact that Mashiro was the one who got so much more focus is a bit disappointing.

As I just mentioned, Tsubasa is our first male Precure. It opens a lot of avenues for future character ideas in coming seasons. And while not the most exciting character on his own, Tsubasa has strong relationships with both Ageha and Elle, and his personal stories often added to Skyland’s lore, and I do love me some lore.

But as I alluded to, Tsubasa isn’t very interesting as an individual. I have a hard time pinning down what his character is supposed to be outside of “male caregiver.” And while I’ll address this more later, I feel like the main reason they chose to have Tsubasa be male is so Elle could have a male caregiver that was on the team and not a side character like Rosemary or Harry.

Ageha was a similarly strong character to Mashiro, having strong relationships with Mashiro, Tsubasa, and Elle. She was also legitimately charming and well written to a notable degree higher than some other characters. The couple times we see her at work are very cute, and at times quite heartfelt. Furthermore, while we’ve had some high school age Precure before, Ageha is our first working adult on a main team (as we’ve had retired and ancient Precure in previous seasons), which is another cool idea that could add to future seasons in big ways. I’ll also add that having her be an early introduction, but not having her become a Precure until after the defeat of the first General are fantastic story beats.

But even Ageha is not without criticism, as her being an adult and a Preschool teacher both felt like they were more in service of raising Elle than furthering her own character at times. Also, as a big part of this show was raising Elle, and she was the most knowledgeable on raising children by a large margin, she was disproportionately featured in the show, further overshadowing the other members of the team.

And last we have Elle. I’ve said my piece on several occasions on how I don’t like babies in Precure, but to Elle’s credit, she was very cute. Her doing things like charging into battles, wanting to share her toys, and specifically her trying to save the rabbit during Minaton’s first appearance were all very nice moments.

But Elle was also the biggest hurdle this show had to overcome, and I think it failed to do so. As I mentioned, certain decisions, like Tsubasa being male and Ageha being an adult, felt like decisions catered to raising Elle before anything else. And that’s another problem. This isn’t a season like Tropical Rouge where Laura was the stealth main character; this season was primarily about raising Elle, not Elle as a character, so despite being the primary focus of the entire show, she has very little actual character to explore. It also doesn’t help that they didn’t give her the power to age-up until the very end of the show. There was such a huge jump in character moments after she got that ability that it’s a shame they waited until the last, like, four episodes to give it to her. I feel like almost every issue in this show could be traced back to accommodating Elle in some way. It sucks that this very unneeded subplot and (most likely) company mandate had to drag down the 20th anniversary season.

The Plot: There are elements of the story for Hirogaru that I really enjoy. The opening series of episodes are really good, and the fact that they really pace out the introduction of each Precure gives us opportunities for stories most seasons only give an episode, if that, which is neat. The ending arc is also very good, with good animation, a decent villain, and fun lore. And on top of that, there are a number of excellent individual episodes sprinkled throughout.

Unfortunately, the story does drag a lot. They always create a new reason for things happening, from generals switching out, to collecting sparkle energy, but when Minaton shows up there really isn’t anything going on; everyone’s just going about their business. From the point when Ageha becomes Cure Butterfly until the point where they decide they want to redeem Batamon, nothing really happens. I mean, there are events that happen that tie into the story, but there’s so much downtime in between moments, and for some reason it’s more jarring than with seasons like Tropical Rouge since only Mashiro has an individual subplot. There’s also so many missteps, like not introducing Kaiserin until the last few episodes, to having all the supporting characters being from a rarely visited other world.

Precure All Stars F: Just because I want to inject a bit more positivity into this review, and because I watched it right after finishing the series proper, let’s talk about the 20th anniversary crossover movie!

It was super fun! While it seems to be slightly bogged down by the voice actors they could get from each previous season, it was still a very well done film. They did get a lot of characters back, even if a lot of them didn’t have a lot of lines, and the characters that did get more screen time were done well, even if they did seem a bit random at first. There’s also a ton of cool crossover attacks, a lot of pivotal moments from previous season got redrawn, and the animation and action were great.

The thing that stood out to me the most, though, was probably the villain. Cure Supreme was an excellent idea for a 20th anniversary villain; a being seeking power that tries to emulate the powers of the Precure, only to not understand how they work. Also, Supreme and Puca being a team of black and white Precure was just a nice callback right at the end.

Overall, Hirogaru Sky! Precure is a season filled with good ideas, but doesn’t live up to its potential. While it’s filled with plenty of cute moments, it’s bogged down by the team needing to raise a child, a task that, ironically, gets in the way of said child’s development. I think a lot of the new ideas it brings to the table will positively influence future seasons, but for now, of all the seasons I’ve finished (that being 14), this one is definitely my least favorite.

As for Wonderful Precure, making the ace an actual dog is so left field and hilarious that I’m quite pumped. I’m really hoping this season takes a cue from the recent Sentai and Rider shows and does something a bit more story driven, but even if it remains episodic, it’s such a batty premise that I think it could work in either format. I hope the fifth member is a chinchilla.

#Precure #Pretty Cure #Hirogaru Sky Precure #Hirogaru Sky Spoilers #Review #Precure All Stars F

[warrioreowynofrohan]

Today in Tolkien - October 6th

This is the night of the attack at Weathertop, when Frodo is stabbed with the Morgul-blade.

In the morning they found, for the first time since they had left the Chetwood, a track plain to see. They turned right and followed it southwards. It ran cunningly, taking a line that seemed chosen so as to keep as much hidden as possible from the view, both of the hill-tops above and of the flats to the west. It dived into dells, and hugged steep banks; and where it passed over flatter and more open ground on either side of it there were lines of large bolders or hewn stones that screened the travellers almost like a hedge.

Aragorn tells the hobbits that the path was made by the men of Arnor to access their forts along the walls when they were fighting Angmar, but that long before they had a great watch tower called Amon Sûl on the summit of Weathertop, and there Elendil watched for the coming of Gil-Galad in the days of the Last Alliance. Sam sings a portion of the song of Gil-galad that Bilbo translated.

It was already mid-day when they drew near the southern end of the path, and saw before them, in the pale clear light of the October sun, a gre-green bank, leading up like a bridge on to the northward slope of the hill. They decided to make for the top at once, while the daylight was broad. Concealment was no longer possible, and they could only hope that no enemy or spy was observing them. Nobody was to be seen moving on the hill. If Gandalf was anywhere about, there was no sign of him. On the western flank of Weathertop they found a sheltered hollow, at the bottom of which there was a bowl-shaped dell with grassy sides. There they left Sam and Pippin with the pony and their packs and luggage.

On the top of Westhertop they find the sign Gandalf left three days ago, and Aragorn interprets it. The rocks and grass are all scorched with fire from Gandalf’s fight with the Ringwraiths. Aragorn says he expects it will be at least 14 days from here to the Ford of Bruinen. The fact that they still manage to make that time even after Frodo is severely wounded - they reach the Ford of the 20th - is impressive on the part of them all. Frodo sees black specks on the road, two coming from the east and three from the west; Aragorn agrees that these are Black Riders, and they conceal themselves and go back dien the hill. Sam and Pippin find a Ranger camp, but there are also footprint of other boots from a day or two ago. Aragorn agrees with Sam that he dies not like the dell they are in, but there is no time to find anywhere better before nightfall. They make a fire as a defence, and at night Aragorn tells them old tales, including the Tale of Tinúviel. I wonder if, in Aragorn saying that the ending of that tale is not known, Tolkien is poking fun at his unfinished manuscript of the poetic Leithian.

Shortly after Aragorn finishes the story, the moon rises, and they see and sense the Ringwraiths outside the dell. The Ringwraiths approach, and Frodo under their influence puts on the Ring; what he sees of the Ringwraiths is matched by the movie depiction very closely. Frodo is stabbed by the Witch-king. Aragorn orders them to put Frodo by the fire, then disappears for some time, reawakening Sam’s suspicions; when he returns, Sam draws his sword and stands over Frodo. Aragorn has been trying, without success, to find out why the Ringwraiths have left rather than attacking again; he is very concerned by Frodo’s account, and then takes Sam aside and tells him he concludes that Frodo’s wound is intended to place him under the Ringwraiths’ control. Aragorn goes off to find athelas, which is uncommon and little-known in the North.

Frodo feels pain from the Morgul-wound on the same day in the two following years. One year later, he and the other hobbits and Gandalf have just left Rivendell the previous and are crossing the Ford of Bruinen:

When they came to the Ford of Bruinen, he halted, and seemed loth to ride into the stream; and they noted that for a while his eyes appeared not to see them or things about them.

“Are you in pain, Frodo?” said Gandalf quietly as he rode by Frodo’s side.

“Well, yes, I am,” said Frodo. “It is my shoulder. The wound aches, and the memory of darkness is heavy on me. It was a year ago today.”

“Alas! there are some wounds that cannot be wholly cured,” said Gandalf.

“I fear it may be so with mine,” said Frodo. “There is no real going back. Though I may come to the Shire, it will not seem the same; for I shall not be the same. I am wounded with knife, sting, tooth, and a long burden. Where shall I find rest?”

Gandalf did not answer.

Then, a year later, in Bag End:

One evening Sam came into the study and found his master looking very strange. He was very pale and his eyes seemed to see things far away.

“What’s the matter, Mr. Frodo?” said Sam.

“I am wounded,” he answered, “wounded; it will never really heal.”

But then he got up, and the turn seemed to pass, and he was quite himself the next day. It was not until afterwards that Sam recalled that the date was October the sixth. Two years before on that day it was dark in the dell under Weathertop.

This is also the day that the story ends, the day that Sam returns to Bag End from the Havens.

The three companions…spoke no word to each other until they came back to the Shire, but each had great comfort in his friends on the long grey road. At last they rode over the downs and took the East Road, and then Merry and Pippin rode on to Buckland; and already they were singing as they went.

I only just noticed this on this reread; and I find it particularly moving. Merry and Pippin do not feel any special need of silence themselves; soon after they part from Sam they are singing. But they recognize, without anything needing to be said, that Sam needs silence in companionship; and they give him that, though the whole of a week-long journey together (Frodo departed from the Havens on Sept 29th), and it is a great comfort to them all. (And for someone like Pippin, who is not particularly noted for his tact, it also shows how he’s grown over the course of the story.)

But Sam turned to Bywater, and so came back up the Hill, as day was ending once more. And he went on, and there was yellow light, and fire within; and the evening meal was ready, and he was expected. And Rose drew him in, and set him in his chair, and put little Elanor upon his lap.

He drew a deep breath. “Well I’m back,” he said.

The final thing that I think we’re supposed to draw from this ending being on Oct 6th, the anniversary of Weathertop, is to conclude that by this time Frodo has reached Eressëa, and this year will no longer be pained by his old wounds.

#today in tolkien #tolkien #the lord of the rings #frodo baggins #sam gamgee #pippin took #merry brandybuck

[medleymisty]

Ask game

Tagged by @nigmos and @siancyaniam

Sorry about the spacing - not sure what happened.

Why did you choose your URL?

Medley and Princess Misty were two of my favorite My Little Ponies when I was a kid.

How long have you been on tumblr?

Since around October 2012 I think?

Do you have a queue tag?

Nope.

Why did you start your blog in the first place?

Came back to the Sims community after a break and I found everyone had moved to Tumblr.

Why did you choose your icon/pfp?

It’s Seth. It’s always been Seth. ;)

If you don’t know - he was the villain of my Sims 3 story In the Valley of the Sun. He became my favorite character and I’ve written a ton about him since.

Why did you choose your header?

On mobile it’s a pic I took at Carowinds at Winter Fest before the plague, and I like the colors. On desktop it’s a pic of a foggy morning in my neighborhood, and I like it and I think it’s cool.

What’s your post with the most notes?

I have no idea and I don’t want to know.

How many mutuals do you have?

I am not sure how to tell.

How many followers do you have?

Nope, not getting me to post bait for trolls. ;)

How many people do you follow?

1152. I should probably go clear out inactives I don’t feel attached to.

Have you ever made a shitpost?

Not sure what a shitpost is. From context I think it’s like a random funny post? Do the ones where I’m like yay I am happy and I love the sky and the clouds and the sun and trees count?

How often do you use tumblr every day?

A fair bit, because my brain needs something to do while waiting for things to happen. I also like to show funny posts on here to the spousal person, so I have to look for them. :)

Did you have a fight/argument with another blog once? who won?

Not that I know of, but I know there are people out there who don’t like me. I guess I won since I don’t even know who they are or why they don’t like me.

Saw something yesterday morning where someone was still making fun of me for not being in a good mental health place 17 years ago near the height of the complex PTSD? There are some weird people out there reading Sims stuff y’all. Be careful.

How do you feel about ‘you need to reblog this’ posts?

I immediately unfollow anyone who reblogs those unless there’s a special situation. I have a Thing about shaming people and using harsh mean absolutist language. I don’t like it and I don’t tolerate it in my online experience.

Do you like tag games?

Yes!! :) I may not always have the mental energy/time to do them and I don’t like tagging people because I don’t want to make anyone feel left out by not tagging them or make them feel obligated by tagging them though.

Do you like ask memes?

See above. :)

Which of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

I don’t know? There is one person I follow whose blog I used to read years ago and I was so excited when they followed me back and even talked to me, but they’re not a Sims person so I won’t tag them. Also pretty sure they’re not famous to anyone but me.

Do you have a crush on a mutual?

No, sorry, I only crush on the spousal person. 20th wedding anniversary in September woooo! :)

As per usual for tagging others - if you read this far you’ve been tagged. Do it if you want and don’t if you don’t want. :)

#text #non-sims #ask game

[popculturebuffet]

House of Mouse: Mickey and the Culture Clash (Commission by WeirdKev27) or “What the Hell, Clarabelle?”

Hello, hello, hello... I wish I could say I was in good spirits but i’m tired, have covid induced chills running down my spine.. and oh yeah there was an armed insurrection i the captial last night that showed just how broken this country was. And while Monster Bash would still be relevant... I couldn’t do it. I admit to being unable to do an episode where the millitant racist nutjob who harms people runs off into the night, and does much worse in later episodes, while the people she harassed are arrested the night after a bunch of millitant, racist, sociopathic, selfish nightmares sieged the captial, killed a woman, raised the fucking maga flag over the buildling and took pictures like they were goddamn heroes.  We got a stark reminder, not a wake up call, not an opening a REMINDER of just how badly broken our country is last night, and it wasn’t till this morning I found out just how BAD it was. The deaths, the flag, the fact josh fucking hawley, MY STAT’ES SENATOR and registered piece of shit, raised  A FUCKING FIST IN SOLIDARITY, which gives me the crippling fear his stupidity and unabashed racisim and support of a cou could mean riots at best and attempted uprisings at worst and who knows what kind of hate crimes against those of color and those in my own queer community. I am afraid, tired, and I am pissed and I feel we could ALL use something wholesome, warm and far removed from the shit going on. And in my hour of need to figure out something like that to put on the schedule.. Kev brought up a wonderfufl idea.  Every month this month till the end of it Kev is going to comission one episode of a show near and dear to both our hearts that has it’s 20th birthday this month. House of Mouse. He was intitally going to request Pete’s One Man Show, which is one of my faviorites, but was ironcially one I already planned to cover next month to celebrate both the show’s anniversary and Pete’s Birthday. But since he was happy to wait till then to comission it, he instead asked for another classic and one with easily my faviorite character on the show: Moritmer Mouse. 

One of the best things House of Mouse did was bring back Mortimer Mouse. Introduced in Mickey’s Rival, Mortimer was an ex of minnies who showed up for one short to be a dick to mickey before running off and leaving Minnie at the mercy of a bull he pissed off. He also weirdly kept electrodes and a car battery in his pants. The short itself is.. not great mostly because Minnie dimissies Mickey rightfully being pissed someone is hitting on his girlfriend in front of him, making jokes at his expense, and generally being a pillock as being jealous... which yeah, yeah he is. Most of the time jealousy and supscison of your partner is ugly, gross and damaging to a relationship.  You should trust them unless you’ve been given good reason not to, and if your paranoidly jealous about every friend she has she could be attracted to.. get some fucking help. Seriously, I need to, not for this for various other problems, but get some therapy to help with your trust issues or if your just being the kind of dick who naturally assumes men and women or men and men or women and women or men and nonibinary persons, or women and nonbinary peeps and so on and so on cannot be friends if they could possibly be togehter romantically... grow up.  I say all of that because those are serious underlying issues and I didn’t want it to seem like for a moment I was supporting them... and because sometimes i’ts OKAY to be jealous, to either just feel a little jealous of someone, or to you know be irate because your girlfriend’s ex is hitting on her in front of you and she’s being entirely receptive to it. 

So yeah i’ts really hard to feel bad for minnie’s bull attack or find the ending sweet after Minnie was you know, what ramona said for an entire short. However my point for this rant, besides giving out about the short again because I clearly didn’t enough in my Mickey Birthday Special, is that Mortimer is still pretty great. He’s a frat bro in the 40′s sense sure, but the idea of a local douche hoping to swoop in and woo minnie away, who has an oddly specific sense of humor and a bizzare, memorable and wonderful walk, seriously the short is worth watching for mortimier’s “I got two car batteris in my pants’ walk, is a good one. While he’d naturally show up in comics and what have you Mortimer just sort of vanished. But clearly someone on the House of Mouse staff, and Mousewerks before it, agreed because Morty was made easily one of the best and most recurring characters in the HOM, and often more prominent than Horace or Gus. While he still tried his old “I’m gonna do your common law wife act” a few times he was mostly there to be an annoying douche when the ep needed one and to be taken down a peg by everyone in the house. And that VERY MUCH includes Mickey. That’s also part of why I love this show bringing him back: It gives Mickey someone besides pete to give out too on a regular basis. He’s still his charming self about it but it’s lovelyt os ee Mickey sarcastically roast someone. And I honestly attribute the main factor of his sucess on the show to VA Maurice LaMarche. While his original VA, Sonny Dawson, was fantastic.. it’s Maurice who very clearly made the character his. While others like Jeff Bennet have taken over since i’ts Maurice who gave him his signature “ha-cha-cha” catchphrase, swagger and signiture voice. And no i’ts not lost on me that one of Maurice’s OTHER best roles is another cartoon mouse.. and I now very badly want him to meet Pinky and the Brain. But yeah, Maurice just oozes the smarm that defines mortimer for me, oozes condescinon and assholery and he, is., glorious. He was a faviorite as a kid, he’s a faviorite now, and Disney needs to use him more.. and also have Maurice voice him for wonderufl world of mickey mouse, though Jeff Bennett is not bad at all I just prefer the master at the role. 

So obviously, after the nightmare of an evening america had yesterday, an episode not only about how wholesome mickey and minnie are but about Mickey teaming up with Mortimer was EXACTLY what i needed. So pitter patter, this is Mickey and the Culture clash. As always for house of mouse i’ll be chonking it up and since this one starts right with the wraparound, and sicnce you know I spent a godo few pagraphs going over mortimer and he’s only IN the wraparound this episode... let’s start there

Mickey and the Culture Clash: Don’t Go Changin, To Try and Please Me So we open the episode and the review proper with Mickey performing a banjo sernade for Minnie, their song in fact. It’s a really sweet scene.. that’s quickly ruined by Clarabelle being an asshole, who says i’ts a bit crude. Minnie counters that while “It’s not mozart”, it’s nice and she clearly likes it and the gesture. Instead of you know leaving it there like a good friend, like she’s SUPPOSED to be to Minnie in most continuities, Clarabelle.. takes the things she said and her having to run out to wrangle pluto out of context, painting it as her thinking he’s not sophisticated and then running out because of it. Oh and she tops it by pointing to a classified add from a MM looking for sophisticated companionship. 

It just paints Clarabelle not as Minnie’s friend or a chatty gossip, but as a heartless bitch who has no trouble implying one of her best friends would cheat on her boyfriend TO HIS FACE, and is fine wrecking a perfectly lovely relationship just to have more to talk about. Seriously she starts gossiping to everybody on top of it just in case you thought Clarabelle was a decent person in any shape this episode. She’s the one thing about this episode that dosen’t work despite being integral to it.. well two but hte other thing is a small, end of episode gag we’ll get to. This.. this is an integral part of the plot. It also relies on Daisy and Donald being absent for the episode for what I can only assume is their annual sex decathalon because otherwise the second she heard about her friend doing this, before reassuring Minnie, Donald would be holdiing her while Daisy beat the absolute shit out of her for hurting thier closest friend and not bothering to take a look into anything when leveling such a rough accusation at Minnie. In a really stellar, really well paced episode, Clarabelle being so heartless stands out. It’s also, might as well get this out of the way, teh final episode not inlcuding the two holiday specials.. and it’s a good note to go out on otherwise, I just can’t ignore the obnoxious cow in the room.. in both senses of the word. 

So yeah Mickey’s trying to be fancy, and Mortimer gets a good dig in about him reading “You having trouble sounding out the words”, but once he hears what’s going on, or rather once he realizes mickey things Mortimer’s personal add is in fact his girlfriend cheating on him, he decides to help Mickey. And to his credit for this con.. Mortimer actually thought things out on how to trick his rival, and his plan here is douchey as hell but incredibly genius: he offers to help mickey and while that’d normally be suspcious he offers a genuine, and very mortimer explination for helping him become a bit more sophisticated to win minnie back: if Minnie finds a handsome, sophisticated guy to date, what chance does MORTIMER have against that? At least with Mickey, in his deluded egocentric view of things anyway, he has a shot at beating him. 

So Mickey classes it up a bit, taking some sopshitcated stances when announcing and trying to woo minnie by talking in ye olde english. When that fails, she just finds it silly but charming, Mickey finds Jose.. hitting on her.

Just.. I expect better from you man. Woo ladies all you like as long as your respectful but I expect better than to hit on someone else’s girlfriend.. which granted he has but given the last time we saw him do that, he nearly got stabbed a bunch and the last time he agressively hit on a woman he got punched in the beak as he should, you’d THINK he’d of learned something. Seriously once again Donald is only missing because this time Daisy would be holding Jose down while Donald hit him. Or possibly they’d take turns. Point is Jose REALLY shoudln’t be doing this and knows better.. marginally. But.. it is in character enough so ti’s not as bad as Clarabelle the homewrecker. 

So Mickey tries being fancy and goes on to do poetry instead of letting O’Malley and the Alley Cats play.. which is a nice running gag the series does as they NEVER get to play.. which while funny is a shame since I love the Aristocats. So then we finally get what Mortimer’s been playing at, he swoops in, claims MICKEY dosen’t need HER, and uses the same personal add to trick her. See, while what Mortimer’s doing is vile.. unlike clarabelle I can repsect it at least. I don’t condone it and i’m glad he gets foiled.. but as a bad guy plan it’s pretty clever and for someone like Mortimer whose usually pretty incompitent.. it’s pretty suprising he could pull this off. It’s still pretty damn low and scummy, no question, but props to being able to outwit and nearly outplay two people who deal with your crap on a regular basis and still convincingly conning both.  Thankfully while he tries to take Minnie out Mickey, in a great visual gag, puts two and two together, and busts out their song, with Mickey and Minnie heartwearmingly reuniting on stage as seen above. Then we get that gag I mentioned not liking: Mickey gets Morty back by planting a false marriage proposal from Moritmer to Clarabelle, again under MM and he gets carried off.. HAHA HE’S BEING FORCED INTO A MARRIAGE HE DOSEN’T. LAUGH. LAUGH AT IT. The gag just really hasn’t aged well, as otherwise it’s clever Mickey used Mortimer’s own trick against both him and the person who caused all of this but really.. Clarabelle gets no real compuance. At worse sshe finds out she was tricked.. but she again you know tried to break up her close friends relationship for shits and giggles. But .. it’s at the very end of the episode and very easy to ignore, so it dosen’t really bother me too bad, and compared to some gags of the type i’ve seen, it could be MUCH worse.  Overall this wraparound is one of the series best and a good one to go out on. it has a simple premise, a brilliant antagonist plot, some great bits from all involved, and even a great Belle and Beast cameo. All in all a really good wraparound only hampered by a sexist and dated ending and Clarabelle being portrayed as ...

She’s the worst, in the world. Okay onto the shorts.

Mickey’s Piano Lesson: That was a Fun One

It really was. It’s a simple premise: Minnie wants MIckey to do a piano recital and he decides “I don’t need practice i’m mickey mouse. “ And it’s REALLY nice to have a short that has, rather than aw shucks mickey, shenanigans mickey. While thanks to the new shorts we’ve had tons, it’s still nice to get one in the House of Mouse era, and it’s just fun to see Mickey take the usual donald roll of letting his overconfidence punch him in the face> It fits both though: Both are everyman and while I lean towards the duck, to no one’s shock, Mickey is just as capable, and his lack of practice comes off less like the angry and hostile way donald would dismiss it and mroe just loveable procastination. And as someone who REALLY struggles with procastination I related to this short, as Mickey does everything else he’d rather do from bathing the dog to skydiving till Minnie, in a great bit informs him everyone from the president, to several dignitaries from other countries, to a televised audience will see. We then get two really great and really beatuifully animated bits as MIckey wrestles with the notes on thep age then fights with his piano as he performs, still pulling it off but destroying the thing and rightfully earning a glare form his girlfriend. Just a fun, slapstick short with a great premise. 

Dance of the Goofys: Scary Children Set to classical music, this one has a bunch of goofys as Fairy’s, who are making the flowers go and the one who sleeps in ends up saving the king from a horrifing looking little brat. He reminds me of Montanna Max a bit.. speaking of which Creer Summer recnetly announced Elmyra won’t be in the reboot. And while this does make me fear actually good characters like Fifi, Montana Max, and more will be cut like the animanics reboot and I do feel for Cree not getting to be involved and hope they find another roll for her as, given her status in the industry she deserves better.. THANK FUCKING GOD. I’ll go into this in another review I have planned for the future but unlike the cuts made to animaniacs this was a REALLY good decision i’m really greatful for. Thank you crew thank you. 

Back on topic, it’s just a fun, really beautifully animated short about the goofies and hteir shenanigans with a really great high concept. 

Maestro Minnie: Brahm’s Lullabye: Simply Irresitable Another simple but clever and lovely to watch one, and one I like quite a bit more. Minnie is conducting some living violins to Brahm’s Lullabye to get a baby Violin to sleep, and we get some really beautiful shots of her as she does so.. only to get comically interuppted by other insteruments turning up the noise. Not much to say on this one as it’s short and simple.. but sometimes short and simple is just what you need and the fun premise nad really beautiful especially for tv animation at the time visuals really sell this one.  ONce again, good stuff. 

Overall: This was a REALLY good note to go out on. While as I said the Clarabelle stuff can eat my entire ass, everything else is really damn good and I highly recommend checking this one out. Next time, in about a month, we’ll be looking at Pete’s spotlight episode for his birfday. While you wait tommorow we have my first look at legend of the three cabs. But for now, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. 

#house of mouse #mickey mouse #minnie mouse #mortimer mouse #clarabelle cow #donald duck #daisy duck #goofy goof #mouseworks #maurice lamarche #mickey's culture clash

[daisies--roses]

MYG|Finally again (M)

Pairing: Yoongi X Reader

Warnings: smut, swearing

Word count: 2,8k

Plot: You're seeing your Idol boyfriend Yoongi again after a long time.

A/N: I wrote this a long time ago (2018) for my (now) girlfriends 20ths birthday, I really forgot about this :3

It was the time of the year. You had written your exams a few weeks ago and now you were free for 1 and a half months.

You packed your things and were standing in the Check-in line in the airport. Your luggage in one hand and your passport in the other.

In your ears the voice of your genius boyfriend who was singing and rapping in a equally beautiful voice.

With every single step you took your heart hammered louder in your chest.

The last time you saw him was like a faded memory. It was on his last holiday months ago. He was in your apartment for a week and left afterwards but you weren't satisfied with that visit. You had work to do for your classes and your job. You went out a few times but you wanted more of him than you got.

You missed him incredibly much. You really wanted to feel his arms around you and his head on your shoulder while you both laid on his bed. You wanted to cuddle with him and kiss his little cute nose afterwards he would scrunch it and you would laugh at his reaction.

But not just your chest was getting hotter your core was aching for him. You loved him for who he was but god he could do so many things to bring you the euphoric feeling no one could ever got close to. How his hands went between your thighs or hold your hips in their place because he wants to taste you firstly. Or the time he couldn't take his hands off of you and fingered you right there under the table while you were eating dinner with your friends.

You shuddered because of these memories and your core got wetter every time you remembered another time you made love to each other.

You were the next in line and smiled instantly when the woman started to ask you your name and your passport.

"Hi I'm Y/N, flying to Moskau and than Seoul."

She smiled friendly "Please lay your luggage on the scale." after checking the score on the scale she gave you your things back and wished you a save flight.

You would spend more than half a day traveling to see the love of your life. You wished that it would take a small amount of time but you lived in the different side of the world.

But this would end next year when you graduate. You didn't plan anything yet but you knew that you want to live with him till the end of your time. You need him next to you. Thats why you don't want to waste any second without him after your graduation.

While listening to his new music you went into the plane. Two flights were awaiting you but you were content because you would see him again.

In the other side of the world your boyfriend was sleeping after a long night of getting some music done before you were coming. He wanted to end everything because he wanted to spend every second with you. He planed your days out.

You were there for 4 weeks and he would work at home in the mornings and than spend the rest of the day with you, his beautiful girlfriend that he loved and cared for.

He woke up after a long time and wrote you a little message before he started to get his apartment ready for you. He knew how much you loved a specific blanket on the couch and how much you hated to have any kind of insects in the apartment. Taking many things under consideration he took his time to get a perfect atmosphere for you and him.

You couldn't wish a better boyfriend than him and you appreciate him everyday in your life.

You were landing in Moskau in a few minutes. You would spend a couple of hours in the airport and than take the other plane to Seoul where he would pick you up.

You were smiling because you would see him again in like 11 hours again. You would feel his warmth and hear his laugh again. You missed his eyes on you and his breath on your skin.

You weren't the only one who missed every single strand of your hair or your little mole under your eye. He missed every little thing and he couldn't wait to take you in his arms.

Finally you were sitting on your last flight. It would take you another 8 hours to reach Seoul but you were going to be there faster because you were to exited to really feel this 8 hours of flight.

Tha landing took another few minutes. You were packing fastly and couldn't contain any more feelings of excitement. You would see him in a few minutes.

Yoongi wasn't any different. He waited on the doors with a black basecap and black clothes. He wore the parfum you liked and the bracelet you gave him on your last anniversary. He smiled silently thinking about you coming through this doors to be in his arms.

Taking the last peace of your luggage you walked fastly through the airport. You saw the doors and breathed in and out a few times before going out. The light was brighter than you were comfortable with but your eyes adjusted quickly.

You got going and looked through the crowd of waiting people. Your eyes searched for the pale, handsome male  dressed in black. He send you a picture of his outfit so you would find him quicker.

Going out of the gates you stayed still for a couple of seconds till your eyes landed on this handsome man who was your longtime boyfriend. Taking big steps to make it faster to him and trying not to humiliate yourself in front of the other people because you wouldn't be a klutz if you didn't stumble.

You got to him in a record time and let go of your luggage to jump into his open arms. Your legs wrapped around his torso and your head on the crook of his neck.

"God, I missed you so much Baby." he took your scent in and held you tightly in his arms.

"I missed you too Yoongi. So freaking much." you smiled when his eyes meet yours. His grin spreading with every other second you spend in his arms.

"I wanna kiss you right now baby, but I know that I won't stop if I start so lets get going."

You giggled after his statement and jumped down. He took your luggage and you took his hand in yours.

Sitting in the car you let go of his hand because he needed to drive but Yoongi didn't want to lose contact thats why he laid his hand on your thigh. "You hungry baby?"

"Not really, we got something on the plane so I'm fine. But I need a bed and my boyfriend to cuddle in it if you have that I'll be happy."

Yoongi laughed at your wish "I have what you want and more baby." he tightened his grip on your thighs a bit and loosened it afterwards.

With his little gesture you felt how your woman part got tighter and you wished that he planned to make love to you at his apartment.

His hand stayed the whole ride on your thighs skimming it up and down. Getting closer to your core and in the next second getting closer to you knee. Ever time he got closer on your wetness you held your breath and wished for more but he just grinned and drove his car.

Parking in his garage you got out of the car immediately and opened the back. Taking out your luggage you smiled tightly at him. "Take my keys and get the door baby. I'll take it from here."

Nodding you took his keys and went to his door. The building was high on security and no one couldn't enter without the knowledge of the owners. You went on the elevator together and  got off on thr 13th floor. It was just his apartment on this floor that's why no one could enter it without a card.

Opening the door to his apartment you stepped in slowly. You took of your shoes and started to light up the room till you heard your luggage falling over because yoir boyfriend just let it go. You turned around and stared at him. "What's wrong?"

He took little steps towards you while he was grinning. "I hope you got enough sleep on the plane Baby."

"I slept for a few hours but why would you-" you couldn't finish your sentence because in the next second you were trapped against a wall and your boyfriend. His eyes hindering you to say anything else.

"You'll need that energy Baby. You're gonna need all of it." he kissed you cheeks and smiled innocently "I promise that."

Looking straight into his eyes you didn't see his hands finding the hem of your Hoodie. You felt him pull the ends of it. He neared your ears and nibbled on them. "My apartment is warm enough Baby. Let's take this off."

Nodding you held your arms up and he took your hoodie off. You were wearing a black under it which showed a but of cleavage. Your hoodie went flying through the room

He licked his lips and got to work. His lips pressing kisses on your neck and going down on your cleavage. Staying above your top line and making you frustrated because he stops right where you want him to be.

His hands are not staying still either. Touching your sides and getting down on your thighs. Grasping them tightly and massaging them in a way you could never imagine felt that good.

You moaned euphoric and felt his smirk on your skin. "You like me handling you rougher than in our previous activities?"

You nodded with closed eyes and an open mouth. "Don't nod baby. Tell me what you want. How should I handle you baby?"

Your voice was hoarse because of the whole thing but you could gave a little sound out. "Rougher please."

"The princess gets what she wants." with this statement he took your thighs in his hands "Jump up princess."

Yoi jumped on him and wrapped your legs up his torso and your arms around his neck. "Can you make me get a little bit hotter baby? You can do anything you want till we get to my bedroom."

"Yes." you started to kiss jawline and took your lips slowly and painfully down to his earlobes. Nibbling on them you started to rub your body up and down on his body. Your hands gettinf tangled in his hair while you kissed his neck down to his collarbone.

His jeans got tighter with every move you made. He contained a groan after you pressed your core a few times on his dick under his jeans. Your hand pulling on his hair and the other going down his clothed chest.

He walked slower as you started to try and open his belt with one hand. Getting frustrated with every other second you couldn't do it he smirked and let you be for a few minutes till he opened his door and laid you on his bed.

Looking straight in your eyes he opened is belt and his jeans. His sweater foloowed afterwards and he was standing with just his boxers in front of you. "Get up baby and take off your clothes while I'm watching."

Obeying what he wanted you started to strip while he sat down with oben legs on the bed. His hawk eyes watching every move you make. Gulping down a few times when you took you little time taking things off. Licking his lips with every leaving clothes. "Get your bra off too baby. I want to see your beautiful breasts."

You did as he told and went to his front. He looked you up and down before he took your arm and laid you on the bed. "You" he kissed your neck "are" he went down to your collarbone "perfect" taking your nipple in his mouth he sucked on it and massaged with his hand the other one.

You moaned loudly when he bit your nipple and gave the same amount of love to the other one. He than went down with his free hand to your inner thighs. Groping hardly and leaving a few hand marks. You whimpered after that and he kissed one last time both breasts. He looked at you and grinned. "I'm gonna make you a whimpering mess after a few minutes baby, just wait."

You thought that your core was wet enough after the playing on the wall but it was nothing after he started taking his sweet little time exploring it with his fingers.

One hand kneeled your butt and the other rubbed your core over your slip. He rubbed it in circles and got faster and slower with a few seconds difference. You moaned and whimpered. Your body getting closer to the orgasm with every circle and every kneeling.

You getting louder and louder even if he didn't get started on the rhing he had planed yet. "You're gonna cum for me baby? You gonna make me happy and coum for my just by rubbing your clit? Make me happy princess. Cum for me."

You moaned one last time and your body shuddering and shrinking under his skillful hands. Breathing heavily you looked at him. With an open mouth you licked your lips." Are you a good girl baby? Do you deserve more of this?"

"Yes."

"Than let me give you more baby. Let me make sure you remember this night even when I'm not next to you anymore. Remember this and touch yourself when I'm gone baby."

You nodded and Yoongi got up on your eye level. "You wanna make me remember too baby?"

"Yes, I want you to remember me and get off to me."

He groaned and started to kiss your lips aggressively. His hands roaming on your sides and grabbing your butt or your breast to make you moan and get his tongue in you. Fighting for dominance with your tongues which you give to him easily. Suckling on your upper lip and biting your under lip.

He groans as you can't take it anymore and your hands makes contact with his crotch. You rub your hand through his boxers and get him to moan between your kisses. He loves how you try to take control of the situation. But he knows that you'll never have it.

You take your hand in his boxers and rub his tip with your thump. Licking your lips and his in the process. He let's you take control and gets on his back. "Do whatever you want baby. I'm yours."

Grinning you get down and took off his boxers. His dick springing out for you to get it in your mouth. Your tongue swirling around the tip for a few rounds. Your getting it down your throat till you chocke a little bit.

Yoongi holding your hair in his hands and controlling the tempo of your blowjob. He groans as he speeds up with his hands. Gagging a few times because he gets too deep into your throat.

Afterwards he let's go of your hair and gives you the control again but you got other plan. You get him rilled up till he gets as close as he can to his orgasm. But you stop than. You earn a groan and cussing. "What the hell baby. Why the fuck would you stop?"

You got up on his level and he looks disapproving "Get down there and finish what you started."

You shake your head and smirk. "Be patient baby. I know what I'm doing."

After your statement he looks amused and gives you a heads up.

Smirking you take your slip off and take a condom of his drawer. You take it on his dick and open up your clit with one of your fingers. Getting in and out beforehand with one finger and than two fingers.

Yoongi watching you with lust full eyes. Fingering and stretching your clit for his enormous dick. He watches you and his dick gets harder every second.

You get your fingers out with a moan and position yourself on him. You get down slowly and wait a few seconds till you're comfortable enough to ride him the way he wants.

Fast and hard. Thats what he wants. Thats what you want and thats what you both get.

His dick goes in and out of your clit. You're listening to skin getting on skin. His loud breathing and groans. Your moaning and whimpering everytime you feel his tip deeply in your vagina.

Your neighbors hearing both of you moaning, whimpering, groaning and screaming your names till there comes nothing anymore.

Till you only hear yours and his steady breathing between little snors when you fall in a deep sleep.

#bts fanfiction #bangtan #bts au #yoongi scenarios #bangtan yoongi #yoongi x reader #yoongi au #Smut #Bts smut #Idol!yoongi #Yoongi smut

[doomedandstoned]

In Conversation With Dutch Avant Gardists Porselain

~By Willem Verhappen~

I was first introduced to PORSELAIN through the live stream of their show at the Effenaar in Eindhoven, back in June. The band was being advertised as a young avant-garde act. That's not something that I usually fancy, but those live streams were what was keeping me sane in those days of lockdown. From the first notes of their opening track, "Duende," it was clear to me that this wasn't going to be comfortable background music. The term avant-garde seemed to be invented for these four young musicians, so focus was required. I decided to extend my lunch break a little and just watch the whole thing. By the end of the show, I was sold. While the band's sonic assault barely resembles anything related to doom, save for maybe the slow pace and the dark themes, it certainly is doom.

At the time, Rob Hammer and I were working on what would become Doomed & Stoned in the Netherlands Part 2 and I pondered for a long time as to whether Porselain should be on that compilation. In the end, it felt wrong not to include them. Porselain sounds like no other band on that compilation, but I consider them one of the most interesting and unique bands we've got in our little country.

December 20th marks the 1 year anniversary of their Duende release party and that's as good a reason as any to have a conversation with vocalist Micky Huijsmans about the band's music, how they continue without a bass player, and what it's like being a graduate of a metal school.

First of all, thank you for making time for this interview. How are you doing during these, well, strange times?

Strange times indeed. I think everyone needs to find their way again, but I’m keeping busy writing. I’m currently writing for Porselain, but in the meantime I’ve also started a new project. It’s a good time to get creative.

It certainly is. Is there anything you can tell us about your new project?

Not much, to be honest. It’s something completely different from Porselain, also a bit more metal.

I’m happy to hear that you can keep yourself entertained. You recently released a new single. Does that mean we can expect more from Porselain in the near future?

Like I said, we’re working on new music, but we’re still in the early stages of a whole new process, because our bassist Jim quit the band earlier this year. We quickly decided to continue without a bass player, which is quite strange of course. It means we have to find a completely different way of writing music, we really have to rediscover everything.

Previously, our guitar player, Cas, would come up with some music, to which I would add my vocal lines. Finally, the glue holding the song together would be the bass and drums. You can imagine things get more difficult when the bass is cut out of the equation.

That does leave something of a void in your sound, yes.

Indeed. So we were unsure about what we were going to do, but we decided to go and make something and just release it. We have to make music now. Go!

The music video was made in the same way. Usually we have a whole concept in mind and we go out and film, after which I spend hours editing. Now we were all at home, of course, and we only had one word as a theme, “reflection”. We gave ourselves 30 minutes to just make something and that’s going to be it. The images you see aren’t edited or anything. They are just taken from the reel, so to speak, and put into the video.

The result was quite different from what I was expecting, but I really like it, especially the drone elements. Is this the direction Porselain will be going?

Thank you. We’re certainly going to make more use of synthesizers, as well as other instruments, to fill up our sound. For us, it’s also a surprise how we will sound, since we’re still in the middle of our writing process.

Are you also planning on using the synthesizer live, or will you be using backing tracks?

[laughing] No, we will never use backing tracks. I’m not a fan of that. And there are multiple ways to do things. You can have a full orchestra playing along, or just add a small synth layer for atmosphere. Those are two completely different things, of course.

Duende by Porselain

  Duende by Porselain

We’ve already been heavily discussing the future, but I can imagine that not all of our readers are familiar with Porselain. Could you introduce the band for us?

Porselain is an avant-garde alternative rock group, now consisting of three people. We released our debut record last year. It actually just turned one year old last October. To be honest, I find it difficult to describe us.

I can imagine, as it's quite a unique sound. I hear some doom influences in your music. Is that something you recognize?

I do get it, but it’s not necessarily our intention to incorporate doom into our sound. We don't really fit in anywhere. For instance, we once played at a black metal show. The atmosphere is similar, you know, but the music is completely different. The opinions vary on this subject.

Duende by Porselain

  Duende by Porselain

I must admit that I had been doubting for quite some time as to whether I should include you on our compilation or not.

I can imagine. Did you get any reactions on that? Like, “What’s up with that weird band?”

Not really no, but I didn't get any complaints either. Did you notice a spike in interest in Porselain?

We did see a slight increase in Spotify streams, yes.

That’s always nice to hear.

In your bio, you state that you’re more than a band, that you have a wider concept. Can you elaborate a bit on that?

We have a broader vision, of which music is still the biggest part, but that vision is completed by all the visual things we add. We’ve made music videos for some of the tracks of our last album, completely DIY. We had no experience with making music videos, but we just went for it. It’s then that you realize that, even though you haven’t had any film training or anything, that with a clear vision, you can convey your message. And that’s the best part. We’ve put those video’s together without knowing exactly what we were doing, but somehow it works. That’s why I like making things for Porselain.

Do you have a set order in which you create your works? Does it always start with a piece of music or do you also have ideas for visuals on which you start to build?

So far, everything grew from the music, but I think that’s changing now. We already have an idea for our next record. That record will be a concept album, which is different from our debut. We also want to create visuals for the entire album. Almost a movie, you could say.

What’s also worth noting, is that you’re graduates from the Metal Factory. Can you tell us a bit about that study?

The Metal Factory is a vocational education, located in the Dynamo club in Eindhoven, so you’re literally in a concert hall. You have all sorts of classes, like music theory, music history, but also the normal courses like English, math, things like that. You have classes like Band Skills, which is aimed towards being a session musician. You get some songs you have to rehearse and for your exam you have to perform them in random groups, for a grade.

Porselain was actually conceived in one of those classes, called Band Development. You get a lot of creative freedom there, which I always really liked about Metal Factory. They give you a certain amount of time and in the end you need to have a certain amount of music. You’re free to do that any way you see fit. How cool is that?

Duende by Porselain

  Duende by Porselain

  Duende by Porselain

That's pretty cool, yeah. I can imagine that your creativity was pushed to the limits for Porselain, right?

That was a very strange period, really. We started off with a different drummer in school and we weren’t really sure what we were making. It was very strange, but some two weeks before our exams everything fell into place. We realized we’d created something cool, something new. It was a strange turnaround for us. After that we continued with a different drummer and eventually we did our final exam with Porselain.

Did you get a good grade?

[laughing] Of course. Let me think. I believe it was a 9.6 [out of 10]. I think that’s one of the great things of the Metal Factory. You get a lot of creative freedom, and from what I hear about other musical educations, you don’t get that as much.

And it’s focused on metal, of course.

And the teachers are great as well. I’ve learned a lot from them.

I can imagine. From what I’ve seen, some of the teachers play in pretty famous bands [e.g. Epica, Within Temptation, Textures]. I assume those musicians aren’t the ones teaching math and English.

No, but those teachers are usually also musicians, so that's nice. There’s usually some music involved.

I’m afraid we’ve pretty much reached the end of the interview. Do you have any final words for our readers?

That’s always a tough question. Thank you for reading! [laughs]

Follow The Band.

Get Their Music.

#D&S Interviews #Porselain #Netherlands #avant garde #metal #Willem Verhappen #Doomed & Stoned

[satoshi-mochida]

The Final Fantasy Portal Site has published the first in a three-volume series of Final Fantasy IX interviews in celebration of the game’s 20th anniversary. Final Fantasy IX first launched for PlayStation on July 7, 2000.

The first interview is with Final Fantasy IX event design and scenario writer Kazuhiko Aoki. Volumes two and three will feature artist Toshiyuki Itahana and director Hiroyuki Ito.

Get the full interview with Aoki below.

―Final Fantasy IX is sometimes introduced with the phrase “returning to roots.” Where did Final Fantasy IX sit in the minds of the development team?

Aoki: “The slogans ‘returning to roots’ and ‘return of the crystal’ were there from the start. That’s why the setting of the game also has a medieval fantasy theme.”

―It is true that compared to the science fiction elements of FFVII and FFVIII, Final Fantasy IX made a sudden return to classic fantasy. There were even references to past FF titles, like character and vehicle names. Were those concepts also planned to be included from the beginning of development under the theme of “returning to roots”?

Aoki: “There were some things that were planned from the beginning, and then there were other elements that came about from those in charge of each part of the game during the creation process.

“The newborn chocobo, named Bobby Corwen…smash those names together and you get Boco.

“The foundation is 10 percent, and the remaining 90 percent comes from individual creators putting their own ideas and heart into a project. I think that’s the creation process of not only FF, but all games from Square Enix.”

―Each main character of Final Fantasy IX carries their own background story into the battles they face. Do you have a favorite character? Please tell us your reasons as well, if you have any.

Aoki: “I did my best not to have any favorites, so as not to be biased toward any specific character.

“There were backstories we wanted to elaborate on more, but sadly had to give up on due to time and data constraints.

“At the time I wished I could have developed how Zidane is afflicted by the difference in social status between him and Garnet a little more. Illustrating the breakdown of relations with the nobles in Treno due to their disapproval of Zidane and Garnet’s relationship, Zidane butting up against the social confines he faces and the incredible power Garnet holds as royalty, and how Zidane gets back up on his feet despite all of that—I felt that would have done a lot to help further portray him as a character.”

―The NPCs are also very well developed. What about them?

Aoki: “I don’t have any biases when it comes to NPC characters either. There actually wasn’t any differentiation in my mind between main characters and sub characters. Once the game’s story started to come to life on screen, my drive to develop each character even further – the steadfast reliability of Marcus or Garnet’s internal struggles, for example—only got stronger.”

―The Tantalus members Genero, Zenero, Benero and all their siblings are an unusual bunch. How did they come to be?

Aoki: “There wasn’t a trace of them until right before the game went gold. Not only limited to Final Fantasy IX, each FF series title has a period of about three to four months of quality improvements and brushing up after all elements that will be included in a game are implemented. How can we make it more interesting, what would make it easier to understand, what new discoveries can we find to add to the experience…as a creator you approach the process with a feeling similar to recreating something entirely. Those siblings came about suddenly right in the middle of that final tweaking for Final Fantasy IX.”

―The characters in Final Fantasy IX are built shorter than in previous FF games. Was there a reason for that?

Aoki: “I don’t know the reason for making the characters shorter in stature, but I did often hear that the cutscene team had a hard time making use of the know-how they gained working on Final Fantasy VIII. It was apparently a lot of trial and error.

“The characters in Final Fantasy IX excel at showing a certain sweetness or silliness, but even when they take on a totally different serious tone their expressions are so genuine. I feel that Final Fantasy IX had quite a good balance going in that sense.”

―Final Fantasy IX is known for its many popular and memorable lines. Whose idea was it to put together the loading screen of CG screenshots overlaid with words from the game and art?

Aoki: “The cutscene leader and event staff made that by picking out lines from the game. It was also the manifestation of a strong desire to show what kind of characters these were.”

―There were also many monsters with unique gimmicks, such as Ragtime Mouse’s quiz-style battle. Do you have a favorite monster or gimmick used by one?

Aoki: “I’m not sure if you could call it a unique monster, but my favorite are the black mages who appear in Cleyra. Your party characters don’t do a victory pose even if you win against them. That came from the battle system team’s consideration of the scene those battles take place in. You grow used to the characters celebrating when they win a battle, so I was really surprised the first time I saw that.

“I don’t know if this is still true, but development happened with next to no meetings between the event and battle design teams. Although that’s not to say that those teams didn’t get along.”

―Final Fantasy IX has a lot of mini games, many of which are quite difficult. Are there any you find particularly memorable?

Aoki: “Chocobo Hot and Cold. It came from the director wanting some contents that would allow traveling all over the game world. The concept came together in less than 30 minutes, but the actual creators who worked on the mini-game put a lot of time into it. Every last detail was done with such care.”

―Final Fantasy IX’s soundtrack was handled by Mr. Nobuo Uematsu. We feel that music is another important factor in expressing characters or story. If there are any songs from Final Fantasy IX that really stand out in your memory, please tell us about them.

Aoki: “That would be the song that Mr. Uematsu played for me the first time he worked at the Hawaii office.

“It was in response to me asking if he had any recommended songs from the new game—I got an idea for part of the story the second it came on. That song would eventually be titled ‘You’re Not Alone.’

“I asked, ‘Are there going to be any more changes to it?’ and he responded, ‘Yes, sorry… I’d like to tweak it a little more.’ It wasn’t finalized until the last minute, so I’m sure he really struggled with the composition of that piece.”

―Was there anything during development that was especially challenging or that sticks out in your mind?

Aoki: “The last few weeks were a battle with data restrictions. We had data increasing every day, having to think about where to divide the story so we’d end up with an amount that fit on each of the four discs. That fine-tuning took some real mental gymnastics.”

―If there’s anything else from your experiences during the development of Final Fantasy IX or messages for the many people who still love Final Fantasy IX you’d be willing to share, we would love to hear it.

Aoki: “There were about 300 people at the party celebrating Final Fantasy IX’s completion. It was developed by a team divided between Japan and Hawaii, so about one-third of the faces there I had never seen before…I was surprised all over again at how many people were involved in the project.

“I’m incredibly happy that Final Fantasy IX is loved by so many people; that’s been a huge motivator and confidence booster when facing jobs I’ve had since. I think that’s true not only for me, but also the many creators who worked on Final Fantasy IX as well. It would be nice to celebrate the game’s 20th anniversary with everyone who was at the post-launch party.

“Near the end of that party, there was a moment when the sound effect team went up on the venue’s stage. ‘In Final Fantasy X, there’s going to be this thing called Blitzball, and there will be a scene with the spectators cheering. We’d love if you would all be willing to help with that!’ they said. And I thought ‘…Oh, they’ve already started working on X.’ Just when I thought things were finished, they had already begun a new Final Fantasy. It really hit me being there, this is how the Final Fantasy series continues on forever.”

―Thank you for your time today!

Final Fantasy IX is available for PlayStation, PlayStation 3, PSP, and PS Vita via PSone Classics, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, PC via Steam, iOS, and Android.

#Final Fantasy IX #Final Fantasy 9 #Final Fantasy #Kazuhiko Aoki #Square Enix #Gematsu #I never did finish IX. ^^;

[puroresu-musings]

NJPW KING OF PRO-WRESTLING 2019 Review (Oct 14th, Tokyo, Ryogoku Kokugikan)

El Desperado Comeback Match: El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Roppongi 3K  ***1/4

Tanahashi 20th Anniversary Match IV: Hiroshi Tanahashi & Tomoaki Honma vs. Togi Makabe & Toru Yano  **3/4

Tetsuya Naito & Shingo Takagi vs. Taichi & DOUKI  *1/4

Jushin Thunder Liger vs. Minoru Suzuki  ****1/4

IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title Match: Will Ospreay (c) vs. El Phantasmo  ****1/2

Hirooki Goto, Tomohiro Ishii & YOSHI-HASHI vs. Jay White, KENTA & Yujiro Takahashi  **1/2

IWGP U.S. Title Decision Match: Juice Robinson vs. Lance Archer  ***1/4

Tokyo Dome No.1 Contenders Contract Match: Kota Ibushi vs. EVIL  ****

IWGP Heavyweight Title Match: Kazuchika Okada (c) vs. SANADA  ****

Photos.

This was a problematic show in that it suffered several misfortunes due to Typhoon Hagibis, the worst typhoon to tear through Japan in a generation, and this caused both Jon Moxley and Zack Sabre Jr to miss the show due to not being able to get into the country. As a result of Moxley not being able to make the show, New Japan stripped him of the U.S. Title, and the belt was declared vacant, with Juice now taking on Lance Archer in a decision match. Beyond this totally unforseen and unpreventable natural disaster, the show had an issue in that it didn’t offer anything especially interesting from a fresh match stand-point. Beside the long-teased Liger/Suzuki bout, it was a card full of matches we’ve seen before, granted matches we knew would deliever, but still, it hardly got me really excited at the prospect. A probelm New Japan’s been facing this entire post-G1, pre-WK season. However, those matches we knew would deliver did, so on the whole, despite being somewhat disappointing, it was a very enjoyable supershow.

The returning El Desperado lead his team with Kanemaru to victory over Roppongi 3K in a hot opener, which saw the masked man get the win over SHO after he took the whiskey in the face off Kanemaru, and Despy nailed Pinche Loco at the 10:44 mark. Tanahashi hit the High Fly Flow to pin Toru Yano in a fun, but unspectacular 9:43 doubles match to celebrate his 20th anniversary as a wrestler. It was weird seeing Tana in a totally nothing old-timers match. The Naito/Shingo vs. Taichi/DOUKI tag match was by far the worst thing on the show, and it ended in a DQ when Taichi nailed Naito with the mic stand right in front of the ref. Taichi laid Naito out with a Last Ride in the post match. I honestly couldn’t give a rat’s ass about another match between these two. Then things got great with the long-awaited Liger vs. Suzuki battle. This wasn’t the crazy brawl they’ve been teasing for months, instead it started as a mat based grapple battle, then turned into a Strong Style grudge match. At 55 and 51 years respectively, these guys worked an excellent match with incredible emotion. They started hitting each other really hard, with Liger, in Battle Liger garb, laying in the Shoutei’s and Suzuki coming back with hard strikes and forearms. It looked like Liger might get the submission win with the Brakes Special arm submission, but Suzuki escaped and locked in a sleeper. Liger scored a very close near fall with the Thesz Press, then hit his Brainbuster finish, but again Suzuki kicked out. After hitting his trademark big dropkick, Suzuki floored the masked legend with a stiff forearm, then hit the Gotch Piledriver at the 17:38 to end this. In the post match, Suzuki nailed the Young Lions with a chair, then threatened to hit the helpless Liger with it, but instead threw it away, kneels and bowes to Liger in a sign of total respect as Kokugikan went crazy. Liger thanked Suzuki over the house mic as he left his final match at Ryogoku Kokugikan. This was great.

The Junior Title Match followed and it was pretty damn crazy. They were out there for 28 minutes and hit so many crazy spots that its impossible to remember them all. Whilst it was my favourite match of the night, I can’t help but feel they maybe did too much. It reminded me of those Adam Cole NXT main events that I just can’t get away with in that they hit so many big moves that weren’t the finish, it became a bit beliveability-stretching. Now thats out of the way, this was a tremendous encounter. The story was that ELP in the early going decided to eschew his evil ways and play the honest babyface, which of course everyone knew was bullshit. After attacking the eyes and hitting frankly brutal back rakes, Ospreay sent Phantasmo into fellow Bullet Club member Gino Gambino at ringside. This lead to them brawling through the crowd, where Phantasmo hit a massive balcony dive. Back in the ring, ELP tried the tree-of-woe-nut-stomp, but Will countered into a Spider German. Ospreay escapes a CRII on the apron and hit an Oscutter off the guardrail whilst Phantasmo was still on the apron, which teased a countout, but ELP ate a huge corner-to-corner dropkick as he enters, and Will gets a near fall with the Shooting Star Press. After Ospreay scored a near fall with Oscutter, Taiji Ishimori ran out, but was sent packing by Robbie Eagles. This allowed ELP to hit a dick punch and a belt shot, then hit the Big Splash, but Will kicks out. A Styles Clash from Phantasmo gets another near fall, then he hits the V-Trigger, then attempts One Winged Angel, but Ospreay rolls through into a cradle for a near fall. Will gets a near fall with Essex Destroyer, then gets crotched as he tries to go up top. Phantasmo tries the super Frankensteiner, but Ospreay turns it into a massive sitout Powerbomb, hits Hidden Blade, then retains the title, and finally avenges his losses to Phantasmo after putting him away with Storm Breaker. As I say, I thought this was great stuff indeed, but it got a bit silly, and I mean PWG levels of silly, by the end.

The six man that followed was the epitome of an OK bout, with the focus being on White and Goto, KENTA and Ishii tearing it up, and Yujiro looking frankly terrible out there in this one. Goto won for his team when he hit Takahashi with GTR at the 12:27. The match for the now vacant U.S. Title followed, and was made a No DQ match (the planned Moxley/Juice encounter had the same stip). This felt utterly superfluous as there was no reason for this to be No DQ, and the plunder spots felt forced. Much of the match was spent setting up furniture, which hurt it slightly. Juice suffered a nasty looking dislocated finger along the way here. The finish saw Archer hit Black Out into a pile of chairs for a close near fall. The big man became infuriated and slammed Juice’s head into the pile of chairs repeatedly, then applied the EBD Claw to win the title at 14:58. Before he could do anymore damage, the returning David Finley ran out and hit his Stunner on Archer, so thats The American Psycho’s first title programme. Interesting. Kota Ibushi avenged his G1 defeat to EVIL in his successful defense of the IWGP Briefcase in another great match. This wasn’t as good as their G1 outing in July however, and personally speaking, the show felt as though it was starting to drag by this point. This started slow, but built into a hot closing stretch with loads of great counters. The King Of Darkness gets a near fall with Darkness Falls, but Kota counters into the Bastard Driver, and scores a near fall of his own with a Last Ride. Ibushi tries Boma Ye but EVIL turns him inside-out with a huge Lariat counter. The STO is turned into a Straight Jacket German, and EVIL hits a Half Nelson Suplex, then tries another Lariat, but Ibushi counters with one of his own, hits a V-Trigger, then Kamigoye for a super close near fall. Ibushi lifts EVIL up and hits another Kamigoye to keep the briefcase at the 24:05 mark.

And in the main event, Okada and SANADA squared off for the fourth time this year in a major bout. This was an excellent match, no doubt, but it had several things going against it. Namely that its the fourth match between these two this year, it was probably never going to live up to their G1 encounter, and no one could feasibly have believed SANADA was going to win this. Indeed he didn’t, but he still put in a great effort. However, I’ve been saying this for years now, and this match just cements this with me, but he needs to drop that Skull End as a finish. It just isn’t a believable submission in the slightest. The amount of times he locked it on in this particular match really jumped the shark, especially when it never looked good, and no one bought it. This was a long, story-based match that went 37 minutes and felt every single second of it. It started really hot but slowed to a very methodical pace, and by the end, I was very tired indeed, so perhaps I’m doing this a disservice. This featured tremendous counters sequences. SANADA turned a TKO in to Skull End but Okada reversed into a Tombstone attempt. SANADA reversed that into a Tombstone of his own, then nailed the TKO for a near fall. Cold Skull locks on Skull End again, Okada freeing his head, but SANADA kept locking on Skull End. He laid there in the hold for what felt like an eternity and Red Shoes really tried to sell us that he was going to stop it. Okada finally fought free and counters a SANADA rolling elbow into a Rainmaker atempt, but SANADA turns it into another Skull End attempt, but Okada hits a dropkick to the back for the double down. Okada with a dropkick, but SANADA escapes another Rainmaker, and locked on another Skull End. SANADA with a Moonsault to the back, rolls the champion over and goes for another, but Okada gets the knees up. Another goddamn Skull End is applied, but Okada escapes by walking up the turnbuckles and hitting a Tombstone. SANADA escapes another Rainmaker and scores a fantastic near fall with the Rolling Leg Clutch. Okada arm drags his way free of maybe the 47th Skull End attempt, and SANADA ducked another Rainmaker attempt. The finish saw SANADA again try Skull End, but Okada turned it into a Fire Thunder Driver, then hit the Rainmaker to finally retain the title.

As I say, this was an excellent match, but it started to lose me by the end. The post match however, was incredible. As SANADA lay on the mat crying, knowing he’s now 7-1 against Okada, the champion sat next to him giving him a thumbs up. This is the sort of believable emotion that sets NJPW apart rom almost every other company. Okada cut a promo in the post match saying he believes one day, these two will main event the Tokyo Dome. We’ll see. This brought out Ibushi, and Okada noted that Ibushi has avenged his G1 losses, but Okada, who lost to Golden Star on the final A Block day at Budokan, has yet to do so. Okada then said Ibushi was overlooking him in wanting to become a double champion, when theres no way he’s getting past Okada on January 4th. They then pretty much made the main event for the first Dome show official, and Okada thanked everyone for coming out in the midst of a Typhoon, and noted that its the wrestlers job to give the fans the energy to carry on through such adversity.

NDT

#njpw #king of pro wrestling #review #njkopw #kazuchika okada #sanada #kota ibushi #evil #juice robinson #lance archer #will ospreay #el phantasmo #jushin thunder liger #minoru suzuki #new japan pro wrestling #puroresu #wrestling #wrestling review #wwe

[theonyxpath]

Or at least the Hunter Kickstarter nears its end!

With only a few days to go, we’re thrilled with how Hunter: The Vigil 2e has been received, and how your pledges have enabled us to create a lovely looking version of the book, get it into stores, and fund some sweet extra projects to further flesh out the game line.

Like all our KSs, that’s a bunch of extra heavy lifting, but it sure is worth it!

Hunter: The Vigil 2e, is the last of the big core game books for 2nd Edition we needed to update, so HtV2e really represents a milestone! Back years ago, as we pitched and re-pitched a 2nd Edition for Chronicles of Darkness, then known as nWoD, it would have been hard to imagine getting to this point. The obstacles seemed insurmountable. So, yes, it is very sweet to look at the shelf and see us with all these fresh new 2nd Edition books and lines.

Since we started doing our new lines and 2e updates on Kickstarter, we’ve also used KS to give us the chance to put out useful Stretch Goal reward books. Various game line Companions, Ready Made Character books, Jumpstarts, and more! Which means that now we have a ton of CofD projects that came out of KS Stretch Goals to get caught up on (just look at the Progress Report below), so we’re focusing our efforts on those and a couple of the bigger supplements right now.

Memento Mori art by Drew Tucker

We’ve had some great feedback on how Hunter: The Vigil 2e has been updated from first edition. Not all positive feedback, but critical feedback that actually goes into why a previous version worked for the poster. Something that developer Monica Valentinelli appreciates, as it’s commentary she can review and consider. Much appreciated, as it’s often a tricky situation when doing a new edition.

Which is not an uncommon situation for Onyx Path, considering we started our efforts way back with the V20 game line. We started with basically an assemblage of previous editions with only those changes we needed to make, and each 20th Anniversary core book moved the dial more towards actual new editions. (In fact, the devs for both Wraith20 and Changeling20 were told to think of them as the new editions both lines never got back in the day).

Meanwhile, we fully intended that Exalted 3rd and CofD 2e would be created as new editions, although we were still restrained since there were lines the IP owners didn’t want us to cross. After all, in the end, it’s not our stuff but game lines that we were shepherding. Which is fine and I think our teams walked those proscribed lines pretty darn well.

Our own stuff, Scion and Trinity: Continuum and Scarred Lands, have started with new editions of established material from previous editions, with the same balancing act, and now are moving to new material. Scion with books that expand the basic set-up from the core four books – Origin, Hero, Demigod, God – and Trinity with expanding the Continuum starting with Assassins.

You can check out our monthly PDF releases for Scarred Lands to see where the inevitable Travis Legge is taking that world; what previously unexplored parts we’re now visiting.

And then with Realms of Pugmire and They Came From Beneath the Sea!, we are creating new worlds, and so while the challenges of adapting from an existing setting or game line aren’t there, there are other kinds of challenges.

But those sound like a blog for another time.

Terra Firma art by Sam Denmark

One of our across the board challenges is something I hit on last week, and that’s getting out the word when any of our new projects goes live. We have this blog every week, and the Wednesday On Sale blog that Impish Ian puts out that trumpets what is now available every week.

Every.

Week.

For pretty much the whole time we’ve been in business, we have made _something_ available for you to get a hold of every single Wednesday.

With our kookie production schedule, that hasn’t always been easy! But we thought, going way back, that having a regular release day was important for all of you folks. Maybe it’s just my old “comic-book day” giddiness coming up from my past to haunt me, but knowing there’s something coming each week is pretty cool. I think, at least.

Right now, we’re pushing hard to get the word out about a specific _way_ you can get our books, and using V5 Chicago By Night as our shining example, by which I’m talking about our books being sold in your local game stores.

The more our community members go into their local stores, the more those store owners will start to ask their distributors to get those books from our sales partners. That’s Studio2 in the US and Modiphius elsewhere. And while ordering, they might become aware that Studio2 also has Scion 2e, Pugmire, Changeling: The Lost 2e, etc!

So, it’s a continual building thing. But you only need to make that initial ask at the store. Or if they have it, and you buy it or even just talk about it in the store, that will clue in the store owner that there is interest in the book, and they’ll tell the distributor, and so on.

These are the traditionally printed and bound books that we are talking about here. We still have PDFs and PoDs on DTRPG, but these are books that were made in order to get a whole bunch of them into stores – so let’s make that happen!

To bring it all together – if you want V5 Chicago By Night, and you should as it is the most universally praised V5 book we’ve seen come out yet, then please:

First check your local game store.

If they don’t have it, please ask them to order it.

The store can order from their distributor, who will order from Studio2 in the US, and Modiphius anywhere else that’s not the US.

You too can order the book from Modiphius‘s website if you are not in the US. If you are in the US, you can order it from Indie Press Revolution.

And as always, the PDF and physical book PoD versions of V5 Chicago By Night are available on DTRPG.

Chicago Folio art by Michael Gaydos

So that’s the big push. Here’s a couple of other things we talked about in the meeting today.

We’re prepping for the Legendlore KS, as that is supposed to start pretty soon. One thing I’m really interested in, to continue our talk of updating game lines, is Legendlore‘s core intrinsic idea of transporting you, the player, into a fantasy realm. What does that mean today vs when the comics our game is based on were originally created last century?

Developer Steffie de Vaan has carefully built this very core idea into one that works for all people who might be into playing – folks who dig roleplaying what they might be like in the Legendlore world, but also folks who want to pick who they could be in a fantasy world. The key idea is to have this movement from our real world into the game world happen in a way that is fun for the player, not a forced situation that might cause folks harm if they feel excluded or shamed by it.

Another thing is that I’m working on illustrating a project, and in order to do it, I dug out the original art from my archives so I could figure out how I did the art back then, and do it again. I’ll let folks figure which project I’m creating the art for:

Last week I mentioned that if you have questions about Onyx Path, our creators, business practices, whatever, that you can come to us with questions. I included the names of the main folks who cover our game lines, the person who looks at how all our various pieces work together, and my own email address separated out on one line so it would be easy to catch.

This invite was to both our fan community, and to our creators. So far, no one has in fact contacted us, but we want everybody to know that this is an ongoing thing, not just one blog and done, and that the door is always open.

It’s pretty simple: we want everybody involved as we ride, boldly ride, towards:

Many Worlds, One Path!

BLURBS!

Kickstarter!

Hunter: The Vigil 2nd Edition for Chronicles of Darkness has only a few days to go! We’re headed towards 400% funding and are over 1700 backers and are shooting right through Stretch Goals, like the Storyteller Screen Stretch Goal, the T-Shirt, and the Tending the Flame: Cells chapter for the Hunter Players’ Companion! With lots more to come!

Join the Vigil!: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/339646881/hunter-the-vigil-second-edition-tabletop-roleplaying-game

Next Kickstarter: Legendlore!

Onyx Path Media!

This Friday the Onyx Pathcast Terrific Trio look deeply into the dreaded METAPLOT – what is it, really, and how to fight it and how to use it! As always this Friday’s Onyx Pathcast will be on Podbean or your favorite podcast venue! https://onyxpathcast.podbean.com/

Tune in for even more shows on Twitch this week! We’re going to have V5, Chronicles of Darkness, Scion, Pugmire, our two excellent chronicles of Hunter: The Vigil 2nd Edition, MORE Vampire: The Masquerade, Changeling: The Lost, Changeling: The Dreaming, Mage: The Awakening, Scarred Lands, Werewolf: The Forsaken and a third Vampire: The Masquerade game! 

I’d like to shout out again to the Hunter: The Vigil games running this week, which along with the Kickstarter have proven very popular! You can subscribe to our channel over on twitch.tv/theonyxpath to catch up with any episodes you missed!

Come take a look at our YouTube channel, youtube.com/user/theonyxpath, where you can find the following videos uploaded last week alone (for a largely Pugmire-themed week!):

Pugmire: Paws & Claws: https://youtu.be/XOzLa9NadOw, https://youtu.be/bAcPMFpk1D8, and https://youtu.be/e4bfrCS6YFA

Changeling: The Lost – Littlebrook Reunion: https://youtu.be/wipvrJqvm8c

Changeling: The Dreaming – The Last Faerie Tale: https://youtu.be/OAiD9mAjbeo

Scion: Behind the Screen: https://youtu.be/v9Wo38rl5-Y

A special shout-out to our Last Faerie Tale Changeling crew have been producing some superb content for us!

We’re back with the Onyx Path News broadcast live from our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/zKo1h7bLPE0 Matthew discusses new releases, Kickstarters, and other projects currently being worked on!

Do subscribe to our channel and click the bell icon if you want to be notified whenever new news videos and uploads come online!

The Story Told RPG Podcast continue with their excellent Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2nd Edition chronicle right here: http://thestorytold.libsyn.com/the-78-laments-episode-3-riders-in-the-sky

And if you missed it, here’s the Story Told‘s review of Trinity Continuum: Aeon http://thestorytold.libsyn.com/episode-40-trinity-continuum-on-overview

Red Moon Roleplaying‘s V5 Cults of the Blood Gods “The Family” chronicle continues on their YouTube channel, Spotify, their website redmoonroleplaying.com and everywhere else good podcasts might be found! https://youtu.be/3w3x6j4APBc

More new Occultists Anonymous for all you Mage: The Awakening fans out there:

Episode 84: Summons, Seers, & Souls The cabal gather together, working to help Network summon forth an Imp from Pandemonium to gather information about their new Seer ‘ally’. Atratus reaches out to the Free Council for their input as well.https://youtu.be/sDt8WvOqW5o

Episode 85: Remodeling Plans Songbird is accepted at the table of the Thunderbolt Guardians who are masterminding the assassination attempt on the Vampire Prince, though Red Dread is not pleased. Wyrd and Atratus discuss a dive into Wyrd’s Oneiros. https://youtu.be/5qLaBZEP6Cc

Please check any of these out and let us know if you find or produce any actual plays of our games!

Electronic Gaming!

As we find ways to enable our community to more easily play our games, the Onyx Dice Rolling App is live! Our dev team has been doing updates since we launched based on the excellent use-case comments by our community, and this thing is awesome! (Seriously, you need to roll 100 dice for Exalted? This app has you covered.)

On Amazon and Barnes & Noble!

You can now read our fiction from the comfort and convenience of your Kindle (from Amazon) and Nook (from Barnes & Noble).

If you enjoy these or any other of our books, please help us by writing reviews on the site of the sales venue from which you bought it. Reviews really, really help us get folks interested in our amazing fiction!

Our selection includes these latest fiction books:

Our Sales Partners!

We’re working with Studio2 to get Pugmire and Monarchies of Mau out into stores, as well as to individuals through their online store. You can pick up the traditionally printed main book, the screen, and the official Pugmire dice through our friends there! https://studio2publishing.com/search?q=pugmire

We’ve added Prince’s Gambit to our Studio2 catalog: https://studio2publishing.com/products/prince-s-gambit-card-game

Now, we’ve added Changeling: The Lost 2nd Edition products to Studio2‘s store! See them here: https://studio2publishing.com/collections/all-products/changeling-the-lost

Scarred Lands (Pathfinder) books are also on sale at Studio2, and they have the 5e version, supplements, and dice as well!: https://studio2publishing.com/collections/scarred-lands

Scion 2e books and other products are available now at Studio2: https://studio2publishing.com/blogs/new-releases/scion-second-edition-book-one-origin-now-available-at-your-local-retailer-or-online

Looking for our Deluxe or Prestige Edition books? Try this link! http://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/Onyx-Path-Publishing/

And you can order Pugmire, Monarchies of Mau, Cavaliers of Mars, and Changeling: The Lost 2e at the same link! And NOW Scion Origin and Scion Hero AND Trinity Continuum Core and Trinity Continuum: Aeon are available to order!

As always, you can find Onyx Path’s titles at DriveThruRPG.com!

On Sale This Week!

This Wednesday, we will be releasing the Advance PDF of Distant Worlds for Trinity Continuum: Aeon on DTRPG!

New Mysteries, New Worlds, New Aliens, and Alien Heroes!

Distant Worlds expands the setting of Trinity Continuum: Æon with new worlds, new alien mysteries, and rules for playing actual aliens, the secretive telepathic Qin. Inside, you will find:

• Further information about the eight extrasolar worlds described in Trinity Continuum: Æon, including new dangers and new opportunities for adventure.

• Detailed write-ups of 10 new planets, including one that is home to a recently contacted intelligent alien species.

• New technologies for interstellar travel and colonization, as well as a wealth of new devices created by aliens, and new Edges and Paths specifically for interstellar explorers and settlers.

• The secrets of humanity’s alien allies, the mysterious Qin. This section includes descriptions of four Qin interstellar colonies as well as rules for creating and playing Qin characters and for designing and using custom-made Qin biosuits.

Conventions!

More conventions will be listed for 2020 in the weeks to come-

And now, the new project status updates!

DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM EDDY WEBB (projects in bold have changed status since last week):

First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep)

Exalted Essay Collection (Exalted)

RUST (Working Title) (Scarred Lands)

Under Alien Suns (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Mission Statements (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Adversaries of the Righteous (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Novas Worldwide (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Exalted Essence Edition (Exalted 3rd Edition)

The Clades Companion (Deviant: The Renegades)

The Devoted Companion (Deviant: The Renegades)

Saints and Monsters (Scion 2nd Edition)

M20 Rich Bastard’s Guide To Magick (Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary)

Wild Hunt (Scion 2nd Edition)

Redlines

Dragon-Blooded Novella #2 (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Hundred Devil’s Night Parade (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Trinity Continuum: Adventure! core (Trinity Continuum: Adventure!)

They Came From Beyond the Grave! (They Came From!)

Assassins (Trinity Continuum Core)

The Book of Endless Death (Mummy: The Curse 2e)

N!ternational Wrestling Entertainment (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Contagion Chronicle Ready-Made Characters (Chronicles of Darkness)

Second Draft

Exigents (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Crucible of Legends (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Many-Faced Strangers – Lunars Companion (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Kith and Kin (Changeling: The Lost 2e)

Development

Heirs to the Shogunate (Exalted 3rd Edition)

TC: Aberrant Reference Screen (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Across the Eight Directions (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Contagion Chronicle: Global Outbreaks (Chronicles of Darkness)

M20 Victorian Mage (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Manuscript Approval

Scion: Dragon (Scion 2nd Edition)

Masks of the Mythos (Scion 2nd Edition)

Trinity Continuum Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum Core)

Scion: Demigod (Scion 2nd Edition)

Post-Approval Development

Scion LARP Rules (Scion)

One Foot in the Grave Jumpstart (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2e)

Editing

Legendlore core book (Legendlore)

Pirates of Pugmire KS-Added Adventure (Realms of Pugmire)

Terra Firma (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Lunars Novella (Rosenberg) (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Buried Bones: Creating in the Realms of Pugmire (Realms of Pugmire)

Monsters of the Deep (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

Tales of Aquatic Terror (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition core rulebook (Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition)

Titanomachy (Scion 2nd Edition)

Player’s Guide to the Contagion Chronicle (Chronicles of Darkness)

Contagion Chronicle Jumpstart (Chronicles of Darkness)

TC: Aberrant Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Post-Editing Development

City of the Towered Tombs (Cavaliers of Mars)

W20 Shattered Dreams Gift Cards (Werewolf: The Apocalypse 20th)

Cults of the Blood Gods (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

Hunter: The Vigil 2e core (Hunter: The Vigil 2nd Edition)

Trinity Continuum: Aberrant core (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Deviant: The Renegades (Deviant: The Renegades)

Indexing

They Came From Beneath the Sea! (They Came From…!)

ART DIRECTION FROM MIKE CHANEY!

In Art Direction

Trinity Continuum: Aberrant – Pinging some bigger names in comics… granted guys I’m a fan of, but still bigger names.

Hunter: The Vigil 2e (KS) – Almost done on KS.

Cults of the Blood God (KS)

Mummy 2 – Starting to contract the rest of it.

City of the Towered Tombs – Recontracted.

Let the Streets Run Red – Contracted.

Deviant

Legendlore (KS) – Contracted for KS, b&w art coming in, color sketches too.

Technocracy Reloaded (KS) – Art out for WW approval.

TC: Aeon Terra Firma – Contracted.

WoD: Ghost Hunters (KS) – Cover contracted.

Tales of Aquatic Terror

Pirates Extra Adventure – Loboyko lined up for this one.

Scion Titanomachy – Just got art notes today.

In Layout

Yugman’s Guide to Ghelspad – Ongoing.

Contagion Chronicle – With Josh, interior proof coming.

Vigil Watch – Ongoing.

TCfBtS!: Heroic Land Dwellers

TCFBtS! Screen and Booklet

Ex3 Lunars

Scion Companion

Proofing

Dark Eras 2 – Sending back to Aileen for errata input.

Trinity Continuum Aeon Jumpstart

Chicago Folio – Awaiting errata from dev.

Pirates of Pugmire – Aileen inputting changes from proof 1.

Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed – At WW for approvals.

CtL Oak Ash and Thorn – Inputting proofing comments.

Geist 2e fiction anthology – Going to WW for approvals.

At Press

Geist 2e (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2nd Edition) – Shipping to backers, PoD proof ordered.

Geist 2e Screen – Shipping to backers.

DR:E – Shipping to backers, PoD files uploaded.

DRE Screen – Shipping to backers.

DR:E Threat Guide – Helnau’s Guide to Wasteland Beasties

Memento Mori – PoD proof ordered.

Wraith20 Anthology – PoD proof ordered.

Dragon-Blooded Novella #1 – The Silence of Our Ancestors (Exalted 3rd Edition) – Backer PDF being sent out.

Trinity Continuum Aeon: Distant Worlds – Advance PDF for sale Weds on DTRPG.

Today’s Reason to Celebrate!

Almost just went with our first birthday today, but saw a few more relevant to our (my) interests and so have added them in with notes:

1904 – Dr. Seuss, American children’s book writer, poet, and illustrator (d. 1991). Has anyone _not_ been influenced by his work? If not, perhaps you will and your heart will grow three sizes that day.

1922 – Bill Quackenbush, Canadian-American ice hockey player and coach (d. 1999). Honestly, I have no idea who this guy is, but love that his name sounds like a character played by Groucho Marx.

1930 – Tom Wolfe, American journalist and author (d. 2018). Perhaps the person who was the inspiration for the Tremere and/or Ventrue illustration in the very first edition of Vampire: The Masquerade. Also did some writing.

1942 – Lou Reed, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, producer, and actor (d. 2013). Take a walk on the wild side.

1952 – Laraine Newman, American actress and comedian. Under-appreciated original Not Ready For Prime Time player on SNL.

1962 – Jon Bon Jovi, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, producer, and actor. WW legend Chris McDonough is JBJ’s biggest fan, and looks a lot like him. Also, pretty sure Chris is the artist who did the clan pics mentioned above.

1980 – Rebel Wilson, Australian actress and screenwriter. Loved her in Pitch Perfect 1&2. There is no 3rd one.

#Onyx Path Publishing

[k-llama-llama]

Milestones

Stray Kids AU: 10th member

Tori x Stray Kids

Okay...I’ve had this idea bouncing around in my head for ages and this was the PERFECT chance to use it! That being said...Minho better heal very quickly and I hope he’s doing alright.

Requests are OPEN : You should drop everything and talk to me RIGHT NOW

MASTERLIST

Tori didn’t know how it happened. One second they were bopping along, doing a run-through of District 9 on the music bank stage, and the next thing she knew Minho was on the ground, clutching his foot. 

Tori was the closest to him, and when she saw him drop she was there in a second.

“What’s wrong?” She asked, carefully moving his hands away. She waved aggressively in the air. “Can we cut music?” 

The music cut and the rest of the boys gathered around them. Chan knelt in front of Minho. “What’s happening?”

“I just...twisted it wrong, I think.” Minho said. He moved his foot a little and winced.

“Don’t do that.” Tori exclaimed. 

Their manager hurried onto the stage. “Let’s get off stage so someone else can rehearse while we figure this out.”

Their manager and Chan helped Minho up and helped him hop off stage. The rest of the group hurried after them.

“Is Minho-hyung okay?” Jeongin asked.

“I’m sure he’ll be fine.” Woojin reassured him.

The carried him to the greenroom, where they sat him on the couch and propped his leg up. One of the medics from the show arrived.

“Mind if I have a look?” He asked.

Their manager nodded and moved out of the way, letting the doctor look at Minho’s ankle.

When he pulled up his pant leg, nothing looked strange, but Minho winced when the doctor went to move it.

Tori wrapped her arms around Minho’s chest in something resembling a back-hug. He reached up and held onto her arm.

“Yah, Tori. Maybe you should give them some space.” Hyunjin suggested, stuttering slightly.

“She should be fine. She’s nowhere near his foot.” The doctor answered for her.

She stayed like that for a good ten minutes, while the doctor wrapped up Minho’s foot with some ice. 

“So what’s the verdict?” Chan asked nervously.

The doctor shook his head. “I don’t think you can perform.”

Minho sat straight up, pulling Tori forward with him. “I have to. Can’t we just wrap it tightly?”

The doctor pursed his lips. “Honestly, it’s not a serious injury right now. Just a mild strain at most. But if you agitate it, it could get worse.”

Their manager nodded. “So you aren’t performing.”

“But..” Minho protested.

“No.” Chan said sternly.

Tori patted his shoulder. “It’s okay, oppa. You’ll just rest and be better for next time. The fans wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.”

He nodded sullenly, settling back into the couch and letting Tori move away. They all sat on the floor as the manager went to figure out some last minute details.

“Are we still performing?” Seungmin asked.

Minho nodded. “You have to.”

“Who will do your part, then?” Felix asked.

“I can.” Jisung offered.

Chan tilted his head. “No. You already have a decent section. We don’t want it to seem unbalanced.”

“Besides,” Hyunjin added. “Our voices don’t really flow into each other too well.”

“Well who else do we have? Felix?” 

Felix shook his head. “I don’t know. I’m not super comfortable with that.”

“Wait.” They all turned to Jeongin.

“You want to do it?” Chan asked incredulously.

He shook his head. “No. Not me. Tori.”

They all looked at her. She shook her head furiously. “No. No way. I’m not a rapper.”

But Chan was already nodding. “You could do. You know the choreo better than anyone other than Minho. You could take his place easily. You know the lines, and your part of the song isn’t until later so it wouldn’t seem unbalanced.”

“No!” She exclaimed. “I’m not a rapper! I can’t rap.”

“You could do it.” Changbin said. “It’s not super fast-paced, it’s more about rhythm.”

Tori groaned. She looked at Minho. He was nodding slowly. “I think you could do it.”

“Clearly I don’t have a choice. When this goes south I’m blaming all of you.” She stood and started walking away.

“Where are you going?” Jisung shouted.

“To practice my rapping face in the mirror.”

Tori took her position on stage with absolute terror in her eyes. She knew the words, she knew the choreo, and honestly she knew that she could actually do a decent job. But she was certain that she was going to croak at the last moment.

As they headed out to perform, she took one last look at Minho. He was propped up watching the monitor that would soon show them. He gave her an encouraging smile. “Fighting!” He mouthed.

Tori took a deep breath as she settled into position. He wanted to be out here. And if he couldn’t be, then it was up to her to make up for it. For him, and for the fans. And also to prove to herself that she could do it.

The sirens started and they quickly fell into the familiar rhythm of the start choreo. She was in Minho’s place, but the choreo wasn’t that different from what it usually was. 

The beat hit and she took a deep breath before starting.

Talk talk, people talk too much What what, saying nonsense All the nagging and cursing, please stop Whether I do well or not, I’ll take care of myself

It went so fast that she didn’t even remember it. All she knew was that she fell out of place to make room for Hyunjin’s part, and then the audience was screaming and they were done.

When they stood to take their bows, Chan pulled her into a hug.

“Did I do it?” She asked, trying to whisper but having to shout because of the noise.

“You killed it!” He screamed back.

Changbin picked her up and spun her around. “Yes! Rap-line Tori is here!”

She laughed. Bowing quickly to the audience and then making her way off stage as the rest of the performers prepared.

They entered the greenroom, all of them laughing. Tori was walking in a bit of a daze. Since she’d joined Stray Kids, she’d always known that she couldn’t rap. Her lack of rap ability almost cost her the chance to debut with the boys. But she’d just done that. She had just opened their title track for the 20th anniversary Music Bank performance... and....she’d actually done well.

She walked into the greenroom and headed right for Minho. He was sitting up on the couch and opened his arms the second he saw her. She practically fell into them.

“I did it!” She exclaimed.

He nodded. “Yeah, you did.”

“We don’t need you anymore, Lee Know. We’ve got Tori.” Jisung sat next to them, laughing.

“Yah!” Tori kicked him. “Don’t be stupid.” She paused. “Wait...Jisung. Was that a compliment?”

He shook his head frantically. “Never.”

She was beaming. She slid into the spot next to Minho, though he kept an arm around her shoulders. She looked up at Hyunjin, who was standing in the doorway, looking awkward.

“Oppa?” She asked quietly.

He looked up. “Good job.” He muttered with a small smile.

Jeongin appeared in front of her. “Noona! I brought you a donut because you are the best!”

She laughed. “Thanks, Jeongin!”

She settled back into the couch laughing. Today was an accident, and while she was still nervous and could feel the butterflies in her stomach finally settling, it still felt like a milestone.

Because she’d freaking done it.

#stray kids #stray kids imagines #stray kids reactions #stray kids ships #stray kids au #stray kids 10th member #female member kpop #female!kpop #bang chan #chan #lee felix #felix #lee know #lee minho #i.n. #jeongin #han #han jisung #woojin #seungmin #changbin #hyunjin #au #kpop #imagines #kpop au #kpop imagines #imagine #kpop imagine #music bank

[chogiwank]

2:00 AM Drives - Jaehyun

Anon asked: hello Can I request Jaehyun (NCT) smut please?? ^^ where he tease u , fingering u in public and then making love in car. thank you so much 🙈🙈

A/N: thank you so much for our first request!! I hope you enjoy !! P.S I cried bc I fucking love jaehyun and he’s a highkey dom and I’m the biggest sub so writing this will be the death of me

(Sorry if I missed some typos or grammar/spelling mistakes)

https://youtu.be/WB3j7q7BquQ <--- i was listening to this while writing, so take a listen to it if you want : )))

You woke up to the sound of your phone going off. Groaning and turning over, reaching to your side table, you grab your phone answering it.

“Jae..?” You said with a yawn.

“Hey (y/n), you want to come outside?” The sound of your boyfriend’s voice came through your phone.

You checked the time, it was 2:00 AM, was he serious? You groaned. “You must be an idiot Jae, its fucking 2:00AM go to sleep!”

“C’mon baby girl, please? It’ll be fun, let’s go for a drive.” Your boyfriend said in a sweet tone, you could practically picture him pouting from the other side of the phone. “It’s been a while since we’ve done anything, just this once? I miss you.”

You let out a sigh and agreed to meet him. “How long will you take to be here?”

“I already am (y/n)” You furrowed your eyebrows at his words.

“You’re what? Jae-”

“I’m outside, just come out. Don’t worry about changing, you look cute in your pyjamas anyway.” He said with a chuckle. “I’m waiting.”

You rubbed your eyes and sat up on the edge of your bed. Standing up you walked to your bathroom and washed your face, along with brushing your teeth to clean up a little. Sliding off your shorts, you walked to your closet and put on a pair of sweatpants. You grabbed a jean jacket, putting it on over your tank top. Placing your phone into your pocket and your keys, you walk out of your apartment, walking to the elevator.

Finally reaching the lobby, you step out of the elevator and are greeted by your boyfriend’s smile.

“(y/n)!” He said cheerfully. Opening his arms to welcome you into his warm embrace. You walk towards him, accepting his hug.

“I missed you!! I can’t believe you came so late, you idiot!” You said lightly hitting his chest with a smile on your face.

“What? I can’t come to say hey to my girlfriend?” He said, cutely pouting with his bottom lip. You rolled your eyes at him.

“Yes you can, but I would prefer it if you did it during daylight! At least I’ll be able to get a decent sleep!”

“Oh so, you want me to come back to your apartment? We can...sleep if you want.” Jaehyun said with a sly smirk.

“Don't be like that! No way in hell am I going back up right now, after coming all the way down here for you, Jung Jaehyun!” You said, jokingly punching his chest. He laughed and grabbed your hand, intertwining your fingers with his. He led you to his car, opening the door for you.

“Ladies first!” He spoke with a kind smile. You playfully roll your eyes at him, stepping into the car and sitting down on your seat. Jaehyun closed your door and walked over to the driver's side, taking his seat. He started up the car and began to drive off.

“So where are we exactly going?” You asked your boyfriend.

“To be honest, I don't really know, I just wanted to see you.” He said with a nervous laugh. “How about we just drive around, see how far we go?”

You laughed and nodded your head.

You connected the aux cord on your phone, starting a car drive playlist. Jaehyun opened the front windows, letting the cool night breeze flow through. You and Jaehyun drove around to the countryside. It wasn’t really new, it was kind of your couple things you two would always do. Every time you and Jaehyun would have free time, you both would drive off to the countryside and visit this ice cream parlour. Unfortunately, you two won’t be visiting that parlour, considering the time. Jaehyun began to drive up a hill, and the city’s night view came into sight. The beautiful city lights seemed like stars shining below. It absolutely looked stunning, taking your breath away. You let out a gasp. You’ve seen this place before, but never at night. Jaehyun and you drove by here often, usually in daylight after your weekly ice cream dates, before that you never really got to see how pretty it really was.

Jaehyun parked the car reaching the top, keeping a safe distance from the edge. He turned to face you and flashed a smile. He intertwined your hands and gave a kiss to the back of your hand. “Happy two years baby, we made it another year.”

“What?” You said raising your eyebrows.

“Check the date,” Jaehyun said. You took your phone out of your pocket and opened it to your lock screen, you checked the date - June 20th. It was, it really was your two year anniversary and you being an idiot forgot all about it. you mentally slapped your self, how could you forget such an important day? Such an idiot.

You turned to Jaehyun, your face a light shade of red from embarrassment. “I’m sorry baby, I didn’t realize! It totally slipped-”

You felt his lips on yours placing a chaste kiss, shutting you up. He let out a chuckle against your lips. “It’s okay baby girl, don’t worry about it.”

He unbuckled your seatbelt and cupped your face softly with his hand. He pressed his lips to yours, bringing you into a passionate kiss. After slipping your jean jacket off, you gently placed your arm on his shoulder, hands playing with his hair. He gently bit your bottom lip and kissed you harder.

He pulled the straps of your tank top down your shoulders, and you took your arms out. Jaehyun pulled your top down revealing your breasts, fondling them with his hand. You moaned into the kiss. He gently tugged on your nipple, making you let out a gasp. He broke the kiss and spoke,

“Pull the seat down.” You reached over to the side, grabbing the handle of your seat and pulling it down. Jaehyun took off his shirt and climbed over the centre console. He placed his hands on the sides of you, caging you in beneath him. He kissed down your jawline to your neck down to your breasts, sucking on your sweet spots. He left a trail of purple flowers on your neck leading to the valley of your breasts. You let out little moans as he kissed you all over and knead one of your breasts.

He brought his hand down from your breast to your sweatpants, pulling them off. He moved up to kiss you on your lips again. One of your hands tangled in his hair, and the other with a hold on his bicep. He hooked a finger onto your panties, sliding them down. He began to rub your clit at a fast pace, you gasped for air and began to pant. He moved his mouth down to your breasts, taking your right nipple into his mouth as he inserted a finger into your dripping core.

“Jaehyun...” You moaned, giving his hair a slight tug. He removed his mouth from your breasts and looked down at you as he continued to finger you.

“You look so pretty baby girl...” He smirked. “I love playing with you like this.” He picked up his pace and fingers you faster. You arch your back off the seat, tightening your grip on Jaehyun’s bicep. Your breathing began to get irregular and heavier. You could feel your climax approaching.

You felt a sudden feeling of emptiness and yyour climax dissapear, Jaehyun stopped his motions and took his fingers out of you. You let out a whimper as Jaehyun licked your juices off his finger.

“Sorry baby girl, but I want you to cum on my dick today.” He said with a cheeky smile. Unbuckling his belt and undoing his button on his jeans, he unzipped his jeans and slid them off. He grabbed your hand and put it on his clothed crotch. “You feel that (y/n)? That’s all because of you, and you’re gonna be the one to help me with it.” He let out a groan as you gave his crotch a light squeeze. “Baby girl, please...you can’t do that.”

“Hm why not? Don’t you want me to help you?” You said looking up at him innocently.

“Of course I do, but I want to cum inside of you today, is that okay?” You nodded. Jaehyun pulled his boxers down and grabbed his hard cock, leaking with pre-cum, you felt so turned on. It was so hot, he was so hot. He gave his cock a couple pumps, throwing his head back. You bit your bottom lip at the sight and Jaehyun smirked down at you.

“You like it, baby? You like the thought of my cock inside of you, don’t you?” You moaned at his words.

“Yes, sir.” You said in a breathy moan. “wreck me.”

Jaehyun chuckled as he positioned his cock in front of your entrance.

“Not today, baby girl. I want to show you how much I love you, show you how much you mean to me. I won’t be wrecking you today,” He smirked. “Only for today.” He pushes his cock inside of your pussy and begins to thrust into you. He started off at a slow steady pace, whispering sweet words into your ear.

“You’re so gorgeous, (y/n). You’re so beautiful inside and out.” He said as he intertwined his hands with both of yours.

“I love you so much... I’m so glad... I met you two years ago...” He panted. “Hell...I’m so glad...I actually decided to get out of bed...that day.”

He pressed a soft kiss onto your lips. He sped up his pace you arched your back, your climax approaching once again. You couldn’t get out any words to respond. Sex with Jaehyun was always pure ecstasy - vanilla, passionate, or even just a rough fuck - he always made you feel like you were on cloud nine. Gosh, you loved your boyfriend so much. How did you even find someone like him?

“oh..FUCK-” You let out as your release took over you. Jaehyun kept thrusting into you, helping you ride out your high. He let out moans at the feeling of your warm juices around his cock, throwing his head back.

“Cum for me Jae...” You said heavily breathing. “Cum inside of my pussy. God, I love you so much, Jae - I really do.” You grabbed his face and gave him a passionate kiss. “How did I even find you? I don’t deserve you.”

You lay back on the seat and felt Jaehyun’s hold on your hands tighten as he came near his release.

“(Y/N)...” Jaehyun trails off, sweat drops dripping down his forehead. He looked into your eyes with pure love, “I-AH SHIT” Jaehyun groaned, throwing his head back as his release finally hit him. You moaned at the feeling of his warm cum inside of you.

He gently lay on top of your body, making sure not to crush you. He looks down at you, admiring you - even all fucked out, you looked so beautiful to him.

“You’re not the one who doesn’t deserve me (y/n)...” He said as he began to catch his breath. “I don’t deserve you, you're the best thing that’s ever happened to me, I don’t ever want to lose you...so please, please promise me, we’ll make it another year, and many more.”

“As long as you stay with me, I’ll stay with you. You won’t lose me. I love you very much, Jaehyun.” You said placing your hands on both sides of his face, giving him a loving smile. He returned the smile and placed a soft kiss on your lips once more before he nuzzled into your neck. With heavy eyelids you both fell asleep to the sound of each other’s breathing, and the soft music playing in the background.

You never knew how much you really loved Jaehyun until today. You never thought you’d ever find yourself someone like him. You truly loved him wholeheartedly, and there was no doubt in your mind he did the same.

A/N: I hope this was a good enough smut for you anon!! I hope this is what you wanted,, it was really a struggle for me to write considering my hormones are all over the place fuckfuckfuck  

Thank you once again for your request!! Send in more if you wish,, we’ll do our best to get them done as soon as possible!! <3

~ Doyoung’s Darling

#nct #nct 127 #nct dream #nct2018 #nct jaehyun #jaehyun smut #jaehyun #johnny #doyoung #taeyong #yuta #moon taeil #jungwoo #yukhei #mark #ten #sicheng #winwin #jeno #haechan #jaemin #chenle #renjun #jisung #kun

[adie-dee]

Day 28 - Gift

Today’s is a little different. It’s an epilogue to this story, which - word of warning - is rather long, at 4600 words, and also contains multiple references to abuse. The following also references a suicide attempt, so i’m sticking it under a cut. I’m also not tagging anyone as I don’t know if you want to read non-DMI stuff.

David put his tea down on his workbench and flicked on the TV, changing the channel as soon as he saw that a special for the 20th anniversary of Gold’s downfall was showing. That Gold had been anything but the beacon of hope and protection he’d made himself out to be had been a shock, the truth of his depravity not surfacing until 6 months after David had fled the city. Ultimately it had been the downfall of the Guard.

His time in the Guard as Cashmere sometimes felt like a lifetime ago. Time moved too fast these days and the older he became, the faster it seemed to go.

Guilt over what he’d helped do to Zella rose, amplifying a pain in his chest that just wouldn’t go away. She had to have known what Gold was up to, to go and do what she’d done. What he didn’t understand was why she hadn’t said anything. She’d just let them end her.

The ding of a bell alerted him that a customer had entered his shop. Picking up his tea David pushed through the curtain to the front counter.

A woman in her early 20s was in front of the display cases, a small smile crossing her face as she looked at the black rose within. She bent in for a closer look, tucking her hazelnut and grey hair behind her ear. The colour suited her somehow, only David never understood why young people liked dying their hair grey. It’d come soon enough, there was no need to rush it.

“That one’s not for sale,” he said after a moment.

The woman looked up, her smile growing larger. “Hello, Cashmere.”

The memories came crashing back and David grabbed the counter for support, sickened by what he remembered. He’d known about Gold. He’d known it all.

“Zella.” He pulled his stool out from under the counter and sat down, not trusting his legs to continue holding him. “You’ve barely changed.”

“And you’ve changed so much.” She joined him at the counter, tracing her bare fingers down the side of his face. “But I still see you in there.”

As with last time it didn’t hurt, though there was some sort of a tingle. Abruptly she dropped her hand.

“I...I thought you were dead.” He stammered. “I mean...we...the graveyard…” he paused, trying to collect his thoughts, tears forming in the corner of his eyes. “I thought I killed you.”

“I was already dead, Cash.”

“David. And you know what I mean. I’ve had to live with that!”

“At least you lived.”

For a moment he thought she was referring to her own state, but the pity in her eyes suggested otherwise. She was right, he knew. He wouldn’t have been able to live with himself over his lack of action with Gold. His suicidal attack on Havoc had been proof enough of that.

“Gold almost got away with what he did. You had no right to take that away from me!”

“He was never going to get away with it,” Zella hissed. “I made sure of that. I just wanted you far away from the Guard before the inevitable shitstorm hit from the documents I sent to the press. If you’d stayed you would’ve gone down with the rest of the Guard and none of this-”she gestured round the shop”-would’ve happened.”

“Why are you here,” he finally asked, body sagging.

“I was in the area,” she replied, wandering around the shop and looking at the things he’d made. “I’ve missed you.”

“You could’ve stayed. We could’ve-”

“No.” She practically shouted it. “There was no future for us, can’t you see that? You deserved so much more than I’d ever be able to give. You deserved…” she trailed off, picking up a photo of him and daughter on display in a frame he’d made. “This.”

“That’s Laura,” he told her, knowing she was right. “The light of my life and a goddamn terror now that she’s a teen. She reminds me of you sometimes. Maybe it’s the name?”

Zella let out a small laugh, the smile reforming on her face. “Maybe. At least you both look happy.”

“We are. It was hard when my wife passed away, but we’re in a good place now.” He stared at Zella, tilting his head slightly to the side. “Are you happy?”

She paused for what felt like an eternity. “As much as I can be, I guess,” she finally said. “I’m not hurting anyone any more, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“Healing?”

“No, not that either.” Zella stared into space, her eyes unfocusing. “I haven’t been able to do that since I saved you. I’m-” she came back to reality, glancing to the side with a frown “-helping people, I guess? Taking away the pain, near the end.”

“You found a middle ground. Somewhere between Vita and Zella.”

“Exactly.”

The pounding in David’s chest returned. “Is that why you’re here? For me?”

“No, you’re ok. For now, at least, but please promise me you’ll get to a doctor before your daughter becomes an orphan? That chest pain of yours isn’t normal.”

The guilt from that statement was almost overwhelming. “I will,” he promised.

“Is this the same rose?” She asked, going back to the display counter.

“Yes. I left it by your grave for a while, but something made me go back and get it. I think I’ve been keeping it safe for you ever since.”

She came back to the counter, leaning over to give him a kiss. Her arms wrapped around his neck and his hand found her hair, savouring the way she felt against his skin. Eventually she stopped, lips lingering on his for a moment before she pulled away completely. There were tears in her eyes.

“This is goodbye, isn’t it,” he asked.” She nodded. “Will I ever see you again?”

“One more time.” It sounded like a promise and a threat. “But not too soon, I hope.”

“I’m not going to remember any of this, am I.” David didn’t even phrase it as a question. He knew the truth.

Zella gave a sad smile and shook her head, picking up a set of earrings off the counter display.

“But I don’t want to forget.

“Go see the doctor about your heart. Goodbye, Cashmere.”

The tears returned. “Goodbye, Zella.”

The woman in front of David looked confused. “I’m sorry?” she asked.

She wasn’t the only one confused. For the life of him David couldn’t understand why he’d called her Zella, though if he looked closely he could see a resemblance. He wiped his eyes, surprised to find he was crying. “Sorry. You just reminded me of someone I used to know.”

“A friend?”

“No. Yes.” He sighed. “It was complicated.”

At that the woman laughed.

“Is there anything I can help you with?” David asked, his chest tightening again. An appointment with the doctor was definitely in order.

She handed the earrings across, along with some cash. “I was just after these.”

He rang the earrings up, then boxed them and put them in a carry bag. “You have a lovely day.”

“You too.” She turned to leave.

“Wait,” David called out after her, heading to the display case. He pulled out the black rose, offering it out to her. “For you.”

“Oh I couldn’t,” she insisted, staring at it with hungry eyes. “It’s your star piece, a one of a kind. That’s too generous.”

“Something is telling me this is meant for you. Maybe because of who you remind me of. Please take it? As a gift.”

Her hand brushed his.

#jotober2018 #day 28 #my writing #tw: suicide mention #tw: abuse mention #tw

[beneaththetangles]

Serial Experiments Lain Revisited: Episode 13 (Conclusion)

In psychology, the ego is responsible for one’s sense of identity. In our everyday speech, we use it to describe self-worth or self-importance. As Serial Experiments Lain comes to a close, layer 13, entitled, “Ego,” centers on those ideas. Lain must decide both what her identity is and where it is she places her importance—her decisions about those questions will determine her future and those of the ones closest to her, as well as of all humanity.

Layer 13

Lain is able to destroy Eiri, but Alice remains in shock from the events. Deeply hurt by how Alice has been pained, she decides to hit “RESET,” setting the world back to one that seems to be pre-Lain. Meanwhile, she continues to struggle with her decision and with the other Lain, working through what she should ultimately do with her presence in the Wired.

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From almost the very beginning of the series, Lain has been hearing voices that dictate her to do one thing or another. One was from Eiri, whose power is now overcome by Lain’s; he would have her be the tool through which humanity could be interconnected and evolve, with Eiri as their god. Another was from the other Lain, who has little regard for humanity and is chiefly concerned with herself. In episode 13, Lain deals with her as well, eliminating that voice for good.

A final voice, though, is one that becomes clearer and clearer through the series, one which is birthed as the show begins and slowly grows up until it can become mature. As episode 13 opens, Lain’s own voice remains confused: what is she and what should she do? If this was ten episodes ago, the answer would have been robotic in nature, matching Lain’s composition, in a sense. But Serial Experiments Lain, as I’ve mentioned before, is a series about humanity from the point of view of a program learning what it is to be human. By this finale, Lain’s “soul” is as human as could be, and it’s hurting.

So Lain decides to hit “RESET,” literally. But this reset isn’t necessarily a reboot, nor is it the same as the delete she used previously. Lain takes herself purposely out of the collective memory as those around her restart from what seems to be a point in time near the beginning of the series. The reset world isn’t perfect—it never was—but the pain that Lain caused through her existence is erased, and knowingly or not, Alice and the others get a chance to restart. For all of them, this new world is a better one, a more hopeful one.

But Lain is left in pain. As described by the other Lain, she’s gotten what she wants, a chance to help those she loved, especially Alice, who became manic at incarnation of Eiri. Still, Lain is sad, because she has to face the consequence of this action. She is forgotten, as if she never existed, and will never have a chance to interact with the people she loved as she once did.

At one point in the episode, Lain is told by her other self that she should become god and that it’s easy to live that way since she won’t be hated and won’t be hurt. But there’s something sparkling inside Lain, something that realizes this is not a symbol of godhood; in fact, as demonstrated through series like Puella Magi Madoka Magica and more abundantly through the Bible, godly love is defined by giving to the undeserving through great personal sacrifice. But for the deity, it is worth it. For God, it was worth the tortuous death on a cross. And in this series, as shown through a conversation where she’s brought to tears by her father understanding Lain’s love of humanity, it’s worth it for her, even for a humanity that understands so little about the nature of communication and love.

Lain’s ultimate choice doesn’t end her life, nor her connections with loved ones, but it does end—for the most part—her physical relationships. It was a choice Lain struggled with, perhaps for years as reflected in the scene in which Alice is now an adult (if time does have any sort of meaning for Lain), but it’s one she’s ultimately happy to have made—the conscious decision of a deity who in giving so much also lost so much, all for a people who didn’t deserve it. And in that final act, Lain shows both what it means to be human and what a godly love really is.

Present Day. Question Time.

Layer 13 effectively takes shots and structure we’ve become to be used to seeing at set times and moves them around (ex. Present day. Present time!), jarring the audience and creating a momentum toward Lain’s final decision.

Alice is unrecognizable at first as an adult, not because a marked change in hair or clothes, but because we know her as a girl in the series, and in the final scene, she’s become a woman. The scene is bittersweet—since she can’t quite remember Lain, though the latter is satisfied with their brief reunion.

It’s remarkable how gifted storytellers can take a basic theme that might seem kitsch, like “robot learns to love through a friend,” and turn it into something powerful, meaningful, and even brutal. In that way, Lain reminds me a whole lot of T2: Judgement Day. Yes, Lain and Schwarzenegger—one in the same!

And kudos to the director and animators, as well. The entire series is heavy on exposition, and particularly this episode, but the action keeps moving in interesting ways, so the episode isn’t near as slow as it might be.

Lain > Evangelion when it comes to the “inside your head / determine fate of all humanity” endings.

And that’s it for our 20th anniversary series for Lain! Thank you for joining along. If you missed any of our articles, feel free to browse through our Lain 20th Anniversary series, which also includes an interview with Jasmine Rodgers of Boa and the remaining episodic posts for the show. You can also stream Serial Experiments Lain on Crunchyroll.

#Anime #Serial Experiments Lain #Christianity #Articles #Author: TWWK

[1baddmouthcrown]

1804 October 6 Governor General Jean-Jacques Dessalines is crowned Emperor of Haiti at ceremony held in the city of Le Cap.

1806 October 16 General Nicolas Geffrard commander in the south, minister of war and Navy Etienne Elie Gerin, Alexander Petion, commander in chief of the second division in the west and others sign Resistance to Oppression proclamation.

October 17 Dessalines is assassinated at Pontianarge Pont Rouge north of the capital Port au Prince.

1845 October 9 Douglass speaks at Waterford City Hall in Ireland.

1846 Kassa Hailu attacks the city of Demba south of Gondar in Ethiopia.

1859 October 16 John Brown leads raid on Harpers Ferry federal armoury in Western Virginia.

1864 crops floods in Jamaica cholera and smallpox and a two year drought.

October Sojourner Truth meets President Abraham Lincoln.

1865 Dr. Edward Underhill secretary of the Baptist Missionary society in Great Britain writes letter to the colonial office in London Governor of Jamaica John Eyre Underhill parish of Saint Ann petition Queen Victoria for land.

October Paul Bogle Morant Bay rebellion in the parish of St. Thomas, Jamaica.

August Paul Bogle leads a 45 mile walk from Stony Gut in the parish of St. Thomas to Spanish town in the parish of St. Catherine to petition the Governor.

October 7 A man by the name of James Geoghegon creates a disturbance in Morant Bay court house during the trail of a man sentenced and convicted for trespassing on an inactive sugar plantation, the police try to arrest Geoghegon, the begin to fight with the police and the court house issues a warrant for those including Bogle.

October 11 Bogle leads hundreds to the court house, the confrontation between the group and the militia begins with the group attacking the militia with sticks and stones, the militia shoot and kill 25 people dead, the parish goes into unrest, Eyre declares martial law and sends government troops led by Brigadier General Alexander Nelson to bring Bogle and to the court to be tried and convicted, the militia kill innocent men, women and children 439 dead and arrest 354 tried and executed, several hundred also flogged and sentenced, the soldiers burn thousands of homes, Eyre has Gordon who he believes to have made the matter worse arrested in Kingston and brought to Morant Bay where he is tried under martial law, convicted and executed.

October 23 Gordon and Paul’s brother William are hanged.

1866 Eyre is criticized for his handling of the situation.

1868 October 10 Carlos Manuel de Cespedes rings the bell of the sugar mill to summon his slaves, makes his grito de Yara (Cry of Yara) declaration of revolt against the Spanish beginning the Ten Years War with the aims of abolishing slavery and gaining independence.

October 26 Maximo Gomez at Pinos de Baire leads a machete charge in an ambush of a Spanish column.

1896 October Antonio Maceo arrives at Mantua in the western extreme of the Island after months of fighting the Spanish in Havana and Pinar del Rio. Maceo and Gomez in command of a column had led the invasion of western Cuba from

1902 Earnest Alfred Wallace Budge makes his first excavations at the city of Meroe the capital of the Kingdom of Kush.

1905 Budge makes more excavations at Meroe.

1907 Budge publishes the record of his excavations at Meroe in his book The Egyptian Sudan, Its History and Monuments.

1913 January 1 Du Bois and New York State Commission attend the 50th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, Du Bois The Peoples of the People and Their Gift to Man (later renamed The Star of Ethiopia) Pageant is performed Emancipation Proclamation.

Garvey begins working for Dusé Mohamed Ali as messenger and handyman at his African Times and Orient Review office on 158 Fleet Street in Central London.

October Garveys "British West Indies in the Mirror of Civilization” essay published in the African Times and Orient Review.

1914 October 31 Amy Ashwood (later Amy Garvey) recites African American poet Paul Lawrence Dunbar's “The Lover and the Moon” at Collegiate Hall Universal Negro Improvement Association meeting.

1915 October 11 Monday, 13 Wednesday and 15 Friday Du Bois’s "The Star of Ethiopia” pageant of the history of the Negro Race from 50,000 B.C to 20th century written, produced, and directed by Du Bois himself, presented by the Horizon Guild and the National Pageant and Dramatic Association is performed at the American League Ball Park in Washington D. C. to commemorate the 13th amendment.

Meroe geographically was known to the Greeks as Ethiopia, according to the Greek historian Herodotus who lived during the 5th century BC Meroe had the reputation of being the mother city of the Ethiopians.

Candice the Queen of Ethiopia has also been identified with the Kandake’s of the Kingdom of Kush whilst it was centered at the city of Meroe because of the King Taharqa the Kingdom of Kush whilst it was previously centered at Napata in Nubia prior to Meroe who in the bible,  is mentioned as being the King of Ethiopia having assisted in conflict with the Assyrians.

And he arose and went: and, behold, a man of Ethiopia, an eunuch of great authority under Candace queen of the Ethiopians, who had the charge of all her treasure, and had come to Jerusalem for to worship,Was returning, and sitting in his chariot read Esaias the prophet.Then the Spirit said unto Philip, Go near, and join thyself to this chariot.And Philip ran thither to him, and heard him read the prophet Esaias, and said, Understandest thou what thou readest?And he said, How can I, except some man should guide me? And he desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him.The place of the scripture which he read was this, He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before his shearer, so opened he not his mouth:In his humiliation his judgment was taken away: and who shall declare his generation? for his life is taken from the earth.And the eunuch answered Philip, and said, I pray thee, of whom speaketh the prophet this? of himself, or of some other man?Then Philip opened his mouth, and began at the same scripture, and preached unto him Jesus. And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water: and the eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized?And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.And he commanded the chariot to stand still: and they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized him. And when they were come up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord caught away Philip, that the eunuch saw him no more: and he went on his way rejoicing.But Philip was found at Azotus: and passing through he preached in all the cities, till he came to Caesarea. Acts 8:27-40

And when he heard say of Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, Behold, he is come out to fight against thee: he sent messengers again unto Hezekiah, saying, Thus shall ye speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying, Let not thy God in whom thou trustest deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria. 2 Kings 19:9-10/Isaiah 37:9-10

674 BC Taharqa defeats the Assyrian Emperor Sennacherib at Eltekeh. Sennacherib then defeats Taharqa.

671 BC The Assyrian Emperor Esarhaddon captures Memphis with Taharqa fleeing to in the south, takes members of the royal family as prisoners at his capital Nineveh in Assyria and places Libyan Necho I as the first of the Twenty Sixth Dynasty at Sais. Esarhaddon on his Assyria erects Stele Stele of Nahor el Kalb and his Victory Stele at ZincirleHayok which shows Taharqa's son Ushankhuru was taken as a prisoner.

Esaehaddon dies in Palestine on the way to Egypt, his son Emperor Ashurbanipal defeats Taharqa who flees to Thebes where he dies.

The Kingdom of Kush was centered at Napata in Nubia since the time of Alara who attacked Egypt, then Kashta who extended Kushite rule to Elephantine and Thebes in upper Egypt. His successor Taharqa's Dad, Piye, invaded and conquered Egypt taking the cities of Sais and as well as in lower Egypt.

Taharqa was succeeded by a son of his predecessor, Shabaka, Tantamani who defeated and killed Necho, and also took Thebes, which the Assyrians retook from him.

Meroe was ruled by Kandakes from Shanakdakhete in 177 BCE to Lahideamani in 314 CE. The Mereotic city MusawwaratesSufra on the island of Meroe in the modern day Butana region was named by the Achaenid Persian King Cambyses after his sister.

Alexander the great romance by Pseudo Callisthenes.

A stele Geez of an unidentified ruler found in Meroe also provides evidence of the presence of Aksum in Meroe from the 4th century Christian kingdoms of Nobatia, Makuria and Alodia.

October 15 Leonard Percival Howell witnesses the murder of his neighbor by her Husband, his parents refuse to let him testify as a witness, Howell travels to Panama.

1916 May 16, 18 and 20 8 P. M. Du Bois’s “The Star of Ethiopia” portrayed by 1010 Actors in Costume 53 Musical Numbers Full Brass Band is performed at the 100th General Conference of the African Methodist Episcopal Church held in the CONVENTION HALL BROAD AND ALLEGHANY AVENUE, Philadelphia.

1918 October 6 Ashwoodtravels from Panama to the U.S.

October 28 Howell travels to New York aboard the S. S. Metapan.

1919 October 11 memorandum from J Edgar Hoover to special agent Ridgely, Washington, D.C. MEMORANDUM FOR MR. RIDGELY.  I am transmitting herewith a communication which has come to my attention from the Panama Canal, Washington office, relative to the activities of Marcus Garvey. Garvey is a West-Indian negro and in addition to his activities in endeavoring to establish the Black Star Line Steamship Corporation he has also been particularly active among the radical elements in New York City in agitating the negro movement. Unfortunately, however, he has not as yet violated any federal law whereby he could be proceeded against on the grounds of being an undesirable alien, from the point of view of deportation. It occurs to me, however, from the attached clipping that there might be some proceeding against him for fraud in connection with his Black Star Line propaganda and for this reason I am transmitting the communication to you for your appropriate attention.  The following is a brief statement of Marcus Gravey and his activities: Subject a native of the West Indies and one of the most prominent negro agitators in New York;  He is a founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League;  He is the promulgator of the Black Star Line and is the managing editor of the Negro World;  He is an exceptionally fine orator, creating much excitement among the negroes through his steamship proposition;  In his paper the “Negro World” the Soviet Russian Rule is upheld and there is open advocation of Bolshevism.  Respectfully, J. E. Hoover.

October 14 Garvey shot by George Tyler at brownstone offices 135th Street. Tyler commits suicide the next day, he was also the only witness for the criminal libel charge against Garvey. October Garvey speaks at Philadelphia Peoples Church for the third time in the year. October The Saint Vincent Gazette anyone bringing the Negro World into the colony will serve six months prison sentence, possibly with hard labor.

October 30 The UNIA rents Madison Square Gardens, Manhattan at which the Lusk Committee Intelligence reports 6, 000 in attendance.

October 31 Thousands turn up at 135th Street pier to see the Black Star Lines first ship the 30 year old tramp ship SS Yarmouth rechristened the SS Frederick Douglass which was previously used to transport cotton and coal during World War I. 1928 October 7 The RasTafari Makonnen Crown Prince, hier to the throne and Regent Plenipotentiary is crowned King/Negus by Empress Zawditu.

1935 October An Italian column occupies Gore in southern Ethiopia.

October 3 Emelio De Bono crosses the Mareb River advancing into Ethiopia from Eritrea without a declaration of war.

October 5 The Italian I Corps take Adigrat.

October 6 The Italian II Corps take Adwa.

October 15 Emilio De Bono’s forces advance from Adwa and occupy Axum with Bono looting an Obelisk.

October 19 The Bishop of Udine [Italy] writes, 'It is neither timely nor fitting for us to pronounce on the rights and wrongs of the case. Our duty as Italians, and still more as Christians is to contribute to the success of our arms.' 

October 21 The Bishop of Padua writes 'In the difficult hours through which we are passing, we ask you to have faith in our statesmen and armed forces.'

October 24 The Bishop of Cremona consecrated a number of regimental flags and said 'The blessing of God be upon these soldiers who, on African soil, will conquer new and fertile lands for the Italian genius, thereby bringing to them Roman and Christian culture. May Italy stand once again as the Christian mentor to the whole world.'

October 27 To His Excellency Graziani. The use of gas as an ultima ratio to overwhelm enemy resistance and in case of counter-attack is authorized. Mussolini.

1945 The Fifth Pan African Congress is held in All Saints, Manchester.

1956 October 21 Dedan Kimathi is shot and captured by fellow Kikuyu termed as askari meaning traitor. Kimathi is then sentenced to death by hanging whilst in the General Hospital Nyeri and executed on 1957 February 18 at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison.

1950 Kimathi takes the Mau Mau oath and joins the Ol Kalou branch of the Kenya African Union, supporters of the Kenya Land and Freedom Army Mau Mau to take land back from the British, Kimathi also becomes secretary of the branch.

1951 Kimathi then joins the Forty Group of the Kikuyu Central Association where he becomes the secretary of its branch too.

1953 Kimathi forms the Kenya Defence Council.

2007 February 18 on the 50th anniversary of the execution of Kimathi, the Kibaki unveil bronze statue central Nairobi.

On 1954 January 15 The Mau Mau General China, Waruhiu Itote is captured by British troops, tried, found guilty and sentenced to hang but speared Ian Henderson agree to with General Erskine bringing operation Anvil to an end after unsuccessful Itote detention camp in for nine years Jomo Kenyatta teaches him to read and write English.

1942 Itote enlists in the British Army serving in the Kings African Rifles in Asia, Ceylon and in the Burma campaign is promoted to the rank of Corporal.

1946 Itote joins the Kenya African Union and Forty Group.

1950 Itote forests.

1961 October Du Bois joins the Communist Party and travels to Ghana with his wife to take up residence there and to begin work on his African encyclopedia.

1963 The Mau Mau including lay down their arms at Ruringu stadium in Nyeri.

1964 October 14 Martin Luther King wins Nobel peace prize.

1966 October 15 Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton found the Black Panther Party for self defense beginning police patrols in Oakland, Califonia.

1967 October 28 Police officer John Frey shot by Huey P Newton during traffic stop.

1968 October 16 African American medalists Tommy Smith and John Carlos give Black Power salute at medal ceremony during the playing of the American National anthem at the Olympic Stadium in Mexico city.

1970 October 13 FBI agents find Davis at a Howard Johnson Motor Lodge in New York City.

[snowpatrolfanclubbrazil]

Gary Lightbody’s moment came two years ago in a gym in Santa Monica. The Snow Patrol frontman has long had a reputation for indulging his appetites. But even he was going at it on a bigger scale, with a fierce, Valhallan vigour.

The band’s last tour had finished in late 2012. And then: “I started drinking,” he says, “with a gusto that a professional boxer might train for a prize fight. It’d be mostly beer. I was quite a happy drunk. There was a hell of a lot of fun. Until it wasn’t.

“I’d get to 2am sitting on my own, have a cry, and then a glass of something [stronger]. I didn’t have any relationships and I wasn’t having sex either. I was very hermetic. Around 2015/2016 I was drinking every day and also I was hating it. I regret doing it even though I knew I was doing it out of compulsion.”

He was hitting the gym in the mornings to sweat it off. Then came the moment.

“I bent down to touch my toes and everything started spinning. It felt like the floor beneath me was moving. I thought it was an earthquake. But it kept going on. I phoned a friend who lived around the corner. I was like, ‘Are we having an earthquake?’ He said ‘Something’s going on here’.

“I had a bunch of CT scans on my head. My whole head was infected – sinus, ears, eyes, everything. I’d been having styes and stuff on my eyes. Stick a teabag on it. This was the week before I was going to France to see Northern Ireland play in their first tournament in 30 years. I said to the doctor, ‘I’m flying to France in five days’. He’s like, ‘No you’re not. If you flew with the air pressure it’d feel like daggers ripping into your head’. I was still thinking maybe I’ll be alright. I spoke to a friend, Gabrielle, an acupuncturist, an extraordinary human being. She’d been trying to get me to stop drinking for a while…”

So he stopped. Or at least, he began to stop. And in flooded the dark realities he’d been masking.

In recent weeks, as he’s been working around the release of Wildness, Snow Patrol’s first album in seven years, Lightbody has started to talk for the first time about the mental health problems which have plagued him for years. (“I didn’t talk about anything; nobody knew, the band didn’t know.”) Last year, after 12 months sober, came another key moment.

“Last summer,” he says, “I thought I’d be relieved to get the album done. We’d just finished. But I wasn’t. I was devastated. I’d opened a place in my psyche and I didn’t know how to shut the door. It was like the ark of the covenant was opened [from Raiders Of The Lost Ark] and there were melting faces left and right and I didn’t know how to shut the thing down. So instead of talking to somebody I tried to shut myself out. Let my own face melt. And the band knew something and they flew from London and arrived at the door and I broke down and told them everything.

“I have a depressive personality that has no relationship with reality. I could be having the best time on the surface and yet my depression goes, ‘You’re still a cunt. Don’t forget that. I’m dragging you down into the ink and the dirt and the darkness’. I could be playing to 15,000 people and three hours later be on a hotel room crying on the floor. That’s happened a bunch of times. The depression and the success have no relation to each other. It’s just part of me. I’ve learned that rather than running from it, which you can never really do – you can never run away from yourself – is you have and turn and face it and look it in the eye and say I’m not afraid of you anymore.”

And so he went home. Back to Northern Ireland, to North Down where he was brought up. It’s the place he was desperate to leave in 1994, when he ran to Dundee to start university, to start the band, to start years of chipping away with no success. Then he wrote Run, and everything changed.

It’s easy, given their time away, to forget just how huge Snow Patrol were for a period from the mid-to-late Noughties. Nobody, really, was bigger.

The song Chasing Cars, from fourth album Eyes Open, was picked up for US hit TV show Grey’s Anatomy and propelled them to huge fame. Lightbody moved to Santa Monica around 2009 (“Soon as my feet hit the sand in Santa Monica something just hit and I thought, I want to live here”).

Recently he claimed he’d moved back to Northern Ireland because the band were getting ready to work again and he needed to be near them. But it feels like the truth is a little more complicated.

It’s a time in Northern Ireland as well when it feels like we’re at a bit of a crossroads again.

“You’re right. There are quite a few reasons. My dad isn’t well, my mum isn’t coping very well and my niece is going to be 11 in July. I’ve missed most of her life living in LA.

“And I missed home. It’s a time in Northern Ireland as well when it feels like we’re at a bit of a crossroads again. I felt a bit of calling back here. Not that I figure I can help in any way, but I certainly won’t feel connected if I’m 5,000 miles away. I wanted to reconnect.”

We’re meeting today in the Crawfordsburn Inn, the picture-postcard hotel not far from Gary’s shorefront home, overlooking Belfast Lough.

It feels timely. We meet on the 20th anniversary of a concert in Belfast’s Waterfront Hall, hosted by U2, that helped deliver a huge YES vote in the referendum for the Good Friday Agreement. In a nation where defiant NOs had been the lingua franca, a YES was significant. A political statement and a cleansing.

On that day, John Hume and David Trimble were ushered onstage by Bono, a man with a keen eye for a moment. U2 sang Don’t Let Me Down. Ash were there too, being young and hopeful. Twenty years on, as Lightbody says, Northern Ireland is at a bit of crossroads. And he’s found his way home.

The album, Wildness, is worth the wait. If Snow Patrol had touched on themes of running and movement in the past, Wildness has a leitmotif of finally settling. The word ‘home’ is laced through several songs. Two tracks in particular illustrate what Snow Patrol can really do – the anthemic reach of the huge, wondrous opening track Life on Earth (a track that took Gary five years to complete), and the intimacy of What If This Is All The Love You Ever Get?, a piece with just Gary on piano, a heartbreaker written for a friend going through a divorce.

The song Soon marks another significant theme. It deals with Lightbody’s father Jack’s battle with Alzheimer’s. It’s a simple builder, full of grace notes and sadness. There is something quietly heroic in it. The video, filmed in Lightbody’s apartment, sees him and his father watching old home movies his dad recorded through the years. As well as the sadness over what his father is losing, there is an understanding of a farewell to lost youth, that the hopefulness of that other country is worth revisiting for both of them.

I have a lot of respect for him so I wanted to honour him, but at the same time I also have a lot of guilt for being away for most of my adult life.

“I love my dad,” he says. “I have a lot of respect for him so I wanted to honour him, but at the same time I also have a lot of guilt for being away for most of my adult life. I don’t just mean LA, I mean Glasgow, London, or on tour constantly. And there is probably a place in my head where I go when I’m feeling homesick and that is both a place of calm and nostalgia and also a place of guilt and some shame.

“I’ve felt I’ve been running away, most of the time from myself. So (he pauses)… some of the home references are me feeling disconnected rather than connected…. feeling like I’d never really found a home. I never truly felt at home when I was growing up in Northern Ireland. Then I left and never really felt at home anywhere else. And then I moved back to Northern Ireland and now I do feel at home here, but that has also coincided with me feeling at home inside my own body. Which was the whole problem the whole time. I wasn’t comfortable with myself. I didn’t like myself. So you have to figure that out before you can feel at home anywhere.”

The band’s influence and legacy goes beyond their own work. They’ve helped shape the sounds that have become pervasive in post-millennial pop. Lightbody and band member Johnny McDaid have written with, among others Ed Sheeran, Taylor Swift and One Direction. Snow Patrol took Sheeran on the road in the States in 2011, helping him break through. They remain close.

“Between myself and Johnny McDaid we’ve written a lot of things for other pop acts, him more than me,” he says. “I would say Ed came fully formed from his first album. He’d done the groundwork. All the grafting that you need to do, when you’re a young band. He busked his ass off from the age of 15 on the streets of London, sleeping on his mate’s couch. He had turned up to gigs and said to promoters can you give me 15 minutes after the doors open. And promoters say aye. That’s how he started. He grafted harder and still does to this day – harder than anyone I know.”

Sheeran is returning the favour, taking Snow Patrol on an American stadium tour this autumn.

Refusing to accept Snow Patrol as fountainheads of a sound, Lightbody says they are more like Zelig, “probably bystanders”.

One got away, though. Mutual friend James Corden introduced Lightbody to Adele.

“It happened to be a birthday of somebody that James and Adele knew.… and I sat down with her and she said when are we going to do [a song]. We did two days – Adele, Johnny McDaid and me – the bones of three really amazing fucking songs. But we never got round to finishing it. And then the album came out and obviously we weren’t on it.”

While his own album has just come out, there is already pressure to get busy on the next. Longtime producer, friend and mentor Garret ‘Jacknife’ Lee has been in touch (“he says we need to get cracking on the next one”).

For now, ahead of their own arena tour in the winter, Lightbody is learning to cope, listening to podcasts (“Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks is my favourite one”) and Bon Iver (“I think he’s the finest songwriter alive”) and working things out.

“Me, now not drinking, I like myself but I’m socially awkward. I’d rather be sitting with bandmates, my family. I’m 41. I know what I want.”

And that is?

“Peace. I want to make sure that every day of my life I take a moment and realise everything is calmer. I’ve learned how to meditate, learned how to do qigong. Learned a whole load of practices that I do every day. They mitigate the madness. The greatest thing I ever did for my own emotional wellbeing was to talk.”

And if we went back 20 years as this all started, and said here are the successes, here are the demands it’ll make on you mentally, personally, physically – would you have taken it?

“I would have taken it for half the successes. I can’t believe what happened to us. I still can’t believe when I look back at it, at everything that is successful that has been good. At everything that is still happening. It’s a dream. It’s a bloody dream.”

Wildness is out now. @pauldmcnamee

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