#< slowly figuring out how to edit stuff so i guess it could be chopped up segements?? maybe???????

[seagullcharmer]

streaming still scares me but i might start recording myself playing pc games + dinky commentary

[storytellerofuntoldlegends]

i’ll let you in on my dark side

A/N: welcome to the godzilla intinct of wanting to see two girlbosses duke it out: redza vs ewalk!ranboo edition. huge thanks for my discord pals for helping me with this (i had no idea how to write redza or ewalk!ranboo, brain just wanted them to fight), and an extra huge thank you to my friend @technpog for beta-ing the final product!! title is from HUSHH by AViVA

Warnings: misunderstandings, violence, strangling, death threats, heavy mocking (redza is generally a jerk to ranboo), memory problems, guilt, awkward conversations, hugs, hurt/comfort with a hopeful ending

Summary: After accidentally startling Ranboo, Philza realizes that the two of them have more in common than he realized. But can he rein in the volatile side of himself before it's too late?

-

Phil had been chopping down some trees near his, Techno’s and Ranboo’s homes, looking to up his wood supply. A snowstorm was going to be coming in within the next few days, and Phil wanted to be sure there would be plenty of wood for fires to keep them warm. He would be sure to get enough wood for Ranboo too, although he was sure the kid would insist he was fine and could get his own firewood. He didn't want to baby Ranboo by any means, he was pretty capable after all- but parental instincts die hard.

The sound of a twig snapping startled Phil out of his thoughts, and he glanced over to see a familiar, tall and lanky figure in black and white. He raised a hand in greeting- the hand wielding his axe, he belatedly realized- and then caught a glimpse of Ranboo’s eyes. Purple, not the heterochromic red and green. Ranboo let out an eerie, enderman-like screech, mistaking what was meant to be a friendly wave with a move to attack. Phil instantly dropped the axe, but it was too late. Ranboo lunged forward, slamming him against the tree he had been about to chop down, the force of it sending the edges of Phil’s vision dark. He blinked away the fuzziness, hands scrabbling at dark clawed ones around his neck. He was well and truly pinned to the tree, his damaged wings trapped and spasming, trying in vain to fly free. The half white, half black face of a friend with fresh water scars and unfamiliar, cold purple eyes observed him with an angered expression. A vengeful vwoop escaped Ranboo’s lips, and Phil struggled to speak, to remind Ranboo who he was- but all that came out was a strangled wheeze as Ranboo’s hands squeezed tighter. Phil knew that his enderwalk state was a little more easily startled, and he thought he could calmly talk Ranboo down before he did anything he regretted… but he should have known better. He knew what it was like to have a deep, dark, and chaotic part of yourself locked away only to come out under duress- wait. Maybe that was the solution here. Fight fire with fire, right? Or in this case- fight a volatile version of your friend with a volatile version of yourself.

“Redza? Still lurking in there mate?” Phil thought, reaching until he found that violent, angry, and chaotic spark within himself and let it loose. It felt like liquid fire was flooding his veins, and he grinned as Ranboo’s expression went from confused to shocked as Phil’s calm blue eyes turned a gleaming red. With a sudden burst of strength, Phil- well, Redza, now- launched himself forward. Ranboo went down easily, clearly not expecting the sudden burst of resistance. The two tumbled to the ground, Ranboo’s hands leaving Redza’s throat to instead try and catch himself. Redza cackled at the foolishness of his opponent, pinning Ranboo to the ground with a knee to his chest and a knife drawn from Redza’s robes against his throat. Redza’s free hand gripped Ranboo’s shirt collar, and he laughed again at the absolutely bewildered expression on Ranboo’s face.

“He’s still Ranboo in this state, don’t hurt him!” Redza’s inner voice reprimanded, which he more or less ignored. The old man could stuff it, he was finally out and he was having fun.

“I could kill you, it’d be laughably easy. But I’ve been far too curious to meet this version of you,” Redza crooned, idly dragging the flat of his knife against Ranboo’s neck. Ranboo let out a confused warble, then huffed out an annoyed breath before screwing his face up in concentration.

“Who- are- you?” he growled, words coming out slowly, like he was struggling to remember how to form them.

“Aw, are words a little hard for you when you’re like this? Poor little enderman, can only do little vwoops and growls,” Redza taunted, pressing the knife a little closer to Ranboo’s throat when he instinctively leaned up to growl at him again, reminding the half-enderman who was in control here.

“Answer,” Ranboo snarled, head dropping back to the ground.

“I’m Philza, sort of. Just angrier, more violent, more chaotic, less of that silly restraint and care Phil prides himself on- he likes to call me Redza. He let me out because of that care, come to think of it. You were dangerously close to killing him, and he didn’t want you to live with that guilt- but Philza didn’t have the guts to pull out the knife in our cloak. I, however, have no such issue,” he explained with a grin.

“Why?” Ranboo asked, voice still a growl, but a bit clearer than before. The harsh purple glow of his eyes was flickering, revealing the true dual shades below.

“He’s coming back to himself now, you can let up on him,” the inner voice said, more insistent than before. Redza pouted inwardly. He was just getting to know his new friend! Philza could wait a little longer, he wasn’t done with Ranboo quite yet.

“I’m not fond of dying, kid. Half the reason Philza’s still kicking is because I’m here to protect him when he needs me. I’m sure you can relate to that,” Redza said, ignoring the continued grumbling in the back of his head from Philza.

“I-” Ranboo faltered, eyes shifting back to the red and green for a brief moment before the purple glow came back again.

“You?” Redza asked mockingly.

“I do what’s necessary,” Ranboo said in a low tone, the clearest he had sounded during the entire encounter. Redza threw his head back and laughed, shifting the knife away from Ranboo’s throat but not getting off of him quite yet.

“Oh, I think we’re going to get along swimmingly! I like this version of you,” he said between laughs. Ranboo gave a disapproving vwoop, glaring up at Redza. He fidgeted underneath Redza’s hold, causing him to dig in his knee more, twirling the knife between his fingers with a disapproving frown.

“Let. Me. Up,” Ranboo growled. The purple glow in his eyes was vibrant and fierce, and Redza loved knowing he could get under the kid’s skin so easily. Well… why not dig a little more then?

“Why should I? You tried to kill Philza, the man who took you in when you had nothing. This could just be a ruse so you can engage in the violent bloodlust you crave, deep down. I should know, you’re like me,” Redza taunted, unable to keep the sinister grin off of his face.

“Stop! I startled him, that’s all- Ranboo’s not like that!” the inner voice cried, guilt bubbling its way to the surface. But it was too late- the words had already done their damage.

“I- I’m not-” Ranboo stuttered, his eyes rapidly flashing between purple to red and green as he trembled beneath Redza.

“Oh really? The bruises blooming on my neck say otherwise,” Redza snarled, before Philza could stop him.

“THAT’S ENOUGH!” the inner voice boomed. Redza felt himself reined back into that dark corner of Philza’s mind, fiery anger rescinding and leaving Philza cold and blissfully empty. Phil let out a shaky breath, stowing away the knife in his robes before quickly scrambling off of Ranboo. Things were a little fuzzy- the memories of what exactly Redza had said to Ranboo were slipping through his fingers like grains of sand, but he knew it was nothing good. At least Ranboo didn’t look like he was physically hurt. Ranboo sat up, one hand absentmindedly rubbing at his throat with a perplexed expression, eyes back to their red and green hue.

“What? Where am I- Phil?” Ranboo asked, looking over to see Phil sitting in the snow beside him.

“You alright, mate?” Phil asked, guilt replacing the cold, empty feeling he had felt before.

“Y-Yeah. I think so- was I… enderwalking, again?” Ranboo asked, dropping his hand from his throat with a concerned frown.

“Yep. Took a minute to uh… wake you up,” Phil said, not wanting to explain Redza quite yet. Ranboo didn’t seem to remember him, and a part of Phil felt horrible for wanting it to stay that way. He wanted to tell his friends about Redza on his own terms, not because he needed to let that part of himself loose in self-defense.

“Oh. Uh… thanks for-” Ranboo halted mid-sentence. His gaze had landed on Phil’s axe lying on the ground near them, then flicked over to the bruises on Phil’s neck. A choked noise that sounded close to a sob escaped his lips, and he brought up a trembling hand towards Phil. Against his will, Phil flinched, and Ranboo let out another wounded sound.

“Mate-”

“Did I- was that me?” Ranboo asked in a shaking, hollow tone.

“To be fair, I startled you pretty bad. Might’ve tried to wave hello to you, and forgot I was holding an axe. You understandably panicked,” Phil explained sheepishly. Ranboo looked down at his hands in horror. Then that horror morphed into a somehow more terrified expression, and he glanced at Phil’s eyes. Shit. He was definitely remembering Redza, at least a little bit.

“And you… your eyes were…” Ranboo trailed off, subconsciously backing away from Phil.

“Red. Guess I panicked too, huh?” Phil said, trying to go for a friendly smile, but the nerves skittering beneath his veins caused it to fall a little short. Fortunately, Ranboo gave a weak smile in return.

“Yup. Just… two dudes, panicking in the woods,” Ranboo said with a half laugh, half sigh. Phil smiled, more of a real one this time, and stood up. He picked up his axe, then offered a hand to Ranboo. He gingerly took it, and let Phil help him up.

“Let’s get home, I think I’ve got enough firewood for all of us,” Phil said, not-so-delicately changing the subject. He could tell Ranboo had questions, and was probably trying to puzzle out fragments of his memory, but thankfully he didn’t voice any of his thoughts.

“Yeah, yeah- there’s uh- a storm coming, right?” Ranboo asked, still sounding nervous as hell. Phil started to nod, then frowned and let out a sigh.

“Sorry. I just- I can’t just… pretend nothing happened. You don’t deserve that,” Phil said, pausing as he tried to figure out how to explain Redza. He wasn’t even sure if he was ready to explain that part of him yet- but he couldn’t just leave Ranboo in the dark like that. He trusted Phil with the dark parts of himself, why couldn’t Phil do the same?

“Phil- it’s okay. You did what you had to, you don’t have to talk about the red eye thing if you don’t want to,” Ranboo said, hurriedly trying to reassure Phil.

“No, it’s not a matter of wanting to. It’s a matter of needing to. Redza is a part of me, whether I like it or not,” Phil said firmly.

“Redza?” Ranboo asked.

“It’s what I call him. The part of me that is completely unhinged, angry, and violent. He’s kind of like your enderwalk state, in a way- it’s just more voluntary on my part. He’s everything about myself that I try to keep buried down. And while he is part of me, I’m not always in control of his actions. Sometimes I’m just helpless to watch as he does what he wants, sometimes I don’t even remember everything he does. It was hard to rein him in this time around,” Phil admitted quietly. Ranboo was silent for a moment, letting everything Phil had said sink in.

“So… you said sometimes you don’t remember what he’s done. Do you remember everything that happened earlier?” Ranboo asked timidly. Phil’s heart sank. Ranboo was clearly remembering more than he let on, and Phil definitely knew Redza had said something to upset Ranboo- but the more time passed, the fuzzier his memories were.

“I know Redza said something to upset you. Whatever it was- trust me when I say that I don’t agree with it. Redza likes to get under people’s skins, to poke and prod at your worst insecurities. Don’t listen to a thing he said. You’re a good kid, Ranboo, and I mean that wholeheartedly,” Phil said firmly.

“Really?” Ranboo asked, voice small and disbelieving. Phil looked over at Ranboo, surprised at how small a six-foot-fuck-off tall kid managed to look.

“Really. I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life,” Phil said with unrelenting confidence. Ranboo still looked a little unsure, but a smidge of relief and comfort crept into his expression. He started to reach out to Phil, but quickly drew his hands back to wrap around himself.

“Thank you. It- That means a lot,” Ranboo said softly. Phil smiled gently, the expression more genuine than it had been earlier.

“Aww, c’mere mate,” Phil said, opening his arms. Ranboo didn’t need to be told twice, all but launching himself into Phil’s arms. He leaned his cheek on the top of Phil’s head, arms gently coming around him and being mindful of his wings, despite the way he had eagerly launched forward. Phil rubbed soothing circles into his back with one hand, the other holding Ranboo tightly and pouring out every assurance and apology that he couldn’t verbalize. Ranboo seemed to be apologizing too, a deep rumbling emitting from his throat like the enderman version of a purr. Phil didn’t know how, but he knew that despite the volatile sides to themselves, he and Ranboo would be alright.

-

MCYT Fic Taglist (send an ask to be added!): @franticfandomfanatic

[cheri-translates]

[CN] Idle Chat with Kiro

🍒 Warning: This post contains detailed spoilers for a feature which has not been released in English servers! 🍒

The CN server was recently graced with a new feature called 随便聊聊 (“Idle Chat”), where you can select a mood and talk to the love interests about work, life, and studies :>

Idle Chat with: Gavin / Lucien / Shaw / Victor

[ WORK - Topic 1: Overtime ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: We can visit that dessert shop today! Because I. Don’t! Have! To! Work! Overtime!

Kiro: Although we’re separated by the screen, I can sense Miss Chip’s happiness~

Kiro: Since this is the case, our challenge today will be to--

Kiro: Wipe! The! Dessert! Shop! Clean!

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: Went to work feeling muddle-headed today, which left me with a stack of incomplete work. Sigh, I might have to work overtime today.

Kiro: Did you spend too much time watching dramas last night?

Kiro: Next time, you have to stick to a regular sleeping timing.

Kiro: Also, isn’t the male lead by your side?

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: The market hasn’t been good lately, so the income I received has also gone down. I feel like I’ve left everyone down...

Kiro: Back then, MC went through such difficult times.

Kiro: I think these little twists and turns don’t account for much!

Kiro: Because you’re always producing miracles!

-

[ WORK - Topic 2: Income ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I’ve received my pay~ I even have a bonus this month! Aren’t I incredible?

Kiro: As expected of Miss Chips!

Kiro: As a reward, I’ll give you a present.

Kiro: Want to know what it is?

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I have no idea why, but I haven’t been interested in anything I do. Could it be because it’s a long time till payday?

Kiro: Mm... want to consider changing occupations and becoming my assistant?

Kiro: You’ll be paid daily.

Kiro: Also, there will be an additional, exclusive Kiro hug every day.

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: Working overtime again and again and again and again! There’s even a rainstorm outside! The most enraging thing is that I didn’t bring an umbrella!

Kiro: I checked the weather forecast beforehand

Kiro: So I knew there’d be a rainstorm

Kiro: Give me five minutes - I’ll be there soon!

-

[ WORK - Topic 3: Program Progress ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Do you still remember the collaborative program I mentioned before? We plan to invite a mystery guest. Want to guess who he is?

Kiro: I’m guessing he is -- Kiro!

Kiro: If Miss Chips doesn’t invite me,

Kiro: I’ll be very hurt.

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: The reaction from the other party regarding this collaborative program seems bland. Actually, I also find the content a little boring. I have no inspiration at all...

Kiro: In my eyes, everything Miss Chips does is very interesting.

Kiro: But if you really have no inspiration,

Kiro: Need me to help you grab it back?

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I’ve already made over thirty amendments to the proposal for this collaborative program. What more does the other party want?! What do they mean by a “vibrant black”??

Kiro: Oo... a vibrant black...

Kiro: It does sound like a difficult operation.

Kiro: Maybe it’s the same thing as how Apple Box’s jet-black eyes are bright even at night?

-

[ WORK - Topic 4: Program Results ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: The program I’ve been working on for months has finally gotten approved! If I were to continue doing it, I’d probably have gone bald... Should I place an order for hair-growth shampoo?

Kiro: Instead of hair-growth shampoo, I think what you need more is sufficient sleep.

Kiro: Or a limited-edition Kiro hug?

Kiro: I’ll decide on both of them on your behalf~

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: My daily self-reflection -- Has the program been approved? Not yet :(

Kiro: My daily self-reflection -- Do I think about Miss Chips?

Kiro: Always. 

Kiro: Miss Chips, do your best!

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: Good news. The program I’ve been painstakingly working on for several months has been rejected. :)

Kiro: Whenever my albums get delayed, I’ll take Apple Box out for a walk.

Kiro: Since Apple Box doesn’t have a slot recently,

Kiro: Why don’t I take you out for a walk instead?

🌻

[ LIFE - Topic 1: Losing Weight ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I've reached my ideal weight! I’m really happy~ I can finally toss away the salad that even Apple Box dislikes.

Kiro: Although I didn’t think you were fat before,

Kiro: What’s most important is that Miss Chips is happy!

Kiro: P.S. You’ve stopped eating snacks recently - Apple Box and I are both very upset.

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: A sincere question - If your weight remained the same after dieting and exercising for a week, would you choose to feast ferociously on crayfish or barbecue? 

Kiro: Since your weight is so disobedient,

Kiro: Let’s punish it fiercely!

Kiro: Why don’t we have barbecue along with crayfish!

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: Why is it that every time I indulge in extravagant eating and drinking, I always scroll to a page showing models with incredible figures?! I’m once again putting up a flag to lose weight!!

Kiro: Promise me that you won’t go on a diet to lose weight.

Kiro: Effective exercise and a reasonable work-life balance is the correct way to do it.

Kiro: But will our weekly dessert day continue?

-

[ LIFE - Topic 2: Meals ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Burp-- I had a buffet this afternoon, and I’m so full now. Let me secretly tell you that I had to support myself on the wall to get out.

Kiro: Hahaha, I’m also the same after a photoshoot,

Kiro: Wanting to stuff myself to the brim.

Kiro: Next time, let’s compete to see who is the true buffet killer!

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I’ve entered a special bottleneck period - What should I have for lunch? What should I have for dinner?

Kiro: Mm... this is indeed a big problem which frequently stumps me.

Kiro: Want to watch a documentary on delicacies?

Kiro: You might be able to find some “inspiration” on what to eat.

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I was seized by a whim and did some cooking. When I changed the seasoning just slightly, I ended up creating a mysterious, indescribable taste...

Kiro: Mm... has your cooking magic lost its touch temporarily?

Kiro: That’s all right 

Kiro: Tomorrow, we’ll try again together. 

-

[ LIFE - Topic 3: Reading ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I came across a picture book today, and readers can use their fingers to make a dot in the book grow bigger or smaller~ It’s very adorable!

Kiro: I really wish Miss Chips were that little dot.

Kiro: That way, I can make you really tiny

Kiro: And store you in my pocket. 

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: There’s a book wasteland... Why can’t I find a single good book...

Kiro: Someone said that the most interesting book is a person’s life.

Kiro: Could the reason you’re unable to find a good book

Kiro: Be because your life is already very interesting?

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I’ve been keeping up with a web series, but the author said that he decided to go on a hiatus today after receiving negative comments. My spiritual nourishment is gone...

Kiro: Negative comments truly make people upset

Kiro: Want to leave an encouraging comment to the author?

Kiro: Tell him that there are many readers who like his work!

-

[ LIFE - Topic 4: Games ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Ding-- Dear respected customer, your gaming partner has found another interesting game. If you wish to know the name of the game, kindly reply with a ‘1′

Kiro: Rejected.

Kiro: Hahahaha, I’m just teasing you.

Kiro: 11111!

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: Help... I’m stuck at the fifth stage of this riddle game. What do I have to do so the squirrel would release its hold on the key?

Kiro: There’s actually such a mean squirrel?

Kiro: Let me handle it!

Kiro: If it doesn’t work, I’ll let Cello catch it!

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: My hand slipped when I was playing a game today, causing the entire game to restart :) Don’t stop me - I’m going to chop off this troublemaking hand!!

Kiro: An urgent appeal to spare your hand!

Kiro: Think on the positive side,

Kiro: We now have another thing we can complete together~

🌻

[ SCHOOL - Topic 1: Progress ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I've prepared a studying schedule, and am filled with confidence for this new life of studying! Kiro, please supervise me from time to time!

Kiro: Understood! 

Kiro: If you get lazy--

Kiro: Heheh, there’ll be punishment. 

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I’ve been staring at my book for an hour in a daze. Why do I understand the words in isolation, but not when they are strung together?

Kiro: Mm... from a certain perspective, isn’t knowledge a series of code?

Kiro: Read them as though you’re playing a riddle game. 

Kiro: Perhaps you’ll find a way to pass the stage!

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: Why does my brain function so slowly the moment I start studying? Isn’t it very amazing when I play games?!

Kiro: I’d like to correct two mistakes Miss Chips made--

Kiro: Number One, whenever you get stuck in a game, you’d let me take over;

Kiro: Number Two, your brain isn’t functioning slowly. It’s just time to take a break.

-

[ SCHOOL - Topic 2: Homework ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Because I remembered the reward you mentioned, I finished my homework really quickly today! What’s the reward, what’s the reward?

Kiro: I already said that you could definitely do it!

Kiro: As for the reward,

Kiro: Come closer, and I’ll tell you.

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: Whenever I do homework, it seems that aside from the homework, I become curious about everything else. Oh yes, do you think a dog sees itself as a dog?

Kiro: Miss Chips, concentrate!

Kiro: But for your question, I’ve asked Apple Box about it

Kiro: It responded and said...

Kiro: Bark!

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: A sincere question - can homework be done in stages? I really can’t finish it ahhh!

Kiro: Take your time, I’ll accompany you.

Kiro: Although I don’t know if homework can be done in stages,

Kiro: But my care for you is a fixed asset.

-

[ SCHOOL - Topic 3: Pre-exam Revision ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: The exam is coming up soon. It’s a good thing you supervised me and ensured that I studied seriously. The scope of the exam was also very clearly detailed by the teacher!

Kiro: I think you forgot the most important thing--

Kiro: Miss Chips’ own diligence and hard work.

Kiro: Miss Chips, all the best for your exam!

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: Memorising the examinable points is really difficult. It feels as though the moment I memorise a sentence, I forget the earlier one. How do you memorise the lines in your script?

Kiro: I have my exclusive Kiro memorisation technique of course!

Kiro: It’s exceptionally effective!

Kiro: If you want know about it, bring a bag of chips over to me~

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: When the teacher was pointing out the important segments, he said the first three chapters are the foundation, the following three chapters are important, and the final three chapters are examinable. Doesn’t this mean I have to revise the entire book!

Kiro: It takes a long time to revise the entire book.

Kiro: Do you need a Kiro exam buddy?

Kiro: It comes with a massage, milk tea delivery, and hugs.

-

[ SCHOOL - Topic 4: Post-exam celebration ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: The exam is over~ After comparing answers, there doesn’t seem to be any big issues! Kiro, who supervised me in my revision, is the best!

Kiro: Congratulations Miss Chips!

Kiro: Since I’ve rendered outstanding service, as a reward,

Kiro: Give all your post-examination resting time to me~

-

2. Mood: Upset

MC: The exam is finally over... I actually don’t feel very happy... Could it be because the final question was simply incomprehensible? 

Kiro: Hasn’t Miss Chips been looking forward to this day for a very long time?

Kiro: In that case, I have to find a way to cheer you up.

Kiro: Let’s laze on the sofa and watch your favourite movie. How’s that?

-

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I messed it up... I gave up on the last two questions... I think I’ve definitely messed it up...

Kiro: Maybe all the questions in front were correct!

Kiro: Also, one exam doesn’t mean much

Kiro: You’ll always be the smartest Miss Chips in my heart!

[radramblog]

Radiohead Retrospective Part 8: Slowly we unfurl

Last week I compared The King of Limbs to Kid A, a reference I find completely natural. Both albums use significant electronic and ambient instrumentation, especially compared to the albums preceding them, and both feature stark, surreal imagery and lyricism. Kid A is a response to the band’s discomfort at getting huge, while The King of Limbs is a response to them deliberately getting much smaller after cutting ties with EMI/Parlophone.

I’m also pretty sure that comparison really pisses off a bunch of people who really like Kid A and really don’t care for The King of Limbs. And they’re entitled to their opinion, but they’re wrong. Album’s great.

Aside from potentially the spookiest cover of any Radiohead album, TKOL as it’s so abbreviated happens to be the shortest Radiohead album, clocking in at 8 songs and under 38 minutes (for reference, the longest one is Hail to the Thief at 14 songs/~57 minutes). It does not, however, seek to be wasting any of those minutes, despite the often looping nature of its songs, each drizzled in enough Stuff Going On that it feels much deeper than that short timeframe makes it seem.

That, or I just get lost in the groove.

While the comparison to Kid A is probably getting a bit old at this point, I think I’d like to reiterate it by comparing the opening seconds of Everything in its Right Place to that of TKOL’s opener, Bloom. EIIRP opens with this ultimately simple electronic line that feels cold and robotic, and while Bloom’s opening moments are still obviously electronic, they’re clearly made of something more lifelike. And by that, I mean it sounds a lot like a heavily edited, chopped, and looped piano line, one that folds itself into the very genuine percussion loops that follow. It’s a difference of tone, this life against the coldness of silica, even though the two are obviously both computer-made.

I don’t think Bloom truly comes into its own until that bassline comes in. Fortunately, it only takes like a minute for that to happen, with the incredibly ethereal and reverb-y vocals soon to follow. The bass is ultimately incredibly simple, but it adds such a grounding to the other instrumentation, those rapid, looping, high-pitched tracks that go on and on et cetera. And then you get about a two-thirds of the way in and the brass and strings come in that I had entirely forgotten about, but are so pretty, during the bridge (?), it’s genuinely quite lovely.

I wouldn’t call Bloom a banger, because it’s not that type of song. But at the same time, Bloom is a banger, basically.

By comparison, Morning Mr Magpie feels much more organic, in that more of the instrumentation being looped is acoustic/”real”. There’s a very delicate and deliberate guitar strum that the song is built around, with a similar but looser bassline meandering around in the background as it goes. MMM is much more built around the vocals than Bloom was (apparently the bass and vocals were the last things to be added to that track), more concrete images developed, and an actual verse/chorus/verse/chorus structure which feels a little strange on an album like this.

The instrumentation on this track feels anxious, the guitar and percussion reminding me of drumming my fingers on the table in impatience or nerves, but it’s so uncomfortable that it can’t get it perfectly rhythmic.

And frankly, this song does make me uncomfortable. You see, magpies in the UK have an association with thievery, collecting, and having an eye for shiny things. In Australia, magpies are associated with pecking people’s eyeballs out. So there’s a bit of a disconnect between countries and species is what I’m saying.

At some point I had decided that Little by Little was my favourite song on TKOL, and while I can’t really justify that, but I will (for now) stand by it. It’s got some excellent instrumentation- jingly background loops sounding like a machine, or even a bicycle, giving the track a sense of motion. Meanwhile, the bass is just absolutely killer, somehow both intricate and simple-sounding, notes that sound almost the same but aren’t quite. The lyrics are nursery-esque, with rhyming pairs and idioms aplenty. “Little by little by hook or by crook/I’m such a tease and you’re such a flirt” is a really fun couple of lines, even if they really don’t have the same meaning outside of context as they do inside.

Every time I think I’ve heard everything there is to hear in this song, there’s more to surprise me. The different guitar lines, the background noises, rising instrumental and sinking vocals. Underrated, methinks.

Track 4 is the shortest song of the shortest album, Feral. Not so much lyrics in this, as snippets of heavily edited vocalisations- they might say something, but you’re sure as hell not going to figure that out listening to it. The song is heavily percussion-driven, to the point where there are long spans of it where the looping drums are the only instrumentation actually present. More electronic white noise comes in later, getting louder and harsher, as the vocal snippets increase in frequency and variability, but there’s always those drums, keeping on keeping on.

Feral is kind of in an odd spot, frankly, because it is one of hose tracks that’s fine, it’s good¸ but I genuinely cannot imagine being in the mood to listen to it. It’s tightly wound, almost stressful, but what little is added on doesn’t especially cater to that mood. I think there’s some comparison to be made to The Gloaming, of all things, though I think I like that track better than this one.

The one single from the album is Lotus Flower, and if you haven’t watched that music video…fucking, do it? Thom is just iconic in this one, channeling memetic levels of weirdo-dance. Lotus Flower makes the best choice for single on this record, being both the most past-Radiohead-y, and the most traditional song-y track on the record, somehow. Thom’s falsetto is at its peak here, utterly gorgeous in performance and presentation, with loops on some of the held notes that in some cases only just reveal themselves as artificial.

This is not to discredit the instrumental, with the best Radiohead use of handclaps since 15 Step (to my knowledge, the previous iteration of this), an electronic instrumental that would probably make a much sadder song were it not for the vocals and the groovy bassline. Seriously, the bass makes this piece genuinely danceable, it’s incredible.

…man, look at him go.

Every time I hear Codex I think it’s the last song on the album, and I always have to remind myself, no, it’s not that short, come on. This slow, sad, piano ballad (?) echoes previous album closers while still feeling incredibly TKOL, its piano being reminiscent of Videotape, brass coming in like Life in a Glasshouse, and utterly down vocals akin to any number of Radiohead’s finest. Some of the lyrics are actually very reminiscent of Pyramid Song, imagery of, well, jumping into bodies of water, but as that track’s river was full of tragedy and memory, Codex’s clear lake is, apparently, clear and innocent.

I was thinking about that album-closer comment before I heard the section of the track that comes in at 3:35, with wavering strings that feel incredibly like Kid A, like Motion Picture Soundtrack and How to Disappear Completely.

I should probably stop comparing Codex to other Radiohead songs, though. It does stand on its own without those, a beautiful, melancholic song. It is incredibly chill, muted even, the kind of song to float in the water to, staring up at the stars. It’s down, but it’s not in pain, if that makes sense? Like, the vibe I get from it is of acceptance, and of moving past what’s holding one down- something you repeat in your head while you’re deep in the shit.

Wait that’s just How to Disappear Completely again, fuck.

Moving on, Give up the Ghost opens with, of all things, birdsongs. It’s actually an acoustic guitar ballad to pair with Codex’s piano ballad, multiple iterations of the instrument layered over each other in a natural but artificial soundscape. The vocals do the same, with the lead harmonising with a backing refrain of “don’t haunt me” to give this relatively gentle track a sense of desperation, almost (I’ve seen it written as “don’t hurt me” in some places but…come on, listen to it, also it is Give up the Ghost after all).

Give up the Ghost is another very chill track that you can just lean into and relax by. Even as it gets more complex and layered as it goes, with another background vocal layer edited in the background steadily getting fuzzed and less comprehendible, the song doesn’t stop being what it is. That acoustic line doesn’t stop vibing, the tempo doesn’t pick up, it is more than content to stay right where it is. And it’s a comfortable stop.

The album’s final track is Separator, and it is frankly one that I always forget. Despite being the actual track closer (sorry again, Codex), it doesn’t have that impact that tracks like Street Spirit (Fade Out) or A Wolf at the Door do. Ironically, this might make it the most fitting closer for The King of Limbs, considering the largely relaxed, ambient nature of the album.

There isn’t honestly that much to divulge about Separator that you wouldn’t have guessed from the album that precedes it. It’s got looping tracks, layered vocals, and this one really satisfying electronic note that hits every couple seconds that I quite like. About halfway through, a patently lovely guitar line comes in, one of the few I can definitively think of that are relatively downtempo but that I could still describe as “bright”. With all the stuff going on at once, the song does end up a bit of a mess at times, as these different elements that have been present in different pieces of the song blend together for a bit of an echoey jumble, but it does resolve itself before long. After that, the song and album’s final minute or so is surprisingly simple, with the track effectively picking the handful of lines it wants to hang on to, one of the vocal tracks and one of the ambient effects and one of the percussion lines, and lets them run their course, the album ending on an echo of the track that once was.

That completes The King of Limbs, an album named after a tree in England, by the way. It always bugs me when I see this one near the bottom of people’s tier lists, because it really just doesn’t miss. It’s the product of a band that’s been working and experimenting for two decades, and it really shows the fruits of that labour. It’s quite the band that can put out something like Bloom immediately after an album with tracks like Bodysnatchers and Jigsaw Falling Into Place, and have both work.

The King of Limbs was the last album that came out before I got into Radiohead, so naturally, I basically didn’t listen to it for several years. I kinda went piece by piece into their discography, and I hadn’t had it as heavily recommended to me as others. But it easily stands just as tall as those other albums, even if it’s technically a little shorter.

For the record, I haven’t decided if I’m going to cover TKOL RMX 1234567 yet. It is listed next to all the rest of them on any collection of their albums, and it’s a perfectly respectable piece of Radiohead canon, and I did want to cover all the non-main-album stuff at some point. On the other hand, it is just a remix album, I’ve kinda been going through the main stuff chronologically, and also I’ve never listened to it.

So basically, we’ll see! And you’ll see, next week, whether we go straight to A Moon Shaped Pool or deviate a bit for some capitalised numerical action.

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 246: Plot Whiplash

Previously on BnHA: Hawks handed Endeavor a copy of Re-Destro’s NYT bestseller and was all “ಠ_ಠ READ THIS!!” He then flew off back to the PLF and was all “hey guys just got back from handing out free copies of Destro’s book to everyone in a 1000-mile radius, which absolutely nobody asked me to do, well anyways you can thank me later” and they were all “SWEET.” Back at the Endeavor HQ, Bakugou got all fired up to BUST SOME HEADS but Endeavor’s sidekicks were all “WAIT FOR THE PLOT YOUNG MAN.” Meanwhile in his office, Endeavor discovered a secret code in the book Hawks gave him, which basically read “HEY WHAT’S UP THE LEAGUE HAS TAKEN OVER THE MLA AND HAS AN ARMY OF 100,000 PEOPLE” and Endeavor was like “!!!!” And then we cut to the League and Toga was all “IN FOUR MONTHS TOMURA IS BLOWING THIS SHIT TO KINGDOM COME” and then the chapter just ended. Sometimes it be like that.

Today on BnHA: Tomura sits down with Ujiko who monologues a bit about Quirk Singularity and then starts some sort of quirk-upgrading process which will apparently take four months to fully set in. And also he’s like “oh btw let me tell you about One for All” so THAT’S A THING NOW, GREAT. We then cut back and forth between Endeavor and Hawks, who both somehow come to the weird conclusion that THE INTERNS ARE OUR ONLY HOPE NOW using logic that is hard to explain on account of THERE ACTUALLY ISN’T ANY LOGIC BEHIND IT, SHHH. But anyway, so Endeavor figures out the rest of Hawks’s message and he knows that Hawks is trying to figure out what the League is up to, and something something that’s why the internships are so important. Like, I get that the Terrible Trio are future legends in the making, but these guys are seriously like “well okay let’s just go ahead and rest all our hopes on them” out of the blue, and Hawks has this big monologue about how “THINGS WON’T GO ACCORDING TO YOUR PLAN, VILLAINS” and okay then!! And then the last two pages are basically just DID SOMEBODY ORDER SOME HYPE with more shit going on than I can possibly sum up so I won’t even try lol. But damn.

(All comments are my unspoiled reactions from my initial readthrough of the chapter. I did a quick edit for grammar and clarity afterward, and added a few ETAs in the process, but aside from that there are no changes.) 

okay guys, I’m feeling kinda under the weather today, but I know this chapter’s gonna be good so lesssssss gooooooo. bring me back to life Horikoshi

(ETA: lol well there sure was a lot happening in this chapter, that’s for sure. my head hurts.)

oooooh it’s a sexy Jump cover celebrating season 4!

I really need the anime team to step up and give Ochako and Tsuyu some more screentime in the Basement Arc since the manga did not do them justice. there’s only like a 20% chance of that happening, which is depressing, but it’s 2019 and the winds are slowly changing, albeit at a geriatric pace. so I’ll allow myself to have some hope. you never know

YEAH SON LOOK AT THIS COLOR SPREAD Y’ALL THIS IS RAD

hello I love everything about this. the colors, the focus on our best girls, Deku’s bizarre-yet-awesome assorted sci-fi accessories (Deku do those headphones let you communicate with space or what), and of course, the five million TVs in the background which for some reason all appear to be from the 70s. all of this to remind us to TUNE IN TOMORROW FOR THE LONG-AWAITED SEASON 4 DEBUT. I will definitely tune in! the first episode is just gonna be the usual half filler/half clip show, but honestly season 3 was so good that I could sit through a whole hour of nothing but highlights and still be thoroughly entertained

anyway let’s move on because there are GAMES AFOOT, and we’re hopefully about to learn which direction this arc will be headed in!

OH SHIT OH FUCK

yep, that’s him. Shigaraki “destruction incarnate” Tomura. I see we’re getting our weekly dose of “just a reminder that WE ARE SCREWED” even earlier than usual this chapter, huh

so does anyone else get a chill up their spine every time Ujiko makes an appearance, or is that just me? like, god. he may honestly be even creepier than AFO. he’s just completely soulless, this guy. he’s got like this Mengele vibe to him (though that may be kinda dicey to compare horrific real-life atrocities to fictional ones in a shounen manga, but I’m just trying to explain why I find him so disturbing) and it really freaks me the hell out, ngl. anyways so him wearing a surgical mask and standing in front of this weird examination chair is pretty much the last thing I need right now. go away Ujiko

so Tomura is all “I want it cuz you promised, so pay up jackass”, and like. fair, though

I really like this new art style Horikoshi’s been using for him since his Awakening. kinda curious how it’s going to translate to the anime, or even to a color spread. but at the very least in black and white it looks siiiiick

smh look at this little punk trying to downplay how insanely freaking overpowered his quirk currently is

okay first of all, “President Baldy” is only alive because you left him alive. and he also had to chop off his own legs to stay that way. like, what kind of argument is this, Tomura? “this power is far from invincible, all my enemies have to do is amputate their own limbs and then they’ll have me right where they want me.” you know what, just go on and destroy the world right now kid. you’re getting greedy now and it could be your undoing

that is a nice parallel between him and Deku there, though. now I’m craving some Symbolic Artwork of them standing back to back each holding out their scarred right arms. maybe with their respective mentors in the background. here at BnHA we prefer our parallels nice and dramatic

sdskfjlaskdj

son of a bitch. I really wish he wouldn’t say that with such utter certainty. “the next conflict will be our last.” cue me flipping through the BnHA table of contents and trying to determine just how far along we actually are here, because this is veering dangerously close to Final Battle signaling, and like, ALREADY?? TOMURA ARE YOU JUST BEING THEATRICAL OR ARE YOU FOR REAL OMG. motherfucking DARK LORD’S LIPS curling into the WICKEDEST FUCKING CRESCENT I’VE EVER SEEN, fuck me

(ETA: it occurs to me on readthrough #2 that “the next conflict will be our last” could be interpreted to mean him and All Might specifically. like, the last conflict between the two of them. and that might very well be true, and would not surprise me at all. shit.)

fjsgk now Ujiko’s talking about research. and quirks!! glkjlkl

fully expecting the camera to cut to some NOUMUS any second now oh my god. also trying not to think about how crazy ominous that fucking chair looks. and how many people this maniac has probably strapped down to it and done god knows what to them. hey Horikoshi you know what, I’ve had just about enough of this dark shit, can we please cut back to my kids now I’m feeling too unsettled. goddammit

anyhow of course we are NOT cutting away, and Ujiko is continuing to talk about quirk evolution, and now segueing into a speech about that quirk singularity thing. -- which he apparently named?? wow

is he actually going to do something to Tomura? holy shit?? this whole time that they’ve been talking about this “power” I’ve just been assuming it was something external, like some other handy dandy villain resource that AFO’s just been sitting on or something. this is not where I expected things to go. didn’t he just get an upgrade??

anyway so here’s a brief summary I just wrote up of The Past Six Months of BnHA:

Deku: [gets a new quirk]

everyone: bruh. Horikoshi really out here giving Deku AFO Powers while Tomura just sits around starving to death on a couch. what the heck

Horikoshi: [powers up Tomura to the point where he can destroy anything just by it being in contact with something that Tomura happens to be touching] [has Tomura use this power to level an entire city]

everyone: -- oh. okay, you know what, never mind --

Horikoshi: [gives Tomura an army of 100,000 people] [also gives him command of 11 extremely lethal and nigh-unstoppable killing machines, just one of which was almost enough to take out the number one hero, LITERALLY THE STRONGEST GUY THE GOOD GUYS CURRENTLY HAVE IN RESERVE]

everyone: okay we’re sorry we get it you can sto --

Horikoshi: APOCALYPSE IN FOUR MONTHS!!!

everyone: WE GET IT WE’RE SORRY PLEASE

Horikoshi: [GIVES TOMURA ANOTHER POWER-UP]

everyone: [curled up in fetal position sobbing]

starting to think the mangaka might be the actual final villain here. hmm

anyway. so I guess we have four months until Tomura ascends to Actual Godhood and proceeds to rain hellfire down upon the world. what are you all gonna do with your four months. I personally have a lot of stuff to binge, but knowing me I’ll probably just waste all my time reading fanfic while youtube videos play in the background which I’m not paying any attention to. what am I doing with my life

oh were we not done hyping him up? there’s more??

(ETA: I got so caught up in the OFA comment I didn’t pay attention to Tomura becoming a beautiful decayed butterfly in this exquisitely creepy panel here. but damn.)

-- HOLD THE FUCK UP. does Tomura know about One for All??? because I was under the impression that AFO hadn’t told him? this would change a lot if he knew this entire time, holy shit?!

aaaaaaaaand exactly one panel later Horikoshi is all “no he didn’t know calm the fuck down” lol

okay then. so he didn’t know, and he’s only just finding out now. well tbh that’s still worthy of a smiling crying emoji face though :’) this is fineeee

shit here we go oh shit

-- WAIT, SO WE’RE JUST CUTTING AWAY FROM THEM? NOW YOU CUT AWAY? YOU GET WITHIN INCHES OF CONFIRMING THE FUCKING ALL FOR ONE FOR ALL THEORY AND THEN IT’S JUST “ANYWAYS HERE’S ENDEAVOR” YOU KNOW WHAT, HORIKOSHI, I --

just. come on dude. AFOFA 2019! let’s make it happen! dammit

sigh, so looks like it’s back to the admittedly-still-epic “Hawks passes down secret information about the villains to Endeavor” plot. I guess we’re not exactly hurting for good plots all around. I may complain but honestly we are spoiled

so Hawks is saying that he actually doesn’t know the specifics of the villains’ plans yet. well shit

apparently his feathers can only pick up sounds from short range, and the villains keep escorting him away whenever they get to talking about the good stuff. well at least that explains that potential plot hole from last week. Hawks’s feathers may have a short range, but Horikoshi’s plot hole caulking gun can fill in leaky plot holes from fucking miles away. amazing

ffffffff

don’t mind me I’m just sitting here fretting about Hawks continuing to be in mortal danger and risking his life to gather information in a race against time against the end of the world. Horikoshi out here piling up stakes like a freaking vampire hunter

but in the meantime, everyone please stop what you’re doing for a moment to look at this absolute unit of a bellhop slash security guard

apologies Lord Vader he was just trying to get to the dining hall. my bad. as you were

and holy shit I hope you enjoyed that light comedic break because two seconds later Re-Destro has dropped in to fixate Hawks with one of those Lightly Menacing Smiles he’s so infamous for. so that’s just fucking great!

HAWKS WATCH OUT FOR YOUR FINGERS

omg. imagine, a showdown between the two stealth murder MVPs of the series, Yotsubashi “Sleeper Hold” Rikiya (yes I did have to look up his real name just now) and Takami “Tag Em And Bag Em” Keigo. true, RD may no longer have legs, but he didn’t need them to choke out our little mouse buddy now did he? anyways speaking of which I just remembered that I fucking hate Re-Destro and I honestly hope Hawks does kill him. it’d be pretty easy to fit him into a bag too. he’s basically just a torso and arms now

oh sure Horikoshi go ahead and spring this on me after all of that ranting why don’t you

by the way does Re-Destro have Robot Legs now, or

looool he does

I will say this for Horikoshi, he knows my weaknesses. more robot limbs please. either badass or memeable ones, either is fine

meanwhile I skipped over this panel of Hawks and Twice being buddies in order to get to the legs, and shame on me for that. let’s go back

Twice is a genuinely good guy and I hope Hawks can tell. I wonder how fake this smile is. I feel like it’d be easy to relax around Twice regardless of how tense you are about your secret spy mission which could go south at any time. anyways this is wholesome

and now we’re cutting back to Endeavor who is taking his sweet time reacting to this whole thing. Endeavor can you fucking chill with the poker face already geez

okay wait, what

are you serious?! I fucking can’t with this lady. “now make sure to throw these children directly into the line of fire! it’s good for them and builds character!” I’m sorry, I thought this was the Hero Public Safety Commission, not the Putting Juveniles Directly Into Harm’s Way Commission?? at least change the acronym to something more appropriate then. Heinous Pathetic Soulless Cowards. just a suggestion. jesus

anyway so for a moment I got confused as to whether this was implying that she’d told Endeavor about Hawks’s undercover mission. but it seems like he’s still unaware. shouldn’t be too long before he puts the pieces together though at this rate

lol in the very next panel, even

meanwhile you’re just sitting on your ass reading a book! FUCKING DO SOMETHING ALREADY, ENDEAVOR

so he’s thinking that the “preparation” part of Hawks’s message is referring to the interns. let me back up a sec and write down the entire message as he’s read it thus far

“four months from now / rising to action / until then / will send / signals / in case / of failure / preparation / numbers”

...read like that, it really does sound like Hawks is advocating to get as many soldiers ready as possible. even if that includes actual children. including Endeavor’s own son. shit. I mean, I get that they don’t have much of a choice, but that’s still so fucked up. sure, we as omniscient readers know that Deku is their one and only hope, but they don’t know that. as far as they know these are just a bunch of teenagers with less than a year’s worth of experience that they’re propping up on the front lines. and the plan is then... what? hope they don’t die too quickly?? fuck

Hawks is out here having an argument with me in his thoughts. you wanna play it like that, Hawks? fine

I don’t know what kind of “but” you can tag on to the end of that paragraph that could possibly win me over, dude, but go for it I guess

and we’re finally cutting back to the kids in question now! with Burnin’ casually trying to crush Kacchan’s hopes and dreams

okay but I love how both Deku and Shouto are like “easy there buddy, we got you” and trying to keep Kacchan from having a fucking aneurysm sob. JUST TRY AND HOIST HIM ONTO SOME DUMB SIDEKICKS, LADY. YOU’VE MADE A POWERFUL ENEMY HERE TODAY

oh shit

oh my god. are we going to get our first actual interaction between the three of them that doesn’t consist of them grumbling annoyed introductions at each other and then running off to fight an old fortune teller omggggg

I love how Deku and Bakugou look weirdly intimidated by him lol. Bakugou where did all that “YOU’RE KIND OF A JERK” confidence go all of a sudden

YESSSSSSS

GODDAMMIT, I’M STILL SO MAD AT YOU GUYS FOR BEING ALL “LET’S JUST MAKE THE CHILDREN DO IT,” BUT DAMMIT THEY KICK ASS THOUGH SO I CAN KINDA SEE YOUR POINT

NOW HAWKS IS METAING ABOUT THEM AHHHHHHH

DAMN STRAIGHT THEY WOULD HAVE. BRING ON TOMURA AND ALL OF HIS STUPID POWER-UPS. WOW I’M WEIRDLY HYPED UP ALL OF A SUDDEN WHAT’S WRONG WITH ME

AND FUCKING LOOK AT THIS TWO-PAGE SPREAD AHHHHHHHHHHH

MOTHERFUCKER [WHIPS OUT PEN AND NOTEBOOK] TIME TO ANALYZE THIS BITCH

so Ochako and Tsuyu did indeed go back to intern with Ryuukyuu again! makes sense, she is a top ten hero after all. who’s that with them, though? almost looks like Yanagi from the hair and the mask, but the costume looks different? hmm

I CAN’T BELIEVE IIDA WENT BACK TO INTERN WITH FUCKING MANUAL AGAIN. THIS GUY IS THE BRAN CEREAL OF HEROES. though I fucking love him though so yeah it’s fine

JIROU AND SHOUJI TEAMING UP WITH GANG FUCKING ORCA AW YISS BOYS THIS IS THE GOOD SHIT LET’S GOOOO

KOUDA AND MANGA TEAMING UP WITH WASH OMG. MANGA IS THE ONLY ONE ON THAT TEAM WHO ACTUALLY FUCKING SPEAKS. IS WASH’S SIDEKICK SOME SORT OF BROOM PERSON OMG

A WHOLE FUCKING ACRE OF KIDS HAVE ALL GANGED UP ON THIS CAVEMAN-LOOKING FELLA I DON’T EVEN RECOGNIZE. WHO ARE YOU. DID YOU CROSS OVER FROM THE FANTASY AU

KIRI BACK WITH FG AND BROUGHT TETSUTETSU ALONG FOR THE RIDE HELLS YEAHHHH

KAMINARI AND SERO WITH KAMUI WOODS AND EDGESHOT I’M HYPERVENTILATING AHHH. AND SHIOZAKI TOO!! I’LL JUST PRETEND I DON’T SEE MINETA THERE IN THE CORNER. MIGHT BE TIME TO DUST OFF THE OLD “CANCELLED” STAMP AGAIN BUT WE’LL SEE HOW THINGS GO

WHO ARE MOMO AND TOKAGE AND MINA AND AOYAMA (WHICH BTW IS THE GREATEST HERO TEAMUP OF ALL TIME HOLY SHIT) TEAMING UP WITH!? TELL US. AND PONY AND MONOMA. GODDAMMIT HORIKOSHI

whew! anyway. they’re all still screwed, but by golly that was nice to have that little invigorating breather of life and hope

LOL OH SHIT THERE’S ANOTHER ONE

okay, SOMEONE TELL ME RIGHT THE FUCK NOW WHAT ALL MIGHT IS LOOKING AT OR I’M GONNA LOSE IT. holy shit. he was researching the past users of OFA, wasn’t he? WHAT DID YOU FIND OH GOD. he’s not just upset, he looks one step shy of fucking crying?? did he learn about what happened to Nana’s son and his family, maybe? shit shit shit

so Yanagi is interning with Kendou then? so who was that with Hadou and Ryuukyuu and the rest. one of Ryuukyuu’s sidekicks?

IS THAT FUYUMI (SPOILERS FUCKING YEAH IT IS) AND WHY DOES IT LOOK LIKE SHE’S FUCKING PRAYING OMG. it looks like she’s kneeling at a family altar?? like saying a prayer for someone who is PRESUMED DEAD, maybe?? LIKE MAYBE A LONG LOST TWIN BROTHER OH SHIT OUT OF NOWHERE THE HYPE DON’T STOP!!

AND WHY DOES NAO HAVE HIS HAT OFF AND CLUTCHED TO HIS CHEST LIKE HE’S TELLING SOMEONE BAD NEWS. GOD WHAT THE HELL EVEN ARE ALL OF THESE PLOT THINGS HAPPENING ALL OF A SUDDEN. LIKE I DON’T KNOW WHERE TO LOOK NEXT

KUROGIRI AHHHHHHHH

WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING TO ERI’S HORN!? DOES ANYONE ELSE SEE THIS?? AIZAWA??? HELLO!?!?

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, TEAM OT3. TIME TO FUCKING SUIT UP. APPARENTLY. WELL ALL RIGHT THEN. [JACKET ZIP] [GUN COCKING SOUND EFFECT] LET’S GO PUNCH ‘EM IN THE MOUTH

y’all. this chapter was like plot whiplash. this went in so many different directions and hinted at so many different things that I’m at a complete fucking loss as to what to process first. but I guess the interns are gonna save us all, somehow. lol okay then

[dollydeez]

Chapter One Sneak Peek

I’m currently rewriting the ending and haven’t done final edits yet, but I thought I’d go ahead and post the first chapter of Lesbian Robots From Space to give people an idea of what I’m going for with this project. So here it is, Chapter One: Get Lost!

I spent most of my free time wandering around the space station. There wasn’t anything I hadn’t seen, but I’m well known enough in this sector that I pick up just as much business wandering around as sitting in my office. It’s a rough part of the galaxy, so it’s not uncommon for your affairs to get FUBAR. There’s four levels to the thing, going from the hangar at the gravitational bottom to the flats at the top, with a shopping centre and office section respectively in between. I don’t know why old space movies liked spherical buildings, can you imagine how annoying that’d be? Use a cube like a thinking being and maximize your available space. If my flat had a curved ceiling I’d start a riot. And having the hangar in the middle, I mean I guess for military constructions but what the fat cats want for their civilian developments is for people to have to walk through as much commercial space as possible.

My favourite part was checking out the hangar, and not just because it was a hotspot for people on the run. So many ships, from all over, docked here. Swear to god, I saw one that looked exactly like a pickle. Funniest shit I’ve ever seen. I mean, until the crew started spilling out and medics had to be called. People don’t land here because they want to check it out, they land here because they are out of options. We are the Saint Jude of scum. The regular clientele had an effect on the shops offered. Shite specific for those living here were automated, usually owned by the station. Stuff like furniture stores, clothes shops and the grocer’s. There were a couple people trying to hack out a living with their cooking, but… let’s just say if they were good they’d be elsewhere. Hell do I know, I never went into any of those disease factories. Most of the other shops sold guns, parts and medical supplies. It wasn’t the worst place in the world to poke around, it was always entertaining to see some lost yokel argue with someone, who’s surrounded by guns mind you, seemingly unaware that this is absolutely the place your annoying corpse would be chucked into space. I was good friends with Doc, the lad who ran the station’s main medical bay. He was a good kid, just made some mistakes early on and had to move his practice off world. Well, he wasn’t bad. Every so often he’d get bored doing his work. You’d know when to keep your issues to yourself when you saw some poor bastard limping around the food court with the wrong number of limbs, or the right number but on the wrong side. He usually stayed up in his office, however, across from mine. We were friendly enough, and he told his staff to let me wander around the wards.

The limited number of staff made this an absolutely desperate place to seek medical attention. If you weren’t of the species represented in the OR, you might have to cling to life as some doofus flips through a book trying to figure out what the hell you are. So, why not have a little conversation? I’d swoop in, say something about how they seemed to be in some heap of trouble, and most of the time I’d get a job. Money up front of course, and if they argued this point I’d make sure they were clear on how friendly I was with the medic bay. This tactic meant that sometimes they’d take my card and never be heard from again. Which is fine, credits spend the same, but it doesn’t do much for word of mouth. I knew I’d hit the jackpot when someone, gushing blood, would look up with wide eyes and ask if I was Lisa Dean. Why yes, and your price just doubled. Hey, if they know my track record I can put it up front rather than racking up bullshit expenses. If they argue about the rate their buddy got, I’d tell them that if I wasn’t worth it I wouldn’t get recommended. Here I hand them my card, because if they’re bleeding there’s someone who caused that blood and they can get looked for somewhere else. But if they approach me as I’m wandering the rest of the station, I’d invite them up to my office.

I’m still proud of how well I fixed up the place; when I moved in it was little more than a ratty little hole in the wall, wallpaper peeling, lightbulb flickering, dark and damp, reeking of mold, somehow there was a leak from the flats upstairs despite the fact this is a space station and, well, that feels concerning. But I’d moved in with plenty of disposable income and plenty of time, so I made use of the automated stores down stairs. I thought it’d be neat to get some wood inside there, so there was a jarring feeling when you walk in from the outside. Most of the station is boring polished steel, blinking lights, then you enter my office and it’s wood. Getting books for the shelf was a pain, it’s the one thing the station doesn’t sell, so for a while I looked like a real cunt with plenty of shelf space and a handful of books. People would ask about it, which was annoying but, alright, it was a compounding factor on how shady it all seemed, and I’d tell them I’d lost most of my books in the move and was waiting for them to arrive. Which was true enough, at least enough to shut them up about it. But they’d sit across from my desk and tell me the details of their woes, then I’d tell them how I’d solve it for them. It was a pretty good system. Sometimes, I’d have to get them back into the office to go over some details or expenses. I started out my practice letting the expenses slide in exchange for a favour, which people are usually grateful enough to accept, so at this point it was generally understood that you should pay your expenses when I tell you to. When I wanted to get out of the flat but didn’t want to wander around the station, I’d hang out in my office. People coming in at these times were the most annoying, because usually if I don’t want to do a job I can get out of it easily. In the medbay, they’re dying so they’re not in the position to chase after me. Elsewhere, I can either pretend they’ve got the wrong person or give some extravagant price that they won’t concede to. Every so often, I got roped into a job I don’t want to do and I resent it. I even resent it when people come into my office uninvited and put me in the awkward position of turning them away. Usually if I’m upfront about how I find their case boring or trivial, they’ll get all offended and leave. Some require more pushing.

The day began normally. I got up, got ready, and headed out into the world. I didn’t have much going on, and was on the edge of liking it that way. The station was pretty dead for once, with the usually chaotic and filled hangar being nearly empty. I think the only ships there might have belonged to the few residents that owned one. I felt sorry, and still do, for the poor fuckers stuck on that hellhole. Usually what happened was that someone, not knowing better, would land from a nearby planet with little more than a dream and an idea of the cheap real estate. Then they’d chop their ship at one of the shops upstairs, grab a place and a store front, and slowly regret their decision. It was cheap real estate, almost offensively so, but that was because no one in their right mind would show up unless under duress. Sure, Doc might get a poor family that’d gained just enough capital to get up there for his skills, but with orderlies mostly running the OR they usually were disappointed. Then they’d have a “well, we’re here, sad and hungry” meal from one of the subpar restaurants before heading back to their planet. So those who sold their way off to settle here were more or less stuck in relative poverty. Don’t get me wrong, I’d be happy if a legitimately talented chef or whatever risked everything to set up shop here and succeeded their way back off, but I’ve never seen it happen. Even when someone has been somewhat of a draw, it was never enough to get a ship and enough money to set up somewhere nicer. The only one I’ve seen get close is Synthia Gray, who garnered good reviews and quite a few people going out of their way to try her food. But the area’s too dangerous for anyone who could have a real impact, or the masses that might do the same, to come by. I just remember them packing up all her stuff one day, saying it’d been auctioned off. Turns out she decided to try her luck leaving the station, only without a ship or a suit. Sweet girl, I was always sorry it happened to her, but it was inevitable as soon as she stepped foot here. People don’t leave, not when they’re attached to it financially.

My theory is that the owners rig the price just so in order to attract desperate people. Those people pay rent, usually two forms of rent, while buying all their goods from the company and paying “taxes” on all the money they make. It’s an absolute racket, designed to keep this sorry excuse of a space station staffed enough to keep it used and profitable. Most people end up going into debt after settling. If the company had a heart, they’d offer some sort of way off when people go broke, but instead they allow people to run up the score. It’s indentured servitude to make the station seem full and welcoming to anyone willing to put money into a bad investment.

In any case, I was one of the few fortunate enough to have a ship still in the hangar. Which was good news for both me and the station itself, as I needed it to work. Can’t quite look into things if I’m stuck on a hunk of metal orbiting aimlessly around some nothing gas giant. I like to keep it tuned up, making sure it’s ready to go at a moment’s notice and taking it for a short spin every so often to make sure it can, in fact, work. I love my ship, but I feel like other people feel that on an entirely different level. It’s a reliable and necessary tool, but I don’t see much need in worrying about it being clean or looking nice or whatever. I’ll get a Wash Me on the window if I haven’t taken it out in too long, but I’ll just scrub it off. As long as it gets me from point A to point B I’m happy with it. After I gave it a good look over, because what the fuck else was I going to do, I headed up to the shopping area to wander around for a little bit. It was boring. Even Doc’s was mostly empty, with the one person being looked after having cut himself deeply out of sheer clumsiness. I wasn’t quite ready to go back to the flat, I wanted to keep it a space I felt good in, so I headed back to my office. And there was someone waiting for me. I did not like this, and I’m still not super happy about it.

She was sat in my office chair, usually reserved for active clients, and dressed in all black. Even when I walked in, she continued boohooing into her snot rag, you know how these mucus gremlins are, with loud and halting cries. I could see flakes of red hair poking out of her garish black hat, complete with a little veil in front of her face. I cleared my throat and she finally turned around.

“Are you Lisa Dean?”

“That’s what it says on the door.”

I made my way to my desk, and she looked up at me from her hunched posture with wet eyes. I had to awkwardly shimmy between the close wall and my desk, an act I don’t like doing in front of people who might be deciding to pay me, before sitting down. She could hardly put words together and babbled incoherently.

“I’m guessing someone’s dead?”

Mistake. This set her off with a loud wail and I had to wait it out. I flipped through an old magazine on my desk and cursed myself for not picking up a newspaper. Apparently those skis were still available with an exclusive discount. Eventually her sobs started to stabilize and it seemed as though she were about to speak, so I tilted the magazine down.

“My wife… she’s gone!”

This had my attention. A lover, possibly murdered, possibly missing, but either way a mystery? Grand, sounds to be quite the adventure.

“So, in your words, what’s happened?”

She sniffled a bit, then took a few deep breaths to collect herself.

“I woke up one day and she was gone, with a note left saying she’d left and her ship was gone. But I know she would have never done something like that!”

“I’m not saying I won’t take the case, but given the evidence she just left don’t you think this getup is a bit much?”

“She would never! She would never do such a thing, the possibility wouldn’t even be in her programming it’s so antithetical-”

“Whoa, stop right there. Her programming?”

“She was a robot, but what we had was so real.”

“Buy another.”

“Excuse me?”

“Your bot babe was defective. Buy. Another.”

I brought the magazine back up to my face and let her spit and sputter. She seemed the type to have always gotten her way, daddy’s favourite, and I’ll be honest I took some joy in saying no. She composed herself and stood, placing a calling card on my desk.

“Regardless, I’ve heard you’re the best. If you change your mind, please give me a call.”

“Mkay.”

She kept standing there, looming over me, until I placed the square into my desk drawer. Who even does that? A square card? Where is that meant to go? A purse I suppose, so I’ll respect the specificity of use, but if she was married it was an oversight to not update it for easier storage. That said, I’m probably over analysing it and should concentrate on telling the story. That’s what’s important, the story, not any of these bullshit details. In all honesty, I might just be bored and pointing out shite like this for the drama. In any case, she took her leave and I went back to reading my magazine. Halfway into an article on exercise routines, for whatever reason, I put it down to go buy a paper because if I had to keep reading this sports magazine I’d punch a hole in the station wall.

I was sitting in the local saloon, watching Doc get absolutely hammered. From that and the blood drenching his coat, you’d assume he’d had a rough day and was having to work through some heavy shite. You would be wrong. Not to suggest he is drenched in blood on a daily basis, although it isn’t an unusual occurrence, but he did enjoy drinking until he had to be carried back upstairs. It was a bad idea to say it, or even imply it, but there was a common understanding that this habit most likely landed him on the station. It was generally accepted that you do not want to piss off the person who has a say in you getting patched up, and if you’re going to be doing something especially dangerous, do it early to be on the safe side. So he’s leaning on the bar, gripping his beer as if it was about to float away, and grimacing. The poor busboy was holding his mop by the tip of the handle to mop up the pool of blood slowly forming underneath Doc’s stool and holding his breath in an effort not to be noticed. I wouldn’t call Doc a mean drunk, as that would imply he was different the rest of the time. Bless him, he was a bastard but wholly honest about it. I leaned forward as he started mumbling, the reek of beer and whisky pouring from his mouth more freely than from the taps, just in case he was trying to talk to me. He bolted upright and grabbed me by the lapel, pulling me close and forcing eye contact.

“No one here today! Only the cunts showed! Cunts, all of them, screaming and bleeding and all but pissing themselves, whining for their mammies!”

He slumped back against the bar and placed his face into his arms, and Frankie, our bartender, looked over to me. I nodded, resenting the fact I’d need a wash after taking him to his place. He turned his head, ear now pressed firmly against the bar and seemed like he was looking for a response.

“Yeah, Doc, absolutely awful. Only job offer I got was to locate a missing bot, wasn’t about to take a salvage job.”

He pushed himself up, working his way into a maniacal laugh, and I had to put a hand on his back to keep him from going arse over teakettle.

“What’s her name?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I have her card upstairs, she wouldn’t leave until I took it.”

“She fit?”

“Not your type, I don’t think.”

“Certainly ways to change that. ‘Not my type’, feh! Insult my skills.”

Knocking my arm away, he took another swig of beer and lied back down on the counter. He should have been cut off hours ago, but Frankie was in the odd position of having to poison the man who might save her life, or he might not out of spite. Well, if you were lucky he’d leave it at that. Most of the time, the blood was from boredom more than altruism. If you made the mistake of causing a ruckus in his med bay, well let’s just say that being handed over to Doc to be handled personally usually was a bad sign. He did personally take care of station residents, at least the ones whose death would be inconvenient for him, but, again, that was only a good thing at the right time of day. Stubborn as a mule, if he wanted to be hands on begod no one would stop him. Which is unfortunate for everyone, including Doc. That’s how Frankie got her job, and it took him almost a year to adjust.

Luckily, Doc wouldn’t argue against the saloon closing and would allow himself to be walked home, usually with a takeaway cup in tow. As the clock struck three, I picked him up and half dragged him away from the bar. He woke up enough to start struggling, reaching toward where he had been with both arms extended.

“Drink!”

“Alright, give me a second.”

I sat him back down on his stool and leaned him on his arm so he’d stay upright. Frankie, who always waited and watched to make sure Doc left without a fuss, already had his cup ready and mouthed a thank you. When I handed him the paper cup, he took a few sips from his straw, readied himself and nodded. He could almost stand, so I had to prop him up by the armpit and lead him to the elevator.

“Real sorry situation.”

“Mhm.”

It was hard to make out the words, but regardless of what he was talking about I was not about to treat it as anything but gospel. He was slumped in the corner of the elevator, barely supporting himself on the banister. The one advantage of helping Doc home is that, despite how busy it is at this time of night, we’d get an elevator to ourselves for a quick trip home. It was a quieter trip than most nights, as he was just staring down at his cup. The ones where he was overly rowdy were definitely worse, but I enjoyed hearing him drunkenly ramble about some random topic. I don’t know if him being a doctor made it more or less weird, but he was well read on the most obscure topics. He once described, in detail, the history of the human homeworld, but with a topic like that it was equally plausible he was making up most of it. Either way was entertaining. But this, this was just sad. The elevator dinged, the doors opened, and I helped him out into the hallway.

“Right, so how far do you need?”

“Bed.”

His flat was fairly close to the elevator, either by planning on his part or coincidence, so it wasn’t too much trouble. I tried to prop him up against the wall to search him for his keys, but he just slid down it. He slapped my hand away when I tried to get to his pockets anyway.

“Leave here.”

“You know you’ll be furious tomorrow if I do.”

“Fair.”

Pawing at his pants, he managed to drop the keys onto the floor. I unlocked the door, then got him up and into the apartment. Ratty is the best way to describe it. I am fully aware we are off-planet, but you could easily convince me there’s any number of vermin among the wreckage. Due to his importance to the maintenance of the place, I’m pretty sure he’s paid more than anyone here, especially since most people don’t get paid at all, but you couldn’t tell from the state of his flat. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was the brokest of all of us, but I don’t think that even matters to him. This wasn’t the first time I had to take him inside, but I always had to adjust to the absolute squalor. It never fully sunk in, the way he lived, if you want to call it that.

There was a relatively clean recliner in the telly area, so I left him there while I got his bed ready. I set up a glass of water and some paracetamol for him in the morning, then brought him over to tuck him in. He kicked off his shoes and curled up in the middle of the mattress, so I put the duvet over him. We were close, but it was well established that he’d rather sleep fully clothed than go through the further indignity of being stripped. The one time I tried, he fought back with tears in his eyes. I didn’t see much, but I remember a large scar across his middle. I’m happy not knowing.

After I got upstairs and cleaned myself up, I sat down on my couch. Any other day, a rejected case would be the last thing on my mind, but I couldn’t help thinking about the one I found in my office. If she wants to waste her money having someone turn up a lost appliance, I have no issue with it, but the gall of seeking me out and expecting me to waste my time with that nonsense was infuriating. But it was none of my business, I made that quite clear. I lied down on the couch and flipped on the telly, not ready to power down for the night. Nothing good was on, so I shuffled through the channels and watched the shadows dance on the wall. It would be a safety nightmare, but times like these I desperately wished we could have windows. There were a couple planets close enough to watch, sitting in a ship outside, and plenty of stars of course. I always loved the look of it, the majesty of the universe, but there was hardly an opportunity to enjoy it anymore. Well, if I wanted it I could have it, but there didn’t seem to be a point to it. I find work by being in the station, and that pays the bills. Plus, the stars just looked duller nowadays. Better off to stay at home and watch whatever brain drain they’re pumping out to the screens of the galaxy.

[cravingcrazewriting]

Reinvent Yourself {Treebros}

(Sorry about the error in the first one! It won’t let me edit it at the moment)

Being a shapeshifter was convenient for a number of reasons.

Evan could pretend to be anyone but himself, well, as long as he didn't strain himself too hard (that was never fun). He could completely redesign his body and alter the features he hated so much.

Even if he'd grown up in the confides of a government lab, and he didn't exactly get a childhood, he deserved to have a little fun, damn it, and explore the world he barely knew. He was finally free, and could do whatever he wanted.

Well, nothing illegal, obviously. He also had to keep an eye out for any government agents looking for him. But that was besides the point.

After flashing an ID at the bouncer, he stepped inside the bar and immediately was met with quite possibly the most beautiful person there.

They had a long, well built figure, with oak brown hair that poured down to their shoulders. Around their waist was a leather jacket, and they were wearing a black tank top, accompanied with multiple rings on long fingers, and ripped jeans to tie the whole outfit together.

Immediately, Evan turned on his heel and ran out and into an alleyway. He had to impress the beautiful stranger, and well, he couldn't, being his actual, boring self. His boring, actual self, who had sandy blonde hair, green eyes and the right mixed with red, soft skin, a snake tattoo on his upper back, little to no muscle whatsoever, and sort of plump build.

Throwing off a drawstring bag he previously had around his shoulders, he quickly stripped naked so his clothes wouldn't rip. Once this was done, he shut his eyes, and tried to imagine himself changing into a more attractive person.

He imagined curly, brown hair, a large physique, skinny waist, and a sharp jawline. Yeah, that'd do. He could change into the opposite sex, but most times he preferred using a male form, but couldn't do an animal, but everything else was fair game.

Bones began to unhinge and rearrange, as muscles started to expand, as his size grew, hair curled to his will, his vocal cords deepened, as his body made snapping and twisting sounds (it was never pleasant to do, let alone listen to).

When he opened his eyes, he was an entirely different person. On the outside, at least, but he could fake it till he made it, he supposed. It would work for the time being, until he didn't have to pretend anymore.

He doubted that'd be anytime soon, though, but that was beside the point.

Evan pulled out his ID again and looked directly at it. What was special about it was that it scanned all of his new facial features, and printed it onto the photo, adding on other specifics, like his height and stuff.

He strode over to the bouncer with confidence in his step, after putting a different set of clothes on, showed him the new ID, and went inside to find the beautiful stranger.

The Beautiful Stranger was sitting on a stool, on their phone, and a class of water sitting in front of them. They moved a hand downwards, and moved the sleeve of their leather jacket, before grabbing the water and taking a sip.

Evan decided to take the initiative, slowly sitting next to them, sparing a glance at their features.

They were a lot stronger than Evan anticipated. While they didn't have a body builder physic, the discarded jacket left a full view of two defined and broad biceps that this person could use to easily pin Evan against a wall or something because he just wasn't that strong of a guy. Sure, he could make himself strong, but it wore him out faster.

He wanted to speak to Beautiful Stranger, but the bartender already came over, and was asking him what he wanted to drink.

"Just some water, please," Evan didn't put any thought into the order, he just wanted the bartender to leave him alone. He spared a glance at Beautiful Stranger, wanting to initiate a conversation somehow.

Maybe a compliment would do? He wouldn't know, he never flirted with anyone before.

"Your hair looks soft," as he let the words unintentionally tumble out of his mouth, he realized that was a really fucking weird thing to say to someone. It sounded weird, too, and he was probably freaking Beautiful Stranger out, now.

Beautiful Stranger turned their head towards Evan, surprised by the compliment, but they smiled, and it was small and kind and friendly and just really nice.

"Thank you," they nodded their head at Evan, in a friendly type of way.

Evan wasn't good at upholding conversations. He really preferred it when someone else upheld it for him, because coming up with questions and creating small talk just wasn't his forte. "Where— where do you get it styled?"

"Oh um, this is all natural, actually," Beautiful Stranger gestured to the wild curls. Evan internally decided he'd keep referring to them as them until he heard a name or other characteristics because he did not want to assume anything. "It's god awful to take care of. It just— does it's own thing— that's how curly it is, it's ridiculous. Back in high school my dad would always tell me to chop it if I complained, but I was as stubborn as a mule, I suppose."

"I can't say the same," Evan chuckled meekly. "My uh— I was never aloud to grow out my hair. They always c-chopped it if I tried growing it out." Back when he was still living in a lab, his primary caretaker, Doctor Sherman, didn't let Evan grow out his hair or change it in any way, shape, or form. Previously before, he didn't know why they wouldn't let him grow it out or dye it, but he knew it was just to keep his appearance consistent on his file. Now that he was free, he was growing out his natural hair to a mullet.

"Oh," Beautiful Stranger looked like they wanted to say more, but chose not to. "I'm sorry," they looked away from him.

And just like that, the conversation died.

Evan resisted the urge to sigh, instead drinking his water, slightly disappointed. He needed a new plan, so he paid and left the bar, going back to the alleyway.

If some friendly banter didn't work, maybe seduction would do the trick? While he didn't know what attracted Beautiful Stranger, he decided he'd settle on a tall, skinny girl, with long, black hair, and would wear a shiny, ruby red dress with flats. It'd be the easiest way to find out what exactly caught Beautiful Stranger's eye (and if Beautiful Stranger seemed uncomfortable, Evan would back off, because he would never want to do something like that to them).

He let his muscles shrink and become more femininely shaped, as fat faded away and gentle curves smoothed their way up his thighs and hips, and his bones shrank and rearranged, as his face become a softer shape (despite having a women's body, he still preferred being as a guy).

Evan once again showed the bouncer his ID as he entered, spotting Beautiful Stranger just where he left them. He strutted over to him, feigning confidence, and willing his hands not to shake.

He gave them a gentle shoulder stroke to catch their attention, and trailed his finger down their arm.

Beautiful Stranger shuddered at the touch, and looked at Evan, seeming to be surprised.

"Hey hot stuff," he purred, silently hoping he was coming off as seductive and not as a predator or anything. "You're looking very nice tonight."

They chuckled somewhat awkwardly, and gave a little smile. "Um.. thanks?"

"You come here often?" Evan leant against the counter, allowing a relaxed pose to take its place.

"Not really? Look, you're attractive, and I mean like, super attractive, you're so beautiful but..." Beautiful Stranger let out a sigh. "I've stopped doing one night stands, and I'm here with my sister, celebrating something kinda important. So if you're looking for a hookup, sorry, but I can't."

Evan was surprised by his honesty, but stood up straight, knowing he wasn't wanted anymore. "Alright, I get it. I'll be on my way."

"Thank you," They seemed relieved. As Evan made his way out, he could feel their eyes on them. They cleared their throat and said, "Is that a snake tattoo?"

Evan turned his head back, seeing some of his tattoo slip out. He supposed he shouldn't have been surprised, as the dress he wore was a bit revealing, especially in his backside. He just nodded.

"What's it mean?" Beautiful Stranger asked.

Ironically, Evan had never been the one who chosen that tattoo. Doctor Sherman chose where it went and what it was, and that was that. That was four years ago, and he was just twenty two, and while he could try to get it removed, it was a special tattoo that changed along with whatever form he took (the same went with his right red-green eye).

"Er— I guess it's a conception of judging something by it's appearance, but it being completely different," he just made all of that up, because what else was he supposed to say?

Beautiful Stranger hummed thoughtfully, before turning away from him.

Throughout the night, Evan tried using different forms and personalities in an attempt to impress Beautiful Stranger, but none seemed to work. They didn't seem to bat an eye at the different people he made, and whatever conversations they had were short and unimportant. Evan could only assume they just didn't like him. It was somehow, still, just him.

Evan entered the bar a final time that evening, wearing a basic blue button up, neat jeans that had little to no holes, and a grey jacket, as he swung his drawstring bag that was filled with his various outfits he'd used that night. Evan was tired, and quite frankly just wanted to drink and to drown his sorrows in them. In the back of his mind, he told himself to stay sober enough to rent a motel to pass out in (he didn't have an actual place to stay).

He sat down a couple of seats away from Beautiful Stranger. He just couldn't bear another rejection or let down. He wanted to be alone, probably for the first time all night, with whatever drink he'd buy.

"What'll it be?" The bartender from earlier approached him.

"I'd like some Rose Wine, p-please," Evan fidgeted with the hem on his jacket. "And put it on my tab?"

As he ordered, he couldn't help but feel a set of eyes on him, which was weird, because he wasn't remotely interesting to be watching. While granted, Evan was a shapeshifter, he tried to live his life as vanilla as possible, because that's what he missed, he never got to live normally, and he probably never will, because the government is still after him, and all he wants to do is meet his mom, who supposedly just 'gave him up', which he doesn't really buy, not at all, and go live in Canada, because he erased all files on him before he left, so they wouldn't be able to get him (or at least, he assumed). The only thing holding him back was the lack of money he had, and he'd need a job for a good solid few months, but he also couldn't stay on the streets, because that was unsanitary, and it was only going to get colder and colder each and every day.

"Bad day?" A familiar voice asked above him, settling into the seat beside his.

Evan didn't even want to raise his head to face them, so he just shrugged feebly. "Shitty night..." he said softly, and fuck, when did his eyes start watering? Doctor Sherman always called him sensitive, and told him he needed to mask and control his emotions. It wasn't like he could control his emotions, no matter how much he wanted to, because feelings were complicated and messy, and he just wanted them gone so he wouldn't have to deal with him.

"You um, wanna talk about it?" The stranger offered, and his curiosity got the better of him, as he raised his head from the counter top, and wow, okay, it was Beautiful Stranger sitting next to him, giving him a look of worry that could be compared to offering someone their condolences when a family/friend died, which was kind of baffling, because they hadn't really cared about him before, well, more like the different versions of him, actually, they'd never formally met like his true, god awful form, and yet he was getting more attention than any of his others did.

For obvious reasons, he couldn't tell him he was trying to talk to him all night, because he'd sound crazy, so he had to make something up. "Er— my b-boyfriend, he didn't like how anxious I was— or well, still am, actually— with like, everything, and I— I tried to change for him, but... nothing worked... so he b-broke it off with me..."

"So wait. You were trying to change yourself for some selfish asshole, while you have anxiety?" Beautiful Stranger looked pissed off, but not at him.

Evan nodded feebly, not saying anything. Really, what could he have said?

"You deserve better than him," Beautiful Stranger said firmly, shaking their head. "You're better off."

The bartender set down a cup of Rose Wine, and Evan suddenly remembered his plan. Taking the cup, he downed it and asked, "Why're you here?"

"Celebrating with my sis. I'm four years clean from cutting and two years clean from smoking weed," it was weird, because they seemed more eager to tell him about this than before in his other form.

"That— that's great," he smiled at them, because it was great, and it had to be a big achievement if they felt the need to celebrate it.

"It hasn't been easy, but it's worth it... What about you?" Again, there's hesitation in their voice, but they fight through it. It's kind of admirable.

In a way, Evan's addicted to shapeshifting. He absolutely loves being able to reinvent himself, despite the pain that rushes through his body, and it never fails to get his blood pumping.

But it's another thing he can't tell Beautiful Stranger. So, he says, "Lying. I hate conflict."

"But you aren't lying to me," Beautiful Stranger was smiling at him, and was he flirting? Evan couldn't tell.

"Or— or so you think," really, he was lying to them, but only about small stuff.

"If you were lying, you'd get defensive, and well, you aren't," Beautiful Stranger laughed slightly.

Evan sputtered, "I mean— well—I guess."

Beautiful Stranger squinted at him, and then smiled, "Wait, hold on, you have it too?"

"Have— have w-what too?" Evan was confused by what he meant.

"Your eye. It's got a little red in it," they clarified.

Evan's face flushed, and he looked away, covering it. Doctor Sherman could never find out where the red came from, and called it a 'scientific anomaly'. "Oh... sorry. It's weird, I know."

"Wait, no! I didn't mean it like that!" Beautiful Stranger rushed, and— that's their hand? It's so soft. "Just. Look at me?"

Evan sighed internally, but complied, and watched Beautiful Stranger brush their beautiful, long hair out of their face, revealing his left brown eye with a large amount of blue in it. He gasped, gazing at it.

"I wanted to say we both have Heterochromia," they chuckled awkwardly.

"Oh..." Evan said softly, trying hard not to stare at them. He knew from experience how awkward it was to have people staring at him, but he couldn't help it. They were just... so beautiful (hence the nickname), and Evan would stare at them for forever if he could, and fuck, their hand was still on top of his, and their gaze was directed at him and felt all too tingly in a sudden moment.

His thoughts were interrupted by the bartender coming by. "Want a refill?"

Evan nodded to them, and watched as the cup filled once more with the Rose Wine, taking it afterwards, and took another drink.

Beautiful Stranger grimaced, "Please tell me you didn't drive here."

Evan finished half of it before setting the cup down. The alcohol was really starting to set in. "Can't drive if I don't have a car," he shot finger guns at him somewhat awkwardly.

"So you walked," they assumed, "cause I don't think you'll be okay to go out on the streets like this."

"I'll be fine!" Evan laughed, and oh yeah, the alcohol was really hitting now. "I don't—" he hiccuped, probably from not having any water in between drinks. "I don't even know y-your— name!"

"It's Connor. Connor Murphy," Beautif— no, Connor Mur— no, beautiful Connor Murphy, smiled at him, and Evan decided it was safe to assume his pronouns were he/him unless told otherwise.

Evan slowly raised his arm so Connor could take his hand, but it probably looked weird, but everything was spinning and he'd rather not fall off of his stool and get a concussion. Never the less, Connor The Beautiful took his hand and shook it.

"I'm... beautiful," he whispered, not really used to calling Connor by his actual name. He was just so beautiful, he couldn't help it.

"While I won't deny that, I still need your name," Connor laughed, letting go of his hand. Evan just let it drop, sort of like it was weightless.

"Oh," Evan drank the rest of his second cup, and asked for a third. He laughed at the fuzziness gathering in his chest and said, "It's Evan."

Oh so beautiful Connor was smiling shyly at him. "Well Evan, maybe I can convince my sister to give you a ride home?"

It dawns on Evan that he kind of can't accept his offer. He'd love to, definitely, without a doubt, but he just have a home. His cup was filled once again, so he took another drink, trying to figure out how to tell Connor he couldn't without hurting his feelings.

"I— don't have one," well, congratulations Evan, for being brutally honest with this super hot stranger that he'd never see again.

Admitting to homelessness probably always sparked concerned, Evan reasoned to himself, as he saw Connor's expression melt into shock. "What? But where have you been staying?"

"Shelters, hotels, motels, and sometimes on a bench," he laughed dryly. He was painfully used to this routine by now, but it's not like he could leave.

"God, I'm so sorry for asking," Connor groaned, hiding his face in his hand.

Another drink went down the hatch. " 'm not mad or anyth'ng, you d'dn't know." He was forgetting to articulate his 'i's, he was aware, but did that really matter? No, he was drunk, and he could do whatever he wanted (well, he'd probably get in trouble, but that didn't matter to his drunken mind).

"Fuck, are you going to be okay?" Again, there was that look of worry, while Sober Evan would appreciated, Drunk Evan didn't want to be pitied.

" 'll be fine," he insisted, his cup becoming empty. "Just need a motel."

"Well when you're done, can I take you to one?" Connor took a moment to pause. "And I know it's weird, because we barely know each other, but I promise it's not out of pity, but because you're important."

'Important to the government? Yes. Important around here? No,' Evan thought to himself, but didn't actually say it. "Okay."

While Evan had a couple more drinks, Connor made some small talk. He talked about how hellous his high school years were, as he was at the bottom of the food chain, among with the relentless expectations from his parents didn't make life easier. He'd spiraled into depression, and struggled with it for the longest time, but eventually got a support system he could fall back on if needed be. He went into Graphic Design and was interning to design Buildboards with a company. In the spring, he'd graduate and start working there, while his sister majored in Astromony, and her girlfriend, Alana graduated early with to be a Paralegal (that was normal for her, because she always went the extra mile, he explained).

Once done, Connor talked to a blonde haired girl Evan could only assume was Zoe. With every passing moment, he could feel his legs wobble and he had to use the counter to stay upright. Connor noticed this, and coaxed Evan into grabbing onto his shoulder for balance, which was super nice, as he lead him out into his car.

It was embarrassing that he couldn't even get his seatbelt on without help, but all he could do was slump back against against the seat and mope. Connor was typing into his phone, looking for a nearby motel, most likely, and Evan couldn't help but feel just... so lucky. He knew guys like Connor weren't nearly as common as he'd like to believe, and just the fact he was doing this for him... Just was amazing.

Finding a motel didn't take nearly as long as he thought it would, much to Evan's disappointment. Was it wrong he wanted to be around him so much? He barely knew him, and yet there he was, wanting to see him again.

"Can you get inside okay?" Connor turned to him once the car was parked.

Really, Connor was just too sweet for his own good. Was he trying to leave Evan swooning hopelessly after him, cause he hoped not. "Yeah. It's just a few feet."

But just when he was about to step out of the car, Connor spoke up, "Can I have your number?"

Evan felt frozen in his spot, out of fear or anticipation, he couldn't tell.

"It's just— believe it or not, I've had a really nice time talking with you tonight, and I wanted to see you again," Holy fuck, that smile, it was like finding a diamond in the rough. So beautiful and rare, and aimed just at him.

Evan could feel himself fumbling for his phone, and handed it over, watching Connor take his out so he could take it. He silently typed in his number, seeing Connor smiling as he did the same, and they swapped back. He couldn't believe it. He'd gotten Connor's number.

And as he stumbled into the cheapest motel room he could find for the night, he felt like he finally did something right for once.

[find-the-eyes]

I’ll Try Anything Once, Chapter 47

Written by: Sol, Allegra, Beth Edited by: Sol, Allegra, Beth

Alex didn’t know if Nick had ever properly celebrated a holiday. Sure, Nick had mentioned getting gifts for Christmas and dressing up for Halloween in passing, but Alex was never sure just how legit his celebrations were. Most of what Nick talked about felt sad, almost— Alex wasn’t sure how it would feel to have his childhood memories invalidated in front of him, so he tried to listen and relate as much as he could. Holidays were no exception.

Whether or not Nick had ever actually celebrated Christmas, Alex was determined to make the day special. He thought about all of his favorite foods he ate on Christmas Day back home, and tried to make a list of which ones could be cooked in the flat, and a list of those that Nick would like.

After a few minutes of quiet reflection, Alex realized he was still sitting on the beanbag chair and should be doing chores and figuring out Christmas dinner before Nick woke up and needed help. He stood and stretched, grabbing his phone off the nightstand and heading out to the living room. His mother made the best spanakopita in the world (in his opinion) and he wanted to give Nick a taste of Christmas in Greece.

Alex still felt terrible for not going home. His family was always extremely close and he was the only one who had left the country permanently. But he couldn't leave Nick, and he couldn't take Nick with him, so that was that. Alex dialed his home phone number and waited.

“Alex!” His mother answered the phone cheerily.

“Hi, mum. Happy Christmas Eve.”

“It’s so nice to talk to you! How is everything?”

"Uhh, I'm alright," Alex said, not ready to give her an update on Nick's condition. "So, I wanted to make your spanakopita for tomorrow, but--"

"Oh!!" As soon as Alex mentioned his favorite food from back home, his mother began listing ingredients. He scrambled to find a stray scrap of paper to write them down on.

Five minutes later, after she had rattled off the ingredients, the steps, and every secret trick that she knew to make the pie perfect, Alex's mother let out a sigh. "Got all that?"

"I think so," Alex said, biting the cap of his pen. "Thanks, mum."

"Of course, dear. How's Nick, by the way?"

At this, Alex could feel himself tense up. Nick was supposedly asleep in the other room, but Alex always felt nervous talking about him. He was clueless as to what Nick could and couldn’t hear, or if he was even asleep at all.

“He’s doing better,” Alex finally decided to say, “but the doctor hasn’t cleared him yet. He still has a long way to go until he’s all the way better.”

"Cleared him for what?"

Alex clenched his teeth, remembering that he hadn't actually told his mother what had happened. "Cleared him to breathe on his own. Without the ventilator."

"He's using a ventilator?! Alex, you never told me!" The worried tone of his mother's voice made Alex feel terrible. "What happened to him?"

"He jumped off the stage at a gig and hit the barrier the wrong way and injured his lung." The memory of it made Alex shut his eyes and shudder. "But he's getting a lot better, and he can go without the ventilator for meals and stuff."

“That’s… alarming. But it’s good to hear that he’s recovering.”

“Yeah. I should probably go check on him; he’s still asleep…”

“Oh, well.. I guess I’ll talk to you later. I hope everything goes well. Tell Nick I said to feel better.”

Alex laughed softly, “Alright, mum. Love you.”

Alex snuck back into Nick’s room to find him still asleep. He went to the side of Nick’s bed and stroked his hair. Nick grabbed Alex’s arm and pulled on it. Oh. Bad dream.

Avoiding crushing Nick, Alex hopped over him and got under the blankets. Nick immediately hugged Alex with his entire body, even tangling his legs with Alex’s. Alex smiled slightly as Nick continued to cuddle him. Even when he was scared or asleep, or both, Nick was so good at cuddling.

Nick was eventually startled out of his dream. He wiggled a bit, and then found Alex again.

“Good morning,” Alex smiled as Nick held onto him.

--

A few hours later, after tidying up the flat, Alex decided it was time to get to work on making the best Christmas meal Nick would ever have.

“Want to come to the store with me, Nick?” Alex asked as he flopped down next to Nick on the sofa.

NIck shook his head frantically, not wanting anyone to see him in the state he was in. Seeing Julian a few days ago had been enough interaction. He didn’t want to upset anyone else with his condition. He didn’t want any more pitying glances and mumbles of ‘feel better.’

“Oh… are you sure? Maybe it would be good to get out of the flat for a bit…”

“I’m sure,” Nick said softly. He missed being outside, but the thought of leaving the flat terrified him. No one could see him like this.

“Yeah, I guess that’s alright. It would be sneaking out, after all, and maybe we’d run into someone from the hospital who knows you’re not allowed to be out,” Alex rambled, trying to stop himself from worrying about Nick. “Want anything specific from the store?”

“An ice lolly?”

“Nick, it’s December!”

“Please?”

Alex looked at Nick to find him staring at him, his blue eyes wide and full of love. “Fine, I’ll buy you ice lollies. What flavor?”

“Cherry.”

“Alright,” Alex laughed to himself as he got up. “Want anything else?”

Nick shook his head. “Just ice lollies.”

“See you later, then. Call if you need anything.”

—

Alex came back an hour later, smelling like winter air and feeling like it too. Nick picked up his ventilator and wobbled to him to help assess the items he had brought home.

“Ice lollies!” Nick laughed, surprised that Alex had actually listened to his request. He also saw hot cocoa mix on the counter and did a tiny fist pump to himself.

“I got marshmallows, too!” Alex wiggled the bag of marshmallows in front of Nick’s face.

“Marshmallows!” Nick grabbed the bag and clutched it to his chest. Alex laughed and wrapped his arms around Nick.

"How would you like to go on a date?" Alex asked, retrieving the bag of marshmallows with one hand and resting his other hand on Nick's hip.

"A...date?" Nick's expression brightened, then immediately fell. "But I can't...go out."

"Yeah! A date right here in the flat!" Alex placed the bag on the counter and slipped his now-free hand onto Nick's other hip, holding him close. "A hot cocoa and cuddling date! We can watch a movie and I'll make you dinner later. How does that sound?"

Nick’s eyes lit up as he nodded and hugged Alex. “It sounds… good. Really good!”

Alex smiled back and kissed Nick's forehead. "Let me just get some things ready, okay?" Nick nodded, unable to hide the grin behind his mask. He followed Alex into the kitchen and retrieved an ice lolly from the freezer.

Alex followed all the steps his mother had told him, taking care to use exact measurements of everything. He wanted to make the pie perfect for Nick. Nick had offered to help in any way he could, but Alex simply waved him off and told him to relax. So Nick did. His mask lay on the table before him as he savored the ice lolly and watched Alex work. Nick smiled to himself at how focused Alex was.

"What movie do you want to watch?" Alex asked as he finished chopping the spinach and poured it into the pan on the stove.

"Oh...I don't know... I'll watch anything," Nick said with a shrug. Alex frowned. Nick never really made decisions for himself, did he? He just went along with whatever Alex (or anyone else) said. Alex flipped on the burner and waited for the pan to warm up to saute the spinach and onions.

"Come on, you must have an idea of what you want!" Alex said cheerily, hoping Nick would actually make a decision. Nick only made a vague noise and focused on his ice lolly. Alex suppressed a sigh and turned his attention back to the food. That conversation would have to wait for another time.

Once the pie was fully prepared, Alex placed it in the fridge to be baked later. "Want to go out to the sofa and I'll make us our hot cocoa?" Nick, who had finished eating and placed the mask back on his face, nodded vigorously. He stood up and slowly made his way back to the living room, wobbling with each step but managing to keep himself upright.

Alex made the cocoa and tossed a few marshmallows on top of each mug. He carefully placed them on the coffee table and sat down on the couch before immediately jumping back up. "Ah, one more thing!" He dashed off to his bedroom, leaving Nick to stare down the hall in confusion. Alex returned a moment later with a silver-and-red-striped parcel and a grin on his face. "Merry Christmas!"

Nick froze for a moment - Alex had gotten him a gift? He blinked and took the package, running his hands over the wrapping paper. He wasn't used to people doing nice things for him, and he certainly hadn't expected or wanted anything. A wave of guilt washed over him - he hadn't gotten anything for Alex. He never had, in all the months that they had known each other.

"Open it!" Alex bounced up and down on the couch beside him. Nick ripped the paper and out fell a fluffy, multicolored blanket.

Nick's eyes lit up as he held the blanket up against his face. "It’s so soft!"

Alex smiled. "It is! I know how much you like blankets and soft things so I had to get this for you when I saw it! And I thought we could use it now!"

"Yeah," Nick replied, smiling, though he could feel his anxiety building. "Thank you," he said quietly, laying his head on Alex's shoulder.

Alex draped the blanket over Nick and giggled. "Of course, love. Let me put the DVD in and I'll be right back." Once the movie was set up, Alex wriggled beneath the blanket next to Nick and wrapped an arm around him. Nick relaxed into Alex's touch.

As he tried to stay focused on the movie, Nick’s mind kept wandering to the fact that he hadn’t gotten a gift for Alex. There had to be something he could scrape up for him. Would Alex understand that Nick wasn’t able to buy a present? Was he even expecting a gift from someone who couldn’t leave their flat?

As the credits rolled, Alex realized that Nick had tensed up again and looked down at him. “Is everything alright?”

"Yeah..."

“You like your gift?”

Nick ran his fingers along the edge of the blanket. “I love it… I just… I should have… gotten you something.”

“Nick, you’ve been stuck in the flat for a month! It’s fine!”

Nick didn't really have an answer for that. Alex was right. Even if Nick wanted to get him a gift, there was no way he could have done it without Alex taking him somewhere. Nick sighed. This whole being dependent thing was getting old. Just then, Nick realized what he could give Alex.

“I’m going to go put the pie in the oven, okay?” Alex asked.  Before he could even stand up, Nick shifted forward on the couch out of Alex's arms, much to Alex's surprise.

"I'll be right back," Nick said, standing up unsteadily and slowly walking to his room.

Alex frowned, wondering what Nick was possibly up to. He switched off the DVD player and headed into the kitchen, hesitant to interrupt whatever Nick was doing. As soon as Alex had finished with the pie and made his way to the living room doorway, Nick stumbled out of his bedroom, guitar in one hand and ventilator in the other.

It was supposed to be a surprise, Nick sighed to himself as he steadily returned to the living room. Nick made his way back to the couch and plopped down. He pulled off his mask and tossed it onto the floor.

"Nick? What are you--"

Nick pulled a pick out of his pocket and looked over at Alex with a smile. "I wrote you a song," he said softly.

“When did you have time to do that?”

“I’ve been thinking about it for a while…”

Alex nodded intently, waiting to see what Nick would play for him.

“It’s called ‘Dream Again,’ I mean… it’s a working title, but… it’s based on some weird fever dreams I had when I was hospitalized…” Nick readjusted the guitar in his lap. “I was scared most of the time when you weren’t there. But sometimes… they were comforting. Like my brain trying to calm me down.”

“Oh…” was all that Alex could manage. He reached out and gave Nick’s hand a squeeze, and that was all the encouragement Nick needed.

He took as deep a breath as he could and began to sing quietly, his voice shaky. "Don't be afraid if you're descending...the sweetest despair...without a handrail to guide you…"

Alex stared at Nick, transfixed. Nick squeezed his eyes shut and focused on pouring all of his energy into the song.

"Sometimes the sound of a thousand whispering words...of hope will reassure...show me the future…" Nick opened his eyes and looked at Alex. "Will see us join together...if the oceans split or the mountains sigh...then I will keep on dreaming…" Nick's voice was weak and trembling. "I live to dream again...I live to dream--" Nick coughed suddenly, a deep rumble in his chest, and began to wheeze. Alex instinctively reached up to rub his back, then leaned down and grabbed Nick's mask when Nick couldn't get his breathing under control.

It took only a few moments for Nick’s breathing to come back to normal. He laid the guitar down on the floor and tossed his pick down with a sigh. Alex could sense Nick’s frustration at being unable to finish the song, so Alex wrapped his arms around Nick and began peppering small kisses on his forehead, his cheeks, his neck. Nick closed his eyes, desperate to kiss Alex back, but instead settled on running his fingers through Alex’s hair and rubbing one hand up and down Alex’s back.

Alex pulled away slightly after a while and gave Nick a gentle squeeze. “That was amazing. I’m so proud of how far you’ve come. You’re amazing, you know that?”

Nick looked deeply into Alex’s eyes, unable to believe how fortunate he was to find someone like him.

“I love you.” Alex almost didn’t hear Nick’s quiet voice over the sound of his ventilator.

“I love you too.” Alex leaned back into their embrace and pressed a lingering kiss on Nick’s forehead, until the oven’s alarm began to beep.

“Pie’s ready!” Alex pressed one more kiss onto Nick’s forehead and went to the kitchen. “I’ll be right back.”

Nick watched as Alex made the final preparations for dinner. A small smile was hidden behind his mask as he felt the butterflies fly around in his stomach.

(with special thanks to this video for the inspiration ♥)

[iffeelscouldkill]

Fic: a Film by Peter Parker

Fandom: Spider-Man: Homecoming

Pairing: Michelle Jones/Peter Parker (Spideychelle)

Summary: “Hi everyone. I’m Peter Parker, and this is my documentary presentation. The title is 'Perseverance'.

“I mostly think that the film speaks for itself, so I’m just gonna hit play, and uh, I’m happy to answer any questions afterwards about the footage, the editing, the choice of shot or well, anything, really.”

“And uh, even though they’re not here, I’d like to thank my close friends and family for putting up with me while I shoved a camera in their faces for three months.”

Peter is given an assignment to make a documentary film about the people closest to him. In the process, he learns some things about priorities, the people he cares about, and life beyond Spider-Man. Set two years after Spider-Man: Homecoming.

Author’s Note: This fic took me four months to finish and I was really unsure about how good it was. However, I got some lovely comments on AO3 (where you can also read it) and so felt confident enough to cross-post it over here :D

“All right, class, listen up – I’m going to give you your main assignment for the semester.” Gloria Steinberg, the teacher leading Midtown Tech’s film-making elective, clapped her hands for attention. The small class of ten senior students paused their discussions and refocused their attention on Ms. Steinberg.

“Thank you. Okay, so, here’s what I want you to do.” Ms. Steinberg uncapped her marker and wrote ‘DOCUMENTARY FILM PROJECT’ on the whiteboard. “This is going to be an ongoing, individual project that I want each of you to carry out. I want you to make a documentary film about the people closest to you in your lives.

“This can be family, friends, or anyone important to you. I want you to tell a story with this film; it’s up to you what that story will be. The key challenge that I’m going to set you is to capture a more natural, unguarded side of your subjects – a side that they don’t normally show to the camera.

“Think about the techniques we’ve been learning about in this class; think about the way that the filmmakers we’ve been studying weave a narrative with their documentaries. I also want you to bear in mind the technical side of things – shot framing, editing, lighting, everything we’ve covered. Now is your chance to put theory into practice!

“At the end of the semester, you’ll screen your films in front of the class, and give a short presentation about the process of making your documentary, the challenges you encountered, and the thinking behind the piece that you have made.

“Any questions?”

“Oh. Uh, are you filming now?”

The camera comes into focus on Ned Leeds’ face, leaning a little too close to the lens. Peter Parker’s voice is heard from behind the camera.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m filming.”

Ned pulls back slightly and grins, waves at the camera. “Hey! I’m Ned, Ned Leeds. I’m Peter’s best friend. Uh… What else should I say?”

“You don’t need to say anything, Ned. My assignment is to try and capture a natural side of people. So just pretend like the camera isn’t there.”

“Oh! Right.”

Ned moves away, into the middle of Peter’s bedroom, but carries on shooting glances back at the camera.

“You know, it’s kind of hard to act natural when you’re pointing it at me.”

“Right, right… Maybe I’ll set it up on a tripod.”

The camera jostles as it is set up in a corner, looking out over the room. A big space has been cleared in the centre of the room to make way for what will be a massive model: the Ultimate Collector’s Millennium Falcon, totalling 5,195 pieces. The box sits off to one side, and Ned reaches for it now, reverently admiring the design on the front.

“This is it… One of the most challenging Lego sets of all time.”

Peter crawls into shot, and motions towards the box.

“Shall we?”

“After you, my friend.”

Peter opens the box and starts laying out Lego pieces on the floor. Ned watches with his chin propped on one hand.

“Do you think we’ll ever get too old for building Lego models?”

Peter looks back at him in consternation.

“Why would we?”

“I dunno… like, we’re high school seniors now; we’re submitting college applications, thinking about our futures, all that serious stuff. But we still build Legos like we did in middle school. Do you think we’re supposed to stop at some point, to qualify as adults?”

“If that’s qualifying as an adult, then I don’t want to be one. Anyway, when we were in freshman year, one of the biggest things I learned about being Spider-Man was that I still needed to take the time to do normal kid things. Our whole lives shouldn’t be about serious, world-ending stuff – we need to balance that out.

“And besides, this is fun!”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

Ned grins, and the two of them exchange their secret handshake. Then Peter looks over at the camera in the corner.

“Oops… I should probably edit out that part about being Spider-Man.”

“Probably.”

“Hey, Aunt May, do you mind if I film this?”

May looks up in surprise from where she’s laying out vegetables on the chopping-board.

“For your project?”

“Yeah, plus I think it’s really cool, you doing cookery classes and all.”

May smiles and goes to the sink to wash her hands.

“Well, we’ll see how they go. I have to do something with my time, what with you off to college in a few months!”

“I don’t have to leave. I can stay here in New York with you.”

May frowns, pausing with the knife poised above the carrots she is about to chop. The light catches the fine lines around her eyes, and highlights the grey hairs that are beginning to appear.

“Don’t be silly, Peter, of course you’re going to college. It’s your future! You’re going to go off and have an adventure, and come back even more clever and talented than you already are. Besides, all your friends are going to college.”

“Yeah, but… you’ll be on your own. And what about… you know… my extra-curriculars? It could be a bad idea to leave the city.”

May fixes the camera with a stern gaze. “New York got along perfectly fine before you started your ‘extra-curriculars’, and it’ll continue to be fine with you gone – and so will I. You’ve done amazing things and helped a lot of people, but you should be allowed to live your own life. You can’t be beholden to this city forever.

“Now, am I going to demonstrate my baton-chopping technique for the camera, or not?”

“Demonstrate away.”

The camera zooms in on the chopping-board, bringing the colourful assortment of vegetables into sharp focus: carrots, onions, red peppers, lettuce and celery. May begins to chop the carrots into neat batons of equal length, narrating as she does so.

“Now, the instructor said that the key to this is not to raise the knife too high when chopping – it’s all about efficient, controlled movements…”

“Is there a reason that you’re currently pointing a camera in my face?”

Michelle Jones, seated at a laptop and typing rapidly, doesn’t spare a glance to the side as she speaks. The camera falters slightly.

“I’m working on a project. For film class.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah – we’ve got to make a documentary about the most important people in our lives.”

MJ raises one eyebrow, still typing without missing a beat.

“I’m honoured to be included in that category.”

“Of course you’re included!”

The pout in Peter’s voice is audible even from behind the camera. MJ’s lips twitch into a barely-noticeable smile.

The camera zooms in slightly on the laptop screen as it fills up with lines of text. Fidgeting sounds can be heard from behind the camera.

MJ sighs.

“You know, I’m pretty sure that cinematographers are supposed to be more patient when filming their subjects.”

“What are you writing?”

“My application piece for the journalism scholarship at Boston University.”

The camera moves around to focus on the laptop screen; Peter reads the title aloud.

“‘The Fight to Preserve New York’s Public Libraries in the Digital Age’.”

“It’s a long-form feature. I’ve been carrying out interviews with librarians all around the area.”

“MJ… This is brilliant. It’s so detailed!”

“It’s just an outline.” MJ’s cheeks look a little pinker than usual.

“It’s a really good outline.”

The camera pulls back again to take in MJ, focused intently on the screen as she types, and for a while, nothing is heard except the sound of tapping keys.

“Don’t you have college applications to work on?”

“Yeah… I guess.”

“You guess?”

“I’m still trying to figure out if this whole college thing is for me.”

MJ’s typing halts abruptly. She turns and levels the camera with a look of alarm that borders on threatening.

“What do you mean? I thought you were applying to MIT with Ned?”

“Yeah, maybe…”

“Is it a funding thing? Does your aunt have enough money to put you through college?”

“Yeah, a lot of my, um, uncle’s legacy has gone towards my college fund. And Tony says he’ll chip in too. We have enough.”

“So what’s the issue?”

“I just don’t know if I can leave Aunt May. Or New York.”

“Oh. You’re worried because you won’t be around to Spidey it up any more?”

“Y-yeah, pretty much.”

MJ turns back to her laptop and resumes typing, a little more slowly than before.

“Just because you have superpowers doesn’t mean you can’t live your life. New York will deal. Presumably it managed somehow before you became Spider-Man.”

“Aunt May said the same thing.”

“Well, if you won’t listen to her, god knows why you’d listen to me.” MJ hits a couple of keys with extra force. “Whatever, it’s your choice. Do you have enough footage, or do you need to spend some more time breathing down the back of my neck while I work?”

“Uh, I think I have enough.”

“Hey, kid. You making another one of your video diaries?”

“Yeah, uh, this one’s for school. So it’d be cool if you could not make any pervy comments this time.”

“Well, is your aunt going to watch it? I’m joking, I’m joking. I’m a married man, now, see? I’m putting all my immoral ways behind me.”

Tony Stark raises one of his hands, which are currently the central focus of the shot, to show off a gleaming metal band around his ring finger. It has a twisting, geometric design in the centre that vaguely resembles the shape of Iron Man’s faceplate.

“I know – I was there. I still can’t believe you had your wedding rings made from vibranium.”

“Hey, I don’t wed with just any old ring. This is one of the strongest, most resilient metals in the galaxy, perfectly crafted to withstand any-”

A shower of sparks flies up from where Tony is tinkering with a near-unidentifiable mass of circuitry and wiring. A rectangular plate of sapphire glass lying off to one side suggests it might have started out life as a StarkPhone.

“-lab accidents.”

“Yeah, I can see that.”

Tony nudges apart the two bare wires that had accidentally connected, and then picks up a solder wick and soldering iron, touching both to a component on the circuit board and de-soldering it. He uses a pair of pliers to flip it away and onto the lab bench.

“You know, this is a classified design you’re filming.”

“Really? It doesn’t look like much to me.”

“Harsh, kid. Very harsh. This right here is genius in the making.”

Tony quickly loses himself in his work, paying no heed to the camera as it moves around him, capturing different angles: the side of his face as he frowns in concentration; a long-distance shot of Tony amidst his cluttered workshop surroundings; close-ups of the tools on the bench, being picked up and set down.

After a long while, Peter’s voice ventures from behind the camera.

“Mr… er, Tony?”

“Mmmm?”

“You went to MIT, right?”

“When I was fifteen, yeah. Great place. You should go there.”

“But like… what if you’d been Iron Man back then, would you still have gone to college?”

Tony straightens up at that, reaching for a rag on the workbench and wiping his hands on it.

“Kid, if I’d been Iron Man at fifteen, my whole life would have been pretty different, so it’s kind of hard to say yes or no on that one. But if I hadn’t gone to MIT, I wouldn’t have met Rhodey, wouldn’t have learned… a lot of shit that turned out to be pretty important – and I’m talking about life stuff, not what they teach you in class – and I wouldn’t have had an outlet for a lot of things, either.

“Would superheroing have given me that instead? Maybe, some of it. But it would have taken me down a pretty different path, and… Okay, just to be clear, we’re talking about you being Spidey instead of going to college, right? That’s what this is about?”

“I mean, just hypothetically speaking…”

“Yeah, sure, asking for a friend, blah blah blah. Look, the superhero gig isn’t everything – I thought we established that one a while ago. You decided to keep it low-key for a couple more years, be ‘friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man’, have a balance in your life. Right? It was a good decision; I supported that decision.”

“Yeah… But four years is a long time.”

“It is a long time. Look, I didn’t really prep for a far-reaching emotional discussion today, but the bottom line is that either way, there’s gonna be stuff you wish you’d done.”

“I guess that’s true. Uh, thanks, Tony.”

“Don’t mention it. But if you want decent life advice, Pepper is a better bet. Even for stuff that you’d think I should know about. She’s still better.”

The Millennium Falcon is taking shape, with the base and most of the forward mandibles completed. The camera captures Peter and Ned piecing it together slowly, sprawled on the floor of Peter’s bedroom, in breaks between assignments and Decathlon quizzing and stress.

Sometimes, they just mess around, picking up the little Lego figurines of Luke Skywalker, Obi Wan Kenobi, Princess Leia and Han Solo and acting out scenes from Star Wars, pitching their voices in an imitation of the characters’ dialogue.

It’s peaceful. Normal.

MJ again, seated in her favourite spot by the library window with the sunlight haloing her head. She is bent over a book, golden sun rays intertwining with the curly brown strands that hang down over her face.

Slowly, she turns the page, appearing deep in concentration and completely unaware that she’s being filmed, her expression relaxed and at ease.

Then, deliberately, she raises one hand with her middle finger clearly displayed. Peter’s snorts of laughter can be heard from behind the camera.

“Wow, this looks so good!”

May Parker half-glances back towards the camera, busy adjusting the heat on the stove.

“I hope so. It’s a bit more ambitious than the stuff I’ve tried so far, but I thought – we both love Thai food, and this is a Thai-inspired stir-fry…”

“It looks awesome.”

May drops ingredients into the saucepan, which smokes slightly. “It’s okay, that’s supposed to happen.”

She turns away from the pan, intently studying the recipe book open on the counter, and reaching for a jar of Thai green curry paste. In the corner of the frame, something bright and yellow flares to life.

“May! The spoon!”

The wooden stirring spoon, which May left propped up against the gas ring, has caught fire.

“Oh! OH! Oh god, oh god-”

“May, it’s fine, just drop it in the sink-”

“Peter, could you switch that thing off, please, and come help-”

The camera tilts wildly, a crackling sound is heard, and the recording abruptly shuts off.

A blurry Peter and MJ are talking together some distance away from the camera. They slowly come into clearer focus, the camera held less steadily than usual, as if by an inexpert hand. Ned Leeds’ voice narrates in hushed tones from behind the camera.

“And here we see a wild Peter and MJ in their natural habitat, performing another complex mating ritual.”

MJ is sitting by the window again, reclining in one of her favourite library loungers with her laptop balanced on her knees. She looks up at Peter with an expression that’s torn between amusement and annoyance. Peter is on his feet, all restless energy, fiddling with a pen in one hand and obviously talking a mile a minute.

“Let’s take a closer look.”

The camera moves slowly towards the couple before eventually coming to a stop behind what appears to be a bookcase; the wooden edge of it obscures part of the shot. Peter and MJ blur in and out as the camera tries to decide what to focus on, until Ned zooms unsteadily past the bookcase and the two fill the whole frame. The microphone picks up their speech alongside Ned’s slightly heavy breathing.

“-Right.”

“Plus, y’know, I could really do with more footage for my documentary film project, and I thought it would be amazing to capture you out doing your reporter thing – plus, you could even edit and submit the video with your piece, y’know, to show some TV reporting experience-”

“The application rules specify text submissions only.”

“Oh… okay, I guess that wouldn’t be helpful, then.”

MJ sighs audibly.

“Fine, you can come with me to my interview this weekend.”

“Really?” Even from a distance, Peter looks about to vibrate out of his skin with excitement.

“Sure, but only if Meredith is okay with you filming her. Some people are weird about being on camera, and if she’s at all uncomfortable with it, you’re out.”

“Of course, MJ, no problem, thank you so much!”

MJ shakes her head in exasperation, but the expression is tempered with fondness.

“Don’t you have other people to follow around with your camera? I don’t know why you need to spend so much time on me.”

“I do follow other people around! I mean- not follow them- I do film other people. I filmed Aunt May making dinner the other night.”

“Really? How did that go?”

“Um… There was a small fire, and the stir-fry got burnt while we were putting it out. We wound up going out to eat.”

MJ laughs, and the adoring expression on Peter’s face is plain as he smiles with her.

“No, I just- I like filming you because you do interesting stuff. And, uh, I love to see you getting passionate over things that are important to you.”

There is a soft, open expression on MJ’s face which would surprise anyone who noticed it – anyone except Ned, who sees this expression quite often, and always directed towards Peter.

“Fascinating.”

It’s immediately obvious that Ned chose the wrong moment to continue his documentary-style voiceover, as Peter’s head whips around, honing in on the source of the noise.

“NED!”

“Damn spider senses!” The camera bounces up and down as Ned sprints for his life, Peter’s thundering footsteps close behind him.

“Ned! Don’t shout that in the library! And be careful with that camera – it’s not mine!”

The middle of a busy street in New York. The camera captures the back of MJ’s head as she weaves through the crowd.

“Keep up, loser.”

The camera jostles slightly as Peter quickens his footsteps to catch up to MJ. He pans to the left and the right, taking in the buildings looming either side of them.

“We’re broadcasting live from the middle of New York with intrepid reporter Michelle Jones, who is hot on the heels of her latest story-”

“Peter!”

“What?”

The camera abruptly swivels around to find MJ, standing in the doorway of a dilapidated two-storey building and beckoning impatiently.

“If you’re done being an even bigger dork than usual, we’re here.”

“I thought it wasn’t possible for me to be a bigger dork than I already am?”

“So did I, but you continue to surprise me.”

MJ leads the way across a dingy, but tidy white tiled foyer towards a reception desk with a petite young Latina woman sitting behind it.

“Hey, Ella. I’m here to talk to Meredith – she should be expecting me.”

The camera zooms in slightly on Ella, who nods at MJ but looks at the camera warily.

“Yeah, she said you’d be by. Who’s this?”

MJ directs a look of irritation at the camera.

“Hey, would you turn that thing off for two seconds?”

“Sorry, sorry!”

In the next shot, Michelle is sat across from an older, dark-skinned woman with braids swept up into a bun on top of her head. They are seated inside a cramped, dimly-lit back office lined with filing cabinets; a few faded posters are visible on the walls, advertising reading competitions from five or ten years ago.

Meredith shoots a glance at the camera. “Okay? Are we good to go?”

“Yep! We are rolling!”

MJ gives Peter a withering look as she pulls out a notepad and pen from the backpack by her feet. She sets a small, old-fashioned dictaphone on one of the filing cabinets next to them.

“Okay. Could you just give your name for the recording?”

“My name is Meredith Felix-Lynch.”

“Thanks, Meredith. And how long have you been head librarian at Dunlop Library?”

Ned’s bedroom this time, which he shares with his ten-year-old brother; Star Wars figurines and miniature Lego models jostle for space with Pokémon plushies and Choose Your Own Adventure novels on the shelves.

Ned sits in the middle of the floor, using a screwdriver to tighten an access panel on the underside of a small, round droid, which looks like BB-8 with wheels. He flips it right-side up and sets it on the ground, next to where Peter is sprawled, eye-level with the little robot. Peter has had a haircut since the last time the two were on camera, and Ned is sporting stubble across his upper lip that has aspirations of being a moustache.

“You know, you could have taken part in this contest with me, if you were still in Robotics Lab.”

“Yeah, I know. I thought about it, but I’m still not ready to take back on everything I was doing before I became Spider-Man. Between patrolling, my assignments and MJ riding my ass at Decathlon practice, I’ve got about as much as I can handle.”

“Wouldn’t it help with your college application, though?”

Peter clears his throat.

“Why don’t you show me what this thing can do?”

Ned picks up a boxy black remote controller from the floor. It resembles a gaming controller, to the point where it might have started out life as one and then gained a lot of extra buttons and dials.

“For the contest, we need to be able to demonstrate three types of independent movement, so…”

Ned pushes down on one of the analogue sticks. Lights on the little droid flare into life, and it begins to trundle forward with a whirring noise.

“Coooool.”

“And the head can move, like this-”

The droid swivels its head from side to side, as if looking for the source of a noise.

“It doesn’t have any arms, because you remember what happened in middle school with the Robotics Showdown-”

“They snapped off, yeah.”

“Right, so the third type of independent movement is…”

Frowning now in concentration, Ned pushes down hard on a large blue button on the controller, while manipulating the analogue stick at the same time. A noise like a laptop fan running at hyper-speed can be heard, and Peter recoils slightly as his hair is ruffled by a sudden breeze. Slowly, the droid lifts off from the ground until it is hovering a fraction above the floor.

“Oh my god, Ned, you made it fly!”

The boys are shouting now to be heard above the noise of the boosters.

“Pretty cool, right? But you have to be careful, because it overheats really quickly and when that happens-”

The noise suddenly cuts out and the levitating droid drops back down to the ground with a sharp thud. Ned winces and Peter recoils and tenses, looking seconds away from leaping towards the ceiling.

“Sorry – I’m still working on actually sustaining that. If I can keep the heat shut-off from engaging, it should be able to get to about a foot above the ground.”

Peter settles back down, crossing his legs and peering at the robot.

“What’s your cooling system?”

“Water-based. I want to fit an extra fan in there, but I’m having serious space issues – I’ll show you…”

Ned lifts up the droid and reveals a round, dark scorch mark where the boosters have scorched the floor. Both boys freeze, staring at it.

“Dude, your mom is going to kill you.”

MJ sitting at a little wooden desk in her study at home, an anglepoise lamp shining on her work, her fingers flying over the keys. Wall-to-wall books fill the background of the shot. MJ is muttering something to herself, dictating the words as she writes.

“Hey, MJ, how long is your piece now?”

MJ continues typing, either ignoring Peter or somehow not hearing what he is saying.

“MJ? You said I could film when I came over… Is this not okay?”

Silence. The clatter of keys.

“MJ?”

“…”

“Wow, you must be really into your writing, huh.”

The camera comes on, and the three people sitting on the picnic blanket immediately groan, throwing their hands over their faces – or in MJ’s case, her book.

“C’mon, Pete, not the camera again!”

“Sweetheart, I love you, but do you think we could give the filming a rest just for one day?”

“Turn it off, Parker.”

“C’mon, guys, please? I really want to get a good grade for this class.”

“Why, so you can pursue your dream of becoming a superpowered Steven Spielberg?”

The camera moves to a low angle as Peter sets it down on the ground a little way away. MJ towers in the foreground, looking disapproving over the top of her book; Ned is amused, leaning back on his hands, while May hides her smile as she unpacks items from the picnic cooler.

“Yeah, maybe! Or, like an indie film creator. Haven’t you always wanted to go to the Sundance film festival?”

“I wouldn’t go there with you, loser.”

Ned snorts with laughter, and May hands out sandwiches and cartons of juice. Peter moves into shot, sprawling backwards until just a pair of gangly legs are visible. May strikes up a conversation with MJ about her piece for the journalism scholarship at Boston, which she has just submitted; MJ holds up her half of the conversation while still appearing to be absorbed in her book, turning pages every now and again.

Peter and Ned tussle over the last mini package of doughnuts, and wind up playing rock paper scissors for it, with May as adjudicator. They draw, and May awards the package of doughnuts to a smirking MJ, over Peter and Ned’s protests.

“You’ll have to put your book down to eat those, MJ, there’s no way you can read at the same time.”

“Watch me, loser.”

A high-pitched, urgent beeping cuts through the conversation. Ned and May start, and MJ peers over the top of her book as Peter extracts his StarkPhone from his bag, looking tense. A red light is flashing insistently on top of the phone.

“It’s Tony, it’s- he’s calling a code red.”

“You’d better go, then, sweetheart.” May speaks with an air of forced calm, her face set in lines of worry.

“But it’s my day off – I can’t go. I didn’t even bring my suit.”

“It’s in the compartment under the cooler.” MJ speaks without looking up from her book.

“It’s- What? What compartment?”

“There’s a catch on the side.”

“What? That can’t-”

MJ sighs and lunges across the picnic blanket to reach the cooler. A clicking sound is heard and in the next moment, she pulls Peter’s Spider-Man suit from an opening in the bottom of the cooler. She hands it to Peter, who frantically tries to hide it with his jacket, glancing around him.

“You can thank me later for actually being prepared. Now go save some civilians or whatever.”

“May? Are you sure you’re okay with-”

“Yeah, I’m fine, sweetheart. MJ’s right; you go save the day.”

Peter stands up and rises out of shot. Ned’s eyes meet Peter’s, off-camera, and he gestures covertly to his phone, then looks slightly crestfallen at Peter’s response. The camera picks up the sound of footsteps running across the grass; a few moments later, MJ reaches over and turns off the camera.

“Okay, we’re rolling! C’mon, open it.”

MJ shoots the camera a look of annoyance from her desk chair. She, Ned and Peter are crowded into her study, MJ seated at the desk with an envelope in her hands. The camera is set at MJ-eye-level, and only the lower half of Ned is visible as he stands next to her.

“Do we have to film this? It’s probably gonna be a rejection letter.”

“Don’t be stupid. I’ve read your piece – it’s awesome.”

MJ smiles slightly and runs a finger under the flap of the envelope, tearing it open, then unfolds the letter. As she begins to read, the smile drops off her face.

Peter’s voice comes from behind the camera: “MJ? What’s wrong?”

“MJ…” Ned, reading over her shoulder.

MJ takes in a shuddering breath, the hands holding the letter beginning to shake.

“Oh, Jesus, MJ-” The camera shuts off abruptly.

The next shot shows Peter and MJ from much further away, the camera filming them from through the half-open door. MJ is sobbing into her hands, the letter discarded on the desk, as Peter hovers uncertainly, finally settling one hand on her shoulder.

MJ’s voice is muffled and thick with tears, but just barely audible.

“It’s such a load of crap. The whole scholarship system.”

“I don’t get it, MJ – how could they reject you? You’re an amazing writer, you write with passion, you picked a fascinating topic and did all this original research-”

“Peter. Stop.”

“What?”

“You don’t have to say all that stuff just to make me feel better.”

Peter sits down on the edge of the desk, which creaks slightly under his weight, and stares at MJ in bewilderment.

“But I’m not, MJ, I’m being honest. Look, I know I… run my mouth faster than my brain, and half the stuff that comes out of it doesn’t make sense, but this is true, okay? I was there when you interviewed Meredith; I saw how much she trusted you and you got her to open up. You’re so good at this, MJ, and it sucks ass that they can’t see it.”

“Yeah, well, fat load of good it’s done me. Whatever I did, it wasn’t enough.”

“But you… At least you tried, okay – you worked your ass off, you knew what you wanted and you went for it. You have something to show for what you did. Better than being too afraid to try.”

MJ wipes the tears away with the heels of her hands and looks up at Peter, assessing.

“I think you’re so amazing, MJ – what you do is gonna change the world. Way more than anything I do.”

MJ snorts, disbelieving. “Being a journalist is hardly gonna save lives-”

“No, it is!” Peter has stood up again and is gesturing for emphasis, all energy and motion. “You’re gonna – help people tell their stories, expose injustices and blow corruption cases wide open. Being a superhero is like – flashy stuff, swooping in to save the day but never really dealing with the real issues. That part… That’s the really hard work. That’s what you do.”

Peter and MJ look at each other for a long moment.

From behind the camera, barely audible, Ned can be heard breathing, “Come on…”

“You inspire me so much, MJ, and I never know how to – to show you how I feel, except-”

Peter sways forward, and MJ leans up, and their lips meet in the middle.

The camera swings away, and bounces as Ned jogs down the corridor until he is out of earshot.

“YES! Ohmygodohmygodohmygod…”

The almost-completed Millennium Falcon sits in the middle of Peter’s bedroom floor, with Peter and Ned either side of it. Ned is holding a Lego brick in one hand and looking across at his best friend, who is lying half out of shot, with only his legs and half of his torso visible. A loud snoring sound emanates from off-camera.

Ned extends one foot and nudges Peter’s leg.

“Hey. Peter, wake up.”

He nudges a little harder.

“Pete!”

Peter jerks away suddenly, and his legs disappear out of shot; a second later, he crawls back into frame, looking sheepish.

“Sorry, sorry. I’m kind of tired at the moment.”

“No kidding, you almost dozed off in Biology earlier. Were you out late patrolling last night?”

Peter scratches the back of his head and looks away.

“Nah, I was actually up late finishing my application essay for MIT.”

“You what? What time did you submit it?”

“Uh, I think it was around 4am.”

“What? But the application window closed at midnight! Did Mr. Stark pull some strings to let you-”

“No! Tony doesn’t know about it. But I called ahead, and they said they’d consider it. It’s… my own fault if I don’t get in, so I don’t want anyone calling in favours. Besides, if I don’t get into MIT, I have some other ideas. I might go to Columbia to study film. Or maybe photography.”

“Wow… Really? Photography?”

“Yeah, I’m thinking about it. The whole documentary thing has been a lot more fun than I thought it would be.”

Ned glances at the camera and away again, his expression uncertain.

“Well, y’know, I’m happy for you whatever you decide to choose. But I thought we were gonna be MIT buddies. That was our plan.”

“We are! I mean, we still could be. But you knew I was having second thoughts about applying to college, and…”

“You said you were going to apply anyway! Or did you just say that to make me back off, like your aunt?”

“No! No, Ned, c’mon, it’s not like that.”

Peter runs his hands through his hair, which is flattened on one side from his nap on the floor.

“I just… I wanted to do it properly, if I was gonna do it, but my heart wasn’t in anything that I was writing. I went through like a billion drafts, until last night… I guess you could say I got inspired.”

Ned looks at his best friend, and raises his eyebrows in an Ohhh kind of way. “This wouldn’t happen to have anything to do with…”

Peter’s ears turn bright red. He looks at the floor and picks up a Han Solo minifigure. “Yeah, maybe.”

Ned laughs, and he reaches out to give Peter’s shoulder a soft punch. “Well, glad you finally got your shit together. In multiple senses.”

Peter laughs awkwardly and runs his hand over his hair again, flattening it back down. Ned picks up a single Lego brick from his side of the model and hands it across to Peter.

“Well, while you were napping, I all but finished building the Falcon. The last piece is yours, my friend.”

Peter’s eyes widen, and he tries to hand the brick back to Ned. “No, I can’t! You should have the last piece.”

“Nah, I insist.”

Peter hesitates.

“C’mon, Parker, pull your weight. I’ve been doing all the building and my arms are tired.” Ned stretches his arms above his head in an exaggerated fashion. Peter laughs.

“Okay, okay. Are you ready?”

Ned improvises a drumroll on the floor as Peter places the last brick on the Falcon with a flourish and gently presses it down.

“There.”

Ned and Peter nod solemnly at each other across the model. Peter picks up the Han Solo minifig, and tweaks one of its little arms to extend outwards. Grinning, Ned does the same with the Luke Skywalker figurine, and the two minifigures come together to “fistbump” in midair.

The camera gazes lengthways down the dinner table at the Parker house, which is laid with nice silverware and delicate china crockery, the kind reserved only for special guests. A pair of hands – recognisably Peter’s – comes into shot and gently sets down a large bowl full of noodles in the foreground. Further down the table, May Parker, visible from the shoulders down, is laying out bowls of stir-fried vegetables and curry.

A woman wearing a long, elegant wine-red dress, visible only from the waist down, walks into shot and pulls out a chair.

“This looks delicious, Mrs. Parker.”

“Oh, it’s May, please. I’m really still learning… I’m sure this is nothing compared to the kinds of world-class cuisine that you and Tony must have cooked for you on a regular basis.”

“Aunt May’s being modest. Her cooking is really great – especially Asian-inspired food.”

“Thai is our household favourite. There’s soy sauce and chilli sauce here in case you want to add any. I should really have put out chopsticks instead of knives and forks, to be more authentic.”

Tony Stark sits down heavily in the chair next to Pepper. “I’m never authentic. Can’t use chopsticks to save my life. Pepper can – she’s good with them. Me, I always ask for a fork.”

Pepper shakes her head, long hair brushing over her shoulders. “Even when he was dining with the Prime Minister of Japan.”

“Hey, at least I didn’t ask for a cheeseburger.”

Laughter. Peter’s fingers briefly blur into view and he adjusts the camera downwards so that only the guests’ torsos and hands are visible.

The group begins to eat dinner; they make small talk and lean over each other to pass various dishes. Compliments flow freely about the quality of the food.

“So, Peter… How are college applications going? Tony said you were having some concerns about balancing college with your superhero duties.”

Pepper’s tone is careful and tactful, her cutlery pausing delicately above her plate as she asks the question. The light glints off the vibranium ring on her finger, the twin to Tony’s, but with smooth, curved lines instead of blocky, angular ones.

Peter sets his cutlery down with an overly loud clank as he hastens to answer Pepper’s question.

“I was, but uh, I think I’ve made up my mind now. I wanna make sure I have a good future that isn’t just about Spider-Man.”

“Is that right? That’s very mature of you, Peter.”

“Yeah, what’s gotten into you, Pete?” Tony jokes. “No, seriously, it’s a good decision, but what prompted it? I know it can’t have been my words of wisdom.”

Peter laughs a little nervously, toying with his cutlery.

“No, I- I mean, your advice was good! Really! But uh, I was also inspired by a friend of mine, who’s… got a lot of dreams for the future. It made me want to do the same.”

“Oh really? You’re looking a little red in the face there – is this a friend, or a friend?”

“Tony! Leave him alone. I think that’s wonderful, Peter, and the best of luck to you with your applications.”

“Wasn’t MJ supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago?”

Ned looks up from the Decathlon quiz cards he is currently shuffling. “Yeah, I guess so. Maybe she got held up.”

“I’ve never known her to be late for one of our practice sessions; she’s normally here like an hour before us.”

“It’s probably a test, to see if we keep drilling in her absence. She could be watching us right now to see if we continue.”

Ned nods towards the camera, resting on one end of the library table at which both of them are seated. “Maybe she’s put a bug in that.”

“How could she have? I keep it in my room when I’m not using it.”

“Ah, but MJ’s been in your room a lot lately. Maybe she distracts you with sexy makeout sessions, and then bugs it.”

Peter goes bright red and looks down at the cards in his hands. “So, geology-”

The sound of a door rebounding off a wall is heard somewhere nearby, and both boys look up. MJ enters in a whirl of coat, scarf and messenger bag, and triumphantly slams an open newspaper down onto the table between them.

Both Peter and Ned peer at the paper.

“Wait… is this-?” Peter stares at MJ.

“‘The Fight to Save New York’s Public Libraries’ – by Michelle Jones. Oh my god, they printed your article!”

“Yup. My first print byline. The first of many.”

MJ is smiling broadly, unable to hide how pleased she is.

“MJ, this is incredible!!”

Peter jumps up and grabs his girlfriend’s hands, spinning her round in a circle. She laughs and goes with it, poking his face after they finish.

“Dork.”

Ned is still leaning over the paper on the table.

“Wow. Did you really pitch this to the Editor?”

“Not the Editor-Editor, to the Features Editor. She was really nice, though, and after they accepted my piece she said I should apply for an internship over the summer. A proper work experience internship, not the making coffee kind.”

“Of course it’d be a proper internship! They’d be morons to waste your talents on making coffee.”

Ned clears his throat to interrupt Peter and MJ making eyes at each other.

“Hey, so, we should celebrate! Let’s go to the Waffle House!”

“Ugh, please, we go there all the time. This calls for something better. I want cheesecake pancakes.”

“Aww, but-”

“It’s MJ’s celebration, Ned, she should get to pick. C’mon, they have waffles at IHOP.”

The three move towards the door, and as Peter picks up the camera, Ned can be heard asking,

“So, are you going to frame it?”

“No way. This is going to be the first piece in my portfolio.”

“Well, thank you, Flash; that was a very… evocative piece,” said Ms. Steinberg. She nodded at Flash, standing next to the projector; he looked pleased but uncertain, as though he wasn’t sure whether she might be making fun of him. “I can tell you put a lot of passion into it.”

Flash cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah.”

“You can sit down now, thank you. Okay, I think we have time for just one more presentation, so… Who will it be? Peter! Your friend Michelle tells me you’ve barely had a camera out of your hand since we began the assignment.”

Gloria Steinberg smiled widely at Peter, who buried his face in his folded arms. “No, no, it’s a good thing. I can’t wait to see what you’ve produced for your documentary.”

Peter nodded and pushed back his chair with a scraping noise, making his way awkwardly to the front of the room. He clutched a dog-eared sheaf of paper in one hand.

After a prolonged period of setting up the projector and a heart-stopping moment where the video seemed like it might not play after all, thanks, Peter had his film cued up and ready to go. Clearing his throat nervously, he addressed the class.

“So… Hi everyone. I’m Peter Parker, and this is my documentary presentation. The title is Perseverance.

“I mostly think that the film speaks for itself, so I’m just gonna hit play, and uh, I’m happy to answer any questions afterwards about the footage, the editing, the choice of shot or well, anything, really.”

Peter went to hit ‘Play’ on the laptop next to him, then paused.

“And uh, even though they’re not here, I’d like to thank my close friends and family for putting up with me while I shoved a camera in their faces for three months.”

That got a quiet chuckle, including from Ms. Steinberg. Peter smiled and pressed Play.

The film began.

 The film opens with a shot of Peter and Ned, sitting on Peter’s bedroom floor, with the beginnings of what will be their greatest Lego project of all time scattered around them. The audio is silent. The two boys exchange their secret handshake, before beginning to assemble the base of the structure.

Cut to Aunt May’s hands, arranging vegetables on the chopping board, then slowly and methodically beginning to chop them up. Her voice can be heard narrating,

“The instructor said that the key to this is not to raise the knife too high when chopping. It’s all about efficient, controlled movements… see how I’m keeping it even? I haven’t been going to cookery classes for very long, but you’d be surprised at how much technique goes into something like chopping vegetables – at least for professional chefs. For us amateurs, it’s not such a big deal… But still, I’m trying to make sure I have the basics mastered before I try anything more ambitious.”

Cut to Michelle, seated at her laptop and typing furiously. The camera zooms in on her screen. Peter’s voice reads, “‘The Fight to Preserve New York’s Public Libraries in the Digital Age’.”

“It’s just an outline,” Michelle says, sounding slightly embarrassed.

Cut to a pair of hands – Tony’s – de-soldering a component from the circuitboard of a Starkphone, wicking away the excess solder. “This right here is genius in the making.”

“It doesn’t look like much,” Peter’s voice replies, teasing.

In the next shot, Ned and Peter kneel on the floor of his bedroom with a sea of grid paper between them, on which are sketched the designs that will eventually become Ned’s entry into the National Under 18s Robotics Competition. Ned reaches forward and fans out a few of the sheets.

“This is my project for Robotics Lab – we have to build an independently mobile robot. Also, entries for the National Robotics Competition are open ‘til December, so if I get my shit together, I can enter.”

“Oh my god, you should!”

The film cuts to a time-lapse shot of Peter and Ned in the middle of Peter’s bedroom, gradually piecing together the Millennium Falcon.

Then May, sitting at the kitchen table, poring over a cookbook with a pencil in one hand, making notations in between the instructions. A series of print-outs sits by her elbow, with names of cooking techniques and clip-art diagrams.

The next shot is of MJ on a busy New York street, looking impatiently back at the camera before she disappears instead a shabby building. Cut to MJ and Meredith, sitting across from one another in Meredith’s cluttered office. The audio is just too soft to make out what they’re saying, but Meredith is holding forth with passion, gesturing, while MJ nods intently. She makes notes on her pad in shorthand without looking down, never breaking eye contact with Meredith.

Cut to Ned in the school Robotics lab after hours, goggles clamped over his eyes, oblivious to the camera and the empty lab growing darker around him. A single lamp illuminates his workspace as he peers into the half-constructed shell of his BB-8 droid, the distinctive rounded appearance already taking shape.

Back to MJ, on her laptop, typing up research in a fury of tapping keys and muttering under her breath.

Another time-lapse shot of Peter and Ned constructing the Millennium Falcon, weaving through the film’s narrative like a thread.

Then it’s back to Aunt May in the kitchen, trying out her Thai-inspired stir-fry for the first time. She drops the ingredients into the pan and shakes it a little as the oil starts to hiss and smoke. Unknowingly, she leaves the wooden spoon perilously close to the gas ring, and as she turns away to study the recipe, it immediately catches fire.

Peter shouts a warning, and May rushes to extinguish the flames; Peter scrambles to turn the camera off as he goes to help her.

Another close-up of Tony’s hands in the lab, as he holds a strange, glowing (possibly extraterrestrial) power source in a pair of tongs and lowers it down into the open chassis of a StarkPhone. For two seconds, nothing happens; then there is a loud sizzling sound, and what looks like bright blue lightning surges along the wires and circuits of the phone. With an abrupt crack and a curl of smoke, every single circuit shorts out.

Peter starts coughing behind the camera, as Tony waves his hand to dispel the smoke. “Mother-” The rest of the long string of expletives that follows is bleeped out.

Cut to Peter and Ned, sprawling on the floor of Ned’s bedroom as Ned demonstrates the controls for his droid. It trundles back and forth, swivels its head, and then with a noise like a jet engine powering up, slowly lifts off from the ground. Peter and Ned cheer in triumph, just a few moments before the droid’s engines abruptly cut out, and it goes crashing back to the floor with an ominous-sounding crack.

Then it’s Peter and MJ, shot from a distance through the frame of MJ’s bedroom doorway, as MJ sobs into her hands, the rejection letter discarded on her desk. Peter hovers, one hand extended uncertainly, before he rests it on her shoulder, a silent gesture of support.

The film lingers on this shot for a time, slowly fading to black.

In the next shot, Peter and May are cooking coconut laksa together in the kitchen, laughing as Peter whizzes around gathering ingredients and May tosses vegetables in the pan.

Cut to May, Peter, Pepper and Tony sitting down to an array of home-cooked dishes, all expertly prepared by May Parker. Everyone starts to serve themselves, and compliments to the chef fly freely, which May deflects, flustered but delighted.

Next, Peter and Ned sit on the floor of Ned’s bedroom as Ned demonstrates his completed, improved robot. The droid does a lap of the floor, turning its head from side to side as if watching a tennis match, before returning to the middle of the floor. This time when Ned presses down on the blue button, the droid lifts off with a slightly quieter whirring, and hovers a full foot above the ground before its creator guides it gently back down.

Peter whoops and reaches out to give Ned a high-five, pounding him on the back.

Close-up on the bench in Tony’s workshop, where a pair of hands (Tony’s, as usual) are pressing closed the case of a brand new StarkPhone.

“All right, now let’s see if this thing will turn on… Say your name.”

“My name? Uh, Peter Parker.”

The phone lights up, a blue light shining out from the screen as a Karen-like voice intones: ‘Welcome, Peter.’

“Oh my god!” Peter exclaims from behind the camera. “It worked!”

“Yup. It’s all yours, kid. Try not to break this one.”

Cut to Peter and Ned, reviewing their Decathlon cards together in the library as MJ whirls into view, slamming the newspaper with her byline down on the table in front of them. Peter and Ned lean forward together to peer at the text.

“Wait, is this-?”

“The Fight to Save New York’s Public Libraries – by Michelle Jones. Oh my god, they printed your article!”

“Yup. The first of many.”

Peter jumps up from his chair and spins MJ around in a circle, both of them laughing.

The film fades to a shot of Ned and Peter sitting either side of the Millennium Falcon, which is one brick away from being completed. Ned solemnly hands the last brick over to Peter, and does a drumroll on the floor as Peter presses the brick into place.

Peter picks up the Han Solo minifigure, and Ned picks up Luke Skywalker, and the two minifigs “fistbump” each other in midair above the completed Millennium Falcon.

Fade into Peter, Ned and MJ sitting at a table at IHOP, celebrating MJ’s first print byline. MJ is ribbing Peter mercilessly about the enormous plate of pancakes in front of him while Ned laughs.

Then Peter gets to his feet, raising his coffee, and proposes a toast: “To Michelle Jones – New York’s newest and greatest hotshot investigative reporter!”

“To MJ!” Ned cries and thrusts his hot chocolate into the air.

MJ shakes her head, but she’s laughing, and she raises her own cup to join them. “Watch out, world,” she says.

The three of them clink cups, and the film fades to black.

[vicariouseyes]

Massive Ask Meme

I was tagged by @grey-skies-full-moon

Rules: Tag 20 people ((That’s so many... I’ll see what I can do.))

Puttin’ this under a Read More because it’s hella long. 

Your last:

1. Drink: A tropical punch-type juice.

2. Phone Call: I had to call my dentist to reschedule an appointment because my car died and I couldn’t get there.

3. Text message: DJ (s/o), I’m pretty sure.

4. Song you listened to: Uh... It might’ve been something from The Last Five Years, which DJ introduced me to. If I’ve listened to anything since then, I don’t remember.

5. Time you cried: Uh... huh. Probably within the last month or two, but I actually don’t remember. That’s a good sign. Gods, it’s nice to be back on my meds again.

Have You:

6. Dated someone twice: No. That is not a thing I do.

7. Kissed someone and regretted it: Nah.

8. Been cheated on: Not that I’m aware of.

9. Lost someone special: Yes.

10. Been depressed: Enough to be medicated for it.

11: Gotten drunk and thrown up: Once.

List 3 Favorite Colors:

12. Teal.

13. Gray.

14: Purple.

In the last year, have you…

15. Made new friends: A couple of acquaintances, but not friends.

16. Fallen out of love: Nope.

17. Laughed until you cried: Oh definitely. That happens all the time.

18. Found out someone was talking about you: I mean, friends making references to me and my existence maybe, but not gossip or anything. At least, not that I know of.

19. Met someone who changed you: I don’t think so...?

20. Found out who your friends are: I mean, I’m well aware of who my friends are.

21. Kissed someone on your FB list: I mean, DJ’s on my facebook list, so yeah, lol.

GENERAL:

22. How many Facebook friends do you know in real life: 99% of them. There are two that added me years ago that I just sort of added because fuck it, and we’ve literally never talked, but it’s kind of nice seeing how their lives are doing. I just haven’t had the heart to unfriend them after all this time.

23. Do you have any pets: Not anymore. My parents have a dog, and DJ has a cat, but I don’t have any pets that feel like they’re MY pets, you feel me?

24. Do you want to change your name: I mean... There are two that I would consider for very different reasons, but I’ve gotten so used to my name that switching now would probably be weird.

25. What did you do for your last birthday: DJ and I hung out and got dinner and stuff. My mom also used it as an excuse to have a cookout later in the month, lol.

26. What time did you wake up: I woke up several times last night. If you mean actually stayed awake, probably around 11 or so.

27. What were you doing at midnight last night: Watching Twitch or sitting on the internet, probably.

28. Name something you can’t wait for: The possibility of moving to Chicago.

29. When was the last time you saw your Mom: Last... Monday, I believe.

30. What is one thing you wish you could change in your life: Financial stability/security.

31. What are you listening to right now: DJ’s mom’s cockatiels chirping. Other than that and the ceiling fan in here, there isn’t really any noise. I WAS listening to a Rooster Teeth Podcast not too long ago while folding laundry, but then I moved to a different room, and haven’t put another one on yet.

32. Have you ever talked to a person named Tom: Yes.

33. Something that is getting on your nerves: Feeling frustrated and lost I guess, but that’s actually started to ease up recently as I’ve been slowly figuring things out. I’ve got a long way to go, but it’s kind of nice.

34. Most visited website: Tumblr, Facebook, Youtube, Twitch. I visit them all pretty equally.

35. Mole/s: Uh... A bunch. Two on my neck, a couple on my chest, several on my arms, maybe one or two on my legs, and one other one.

36. Mark/s: I’ve currently got some scars thanks to Nugget (DJ’s cat), but those’ll probably go away sooner or later, as with any other scars or bruises I’ve ever picked up. The only lasting scar I have is on the bridge of my nose. When I was 5 or so, I tried to feed my uncle’s Very Large Dog, Snowball, a piece of ham. He was very excited about the ham, and I was very small. Wasn’t his fault, and I never blamed him for it. Honestly, I’ve kind of grown to really like that scar. It’s distinctive.

37. Childhood dream: I wanted to be a horse until I was 5 and found out you couldn’t do that (lmao). I wanted to be a vet after that until I was 11 or 12 and realized I was very squeamish around gore. I wanted to be a zoologist after that all the way up until freshman year of college, after which my goals changed, and are still currently evolving. There was also DEFINITELY a point where I wanted to host my own Animal Planet show, a la Steve Irwin or Jeff Corwin.

38. Hair color: It’s currently a light/medium auburn. I tried dyeing purple over it, but it didn’t stick for very long. Naturally, it’s a medium/dark brown with some red in it.

39. Long or short hair: My hair is actually currently the shortest it’s been since 2008, and it’s still a little below shoulder length. I’m used to having very long hair, but my hair is prone to damage and split ends, and tangles, and is also very thin. Getting half of it chopped off has helped immensely. It looks much healthier.

40. Do you have a crush on someone?: Nah.

41. What do you like about yourself: Hm. I’m kind, thoughtful, generally try to be helpful, tactful, reasonably intelligent, and musically talented.

42. Piercings: None. Not really a fan of them, tbh. I think I’d look good with a monroe or madonna piercing, but it would irritate my gums too much. 

43. Blood type: A negative.

44: Nicknames: Sabs is the only one I get even remotely regularly anymore.

45. Relationship status: Happily taken.

46. Zodiac: Cancer / Horse.

47. Pronouns: She/her, I guess. I probably wouldn’t really care about any of them, tbh.

48. Favorite TV show(s): Hm. Community, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Parks and Rec, maybe The Goldbergs, Steven Universe, Gravity Falls... There’s probably more. I’m not even going to include anime, because that list is way longer.

49. Tattoos: I currently have one on my left wrist. I think I’d like to get full sleeves eventually. I’m still planning out some of the designs. Also, you know, tattoos are expensive.

50. Right or left hand: Right. 

51. Surgery: I’ve had x-rays, ultrasounds, dental work, but never a surgery. I’d like to keep it that way, but something tells me my dentist is going to harp on me about not getting my wisdom teeth removed.

52. Hair dyed a different color: I’ve been dyeing my hair since I was 11. I guarantee there are some people who’ve never seen my natural hair color.

53. Sports: I am Bad At Those.

54. Vacation: I’ve only ever been on a couple in my life (California to visit my aunt when I was 13, St. Louis in high school for the band/choir trip. Chicago every once in a while to visit friends, but I don’t know if I’d call that a vacation, per se). I’d love to go a TON of places.

55. Shoes: I’ve mostly been wearing flip flops lately, flats if I need to be dressy. But that’s because it’s hot and humid right now. Ohio air is like soup. It’s the worst. I prefer boots of all types, and some tennis shoes/sneakers.

56. Eating: I’m about to go make a leftover taco or two. I want to go get something somewhere, but... financial responsibility. *sigh*

57. Drinking: I had some juice earlier. Will probably have more, or water.

58. I’m about to: Go make those tacos I was talking about.

59. Waiting for: Things to finally start moving in the right direction.

60. Want: To win the lottery. It would fix 90% of my problems. Also, to find out what’s wrong with me, but the doctors’ appointments and lab work should solve that.

61. Get married: I’d like to eventually, but I’m in no particular rush. I got engaged once before, and it ended horrifically. I mean, I’ve certainly got high hopes for this one, but I, again, am in no particular rush.

62. Career: I do some freelance editing currently, but it’s not enough to pay the bills. I’d like to get into full-time editing, web development (which I’m currently learning how to do), or, ideally, being a full-time Twitch streamer would really suit me, but I like streaming just because. I would just like to do it more often.

WHICH IS BETTER:

63. Hugs or kisses: Hugs.

64. Lips or eyes: Eyes.

65. Shorter or taller: Taller, I guess? It really doesn’t matter to me either way.

66. Older or younger: Doesn’t matter, within reason.

67. Nice arms or nice stomach: Arms, maybe. Don’t super care about either.

68. Sensitive or loud: Sensitive, I guess.

69. Hook up or relationship: Relationship.

70. Troublemaker or hesitant: Hesitant. I’d rather not have to deal with cops, if at all possible.

HAVE YOU EVER:

71. Kissed a stranger: Once, that I recall.

72. Drank hard liquor: Yup. I don’t drink as much these days, but it’s still fun from time to time.

73. Lost glasses/contact lenses: I lose my glasses all the damn time. Accidentally left them at my parents’ house the last time I was over, so I’m gonna have to go get those back soon.

74. Turned someone down: Yeah.

75. Sex on first date: It has happened.

76. Broken someone’s heart: Yeah.

77. Had your heart broken: Yes.

78. Been arrested: No.

79. Cried when someone died: Very much so, even seven years later.

80. Fallen for a friend: I mean, that’s usually the case. I don’t tend to date people if I’m not already friends with them first. 

DO YOU BELIEVE IN:

81. Yourself: That answer changes from day to day. It’s better than it used to be.

82. Miracles: Maybe? I’m not entirely sure. I don’t know the exact definition of what constitutes a miracle.

83. Love at first sight: I think people can have Interest at First Sight, or, like, I Think I’m Compatible with This Person Probably at First Sight, but true, actual, lasting love? No. That develops over time and requires work to sustain.

84. Santa Claus: St. Nicholas was absolutely a real person.

85. Kiss on the first date: Again, it has happened.

OTHER:

86. Current best friend: I have several. I know that defeats the purpose of a “best friend,” but I consider most of my close friends family at this point. I suppose I’d have to say DJ, in that case.

87. Eye color: Light grayish-blue. Some days it looks more one color than the other. Depends on what I’m wearing.

88. Favorite movie: Well, the only three movies I’m generally able to watch multiple times (and have) are Scott Pilgrim, The Nightmare Before Christmas, and Repo! The Genetic Opera. I’ve also seen all the Harry Potter movies several times. There are a ton of movies I’ve enjoyed, though. I just usually don’t have the attention span to watch them.

tagging: @theifbaby @patillojack @gordona424 @octoberspirit @legendxofxzach Uh...I don’t know if I can think of 15 more. I’ll tag @nwinchester94 too, even though I haven’t heard from her in a long time. :(

[no-crap-fm]

An Evening Walk - Chapter 11

Rae hummed as she studied the menu. Finn recognized the hum was The Smiths’ Ask, an old favorite of his. Having decided on his order he had time to observe Rae. Leaning his chin in his hand, he smiled to himself. She twirled a loose strand of hair around her finger and then tucked it back into place. That’s my job, Finn thought. He was so distracted by Rae’s hair and his desire to touch it he jumped as she slapped her menu down on the table with a look of resignation. “Beef Wellington, I think.” Finn shook with silent laughter. He straightened and smacked the table. “Make that two.” Her enthusiasm inspired him to change his mind. Sharing a chuckle, Finn got their server’s attention and placed their order. “It’s actually an excellent choice, Rae.” He winked at her as their menus were collected. Once their server departed, Finn reached across the table and clasped Rae’s hand in both of his. “Rae, em, how would you feel about coming to Stamford with me?” Her sudden wide eyed expression concerned him. Rubbing her hand he tried to approach it from another angle. “I know it’s still new for us but my dad has been after me to come home and I thought you could see your family.” Rae remained still and Finn was worried. “Rae, blink for me. Have I scared ya?” He bit his lip and scrunched his eyebrows. Finally releasing the breath she’d been holding, Rae said, “No, Finn! Em, I’m not scared…just shocked.” Letting her hands go, Finn asked, “Why shocked, Rae? Too soon to ask you to meet my dad?” Blinking rapidly, Rae guffawed. “It isn’t that, Finn. I’d love to meet your dad. It’s just…” Her eyes dropped to the tablecloth and she shook her head. “What, Rae? It’s just what?” Finn was feeling anxiety rise at her strange reaction. Pushing back from the table, Rae said, “It’s just that I was going to ask if you would want to come home to Stamford with me!” It was Finn’s turn to freeze and slowly resume his breathing. Nodding, Rae went on, “I spoke to my mum today and she reminded me that I was expected home this weekend. It’s my little sister’s birthday on Saturday. I had planned to go and promptly forgot in the throes of recent events.” She gave Finn a shy smile and continued, “And naturally, when I told my mum about you-” Finn’s enormous grin was undeniable as he cut her off. “You told your mum about me, Rae?” His eyebrows cocked as he reached for her hand again. Biting her lip, Rae said, “I might have done. A little bit anyway…” Finn sighed. “That’s good because I kind of wouldn’t shut up about you to my dad.” He laughed. “It sounds like we’re on equal footing in that regard.” Lifting her glass to Finn’s, Rae said, “Indeed, here’s to equal footing.” The glasses clinked as the pair locked eyes and gazed at the other as they sipped their wine. Swallowing, Rae said, “So, how about it?” She set her glass on the table and leaned toward Finn. “Ya fancy goin’ round to me mum’s Finn?” Choking a little on his wine, Finn coughed and nodded. “Only if you’ll come round to me dad’s.” Rae’s smile was all the approval Finn needed. He was thoughtful for a moment. “We should probably take the early train on Saturday. We both have work on Friday and we still have plans to meet up with Archie and his boyfriend, James. I figured a late dinner would be best. Would that work for you, Rae?” Rae nodded. “Em, I would guess you were planning to stay at your mum’s. But my dad has a guest room that would fit both of us. We could even sleep in my old bedroom, if you wanted. How does that sound?” Rae was tickled. “You thought of everything, Finn. All you need to do is figure out what I need to pack.” A serious demeanor overtook him as he said, “I love everything you wear, Rae. I also love when you don’t wear anything.” Rae took a huge gulp of her wine and tried to get her cardiovascular system to behave. Taking a calming breath she chided, “Now, now, Finn, none of that or we won’t make it through dinner.” His stare was getting far too intense for Rae to remain seated. “If you didn’t want me to think about it you wouldn’t have worn your hair up. All I’ve been imagining is you back at my flat in nothing but my Radiohead t-shirt. And in my fantasy you don’t get to keep it on for long.” Rae’s breathing became shallow panting as she felt her cheeks burn while Finn focused on her. Finn went on, “I noticed it when I saw you at the station. I had to give myself a moment to recover my senses. That’s why I called you before I came to your desk.” “You called me while you were in the building?” Rae was caught off guard. Finn nodded slowly. “I had to, Rae. You looked so insanely sexy and I knew I would make a scene if I rushed up like I wanted. When I saw you check your phone I grabbed mine and you know the rest.” He gave her a wink and added, “I’m so glad you like your flowers.” “You are astonishing, Mr. Nelson. Nothing gets past you.” Rae’s mouth hung open as their server approached with their food. Finn beamed at her. As he lifted his knife and fork he gestured for her to tuck in. The meal passed with the two agreeing on Finn’s suggestion of taking the Saturday morning train. Finn was going to call Archie to firm up plans for Friday night. Rae would chat with her mum about sleeping arrangements. The option to stay at Finn’s dad’s appealed to her. As much as Rae adored her family, she could always use a respite from her mum during her visits. “I think I should probably stay at yours on Friday,” Finn said as he took another bite of his perfectly cooked beef. Not missing a beat, Rae challenged, “Is that so, Finn?” Swallowing his bite, Finn said, “Well, I would imagine you would feel better leaving from yours. You can make doubly sure to have everything you’d like to take along.” “Including you?” She teased. “To be sure, Rae.” He lazily pushed his fork onto his plate to cut another morsel. “I should probably tell you I have an ulterior motive for wanting to stay at yours Friday night.” Rae took a sip of wine and said, “And what is that?” She cocked her eyebrow in expectation. Lifting his fork, Finn said, “I will be happier knowing I have a guaranteed night with you on my calendar.” He popped the bit of beef in his mouth and groaned making Rae giggle. “But Finn, we’ve spent every night together since we met.” Rae was perplexed. “I know, Rae. But those were all spur of the moment. I love the thought of making plans with you.” The words were out of Finn’s mouth and a moment later he considered their significance. Finn had never been one to make plans with women. He was very much an I’ll call you later kind of man. Aside from work, his father and Archie, Finn was patently disinterested in setting appointments. His previous girlfriends would be amazed to hear him say such things. Rae was bordering on overwhelmed. This kind, funny, affectionate man was saying things she had never entertained hearing in her wildest fantasies. “So, em, we’re not going to break our pattern tonight.” She bounced her eyes to his. “Are we?” Finn gulped at her lusty look. A crooked smile took over his face as he scanned the restaurant for their server. They finished their meal and Finn quickly paid the bill. Stepping around to Rae’s chair, he held her coat for her. As she pulled her arms through the sleeves, Finn gave her a lingering kiss just below her ear. He whispered huskily, “I told ya, I love your hair like this.” Rae shivered and not from the cold. 

Finn got them safely back to his in a trice. He and Rae stowed his bike and found themselves in Finn’s bedroom faster than their previous nights. Rae rested her hip against Finn’s bed frame. “Well, now that you have me here, Finn, what are you going to do with me?” Her eyes went wide in faux innocence. Sauntering over to her, an arousing smirk firmly in place, Finn placed his hands on Rae’s hips and squeezed. She gasped as he pulled her flush against his body. Finn’s mouth was at her throat, kissing and teasing. Rae’s ragged moan was the only sound as Finn continued his movements while undressing Rae. 

Wednesday came in a whirlwind of activity for the couple. Rae had another stellar show and discovered she was gaining a sizable amount of listeners. Her station heads were thrilled at her results and sent their compliments. Chop was effusive about Rae’s mix of sound and edgy music choices. “We’re educatin’ the audience, we are!” He’d gushed as he’d waved to Rae from the exit door. Finn enjoyed two tremendous recording sessions, followed by loads of editing and remixing. Both artists had genuine potential if what he heard in his studio was any indication. Rae stopped by the studio late Wednesday night. Finn played what he thought would be the first single on a new album for her. She agreed with Finn that there were some really ingenious arrangements. “I’ve never had someone to talk to about this stuff before, Rae. I mean, my mates in the industry, but no one like you.” He pulled her onto his lap in front of the board. “Well, Finn, would you say you were ever involved with someone like me?” She raised an eyebrow. Pushing her hair into place and tucking his hands behind her ears, he sucked his lips in and thought. Pulling her in for a kiss he whispered against her lips, “Never, Rae. There’s no one else like you in the world.” Rae stayed with Finn for an all-nighter at the studio. As much as Finn wanted her to get some rest, he loved having her with him. Rae brought him cups of tea and scrutinized the sound quality along with him. Rolling the sleeves up on his flannel, he turned to Rae. “You know, you would have made a fantastic engineer, Rae. I would hire you in a second.” Rae laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind, Finn.” She sipped her tea with big eyes and said, “It’s just so cool getting to be part of this.” They shared a smile. “I really love this, Finn.” He wondered what she meant by this but Finn left it for another time. “I love it too, Rae. You’re really good company.” He caught Rae’s yawn and insisted she rest. Finn stood and moved to the sofa against the wall. Rae was relieved and surprised to see that the sofa was a pullout. The bed was made with soft sheets and blankets. Rae sighed at the sight, her exhaustion getting the better of her. The pair wound up sleeping on the sofa in the studio. Finn spent the odd late night there and kept a pullout sofa exactly for that purpose. “You’re my first guest,” he declared as he scooted closer to cuddle Rae. “I’m flattered,” she said as she stifled another yawn. “Don’t be. I’m the one who’s lucky to have you here.” Kissing the back of her head, Finn closed his arms around her and murmured, “Goodnight, Rae.” She rubbed her hand over Finn’s arm and muttered, “I’m lucky too, Finn, goodnight.”

More to come...

All my thanks for reading! - Katie

[thain1982]

Gene Wolfe's address to ReaderCon 1987

This is the transcript of a speech Gene Wolfe gave at ReaderCon in Boston, 1987, regarding what he dubs the "New Illiteracy." It is an exceptional read.

 I would like to begin by asking you to contemplate a statistic and a quotation. The statistic is that in America today one person in seven is completely illiterate--unable to read "IN CASE OF FIRE BREAK GLASS," for example. Let me admit immediately that this figure--which was given me by a nurse who is involved in adult education--may be considerably in error. The fact is that no one really knows what proportion of the U.S. population is illiterate; any figure that may be quoted to you is an estimate. And if you are given a Government estimate, you should keep in mind that no government is really proud of its illiterates. However, the Adult Performance Level--APL--study funded by the U.S. Department of Education estimated that 27 million U.S. adults were completely illiterate; that is roughly one in five.

 The quotation is Mark Twain's: "The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them." [emphasis mine]

 One of the reasons it is so difficult to get good figures on illiteracy is that illiterate people are ashamed of it, even though in nine cases out of ten it is not their fault. Thus the Census Bureau cannot simply ask whether this person or that cannot read. It would be told that he or she certainly can; and although it would know the answer was often untrue, it could not know how often.

 The people Mark Twain spoke of are, if anything, rather more difficult to detect. Let me give you an example. A few years ago, I came across a remarkably fine two-volume set of what I think is one of the best books of fantasy ever written--Washington Irving's The Alhambra. This edition had appeared in 1891, and its marvelously florid white and gold bindings were still protected by dust wrappers of thick black oilcloth. If its paper was not acid-free, it had certainly acted like it: the pages had not yellowed, and their decorative borders of bronze and vermilion could almost have been printed the year before. The two volumes were $7, and I bought them at once.

 Halfway through the first volume, I began to hit unopened pages. I was forced to read with a letter-opener in one hand, separating them as I went. No one had read more than the first half of the first volume, though the books had been in existence for nearly a century. I ask you to consider, please, just why the owner of those books had bought and kept them.

 Of course it is notorious that some rich people buy books merely to decorate their rooms. I have been told--and I'm sure it's true--that many interior decorators offer to supply up to so many yards of gold-tooled red or blue leather bindings. And though I hesitate to disillusion you, I fear that it's equally true that there is a stage set in the basement of the Senate Office Building made by cutting away everything but the spines of hundreds of good books. It permits a senator to face the cameras against a background as false as his own.

 The original owner of this set--let's assume him male--was clearly not that sort of man. He had kept its white-and-gold bindings hidden beneath their oilcloth jackets, remember; and in those jackets the two books are as dismal, and as plain, as you will ever see. What's more, he had begun to read them.

 That he never found the time is the conventional guess, to be sure. But when books published nearly a century before are discovered in near-mint condition, it's generally safe to assume that they have spent most of the century in the possession of a single owner. And since he bought them well before the advent of modern labor-saving machinery, he presumably had a good deal of leisure time. It's hard to imagine how decade after decade might roll slowly by without ever an illness or a vacation, a layoff, a summer Sunday, or a blizzard that would have allowed him to read.

 We are left, then, with the books themselves; and we must consider whether they are dull or overly complex. I very much regret that I didn't mark the exact point at which the previous owner ceased to read. But I remember the approximate place:

 In one of my visits to the old Moorish chamber where the good Tia Antonia cooks her dinner and receives her company, I observed a mysterious door in one corner, leading apparently into the ancient part of the edifice. My curiosity being aroused, I opened it, and found myself in a narrow, blind corridor, groping along which I came to the head of a dark winding staircase, leading down at an angle to the Tower of Comares. Down this staircase I descended darkling, guiding myself by the wall until I came to a small door at the bottom, throwing which open, I was suddenly dazzled by emerging into the brilliant antechamber of the Hall of the Ambassadors; with the fountain of the Court of the Alberca sparkling before me.

 Now I admit that is not utterly thrilling. A certain young American enjoying a holiday in Spain has decided to explore a ruined palace inhabited by beggars. He visits the beggar queen (whose friendship he has secured in an earlier chapter), opens a door that has piqued his curiosity, goes down a dark hall and an even darker stairway, and finds himself in the room in which the representatives of foreign powers once waited the pleasure of the Moorish king.

 But it is not without interest. One wonders what the young American will find next, and dreams--as he himself does at times--of ghosts and hidden treasure.

 Nor is it very difficult reading. There are three foreign words, but two of them are place names, and the third is part of a proper name. A reader who does not realize that tía is the Spanish word for aunt is free to assume that the lady's name is Tia-Antonia and get on with the story. Irving's sentences are somewhat long, but they are so filled with familiar words and words of one syllable--in, one, of, my, to, the, old, where, the, good, Tia, cooks, and so on--that they make easy reading. That darkling seems a little strange to us; it is the sort of word William Hope Hodgson and H. P. Lovecraft revived as a mannerism; but it is not a mannerism in Irving, and would not have seemed strange to a reader of 1891.

 Why, then, did the original owner stop? Why did he not go down that darkling staircase in an angle of the Tower of Comares with Irving? I think I know.

 It has to do with the history of literacy, and particularly with the history of mass literacy. People have been reading and writing for four thousand years and more, but for ninety percent of that time we readers and writers have been a very small fraction of the population. My mother once worked for a man named Appleby who made serious and protracted efforts to trace his own descent in the male line. He had an easier task than most of us would, because these ancestors had been English. Furthermore, he was lucky enough to strike a line of parsons that carried him back almost to the 1500s. But there the trail of ink ended, and no expenditure of time or money--and Mr. Appleby was a rich man--could turn it up again.

 Widespread reading began, as most of you surely know, with the desire to read the Bible; Still more with the desire that others should read the Bible. When William Tyndale said, "I will cause that a boy that driveth the pow shall know more of the Scripture than thou dost," he created thousands of teachers and preachers (then often the same person) whom we have since forgotten.

 They made it okay to learn to read. It was a staggering accomplishment. The boy was needed for plowing and sowing and chopping wood and a hundred other labors. The girl was needed to cook, mend, wash, and sweep, to make pickles and jelly, to watch the stove and her small brothers and sisters. All this not just because the wealth of the family depended on it, but because the very survival of its members depended on it. These people were subsistence farmers, as were nineteen twentieths of the population; and subsistence farmers need a good harvest each year with nothing wasted, particularly time. One crop failure may mean starvation. The boy's father and grandfather could not read a word; nor could the girl's mother, nor her grandmother.

 But God came first.

 The question was whether anything came second. Reading the Bible was all right--very much so. Reading a book like Pilgrim's Progress was probably okay too. But what about all this other stuff?

 As you might have expected, there were two answers. The old educated classes, brought up on Virgil and Homer, said yes. The newly literate or semiliterate class said NO!

 "I skip forty years," said the Baker,in tears,

And proceed without further remark

To the day when you took me aboard of your ship

To help you in hunting the Snark."

 But I really mean to skip a lot more than that. Tyndale died in 1536, and I'm going to jump to 1850, or so, with another quotation most of you are sure to recognize:

 Each in her turn stepped forward to the edge of the platform, cleared her throat, held up her manuscript (tied with a dainty ribbon) and proceeded to read, with labored attention to "expression" and punctuation. The themes were the same that had been illuminated upon similar occasions by their mothers before them, their grandmothers, and doubtless all their ancestors in the female line clear back to the Crusades. "Friendship" was one; "Memories of Other Days"; "Religion in History"; "Dream and"; "The Advantages of Culture"; "Forms of Political Government Compared and Contrasted"; "Melancholy"; "Filial Love"; "Heart Longings," etc., etc.

 A prevalent feature of these compositions was a nursed and petted melancholy; another was a wasteful and opulent gush of "fine language"; another was a tendency to lug in by the ears particularly prized words until they were worn entirely out; and a peculiarity that conspicuously marked and marred them was the inveterate and intolerable sermon that wagged its crippled tail at the end of each and every one of them. No matter what the subject might be, a brain-racking effort was made to squirm it into some aspect or other that the moral and religious mind could contemplate with edification. The glaring insincerity of these sermons was not sufficient to compass the banishment of the fashion from the schools, and it is not sufficient today; it never will be sufficient, perhaps. There is no school in all our land where the young ladies do not feel obliged to close their compositions with a sermon; and you will find that the sermon of the most frivolous and least religious girl in the school is always the longest and the most relentlessly pious.

 The scene is, of course, Tom Sawyer's school. We see that religion as a justification for literacy has lasted more than three hundred years. And we sense that its reign is about over. Here was one of the greatest turning points in its history. Was literacy to become a good in and of itself? An end, and not a means? Or was it to become no more than a fading customer that had lost its justification? (Notice, by the way, that Mark Twain carelessly supposes that village girls were writing themes in the Middle Ages, though he must have known better.)

 I think that Mark Twain saw the beginning of the change, and that the original owner of my set of The Alhambra was born in the period of transition. I think he stopped reading because he liked it too much.

 I realize that's an outrageous statement; but I think that it is true, like so many other outrageous statements. Consider what a set of books like those must have cost in 1891--only a few dollars, to be sure; but this was still the era of the five-dollar gold piece. Consider too that though he never finished those books, he preserved them beautifully for year after year.

 He lived, probably, somewhere in the Middle West. It's a raw and corrupt country even now, and it was a far more raw and corrupt one then. If he lived in Chicago--which is where I got his books--it was the Chicago of slums and packing houses, of Colonel McNeery and Jane Addams. But he had read of the Tower of Comares and the fountain of the Court of the Alberca, and there was no one he could tell about them.

 This, then, is the new illiteracy, the illiteracy of those who can read but don't. Mark Twain saw it coming, and we have spent our whole lives living in its shadow. Long ago it lost its own justification, of course; it had lost it before Mark Twain was born. And reading has found new ones even while retaining its old one--for reading's original justification was never really lost, only for a time "entirely worn out."

 Now for my own little sermon: This new illiteracy is more pernicious than the old, because unlike the old illiteracy it does not debar its victims from power and influence, although like the old it disqualifies them for it. Those long-dead men and women who learned to read so that they might read the Bible and John Bunyan would tell us that pride is the greatest of all sins, the father of sin. And the victims of the new illiteracy are proud of it. If you don't believe me, talk to them and see with what pride they trumpet their utter ignorance of any book you care to name.

 The old illiteracy is with us still, and indeed is growing; but its victims hate it, and escape it when they can. The new illiteracy, though it is so easily escaped, is escaped far less often. It is a jail so good that its doors need not be locked. The prisoners sit staring at the screen--or at the wall--or at of the window at the cell across the way; and they never try the knob.

 I suspect that many of you recognized this new illiteracy before I did, and that many of you have despaired of fighting it--as I, too, despaired for so long. For years it seemed to me that the only way to reach the victims of the new illiteracy was through television; and television was and is beyond our reach. But at least I realized that there is a more powerful medium than television, and that it is available to every one of us. It is speech--talk, if you will. Conversation.

 We can do two things.

 The first is what we're doing right here at Readercon. We can gather together specifically as readers. In Mark Twain's time a statesman said, "Books are a delightful society. If you go into a room filled with books, they seem to speak to you, to welcome you." That is so; and yet the pleasure of reading is doubled at least when you can share it.

 The other is simply to talk of books even to those who have not read. It exposes us to their contempt, indeed; and it may be that though they watch us enter their prison a hundred times, and leave it a hundred too, it will suggest nothing to them. But the opening and closing of the doors is bound to let in free air, and who knows what that may do?

[lesserplaces]

One of the consistent complaints I hear from people looking to get into fly fishing is that the cost of entry is simply too high. Experienced fly fishers usually scoff at this, having slowly acquired all there gear over a period of years, but as the Immortal Hank Patterson puts it…

…the newbies have a point. Without careful planning it is easy for your first fly fishing trip to turn into a several hundred, if not thousand, dollar experiment. An experiment your significant other will almost certainly resent.

However, there is another danger in getting started: buying garbage gear. If you are looking to ensure that you don’t like fly fishing a good start is to try casting a bad rod, get soaked in poorly made waders, or spend a day fighting a cheap line. As such one of my goals for the next year is to try to highlight gear that works well at a reasonable price.

The most core piece of fly fishing gear is the rod. Hell, some people don’t even use a reel. However, the rod is also one of the places where things can get really expensive fast and most “entry+” level rods (read: a rod you wont want to replace immediately), such as the Orvis Clearwater and Fenwick Aetos, are hovering around the $150-200 marks. By the time you add a cheap reel, cheap, backing, and a reasonably good line this puts your starter package somewhere around $300, much more than most people want to spend.

To get around this you have a few options. First, you can buy one of the “kits,” which package a rod, reel, and line all together at some discount. This is how I started fishing, as most people did, but the savings here aren’t huge (though see the Echo Base at around $150, which I have never cast but gets phenomenal reviews). Second, you can check the used market, which regularly has these “entry+” rods floating around at steep discounts after people try the sport and give it up. Third, you can wait for an absurd sale on a good rod. Enter the Cabela’s Prime Fiberglass Rod.

As one piece, slow action, fiberglass rod the Prime is a rod you expect to come out of some tiny shop making crazy stuff to stay afloat, not from a mega-behemoth big box like Cabela’s. They come in weird sizes (6″ 6′ in 4 weight?), are difficult to transport, and I imagine even more difficult to sell. I have no earthly idea how this rod got past the chopping block at corporate headquarters, but God bless the mid-level manager who had the guts to suggest it and the executive who had the good sense to look the other way. Early takes from the king of fiberglass, Cameron at The Fiberglass Manifesto, were really positive and from the first time I held one at my local store I could tell that Cabela’s managed to make a rod that was not only interesting, but also appeared to be good.

Unfortunately the Prime also cost $150+, which is significantly above my “hmmm that looks interesting” outdoors gear budget. Low an behold, when the price fell to a crazy $50 a few weeks ago (as of this writing there are still some sizes available at this price), I just couldn’t resist. Curry jumped on the 7 ft 4 wt, me on the 6 ft 3 wt, and Padre grabbed one of each.

Fit and finish better than you would expect on a $150 rod, and absurdly good for a $50 rod. Compared to my old Orivs Clearwater (which retails at $198), the cork has less filler, the wraps are better, and the blank looks much classier. On the downside, the wood in the reel seat doesn’t look great, the up-locking foot is very thin, and I wish the snub-nosed half wells grip had more figure to it.  Still, in this price range I can’t think of a rod I’ve seen that looks better.

None of that matters, however, if it doesn’t catch fish. To find out how they acted with a fish on, Curry and I took our rods to the only place we were sure we could not get skunked, my beloved Fossil Creek.

The plucky little three weight had more punch that you might expect. Despite the fact that it is a slow action rod it has a good strong butt that will do the work if you give it time to flex. Paired with a Leland three weight line and an AZ Wanderings furled leader I had no problem throwing single tungsten-bead headed nymphs. However, when I tried stepping up to a tungsten-bead headed nymph and a size 10 woolly bugger things went awry and the rod ran out of gas. Still, this is stronger than expected performance from a six foot three weight glass rod.

Prior to this trip Curry had been a dedicated Tenkara fisherman. By the end of the day he was throwing reasonable loops, which is a testament to how newbie friendly glass rods are.

It even got him his first fish on traditional tackle before the sun hit the water.

Throughout the day we caught several fish in the 8-10 inch range and had one monster on that managed to wiggle himself off the hook while I was trying to net him. In my experience roundtail chub, the main quarry in Fossil Creek, fight harder than smallmouth of comparable size, and each of these put a solid flex in the three weight. The big guy in particular (who looked to be 12+ inches, only a little smaller than the state record) bent the rod clear to the cork.

In case you are a trout snob and don’t like looking at chub know that the Prime can catch trout too. On a previous trip I used to rod to pull two nice rainbows out of a micro-stream, both of which the Prime fought surprisingly well despite very tight quarters. There is no reason you cannot bring in good fish on this rod.

We also caught countless, as in we literally lost count, tiny fry. These remained fun on the three, but looked a little banal on the four. If Fossil Creek has any real problem, as a fishery, it is that it is hard to keep the little fish off your fly long enough for a big one to take it. This is a good problem to have.

So what are the downsides? For one, you aren’t going to get a brand-new made in the USA rod for $50. The Prime tries to hide it’s “Made in China” scarlet letter, but if you look close enough you will find it:

Second, it only comes with a rod sock, not a tube. This is acceptable on a $50 rod, but if you were paying full price it would be genuinely annoying. I guess the accountants had to get involved at some point, and in the grand scheme of things it is nothing a little PVC pipe cannot fix.

Lastly, and this is an odd thing to say for a glass rod, my three weight is a little rear heavy. This could be solved by going with a lighter reel, as I am using my Orvis Battenkill Disc II (review HERE), and Curry’s four weight felt much better.

In summary, these are rods that punch above their weight at $150. At $50, they are stupid good. It is rare that entry level prices line up with gear you will never feel compelled to replace, but as small stream rods the Prime falls square into that category. I, for one, will be keeping mine.

You can follow Lesser Places by email, or on Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram using the menu at the top of the page. Or, you could click the links below to share with your friends directly. Or, copy and paste the URL someplace you think people will find it useful. Or, print the story, place it in a nice envelope, and send it to one of your friends. Basically we support any way you want to share.  No, we aren’t above begging.

Max Wilson is a graduate student studying ecology at Arizona State University. He writes here at Lesser Places, has occasionally written for Backpacker.com, and even more occasionally written for scientific journals. You can follow him on twitter @maxomillions.

  How much fly rod can you get for $50? Cabela’s Prime Fiberglass Rod Edition One of the consistent complaints I hear from people looking to get into fly fishing is that the cost of entry is simply too high.

[newstechreviews]

LawBreakers, the first game from Gears of War designer Cliff Bleszinski's new studio Boss Key, launched in July on PC and PlayStation 4. It wasn't the out-of-the-gate success that the studio might have wanted, however, with player figures reportedly very low. In an interview with GameSpot, the industry veteran spoke frankly about the game's launch and told us what Boss Key plans to do in the future to get more players into the game.

We published a portion of this interview last month, and now we're bringing you the full thing. In our conversation, Bleszinski talks about the feedback since launch, why launching in "Destiny season" might have been a little problematic, support for new consoles like PS4 Pro and Xbox One X, and if Boss Key might ever consider bringing LawBreakers to Nintendo Switch. You can find the full interview below, edited and condensed for clarity.

LawBreakers is available now on PS4 and PC for $30.

GameSpot: What were some of the key pieces of feedback you've heard since launch?

Cliff Bleszinski: People who sit down and play the game see that, apart from it looking very different, art style wise, it actually plays quite a bit different. However, it's because I didn't do the same archetypes of the guy who builds the turret or the sniper or the traditional kind of healer that follows behind people, the healing ray, we kind of rolled our own archetypes. That ultimately proved to be very confusing for a lot of core players who were getting into it, in regards to, are they gonna watch the tutorial video? What happens if people like to go online and then they hit all the buttons or all the keys and they just want to figure out, kind of in a vacuum, what they can do with that?

So, what we've done is you kinda double back. And I'm not going to go into all the future content yet, in terms of things we're working on, but creating a far better onboarding experience where it works on PlayStation, it works on PC, it'd have more of a scripted tutorial and continue to look at ways we can improve our offline mode, so people could quote, you know, practice their lines a lot better before they get on stage. So, that was the big take away, honestly, from us.

"We made a skill-based shooter that people who actually play it love"

What are some of the things that you think went well?

Well, I think we made a darn good shooter. And the elephant in the room is our fledging CCU, which we totally understand. We remain committed to the project and those that we have who are our fans are dedicated and we're engaging with them constantly and they're doing fun things like grassroots tournaments that they're organizing themselves. But we made a skill-based shooter that people who actually play it love and continuing to double down on marketing and awareness of it and committing to the product, is something that we're very much intent on. But, if you look at ... If you Google the game right now, the first thing you see on the top right is aggregate of nine out of 10 on Steam. And for me, that's the feeling that, "Yeah, we did our job. I did what I set out to do three years ago."

And like I always said in the other interview, it's a marathon, not a sprint. We're just gonna keep iterating and keep working on it. And at the end of day, I just didn't want to make the exact same archetypes that everybody else did and I wanted to make a game that was, first and foremost, a shooter for shooter players.

The CCU's and just how many players are in the game today, that's ... I guess, how are you feeling about that? You said it's not exactly where you would want it to be, but if you could just talk a little bit more about that, that would be great.

Yeah, I mean, so the thing is, is we're now officially in Destiny season.

Right, yep.

And God bless Bungie for the fantastic job they did. The first one I played for about a week and I was like, "Okay, I get the idea." But, it looks like the second one addresses a lot of those issues and is a, really, knock it out of the park, especially with a really good frame rate on the PC version that's forthcoming. But, in regards to that, it's one of those things that there's a situation where players look at numbers on Steam, that doesn't happen on PlayStation 4. And I don't have the numbers in front of me, but in regards to, you look at PC CCU health versus PS4, PS4's doing fine. Because people just chop up, cough up 30 bucks and hop online and they just play and they don't overthink it. On PC, there's this immediately wanting to declare something a success or a bomb by this kind of internet culture that loves to just observe things.

And it's like, "Well guys, the small bit that we have, we're gonna continue to iterate with and engage." And as we issue content drops, maybe there's gonna be sales or a potential free weekend somewhere down the line. You know, continue to fluff that CCU up and I continue to go back to games like Warframe, that slowly built their very small audience as a bunch of dedicated fan and then, continued to fluff it up. And you watch the graph of the CCU and it's so low, so low, and then eventually, over the course of a year, year and a half, two years, it became this phenomenon that a lot of people weren't even talking about it. But, my friends at Digital Extremes committed to that and that's what's required. Especially in such a crowded market when you're launching a new IP.

That and of course, rebranding of the marketing, showing all the new content and saying, "Hey, if you gave it a go, come back or if you haven't done it yet, try it." And maybe other techniques like send out a, "Hey, here's a free code for your friend." So, you could write a dissertation or an entire GDC talk on the keeping, care, and feeding of maintaining a healthy player base.

One of the things that goes along with that I think would be matchmaking times. It's something you've said is maybe a little bit slower than people would have liked to see and that goes along with the player figures. Here in Australia we've been testing and it's been difficult to find a match on PS4.

Yeah, well, it's one of those things, the Australian market is one that we want to definitely support. But, when it comes to actual number of CCU with a game that has a fledgling player base, it's not a lot to be frank. So, the big thing we have to do is continue to pump into this. People said they want a team deathmatch, they've played the dart game like teamdeath match so we're like, "You want team deathmatch? Here, have it." And you just want to get around and shoot people and ignore the objective, stick with it. So, even further on down the line, we've got new maps coming, such as Valhalla, which is our first forest map, which is our first asymmetrical one.

We got our rapid fire updates hitting and it's just, that's the main thing that we do right now and continue to remind people of it. It's one of those things that whenever I talk about the game on Twitter with my pretty good following there, people respond when our LawBreaker's Facebook page posts about this, that, and the other in regards Balance. People who are playing the game are engaging and so, we're gonna continue to remind them that, in the words of Megatron, "I still function."

That's good. And kinda just what you just said there, with scrimmages, you're adding team deathmatch and that's something people had obviously been really, really asking for. But, if you could go back a little bit and talk about why that wasn't included in the product to begin with?

That was part of my design mantra in regards the way the classes were designed. I didn't want to do the exact same stuff everybody else did. And the funny thing was making a character-based, class-based shooter where it has those ... Even though it's not as simple as a traditional arena shooter, it still, it kinda has a lot of that kinda feel underneath it all. In hindsight, I think it was a mistake to not ship with it. I was stubborn. And I'm like, "Oh, everybody's done TDM, you've done it." Even Blizzard's like, "Screw it, we need to put some TDM action in Overwatch," because fundamentally, at the end of the day, players just want to get in and shoot some stuff sometimes. They don't want to think about, "Okay, what am I carrying? This objective, am I selecting the right? I just want to hop in, shoot some friends or enemies for 20 minutes and have a good time."

And in hindsight, that's one of the other mistakes, you know, you asked about things that I felt were mistakes. Not having that from the get go, honestly. I mean, that's one of my things that I consider my strengths, is I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong. I think the people in the public eye would do them a great benefit to do that more often.

I have a reputation for being brash and loud and everything like that, but I'm the first person to admit when I'm wrong. And we certainly did make our share of mistakes with the game. In spite of the mistakes, we're going to continue to update and iterate and the reviews do not lie for me.

And one of the other elements going forward, too, that I was reading about was Boss Leagues mode. It seems like a more competitive level. We don't really know too much about this. Is there anything more you can say about boss leagues and what that mode is going to entail?

"Those of you who have been kind enough to drop 30 bucks on this. We got your back and we're sticking with it."

Yeah, it's basically kinda like ... Almost like a season zero for kinda testing kind of what our kind of season based game play would be and kind of dipping our toe into that water. And again, that's admitting things we should've shipped with. Shipping with an actual ranked mode instead of just one way would've, of course, made sense. The problem with what we were trying to pull off with this company and this title was shipping a quality product with a team of 65 people without ruining everybody's marriages. And so, certain concessions did have to be made from a production standpoint. And it's easy for me to sit there and go, "Oh man, we should've shipped with this, we should've shipped with that. You know, changed the date and everything like that."

In hindsight, it would've made sense. But, as you know, hindsight's always 20/20. And if I could go back in time, I would've figured out a way to re-change the schedule and ship with more of those things and maybe not even before the crazy holiday season. But, you've gotta work with what you've got now and telegraph it to everybody. And there's a reason why we did that kinda cool little graphic that's my Twitter header profile right now that kinda just graphically lays out, boom, boom, boom, stuff is coming, those of you who have been kind enough to drop 30 bucks on this. We got your back and we're sticking with it.

Before launch, you had the big news that switching from free-to-play to a premium product and I think now, some people have been suggesting or stating online, which doesn't necessarily carry any weight, but that the game could be looking to go back to a free to play model. Is that something that's on the table or no?

"I don't want to get into Candy Crush type-tactics 'cause I just won't be able to sleep at night and I don't sleep well to begin with."

Which just boggles me, my brain because my ... I've got a decent business sense. Especially when it comes to this industry. It's gotten me fairly far. And under the assumption that games are expensive, 60 dollars is a lot of money. Even 100 dollars for all the special editions that you see coming out. And I was of the belief that $29.99, it's a little bit over ... It's pretty much an impulse buy. And did it help? Did it hurt? Should it have gone free? Maybe. Would we consider experimenting with that in the future? I wouldn't remove it from the table. But, I just ... I don't want to get down into sleazy free to play, as much as I want to keep this game afloat and with our, like I said, our fledgling community, I don't want to get into Candy Crush type-tactics 'cause I just won't be able to sleep at night and I don't sleep well to begin with.

But yeah, I wouldn't rule it out in the future, especially if we consider rolling the game out ... Well, we're considering in the future, rolling the game out in Asia. It's one of those things that you almost have to do that in Asia, so we'll be considering doing that, maybe one of those things if we do it there, would it make sense to roll it back out to the states? Possibly. But, I don't want to start doing gun rentals any time soon in game.

Another thing that's gonna keep people coming back is new roles and you've released a silhouette teaser of this new character and confirmed that, I think it's a guy. So, is there anything else you can tell us about this new hero and why people should be excited about it?

He's very good at defense, I guess that's one thing that I want to say. And it's ... He's got ... His device that's, were jokingly called a thumper, that when placed by multiple players playing as that class can essentially turn the enemy team into almost like a human pinball machine, which provides for some highly amusing moments. Oh, by the way, in hindsight, this just reminded me, I ... Having class limitations is something we also, in hindsight, would've made sense to ship with so you don't have five Wraiths stacked on one team, which just, players are merciless with each other and they ruin somebody's experience and a person's like, "Well, these guys are being dicks. I'm just not gonna play anymore," which certainly didn't help the situation.

So, in the latest patch, we limit it to two per team, which we think is fair. We don't have the ridiculously large cast that games like Overwatch has. So, limiting it to one would not have made sense. We felt like two was kind of a good compromise, which we got that feedback and that idea directly from the community. So anyway, he's an interesting character. Trying to make sure the silhouettes keep getting more and more unique as we move forward 'cause that's one thing I think we could be better about as well. Again, in hindsight.

Whenever we introduce these new classes, they're probably gonna wind up overpowered in the build, but that's an old kind of technique, taking some moments to kind of try and get people to try the new hero and then, of course, massage your back and balance it once players get a sense of it.

Is there a ceiling that you might have in mind for how many characters you might want to have in the game at the end of the day?

You know, if we can fluff up our CCU and if we can keep people engaged, I would love for it to go on as long as humanly possible. I love what we built, we have playtests and I still come out sweaty and I still thoroughly enjoy myself. And this is our baby. This is three years of blood, sweat, and tears. And the news story of the CCU is not much right now and everything, it's ... You gotta maintain a positive attitude about it. But, one thing I'm happy about is, even anecdotally from my Twitter feed, it's no longer about Gears. As much as Gears will always be a part of me, it's nice to say, "Oh, went bowling the other night," and people aren't replying and saying, "Did you chainsaw the lanes?" They're talking to me just in general about everything I post and they occasionally talk ... They're having a dialogue about the game.

Which, for me, was one of my actual goals in starting the studio and the product. I'm not going to deny my legacy of what Gears was and I'll be happy to comment and give my opinion on any future things that come out of it. But, it's nice to be known from this generation for more than one thing.

And you had kinda touched on it earlier, too, though, and I was reading in a blog post about a revamped marketing campaign. Can you talk about what that might entail and why you wanted to change things up in that regard?

Here's the thing; I really like and enjoy the characters we shipped in the game because I wanted to go in the opposite of the kind of style that's really popular right now. And is it a little bit retro? Sure, it's a little bit '90s. Maybe it's that my love of the whole '90s Spawn archetype's coming through. Who knows if that's the case? But, the thing is, is we're not gonna beat some of those other games in regards to their crazy, 400 Pixar animators creating these amazing ... The five-minute shorts that make you care about a robot and a bird, right? So, it's like the direction that I've been working with with [community manager Rojan Rivas is to] double down on the verbs you do in the game and in particular, the guns. Let's put the characters in the background, but let's really double down on the sliding, the shooting, the stabbing, the sexiness of the manufacturers of the weapons.

And remind people that what I've been saying tirelessly in interviews is we're a shooter that then, also has characters and I feel that the marketing campaign should've represented that. I also think in hindsight, leading with the [Blink 182-like logo] probably wasn't the best move to do. The example I use is going to Comic Con this year and Game of Thrones was there, of course, everywhere. But, only now, after how many seasons, they're at the point where they can just do the font with GoT? When you look at Grand Theft Auto, only when they got to GTA four or whatever, they did the Roman numerals. Only now, could Gears just pop out the crimson omen. You have to ... Eventually, if you want to get to the point where people you're Nike swoosh, that's the point. But, leading with that ... You look at that logo and actually, I like it. It's on the back of my phone.

People love the hats. People have already got some tattoos of it. But, if you're a casual person who just sees that, you know that we're a cool ... Kinda gritty, class-based shooter. You just think you're gonna have a bad time, right? So that's, the other things ... Hindsight, once again, is 20/20, which could be the damn name of this interview.

So, the concept art for the new map Valhalla looks really, really gorgeous and it's unique, as you said, and it's the first asymmetric map that you have in the game and I was also reading that it's gonna have some environmental hazards and fresh ways to mix up the game play. So, I was just wondering if you could offer an overview of Valhalla and why you think you're ... Or, why you're so excited about it?

Well, one of the trips I want to take eventually is to go to the redwood forests. And it's kinda like almost like a high tech Ewok village. It's essentially kinda the training grounds for the Valkyries. And the idea is that certain sections of it have had to be deforested because some of the trees were dying and the way that they have to do that with these large trees and they have these giant kind of wood chippers that are there. And as the battle breaks out in this location, it just so happens that you may accidentally kicked into one by an enemy and kinda go full Fargo in this game. And for me, this is ... That's one of those just things that you can do in our game that you can't see in a lot of the other kind of hero-based shooters where we could mulch people.

It's just ... We aren't gonna make it completely disgusting. When it happens, you're gonna laugh kinda like the old school Unreal Tournament. And also, just for me, this is gonna be probably one of our most vertical maps yet because the stacked layers of kinda the high tech Ewok village and since the trees are mostly vertical and for me, it's a full circle moment because that was one of the very first images that just, I had concepted all those years ago, four years ago, when I was initially kinda conceiving the game. And it's one of those things that I'm excited to break out of kinda that cycle of techy doo doo. We have a lot of really great, fun maps, but some of them are just kinda ... It's a reactor. Fuck it.

And yeah, the map looks great and it's cool, but you want to really get that sense of atmosphere and location that if the crap hasn't hit the fan or the mulcher in Valhalla, hearing some birds tweet in the background or kinda having that kind of contrast of a beautiful nature environment with the over the top verticality and violence is what Law Breaker's kinda entails and it's a good map and yean, it's fun.

All of your DLC, the maps and everything is free and this is the case for a lot of multiplayer games these days, but it definitely was not always that way. So, I'm wondering if you could talk about just why it was important to have the DLC in that way be free?

Well, first off, separating the player base, especially when you have the fledgling one that I've said multiple times of course, through the course of the interview. But also, it's just that nickel and diming that happens with players. It's like, "If I sell as a player, it's like oh hey, you're at this even, this party at a bar. But, if you want to go in the other room where your other friends are, now you have to pay an extra cover charge. Oh, then there's another one with another cover charge," and it's like, I love how I always use restaurants and bar in my analogies. But, it's just, it's kind of an old school, flawed way of thinking. And for me, I if I get these kind of cosmetic crates, which I'm rewarded and encouraged to kinda stick around and play the game?

When there's DLC, I'm just like, "Yeah, okay, you just lost me now. You're just gonna split your servers and I have to just cough up more money for a game that I felt like should have had this in the box from the get go." So I think that's why the movement's shifted that way. I think there is a lot of gamer resentment, based on the old techniques that everybody used to use, throughout the industry, which is why we're here now. It just took a while to get here.

And another big topic these days is new consoles and the power inside them. And we know LawBreakers is gonna have enhancements, or already does, for PS4 Pro and obviously, Lawbreakers is not announced for Xbox, but I wonder if you could speak more generally to what the power of new machines can do for a game, specifically like LawBreakers.

I think it always goes back to Moore's Law, where the computing power doubling, and what you saw with this generation of consoles, is very, very quickly the power kind of really kicked in, hence the need for the new Xbox and the PlayStation Pro. And in regards to considering doing an Xbox version. I'd love to, but there's still other discussions that need to be had. And I think, you look at Xbox ... from my prior work, and I think they felt miffed and kind of rejected, that we chose PlayStation, but for us it was just a matter of install based for PlayStation at the time, and then considering we'd see for Xbox down the line.

Obviously there has been solid third-party support already from companies like 2K and EA, but is Nintendo Switch something you're ever thinking about, or you have ever thought about for LawBreakers?

We would probably consider the Xbox first, and then we're very much in wait and see mode right now. It is a fine console, the Switch. I am taking my wife to Japan on a trip tomorrow, and I'm finally going to take the time to sit down and continue digging in to Zelda, because the entire concept of it is just brilliant. Nintendo just really knocked it out of the park with this one. Would definitely love to have even more games on it. But I sit back and think about what kind of experience. If we were to do the Switch, would it be like a Rocket Arena, 1v1 with nearby people or something like that? I don't know. But if we were to do it, we'd want to switch the game up in a fun and interesting way, that would make itself work with the portability aspect of the console.

Rabbids is also wonderful too, if you're looking for something to do on Switch.

Is it? You mean Minions?

Yeah, basically. Basically.

Somebody at Minions is like, "Hey, those rabbits? Let's just do that."

I think it worked out for them. I think it did. And then, I saw some of your recent tweets about the realities of living and working in San Francisco as a game developer. I know this is very different. I know that you had talked about making North Carolina a game dev hub. So I was wondering how you think things are going in that regard, and would you ever consider running for a political office, to try to push that initiative forward?

That's a lot.

Sorry about that.

So the first thing is, I've been here since 1998. I'll talk about North Carolina first. And I have a shirt that says, "I used to be a Yankee, now I'm a Southerner." And the South is a fantastic place. It's not without its faults, but I'm doing everything I can to kind of help encourage the South to kind of be this new South, that's more known. Not just known for sweet tea and BBQ, but also technology, with my small crew of 65 folks. But also, I have gotten involved with local politics. I'm on a first-name basis with the Governor, that helps kind of get him elected with all the HB2 garbage that was going on. And to kind of steer this state right back in the, what I consider the better direction.

But the thing about San Francisco is it's a fantastic city. There's a great documentary I'd recommend watching on Netflix, called San Francisco 2.0, that kind of basically outlines the thing the drew the tech companies to San Francisco in the first place, is the very thing that they're driving out with the gentrification and all of the money in tech. Yeah, San Francisco is such a great town, with such an amazing Bohemian art scene and everything, and then here come the tech bros, then the rent goes up and all the awesome artists that made San Francisco what it is and was, are driven out. I saw that image a couple years ago, it was a public bus that had gotten in an accident with a Google bus and it was like the ultimate metaphor for the contradiction that that city has.

But if you're a game developer, especially if you have a family, the main thing that they consider often is, "Okay, well if things don't work out in one studio, there are a bunch in the area that I could potentially move over, without having to uproot my family and the kids have to go to a new school." Because I don't have kids, but the one thing I've learned the last few years of moving people to the state of North Carolina, it's basically they find the proper school that they want their children in and then they put a pin there, and then they put the radius out for what house they're gonna pick. And the school is the deciding factor for that. And San Francisco's expensive. It's ridiculous over there. But also, the West Coast has a very large concentration of game development, and for me, I always talk about North Carolina. You can buy a beautiful house for a quarter million dollars out here. And help bring North Carolina forward.

It's one thing I learned from my business partner in the restaurants is, find an emerging market and ride it up. Raleigh recently is, the shared working spaces are starting to explode out here. We finally have Barcades, restaurant wise. Putting the beer garden out here when there was none. And the beer garden's doing rather well. My buddy put a meatball shop down here, 'cause he saw there's a bunch of those doing well in New York. And make Raleigh happen and watch it change. And one of my favorite things to do is, if I have to do a temperature check with employees, on a nice day go outside, just go for a walk and see, "That old storefront has cardboard on it. I wonder what's going in there. Oh, it's going to be a new coffee shop." And to see our little Southern city grow, it's very much one of my favorite hobbies to do.

That's really nice. Another question, I'm sorry, this one goes back to Gears. What's your take on Gears of War 4 and the future of the series in Microsoft's hands?

Well, I have fans tweeting me occasionally, "Come back to Gears, the screwed it up." And it's like, if you love something that much and you love your memory of it, I don't know if anything can ever compete with what your memory is of it, right? And so I played through Gears 4 in co-op with my wife. I really enjoyed it. Would there be things I would have done differently? Of course. That's because I wasn't working on it.

I'm not going to delve too deep in to what Rod's going for in the [Gears of War] mythology, but there's a lot that he layered in there, in a very, very smart, tricky way. And I remember, we were always grappling with, "So, are we going to be in a civil war at the beginning and are we just gonna have a protagonist that's just going to be killing other people? Are we going to have the Nathan Drake problem, of he's charismatic and swagger, but he just murdered 4,000 people."

That's true.

That the internet was losing their brains over. It's a video game, but why did he shoot that guy? He shot at him first, he was defending himself. He just happens to be a mass murderer. But also, what they wound up doing was going with the robot that you're fighting in the first are killing people, which is a really smart and creative solution to that.

And I guess just the last one, I know we're running out of time here, but what kind of future would you say you see for LawBreakers, potentially as an Esport? Now that the game is out there, are you looking at this as a new path maybe to grow, for the growth and visibility of the game?

I believe that I made a very fun core shooter, that is very watchable and it has a lot of, the marketing term, the buzzer beater moments. I would love for it to potentially eventually happen, we just, we need the bodies. We need to keep fluffing up the CCU and then once we get to better numbers, do the things like that phase match that's going to be happening, I think it's tomorrow. Where you get the phase players playing the game in this kind of almost eSport like setting, because there's so many times in our lab, or when we've done events with influencers, that people don't see, where the energy in the room is amazing, where people are streaming and hooting and hollering and getting sweaty. And I've seen influencers get up from their computers, literally shaking after playing it.

And that's not coming across right now. So we need to do what we can to let people know that this is a really sweaty palm type of experience, that hopefully can lend itself to ESports, but I have to keep this game alive first and foremost. I could be very cocky and very brash on social media and realizing that the fledgling player base that are very humbling for me and I'm gonna continue to iterate on this game, continue to add to it. And try to be less of a dick, honestly.

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